TITLE: I Will Lead You
AUTHOR: Obi the Kid
RATING: G
CHARACTERS: Jaythen Talari, T'narr Kresson
SUMMARY: Pre-TPM time frame. T'narr has doubts about training Jaythen during their first week together. T'narr POV.
NOTE: This story will make more sense if you've read my other stories that star T'narr and Jaythen.
DISCLAIMER: The characters and venue of Star Wars are copyrighted to Lucas Films Limited. I make no profit from the writing or distribution of this story.
I've been unsure about this whole master-apprentice deal. For years I never wanted anything
to do with it and now, ironically enough, there's an eight year old child under my care that I am completely and wholly responsible for. I can't help wonder if this how a parent feels raising a first born. Nervous. Uncertain. Worried that they'll screw things up so royally and scar the child for life.
Although sheltered by my outside façade of calm and cool, inside, those other feelings are me. I find myself constantly questioning my decision to train him and this only a week into our pairing.
I don't question Jaythen's ability to be a Jedi. I don't question his obedience or want to learn.
I do question my ability to lead him into those things. To guide him to what he will one day become.
These are new feelings for me - feelings of doubt.
All my life, as an initiate, then training under Kaai, and then as a solo Knight, I rarely doubted what I could accomplish. I never overestimated myself, but I was confident in my abilities.
Then along comes a boy that shatters all of that and makes me feel a bundle of nervous energy.
No doubt that part of it is the excitement at the challenge. But there's also no doubt that the bigger part of this, is worry.
Can I do this? Can I lead this boy into a future that's never definite? Death and destruction; pain and hurt; tiresome journeys into endless missions. How can I ask of an eight year old child, what so many others would never ask of themselves?
Our lives - always in danger. Our days - filled with the unknown and even hatred.
Who in their right mind takes a boy into that uncertainty?
But, it's a week in and we're bonding. Jaythen is a good learner. He tries hard. He listens always. With those piercing green eyes, he watches me with such commitment. I know we will be a good team.
As I lead him though into his life's journey though, I can't help the nerves. Never have I attended one so dependent on me for so many things. The only future I've ever had a hand in shaping was my own. And even then, I had a huge wake to follow with Kaai around. I don't know if I can be to my apprentice what Kaai was to me.
And Master Kaai was everything.
Even now, Jaythen watches me. Almost as if he can see right through me and read my thoughts. I've been quiet too long. He's a boy full of questions, but he observed my need for a brief period of silence. Already he knows my ways and my needs.
Can I return the same to him? Can I provide for him a teacher that is everything that Kaai was to me?
Honest. Protective. Caring.
Can I lead him as I was led?
Can I trust myself to allow him to grow at his own pace? Can I trust myself to allow him to hurt when he needs to? Can I trust myself to allow him to teach me when I fail to see the truth in front of me?
Can I, a hesitant and newly turned Jedi Master look past my own doubts and offer Jaythen,
a wary and newly turned Jedi Apprentice, the one thing that he craves so badly? Can I offer him that strength and stability, comfort and support that he so desperately needs?
He smiles at me now, shy and warm. He trusts me and he hardly knows me.
Or…
Perhaps…perhaps he knows me more than I think. Perhaps he is shaping me as I battle to shape myself.
Returning his smile, he holds his data-pad out to me.
"Master T'narr, can you help me with these studies?"
He doesn't really need help with his studies. Jaythen is a quick as they come in almost every subject.
No, this is his way of pulling me away from my warring thoughts.
As I said, it's as though he can read what I feel and what I think. It's quite uncanny for one so young.
It's also his way of bringing us closer together during these difficult and confusing first days.
Already he is leading me.
I brought myself to the couch and sat next to him, moving the data-pad so it straddled the small space between our knees. Staring at the screen, I stifled a silent chuckle at where I was.
I, Master T'narr Kresson, the one who vowed never to take on the training of an apprentice as long as he remained a Jedi, was now sitting here beside a boy of eight, leading him and training him and supporting him like my master did with me so many years ago.
Our future is indeed ever changing and you certainly never know what tomorrow holds.
Certainly, I can't change that quickly, not completely overnight - so my doubts will remain…for now.
In time though, those doubts will ease.
I won't so much lead Jaythen as we will lead each other.
The end.