ETIAM SANATO VULNERE CICATRIX MANET

"even when the wound is healed, the scar remains"

cicatrix manet

An Obi-Wan on Tatooine Story

Heat purifies.

Obi-Wan pondered this truth for a moment as he pressed the side of his thumb along one cheekbone, smearing away a trickle of sweat. Whatever wounds his spirit and body had borne upon his arrival here, they had been cauterized by the relentless sun. He took a measure of comfort in that.

An indulgence, these thoughts. With a slight shake of his head, he turned back to his home's dusky interior and focused once more on his visitor. She was gathering her robes about her, preparing to leave.

"You know how much I appreciate your visits," he said simply. "It means a great deal to me to know how the child is faring."

She nodded, her mouth settling into a firm line. "Yes, but it can't continue for much longer. Owen wishes to cut off all contact. I know that's hard for you, but . . . well, it's for the baby's sake."

Obi-Wan felt a tiny smile tighten his lips. "This is all for the baby's sake. Everything we do."

"Yes. And he's a sweet child. With such a father. . ."

"I don't wish to discuss Anakin today." Obi-Wan's gaze sharpened, although his voice remained even.

A faint frown crumpled the skin of her brow. "You never wish to discuss Anakin, Obi-"

"'Ben'," he interrupted softly. "Please. 'Ben'."

She blew out a breath, her plain, strong face reflecting her frustration. "It doesn't matter if I call you 'Ben', or 'Obi-Wan', or . . . or 'Bail Organa', for that matter! No one's going to hear us way out here!"

"Perhaps not. But some names have loud echoes. And some names must be left in the past. With those who live there."

The irritation left her eyes, and something very like compassion softened her face for a moment. "You're not thinking of Anakin when you say that."

"No."

She waited, but he did not continue. After an empty silence, she lifted her hood over her face, its deep shadow obscuring her expression. Softly she said, "I must go. I'll try to come again in a month or two."

"Thank you." Obi-Wan paused, and then, as he always did, he asked, "Will you bring the little one with you next time? I'd like very much to see him."

And, like every other time, Beru held herself utterly still for an instant and then answered, "No. I don't think that would be wise."

She turned toward the doorway, and then pivoted back, robes whirling, eyes flashing sudden anger from beneath the deep hood. "Why, why do you keep asking that? Why would you wish it? Why do you seek to forge a relationship with the child when it can go nowhere? He's a tiny baby now, but very, very soon he'll be old enough to *know*, old enough to remember, and then all contact with you must cease. You know this! Why do you seek to tear new wounds into a heart already so scarred?"

Obi-Wan spread his hands, searching his spirit for an answer that could be contained in words, and finding none.

She turned away. Voice muffled, she said, "Don't ask it of me again."

Brilliant sunlight engulfed her as she hurried out the door. Obi-Wan stood, head bent.

A scarred heart? He slowly exhaled the breath he'd been holding, and shook his head. No, she was wrong. Scars were left when a wound was healed, and the wounds that Anakin had wrought in Obi-Wan were fresh and raw, still bleeding. No scar tissue.

But then he stopped, and considered his heart, and knew that what Beru had said was true, after all. His heart *was* marked, with an old scar that had changed him completely. A scar left by the double-bladed lightsaber of a tattooed Sith.

He lifted his head, eyes trained on something distantly removed, and then his gaze fell upon a small bundle lying beside the chair where Beru had sat. Her macrobinoculars, a necessary tool if one wished to avoid aggressive sandpeople.

He scooped them up and strode to the door, flipping his own hood forward to shield his eyes from the burning sun. A quick scan of the horizon showed him the faint dust trail of Beru's landspeeder as it ducked into a nearby canyon. As he stood there, bundle in hand, a breeze swept up the cliff upon which his home was perched. Unexpectedly cool, it swirled around him, lifting his hood from his head, curling itself around his shoulders. He could almost hear a deep, warm voice in it: "Come, Obi-Wan. Walk with me."

A smile lightened his eyes, though his face was solemn as he murmured, "Yes, Master."

He walked, the breeze dancing around his ankles and tugging at his sleeves, along the cliff's edge. He wondered what his master would have said about scarred hearts, but then he smiled, because he already knew the answer: Live in the moment, Obi-Wan. The past is past. Let the present heal you.

The present. . .Obi-Wan sighed. He felt as if he very rarely lived in the present; his gaze was so often on the future now, as embodied in a baby boy. Perhaps he would do well to submit himself once more to his master's wisdom, and keep his focus on the here and now. . .

His meditation was abruptly interrupted by a keening sigh, full of breath and pain. Startled, he stopped, closing his eyes to center on the cry's source. It came again, almost beneath his feet. He dropped to his knees and carefully peered over the cliff's edge, into a chasm of golden light.

There, clinging desperately to a heat-seared kana bush, was a small, spiny mammal. A _mundi_, the analytical part of his mind identified it. It was a young one, and Obi-Wan could clearly see that one of its legs bent at a wholly unnatural angle. It clung to the bush with its forepaws and one uninjured back leg, and, when it saw Obi-Wan staring down at it, pulled its lips back into an unconvincing snarl.

Obi-Wan lifted one hand to stroke his beard, thoughtfully, and then stretched it out, manipulating the Force with consummate skill. He wrapped the little creature in its energy, tugging gently until, with a panicked squeal, it released its death grip on the bush. Carefully, he lifted it to the clifftop, and laid it on the ground at his knees.

At once, it leapt up, and promptly collapsed again, its broken leg providing no support. He saw now that its spiky hide was gashed raggedly in several places: obviously, tumbling off the cliff had saved it from being devoured by a much larger predator. He reached out toward it, but it scuffled backward, pushing with its forelegs, and snarled again, more authoritatively. Obi-Wan pulled his hand back. Satisfied, the _mundi_ struggled to its three good legs, and began to drag itself away, with many suspicious, darting glances back at its rescuer.

Here we have it, Obi-Wan thought. The proverbial pathetic lifeform.

A shadow darkened his face as he watched its painful progress. It would surely be pounced upon by the first predator that sensed it, and despite a doughty attitude, it stood no chance of surviving such an encounter. But, what could he do? It would not allow itself to be picked up, and, well, nature's way was hard. . .

But he felt the breeze return with shocking suddenness, and a warm pressure on the back of his shoulder, as if a large hand were gently pushing him forward. Squeezing his eyes closed for a moment, he said aloud, "All right, but this is much more your sort of activity than mine."

His master's voice echoed through his memory in response: "The Living Force makes even the smallest creature worthy of our concern."

With infinite caution, he approached the _mundi_, which had managed to pull itself several meters away and had paused to rest, tiny blue tongue protruding from a needle-toothed mouth as it panted. When Obi-Wan approached, it fluffed its spikes belligerently and emitted a virulent hiss.

"Friendly, aren't you?" Obi-Wan murmured, squatting just out of reach and regarding it sourly. The breeze caressed his cheek. Slowly, he shrugged out of his cloak, and then, with inhuman speed, lunged forward and enveloped the little creature in its voluminous folds. An infuriated screech revealed only too clearly his captive's state of mind, but Obi-Wan could hear the pain and fear beneath the anger.

"Quiet now," he said, pitching his voice low, aiming for a certain deep and comforting inflection. "Let me help you."

After many long hot minutes, the creature ceased its struggles, and lay, limp within the folds, high-pitched little gasps punctuating its breaths. Obi-Wan spread his hands over the lump that was the creature's body, closing his eyes and letting everything around fade as he gathered the Force, guiding it into the _mundi's_ sinews and bones. The rasping breath quieted, and it lay easy beneath his touch.

He was smiling when he opened his eyes. Carefully, he gathered the bundle of robe, creature, and Beru's binocs into his arms, and turned back toward his home.

I'll keep it with me for a few days, he thought. Just to see it through this completely.

The sandy walls of his house reappeared, and, as he rounded a corner, he was surprised to see Beru's landspeeder parked there in front. His grip tightened on the binocs; she must have noticed their absence and returned for them.

His pace quickened toward the door, and he drawing breath to call Beru's name, when the _mundi_, sensing his shift in attention with the instinct of all prey animals, wiggled out of the robe's folds with a sinuous heave, and launched itself upward. He jerked back, and his Jedi reflexes saved him from a lacerated face, but the creature's knife-edged teeth took a sharp nip out of his right earlobe as it flung itself over his shoulder and away.

Obi-Wan braced himself on the wall with one hand, bringing the other to his ear, and pulling it away slicked red with blood. The _mundi_ had scurried several meters away, and crouched staring at him with an expression of purest loathing in its beady eyes. For a moment, creature and Jedi regarded one another, one bemused, the other fiercely malevolent.

And then Obi-Wan began to laugh. He laughed so hard that he had to lean forward, hands on knees. Scarlet blood dripped into the pale sand at his feet. The _mundi_ swiveled its head back and forth, and hissed.

"Why in the all the worlds were you carrying a _mundi_?" It was Beru, standing in the doorway, eyes incredulous.

Grinning up at her, Obi-Wan answered. "I am a great Force-wielding Jedi, helping a defenseless creature."

She raised one eyebrow. "Oh, really? It doesn't seem very grateful."

They both looked over at the _mundi_, which responded by cocking its head sideways and baring all its teeth. Another gale of laughter shook Obi-Wan.

Beru tapped her forefinger against her teeth, studying him. Finally, she said, "Can your scarred heart really feel joy, then?"

Obi-Wan straightened, eyes still alight with humor. "Beru, a scar is a wound that's healed. It's a talisman of memory, not of pain. I'm glad to have the scar, if the memory continues with it."

"Still not talking about Anakin when you sat that, are you?"

"No. But, in time, I will."

She smiled. "Well, if a scar is a talisman, you're probably going to have one as a token of today's business."

Obi-Wan put his hand to his ear, ruefully. "Perhaps." But I was living in the moment, Master. I was honoring the Living Force. And I rescued a *most* pathetic lifeform.

He stooped, picking up Beru's binocs from where he'd dropped them, and handed them to her with a courtly bow. She tucked them into her robes, and then stood regarding him for a moment. Abruptly, she said, "I think I've been too concerned about the state of your heart, General. The next time I come, I will bring the child to visit you. But just this one time, understand?"

Obi-Wan allowed gratitude to broaden his smile. "Of course. Thank you."

As he watched her speeder maneuver back toward the canyon, the breeze returned, tapping lightly on his shoulder. Obi-Wan stretched out one hand into it.

A cool breeze in a blazing desert, its edges were tinged, ever so slightly, with a brilliant green light.

FINIS

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