FATHERLESS
by ardavenport
- - - - - PART 1
When his Master, Qui-Gon Jinn came very early to his room, waking him, to tell him that his father had died, Obi-Wan Kenobi felt nothing.
He recognized that it was a sad event, but it was only his biological father who had died on his home world, Stewjon. The Kenobi family had done little to stay in contact since their oldest child was given to the Jedi Temple to be trained, beyond a few obligatory visits when he was a small youngling. He was almost eighteen standard years old now.
Nor was his death a surprise. The family had sent a message to the Temple that Zuroyo Kenobi was ill and Obi-Wan had been immediately tested for genetic markers of his degenerative nerve condition, but he had not inherited it, nor had it manifested among the rest of the family before.
Now Obi-Wan's father had died and the family's notification included an invitation to attend the memorial. He had glumly stared at the glowing yellow text on the small data screen Qui-Gon showed him. He hoped his duties would prevent him from attending. But they did not. Then Qui-Gon asked if he could accompany him. Shocked, he had not even considered the possibility that he might go alone. He hastily accepted Qui-Gon's offer.
Now, sitting on a second row bench of the family section of the audience at his biological father's memorial, Obi-Wan peered under the hood of his brown robe at the people next to him while Tima Kenobi-Kuch, standing at the speaker's podium amidst stands of white and pale purple flowers, sang a tribute to her now dead brother. Birds called out as they flew by in a cloudless blue sky. The nearby surf partially drowned out the singing.
Everyone had been polite but formal when he had arrived. They did not know each other. He had been prepared for that. But he had not expected to find himself amidst a crowd of people who all looked like him. Versions of him with lighter hair or darker skin. Older, fatter versions of him. Youngling versions of him. Female versions of him. There were fewer than twenty extended family members. Aunts, uncles, cousins, siblings, but they all bore the same strong resemblance. Obi-Wan could tell by sight alone which ones were members of the Kenobi clan by birth and which by marriage or alliance.
He caught his sister peeking back at him before hastily turning back to the front. Obi-Wan's eyes went to the benches where the friends of the family sat, the top of the dark brown hood of Qui-Gon's robe visible over the heads of most of the others.
Tima Kenobi-Kuch finished her song and Zuroyo Kenobi's father took her place at the podium flanked by the floral displays. Paunchy, bearded and white-haired, Cham-Obi Kenobi moved a little slowly and leaned on the podium for support as he spoke. Obi-Wan hoped he would not look like his biological grandfather when he got old.
Three women and a man in white robes called out a farewell to the winds and rang bells. The memorial was over. Obi-Wan sighed and got up with the others. Everyone shuffled away from the benches, led by the foursome in white to the life-celebration area ringed by the local giant grasses waving in the hot, humid sea breeze, scented by the tall displays of white and pastel flowers.
Deliberately walking slowly to let his Master catch up with him, Obi-Wan heard Zuroyo Kenobi's family murmuring their approval of the ritual. More than one person had spoken of 'relief' in their eulogy. His biological father's last half-year had been difficult.
"Ohhh. . . . . "
A short, stout woman in the group had also fallen back and she suddenly grabbed him in a hug. He barely managed to pat her sides in return. She pulled back with a kind and teary smile and touched his face.
"Thank-you for coming. I know we've been very bad about sending any coms. We always said that you must be very busy, but . . . . really we were always the ones who were too busy. But I can see you have a good life." She hugged him again, not so tightly this time. More formally, like she had when he first arrived.
His own eyes teared up as he watched her go, rejoining her family. His biological mother. . . .
He had felt nothing. . . . .
Obi-Wan tugged his hood further forward to hide his face and folded his arms before him. His Master's tall dark robe appeared beside him. The other mourners stayed away from them. Some members of the Kenobi and Tushka families resumed curiously looking at them from the refreshment tables.
His control fleeing him, Obi-Wan clutched for the one thing he thought he could do, keeping his head down and not making any noise. He didn't know these people, so how could he be so stricken now?
He felt Qui-Gon's hand firmly grasping his arm and guiding him away from the gathering through an opening in the green stalks of grass towering over their heads. Of course his Master could sense his feelings. Shame tightened his throat. He couldn't speak.
They stopped at a low cliff overlooking a blue-green sea, gentle waves splashing on a green and dark purple mossy shore.
Hand on his shoulder, Qui-Gon turned him to face him. Obi-Wan held his head up, determined not to look down. Qui-Gon lifted his hood up and back off his head and he looked up to his Master.
Tears trailed down Qui-Gon's cheeks.
"Suppressing your feelings is not control, Obi-Wan."
Obi-Wan pressed his lips together hard, still unwilling to let any sob out. But he had to. They came with every breath of air he gasped in. Qui-Gon laid his hand on his arms and stood close, lowering his forehead to touch his. Obi-Wan squeezed his eyes shut.
"I don't know them. I don't know them. . . . ."
The reason why he should not feel anything at all suddenly transformed into his own personal tragedy. He did not know them. And that seemed horribly cruel. Zuroyo Kenobi had only been his biological father. But he had still been somebody's father. And any opportunity to offer even token compassion when he was sick and most in need had slipped away from him unnoticed. He had failed somehow in his minimal obligation as a biological son to offer even a small act of kindness when it would have mattered. When his father was still alive.
Now it could never happen.
Qui-Gon remained motionless, his large hands firmly gripping his upper arms, thumbs curling over his shoulders. Comfortably neutral, he could cry out his regrets to his Master with no shame.
And to the Force.
He could feel it. One life gone, but still reflected in the family gathering beyond the screen of tall grass, part of the changes of life itself, like water returning to a warm sea.
The waves continued washing in and out on the mossy shore below until he finally seemed to run out of sadness and regret. It was still there, but spent, the pain of it bled out of him. He wiped his nose on his inner sleeve. His sniffles came out as obnoxious snorts and snuffles and he cringed.
"We should go back to the party."
"If you wish." Qui-Gon folded his arms before him, his expression neutral. But Obi-Wan still felt like something more was expected of him.
"My father is dead." His own words sounded dead to Obi-Wan as well, but he had run out of grief.
"Mine as well."
Obi-Wan could read nothing from his Master's reply. He had never thought about Qui-Gon having a father. Master's didn't need fathers. He looked toward the sounds of people. He knew that when he and Qui-Gon left that he would never see them again. He probably would never have reason to return to this world.
"It feels strange." Obi-Wan did not know why. He had seen death before, but this felt intangibly different.
"Death is a very permanent passing," Qui-Gon sighed. "Many possibilities that you were never aware of before are suddenly gone. You feel incomplete."
Obi-Wan watched his Master's dark blue eyes gazing skyward and wondered what memories lay behind the loss he heard in his tone. Then Qui-Gon seemed to notice him watching and he quirked a smile down at him. "But there are always new possibilities to take their place."
Obi-Wan nodded. New possibilities . . . . But they would not include the crowd of Kenobis nearby. He replaced the hood of his robe, exhaled and pushed past the giant grass blades. But just before he passed through the greenery, he felt a sharp tug at the back of his hood that pulled it back off his head. Quickly turning his head back, he saw his Master, his head also uncovered, smirking at him.
They joined the others at the refreshment tables. Some family members fell back with furtive glances toward their Jedi relative, but most seemed to accept him now. Zuroyo Kenobi's daughter, Wia-Naki, an older youngling with dark brown hair, offered him a small finger-cake and a smile. She had been born years after he'd had any contact with the family, so her status as his 'sister' was as impersonal as a title to him.
She shyly asked him about Coruscant. She had never been off-world. And her fingers were sticky. After eating the cake, a one-bite treat, Obi-Wan's fingers were sticky, too. As he told her about the Temple and the Republic's central city-world, he surveyed the refreshments.
Everything was sweet. Little cookies with white flower-shaped dabs of fluff-sugar on top. Multi-colored cakes. Blue sucking candies. Red crunching candies. Bright yellow and pink stretchy candies. A circle of pale cake cubes ringed a fountain of deep maroon syrup. Candied nuts. Fizzy drinks. delicate confections spun into green and purple loops. Platters of tiny pastries. The humid air felt even thicker with the clinging scents of so many sugars. He saw his Master test a pink berry, but he did not take another. Obi-Wan quickly dipped his fingers into one of the many cleansing finger bowls on the table.
The family and friends seemed to appreciate the excess of desserts, especially the smaller younglings darting under and around the table, their faces smudged with maroon syrup, but Obi-Wan had no appetite for it. When Wia-Naki tried to offer him a curling orange candy he diverted her attention by asking her about where she lived. Some of the adults, who had conspicuously been lingering near them listening to what he said about Coruscant, wandered off. Then Wia-Naki got tagged by a younger cousin and with a hurried 'excuse me' she rushed off to chase him.
Sighing, Obi-Wan wandered off away from the refreshments. The adults seemed to be shy of approaching him with anything other than bland condolences.
Qui-Gon stood at the sidelines of the group with Zuroyo Kenobi's nephew, Zeri Kenobi, a taller, blonder member of the clan in a faded blue suit. A few people had addressed him as 'Sheriff', but Obi-Wan did not know what the title was affiliated with. But both Jedi noted that he was armed when they were introduced, though Obi-Wan doubted that many of the mourners had noted the small blaster under his jacket.
" . . . . if the Minister wishes to make a special request they can submit it to the Jedi Temple through Senator Akazu's office."
Zeri Kenobi visibly squirmed, obviously unhappy with Qui-Gon's answer to some request he must have made.
"The Minister's secretary didn't give me any details, Master Qui-Gon. But I can guarantee you that they wouldn't have asked you to help them if it wasn't important."
Qui-Gon folded his arms before him. "Then I doubt that I can help you or them, Sheriff, without knowing more."
"Wait, wait." He held up a placating hand. "Just let me com them and they can tell you what they need." Sheriff Kenobi backed up to the edge of the tall grasses, his other hand pulling out a holocom from his pocket. He clicked it on and spoke softly, his back to them.
"Master, what did he want?"
Qui-Gon shrugged. "I do not know. Nor do I think, does he."
A moment later Sheriff Kenobi looked over his shoulder and made a 'come here' gesture, his eyes suspiciously scanning the other people at the gathering, but no one else was near. A few of them seemed to have left already. The Jedi joined him.
Sheriff Kenobi presented them with a small holo-projector, holding it so its image was concealed from the others in the area by Qui-Gon's body. The tiny transparent, bluish holo-figure, a middle-aged male Humanoid with thinning hair and wearing a crisp suit with square shoulders, curtly bowed. The Sheriff opened his mouth to introduce them, but the holo-figure cut him off.
"Master Jedi, I am Secretary Thayat Toibi, the prime assistant to Sub-Minister Lallot. I apologize for intruding upon your personal time on our world, but we require your assistance for a very . . . . delicate problem."
Qui-Gon was unimpressed with the man's title and vagueness.
"I am sorry, but as I told Sheriff Kenobi here, without more information about your problem, I cannot help you. Perhaps if you - - -"
Toibi cut him off.
"One of our leading citizens has apparently accidentally killed himself with an illegal lightsaber. I was hoping that you could come assist us with the investigation. Quickly and with as little public discourse as possible."
Qui-Gon's raised his brows. He unfolded his arms.
"We will require transport, of course, to your location."
"Sheriff Kenobi can take you in his flyer. I am sending the coordinates. Thank-you. We will be expecting you." The holo-image vanished.
Sheriff Kenobi flipped his holocom over, checking a small screen on back and rubbed a thumb over glowing control indicators.
"Got it," he told them with a hint of a smile. Qui-Gon nodded in return.
"Then we should proceed, immediately."
However, 'immediately' to Sheriff Kenobi still included a detour back toward the funeral gathering to tell his wife that he had to leave. And that he didn't know when he would return. And to give oblique non-answers to other members of the family about his 'official business' with their Jedi guests. Obi-Wan saw his Master impatiently sigh while this went on. Most of the people nearby craned their necks to look their way and then turned away as soon that they saw that he was looking back. Eyes and faces so similar to his own burning with curiosity about what was going on now with their strange relation.
Finally, the Sheriff finished and he led them down the pathway away from the gathering. Qui-Gon silently folded his arms, but Obi-Wan could tell that his Master was annoyed by the delay. They cleared the tall grasses and descended down a hill of low ferns and wild flowers. The hill was high enough to see the grays and pale pastels of the low buildings of the coastal city, Daealisho, filling the horizon beyond the nature preserve.
In a low, flat area was the cluster of park vehicles that nearly all the attendees had been required to use, leaving their own personal vehicles behind at a transport garage back at the city. Except for one police flyer, white with purple stripes marking the wings angled downward and the rear steering tail.
Sheriff Kenobi climbed into the pilot's seat on the right and after a gesture from his Master Obi-Wan took the front seat on the left while Qui-Gon squeezed himself into the rear space in the middle. The engine hummed; lights flashed from the wings, under and behind them, alternating white and purple. The flyer rose in the air and then took off over the parklands.
"Uh, those coordinates are in the next hemisphere by the capital city," Kenobi told them in a friendly tone as he steered the craft over the city and inland, a vast green plain before them.
"Your best speed should suffice for the Minister," Qui-Gon answered in an utterly neutral tone.
Now Obi-Wan was annoyed. In his years as Qui-Gon's apprentice he had seen his Master befriend any number of vagrants and space drifters on the pretext that they might be useful to their mission. Most of the time, they actually were; the Force guided Qui-Gon interactions with them. But not this time. Qui-Gon was just snubbing Zeri Kenobi because he was annoyed with him or the request for their assistance with a lightsaber accident or both.
"So, how long have you been Sheriff?"
Zeri looked startled that Obi-Wan had even spoken. "Oh, about four local years. About three standard." He cautiously divided his attention between the controls and his passengers. Obi-Wan noticed that his eyes were blue-gray, exactly the same as his own. His biological cousin, they were quite similar, though the other man was a little taller, older, his short hair a yellow-blond color.
"So, how'd you like the service?" Zeri asked.
- - - - - END PART 1 - - - - -