Legacy 5

Chapter 4

Reunions

Ben To Li's self-heating ceramplast teapot shrieked its readiness like a class-three ion storm alarm klaxon, instantly jolting the senior healer's guest into adrenaline-saturated wakefulness.

"Good afternoon," the silver-haired Jedi master said, convivially pouring the aromatic brew into two wide-brimmed bowls.

Obi-Wan ran a hand through his sleep-mussed hair. "Stars' end, Master ."

Ben To clucked briskly, proffering a steaming serving to the younger man. "The very finest silpa from Chandrila. I've a Quondoor surgeon friend there – he occasionally sends a care package in exchange for my expertise as a consultant."

The tea was indeed superlative, subtle and rich, tannins mellowed by floral overtones and a lingering earthiness upon the tongue. "Shame on you. Accepting bribes."

"Payment," the healer curtly replied, rearranging the prodigious stack of holovolumes upon his broad desktop. "Don't pretend you are above such enticements yourself."

Obi-Wan idly levitated the topmost book into his own free hand. "I am immune to such base allurements," he claimed, airily. "You should know that." The warmth kindling in his belly momentarily drove away the clouds of anxiety over his comrades and master; it was possible to believe that the Force would produce a miracle, rectify all that was injurious and imbalanced, restore the tranquility of order to the microcosm of his inner circle, to the galaxy at large.

"Pshaw." A dubious snort. "Every man has his price. If I were to offer you access to the recently discovered missing volume of the Teth Dynastic Annals, for instance – "

"Missing volume?" the young Jedi perked up instantly, nearly spilling the dregs of his bowl . "Has Madame Nu accessioned a copy yet?"

Ben To guffawed heartily at his victim's expense. "There is no such thing!" he exclaimed. "But you were willing to all but publicly repudiate the Code in order to get your hands on it. Admit it!"

Obi-Wan's eyes narrowed. "I might have been carried away by enthusiasm," he grudgingly admitted. "But that doesn't count – it's been months since I've set foot in a decent library." His gaze dropped to the tome presently in his grasp. "…You're researching the midichlorians?"

Twirling his pointed beard between thumb and forefinger, the master healer leaned back in his creaking and generously upholstered chair. "The one commonality of your two impossibles." When this revelation produced nothing more than a quizzical frown, he waved a dismissive hand. "I'll explain later, when I'm certain I'm not spouting vacuous nonsense." The narrow holo-book flew out of the young Knight's hands into his own. "These theoretical natterings are of far less interest to you, I would wager, than certain other things."

A sober nod. "With your permission… or must I bribe the gatekeeper?"

Ben To's answering smile was beatifically mercenary. "Make yourself presentable, give me another look at you and a blood sample, and I shall meet your terms."

There was a time for aggressive negotiation, and a time for meek compliance – and Obi-Wan, at this point in his career, liked to think that he could not only recognize the latter situation on the rare occasion when it manifested itself, but that he could actually meet its demands. Thus, properly bathed – water shower, to ritually expunge Tatooine from his person - and groomed – fresh, brand-new whites from the quartermaster's supply, ones not bearing the traces of his encounter with the Sith – and dutifully worked over by the intrusively solicitous Ben To – because no price was too high for the privilege of seeing his comrades again – he followed the master healer to the ward's sequestered intensive unit, where he was grimly issued into a small chamber full of blipping monitors and the ominously hovering presence of an older-model med-droid, the sort that had no bedside manner whatsoever.

It didn't need to have one here; Qui-Gon Jinn lay unmoving, the shroud of death invisibly draped over his form, his skin ashen grey, his presence muted to a nullity. The machines clustered about him all proclaimed the absence of life, flat-lining, emitting continuous monotonic drones, mournfully blipping zero and nil. Their quiet, overlapping chorus could easily be the crackle of funeral flames, the sterile couch beneath the tall man's body a stone-hewn pyre slab.

The impulse to put his cowl up and retreat into the Force's anonymity was overwhelming, but he would have to wheedle a new cloak out of Master Pakkra later. For the moment, he was naked beneath the glare of the overhead illuminator.

"No change," Ben To observed, behind him.

Obi-Wan managed a curt nod.

"Which is good news, from a certain point of view," the healer continued. "My time has not yet run out."

But can you do anything? "Yes," he answered. In death – in the simalcrum of death – Qui-Gon appeared startlingly older. There were fine lines upon his skin that had been but the grooves of laughter before, the exuberant channels of his life-energy coursing across a wide plain; there were silver swaths in his long hair and beard, that had been wisdom's crown but now appeared as the scars of time, the hollow decanting of precious life. The Jedi master had not reached his sixtieth cycle yet, but here he appeared more aged than Master Yoda, a worn husk, all the vital fire dampened and stamped out, furled deep deep within, invisible.

Perhaps it wasn't there at all. Perhaps it could not …escape. This was neither life nor death – what if, somehow, luminous spirit was trapped, unable to return to the universal Force, caught forever in a tepid limbo between existence and nirvana? He shook his head, dispelling the awkward, rough-edged concepts., banishing the superstitious dread stirring in his gut.

Ben To's hand found his elbow and exerted a small pressure. "What the mind does not grasp, it seeks to explain by other means. Do not let your imagination run amok."

He forced a rueful smile. "Yes, Master."

"If it's any consolation, I do not understand, either – yet."

Which was no consolation at all. "Is there anything I can do?" he queried, though instinct told him it was a futile gesture, the helpless pleading of a mere bystander.

To his surprise, the healer thoughtfully stroked his beard. "If there is, I shall certainly importune you," he promised. "…But there is nothing you can do now. Come along."

Garen Muln was not in a sepulchral state of suspended animation.

He was merely confined to the narrow parameters of a hover-chair.

"Yeah," the disconsolate padawan grunted, in answer to his friend's hesitant inquiry. "It's permanent. People don't spontaneously regenerate spinal tissue, Obes. Trandoshans, maybe. But humans, no." A bitterness twisted the Force between them.

"Prosthetics-" Obi-Wan began.

"-are a heap of rancor chisszk where central nervous damage is concerned. I'm not doing a full spinal transplant." He shuddered. "No cyber-Gar, thanks."

Silence descended, an untimely frost nipping the buds of further discourse, settling icily between them. The young Knight shifted uneasily, a deep line stamped between his brows. "Garen, I …."

"You know what?" the invalid aggressively interrupted him. "Remember how we used to wonder about the Service Corps? Worry about not making the cut? About falling short of Knighthood?"

Obi-Wan's back stiffened. "Garen, you mustn't – "

"Don't tell me what I must and must not do, Kenobi!" Throttled resentment edged the injured man's next words. "Don't like what you see? Get used to it. Accept it. You're supposed to be the master of serenity and wisdom, remember? So set a fine example for the less exalted members of the Order, would you?"

The subject of this unprovoked abuse stood. "I am sorry if my presence causes you further pain. I shan't impose any longer."

Garen's hands clenched hard at the armrests of his hovering conveyance. Color suffused his pallid face, a splotch of angry red spreading over either cheekbone. He looked away. "Kriff it. Merbla'tzu, Obi, just….. go. Please." He wheeled the floating chair about, hiding his face and offering no additional words of parting.

"I'm sorry, Garen."

He left before the hard ache in his throat could betray him in a trembling syllable or hitched breath; in the corridor outside, Ben To waited with folded hands and deep-set eyes glimmering in subtle sympathy. "He will walk again," the healer assured his younger companion. "With much training. But to fight with the 'saber?..." A shrug of bony shoulders. "That would indeed be a feat. A marvel of the Force. He has refused neural transplants."

Obi-Wan scowled. "He is angry."

"Anger fuels recovery, sometimes."

"It is also a path to the Dark."

Ben To was unimpressed. "Then be you sure he doesn't wander from the path. You aren't going to abandon a friend simply because he's a convalescent, are you?"

"He told me to leave, Master. I do not think –"

One gnarled finger poked him hard in the chest. "Good. You do better when you curb that overactive mind of yours. Feel, don't think. "

"I – "

But the master healer was already brusquely hurrying down the hall on his next errand, leaving the young Knight to sort it out for himself.

"Blast it all to the hells," he muttered, releasing a long purgative breath.

"Further than that, my friend. Further than that," a familiar voice recommended.

Obi-Wan slewed round, heart leaping. "Feld!"

The Twi"Lek Knight was a haggard sight: one lekku was marred by a sinuous, still-healing scar, his halting gait a testament to recently mended internal injuries, the lackluster cast to his blue skin a sad contrast to his usual robust appearance. The indigo freckles on his shoulders and back peeped through where the sloppily fastened med-ward gown gaped open. But Feld's brilliant white smile was unsullied, a flash of purest defiant ebullience. "Much further than the hells." He limped his way down the corridor, one hand trailing the inset rail for support, and came to a halt arm's length from his friend. "Blast it straight through the Underworld, into the Sullustan Seventh Paradise, and right up the Thousand Blessed Ones' –"

"Feld!"

An impish chuckle. "You're a prude, Obi-Nobi."

"I am civilized."

Feld's mutilated lekku twitched in amusement. One blue hand touched the tender spot where sensitive skin was puckering into a thin white rivulet. "Like my new look? Rakish, eh? Maybe Zhoa will respect my authority now that I resemble a pirate. "

Obi-Wan gently clasped his comrade's shoulder. "How is your padawan?"

The tall Twi"Lek Knight sobered. "Better. Better, by slow degrees. She told me how you rescued her." He returned the half-embrace, one hand gripping hard at the other Knight's shoulder. "I am forever in your debt."

"Hardly." A rueful grimace. "I sent you into that ambush –"

"What? I can make my own mistakes and own them, too," Feld scoffed. "Keep your greedy mitts off." He winked slyly. "Besides, rumor has it you ticked off the Council enough without borrowing trouble, eh?"

Obi-Wan's mouth thinned to an aggrieved line. "Still grinding the gossip mill, Feld?"

"I have connections," the Twi'Lek quipped, leaning wearily against the wall. "…Zhoa has connections, I should say. They've found her a companion in my absence – senior padawan to keep her company, somebody to provide counsel."

His friend frowned. "From another padawan? That's rather unusual."

"Master Li's brilliant idea. Most his ideas are not so agreeable, though, eh? I've had it up to here with bacta," he confessed. "Makes my gorge rise. You aren't still in the rescue business, Obi-Nobi, are you …. I could use some liberation here, if you are in the mood."

The would-be hero snorted. "Sorry. I only rescue innocents."

" Heartless bastard," Feld hissed beneath his breath, just as Ben To Li appeared in a swirl of pale healers' robes, MD-41 hovering flusteredly on his heels.

"What in the blazes," the senior Jedi muttered. Then, "I should have known. You. Spruu. " A terse chopping gesture dismissed Feld into the nearest exam room, escorted by the droid. "And you: Kenobi. If you want more tea or wisdom, come back after hours; otherwise, scram. You're underfoot."

IN the end, he had no heart to leave. Garen's resentment, or fear, spilled like corrosive acid across his shields, tethering him to the spot with reflexive guilt; the empty quarters he shared with Qui-Gon Jinn would surely offer no true respite from anxiety; the Council's pleasure had suspended him from any pressing duty that might provide distraction. His reluctant steps therefore carried him out of Ben To's irritable path, but not far – the Halls of Healing boasted a small indoor garden at their very center, a hushed sanctuary for those seeking meditative quiet and recuperation.

Water played softly, counterpoint to the Force's chiming. He sank down, in a sequestered corner, seeking that deep and enduring center that had eluded him ever since Tatooine.

Measured breath in, careful release.

Again.

In . Out. In.

The Force coalesced, bending the diaspora of starstuff into flesh and bone, air and water into breath and blood, the ethereal scent of mandrangea blossoms borne upon an invisible wind. The warmth of another presence settled beside him upon the fragrant grotto's margins; a hand brushed against his sleeve – a flutterwing's touch, a searing brand.

He opened his eyes, in sudden recognition. Delight. Alarm. "…Siri."