Sun Kissed

Chapter 20

Beta: Estora

"I can't believe you got yourself suspended on your second day, Anakin!"

Anakin huffed and rolled his eyes. Of course Obi-Wan would have a meltdown over it. It was kind of adorable though, Obi-Wan flustering himself over it. Not that Anakin would ever say it out loud - it might make him more irritable. He could already hear Obi-Wan's voice in his head; My perfectly justified annoyance is not adorable, Anakin, nor is it cute. It is entirely inappropriate to have these feelings when I'm scolding you. Pay attention to my lectures!

Anakin fought the urge to smirk. It wouldn't do to smile in the middle of a lecture. And okay, so he was suspended. But it was for an entirely noble reason. He didn't regret it. The son of a bitch had it coming. And really, would Obi-Wan just stop it already? The aghast lecture was cute at first, but it was starting to grate as he was told that he should have just 'let it go'.

"He was talking shit about you," Anakin interrupted.

"They always 'talk shit' about me," Obi-Wan grimaced, spitting out the phrase. "I know what they say."

"That doesn't make it right!"

"Just ignore it."

Ignore it? Anakin's mind raced. Ignore people who are so kriffing ignorant of who you are? Who think there's something wrong with you because you prefer to keep to yourself? You know what they say about you and you don't care? I care, Obi-Wan. I care a damn lot that some dipshit thought the best way to hit on me was to insult you.

"They don't know you."

"I don't want them to know me."

"Why not? There's nothing wrong with you," Anakin protested. "If anyone could understand the way you've felt about the Jedi all these years, it's them."

"Anakin..."

He barrelled on. "If they knew who you were, they wouldn't be making all this bantha poodoo up to make up for the mystery of 'Ben Kenobi'."

"There is no mystery," Obi-Wan said bitterly. "He's a miserable old hermit who lives alone by the sea, no more to the story."

"You're not miserable. And you don't actually live alone, anymore, by the way. You know you're never getting rid of me, right? You're stuck with me."

"I don't want-"

"They've been through it too you know, they would understa-"

"Stars' end, Anakin! By that logic, the only person who could understand you is another slave." Immediately Obi-Wan broke himself off and swallowed.

"Well, you are a slave!" Anakin's eyes flashed, angrily. "To yourself and to your past."

Silence fell between them. Anakin could already see the regret for Obi-Wan's words sitting in his throat as his stiff posture deflated rapidly, shoulders hunching in on himself, eyes pained and sad. Anakin's gut twisted, his own anger completely gone as he watched the fury drain from Obi-Wan to be replaced once again with that quiet self-loathing Anakin had come to hate.

"I'm sorry," said Anakin.

"Don't be. You're right, you know."

"I shouldn't have said it."

Obi-Wan shrugged. "I started it."

"Please don't do that."

"What?"

"Just- you always just shrug everything off, or make it your own fault. Trying to act as though none of it matters to you, when it actually does matter."

"If you can shrug it off, it can't hurt you."

"Even though it does?"

Obi-Wan pinched the bridge of his nose. "What do you want?"

"The truth."

Obi-Wan sighed and ran his hands through his hair, then turned and wandered into the kitchen. Anakin followed, and they both took a seat at the island counter. Many of their talks happened in the kitchen, most of their important ones. It's where they kept coming together.

"I've told you about the Jedi, about how I preferred to keep to myself when I came here," Obi-Wan finally said. "I've been here for almost thirty years, Anakin. In that time, a lot of half-truths get spread around. Particularly with newcomers, or older adults wanting to scare the younglings. I just happen to be the target of a very bored group of people. They've never said any of it to my face, but I'm not deaf. And when it's behind my back, they don't lower their voices quite enough. Sometimes they don't even try. They know I'm going to ignore it anyway."

Anakin scowled. "Well, I'm not."

"Anakin…" Obi-Wan sighed again.

"They don't get to treat you like that. That's a shitty thing to do to a person and I'm not going to stand for it. They want to say it behind your back, then I'll make sure all of them know that they'll have me in their faces when they do."

He had always been ruled by his heart, and always would be. The self-loathing was leaving Obi-Wan's eyes, letting in room for that little glimmer, that light that had started sparking in them more and more when he looked at Anakin. It was a light Anakin craved, a look that he coveted more than any other.

"You mean a lot to me," Anakin kept going. "You've helped me so much. I've overcome things with you by my side that I don't know if I would have ever made it through by myself. You're always there for me. What makes you think that I'm not going to do the same for you?"

Obi-Wan's mouth twitched into a shy smile. "There's no one like you, Anakin Skywalker."

Returning the smile, Anakin stepped around the island counter and boldly straddled Obi-Wan's lap. Wrapping his arms around the older man's neck, his fingers carded gently through his ginger hair. Obi-Wan's arms wrapped lightly around his waist.

"I just..." Anakin started. "I disappointed you today, didn't I?"

"Anakin…" Obi-Wan leant forward, their foreheads touching.

"Forgive me?" Anakin asked.

"Always."

He smiled.

"I do have one question though," said Obi-Wan.

"Yes?"

"Did you have to punch him in the face, Anakin?"

Anakin's cocky smirk and laughter was the only answer.

The cantina band played yet another irritating tune, and not for the first time, Dejiak wondered why he hadn't shot them all to put them out of their misery. Or he could have just left, but why leave when one could make a statement?

Swirling the whisky in his glass, he drained it and motioned the barkeep for another. His cold blue eyes followed the woman. The dislike between the two of them was wholly mutual, yet he kept coming back because she sold the strongest fire water on Tatooine. It was worth getting his drinks spat in (half of them), or her finding something to have her bouncers throw him out for (chatting up her servers, planting Spice on him, or the one memorable time he punched her brother – really the boy was an ass, he deserved it. Really.)

He thought she was a bitch.

She thought he was a monster.

Dejiak smiled at her lewdly as she slammed another glass down in front of him, a quarter of the contents sloshing over the rim onto his hand. He licked the liquid off his finger then took a sip of his drink before nursing it as he thought. He ignored the suspicious glares Ackmena sent his way. She wasn't used to him not trying to cause shit. Dejiak chucked to himself; it was good to know he could still worry people by not doing anything.

Tatooine. He'd come back to Taooine. But not in defeat, oh no. No, no, no. To regroup. He was here to regroup after his getting nowhere with the Inner Rim. He shivered.

From Corellia to Talus. From Talus to Nemoidia.

And Coruscant. Finally Coruscant, where he spent the first hour fighting his nausea and trying not to vomit. The Senate buildings and Jedi Temple were both clearly visible from the platform he'd landed on. Both made him want to retch.

It hadn't even been worth it in the end. Skywalker's trail was cold.

Ice. Fucking. Cold.

He'd moved too slowly. Taken the wrong trails. Should have gone straight to Coruscant to begin with instead of wasting time elsewhere. He had a feeling now that Coruscant had indeed been the boy's ultimate destination. It lingered. Gnawed in his chest and roared. He needed to hit something. Again, anyway. And soon. Maybe strangle a box of baby jawas and set the corpses on fire, he didn't know. He needed to do something, in any case. It would make him feel better.

It was his own fault he lost Skywalker's trail. His own arrogance in dealing with Kerr, the belief that the little shit was too afraid of him to sell the slaves from under his nose. Hesitating instead of going straight to the Core.

Shit.

Back to Tatooine. Back to square fucking one.

A bell chimed as the bar's doors slid open, admitting more patrons. That was another thing Dejiak hated about this place. That damn bell going off. He had half a mind to shoot the fucking sound box. Knocking back the rest of his drink, his eye caught a flash of blue settling into a table. A woman. Not a young pretty thing, far from – hardly anything to look at at all. And yet he couldn't draw his eyes away. Dejiak's brow furrowed as he was hit by a strange sense of familiarity. He kept on staring, turning over the feeling in his mind. Where had he seen…

It clicked then, after all these years and he felt his lips twist into a grin.

The Gods saw fit to smile on him today.

Skywalker's mother.

He ordered another drink.