By the time Jerot and Anakin made it back to the temple, the sky was already lit with dawn's early rays streaking through the otherwise black of open space that hung above the odd world. Morning classes would start in less than an hour from the time Anakin could even make it back up to their apartment. Another day would begin, seamless from the last, completely indifferent to any plight or pleas for just one more hour of darkness.
And in spite of the empty nausea that stirred in the pit of Anakin's stomach, along with the small blac khole that seemed to take residence inside his chest, he could feel the energy of the nexus singing brightly all around him. Light was rife in the air, dancing in the trees. The flora and fauna that surrounded the temple was all too beautiful to quietly coexist with the ache that burned inside of him. It was a debilitating sort of pain that ebbed at the center of his being, both disabling and soul shattering for however muted it was for the moment. It was the subtle reminder of all the things that he would never be, no matter how hard he might have tried.
Still cloaked in silence, Jerot and Anakin made their way through the side entrance as quietly as possible, not wanting to draw any undue attention to themselves. It was already bad enough that they had to trek up through the temple wearing civilian clothes that would undoubtedly make them stand out to begin with. However with a measure of luck they made it up to the apartment wing without anyone taking notice.
"I'll see you in class then?" Jerot said in parting, already sensing Anakin's deviating intent.
"I don't know," Anakin said doubtfully, knowing well he had no plans to go to class at all.
"I see you're giving up on keeping a low profile." Jerot remarked with a touch of worry. "If you're already on unsteady ground with my Master, skipping class isn't going to earn you any points with him."
Anakin felt anxious tension form in his chest, but willed himself against its presence. "What's he going to do, kill me?" Anakin said sarcastically.
"It's your funeral." Jerot replied, not as much humor in his voice as Anakin would have expected. Though just as quickly he brushed off the morose expression, exchanging it for a brighter one.
"Well, I guess I'll see you later then?" Jerot said with a smile, turning to leave for his own quarters.
With a growing knot in his chest, Anakin turned to make the dreaded march back to his own shared apartment. He didn't dare reach out to feel if his Master was still there. He didn't want to know. The horrid suspense seemed preferable to reaching out, only to be felt by the man he was trying to avoid.
And as the knot in his chest tightened, the ache in his side returned, sending sharp stabbing pain through his frame with each step. His nightly activities certainly hadn't helped him heal up at all. No, more likely than not he had exacerbated his injuries.
Anakin stood before the door to the apartment, mustering up the courage to walk inside. He took a breath of relief when he found it empty. He walked over towards his quarters, finding everything just as he had left it.
Feeling something had looked different as he had walked through the main living space, he turned back, realizing the sofa was somewhat disheveled with a pillow and blanket tossed to the side. Anakin saw the wrinkled imprint of where his Master's body had been, still clearly impressed into the soft material of the cushions.
Anakin smoothed a hand over the matted texture of the sofa, feeling his Master's essence linger in the space. His heart wrenched around the uncomfortable reality of the state of their relationship. Obi-wan had probably waited up for him for hours, waiting for him to come home, just to get up and realize he was still gone. Obi-wan deserved better, Anakin thought, feeling the searing regret tormenting his already troubled spirit.
Anakin took the discarded blanket and folded it, placing it neatly with care on the arm of the sofa and fluffed out his Master's pillow and set it neatly on his sleeper. He smoothed over the sofa cushions, erasing the impression his Master's body had left, leaving the front dwelling completely clean. Obi-wan always insisted on things being left tidy, and had preached endlessly about respecting their surroundings and environment when he had been younger.
Anakin went to his own quarters and folded his clothes, stowing them away as he ought to have. He could hear his Master's softly chastising voice in the back of his mind, filling his heart with even more remorse and sorrow. It was the impossible burden of his own feelings that would never amount to anything. They would only serve as a reminder of how unworthy he truly was to have Obi-wan as his Master.
It didn't matter that he had finally figured out how much he loved the man. Obi-wan would always deserve better. He would never be someone to be proud of. He was already a failure.
A waste.
Obi-wan was really just wasting his time, Anakin concluded. Qualturus was a nasty, mean spirited person. But if he was right about anything, it was that one single thing.
With his quarters clean, and the gaping tear in his heart ever in disrepair, Anakin stripped off his soiled civilian clothes and walked into the fresher, turning on the shower to rinse the grime off his skin. He had forgotten to take another pain blocker before he went into the shower, but the steadily increasing throbbing ache in his side reminded him. The swelling didn't like the hot water that cascaded down his skin, waking up the angry nerves in his broken bones and the tissue that surrounded them.
But Anakin breathed through the pain, using it to center himself away from all that distracted and taunted him. He didn't have to think about how his Master seemed to be at the heart of everything that soothed and tortured him. How even in the arms of someone else, he found him there. Anakin didn't have to worry about that now, or what he would say when he eventually faced him.
He might not have had to think about it, but the pain that it stirred in him remained, unattached from thought and reason. The immensity of it seemed far worse and brighter than any physical ailment could ever make him feel. Having his mind empty was only a slight measure of comfort, that didn't seem to amount to much amidst the growing heap of torturous emotions.
Because he could feel the nexus sing all around him, and he felt like a boulder in it's stream of light and goodness. For however much it scathed the surface of his flesh, none of it seemed to penetrate his surface. He remained that much darker for its contrasting shine against his weary soul.
With palms near pruning, Anakin twisted the water off and reached for a towel, tousling it over his hair before he tied it around his hips. He caught a fleeting glimpse of his fatigued expression in the mirror, along with the darkish purple of broken ribs still painting his side with its grim reminder.
His chest ignited with helpless rage. He was furious with himself for how weak he had become. On Kraysiss two, not raising his saber against his own Master had been a choice, one that had barely seemed a choice at all, but one he had made. He knew he could never hurt Obi-wan, not even if he had been taken over by someone, something else. It wasn't in him to do, it never would be.
But Zaann, he had tried to contest against, even if just barely. The man had caught him off guard. Anakin never expected to receive such treatment at the hands of someone who carried the rank of Jedi Master. It went against everything a Jedi was supposed to be. Anakin hadn't even had his saber to defend himself. Everything about the circumstance made his blood boil.
Was he really so helpless? Could he have done nothing else to save himself? He had been reduced to begging for his life at the end of their encounter. The thought made Anakin's skin crawl. He was better than that, wasn't he? More able? He had to have been.
The scar of memory ached in his mind- that terrible moment when he had been unable to protect his mother against those two awful men. He had been helpless then, and they both suffered for it. And in spite of all the effort Obi-wan had put into him, somehow he remained helpless all the same.
He was weak, pathetic. The thought of his failure brought stinging tears to his eyes that he blinked away intolerantly. Weak and self pitying, even worse. He felt a flare of hate towards himself. He would never be the Padawan that his Master deserved, but it was even worse than that. It wasn't just a lack of discipline. It was absence of potential. Obi-wan was toiling away for a lost cause. He would never amount to anything.
Anakin wiped hot tears from his eyes and took a breath, pain lancing through his side anew. The pain blocker had completely worn off and he was more than in need of another. In search of another, Anakin threw the door of the fresher open, his blood running cold in an instant.
Anakin froze, afraid to breathe or even blink as he looked out at the hollowed skull of a monster that stood before him. The decrepit wiry frame topped with a mouth full of razor sharp teeth menaced barely a meter away from where he stood. In spite of its lack of eyes, it stared at him with a beastly hunger, a rasping snarl ripping out of its throat.
Helpless yet again, no saber to cut the thing down, Anakin stumbled backwards, falling onto his back as the beast took one wavering step towards him. Its gnarled claws tore into the carpet of his quarters before it lurched forward, hurling itself at him teeth first towards his bare flesh.
With a startled cry Anakin reached out and shoved the monster against the opposite wall of his quarters. The beast let out a high pitched whine and with unnaturally deft speed, scrambled towards him in a ghastly crawl on all fours. Without a second to draw breath Anakin coiled force around the fresher door, slamming it shut and locking it just in the nick of time.
The door shuddered with impact as the beast slammed itself against it again and again with animalistic single mindedness. The sick thud was punctuated by shrill horrendous whines from its corroded vocal chords that sounded like they might snap at any given moment. Gnarled claws clacked against the metal doorframe, seeming to search out a handle or switch to open the door.
Fearfully Anakin scrambled back further, pressing his back hard up against the far wall of the fresher. He felt his lips grow cold and his hands shake, the pain of his injury numbed by shock. Helpless again, Anakin thought, too much fear gripping him to feel any anger towards himself in the moment.
….
Obi-wan hadn't had a moment to address his first class when he felt the first hint of something amiss. At first it hadn't surprised him at all. It seemed to be the same dull drone of angst that had permeated Anakin's aura of late. However it hurt him to feel Anakin in such a state, it hardly seemed out of the ordinary.
But it escalated quickly, a shockwave of raw terror pushing through him. Obi-wan's stomach ached anxiously. He didn't think he could stand trying to ignore it this time. His heart wrenched, and somehow it didn't seem like investigating the situation would be giving in to his own unruly emotions. To let it go on unchecked would be neglect, especially since Anakin had been out the entire night prior.
Master!
All internal deliberation on the topic ceased immediately as Anakin's voice cut through his thoughts, reaching out desperately across their bond. Obi-wan quickly cased to the classroom door, nearly forgetting the group of confused students that watched him leave.
"...No class today," Obi-wan mumbled out distractedly before he left the room, breaking out into a sprint towards Anakin's force presence that seemed to be somewhere near apartment wing.
Finding himself headed towards their shared quarters, Obi-wan threw the door to their apartment open and rushed inside, pulling the door to Anakin's room open after. Obi-wan paused, feeling slightly confused.
"Anakin?" Obi-wan called out, his eyes moving to the fresher door that had been locked and closed from the inside. Obi-wan walked over closer, knocking on the door. He could feel Anakin's presence burning on the other side like a beacon through the force.
"Anakin, open the door." Obi-wan commanded, hearing the tremor in his breathless voice. He heard what seemed like a whimper from the other side, but no coherent verbal answer.
"Anakin as your Master I command you to open this door at once!" Obi-wan said, his voice more sounding more angry than he would have liked, but he couldn't help it. He felt terrified and helpless in equal measure.
Thoroughly done asking, Obi-wan opened the door himself, striking the locking mechanism through with a flash of his saber before he wrenched the door open on its track manually. Curled up at the far end of the fresher was Anakin, half naked and huddled in a trembling mess on the floor.
Obi-wan rushed over to kneel beside him. Anakin was reluctant to unfurl from his position. Obi-wan ran a hand through his dampened locks causing the boy to shiver. Still, Anakin avoided his gaze.
"What happened?" Obi-wan said softly, allowing himself to breathe. Anakin was here, seemingly unharmed. Everything was going to be alright.
But the way Anakin's eyes avoidantly darted to and fro, unwilling to make or sustain eye contact, made Obi-wan's chest fracture through. A full strafe of worst-case scenarios ran through Obi-wan's mind in the span of a second, filling his chest with rage and fear anew as his stomach dropped.
"Anakin, tell me what happened." Obi-wan said, a touch more commanding.
Obi-wan took Anakin's face gently between his hands, his heart breaking. Anakin was tattered and fragile, his spirit just hanging together by shredded threads of composure. Clearly, he was going about this the wrong way.
Obi-wan's voice softened. "Here, let's get you dressed and make some tea, alright? You must be freezing." Obi-wan said reassuringly, noting the purple shade of Anakin's lips with a dull ache in his chest. Anakin's lip quivered at the suggestion, restraining more tears as he nodded willingly.
Obi-wan stood and waited for Anakin to follow, but he appeared to be having some trouble. Obi-wan reached out a hand to help him up. Hesitantly, Anakin accepted. With a grimace and stuttered gasp, Anakin righted himself, a hand wrapped around his torso to hold at his side.
Obi-wan pulled Anakin's hand away gently and looked, seeing the mottled bloom of differing shades of plum and violet rise up underneath the skin of his side. Obi-wan placed a gentle hand over the cite, sensing the boy's broken ribs. Though from the look of the bruising and the feel of the wound, it wasn't quite fresh.
Obi-wan felt his body begin to quake with rage, but he willed himself to remain calm. Anakin was clearly traumatized or extremely upset, and to gain any insight from him Obi-wan would need to keep steady himself.
Gently, Obi-wan guided Anakin to sit on his sleeper while he set out in search of a medkit. Finding it, he rummaged through for a pain blocker. He was able to find one, though there ought to have been two in the kit. Anakin must have already used one himself. More questions presented in Obi-wan's mind that he forced himself to sideline for the moment.
Obi-wan went back over to Anakin who still sat obediently on his sleeper where he had left him. Obi-wan knelt before him and pushed the towel up his thigh, gently probing for a suitable injection site. "Take a deep breath," Obi-wan ordered softly, just before he depressed the hypo against the side of his thigh. He felt a twinge of guilt when Anakin flinched against it.
Quickly, Obi-wan placed a bacta patch over the broken ribs in order to speed up the healing process, then went to rummage through Anakin's dresser for fresh clothes. Finding them, he sat them on the sleeper beside Anakin and promptly turned to leave.
"Go ahead and get dressed and I'll make some tea." Obi-wan said in a sterile voice. It was the only alternative to giving any voice to the welling emotions that began to boil inside of him. He couldn't let any of it leach out into his words and actions. It was already difficult enough to keep from demanding answers for the numerous questions that bounced around his skull. It would be a challenge to keep from interrogating him, it would only serve as counterproductive if he did.
And Anakin gave him no answer as Obi-wan closed the door, setting himself to the ritualistic task of making tea. He thought it would help calm himself down, as well as help soothe Anakin. Though as the water began to boil, and he poured the hot steaming liquid over the dry crushed leaves, he felt his mind still teeming with questions that he desperately needed answers to.
Just as he began to set the table, Obi-wan saw Anakin emerge from his quarters. He looked a shade less pale, and his lips had nearly returned to their usual pink color instead of the sick violet that mimicked the nauseating bruises on his side. Obi-wan forced a smile onto his lips. For however strained it may have been, it was indeed genuine, cut through with concern and fear. Obi-wan's mind still played over the worst things he could imagine being enacted on his beloved's flesh. It made him cringe and scream inside all at the same time.
Anakin sat across from him as he had so many times before. Obi-wan could sense the heavy weight of burden in his heart, something vague he couldn't narrow down, among other things that muddled his aura. Even if he had been blind to it all, he would have seen the weight of it on the boy's body as he moved languidly, as if all the life had been drained from him.
Obi-wan poured Anakin a cup of brew, then one for himself, setting the well used teapot in the center of the table between them, small vapors of steam rising up from its spout. Obi-wan took his cup between his hands, looking down at the tinted liquid as if it might hold the answer to what he should say, or how he should say it. He felt mute instead, all the things he needed but couldn't say jumbled up in a knot, lodged in his throat.
Perhaps on the verge of speaking, Anakin pursed his lips and furrowed his brows as he inhaled through his nostrils, but continued to forgo explanation for more silence instead. Obi-wan felt his heart burn inside his chest, taunted by the truth of what happened, by the too many possibilities that scraped the inside of his skull.
"Anakin," Obi-wan started, hoping the boy might meet his eyes. "No matter what happens, I'm going to be here for you. But I can't help you if you don't let me in." He said, using the most level voice he could employ. In spite of his best efforts, it undulated with unsteady emotion. Still, Anakin only retreated in on himself more. Obi-wan couldn't stand it. He could feel his practiced demeanor falter slightly, letting a sliver of his emotions past his defenses.
"I know these have been difficult times, but I'm sitting here running a thousand different scenarios in my mind of all the different ways you could have been hurt and it's driving me crazy." Obi-wan said in one breath, surprised by the burst of disclosure that he instantly regretted. He couldn't reverse the self centered remark, or the tears that had already begun to gloss over his eyes.
Anakin swallowed hard, glancing up at his Master then back down to the cup he held between his palms, a pained expression in his beautiful blue eyes.
However a selfish remark it had been, it seemed to be effective as Anakin began to speak. "I thought I saw something, but I couldn't have." Anakin said, conflicted.
"Thought you saw what?" Obi-wan asked, trying hard to hold back his frustration.
Anakin searched the air before him. "That… thing, the monster from Kraysiss. It was there, in my room." Anakin said, looking up into his Master's eyes, finally. "I could see it as clearly as I see you now."
Anakin averted his gaze just as quickly. "But that can't be. I feel like I'm going crazy." Anakin mused, slightly embarrassed.
"I don't think you're crazy." Obi-wan said immediately. "Whatever you say, I believe you."
Anakin looked up at him bashfully. "But it doesn't make any sense. It was there, screaming, banging on the door, up to the very second you opened it. And you didn't see anything."
"That doesn't mean you didn't see it." Obi-wan insisted.
"Okay, but that doesn't mean anything other than the fact that I'm totally crazy." Anakin said, defeated.
"I don't think so." Obi-wan said skeptically, swirling the tea in his cup and taking a sip.
"Well then what do you suggest?" Anakin asked irritably.
"Maybe exhaustion, some sort of hallucination. You were out all night last night." Obi-wan said as gently as possible, not wanting to seem too chastising.
Still, Anakin deflated with a trace of guilt before a spiteful sneer touched his lips. "Still sounds like crazy to me."
Obi-wan set down his cup and reached across to cradle Anakin's hands within his own, only a passing second thought as to whether or not he was letting his emotions control him too much. Any touch seemed inappropriate when his heart was ruthlessly unrelenting in wanting so much more.
"You are not crazy. I think you're exhausted both physically and mentally." Obi-wan said in a warm voice.
The comment had been meant to console, though it seemed to have the opposite effect. "I'm weak, physically and mentally." Anakin declared, his voice taut with emotion. "And most of all, I'm a waste of your time."
Anakin pulled his hands back from his Master's touch. "And I'm never going to be what you want me to be." He insisted, quickly wiping away the telling moisture in his eyes.
Obi-wan's focus sharpened as things began to make sense. "Who told you that?" He asked, mindful to keep a soft edge to his voice, especially as his anger began to wax again, creeping over his chest.
Anakin shook his head in frustration. "Who told me?" He said indignantly, "It doesn't matter when it's true." Anakin insisted through bated tears.
"Oh Padawan, nothing could be further from the truth." Obi-wan said earnestly, searching out Anakin's tortured soul.
Anakin returned him with silence, dangerously near the edge of tears. Obi-wan took a breath, trying to navigate the situation as best he could.
"I have something for you." Obi-wan said gently. Reaching to the back of his belt he unclasped Anakin's saber and took it in his hands. Anakin's eyes widened as his shoulders tensed, then wilted, upon seeing the weapon in his Master's possession. Obi-wan presented it for him to take, but Anakin shirked away from it.
"A Jedi should never be without their lightsaber." Obi-wan said simply, nearly routine, as he had a thousand times over before.
Anakin shrunk away from his words. Regardless, Obi-wan placed the saber on the table beside Anakin's cup for him to take when he was ready. "What happened to your side?" Obi-wan asked calmly.
This time he could see the boy's complexion pale in response to the question. A flash of fear crossed Obi-wan's heart. "Someone hurt you. I need to know what happened." He said, trying to keep his voice steady against his unsteady emotions.
"It's nothing." Anakin said in monotone.
"It was Zaann, wasn't it." Obi-wan said, restraining himself, his anger and outrage. But Anakin could hear the anger flourish from his flatly spoken words.
And the way Anakin's shoulders stiffened in response to the allegation, told Obi-wan he had struck a vein of truth. Still, too much remained unknown. Obi-wan's mind ran wild with all the ways he might have hurt Anakin. After all, not all wounds held such a physical manifestation. Obi-wan tried to steady his trembling hands by pressing his palms into the table top, but the residual fear he felt crept into his veins, transmuting to rage.
Obi-wan felt his chest rise and fall at an increasingly rapid pace, his thoughts turning murderous. Obi-wan didn't know what he might do if he saw Zaann again, but his first inclination was to kill the man on sight.
Anakin must have sensed the darkening of his Master's aura, the malintent that began to root in his heart. He took his saber in his hands, running his hands over it's ridges and edges as he took a pensive breath, willing himself to speak.
"I hurt someone in class. I hadn't meant to, but something came over me and I couldn't stop myself. I nicked her neck, but I could have killed her... I think I wanted to." Anakin said contemplatively. "What I did was inexcusable. I apologized but it didn't matter since I had already hurt her. The teacher took my lightsaber and sent me to Master Qualturus's office." Anakin said, his already dim eyes becoming empty and hollow.
"Then he started- I thought he was trying to kill me. I couldn't fight him without my lightsaber. I tried to knock him off balance, I thought maybe I could get away if I did. I took a chair and threw it at him, but he shoved it back at me so hard I couldn't get away in time." Anakin paused, trembling from the disclosure.
"He grabbed me, he had his lightsaber pressed against my neck, I thought he was going to…" Anakin said, taking a heaving breath and wiping his eyes again. His brows furrowed and his mouth twisted into a frown. "But he just laughed, and let me go."
Obi-wan only felt partial relief at knowing what had happened. Mostly he itched that much more to draw his saber through Zaann's neck, severing his head from his spine. It didn't make sense for a Jedi Master, the lead director of the entire temple, to be so terribly sadistic. Aside from terrorizing his Padawan, he had sewn seeds of doubt and futility in Anakin's soul. It didn't matter that Anakin had been at fault to start, Zaann had no place to hurt Anakin or berate him in such a way.
"I'm going to send a message to Coruscant, and then we're going home." Obi-wan declared. It wouldn't due for him to confront Qualturus himself. The only way to deal with the issue was to go to the highest level of authority to begin with, so that Zaann could be dealt with accordingly. It wouldn't be the best course of action to kill a member of the Order, no matter how badly Obi-wan wanted to. It would only serve to put his own rogue emotions on display, and that wouldn't serve anyone. Though Obi-wan wished the man would push him, to give him an excuse to give life to his dark desire to end the man's life himself.
Anakin looked over to him in slight disbelief. "We're going home?"
"Yes, Anakin. We're going home."