DISCLAIMER: None of the characters belong to me. They belong to the almighty G.L. and are used without permission. Oh, except for Q, who belongs to...um, I don't know, maybe Gene Roddenberry? Whatever, he belongs to Star Trek. Basically, none of these characters are mine.
Author's Note: This is just a stupid, short fic that I came up with late at night. Enjoy!
Boys Will Be Boys
Anakin slumped in his bed. It was only 8:00, and he was already in bed. Obi-Wan had grounded him for a week. It wasn't fair. It was just a practical joke. And anyway, he hadn't meant for Obi-Wan to walk under the door. It was an accident! But no, Obi-Wan hadn't listened, and so Anakin was grounded. Again.
Anakin wanted to like Obi-Wan, but he was so...boring. Didn't he ever do anything fun? All he cared about were rules and the Jedi Code and stuff like that. Yawn.
Anakin crawled under the covers and wondered if Obi-Wan had ever been a kid. Nah, he decided. He was probably born a boring grown-up.
*****
Obi-Wan finished mopping up the water by the door. Anakin had done a pretty good job rigging up the bucket over the door, he had to admit. But there was a time and a place for everything. He was still a little upset that Anakin had pulled that stunt. It was immature. Then again, he wasn't stupid enough to think that he had always been perfect. A smile tugged at his lips when he recalled his own hellraising youth. That was behind him. He was an adult now.
Still, he thought as he lay down in bed, it would be kind of fun to be a kid long enough to get even with Anakin...
*****
"Pathetic," Q muttered. This situation was so dumb. It had been repeated millions of times. The stiff adults became kids and ran the kids ragged. Boring!
"Oh well," he sighed. Life had gotten dull. It might be predictable, but it was also classic.
He snapped his fingers, and then sat back to watch the drama unfold.
*****
Anakin crawled out of bed. Sun streamed in through his window. He wondered why Obi-Wan hadn't woken him up, but his brain was still half-asleep. Yawning, he walked out of his room.
Splash!
A bucket of icy water fell onto Anakin, soaking his hair, his body, and his Jedi robes.
"AAAAAHHHH!!!" Anakin screamed.
A boy about Anakin's age was bent over, laughing hysterically. He had close-cropped brown hair with a little tail in back, and he was considerably shorter than Anakin.
"That was so funny!" he laughed. "But who are you? And come to think of it, where's Master Qui-Gon?"
Anakin felt a shiver at the mention of Qui-Gon's name. "I'm Anakin. Who're you?"
"Obi-Wan." He looked around nervously. "Where's Master Qui-Gon? He'll be really mad at me. But I saw you in there, and I just couldn't help it. You looked so funny!"
"Uh...he's not here," Anakin replied.
"Is he on a mission?"
"Umm...yeah."
"Great!" He grabbed Anakin's arm. "Let's go!"
"Where are we going?" Anakin asked, detaching his wet arm from Obi-Wan's grasp.
"I don't know. Let's go get something to eat. Come on."
"I can't. I'm all wet."
"So change," Obi-Wan said impatiently.
"What about the water? Shouldn't we clean it up?"
"Nah. It'll evaporate. Hurry up!"
Anakin obediently walked back into his room and threw on some dry clothes. His head was spinning. What was going on?
When he came out, Obi-Wan was tapping his foot impatiently. "Hurry up!" he exclaimed. "Let's go! I'm starving."
"I'm ready." As they walked into the hall, Anakin asked, "How old are you?"
"I'm ten. What about you?"
"Me too."
Obi-Wan looked suspiciously at Anakin. "Then how come I don't know you? And what were you doing in my room? And why was I in Qui-Gon's room?"
Anakin uttered a silent thanks to whoever had built the temple. All of the units--which contained two bedrooms, a living room, and a bathroom--looked identical. Otherwise, Anakin would have a difficult time explaining why Obi-Wan was in a strange unit.
As it was, Anakin had to fumble for an explanation. "Um, I'm new. Qui-Gon let me stay in your room, and he put you in his room."
"Oh, okay. But where's all of his stuff?"
"He--he took it with him. It's a long mission."
Luckily, they arrived at the dining hall before Obi-Wan could ask any more questions. Anakin wasn't sure why he didn't tell him the truth, but he had a feeling that having Obi-Wan be a child would be fun.
The two boys got in line. Anakin's eyes nearly bugged out of his head when he saw the huge amount of food that Obi-Wan piled on his tray.
"What?" Obi-Wan asked. "I'm hungry."
They walked over to a table and sat down. Obi-Wan craned his neck for a while--"looking for my friends," he explained--before settling down to eat his food. Startled, Anakin watched a miniature mountain of fruit, rolls, and eggs disappear into Obi-Wan's mouth.
"You don't eat very much," Obi-Wan commented.
"No I don't. You just eat a lot," Anakin countered.
Obi-Wan shrugged. "Master Qui-Gon says that I have a hollow leg...and a hollow head. Besides, if I eat a lot, maybe I'll grow as tall as he is." He raised his hand as high as it would go. "I'll be this tall."
Anakin repressed a snicker.
"So, where do you want to go now?"
"I don't know. We don't have class today. What do you want to do?"
"I know!" Obi-Wan's eyes lit up. "Let's go rolling!"
"What's that?" Anakin asked.
"It's a lot of fun! Come on."
*****
Anakin stared at the slope and then back at Obi-Wan. "Are you sure this is a good idea?"
"Yeah! It's lots of fun." He stood inside of a round trash bin. "Come on."
Anakin climbed into the bin. "Okay, now what?"
"When I count to three, throw yourself down the hill, okay? One...two...three!"
The two boys fell with a loud thump and proceeded to roll down the hill. Anakin laughed excitedly as the world flashed by him. They were going so fast!
Suddenly they stopped. Anakin crawled out and looked up into Mace Windu's disapproving eyes.
Obi-Wan crawled out. "Hi, Master," he said cheerfully.
"What were you two doing?" he demanded.
"Rolling," Obi-Wan said. "It's lots of fun."
"Yes, well, you almost hit a bunch of children. Besides, you could have gotten hurt. Anakin...what's your name?"
"Obi-Wan Kenobi."
Mace Windu stared at him. "Obi-Wan?" He squinted at the boy. "Obi-Wan Kenobi?"
"Yes, sir?"
Mace grabbed the two boys by their arms. "Come with me!"
*****
The healer shook her head. "I can't explain it, but that is definitely Obi-Wan Kenobi...just ten years old."
"How can that be?" Mace Windu demanded.
The healer gave him a helpless look. "I have no idea. But the DNA matches perfectly."
Mace groaned. "Great. What am I supposed to do now?"
"Why don't we just keep him here?" the healer suggested. "I can keep an eye on him."
"Good idea," Mace said. "Thank you."
"Can I stay too?" Anakin asked.
"If it's all right with Healer Joren," Mace told him.
"No problem," the healer said. "How much trouble could two ten-year-olds be?"
Mace smiled. "You have no idea," he said as he left.
*****
Anakin shared Mace's knowledge of the capacity for mischief of a ten-year-old boy. The minute Healer Joren turned his back on them, Anakin walked over to the medical bed.
"Psst, Obi-Wan! Come on, the coast is clear. Let's get out of here. What do you want to do?"
Obi-Wan stared up at the ceiling. "I'm going to stay here like Master Windu said."
"What?!" Anakin explained in disbelief.
"I don't want to get into any more trouble," he explained. "I'm just going to sit here and...and mediate until Master Qui-Gon comes back." He sat cross-legged on the bed and squinted his face into a look of intense concentration.
"Why not? It was your idea to roll down the hill," Anakin reminded him.
Obi-Wan's eyes remained firmly closed. "I didn't realize how much trouble I would be in. Master Qui-Gon said that's my biggest problem. I don't mean to do bad things, but sometimes I don't think enough before I do stuff. So I'm just going to sit here and meditate on that until he comes back."
Anakin sighed. That was the Obi-Wan he knew! Still, he tried once more to get the boy to come with him. "We won't get into any trouble," he promised. "We'll just sneak out for a while and then sneak back. Healer Joren will never even know we were gone."
Ohi-Wan opened one eye and looked at Healer Jorin, who was busily reading a computer screen. He opened the other eye and looked at Anakin. "Well...okay."
*****
The two boys were in the Room of a Thousand Fountains. Water roared cheerfully from the plentiful fountains and from a more wild source--the waterfall. It rose majestically from the flat earth, its sides rough and stony, tempting all those impulsive who saw it to climb to the peak.
That was just what Anakin and Obi-Wan intended to do. They picked their way carefully among the grass near the bottom and scrambled up the stones. Higher and higher they climbed, their faces shining in anticipation of the glorious moment when they would stand on its summit and gaze down on everything there.
Being ten-year-old boys, though, neither of them had the slightest inkling of the danger that they were in. Although they had heard many warnings against climbing the waterfall, they failed to heed them. "Only experienced Jedi can climb it," the teachers warned, but neither of them paid any attention to that and instead set about to scale the miniature mountain.
They should have paid more attention. Obi-Wan was climbing in front, and he put his fingers into another groove. It crumbled beneath him. At the same time, his feet scrambled for purchase and sent dust falling on Anakin, who clung to the rock below and a to the right of Obi-Wan.
"Hey, watch it," Anakin started to say, but the words died in his throat as a scream filled the air. He looked up in time to see Obi-Wan tumble to the ground below.
*****
A dark shadow fell on Anakin, and he looked up from the bed dully. He had already been scolded severely, and he waited listlessly for the next. Instead, though, a stranger stood next to him.
"Poor boy," the man said.
Anakin looked up at him. He was tall and thin with dark hair. "Who're you?"
"I surprise myself sometimes," the man continued, ignoring Anakin's question. "There was a time when I couldn't have cared less about him. But now I find myself worried about the boy. I suppose that's what fatherhood will do to a person." He looked up Anakin. "Don't worry. He'll be fine."
Anakin looked doubtfully at Obi-Wan. Several bones were broken, and his body was badly bruised. A bloody cloth at his temple covered a ragged gash. "How do you know?"
The stranger snapped his fingers. A burst of light filled the room. When it cleared, Obi-Wan--the adult Obi-Wan--lay on the bed, completely unharmed.
Anakin gasped. "Who-who are you?"
He waved away Anakin's query. "That's not important. Now, in a moment your master will wake up. He, and everyone else, will remember all of this. Perhaps you will put this to some constructive purpose, although I doubt it. Farewell."
The man snapped his fingers again and disappeared in a blaze of white light.
Obi-Wan's eyes blinked open. "Anakin?"
"Yes Master?"
"Was that a dream?"
"No Master."
"Oh." He sat up. "You realize that you will have to be punished for your reckless behavior." He paused. "So will I."
"You?" Anakin asked incredulously.
"I expect that Master Windu will punish us both."
"Oh."
Sure enough, Mace Windu came in to talk to them. He yelled--well, okay, he didn't yell, but if he weren't a Jedi, he would have--for quite a while about how reckless and dangerous their behavior had been.
"But Master," Anakin spoke up, "Obi-Wan wasn't himself. *And* it was all his idea. So you can't really punish either of us."
"Ha!" Master Yoda cried as he made his way into the room. "More like himself than ever he was."
Mace nodded. "You both will be punished for your actions."
*****
"Why didn't you argue with him?" Anakin demanded as he and Obi-Wan scrubbed the floor in one of the many hallways of the temple.
"Anakin, when you've been in trouble as often as I have, you learn very quickly not to argue with Master Windu, especially when Master Yoda backs him up."
"Did you get in trouble a lot when you were a kid?"
"All the time," Obi-Wan sighed.
"Is that why you act so..."
"So boring?" Obi-Wan finished.
"Yeah," Anakin admitted sheepishly.
"I don't know. I always tried to stay out of trouble, but I wasn't every successful. I kept trying, though, and eventually I learned to be mature and responsible."
"Oh."
Obi-Wan heard regret in Anakin's voice. He would probably miss the young Obi-Wan, who still did reckless stunts without thinking of the consequences, who acted like a child freely. For the first time, Obi-Wan regreted the loss of the little boy he had once been.
*So do something about it* a voice inside him said.
Obi-Wan stared at the sponge he was using to wash the floor. He dipped it into the bucket of soapy water and threw it at Anakin.
*****
Master Yoda walked through the Jedi Temple. He peered down one of the intersecting halls. Obi-Wan and Anakin were busily throwing wet sponges and soapy water at each other. Their cheerful laughter filled the corridor.
Yoda smiled and walked on. "Good for each other they are," he mused aloud. "Right you were."
*It's nice to hear you say that,* Qui-Gon said as he smiled down at his boys.
Author's Note: This is just a stupid, short fic that I came up with late at night. Enjoy!
Boys Will Be Boys
Anakin slumped in his bed. It was only 8:00, and he was already in bed. Obi-Wan had grounded him for a week. It wasn't fair. It was just a practical joke. And anyway, he hadn't meant for Obi-Wan to walk under the door. It was an accident! But no, Obi-Wan hadn't listened, and so Anakin was grounded. Again.
Anakin wanted to like Obi-Wan, but he was so...boring. Didn't he ever do anything fun? All he cared about were rules and the Jedi Code and stuff like that. Yawn.
Anakin crawled under the covers and wondered if Obi-Wan had ever been a kid. Nah, he decided. He was probably born a boring grown-up.
*****
Obi-Wan finished mopping up the water by the door. Anakin had done a pretty good job rigging up the bucket over the door, he had to admit. But there was a time and a place for everything. He was still a little upset that Anakin had pulled that stunt. It was immature. Then again, he wasn't stupid enough to think that he had always been perfect. A smile tugged at his lips when he recalled his own hellraising youth. That was behind him. He was an adult now.
Still, he thought as he lay down in bed, it would be kind of fun to be a kid long enough to get even with Anakin...
*****
"Pathetic," Q muttered. This situation was so dumb. It had been repeated millions of times. The stiff adults became kids and ran the kids ragged. Boring!
"Oh well," he sighed. Life had gotten dull. It might be predictable, but it was also classic.
He snapped his fingers, and then sat back to watch the drama unfold.
*****
Anakin crawled out of bed. Sun streamed in through his window. He wondered why Obi-Wan hadn't woken him up, but his brain was still half-asleep. Yawning, he walked out of his room.
Splash!
A bucket of icy water fell onto Anakin, soaking his hair, his body, and his Jedi robes.
"AAAAAHHHH!!!" Anakin screamed.
A boy about Anakin's age was bent over, laughing hysterically. He had close-cropped brown hair with a little tail in back, and he was considerably shorter than Anakin.
"That was so funny!" he laughed. "But who are you? And come to think of it, where's Master Qui-Gon?"
Anakin felt a shiver at the mention of Qui-Gon's name. "I'm Anakin. Who're you?"
"Obi-Wan." He looked around nervously. "Where's Master Qui-Gon? He'll be really mad at me. But I saw you in there, and I just couldn't help it. You looked so funny!"
"Uh...he's not here," Anakin replied.
"Is he on a mission?"
"Umm...yeah."
"Great!" He grabbed Anakin's arm. "Let's go!"
"Where are we going?" Anakin asked, detaching his wet arm from Obi-Wan's grasp.
"I don't know. Let's go get something to eat. Come on."
"I can't. I'm all wet."
"So change," Obi-Wan said impatiently.
"What about the water? Shouldn't we clean it up?"
"Nah. It'll evaporate. Hurry up!"
Anakin obediently walked back into his room and threw on some dry clothes. His head was spinning. What was going on?
When he came out, Obi-Wan was tapping his foot impatiently. "Hurry up!" he exclaimed. "Let's go! I'm starving."
"I'm ready." As they walked into the hall, Anakin asked, "How old are you?"
"I'm ten. What about you?"
"Me too."
Obi-Wan looked suspiciously at Anakin. "Then how come I don't know you? And what were you doing in my room? And why was I in Qui-Gon's room?"
Anakin uttered a silent thanks to whoever had built the temple. All of the units--which contained two bedrooms, a living room, and a bathroom--looked identical. Otherwise, Anakin would have a difficult time explaining why Obi-Wan was in a strange unit.
As it was, Anakin had to fumble for an explanation. "Um, I'm new. Qui-Gon let me stay in your room, and he put you in his room."
"Oh, okay. But where's all of his stuff?"
"He--he took it with him. It's a long mission."
Luckily, they arrived at the dining hall before Obi-Wan could ask any more questions. Anakin wasn't sure why he didn't tell him the truth, but he had a feeling that having Obi-Wan be a child would be fun.
The two boys got in line. Anakin's eyes nearly bugged out of his head when he saw the huge amount of food that Obi-Wan piled on his tray.
"What?" Obi-Wan asked. "I'm hungry."
They walked over to a table and sat down. Obi-Wan craned his neck for a while--"looking for my friends," he explained--before settling down to eat his food. Startled, Anakin watched a miniature mountain of fruit, rolls, and eggs disappear into Obi-Wan's mouth.
"You don't eat very much," Obi-Wan commented.
"No I don't. You just eat a lot," Anakin countered.
Obi-Wan shrugged. "Master Qui-Gon says that I have a hollow leg...and a hollow head. Besides, if I eat a lot, maybe I'll grow as tall as he is." He raised his hand as high as it would go. "I'll be this tall."
Anakin repressed a snicker.
"So, where do you want to go now?"
"I don't know. We don't have class today. What do you want to do?"
"I know!" Obi-Wan's eyes lit up. "Let's go rolling!"
"What's that?" Anakin asked.
"It's a lot of fun! Come on."
*****
Anakin stared at the slope and then back at Obi-Wan. "Are you sure this is a good idea?"
"Yeah! It's lots of fun." He stood inside of a round trash bin. "Come on."
Anakin climbed into the bin. "Okay, now what?"
"When I count to three, throw yourself down the hill, okay? One...two...three!"
The two boys fell with a loud thump and proceeded to roll down the hill. Anakin laughed excitedly as the world flashed by him. They were going so fast!
Suddenly they stopped. Anakin crawled out and looked up into Mace Windu's disapproving eyes.
Obi-Wan crawled out. "Hi, Master," he said cheerfully.
"What were you two doing?" he demanded.
"Rolling," Obi-Wan said. "It's lots of fun."
"Yes, well, you almost hit a bunch of children. Besides, you could have gotten hurt. Anakin...what's your name?"
"Obi-Wan Kenobi."
Mace Windu stared at him. "Obi-Wan?" He squinted at the boy. "Obi-Wan Kenobi?"
"Yes, sir?"
Mace grabbed the two boys by their arms. "Come with me!"
*****
The healer shook her head. "I can't explain it, but that is definitely Obi-Wan Kenobi...just ten years old."
"How can that be?" Mace Windu demanded.
The healer gave him a helpless look. "I have no idea. But the DNA matches perfectly."
Mace groaned. "Great. What am I supposed to do now?"
"Why don't we just keep him here?" the healer suggested. "I can keep an eye on him."
"Good idea," Mace said. "Thank you."
"Can I stay too?" Anakin asked.
"If it's all right with Healer Joren," Mace told him.
"No problem," the healer said. "How much trouble could two ten-year-olds be?"
Mace smiled. "You have no idea," he said as he left.
*****
Anakin shared Mace's knowledge of the capacity for mischief of a ten-year-old boy. The minute Healer Joren turned his back on them, Anakin walked over to the medical bed.
"Psst, Obi-Wan! Come on, the coast is clear. Let's get out of here. What do you want to do?"
Obi-Wan stared up at the ceiling. "I'm going to stay here like Master Windu said."
"What?!" Anakin explained in disbelief.
"I don't want to get into any more trouble," he explained. "I'm just going to sit here and...and mediate until Master Qui-Gon comes back." He sat cross-legged on the bed and squinted his face into a look of intense concentration.
"Why not? It was your idea to roll down the hill," Anakin reminded him.
Obi-Wan's eyes remained firmly closed. "I didn't realize how much trouble I would be in. Master Qui-Gon said that's my biggest problem. I don't mean to do bad things, but sometimes I don't think enough before I do stuff. So I'm just going to sit here and meditate on that until he comes back."
Anakin sighed. That was the Obi-Wan he knew! Still, he tried once more to get the boy to come with him. "We won't get into any trouble," he promised. "We'll just sneak out for a while and then sneak back. Healer Joren will never even know we were gone."
Ohi-Wan opened one eye and looked at Healer Jorin, who was busily reading a computer screen. He opened the other eye and looked at Anakin. "Well...okay."
*****
The two boys were in the Room of a Thousand Fountains. Water roared cheerfully from the plentiful fountains and from a more wild source--the waterfall. It rose majestically from the flat earth, its sides rough and stony, tempting all those impulsive who saw it to climb to the peak.
That was just what Anakin and Obi-Wan intended to do. They picked their way carefully among the grass near the bottom and scrambled up the stones. Higher and higher they climbed, their faces shining in anticipation of the glorious moment when they would stand on its summit and gaze down on everything there.
Being ten-year-old boys, though, neither of them had the slightest inkling of the danger that they were in. Although they had heard many warnings against climbing the waterfall, they failed to heed them. "Only experienced Jedi can climb it," the teachers warned, but neither of them paid any attention to that and instead set about to scale the miniature mountain.
They should have paid more attention. Obi-Wan was climbing in front, and he put his fingers into another groove. It crumbled beneath him. At the same time, his feet scrambled for purchase and sent dust falling on Anakin, who clung to the rock below and a to the right of Obi-Wan.
"Hey, watch it," Anakin started to say, but the words died in his throat as a scream filled the air. He looked up in time to see Obi-Wan tumble to the ground below.
*****
A dark shadow fell on Anakin, and he looked up from the bed dully. He had already been scolded severely, and he waited listlessly for the next. Instead, though, a stranger stood next to him.
"Poor boy," the man said.
Anakin looked up at him. He was tall and thin with dark hair. "Who're you?"
"I surprise myself sometimes," the man continued, ignoring Anakin's question. "There was a time when I couldn't have cared less about him. But now I find myself worried about the boy. I suppose that's what fatherhood will do to a person." He looked up Anakin. "Don't worry. He'll be fine."
Anakin looked doubtfully at Obi-Wan. Several bones were broken, and his body was badly bruised. A bloody cloth at his temple covered a ragged gash. "How do you know?"
The stranger snapped his fingers. A burst of light filled the room. When it cleared, Obi-Wan--the adult Obi-Wan--lay on the bed, completely unharmed.
Anakin gasped. "Who-who are you?"
He waved away Anakin's query. "That's not important. Now, in a moment your master will wake up. He, and everyone else, will remember all of this. Perhaps you will put this to some constructive purpose, although I doubt it. Farewell."
The man snapped his fingers again and disappeared in a blaze of white light.
Obi-Wan's eyes blinked open. "Anakin?"
"Yes Master?"
"Was that a dream?"
"No Master."
"Oh." He sat up. "You realize that you will have to be punished for your reckless behavior." He paused. "So will I."
"You?" Anakin asked incredulously.
"I expect that Master Windu will punish us both."
"Oh."
Sure enough, Mace Windu came in to talk to them. He yelled--well, okay, he didn't yell, but if he weren't a Jedi, he would have--for quite a while about how reckless and dangerous their behavior had been.
"But Master," Anakin spoke up, "Obi-Wan wasn't himself. *And* it was all his idea. So you can't really punish either of us."
"Ha!" Master Yoda cried as he made his way into the room. "More like himself than ever he was."
Mace nodded. "You both will be punished for your actions."
*****
"Why didn't you argue with him?" Anakin demanded as he and Obi-Wan scrubbed the floor in one of the many hallways of the temple.
"Anakin, when you've been in trouble as often as I have, you learn very quickly not to argue with Master Windu, especially when Master Yoda backs him up."
"Did you get in trouble a lot when you were a kid?"
"All the time," Obi-Wan sighed.
"Is that why you act so..."
"So boring?" Obi-Wan finished.
"Yeah," Anakin admitted sheepishly.
"I don't know. I always tried to stay out of trouble, but I wasn't every successful. I kept trying, though, and eventually I learned to be mature and responsible."
"Oh."
Obi-Wan heard regret in Anakin's voice. He would probably miss the young Obi-Wan, who still did reckless stunts without thinking of the consequences, who acted like a child freely. For the first time, Obi-Wan regreted the loss of the little boy he had once been.
*So do something about it* a voice inside him said.
Obi-Wan stared at the sponge he was using to wash the floor. He dipped it into the bucket of soapy water and threw it at Anakin.
*****
Master Yoda walked through the Jedi Temple. He peered down one of the intersecting halls. Obi-Wan and Anakin were busily throwing wet sponges and soapy water at each other. Their cheerful laughter filled the corridor.
Yoda smiled and walked on. "Good for each other they are," he mused aloud. "Right you were."
*It's nice to hear you say that,* Qui-Gon said as he smiled down at his boys.