Chapter Eighty-Three

Obi-Wan watched dispassionately as a Calamarian and a Gamorrean wrestled at the end of the bar. He wasn't exactly sure why he had come to this place, one of the thousands of seedy lairs like it which existed on the lower levels of Coruscant. Like all such places it was noisy and smoky and reeked of too many bodies. He supposed he had come because it was easy to lose oneself in a place like this.

Obi-Wan wasn't wearing his Jedi attire, but he did have Qui-Gon's lightsaber hidden under his dark tunic. He hadn't wanted to be recognized as a Jedi. He had wanted to be just as he felt; faceless, unknown, a hollow man.

The barkeep, an obese human female with purple hair, watched blankly as the Gamorrean put a headlock on the Calamarian. She shrugged, glanced down to where Obi-Wan sat by himself and wobbled over to him.

"Yar sure yar don't be wantin' somethin' stronger?" she asked, her one good eye gazing skeptically at the nearly empty glass in front of him.

Obi-Wan shook his head. "No, this is fine. Thank you."

He picked up the glass of Alderaann tea he'd been drinking and downed the rest of it quickly. Obi-Wan hadn't had anything alcoholic to drink since the night of his birthday dinner when he and Aalea had had too much wine. He winced as he thought of her.

The barkeep leaned closer to Obi-Wan. Her breath was foul.

"Yar know, yar looks to me like yar might be just a tad lonely," she said. "Aye, I've seen that look before. Missin' yar girl, are yar? Far away is she?"

Obi-Wan only shook his head.

"Well, iffen yar interested, I can hook yar up. Iffen yar can't be with the one yar loves, loves the one yar with me mum always said. No since spending the night alone iffen yar don't have to. Especially a handsome young lad like yar."

She jerked her head over to where a blue-skinned Twi'lekian female was dancing on the stage.

"Her name is Lalai. Fifty credits and she's yars for the night."

As Obi-Wan gazed back at the barkeep, he considered for a moment revealing to her he was a Jedi Knight. Instead he shook his head.

"No, thanks. I'm fine."

The barkeep leaned back. "Alrighty, then, But iffen yar change yar mind, just give a holler."

She waddled back to the other end of the bar where the Calamarian and the Gamorrean were now buying each other drinks.

Obi-Wan sighed. He looked over at the stage. The Twi'lekian dancer gyrated her hips sinuously, her head-tails snaking down her slender back. But when Obi-Wan looked up into her face, it was vacant. Her eyes gazed indifferently across the room. Obi-Wan looked at her audience. They stared up at her, their faces equally empty and barren.

Obi-Wan looked around him. The pub was full of people who were searching for something, anything which would fill up the emptiness inside them. Gambling, liquor, drugs, a fight, a man, a woman; anything, anyone to hold onto in the darkness.

Obi-Wan closed his eyes and thought back to that moon-drenched night on Sylvonna when he and Aalea had made love for the first time and all he could see was her night-black hair flowing over her slender bare shoulder, and all he could feel was her, soft and warm in his arms, her little pants of pleasure hot and sweet on his neck, her violet eyes gazing lovingly up at him.

Obi-Wan opened his eyes, pushed his glass away and stood. He tossed more credits than the drink cost him on the bar, turned and quickly left the pub.

He knew where he wanted to be.

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Obi-Wan chimed Aalea's door. He had already chimed it twice. He sighed. He had left the seedy pub and come straight back to the temple. But it was very late. Aalea was more than likely asleep. He had tried. Tomorrow he would have to take Anakin back from Master Yoda and then he would have no time for her.

He turned to leave, then he heard a soft voice behind him.

"Obi-Wan."

Obi-Wan turned and his throat tightened. And suddenly it was that morning months ago, a lifetime ago, when Qui-Gon had asked him to check on Aalea. At the time he'd been unaware of what had happened between her and his master; how Aalea had impulsively kissed Qui-Gon under the influence of not only the wine they'd had at Cian's, but her girlish crush.

Now, as he looked over at her, once again her black hair was unbound and lay heavily about her slender shoulders. Her violet eyes regarded him sleepily. But this time, instead of the cold and haughty reception he'd received then, she smiled warmly at him. She reached out her hand. He took it and let her pull him into her quarters.

Once the door was closed, they stood for a moment and looked at each other. The room was softly lit. Aalea had turned on only one of the glowlamps in the common area when she had come to answer the door. Her eyes were shadowed in the soft light.

As Obi-Wan looked down at her, he wanted so much to take her into his arms, but he couldn't move. She had to know, had to see, that he was only a hollow man; that a part of him had died in that melting pit on Naboo.

Aalea reached up and touched his face. Then he felt her reaching to him through their bond, but he couldn't let her in. There was nothing there, couldn't she see that; nothing for her to connect with, to feel, to embrace.

Pain flared in her eyes when she encountered his shields and it hurt him to see it. Then she smiled softly. She slipped her arms about him and laid her head on his chest.

"It's all right, dearheart. It's all right," Aalea said softly.

Obi-Wan closed his eyes. Her voice was so sweet. Tears welled under his eyelids. Why couldn't she see he was dead inside?

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Aalea held onto Obi-Wan even as she noted that his arms remained at his side. When she had looked into his eyes as he had stood at her door, she had recognized that dead-eyed look. For she had seen it in her own eyes whenever she had looked in the mirror after Qui-Gon's death.

But Cian had helped her. Cian, who of the three of them, had lost the most, was the one who had rallied to save her. And now Aalea would do the same for Obi-Wan. He thought he could not be helped; Aalea could see that. But the fact he had come to her when he could have stayed away gave her hope.

So Aalea waited. She spoke soothingly to him, gentle words of comfort and solace, her arms around him. It wasn't long.

At first Obi-Wan cried quietly, but then he began to weep, heart-wrenching sobs which sounded like they were being ripped from his soul. He slipped his arms around her as he buried his face on her shoulder. Aalea held him tighter.

"It's all right, dearheart," she said as she held him. "It's all right."

"Oh, Aalea. I failed him! I failed him!"

"No, Obi-Wan, you did not fail him."

He raised his head, his eyes wild with grief.

"If only I had been stronger, quicker, I could have saved him." His voice choked on the words.

Aalea reached up and cupped his face. She looked deep into his eyes.

"You did all you could, my love. I know that. You must stop blaming yourself."

"How could you know?"

"Because I was there. I saw what happened. You mustn't blame yourself for something you had no control over. Qui-Gon pressed the attack against the Sith because he was protecting you."

"But how could you have seen...?" Realization dawned in his eyes. "The bond?"

Aalea nodded. "I can't explain what happened. I was pulled into the Force matrix and I went to Naboo and I was there with you. And I saw...I saw him...struck down."

Tears welled in Aalea's voice and in her eyes.

Obi-Wan touched her tears as they slipped over her lashes.

"Oh, Aalea," he said softly. "I didn't know."

"And I was so afraid you were going to be killed too," she sobbed. "I tried to get help, but no one believed me."

Obi-Wan pulled Aalea close to him and they wept in each other's arms and, as they did, the shields in Obi-Wan's mind dropped and he flowed to her and she to him, their tears like wind and rain, sweeping through their shattered and wounded souls. They found comfort in each other's pain and in each other's love and, for long, tear-filled moments they stood and held onto each other, two tiny flickers of light in a universe of darkness and grief.

Finally, after all their tears were spent, they still held on, their arms warm and soft about the other.

Then Aalea, her face pressed against Obi-Wan's chest, sniffed at his tunic.

"Obi-Wan," she said as she looked up at him. "Where have you been? You smell like one of those places the proctors used to warn us about when we were initiates."

He smiled slightly down at her.

"Would you believe I was on a reconnaissance mission? Scouting out potential contacts in the hope of finally bringing in the head of the Black Sun crime organization."

She laughed softly.

"Not in a million years." Then her eyes sobered. "Did you find what you were looking for, dearheart?"

Obi-Wan hugged her. "Yes, love. Yes, I did."

Aalea took Obi-Wan's hand and led him into the sleep room. They then lay on her bed and kissed and made love and cried again, for even as they found solace in each other's arms, they also could not forget the man they had both loved and respected and missed so much. Later, much later, they both finally fell asleep, their tears drying upon the other's cheeks.

To be continued...