A/N: I knew I wouldn't be able to focus on studying. So, here's another chapter. Not much to really say except I love the comments—thanks to those who have responded—it never ceases to make my day!
Chapter 5
The banquet hall, trimmed with the greatest finery, encased Anakin, who stared wonderingly into the vaulted ceilings. Intricate carvings etched delicately across the ceiling, forming some geometric tessellation that Anakin knew must have taken a great deal of precision. The walls, an exquisite shade of pale green, hosted a variety of other framed artwork, ranging in styles from surrealistic to classical. Fantastic sculptures were spaced between the gold rimmed windows. Exotic plants hung carefully about, well watered and cared for on a daily basis, for their colors were vibrant and true, and showed no signs of decay. The table spanned out before him, lined with elegant padded chairs—10 on each long side. At the head of the table surely sat the Queen's chair, for it was adorned royally, with frivolous accents that accumulated more wealth than Anakin had been privileged to in his entire life. It seemed there was no end to the wonders of Naboo.
When Padmé had suggested lunch, Anakin had assumed it would be a simple affair. When Sabé had brought him to the main banquet hall, the idea at first overwhelmed him slightly. But, in truth, things were beginning to overwhelm him less and less, as situations appeared to him with a new, distinct kind of clarity. After Sabé politely retreated, he had merely laughed, his young voice resounding off the ceilings in an odd melodic manner. Things in his life were definitely beginning to look up.
Suddenly the main doors opened, and Padmé, decked in a large and flowing gown, strode in, followed by an entourage of guards, handmaidens and advisors. Her face, painted chalk white, accenting the red spots more clearly, remained expressionless. She turned abruptly to the group and said, "Thank you all. Now you make take your leave of me."
"Your Highness, shouldn't you have protection?" one of the guards asked. The brief Trade Federation occupation affected the people, especially those in the Palace deeply. Guards especially were still tense, almost afraid to believe the peace was possible.
Unfazed, Padmé held her head high. "I appreciate your concern. When I am finished, I will address the public. Until then, however," she said, a small smile daring to cross her lips as she looked at Anakin, "I have a previous engagement."
Grinning, Anakin watched as the entourage reluctantly left. Her attire, majestic in its intentions, made Anakin feel awkward in his plain tunic. But Padmé's face, beaming with radiant contentment, put him nearly at ease. "It is good to see you again, Anakin," she greeted him happily.
"I'm not keeping you from anything?" Anakin worried conscientiously.
Moving toward the end of the table, she shook her head. "What could be more important than spending time with a national hero?" she asked him lightly. "Besides, after such events, I have come to appreciate that which is truly important to me—not to the Queen, but to Padmé. And you are important to me."
Trailing behind her, Anakin blushed slightly. "You're important to me, too," he murmured.
Padmé merely smiled and set to arranging herself in her chair. Anakin hesitantly crept into a chair on the end. "I apologize for my clothing," she said, noting his somewhat unsure posture. "But once I finally get into one of these things I can't just take it off. The whole process takes close to two hours, so you can imagine that I try to minimize how frequently I change, even if it is dreadfully uncomfortable."
"Sometimes it's just hard to imagine that it's really you under all that," Anakin told her shyly.
"Yes, it is a bit ostentatious," Padmé agreed. "This is traditional dress on Naboo, and our history is very important to us. It's a part of our culture that we don't want to forget. It is so rich and so vibrant. I guess that's why we fought so hard against the Trade Federation. We had much to lose."
Anakin considered this inquisitively. The elegance and depth of Naboo was more than beautiful to these people. When they fought, they fought to defend it. Anakin had fought to defend the people. They had fought because they had so much to lose. He had fought because he had nothing to lose. "I wish I had a home that I could love like that," he said wistfully, thinking of his own humble quarters back on Tatooine. Despite his mother's best efforts, the place had still been barren. It had been warm with love, but meek in decoration. It held an ambiguous place in his heart—the only place he knew and could care for yet the only place he had wanted to flee from his entire life.
"A home is more than a building," Padmé said softly. "It's even more than things in a building. It's about love."
"I know," Anakin said, forcing a smile. He knew all too well. He missed his home suddenly. He missed his mother.
The young boy's disposition faded slightly with sadness. Padmé knew the boy's background, and she had seen where he had lived. And although he had loathed his existence as a slave and dreamt always of leaving, he had been inexorably attached to his mother. "You miss your mother," she guessed gently.
Tears threatened to spill onto his cheeks. He offered a weak smile. "Yeah," he admitted. "I mean, sometimes I worry that I left her behind and she is the best thing in my life. What if the Jedi don't take me?"
Touched by his innocence, Padmé longed to comfort him. Sometimes she forgot just how much he had left behind. Yes, he had left behind a miserable life of slavery—an inhumane position that no being should have to fulfill. But, even in that, he had been bathed in love and security. The bond between Anakin and his mother had been strong—stronger than anything else Padmé could sense from him. Leaving Tatooine for the chance to be a Jedi would seem like a no-brainer, but leaving his mother for a life he didn't know must be much more frightening. "Why wouldn't the Jedi take you? Master Jinn has said that you have extreme talent. You are very strong with the Force."
Anakin shrugged. "I don't know. I went before the Council, and they asked me a lot of questions. They also said I was strong with the Force, but they said I was too old."
"Too old?" Padmé wondered. "You're just a boy."
"Most Jedi are trained from their toddler years, I guess," Anakin surmised. "But Qui-Gon was insistent. He tells me I will be a Jedi."
"Well," Padmé said with confidence. "If Master Jinn is sure, then I am also sure. Master Jinn has proven to be very wise."
"I know," Anakin conceded, doubt still coloring his voice. "But I don't want to be in a place where I am not wanted."
There was a painful honesty in that admission that gripped Padmé's soul. In that moment, her feelings for the boy became startling evident in her mind. He was more than her friend—they were connected on some other level, some deeper level. She could not understand it, but she knew it with an indubitable certainty. "If the Jedi do not want you Anakin, they are fools."
"But I want to be a Jedi!" he exclaimed, slightly alarmed.
"And you will be a magnificent Jedi," she assured him. "But, if things should not work out, you will always have a home here on Naboo."
His eyes slowly rose to meet hers. "Really?"
"Yes," she said, thinking suddenly how wonderful it would be. He could live at the Palace during her reign, and he could learn how to be a pilot. He could go to school with children his own age—free children. She could take him to the mountains and the lakes where she had frequented on retreats as a child. She would show him the beauty of Naboo. And then, when she was no longer Queen, she could take him back to her home and her family and he could be her brother. No, not a brother. But they would be close and true.
The worries had melted away from his face, which was now glowing with his radiant smile. "I would very much like to do both," he said.
"Both?" Padmé said with a laugh.
"Yes! Be a Jedi and live here with you."
The idea seemed preposterous and picturesque all at once. They both laughed at the thought as the food was brought in. They dined together, joined already by a bond neither could comprehend. But surely it could only keep growing.
***
The lightness had given way to a solidity he had forgotten about. The sensation of floating vanished, leaving the odd reality of concrete contact.
Qui-Gon quickly realized that although bacta was still covering him head to foot and soaked into his internal organs, he was no longer floating in it. With this new and rather inspiring knowledge, he acknowledged each of his body parts, twitching his muscles with the Force approvingly.
Warm hands were rubbing him, trying to dry the bacta as best they could. The contact revitalized his sense of existence, and he quickly gained the will to try real movement. Proceeding unsteadily, he lurched upwards, trying to sit up on the bed which he had been placed.
He was greeted with a light chorus of reprimands. Qui-Gon looked at them beseechingly but they appeared unaffected by his pleas for indulgence. A young woman who could have only been a medical assistant shook her head, saying, "Take it easy. You're not quite well yet."
But Qui-Gon would not be placated. He could not remember how much time he had spent in the tank, but he knew it was too long. He had things to attend to. He had to talk to Anakin—make sure the boy was okay. He needed to contact the Council—Anakin's fate still hung in the balance. And Obi-Wan…Obi-Wan!
With a new and more pressing need, Qui-Gon attempted to sit up yet again, eliciting a very similar response. "What are you trying to do?" one of the workers asked him, his voice blithe but stern.
To explain his motivations, he attempted to speak, but only a garbled sound came out.
"Exactly," the young woman said. "Now we've expended far too much energy to make sure you're okay for you to go undo everything now."
Qui-Gon shook his head vehemently, straining to look around the room. The whiteness of everything was disorienting without the veil of bacta to soften it. Then, through the hands of the workers cleaning him off, he spotted his apprentice. "Obi-Wan…," he managed to say this time, trying to sit up once again.
One of the workers glanced to see what had captured his attention. "Oh, look, you need to focus on yourself right now," he said.
Finally Qui-Gon was successful in his venture to sit up, despite the protests and hands of the workers. "Obi-Wan needs me," he said breathlessly.
"You can't do anything for him," the young woman explained. "He's stable. You can check on him a little later when you're more rested."
"No," Qui-Gon insisted, now endeavoring to swing his legs off the bed. It seemed that his motor functions were gaining accuracy and strength and words came with significantly more ease. His mind cleared more and more each second. "I must help him."
"You can't even stand!" another protested.
Reassessing his physical capabilities, Qui-Gon didn't doubt that they were right. He closed his eyes, taking several deep breaths. When he opened his eyes again, he felt much steadier, although he felt quite sticky. He examined each of the four med workers with respect and control. "I respect and appreciate all that you have done and are trying to do," he said. "But I really must tend to my Padawan."
"You can't help him," one said emphatically.
Qui-Gon decided not to debate that point with them. Instead he would plead with a more sympathetic tactic. "He is my Padawan. Our relationship is very deep. I must be with him."
The young woman's face softened the most visibly. "Look, just let us clean you off, and then you can go see him, okay?"
It was an annoyance, but in the end an acceptable compromise. "Very well," he replied. "Proceed."
The rubbing resumed hesitantly. Lying down again, Qui-Gon closed his eyes and went limp for the med. workers. The process, with its steady and methodical movements, resembled that of a massage and took on a therapeutic quality in itself. Qui-Gon allowed himself to reap the benefits of the process, and when they were finally done, he felt not only much drier and less gooey, but far more relaxed and collected as well. Three of the four workers had gone on to other things, but the young man eyed him carefully as he helped Qui-Gon into a more suitable outfit. "You feel better now?" he asked quizzically.
"Yes," Qui-Gon replied, sitting up with a substantially less effort. "Thank you very much."
The man smiled slightly. "You still need to take it easy," he said. "I know you're a Jedi and all, but you still are recovering from a nearly fatal wound. It will take time to regain your full strength."
"I am well aware."
"We don't want to have you aggravate your injury," he said.
"I will heed your advice," he assured him with an air of calm that belied the urgency he felt within. He could see Obi-Wan's prone figure on the bed in the far corner of the room. "But I really must go to my Padawan."
The man looked down, hesitating. "Yes, of course," he said. "Follow me."
With care, Qui-Gon eased himself off the table. The med worker watched him closely, hovering to offer aid if needed. Although Qui-Gon's knees threatened to buckle under the strain of his large physique, he managed to hold himself erect. Smiling with reassurance at the med worker, he let the man escort him to the other side of the room where Obi-Wan lay. Seeing Qui-Gon was fairly stable on his own, the man pulled up a chair for the Jedi. "You should sit down," he recommended softly.
Qui-Gon didn't see any reason to ignore the suggestion and sank slowly into the chair, his eyes fixed on his apprentice. The pale hue of the young man's skin was disconcerting, and the lax features on his face made him appear frighteningly vulnerable. The young man seemed dwarfed lying in the small bed, accentuating to Qui-Gon that while Obi-Wan was nearly a Knight, he still possessed remnants of the naiveté and innocence of the boy Qui-Gon took on 13 years ago. Suddenly the years seemed like mere seconds, and the young man lying before him was again the battered 12 year old boy who had unsuccessfully wrestled a Hutt on the way to Bandomeer. There were so many memories hidden just beneath the comatose presence of his Padawan. He recalled times when they had been sharing the same room. After the long days of a mission, Obi-Wan usually fell asleep quickly, his quiet snores soothing and amusing to the elder master. But Obi-Wan's face lacked the youthful peace that befell him in sleep. In fact, the inanimate quality of his normally vibrant apprentice gave the impression of death far quicker than that of sleep. There was a tube in Obi-Wan's mouth, which snaked out to a machine that whirred rhythmically with the nearly imperceptible rise and fall of Obi-Wan's chest.
"He's stable," the med worker interrupted his thoughts. "But we don't know what's wrong with him."
"Has he woken up?"
The man shook his head. "No. There is no sign of physical injury otherwise we'd have him in bacta. We can find no reason for it, but he seems to be in a deep coma. His bodily functions are slowly shutting down." When Qui-Gon had nothing to say, the man continued, "He stopped breathing late last night. He didn't respond to any treatments. We had to put him on a ventilator to keep him breathing. It's the only thing keeping him alive."
"You have done all you can," Qui-Gon murmured, reaching out to stroke Obi-Wan's hair gently. There was an awkward lapse of silence, the man still loitering at the bedside. Without looking up, Qui-Gon focused on the man's mind, drawing on the Force. With a wave of his hand, he said, "You will leave us be now."
The man was not particularly stupid, but was also not particularly on a defense for such a willful Force suggestion. He succumbed easily to the suggestion. "I'll leave you be now," he said, as if it were his idea, and then wandered off. Satisfied that he now had adequate privacy, he leaned closer to his Padawan's bedside. The sheets were neatly drawn over the young man's lithe body, the pale, milky color casting an ashen shade on Obi-Wan's skin. As a master, the injury or illness of the apprentice always caused an unsettling feeling. He had been at Obi-Wan's bedside before, but that never made it any easier. He cared deeply for the young man entrusted to his care. And although Obi-Wan was practically a grown man—nearly a Knight—he was still under Qui-Gon's care. His hand rested on Obi-Wan matted hair. Closing his eyes, he used the Force to reach out to the still body.
He recoiled in surprise and fear when he received no trace of response. Not even as much as a flicker of Obi-Wan's mind had responded to his approach. Studying the young features again, he allowed his fatherly hand to caress Obi-Wan cool cheek. Calming himself, he closed his eyes again, approaching with more care and completely prepared.
Again he met with the same emptiness, but this time he probed deeper, exploring the depths and make up of the emptiness. His Padawan was clearly still there—machines may have taken full hold of his autonomic functions and his brain may have shown no detectable activity, but his Padawan's Life Force still inhabited the shell of his body. The careful examine of his student's mind told him this much, and it appeared that Obi-Wan had retreated within himself.
Feeling along their training bond, he came to remember the other bond that still linked them—the healing bond that Obi-Wan had initiated following Qui-Gon's mortal injury. Carefully, he sought that bond out, feeling it stretched from Obi-Wan's Life Force directly into his own. On the floor of the pit, the stream of energy from Obi-Wan had been an uncontrolled rush. Now, the young man's adrenaline depleted and Qui-Gon's energy restored, the flow was a tiny dribble, slipping through the bond and embellishing Qui-Gon's own life signs ever so slightly. No wonder he'd been able to recover so quickly. The formation of the bond was undoubtedly foolish and impulsive, not traits common to his Padawan. But the young man's common sense attitude had been overthrown by affection. In an act of pure self-sacrifice, Obi-Wan had saved him. Qui-Gon sighed slightly. What had he ever done to elicit so much love and respect from Obi-Wan? What had he done to deserve a Padawan like him? Now it was Qui-Gon's duty to bring Obi-Wan home.
Before he could even attempt to reach his apprentice, Qui-Gon had to sever the bond. He did not doubt that the open bond kept Obi-Wan's body from recovering from the drain. Once the bond was shut off for good, the energy could be used to sustain his own autonomic functions. Slipping easily into his Padawan's dormant mind, he quickly took control of the young man's unconscious hold on the bond. Since Obi-Wan was essentially defenseless, it was not difficult to break the bond off at Obi-Wan's end.
The results were immediate. He felt as though something had deflated within him. The amount did not substantially change him, but it still physically affected him, reminding him of his weakened state. The effect was much more readily seen in his apprentice.
Obi-Wan's body shuddered beneath the sheets. The sharp change in its energy flow shocked his unconscious and unstable system. Although it now conserved energy, it lost its precarious balance, maintained only by the whir and hiss of the nearby machines. Qui-Gon didn't hesitate to calm and comfort Obi-Wan, easing his systems back toward normal metabolic flow. After a moment, Obi-Wan seemed to relax, falling still against the sheets once again.
That had been the easy part, Qui-Gon reminded himself grimly. Now he had to coax Obi-Wan out of the deep hole in his mind where he had retreated. Traveling down their bond once again, he again entered the emptiness of Obi-Wan's mind. Then he silenced his own thoughts and listened. Stilling his own sense perceptions, he opened himself up completely for Obi-Wan's faint Force signature. After a moment of resounding silence, he picked up a slight trace. Honing in on it, he drew further into Obi-Wan's consciousness. Then, in a deep crevice, he found the presence.
The presence was confused and uncertain, but it was there, and it was without a doubt Obi-Wan. Qui-Gon could not restrain himself from smiling. His concentration unwavering, he gently reached out for Obi-Wan, offering him a hand—a way out. At first the young man seemed reluctant, but, once he placed the familiar love that beckoned him, he found a new will to try. With a hopeful and reassuring smile, Qui-Gon began to lead the young man back to the waking world. The process progressed slowly, but Qui-Gon felt no hurry. He and Obi-Wan had all the time in the world.
"Excuse me, Master Jinn?" a voice interrupted from behind.
Qui-Gon kept his hand firmly over Obi-Wan's eyes, still coaxing the hesitant apprentice out of the depths of his unconsciousness. Without moving, Qui-Gon replied evenly, "Yes."
It was the same young worker who had helped him over to Obi-Wan's bedside. He appeared more nervous now, perhaps intimidated by the Jedi's apparent powers. "Well, I hate to disturb you," he began in a stuttering way. "But there's a young boy outside who's demanding to see you."
This caught Qui-Gon's attention. He opened his eyes, turning his head slightly so he could look at the man, never moving his hand from Obi-Wan. "Anakin?"
"Yes."
"Somehow he knows you're awake," the man continued. "And he's desperate to talk to you. We tried to tell him that he could talk to you in a few hours when you were better rested, but the boy was incorrigible."
Somewhat touched, Qui-Gon allowed a dry smile to cross his face. The Master/Apprentice bond already had roots in both Qui-Gon and Anakin. The boy had already opened up his end. Once Qui-Gon allowed his end to be open, the bond would be firmly established. Under his hand, he could feel Obi-Wan's slow ascension to consciousness. It was slow, but somewhat steady. Obi-Wan could wait, he decided. Removing his hand, he barely noticed the slight tensing in the prone body. Instead he stood, gathering the Force around his own still weakened form, and said, "Very well."
***
The darkness hampered his vision, causing him to grope blindly through it with a staggering walk. He felt tired—so tired. He had never felt so tired before. Where was he? Where was his master? Why was he so tired?
Rationality finally trickled back into his disoriented senses. He was unconscious, he realized with a peculiar start. Deeply unconscious. He could slip back, away from this state he was in and regress to wherever it was he had been. But something—no, someone—had called him out of it. Master. As if on cue, the sensation of their bond returned to him. It comforted him greatly, and he breathed a sigh of relief. He was not without hope. He would not be alone. He would never be alone. He had his master.
So he determined to move onwards, struggling against the tired, heavy bonds of darkness that had laid claim to his brain. Onward, he told himself. That was what his master would want him to do.