Get up.
Ben pretended he had not heard the voice and went back to sleep. Bed seemed the best place for him to be. It had been a week since he had left the Lars homestead and learned of Padmé's death; in that time, he'd ventured into Anchorhead and made discreet inquiries about the price of passage to Coruscant. There were no transports that he could afford with the remaining cash Bail Organa had given him before he left Alderaan. Briefly, Ben had considered selling Anakin's lightsaber, but decided against it. Not only would selling it give him away, it was, on reflection, a sick thing to do.
No, the Force seemed determined not only to give him no useful task on Tatooine, but also to prevent his escape. In response he slept as much as possible. Sleep was the only escape granted him.
Get up.
Now the Force wanted to take that away, too.
Get up, Obi-Wan.
"Ben," he mumbled, and rolled over to find a more comfortable position. "My name is Ben."
No, it isn't. You've only forgotten.
"Forgotten the name of the man whose pride was his downfall? Who was too concerned with being a Jedi to take the precaution of posing as a wizard? Who was too full of being the perfect Master to save his own Padawan? Well forgotten, I say."
Think again, Obi-Wan. Or have four and a half years in the desert so clogged your brain with sand that you cannot?
Suddenly, the voice of the Force did not sound like his own voice at all. It sounded, in fact, very like his old Master.
"Qui-Gon?"
Think, Obi-Wan.
Invisible fingers tugged at the corners of his mind, gently but firmly. Obi-Wan thought.
A not-too-distant memory came, of a voice saying What if your task was not to save Anakin? And he thought of his own words just then, lying in bed, claiming responsibility for Anakin's fall. He groaned.
"All right," he said, "I see now. Taking the blame for the greatest evil the galaxy has ever known – claiming that kind of influence – that's a kind of pride too, isn't it? Very well. There was nothing I could have done. Are you satisfied? I've no pride left now."
Perhaps now that you've no pride, you will listen to me.
It sounded like "me" when the voice spoke, but it sounded curiously like "us", too, and afterward Obi-Wan was never quite sure which word the Force had used.
He allowed his eyes to slit open. "What do you want of me?" he asked.
I want you to use the mind you were born with and the wisdom you've earned. Get up.
"For more torture? I thank you, no."
Someone is coming to see you.
The invisible fingers pulled at him from the inside, urging him to sit up. Obi-Wan remained still.
"I have strength enough in me yet to resist you," he said, and he knew it was true. He could break the hold of the Force, shut his ears to its voice, stay in bed, ignore the visitor, and sleep away the rest of his days.
But deep within, he knew he did not want to resist.
Get up, said the Force, and Obi-Wan got up to greet his visitors.