Athena Leigh Thank you! I was worried about the title at first, so thanks doubly!

Where moments before there was merely quiet, his light, bright laughter fills the viewing room.

And I have to wonder how I find reason to be distressed by this grinning child.

'The boy is dangerous. They all sense it. Why can't you?'

Perhaps they were hastily spoken, those words on the landing platform. It was difficult to function in a whirlwind, with so many constants in upheaval, and the plumes of exhaust rising hot in the air.

Could I have been speaking not out of concern for Anakin-or even the Jedi's behalf—but for my own, selfish motives?

Did I look at Anakin, a mere child, saved from the toil of slavery, and see only the ramifications his freedom, his Jedi training, would have on me? Is that why I could sense such patent sadness roil through my connection with Qui-Gon, as we stood facing one another, like two friends who abruptly cannot understand or recognize their camaraderie?

Did he, in all his wisdom and capacity, detect the sins that I have only discovered this night?

And when he confided in me his certainty that I would be a great Jedi Knight, was he already aware of what fate would deal him, in the terrible battle that would follow? Were his endearments an empty attempt at assuagement—a final reprieve so that I might not remember him, or regard Anakin, with resentment?

What if this path we walk is rife with false stones, riddled with ash and the ghosts of lies once spoken? Is this bead to bring the moment when our steps press a little too hard, and shatter the fragile road?

"Master?"

A small quake in my stomach. For all the sweetness in his voice, it can be an unsettling sound. "Yes?" I force myself to look at his rounded face.

"Do you remember anything that happened that day?"

I frown. Countless shards of my life, since he was brought into it, glint in my mental vision, each threatening in different ways. "What day?"

He stares at me, his eyes boring into mine with an intensity no one else—not even my Master-has been able to rival. "That day on the Pramilx moon." He clarifies softly.

"Oh." And for once, I can answer with total honesty. "No. No I don't, Anakin."

"I didn't think so." He plays with his thumbs, head down.

"Why?"

He shrugs. "I dunno."

I cross my arms, leaning forward to peek at his hidden face. "You obviously had a reason, or you wouldn't have asked."

He sighs and glances up at me, gnawing at his bottom lip. "Um, when I found you, you were yelling."

"I was yelling?"

He nods. "You were yelling my name, over and over."

I shake my head, bewildered. "No, Anakin. The gas knocked me-it knocked everyone-unconscious. I couldn't have been yelling."

"But you were." He persists, the tiniest stirrings of frustration creasing his forehead. "You were yelling. I heard you. You were telling me to be careful. I couldn't see through the smoke, but I know what I heard."

Despite his insistences, I can't believe it. The gasses used were later identified as incredibly potent, and I was told there was no way we could have escaped them. Anakin was able to perform his rescue because enough time had passed to allow air circulation to weaken the effectiveness of the fumed poison, and he further dispersed it by throwing open the doors and windows.

My chest constricts as I realize, yet again, the magnitude of the miracle my Padawan accomplished. If not for him, innocents would have breathed their final, tainted breaths on Pramilx –and I would have, as well.

I am grateful that Anakin saved my life.

I am.

I will not abide further contemplation of it.

"Padawan, you were nothing short of a hero that day."

This earns me an earnest smile.

"But you know the details of the gasses that were employed. I was, well, out cold, and incapable of providing you a warning of any kind."

Anakin pulls his knees up against his chest. For a short span of time, he is uncharacteristically quiet, staring out at the neon firework of hyperspace. "Master Qui-Gon can talk to me." He moves sobered eyes to my face. "I can hear him, even though…Even though I can't see him."

I have to look away briefly. "Anakin—"

"I know you don't think I can." His soft, slightly accusing voice is a scrape against my soul, more than grazing the heart within. "He tells me you won't let yourself believe it."

I can sense my body go completely still under an onslaught of unnamable despair. My only means of defense is denial—and I know it. "Master Qui-Gon is gone. It isn't a question of 'letting myself' believe he can somehow communicate with us. I saw him," I close my eyes and swallow, "I saw him…pass. And I've never—"

"Then how do I hear him?" He asks, pitch rising, almost echoing in the silent bowels of the ship.

I run cold fingers through my hair. "I don't know, Anakin. Maybe because you want to hear it."

That was a mistake. I recognized it the instant it was spoken, but there's no taking it back now. I can't erase the hard glint of pain in his young eyes.

"I'm not imagining it."

Suddenly unbearably tired, I press my face into my hands. "That's not what I meant—"

"I'm not making it up, Master."

In the smothering darkness of my palms, it's easier to disagree with him. "I know you're not making it up, young one. But if you badly wanted to believe it—"

"He told me he misses you." He says bluntly.

No no no. I sit upright, and take a steady breath. "Anakin, I will not listen to this. It has nothing to do with Pramilx. It has nothing to do with anything."

"But it does! I can hear Master Qui-Gon, even though he's dead-"

"Anakin!"

"And I could hear you that day, yelling to me. I heard it ringing in my ears, and I heard it through our bond." He reaches out and, to my surprise, grasps my hand as though I would be sent spiraling down a cliff if he let go or even loosened his hold.

I flinch inwardly, and want very much to pull away. But I've already hurt him more than I can endure, so instead, I wrap my fingers around his, and wish fervently, silently, that this subject will just drop.

In too many ways, my levels of tolerance have been threatened tonight.

"You told me to be careful. That you wouldn't be able to stand it if something happened to me. You—You wanted me to stay away from the building you were in."

Once again, I'm confounded by his words. I have not even a residual recollection of any of it. Gently, "Anakin, I don't…"

"But I do, Master. I know I heard you…because it took a lot for me to disobey what you said. I knew I wasn't supposed to go against a direct order from you." A single droplet gleams at the edge of a blonde eyelash, and I can hardly brook the agony that results from that heartbreaking image. "But, in my mind, I didn't have a choice. I felt all this…open emotion from you, and I couldn't just stand by and…"

He is unable to continue.

A fact for which I'm thankful, because I can't take anymore.

Emotion? What emotion?

A sense of duty? Obligation? Responsibility to the Order, and to my Master?

What else can there be? I have trekked the bitter wilderness of my soul these few hours, and I hold no more illusions.

I glance at him over my shoulder, and pray he'll know how much I regret.

"My mom used to say you could tell if someone loved you, because you'd be able to feel it, like a warmth inside you. I always felt it around her. And when I met Padme…" A faint blush appears on his cheeks. "And Master Qui-Gon, I felt it a little. But I barely got to know either of them.

"When I heard you yelling to me on Pramilx, I felt it. Stronger than I've ever felt it since I left Tatooine." He shakes his head. "You can't imagine something like that. I don't care if you were unconscious. You can dream, can't you? So how do you know you can't do more?"

I expect to drown in the current of what he has told me, but I find that I'm numb, and can't feel the small hand enclosed in mine.

"I-Is Master Qui-Gon proud of you?"

He slowly nods. "Yeah. He says I'm doing great."

I nod in reply, then wet my lips. "Anakin, why don't you go back to our cabin, and try to get some sleep? I'll join you in a moment."

He hesitates, ever-attentive to detail. "Are you okay, Master?"

"I'm fine." I usher a smile from the dark drafts and trembling candlelight of my spirit, so he will believe it, and be at peace.

"Okay." He half-hops off the bench, walks to the door, then wheels around on his heel. "Master?"

I clear my throat. "Yes?"

"He's proud of you too."

)(

My Master once told me, as we settled down for sleep on a transport ship, that I had one of the most organized minds he had ever encountered. It was after a difficult mission, during which we salvaged the lives of an entire village, including children. We survived by the skin of our teeth, and afterward nursed quite a few bruises on the beaten skin of our bodies.

The day we were preparing to depart, an elder regarded as a sage stopped us as we were cinching our travel packs.

His considerable years had left his voice not much more than a croak, but my Master heard every word.

The man said that once, he had taken ill with a ravaging disease, and actually died for a few tense moments before he was resuscitated. He described the moment he felt himself separate from his earthly form, and saw the faces of angels, glowing with a pure, beautiful luster. It lasted only fleetingly, for he was quickly brought back to life, but he never forgot the precious seconds he spent in the company of the luminescent spirits.

New decades had brought serious problems to his homeworld, and the blessed memory began to fade in the midst of violence and political unrest.

But, he told my Master, gripping his arm with liver-spotted fingers, his faith was restored by the appearance of the Jedi.

He said he was astounded, and utterly rapturous, to learn that some angels had chosen to walk the grounds of the Universe.

Qui-Gon was ever-gracious, thanking the man while concurrently denying the enormous claim.

The man shook his head. He contended that he had seen the light surrounding us only once before, and never mistook it for something less remarkable.

Later, in the privacy of our little on-ship quarters, I mentioned that the people of the quaint village must have undergone tremendous hardship, for their wisest member to genuinely believe the presence of angels.

Qui-Gon rolled onto his side, so that he faced me. In the darkness, I could barely make out the regal composition of his face, but his eyes shone clearly. As they always did. "Why do you say that, Padawan?"

I hadn't expected my comment to be questioned. Immediately, I felt—stupid. "Well, believing in another, higher state of existence is one thing. But thinking that the two would intersect is…"

"Silly?" He offered.

"NO." I fought the heat surfacing on my face. "But it's…It's stretching it, I guess."

"You don't believe that elements of the afterlife could touch the living? Touch someone like that man?"

I closed my eyes. It wasn't uncommon to feel very small when your views were challenged by a man as intelligent and seasoned as Qui-Gon Jinn. "For me, it's a stretch."

His tone was uncritical, almost tender. "Have you seen so much, my apprentice, that you can't believe such things?"

"I don't…I don't know, Master. When I look inside myself, I don't feel that kind of faith." I stared at the ceiling. "What does that mean? What does that make me?"

I felt my sleepcouch pressed down by his weight. He sat beside me and gazed down with a slight smile. "There's nothing 'wrong' with you, if that's what you're concerned about, Obi-Wan. Not everyone can easily accept those things which are unusual, or unexplainable. Your mind is orderly, more so than most. As a Jedi, it needs to be. Perhaps you'll change a bit, as you grow older. Or maybe you'll stay the little cynic that you are." He poked my cheek.

I smiled. "Do you believe?"

"I think that the Universe is colored by more than black and white. Gray is everywhere, Padawan. Hells," He chuckled, "It'll even be in your hair one day." He invited me to look at the streaks that ran through his mostly chestnut mane.

"Don't be ashamed of your sensibility. It's one of your most admirable qualities." A spark lit his eyes, and I wanted very much to think it was caused, even partially, from me. "When you give your faith to something, you give it wholly, Obi-Wan."

He smiled again and leaned in close, to whisper the last in my ear. "So make sure it's something worth believing."

I don't think my Master would consider my mind to be the epitome of tidiness and structure anymore. Voices swarm my thoughts, and only one of them is my own.

He's proud of me?

That's what Anakin said. But to accept the sentiment—

How can angels converse with the living? It is beyond the realms of rationality. It is a sweet notion of stardust and crystalline wings—

And does not involve feeling a body cool under your hands, smelling the burnt flesh of a fatal wound, all while attempting to swallow the bile churning in your throat.

I loved my Master with every fiber of my being. I would throw myself out the window right now, throw away all that I have worked for in life, if it would bring him back.

But believing he is a ghost at our shoulders is not going to bring him back.

I want to believe. I want to believe he is proud of me, and is proud of Anakin.

Certainly it's worth believing.

But now, these years later, I have seen too much.

Besides, what would he say to me, if he could hear the deliberations of my psyche? How could he possibly be proud of me?

Would he be pleased if I came to believe it, really believe it…and was unable to handle it?

Anakin can handle it, so let him believe, for surely Qui-Gon is proud of the amazing strides the boy has taken.

If it comforts my Padawan, then I'm glad.

But I couldn't deal with—I don't deserve—that kind of comfort.

I walk out of the dim room, my steps echoing in the hollow corridor. I know Anakin is still awake; I can hardly blame him.

He'll be waiting for me to make things right, to straighten the wrinkles in the fabric of our bond and our hearts.

To do so, must I take stock in his claims? Must I believe that I do love him to the incredible degree he says he felt on Pramilx?

What if I try, what if I embrace the idea, and am incapable of managing it?

I'm standing at the door to our cabin, wishing the sojourn from the viewing room would have taken longer.

But I can't hesitate anymore. Anakin has probably already sensed my arrival.

With a sigh, I enter.

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