So this is bought to you all by the fact that back in July I fell face-first into the Star Wars fandom again, and then proceeded to lose an entire month to binging fics. There might be more of them in the future, since I've kinda become enamored with it all again and messing about in big universes like this is kinda my jam.


It takes a week for Anakin to learn about the mission files.

Mostly this is because the first week at the Temple is a mess, made up of arranging their quarters and getting all of his medical stuff dealt with, but at dinner one night Master Obi-Wan- as he'd wanted to be called in private- had made a sound of remembrance and turned away, coming back with a datapad.

"I meant to give you this earlier, but it slipped my mind." He says, apologetic, and holds it out. "This already has all of your access permissions set up on it, including the ones to my Archive files- that way you don't have to go digging for me."

"Your… files?" Anakin asks, slowly reaching out to take it (with frequent glances at his Master's face, of course. Sometimes the Masters would offer something only to punish you if you tried to take it, and while his new master hadn't shown any signs of doing something like that so far, that didn't mean he wouldn't do it. It could be a test, or a way to build trust before tricking him into doing something wrong).

Master Obi-Wan makes that odd face he makes every time he's reminded that Anakin didn't grow up in the Temple and lets go of the pad once he's got a firm grip on it. "When an Initiate is taken as a Padawan, they gain access to their Master's mission files, so they can gain something of an idea of what their Master's done in the past. Most Padawans have already been wandering the Archives for some time by now, so they already know where they can find these sorts of files, but since you've not had the time yet I thought I'd save you from getting lost in the Archives' database and load the files for you ahead of time." He explains. "Of course some things are still classified above the level Padawans have, but you'll be able to get something of an idea of everything."

Anakin's eyes widen slightly. An entire datapad linked into a massive library- he's seen it in passing, during their runs about the Temple trying to sort everything out, but he didn't know he was allowed to use it!- and all sorts of files about his new Master on it? He'd have done a lot for this sort of chance on Tatooine, to learn about who's in control of him now, and now it's just being handed to him!

The temptation to leap up and run to his room to start reading is overwhelming, but he knows it would be rude and he doesn't want to give Master Obi-Wan a reason to think he shouldn't have the pad, so he puts it down on the table before slipping out of his chair and bowing. "Thank you, Master."

Master Obi-Wan smiles. "It's no trouble, Padawan. Finish your dinner, then you can read to your heart's content." Anakin flushes, and he laughs. "I was quite the same when I got access to my Master's files, I assure you."

Master Obi-Wan goes quiet, in that sad way that he does when he thinks about Master Qui-Gon, so Anakin hurries to finish his meal before he says something else that makes his Master sad and rushes away, shutting the door behind him and throwing himself onto the bed with the pad.


He spends the rest of the night like that, putting the pad down and pretending to sleep when Master Obi-Wan checks on him, then going right back to reading again.

Master Obi-Wan's files were filled up with more horrible things than Anakin had thought could happen to a freeborn, let alone someone who was raised as a Jedi. There was so much, and so many of the missions were absolutely awful…

But his attention was caught by one in particular, and no matter what he tried he couldn't get it out of his head for the rest of the day.

956.08.13. Bandomeer.

It was the first mission on the list, though he'd ignored it at first in favour of just looking around. But eventually he'd gone back, wanting to see what Master Obi-Wan and Master Qui-Gon had done together on their first mission…

And he'd ended up having to bury his face in his pillow to muffle his sobs.

It was so awful! How could Master Qui-Gon have let Master Obi-Wan get sent to the deep sea mines? Even Tatooine slaves knew about them, and knew how deadly they were- sometimes slaves got sold there for being useless to their Masters, and everyone knew those people weren't ever heard from again. And this was the not-secret version of the file, too! Anakin was honestly afraid of what the secret one looked like.

For a while he'd been too afraid to keep looking at the other missions, but eventually he'd plucked up his courage and picked up the tablet again, moving to the next one. After all, there were a lot of missions, and maybe they'd just been really unlucky on their first one together? They couldn't have all been awful…

Admittedly he'd been right, but that didn't stop him from crying about how bad most of Master Obi-Wan's time as a Padawan had been. By the time he was finished, there was barely enough time for him to clean up his face so it was less obvious that he'd been crying and hide away the pad before Master Obi-Wan knocked on his door to make sure that he was awake for breakfast.

He knows he was distracted the entire time, and it was hard to pay much attention in his classes that day, but it felt a bit awkward to ask about all of that before lessons. He'll ask later, he reasons, once the classes are over for the day and then that way he won't end up getting distracted by the chat.

Except he spends the day being distracted anyway, and he can't really afford to do that during lessons because he's still struggling to focus on everything, he's so far behind the rest of his age group and Basic is still hard for him sometimes- he grew up with both that and Huttese but the latter was more common- and that just makes things even worse really, because now he's stressed about his classes too-

And then it all boils over when he sees Master Obi-Wan at the end of the day, before latemeal and after classes and after he's gotten back from wherever he's been spending most of his days when Anakin's in class.

"I read the stuff." He says, a little grumpily from the lack of sleep and the bad day of lessons and other kids being mean to him for being slow, and Master Obi-Wan blinks at him from where he's sorting through the cupboards for tea.

"Already?" He sounds surprised, in that faint way that Anakin's slowly coming to understand is just how things are at the Temple, and he nods.

"Why didn't you tell me you were a slave too?" Anakin asks. Because he feels a little bit bitter about that, that Master Obi-Wan didn't tell him, because he would've wanted to know and maybe it would've helped him get settled faster-

And Master Obi-Wan freezes, in that same way Mom would freeze when Anakin said something that was a little too weird for a child to know about, even a slave child.

"Too?" His voice has a strange quality to it, he thinks, like there's something choking him. One hand rises up to his throat, which makes Anakin wonder if that's actually the case and worry slightly.

"It didn't say much but your file said you were a slave in the mines, and I don't get why you wouldn't tell me that but even if it was only a little while it still counts-" Anakin starts to babble, partly because now he's worried he's triggered some kind of memory that Master Obi-Wan doesn't want to think about and partly because he's seen that sort of attitude before, in people that weren't slaves long for whatever reason before escaping. They don't think it counts, nevermind that they still suffered for however long they were enslaved for, they still were in chains and didn't have any freedom, and Mom had always said that it counted for those people so it must count for Master Obi-Wan too.

"I- no, Anakin, I-" Master Obi-Wan stumbles, before slowly turning and sinking into a seat at the table. "I didn't know you were a slave."

Now it's Anakin's turn to freeze, because- "How didn't you know?" He gapes. "Master Qui-Gon freed me!"

"He never said." Master Obi-Wan explains. "I thought he'd just gotten lucky enough to stumble across you and decided to take you with us to the Temple. I didn't realise- and his report didn't say either."

"Is that why you didn't take me to get my chip out?"

"Chip?"

"The slave chip." He says, carefully, because Master Obi-Wan looks pale- kind of like he's about to faint, or something, and Anakin doesn't want that to happen. "The one that's in my leg, to keep me from trying to run away. I think it's deactivated now, cause I was freed, but…" he glances away, embarrassed. "I didn't know how to ask you if we could get it removed quicker- I thought you were waiting for some reason. Like there was some sort of tradition or something."

Master Obi-Wan makes a pained sound. "I- no, there's nothing of the sort- I-" He stops. Swallows. Closes his eyes and folds his arms around his front, the same way he does when he's wearing his robes- only this time there's no robes to hide the fact that he's clutching his elbows tightly.

Then he stands up and walks over to the couch, picking up his comm as he does, and dials a number.

"I'm going to call the healers." He says, with forced calm. "And we'll get your surgery sorted out. Ok?"

"Ok." Anakin watches him do just that, wondering absently what happened when Master Obi-Wan got out of slavery if he didn't know about Anakin's chip- maybe those surgeries had been done while he was resting after the missisons?- as the man next to him argues his way through the Jedi in the Halls of Healing in order to schedule to surgery for the next morning- giving Anakin a sideways glance before he agrees to make sure it was ok.

Once all that is done, though, Master Obi-Wan just… stops. He puts down his comm on the table and just stares at it, looking...very, very tired, all of a sudden.

"They used a collar on Bandomeer." He tells him, lowly. "And most of the other times where I was held for any sort of long period. It's easier to use a collar on Force sensitives, you can have it make out of a material that stops us being able to access the Force, so we can't escape. And on Bandomeer just about everyone had collars, too, that wasn't special. So I didn't think…"

"You didn't know." Anakin corrects, when he trails off. "It's not that you didn't think, it's that you didn't know." Most slaves probably wouldn't care for the difference, but Master Obi-Wan had been a slave too, and that gives him a bit of leeway as far as Anakin's concerned.

Master Obi-Wan doesn't look like he quite believes it, but lets it go. "I'll send your teachers a message, warn them that you won't be in class for a few days while you have your surgery." And then, before Anakin can get too dismayed at the thought of being even further behind, adds, "And once you're up and about again, we'll head down to the Archives proper, see if we can get a hold of the materials used to teach the Crechelings. I know you're not one, obviously, but it would probably help catch you up to at least the theory parts if you go through that first. And there's someone I really ought to introduce you to down there anyway, I'm surprised I've gotten away with a week."

"Couldn't we go down now, before latemeal?" Anakin asks, because being able to get all of the information that the others his age have grown up with definitely sounds like it'll help with catching up, but Master Obi-Wan shakes his head.

"It can wait a little while longer. And also I think if we go down now, we'll end up either missing latemeal, which would be bad considering your surgery in the morning, or dragged into one with my friend, which is something I'd like you to be a bit more prepared for." Master Obi-Wan smiles, faintly. "Would you like to look at your classwork? If you're able to get a little further ahead before your surgery, then you won't be so far behind when you rejoin the class afterwards."

Anakin nods, a little sullenly because classwork is boring and difficult, but by the time he comes back into the main room Master Obi-Wan has a cup of tea waiting for him and is looking at his own datapad, seeming more settled.

"You don't have to call me Master, by the way." He adds into the quiet. "It's traditional, but- I understand now that you probably have a lot of bad memories tied to the word, and just because it means something different in the Temple doesn't mean that it will mean something different in your head for quite a long time." Anakin looks up at him.

"So, what, I just call you by name?"

"In our quarters, that's fine, but out in public… After my brushes with slavery, I looked into some alternatives. I didn't find one for a while, but eventually my friend pointed me towards Jaieh. It's Dai Bendu, which is essentially the Jedi language, and because of that it's considered traditional enough to be a viable replacement for the word Master. Master Qui-Gon agreed to let me use it on days where Master was a bit too sharp."

"Jaieh." Anakin tests, rolling it around in his mouth. He grins. "I think I can use that, Obi-Wan."

Obi-Wan smiles back, a little smaller, but no less pleased. "I'm glad."