KEYnote: I wanted to give a backstory to the kyber and I ended up with that little original character narrative. Obi-Wan is Master Jedi, he is wise enough to apply any lessons he learns to his own relationships, and I think anyone who reading SW has read enough flashbacks to movies, so I wanted to try something different.
WARNING: Short chapter, but I posted 20k this week, so enjoy.
Chapter 7 - The Suns of Tatooine
Luke was so cold he could hardly think, hardly move.
How was Ben able to handle this?
His feet dragged, his toes numb, his hands feeling like ice in his gloves. The only heat he had was his breath fed back to him in his scarf.
How could he be this cold yet feel as though he was sweating?
Luke.
He spun. But no one was there.
Great, he was hearing things. Ben had said that he would be thrown into a vision quest.
He didn't really know what that meant.
You cannot hide forever, Luke.
Luke shivered at that voice that echoed with some type of breathing device.
I will not fight you, his own voice reverberated off the cave walls even though he hadn't spoken.
In his mind's eye, he glimpsed a black clock in the mirrors of ice shelves.
When he blinked he saw the light of blue and red.
There is no escape. Don't make me destroy you.
Luke picked up the pace, hoping moving would help him warm up. The ice was beautiful in its own way and he had never seen stone so dark.
He steadied his breath, he was used to running these days, and he had to focus on how the tread of his boot landed on the uncertain ground. The concentration helped keep the voices at bay.
Obi-Wan has taught you well. You have controlled your fear... now release your anger.
Fear.
What was fear?
Luke didn't know it yet, not the way the others around him dead.
He hadn't known to fear Aunt Beru and Uncle Owen dying.
Being thrown in the past? Hadn't phased him, he was with Ben. And even now as he lost himself in these caves, he knew that no matter how far he went Ben would be able to find him.
As long as the Force was his ally, he was never alone.
Jax down.
Luke flinched, or maybe he was hiding from it. People died in war, and he was afraid of losing this new family he was forging.
What if Ben died?
Young fool...only now, at the end, do you understand.
Pain arched Luke's back as he fell to the ground, the impact was lost in the pain of the Force ripping through him, like bolts of electricity sparking between two charges, only worse.
So much worse; this could kill him.
He was dying.
Only your hatred can destroy me.
Luke opened his eyes, and he was no longer in the cave but in a dark room, pleading for help from a black figure who stared at him with a lifeless face, a dark mask that could only reflect light, not give it.
Ben's voice came to him then, The Force is what gives a Jedi his power. It's an energy field created by all living things. It surrounds us and penetrates us. It binds the galaxy together.
Luke closed his eyes, and let out a breath. He had the power to save himself.
The Force will be with you, always, Ben encouraged.
Luke found his feet, the pain of what he now knew as lightening forged from something dark and sickly, something twisted from the Force that should never have been, he shook off like an ill-fitting cloak.
He opened his eyes slowly as he said, You failed, your Highness. I am a Jedi, like my father before me.
When his gaze rose fully, he saw a sheet of ice, a mirror, his own eyes stared back at him, his scarf pulled from his face.
A shadow loomed behind him, a darkness in the Force, looming over him like a cursed fate that he might have been destined for.
He heard Uncle Owen's voice, The boy is just like his father! If he leaves Tatooine he will become the same kind of mon-
Owen, Aunt Beru chided, have faith in him, he is our son too.
Luke blinked, and Padme stood before him, her reflection replacing his, she smiled at him, I've learned to have trust in myself, and you will, too.
"But who am I?" he asked her.
But Padme was gone, and he was alone again.
So Luke closed his eyes and looked inward.
Thought of the heat of Tatooine, a place he never thought he would miss.
But he missed it terribly now.
All those years looking at the horizon. All those years he had felt alone. Unsettled, ungrounded, never understood.
But Ben understood, Ben Kenobi knew him and had always been there with him, even if Luke hadn't known it consciously.
He had never been afraid.
Which meant there was no reason to be afraid now.
He was beginning to love his birth parents, but Ben Kenobi had been the one who had been with him, always.
Just like the Force.
Luke sat down on the hot sands, letting the warmth fill his bones, the stillness of the desert clear his mind.
He wanted to be a Jedi like Ben. Centred, even in turmoil, kind and caring even when broken.
Ben had lost everything, the war, his family, his lover, his home, but he still had hope in the galaxy, still had the strength to face it all again even if the odds seemed utterly against them.
Luke wanted to be like that.
Breathing became easier, the tightness in his chest releasing him. The shadow within him was cast out of his heart by the brightness of the suns. He opened his eyes, the desert dunes of Tatooine surrounded him.
So long he had wanted to escape this place, but the desert sands were a part of his being.
A long haired Jedi appeared across from him, he too sat in meditation, his dark blue eyes shown with mischief and a great kindness.
They did not speak, there was no need to.
Others appeared around them, the Jedi of the galaxy, alive even in death, their spirits echoing in the Force, they were the individual grains of sand that made up the ocean of eroded stone.
Luke found his centre then and in doing so, he found the centre of the galaxy. All things were connected within the Force, all that lived and all who had lived were essential. And so long as the Force was with him, he would never be alone.
He had been raised in the desert, and that desert was a part of him, as he was a part of the Force. And in all the ways that mattered, he was his father's son.
He was Luke Kenobi.
When he opened his eyes, he held a completed lightsaber in his hands.
Igniting it, the saber blazed an orangy-pink light, matching the hue and intensity of the setting and rising suns of Tatooine.
AN: Thoughts or feedback, pretty please?