Tranquility
Scene 6
They move on, all the way back to their shared quarters in the fourteenth-level east-facing residence wing.
Qui-Gon does not slacken his habitual pace, as he has been of late, to accommodate his student's much shorter stride. It will do the boy some good to stretch his limbs, even to trot down the Temple's hushed concourses. The steady pat-pat-pat of supple boots upon inlaid marble floors echoes reassuringly behind the tall man as they wend their way home. He hasn't entirely lost his padawan's confidence yet, nor has the young Jedi lapsed into morose self-recrimination, as he is wont to do.
They will surmount this obstacle before either of those things happen. It is simply a matter of… rephrasing the problem.
The apartment is faintly redolent of incense, the lingering echo of their first attempt to master this skill, in the morning's early hours. Qui-Gon opens the balcony doors with a wave of his hand and grants his apprentice permission to change his trousers, which- stars forbid- are dirty about the knees.
The small indulgence affords him a few more minutes in which to make preparations.
When Obi-Wan reappears, immaculately clad and simmering with a contained curiosity, the Jedi master gestures him over to the low table occupying the common room's center. Here, a wide variety of common objects are laid out upon the scarred and worn halsa-wood surface: a cracked tea bowl filled with water, a rock, a leaf, a comb, a commlink, a sheet of flimsi, a soft pile of potting soil, a container of boot polish, a stray twist of cobweb, a ration pellet, a single long hair plucked from Qui-Gon's luxuriant mane.
"Is this a crèche game?" the padawan inquires, suspiciously. He kneels obediently in place, eyes searching the tall man's craggy face for answers.
"In some ways. Your task is to grasp each of these things in turn."
Obi-Wan remains motionless, waiting for further explication. None is proferred.
His brows come together. "That… is all?" he clarifies.
His teacher extends one hand in invitation. "Do not underestimate the difficulty of small undertakings… such as maintaining focus for a quarter hour."
The mild reprimand brings a spot of color to the young Jedi's cheeks. "Yes, Master," he mumbles, and sets meekly about the proposed exercise. He lifts one object after another, handling the cobweb and the hair with extreme care, scooping the grains of soil up between curled fingers, then setting each successive element down again, precisely where he found it. Another quirk of the brows, and he is gazing up into Qui-Gon's face again, expression almost pained.
The Jedi master cannot entirely suppress his burgeoning smile. "You overlooked something."
Obi-Wan's blue gaze scours over the tabletop, seeking perhaps some dust mote or microscopic oddity which he has missed… but he comes up blank and now appears positively stymied. "I'm sorry, Master, I don't…"
"The water." Manipulating the Force with masterful finesse, Qui-Gon cajoles the water from its resting place, suspending it a few centimeters above the bowl's rim, in a shimmering sphere.
His student blinks, manifesty impressed by the display of subtle acumen.
"Take it," the tall man urges.
Tentative, the padawan extends one hand and brushed fingers against the hovering orb's surface; the surface tension breaks, sending droplets spattering into the bowl. Obi-Wan scowls, gently closes his hand about the wavering form, and grasps –
Water sloshes over the table, tiny rivulets rolling off its edges.
"Blast."
Chuckling, Qui-Gon gathers the fallen water again, summoning it back into a glossy puddle, then levitating it again, another perfect sphere floating in mid-air, held in flawless equilibrium a half-meter above the table. Obi-Wan goggles, eyes round with admiration.
"Some things," the Jedi master tells him, "Cannot be grasped. Water, among them."
"Yes, Master."
"Hold out your hands."
Bemused, the young Jedi cups both hands beneath the softly undulating orb. The water falls, pooling between his fingers. A little spills over the rim of his makeshift bowl, but a clear meniscus remains, tremblingly contained within the fragile dam.
Qui-Gon nods in approval. "Drink."
His student slurps down the cool libation, then fastidiously dries his hands upon his tunic's hem.
"The Force likewise cannot be grasped; focus in meditation is akin to holding water – you must keep your mind still and open, ready to be filled."
Obi-Wan absorbs this with characteristic sobriety, forehead rumpled in concentration. "Yes, Master."
And now they are ready to move on, yet again.