The air on Mustafar is hot and heavy and Obi-Wan feels like he can't breathe.
Anakin stares at him, yellow eyes burning with a hatred Obi-Wan had never thought possible in his Padawan. The little boy from Tatooine was gone, in his shadow stood person he did not know. A person that he so greatly failed to train and protect.
It was all his fault.
"I hate you!"
The words cut deeper than any wound ever could. And yet, despite it all, he still loved him.
When he blinks Anakin is gone, his place taken by a figure cloaked in black. There's a malice seeping from the crevices of his soul and that shakes Obi-Wan to his core and though he cannot see the beings face he knows should he look into its eyes they would be the same sickly yellow as his Padawan.
In an instant, the hooded figure is at his side, its lightsaber colliding with his own. Every blow almost knocks him off his feet and all the figure in front of him can do is laugh.
"Kenobi."
The figure crumbles into dust before him, and when he turns to face the sound of the voice he finds Maul standing at the top of the crater, his double bladed saber burning red against black stone. There's vengeance in eyes and a sickening smile on his lips.
Obi-Wan clutches his own weapon tightly in his hand.
"You're a fool, Obi-Wan Kenobi."
With a raise of his hand, Maul yanks Obi-Wan off his feet and into the air, the pressure squeezing his throat hard enough that what little air was in his lungs rushes out.
He thinks of Padme, how harrowing it must have been as the man she loved stripped away her ability to breathe, what she must have thought as she dangle dying from a grab she could not see. He adds her to the long list of people he failed to protect.
"You've been running for so long now, but you can't hide from the past."
He can feel himself dying.
"Your pain has only begun." Maul growls.
He's thrown violently back to the ground and suddenly Mauls on top of him and driving his lightsaber into his shoulder.
The pain is unbearable, but he refuses to die without a fight.
Obi-Wan reaches up for the weapon, grabbing the hilt with what little strength he has left and yanks it from his body.
It's then that he screams.
He gasps, swallowing a mouthful of air as he's violently ripped away from Mustafar and thrown into darkness.
"Shhh, it's okay."
He's no longer on his feet but splayed out on his side, fingers coiled around something so tightly that his own hands ache from how hard his grip was.
"Obi-Wan, it's okay."
Her voice grounds him, cutting through the echoes of screams that were still ringing in his ears, and suddenly he's no longer dying on Mustafar, but tucked into his own bed with Satine.
Satine.
When his vision begins to even out he is able to lay eyes on her, and ever through the darkness he can clearly see the paralyzing trepidation written across her features.
Its then that he realizes it was her he was so violently holding in his hands.
Prying his fingers off of her made him feel sick. One moment he was fighting Maul, and the next he was harming Satine.
"You're okay," Satine whispers, slowly reaching up to cup his face, "It was just a nightmare."
"I-" He swallows thickly, trying to locate his voice, "I didn't mean..."
He feels like he's choking still, as if there was an invisible grip still wrapped around his windpipe that held on even after waking from his nightmare.
"It's okay, Obi-Wan." She soothes, "You're safe. I'm right here."
He wants to tell her they're far from safe, and that it was ultimately his fault, but no matter how hard he tries he can't find the words. Saying it aloud would make it all the more real.
"I hurt you."
His voice is gravely, a result of the dry desert air and the screaming he's certain he did in his sleep.
He touches her arm gently with the tips of his fingers, unable to stop the trembling that accompanied it. She would surely bruise.
"You didn't," She assures, letting her hands trail down the length of his neck until they've settled on his shoulders, "It's fine."
It wasn't, though. Nothing about it was fine.
It was dangerous for her to be here, no matter how much comfort her company brought him.
"Obi-Wan," She kneads gentle circles into his shoulders with her thumbs, "Talk to me, dear. What were you dreaming about?"
The question almost makes him laugh. How can he answer something so simple with something as complicated as his visions? How can he tell her that having her here has been his greatest pleasure since the order fell, but that it might be for the best that she leaves him now before its too late?
Through the darkness he makes out her silhouette and trails his eyes down the length of her bare arms. He could have hurt her; it would have been so easy for him to break her bones. He had been fighting most of his life. He could have done it like it was nothing.
It dawns on him then that, while the people hunting him may be a danger to her, he might just be the biggest one.
He's too unstable, too reckless in his own mind right now. The visions were only getting worse, the face of Maul only creeping closer every time he closes his eyes.
"Ben?" She prompts in wake of his silence.
"Nothing," He says, the lie rolling off his tongue so naturally he wonders what it says about him that he can lie with such comfort, "Just a bit of a bad dream, is all. Nothing to worry about."
Despite the shroud of shadow encompassing them, he can still make out the way her blue eyes narrow at him.
"I would hardly describe screaming in your sleep as nothing." Satine says, "And its insulting that you would try and play it off as such."
"It was a dream," He says again, a bit more to himself than her, "That's all. Just a dream. I...I'm sorry to have startled you."
He averts his gaze, unwilling to see the look in her eye he knows is there. The pity that he's trying to desperately not to feel for himself.
Because there he was, a shell of the person he once was. No more was he a Jedi Master, instead just a man haunted by his own demons.
He was too broken to protect her.
Satine lets her hands drop from his shoulders and rests them on the bed, close enough to his own that they're practically touching. She doesn't move to cover her own with his though. He supposes she's waiting for him to do so when he's ready.
"Perhaps it would be better if I were to sleep somewhere else," He says lightly, "It seems I am constantly preventing you from sleeping."
"Don't be ridiculous." Satine quips, her tone every bit as resolute as it was when she led her planet.
"I harmed you, Satine." He stressed, not daring to look at her, "I could...I could have killed you."
And he probably could have. He was too strong and too volatile.
He had thought - hoped, really - that the nightmares would have been chased away by her presence. And they were at times. Sometimes she was the only thing keeping his head above water.
But he would rather send her away from him and hide her from Maul than keep her around for his own selfish reasons.
He loved her too much to bare the thought of someone else dying because they loved him, too.
"You would never." She says, almost defiantly.
"Satine," His voice cracks as he says her name, "How can I protect you from the things lurking in the galaxy if I can't even protect you from myself?"
The force wouldn't be sending him visions of Maul for no reason. He was out there, somewhere, searching in every corner of the galaxy for him. And Obi-Wan knew that should they be found, Satine would be killed without hesitation.
He was no longer a Jedi. How would he protect her? Luke? Himself?
"Obi-Wan," Satine says, voice unwavering despite his increasing hysteria, "You would never, ever harm me. I trust you. I trust you with my life."
He untangled himself from his blankets and jerked himself out of bed, desperate to feel the solid ground beneath his feet and not the crumbling world of Mustafar. It felt all too real.
"Tell me how to help you." Satine requests gently, slipping out of the bed herself.
He shakes his head, "You shouldn't have come, Satine."
It kills him a but inside when he sees the look on her face. Having her there was like a beacon of light after so long in the dark, but it was unsafe for her. Danger would either find him or he would become it himself.
He wasn't the man she once knew.
"There is no where else I would rather be." She says, almost defiantly so.
"I'm not who I once was, Satine." He says breathlessly, "I'm too broken to protect you."
And that was it, wasn't it? He was completely shattered. Damaged, perhaps beyond repair. He wasn't even fit to really protect Luke, should danger arise. How could he protect her too? At least Luke's mere existence was a secret. Satine however, she was a known face. The exiled leader hiding with the most wanted man in the galaxy.
And he hates himself even more than before when he sees the agony in her eyes.
"Stop, Obi-Wan." She demands. Its not a plea; she was far too dignified to ever beg, but he knows the unsaid implication.
He clenches his fists tightly, trying his best to rid himself of the shaking that permeates throughout his whole body. The sensation of being choked by Maul's grip still feels so real and all he wants to do is expel the feeling from his mind.
"I can't protect you Satine." He repeats, "I can't protect you from what's coming."
He closes his eyes and tries to focus on his breathing, on the quiet of the night, on anything that would ground him.
But it Satine's hands covering his own that brings him back to reality.
"Obi-Wan," She says gently, wrapping her hands around his fists, "I am not safe anywhere. Don't you see that? I am an enemy to the Empire. I am exiled from my own planet."
"My enemies are far more dangerous, and much more bloodthirsty."
Satine shakes her head, "Be that as it may, I am not leaving you. I would throw myself in the fray of bloodshed so long as it meant I could remain by your side."
"You don't know what you're signing up for, Satine." He says, practically begging her to understand.
"You stupid man." She chides, "Don't you get you're all that I have anymore?"
He doesn't really know how true that is. She had a sister, a nephew, a whole planet full of people waiting for her.
But then, what did he know? So much could have changed in between the time he last saw her. Perhaps what was left of her family no longer exists. Perhaps he really was all that she had left in the galaxy. And if that was true, his heart breaks for her even more. There wasn't much left to that man she once knew.
"I just want to keep you safe." He says, almost brokenly so.
"You saw something, didn't you?" She asks cautiously, "In your nightmare. You had a vision."
Sometimes he underestimates how perceptive she is. It shouldn't surprise him, not really. Part of her role as leader of an entire system of planets involved her being able to read people. Knowing your enemy was almost as vital as having the strength to defeat them.
"It doesn't matter." It was a pitiful attempt to dissuade her from asking further questions, but he knew it was pointless. It was one of the things that he loved about her; she was tenacious and headstrong.
"Lying is unbecoming of a Jedi Master."
"I'm not a Jedi anymore, Satine." There's a sadness to his voice he can't hide.
"You will always be a Jedi." She affirms, "Order or no Order."
He can't stop his gaze from dropping to the floor, because he doesn't know how true that really is. These days he wasn't much of anything. A broken husk of a man?
"I can't loose you," His voice cracks, "I'm not strong enough. Not anymore. I have a mission to finish one day. There are too many people I need to protect and I am terrified of failing you all."
The glimpse of first light peaks through the windows of his home. It illuminates her in a pale glow, so soft that the only thing it clearly defines is the blue of her eyes. She was beautiful, and so much more than he ever felt he deserved.
She threads her fingers through his own, "No secrets. Not anymore. Tell me what you saw."
He does.