DISCLAIMER: Star Wars and all publicly recognisable characters, names and references, etc are the sole property of George Lucas, Lucasfilm Ltd, Lucasarts Inc and 20th Century Fox. This fan fiction was created solely for entertainment and no money was made from it. Also, no copyright or trademark infringement was intended. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author. Any other characters, the storyline and the actual story are the property of the author.
Newly knighted, Qui-Gon Jinn was sent to the remote planet of Gallba to settle a land dispute between two of the reigning dukes. After his mission...
Gallba was a bright planet, bright under the dying red sun Xerani 4. The soil was dry and cracked, the vegetation in a perpetual state of decay, and the small towns were nothing more than giant palaces for the few elite leaders of the place.
Qui-Gon Jinn strode through the dark narrow streets, the hot wind ruffling his short dark hair. His nose wrinkled a little at the smell of decay emanating from the nearby gardens, behind the huddle brown houses. He sighed, and wrapped his cloak around himself, glad that he was finally leaving Gallba. The death that hung in the air seemed to permeate his mind.
A hand grabbed his cloak and yanked. "Please!" a sobbing voice whispered.
Qui-Gon whirled, wrenching his cloak from the person's grasp, and automatically reached for his lightsaber. A long, thin hand grasped his shoulder, and he clapped his hand over the wrist.
He found himself staring into a pair of bright blue eyes, wide with terror and fear. They were set in the pale, scarred face of a girl... no, a woman, not above twenty. Thin red marks laced her cheeks, sunken with lack of food and overwork. Despite the fact that she was not much younger than he, he saw faint streaks of gray in her dark chestnut hair.
She wore a ragged shift and leggings, with a bright red emblem embroidered into the fabric of her shoulder. A blanketed bundle was bound to her chest by a thin carrying strap.
A slave. Frightened and alone, clearly abused. Begging him for help.
"What's wrong?" Qui-Gon said, releasing his grip on her hand. He softened his tone and put a hand on her shoulder, then quickly withdrew it as she gasped.
"He's going to take him," she choked, her bony hands closing around his in a death grip. She stared straight into his eyes, as if trying to see the future in his soul. He winced a little, feeling her jagged, broken nails digging into his skin.
"He? Who?" Qui-Gon asked, glancing down the street.
The girl stopped, released her death grip on him, and pressed her hands to the bundle on her chest. "My baby," she whispered brokenly. Slowly, under her careful prodding, layers of ragged cloth began to peel away, revealing a child, asleep against his mother.
Qui-Gon bent down and touched the baby's face with a careful forefinger. He's only a few days old... thin as his mother. What a little thing... Tiny and alarmingly thin, with a few wisps of light brown hair on his small skull.
Qui-Gon shook himself and straightened. He glanced down the narrow street, then pulled the girl into an alley, standing in front of her to shield her from sight from the street. The air in the alley smelled even more putrid than the street did, and he had to hunch to fit his large frame in the narrow space.
In the dark, her blue eyes seemed to bore like lasers.
"Who are you?" Qui-Gon asked softly, touching her face gently. She cringed a little, drawing back, and he hastily withdrew his hand.
"I'm Sa're," she replied quietly. "I'm slave to Jobu, one of the advisers of Lord Kaldir." She bit her lips, tried to force the next words out. "And I need you to take my baby far from here."
Qui-Gon stared at her, then passed a hand over the baby's downy head. The child stirred, yawned, but did not awaken. "What happened?" he asked.
Sa're's eyes stared into his, then began to shimmer with tears, like an oceanic mirage. Qui-Gon mentally kicked himself for his ill-thought question.
"My master... thought I was pretty," she said slowly, putting one hand up to touch her scarred cheek. "Not anymore. But I tried to get him to go away, to leave me alone... he wouldn't. Wouldn't. He wouldn't."
Her voice rose and cracked, beginning to ramble to itself. Her clawed hands crossed over her baby's back, her head bowing to allow tears to stream down her cheeks and chin, soaking into the blanket. Qui-Gon quickly pulled a small cloth from his cloak and tenderly wiped her face.
At this gesture, a racking rob shook her emaciated frame. She pressed a hand to her face, as if trying to hide her misery from him.
Qui-Gon pressed his large hands to her face, tilting her head until she was looking into his face. "It's all right," Qui-Gon whispered, brushing a few wisps of her dark hair back from her face. He tried his hardest to look reassuring, despite the obvious misery of the young woman before him. "Everything is all right now."
Sa're swallowed hard and tried to regain some of her poise. "Jobu... doesn't know that I was pregnant. I hid it as well as I could. I was too ugly and too stupid for any of the other slaves to notice me, so no one knows about my baby."
"Are you certain?" Qui-Gon asked, glancing down at the road again.
"Yes," Sa're said firmly, the blue eyes flashing. She glanced down at the baby, and bit her lips, trying to contain her emotion. "But I work most of the day... and someone would notice. They'd find my baby, and Jobu would make him a slave. He might sell him, or kill him, or..."
Her voice broke off in another rasping sob. "Please, take him away from here," she whispered, standing on her toes, to look Qui-Gon straight in the face. "I heard... that the Jedi are kind. That you will help anyone who needs it."
"That is true," Qui-Gon said softly, brushing his fingertips over the sleeping baby's head. "I think I know what you want me to do."
"Take him away. Away from this place. I want him to be free," Sa're said passionately, her long fingers fumbling at the snap on her shoulder. At the sudden motion, the baby awoke. As if sensing what was happening, he began to cry. Thin wails, protesting the imminent separation...
Qui-Gon stopped. Sensed.
His heart skipped a beat as he looked at the child, wriggling and crying. Barely a few days old, tiny and undernourished, but... Force-sensitive? He banished the thought for the moment, but it nagged his thoughts nonetheless. There will be time enough to test him later... patience.
Sa're finished unsnapping the bundle that carried her baby, and slowly began to rock him in her arms. Blue eyes met, and a small fist locked around her finger. She looked up at Qui-Gon, her face composed, her eyes bright and calm.
"Take good care of him," she whispered softly, any trace of brokenness gone from her features and words.
"You have my word," Qui-Gon replied, slipping his arms under hers and drawing the baby to himself. The tiny fist lost its grip on Sa're's finger, slid off and flailed in thin air. The baby began to cry again, muffled against Qui-Gon's broad chest.
Sa're bit her lip again, backing away from Qui-Gon with halting steps. As she reached the end of the alley, she seemed about to say something more. But a harsh call, from somewhere in the distance, sent her once more into the shadows of the dying city. Like a wraith, she was gone as she appeared.
Qui-Gon looked down at the sobbing baby in his arms, and ran his finger over the boy's cheek. The fist that had locked onto Sa're's hand not a minute before slid onto his, but the crying continued. Crying for his mother, a mother he might never see again. She had been abused, violated, her spirit shattered and her will all but destroyed. But somehow, she remained standing throughout the storm of darkness. Qui-Gon winced as he thought of how she had described herself as "ugly" and "stupid"—probably words flung at her by her devilspawn master. But she was neither.
"You have my word," he whispered again.
Four years later...
Gallba had not become more beautiful in the past four years. The air of death still hung over the parched land like a perpetual cloud, only it had gotten worse. Figures I'd be sent back here.
A faint breeze blew strands of Qui-Gon's long brown hair across his chiseled face as he strode through the narrow streets of the capital. He couldn't help heaving a sigh, as he thought of how fragile agreements between dishonest men were. How easily, how casually broken. In four short years, the two dukes had both broken their agreement, and now were squabbling as they had before.
Once again, Qui-Gon was dispatched to settle their bickerings...
As he walked down the stone-paved street, he saw a figure lying in the road, dark and limp. Alarm began to rise in him as he ran toward it, reaching out with the Force to see if the person was dead.
Not dead. Almost. But as the young Jedi reached the prone figure, he felt a sharp twist in his chest.
Sa're. Her scarred, dirty face had a huge welt on the temple, and bruises mottled her skin green along the jaw and eyes. Blood was seeping into her ragged clothes from half a dozen places. She lay on the street like a rag doll, tossed there like so much garbage.
Rage boiled up inside Qui-Gon, but he quickly quelled it. He grasped the young woman's shoulders and gently rolled her onto her back. She moaned and shuddered, her battered face contorting with pain. Broken ribs, he thought grimly, running his hands over the bloody spots on her stomach. She'd been beaten, badly.
He glanced around, but the door to every house on the street was shut tightly, meaning that it would violate the law for him to so much as knock. And few doctors on Gallba had the medical expertise to treat her...
For a moment, he flailed between the two options. He might injure her further by carrying her back to the transport, but leaving her here, even for a short while, was not an option.
Carefully, he eased his arms under her neck and legs, lifting her as if she were only a child. He felt with a shock that she weighed nearly nothing, her body frail and battered by a lifetime of misery. I could lift her with one arm...
He turned and began to walk quickly back to the ship, hoping that the unconscious girl in his arms would last that long...
The medical staff had cleaned her and attired her in a white nightgown, putting her in a large cabin, isolated from the rest of the ship. The windows were darkened, keeping the alarming sight of the dying world from their view.
Qui-Gon looked at Sa're, her tangled dark hair combed and framing her closed, deep-set eyes. Her pale, scarred face had been healed of the horrific bruises, and a thin piece of tubing tied into her bloodstream, trying to make up for twenty-five years of malnutrition.
As he watched, her blue eyes flickered and opened. For a moment, she stiffened and shook, looking around in a panic. "It's all right, it's all right," Qui-Gon soothed, putting a hand on her shoulder.
She stared at him, as if trying to dredge up a memory. "You..." she whispered. "You're the one who..."
"You're safe," Qui-Gon said quietly, enveloping her hand in his larger one. "I found you in the street... what happened?"
"Jobu," Sa're said distractedly. Her eyes were distant, anguished, seeing some specter that no one else could see. Tears welled up and vanished in her eyes, not daring to touch her cheeks. "I don't know what I did wrong... but suddenly he was just hitting me and hitting me and I was crying for him to stop, and he said that he hated me and that-"
"Shh," Qui-Gon soothed, squeezing her hand. "Don't think about it. You're safe."
For a moment, Sa're just sat and shivered, her eyes looking off into infinity. Then, she stared at Qui-Gon. "My baby..." she whispered. "What happened?"
Qui-Gon felt a grin rising through the sorrow of this occasion. "Your baby is fine," he said quietly, seeing hope begin to rise in her face. "He's almost four now... and in training to become a Jedi."
He felt a thrill as wonder and joy crossed her face, culminating in the first true smile he had seen from her. "A Jedi?" she breathed. "My baby... a Jedi?"
Then the wonder faded a little. "What's his name?" Sa're asked quickly. "I never named him, I never got the chance. What did you name him?"
Qui-Gon smiled and patted her hand. "Obi-Wan. Obi-Wan Kenobi."
Sa're seemed to sink away again, whispering, "Obi-Wan... Obi-Wan..." Then her attention snapped back to the present, and she smiled again. "I can't thank you enough... for saving my little Obi-Wan."
"I am a Jedi," Qui-Gon replied, inwardly wincing at the stiffness of his words.
"I wanted to thank you as a person," Sa're said firmly. She thought for a moment, then asked, "May I see what he looks like now?"
Qui-Gon nodded, reached to a small leather bag at his feet, and drew a tiny holocard from it. Sa're's trembling hands took it from his fingers, and her wide eyes roved over the picture of a solemn, stocky little boy, with her chestnut hair and bright blue eyes. "What is Obi-Wan like now?"
Qui-Gon mulled over the question for a moment, took a deep breath. "He's kind and considerate, thoughtful, intelligent. He has great skill with the Force, and is one of the most athletic boys of that age. He often asks who his parents are, but I never was certain what to tell him."
Sa're sat up slowly. Qui-Gon saw with a shock the gray paleness of her face, healed of the reddish scars that had marred her skin. "Tell him," she whispered, "that I love him."
Qui-Gon shook himself and touched her hand. He could sense the weariness that was slowly seeping from her. "You'll be able to tomorrow. We're going to Coruscant... you can see your son for yourself, then."
An angelic smile crossed Sa're's face as she drifted out of consciousness, her starry eyes drifting shut. "I can hardly wait to see him again..." she whispered. Qui-Gon smiled, thinking of young Obi-Wan's excitement when his mother arrived on Coruscant... But only then did he realize that Sa're was not breathing.
He watched her, curled up under the coverlet, then gently pressed his lips to her forehead, holding her hand tightly. "I'm sorry, Sa're," he whispered. "I'll take care of Obi-Wan... I promise."