Archive: m_a, SWAL, WWOMB and JAOA - anybody else just ask.
JAOA Webpage: http://digitalmidnight.simplenet.com/garden/jaoa.html
Category: AU, Drama
Disclaimer: George Lucas is god and owns everything... except this weird permutation which is just for fun and I doubt he'd want it. All JAOA-specific things belong to Black Rose.
Feedback: YES please! It keeps my plot bunnies fed and healthy.
Notes: Many thanks to Black Rose for letting me play in her universe, and to bothher and Divinia for comments, inspiration & help. Any errors or oddities left are not their fault. :-)
The quote Qui-Gon thinks of is from Lao Tzu.
[This is telepathy] and these are thoughts.
Pairing: Q/O
Rating: PG-13
Series: JAOA
Summary: With Qui-Gon's improved health come new challenges.

Sunrise on Coruscant. Dawnlight touches the eastern edges of the high towers, sparkles on windows, reflects pale patterns on sleeping faces, closed eyes. On the round face of a child - an ash blond urchin who curls and burrows away from the light, dreaming alone; on the silver-bronze fall of hair framing the strong planes and angles of a face shadowed by age and illness, wise & beautiful in repose, that turns to seek the warmth of day; on the stern features of youth come full to manhood, responsibility and care, honey-amber strands ruffled close above and mixed with the bronze of his beloved. There are thirty years between them, and none at all.

Tourmaline eyes unclose. Qui-Gon's small stirring has awoken Obi-Wan, not the advancing light.

Soft, uneven breath assures him that the man within his arms sleeps still, undistressed. Obi-Wan relaxes again with a little sigh, cheek brushing a caress.

It is only recently that the healers have allowed them the comfort of a shared couch, and that with some reluctance. Only months since Qui-Gon's condition was judged "no longer gravely injured," requiring constant and skilled care, but recovering, convalescent, stable and improving, well enough for him to leave the medical center and return to his - their - quarters in the North Tower. Allowed a measure of autonomy, increasing self-reliance and responsibility - ability - to care again for himself. With Obi-Wan and Anakin to help.

Together they are beginning to discover what it is the Sith lightsabre, the reconstructive surgery, and his adamant refusal of mechanical replacement have left him with. No stamina. Short wind. Still rather a lot of pain. Left arm & hand weak to near-uselessness, stiff and restricted in motion & range (though there is steady improvement here). A system prone to infection, especially respiratory. A single lung.

Obi-Wan tries not to think of how fragile Qui-Gon is, does not acknowledge being terrified, turning instead to frustrated incomprehension at why his lover and mentor has so much trouble with accepting some kinds of assistance, but not others.

But, he is recovering, and Obi-Wan will allow nothing within his control to hinder that. His mouth tenses, his arms do not.

With Qui-Gon in no position to be defending his views and convictions, Obi-Wan finds himself doing it in his stead - ("Qui-Gon's defiance I sense in you. Need that, you do not." Oh, Master, I have indeed taken on your defiance, and I do need it. I never thought I would, but I do. And I find I need your strength as well.)

And Qui-Gon sleeps better - they both sleep better - together than apart. Even when apart is only the width of the sleeping chamber. So he sleeps lightly, always a little alert, should there be anything that his Master might need, holding the life he loves more than his own in his arms. The second, narrow couch is still there, occasionally necessary, and Anakin sleeps in his, Obi-Wan's, long unused room. Close, but separate, private.

Obi-Wan is slowly becoming accustomed to being the one teaching, rather than learning, caring-for rather than cared-for. A year is not a long time for such a thing. He wonders if he will ever become used to it.

Anakin. His Padawan. His responsibility. The youngest Padawan in living memory (including Master Yoda's), the whole of his first nine years spent outside of the Temple, already old in fear and love and other vast unknowns, too dangerous, too powerful to leave untrained, apprenticed to a Knight new-made in a crucible of necessity. At least it had not been a crucible of grief.

Obi-Wan's arms tighten fractionally, and Qui-Gon stirs again.

The morning sun is kissing his eyelids, and Obi-Wan's hands are kissing, unconsciously and feather-light, the knotted, livid scars below and beside his breastbone. Both are soothing. Awareness beckons, but Qui-Gon sees no reason to move just yet. Neither Obi-Wan nor Anakin have risen, though his beloved is awake. This is a rare moment, one that will become rarer.

His healers have expressed themselves as "cautiously and reasonably pleased with his progress" (physical progress - they haven't concerned themselves much with his internal emotional or spiritual states). But more than a quarter-year released from the medical center and still they want him to sleep and rest as much as possible. Meditative stillness within Obi-Wan's arms is no hardship.

He feels the soft slide of Obi-Wan's cheek against his hair.

He has schooled himself to patience with the need for slow improvement, but will make no concession to weakness, to helplessness. The big things, the major restrictions, he can reason with, rationalize, engage the force of his intellect, the Force itself, to bear; the little ones continue to surprise him. That he needs help with his hair.

An irritant all out of proportion to its importance, he has been fighting this battle for weeks. He knows it pains Obi-Wan to watch him fumbling one-handed with the comb, jerking at the tangles, and he cannot explain why he cannot let it go. In a completely inarticulate way the struggle has come to symbolize & contain the frustration and fear and anger and grief of all the things he cannot do, and stubborn, stubborn man that he is, (stubborn man that he knows he is) he cannot let it win.

Accustomed to independence, deeply reserved and private both by nature and training, being helped, needing help is a thing he has always found difficult, even as he recognizes Obi-Wan's and Anakin's need to help. So sometimes he does choose to let Obi-Wan comb his hair for him, fasten it back away from his face. Sometimes he chooses not to. A decision made no easier by having to be made again and again.

However, this is not a morning to engage that struggle. This morning he will let his beloved have free rein with the unruly mass, will let him play with it even, and endeavor to take pleasure from Obi-Wan's enjoyment. As he had occasionally done before it ever became an issue. Before.

In his stillness, the Jedi Master stops that thought abruptly, bringing himself back to a conscious awareness of the here and now - the warmth of Obi-Wan's breast against his back, the crisp linen scent of the pillow, the shallow, asymetrical movement of air in his chest, the solid shine of the Knight and the dreaming sparkle of the nearby Padawan within the Force. He does not wish to disturb either of them.

Obi-Wan and Anakin have had adjustments of their own to make.

There has been a great deal for Anakin to catch up on - basic forms, exercises, meditions - all those things that every other child in the Temple has been learning for years, ordinary educational things (what he knows, what he doesn't know), social skills suitable for a very different environment. He's quick, but it has been very hard work. Qui-Gon knows that he still misses his mother (a chill, fisted ache in his stomach) and the lively young Queen of Naboo ("Oh, Padme'd like this!") Missed himself, much of the first year, allowed only short visits. Though that hadn't kept him from asking frequent questions - the connection between the three of them was strong enough to make speaking through the Force easy even while actual speech had all too often been impossible on his own part.

The healers had frowned and Obi-Wan had worried that the silent exchanges would tire him, but he had found Anakin's questions refreshing most of the time. An external focus. And Shmi's son had few qualms about telling Qui-Gon exactly what he thought of some of what he was learning. So far, Anakin had not yet stopped asking him questions, nor had he ceased answering them.

Qui-Gon could and did relate to Anakin's wide- ranging effort to expand and re-write his understanding of the universe, while the Temple worked to bring him in line with Traditional understanding. Often enough his feelings and understandings are more relevant & valid than the old ones. A conflict his Knight's Master understands very well indeed. His fears have not vanished, but changed - he now has more people to be afraid for, and, to a certain extent, of - but there is more of love as well.

The Council has expressed itself as being "cautiously and reasonably pleased with Anakin's progress both physically and in emotional & spiritual matters," and has decided it is time to send the Knight and Padawan off on a short and simple mission, a test run.

This will be the first real separation of Obi-Wan and Anakin from Qui-Gon since the return from Naboo. A test of more than Anakin's adjustment to Jedi life, of Obi-Wan's to Knighthood.

Jedi Knight Kenobi. His third apprentice is growing well into his Knighthood, wise and sturdy. Wise enough to have patience with both his and the boy's stubborn struggles, sturdy enough to withstand and learn from the hard lessons of the recent past. Sturdy enough to keep up with Anakin. Wise enough to hold fast to what truly matters to him by not clinging too hard.

His Master's loved and beloved.

A quote comes to him, a line from a book. (Ylian, his first apprentice, had been passionate about books and poetry, gifting people with obscure and beautiful volumes as the Force moved her and opportunity allowed. He had several, nameday presents, and occasionally even now another would arrive. They never failed to speak to him. Short as it had been, pale in comparison to what would follow, he values the relationship they had and have - his first Padawan, his first-made Knight - and remains proud of her. This line is undoubtably from one of her gifts.) "Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength; while loving someone deeply gives you courage." Strength and courage - his Obi-Wan certainly had both, and gave both. His Obi-Wan, his new-made Knight, though not so new, really, at over a year.

It pleases him to be able to answer Anakin's more importunate questions, to see Obi-Wan's exasperation and relief at not having to come up with all the answers, all at once. Soon enough for that.

It is an essential aspect of Jedi life that Knights and Padawans journey, serving and training to serve. The will of the Council, if not always the will of the Force. Knowing that, believing that, makes it no easier to contemplate Obi-Wan and Anakin gone, himself staying behind.

Oh, it is a very safe, simple, straightforward mission: Witnessing an Inauguration, nothing complicated. Go, watch the ceremony, mix at the reception, deliver official congratulations, keep an eye open and come back & report anything interesting or out of the way. Four days away, a week at most. Nothing to worry about.

Obi-Wan's arms tighten around him, and he moves to return the embrace.

Nothing to worry about.

Master Qui-Gon Jinn, formally robed, silvered hair elegantly drawn back and fastened high with a twisted bronze clip, gravely accompanies Knight Obi-Wan Kenobi and Padawan Anakin Skywalker to the ship that will fly them to and from Delatia Minor.

"Remember, Anakin, you are a Jedi now. Be mindful of what Obi-Wan tells you."

"Yes, Master Qui-Gon, sir."

"May the Force be with you." [I love you. Both of you. Take care.] Come back to me safely.

"And with you also, Master." [I love you. Take care of yourself.]

[We'll be back before you know it!]

Nothing to worry about.

Coming away from his regular appointment with the healers the following day, Master Jinn's steady and thoughtful pace slows as he turns the corner. Obi-Wan will not be waiting with a pot of tea and a tale of Anakin's latest escapade, holding back his anxiety to hear every result and detail of the session.

The healers had professed themselves very happy with his body's response to the physical and chemical therapies. "Progress is being made," said one, giving him new exercises. "And," another had chuckled archly, "you may begin to broaden your activities." Just the sort of detail to make Obi-Wan suppress a smile and twitch his eyebrows suggestively, when told with the right deliberation and dryness. He realizes he has been planning the telling to that end, anticipating the teatime amusement, smiling in advance at Anakin's rolled eyes and boy-sigh at perceived but not yet understood 'mushy stuff'.

But, they are on their way to Delatia Minor. He is ... "doing very well, considering." Impatiently, he shakes back the long strands of hair that have fallen forward, catching in his eyelashes.

He should be pleased, relieved. But. But. For all his determination he cannot even comb his hair without the muscles of chest and back threatening to cramp or spasm. Fastening it back, requiring both hands, just isn't possible. So it's in his eyes, reminding him. Getting tangled. What if the situation Obi-Wan and Anakin are in gets tangled? He cannot help. He cannot help. And a wholly unexpected, unanticipated, unprepared for panic assails him.

There is an alcove just beyond with a tiny fountain. He sits, staring blindly at the sliding drops, back held straight, one hand pressed flat against the cool stone of the bench. All his long held serenity has deserted him, the words of the Code gone meaningless in the face of What If. I thought I knew my capacity for fear. There is a suffocating tension under his breastbone, his breath labored, shallow and painfully fast. I thought I knew how to deal with it. It is a sea, waves retreating and advancing. He is not quite drowning: the hard stone rough against his palm, the song of the fountain, the constant, distant warmth that is Obi-Wan within the Force in the corner of his mind, even the sharp, tiresome, ordinary aches of his scarred and damaged body serve to anchor him to the here and now. Gradually his desperate breathing eases. This too can be endured. Must be. Will be.

(His spirit has been waiting for his body to regain enough strength to support a crisis of its own.) Not-help a necessity, not a choice. Obi-Wan and Anakin away, out of his too-short reach. This is a distress the healers can to nothing about, do not recognize or concern themselves with. Jedi Masters are, after all, masters of matters of the spirit, mind and heart. And is he not a master, with the dark cloak, the large quarters, the long hair to prove it? (Moment by moment he must remember to relax fisted hands, breathe through the tightness in chest and throat, release the fear and reach for serenity. Moment by moment hold to and practice that mastery.)

Their empty common room is too quiet for meditation, the sleeping chamber too full of pain and memory. Watching the city-scape and the stars from the balcony provides some solace, but the wind teases at his ear, plucks at his hair. And he has never been over-fond of heights.

Qui-Gon paces their big main room, blankly considering the pot-plant, the bookshelves, picking up and putting down the objects kept among the wide variety of books. There is the 'spare crystal' that had so amused Ylian and Plo, the intricate wooden puzzle-box he had found for Obi-Wan, one of Anakin's clever wire constructs. He stops. There is the extraordinary knife that Obi-Wan had gone to such lengths over.

Beautifully made of Varinian patternfolded steel, hilt carved out of black amber, exquisite, wickedly sharp and wholly impractical, it had caught his eye during a needed break in a hostage negotiation mission. Obi-Wan had been nineteen, fiercely eager, and had not only noticed how much it spoke to him, but had worked out an elegant, elaborate subterfuge to buy it, wrap it, get it home without his Master knowing, and then keep it hidden until the time felt right to give it.

There had been just enough time before Obi-Wan's twentieth birthday for Qui-Gon to come up with a suitably speaking present in response. A courting gift, at my age, he remembers thinking to himself at the time in gentle derision.

He has taken the knife out of its stand and holds it, drawing a finger lightly down the whorls and waves marked in the blade. It almost hums in his hand, so much art and love went into its making, its giving. Qui-gon sighs and puts it back, the moment of calm in contemplation of its beauty, its meaning, overshadowed by its giver's absence.

He escapes, to the Fountain Court, the garden, the library, and for all his deliberate pace he knows it to be flight.

The shielded gardens see the most of him, when he is not persuing distraction in his exercises, finding a measure of peace in the simple vigor of growing, living things, the running-water plash of fountains. "Good for worry, weeding is. Roots it out, it does." Not that a weed would dare to show its face in the Temple herb garden, but Yoda's impromptu gardening lesson gives him an unexpected hour of undemanding interest, listening and watching with the solemn attention his old Master can still so effortlessly command.

(A picture, this, a moment: a small green bustle, hardly taller than the plants he tends, ears alert and eyes bright, the whole attention of a seated figure, ivory and silver wrapped in brown, a weary strength reviving slow in sunlight, similar and opposite, connected.)

"Rest, you must." The light touch of a small hand on his knee, a speaking look. They share a glance, and the oldest Jedi leaves to tend to other pressing matters.

"Yes, my Master."

But once back in the silence of solitude rest is not his to command. 'What if' tangles his dreams with draigons, red-black shadows, broken rings - threats and dangers all the worse for having once been faced and overcome for real.

He reads himself back to sleep, another of Ylian's books, poetry and essays and drawings of beautiful things, hand-bound, hand-written before Obi-Wan was born or Anakin thought of. He wakes again to silence and cold sheets.

The sea rises.

I will not resort to drugs. I will not. This too will pass; they will return to me. He breathes in the strict pattern taught the creche children, the ones subject to nightmares. They will. They will. Nothing to worry about. Long hair twists into knots in his fingers.

The Inauguration successfully Witnessed, the political minefield of the reception survived without any major incidents, Obi-Wan and Anakin board their shuttle back to Coruscant.

Anakin proceeds to pester the pilot unmercifully, and Obi-Wan is not inclined to restrain him.

"You said on the way out that you could get us home faster than we left. You said the 'hyperspace vectors will be clearer,' and 'I can make this old Lady fly like a toopel after a gorlat.'"

"That I did, young Ani, that I did." She has green and gold feathers for hair and the nails of the six long fingers on each hand are polished a brilliant red-violet. She smiles at him slyly, teasing. "But tell me, young Ani, why should I?"

Bright-eyed and alert, he is folded into his cloak in the second chair at the flight console, the Navigator having again been relegated to the padded bench at the back with Obi-Wan. His eagerness is making the air vibrate, even though he is careful to be (relatively) still. "'Cause we want to get home, and," unconsciously charming he smiles up at her, "I wanna see 'this old Lady fly like a toopel after a gorlat.'" The kicker then: "and 'cause it'll be fun." An even bigger grin. "And then I can tell Master Qui-Gon-sir about it."

"Enough, Ani. You have plenty of tales to tell Master Qui-Gon." Obi-Wan's voice is more amused than stern, and there is deep affection apparent in both names.

Not immune to the charms of bright boys, nor unaware of the unspoken but not invisible desire of the decorative Knight to be to Coruscant with speed, Pilot-officer Kee'i'eyt ruffles her ridge-feathers in amusement. "Got a someone to be homing to, eh?" She briskly adjusts several settings on the flightcomp, Anakin watching avidly. "Lets just see what this Lady can do, then."

"Oh, what is a toopel? And a gorlat?"

Obi-Wan just shakes his head with a smile as the pilot starts to explain. Delatia Minor vanishes behind them.

The time has passed. Knight and Padawan are on their way home. Nothing has gone wrong with the mission. None of the nightmare images have come real. They are only hours away.

Qui-Gon tries to pull himself together - he would not have Obi-Wan see how shaken their being away from his small ability (and vast need) to care & have a care for them has left him. Worn with worry, broken sleep, stubborn insistence on doing his (hated, needful, painful) therapy exercises, he goes to tidy & order himself for their arrival.

He has set the tea things out - the large pot of Cinndarian alabaster, warm and pleasant to the touch, the set of teacups glazed in shades-of-blue, a plate of fruit, a bowl of nuts. The water is set ready on the warmer, the herbs and strainer by the pot. Making a routine, a ritual.

In the bathing chamber he starts the bath running and undresses slowly, looking at himself critically and dispassionately in the mirror. Muscle lost during the long months abed is beginning to make a return. The slick, red, palm sized expanse of the original injury and the knots of scarring caused by the subsequent surgeries and repairs have not yet started to fade, running livid and stark across a third of his chest, his back, but the last of the puffy tenderness has finally gone, and he is becoming accustomed to the hollow shadows and shapes. Stretching both hands in front of him he studies the tension in the right arm, the tremble in the left, lips folded tight against the pain. It is getting better, slowly. He sighs and lets them drop, rolling his neck to ease it. His hair needs washing, and the beard could use a trim. Sighing again with resignation, he picks up the comb. If he washes it uncombed, untangling it wet will be much, much worse.

As he works through the day's snarls, Qui-Gon remembers. He grew his hair out initially to please Ylian, and discovered he prefered it long - practical, aesthetic, distinctly non-apprentice looking, and lending gravity to a face (as he recalled thinking at the time) too young-looking for authority. It reached a neat and graceful length just about the time she was elevated to Knight, making him a Master. "Long hair makes a Master!" she had laughed. "Oh, like clothes make the Knight?" he had riposted, smiling, as he helped her into her new formal white tunic for the ceremony. But in an obscure way, both statements were true. Are true.

It rather surprises him how much Ylian has been in his thoughts, when it is Obi-Wan he is missing. Oh beloved. Loved and beloved. He pauses to work at a particularly stubborn knot. Obi-Wan likes his hair, likes running his hands through the soft weight, winding the strands around his fingers. That would be argument enough (has been, in other things), but.... With a grimace, he turns his thought. Finally, the knot releases. There, that's done. He puts the comb down with a click on the tiled counter and leans wearily against the cool rim of the basin, breathing through the protesting twitch of back muscles, the ache in his shoulders. It has been a long day, a longer week. Bath. Hot water.

The bath is deep and hot. He steps down into the water, gratefully breathing in the rising steam (healer recommended, up to a point). After a brief submersion he lies back, letting the heat penetrate and soothe. Hot baths, one of the genuine pleasures of his theraputic regimen. But soon he is sitting up and scrubbing, soaping and rinsing everything else before tackling the chore of washing long hair in a bathtub virtually one-handed. He has done this before. All it takes is concentration. Lie back, relax, centering breaths. Submerge again to get everything thoroughly wet. Sit up, balanced and stable. Soap in the left hand, pour into the right. It's like doing katas in a fountain. Sith. Grimly, he sets to.

By the time he is finished his softly intense internal language has gotten much more creative and his breath is coming in gasps. He is nearly trembling with exertion but his hair is clean. The water is growing cool. Time to get out. He sits for a moment on the edge of the bath, working to relax the tension wound through him, catching his breath. He has left his robe in the sleeping chamber. No matter, the room is warm. He will finish in here and then dress.

His knees threaten to collapse as he stands, so he folds them into a meditation posture and collects the comb on the way down. "Work with the body, not against it," keeping a tight, tight rein on his feelings. The dripping mass of wash-tangled hair has fallen forward into his face as he knelt; it snags and pulls in water-roughened fingers as he scrapes it back. He raises the comb once more.

And his hair fights back. The comb falls as his chest goes into spasm. He can hardly breathe, hardly think. This is too much. All those things that this slippery, stubborn, uncontrollable length tangled wetly around his helplessly shaking left hand symbolized have gone pale and unreachable, outside of his present intolerable reality, beyond his control. Something snaps, and in the hot grip of frustration, fear, grief & anger, he _calls_ the knife to his right hand from the other room, forces his uncooperative left hand to twist & hold. This I will control. Kneeling on the cold, wet floor of the bathing chamber, with one swift, violent upward motion, he slices through the twisted mass.

It is a very sharp knife.

Hair and hand drop limp, a bright point of pain blossoming. The knife clatters to the floor. He has cut his hand as well as the hair. A ragged lock falls forward, pricking in his eyes. Cradling his wounded hand in the other, he curls forward, despairing. A pain too deep for tears. Not even this within my compass.

Obi-Wan walks swiftly through the hallways, Anakin trotting to keep up. Eager to be home, Master and Apprentice share a wry smile as they wait for the lift. Approaching the level of their quarters, Anakin cannot help but bounce, and Obi-Wan tousles the brush of hair on the vibrating boy's head. You missed him too, didn't you, youngling. I certainly did. How odd not to have Qui-Gon with them, tempering their observations with his own, leavening the meal-time conversation with dry wit and keen insight, penetrating questions. How odd to jerk awake to the steady, deep, even breaths of his sleeping Padawan, missing the uneven, soft rasp of his Master's. Only a distant, silent presence in the corner of his mind. Light-years away. Only a corridor away now.

"Something's wrong." Anakin's eyes are round moons of worry.

A sharp look at the boy, and Obi-Wan opens himself to the Force and his connection with his Master. Sith! Dropping all pretence of decorum he lengthens his stride to a near run, his Padawan right behind.

Into the empty common room, leaving Anakin at the entry with bags and cloaks. Vaguely noting the neatly set table in passing. Racing into the bathing chamber, Obi-Wan stops, stricken at the sight that greets his eyes, his heart. Oh love, no...

Naked, damp as if just stepped from the bath, Qui-Gon kneels almost as if in meditation but for the visible tremble of cramping muscles shaking his frame, the harsh disorder of his breathing. Worse is the despair in the bent neck, the drawn brows and tight-closed eyes, the stark distress of the raggedly shorn head and the trembling hands clenched around a bronze-dark tangle dripping a slow red stain from knee to tile. His Master's hair, his heart's blood.

Oh love. The Knight takes a deep, sobbing, silent breath, throat locked tight, and moves forward, as gently and carefully as if he were approaching a wounded wild creature, or a frightened child. Water-colored steel catches his eye, a single drop of crimson beaded at the tip.

Fear shocks through him again, turning his bones to water, blood to ice. The knife on the floor was the one he had given Qui-Gon.

(Oh, the expression on his Master's face when he had opened it, and the delight they had both taken in the tale. And what followed.)

All this flashes through Obi-Wan's mind as he picks it up and blindly puts it on the counter, out of harm's way, while coming swiftly around to crouch in front of his beloved. Slowly, so as not to startle, he touches the other man's wrist, feeling the deep vibration flutter against his fingers, and takes the wounded hand into his own. Unwinding the snarled twist of hair and pulling it away, he sees the cut is not as bad as he feared - a short gash in the heel of the palm, easily Force-healed.

As he is focusing on that, the bent, ravaged face turns to him and deep, deep blue eyes open, dark with emotion. [Obi-Wan.]

With an almost-sob of relief, Obi-Wan gathers Qui-Gon to him in a fierce embrace and just holds him, speechless, as gradually the cold wash of adrenalin recedes, leaving him chilled beneath his clothes. The long shuddering tremors coursing through the older man ease under his hands and then Qui-Gon begins shivering in reaction. Obi-Wan reaches out and collects the nearest towel to hand - one of the big bathsheets - and wraps it around him, never loosing contact. [I've got you, love, I've got you. It's all right. Hush, hush.] Comforting, silent murmurs.

Qui-Gon slowly reassembles himself in those strong arms, piecing together his perceptions and controls. He feels scoured inside, somehow, or like blown glass, breakable and light-headed. One of Obi-Wan's hands is warm on his neck, cupping the back of his head, an anchoring solidity, an oh so welcome intimacy. His breathing steadies and the shivers stop.

Presently Obi-Wan coaxes Qui-Gon out of the bathing chamber, to a seat in the common room, and finishes the haircut, gently, carefully, almost silently, as if the hair itself had nerves and could feel the scissors, disregarded tears filling his eyes & slipping down his cheeks. To be even it will need to be so short--. He wants to ask why but is afraid to really know the answer, senses that the answer wouldn't be for Anakin's ears, that there may not even be an answer he, Obi-Wan, could understand in words. His hands, working neatly, already miss the soft weight, the silken caress. Naked, the nape of his Master's - his beloved's - neck looks shockingly vulnerable. He is grieving equally for the loss and what the loss might mean.

Anakin is there - he's part of this, he sits at Qui-Gon's feet & holds his cold left hand, a comforting presence.

Qui-Gon senses Obi-Wan's questions, feels his confusion and hurt, and knows he doesn't have words to give him - doesn't know himself entirely why, but that the action was right, was something he needed to do. (Not, as he will discover, that he likes having short hair. He doesn't. But something in him needs what its being short symbolizes.) And it is also right, and needful for them both, that he let Obi-Wan finish it for him, make it tidy, (even, in a severe and prickly way, beautiful). Like a Padawan cut, but not.

Eventually Anakin breaks the silence with an abashed "I'm hungry." He makes tea, makes a sandwich, something to eat, to do. The Force is telling him to be small and quiet, but Present, there in the spaces of the room. He puts generously over-full teacups down for the other two. Soft chatter, bleeding away the painful tension, talking about the sly & speedy pilot, people met, things seen, aware in a new way of the connection between his Master and Qui-Gon, himself and Qui-Gon, himself and his Master. Stuff to think about. Interesting. He helps to tidy the snips of hair, teacups and crumbs.

At length, having thought, Anakin remarks, "Hey, we're a symbiont circle, you know, the three of us: 'lifeforms living together for mutual advantage.'" He has the inflection down perfectly. Obi-Wan raises his eyebrows at him, bemused, while Qui-Gon just looks at him, and then, finally, laughs - softly, even painfully, but a true laugh nevertheless, as he lets his head relax back against Obi-Wan's middle. He reaches up to cover Obi-Wan's hand, curled at his collarbone with one hand, capturing one of Anakin's in the other. "Yes, we are." Softly, almost apologetically, "Welcome home." [We all have adjustments to make. But we will make them. Together.]

"Well," says Anakin, after a moment "I'm going to bed. 'Night." & off he goes.

Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon are exhausted, wrung out by fierce emotion. Anakin has more energy than both of them put together, and will undoubtably stay awake and read, or tinker quietly, or something, but will stay in his room, giving them space, privacy, while keeping the bright flame of him within the Force close enough for comfort. A bright boy in more ways than one. Qui-Gon indicates a desire to stand, and Obi-Wan a desire to help him. They stand together for a moment, held and holding. Qui-Gon is wearing only the bathsheet that Obi-Wan had wrapped around him, Obi-Wan is fully and formally dressed.

[Bed?]

[Together, yes.]

Obi-Wan sees him into their sleeping-room, then goes to put the dressing chamber and himself to rights. He is still very shaken, and he doesn't quite know why, or what, if anything, to do about it. He drains the long-cold bath, straightens towels. Carefully, gingerly, he collects the tangled, still-damp coil of hair from where he had dropped it after pulling it from Qui-Gon's bleeding hand. It clings to his fingers, a peculiar, airy weight. What would Qui-Gon want done with it? What did him himself want? Frowning, reverent, he coils it into the dish where Qui-Gon was wont to keep his hair-ties. A hair-sacrifice. He would deal more properly with it later. He washes his face and returns to their room.

Qui-Gon is waiting for him. The room is dark, lit by the starry glitter of Coruscant's night-time glow. He undresses slowly, neatly. [Are you sure?] He glances at the two sleeping couches, one broad, for two, one narrow, for necessity. Qui-Gon, with face unreadable, has made a space for him within the wide expanse.

[Yes. Together.]

The love they make is very quiet, kisses, touches. Obi-Wan tries to reconcile himself to the bare neck, the short-cropped skull with kisses, feather-light, nuzzling. It will take them both a while to become accustomed. [Oh love, oh love.] They do not try for ecstasy, only comfort, and soon, come to stillness, Obi-Wan sleeps curled within his lover's arms, and Qui-Gon sleeps, enfolding his beloved.

[...to the next stage]

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