darkforcerising | OPEN POST

"I like to account for as many possibilities as possible before giving my word."

He shook his head, slightly. "I do not get the date reference. If you are Anakin, it has not been twenty-six years. If you aren't, I've never seen you before."

He's been refusing the 'Anakin' part, honestly.

Maybe he should stop doing that.

Okay, this was going to be hard.

"Oh!" a thought occurred to him. "Remember Mortis?"

That is a very good question and even before he answers it, thinking of that ethereal place starts to settle some of his confusion.

"Yes."

"Okay," Anakin said, his mind working to find a way to explain this in a way that both made sense to him and Obi-Wan.

"That place had some kind of time dilation property to it. Maybe this is like that, well, the time dilation part? I've been somewhere else the last twenty-six years... and now I'm back here, which is weird. Not going to argue with that."

Okay, focus on now and what's in front of you. Deal with it. He takes a deep breath, exhales slowly and visibly relaxes.

"Then who's been here?"

Oh, okay, yes. That thorn.

"I think... now, remember, you said you wouldn't stab me. But I think... me?"

He makes that 'what the actual fuck' face again, and has to take and release another measured breath.

"You've been in two places at once. And now you're... both here?"

"Two places at once? Um... no... Well, now that I think about it, now I am in two places at once, I guess."

He'd been holding back information mostly because he didn't quite know how to explain it, but maybe he should just say what he knew.

"I lived, here. A whole life. Then I died. And existed like that for a while. Then I guess I was reborn somewhere else and lived there for twenty-six years until just right this moment."

That makes an unfortunate amount of sense.

He understands why Anakin was worried about being stabbed, now.

He rubs his hand over his face - his shaking hand - and turns and walks toward the kitchen.

"I need a drink. Sit down."

Anakin nodded his head at Obi-Wan excusing himself. "Oh sure."

But he wasn't so sure he should come any closer. He looked around for a chair near him, but none closer than the table. So he stood there awkwardly, keeping distance between them.

He actually has a bottle of alcohol in the kitchen, so he drags it out and pours himself a hefty shot.

It isn't going to get him drunk, but the sting and burn of alcohol does prove somewhat grounding.

When he looks up and notices Anakin still hovering- "For-" He doesn't finish, but uses the force to call his lighsaber to him and... drops it down the trap door into his cellar.

Then closes the door over it.

"I am not going to stab you."

"But you still have the Force," Anakin pointed out.

"And I know that this..." Oh, how did he finish. "Isn't- can't be easy for you."

He sets a chair from the table directly on top of the trap door. "Yes, and now you'll notice the chair flying if I attempt to use it to retrieve my weapon."

He walks back, toward Anakin and then gestures toward the living area. Where they can both sit down.

"I am not the one who's afraid of being killed." Deflect, though it's a pretty shaky deflection.

This really is... just about unbearable.

"That's not how..." he was thinking the Force would be used. But he stopped himself from illuminating his creativity. It would probably make things worse.

"I've got a good reason to be cautious, don't you think?" But that wasn't fair, was it? Maybe a bit harsh? Maybe precisely on point?

Do not highlight your creativity, Anakin. The most 'creative' Obi-Wan's gotten with the use of raw force toward anything living is throwing them or throwing things at them.

...which would be a bigger problem for a human, but still. He is fairly straight forward.

He sits and snorts, face in his hands for a moment. "I could make a very good argument either way."

Anakin had always wondered, in his currently like, after he received his memories of this other life back, what it would be like if he ran into Obi-Wan again. All the things he'd wanted to say but never had, which feelings would win out: the draw for the connection they once shared, or the resentment for what they'd become.

Standing there, he realized he still didn't know the answer to any of that. His emotions, untested as they'd been, still fought each other.

But he did know, whatever it was he was feeling, he didn't want to cause Obi-Wan more pain.

"I can leave... I think," he offered. "I could... just go..." He pointed to the door.

"No."

He doesn't look up immediately. He's doing some kind of breathing exercise to get a grip on his...

trauma response, honestly.

It hasn't been nearly long enough for this not to be fresh for him, and it isn't as though the Jedi were truly capable of handling any kind of emotional or mental trauma.

He could probably have used Yoda whacking him in the leg with his stick, about then.

"For one thing, it is incredibly dangerous." He drops his hands. "For another, I want you here. Please." More softly. "Sit down."

"Obi-Wan, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to..." To what? Step off a train and into his past to re-traumatize his closest friend?

He didn't move to sit. He just didn't think he could move closer to that man sitting in the living area without terrifying him.

"I mean," he tried to sound more positive. "I've already died once, universe isn't going to fall apart if I do it again."

Fun things: Obi-Wan was reading Anakin's anxiety and refusal to come closer as Anakin being afraid for his own physical safety.

"First of all, unless I am missing something very important, some you is still out there. Secondly the universe won't, but I might." There, there was an admission.

"Is there anything I can do that will convince you I am not going to hurt you?"

"Oh!" Anakin couldn't help himself, he did just sometimes say the first thing that came to mind. "Maybe if we meet, we'll cancel each other out like matter and anti-matter."

Okay, that was a thought he should have kept inside his head.

"Sorry... It feels like getting closer won't do either of us any good."

"I am not convinced that anything is going to do either of us any good." He needed to be able to apologize, but at the moment it was so big he was locked onto minute detail as a coping mechanism. His throat hurt. Not from the bruises but because he's failing at being a Jedi right now, entirely.

And the more he understands and believes what is happening here, the more he is failing.

"I am absolutely sure there is no good to anyone in you trying to die. Or no longer existing. Especially you and especially when you have a life, even if it isn't here."

Anakin seriously considered just turning and leaving, as it might have been the kindest thing to do.

His life. His life no longer included this man, this man who was once so integral to his very survival. Though a day didn't go by that he didn't think about him. And it wasn't as if Obi-Wan's life included him anymore, either. "He," Anakin - the Anakin he'd been so long ago - was gone.

Sometimes, somethings were better left alone.

But the date came back to mind. He knew how much time, or more precisely, how few days, had passed for Obi-Wan since... Well, Anakin didn't really want to think about the details of that day. He could sit with uncomfortable emotions but he didn't invite them.

He knew all to keenly what PTSD was like, and every line of Obi-Wan's frame spelled it out.

Anakin finally relented and moved into the living area. He grabbed the bottle of alcohol and poured Obi-Wan another drink.

"I'd give you something else to make this easier, but you're already drinking and some drugs just do not go well with alcohol."

Don't focus on the past, or worry about the future. Live in the now.

Wonderful advice, but fairly useless when the past and future, wrapped into a single person, was deposited in your present.

He took the drink from Anakin without a word and threw it back like it was medicinal, and then wrenched his breathing and heartbeat back into more reasonable patterns. Not meditative, no kind of release, just using practice and Jedi ability to force his body to comply when his mind wouldn't.

What he got was the illusion of being almost under some kind of control, and it was damn fragile, but it was something.

"I am sorry you're here, but I'm sorry that you're here for your sake, not mine. If there was a way for you to come here, there is a way for you to go home. We'll find it."

He's going to choke to death on an apology, because it is so fucking inadequate and unproductive that he's ashamed of even wanting to say it.

Edited (word correction) 2020-01-05 03:49 (UTC)

Anakin sat down and stuck the sucker back in his mouth. He finally turned off the music on his phone and took the air-pods out of his ears and let the Force tell him everything he was trying to ignore. He could fell now how fragile Obi-Wan's composure was. Not that he couldn't see it, also.

"I'm not all that worried about getting back. It's a good life, but you're doing something important here, and I shouldn't take you away from that."

And then it occurred to him he should explain a bit more.

"I don't- I mean, the me that's here, he doesn't know you're here," he said to reassure Obi-Wan. "Your plan works out fairly well."

It's odd how no matter how differently the external trappings are - the phone, the air-pods, even the sucker - the way he moved, the way he felt to Obi-Wan, and just the feel of him could be so completely Anakin.

He'd already realized that this Anakin had lived not just Anakin's past but Vader's future and end, so at least he didn't have to scramble too hard to process that, too.

"I'm not going to leave Luke." He thought the plan working out fairly well was a good thing, but that was pretty uncertain. "And you're far too restless to stay long, but you being here isn't taking me away."

He didn't want to ask. He really didn't. He couldn't not. "What's the end of the story?" Yours, Anakin, not his.

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