darththalia (darththalia) wrote in tpm_flashback, @ 2004-07-11 11:42:00 |
|
|||
Original poster: gloriana
Title: The Best Medicine
Author: Russet McMillan
Rating: NC-17
Pairing: Q/O
Warnings:
Russet warns: UNDERAGE Obi-Wan alert! But wait, it isn't as bad as you think. It might not squick some readers who ordinarily hate underage stuff. In the main part of this story, Obi-Wan is 19 and is with Qui-Gon for the first time. However, flashbacks include scenes with a 14-year-old Obi-Wan masturbating and fantasizing about his master, plus mention of a 16-year-old Obi-Wan in a relationship with another padawan.
Author's LJ id, e-mail, and/or website: email: mcmillan@apo.nmsu.edu. I have no idea if this is still current, since I haven't been in contact with Russet for a couple of years, more's the pity.
Link to story: http://www.masterapprentice.org/archive/b/b
Reasons for recommending: It's easy to overlook The Best Medicine while hunting through the archives, since it's the only TPM story Russet ever completed, and it's buried under Rushlight's oeuvre :). But there was a time when everyone on the list was waiting for the next instalment - for it's a hefty thing, filled with gentle angst, a little hurt/comfort and an awful lot of emotional and sexual tension. I wasn't quite as devoured by it the first time round, perhaps because it is fairly Obi-centric. It's really his coming-of-age story, as we follow a series of flashbacks showing us his growth over the years, interspersed throughout a mission that the adult padawan suddenly has to take over when his master is wounded.
Yet, for all its length, it is wonderfully cohesive, some of the flashbacks acting as lovely little adventures in their own right, but also and always as progressions of both the emotional and plot elements of the main arc. Plot-fiends will find a lot to enjoy in here; I think I appreciate it much more now, especially when too much current Q/O lacks this level of indulgence in Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan as Jedi.
Quote from story:
" I assume you engage in self-pleasure, Obi-Wan?"
Obi-Wan felt his face starting to heat up. Discussing sex was one thing, but this was getting personal! "Yes, Master." He studied the plush carpet beneath his boots.
"Good. Have you noticed a change in the Force when you become excited, then?"
Obi-Wan's eyes snapped up in surprise. "Er, no. In the Living Force?" He was always forgetting to pay proper attention there.
"In your own Living Force. Sexual arousal and release can cause a powerful buildup of energy in Force-sensitives."
"No, I never noticed." But now that he thought of it, there was the way he kept getting little shocks of energy when he went to the 'fresher afterwards to clean up. And there was that time . . . "Oh."
"Yes, Padawan?"
Now Obi-Wan's face was truly burning. "Remember last month on Malastare when the assassins came into our suite at night?"
"And you stopped all of them before they even reached my door? Yes, I recall." Qui-Gon studied his apprentice closely. "I see. Did they interrupt something, then?"
Obi-Wan shrugged, acutely embarrassed. "I was just getting started."
Extra comments:
On re-reading, I'm struck by two things. One is the lovely characterisation of Obi-Wan, especially as an adult padawan. Cool, competent, accepting of his master's will yet with a firm mind of his own: yes, this is my Obi-Wan, alright. And watching that independence grow through the flashbacks was very fulfulling. The second is the decided practicality of this universe, grounded in exactly the sort of detail that made ANH so unusual as an SF film: problems with refuelling a spacecraft directing the plot, a fascination with cute techie devices and alien cultures allowed full rein.