She's back from the dead, he's got survivor's guilt. Cue awkward conversation.
To say Siri was no stranger to unusual situations was an understatement. It could be part and parcel for any Jedi. But this wasn’t just an unusual situation. Despite her calm demeanor, her training to adapt and listen to the Force, she felt unmoored, at a loss for the first time in a long time. She had been good at war; too good, perhaps. Too used to it. All the Jedi had been feeling that as of late; she sensed the fatigue at the endless fight, the senseless battles. Even she, with talents suited more to conflict resolution than peacekeeping, felt the slow crumbling of their way of life, their ideals. She hated it. But she hadn’t looked too closely, either.
Not until she and Obi-Wan had discussed the future. How, after the war, they could have traveled together again, like before. How they could regain what had been lost. And she had to admit, he was so much more optimistic than she had been. Dying, she’d wanted to preserve that, not see that optimism die with her. Of all the Jedi, his unfailing dedication to that was needed most. She died believing that he would continue on.
She died, that was the real crux here.
No Jedi truly feared death, knowing the Force the way they did. She knew she would be at peace with it, no matter how much she didn’t want to go yet. She just….why then? The plaintive thought was immediately followed by her own bemusement, because you were determined that Magus wouldn’t get away, that’s why. But it wasn’t the train of her thoughts. Why so soon after she’d admitted to Obi-Wan that despite her promise twenty years before, she hadn’t forgotten. She hadn’t successfully let go of her feelings.
The Force was likely putting her here so she would face it, for star’s sake. Sithspit, introspection was the worst.
She wasn’t dead. Her dearest friend and confidant was here, wherever here ended up being. Good enough. More than good enough, truly. What if she had come to this place and he was no where to be found?
The apartments, Morningside, were easy to find. Usually, any place that housed primarily offworld travelers was an easy mark, and she’d seen so many. Hundreds of planets worth. Her subconscious took in every detail as she navigated but she only filed that away. Closer, she thought she picked up the thread of Obi-Wan in the Force, that familiar, steady presence. Yes, she was sure of it, as she reached the apartment.
Obi-Wan was thoroughly sick of war. He’d never wanted to be a General or lead armies into battle. It wasn’t what a Jedi was about, but it was what he’d been doing the last several years. It wasn’t something he’d questioned until he’d come to Vallo and suddenly he’d had time to think and meditate. Here there were no Council Meetings to attend, no missions to plan, no armies to lead. He could just be Obi-Wan Kenobi, Jedi.
And now Siri was here. Back from the dead.
Was the Force toying with him? Siri had been his first love, and truthfully he’d never gotten over her anymore than he’d gotten over Satine. Avoiding attachment was never something he’d been able to achieve if he was being honest with himself, he was terrible at it. But it was a weakness in his line apparently: Qui-Gon hadn’t been any better and Anakin was even worse judging by the fact that Luke existed.. Was Siri’s arrival a sign that he shouldn’t try to avoid his feelings again? Or a test of his willingness to let her go?
He so very much needed to meditate on it.
Once she’d told him she was coming he’d taken a moment to judge the condition of the apartment and decided it didn’t look like something he’d deem unpresentable. It had a lived in look and wasn’t spotless, but it was relatively neat and orderly, not an animal’s den. He himself looked presentable as well, thanks to rapid healing through the Force he didn’t look a complete invalid who’d only been unconscious in the hospital not even two weeks ago.
Sensing her presence in the Force he found himself fidgeting as she drew close, and made himself stop. He was a Jedi Master closer to forty than he was thirty, not some wet behind the ears Initiate barely out of the creche. It wasn’t out of his ability to control himself. That still didn’t stop his heart from speeding up when she knocked on the door.
Siri hesitated with her hand raised to the door, reaching out with the Force. She caught the faintest sensation of his feelings before she knocked, and it made her smile as he just as certainly locked it down. So disciplined...three years had not changed that. She enjoyed when she could get his composure to break, just a little.
But the reality of three years echoed with the sound of the door opening, and she paused there, her hand still raised to the panel, and because she had been so busy memorizing his features as she died, she saw every tiny change at once. It felt as if she’d only blinked, and his face had gained sadness around his eyes, grey among the sandy-colored lock of hair over his eyes. A few hours, and three years of war. I think we lost the war. She had no doubt that he would have battled until the last bit of hope was truly gone.
If he was going to say something, it didn’t truly matter yet, because Siri embraced him before he had a chance. Unusual for her, but she knew him better than anyone else. She knew, suddenly and surely, that they both needed reassurance in each other’s existence. She hugged him tightly, communicating through her grasp and through the Force that she was here, alive, the truth echoing on the deeper level they understood.
“Hey,” she said, quiet, in his ear. She would only let go when he did.
"Hello there," he replied, just as quiet. He held her close, unwilling to end the embrace just yet.
She was real, not a force ghost or hallucination. He could feel the solidness of her body pressed against his, with his arms around her. The steady rise and fall of her chest was a reassurance as well, it wasn’t something his mind would have dreamed up . She looked just as she had right before she was shot, something burned into his memories alongside Satine’s. It just made him wonder once again what the Force was trying to say with her return to the land of the living.
“I thought I must be dreaming when your communication came through. But you’re here. Real.”
Siri smiled, moving back finally so she could see him once more. As it always had been, her smile was small but self-assured, with mischief at the corners. “As far as I can tell. Or as we both can.” She slid her grasp from his shoulders down so she could clasp his hands in each one of hers, reassuring still. “This place is….unusual at best, and I can’t begin to fathom the why, but we can only work with what we know.”
She had glanced away once, to see the rest of the room, but only for a moment, still needing to relearn how he looked, now, with different experiences on his shoulders. She tugged him towards the couch, knowing intuitively that a lot of what would be said would weigh heavy. She could sense it.
“Before anything else….are you alright? Are you, or we, in any danger here?” She had let go as they moved, but she did lift a hand to touch his cheek gently, just above the roughness of his beard. “I’m here now, which means we are a team, no matter what, Obi-Wan.”
"Define 'danger'," he quipped, allowing himself to be led to the couch and sank down beside her when she sat. It allowed him to delay talking about what her being here meant for just a moment longer. "Neither the locals or those like ourselves mean any harm. But there are creatures and beings that appear from time to time through the waypoints and sometimes simply appear in the forest. They can be quite dangerous, which is why there are defense teams that regularly patrol as a precaution."
Obi-Wan put his hand over hers. “I won’t question the will of the Force. I don’t understand why you’re here, but I don’t think I’ve ever been so glad to see someone in my life.” He brought both her hands into his own. “I’ve missed you.”
“I hate that you had to miss me.” The feeling had coalesced as the grim reality of it set in, that she saw the effect that it had on him. For once, her eyes dropped a moment; was that shame or regret, so unusual to see on her face...it was hard to tell. “Obi-Wan….to me, no time has passed since we talked about our future. That we wanted to have a future. Even recognizing that we are...we were in the middle of a war, but nothing for me had changed. I still love you.” She let out a small breath. “And then I...was reckless. I didn’t think about the outcome, and I should have. I am better than that. I’m sorry that I jumped onto that ship.” The lines of her body spoke of that regret as she leaned forward slightly, her hand in his. “I’m sorry that I did it, forged ahead thinking only about how I couldn’t let him get away. That I risked throwing everything else away in the process.” She huffed a small half-laugh, a sad sound. “That I did throw that away. Maybe this is my second chance to do better.”
“Perhaps.” Obi-Wan squeezed her hands. He did love Siri. That had been true since they were teenagers.He’d tried to deny it, bury it away as incompatible with the life of a Jedi, but it had never left him. The same with Satine. “I’ve never been good with staying away from attachments.” Should he tell her about Satine? What had happened to her? He owed it to her to mention Satine, but when was the right time? Not right after she’d returned from the dead and professed her love for him, that much he knew. The conflict was clear on his face.
What Siri had done was rash, there was no denying that. And it had gotten her killed. “I can’t ask you to be anything but yourself, Siri. I love you too, and Force knows I’ve made mistakes in my life.” He bowed his head. “Mistakes that have gotten people I loved hurt and killed.”
Even had she been less perceptive, Siri could have picked out the indecision, something weighing on him. For someone tuned to both the Force and her longtime friend, it practically shouted at her. “None of us are infallible,” she said, quietly but firmly. “You know that...how often did Qui-Gon say something like that to you, or Adi to me. And yet we try and hold ourselves to a better standard, so it stings worse when we do fail.” Her blue eyes tried to search his face, sense what he was holding back. “Ferus...he left the Order after Darra’s death, and that was due to only a faulty lightsaber. It hurts to know we can lose so much over even a small mistake.”
Advising wasn’t going to be enough, she could tell. It was almost as if he were burdened. It couldn’t have been about Anakin; he so often sought her advice there. “There’s more you have endured,” she added, with clarity. “Tell me.” It wasn’t a command, but she gave him little room to withdraw.
Satine's ghost would hover between them anyway if he didn't say anything, and he'd already decided to tell her. He just hadn't been sure when that should be. "Very well."
Obi-Wan closed his eyes, breathed in, and tried to release his anxiety into the Force. It helped only slightly. Deciding there was no putting off the inevitable he opened his eyes and began to speak. "The zabrak, the sith who killed Qui-Gon, is still alive. Somehow being cut in two and falling down a reactor shaft isn't enough to kill a being.". He could hear the bitterness in his voice and frowned.
"His name is Maul and he resurfaced during the war, after you'd died. With his brother, Savage, he waged a campaign of terror across the outer rim. And he seemed to hold a grudge against me for cutting him in half, can’t imagine why." Sometimes his mouth had a mind of its own, and Obi-Wan shook his head slightly, refocusing on the matter at hand.. Siri needed to know the full truth. "Adi and I were sent after them and there was a fight. Adi was killed in the battle and they managed to escape.” He’d tell her all the details of that fight another time, for now a thumbnail sketch would have to do.
“We didn’t know where they’d gone at first but soon after it became clear they’d gone to Mandalore. They threw in with the Death Watch and overthrew the government, taking Satine hostage. She managed to get a message out to me and I went to rescue her, against the wishes of the Council. By the time I’d arrived Maul had killed the head of the Death Watch and taken over, proclaiming himself Mandalore.” Obi-Wan recited the words flatly, his eyes closed as he relived the events in his mind. “I broke her out of prison and we almost escaped, but it failed and we were both captured. Maul wanted to turn me to the dark side, and killed Satine in front of me to try and make it happen.” And she’d told him she’d always loved him. “She died in my arms.”
He was quiet for a few heartbeats, the pain of her senseless death washing over him once again and he had to force himself to let go of Siri’s hands for fear he’d crush them.
“If she’d ever asked, I would have left the Order for her.”
Worse than she expected, but Siri kept her composure, even as she had to close her eyes briefly at the sting of Adi’s death. She hadn’t seen her once master the same way Obi-Wan had cherished his; Adi had always taught her independence and a willingness to let go. It still hurt, knowing the Jedi who had raised her and molded her was gone. For later, she knew. She would meditate on Adi on her own.
“Satine wouldn’t have asked you,” she said, instead, almost carefully, as he felt his way through reliving the events. “She was brave enough to have done so, if she felt it was right. You know that. She spoke her mind.” Perhaps not as often her heart as she should have. Siri knew she couldn’t wonder what might have been, had Satine indeed voiced what she felt sooner. That path was closed, and if she entertained it, Obi-Wan would feel her pity. Siri herself had known the Mandalorian leader, had known even what was in her dear friend’s heart. It felt like a wound, when she opened her senses to the Force. An aching wound of loss.
Sighing a little, she added, with care, “When someone like that loves you, it’s a gift, Obi-Wan. She loved you without holding you back, or keeping you from what you had chosen for your life. It’s admirable, as she was. She cherished you without changing who you are at your core. Remember that of her, not what others did.”
“I know.” Obi-Wan sighed and reached up to stroke his beard. “And most times I do just that, but there are times when I find it difficult to release the negative emotions into the Force.” Satine’s death would always be a scar he carried on his soul, burdened with the knowledge she’d lost her life because of him. He honestly didn’t know what he’d do if she returned from the dead like Siri had, and he shoved that thought firmly to the back of his head and tried to forget it.
“The war has brought nothing but pain and suffering to so many worlds. I sometimes wonder if it wouldn’t have been better for everyone if we’d just let the Separatists go and wished them well rather than fighting a civil war to keep them in the Republic.” But of course that couldn’t have happened. Like it or not they’d danced to the Sith’s tune, and based on his interactions with Luke he suspected it had ended very badly for the Jedi.
“By the time we entered the war, we were already a tool being used.” The words rang with acrimony and resignation both. It wasn’t the first time she had thought it; she had admired the Council but had no qualms telling them when they were being foolish. And the last few years, she had rarely gone back at all, lest her tongue get the better of her. She had done her duty all the same, and taken solace in the fact that she had done what good was possible. “I miss what we were meant to do, as Jedi.” Some missions, she cherished. Freeing the slaves under Krayn’s rule. Stopping Jenna van Arbor. Finding the way to save people amongst the battles.
“But I’m…..sorry about Satine.” She was, and that sadness slipped itself between her ribs, an aching spot. They’d never been able to keep secrets from one another, and she knew he’d fallen for Satine during those years that Siri herself had been avoiding him. There was no other term for it. Absence had seemed the best solution to their problem. Never did she begrudge him that, and she despaired that he’d not only been witness, but unable to save her. For them, with all their training and their abilities, feeling helpless was the worst of all. Just as Qui-Gon had felt helpless when Tahl died, and Ferus when Darra died. “It’s seems simple to repeat what we were taught, and just say to let it go into the Force. But it’s anything but simple. I feel your regret, and how much you miss her.”
Grief brought that familiar restlessness, and Siri almost hated it, for a moment; how when facing loss, she wanted to act to put it behind her. So terrible at facing the truth. Satine’s death was so fresh in his thoughts, unlike hers three years prior, and she was both grateful for that and also despaired of it. She leaned back, rubbing her hands over her face, willing herself to not get up and pace. “What do we do here, now? I don’t even know this place. Everything else, everyone else…..is out of reach.”
“Thank you.” It was more Siri’s return from the dead and arrival in Vallo that had stirred up the memories and emotions of that day than anything else, but it would always be something he carried with him. She was quite correct that it was anything but simple to let the emotions go into the Force, but he worked diligently at it nonetheless when they came. What else could he do? Wallowing in the memories and grief would solve nothing, and Satine wouldn’t want him to be in that state anyway.
The subject change was a welcome one. He’d accomplished what needed to be done, making sure Satine’s ghost didn’t hover between them with her death unmentioned, now they could move their focus to the present instead of the past. “What is it you would want to do? I’ve chosen to work with the defense teams to patrol and help protect the city from dangers that come through the waypoints, but everyone here can choose their own path. You’re not able to roam the galaxy like in the past, but on this world you’re free to do, to be, whatever you wish.” There was nothing stopping her from abandoning the life of a Jedi, if that was what she wished.
“I was doing what I wished,” Siri joked, a humored exhale. “Well, truly, we both didn’t want to be in the war. For good or ill, that’s beyond us here. But working with you, traveling, helping others….my life wasn’t so bad.” She didn’t think she would have missed everyone, and the Temple, so badly, but the knowledge that there was no way to reach them sat heavily. For now, she let that go.
“If there is space for me, I’d rather continue working with you. My strength is defense, we both know this. No need to tell anyone that I am better at the lightsaber than you.” The tease made her eyes glint a moment. “After that….only time will tell. I don’t know enough of this place yet.” And the implications were setting in as well. There was no Jedi Order here. Was she still a Jedi if it didn’t exist? Her ideals remained the same, but some things were destined to change, without that guiding influence any longer.
“You’re always welcome by my side.” Obi-Wan smiled and reached out to brush away a fallen strand of hair away from her face. “And we’ll have to spar to see just who is better at saberwork. If you want to stay here there’s plenty of room, I’ve only the one roommate.”
“Thank you for that. And for the offer to show you up again.” She could never quite pass by a chance to kid with him. Still, she softened a little as his fingers moved her hair back. She wanted to lean into that touch, to be closer, but something held back the impulse. In a way, he wasn’t who she remembered, although he was. Only a short span of years, but enough changes to make her pause. “I’m glad you are here,” she settled for saying, instead. “I doubt I would have been half as calm otherwise. It seems the Force looks out for me, still.”