InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "Stardrops!"

Obi-Wan Kenobi (do_what_i_must) wrote in makebelievelog,
@ 2012-07-08 00:44:00

Entry tags:

anakin skywalker, obi-wan kenobi

Who: Anakin Skywalker, Obi-Wan Kenobi
What: Super Fun Chat
Where: In the castle, somewhere
When: Evening time, July 7th
Status: Closed/In Progress

Anakin had been avoiding him of late. None of the messages he had sent on the comms device had been replied to. None of his voice-mails had been replied to, either, and so Obi-Wan set out to explore the castle and find his wayward Padawan. He knew vaguely where Anakin was - he couldn't not know - and so he was able to home in on him fairly quickly.

Knocking on the door of the suite Anakin was holed up in, Obi-Wan stepped back and waited. Looking down at his feet as he did so, he noticed a handful of wires and tiny spare parts in a small pile by the wall. A quick nudge of the Force brought them up to his hand and he took hold of the minute cogs and strands of copper before raising his voice slightly. "Anakin? I found some droid innards, I think they belong to you."

He reached out with the Force and opened the lock, watching as the door swung open, but he didn't go into the rooms just yet. He stayed in the doorway and looked in, blinking at how familiar the scene was. "What did the poor droid do to deserve... that?" he asked, looking at all the different wires and components that surrounded his Padawan.

(Post a new comment)

darkforcerising
2012-07-08 07:01 am UTC (link)

Anakin knelt amidst mounds of what could only be loosely grouped together under the label of junk. Some piles contained working, intact components, wires, or chips. Other piles consisted of cut or exposed wires, dismantled casings, and broken pieces. Though the latter did have a discernible pattern to the damage, it was meticulous, and served a purpose. Gutted materials deconstructed to be used in other ways and assimilated into something new. From in those piles he rummaged and pulled out wanted modules for the project that currently fixed his attention.

But that was the circle of piles closest to him. In a greater radius outward from Anakin, in a haphazard configuration one could comfortably say was no longer a circle shape, spread debris that bore signs as if they had encountered a devastating battle. Some crushed casings here and smashed exteriors in another direction. Shattered glass there – yes, those remains had once been the screen of the television that had hung above the fireplace mantle in the sitting room. And even a few completed robots that had been sliced in two by a blade littered the floor between the other congregations of detritus. And if someone were looking hard enough, in one spot along the wall, there was a pile of broken DVD shards. Evidence of destruction among the creation.

Anakin cast a dark look in Obi-Wan’s direction, focusing mostly on the Jedi Master’s hand. “You’re holding a coil of copper and some experimental converter plugs,” he scoffed, as if the red-gold wire and pronged caps should be self-evident to even the youngest of children. Anakin, at the academy, had always been smug about his mechanical abilities. “They’ve yet to be incorporated into anything resembling a droid.”

He returned to the task at hand, stripping a set of wires to integrate into the jury-rigged adaptor he needed.

He clearly wasn’t in a joyful mood, evidenced by his previous ignoring Obi-Wan. But he hadn’t made himself difficult to find, a few locked doors and unheeded messages were hardly an effort on his part. One might question if he truly wanted to be left alone if he made it so easy for a Jedi Master to track him down. Maybe this was the case. Possibly. But he wasn’t in any kind of state to admit it. No, sabotaging his bid for solitude was the closest he could get.

“What do you want, Master?” he asked as he yanked back with the wire-striper, pulling the red coating off the metal threads underneath.

(Reply to this) (Thread)

do_what_i_must
2012-07-08 12:22 pm UTC (link)

Obi-Wan frowned as he looked around the room at the obvious carnage, only glancing at Anakin when he spoke. "I wanted to see how you were," he replied, stepping in and carefully picking his way over to where most of the broken glass was. He carefully picked up every piece with the Force, collecting all the shards in one big clump that hung in mid-air, before going into the bedroom to grab the bin from the bathroom. "You didn't reply to any of my messages, so I felt it would be easier to come and see you in person," he continued as he returned to the main room and collected the floating glass in the metal bucket. The sharp bits of metal were left alone since Anakin might have need of them at a further point, but the silvery-coloured bits of plastic were picked up as well and added to the contents of the bucket.

Once he had tidied up the obvious injury-causing things, he crossed back over to stand in a relatively clear patch of floor and watched Anakin work for a while. The methodical stripping of wires and assembling components was something Obi-Wan knew was far below Anakin's skill level when it came to working with machinery and the like, and so he had come to think of it as Anakin's own personal form of meditation. It kept his hands and eyes busy, but left his mind free to concentrate on other things.

Obi-Wan's silence, though. That would get to the younger man after a while, break his concentration and then he would start to talk about what was bothering him. That was the plan, at least. Obi-Wan settled in to wait. Hopefully, it wouldn't take long for Anakin to fill the silence.

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

darkforcerising
2012-07-08 01:39 pm UTC (link)

Anakin didn’t follow Obi-Wan’s movements with his eyes, but he was keenly aware of everything the older man was doing. He couldn’t tell if the cleaning of his mess was an appreciative gesture or annoying to the core. That was his mess, after all, and he was experiencing a moment of extreme defiance against the precepts of the Order, and he irrationally wanted to be attached to his mess. But, he rebelliously kept that to himself, and instead resorted to bottling each ping of irritation of the bits and pieces hitting the bottom of the waste receptacle, as he had been taught to do.

Conveniently forgetting the part about releasing that emotion into the flow of the Force.

As the silence stretched and there were no more utterances, or attempts at tidying, Anakin’s concentration did begin to falter. First, the stripper didn’t clean the length of wire in one yank. He had to pause and remove bits of casing off the strands after the first pass. Then he broke a few threads, and had to clean off more. And with each mounting mistake his scowl deepened and his patience to endure Obi-Wan’s immovable, soundless presence wore just that much more thin.

Until he broke under his former master’s stubbornness (was it any wonder Anakin had that in spades with a master like Obi-Wan?) and the first thing that came to mind burst out, riding on a wave of frustration and bitter emotions.

“How could you not see who he was? He was right there the whole time. A clear view out the Council Chamber’s windows!” Anakin didn’t clarify the ‘who’, the who was Palpatine. It was an unjust indictment, deflected from the full, unbearable weight of the knowledge of his own culpability. He was angry. But it was mostly at himself. Disgusted, really, after watching those depictions of home. Unfortunately, inward reflection was an unperfected skill for him and, as it often did with him, his emotions spread out, and away, in erratic waves, rather than meditatively through the Force. “You were the Council,” he clarified, because he wasn’t just upset with Obi-Wan, or himself, but the whole of the Order. As it seemed like the best target. “You were supposed to see these things. But you just left me with him? How did you not see how wrong that was?!”

Of course, each question was more a vocal demand of his own accounting and fault than his tone would suggest. How had he stepped so blinding over the edge? But it came out as an accusation.

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

do_what_i_must
2012-07-08 09:21 pm UTC (link)

The waves of emotion went roiling through the Force, smashing into Obi-Wan like a battering ram, but he stood his ground as Anakin accused him of one of the very things that kept him awake at night. He simply did his best to remain where he stood and to keep watching Anakin without flinching or turning away.

"I... I don't... Anakin, he lied to us all and he had been doing so for years. Master Yoda didn't even know... We, we knew something was wrong, but not what it was; otherwise, we wouldn't have asked you to report back on what he was doing. Mace thought it might have been his aide, Pestage... If we had known... If I had known..."

Looking down, he rubbed at the bridge of his nose. "I... I didn't know."

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

darkforcerising
2012-07-09 01:34 am UTC (link)

“You don’t know?!” Anakin shot back. “You’re supposed to know!” Because someone was supposed to know. Right?

The wire he was holding in his hands snapped from the tension he was unwittingly exerting on it. He stood up then. Not in a threatening manner, the most he wanted to break apart were non-sentient objects like the things scattered about the room. He just needed to move, to find some outlet for the energy building up within him. He paced to the other side of the room on the pretense of sifting through a pile on the table there. But not finding the piece he wanted, not that he expected it to in the first place, but he was more than willing to let the effect substitute for the cause in this instance, his movements became less methodical.

“So what am I supposed to make of that? The will of the Force?” he grumbled bitterly, dropping things with increasing force and noise until he just wanted to shove it all to the floor.

“Because I knew once,” he continued over the clatter he was making. “On Mortis.” He trusted Obi-Wan remember just about as much of that place as Anakin did. More so it seemed, because there was a stretch of time that was nothing but a blank when he tried to recall what had happened. “Apparently, all of it was shown to me. Everything that you say I do.” He paused in his digging to then add, “But then it was all erased from my mind. So ‘balance could be restored,’ that what I was told.” Or so he had learned. Because he didn’t recall his conversation on the matter with the Father any more than he could remember what the Son had shown him. But if it was true, did it matter if he could remember?

“So what am I supposed to make of that? That it's supposed to happen?”

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

do_what_i_must
2012-07-09 10:43 pm UTC (link)

Obi-Wan remained silent as Anakin clattered and banged about at the table, watching his slightly frantic motions as he sorted through the... the stuff on the table. His mind could not settle on one train of thought; he flitted from wondering how Anakin had found these things out, to trying to concentrate enough to remember the prophecy, that kriffing prophecy that had been like a millstone round their necks ever since Anakin was accepted into the Temple, and then he bounced straight on to how he should have known, he should have known, and no wonder Anakin was blaming him...

"How... How did you learn that?" he asked eventually, not answering any of Anakin's rhetorical questions. He could not think. Why couldn't he think? Why couldn't he talk with his own Padawan? He had escaped from Ventress while she forced him to wear that blasted Sith mask; he had commanded entire armies, he had fought Sith Lords, thre- oh. Oh. Clamping down on his shields, he did his best to remain calm.

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

darkforcerising
2012-07-10 03:04 am UTC (link)

Silence, more insufferable silence! To Anakin that was almost torture. He needed to be always moving, and if he wasn’t moving he needed noise, lots of loud noises. Because if he stopped, if he was quiet, then his thoughts could catch up to him, and then he was stuck, because he could be wrong. He was right often enough to justify jumping heedlessly into action, but when he was wrong, so very wrong, the consequences rippled out for generations and across galaxies.

His hand paused on some gutted casing, gripping it tight. He wanted to turn around and continue shouting back at his former master. Fight me, tell me I am wrong, don’t take the blame, lay it at my feet. The casing gripped so tightly in his hand started to buckle under the stress of the Force. Trained from the moment he could walk, or talk, to expect swift, harsh punishments for mistakes, leniency was sometimes too much for Anakin to accept. When expected punishment never fell he was lost, confused, because he wasn’t a master, he was a servant. He could lead, but always when granted leave to do so by another. Do it, someone needs to, someone I trust and look to for guidance needs to make this right because I cannot. Because I failed at it when I tried!

But that chastisement never came.

Instead he felt a momentary surge of aching emotion from Obi-Wan and then it was all whisked away as the older man’s shields were slammed into place.

Anakin closed his eyes, trying to bite back the retort he wanted to shout at his former Master. Why did Obi-Wan do that? Shut himself off and never acknowledge what he was feeling? Oh, Anakin knew the answer, seeped so much in the Jedi dogma himself. He could and did rebel against the precepts forbidding feelings so often, but that didn’t mean he didn’t experience guilt for each slip in behavior, or understand the trained response to check oneself.

And those thoughts, all combined, fueled his frustration, because they weren’t solving anything. They were just sinking further into the misery that was suffocating the room and everything in it.

“NO!” Anakin shouted, slamming the casing down on the pile of junk, and then, with the Force, shoving the junk immediately before him on the table to the ground. He whirled around to face Obi-Wan.

“Don’t do that!” He ignored Obi-Wan’s question and rushed on; all his self-loathing, once started couldn't be stopped. “Don’t stand there and not tell me what I did wrong. Reprimand me! This isn’t right! You didn’t fail, I did it! I failed- Everyone. Do something that makes sense, because. This. Doesn’t!”

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

do_what_i_must
2012-07-10 11:14 pm UTC (link)

"Of course I failed," he replied, almost talking over Anakin as he did so. "You said it yourself. I should have known. We should have known, but we didn't and..." he said, trailing off for a moment before shoving some of the things on the floor out of his way with the Force. He felt oddly trapped by all the components, and needed clear floor-space around him.

"I spend every night going over... over everything, every night, trying to see what I missed, what I should have done and what I did wrong," he continued, closing his eyes and covering them with his free hand, still holding on to the bin full of glass with the other. "I'm your Master, I should have... Why didn't I..."

(Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

darkforcerising
2012-07-11 12:29 am UTC (link)

“Well-!” And now the two were engaging in a shouting match over one another, like two mature adults did in arguments. “You’re wrong! I’m the one that failed!”

Even though the conversation had started with Anakin accusing Obi-Wan of the very thing Obi-Wan was now trying to take the blame for, that wasn’t the younger Jedi’s position now. The flip-flop could be partially attributed to Anakin’s defiance and initial reaction to buck responsibility, but also a great deal was due to his confusion. He couldn’t make heads or tails of their history, the why and the how Palpatine was able to fool everyone, or what his own role in everything, especially regarding the Prophecy, meant for anything about their world. It didn’t make sense and when things didn’t make sense Anakin, due to his competitive nature, took it as a personal challenge to make even less sense.

“And maybe you should stop doing that every night because… because! I’m right and you’re wrong!”

Anakin had been known in the past to express salient and convincing arguments. A few times. This would not go down in the records as one of those moments. Perhaps because he wasn’t known for his eloquent diplomatic style. Or, perhaps the topic, who failed most, could be the true culprit. Or perhaps Anakin simply didn’t have the courage to say what was nagging at the back of his mind since diving into the information of their world. What if it had been the will of the Force? What if the Force was a down right bastard that hadn’t given one kriff about the pawns who could wield it? What if everything that had happened, and would happen, was supposed to happen, their wants and desires be damned?

The thought was flooring, and feeling more than a bit defeated by a problem Anakin simply couldn’t bowl his way through to find the solution, he slumped back against the table. He looked across at his former master, only ‘former’ in that Anakin now carried the title of Knight, no longer a Padawan in official label, but he would always view Obi-Wan as his master. He was oddly bereft of any further yelling.

Hero with no fear, indeed. And what of the negotiator?

“The will of the Force,” he mumbled quietly, miserably.

(Reply to this) (Parent)