Once upon a time, there was a Jedi master. His name was Qui-Gon Jinn. And he had never, ever, despite his years and wisdom, seen any action.

He'd trained one padawan all the way to knighthood -- bing! Next.

He'd lost the next padawan to the Dark Side. Buzz! Next.

He didn't want to take another padawan. He just wanted to go look at the wall and wallow in self- pity for the rest of his life.

He especially didn't want the little whiner who kept screwing up really easy assignments. Kid was on his way to the Agricorps, and not a moment too soon. Especially what made Qui-Gon the maddest was how moony-eyed the other kids got around the little twerp. By the time he was of Acceptable Age, that boy was going to be seeing more action than a proscenium stage.

But as the transport was leaving, washouts aboard, Qui-Gon saw the face of young Obi-Wan framed in the rear window, looking wistfully at him. He felt a softening in his heart (and a hardening in -- well, we'll get to that later), and he chased after the transport and made it stop. He pulled Obi-Wan off the transport and said, his voice choked from the exhaust, "I would be honored if you would be my padawan, Obi-Wan Kenobi." Obi-Wan smiled through his tears, and the iris closed around their beaming faces as the house lights came up on intermission.

---

As Obi-Wan grew older and wiser and yummier, Qui-Gon knew he'd been right. He had to fend them off with sticks; poor Obi-Wan had a different date every night of the week, and a different pattern of scratches and teeth-marks every morning.

It was quite tiresome.

Qui-Gon told himself not to fall victim to the green- eyed monster (Obi-Wan), but his lust was rapidly undermining his constitution. He tore his hair and beard out in great handfuls. He developed bags under his eyes. He was as jealous of Obi-Wan himself as he was of all those other people who were sleeping with him.

How had he gotten to be forty-two (or sixty, in base seven) years old without ever getting any? Was there a deadline nobody had told him about?

He contemplated the merits of strong drink.

And the curtain fell on Act Two.

---

Finally, the moment came when Qui-Gon Had To Act. He'd been biding his time for ten long years (that's thirteen, base seven), and enough was finally enough. Over lunch one day, he put down his beer bottle, leaned back in his chair, and spoke his padawan's name.

Obi-Wan looked up from his plate of oysters. "Master?"

How do you do it, Obi-Wan? he wanted to ask. You're such a ... such a slut, and you don't seem to care what people think. Qui-Gon cleared his throat and took a breath. "You're grounded, Obi- Wan."

"I -- what?"

"Grounded. Down to earth, so to speak. An electrical charge would pass right through you and into the floor. How do you remain so level-headed? Do you never fantasize?"

Obi-Wan cocked his head to one side and got a crinkle between his eyes, and Qui-Gon had to clear his throat again. "Well, of course I do, Master. Don't you?"

Qui-Gon gave a Mirthless Laugh [tm]. "Do I? Only for the past twenty-eight -- or possibly forty -- years of my life, Padawan. Every master who ever trained me, every superior officer I ever had, they all complained constantly that my thoughts had an obvious tendency to wander." He spun his plate around in circles a couple of times.

Obi-Wan cocked his head to the other side. "They could tell?"

Qui-Gon nodded. "It caused me no end of trouble."

"I should say, Master. If you don't mind my saying so, you've been doing it wrong."

"I beg your pardon?"

"The whole point of allowing your mind to wander, Master, is to do so without being detected. As long as the person you're speaking to believes he has your undivided attention, you're free to actually think about whatever you wish."

"I know the point of allowing one's mind to wander, Padawan."

"I don't think you do, Master. Because in your case, the people you've been speaking to have been conscious all along of the fact that your attention has been ... elsewhere."

Qui-Gon fidgeted and scratched his shoulder against the back of his chair. "So you just seem to be alert and attentive at all times, Padawan?"

Obi-Wan looked down at the table, but not in time to hide a Slight Smirk [tm]. "Often, Master."

"Your concentration on your lessons and training is a mere facade, while your mind occupies itself with thoughts of your many conquests?"

Qui-Gon felt his nostrils flare. He folded his arms in his sleeves so Obi-Wan would not see him clench his fists. But Obi-Wan had looked up sharply and met his eyes. "No, Master! You misunderstand me!"

Qui-Gon Raised One Eyebrow [tm]. "Do I."

"It's ... I ..." Obi-Wan looked back at the table and started arranging his oysters in patterns on his plate. His face flushed; the tips of his ears had turned a rather fetching shade of pink.

Qui-Gon bit his tongue. "Go on, Padawan."

"Well ... I mean to say ... this is rather difficult, Master." Obi-Wan scratched at the back of his neck. "It's actually -- Master, when my mind wanders, it wanders to thoughts of you."

Qui-Gon sat very still.

He sat very still and looked across the table at Obi- Wan.

He looked across the table at Obi-Wan and breathed calmly and evenly through his nose.

"Obi-Wan Kenobi. It is not nice to tease."

Obi-Wan looked as though someone had asked him to thread a fish. "Master?"

"You heard me. You are a man, very nearly grown, and you should not toy with another sentient being's feelings."

"I don't under--"

"I imagine that my romantic life, or lack thereof, is the subject of much discussion and merriment among you and your many friends, but I assure you I am not as stoic as I sometimes appear."

"You -- stoic -- what --"

"Don't sit there with your smug face and your bruised neck and tell me I'm the subject of your fantasies, Obi-Wan! You insult me to suppose that I would fall for such a line! With age comes wisdom, Padawan; it's taken me a long time, but I've learned that one thing I am not is sexually desirable."

Obi-Wan stared at Qui-Gon and didn't speak.

Qui-Gon un-clenched his fists.

Obi-Wan folded his napkin, stood up, replaced his chair, walked across the room, turned Qui-Gon around so his back was to the table, and slapped him across the face.

His eyes widened in horror immediately, but he didn't look away for another couple of seconds. Obi-Wan's nostrils flared, and Qui-Gon could tell he was biting down on his tongue. Qui-Gon himself was too stunned to do much more than stare. Had Obi-Wan just struck him? Obi-Wan had just struck him!

Finally, jaw trembling, Obi-Wan dropped to his knees and hung his head. Even with his chin in his collarbone, though, he spoke. "That was for calling me a liar, Master," he murmured.

"Obi-Wan --" Qui-Gon choked. "I --"

"I'm afraid it's a conditioned response." His shoulders set and held. "I've never done well with people speaking ill of you. Apparently it doesn't matter who."

Qui-Gon shook his head once, sharply. Obi-Wan had struck him -- because he had disparaged himself? The logic of that wasn't immediately apparent to him, but the end result seemed to be -- yes, any way he approached it, it seemed to mean that Obi-Wan Kenobi considered him, Qui-Gon Jinn, very attractive indeed.

Obi-Wan had raised his head. "There you go again," he said with a nervous smile. "I -- where does your mind wander to, Master?"

Qui-Gon snorted very ungently and reached down to touch Obi-Wan's face with his fingertips. "Isn't it obvious?" he whispered.

Obi-Wan's smile brightened by degrees. By the time he said "It is now," he was beaming.

"Why have you never --"

Obi-Wan laughed lightly and leaned his head into the palm of Qui-Gon's hand. "Please, Master. Think back a few years, if you will. Here's me, a mere boy in the first flush of adulthood. More than anything in all the worlds, I yearn for one man -- a man who is proud and aloof, and who incidentally also happens to be my master.

"It's not long before I realize that damn near everyone else I know wants him as well -- and as so many of them are so much more, ah, qualified than I am, I resign myself to only admiring him from afar.

"Many of these other admirers reach the same conclusion, but they think of a way to get as close to him as possible without actually being with him."

Qui-Gon slid his fingers through the fuzz of Obi- Wan's hair and said nothing.

Obi-Wan said nothing either.

Qui-Gon slid off the chair to join Obi-Wan on his knees. "They were using you," he whispered.

"Yes."

"And I assumed you were simply putting off making a choice," Qui-Gon went on. Then, with a smirk, he added, "Perhaps indefinitely."

Obi-Wan nodded. "So it would seem."

"And you ... assumed the same about me, I suppose." He raised his other hand to the other side of Obi-Wan's face, lightly massaging his neck behind each ear.

Obi-Wan's eyes drifted closed and he nodded mutely.

"Which of us is more foolish?" Qui-Gon asked.

"The fool, or the fool who follows him?" Obi-Wan murmured, as he closed his hands over Qui-Gon's and tipped up his chin, and quick like that they were kissing.

The initial brush of their lips was soft and dry and over in an instant, but before he had time to regret its brevity, Qui-Gon's mouth was sealed to Obi- Wan's. He felt a sound of approval begin in his chest, something between a moan and a shout, but it had nowhere to go; it stuck in his throat and reminded him to breathe.

He closed his eyes and opened his mouth wider, and Obi-Wan's mouth was immediately opened wider too. Obi-Wan's tongue was tracing the inside of his lips, the inside of his cheek, the roof of his mouth; Qui-Gon touched his own tongue to the inside of his lower lip, and Obi-Wan's tongue was there again.

Then it was gone. Qui-Gon felt his eyebrows knit, frustrated. The tip of Obi-Wan's tongue returned, then flickered away again; Qui-Gon took a breath, changed the angle of his head, replaced his mouth on Obi-Wan's, and followed. He felt Obi-Wan's teeth with his tongue. He felt Obi-Wan's tongue with his tongue. He tore his hands from under Obi- Wan's hands on the side of his head, wrapped an arm around Obi-Wan's shoulders and the other around his waist, and pulled Obi-Wan to him, knee to chest.

Obi-Wan slid a hand behind Qui-Gon's head and pulled away to catch his own breath, sliding smoothly into the next kiss, and the next, and the next.

Qui-Gon moved his hands.

He didn't know what to do next -- he couldn't decide. All these years, however many it had been, looking but not touching, enduring his thoughts of what other people -- damn near everyone else, as Obi-Wan had said -- had been allowed to see and feel ... he wanted, was all he could think, but he couldn't choose.

He tugged impatiently at Obi-Wan's shoulders and leaned towards the floor. He could feel Obi-Wan's smile as they lay down side by side; then Obi-Wan was pulling away, kneeling over him, bracing his weight on one hand and tracing the lines of Qui- Gon's face with the other.

"Obi-Wan ... I ..."

"Shh."

Qui-Gon gasped for breath. He helped Obi-Wan unfasten his belt and sash, but his fingers were clumsy. Finally he took hold of Obi-Wan's tunic and held on. Obi-Wan smiled and kissed him and unwrapped him like a gift.

At the first touch of Obi-Wan's bare hand on his bare ribs, Qui-Gon felt his whole body tense. He heaved another breath and tried to speak, but Obi- Wan shushed him again, kissed him again, and placed his elbow at Qui-Gon's shoulder and his hand behind Qui-Gon's head. He kissed Qui-Gon's chest and throat as his other hand crept down toward Qui-Gon's waistband; but by the time his hand was inside Qui-Gon's pants, Obi-Wan's mouth had covered Qui-Gon's again.

Magic fingers. Magic fingers. Magic fingers. Qui- Gon couldn't breathe. He couldn't see. His mouth was full of Obi-Wan's tongue and he couldn't cry out. He couldn't even kick his legs.

He arched his back and Obi-Wan's mouth left his and he shouted something that sounded to him like "AAAH" and he opened his eyes and the room was upside down. Qui-Gon took a great gulping breath, and then another. Obi-Wan's teeth were sunk into his shoulder. Obi-Wan's one hand was still behind his head -- between his head and the table leg, he realized, as he gasped another breath -- and Obi- Wan's other hand was tracing sticky shapes on his belly.

Obi-Wan grinned as Qui-Gon's breathing returned to normal. He licked his collarbone. Qui-Gon still held Obi-Wan's tunic in his fists; he tugged, strengthlessly, and Obi-Wan was instantly on his knees and pulling off the belt and the sash and the tunics and shoving his pants down over his boots, and only a moment later he was back. And now Obi-Wan gave Qui-Gon his full weight, didn't hold himself up on one arm any more, and kissed him and kissed him and pressed their bodies together. And Obi-Wan was young and strong and his skin burned like fire, and Qui-Gon found the strength to wrap his arms around Obi-Wan's back and hold tight.

Obi-Wan rolled them away from the table, rolled them until they were both lying on their sides, and then he had one arm around Qui-Gon's neck, holding him in place for more and more kisses, and one arm around Qui-Gon's hips, fingers digging into his flesh, holding him in place so he could shove his own hips rhythmically against him.

Obi-Wan rocked, and Qui-Gon clung, and Obi-Wan tried to get his legs in amongst Qui-Gon's, but they were both just a jumble of pants and boots from the knees down. And Obi-Wan rocked and rocked and tore his mouth away from Qui-Gon's, and Qui-Gon licked his jaw and his ear and bit his neck as Obi- Wan tensed and shook and tipped his head back with a sustained, keening wail.

Qui-Gon closed his eyes, and he fell asleep with the sound of Obi-Wan's voice in his ears.

Qui-Gon was aware that some time had passed when he opened his eyes again. His boots and his pants, and Obi-Wan's, were gone; Obi-Wan lay pressed against him, legs finally tangled together comfortably. His chin rested on Qui-Gon's breastbone, and his smile was the very image of contentment.

Qui-Gon sighed. "That was --"

Obi-Wan interrupted him with a soft kiss. "Just the beginning, Master." He laid his head on Qui-Gon's shoulder. Qui-Gon smiled and closed his eyes and allowed his attention to wander.

---

Comments always welcome!