Archive: SWAL, M&A - anywhere else please let me know first
Archive Date: March 11, 2000
Category: Alternate-Universe, Angst, Non-Q/O, Drama
Feedback: Pretty, pretty please!
Notes: I want it known that this is ALL YVETTE'S FAULT!
I was all set to write another story about Obi and Maul, maybe *the
actual Soul Bonding itself*, but then Yvette sent me an email - much
of it in all caps - emphatically telling me that it was my duty to
Make. Qui-Gon. Suffer.
Her use of adjectives describing her thoughts about the Qui-Gon of
this universe inspired me. Heh heh heh...
Again, thanks to Kristi for letting me play in her sandbox!
I hope you like this one, Kristi - see, no Obi/Maul! ;D
Rating: PG-13
Series: This story won't make much sense without reading Kristi's story
first, which is archived at:
http://www.sockiipress.org/ma/a2/dissolution.html
and then my sequel to her story, which is called
'Sea Change'
This is from Qui-Gon's point of view a few months after the events of
'Dissolution' and 'Sea Change'.
Spoilers: So AU it's not a factor.
Summary: When Qui-Gon betrays Obi-Wan's years of love and
devotion to pursue another, he realizes too late just what he's lost.
Warnings: Much angst, not a happy fic.
Like one
Who having into truth, by telling of it,
Made such a sinner of his memory,
To credit his own lie.
~ William Shakespeare's 'The Tempest'
He walked around the grounds listlessly again, trying to find some outlet for his boredom. There was little to do at the Jedi Temple in way of leisure activities. Most of the Temple was set up for the training of the young for knighthood and for research into the many cultures of the galaxy.
Thanks to his convalescent status he was unfit for physical training, even if his aging body could handle the physical regimen of his youth. And he was well-versed in the multitude of cultures across the galaxy, not that he'd practically apply that knowledge ever again.
Two weeks previously, after a severe injury while on duty on Paralyn V, he had been told, while recovering in the Temple infirmary, that he had been permanently removed from active status as a Jedi. His duty - what he'd lived his whole life for - was taken away in an instant. He'd tried to argue, to say that his injury had nothing to do with age, just sheer bad luck. His arguments fell on deaf ears.
"Qui, you know you're getting too old to go running off to save the galaxy. You're not a young man anymore. Let the up-and-coming knights have their chance. Besides, Mundi has been making noises about stepping down to take on a padawan. You'd be perfect, Qui."
He had gazed at his bondmate coldly. "You know how I feel about this, Mace," he'd said. "I'll appeal to the Council. I'm a Jedi Knight - not a bureaucrat."
His bondmate had frowned at him. "I think you'll find the Council is agreed on this matter, Master Jinn."
He had looked up in surprise. "Meaning you decided for them?"
Windu's frown deepened with annoyance. "Meaning they value my objective opinion of your condition based upon my status as your bondmate."
"I am still a valuable knight!" he'd argued. "I could take on another padawan for training!"
And then Councilor Windu had actually sneered at him. "Oh, really? Your first three padawans certainly did you credit, didn't they? One turned to the dark, another fled and almost certainly turned as well, while the first suffered a nervous collapse and now functions as a 'Jedi presence' on an unimportant backwater world. I hardly think that your skills in training would be a great loss to the Jedi." And the distinguished Council member had swept out of the room without a backward glance.
And so it had been. At the age of sixty-three years, hardly at death's door, and certainly well before age should force him from active duty, he was grounded at the Temple. He wasn't unaware of what was happening or why. It hadn't taken a genius to figure it out, after all. His bondmate wanted him near. Politically, if Qui-Gon took a seat on the Council it meant that Mace gained another vote on Council decisions. Personally, it meant that Mace was able to keep an eye on his bondmate. No more 'shielding for days for the sake of the mission.' Mace was far too clever.
He sighed deeply again. There was no privacy from his bondmate. And since he didn't want the Council seat Windu had so cleverly arranged for him to have, he had nothing to do during the days while his mate sat in chambers deciding the fate of the Jedi. 'Force, even that would at least be something to do!' he thought maddeningly.
His mate had been right. He was strongly encouraged not to take on another padawan, and the few times he'd even gone to watch the initiates training he'd noticed the gossip and agitation whenever he was present. After shamelessly scanning the weakly shielded young minds he'd come to an awareness of their true feelings: None of them wanted to be taken as the padawan of Qui-Gon Jinn. Associated with a string of failures, the children asserted his former padawans had all "gone crazy or run off."
After that he'd stopped watching the initiates, and stopped teaching classes altogether.
Which left him with time on his hands and nothing to do. He knew Mace had backed him into a corner, and that soon he'd give in just for the joy of actually doing something, as much as he resented it.
And he did resent it - that his bondmate has abused his position on the Council, had forced his early 'retirement', had kept him from what he loved. This wasn't what he'd envisioned when he'd accepted Windu as his lifemate. He thought he was following his heart, following the will of the Force. Now he wondered if he had merely been a victim of the political manipulations of Mace Windu.
For the man had changed. The passionate man who had claimed to adore him, who was so worldly and sophisticated, had disappeared soon after their bonding. In his place stood Senior Councilor Windu, who seemed determined to shape his new bondmate into the image he wanted. And Qui-Gon didn't want to be shaped.
'It wouldn't have been this way with Obi-Wan,' he thought before he could stop himself.
He winced, but couldn't stop the thoughts associated with his former bondmate. Obi-Wan would have fought with the Council. He would have gone head-to-head with them to defend the need for Qui-Gon Jinn to be out in the field as a Jedi, knowing how much it meant to Qui-Gon, and confident in Qui-Gon's strengths in that regard. Obi- Wan would never have manipulated him into something he hated - such an action was beyond Obi-Wan, who, Qui-Gon remembered, was always considerate and kind and subservient to a fault.
Thinking back he remembered years of waking to Obi-Wan fixing him breakfast, providing backrubs after tiring days on missions or fighting with the Council. He had taken it all for granted, even after Obi-Wan had achieved his knighthood, and was under no obligation to 'serve' his bondmate in any way. But Obi-Wan had delighted in such actions. Certainly he had been a far superior padawan to the timid Lizann and the arrogant Xanatos.
Not for the first time in the last few days, Qui-Gon wondered where Obi-Wan had gone when he'd left the Temple. It was ascertained that he'd left around the time of Qui-Gon's own bonding ceremony with Mace Windu. Was the boy ('Man,' Qui-Gon corrected, 'Man - he's thirty-three years old') doing all right? Had he gone home to his biological family? Found a job somewhere? Was he, too, lonely?
Qui-Gon sighed and decided to leave off such useless thoughts. He wrapped his arms around himself, swathed in his robe, and strode out of the gardens to head to the dining room for lunch. Mace would be enclosed in sessions all day, as usual. Walking serenely down the hallways he passed some young padawans sitting on a bench outside one of the classrooms, likely waiting for a friend before heading on to lunch themselves. He nodded at them as he passed, noting their proper bows and both padawans' reverent greeting of "Master."
Two steps onward, past a huge column, he noticed Master Th'roc ahead of him, and since he detested the man, he came to a halt to make sure his long stride would not cause him to overtake the little man. The possibility of having to eat with the odious little Vesh'tak was too much to be borne.
However, he might have borne it happily if he knew what he otherwise was to endure. The padawans he had passed began talking, no doubt assuming he was beyond range of their words.
"Who was that? I've seen him before, but I don't recognize him."
"That? That was Qui-Gon Jinn, the one Master Windu married last year. You must have been away during their ceremony - I think the whole Temple was there!"
"Master Windu bonded with that old fossil? Why?"
"Beats me. None of us can figure it out. I guess love truly is blind!" the voice said. Both laughed at the statement. "And Jinn was bonded to a young knight before he left him for Windu. Or so they say, but I think that Kenobi left him, and then maybe Windu bonded with him out of pity or something."
A gasp was heard. "He was married to Obi-Wan Kenobi? The one who left? Gods, I remember Kenobi - he taught a class of mine two years ago - what a hunk! He was beautiful! He probably left out of trauma from waking up next to that every morning!"
Laughter from both padawans.
"No joke! I don't know what Master Windu was thinking! And now they say Jinn just wanders the Temple. No one wants to be his padawan - he's a total jinx. And he's too sick to go on missions. He sounds half crazy or something."
"Force - how pathetic!" the other voice said with a snort of derision.
Then the door opened as the class was dismissed, and Qui-Gon hurried to move away before the padawans noticed him behind the column.
He walked in a daze down the corridors, finding himself in his favorite room of the Temple - the Star Map Room. But looking at all the many worlds he'd never visit again as a Jedi only made him more despondent. He sat down in a corner of the room, gazing at all the stars and planets shining above him.
He was cold, so cold suddenly. He huddled in his robe. It was becoming threadbare, he realized. He hadn't noticed. He hadn't had to for years. Obi-Wan always took care of it. Obi-Wan always took care of everything.
But he'd driven him away. For the sake of something that only proved illusory and false.
Tears in his eyes, he shivered in his cloak, drawing it tighter around him.
"Force, what have I done!" he whispered plaintively.
But there was only silence.