Chapter Text
Dear Qui-Gon,
I find time passes very slowly on Tatooine. I've only been here six months, and it already feels like six years. The days are long and bright, and I can feel my skin begin to weather under the twin suns. There is little to occupy my days, and I content myself with meditation, talking to you or communicating with Yoda. Occasionally I go into town to get supplies, but I do not want my face to be too well known.
Every morning Rooh and I make the journey through the Wastes and across the Dune Sea to the Lars homestead. I always make sure to arrive after Owen is up on the ridges tending to the vaporators, and Beru is in the home going about her daily chores. I sit with Luke and let her work, the brief time enough to content myself that the boy is safe, loved and well cared for.
Today he was asleep when I got there, and I held him in my arms, marveling at the wispy blond hair, the features which are so familiar to me. His expressions are much like Anakin's, although sometimes I see dear Padmé as well, when the boy smiles.
He is not a calm sleeper, constantly wiggling and shifting in my arms as if always striving for a more comfortable position. And yet he sleeps soundly, his movements instinctive. Beru was particularly talkative today, and I discovered that Luke had been unsettled the previous night and wouldn't stop crying. This is not unusual for a child his age, Beru told me, but when Luke's cries reached their zenith the power in the room went out.
"Owen is convinced it was a generator glitch," Beru said, wringing her hands. "But…you said that Luke has the same powers that you and Anakin have."
"Yes," I replied, and I could see she suspected that Luke's distress triggered the lighting malfunction. A sound assumption. "He is very strong in the Force," I told her.
"And you can't...take it away?"
"No – I'm sorry." I truly was, because I could see her distress. In her eyes, Luke's Force potential was a danger to him – it made discovery far more likely, especially if his emotions were having physical consequences. "When he's older, he can learn how to control it."
Beru did not seem comforted. "And what will stop him from falling to the…dark side...like his father?"
"The proper training," I told her. "Discipline and self-control."
"Was Anakin not properly trained?"
Her words struck me. "No," I said after a long silence. "He wasn't." Looking back, I see only my mistakes with Anakin – my indulgence. I loved him, but I'm not sure I ever really understood him. I certainly didn't give him what he needed.
"But you think you can train Luke?" Beru asked, and the tone of her voice was a trifle sharp. I do not blame her, for what assurances are there that I would not make the same mistakes as I did with Anakin?
"Yes," I told her, with as much conviction as I could muster. What other choice was there? And besides, I have learnt from those mistakes. I hope.
"And what would you want of him, if he is trained?" Beru pressed when I did not answer.
"The Empire cannot stand forever," I said. "It may take years, but I believe that good will prevail."
"So you want to make him a Jedi," Beru turned her face away. "A soldier."
"Perhaps." In truth I am still undecided.
"You had thousands of Jedi," Beru pointed out, "and they were not enough to stop the Empire rising."
"We were betrayed," I said, a bitter twist in my heart. "And unprepared. This time we won't be." I looked down at little Luke, still asleep, his tiny hand curled around one of my fingers. Luke is not his father, I remind myself; he radiates pure light.
"Luke is just one," Beru told me, stepping forward to lightly brush the boy's hair back. "What difference can he possibly make?"
Of course, Luke is not just one – I think of Leia on Alderaan in the care of Bail Organa. He is unlikely having the same dilemma that I am. He is without the Force, and so will be raising Leia as Queen Breha's heir as he would have done his own blood daughter. I doubt he has given much thought to her Jedi potential – but then I suppose neither have Yoda or I.
Owen and Beru know nothing of Leia, of course. Somehow I think they would not approve of us separating the children.
Luke awoke in my arms then, his chubby cheeks prominent as he cracked a wide smile, his eyes a brilliant blue as they bored into mine. He wiggled and I lifted him upright, securing my grip under his arms and letting him kick his feet down towards my lap, trying to stand.
"Hello, little one," I said softly, and was rewarding with a babbling laugh.
The tension in Beru's shoulders seemed to ease, and she smiled as any indulgent mother would. "He likes you," she said. "That's why I let you visit."
I thanked her heartedly, since I knew my contact with Luke was entirely dependent on Beru's goodwill. And although the circumstances are not what I would like them to be, I remind myself that Luke is thriving under their care.
"Ba-ba," Luke said, a cheeky grin on his face as a sliver of drool ran down his chin. Beru laughed and wiped off the spittle with a cloth.
"You see," she said, as if being salivated on was a mark of approval. But I didn't mind, and engaged in some more embarrassing cooing with the boy as he kicked his legs and laughed. He's strong, always moving and unable to sit still – I remember Anakin was much the same as a child. At the end of my rope, I once asked Mace for some advice in teaching Anakin to sit through a meditation session without his usual fidgeting, huffing and exclamations of boredom. Mace suggested that every time Anakin broke concentration, we start the meditation all over again, and eventually the boy would learn patience.
Suffice to say I gave up after eighteen hours. I don't think Anakin ever actually mastered that skill, in the end.
I suppose this was reflective of his life here on Tatooine, before his training. He was a slave, a commodity, and therefore every moment he was not doing something useful was a moment wasted, a moment when he was not performing as expected. I did not see this clearly until now, did not understand how profoundly his early hardship affected him.
Does he meditate now? Is he even able to in that suit that sustains him? It must require intense concentration to even keep himself alive, and I wonder if that occupies him enough. There is scant news of him on the holonet; he is a specter, a bogeyman, where once he was the holonet prince, the galaxy's greatest hero. How far he has fallen.
How far we've all fallen.
Obi-Wan Kenobi