Kanan Jarrus, The Last Padawan (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
uncertain_dume) wrote2016-09-12 07:38 am
uncertain_dume) wrote2016-09-12 07:38 am
The Hermit Shack in the Woods, Monday Morning
Unlike when Caleb had woken up in a strange bed on Friday night, there was no sudden jerk awake for Kanan this morning. There was no immediate onset of panic, no choking sense of fear of a strange place. Which didn't mean that Kanan didn't contemplate trying to exit through a window this morning too, granted. But here in Obi-Wan's shack, it would be a somewhat less dramatic, rather more undignified sort of escape route.
Anyway, the door was right over there. And he could be reasonably certain that there weren't any clones on the other side of it, waiting with blasters at ready to take him down.
He sat up, looking quietly at that door, and then sighed and slumped forward, scrubbing at his face with his hands.
He felt almost as exhausted as Caleb had the other evening. His reasons for that were only mostly the same.
[OOC: For that Kenobi guy, naturally!]
Anyway, the door was right over there. And he could be reasonably certain that there weren't any clones on the other side of it, waiting with blasters at ready to take him down.
He sat up, looking quietly at that door, and then sighed and slumped forward, scrubbing at his face with his hands.
He felt almost as exhausted as Caleb had the other evening. His reasons for that were only mostly the same.
[OOC: For that Kenobi guy, naturally!]
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He took a sip of his tea.
"Even if we disregard the way your running has cut you off from the Force, how it is hampering your ability to progress past your own defenses and accomplish something meaningful," he said, "Your unwillingness to accept your past is becoming a weakness. Something that could be exploited."
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"Exploited, assuming anybody knows who I was," he noted. "I didn't have that problem before I came here."
... He wasn't touching that bit about accomplishments for love or credits.
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"What would you suggest I do about it, then?"
Because jumping into the cockpit of the Expedient and just traveling until he found an inhabitable planet was still pretty damn tempting. The only thing stopping him was fuel.
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Kanan fell silent, once again staring into his tea. He wasn't equipped for this. Which was, admittedly, part of the problem that Obi-Wan was talking about.
"Master Billaba didn't die just so that I could kill him?"
Damn, saying those words hurt like hell. Everything was so fresh all over again.
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... He was too used to Anakin. Anakin did not do self-blame; he externalized everything.
"Master Billaba died so that she could save him," he said, as he steadied.
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He brought the tea to his lips, but didn't actually drink any. Just held it there. Breathed it in.
"Running was everything he had."
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Obi-Wan brought up his own tea. He didn't drink it, either.
"If you let it. But I suppose that is the terrifying part, isn't it?"
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His throat felt tight. He probably couldn't drink the tea if he wanted to; he'd just choke on it.
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Please forgive Kanan for sounding less than enthusiastic about that plan, Obi-Wan. Tethers and anchors and the Force had all been somewhat anathema to him, what with his plan to go on existing and all.
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From a man who was absolutely terrible at it. He'd run all the way to Anakin's birth planet, where he had accidentally made himself part of a community he'd then had to pull himself out of.
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But it was almost - almost - tempting. Kanan sighed, and then finally took another sip of his tea.
"So I tether myself to the Force, using a damaged child as an anchor," he said, fatigue slipping back into his voice. "What kind of anchor is that supposed to be?"
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Which hopefully Kanan could, as opposed to Obi-Wan, with the eternal Anakin-shaped hole in his heart.
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Safe. What was it that Obi-Wan had said to Caleb the other day? Among family? If ever there was a time to claw open old wounds and actually let himself nurse them back to health, now would, theoretically, be it.
Kanan lowered the mug in his hands and shut his eyes, sighing.
"That terrifies me."
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He could guess, but he preferred not to.
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"Because I'll be just as vulnerable as I was when the wounds were new," he said, finally. "I can't just slap a bacta patch on it and be on my way."
It terrified him because it would hurt. Because there was no way for it to not.
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He set his cup aside. "But you will not be alone," he said. "Better to do it with care now than open up the wound while you are running into blaster fire."
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He was also well aware that intentions didn't mean a hell of a lot when it came to things like that. Especially if the Jedi were going to be a part of his life again. Even before he'd found them, he was prone to finding himself in trouble. There was a reason he carried a blaster at his own hip, after all.
He looked down at himself. Somewhere over the course of the night, Caleb's robes had become his own tunic again. Maybe the island even had the decency to put his lightsaber back where it had been stored, in two pieces, on his ship. But then again, the island was a tuft-sucking pile of meddling poodoo, and odds were better that a quick pat-down would reveal the saber and his holocron both tucked away into his clothing, as Caleb had hidden them away in the folds of his robes before.
He frowned.
He wished that Master Billaba was here. Wondered what she'd tell him to do. Suspected that she'd be with Master Kenobi on this one. After all, she'd been considered damaged goods herself. She knew the subject intimately.
"You'll be here?"
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Taking down an Empire would take a bit more time than that. As did waiting for Luke to grow older.
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"... You know what I mean, Master Kenobi."
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"Alright," he said, a little extra backbone in his voice that he wasn't entirely feeling. "I'll give it a try."