Her ship slid into the planetary atmosphere with only a small tremor, and she began scanning for a good place to set down and stay for a few days. Eventually, she found a spot with a wide enough platform to hold the ship. It was quite high up, so the air was crisp. The planet was smaller than the one where the Fardis lived but larger than Raada, so she was accustomed to the gravity. All told, it was not a bad spot to set up shop for a while and check the ship. It seemed to be running just fine, but since she had some time, she could give it a thorough onceover.
She was fine-tuning the plasma manifold when she heard it: the unmistakable hum of approaching engines. The blaster was still next to the pilot’s chair, so she had to run up the ramp and back into the ship to fetch it. She clipped the blaster to her side and cautiously walked back down the ramp.
Ahsoka could see the approaching ship now. It was flying low, skimming the tops of the mountains and weaving to avoid the highest peaks. It was definitely following her. If it were randomly scanning, it would have been higher up. She wondered how it had found her, and then she realized that since she hadn’t gone into hyperspace, whoever was flying that thing could have just tracked her visually.
The ship was not new, but it was well maintained. Even from a distance, Ahsoka could tell that much. It didn’t have space for cargo. Single pilot, she suspected. Maybe one or two crew. It began to descend toward her, which was interesting. At least whoever was flying in wasn’t going to blast first and ask questions later.
Ahsoka waited, calm and collected, until the ship landed. The other vessel’s ramp descended, and then a single figure emerged. Ahsoka couldn’t begin to guess if the being was male, female, or otherwise. Their armor was dark, and covered them from head to toe. They carried at least two blasters that Ahsoka could see immediately.
“Pilot Ashla.” The voice was heavily modulated. “Congratulations. You have come to the attention of Black Sun.”
OBI-WAN REACHED and found nothing.
It took him a while to get to this level of deep trance, and now that he was here, he was reluctant to pull up, even though he had failed once again. There must be other things he could see, other Jedi he could find and possibly aid.
Images flickered across his eyes. Padmé, dying, with the babies beside her. Yoda, exacting a promise and giving him a new goal. Anakin, burning on the volcanic slopes of Mustafar, blaming him for everything that had gone wrong.
And it had all gone so wrong.
Now he was back in the place where his carefully ordered life had begun to unspool. Not the exact location, of course. The Lars family lived in the middle of nowhere, and it was a part of Tatooine where Obi-Wan had never gone until he had brought Luke to them. But it was the planet where his whole existence had been forever altered.
He’d gone to Shmi Skywalker’s grave to apologize for losing her son. He had never met her, knew her only from Anakin’s stories, but Qui-Gon had made her a promise and Obi-Wan hadn’t been able to keep it. As he stood there, looking at the stone, he felt an even deeper shame. Qui-Gon had left her there a slave, and Obi-Wan had done everything in his power to prevent Anakin’s return. It was only the love of a good man, here on Tatooine, that had saved her—the kind of love the Jedi were supposed to eschew. Yet it had done something the Jedi could not.
But that was the past. What he did now, he did for an uncertain future and for hope. He had trusted in the light side of the Force for his entire life. There was no call for him to stop now. He found the center of his meditation, the quiet place where there was no emotion, no resistance, no worldly bonds. He rooted his feet in that place and reached again.
Still nothing.
Obi-Wan shook himself out of the trance, more annoyed with his failure than disappointed, and found he was still sitting on the floor of Ben Kenobi’s house. It was sparsely appointed, only the basic necessities. He hadn’t been there long, but he got the feeling that even if he stayed until Luke Skywalker had a long gray beard, he still wouldn’t accumulate many possessions. Tatooine wasn’t that sort of place.
He stood up, his knees creaking in a rather alarming fashion. Surely he wasn’t that old yet. It must be the desert climate that affected him strangely. He got a small cup, filled it with water, and then returned to his seat on the floor. Something caught his attention, one of the few pieces of his old life that he’d taken with him to his desert solitude.
Anakin Skywalker’s lightsaber.
It was all that was left of the man who had been, often simultaneously, Obi-Wan’s greatest annoyance, his brother, and his closest friend. If any other part of Anakin had survived, it was lost to evil and darkness. Obi-Wan couldn’t save him any more than he could save any Jedi who was still at large in the galaxy, trying to find footing in the new order. All Obi-Wan could do was make sure the child Luke survived to adulthood, and train him if he exhibited his father’s talents.
He wondered briefly how the daughter was faring under Bail Organa’s tutelage.
Then he closed his eyes and took a deep breath.
Down he plunged, through memory and dream. There was Commander Cody, handing him back his lightsaber only to blast him off the cavern wall moments later. There was Anakin, laughing as he made some improbably difficult landing, saving all their lives again. There was Ahsoka, her hands on her hips, her endless questions challenging him at every turn. There was Palpatine, as Chancellor, his disguise so complete that Obi-Wan couldn’t detect his villainy even when he knew where to look.
He made himself pass them all by. It was easier this time. It grew easier every time. That made his heart hurt, to think he was so fickle that he could turn his back on them to achieve his own ends. When he thought it, he heard Yoda, reminding him that his work was important, that he must focus on the future alone, obscuring the past and even ignoring the present if he must. He had to break through.
He reached the bottom again, the quiet place where his doubts, loves, and fears were gone. Then he realized it wasn’t the bottom, not quite. There was another level below.
Obi-Wan let go of Ben Kenobi’s house, the last place in the galaxy where a piece of Anakin Skywalker rested, and broke through the wall between life and death.
It was dark there if he wanted to take anything with him or leave anything behind, but he wished for neither of those things, so he stood in the light. His senses were sharp. He could hear every sound at once, and also none of them. It took him a moment to focus on the voice he wanted most to hear.
Alone and connected. Aloof and hopelessly entwined. Obi-Wan had only a moment before he was wrenched back into the physical world, but it was long enough to renew his hope.
“Obi-Wan,” said Qui-Gon Jinn. He was sure the voice was stronger this time. “Let go.”