Chapter Text
It’s a dark night on Mortis when Anakin reaches the foothills of the tower. The weather has turned quickly from leeching fog to a denser sort of cloud cover. Obi-wan has told him the names of these stormbringers before, black and roiling in the dark blue sky. He can’t remember any of them.
A green light emanates from the tower’s peaks. Anakin can feel the restless energy of the Force from the bottom. What will it feel like up close?
He isn’t sure he wants to know. No, he’s sure he doesn’t. The Force is recoiling from the glowing lights. It’s telling him to recoil. Run away! It shouts. Run away before it gets you too!
Anakin can’t run. The Force may urge him to, might ring true in his bones and heavy in his gut, but he can’t leave. At the top of the tower, Obi-wan’s waiting for him. His presence in the Force is blinding against the black of the night. It beams, then flickers.
He must be hurting, that close to the beacons. Anakin will have to hurry.
Run! The Force screams, and Anakin moves to climb.
The moment before Anakin tips over the tower’s uppermost walls it begins to rain. It is as though a vertical dam has been released. Within seconds the skies burst open and drench him from skin to bone. The layers of his robes absorb the water instantaneously. They weigh down heavy from his shoulders, pulling him towards the ground. The water makes the metal rivets he’s used as handholds slick and Anakin comes dangerously close to letting go.
For all Obi-wan has lectured Anakin on appropriate Jedi attire, the entrenching levels of his clothes that lead to his untimely death are not elements he wants to bring to the argument, theoretical or otherwise.
He can feel Obi-wan, bright and flickering, an uneven flash of energy. They are close, not even hundreds of yards away from each other. He’s almost there. He can’t stop, or fall, or pause. He’s almost there.
He’s almost there.
Someone has to save Obi-wan. Ahsoka’s still on the ship, waiting for him to return and ready to fly away at a moment’s notice. Anakin doesn’t trust the beings of this planet to help him, so it has to be him.
He’s sure by now that Obi-wan is in need of saving. He hasn’t moved once from his spot at the top of the tower, and while Anakin can still tell he’s there, his side of the bond is closing. Not gone, but shuttered in a way it’s never been. Even during their worst arguments they’d shared more than this. The only thing coming through is Obi-wan’s presence, and Anakin isn’t sure that’s intentional.
Something’s wrong. The Force is calm. To Anakin Skywalker, Son of the Force, things are calm only when in tragedy. When the Force is most content, there is less possibility, little chance for outcomes to be favorable. The Force is an ever-shifting presence, a shapeless entity of continuous motion. It was not made to be content.
War in the air is a sign of peace. This is not.
Anakin grits his teeth and drags himself over the ledge.
The first thing Anakin notices is his smile.
Throughout his apprenticeship, his life has been filled with Obi-wan’s smiles. He’s seen warm ones and snarky ones, smug ones and exasperated ones and admonishing ones. Anakin’s seen smiles with teeth and tight-lipped, pointed smiles, smiles with quirking eyebrows and smiles that give Obi-wan crinkles around his eyes.
Obi-wan has always been overflowing with light. With smiles, too, he is overabundant.
He smiles even at his enemies, though it’s a different kind of smile. There’s a jut to his jaw that doesn’t exist when it’s for Anakin or Ahsoka or a shiny new trooper. There’s a glint in his eyes that turns just south of cruel that lands somewhere between justified and regretful, as though one more meeting with the light would make their enemies run turncoat.
The fact is Obi-wan smiles. In both of their darkest moments, Obi-wan has smiled. Moments after his Master’s death, he’d looked to Anakin and smiled.
Anakin’s seen enough of Obi-wan’s smiles to know that this is not a happy smile, but without their bond he doesn’t know why.
Obi-wan, who had been curled on his knees with his back against the rain, had risen to his feet. He’d turned to where Anakin had been finding his footing and grinned.
The points where his lips meet skin are sharp, and his teeth look needle-tipped. His chin is tilted down and his eyes are hooded. From the sharp lighting of the beacons, his face looks thin and gaunt. His skin is ghostly, a white turned slightly green under the burning emerald lights. The whites of his robes are water-dark and clinging tightly.
“Anakin,” Obi-wan says without looking up. His voice is welcoming, but there’s a warning hand on his saber. Anakin immediately grabs for his.
Anakin had worried, climbing up, that this would be a trap set by the Son. Given Obi-wan’s reaction, he was right.
“What’s wrong? Are you hurt?” Anakin asks urgently, stepping towards him. Anakin keeps his eyes wide and alert as he moves, listening to the Force for any signs of movement.
The Force is oddly quiet. It’s viscerally discomfiting, and Anakin takes another step towards his Master.
Obi-wan steps back. His hand visibly tightens on the handle. He breathes in sharply, and the line of his shoulders shakes. It’s clear as the sky isn’t that something is wrong.
Given their track record, it’s equally likely a number of things. Including torture. With Obi-wan, especially torture.
“Nothing’s wrong with me,” Obi-wan says serenely, and though Anakin might miss some signs he can read between the lines well enough. Nothing’s wrong with him.
“Is something wrong with something else?” Anakin asks, adjusting the grip on his saber. He takes another step forward.
Obi-wan’s smile falters. The rain, then drenching, stops. Obi-wan’s Force presence reignites.
It is not the presence of a Jedi Master. It’s barely Obi-wan at all.
The Force explodes. Anakin swings his saber up moments before Obi-wan’s goes for his head.