#I swear to god i came here to give it a kinder‚ sweeter wrap up.

[magnusbae]

hi, i just read your latest piece, and i was wondering:

……..

who gave you the right?!?!?! that shit hurtEd. ouch.

now, i took longer than i wanted to reply to this one, because i knew i wished to write back, and there was simply not a good moment for it--- with less words... here are...amends, dear anon. edit: it was not amends, i am so sorry. prev ♥️

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There's a certain kind of relief, Obi-Wan muses. In death, that is.

Afterlife, part of the living force, heaven or hell— however you would call it, it matters little. This is where Obi-Wan exists now, lingering in the twilight of the force, between the the living and the else.

He should move on.

He's done enough, he's given enough.

Obi-Wan tells himself that the reason for his protracted stay is his promise to watch the boy. He did not train him as he should have. At the very least he will not break his promise to keep him safe.

Some days, it was the only thing that kept him going.

The promise to himself, to the force, to...Anakin.

Obi-Wan tells himself that he owes that much to the memory of the man he once loved. (Still does, if he's honest enough.)(He is not.).

Owes that and more— for how completely he had failed him.

If he spends more time on watching the ashen remains of what used to be a breathtaking, beautiful supernova in the force— than on actually guiding the boy, well, he tells himself that this is for the best, as well. There's little good Obi-Wan's guidance does, after all.

There's no fixing it. Obi-Wan realizes as he watches the one who used to be his Padawan meditate, shields lowered, thinking himself alone.

He said so himself, many times over. He knew that, many times over. Yet he still finds new ways to feel heartsick over it, still manages to be somehow surprised at the notion that this is the truth, that his—

Despair sinks deep within Obi-Wan's core as Darth opens up wider to the force, exposing his turmoiled self to the living force. The layers of anger and hatred are blinding, crimson red and pitch black, all coiled tightly together, protecting what's inside. Claws and venom, and—

Oh, Obi-Wan shudders as Anakin lowers one more shield, for it is Anakin he senses beneath it all— his fear, his agony, his pain.

Oh, Anakin. Obi-Wan thinks, his own force signature twisting into knots. What he would have done to amend for this, to fix this to save him— but there's no bringing that rueful smile back, nor changing the past. Obi-Wan recoils from the thought. It is ruthless, pragmatic, and familliar. One he is used to, one he had been repeating to himself each day and each night. There is nothing he can do. Nothing.

Not anymore, not now, not then.

He can feel himself fading away, shifting deeper into the Force.

Away, away, away— again.

Turning his back as he once did, decades ago, the words 'Help me, Master' scourging through his soul and beyond.

He is a coward.

An old, foolish coward, who can never follow through.

Not that way, or another. Not in any way that matters.