#Since this is much shorter than KTL and I'm taking an original fiction break while I market my trilogy so I'll have time to update both

[kcrabb88]

Blood Makes Noise

A QuinObi AIDS Crisis AU

Chapter 1: Dreaming Is Still How The Strong Survive

Summary: As the AIDS crisis sweeps across New York City in the late 1980s, professor, activist, and writer Obi-Wan Jinn-Kenobi finds himself with a devastating diagnosis. As he tries to make sense of things in the aftermath, he gravitates toward the friend who has been at the center of his life since childhood: Quinlan Vos. Through the tumble of letting themselves be in love, Quin's music career, and meeting a young boy who will change their lives forever, they try to keep Obi-Wan alive. Obi-Wan fights for the rights of his community and finds himself in the sights of a powerful man who is determined to ruin him. In the end, Obi-Wan must try to survive the race between the virus in his veins and the slow slog of medical discovery. With his family and a little luck on his side, he might just be one of the precious few to make it.

Positive.

HIV … positive.

“Honey?” the nurse prods as she puts one hand on Obi-Wan’s shoulder. She’s not scared to touch him or breathe his air.

“Yes.” Obi-Wan swallows, and the test results crumple further in his clenched and shaking fist. “I’d like to call my best friend. Can I … could I use your phone?”

He runs his thumb over the ACT UP button on his denim jacket while he waits for her to cart the phone in so he can call in private. It was one year ago today, exactly one year, when he heard Larry Kramer’s speech at the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Community Services Center.

When he heard him say AIDS was allowed to happen. It is a plague that need not have happened.

Quin was there too.

Quin.