The Hermit Shack in the Woods, Saturday Morning

[saddeserthermit]

Yesterday had been... unpleasant. Or at least troublesome. And yes, eventually Obi-Wan would have to have that conversation with Ahsoka he'd been putting off for some time.

But that would come whenever it came - whenever Ahsoka chose to have it.

Today, Obi-Wan was meditating, the eopies wandering around him, undisturbed. His efforts to refamiliarize himself with the Living Force this past year and a half had been steady, if slow-- but it was easier now, to simply throw his consciousness into the winds and feel the life around himself.

Obi-Wan sat outside his shack, but in truth, on this island, he was everywhere, all at once, and everyone, all at once.

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[saddeserthermit]

He had never been anything less than an expert in the field of dancing around unpleasantness.

"I was over ten years older than you were when I lost my Master," Obi-Wan said. With the water on, it was time to set out some cups. "And even then, I felt lost."

Admittedly, he'd also gotten a Padawan shoved at him.

[uncertain_dume]

"I'm sorry," Kanan said, a bit lamely, as his mind worked double-time to reassure the rest of him that having a conversation like this wasn't going to end with handful of clones or worse spilling through the door. "What did you do?"

[saddeserthermit]

"Returned to the Council, let them Knight me," Obi-Wan said. "Got into an awful lot of trouble."

Tea bags? Ah, over there.

"I had Master Yoda to guide me, of course. You have been alone."

[uncertain_dume]

"I've been alone," Kanan confirmed, frowning. Nothing seemed to be crawling out of the woodwork to execute him, so he finally made his way the rest of the way inside. "I have a holocron that Master Billaba gave me, and a recording of the last message you sent."

And his lightsaber, if in pieces. That seemed less important than the other two, at this particular moment.

"But that's all there really has been. I tried to go back to Coruscant, once. I stole a ship, made it part of the way, and then turned around and went back. That was when I got your message."

Avoid Coruscant. Avoid detection. Be secret... but be strong.

There you go, Obi-Wan. The last guiding words Kanan had heard from any Jedi were from you.

[saddeserthermit]

"And you appear to have followed it by the letter," Obi-Wan said.

He looked up from the business of teamaking, which had clearly engrossed him this entire time. "For which I am grateful," he said. "But it cannot have been easy, and things having been as they are... I don't doubt there are many things you have missed in your training."

He watched Dume for a moment. "Was that what you wished to talk about?"

[uncertain_dume]

"No, I..."

Kanan paused, running a sore tongue - he'd bitten into it yesterday to keep him from saying too much to Eliot, having already said far too much to Doctor Lecter - over his teeth, gathering his thoughts. On his way here, it had seemed like he'd known exactly what it was he'd wanted. Some reassurance, at least. For Master Kenobi to tell him once again that this place was safe.

"Maybe. I don't know," he amended. "Yesterday brought up a lot of questions. I never was good at keeping my questions to myself."

... No kidding, Caleb.

[saddeserthermit]

"A problem most Padawans shared at one point or another."

Some things one just had to be wry about, at least if one had ever been master to Anakin Skywalker.

The water cooker gave a soft thwop as the water finished heating. He returned his attention to it. "What questions?"

[uncertain_dume]

Well, yeah. But Kanan had enjoyed a sort of notoriety for that among the other Padawans. Where most people kept their mouths shut and listened, he prodded, asking questions nobody else had even considered. It was why Master Billaba had chosen him as her Padawan in the first place.

He looked up at the ceiling momentarily, and then sighed.

"At the risk of sounding repetitive, I'm going to have to start with, 'Are you sure that nobody here cares about the Jedi?'"

Yesterday and talking. Those had been a thing.

[saddeserthermit]

"In the sense that they would sell us out to the Imperials?" Obi-Wan asked, pouring water into each cup. "No. In other ways? That depends entirely on what you care about."

[uncertain_dume]

"I suppose it would," Kanan allowed, watching Obi-Wan pour the water, and only then coming to some kind of realization that sitting down was probably a good idea. "I wound up saying things yesterday that I haven't let myself talk about in years. To people I barely know. It's left a lot on my mind, and today I'm not completely certain what to do about any of it."

He paused before adding, "Normally, I'd just run."

He'd gotten very good at that over the years.

[saddeserthermit]

"I find it best to retreat to my home and stay there whenever I find the island is compelling me to do or say something I would rather not."

But then Obi-Wan kind of lived and breathed dancing around the truth.

He picked up both cups and set one down in front of Du-- Kanan. "What did you talk about?"

[uncertain_dume]

Kanan's hands reached out and his fingers curled around the cup, and he gave Obi-Wan a little nod of thanks.

"The war. The aftermath. I gave one person a crash-course on what the Jedi even are, because he'd had reservations and one of his friends was in some galaxy like ours only thousands of years in our past, looking for one of his Jedi friends. And then I mentioned that I had been one."

Well, he hadn't said it in so many words as that he'd said 'we' during the explanation, damning himself to association with no way of weaseling out of it.

[saddeserthermit]

"No doubt he was talking about Master Atton Rand," Obi-Wan mused, though he refrained from asking Kanan how well he remembered his history lectures. "No matter. If he does not know what the Jedi are, this one will hardly find grounds to do you harm, I'm sure."

He took a sip of his own tea as he sank into his seat. "But that isn't what worries you."

[uncertain_dume]

"No," Kanan agreed. "It isn't. Not entirely."

He frowned into his cup, watching the steam curl up from the hot liquid inside for a moment.

"The Empire believes I'm dead. Dodging clones isn't the reason I keep running," he said, finally. "I try not to get too comfortable in any one place. Whenever I do, that's when the Force comes back around to greet me, whether I want it to or not."

And for the past eight years, he'd been leaning very strongly into 'or not.'

[saddeserthermit]

"You have closed yourself off to the Force," Obi-Wan said.

He cradled his cup close. "I'd gathered that. You are, after all, somewhat hard to sense for the uninitiated."

By which he meant 'people who didn't recognize your face on sight'.

[uncertain_dume]

"It's been the safest option," Kanan sighed. "And the sanest one. If there's anything that can make people reconnect the dots between Kanan Jarrus and Caleb Dume, it's going to be me, doing things that most people - fewer people each day - can't even dream of doing."

There was more to it than that, of course. There was always more to it than that. But visions and backflips hadn't saved Master Billaba from being gunned down by her own troops, and they'd only brought Caleb more trouble afterwards.

"But I'm getting comfortable here."

And he hated the way that word sounded on his tongue. Hated the implications of it. 'Comfortable' was a swear word and a death sentence. He avoided it wherever he could.

[saddeserthermit]

"You could always return home and spend a season running away from Stormtroopers, if that settles your nerves."

... Sorry, Kanan. The sarcasm had always been strong with this one.

Obi-Wan settled back. "I understand your unease," he said, tone milder. "There is a reason I chose to live out here, after all, rather than picking a more comfortable dwelling in town."

[uncertain_dume]

Eight years ago, Kanan never would have given Obi-Wan the 'are you karking kidding me' look that he gave him for that particular bout of sarcasm. My, how times had changed.

Still, he settled back a little when Obi-Wan did, and took a sip of his tea.

"So the solution is to just avoid people entirely, hm? Get a couple of eopies, become a hermit in the woods?"

Sue him, it almost sounded tempting.

[saddeserthermit]

In this time they were all getting more bitter, sharper, with age. Obi-Wan's sarcasm was no exception.

He was, to use the vernacular, slowly running out of fucks.

"It is a solution," he said, "Much as your traveling around has been. But if you choose to stay here, that is no longer viable."

He sipped his tea. "Though blinding yourself near-fully to the Force may be a touch of overkill."

[uncertain_dume]

"Portalocity hasn't been able to reconnect with our galaxy in my time. I've checked," Kanan sighed. "If I leave, it'll be though one of the island's stops, after a week of sampling the local night life."

He was still being honest, look at him go. He gave a short, sharp sort of smile, and then had another sip of tea. Mostly as an excuse to gather his thoughts again.

"Overkill, huh?"

[saddeserthermit]

"As you may remember," Obi-Wan said, "The Force is not all fancy leaps and excellent blade work."

He set his cup back down on the table.

"You would be safer in another corner of the multiverse, that much is true."

[uncertain_dume]

"But if here is safe, then maybe I don't need another corner of the multiverse," Kanan muttered. "I suppose part of it is that I've gotten so good at running, I'm not completely certain how to stop, now."

And part of it was guilt, plain and simple. If he kept moving, he didn't have time to face that part.

"Overkill or not, it'll come creeping back to me if I stay. If I let my guard down." He blew out a soft breath. "Do you ever stop to wonder what your Master would make of where you are now?"

He'd been doing a lot of that, too.

[saddeserthermit]

"I do."

Obi-Wan considered his tea.

"Master Qui-Gon always wished for me to listen more closely to the Living Force," he said. "So now that is what I do, every day. Perhaps it will teach me answers. Perhaps it will simply allow me to remain connected to the Force. The Cosmic Force is no longer what it once was."

[uncertain_dume]

"No," Kanan agreed, sighing. "I suppose it isn't."

The death of nearly every Jedi in the galaxy had a funny way of doing that sort of thing. Kanan took another sip of tea.

"Master Billaba encouraged my curiosity, told me to keep asking questions," he noted, shaking his head. "Peaceful dissent, she said. I suppose I'm trying to figure out what role that has, now. She'd probably agree with you about the overkill thing, at least."

[saddeserthermit]

"You avoid the Force because you fear you may wind up using more of it than you should," Obi-Wan noted. He studied Kanan closely. "Do you remember what Master Yoda always said - to the point of distraction, if I'm honest - about fear?"

Don't start sounding like a Jedi Master now, Obi-Wan.