November 25, 2018

A Qui-Gon Jinn Story

14 Years Later

The last hours of the Naboo Crisis

Six plasma gates sizzled, crackled, closed.



The emitters rotated slightly, locking all six gates into position, partitioning off the corridor to the Theed palace core…



… and the three combatants who found themselves there.



Qui-Gon Jinn felt his padawan, Obi-Wan Kenobi, stop himself before running into the first gate through the Force as if it were a soft breeze on his back. He did not need to turn around to verify that his padawan was indeed closed off from the fight, and the adversary, who had led them through the Royal hangar and down into the bowels of the palace.

He simply knew.



Just like he knew the young Jedi was frustrated at being separated, and feeling guilty for leaving his Master to fight alone. Qui-Gon felt this in his apprentice and also felt him push these emotions to the side, felt him attempt to refocus, felt him attempt to quiet his heart. He had so much still to learn, but Qui-Gon was proud of how far Obi-Wan had come. His apprentice was a warmth in the Force, a glance of sunlight on a cold morning. Rigid maybe, but there was a light in him that refused to be diminished.



Qui-Gon sensed all this behind him.



In front of him, Qui-Gon only sensed fire.



Qui-Gon remembered a Naboo legend, one about six impenetrable gates that held back Chaos. The legend was exactly that, but standing in this hallway with similar gates and looking into the yellow embers that stood in for their adversary’s eyes, stoked by Qui-Gon’s mere presence, he could only feel its literal truth.



The creature that stood before him was embodied rage kept in check by the thin tissue of a body.



As far as he could tell, the Sith was a Zabrak, with extensive tattooing that dipped beneath his dark tunic. He was trained, extensively. His body hummed with lethal energy. His movements were raw but graceful, almost choreographed in their elegance. But underneath the training, underneath the prowess, Qui-Gon could smell smoke. Off him came the scent of fire in the Force.

But now the gates were shut. There was nothing left to do, but wait. So, reaching into the Force and letting it guide his body gently to his knees, letting it soothe his beating heart, letting it wash his mind, Qui-Gon was content to wait.

Their adversary had paused, examining the now-closed energy gate, testing it with his lightsaber, before deactivating his own. And then he began to pace. Unlike Qui-Gon, the Sith let the gate become an object to be hated, a barrier that withheld him from the life that was rightly his to take. He let his impatience transmute into agony which transmuted into fury. He paced. He stared.

Qui-Gon met the stare, returning his burning gaze with the serenity in the blue pools of his own eyes before shutting them.

The fabric of the Force lowered over him, brushing his face, covering him, and Qui-Gon allowed himself to sink into it. The steady buzz of plasma-sealed gates drifted away along with the steady echo of energy thrumming in the palace core. The pacing steps of the Zabrak tapped a rhythm until Qui-Gon no longer heard them. Far away now, he felt his physical form: aching muscles in a strong but aged body. He felt that body loosen, relax, and begin to heal before a current of the Force carried him further down.

Deep. Dark. He was unafraid, only curious as to what this meditation would bring and unconcerned about the battle that loomed ahead. That would come when it would come. For now, there was just the darkness.

Then.

Suddenly.

Light.

Desert wind. A cool dryness on the air.

Qui-Gon sat on a cold stone desert brick wall in the courtyard of a city built on a plateau. It was soft-lit as if the sky of the plateau moon was beginning to close its eyes for night. The courtyard itself was empty, save for a single tree in the center. The tree had no leaves on it, just a thick trunk twisting into several thick branches whose ends were tied off by a line of prayer flags strung across the width of the courtyard. A series of small lanterns ringed the tree, their insides glowing a soft orange to match the dusk sun.

It was the memory of a moon, as distant now in space as well as time, and an evening he had spent there. It was tactile, real in its way, and peaceful. Maybe the most peaceful memory he had. For years, this courtyard in Jedha City is where Qui-Gon went when he needed a refuge inside himself.

It was here that he always did his best thinking.

The Jedi Master studied the structures in the courtyard, realizing that they were not dissimilar to the slave quarters of Mos Espa on Tatooine—sand-colored with soft-edges. Qui-Gon realized that had only been a few days ago: the queen, the podrace, the boy.

The boy. Anakin Skywalker. Even just speaking his name seemed to draw power from the Force. But it was not the boy’s power that Qui-Gon had first sensed, it was his light. It’s true that all beings were somehow luminous in the Force, even those who could not sense it, but Skywalker was a beacon. A fulcrum of light on which the entire galaxy rested. His spirit was fiery in its generosity, fierce in its love.

But.

Qui-Gon also sensed darkness. The kind that fills your lungs, rises in your throat and drowns you in bleak oblivion. The kind that, with a single breath, could snuff out all the light in the galaxy. The light and the darkness competed in the boy—running, breathless, toward a horizon that Qui-Gon could not see past.

It didn’t matter. Qui-Gon knew the boy must be trained. There was no doubt in his mind that the boy was the Chosen One and, regardless of the journey, Anakin Skywalker would bring balance to the Force.

Qui-Gon knew this, and also realized now that his own life had all been prologue, a series of stops and starts leading to the boy.

And he could sense now that he had found him, his own life was coming to an end.

The thought appeared, just like that, as if he had known forever and was just reminding himself.

He could not sense when, he could not peer into the fog of the future and see, but he knew that the door of his life was closing. Qui-Gon smiled at the small sadness he felt at this. He was, first and foremost, an apprentice to the living Force and he understood the balance that fed the Force was beyond life and death. Yet he could not stop himself from the thought that he, so full of life, would soon be nothing at all.

He would not be the one to train the boy. That duty would fall to someone else. It must, as there was no other course. The Jedi felt disappointment for a moment, a self-righteous indignation that he who had trained for so long, had opened so much of himself to the Force, would not be the one to train the Chosen One. But he let that go. It was only ego, and the disappointment he felt could quickly turn into a useless anger if entertained for long. If he was not to be the one, then who would train the boy? Yoda and Mace Windu held too many responsibilities and were too steeped in tradition. Their goodness could not be calculated, their wisdom was unparalleled, but they would not understand him.

The lanterns in the courtyard flickered, and a glance of sunlight through rooftops caught Qui-Gon’s face with warmth… and he knew.

There was really only one choice. He had been training the boy’s Master for years.

He had watched the Master struggle, watched him grow, watched him begin to come into the man Qui-Gon knew he would eventually be. Obi-Wan Kenobi. Rigid. Headstrong. Just beginning to develop a sense of humor about himself. The boy would challenge his patience, open up his compassion, soften his solemn exterior, and expose the great Jedi within. In turn, Obi-Wan would help wash away the boy’s anger with serenity, give him an example to aspire to, challenge him to be a light in his own self-imposed darkness.

They would become more than master and apprentice. They would be brothers.

Qui-Gon sensed their greatness reverberating in the Force like an echo off a mountainside.

But he also sensed, maybe now because his own death was so close, the malevolent shadow that would oppose them. It rose in his mind, towered over not only Obi-Wan and Anakin, but the entire galaxy.

And he would not be there to help them.

Qui-Gon shook his head. He had learned long ago, in this very courtyard, that you could not stop what was coming. You can only meet it as you are.

And the shadow was not his foe to meet. His path now lay elsewhere and he would have to do what all masters eventually must learn to do: let go.

Qui-Gon smiled again. Even now, at the end, there was so much to learn. So much to know.

But his time here was at an end.

Qui-Gon collected all the things he would miss, every image, every face, every taste, and thought, and tried to gather them all in his heart.

He had loved it all. He had, at least for a Jedi, reveled in it. Life’s fragility, it’s knife-edge precariousness, held Qui-Gon’s heart in its crystalline hands for a moment.

And then, like the great Jedi Master he was, he let them go.

He let all those precious things drift from his hands like ashes taken by the wind.

He would be Qui-Gon Jinn here and now. There was no other choice. No matter what would come.

Distantly he heard a metallic click, the sound of a plasma gate getting ready to unlock. Distantly he heard the rhythm of pacing boots stop and turn.

Qui-Gon took one last inventory of the courtyard in all its peace and smiled. It was all so beautiful. He thanked the Force for bringing him there as the Jedha sun dipped below the sky, casting it a burnt orange, a pink, a deep blue. Then the stars came out. All of them. Every one.

Six plasma gates sizzled, crackled, opened.

All of Qui-Gon Jinn returned to himself and he moved, erupting forth from his meditation. In one motion, he was on his feet, lightsaber ignited, charging forward just as the plasma gate opened. The Sith backpedaled, surprised by the charge, compensating to meet the Jedi Master.

Qui-Gon Jinn felt his end lingering at the edges of the room.

He did not hesitate.

Qui-Gon Jinn strode forth to meet the future, unafraid, firmly in the light.