Au: Kid Ibani-Tatooine Era Obi-Wan Kenobi

[last_kallig]

(OOC: Content warning for mention of torture, harm done by and to children, suicidal ideation and quite possibly suicide attempt.)

Ibani is a fourteen year old Sith Acolyte and her life of pain is written in her body for those who can read it. The scars of a slave collar on her neck, the letters and numbers carved under one eye like a bantha brand, those were only the beginning. She's been shocked regularly with force lightning for years as well as being subjected to more primitive methods of torture, and all have left their mark. Scars from teeth, claws and blades mark her skin, the echoes of broken bones still visible if you look the right way in the Force.

She should be dead, and she might be shortly, despite her struggles. She doesn't know how she got HERE, wherever this hot desert is, instead of the cold desert of Korriban. The gravity is wrong, the temperature is wrong, and while the Force shouted just before she landed here it is strangely silent now. (She might be insane, in which case she should put herself down before she harms anyone, but she's waiting for more evidence on that one way or the other.) She's dying by inches of heat and thirst and she can't push her body any further, even with all the Force tricks she knows.

She crawls on her belly under an overhang of rock, collapses. She can enter a trance, reduce her need for water, but that means that without help she will simply fail to ever wake, will slip away into the Force in death. It's a long shot, but she's worth more alive than dead even to the most nefarious of persons. (She knows better than to expect mercy or kindness from strangers.)

Ibani sinks into the Force, awaiting aid or death.

Comments

[acertainpov]

Very easy, yes. He helps her up, and then climbs up behind her - though being the old Force-blind man he isn't, this takes a bit more effort.

He has it down to an art, just enough Force to make things possible, not enough to actually be distinguishable from the normal ebb and flow of the Force, and not enough to prevent a grunt of effort as he settles down directly behind her.

Dolo wears no muzzle, Ben rides her as a Tusken rider does, by sitting astride her and giving directions through the movement of his legs against her thick hide. Once he's settled, she lumbers up and starts to head away towards the Dune Sea. Behind them, the rest of the bantha herd begin to move way looking for food.

Ben leans behind him after a moment and produces a woven cloak for Ibani, which he drapes around her shoulders. "Best to keep the sun off while we ride."

[last_kallig]

"Thank you," she says quietly when he drapes the cloak around her shoulders.

"Will my being with you raise questions in Mos Eisley?" Unless Ben takes in strays all the time, people might expect him to be alone.

[acertainpov]

"I doubt it," Ben says. "No one knows me well enough to question another person accompanying me. It's a big town, relative for around here."

Also people don't tend to repeat questions around him. Funny that.

[last_kallig]

"That's good, although I do have means of making myself unnoticeable, if it turns out to be necessary."

There is a tiny flare of pride at that statement. The only purely positive emotion Ibani has felt about herself since she's been with Ben.

[acertainpov]

"Really?" He sounds ready to be very impressed. "Well maybe that would be useful. I'd like to see that at some point."

He knows he's going to have to hide her, as well as himself, as well as he hides Luke's presence, when they get there. He's not worried about today, but he's beginning to see a future stretching ahead of him that includes a teenage Sith apprentice, and he's going to need to make longer term plans for that.

[last_kallig]

"I can show you now, if you like?" Ibani offers.

If Ben assents, Ibani will seemingly vanish into thin air, gone from physical senses and the Force. (There are ways to detect a force cloak, if you know precisely what you're looking for.)

[acertainpov]

Ben raises an eyebrow, which takes the place of a full on double take on someone more prone to expressing emotions. He smiles softly and places a hand where he remembers her shoulder had been just a few seconds ago.

"Well isn't that something?"

He really is impressed. "I've never seen that before."

[last_kallig]

"It's not a common skill, even in my time," Ibani explains, after dropping the cloak. "It's a beast if you don't have a natural inclination for it. Technically, I'm not supposed to know how to use it yet."

"Even works on things without brains, like cameras and sensors, since you're bending light and sound and not just pushing at people's minds."

She's pleased at him being impressed with her, actually happy if only for a little while.

[acertainpov]

He smiles at her, determined to keep that positive feeling in her for as long as it can stay.

"You obviously have a very strong natural inclination for it."

And reliable against even a strong force user, he thinks. Very useful indeed.

[last_kallig]

She's actually smiling when she turns to face him. "I do. I think I was using the lesser cloak, the one that pushes on people's minds, before I even had any training in the Force."

"I could teach you how it's done, if you were force sensitive," she remarks idly, but she's watching him out of the corner of her eye. The suns are rising and the desert is starting to heat up as they make their way toward Mos Eisley.

[acertainpov]

Ben grins at her from under his hood.

"What use would I have for that?" he asks, lying in his tone. Obviously the uses for hiding himself, maybe even Luke or someone else, from prying eyes, would be numerous. But he's doing so well here.

[last_kallig]

Ibani grins back.

"Always good to have more options," Ibani quips. "And someone who lives all alone in the middle of nowhere might have more reasons to hide than most, no? There's always a bigger fish."

[acertainpov]

"I don't think of myself as a fish," he admits. "Not in this environment.

Dolo draws up eventually near a rock that protuded form the dunes and forms a small overhang with some shadow.

"Here's where you arrived. Did you want to look for something?"

[last_kallig]

"It looked bigger when I found it," Ibani remarks, tone dry.

"Yes, I'd like to have a look, see what I can see in the Force."

Ibani carefully gets off of Dolo, then jumps on top of the rock. She tilts her head as if she's listening to something, and she is, but it's not physical sound.

"Nothing, not even a ripple," she remarks. "Looks like I'm stuck here for, well, however long I have left."

Not long, not long, because there is no justification for her further existence anymore. Not here and now.

[acertainpov]

Ben watches her from on top of Dolo's head, his fingers curled and resting against his beard. He already did a bit of a check last night, and has been trying to sense something already, but wants to watch her technique without intruding.

"Well, we don't have much," he says, "but Tatooine has a lot to recommend itself against Korriban, at least."

Can she stay here? Probably not, but he won't let her take her exit, and he doesn't know where else she can go.

[last_kallig]

Ibani doesn't know how her techniques relate to what the Jedi or even the Sith of this time use. She can't remember NOT being aware of the Force, so it's less a process of reaching OUT than of allowing it IN.

"It's nice not to have to keep my shields up at full strength all the time to keep the Valley from driving me mad," Ibani allows. "It...whispers in the back of your mind."

Where else would be better than here? At least she has backup here, if she needs it, and no one's likely to come and look for her. Anywhere else would be equally strange and much more dangerous.

Absently, one hand touches the hilt of her sword, mostly concealed by her robes, and she looks thoughtfully at Ben. No, not yet. Not until she knows her arrival hasn't attracted attention to Ben. She can wait a little longer.

[acertainpov]

Ben meets her gaze, his expression impassive, though internally he sighs. How long until she tries it, he can stop her and they can get it spoken? Or how long until she stops considering it, and he can finally rest?

"I cannot imagine what that must have been like," he says now, sympathetically. "I'm sorry you lived it."

[last_kallig]

Ibani climbs back up onto Dolo, and nods in acceptance of his sympathy. "I had hoped some good could come of it, that I could change things, when I was powerful enough."

Her smile turns bitter. "No chance of that now, of course. Only your accent tells me that any of the Empire's people survived between my time and now, you sound as if you were from Dromund Kaas, the capital of the Sith Empire in my time."

[acertainpov]

"I'm sorry to bring more bad news," Ben says sadly, "but Dromund Kaas has also fallen into legend by now. I doubt you'll meet many people who had even heard of it."

He pats Dolo's side and they head off once more.

[last_kallig]

"I'm not surprised," Ibani replies, sighing. "There was a nexus there, a concentration of the Dark Side, not a good spot for tourists."

As the approach the gates of city, there is a sense of curiosity in the Force from Ibani. She's never seen a city before, not that she can remember.

[acertainpov]

"They say similar about this place," Ben remarks, but lightly. Not for the same reasons or to the same extent.

It's not much of a city if you're used to Coruscant or Sundari - mostly low white buildings hunched together around white sandy roads. But even this many people in this heat creates a smell and a noise that oppresses.

They wend their way through the city towards the space ports, and Ben keeps an eye out as they do so. Thankfully he sees no white plastoid helmets, and is able to stay relaxed.

[last_kallig]

Ibani snorts. "I should do just fine, then," she drawls.

Ibani pulls in on herself, in the Force, as they near the press of people. Not making herself outright invisible in the Force, but dim, no stronger in the Force than any other girl.

Nothing to see here, nope. She's alert to what the Force tells her, listening for aggression and suspicion directed their way.

[acertainpov]

She will find, if she looks, that there is no one likely to notice her strength. The entire city, in fact the entire planet, has no one stronger in the Force than Ben himself. And he gives no reaction to her pulling in on herself.

(But he is grateful.)

They reach a watering hole and Ben climbs down off Dolo's back, offering a hand to help Ibani follow.

"I'm going to go into the Cantina and find out what I can. Would you prefer to stay outside with Dolo?"

He's not sure how she'll fare with that many people.

[last_kallig]

Ibani takes the offered hand and thanks Ben. The Force feels too quiet, it's strange, making the hair stand up on the back of her neck.

"I think that might be best," she agrees. "And I can make sure no one tries to take Dolo somewhere she doesn't want to go."

[acertainpov]

"No one takes Dolo where she doesn't want to go," he says, with a slight smile. "But do try not to let anyone steal my melons."

He nods at them both and, looking around just to check he is leaving them somewhere safe, he heads into the Cantina.