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]

What might happen if they get Ben's moisture farm up and running is a different matter. He could defend himself against raids without any issues, but he enjoys an uneasy truce with the local sand people that not many off-worlders would understand.

His hand takes a moment to respond, not knowing what to do with this, before it turns away from hers and wraps around her shoulders instead.

As they near his hut, they can see the bantha herd, inlcuding Dolo, who bellows at them and starts shuffling over. Ben grins.

"Left you with a lot to carry, didn't I?" he says.

[last_kallig]

The arm around the shoulder works, and Ibani leans into it.

"Hello, Dolo, I'm sorry I ran off in such a hurry," she says to the bantha.

She starts to unload all the stuff they left with the bantha.

[acertainpov]

Dolo has a lot of complaint to Ben, who rests his head against hers for a few seconds to apologise.

"Stop complaining," he says after a while. "You're just trying to make me feel bad."

She does get the rest of the manak leaves, though, before shuffling off to her family. Ben watches her fondly as the herd move off, and then he turns back to Ibani.

"There's womp-rat pies in there somewhere."

[last_kallig]

Ibani fishes in the packs for the pies. "Found them," she announces, handing a pie to Ben.

She's feeling rather hungry herself now, and her stomach chooses this moment to rumble, loudly.

"Stop that!" she mutters at it, as if this will accomplish anything.

[acertainpov]

Ben gives her a gently teasing smile as he heads back into the hut, carrying one of the packs in one hand, already btiing into the pie with the other.

"You'd better eat that up, then."

[last_kallig]

Ibani bites into her pie as she follows him, carrying a pack in her other hand.

She makes an appreciative noise. This is good!

She eyes the bed speculatively as she enters. She's pretty sure Ben didn't sleep at all last night, and he needs his rest!

[acertainpov]

Ben entirely misinterprets that look as he settles down on a seat in order to finish his pie. He nods at her.

"Have a lie down. It's been a long day already."

He's got some things to do after food anyway, not least of which is figuring out their sleeping arrangements for the longer term.

[last_kallig]

Ibani frowns. "I'm pretty sure you didn't sleep at all last night. I slept on the ground for years, a night on it won't hurt me any."

[acertainpov]

Ben holds her gaze steadily. "I might have had some sleep if I wasn't waiting for you to draw your sword all night."

So it's her fault!

"And unless you know how to weave poonton grass into bedding, one of use isn't getting much sleep unless I make a start."

[last_kallig]

Ibani grimaces in acknowledgment of that fact.

"I don't know how to do that yet, no. I could learn?"

[acertainpov]

Ben nods in concession to that. "The suns are too high right now to go gathering, so we'll have to see what we've got."

He waves a hand to indicate that Ibani should sit, and opens one of the chest he has around the place. Lots of tanned bantha hide, some wool he hasn't really worked on yet, and eventually a few sheets of bedding he'd alrwady worked on, and then a sack of the dried grass.

"Can you sew, at least? We can stuff some of these sheets to start."

[last_kallig]

"Nothing fancy, but I can blanket stitch," Ibani replies.

She's seated herself, curious as to what the process will be.

[acertainpov]

Further rummaging produces a bone needle and a length of tough thread, which he hands over to her.

And so Ibani's first lesson on desert living starts: how to throw a passable mattress together in an afternoon while sheltering from the burning suns.

[last_kallig]

Ibani absently threads the needle with the Force while she reaches for the fabric. That level of control with the Force is both rare and hard earned, most force sensitives never manage that level of precision!

Ibani likes learning new things, and this is useful besides!

[acertainpov]

He doesn't comment. But he smiles, and that's like a comment, right? This isn't about learning the Force anyway, but about the other skills he uses from day to day, and Ben starts giving her a run down of what they're doing and why - where the thread comes from, why pontoon grass if the best option for this, and the best time of day to collect it.

"We'll have to collect more anyway, I never expected I'd have to make a whole new bed so suddenly."

Though he always hoped that some day Luke would want to stay over, he's put that hope aside for now.

[last_kallig]

Ibani catches his smile and is happy to see it. It's been, well, it's been a long time since anyone has been happy about anything she's done.

"No, I suppose you wouldn't," she says, chuckling. "Who would expect a foundling to just show up out of thin air."

Really, the situation is just so bizarre!

"Did you want to do the adoption now?"

[acertainpov]

"Do you?"

It's a gentle question, probing just to make sure. "Do you really want to tie yourself to an old man on a desert planet on the outer rim? It's a big galaxy."

[last_kallig]

"A big galaxy that is utterly alien to me," Ibani replies softly. "Everyone and everything I've ever known was lost centuries ago, and I am facing dangers now that I am only beginning to understand. You may be the only other force-sensitive person I ever meet who won't want me dead on sight."

But then her smile broadens. "But it's not only that. The breadth and specificity of my translocation seems too specific to be an accident."

Across the galaxy and centuries in time and she just HAPPENS to land near one of the few Jedi left that might take her in? Yeah, that would be a hell of a coincidence.

"And I like you, and I trust you. That's sounds like a decent foundation for family to me."

[acertainpov]

That's the problem, isn't it? Ben is not the most important person on this planet, but he does have responsibility for that person. If Ibani was destined to help Luke, he can't turn her away. But he'll have to do a lot of meditation, and if he could talk to Yoda it would help.

He nods.

"Well," he says, "I've never had a family. But I know some people once who valued family above all, and I think they'd agree trust was the most important thing.

"Okay, we'll do it now, if you're sure."

[last_kallig]

Ibani draws her sword and nicks her forearm with the blade, enough to draw blood.

There is a feeling in the Force of a held breath, of anticipation, and the electric tingle of Ibani's force presence.

She sets the blade down near Ben, in case he would like to use it himself, then offers her forearm.

[acertainpov]

Ben, of course, gives off no Force presence at all. He pushes up his sleeve, picks up the sword himself and holds the edge of the blade against his own arm, giving a long but shallow line of red along his skin.

Then he holds that arm out, to hold Ibani's by the elbow.

[last_kallig]

Ibani grasps his arm by the elbow also, a similar gesture to the Mandalorian greeting. Perhaps not entirely coincidental.

Their blood mingles and Ibani speaks, looking into his eyes. "By my blood freely given, I am your daughter."

[acertainpov]

Ben holds her gaze, his beard twitching with the smile underneath it.

"By my blood freely given, I am your father."

It should feel momentous, one sentence breaking so many of the rules and traditions he has spent his life holding sacred. Abandoning of the the basic precepts - that of non attachment - for a girl he hasn't known 24 hours.

But instead it feels quiet and truthful. And he never thought much of that particular precept anyway.

[last_kallig]

Ibani would think that precept is foolish too. Not as foolish as the whole Rule of Two thing, which will make Ibani mad enough to spit when she finds out about it, but pretty foolish!

There is a feeling of warmth where their blood meets as the Force swirls around them, a feeling of the bond between them strengthening, being NAMED. When the Force exhales, there is no blood on Ibani's sword or on either of their arms and the wounds they made have healed as if they never were.

Ibani's smile turns joyful, and she can't put it into words so she lets the Force speak for her instead.

[acertainpov]

Ben closes his eyes for a second, and the swirling Force stays within the hut, exhales no farther than the two of them.

He opens them, and while he gives no indication of his feelings in the Force, he gives her a warm smile and puts his other hand on her shoulder.

"But you'd better carry on calling me Ben," he says. "I'm too old for a new title."