Prologue

The clash of lightsaber against lightsaber was already of the past; the battle ended. One combatant still stood, weapon held loosely in one hand as he wearily contemplated what this victory had cost him. The tide of adrenaline that had sustained him ebbed, only to resurge as his mind comprehended his new reality.

He stood alone on the field of battle. At what price, victory?

A sluggish, weary body obeyed the command of a suddenly alert mind: go to him. He will need you, to save him or ease his passing. Nothing else for the moment matters. Only he.

One moment he trembled, standing – there. The next moment he trembled – here. Where an invincible man lay in a heap, no longer invincible. Even the mighty did not stand forever. The warrior had fallen at last.

He who had been the least among them was the only one still to stand.

Time, which had seemed to hold its breath, was again as it had been.

Except that one who had been the student now cradled the one who had been the teacher.

And wept.

Chapter 1. Even Giants May Fall

The Jedi master had been a large man in both physique and presence. Crumpled on the cold floor, the giant had become a dwarf, shrunk by his mortal wound; he who had been amongst the more powerful of the Jedi now only a mere man, dying, on a strange planet far from "home," dying for duty, dying with no one at his side to mourn him.

Dying alone for he feared none others yet lived – for his enemy, too, had surely died, along with the student he had been willing to set aside for another - while that other student, the one he wished to now guide, had been imperiled elsewhere and was far from his side.

He had left the Chosen One behind, left him hidden and hopefully safe, but he had sensed during his battle that Anakin was no longer safe. Anakin had been in danger, in the thick of a different battle.

The dying Jedi feared that he, too, no longer lived.

Naboo had not been kind this day to those who knew the Force. It had taken them all, or so the Jedi feared, for the Force did not speak of others to a dying man. It offered comfort of a different kind: welcoming arms, whispers of everlasting peace, a gentle welcome "home."

It was not the comfort he sought. Comfort for this dying man was to know the fate of those he loved and hoped he was leaving behind, alive. Comfort could not come when he feared that they had already preceded him into the Force, dead.

Afraid there was no one to mourn him and yet hoping there was. Suspected otherwise.

Was he, the dying, the only one still living, however long that life might last?

Surely that was so. Dead, all were certainly now dead, and soon he would join them. He was fading; a strangled cough shook his chest. The Force was reaching for him and he could feel a familiar presence within it. He was dead, then. They were all dead. He would be with them in a few minutes, and a hint of a smile mixed with a tear at the thought.

I had hoped you lived. I shed my last tears for you. Know you held my heart.

He felt a swell in the Force; it offered knowledge of that one's fate: its gift to the dying.

"He lives," the Force whispered around him. "He lives yet."

His failing heart quickened with his joy.

He lived, yes, and that glad knowledge filled him and gave him peace as he struggled to draw his final breaths. The pain was intense and the smell of charred flesh and smoldering cloth filled his nostrils, but soon he would be resting in the soothing arms of the Force from whence he had come. It was always where he was destined to return, for the Force was both womb and grave; it was, ultimately, home.

Of regrets he had few, and they centered on the one whom he now knew he was leaving behind. The Force would guard and guide him equally as well as he could have done. He could die content in that knowledge.

Then something – someone – lifted his shoulders and wrapped him in an embrace.

"Master;" the whispered word fell like teardrops upon his face, damp and full of grief and affection.

He lived!

A hand sought upwards to touch the young, smooth cheek. "Anakin," he whispered, too soft for the one who cried for him to hear the spoken name. The Force had said he lived, and indeed he had. He tried to smile. What better time to die, than in the arms of one he loved?

I'm ready, he told the Force.

*

"Master!" Obi-Wan's voice strangled in his throat. Nothing in the past mattered: disagreements, hurt feelings, and harsh words now forgotten, unimportant. Life mattered. Qui-Gon Jinn mattered. The man he would give his own life for without one second's hesitation mattered. Only he mattered.

And he was dying, slipping away into the Force.

He would give everything to he had to this man, and if it wasn't enough, he would give more, give until there was nothing left to give, and if that still was not enough, there wouldn't be enough of him left to even know of his failure. His fingers touched his master's temples, seeking life, seeking to give life. The only sound was of his breathing: harsh, hard pants that almost drowned out the name spilled from the master's lips even as the hand fell limply away from the padawan's face.

"No!" This broken scream was not the harsh denial that shook the Force when the Sith's blade had pierced the master's chest. This scream was a bare whisper, but no less heartfelt.

And a tear fell.

*

A guttural cough broke the silence and proclaimed that two as yet lived. Jedi impassivity shed, the padawan pressed his lips to the master's forehead as his braid swung forward and brushed across Qui-Gon's lips. The tip came to rest on one of the wounded man's hands and a finger weakly twisted around it.

"O…Obi-Wan?" Realization hit Qui-Gon.

It wasn't Anakin, not the one he meant to have as his padawan, but the one still bonded to him. No, and his tears mingled with those from above.

He slipped back to the ground, filled with his pain. "He lives," the Force had let him know. "He." Not, "they." He had thought – hoped, but the Force had misled him. If one only had lived, why hadn't it been Anakin? That was who mattered. Anakin, only.

"Y…yes, Master," the young Jedi nodded, eyes blurry but still able to trace the lines of his master's face between his two hands as he channeled healing Force through them.

Letting go the braid, Qui-Gon weakly raised his hand to the damp face; traced a cheekbone still holding a touch of roundness, touched a tear trickling slowly down the grief-filled face. Obi-Wan, it was Obi-Wan's face; the padawan he had wanted to discard for another.

Why? I wanted Anakin at my side as I died. Obi-Wan is here instead – he who opposed me, defied me - and Qui-Gon slapped his face with all his waning strength. Obi-Wan rocked back, face frozen.

"Your fault – your failure. You…you – were better – than that. I thought…," and the dying man's words trailed off.

*

"N…no, Master," the young man gasped, redoubling his effort to send healing energy into Qui-Gon's fading body, pulling recklessly from the Force. "I won't let you die. I will not fail you this time."

Power, healing energy streamed from the Force in response to the padawan's call.

Obi-Wan laid himself bare, submerging all that he was into the Force in desperation. He stripped from his own reserves of strength, banished his shields, wiped out all thought until he became little more than a conduit for the Force. Heat and fire and light flooded him; molten flame coursed through his veins, searing, burning, scorching until he couldn't hold it anymore and it started to fade.

The Force was retreating from his grasp because it would not allow itself to be used to kill one in order to save another, for it was created of life and would not destroy it, as Obi-Wan was being destroyed.

A cool whisper brushed against his mind and through his body, soothing the cell-deep pain as it slipped away.

Obi-Wan gasped from his effort, chest heaving, mind burning, heart numb, as the power receded. He trembled from shock, awe and fear. He had not been strong enough to hold it and the Force would not let its vessel be shattered.

He stared down at his master's slack face, hardly daring to breathe in case it drowned out the sound of Qui-Gon's breathing.

Had enough Force flowed through him to sustain life? Had it been enough, or had he, again, failed?

After what seemed an eternity, but was only a few heartbeats, Qui-Gon opened his eyes and stared back at him, only to whisper words that turned his despair into a frigid hollowness that swallowed Obi-Wan's heart and shocked his tears into frozen ice.

"But you did fail me – you – left me to face him – alone….Anakin would not have. Anakin – would have saved me. You – are my death. My padawan…no more."

And that's when the real pain engulfed him.