Title: Listening Well
Author: Saydria Wolfe
Fandom: Star Wars
Genre: Fix-it
Relationships: Gen
Content Rating: PG
Warnings: Discussion of Slavery
Author Notes: I have a headcanon about Stewjoni that I made to make sense of the various fanon versions there are of Stewjoni out there. They are basically a hybrid race—humans gone to explore an anomalous planet mixed with energy monsters living on the planet, causing the anomalies. They are basically space energy-vampires. Once they are fully mature, they feed off of various kinds of energy. Sexual energy is the easiest for them for what I think are obvious reasons when you look at Ewan McGregor lol
Word Count: 2,913
Summary: Obi and Ani have a much-needed conversation.
“Listening well is one of the most powerful skills you can bring to a difficult conversation.” ― Douglas Stone

Art by me!
“Anakin!” Master Obi-Wan called.
Ani fled for the door faster. “Going out, Master!”
“Anakin, wait.”
“I can’t,” he objected. “The Chancellor—”
“This is more important,” Obi-Wan insisted. For the first time ever.
“But, Master—”
“We need to talk.”
Anakin’s gut turned to lead. His master had never used that phrase with him before, but he had the holonet. He knew what it meant. And all possible meanings were awful.
Anakin turned to face his teacher of nearly six years. That made everything worse because Obi-Wan had his Patient Face on.
Obi-Wan never used the Patient Face with him.
It was reserved for government officials that knew they were being stubborn for no reason. It was for the teachers that thought he should succeed in everything because he was the Chosen One when they both knew he was just a fifteen-year-old slave. It was for serious things.
“The Chancellor—” he tried again, dreading the conversation. His friendship with Chancellor Palpatine got him out of a lot.
“Anakin,” Obi-Wan interrupted—a third time, that was a record— “sit down, I’ll make some tea.”
Anakin sat at the small dining table they had shared for six years and wondered if this was the last time he would get to do such a thing.
The Obi-Wan slid a cup of Alderaani Blue in front of him. It was doctored exactly to his taste—a ton of sugar, something Obi-Wan had introduced into his life and he adored it, with no cream because cream was a waste of a child’s milk. It was comfort. It both relaxed him and worried him.
“What’s wrong?” he had to ask.
“Nothing.” Obi-Wan smiled like he meant it, but he was good at that. Obi-Wan was always entirely sincere, even when he was misleading some fool face to their face and turning them in verbal knots.
“No one says we need to talk when it’s nothing, Master,” he pointed out.
Obi-Wan laughed. It was not his Mission Laugh. That was Good.
“There are a thousand and one ways to be a Jedi,” Master Obi-Wan said. “I am a Consular, specifically a Jedi Ambassador. Master Qui-Gon was as well, but his master was a Guardian and his master was a Sentinel at the time of that mentorship.”
“Master Dooku and Master Yoda,” Anakin said to hide the racing of his mind—as Obi-Wan had taught him.
“Yes,” Obi-Wan agreed.
“You got my grades from Intermediate Diplomacy,” he said baldly. “I failed,” he admitted, softer.
“You did not fail,” Obi-Wan disagreed. “You simply did not make the grade to join the advanced course.”
Anakin rolled his eyes. “That’s failing.” For the student of the Order’s most successful diplomat it was worse than failing.
“No, it is finding a limit,” Obi-Wan said all sharpish. Anakin sat up straighter in surprise. “Not everyone’s limits are the same—not among the same species, not even among the Jedi. The point of training at your age is to find your individual limits. To find where you fit. You have accomplished that. That is a good thing, Anakin.”
Anakin tried to fit that in the pass-and-live or fail-and-be-punished mindset he had always known. He couldn’t. It just didn’t match his experience.
“It is not even a surprise, to be entirely honest with you,” Obi-Wan offered wryly. “You have no sabacc face and can’t bluff to save your own life.”
“I can bluff to save your life,” he countered, more than a little bitterly. Because he had. Just because a crecheling could beat him at some stupid game of cards didn’t mean anything. Not out in the universe.
“And I am grateful for it,” Obi-Wan agreed warmly. “But you have other gifts. You are the best pilot I have ever known. You can do things with machines—you made Reisi’s prosthetic yourself and you invented artificial lekku for that twi’lek boy we met in the lower levels.”
“Those aren’t Jedi Things,” he protested.
Obi-Wan frowned at him. Anakin could feel his genuine confusion in the Force. “Says who?”
“The Chancellor.”
“I mean no disrespect to Chancellor Palpatine,” Obi-Wan offered though his face did not support that statement. “But he has never been a Jedi. He has never set foot in the temple himself and Naboo has only started testing children for Force-sensitivity since the Battle of Naboo. What could he possibly know about Jedi Things?”
That… was a good point.
Anakin found he had nothing to say to that.
“I want to shift your education from Consular-path to the Sentinel-path training. It will mean less time in the field for you, but that is no bad thing. You can focus on mechanical design. We can add medical classes to your load to help make prosthetics or more astronav, if you want to focus on flying. We can send you to university when you are ready, if that is your desire.
“You do not have to do what I have done just because I have done it.” Obi-Wan smiled at him.
A real smile, the one Obi-Wan only ever gave him.
“I want you to be happy, Anakin. I want you to be fulfilled. To make the most of the gifts the Force has given you.”
“We could make the Temple the center for prosthetics in the galaxy?” Anakin asked more than offered.
“As it should be,” Obi-Wan immediately agreed. “You can design and build. Medics across the galaxy can evaluate patients and install devices. You could sell other designs to fund the project to make prosthetics free for all.”
That would be amazing.
His mum would be so proud of that.
“Also,” Obi-Wan offered cautiously. “Your mother said you enjoyed working with children when you were younger. Sh—”
“DO NOT SAY HER NAME!” Anakin shouted.
Obi-Wan raised an eyebrow at him but continued as if Anaking had not just about lost his shit. “She said you were good with them. Patient and caring—”
“When did you speak to my mom?” he demanded.
“She holo-called me after she was Freed,” Obi-Wan said evenly. “It took a while to change my Republic credits to Hutt-honored currency. Though, I would have started the process sooner had someone mentioned to me that you were a slave rather than me finding out from your medical record of slave chip removal.”
Anakin blinked, confused. Had Master Jinn not told him? Had he not told anyone? Anakin knew for himself that he hadn’t.
“Regardless,” Obi-Wan said dismissively but Anakin could feel his teacher’s lingering hurt in the Force. Not a deep wound, but a festering one related to Anakin not trusting him.
On the one hand, he hated that Obi-Wan knew how it felt. On the other hand, he felt fiercely glad that he did. Both emotions made him physically sick.
“I have never seen you in the creche,” Obi-Wan said. “Despite your mother’s reports, you go out of your way to avoid creche duty. Why?”
“It’s attachment,” he blurted.
Obi-Wan had the absolute gall to look surprised and that pissed him off.
“If I had to take care of kids, I would get attached,” Anakin explained. “You and every single other master in the temple lecture me about attachment. You punish me if I look at someone for more than five minutes. Why would I do that to myself?”
Obi-Wan didn’t have anything to say to that. He looked nauseous and wounded like that time he stepped between Anakin and a poisoned knife on Selonia, though he carried no wound.
It made him madder.
“If I go in the creche, I’m going to want to help, to support. I’m going to care. I will want to protect. If I do, I’ll get lectured, and grounded, and isolated, and assigned MORE CLASSES FOR ME TO FAIL!”
He was panting when he finished. A strange voice—one that sounded like the Chancellor, of all people—cackled in his head. “Yes, yes! Use your hate!” the voice encouraged and he hated it, too.
His friend would never unencouraged him to do something that would hurt him, like he was hurting now. No real friend would want that.
Right?
“Anakin,” Obi-Wan said softly, his eyes and the Force around him begging for him to understand. “Anakin, that wasn’t supposed to be a punishment. That was supposed to be a break from the lectures and the attention—” Obi-Wan dropped his head into his hands.
Anakin was startled by Obi-Wan suddenly doubling down on his shields, even going so far as to shield their mental bond.
When Obi-Wan looked up his face was pale and dry but resolved.
“I started this conversation because I did not want to fail you as your teacher but I see now that I already have.”
Anakin opened his mouth to refute that. Obi-Wan was not a failure, but something in Obi-Wan’s face—in his brother’s face—stole the words from him. “I have never asked you this before and for that I apologize. What do you want to do, Anakin?”
“I— what?” He was confused.
“You aren’t a slave, but the Order forces you to call me ‘master’ so I fear that, perhaps, you don’t feel Free,” Obi-Wan explained. “What do you want to do?”
Anakin swallowed, hard. “I want to visit my mom.”
Obi-Wan nodded. “May I go with you?”
“I had assumed you would,” Anakin admitted.
“Is that what you want?”
“Yes,” he had to admit it was. He wanted his brother to meet his mom. Their mom, if he knew his mom at all.
“Would you like to holocall her?” Obi-Wan asked. “A trip will take longer to arrange but I have her comm code.”
“Please,” Anakin’s voice broke. He wanted to talk to his mom so much that he didn’t care.
“And after our trip?”
“After?” Anakin was confused.
“Do you want to return to the Order?”
“I—” Anakin had no idea what to say to that.
“You do not have to,” Obi-Wan told him. “If you feel your path is with your mother, you can go with her. You know enough now to protect yourself in most situations and from the Force.” Obi-Wan frowned. “You would have to leave your lightsaber behind. I warn you, that is not a pleasant experience.”
“Is that why it took so long for you to take me to Illum?” he wondered. He had assumed Obi-Wan had been disappointed with him and that was why it had taken him more than a year to get his crystal—the Chancellor had certainly supported that assumption—but what if it wasn’t?
Obi-Wan nodded. “If you were going back to you mother, you didn’t need the…pain of losing your crystal. You did need to know how to calm and protect yourself from the Force. And how to read more than Huttesse.”
Obi-Wan had researched and taught him nearly a dozen forgotten meditation methods in that first year before they found out that moving meditation worked best for him. How could he doubt Obi-Wan after he had gone through all that effort?
Obi-Wan had stood up to the Council more than once for him. He flushed, ashamed of the hateful thoughts he’d had. And, worse, the ones he had said that first year.
And after.
“Master—”
“Call me Baji,” Obi-Wan nearly ordered.
“Baji?” he asked.
Obi-Wan gave him a small smile. “It’s Mandalorian for teacher. It’s short for baji’buir which is, basically, teacher-guardian. Not all ideas translate directly between languages.”
Anakin nodded. He knew that. Obi-Wan had taught him that. “You speak Mandalorian?”
“I spent a year on the run in the Mandalorian System with Duchess Kryze in my youth.”
Anakin’s jaw dropped open. As oblivious as he had been accused of being, even he knew who the ruler of Mandalore was!
Obi-Wan preemptively waved off his questions. “It’s a long story. The important part here is that the Council has already approved you calling me Baji rather than master after I told them you had been enslaved. Baji Plo Koon insisted—he works with a lot of Freed.
“I should have told you before, but you were worried about how you stood out and I didn’t want to make it worse.” Obi-Wan looked away—in shame, Ani thought.
“Baji Obi-Wan,” he tried. He liked it much more than Master, that was for sure.
His Baji smiled at him.
Anakin smiled back. His heart lifted and he giggled, feeing lighter than it had since he walked away from his mother.
Obi-Wan chuckled with him.
“Can you teach me Mandalorian?” he asked when their amusement passed.
“Of course,” Obi-Wan agreed immediately. Like he always had whenever Anakin asked to learn something new. “They call their language Mando’a but you must never mix it with Basic in a sentence. The least you will get is a punch in the face.” Obi-Wan looked put upon for a moment, “Or rather as long as they consider you a child, you will be gently instructed and I will get punched in the face.”
Anakin laughed at that.
Baji grinned at him but sobered quickly. “You know, if you study medicine or go the way of the creche, you will have to subject yourself to the Mind Healers.”
Anakin was not impressed. “The same Mind Healers you avoid like a plague?”
“I don’t avoid the Mind Healers!” Baji objected. “I just know what they are all going to say so I don’t waste my time.”
“What,” Anakin rolled his eyes, “do they have some way to make you stop being a slut?”
Obi-Wan gave him a look that he had never seen before. He thought it might be hurt and the way Baji increased the shields between them made him sure he was right.
“Anakin, I’m Stewjoni.”
Anakin stared at his teacher in horror. No, no way.
Sweet All-Mother, had he been slut-shaming a being that survived of sexual energy the way Anakin survived on food and water?
“But you eat food!” he objected.
“I was on the verge of full maturity when we met,” Obi-Wan explained. “But it made you so uncomfortable, I meditated until I could use the Force to reverse my physical maturity. It is incredibly difficult sometimes I have to feed naturally to return to an immature state.”
Anakin was horrified. He had slut-shammed an energy being that lived on sexual energy. And he had done it so much that Obi-Wan was damaging himself—endangering his own life by denying his species natural process–for Anakin’s comfort.
His mother would hate him!
And no wonder Baji avoided healers to an insane degree!
Anakin was dizzy with the horrific implications.
“Go!” he ordered his teacher, pointing to the door. “Mature! Get the sex!”
“Get the sex?” Obi-Wan snorted.
“Well, I’m not going to tell you to get f—”
“Do not use that word,” Obi-Wan said warningly.
Anakin swallowed it back.
“I don’t know that I can reverse it on my own at this point, Anakin,” Obi-Wan said, tiredly slumping in his chair. “I’ll need a team of healers and a half dozen volunteers.”
Volunteers. For Baji to have sex with. Anakin struggled not to make a face.
From the look Obi-Wan gave him, he wasn’t very successful.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” he asked. It hurt. Didn’t his brother trust him? He could keep secrets. He could protect Obi from slavers.
“This is the fourth time I’ve told you,” Obi-Wan said with a Look. “You seem to forget every time you leave the Temple. I’ve had Shadows combing every Temple exit you use and all of the lower levels for Sith Alchemy for five years!”
The lower levels. Where he raced pods illegally.
He gauged Obi-Wan’s face to see if he was in trouble. Obi-Wan gave him a pointed look
“No more pod racing,” he promised.
“You also leave to meet with Chancellor Palpatine alone,” Obi-Wan pointed out. “I cannot handle any more slut-shaming from you, Anakin.”
Anakin got that. It was worse than being shamed for using too much water—it wasn’t like sexual energy had a limited supply. Now, he had to choose between Chancellor Palpatine’s friendship and Baji Obi-Wan’s life.
His choice was a no-brainer.
Anakin pulled the battery out of his comm and sent the comm down the recycler. Chancellor Palpatine was the one that had given it to him and Chancellor Palpatine was the only one that called it. “There,” he said to his brother’s shocked face.
“Anakin, you love that thing!” Obi-Wan objected, dashing to the recycler like he could get it back.
“Not more than you,” he said honestly.
Obi-Wan whirled on him and stared, more surprised than if Anakin had slapped him. Why was he surprised? Baji should not be surprised that Anakin loved him. That he was so surprised left Anakin shaken.
He touched the Force and asked it for guidance as Obi-Wan always said he should when he was uncertain.
The path the Force wanted him—wanted them both—on was clear.
“You need to make me a Mind Healing appointment right now,” Anakin said even though he shook with how much he didn’t want to. “And then you need go to the Healing Halls to see Healer Bant.”
Obi-Wan stared at him. It felt like Obi-Wan was weighing his soul.
After a long moment, Obi-Wan nodded. “Your mother will be calling after dinner our time. Even if I’m not, be here for it.”
“I will,” he promised.
He had never meant anything more.
Back to Birthday 2024.
This is really amazing. I love that Obi-Wan is getting all these heads up moments, and seeing them.
Happy Birthday and thank you!
Good story
Awesome!!!!!!
Interesting story.
I am so intrigued!!! I love the world building you put in such a small story. I respect that skill a lot because I have never managed it. Thanks for sharing.