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Obi-Wan wakes to Quinlan screaming.
The creche is silent, with only the sound of younglings waking up, but Obi-Wan can hear Quinlan’s screams. They ache along his bones, like a chill up his spine, like the bitter tang of fear along the back of his throat.
It takes Obi-Wan a while to wake up, to slide from his futon and crawl out of the blankets. Quinlan is only a few meters away, perfectly still and rigid from more than sleep.
Bant blinks her eyes open as Obi-Wan creeps past. Her eyes flick towards Quinlan, and then back to Obi-Wan. He knows enough to know that Bant would have felt the churning currents of Quinlan’s distress the same as Obi-Wan felt it.
Siri is kicking off her blankets as Obi-Wan passes her. She’s got the pinch in-between her eyes that says she can smell the scream, rancid and spoiled. She’s not going towards Quinlan though, but rather to where Garen and Reeft are sitting up.
Obi-Wan stops before Quinlan’s mat. His eyes are shut, and his breaths are ragged. Obi-Wan presses a hand to Quinlan’s shoulder—too warm, too hot, but the heat drives away the chill that he still feels, the fear he can still taste.
He closes his eyes. Quinlan’s scream was soundless and raw, but he has the privilege of waking thought. He shapes the Force the way he has been taught, forms it into the patterns that mean that all is well, that he is here, that it is time to wake and leave the terror behind.
It feels like an embrace, like a wash of cool water down a parched throat. He shapes the emotion with the Force, the pattern and the lilt of it, and then he passes it, like an offering, to Quinlan.
When Quinlan wakes, he is no longer screaming. The others come to him, their mouths silent, but their hearts open. They press to each other with the Force, the language coming effortlessly as they shape and pour themselves into the Force, bring it to the fore, mold it into the patterns of language and share in it.
It is silent, being a padawan.
Qui-Gon is quiet—deep and meditative in his own thoughts. They share a bond, but it is not like being in the creche with his initiate-siblings. Obi-Wan is used to the chatter that comes from being among his many siblings. Being alone with Qui-Gon is unsettling.
Like all Jedi, Qui-Gon shapes the Force in the same patterns. But there is a twang to the cool wash of water along his throat that means all is well—a hint of mint that was not there among his initiate-siblings, the faintest taste of lemon. When Qui-Gon shapes the Force into the pattern that Obi-Wan knows like the back of his hand, when Qui-Gon wishes that the Force be with him, Obi-Wan feels it not just as the warmth of a blanket around his shoulder, but one still warm from resting on the radiator.
It is different, being a padawan with a Master, instead of being an initiate surrounded by his siblings. But whenever the silence seems too much, whenever it is too empty in his own head, he reaches out, calls: is anybody here?
He can feel it, the brush of a hand against his shoulder, the settling of a cloak on a cold day, a cool towel against his forehead on the hottest of summers—they say we are here, we are with you, the Force is with you.
Anakin is strong in the Force, but he has always been alone in that strength.
He does not know what it is like, to pass a thread back and forth, chattering during class while their mouths remain perfectly pressed shut, and their eyes glimmer with carefully hidden amusement. He does not know what it is like, to pare themselves down to a whisper to a friend, to open themselves out and shout for the whole Temple to hear.
He does not know the patterns that make up their language. His voice in the Force is wordless, the raw emotional cries so similar to any Force Null.
Obi-Wan sits down to teach Anakin. He teaches Anakin how to meditate, how to settle himself and look at his feelings. He teaches Anakin how to take the Force, to take his emotions, and to shape them into the patterns that make up language. He teaches Anakin to speak and to listen in return.
Obi-Wan has grown up with his brothers and sisters, with uncles and aunts, with a lineage as wide as it is long. He has grown up with this language on the back of his throat, with it wrapping its warmth around his bones. But he has learned other languages, and he takes that knowledge now, passing to Anakin grammar and vocabulary, teaching him of what it means to use the Force to speak.
Anakin shouts, he roars, and slowly, he gains words. But he always speaks with his voice first, and the Force second.
The Jedi are empaths; they always have been, attuned to the Force as they are.
But their language is not just emotion. It is more than the outburst of anger, the impulsive laughter, the satisfaction of a task well done.
Obi-Wan closes his eyes in meditation. He remembers the lessons from when he was a youngling in the creche. He remembers Crechemaster Lurtolo, the lecture that came not only in Basic, but also with Galactic Standard Sign, with the echoing warmth of the Force.
You cannot speak in anger, Crechemaster Lurtolo said. When you speak in anger, what do you gain? You only hurt yourself and others. You must let your anger go: you must not hold onto it and let it spill out to the others.
You may bite your tongue, Crechemaster Lurtolo said. You may hold your fingers still. But the Force is not so easy to silence. It is not enough to hold your tongue still and your fingers still. It is not enough to be silent and simmer inside.
Obi-Wan, Crechemaster Lurtolo asked, How can you shape the Force, when you burn with such fire? How can you press it into the correct patterns, when it churns out of your control?
Obi-Wan was a youngling. He stood with his teeth on his tongue and his fingers clenched tightly and still, the Force roiled, in the pattern of hurt and fury and frustration.
Meditate with me, Crechemaster Lurtolo said. Meditate with me.
Obi-Wan meditates. He sets his emotions before him, one by one. He looks at them, acknowledges them, lets them free so they do not hold onto him. He presses the Force into the familiar patterns, naming each emotion in turn. He lets them settle, lets them flow, lets them wash away along with the tide. When he is done, and his eyes are open, he can touch the Force without his emotions coloring his words.
He does not allow himself to speak in anger with his tongue. He does not twist his hands into bitter fury. It is not the right thing to do: to shout when he can speak, to lash out when he can listen.
He is not cruel with his voice, is not cruel with his hands, and he will not be cruel with the Force.