Archive: Certainly on M&A, The Nesting Place, Wayward
Inn.Others please request.
Category: POV, angst, romance, nookie
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: Explicit sex between two hot guys.If it's not your
cup of tea, leave the pot for the rest of us.Dark and ugly
hints of the future, but no actual spoilers. Well, a teeny
spoiler for JA #2.
Pairing: Q/O, O/ Bruck
Summary: Obi-Wan turns 23, an occasion for celebration,
presents, messing about, and a little angst.
Notes: Notes: Another piece of the Warrior's Heart series, the
correct order of which is as follows:
"Rightful Owner"
"Crime and Punishment"
"Ecstasies"
"The Anger Exercises"
"The Geometry of Desire"
"But For Grace"
"Give and Take"
"Meditations"
"Master & Apprentice"
"Nomenclature"
"The Fear Exercises"
"Willing Vessels"
"An Accident Waiting"
"Bruck's Turn" (fic by Pamela R)
"The Sweet Science of Bruising"
"From a High Place"
"Artifacts"
"Silk"
"Birthday Suite"
Bruck Chun, Obi-Wan's tormentor from the YA Jedi Apprentice
series appears here, redeemed and grown up. I don't own him,
either, or I'd put him on the auction block and buy a house
with the proceeds. I know a few of you Bruck fanatics out there
would pay that much. <eg> However, if anybody'd like to
sell me Qui-Gon, slightly used or otherwise, I have a platinum
card waiting to be broken in.Atrussed-up Obi-Wan wouldn't be
amiss either. Home delivery requested. I'll even share. (Well,
maybe not . . .)
This story takes place about three years into Obi-Wan &
Qui-Gon's relationship, when they've worked out most of the
bugs, if not all the kinks, and two years into Bruck &
Obi-Wan's where things are still a little unsettled.
Big thanks to Gloriana Reginata for editorial suggestions. If
this story is tighter than Bruck's butt, it's due to her
thoughtful comments. If not, it's my fault.
Thoughts in italics (or */*); telepathy in //.
Feedback: The more I gets, the more I writes, so if you like
what you read, please feed the writer.Warning: Proportion of
writing to feedback may increase exponentially, unless I go up
in flames shortly.E-mail only, please.
Disclaimers: The characters are George Lucas's, bless him for
having such a fevered imagination, even if it's not as fevered
as mine. Still waiting for George to call me or send me a
check. In the meanwhile, just doin' it for fun.
I. Stones
Ten years ago I gave Obi-Wan his first birthday gift as my
padawan. We just barely made the Temple's rather arbitrary
deadline, else he would have been too old to be anyone's
padawan, at 13. He was tall for his age then, having come into
an early growth, and both looked and acted older than most of
his agemates. Obi-Wan has always been a very dedicated padawan,
hardworking and serious about his studies and about being a
Jedi--sometimes too serious. Before I ever knew him, I sensed
that about him, watching him spar with such intense ferocity
against Bruck Chun in a desperate bid to show himself worthy of
my attention. So for his first birthday gift from his master, I
gave him a rock.
It saved his life.
Since then, we have made something of a joke of that gift, but
the stone itself has become almost a fetish for us, both
symbolically and literally demonstrative of the way the Force
can guide us, all unknown, how it both brought us together and
seems to actively protect us if not for each other then for its
own use some time in the future. This isn't to say we are never
hurt. Both of us have sustained at least one serious injury
during our time together, and will doubtless suffer more. A
Jedi's life is hard and dangerous. But the Force brought us
together as master and padawan first, then as lovers, and
through it we have healed each other and grown together. So
each year I give him another rock on his birthday, to remind
him of the earliest days of our bond and the ways of the Force.
They are not always just stones. A few are carved in some
likeness or with some symbol to remind him of one mission or
another that marked a turning point in his training or a goal
achieved, or some special event. The stone from the year we
became lovers is incised with the likeness of a young vine
working its tendrils into the cracks, splitting it open while
at the same time holding it together in its twining grasp. Some
are cut and polished and mounted to display their natural
beauty. Some are set in another object, like the crystals in
his saber, to make it useful or beautiful. One of them sings
when it is stroked, because Obi-Wan loves music of almost any
sort. Another changes color in response to the heat of the hand
holding it. Jedi rarely wear jewelry, even when not on active
duty, so there are no rings or pendants or earrings, simple or
gaudy.
By temperament, Obi-Wan is not a collector of things as I have
been, and before we became lovers, his room was spare and
unadorned but for the stones I gave him. Now they line a shelf
in the common room with some of my books. He has clear
favorites among the nine I've given him, but he considers all
of them often, sitting where he can see them when studying,
using them as points of focus for his thoughts. Occasionally,
when he has difficulty meditating, he will hold the first one I
gave him and find his way to the Force through it, or stroke
the singing one with his thumb to produce a soothing tone. So,
joke or not, I know he values them, as he values our bond.
I would have known that even without what he did a few tens
ago. For the first time in our decade together, Obi-Wan chose
to honor our bond on the anniversary of our joining as master
and padawan. He did so elaborately, with a wonderful meal and a
blue silk robe which I enjoy wearing as much as Obi-Wan enjoys
seeing me in it. Then he gave me the gift of his body, as he
has done so often before, though it is always hard to say who
gives and who takes, and who receives the most pleasure. We
ruined his newest set of blacks in our enthusiasm for one
another, but that, surely, was part of his plan. So I have made
my own plans to mark his birthday.
Today he turns twenty-three, and I sent him out with his
friends to celebrate. Thirty-five years separate us, and
although we have been together for ten years and lovers for the
last three, our social circles overlap only slightly. Most of
his friends are young knights or senior padawans not far from
their own knighthoods, as he is not, and most of mine are
masters and senior knights, a few of them members of the
Council. It is difficult enough to fraternize with your elders
and superiors at required functions, and Obi-Wan needs friends
of his own, his own age, as much as I do.
I know, however, that he will not be out all night, despite the
fact that many more of his friends are at Temple than is usual
at one time, including someone very close to him whom he does
not see often enough. I have not asked him to come home
tonight, nor do I expect it of him, but I know Obi-Wan will, as
I know what katas he likes best, and which side of the bed he
prefers, and where and how to touch him to make him cry out.
When he comes in, it will be quite late, and with his clothes
reeking of various kinds of smoke and inhalants sold and
consumed at the club they have gone to, with his mouth tasting
of kisses, his breath of one or another of those inhalants, his
body full of adrenalin from a night spent dancing, his eyes
still alight with shared laughter. If he comes home tasting of
semen and smelling of sex, so much the better.
Perhaps I should be jealous that Obi-Wan has another lover, but
I do not feel so. I have never asked for an exclusive devotion
from him, nor has he of me. Though lovers, we are still master
and padawan, and he is not free to give that kind of devotion
and will not be until he is a knight. I would not ask it even
then, for what we are dictates our behavior in ways that make
that kind of relationship nearly impossible. Once he is
knighted, both of us will likely be away from Coruscant and
each other for long periods of time, each of us perhaps
training a padawan. This is likely the longest period of time
together we will share.
Even so, I have always hoped he would choose to remain my lover
afterwards, and that perhaps the Council would pair us as it
sometimes does two Jedi who work particularly well together, as
we always have. I fear this is an old man's wishful thinking.
Few Jedi are paired permanently in any way, and life bonds are
nearly unheard of, though they were not so rare in the past
when there were more of us. Not that I would wish that
entanglement on him, not with an old man like me.
And I would tell him none of this before his knighting. My
reflexes are slowing and my body complains more and more with
the weather and mornings, and Obi-Wan comes closer each day to
fighting me to a draw or clear defeat in our sparring. I do not
know how much longer I will be in the field, though I suspect
it will not be much past Obi- Wan's knighting, and it would be
wrong to deprive the Order of his capabilities by keeping him
near me. Jedi are taught to live in the moment in all things,
even this, so I am glad enough that we have each other now,
even knowing I am not the only one.
In truth, I find it a relief to know he has someone his own age
who clearly loves him as I do, if not, perhaps, for the same
reasons, and who will, I hope, be a comfort to him when I am
one with the Force. No matter what we feel for each other--and
I have no doubt of Obi-Wan's love or my own--there is always
the difference in our ages to consider, something he is more
likely to overlook than I. There was a time when I had energy
enough for two lovers, as he does, but not now. It is sometimes
all I can do to keep up with him, though he does not think so.
I am content with the one I have, but he need not be.
And I knew before he did that he was not content. I know that
at first he turned to someone else in loneliness and pain when
we had parted angrily and I was gone from him for a half-year,
but that was not his only reason, not when he went back for
more. There are pleasures I cannot give him because of who and
what I am, and despite of the depth of my love for him,
pleasures that I would not deny him. I would rather he sought
them from someone I know and trust than from a stranger who
might give him more than he bargained for or wanted. And while
there is much I can and have taught him, there is much more he
needs to learn himself, from his peers.
His other lover has taught him much. Obi-Wan has been with me
long enough to know there are many ways to negotiate and many
ways to win peace, and so he did from a long-time antagonist.
By the time I returned, cleansed by fire of Xanatos's shadows,
Obi-Wan had won a bitter enemy to his camp, and changed the
life of a young man the Council seems intent on throwing away.
While it is something I might have done, it is not my example
he followed, but his own heart, and in his own way. It is a
pleasure to see him learning to trust himself so. For that
experience alone, I am happy enough to let him go.
He does come home late, and I am not precisely waiting up, but
he finds me sitting in my chair, wearing his gift, reading,
when he comes in. Knowing I would be, he makes no attempt at
stealth, but comes in singing and drops his black boots--the
only part of his Jedi garb he has worn tonight--with a noisy
thud beside the door. I love hearing Obi-Wan sing. He has a
beautiful tenor that he has taken some care to train as part of
his studies, as I learned the poet's craft while still a
padawan, as each padawan is encouraged to find an art to
practice.
This moment or that
how do we know?
In the mirror of the past
it's too obvious:
I did this, should have done
nothing, did that, should have . . .
but it's gone now.
I don't recognize the song, which is hardly surprising, but the
melody is sweet and a little syncopated, in a minor key, and
the lyrics are rather melancholy. I wonder for a moment if he
has enjoyed himself, until he straightens up and smiles at me.
His eyes glitter, the pupils large with desire, and he slinks
over to me in my chair, moving with a liquid stride designed to
arouse his old, tired lover. It works. I'm half hard by the
time he slides onto my lap, straddling my legs and pressing his
mouth to mine. His hands comb through my unbound hair, fist in
it, and hold me hard against him. His tongue opens my lips and
meets mine. He tastes just as I thought he would, smells of
sweat and smoke and sex. By the time we come up for air, my
cock has escaped the robe and is arched against my belly
between us. He grinds his groin against me so I can feel the
twin bulge in his soft, tight leather pants. The friction of
the leather nearly makes me come.
"Did you enjoy yourself, Obi-Wan?" I ask him when we lean back
to inhale again.
"Yes, thank you. Very much. It was good to see everyone again,
in one place at the same time, and the music was quite good
tonight. I think I danced with nearly everyone in the club. At
least it feels like it."
"You could have stayed longer. . . ."
"When I had you to come home to? Why would I?" He leans forward
to kiss me again and my hands mold themselves around his hard
little ass. I wonder if he is already loosened and ready for
me.
"Bruck says hello," he murmurs, shivering, hands playing in my
hair.
"Does he?" I reply vaguely, engrossed in the taste of Obi-
Wan's earlobe.
"Yes. He also says you're a lucky man."
"I am," I agree, not so vaguely, and curl my tongue around his
ear. Obi-Wan's breath catches a little in his chest.
"Want to show me how lucky you are?" he growls.
"Oh yes. And I have a present for you."
"Ah, let me guess what it is," he says slyly, leaning back to
look at me, arching one ironic eyebrow and stroking a finger up
my cock. This time it's my breath catching. "Is it hard as a
rock?"
"Yes."
His hand closes on one testicle, fondling. "Is it cold as a
stone?"
"No."
He hesitates then, and I could kill him for stopping. "No? What
could it be then?" He closes one hand around my scrotum,
strokes his thumb lazily over the crinkled skin, tugging a
little, pulls me in with the other hand for another kiss. It's
all I can do not to erupt where we sit.
"Not what you think, padawan," I tell him when we come up for
air again. I'm surprised I sound as controlled as I do.
"Oh? Well, let me shower then and you can show me what it is,
since I can't guess."
"You needn't. Shower, I mean. I like the way you smell now."
He smiles a little smugly, as he does when he thinks he has
cracked my control. "I thought you might," he says. Wicked boy.
Supporting his weight a little with the Force, I stand up,
holding him as he wraps his legs around my hips. I have more
room to knead that hard muscle he sits on now, and do so,
making him grind against me again. He locks his ankles behind
me, holds me tightly around the neck as though he were much
younger, and lets me carry him into the bedroom. I set him down
gently on the side of the bed, though I'd like to throw us both
down on it, strip him out of what clothes are in the way and
drive myself into him. I may yet get to do that, but it is his
privilege to ask for it tonight.
"Is this my present?" he asks, picking up the velvet bag I've
left on his pillow, fondling it the way he did my testicles.
The inference isn't lost on me.
"Yes. Open it."
He does so, pulling out one by one, like a beaded necklace, a
string of four stone spheres, two centimeters in diameter,
strung ten centimeters apart on a coated silken strand of woven
monofilament. Dangling from the end is an oversized ring big
enough for two of my fingers. The spheres are black veined with
white, white veined with pink, pink veined in green, and green
veined with white, very smooth and highly polished. "You're
right. They're warm," he says, "like yours," with a wink,
weighing them in his heavy hands. "This one's a bit sloshy
inside. And this one . . . hums. And this one is very heavy.
And this one, this one feels like it's alive, or there's
something alive in it, bumping about."
"Magnetized bearings inside a polarized shell," I explain.
"Very pretty. And very mysterious. What are they for?"
"Shall I show you?"
"Yes, please," he replies, getting a glint in his eye again.
"It involves taking your clothes off," I warn him.
"Oh all right. If you insist," he replies with mock annoyance.
"Let me, if it's such a bother," I offer, and he acquiesces,
pretending to sulk. He's long outgrown that trait, but it makes
his eyebrows curve so wonderfully that I never tire of seeing
the mock expression on his face, and he knows it.
I open his shirt first, running my palm down his sleek chest
and belly inside it as the closures split open. He shivers.
He's worn the green shimmersilk I bought for him on our last
anniversary, the one that changes colors as he moves in the
light. It ripples over him now like an aurora as I slide it off
his shoulders and down his arms and over his hands, laying it
out over the bench at the foot of the bed with my own robe.
Then I get up on the bed behind him and pull him in between my
legs so he's lying back against me, and slide one hand down the
front of his pants, popping the snaps of the black leather with
my thumb. The first time he put these on, I could barely keep
my hands off him. They fit him like a second skin, soft as his
own, and I enjoy taking them off him as much as seeing him in
them.
I slide my hands down his hips, which he lifts a little off the
bed, and down the outside of his legs, stripping off the
leather at once, bending him forward beneath me as I reach down
to his ankles. My cock grinds between us against the small of
his back. He kicks the leather off his feet and onto the floor.
I lean back again with him following, trailing my hands up the
inside of his legs, behind his knees, inside his thighs,
spreading them against mine. The skin there is unbelievably
soft.
We're both shaking now, hearts pounding, rocking us against
each other.
Freed of the confining leather, his cock arches up against his
belly. I run my fingers through the tight gingery curls at its
base and inhale the scent on them, smelling his musky pong and
someone else's, almost familiar. Though three of us together
does not appeal, knowing my lover has been with someone else
before coming to me is surprisingly exciting.
Obi-Wan turns his face against my neck and bites a little. "I
want my present," he growls.
"You shall have it, my love," I tell him. "Patience."
Bending him under me again, I pull his knees up against his
chest and get up on my own, rocking him forward and onto his
until he is kneeling beneath me, my cock sliding over the
crevice between his cheeks. He shivers in anticipation. I reach
beneath him and squeeze his balls, making him gasp and moan and
arch against me, then put a hard pillow beneath him and push
him down onto the bed again and spread his legs. I kneel
between them. He wriggles a little and props himself up on his
elbows, making a curve of shoulders and back and rump even more
attractive than his eyebrows. Beautiful. And shamelessly so. He
knows this is a view I like.
I nip his shoulder, then kiss my way across it and down his
spine, ending at the small of his back, just above the V of
flesh at the top of his ass. It's one of his most sensitive
spots and I spend some time there, licking and sucking and
nibbling, running my beard over the soft skin, listening to him
sigh and moan, which he does eloquently. Then I mark him there,
leaving a painless bruise only I can see, in the shape of my
mouth. There are other bruises there, not mine.
Down the middle of his back are other marks of my own,
permanent ones: two pictograms in Danjii, raised against his
fair skin in welts and colored a deep blue. I trace a finger
along the first one, lean over him again and whisper,
"Passion"; trace the other one and murmur "Serenity," then let
my hands slide down his back again and watch as he shivers.
"Which do you want tonight?" I ask him, holding his hips.
"Passion," he growls.
I lay the string of balls against the curve of his spine,
spread his cheeks and let the first of them slip between those
firm hemispheres. Making sure my fingers are slick, I stroke
two over and around the revealed pucker of muscle, coating it.
He moans and wriggles, grinding against the pillow under his
hips.
"Patience, love," I tell him again, rubbing my palm against the
small of his back and slipping two slicked fingers into him,
flicking over his prostate. He bucks against the touch, crying
out. As I thought, he's loose and relaxed, though he tightens a
little around my fingers. I stretch him a little more, soothing
him, then coat the first of the smooth stone balls with
lubricant and press it against his opening.
"The order these go in is very important," I tell him, pushing
it in gently. Obi-Wan moans as it disappears into his rectum,
stretching and filling him. "The one with the heavy oil should
go in first, leaving the solid one to sit against the interior
ring of muscles." I coat the next one and push it in, feeling
it vibrating softly against my fingertips. Obi-Wan cries out
and clenches his fists in the sheets as the first bumps his
prostate and the second sets off an unnameable sensation in
him. I coat the third--with its pellets pinging off the
interior and each other, making it quiver unsteadily--and push
it in against the second one. Obi-Wan throws his head back and
moans again, writhing and grinding against the pillow beneath
his hips. "Oh gods, Qui! What--"
"Shhhh. One more," I tell him, and push the fourth one in just
past the interior ring, then tug on the woven cord a little.
His muscles clamp down hard around the cord and there's a
little bulge around his anus where the last ball sits packed
against it. I lean down and run my tongue over it, making him
thrust back. He's breathing heavily now, and when I roll him
over onto his back, leaving the pillow under his hips, his eyes
are glazed, his mouth open. "Rock your pelvis a little." I want
him to feel what it's like without any other stimulation.
He does, and the sound that comes out is articulate in its own
way, though wordless. He reaches up to me, a little dazed,
almost hypnotized by what's going on inside him. I lean down
and kiss him, his mouth first and then along his jaw, down his
throat, over his collarbone, his nipple, which I bite a little.
His fingers clench in my hair, his pelvis rocks, his cock
leaking. I disentangle his hands gently and let them fist in
the sheets as I kiss my way downward, over his ribs, his hard
belly, swirl my tongue in his navel. Everywhere I taste the
other, faintly. They've cleaned one another up, no doubt, as
Obi-Wan's often done with me, but the smell of another's skin
and sweat still clings to him without soap to wash it away.
Wondering what they've done together makes me harder.
I take his cock in hand and swirl my tongue over the crown,
making him thrash beneath me like a hooked fish. That only
makes the vibrations and pressure in his rectum stronger, and
moves the balls over his prostate. He cries out as though I've
burned him. His muscles are quivering now and he's breathing
harshly. Relaxing my throat, I take him all in and find the
ring at the end of the cord, slipping two fingers through it
and pulling the last ball tight against his anus, almost out,
stretching him open. I pull my mouth up his cock slowly, just
grazing him with my teeth, tongue the sensitive spot on the
underside and slide down again, repeating the motion again,
again, again, again, each time a little faster. His hips pump
into me and he's crying out, lost, undone, so much in the
moment, so beautiful. *Mine.* He arches up, coming, crying out.
I swallow a little and let the rest of his cum spatter against
my neck and chest so I'll have his scent on me the way I know
his other lover does. Despite the fact that he's been with
another, he comes in a long ropy jet. I rub it into my skin
like cream and nuzzle my face against his softening cock.
"Oh gods, Qui. That's amazing," he murmurs dreamily, rocking,
rocking, more gently now, still lost in the feelings coursing
through him. He runs his fingers through my hair again. "It's
always so good with you."
Sweat- and cum-slick, I slide up his body until I can recapture
his mouth. I wonder if his other lover can make him say that.
"Happy birthday, Padawan," I murmur against his lips. He
strokes his hands down over my back and closes them on my ass,
pulling me hard against him, so he knows I haven't come yet.
His tongue thrusts into my mouth as he grinds against me and
one finger strokes against my anus. It makes me shudder against
him. He's all fire tonight.
"Tell me what you want," I murmur against his mouth.
"I want you. I want to be inside you, Qui. Let me in."
It's not a request he makes often; it's not something I offer,
or ask for, either. I don't think he knows how much I want it,
so it's ironic he should think of it as a special gift. I roll
over, pulling him on top of me and he sits up and straddles me,
thick fingers drawing a trail of heat down my body to my groin.
He moves back down my legs and then between them, as I pull my
knees back against my chest for him. I should feel vulnerable
like this, but all I feel is desire as he hefts my balls and
strokes the skin behind them and back to my anus. I give him
the lube and he slicks his fingers first, sliding one inside
me.
"I want to hear you cry out, Qui, I want to know how I make you
feel. I want to know I can rob you of words. Don't hold back.
Not tonight."
And what harm can it do, for one time, one night? He knows the
constraints between us as well as I do, and he is old enough
now not to test them as he might have, as he did, once. In a
few years, he will have all of me, along with his knighthood.
So I let go.
He slides one finger in and out, rotates it, flicks against my
prostate and I let out the sounds I've kept stifled other
nights, other times, thrusting back against him.
Then he starts to tell me what he and his lover have done that
evening: Dancing in a pack of young sweaty bodies, rubbing up
against each other indiscriminately, hard and aching for
release, kissing with tongues and hips mimicking each other. He
twists and strokes with his finger, the other hand circling my
cock, moving up and over the crown and back down. My hips rock
up into him, back against him. I hear myself moan.
"Yes! Yes!" he hisses, ferally delighted. "Show me what you
want, Qui, show me you like it."
He works another finger inside me, waits for the muscles to
stop spasming, and gently scissors me open more, slowly moving
my foreskin over the crown of my cock. He tells me about
leaving through the back exit with his lover, what they did
there in the alley. It's torture. I want more. And I find
myself wishing I could have watched, could have, perhaps,
fucked one of them as well. In my younger days, I would have.
"Tell me, Qui." He squeezes my cock, slides the tips of three
fingers in, and tells me about the ride home, then, as he's
working those thick fingers in deeper, how his lover shoved him
against the wall of his quarters and--
"Oh, gods, Obi-Wan! Now!" I hear myself shout, my hips
thrusting as mindlessly as his had been earlier. My heart feels
like it might burst and I can feel the heat in my face and neck
and chest, most of all in my groin.
I feel his fingers withdraw and then he pushes into me, showing
our age difference in his quick return to hardness, hooking his
arms behind my knees to hold me open and leaning over me. He
builds the rhythm slowly, my cock caught between his lean belly
and my own, until he goads progressively louder sounds out of
me with each stroke until I'm groaning loud enough to make
glass shudder. Each thrust sends a wash of fire through me. I
open my eyes, see him above me, head thrown back, gleaming with
sweat, hips working his cock into me. I know he's feeling the
balls inside him as well as his own pleasure of being inside
me. "So beautiful," I tell him. "So good, so hard, so hot, so
good, so good, so good . . ."
It's wonderful to let go a bit with him, but there's more I
want to give him too. With what little presence of mind I have
left, I grope for the ring at the end of the cord and as he
shudders into completion, I tug it, pulling the balls out one
by one. His hips spasm and jerk into me as each one leaves his
body and he comes with a deep, guttural groan, more like the
sounds I make, like the one I make now, coming with his last
thrust and grind against me.
After a moment, he rocks back on his heels and we disentangle
ourselves so he can collapse back into my arms. The smell of
sex is thick in the air around us, and I can smell Obi-Wan's
lover more strongly now, for the heat. Or perhaps it's only my
voyeuristic imagination.
"Did you really let him--"
Obi-Wan chuckles. "Yes. I can't believe I did, though."
I can't either, but I'm glad of it. Obi-Wan needs someone his
own age to goad him out of the early senescence his own nature
and having an old man for a lover would doom him to.
That said, Bruck Chun is the last person I would have thought
to see him with, though he could be said to have brought us
together. Somehow, his life has become intimately entwined with
ours and he and Obi-Wan have taught each other much since they
became friends and lovers. I find I like the boy, as well,
though the two of them together are a study in contrasts. And I
begrudge Bruck nothing he has of my lover, for I know I have
the greater part of his heart, at least for now.
II. The Hard Place
I watch him dress, after we've gotten our breath back and wiped
each other down. I'm still sweaty and the sheets reek of us,
but in a moment that's all I'll have of him. He pulls on the
tight black leather pants I had made for him, molding them to
his body like a second layer of skin, tucking in the shirt his
master gave him a halfyear ago. It's mostly green, but changes
color as he moves and as he walks from light to shadow, like
his eyes do. He scrubs his hands through his hair, drying the
last of the sweat out of it, flips his braid over his shoulder
and leans down to kiss me again. I taste us on his breath. He
makes sure I do.
"I love you," he says and cups my cheek. "Remember that," and
turns away. The door closes quietly behind him. I hear the
outer door of the quarters I share with my master close just as
softly.
We've made love together a grand total of 17 times in the last
two years. Yes, I keep count. It's all I have to keep. Tonight
was number 18 and I only had him for a little over an hour, not
counting the time at the club. When we were inside my room, I
pushed him against the wall, not wanting to waste a moment,
went to my knees and rubbed my face against his crotch, the
smell of leather and sex coming from him. He was hard already,
we both were, but I took him out of those pants slowly and
carefully, and had him there up against the wall, with that
long, thick cock framed in black leather. I never thought I'd
ever be blowing another man, and I've never wanted to do this
with another, only Ben-- and he had to teach me. Needless to
say, I pretended I wasn't a quick learner.
I made his hips jerk and his hands fist in my hair, made him
cry out, made his knees go weak and swallowed as he came.
Afterwards, he slid down with me, arms going around me tight,
tongue thrusting into my mouth, hungry to taste himself, to
taste us. Then he started stripping the clothes off me and
pushed me onto the floor.
"I can't . . . believe . . . I let you . . . do that . . . in
that alley . . . outside . . . the club," he said between hard,
almost vicious kisses. Our teeth banged and grated. Last time
he cut my lip open.
I grabbed him and rolled us over so he was under me, kissed him
hard, crushing him to the floor with the ten more kilos of
weight I have over him. I'm a bit bigger than he is, but he's
kicked my ass in the sparring rooms any number of times. Master
Yoda would say that only proves his point, and it does. But
there are times when size does matter--like when I'm sucking
Ben off. It's a real mouthful to get around.
"You loved it, Kenobi, you know you did."
"Didn't say--I didn't," he gasped. "I just can't believe I let
you--" Getting leverage somehow, he flipped me back and pinned
me, groin to groin, and damned if he wasn't getting hard again,
"do that--" he purred, grinding against me, "--in public. Now
it's your turn."
I never thought I'd like that either, but I do. Little gods, do
I. And it's another time size matters.
Tonight we went out for his birthday. He's 23; I'm a little
younger. We were initiates together, rivals, enemies for years.
Now we're lovers. Or I like to think of us that way. Really, we
only sleep together now and then. "Sleep together." That's a
nice euphemism. We fuck like two animals in rut now and then.
No, that's not fair. I know it's more than that to him. I know
I mean more than that to him. If he hadn't fallen for his
master before we were friends and had it not been mutual, we
would be exclusively lovers as much as two padawans of
different masters can be. As it is, we see each other maybe
three times a year, because he's apprenticed to a master much
in demand, and so am I, now. Our paths seldom cross. Once we're
knighted, that won't change much, unless we're asked to work
together. So I've learned to be content with what we have. It's
probably not much different than it would be under ideal
circumstances. Unless we're very lucky, Jedi don't have lovers;
we have liaisons. Or most of us do. Some of us don't have
either.
Then there's Ben, who seems to get exactly what he wants. Do I
sound resentful? I'm not. I'm glad for him. But there are times
I wish I was more like him. It would make my life so much
easier. And a lot less empty.
"Live in the moment," he tells me. It's something we're both
still learning to do, in different ways. When we're together
there's no mention of his master, or very little. He doesn't
compare us, doesn't cry out his name when he's coming. When
we're together, I'm his lover. And it's not as if I'm jealous.
How could I be? Not anymore. There probably isn't a human in
the Temple who doesn't envy either him or his master their
choice of bedmate. I've got the one I want, as often as
possible. It's just that his master gets more of him more
often. And I know, no matter what he says to me, that Qui-Gon
Jinn is Ben's first love. He wouldn't lie if I asked him, but I
won't. I don't have to. It's obvious to everyone.
But he was dancing with me most of the night at the club. Then
we came back here, where I asked him to spend the night, though
I already knew the answer. Another time he would have said yes,
would have expected to, but tonight he wants to celebrate with
"Qui" as well as his other friends. That's why we left the club
a little early and came back here to my quarters, because we
had our own private celebrating to do, as we will on my
birthday too, if we're lucky enough to be together for it. Just
in case we're not, I gave myself a little present in the alley
on the way home. I'd have fucked him on the dance floor if I
thought I could have gotten away with it. Well, actually, I
could have. A little Force manipulation and nobody around us
would remember a thing. We were packed in there so tightly we
were practically fucking already anyway, and it's not like I
haven't seen it happen there. . . . But I know I can only push
Ben so far, and that would have been way over the limit. And
he's right. He's good for me that way.
But I wish he were staying. It's so hard to watch him go this
way. On the nights he stays, now that neither of us have
curfews, I get to wake up next to him in the morning. I
couldn't ask for a better present. We're both late-night types
and not our best in the morning. I'm grouchy and he's usually
just bleary--I don't think I've seen him in a foul mood more
than twice since I've known him. So we wake up slowly, holding
each other, warm and drowsy and comfortable skin to skin. He
always smells so good. Eventually we'll make love again and get
up and shower together and go on with whatever the day calls
for. But those few minutes together, waking up--I'd give
anything for more of those. Almost anything.
His master knows we sleep together. Sometimes I wonder if he
doesn't know when we're having sex, since his bond with Ben is
so strong. And Ben knows I don't sleep with anyone else. I'm
not much for bed-hopping. He's always been more comfortable
with that than I am. I need some kind of connection for it to
mean anything, and if it doesn't mean anything, why do it? Like
after our first time, when Master Jinn had more or less
abandoned him--an exercise I still don't understand the point
of--I knew I wanted Ben more than I've wanted anyone before.
And I knew, when his master returned and Ben appeared in the
showers with those characters on his back, that I'd have to
settle for being the alternate choice. I've learned to live
with that.
It's been a struggle. I'm not like Master Jinn, who seems very
much above something as petty as jealousy or possessiveness
(though Ben swears he's not and that's what their little hiatus
was all about). I'm only a padawan yet, with a long way to go
before my trials--much longer than Ben. But Master Jinn's
always treated me like any of Ben's other friends, and even, I
think, come to like me. And it's not like he's just being
magnanimous because he knows he's in a better position than I
am. He's not condescending or pitying any more than he's cold
or proprietary when I'm around. From what Ben says, he never
protests him spending the night, never asks him not to. He has,
in fact, really gone out of his way for me more than once. He's
the one who found me a new master after mine died and I'd been
without one for almost a year--and made sure I got a good one.
If I've made up for the year of training I lost, it's because
of Ben pushing me in my studies and Qui-Gon's efforts to fill
in while I was masterless.
All that said, I do know Ben loves me. We have a bond that he
doesn't have with anyone else, not even his master. Ben calls
it a lover's bond, and maybe that's what it is, but I don't
remember anybody telling us about those in sex-ed or Advanced
Force Abilities, lecture or lab. All I know is that it's not
like my training bonds, and not like the bond he has with
Qui-Gon. We can't hear each other's thoughts the way he and
Qui-Gon sometimes can, but sometimes at night I can almost feel
him wrapped around me, usually when I'm missing him most. Maybe
it's only an illusion, me kidding myself, or Ben faking me out,
but somehow I don't think so. When he's not here, even when
he's shielding, I feel like there's a cord stretched between
us, no matter how far apart we are, and it's definitely
stronger when we're together. Whatever bond grew between Ben
and his master just happened, and became part of their training
bond. But Ben and I *made* this one. He made it with me, so I'd
know he loves me even when we're apart.
It doesn't hurt that the sex is so hot, either.
So I can't complain. But when Ben leaves me in the morning, or
worse, in the middle of the night like tonight, there's a dull
ache in my chest and some of the color goes out of my life.
I think I'm all right with it now. And it won't always be this
way. It might seem callous to say so, but Qui-Gon is 35 years
older than Ben and I know it's something he's considered even
if Ben hasn't, or won't. I know it's not wise to think this
way--so much can happen in our lives in the space of a careless
moment, and Master Jinn may long outlive me. But it's the only
hope I have, because the chances of Ben falling out of love are
nil.
I burrow down under the covers, smelling the scent he's left
behind and try to sleep. He's told me before not to wait and I
wouldn't, if I were different. But I'm not like Ben, and there
won't be anyone else. Not really.
III. Between
I stop to catch my breath somewhere between Bruck's quarters
and my own, on my way from one lover to another with not even a
shower. Crazy.
I must have been out of my mind. I must still be. How is it
possible I feel this way, how do they both put up with it?
And why am I so happy?
The first time Bruck and I slept together I thought I'd lost
Qui-Gon forever. He had blocked off our bond and gone off on a
mission to bring his second, failed apprentice to heel, and was
acting as if he weren't coming back. I wasn't sure that, if he
did come back, he would still want me as either apprentice or
lover. So it started out, with Bruck, as a way to make peace
between enemies, as a ceremony and ritual to cleanse his
quarters of his dead master's presence, as a way to assuage our
mutual misery and loneliness.
Force help us, we fell in love.
Or I did, at least. He must have been in love with me already,
for a long time, to have carried so much animosity for so long,
but I've no such excuse. I don't know how it happened. I
thought for a time it was just residual hormones, the afterglow
of a night of enthusiastic lovemaking, but in the days that
followed, I wanted to be with him as much as I'd ever wanted
Qui-Gon. Then Qui- Gon came back, and it was--not like he'd
never been gone, definitely not--somehow stronger, and more
intense. When I told him about Bruck, he seemed almost
relieved, rather than angry or hurt, and made it clear he
didn't expect me to give Bruck up, no matter how much I
protested that it was a one-time occurrence.
We mended both our master-apprentice and lovers' relationships
and went on. In the meanwhile, Bruck got a new master. We
remained friends but didn't sleep together again until over a
year later, after we had all gone off on other missions. When I
saw him again, finally, it *was* like we'd never been apart,
like it was with Qui-Gon but different.
The second time we slept together was almost an accident, or at
least it felt like one. Like a speeder wreck, in fact. I can
see Qui's eyebrow rise with amusement and Bruck roll his eyes
in sarcasm when I think that, but it was. "Oh yeah," Bruck
would agree, "we 'accidentally' kissed so hard that you almost
chipped a tooth, and then I 'accidentally' took off your belt
and ripped your tunics off, and you 'accidentally' put your
hands down my pants and grabbed my ass, and--" until I'd have
to shut him up with another "accidental" kiss. But I hadn't
intended to sleep with him again. I thought we both understood
that what had happened a year ago wouldn't happen again.
I'm not often wrong to that degree.
And again, all Qui-Gon said was, "I'm glad you have someone
among your peers who cares that much for you, Obi-Wan," when I
told him we'd done it again, in an agony of shame. Since then,
we haven't mentioned it, but whenever Bruck and I are both at
Temple at the same time, we're usually with each other, and Qui
knows what we're up to. I'm beginning to think he takes his own
pleasure in it. I wonder how good my shields are.
It is different with Bruck, different as I first told him it
was different with men, because I was the first one he'd ever
slept with--the only one, I think, even now. Very different.
With Qui it can be any number of things: exciting, intense,
ferocious, tender, comfortable, silly, and usually inventive,
but somehow constrained, as it must be. With Bruck it's--
urgent, dangerous, a little wild. Like tonight, for instance.
We'd gone out dancing with a group of friends, because it's my
birthday, and left a little early--just past midnight-- going
out the back door into the alley because it was quicker than
fighting our way to the main entrance. And in the alley, he
grabbed me and pulled me back against him and started to rub
his groin against my ass. "I can't wait. I want you now," he
growled.
"Here?" I squeaked. "Are you mad?"
"Yes, here," and his hand slid inside my pants and closed
around my cock. In moments I was painfully hard, panting, and
he was grinding against me in long, slow strokes, almost as
though we were still dancing. We'd been doing that all night,
rubbing against each other, teasing each other. We could just
hear the rhythm of the music through the walls and he matched
his movements to it, popping the snaps on my pants with a flick
of his thumb, one by one, to the beat.
"Bruck--you're crazy--we'll get caught--"
"You want it," he rumbled in my ear, ignoring my protests. "I
know you do."
And I did. My heart was banging frantically against my ribs.
"We'll get in--"
"Trouble? Gods, Ben, you're being a Perfect Padawan again.
We're consenting adults. We wouldn't be the first to do it back
here. It's practically expected. Let me put something else up
your ass besides that stick." One moment his hand was stroking
me inside my pants and the next he'd worked the tight leather
down around my thighs and his cock was hard against my ass,
slick with pre-cum already.
"Tell me you want it," he said, stroking me, cool air on my
bare skin where it wasn't covered by his own. I heard myself
moan helplessly.
"Do it," I gasped. And I must have really wanted it because
when he bent me over and drove inside me there was no burn, no
pain, just a wild thrill that we were here practically fucking
in public. "Do it. Do it, do it, do it . . ." I kept saying,
like a chant, as we moved with the thumping rhythm from the
club. He held my hips hard against him, slamming into me. Gods
it was good, too, sharpened by the cheap thrill of perhaps
being caught, of doing it where anyone could see or hear us,
and I came hard, stroking myself, spattering the wall. Bruck
covered my mouth as I did or we would have had the patrol down
on us, wondering who was being murdered back here. A moment
later and he was pumping his cum into me, shuddering and
bucking and making almost as much noise as I had.
Then it was all we could do to put ourselves back together and
stagger out to the street and on our way home, sweaty and
laughing and giddy that we'd gotten away with it. On the
transport on the way home, beneath our cloaks we were feeling
each other up, stoking the coals that roared into flame again
the moment the door to his quarters closed.
I can't imagine Qui-Gon doing any of that, certainly not
fucking me in an alley.
Bruck and I are alike in many basic ways--we both have stronger
connections to the Unifying Force than to the Living Force, for
instance--but we're also polar opposites in others. Bruck is
mostly instinct and emotion, though he's certainly not
unintelligent. He prefers to feel before he thinks and I
usually do the reverse. Qui-Gon has told me I'm more likely to
act my age when I'm around Bruck, as though he thinks that's a
good thing. I'm more likely to get dragged into some wild prank
or escapade with Bruck, that's for certain.
The oddest thing is that Qui-Gon loves seeing me--and fucking
me--when I've been with Bruck for any length of time. I know
he'll be waiting up for me tonight because he knows I'll be
coming home to him. He may not expect it of me, but I do, and
he knows me well enough to predict my behavior with great
accuracy. And he's the one I want to come home to, because I
don't know how much time we have together.
It's not something I like to think about. Sometimes, I'm forced
to, you might say. When we first became lovers, I'd sometimes
dream of our bed, burning, but Qui was ever the only one in it.
Then, as I started to work more closely with Master Yoda,
learning not to see the future but rather to follow the
possible timelines for myself or someone else, I realized it
wasn't our bed, but a pyre. In that vision, Qui is about the
age he is now. I don't know how he's died, whether peacefully
or with some illness or injury, but I suspect the latter. There
is such a feeling of wrongness and angry grief to the vision
that it can't be simply the end of his life. Fifty-eight or
sixty or sixty-five is far too young for his normal life-span
to be over, let alone one enhanced by serving the Light.
So I am going to lose him.
If not in the near future that leads to that pyre, then
eventually some other way, through the natural course of things
or some other unforseen blow. The years between us make that
inevitable. Even if everything goes well in our lives, if
Qui-Gon lives another fifty or sixty years and I another eighty
or ninety, I will still spend the last third of my life without
him. Perhaps I'll be reconciled to the idea by then, though I
suspect not.
If nothing else, we will be together much less often when I am
knighted and sent into the field on my own, and, alone, my
chances of being killed are much greater than they are with him
or another partner. It's as true for Qui as it is for me, but I
think he will probably ask to be taken off the field duty
roster after I'm knighted. Already, he complains his reflexes
are slowing and he's growing too stiff to endure field
conditions. I can't fault him for it, but it hurts to hear him
say so. I hate to hear him speak of leaving the things he loves
and of his frailties. I love him so much.
I don't expect Bruck to understand what I feel for Qui, but I
don't want to hurt him, either. He knows Qui is . . . is what?
How do I describe what Qui-Gon is to me? All the roles he's
played in my life are mixed up together: rescuer, father
figure, teacher, healer, partner, blood brother, confidant,
friend, lover. At first it was hard to separate all of them, to
keep the master and teacher separate from the lover, but we've
both learned to do that now, as much as anyone can.
It's not that Bruck means less to me, it's that he *is* less,
just by virtue of our ages and circumstances. We're peers,
friends, former rivals for Qui-Gon's attentions, and then
enemies. I haven't known him for half my life as I have Qui. We
weren't even speaking to each other three years ago. I've come
to care about him very much, to want his happiness the way I
want Qui's. I can't imagine my life without him, and I love him
very much. Enough that I let him see parts of me only Qui
knows, enough to build a connection between us that only death
or mutual agreement would break.
But with Qui I have something so much stronger, something that
just . . . happened, something I'm sure won't end when our
training bond is broken.
I can't imagine my life without Bruck, but without Qui, it's
not even unimaginable. It's impossible.
I see that pyre in the night and I'm filled with such terror,
and a desperate sense of urgency. Something beyond my own need
to please and desire to do well spurs me to work toward my
trials. I want to be ready for whatever's coming. I want to be
able to do whatever I must to keep him beside me. I want us to
grow old together. I want him to have time to teach me to meet
our future with the same serenity he faces it with. To teach me
how to love and let go.
Archive 