Master Apprentice Archive Just How Much Quick search:

Archive - M-A, The Remix...Redux archive, my LJ

Category - POV, Q/O, Angst

Rating - G

Summary - Love and the Force

Warnings - Not beta'd and follows canon

Feedback - Sure, anytime anywhere

Notes: This was my contribution to "Remix...Redux IV: I Know What You Did Last Remix". I remixed the Amy Fortuna story "Just Quite How" which can be found here: http://amy.slashgirl.org.uk/archive/sw/justquitehow.html. Amy and I ended up remixing each other's stories!

I feel how intently he watches me. On his instruction I bumble my way through a saber dance far more difficult than any I've attempted before. I try to turn each of his verbal commands into action at the speed of thought. And I fail. I don't need to hear his criticism to know I wasn't up to the task – surely my flushed face and ragged breath say it as much as my clumsy motions. Yet Master Jinn sharply recounts each error just the same.

I know I often fail to focus in the moment, thereby failing to make my body the perfect reflection of my intent. I stand respectfully before my new Master as he opines on the possible reasons for this.

Surely he won't be my Master for long, if I continue to fail in his eyes. What does he see in me? I am so exhausted I'm surprised I can stand. I hear his words in a slur, until a large hand firmly grips my shoulder and I startle and look up to see his blue eyes bore into me.

"I will train you until you react to the Force perfectly."

My heart soars. If Qui-Gon Jinn says I will be trained, will be a Jedi, then it must be so.

I cling to Qui-Gon's belief in me over the years, when my own mind brings doubt. As I grow, we seem to grow together. He becomes my friend as well as my mentor. I do more than learn to adapt the most difficult saber dance to any situation; I learn to be his partner.

As he trusts me with more, so I come to trust myself, and my instincts. I even trust my connection with the Force, as different as it is from his. Self-confidence builds on the foundation of this trust, and I find myself questioning my Master.

He always encouraged me to be critical in my thinking, but I don't know how he'll feel if I turn the analytical method on him. His summary report of our mission to Heldor IV leaves out important points of view in my opinion, and I tell him so. And wait in apprehension.

Ah, I know do know how he feels. The slightest upturn of his lips and the flash in his eyes tell me Qui-Gon welcomes the challenge.

Does he know what these moments mean to me? I am greedy as a Jedi should not be. I want more than his affection, his teaching, his attention. I want him.

I desperately hope he does not know. How disappointed he would be if he thought I had a crush on him.

How inappropriate it is that what I feel is love, not passing infatuation?

I hold his dying body and cannot stop myself from weeping. There is a mission to complete, and still I press my face to his and rock him. My cheek burns where he touched me.

I cry for lost opportunity. So beholden was I to propriety that I never kissed him. Never touched him like I wanted and now I'll never know how he would have reacted. In this instant I realize I am doomed to dream forever of scenarios where I told him how I felt. I'll never know. Never.

Is it proper, in the midst of so much suffering and tragedy, to hope? For I have hope, alone in the desert wastes. The Force fills me with hope for Luke and his future, and Master Yoda gave me hope that I might yet be able to say what I need to Qui-Gon.

I only now realize that my own heart was as wasted as the sand and stones around me for many years after his death.

This morning I settle into deep meditation once again. Mastering the path that Yoda set me upon before his exile has proven far more difficult than mastering any saber dance. I empty my mind and sink deeply into the Force, past the currents of time and chance and into its very core. I seek a place where I am both living and timeless, and since I'll likely never see Yoda again, I can admit to myself that the sensation is frightening.

Then I feel a large hand firmly grip my shoulder and I startle and look up to see blue eyes boring into me.

"Qui-Gon," I murmur.

I open my mouth to blurt out my love for him, before this second chance is gone. Then I realize there is no need for words. He knows. He knew the second he became part of the Force. He draws me close, and then we are kissing. He knew just how much I needed him, and now I know how very much he needed me.

And I also know that there truly is no death, there is only the Force, and the force of our love.

End.