Saga Bless the Child (AU, Qui-Gon, Anakin, usual suspects, OCs) AUTHOR'S NOTE 1/23/06

Bless the Child
By BrightFeather

Disclaimer: If you think they're mine, you're sadly mistaken. I borrowed them, hugged them, squeezed them, called them George, then gave them back like a good girl. All things Star Wars belong to George Lucas.

Author's Note: This is definitely an AU. My brother and I were having a Star Wars marathon, and I started wondering if things would have turned out differently had Qui-Gon lived and been Anakin's Master? So this is my attempt to find out.

Warning: I'm circumventing canon here. TPM happened? mostly. Almost everything afterwards is up in the air. Oh, yes, and Waqkemé Noori is Ophelia's, but she kindly let me borrow her. Waqkemé's stories are The First Four Days by Ophelia, and she's also found in DarthIshtar's Wayward Beings. I'll be posting every other week.

~*~*~*~

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Prologue:
Rewind
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"You travel back along the line of time and you don't find the past, but another world, another bracket of consciousness. The earth would be the same, you see, or almost the same. Same trees, same rivers, same hills, but it wouldn't be the world we know. Because it has lived a different life, it has developed differently. The second back of us is not the second back of us at all, but another second, a totally separate sector of time. We live in the same second all the time. We move along within the bracket of that second, that tiny bit of time that has been allotted to our particular world."
--Clifford D. Simak, "City" 1952

~*~*~*~

Night blanketed Theed in darkness. In the hastily cleaned Palace, the main players responsible for taking back Naboo slept the sleep of the just. Outside, the capitol still showed signs of both battles, but was not heavily damaged. After all, the Trade Federation had wanted the planet in one piece.

Extra security, however, had been assigned, and the planetary defense network was being upgraded to prevent another invasion. It had never before occurred to either the people or the ruling council that it would be needed; peace had reigned for so long that the thought of even needing defense was alien. But recent events had proven that supposition to be false; there was no reason to believe that the Trade Federation would leave them alone, so they were preparing for the eventuality.

Now was the time for resting, restoration, and recuperation. The dead had only just been laid to rest with honor; the signs of the battle and the invading droid army, parts of which were strewn over Theed and the battleground, were still being cleared away. Tomorrow or even the next day would be soon enough to celebrate the expulsion of the invaders from their homeworld. It was to be a new age for Naboo--one of mutual cooperation between the Gungans and the Naboo people. Their battle had not been without losses, but the heroes of Naboo had triumphed.

Yoda, as a representative of the Jedi Council, had come and granted Qui-Gon's request to train eight-year-old Anakin Skywalker and confirmed Obi-Wan Kenobi's elevation to Knighthood. Tucked in their rooms at the palace, two Jedi and the little boy who, by accident or fate, had saved the planet, slept, waiting for the morning's celebration, and the ship that would take them back to Coruscant.

On the other side of the galaxy, a lone man examined his latest profit margins and smiled. It was a good time for business. His latest merchandise was much more promising than his past enterprises. They were young, healthy, and--best of all--there were no known relatives to complain to the authorities. His employees just had to be careful not to? glut the market. Too many missing would mean an investigation, which he couldn't afford. It had been expensive enough to obtain the neural implants to suppress the pesky? talents of his merchandise.

~*~*~*~

TBC...

 

What is it with bad guys and stealing Jedi kids, might I ask? You'd think after the first thousand attempts that they'd get the point that it DOESN'T WORK!!

 

It had been expensive enough to obtain the neural implants to suppress the pesky¡­ talents of his merchandise.

A and a nod will get you in. I'll be interested to see where you're leading us, BrightFeather.

 

Very good start. I really look forward to seeing where you are going to go with this. LOL on the usual suspects in your title. Keep those PMs coming!

 

Thank you for the PM, BrightFeather, this looks great. Keep it coming!

 

Yay! You posted!

Very very good story. *begs* Please, please (with a cherry on top) continue!

 

Ooh, interesting start! And none of our boys are dead! Hurrah!
Can't wait to see how this goes!

 

An interesting beginning. AUs where Qui-Gon lives always have the potential to be really good and interesting, in my book. I like what you've done so far. And the promise of Kemé showing up makes me happy!

 

Ooooho very interesting beginning you've got going on here! Please pm me when you update this!

 

Wow! I was half-panicing over posting this....

Draconarius- Well, if you think about it, Force-sensitive or not, Temple kids would be a good target... well, if you discount the Jedi. No realitives to raise a fuss. They're kept healthy and well-fed. And if you put neural inhibitors in their heads to keep them from touching the Force when you don't want them to... Well, that makes the easy to control. And since when were petty crooks all that bright?

BrentusofGath-- Well, I had to have some kind of plot to hang all the rest from. This wants to be an epic. It wants to end up spanning years, with several different stories and plots...

dianethx-- Ma'am, yes ma'am! *snaps to attention and salutes* Okay, I've hung out with JAGaholics for too long... Seriously though, we should be spending some time at the Temple, so we'll run into lots of canon and non-canon characters. The "usual suspects" seemed to be a good way to go... especially since I'm thinking of this spanning years.

Zonoma-- Yes, my Master.

DaenaBenjen42-- I'll be posting once a week. So stay tuned next Monday for chapter one.

Stella_Ripple-- What I really hated about TPM is that they killed Qui-Gon. I've always hated that. He was too cool to die...

solojones-- Woohoo! Another Kemé fan. I thought that she'd come in useful. Ophelia has been reading this--I wanted her to see what I'm doing with Kemé.

Layren-- Yes'm. You're added to my list.

Thanks, y'all for the response. I do have a little cushion, so weekly updates are definately in the future... and chapters will be longer than the prologue, I promise.

BrightFeather

 

Very interested in seeing where this one goes. I've never read a Qui-Gon lives story before, but I'll read this one

 

Thank you, iLoveAnakin7! Qui-Gon is my favorite Jedi, so....

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Chapter 1:
Beginnings
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"Every phrase and every sentence is an end and a beginning,
Every poem an epitaph. And any action
Is a step to the block, to the fire, down the sea's throat
Or to an intelligible stone: and that is where we start."
--T. S. Eliot, from "Four Quartets: Little Gidding"

~*~*~*~

Qui-Gon Jinn sat up in bed, instantly awake. Something was wrong; he could feel it. He closed his eyes briefly and, with a moments thought, traced it. Anakin. He pushed the blankets back and slipped out of the soft bed. Silently, he left the room and padded quickly down the hallway to the room that the Queen's handmaidens had assigned to the child.

He hurried inside and over to the side of Anakin's bed. "No, NOOOOO," Ani cried, still asleep.

"Ani," Qui-Gon said softly. He ducked as an ornament flew at him. The child thrashed around in the bed, kicking the covers off in the throes of his nightmare. He laid his hand on Anakin's shoulder and tried to soothe away the nightmare, but it only seemed to intensify it. More objects began to levitate and fly around the room, smashing into walls.

He sat down and put both hands on the boy's shoulders. "Wake up, Anakin," he said.

Anakin stirred restlessly as the door opened again. Qui-Gon sighed. The ruckus must've woken Obi-Wan--usually his padawan could sleep through almost anything. "I won't, I WON'T," Anakin said.

"What's the matter?" Obi-Wan asked with a yawn.

Qui-Gon barely spared him a glance. "Nightmare," he said. "Anakin, it's all right. Wake up."

Obi-Wan ducked. "I see," he said with a wince as something breakable collided with the wall near his head.

"Go back to bed," Qui-Gon said softly. "I'll take care of this."

"Yes, Master," Obi-Wan murmured, then left the room.

Qui-Gon caught a little jealousy coming from his apprentice, but shunted it away to deal with later. Little Anakin needed him at the moment. "Ani," he called again, "wake up." He smoothed some tousled blond hair away from the boy's face.

"NOOOOOOOOOO!" Anakin screamed, then sat straight up, eyes flying open and breathing hard.

"You're safe, Ani," Qui-Gon said softly, still trying to soothe the boy.

Items crashed to the floor, startling Anakin. He jumped slightly and began to look around frantically. "Qui-Gon, sir," he choked, then threw himself at the Jedi and buried his face in Qui-Gon's shirt. Ani's shoulders shook, and Qui-Gon could feel the tears as they soaked into his sleep clothing.

What really disturbed him was the fact that the child cried soundlessly. It was as if crying was something that he could be punished for. He rubbed Anakin's back gently. "It's all right , Ani," he murmured.

After a few minutes, Anakin pulled back. "I'm not a baby," he muttered, wiping his eyes. "Only babies cry."

"No, you're not," Qui-Gon agreed mildly. "But you just had a nightmare that scared you; it's only natural to be upset." He hugged the child. "Sometimes, it helps to talk about scary dreams, Ani. And sometimes, among the Jedi, nightmares aren't always just dreams."

Anakin leaned back against him. "They're not?"

"Sometimes," he said. "Sometimes, they're just dreams, but sometimes, they're more. Sometimes, Ani, they come true."

Anakin tightened his grip on the master Jedi. "Don't go away," he begged softly. "Don't die."

"Is that what you saw?" he asked softly.

Anakin nodded. "You an' Obi-Wan were fighting that guy with the red and black tattoos, and horns on his head, and he killed you. And, and, and, then, I was older, and Mom got killed by Raiders, and I went and killed all of them." The child started trembling. "And then I did something real bad and killed lots of people."

Acting out of instinct, Qui-Gon rocked him the way he would a baby from the crèche. "Shh, Ani, it's all right," he murmured. "I'm still here and I promise that you won't be left alone

 

UP! Don't want the new chappie to get lost...

 

I like the start, i'm one of the few who tought it would have been better that qui-gon was anakin's master.
I didn't like the negative attitude of obi-wan towards anakin in episode1.
I saw them more as brothers when in fact that anakin needed a solid father figure, wich in the end became palpatine.

seey

 

I just discovered your story today, and only one word can describe how I feel.

Hooked.

Add a line and sinker if you wish.

I love to read stries were Qui-Gon lives to become Anakin's master. And what's even better is that Obi-Wan didn't die.

If you've got a PM list, please add me. Can't wait to read more.

 

I liked the setup with the nightmare and Anakin's unconscious self sending things everywhere. Qui-Gon would do well to pay attention to Ani's dreams. I think that Qui really needs to tell Obi-Wan how he feels. I don't think that Obi realizes that Qui-Gon is telling the truth about him being ready or that Qui loves him like a son...

Good job. Looking forward to more.

 

Ooh nice job! I love how good Qui Gon is with Ani, but I'm not convinced everything is cleared up between Obi and Qui. Oh, the possibilities of this...did i hear evil plot?! *rubs hand gleefully* Can't wait!

 

Glad y'all liked it!
BrightFeather

 

"I don't want to be bad." Ani rubbed his face with his sleeve.

"You're not bad," he said softly. "You never were. I think what you saw was a possible future and a possible past. I didn't die, Ani and your choices determine your future."

If only he had felt that way in canon, things would be waaaay better now but we love him anyway!

Qui Gon Jinn is alive!! and poor Obi is jealous!! I'll take care of him for you if you want me too!

 

"Not all mush"

Stellar!

Other than the oatmeal-like mushiness, this is starting out to be a good story. Keep up the good work!

And, can you PM me with a link when you update?

 

Awwww! Very very good!

Love it!

Good posty. Continue, please.

 

AWWW I love the mush
Qui-Gon would have made a GREAT father to little Ani...and Ani sooo cute!!

I guess Obi-Wan is the black sheep of the Jedi family

And I hope Shmi gets freed. I always knew if Qui-Gon lived he would have done something!!!!

Best Jedi EVER!

 

Update, of course, will be next Monday...

Yes'm.

More next week...

 

Oops, wrong bookmark.