Chapter Text
Clarity is a complex thing, Obi-Wan discovered. It wasn’t so much a singular moment in which one has an epiphany, a clearing away of the clouds of bias or ignorance that makes way for luminous understanding. Yoda had always spoken of clarity like something to be achieved. It was the end goal of meditation and communing with the force. He learned that that view was not quite the whole truth.
Clarity, instead, was a process of seeing the galaxy and the events therein from new angles continuously until you realize that you have never and will never understand every facet of what you’re aiming to comprehend. It’s like holding an ever shifting kaleidoscope, layers upon layers of choices and influences and accidents that spin a web that sentients call life. When he was alive, he’d had many perceptions about the events of his life. To him, there were several key, fundamental facts that could not be denied. Facts such as: the Jedi were pillars of good in the galaxy, revenge was never the right answer, and that he had made a series of terrible decisions in his life that had led him to an existence epitomized by infinite sorrow. He had been an unwanted padawan, rejected over and over again for being too angry, too impulsive, too emotional, and too disobedient for anyone to take on or keep. He’d failed his Master, he’d failed Ahsoka, he’d failed the clones, he’d failed the Jedi Order. If there was one thing he’d done right, it was in his final act of sacrificing himself for the twins. He’d been at peace with the prospect of dying. He’d fallen with grace, and an apology on his lips towards the one he’d failed most.
The Force, it seemed, was not as sanguine about his death. He’d known the lightness of the Force in his youth, had felt it wrap itself around him in welcome and promise him great things to come. It had not promised good things, he reflected later, but great things. Momentous events of which he would be part. It had grown dimmer as he aged, so slowly at first that he hardly noticed the difference. It spoke to him less, guided him with less insistence. He’d attributed the change to maturity, and trauma, and had dismissed any niggling concern he had for the quieting of the companion he’d had since birth. Now, with his spirit detached from his mortal body, the Force felt far stronger than he’d ever known in life. Yet, still, there was a veil between himself and the true well of power that he knew the Force to be.
There are so many things to show you , the Force whispered to him. The words rang with something like regret, if the Force could feel such things, and pain. So many things to teach you, so many warnings unheard .
The Force had been shrouded, he realized. It had not distanced itself from him, or from the Jedi as a whole, but rather it had been subdued by some outside influence. His heart ached with the knowledge, but the Force soothed him with reassurances that surrounded him, overlapping like waves.
Change, it said, is inevitable. Yet not all change is welcome, even by an entity as neutral and removed as the Force. Balance , it emphasized, is its domain and balance has been lost. Some might say the fall of the Jedi and rise of the Sith was inevitable, as there is always a rise and fall throughout history in a never ending spiral. Fate, they would call it. Yet Fate as sentients perceive it is merely momentum, and the direction of momentum can always be altered. If the Force wished to spin a few gears of the great machine of entropy in a different direction for the sake of that balance, then that was its right. So, the Force wrapped Obi-Wan in its threads of gold and shadow and held him close as it gave him the gift of clarity.
At first, Obi-Wan was confused. Visions passed by him, filled with color and sound and emotion. The Force was showing him his own life, moment by moment. He’d already lived through all of this. Was this punishment for his inability to save anyone he’d meant to save? Except, these memories weren’t just his own. Each moment was broken down and dissected, the fragment of time expanded to show the decisions and events that lead to every occurrence in Obi-Wan’s life. Seconds expanded into years which folded down into days which scattered into shards of memory like mosaic tiles. Time did not exist in the Force the same way it did for living, sentient beings, so he could not say how long he lay cradled in memory. Long enough to understand several things, and to unravel his understanding of many others. Long enough to be guided through the path of grief into a realm that was not quite acceptance, but something with a sharper edge that reminded him of determination.
Good , whispered the Force. Remember.
Then, he knew nothing for a long time.