A short story is below the cut, belatedly for the Obi-Wan and Satine ship week prompt "first meetings".
The beginning of this story has been in draft form for literally years because I didn't want to commit to a scenario for their initial meeting. Still not sure about committing, but here's a version of it anyway (~2300 words):
Obi-Wan Kenobi was gifted with foresight, and when he first locked eyes with Satine Kryze, the Force sang with a resonance that startled him.
For good or ill, this woman would become Important to him.
. . .
The girl in the cell was asleep.
He checked the number again to confirm that it was the right cell, but there wasn’t much cause for uncertainty. The other prisoners were loud in the Force, angry, frightened, exhausted, but they were all full of hate and craving violence and retribution against their captors.
Except Her.
Sliding the stolen key card through the reader on the door, he held his breath.
The door didn’t click open. They must’ve changed her security level since the card had been obtained by the New Mandalorian spies. He slid the card back into his belt pouch and then examined the locking mechanism. It was primitive, just an electronically controlled bolt holding the door shut, and fortunately it didn’t seem to be rigged with an alarm. He supposed the cell block surveillance seemed adequate enough to her captors.
He sliced the reader off the door and severed the bolt with such delicacy and finesse that it didn’t even wake the girl inside.
She was wearing a thin white shift and her feet were bare. Bearing in mind the bitter howling wind and biting cold outside the compound, he quietly unbelted his tunics, shrugging out of the tabard and the outer one before he woke her – having one’s cell invaded by someone who immediately started removing his clothes would give the wrong impression entirely. He tightened his belt over his undertunic and rolled up the tunic and tabard into a bundle before reaching out to lightly touch her shoulder.
“Duchess. My lady.”
She opened her eyes, sky blue fringed by the flutter of dark gold lashes.
Obi-Wan Kenobi was gifted with foresight, and when he first locked eyes with Satine Kryze, the Force sang with a resonance that startled him.
For good or ill, this woman would become Important to him.
“Don’t touch me,” she snarled in Mando’a, imperious, drawing him away from the gossamer strands of cosmic brilliance weaving the future and back to the moment.
He pulled his hand back quickly.
“Duchess Kryze, I’ve been sent by the Galactic Senate at the behest of the New Mandalorians to bring you to safety and protect you.”
She sat up quickly, blinking at him.
“This cell is being monitored,” she warned him, her voice a little hoarse, but with a light Core accent that surprised him.
“We’ve looped the feed,” he reassured her, handing her the tunic.
With a quick jerk, he tore the tabard into two pieces and then searched for a loose thread to unravel.
“Who’s the other part of we, and what are you doing?”
“My Master, and let me see your foot, please.”
She lifted her right foot from the floor and extended it towards him slightly. He twined the torn tabard around it, tucking in the end and tying it off with the thread to make a primitive boot.
“You’re a Jedi,” she observed.
“It’s cold out there,” he prompted, gesturing at the tunic in her hands.
“It’s cold in here.” She put it on as he wrapped up her other foot.
That done, he stood, offering her his hand.
She took it, her thin fingers cold against his skin.
“How do I know you are who you say?” she asked, narrowing her eyes at him.
He turned slightly and pushed the door open with the Force.
“Satisfied?”
Her eyes widened.
“All right, Master Jedi.”
Her hand clasped in his, he lead her through the corridors to the entry point, blacked out in the sensor net thanks to Qui-Gon’s skillful sabotage. A few saber cuts to a ventilation duct had opened it the outside.
The Duchess’s already pale face turned ashen as she peered down the snow-swept cliff face.
“Haven’t you got repulsors or ropes or anything?” she asked faintly.
“It’s not as far as it looks. I’ll go first. You jump after me, and I’ll catch you.”
She looked at him as if he was out of his mind, and he tried to smile reassuringly.
“Not many other options, I’m afraid.”
She muttered something under her breath in Mando’a that might’ve been a prayer or a curse. “Go on.”
“On the count of 10, follow me.”
Feet hitting the packed snow with a crunch, he turned to peer up through the haze of blowing snow to wait for the Duchess. Above him, she took a deep breath and then stepped out into the air.
He slowed her descent with the Force, and the sight of her, all clad in white and eerily floating downward through the snow, was something otherworldly.
He reached for her, she settled lightly in his arms, and for a long moment he forgot to breathe.
“I can walk,” she protested, eventually.
“In the snow?” he asked, indicating her makeshift footwear with a jerk of his head.
“Where are we going?”
“It’s not far, but… why don’t you get on my back?”
“All right,” she assented, nodding.
He set her on her feet briefly, and she let out a strangled gasp as the snow rapidly melted through the layers of the tabards, and scrambled up onto his back quickly, her arms closing firmly around his neck as he hitched his arms under her knees.
“Ready?”
“I probably won’t fall off,” she said dubiously.
The wind cut through the thin layer of his undertunic, though his back was warm with the Duchess’s slender body pressed against it. He could feel her shivering hard.
“No much further, my lady,” he reassured her again, keeping his footing over the uneven ground.
“It had better be ‘Satine’ when I’ve got my legs wrapped around you, Master Jedi,” she said dryly.
He let out a quick gasp of surprised laughter at her unexpected innuendo, his breath a white fog.
“I’m sorry,” she said quickly. “Did I offend you?”
“No,” he denied. “Embarrassed, yes,” he admitted, “but not offended. Satine,” he ventured to add, savoring the shape of her name in his mouth.
“And what should I call you in these intimate circumstances that we find ourselves?” she asked.
“Obi-Wan Kenobi,” he told her. “In any circumstances you like.”
“Obi-Wan,” she repeated as well. “You must understand, reacting to stress with inappropriate humor is a time-honored Mandalorian tradition. One of the few I embrace. Unlike hating Jedi, which I’ve decided to forgo.”
“Is that a recent decision?”
“Actually, no. Though, if I was still on the fence, your heroics would have been fairly convincing.”
“A generous assessment.”
“Now you are offended.”
“No,” he denied, laughing softly.
“Well it sounded ungrateful of me, which I didn’t mean to be. It’s just that another Mandalorian tradition is a high threshold for dramatics.”
“Which you have not decided to forgo?”
“Guilty,” she confirmed. “Though I’m not sure if that’s a decision or a personality trait.”
“I have a feeling that there’s drama to come,” he predicted.
“You’re probably right. But I hope I have a moment to catch my breath and dress a bit more appropriately first.”
“What is the proper wardrobe for it?”
“Beskar, I suppose. But I’ve forgone that too. Decidedly not my current attire.”
“It’s not unbecoming, though.” It was out of his mouth before he thought better of it. At the very least, it seemed mild in light of the Duchess’s earlier suggestive comment.
“Small comfort. Though I do appreciate your efforts towards my comfort. Your tunic is warmer that it looks.”
“My boots wouldn’t fit you well, unfortunately.”
“And we wouldn’t make quite as good time if I was carrying you,” she admitted.
“Do let me know if you want a turn,” he teased.
“Perhaps another time,” she demurred. “You keep saying there isn’t far to go.”
“Just there,” he said, indicating, with a jerk of his head, a small stand of pine trees with a trail of footprints through the snow leading towards it.
“I don’t even know what planet we’re on. Is it Krownest?”
“It is,” he confirmed, nodding.
“Suspected as much,” she concluded glumly. “They cook with a lot of pinenuts here, and all the prison food had a certain resiny flavor.”
As they made their way through the trees, joining up with the trail he left in the snow on his way out, the small ship came into view.
“Tell me it has ray shielding and hyperdrive.”
He nodded. “No weapons though, I’m afraid.”
“I’m not. I’m glad.”
“They said you were a pacifist. But I…”
“… didn’t quite believe them,” she finished, sounding tired.
“I believe it now,” he assured her.
“Because I’m pleased your ship doesn’t have weapons?”
“No. In the prison, you just… felt different than the others.”
“Were you reading my mind?” she challenged.
“No. It’s just a passive perception. I couldn’t very well miss the serenity you radiate any more than I could fail to notice your golden hair.”
“You could close your eyes,” she suggested.
“During a prison break?”
“Point taken, Master Jedi,” she conceded.
“I thought we’d agreed on given names.”
“Obi. Obi-Wan,” she corrected herself.
“The latter, please.”
The ship’s loading ramp began to lower, and not a moment too soon. The roar of the ship’s engines cycling to life was accompanied by the higher pitched whine of a jet pack engine and the chirp of a blaster carbine. A warning shot into the trees left a smoldering branch near Obi-Wan’s shoulder. Someone had followed them from the prison compound.
“Blast,” he said, with feeling, sprinting the rest of the way towards the shuttle.
“She didn’t have to miss,” Satine warned, clearly having caught sight of their pursuer. “Her clan doesn’t want me dead, currently, and she can’t get a clear shot at you yet.”
His boots hit durasteel, vibrating with the hum of the engines, and he deposited Satine at the top of the ramp, reaching for his saber and turning to look for the airborne Mandalorian warrior.
“Please don’t kill her,” she said, putting her hand on his arm.
“I won’t,” he reassured her, hoping he could manage to be true to his word. He’d never fought a Mandalorian before, but he’d studied their fighting styles and tactics to prepare for the mission; he fully expected his opponent to be utterly relentless. “Get into the ship,” he ordered, and she did as bidden.
He could sense the warrior lurking, ready to spring on her prey, and he engaged his saber and walked back down the ramp to draw her out.
It worked; she barreled in, carbines blazing. He deflected her shots and then reached out with the Force to open the fuel valve on her jet pack. The emergency shut-off deactivated the pack as the fuel emptied, wetting down her leg and splattering on the ramp. Even as she started to fall, he knocked her out the air with a kick, boot connecting with the beskar breastplate. She hit the ramp, winded. He snatched the blasters from her grasp with the Force, tossing them out into the snow.
“This is none of your concern, Jedi,” she snarled at him, hitting the d with the sharp sound characteristic of Mando’a. “The Republic has no business meddling in Mandalorian succession.”
“A great many Mandalorians think otherwise,” he told her gravely.
“Then they’re no Mandalorians,” she spat, pulling a vibroblade from its gauntlet sheath and getting to her feet.
“Don’t be foolish,” he chided. With a delicate flick of his lightsaber, he severed the vibroblade from its handle. His lightsaber blade bounced off her beskar gauntlet, leaving her unharmed. “I recommend a tactical retreat.”
Infuriated, she threw the hilt of the knife at him and then reached for her boot as he dodged it. “Only one of us walks away from this, Jedi,” she vowed.
He readied his blade to deflect a shot from the holdout blaster, but a stun blast hit his opponent first. She crumpled with a clank of beskar on durasteel.
Obi-Wan turned to see Satine drop a blaster, her hands shaking.
“Appreciated. I didn’t expect her to be so…”
“Stupid?” Satine supplied. “You’d be surprised.”
She leaned to grip the unconscious warrior under the arms and haul her out into the snow. Obi-Wan disengaged his saber and helped, picking up the warrior’s booted feet. As they left her in the snow, Satine yanked the helmet from her head, revealing a great deal of glossy black hair and a startlingly young face; she couldn’t be more than sixteen. Satine tossed the helmet into the trees as hard as she could.
“Live to be a little wiser,” she said, almost like a benediction.
Obi-Wan realized Satine was standing in the snow, and her toes emerging from the fabric wrapping were red.
“Get on my back again,” he offered.
She complied without comment, and her arms around his neck were trembling.
“You ought to have stayed on the ship,” he scolded. “I wasn’t in any danger.”
“She was,” she countered.
“I wouldn’t have killed her,” he promised.
“She was going to make that damned difficult for you. They all will,” she added, sounding utterly exhausted.
Rather than put her down on the ramp, he carried her into the small galley. She collapsed onto the bench, and he pulled an emergency thermal blanket from the cabinet of first aid supplies. She draped it around herself, a silvery shroud, and he knelt at her feet, carefully unwrapping the soaked remnants of his ruined tabard and checking her toes for signs of frostbite. Fortunately, they hadn’t been out in the snow that long, but they were red still, and cold against his palms. He chafed them between his hands.
“Try to get warm,” he instructed. “I’m going to tell Qui-Gon to take off.”
“Your master?” she asked.
He nodded. “I’ll be back in a moment.”
Before he could stand, she leaned forward, placing her cold fingers lightly on his cheek. “Thank you,” she said, earnest.
“Of course, my –“ he caught himself mid-honorific and changed his mind, swallowing lady and calling her by her name instead. “Satine.” Belatedly, he heard what he’d accidentally said.
My Satine.
He pressed his lips together and felt his face flush hot.
She smiled though, an affectionate, understanding smile, and he forgot to breathe again.
It was the first time he’d seen her smile, and it felt like stepping into midday sun after a long time in the dark.
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