"I have to go to the bathroom."
"Wait, you should, young Skywalker. Not done grieving, is your new Master."
"But I really need to go. Bad."
"Two bathrooms there are, young Skywalker. No more, no less. And Yoda and I have first claim."
Obi-Wan stood in front of the flames, watching as the last licks of fire burned down into embers. His Master had left him with a squeaky little apprentice and a senile green Jedi Master. There was no reason to continue on.
"I will not condone a course of action that will lead to my waiting in line for the bathroom."
"You can't go to that bathroom, highness! It's controled by the hutts. The Hutts are gangsters!"
"Both bathrooms present significant danger . . . to us all . . ."
Obi-Wan stood in front of the flames, watching as the last licks of fire burned down into embers. He had lost his Master to a queen who had a crush on a nine-year old. If this was the state of the galaxy, he didn't want to be a part of it.
Sighing, Obi-Wan turned away from the pyre. It mattered little what he thought. He was a Jedi, and would honor the Jedi ways, like his Master before him. No matter that there seemed to be nothing to live for--
He was a Jedi. That was enough.
Applause startled him.
"Confer upon you the rank of Jedi Knight, the Council does."
Obi-Wan's eyes popped open and he jumped to his feet, gaze darting frantically around the council room.
"Whaa--"
"You have passed your Trials, young Kenobi," Mace Windu said with a smile. "I must say I am very impressed. Most people don't even get off of Tatooine without smacking the Skywalker kid aside the head--and you are the first Padawan in living history not to at least /try/ to leave Jar Jar Binks behind somewhere."
"Remember I do, when your own Master the Trials did take," Yoda said wryly, shaking his head. "Sold Jar-Jar to the Hutts, he did."
"But I thought--" Obi-Wan shook his head, rubbing a hand through his hair. "That was all a trial?"
"The same trial everyone takes, Jedi Kenobi," Mace said kindly. "We were all very impressed by your restraint, especially in the matter of the Queen."
"The Queen?" Obi-Wan asked, confused. Mace blushed, looking at the cealing as Yoda cackled.
"Tried to seduce the Queen, Windu did. Bad form, it was. Nearly failed him, we did."
"Then--I passed?"
"Passed you have," Yoda said, thumping his stick on the ground. "With honors, you passed."
"And without trying to kill the pipsqueak once," Adi said softly. "I must say that I am in awe of you."
"He gets it from me," a quiet voice said from the corner, and Obi-Wan spun gratefully towards the familiar sound.
Standing in the corner, healthy and fit, was Qui-Gon Jinn. Not dead. Not burned.
Alive.
"Not so, Padawan," Yoda cackled from the corner. "Tried to toss Skywalker out the airlock, you did."
"And the orgy with the handmaidens . . ." Ki-Adi Mundi added with a wide grin.
"And selling Jar-Jar to Jabba," Depa chimed in brightly.
"And you think what /I/ did to the Queen was bad," Mace said darkly.
Qui-Gon blushed. "She liked me," he replied brightly. Holding out a hand to Obi-Wan, he bowed to the Council. "Are we dismissed?"
"Dismissed you are, Knight Kenobi, Master Jinn."
As the door whisked shut behind them, Obi-Wan spun to face his former Master.
"The /Queen/?" he sputtered. "Master, she was fourteen!"
"I was younger then . . ." Qui-Gon said with a faint smile.
"The handmaidens?"
"Don't ask," Qui-Gon said with a slightly haunted look. "Let us just say that it is a good thing the Trials are just a vision. I wouldn't have been able to walk for days."
Shaking his head, the newly Knighted Kenobi followed his Master down the hallway.