Fandom Island Counseling Services and Psychiatry, Monday

[sharp_as_knives]

Vacation had been lovely, but Hannibal was pleased to be back at home, too. His patients seemed glad to see him, too. Some of them far too enthusiastically. He'd blame it on the island, but some people seemed to just be like that. And there hadn't even been any invasions while he'd been gone!

Nevertheless, he was in his office, seeing people, working on another set of wedding invitations, and open to working in friends or colleagues who might want to see him.


[Open post; the doctor is in! No OCD.]

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[sharp_as_knives]

"Fears set when you're a child can be very difficult to overcome, even when they aren't rational," Hannibal said. "And from what you've told me, your fear is very real. I wonder if the Dean isn't so far removed from his past in your world that he has difficulty allowing for it. He seems to have a peculiar blindness toward it."

He shook his head. "But you didn't come here for me to analyze him, either."

Not that he wasn't happy to trash-talk the man.

[uncertain_dume]

And really, Kanan would be quite happy to spend all day doing the same. It was something to focus on that wasn't himself. But here he was, and that wasn't what he'd come here for, entirely.

"I suppose not," he sighed. "Though it's reassuring to know that wanting to get distance from a situation that might very well come back to kill me isn't childish, however cowardly it might ultimately be instead."

Oh yeah, Kanan had issues a mile deep.

[sharp_as_knives]

"Neither childish nor cowardly, I should think," Hannibal said. "But rather, eminently sensible."

[uncertain_dume]

"You know, not many people ever really call me sensible, Doctor," Kanan mused. "Part of me feels like I should get that in writing. I don't think anybody would believe it."

[sharp_as_knives]

"Well, I make no claims as to your general sensibility," Hannibal pointed out, "only to the validity of this decision."

[uncertain_dume]

"Well, since that's the decision I'm currently having trouble with, I'd still take it," Kanan decided. "I shouldn't be having trouble with it at all. Keeping on the move hasn't exactly played a small part in my still being alive today."

[sharp_as_knives]

"What is it, then, that is giving you the trouble?" Hannibal asked. "Why is the decision any more difficult than usual?"

[uncertain_dume]

Kanan sighed. Admitting this was paining him, clearly.

"Because usually, it's just me," he said. "I've turned around and walked away from a lot of situations because I've come too close to being found out, or because I saw an opportunity that would serve me better elsewhere, or, hell, just because I got bored. But there was never somebody else in the situation, or if there was, my leaving could only stand to benefit them. There sure as hell weren't students, or other Jedi."

Or students who were other Jedi.

[sharp_as_knives]

"Caring makes mobility difficult. Which do you prefer?" Hannibal asked.

[uncertain_dume]

"What, given the choice between caring or not? I'll take the one that isn't likely to get me killed," Kanan sighed. "Or, normally I would. Jedi aren't supposed to get wrapped up in connections with other people anyway. Not that I'm exactly a Jedi."

Not that he'd ever made it that far.

"It's made things simpler up until this point."

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal raised an eyebrow at Kanan. "Controlled emotions, lack of interpersonal relationships, and a militant upbringing - your Jedi would seem to have been training you all very well, if their object was to raise an entire cadre of sociopaths."

[uncertain_dume]

So help him, Kanan actually barked out a bit of a startled laugh at that.

"You suppose so?" Well. Didn't that explain so much about certain Jedi that Kanan currently wanted to strangle? "I strike you as a sociopath, then, do I?"

[sharp_as_knives]

"Not at all," Hannibal said. "But then, you've admitted to thinking yourself a very poor Jedi." He shook his head. "I don't know to what extent any of those I've met are examplars of what would be a good one; I am only making an observation. Human beings - I can't speak for other species - are social, emotional creatures. Demanding they cut off significant relationships and brutally control those emotions can lead to any number of psychological problems, and an increased propensity for psychopathology."

[uncertain_dume]

"Skywalker... isn't the greatest example," Kanan noted, shrugging his shoulders. "And I'm not mostly because I never really got to become one. I think you would have liked my master, though. She understood that it was important to feel emotions, to even feel them deeply, but it was also important to not let those emotions rule us. Acting out of fear and anger without thought to temper them... that was the danger."

Kanan hadn't really managed to get a handle on that one himself yet, mind.

[sharp_as_knives]

"I think that sounds much better, yes." Hannibal smiled. "I should have liked to meet her."

[uncertain_dume]

Oh, Master Billaba would have had a heyday with you, Hannibal.

"I wish she was around for you to meet," Kanan sighed. "Too bad that isn't the way things fell out."

Well, around here...

[sharp_as_knives]

To be fair, Hannibal might have had a lot of fun with her, too.

"Unfortunate," Hannibal agreed. "Though subject to the island's whims, I may yet have the opportunity. Were there other Jedi who believed as she did, rather than advocating for cutting yourself off from humanity?"

[uncertain_dume]

"We didn't really cut ourselves off from other people completely," Kanan replied, though he sounded a touch distracted. "I mean, we were family, to each other. And some of the friendships we forged during the war were as strong as any that people outside the Order have. Hell, my dog is named after an old friend..."

He frowned, and then sucked it up and finally backtracked.

"Sorry, the idea that my Master might end up on the island..."

[sharp_as_knives]

So, less an order of sociopaths, and more a cult, then.

Thank you, George Lucas.

Hannibal nodded. "There is always, of course, the possibility that another version of her could come here. But the island has also, on occasion, brought back the dead for a weekend. Nobody has told you about that yet?"

[uncertain_dume]

... Basically a cult, yes.

Kanan, meanwhile, looked like he'd been winded.

"No," he managed, after a long pause. "No, nobody's told me about that one, yet."

Excuse him. He was feeling a bit faint.

[sharp_as_knives]

"I've experienced it only once so far myself," Hannibal said, "but Jono, I know, has seen it at least twice, with different people each time."

[uncertain_dume]

"So, something else to brace myself for," Kanan sighed, shaking his head. "Maybe I'll luck out and it'll happen when I'm a teen again, so I won't realize how excruciatingly karked-up the whole situation is."

Be careful what you wish for, Jarrus.

"Master Billaba was easily one of the strongest influence I've had in my life, but I'm not certain I could handle meeting her again."

For so, so many reasons. Many of them involving shame.

[sharp_as_knives]

"Why is that?" Hannibal asked. "Wouldn't you be pleased to see her?"

He had a feeling that wasn't the problem, no.

[uncertain_dume]

Kanan made a quiet huffing noise that wasn't quite a laugh. It was trying, sure, but... it was a swing and a miss.

"Of course I would," he replied. "That doesn't mean meeting her again would be any less complicated for it. I had to make a lot of compromises to survive this long. Not all of them are ones to be proud of."

[sharp_as_knives]

"Would you have survived without these compromises?" Hannibal asked.