Listen, I love them both, and this fight is cruel. But it has to be Aayla. Quinlan is a feral gremlin who kidnapped a toddler, brought her to the temple, and taught her everything that he knows. But then Aayla learned everything from him and also learned from other people as well, surpassed him in skill, remained firmly lightside, and kept at least a façade of sanity. He breaks every rule in the book, lights the book on fire, and throws it off a cliff. Then, when she chooses to follow one or two rules, she is practically placed on a pedestal as the perfect Jedi because at least she is less of a headache than him.
Like yes, he survives 66 while she doesn't. But that's because she takes his lessons and paranoia and learns from them. In their specific circumstances, it would have been safer for her not to trust as freely, but she died because she loved. She dies because she loves and trusts her nation, her religion, and her troops. Through the war, even when she questions something about the Senate or about the Council's way of going about something, she trusts the ideals of the Republic and trusts the Jedi not only as her religion but as her family, and when and if those fail her she trusts Bly and their men to have her back. It doesn't even cross her mind that something could force them to betray her because she loves and trusts them so.
She's an absolute trainwreck, don't get me wrong, but her entire childhood and apprenticeship she was stuck with this nutcase, who was barely an adult himself when he took her as his Padawan, as the closest thing to both a father and older brother she ever had, and she somehow ended up a semi-functional adult. I think that says more about her own strength than his parenting and teaching styles because he is a MESS. Most Jedi Initiates look forward to getting a Master as someone who will teach and take care of them one on one. Aayla spent half the conversation where Quinlan informed her that he had been knighted and chosen her as his apprentice, wondering whether he was concussed or high this time, and still agreed to be raised by him. And that set the tone for everything about their relationship.
Who raised the other more? I'm not sure, but she was definitely the one with an eternal migrane at his every antic. They might be on barely speaking terms at times due to her just being SO done with his crap, but he's both her finder and her Master. As much as it often pains her, he is her deranged trash man, and she can't help but love him.
I love them both. They are both chaotic disasters whose lives and stories are so intertwined as to never fully be divisible. They both have stories and romances doomed by the narrative that wrench my heart every time. But she put up with his utter nonsense, stayed light, and hopeful, and trusting, and loving. And she deserves all the love and respect for that.
