Chapter Twenty-Five (Patreon)

They arrived at the temple seventy-three weeks after they’d left. Three hundred sixty-five days, just three short of an entire year. They left in a broken-down freighter. They returned in something just shy of a warship, escorted home by a group of Kaleesh warriors after both Ali’ya and Master Bulq decided to gift the Kaleesh the captured ship.

It was a small group that greeted them at the Jedi Temple. There were Master Bulq’s friends, Master Drallig and Knight Bondera (Master Dooku was off-world). There were Ali’ya’s friends and their masters; Padawan Paratus and Knight Edmor, Padawan Kirana and Archivist Joli, Padawan Ug’otor and Knight Koon, and finally Padawan Windu and Master T’ra Saa. Despite Kirana’s efforts it was Padawan Ug’otor who reached Ali’ya first, grasping her into the largest hug he could manage.

“I am glad you are safe,” he told her in the soft roars of Shyriiwook.

“As am I, my friend,” Ali’ya said, hiding her tears in his fur. “As am I.”

“You’re back!” Kirana exclaimed, leaping into their hug. Kazdan was only slightly more refined, using his small size and dexterity to slip into the embrace. “I was so worried for you! What happened?”

“I’m afraid we will need to debrief with the Council before telling you,” Master Bulq cut in gently. Ali’ya grimaced at the reminder, and slowly extricated herself from her friends’ embrace.

“Mace,” she smiled. “It’s good to see you.” The boy’s cool composure broke at once as he rushed to hug her.

“The Unifying Force is mean,” were the first words he said. “I saw so many shatterpoints of you. I’m glad they broke in your favor.”

Ali’ya smiled at that, bestowing the boy with a kiss on his forehead. Mace leapt back, wiping away at his skin.

“Master Saa,” Ali’ya greeted. “Master Drallig, Knight Bondera, Knight Koon, Archivist Joli. It is good to see you all well.”

“As it is you padawan,” Knight Koon said, his voice deepened by his respirator. “Though I am afraid we have not come solely to greet you. Master Tyvokka requested that we take you to the Council. After a visit to the Halls of Healing, of course.”

“Of course,” Master Bulq replied smoothly, only the spikes in his Force presence belying his irritation. “Lead on.”

Their presence in the Halls of Healing proved to be mercifully brief. Despite the best efforts of the Huk, Kalee was a verdant planet, bereft of ores and gems but plentiful in food and medicines. They had neither starved nor been weakened by disease despite the bombings of Khedive and the reality of war on the front lines--thanks entirely to the medical staff of Kalee and the farming and herding clans. They had new scars from blaster bolts and the Huk’s blade-arms (mostly Master Bulq) or from falling debris (mostly Ali’ya) but were otherwise unscathed. A bit thin, perhaps, and in dire need of respite, but overall physically well considering the circumstances.

The High Council was a different story.

*

Having missed an entire year of her education, Ali’ya was enrolled for the rare three-semester schedule at the Temple, taking at least eight classes each semester. While it meant she was grounded for the rest of the year (and probably longer) it meant she would be fully caught up.

Her first semester was, while not easy, simple. Her friends were there. Her mind-healers and psychiatrists worked hand-in-hand to ensure her well-being. Her Master, for all the unofficial censure of the High Council grated at him, was there for her as well. On A-block days she had Intro to Diplomacy, Huttese, Soresu, Pre-Healing (Biology), and a free block (taken up by therapy). On B-block days she attended Galactic History, Ryl lessons, Form V lightsaber combat, Mathematics, and Pre-Healing (Chemistry). It left little time for her outside of classes. Nonetheless she made an attempt to spend time with her friends. She sparred with Mace and Master T’ra Saa on Primeday. She visited the hangars with Kazdan on Centax Day. She spent Taungsday in the Archives with Kirana, learned Shyriiwook from Ug’otor on Zhellday and taught him Togorian on Bendusday. Between that she managed to cram in lessons in the Force, learning healing with the newly-chosen Padawan Vokara Che, meditating with her Master (and occasionally Mace and Master T’ra Saa, whose presence was undeniably calming), and learned more about the Force’s elemental properties from Knight Koon. It was a busy, hectic three months but compared to a warzone it was paradise.

Ug’otor and Knight Koon left before the second semester. She was sad to see him go, but she wished him well in their mission. She shuffled her schedule around, though she was only able to do so much as Master Rancissis commandeered her Zhellday evenings. Nominally he was meant to be teaching her about Battle Meditation, but every other sentence was about how she wasn’t supposed to be able to use it, how dangerous it was for the user, and how it would be best if she just forgot she had it. Ali’ya was familiar with the pain caused by Battle Meditation. She had lost hundreds of souls while guiding them, but to say she ought to simply ignore the ability, one that saved millions, felt like spitting on the deaths and lives of the Kaleesh. The lessons weren’t teaching her much about Battle Meditation, but they were teaching her how to hide her feelings from even the best of empaths.

The second semester was also when Ali’ya published her second novel, Winds of Change. Picking up four years after Sandstorm, the Winds of Change followed the tale of the teenage protagonist as he struggled to convince the slavers’ enemies--the enslaved and the Tuskens--that they could work together, despite millennia of conflict. It ended with the overthrow of the slavers, albeit at a high cost--the death of the protagonist’s father. It sold four hundred billion copies in the first week. Part of the sales were due to the Huttese translation. Ali’ya had finally reached fluency in the language, something that helped both her sales and her experience points as her perhaps longest-running quest (Language of the Underworld) granted her a thousand experience points.

Kazdan left halfway through the second semester, and while he did not return in time for the third, Ug’otor did. Unfortunately, by the third semester Master Bulq was deemed ready to return to his normal duties, and called away to negotiate a settlement on Denon.

“I should be going with you,” Ali’ya stated, using the Force to perfectly fold her master’s robes.

“You need more time,” her master replied.

“My mind healer--”

“Academically,” Master Bulq clarified.

“I’ve already caught up to my age group!” Ali’ya protested.

“Which will not remain the case if you come with me,” Master Bulq clarified. He sighed, putting down the bag of toiletries. “Ali’ya, it is a short trip. Only a month, perhaps.”

“Kalee wasn’t supposed to take a year either,” she pointed out, looking away. She was being petulant, she knew. She sighed, letting her anxiety wander off into the Force. “I will miss you,” she said, looking back.

“And I you,” Master Bulq said. “Hopefully it will not take long, simply another argument about the use of the Hydian Way and whether a customs pass from Brentaal IV allows them to bypass Denon.”

“It doesn’t.”

“I know that,” Master Bulq huffed. “You know that. The Senate knows it, and so do both planetary governments. Unfortunately the Trade Federation seems to be slow on the uptake.”

Ali’ya winced. “Be cautious Master,” she warned. “I have sense ill things from the Trade Federation, though I cannot tell how soon they will come to pass.”

“I will heed your warning,” Master Bulq agreed. “Though I doubt this particular instance is one of premeditated evil, there is always the  chance threat they will seek revenge for our role in taking down their Yam’rii allies.”

“All the more reason to be careful.”

“And so I shall be.”

With Master Bulq gone, Ali’ya was largely left to her own devices. She still spent most of her time with her friends--Primedays with Mace, Centaxdays learning from Ug'otor, Taungsdays with Kirana, Zhelldays (now that Master Rancisis deemed her sufficiently cowed) teaching Ug'otor (and increasingly Kirana, who had already learned Shyriiwook but wished to know Togorian as well), and Bendusdays with Vokara. She also (whenever she could, which was usually once or twice a week) talked with Master Tyvokka and Knight Koon about philosophy. She met both of them through Ug’otor, meeting Knight Koon shortly after he was taken as a padawan and meeting Master Tyvokka after Ug’otor invited her to a lineage dinner, citing her lack of a master and a lineage in the temple (Master Bulq’s master having died at the age of a hundred forty-eight before Ali’ya was taken as his apprentice). While the young Wookiee vastly preferred sparring and more practical lessons in the Living Force to the meandering debates over Jedi Philosophy, Ali’ya couldn’t help but be intrigued by Master Tyvokka and Knight Koon’s personal interpretations of the Jedi Code.

“The Code is not one of reality, but aspiration,” Master Tyvokka told her. “We experience emotion, yet as Jedi we must strive for peace. Emotions cloud our judgment. As Knights of the Republic we cannot allow our vision to be so blinded. We are similarly all ignorant of certain things, and must therefore strive to learn. Every Jedi, from the youngest crecheling to Masters Yoda and Fay, is a student, not only of the Force but of the Galaxy as well.”

“I have heard this argument many times,” Knight Koon smiled, invisible beneath his breather yet oh so obvious in the Force. “You have yet to convince me, for the last line of the Code disrupts your argument. There is no Death, there is the Force. In saying so, the Code reveals that it is not an edict of mortal kind, but rather a description of the Force itself. The Force does not have emotions, does not have ignorance, does not have passion, and does not die. The Force is all and eternal. While I agree that we must strive to meet the code, it is because we must strive to be One with the Force, not because the Code is a set of ideals. As Master Yoda says, “Luminous beings are we.” We are children of the Force, chosen for reasons beyond our understanding. We honor the Force by striving to be One with it, and in doing so we let go of our emotions, strive to learn, and embrace the serenity of the Force.”

“You did not say this before your journey to Kel Dor,” Master Tyvokka grumbled.

“I learned much with the Baran Do Sages,” Knight Koon countered. “They feel the Force in a different way from we Jedi, yet describe it in similar terms to our code. The Code describes the natural way of the Force, when it is in Balance. That is why the Sith were an abomination, yet the Nightsisters are not. Where the Nightsisters and other dark-leaning cults listen to the chaos of life that exists with the serenity of the Force, the Sith took serenity and twisted it, torturing the Force into fulfilling their whims.”

“So you say,” Master Tyovkka argued. “Yet Master Fay does not agree, for she find similarity between the Sith and many of the remaining Dark cults. The issue is not with the Force but with their impact upon reality. What say you, child?”

Ali’ya hesitated, but a wave of kind-gentle-no judgment from Knight Koon relaxed her. “I am not sure it matters,” Ali’ya confessed. “Whether the Sith are evil for the impact their actions have or for the way they use the Force, are they not evil regardless? If we must strive to be calm in mediation, strategic in battle, and serene at rest, does it matter whether we strive to be so from a desire to be close to the Force or simply because we think it the right thing to do?”

“Perhaps not,” Knight Koon chuckled beneath his breather.

“Or perhaps it does,” Master Tyvokka smiled. “But not so much. We are all Jedi, after all, and it our actions that make us such as much as any philosophy. That is why we may disagree yet remain close, for we agree upon what matters most.”

“Philosophy matters,” Knight Koon protested.

“More than the lives of the innocent?”

“No,” Knight Koon agreed.

“Is it justified then to use the Dark Side to protect the innocent?” Ali’ya asked. She shuddered as a cold wave swept through the conversation.

“That,” Master Tyvokka said, all joviality gone from his voice. “Is a difficult question. Some would say yes. Others no. Yet the truth is that once used the Dark is hard to eliminate. If one must chose between saving with the Dark or letting tragedy happen with the Light, then keep in mind where Darkness leads. If you touch it, can you resist the call? The best of Jedi Knights have failed to do so, and turned themselves into greater monsters than the ones they fought to stop.”

“I had not fully considered that,” Ali’ya said softly. “Thank you, Master.”

Quests Completed This Chapter

Quest: Language of the Underworld

Become fluent in Huttese

Reward: 1,000 experience points

Quest: Master Before Your Time (Lightsaber) Completed!

Increase one of your Lightsaber skills to Master: 1 before being knighted (Lightsaber [Soresu] Master 60

Reward: 1,000 experience points

Bonus Quest: Increase one of your Lightsaber skills to Master: 1 before becoming a Senior Padawan

Reward: 1,000 experience points

Bonus Quest: Increase one of your Lightsaber skills to Master: 50 before becoming a Senior Padawan

Reward: 1,000 experience points

Current Quests:

Noble Lineage: Find out your noble ancestry

Subquest: First on Planet

Find the deed to your old apartment

Revenge: Find out who killed your parents and avenge them

Equal Sequel: Publish a sequel that sells a trillion copies

Jack of All (Force): Increase 15 Force skills to Adept: 50

Jack of All (Lightsaber): Increase 7 Lightsaber skills to Proficient: 50

Language of Trade: Become fluent in Bocce

Master of Some (Force): Increase 5 Force skills to Master: 1

Master of Some (Lightsaber): Increase 3 Lightsaber skills to Master: 1

Young Legend (Force): Increase 1 Force skill to Legend: 1 before being knighted

Young Legend (Lightsaber): Increase 1 Force skill to Legend: 1 before being knighted

Research Master: Increase at least one of your technology or knowledge skills to Master: 1

Padawan, but Older: Become a Senior Padawan

The First Hunt: Complete a Togorian rite of passage

Knighthood: Become a Jedi Knight