Here's another one of my projects that I'm writing. I mean, I'm eventually going to get to writing. It's an AU, as they are called, but I don't want to delve too much into the details, so as to not spoil too much. But I can say It will be a mash of Canon and EU/Legends, amongst other things.
Here's the prologue.
The morning suns illuminated the forest, awakening the abundance of life-forms. Life, so beautiful and wonderful, seemingly timeless yet ever-changing, covered the world. Predators hunted. herbivores, in herds, moved about, grazing, thinning the population of plants just as the carnivores thinned theirs. Plants consumed the energy of light to produce sugar and oxygen. Everything had its place in the ecosystem. The balance of all living things ruled.
A structure of concrete and steel, hidden in the deepest corner of the forest, disrupted the otherwise perfect natural image. Life didn't let itself be bothered by it though; plantlife grew over it as if it were regular rock, leaving only a giant steel gate and a few windows of glass uncovered. Rays of sunlight shone through one such window, into a grey chamber.
Dozens of figures were lined through the chamber, sitting cross-legged on the floor. They were children of various species, about ten years old, listening to an adult lecturing from a raised platform at the other end of the chamber. Behind the lecturer, a male human in his older years, on the wall, were two giant symbols, drawn next to each other. The one on the left was smooth, with four circular shapes sticking up, down, left and right and a rough explosion-like shape in the middle. The one on the right was the inverse; the circles were placed within the rough shape.
"Thus you must always remember," the lecturer stated. "In the light, there is darkness. In the darkness, there is light. Be a prisoner of neither the Ashla," he said, pointing to the symbol on the left, "nor the Bogan," he said, pointing to the symbol on the right. "Follow the Bendu, the Balance between the two aspects of the Force. Whenever you feel the Balance shifting towards one, seek to push it back to the other, until you reach Bendu. Walk the middle path. It brings only pain and suffering, to others or to oneself, to do otherwise."
He breathed in, then the chamber, in unison, recited their mantra:
"There is no ignorance; there is knowledge.
There is no fear; there is power.
I am the heart of the Force.
I am the revealing fire of light.
I am the mystery of darkness
In balance with chaos and harmony,
Immortal in the Force."
The lecturer nodded in satisfaction. "You are dismissed. Enjoy your breakfast and don't be late for your lessons."
The smaller figures got up. Dozens of children, some faster, others slower, filed out of the hall. They condensed into smaller groups of three to six as they walked. All wore loose temple robes of varying shades of grey, tied together with leather belts. Chatter filled the chambers of the structure, as the group of children met and mixed with the older dwellers; teenagers, young adults, adults, even older people, like the lecturer from earlier. All moved south, towards the common cafeteria.
The dwellers' diet was humble; they ate what they could produce in the facility, with the occasional meat, when the hunters were sent out. But they didn't complain - their meals were nutritious, and the occasional treat brought something to look forward to. This was all in accordance with their teachings. They enjoyed their food, but not in excess.
One group of four children took the seats at the far side of the cafeteria, with their platters of food. It was comprised of two male humans, a female twi'lek and a male ithorian.
"Every day," one of the humans, a blue-eyed boy with shoulder-length naturally blue hair, said. "Every morning and every evening, they take us through the same lecture. I get it! Don't fall off Balance."
"Yeah, Ezra," the twi'lek replied. "But some might not. They show us how easily one can fall down the path of Light or Dark. You saw what becomes of such people."
"Baz, Baz," the boy, Ezra, answered. "If not for those, the lecture would seem like a religious sermon. We're an order of science and philosophy, not of dogmata! I can't wait till I become an Apprentice. No more mandatory lectures."
The other human, a blonde brown-eyed boy, raised his glass. "Two more years of Novicehood. Then, we find ourselves our own professors." They clinked their glasses together.
"Though, Loh-kee, Ezra probably won't have a problem, with that zabrak already watching his progress," the Ithorian stated
"You mean that Maul guy, Briwl?"
"Expert Maul." he corrected.
"Yes, him," Ezra said. "I heard he was far in the Dark Side when the Grand Master found him. Only with his guidance did he manage to find balance."
"Speaking of the Grand Master," Loh-kee interjected, "he comes today, doesn't he. What do you think he's like?"
"Well, he is the One, or so they say," Baz said. "He must be tall, handsome, wise, strong..."
"You're just listing positive traits," Ezra interrupted. "He can't be perfect, no matter how great he is. 'There is no perfection, only... uh... approximations?'"
"Master Hett says it better," Loh-kee stated.
"Master Hett is a Master," Baz said. "Of course he's good with big words!"
"Isn't he also one of the founding members of the order?" Briwl asked.
"Not only that!" Ezra answered. "He used to be a Jedi. One of the few that the Grand Master saved from the Purge." He leaned forward. "I hear he was also one of the Grand Master's first friends in his time as a Jedi."
"The first," Loh-kee corrected. "The Grand Master didn't have many friends in the Jedi Order."
Ezra hummed. "I wonder what it was like... The Jedi, the Clone War, the fall of the Republic..."
"Oh please!" Baz said. "We have history lessons, if you didn't notice."
"Yes," Ezra agreed, "but the Masters only tell us what happened, not how it was. They won't open up about how they experienced the recent history. The Experts won't talk either and most of the Adepts were about our age when the Empire was founded... Maybe if we asked the Grand Master? He was at the centre of it."
"The Grand Master?" Loh-kee said incredulously. "As if! He'll be to busy to have time for a bunch of Novices. But enough about him. Did you hear what happened in the Art Wing?"
Once their meal was done, the Novices filed towards their classrooms, where their lessons would start. They learnt the sciences, engineering, literature, languages, music, visual arts, philosophy and mathematics, as well as martial arts, deception, flying, programming and about the Force.
Ezra was sitting, leaning his head on his palm, listening to the Master drone on about the events which led to the Force Wars of Tython. Ezra had already read up on that, as the Master was not a good lecturer, with his voice monotone and dreary, which made even the most interestingly worded lectures tedious. The other Masters had received complaints about this and promised to find a suitable replacement for the professor of history. However, considering the small size of their order, finding someone who would have both the experteise and the desire to profess their knowledge of history to the young proved to be a hard task. The Novices wuld thus have to learn history on their own.
"The attack of the Infinite Empire thus shook the ancient Je'daii Order. After the Rakatan invaders were defeated, old grudges, cracks in the Balance of the order, emerged-... Novice Bridger! Are you paying attention?"
"Uh... of course, Master Binn."
"Then perhaps you might be able to continue."
Ezra sighed and got up. "After the Rakatan defeat, the schism from before only continued, with the two factions growing further and further into their respective Sides of the Force. Daegen Lok's followers believed that only with the power of Bogan could their ways be defended, while the Council argued that the Dark Side was dangerous and corrupting and followed the Ashla as the 'only force of good in the universe'. The latter eventually became what was known as the Jedi Order, the victors of the Wars."
Master Binn stared at the human boy and shook his head. "Am I boring you, Bridger?"
Ezra looked down. "I... shouldn't answer that question honestly, sir."
"You've already studied up on your history, I see. What are you still doing here? If you want to use your time more productively, all you have to do is ask."
"I may know my history, Master, but I wish to understand it. I know the facts, but what were all these wars like? What was it like to live through, say, the last years of the Republic?"
Master Binn stiffened. "Those... are some dark memories, Bridger. And, I'm afraid I'm not that good with recounting my feelings. Besides, I was at the sidelines most of the time. I didn't see the election of Palpatine, the Battle of Geonosis, or of Coruscant and neither the founding of the New Order." He chuckled. "Were it not for the Grand Master, I would probably have slept through the Purges as well... That's when I got interested in history, you see. I realised that I had missed historic events that changed the course of history."
After the history lesson, the Novices were given the rest of the day off, as the Masters would be busy meeting the Grand Master, who was just about to arrive at the complex. The children, thus, dispersed around the facility. Bridger and his three friends went to the Cloister of Reason, which was the largest of the five cloisters in the complex. The open arcade was the place often frequented by the members of the order seeking company and fresh air.
Ezra, Baz, Loh-kee and Briwl sat down on the green grass covering the ground and brough out the sabacc cards. Since they didn't have money, they simply played for points, which acted as bragging rights. The order encouraged competition, as it drove its members to improve themselves. Sabacc was also encouraged, as the game was perfect for training one's skills in deception.
As they played, the children listened in on a philosophical debate between two Adepts taking place in their vicinity.
"We come back to the concept of good and evil. Do not be deceived, though, that those two have any relatin to Bendu and Ashla. I never said that. However, good and evil are concepts present in all civilisations, except, of course, for those deeply immersed in the Dark Side. And they always seem to follow the same rules, to some degree. They are always the same. It might be that the Force is connected in some way to morality and suggests its concepts on us.
"True, it might be so. But, let's not forget, that the concepts of morality are not as universal as one might think. It seems that they only... shall we say, manifest in pack animals, that is, animals who live in groups. Morality is the by-product of societal life, as it is necessary for the stability of animal societies. Therefore, I don't think the Force has anything to do with it."
"Then whence comes the Light Siders' obsession with morality and justice? If it is not in the Force that good and evil were created?"
"Aha, but this raises another question. Which came first? Life or the Force? We know that the Force is some sort of field that connects all living things. But which is the truth? That there is no life without the Force, or that there is no Force without life?"
That was a question no one was sure how to answer. After thirty-five thousand years of orders dedicated to the Force, there was still much they didn't know about It. That was one of the goals of the young organisation; to study the Force, learn all there is to know about It, even if it takes millenia to fully understand It.
It was later, in the afternoon, that the four friends were walking in the quiet Cloister of Time, which was dedicated to the contemplation of past, present and future. It was commonly silent, with people coming here to remember whatever or whomever they've lost - even though it had already been ten years, the day the Empire was founded was still fresh in the memories of those who witnessed it. In silence, they would yearn for the day when the Empire would fall and the order could reveal its existence to the Galaxy.
Ezra looked towards the centre of the cloister, where a statue stood, dedicated to those that had fallen - and likely were to fall, if Bendu wasn't established - in the countless wars between the Light and the Dark. A lone figure kneeled before the statue of bodies mashed mercilessly together with weapons in hands and looks of pure sorrow on their faces. He was a man in a black suit of armour and a black cloak. The children knew who he was; this was Darth Vader, the emperor's right hand. However, the children knew him by another name: Anakin Skywalker, the One, the Grand Master of the order. With his position in the Empire, he very rarely came to the facility, so as to keep it hidden from the emperor.
"Master!" Ezra called to him, running towards him.
"Ezra, no!" Briwl shouted as his friends ran after him.
The figure got up and turned to see who had interrupted him. As the children reached him, they could see that his face was covered by a black, intimidating mask. His breathing was loud and artificial. Buttons on the front of the suit made the children realise, that the man was encased in a life-support unit.
"Sorry, sir, he's a bit rash," Baz quickly apologised to the One, but he raised his hand to silence them all.
"Why do you disrupt my mourning, Novice?" the Grand Master asked, his voice deep, produced atrificially.
"I have a few questions, sir," Ezra stated.
"Oh? And what questions are these?"
"What was living in the Jedi Order and the last years of the Republic like?"
The Grand Master remained silent for a while, so long, in fact, that the children started to think they had angered him. But he spoke: "That's... a loaded question. Have you tried asking some of the other Masters?"
"They give us vague answers, sir," the Novice answered. "As if it's a touchy topic."
The One took a few seconds to reply silently: "That, it is, Novice." He looked at the statue, repeating himself: "That, it is..."
Even with his mask, the man's melancholic stare didn't go unnoticed by the children. Aparently, even their Grand Master wasn't exempt from the painful memories plaguing those that had survived the Jedi Purge, those who had seen the Republic fall. However, before Ezra could question him further, an Adept, who had entered the cloister, interrupted him.
"Hey, you there, Novices! Help is needed in the Science Wing."
The Grand Master watched as the children left following the Adept. Behind his mask, he smiled fondly. He had been like them once; full of curiosity and naïveté. But that was a long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away...
Here we go. Next up: twenty-two years earlier...