Atris first met her in the archives.
It wasn't a surprise to her. She and the Dantooine curator had already discussed Kayrn Tekal's interest in the collected Jedi libraries, and she'd learned from a distance of a ravenous thirst for knowledge that one day, Dantooine simply could no longer sate. So she came to Coruscant, and then down to the library, walking up to Atris' desk with great purpose.
She cut a striking figure. Tall, with shaggy blonde hair and deep green eyes that commanded one's attention. She brought with her an endless wind, or so it felt to Atris, the Force swirling around her like gas condensing into a star. She'd already been warned that the woman didn't care much for tradition, but it was still odd to see her not wearing the traditional robes of the Jedi; instead, she'd donned a tight green tunic under a scaled chestplate.
"May I help you, Kayrn?" Atris asked, looking up.
"You know me already," she replied with a soft smile. "I take it Daneel has been spreading tales again."
"He does like to talk. A tendency among our kind, I'm afraid," Atris said, smiling back. "Still, I'd be happy to help you with anything you need. I've been told you're quite the prodigy."
"I've not done anything spectacular," Kayrn says, waving her hand dismissively.
"Really? A 'natural leader,' a 'born mediator,' who has on several occasions proven herself capable of helping the local population without inflaming old tensions," Atris quoted, raising an eyebrow. "Not to mention your mechanical aptitude."
"I tinker and I talk," Kayrn said with a shrug.
"And you read."
"And I read. Tell me, do you have any resources available on the nature of Force bonds? They've been an interesting subject to me for some time."
Atris thought back to the things the masters had whispered about, the confidential logs she managed. So she had some awareness. "I can point you to any number of dissertations on the subject, though as with anything involving the Force…"
"It's rather subjective." Kayrn blinked slowly, like a mother cat. The expression was fascinating. And distracting.
"But still, a little extra knowledge never hurt anyone." Atris stood up. "I can bring you to some material you'd find interesting right now, if you like."
"I would." Kayrn tilted her head just a hair, studying Atris' features. "You know my name, but I don't know yours."
"You may call me Atris."
"Quite stately."
Atris flushed. A silly, emotional reaction, not the way of the Jedi at all. "It's only a name."
"So it is. Lead on, Atris."
And yet, somehow, Atris felt always that she was the one being led around.
It was only natural that a frequent visitor to the archives would speak with Atris. Their conversations were never inappropriate or meaningless. Discussing Force theory with her was engaging, and she had a knack for remembering ideas from several sources and tying them together. Privately, Atris often wondered why she didn't formally enter into the academic side of the Jedi, why she didn't seek out classes or discussions outside of her. She obviously had great talent, but where was it going to use, really?
Sometimes, she wouldn't visit for a few days, a week. When she'd return, Atris would hear where she'd been, protecting civilians from gang wars, striking out on her own to help the Coruscant security forces in raids, or simply taking up residence in a local hotel for a while and positioning herself as a potential mediator for anyone's problems, mechanical or personal, free of charge. It seemed foolish to Atris. When one had bright ideas, why waste one's time on such trivial matters? There would always be trouble on Coruscant, always an endless procession of unenlightened people being cruel to one another. Differences were made outside such petty conflicts.
She voiced this opinion to Kayrn once, when she'd been away for almost two months, and got her first real frown out of her in response. She looked at Atris in a new way, an unsettling way.
"Would you come with me for a moment?" she asked, walking around behind the service desk and extending a hand. Atris hesitated, but took it. Her hold was firm, yet she knew it would break if she wanted it to. Something about Kayrn told her that.
Kayrn led her to one of the Jedi Temple's many meditation chambers and bid her to sit beside her and close her eyes. "Do you feel the Force?" she asked, as though speaking to a Padawan.
But Atris could feel nothing beyond that wild aura surrounding Kayrn, the gravitational power of her presence. "Yes, but…"
"But?"
"Not much...beyond this room."
"Close your eyes. Breathe. Stretch beyond the temple and feeling the teeming masses of Coruscant."
It went against Atris' every instinct since she'd arrived on the planet. To dull one's Force-sense here was considered a basic requirement for one's sanity; the feelings of a population in the hundreds of billions were too much even for many of the greatest Jedi masters to feel at the periphery. But something in Kayrn's tone told Atris that there was a reason for this, the way Kayrn could lead her down thought experiments with ease, always knowing there was a point at the end of it all even when it seemed a foolish hypothetical.
It was too much. Too much noise, like static on every inch of her skin.
"Now, hold it. Breathe. And focus on a small part of it. A subdivision, a neighborhood, one city block."
Atris swallowed and tried, to find somewhere not here that produced something discrete. She found it — a few dozen souls, living their lives, hectic and yet—
"Connected," she breathed.
Kayrn nodded. "We've been speaking of Force bonds, and you found them."
"But they aren't — not what we're talking about. This is, just a temporary collective. It's like—"
"Neurons, little electric signals from one part to another. Right?"
"Yes."
"Feel the energy, the mood of the place you've found. Now watch it for a while longer."
Atris' perception had clarified, and she felt she was in a marketplace, where one of the dealers was being told to leave due to an out-of-date permit. Around that commotion, discontent spread like a virus, from person to person, encountering the stern police, the angry shopkeeper. Haggling was getting aggressive around it, deals going bad in alleyways and blasters being brandished, anxious part-time workers returning home and locking their doors for no reason they could determine.
"Each bond may only last for a moment, but it's an exchange. When the exchange is negative, it starts coloring all else around it, exponentially. I can feel it always." Kayrn wet her lips. "The more negativity goes uncontested, unresolved, the more tension builds and the faster the effect takes hold, until suddenly a neighborhood is engulfed in conflict and flames and starvation. It only takes a few actions to prevent this, to reverse the flow."
"But there is always reason for the flow to resume," Atris argued. "Life outside the Temple is hectic, full of people working only for their own selfish goals."
"It's true," Kayrn granted. "But if one buildup is prevented, one careful fix applied, it may save a life. Someone keeps a child, a mother, a lover. Life can be better, and life is all there is. It is all the Force truly is."
"But how much can we do?" Atris asked. "How can we hope to fix anything truly important if we spend all our time maintaining?"
"We are not galactic governors. We are peacekeepers. I take that to heart. It matters to me," Kayrn said. "You needn't devote yourself to this the way I do. You do it on your own, by keeping knowledge available to us, by keeping our Order happy and well-organized. But we all aim for the same thing. Our scale can truly never be known, so there is no way to say what is time better spent. Do you understand?"
"I...I think that I do." Atris opened her eyes, and saw Kayrn, on her knees right in front of Atris, smiling at her.
"And my presence in the library serves the same purpose," Kayrn said, a teasing note in her voice. "If I'm not there to entertain you, I hear you get grumpy."
"That is completely untrue!" Atris objected, ears growing hot.
"Everyone needs pleasant company, Atris. It's all right to admit it."
"The Jedi need nothing but our own inner peace," Atris said, folding her arms.
But Kayrn smiled still. "Simply because you're not aware of the quality of your part of an exchange doesn't make it stop happening, Atris. You felt it yourself. We often don't know why our moods and temperaments change unless we sit back and examine them. If we did always know, I think it'd be too much."
"I...suppose you are right." Atris swallowed. "I miss you when you are away. Perhaps that's why I was led to think as I did." She looked into Kayrn's eyes. She always sounds so certain. So right. "I do enjoy your company," she admitted. "Quite a bit."
"I know." Kayrn leaned closer, and Atris lost her breath. When their lips met, it was like drinking something warm and sweet, trickling through her veins. Kayrn pushed her to the floor, and flicked her wrist to lock the room, and all except feeling was forgotten.
Everything felt new, and wonderful, and full of light.
Kayrn and Atris no longer only spent time together in the archives. They would spar, Atris' silver blade against the shimmering viridian of Kayrn's unique crystal, and after they'd finished sweating and panting, they would fall together and spend the remainder of their energy.
They would find one another in their rooms, conversations carrying long into the night, the nature of the Force, the true role of the Jedi, the Sentinels and the Consulars and how these factions could best work together.
Sometimes, Atris would accompany Kayrn outside the Temple, walking the streets of Coruscant for the first time since she'd arrived on the planet as a child. They'd travel to Kayrn's favorite shops and diners, find her many friends in the oddest of places, laugh and try strange substances in brightly decorated apartments.
Atris hung on her every word. How could Kayrn be wrong about anything? She made Atris feel like she was truly a living source of the Force like she was meant to be, and wasn't that worth it all?
Atris felt such purpose, so right, being in Kayrn's orbit. She never wanted to leave.
It was all perfect, until Raven Y'tal came to the Jedi Temple.
They'd been talking in the library, like old times, when Raven came down the stairs.
Atris recognized her immediately. She'd become a known quantity, a frequent topic of discussion all around the Temple. Everyone she talked to had an opinion on her, save Kayrn, who'd been 'waiting to meet her before deciding.' Everyone had seen the holos, though. A tall, strong, black-haired woman with dark skin and brilliant blue eyes, clad not in robes but in armor, a single hand-machined saber at her side set with a violet crystal. In some of the vids, she wore a mask, that bright blade twirling to deflect blaster bolts from fleeing civilians, then slicing effortlessly through faceless armor.
And now she was here. Atris felt her before she saw her, a great hurricane in the force to match Kayrn's. She walked towards them with the same purpose Kayrn had once shown, but her eyes were trained only on Kayrn, not the actual archivist behind the desk.
"Raven!" Kayrn said, hopping off of Atris' desk. "I didn't expect you quite so soon. You arrived very quietly."
"The Council would drag me into a trial if they knew I was here," Raven said with a smile. "But I figured you were worth the risk."
"Kayrn?" Atris asked, confused. "What's going on?"
"I know of Knight Tekal's reputation among the people of Coruscant," Raven said, sparing her a brief glance. "I wanted her to join my forces on the Outer Rim, but she's a stubborn one. Didn't want to run off without seeing me in person."
"I need to feel a person's energy before I commit to their cause," Kayrn explained, looking down at Atris, who felt very small and unneeded at her desk.
"You're...thinking about going to join the war?" Atris asked, her voice squeaking annoyingly. "But—you never told me—"
"I hadn't made a decision yet," Kayrn told her. "I didn't want to bore you with my deliberations."
"You never bore me! And — and how could you — you're going to leave? "
"If she's made her decision," Raven interrupted, putting a hand on her hip. "Has she?"
Kayrn looked at her. And Atris felt something, a spark, like neurons firing. Kayrn looked at Raven the way Atris had once looked at Kayrn, eyes shining, the air between them crackling with energy.
Atris hated it. She felt sick, hot, hands clenching on the desk.
"I have."
Atris shot up. She grabbed Kayrn's hand and dragged her to the meditation chamber where they'd first kissed, leaving Raven behind them, only a smug quirk of the eyebrow showing that she understood what was going on at all. Atris slammed her hand into the lock panel on the door and whirled to face Kayrn, who put on a face of concern.
"Atris—"
"You can't go." That was all that she could think to say. Kayrn couldn't just leave, no discussion, no—
"I can. I am a free woman."
"Why didn't you talk to me about this?" Atris demanded, fists tight at her side. "We've been — we're…"
But what were they? Clearly, Kayrn didn't think they were what Atris had thought they were.
"I didn't want to worry you unless I was sure I wanted to go. And I do now, so I'm going, so there needn't be a long period where you're dreading it," Kayrn explained, in that way where she was always right, but this time she wasn't, for no reason Atris could articulate.
"But what if I wanted to go with you?" Atris asked, her voice breaking. "What if I would follow you?"
"You wouldn't," Kayrn said. "You like it here too much. You have duties, and you—"
"You should have asked! " Atris shouted, anger burning in her throat. She'd been thinking about the war, truly. Kayrn's philosophy, her way of viewing the Force, had been making her doubt the Council's decision. But now…
"Well, do you want to join me?" Kayrn cocked her hip.
"No!" Not anymore. Not after seeing the way Kayrn looked at Raven, not after feeling those two intense Force energies collide and then harmonize, right in front of her, in an instant.
"Then I'll go, and you'll stay. So what's the difference?"
Atris felt something stinging at her eyes. How dare she. Just because she could form these connections so easily doesn't mean Atris could. She had no idea, didn't care to know, how it felt to suddenly be losing it. Atris thought she was special, and here Kayrn was, acting like this is just another jaunt into the streets that Atris can't make.
Was this what heartbreak felt like?
"Atris…" Kayrn stepped forward, laying her hand on Atris' shoulder, and she hated it. She wasn't sure she'd ever hated something so much as Kayrn's touch right then, and without thinking, without even considering what she was doing, she threw out a hand and sent Kayrn careening across the chamber, her back slamming into the wall.
Kayrn doubled over, looking up, eyes wide with sudden comprehension and fear. "Atris—"
"You. Can't. Go." Atris' voice shook. "I won't let you."
"Why not?" Kayrn challenged.
"The Jedi Council has forbidden it. It's against our Code to—"
Kayrn barked out a bitter laugh. " Now you care about following the Code? You've let yourself understand so much more than that! I've seen it!" She stood to her full height, arms tight at her sides. "You've fallen in love with me."
Atris felt bile rise in her throat. "I wish I'd never met you. You just — took me and spun me around for — for what? To entertain yourself?"
"To help you! To make you see how much more we can be!" Kayrn took a step forward. "Atris, people listen to you. You're smart, and well-respected, and the Masters are considering you for Council membership! Think of the good you could do if you apply what you've learned—"
"I've learned nothing from you, except how to flirt with the Dark Side." Atris' voice lowered. "That's what all of you are doing. Out there, fighting. You're not doing it to save innocents. You're doing it for your own twisted satisfaction."
"You know that's not true. You know me."
"I'm not sure I ever did." Atris reached for her saber. "I should have known better. The First Great Schism of the Jedi was started by two lovers, and I let myself fall into the same trap."
"You don't want to do this," Kayrn warned.
"It's not about what I want. That was the problem. It's about what's right." Atris unclipped her saber and ignited the silver blade. "If I let you go out there, I'm repeating the same mistakes other Jedi have throughout history. How could I have been such a fool, to act like I was immune to it all?"
"Atris—"
"You will promise to stay in this academy, or I will strike you down. You would be far too potent in the Force to risk losing to the dark. We will take you to the Council, reform you—"
And Kayrn's lightsaber was in her hand, viridian light filling her side of the room. "I'm going, Atris."
"You aren't."
Atris launched herself at her, righteous anger filling her limbs, driving her attack. Kayrn blocked and weaved, trying to avoid her strikes even as she scarred the walls with her blade. They danced around the small round chamber, Atris trying anything to weaken her, while Kayrn did nothing but defend herself, until their sabers locked in front of the window overlooking Coruscant below. Atris pressed Kayrn's back into the glass, wanting to snarl, spit in her face, make her hurt and understand what she'd done wrong—
The door suddenly blew open behind her, and she was gripped in something inescapable, something invisible and incredible. She couldn't move, could barely breathe as the pieces of the door clattered against the floor.
"Kayrn," Raven intoned from behind her. Kayrn deactivated her saber, looking at Atris with deep pity. "It's time for us to go."
No. No, no, this couldn't be, she can't lose, she's meant to win, that's how it's meant to be, the righteous always win in the end. It's what the history books tell her.
Kayrn walked around her, towards the door, and then Raven was in front of her, blue eyes boring into her.
"I've seen this across the galaxy," she said, a note of rage in her voice. "The Jedi institution thinking it has the right to stop us from defending the innocent, and going against their own codes to enforce them. It's sickening."
"Raven—" Kayrn started from behind Atris.
"I can't let her go. She'll report us as soon as I release her," Raven snapped. "The war effort can't lose either of us."
"What are you going to do?" Kayrn asked, and Atris recognized her tone. A test. They made eye contact over her shoulder.
Raven put her hand to Atris' forehead, thumb in the center. "Sleep," she told her, and blackness took her.
When Atris awoke, she hated Kayrn.
She hated the feeling of hating her. She hated everything Kayrn had taught her about opening up to possibilities beyond the Code, because it had let her feel like this, so irrational, so foolish. She saw where she'd gone wrong, and she vowed to fix it.
In the ranks of the Jedi who'd remained out of the war, her ideas spread quickly. She rose through the ranks, spreading word of the failures of Raven's initiative, their fall to the dark side even before they'd gotten the reports that the remainder of her forces had disappeared beyond the Rim. She got on the Council, just like Kayrn had told her she could.
And years later, when Kayrn came back to face judgement, Atris delivered it with nothing but conviction in her heart.
At least, that is what she told herself, and what the holocrons whispered in her ear.