A flash of fields.
An echo of laughter.
Hands framing a face.
Dire pleas to stop.
Fade of black.
A gasp rippled the darkness. Deep, rasping. Lungs sought oxygen as though starved of it for days, urging suctioning breaths that sank through teeth and throat, and inflated them with rapid successions. Upon each second, their volume grew, interchanging with brief, congested whimpers that carried the struggle of an adolescent boy. Consciousness struck him with cruel instantaneity, sprawling the lids of his eyes to their extent, as fear and uncertainty quickly blossomed at their cores. With a shooting rise, his small torso sprung from the cold floor in a disoriented panic of guarded limbs, as if someone reeled back to continuously strike him. Yet, the strikes never came, and it was only after acknowledging that fact, that another became readily apparent.
His hands, his arms, they were right there in front of him, except they weren't. He could not perceive their shape, even as he waved his fingers vigorously in front of his face. The boy's gaze now darted from point to point, urgently searching for something to recognize, something to take form, but could discern only nothingness. He tried to blink hard, to force his vision to adjust and add some measure of visibility, but still found it lost in the complete absence of light. It was as though the world around him had warped into shadows so deep, there was no difference between looking out and shutting his eyes. A paralyzing hurt enveloped the child at this grim revelation, shackling his body with inaction that stemmed from panic.
Seconds ticked to minutes, and minutes into time that could not be quantified within the impervious black. Had he been blinded? The thought accelerated inside his head, allowing anxiety to fuel his skin to crawl, burn, anything but remain still. Spurred from necessity, his breathing intensified, drawing more thick and stagnant air into his mouth, drying his already parched lips and leaving a dusty taste on his tongue. The spills of impacted breath continued without destination, until the boy knew that if it didn't stop, his body would forfeit to the frenzy of emotions, and ultimately, life altogether. Squeezing his fingers into air-tight fists, the boy finally endeavored to gain some semblance of composure.
Gathering what he could of his resolve, he tried to will his breathing to slow, to halve each exhale at its source, but found the task strangely difficult. A feverish haze lingered on the crevice of his mind like a bank of fog, limiting its processes to bare increments of what they should be. His body slacked at each attempt of movement, slowed by a ponderous laze that contrasted the weightless drifting of his head, as if it could float away if he didn't secure it with both hands. It was a confusing form of confinement, one he attributed to being drugged or poisoned. Is that what has happened to him? The boy dared to wonder; knowing the possible cost such thinking could pose to his already fragile state.
How did this happen? Another question appeared as the floodgates of his mind sprung free with paranoia, twisting in his gut like a vibroblade, and edging ever closer to piercing his sanity. When did it happen? The mental blade slit further. The helplessness of the circumstance only now truly began to take root, levying an unsustainable pressure upon the child's shoulders that heaved down as if gravity, itself, had betrayed him. Tears of dismay formed and led streaks down his features, dripping silently with a pain that only seemed to fester. The realization that he could die here became more than just surreal, it became likely, and it was that notion that urged his blood to pump faster than it ever had before, resonating thumps of his heart so loud and violent, that he could hear their thunder in his ears. He hated this feeling, to be this trapped, this violated. He just wanted it to stop…he wanted to go hom…
A pause in the boy's thinking affixed him from his ailments, if only for a short time. He probed his memories for the answer that should've come easily, but drew a blank for all his effort. He had a home, he was sure of it…wasn't he? A sickening feeling polluted his stomach with knots, while angst sent his adrenaline surging the length of his veins. He couldn't recall it, he couldn't recall anything, not even his own name, and the more he tried, the worse the sickness became. It wrenched mercilessly, swallowing him in a twist of circles that only abated when he did the same.
It was then that what hope he had managed to sustain felt especially distant, destined to fade and disappear somewhere among the shadows with him. With a weary head falling low to his knees, the boy's breaths shallowed. Not in fatigue, but submission. He had no memories of who he was or how he came to be here , and to even try and recall them was punished viciously by his own mind. He knew the wrong of his displacement, but was unaware how. It was those facts that cemented his isolation, and it was the finality of their acceptance that brought on something unexpected of the void, something that before then didn't seem possible. It brought a response.
"What's wrong, child?" The gaunt voice came from within the vast emptiness, carrying from every angle with booming acoustics, as if transmitted through an intercom. "Why do you submit so easily?" It inquired further, a near hypnotic blend of power and intimacy forging its tone. The boy spurred back to life, his mouth jittering agape, but unable to compose words. Like a scarce rodent, he retreated, leaping to his back as his legs and elbows scurried him away. For one long, quiet moment, he kept motionless, more still than stone. His palms clasped the entirety of his nose and mouth in order to help retain breath, forcing them to conceal his location, even if it meant slipping back into unconsciousness. "There's no need to run from me, boy. I will do no harm."
The boy refrained from answering at first, believing it smarter to remain silent until whoever was here with him departed, but those feelings were fleeting at best. Revisiting his previous thoughts of being drugged or poisoned slowly turned what was once fear into something more profound. Defiance swelled in him like a thruster before the launch, as if recognizing that there was opposition to be dealt with, and that facing it felt more than right, it felt natural. "W-Who are you? Why am I here?!" The boy lashed out, recalling for the first time that he possessed the ability to speak.
"Answer, child, and you will know all you seek, and if willing, much more." The voice appeased, still unrepentant in its ominousity, but oddly comforting as well. It hinted of an attainable trust, an instant sort of familiarity that made the boy not just consider an answer, but yearn to give one. "Why do you submit?"
"I-I can't see. I don't…know who I am…where I am." The boy released a low mutter, barely resonating above a whisper.
"So you submit, is that it? You need a name and place in order to know who you are?" The response came quizzically, but also poised, as though the owner intended to make a statement that sounded like a question.
"Shut up!" The boy growled, his demeanor slowly shifting to aggression. "You did this, didn't you! You put me in this darkness to torture me!"
"The darkness tortures you? What if I told you that you had been in this place for many hours now, and had endured no harm that could be had. What then would you think of it?" The voice allowed a moment for his words to be pondered, before continuing. "The feelings that maim you now originate from ignorance. You fear what is unknown, and in turn, it is that fear that destroys you. You fear me now because you cannot perceive me, but what makes you believe I can see you?"
The point was not just enlightening; it was truthful, which would've carried more weight had the boy not sensed a manipulative undertone. Still, he couldn't see the voice's owner, not even remotely, and he imagined it was the same way for him. Even the galaxy's nocturnal species would be hard-pressed to find vision in such a shade. "You can't." The boy allowed a cautious consent, squinting into the shadows again to confirm his theory, and seemingly oblivious to the fact that his nerves had calmed from the maelstrom they had been.
"And if I cannot see you, how then can I harm you?" The voice added.
"You can't." The boy repeated, his previous anger succumbing more and more to reason, and the suspicious wisdom being given to him.
"Correct. For this is not my darkness to command, but your own. I have merely bonded your consciousness to mine, to serve as guide to what is to come. We now stand inside a manifestation of what lies beneath us all. That which most keep hidden for worry of judgment. Anger. Hate. Fear. Their roots grow here, and it is they that cripple you with haze and weaken your resolve. For now, are unfit of their potency, but they wait for you still, ever patient, ready to be tended, and in time, blossom. You need only give them the opportunity, and welcome the fruits they will bare for you."
"Bonding consciousness...w-what are you saying?" The boy pleaded, confused, and still weary of the voice's motivations to seemingly aid him. How could someone do such sorcery as what was being claimed? Was it really possible, or had he somehow lost all traces of mental stability?
The gaunt voice released a low, guttural chuckle, as if the answer was obvious. "I am saying that if you wish to see, then see. Focus. You have immense power inside you, and it has slept long enough. Awaken it, boy. Immerse yourself. You hate what has happened to you, then use that hate to drive you, to enact change. Bind it with your anger and take control!"
The boy's brow unbalanced, his face becoming crinkled with trepidation, and yet, somehow, in the recesses of his mind, he wholly believed what was being said. He knew there was something inside of him, he could feel it now, flowing like a tide of waves, like another extension of himself that had been dormant until made aware of it. Sinking his eyes shut, the boy searched within, guiding every fiber of his being to seek out the source of the sleeping power, knowing every second he spent brought him closer to understanding it. "I-I feel it..." He murmured, his voice stricken with an exalted awe. This surge of feeling, whatever it was, not only exuded the instant comfort that had he had prayed for the moment he awoke, it embodied it. He could see now, not through his physical sight, but through the eyes of something infinitely greater. He watched hazy shapes that seemed far away and up close all at once, hearing their jumbled lines of speech as clearly as his own words. There were billions of them, even more, human and not, savage creatures and sentient lifeforms blessed by brilliance. So different in variance, but all connected by this power. The boy knew now, knew of information that he shouldn't, that he had been freed from what was recognized as living, while left untouched by death. He had unbound from the vessel of his body, and yet he remained himself. It was as though he was set adrift into an ocean of conscious life, wading through layers of start and end, of knowledge and experience. Their many streams began here, converged here, and finished here, all feeding into a grander form that transcended the limitations of thought and imagination. These were mere windows to what it was, tools to give shape and origin to something beyond simplifying.
"Yesss." The voice gave a seductive approval, as if deftly aware of the connection between the boy and his power growing stronger and more defined."You have found your power, child. Now impel your influence upon it. Take hold of your darkness and command it!" His tone rang out, engaged, yearning for more strides to be made.
The veil of shadows now moved all around the boy in the guise of vaporous tendrils, slithering over top one another like a pit of serpents. Gradually, the boy returned to gasping, but unlike before, it brimmed from excitement. His every sense keened with an omnipresence that was sharper and more vivid than anything he'd ever dared imagine. The veil then broke from its slither and ascended to the greatest of heights, climbing high into the emptiness where it stalled and spun, encasing the child in the eye of a spiraling tower of onyx wind. Roars of motion absorbed all other sound, the twisting vortex becoming the darkness' only voice, all because the boy wanted it to. An innate animosity simmered upon his faculties, but he retained control, and the exhilarating emotion it brought forth from him was complete and utterly intoxicating. "How is this real?" He inquired to the voice, hoping with all his soul that what he was experiencing wasn't some dream due to end an instant later.
"It is, boy. This is your gift. This…is The Force." It finished.
"The Force?" The name stirred familiarity, its legend representing one of the things he could only vaguely, but not fully recall. Old stories of Jedi and Sith, good and evil, existing centuries before he was even born. It was folklore, theatrical tales told by parents before bed. Until now. "Are you a Jedi, a Sith?"
A knowing snicker echoed as a prelude to his reply. "There is so much more to the Force than those misguided religions. Shall I show you? Would you like to learn?"
Kneeling there, surrounded by a spinning marvel of his own conjuring, the boy had no need to think over his response. This ability, this gift, it fulfilled him in ways he never knew he needed. It was more than intrigue that now tore at him, it was desperation, like a dire thirst needing to be quenched. He had to know more, to know everything about The Force, no matter the cost. "Yes!" He shouted, trying to elevate his words over the deafening swirls of momentum.
"Then it is time you joined the others." The voice concluded, and upon the comment's end, the tower of wind dispersed outwards with a calamitous crash. The boy reeled from the explosive boom ringing through the canals of his ears, until the empty silence returned to ease them. At the very edge of his vision, a doorway materialized and brought a beaming frame of ruby light that pained the child's eyes, but returned his sight and appearance to him. His light human skin, his bushy umber hair, the boy touched them as though they were expensive treasures to be cherished and never again forgotten. Raising his hand to his brow in an attempt to stare further at the emblazoned door, his eyes focused on something moving from the light. Standing there, appearing from the depths of its red luminescence, were three silhouettes, small and thin like...children? The corners of the door then expanded with a blinding flash, reaching out and beyond, swallowing the dark, and the boy within it.