A/N
I know this has nothing to do with this story, but Allez les bleus! Vive le France!
.
Pronunciation Guide:
.
New Concept/Word
The Cerean writer and trees
.
Chapter 9: Weak Force
.
Everyone threw themselves into preparing for the final trials and had little time for feelings. Each student was left to their own devices when it came to preparing. Teachers were always willing to meet with their students during their time off and Abel often sought them at these times for extra help. Even after two years, he still felt his education riddled with cracks. Others like Zek and Odo preferred studying alone. Zek talked about waking up just after dawn and studying late into the night with only occasional breaks for food and to go to the bathroom. Abel didn't think this was healthy and told Zek so.
"On the contrary," Zek said, "it is wonderful preparation for my future. I expect I will have to work similar hours on occasion." Abel didn't know exactly what he wanted to do, but he knew it wasn't whatever Zek was hoping for."
Then there were And and Tiloa who preferred the "let it be" method.
"Look, I already know what I know. I don't think killing myself for the next month will make much of a difference." Tiloa agreed.
The three of them were sitting by Tiloa's cabin. Abel had his desk propped up on his legs, reading over several articles on the Mandalorian Wars that the others knew like the back of their hands. Tiloa had just finished exercising – Force jumping and pushing around the woods – and was reclining on the porch, letting her sweat evaporate. And was lying on a u-shaped root of a tree, levitating a tree branch.
"That's because you're not a masochist like me," Zek called from inside, and And let out a barking laugh. Zek still had "mounds of work to do," but he let them convince him to at least get some fresh air…by opening up the windows.
But surprisingly, Zek followed his own voice out the door.
"Oho! And the mynock emerges from his cave!" And called.
"Mm, I thought I might get some movement in. You up for another go, Tiloa?"
"You're not really my type…" And and Abel snickered as Zek scowled. "No, I'm done for the day. Take Abel though, he needs a walk."
Actually, Abel had been ready to volunteer anyways. Zek was an easy person to be with one-on-one; perfectly willing to engage in conversation or not depending on the situation. Abel put down his desk, shrugged off his robe and started jogging with Zek.
After only a few minutes, Abel called a halt. Man, he was out of shape.
"If you hadn't stopped I would have soon. I'm dying," Zek wheezed. At least it's not just me. They took a few sips of water from their belts.
The forest here was getting thick with vegetation. It was a far cry from the beautiful halls of Nak's tended forests up north. Here the colors were thick with grayish brown and green.
"It sure is pretty here," Zek said calmly. Abel looked at Zek. He often became what Zek called "melancholy" but Abel called "poetic."
"Is it pretty on Cerea?"
"Yes, very much so," Zek acknowledged of his home planet. "My father was a Council official, in charge of overseeing economic practices in the sectors of Cerea. That's why we often moved around a lot; it was because of his job. But I got to see a lot of my planet…in my early years."
"You came here when you were ten, right?"
"Yes. Maybe that's why I remember my planet being so pretty. Everything seems pretty in your memories of childhood."
They broke off, thinking of their own planets far away.
"It reminds me," Zek started, "of a Cerean writer. He compared life's memories to the flowering buds of trees. He wrote how we are the trunk, the center, our memory the branches which spiral out in a web, and our happy moments are those blossoms; they are always at the edges, and bloom so infrequently, and are so delicate that only a week passes and the winds carry them away. Of course, the Cerean trees to which he is referring only blossom on the very edges of branches and are far away from the trunk, and the blossoms bloom as many as twenty times throughout the year but are gone in a matter of days. It makes more sense if you are a Cerean."
But Abel assured him the metaphor was apt for an Earthling too.
"You really are a poet, aren't you."
"Me? No," Zek said laughing. "That's not even poetry. The writer was merely trying to describe how we should live. He said that we should be a tree that is always in blossom, so much so that even the trunk blooms in color. This is the summation of his thousand page treatise. It's for fun," Zek adds, looking to the woods with a sigh. "I thought of it because the trees here don't ever seem to blossom and it feels odd to me."
Abel agreed. Though the woods of Tython stood in sharp relief, as if in high definition, and hummed with tremendous energy, they were not colorful. But that allowed them a certain endurance, Abel thought. They could be green and gay in the sunlight, but gray and groaning in the night.
The light was dimming as Zek and Abel started to head back. They had climbed a couple trees, lifted some rocks…you know, usual Jedi stuff.
They stopped once more, this time for Zek to relieve himself. They had wandered into an area recently burned from the fire in the night. Abel started to prod a charred trunk that still had a couple hot embers when he thought he heard a thwacking sound off in the woods. He started off in that direction, wondering what someone would be doing there. It almost sounded like someone was cutting down a tree.
As he neared the sound, he heard accompanying grunts and realized they must be the sounds of fighting. He assumed it was practice, but then he heard a cry and ran through the white bones of trees and dusty ash and stumbled onto the scene.
Lena was mercilessly beating Lev with her steelsaber. Evidently, they had come here to train, but things had gotten out of hand. Lena looked like she was in a trance: her arms moved swiftly and precisely, but as if they were destined to move to each position; he face was devoid of emotion, a blank mask of total solemn serenity; a Jedi master would be proud. But she didn't seem to realize that with each successful prod, Lev was hit again and again and was staggering under the onslaught. He was a pitiful creature, a giant of an Ortolan stung over and over, pleading, weeping for mercy. But just as Abel was going to cry out, Lev suddenly shivered and his eyes grew dark.
He began to sing. The notes and utterances were staccato and trembling, pouring out like a swift running river. The light of the sun seemed to dim over the forest of ash and bone. Then Lena stopped. Her saber fell and her trance broke. Her eyes bulged and her lip quivered. She began to back away. But then she stopped and raised her hand to her head. Then her hand started for her neck. And Abel realized what was happening.
Lena stared at her own hand in fear. Her breaths were so fast she couldn't even manage a scream. Her fingers curled around her throat.
Abel shouted, coming forward.
"Lev, stop your singing! Levenbro!"
At the sound of his full name, Lev started to blink and the singing faded away. Light came into the woods again. Lena slumped to the ground, hyperventilating, and touched pieces of burned and broken wood, trying to grab onto something.
Abel didn't know what to do, but suddenly Zek burst through the trees. He saw Lev and Lena in complete disarray, lying on the ground in shock.
"What happened?"
All Abel could manage was: "Fetch a master."
.
It was evening. Lev and Lena had been rushed to the Temple where the masters awaited to hear their sides of the story. Abel and Zek came along as well as witnesses, along with their entire class who came to watch, having been told by Zek. They met in the sitting room.
It was an odd room. It was circular like most of the rooms in the Temple, but otherwise it was different. Comfortable couches laid about the room in various groups and angles, while plants sat and hung about. The floor was carpeted. The room was specifically built to cater to outsiders who came to the Temple, so it was modeled on comfort.
Lena spoke first. She said how she called on several of her classmates to practice dueling, but they refused until Lev agreed. They went into the woods to practice, deeper than normal, because Lev requested it to avoid others watching him. After several minutes of fighting, Lena tried to impart her skills to Lev, but he was unreceptive. She became frustrated, but agreed to simply hone her own skills. She focused her energies and began to channel the light side of the Force, which guided her own movements. She had done this before, she said. The next thing she knew, Lev was singing and the woods became dark. She felt a pounding in her head then she realized she couldn't move. The next thing she knew, her own hand was moving to choke her own neck. That's when she heard a shout and everything stopped.
Master Prada nodded politely. He was the master that Zek had found, and he in turn reached Master Yul, the other master listening to Lena's story.
Also listening to Lena's story from across the room, the classmates whispered between themselves.
"Oh, come on," Kay whispered. "Who's gonna believe Lev's channeling the dark side?" That was certainly what Lena was implying.
"She's probably making it all up," Tiloa spat. Abel felt obligated to interject.
"Not entirely…" Abel didn't know how much to say. He wanted to protect Lev, but it did look bad. Even so, his friends didn't seem convinced.
"What, you think Lev did channel the dark side?" Kay snorted. Kyrana, who had been sitting rigidly, glared at Kay.
But at that moment, the masters turned to Lev for his side of the story.
The plot details were similar. Lena had asked him to train that day, but as he remembered, it was Lena who suggested going deeper into the forest. They began to train, with sticks at first, and Lev did so poorly that he requested they stop. He wasn't learning anything. Lena tried to teach him, but she soon gave up because he couldn't get it right away. She became frustrated and suggested they use the steelsabers. She insisted and he reluctantly agreed. Then she began to attack him mercilessly, and though he tried to get her to stop, she refused to yield. After the first twenty shocks he began to lose consciousness. He remembered seeing before him a cloaked figure attacking him with a red lightsaber, but he could do nothing to stop it. It felt like a dream. The next thing he knew, Abel was running towards them and Lena was slumped on the ground.
"Hm. I wouldn't be surprised if Lev were making up that bit about the cloaked figure, making it seem like Lena was the one using the dark side," Zek said thoughtfully. "Either way, it still seems that he is shrouded in shadow." Privately, Abel agreed with him.
"You do not know." Kyrana's venomous interjection left them speechless. She had been whispering with Lev as they waited for the masters. "He does not lie."
"You only know what he told you," And said, and Kyrana turned her eye on him, color rising to her cheeks.
"I believe him," Kay said. Kyrana turned to him gratefully. "Obviously. It's right up Lena's alley. She invites him there so she can bully him – remember how much she's been failing recently – then she creates this story about Lev singing to cover up the fact that in her rage she became a Sith."
"Ah – O.K., Kay," And said, with his hands up, "I don't think you 'become a Sith' when you channel the dark side."
"Whatever, you know what I mean."
"He's kind of right, though," Tiloa said. "It's the horseshoe theory. She's such a light side zealot that she becomes like a Sith."
"Abel, didn't you say that Lena looked possessed?" Kay asked him. Abel started to equivocate, but Kay cut him off. "Exactly. She says she's channeling the light side, and you and Lev seem to say she's channeling the dark side. It's all meaningless. What matters is that she purposefully lost control of herself and inflicted pain. 'Oh no, it wasn't me it was the Force…' Bulls**t! It was her and her alone. And if she did go into some altered state, she shouldn't be doing it if she can't control it. Exactly, Tiloa: horseshoe." At that Kay put up his hands and walked away muttering.
As he paced, And continued the conversation. "I don't know, it seems pretty clear to me that they were both doing some shady things." Looking to Abel, he said: "At least you'll be able to nail Lena –"
"What do you mean 'both of them?'" Kyrana interrupted. Her eyes burned and her normally controlled voice was quivering high. "Lev did nothing wrong."
And held up his hands, and Abel started to shrug. "To me, it definitely seemed –"
But Kyrana grabbed his arm and brought him away from the others. She looked over his shoulders toward Lev, then focused on Abel.
"You can't say anything against Levenbro." She studied him seriously. Abel opened his mouth.
"I…I mean, I have to say what I saw. And it seemed –" Kyrana shook her head frantically.
"No, don't you see? He's already… He's the perfect scapegoat. They" – she nodded towards And, Tiloa and Kay – "don't care about him, they just care about screwing Lena. He doesn't have…support, even the teachers don't think… If they think he has dark tendencies –" She broke off in a huff and blinked several times, looking at Levenbro slumped in a chair as the masters talked patiently with him.
"You love him," Abel stated warmly.
She nodded. "He is my friend. I thought he was yours, as well."
"Abel," Master Prada called. "May we speak with you?" Abel turned to go, but Kyrana grasped his arm.
"I stick by my friends, Abel. It's the only thing." Then she let him go. As he waded through the couches, he caught the eyes of his other friends. And was smirking and he thought Tiloa mouthed 'Get it;' Kay was looking beyond him at Lena, trying not to smile. He looked righteous.
"Abel," Master Prada began as Abel drew near, "can you illuminate this mystery? What did you see?"
He was about to tell how Lena was dominating Lev in a grotesque way, but then he faltered. If he began to describe that, he would undoubtedly have been looking when the singing started. And what could he say? He had certainly seen Lev's mouth moving as the singing began, and besides, he knew what Lev could do: he had seen it in the forest that day when he called the animals. He looked to his friends, clamoring for justice as they would call it, revenge as Abel saw it. All he had to do was describe what he saw, Lena bullying, Lena in a trance, a darkening forest…all true, and all would point to her. But he saw Lena, saw her sitting there legs stuck together and bent daintily like a doll; her hair hung loose and frayed. He didn't have it in his heart to lie against her, not even when it was she that was the cause of all his misery after Bothawui. But could he lie for Lev? He looked equally pitiable, slumped in a chair, all hope of a reprieve surrendered. Kyrana looked on with a clean gaze, stoic; but even then, Abel could detect the hope in her eyes, hope that he would lie to save a friend. Save him from what? But he knew her fear. Lev was an oddball, a loner, and if the teachers believed him capable of what Abel saw, they might well expel him. And even if they didn't, he would be forever marked, forever treated with care, like he might explode at any moment with evil. Abel couldn't be the cause of that, he knew, he just couldn't. He couldn't betray his friend in such a way. But neither could he lie in the way his friends wanted him to. He suddenly welled up with pity for Lena. She was as much an outsider as Lev, perhaps even more so. She had experienced a modicum of friendship in her earlier days here, but as she grew with the Force, so her friends left her and she drew inward. It was the horseshoe all over again, but Lev and Lena were the ends that curved back and met again. But still opposing. It had been terrifying, thinking that each had moments where they could have destroyed each other, but must he now condemn them both? For that is surely what his testimony would show, guilt on both sides. In truth, he didn't believe either guilty of a crime. But his opinion would matter little in the face of his facts. He realized he didn't want this burden. He wanted to leave.
"Abel?" Master Yul prompted. He looked at Abel softly. He knows, Abel thought, he knows I am struggling to craft a narrative.
Abel looked back once more at his friends, at Kyrana's hope-held eyes, and he burned with shame.
"I don't know. I didn't see much. I…I heard ringing of metal and shouting and I came to investigate. When I arrived, Lena and Lev were locked in combat, but they fell away at my call. I cannot say anything."
Abel bowed his head. He was racked with shaking.
When he looked up, Master Yul was looking with such concern at him he felt so guilty he almost confessed to everything. He suddenly realized how odd the entire situation before him was. Here were two great Jedi questioning students in a sitting room – with their classmates looking on – about grave matters of the dark and the light. He realized that this wasn't a matter of discipline; the masters weren't acting as guardians of the school, but as concerned…parents. They had not insisted that their classmates leave because they themselves were too shaken. They were worried, not angry; worried that a shadow may have fallen on one or two of their children. Lena and Lev weren't to be punished, they would be helped. And Abel had prevented that, instead throwing them into more darkness. But it was too late, for Master Yul spoke, loud enough for the others to hear.
"A shadow dwells here, but we think not in our students hearts." He smiled kindly the three of them. "Something transpired that we cannot comprehend, and each remembers his own differently. Go; sleep tonight. We will think on this more. I hope –" They had turned to go, but Master Yul continued. "I hope that you will treat each other kindly. Feelings often flare in trying times as these. But remember that these are your fellow Jedi and deserve your care. And your trust." With that Masters Yul and Prada went away, conferring with each other, while the students slouched back toward their dormitories.
Abel could see Kay shaking his head, while And and Tiloa refused to make eye contact. Lena turned to Abel and seemed about to speak. She had an odd look on her face, torn between gratitude and scorn. She settled on a quick nod, then sped-walked to the dorms.
Abel fell into step with Lev and like Lena, tried to speak. "Lev…I'm sorry…"
Lev shrugged. "You didn't see anything. I understand." Abel nodded, more for his own sake.
"You know, if there was any way I could have defended you…" But Lev just nodded.
Then he stopped, and placing his squishy hand on Abel's arm, said: "You tried. You're a good friend." A smile flickered then died. Lev left Abel standing there and walked to Kyrana who gently took his hand in hers. She grasped his shoulder then leaned in, hugging him. He broke the hug and moped forward to seek the solace of his lonely room.
Abel started walking, but no sooner had he started than he was thrown back against the wall. He thought he had been force-pushed, but he felt a forearm jab into his windpipe. Kyrana was nearly foaming at the mouth as she spat her words at him.
"You saw nothing? Lies!" She pushed him again against the wall. Abel huffed in pain as his head banged. "You had it in your power to pardon him, yet you say nothing." Another jolt. "Now he's branded as a Sith, you – you –" One last jolt then she released him. Abel fell to the ground clutching his neck.
"Wha – what the hell?"
"You faithless friend!" There were no tears on Kyrana's face, only anger.
"What was I supposed to do? I couldn't lie, I did see him singing, bringing darkness…"
She laughed mirthlessly. "Lie? You said you saw nothing. You're already a liar, but you're a coward and a betrayer too!"
"Maybe I'm a coward, but I did not betray him."
"Yes you did." She quieted. Her soft voice was even scarier than her screams. It shook with emotion. "You betrayed him from the moment you met him. You were never his friend. He was just a stepping stone, someone you could use because you felt oh so out-of-place. The new kid finds the weird kid and makes friends. Great! Then you abandon him for your new friends, but only come back to him when you feel like it."
Abel tried to think. Did he do that? He didn't know.
"Yes, you see? You don't care about what happens to him, really. You just spin your wheels, la-la, and once you're done here, at this wonderful academy, are you going to call on him in his small house? Hmm?" Kyrana was pacing back and forth, letting all her feelings she had harbored toward Abel for two years. "No, by then you'll be on some grand adventure and have no time for him. I am there every time he feels lonely, I am there every time he wants to quit, I am there, at dinnertime or on off-day walks in the woods, I am there every time your friends ridicule or exclude him... And every time you play the middle ground. Even tonight, you refuse to pick a side, you refuse to back your friend."
"I…I couldn't…"
"I would at least have respected you if you told the truth," Kyrana said finally. "At least that would have meant something. But this…" She clenched her fists, intent on rolling on another tirade, but then she blew out a puff of breath and released the tension. She threw up her hands and started to walk away. But then she couldn't resist one last word.
"I stand with my friends. You stand for yourself. That is a difference I cannot reconcile." Then she walked away.
