~Nava's POV~

Nava did not often have visions. As a Padawan they had been even rarer than when she had been a Knight. Visions were Obi-wan's expertise. He had them less since being cut off from the Force, but he still did have them.

Having been strong with the Mirroring force, she was more prone to catching someone's else's nightmare than having one of her own, but this night she knew it was hers.

And she knew that it was important.

"Nava!"

She spun at the sound of her name, snapped and yet spoken at the same time. Sharp and firm, gentle and yielding. She would recognize the tone anywhere, despite all the years that had passed. But the person who held the voice was nowhere to be found in sight. Nava swiveled, trying to see anything past the fogginess of her environment.

There were pinpoints of light streaming down on her from above, as if she were trapped beneath hunting mesh, and the sunlight was beating upon the fabric, trying in vain to get through to her.

Everywhere else was darkness. Hauntingly empty darkness that was impenetrable. Nava let out a small growl of frustration that she could see nothing. Why couldn't she see? And where was she?

"Nava!"

Once more the voice shouted out, this time with more urgency. Nava moved forward, hands spread in front of her, trying to feel what she could not see. "Master!" She called back.

"Master, where are you?" She yelled into the darkness. "Hidden, my child. Hidden by the shroud of the Dark side," Nava's brow furrowed, though she knew that it was all too likely Kapli was right.

Heart pounding, she stopped turning and moving, accepting her inability to see with reluctance. After all, she had been forced to accept a great many things over the years.

"Master," she said softly. "How can I find you?" Because she wanted to find that woman. She had not seen Kapli is more than ten years. Even in dreams. The thought that she would be able to see her now was cruelly tantalizing at her heart strings.

"I am not for you to find," came the mysterious answer. Nava chuckled softly. Same old Kapli, always with her riddles. It was hardly a surprise, seeing as Kapli had always martyrized Master Yoda. "Then how do I seek you?" She amended. She really should have seen that coming. Kapli's presence from above radiated slight amusement.

The amusement of a mother broke through the darkness. The pinpoints of light above her, no more than stars a minute before, became one glowing spot of pure light. Nava closed her eyes tight and looked away, blinded by the clarity of it, A clarity she had not felt for a very long time.

Her muscles cried out in abrupt pain and she gasped as she was hit with a purity that boiled in her heart and surrounded her lungs with acid air. She recognized it as if it were an old friend with a fuzzy face in her memory.

The feeling of the force running through her veins. When Nava opened her eyes again she found herself on one side of a roaring campfire. Gasping, she swiveled around, taking in the darkness of night around her.

The forest that surrounded the small clearing rippled with a soft wind, which ruffled the trees and caused a company of musical chirping and twittering from birds and insects. Nava inhaled sharply, and realized that the air was warm and smelt of lavender.

The pond a few feet away lapped at the shore, causing tiny sounds of content to rise from land as it was stroked by the water. She looked up at the fat face of mother moon overhead, then down at her reflections in the water, a queen always beholding herself in all the mirrors of the world.

Nava smiled gently. She looked down at herself, half expecting to find herself a Padawan again. The last time she had seen this picture she had been sixteen. Yet she was there, a grown woman yet. She was a bit disappointed. Even in dreaming, the gift of youth was something she would have liked to possess just once more until she noticed that her dingy slaves rags had been replaced by warm and clean Jedi tunics.

Her hair, ratty and tangled with sweat and blood, was now heavy and smelled sweet with fresh braids. She felt as if she had stepped into another skin altogether, and thus became a different person.

But I am the same, she reminded herself firmly, trying to quell the excitement that made itself apparent in her breast, hands roaming down her body as if to feel the still healing scars in some places. This is dream, and I am the same person except for…

The lightsaber at her side. Nava inhaled sharp enough to make her lungs ache as she snatched the weapon at her hip into her hands. Urgently, she felt at the weight in her hands again, feeling the worn cool familiarity of it, sitting there as if it had been waiting for her.

To others, this was a weapon of death, a warning, a sign of her authority. To her, it was a dear friend, a protector and enslaver, savior and soul mate. To hold it-even if this was just a dream-was a tantalizing gift.

At some level it could be called cruel, but Nava was grateful, for the moment, for the cruelty. She had not held this weapon in seven years. She missed the metal in her hands, missed feeling its power reverberate in her soul, the only time when she could be sure that she was her was when her saber reacted. It only reacted to her, after all.

"Oh, my friend," she mumbled, igniting it and staring at the bright light that emerged in scorching heat and power. She watched the sleek elegance of the blade, entranced as a youngling. She was so entranced, indeed, that she did not see the graceful creature slip into the circle of flame on the other side of the fire.

"Well, hello to you too. Good Force, I've been itching to get you out of those slave's rags for years," a very familiar voice said. Nava looked up. Then she had to grin in exuberant joy when she saw who was standing there at the other side of the fire. Even the joy of seeing her lightsaber could not compare to her joy at seeing her old teacher.

Setting the lightsaber at her hip, she stood there a moment, gazing at the Twi'lek woman who had taught her everything she knew, the woman who reminded her so much of Intrepid.

"Master," she breathed. Kapli smiled and dropped the few sticks of firewood she had managed to bring herself to find.

Nava took it as the invitation it was. With a burst of speed someone at her age should not have had, she was suddenly racing into her mentor's arms. "I've missed you, my master," she mumbled brokenly, burying her face in Kapli's shoulder. She wasn't quite taller than Kapli yet, but she was almost there.

Kapli snorted as she stroked Nava's hair gently. "As if I went anywhere. Honestly, dear, you know better than to think I have let you out of my sight for more than two seconds the past however many years. Even Qui-gon, with his over protective, interfering, arrogant Gundark's hide has accused me of coddling," she informed her. Nava smiled dully as they separated.

"I'm a misguided soul," she reminded Kapli.

Kapli chuckled softly, eyes lighting with affection as she gazed at her. "That might be my fault…Nay. I'm proud of you, my girl. Very proud," Nava's bottom lip trembled. She quickly turned away to hide her tears.

She knew this, of course. She had always been aware of Kapli's pride in her, had not once been given reason to doubt. At some level, she had always felt Kapli's pride in her with a clarity that never vanished, but hearing it was another thing altogether. And especially now. "I remember this place," she recalled fondly, looking around.

"I brought Intrepid here once. When she was younger," good Force knew the girl was no longer a child. Nava still could not figure out where the time had gone too, and when she began to think of it, her head started to hurt. Time was something not to be contemplated.

"Hmm," Kapli joined her in staring out at the river, arms folded behind her. The fire crackled and danced behind them, making their shadows scurry to keep connected to their owners."This is also where I gave you a lecture on attachment…Concerning a certain Kenobi boy," she said.

Nava smiled impishly. "I'm hard-headed," she defended herself when Kapli gave her an exasperated look. "And besides, he's a good man," she assured her master, who nodded.

"He is," Kapli agreed cheerfully. "And by decree of Siri, Tahl, Qui-gon and a good majority of everyone else up there, I've been tasked with asking you to keep him out of trouble, if any such thing is possible," she told her dubiously. Nava cocked a brow.

"It isn't," she agreed. She wondered what Anakin's opinion on this keeping people safe business would be, and especially when Obi-wan was involved. I can already hear him laughing himself into tears, she thought.

"I know," Kapli shook her head with a smile, then her face sobered. Nava noticed the difference immediately. She turned to her.

"Master," she began. "Not that I'm unhappy to see you, but what are you doing here?" She asked. Kapli glanced at her.

"Perhaps," the older woman said slowly. "It would be best if we sat down," she gestured towards the log that mysteriously conjured itself before the searing flames. Nava's gut clenched. I have a bad feeling about this, she decided.

Nevertheless, Nava allowed Kapli steer her towards the fire to sit down at her side. The Jedi master was staring into the flames, obviously deep in thought Nava waited patiently.

While she awaited whatever message Kapli had been sent to deliver, Nava curiously watched the orange beams of the fire dance on Kapli's aged face. Her master had never been old, in Nava's view. Of course, she had been older than even Nava was now when she had been killed,

However, Kapli was not old by any normal personifications of it. There was no satirical length to her sighs or the waning joy of life in her eyes, or even the affectionate amusement that came with watching the universe pass you by. Her face, when viewed by light of the fire, was as soft and thoughtful as a young girls, the defined bones and wrinkles mere set backs on the path to true loveliness.

Had Nava not known the woman while in life, she'd have assumed that this apparition sitting at her side was an angel, might even have mistaken her as an angel of death. Things pertaining to that nature certainly tended to have the innocence on Kapli's normally merry features.

Kapli had always and forever remained young in Spirit besides. Nava wondered if it was contributed to Kapli's strength in the force or whether the cheerfulness passed down to her had been the real cause. Whatever it had been, Nava could only hope that she never aged either, at least not in that way. To grow older was one thing, to actually get old another.

"This is difficult to explain, my dear," Kapli finally spoke, eyes down cast. "And I do not have much time, so I will not explain it. Suffice to say, the balance is more than half way tipped," Nava nodded. So she had figured years earlier."And now, the balance is breaking," Kapli said.

Nava's brow furrowed. "The what is what?" She demanded.

Kapli waved a hand dismissively. "It is not for you to worry about now. There are only two who can solve that problem, and neither includes you. What I mean to say is…Everything that will happen….Will happen," she said.

Nava stared at Kapli as if she had gone mad. And she was sure that she had. Which of them had lost their marbles first though was not to be answered tonight. Kapli was gazing at her with such an intense, concentrated gaze that Nava felt sure she was trying to tell her something appallingly important.

"Master, I don't understand…" she said.

"Everything that has happened has been preordained at the start of time, Nava. And it will happen. Darkness will be absolute soon enough. When the grandfather clock goes out, that is when darkness will fall," Kapli asserted, a bit confusedly herself, as if she were listening to a secret message within her mind and the words were coming out burbled.

"The grandfather clock?" Nava echoed, more than just a bit mystified. Then something occurred to her. "Are you saying that we need to save the grandfather clock?" She asked hesitantly, guessing.

"You can't," Kapli stated wisely. "It has been preordained. And we cannot help you. Nava, the Shroud of the Dark Side is too deep for those who have been left behind," now her eyes grew sorrowful. "Always, the fighters of the Light have been privy to knowledge from those before, to power stemming directly from those lost…That is no more," she told her.

Nava felt as if she had been punched in the gut. "We have?" She demanded. "I don't remember ever having any knowledge that I didn't learn myself," she pointed out indignantly.

"We are all copies of those who have gone before us," Kapli sighed ruefully. Nava shook her head, and returned her gaze to the lake.

"Master, for once, I wish that you would make sense to me," she admitted.

"You'll understand in time. Just know this: when the grandfather clock goes out, darkness will fall," she repeated, with a haunted look in her eyes.

"But what does that mean?" Nava hissed.

"It means…" Kapli opened her mouth, clearly struggling to find words that could explain hat in the blasted blazes she was talking about…

But at least shook her head with a sigh. "It means this, Nava," she whispered softly, and waved her hand. Nava looked up when the atmosphere changed from the fireside she had known as a child to the battlefield that she had grown up in as an adult.

A universe bathed in darkness.

She gasped, looking around her at hills and hills and caverns and crevices filled with fire. The building that had once inhabited the ground were now ruins of mangled disease and famine. People of all species screamed in outright madness as any sort of anything that could be used as a weapon was used against the fellow at his side.

Everyone was doing it. Every man, woman and child Mother turned against daughter, and son against father. Hope was lost because there wasn't a single person not trying to kill the person next to them. This wasn't even the calm enslavement that Sith called order.

This was chaos descended and taken root inside the mind, this was destruction unleashed without a chain around its neck. This was fire and flame and heat without its brother cold to tame it. This was darkness in agony over the loss of Light.

She looked up to see a blood red sky spanning for miles, space with no stars. The moon had been blocked out by a giant contraption that Nava knew all too well. The Death Star lay clear in orbit, and even from the ground Nava could see the half that was reflected by the sun was aflame. Orange and black and red.

The colors of fire and destruction.

Eyes wide, her sight was drawn back to the fighting below her. There wasn't a a Sith or Jedi to be found. It was all fighting, and she could feel that whatever this place had been. It wasn't alone. Everywhere was fighting, was dying, was wanton destruction.

There wasn't even any beauty in the flames, nor even resolve or courage in any of the faces below. War was ugly, but it could bring out beauty. It could bring out loyalty and selflessness, humility and freedom. There was none of that here. Not even greed was here. There was nothing to fight over because everything was destroyed. They were just fighting.

Nava was horrified. "What..." She choked, finding her throat clogged with tears. "What is this place?" She demanded.

"This is Darkness without Light," a voice behind her whispered. Nava spun around, but it was not Kapli that caught her eyes next. But the only building left standing.

The Jedi Temple.

It was still standing, if one could call the half crumpled thing that it had become stood. Yet, it wasn't helping anything, in fact as far as she could see it was deserted.

Not aflame, not even a refuge for those below. No one ran to it because a building could not be refuge. There was no refuge. There was no light, no way to hide from the darkness, nothing to show them that there was another way. Only by seeing an opposite was there a choice.

That choice had been taken, and the darkness roared back in screams of true rage because darkness existed to defeat light, and now that it had, there was no purpose in its existence. Destruction was nothing without creation, because what would it destroy? Itself? As far as Nava could see it had already done that.

Now all it had to do was…

Fight. Fight for nothing, against nothing, with nothing, having nothing.

So the Jedi Temple stood discarded, not as a sign of hope, but as a sign of slavery. There was no hope anymore, no one knew what it was. The only artifact left that had seen those better times was the Temple, but even the name Jedi had been discarded.

"This is the universe Nava. Without Jedi or Sith. The Force users of the galaxy destroyed themselves. The Jedi in trying to prevent the inevitable, and the Sith in trying to rule that which cannot be ruled," Kapli whispered. Nava's eyes snapped to meet hers.

"You mean this is going to happen?" She nearly screamed. Kapli's large eyes were sad. "This," Nava swept her hand to encompass the entire theatre of hatred splayed out below. The place once named Courascant, but nothing had names anymore. Names had to be created. Creation was gone.

"Was preordained? By whom?" She demanded. "And this is impossible anyway!" she cried. Kapli only stared back forlornly. Nava couldn't stand the message in her mentor's eyes.

She swiveled around, staring down at the carnage with tears streaking down her face. "You cannot kill Light without killing darkness! They're one!" She shouted.

"Not while they are on two different sides of the balance," Kapli whispered.

"What does that mean? This can't be so," desperately, she gazed around. "There must some good left in someone! How can you know what darkness is without ever having seen Light?" She demanded.

"How can you know what Light is when you're surrounded by darkness?" Kapli countered calmly.

"This can't happen!" Nava choked. "I won't let it! The galaxy won't let it, the Force can't let it! Even if the balance is tipped there must be Light! It defies the laws of nature any other way," She screamed.

"Nature was destroyed," Kapli informed her helpfully. "It had creation in its laws. Thus it was the Dark's enemy," she carefully informed her. Nava was most unhappy with this news.

"What do you mean darkness destroyed it? You can't destroy creation because then who would create destruction?" Kapli cocked a brow.

"That's what destruction is doing," she pointed out.

Nava shook her head, not daring, defiantly not believing that any such thing could be true. It went against every teaching and philosophy ever given that darkness could exist without light.

"THIS IS NOT REAL! Did you say this is what is to become of the universe?" It couldn't be. There had to be a way…

"If the balance is not broken," Kapli replied, with a diffident half shrug. Nava could not believe her master was being so nonchalant about all of this.

"So we have a chance?" She summed up. Kapli gave her a small, sympathetic smile.

"All is preordained," she replied.

"What's preordained? This madness or a different choice?" Nava screamed.

Her master merely shook her head. "Remember, my apprentice; the Shroud of the Dark Side has fallen. We are no longer able to help you. When the grandfather clock goes out, darkness will fall," she reminded her. Nava's temper boiled over.

"What does that mean?" She yelled again, for the first time in her life wanting to seriously strangle Kapli. However, as if she had heard her apprentice's thoughts, Kapli smiled sadly and pressed her fingers to her lips. Slowly, her body began to fade at the edges.

"I love you, Nava, remember what I have said. Warn the others: When the grandfather clock goes out, darkness will fall," she whispered, blowing Nava a kiss.

"Master! Master, wait! What do you mean?" Nava cried, reaching out, but her hands gripped nothing, and Kapli was vanishing.

"Master!" She screamed again, trapped within this horrible reality of Darkness missing its nemesis, of the BAlance of Nature undeniably broken and misguided so that nothing, nothing was alright. "Master! MASTER!"

"Master!" Nava sat straight up with a strangled gasp. Sweat dripped down her forehead, and shivers wracked her body. Her heart pounded in her ears, a drumbeat so loud that for a moment hushed all else.

Her hand smacked something warm and solid next to her. Desperately, her eyes sought out the horrible fiery blackness that she had just come from. But it was not there, at least not the suffocating sort she had just come rom. This darkness was silky and soft, filled with the sound of soft snores of the exhausted, and warm with bodies.

The warm body next to her shifted, and above the rushing of blood in her ears she could hear a voice mumbling her name sleepily. "Mmm, Nava? Why'd you hit me? What'd I do?" Obi-wan inquired, not with irritation but rather the whine that accompanied hurt feelings.

Nava stared down at him, vaguely wondering where she was. Then, as if a tidal wave, it all came back. She was in the here and now where she belonged. Nava had never been so grateful.

"Oh, Obi," she mumbled, taking immeasurable relief from him. She reached down to rub his back soothingly, though it was herself she were trying to console.

"Why wouldn't she answer my question?" She asked despairingly.

"Who?" Obi-wan inquired, still sleepily as he turned unto his back, propping himself up on his elbows to face the general direction of her voice. He squinted at her with blind eyes as if he were trying to figure out why he still couldn't see her with his eyes open.

"It wasn't real, hopefully," Nava muttered, her mind still trapped with the horrid picture of a potential future for all the galaxy. She shivered more violently. "It couldn't be. Darkness cannot exist without light, right?" She looked down at her puzzled husband.

"Is it morning?" Obi-wan replied, not yet awake himself.

"Oh, Obi, what did she mean by the shroud of the Dark Side? And this supposed knowledge we've always had. Did you know about any of that?" She demanded, while her heart returned to normal pace, though fright still held a claim on her.

"Someone go tell Yoda to filch me a sandwich from the kitchens," Obi-wan mumbled, his eyelids drooping. Nava smacked his chest, making him jolt as if he had been electrocuted.

"Obi! Stay awake! You have to help me figure this out!" she commanded.

"All I want is a sandwich!" Obi-wan growled at his attacker, obviously piqued by his continued abuse.

"No one has a blasted sandwich Obi-wan! You have visions. What's the grandfather clock?" Nava asked.

At first, it appeared as if Obi-wan had woken up, and were giving her question serious thought when he sighed dramatically and laid down on his back once more. "Ham please," he requested, crossing his ankles. Nava stared down at him as he then proceeded to ignore her and go back to sleep. Men, she steamed, watching him.

Then, wickedly, she bent down over him. It might not be the most appropriate thing to do, but he deserved it. With that decided, she landed a ferocious, passionate kiss on his lips, efficiently cutting off his air supply.

That woke him up.

"Nava!" hissed the Negotiator, eyes popping open and his arms flexing to grab her own and push her away with surprising gentleness for someone so startled.

"How did you know it was me?" Nava inquired sweetly, rather pleased that he didn't call someone else's name.

After all, there were over a dozen other women near them, and Sith included had begun noticing her husband's natural charms. It could have been anybody, and Nava would not have particularly been angry had he called someone else's name.

"Only you would be so cruel," Obi-wan dryly commented, setting her down at his side. He cocked his head, listening to see if they had awoken anyone else, but once he noticed that she had not been that careless, turned back to her sternly.

"For Force sakes, Nava you could have woken me the civilized way," he reprimanded. Nava was too relieved by his presence to be angry at him.

"I tried hitting you, yelling at you and talking to you," she informed him.

"You did?" Obi-wan seemed surprised. "When?" He demanded.

"A few seconds ago, you chosski," she replied.

"I don't remember that," Obi-wan dubiously replied, crossing his arms.

She snorted. "I should think not. You wanted a sandwich," she told him.

"Really?" Obi-wan asked, even more surprised. A grin quirked up at the sides of her mouth.

"And you wanted Yoda to filch it from the kitchens. With ham," she said.

Obi-wan stroked his beard contemplatively. "Ah…That does sound like something I would do," he mumbled abashedly. "I worry about myself sometimes," he admitted.

"Join the club," Nava agreed. Obi-wan sat there for a minute, obviously trying to link how he managed to get Yoda, ham, sandwich and filch all in one sentence without at least giving it supreme thought.

"Well, now that you have my undivided attention, what did you wake me for?" He inquired after the moment of contemplation ended.

Nava sobered immediately. A flash of red and black pivoted before her eyes once more. "I had a vision," she admitted, softly.

He perked up immediately. "A vision from the Force? Are you sure?" he asked, grabbing her arm. Nava shivered.

I wish I weren't so sure, she thought ruefully, meaning it with very fiber in her body left to her. "I'm sure," she replied. "Kapli was in it. She gave me a message," she said.

Obi-wan, having felt her shiver, scooted closer to massage her shoulders and neck reassuringly. The fright in her heart started to decrease, though the shock of it never went away. "What was the message?" Obi-wan asked softly, as if he were afraid that they would be overheard.

"The Shroud of The Dark Side has fallen. She can no longer help me," she named off.

To her astonishment, Obi-wan nodded understandingly. "I thought so when Anakin told me Qui-gon hadn't visited him in seven years, and it has been awhile since anyone else has seen any other Force ghost…Or anything of that nature, admittedly," he explained, feeling her confusion.

Nava nodded. She hoped that was what Kapli had meant. Rumors had it that Qui-gon Jinn had appeared to Dooku, so why not them? Or was it only them who the ones before could not help? "And she also said," here Nava scowled. "That when the grandfather clock goes out, then darkness will fall," she explained. Obi-wan's brow creased.

"Cryptic. It certainly rules out the factor that this might have just been a bad dream," he mumbled thoughtfully. Nava was glad she was not the only one who thought so.

"Did Kapli explain?" He asked. "She did everything but explain, including and up to informing me there was nothing I could do about it, that there was still hope, that the balance is going to break and we're all doomed," she groaned.

Obi-wan did not seem overly concerned. "So she's become morbid. It happens to us all eventually," he observed dispassionately.

"That isn't funny Obi-wan," Nava growled. "What she showed me…The sort of place she said the universe could become, it had no Light," she said.

"Impossible," was the sure answer. "There can be no Darkness without Light, just as there can be no Light without Darkness. Nothing either side could do would destroy the other," he reminded her.

Nava nodded. "I thought so too, but…" her unease came back, along with a violent shudder. "She said there were no Force users. They had all died out. People fought, continuously, without end. They didn't even have a reason to fight…But nor did they have a reason not to. There wasn't anything they had to compare. There was only darkness, so they didn't know what Light was," she said.

Obi-wan's brows beetled further. "But…It isn't possible," he said again.

"How do we know that, Obi-wan? The balance has never, ever, ever in all of history that we know, been tipped completely to the Dark Side's favor. What if it is one day? She said it was preordained, though she didn't specify what," the speculation left both hearts chilled.

"Nothing is set in stone," Obi-wan whispered after along moment. Nava sighed and gripped the front of his shirt, if only to remind herself that he was there.

"Says the man who believes in the Prophecy of the Chosen One," she whispered back.

At that, Obi-wan stiffened, because it was true. "I believe in Anakin, the Prophecy has little to do with it," he stammered lamely.

"Anakin is the Prophecy, Obi-wan," and with that they lapsed into another fearful silence. Not because they were afraid to die, but because they were afraid that life itself would accompany them into death.

Obi-wan took it farther than her. Ignoring the potential that someone might see, he pulled her into his arms and hugged her tight against him. Nava rested her head on his chest, listening to a steady heartbeat. Listening to life where it was most apparent, as if by hearing and seeing it, she could deny it's death. There could be no death without life.

Destruction couldn't destroy creation, could it? Because then who would create life? Only life could destroy. If Life went, there was nothing to destroy. That was why darkness needed Light.

Or does it?

It had too. Otherwise, when whatever this grandfather clock was went out, then that would be the start of galactic annihilation.

End of Part One