Whie tried not to sleep. The nightmares were always regular. Almost every night for the last two years he had them.
In every nightmare he was falling.
There was always something he was doing...A class he was supposed to attend. It was his turn on front gate duty. He had to mist the plants. He had to deliver hyperspace coordinates to a Master. He had to go to the cafeteria to help prepare a meal.
He was always being hunted. The ground shook around him. He was shaking. On his knees. He was always clinging desperately to a high place.
Then he would fall, fall, and keep falling...
The true dreams were different.
Those were not like the nightmares.
He was aware.
Too aware in fact. He would go to sleep, and then wake up with a jerk in the future in a bigger body, as if he had fallen through a trapdoor and was actually moving ahead through time, in a dream. One time he had a dream he was building his own light-saber, but he had been seven when he had the dream.
There was nothing worse than that horrible feeling of being buried alive. Of seeing someone he hadn't yet seen, talking to them, helping them, laughing, even getting a little upset with their behavior.
The panic grew so intense he would snap out of his bed when he woke up and stand staring into nothingness, while at other times it would be hours before he jerked awake back in his room.
Other times in the real dreams he was flying and would land on the ground through some means. It was dry and cold, devoid of any life. He was standing on mounds of rubble and debris that went on as far as he could see and the sky was gray with no light.
Swept up the in the same destructive aftermath like the land was.
There were people standing before him.
One was a bald woman with tattoos on her skull.
Three more had cranium horns protruding from their skulls. He could smell the dark side on the woman like two with spikes protruding from their skulls were saturated in the dark side that it came off in waves to the point of nauseating him.
There was another-he wore a face mask, obscuring everything about him...But, like his comrades he reeked of the dark side.
They terrified him, especially the being in gray armor. His head was long, like his cranium had been pusposely elongated, and two big bulbous eyes protruded from the sickly sight. He was easily nine feet tall and twice as wide, dwarfing his fellow comrades, even the other one in armor.
The were two Jedi apprentices beside him.
The first was a red haired girl named Talisibeth, but everyone called her Scout. In waking life she was a year older than him. She was competitive, loud, bossy, headstrong, an ace at unarmed combat, and had never paid much attention to him.
The second was an ebony haired girl named Aola. In waking life she was three years his junior. She was strong, emotional, liked playing pranks, telling people off in alien languages, getting in trouble, and loved eating sweets.
In the dream, blood was covering Talisibeth's face.
Aola had her blade digging into the ground, her face was bloody.
They were both staring at him.
"Do you love these girls, little boy? This ten year old is protecting you and your friend. She is fighting to the very limits of her abilities and you sit there like a coward."
The being with red and black skin spoke.
His voice was low, piercing, and contemptuous.
Aola's blade dug deeper.
Whie could feel her desperation and fury, how she fought so furiously against these beings that terrified him to near paralysis.
Blood began to pour from Tailisibeth's mouth. It oozed in a red blob down her throat to drench through the hem of her tunic until there was a streak going all the way down to her hip and the blood ran down between her legs to her ankles.
She looked at him with so much intensity, so much fear, and...
"You should be ashamed, Jedi. You are going to die. They are going to die. But, I will give the brave child a worthy death of a warrior. I will give the girl a worthy death...But you will not be so lucky..."
The bald woman grinned at him, teeth like daggers. "You die first and shamefully, you are the model Jedi here. Seeing the sorrow or fear in your eyes when I push the oxygen out of you...Will be euphoria."
It was always the same in that regard.
Always on the far away world that had no life, only bombed out ruins, all of it always made him feel exhausted.
Sometimes he would be on Coruscant.
When that happened he was always in the Temple.
He was running for his life, but couldn't move, there were two beings there that chilled him to the bone.
They had no muscles-they were just skin and bone. They looked like corpses. Their eyes were pitch black. Their hair was as white as snow.
Their veins bulged, the same black as their eyes.
They moved slow and methodical.
They were mowing through Jedi.
In one hand was a light-saber, with the other hand they were using lightning and the force to bash everyone around them. Hundreds and hundreds of Jedi fell with such ease. His comrades charged. Jedi Masters and Jedi Knights alike rallied but it was all in vain.
These two were too ferocious, too powerful, too pinpoint, too vicious, and their might and intensity was too brutal to defend against.
They were savages.
Jedi bodies piled through the Temple.
He could hear his brethren screaming.
He could hear them crying.
Begging.
Pleading.
He could feel their hearts breaking.
He could smell the stench of cauterized flesh, the pressure around him from the force push. He could feel the paralyzing agony of the lightning scorching his nerves. His fellow Jedi's shock.
Their horror.
He could feel all of it.
"We're your friends!"
"We're your family!"
"Please don't kill us!"
"Don't do this!"
The cruel beings fed them their blades while they screamed the words over and over. Jedi Masters were fed the blade. Jedi Knights were fed the blade. Jedi Padawans were fed the blade. Whie could distinctly remember Jedi being bisected from the head down.
Their limbs and heads all being taken in a single sweep of Mou Kei.
A Padawan younger than him screaming in pain as his body was ripped into two pieces. His bones and tendons snapping, his spine shattering. The half with the head was smashed right before Whie's eyes in a bloody mass and he wept, bowing his head in submission and mercy.
Then whenever he would panic when the murders became too much, whenever he was fed the blade, whenever he had to see someone younger than him be fed the blade, when someone was pulled apart and smashed to pieces, the dream would finally shift, and he would be looking into the sky of Coruscant.
He always felt like he was supposed to be doing something, that something wasn't quite right. Before he could ponder more, the entire city-scape of Coruscant-from the lowest levels to the highest levels, the skyscrapers, the Senate Hall, the Jedi Temple, all of the buildings, the whole planet was rolled into one massive tidal wave.
The waves of destruction froze him in place.
He could hear the entire population screaming, crying, and shrieking.
Molten tons of steel and bodies all contorting and dispersing, tearing into his ears like twisted metal.
Before it hit him-he would always wake up.
But, there was another dream that he had since before he began his training as a Jedi. In that dream there was nothing to see or hear. There was no planet, no stairs, no people, he wasn't running, but he couldn't move according to his will either.
In this dream there was no light. There was a sense of fear. Someone...Something was always watching him. He could feel it against the edges of his perception, a presence, the darkness that grew within the darkness that already blinded him.
But, at this moment in time the silence in that darkness evaporated.
A roar like none other-not even the combination of a star destroyer's engines thrusting on full power and a Rancor bellowing could compare to this. It shook him to his core, hollowed out his chest, and filled him with despair.
He began to cry.
Then-whatever or whoever it was that had been watching him finally spoke.
The voice pierced his ear drums.
The pure malice and contempt made him shiver.
This thing hated him.
He could not move or run away from the crushing grip that ensnared him. He couldn't scream. He couldn't fight. He couldn't cry out. He was helpless. Fingers pried into his throat, an impact slammed into his chest, effectively cutting off his sense of breathing.
"You of Ashla. You are weak, just like Ashla. Whenever you dream, I will know you are, and I will come to you to torment you in your sleep. You will not sleep peacefully-you are mine and you belong to me!"
"Who are you?"
Were the words Whie tried to say, but it was impossible.
"I am darkness. I am hatred. I am destruction. I am rage. I am fury. I am wrath. I am all that you of Ashla fear and revile. I am what makes you all sick. I will forever cast you into darkness. Do you understand weakling!? I am going to eat you-I am going to take your light and extinguish it, and there is nothing you can do about it."
Whie fought to no avail.
"There is no light here. Look around you. You of Ashla wretched filth. I will eat you!"
"Whie! Wake up!"
"Mnn..."
"Whie, it's me. Master Leem. Please wake up."
He opened his eyes, looking into the kind face that was looming over him.
"Master Leem...What are you..."
She blinked down at him.
"Whie, are you okay?"
He blinked a couple of times, trying to hold onto the present, trying to hang onto the light, and trying to hang onto reality itself. He savored the oxygen going down his throat and the smooth exhale of his lungs. The fact Coruscant and the Jedi Temple were intact brought him relief.
He finally took the time to notice that the boys who roomed in the dorm with him were clustering around his bed.
"Were you having one of those dreams again?"
He remembered Scout and Aola.
The blood that covered Aola's face.
The blood that covered Talisibeth.
The blood that had soaked through his robes.
Then he thought of that terrifying roar, that malicious voice in the darkness, that hand that reached out to grab a hold of his throat, and that promised to always torment him in his sleep.
And there was the two cruel beings who were the embodiment of the dark side. It did not come off in waves or gush, nor did it come off of them like molten lava. They were the dark side. They were the physical container through which it operated.
They were too powerful. Frighteningly powerful and completely cruel. Pitiless. Bestial. Barbarous. Black hearted. There wasn't an ounce of good in them. They were so cruel that they fed their blades to Jedi in training younger than him.
They massacred Jedi Knights.
They mowed down Jedi Masters.
They destroyed the statues, the pillars, the gardens, everything of beauty was torn asunder...
The whole time he could hear the cries and wails of fellow Jedi.
Whie came back to reality once more, not even aware he had drifted off until Master Leem laid her six fingers on his hand.
"Whie, if it is bothering you, you can tell me. You should tell me. We can go somewhere private."
Whie tried to look composed. "It was nothing, Master Leem. Just a bad dream."
"Didn't sound like a nightmare."
"You were really afraid. You kept saying we're your friends and family."
"You said something about a person with a long skull too."
"And about lipstick and tattoos, that was kind of weird.
"It was just a bad dream. Intense, but just a bad dream." Whie reasoned, tone even.
He was thankful the dodge was enough to get the boys around him to go back to their cots, more than a little disappointed at the news.
Master Leem just sighed seeing the whole thing. They were all still young enough to want to see themselves in the future or have a vision of the future.
They thought having visions would be fun.
They couldn't understand the fear of drowning in their own body. To see a moment-to be in a moment of the future, like a mountain revealed in the lake through the fog. To move and interact with people they have yet to meet...
One could only smash right into it, and there was no way to really recover from it.
To be completely aware and functioning in the future was horrifying.
To be in a older, bigger body, or a smaller, immature body. To see people dead or dying, who are alive in the present, will shake anyone. To see destruction on worlds and even on the Jedi Temple itself. To tap into the possibilities.
"Whie?" She ventured, focusing on him more intently.
Whie found himself spacing out again.
Who were those two cruel beings?
Who was that group on that demolished world?
Whie grimaced a little.
All of them stank of the dark side, it came off in rushing waves, in smoke, in fire, in the cold hatred that iced their veins.
And they were fighting to the death.
And the girls...
Why was he covered in Scout's blood or his own?
Why would she look at him in the future with so much fear?
Why did her eyes bulge?
Why did she have so much fear and intensity?
Why would Aola look at him with such contempt?
Why was her face nothing but the crimson of blood?
Why was she laying down her life for him, when he should be safeguarding her since she is younger?
Perhaps both would become allies of the evil group.
Perhaps Talisibeth would give in to her desires, her anger, and her lust.
Maybe she would try to trap him...
Seduce him.
Manipulate him.
Perhaps Aola would give in to her fury, her rage, and murderous intent.
She would use that as her power.
Maybe she would be the one to kill him.
To run her blade through his chest.
To send him flying off of a staircase.
She would embrace the dark side.
Or, maybe they would both be killed.
Maybe the three of them would all be killed without remorse.
And, those two cruel beings that decimated everything...
"Whie, what are you thinking about?" Master Leem pressed, keeping her voice even.
He squeezed her hand in assurance, able to keep his voice even.
"It was just a bad dream. One of the dreams that are more...Intense. But, it was just a dream. Just a bad dream."
Whie didn't stop insisting until he was left alone and Master Leem conceded that he was okay.
The most terrifying thing was that he had been haunted his whole life with such destructive dreams, but this was the first time he had ever heard that voice speaking to him in the darkness. Never had he found himself in a body much older than the one he was in now.
Never had that voice lashed out against him in a physical capacity and grab him.
Never once did he see Coruscant, the Galactic Capital-the bedrock of the Republic...Be in such decimation where nothing was standing and all was rubble.
Never once did he have such a...
Desire...
Never once did he space out to where he would see the dream while he was conscious and everything else would fade.
Never once did he shift from reality to dreamscape.
His death was coming soon.
The destruction of Coruscant was coming soon.
An invasion on the Jedi Temple was coming soon.
The dark side was everywhere.
It was in everyone.
Those two creatures...
So cruel and void, would be the ones to bring carnage.
They would bring...
Wrath, carnage, havoc, destruction, hate, rage, and fury.