Author's note:
This chapter is for you to learn the backstory of the main character, relevant lore to the Star Wars universe, and catch up to where the story "begins" in the next chapter.
You can skip the prologue and continue reading if you want to get straight to Part One. Future chapters will include small references to this prologue as refreshers, but will not include a detailed explanation.
Prophecy, a prediction. The faculty, function, or practice of prophesying.
Withholding, a refusal to give something that is due or desired. Not expressing affection or warmth of feeling.
Lying, a present participle of lie, the act of not telling the truth.
Sometimes a prophecy withholds details to prevent upcoming events from being disrupted.
Sometimes a prophecy is a means to an end. An end that is the true beginning, instead of a true end.
Sometimes, information is withheld to maintain balance.
Bastard, born of parents not married to each other. Illegitimate. Skywalker, a name given to bastard children of the Galaxy. A name given to Mothers of bastard children.
Shmi Warka, Mother of Anakin, known as Shmi Skywalker after his birth.
The Ones, the Gods of Mortis. The Daughter, the keeper of the Light. The Son, the keeper of the Dark. The Father, the keeper of t Balance. The Chosen One, he who was meant to correct the balance.
Anakin Skywalker.
First, the Son killed the Daughter.
The Father then killed himself to weaken the Son.
The Chosen one killed the Son to restore the Balance.
More like... Set the motion to correct the balance that was intended all along.
Father saw time and all of its possible outcomes.
Father recognized time to be ever-changing and dependent on the sentient lifeforms that consistently made decisions that altered time.
To fall into the idea of maintaining time is to fall into the ideals of insanity.
The power of the Force lives through the Gods of Mortis. The Gods serve as a conduit for all Force Wielders in the Galaxy.
The death of the Gods must mean the end to the Force?
The world might carry on just fine, if not better, without the power of the Force blessing random children in the galaxy.
Arguably, the species of the galaxy would find new and interesting ways to kill themselves.
Father knew, more than anything, that a day would come where they would all die. Himself, his Son, and his Daughter.
When and How was an ever-changing story.
The fact that it would happen? Inevitable.
The answer?
What if the Father, Son, and Daughter died? What if, instead of the Force dying with them, a new source was created? The same Force, but a different power source?
What if there was one? What if there was only Balance?
What if all Force Wielders use one source as a conduit for their powers?
One source powering them all gives no side an advantage.
This finally puts balance in the hands of the sentient beings we relied on to turn the wheels of time with their decisions.
What if it was time the Gods stepped back and allowed the galaxy to fend for itself?
What if, instead of the Father, Son, or Daughter, there was...
The Child?
In 20BBY the Father, Son, and Daughter were killed.
A trio of Jedi leaves Mortis and the bodies of the Gods dissipate into the ground. While the Daughter's life was used to replenish the life of Ahsoka, her Force was still soaked into the planet.
A golden hue of light, followed by a dark looming shadow, followed by an ebbing mist of grey surrounded the Gods' monastery.
The Forces dance through the air like an elaborate ball that only the forces of nature were invited to.
Each year the Forces dance closer together. Sparks fly from them and destroy the environment around them.
In 5 years the monastery is no more.
In 15BBY the world of Mortis becomes a blank slate where nothing exists. It falls from the world.
Nothing except the grey mist, the golden glow, and the dark shadow is here. Their 5-year dance takes the shape of a sphere.
The sphere is vicious, chaotic, and pure.
The Force Wielders are drawing power from the sphere. The Dark, the Light, and the Balanced Wielders may draw from this energy. It does not pick sides. It is nothing, and yet somehow everything.
The sphere blasts radiant light and bestows the planet of Mortis a humanoid child. When the Child reaches nothing, which is all Mortis is, it is surrounded by darkness.
The Mist recognized the Child to be nothing, and yet also everything. The mist engulfed the Child to protect it in a Force Barrier. The Golden light surrounded the barrier and, together, they cast the Child out of Mortis to the Outer Rim of the galaxy.
Desperate to find a new home for the Child, the Mist and the Golden light followed the last chain of connection it remembered.
A connection to the prophecy.
A connection to the Chosen One.
In 15BBY the Child crash lands on Tatooine, the homeworld of Anakin Skywalker.
In ancient times Tatooine was known for being a planet of oceans, rivers, and rainforests. When the Child lands on Tatooine the Mist and the Golden light cause an explosion that creates a rainforest to emerge in a perfect radius around the Child.
This rainforest is roughly the size of an acre, but it does not appear on ship scanners. It does, however, catch the attention of the local Tusken Raiders.
You see, water is sacred to Tusken Raiders. They believed the rainforest was a gift from the Gods.
When they infiltrated the rainforest and found the Child, they believed the Child to be the eyes of the Gods.
Therefore this rainforest, and the Child, are sacred to the Tusken Raiders.
The Tusken Raiders take the Child as one of their own. They gave the Child to their Tribal Leader, Jido, and made him solely responsible for raising it. He gives the Child a Bantha, a sacred present given to all children of a Tusken Raider tribe.
For the first 15 years of the Child's life, it was raised within the sacred space and not allowed to leave it. The Child named its Bantha Balosar and the Bantha was not allowed to leave the sacred place either.
The Tuskens teach the Child to speak Tusken, Jawa, Huttese, and sign language. All are common for Tusken Raiders due to their frequent interactions of the respective species.
It is 1ABY and the Child is 15. When Tusken children turn 15 they go through a trial of killing a Krayt Dragon and harvesting its stomach pearls. Should they return alive they are given their adult names and roles.
The Child completes this trial. Once the Dragon was slain, and the Child believed itself to be an adult, the rainforest scorched in Tatooine's suns.
Fires blackened the area that the rainforest once inhabited. The Golden light and grey Mist return to the heavens.
The Tusken Raiders believed the Tribal Chief failed to foresee the wrong in treating God's blessing the same as everyone else. They believed their leader made decisions that caused the Gods to punish them.
They knew they needed to attune for their sins and sacrifice was the only way they knew how. The Tusken Raiders bound their Tribal Chief and executed him in front of the child's eyes.
It was God's eyes. The Gods needed to see.
While they could not bring themselves to kill the gift, they recognized the need for the loss of the gift.
Their shame could only be recouped by a total loss.
The Child, and it's sacred Bantha, were banished.
It is 1ABY and the Child survived the treacherous desert clad with only the Gaffii Stick it created and a small bottle of Sandbat venom.
Issa-Or, a female Twi-lek, found the Child and took it in. With no alternative means for survival, it accepted this fate.
The Child discovers she is a woman and not an "it". Tusken Raiders believe children to be androgynous, but since she never returned from her rite of passage she was never given a name or a role.
Now, she is no longer "it".
They settled in Freetown, a small settlement on Tatooine, and Issa-Or taught the Child to speak the common language.
In 4ABY the Child is 18. Jabba the Hutt is killed. Issa-Or and Cobb Vanth, a human male, are the Sheriffs of Freetown.
The Red Keys are a local group of organized crime. They are fronting themselves as a mining company that threatens all peaceful life on Tatooine.
After Jabba's death, the Red Keys brought a small Huttlet to install in the empty palace. Cobb and Issa-Or captured the child.
Malakili, beastmaster for the late Jabba, was recruited by the couple to help raise the Hutt. Maliki insisted on raising the Hutt as a sentient being, with care and love, and named it Borgo.
In 5ABY Cobb Vanth made a deal with the Tusken Raiders to protect Freetown. He offers them a steady shipment of water and proves his strength by completing the rite of passage.
The Tusken Raiders believed this stroke of fate was an act of the Gods recognizing their sin and resolving them of it by proving the water.
The Tuskens make Cobb and Issa-Or promise to care for the Child for the rest of her life. They tell Cobb and Issa-Or the strange background of the Child and they all decide to keep it a secret.
All of them convince the Child to keep it a secret as well. They explain bad people, like the Red Keys, exist in this world and would hunt her for it.
Later, in the same year of 5ABY, the Red Keys successfully take over Freetown. They steal the Child, the Hutt child, and the rest of the population.
Borgo screeched, notifying the Tusken Raiders. They infiltrated the village and helped Cobb remove the Red Key's influence. After the battle of the Red Keys, Cobb Vanth acquired a set of Mandalorian armor from a Jawa Sandcrawler.
He put the armor on to rescue
He wore this armor to protect Freetown and save the Child from her fate as a slave to the Hutts.
Later, in the same year of 5ABY, the mercenaries of Red Key were walking the slave chain across the desert of Tatooine to load them into a cargo ship and deliver them to planet Nal Hutta.
Cobb, stopped them before they could make it to the ship, but not before the Child was branded. Cobb, as a formal slave himself, decided to cover her slave markings the same way he covered his own.
With the branding of a star over them.
He and Issa-Or named the child Anthadme and recognized her as their daughter.
It was the shock of them calling her their daughter that confused her.
Was she not good enough to be considered an adult in Freetown?
Was the idea of parents sacred to the people of Freetown throughout their whole lives?
Despite spending 4 years outside of the Tusken Raider clan, there was still so much she was blind to. There was so much ingrained xenophobia that she didn't know what to do.
So she smiled, nodded, and accepted the gift.
She had far too many bad memories associated with gifts.
It is 6ABY and Anthadme is 20 years old. She spent the past year learning the customs and cultures of humans outside of the Tusken Raider Clan.
Cobb was gone during this time. Very soon after the battle of Red Keys, he set off to find learn what it truly meant to wear the Mandalorian armor.
He wanted to take his role as Sheriff of Freetown and father to Anthadme very seriously. Becoming the best kind of warrior the galaxy knows was the only way he knew how to.
The day Cobb returned home he happily embraced his family and told them all the tales of his journey.
Issa-Or and Anthadme were heartbroken to discover he could never take his helmet off and reveal his face again, but they accepted his wishes just as wholly as he accepted his new Creed.
Cobb slid into a new role of Freetown, as Mayor, and continued his duties diligently.
He taught his family as such-
The Super Commando Codex
Strength is life, for the strong have the right to rule.
Honor is life, for with no honor one may as well be dead.
Loyalty is life, for without one's clan one has no purpose.
Death is life, one should die as they have lived.
The Resol'nare
Wearing Armor.
Speaking the language.
Defending yourself and your family.
Raising your children as Mandalorians.
Contributing to the clan's welfare.
When called upon by the Mand'alor, rally to his cause.
Those who do not follow the Resol'nare are dar'manda - someone who is ignorant of their Mandalorian heritage.
The status of a Dar'manda was wildly feared in Mandalorian culture and thus instilled in Cobb's mentality. To Mandalorians, being Dar'manda meant you were soulless and had no place in the Manda, a Mandalorian afterlife.
Mandalorian children were taught a tune that Cobb found necessary for Anthadme to learn, along with the parts of Mandalorian language he knew.
Ba'jur, beskar'gram,
Ara'noc, aliit,
Mando'a bal Mand'alor-
An vencuyan mhi.
(Translation: Mandalorian for "Education and armor, self-defense, our tribe, our language, our leader- all help us survive)
It is 7ABY Cobb relentlessly tried to convince his family to swear by the Creed and don their own armor. He spoke of how they were not able to go to Manda in the afterlife too often.
He Anthadme his "Foundling", but his daughter no more.
"Foundlings are supposed to swear by the creed at 18. She was 21. She is late, but she can still try.
Issa-Or firmly stood by her decision to not take up the Creed, Manda be damned, and remained at Cobb's side.
For the entire year of 7 Anthadme was relentlessly educated on Mandalorian culture in the hopes she would convert.
She was scared of losing her family to another "religious" tragedy.
So she ran.
She stole the largest ship she could reasonably fry alone from her Father's fleet, loaded up her prized Balosar, and headed for a new planet.
Nevarro.
It is 8ABY. For the past year, Anthadme took small end jobs at the local Bounty Hunter's Guild to prove she was worth being a member.
No one ever asked where she came from, why she needed to be a bounty hunter, or any other personal information.
She took this lifestyle with a greed for comforting silence.
Words that did not need to be spoken were not spoken. Opinions and stories were locked away like a princess in a fairytale tower. She crafted a new Tusken Raider mask to hide her face and donned flowing robes to conceal her skin.
The armor she built around herself put her in control and she wished for nothing more.
For the first time in her life, Anthadme was in complete control of her entire being.
She wasn't a gift from the Gods.
She wasn't a Tusken Raider.
She wasn't an it.
She wasn't a daughter.
She wasn't a Foundling.
She was just Anthadme, a bounty hunter, and that was so, so enough.
Author's note:
Thanks for reading! Leave a comment to let me know your thoughts/favorite parts!
It helps keep the motivation going to keep writing.