The Force's Balance

By Kassien

Chapter 6: Training & Rescue

We did indeed meet up the next day as well, for Round 2 as Qui-Gon said with a friendly laugh as we returned to the same room for another go. This time, the slightly younger Padawan would not let me get too far away, and every time I apparated he followed as fast as he could to my new location, making the first few minutes seem like a frantic game of tag until I was able to leave behind spells that slowed him up enough to get the distance I needed to begin flooding him with spells and transfigurations that eventually overwhelmed him. We had a bit of fun afterward testing various spells and shields against his lightsaber, and even tried comparing his Force push and pull against their magical equivalents, and found they were relatively evenly balanced with his push being a little stronger while my summon was the better.

We both took notes of the results in case of another rematch and he actually showed how the training rooms recorded our previous fights and the following experiments so they could be put in the Jedi Archives to be further studied down the road. We talked a lot about our various lives and adventures leading up to where we both were, and I realized he was very much a charging forward Gryffindor, and even reminded me a bit of a Lion. He had a lot of questions about magic, and all its capabilities, and I happily indulged him with countless stories and things I had encountered until it was time for lunch.

At lunch, we were joined by his Master, Jedi Knight Dooku who came to inform his Padawan that his trials would begin the following day and that he needed to sit in meditation until they began. I wished him luck, and we said our goodbyes for now as I watched him walk after the dour-faced man who still had not warmed up to my presence in the temple as he practically ignored me the entire time. Deciding not to worry about other Jedi attitudes towards me, I instead left the cafeteria to get back into my studies of obscure dark spells Bellatrix may have used on Sirius by heading back to my room and tent to continue my research well into the night.

For the next two days, I was rarely seen outside of the cafeteria at meal times, as I had sequestered myself in my library trunk scouring through old tomes that grew more and more gruesome the longer I searched. I stopped a few times to talk to Kenroo, who was happily teaching and learning with his young Wookie friend and promised me help if I needed it, but I just happily waved him off, knowing he didn't know the language or have the background to help me with my magical research. I also stopped in to see Sirius and Jedi Master Ardu'kinvra every day for status updates that hadn't changed as of yet, and ate my meals quickly before returning to work.

On the third day, I was interrupted from my meal by Grand Master Yoda, and Jedi Master Rohann Silvere, the tall silver haired black man that reminded me of a mix between Kingsley Shacklebolt and Xenophilus Lovegood as they joined me. They were very curious about my friendly spars with Padawan Qui-Gon Jinn, having reviewed the footage repeatedly and wondered if I would consent to giving them both a live demonstration of several of the things they saw. I had no problem with that, and we returned to that same training room once our meals were finished.

"The recordings were very enlightening, but they only show what happened, not how the spells felt both physically and to our Force senses, and we would like the chance to experience it for ourselves," came the smooth base voice of Jedi Master Silvere as we entered the room.

"I doubt I could keep up with the pair of you," I answered honestly, "but if you wanted to take turns we could have a friendly spar or I could simply demonstrate and run through similar experiments that Qui-Gon and I did?"

"A friendly spar, I would like," came the immediate and almost excited response from Grand Master Yoda, the one I thought would be less likely to want to spar and began preparing myself for an even greater challenge than I had ever faced previously.

I started to gather my magic and flood my body with it as I conjured a dueler's shield on my left arm as I faced off against the small green Jedi Master, who casually lit his lightsaber and exuded a sense of calm tranquility that I'm not sure I would ever be able to replicate. When he motioned to begin, even having faced a Jedi before, I was still completely unprepared by the absolute speed and constant attacking the little green being fought with. If I thought Qui-Gon was acrobatic, it had absolutely nothing on Yoda, who flipped and spun and bounced off walls faster than I could almost see, and I was barely able to continually block in time to keep up with him.

Me apparating away from him though still worked for a moment, as it didn't take long for him to recalculate where I ended up and re-engage me at speeds I was very hard pressed to match. He did seem to react even more than Qui-Gon to my apparating, as after every one, he had a hard flinch before he could re-engage me, and that slight pause was what allowed me to barely stay ahead of the incredibly fast Grand Master. I started apparating even more, and conjuring a single or pair of animals at every stop before apparating away again, hoping to build up a transfigured army to start harassing the little green Jedi and giving me more time to turn the tables and put him on the defensive.

It took almost ten minutes for this strategy to pan out, but I was really starting to drag a bit when I finally got lucky with some birds bothering him at the exact same time a snake wrapped up his leg and bit him. It allowed me to start turning offensive for the first time in the duel, and I quickly used the time to start summoning all the gathered debris around the room that was behind him, making him split his focus even further. I also started a barrage of easy offensive spells, tripping jinxes, binding, slowing, itching, hair growth, you name it. I really did need to hand it to the Weasley Twins, they were geniuses when it came to inventing and using prank spells in duels, and in a friendly duel where I wasn't trying to permanently take down my opponent, they were the perfect offensive weapons.

Yoda however showed why he was the Grand Master, and leaps ahead of Qui-Gon in terms of straight out combat, as he withstood my continuous barrage of spells, conjured animals, and summoned objects with a speed and grace I found fascinating. For a few minutes he withstood everything I was throwing at him, while slowly getting himself backed into a corner to be better positioned against anything I could summon behind him, and then really started using his Force powers to corral all of my conjured animals into better positions that allowed him to quickly dispatch them dozens at a time with his lightsaber. With everything now in front of him, he was also having an easier time deflecting my direct spells into the corralled animals to help thin the herds as he defended himself against everything I was throwing at him.

We were approaching the thirty minute mark when I really started to feel myself slowing down, and I could tell that while he too was a little slower than he started, he was thinning down the opposition much faster now than I could replace it. The tide was definitely changing back into his favor, and without going into more destructive and dangerous spells, there was no way I could see to overwhelm the little green Jedi Grand Master. With my final gambit, I used an old spell I had found among the Black Family library books over the last few days that pulled together all the rocks and debris from my surroundings and formed a large Golem easily ten times my size.

It was the first time I had formed one so large, as the size was dependent on both the available debris, and the amount of magic you pushed into it. The problem was that it left me breathless and damn near drained magically for several long moments, and so I couldn't capitalize on Yoda's new distraction that he was quickly and systematically destroying piece by piece with his lightsaber. Within a minute, the Golem was struggling to hold itself together as the debris was chipped or cut away, and the magic was fading trying to keep it together, but I was too tired to continue, and too low on magic to keep fighting the little green Jedi.

"I'm done ...you win," I breathed out as what was left of the Golem finally collapsed in a crash at Yoda's feet and he turned back to engage me, breathing heavily as well but still ready to continue.

"Most impressive ...that was," came his breathy reply as his posture relaxed and he returned his lightsaber to his belt. "Varied and adaptable, your magic is."

"Thanks," I answered back, still catching my breath. "I can't believe just how fast and acrobatic you are. That speed is beyond anything I've ever faced."

"Never kept up so well, a non-Force user has," responded Yoda with a nod of acknowledgement that had me quirk a small grin, but was too tired for anything else.

"I had to push magic through my body constantly to maintain that speed, it caught up to me in the end though, and I just didn't have any left to fight with," I answered easily, knowing that had I not flooded my body with magic the fight would have been over in the first few seconds.

"Flood our bodies with the Force, we do," he answered back, as Jedi Master Silvere was joining us and we both looked to the newcomer for his thoughts.

"I have never seen a single person fight on so many varied fronts like that before," came Rohann's deep voice, "It was like watching the Grand Master fight against a surrounding army all at once ...most impressive."

"Thanks," I replied somewhat sheepishly, still not very comfortable with praise. "Though, I don't think I have enough left to spar with you now."

"Another day then," he replied with a grin. "I wouldn't want to fight you at less than your best."

"Sounds good," I replied with an easy smile.

"Holding back, you were?" came the question from Yoda as my attention went back to him.

"Um ...just in spell selection," I answered, and at their confused glances decided to elaborate some more. "I know more destructive or harmful spells, but definitely wouldn't use those in a friendly spar. Most of the direct spells I did use were more bothersome than actually harmful, itching and tripping jinxes, teeth enlargement, makeup charms, hair growth, disarming spells ...that sort of thing."

"Hair growth?" came the somewhat amused voice of Rohann.

"You would be surprised how many spells fall in the category of personal grooming ...want to try one?" I asked somewhat cheekily, as I waved my wand a little, "I can style and color your hair with a flick of my wand, and can always remove it afterwards."

"I am curious what the magic will feel like," came the response from the Jedi Master, as he seemed to be really considering it, "okay ...let's see it."

I had to remember not to laugh out of respect to the Jedi Master, as I watched the results of the Weasley Twin's famous rainbow afro hair spell on the older stately looking gentleman. Yoda, was much more practiced in politics, was easily able to not react outwardly, though I think it amused him greatly. Both watching the taller man flinch when the spell washed over him, and the impending results. I conjured a small mirror for the formerly well groomed silver haired Jedi Master, who took several long moments to admire the very full rainbow colored afro that now sat atop his head in apparent wonder.

"The feeling was most peculiar," started the dark skinned man thoughtfully, "the magic blanketed me and overroad my connection to the Force for the briefest of moments, there was also an almost instant slightly strong tingling feeling on my scalp as hair follicles were flooded with energy and I could actually feel the hair changing. But now, the tingly feeling of the magic is completely gone, and I am left with what feels exactly like my own natural hair ...simply amazing!"

"There is a whole field of grooming and cosmetic charms," I replied easily. "Actually there are charms for just about anything you can think of ...most magicals are rather lazy. Why get up and physically do something when you can simply wave your wand and fix it."

"Yet, you have very good physical fitness," answered Yoda, wondering what the difference was between me and other magicals.

"Well ...I was raised mundane and didn't learn about the magical world until eleven when I started at school ...so I didn't have some of the same ingrained mentality of other magic users," I answered honestly. "Plus, growing up with the war ...let's just say that I did a lot of running around and dodging more experienced magical users enough to increase my fitness, and arriving in the Dark Forest of Kashyyyk forced me to rely on my fitness even more."

"So, you've never really trained for fitness?" asked Rohann Silvere as I returned his hair to normal and he continued feeling it with his hands, surprised at my quasi-confesion.

"Not really, it's more a byproduct of other training and my upbringing," I answered, not really wanting to explain the upbringing part but thought it would be better explained. "I grew up with an Aunt, Uncle, and cousin that treated me pretty poorly ...and my older and much bigger cousin and his gang had a favorite game they called Harry Hunting ...so, running was a really big part of my early life."

"The Force, preparing you it did," came the reply from Yoda as he searched my face and could obviously sense some of my discomfort with the topic, and quickly moved on. "Train you, we will."

"Train me? Like as a Jedi?" I asked completely floored at his decision, looking back and forth between the two powerful Jedi Masters.

"Not exactly," responded Rohann, "it's a little late to start you with our younglings."

"Teach the basics of the Force, we will," came Yoda next as he motioned to himself and Rohann. "Pleased with this choice, the Force is."

It was then decided that every morning until lunchtime, I would work with either Yoda or Rohann to begin my learning of the Force, and have the afternoons to practice and research into the healing of my godfather. They would focus first on my feeling of and accessing the Force mostly working with Yoda on this part, before then moving to increasing and filling my body with the Force to accelerate my fitness levels primarily with Rohann. If things went well, they would assess it as it came up, but both agreed that the Force itself was encouraging them towards this path, and neither of them was foolish enough to not listen despite the opposition they faced from the Council.

So, the next morning I found myself back in the same training room with Grand Master Yoda, trying to meditate on the Force, and having some difficulty getting past my own magic and Occlumency meditations I was much more familiar with. As it neared the time to stop for the day, and I had still yet to make any progress, I asked the aged Master to use some Force powers on me so I might try and get a better feel for the difference, and what I was looking for as I seemed to keep running into my own magic. Being levitated and moved around the room by someone else's powers was a little terrifying at first, but I trusted the powerful Force user, and slowly started to recognize the energy he was using even if I couldn't yet find it on my own.

I promised to practice some more, and that I wasn't discouraged in the least and grateful for any help he could provide, and we split up after lunch. I swung quickly by the medical bay for my daily check, and returned to my library trunk to continue my research, almost finished now with the spell books, and only the really old family journals left to go through. Unfortunately, there were almost a hundred of them, written by various Black Family members, and most very long and the writing in some of them that I just glanced at was atrocious.

That evening at dinner, Kenroo, with the help of TC-7H, told me all about hanging out with the young Wookie Force user, Chabesdee and how much fun they were having sharing stories. Apparently Chabesdee was very lonely in the temple, and though he got along well with everyone, he did not have any close friends and missed the camaraderie and companionship he remembered from his short time on Kashyyyk before coming to the Jedi. Having another Wookie in residence had done wonders for his spirit, and he greatly enjoyed learning more about his kind now that he was old enough to understand, having left home almost six years ago at the age of two. In turn, he was telling Kenroo all about what he was learning, and sharing their passion for spaceships by checking out all the ones in the Jedi docking bay.

Kenroo already knew of my plans to stay and research ways to heal my godfather, and was okay with however long it took, but I had to also now include my Force lessons that I was going to continue for as long as the two senior Jedi had something to teach me on. He claimed that it did not matter how long I went or stayed anywhere, and that he would follow me anywhere ...his honor would demand no less. I thanked him again, and gave my permission to let him and Chabesdee look around the Marauder ship, and would secretly pull out and enlarge one of the several shrunken ships I still had in my possession if they wanted to tinker and work on it.

Apparently, I am the best ever, as it would give him and his new young friend weeks of fun bonding and learning time to work on a ship together. I offered to let them start working on another YT-1000 Class Freighter that I was planning to model after the Marauder and use as a decoy or spare down the road, and was quickly agreed with. Knowing that it would both make him happy and give them something to do for the foreseeable future, that night I expanded my other YT-1000 that was still in serious need of repairs right next to the Marauder and along with a large crate of spare parts, put similar protections around it so nobody else would bother with it while they worked on it.

The following day, I was again struggling to get past my magic and reach out to the Force, and asked Yoda if he was sure that I would even be able to access it, since I wasn't actually a Force adept. He simply smiled, and told me that despite its murky reading, he expected because of my magic, that I was indeed a Force user, and maybe the strongest one he had ever felt. This led to a bit of a discussion on how they measured Force sensitives, and Midi-Chlorian counts, which reminded me of their initial description of Sirius as the 'Midi-Chlorian Man', who he claimed had over 21,000 midi-chlorians in his blood, the highest ever total recorded.

We talked for a bit more about it, and he assured me that I too probably had a similarly high count, and if I wanted to, could have my blood examined for the actual number after lunch. After that it was back to meditation, and although I didn't reach the Force that day, I was at least in better spirits that I would find it one of these days. On my swing back through the medical bay after lunch, I brought up the blood test with Jedi Master Ardu'kinvra, who promised to run the test for me after I was assured the blood would be disposed of afterwards.

"This machine just takes a little prick of your finger and analyzes the midi-chlorian count in seconds," began Ardu'kinvra, "the old method of analyzing a blood sample will give more details on other things found in your blood, but this one defintely works faster for midi-chlorians."

"Okay, fire away," I sighed with resignation, holding out my hand to the small handheld device.

"Oh, it's not bad at all ...you'll hardly feel a thing," she continued as she held the small device up to my finger and a small prick took my blood sample while she read the small screen on the part of the device facing her before she gasped, "OH MY!"

"That can't be good," I mumbled somewhat sarcastically as she had gone silent after her exclamation of shock at what she was seeing, "so ...want to share with the class?"

"Tw-twenty five thousand ...that can't be right," she stuttered, still in a state of shock, as she stared at the little screen as if willing it to change. "Maybe I should use a different machine in case this one is broken?"

I could have told her it wasn't the machine, fate just liked fucking with me, so of course I would have an ungodly amount of midi-chlorians and be different among the Jedi as well as the magic users on Earth. The second machine confirmed the first, and still she wasn't convinced and asked if she could do the full blood sample workup. I let her do it, as long as I was able to destroy all the blood samples afterwards since I didn't want any of my blood lying around, that was just a big no-no in the world of magic, as evidenced by my fourth year in the graveyard at Voldemort's resurrection.

Within half an hour, my blood work was done and analyzed, and Ardu'kinvra was looking at me like she had just seen a ghost, which was always a good thing from the healer ...right?

"Y-your b-blood?" she stuttered out completely in shock and utterly not the normal composed Jedi I was used to seeing. "How is any of this possible?"

"Maybe if you explained what you're seeing, I could help?" I replied, trying to think what else would be wrong with my blood beyond just the elevated midi-chlorian count.

"There are three different poisonous venoms in your blood, and while two of them probably aren't deadly in the small amounts you have, the third should have killed you in seconds and is stronger than any venom known in the galaxy and the amount of it in your blood is staggering," came her incredulous response. "Then you have some other foreign healing substance, that is unlike anything we have on record, and possibly the only thing keeping you alive. But in spite of all of this, the cells in your body are actually constantly healing themselves and replicating at a rate greater than any degradation usually seen in humans ...I think you might even be immortal."

"You got all that from a little blood sample, huh?" I answered back somewhat sheepishly, but not too surprised after everything I had been through in my life, with the Basilisk venom and Phoenix tears, becoming the Master of Death, and the enhancement rituals I wasn't too surprised.

"Y-you don't even seem surprised?" came her incomprehensible reply, not at all understanding how anyone can take that type of information and just shrug it off.

"To tell the truth, I already knew about most of it," I answered back easily to the elderly woman's completely gobsmacked face, even if I wasn't really sure about the other two smaller venoms, I assume they came after the basilisk and phoenix tears so I never really noticed them.

I ended up spending the next hour with the elderly Jedi healer, both explaining about how most of those weirdnesses in my blood came about, or as vaguely as I could get away with it, and also learning quite a bit about the technological possibilities that were available. She explained how they could actually pull the foreign substances out of my blood to make pure samples of them, which opened up a whole new avenue of healing possibilities due to the phoenix tears, as I only had a single drop left after my enhancement ritual I was saving for an emergency. I could also produce pure samples of the three various venoms as well, though as a healer she was much less interested in that, I could definitely see the financial incentive to do so, even if I didn't want to have a lot of basilisk venom out in the galaxy.

With enough samples of these substances, we could also try to find a way to synthesize or make a synthetic version that would be even easier to mass produce. My biggest problem was with the amount of my blood that would need to be used for any of these ventures, and not having complete control of it was not something I was willing to let go of. Instead, I convinced her to create a list of equipment I would need to do all this work myself, or at least with only medical droids for helpers and added it to my current orders I had just recently placed with Zaltin Corp and Xucphra Corp, that were supposed to arrive within a few weeks.

I promised that I would let her have samples of the phoenix tears once I extracted them from my blood and/or synthesized them, and she promised to teach me everything I would need to know on how to accomplish this in my afternoons right after lunch. I then vanished all my blood samples and sterilized the midi-chlorian readers, which reminded her that she had been in fact testing my midi-chlorian count before getting sidetracked by the uniqueness of my blood, and could only shake her head in wonder that the readings were in fact accurate. I had the highest midi-chlorian count ever recorded, and it wasn't even really close, as Sirius held the previous high and mine far outstripped his.

Ardu'kinvra was reluctant to agree, but I convinced her that the information on my blood and midi-chlorian count should not be shared with everyone, and we agreed that it would go no further than Yoda and Rohann as the Grand Master and Master of the Order respectively. We also discussed if the healing powers of the phoenix tears would help my godfather, but came to the conclusion that they would only restore his physical body which was already in prime condition after the bacta-tank healing. Whatever spell Bellatrix used on him, was seemingly only affecting his mind, as his body had responded well to all treatment and stimuli that it was exposed to.

With the addition of my new medical training taking place in the afternoons, the next few days flew by as quickly as those preceding it, until I finally made the breakthrough I was waiting for. Discovering a truly sick and twisted journal of one Elladora Black dated in the late 1780's, where she experimented on muggles with several self-made spells that primarily affected the minds of the victims. The journal itself was really difficult to read through, as the handwriting was small and messy, and the content made me sick regularly, but I realized it was probably right up Bellatrix's alley.

My excitement and seemingly finding the answers to Sirius' condition, had me reading the long and dark journal well into the night, and therefore was extremely exhausted when Yoda showed up that morning for my lesson. Instead of skipping as I desired, Yoda convinced me I needed the break and maybe the exhausted state would serve me better than the last several lessons that ended with me still unable to access the Force. It turns out, he was right, my distracted and exhausted state actually allowed me to find and experience the Force for the first time, and I couldn't believe how amazing that experience felt.

Even better than when I first felt my wand connect to my magic, connecting to the Force was so incredibly filling and such a sense of completeness and belonging that I think I may have actually started crying. Though, with my exhaustion and excitement and possibly finding the spells that hurt Sirius, that could also have contributed to my over-emotional state as well. Yoda was very pleased, and told me to just continue to feel out for the Force until it started to become second nature, and we would then move on to the next step of directing or letting it flow around and into me tomorrow.

That afternoon in the medical bay was spent making sure Sirius was ready for whatever, as I explained to Ardu'kinvra that I found the journal and spells used on him, but would need some time to read and analyze every single aspect of it before we started trying to treat my godfather. She suggested I let my droid scan and translate the journal as much as he was able, as it would allow her or others to go over and see if any more minds would help in solving the problem. It was actually a great idea, and not just for this journal, but for my entire library to have digital copies of all my books for easier cross referencing and searching.

I wasn't sure if I wanted TC-7H to also be my librarian or library storage, and decided to enlist the help of another droid of the same model to start tackling the large library I had brought with me from Earth. Luckily, after the Wookies had seen my fixing capabilities on ships and droids, they had started buying up old and used droids by the container full at rock bottom prices that they then had me restore and get operational. So, I had created a veritable warehouse of them that the Wookies happily employed and allowed me to continue with TC-7H as I had grown fond of him, but also gave me a dozen more of the same models for my own use that had sat shrunken inside my tent up until this point.

Getting one of them now and setting him up inside my library trunk had the golden droid's head spinning when I set him to his task of scanning and digitizing my entire library. When he estimated it to take over two standard Galactic years, I got out his buddies and set all ten of them to the task hoping it would significantly cut down on the time. But first, I had to get them all upgraded and integrate with TC-7H to learn English and Latin, thanking my lucky stars I had purchased several English-Latin primers and dictionaries before I left Earth to aid in the task and not leave me to teach them all individually.

TC-7H was fucking brilliant. He had already learned enough of my language to easily create a system update for all the new droids to have my language implanted into their processors in under an hour. I then worked with him for a bit on basic Latin and Olde English as several of the really old books in my collection used that language as well to build the same system updates for those languages. We ended up working relatively late into the night, and I didn't get to accomplish any more studying of Elladora Black's journal, but it was still time well spent.

The next day, all eleven droids started tackling my library, and assured me that it would only take two months at most to get through it all. That was pretty impressive when you consider just how many books I had brought with me, as being a friend to a bibliophile like Hermione I had gathered a substantial personal collection. Along with the full library of the Black Family, several used bookstore's complete inventory, and the ones found in Hogwarts' Room of Lost Things gave me quite the robust collection of magical texts that I probably haven't even read 10% of yet myself.

The following several days were very busy and exhausting, with my morning Force lessons with Yoda, now rampling up to using the Force that I could now sense and feel all around me taking a serious physical toll. Then mentally exhausting medical lessons from Ardu'kinvra where we were really getting to the nitty gritty of what I needed to know for blood extractions, and running a few tests on Sirius daily to see if anything I was studying at night came to fruition. My nights now were even harder, as I had finally felt like I was on the right track after learning about Elladora's journal, but was having a lot of trouble trying to pull apart what she was actually doing to her victims from a magical standpoint, as most of her writing was not scientific at all.

I have learned that it seemed to be based around memories, as she was at the time an obliviator for the Ministry, and often talked about how fun muggle minds were to play with and little "gifts" she would leave them implanted in their magically reconstructed memories. Like I said, not a very nice person, but someone I expected that Bellatrix would have really looked up to and idolized from her family. I skimmed the rest of the Black Family journals, just in case she had another, or there was someone else that worked in a similar manner, but that one journal seemed my best bet for discovering what happened to Sirius, now I just needed to find out how to fix it ...assuming Occlumency and Legilimency were going to be the only real way.

According to Yoda, my progress in the Force was unheard of, as I was completing tasks he set me as fast as he could set them, and now that I was using it regularly, I was finding using the Force to be much easier than magic at times. You could always just breathe in the Force and fill yourself to wash away fatigue or increase your focus, and while magic was very similar in many aspects, the Force was more saturated through everything and easier to feel for. I had gotten to the point where Yoda enlisted Rohann's help to combine their powers to keep pushing my use of and ease with the Force techniques I was learning.

I could use the Force Push and Force Pull better than each Master individually, and was quickly getting to the point where I could hold my own against them both together in both techniques. The increase of my body with the Force, along with the magical rituals I had already done, was simply another level and allowed me to move so fast that the two Masters deemed me capable of beating almost every other Jedi in pure speed and endurance. Because of my quickness and reaction speed and their own limited time, they deemed me ready to start training with a lightsaber while they continued on to sensory deprivation training. I was really excited, until they blindfolded me and set several training remotes loose which shot continuous sting beams as they zoomed all over the room, reminding me I still had a long way to go.

I was then given over to Rohann for morning lightsaber training in Form I, also known as Shii-Cho, for the foreseeable future, as it was the first form all Jedi's learned to some degree as it focused on defense. It began several long weeks of getting my ass completely kicked every morning, as the moment I made any progress, the very stoic man would turn it up another notch to increase the pace or the amount of material I needed to learn. Luckily, he didn't show up every morning though, as his own duties with the Jedi Order kept him very busy. On those days I was usually set up against an increasingly growing army of training remotes to improve my spatial awareness and sensing within the Force.

All the lightsaber training though, had taken a back seat in my mind, as shortly after beginning, I deemed myself ready to start trying to heal my godfather. It left me more tired during the days, as I continued through the night to study up and practice as much as I could before trying to heal Sirius. Luckily, Rohann was patient with a new lightsaber student, and secretly pleased that I wasn't picking everything up at such an advanced pace as the beginning of my training suggested I might.

Exactly one month to the day after arriving on Coruscant in search of my godfather, I was in the medical bay with Jedi Healer Ardu'kinvra, Jedi Grand Master Yoda, and two Jedi Healer Acolytes whose names I forgot the moment they were introduced. We were all standing around Sirius' bed, watching the comatose man after strapping him down to prevent movement or injury as I planned to enter his mind. I had exhausted all other methods of trying to heal him of the damage Bellatrix's last spell and falling through the Veil caused, and was desperately praying to myself that this would work.

"Legillimens," I stated clearly, as I stared into my godfather's blank looking eyes, and brought to bear the full power of the Elder Wand in order to help me as the scenery around me melted away like a Salvadore Dali painting and one of the most unique and unpleasant feelings settled in my mind.

I was seemingly in a barren wasteland, being buffeted with strong and biting cold winds that actually felt like it was causing cuts to appear on my exposed skin, but at the same time, I intrinsically knew this wasn't my physical body. It was a psychic representation of myself created by my own mind and magic as I tried to enter another wizard's mind uninvited. The ground around me was rocky, sharp, and cracked in many places, feeling like it wasn't too far from crumbling altogether and being swept away in the heavy winds, and made moving around increasingly difficult even though I knew it wasn't me physically needing to move.

That was the power of another person's subconscious mind, doing anything against what they were, was like moving through molasses uphill, and every "step" my mental body took was harder than the previous one to the point that I wasn't sure if I could continue. The winds themselves felt like they had a physical presence as well, as those previously mentioned cuts continued even more frequently as I remained. It was during a particularly rough gust of biting cold wind that I noticed the weird patch of darkness off a ways to my left that I originally assumed was the rocky ground, but in fact shifted a bit during the gust that tipped me off to something else. Slowly staggering my way towards it, continued to get harder and harder as I approached but I was determined not to give up on Sirius.

What felt like hours, but could have only been seconds I finally neared the bulge in the ground enough to try and make out the shape, but was being hit by winds so strong it felt like a physical shadow pushing me away and cutting my exposed skin with their cloak. I even felt my magic being leached off of me, and was getting weaker the longer I stayed, and had this happened before finding the Force I probably would have already given up. The Force however, allowed me to call on it and fill my being with light and energy that pushed some of that physically biting cold winds back and continued to the downed shape I still couldn't see well enough to recognize.

"Padfoot!" I gasped the moment I was able to get down to the ground enough to be able to see the huddled black mass of fur that was Sirius' emaciated animagus form, looking far worse than I can ever remember seeing.

He almost looked blank and soulless, was disgustingly skinny with cuts littering his body and shivering to such a degree it almost seemed like he was twitching under the cruciatus curse. He was alarmingly cold, with red irritated skin showing in several places his fur was not thick enough to protect him, and I almost couldn't bear to see him so defeated and miserable. He barely responded to me or my words, but did look up at the movement as I got down on the ground and tried to shelter and cuddle the desperate looking dog as best as I could against the still biting winds and physical cold presence that permeated everything.

My sheltering of the terrified dog seemed to be helping some, as the area immediately under us slowly seemed to be strengthening somehow, and it wasn't until I started trying to understand how that could be that I think I figured it out. This ravaged and desolate wasteland was Sirius' mental landscape, and in its current condition there was no way for him to improve his mental state while being constantly attacked by the cold winds, which I was slowly coming to realize were actually Dementors. No wonder he had retreated to his animagus form and was incapable of defending himself, Dementors were a legitimate weakness to the man who spent ten years among them in prison, and I hypothesized that these "Dementors'' were what Bellatrix left inside Sirius' mind when she hit him in the Department of Mysteries.

It followed the trend of Elladora Black, who wrote a lot about hidden "mental construct" monsters she left in the heads of her muggle test subjects that eventually brought them to mental ruin and countless other ailments she happily documented between torturing sessions on the same victims. Unfortunately, she never mentioned how to remove those monsters, but I hoped that I could somehow find a way, but knew I needed to protect Sirius first. I started by drawing more of the Force into me and slowly running it through Padfoot as I tried to spread it out around me to affect the immediate area we were in.

Slowly, I could see the landscape directly under and around us start to firm and lose some of the despair that seemed to permeate everything inside Sirius' mind, but that only seemed to draw the cold winds and presence of the Dementors' closer to us. Gathering even more of the Force to hold off the worst of the attacking cold presence of the Dementors, I thought about rescuing Sirius, and getting to spend the rest of our days enjoying life free from all the past bullshit and couldn't help but smile widely as my whole being felt uplifted. Glancing up at the bleak surroundings, I whipped out the Elder Wand and poured everything I could into a spell I had to use much too often for someone that shouldn't have to deal with Dementors.

"EXPECTO PATRONUM!" I shouted as my wand lit up like a lighthouse, and almost instantly vaporized the cold dark feelings that had permeated Sirius' mental landscape, leaving the place bare but finally free of the darkness.

Without the encroaching cold winds and depressing dark atmosphere, his mental landscape now just looked like a ruined plot of land, and despite my desire to try and fix that too, I knew it was an important and personal thing for every wizard and instead focused on the still trembling dog under me. It seemingly took several very long attempts to coax Padfoot into even lifting his head, but after the several years' long ordeal of having a constant Dementor presence inside your mindscape, I could understand completely. When he finally seemed to lift his head and look around, I must have looked a right mess, as my consoling of him had brought me to tears at what he must have had to go through.

"Padfoot?" I asked quietly, not wanting to startle the still terrified dog into retreating back inside itself. "Sirius?" I continued, "can you hear me? ...please Siri."

It took way too long for any type of recognition to appear in the dog's eyes, as they slowly lost their foggy and blank stare, I was able to see the moment he realized someone else was there, and that the Dementors' presence was gone. Even then, it seemingly took him another very long moment to reconcile those facts with what he was seeing as the confusion on the dog's tilted head was easy to see. Then, after a long time staring and looking around, Padfoot finally seemed to really understand who it was in front of him as his eyes lit up just enough to know that my godfather was still there.

"Woof," came the surprised bark as it looked somewhat stupidly up at me, as if trying to put all the pieces back together in a muddled mind that had been ravaged for far too long to work properly.

"I need you to change back, Siri?" I spoke with a wide smile, as tears still fell freely down the cheeks of my mental construct, and probably my real life body as well. "And you've got to wake up ...I have so much to tell you."

The whining of the dog alerted me to a problem, and after trying unsuccessfully to get him to change back on his own, I wondered if his whining was in fact his way of saying that he was incapable of initiating the change himself. Figuring that it wouldn't hurt too much to try at this point, I asked if he needed help changing back. With the frantic nodding of the dog's head, I raised the Elder Wand, and again poured power into the reverse animagus spell that hit the damaged dog causing it to glow and change back into my godfather before my eyes.

"Sirius," I cried, still very emotional over everything that had recently taken place, and beyond happy to be reuniting with probably the only other person that loved me and that I loved unconditionally.

"Harry?" came a horribly deep and raspy voice of someone who hadn't spoken properly in years, as his tired and beyond haggard appearance sent another set of sobs through me before practically tackling the man in a strong hug that was weakly returned as we both broke down for several long moments.

Without the negative effects of the Dementors, and the biting cold winds, the mental landscape was allowed to slowly start recovering as we were hugging and sobbing into each other's shoulders for a variety of reasons. These weren't our real bodies, but in fact reflections of our mental projections of how we saw ourselves and likewise usually very positive and almost superficially more than we were in reality. That Sirius was still emmaciatingly thin, drab and dirty in his clothing and appearance said a lot about how negatively he saw himself at this point, and I knew that getting him mentally healthy was going to be our next biggest step, and hoped we could accomplish it soon for his sake.

"Where are we? What's going on?" came the small voice of my godfather after our cries were slowly starting to fade, and despite my desire to spring everything crazy on him at once, I knew his mental health was far too important to mess with just for a laugh.

"We are in your mindscape ...Bellatrix hit you with an experimental mental construct spell she learned from one of your Ancestors. It caused the "Dementor" to appear within your mind and do all this damage to your mindscape," I started slowly and calmly as I looked around the now seemingly barren land. "Your real body is completely healthy, but you've been in a coma for about seven years, and I've spent the last month since finding you trying to repair the spell damage."

"Fucking Bellatrix!" he snarled a bit, some of the old fire coming back slowly, as he processed the rest of my words and was slowly trying to piece things together. "Wait ...did you say seven years?"

"Yeah," I answered with a small smile, "you've missed a few things."

"Wait ...what about the war? Is Remus okay?" came the first of many questions that would follow, and I knew that it was important that I try to answer as many of them as I could to help with what I assumed was going to be a very difficult transition to our new reality, but only after we had dealt with the ghosts of our old one.

"I killed Voldemort five years ago," I replied, ignoring his shudder at the Dark Lord's name, and giving him a moment to comprehend that before his eyes widened almost comically as he stared at me in utter shock and seemingly waiting on me to continue. "Unfortunately, by the time I did ...Dumbledore, Moody, Remus and Dora had all died as well."

"Oh Shit!" he exclaimed in shock and disbelief, before quickly getting choked up and emotional over the loss of so many people he knew and loved. "H-how?"

For the next little bit, I described how the war progressed after his "death" with the lessons about Voldemort with Dumbledore and the horcruxes to the Death Eater break in, facilitated by Draco at the end of my Sixth Year that resulted in Dumbledore's death. Then the fall of the Ministry, and the horcrux hunt for me and my best friends which culminated in the Battle of Hogwarts where Remus and his wife, Nymphadora died protecting students along with several of my own classmates. My learning about the horcrux in my scar, and giving myself up to Voldemort only to come back and kill him later and sending the remaining dark forces running.

The subsequent years afterwards rounding up the Death Eaters, discovering I was the owner of all three of the Deathly Hallows and everything that came with it. The overwhelming fame and adulations poured on me, the pressure to take on Dumbledore's mantle, the utter lack of privacy or respect, the lack of education that led me to study magic on my own and the moving on of everyone else but me as I wallowed in Grimmauld Place alone. It all led me back to the Veil of Death, and eventually to this new galaxy where I was able to find you and get away from all the fame and pressure, a chance to start over fresh.

"You went through the Veil?" came the stunned question as I finished my tale, knowing he had more that he hadn't asked as I tried to remember everything he might want to know.

"I came after you?" I replied easily, but when he continued to just stare at me, I caved a little more, "it was an escape either way."

"Alright," he sighed, seemingly giving up on the topic, at least for now, "but now we are in another galaxy?"

"Yes," I answered somewhat excitedly, trying to get back positive after the difficult recounting of everything he missed, "and one with space travel, and thousands of planets both already explored and those unexplored as well."

We talked for a little bit more about some of the basics that I had learned, mainly the different languages, beings and cultures, and technology so as not to startle him too badly when we returned to the Jedi Medical Bay. I then told him how he was found and transported to the Jedi, who they were and how they were able to heal his body and what I had been doing since arriving here. I then said that we had our whole lives ahead of us now to catch up and spend time together, but first he needed to fix up his mindscape and wake up so we could really begin.