Nila speaks...
The Jedi believed in oneness. Simplicity was the key to everything. No emotion, no passion should come disturb the peace unifying body and soul.
Unmarked, unaffected, undoubting.
Such was the way of the Force.
However, the world they were sworn to protect followed a more chaotic pattern. Coruscant, imposing republican capital and location of the Jedi headquarters, was split by an intangible frontier between the wealthy Upper City and the Lower City bathing in a desolated fog. The two faces of the megalopolis fared surimposed but never mixed.
And the five Towers of the Temple, symbol of the ascetic Philosophy, neat bubble of perfection among the squalid multitude, illustrated so well that latent disconnection people had come to resent.
Rumours had started, discreet at first yet getting steadily stronger. The Federation's blockade, the Senate's inability to settle matters between an increasingly divided galaxy and the Jedi's silence – all had concurred to create a latent feeling of insecurity among the population. The politicians were not optimistic either. A nagging question kept going on the sly: how long would the old, outnumbered Order manage to keep threat at bay?
A justified question, for I also have the feeling the Jedi do not have the right means to read the world anymore.
Who am I to find fault with a millenarian dogma?
No one.
Nila Sohal, that's the name I had chosen for myself.
'Ni-la'
A feminine version of the word 'nilum,' coming to think of it.
Nilum, nili, neutral: nothing, no one.
A rather accurate coincidence: I had not the faintest idea of how I had found my way in this world. Everything about my birth and my biological parents was a complete mystery. The absence of memories was the common lot of every Jedi as the future trainees were identified and brought to the Temple around the age of six months. No connection with the original circle was allowed afterwards.
The thing was I did not join the Jedi until I was twelve.
My first recollections date back to the years I spent at the Centre, a local association collecting the children found in the streets. They were looked after until they were old enough to become independent. It was only a transitory solution but our keepers treated us well. And, more important, we were not wandering outside.
I remember our habit to sneak out by the emergency stairs in little groups and climb up to the roof to watch the lights appear at dusk. It was awfully dangerous because of the surrounding traffic and the potential lurkers but for an hour or two, the roof became a fabulous craft carrying us high up in the blue where countless adventures waited to be lived.
One night, a few days before my sixth birthday, a craft did come on the roof, a real one this time, but the adventures that ensued had nothing in common with those we had imagined. Three kids were missing in the dorms the following morning and I was one of them.
Sad, regrettable, yes, yet almost predictable: children disappeared everyday in the streets. Everybody knew who did that and what for but no one dabbled with the Underworld business. So they said that was just the way it was and nobody could do anything about it.
Nine clans -- the "Families"-- had divided Coruscant's nights in nine zones of influence. Each of them had its tacit codes and rules. They controlled everything from the leisure market through the bars, the clubs and gambling joints to the legal businesses, which had to pay a 'protection tax' to the Family running the area. And of course there was spice, weapons and probably a fair part of the political affairs although no one knew exactly to what extent.
It was Mikan Santillian, the chieftain of the Household which would become my own who had first developed the idea of using children collected in the streets at a very young age. Once they were old enough, they were gathered in squads to perform various tasks like stealing data or equipment, dealing some spice...sometimes having some when the night just felt too long. We would also be sent when time had come for a debtor to pay back what he owed. In any case, the 'Cleaners,' the Family snipers, were never far.
Dreadfully efficient and as good as invisible, it goes without saying that Santillian's Children built a particularly eerie reputation in the circle.
My life as one of the Children passed in a strange state of stupor. Our hunts would invariably begin around midnight with the opening of the clubs. I recall this unshakable dread of being caught, injured or worse which would only recede when the horizon started to glow, signalling that everything was finally over until the next night. Then, with the practice, our anxiety lessened. Even the thrill of transgression we had experienced at the beginning wore off quickly.
I forgot most of my mates, their names, their faces... Except one. I used to have a friend there, she had small white hands and her voice was very soft.
Beryl... yes, it was her name.
We were inseparable.
Of course, the Family found out and moved her into another squad. Another method of theirs -- a solitary child bound to a group would not think of running away or question the life he had.
Beryl's disappearance hit me hard. I did not trust my other mates, she was the sole familiar face in my life besides those of our Ardas –the Clan's chieftains-- and I waited for her to be moved back. Every night, for years, I waited. The Clan was my kin, they loved me, they could not mean it.
Despite all I had seen and done, I was still young enough at that time to think the world was made of inseparable things – men and women, men and gods, me and the Family.
It all ended brutally though, one night at the Saarliaban, a bar used by the Clan as headquarters and meeting point. I had been recently promoted squad leader and a distinct tension was hanging in the air when my team made its entrance. The rest of the clan was already in place, motioning gravely their guests of the evening in the back room.
We were late and Winsott, the right-hand man, urged us crisply to sit down in the main room and keep out of the way.
Our chieftain Mikan Santillian had consented to meet Nasrin'Lya, the leader of the Family running the North-East sector, after ten years of covered war. Big deal.
The bar was literally crammed with security guards blending in the crowd and it was quite certain that about the same number of Nasrin's Cleaners had positioned themselves somewhere outside if not inside the very building. The two clans were launching those peace negotiations sitting on a powder keg.
We joined the table of another squad and sat down unobtrusively. Just before the last members of the meeting walked past the door, Anjiil, my second, tugged my sleeve discreetly.
"Those two," she whispered, indicating two unfamiliar humans, a man and a woman, about to step in the reunion chamber. "I've never seen them before among Nasrin's folks."
She was right. We knew every member of Nasrin's clan and I couldn't recall anyone bearing the same tanned complexion enhanced by two golden beads between their eyes.
"What the hell is he thinking bringing newbies here?" I murmured in disbelief. No one would waltz in enemy territory introducing novices. And Nasrin was a Bothan, a born negotiator people blessed with a particularly paranoid nature…
We glanced at each other and back to the door. We knew we should tell Winsott something was not regular. If something went wrong, there would be some serious thrashing for us at the end of it. Yet we did not rise from our seats. I glimpsed the others who were talking quietly about their latest hunt. For some reason I could not quite explain, I joined the conversation, turning my back to the door which was now closed. Anjiil followed suit without asking questions.
The minutes ticked by, the animated rumble of the patrons went on just as any other night. But I could have almost sworn I felt it coming -- an odd lull coming from the backroom, a strange pulsation within me...
Suddenly, there was a muffled clamour, the backroom's doors shook and burst open. Len, one of our bouncers, tumbled backward and lay still, his eyes rolled upward, a dark slash tearing his chest open. The closest patrons turned around, startled into silence while the rest of the place was still full of laughters and cheerful chatter. We sprung to our feet only to dive to the floor as a flurry of blaster shots gushed from the backroom and blindly hit the crowd.
There was a stunned lull that seemed to stretch unnaturally until a scream split the air. From my spot under the table, I felt the mad vibration of the customers rushing toward the exit. Near me stood a pair of booted feet which appeared to sway a little. Anjiil! She was still up in the shooting range. As I grabbed her ankle to urge her down beside me, a tremor ran through her. I dragged her toward me as she struggled weakly to take cover. She seemed petrified, her limbs were growing heavier by the second. I had to clutch her jacket and shake her.
A shot zoomed past us.
With one final pull, she was under the table with me. Anjiil turned her head toward me and smiled wanly as she lay on her stomach, her fingers gripping mine. I felt a pain that was not mine. The lights had gone out; I could barely make out shapes around me, but another shot lit up my surroundings long enough for me to notice that her eyes had turned a glassy grey. Her hand was limp in mine and a trickle of blood poured from her parted lips. I gasped and crawled backward. My hand fell in a sticky wet substance and I looked, horrified, at the thick blood coating my fingers.
A pool of dark liquid had formed around a man slumped on the booth behind me, his face hidden in his arms. The girl was staring at me with her dead gaze a few feet away -- a wave of nausea wrenched my stomach before instinct took over. I dodged the bodies and stumbled away, vaguely trying to spot my other mates in the confusion. A complete pandemonium had broken loose in the bar. In all the years I had spent in the Underworld, I had never witnessed such a slaughter.
Suddenly, a lanky frame materialized in front of me. A rush of relief flooded me as I recognized Arda Eru Santillian, our chieftain's son.
"Where do you think you're going, kid?" he barked, identifying me. "The place is swarmed with Jedi, Nasrin set us up," he shouted over the racket as he pushed me ahead, covering us with his blaster. "Go hide under the bar and don't move until I come get you. Understood?"
Lost as I felt, I turned to obey promptly. Eru was a young Arda, only a few years older than me but a great deal taller and not to be crossed. So I ran…
As I climbed the half collapsed bar, a rough hand seized me by the collar and jerked me back roughly. A blaster barrel pressed on the nape of my neck. Unable to break free, I stopped struggling. In my head, words kept going:
It cannot end here, it cannot end here, not this way, it cannot…
It lasted but a split second before I sensed it. It tingled all over, a strength that was not my own which seized my body as if every particle of tension scattered around the room had been summoned to me. It swelled fast, overflowing me and my lids slid shut on their own accord.
When I opened my eyes again, I saw my assailant lying limply against a wall at the far end of the room. I had not moved an inch and no one had come to my rescue…
I regained my bearing in time to glimpse another man standing a few meters away. Two small golden beads marking the bridge of his nose and his forehead were catching the faint light. I recognised him. His gaze was riveted on me with an expression of mild surprise while mine fell on the silvery handle in his hand -- a Jedi!
Guessing my intentions, he slowly shook his head before I'd even started to back away.
I turned to run only to realize that a couple of Nasrin's men had approached when I was not paying attention. Their features were contorted with rage as they glanced from their fallen comrade to me.
They dropped dead mid air as they sprung forth, neatly slashed before they could even realize what had occurred, the one after the other.
I stared down at them in disbelief and I raised my head to find that the Jedi was now standing beside me. He did not touch me; he did not talk; he just looked down at me as I dimly registered that around us the racket had abated. I held his gaze with an odd sense of foreboding.