To Aevum: Forging ahead for the first time in a long time!
You know the drill. Don't own, don't sue.
Alnor spent the next few days preparing for the journey. The problem was, he had no idea where to start. In an attempt to clear his mind, he set to work on a new lightsaber. Everyone was given one upon arriving at the temple, but very few kept it upon being raised to Jedi. He had all the parts laid out before him on the plain wooden desk in his chamber.
As hew worked, Alnor thought back on his past. His family had taught him many things that no Jedi should ever know, never mind use. The lightning that was so commonly associated with the Dark Side seemed menial in comparison to some of these powers. One of them was a variation of Force Grip, which, rather than choking a person, was used to crush objects. Alnor had ground many stones to dust with it in his childhood, but his parents had used it on living people. Alnor had never seen them do this, but he'd heard it. Nothing made quite the same sound as a skull caving in on itself.
Alnor was disgusted by how natural this had all seemed to him back then. He had never been taught mercy or compassion in his family. Instead, he had learned greed and hate. Part of him had always thought that something was wrong, but his family had simply told him that it was his weak side, and that he should ignore it. If his family hadn't been forced to leave him behind when they fled Coruscant, they would surely have turned him into a heartless killer. He could have been one of the most powerful Dark Jedi ever! The very thought of that made him lick dry lips…
A sudden cracking noise snapped his attention back to the present. Fractures ran all across the tabletop, and there were places where splinters poked up to reveal the wood beneath the finish. His lightsaber sat in the epicenter of those cracks, completely assembled, save for the final step of fusing it together with the Force. Alnor's hands shook as he realized what had happened. It had been a long time since he'd lashed out through the Dark Side like that. And yet, at the same time, it felt like the Dark Side had lashed out through him. Once, he had been a rash youth, acting simply as he had been taught, striking through hate. On his first day, he nearly killed a student who had been arrogant enough to think Alnor was inexperienced. It had come as a nasty surprise for the sixteen-year-old student when he was thrown against the wall and began to feel his chest constricting. Master Skywalker had been forced to intervene quickly to keep the poor student's ribs from snapping like twigs, but had not dealt with Alnor harshly. He had simply said, "From this day forth, you can lay aside your hatred, Alnor. This is a place of peace."
Alnor ran his fingers along one of the cracks in the desk. Something about it this time had been different. It had taken time, but he had managed to rid himself of his anger. He knew he was above these things. And yet, somehow, those thoughts had come. They felt so strange now, as if they were someone else's. He still felt a tremor of the Dark Side. Something about it was familiar, and yet it was so distant. One part of him told him to focus, and clear the fear from his mind. Another part rose up in fury against that fear.
Alnor tried to shove the anger and fear from his mind, to focus, and yet he found he could not control it. The fury seemed almost unfounded, as if being pulled from him against his will, drawing on his fear. He had to strike out against it! He had to destroy this evil within himself!
The desk burst into thousands of splinters as it was crushed by the Force. Lightning flew from his fingertips, striking at anything in sight. He saw his lightsaber fly upwards as lightning struck it. The Force surged into it and suddenly a green blade emerged from it, as if the weapon had come to life. Alnor no longer remembered what he was afraid of, or what he raged against, but the lightsaber buzzed around the room as it joined in the effort to destroy it.
Lightning continued to pour from his hands, but the majority of it went inside him, in the hopes of rooting out his fear. Alnor let out a scream as the Force ate at him from the inside out. The lightsaber whirled faster, bouncing wildly off the walls and ceiling. Just as he thought he could take no more, and the Force would simply tear him apart, a second green blade knocked the weapon out of the air, and something flung Alnor off his feet. Everything went black…