Chapter 1
The wee hours of the morning were the best ones. The peaceful ebb and flow of life in the slowly awakening jungle was of a magnitude, that Jacen Solo failed to describe.
He loved the jungle, he had always loved it.
It was here, where he could rest his mind properly and reach out into the force in a way he coulnd´t do anywhere else. The concentration of life in this certain place, formed a unique force signature that made him feel elevated and at ease, at the same time.
He sat down on the floor, crossing his legs before him and gave his conscious self up to the force. He concentrated on the beings and things immediately around him. Lifting stones and small insects. He focused on his own body and levitated himself until he was floating over the ground. That´s when he started to reach out further.
He felt the temple, and the peaceful minds of his fellow Jedi, either asleep or in deep meditation.
He gently touched his uncle´s consciousness and felt him asleep, oblivious to the fact that his five year old son, Ben, was on the verge of waking up and about to pronounce this fact all across the temple. Jacen smiled and refrained from probing further. He didn´t want to intrude into the Skywalker´s privacy.
Instead he reached out across the vast distances of space to the place where he hoped to find his family. Coruscant wasn´t hard to detect in the force. It was as livid and vibrant as Yavin IV, but it wasn´t as beautiful and raw in it´s nature.
Jacen easily made contact with his twin, brushing her mind in a greeting. She was busy, and only aknowledged him shortly. She was with Anakin. That much he could tell.
He reached out for his parents, the moment his mother´s mind exploded with waves of pleasure, which made him blush and hurriedly shut off all perception but his five senses.
"Oh, please no!" he muttered, completely grossed out, not daring to check on his father. He opened his eyes before repositiong himself.
With a somewhat smug smile, he focused again. He was aware of the sweat trickling down his bare chest and neck and a cool breeze blowing over him.
The second time he started to medidate, though, something felt very different. It was like the force was pulling him in a certain direction.
He inhaled deeply and let everything go, like his uncle had once taught him. Once the force decided to become active, one was bound to listen.
He felt like falling and a blurred picture formed before his eyes.
He could make out a wide wasted desert and two setting suns on the horizon. Although he had never been there, he was quiet sure that he was seeing Tatooine.
As the forms took shape he became aware of two figures standing on a small sandy hill, observing the sunset.
It was a beautiful and peaceful sight, and yet something dark was looming in the shadows behind them.
He felt a cold shiver crawling up and down his spine, making the small hair on his neck stand up. Something felt terribly wrong, despite this harmony.
A small and dark robed figure was slowly but certainly making it´s way toward the couple.
Jacen wanted to scream, to warn them, but he couldn´t draw attention to himself. On his way to the couple the figure passed Jacen, turning his face toward him, sending a smug smile in his general direction.
A very familiar smug smile.
Jacen gasped and stumbled backwards.
He felt his breath knocked out of his lungs.
He wasn´t sure if it was the fact, that he was facing a ten year old boy, that was making him feel completely numb.
The familiarity and purity of his hazel eyes
The similarity to his brother Anakin, he saw in the boy´s featurs
Or the ebon hatred he found in the boy´s eyes and felt in his presence.
The boy got rid of the black robe, revealing an unruly mob of brown hair and a set of scattered and dirty clothes underneath. Jacen watched helplessly, as the young human raised his hands and blue and white lightning came shooting out of his bare hands.
He heard a man´s scream
"Beru, take him and run..."
Jacen realised that the woman was carrying a small bundel in her arms...
The boy didn´t bother with the man, when he tried to come in his way... one small wave of
his arm, and the moisture farmer folded like a leaf. It didn´t need expertise to realize that he was dead.
The woman hadn´t come far, before she stumbled over something unseen. The boy approached slowly and menacingly, as if he was savouring the woman´s fear. Out of a recess of his mind, Jacen heard the the terrified crying of a very young infant, and suddenly he knew.
He knew exactly what was going on.
He was watching the murder of Luke Skywalker. A murder comitted at a time and place where nobody was able to defend him. But where was Obi Wan Kenobi and why wasn´t he coming?
Suddenly the world around him was starting to twist, and he was pulled skyward. For a short time, all he could see was a twisting haze of colours.
When things started to take shape again he found himself standing in a big hallway. Pictures and tasteful sculptures were decorating bright painted walls.
Like the place he had visited before, it was an example for peace and tranquillity. And as before, he felt the same presence approach. Evil was coming to claim the second twin. Nobody was prepared for the attack and it all happened in the blink of an eye. The boy was leaving behind a trail of death and destruction and everybody who stood in the way would be consumed.
Once again Jacen was forced to helplessly watch the death of Bail Organa and his newly adopted daughter. He felt tears trickling down his eyes, before the world around him faded once again.
The next time he opened his eyes he stared up at the high treetops of the Yavin jungle. The sun was setting again. He shook his head, trying to brush away the images that had inevitably burned themselves into his brain.
...Through the force, things you will see... other places... the future the past...old friends long gone...
He started into a dead run toward the temple, passing some confused Jedi students, in the search for his uncle.
He ran into him,on the way to the great hall.
"Uncle Luke!" he panted "wait!"
The Jedi Master turned around to watch his nephew´s fast approach, immediately sensing that something was very wrong with him.
"Jacen, what´s the matter?"
Jacen grabbed for a ledge that was coming out of the wall, for support. He lifted his gaze to meet his uncles calm and gentle eyes.
"Something happened, or is going to happen! I don´t know! I saw it!"