62. Hopeless
14th day, 7th month, standard year 24938
I had a nightmare. About Amiri, as you can probably imagine.
Except you're not real. I'm not actually talking to anybody.
I really wish I was. I ought to.
14th day, 7th month, standard year 24938
It was just gone midnight when I wrote all that. Now it's the mormning. Coruscant looks pretty today.
It's different for different people, isn't it? Sometimes when a person wakes up after something terrible has just happened they look outside and see it's a nice day and curse whoever made the sunshine because it doesn't seem right, and others thank the Force for the sunshine because...it's there. And it's sunshine.
My Master just went and shut the blinds.
Anyway. The basics.
1. Amiri is dead. For real, this time.
2) Lorian confronted my Master about his now-dead family. I think he was going to kill him. It doesn't seem real now, anyway.
3) Lorian's dead. Mapru killed him. Saving my Master's life in the process.
3) I think someone asked what happened to the book of Sith magic. Dilan laughed and laughed and laughed at that. I will never hear laughter in the same way again. And that just isn't fair.
4) Dilan and Lorian tortured Amiri. That's how come they knew about the Temple's weaknesses. She told them. I don't know if she told them about me or Vulna or my Master or anyone. I have no way of knowing now. I'm holding on to the hope that she didn't.
5) She's dead. She's actually dead.
6) I don't know how or why it happened...but things had exploded, taking people with them...and I just saw Dilan running away, out of the corner of my eye, and I couldn't believe I was actually still alive, and I chased him...Tahl and Vulna joined me, we were running, and the Temple wasn't right anymore, like it was dying...
...and we got split up. There was a lot of smoke, for...some reason. Everything was in shadow. Anyway, Tahl screamed at some point and I went to get her and she was hurt, some chemical from the detonators was eating into her skin, she said Vulna had gone off after Dilan...
7) Vulna came back with nothing. It's most likely Dilan overpowered him. In fact, it's obvious Dilan overpowered him. Why wouldn't he?
Oh, this is hopeless. You can't just list things like that. It turns them into something that didn't actually happen, not to you. Or maybe it makes them more manageable. Or maybe it shouldn't actually be manageable.
Now, I want to write about the Force and it's will. But I shan't.
One more bit of list, though, one worth writing:
8) The Younglings were okay.
15th day, 7th month, standard year 24938
You know what? I lied. The Younglings weren't okay. They all died. Along with hundreds of others.
16th day, 7th month, standard year 24938
The whole Temple is in shock and mourning. Or so it seems. I don't know what to do. Tahl is in the Healer's wing, but there's barely enough room for everyone. Funerals have been held. Nothing has changed between my Master and Mapru I heard them talking...Master mentioned that now the entire d'Jochek family was dead, and Mapru shooting back that he had killed one of them and it hadn't even been for a good reason.
I keep forgetting about that.
I want to go and see Tahl.
Maybe I won't write for a while. Perhaps that's best.
There's smoke in the air.
29th day, 9th month, standard year 24938
Well, I kept that promise, didn't I?
The Temple has...for the most part...gone back to normal. Tahl is fine, for which I am grateful. She's been in so many awful situations, and she always comes out of them mostly okay. I think she always will. She has no idea how grateful I am for that.
The funerals are over. Do yo know how many people died? One hundred and fifty seven. Younglings, Padawans, Knights and a few Masters. None of the Council. It's too horrible to think about, it really is. Vulna doesn't talk about it either.
Anyway.
There's a big room in the Temple. I don't know if I've spoken about it before. All the names of dead Jedi are listed there. Most often, people who aren't Masters aren't allowed down there. I don't know who keeps track of all the Jedi who've died. I don't know who does the writing. But I do know it's there.
I met Master Mapru in the star-map room. He looked at me when I came in. It wasn't the usual look, but it was far from being kind.
"Ah, young Padawan. Why are you here?"
I told him the truth. "This is my favourite room. I wanted to come here...and forget."
He narrowed his eyes at me. "As so it happens, this is my favourite room as well. Not that Jedi ought to have fourites. As for forgetting...there is plenty you need to remember."
"What do you mean."
"I'll show you," he said, and then he simply walked out of the room. I followed. He led me underneath the Temple, to the room I spoke about before.
When we got in he paused and glanced around. The room itself was like a cave...not unlike the caves of Ilum. All the millions of names glittered like stars. I wondered how they got the writing to shine in that way.
I followed Mapru and didn't speak to him, and he didn't speak to me. Finally, he stopped, and pointed to one name on the wall, written no larger and no smaller than any of the others.
Eridar Ololian
I nodded and waiited for him to explain why he'd brought me here. He didn't. So I said, somewhat nervously, "Forgive me, Master Mapru, but...what's going on?"
"Eridar Ololian had a gift, no matter what that idiot you call your Master thinks," he informed me calmly. "Once she told Yoda she believed that he would be partly responsable for the downfall of the Jedi, and that is why he cut himself off from her."
Then he was silent.
"Did you love her?" I eventually ventured.
"That's not important," he hissed. "What is important is keeping the Order alive. You have some part to play. So does Vulna, your dear friend. Do you ever wonder why he was never expelled for all his misdoings?"
This didn't require much thinking. "You." I gasped.
He nodded, and then smiled. It was the sort of smile you'd have expected to see on someone in a nightmare. And then he left the room. I was alone underneath the Temple, in a sea of names no longer used. I looked around me. The names of the Younglings and of the others who'd died were newly written there. I recgonized most of the names. I felt like sobbing.
Then I went away as well.
I didn't see Amiri's name there. I did look....there were a lot of names, and I couldn't have read all of them. She is there, I'm sure of it.
She was a Jedi. And she was my friend.
They sent many, many Jedi teams out to find Dilan, you know. They've all returned empty-handed. Every single one.