So it was all over, at last. No more retreating. Only advancing. I felt proud, but humbly so, because mine was a burden I, and only I, carried. Under guard, I boarded Revan's small, speedy command ship. I was escorted by four of her assassins, but I was not worried. The galaxy itself had its eye on me, and all was well. I stood in her chamber, but although the darkness was thick, I could now see the turbid flow of the Force through her diseased spirit. I pitied her.
"I expect good news after all this time.""Revan, I am your vassal no more."
The assassins were trained to respond at once to such treachery, and lifted their flashing sabers against me. I raised my fingers slightly, and they fell stiff as boards around me. Lights glared in the chamber as Revan's angry saber snaked from her hand.
"What trickery is this?"
"Force Paralysis."
I balanced my saber in the palm of my hand. Her eyes lit up with fury.
"You! You bowed to him?"
"That I did, and now, I bow to none."
"Then die!"
She clenched her fist to Force Crush me. Using the same principle of Force Paralysis, I negated her efforts. I walked forward in perfect tranquility, my heart beating with the Force.
"So you see, Revan, I walk a different path."
"That path leads to your doom!"
She leapt at me as a wildcat would its prey. I stepped aside and allowed her to skid.
"Reckless."
"Traitorous imp! You would dare challenge me, the Sith Lord?"
"Would you demand any less?"
"I demand obedience. Exile!"
A wall panel lowered to reveal a girl of slight build. Her blonde hair was cropped short above her sable robes.
"A child, Revan? You would pit a child against me?"
The Exile's saber flickered to threatening life while the Sith retreated to her inner sanctum.
"I will gain a name of honour from Lord Revan when I lay you at her feet."
"Such animosity, my dear, does not become your yet fair face. Turn away before it is darkened."
She circled me as a lioness on the hunt.
"You shall disappear within my saber's shadow!"
Her fighting style reflected her internal conflict. Once a sword of the Council, now subservient to Revan, she held within her the desire to be something greater. Something, no doubt, that Joe himself had found within me.
"There is more to the Force than mere power," I mentioned while parrying her deadly thrusts.
"What would the Light Side know of power?" she retorted, kicking me away before pirouetting through the air in a whirling strike that I hopped away from, as Hanny might.
"There is no power, there is only choice. Your choices unlock your potential," I lectured while deflecting her decapitating blows, "Your potential, not the Force, sets you free!" I somersaulted over her, "Freedom brings responsibility, which calls the Force to your side!"
"Silence! I will not hear the words of a traitor!"
I went on the offensive for the first time, and flicked her lightsaber from her hand to catch it in mine. As the Force was turbulent within her, so were her skills weak. I held her in place with Force Paralysis so the uppity minx would desist from her attempts on my life and instead listen.
"When the Force is yours, the Force redeems you. Not the Light Side. Not the Dark Side. There is only the Force, and it is all that matters, not this veil of flesh, not idle teachings or passionate speeches. Let go of your hate," I released her, and she remained, listening, "Let go of your anger. It clouds your mind to the point that your soul disappears in its shadow. Why be lost in darkness, when you can make choices that allow your spirit to be free?"
"You do not know the power of the Dark Side."
"I know the power of choice, Exile. I do not possess this red saber because I am a saint. I wield it as one who carries the burden of choice. I choose to redeem Revan, and now you, because I have seen salvation, and it will not mean that you, yourself, disappear."
I dropped her lightsaber at her feet.
"Now go. Ignore the words of a fool, or be the first of your kind to realize the potential of choice and not passion. Passion controls you, but you control choice."
She summoned her saber to hand.
"Peace is a lie…"
"This is not about peace," I stared at her and her eyes could not leave mine, "This is about the Force. There will never be a higher calling in your life, and you can either allow it to guide your footsteps or resist it and destroy whatever vestiges of yourself remain. You know the Force, Exile, and it knows you. There is no escaping that."
I Force pushed her and the paralyzed assassins out of the chamber and crunched the doors shut so that none would enter.
"Revan."
"So, you believe yourself to be omniscient in the ways of the Force. Pitiful fool, you shall experience the darkness you fight against."
Choking gas began to fill the outer chamber where I stood. She was safe within her walls of duratanium reinforced by a generator forcefield. No lightsaber could hope to best such a defense, but there was one trick Joe taught me that could.
"LIMITER REMOVAL!"
I smashed the casing of my lightsaber, disrupting the field emitter matrix and throwing the crystals out of alignment. The energies ran unrestrained and the lightsaber would have detonated had I not kept tight control with the Force.
"PERIL BEAM!"
I aimed my erupting saber at the inner sanctum. The dazzling red beam sliced through the multiple defenses and punched a hole in the hull. The rooms beyond Revan's chamber began to decompress, sucking out the killer gas as well as air, and an automated voice sounded across the ship to evacuate.
"WIDE SWORD!"
It tore through the length of the inner sanctum – including the ship – that cracked like an eggshell. Revan escaped, though. She had a talent for survival.
"Lunatic! It will destroy us both!" she shrilled. Truly, I had damaged my saber beyond repair and it was approaching critical mass, as more and more energy was pumped unchecked out of the power cells in a constant stream barely held together by my own strength. Meanwhile alarms blared, advising all personnel to abandon ship before the decompression collapsed the hull entirely.
"Run, Revan. Run to the ends of the cosmos. Run to the farthest star and keep on running. You will never escape the truth of the Force, and it will consume you."
My exploding lightsaber shuddered violently.
"You'd better go – I cannot hold this for long."
Without a word she ran, as she always would, now and forever.
And I, I remained. Soon it all became red, then white, then merciful black.
I open my eyes, realizing they have always been open. I am not blind; rather, I see the expanse of the void. Slowly the stars come into focus. I feel it. A heartbeat. A pulse, that resonates through the void and me. It is the affirmation of that whisper that had tantalized me all my life.
I hear a voice.
"Well done, good and faithful servant."
"Joe?"
His smiling visage came into view, robed in eternity.
"Welcome home, my young Padawan."
"Hey, we're equals."
"Such is the Force that its work is never done. For now, the night is over. This is the morning."
Now comes the song, the song of billions upon billions of souls moving around me. I see the Exile, returning to the Council for judgment. I see Revan, fleeing where she would not be found. I see Jen, Bob and Alice, whose work among the living is not yet done.
I at last see where I am.
Majesty. Glorious majesty. Yet no word, no thought, no dream can encompass the True Force. Only the soul of one departed from the mortal spiral of the galaxy could gaze upon the Totality.
"This," I say with irrevocable certainty that gladdens my heart, "Is why I live."
"Do you see?" says he who had lived a thousand years, "Neither heart nor tongue nor mind can conceive where it begins and where it ends."
I would have gazed evermore, but he moved toward it.
"Where are you going?"
"To be redeemed."
Out of that living ocean of light cries the voice that had whispered to us since birth.
"Come!"
As one spirit, one hope, and one joy we respond, "Behold, I come!"
END