Disclaimer: If I owned
Star Wars, I'd be a lot richer than I am right now, so I don't
own anything and don't sue me, please.
Title: 11.3.67
Characters: Ben Skywalker
Author: SilSolo
Time: 67 years
ABY, like the title says
Genre: Challenge replies
Notes: I'd
like to thank ZaraValinor for beta'ing this! I wrote this to
answer LegacyChild's April challenge, which you can find on the
Resource board.
Summary: Ben reflects on his choice to leave the
Jedi Order after living in the wilderness for several years.
I've
become so numb
I can't feel you there
I've become so tired
so much more aware
I'm becoming this
all I want to do
is be more like me
and be less like you
Numb by
Linkin Park
11.3.67 ABY
I've tried to convince myself that I always was Ken, spirit son of Clan Omicron, to the core, but now, I'm not so sure, if I ever was. Ben the Aberrant Scion Skywalker is beginning to resurface on this lovely backwater planet of Onderon and I don't want him to.
Here, without that cumbersome identity, I can live as a normal man, a beast trainer and a husband. Here, there's no politics, no war, and no Jedi meddling until just now. I don't like doing what Jedi do, nosing into the affairs of others for little but death and destruction in return all because they have this power. I don't know how long I'd ramble if I were to give all of the examples from the Yuuzhan Vong war. I once didn't believe any of the stuff that I just said, but years of futile missions, with the last one being to and from Hapes, changed that dramatically. I won't blame Allana for using me as a chess piece since she's Hapan, but I can't forget the way she flirted with me when Jedi sentiments were high and revealed a secret that almost got me executed when times turned sour. How was I supposed to know that we were related, especially when she pretended to have no trace of Skywalker blood?
The one good thing that came out of the incident from my Hapan mission was my 'exile' and my being stripped of the Force; I ascertained for myself the life sentence that I've wanted and am still serving. I cannot thank Valin and Jysella enough for silencing the Force in my head once and for all, even though they demanded an almost impossible price. People protested my leaving the known world, but if they want Skywalkers, they can have Allana, the two goons she calls brothers, and their cousins.
Here comes my adorable little daughter, Mara. Until very recently, she, or rather, her name, was the only trace of my origins outside of this felicitous world, but I never cared because she always used her sobriquet, Mara'ihka and her namesake was the only thing that I liked about the Jedi world. I don't want to look at the artifact that my daughter wishes to show me since I know that it dates back to the time of the Sith rule---the Sith War at the latest. On the other hand, I can't reject my kid, can I, even if she's digging up something related to my annoying doubts about a former life that I do not miss at all? At least I'm trying to tell myself that I never belonged with the Jedi and don't yearn for that old life.
My daughter's coming to me, of all people, because she knows that I was once a Jedi Knight but not the pain I went through. I feel all the more confused and I wonder if that's how Vader felt all along, but especially after he met my father. What am I saying? I can't afford to have even the slightest conflict about the past that I've left behind and can never return to when my beautiful little Onderonian daughter's running to me. I'll just have to tell her to stay away from these items and the ruins of the city. That'll spare her the hurt of being Jedi, though it'll upset and disappoint the kid a little bit since she's pretty eager to show me what she's found.
-San. End
-
Endnote: If you want more information on Onderon,
read the Tales of the Jedi comics.