Okay, a brief moment to personally address the issue that I found for my story: that I was using orange lightsaber/light-tonfas that Maris uses. The source I used said that orange sabers signified a conflicted use that was grudgingly move to the light. They have a brush with the darkside and usually aren't the orthodox of jedi as they are sly and mischievous. So I thought it was perfect, now I understand that the only canonical real meanings are for red, blue, green, and yellow, but the expanded universe has dozens.

All credit respective owners and such.

Also, you may think I nerfed some characters, but do realize this is YEARS before A New Hope and Starkiller and a whole bunch of other stuff. No one is at the level they were shown to be in the various media and such.

Igcasa: Si bien me gustaría, no sé nada sobre esos personajes y, francamente, demasiada gente causa demasiada suciedad y desorden en una historia, apenas puedes hacer un seguimiento de quién está haciendo qué. Quiero decir, hacer un seguimiento de las personas en un grupo no es demasiado difícil, pero cuanto más agrega, más compleja es la sopa. No soy tan malo, pero tampoco soy tan bueno.

P.S. Reviews are appreciated and thank you google translate!

-Y.A.R.N.

Felucia was frankly a rather surprising sight from space.

The planet was absolutely teeming with life, and in that moment Cal understood why it was such a good place to hide. The constant broadcasting of life was almost overwhelming; if it wasn't for the masters on Dantooine telling him Shaak Ti was here, he would've had no idea a Jedi was here because of the sheer output of life that blanketed the planet completely hid even any individual, even with a powerful force presence. Cal began to guide the ship down with Xavier only to realize a serious issue.

There was no hangar or relatively empty place to land.

Dantooine was a grassland farm planet with many relatively flat landing areas and it did have a landing pad for anyone who needed to use it; Felucia was a planet of a different land, it had tangles of trees and other plants that stretched into the sky, making landing in an of itself nearly impossible. Neither Cal nor Xavier wanted to go alone and frankly the lower they got, the more time they probably gave Shaak Ti the wrong impression that they were scoping the place out. They eventually found a clearing but Cal would bet that it had been cleared out for the sole purpose of forcing any ship to land there. Xavier guided the ship down and they both shared a glance before getting up and walking towards the ramp. On the way Cal made sure his rebreather was functional and Xavier checked his old mask filter — something he broke down into individual components just in case — was fitted properly and working before they opened the ramp and walked out. The air was very breathable, but in case they came across something a bit too much for them, breathing masks were handy.

Cal was surprised when there was no one waiting. The cries of the indigenous lifeforms echoed in the far distance, but other than that the place they had landed had no one around them.

Xavier's hand was already resting on the hilt of his lightsaber, eyes scanning the forest, "No greeting party?"

Cal shook his head, "Apparently not, but let's not assume we're safe. Shaak Ti probably knows we're here and she's gathering her forces, we need to make sure we don't look hostile."

Xavier wouldn't argue with that, but the problem now was where would they go? He closed his eyes and the force whispered in his ear, telling him the path. He motioned to Cal to follow him and the duo began to make their way into the forest, it was almost completely shrouded, but there was a noticeable pathway that led deeper into the planet. Cal let the force guide and his friend him as much as he could, unwilling to let any attack coming towards him or Xavier go unnoticed.

They entered a cave only to emerge at the base of an absolutely massive hollowed out tree with passageways that had crisscrossed across the hollow in somewhat winding paths. None of them were naturally made and had been lashed together with what seemed to be sap and vines that had years to harden.

He and Xavier only had a moment to marvel before the force screamed and they threw themselves to the side as a blur of two orange sabers spun through the air — swiping through where they had been standing — and into the hands of a figure falling from the sky.

'So much for a peaceful meeting.' Cal lamented as Xavier and his lightsabers blazed to life.

Merrin swung her blade at Cere's neck, Cere ducking under the blow before lashing out with a force push that sent Merrin back. Merrin didn't dig her feet in against the push, knowing that she was currently no match against Cere's abilities. Instead, she rolled with the wave, allowing herself to push herself to her feet as she had seen Cal do on multiple occasions. She threw out a burst of flame from her free hand to ward off Cere's follow up and moved to counter Cere as the Jedi Master spun around. Merrin lashed out with a kick that Cere caught on her forearm before moving in to thrust at the night-sister's ribs. Merrin twisted in just enough time to swipe her lightsaber up and catch the strike. Their lightsabers crossed and crackled as their blades were locked in position; Merrin grimaced as Cere mouth thinned as they pushed against each other.

"I think we're done." Cere said as she stepped back and clipped her lightsaber to her belt, "You really have improved."

Merrin held the magenta blade in front of her for a moment before dismissing the blade and placing it back on her belt, "Ever since its purification, the blade feels lighter. It's almost as though I am extending my reach with my hand."

"You're connecting with the blade." Cere said with a soft smile, "Your attuning yourself well to your weapon."

Merrin nodded but let out a soft sigh, "Thank you."

Cere regarded her for a moment, "You're worried?"

Merrin nodded, voice quiet, "We haven't really separated since I had joined and that too for only minor things and some attacks. It's... uncomfortable to not have Cal around as he usually is."

Cere inclined her head, "I'll admit I feel the same, but you shouldn't worry. Cal's more than capable of handling himself, and I am sure he and Xavier are fine. Cal has a way of reaching people that don't trust him. I bet he's in having no trouble."

Cal wished he wasn't having so much trouble.

It wasn't trouble as in he was having problems in dealing with the girl that appeared out of thin air to try to kill him and Xavier, but rather that he didn't want to kill or seriously injure the girl in front of him. Granted she wasn't holding back at all — or so it seemed — but Cal hadn't been training with deceased masters of the past for no reason, he wasn't a pushover and she was a padawan at best judging by her skill. She just wasn't on par with him — even when it came to the saber-tonfas, they were a bit of a surprise — even with her own unique style of fighting, Cal had little trouble fending her off. The same could not be said for Xavier, even for all of his combat experience or stormtrooper training, he was still getting used to fighting other force-wielders. His own barriers were decent for the level of training he had, but this girl clearly had both the time and training in the force Xavier lacked. The girl had no shame in capitalizing on Xavier's weaknesses and using the force to keep him on the defensive.

It also didn't help that she struck out at any time Cal or Xavier tried to get a word in edgewise.

Cal danced away from the girl who spun in a blaze of orange light, she was quick and acrobatic, rolled and flipping in between him and Xavier as they battled. Xavier scowled at the girl as he batted her swipes away before lunging at her with a stab at her arm.

The girl swayed out of the way of the thrust before she leapt with the force to one of the crossways and whirled to snap a hand out. Xavier hastily raised his hands and replied with a push of his own that dissipated the wave of force rippling towards him. Cal's own barrier held without so much as a waver as he leapt through the air to land next to the girl and brought his saber into position. He use his free hand to motion for Xavier to back off and let him handle the battle from this point on.

The girl grit her teeth and advanced, swinging her tonfas and trying to gouge out a chunk of flesh from Cal's side. Cal weaved through the strikes, not holding back as much now that he had a moment away from Xavier. While the padawan was not bad, defending him when he rushed in to attack and then be forced to disengage was disrupting Cal's concentration and intention to strike. Xavier seemed to want to protest the order as he leapt to the same crossway they were battling on, but he hung back and left Cal to battle the padawan. Cal batted away her swipes before he grabbed one of her tonfa handles and wrenched it up to slam his knee into her stomach. She doubled over as the breath left her lungs in a sharp huff and cried out as a force push sent her flying into a wall. She didn't fall and felt a invisible force pin her as another force ripped her weapons out of her grasp and into the hands of the fiery-haired intruder.

"Would you stop trying to kill us to let us at least talk?" He demanded before blocking several rather weak attempt to lash out with the force from the struggling girl.

"Quiet assassin!" The girl shouted, "You won't deceive me! I'll never tell you where she is! She will avenge me!"

She squirmed and wiggled, trying to writhe free of the hold, but eventually slumped in defeat and submission.

"I'm not going to kill you you brat!" Cal barks, his patience finally spent as he clips her tonfas to his belt and literally uses the force to snap her mouth shut before she can utter a syllable, "I am Jedi Knight Cal Kestis, former Padawan of Jedi Master Jaro Tapal, Survivor of the Jedi Purge! I am trying to speak with Master Shaak Ti about the future of the Jedi Order!"

There is a cry from behind and Cal whirls hand still pinning the girl and his lightsaber lit and humming in his free hand. Xavier is on his knees as a blue lightsaber and his own yellow lightsaber are crossed just over his throat and in the hands of a red-skinned Tortuga female who holds him prisoner. Cal eyes widened as the force whispered the name of the Tortuga in front of him.

"Master Shaak Ti." He greeted, dipping his head in a semblance of a bow, "I am sorry we had to meet like this."

Master Shaak Ti regarded him before smiling and nodding, "So you seem. You'll have to forgive me if I choose not to take your word at face value."

"Is there any way I can convince you that I am sincere?" Cal inquired, "Because I really only did come to Felucia to talk to you about the Jedi Order going forwards."

"Release my padawan." Shaak Ti said sternly, "And I will release your companion."

Cal sighed and disengaged his lightsaber before unclipping the saber-tonfas and tossing them to the ground and letting go of the girl. She landed in a crouch and reached out, calling her weapons to her hand and igniting them.

"Surrender!" She demanded.

Cal heard a long-suffering sigh from the Jedi Master, clearly the girl had little training in the way of controlling her emotions.

"Maybe you should let your master handle this?" Cal suggested to the fuming girl, "You do realize if I wanted to hurt her I could've killed you just now?"

"Maris." Shaak Ti's voice became a touch sharper with command, "Stand down."

The newly identified Maris scowled but disengaged her lightsaber before clipping them to her side and folding her arms moodily.

Cal raised his hands away from his lightsaber and smiled, "Okay, my hands are away from my lightsaber, so can you please release my friend?"

Shaak Ti eyed Cal and stepped back, tossing Xavier's lightsaber to Cal, who caught it with the force and floated it over to Xavier.

"Jedi Master Tapal was your master?" Shaak Ti inquired.

"Yeah." Cal replied, a sad note entering his voice, "He was killed protecting me from the clones during the first moments of the purge."

Shaak Ti could sense no lie from the jedi and relaxed, a small burst of relief that she and Maris truly weren't the last of the jedi. Even so, she was curious where he had hidden himself and why was he showing himself now.

"YOU DESTROYED IT?!" Shaak Ti shouted in dismay.

"We couldn't risk it falling into the hands of the Empire." Cal replied evenly, inwardly groaning at the reaction he knew was coming.

Perhaps it was a good thing he sent Xavier and Maris off to train with each other for a bit while he talked with Shaaki Ti. Cal was no fool, he knew telling Shaak Ti this was probably going to be the biggest problem in his pitch, but he had honestly had enough of this holier-than-thou bullshit the jedi had been shoving down the entire galaxy's throat.

He was tired of trying to be a good jedi that can just let go of the things that make him feel life is worth it. He's a jedi, maybe not by the most conventional means or by the standards of the council — mainly since there was no council really left — but by the will of the force and to him that is all he needs to be sure of himself. He had no desire to perpetuate the traditions that kept the order 'safe' for a millennia because in the end it had done nothing but make them lambs to the slaughter. If Shaak Ti thought that the old ways were best, then he would leave, he had no desire for the cycle to repeat, better to be a 'heretic' and create something that may actually last rather than stick to a path that lead to devastation and death, each one a tear in the Force that ached and screamed.

He also couldn't lie and say it was destroyed by the Sith because Shaak Ti would know and end the conversation before it begun.

"You could've — there was a chance — how could you?!" Shaak Ti was sputtering as she quite honestly couldn't believe he had such an important item and destroyed it, especially after all he had gone through to get it.

"If we fell and Vader got a hold of the holocron, then a whole new slew of sith acolytes were ready to be made from innocent children. The force showed me a vision of an attempt at raising a new order only for it to fail and the padawans to be tortured and captured." Cal replied tiredly as his eyes closed, the vision he had seen played back beneath his eyelids, the whimper cries and his own blood-red lightsaber's glow bathing the world in blood and pain, "I couldn't risk it, better to leave their lives to the force to decide, as the jedi would've done."

Shaak Ti released as much of her anger at the stupidity of the boy — he was unworthy to be a jedi (let alone a jedi knight) if he was ruled by cowardice — before her and slowly stops thinking in fury, "You don't deserve to be a jedi. You gave up when the force could've showed you a way, you let yourself be ruled by fear."

Cal's eyes snap open and he gets to his feet, force blazing around him in conviction words whispering in his ear guiding his own tirade, "The Force did show me! It warned me against the path I was to step onto, and I listened! Can you say the same as you stay here alone and wait, militarizing a planet while other planets wither and die? Do you think the galaxy will change without action and people actually willing to stand up and say something, do something? The Jedi fell because they were blind to the shadow that they themselves cast that the Sith hid in! If you want to make a new order than go out and do it, but you say you're waiting for the right time?"

"You think going out there and announcing my presence will do anything?" Shaak Ti retorted, "I have no desire for Vader to kill me, the last of the jedi!"

The force whispered to Cal and his eyes widened before hardening, "At least be honest, you aren't leaving because your waiting for a sign, you're waiting because you're afraid! Afraid to die and that you'll have changed nothing! I can understand that, I used to be the same way, but maybe if you actually took a step against them, you might inspire others to do the same! Death isn't meaningless unless you make it meaningless! I knew full well that my journey would be full of danger, but even that wouldn't stop me from trying to do what was right!"

Shaak Ti scoffed but remained seated, "All the more proof that you are unworthy of being a knight. You accuse me of cowardice, but to reveal that the jedi are still alive will only bring the Empire down on us and erase what's left. You show no wisdom and have completely abandoned the traditions of the jedi! You are little more than a force-wielding heretic!"

"The Empire will come regardless." Cal fought the urge to retaliate in indignant anger, "They may not come today, or tomorrow, maybe not this year or the next, but they will come. They'll raze this planet to ash and then what will you do to stop them? As for the traditions of the Jedi, what good did it do? The old traditions and dogmatic beliefs didn't save the jedi, they didn't help in any way! We lost almost everything because we refused to change, we refused to think that the sith were alive! In the end the traditions were nothing more than arrogance and a smokescreen that the Sith used to keep us blind till Order 66! We trained to fight the same war all over again when the sith adapted and became more than we ever could hope to match!"

"You dare say the Jedi were less than the Sith?" Shaak Ti demanded.

"No!" Cal shouted, wishing that she could see what he saw, just try to look at the situation from his angle —

A wave of exhaustion hit Cal as he realized that he wasn't getting anywhere by arguing with Shaak Ti. He had hoped that the decimation of the jedi would've have been enough for her to see that maybe things needed to change, but she was still convinced that as long as the jedi lived in the past, they could rebuild in the future. Cal inhaled slowly and let the annoyance and accusations drift away, he was done. He straightened his back and looked at the Jedi Council Member straight in the eye. Whatever she saw in his gaze made he square her shoulders and he felt the force rise around her to defend her if need be.

But he had no desire to fight.

"I believe I have taken enough of your time Master Ti." He said quietly, "I should go."

Shaak Ti seemed to mull over this for a few moments before sighing and meeting his gaze, "I agree."

And that was that.

He just hoped that she would survive, but he had nothing more to ask or give or say in the face of her stubborn adherence to the dogmatic traditions of the order.

It was time to go.