31 A.B.Y
Mega-Class Star Destroyer
"Gaahh." Kylo gasped as he was thrown across the training room, hitting the ground and continued to slide until he hit the room's wall. He struggled to get up to his knees from his prone position. The pain from his tired muscles and small lightsaber burns making it difficult.
"Pitiful brat! Your dueling skills are almost at the level of a child." Snoke sneered as he strolled around the training room, his deformed and withered body in a relaxed state as he absently toyed with the Darksaber in his hand, "No wonder you failed to eliminate Skywalker."
Snoke continued to look down at the boy as he circled him. He had high hopes for the Solo-boy, as finding someone with a natural attunement with the dark was hard these days. Oddly, (and quite suspiciously) Snoke had noted, the amount of Force-sensitives in the galaxy was at an all-time low. From records and stories from the days of the Old Republic, Force users had at one point been an almost a common occurrence in the galaxy.
At one point armies of Jedi and Sith had clashed in fierce, galactic-sized battles. Both orders fielding tens of thousands of warriors each as they clashed over which side of the Force should remain supreme.
Now it seemed like they were a dying breed. Even the core world's analysts had noticed a sharp decline in Force-sensitive children born since the Empire had formed. Though this fact amused Snoke, as it revealed that the New Republic was still administering mandatory Midichlorian tests to newborns. To which Snoke couldn't blame them at all. Afterall, what type of government wants people with potentially lethal supernatural powers running around unregistered? Perhaps the reason for the sudden lack of Force-sensitives was that the higher-ups of the various galactic governments had finally pulled their heads out their Sarlaccs and figured it was better to hide a small pile of bodies than to deal with galactic wars.
Snoke looked down to see his apprentice still lying on the floor. Hmmm, maybe a little anger would get him going.
"Is that all you are capable of boy? Perhaps I should've recruited one of our radar technicians to be my apprentice. They'd probably be more competent than you."
"RRRAAAHHHH!" Kylo snarled as he got up and ignited his crackling crimson saber, lunging at Snoke. His rage clouding out the pain as he tapped into the dark side.
"Petulant child." Snoke snorted with a roll of his eyes and ignited the ancient saber. The dark master simply raised the black saber and with practiced ease parried the overhead strike before unleashing a force blast with his free hand, once again sending Kylo flying back across the room again.
This time Kylo didn't even touch the floor, instead, he slammed directly into the middle of the wall. The young man groaned in pain as he fell face flat on the floor.
Snoke shook his head, "Unbelievable. Simply unbelievable." He said, "How can you possibly be the grandson of Vader? Who was one of Form V greatest practitioners. The nephew of Luke Skywalker? Who skills in dueling were so great that he was known to be able to mimic his opponents style just by seeing them in action!"
"S-shut up…" Kylo muttered as he once again began lifting himself off the ground.
"I'm sorry, what was that?" I couldn't hear you over that whimper, boy." Snoke continued to prod.
"Shut up." Kylo said more firmly this time as he got to his knees. The young man's eyes starting to flicker with rage.
'Ahhh, there we are. Just a little more.' Snoke thought.
"Ahahahaha, and they call you the Jedi Killer?" Snoke cackled, "Your grandfather stormed the Jedi Temple and slain hundreds of knights and masters. You, on the other hand, couldn't even completely kill a couple dozen students and a single master! Remind me again how many others escaped besides Skywalker, boy."
"I. Said. Shut. Up." Kylo repeated with a strained voice as he clenched his fists.
"My, my, my. Quiet the legacy to Vader you are!" Snoke said with sarcasm dripping from his tone, "You really are a failure, aren't you boy."
"SSHHHHHHUUUUUUUTTTTTTT UPPPPPPPPP!" Kylo roared as the dark side exploded from him.
The room's walls buckled and pulled in various ways as the Force pushed out against them while the durasteel floor developed spider web-like cracks. All throughout the sixty-kilometer long ship, lights, electronics, and even the dreadnoughts own reactors started to go haywire. Crew members and guards on the floors within five miles of the training room would later report that they suddenly had a hard time breathing and concentrating around that time, with many who were closer even falling to the floor or unconscious from the sudden mysterious pressure.
Even Snoke himself was momentarily shocked at the young man's explosion of power but soon regained his composure with a crooked smile forming.
"Very good boy. Now, this is what I expect from the grandson of the chosen one!" Snoke said. The man's smile only grew as he noticed Kylos eyes burn a sulfuric yellow.
"Excellent indeed."
Remnant
"Excellent work Jaune! Now switch to Form IV." Luke said as he himself slipped into the defensive stance of Form III, preparing for his padawans incoming assault as they trained in a lightly wooded area near Luke's small hut.
It had been three years since Luke had crashed landed (or just plain out crashed in R2's opinion) on Remnant. Three years since Ben had betrayed him. Three years since he had gained a new apprentice in a now fourteen-year-old boy named Jaune Arc.
Luke had been wary at first, despite the Force telling him that it was his job to train the boy. He had sensed the Jaune power and just like Ben's, it scared him. There were few things that had ever put fear into him. Leaving Tatooine for the first time to embark on an asinine quest to save a princess, assaulting superstation with just a couple handfuls of fighters, and of course, facing down his father for the first time were all things that had sparked bits of fear into his heart.
But when Luke had first sensed Ben's power… it had put true fear into him. Not fear of the power itself mind you, but the fear of what the boy would do with that power, and it seemed his worst fears had come to life. It seemed that the Force had destined him to try to raise the dark, and for Jaune to try and stop him.
Did Luke ever mention how much he hates prophecies?
"Haaaa!" Jaune cried as he leaped into the air with a blue lightsaber ignited. Doing a flip over Luke before landing and sending out rapid slashes with the blade.
Luke responded simply by spinning around and blocking every slash Jaune sent out.
"Keep moving Jaune! Form IV is all about acrobatics and maneuvering combined with aggressive, fast attacks. Don't stay in one place for too long." Luke said as he demonstrated to Jaune what he meant, parrying one of the young teen's strikes and elbowing him in the jaw.
Jaune grunted as the sudden blow shocked him and took a few steps back. He regained his wits just in time to jump out of the way of a horizontal slash from Luke.
'Keep moving huh? Alright then.' Jaune thought as applied more of the Force to enhance his body. Speeding up his reaction time and increasing his muscle strength he went an all-out offensive on his master. Doing as Luke said and combining fast strikes with constant movement, forcing Luke to react to his attacks so he didn't have time to counter.
"At a boy. Now keep it up Jaune!" Luke encouraged as he smiled at the fourteen-year-olds sudden capability with Form IV. Just like the first three forms he had taught Jaune, the boy had gained an intermediate level of skill after only some trial and error, along with some pointers from him.
He was a master at them by no means, but it still surprised Luke how well Jaune seemed to take to the saber forms. While not quite at the level of an Imperial Inquisitor, Jaune was certainly above Jedi padawan that would be around his age of the old order.
"What's wrong old man, your age starting to get to you? If you need to take a break to catch your breath it's alright." Jaune taunted as he continued to press Luke.
And there it was. Luke rolled his eyes, 'Time to knock the cocky little shit down a peg.'
Luke switched to Form V, or more specifically, the Djem So variant of the form. Blocking a final strike he then began counter-attacking, launching strike after heavy strike at his padawan.
Form V of was indeed one of the most aggressive and powerful of the saber forms if used properly, though it was split into two different subforms. Form V Shien was created to accurately deflect blaster bolts back at enemies and defend against other sabers in-mass but was weaker when faced with a single opponent. The exact opposite of Form III.
The more aggressive variant of Djem So, on the other hand, was a different beast altogether. It focused on not only deflecting strikes but then launching devastating power counter attacks upon the enemy to then keep them on the defensive, dominating them and breaking their defense. The forms drawback though was it relied on the practitioner have the muscle and power to back it up. As such, it was aptly nicknamed, The way of the Krayt Dragon.
Luke pressed his attack as he forced the boy to adopt a defensive stance. Unfortunately for Jaune though, his master was an expert in lightsaber combat with decades of experience under his belt.
In one fluid movement, Luke disengaged to build momentum before bringing his saber overhead for a power attack.
Jaune scrambled to block the sudden attack, managing to lift his sapphire blade just in time to catch the emerald one.
Which was a major mistake.
Jaune's smaller frame shook as the hit crashed into him and he fell backwards on his ass, lightsaber slipping from his grasp. He felt his muscles all turn to jello despite being Force enhanced and swore he could feel his bones reverberate from the blow.
"Owww." He groaned, rubbing his now sore arms.
"And that is what you get for being a brat. My hair may be graying, but that doesn't mean that I'm still not spry enough to hand you your but kid." Luke said with crossed arms, though a slight smile played on his lips.
"Yeah, with liberal amounts of Force enhancement maybe," Jaune muttered.
"What was that?"
"Nothing!"
"That's what I thought." Luke said as he began to back away, "Now pick up your saber and clip it to your belt. We're working on Force abilities next."
Jaune nodded, getting up and grabbed his saber. Clipping it to his belt he looked at Luke as he backed away.
"Uh Luke, what are you doing?" Jaune asked.
"Preparing for the next technique that I'm going to teach you," Luke responded.
Now Jaune's interest was peaked, "What kind of technique?"
"Tutaminis. The subset of the Control aspect of the Force, it deals with energy absorption." Luke explained.
"So like electricity and plasma? Does that mean Tutaminis can block Sith lightning and blaster bolts?" Jaune asked.
Luke smiled, "Exactly my young padawan, and depending on one's mastery of it, can even stop lightsabers barehanded. So now we practice."
"So what, am I going to practice drawing energy from a dust battery or something?"
"Nope." Luke said as he pulled out a blaster from his cloak, "We're going to do it a more exciting way."
Jaune paled slightly as the sight of his master pointing a gun at him.
"This is for calling you old isn't it?" Jaune gulped.
"Nah." Luke denied before smirking, "Well, maybe just a bit."
2 Hours Later
"Ow ow ow ow ow." Jaune squeaked as he blew on his hands, which were now an angry red color.
Luke's eyes rolled at his padawan, "Oh shut it, you big baby. If they hurt that bad just Force heal them quick."
Jaune gave Luke a pointed glare, "That's not the point! You shot me with superheated plasma!"
Luke snorted and held up a finger, "First off, there's no such thing as superheated plasma as plasma is already superheated matter you nerf herder. Second, it was for training." Luke said, "And look at what happened, you already have the hang of it!"
In all honesty, though Luke was once again impressed on how fast his student's learning curve was. Even despite being designated as the dark champion's equal in the light (which in Luke's experience with prophecies meant the universe's newest chew toy), Jaune's rapid progress with learning to harness the Force and its many abilities was simply astounding to Luke.
Luke had only seen that type of power with one other person, his nephew. Which once again confirmed his suspicion that his nephew was going to be the dark champion, Ben's natural acclimation to the dark opposing Jaunes acclimation for the light.
It almost amused the old Jedi master how the Force had chosen two people who were almost exact opposites. Their attitudes were completely different as Ben had eventually become rather arrogant with his power and even started ignoring Luke's teachings, Jaune on the other hand just grew more curious and was (usually) eager to learn. Ben seemed to not care about others that served no purpose to him while Jaune had wanted to be a hero since he was young. Then there was the looks department. Ben having dark hair and eyes with a usually solemn look on his face versus Jaune's blond hair and blue eyes with a goofy smile almost that was almost constant.
Seemed the Force had taken the light and dark aspects being completely different from each other quite literally in its champions.
Jaune rolled his eyes at Luke's words before closing them and concentrated on his hands. The Force shifted around him for a second before forming a bluish-white light around the area where the burns, pulsing before dying down after a while. Leaving behind freshly healed hands.
"See! Wasn't that hard. Now come on kid, let's get back to my little about and I'll have R2 download some meditation techniques I want you to practice on a portable holo disc. Then you can hurry home before it gets dark and your parents find out what you've been doing out here." Luke said as he walked away and gestured for Jaune to follow him.
Jaune nodded and followed Luke as the two made their way back to Luke's hut.
Looking around at the beautiful spring afternoon mad Jaune feels at peace. He had always preferred looking at the stars or spending time in the woods than spending time at home or in one of the cities.
Especially so as he learned to attune himself with the Force and sense living beings. The big cities now feeling even more claustrophobic to him than ever.
He did notice though that Luke was right. It was getting dark, which meant his parents would be mad if he wasn't home soon. Though they'd be even madder if they found out why he went to the forest almost every day.
'Though they might not even notice honestly.' Jaune thought, 'Probably to busy with preparing Rouge for Atlas.'
A sudden thought struck Jaune mind as the warm spring air reminded him of something.
"It's almost summer, are you going to leave again?" The young teen asked his master.
Without breaking his pace Luke responded, "You know I am Jaune and like always I'll be back by early fall."
Jaune's face fell with brief disappointment. He had been hoping that Luke would stay around for the Summer instead of travel.
It had become a routine for the past three years of their training together. Luke would stay around with Jaune for about three-fourths of the year before he would leave for the Summer.
During which Luke would leave R2 with Jaune so he could use the droid to study both Force knowledge that R2 had stored, but also galactic history.
As for Luke's reason for leaving? It was quite simple. He would go to the main cities of the kingdoms in search of certain materials. Materials one would normally use for a starfighter frame and a hyperdrive. Which he could possibly fabricate all thanks to R2.
Over the course of its immensely long life, the Astromech had downloaded all sorts of useful knowledge. Ranging from how to repair hyperdrives, being able breaking encryptions, and even Jedi knowledge and techniques of the old order when R2 had belong to Anakin.
"You're still trying to rebuild your ship right?" Jaune asked.
"Yes…" Luke trailed off, not knowing where his padawan was going with his question.
'This is my chance to ask him.' Jaune thought before he asked, "Well I was just wondering that if you are able to repair the ship and leave… could I come with you?"
Luke stopped walking and turned around to face his padawan, his face was actually taken aback slightly.
"You want to come with?"
"Yep."
Luke was actually somewhat shocked by that. While he had planned on asking Jaune if he wanted to come with when he eventually left to try to warn his sister and the Republic of the Empire having returned in some form, it wouldn't be for years until he could possibly repair the hyperdrive and he was planning on Jaune to be an adult by then.
That way if the Force was right and the Darkness was indeed rising again, Jaune would be fully prepared for it.
But even then, he would've expected him to be hesitant about it. He shouldn't be this hopefully about wanting to leave his homeworld. After all, Remnant was actually a nice place if you didn't factor in the genocidal shadow monsters (which suspiciously felt like dark alchemy to Luke), but if he was honest, was still better than Tatooine.
Luke bent down to his knee so he could be at eye level "Jaune, what's wrong. Why do you want to leave your home, your family so bad?"
Jaune didn't meet his eyes and instead looked at the ground.
While it was no secret to Luke that his apprentice was not very close to his family, he didn't understand why the boy was so ready just to up and leave them. Sure they let his sisters pursue their dreams while telling Jaune no repeatedly, which was just a plane out asshole move if you asked the old master, but surely that wasn't the only reason he wants to leave.
"C'mon kid, talk to me." Luke nudge him.
"T-they never let me do anything I want." Jaune sighed, "Every time I asked to be trained it's always a "No!" from them. Anytime I asked to be enrolled in a combat academy I got the same answer. Even something as basic as just unlocking my Aura is a big fat "No"! Instead they want me to be doctor or scientist, something that has nothing to do with combat. But when my sisters asked they all got "Yes's" and world-class training. It's not fair!"
'Huh, so it is just his family saying no to his dreams. I forget what it's like to be a teen that's being told he can't do something, especially a fourteen-year-old.' Luke mentally sighed before coming up with a deal to appease Jaune.
"How about I make a deal with you Jaune," Luke said.
Jaune looked up, "What kind of deal that?"
"Well since it's going to be a while before I repair my ship, you'll probably be an adult by the time it's done. So here's how this deal will go. Until you are the age of 17, which I believe is the age when you will legally be an adult here, you have to try to get along with your family. If you try, then when you're older you can come with me if you still want to." Luke informed him.
"But why? I don't want to get along with them, I just want to leave!" Jaune pouted.
"Because Jaune, there your family," Luke said as he fully realized what he was going to say next would be completely hypocritical of him. Images of him standing over Ben with his saber ignited flashed through his mind as he said, "And you don't give up on family. Yes, they might tell you that you can't follow your dream, but I know they still love you. Especially your father and er...moms." He tripped over his last bit of words, still, a bit weirded out that people on this planet sometimes had multiple spouses simultaneously, "So we have a deal?"
Jaune sighed, "Deal. I'll try to get along with my family."
"Good!" Luke said as he stood up, "And look at it this way kid. If you still don't like them by the time your older, you can just tell them to go kriff themselves. Now c'mon, let's get you back home."
Jaune nodded and began walking back to Luke's hut.
Luke meanwhile lingered back for a second, a thought having entered his mind.
'For Remants sake I hope Jaune chooses to come with me to confront the dark when the time comes. Because if he doesn't, it will come and confront him.'