Note: WOW. Just WOW. I have to stop and think about this…

WOW?

I go on to check, and find I went from being 30-35 reviews one day, and 52 the next. O.O, as well as a ton of favorites and follows. So I checked out of curiosity.

Reviews: rank 8/55

Favorites: rank 12/55

Follows: rank 11/55

I am so incredibly psyched! I cannot express enough… I don't even know how to put it into words.

My expectations were that this story might be 1-2 people to follow it and read consistently. Reviews would be 10, at most, over the course of the 40-50 chapters this story will encompass. (I'm guessing. But I do think it will be about 50 at this point.) Or maybe more like 3 reviews. I wrote something once for about… 40 chapters, 300,000 words, and got 5 reviews at most. I trashed it and put it on a storage place somewhere. (each chapter was HUGE.)

Instead I have 64 reviews, 39 followers, 32 favorites, and 7676 views by chapter 27.

There have been times I've wanted to cry. Times I've wanted to just sit back, and try to figure out what it is about my story that went above and beyond my expectations. There have been chapters I've hated (including the one I'm about to give you, I'm sorry) and there have been ones that have sent chills down my spine while I'm writing it because of the sheer epicness of the scenes.

My conclusion? Its not my story you love. Oh no. Its not me either. What everyone loves is Varus Wynn.

I originally started Varus' personality with great fear. I read the Force Unleashed book, and found they presented a very hollow Starkiller. In the game, he was epic. In both cases he was very much action-oriented more than he talked. He just went with his gut in almost all cases, and that is exactly what I went with as Varus' core personality, but wanted to add some stuff to him to help bring out his inner personality. If you actually read back over the story, he does a lot more thinking than he does talking. The difficult part was balancing his Canon Starkiller side with an invented side that exists as hollowly in my mind as it did in himself as a man coming out of amnesia.

The amount of love going to Varus only shows me that he invented himself correctly. I didn't make Varus, I wish I could make the credit for that. No. He made himself. I invented his core, gave him a situation, and let him go free.

Thanks, from Varus. He is passing out now.

Disclaimer: I own nothing. Not even the clothes on my back.

Episode 9 - A Day in the Republic Part 2/2

I can't begin to say or comprehend how long I sat there. I just simply reclined on my new couch staring at the ceiling. The clock ticked on and on, and I paid it no mind. The distant sound of hovercars zooming by was a comforting sound, keeping the silence at bay. Periodically something would break my thoughts like someone walking by my apartment door and being entirely too loud about it. Life went on, except for me. Life seemed to have come to a standstill.

Not to say I was depressed or suddenly suicidal. I had no intention of ending my life. But life as an existence of energy and time and emotion ceased. I lost all comprehension of time, and I didn't have the drive to get up and do anything. I just stayed there and thought.

I thought about myself. I thought about the Miraluka. I thought about the Jedi who had taken me in.

Somewhere, deep down in the thick of words and facts, it felt like something was wrong. I can't begin to say what it was so I focused myself to processing and understanding what I had learned.

The Miraluka are, or rather were, a people of blind force-sensitive's with an amazingly high percentage and average strength. They were at odds with the Jedi and Sith. Last of all, they were annialated by a Darth Nihilus.

Or so it says. If I truly am a Miraluka, than I am the last.

What's more, unless there is a branch bloodline that also isn't blind and are still force-sensitive then I am of the Marak bloodline. I'm the last Keeper, last of the Marak, last of the Miraluka. It sounds rather cheesy, like the bad punch line to a book or movie. 'The Last Keeper' could make a great book title. However, I'm not laughing. It makes me feel sick.

I remember. I remember a giant pillar of fire from Revan's memories, but now… is it truly Revan's memories? There was a reference to Revan having fought the Miraluka briefly along with his other conquests, but had he ever laid eyes on the pillar of fire as I saw in my dreams and visions? Or was it my memory I was finally seeing. So far I have been able to distinguish between Revan and my memories, as I keep seeing his as a kind of underlying layer over what I see. When I walk into the Council, I see Revan as a kind of ghost talking to a ghost council. On Dantooine, I saw hundreds of Revan ghosts, one for each memory during the months he spent there. But this memory was different. It was one of the original memories where I saw the world through his/my eyes. Just as I saw his old friends through his eyes, I saw the fire through… someone's.

But whose eyes were they that I was looking through?

No… A thought comes to me. The fire was not a memory of conquest or battle! It was one of celebration and ceremony. They were not his eyes. Revan was not a Miraluka. He was not of the bloodline of Marek. I am. I'm a Miraluka. Those were my eyes. That was MY pillar of fire and that was my memory!

That was MY memory!

A sharp pain erupts in my head. My mind feels like a flood of water is desperately trying to escape and push outward. I see images and hear sounds fly by. I try to reach out to them with my mind, hoping to grasp one and see it clearly, but they all go by like water through my fingers. With each image, my fear grows, for the images are ones of pain, hatred, loneliness, emptiness, dread, coldness… there is no mixture of goodness and life lessons earned through hardship, but pain alone. One after another they appear and I feel them as though I lived through them at day. I cannot see them clearly, I cannot say where they came from, but there is a very distinct flavor to them.

Before I had never understood something. Revan's memories have a flavor, and mine do as well. Something about them very distinctive. Something subtle, like how he saw much of the world through slits in a mask, or how he is taller than I am, so his memories reflect it. His memories include leadership, hate, love, salvation, damnation. So many flavors that I now recognize as his own. Whereas my memories carry the same endless flavor of pain, emptiness, and void.

With a shuddering cry I clamp down my eyes and the images both. The memories disappear just as fast as they appeared, and I open myself to find myself shaking on the ground sweating as though I had run for hours. I slowly pick myself up shakily, and let out a shuddering breath.

The memories are gone. The images no longer haunt me. All the remains is a terrible feeling that something was very wrong. A lie exists in my life. I cannot say what form this lie takes or how it affects me, but it feels like I am close to a key of some kind. I am surrounded in a confusing web of words and actions and beliefs, and I cannot say what is truth and what is lie, but all I do know is that I am close, so very close, to the core of this web. Its practically on the tip of my tongue, but it just wont come out! Its like one of those images that wont quite stay long enough for me to see and understand!

The memories themselves, I cannot recall. I know the flashes and overall 'flavor' I felt from them all, but its agonizing me. I am so close. I am so close to understanding myself!

Am I Varus Wynn, son of some people, born of Taris, and a refugee who was accepted into the Jedi Order?

Or am I -something- Marek, son of Kento Marek, born of the Miraluka, last of the Marek Bloodline, last of the Keepers, and if so… how did I relate to Taris? Did Kento take me to Taris and die there? How did I come to join the Order? Am I even the son of Kento, or is he my grandfather? Or is he an uncle, and I'm just a branch-member of the special bloodline. (I can see, so there is no doubt I'm at least related distantly.)

I sigh deeply to myself and wipe my face under running water in the kitchen sink. A part of me feels I should be angry about how the Jedi got facts on me wrong and confused, but another part of me says to think. I can almost hear Master Anikan telling me to stop and think about it before I get angry. I can feel the slap on the back of my head as Ahsoka rebukes my antics, before she does something amazingly similar like the little annoying, lovable hypocrite she is.

Think about it… Taris was destroyed. Facts get confused in a warzone or lost in rubble. Yeah, that makes plenty of sense. No one is lieing, its just… they don't actually know and are making reasonable assumptions.

I look up at the clock and realize I need to be getting ready to leave. My daily training session with Rahm Kota and Falcon is soon. I have spent the entire night sitting around thinking and studying.

I fill the sink with cold water and plunge my head in. I let the sharp coldness seep into my skin and exhaustion goes away. My mind sharpens and all my worries and all my fears dissipate into a new day. I can worry about it all later. For now, I have a life to live, and Kota has a habit of making me do sit ups -while he sits on my back!- when I'm late.

Izthark and the Royal Guard exchanged blows. His fibroknife met the lightsaber with greater speed but less strength. "These guys don't hold back do they?!" He barked. The attacker lifted his lightsaber spear to strike down, and Izthark had to put his strength into blocking it under the Force-enhanced blow. Zalbar tackled the robed man from the side to the ground, and in a flurry of fur and arms and roars, grabbed the man's head and snapped it with a sharp twist.

The crack of the man's neck resounded through the silent dark halls. "Well, stealth was just thrown out the window." Anakin muttered.

The sound of heavy boots met them and they turned to find three running at them. The enemy put up their hands in a coordinated Force attack. Anakin met their power with his own and matched them in strength. Izthark grabbed his rifle from his back, took aim, and shot one in the face all in one motion. The other two drew lightspears and came on them.

The two Republicans were reluctant to fight their own, but the foe was not holding back. The two royal guards were fueling their strength through the Force, and they brought all of their strength and speed to bear. Anakin pierced one in the side, but that did not slow them down. Pain meant little to them in their zeal. They did not stop until they were dead.

Izthark removed the helmet of the one he killed and cut the front face panel off. He tucked it into a groove of his armor. Zalbar looked them over and growled questionably, "What are Force-Users doing as guards of the Chancellor?"

"There are a number of Jedi who give their allegiance to the Order away to the Republic. It is their duty to guard the Senate building and the Supreme Chancellor from all, including their own brethren." Anakin answered. "Senator, please return to the entrance and make sure someone knows what is happening."

She looked at him in disbelief. She took a second pistol out of Izthark's side strap and said, "I don't think so."

She walked by them with Zalbar. Izthark watched her go in gaped amazement. He whispered, "That is one heck of a woman, Jedi. If I didn't know otherwise, I would say she was Mando'a."

"I know." He sighed. He wasn't sure whether right now he was happy about that or exasperated, or both. She kept him on his toes and she wasn't some dainty little flower, but she was also not exactly inclined to sit and stay where she was safe.

The four of them moved through the dark halls. Encounters with the illusioned Jedi were few, but enough to give them an impression they were coming closer and closer. With each step, Anikan felt the darkness was deepening around him. Before long a team of Master's lead by Master Windu caught up to them. They exchanged pleasentries, but said little as they focused on making their way to the Chancellor.

They stopped before his door and hit the button, but it would not open. "Let me try." Padme said. She stepped in and used her password. It would not open. She tried other passwords she knew, but nothing happened. Anakin stepped in to try to hack into the hardware, but there was no response. It was as though the electrity to the area had stopped flowing entirely. He felt worry overtake him as the void and empty air had become so strong that energy in its most basic form had ceased. Windu nervously palmed his saber in his hands as the only sign he felt the same Force energy, or lack of.

"It's not working." Anakin said, his hands still deep in his work on the cables behind the panel.

Windu nodded. "Then we don't have time to be delicate." He plunged his saber into the door. The door was dense despite its thin construction, and it took a minute for the overpowering heat and power of the saber to cause a portion of it to melt and collapse. They stepped through, with most of the Master's hanging back to watch their exit.

"By the Force…" Anakin muttered. Windu and him turned off their sabers.

In a chair facing them was Palpatine, and on the ground in front of the Chancellor was a darkly robed woman. She had a blaster bolt in her face, and the pistol in question lied unceremoniously on the floor by the Republic leader. The leader in question was mindlessly fidling with a mask in his hands. It drew all of the man's attention as he gazed into it and ran his hands over its surface.

"Are you well, Chancellor?"

Palpatine looked up at their question. He placed the mask on his desk and stood up on weary legs. "I am, Jedi."

"Good." Windu acknowledged. He looked down at the woman and suddenly recalled her. "This is the woman who got involved with the man we were investigating. What was she doing here? Did she attack you, Chancellor?"

"She was leading the attack. A Sith apparently of enough power to influence everyone in the building."

"But not you?" Windu wondered.

Palpatine shrugged and smiled weakly. His exhaustion clear in his distant eyes. "Lucky shot."

"There is no luck." Windu recited, but he smiled in relief. He hugged the Chancellor in an embrace and patted him on the back. "To think the Force could empower you to slay a Sith with but a pistol. There are odder coincidences, but times as these you can only stand in wonder and faith. Now, come. We have to get you to somewhere safe."

"Thank you, Jedi. Just put me somewhere with a bed, and I'll be happy. These old bones are wearisome."

"I am sure we can oblige." Anakin said.

"Thank you, Jedi."

Padme, Zalbar, and Izthark watched the Chancellor get dragged away. In the distance, sounds of another battle ensued between the Jedi Masters and illusioned Jedi. Padme hoped they wouldn't have to resort to culling all of the Jedi caught in the illusion, but her attention was drawn to her favorite Jedi most of all.

"Ani?" She asked worriedly. While the Jedi had left, Anakin remained still. More than that, his expression was troubled and thoughtful. Padme put a comforting hand on his shoulder, and he blinked in surprise out of his deep thoughts at the contact. "Anakin, are you ok?"

"Yea, I'm fine." He replied. His eyes did not lose their troubled depths. She didn't believe him, and he knew it. He relented, "Palpatine has never, ever, referred to me as simply 'Jedi', even in the most public or official capacity. It's always 'Anakin', 'young one', or just 'General' at most."

"He was being respectful and wasn't thinking straight. A lot of people refer to you as Jedi."

"Perhaps, but he has never, ever, referred to Windu as 'Jedi' either, always 'Master Jedi'. His form of respect is always, always 'Master Jedi'."

Took his head in her hands and made him face her. "Ani. He barely survived an encounter with a Sith with just a pistol. You should be thanking the Force he is alive, not wondering about his use of words. He's. Simply. Exhausted."

He said nothing for a while, just studying her eyes and her firm strength. "Your right." He relented. He relaxed and forced a fake smile to show he was moving on. She was right. Exhaustion did all kinds of things to people, and while it may hurt his feelings to be called 'Jedi' in such an impersonal manner by a friend, it was nothing technically wrong. Why, there were times his wife called him all kinds of things to his face when she was in a bad mood, things he would never repeat so long as he wanted to live.

Maris finished retelling of everything she had gone through and encountered in the last week or so since Ahsoka had left for her mission. She told of the mourning, the kidnapping, the place she was kept, and of the man who looked like an ad for Death'R'Us. When it was over, a good two hours in its retelling, she watched her friend closely.

Ahsoka was horrified at what this revolting man had done to her friend, but everything about the Sith, Varus… she didn't believe it. "Maris, that message from me was a joke."

"It's his face!" Maris yelled. Why couldn't her friend believe her? "I remember! I could remember that face and those eyes if I lived to be nine-hundred and a wrinkled old hag! He butchered Azhaak Ti! He left us both to rot!"

Ahsoka, for a lack of better thought, was silent. She didn't know what to say. She opened her mouth repeatedly to argue, but Maris saw her disbelief clearly in her eyes. It wasn't just the 'I can't believe' disbelief, but her friend, one of the only people who accepted her as herself, was trying to form words in a political manner as if she was insane. Despite everything she had gone through thus far, the sight of one of her only friends thinking her mentally unstable was the most horrifying. It left her empty in a way only the loss of her master did. But this wasn't just the pale emptiness of loss, it was painful and fresh and new. "You think I'm mad." Maris said quietly.

"Maris, I…" Ahsoka tried, but couldn't form words properly.

"No!" Maris stomped angrily. "No, no, no! I am not mad and this isn't just about me! He is a Sith, 'zhoka! Sith always betray their allies! He is going to kill you and General Skywalker!"

"Varus is many things," Ahsoka finally said gently and slowly. "He is brash and mouthy, but-"

"He cannot be trusted!"

"Based on what?!" Ahsoka snapped. "Your…" She stopped herself from saying something along the lines of 'your failing memory'. She closed her eyes and calmed herself. "Maris. If you can bring me proof. Anything. A picture of him AS a Sith, an archived file of him causing havoc -beyond Dantooine-, even just flight plans for him to have been on… wherever you and your Master were, then I can listen with an open mind. But… The Master's trust him. Anakin trusts him." Ahsoka smiled in memory. "Sith don't laugh, Maris. They live only to seek power at the expense of others, and I have watched with my own two eyes as Varus laughed, used his power to save lives, even stood by me when I was upset. Sith do not do that."

Maris walked back until she hit the wall. She fell to the ground against it and put her head in her hands. "No… no, no, no, no, no!" Maris rambled to herself. She saw Ahsoka's honesty, and she trusted her friend, so Varus, the Sith bastard, must have done those things… but it makes no sense! "No! Its… its all an act, 'zhoka!"

"Maris." Ahsoka hugged her friend. "Please, sleep. You look like you haven't slept the entire time I've been gone. Then I want you to go for a swim, and then do something else. When that's done. Do another thing. O.K.?"

Maris could only nod numbly, her eyes distant.

The Sith always betray one another…

And Jedi do not?..

Varus is a Sith…

Varus, new Padawan under my Master…

Varus is classified…

Varus is coming to finish the job…

Varus sends his love…

Somebody's lying… the question is 'who'?.. The shadows whispered to her.

Why couldn't her friend believe her?

Maris opened her eyes to find she was showered, clothed, and in bed. She did not recall having changed and climbed in bed, but all she knew was she needed to get up. She needed to go. She needed to get her proof or… get some help or… something. She couldn't just lay there and do nothing.

She climbed out of bed. Sleep crept in on her from all sides, but now wasn't the time to just close her eyes and waste away hours and hours of work! She didn't blame her friend for her disbelief completely. It all sounded insane when said out loud, even to herself. But her friend had given her one thing to focus on at least.

She wanted proof. Maris was going to get it.

Maris crept through the room, quietly opened her friends door, and slipped out. She held her head high as she walked down the brightly lit hall. Jedi came and went. Some offered her a gentle smile or respectful nod as they went, and deep down she was… relieved. It had been a long time since she walked out that door. It was refreshing to be among others.

Now everything she said last night really did sound mad! Maris entered the main lobby and felt so desperate as to dip her feet into the flowing water next to the waterfall. The coldness was soothing, unlike the cold void she felt over her heart for what felt like years. She allowed herself to lay back on the smooth stone floor and just let her feet soak up the water for a few minutes. Already she could feel her thoughts clear and the world come into focus and perspective again without the darkness and shadow surrounding her as it had when the 'man' held her.

Whether Varus was a Sith or not, the Council knew it. They would keep him under surveillance, under guard, and keep other Jedi safe from him. Anakin was a strong Jedi, supposedly one of the strongest in history. Rumor was he hadn't met his potential because of his arrogant attitude, but he was already a Jedi to be feared by Sith and respected by his peers. Ahsoka would be safe with him. Varus would be kept away from other Jedi and contained only by those who could control him.

The Jedi would respect the agreement with him, and then, much to Maris's disdain, let him go peacefully.

But this one Sith would be kept where he couldn't hurt anyone… where he couldn't kill Maris and finish what he started with her Master.

Maris watched the day rise. The rising sun warmed her, and she almost felt like crying -gently- and crying at its beauty for the first time in forever. Instead she was content to sit and watch the Jedi come and go.

Varus.

At first she didn't see him, then she thought herself to just be seeing things. No, it was just her imagination. She was just… But it was. Varus Wynn, the Sith who killed her master, who haunted every dream and had successfully taken hold of her every thought and taken her heart and crushed it into a black hole, walked out amongst the Jedi who lived here. Varus lived here. He lived next to her. He lived next to Ahsoka.

He was amongst Jedi, he was close to her.

He had come to finish the job.

Maris fled. She didn't take notice of how she slipped and scrambled across the floor on her wet bare feet. She didn't notice or care until she felt the cold doorknob in her hands. The chill brought her thoughts back, and she realized what she had done. She had fled.

Where was the Maris she had always known? Where was her strength, the great self-will that her Master had carved and refined rather than destroy? Was it gone? For that matter, what had she been doing since she had arrived?

Retreating. Nothing but retreating. She retreated from the outside world, she retreated from her peers that called her friend except for the few who were persistent, she retreated so far as to retreat from herself! She had fallen back into the deepest emptiest part of herself for so long.

She had tried reaching out to her friend, but now that Maris was able to see it from without, how could she be believed? She was a lone witness to her Master's murder, and she had some eye-opening moments with a local Sith with psychotic issues. It was basic social logic that you needed more than one witness, as well as something solid, to speculate anything.

All she had was her sole witness.

She could try to find some proof against this 'Varus' the Sith calls himself, probably a fake name, but then the fact that he was using a fake name to begin with, as well as how he acted like an assassin when they met, pointed to the fact that he was an assassin. He worked in the shadows. The Republic may have been able to get enough on him to make contact to 'hire' him under a fake name, but Maris alone…

Maris's eyes bloomed. She wasn't alone. She had the Republic.

Her legs started to move on their own. One step, two steps… soon she was able to move herself, and she found the strength to move away from the dark shelter she had hid in for what felt like years.

She may not have proof, but she knew how she could get it, and even if she didn't, she was a witness to his crimes. That may not be enough for the Republic at the end of the day, but it would be proof enough for the Force to take judgment.

Maris entered her own room, and laid eyes on what had been her life for so long. Azhaak Ti wasn't the most sentimental person, but she still had a knack for collecting that she taught Maris. The idea was to collect something nearby every time you learn a lesson. The Jedi do not feel good for sentiment, but Azhaak Ti taught her that the knickknacks offer a reminder of the lessons. Maris rolled her eyes across all kinds of things that to some would never matter. Seashells, a plant, a few rocks, a dead bird -now stuffed-, and other things were laid out on shelves.

Maris Brood blew the dust off her chest and opened it. Her own collection was smaller and tossed inside. Her master was a visual person, hence the shelves, but Maris was more physical. She liked to stick her hand in and feel everything as she dug around. At last her hands felt the rod of cool metal wrapped in old leather. She pulled it out and inspected it. The cylinder was old and scratched and marked with more lessons than every object in her chest combined.

Maris strapped her Master's lightsaber to her belt and locked her door. It was time to go on the offensive.

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