"When I look on the ravaged face of Tython I see a map of our sins and I am filled with unspeakable shame." Je'daii Master Rajivari, 10,670 TYA [Tho Yor Arrival]
Year 11,340 TYA
Erakas stood with his feet on the sand and the world overhead.
It truly was the world, though the galaxy teemed with planets. Eleven swung through this star system alone. But Tython, looming broad and vivid in the sky of its moon Ashla, was special. For millennia, the ancestors of those who called themselves 'Jedi' had believed the Force itself emanated from that mysterious sphere. Their own ancestors had been retrieved by the black stone arks called Tho Yor and deposited on Tython, near the heart of the galaxy, and it was in that strange place that they had trained to use their powers. Tython had taught, trained, even honed them.
And in response, the followers of the Force had destroyed Tython.
When Erakas tipped his head back he could see the massive swirl of stormclouds, the black scars of impact craters, even the sickly dark-green tint to the planet's oceans. The world was habitable; he himself had been to the surface twice during his years of training, though he had been raised and mostly educated on Ska Gora, further out in the Tythan system. Tython itself was a crippled place, wracked by storms of bleak Force energy that ripped across its surface like tremors of memory from the long-gone, cataclysmic wars where the Je'daii divided themselves into warring halves and despoiled each other, their home, and the Force itself.
Today, Jedi only came to their order's birth-world to test themselves, to remember the sins of the past, and, as Erakas did now, to say goodbye.
"What are you thinking, my apprentice?" asked Master Sohr.
Erakas turned his eyes from the great planet to the being sitting in the chalky plain beside him. In his half-squatted position he could nearly match Erakas eye-to-eye, and standing at full height towered over him by more than a meter. Nothing about him was human; the pupils of those eyes were vertical slits, his skin was leathery and blue. His hands, peeking out from the sleeves of his loose cloak, were made of three claw-tipped fingers, and though folds of brown cloth hid it, a thick tail wrapped around his long legs. Master Sohr was a Kwa, one of the galaxy's most ancient races.
Sohr's questions were never to be answered lightly. Erakas considered before he replied, "I think that place is a reminder for us."
"Of what?"
He looked back at the planet, its swirls and its scars. "The old Je'daii thought they had to stay in balance in the Force. They thought their place was in between the light and dark side."
"Between Ashla and Bogan, the light moon in Tython's sky and the dark." Sohr tapped his gnarled walking-stick into Ashla's white sand. "And what did that mean in the end?"
"It was a disaster," Erakas said bluntly. "After the Rakata invaded—after the Je'daii forced them back—it broke the balance and unleashed something awful. We fought amongst ourselves for a decade and killed more than the Rakata themselves. We even ruined our home and had to scatter to other worlds." He swallowed hard. "It… frightens me, Master."
"Fear can be useful, even necessary," Sohr told him. "It can also be very dangerous."
"I know that. But I can't image the Jedi splintering themselves and making war on each other."
"They were not Jedi as are now. The Je'daii believed they could hold the balance. Your predecessors learned from those mistakes. For Jedi, the light side of the Force must be all. Darkness is to be resisted, whatever the price." The Kwa's eyes narrowed. "Have you felt the dark tempting you, apprentice?"
"No," Erakas said quickly, honestly. "But I have to wonder what lies… out there." He gestured away from Tython, to the blackness of the sky.
"Do you not feel you've been properly trained?"
"Of course I have. I owe you everything, Master, but there's no telling what we'll face outside the Tythan system."
Sohr gave a tiny sigh. "I wish I could tell you more. My people's empire collapsed many centuries ago. We foolishly unleashed the Rakata on the galaxy and we paid the price in ways deeper than we could have ever imagined. Now our scattered revenants struggle in the mists of distance and time, just as you do..."
He trailed off, and Erakas knew his Master spoke of disaster far greater than the collapse of an empire or even a culture. According to him, the Kwa had once reigned across the stars in perfect union with the Force. Every member of their race could touch it, but over time, for reasons unexplained, they'd lost touch with its mystic power. Only a handful of born-lucky Kwa could discern the Force's flow now. Sohr was one of them, and he had come to Tython to pass his dying fire to Jedi more capable of lighting a new flame.
Sohr exhaled deeply and looked back to Erakas. "It is good you are aware of the danger, but you cannot let your fear consume you. That, too, leads to darkness."
Bogan was out of sight now, swung to the far side of Tython's swell, but Erakas felt the threat of darkness not from the unseen moon, but the blackness between the countless stars. He'd known that his path as a Jedi would likely lead him there, but knowledge did nothing to assure him as he prepared to leap into the unknown.
But leap he must. It had taken a century for the Jedi Order to emerge after the cataclysmic Force Wars. Centuries more had been spent recovering, adapting, and perfecting the technology left behind by the Rakata. The Rakatan warships possessed mysterious devices that allowed one to breach the lightspeed barrier and access the infinite spread of stars, but navigation was only possible through use of the Force. The initial Jedi explorers had spread out haltingly two hundred years ago, and the Force had led them to make contact with the isolated Kwa revenant to which Sohr belonged. Whole generations had been spent working with these ancient saurians until, a mere century ago, Jedi engineers at Shikaakwa began constructing unique ships that combined native Tythan, Rakatan, and Kwa technology. With that power in their hands, the only place to go was outward.
Since their ancestor's arrival on the mysterious Tho Yor, the Jedi had been pent by the limitations of physics and the boundary of the Tythan system. Those were no longer obstacles. Yet the Jedi did not leap madly into the unknown; instead, the elder Masters had decided to send teams in different directions. Jedi explorers were always dispatched in teams of three, placed together by some algorithm known only to the Masters. They worked slowly, carefully. Over the past century, Jedi teams had charted a complex network of hyperspace corridors branching out from the Deep Core. Successful contacts with other civilizations had been made, but they had only mapped a tiny fraction of the galactic plane. So much more awaited discovery.
Erakas hoped he would discover some himself. For all his years of training he'd known he was meant to go out among those distant stars. In the worlds beyond he'd learn about himself, other civilizations, even the Force.
But he could never separate fear from anticipation. Even after a century of venturing into the stars and progressively mapping the galaxy's myriad planets, space still teemed with danger. Of all the Jedi explorers who left Tython, nearly a third were never heard from again.
"I wish you were coming with us," Erakas admitted.
Sohr shook his head. "Explorers are never dispatched with their Masters. A student must learn to grow beyond his teacher, as I believe you have done. Otherwise I would not have approved you for an expedition."
Erakas wanted to believe he was ready, but when he looked at the infinite black that surrounded the stars, he was afraid what the outer dark might bring. The only escape from impasse was to leave the system and fulfill his outward urge. One way or another, one fate or another, he would meet it soon.
"You will be in good hands," Sohr said as he drew lines with his walking-stick. "Master Talyak is a wise being. You could not ask for a better guide."
Erakas didn't doubt Mal-Oba Talyak's wisdom, but his meetings with the elder Talid thus far had been so formal, so cool. He knew he would never be able to trust him as deeply as he did Sohr. His earliest memory was of the Kwa bending over and offering him a claw-tipped yet gentle hand after he'd fallen to the dirt as a child.
He also wasn't certain about the other member of his team. Essan was a decade older than him, far closer to him in age than Talyak but even more inscrutable. The impression he'd gotten of the scarlet Sith woman was one of intensity. She was talented and driven, and she preferred to do things by herself.
But Jedi were being sent out three-by-three. That was dangerous enough, and no solo explorations were allowed. A wise decision, and probably the best policy the Masters could have drawn up. Still, Erakas wished he could have been going out with Master Sohr, or even younger Jedi he'd apprenticed with. It seemed wrong to venture into the unknown without a friend at your side.
"Will you ever go back out there, Master?" he asked. "Or are they giving you a new padawan after I'm gone?"
"That is uncertain so far," Sohr gave a tiny shrug. "I would like to return to the worlds beyond one day. The Masters know this, and I think they'll grant me my wish… but not yet."
"Maybe we'll see each other out there one day. Maybe we'll bounce into each other without even meaning to, in some big, bustling city on a planet neither of us have ever heard of." The thought brought a dreamy smile to his face.
"That would be a good fate," Sohr agreed. "I hope the Force wills it. But for now, you must focus on your mission."
Like many exploration teams, his was being sent on the path of one of the generation ships that had left the Tythan system in ages past. Before the replication of Rakatan hyperdrives, massive starships had periodically pushed into the unknown on powerful fusion drives that brought them as close as possible to the speed of light. Sometimes these ships were hollow cities, packed with plants and animals, a miniature and self-sustaining ecosystem. More often, passengers were placed in cryogenic freeze while computers guided them on preprogrammed courses. Many hundreds had pushed out over the millennia. In particular, there had been a massive exodus of the Tythan system's non-Force-using population during the Force Wars. Erakas, Essan, and Master Talyak were being sent on the trail of one of the oldest to have launched, long before that calamity.
Erakas didn't expect to find that generation ship, but he expected to find something. Great or terrible, there was no way to say. But something was going to happen that would change his view of the universe, and perhaps the Force itself, forever.
Sohr looked at the scarred world above. "We should not let this be a sad occasion. No, this is joyous. You are about to go among stars and do what Jedi were meant to do. And, just possibly, we will meet each other again. I look forward to seeing the changes in you, my padawan."
"Are you suggesting we celebrate, Master? Should we throw a party?" Erakas spread his arms, taking in the white-sand, boulder-strewn plain on which they stood, alone. Ashla was not dangerous the way Tython was, but the light side moon was only visited by Jedi for moments of training or contemplation.
A tiny gleam in Sohr's eye told Erakas he was about to get the former, one final time. The Kwa stood up, swiped chalk off the bottom of his robe, and said, "If this is to be a parting, I suggest we indulge ourselves, one last time..."
The gesture Sohr made with his hands was small; the result was huge. A dozen heavy boulders lifted into the air, shaking off white sand as they ascended to different levels, the highest twenty meters over the heads of the two Jedi. Slowly, the rocks began to drift in loose, unsynchronized spirals around the standing figures.
Erakas looked at his Master and said, "Seriously? We're doing this here?"
"You are about to aim for distant stars," Sohr said with just the hint of a smile. "Can you not reach the highest rock?"
This was a test Erakas had been put through a number of times at different stages of his training. Jumping from moving rock to moving rock, propelling himself with the Force at every step until he reached the top of the messy spiral, had been impossible at first. Even now it wasn't easy, and he was used to doing it on the heavier gravity of Ska Gora. He would have to recalibrate his body and the Force both to accurately jump against Ashla's lighter pull.
"A Jedi is only a Jedi when he is in motion," Sohr said. It was something he'd told Erakas many times before. "A Jedi acts, or he is not a Jedi at all. Will you be a Jedi here, apprentice?"
It wasn't exactly and offer he could turn down. Erakas found a reluctant grin spreading on his face; it was just like his Master to keep challenging him, even here, on the eve of his departure to the worlds beyond.
Without another word, Erakas sprung into the sky. He took it slowly at first, pausing every time to steady himself atop a boulder before aiming and leaping for the next one. Ashla's light gravity threw him off; twice he jumped past the second stone, fell to the ground, and had to start again. When he lingered to too long on a rock, calibrating himself for the next one, Sohr would move the stones more erratically, forcing Erakas to make a daring leap toward the nearest one. Twice he landed poorly, slipped, and had to cling to the rock with both hands to avoid a ten-meter falls. His palms and forearms became scraped; once he nearly twisted an ankle.
But he improved. He progressed. Soon he was not pausing at all. As soon as he landed on one rock he found the next one, pivoted, and sprung himself, trusting his body and the Force to deliver him to the next solid step, even as body and step continue to whirl through the air at accelerating speeds. He had moved into a place beyond conscious thought, where he was every piece of this swirling spiral and they were part of him.
The Force was with him. Nothing could stop him. He was a Jedi in motion, a Jedi as he was meant to be. When he leaped to the top of the spiral and set feet firmly on the final stone, the boulder ceased its swirl and hung motionless twenty meters above Master Sohr and the chalk-white plain. The Force, adrenaline, and triumph surged through him. Suspended between Ashla and Tython, surrounded by blackness and stars, he believed for a perfect moment that everything would work out right.