This smell…
Qui-Gon brought his hand, slick with the red mist to his nose and sniffed experimentally. Then he recoiled, staring at it in horror.
Blood.
Qui-Gon stared around at the blood mist that had rolled out of the settling dust in awe and horror. What fresh terror had the Force brought to their doorstep?
"Obi-Wan, stay close."
Silence greeted him.
"Obi-Wan?" Qui-Gon whirled.
Obi-Wan was gone.
"Obi-Wan?" he called, looking every which way, searching for the light of his padawan's saber and finding nothing. "Obi-Wan!"
Where was his padawan!?
Throwing his senses into the Force, reaching, grasping desperately for his student's presence as he followed his instincts. It was then that Qui-Gon got the strangest sense of… lethargy. Suddenly, for the first time he could remember, the Force was holding him back. It was like running in water or trying to walk against the winds of a hurricane. It was bizarre… and then he felt his padawan's distress across their training bond.
"Obi-wan," he gasped.
'H-elp!' The disjointed call came across their bond.
"Obi-wan!" Qui-Gon cried, diving into the red mist, rushing under his own power to where he could feel his padawan struggling against their shared opponent.
He had just enough time to see it-her release Obi-Wan before she melted into the mist like some nightmarish specter. A girl. It was a human girl no older than his padawan.
'Later,' he told himself. Be here now. He needed to get Obi-Wan out! "Come on, Padawan mine," he grunted, hefting his student up. "This is not a place for a nap."
"Srreh mster," Obi-Wan slurred as Qui-Gon half-dragged him toward the door.
Danger!
Qui-Gon spun, cleaving the knife aimed at his shoulder into glowing pieces of slag. The attack confused him. Surely the enemy hadn't expected such a crude attack to harm a Jedi?
The Force moved oddly as the truth came to him in a blur of motion and pain a moment ahead of reality.
The knife had been a distraction.
She appeared like a ghost as she deflected his lightsaber at the hilt and delivered a brutal series of strikes to his abdomen to stun him before delivering a crushing uppercut to his jaw that rendered the Jedi master instantly unconscious.
Qui-Gon Jinn fell like a puppet cut from its strings.
Several Days Later…
"Have we found her?"
"She's in the walls," Mace answered with a sardonic smile.
Many of the masters gave him a strange look.
Mace sighed, looking very put upon. This girl was giving him a serious headache and he hadn't even met her yet. "According to a few of the cleaning droids, she has not left the temple as we first suspected. She has instead taken up residence in the ventilation systems and spaces closest to the mountain," the dark-skinned master explained. "Apparently, she is very adept at remaining out of sight. We only know where she is because the micro-scrubbers detected her DNA in the vents. According to the tracking programs we've run the data through, she never seems to stay for very long and she has not slept in the same place twice," Mace explained, looking more and more troubled as he read through this information.
"What troubles you, old friend?" Master Mundi asked.
"This is not normal behavior for a human child," Windu murmured. "She should be seeking normality, routine. Children crave stability, it makes them feel safe. This is..."
"It is a behavior pattern that speaks of a life of constant danger," Master Plo Koon speaks up, his tone grave. "She seeks remote and hard-to-reach places where few can follow and fewer still can reach her without giving away their approach. She leaves no trace she can detect, likely to hide evidence of her movements. She changes her routine and sleeping location constantly to confuse any who might be able to observe her in order to reduce the likelihood of an ambush… Where else has she been tracked?"
"She seems to have traversed an impressive expanse of the Temple," Mace admitted. "You'll have to be more specific."
"Has she been detected near any of the storage units or the archives?" the Kel Dor master asked.
"Yes," Mace answered.
"Likely, further analysis will show that she has also at least visited the kitchens. Water, food, and information in that order when taken with her behavior… this is not random. This is a deliberate set of behaviors and methodology," he reflected, sounding incredibly sad. "We are dealing with a child soldier."
Gasps and other sounds of disapproval mingled with flashes of anger and disgust within the chamber.
"More we will know, when wake her opponents do," Yoda decided.
Council Log
Post Incursion Report: Interview With Or'han D'fu
"Masters… she didn't recognize me," Or'han explained, looking troubled.
"How mean, do you?" Yoda asked.
"I have nothing to support my claim other than impressions, masters," Or'han explained with a frown. "But I think-No, I'm certain that she didn't know what I was, Master."
"You believe this is the first time she has seen a member of your race?"
"I don't think she's ever seen an alien before," Or'han explained. "The entire fight, there was an undercurrent of… displacement. She was confused, like an initiate who has wandered out of the temple. She felt… lost, out of her element. Until Knight Jinn and Padawan Kenobi entered the room, I do not believe there was anything she recognized other than combat."
"Well, isn't that a depressing thought," Master Sifo-dyas muttered. What a situation to be in that fighting for your life was the only comfort you had.
The council and gathered Jedi nodded in agreement.
Council Log
Post Incursion Report: Review of Security Footage
For what felt like the hundredth time, the council rewatched the security footage from the skirmish in the upper levels of the temple.
"Never, in my wildest dreams, did I think I would live to see such a resurgence of the Dark Side," Ki Adi Mundi lamented as he watched the brutal fight between the young human female that had appeared in the temple and a cadre of Jedi Knights and padawans. He scowled, watching her viciously incapacitate the two padawans before vanishing into a strange mist that had overtaken the cloud of debris.
Yoda frowned at the general agreement he sensed in the room. When had his council becomes so… narrow-minded? "Watch again, you should," the Grandmaster commanded, restarting the holo and playing it at half speed.
It was Master Windu who spotted it first. "She's not trained in the ways of the Force," he realized, suddenly marveling at the child's level of skill as he watched her barely dodge a sweep from a knight's lightsaber before brutally disarming him and aborting what would have likely been a killing blow in order to step out of the way of another as Qui-Gon Jinn and his apprentice entered the fight.
Yoda hummed in agreement.
"But the emotions she was using," Master Mundi protested. "Surely-
"The Darkside, this is not. The Force, this is not," Yoda interrupted, pointing out a number of moments in the security footage where the girl would begin a motion before suddenly changing it in reaction to one of her opponents. "The motions of one attuned to the whispers of the Force, these are not. Skill, speed, perception, strength of body, strength of mind, her allies these are."
"That is somehow less comforting than it should be," Yarael Poof quipped dryly. The idea of a person, much less a human child, skilled enough to survive a fight with seven Jedi Knights and three Senior Padawan learners, much less defeat most of them, with nothing but a few knives and her bare hands was… well, disconcerting to say the least.
"How is that possible?" Jocasta Nu wondered as she studied the girl's movements. They were unlike anything she had ever seen. "That kind of reaction speed isn't normal outside a very select few species and not at all in any recorded near-human variant."
Mace frowned, troubled. "If she were an adult, I would suggest bionic enhancements or advanced combat prosthetics, but…"
"No one willing to spend that much money would waste it on a subject that would outgrow their enhancements within a year or two," Sifo-Dyas agreed, watching the holo with a troubled expression.
"Precisely."
"She is Force Sensitive, however," Adi Gallia observed, still watching the playback intently.
"We have already established that she hasn't been trained," Ki Adi Mundi replied testily.
"Yes, but she can sense it," master Gallia argued before approaching the projection. "Look here, she dodges a push from Master Jinn who is attacking from beyond her field of vision, and again as she dodges the stone sent by Padawan Kenobi."
"She does seem to be an unnaturally slippery opponent," master Rancisis observed as the girl in the holo ducked a swipe from a saber and seemingly melted into the mist that she had conjured.
"And what do we make of this?" Master Dooku wondered as they, once again, watched the girl appear out of the mist behind padawan Kenobi, quickly disarming him and pinning him in a chokehold. It was difficult to see in the mist, but he can see his grandpadawan struggle for a moment before seizing up.
"Hmm," Yoda mused, pausing the holo to stare at something. "A scan of Padawan Kenobi's brain, we should take," he said, eyeing the odd placement of one of the girl's hands.
"Master?"
"Techniques there are, for extracting information," Yoda explained, jabbing his gaffing stick at the hand that seemed better positioned for patting Obi-Wan's head than subduing him.
"Such a technique would undoubtedly leave some trace of what it touched," Mace mused before frowning. Especially if the user didn't have time to be subtle which was worrying for a whole other set of reasons. "But without training in the Force, how could she use such a technique?"
Yoda blew out a breath, releasing his annoyance into the Force. "Much there is of the galaxy, we know, much that we understand. Much more there is that know, we do not. Still more there is, which we have forgotten," he chastened. "Master Nu, records of telepathic near humans, have we?"
"There are several near-human variants with psychic abilities. Most are related to the use of the Force. They are quite rare. However, seeing as our… guest is sensitive to the Force, I would say it's within the realm of possibility."
"I'll order the scan," Mace sighed, shaking his head.
"Hmm…" Yoda responded, his gaze wandering to the sweeping windows.
Curiouser and curiouser…
Council Log
Post Incursion Report: Interview With Siri Tachi
"Thank you for your time, Siri," Mace said as they finished questioning his padawan.
"Of course, Master," Siri replied, shifting uneasily but not turning to leave.
"More to say, have you?"
Serra frowned but nodded. "Masters, I do not believe she was fighting seriously."
"Expand on your answer, please."
"Of course, there was this sense… I felt as though something was missing," the young padawan explained. "It felt very much like fighting Master Drallig? Or when my master and I are involved in some kind of violence on our assignments. There was a sense of enough violence, if that makes sense?"
"You feel as though she was doing only enough to complete some goal of hers?" Master Koon clarified.
"Yes, Master."
"Thank you, Padawan."
"Is it possible that she was intentionally infiltrating the temple?" Sifo Dias wondered as the chamber doors
"Given the state that Knight D'fu said he found her in? Doubtful," Mace replied.
"Then we are dealing with a being who is used to resorting to violence but has the presence of mind to restrain themselves even under extreme duress?" Plo Koon suggested, more than a little impressed.
Many of the masters paused, considering this possibility. From Or'han's description, the girl had been nearly killed by her experience. That she hadn't been killed by the impact was nothing short of miraculous and suggested that she possessed some kind of ability they were unfamiliar with.
"So, it would seem," Yoda muttered distractedly.
Council Log
Post Incursion Report: Review of Lab Results
"We have the results of Padawan Kenobi's brain scan."
"And?"
"See for yourselves," Mace sighed tiredly, massaging his temples after he sent the information to the other councilors.
"Strange… Aren't these the centers of the human brain associated with early childhood?"
"They are, indeed."
"Certainly not the memories I would choose if I were breaking into a place as jealously guarded as our temple."
"Speech, language, communication…" Yoda mused thoughtfully.
Mace nodded in agreement. "She is far from home indeed if she would risk her life just to understand what we are saying. There are very few places that don't speak Galactic Basic."
"Far from home she must be, if encountered her people we have not," Yoda scolded, jabbing the tip of his gimmer stick at the much younger master. "Memorable they would be, yes? Hard to forget, I would say, hm? Not so old am I, that forget such beings I would."
Mace nodded. "As you say, Master."
"Hmm," Yoda responded, returning his gaze to the holographic display of Obi-Wan's brain.
"But then… how did she get here?" Adi Gallia wondered. "Where's her ship."
"There was no ship." Windu groaned. "According to the security feeds I reviewed before coming here. She appeared from a space-time event consistent with a hyperspace corona."
"…What?" Mundi asked, sure that he had misheard.
"You heard me."
"She fell… out of hyperspace?" Master Rancisis wondered. How in the blue blazes had she survived the experience without the proper shielding? Much less escaped back into real space?
"It gets better," Mace sighed, looking tired as he retrieved his datapad.
"Now, don't keep us in suspense," Master Koon drawled, tapping a claw against his respirator.
"The spectrum analysis of the knives she used suggests that they were hand forged," Master Windu explained, flicking through the report from the analysis droid. "A coal-heated and folded carbonized ferric alloy," he murmured, looking perplexed as he read the report.
Mundi blinked along with the rest of the council. "But normal steel hasn't been used in…"
For the first time, Master Piel spoke. "With the exception of a few particularly rural or underdeveloped planets, unalloyed steel has not been used since before the founding of the Republic," he supplied. "Hand-folded steel… is all but unheard of outside of artistic circles."
"If she were from an underdeveloped world…. That would explain why she would prioritize language and communication," Master Koon mused thoughtfully. However, it meant that she knew what information to prioritize and, taken with her skills, it painted an… unsettling picture.
"What of the mist that she conjured?" Jocasta Nu asked. "I must say I'm rather curious."
Mace flicked through the readout for a moment before giving the data pad an incredulous look.
"What is it?"
"Blood," he answered with a grimace.
"Well, considering the injuries she sustained-"
"No, you don't understand. The mist was entirely composed of human blood," Mace explained, looking shaken.
Intakes of breath and curses filled the air.
"How in the moons of-how?!"
"Where did all of it come from?!"
"It's hers I'd expect," Mace supplied, sounding exhausted.
"But that must be liters of fluid!" someone protested.
Mace shrugged. "The species and antigens match what we've found at the initial points of impact. I've requested confirmation, but it's a safe bet that it all came from our… guest."
"But… blood?" Adi Gallia murmured, disquieted.
"So, it would appear," Plo Koon affirmed gravely.
"We're sure? There's no chance it was something else? It was hers?"
Mace nodded. "As I said, it matches the blood recovered from the various points of impact where she, apparently, fell through the temple," he drawled, still trying to grasp the idea of any kind of organic impacting the temple with enough force to compromise the outer wall, much less punch through it. And then survive? It was… improbable, in the extreme. "The blood is near human and shares the defining double X chromosome structure we would expect from a human female. Much of the waste genetic material is different, but without a sample comparison, we can only speculate as to the effects those changes have on her."
"What madness could someone live through to use such an ability?"
"Many things there are, that can drive a being to such lengths," Yoda mused. "Those lengths? Depend they do, on how precious blood is to her, I think. Many gifts there are within the Force. Many expressions of its will, there are, yes."
"Accelerated healing could explain such a… cavalier technique," Master Dooku mused from where he stood beside Master Yoda, stroking his beard in thought. "Alternatively, it could be some manner of conjuration similar to what the Nightsisters use or… something akin to the sorcery rumored to be wielded by the Sith."
"You suggest the re-emergence of the Sith?"
"No," Dooku replied. "I am merely commenting on the similarities. Just as many civilizations have discovered the same technologies without ever encountering each other, it is within the realm of possibilities that this girl or her culture has independently uncovered some of the same secrets."
That… was not a comforting thought.
"Masters?" a young knight called, entering the room. "Padawan Kenobi has woken up."
Council Log
Post Incursion Report: Interview With Padawan Obi-Wan Kenobi
"Tell us, Obi-wan, what you remember of your confrontation with the intruder," Master Windu commanded, his usually stern voice taking on an uncharacteristically soft tone.
Obi-wan frowned, glaring at the floor as he tried to remember. "We had just arrived back. We were going to visit the mess hall when the impact happened. At first, we thought a ship had crashed into the temple but when we entered the training chambers..."
Utter chaos…
That was the only way to describe the melee that Qui-Gon and Obi-wan waded into. All was dust and lightsabers and shouting.
"Stay close to me Obi-wan!" Qui-Gon commanded. Whatever this was, they would be safer if they faced it together.
Obi-wan didn't need to be told twice as he saw a Togruta he vaguely recognized flung out of the settling dust and sent tumbling along the floor until he struck a stone bench with a sickening crunch.
Obi-wan flinched as the sound echoed in his mind.
"Take your time, Obi-Wan," Master Dooku ordered evenly from where he stood next to Obi-Wan as he stood in for Qui-Gon. "The danger has passed. Release your feelings and view the events objectively."
Obi-Wan nodded at his grandmaster and took a steadying breath. Master Dooku had never been much of a presence since he had become Qui-Gon's apprentice, but since the… incident, he had made himself available while Qui-Gon was recovering.
He had been running, rushing to help. He remembered feeling a disturbance in the force, something moving toward him. Then out of the gloom came…
Obi-wan froze, gobsmacked as he came face to face with a human girl. Later, Obi-wan would say that it was a moment that stretched on into eternity as the Force whirled chaotically around them.
Then, the moment had passed and, according to the Force, the being before him was the most dangerous creature he had ever faced.
"There was a girl," he spoke, his eyes suddenly far away. "She was… human, I think. I'd never seen her in the temple before." He went on to describe her coloring. Pale skin. Blue eyes. Red hair.
"Hmm," Yoda mused, listening to the subtle tones of Obi-wan's presence in the Force.
Obi-wan ignored him, keeping his own counsel as the scene flashed once more in front of his eyes.
The girl's eyes had been… odd, striking. Something in the coloring had made them strangely deep and clear, like the oceans of Mon Kal and her hair flowing behind her like ribbons of blood. He could recall every tear in her clothing, soaked with fresh blood, soaked, not spattered. It had to have been hers but beneath the ruined clothes he could see unblemished skin. Most of all, he could remember how she felt in the Force, powerful and open. So full of violent resolve, but somehow lacking the malice that he had come to associate with anything that wanted him dead.
"You think she did not intend to harm you?" Master Yaddle asked, seeking clarification.
"Oh, she had every intention to grievously injure every one of us, I think," Obi-Wan grumbled. "But it felt unfocused, master. Like when I spar. My opponent intends to harm me, but it has nothing to do with me personally. It's just… part of our day. An action. Not a desire."
"As best you can, describe the feeling you mentioned," Master Mundi requested. "The strangeness of her presence."
"It was like staring down a gundark, Master," Obi-wan explained, trying to recall the feeling. "I felt… small, as if her presence dwarfed mine in some way."
"You felt as if she were more powerful than you?"
"It was more abstract than that, Master," Obi-wan argued as he wracked his brain for a better metaphor. "Her presence in the Force was nothing… abnormal. Perhaps stronger than most but not… large, or bright, or cold. The closest comparison I can think of would be the difference between a lightsaber set to training intensity verse a normal one. Neither burns brighter than the other but you know that one will hurt you."
"Ah, yes, that does make sense. Thank you for the clarification, Padawan Kenobi," Master Mundi replied with an even nod. "What then?"
Obi-wan frowned, concentrating. "We fought," he replied. "It was like trying to duel smoke. One moment she was there and the next she was gone, or I was dodging one of her knives. I couldn't even see where she was pulling all of them from..."
Then she was on him. He tried to defend himself, but before he knew what was going on his lightsaber was gone, knocked from his grasp. He couldn't move. He couldn't breathe! Her hand was on his head and-
He remembered…
He remembered so many things…
"Obi-Wan!" Qui-Gon cried, rushing out of the mist.
Then she vanished, melting into the chaos as other Jedi closed in.
'She could have killed me,' he thought.
But she hadn't.
He knew no more.
"Nothing is irrelevant, Obi-wan. What do you remember?" Mace asked, his voice calm and soothing.
"I remember," he cut himself off, trying to concentrate, trying to remember that moment. "When she had me pinned, I saw… the creche," Obi-wan said, frowning. "Games and learning… words, letters, and numbers. I saw the temple in my mind's eye."
"A premonition, perhaps?" Master Mundi suggested. If memory served, young Kenobi was rather known for vague and confusing premonitions.
Obi-wan shook his head. "This felt different," he argued. "It was… unlike my dreams. It was as if I was remembering, perhaps? Like meditation, I was remembering things but I felt inherently detached from them."
"Thank you padawan."
Council Log
Error: No further entries recorded at this time.
"Well, that more or less confirms our theory of what she did to Padawan Kenobi," Adi Gallia mused as Master Dooku led Obi-Wan out of the room.
"It still doesn't help us overly much," Mundi sighed, showing a small modicum of his frustration.
"But it does tell us that we are likely dealing with a child that comes from a culture that has not yet achieved space travel," Plo Koon observed.
"How though?" Master Tin wondered. "This is Coruscant, the heart of the Republic. If we are assuming that she hails from a primitive planet we can only assume that she was abducted. Why smuggle her so far into the Core?"
"You are assuming she was abducted?"
"Do you have a better explanation?"
"Well, considering she has a strange connection with the Force and she appeared from a Time-Space event? I would say that there are numerous possibilities."
"Surely you jest?"
"Possible all things are, through the Force," Yoda interrupted with a tired sigh before the other masters could begin to truly bicker. "Dismissed the council is," he told them as he tracked the eddies and flow of the Force through the tower. "No more will we deliberate today. Rest, meditate on what we have learned, yes."
Mace eyed the old master suspiciously as a shatter point began to form. "It is barely midday, Master Yoda," he hedged. What was happening? What decision were they about to make?
Yoda's ears perked up as he eyed Mace. "Then excellent timing it is. For Jedi Masters must eat as well. Go! Good food, good food, yes. Or grow as small as me, you will."
"We wouldn't be in danger of shrinking if you would just stop aiming for our ankles," Plo Koon joked.
"Your knees, you would prefer, hm?"
"I for one, would settle for a good old-fashioned flesh wound," Sifo Dias said as they made their way out of the chamber.
"Hmm, take this under advisement, I will," Yoda chuckled as he split from the other councilors. "Speak later, we will. Company, I have."
Master Dooku met him at the door.
"Obi-Wan?" Yoda asked.
"He is sleeping, master," Dooku replied with a sad smile. "And the healers say they will be ready to wake Qui-Gon tomorrow."
Yoda nodded. "Yes, yes, good this is," he agreed before eyeing Dooku shrewdly. "And you, my young padawan? As well as my grandpadawans do you fair, hm?"
"I am hardly young, master," Dooku argued.
"When almost nine hundred years old, you are, decide who is young you may, ha!" Yoda chuckled at his own joke.
Dooku rolled his eyes.
Then Yoda sighed, sobering. "How are you, Yan?" Yoda asked, momentarily abandoning his usual cadence.
Dooku paused, recognizing his master's seriousness. Qui-Gon was still so young and he hadn't even had a chance to meet Obi-Wan before the incident. The incursion would have been traumatizing enough, to come so close to losing them? "I am… shaken, master," he admitted. Worse, he was honest enough with himself to admit privately that he was attached. "This is our home and we nearly lost a dozen Jedi to a single enemy in a moment of inattention. We would have lost them if she had actually intended to kill them."
"Mmm, noticed that too, did you?"
Dooku nodded gravely. "She could have snapped Obi-Wan's neck once she had what she needed. Or stabbed Qui-Gon instead of punching him. Every Jedi she disabled could have been…"
"Yes," Yoda agreed knowingly.
"This is our temple, our home," Dooku muttered. "We should not be so vulnerable. Whatever technique she used to survive the fall—a breaching pod could have accomplished similar results. We could have been facing real enemies, real threats. It could have happened in a less secure location like the creche or the padawan dorms. And with the corruption and unrest within the Republic… The thought unsettles me greatly."
"You fear an attack," Yoda realized with a serious frown.
"We are one of the pillars of the Republic," Dooku argued. "Though we have been reduced to enforcers, little more than dogs of the Senate, we still have great influence within the galaxy. If one wanted to strike a blow to the Republic, the Jedi would be a likely target. If our numbers were reduced, it would be decades before we recovered and the Republic would suffer in the interim. This most recent generation of senators have become too used to us solving their problems, forcing a settlement rather than having the spine to negotiate useful compromises."
"What you would do, this is," Yoda observed.
Dooku did not answer at first, shame swirling around him. "Yes, master. If I were in such a position where I wished to strike a blow to the Republic, I would first move to undermine the Jedi. Either depleting their numbers or attacking their reputation so that they could not provide effective oversight. Then I would find a means to preoccupy the Senate. Some kind of emergency, I think. Something to cause discord and a need for expedience so that I could slip legislation that would aid my cause into bills that I believed the Senate would feel they needed to pass. With the right timing… the results could be catastrophic."
"Wise you are, to consider your enemies' point of view. Wise you have become to consider them competent, as well," Yoda mused, nodding at the truth in his former padawan's words. "No longer as the Jedi once were, are we. Diminished we have become, too homogenous." He remembered realizing one day that all the younglings carried blue and green lightsabers and wondering where the color had gone. Where was the rainbow of individuality he remembered in his youth?
"We have become complacent," Dooku observed.
"Comfortable," Yoda argued.
Dooku paused, considering this. "Yes," he finally agreed. "The Jedi have gone too long without being challenged and it has made us… soft. We have become careless."
"Hmmm, troubling this is," Yoda responded gravely.
"Master… how do we fix this?"
Yoda shook his head tiredly. "Know this, I do not, but…" the old Grand Master admitted, his voice trailing off as he listened to the ebbs and flows of the Force. "Hmm, the answers we seek, not so far away they are, perhaps," Yoda mused as he parted from his former padawan.
Dooku quirked a brow at his old master.
"Take a stroll, I will. Too long it has been, since meditated beneath the stars, I have," Yoda decided as he started hobbling toward a turbolift normally reserved for service droids.
Dooku blinked bemusedly. "Master, the gardens are the other way."
"The gardens? Say to the gardens I would go, did I? Hm?" the ancient master asked as he jabbed at the control panel with his gimmer stick.
"But master," Dooku protested, as his master hobbled into the small space, "that's the lift that the droids use to-"
Click! Whooosh!
"-wash the tower windows..." he trailed off with a tired sigh. Perhaps the Grand Master was finally going senile? He was nearing nearly nine hundred years, after all. Some mental degradation wasn't at all far-fetched.
A moment later, Yoda stepped out into the constant, though not unpleasant winds that swept the upper levels of the temple.
Hobbling along the ledge high above the meditation balconies and gardens, Yoda searched for a comfortable-looking nook, nodding when he found one that was to his satisfaction. "Mhm," the old master grunted as he set his back against the sun-warmed durasteel. "Hmm, join me, you should," he spoke as he settled his gimmer stick in his lap and set his eyes on the horizon.
Cool, calculating blue eyes followed the aged master from the shadows below the windows of the floor above.
Watching…
Waiting…
Yoda paid them no mind, content to enjoy his meditation as the sun set and night slowly overtook the temple. And, for the longest time, they stayed like that. Just the two of them staring up at the sky as the light of the day eventually gave way to the pinpricks of the stars stabbing through the light pollution and the dancing lights of starships as they streaked into space. There was a time when Yoda remembered coming to this place to escape the pressures of his duties. Times when he simply needed to get away…
Slowly, ever so slowly the small figure slipped from its vantage point, creeping cautiously closer.
Yoda marveled at the shadow the girl cast in the Force as she moved to join him. So very unlike what Obi-Wan and the others had described. All the witnesses had described her as unremarkable in terms of power but… strange. Today her presence was a subtle thing, an emptiness in the Force that was almost unnoticeable. It was as if within the space the Force was simply absent. It was neither cold nor unsettling, it simply… wasn't.
What strange curiosity had wandered into his temple?
"Want to thank you, I do," he told her, momentarily putting aside his questions.
The girl said nothing, but turned ever so slightly to gaze at him out of the corner of her eye.
"Trained in killing arts, you are. Very skilled, yes. Killed my knights, you could have," Yoda observed. The girl shrugged and Yoda got the vaguest impression through the Force that she had not held herself back out of altruism. "Small matter there is however, of putting a hole in my temple. Most unfortunate, that is. Liked those walls where they were, I did!"
A small laugh escaped his stargazing companion.
Ah, success at last.
A companionable silence overtook them until the girl eventually chose to break it.
"These aren't my stars," she finally said as she eyed constellations and the thousands of starships flying high above them.
"Hmm," Yoda replied with a sagely nod. "Suspected as much, we did. Far from home, you are, hm?"
The girl does not answer, but Yoda feels a stab of bitter, stale loneliness in the Force before it is ruthlessly suppressed and buried under a blanket of pain, resentment, and unwavering conviction.
"Hmm, far from home, you have always been, it seems," he mused sadly.
The girl glared at him, irritation plain on her face and in the Force, but not surprised.
Yoda quirks a brow at this. She already knew of the Jedi's ability to glean information from another's mind? She learned quickly it seemed.
"You know, in my culture, invading another's mind outside of interrogation is considered a crime."
Yoda filed the comment about "Interrogation" away for later consideration. "Rude to tear information from our students' minds, it is in ours," Yoda reposted, quirking a challenging brow at her.
The girl gave a snort. "What's the saying? 'You touched me?'"
Yoda nodded. "The translation, that is. 'Touché,' the actual saying is," he corrected.
"Thank you, Master Yoda," she replied.
"Know me, do you?"
"You are… mentioned, in the archives," she hedged as an impression of hiding, of concealing spilled out into the Force.
Yoda gave a little chuckle. "Yes. One of the dangers of a long and accomplished life, that is," the aged grand master acknowledged. "What is your name, young one?"
The girl eyed him, radiating wariness in the Force. "You may call me Aki," she told him.
Not a name…
A thing…
Something to be feared…
The impression in the Force was accompanied by a flash, a vision of somewhere else, some when else.
"Who names their kid evil spirit?"
It is the girl that answers, smiling like a nexu playing with its prey. "I did."
"Strange thing to use as a name," Yoda mused, feeling impossibly sad for reasons he couldn't quite comprehend.
The girl—Aki—shrugged, turning back to stare out at the cityscape. "What happened here?" she wondered. "There's so much… I've never seen so much metal before, so many buildings. Where are the trees? The plants? The animals?"
"Gone they are," Yoda explained. "Gone deep beneath the buildings and the roads. Lost beneath the undercities, they are. No wilderness is there to be found here… none that recognize, would you."
Sadness and longing seeped into the Force.
An idea struck the diminutive Jedi and the Force hummed with possibilities. Bracing his gimmer stick, Yoda climbed to his feet. "Come come, something I wish to show you, there is," he told her, offering an encouraging smile as he hobbled back toward the turbolift.
Curious, Aki followed the strange Jedi into the strange contraption.
The strange pair drew more than a few stares as they walked through the temple. More than once, Yoda had to wave off temple guards when they approached, assuring them that all was well. More importantly, while she never let her guard down and always seemed ready to bolt at the first sign of treachery, each time Yoda would wave off the security personnel his guest seemed to relax ever so slightly and her presence in the Force became increasingly less agitated.
Then they reached their destination and Yoda
She gasped, eyes wide as she stared into the cavernous room beyond the door and the sprawling organized chaos of greenery and running water that stretched farther than the eye could see.
"The Hall of a Thousand Fountains, this is," Yoda explained as the doors slid shut behind them.
"It's… beautiful," Aki whispered.
Yoda's ears drooped at the way the child hesitated, how it took her a moment to find the right word and how clumsy and uncertain she felt using it. What a foul place she must have come from that even the idea of beauty was in some way foreign to her. "Come, come," Yoda urged, leading her deep into the Hall.
Around them, the Force sang.