Arc 2 Chapter 8

Jorel had wondered what would life be like if he’d left the Order. He’d still have his training, and the Force, but he’d be turned out with, at most, the clothes on his back, a pittance to buy a ticket offworld, and his saber, and Master Halrol had insinuated he wouldn’t even get that if he didn’t ‘respect the decisions of his elders’.

Er’izma had told Jorel that, if those in the Order were to follow the rules of the Order, the then ex-Initiate would be allowed to keep his saber, as it was his, but the Knight had also noted that, more and more often, the rules were being ignored by what the general had taken to calling ‘management masters’.

As the years had progressed, according to the centuries old Jedi Knight, the threat of the Sith had faded into distant memory, and the ‘power’ of the Jedi had grown increasingly consolidated by the various councils that were only supposed to guide it. With that, ironically, the ironclad rules of the Order had started to relax, and not in a good way. Well, in a good way occasionally, but more often than not it was for reasons of dubious morality instead of allowing the right thing to happen instead of what the Order said must be done. Er’izma had been clear that the additional measure of mercy and kindness the Knights of the Order were afforded in enacting their duties helped, at times, but because they were still acting against the rules of the Order, such actions constantly hung under the waiting blade of unkind official attention. And so, things had become political.

Oh, everyone in the Order would publicly agree that Jedi were above such dealings, and as such to accuse another Jedi of acting that way, especially one of higher rank and prestige than yourself, would see you ignored at best or censured at worst. All that did was let the dirty dealings hide in the shadows, as orthodox and corrupt alike would deter anyone from investigating claims, as it would be a waste of resources or a ‘waste of resources’. That meant the unpleasantness, like the situation with Anaïs’ ‘Master’ being selected for her, with no input from her, and no other Jedi allowed to ask her what she wanted, while also not telling her, could hide amongst the more mundane dealings, like that Initiate, Skywalker, becoming a Padawan without passing the Initiate Trials.

Everyone knew that boy was going to end up apprenticed to Knight Kenobi, but the fact that he hadn’t gone through the basic tests, was admitted late, and was hurried through the program, had all been things that shouldn’t have happened. It’d helped keep the appearance of propriety that the kid himself didn’t know he was being fast tracked in defiance of the rules, only thinking himself gifted, which, to be honest, he was. Heck, Jorel hadn’t known until he’d overheard two Jedi gossiping, another thing he was informed that true Jedi never did, but it was just another example of the Order not following its own rules. Er’izma had been clear that, if one truly understood why the rules existed, then they could be bent, or outright ignored if need be, but such an understanding required one to know the outcomes the rule was trying to prevent, and why they worked as they did.

And the Temple, for all it talked about understanding the Force, wasn’t the best on helping Initiates understand why they were doing what they were doing, other than ‘Us Masters are wiser than you’, ‘If you don’t do X you’ll fall to the Dark Side!’, and other versions of ‘Shut up, do what we want, or else.’

And for Jorel it’d worked.

At first.

Then Jorel had gone on his Gathering, and that’d all come tumbling down.

But he’d still worked in the system, and hadn’t left, not wanting to give up his Saber, while also afraid that, if he’d chosen to walk away, he wouldn’t actually be allowed to. A fear that was, as it turned out, at least partially justified. He had fallen to the Dark once, everyone knew it, even if he’d brought himself back, or as back as a Jedi could, according to the Temple Masters. He wouldn’t be the first Fallen Initiate the Jedi had ‘taken necessary action’ against, either capturing to ‘help them re-find their way’, with the Order deciding what ‘the way’ was, or were just killed outright.

And some Initiates truly did Fall, in a way that he had not, and in those cases such actions were necessary. He’d found several such cases in the archives, and they made for harrowing reading, though, at first, also comforting reading as Jorel, by the Order’s own rules, wasn’t ‘Dark’. But when the rules became fluid, what was necessary, and what was ‘necessary’, became blurred. However, Jorel had found his Master, and kept his saber, even if he had to hide it now that he was pretending not to be the very thing he’d always wanted to be.

Lightsabers themselves were curious things. The plans were fairly straightforward, but if someone without the Force tried to build one, it would almost certainly refuse to work, assuming it didn’t just blow up in their faces. That was because, once it was complete, a Jedi needed to fill the device with the Force, allowing it to guide them as they ‘attuned’ themselves to weapon. Doing so fixed all of the small impurities in the manufacturing process, aligned all of the pieces precisely, and telekinetically repaired all of the small, normally harmless flaws that were within the components used to build it.

That was why anyone could activate a lightsaber after it was built, though without the Force to guide you, it was incredibly dangerous to do so. However, to repair one past a certain point of damage, and certainly to build one, you needed a Jedi.

And, for the third time since he’d built his, Jorel could not reach his blade. The first had been after the Gathering, when the Masters had decided his fate, and his newly formed, and newly bloodied, weapon was taken from him. The second had been on Dell, after he’d been rendered unconscious. And the third was right now. It was still on him, in a hidden compartment in his armor, but, were he to take it out, their mission would be over.

Captain Thul had readily informed the Jedi that, if the older man had his way, the Padawan’s weapon would be safe and secure in his room on the Dove, but General Er’izma had been clear that, between sending his apprentice down without his weapon, and just killing the ‘rebels’ wholesale, he’d take the second option.

That was. . . certainly something, and not the kind of thing Jorel felt a Jedi should probably say, but he wasn’t going to complain. Regardless, the infiltration team had landed in the small town of Kernast, wandered about, and then word had come ‘down’ to the Captain of ‘The Republic’ ordering the destruction of the very town they were in the very next day.

Hisku and he had done as they were ordered and wandered about the small city with a Twi’lek sergeant major named Eted’diwe, all three in civilian clothes, the two of them acting like a pair on leave for that first day. They’d done the same thing the next morning, before they’d gotten a warning to come back to ‘their ship’ because of an emergency. Really, it was a random smuggler’s ship the Flock had requisitioned from the Pengalan government’s wreck-yard and tweaked enough to pass inspection, but for this operation it was ‘theirs’.

After all, they needed to lose something when this town was blown up to excuse their joining the local freedom fighters, and while the resistance couldn’t inspect the smoking crater of Kernast after it’d been orbitally bombarded, they could check the records that’d been backed up elsewhere, and ask the survivors who worked the spaceport how Captain Thul, Jorel, Hisku, and the others had shown up.

So they’d returned to the ship, after being out enough to be spotted by the locals, and suited up in their gear while Thul and the others contacted everyone they could to warn them of the impending attack, playing the part of a panicking smuggler captain. Jorel’s armor was unique enough it wouldn’t be recognized if the rest of the Flock were deployed planetside, but Hisku and the others had been issued ‘field-armor’, which was built to look shabbier, and didn’t have the built-in shield generators, among other features, but would still, hopefully, keep them alive. It was on the higher-end of the spectrum of what a mercenary group might outfit their people with, but, he was told, it was nowhere near as advanced as what the best bounty hunters and other such combatants-for-hire would wear.

They’d requisitioned, which meant they stole, a speeder-truck and had loaded up as much of their ‘cargo’ as they could before Gamma team did what they were supposed to, and sent a ship up from the spaceport at speed off as the first ‘escapee’. It’d made it almost out of sight when the Dove, a tiny white and purple dot in the distant sky, had fired its first turbolaser volley.

If Jorel hadn’t known the plan, and even then if he hadn’t had the Force reassuring him that he was in no danger, he might’ve panicked a little himself. That was because, while several shots hit the escaping ship, sending burning shrapnel to fall on the countryside outside of the town, several missed. Speeder-sized packets of plasma arced over the small city, hitting nothing but the trees outside of it, but from the reactions of the populace, you’d think it’d landed right next to them. Given that they didn’t know that such a thing was planned, it was understandable.

“Slag! Alright, grab the last of your druk! We’re getting the hell out of here!” Captain Thul had ordered, gruffly, in a tone completely devoid of his normal Alderaanian accent, everyone dashing back inside as a second ship tried to take off. This one wasn’t part of the plan, was a ship full of scared people. Jorel had tried not to pay attention, but he had still felt the faint echo of violent death through the Force as he’d heard it explode, more shots landing near the edge of the city.

Alpha team had wiped the ship’s computers, ostensibly to keep their smuggling routes a secret, but really to further hide the true origin of the light freighter they were sacrificing in case anything salvageable survived. With the last of their personal effects, mostly a change of clothing, a ‘momento’ each one of them had been issued by the Dove’s quartermaster, and some credit chips, they’d jumped onto the back of the speeder truck. The Nikto lieutenant had yelled, “Don’t fall off, ‘cause I’m not slowin’ down!” and floored the accelerator, bursting out of the spaceport and onto city streets that were in complete chaos.

From the time of the first turbolaser shots, they’d only had twenty minutes to escape the city, the longest Er’izma could realistically wait from when a ‘minor officer’ had jumped the gun, destroying an ‘escaping’ ship, to when the General, who was in a meeting at the time, could be reached and give the order to fire on the town proper.

Five minutes after the first volley, a concentrated barrage of fire, an entire broadside from the Dove, thundered down into the large town’s spaceport, destroying it utterly and completely. Those still on the ground, mostly running, fell as the streets buckled beneath their feet. In their speeder, there was a slight dip and bounce as it compensated, but the Nikto hadn’t so much as flinched, neither did nearly two-thirds of those holding on.

Jorel flinched, as he’d felt the deaths of hundreds in an instant in the Force, those trying to desperately get their ships ready to escape, even as his team quickly approached the small city’s walls. Jorel wasn’t the only one affected, looking to see that several of the others weren’t happy either, dark expressions on their faces. However, the Padawan noticed it was only the younger members of their group that had reacted, none of them above a sergeant in rank. They didn’t have any troopers with them, only corporals and above, and even then, out of the original twenty-odd soldiers on this mission, twenty were second lieutenants, which were actually the rank below lieutenants, or above. That had seemed odd, but Jorel had supposed that normal troops wouldn’t be sent on an infiltration mission like this.

Either way, he’d been glad that all he’d had to do was hold on, as the Lieutenant drove their speeder and threaded through it with the ease of experience. How one got that experience was something the Jedi didn’t think too hard about. Regardless, their driver had gotten them out with a speed that Jorel, with the Force, would’ve been hard-pressed to match, especially as the city was tearing itself apart in mass panic, and for good reason.

As they approached the city gates, they found them blocked, several speeders having crashed together, all likely trying to leave at the same time. Before he could worry, though, Jorel had felt the others from the Flock already there, and they detonated the wreck, leaving Captain Thul’s transport to shoot through the flaming wreckage before the smoke had even cleared, several other speeders following a moment later.

They’d made it almost out of sight of the city when time had run out, and the purple turbolaser bolts once more fell upon the city like rain. Whereas the first attack had been targeted, even precise, this time a stream of destruction that fell upon the town, utterly obliterating it.

Jorel had hoped everyone could get away, that those in the Flock had given the locals enough warning, but he’d been warned by the Captain that, even with their other team warning everyone they could that an attack was coming any day now, in addition to their own, even with them giving everyone they could more than enough time to escape the immediate blast-zone, this wouldn’t be a bloodless operation.

More than that, though, if it had been bloodless, then the plan would not have worked, as these things were never that clean, and the rebels wouldn’t bite on their bait if it were.

Regardless, Jorel hadn’t been able to control his cringe at the distant pulse of Dark, as several thousand likely innocents died in an instant. It was a quick death, but, in some ways, that was worse, as the feeling of their passing, the release of Dark, built upon itself to make a wave which caused the Force to tremble more than the ground itself did. The others with him had taken it little better, Hisku physically recoiling at the feeling.

Ironically, her lack of training had protected her as much as his own mental shields had. While she had talent in the Force, she was listening with muffled ears. It would be harder for her to hear the Force help her, but, at the same time, she couldn’t ‘hear’ what had happened nearly as clearly as he had.

And so they’d driven onwards, all day, until they’d reached the next town just before nightfall, along with the other refugees, and Jorel had been thankful he wasn’t the one in charge. The Force hadn’t blared any warnings, so he’d followed Captain Thul’s orders to take a room in a local inn, along with Hisku.

There’d been a small fight about who’d get the single bed, both him and his attaché arguing the other should take it, only compromising when she’d gotten the bed, but he took most of the pillows, the temperature enough that neither needed sheets. While she’d had ‘boot camp’, whatever that was, he had gone through specific deprivation and hardship exercises, even if most of it was self-imposed training techniques he’d taken from the archives. With his experience, even having a few pillows was enough for a good nights sleep if he put himself in a healing trance.

The next morning they’d set out, deep into the woods, off any perceivable path, along with a dozen other speeder trucks all loaded with people and goods. The others of the Flock were with them in another truck, though Jorel made sure not to stare, and they’d been eventually led to a hidden base, at the edge of where forests turned to swamp, covered by trees.

So now here he was, with close to a hundred others, in a large loading bay, most of those present armed, though only half of them armored, all of them waiting for something to happen. Unable to touch his Saber, he instead let his hand rest on the handle of the blaster on his hip, standing next to Hisku, who was similarly armed, and similarly on edge.

Turning to her, he tried to break the ice, and asked, “So, um, honey, are you sure about this?”

Yeah, that’s just as awkward as I thought it’d be, he winced internally, as she turned a glare his way, though she tried to suppress it. “What did you call me?” she demanded.

“Oh, right, you said no pet-names unless we’re alone,” he commented with a nervous smile. He’d wanted to hash out exactly what their ‘backstory’ was, but she’d been kind of reticent to do so, not wanting to talk about how they were going to sell this entire. . . ‘couple’ thing.

That, however, got a few laughs out of the others nearby, and, as Hisku’s glare deepened, Captain Thul cleared his throat. “Don’t get too upset with the boy, Hissy,” the older man chided. “You’re the one who convinced him to leave the circus.”

As the sergeant turned a disbelieving look towards her commanding officer, several more people paid attention, desperate to break the tension. “Seriously?” The man standing in front of them asked, turning to look at Jorel incredulously. “The circus?”

Thul laughed, “Boy’s an acrobat. Our little ice-cube here got her heart melted, and convinced him to sign up. I don’t think she thought he’d actually do it though. He’s okay with a wrench, but a deft hand with a blaster. Helped save us when we tangled with pirates.”

Jorel mostly hid his wince, remembering the exact opposite happening on that asteroid base. By the Force he’d been an idiot.

The Captain, however, kept going. “Was the kid’s first kills, actually, but he’d been dealing with it pretty well.” The older man shot Jorel and Hisku a look that seemed to say ‘You didn’t bother to come up with something, so I did. Now own it.’

The man who’d questioned them shook his head. “Kriff, Kid, that’s rough. Pirates are nasty business. Don’t let it eat ya up,” he offered consolingly.

“I’m not,” Jorel answered, a bit too quickly, from the man’s sympathetic look. “I, thanks, but I’m good.” Trying for confident smile, he asked, “Got any advice about women, though?”

The man laughed, as did a few of the others watching. “You’re on your own with that, kid. Best of luck.”

Unsure of what else to do, and turning to Hisku, Jorel approached her, while she watched him warily. “Sorry,” he whispered, knowing their conversation might be overheard, either by the others, or by the ‘Resistance’, waiting for them and watching what they did to evaluate them. “Still trying to figure this thing out,” he offered.

His attaché stared at him for a long moment, before she sighed. “It’s. . . fine,” she gave. “I, I just didn’t expect this. I. . .” she glanced around. “This wasn’t what I expected either, when I, um, ended up with you. But it’s too late to stop now.”

“Am I really that bad?” he asked, teasingly, but not entirely.

She glared at him, before she shook her head. “No. It’s just. . .” she trailed off.

“Ship life is what you expected, not adventures in the middle of nowhere?” he prodded, which could fit both of their situations.

The Chiss woman considered that, before nodding. “Yes. I, I’ll get used to it.” He smiled, which was apparently the wrong thing to do as she frowned, hissing, “But don’t take liberties, or you’ll regret it!”

A few others chuckled, and she blushed purple, not having meant to say that as loud as she had.

Jorel, however, ignored them. “If you ever feel we’re, um, doing too much, say so,” he requested, continuing in a whisper, “in any respect. That thing with the, um, foundry? If I’d listened to you, we wouldn’t’ve gotten in nearly as much trouble. I ignored you, because I thought I knew better, and I was wrong.”

Other than the day after, they hadn’t talked about their near-death at his hands because of his blind trust in the Force, and her gaze was sharp as she considered him. Hisku didn’t say a word, but slowly nodded. Jorel opened his arms for a hug, and, unamused, she took one of his outstretched hands and shook it, to mirth of those who’d watched them, even if they couldn’t hear what they were saying.

“Good evening, everyone,” A voice called, with almost robotic undertones, and Jorel, along with the others, turned towards the voice. A Duros walked out, in rugged clothing, flanked by several armed and armored humans. “I’m glad to see more who wish to join our cause. I know it might not be for entirely altruistic reasons, but if we only did things for altruistic reasons, nothing would get done,” the blue-green skinned man smiled. “Normally I’d talk about freedom, or representation, or supporting your fellow being. But, let’s be honest, you’re not here for hollow words, you’re here for justice, or revenge, and definitely for restitution. We’ve all lost something these last few days, and the people responsible need to pay.”

The more relaxed atmosphere that’d slowly grown disappeared in an instant, and several of those gathered grunted or nodded, a few laughing in acknowledgement, but there was no humor in it. Hisku and Jorel looked to Captain Thul, as they’d been instructed to by the man, and watched him nod in grim agreement.

“I can offer you that. We’ve long since argued that the Pengalan government didn’t represent the Pengalan people, but only the elites,” the Duros continued. “But even we didn’t think they’d go as far as they did yesterday. Most of you lost family, friends, loved ones. Lost what you’d spent your lives building. Some of you are offworlders,” the leader noted, nodding to Thul, “who’ve been caught up in all of this, and, by now, should know the planet’s been blockaded. The old government has called in Republic forces, who we’ve tried to reach out to, but the Republic’s only willing to buy the status quo, and has decided to do so with our lives.”

Watching the Duros speak, Jorel felt the Force shift slightly in the room. It wasn’t a formed technique, he would’ve sensed something like that, but, at the alien’s words, the natural flow and weave seemed to shift and twist. It wasn’t Dark, not by a long shot, but the ambient energy in the room seemed to. . . dim, the anger of the others in the room stirring to life.

“We’ve tried being peaceful, tried to do things the right way, and because of that, Kernast is nothing but a smoking crater. So we’re going to go on the offensive. We’re going to go after the ones who hurt us,” the leader promised.

“The Republic!” A woman sneered.

The Duros shook his head. “No, the Republic doesn’t care about us, but it doesn’t care about those in the capital either. But, we can use that,” the leader of the local Resistance replied. “They don’t care who’s in charge, only that someone is, and that means if we show we’re the ones who control things, then we’ll be the ones who’ll call on that ship of theirs in orbit,” he promised. “It’s happened before, trust me, it’ll happen again.”

Jorel wasn’t sure what the alien was referring to, but he knew he was wrong. Then again, if this mission of theirs showed the Rebels were in the right, to everyone else on the outside that’s exactly what it would look like. Pure power wasn’t going to win the day, morality was, but he had a feeling that convincing anyone here of that would be difficult, to say the least.

“If violence is what it takes, then violence is what we’ll give them,” The green skinned man declared. “You’ve paid the price for something you haven’t even done, so it’s time to make them pay for what they have. It wasn’t us who took this conflict hot, it wasn’t us that struck the first blow, but we’ll take our revenge, take what the elites have stolen from us, and show them the consequences of their actions! Who’s with me?”

The room cheered, even some of the Flock, though, in the Force, the others from the Dove didn’t burn with shadowy flames of anger and rage like the others, but rested with a bright clarity of purpose that stood out starkly in the Force, like crystal spires in a dark sea, even if the corporals could barely be seen over the waves.

The Duros smiled at the room full of newly minted freedom fighters.

“Welcome to the Resistance.”