liriael (liriael) wrote in thegalaxy, @ 2016-05-16 12:30:00 |
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Entry tags: | !locale: dermos, liriael d'lander, qui-gon jinn |
Who: Liriael D’lander and Qui-Gon Jinn
When: Three weeks after this post
Where: Dermos
What: Liri arrives at the Jedi enclave
Rating: PG
It felt strange, not to be piloting her own ship, but Liri had stashed the Vagabond away on Tatooine. She couldn’t take the chance that the Knights would track it, especially here to Dermos, the new Jedi base. In fact, she almost didn’t believe that she had been asked to come here; a part of her still expected that Master Jinn’s offer wasn’t real, just a product of her imagination. Yet, the message on her holoreader remained. He expected her arrival imminently. The small Resistance shuttle jerked as it landed, and she stirred from her somber thoughts enough to wryly critique the pilot’s skill, albeit silently. Taking up the pack with all her belongings, she hefted it over her shoulder, waiting for the docking to secure and the door to slide open. A wave of warm, almost muggy air filled the cabin, wiping away the cold of space travel, and she took a deep breath. It wasn’t like the cool forest of Malastare, nor nearly as dark, but it felt good to be among trees again. Deep space salvage in the Outer Rim had given her much needed quiet and solitude, but it had hardly been comfortable. She was almost too warm, here; she still wore the quilted jacket over her light blue tunic. Her black leggings were tucked into high boots that were more suited to the metal floor of ships rather than the uneven ground of jungle. Idly, she wondered if the Jedi here would revive some of the older traditions, like Jedi robes, or the padawan braid. For some reason, it made her smile, the expression passing briefly over her mouth as she walked away from the transport and towards the base proper. There were true Jedi here again. On the heels of that wonder, she felt a surge of uncertainty. Did she belong here? Taking a deep breath, she remembered Master Kenobi’s instruction and calmed, letting that worry go. The breeze stirred her hair, and Liriael looked up at the canopy of trees as she walked into the base. This was a good place; she could feel the life sighing through the branches above, curling through the leaves, steady in the roots below her feet. Peaceful. She needed that, after the last month, when so much of her was still very raw. In a way, she hadn’t yet said goodbye to Cassie, and that needed to be done. She would find a way, here. Hitching the pack up again, she paused on the path, looking at the few buildings that surrounded her. They were obviously old ruins, some standing a few stories tall, many of them vine-covered and mottled with moss. And yet there were signs of activity, with the faint hum of machinery and droids, the sound of construction further off, the low thrum of conversation. The others who had arrived with her, all of them Resistance people bringing supplies or coming to help rebuild, passed by her as she hung back. She wanted to absorb this first impression, fix it in her mind. After all….for the time being, this was going to be her home. The warmth of Dermos suited Qui-Gon well, as did the deep sense of the Living Force that abided in the forests. He felt almost his old self again, the only outward sign that he was anything less than the formidable swordsman of old his cane, which had become a familiar weight in his hand. Qui-Gon wondered, idly, if he would follow in Yoda’s path and keep the thing on hand for appearance’s sake, even when he had no need of it. A restless breeze tangled the Jedi Master’s long hair, and he considered for a moment raising his hood. He had come to the landing platform ahead of schedule, wanting to ensure that he would be there when Liriael arrived. She had put so much of her heart into the mere idea of training. It was only right that he respect that commitment by being the first to greet her on Dermos. Qui-Gon learned from his mistakes, after all, and he would not leave another learner uncertain of their path on his account. Shadows fell across the landing platform, accompanied by the rumble of a ship’s engines. Automatically, Qui-Gon noted the clatter of a worn vessel in need of repair. A mechanic, he was not, but his life had depended on a struggling ship often enough that he’d learned the sound of their complaints. Still, the shuttle served its purpose well enough. Better that the Resistance focus its efforts on more immediate concerns. How strange thoughts like that sounded in his mind, some days. Qui-Gon woke every now and then half-convinced that his life now was a hallucination, his life before the reality that waited to greet him once he opened his eyes. Qui-Gon stepped forward once he spied Liriael lingering at the back of a group of beings who were hustling off of the platform with supplies and missives. He made no sound, merely waited for her to absorb the moment and be ready for the next. When her gaze came down from the tree canopy overhead and landed on him, her face lit up. It temporarily banished the shadows that had been there a moment earlier, in her eyes; to all appearances, she was simply happy to be there. Hitching up the pack once more as she reached him, she said, “Master Jinn...it’s an honor to meet you.” As it was tradition on her home planet, she put her right fist over her heart as she inclined her head. “Thank you for asking me to come here.” As tall as she was, he only had a half-head of height on her, so she did not have to look up much. There seemed to be little outward evidence of her recent troubles, although a sense of sadness still clung to her. Qui-Gon inclined his head in return, the gesture an easy one that every Jedi learned while still in the creche. It was a way of showing mutual respect. Almost every species in the galaxy recognized it as such, which made the habit doubly useful. “The pleasure is mine,” he told Liriael, a smile of welcome drawing faint lines in his weathered features. “I hope your journey was not too difficult. I know that Dermos is somewhat out of the way, but it suits our purposes for the time being.” “It was no trouble,” Liriael replied, easily. “I've spent my entire adulthood traveling, I think. In the last three weeks, I have been on five planets, if you include this one.” She took a deep breath as her gaze encompassed the trees around them. “Dermos is a good choice. Admittedly, I am partial to any forest.” “I suppose that makes sense. You were raised on Malastare, if I recall correctly.” Qui-Gon turned to the path and gestured with one hand for Liriael to follow. “Even though the Jedi were, as a rule, raised on Coruscant in my time, many of us still found ourselves most comfortable in nature. The Temple had gardens that were unmatched. They were enough to satisfy those of us strong in the Living Force, though not the same as setting foot in a place like this. There is a different feel to nature when it is left to thrive on its own, rather than managed by a sentient species.” She fell into step easily alongside him. “I was born there, yes. My village was very far from any of the mining operations, so all I saw for most of my childhood was trees. I haven’t been back there in many years, but I suppose you never forget.” She agreed with him about the sense of Dermos, how rich it was, teeming with life. So many planets felt like the desert to her, in comparison. “I have been to the palace in Coruscant, what was once the Temple….I always wondered what it looked like before the Empire changed it, and then the Republic after that. There are places intact but never used, little more than forgotten halls now.” She immediately looked contrite. “I’m sorry, it’s probably still very fresh for you, what is past history for us.” “It’s all right.” Qui-Gon waved off her concern, his gaze forward, on the path that they walked now, rather than what lay in the past. “I cannot change what has come to pass. The Jedi are not the only ones who lost their home to the Empire. It would be selfish to hold our loss above the losses of others. That is something that no Jedi should indulge. Not for long, anyway.” A rueful smile drew attention to the lines of age and stress that Qui-Gon had earned over the years. “We are not perfect, but we do strive to be better than we have been. Even attachment to our home must be released into the Force if that attachment interferes with our duty to the rest of the galaxy.” Liriael nodded, but she didn’t immediately respond, processing his words. “Some things are easier to let go than others,” she conceded, more an acknowledgement of his advice than a continued discussion. Although she smiled in response to his own, her tone had become serious as she said, “Before I become too comfortable in this home, Master Jinn, I would like to speak to you about something weighing on me. It may affect your decision to train me, and I would prefer to be honest from the beginning.” Obi-Wan had reassured her than this was not the case, but she wanted no semblance of deception with Qui-Gon. If he told her she was not suited to this life, she needed to know now. Qui-Gon paused to search Liriael’s expression, even as he reached out to the Force for a sense of the true weight of her words. After a moment, he said, “Not here. Come.” This was an exchange that should occur in private. He turned from the path to lead Liriael into the trees. Patterned shadows shivered across the ground, laced with glimmers of sunlight. Several meters removed from the path, a small seating area waited, half-choked by wild brush that had not yet been cleared away. The space was peaceful, and, just as importantly, set well away from the active portions of the newly resettled ruins. “Please, sit,” he invited. “We will not be interrupted, here.” Walking through the woods came as second nature to her, and Liriael let the familiarity wash over her, centering her mind on more pleasant memories. It dispelled the last of the tension she had over what she needed to tell him. Three weeks she had prepared, and that was all she could do. Taking a seat, she set the pack beside her feet before she straightened up, looking at him. For a moment, she just marveled at her circumstances, committing all of what surrounded her to memory. Qui-Gon was more important to her than he realized, and she had known him long before he ever came to her time. He and the others had inspired her before she had known anything but the forests of Malastare. She looked at him, truly looked, wanting to keep this image of him, before she nodded and started her story. “Three weeks ago, I encountered another Knight of Ren,” she said, soberly. “Issan Vox, now Issan Ren. She and I had known each other for years, had traded barbs and sometimes blows, had always been running along the same path. I did not know until this encounter that she had become a Knight. Although we were enemies, I had always held out hope that...it would change. We seemed so similar, just on opposite sides of every issue. I wanted to be her friend.” An odd confession, to herself, three weeks ago. “I could not trust her, but I still wished that circumstances had been different.” She took a short breath, but she didn’t look away as she explained. Liriael was many things, but never, ever a coward. “When I confronted her, I warned her about the Knights. I thought they would target her, since I knew she had significant ability with the Force as well. And that is when I found out the truth. That she had been the one who had taken Dee, had set the events in motion that led to Cassie’s death, and that she was a Knight. And I lost control.” She frowned, deeply; for all that she regretted Cassie’s death, Liri had been surprised to find that she regretted attacking Issan even more. “I could have killed her. I felt it, felt the rage at being betrayed, felt that it was within my power to make her pay for all of it. Revenge, pure and simple. I had never touched the Dark Side, but I knew what it was. And I did hurt her, very badly. I beat her.” Issan had walked away, she knew that, but what damage had been done beyond that, Liri had no way of knowing. “Then I….stopped myself. I managed to step back and recognize it for what it was. But it’s not as if it all left me at once, that feeling. It lingers. I felt as if it hovered, waiting for a misstep once more.” Her frown had not changed, directed inwardly. “I still worry that it is, although it has lessened. I spoke to Obi-Wan, and he….helped me. Helped release some of that. But I thought it was important that you know.” Her eyes met his, and though there was no pleading or worry there, there remained concern. “In case you sensed it.” For a time, Qui-Gon stood in silence. The small sounds of the forest marked the moments as he considered what Liriael had told him. There was fear, there, but also humility. “That is a heavy burden to carry on a new path.” He turned and cleared the surface of a bench, then sat. “Your concern is not unwarranted. However, you may do yourself more ill if you continue to cling to it.” Qui-Gon folded his hands over the top of his cane. Every Jedi Master faced this discussion in one form or another during their student’s apprenticeship. Most did not have it on the first day. “You are not the first learner to be presented with such challenges, nor will you be the last. How you handle them is unique to your situation, and your strengths.” Obi-Wan had anticipated Qui-Gon yet again. The elder Jedi had not yet had the opportunity to ask his Padawan for assistance with Liriael’s training, but Obi-Wan had already imparted vital knowledge to her. “I’m glad that you came to me with this, and I want you to know that your actions do not make you any less worthy. You have shown a wisdom and a strength that even some raised in the Temple could not summon. In fact, there is something you should know.” Qui-Gon would repay Liriael’s trust with his own. “Obi-Wan was not my only apprentice. There was another before him. He fell to the Dark Side. At the time, I thought I knew him, but I came to see that we had never truly communicated. I am not a perfect master, and it would be unreasonable of me to expect a perfect student. But the Force can be forgiving. It accepts us, flaws and all. I am willing to continue on this course if you are.” As she waited his initial words, Liriael let the serenity of the forest wash over her. She could foresee that it would be easier for her here than anywhere else, for it was the one method she had taught herself as a child, long before she had a teacher. But the knot of emotion in her chest did not loosen, not until he sat down as well, and spoke of the challenges and his own past. Her expression cleared, the frown dissipating, to be replaced with gratitude that he still offered, having experienced another student turning his back on the Light. She warmed under the praise but did not take it too deeply to heart. There were plenty of times ahead, she knew, where she would likely challenge the idea that she had any wisdom. “Yes, I am very willing.” Her voice was steady, but held a note of relief. “Perhaps it is not a burden if I carry what happened as a lesson.” She did not want to turn away from it, because she knew that for all that had happened, Issan had not deserved what Liriael had done, when Liriael could have reached out in a very different way. She wished to remember that. “You have placed a great trust in me, one that your former apprentice betrayed, and I will not forget that. I am not unwise enough to promise I will never falter again, for we both would know it for an impossible pledge, but I will give everything I have to this training.” “All Jedi are students. Master or apprentice, we must learn from our experiences. You understand something that Xanatos never did. To become a Jedi is to act in service to others. I’ve already seen your commitment to that life. I do not ask you for perfection, only for your best efforts.” Her smile came automatically at that. “I am glad you know not to expect perfection, then,” she answered, the humor reaching her eyes once more. “But I am committed to this path. It’s different than simply helping those I care about. Bigger, perhaps, although that’s not quite the right words, I would say. I feel like if I can do more, I should.” She paused, then added, “If you don’t mind my asking about him….your apprentice, he was raised in the temple? He must have been very young.” It was hard for her to fathom anyone turning their back on that history and life that Xanatos must have had, when she would have given much just to have seen it at the height of the Jedi Order’s days. “No,” Qui-Gon returned, voice heavy with regret. “Not entirely. He was not found until he was almost too old to be accepted by the Council. Some would say that was where the fault began. I agree that the circumstances played a role in Xanatos’s eventual fall, but they were not solely responsible for the decisions he made.” His voice was grave as he continued. “Understand that it is not age alone that determines how readily one embraces the teachings of the Jedi. Your conviction to do good, to be a better person than you were a moment before, matters more than when you begin your studies. In years past, Jedi had only until the age of thirteen to be chosen as Padawans. I wonder now if we erred in that tradition, as we erred in so many others. The shadow that the former Order casts is not yours to bear. We look to you, and the others who have come to Dermos to learn, to step beyond history, and forge a better Order, one that will respect tradition, but not be bound by it until it can do nothing to save itself.” Although Liriael had known some of the traditions, she had not known about the true age that possible apprentices were cut off from further training. For once, she had good cause to be grateful she had been born in this time, as it afforded her a second chance. “There is something I wanted to show you,” she said, in lieu of answering yet. Leaning down to the pack by her feet, she drew out a small square memory cube, a bit old and battered. “I told you before that I had studied the Jedi Order all my life. As I am sure you know now, the Empire destroyed everything they could reach that spoke about the Order, so that many times, I had to locate very old archives on extremely remote planets. I didn’t want to take the chance that what I found could be lost, so I saved everything I ever learned on here.” She held it out for him. “I thought the new Order could use it. When you spoke about the traditions, it reminded me, because….some of what became tradition in the thousands of years of peace after the Hundred-Year-Darkness, would seem strange to those who came before. I always wondered, why were the traditions such as the rules against attachments brought about….and why was the Code changed over time? Whenever I would find one clue, it seemed that even older archives would contradict.” The cube fit neatly in Qui-Gon’s broad palm, yet felt as immense as the Jedi Temple itself. Generations of lost knowledge, found by a woman whose dream had been dismantled, it had once seemed, as thoroughly as the Empire had dismantled the truth of the Jedi--it was a gift not to be taken lightly. “Thank you,” he said. Anything else seemed inadequate. Seeing the import of what she had given him and what it meant, in his expression, Liriael felt a flush over her cheek even as she smiled, softly. She had not known if what she had recorded over the years would be valuable, since they had lived so much of it. “There are still many gaps,” she replied. “It was heartbreaking, sometimes, to see a glimpse of what had been erased. I hoped that those here, like you, could add your knowledge of this history, and make the record more complete.” Qui-Gon nodded his understanding. “This is a fine beginning,” he assured Liriael. He glanced up when a drop of water splashed lightly on his hand. A chill now accompanied the breeze, and he could hear a faint rumble a long distance away. “Though I think our next step should probably be to get inside. Nowhere in the Jedi Code does it require that a student be thoroughly soaked on her first day.” Her grin came automatically. “Are you sure?” she joked. “It could be an ancient tradition, fallen by the wayside.” As she was speaking, however, she took up the pack once more and put it over her shoulder. It, and everything else, felt lighter somehow. Qui-Gon heard her out, and had accepted her as a student all the same. She finally belonged right where she was. Giddy at that, she added, “Well, if it was in the Code, I’m sure it would state that her master could watch from somewhere nice and dry.” “Believe me. It’s been done. Whether or not a master used the Code as an excuse … Well.” He smiled, a glimmer of mischief in his stone blue eyes. Let Liriael wonder exactly what she’d gotten herself into. Every apprentice did, when first paired with a teacher. |