Changing of the Guard [Juzt]

[Charlie Sharper]

Tem accessed the message for him on the datapad again for the fifth time, reading it over again. -To my friend Tem Farelle: I hope you are well, friend, it has been too long. I’m afraid my duties as a councilor have forced me to see little of you as of late. You may or may not be aware of my recent absence, so in advance, I would like to apologize for not being as present as I would like, but as you know, rarely does a Jedi’s life allows for personal dealings. My meaning for this message is a request; as you may, or may not know, but I have recently taken on a padawan named Kalan D'ravk. He is a talented, if somewhat nervous, young Miraluka who has great potential, even if he struggles to see it. As much as I’d like to be present to train and encourage him, something of great importance has come about that requires my fullest attention. I wish I could elaborate, but at this time, I cannot. For this reason, I cannot fulfill my obligation to him. It is for this reason I ask you to watch over him in my place, not by order, but as a favor to me. He carries the weight that is far more than any child should, but as you know, ours is not a life of ease, and rarely are we given the time to mourn our losses or mistakes. Please, be patient with him, for you have much in common. Thank you, Rune Oki.-

The enclosed message disappeared and another one appeared labeled for Kalan. Tem still didn't know what to say, even after reading it five times. He had never been much for training or mentoring the younglings, yet now he stood outside the door of a youngling...No, Padawan, about to tell the boy that his Master was unable to continue the boy's training, so Tem would be assuming the role. He mentally asked himself again: 'what could he offer this child?' But he mentally stopped himself, he had accepted the offer, so now was the time to deal with it.

Tem reached an arm out to press the access button of the room, the chime sounded and he waited for the door to open. There was a long time before he heard anything, but eventually, he pressed the button again, this time holding it down. When another minute passed, he knocked on the door. "Hello? Padawan D'ravk? Are you in there?" He asked through the door.

[Juzt]

Kalan cut a pretty miserable figure. He moped on his own around the temple, he had never had many friends in his life but now he felt more alone than ever. He had gotten to like his former Master Rune Oki, well more than like love would be approaching the word. Supposedly Jedi were not meant to feel attachments but he had felt a strong father son relationship with Rune and now Rune was gone.

Kalan still had practised and trained in the short time since Rune had gone but it did not feel the same. Every time he made a mistake he found he missed Rune's grumpy irritation and when he did something well he missed his grudging praise. The question was, what was to be done with Kalan now. His apprenticeship had lasted a little under a year. His birthday had passed a few months a go, and he was now a teenager. Somehow he did not feel much of a difference from being twelve. He still felt awkward out of place and inferior.

It did not help that he felt that Rune leaving him to take on a vital mission was an indication that Kalan had failed somehow. His lack of self worth would not convince him that Rune had left unwillingly. Now images of being driven out of the Order were running round in his head. The blonde Miraluka, tightened his grip round his knees. His agoraphobia seemed to have relapsed in a big way as he huddled under his bunk his robe cast about him.

He had long ago give up crying it was just a waste of the body's resources. The room was pretty bear and there was little light in the room. Being bind he had little need for light. There was a simple desk, on it were a collection of datapads from various books he had been studying, of course he had to have the ones that read to him. The precious lightsaber that Rune had give him he had cradled in his hands like it was a cuddly bantha. He supposed he must be growing, at first the lightsaber had been way to big for his hands, it felt aa little more comfortable in them now.

He suddenly heard the chime, he sensed a presence outside the door. It seemed vaguely familiar it seemed to be a Jedi Knight he had sometimes seen about the temple. He knew it was childish but at this moment he did not really want to talk to or see anyone, and could not imagine why anyone would want to deal with wimp like him. However, after a while the Jedi entered the room, a face with short blonde hair and a wrap tied around his head where his eyes should have been. It was made of a coarse materiel. Kalan had taken it from the mining uniform he had worn as a young salve before being freed by the Republic. It even still smelt faintly of spice. "H-hello." Came a voice barely above a whisper.

[Charlie Sharper]

Tem stood at the door for almost another minute, waiting for it to open, but instead it stayed closed. Impatience got the best of the tall Jedi and he finally began to wonder if the boy was even in his room, but before he would go searching for the boy, Tem wanted to be sure. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, letting the force wash over and through him as he slowly let the breath out. He could see his surroundings through the force, the door in front of him, the panel next to it, he could even sense the younglings walking down the hallway away from him. He pushed out further and focused on the door, causing everything to disappear around him save for the door. As he pushed through it he could sense another presence, it was there, clear as day, but he couldn't tell where in the room or who it was, being that he didn't know the boy well enough to discern such things. When he opened his eyes and the force vision faded instantly, replaced by what his eyes saw before him, the unopened door and the wall.

Now that he knew the boy was in there, Tem decided on brash action rather than finesse, and pressed the override for the door, something that was reserved for emergencies. This caused the door to chime several times very loudly before opening. As the door opened he saw nothing but darkness, save for the rogue light spilling from behind the curtains. "Padawan D'ravk? Are you awake?" he asked as he entered the dark room and looked around. His goggles greatest weakness was that they were often ill-equipped for dark settings being only able to lower light levels, not increase them. In fact, they operated much like the human eye does when wearing sunglasses, so while bright light would be easier to deal with and be less disorienting, darkness was quite a hinderance for the Jedi, as he couldn't see in darkness with his goggles as the average human could without them.

As he crossed into the room, he could make out a desk, as it was close to the window that was covered, so that half of the room was almost visible to the Jedi, but the other half might as well been in a black hole, for all he could tell. As he walked into the room, his leg hit a post of a bed, causing the Jedi slight pain, he fought the urge to curse his goggles as he turned toward the bed. "Padawan D'vark? Are you here?" He asked into the darkness, hoping the boy wasn't sleeping. "I have a message for you from Master Oki..." Tem said in a slightly less somber tone than he had intended.

[Juzt]

Kalan, noticed his greeting seemed to have gone unheard. Perhaps, he half hoped, who ever it was had gone away to leave him in peace. This was not the case he could feel the fingers of someone's mind stretching over him, the unmistakeable presence of another far more powerful force user. Kalan shivered a bit. He however nearly jumped out of his skin when the emergency override was pressed, the noise drilling into his skull.

His stomach dropped in fear into the pit of his stomach, like he was in a ship performing a sudden drop into a planet's atmosphere. In came a presence, that Kalan barely knew. He was sure he had encountered this one bickering with a young Wroonian Jedi knight once or twice on his journeys around the temple. He had an outline of the man in his mind, tall powerful. However, for a Miraluka it was always easier to 'see' someone's presence in the Force than get a good idea of their physical appearance. The young Padwan started to emerge from under his bed he winced a little as the newcomer seemed to stub his toe and almost trip on a stack of datapads. Would he shout? He was not sure.

However, he perked up as the Knight mentioned the magic words, Master Oki. Had he come back to him, had he changed his mind? No that seemed unlikely. He knew his old Master's dedication to duty. No it could only be that he was to be removed from the Order, sent to use his meagre talents on behalf of the Republic. To be viewed and derided as some sort of failure. What did he expect after all he was a failure, unworthy of his place in the Order. Out of the shadows came a small voice that seemed destined to carry with it a sense of inferiority and fear. “I am here.”

[Charlie Sharper]

The tall Jedi's goggles to a moment to adjust to the dimly lit room, the only light being the beams that spilled in over Tem's shoulders and around his body from the hall. As the goggles adjusted to the low light, they let of a series of audible clicks accompanied by a moment flickered out of the lenses, each time the hue retuned to the goggles, the light they gave off was brighter than it was before the flicker. The process took approximately a moment, one that Tem always hated, for the flickering was actually the lenses shutting off and returning, while most thought his goggles were an asset, assuming that his goggles were some sort of eye protection or special device to give him some sort of enhanced vision, they were nothing to the Jedi but an hinderance, they broke often, and if they were damaged in anyway, he would be in almost all cases, unable to see, as his eyes super-sensitivity to light rendered even the softest or most indirect of lights a blinding and headache inducing illumination. It did not help matters that he was a genetic defect of sorts, most Miralukan and human hybrids were either born blind, or complete able to see, so there was little knowledge on why or what caused his eyes to develop the way they did. He would, however, remind himself, at least he had eyes, and as mentioned, they worked, albeit needing the goggles to not go blind.

As they finally adjusted to the level of light, he looked around the room, but quickly noticed that a boy stood in front of him. Looking down at the boy, he saw the person for whom he was seeking, Kalan D'vark. Tem stood over a foot and a half taller than the boy, who appeared to not even fit his own frame. Tem instantly felt for this boy, he could sense the boy's fear, and was almost sure it was for fear of Master Oki. The red haired Jedi's heart felt for the boy, he knew what this was like, the limbo of childhood into adulthood, which was not something that was easy or slow for anyone, let alone the added stress of the jump from youngling to padawan. He remembered his own story, knowing the trials of going from a simple, structured life of a youngling, where one would see right and wrong being as clear as black and white, to the complicated, murky, and very much imperfect universe that they all inhabited. While the Jedi did not hide the world from the younglings per say, often telling the younglings that the world is rarely fair or perfect as one would hope, but these words no doubt rang hollow with a childlike mind, and the younglings would rarely leave the Temple, a world full of bastions of the Light, Fairness, and Enlightened ones. It wasn't until they would be old enough to leave that they would taste the harsh realities of the common phrase in the Temple: 'The life of a Jedi is not an easy one.' And try as he might, Tem could think of no words which to ease the burden he was about to place on the boy.

"Padawan D'vark. I something I must tell you..." Tem spoke in a calm and as gentle as he could manage, tone. "I am a friend of Master Oki, and...You see..He has asked...Well" Tem slightly stammered the last bit, and couldn't help thinking ~How will I ever make a good Master?~ Tem stifled the doubts and thought; ~Well, might as well say it~ as the silence hung in the air. "I'm afraid that Master Oki will not be returning for some time," Tem cringed as he spoke again, knowing that his transition into 'I'm taking on your apprenticeship' was about as subtle as a club to the head. "And he has requested that I take over your training for the forseeable future..." Tem tentatively reached out and place a hand on Kalan's shoulder. "He believes in you..." Tem said finally.

[Juzt]

Kalan listened to all that Tem said. Most of it he already knew Rune had gone on a mission and would likely be gone for years or maybe not come back at all. Kalan was too young and inexperienced to undertake such a mission with his Master. Even though he could not see it, he was becoming a skilled if slightly overly defensive Jedi, but such an idea never occurred to him. Also he knew deep in his heart what Rune had said was true, but part of him still felt like Rune had cast off an idiot someone who was untrainable.

That is why what Tem said staggered the boy. Tem had been selected to train him. He was taken aback he had been fully expecting to be drummed out of the order to be of some use to the Republic in one capacity or another. This changed everything, well not quite everything. The way Kalan saw himself was not likely to change, his despair just gave way to an odd feeling that he was getting something he did not deserve. A guilt squirming away in him that he would be taking this Jedi away from a more rewarding Padawan. Then he was surprised again, Master Oki believed in him? Maybe he had said it to be kind but that was not Rune's way. It had always been to call a hydrospanner a hydrospanner. Maybe his belief was misplaced, but it was not for Kalan to disagree. He now regarded his new 'master' as best as he could.

His Force vision gave a rough approximation of size and shape, a sense of alignment and power. The one who stood before him seemed impossible tall to the youngster powerfully built to and not as old as he had pictured a Master would be. He also had something over his eyes, some kind of protective device, Kalan's brain cycled through species who needed that kind of protection. Arkanian... no, he defiantly had more than three fingers. Offshoot maybe... no. Arkanians and their Offshoots had problems in high intensity lights and this room was dark surely he would have taken it off. Maybe a half Miraluka or something. He had certainly encountered him a few times before he had come upon Master Oki talking to him once or twice but the name eluded the Padawn.

“I see.” He said softly, “May I know your name..... Master?” Now that felt strange to him, though he supposed it should not Jedi were used to addressing their seniors in such ways. He bowed stiffly and formally, suddenly hyper aware of the messy room. “Uh.... sorry for the mess.”

[Charlie Sharper]

Tem could feel the young boy's curiosity, mainly pertaining to who and what Tem was, most likely made more difficult to discern thanks to the Jedi's goggles. It had been over two decades since the local handyman on Nadiem modified a pair of welding goggles to allow young Tem to see without the force. While Tem had long since lost that first pair, he still wore the same basic design to this day. The pair was simply a pair of modified weld-worker goggles, which passed all the light that met the lenses through a filter before displaying them as a corrected image, but in Tem's case, the image was much darker so that his eyes wouldn't be blinded. While the goggles allowed Tem's highly sensitive eyes to see the world around him, they were very finicky and unreliable due to the complicated settings they had to maintain for Tem to see. Because of this, Tem had learned to use force sight quite well for whenever his goggles failed, and was familiar with the advantages and shortcoming it had compared to normal light dependant vision, but still was thankful to not depend on it completely as all Miraluka did.

The first thing Tem saw with his own eyes were his smiling mother, Jera, it was an image he couldn't picture remember anymore; instead, he recalled the sadness he felt in her presence. Torn between happiness for her son who could finally see, and fear that her son wouldn't identify with her through blindness. Tem found himself feeling the same twinge of guilt as he felt the day he first wore his goggles, realizing that he wouldn't identify completely with this Padawan, who like his mother, was full blooded Miralukan and had no eyes.

Tem's moment of introspection was interrupted when the timid young boy spoke again, catching Tem off guard by the question he posed. “May I know your name..... Master?” Tem silently cursed his lack of tact, how the boy expect to hear such news from a total stranger was unforgivable. "Oh, how could I forget. I apologize Padawan D'ravk, My name is Tem Farelle." Tem spoke before bowing to the boy in respect, as he rose back to full height, the Padawan apologized for his room being a mess. Tem looked around but couldn't see much in the dark room, but could make out a few shapes of piles of clothes or data pads. Tem had always believed in a clean area leading to a clear mind, but still, the boy was young, and Tem had been no different when young.

"Relax Padawan D'ravk, I am not here to judge you, you must not worry so much. Now, even though the Council has granted me permission to train you, I do not believe that you have no say in decision. Despite what some younglings believe, the path of a Jedi cannot be pressed upon you, you must chose to take on the responsibility. That said, I will not coddle you, the life of a Jedi is a hard one, one of sacrifice and loss, as I'm sure you will learn. So the question I have for you is this Young Padawan, do you wish to continue your training with me as Master Oki has requested?" Tem held out a hand to the Padawan, awaiting his answer.

[Juzt]

Kalan listened to Tem in silence and when he had finished talking Kalan remained silent for a few beats more. “I see.” Was in the end all he could say in response. It was rather a lot to take in, a father figure had gone one who he had just gotten used to and now he was being confronted with a new situation. Well at least it seemed he was not going to be drummed out of the order. It was one of the things Kalan had been most desperate to do was become a Jedi. To make a contribution to the Galaxy not matter how small to compensate his feelings of guilt that he retained from his childhood.

Most people when they got over a certain age started to forget things from when they were four. Kalan remembered every horrid detail. The tight confines of the spice mines the darkness the smell and his role to lead others through the maze of tunnels, as any torch light could damage the sensitive spice seams. It had left Kalan with a fear of wide open spaces especially a strong fear of space travel. All that emptiness above him was terrifying. On top of that it had left him with an overriding guilt and feelings of inferiority. There was something wrong or bad with him. He had led all those people to suffering in the mines. It had taken Rune many long months of pateint care to persuade him that he had been a scared child at the time and could hardly have been blamed. However, with every set back like this it knocked his fragile confidence. In fact he had been learning his lessons well.

Kalan had a particular love of Galactic History and the History of the order. He retained knowledge remarkably well. However, his lack of confidence asserted itself in physical training. Rune had educated Kalan to a limited extent in Soresu which played to Kalan's natural timidity and defensiveness. Aggression was very much an alien concept to Kalan, and he had a tendency to be clumsy. However, he had learned a great deal from Rune and was actually a good student far more than he would give himself credit for.

Kalan looked at Tem. Rune seemed to have selected the young Knight personally to train him. So that meant there was hope for Kalan yet, no one was as yet going to send him away. Kalan, straightened himself up out of his typical slouching posture. “I- I...” he shook his head and firmed up his voice. “I wish to continue.” He said as firmly as his quiet voice could manage.