Private A CITY WITH NO SKY

[Aadihr Lidos]

Echoes Without Witness

Outfit: Clothes, Earring, Bangle
Weapons: Walking stick / Lightsaber Pike

Aadihr had to pause.
His head bowed.

"Aadihr. What was the Purge?"

"It was the end of the Jedi."

He didn’t raise his head.

"Over a thousand years ago - during the fall of the Republic and rise of the Empire, before the Battle of Yavin 4. It's a brutal event in history, studied to prevent the past from happening again. It began with Order Sixty-Six. A protocol buried in the clone soldiers the Republic used at the time. A plan, a hypothetical contingency on when and how to kill every Jedi they fought alongside. When the chancellor took over emergency powers, the order was triggered. They turned on the Jedi. On their friends. Jedi were hunted in temples, in forests, on ships. Children. Masters. Even those in medbays. All of them."

He turned slightly—toward the wall Acier had indicated.

"But that was only the first blow."

A pause, breath steady now.

"What followed was slower. Crueler. Some Jedi survived. Many didn’t stay Jedi. They surrendered to the Sith. They gave names, opened vaults. Gave away the locations of their kindred. Maybe they believed it was for peace. Or order. Or survival."

He stepped forward, fingers brushing the stone beside them. Beneath scorched soot and grime, the shape of an old symbol lingered—cracked, buried, but still there.


Aadihr pressed his hand to the wall.

There was a sound. A click. Then another. A pulse behind the stone.

Something unlocked.

"This wasn’t meant to be found. Not easily. They hid it. Then they sealed it. But she had the key. She had their trust."

A sliver of durasteel shifted open with a hiss. Cold air escaped like a held breath.

"Which means this..."

He struggled to voice the words.

This rubble could be all that's left... Or it could be history preserved through the dark times.

Acier Moonbound​

 

[Acier Moonbound]

Location: Denon

Equipment:
Standard Outfit | Lightsaber | Modified DL-27

Acier noticed Aadihr's head lower. He wasn't sure if it was from sorrow, or respect maybe. Listening to the Miraluka attentively as he described what the Purge was, the young man pictured the events vividly in his mind. The sound of lightsabers and blaster fire rang in his mind, he imagined the smell of smoke and fire. the sea of bodies. Ace almost winced at the thought.​

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Order 66, the Fall of the Old Republic, the rise of the Empire, clone troopers - all of this was foreign to the Bonadan native. Growing up with no formal education, his knowledge on galactic history was extremely limited. Learning this happened a thousand years ago and having experienced echoes pertaining to it was surreal.​

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It didn't stop there. Aadihr continued to explain that some Jedi managed to survive, by betraying the Order and serving the Sith or, the Empire. Ace hung on the Miraluka's every word, breath unknowingly held and lips slightly parted. He had always thought Jedi as these untouchable, infalliable figures - to learn they'd turn on their own out of survival. It shattered the illusion.​

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Acier didn't notice the blind Jedi's next movements. He was swimming in a sea of his own thoughts, reflecting on what he'd just learned. Processing. It wasn't until he heard a quiet hiss and felt cold air touch his skin that he'd finally turn to see what Aadihr was up to.​

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"Wha..." was all the escaped him as his eyes fell on the gaping entrance within the wall in front of them.​

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Ace stepped forward, unsure of what to expect inside the vault. Nothing. Of course there was nothing, just more rubble. He turned his head to face the blind Jedi.​

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"Whatever was in here. She took all those centuries ago." ​

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Saying that felt like a gut punch. Ace thought about all those Jedi, all those echoes he experienced. He was saddened. For what felt so real, so present, were merely the memories of people that fell a thousand years before. It felt... haunting.​

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Ace trailed a hand through his white, damp locs, while resting his other on his hip. Then sighed.​

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"What now?" he asked "Have we, like... cleansed this place?" ​

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Aadihr Lidos ​

 

[Aadihr Lidos]

The Absence That Remained

Outfit: Clothes, Earring, Bangle
Weapons: Walking stick / Lightsaber Pike

Aadihr stepped slowly into the remains of the vault.

Nothing waited there. No holocron. No secret salvation. Just stone. Damp air. A rusted bracket half-sunk in ash and ruin. He paused and placed his hand to the cold wall. The memory here had already played its final act. Now it only lingered like smoke clinging to robes long after the fire had died.

"Whatever was here..." he said quietly, "it’s gone. Taken, like you said."

He stepped out again, back into the open chamber where Acier stood, the vault yawning behind him like an accusation.

"And, sadly It’s not cleansed.”

A pause. His face remained tilted downward, jaw tight behind calm words.

“These memories are strong. Ancient. This wasn't one of those 'splinter infections' I mentioned, just a very old cyst. That kind of echo... It will take a long time to fade.”

He tapped his pike lightly against the ground—just once—before continuing.

“I’ll file a report with the New Jedi Order when we leave. Let the Service Corps send a team out here. They’ll excavate what they can. Archive what’s left. Probably end up sealing the structure again afterward for public safety.”

He looked back toward the collapsed stairwell. The Force still pulsed faintly beneath the surface. Fading now.

“Eventually the echoes will weaken. Could take months – more likely years, given their age. But they'll fade.”

There was a silence then. Heavy. Honest.

“The living shouldn’t have to carry the burdens of the dead.”

Not like he did. Not like they both did, now.

“We'll remember them. We'll learn. Then we'll sweep what remains of them into a tidy bin,” he added softly, “So they stop bleeding into the lives of people who never got a choice in the matter.”

Like Nivon. Like Acier.

“It’s not some sacred rite. Not a Jedi ritual. It’s just... cleanup.”

He said the last part with a hint of melancholy. The lives they had experienced to be excavated and extracted like unstable ordnance.

“Same way you’d clear a collapsed speeder tunnel or seal a leaking reactor.” A faint sigh. “What’s left here is dangerous. Just... Less so for us than for them.”
He motioned with his staff back out to the streets, the layers of city that house millions of everyday people just outside this hidden relic of the past.

He finally turned his face toward Acier again, A gentler tone returned, softened by a somber kindness.

“So. No, we didn’t save anything today. But we’ll make sure no one else has to trip over the ghosts. ”

Aadihr let the sound of the rain pattering against the city wash over the moment.

Acier Moonbound​

 

[Acier Moonbound]

Location: Denon

Equipment:
Standard Outfit | Lightsaber | Modified DL-27

It wasn't cleansed. Not yet, at least. Acier didn't know what to expect, if them reliving these echoes would somehow... free the energy left behind. His understanding of it all was completely rudimentary, despite all he had learned from Aadihr in this short time. Acier's arms fell to his side as he listened to Aadihr.

The Miraluka almost sounded detached as he went over, what Ace assumed, was some sort of standard protocol for situations like this. He didn't know how to feel about what was to come. The idea that all these lives, this monument of a tragic event - Nivon, was now about to be reduced to a safety hazard. Something to bury and forget. Maybe all of this was the right thing to do, but it still felt hollow.

"Just cleanup, huh?" he muttered, failing to mask the disappointment in his tone.

Maybe it was dangerous, what was left here. But what if it had only gotten to this point because it was forgotten about. Swept away by the ever moving current of time. These were people, with thoughts, feelings, dreams. This place was their home, their way of life. Then, in a moment, it was completely wiped out. No ceremony, no remembrance. Just gone like it'd never even been here. Then time moves on, not even giving those lost the closure they deserved. This all felt so cruel.

Being told they didn't 'save' anything today, felt disheartening. But realistically, Acier asked himself what they would even be saving. He'd come here because the Force drew him here, he'd hope to leave with understanding, knowledge - resolution. But the hollowness remained. Sure, they prevented this vergence from spreading out any further to the locals but... was that really it? That's the best they could have done?

Something felt amiss. Maybe it was Acier being afflicted by a flight of youthful righteousness. Maybe it was something more. It's not like he'd find out anyway.

This entire time, Acier had averted his gaze away from Aadihr. Staring so hard into empty space that maybe, just maybe, he's see one last imprint of the past.

"Their story. I won't forget." he said softly "Knowing what really happened here. Even if it's just us. Maybe that'll honor their memory in some way." Ace pondered this aloud.

His gaze lingered on the cracked stone a moment longer, then drifted to the vault's gaping mouth. Not as a doorway, but a wound.

"Let's go." he said quietly.

The rain hadn't stopped. Maybe it wouldn't for a while.

Aadihr Lidos
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