Private It starts with...

[Aeris Lashiec]

One thing that Aeris really couldn’t understand no matter how hard she tried was this fascination with the Old Republic. Well, she could understand why, but it was also an era that she associated with Jedi arrogance, a belief that there was peace while the dark grew beneath their noses. No matter how hard she tried, her opinions of Revan had rendered her a controversial figure in some areas and a peer in others. She kept that in mind for when in due time she would have to explain why Jedi of this age were in many ways both the same yet different from back then.

Regardless, time was a valuable thing and they had a whole evening free to watch it fly by as they studied one of the old masters of the Old Republic together. Not Revan themself but one of the Jedi that had served with him during the wars and the stories of what said Jedi General had been up to after it had ended.

They had gotten far in their career, there was no denying that, but in the end it seemed that like many other jedi of the time they would lose it all, and in a fall to the dark side of the Force no less. It was an all too common story at the time which either spoke of how the Jedi treated fallen brothers back then, or screamed of extreme inefficiency in keeping tabs on who did what and why. Either way it hardly painted a bright picture of who or what they did at the time.

“So,” Aeris said and put the book down before Brandyn with a curious glance. “Remind me why you want to read about this particular General, again?”

She took a seat in front of the man on the other side of the small table and opened her own copy of the book. It looked more worn, definitely a piece that had seen less use than most books, but an important piece of Jedi history nonetheless.

“It’s an intriguing story, but there are more detailed accounts on others. Especially given how many Old Republic Jedi and Sith seem to have been frozen in time for varying reasons and what-not.”

Brandyn Sal-Soren

 

[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

For Padawan Brandyn Sal-Soren, libraries were about as exciting a thing as he could imagine. If his imagination was flicked into reverse and he sped full steam ahead for several hours into the system of Boring, with all its boring little planets orbitting its boring little star. Such was his luck that his usually very action orientated Master had thought it time for him to go and spend a bit of time researching a specific Jedi from the Old Republic era.

Now, he knew plenty about the Old Republic. He had seen all the Old Republic Jedi serials on the Holo-broadcasts, multiple times over. The possibility of any of those being even partially fabricated or embellished completely alluded him. No, he was an expert on this time frame. But the Jedi his master had set him out to learn about was a name that was no in any of those productions. Gorgo Maye. Even the name sounded dull and uninteresting.

The librarian he had met seemed nice enough, though she talked almost as much as his sister, Briana. (That wasn't a kind comparison.) But why anyone would want to become a Jedi, just to become a librarian...a librarian!? The why of that completely alluded him as well. But at least he was actively pursuing an answer to this question.

He watched the woman closely, trying to find out what was wrong with her beyond being a chatterbox. He could handle that. He had plenty of experience. But a talkative person in a library sounded like the most anethma thing imaginable.

She had asked a question, and he shook his head to get himself out of his staring-mode. "Honestly...I have no idea...it is an assignment from my master," he said with a shrug before looking down with some degree of reluctance to look over the information in the pages before him, "Gorgo Maye was an Ithorian General in the Old Republic Army...in the battle against the Sith invasion under Revan and Malak. A healer in practice...Gorgo Maye created his own lightsaber for his Jedi trials, but never once activated it in combat, refusing to take the route of combat and acting only as an adviser and healer in the way..."

Brandyn leaned back in his chair. No wonder he had never heard of this Jedi.

"Sounds like the most boring Jedi imaginable," he muttered to himself.

| Aeris Lashiec |​

 

[Aeris Lashiec]

Brandyn Sal-Soren

“That’s right, he…” Aeris tried to interject between the boy’s recounting of Gorgo Maye’s life. Except instead he would go on to insinuate that Jedi that never raised their blade in battle were some of the least interesting ones. Aeris’ brows rose, her eyes closed, and her head tilted just ever so slightly as if she had taken a hit to her cheek. “Okay, so that is certainly an opinion.”

Should she have defended herself? It was practically an insult to her own honor. No, this kid was a teenager still and a clearly immature one at that. She settled for the names she could call him in the quiet of her own mind instead. Being a teenager bought him some leeway with his hormonal impatience, but that was not to excuse what else he might say as their study session continued.

Aeris’ eyes opened and glanced down into the book before her.

“A healer’s primary duty is to heal,” She said and flipped the page. “To raise a blade would be counterintuitive to the altruistic foundation that was laid out in his studies.”

Ha-ha! Big words, a teenager’s worst enemy. Aeris glanced up at Brandyn.

“And why did it say that Maye became a healer in the first place?” She said and tapped on the page number at the top of her book. As Brandyn began to sift through the pages to reach page thirty-eight Aeris raised her voice.

“Ah-ah. Nope.” She objected and used the force to flip him right back to page one again. “Take it from the start. You need the whole picture.”

 

[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

Brandyn looked up at his library guide witha frown. "But surely that is only the healer's primary goal. If there was need for a blade to be raised, and you did not do so because it was against your primary duty, then surely that would undermine the general duty of a Jedi to protect the defenceless. Altruism is only as good as the pragmatism that accompanies it," he said, in almost a throw away manner.

He sensed that there was some level of frustration, or even offence that had been taken. This was not through the Force, but simply a read of Aeris' expression. Years under his mother's tutelage had not been in vain, though he did not realize this at the moment. Instead of thinking about how he could have offended Aeris, Brandyn instead found himself annoyed that she could be offended so 'easily'.

He attempted to brush it aside as she pushed him into the books even more.

“And why did it say that Maye became a healer in the first place?”

Brandyn started to flip through the book in order to find a chapter title that would best indicate that the answer to her question would be contained within.

“Ah-ah. Nope. Take it from the start. You need the whole picture.”

Brandyn's hands lifted, away from the pages, partially in protestation over how she had taken over his book, partially to avoid papercuts.

"Fine," he said, his annoyance rearing its hiddeously deformed ugly head, before he slouched just a little. Why Mastor Noble had sent him here was already beyond his reasoning, now it was just starting to try him.

"Master Maye's parents were killed in a bombing raid by insurgent forces when Maye was only six years old," Brandyn said, his voice not carrying the care or gravitas that honoured the words he read, "a resentment and rage built up in the child, even as he was adopted into a Jedi Enclave on Dantooine. For many years, the Jedi were concerned that training him would prove to be their undoing. One Master saw in the young Ithorian a bright future, if Maye could learn to control his anger and channel that control it into some more useful task."

| Aeris Lashiec |​

 

[Aeris Lashiec]

Brandyn Sal-Soren

Defense wasn’t always to pick up the sword. A weapon was only as clever as the hand the wielded it, and if that hand didn’t partake in its reading, then what was it really protecting, and from who? The kid had his rights to the belief that altruism tempered by pragmatism was the way forward. In the end because she was not his master and more than anything because Aeris had grown tired of having the same debate over and over again where all either party could do was agree to disagree.

At least he seemed genuinely interested in the book. Or rather, not at all. She kept from nodding her head or giving much of a reaction at all, but it was definitely still there in the way she looked at him.

“Right.” She said and slowly nodded. “Master Maye was a highly regarded master in his order at the time, and even he was vulnerable to the dangers of his past because he had yet to make peace with it.”

“What does that tell you, Padawan Sal-Soren?” Aeris asked and raised her brow out of curiosity. “And why did you reach that conclusion?”

 

[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

"I don't know...I guess...we all have a past that can interfere with our future?" He said with a frown of disatisfaction with his own answer. To be honest, the answer was too simple and vague. Unoriginal and trite was not something he tried to be, not intentionally at least.

Brandyn shifted uncomfortably in his seat. She was pushing for answers to his answers, which was further than he would normally take his thought process. "Well...I guess it's like this...when my Master took me to Va'Alum recently...we visited a village of orphans that had been smuggled to the village for safety. A year prior...a group from the Alliance had come to bring aide in the form of Holo-emitters, datapads and water tanks for the orphanage. The water tanks had been in use...but the moment the holo-transmitter had broken down the people of the village had no idea how to fix it...and they ended up with fancy paperweights and holo-emitters taking up valuable sleeping space on the floors. As much as we wanted to save all the orphans, we knew that more would arrive after we left. So we brought some poultry, and built a shed to keep them in, but out of material they had readily available. The orphans had enough eggs to breakfast every day, and enough to sell in the village market to purchase other essentials."

He leaned back in his chair, with a finger holding his spot in the book he had open.

"I guess not all altruistic actions are created equal...sometimes the best right thing to do...is draw your blade," he said, but showed signs of uncertainty in his tone and expression, "right?"

| Aeris Lashiec |​

 

[Aeris Lashiec]

She listened to the story and she watched the way he seemed to grow more and more uncertain the more he had to think one step further on the consequences of his actions and those of the people around him. Whether she wanted to or not, Aeris considered that a sign of her progress.

“Yes, and no.” Aeris said and let her uneasiness show in the way she seemed to sway ever so gently from side to side. “I will try to take this from a, ahhh, warrior’s perspective since that is what you seem to understand the most or want to draw comparison to.”

Deep breath, here came thet lecture.

“Keep in mind that the wisdom I find in my meditation may differ from yours, but it is the fact that we exchange these thoughts that are the most crucial when it comes to us, and what it means to be a jedi.” Aeris frowned and slowly began what she had no doubt would become a rant. “Your example on Va’alum is a perfect example of how less is sometimes more, and how resources are not what makes the difference when it comes to actually fixing a problem.”

“We are going a bit off track here,” Aeris noted and shrugged. “But in short, the moral goes back to the old saying: give a man a fish and he is happy for a day, teach him how to fish and he can be happy for the rest of his life. I can only hope we in the Alliance learned from that.”

She wasn’t beyond accepting her faults. Time and time again it had been shown just how liable the Jedi themselves are to misdeeds as their supposed enemy.

“While I disagree, I can also admit that there are times that the sword is the only option an individual has. However, that should never ever be the first option that a Jedi jumps to. At least not the way I see it.” She leaned back in her seat, confident in what she said. “If peace through words and understanding has failed, and if the opponent is the one to initiate combat, then a Jedi has as much of a right to self-defense as anyone else does.”

“But, a Jedi should never be the one to instigate violence.”

Brandyn Sal-Soren

 

[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

Brandyn listened intently, possibly for the first time. He rarely found the philosophy of the Jedi way to be very engaging, but recent events had made him have a little more hesitation regarding the cavalier attitude of the past, even if it did not always come across in his speech.

"So. You don't think that there is ever an occasion where a Jedi should be the first to ignite their blade?"

His question contained no ire, nor deception, it seemed sincerely asked.

"What if it was like...some law that was being passed that would see millions suffer as a result? The weapon in this case would be the datapad that passes the law...the members of government that weild the power over multitudes..."

| Aeris Lashiec |​

 

[Aeris Lashiec]

Brandyn Sal-Soren

“I don’t. An ignited lightsaber is the sign that all else has failed.” She said and gave him a slow, approving nod of his question. “That’s a very good example.” She then added and crossed her hands on the table. “Does the action of one cancel the voices of the many, or does the actions of many overthrow the voice of one?”

“Or, to put it more blunt,” Aeris let herself laugh at herself. “Would the death of a tyrant ensure no other tyrants came after them? Is that not up to the people?”

“The appropriate arm to wield in your example is not to cut down the few in favor of the many, but to empower the many to overthrow the few. Encourage people to speak up, get others on their side. Start movements, get them to understand the purpose of freedom and liberty, rather than force it upon them.”

 

[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

As Aeris spoke, Brandyn's mind went to the subject of The New Way. The grassroots movement had sprung up in the region of space near his homeworld of Naboo. He had thought those people to be loons and unreasonable, but if they were going about their protestations in a purposely non-violent manner, then they were doing just what Aeris was suggesting.

"So the vote goes ahead...and many people die...and my solution is to go and start some protests?"

His face screwed up apparent distaste at the idea. He leaned forward and closed the book in front of him.

"But the idea of attacking first...someone unarmed...even if they are truly evil...leaves a foul taste in my mouth."

| Aeris Lashiec |​

 

[Aeris Lashiec]

Brandyn Sal-Soren

“Minds and hearts are never as simple as just starting protests. Think of it more as educating them. Same as with you, and me, there are some who will understand and some of those who will not.” Aeris shook her head. “More importantly, how do you know that you are right? How do you know that your actions lead you where you need to go?”

“Movements don’t have to be protests though. Helping underground networks — providing aid to their cells and intelligence — is a valid point of action too. As a Jedi it is our duty to defend the defenseless, yes. But what we really need is to be less of the shields that people hide behind, and more of the leaders that make others aspire to be greater.”

“That is what being a Jedi boils down to.”

 

[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

“A Jedi boils down to being hopeless in effecting quick solutions to difficult problems?” He said with a sigh, before looking out the nearby windows.

He glanced then at his teacher, then back to the book, and out the window again.

”I always thought the Force would solve the big questions. But instead it just seems to make the wrong choices easier and the good people have to be more cautious than ever.”

| Aeris Lashiec |​

 

[Aeris Lashiec]

"Well, yes and no." She said and shook her head. "It is more the case that effective changes cannot be achieved with quick and rash decisions. As a Jedi you will be tested on this, and in many cases its about making the most out of a bad situation. People will look to you for guidance, and that is why patience is such an important part of our faith."

"If you think back to the code, it is not so much mentioned as it is implied. Serenity, peace, things that you can only achieve when you are in control of yourself and your reactions."

Brandyn Sal-Soren

 

[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

“It seems like there is a lot of rules preventing us from acting rightly, but also decisively,” Brandyn said with a slight hint of resignation in his tone, “sounds like the dark side grants quick and easy power to achieve your ends and we just have to absorb the damage to innocents around the galaxy while declaring peace And patience.”

A slight hurt showed in his eyes as he looked back towards Aeris. Did he want to go the path of the darkness, try and reign in his impulses and still do good, no not at all. It was a fools errand, history was replete with those that had failed.

”I just want to help people and stop those that want to hurt people. But it isn’t as easy as that…is it?”

| Aeris Lashiec |​

 

[Aeris Lashiec]

"No, it is not." Aeris frowned. "The high road is hard to find, as they say. And in a way, yes. The dark side leads to destruction and shortsightedness that usually reinforces the saying about hell and good intentions."

"But, hey, sometimes intentions are all you have. All that truly matters is how you achieve them and who has to pay the price. A jedi never forces it upon someone else to fix something but rather acts as a mentor."

"I can give you some more books if you need them." Aeris sighed. "You can mail them back later when you are done with them. Preferably in the same state."

Her mobile device beeped once, beeped twice. A frustrated sigh blew from her nose.

"Sorry, I have to take this."

Brandyn Sal-Soren

 

[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

"More books," Brandyn said to himself, before shaking himself free of a half daze, "sure...yeah, that sounds great."

The life of a Jedi was increasingly looking less heroic than what the holovids had presented him when he was a child. Were the Jedi really so hamstrung by their need to always be passive in their approach to resolving great conflicts?

A conversation that was supposed to help him understand that aggression was not the primary method of solving problems had left Brandyn wondering if there was an affective Jedi response to difficult problems. Did the Jedi worldview have the bandwidth to deal with issues beyond the clearly defined?

"Feel free to take the call," Brandyn said as he stood, "I need to leave anyway."

| Aeris Lashiec |​