Student of Confusion

[Jorus Merrill]

[SIZE=14.6667px]From space, nearly any world was beautiful. Infinite detail, stark contrast, dynamic light and shadow. Of all the worlds he’d seen from above, this wasn’t the strangest. He’d flown around the Spires of Hell, after all. But even so, this one made the deepest impression.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]It looked desolate -- no water, no clouds, just red-brown soil and rock. But from various points, thousand-klick streamers of yellow light connected the planet to a systemwide network of tendrils and radiance. He’d come here the same way he went anywhere, by instinctive astrogation. Same way he’d found Ahch-To and visited Companion Grek and built the Mara. But like Ahch-To, this place had called to him, so he’d shut off his navicomputer and pressed the button. [/SIZE]
[SIZE=14.6667px]The [/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]Gypsymoth[/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px], the beat-up, oft-reconstructed YV-929 where he’d spent his life, went dead as it drifted toward the planet. He’d picked up no EMP on sensors. Something here just didn’t want starships operational. Comparable, perhaps, to the electronics interference you’d get on Dromund Kaas, but he didn’t feel the Dark Side here. And a service astromech twittered nervously in the hold, and his datapad still turned on, so yeah -- it was just the ship. Baseball in hand, Jorus sat back and let the Force guide his ship without him as an intermediary.[/SIZE]

 

[Jorus Merrill]

[SIZE=14.6667px]The [/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]Gypsymoth [/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]meandered down toward the planet as if guided by an invisible hand of stellar proportions. No shields, but little reentry burn, nor sense that he was coming in ballistic in a flying brick. Everything was controlled, tranquil, absolutely unnatural -- no, a if a higher law was in operation. As if his vessel was gripped by layers of physics beyond what he knew. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]The ‘929 touched down gently in a hollow at the base of a tendril. Up close, it was made of dozens of tendrils, incorporeal, radiant, and loosely braided together. His artificial eyes adjusted to compensate. Behind him, unbidden, the [/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]Gypsymoth[/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]’s ramp dropped. An invitation if he’d ever heard one. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]The freighter sat in a rocky depression, a crater almost, with the ten-thousand-kilometre braid rising from a pit in the centre. Jorus eyed it for a long time, weighing faith versus preparedness, then grabbed a fibercord dispenser and a bag of basic supplies. The [/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]Gypsymoth[/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]’s exterior sensors, calibrated across dozens of first contact missions, were useless with the ship disabled. But the ramp was down and there’d been no rushing wind of equalizing pressure. Composition and pressure matched his body’s needs, despite the lack of serious reentry fire. He could smell the world, and it smelled like plants. [/SIZE]

 

[Jorus Merrill]

[SIZE=14.6667px]***[/SIZE]​

[SIZE=14.6667px]The fibercord tip bonded easily to a boulder at the edge of the central pit. He took a final look around the crater, tossed a wave to the empty [/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]Gypsymoth[/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px], and stepped off the edge. The cord and boulder took his weight well enough. His ears rang, a sharp, sparkling sound, and the scent of greenery intensified. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Mottled, overlapping shadows had painted the surface; the tendrils and the system primary provided light, but the sky had been dark otherwise. Another sign of a thin atmosphere, though ground-level pressure remained normal. But inside, intense light diffused from everywhere and nowhere. He found himself in a cloudy cavern whose walls he couldn’t see. Beneath him was the top of a pillar, covered in larger-than-life plants. As his feet hit the rock, though, he looked around the cavern and realized that what he’d taken for protrusions were little floating gardens. Rocks bobbing in the air, either from repulsorlifts or the Force itself. At a guess, he was on one such right now. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]His bag held one of those Silk utility belts, the hard-light kind. He buckled that on and summoned a hard-light walkway to a large floating island nearby. A Padawan, or at least a Knight, could have jumped it easily, but Jorus had no such skills. He walked the hard-light bridge, whose end terminated a good ten feet above the larger floating garden, then hung off the edge and dropped the rest of the way. He touched the controls and the hard-light bridge dissipated. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Welcome, Captain Merrill. You are early.”[/SIZE]

 

[Jorus Merrill]

[SIZE=14.6667px]There were five of them, androgynous-leaning-toward-female. Corporeal, but hovering a couple of handspans above the ground. One moved for a better view of him, bobbing in air, and a two-toed foot brushed the ground. Grass sprang up at the casual contact, and nothing about it gave the impression of a display of power. Just a natural side effect.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]They wore black-and-tan robes of a slim cut, and they wore masks. Smooth, pale, stylized caricatures. Anger, Sadness, a flat slash for the mouth of what might be Serenity, an angled slash for Confusion, and the biggest happy face he’d ever seen. Serenity took prime position, but each moved in and out independently, examining him.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Half a dozen hints in the oldest holocrons fell into place, alongside the brief contact his daughter had made with the spirit of an ancient Oswaft. The starfaring being had given her a message for him, from- “The Five.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Good, he can count,” said Anger. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“The Priestesses of the Force. The balance -- not dichotomous, not even a multi-axis even number-”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“He is too bound up in his own intelligence,” said Confusion. “He will face such troubles.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“And have before and will again. You’re the Five. You teach elite souls how to retain identity at death.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Not elite,” said Anger.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“The gift of progression,” said Joy.[/SIZE]

 

[Jorus Merrill]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Jorus looked to Serenity. If they stood, they’d still be a bit taller than him. As it was, they downright loomed, and they had little regard for personal space. “That [/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]is [/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]what you do, right?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“In essence, yes. We watch, and wait, and test.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Well, I don’t mind a test or two -- looking inside myself and all that, I’d wager, and there’s nothing wrong with some good self-examination. But let me head you off at the pass. I’m not interested in immortality, thanks but no thanks.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Confusion stepped back. Sadness nodded. “Explain,” said Anger.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“You say you’ve watched. You can see across the galaxy, frequently? You know who I am and what I’ve done, what my life is like?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Most thrilling,” said Joy.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“My family. Maybe Mara will grow up to face a choice like this. That’s her purview, and she’s a Master herself or near enough -- up here, where it counts.” He tapped his temple. “My kid. How about that. But my [/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]wife[/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px], my wife Alna, she’s not Force-sensitive. She couldn’t learn this.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“No,” said Sadness. “She could not.”[/SIZE]

 

[Jorus Merrill]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Serenity gestured to the golden-light ribbons that twined through the air. “When she dies, she will become one with the Force. All that is the living Force comes to this place and is returned to the cosmic Force.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“I’m not sure you’re using the term ‘living Force’ in the same sense as a Jedi would.’[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“The Jedi are fools,” said Anger.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“No argument there,” said Jorus, patting the sabre at his belt in self-conscious acknowledgement that both categories included him. “So you’re saying that the life energies of everything that dies come here and are recycled into the cosmic Force, to be re-integrated into new-born life like sun into plants or nutrients into a fetus? And the Force that mortals use is just our touch on that two-way current -- the life energy coming here, and the energy going out through the cosmos? Accurate?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Um,” said Confusion.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“I was looking forward to explaining it,” said Sadness.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“That is accurate,” said Serenity, “in broadest terms, while still bearing no relationship to deeper levels of truth. But it suffices as a summary, for your purposes.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“So my question is, when my wife and I return to the Force -- luminous beings, not this crude matter -- we become part of the Force, to be commanded but also to influence? The will of the Force being a composite of the will of life, maybe localized, maybe universal? Less self-aware, but more collectively aware?”[/SIZE]

 

[Jorus Merrill]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Very good!” said Joy.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“A rough approximation,” said Anger. “With exceptions.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Confusion nodded. “And so many variations.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“All my life I’ve felt like I should be part of something bigger than I am. Maybe it’s not ennui. Maybe it’s memory.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Memory is a biological concept,” said Anger.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“But also a spiritual one,” said Jorus. “Just ask any Kiffar. Or Aing-Tii, for that matter.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Serenity nodded once. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Sadness moved forward. “So you wish to take the trials…[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Confusion joined her. “...without learning from us?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“I’ve known immortals. They were all dicks. I’m already enough of a dick without being immortal. That said, I’ve cleared my schedule, and I wouldn’t mind just...talking with you, all of you. I’m curious. I’ve got my guesswork and I’ve plumbed the depths of the mortal guesswork in the holocrons -- all the holocrons. Give me some truth from the source, not just watered down through millennia of opinion and bad memory. I don’t want anything from you except to talk. Power just doesn’t interest me. I’ve had it and given it away, and I’d do it again.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]***[/SIZE]​

 

[Jorus Merrill]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Between one blink and the next, they were standing in a structure or cavern shaped like an inverted teacup. Gold lines marked the black stone all around. Some process or person had readied a meal of strange local fruits. Jorus took it on faith that beings who could use Farsight on the greatest Masters across the galaxy without notice -- or teleport their guests, for that matter -- wouldn’t poison him by accident. He sat on a small woven mat and ate the fruit from the bowl with a simple spoon. The Five settled down in kneeling meditative postures, making him part of a circle around the room. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Black and gold everywhere,” he said, apropos of nothing. The fruit was tart, mildly sweet, juicy and cool. It was also brilliant pink inside its dusty green rind. “Your robes, this room, and the view from the surface. I’m assuming the view came first.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Joy laughed at the dry joke. “Yes, our robes and our home were made to honour the patterns of the Force around this world. Gold for the Force’s currents; black for the material universe, the emptiness of space.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“A reminder, maybe,” said Jorus, spoon halfway to his mouth, “that the Force is everywhere? Woven through everything, at a deep level? You can feel the Force strongly in a jungle, but I’ve never heard of a Jedi having trouble with a Force-push in deep space, and most of my Force use is as far away from a planet as I can manage.”[/SIZE]

 

[Jorus Merrill]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“The Force is indeed in everything,” said Serenity. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“So space, subspace, otherspace, hyperspace, sub-hyperspace, shadow energy, quintessence, and other forms of dark energy -- all are framed and upheld by the Force?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“In a sense, yes,” said Serenity.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Once more, a mortal approximation of limited value.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Jorus shrugged in Anger’s direction and swallowed another spoonful of fruit. “Thank you for this, by the way. It’s delicious. Even limited value is an improvement. Consider this: ninety-nine point nine percent of Jedi never think past normal space. Very few ever touch the higher bands of instinctive astrogation, which affect hyperspace. So far as the pre-Dark Age records show, I’m the only Jedi to ever think of developing the Force in the direction of subspace or any of the others. It’s possible that kyber crystals, quintessence, and Snoke-”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Anger hissed.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Have you attempted any of these?” said Confusion.[/SIZE]
[SIZE=14.6667px]“Sure. Doesn’t work for me any more than lifting rocks does. But it could work for [/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]some[/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]one, and there’s value in that.” [/SIZE]

 

[Jorus Merrill]

[SIZE=14.6667px]He poked at the fruit. “Another question, if you don’t mind.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Of course not!” said Joy. “This is most entertaining.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“You teach individuals to transcend death by retaining their identity, by manifesting themselves here and not in the netherworld of the Force. Can I assume you teach this to Darksiders, if they’re led here?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Why would you assume that?” said Serenity.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Confusion is the shadow of doubt and fear, and anger isn’t normally associated with Lightsiders. No offense.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Confusion came up close, then, mask right in his face. “Confusion is a [/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]question[/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px], and a question brings enlightenment. Doubt and fear are are not exclusive to the Dark Side. Or is it of the Dark to fear falling to the Dark?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Jorus took another spoonful of fruit as she backed away. “That depends on what your fear of sin makes you do. Ever heard of a cilice?” [/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Joy chuckled. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“And yet,” said Serenity evenly, as ever, “Confusion’s point is significant. Her aspect is not innately of the Light or the Dark Side. Neither is Anger’s. Neither is mine, nor Joy’s, nor Sadness’s. We are life, Captain Merrill. Light and Dark are both influenced by us. A Jedi can be confused and turn that confusion to enlightenment, can be angry and turn that indignation into necessary and measured action, can be sad and turn that sadness into a greater care for what remains. One can be serene while committing atrocities, or joyful while taking revenge. We are not dichotomous; our number is not even for a reason.”[/SIZE]

 

[Jorus Merrill]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“That makes sense to me.” He set the empty bowl aside. “I’ve seen serene vendettas and calm murders. Matsu Ike on Metalorn-”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Matsu is so [/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]curious![/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]” That was Joy. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Jorus blinked. “You know [/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]her[/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“She came here,” said Serenity. “And spoke with us, and faced our tests.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Matsu Ike is a war criminal. The Jedi Council severed her from the Force.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“And yet, like you,” said Serenity, “she serves the Silver Sanctum Coalition. Like you, she has devoted her life to exploration and inquisition. Like you, she has made poor judgments and difficult decisions that cost the lives of thousands. After she was severed, she regained her connection, and eventually her status as a Jedi Master.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Is your anger useful?” snapped Anger.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“In the sense that it motivates me to ask questions? Absolutely. What is your opinion on the concept of worthiness? How do you decide who is worthy of learning from you?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“We could not agree on how to judge,” said Confusion. “That is why we made the tests, which adapt themselves to the tested one. Know this, Captain Merrill. It is good to ask questions, but the great students learn more by being asked.” [/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“The Sokrat’ic method.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“[/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]My [/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]method. Let us see if you can find the answers for yourself, you who were so quick to call yourself a fool before. You may have plumbed the depths of mortal supposition, but do you know what you know?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]***[/SIZE]​

 

[Jorus Merrill]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Another blink, and he found himself outside, in the cavern of floating islands, surrounded by bright but diffuse light. Only Confusion stood before him. She turned and bobbed away buoyantly, grass springing up where her two-toed feet brushed the ground. He followed Confusion through ferns the size of Herglics.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Tell me, Captain Merrill,” she said over her shoulder, “why it offends you that we have taught who we have taught. Not just Master Ike, but others. We taught Ashin Varanin once.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]He stopped, lost for words, and Confusion turned to face him. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“You see?” she said. “Offense.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Varanin’s as much a war criminal as Ike. More.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“And yet they both sought redemption.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Jorus snorted. “Ike was dragged to it kicking and screaming. The precogs say she almost took a swing at the combined Jedi Council. Varanin sought it out and then rejected it when the going got tough. She’s out there right now, as Dark as she ever was.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“There is, perhaps, more to both stories than you know.” Confusion turned and kept walking. “Do you have an answer for me?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Because, if anything from the modern era is worth passing on to influence the next generation, via the greatest ability of the Jedi, it sure as feth isn’t them.”[/SIZE]

 

[Jorus Merrill]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“You feel superior to them?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“I haven’t led conquering hordes or butchered civilians. I’d say I’ve got at least some claim to the high ground.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Leaving that aside, though I urge you to reexamine it -- have you not done a great deal to pass on influence to the next generations? Through holocrons and instruction and so forth?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“You know I’ve tried.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Successfully?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“I can’t see the future unless there’s mass shadows involved.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Confusion sat with him on the edge of the forested, floating island. A mass of clouds stretched out above and below them. “Captain Merrill, who do you think will have the greater influence on the coming generation? Matsu Ike and Ashin Varanin, based solely on what they may choose to say and do after their deaths? Or the material legacy left behind by any given archivist or teacher -- you, Phylis Alince, Kiskla Grayson, Thurion Heavenshield?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“The latter, I suppose.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“One spirit’s whispers are a raindrop trying to raise the sea?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“A bastardized reversal of the original quote, but yeah. Ghosts touch individual lives, rarely. Teachers and holocrons touch many.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Confusion turned from the vista to stare him in the face. “Then why, Captain Merrill, does it matter so much to you that one morally compromised soul may carry on past death? I believe the failure of the utilitarian argument turns against you, for it reveals that your feelings can only have one recursive foundation. You are offended...because you are offended. And that is not the path of wisdom.” [/SIZE]

 

[Jorus Merrill]

[SIZE=14.6667px]She looked back at the clouds. “Think of Serenity’s words, of the relationship between anger and action. What action do you choose to take? To dwell on indignation? To become rude? To condescend, to judge? What, in your opinion, is the most sensible and ethical thing to do, now that you know what you know?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Are you looking for one specific answer, or will you accept anything valid?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“I’d be pleased by one specific answer. I’d be pleased by anything of worth. But I am not grading you, and this is not the Levantine Astronautical Academy. Your answers are only the foundation for further questions, both from me and from yourself. Now: what is the most sensible response?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“To knowing that you’ve shared transcendent knowledge with people I have a difficult time respecting? To knowing that after they die, they’ll teach their moral relativism and probably lead Jedi wrong?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Let us say we agree on that conception of things, for the sake of argument. What then?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“I suppose...doing more. Influencing more Jedi.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“It speaks well of you that your reasoned instinct is to teach. Just as clearly as it speaks unwell of you that your first unreasoned instinct is to judge. Would you dispute that?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“I wouldn’t. I can’t. The way I treated Circe Savan when she was young -- the way I’ve treated Corvus Raaf-”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“What about your relationship with Savan do you regret?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Relationship’s a strong word.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Her impassive mask gave the distinct impression of raising an eyebrow. He had, after all, just proved her point.[/SIZE]

 

[Jorus Merrill]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“This was...a long time ago. The early days of Silk. I wasn’t even a Jedi then, just a Warden of the Sky working for the Omega Defense Force. Subach-Innes was successful back then. I struck a deal with Savan: she’d give me space stations to help build the Mara Corridor, and I would teach her something of the Force. I didn’t know much, just fighting. But she…” He shook his head. “She always rode the boundary between exploited and exploiter. She wasn’t healthy in the head, but all I saw -- all I chose to see -- was an oversexed, avaricious, worthless, dissolute fool. And I treated her that way, and it ended up costing a good many lives. I...humiliated her. She earned it, every time, but even so. Even so…”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Confusion nodded. “And what of Grandmaster Raaf?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Grandmaster Grayson was the one who brought me into the Jedi fold. She and I, the work we put into trying to bring the Jedi back together -- and then she was gone, and there was this kid trying to fill her shoes. And you think I can judge, you should have seen Raaf in the early days. I don’t know of anyone who did more to alienate and divide Jedi, except maybe Halcyon. She smartened up, though, Raaf did, even if it took her a while. But I didn’t see that. All I saw was the kid who insisted that all the holocrons, everything, was the rightful property of her little faction of Jedi. The kid who demanded that the Jedi academies never promote anyone who answered to the Republic. The kid who literally had mouthbreathers camped out on the Library Card lines eavesdropping on everything and figuring out who was-”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Captain Merrill?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Yes?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“I believe the subject came up in the context of regret.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Sure. I regret that I feel this strongly about it, still. Even though I [/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]do [/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]regret what I did.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Which was?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“They’d left the holocrons I’d saved sitting there in the system I’d built, but they weren’t using it like I’d intended. So I sent a message. Eyal M’ti and I took the most important holocrons out of the system and gave them to the custody of Jacen Voidstalker. Raaf flipped out, from what I hear. I’m pretty sure I’m still considered a thief and a traitor in her little coterie.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Are you?”[/SIZE]

 

[Jorus Merrill]

[SIZE=14.6667px]That rocked him back on his heels, or would have it he hadn’t been sitting on the edge of a cliff. “Traitor, no. I’m loyal to the Jedi Order as a whole, not what they call the Jedi Order. Claiming a name doesn’t make it so -- just look at what calls itself the Republic. But thief...yeah, I’m a thief. I enjoy it. I enjoy showing people up, and I know I shouldn’t. And I didn’t need to handle the holocron situation the way I did, and I’d do it differently-”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Captain,” said Confusion firmly, “how many times have you just said [/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]I?[/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]He opened his mouth, then closed it. “Pride, you’re saying.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“I’m sure it began as a desire to prove your worth after a disreputable past and a late start in the Jedi. But do you feel it’s become an obstacle?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Hubris? I built a super-hyperlane and one of the galaxy’s largest corporations and stamped my name all over’em.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Yes, nearly a decade ago in mortal standard years, before you became a Jedi. But how should you measure yourself [/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]now?[/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]He sucked his teeth and spat a seed off the edge. “You’re saying I’m cutting myself too much slack because I’m better than I used to be.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Yes, but would the man you used to be have seen himself as morally and intellectually superior to the Jedi Grandmaster?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“...point taken.”[/SIZE]

 

[Jorus Merrill]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“I wonder, too,” said Confusion, scrutinizing him again, “if you would have had such a strong reaction to Grandmaster Raaf if she was a young man or a middle-aged woman.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]He recoiled, more mentally than physically. “I’m not a sec-” He let out a slow breath. “So I look at her and see my daughter’s friends. Or my little sister.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Your daughter is a Master of the Force, as such things are reckoned, is she not? And did not your sister do great things? Terrible, yes -- but great? And largely for your approval, I think, the both of them?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Jorus grimaced. “I’d wondered that.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“You have been the centre of so many lives, Captain Merrill. Did you become used to being seen that way? Is that, perhaps, the root of your aversion to Grandmaster Raaf -- and Master Alince, for that matter? That they look at you, and all you have accomplished, and simply...do not care?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“...feth.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Delicately, awkwardly, Confusion patted him on the knee and stood. She bobbed away as if walking on a 0.2g moon. “Yes, we watch others just this closely. No, I am not reading your mind. You are not unique in coming here; those who come here simply do not talk about the experience after they leave.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“I can see why.”[/SIZE]

 

[Jorus Merrill]

[SIZE=14.6667px]***[/SIZE]​

[SIZE=14.6667px]Confusion watched him cross from floating island to floating island via awkwardly deployed hard-light bridges and stairs. After three or four such transitions, Jorus found himself transports in a split instant to the place where they’d been bound: a large, dark island, a floating chunk of overgrown rock the size of a cruiser. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Your weapon,” said Confusion at what was clearly the door. She held out one long, gray-skinned hand with too many fingers. “You will not need it.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]He eyed the aperture. His gut said to go in there, but it also said he’d run into trouble. “All right,” he said, unclipping his lightsabre. As Confusion’s grip closed around it, though, something moved inside, and an ugly chuckle prickled the hair on the back of his neck.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“And the other one,” said Confusion.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Oh...right. Sorry.” Jorus crouched and pulled his old BRKR-12 Taserblade out of his boot. Confusion placed both weapons beside the door and, without a word, vanished. Perhaps she could only go a certain length of time without being enigmatic. The thought gave him a grin as he stepped into the shadow of the arching structure. Ribs made of trees or stone, overgrown with vines -- he couldn’t pick out details. Something moved in there, he heard the chuckle again, and he dialed his cybernetic eyes to infrared. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Nothing.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Well, feth,” he said, and then someone hit him like an octuple barbette HLRHVG with anger issues.[/SIZE]

 

[Jorus Merrill]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Wakey wakey, Jor.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Consciousness surged back. He tried to scramble to his feet; no luck with the feet, or with the scrambling. Vines bound him hand and foot. Shadow obscured the detail of what lay around him, and the figure crouching by his feet. Red eyes, a gleam of bared teeth. Some other visitor, maybe? Some Varanin or Ike who’d failed a test and been stuck here? Getting free in moments wasn’t an option, and the dark figure held Jorus’ lightsabre, unlit. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Do I know you?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“You wish.” The figure sank on its haunches, crouching lower. “Now, you’re gonna leave.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“What’s so important about this place?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Not much. I just don’t trust you.” The figure tossed the sabre aside; it rattled into murky shadow. Jorus stretched out to the Force -- this place was a hundred times the nexus of Ahch-To -- but nothing happened. [/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“What do you want?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“I want to know that everything I’ve built wasn’t for nothing. I want respect for what I’ve done. I want sanctimonious karks like you to leave me the feth alone.” The figure leaned into a shaft of light. The face fit the voice. Red eyes or not. “Enough said?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Tell the Five this is really ham-handed,” said Jorus to Jorus.[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]His shadow self was already walking away. “You set this up, Jor, not them. Take it up with you if you’ve got a problem.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]***[/SIZE]​

[SIZE=14.6667px]“Did I pass or fail?”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“You don’t want to learn, so it doesn’t matter. What matters is did you [/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]learn?[/SIZE][SIZE=14.6667px]”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]“I think so, but I don’t know if it’ll stick.”[/SIZE]

[SIZE=14.6667px]Confusion shrugged. “Then ask yourself those questions once a day, and we shall see, shall we not?”[/SIZE]