Second Chances (Zain Kalan)

In Character Character Biographies
#161

Things with Damien have taken a turn south.

I could really use some advice from The Captain.


I… got really upset when I thought the Order was gonna forbid me and Ira from being friends anymore and did some really stupid stuff.

Seela and Tara were a bit horrified that my extreme strict interpretation of their Jedi no attachments rule was it meant: No caring about anyone other than yourself ever.
They explained that first off: I’m a nonJedi so that doesn’t apply to me and secondly, that if Jedis weren’t allowed to care about people at all then they’d fail at being able to protect the galaxy, do peacekeeping, diplomacy and so on.

I had been led to believe that from perhaps well meaning but extremely misguided repetitive lectures and scoldings about it by several neophytes who probably we had concluded have no business pretending at being knowledgeable about Jedi ways.

#167

The reason why I came back to Viscara is to face my fears and deal with the messes I had left behind… people I had hurt need to be reconciled too.

There’s nothing really positive for me here or anywhere.
We broke up and she’s gonna go on with being a Jedi Knight.
I shouldn’t resent it but it does make me sad kinda.
I wonder if anybody will ever… like me? … maybe? Maybe not… probably? Probably not? Who knows, who cares.
It’s not like… and those guys aren’t… ugh, this is stupid.
I might as well try to patch things up with my brother possibly… and help dad get started on his new business.

There was a time when I felt like life had infinite potential and possibility.
Now I just feel like everybody else’s does and I am stuck with not much of anything. All that hard work on everything is for nothing.

I’ll keep buying back our old stock from the scavengers and impound lot.
It was so much effort I put in.

Ugh… among them a gross of carefully and lovingly machined training foil emitters. I slavishly worked at that with the hope and dream of becoming a Jedi but they really, really didn’t want me.
The Sith didn’t either.
I’m not “special enough” to be the type of candidate anybody will ever want is what I got told basically.
That stung. So did losing her… I mean… we can still be friends so I guess that’s alright but there’s nothing really to look forward to and it’s like I don’t know anybody all over again.

Dad is permanently exiled from the Ascendancy too and I feel like there’s no real point in much of anything. No real point in working hard at crafting… no real point at putting the effort in to be a master crafter anymore either.

I’m going to keep going with learning Ugnaught. I’m close to mastery over most alien languages now. Maybe somebody will need an interpreter some day. I don’t know.

It feels pretty empty though.
Maybe not everybody gets to be special or have that destiny they desire in this galaxy. Hmm.

#168

=I hereby give my father Vrarc’Adush’Lasheqo permission to review and comment on these new entries in my journal log.=
On the subject of Heartbreak:
I really genuinely loved Iradtoki. I guess that’s probably why we agreed to stay friends even though a romantic relationship didn’t pan out. I’m going to miss our cuddles. Just… gotta be strong man. She wouldn’t want you to be bawling about it like some loser, right?

Maybe somebody else might like me like that the way she did some day? Doubtful… for now, I just need to get back into a working routine. Right now I’m homeless, friendless, my brother still hates me and dad and I are camping in the streets, surviving off what we can scrounge as we save up to buy back what little remains of what we had from the very scavengers and parasitic entities who took it from us in the first place.

That is humiliating.

Update: Okay, not homeless anymore. We got a basic building set up so now we have shelter… and when the tower is fueled we will have power for a couple utilities. Those four months together on Corellia where we got to play at being normal people and nobody would bat an eye that she was a Jedi and I wasn’t… because Corellian Green Jedis are allowed to have families and relationship attachment unlike the orthodox ones… were very blissful but like people say… ignorance is bliss. It wasn’t… real and it couldn’t last. No use wishing we could go back bud. You just have to rebuild and let go of what once was but never will be. Sigh.

I don’t get to be a Jedi. I don’t get the girl. I don’t have that awesome life I built for myself on that world and in that system on expertise as a gunsmith… and the weird thing is… this little voice in the back of my head keeps saying it is going to be okay and things can really only start to get better from here.

I want to say though that even though it couldn’t last… that what we had did feel quite real at the time and… I’m not gonna just be able to get over it like nothing happened. She was sweet and nice and kind and all the things that make a good partner… it wasn’t what she wanted though and I respect her choice at the end of the day. It’s better to leave that as friends than trying to force something that isn’t working to work. That’s what I keep telling myself anyway.

Now I just… need to figure out what in the hells to do with myself and if I can be of any use to anyone on this dumb mid-rim rock full of fringer settlers and corporate greed… a frontier where everything is much more outer rim in attitude.

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#169

=Broken=
The challenge now will be in finding something, anything to be able to be happy about now that it feels like pretty much everything has been ripped away. At least dad is still around and doesn’t hate my guts.

I can get why Damien does. I ran away for four or five months. I really wish things could be different than they were and I could forget some of the weird biological warfare experiments and stuff that happened… the atrocities of the war… but I can’t. I wish I could cuddle somebody at night and forget or drown my sorrows in a bottle to forget but that’s only temporary relief from the trauma.

What I’ve gotta do though is clean myself up and stop feeling sorry for myself. I don’t like living that way, so let’s try a thought exercise.

There’s gotta be something to be happy about here. There has to be. Maybe something as simple as being able to repair my gear or do maintenance on my cybernetic parts. That we can have a profession again and maybe someday I could fly a ship again? That’s thinking more positive.
There’s no lying that what happened to us doesn’t suck in a big way but… You’ve gotta keep hoping things will get better. Even if it doesn’t feel that way like they will.

Can you say you had to dig your way out of meters of broken duracrete… buried alive under your home and place of business to a crowd’s jeers? Yeah, [I] withstood that. It broke me inside though and there was a moment of respite in that relationship I had even if it couldn’t last.
I just wish I could find something to do here. My life is a mess. Maybe someday I will pilot again. Exploring the stars always held promise and that promise was freedom from being so damned confined and restrained in my choices.

I hate feeling trapped and like there is no possibility and nothing to be able to look forward to. The opportunities that you build yourself can and will be torn down by an an apathetic galaxy that rationalizes it saying you couldn’t truly deserve or have earned what you worked towards but hey, fighting against entropy might be the good fight and even when you lose it puts out a helluva bang. Heh.

It’s just… sometimes you get tired of the amount of effort that goes into having to continually rebuild. Kinda like you can’t go forward and can only tread water sideways. It does teach you how to be a good swimmer though.

Conclusion? If nothing matters… then nothing mattering also doesn’t matter… which means some things do matter and it is okay to care about them. Aha!

#170

I still have feelings toward Ira but she wants to be a Jedi Knight and they are forbidden from romantic relationships because that very much is a form of attachment that goes against achieving or obtaining enlightenment, basically.

Dad and I are still working at getting the new shop up and running.
Things are slow. I have to keep telling myself they will eventually get better. They have to.

#171

Lonely.
Still waiting for things to get better.
I wonder how Ira is doing and what my brother is up to.
Screw the Jedis and the Sith.
They each think they are the greatest thing to happen to the galaxy and that the other side is the ultimate evil with them the good one in a one-dimensional view of morality. Neither side seems to truly care about the rest of us, only themselves.

Sorry dad. I miss her. I’m trying to get over it and probably can’t.
I know. There’s more work orders to take care of. Hopefully business picks up soon.
I wonder if she ever thinks about me at night… probably not. Well maybe not. I don’t know. I doubt it.

Maybe some other girl might like me someday? Doubtful. Maybe she’ll even be a funny twi’lek. Is that my type? Sheesh.
Well no, I’ve been with other girls too. Echani, Zabrak… haven’t been with a Chiss yet. Maybe love could find me when I stop looking for it?
I don’t know and it’s a big galaxy but honestly most of the time things feel like a big whole lot of nothing for me and everything always for everybody else.
Zain went back to cobbling shoes, replacing bad motivators and taking work orders for various custom tailoring, armorsmithing and tinkering from various people and beings around the colony, somewhat sadly.
Adventure? Feh!