Almost every morning, the citizens of Veles may observe a dark red robed Togruta on the roof of the local hotel. This Togruta engages in various katas, cuts, and strikes, as well as shadow-fighting, using both a wooden sword and martial arts. Her movements are fluid. The shadow sparring often includes various acrobatics, such as circular kicks with a jump or rolls forward across the ground to quickly cover greater distances, followed by upward slashes of her sword as she stands up and transitions to the next part of a combination. She concludes her morning routine with meditation at the edge of the hotel’s wall.
The young Togruta yet seasoned Temple Initiate often meditates under one of the trees, sitting back-to-back with it as if she has formed a bond with the tree itself. Recently, memories of her past have taken her on vivid journeys. In her recollections, she finds herself seated in a small spaceship, approaching a planet from afar, adhering to Jedi protocols. Behind her, a figure watches silently. She is aware that he is there to assess her performance on this mission, her third test as an initiate. Despite the close bond they share, she understands that she is ultimately on her own in this endeavor. He will not intervene unless the situation deteriorates beyond what they could have imagined. “What could possibly go so wrong?” she wonders, feeling the confidence of her younger self from many years ago.
Opening her eyes in the present moment, her eyes moistened, yet she maintains a neutral and composed expression.
“So much,” a thought passes through her silent mind, addressing her young self.
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In the evening, after several exercises, she returns to the tree, meditating once again. Memories from the past form in her mind, again placing her on the planet of her third test.
Frustrated and irritated, she exits a building in a bustling city during the late evening hours, amidst the lights of a metropolitan city. “This all has no point,” she thinks. “They are not interested in talking with each other, nor in talking with me. They hate the others so much, and anyone who is not like them. Has it really come down to the color of skin and the shape of noses?” She feels overwhelmed by the enormity of the challenge. “I cannot succeed here! I cannot! Why are they sending me into a situation with no chance of winning?”
She sighs deeply.
Then, the memory from the past catches up to the frustrated teenage Togruta: “There exists a challenge, known among the wise as the Trial of Unwinnable Choices. It is a test not of skill with the Force, nor of prowess in combat, but of one’s spirit, leadership, and resolve when faced with the harshest reality: certain defeat,” said by one of her wise masters to the students, Kodasi Maruu, who liked to put students in such situations at least once during their time at the temple, when they were least expecting it.
“What am I to do now? If they continue all this in all parts of their lives, one day they will eventually…” her thoughts stop as the night turns into day. “It’s too early…”
She turns around, looking towards the source of the light — a huge mushroom cloud emerging from behind the horizon and extending towards higher parts of the atmosphere amid the light. “No… no… no… this cannot be true.” Her purple eyes grow larger as they reflect the scene, bright light, and a shockwave emerging from horizon and disturbing the atmosphere.
Suddenly, a pull by the hand yanks her out of the shock. “Move! Now! We have to seek shelter!”
…
Vivid quick snapshots of “Death. Despair. Sorrow. Horror. Devastation. Fear.” of billions over a period of several days follow in her inner eye. The death of a young spacefaring civilisation.
Finally collapsing in the rubles and ashes of what once was a city.
Eyes closing. Slowly. Fading.
Darkness.
“War.”
“Hell.”
Silence.
Emptiness.
Floating.
…
Then a warm light extends before her and embraces her.
The teenage Togruta opens her eyes, lying in a medical bay on Coruscant, with machines that were sustaining her life still standing nearby.
A young, seasoned Togruta opens her eyes, meditating under the tree.
Day 134
“Day one hundred and thirty-four… Day one hundred and thirty-four,” speaks a youthful, still childlike appearing Togruta into her portable computer. Her face and lekku show burns, not from conventional fire, but from exposure to radioactive radiation. A dirty bandage on her arm covers another wound from a projectile weapon. She kneels before a campfire. It is night, or at least it should be, yet the radioactive fires that still flare up in the atmosphere are particularly intense tonight. If she did not know their source, she might mistake them for a beautiful natural spectacle. “We are only a few days away from Zeva-Antra base. So far, no sign of Warlord Andron’s troops since we had to bring down one of their scout helicopters a few days ago. And we all need this break.” The young Togruta looks around at the sleeping people. Among them, nearly three dozen men and women, adults as well as children, but no elderly. They decided to stay behind in the bunker where she had met many of them on day one, they stayed behind as not to hold back the younger ones, knowing that sealed their fate. They all wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for the Knight who protected them from the radiation in the early days and created a path out of the city center through the radioactivity. But all at a great cost. His life. Since then, she has been leading the survivors to safety, or rather, through the dangers. Along the way, she met more locals who joined them. She continues her diary entry as she stands up and walks up a hill. “I don’t know how much longer I can keep this up. They look at me, they see an alien with advanced technology. Especially the Knight’s lightsaber that I carry seems to have a great attraction to them. Only Manled and a few others close to me know how exhausted I am, and how weak I feel. I am just a alien kid. It’s all too much for me. It’s not heroism or extraordinary strength that drives me… it’s just the will to survive. Mine and theirs. And the memory of the Knight who saved us. It can’t be in vain.” The Togruta looks around and takes her binoculars in hand. “We are now deep in the mountains. This should slow down the Warlord a bit; they won’t be able to move their heavy transports as effectively. But they know we are also on the way. It’s a race. A race for perhaps the last intact hyperspace-capable prototype housed in the research facility.” The young girl peers through her binoculars between the mountain valleys. A flicker of light in the night vision device catches her attention. She zooms in further. A truck. Behind it, a light tank. Followed by more vehicles and soldiers on the ground. She runs back to the camp, the recording device still active.
“Wake up! Everyone! We need to move on!”
One of the local near-humans approaches her excitedly. “What’s happening?” he asks.
“They are close. It will now be a tight race between them and us.”
The young Togruta deactivates the recording device as she packs it along with the binoculars into her worn and dirty backpack.
Day 137
The green light of a lightsaber illuminates a corridor of a military base with emergency lighting as someone cuts through the metal door from the other side. A kick brings the door down, followed by the loud crash of metal, and the dark blue skinned fourteen-year-old Togruta appears first through the hole in the door, after a brief look around she calls out: “Let’s go! We have at most one day until they arrive! By then we need to find the command center and the ship and get it ready to launch!” The other refugees come through the hole one by one into the center of the research facility, deep in the caves of a mountain. It’s a base made of concrete and steel. It reflects the early technological state of the young civilization on this planet. Or rather, what’s left of it after a war that lasted only a few days, could only last a few days, in the face of the destruction it brought. After an hour, they finally find the command center of the research facility. The two engineers in the group of refugees get to work. Another hour later, a large metal plate at one end of the large room begins to move upwards. “Done!” one of the engineers shouts. Behind the metal cover, a glass window appears, behind which a huge hall that would encompass several floors. At the other end of the gigantic hall, another gate of immense size opens. Two metal gates move aside. Behind them, the stars of the night appear. The hangar is on the slope of the mountain. A valley directly in front with more high mountains around. “WOHOOO!!!” the group shouts joyfully and triumphantly as they walk towards the window and look down into the hall: The small research ship, it’s there, and intact. Another access now open into the hall. It’s dark in the hall, like the rest of the base, only the emergency lighting is active. The group makes their way.
“Alright everyone. You know the plan. Everyone except the tech team boards the ship and stays there. The tech team, get the ship ready to launch. Use the plans we’ve found in the meantime. Manled, you and I will go through the ship’s controls. Let’s go!”
The group moves swiftly along the ramps and stairs in the hall. Most follow the young Togruta onto the ship. As she reaches the cockpit, she begins to study the systems of the primitive alien vessel.
“The core is fully functional. It will just take some time until it’s fully charged and the reserve tanks are full. It will be a long journey for this small ship.” The Togruta looks at Manled. “Do you still have the notes?”
“Yes, they’re all here.” He shows her a stack of papers and places them on one of the panels in the cockpit. On them, she drew the constellations of the galaxy as seen from different systems. In each constellation, one of the planets is marked.
“But luckily, we won’t need it. We have you and your technology.” He smiles at the Togruta and embraces her warmly. She returns the hug. “A lot can still happen in the next few hours, until we’re ready to launch. If necessary, start without me, follow the stars, find the Jedi. The recorded constellations will guide you.” She removes the backup storage from her portable computer. “And when you find them, give them this.”
The duo goes back to their activity, studying the ship systems together. Many of the refugees sleep as outside the hall two loud noises echo through the valley.
“Transport helicopters!” someone shouts who is running from the edge of the hall towards the ship.
The Togruta looks at the charging status of the ship core “80%, that has to be enough. Now or never!” She operates several display buttons and mechanical levers. A humming penetrates the interior of the ship as the engines activate. Meanwhile, two helicopters fly into the hall and land at the edge. The young Togruta runs to the exit platform of the ship and as she ensures that everyone is on board, she activates the closing mechanism. As the platform retracts and closes, she jumps outside.
Soldiers with heavy guns storm out of the helicopters and open fire on her. She runs fast and seeks cover between the containers in the hall. The soldiers initially move slowly in the open until a shot from a precision rifle pierces the head of one of the soldiers… and another. Both fall almost simultaneously to the ground. The soldiers then quickly take cover. Another shot penetrates the chest of one, bringing him to the ground as he ran. Moments later, the humming of a lightsaber and several screams echo in the hall. The green light illuminates an area briefly before it is deactivated again. Only the fall of several bodies and their weapons to the ground can be heard echo in the large hall. The soldiers aim their guns in that direction, several begin to blindly fire and then more. The green light turns on in another area of the hall and then off. More guns fall to the ground. Light panic spreads among the soldiers and a few move back into the open from their tight hiding spots… then… shots from the precision rifle and more bodies fall to the ground. Amidst the silence of fear and the sounds of silent death, the spaceship takes off. It moves slowly towards the exit of the hangar and flies over the helicopters on the ground.
One of the soldiers then runs back to cover towards the helicopter, on the other side, he readies a rocket launcher at the cliffs edge. The Togruta runs with all her might. Soldiers from all directions open fire on her. The darkness and her speed are now her only protection. She leaps forward with her legs and a kick sends the soldier with the rocket launcher over the edge into the abyss of the mountain. She lies down on the ground, blood from several wounds spreading on the floor. With her last strength, she sends the lightsaber she has been carrying since the death of the Jedi knight over the edge.
The soldiers gather around her. Their guns aimed at her. One of them steps closer and brutally pulls her up by her rear lekku. “Don’t think this is over. You’ve caused me so much trouble and now this. Death would be too good for you, little alien bastard!”
The 14-year-old stands wobbly on her legs. The pain almost numbing. She wants to scream, she wants to cry, but she can no longer… The butt of a gun hits her in the forehead and she loses consciousness.
Day 159
A young Togruta sits on a hill in a scorched, dead flat landscape. Before her, the sea where she watches the sunset. Her face, her eyes bear wounds from many blows. A knife wound stretches across her lips and right cheek. She pulls the worn portable computer from an old backpack and activates it. “Day one hundred fifty-nine. A lot has happened since the last entry…” She continues to recount the events since the encounter in the hangar.
Day 255, Star System: Ilum.
A primitive ship appears at the edge of the star system and continues its journey toward the center, toward the planet Ilum. As the splendor of the ice planet comes into view, a ship from the Exploration Corps approaches, aligning itself alongside the experimental spacecraft of the primitive species and the refugees within …
TO BE CONTINUED
Information noted to be part of her recorded journal may be available to higher-ranked Jedi who have access to her file.