‘I was led by my arm to the cil room all while the eemple seemed to have sunk into a judgemental silence around us. The sense of frustration and injustice I had to gh sining here boiling inside me. The hot bubbles of impotent rage slowly simmering to the surfay subscious.’

  ‘I was annoyed by the occasional stares and whispering that followed my dejected steps across the corridors. I tried my best to run away, and I failed. What is going to happen with a fugitive who tries to slip away? Surely nothing good.’

  ‘As I limped along, led by Kenobi, I kept up my stoic facade, but that was it, unfortunately. My ess was, but a carefully created act.’

  ‘From now on, I will be taken much more seriously by the jedi. There will be no leeways to use. I looked up at my substitute master. He looked pretty disappointed and angry... I... I hoped that they weren’t going to actually torture me... That would be...’

  ‘Fear settled in my stomach like a big cold stone as the dire thoughts tio haunt me. I unsciously squeezed tighter Obi’Wan’s hand that was grabbing my wrist since our little walk of shame began.’

  ‘Until now, I was holding back my powers. The reason for that retty obvious. I have never killed anyone before, nor did I hurt anyone seriously. I might have experie through my master’s memories, but I wasn’t as foolish as to assume it wouldn't affect me. Yet, if they actually tried to torture me... I... I would have to, at least die as a warrior... and not be tortured to death... I didn’t want to die yet, nor did I want to be tortured. I hated pain as much as the person. Don’t hold it against me.’

  ‘Then an even more dreadful weight settled on my shoulders... The thought of losing the memories was simply unbearable. I ’t let that happen to me... Those thoughts bounced around wildly in my head, uo find any type of reassurance.’

  ‘The remorse which I felt was real and powerful. It was eating me from the i. I was risking so much here… Why am I even in this damuation? Where did it g? The answer came immediately. That curse of a crazy droid is the reason for everything! If I ever find you, I will throw you into the va pits of Mustafar. You should pray that I never get away from here, because if I do, you are done for!’

  While Nizzal was distracted from her various injuries that tio ache through her body, ahoughts which were submerged in a personal revenge on that particurly ugly droid.

  The internal anger and desire for revenge caused an unfortunate side effect. Her light yellow eyes, whose yellowish color somewhat dimmed sihe time of her forced dark side presentation… Well, suffice it to say that they took upon a more ominous shade once again and began to radiate with an unusual iy of that baleful yellow hue.

  ~oOo~

  Unknown to Nizzal, Obi-Wan, being the Jedi Master who prides himself on his stant awareness, immediately realized this not-so-subtle ge. After all, he was his new padawan’s every move.

  ‘Luckily, she seemed to be quite distracted.’ — Obi’Wan o himself. He didn’t really expect that the girl would really follow him to the cil hall so easily. Especially not after su act of defiahat she showed towards the shadows… Still, maybe he couldn’t really fault the girl for that. He swallowed back a sh.

  ‘One of our shadows has irrevocably overstepped his boundaries. It is a shame… but at least the mistake didn’t result in dead bodies. The man will surely be expelled from the ranks of shadows, put baore mundaasks.’ — That fact, aside from his intuitiohe main reasons Kenobi didn’t raise his sword at the girl.

  ‘There was a lot of hesitan this child. She definitely had the capacity to maim or even kill the first shadow, but she choose not to.’ — Obi’Wan thought carefully.

  ‘She was about to be judged by the grandmaster, yet she seems to be more ied in fantasizing over something predictably gruesome, at least from the expression she is currently making.’ — Obi’Wan could only hope that the fore-mentioned gruesome fantasy didn’t include his person and the Jedi cil at rge.

  ‘Does her sect really teach both the use of the dark side and the light side?’ — The idea in itself seemed so unorthodox he couldn’t quite believe it, even with the living proof relutly trudging along by his side.

  He uedly felt the girl’s small hand anxiously closing around his wrist. Obi’Wan gnced in her dire inquisitively, only to realize with a small deal of surprise that the girl didn’t eveo realize her own a. She was lost in her own thoughts, notedly chewing on the side of her lips.

  ‘There were precious few jedi, who actually could use force lightning as a teique. It was rare among light side wielders to pull off the infamous ability. Because it required an uny level of trol over one’s emotions aside from a great deal of raw force power.’

  ‘In the current order, I wouldn’t be able to name a single jedi, who actually uses it in battle.’

  ‘Some, like Master Windu, could do it on the practice field, but he never used it in an actual duel or a battle sario, as far as I am aware of it. He deemed it too risky, something that could potentially disturb his focus, that could result in a careless mistake leading to an immature death.’

  ‘All in all, light siders were simply not fortable enough with the teique to even rely on it in low-risk enviros. Not even speaking of actual battles’

  ‘What a strange sect this must be. How did they even mao not turn to the dark side?’ — He looked at the girl beside him. She was looking like a Sith with all the stereotypical features. Then Obi’Wan realized something that he wasn’t really willing to, not until now. The answer redictably simple, if a bit hard to accept.

  ‘They don’t.’ — With that thought in mind, he couldn’t help but steel himself for what was ining. He just koo well that the cil would not see reason for this. That they would ertain the idea of someone so in lih the dark side and not being evil at the core. — ‘That would question all our beliefs, the very foundation of the teags of which our temples were built upon.’

  He g the girl once again. A foreboding sense of impending doom h in the surrounding air.

  ‘Such a small child holding so much mysteries as. We must have won the celestial lottery to catch her in such a ludicrous way… In an attempt to buy an antique ship of all possibilities… The fordeed works in mysterious ways.’ — Obi’Wan noted, while shaking his head, a sparkle of amusement sneaking into his dire thoughts.

  They finally reached the cil hall. There were only two masters present at the moment. One of them was Grandmaster Yoda, just as Kenobi expected, while the other was a bit of a surprise.

  “It is good to see you, Master Aay Secura. I must have missed the news of your arrival back to the temple. Never mind that. Allow me to wele you once again in our circles.” — He bowed lightly towards the blue twi’lek woman who was sitting in one of the empty seats.

  “It is a pleasure to see you too, Master Obi-Wan. I see that trouble once again has found you, but this time it is in an unusually strange form, if I may add.” — The womaed serenely, returning his polite bow while openly staring at the gray-skiwi’lek girl limping along Kenobi.

  As she took in her features, Aay’s expressions darkened with every passing sed. The girl was clearly tugged along against her will. She looked very dejected, and above all injured if the blue lines of retly leaked blood traces around the edges of her orifices were anything to go by.

  Naturally Master Secura wisely he telltale signs of heavy dark-side exposure screaming from the girl, most notably the bzing goldearing ominously right back at her.

  Yoda looked up from his light meditation as Obi-Wan and his newly assigned padawan marched into the room. He was eyeing them at this very sed, his wizened features thoughtful, scious of the importance of this predit.

  “Fear, distrust and fusion, I sense, surrounding both of you. What trouble has befallen you, Master Kenobi, I wonder?”

  Kenobi’s already strained expression seemed to worsen after hearing the Grandmaster’s words.

  “Did the other shadows perhaps fet to tell you what exactly has befallen on me?” — He asked, clearly annoyed by this oute.

  Yoda thought about this for a while, then he looked to Secura, who was simirly meditating until this ret interruption. Eventually, he decided to expin.

  “When we meditate, we close off the distras of the mundane world. Master Kenobi, five us, but we do not know what you are talking of.” — Yoda stated, with the ess and serenity worthy of his age and position.

  “Well, I guess that the honour shall be mio retell the story then.”

  Secura looked at Kenobi, and before he could start his obviously long-winded monologue, she decided to gently interrupt him.

  “Five my interruption, Obi-Wan, but I am not a member of the cil, as you are no doubt familiar with. I was merely here to meditate. If this is something that could only be heard by official cil members, then I shall take my leave.”

  “Ah, don’t fret, Aay. I guess you will probably hear about this soon, one way or the other... Might as well be ing from me then.” — Obi’Wan stated with a wry smile.

  “Go on then, if you please.” — Yoda, urged him. No doubt eager to get to the bottom of this.

  Obi-Wan nodded with finality, then began to retell the happenings until the moment he reached the cil room.

  ~oOo~

  “So, that was it.” — Kenobi finished his speech. It took quite a lot of time to retell this, especially with all the details.

  There was solemn silen the room. Yoda seemed as if he had aged ten years i fifteen minutes.

  Aay Secura was looki and right with a plicated expression, trying to judge if this whole facade was some kind of poor joke. Her worried look kept h over the obviously unfortable girl. Who was standing rigidly, slightly fidgeting from time to time. She was clearly unsure of what was going to happen to her .

  Aay decided to ask, uo watch the girl’s silent struggle any longer.

  “Are you tellihat this girl is equally trained in the use of the light side and the dark side at the level of a master? For real? When I was her age, I could barely hold a lightsaber properly...”

  “Well, yes.” — Answered Obi-Wan. — “But are you sure about the st part? I seem to remember quite differently...”

  “Hush, Obi’Wan, your fttery is wasted on me.” — Aay chided.

  Nizzal, could have sworn that she heard Obi-Wan murmuring under his breath, something along the lines of: fttery my ass, you always kicked me out of the dueling ring. Yet she didn’t have enough time to sider the possible meanings of that sentence, since Yoda chose that moment to speak up.

  “Hmmm... So a master you are, at least that is what you cim to be. Atop of that already questionable feet. You say that you have mao reach a mastery with both sides of the force? Something that was believed to be impossible, or near impossible?”

  For the first time since she came to this temple, Nizzal decided to drop every facade.

  She was already tired of this versation. She just wao get over the humiliation of having to be present at the retelling of the exact way she was thrown across a corridor with a plethora of random junk traveling along only to be knocked out by a heavy vase hitting her on the head mid air. Then crash into an annoyingly good looking cil member at the end.

  There was truly no more reason to lie. The loth-cat was already out of the bag. Of course, that doesn’t mean that she will tell them more than she must. Secrets were supposed to be closely guarded after all.

  She felt her heart throbbing ihroat as she began to talk. Her voice sounded annoyingly hesitant right now.

  ‘Am I really intimidated by them? It must be because of my childish body... Damn it!’ — She scolded herself wordlessly.

  “...Yes, that is correct…” — Was her eventual answer. She bit her lips, after realizing how stupid that sounded... She was a young girl… Stating that she has some knowledge about the dark side is pletely different than saying that she has a mastery over it. Nobody will believe her…” — That was what she expected, but to her surprise, a differeion occurred.

  “Hmm... Show us then. Your power. Master Nizzal.” — Came the infuriatingly calm rea from the grandmaster.

  “Wh-what!?” — Souhe disbelieving question from Nizzal and everyone else present in the room.

  “Master Yoda, five me for my interruption, but we shouldn’t let her...” — Obi’Wan began to persuade the grandmaster that it wouldn’t be a wise decision te the girl for further presentation after what happened in the corridors and the hall of fountains.

  He was soundly interrupted by the grandmaster's voice.

  “No, Master Kenobi, we must know if she is really what she states herself to be. Allow her to prove the true worth of her cims. We must.” — The grandmaster skillfully closed the discourse before it could truly begin.

  Nizzal, was taken aback by this. — ‘What would they achieve by seeing her powers? What does the grandmaster want to achieve by this?’ — Were her thoughts, but she had no ao those worries, and that was even more annoying.

  Kenobi bowed to the grandmaster, then stepped back from Nizzal, giving her space to do what she wished.

  Aay Secura also decided to stand up and walk to the other side of the room. She was the girl’s every move, just like Obi-Wan did.

  In the meantime, Nizzal forced her body to rex, while mustering up her ce to ask a question that was b her.

  “What would I achieve by proving my knowledge to you? I know my own abilities quite well. I don’t see a reason to advertise them.”

  “Hmm... Not eager to showcase your knowledge, you are... An excellent trait that is valuable for someone who pretends to be a master.” — Yoda added, snidely. Something that clearly irked the girl to no end.

  “I know what I am capable of.” — Nizzal stated, signs of frustration leaking into her childish voice. Then she blinked, realizing the grandmaster’s iions. A ing smirk reading across her face.

  “For a suffit price, however… I might be ined to make an exception with you.” — Yoda, smiled back at the girl, with all the patiend fake politeness in the gaxy. — “And pray tell, what would serve as a suffit price?”

  The girl snorted. As if her desire could be anything else in this unfortuuation. — “Let me go free, and I will show you my abilities. I promise that you will never hear of me again.”

  “Unfortunately, that I ot accept, but I will take it into sideration in my final judgement.” — Stated the grandmaster.

  “It’s unfortunate indeed… sin this case, I have no desire to showcase any of my abilities to you, either.” — Nizzal said stubbornly.

  There was an unfortable silence h in the air of the cil hall. It was broken by Yoda’s anding tone. — “Take her to the dungeons then. A few weeks of solitary tai might prove enough to looseongue.”

  Nizzal, shuddered from the thought. She was not used to being alone by any means… such punishment was the worst she could have envisioned aside from dht torture… No… this… this was torture. Just not physical, but mental torture.

  It seemed that evewo other masters were shaken by the coldhearted decision. Still, they hid their shock well enough that the terrified girl didn’t notice it.

  Nizzal was uo hide her fear. Overe by emotions, pain, and the general tiredness of her injured body. She eventually gritted out the words.

  “…Fine… What do you wao do?… You bastards…”

  “Kenobi reported that you have spoken of a curse surrounding our temple. Break the curse, and I will believe that you are indeed worthy of the rank of master. This shall prove to us that you are more than a willful child who drifted far from her home.” — The grandmaster demanded.

  The infuriated girl hardly batted a the request, as if she was expeg it.

  “Then allow me, grandmaster.” — The girl gritted out the st word, dripping with venom and distrust.

  She suddenly reached out through the force, her awareness expanding rapidly in every dire.

  What felt like a fickle force presence, barely noticeable before. Pulsed with a new life, its previous form overtaken by a refined and solid tower, ohat has witnessed untable numbers of storms and still stood proudly, watg over the flow of time.

  Her tense force presence coiled wildly like a snake, unveiling itself with wild i motions.

  It eventually came loose as her unmasked force presence radiated through the room with the same iy as any Jedi Master’s. The only difference was the pilr’s size. It might have been refined beyond belief, yet it was much smaller and thinner in raw potential.

  The girl was no powerhouse like Anakin or most members of the Jedi cil. She will never be, with her average midi-chlorian t.

  Still, her skills in hidirue abilities all this time, right in front of the Jedi cil, proved that she was nothing to scoff at. Above all, she was still a child, meaning that her abilities would keep growing in the following years.

  The dark side stigma like signs over her body slowly began to withdraw as she kept drawing in the lingering light side energies of the temple. The bruises and minor cuts visible to everyone slowly retreated as well and soon enough, pletely disappeared from sight.

  Then the presence suddenly pulled back, and they couldn’t se anymore. As if everything that had happened previously was nothing but an act of their imagination. Except that the girl’s wounds were o be found.

  The present masters watched this phenomenon with fasation in their eyes.

  Obi-Wan o himself that in case of Master Yoda, there was a familiar glint present in his crooked eyes.

  ‘The grandmaster has definitely cooked up some sinister plot, like when he dropped the twi’lek mena my p.’ — Kenobi thought to himself.

  Meanwhile, after carefully everything that the girl did, Master Yoda nodded with a solemn expression, then said.

  “I see that you did not lie about your familiarity with the light.” — He stated with a pyful smile.

  Aay spoke up as well, after Master Yoda finished his sentence. — “That was a textbook example of a perfectly applied force heal if I ever saw one.” — The raised.

  The girl looked at this stra with fusion.

  ‘What is his deal...’ — She wondered silently. — ‘Anyway, I will know it soon enough. The only thing that remains is to break that curse. It will take siderably more effort, especially after using force heal two times. ging to a dark side teique after pulling so much light side energies into my body will put a ridiculous strai. That was why I choose to heal my less important injuries just now.’

  To the surprise of the onlookers, Nizzal, sat down on the floor in a meditative position.

  The three masters exged a few curious gnces above Nizzal’s head while she was too occupied searg for the core of that dark whirlpool that surrouhe temple.

  ‘There!’ — She thought, finding the strange accumution of ive energy gathered above the Hall of Thousand Fountains. — ‘No surprise that we got drawn into that mess earlier.’ — Nizzal’s brows creased in frustration.

  ‘The whole i was caused by my ck of awareness. Not like I would expect to find anything like that in a Jedi Temple… If this was a sith ruin, I would never fall for su obvious… Ah… so that was it… the surreality of the situation caused me to overlook the signs. It’s a calcuted effect.’ — Nizzal shook her head as light goosebumps appeared all over her skin.

  ‘Su insidious trap, it’s worthy of a Sith Master.’ — She thought.

  ‘The dark side teique must have reacted to my presence when I meditated there, aowledging me as its master. The sith nuarded against one another with the same effectiveness. Not since Darth Bane created the rule of two. Pg the core of su ominous teique right above a loost frequented for meditation is just basic sith effid arrogance. Anybody who would start looking for it would start at those locations, just as I did, but they never expected ao do that to begin with.’

  ‘Whatever, I will break this barrier then figure out how to get away from these pestering jedi.’

  She made up her mind and trated oask at hand.

  In a matter of seds, thin tendrils of dark miasma started to be drawn towards her. The ominously wriggling tendrils came from every direaing through the walls, ceiling, and even the floor.

  They only became trated enough to be seen by the naked eye when they reached her proximity. The dark tendrils then started to circle around her like bees drawn to a particurly entig flower.

  She was too focused oeique to notiy of this, or the pale expressions of the masters watg her with abated breath.

  As the dark miasma kept accumuting, it also began to circle arou a faster and faster pace. When no more darkness was left to be drawn towards her. The miasma suddenly uself towards Nizzal’s body, which seemed to greedily absorb it. In a few seds no sign of the all inating miasma was left in the eerily silent temple.

  The three masters were staring at all of this, with plicated expressions and a spiking worry. Especially after seeing that the girl’s features, reag to the absorption of that dense dark side miasma reacted quite radically.

  Her skin became ghostly pale and brittle, with the occasional wrinkles running along her face. Underh the surface, dark corrupted veins covered every part of her uncovered skin, suggesting that the same was happening with the entire surface of her body. Uhy splotches of darkened skin appeared in seemingly random pces. Her eyes were surrounded by deep dark creased circles as if she hadn’t slept for a week straight.

  The girl wobbled in her pce, being so tired that she seemed to have difficulty remaining in a seated posture. She opened her eyes and, as expected, they once again glowed with a bright yellow color.

  Yoda observed the ges in a silent ption, trying to figure out what exactly had happehen his ears suddenly raised, his eyes opened wide as he looked at the weakly smiling girl with shobsp;

  Obi-Wan, gging a step behind Master Yoda, also felt the ongoing ges.

  A powerful resonance emerged through the force around the ey of the temple. Followed by a wave of relieved sighs, as if every soul inside could finally be able to breathe air for the first time in many years. A weight was lifted from their shoulders. A weight that they didn’t even know was there.

  The three masters present in the hall felt as a rge amount of the coiled up tension in their bodies slowly loosened up, their thoughts became clearer and more positive in regards to the future.

  Yoda was the first to pose himself. His visibly surprised expression morphed baore ral one.

  “Hmm, so that was the dark barrier that you spoke of Ahsoka?” — Yoda questioned with a knowing smile.

  Nizzal was too tired at the time to think clearly, the retly absorbed ive energy creating small quivers throughout her body. As it violently cshed with the remaining light side energies. It was a known side effect to her sect, though, so she wasn’t too worried about it.

  Fray lords ray jedis, even if they were capable of using both sides of the forfortably. Switg between one and the other without allowing time for the body to adjust was a reckless a. Resulting in the current side effects.

  They were usually harmless, and they teo pass over in an hour or so. As, if it happened in the middle of a flict, they would likely prove fatal. As the slightest distra tends to do in life ah situations. Especially sihe side effects included a sense of dizziness, fusion and general weakness.

  That was why masters of the gray were separated into twe fas. Grey jedi and grey lord. The first favored to only lean on the light side in flicts, while the other wielded the dark side. It was not an ideological split, but a practical one.

  While Nizzal was lost ihoughts, fighting back the unfortable symptoms of her overstrained body. She barely noticed a blue hologram appearing by her side. The figure in the proje was throwing worried gnces in her dire.

  “Yes, Master Yoda.” — Souhe familiar voice. It beloo Ahsoka. With that blurry realization, Nizzal felt as if a cold and heavy stone had just dropped to the bottom of her stomach.

  She shouldn’t see me like this… I-I most definitely look terrifying now… after directly abs so muegative energy.

  While she was worried about those things, Ahsoka tinued with her words. — “I couldn’t se anymore, the barrier, it suddenly disappeared.” — She finished her words solemnly, through the holo-unicator device pced in the room.

  Aay showed a relieved smile while Obi-Wan also realized what must have happened. He shook his head weakly as he tried to foresee ossible and most likely ive effects this situation would have on his mental health. The ces weren’t in his favor, sadly.

  Uhe bined siege of the side effects and her mounting tiredness, Nizzal’s sciousness was threatening to slip away. Her thoughts were swimming in a more fortable dire for once as she wondered.

  ‘Was that truly Ahsoka’s voice? She didn’t sound angry anymore, but I thought that she would hate me... after that…’

  Beyond the loud waterfall sisting of her immediate thoughts, a distant resonating speech seemed to find its way to her mind.

  “Nizzal Grey from the Grey Order. As ag Grandmaster of the Jedi Order. I hereby find you guilty in the crime of unnecessarily attag and heavily injuring a Jedi Shadow ihe Jedi Temple of Corust. It is true that the attaly happened after provocation, but it could have been solved without further injury. The Jedi Shadow himself will have his own trial and his own punishment for his rash as, but that did not erase your own crime.”

  Nizzal’s eyelids suddenly felt incredibly heavy... She forced her eyes open with sheer willpower. She wao hear about her punishment, at least...

  “As a legitimate master of your order, which you have proved to be in front of at least two active members of the Jedi Highcil and an additional impartial witness of your race. You will be judged as an adult who is in a plete uanding of the sequences of her as and potential repercussions.”

  “Therefore, as per current republi w, your punishment is five years of mining bour in one of the meteorite mining camps in the possession of the republi state. Which, added to the previous suspis regarding your person, adds up to a plete twenty years of forced bour.”

  Nizzal blinked after hearing the eous statement, but she was too drained for the time tue back… Ohing she definitely knew she was not going to frig mine rocks for twenty fug years straight… It was more likely that an escaped from jail tag will be added to her fastly accumuting titles soon enough, if that truly came to pass.

  “In light of the potential service you provide and your special circumstances. Your forced bour be repced by five years of military servi the army of the Gactic Republic.”

  “As a trained force wielder, you would immediately receive the rank of squad ander, especially with the bag of the Jedi Order, which I will gdly provide if you chose to accept.”

  “As a sign of goodwill and trust in exge for destroying the dark side barrier surrounding our temple, you will not receive the otherwise mandatory aracker that would normally provide us with your current location, in case of an attempted desertion.”

  Nizzal, finally realized with a weak smile what the grandmaster’s scheme was. — ‘This green guy was a truly terrifyiy. I have vastly uimated him. He khat there was no way I would choose to go to a prisoner bour camp on some meteorite field for twenty years. Just as much as I k.’

  ‘And the other part… if I follow the military route, without the tracker… That means I basically run away anytime I choose to. What the green guy… no, what Master Yoda wants to say… Is that he ’t just let me go after the otion I caused, even if he wao.’

  ‘Instead of that, he gives me a choice. I holy do the military service, and prove myself i, or simply find an ideal moment to steal a fighter ship and escape. With the future sequences being that I will be a wanted criminal throughout the systems of the Gactic Republic.’

  ‘What a shrewd bastard… He is worthy to be called a grandmaster, too. I guess…’

  In the end, Nizzal said with her st bit of energy before she lost sciousness.

  “... Give me… that squad...”

  Yoda smiled and nodded with ued warmth.

  “Your squad will be a newly trained e strike team. You and your squad will serve uhe leadership of General Kenobi, who you already knew.”

  In the background, Kenobi’s shoulders dropped dejectedly.

  “I k...” — He stated, in a low whisper, no doubt expeg something simir to happen since he caught that baleful glint crossing the grandmaster’s eyes.

  o him, Aay snorted aloud, no doubt catg the gist of his whisper.

  There were other things that were spoken in the cil hall after that, but Nizzal, was not aware of them anymore, as she lost her sciousness.