Artimaes: Time, and again

[artimaes]

<Written in preparation for the transition to SW:TOR>

..........The Force is a god. A self-absorbed god. The Force is an egomaniacal, selfish, and uncaring god. It pits its subjects against each other in bloody and brutal conflicts to serve its own terrible self-importance. Precious few are wise enough to realize the nature of the force. Most of those come upon this wisdom only through complete foolishness, and they are too mad to understand it. I myself came across this because of a mistake. The mistake. Perhaps the only mistake the Force has ever made, perhaps not. Let me begin near the end, approximately eight years from it.
..........I awakened on the planet tatooine. I did not know who I was, I knew only why. I was created there to serve the will of the Force. You see, with another it had begun a cycle to “bring balance to the Force” in a manner that would please it and bring it greater power. I did not know who this other was, it was not of any significance to my purpose. I was in the wilderness, and I recognized this wilderness. I did not know why I recognized it, it must have been because the force saw fit to enlighten me and give me clear passage.
..........I traveled to Mos Eisley, and after some time familiarizing myself with the state of affairs in the galaxy I boarded a ship destined for Naboo. I spent time on that planet training. Though the Force had created me, it had created me without the skills and discipline required to do its bidding. This, I now believe, was because the Force revels in the struggles of its subjects, even its favorite ones. I trained in secret, for the Empire persecuted those who openly used the Force. I was granted one thing without earning it, and it was for my purpose. I was given great wisdom of the Force. My predecessor was to eliminate the imbalance in the Force, to destroy the orders that had for so long ruled over the galaxies perception of the force. My purpose was to create a new understanding of the Force and its balance. There was to be a new order, but I was a fool to think that the Force wanted balance at all. It wanted to begin the cycle anew, that was all. It wanted me to create a new order that it could split into several factions again, to war against each other for a new age. I know this now.
..........I saw that the Empire was the dominant force in the galaxy, and I enlisted during my time on Naboo. I joined a special operations stormtrooper company designated Stormtrooper Company Gamma, or ST-G. I was quickly noticed by a force user who was leading their inquisition detachment. He apprenticed me and aided me in hiding my force sensitivity from the Empire at large, just as he did. Only certain channels of the Empire, he explained to me, were aware that the Empire used Force sensitives for special purposes. If we were discovered by the other members of the Empire we would be disposed of. I trained strongly in the use of the force to discreetly aid my combat skills. I became a great shot with a blaster rifle, and known as a natural leader among the Companies noncommissioned officers. I worked, all the while, to impart my wisdom of the balance of the force to my master. I helped the Empire to exterminate the rebellion and many force users who arose during that time.
..........I came to wonder, though. I knew why I existed, and I had purpose that drove me. I was quickly becoming very powerful, but I was humble. Why, though? Why was I humble? The question that cataclysmically changed me, however, was this: What will happen when my purpose is fulfilled? What comes after? I was created from nothing, would I go back to nothing? It tore me apart. I came to a conclusion. If the Force was everything I believed it to be, then it would be able to cause the fulfillment of its goals even through the failure of its chosen subject. The Force would not be hurt by my failure. Furthermore if I had come from nothing and would go back to nothing, then there was nothing to lose from my pursuit of knowledge outside the Force. If I destroyed myself I would go to nothing, as I would if I did not destroy myself. There was nothing to lose, but there could be much to gain.
..........I studied the nature of those few things that the Force seems unable to control. I studied the mandalorian metal that can block the Force, the Ysalamiri creature that repels the Force, and most importantly the technique used by Nomi Sunrider to sever the connection of Ulic Quel-Droma to the Force. None of these things, I found, were truly seperated from the Force, but they gave insight into the Force that eventually aided me. I took longer and longer on my missions from my master as I ventured further and further out of the way of my missions before returning from them. I acquired a crystal formed in the distant reaches of space that was roughly a translucent form of the metal used by the Mandalorians in their armor. I acquired the most “Force-neutral” materials I could for a new lightsaber. Eventually, I had everything I needed.
..........This was it, I had everything I would need. In my home on Naboo I prepared the ritual. I placed all my components together, formed the lightsaber. I made sure it was the only thing in the room other than myself. Then it began. I performed the intensive ritual to completely remove myself from the Force. Not sever my ability to use it, to sever its ability to affect me. I went unconscious, and awoke in the same room with no change apparent.
..........I rose to my feet, ably. I looked around myself, and felt no different. I knew, however, that I had not failed. I cannot say how I knew, but I knew. I suddenly realized what this was. I had not failed, I was not even done. The Force was fighting me. I had to make sure, and so I Force-pulled my saber to me. It was as easy as it had ever been. Turning the saber to my own chest, I suddenly felt the hand of my father on my shoulder. That was when I knew for certain. This was a lie. The Force had created me from nothing? Yet it allowed my father to dissuade me from this attempt to leave it? Either I had a Father or I did not, and I knew from somewhere in my heart that this truly was my father. I activated my saber before I could hear the words. I fell to the floor, I assume, dead.
..........I awoke in truth, a very short time later. This time it was very different. My consciousness returned to me easily, but I could not even control my own body. I struggled and finally opened my eyes. After a time I regained the ability to control my basic functions. I stumbled to my feet, and felt awkward and clumsy. I was completely at a loss. This was the truth of how great the Force’s hold was? It pervaded every aspect of a person’s life so that they could barely if at all live without it? It was through great strength of will, I know now, that my heart even beat at all when I was done with my ritual. I made my way slowly out of my house. I reached the door, and remembered the saber. I had the foresight to put a mechanical toggle on it, rather than the usual force activation method. I stumbled back into the room and grabbed it from the floor where it had fallen. I made certain not to turn it on. I grabbed a few things, including an amount of credits, and headed for the door again. I made it out a little easier this time, and made it to my speeder.
..........I had a very fast speeder, which I drove very slowly. The speed, even then, was almost too much for me. I nearly crashed several times before reaching the spaceport in Kadaara. I found a ship bound for a remote location, and headed on my way.
..........I ended up on Yavin IV, and found a temple that was uninhabited in which to train. I had some supplies, a blaster rifle and pistol, and my lightsaber. I began to train myself and did not stop for over a year. I became so strongly skilled that I was more confident in my skills than I had been when I had the Force. An expert shot, and an agile and skilled swordsman. But I had not tried my lightsaber. I knew that I would have no trouble with it now, and so I began to go further and further into the depths of the wilderness on that dark moon. I eventually found a pack of darkside users, and decided to reintroduce myself to the Force. I was very bitter, you see. Betrayed. I attacked them, four of them, and they never stood a chance. I cracked a shot at one, who never saw it coming. He went down, and as his companions wondered how he could have been shot without feeling so much as a small warning from the Force I opened up on them. I injured another, and rushed in drawing my saber for the true test. I activated my saber as they arced lightning at me. What happened was something even I did not expect.
..........Their lightning cracked and split around me and I performed a striking motion against it with my saber. It arced wide around me, and came together again on the other side striking a tree. I was untouched. The Force, it seemed, was unable to directly touch me in any way. They were afraid, but what caused more fear than that was my saber. Black is not a fitting term. I have seen black. You could not see the depth of the color of my saber. It was a void, a saber of dark. Not of black, of dark. I came to call it the Darksaber. It was a sight that could melt the mind of some lesser men. I cut them down with ease, the rest of the battle needs no description.
..........I returned to the Empire, and became known to the Emperor as an assasin capable of eliminating force sensitives without fail. No doubt he still thought I was a sensitive myself. I rose through the ranks and reached Colonel, at one time leading my own squad of Dark Troopers in battle against the forces of the Rebellion. My troops never knew my alternate identity. I became known throughout the galaxy to those whom I hunted as “The Stormreaver” for my uncanny ability to rend storms of lightning and any other Force power wielded against me.
..........I will not pretend that I did not struggle, many times I would find myself pitted against a force user wise enough to use the force indirectly to enhance himself in his fight against me rather than to try to attack me directly. There were times when I nearly died. Occasionally I had to…as I like to put it….allow my prey to escape so that I could find them later and eliminate them. Over my time hunting the subjects of the Force I met a man named Wreshen Morduum. He and I became great friends, and over some time I began to spread the word in secret of the truth about the Force. I gathered a following, a cult if you will. I eventually feared that my different lives would certainly collide and it would be more than I would be able to deal with. I would be destroyed by one life or the other. I gathered my followers and we acquired a transport ship. We began to head for the distant reaches of space. While we exited hyperspace and prepared to refuel at a space station orbiting Dathomir we were struck by tragedy. A smuggler, having bypassed the protocols on his hyperdrive governing hyperspace travel, came out of hyperspace on us. Not colliding into us after exiting, he literally exited hyperspace in the middle of our vessel.
..........We crashed to the surface of the planet, and there was no one left alive except me. I believe this was a cruel turn enacted by the Force. Ensuring that nothing it held power over would kill me, while it did kill everyone it could directly control, it struck at me a blow I could not block. I found few bodies, but among those was my friend Wreshen. I donned the armor of my fallen companion and took up his identity as a bounty hunter. I spent years hunting the smugglers in retribution for what one had done to me. I began to hunt the Jedi again for the Force’s hand in it. I eventually grew to hate most of the galaxy and despise the rest.
..........Over time, though, passion cools. It gives way to reason and logic. You never let the coals die, and they are easy to stir to life again, but you begin to think more and feel less as it fades into the past. I felt this happening, and though it was that very clarity and logic that enabled me to think of it I did not want my passion to fade. I used the logic and reason to find a way of never letting my passion fade out. I found it.
..........I record this now not knowing in which age it will be read, it may not make any sense to someone who reads it. The reader may not have come into the proper age to understand it yet, they may mistake certain things for others such as the Galactic Empire for another empire. But if you read this with full understanding you will know the truth of my words, and you may find yourself able to seek and find what I found. The truth about the force, and the truth about life. You live eternally. Not once, but forever. Choose how you will live, as I have. Choose for yourself, and you will have true power. Choose, and you will have defeated a god. Let none choose your fate for you, let none control you but yourself.
..........As I record this, I live the life that the Force hid from me. For I began as a servant of the Force, long ago. That is why it chose me for service later, and that is why I recognized things such as my father’s touch, or the harsh wastelands of Tatooine. I was a Sith, once. I was a great promoter of the balance of the Force, and its proper use. I said I found a way to never let my passions fade, and this is the truth of it: I live outside the bounds of the Force, and I have found a way to step into my own past. To relive it, rather than simply remembering it. I cannot be certain of whether or not I relive it the same way, bound to repeat it as I relive it, or whether I have some ability to affect my previous fate.
..........I know, now, the reason for the mistake. The Force believed me its best tool because in my former life I had been a great advocate of the balance and proper use of the Force that it wished to build a new order from. I was before my time, and it sought to put me in a place more useful to it. It gave me a second chance to do its work, and a second was one chance too many. A second chance at serving is also a second chance at betraying your master. Remember that. I do not know whether I died the first time, or whether the Force removed me, but one way or another I shall see. Perhaps I may change the history of things, or perhaps I will simply finish reliving this and move on back to my own time and continue. Perhaps I am removed from my later time and will reappear some years later after finishing this “re-living” experience. I do not know. Again, I shall see.
..........If you do not understand, still, I make it clear now. Through this, I have made you choose. You are now master of your own destiny. You now have the knowledge. Now if you let the Force rule you, it is your choice to do so, and if you separate yourself from it then that is your choice. One way or another, even if you forever follow after the Force I have mocked it by making you choose. It does not choose for you. You have read my teachings, and they have changed you. You are now master of your own destiny, enough at least to choose whether you will be ruled or not.
Make your choice, my friend.