The Fall Of Atris
“We take responsibility, Atris.” She could remember the words as if
Vash had spoken them the day before. How she sorely missed Vash’s
council now. But taking responsibility was exactly what she’d been
doing as of recently, only things hadn’t gone as planned.
The Exile had spare her life, much to Atris’ surprise and humiliation.
Atris had imagined that the Exile would finally receive her
comeuppance, but it hadn’t went that way at all. Instead, it was Atris
who had been defeated. She had not expected the Exile to have grown so
powerful in such a short time, particularly as the Exile still was a
wound in the Force. She could feel it in the other woman’s presence
still after all these years. Atris still believed that the wound was of
the Dark Side
Now the Exile had gone off to face the Sith at Citadel Station, and
from there, no doubt, on to Malachor to face Kreia. Atris felt
fortunate indeed to have been in the presence of two such Force users
and still be alive. Clearly they understood the Dark Side better than
she. Kreia was a Sith. The Exile, possibly something worse, though had
she truly fallen to the Dark Side, Atris would now be dead. Yet how
else could that emptiness in the Force be explained. Surely it was not
something of the Light Side. But then again, neither was she apparently.
Atris meditated in her chambers, allowing the Force to flow through her
and heal her wounds, and within her she seethed. The stillness of her
meditation did not bring her serenity as it had not in years.
Humiliation at being defeated by the Exile, shame at having her true
nature revealed to her by Kreia, and coupled with the guilt over
Katarr. There is no emotion, there is peace. The words had long ago
ceased to have meaning for her. Emotion was all she had, anger driven
by the Force of her will as she, like the other Jedi Masters, sought to
find a way to meet the Sith threat. Frustration as the losses to the
Jedi Order grew greater by the day. It was likely that her descent
began that day so long ago when the Exile had first defied her orders
and went off to fight along side Revan in the Mandalorian Wars. She
could admit it to herself now. Kreia had at least done her that favor,
though no doubt, it served Kreia’s purposes. It was a blurry area
between the Light and Dark Sides. That much, the Masters did not teach
the Padawans. According to the Masters it always seemed as if it were a
line that was either crossed or not, and once crossed would forever
dominate a Jedi’s destiny. But it hadn’t been nearly that clear to
Atris, though she herself was a Master and had sat on the Jedi Council.
One simple step could lead to a fall that lasted a lifetime. She, of
course, knew better than to let anger rule her actions. But in the case
of the Exile, she hadn’t been able to restrain it. The Exile had
disobeyed her, had been part of the massacre at Malachor, had been
defiant in front of the Council when she returned to face judgment,
and yet when she had unexpectedly showed up on Telos, she had
acted like a true Jedi, something Atris knew she could not be. There
was no sense in denying it. Atris resented her, and with that simple
admission, she gained greater acceptance of what she was becoming.
When she finally stirred from her meditation, refreshed, and stepped
out of her chambers, she hefted the lightsaber that had been taken from
the Exile on that fateful day when she was cast out. It was a fine
weapon, worthy of a Jedi Guardian. She had hoped to return it to the
Exile, if she would repent of having defied the Order, but she did not.
And when she defeated Atris in lightsaber combat, Atris’ hubris would
not allow it. So she stepped out on to the long walkway in between the
new Jedi Council chamber she had constructed and the hub of the Telos
Academy, and looked upon the lightsaber one last time. Then she let it
drop into the depths of the chasm beneath her.
When she emerged into the hub, she was immediately ringed by her
handmaidens, a mixture of concern and relief showing on their faces.
“Are you injured, Mistress? We feared the worst,” said the nearest
handmaiden.
It would have been a relatively simple matter for Atris to admit the
Exile had bested her, that she had, in fact, been wrong about the
Exile. That she had spared Atris’ life and once more walked the path of
a Jedi. The handmaidens would have followed her still, accepting her
word as law and continued to help her rebuild the Jedi Order according
to her plans. They would have accepted her even though she were not
perfect. But as she looked around at their faces, a twinge of shame
mixed with fear at their reaction entered into her, and her heart was
hardened. “My confrontation with the Traitor went as I had expected,”
she said, speaking slowly and forcefully. “I have sent her to Citadel
Station to meet the Sith Threat there in order to prove herself worthy
of being called a Jedi once more.” “She sensed their tension leave them
at those words, and she silently let out the breath she had
inadvertently been holding. She was surprised at how easy the lie came,
and relieved at how it greatly simplified things.
“Mistress, will we go and fight along side her, now that she is a Jedi
once more?”
At the question, Atris felt her chest tighten and her breath came more
difficult, still she forced herself to retain her composure. “No, there
are other matters that require our attention. I desire to know more
fully what happened on Dantooine.”
“Mistress, you should rest. This has been a trying period for you,
dealing with the Traitor. Do not exhaust yourself.”
“Thank you, but I am well. I have meditated on this. I must go there
and learn of the Jedi Masters. Ready my ship.” The last words came out
a bit more forcefully, perhaps, then she had intended, but the
handmaidens seemed not to notice.
“Yes, Mistress. At once.” They disappeared to carry out their various
tasks, and Atris was mercifully left alone. She took in a deep breath
and let it out slowly.
It had went better than she had expected. Of course there was no reason
to tell the handmaidens everything. They need to be told only as much
was necessary to carry out their function. Wasn’t that the Jedi way?
Hadn’t faith always been a part of it? Although if that faith were
broken, what then? But it served no purpose to think along those lines.
The Exile would deal with the Sith Threat, and if not, then Atris
would. She was late in arriving on Dantooine, and it was time she left
to meet with the Masters. Odd that the handmaidens hadn’t mentioned
them.
They’d received the short message from Kreia to meet them on Dantooine,
something in reference to the Exile, and so Atris had sent the
handmaidens, but something held her back from going herself. Now she
realized that her presence there was needed. Kreia had not said
anything about the Masters, nor had the Exile, and so it was possible
that they had failed to assemble. If so, then she needed to know why.
Surely they would have known Kreia for what she was and dealt with her.
Kreia was the other great mystery. She who had been responsible for
Revan’s fall and cast out for it. She was a Sith, but yet an odd sort
of Sith. Twice she had been on Telos and neither time has she attacked
Atris. Perhaps she was merely an adherent to the Dark Side, and not a
Sith. But if being so and being a Sith were not the same the thing,
what was the difference? Was the Sith merely a set of teachings? For
that matter, were the Jedi also just a system of beliefs?
Atris knew within her that the Jedi teachings were flawed, were
responsible for the fall of a great many Jedi including Revan. The Jedi
were responsible, Atris understood now, because they had inadequate
safeguards in place for when a Jedi turned against the Order. Exile?
Not a severe enough punishment. Severing one from the Force? To
seldom used to be effective. Had Revan and Malak been captured and
severed from the Force immediately after they’d rebelled against the
Order, much horror would have been avoided. True, the Mandalorians
would have won the war would it not have been for the intervention of
the Jedi. But there might have been a possibility for a peaceful
solution, and if not, then they were at least not as great a threat as
the new breed of Sith was.
But none of that mattered now, Atris decided as she returned to the
Jedi Council chamber, seating herself in one of the high-backed chairs.
As with meditation, the room brought her no peace, but did serve to
focus her thoughts. Death would be on the only solution to the problems
facing the Jedi. The extinction of the Sith wherever they might be in
the galaxy had become a necessity. They were drawn to the Exile, these
Sith, and Atris would use that factor to destroy them. The handmaidens
would be instrumental with their combat skills and lack of a presence
in the Force. The Sith Assassins, Atris had come to realize at the cost
of many Jedi on Katarr, tracked their prey through the Force, actually
fed on the Force. From the handmaidens, they would gain no such
strength. They would pit their combat skills against the Eschani, and
they would be slain.
It was a twisted sort of irony, Atris decided, rising and beginning to
make her way to the hangar. The tension was rising in her again, and
she felt unable to sit in one place for long. The irony was that the
Jedi for centuries had used the Force to protect and serve the galaxy,
and now it was being used against them in ways they could not
comprehend. Like it had been used against them on Katarr. The fear of
future Katarrs had sent the remaining Jedi Masters into hiding,
waiting, Atris felt, for one who would lead them. And as Katarr had
been partly her fault, it was her responsibility to be that one.
A handmaiden approached her and bowed.
“Is the ship ready?” Atris asked.
“It is Mistress. The others have finished their pre-flight sequence.”
“Then let us depart.”
She followed the handmaiden down the walkway leading into the hangar
from the control room, to the ship and up the ramp leading into it. She
walked down a corridor, feeling a rising tingle within her as she
anticipated lifting off, and made her way to her quarters aboard the
ship. “Tell the others I am not to be disturbed until we reach
Dantooine.”
“Of course, Mistress.” The handmaiden left, the door sliding shut
behind her.
Atris, once more, settled into meditation. It was simple really. They
should all have seen it much sooner. It took an understanding of the Sith to
defeat them. So Atris had collected all information and relics
pertaining to them that she could get her hands on, including a great
many Sith holocrons. She’d come to understand how they derived their
power from strong emotion, and more importantly, that it was their way
to destroy each other to ensure the strongest of them survived to lead
them. Therein, also lie their greatest weakness, for it was this lack
of unity amongst them that would lead to their eventual downfall. No
doubt, they were fighting against themselves, were already weaker than
appeared so. They could not long coexist. For them, the galaxy would
always be too small. Thus why they were forced to operate from the
shadows in secrecy, no doubt. This Atris could use against them,
using one against another just as she used the Exile against them. Thus
the urgent need to get to Dantooine, to mobilize the Jedi as the time
to attack them had come. They would follow in the wake of the Exile,
the Jedi would, and even if it were Kreia, Revan and Bastila arrayed
against them, the Jedi would prevail. Every last traitor to the Jedi
Order would die.
As always, when Atris plotted her strategy against the Sith or pondered
the future, her thoughts returned to the Exile. She was the only
unknown in Atris’ calculations. The Sith were drawn to her, it was
clear. But did they wish to kill her or merely turn her? Would she
destroy them and take their place? Had she spared Atris not out of
mercy, but simply so that she might be a Pawn in the Exile’s plans?
Such a possibility did not escape Atris’ attention. Having felt that
emptiness in the Force within her, caused no small amount of
irritation and concern for Atris. True, the Exile had acted as a Jedi
in their last meeting, but even if she walked that path now, there was
no guarantee she would remain that way. Examples such as Exar Kun had
made it abundantly clear that those who fought against the Sith often
became in the end that which they hated most. The Sith holocrons had
made one vain attempt after another to try and turn her to the ways of
the Sith, but a Jedi Master she remained even if her methods had become
unorthodox.
Anger is the path to the Dark Side. How many times had she heard that
as a Padawan? The truth about anger was that it ebbed and rose, never
quite gone but not always overwhelming either. As it ebbed, a small
part of it always remained and replacing it was tension. A tension that
haunted one, left one feeling exhausted. Even as she struggled once
more to quiet that tension within her, she wondered if there still
might not be an answer to the problems of the galaxy within the other
Jedi. She had not lost all faith, and at times when she was allowed a
respite from her anger, she hoped desperately that their might be an
easier way to deal with the Sith, one that did not involve battle but
simply the will of the Force. It was a source of great turmoil for
Atris which never departed, but became greater when she was angry, as
she struggled to find some middle ground between the two approaches she
contemplated. Still serenity eluded her, though she had released the
anger she felt at having been humiliated at the hands of the Exile.
Atris had not known true serenity in years since she was a Master on
Dantooine, and the prospect of returning, she hoped, would restore what
she had lost since leaving that planet. The simple act of trying to
still the disquiet within her was draining, a process she seldom had
the patience or the energy for these days. For the remainder of the
trip to Dantooine, she struggled to find that peace she had once known.
As soon as they set down on Dantooine, she made for the Khoonda
settlement, where after speaking with the Administrator there, she
confirmed that Master Vrook was there, and that he and the Exile had
assisted in staving off an invasion by mercenaries. She took it as a
positive sign, and leading the handmaidens, felt the calm of Dantooine
helping her to relax, the tension in her muscles relaxing.
As soon as she came within viewing range of the Jedi Enclave, the
deaths of all the Jedi lost there assaulted her, their loss almost
overwhelming her. Her eyes became moist, and she paused to summon the
will to shut out the horror that Malak had inflicted on this place. But
as she entered into through the entrance, noticing much work had been
done to repair the building, hope came to her. Hope that she might find
the strength and counsel within to assist her in the days ahead.
She stopped in the courtyard where a new tree was growing beside the
fountain to replace the one that was killed in the bombardment by the
Sith, remembering it in better times when Vander, Vrook, Dorak and Zhar
were there. Zhar in particular, had been a source of strength for her
in difficult times, always able to help her center herself, just as
Vash had done for her on Coruscant.
Vrook had come to dominate the Council on Coruscant, his strong
disapproval of any Jedi who went to fight the Mandalorians bordering on
hostility. Vash and Cavar were two who remained compassionate for the
fallen and even for the Exile, despite her open defiance of them at
being cast out. “You are a Jedi no longer,” Vash had told her. Atris
had felt then that the punishment was too lenient then and had even
accepted Vash’s rebuking her for her own lack of patience for the
fallen, but Atris had accepted it in silence because it came from Vash.
Because Vash could be trusted to have the calm and serenity that she
did not in those times. She and Vash were close, almost as sisters,
after all. She never had the stillness within her that Vash had, not
then and certainly not now.
She smiled slightly at those fonder memories, a smile which she had
only rarely worn since those days, as she walked down the corridor
toward where the Jedi Council chamber was. The passageway was dark and
thickly covered with dust. She felt hope for the future return to her
as she had not felt it in many long years, as she walked through the
Enclave. Which is why she was not prepared for what was waiting for her
in the Jedi Council chamber.
Atris hadn’t actually gone to Katarr after the attacks on the Jedi
there, merely heard the reports. She actually hadn’t had the will to
set foot there, since she had been responsible for leaking the details
of the meeting to the Sith through a third party in the hopes of luring
the Sith out. The results of that decision had been catastrophic,
horrible beyond imagination, and she had used every means at her
disposal to shut out the grief and the horror she felt from that
incident. The guilt at her grave miscalculation almost drove her into
self-imposed exile as it had so many other Jedi.
She was not prepared for the sight of Cavar, Vrook and Zez-Kai Ell
lying dead in that clearing. Not just dead, but utterly drained of the
Force, now wounds in the Force, themselves, much like the Exile. A void
which should not be and could not be, but was. And Atris felt panic
rising in her quickly, bordering on stark terror. Along with it, her
old guilt over Katarr confronted her, as once again she bore
responsibility for the deaths of Jedi. It had been her idea to bring
them her for another Council meeting, and though she had not tempted
the Sith, neither had she been there with them in their greatest need.
They lie dead in the grass, while she still lived and breathed. She
felt her breathing become strained, felt the blood rush out her face
and noticed she was feeling dizzy. Her arms unconsciously wrapped
themselves about her, and she forced herself to look away.
“Mistress, we should leave this place. You are in great danger here.”
The handmaiden nearest her, spoke with urgency.
“Leave me,” Atris replied, her voice cracking. “Await my return on the
ship.”
“Mistress…”
“I said leave me!” the words came more forcefully this time, though she
spoke them through her hands which covered her face. It was not good to
lose her composure in front of the handmaidens, she reminded herself,
even as her mind struggled to cope with the shock of her discovery.
They appeared reluctant to leave her, but as she removed her face from
her hands and looked at them through teary eyes, they understood and
left her to her grief.
Only when they were out of sight, did Atris fall to her knees, feeling
herself shaking from the spectacle before her. “There is no emotion,
There is…” she whispered the words aloud, but they seemed empty now, a mockery of the respect and friendship she had shared with the three Jedi
Masters. She’d been through a great deal in recent years, suffered with
the rest of the Jedi, felt shame, loss, guilt and horror at all that
happened but this event was beyond what she could cope with try as she
might. She immediately began to rationalize that they had not fallen in
vain, that her own continued existence was an opportunity, not a
failing on her part, that they would have wished her to carry on the
spirit of the Jedi Order and rebuild it even if they could not be a
part of that future…the logic came to her and meant absolutely nothing
as she grieved over their loss. The pain was terrible, and with it came
the tears. And she heard herself scream up at the sky, venting the pain
in the only way she knew how.
At this, the handmaidens reappeared again at a run, circling her,
helping her to her feet and leading her out of there, out of the
enclave and back to the ship. She allowed them to help her now, no
longer having the strength to fake composure. They led her back to her
quarters and enticed her to lay down. A tranquilizer was applied to
her, against her feeble protests and immediately she felt slightly less
overwrought. The handmaidens left her, one remaining outside her
quarters at the bidding of the others, while they left to take the ship
back to Telos.
As she lie there, she came to understand the absolute worst part of
this recent tragedy. It was not just Jedi Masters that had died there,
but also hope. Hope and the last vestiges of her faith in the Jedi
teachings or the faith that the future would be a better place. The
hope that the Jedi Order could still somehow solve the problems of the
galaxy and defeat the Sith with the strength of their beliefs was dashed.
In the wake of that tragedy, all Jedi methods and rationale failing
her, she turned to the one ally who was always there for her, who
remained steadfast despite all odds, no matter what the threat…her
anger. ‘Fear is the past to the Dark Side,’ she heard the old saying in
her mind. But she felt all hope die, the fear could not so easily be
quelled. Strength was needed now, and she would take such strength from
wherever she could find it. The anger brought strength. She understood
at that moment why the Sith drew power from it, how it could protect
them from whatever they might face, and she immersed herself in it,
willing it to become greater within her. The Sith would pay. Somehow,
some way, there would be no mercy and no more Jedi patience. They would
die, Kreia and all the rest for the tragedy on Katarr, on Dantooine,
for the deaths of the other Jedi, and most of all for destroying hope.
They would feel the hate and rage that they had created in her when the
time for her vengeance came.
Allowing the anger to fill her, she rose from her bed and moved to a
storage cubicle where she rummaged for a moment and then pulled out a
small, black stone pyramid. She set it upon the floor and began
to concentrate on it. Presently, it began to glow, and the hologram of
man in black robes appeared above it.
“Ah, Atris, are you ready to begin, your training?”
“I am, My Master….”