BALANCE | A Star Wars story

XXXIV

When I open my eyes, the first thing I see is bars. I groan and push myself up onto my feet, looking around hastily. I sigh in defeat when I realise that I'm back in my cell.

I feel his presence before I see him. Warning fireworks explode around me in the force, alerting me to the fact that I'm not alone. He steps into the light and I roll my eyes.

"Really?" I ask, "back in the cage?"

"Until you stop behaving like an animal, this is where you'll stay." My father says, anger lacing his tone menacingly.

      "You mean until I join you."

"Now you're catching on," he smiles crookedly. We stand in silence for a moment until I blurt out the question that has been bugging me ever since I regained my memories.

"Did it hurt?" He crooks an eyebrow at me in amusement and confusion. "I mean, did it hurt when I left." I glance down at my feet, not the best thing to do as know I'll showing weakness. "Did it hurt you that I chose to run away because you're acting like it never even happened, like the last four years didn't happen."

"We always knew you'd be back," he shrugs half-heartedly.

"That's not answering my question."

      "No. No it didn't hurt because we knew those Jedi would hurt you even worse than we ever could and you'd be right back here in no time."

      "This is so fucked up," I almost shout raising my head so I can look him in eyes now. "How could you be sure I'd be back? I'm a Jedi now, I have been for the last four years. I changed and now I'm only back here to stop you from destroying the Jedi and everything they stand for!"

"You may of been a Jedi for the last four years but you were a Sith for the sixteen years before that." He steps forward, closer to the cell so I can see the wrinkles in his red skin. "You were a Sith once and you will be again."

"And how can you be so sure?" I challenge.

"Look at your hands."

"What—" I look down at my hands, only they aren't my hands. Well, they are, but they're a glowing red instead of the pale white that has painted my skin for the last four years. I stumble back in horror, I can't seem to stop staring at my hands. "Wha— what did you do?"

           "Me? Nothing. You? Well you are finally embracing who were always suppose to be." He laughs, "you're becoming a Sith again."

             "No— no— I won't go back!" I stumble backwards into the wall, there is a loose shard of glass on the floor of the cell next to mine and I look at my reflection in it. The red is spreading up my neck, it hasn't fully overtaken my face yet and I claw at my next desperate to be rid it. To be rid of the very thing I never wanted to be again.

             "Now we can talk business Erinyes," my father laughs hauntingly but I barely hear him, I'm too busy trying to erase this mahogany infection from covering me head to toe.

            "No— I won't— I don't want to—"

            "Ah but your changing skin tells me different." He laughs and I want to throw up, "but you still don't have all your memories, not the ones the Jedi hide furthest in your mind. Let me retrieve them for you."

           Before I can say no, not that it would make a difference, he thrusts up his hand and sends my mind flying back into memories I'd long forgotten.

○ ○ ○

           I stand in the centre of the Jedi council, looking straight at Grandmaster Moza. The Ithorian strokes the grey wisps of a beard gently with a pale green hand, their eyes focus in on me tearing me apart. I feel as though I'm on a set of scales, Chaos on one side and the light side on the other. At the moment the scales are perfectly balanced but whatever the Grandmaster decides will tip my fate one way or the other.