Moments of Truth/Prologue

1,402 BBY

Vol Aldauk had dared to hope for a moment of peace.

He'd finally gotten his Jedi Initiate pupils into pairs and set them to hand-to-hand combat; their skills remained unenviable at best, but this group was the best to be had on Kamparas, where Jedi brainiacs went to polish the ivory on their towers and Jedi Guardians like himself went to be unhappy. Jungle birds cawed in the rainforest that encroached on the training ground—today's lesson was on a fighting dais set admist the ferns, under the eyes of cackling primates and slithering reptiles. The Initiates knocked each other to the gravelly surface of the dais, but at least they popped right back up again; what they lacked in skill, Vol could admit, they tried to compensate for with spirit. A Jedi needed both, but apprenticeship could attend to the former; there was no faking the latter.

Sweat dripped down Vol's face, but he betrayed no sign of discomfort as he settled himself for what he thought might be his first real moment of peace that day. Then he heard the soft tap…tap…tap… of a cane on the rainforest floor and realized his day was about to get worse, not better.

He held out about as long as he could, but when some of the Initiates stopped sparring and looked over, he felt there was no choice. Turning and bowing, he said, "Master Cuyvalsa. I didn't expect to see you out here at the fighting ring."

I didn't expect to see you out here, period. Coshal Cuyvalsa was the quintessential Kamparas Jedi in every way Vol wasn't—bookish, ethereal, smarter than half the library droids and stuffier than all of them. Beneath her patterned tunic, she wore the wide hakama skirt favored by librarians, philosophers, and other Jedi with no intention of going to combat and who probably wouldn't know what to do if it came to them. All those qualities weren't in short supply on Kamparas, but even among the databookbugs, Master Cuyvalsa was something odd. Never before or since had Vol heard of a Jedi Prophet being such a mystic that the other Jedi Seers had beseeched the First Knowledge Council to…share her wisdom with other parts of the galaxy.

The Miraluka Jedi Master turned her hooded and veiled face on him and crooned, "Ah, Knight Aldauk. I had hoped that fate might have relented and given you a more pleasant morning than I beheld, but alas, what will be will be, and the conceit of we passing blips upon the galactic sensor of history can not change it."

She had lost him at Knight Aldauk—it was true enough, but most of the Jedi Masters on Kamparas afford him "Master Aldauk" as an instructor's courtesy title. Trying not to be petty enough to let it bother him, he slapped an insect on his wrist, then replied, "Well, I appreciate the thought."

She gave him a regal nod, like a queen acknowledging her courtier's flattery. As the last impacts of forearms and shins dropped off behind him, Vol pressed, "Something I can do for you, Master?"

"I have been borne hither upon a tide of the Force's will, Knight Aldauk," Master Cuyvalsa replied. "A revelation unlooked-for, but I will not set myself as a stone against the Force's current."

"…of course not. Did the Force happen to tell you why you're here, or…?"

"Oh, indeed." She leaned past him as if she could see the Initiates. "I'm here for my new Padawan."

Vol glanced over his shoulder, but the only Padawan he saw was Gatiin Muir, his own pupil. She looked just as puzzled, and Vol said, "The Academy Council—"

"—didn't mention my new Padawan," Master Cuyvalsa completed, nodding. "Indeed not; the Force has not seen fit to bestow this revelation upon them, and thus am I compelled to seize the moment myself."

Excitement rippled through the Initiates as Vol asked, "Which one, Master?"

"That, Knight Aldauk, we must discover. Come."

She advanced onto the dais with surprising agility for a woman her age, while Vol trailed after her, still processing how completely he'd lost control of his own lesson. Beckoning Gatiin to his side, he pointed out a Nosaurian and said, "How about Starg?"

Starg straightened, smiling. Master Cuyvalsa spared him a glance. "No, he has a different path, poor boy. A pity to die so young, but such are the travails of war…"

Starg's smile crumbled, Gatiin stumbled and had to catch herself, and Vol dug the calloused knuckles of one hand into his temple, trying to work out the headache before it hit too hard. "Right, moving on." He gestured to a fellow Human. "I'm told Kierno here is top-notch academically—"

"Yes, yes, and thirty-seven years from now I'm sure his seat upon the First Knowledge Council shall be quite well-deserved." Master Cuyvalsa hardly seemed to be paying attention. "And yet, the Force does not bid me to guide him there."

Kierno looked startled, but beamed. Tossing off a glower to drag Kierno out of his visions of future glory and pull Starg away from his growing dismay, Vol opted to just follow Master Cuyvalsa after that rather than subject any other Initiate to her fortune-telling. She spent most of her time—sometimes days on end—cooped up in a disused wing of the library she had commandeered, surrounded by ancient texts and holocrons; the Academy Council had never seemed anxious to immerse her more in the praxeum's day-to-day life, and Vol was starting to understand why.

"No…mmm, no, entirely ordinary…goodness, such drama in store for you, my dear…"

Halfway through the second row, though, the Jedi Master stopped; Vol caught himself just short of walking into her, though Gatiin walked into him. Steading his rangy Padawan, he asked, "Taken a shine to Maia, Master?"

"Maia…" Master Cuyvalsa breathed, as if the girl's name was an incantation. "Yes, I see…"

Twelve-year-old Maia Kyss looked apprehensive, and Vol couldn't blame her, but she swallowed and asked, "What do you see, Master?"

Master Cuyvalsa did not reply right away; shifting her cane to her left hand, she laid the fingertips of her right on Maia's cheek. Vol felt the Force swirling between them; the Living Force had always been his domain, but even he perceived the Unifying Force strengthening between them like puzzle pieces being brought together.

After so long that the other Initiates began whispering to one another and several backed away, Master Cuyvalsa laid her hand on Maia's shoulder. "The Force has greatness in store for you, Maia. Your actions will bring about the downfall of a great and terrible Sith blight, the likes of which even the warlike Darths and fell sorcerers of the Sith Empire should tremble to behold!  It has been ordained that I should guide you in pursuit of this destiny, and so I shall.  I take you as my Padawan learner."

Maia blinked her dark eyes, then hurried to bow. "Yes Master. Thank you, Master!"

Master Cuyvalsa turned and swept off. Maia's amazed grin curdled a little, and she looked at Vol for help. Sighing and fighting the temptation to roll his eyes with more effort than a fistfight had ever cost him, he tipped his head after the Jedi Master's retreating figure swishing through the ferns. "Go. May the Force be with you."

Once Maia bowed and raced after her new master, Vol grumbled, "Though maybe 'good luck' would be more appropriate…"

Gatiin laughed, and Vol said, "Sorry, was that out loud?"

"Might've been, Master."

"Pity, that. Ah well.  All right, the rest of you look sharp!  None of you got prophesied some epic victory over a Sith, so we're not taking it on faith.  Back at it!"