Fateful Reunion (Closed)

[Cyril Khan]

The morning sun rose over the horizon pouring light through the many windows of the Temple on Ossus. Tían Velvar sat in a meditation stance inside his room. The open door to his empty room faced his back. Only his lightsaber decorated the dull quarters. The Jedi sat completely upright and motionless, but his eyes were firmly closed. Anyone who saw him would have trouble telling it he rested in meditation or sleep. The master, however, hardly slept; he spent his nights in meditation, using the Force to regenerate his body. He knew he was nothing more than the tool of the Force, and thus he need to remain completely connected to it. Thus in his meditation he looked upon the Force within and external. The world as it pertained to him was clearly insignificant to the world he sensed about him. In his nightly meditation, hardly anything within himself went unnoticed, and the same was with those things happening around him. The councilor seemed vulnerable in his state, but in reality he was at his strongest. He could not reach a better state of communion with the Force.

 

[D-Despario]

In seeking answers, Alaan had never resorted to what he was about to do. Since his return to the order, he had always avoided the man on sheer principle. Tían Velvar was not someone that he particularly liked, though Alaan certainly respected him. He was the sort of teacher that commanded respect and obedience, and as one of the leaders of the Order he usually received those things.

Alaan was now seeking Tían's wisdom in an urgent matter, regarding the training of one of his more controversial students.
He reached the door of Tían's apartment, and found it open. Alaan gingerly entered. Tían appeared to be deep in meditation, sitting motionless with his eyes closed. Alaan cleared his throat.

"Master Velvar, I seek guidance."

 

[Cyril Khan]

"Get out." The command rang clearly from his throat. The deep voice spoke with a subtle threat; the tone implied that worse would happen than brutal conversation if he stayed. The master's past with this youth was dark; Alaan never had any discipline in his mind. He could tell from the Knight's force pattern that he had yet to fully gain this discipline. The councilor did not intend to converse with his past student due to their history together. If it had been up to him, Knight Korre would not have returned to the Order.

 

[D-Despario]

"I expected such an answer Master." Alaan admitted. "Nonetheless, I have need of your wisdom. Please listen to me."
Alaan's hands remained respectfully by his sides, hidden inside the sleeves of his dark robes. He did not desire hostility from Tían, nor did he desire acceptance. All he wanted was some council.

"I am now a Knight, master. I have a student, a troublesome student."

 

[Cyril Khan]

"One must master discipline itself before one can teach it." The title "knight" meant nothing to the Jedi. Alaan did not appear to have mastered discipline in any way since they last met. The youth did not want to create hostilities, but that did not excuse his true mind and heart. There was something amiss about this younger Jedi that the councilor could not explain. He knew well that his former student had changed very little in their years apart.

 

[D-Despario]

"Master, to say I have mastered discipline would be an arrogant statement. However, I have done my best to try and atone for my former behavior. I have learned much, and lost much as well. I would like to point out that I am not the same man that left your teaching." Alaan was calm, but there was an undertone of ice in his voice. He had learned patience, but his former master seemed to be trying to provoke him. He decided to go ahead and push on, in hopes that Velvar might work with him if he heard the question.

"Master, I believe you know of the Jedi named Osman Pasha?"

 

[Cyril Khan]

"You say you have changed, but who are you to judge your own character?" Tían remained with his back to the other. He had not left his meditation stance since the conversations beginning. Even his eyes had yet to open; he did not move in the slightest. Still his voice rang out forcefully and intimidatingly. "The Force reveals the truth. You may have aged and learned some wisdom, but your heart is as it always had been. I can feel your inner brutality and impatience. You would not be here without them."

He ignored the question about the student Alaan attempted to train. It was not his interest to discuss such things with others. If a problem came from training, he knew that it was never the students fault but the teacher's. Of course, not too many Jedi agreed with this philosophy.

 

[D-Despario]

Alaan took a deep breath and exhaled, letting go of the frustration he had been feeling. In its place was a calm focus.
"Master Velvar, I respect your teachings. We may not always have seen eye-to-eye in the past, but I have tried to do the best I can to follow the Jedi ways. I think we should let the past be past and not let it cloud our conversation in the present."

He paused for a moment, then continued.
"My student, Osman Pasha is nearly ready to become a knight, though I personally have some conflicting feelings about promoting him. He is too proud, too sure of his powers and abilities. I sense that such could lead him to the Dark Side. I need your wisdom, Master. The decision I make should not be lightly considered, and I wanted your wisdom and experience to help me make it."

 

[Cyril Khan]

"Do not tell me of the past." Tían did not like it when people told him how to think or speak. It may be true that he did not understand some people, even though he usually did; however, no one truthfully understood him, and he made every point of correcting anyone who attempted to say otherwise. "A mind not in the present does not exist. I do not dwell on the past, and my words speak about the here and now.

"I once knew a student like the one you speak of." The councilor did not move in the least from his position. It was pointless to anything other than move his lips; conversations needed no other wasteful motion. "He was impatient and arrogant. However, as I saw it, he was not ready to be a knight. Unfortunately, it was out of my power to choose, and he now stands as such a member of the Order. I cannot agree with his ranking even now; if you cannot control yourself, you cannot control your student. If you cannot control your student, you cannot control yourself. That is the Way of the Force."

 

[D-Despario]

Alaan shook his head sadly, Tían seemed only to remember the bad side of everything that had happened. He did not seem to notice Alaan's change of heart, his desire to make things right. Alaan wasn't the calmest Jedi in the Order, but he had done his best to try and follow what he knew to be right.

"I'm not asking you to trust me, I'm not asking you to accept me. All I am asking is for some experienced council on an important decision that must be made." Alaan said. "I will do my best to deal with my own failings. I am only sorry that you do not believe in me."

He sighed. "It is true, my apprentice does have the ability to irritate. I may have handled some things in his training in a way that might have been better dealt. That has already passed, I would only like your wisdom in this matter. After all, you are a member of the council, this is what you do the best. It is your field of expertise, and I submit to your experience."

 

[Cyril Khan]

"It is not for you to be sorry for me." Tían knew what his student thought; it was impossible to escape from the master's grip while he meditated. The councilor did not hold back in the least, and allowed the Force to speak everything. However, this was not due to past relationships; no other Jedi would have been spared this as well. "It is the bad within everyone that corrupts the good. That is why I speak of it.

"Through the Force we are indeed ever-changing. However, we are only tools of the Force, and so we must look to our own inner control before teaching control to another. The least darkness in the teacher flows into the student; it is seed that can grow into a tree the size of a planet. My council stands; until you defeat the conflict within you, you cannot defeat the conflict in your student." Tian still remained motionless; not a muscle in his entire body moved except those needed to speak. From the beginning he intended to remain still and continue so to the end. "If you doubt your conflict and it did not exist, then you would not be here.

"If to know when someone is ready, listen to the Force. We are all tools that the Force works through, and thus it knows our destiny. The Force tells me you are not ready, and I am certain it will tell you your student is not ready because you are not ready."

 

[D-Despario]

"If that is the case, then what must I do?" Alaan asked.

 

[Cyril Khan]

"Your question is exactly why you are not ready." Tían never considered himself to be a great adviser to anyone. He always disliked searching others for wisdom, knowing that no being is perfect enough to do so. Only the Force, in his mind gave the perfect advice. However, too few Jedi listened well enough to be able to follow the way of the Force. Perhaps Tían had just found a philosophy with the Force that made him able to do so. Nevertheless, his distrust for human advice taught him to always look down on human actions, his own or others. "It is not what you ask, but to whom you do."