Public Scoping out the Temple

[Tevan Losh]

Coruscant

Tevan stared out the window of the restaurant at the giant temple in the distance. a large bowl of stew cooling on the counter in front of him. He had arrived on the planet earlier that day with the intention of heading straight for the temple to inform the Jedi of the death of the woman he had briefly trained under and to return her lightsaber, but a deep sense of anxiety and panic stayed his hand.

What if the Jedi blamed him for her death? Tevan himself did, the memory of him freezing in battle and his master shoving him aside and receiving a blaster bolt intended for him in the process still haunted him every time he closed his eyes. He knew he had to face the consequences.

"I'll go soon." He muttered. "I will"

But not until he finished his stew, he deserved a last meal after all.

 

[Saga Merrill]

"It's not worth it," said a nearby droid sipping nepenthe from a mug.

His name was Saga Merrill, and he had opinions.

"The Jedi Temple out there?" Saga gestured out the window. "What could be more natural that feeling conflicted? Your youth and life are so brief. Why sacrifice your autonomy, your agency, your own dreams, to an institution that will never love you back? To be part of something? There are better places to be a component."

He'd had, perhaps, a little too much nepenthe today already.

Tevan Losh

 

[Tevan Losh]

Tevan started, he had been too deep in thought to pay the droid any notice but now he turned to look at him.

"Aren't they the legendary defenders of peace? There could be no greater honor in joining their ranks, surely." Tevan blurted out, he immediately felt childish, reciting the words he had heard in stories growing up.

"And besides, I owe them something." He absently reached down and patted at the spot where the lightsaber was concealed beneath his robes. "So what choice is there?"

 

[Saga Merrill]

Saga waved in a vaguely dismissive way. "Honor is as honor does. I'm sure there are honorable sapients in that temple, and those who aren't. I'm less sure how to tell the difference. I know it's not by color scheme or burlap roughness. That way lies affinity fraud."

He glanced down at where Tevan Losh patted his robes. On private playback, fabric stress and sound analysis suggested a datapad, a lightsaber hilt, or a recording device, all reasonably likely.

"If you feel you owe them, if you would find peace by paying off that debt, that's an understandable motive. But retain the right to reconsider your decisions. Perhaps a week's service will pay what you owe, or a month, or a decade. Do you owe them a lifetime? Is that really so proportionate?"

 

[Jasper Kai'el]

Coruscant
Tags: Tevan Losh , Saga Merrill

​

"If you feel you owe them, if you would find peace by paying off that debt, that's an understandable motive. But retain the right to reconsider your decisions. Perhaps a week's service will pay what you owe, or a month, or a decade. Do you owe them a lifetime? Is that really so proportionate?"

"I'd reconsider in general," a nearby man noted. "Jedi these days aren't those types of folks. The kind that believe in debts, I mean."

Jasper went to local restaraunts often. He did so because Coruscant was his home, and he liked to support local folks who had talents and aspirations of success. He didn't have much money himself, so it was the least he could do with the funds he did have. The droid fellow was funny. He talked about giving away freedoms and having an organization that could never love you. Maybe those were the old ways, but the New Jedi Order wasn't that. It was more complicated.

"But freedoms aren't something you necessarily have to sacrifice either," the knight added. "A lot have families, businesses outside of Jedi life, ties back to home worlds. The only things people sacrifice are what they see fit to, just like any other person. They're just people after all. The only pedestal they stand on is the one you place on them in your head."

There was more to life than being exclusively a Jedi. Jasper knew it well. He had a partner, a home, plans for the future. To say that the Jedi Order threatened to take that from him would be rather silly.

Besides, ultimately the choice here lie in the young man the droid was speaking to.

 

[Tevan Losh]

Tevan pondered the words. "You've got a good point, I'll make things right and then choose my own path from there." The dread was still there but this conversation was making him feel better.

"I'm Tevan Losh by the way." He said as he extended his hand towards the Droid. "What brings you to Coruscant?"

Tevan heard the man's voice and turned to look at him, hand left awkwardly outstretched. His words were reassuring to Tevan, maybe there was a path forward with the Jedi after all. He looked the man up and down and hazarded a guess. "You're one of them, right? A Jedi I mean."



Jasper Kai'el Saga Merrill

 

[Saga Merrill]

Tevan Losh — to tag someone, type @ and then start typing their name, and it should pop right up. Welcome aboard!

---

Saga accepted Tevan's handshake. "I'm called Saga Merrill. I'm here for a funeral, nobody you'd know. Chart your own course, yes."

He flicked his head's orientation to indicate Jasper Kai'el but make it clear that he was still speaking to Tevan. "The man over there has a point. There are so many kinds of Jedi these days — killers, billionaires, kings — who make many other kinds of sacrifices, like giving up the freedom to be taken seriously. If you have it in you to — ah, but I digress. By all means go to the Jedi and become who you desire to be. I'm sure this fellow here will be only too happy to give you the local context."

Saga set aside the rest of his mug and got up.

"A pleasure, Tevan," he said by way of goodbye.

 

[Jasper Kai'el]

Coruscant
Tags: Tevan Losh , Saga Merrill

​

"Hey, it's not my place to judge," Jasper remarked, "I don't know Jedi like that, but the galaxy is big. Bad eggs are everywhere. Still, I'd say the killers and billionares are a small number. That's like saying a senator accurately represents their people 100% of the time. The galaxy is a lot more neuanced than our percieved biases."

He knew bad Jedi, of course, but the whole was a good thing. They were just wrapped up in a mess that they couldn't control. But that was life. Jasper had little time to get wrapped up in someone else's misconceptions. Not that it mattered either way. The droid fellow was leaving, but he still felt it best to put that info out there. After all, opinions could only be formed by taking in multiple perspectives.

"My condolences to the funeral attendants," he added.

"You're one of them, right? A Jedi I mean."

"You could say I am," the knight shrugged. "Names Jasper. I can indeed give you local context. Coruscant is my home after all. I know her streets like the back of my hand. I can give you good restaraunts, street artists, where to find the best mechanics, and of course the places you should avoid if you don't wanna wind up in a spice deal gone wrong... but you're probably interested in the Temple, yeah?"

 

[Tevan Losh]

"It was good meeting you Saga." Tevan was unexpectedly sad to see the droid go, he had made quite an impression in such a short time. "I hope we cross paths again in the future."

Tevan turned his full attention to Jasper. "It's nice to meet you Jasper, I'm Tevan. Some directions later might be nice, this city is so much bigger than I ever could have imagined! It's some luck I made it here at all."

Tevan grew somber remembering that he still had to explain why he was here. "But yes, I'm here about the Jedi. I'm from a small farming planet on the rim, you probably haven't heard of it, and around a year ago this Jedi showed up, just passing through apparently but she ended up staying after 'sensing something in me'. Tevan paused. "I feel like I'm rambling, the long story short is that I spent the last year training with her until a few weeks ago when she... died." Memories of that night flashed through Tevan's head, fire and screams. Don't think about it.

"I thought it'd be best to come to Coruscant to let you guys know about her passing, and to." Tevan reached into his inner pocket and pulled out the stashed lightsaber "Return this."

Jasper Kai'el Saga Merrill

 

[Jasper Kai'el]

Coruscant
Tags: Tevan Losh

​

"I feel like I'm rambling, the long story short is that I spent the last year training with her until a few weeks ago when she... died."

"That's... I'm sorry," Jasper sighed, his smile fading. "I'm sure she made a lasting impression on you if you were moved to bring this back."

He examined the lightsaber for a moment, observing the intricate grooves and marks from use. Aged, but well cared for. Certainly the sign of an experienced Jedi. Something terrible had surely transpired. That was the Outer Rim unfortunately. Jasper understood it well. His own brother had been subject to it's terrors back on Lothal when his home had been burnt to the ground.

"Why don't you come with me?" he told the man. "We have a place where we put the crystals of fallen Jedi. You've brought it all this way. I'm sure it would be best for you to place it there yourself."

It was only fair. He would need the closure.

 

[Tevan Losh]

"I'm sure she made a lasting impression on you if you were moved to bring this back."

"Yeah she did, she embodied everything I had heard the Jedi stood for and more, I miss her greatly." When Tevan had first heard the Jedi had came to his town, he was expecting a distant godlike figure but instead found her open and humble, helping the villagers with chores and farmwork on the days that she wasn't training Tevan in the ways of the Force. He wished he could have been a better student.

"Why don't you come with me?" he told the man. "We have a place where we put the crystals of fallen Jedi. You've brought it all this way. I'm sure it would be best for you to place it there yourself."

Tevan got up from his seat. "That sounds like a good idea, you lead the way."

As they headed for the door Tevan decided he might as well ask. "How does the Jedi Order accept new members? Do they have to be of a certain age?"
He knew he was dancing around the real question, could I be a Jedi?

Jasper Kai'el

 

[Jasper Kai'el]

Coruscant
Tags: Tevan Losh

​

"How does the Jedi Order accept new members? Do they have to be of a certain age?"

"By volunteer, typically," Jasper noted. "Older incarnations of the Jedi Order saught out individuals in their youth to train, but nowadays force sensitive folks from across the galaxy come to learn at the temple at their own pace. Age doesn't really mater, only a willingness to learn. Having a little bit of training already should make you a shoe in."

That was really what he had been asking. Jasper understood enough. Besides, there wasn't any kind of insane requirement, or call to take up arms and go to war. The Jedi were first and foremost about understanding the Force and uplifting the weak. That took all kinds of different forms. It was simply a matter of finding what that looked like for him, independently rather than being told upfront by someone else.

The man got to his feet, tucking his hands into his pockets.

"Right then," he decided. "Let's get going then, shall we? The Temple isn't far, of course. We should have this matter put to rest in no time."

The Kyber Arch awaited them.