Atino rested at the pillar of self-discipline. The noise of the forrest was drowned out by her deep meditation. Even the younglings soft laughing was a distant sound to her. She smiled to herself. This was the hardest part of being a Jedi, she thought. The constant need to control ones self, to escape the world around them and focus on nothing but the force.
Silence.
The word brought pain to her. The feeling she felt toward was closer to hate, if she would have aloud herself to hate. Even when she was little she hated the coldness of silence and the emptiness it brought. It made her trial of discipline the hardest. She would never truly understand how she was able to make it through those trials. If it wasn't for the help of her Master Tralsay.
Master Tralsay. The name left a bitter taste in her mouth. She missed her old Master dearly. To her he was more than a mentor, he was a father figure. He was someone she could careful and respect, who would accept her for who she was.
That was until he let the Dark Side control him. Darkness was the enemy, yet he treated it like it was a friend, a tool to be used. He didn't accept the dangers of the path he was going and even worse he tried to drag her along too. She resisted the Dark Side, the place of her eternal silence.
The death of her Master made her desire to join the Dark Side even less. She had never been one to be power hungry. Instead she preferred the peaceful nature of the Jedi. The passing of her old Master was something that would be stuck in her mind forever. The memory was like a splinter in her minds eye. No amount of meditation would erase the memory.
Even now as she tried to reach perfect silence all she could think about was the warm blood splashing on her face as Tralsay took his own life before her, not giving her a chance to bring him in to the Jedi Council. She wanted more than anything for him to live, to maybe be able to return to being a Jedi. There were few who tread on the Dark Side that were able to return to the light. She learned that from the Jedi archives that she studied.
He had always shown signs of straying. Atino didn't notice them at the time but it became apparent. She wished she had known what she knows now. If she was wiser, if she had known more about the Dark Side and its powers maybe she could have shown him the dangers of the Dark Side. If he had known how much he would lose he probably wouldn't have left the light.
As she was about to graduate from Padawan to Knight, she had noticed a change in him. He seemed to be more aloof. That was something unlike him. He was a social Jedi, very unlike her. He started doing more research about the Sith. At the time Atino thought it was natural. She had done her own research, curious about why the Sith were their enemy. The research made her realize that the Sith were twisted and she would never join.
Tralsay on the other hand found the evil text to be a way of life. He wanted peace through chaos. Something Atino wouldn't even try to understand.
The more she meditated the farther back the memories went. The more she realized that her Master had shown signs of Darkness before, even before reading the text. Why hadn't she known before? Why couldn't she help him? Was there a part of her that was broken. That must be it. The Darkness in her blinded her from seeing the Darkness in others.
The Darkness. The Silence.
Memories of the trial of Courage came to her. During the trial she was required to face her greatest fear. The silence, the silence in herself and the silence all around her. To be trapped in the darkness of Silence. Her master wasn't supposed to be with her during the trial, but he came anyways. He stayed with her, at a distance. He knew she was terrified of tunnels and caves.
It might have been because of his reading of the SIth, or it could have been his fatherly insticts, but Traslay was terrified he would lose Atino to the Darkness within herself if she went into the tunnels alone. He just wanted her to be careful of the Darkness and accept it. To teach her that it wasn't all evil, that it could be used for good.
Itino had always had problems keeping her eyes shut. The Darkness swallowed her up when ever she did. She would even have problems sleeping. The Silence of the knight consumed her. When she became his Padawan Traslay was always there to comfort her when the Darkness hit. She would sometimes wonder if Traslay had his darkness. When she was young she believed no one as strong as her Master could get turned. He was the perfect role model for her. Strong and powerful, yet a peaceful giant when he needed to be. Like her he was into history and learning about how the Jedi came to be.
In the tunnel, the tunnel that lead to the Darkness, there was only her and silence. That is until her Master decided to show himself. He came to the trial, with the intent of helping her concurs the Dark Side by allowing herself to accept it.
Even than she wasn't aware of the darkness in him and how it had twisted him.
She listened to him tell her about the Darkside and how some former Jedi had used it for good. How they aloud their emotions to make them stronger.
Emotions lead to Darkness, Darkness leads to madness and madness leads to death.
Atino opened her eyes. She was back at the pillar. Her Master was gone. The light was a warm welcome to her eyes. It was odd, her Master tried to concur the Dark Side. He did it, she was sure, for the good of the pride. Yet he let the Darkness control him. He was never scared of the darkness and that was his downfall.
She still was had troubles sleeping at night, when the silence hit. It was something she was never able to break from. Even as a member of the Council. However now she found she was able to stand up to the silence and darkness as their equals. She had no intention of running away, in stead she was determined to face her fears till the bitter end.
Unlike her Master she would never let the Darkness control her.
WC= 1,137
