The Jedi Order was lost, and he wasn't only referring to the tall predominately marble and duraglass structure perched in the center of Theed that was now sealed away from the rest of the galaxy by the revered Masters. He was speaking of the Jedi identity. It was lost, and had been the moment they were told that they weren't to step within the walls of the Academy ever again. The Order had been inactive for so long that the only thing holding the Jedi identity together, the only indication of being a Jedi, was one's residence in the Temple.
The moment the Jedi stepped outside of the Academy's gates, they had to find other ways to define themselves. Immediately they turned to the streets and sought to aid the city of Theed as best as they could despite their lack of experience. And their deeds made him proud. However, having spent a good portion of his Jedi career outside of the Temple, his identity crisis was of a different sort. He never forgot what it meant to be a Jedi, he lived and breathed his duty.
What he needed was a reminder of his humanity.
The Jedi phenomenon is kind of a paradox. Trained in the use of the Force, a person is capable of incredible feats of strength, speed, and endurance. Trained in the philosophies of a Jedi, a person gains uncanny self discipline. A normal human being with either Force control or self discipline would be considered a extraordinary person. To have both would be as if you weren't human at all. And because the Jedi weren't held to the same standards of normal people, they were considered super human, they were gradually losing a very important trait: empathy.
He had learned throughout his years as a Jedi that empathy was extremely important. People didn't only want you to save them from suffering, they wanted you to understand why they suffered as well. It is conflict that fosters identity and not to have the story preserved along with the body could be considered by some to be just as bad, if not worse, than total obliteration. But to possess empathy meant a balancing act. Jedi were trained to squash emotions. The prerequiste for empathy was an experience of emotions.
And so here he was doing the one thing he knew to do when he needed to find himself. He was wandering, for it was in his wanderings that he encountered the best conflicts and if he overcame these conflicts, then he would be a better person. If he could remember how to be a person then he would be able to be a better Jedi. Or so that was the idea anyway. Sometimes things just didn't work out they way they were planned. He was at least guranteed a story to tell at the end though.
Washburne Estate, Dantooine...
The blaster in his hand screeched twice and immediately the kinrath rebuked with a ear piercing scream of its own as it crumpled into a ball at his feet, the quivers of death possessing its body for a moment before passing on. He scanned the horizon for any sort of movement and satisfied that there was none, he holstered the weapon. His gaze turning down to the corpse once again, a slight frown appeared on his face.
Removing the rag tucked at his belt, he leaned his foot against the hood of the landspeeder and wiped the kinrath guts from this boot. Ian would not be pleased to hear that the attacks were becoming more frequent now. Climbing behind the driver's wheel, he gunned the engine and sped off in the direction of the far field. Kath hounds would soon catch wind of fresh meat and he didn't want to be around to deal with more hungry predators.
They would have to move the herd of iriaz to the eastern valley to avoid the kinrath. And they had just moved them here too. Why did Ian even bother to raise these flighty creatures? Who had ever heard of a farmer trying to domesticize them anyway? But he knew the man's mindset, always wanting to try something that had never been tried before. And iriaz was pretty good meat. He just wasn't sure there was a market big enough for it out there.
With a long sigh, he busied himself with steering the landspeeder through the chain of fields. The sea of gold rushing past him was calming, as was the wind that blew through his hair. A slight smile managed to creep onto his face as he drove. He would think of a plan with Ian later after supper. With that thought, his foot eased a bit from the gas pedal. Until he got back to the manor, it would just be him, the hovercar, and the entire expanse of grassland before him.
