The Rebel Faction

He knew he’d been here longer then it felt like he had, his growing skill with the Force and his advancement in learning Basic was proof of that, but still it felt like it was only yesterday his Aunt Varcanna left him here.

It wasn’t nearly as bad as he thought it would be. He had a lot of friends, though his best friend Mortor, who was the only other Trandoshan padawan in the Academy, still had to translate for him a lot of the time. Mortor was a full rotation younger then him, having been dropped off at the Academy a few months before he was, but had the advantage of having already known Basic. His younger friend didn’t talk too much about where he came from, just that his parents traveled a lot and recognized early on the travelers life would have been too hard on a young Force Sensitive child like him. Silonik did pick up a hint of jealousy from Mortor sometimes, no dobut in regards to the fact he had four siblings to look forward to seeing again when his family came to visit. That is, if Aunt Varcanna dared to bring the likes of his more aggressive brother Trissan to the Academy.

“What you giggling about Sil?” He heard Mortor say, who was laying on the bed playing with a Force toy they were allowed to borrow to practice with. He was trying to direct a ball through a maze of transparent walls in a foot by foot cube, but not having much luck: telekinesis was Mortor’s weakest Force talent.

“Just thinking about one of my siblings.” Silonik replied, glancing out the window.

“Let me guess. Trissan right?”

Silonik giggled. “Yeah. I remember when he used to claim I was cheating when I would beat him in our scraps. Don’t see how it was cheating since I was doing just what was natural right?”

Mortor pushed aside the Force toy, giving up on it for the time being. “Probably just jealous he couldn’t do what you can.” He replied. “Still, he’s not someone I would want to meet. Your sisters sound like fun though.”

“Maybe when grandma is doing whatever it is Aunty Varca said she was doing she’ll bring them down for a visit.” He walked over and sat on the bed next to Mortor. With little effort he floated the ball through the maze. “They’ll probably smother me with hugs when they see me again.”

“Bah. Show off.” Mortor said with a faint scowl. “Someday I’ll be as good as you.”

“Not if you keep giving up.” Silonik said with a faint smile.

“I was just taking a break…that’s all.”

“Uh huh. Come on, it’s dinner time, we better get down to the cafeteria before the big kids eat it all.”

“I’m more worried about that one kid, Jacob….” Mortor said reluctantly as he slid off the bed.

“Well if you hadn’t slipped that pine cone on his chair…” Silonik said, wagging his finger at him in a scolding manner.

“Hey…that day I was able to beat the beginners Force toy, I wanted to celebrate somehow…”

Silonik shook his head, chuckling faintly as he headed out of the room, Mortor following close behind.

“What ya doing Mortor?” Silonik asked his friend, noticing that Mortor had picked up the Force toy and was heading for the door.

“I gonna trade this in for the beginner one, practice on that one some more.” Mortor said softly.

“Told you, you give up too easily.” Silonik teased.

Mortor shrugged. “Want me to get the advanced one for you while I’m at it?”

“Sure why not. Think you can carry both alright?”

“I’ll manage.” Mortor said as he exited the room, leaving Silonik slightly baffled.

While he waited Silonik practiced levitating various objects in the room, even managed to levitate one of the beds briefly. A cool breeze hit his cheek at one point and Silonik looked out the window to see the colors of the sunset. Wait a minute. Who opened the window?

The answer came a short moment later when a dark robed figure suddenly appeared in the window, nearly making Silonik cry out in surprise. Under the robe he could see little beyond a hint of a purple tunic and a green snout, marking this one as a Trandoshan like him. The funny thing was, this Trandoshan was shorter then Master Leia and much shorter then his Aunt Varca. Was this one a kid like him, only older?

Silonik could only watch as this strange robed Trandoshan stepped down from the window sill and gave the room a quick look over before finally focusing his gaze down at him. His presence Silonik found to be overwhelming, making the young Trandoshan tremble: but was it with awe or fear?

“It has been far too long since I’ve last seen you.” The stranger said with a smile, in a voice he would have sworn he had heard before. “My have you grown…”

Silonik found himself taking a step back, uncertain as to how to react. “Who…who are you?” He asked, his voice squeaking faintly.

Leia had been purposefully headed in the direction of her chambers in the Academy, with the intention of retiring to them for the evening. However, the sight of a young Trandoshan struggling to maintain a grasp on a collection of objects too large for his short arms to easily carry caught her attention. The young trando seemed to be headed to the Padawan's dormitories, and the expression on his face was that of pure determination.


Leia smiled as she recognized the young trandoshan to be Mortor, and she moved to intercept him. Mortor nearly dropped whatever he was carrying several times just in the time it took her to reach him, and as they met Leia fluidly reached down to scoop up part of his burden into her own arms. Though Mortor looked relieved to be rid of some of the load, he also seemed dissapointed that he had not been faring very successfully on his own. But Leia found the fact that he was alone at all to be rather odd... his partner in crime, Silonik, was missing. Leia knew this to be a rare occurrence; the two younglings were the closest of friends, and one rarely ventured very far without the other.


What Mortor had been carrying had not so much been heavy as just bulky and awkward to handle, and Leia slipped the boxlike object under one arm as she glanced down at Mortor.


"Now what are you up to, all by yourself?"

Leia was having a hard time understanding the logic behind Mortor's decision to downgrade himself to a challenge he had already mastered, and when Mortor suddenly seemed confused by his decision as well, Leia found herself utterly mystified.


"I had a sudden strong need to go switch them out…but it’s not there anymore."


Mortor was just finishing his explanation when a sudden cold, dark tremor in the Force washed over Leia. She shivered, and turned to look down the hall that lead to the Padawan's dormitories with an increasing suspicion. It almost felt like someone had just tapped into and briefly manipulated the Dark Side of the Force... an act unheard of, in a Jedi Academy.


What is going on here...?


Meanwhile Mortor was indicating his desire to return to the storeroom to retrieve his old toy, but Leia shook her head. It was possible that Mortor was trying to cover for some sort of trouble Silonik was getting himself into... and judging from the disturbance in the Force Leia had just sensed, it couldn't have been anything good. But then there had also been Varcanna's warning about the possibilty of Trazu and the K’Satizitus attempting to seek out Silonik...


Leia hid her growing concern behind a mask of neutrality. She didn't want to scare Mortor...


"You know what, let's just take these back to your room for now. It's getting late, and actually I've got a different intermediate one laying around somewhere that you might like better. I'll make a point to find it later and give it to you tomorrow."


Mortor nodded in assent, and soon found himself struggling to keep up with Leia’s brutally fast walking pace as they headed back to the dormitories. Usually the Jedi Master had more of a mind to moderate her pace to one that shorter legs could more easily keep up with, but for some reason she seemed to be in some sort of hurry…


As Leia emerged from the stairwell and stepped onto the dormitory floor, she was greeted by the sounds of a struggle up ahead, and suddenly Silonik’s voice cried out.


“Master Leia! Help!”


Leia heard a door slam shut, and the sounds grew muffled. Her hand automatically reached for her saber as she broke out in a sprint for Silonik’s room.


Mortor emerged from the stairwell and stepped into the hallway in just enough time to see Leia key in an override code to the door leading into his room. She had dropped the Force toy she had been carrying, and he could clearly see the silver gleam of the saber hilt in her hand…


The door slid open with a hiss, to reveal Silonik floating several feet in the air in the middle of the room, while another adult Trandoshan looked on. The adult Trando was male, and rather short for a fully developed male of his species. He looked an awful lot like the description Varcanna had given her of Silonik’s possessed father, Trazu…


Leia’s sudden entrance into the room surprised the adult Trando, causing him to drop Silonik as his attention turned to the new intruder. Leia pointed the business end of her saber at him, but did not ignite it.


“Who are you!?” She snapped.

Young Mortor reached the doorway to his room in just enough time to see Leia dive headfirst out the window. More than a little disturbed by his Master's odd behavior, the Padawan rushed to the window and peered out in time to see Leia land in a catlike crouch on the ground several stories below, and sprint off in a terrible hurry.


A quick look in the direction she was headed revealed that she seemed to be chasing a dark figure lugging some sort of squirming, screaming burden slung over one shoulder.


***


Leia was vaguely curious as to where an ancient spirit possessing the body of a fully grown male Trandoshan thought he could run to in a city such as Theed, especially carrying a rebellious young Trandoshan Jedi Padawan. There were very few Trandos on the planet to try and blend in among to begin with, and Leia's knowledge of their surroundings gave her a definite advantage. That meant that the K’Satizitus was fully confident that it could either simply overpower or outsmart Leia... Though many had held that same belief in the past and had soon found it to be quite erroneous, Leia had taken Varcanna's earlier warnings to heart. She had never dealt with an evil mind and body controlling, force wielding spirit before...


But still... where did the ancient spirit think it was going, that Leia would not follow?