Chapter 53: ED : Chapter 51: Consequences Confronted III
It was maddening dealing with this man. Not just in his own person, but due to the unthinking worship of the status quo he was a symbol for.
The galaxy was on the brink of a conflict all set to be worse than the Clone Wars, and this arch-traditionalist had no questions or doubts. He would have died surprised by mind-controlled clone treachery, if not for my intervention, but to him, I was the problem.
...
For just a moment or two, I wondered if it really was possible to change the Jedi Order for the better. Without the shakeup precipitated by huge numbers of Jedi casualties during this or that cataclysmic event, would I ever be able to convince enough of them that some of our present ways needed to change?
Ferus interrupted my bleak musing with a sniff and a pronouncement which came off soundly smugly superior to me. "Your problem, Skywalker, is you think it's your place to change things. Your right to save us all from our woeful ignorance when compared to your brilliant insights.
You believe you speak and act with the moral authority of the Supreme Good, and it makes you unspeakably arrogant even when you believe yourself to be working within the system. You're never working within the system or accepting of your place within it.
To you, it's simply a matter of biding your time and playing along. Until you're in a position to change things as you believe they should be changed."
He looked at me with a mix of pity and contempt, as he concluded with the question "How is that the least little bit different from what Palpatine just tried as Chancellor?"
Initially, I wanted to refute that on knee-jerk principle. Yet I'd had similar thoughts myself more than once. The expression of resulting disquiet as I considered various possible responses must have shown on my face, because Ferus leaned forward and pressed the point.
Thrusting an accusatory finger in my direction, as he declared "You're no different than any of the many Dark Jedi who have preceded you.
It always begins with philosophical and ideological differences of opinion, but an arrogant confidence in your own moral supremacy inevitably sours into contempt for those who refuse to see things your way.
A contempt which will invariably excuse ever greater moral compromises to bypass the impediments posed by those insisting on resisting your inspired goals.
From there it's just another in a long line of blood-drenched rampages until others eventually stop you. At a significant cost in suffering and innocent lives, of course."
It wasn't that I believed any of that. It was the realization this self-satisfied, status quo worshiping arch-conservative might well represent the perspectives of a great many present-day Jedi which made my heart sink.
How was I going to persuade Jedi I'd never met, with values different from my own owing to the differences in species, if I couldn't persuade a fellow human I'd known for many years?
If I couldn't convince the Jedi to become more flexible, then getting through the upcoming war and dealing with the Banite Sith was almost pointless. The Lost Tribe of the Sith might easily bring about even more destruction than Palpatine and his cronies. Possibly even causing another series of events where hundreds of Jedi turned to the Dark Side at once.
"Is it finally beginning to sink in, Skywalker? This is why Masters Piell and Rancisis did everything they legally could to prevent your training.
You and your wrongheaded need to fix what isn't broken could lead a large number of Jedi impressed with all this Chosen One nonsense astray. Causing an inordinate amount of suffering, and distracting the Order from the vital work it does"
Ferus pressed in the manner of someone talking at rather than to another person. His confidence was the confidence of the worker-ant which could not imagine anything beyond the narrow list of tasks for which it had been brought into existence.
It wasn't Ferus-the-individual which so disheartened and filled me with hopelessness. It was the almost mindless and sometimes entirely baseless reverence for the ways of antiquity he stood as the symbol of which dimmed my hopes and so diminished my confidence.
A feeling which gave me empathy for the victims of the Sarlacc. Just slowly ground down and used up by something which fed off your hopeless efforts to oppose it's ability to constrain you as something consumed all of your potential.
If reason wouldn't do it, then I had no idea how to get through to Jedi like Ferus. The weight of that understanding was like a pack full of mandalorian iron ingots.
It was a realization which threatened to crush the hope from me. What could I do, if I couldn't get through to him with words? It wasn't as if I could manipulate him into going along or use force. That would only prove his point.
It was like this understanding increased the very gravity working upon me. A room which had always been a place of relaxation and a haven from worldly concerns now felt heavy and oppressive. Ferus seemed to gain height and substance, while I began to feel weaker and more off-balance than I had at any time since before my emancipation.
Memories of the routine indignities and thoughtless offenses against my worth as an individual while trapped as Watto's property crowded in on me like a horde of vengeful ghosts out to drain me of all vitality so they could force me to join them.
"Can you feel it, Skywalker? Is the truth finally crowding out the self-centered delusions where you feature prominently as some sort of savior the Jedi don't need?" The handsome Jedi Knight condescendingly questioned in the manner of someone not looking for a real answer. Just someone to admit defeat and agree with him.
Blackness was actually crowding in like concentrated moonless night to blot out the Room's edges. It had already devoured the sky-scape, and was now spiraling inward toward Ferus and I with an inexorable inevitability.
I hardly noticed, as burdened as I was by an ever increasing despair. The blackness was almost touching me when a chiding voice echoed faintly up to me from the well of memory.
It wouldn't have gotten past the whispers of doubt and fears of failure hammered home by the ghosts of uncertainty and indecision, but these were words I'd heard so many times they were carved into the underpinnings of my psyche at this point.
"Root yourself in this present moment. Fear can only exist in your thoughts of the future. Focus on what you can do in the now, and leave the future to it's own devices" Dark Woman's remembered voice sternly reminded me.
It suddenly occurred to me I was coming at this all wrong. Trying to view the change I wanted to bring as one vast wave to encompass the entire Jedi Order in a single flash of enlightenment was wish-fulfillment nonsense.
I didn't need to convince all the Jedi of anything. Not simultaneously, and surely not as some incontrovertible revelation handed down from on high to sweep all I disagreed with aside in a flash.
"I may not convince you or those like you I'm right, Ferus, but there are others. Other Jedi I might convince one at a time, with patience and hard work, by exemplifying another way of doing things in my own conduct.
It isn't about winning some kind of who's right pissing match. I want what's best for our brothers and sisters, so I'll show those who are open to it my ideas in practice"
I finally responded to my adversary's saccharine moral superiority with my own reawakened belief in myself.
The blackness shuddered and slowed to a crawl, but Ferus opened his mouth to retort with more support for stasis and stagnation. I didn't give him the chance, as I went on before he could do so.
"No, I listened to you at length. Respectfully, it's my turn, Ferus. Jedi don't abandon debate and the exchange of ideas as a means of resolving conflict unless there's no other choice" I said in a determined yet polite way. Acknowledging we were spiritual kin, as I acknowledged his right to his own opinion.
Unwilling to abandon the standard of upright Jedi behavior, Ferus hesitated, and with him, so did the coalesced darkness crawl to a halt only a meter and change away. Leaving the two of us in a tube of wavering reality on the horizon of hungry oblivion.
"There will be those who see the wisdom in what I'm advocating. It may take years, or even decades, but patience and dedication will see me through to persuading enough Jedi to peacefully bring about an improvement.
Superior results will lend weight to the position of those who see things as I do. The day will come when the High Council will need to give ear to our concerns in the interests of not appearing to lack all belief in their advocacy for peaceful resolution of conflict by discussion and debate.
That, or accept the formation of another group like the Altisians or Green Jedi" I declared with renewed confidence. Meeting my opponent's gaze once more, as I dared him to deny the validity of my course.
"It, it will never work. It shouldn't work, and that's all there is to it!" Ferus stubbornly declared. Once more crossing his arms over his chest. He seemed surprised when the darkness didn't begin advancing again at this pronouncement.
"If there is real worth in the effort I won't abandon while life and strength remain, then the realization of the ideas I champion will refute your declaration. If there isn't, then others will perceive as much, and those ideas will pass away"
I responded with poise and the serenity of one who knows his place in the scheme of things. I favored a foe who had yet to apprehend his own defeat with pity, before gently explaining it to him.
"You abandoned any pretense of discourse and debate with that last bit solipsism. Abandoning any pretense of moral authority in doing so, with your absolutist declaration" I explained gently.
Seeing Ferus for the first time not simply as the enforcer of my status as an outsider, and the enemy of what I stood for.
His own uncertainties he soothed by embracing orthodoxy and procedure. For all his maddening qualities, he was trying to do the right thing as he understood it. I could get behind that. Even if his way would never be my way.
White cracks had begun to form in the darkness and what little bit of the Room remained. Now, those cracks began to grow ever more radiant, as a new sense of peace and purpose filled me.
There was no benefit in getting angry with the likes of Ferus. I needed to focus on doing what I knew to be right each day, and leave those who insisted on remaining mired in the past to their own devices.
A smile quirked the corners of my lips upward, as everything dissolved into a soothing white radiance.
...
I opened my eyes, saw the concerned, questioning look on my Master's face, then nodded solemnly. The poise in the face of a world which so often tried to fly apart at the seams?
I finally really grasped how my Master could manage it. The feeling of being grounded and rooted in the moment by a sense of purpose I knew nothing would easily set aside was exhilarating.
"Congratulations, Aspirant. You have overcome the Trial of the Spirit by Facing the Mirror" Dark Woman quietly declared. The pride evident in her voice as she flashed me one of those dearly-won smiles of approval.
"Thank you, Master" I replied in a thin, weak tone.
Then I fell over and blacked out.
...
Hey guys can you throw some power stones to Elevate the ranking.
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