Chương 54: ED : Chapter 52: Knighthood
The absolute stillness and silence of the Tranquility Spire had remained unbroken during my entire day and night long meditative vigil inside it. Making even the light footfalls now approaching seem rather loud. Loud enough to stir me from a trance-state which had been lessening gradually for the last couple of hours.
"It's time, Anakin" Dark Woman called out to me softly from the entryway to the veranda. I rose as if my body were being drawn up from it's kneeling position by invisible overhead wires. It was the first time my Master had ever called me by name when she was obviously prompting me about a tradition of or duty to the Order, and it hadn't escaped my attention.
Turning slowly, I smiled at the woman who could truthfully be said to have forged me, then bowed deeply to the Jedi Master. I didn't care that wasn't any part of the traditional series of events. The day I failed to show respect for Dark Woman, check my pulse or examine me for signs of an imposter.
The gesture brought a brief smile to the venerable yet still handsome woman's weathered face, as she inclined her head in answer, then asked quietly with a brief smile more amused than pleased "Feeling sufficiently focused upon your future path?"
I groaned quietly "To which future path should I give the most focus? I think I glimpsed a dozen distinct possibilities in the last twenty-four hours." My tone made it clear I was less than best-pleased with a future I could perceive in multiple ways with a variety of distinct differences.
Giving me a sympathetic look as we walked side by side to the turbo-lift which would carry us still higher in the Spire, the Jedi Master replied "Generally, the stronger the Knight-to-be, the more potential futures are glimpsed during the vigil. The vision-fragments do often contain some tidbits of information useful at some point down the line though.
While awaiting my own Knighting, I glimpsed an Echani cutting up an Antarian Ranger in an alleyway somewhere. Thirty years later, the woman I'd glimpsed tried to pass herself off to me as the very Ranger she'd murdered.
Her impersonation was so flawless, she might have won my trust and managed to catch me by surprise if something hadn't given me a bad feeling about her immediately. It took me hours after meeting her before I recognized the bounty-hunter from the vision, but there you are."
The lift's doors closed with a quiet hiss as we both turned to face them. The almost imperceptible tug of it's ascent symbolic of a call to a higher state of being.
While it continued to rise, I quietly remarked "I'm going to approach Master Vilbum about seeing what it would take to remove the Find the one grain of sand among the millions of bits of gravel test from the list of possible Trials of Insight.
The acuity of a given Force-sensitive's version of the Force Sense technique is fully half the individual's strength in the Force. It's a challenge biased in favor of the strongest Force-sensitives."
Dark Woman glanced my way with a long, considering expression on her face. Finally, she quietly replied "I don't disagree with you, but please, Anakin. Allow me to speak to the Caretaker of First Knowledge. You will damage your relationship with Master Vilbum if you are the one to bring this up, and I know you don't want that."
What the Jedi Master had just left unsaid was that Master Vilbum had leaned on the High Council with the full influence of his office to ease off on the nearly sheer challenge-curve through the final stretch.
Which would make my complaining about it nothing short of spitting full in the face of a Jedi Master who had worked tirelessly to see me given a fair shake. It would brand me the worst sort of ingrate, and play into the hands of my detractors like few other things might.
"Right. Perhaps I was too hasty and didn't consider the matter from every possible angle, Master. It's nothing which needs to be made an issue of immediately. The chances of them choosing the same Trial of Insight in the next year are miniscule, after all" I quietly responded as I stared straight ahead at the lift's doors.
My empathy allowing me to sense the amusement I couldn't see on my mentor's face. Say what you wished about my shortcomings, I had never been an ingrate, and had no plans to start now.
The silver-haired woman beside me glanced my way again. "Masters Piell and Rancisis won't appreciate you wore the black and dark blue, rather than the brown and off-white." It was a simple statement of fact from her. Lacking any judgment one way or another on the fact I wore dark blue beneath black, rather than off-white beneath brown.
"It would rightly invite contempt and criticism to wear the white-and-brown to be Knighted, then immediately revert to the blue-and-black, Master. I prefer being open and honest with who I am. Let any of them spend a few years forced to obedience by explosive implant.
They'd discover a new appreciation for the tiniest bit of control over one's appearance" I replied in quiet yet intent tones.
"I wouldn't have bought them for you if I didn't understand, Anakin. The blue does go beautifully with those blue eyes of yours" Dark Woman responded with a hint of warmth beneath her usual formal diction.
I sensed what was coming before the teasing barb was fired, and barely suppressed the desire to groan as the lift took the sharp jog to the right which warned we were in the much shorter apex-spire shaft now. The one only a couple floors beneath the Hall of Knighthood.
"Besides, the blue and black makes of you a much more dashing figure in a certain holo-novel's title image. What was it's name again? It seems to have slipped my mind" The Jedi Master quipped in an absolutely neutral monotone.
Gritting my teeth, I did my best to release my irritation into the Force, then answered stiffly "Jedi Against the Mad Doctor, Master." Referencing the Naboo holo-novel released in the wake of our capture of Dr. Vindi.
A person who might well tempt me to explore what was required to Force Choke someone had snapped several holo-stills of me during the Theed ball without my knowledge, then passed the images on for use as cover-art. My first instinct had been to demand the image be parted from the holo-novel.
Only to discover from my wiser and more experienced Master this would only result in an "underground version" of the holo-novel which would make the entire work far more popular than it presently was for the taboo air surrounding it.
That was why the Order's official policy had long since been to ignore such unless a Jedi's image was being used for clearly unscrupulous reasons.
Frustratingly, the author had donated seventy-five percent of the proceeds to a charity helping people who are suffering due to the Secessionist Crisis. How was I supposed to go on a righteous tear against a charitable dodge?
I might have come up with something clever to deflect my Master from pressing her advantage to bring up the young teen girls who once in a great while actually approached me for an, ugh, autograph. Fortunately, the lift-doors hissed open just then. Revealing a darkened Hall of Knighthood and the circle of waiting Jedi Masters with a single obvious gap to complete it.
It occurred to me my normally prim Master had resorted to teasing to keep me from growing nervous and stressing during the lengthy ascent. Filling me with a rush of warm affection for the woman, as I proceeded her through the gap into the center of the circle. Sensing her stop and complete that circle even before I turned so I could see her as I went to my knees in silence.
A quick glance revealed the circle around me consisted proceeding clockwise of Grandmaster Yoda, Master of the Order Windu, Caretaker of First Knowledge Astaal Vilbum, Master Yaddle, Master Billaba, Master (Plo) Koon, Battlemaster Drallig, Master Giett, Master Poof, Master Fisto, Master (Qui Gon) Jinn, and of course my own Master to make the ceremonial twelfth.
Many of these Jedi Masters had played significant roles in my having come this far. All of them were individuals I possessed a deep and abiding respect for. Even if one of them had surprised me by choosing to be here today.
My eyes flicked up to meet Cin Drallig's for a moment, then I closed my right hand over my closed left fist before me and bowed my head to the Battlemaster. If he cared to be here despite things getting a little heated between us during the Trials, I wanted to mend fences if that was at all possible.
I'd found that the more time which went by, the more I cared about the fact the man was an absolutely brilliant instructor of an art I'd devoted much of my life to mastering, and the less his possessing a prissy personality concerned with the proprieties mattered to me.
I caught an approving pulse of emotion from several of the gathered Masters as my emotions were scrutinized and discovered to contain no insincere overtones.
It was a little disheartening there were people here who'd even considered the prospect I might behave in so false a manner, but I remembered my confrontations in the Mirror and my resolve remained undaunted. I would allay any doubts that any of them possessed about me over time.
Yoda clearing his throat prompted me to shift on my knees to face him squarely. Which was perhaps something I would have done immediately, if the Grandmaster had been in his traditional spot.
It was only as I reoriented myself, that it occurred to me the cagey and ever so cunning Hobgoblin of the Light had kept himself out of the equation to allow for the possibility of something like my gesture to the Battlemaster.
It was going to be a great many years, if ever, before my mind was going to be up to the task of navigating the labyrinth which was the mind of the Grandmaster. I could see that with the sharpness of a lightsaber's shroud.
Surprising me further, the diminutive green Jedi Master spoke the opening words of the Knighting Ceremony as if he spoke Basic like the rest of us all the time.
Looking down at me from the chair he stood upon to give him the proper perspective on my kneeling form, Yoda recited the following with solemn gravitas. Filling the room with a seriousness bordering on the sacred in so doing.
"We are all Jedi. The Force speaks through us. Through our actions, the Force proclaims itself and what is real. Today, we are here to acknowledge what the Force has proclaimed" The Grandmaster intoned. Power filled his voice and caused it to carry powerfully throughout the room despite the quiet, measured way in which he'd proclaimed these things.
In perfect sequence proceeding from Master Windu's violet lightsaber, the lightsabers of each of the others hissed to life as if a single unifying impulse had rippled through each Jedi Master. Until only Master Yoda's lightsaber had yet to burn.
"Anakin Skywalker" Yoda named me, his emerald green blade at last hissing to life as I bowed my head.
"By the right of the Council" he declared. His lightsaber descending to hover just above my right shoulder before rising once more.
"By the will of the Force" The ancient Jedi Master announced. Lightsaber crossing above my head to descend to just above my left shoulder and rise again.
"I dub thee Jedi, Knight of the Republic" The Grandmaster finished. Lightsaber blade flashing downward with killing speed past my left cheek, then upward again just as swiftly.
I felt the weight which had tugged and dangled ever more firmly on the left rear quarter of my scalp for the past fifteen years vanish. My eyes flicked downward, and found my Padawan's braid with it's three specialty-bands lying directly in front of me as if it had been neatly smoothed once laid there.
The precision of Yoda's cut had been such that he'd used the angle and the speed of his blade at the time the braid had been severed to determine precisely where it would land despite it having begun at an entirely different angle and orientation.
I took up the braid in my right hand, then re-clipped the lightsaber I'd placed on the ground before me to my belt with my dominant left hand. Only then rising, and offering the entire circle one extremely deep bow before departing to the lift in the absolute silence of tradition.
Although I did catch more than one face smiling at me as I moved beyond the circle, and I couldn't tell you but that my own face might have been locked into a wide smile.
When the lift-doors hissed closed, I did remember clearly thinking "I did it, I made it, I'm a JEDI KNIGHT!"
My scream of complete triumph would remain between me and the soundproofing of the lift.
...
Hey guys can you throw some power stones to Elevate the ranking.
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