Pilgrimage to the Jedi Temple 2

CHAPTER ONE:

Failure.

That was the only thought burning in my mind as I stood at yet another dead end.

I had came to the Temple to pay homage to the dead, yes. But also to see if any information on the Temple Guardians remained undisturbed. Their elusive and masked ranks protected these hallowed halls which now lay broken and ruined. A testament to the devastation wrought by Darth Magus and his acolytes.

My boots crunched on the shattered stone of once great pillars as I paced back and forth, the elegantly carved arches were still inlaid with gold in some places. The bright lines muted by a thick layer of dust. Whatever scavenger had desicrated this place had evidently been interupted, but it was nothing recent.

In this place it was easy to believe the trillions living in this eternal city in their hive like stacks that clawed up into the black were only a fleeting interlude. That this was the natural state of things. That our most fervent dreams and glorious accomplishments would crumble into dust that blanketed the ground and choked the air.

The echoes of the dead still haunted this place, sending ripples through the force that tainted everything. Their screams of anguish and terror were still faintly heard, as if across a vast ocean of time. Had it really been only a mere two decades since the slaughter?

And yet fainter still were points of light. Beacons of hope that clawed against the crashing waves that threatened to swallow their hearts. My companions were few on this expadition, our primary directions were to see what had been accessed, and what may still lie undisturbed. And so we came, knowing that in this place that was once a santuary we may join in the corrupted seiren song of the dead. Our voices forever echoing through the halls and chambers, becoming only a wisper among the storm that crawled within the skulls of any who would open their minds and hearts to our presince unprotected.

I sat down hard on one of the broken arches, the full weight of what could happen should I fall here hitting me like the shuttle that had tore through the main hall signaling the start of the slaughter. Clinging to any sense of stability and order, trying to hold off the waves of dispair and whispering voices that raged like a storm just out of reach I tried to center myself. Sensing those few motes of light, and now... something else.

A presince. Faint and on the edge of perception, it gave me a sense of calm that stemmed the tides by only a fraction, yet it was enough. Enough to begin to form the baracades that would hold back the crawling tendrils of fear. And then slowly it began to fade, lessening its grip and becoming unintelagable behind the chaotic foaming sea.

Then I was once again facing the full onslaught, tendrils of malevolence creeping in through my defences. Yet still I held them back, drawing on the force, the faint echoes of life from the reeming trillions that permiated this world.

As calm returned, I knew I needed to know more