Dying Light [EE5]

[Daunt]

He felt compelled to rise, and so he eventually did, turning round in attempt to trace the source of the other voice.

"Must I choose between untenable abstracts? Peace is as big a lie as power. Instead there is everyday struggle, doubt, pride, tension and all the uncertain outcomes. I want to know myself, be true to my roots, be sure of my abilities, protect those with me and kill those in my way. Is there no path through the Force that lets me be that? Ar there no shades to life when the Force is involved?"

He gripped the hilt tight. He tried to maintain calm, but his anger was mounting again.

[Dapper Dog]

"Peace is not the absence action, it is understanding of the self," the Jedi replied. "You can live your life your way but you are waiting for someone to tell you what that is, you need to decide that path. There are many shades, but it depends on your intent. The Force is a multitude of colors, but this anger and Fear will be a poison in time, and soon you will just be alone."

"Better that way, less people to betray you," the shadowed voice hissed. "Peace is submission and complacency. Free yourself of useless dogma. You have started down this path, embrace it... kill who you must, protect those that have value to you. There need not be anything else."

The Jedi added, "Choose for yourself but I have seen where that path leads, eventually you hurt or kill those you hold dear to you for want of power... and it is an illusion."

[Daunt]

[Morality play, from Confusion back to Malleability]

He listened carefully, suddenly finding it in himself to open to both narratives without bias, without hiding behind apprehensions and traumas. As they spoke, he buckled the lightsabre, slowly coming to a decision. "You are right, I must choose a path for myself. And whatever I choose, it shall bring me either toward the Light or toward the Dark. I shall not choose today, however. I must first live through my choices with the awareness of their meaning which I have acquired only just now. I don't know what ghosts you both are, and why you've taken interest in me, but thank you."

He took a deeper breath. "I will not outright divest myself of anger, fear, or urge to be powerful and victorious. Nor will I readily forego the pursuit of knowing myself, nor of peace of mind, nor my ability to trust and be selfless. I'll let life itself peel those off through trial and challenge, and see what remains."

He nodded in the dark. "I'll accept one, separate challenge from each of you, and then will earnestly face them in the days to come. You want to sway me, sway me. But not when I've just awoken from a Force nightmare that I actually can remember."

[Dapper Dog]

The shadowed voice hissed, "This is no game, that can be won, to live is to know that pain and conflict exists, better to be the one that inflicts it than be the inflicted."


The Jedi offered, "Then live, that is all anyone can do. Every choice will have consequences that resonate through the galaxy, seen and unseen. Choose carefully who you allow to control those decisions, be it yourself or some child who plays at being a Master."

"They will resonate, long after you have acted," the ghostly woman finished.

Then he is back on the dune where he started, the weapon sitting beside him under the night sky but time has passed the positions of the stars were different; perhaps an hour, maybe less.

[Daunt]

He stared into the stars for a longer while, imagining the choices ahead. Some obvious, some less so. Then, he would switch on the lightsabre to check if its colour had changed...

To his amazement, it shone bright orange. The colour of the sunset that had been. Or of the sunrise that would be. Light dying, or rising? He didn't know yet. But he eventually would.

To that future, he walked off the dunes, a changed man.

/scene