My Flesh May Fail (Part 1/4)

“Eyes closed.”

“Just breathe.”

“Controlled, fluid motions.”

“Muscles firm, arms out, feet set apart, knees slightly bent, back taut and straight…”

“Trust your mind more than your eyes.”

“Focus on my words first, then your surroundings and body, and lastly your thoughts.”

The young Mon Calamari Jedi apprentice singled out his Master’s raspy mantras as he stood atop a stone, surrounded by a grassy field and chalky, jagged rocks. At least, that’s what he assumed his surroundings were like. 

“And no matter what you do, use your movements to determine your surroundings, don’t only let your surroundings determine your movement.”

In actuality, Chell Raddus had been barred from opening his eyes since the moment he and his Master had first exited their luxurious Jedi shuttle an indeterminable number of hours ago. He knew neither the planet, nor the system they had traveled to.

What he did know was that his Master had requested this specially sanctioned trip directly from the top. Chell had found it incredibly embarrassing that none other than Grand Master Yoda of the legendary Jedi Council himself had approved this special training endeavor. 

“Is this really necessary? I feel like we’re wasting-”

“Hush child,” Jedi Master Mon’grell Kbatha said, cutting off his padawan’s interjections.

“Focus.”

Focus, right… Chell let out a deep breath and felt a muscle in his left arm twitch ever so slightly. To any normal person, this spasm would be nigh unnoticeable. However, for a Jedi who, for hours on end, had been allowing the Force to flow through every micron of his body, as well as a small sphere of his immediate surroundings, this had sent massive ripples throughout his very being that had almost caused him to lose his focus entirely.

He supposed this was exactly why he still required focal training like this in the first place, but it vexed him nonetheless.

Chell already knew he was falling behind in his studies, this trip just felt like the whole Jedi Order was now rubbing it in his face. 

His attunement with the Force was weak, and it only felt like it was growing weaker by the day. He had been held back in multiple classes, watched most of his peers gain masters and proper training, and even witnessed a few of them become full fledged Jedi Knights while he was still waving a training saber around with a bunch of much younger children. And it was frustrating.

It wasn’t like he was a bad student, quite the contrary. He excelled in a number of fields including cartography, hand-to-hand combat, and even engineering. However, the Jedi Consulars had determined he had a much lower midi-chlorian count than they were initially led to believe which was responsible for hindering his overall Force sensitivity.

Since most of the Jedi only seemed to care about one’s attunement to the Living Force, he had been overlooked by elder after elder who were searching for the appropriate candidate for an apprentice. Some of his classmates had even been assigned to Jedi without their acknowledgement, but he had never been one of those lucky few.

He supposed that Master Kbatha had been the perfect match for him then, and he was at the very least glad that the aging Tarsunt Jedi had chosen Chell without even so much as considering the other trainees.

Both Master and Apprentice were outcasts in their own right, Chell being dubbed a challenge due to his weak connection to the Force, and Mon’grell being denied a seat on the Jedi Council, as well as already losing two padawans during his time in the order before either had even reached Knighthood.

Hopefully Chell would be the one to break that tradition…

Nearly losing focus to his stream of consciousness, Chell was brought back to his pitch black reality by a strong gust of wind. At least, it felt like wind, but it may have just been another ripple in the Force. He shifted his arms into a new meditative form as he slid his foot back to the edge of the stone he was currently perched upon.

He had slowly lost bearing of his surroundings, the once outlined rocky outcrops and flowing blades of long wildgrass now darkened by his own thoughts.

But unlike the previous hours, something felt different now. He could sense his Master a few meters to his left, but there was now another presence somewhere in the distance. An aura that was much stronger than the small animals he had felt scurrying around at the edge of his sensory reach.

His initial thought was that it was one of the Clones they had left onboard the shuttle. Chell wouldn’t put it past Clone Sergeant Moon to try and sneak up on the Jedi duo to gauge their reactions. However, this presence felt foreign, almost fierce. Different from either Moon or Commander Frank. And it was approaching, fast.

Chell longed to open his eyes. He needed to confirm exactly who or what was drawing near to him. But his Master’s words ran like a loop through his head.

“Trust your mind more than your eyes.”

Surely Master Kbatha sense this as well, right?

Maybe it was nothing. Maybe it was a test. Kbatha was known for his outlandish training regimens, so that could very well be a possibility. He would just keep his eyes closed and focus his attention on the inbound entity.

That was when he realized he couldn’t tell which direction it was coming from, only that it was growing closer to him. He tried to draw all of his attention away from everything else and focus it solely on their new “visitor.” However, there was still no discernible difference in how the entity resonated, and before he knew it, Chell found himself losing his balance.

He made a few rapid adjustments to his stance and regained his composure moments before he heard the old Jedi clear his throat over to the side, Chell quickly attempting to reinstate the muscle memory he had just spent hours trying to acquire.

Still, he was now feeling incredibly nervous. The idea of not knowing which direction the individual was approaching from was spreading like a cancer in his mind. If he wasn’t a naturally amphibious species, he probably would have broken out into a cold sweat by now.

He heard the grasses rustle around him on all sides, and he could no longer tell what was the wind and what was not. 

What if it was the Separatists? What if he could only sense their organic commander, but he and his Master were actually surrounded by an entire droid army? Chell had never been in real combat before. He’d be dead in seconds. Why wasn’t Master Kbatha saying anything? What was going on?

Chell could no longer handle the suspense. His thoughts were overwhelming him and further clouding his focus. He slowly opened his large, bulbous eyes, the light temporarily obscuring his vision.

Instead of some sort of death trap or worst case scenario, the young Jedi was taken aback by just how breathtakingly beautiful his surroundings were. In front of him was a small field of yellow-green grass flowing like an ocean in the wind, periodic rocks jutting upward like the massive fins of a Frist Shark. Beyond the field was a deep and lush canyon permeated by a wide, rushing river. 

To his side was the source of the waterway, a mountain resembling an overgrown variation of the slate gray rocks protruding from the ground around him. A waterfall was proudly bursting forth from the mountain and spilling down into the valley below. A colorful assortment of avian creatures dove from the rocky cliffs down into the rapids, lifting large fish back up to their unseen grotto nests in a continuous cycle. 

The massive waterfall was too distant for Chell to clearly detect, which is why he hadn’t sensed its presence while meditating. However, he could now distinguish a low, constant rumble from the whitewater tributary that he had not noticed until this very moment. This world was stunning. A stark contrast to the perpetual cityscape of Coruscant that he had grown far too accustomed to during his childhood. All of Chell’s anxieties momentarily washed away as he basked in the noonday sun.

Then he remembered his Master in a sudden panic, and turned his head ever so slightly, hoping to avoid a disapproving gaze. Fortunately, he now realized that Master Kbatha was also standing on a stone not too far from him, albeit in a much more reserved stance, but his arms were still outstretched and his eyes were gently closed.

Chell silently celebrated his evasion of his Master’s stringent discipline and he began to close his eyes once again, completely forgetting the presence that had brought him out of his meditation in the first place.

“You opened your eyes, did you not, young one?” Kbatha said, startling the young Jedi.

“Was it that obvious?”

He heard the hairy Jedi Master let out something that sounded simultaneously like a sigh and a snarl, “you betray your emotions rather easily, padawan. I could feel both your anxiety and excitement, just as I could see it on your face.”

Before Chell could come up with a response that may have saved him from at least some of his assured punishment, he realized that the foreign presence was now right upon him.

He heard a muffled voice exclaim something from directly behind and immediately spun to face whoever or whatever had been approaching.

Chell was not going to die today. 

Not here.

Not now.