Chapter Text
Kahre Gialli had the terrible habit of fidgeting with his lightsaber. He really shouldn’t have, it was a dreadful practice. One that could have resulted in an awful accident right before the Apprentice Tournament of 975 ARR, if he hadn’t been drilled to exhaustion on the location of his training saber’s activation switch.
Fortunately for the Arkadian offshoot, this meant that he’d be able to participate in the Apprentice Tournament, whatever meager showing that may be. He’d managed to muddle his way up to this point, a decade and three more years spent with books and lightsaber katas and a frustrating lack of progress with the Force and anything heavier than the carts in the library.
But he could only exhale, and release those feelings into the Force. Across from himself, he eyed his opponent, Tap-Nar-Pal. Acknowledging the master between them, Kahre considered the fact that he liked Tap. He was a good clanmate, despite how often the Cerean dedicated both brains to being as stubborn as a Bantha . Settling into the Form I stance, he tried to release this frustration into the Force.
Tap took one step forward, and Kahre tried not to focus too hard on the fact that this was his last chance. Another, and he tried not to think about the gathered Masters, watching, judging. Just as Tap prepared to take one more step, Kahre came to the conclusion he didn’t like his clanmate that much. Midstep, Kahre lunged, stepping into Tap’s guard and meeting his blade with his own, hard. Sliding across Tap’s blade, he was able to take a glancing strike before stepping away.
“For a form based on disarmament, you feel awfully aggressive.” Tap said, wincing as he kept his guard up. A training saber to the bicep still hurt.
Kahre could only offer the most minuscule of shrugs, training saber humming along. “Needs must, Pal. And my needs mustn’t see me—” he only barely tapered off, an overhead swing flowing into a reversed swipe, catching Tap at the expense of getting tapped himself. But blast, did that sting !
Rather than stand his ground, Kahre opted to dodge out of the way of Tap’s attack, and the second, but that third caught him before he could get too clever. Pittering back, Kahre opted for a chop at the knees, and another, and as good as Tap’s guard was, it couldn’t manage a swipe to the head and a kick to the knees all at once. His guard stumbling, Tap was left clutching his forehead as Kahre landed one last, glancing strike.
Ultimately, both stood and bowed, and young Gialli managed to avoid exploding as he was approached by Ronhar Kim. “More aggressive blade work than one typically finds in Form I.” He started, looking with that same passive stare that seemed required for Jedi to elevate to Mastery.
“Aren’t Jedi supposed to adapt when they find an obstacle?” Kahre said, killing the smile on his face before Master Kim could speak on it.
With a nod, Master Kim’s hand clapped onto his shoulder. “I sense great things in your future, Padawan .” And at that, Kahre couldn’t truly bring himself to care about how damn wide his smile was.
—————
Three years later, months after surviving the baptism by fire that was Geonosis, Kahre noticed his hand shaking while scrolling through Master Kenobi’s incident report once more. He tried to release it into the Force, all of it; the report of sonic weapons, the smell of burning flesh, that fucking chittering—
He slapped his hand against the pad, and just thumbed the scroller.
A Sith Lord. In the Senate. Reported by another, Count Dooku , their enemy . Kahre had meditated on this. The frightening sense it made. He thought back to slimy senators and scummy businessmen he and Ronhar had had to defend. It made his guts toil with feelings and un -Jedi like thoughts. But these thoughts he pushed into the Force easily. For the solution had become apparent.
Midichlorian testing. Tragically, whoever this Sith Lord was had been missed as a child. Rare, astronomically so, but it could happen. If they were smart, their record would be middling, as average as the rest of the galaxy compared to most Jedi. Unfortunately for them, a live test was not so easily fooled.
His master agreed that it wouldn’t be definitive, but it would certainly point in the right direction. When his Master brought up his idea to his friend, the very Chancellor of the Republic, he once more exemplified the Jedi in how quickly he quashed his irritation. He thought Bail Organa of Alderon was everything a politician should strive to be, right up there with Palpatine, but there was such a thing as too soft. If people had been more decisive in general, the Separatist Crisis never would have escalated to this mess. .
When Kahre and his Master left, Palpatine urged them to reconsider. If they truly had no better alternative when they returned, he would go first—before the entire Delegation of 2000—to help root out this threat. When they arrived at Merson, chasing rumors of pirates, they had been expecting some light droid reinforcement, nothing they and their clones couldn’t handle. Then light reinforcements became a Lucrehulk and swarms of droids and pirates.
Kahre had thought his Aethersprite could reach Ronhar fast enough. Too fast, he screeched past as Vulture droids peeled off, allowing him to careen into the jungle floor. There, amongst the wreckage, he heard Ronhar tell Commander Dox to die well. There, he felt his Master die, a lone blaster report highlighting what he felt in the Force. From there, he fled, ducking pirates and droids, hiding in the growing dark.