Chapter 5 - The Choice
When the explosion sounded, not many had time to react, the Jedi within the perimeter had almost lost their footing, what's to say of those walking outside near the temple grounds? What could have caused this messed-up situation?
Nobody knows but the reaction was timely. Just as two teens hopped from the hole in the temple gardens. A shield was risen covering the whole place to stop anyone from leaving or entering.
The ground shook constantly and many people cried in fear while running down the roads. From afar, Shadow saw many explosions happening and it soon became clear that whatever managed to melt a hole through the Jedi Temple was wreaking havoc across Coruscant surface level.
"Holy crap!" Ahsoka exclaimed as she looked behind her. When she followed him out of the temple to check the source of the explosion she never expected to see a hole so big as this one! How many of her could fit inside? Five? Seven? She didn't know the answer for that but knew that a troublesome fellow was having fun in the city.
"Hey, let's go! We need to stop it!" Ahsoka waved and followed the trail of destruction without looking back. Shadow, however, didn't listen. He just tilted his head and remained motionless, why should he help? There were no orders, it wasn't something that required him.
Not listening any steps, Ahsoka drifted across the ground and turned back to glare at Shadow. "What are you doing!? Move!"
"I refuse." Shadow turned his head away with a visible grunt and was soon caught by surprise by his own actions. What was he doing?
"Y-you refuse??" Ahsoka looked at him in shock. "What the hell are you talking about?! People might die if we don't help!"
Shadow who still had his back turned towards her flinched. An unknown feeling crept into his mind as he shook his head. "You are the best youngling of all clans in the temple right now. I'm sure you can handle yourself.
Ahsoka couldn't believe what she was hearing, she would have even laughed if it wasn't a pressing matter. Walking over to him, she punched him in the chest. The attack was so sudden and unexpected he froze for a moment, taking the hit and falling on his butt.
"What was that for?" He asked in a tone that become increasingly more recognizable.
Ahsoka herself could easily tell what it was for she had felt that way many times. "How could act annoyed when people's lives are in danger?!"
"Why should I even think about it? Their lives are not my responsibility."
Raising her eyebrow, Ahsoka bit her lips in anger and clenched her fist. "... I should have listened to the others, you are a waste of time."
She turned around and burst through the debris, following the creature.
Seeing how she acted, Shadow closed his eyes and the corner of his lips turned slightly down. The nerve, she came to mess up with him and still expected that he would offer assistance? Why complete a request that offers him no benefit at all?
Looking up towards the dull gray sky of Coruscant he closed his eyes and drew a mouthful of air while feeling the droplets of water from the rain beginning to fall. He couldn't understand the situation happening, while it's true that he was being taught by a Jedi, who wasn't one per see. As an outsider, he wasn't even allowed a lightsaber nor any other similar things.
Ahsoka who had all that still sought his help for no reason at all. Having learned or not the tenets of the Order, he was by no means bound by the principles of the Jedi. The lives or deaths of the people on this planet didn't concern him, and... he didn't want to help her.
As odd as it might sound, that little girl managed to invoke a strange feeling within him, it reminded him of the time he died, some sort of hesitance, or perhaps, unwillingness.
Shaking his head, he was about to return to the temple when he noticed something. Wailing on the floor was a small creature, a very squirrel-like one.
"You...?" Dropping on his knee Shadow carefully picked up the small animal in his hands and brought it near for a closer inspection. After a careful assessment, he felt his heart beating faster as another rush of strange and alien feelings tried to take over.
How could that blasted thing do that?! WHY? WHY DO THIS TO SUCH A HARMLESS LITTLE CREATURE! Bitting his lips his face darkened and distorted as a single tear fell down his cheeks.
Memories of the years he spent here played in his head, all the similarities of this alien universe coming back and crashing like a mountain revealing many things in that he had buried deep in his heart.
He remembered now, like a knife cutting open a once closed wound, he remembered all the times he spent watching the puny humans, their connections, and all the smiles they shared even despite their deplorable situation. Why Genesen doesn't smile? He had once asked himself about this.
In mirrors, he tried mimicking the humans but never came to understand what could make them like so much to do this. What was the meaning behind a smile, and why do they always answer that it was the joys of life? What could that even mean?
At this moment, he felt like he discovered the meaning of that dreaded word's antonym. In all that loneliness breaking apart his heart, sprouted the seeds of rage and fury. Like a tempest, dark clouds gathered and lightning burst through the silvery gray clouds, as the once tiny ripples in the force became a massive crack of explosive dark side energy.
Feeding the many negative emotions in his body, Shadow put down the squirrel-like creature gently and tried smiling at his first-ever friend, but it didn't work. And in his last moments, all he could see was the torn face of Shadow, but something in those black eyes still made him astonished, like that small innocent creature was apologizing, he couldn't tell how but he felted it and this made all those emotions inside him release like a broken damn as he fell on his knee.
Shadow finally realized it then, thanks to a small creature that would go unnoticed by any and every person, that the selfish desire that made him hesitate in the first place. Was a desire for something to fill his hollow heart, a company, a connection. And now, the only one to have ever formed with him is utterly broken and that... that's all that creature's fault.
Turning to look back towards where Ahsoka went, his eyes narrowed as he stood up. The iris in his eyes slowly turned orange like a boiling well of raging lava. Reaching out his hand, he grabbed the only thing he could find in this destroyed place, part of the steel frame from a smaller building that had collapsed.
Straingthing it, he swore to himself, he would kill that thing even if it was the last thing he did.
...
Faraway, resting in a forest-moon. Yoda suddenly opened his eyes and looked towards the inside of a tree trunk. Within, he saw a person clad in a black hooded robe, this individual carried two red lightsabers in his hand, but there was something strange about him.
Narrowing his eyes, Yoda tried to understand it through the force, but what he felt was a mix of complex emotions all boiling beyond anything he had ever seen before. If he had to describe it in any way, it was pure passion.
And in this passion dwelt extremely powerful dark side energy, but it was so strange. How could the dark side feed on pure passion? Who was this person and how could his love feed the dark side like that? How was he not consumed in the despair and rage that followed passion?
While thinking about it, he suddenly noticed another detail, even if a little, he could feel that person's body and somehow... "No dark side corruption... a mystery this is."