Chapter Text
Eeth had seen his world fall apart the day the Empire was born.
He still vaguely remembered a world before the Jedi, he was a standard four-years-old boy but closer to the human six knowing that Zabraks aged faster than humans, one of the oldest children ever taken by the Jedi, and he understood why younger children were preferred to join the Order. They were pure and untouched by the vices of the Galaxy, they were just children of the Force, with the potential to be so much more. His childhood on Nar Shadda had been normal, for a Zabrak, and therefore harsh and brutal from the perspective of other, much less warlike cultures, but he remembered that violence was not poorly considered in his family. It was just a part of life, to be accepted and mastered, to control one's body and reaction to fear and pain in order to grow up and become stronger. In a way, it was very similar to the teachings of the Jedi.
In any case, it was reasonable for the Jedi to learn only one doctrine and have no trauma to fully live by their philosophy and have the chance to experience true inner peace.
Eeth had managed, against the expectations of many, to become an incredibly competent Jedi Master and respected for the one thing that was thought to be fragile in him because of his species and late arrival: self-control. Eeth was very controlled and therefore did not have the reservations of other Masters who had no memory of having known anything other than the Jedi.
He had voted to admit Skywalker into the Order despite his advanced age.
It was the reasonable and rational decision, with the reappearance of the Sith, Master Jinn's and Padawan Kenobi's vow of protection, the support of the Queen of Naboo and the new Chancellor who was also from Naboo and whose people had been saved by his courageous and selfless actions, the boy had a lot of support. But Eeth would have voted for him even if those two factors had not existed, for there was something obvious to him: Jedi should not be afraid. To fear what a frightened and distrustful child would become when he had left his life at a late age was ridiculous and unworthy of a good Jedi, so his vote was decisive and confident.
It was logic and compassion, the way of the Jedi.
He still deeply regretted it, knowing that he had allowed Skywalker to become Vader, to become a hero and then an executioner of the Republic.
And yet, despite all the probabilities, Eeth had survived for years when so many others had not been so lucky. Friends, better Jedi, but he was one of the chosen few to survive. He had survived the betrayal, the genocide, the stalking and chasing of the clones and Vader and Sidious by running far away, forgetting his past and becoming something other than what he was always meant to be, but in his eyes, he was still a Jedi, with or without the Order, with or without a wife and a newborn daughter.
But despite what he told himself every day, a part of him had still died with him that day, and he hadn't been able to get over it.
Mira had saved him from himself, he could never thank her enough for that, but the emptiness inside him remained all-consuming and corrosive.
And so was the fear, because there was reason to be afraid in this world when you were a former Jedi of his prestige. A Master of the Jedi High Council... it made no sense today.
Well, for him. Unfortunately, there were others who did not share this mindset. Sidious was intent on destroying the Jedi all the way, insisting relentlessly on flushing out and corrupting or killing former Jedi until they surrendered their principles to the Dark Side and joined him in their persecution and annihilation of what was once their culture, their people... their connection to the Force.
Eeth had escaped discovery for as long as he could by staying as far away as possible from Coruscant, the new centre of Imperial power after millennia of a Republic that was certainly in decline, certainly corrupt, but functional enough not to have succumbed on its own without the outside influence of the Sith. Distance had helped, he was convinced of it, and he was also adept at hiding in the Force, and he used handcuffs on himself several times to cut himself off from the Force at night, when he was less in control of his presence and nightmares plagued him constantly, thus managing to escape detection by the Force. He then disappeared and settled on a planet that had never even heard of the Jedi as anything more than a vague legend and became a priest. It was probably the only profession he could see himself pursuing besides teaching, and eventually he even started teaching children. That's how he met Mira, helping her niece with her homework and overcoming her stutter.
She was joy and life, hope and fun... she was everything he had missed since his heart was ripped out along with his life.
It had taken him months to succumb to the comfort and love she could offer him, Mira had become the new wonder of his life, his new light, and he had fallen deeply in love.
He had hesitated for a moment for each stage of their relationship: the discovery of love, the carnal passion, the marriage... starting a family.
Eeth had broken every Jedi taboo, which was both his greatest weakness and his best cover, his concealment from the world. Who would suspect a gentle priest and charming romantic Zabrak of having been the warrior representative of an Order of lonely, impassive monks?
No one would.
He hadn't even kept his name, had to invent a whole life for himself, and had only told Mira about it the day he determined that he was truly in love and had become attached. He was ready for rejection and to disappear again, but against all hope, Mira had accepted his identity and accepted the risk of making a life with a hunted man, a man the Empire wanted dead, a man... a man she could die for the crime of loving him.
He had put away his lightsaber, his tunics and his serenity to become fully what he claimed to be to the point that sometimes he felt like his life as a Jedi was just a bad dream, other times he felt like his life as an anonymous priest was the dream, a sweet and wonderful dream, a dream... from which it was unfortunately time to wake up to face the nightmare of the world and real life.
Living closed to the Force, entirely focused on the birth of his unborn baby, he had only discovered the arrival of death on his planet at the last moment, entering his house through the front door as if he owned it only seconds after he and Mira had heard the news they had wanted to keep as a surprise: their child was a little girl.
He hadn't even held her in his arms.
His heavy, tall black figure, covered in a cloak and that mask that terrified every one of them, the Jedi survivors. The determined footsteps, the mechanical breathing and the icy feeling in the Force.
Vader.
Vader was going to kill him, he was coming for it, Eeth had no hope of escaping the attack, but his daughter, his wife... he could save them.
Vader already knew he was there, there was no point in continuing to hide, on the contrary, he could give them an extra chance if he drew Vader to him and focused his attention, so he prepared to connect to the Force again, and tried to entertain him so that he would forget about the clearly not Force sensitive woman and keep his eyes on him.
He tried to convince and bait him, pretending to be a desperate man – which he was – but it would be wrong to think he would give up so easily. Above all else, Eeth was in control of himself.
I am not him anymore. I am no one. No threat to anyone.
They kicked me off the Council... I have no loyalty to the Jedi.
I have codes. Secret contact frequencies. I can tell you how to find other survivors of the purge.
He didn't mean a word of it, he would never sell out other survivors of the purge, a Zabrak wouldn't talk under torture, so he wouldn't talk under threat, but he carefully gestured to Mira with his right hand and she listened without hesitation, retrieving their daughter from the medical robot.
His outfit was far from ideal for fighting, a long black robe, no shoes, his lightsaber was to be retrieved and he had to create an escape route for Mira.
He stared at Vader, his eyes straight ahead, his face impassive.
Before the next blink of his eyes, he would attack.