Name: Alu Kessic Race: Human Sex: Male Age: 22 Ht: 1.81m Wt: 80kg Appearance: Alu Kesic has medium brown hair that he wears short and messy and light colored eyes that seem to not have a color. People say Alu is attractive, but they can't often say why, what it is about him that appeals to them. His features are unmemorable and Alu takes full advantage of that. The Force dulls his presence in the world to the point that people often forget he's there, or that they've ever met him. He tends to dress in mundane fashion to enhance his ability to blend into any crowd and travel unnoticed. He has an trim, athletic build from the few years of training he got from Therin. Background: Alu Kessic. Thief. Liar. Ghost. Born on the Imperial Capital, Coruscant, Alu never knew his family. His earliest memories are of swimming in the disease-ridden scum ponds of the lower levels of the city-planet and dodging in and out of actual wretched hives of actual scum (pond scum, wall scum, scum boogers/hangers…) and actual villainy (spice and slave trafficking, murder for hire, murder for fun...). Begging until he became even remotely crafty, young Alu quickly earned two reputations in the underbelly of the capital... that he was completely harmless and thus beneath notice... and that not one, single word that ever came out of his mouth had anything remotely to do with the truth. He learned to get into and out of places unnoticed (not "unseen," just unnoticed), he kept "finding" things of value with which to support himself. He learned how to talk to the people who knew what was what. By the time he was 10, he had found his place among the scum. Once he found his place, his world settled into a routine. And while that routine included all sorts of criminal activity, it was familiar. It felt comfortable, and nothing out of the "ordinary" ever happened. ...until the day stormtroopers, hundreds of them, came with blasters and thermal detonators and heavier weapons, tracking animals and droids, and the other. Explosions ripped the neighborhood. Missiles flew, hit, and exploded. People died. So many people died. Even more were wounded. So many wounded. The Imperial forces scoured the area looking for something, someone. Gripped by an odd panic, Alu flew to his best hiding spot, a broken part of the sewer system that was not only forgotten about and nearly inaccessible unless you knew how to get in, but also with enough exits to different parts of the lower reaches that he could get anywhere quickly. As he eased into the crawlspace, Alu saw that it was already occupied... by someone who didn't belong in his, small world. The man... human, was covered in blood and filth, and he looked at Alu with an expression that was a combination of surprise, expectation, and need. "Well, that was timely," the man said cryptically as his breath gurgled and blood began to stain his teeth. "Chendo Therin, nice to meet you." Instantly, the teen-aged Alu knew this person was the thing that the Imperials were looking for. "Keep quiet you fool," he hissed at the wounded human. The assault on the sector continued heavily for another ten minutes, but the occasional exchange of gunfire (usually terminating only after a few rapid-fire explosions from the Imperials destroyed whatever building the holdouts or malcontents had retreated to) held on for another hour... Then things became really quiet, nothing but the dripping of skunge-water and the occasional clank of debris on the deck. Alu would occasionally look over at the wounded man, checking to see if he were dead yet, hoping that he would be so Alu wouldn't have to deal with the situation. But no, Chendo was still alive, and every time Alu looked at him, Chendo just smiled back, like he were enjoying himself. Several times Alu would move to go get a peek from a better vantage point, but Chendo placed a blood-drenched hand on the boy's arm and, ever so slightly, shook his head, freezing the teen in place. The only tense moment in the next few hours was when the sound of a single pair of boots walked just below the hiding spot. The water-dripping noises and the clicking sound of boots as she walked very nearby. Alu had a very bad feeling and looked over at his hidey-hole's usurper. For the first time, the man had his eyes closed and he looked as if he were dead. He wasn't breathing and Alu thought that maybe he had died. The two of them stayed frozen until the sounds of the clicking heels had receded, leaving only the skunge-water dripping in their wake. It was then that the wounded man let out a small sigh, opened his eyes, looked at Alu and said, "You're safe now. That's all that matters." Alu finally moved out of his hiding spot and went to get some supplies to treat the wounded human. He figured that keeping him alive would bring a better reward when he turned the man over to the Imperials. Stealing the healing equipment was easy because of all the chaos that still erupted around him, and Alu was able to get enough med-packs and food to last him and Chendo for days... maybe a week. When he returned, the man was gone. Glad that the weirdness was over, Alu made his way home. Chendo Therin was there waiting for him. In the dim light of Alu's crash, which was much brighter than the near darkness of his hiding spot, the older human looked much worse than a man who was about to die. His left hand was severed at the midpoint of the forearm, he had several blaster burns on his torso and legs. Alu did his best to apply the medical patches he had to the worst wounds, but he'd never seen anything like this on a living person before (he hadn't seen anything like this on a corpse either). Eventually, Chendo told Alu that he had done good work and that they both needed rest. The older man fell into a deep, relaxed sleep. Alu was too excited to sleep. He went out into the chaos of the streets of his old neighborhood to find the people who were connected enough that Alu could figure out how to turn Chendo Therin in for maximum profit and minimal trouble. Alu met up with his three best contacts. All of them were scared, and looking for someone to blame for what had happened to their part of the world. When Alu told them that he had the person the Imperials were looking for and was hoping to sell him... Not one of them believed him. They resoundingly thought he was just running a game to stir up trouble, and with everything that had just happened they didn't have time for his lying antics. Completely disheartened at his first attempt to profit from the truth, Alu returned home to find his mark sitting up, meditating. "We need to leave as soon as we can," Chendo said. "Your recent adventures will have swift consequences. This area will become unsafe as soon as your contacts start talking amongst themselves. The emperor's spies will hear them. Then his people will come back. I just hope we're able to travel before then. You have so much to learn." Three days later, the two humans were on a ground transport to the far side of Coruscant, to a different patch of shadow, hopefully a deeper one. Chendo hadn't healed nearly enough but he told Alu that he sensed that they needed to go, so they did. Alu knew the power of following hunches. Hunches and gut instinct had saved the young human many times during his youth. As the pair made their escape, Alu began noticing an subtle influx of people-who-didn't-belong. Alu got them settled into a run-down squat and set out to learn the lay of the land. Even at his young age, Alu was a proficient sneak-thief and con artist. With skills he had almost everyone convinced he'd lived in the new area his whole life, that he was completely alone, and that he was utterly and completely harmless. Within a month, they were as secure as they possibly could be, life settled into a little routine. Chendo Therin stopped bleeding to death and began eating. Alu started a nice little series of enterprising scams and cons, earning enough to survive, but not enough to draw unwanted attention. They barely spoke. For a month, they barely spoke. One day, after a particularly good day, Alu was resting after their meal. He drifted off, like he had a habit of doing, into the place his dreams take him. He liked doing that because the feel of it was far more comfortable than the coldness of his real life. As he drifted, Alu felt a warmth. {I had not expected this} the warmth thought at him. {You have skills that I had not anticipated, that's good} The familiarity of the warmth startled him, and Alu fell out of his dream. "I wasn't doing anything, Chendo," he said, shocked to see the wounded man looking at him. "I know," came Chendo's reply, "but you need to learn how to not be so loud with your 'nothing.'" And that's how Alu's training began. "You're telling me," Alu began incredulously, "that you used to live in the Imperial Palace! I don't belive it." "It's true," Chendo answered. "Only back then it was the Temple of the Jedi, and the headquarters of the Jedi Council. It was the collecting place of the Jedi's power, and the focus of our arrogant conceit. Its grandeur was exactly the source of our downfall and defeat." The Jedi went on to tell the story of the Jedi Order and how they rose in power thousands of years ago, how they worked to make and keep the galaxy safe and just, how they worked with the Galactic Republic to ensure peace and stability, and how they ultimately failed to see the Darkness rising, or more correctly, they failed to heed the warnings given to them by members of their own Order who told them what was stirring in the depths. In the months that followed, Alu learned a lot about what makes a Jedi a Jedi. "I don't want to learn ways of thinking that failed when they were needed," he said during one of Master Therin's lessons. "That is exactly the right way to think, Alu Kessic," Chendo answered. "Keep using the knowledge that kept you alive before we met. It's a truer measure of truth than what the Jedi could teach you. However, as your master, I would be remiss if I didn't teach you everything I can about where we came from." "I'll never call you, Master," Alu snapped back. "That pleases me more than you know. Ranks and accolades and hierarchy, these are part of the arrogance that killed the Jedi. You must never fall into the trap of respecting your betters. A Shadow lives in the twilight between Darkness and Light so that he may serve the Force. Deception and misdirection are what we do. We learn to hide amongst the filth so that we go unnoticed in our pursuit of evil." As Alu's mind and powers developed, he began to regularly feel the Force's influence. Listening to it, he became a better skulker, a better thief. With the Force, his presence seems to slide off the minds of others. One day, Chendo handed Alu his lightsaber. "You've learned enough control over your emotions that it's time to learn this," he said. "This is a lightsaber, the weapon of the Jedi... and the Sith. It is the most fearsome, elegant weapon that has ever existed. In the hands of a master, none can stand against it." Chendo taught Alu the basics of lightsaber combat. He called it Form I and Shii-Cho. They talked about Chendo's preferred form, Shien... Form V. "It's unpredictable and aggressive compared to Shii-Cho," Chendo said and he showed Alu the moves. "It feels really good," the young apprentice commented. As Alu became more proficient, Master Therin explained, "As a Shadow, you must understand that to draw your lightsaber is already a defeat. This is something you are already familiar with growing up as you have. A Shadow's success is in remaining unseen, undetected, unnoticed for what we really are... It is best to study and perfect lightsaber Form 0... victory without drawing the weapon." In the five years Chendo taught Alu about the Force, the Jedi, the Sith, and how the Order fell, the older human made it clear that the reason he was teaching what he knew was that the Force had drawn him to the younger man because when the Jedi found their way back to the Light, when the Jedi returned, there would need to be Shadows ready to do what must be done so that the Jedi Order never again failed to react to the threats that surrounded it. Chendo needed Alu to be prepared to be the Shadow of the Jedi. And then it all ended. In the years they'd trained together, the Emperor's Sith demon never stopped looking for Chendo, and as is the way of things, eventually he was found out. The Imperials came, and tore everything apart, just as they had before. "Go now, this is not your fight," Chendo said to Alu calmly. In the terrifying battle, Chendo was cut down. Alu was well hidden when the confrontation happened, and rather than stand by his friend's side, Alu disappeared into the shadows, knowing that he had made his master proud. The fight would continue, the Jedi would live on. For three years Alu has been on the run, pretty sure that no one is following him, certain he's being hunted by the thing that killed Chendo Therin. About six months ago, he landed on Taris. The cityscape felt like home to him. He settled in quickly and started earning more than he was spending. .. And that's when the dreams started. .. The dream. The Calling. Whatever you want to call it, it started, and it's gotten worse. Slowly it's been making Alu get closer to its location. Soon he will have to investigate or he will go crazy.