The Edge of Your Shadow (yet another SW-Meets-Earth fic, JA)

No spoilers, PG for a bit of bad language later in the story... and why, yes, I am a physics student! However did you guess?

Don't worry... we'll get this out of the way and then there is a story to come!

=============================================

PROLOGUE, or A BRIEF HISTORY OF PHYSICS

Sir Issac Newton believed that what we call light is the result of a wave phenomenon, not too different in its mechanics from the tide on a beach.

Albert Einstein believed that light is a stream of infinitesimal particles, very much like the particles that make up matter.

Einstein and Newton were both physicists. A lot of other physicists have spent an awful lot of time trying to figure out which one of them was right. The answer, as it turned out, was 'both and neither.'

Allow me to clarify:

Light is a wave. It is observed to diffract around the edges of objects... this is why the edge of your shadow is blurred... just as waves in the ocean diffract around a half-submerged boulder. There can be no argument that light is a wave, just as Newton said.

Light is a particle. Each piece of light has a specific, measurable energy and momentum. A sufficiently sensitive camera can record individual particles of light. There is no questioning that light is a particle, exactly like Einstein told us.

The problem, of course, is that 'wave' and 'particle' are mutually exclusive concepts. A 'wave' is a disturbance in a substance... it exists only as the motion of the substance. A 'particle' is a substance in and of itself. One phenomenon cannot be both.

Having learned this much, the physicists examined the data, scratched their collective balding head, and said, "what the hell is going on here?"

Erwin Schrodinger believed that light is a particle, the movement of which is governed by a wave-shaped probability. He invented an equation that predicted the behavior of light with impressive accuracy. Light does in fact fall where it would be most probable for it to do so. Schrodinger's equation allows light to be at once a wave and a particle without contradicting itself.

The only problem left is how does it do this?

For something to exhibit wave-like properties, it has to interfere with itself. Multiple particles of light can interfere with each other... but light continues to obey the Schrodinger equation even when only a single particle is considered. How can a single particle interfere? There is nothing for it to interfere with.

Various answers have been proposed, but the only one that seems to make sense is that the particle interferes with itself... as it exists in another realities. An interesting concept. The idea of other universes has always held a place in the human psyche... the idea goes back to the earliest primitive shaman, communing with the spirit world in a drug-induced haze. Now physics tells us that for the world to work as we know it to exist, this ancient fiction must be a literal truth.

Unfortunately, physics can't tell us anything about these other universes. Only that they exist, that there are an infinite number of them, and that there are places, like the edge of your shadow, where two realities meet and blur into each other.

The rest... who and what is in these other universes, the rules by which they work... the rest is up to fiction.

 

Interesting beginning, Hope to see some more soon?

 

OoOo very interesting start! You MUST pots more soon!

 

"Your highness!" a voice exclaimed.

Princess Kiele moaned inwardly as she recognized Talwan's voice... she thought her mother had gotten rid of him by sending him to Coruscant as the planet's senator! Somehow, it had never occured to her that coming here could mean running into him... but as she stepped off her starship onto the landing platform, there was a familiar balding head bobbing towards her.

"Your highness!" he exclaimed again. "You didn't need to come in person! Not with our planet on the brink of..."

Kiele held up a hand in his face. "Talwan," she said.

"Your highness?" he asked.

"Shut up," she told him.

He gaped... the expression adding to his bulging eyes and pasty complexion to make him look more than ever like some sort of humanoid fish. "Yes, your highness," he said once he'd recovered. He bowed low to her, then backed away... allowing her a full view of the people assembled to meet her.

Whoops.

"Our greetings," she said with a smile, using the royal plural in an attempt to look and sound more princessly than she felt right about then. At the front of the group were two men in rust-coloured robes... a toweringly tall man with graying brown hair, and a boy probably younger than Keile. "Are you the Jedi?" she asked.

"We are, your highness," said the taller man. "I am Qui-Gon Jinn, and this is my padawan, Obi-Wan Kenobi."

"An honour to meet you both," replied Kiele, extending her hand to be kissed. "We are Princess Kiele of Ulliam. It will be our pleasure to accompany you to our planet, where we hope with your help we can settle the situation there to everybody's satisfaction."

"That is our wish, as well, your highness," said Qui-Gon.

"Then there is no need to delay," Kiele said. "We may depart as soon as you are ready."

"Your highness," Talwan spoke up again, "there's not that much of a hurry, you just got here..."

"The situation on Ulliam is very serious," Kiele said, more severely than she meant to. "It is to everyone's benefit if we leave at once." Or to my benefit anyway... because it means you can't take me to task for telling you to shut up. Who made you the last word on proper behavior, anyway? Not that she wasn't anxious to solve her planet's problems before they escalated to the point of civil war... but she had been so glad Queen Serenia had sent Talwan to go bother the senate. Some people simply should not be born with titles.

"We are prepared to leave immediately, your highness," said Qui-Gon.

"Excellent." Kiele smiled at him. "Then there is no reason why we should not do so."

"After you, your highness," said Talwan.

Kiele glanced at him, then furrowed her brow in suspicion. "You're not... I mean, we had not been informed that you wished to accompany us," she said. Out of the corner of her eye, she noticed Qui-Gon Jinn's apprentice smiling a bit at the way she'd had to catch herself. She bristled a bit... if there was one thing Kiele hated, it was being laughed at.

"Your highness, you said so yourself... the situation is becoming quite tense," Talwan said. "As our planet's representative, I should be there."

"As our planet's representative, you should be in the senate," Kiele informed him.

"I agree with her highness," the tall Jedi said unexpectedly, saving her from having to answer to Talwan's shocked expression at this further unprincessly behavior.

Talwan shook his head. "I cannot in good conscience allow her highness to make a second dangerous space voyage alone! I will be coming with you."

Kiele rolled her eyes. Why had Talwan been born a duke? He should have been a babysitter. She thought of ordering him to stay... but her mother would most likely find out about it, and then she'd get a lecture for disrespect. "Very well." She tried not to sound too resigned. "Let us depart."

---

Obi-Wan and Qui-Gon followed the young princess up the ramp into the starship... and Obi-Wan found himself staring at her hair. It was a purely academic interest; he was try

 

Carry on, nice beggining, sound like obi wan cant wait for the meeting

 

So far, so good! Keep going!

 

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There were a lot of things Oliver didn't like about his English teacher. The woman's obsession with tragedies was high on the list. Would it be too difficult for the class just once to read a story with a happy ending? Her way of taking marks off for 'mistaking the author's intentions' was another. How could anybody but the author know what the author's intentions were? As far as Oliver could see, anything less than a direct statement from the author him-or-herself was just literary semantics.

The worst part, however, was how she would ask a student to stay after class, then sit silently at her desk while she waited for the kid to guess what he or she was in trouble for. Fortunately, Oliver had a pretty good idea what she thought he'd done wrong.

"It's about my report, right?" he asked.

The teacher nodded. "What was the assignment, Oliver?" she asked.

"Symbolism employed in a classic film," he recited flatly. "Come on. You can't say Star Wars is anything but a classic film!"

She sighed. "Oliver... do you honestly think Star Wars is what I meant by a classic film?"

"No," Oliver admitted, without any remorse whatsoever. "But it is. And I don't think you'd have given me a good mark if you didn't think it was a good report... so what's the problem?"

"The problem is..." the teacher had to pause and think for a moment. "At the beginning of the year, I thought you and I had a communication problem. I thought that as you learned what was expected of you in this class, these misunderstandings would stop happening. At this point, however, I'm starting to think you must be doing this on purpose."

"Um," said Oliver. He was clearly supposed to say something here... most likely something along the lines of 'no, I'm not, and I promise it will never happen again.' That would, however, have been a lie. He did do it on purpose, although not consciously... Oliver just had a habit of interpreting things in ways nobody else thought of. He could do things the way everybody else did when he wanted to... but why would anyone want to?

"Well?" asked the teacher.

"Sorry, Miss Fisher," Oliver said, hoping that would suffice. "Thanks for giving me a good mark," he added. Kissing up never seemed to hurt.

She smiled, apparently satisfied. "It was quite a well-written and insightful piece, to tell you the truth. You would be at the top of the class if you'd make a bit more effort to do what I assign."

You mean if I thought the way the rest of the sheep around here do, Oliver thought. But all he said was, "thanks." He picked up his backpack and jacket, and left the classroom.

---

"Oh." Leigh-Anna poked Kelly's shoulder. "Here he comes."

Kelly looked up from the mirror in her locker in time to see a tall boy with short, spiky blondish-brown hair coming out of the english room. "About time," she muttered, dropping her lipstick back in her purse and shutting the locker door.

"Give him hell," Leigh-Anna laughed.

Kelly closed her locker and marched up to Oliver. "Here," she announced, holding a binder up in his face, "is my half of our social studies project. How is your half coming?"

"It's fine," he gently pushed the binder down so he could look at her. "It's fine... it'll be done on time."

"It had better not be another of your jokes like you and Brock ended up with," she said. "You know he still hasn't forgiven you for that?"

Oliver winced visibly. Brock must've given him a reminder recently. "We got a good mark," he said.

"Well, maybe I don't want to be a class laughingstock," Kelly replied. She put the binder in his hands. "There's mine. Make yours match." She hitched her backpack up on her shoulder, turned around, and walked away.

Leigh-Anna giggled as she caught up with her friend. "No wonder you don't have a boyfriend, Kel," she said. "He looked like he thought you were going to bite him!"

"If he makes a fool of me in front of our social studies class, I will!" Kelly vowed.

 

Don't mind me... just upping this so I'll remember to write more of it tomorrow.

 

Hey! I came here 'cause I read the scene you posted on the Story Snippets thread I started. It sounded good, and the beginning is even better. I like it a lot.

Post more!

 

For anybody who doesn't know: 90% of the mass in the universe is something we can't detect. We can tell it's there because of its gravitational effects, but nobody knows what it is.

Earthly scientists call this stuff 'dark matter.' I thought 'shadow' was a bit more poetic and Star-Wars-ish.

=============================================

Patience is a virtue, Obi-Wan told himself. Patience is a virtue. Patience is a virtue.

"I'm related to the royal family, you know," senator Talwan said. He'd been talking well-nigh nonstop, in his aimless fashion, ever since they left Coruscant. Obi-Wan was doing his best not to fall asleep. "The queen's cousin. Only living relative besides her children since the old dowager died... lived to the age of a hundred and four, she did. We thought she'd never go." He chuckled.

Obi-Wan tried to ignore him and looked out the window... but the view was nearly as boring as Talwan's meaningless chatter. The shifting fractal shapes of hyperspace drifted slowly by, warping and twisting as they went. The effect was almost hypnotic. Obi-Wan's head began to droop... he was starting to nod off again.

What woke him up was the hum of the sub-light engines taking over from the hyperdrive. Obi-Wan raised his head and looked out the window... the blues and purples of hyperspace were misting away, leaving behind the blackness of space.

"Are we there yet?" he asked, surprised. It didn't feel like it had been six or seven hours.

"Mighty short trip, if we were," said Talwan. "Then again, can't complain about a short trip, now can we? I know I certainly can't..."

The door to Princess Kiele's private chamber opened, and her head of multicoloured curls poked out. "We can't be there already," she said, echoing Obi-Wan's question a moment ago. "Why did we leave hyperspace?" She walked past the Jedi and the senator, heading for the cockpit.

"I don't know." Obi-Wan got up and followed her. "We should ask the captian."

The princess turned and gave him a cold look. "We weren't talking to you, padawan Kenobi," she said stiffly.

"Your highness!" exclaimed Talwan, before Obi-Wan got a chance to stammer an apology. "These are Jedi... you must show more respect!"

The princess' pale gray-blue eyes fixed ferociously on Talwan, and for a moment Obi-Wan was almost afraid she would literally explode.

"I'm sorry, your highness," he said quickly, trying to diffuse the situation.

"Apology accepted," she replied primly, and continued on her way.

Obi-Wan started to sit down again, then changed his mind and followed her into the cockpit anyway. High-and-mighty princess or no high-and-mighty princess, he did want to know why they'd slowed down.

"Captian Decimus," said the princess, stopping in the doorway to the cockpit. "Why are we no longer in hyperspace? This isn't our system."

"We're passing through an area of shadow matter, princess," the captian replied. "We should be out of it soon."

Obi-Wan opened his mouth to ask what shadow matter was, but the princess spoke first. "You didn't program a course around it?"

"It's a mobile cloud, your highness," said the captian. "Our sensors detected it in time... there shouldn't be any danger."

"Thank you, captian," said the princess. She turned around, glared at Obi-Wan, and returned to her private room.

Sheesh, thought Obi-Wan. Are all princesses like that? He'd somehow thought royalty would be a bit more... polite, perhaps. A bit more dignified. And a bit less bratty.

He returned to the cabin and sat down again between Qui-Gon and Talwan.

"Did you find out why we've stopped?" asked Talwan.

"The captian said something about shadow matter," Obi-Wan replied.

"Ahh," the senator nodded. "Beastly stuff. Gives me the creeps. Hope we came out of hyperdrive before we got into it!"

"He said there wasn't any danger." Obi-Wan sat quietly for a moment, then said to Qui-Gon, "master... what's shadow matter?"

"Shadow matter is what makes up the vast majority of

 

lol at the end Lina! And so they passed through "Shadow Matter" eh? Eenteresting... why do I get the feeling they'll hit Earth before they ever hit Ulliam?

 

you know ive read a trilogy of books by phillip pullman all about the dark matter and universes and dimmensions, and "gaps" i find it really interesting

 

Hmm, I like this Oliver Kendall already. And he has an enemy named Brock? I'd like to see them meet up.

Dark matter and hyperspace? Good idea!

 

Cool! So will they go through it and come out in another universe?

Yeah, TheDarth, I've read those too. They're really good. His Dark Materials, it's called. Good stuff.

 

padawan lunetta: because it says this is a SW-meets-Earth, that's why!

TheDarth and Mcily_Nochi: I've never read those... I'll have to look 'em up. And by the way, Mcily, I love your quote... that's what I'm shooting for, too.

 

yeah i love them, hes my fav writer, thinks of things i couldnt imagine about... well before i read the books anyway im reading his sally lockheart trilogy now

 

"Hey, Oliver," said Owen, scrambling into the back of the Kendall family's pickup truck. "Guess what?"

"What?" asked Oliver.

The eight-year-old grinned. "Mom says you gotta take me with you to see the meteor shower, that's what!"

"No, she didn't," Oliver replied calmly. He put his backpack -- containing his binoculars, his dinner, a sweater, and an issue of 'Astronomy' magazine -- on the passenger-side seat and shut the door. "I heard you talking to her earlier. She said you're not allowed because you have to go to bed at a reasonable hour, remember?"

Owen pouted. "How come you get tomorrow off school and I don't?"

"Because my school is having a professional development day tomorrow, and yours isn't," Oliver told him. "Come on, get down from there," he added, reaching for his little brother's arm.

Owen reluctantly allowed himself to be lifted out of the bed of the truck. "Why do you have to go all the way out into the mountains to watch the meteors?" he asked.

"Because it'll make them easier to see," said Oliver. "Here in the city there's too much light from the streetlamps... that's why we can barely see the stars. In the mountains, the sky will be clearer."

Owen gave Oliver's arm a hug. "Please can I come... please, please, please?" he asked, doing his best sad puppy impression.

"No," said Oliver.

"Fine," said Owen. "I'll just stay up and watch the meteor shower from right here!"

"You'll fall asleep before it peaks," Oliver said.

"Will not!"

"Will so!"

"You're mean," said Owen.

"Yep." Oliver nodded as he climbed into the truck. "It's a perk of being an older brother."

"What's a perk?"

"Go ask Mom," Oliver told him. "I have to go."

---

Princess Kiele couldn't imagine what it must've been like living in the time before the hyperdrive had been perfected... back then, space voyages had taken months or even years, as opposed to the hours or days they took nowadays. A six-hour trip was boring enough. The idea of a six-month one would be enough to drive anybody insane.

She killed time, as usual, by drawing. In this case, the image taking shape on her sketchpad was that of a very fat blowfish, although one lacking the species' characteristic spines. A senatorial robe and enough hair to suggest it had once had much more made it a perfect caricature of Talwan.

Kiele giggled. A spineless blowfish... that was Ulliam's senator, all right!

She turned the page and began a second sketch. The Jedi master, Qui-Gon, was easy to match with an animal... he was so tall he could only be one thing; a giraffe! And the padawan was a small dog; impatient and fidgety, and running around under his master's heels.

As for Kiele herself... she'd decided long ago exactly what sort of animal she was; she was a pony. A badly trained circus pony who would rather run free with the wild horses than dress up and put on a ridiculous act for strangers.

Kiele finished her drawing of the two Jedi, then closed the sketchbook and sat up to stretch. According to the wall chrono, they should be nearly to Ulliam by now.

Sure enough, just as she made this observation, she heard the hum of the hyperdrive winding down as they entered normal space again. When Kiele looked out the window, there was the marbled blue orb of a watery planet visible among the scattered stars.

She smiled, then groaned as she realized what being home would mean; Talwan would certainly tell the queen about Kiele's 'unprincessly' behavior, and then she'd recieve a lecture about what was proper in front of strangers. Lovely.

As the spacecraft approached the little planet, Kiele put her face up to the window and tried to spot Ulliam's three small moons. None were visible. That was strange... one or two of them might be hidden by the planet, but usually you could see at least one...

Out in the main cabin, Talwan's voice said, "where are we?"

 

Nobody's reading this, are they?

 

I am reading! I liked the way Oliver was being an older brother, and the way Owen wanted so badly to come along to see the meteorite shower. I also liked the way Princess Kiele was drawing caricatures. Talwan does seem like a blowfish without spines, but I've never thought of Qui-Gon as a giraffe! More like a sphinx--or at least leonine. But that was introspective of her to recognise herself as a "badly trained" circus horse. Loved the part where she was looking for the moons and not seeing them.

 

Yay! *hugs her fans... both of you*

Kudos to anybody who can identify what's going on or playing on all the radio channels they picked up! Some of them should be obvious, of course, but I put in a couple of rather obscure ones.

=============================================

"What's going on?" Kiele opened the door and looked out into the main room again. Talwan was pacing in fast circles, wringing his hands. The Jedi master was sitting there as tranquilly as ever, while his padawan was staring out a window, and Captian Decimus argued with the computer.

"The autopilot says we never deviated from our planned course except for moving through the shadow matter," he said. "The navigational computer doesn't know where we are... this world doesn't match anything in the database."

"It's inhabited," the younger Jedi pointed out. "There're city lights on the night side."

"Well, what about the configuration of stars?" demanded Kiele, surprising herself by managing to sound calm. She felt as though she were about to cry... this was absurd! They couldn't be lost? How did one get lost in a galaxy that had been charted from one end to the other? "Have you run those through the computer?"

"I did, your highness," the Captian replied. "No match."

"Oh, dear, oh, dear," lamented Talwan. "I told you! It's that beastly shadow matter... we could be in another galaxy!"

"Talwan, shut up!" snapped Kiele. She took a deep breath. Why was it always her job to be Calm and Capable in a crisis? Couldn't she let herself fall apart just once? "Orbit the planet, Captian," she said. "If our computers are giving us contradictory results, it means something's wrong with one of them. It's too dangerous to try to go anywhere until we've found the problem and fixed it."

"My thoughts exactly, your highness," Captian Decimus agreed.

Kiele glanced out the window. "Place us in a geosynchronous orbit over one of the oceans or uninhabited areas," she said. "If we cannot identify the planet, we should try to err on the side of caution."

"Yes, your highness." The captian sat down in the cockpit again and put the ship in motion.

Kiele noticed the Jedi master watching her as she gave these orders. She met his gaze levelly. "Is there something you'd like to say, Master Qui-Gon?" she inquired, knowing full well she was being rude.

"No, your highness," he replied.

A quarter of an hour later, the results from the diagnostics were ready. Captian Decimus read them off the terminal in front of him. "The navigational computer is experiencing errors," he said. "Looks like there's a faulty connection between some of the sensing equipment and the central computer... probably the reason we don't know where we are is because the computer can't get a complete look at our surroundings. We can't go anywhere until it's fixed."

"Can we repair it here?" asked Master Qui-Gon.

The captian shook his head. "We'd have to land," he replied.

"All right..." Kiele licked her lips and thought. "In that case, this is probably a known planet. Contact them and inquire where we might land safely. Do not tell them that I am on board," she added.

"Of course not, your highness." Captian Decimus began fiddling with the radio. He went on doing this for some time, without sending anything.

"What's the matter?" asked the padawan.

The captian shook his head. "The channels are all full of noise... I can't find an open one."

"Noise?" asked Kiele.

Captian Decimus flipped a switch and began twirling a dial, taking them through a sample of the radio noise surrounding the planet.

...VE6KC calling CH8MNP... VE6KC calling...

... yo, tell me what you want, what you really, really want...

... and he scores! Another point for the Maple Leafs, in what looks to be...

... no, Luke... I am your father!

... there's thirty people in the kitchen, and there's always room for more...

... fell in love with the girl at th

 

ohhhh no, be carefull guys!!

 

I guess it would be too much to hope for that the meteor just hit Talwan? No, don't tell me, it's hit the ship and made it crash, but everybody (and I mean everybody *sigh* ) gets out alive.

Just wondering if this line "I fell in love with the girl at the rock show" will be prophetic for Oliver in an odd, twisted kind of way? A meteor is a rock, and a shower is quite a show to behold, and Princess Kiele's right in the middle of it ... ?

Sorry about the radio channels--not my thing. But I'm looking forward to more story!

 

oOOohhh very good!!! I LOVED the radio chanells And the meteor showere, and the big brother\little brother interactoin Heck I just loved it! Post more soon PLEASE!

 

umm, if a meteor is a rock and the shower is a good show then ill just go to the border next to all the arabs and get showered with rocks then