Beyond - Legends Masada {Sequel to "The Eve of Battle"} Co-written by Elena and Thrawn McEwok!

It all started with a simple PM... Next thing you know, Thrawn and I are arguing over analogies to the Roman Empire in the NJO. And here we are, writing a collaboration 'fic...

I think our friendship has really come along, don't you? *grins*

Anyway, as the title says, Masada is the sequel to Thrawn McEwok's The Eve of Battle. I wrote the first vignette, the one I'm posting now. Thrawn will probably post the next one - whenever he finishes it, that is... *pointed look*

Word Count: 1,430 words on ancient history, migration patterns, and what happens after the Roman Empire destroys your home.

-Elena

Edit: It lives!

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They still call it Mon Calamari, even though the Mon Cals are gone. The Quarren died off soon after, the last survivors sterile and unable to propagate, effects of the radiation from their war.

In the 1700 years since the fall of the Mon Cals, the radiation has abated somewhat. If you stay on the archipelagos, and don't venture down to the rims on the bottom, you'd be relatively safe.

They settled there 900 years ago, when trees grew back onto the islands and the water didn't leave acid burns. They farmed a little and later they mined ice from the caps as a source of safe water. They didn't trade, and traders didn't come to them.

They lived a life of neglect by the rest of the galaxy, and that was the way they liked it.

They thought they were the last. Because they were the last, they acted accordingly, keeping their way of life pure, abstaining from contact with outsiders. Sometimes, travelers would come, but they would leave shortly thereafter, finding nothing of interest on the healing world. The ruins would be dangerously radioactive for years to come, and the people who lived there now were laughably primitive. There was no reason to come.

So when a traveler came with the express purpose of seeing them, 800 years after they had come, they were surprised, and with that surprise, wary. But the wariness melted away when the traveler said something so ludicrous that they thought he must be touched in the head to say something so obviously wrong.

They exchanged amused glances, but it was a child, unschooled in the ways of courtesy, who said what they were all thinking.

"But...you cannot be a Chiss. You are human."

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In the years since the Great Scattering, as it was called, the Chiss spread to every conceivable part of the galaxy, and some areas where it wasn?t conceivable that they should exist. But exist they did, despite ? or perhaps because of ? the odds.

A large community developed in the area that became known as the Late Empire. A century after it was formed, a group of scholars, priests, and warriors drew up a codification of laws for the Chiss. The Yaga Minor Dotans would remain the cornerstone of Chiss civilization even after the community faded into obscurity five centuries later.

They traveled in a slow migration from the Late Empire to the Corporate Sector, leaving a small community on each planet they rested. Sometimes they stayed for a month, maybe two ? in others it was five generations until they were forced to leave. Some would not leave, of course, but eventually they were choked out by economic deprivation and base prejudice. In the Corporate Sector, with the constantly warring factions and intrigue that made up each governmental dynasty, they found a sort of refuge. The community there survives to the present day.

A thousand years after the fall of Chillai, the Core Worlds found significant populations of Chiss within their midst. The once populous Core had been ravaged by a terrible plague, and their economies torn into pieces. There was ample opportunity for the now-wily Chiss to slip through the cracks and colonize an empty continent. Within three or four centuries they would be expelled from the separate planets. Chiss would not enter Corellian Space for another three hundred years.

Seven hundred

 

An excellently written piece on the fall of the galaxy.

 

I agree. Excellent analogies to the fall of empires and the assimilation and persecution of the Jews ever since their flight from Egypt.

 

** jaw drops **

Wow.

I mean . . . WOW!

That was brilliant, Elena!

I'm looking forward to seeing where you guys go with this.

 

I agree. Excellent analogies to the fall of empires and the assimilation and persecution of the Jews ever since their flight from Egypt. Spike2002

That is exactly what I was going to say!!!!

Beautifully written Elena
Thrawn...you have a lot to live up...

 

Replies when my homework is finished.

I think, maybe in three years?

Elena

[And yes, this was a shameless up...]

 

Have I already said that this is briliant?

- The Imperial Ewok

 

A fascinating beginning! I can't wait to see where this one goes!

 

I agree, a fascinating beginning! The parallels between this and the Roman Empire were extremely well done!

 

*blinks*

I'm going to have to print this out tomorrow and read it slowly, I think... ;|

 

Striker:

An excellently written piece on the fall of the galaxy.

Not quite, but thanks for the compliment!

Spike:

I agree. Excellent analogies to the fall of empires and the assimilation and persecution of the Jews ever since their flight from Egypt.

Why, thank you!

Scoundrel:

** jaw drops **

Wow.

I mean . . . WOW!

That was brilliant, Elena!

I'm looking forward to seeing where you guys go with this.

Well, just lean back and have some popcorn?

preggers:

Thrawn...you have a lot to live up...

This wouldn?t be a problem if he actually wrote something?

Thrawn:

Forget the compliments ? just post something!

VaderLVR64:

At this point, nowhere specific, and not very fast, at that.

BrokenNose:

Nice name. And thanks for the compliment!

Blended:

What? No high-powered debate?

I?m disappointed in you, m?lad?

Elena

 

OK, turning away from the fact that I ignored this fic for half a year, I finally typed up a second part last July... Anyway, there's a second part, but you only get it if Thrawn gets off his bum and edits it, which isn't going to happen. He's got university to deal with... Maybe this will spur him on a little.

-Elena

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This is a true story.

There are always stories; my life sometimes seems to have been built on them. Some of them are sad, some of them are happy, some of them are frightening, but they are all true. At least, from a certain point of view?

My grandmother told me a story once, a story that her grandmother told her, who got it from a great-uncle, who got it from some other relative. It is an old story, a story from the beginning of our scattering. It is story peculiar to our House, the Nuruodos, and the other Houses, the other Chiss, mock it as false. But it is true.

It is.

Once, so long ago that we still lived in our home territories, there was a girl. She was one of the earliest Aduk, a Chiss as true as any other even though her skin was as pale as frost and her hair shone like the dim winter sun. Even odder, though, were her eyes; they were the green of the artic ice, a green seen only in the winter, and only in the darkness.

She was a brave girl; a pilot, a spy, and a soldier. But no matter how hard she fought, she could not change the tide. She could not hold back death. Her entire family died, save one brother. He, like her, was a soldier, but his story is not her story?

During the early days of the Scattering, when we could still fight against the hated ones, she was injured in a battle. She managed to land her fighter on an abandoned planet, but she was still not safe. The Jedi were searching for her. She found a cave, and hid in it, hoping the thick stone would hide her from their mind-senses.

She ran on and on into the cave, trailing blood the entire way and hoping the hunters would believe her dead from the wreckage. And they did. They saw the wreckage and thought her dead. But she didn?t know that. She kept running, and she ran right to a magic lake.

No, the lake itself wasn?t magic, but something in it was. She didn?t know it was a magic lake. She only saw the dark still waters and the dull metal arching overhead. But underneath, she saw a glow. And against that glow, she saw the figure of a man.

I wondered, always, why she decided to go into the lake. What was going through her mind? A woman, barely more than a girl, bleeding and tired and dirty and afraid that maybe some mind-sniffing Jedi were hunting her? I try to imagine myself in the same position, but I can?t. I can?t see myself in that role, just as I can?t see myself in the death camps or the blocs or the escapes.

When I said this out loud, my grandmother just petted my hair and told me she was glad I couldn?t see myself dying.

The girl walked into the lake, ankle-deep, knee-deep, waist-high, shoulder-high. She begins swimming, her body and skin pale against the dark water. Eventually, she dives. Once, twice, thrice she dives, and each time she cannot reach the man in the glow. She tries again, and sees him, perfectly formed against the light. She tries once more, and this time manages to drag him to the surface.

On the shore of the lake, she straightens his body and listens for a heartbeat. There is none. She watches and waits, and suddenly, he seizes, his limbs jerking and head twitching. Water bubbles out of his mouth in a stream, and he breathes.

It is a birth, albeit a birth without a mother or father, just a midwife and a child. The man opens his eyes and looks at her. The girl smiles at him and holds out her hand. He takes it uncertainly.

?My name is Wyn Fel.?

?Mitth?raw?nuruodo.?

It is a beginning. In some stories, among the more superstitious, the girl is a witch and the man is a king. That is not true. They were prophets. They were teachers. They led us into exile, but they led us with the knowledge we would return one