Before - Legends "Mothers of the Disappeared" Songfic Challenge Before the Saga Response Thread

This thread is for Before the Saga responses to the ?Mothers of the Disappeared? Songfic Challenge . Please post your response here and post the title and a link back in the original challenge thread on the Fanfiction Resource Board.

Thank you!
Sionnach-Airgid

 

Title: Shh-kir
Author: Earlybird-obi-wan
Timeframe: JA
Characters: OC
Genre: single-post
Links with Two red beads


Mothers of the Disappeared
Midnight, our sons and daughters
Were cut down, and taken from us
Hear their heartbeat . . .
We hear their heartbeat
In the wind
We hear their laughter
In the rain
We see their tears
Hear their heartbeat . . .
We hear their heartbeat
Night hangs like a prisoner
Stretched over black and blue
Hear their heartbeat . . .
We hear their heartbeat
In the trees
Our sons stand naked
Through the walls
Our daughters cry
See their tears in the rainfall

- U2: The Joshua Tree (1987)

Shh-kir had become one with the Force

Tss-kik-Shh-Kir-ssj-kr had been his name when he was born. He was a Barkanian lizard and his mother was still alive when she heard the news from Yoda.

Yoda had contacted her after so many years and said ?become one with the Force Shh-kir did. Studied the ways of the Jedi he did. Great asset to the archives he was.?

Tss-kik-ts-kir remembered Yoda because he was the Jedi who had visited her 225 years ago.

Tss-kik-Shh-Kir-ssj-kr had been a soft-spiked youngling of only two months old at that time and only 75 cm tall. Yoda had said ?strong in the Force your young one is. Lead the life of a Jedi he can.?

She had agreed to his wish as it was a great honour for her tribe to give a child to the Jedi.

Barkanian lizards had been Jedi for thousands of years and most of them became fierce warriors defending the republic.

She was old, very old, but being a female that was normal for her species. She was cared for by her tribe and would live for a few years more before she too became one with the Force.

---

A red and white Jeditransport was descending to the great grassy plain of Barkania and two Jedi exited it.

Tss-kik-ts-kir observed them from afar with her sharp yellow eyes. They were humanoid. One was very tall and had long flowing hair tied with a thong and a beard. The other was gingerhaired and had a braid.

Tss-kik-ts-kir saw them approaching and she welcomed them in a gravely basic voice.

The large one said ?I am Qui-Gon Jinn and I have known Shh-kir all my life.?

The short one said ?I am Obi-Wan Kenobi and I met Shh-kir when I was three years old. He was a great storyteller and I loved to come to his place in the archives. He was very funny. He was my teacher when I went to the archives.?

Qui-Gon said ?I have met him also in the archives. He was retired from field duty and had joined the archives and became an assistant of Knight Jocasta Nu. I have a holocube of his adventures and they are numerous. He was liked by everyone and my meeting with him was humorous.?

Tss-kik-ts-kir said ?it pleases me to know he was liked by everyone. Will you tell me how you met him??

Qui-Gon said ?I was gliding down the banister with my crèchemates Mace Windu and Benno Perion and we collided with Shh-kir. We landed atop of him and he helped us. After that we had some duty in the archives but Jocasta Nu wasn?t pleased with us? and he told the whole story.

Tss-kik-ts-kir was making ss ssh ss ssh sounds and had smiling eyes. She said ?that was very funny.?

Obi-Wan told her his stories of meeting Shh-kir and after some more talk they said goodbye.

Tss-kik-ts-kir saw them walking towards their transport and the rays of the setting sun caught the red beads in the hair of master and padawan, setting them aglow.

She was very pleased that her son had led such a good life and she would cherish those memories.

fin

 

I love how Qui and Obi came to let Tss-kik-ts-kir know about her son's life as a Jedi! And to give her the holocube of memories to add to the ones she already treasures.

Excellent response to the challenge!

 

Awwww...how wonderful of Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan to go to Tss-kik-Shh-Kir-ssj's mother and share their memories of her son with them



The Jedi certainly know the meaning of the word compassion.

Great response to the challenge

 

Beautiful earlybird!

---

[b]112[/b]


Some might think he would have lost count long ago of how many such letters he had written. But as he prepared to write this one, he knew without having to refer to any records that he had written precisely one hundred eleven such letters in the past. This one made one hundred twelve.

Each of them was engraved on his memory.

Those letters were a well kept secret, and in his inner most heart, Yoda sometimes wondered if, by their very existence, they were a violation of the Code. He always comforted himself with the thought that though attachments were forbidden for a Jedi, they were not forbidden for their families.

And those families had a right to know when one they loved, and had given into the care of the Order, had died. Some rights could not be taken away with the child.

It was simple duty as he saw it, and he had never been one to shirk his duty.

A heavy weight settled over Yoda as he wrote, and he felt the burden of the responsibility that was his. He had been the one to send young Migrili on the mission that had taken her life. Yes, it was the will of the Force that the thread of her life be cut then and there, but he could not escape the thought that somehow, it has been his choice to send her there.

What would her mother think when she got the news?

Every family was different, he knew. Some families dealt with the loss of their child by pretending that the child had never existed. Every holo was packed away; their names were not spoken except in hushed whispers and then only rarely. They dealt with their pain by pretending it was not there. They found solace in their hiding.

Other families made much of their pride in having a child who was training to be a Jedi. They spoke openly and often of their son or daughter, boasting about their supposed deeds, though to be honest, much of what a Jedi did was never know by those outside the Order. Still, they had their dreams of glory and service and those comforted them. They had lost a child to a cause greater than themselves, and they bore their loss with a proud dignity.

And there were those who openly mourned, never letting that wound heal completely, perhaps unable to do so. Their lives were forever marked by that loss, their sacrifice and what came after was merely a pale reflection of what had been before.

He felt sorrow for every family that had given a young one to the Jedi, but the Order was his life, and to it he gave his heart and soul. So he trained the young ones who had been given into their care and did his best to teach them well, bring them up to be servants of the Force.

Like any leader, however, he had learned to accept that he could not save everyone. The life of a Jedi was not without dangers and death was more common that he would have liked.

Yoda served the Force first and foremost, and the letters did not seem to go against the will of the Force, and as long as that was true, he would write them.

Now, for the one hundred and twelfth time, he would tell a family that the Order had failed to protect the precious life that had been entrusted to them.

When the news had come, Yoda had retreated to his meditation chamber. It was his way when they had lost one of their own ? not to mourn, for the passing into the Force was to be celebrated. He withdrew so that he could examine his own actions, remind himself of the fragility of life, the inscrutability of the will of the Force, and to prepare for the task which faced him.

Migrili Donoro had been an only child, the daughter of a woman who was widowed during her pregnancy. The Jedi who had tested the baby girl had not truly expected the woman to give up her only link to her lost husband, but the woman had done so with a full and loving heart.

?It?s what my Myknos would have wanted,? Kaiya Donoro had told the Jedi. ?He would have been so proud. If I want to honor his memory, I will do what [i]he[/i] would have done.?

And so young Migrili had come to the Temple and become a Jedi. She had served the Orde

 

That was really heartwrenching and beautiful VaderLVR and that title alone is signifying something is amiss.

 

Thanks earlybird-obi-wan, I'm glad you liked it!

 

Some might think he would have lost count long ago of how many such letters he had written. But as he prepared to write this one, he knew without having to refer to any records that he had written precisely one hundred eleven such letters in the past. This one made one hundred twelve.

Each of them was engraved on his memory.

Those letters were a well kept secret, and in his inner most heart, Yoda sometimes wondered if, by their very existence, they were a violation of the Code. He always comforted himself with the thought that though attachments were forbidden for a Jedi, they were not forbidden for their families.

And those families had a right to know when one they loved, and had given into the care of the Order, had died. Some rights could not be taken away with the child.

It was simple duty as he saw it, and he had never been one to shirk his duty.

He felt sorrow for every family that had given a young one to the Jedi, but the Order was his life, and to it he gave his heart and soul. So he trained the young ones who had been given into their care and did his best to teach them well, bring them up to be servants of the Force.

Like any leader, however, he had learned to accept that he could not save everyone. The life of a Jedi was not without dangers and death was more common that he would have liked.

Yoda served the Force first and foremost, and the letters did not seem to go against the will of the Force, and as long as that was true, he would write them.

Now, for the one hundred and twelfth time, he would tell a family that the Order had failed to protect the precious life that had been entrusted to them.

Very moving! I love how Yoda appreciates the loss that the families go through and that he personally writes to the survivors!


There would never be a chance at reunion, or the mention of her daughter?s name on the holonews, as Jedi sometimes were. She had nothing at all of Migrili, save this single letter.

And then she noticed a tiny package attached to the back, folded and secured tightly so that even a trip across the galaxy would not dislodge it.

Opening it, the tears started at last.

It was a simple thing, suited for a woman who was also a Jedi ? the feminine heart and the soul of a Jedi. A coppery colored rope of metal, a design that Kaiya recognized well. It had originated on their home planet, a craft for which their people were known.

Why had Migrili had it? Had she somehow known?

Kaiya fastened it around her own neck and felt a bond with her daughter. They might not have known each other?s faces, but their hearts were connected. She rubbed a loving hand over the links.

For you, Migrili. You were born my daughter, and died a Jedi. But now you?re mine again. At last.
What a beautiful sentiment and ending to the post!

Excellent response to the challenge!

 

That was devestating but how wonderful of Yoda to send the metal to Kaiya.

I'm also impressed he wrote the letter himself. A heavy, but necessary burden and I'm sure it meant a lot to have such terrible news coming from the Grand Master of the Jedi Order.

Great response to the challenge

 

What a great idea for a challenge! I'll have to see if I can lure my own muse.

 

earlybird-obi-wan: "Shh-kir" was very well done. I love how Qui-gon and Obi-wan came to tell his mother his stories.

VaderLVR64: but Very touching.