Beyond - Legends The Odyssey of Jacen Solo [DDC 2014]

OOC: I've always been frustrated that nobody has ever taken the time or the effort to write a profic about Jacen Solo's travels after the Vong War. I figured I'd give a crack at it for my journal of 2014. I hope you guys enjoy!

Entry #1​

The war is over.

It feels as if just yesterday Anakin and I were clashing with both our words and our lightsabers while we struggled to come to terms with our purpose as Jedi. I can’t believe that I was silly enough to call myself a philosopher at the age of sixteen. I spent all my time following around Uncle Luke questioning his every word as he attempted to rebuild the Jedi Order. Then when the war started I spent my time questioning and second-guessing Anakin up until the day he died. I had all these questions and no one had the answers. During all these years it never occurred to me that perhaps I should answer these questions myself.

Many call me a hero. I killed Omini, saved my family and prevented the extinction of an entire species. Everyone seems to know who I am except for myself. Am I defined by my name? Am I defined by my talents? Or my affiliation? Even after this war has ended I have more questions racing through my mind than what I started with.

There was one moment of absolute and pure clarity where I felt as if I was one with the universe. Then it was gone before I could even blink. Just when I felt as if I understood everything I suddenly realized that I truly don’t understand anything at all. Maybe that’s the nature of the Force, maybe there’s only so much that the human mind can comprehend. I’m sure that if I voiced these thoughts to Jaina she’d call me silly and just tell me that I’d be glad that I put an end to the war. Yet I don’t feel that way. I don’t feel like a hero and I certainly don’t feel like a Jedi.

Anakin was the hero. He was the one who should have ended the war. He would know how to lead his generation to the light and usher in a golden age for the Jedi. He would take his experiences from the war and actually apply them. He would learn and apply what he had learned.

But here am I, the savior of the galaxy and I’m not even sure if I could call myself a Jedi anymore.

This is why I’m leaving.

Apparently it’s the norm for a Skywalker to save the galaxy. We’re burdened with these gifts and a hero complex so strong that it overrides any sense of self-preservation. However, I don’t want to fight in wars for the rest of my life. I don’t want to amble around for the next few years waiting for an opportunity to prove my self-worth. I want to be more than a hero. I want to be more than a Skywalker. I seek understanding and understanding cannot be gained through conflict or misery. This is why I am leaving. There is so much about myself and my purpose that I don’t understand.


I managed to convince Jedi Master Kyle Katarn to loan me the Moldy Crow so that I could have a starship suitable for longterm travel. I said my goodbyes and then I left.

With the aid of Master Tionne I managed to compile a shortlist of places that I hope to visit during my travels. I'm not entirely sure where I'm going first. Not yet, anyway. However, I'm going to allow my instincts to guide me and trust that I end up in the right place.


Jacen Solo

 

Fascinating choice & with plenty of room for creativity and character development

 

Great beginning. Jacen is a nice character.

 

Very nice. There are a lot of interesting stories that could be told.

I don't know why people didn't write any stories about this timeframe. I can't remember much of FOTJ. Didn't it start out with the readers finding out he was gone but just returned and then we see his slide to the darkside. By then people may have been disenchanted with Jacen. I know I didn't have warm fuzzy feelings about him and he was one of my favorite characters before that.

I look forward to reading this diary.

 

Entry #2​

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The first planet that I visited was Nam Chorios. Apparently my mother and Uncle Luke solved a dispute there during the earlier years of the Jedi Order. During my apprenticeship with Luke he spoke of a force-sect there that had mastered an art that allowed them to transcend language barriers. Somehow they were able to communicate with beings that spoke languages that they were incapable of speaking or even learning. This seemed like a basic talent but I have devoted much thought to the discipline that is required to learn such an art. I was always taught that the Force binds us all together as living creatures, that we are supposed to live in harmony simply because we are all alive in the same galaxy.

I have read of wars that have started simply because of a misunderstanding or an inability to understand your enemy or meet them on common ground. It took common ground for us to win the Vong War….it only makes sense for me to learn how to understand a different species in order to better mediate disputes. I’m not sure if Uncle Luke knows this talent or even if he needs to. He is such an emphatic man that he doesn’t need to understand what another person is saying to understand how to help them. I’m not sure if I have this same talent.

I can’t help but think that Jaina could learn a thing or two from these Theran Listeners as well. She always tends to negotiate or mediate disputes with her lightsaber.

I wasn’t sure how Nam Chorios fared during the war. It is not heavily populated and as a result NRI never bothered to investigate the planet for occupation. What I do know is that those who do live there keep the planet heavily defended in order to prevent some sort of plague from escaping and reaching more populated star systems. Any Vong who reached Nam Chorios would be forced to battle the natural elements of Nam Chorios while also dealing with the Droch and the Tsil crystals that inhabit the planet. While the Vong aren’t supposedly detectable by the Force the Tsil crystals manifest their Force-sensitivity through dangerous lightning storms which would make it difficult for a large invasion force to land there. I doubt that the Vong were able to invade Nam Chorios or even that they found it useful but I was certain to keep my guard up just in case.

I didn’t trust my own piloting skills to fly a ship as bulky as Moldy Crow through an atmosphere that is filled with erratic lightning storms in the upper atmosphere, and devastating hail and fog in the lower atmosphere. As a result I opted to take my Stealth X. In all my infinite wisdom I forgot to bring an astromech droid with me for my travels. As a result I was forced to rely on the Stealth X’s navigation systems and my own talents in the Force to land the ship. What I failed to understand was that the Tsil crystals that populate the planet tend to cloud one’s connection to the Force…and reaching through the Force while on Nam Chorios could potentially intensify the lightning storms that rage on the planet day and night. This is something that I didn’t realize until I was in the midst of a hurricane filled with electricity that served as a natural EMP bomb for my ship.


This was when I realized just how much of a hypocrite I am…and how little I learned from Vergere. Everytime I saw a flash of lightning or felt a distant rumble in the background I reflexively closed my eyes and reached for guidance. I trusted in the Force but every time I did I was rewarded with a flash of energy or a sonic boom so close to my ship that my cockpit rumbled. It wasn’t long before my sub-light drives were failing and my navigational systems were totally shot. Piloting was something that came to my sister as naturally as breathing. I have no doubt that she could have flown her ship through this storm with minimal difficulty. The Force came to her so naturally that even she couldn’t tell that she was drawing upon it. Yet here I was, dealing with a scenario that did not match my talents and at the slightest sign of trouble I reached for something that was within my grasp and every time I reached I felt as if my hand was smacked away. It was as if the Tsil crystals below were tracking my every thought and punishing me for attempting a shortcut.

Somehow, the Solo Luck that every member of my family seemed to possess but myself kicked in. I managed to evade the lightning storm (or rather my ship plummeted through the atmosphere so quickly that I fell out of the storm) and somehow managed to avoid crashing. Any decent pilot can survive off of one sub-light drive as long as they aren’t trapped in a dogfight and this situation was no different. So somehow, with two failing sub-light drives and a dead navigational computer I managed to initiate a controlled crash in a narrow valley not far from a sparsely-populated village.

Luckily Crystal Valley is only a flew klicks away from my present destination. After patching up my ship and returning power to my sunlight engines I hope to trek there and discover where the Theran Listeners are. I am also curious about the aggressive nature of these Tsil crystals. I was able to reach through the Force while trapped in the mesosphere of Nam Chorois but whenever I did the lightning storm around me intensified. Were they able to stagger my attempts to evade the lightning storm because they sensed me reaching through the Force? Was this an automated defense or do they someone simply not trust Force-sensitives?

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I hope to discover why or else I fear I may not be able to leave this planet alive.

 

A nice post with his thoughts about Jaina and the Force

 

Ooh, very touch and go there for a while. The Therans could be ominous captors or unexpected benefactors and mentors.

 

Jacen better watch out for those Drochs. They don't sound like a fun parasite to catch. I often wonder if the profic artists purposely made them look very much like an Earth obligate ectoparasite called Pthirus pubis?

 

Enjoying it. You have a great writing style!

 

You know, Jace…if you get zapped every time you use the Force, you might want to stop using it! What's the definition of insanity?

Nice start!