Floating.

I was floating.

That's the best way I can describe it. At the time, I didn't care why I was there. It was like a big, soft blanket had been pulled over my mind, making me feel safe. I could see nothing but blackness, hear nothing but the distent flow of the Force and feel nothing but comfort and warmpth. It was like I had reached Heaven.

I didnt care how I had gotten there, or why, but that fact that I was there was plenty enough. I don't know how long I stayed in that place; the thought never crossed my mind. I didnt think, I just was. It was perfect.

Then I felt myself floating up, and the serene darkness around me began to dissolve. I tried to fight my way back down into the peaceful slumber, but the more I stuggled, the more I found myself chilled and being pulled away. A brightness made itself known, and I shyed away from it. I tried to bring my hands up before my eyes, but they wouldn't move. It was then I realized that my eyes were closed all along.

I shook my body against my restraints, but my arms and legs felt like jelly. A distant, vaugely familiar presence was near, but I didnt care. I just wanted back into that peacefull sleep I had known.

The light grew brighter, and soon I was shivering. Something hard was against my back and I again tried my restraints. It was like something was tangled around me. I fought off panic when I realized I didn't know what was happening then, or what had happened before that.

I tried my voice, but all I could manage was a moan. That sound alone seemed to push me farther toward the panic.

I stuggled agian, straining to hear or speak. I wanted out of this, and for a moment, I opened my eyes.

The light blinded me so I shut them tightly, intinctavly pulling my arms up to my face.

But they were still bound by something.

Then the pain set in. It came sharply at first, like someone just dropped me into a pit filled with palpable energy. Then there was nothing but a gaping hole inside of me. I reached out along the flow of the Force and found that vaugly familiar presence again and tried to place it. I couldnt, though my mind seemed to be looking for someone else.

Nothing.

I couldn't feel who ever my mind was searching for, and the emptiness I felt made me cry out.

"No..." A distant female voice croaked. She sounded like she hadn't spoken in years. Was that me?

"No, no... NO!"

My eyes flew open as I tried to sit up. My world had become inner pain, an emptiness through the Force that suggested I was alone, and yet I was being shaken by hands on my shoulders. I tried my eyes agian.

The light around me made me blink, and I think I was screaming because of the way panic was thick in the room. I could only see blurred shapes, and nothing of the person whose hands were on my shoulders. I felt like I was spinning out of control.

Sleep.

The single word pressed itself into my mind, and I gave into the power of the voice who spoke it.

I fell back into darkness, welcoming the release.

~~`~{@

Force. Mind. Body. Sound. Touch...

I was laying on something hard, like stone. I could hear voices, but my brain was far too fogged to understand what they were saying. My body felt like jelly when I tried to move my hands and legs, but it also felt like it weighed a million tons. My mind was closed, and shallow. Like I could only access part of what I should.

And the Force...

I felt nothing from the Force.

That relazation made me slowly open my eyes. This time, the light was dim and I was able to make out the corner of a room made of stone.

I found my voice. "Uhhh.... mmm..."

Ok, I found something in my throat that could make sound, anyway. The voices around me stopped.

"... awake..." I understood one of the words they had said. Lolling my head to face them, I blinked and managed a ragged breath.

"... get... Skywalker..." Wow, I understood two words from the other. What an improvment. But Skywalker, is that what he said? The name, presumably, seemed so familiar.

I heard a set of foot steps leaving the room, and the other one coming towards me. I tried to move my arms agian, but they were still tangled around something. I looked down at my body and tried to blink my eyes into focas. It didn't work too well, though.

The person who now stood above me was speaking, but I couldn't make out what they were saying. Just friendliness I felt from what I could tell was a 'she'.

Then two more sets of footfalls came into the room and I saw the girl turn away. Piercing blue eyes came into view, and I felt at home for a moment. Where had I seen those eyes before?

Words began to make sence as the figure above me spoke.

"... I'm saying? Do you speak Basic?"

I managed a nod. I tried to move my hands again, and looked down to see that I was not bound, but rather I was tangled in thin, white sheets.

The figure--a man from what I could tell--helped me into a sitting position. I pushed my still-jelly-like legs over the table and leaned my head against his chest. This was the familier presence I had felt, and the voice that had told me to sleep again.

I sighed. "Where..." I whispered. I was already exhasted by the effort of sitting up. Then my eyes snapped open and I realized what was happening.

I leaned back away from the man sharply, and tried to stand. This proved useless, because I sank to the floor. I fumbled at my right hip for my blaster, then my left for my lightsaber. Both were gone.

"Where am I?" I growled as the man tried to help me to my feet. I couldn't stand, my weapons were gone and I was near deaf to the Force. Ifelt like I was seeing in black and white because it. I fought off panic for a second time and focased on the man with his hands on my shoulders.

His blue eyes and peaceful demenor came into full focas for the first time, as did the two youth standing in the room with me. I glared at him and put on my most foul smirk. This was a natural reaction for me. I didn't dare to think that this man wasn't my enemy, but thinking that he was could cost me his trust. I don't know where this reaction came from, but at the time I didn't bother to think about it. In the back of my mind, though, a small voice, told me to be nice.

This man was family.

So I stepped back from him and pushed myself into a sitting position on the table I had been resting on. Or was it a bed? I didn't know because my eyes had never left his. He let go of my shoulders and took a step back.

I sized him up for a moment. Not very tall, but not short. Brownish-blondish hair with blue eyes that shown with their own knowledge and light. He seemed wise, old, young, boyish and humble. But, most of all, it seemed like half of his presence was made of something I should have known right away, but didn't. It was unerving, almost recognizing him, and more so because I couldn't read his feelings through the Force.

"Hello," I said simply. It was accually more of a croak than a greeting. I coughed a bit, feeling like I had slept for years.

"Hello." he replied, amusment showing in his eyes. "I'm sorry if you were alarmed the first time you woke. You're accually lucky you're alive, because the stasis chamber was almost completly broken when we found you-"

My ear perked up. Stasis chamber? What was he talking about?

"What the hell?" I interputed him abrutly. "Stasis chamber? Since when was I..." My voice trailed off as I tried to remember the last time I had been awake. Why hadn't I tried to before?

I put one hand up to my forhead as I thought. And thought. But there was nothing to remember. I knew how to speak. I knew that I carried a blaster at my right hip, and a lightsaber at my left. I remembered the Republic and the Jedi. I remembered... nothing. Who I was, who I had been, when I had my last meal. My name. The color of my lightsaber, and the sound of my best friend's laughter. The face of the Master who trained me. All of it gone.

"Do you not remember?" He asked, seeing my disstress. I tried to cover up my riseing panic, but I couldn't stop it.

I paused, and looked him in the eye critically. I shouldn't trust him, I thought. Or, tried to think, anyway. Something kept nagging at me, possiably my only conection with the Force, and telling me that I should get over my paranoia and trust him.

I sighed, and felt like crying for some odd reason.

"No..." I whispered. "I don't... know anything. Oh, for the love of the Goddess..." I shook my head violently. It hit me hard, right then, that this really wasn't good. I knew how to swear but I couldn't remember my own damn name.

"Nothing?" He asked, sounding a little bit worried. I shook my head again.

He picked up something off of the floor and handed it to me. It was a small, black satchel.

"Here, this might help jog your memory." I took it from him and opened it up. Dumping the contents on the table beside me, I looked through them.

There was a blaster, which I holstered; A lightsaber with a wooden handle, which I somehow knew was mine so I clipped it to my belt; A data pad that had seen better days; An old Jedi Holocron which had also seen better days; A light brown Jedi robe that looked like it had been used for a long time and never washed; And the last thing in there was a small chain with a ring strung onto it. I put the chain around my neck, and found that the ring rested comfortably at a spot on my chest.

"Do you know who you are, or how long you were in that stasis chamber?" the man asked innocently as I studied the data pad. It had been shut off to conserve power, so it still ran. It was blocked with a password which I of course didn't know.

I looked at him pointably. "Sir, if you don't mind, I'd like to ask you a question." He guestured for me to continue.

I put on my best, or what I thought to be my best, smirk and said, "Just who are you?"

The man smiled at me. "Sorry for being so rude. I am Jedi Master Luke Skywalker."

"Skywalker...?" I ran the name through my head again. Where had I heard that before? It sounded so familiar. The Master nodded.

"I take it you've heard of me." There was some amusment in his voice, along with a hint of annoyance, but I had to dissapoint him.

"No," I said flatly, gaining quite a response from the two youth in the room, as well as him. "I can't say I've heard of a Luke Skywalker, but the name Skywalker does ring a bell." I sighed. "Sorry for being blunt."

He waved his hand. "It's quite all right. I rarely get that anymore." I could tell that when I glanced up at him again and gave him a questioning look. Then my eyes widened and I bowed my head to him. "Forgive me Master." I remembered what my formality should be around a Jedi Master far too late, but Master Skywalker seem didn't think so.

"For what? You didn't do anything wrong." I raised my eyes to his again, and he smiled. So familiar...

I nodded, then looked back at the data pad. I took a deep breath and began going over what I was thinking aloud. Trust came off of this Jedi in waves and you didn't need Force ablitlies to see that. This was good because of my loss in that area. Panic rose within me for a moment, but I beat it down quickly.

"No, I don't know who I am... I suppose that these tell a bit about who I was, but not much." I pointed to the lightsaber. "When I woke up, though, I already was well aware of the fact I was a Jedi. I reached out with the Force, but it's like I'm behind a 'mental wall'. I don't feel anything very strongly, except your presence." I left out the fact that he felt so familiar, for what reasons I don't know. Maybe I was just avoiding pain, though I didn't know that the time. Something told me I needed to avoid that subject, and instinct told me to obey that something's warnings. "I felt emptiness when I first woke, and I think that is reason I can't remember anything." I broke into a smile that seemed to milding surprise him. "So I guess I'll just have to hack in here and see if this is any way to find that info."

He nodded thoughtfully. "That's a good reason." Then a smile broke out on his face as well. "Come, you must be hungry. We can solve this puzzle later. Can you walk?"

I found out that I could, and shouldering the satchel with my things in it, I followed him through stone passages. He told me what I had the choices of eating, and it all sounded very good. I was about to ask when exactly it was on the Galactic time scale (not that I could remember anything about that either, but I felt I should ask it anyway), when he suddenly stopped at a large room.

Pauseing in the doorway he said, "Here are my students," he guestured to the fifteen or twenty people sitting in what looked to be a mess hall. There were all different races, genders and ages seated there, and for a moment, I marveled.

"Your students?" I asked, a little confused. What was a Jedi Master doing teaching a bunch of random people?

"Yes, this is a Jedi Acadamy."

End chapter 1