A Different World

This is dumb,' I mutter, staring at the blank datapad. 'Ban wants an essay? A fracking essay?'

On the other side of me, Telos and Mekk type away like busy little tuk'ata. I roll my eyes at Thalia, hoping for sympathy but the prissy granslug just looks blank.

I stare at the question again.

Why did you join the Sith? Please describe in three thousand words or less the reasons you became a cog in our glorious machine. Sarcasm or dramatic irony will not be tolerated. You have been warned.

I tap my fingers on my desk and stare at the flagstone floor. My mind is as blank as a piece of cheese. Or -- or -- something.

Why did i join the Sith?

by Cadet Lashowe Devry

No -- that isn't right. I delete out the apostrophe and it still looks wrong. So I try again.

It was my parents idea.

No. Ban is always going on about taking responsibility for one's own actions.

i was a very bad girl.

I scowl at the screen. That's the old Lashowe talking. Bad's meaningless here. In fact, bad is good -- or good is weak. Or whatever. Who the hell really cares.

XXX

'I don't know what to do with her!' My father is talking to my mother. I am locked in my room again after getting busted coming back from an all-night spectacle on the downward spiral. Undercity allll the way. It was a fundraiser for the Young Republicans. Revolution. Fight the power! My parents don't understand.

I lie on my back staring at the ceiling, trying to decide if the juma I drank has more calories than the dinner I haven't eaten. Or less.

Also things are spinning. Sort of like a decaying orbit. Sort of like my life.

I can see now that the way I was back then was wrong. Out of control. On a rapid trajectory with a neutron star. It was a lot of things, I guess. The glitterstim and the spice probably didn't help. But, like that sad song goes:

Ashes to ashes, funk to funky, crash your starship into a planet cause you're a junky, strung out on heavens wide, hitting an all time low...

I was at an all-time low back then, back before I tasted real power.

"The psych-droid says it's just a phase..." Mother sounds like she wants to convince herself. "We were pretty wild ourselves back in the day, dear. Remember going to the anti-Krath demonstrations? It wasn't all politics..."

"That was a different time," Father's voice. "And we were older. She's only sixteen. This is dangerous. For all of us. If she doesn't end up dead in an undercity sewer, she'll end up arrested. And she'll drag us down too."

In my room against the wall, there is a picture very small. A hologram I took some years ago. It shows a picture of a room I know. I sit and wait alone, in my room. The walls are white and in the night, the room is lit by electric light.

In my room I laugh. "Up the Republic!"

"She'll grow out of it," Mother murmurs.

"These aren't good times to be rebellious," Father says.

Father was right. We lived on occupied Taris.

But who am I kidding, I wasn't really political. Sith, Republic, what's the diff? Of course, now I know. The Sith are winning and tomorrow belongs to me.

"The psych-droid says she's Force-sensitive. Like your Aunt Vinni."

Vinni became a Jedi Knight and died on Yavin IV. What a fracking idiot.

"Do the doctors think the Force makes her troubled?" Mother asks, voice soft with concern.

"No," Father says. "They think the Force makes her dangerous."

This is the sound of poisons, the sickness no one knows.

I told my best friend to take a short hike off a long platform and she did. She broke her spine. Lucky thing they were able to fix it.

I told a boy that he loved me and a few weeks later we had to get a restraining order because he wouldn't go away.

I crashed the speeder Father bought me into an Upper City apartment wall and walked away without a scratch.

I drank a fifth of Corellian brandy and slit my wrists. I didn't want to die, it was only a song. You know the one I mean.

I don't want to start any blasphemous rumors but I think the Force has a sick sense of humor.

I took a lot of tranks because that was the only way to make the voices stop inside my head. Make the songs of the universe shut the frack up. I guess it was the Force. At the time I just thought I was crazy. And the world sucked.

"There's a school someone at work told me about," Father says. "A school for kids like her."

"I believe that children are the future, teach them well and let them lead the way. Show them all the beauty they possess insiiiideee..." I lie on my bed in my room against the wall, staring at the ceiling. And singing a sad, sad song.

"Shut her up," Mother whispers from outside the door. "I can't stand it when she's like this."

There is no doubt upon us when the greasy men come back again.

The men that came weren't really greasy though. They were professionals. They gave me more tests.

"Your father tells us you're seeing a Republic sympathizer, Lashowe."

"All my friends like the Republic," I spit. "The Sith shouldn't be here. You should get off our world. Fascists! Imperialist nerf herders! Super trooper chuba-faced scum!"

"You're very angry," says the gray non-greasy man. He has tattoos on his face, but he isn't cool. Not at all.

He's smiling.

"Life sucks," I shoot back. "Die young, but stay pretty. Live fast 'cause it won't last. Oh no, no, no."

The gray man laughs.

The other one -- I can't remember his face -- turns to my parents with and and hands them a datapad to sign. "We'll take good care of her. There's a place for her, in the new order."

I think Mother is crying. That is the kind of thing she'd do.

There's a place for us, somewhere a place for us. Hold my hand and you're halfway there. We had some good machines, but they don't work no more. I loved you once, don't love you anymore.

Rehab was hell. They didn't make it easy on me. Of course they didn't. They taught me not to be weak. They taught me to be strong. To be ready. They taught me evolution. I puked my guts out and shed my skin.

I stare at the datapad again, flick my eyes over to where Dustil Onasi is sitting with a furrowed brow, probably tapping away something about sadness and loss. He'd better watch out. Ban meant what she said about dramatic irony. Even if he just gives her the facts he's gonna be walking a damn thin line.

Mekel Jin's already done. He sits, hands folded neatly at his desk. I'm pretty sure I know what he'll say too. He reminds me of a pampered sleek kath pup. I always wanted a pet.

Dustil. Mekel. Shardaan, Thalia. Kel. All of them have stories. But mine is more simple. The simplest. I'd laugh, if it were allowed.

Why did I join the Sith?

by Cadet Lashowe Devry

i was bored.

Three words on the datapad. Not three thousand, just three. Either Ban will choke me for insolence, or she'll get it. I wonder which.

It might be interesting to find out.

XXX

A/N Disclaimer: Star Wars Kotor not mine, also song references listed below, not mine.

Song quotage:

David Bowie, "Ashes to Ashes"

Yazoo, "In My Room"

Cabaret, "Tomorrow Belongs to Me"

Depeche Mode, "Blasphemous Rumors"

Shriekback, "Faded Flowers"

Abba, Super Trooper

Shirley Bassey, "I Believe that Children are the Future"

Blondie, "Die Young, But Stay Pretty"

West Side Story, "There's a Place for Us"