Misapplied Lessons (Ley'li Back Story)

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I was born two decades and five years past to a den of six sisters on the planet Saccoria. There was a surge of anti-Republic thinking at the time. A governing Triad had come to the conclusion that they alone had the right to rule Saccoria. The dens of our origin on the planet had a history of dishonor. Their name was viewed as a curse and was lost over time. My den was strongly aligned with the viewpoint of the Triad, who were willing to do anything to take control from the hands of the Republic and keep it firm within their own greedy claws.

Even when I was just a pup, I could see the desperation in their way of thinking, the danger in their plots to hold power. I became a bit of a black nerf in my den. And, when asked by my sisters for the first time where my loyalties stood, I committed a heinous and cowardly act. I lied. But, I wasn’t ashamed for the mere act of lying. I was ashamed of myself for not speaking. I was ashamed for feeling so intimidated by the number that stood against me, all of one mind, that I failed to dissent. If not for what I knew to be right, at least against what I knew to be wrong.

“You want humans to rule, don’t you?” My sisters asked.

“You want to be the pet of your old human teacher,” they accused.

“You want our race to fall,” they sneered.

“You want the Triad to lose to the Republic.”

“You love that old hairless thing more than you love your den.”

“No,” was all my young mind could think to say.

That was my lie. My very first lie.

I was being trained, at the time, to interact with species outside of my own so that, in the future, I could aide in building alliances through my ability to speak Basic. This vocation was seen with ever depreciating eyes by my denmates. Most of them had chosen to enlist as warriors, to protect Saccoria from the perceived persecution of the Republic.

My instructor… We were very close. He was an ancient human being named Lerokee Allftin. His sight had left him long before I ever met him, and his bones and skin were frail with age, but he could command the attention of a room with the simple act of baring his teeth in the strange, comforting, unoffending way that humans do.

The morning of my first deceit, I came to him and wept from my guilt. It burned me as if I had burrowed my way to the core of the planet; burrowed my way to the gravity and heat found there. I had never lied before. I feared being found out. But, I couldn’t stand for what was happening on my planet.

“Sweet little Ley’Li,” he said and scratched gently between my ears. “You have such a big heart and such a sharp and opened mind. Don’t be so scared. Take this guilt and grow from it. I will teach you how to keep yourself safe with what you choose to say and what you choose to hide.”

“Are you going to teach me how to lie?” I asked, searching his opalescent eyes for an answer.

“I don’t believe that lying is good, but I do believe it kept you alive today,” he answered. “I will teach you how to stay alive.”

The Triad took possession of a starburster, promising peaceful intentions of harnessing the energy from destroying the stars of uninhabited solar systems.

They didn’t keep their word. In an attempt to cause chaos and over through Republic control, they destroyed the lives of thousands with the weapon they had acquired. I was terrified, horrified, and ashamed for my people.

A civil war ensued between those who were disgusted by this careless act of destruction and the careless ones who committed it. I lost my den.

Lerokee found passage off planet for both of us in the cargo bay of a smuggler ship that was set to leave at sunrise. The night before our departure, my sleep was shallow and full of awful dreams. A group of pro-Triad soldiers hiding, waiting to attack our ship. They fire a blaster. It hits me in the chest and I die.

At dawn, I was groggy. Lerokee had a long cape that he let me wear to keep warm in the cold, dank air. I remember thinking how funny it looked, gathered up and swaying with the movement of my tail as we snuck through darkened tunnels.

We finally made it to our rendezvous point. I saw a head peek out over a rock. Before I could yelp in panic, Lerokee was standing in front of me. A wound from a blaster hitting his lower abdomen. It had been meant for my chest. He slumped down to his knees, then fell onto his back.

I knelt over him, looking to his face. He smiled up towards me and reached out to pet my cheek.

I looked at the wound, longing for it to close up.

To my surprise, the skin began to knit itself back together. But, it wasn’t fast enough. His hand fell limp from my cheek and hit the ground.

I howled in pain at my loss. Arms wrapped around me and pulled me briskly away from him and towards the ship.

Later in the cargo bay, I stared at the blood that stained the edge of his cape as I pulled it tightly around myself.

How did he know the blaster fire was coming? I asked myself.

And then I thought further.

How did he guide us so carefully through the network of tunnels on Saccoria?

My opportunity to dwell on this was short-lived once the Empire came to be. I was a child, but I was also responsible for earning my keep aboard a shipped captained by an amoral smuggler.

My training in diplomacy became hands on lessons in deceit and coercion. My silver tongue earned Imperial credits. The formal combat techniques I had learned gave way to dirty tricks like sweeping my tail under someone’s feet and making quick decisions under the pressure of a skirmish with thugs and bounty hunters. My eloquent basic blended with the speech of criminals and the revolutionaries who begrudgingly hired them to do their dirty work in their blossoming rebellion.

All the while, inexplicable things quietly continued to happen. A guard too easy to convince to let me past. A blaster fired just a moment before I actually see my enemy. Lucky breaks, one after another, and all along I start to feel crazy for thinking I might have some subconscious control over it. And then I recalled again, my blind teacher who seemed to be able to see as well as I could in the dark.

I tried to push these thoughts away, but in the back of my mind played the memory of how his skin had began to knit together when I longed for him to heal. I tried not to wonder about why that was possible. I wasn’t sure I was comfortable with the answer when I found it. I didn’t trust myself. I reasoned it away as a dream, a delusion of a suffering child who had lost the person closest to her.

I felt the desire for vengeance welling up inside, but even more so did I feel the need to honor my kind teacher by speaking out for what is right. By keeping secrets and using words to make things change. To make things happen.

When I’m able to do that - maybe - my shame will disappear. In the interim, there is no delegation, no ambassador, no diplomat. He wouldn’t have chosen this position for me, but it’s the one I’m in; skirting the edge of the Empire’s grasp and taking every opportunity I can to inconvenience them, to knock them down a peg, and to eventually bring them to their knees.