The smell of water clouded Gabri's mind.  The vast painting of blue was beautiful.  Forget the immense fog.  Forget the millions of trees closing him in.  All that was there was the pool of water.  He began touching his feet inside.  Its crisp freshness made him shiver with joy.  Soon, he was wading, all of him, in the water.  He swam around rapidly and then just let the water carry him.  It felt good.  Oh, how it felt good.

"Gabri!" shouted a voice from outside his own world.  There, clothed in a brown and apricot robe, stood Ka Kamikaze, Jedi Master.  His black hair, silver at the sides, clung to his scalp, refusing to let any wind pass through.  His ashy black beard did the same.  Ka was stocky, broad-shouldered.  His blue lightsaber stayed tucked away deep in his robe.  Gabri had never seen him withdraw it, but he had heard great tales in which he fought with it.  Oh, if he could see him wield it, see all those tales come true, he would love it.

"No more tomfoolery!" Ka ordered in his bold voice, "Do you come or do you stay?  I must search this area."

You stay

"I think I shall stay." Gabri told Ka, and began drifting off into the water's hypnotizing ripples.

"Very well.  If you must.  I shall meet you back here soon." Ka said, a touch of bitterness in his voice, and was off.  But Gabri didn't listen to him.  He was already immersed in the water.

The quiet tranquility calmed him.  It was a calm quiet.  A peaceful quiet.  An eerie quiet.  A menacing quiet.  He felt the sensation of being watched.  He reluctantly emerged from the water and draped his robe around him.  He then went to explore the region around the pool.  The only sounds were his footsteps squishing on the damp grass and his breathing.  But, as he quieted himself, he heard another breathing noise.

He whipped his head around, scouring for another being.  He saw nothing.  He looked to the north and, suddenly, he heard the hum of a lightsaber.  He lashed his own out.  The crrsshh of their lightsabers clashing echoed around them.  The bright hues of green and red lit up their faces.  Gabri could not see the other's face, for it was covered by a sooty, black hood.  He knocked the lightsaber out of the other's hand and pinned him to the ground.  The other was not, however, a he at all.  She was a woman, with musty red hair all ablaze and fawn's eyes.  They were timid pools of blue-green water and they were glistening.  Her hood was now down and her arms bent up against her head.  With flaring nostrils, Gabri shouted at her,

You say "Who are you?!"

The woman looked at him with stern eyes.  She clenched her teeth and answered, "I am Ophelia.  And you may be?"

"Gabri," Gabri told her, "I'm tempted to kill you."  She looked at him with girlish eyes.  Her sternness was there but her eyes sang a different tune.  They sang, "Have mercy on me."  He kept her restrained but, in an act of kindness, eventually let her be free.  She stood and brushed the dew off her robe.  As she stared at him her eyes said something again that her voice did not: "Why are you kind to me?"

He knew not why, but he felt a certain sadness for her.  It seemed she wished not to be here, that she longed to be somewhere safer, happier.  A tear trickled down her face.  She gazed down a moment.  Then, she looked into his periwinkle eyes.

"You have been sent to free me," she replied, speaking like a prophet, "To free me from the Sith's manacles."  He stared into her fawn's eyes.  Her strength was wilting.  She suddenly dropped to her knees, laid her face in her hands and cried.  Seeing her sorrow made him think of how he was glad he was a Jedi.  The Sith were menaces.  They always turned on each other.  They couldn't be trusted.  But he then remembered the harshness of Ka.  How Ka was cruel and unforgiving.  That was like the Sith.  They both sounded horrible.  He knelt by her, resting a claming hand on her back, and told her,

You say "Come with me and the Jedi shall protect you."

She looked up at him with trustworthy eyes.  The tears made her eyes quiver like someone dropping a pebble into a a pond and watching the ripples.  She laid a hand on his shoulder and said, "Thank you."

He never quite did know if the Jedi were the good ones, or the Sith.  But seeing this girl break into tears, he knew.  He had to take her into his custody, make her feel wanted.  And so, following the path from Padawan to Jedi Knight, he took her as his Padawan.  He needed to show everybody how the Jedi were the ones to be trusted.  He did show them.  Every one.