--- Book 1: A Young Girl's Padawan Record Start ---

I first gained consciousness in this life in the arms of a demonic looking being that I later learned was an alien known as a Togrutan. For a while I thought I had been sent to hell as a baby, setting only strange creature that vaguely reminded me of stories about demons, and evil spirits, but as time wore on I began to realize that these creatures were actually just care takers for children. Aliens in a world, a galaxy really, far more advanced than the one I originally came from.

It took years for me to learn that all the children that were being taken care of where special, having the potential to access the Force, a form of magic that did not follow any logical rules. And that we had been 'retrieved' from our parents to be indoctrinated into what was basically a cult. It was not till my age group reached the age of three that a realization hit me. I had been reincarnated into Star Wars. The clue was being handed a training lightsaber to begin learning how to use it and recognizing it from the movie I had seen so long ago.

Damnable Being X couldn't have picked a world I knew better. Guess that would have been too easy for me. No, he just plops me into a world that I could not use my previous life experience to help me with. And he made me a girl. Thankfully puberty was still a few years away, but that is not going to be a fun time getting use to bleeding for a week every month.

Taking a deep breath and letting my frustrations go as best as I could, I divided my attention back to our instructor. If I was going to do well in this world, I would have to know what is expected of me. Just have to parse out what the mind washing BS was that I had to pay lip service to and the actually useful bits of information.

—-

Jedi Master Sa Tum had taken to teaching Younglings many years ago, finding a satisfying pleasure in watching ignorance shift into knowledge, helping each child that passed through his classroom become closer to being and to live the code he followed.

In his time, he regular saw prodigious students advance in a field far faster than the other students, usually just in one discipline, but occasionally several. It was a rare individual indeed that went so far above their peers as a certain blonde conundrum he currently had to instruct. Which lead directly to his current meeting with Grand Master Yoda and Master of the Order Mace Windu.

"Begin meeting now, we shall. A youngling you wish to discuss." Yoda began the meeting with a simple statement, his walking stick in hand as he sat on his poof of a chair.

"Yes, Tanya Degurechaff," Sa Tum acknowledged before expanding. "She is advancing very swiftly in her studies, it is rather remarkable for one so young to show such advanced knowledge and technique in so many things."

"Are you suggesting she is a prodigy?" Mace Windu asked, looking for the reason for the meeting.

"A bit more than that I am afraid, she was the first of her creche mates to pick up reading and now spends a lot of time in the library reading."

"Are you telling me there is a problem with someone choosing to read?"

"No, but the things she is choosing to read is unusual for one so young, I got a list to see what she liked reading about in hopes to get her to interact with the other younglings more."

Sa Tum handed over a flimsy with a list of titles on it and date of check out in an adjacent column.

"A Treatise on the Tactics of Defending a Fortified Ground Position? A Summation of and Listing of Conflicts of the Old Republic? Stratagems of Internaval Boarding? Hmm, a rather militaristic listing."

"Ah, Intergalactic Trade Laws, good book it is."

"I did not expect you to enjoy reading something so dry, Master Yoda," Sa Tum expressed his surprise.

"Useful for sleep, I find it," Yoda responded with a smile.

Giving a cough to hide his laughter at Yoda's little joke, Sa Tum continued, "Yes, that is precisely my point, these books are rather advanced and very dry for someone so young to show such interest in, but I had tested her on her knowledge and she had actually been reading them. And far more thoroughly than I was to be able to test her on the knowledge."

"More concerns you have, I sense outside of reading material." Yoda said, encouraging the meeting to move on to the next point.

"Yes, if it was just an unusually advanced reading level, I would just assume the force gifted her with a bit of talent in research, but there is also her ability to articulate her thoughts."

Sa Tum handed over another flimsy that was a report that claims to have been written by Tanya.

"I had assigned the class to write their thoughts on what causes conflicts and methods to resolve them after two of the other younglings got into a fight. I had thought it would be a good way to teach a bit of diplomacy and ways to foster harmony, but then Tanya handed in this. I already checked, and there was no plagiarism from another source, this is all her own work."

—-

Conflicts have many claimed reasons for beginning, but most conflicts can be directly attributed to resources with other reasons merely being either justification or a thinly veiled cover for an attempt at either gaining more resources or depriving others of resources...

...Religious wars are a conflict to gain more resources in the form of more followers or deprive another religious entity of the resource of followers. This is most blatant with crusades to conquer some holy land or another, thus gaining all the sentient beings that reside there as more potential followers...

... the Naboo occupation by the Trade Federation being a perfect example of the way a change in how available certain resources, or in this case the lack of tax, can motivate a violent conflict to return a previous status quo...

... labor unions protecting Human Resources...

... call for peace ...

...Equitable Agreements...

—-

Mace Windu stopped reading and began flipping through the flimsy report, impressed at the thorough dissection of the topic and the various forms of conflict one could talk about and how each is a conflict over resources, even if not of a physical resource.

"Impressive understanding of conflicts."

"And there are two more things." Sa Tum stated while pulling out a datapad. "The first is her work ethic. She does not appear to have a gift for using the Force and her presence in the Force is only slightly above the average for her age, nothing too unusual there, but she is the one who works the hardest on trying to utilize her abilities and is beginning to lead the class in this too. The other thing is best explained with this recording of one of her sparring matches with one of her fellow creche mates. Before I play it, the younglings have only been taught the basics of Shii Cho, mostly how to hold a lightsaber and how to swing it."

Playing the video, Tanya and a Rodian boy are squared off, the Rodian is all smiles and practically bouncing in excitement. In contrast, Tanya has a firm stance on the ground and her face set in a blank look that on someone older could be taken as a serious face.

At the match start, the Rodian takes a wild, untrained swing at Tanya. Tanya meanwhile stays still till the last moment where she steps in, deflects the blow before landing a blow that would have killed the Rodian if they had been using real lightsabers. Tanya then gives the fallen Rodian a respectful bow before helping him up.

"Play that again," Mace Windu asks, feeling like he missed something important the first time.

"Old, her style is," Yoda notes after rewatching the video. "Recreate ancient Shii Cho, previous Battlemaster had."

"What does that mean?" Mace asked as he watched the video a third time, noting how even with the clumsy body of a toddler, Tanya did show she knew some variant of Shii Cho, the oldest and most basic of the lightsaber fighting styles.

"Mysterious the Force is. Meditate on this we should. Suspicion I have."

"What suspicion do you have?" Mace asked, Sa Tum staying out of the discussion.

"Old soul she has. First life, this is not."

"Are you suggesting she is a reincarnation of someone?"

Yoda have a nod. "Future, hard to see it is." Picking to the flimsy copy of Tanya's report. "Coming, conflict is."

"Is that all of your concerns about Miss Degurechaff?"

Sa Tum seems to hesitate for a bit before steeling himself and making a decision. "There is one more thing. I often sense a lot of dark emotions around her. Anger, frustration."

"Hmm, advance training perhaps she needs," Yoda suggests, looking to Mace Windu who takes on a thoughtful look as he leans back in his seat.

"Perhaps. I might have an idea to help her deal with her darker emotions."

—-

Lightsaber practice reminded me of being in the kendo club in school. A fun enough activity at the time, but I was not particularly talented at it and had given it up in favor of pursuing activities that would actually pay dividends in the future. Here, though, I had to be skilled in using the lightsaber in order to progress to a comfortable position in the Order. A bit of a barbaric requirement for advancement, but if that was what I had to do, so be it.

The weight, or lack thereof, of the blade took some getting use to. Thankfully there was a nudge of feeling from what I took to be the Force our teachers kept going on and on about which helped guide my movements in ways so I would not hit myself in the face with the practice blade.

The katas we were taught were a bit different than what I could vaguely recall from my previous life, but they had a logical reason for the difference. I learned using a bamboo shinai with plenty of heft to the blade, not a handle with some weightless light coming out of it.

Finishing up our warm up stretches, I began to head to my place when the teacher called my name.

"Tanya, you are going to be training with someone else today."

Looking up to her, I saw a man standing next to her. I did not recognize him and he most have come in while we were stretching. He was very tall, dark and bald with a very serious expression on his face. Was I really doing so poorly learning these new katas while trying not to get the ones I vaguely recalled mixed in that they had to call in who must be the battlemaster to help me?

"Children, please say hi to Master Mace Windu. He is here to provide Tanya some extra help with her technique."

Yep, I was doing that poorly. Only one thing for it then, go along with these lessons and try my best to catch up to the other children so I do not fall behind.

"Thank Master Mace Windu, sir," I say, giving a respectful bow while trying my best to keep my frustration in check.