Atris

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Atris was a Human female who served as a Jedi historian, and later as a Jedi Master and Jedi Council member during the Mandalorian Wars and the Jedi Civil War. She was deeply committed to the Order and was a fierce adherent of the Jedi Code. But Atris' faith in the righteousness of the Jedi wavered when her personal hero and secret love interest, Macen Surik, turned his back on the Council to join rogue Knights Revan and Malak and their faction of Jedi during the Mandalorian Wars. Atris chose not to go to war, but this decision left her bitter and conflicted.

When Surik returned to face the Council's judgment after the devastating events of the Battle of Malachor V, Atris was the first to condemn him, suggesting that he had fallen to the dark side just as Revan had. Over time, Atris grew to hate Surik for complicating her black-and-white view of the Jedi, the Sith, and the Force and her perceived abandonment. During the Dark Wars, Atris called a secret Jedi convocation on the Miraluka world of Katarr in an attempt to find the threat that was stalking the Jedi. She then leaked knowledge of the conclave's existence in the hopes of drawing out the Sith. She succeeded, but with dire consequences; Darth Nihilus devastated the surface of the planet, wiping out all life on Katarr, including the Jedi gathered there.

Atris remained in seclusion, surrounding herself with Echani Handmaidens who could not feel the Force. She planned to rebuild the Jedi Order, and established a Jedi Academy in the old irrigation system on Telos IV. However, she was heavily influenced by the many Sith Holocron's she had collected in her efforts to find and understand the Sith. The Holocrons fed her bitterness, and she slowly and quietly fell to the dark side. After a final confrontation on Telos, Macen Surik convinced Atris to turn away from the dark side. Atris then remained in the Jedi Academy, waiting to be judged for her actions by the new Jedi Council.

Early Life
After the end of the Great Sith War that was started by the Sith Lords Exar Kun and Ulic Qel-Droma, the Jedi Historian Atris attempted to revise the broken system of Jedi apprenticeship. She argued that there was little wonder why Kun and Qel-Droma fell to the dark side of the Force, when the Jedi had liberal instruction practices in place, such as dozens of Padawans training under a single Master, the radical bonds of reciprocal apprenticeship, and Jedi beginning their training in their teens and later. She invoked thousand-year old recommendations first suggested by the Jedi Master Simikarty, lobbying for the restriction of Padawans that a Master could have at one time, and also limiting the age of Jedi candidates.

Atris also advocated prohibiting romantic involvement for Jedi, citing that the First Great Schism had been started by two lovers. However she secretly continued her love for Macen Surik. She even endorsed adoption of a more austere interpretation of the Jedi Code which was favored by the Draethos Jedi Master Odan-Urr, in memory of his death at the hands of Exar Kun at the Jedi Academy on Ossus. Her arguments found powerful purchase amongst the Jedi, and she was appointed to High Council.

The Mandalorian Wars
When the Mandalorian Wars erupted in the year 3964 BBY, the Galactic Republic came to the Jedi for assistance. However, Atris resisted the call to protect the inhabitants of the Outer Rim Territories, instead staunchly defending the council's decision to meditate and reflect before taking action.

Many Jedi did not understand how the Council could sit idly while innocents died, and the order was split when two Jedi Knights named Revan and Malak chose to go to war. Many followed them, including the Jedi Macen Surik. Atris had held a strong admiration for Surik, an admiration that had quickly grown into a romantic affection, viewing him as something of a hero as well as a close friend. When he and Revan left the Order to join the war, rejecting everything that Atris believed in, Atris felt personally betrayed as well as heartbroken] Atris condemned Revan, his followers, and the "freethinking" teachings of his former Jedi Master, fellow historian Kreia. Revan's eventual turn to the dark side came as little surprise to Atris. Indeed, when Revan met Atris years later asking what happened to Surik, Atris made little effort to conceal her contempt.

After the war's end, only one of the Jedi who had followed Revan to war returned to face the council: Macen Surik. He stood before them as an echo in the Force, having cut himself off from it after the final battle at Malachor V. Surik was so defiant, so certain of the rightness of his actions that he caused Atris to doubt herself. Atris wanted to punish Surik for this, and became convinced that he had fallen to the dark side along with all of the others who had followed Revan. She felt that exile was too lenient of a punishment for Surik's betrayal, and believed that he would only join Revan again if she was free. The other Masters warned her to be mindful of her feelings, but Atris insisted that Surik ought to have died at Malachor V, because when he stood before them, it was if he was already dead. The Council decided not to tell Surik that he had become a wound in the Force, which was the result of her actions at Malachor.

Atris kept Surik's original double bladed Lightsaber after the trial, carrying it with her always. Even many years later, she insisted that the Council was right to be cautious. But deep down, she continued to question the actions of the Council, Surik, and herself.

Behind the scenes
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