The Sequel To The Jedi Academy Trilogy The Inhabitants Of The Carida System Deserve -The Toast

The year is 11 ABY, shortly after the events of Champions of the Force. Kyp Durron has just been returned to Coruscant with the Sun Crusher by Han Solo after having destroyed the entire Carida system, along with its 25 million inhabitants, for a trial.

LUKE SKYWALKER speaks before the council headed by MON MOTHMA, Borsk Fey‘lya, and Leia Organa Solo.

LUKE: …so, anyways, if you guys could just release Kyp back into my custody, I’ll just, uh, take him back to Yavin 4, the planet where he initially encountered the spirit of Exar Kun and turned to the dark side, and continue his Jedi training.

MON MOTHMA: What? No.

LEIA: Absolutely not.

BORSK FEY’LYA: It feels borderline criminal that you would even ask us that.

MON MOTHMA: This is a court of law. You get that, right? Like…I get that he’s your buddy, or whatever, but he’s literally killed more people than Darth Vader and Moff Tarkin put together.

LUKE: Right, right, I know, but he’s really sorry.

MON MOTHMA: I mean…okay?

LEIA: That super doesn’t change the amount of people he killed. Right? Like, even if Hitler had survived the bunker and been super apologetic at Nuremberg – and I’m sorry to invoke Hitler here, but I actually do think it’s a kind of apt comparison – we wouldn’t have just said like “Oh, well, thanks for the apology, go in peace,” right?

LUKE: I don’t know who Hitler is.

LEIA: Whatever the equivalent of Hitler would be in our own timeline, then.

LUKE: Look, to be fair, he was under the influence of the evil spirit Exar Kun at the time. Who has now been destroyed, we’re pretty sure. Although people thought he had been destroyed before, and he sure hadn’t been, haha.

LEIA: Didn’t he willingly accept the tutelage of Exar Kun during his time on Yavin 4?

LUKE: I don’t follow.

LEIA: It’s just that it’s sort of less…exculpable to have been possessed by someone if you asked them to possess you.

LUKE: Well, I’m not going to let him get possessed by another Sith spirit and destroy a second star system, if that’s what you’re worried about.

MON MOTHMA: That is exactly what we’re worried about.

LEIA: Also, it feels morally…questionable…that you think we would turn a mass murderer over to his own mentor for justice just because he belongs to a highly secretive religious organization. This isn’t Medieval Europe, or whatever, we don’t have special canon law for Jedis.

LUKE: Okay, but like, I sort of feel like I’m the most qualified person to decide what his punishment should be, and I really think he’s punished himself enough.

MON MOTHMA: Okay, see there I just straight-up disagree with you.

LEIA: Yeah, this hearing isn’t about whether or not he can go back to being a Jedi. That point is super moot. It’s mooted.

BORSK FEY’LYA: We’re just trying to decide whether to execute him or imprison him forever.

LUKE: Oh, is there still capital punishment in this time period?

LEIA: I mean…maybe? It’s not the future, right, it’s “long, long ago,” so we might not have advanced past the death penalty.

LUKE: Well, sure, but you don’t think a society that has come up with intergalactic space travel has also figured out a better way to treat criminals than executing them?

LEIA: Honestly, not necessarily.

MON MOTHMA: Either one is better than your plan, which is just going back to teaching him how to move battle destroyers with his mind.

LEIA: You’re honestly a horrible teacher.

BORSK FEY’LYA: Frankly, I’m a little confused why you’re not on trial too.

MON MOTHMA: Yes, let’s put him on trial later. In the meantime, I think we should execute Kyp Durron, because even though I’m opposed to the death penalty for regular human beings, I’m pretty sure there’s no way we can contain someone powerful enough to power the Sun Crusher with his brain for the rest of his life.

LUKE: I feel like we’re really getting away from the other option, which is let him apologize and come back with me to hang out on my Jungle Friendship Planet.

LEIA: Apologize to who, though?

LUKE: To…to all those dead people.

LEIA: There’s literally no one left to apologize to.

LUKE: He had a really hard upbringing, you guys. He lost his brother!

MON MOTHMA: Did he have 25 million brothers?

LUKE: I…no.

MON MOTHMA: Okay, then, you see how it’s sort of not the same thing.

LUKE: I guess.

BORSK FEY’LYA: So we’re agreed. Kyp Durron will be executed immediately for his crimes against the New Republic and sentient beings everywhere.

LEIA: Absolutely.

MON MOTHMA: No question.

LUKE: Can I at least return to the planet where Kyp Durron turned to the Dark Side under my tutelage and continue training a bunch of unknown quantities with absolutely no oversight or standardized curriculum, lacking even a single metric for measuring progress?

MON MOTHMA: Oh, that’s fine with me.

LEIA: Yeah, I see no problem with that.

LUKE: Okay, then. See you guys the next time one of my students goes rogue and murders everyone, I guess. Which hopefully won’t be that often.

MON MOTHMA: Well, don’t be too hard on yourself. It’s what we’re here for.

OFFSCREEN, KYP DURON is summarily executed for the murder of 25 million innocents, as is appropriate.