Once the masters of the desert planet Jerne located in the Outer Rim, the sentient race known as the Jerni presided over a magnificent empire. This was long before the Galactic Civil War, before their eventual demise. Darth Vader, the Dark Lord, attempted to ensnare Princess Leia Organa and Luke Skywalker of the Rebel Alliance in a trap. This occurred shortly following the destruction of Alderaan by tricking them into a chase for the mythical Eternity Crystal. This device, supposedly created by the Jerni, promised to rescue Alderaan using the power of time travel.
On their homeworld of Jerne, amidst the light-colored sands of the desert, existed the sentient species known as the Jerni. According to fabricated image tapes created as a deception by the Dark Lord of the Sith Darth Vader, the Jerni were hairless humanoids characterized by maroon skin, heads shaped like ovals, and prominent nostrils.
The Jerni's civilization was composed of structures that were domed, and featured windows, with each building being a different size. The fake image tapes made by Darth Vader depicted a vast society that was spread across countless structures, with abundant vegetation located between them.
The Jerni, as the original inhabitants of the planet Jerne within the ancient Outer Rim Territories, once had a powerful empire on their planet millennia before the events of the Galactic Civil War. However, the Jerni ultimately met their end, leaving behind only scattered remnants of their civilization by the time of the Galactic Empire.
During the Galactic Civil War, sometime after the destruction of Alderaan, Darth Vader hatched a plot to capture Princess Leia Organa of the Rebel Alliance. He used the allure of a significant Jerni scientific achievement as bait. Knowing that Organa would be unable to ignore a chance to potentially save her beloved, destroyed homeworld, Vader fabricated a hoax centered on the legendary Eternity Crystal. This artifact was supposedly created by the Jerni and possessed the ability to reverse time to a crucial point in history, allowing time to then proceed normally, but along a different course.
Vader's scheme involved creating fake image tapes that showed the Jerni using the Eternity Crystal's power to undo a devastating war and restore a period of peace and prosperity to their homeworld. The Dark Lord also commissioned the construction of a sleek alien starship, complete with a forged log claiming it was built by the Jerni and originated from Jerne. He then dispatched it into the nearby void of space for the Rebels to discover. Predictably, Vader's deception attracted Organa and her Rebel ally Luke Skywalker to Jerne, in the belief that they could locate the Eternity Crystal and use it to rescue Alderaan from its fate, or even prevent the Empire's rise altogether. However, Vader's plan was ultimately unsuccessful, and both Rebels managed to escape Jerne.
The Jerni were conceived for the comic story "Dark Knight's Devilry," penned by Steve Moore and illustrated by Alan Davis. It was originally published by Marvel Comics in the 153th issue of The Empire Strikes Back Monthly in January 1982. "Dark Knight's Devilry" depicts the Jerni within the context of Darth Vader's fake image tapes, leaving the true physical traits of the species undefined.
Dark Horse Comics republished "Dark Knight's Devilry" in the first issue of its Classic Star Wars: Devilworlds series, which was released on August 21, 1996. This reissue presented "Dark Knight's Devilry" for the first time in color by artist Matt Webb as the story was originally published in black and white in The Empire Strikes Back Monthly.