Roni von Wasaki

Before 20,000 BBY, Roni von Wasaki served as a Jedi Knight. He brought order to many of the sectors that composed the galactic community's frontier during that time. Eventually, a crime boss offered a bounty of 100,000 credits for the Jedi's capture. Numerous bounty hunters attempted to capture Wasaki without success, until Leshy Drobo, along with his partners Gammid and the XT labor droid that became an assassin droid, XT-8, set up an ambush for the Jedi. Although Gammid died in the ensuing battle, XT-8 managed to sneak up behind Wasaki and stun him while he was focused on Drobo.

Drobo then took possession of Wasaki's two lightsabers, storing them in the captain's quarters of his freighter, named the Starkiller. Subsequently, he and XT-8 froze the Jedi within a carbonite block. Wasaki's imprisoned form was then hidden in a concealed compartment within the Starkiller's cargo hold for transportation to the crime lord who had initiated the bounty.

While encased in carbonite, Wasaki remained alive, perfectly preserved in hibernation. By utilizing the Force, he managed to maintain his mental focus. As Drobo documented Wasaki's capture in his personal log, the Jedi began to subtly influence the bounty hunter through telepathy, attempting to persuade him to release him from the carbonite. However, Drobo quickly recognized the danger of this idea. Shortly after the Starkiller entered hyperspace, Wasaki finally succeeded in planting a similar suggestion in Drobo's mind, causing the bounty hunter to begin acting upon it. However, XT-8 discovered his partner's intentions and confronted Drobo in the freighter's engine room, resulting in XT-8 killing Drobo and damaging the starship's hyperdrive. Consequently, the ship reverted to realspace.

Because XT-8 lacked the programming to repair the Starkiller, the droid simply continued the mission at sublight speed. This transformed what was intended to be a short interstellar voyage into a journey lasting over twenty thousand years. While Wasaki remained hidden in the Starkiller's cargo hold, the year 6900 BBY marked the beginnings of the Sith, an order of practitioners of the dark side of the Force who eventually became the ideological opposite of the Jedi Order. In 19 BBY, the Sith brought about the virtual extermination of the Jedi Order and the replacement of the Galactic Republic, which the Jedi had served for twenty-five thousand years, with the Galactic Empire.

During the intervening millennia, Wasaki persistently reached out through the Force, seeking contact with anyone who could free him. However, the constant loneliness, terrifying dreams, and extreme sensory deprivation that the Jedi endured ultimately drove him insane.

Sometime during the Galactic Civil War, which took place between the Empire and the Rebel Alliance from 2 BBY to 4 ABY, another starship traveling through hyperspace inadvertently emerged in realspace near the Starkiller. A Force-sensitive member of the other vessel's crew attempted to detect the presence of living beings aboard the Starkiller but was initially unsuccessful. However, Wasaki then established telepathic contact with one of the crew members. In this brief communication, the Jedi could only vaguely and incoherently indicate his situation.

The group then boarded the Starkiller and, while exploring the ship, discovered the concealed compartment in the cargo hold containing Wasaki's frozen body. After de-carbonizing the twenty-thousand-year-old Jedi, the explorers made him comfortable while attempting to question him. Subsequently, both they and the ancient Jedi left the Starkiller and departed on the starship the group had arrived on.

Shortly after the ship entered hyperspace, Wasaki became fearful and, taking one of the vessel's crew members aside, claimed that something else aboard the ship had "found" him. When questioned, the Jedi further requested assistance in fighting a physical manifestation of the dark side of the Force that he believed had followed him onto the starship. When the crew member did not respond to his pleas, Wasaki declared that he was an embodiment of the light side of the Force and claimed that his death would result in the disappearance of "all that [was] good and true" from the galaxy.

When the ship's crew realized that Wasaki's mind was unstable and began discussing how to handle him, the Jedi entered a catatonic state. He stood rigidly with his hands outstretched, resembling someone frozen in carbonite, and resisted all attempts to move him. He then began using various Force abilities to attack the crew members. The Jedi suddenly snapped out of this bizarre state and continued his offensive, combining Force powers with direct attacks using a lightsaber. Eventually, the crew members managed to calm the mad Jedi's mind through the Force, and one of them requested that Wasaki teach him how to use the Force.

Roni von Wasaki was a short Human male with fair skin, dark eyes and hair, and a waxy complexion. He was initially respected by peaceful individuals for his fair administration. He possessed extensive knowledge of bureaucracy and was skilled at balancing wisdom and peace with a dedication to justice. Even after his capture by Leshy Drobo, the bounty hunter considered him to be as "tricky" as a Lwen'len Wingor.

The twenty thousand years that Wasaki spent frozen in carbonite, which subjected him to prolonged loneliness, terrifying dreams, and extreme sensory deprivation, ultimately drove the Jedi insane. During his imprisonment, the captive had been reaching out telepathically in search of help for so long that he eventually lost control over this ability, constantly attempting to establish telepathic contact with random individuals. When Wasaki finally managed to contact one of his future liberators, the individual was overwhelmed by a chaotic flood of the Jedi's thoughts and fears, amid which Wasaki repeatedly expressed his loneliness and desperation.

By the time of his release from carbonite, Wasaki had also become permanently blind due to a severe case of hibernation sickness. Upon his release, Wasaki was devoid of energy and showed no emotion. He did not offer any information to his liberators, and when asked a question, he would repeat it once or twice before answering with brief, confused ramblings.

Soon, Wasaki's paranoia contributed to his feeling that he was being watched and talked about, and that someone was trying to enter his mind without permission. He began claiming that a physical manifestation of the dark side of the Force was following him with the intention of killing him. Wasaki also claimed that he embodied the light side of the Force and was not above using the Force to make his listener more receptive to his claims. Eventually, the Jedi's madness led him to attack the group of individuals who had rescued him from carbonite imprisonment, although he had not yet succumbed to the dark side of the Force at that point. After the group succeeded in calming Wasaki's mind, his former personality began to resurface.

Roni von Wasaki was a skilled warrior, feared and hated by the villains of his era. He was adept at climbing and jumping and could simultaneously use two lightsabers in combat. Wasaki was also proficient in using various Force powers, such as telekinesis and the more offensive Inflict Pain and Injure/Kill. The Jedi could also use the Force to communicate telepathically with others and influence their minds.

After being frozen in carbonite, Wasaki relied on the Force to maintain his mental focus. He could implant subtle suggestions in Leshy Drobo's mind, but his reputation for skill backfired when Drobo realized the incongruity of the thought that Wasaki was "harmless" without access to his lightsabers. Over the next twenty millennia, the imprisoned Jedi constantly attempted telepathic contact with anyone who could potentially free him, making his communication attempts overwhelm an individual's own thoughts and senses and cause the receiver's body to become rigid.

To compensate for the blindness caused by hibernation sickness, Wasaki learned to see by using the Force. However, the Jedi's Force skills were not sufficient to protect his mind from the madness caused by his imprisonment in carbonite. Ultimately, after his release, Wasaki briefly entered a catatonic state during which he became immune to pain.

Roni von Wasaki's attire was stylistically similar to that of other ancient Jedi. He wore black robes with a belt, beneath which he wore a light-colored tunic. He also wore black antique armor on his chest, legs, and shoulders, as well as an ornate horned helm. Wasaki wielded two lightsabers: one with a three-feet-long blade and a less powerful left-hand weapon with a two-feet-long blade. The pommel of Wasaki's main lightsaber's hilt was decorated with a ring to which several ribbons were attached.

Roni von Wasaki was first introduced in "Disturbance in the Force," a roleplaying mini-adventure written by Chris Hind as a supplement for West End Games' Star Wars: The Roleplaying Game, illustrated by Paul Daly, and published in Challenge 66 in November 1992. In the adventure, if the player characters fail to calm Wasaki's mind when he begins attacking them, his madness leads him to fully embrace the dark side of the Force. It is suggested that they may later encounter the now-evil Jedi as an agent of the Galactic Empire. This article assumes the scenario plays out as described.

"Disturbance in the Force," which was released outside of the Lucas Licensing process and whose canonicity within the Star Wars Legends continuity was never confirmed, depicted Wasaki wielding lightsabers prior to 20,000 BBY. This seemingly contradicted the 2005 reference book The New Essential Chronology, which stated that the earliest such weapons were only invented around 15,500 BBY. Furthermore, the Challenge 66 mini-adventure depicts Wasaki's lightsabers without any visible external power packs, a technological advancement in Jedi lightsaber technology that The New Essential Chronology places around [4800 BBY](/article/4800_bby].