Yun

"Yun: a young and willing Dark Jedi, the newest addition to the cause. Brash and eager, he is ready to prove himself to his master at any cost. These elements make him a dangerous and unpredictable foe."

- Qu Rahn as a Force ghost, to Kyle Katarn

Yun, a Force-sensitive male Epicanthix, was the son of a wealthy mineral baron on Panatha. At a very young age, he became infatuated with Sariss, the Prophetess of the Church of the Dark Side. Following her teachings, he fell to the dark side of the Force and killed his own father. He later joined Jerec, the feared Dark Jedi and Inquisitor, and his band of Dark Jedi in the search for the Valley of the Jedi, a powerful Force nexus. In the city of Barons Hed on the planet Sulon, he dueled Kyle Katarn, a Jedi-in-training and the son of Morgan Katarn, the man who had discovered the valley and whose map Jerec used to locate it. Katarn defeated Yun but spared his life.

When they met again near the valley, Katarn had been rendered unconscious by the crash of his ship. Sariss tried to kill the defenseless Katarn with her lightsaber, but Yun, remembering that Katarn had not killed him when he had the chance, blocked Sariss's blow. Deflected by that block, Sariss's blade accidentally hit Yun himself, mortally wounding him. Before dying, Yun could only say that the Jedi was worthy of defending himself in a battle. However, that last action redeemed Yun, and the young Epicanthix became one with the Force, seeing the bright light as he died. Indirectly, Yun continued to help Katarn even after his death; it was Yun's lightsaber that Katarn used to defeat Jerec.

Early life
Yun was a Force-sensitive Epicanthix male born in 17 BBY on the planet Panatha. The pampered son of a wealthy mineral baron, Yun had everything he wanted&mdash;as a result, he lacked patience and level-headedness. To develop such traits, which were needed in the family business, Yun was sent to Bunduki in around 3 ABY to learn from the ancient monk order known as the Followers of Palawa. However, after spending a year with them, he returned home, as the Palawa monks refused to teach him the secrets of the ancient martial art called Teräs Käsi, thinking him to be unprepared for such skills. Yun's father was disappointed, but he had another plan in mind.

Seduced by the dark side
"In all my years I've only known Dark Jedi. Never one from the light side."

- Yun

Yun's father decided that his son should spend more time with the baron's fiancée, Sariss, the Prophetess of the Church of the Dark Side. Soon, Yun started learning the secrets of the dark side of the Force from Sariss. While listening to her teachings, Yun eventually fell in love with the Prophetess. Sariss, realizing this, seduced Yun, but she told him that they could not be together because of Sariss's vow to Yun's father. Manipulated by the Prophetess, Yun killed his own father and succumbed to the dark side. He then apparently abandoned, if not killed, his mother and sister. After that, Yun pledged his family's assets to Sariss's Master, the Miraluka Dark Jedi Jerec, and joined Jerec's cadre of Dark Jedi. Besides Sariss and Jerec himself, the cadre included the former Jedi Maw, the insane Twi'lek Boc Aseca, and the Sithspawn Gorc and Pic, also known as the Brothers of the Sith. Yun then constructed his own yellow-bladed lightsaber.

Serving under Jerec and participating in many senseless slayings, Yun became very cold-blooded, with killing becoming normal for him. However, he soon noticed that Sariss was not responding to his feelings and began experiencing countless nightmares in which he killed many people. Yun started to doubt if his actions were right, but Sariss suppressed such thoughts in her apprentice. Soon, egged on by the Prophetess, Yun decided to wreak vengeance on his Palawan masters. He took a squad of stormtroopers and his comrade Dark Jedi to Bunduki, where he killed his former teachers. On Bunduki, during the height of the carnage that Yun had started, his men met the twenty-five-thousand-year-old master of Teräs Käsi, ex-Emperor's Hand Arden Lyn.

Search for the Valley of the Jedi
"Kill me! Isn't that what you do to Dark Jedi?"

- Yun to Kyle Katarn

With the death of Emperor Palpatine in 4 ABY, Jerec started thinking of plans to rebuild the collapsing Empire, with himself as the new Emperor. In order for his plans to come to fruition, however, he needed the power of the Valley of the Jedi, a Force nexus formed in the final battle of the New Sith Wars more than a thousand years ago. The souls of numerous Jedi and Sith were trapped in the valley as a result of the explosion of the thought bomb, a powerful weapon detonated by Lord Kaan, one of the last leaders of the Sith during that period. If Jerec could control the essence of the valley, he would possess the great power that he felt he needed to achieve his goals. As one of his servants, Yun helped the Miraluka Dark Jedi in his quest.

Somehow, Jerec learned that a Jedi called Qu Rahn might have known the location of the valley. The Miraluka tracked Rahn to the planet Dorlo and ordered his capture. Yun, Sariss, and Maw led the landing party, which consisted of two skimmers. However, their prey evaded them, destroying both skimmers in the process, and escaped from the planet on a CR90 corvette. Rahn and his Rebel companions&mdash;the young pilot called Duno Dree, the Klatooinian technologist Rolanda Gron and the linguistics expert Nij Por Ral&mdash;however, could not escape from Jerec's Super Star Destroyer, the Vengeance, and soon they were captured and brought aboard.

Rahn and the Rebels were then interrogated. Each time Rahn refused to answer the question Jerec asked him, the Miraluka ordered his Dark Jedi to kill one of Rahn's men, with Yun being instructed to kill Nij Por Ral. Before doing so, the young darksider asked Rahn about the location of the valley himself. Rahn refused to answer, again, and Yun struck Por Ral with his lightsaber. However, he accidentally hit the linguist's shoulder. Embarrassed by his failure to make a clean kill, Yun struck once again, this time killing the Rebel.

Eventually, Rahn was left alone. He tried to provoke Jerec into killing him, but Jerec probed his mind instead and discovered that although Qu Rahn did not know the location of the valley, his friend Morgan Katarn, killed by Jerec several years ago, did and had kept the map leading to it in his home on the planet Sulon. Realizing that Jerec had learned his secret, Rahn, using the Force, stole Yun's lightsaber from the youth's belt and attacked the Dark Jedi. Having lost his weapon, Yun barely avoided Rahn's blow and then could only watch as the Jedi Master easily dealt with the far more experienced Boc, Sariss, Maw, and Gorc, one by one, until Jerec intervened and killed Rahn.

Jerec then sent Yun, along with the other Dark Jedi, to Sulon to assist the droid information broker 8t88, whom Jerec hired to find and decode Katarn's map. The droid succeeded and found the map embedded on the ceiling of the Katarn homestead. He then took it to the Government House located in the city of Barons Hed, where he deciphered it and sent a digital copy to Jerec. However, at that moment the son of Morgan Katarn and an aspiring Jedi, Kyle Katarn, who was trying to stop Jerec, appeared in the tower and started asking 8t88 about the map. Yun, who was ordered by Jerec to destroy the stone map, took it upon himself to protect the secret of the valley's location from Katarn. Yun rode an elevator down from the roof of the tower and destroyed the map, creating a distraction that allowed 8t88 to escape. Yun then defeated Katarn by using Force Destruction to knock him unconscious against the wall, disarming him by throwing his blaster away with the Force, and mocked him. Katarn quickly recovered and was forced into a duel rematch. However, this time the inexperienced Yun was himself quickly defeated by Katarn, who had a lightsaber of his own. The duel ended when Katarn struck Yun on the arm. Defeated, the young Dark Jedi told Katarn to kill him, but the latter spared the youth's life. Surprised and feeling that something was right in Katarn's action at the same time, Yun used the Force to retrieve his lightsaber, which he had lost during the duel, and escaped the tower by levitating through the roof.

Rejoining his dark side comrades, Yun traveled along with the rest of Jerec's forces to Ruusan, the planet where the Valley of the Jedi was located. There, they discovered a settlement called "Fort Nowhere". Yun, Boc, and Sariss were sent there under the guise of parlaying with the locals, while their real intent was to learn if the people who lived in the fort knew about the valley's location. While Sariss "negotiated" with Mayor Byron Devo III, Yun and Boc looked around the fort. They eventually discovered that the fort-dwellers had no knowledge of the valley and, upon hearing that, Jerec ordered them to destroy the settlement. Soon, a battle broke out on the planet. Commanded by Sariss, the Imperial forces captured or killed almost all of the people from the fort, though some managed to escape. Yun participated in the battle and at its end, he was given the task of destroying the colonists' subsurface farms, after which he returned to the Vengeance.

Aboard the Vengeance, Yun once again began having dreams of himself killing many people, including his father, mother, and sister, as well as of his failure to kill Nij Por Ral with one strike. Those dreams had been following him for a long time and in them, Yun's lightsaber was transformed into an ancient-styled sword, with which he cut off heads of his relatives. The dreams once again raised questions in Yun about his path. After waking up in horror from one such dream, Yun was approached by Boc, who said that Jerec needed him. Eager to help his Master, Yun was very disappointed when Jerec revealed that his task was to oversee the excavation works at the valley's caves filled with artifacts. Specifically, Yun was assigned to assist Major Vig in getting rid of the spirits of the Jedi and Sith that scared the stormtroopers and halted the operation. However, Jerec took the young Dark Jedi to the planet in his personal ship, telling Yun many amusing stories along the way and leaving him with a sense of significance. Following this trip, all Yun's doubts and frustrations temporarily faded away.

When Yun reached the caves, he saw the stormtroopers running in panic from the spirits, or "screamers" as Jerec's troops had dubbed them. Yun tried to defeat the spirits by shaping the Force and hurling it towards them, but this tactic did not work. Suddenly, he heard a strange voice in his head. Not realizing at first who was talking to him, Yun listened as that voice told him to think about the extent to which the spirits had suffered in order to make them go away. Successfully eradicating several spirits this way and taking a tour of the ancient storerooms filled with treasure, Yun listened as the same voice, which he finally recognized as Qu Rahn's, told him that the fate of billions of lives were dependent on the events that would take place on Ruusan and that Yun would play an important part in it. Yun asked what kind of part, but was told that that was entirely up to himself. Rahn also informed Yun that, deep inside of him, the light side of the Force was still present; it was weak, but it was there.

Redemption
"He is a Jedi. He deserves a battle."

- Yun, after saving Kyle Katarn

Days later, the Imperial forces on Ruusan experienced a worldquake which caused a large piece of rock to fall on top of an Imperial called Jaru. Under the influence of the light side, Yun used the Force to lift the rock from Jaru, thus saving his life, despite not lifting anything of such size during the training under Jerec and Sariss. After that event, Rahn briefly contacted him again, telling him that the dark side was not the only source of power. Yun thought on Rahn's words, and later that night, he slept well for the first time with a smile on his face. After that event, something changed inside of Yun&mdash;a fact that did not escape Sariss's eyes, though she did not understand what the reason was.

A short time later, Yun was called by Sariss, who told him that Jerec acknowledged that Yun did well with the rock. Despite being driven closer to the light side of the Force, Yun was still pleased with such words. Sariss then gave Yun his next assignment&mdash;to find out what happened to Patrol Zulu, Able, Mary 341, which was long overdue. His previous task having been given to Boc, Yun took an AT-AT and an AT-ST and set off on the mission.

Remembering that the men of Lieutenant Aagon, the commanding officer of the patrol, had the dead bodies of Ruusan's native Bouncer species hanging over their bunks, Yun turned his squad to the north, where the Bouncers were rumored to live. There, he felt Katarn's presence in the Force. While he had the chance to report everything he knew, Yun chose not to as an act of repaying his debt to Katarn. Yun said to himself that he would spare Katarn's life just as Katarn had spared Yun's, and ordered his troops to continue north.

Yun later accompanied Jerec when the Dark Jedi Master confronted Katarn, who was furious after killing Maw on a landing pad near Jerec's personal cargo ship, the Sulon Star. Jerec tried to turn Katarn to the dark side by persuading him to kill his partner and love, Jan Ors, whom Jerec's men had captured earlier. Katarn managed to hold off his anger and stay with the light, and Yun watched as his Master pushed the Jedi into the Sulon Star and then sent the doomed ship towards the surface.

Katarn managed to escape from the Sulon Star in his own ship, the Moldy Crow, though he crashed the vessel in the process. He was later found unconscious by Yun, Boc and Sariss. Boc destroyed Katarn's lightsaber before leaving to assist Jerec in the valley. Sariss then attempted to execute Katarn with her lightsaber; but Yun, whose body seemed to act on its own, blocked Sariss's blow, which accidentally deflected against him, inflicting a mortal wound. Before dying, Yun told Sariss that Katarn, as a Jedi, did not deserve to be executed, but instead should be granted a battle. Seeing a bright light before his eyes, Yun was redeemed and returned to the light side before he drew his final breath.

Legacy
"May the Force be with you, Yun."

- Kyle Katarn

Katarn, having lost his lightsaber, took up the fallen Dark Jedi's lightsaber in order to defend himself from Sariss, whom he eventually slew. With Yun and Sariss dead and Maw, Gorc, and Pic all killed by Katarn earlier, Boc and Jerec were left as the only living members of Jerec's Dark Jedi cadre. Using Yun's saber, Katarn descended further into the valley and killed them as well.

Ultimately, Yun had played his part, indirectly saving billions of lives, as predicted by Rahn. By blocking Sariss's blow, he had saved Kyle Katarn, enabling him to locate the Valley of the Jedi, slay Jerec, and save the galaxy. Following the death of Jerec, Katarn continued to use Yun's lightsaber for several more years and used it to duel his former apprentice Mara Jade when he was corrupted by the dark side until he eventually constructed his own.

Personality and traits
"I sense great promise in you Yun, but also self-doubt. You fear failure?"

- Jerec

Being only twenty-two years old, Yun was very brash, impatient and always wanted to prove himself to his Masters, especially Sariss, whom he truly and deeply loved. Because of such an attitude, he was considered the most wild of Jerec's cadre. One of Yun's ways of showing his worthiness was the participation in many slayings. Killing became normal for Yun, and he eventually found out that he wanted more. However, he soon realized that Sariss was not responding to his feelings, as she in fact considered him no more than a son. Yun then started to doubt if being beside his love was worth the price he had paid for it. Such thoughts were eventually suppressed by Sariss, but Yun still questioned the righteousness of his path several more times, although in some moments&mdash;like when Jerec took him down to Ruusan aboard his personal ship&mdash;all doubts disappeared and the price seemed worth paying for a moment.

Yun was severely worried with the amount of stormtrooper casualties during the battle of Fort Nowhere, until Sariss assured him that that was what they were paid for and asked Yun to be less sensitive. However, when Yun saw that stormtroopers were scared by the ghosts of the Jedi, he asked Major Vig to execute several of them. Vig refused and Yun found his method of compassion "interesting." Qu Rahn provided a final catalyst for Yun to make a long chain of seemingly minor decisions, which, when taken together, formed one important decision&mdash;to save Katarn, even though at the moment he blocked Sariss's blow, Yun did not fully understand when and how he decided to do that; he only felt himself respond. He only seemed to realize why he saved the Jedi after Sariss struck him with her lightsaber.

Yun also developed a unique attitude towards his fellow Dark Jedi. For instance, he found Maw's talent to sense fear distasteful, likening him to a Nek battle dog sniffing its prey. Yun himself preferred more elegant demonstrations of power. In turn, he thought that Jerec had many unpleasant qualities, but could be very charming when he chose to, and enjoyed being in Jerec's company. He basked in the glory reflected from his Master, when stormtroopers jumped out of the way and officers came to attention upon seeing him.

Powers and abilities
"Yes, when the chips were down, you forgot all about the dark side&mdash;yet the power you needed was there."

- Qu Rahn

Despite being the newest addition to Jerec's Dark Jedi and spending only a year with them, Yun became a skilled Force-user, although he mostly used non aggressive Force powers. He was especially adept at telekinesis, as indicated by his ability to Force-throw Katarn's blaster and then to levitate through the roof after his duel with the Jedi while summoning his lightsaber at the same time. As a subtle demonstration of his powers, he was able to make the skimmer's slipstream avoid his carefully combed hair and to lead the helmsman into believing that his body was itching. Yun's telekinetic powers seemed to increase even more when he tried to lift the rock the size of a hovercraft from Jaru, not thinking about the dark side at all.

Yun's Force sense ability was less developed and sometimes failed him. He was unable to sense Sariss approaching him on Sulon, although he later sensed Katarn's presence on Ruusan. In addition to Force sense and telekinesis, Yun was also a practitioner of Force speed, Force blinding, Force Jump and various incarnations of Mind trick, including Force Persuasion.

Yun's most notable offensive power was a somewhat weaker version of Force Destruction, which he used to attack Katarn. Instead of killing Katarn instantly or draining all his powers as Destruction usually did, Yun's attack only threw the Jedi into the wall. While on Ruusan, Yun also tried to defeat ghosts of the Jedi and Sith with the Force, by shaping it and hurling it towards them, before trying another tactic suggested by the spirit of Rahn&mdash;to sense their pain.

Yun could read, write and speak two languages, his native Epicant and the widespread Basic. He was proficient with blaster pistols and some other simple weapons. He also managed to build his own lightsaber, which was a unique weapon. It came equipped with a so-called "modified pistol grip"&mdash;meaning that carefully cast projections echoed the Human hand and gave his index finger a place to rest. Not only that, but the grip was made from a highly malleable "live" polymer that explored the user's hand and morphed into a solid, highly customized grip. When Katarn took the lightsaber, he immediately fell in love with it.

Yun's skill with the lightsaber was not as good, however, as shown by the fact that he was defeated by Katarn, who had acquired his own lightsaber only hours before their duel; and by Yun's failure to kill Por Ral with one strike.

Behind the scenes
Yun's first appearance was in Star Wars: Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II, a first-person shooter video game released on October 9, 1997, by LucasArts. In the game, Yun serves as one of the main character's antagonists, who ultimately saves the main hero. In the live action cutscenes of the game, Yun was portrayed by Rafer Weigel, who also provided his voice for Yun's CGI appearances. Yun later appeared in Dark Forces: Rebel Agent and Dark Forces: Jedi Knight, the 1998 novella adaptations of the game, as well as in the Dark Forces: Rebel Agent audio drama and the Dark Forces: Jedi Knight audio drama, which, in turn, adapted the novels into an audio drama in which Yun was voiced by Timothy Kuhlmann. Yun's backstory was later expanded in The Dark Forces Saga, a series of game scenarios released by Wizards of the Coast on their web site. Also, Yun was briefly mentioned in Jerec's and Katarn's entries of The New Essential Guide to Characters and received an entry in The Complete Star Wars Encyclopedia. Yun is also a playable character in the multiplayer feature of both Star Wars: Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II and its add-on Star Wars: Jedi Knight: Mysteries of the Sith.

Yun's likeness was also used in Mysteries of the Sith to represent a type of statue which the player encounters in the last two levels of the game.

Non-canonical death
"You are quite a sticky enemy."

- Yun to Kyle Katarn during their second duel.

In the non-canonical ending of Dark Forces II, where Kyle Katarn has chosen the dark side, Yun, not impressed with his choice, remains on the dark side as well. He is then sent to stop Katarn from reaching the valley and claiming it for his own needs. Yun faces Katarn, who in that case does not crash the Moldy Crow, near the crash site of the Sulon Star. There, Katarn corrects his "earlier mistake" and kills Yun.

Differences between versions
Yun's death is shown slightly different in Star Wars: Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II, Dark Forces: Jedi Knight, and the Dark Forces: Jedi Knight audio drama. In the game, he blocks Sariss's blow, and she accidentally deflects her lightsaber into Yun. Before dying Yun tells her that Katarn is a Jedi and deserves a battle. In the novella, Yun hits Sariss in the arm and she instinctively strikes him in self-defense. In the audio version, Yun blocks Sariss's blow and tells her that he will not allow her to kill Katarn. He informs Sariss that something has opened his eyes and he knows that there is a better way. Sariss responds that there is one, but Yun won't live to see it, and deliberately strikes him. Sariss's action angers Katarn. He picks up Yun's saber and attacks Sariss. After Katarn kills Sariss, he checks Yun, who, surprisingly, is still breathing. Yun tells Katarn that he is "fading into the Force" and that he has learned compassion, before passing away.

Yun's words before the duel with Katarn also change between the game, the novel, and the audio adaptation. In the game and the novel he says a single line, although it differs between the sources. In the audio drama, Yun and Katarn engage in a much longer dialogue that continues throughout their fight. The audio drama dialogue is notable for including the line: "You are quicker than I thought"&mdash;a taunt that Yun actually uses during his duel with Katarn in the game.

Additionally, the Dark Forces: Rebel Agent audio drama omits the scene of Nij Por Ral's execution and Rahn's subsequent attack on the Dark Jedi.

Appearances

 * Dark Forces: Rebel Agent / audio drama
 * Dark Forces: Jedi Knight / audio drama
 * Star Wars: Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II

Non-canon appearances

 * Star Wars: Jedi Knight: Mysteries of the Sith