Passing the Baton
Posted on Sun Jan 6th, 2013 @ 6:39am by Berry & Thane
2,871 words; about a 14 minute read
Chapter:
Chapter III: Relics
Location: Red Raptor
Timeline: 1030 Hours, Day Eight (Journey to Tython)
Running his soft fingertips over the cool metal of the box, Thane felt all of the familiar grooves and ridges that the sands of time had gifted one of his most prized possessions. With little sheen left on the home-made container, it was still sturdy in its worn state; Thane's initials (including letters concerning his noble house on Caanus) were etched into it, written in High Galactic - an alphabet not widely known across the galaxy in the modern age; an alphabet typically reserved for the nobility who still learnt the language out of tradition and deference for their ancestors.
Although born of nobility, Thane had not yet reached the age at which he would have been instructed in the language, and so had taught himself during the following years as he developed his own particular reverence for his heritage and culture - something that was not often encouraged by the Jedi Order, despite Grand Master Quellus' own often-regal finery. Another piece of their hypocrisy and eerie cliquey-ness he was pleased to now be away from, even if the object now in his hands was one of their few traditions he did feel an attachment and respect towards.
He stepped out of his cabin, now fully-furnished with objects from his old dormitory at the Jedi Temple, and made his way towards the training room he had set up for the crew just days before. As requested, Berry was already in there. He had chosen a time he knew to be clear of any standard meal times (although they seemingly meant little to her), and late enough to be sure she had caught up on any sleep she thought she needed.
"All fed and watered?" He asked as he stepped into the makeshift dojo, dressed in his black tunic and grey trousers, the cloak left in his cabin.
Berry laughed at that, grinning brightly at that pale guy. "Yup, like a seacow!" She paused. "But, I'm not a seacow because they're really slow....but really cute." She fidgeted while sitting on the ground, eyes alighting on a burn mark in the corner of the mat and chuckling to herself. Good times.
"Your mind works in a very confusing way, Bería," Thane mumbled in reply, pushing the topic away as he moved over to the Near-Human. He set himself down next to her and placed the metal box on his lap as he unclasped the lock and brought the lid up carefully. Nestled on a black velvety cushion inside was a metal cylinder - a lightsaber.
The rogue Jedi clasped the hilt firmly with one hand and examined it for a moment, a slight smile in the corner of his mouth as he reminisced on the construction of the weapon, many years ago before he passed it over to his informal apprentice. "Do you remember what I said about the lightsaber?" He asked. "Of what it represents - of what it should represent?"
Berry grinned at him as she held the light stick not too irreverently. At least she was dressed better, back in her pants and tunic. But that's all that improved. "Honestly, I thought I'd never see you again so I didn't bother remembering." She looked down at the hilt. "But if it's still used by your Jedi, who are supposed to be good guys, it's supposed to represent...good." Then her eyes narrowed suspiciously at him, her lips slightly pouting now. "BUT you're not a Jedi anymore so what's it mean now??"
She was surprisingly smarter than she looked, Thane thought to himself, and not for the first time either. Every now and again, through the murk of jumbled thoughts and childish antics, surprisingly concise and intelligent ideas seeped through. "At least you were honest," he sad first before continuing, "but 'good' is merely a point of view; the Jedi Order likes to think itself good, but is it really good to be so gifted that you could make a true mark on the galaxy, genuinely do the right thing by people, but then refuse to do it?"
It was good for him to air his thoughts, and with Berry - whilst she may hop in and out of attention - at least some of what he was saying must sink in and resonate somewhere. He wondered at times. "Some people in the galaxy are unfortunate: they are born weaker, with ailments or unable to touch the Force, and they have an excuse, but the Jedi Order could do what is necessary, but instead ignore their true potential - a responsibility and power they have squandered time and time again. Besides," he shifted on the spot, "other types of Jedi still use lightsabers, like Axion and his cult - Dark Jedi - and myself, and whatever I could now be called."
Thane pulled his own lightsaber from his belt, the electrum-gold glinting brightly in the dim lighting of the Red Raptor. "'Strength, the Force and a purpose'," he recited to her, "was what I told you. Few can master such an elegant and powerful weapon and tool - an object that becomes an extension of yourself and enhances your ability to do your utmost with your powers. Already, I am certain you could quickly master the basics of saber combat. You are strong in the Force and it will come naturally. I spoke of responsibility, of your ability not going to waste, and this is a part of it. Imagine how differently - how much better - some situations in your life could have gone with one of these at your side."
Reaching out with the Force, he let his mind stroke over the activation switch on the hilt in Berry's hand, and a blue blade sprung forth from the cylinder. "In time, you will construct your own lightsaber, reflecting your individuality and ability, a sign of your talents, power and devotion."
Berry grinned, not at what he said (if she heard it at all) but at what he did. Aaahh, good old water magic. "Uh huuuh," she said, absently agreeing in a very drawn-out fashion, her brain still making a decision. She raised an eyebrow at him before she herself copied him and "flicked" the switch, the blade retracting. Both her eyebrows shot up as she gasped and flicked it on again. "Nice!" She smiled excitedly over at Thrane as the blade kept extending and retracting without her hands moving. "I think this stick is too sharp for me, though, since I like my enemies to keep their arms and legs and stuff so we can keep fighting." Her eyes briefly glinted with an eagerness that often came upon those who liked to fight for the sake of fighting. But the flame quickly flickered out, almost as quickly as the saber blade retracting, and she chuckled.
As annoying as it was to see the blue blade sliding back and forth from the hilt in Berry's hands, Thane was still pleased with how quickly she had mastered - without prompting - the use of the Force to affect objects. "You don't have to slice limbs off if you don't want to," he explained, "but when faced against a Dark Jedi of great power, sometimes hacking his hands off is a good way to basically end any threat." He stood up and gestured for Berry to do the same and then used the Force to call the battered training remote over to one hand, whilst using the other to call over one of the bits of cloth he had left lying around to be used as blindfolds. "I'm going to tie this around your head and cover your eyes," he said, the remote hopping from his hand, activated and lopsidedly floating in the air.
Berry was busy grinning at her old floating foe. "You again!" Then she glanced at Thrane, brows furrowing. "And you! My grandpa did this to me already, I don't need it anymore." She frowned at the cloth as if it was the cloth's fault.
"Then you must have been adopted somewhere along the line," he deadpanned, going ahead and affixing the blindfold around her eyes anyway. Pleased it was on tight and she could not wiggle in a such a way to get her eyes poking out, he took a few steps back and let the remote move forward, ready to start blasting at the effectively-blind Berry.
"The last time you did this in here, you had your eyes to help you, but now you must let go of the aesthetic world, and feel the room, the ship, the universe around you." Thane watched as the remote prepared to fire its first shot. "Anticipate where the shot will land."
Berry fully pouted now, leaning onto the balls of her feet nonetheless for quick movement. "Yeah but Shady Lady said I feel too much so I should try to tone it down or something, but was that from the world or you—" Her babbling was quickly cut short as the remote zapped her in the shoulder. She seemed to shrug it off, saber still pointed down as she held it loosely in her hands. She turned her head and looked into Thrane's direction, seemingly staring at him through the blindfold. "Hey, should I tone it down?"
He thought about that for a moment, notions from the Jedi Code entering his mind, but - as he had been for many years, really - he was able to push them to one side. "Your emotions are an important part of you," Thane said, watching as the remote swished across to Berry's offhand, "and whilst you should never let them control you, there is nothing to say you can't use them. You've seen me fight, Beríá," he wasn't going to stop using her proper name, "the extreme speed of my saber form and my technique - I couldn't do that without focusing and utilising my anger. My entire technique and my abilities in the Force rely on making the most of my emotions, of turning them to my advantage."
As he spoke, Thane felt himself involuntarily smile as Berry quickly brought the blade about and caught one of the remote's blasts with its gleaming-blue streak. "You feel what you feel, but how you act is down to you, so you should make the best of it. That doesn't mean you shouldn't try and hold back some of your inane chatterings and whimsically random thoughts, though," he decided to add.
Berry burst into laughter as if he made the funniest joke ever. "Yeah, I never do." She stepped aside out of a blast and half-blocked one as she glanced at him from behind the blindfold. "I always use my emotions. They never stop and help me to never stop, even when I'm about to die. But..." She pointed at him with the blade, frowning slightly as she side stepped a blast from the remote. "Yours don't, either. Sooo...should I stop listening to you? Your emotions." She sighed at the dilemma and tilted her head at that, frowning slightly. "I don't know if I can or should..." She was, in fact, thinking SO hard a blast hit her in the thigh, and she didn't even blink. Well, maybe she did but the blindfold covered it.
Thane thought about that, only be interrupted for a moment to give a short chuckle at her being hit by the remote's shot, but he quickly returned to the dour consideration she had brought him into.
"The bond we share is not something we can choose to have; it is not something we can choose to make or break, so there is no way for us to decide on whether we feel each other's feelings or not." Thane was beginning to feel tempted to ignite his own violet blade and hop into the crusade against the clumsy remote. "But it doesn't mean we have to give in to them."
The former Jedi Knight stepped towards Berry, the connection being more apparent, to the degree he could almost feel her body shifting to battle the machine. In a way, it was becoming as though his hands were upon her shoulders metaphorically, guiding her as he anticipated the remote's movements himself.
Don't hafta give in? The thought never really occurred to her...
Berry's worried, thoughtful frown slowly turned upside down as she began to smile excitedly. What was this?? She could see sharper in this water magic...but it wasn't all hers. An excited giggled escaped her as she dodged and (accidentally) deflected much faster than she had. "H-hey! What's going on? Are we making some kind of water ball?? I like putting them in leaf bags and throwing them at people."
With the most recent deflection, Thane narrowly shifted his body to avoid the ricocheted blast, only to see Berry move swiftly against several more blasts as the remote increased the difficulty to compensate for the trainee's sudden increase in momentum and success. Even as realisation dawned that it was his own influence causing her improved performance and he did what he could to decrease his effect upon her, she seemed to maintain much of the speed anyway.
"Enough," he finally decided, drawing the remote into his open palm through the Force. "You have done exceptionally well, Bería." The words Thane said were honest, and he was not a man quick to compliment others. He rested a friendly hand upon one of her shoulders and used the other to pull the blindfold off. "This is now yours," he said, tapping the now-disengaged hilt in her hand, "to use as you see fit - a gift from me to you as my student and... and friend." He offered a smile, but it was fleeting. "You should speak to Bomoor about trying to use the Force to manipulate objects; he's far better at explaining that side of things than me. Once you've spent more time with the remote, and you've reached one of the highest difficulty settings, we'll work on perfecting some of the saber forms." He squeezed the shoulder slightly, not actually entirely comfortable in the show of physical camaraderie. "But you've done very well."
Berry grinned. "Yeah? Well, I better or I might die someday." She seemed not to care about that, but her smile faded slightly as she looked up at him. "Or someone else might." She smiled curiously up at him now...as if trying to figure out his chances. The look was fleeting, but not her battle spirit! She raised a hand and briefly gripped his raised arm, grin widening. "Thanks for this. I know it means a lot to you, so I'll try not to drool on it...too much." Was that a mischievous twinkle in her eye? She turned and walked off to the outer hull of the ship before realizing there was no exit there and turned right around, laughing amusedly at such a turn of events.
Then she paused, eyes widening as she stuck the hilt through a loop in her belt. "Friends? We're friends? Whaaaat!" She laughed again, almost guffawed, as she ran up to him and grabbed his shoulders, which was a bit awkward since she was shorter. Her smile was so bright and full of excitement as if she had some news to tell that he hadn't heard yet, with some shoulder shaking to boot. "That's awesome! Well, people tell me I get more annoying because of that so I hope you can handle it!" Her eyes narrowed at him as she gave him a playfully suspicious look. "Well, I can handle you. I think." And with that she gave him one last excited smile before running off out into the hall. So much work means so much food!
There was still a raised eyebrow on Thane's face as he heard the fledgling Jedi's footsteps patter away off into the ship, but it soon gave way to the usual grimace he tended to express in recent days. It was annoying how she insisted on suggesting she understood people to a greater extent than she did, of thinking she had some sort of inkling of how to handle and address him, but he was still nevertheless impressed by her success today. And whilst she did annoy him in that way, he was still finding himself fond of her, and hopeful of what she could accomplish.
Closing the door to the training room, he turned to face the rest of the room and outstretched his palms towards the far wall. Clamping his eyes shut, he began thinking through all that Darth Bane had instructed him on perfecting this technique, of calling on memories, people, things, ideas that angered him, that bothered him to the core, to let his anger well and then use it. As images of Axion flew through his mind and the words of preachy and pretentious fools hopped about his brain, a small crackle leapt between his fingertips.
Thane grinned to himself.
THANE
☼ New Ability - Force Lightning
BERRY
▬ Lightsaber ability increase
☼ New Ability - Lightsaber Form: Shii-Cho
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