A New Power

[Super Girl]

Kia finishes her noodles and then presses the final button on the packaging of the meal that breaks the trash down into ashes. "I don't know that calling Skywalker's teachers names will endear you to him. Lets just get the repairs over with and go from there. If you want to point out anything about the force while we work, I'll keep an ear out, but my main goal is getting off this rock." she says, dusting her hands off, and then standing.

"I would love some pointers on using a light saber though, or just about what is possible with the force. I've figured out the best known Jedi tricks, I mean, the mind trick thing I can do, and the moving things. I don't really know anything else, the Jedi hunters were too good at getting rid of stories and people passing on information."

 

[Angcuru]

"You wish to know what is possible with the force?" Miera asked Kia. "Anything is possible. What we can do through the force, however, is limited by the effort we put into expanding our abilities. I'll give you a simple, tangible demonstration through contrast for now. Adrial, levitate that stone if you would." Miera pointed to one of the sizable rocks which lined the outer ring of one of the nearby fire pits.

"Of course, Master Miera." Adrial smiled. She always enjoyed practicing her abilities. Here she had an opportunity to both show her progress to Miera, and to show off to the new arrivals. Adrial focused on the rock which had been pointed out to her and concentrated. The stone was not very large, being roughly twenty five kilograms at the most. It rose off of the ground slowly, and then floated over towards Adrial at the speed of a brisk walk to settle down on the ground in front of her. Miera smiled approvingly at her.

"Adrial has been training for eleven years. Normally we would start the training at around the age of four or five years, but she came to us late. Her skill is representative of her time spent training, not her age. Now, observe your ship."

Miera waited until Kia was looking at her ship, and then concentrated on theDawnsprinter. The massive Corellian Transport was still, and then suddenly, it shot up into the air at incredible speed. It rose above the wall surrounding the settlement, and then sped around the perimeter at more than one hundred twenty kilometers per hour before coming back to rest right where it had been sitting a moment before.

Miera observed the shocked and slightly annoyed espression on Kia's face. "I have been training in the use of the force for approximately forty eight years. The ability to move physical objects is one of the skills I specialize in. But there are other, less observable applications." Although still stunned by the earlier display, Kia is slightly confused. Miera said she had spent nearly fifty years training in the Force, yet she doesn't look a day older than thirty.

"So you want to learn how to use your lightsaber properly, do you?" Arais asked Kia. "Luckily for you, I was planning on evaluating Jorran's proficiency with his own today. You might as well observe, perhaps you will learn a thing or two." Arias stood up and walked to a spot not far from the rest of them, but with a good deal of space to move about. He took off his cloak and tossed it to Kal, with just a touch of the force helping it get over to him. "Come on, Jorran. Let's see just how skilled you are in lightsaber combat." Arias flicked his wrist, and his double bladed lightsaber shot from its resting place on his back into his right hand, where a single white blade sprang to life with a snap-hiss.

 

[Ankh-Morpork Guard]

Aasan watched the little demonstration and sighed, which came out sounding scratchy through the breath mask. Idly, he took a step next to Kia and said quietly, "Do not let their flashy displays cloud your judgement. I have seen many more elaborate displays of strength in the Force, but I learned quickly that it is restraint that proves to be the real power. I have a bad feeling about these...people."

He does his best to stand there looking as polite as possible. That is, thankfully, not too hard when his eyes and mouth are concealed, but it was keeping his mind calm that was the tricky part. One didn't have to be a Jedi to have strong control, but it had been years since he'd really thought about it.

 

[Super Girl]

"My ship isn't a toy, at the moment its our only chance of getting off the planet." Kia mutters grumpily. She reaches out with the force to grab that same stone that Adrial had lifted, and without any real strain, does the same that Adrial had done, moving it to herself instead of the short woman. "Like I said, I know how to move things, a starship is a bit out of my class at the moment, but with a bit more work I should be able to move heavier stuff without too much effort." Kia said looking pleased with herself at learning on her own in a month or two what it took Adrial 11 years of training to do.

When Arias threw off his cloak and lit his saber, Kia grinned, and seated herself on a bench. Her green eyes darted, following every movement, wanting to be that fluid and agile herself with her own blade.

 

[Galethorn]

Jorran pulled his own saber from his belt--by hand--and ignited it.

"It's been a while," he said, whirling the blade around in a simple flourish. He proceeded to put his left foot forward and hold his saber in a high, attack-oriented stance.
"I take it you--errr, we--Sethi follow the traditional rules for sparring?

Standing ready, all of the signs of his age seemed to diappear; he may as well have been twenty years younger.

 

[Angcuru]

"Rules only weaken the lessons learned from sparring." Arias raised the blade in front of his eyes in a salute, illuminating his face. "In combat, there are no rules, only the victorious and the vanquished." He held the white blade off to his side. "Now come at me."

 

[Super Girl]

No rules? Kia mouthed confused...did he really mean that? It was dangerous, not having rules, it wasn't fair either, Jorran wasn't a master like Arias, or at least it didn't sound that way, and no rules sounded like a good way to get someone hurt. "No rules doesn't sound very safe." she says to Miera questioningly, wanting the woman to tell her she had heard wrong. Kia's hand rested on her own lightsaber, ready to spring in to help Jorran if it looked like he needed it, even if he was better then she, and Arias was every bit as good as his confidence made hm seem.

 

[Angcuru]

***

"Don't worry, Kia. He knows what he's doing." Miera said to Kia. "No one is going to be hurt."

 

[Galethorn]

"Well, the only real rules I can remember are these; the fight is over if either of us (me, probably) is injured, or if either of us (again, probably me) has had enough. Common courtesy, right?"

(assuming Arias agrees) Jorran made the first move; a simple diagonal slash, neither overly aggressive or cautious.

 

[Angcuru]

Arias gave Jorran a nod. The attack brought the blade down towards the intersection of Arias' neck and shoulder, but was quickly nudged off to the side by the tip of Arais' blade.

"Good, but you can do better, Jorran. Even if just for an opening attack, never follow through with such a simple and predictable move. If your blade is held high, your opponent will expect you to strike with a downwards slash, as you just did. Instead, do the unexpected."

To demonstrate, Arais stepped back and copied the stance which Jorran had started from and began with a similar downwards slice, but halfway through the arc of the attack Arais flicked his wrist to the side. Instead of coming down straight on Jorran's head, neck and shoulders, the lightsaber blade wove around Jorran's high horizontal defense and came to a stop near his armpit, almost singing his robe.

"After so many years away from practice, it's not surprising that you may have forgotten that a lightsaber is not simply a sword of light. The blade has no mass, no heft, leaving absolute control in the hands of it's wielder. Do not be disappointed. Mistakes are just as valuable as successes in your training. In realizing a fault in your form, you don't fail to improve, but find a way not to succeed, which you can then avoid."

Arias stepped back and raised his blade in defense. "Again."