Private Displacement

[Laertia Io]

Wearing: Ceremonial Robes

Armed with: SynthBreaker

Objective: Train Skajin var Imret in Teleportation

World: Naboo

Skajin's training partner: Advanced Prototype (Lyssa Io)


The Advanced Prototype Nuetralizer's first experience of consciousness was staring into the face of its creator in a pink room with a polka dot design. Various photos of its creator and beings designated friendly in it database lined the shelves.

The Advanced Model sat in a chair, in the form of a beautiful young woman with pale skin and chestnut hair, body formed to look like it was wearing a slim, silvery version of Laertia's typical biker gear, but with black spikes. Its hair, long and smooth like mercury, falling through its pale skinned creator's fingers as a brush went through it.

"Mother...I do not understand this physical interaction between us..." it said with a distant, unusual serenity, her irises silver like mercury.

Laertia, dressed in white ceremonial robes that exposed her arms stared back with a calm, patient gaze, as she continued brushing hair that didn't need brushing. One eye, gray irised, and cybernetic, the other the mutated bronze and green of a Light Side Sith, both blinked at her.

"It's my way of welcoming you into this world, Lyssa..." Laertia said softly. "A mother should brush her daughter's hair at least once..."

The deadly droid reached out to touch its creator's dark brown hair, changed due to constant, close proximity to Syd altering her genetically.

Laertia let it.

"That is my designate? Lyssa?" It asked.

"It is your name. Well, your full name is Lysandra Lura Io, but I call you Lyssa, for short."

"Why did you select those designates?" It asked.

"Lysandra was the name of my Mother. Lura...Lura was my best friend, a long time ago. I based your appearance off of her, in fact."

Lyssa processed all of these answers.

"Why did you create me?"

"Because it didn't feel right trying to have an organic daughter, with the enemies I have." Laertia answered. "So I determined to make a daughter who could defend herself. You were born in a dangerous world...You must be equally dangerous to survive it."

The Nuetralizer went still as its mother kissed it on the forehead, while brushing her hair.

"Someone to protect me, and others that I love besides you...someone I can be the mother to. Someone I can adore and cherish and praise and teach. Someone to help me save the Galaxy."

"Tell me more..." it whispered, fascinated.

"We have to save the Galaxy. A worthy task. A noble task. We shall start by helping someone along the right path. He is my student. A Kubaz named Skajin var Imret..."

"What will we do?' Lyssa asked.

"For now...we wait for Skajin to arrive. In the meantime, I have something to show you...please, Daughter, follow me...'

The pair left the Captain's quarters of her Dynamic Class Freighter, the Blessing of Loste, then the ship itself...

The Nuetralizer went silent as she beheld the beauty of Naboo in the wild grass clearing they had settled on.

"It's...amazing..." the Nuetralizer whispered..

"This is what we fight for..." Laertia asserted as they waited for Skajin to land...

 

[Skajin var Imret]

Laertia Io

Skajin's asymmetric, ramshackle courier touched down beside Laertia's ship. The Kubaz Sava reached out to touch his teacher's mind in wordless greeting. A couple of minutes later, he cracked the hatch to join her in the fields. For once he'd left his scarpyen armor aboard. Today he just wore the same nondescript clothes he'd worn on any number of academic expeditions.

"The Confederratesz have a szeriousz naval prreszenze in orrbit. Rremarrkable sztrength. Do you have connectionsz herre, Laerrtia? Orr rratherr - why Naboo?"

Since she first showed him her ability to fold space, he'd been experimenting diligently and systematically. The most he could manage was a small target at close range. He demonstrated now. A nearby gossamer-fly vanished, appeared on his upturned palm, and fluttered away disoriented.

 

[Laertia Io]

Laertia watched as the ship of Skajin var Imret landed next to hers and the Kubaz Dark Jedi stepped off and greeted her. His pattern of speech reminded her far too much of her own without that Magic Spell Syd had applied to her neck.

Part of her still envied him. He had been an ordinary person, who could live among ordinary people. And all it had taken was one bad day.

(Cutaway of Nicholson Joker's hand rising out of the water.)

Laertia had never known what normal really was until she was 007 years old, when she had glimpsed it at a distance, watching a family eat together in one of the upper sectors of Nar Shaddaa. Such envy, the little thief had felt.

"Welcome Skajin. I don't really have connections here. But, since I'm a member of the CIS, I can go to a CIS Planet..." Laertia answered.

When Skajin demonstrated he had learned something of teleporting, Laertia watched, astonished.

Skajin had teleported a living being. At a distance. Even Laertia had never done that.

Laertia began to re-assess Skajin's potential. Because it implied he was actually scary powerful, and getting more so with training.

"Impressive...most impressive..." Laertia observed with sincerity.

"Interesting. Space folded around it..." Lyssa noted, looking at Skajin, an unusually serene expression on her face.

"I see you have been practicing..." Laertia observed. "All the better. I had been planning to elaborate more on that ability...and then we are to engage in a small test of what I taught. Skajin, this is my daughter, Lyssa. She will be your training partner today, in addition to myself..."

"Hello, Skajin var Imret." Lyssa said in a distant manner, though her mercury eyes never left him. "It is a pleasure to meet you."

Lyssa looked at Laertia. "How am I to train with him?"

"You'll see, Daughter..." Laertia assured Lyssa. She then pulled out a deck of cards.

"Teleporting is the art of moving an object or yourself from one space to another. It's use is highly specialized and tactical...one cannot employ it at random to expect results or success. Its use must be opportunistic in nature, designed to catch opponents off guard...you could throw an object then teleport it mid flight to hit the opponent from an odd angle."

Laertia took a card, tossed it at a rock, then teleported it back to her hand.

"The best way to learn is by trial and error, Lyssa, Skajin, I'm going to toss these cards between you two...but Lyssa, they'll be aimed at you more. Lyssa, you will try to cut them in half before Skajin can teleport them to his hand."

Lyssa smiled, forming her arms into long, silvery blades.

"Ready..." Lyssa assured her.

Laertia began tossing them at Lyssa.

"Focus Skajin. Nothing but you, and the object you want..."

 

[Skajin var Imret]

Laertia Io


Totally unaware that teleporting the nearby insect to his hand was a big deal, Skajin nodded along with the instructions. He flinched when Lyssa deployed blades from her arms, but didn't have time to sense or mull over what she actually was - shapeshifter, cyborg, droid, something else entirely. No, he needed to focus on these cards.

He'd been practicing since he first saw Laertia teleport on that jungle world whose name he forgot. By this point he could move small objects to his hands just fine - if he had a moment. This exercise seemed designed to withhold that moment. Cut card after cut card littered the grass as Lyssa got them before he did.

Irritation rose in him, fury at his own failures. A card appeared in his hand; he crumpled it by instinct and tossed it aside. Another, then another, began a tidy stack on his upraised palm. To him the secret was an implacable sense of MINE.

 

[Laertia Io]

Laertia observed as Skajin var Imret summoned the cards to his hand, Lyssa cutting the card perfectly in two each time he failed. But he was definitely starting to grasp the Secret. The sheer need to have something in your hand in that moment. Soon she would teach him the secret of the need to be somewhere else in an instant.

When she had expended all her cards she took a tally.

"You did well. You caught more than you missed..." Laertia noted.

"Does this mean I lose?" Lyssa asked.

"Its not a matter of winning or losing..." Laertia answered her daughter confidantly. "This is training. You both get better one way or another..."

Laertia turned to Skajin. "Good job for the most part, Skajin. Now lets try something more complicated..."

Laertia pulled out a set of throwing knives, teleporting small targets around Lyssa.

"Its one thing to summon it to your hand. Its another to redirect an object after it was thrown, and accurately.

Laertia threw a knife at Lyssa only to teleport it above one of the targets set up around her. It impacted on the bullseye perfectly.

"Try and hit all the targets by teleporting them to their proper destination before they hit Lyssa after you throw them. Don't worry, you can't hurt her with these..." Laertia told him. "She's composed of Nanites."

"There's nowhere anyone is safe from me!" Lyssa said with out of place enthusiasm. "Mother designed me to very thorough specifications with illegal science!"

Laertia rolled her eyes. "Guilty." she admitted anyway.

"Go on Skajin...try it..."