Private Hello Master

[Alina Tremiru]

Death was the great equalizer. Or something along those lines. She doubted death was as equal as that philosopher believed, especially after experiencing it herself. The void that she made her own, adapted and manipulated into a reality that at least let her not be so idle, certainly didn't feel equal to what she imagined others might have experienced. Even thinking about it brought an annoyed expression to her face, but now she was back. Alive and.. Not exactly breathing since she didn't need to. But close enough.

It was, none the less, humbling. And why she'd returned to Amaltanna. Death was not something she wanted to experience again. And the only way to truly ensure that was to get stronger. And finish her training. She stood outside the same estate she'd been coming to for her lessons with a faint mile. Then reached up to push the door open. She had no doubt Lady Raaf already knew she was there, but she walked in regardless with her head held high.

"Hello, Master."

Taeli Raaf

 

[Taeli Raaf]

Amaltanna would be a changed world for Alina.

Before her untimely demise, it had been a world of rock and wastes with only a small colony on the surface and the more significant presence of her Master's power base on the frozen moon that orbited the world. Now, however, lush wetlands and forests dotted the world as terraforming had transformed the barren planet. The colony and population had grown. Cities and towns covered the surface as wealth flowed into the world, and underground... it was another world entirely.

The estate Alina came to had also grown. Lush gardens and water features covered the grounds, many a combined style of Naboo and classic Thule architecture, leading to a compound equally influenced by those two worlds. It had been no secret that she had appreciated the style of those worlds even for her own dress. And it would be how Alina found her, guided by servants to an interior garden with the constellations of Corellia embedded in the ground with stained glasteel, where Darth Arcanix was sitting on a stone bench reading.

Purple eyes looked up at her approach, unchanged by the years still, and a small, satisfied smile formed.

"Welcome back, Alina," she responded. "I am pleased to see the Netherworld could not hold you."

Alina Tremiru

 

[Alina Tremiru]

"It would be a lie to say I clawed my way out on my own."

She lowered her head then, set her hand over the maw that resided where her heart had been. A symbol of utmost respect for the Sangnir, of which she had learned much while locked away in the void of death. "It was Quinn's uncompromising loyalty and power that opened the way so I might. Much time has passed, I see, though. Your world has flourished." Alina lifted her head, staring off at the various greenery with a faint smile.

No doubt most would be capable of killing the unprepared.

"Death has humbled me. Dominion over the Force means little without the knowledge to properly use it. I would like to learn what I can so if death tries to claim me again I can find my own way out."

Taeli Raaf

 

[Taeli Raaf]

Quinn? Now that was an interesting development. Interesting indeed to hear that Varanin heir had both continued her practice within the Force and had remained loyal enough to Alina to help pull her out of death's clutches. She accepted the Sangnir gesture of respect with a slight bow of her head, following her apprentice's gaze over the gardens. The greenery was harmless, imported from various worlds, but the statues... the statues were not sentinel in placement only.

"I've found cultivating something, be it an individual, a world, an organization, a nation, takes patience," she replied, setting the tome she had been reading aside. "Such as it is when mastering the Force, be it Light, Dark, or somewhere within the middle. Power, untempered by patience and knowledge, can be just as addictive and clouding as any drug."

A pause.

"That you discovered this the hardest way could be seen as unfortunate, but then adversity overcome strengthens us. A lesson to take to heart, my apprentice, and one that will carry you far in the new state of the galaxy you find yourself returned to." She rose to her feet, the book on the bench vanishing in a whirl of purple and black smoke to return to its place in her library.

"So, the only immediate questions that remain... are you ready to begin and what do you wish to start with?"

Alina Tremiru

 

[Alina Tremiru]

"I am." Between the fits of insanity and despair in her time alone, Alina had long learned what she wanted and needed to do. The fantasies of being alive again, and the path she'd walk, were all now firmly within her reach to take. She had power, dominion over the Force. And as her Master said, she would not let the lesson death had taught be forgotten.

"The beginning. My inability to use the Force had the lessons taught in the academy beyond my grasp of understanding. And as much as I remember the lessons, in practice I find myself lacking."

Taeli Raaf

 

[Taeli Raaf]

"Then we shall start immediately, and the beginning it is," she replied, gesturing for Alina to follow her into the estate. Their destination would be quite familiar to the Sangnir, having previously been where Taeli had tested her physical prowess and her ability to disrupt the Force abilities of others. The training room had seen some improvements in recent years as Taeli had continued the education of her own daughter.

A gesture and a small compartment would open and spheres of different metals; one of plasteel, one of durasteel, one of doonium, and one of neuranium would slide out. Another gesture and a holographic target would appear on the far wall.

"As you remember the theory taught to you at the academy, you understand already that telekinesis is one of the most basic abilities taught by both Jedi and Sith and that involves stretching out with your feelings and the Force towards the target you wish to manipulate with. What is less talked about is that part of that comes down to your own strength of will, something I believe you have in abundance. That willpower and belief in your own strength will be important when encountering the challenges that come with telekinesis. Many Padawans and Acolytes complain about the size and mass of objects they are asked to move or the number of objects they are told to move at any one time... but those limitations are ones your mind imposes upon yourself."

Her gaze shifted to the spheres, and each lifted off the table and effortlessly flew to strike the target dead center before she returned them to the table they sat upon.

"Your will and your desire to dominate and command the Force are more important than the nagging distractions the brain creates."

Alina Tremiru

 

[Alina Tremiru]

"Where there's a will, there's a way."

Alina walked beside her, her eyes gazing over the familiar area. She'd been weaker here before, the last time. And yet she hadn't felt quite like this the last time. Stronger, yet more aware of how small she was compared to the others. She raised a hand, plucking the first of the sphere's through the force to bring over to herself. Let it hover just above her hand before sending it for the target. The next followed suit, and the next. Her brow twitched though as she felt the weight of the last.

".. It's all a limit of the mind. That's a crazy thought, isn't it?" Her eyes narrowed as she pulled the sphere to herself regardless of the strain she could feel. If this was the limit of her mind trying to convince her it was too heavy, then she'd prove how wrong it was. In death, all she had was her mind to make her world. To keep herself sane. The sphere floated more freely as she smiled before it was sent soaring right through the target.

"Mastery over the mind, then?"

Taeli Raaf

 

[Taeli Raaf]

"Is it a crazy thought though?" she asked as she watched Alina easily deal with the first three and proceed to show some slight strain as she reached the neuranium sphere. One of the densest materials in the galaxy, where even that sphere if not properly mounted would start collapsing into the ground from sheer mass, and she had managed to lift it and send it through the target as well. The evidence was before the Sangnir's eyes.

"When it comes to wielding the Force, an unshakeable will and a focused mind are absolutely key to true mastery," she continued as she made another gesture towards the control panel for the room. Multiple targets would now appear, each one blinking as though on a timer that was about to start. "Our emotions may fuel our powers, unlock our potential, but it is will and focus that shape that power. Many who have gained the power of the Force through allegiance to the dark side have bene consumed by their newfound abilities, letting their emotions and hunger rule them instead of the other way around. A true Sith controls that which empowers them; whether it be rage, hunger, grief, or any other emotion, you must master yourself."

Not that, she was sure, Alina needed to hear this part of the lecture as that had been the source of her downfall from Taeli had gathered. She unlocked her power and her hunger had run free. She already knew her apprentice would not make the same mistake again.

"That ultimately creates the difference between a Force user that struggles to lift a rock over one that can move starships and the speed one accomplishes that task... willpower and focus. The neuranium sphere to each target... in thirty seconds. Begin."

Alina Tremiru

 

[Alina Tremiru]

It was a lesson she had learned, but there was some comfort in knowing more than one had fallen prey to the same thing. Comfort, and frustration at her own inadequacy. A frustration she now drew on from deep within the maw that now acted as her heart. Thirty seconds, all the targets. She raised her hand, lifting the neuranium sphere from the slowly collapsing hole it'd been creating from it's own mass. Slow. Too slow.

The rush she'd felt after finally finding the connection to the Force had been long dampened by her death. Dampened and suppressed. But that wasn't the type of control she needed, was it? "Master yourself." She repeated it. Don't suppress. Embrace, but control. Her other hand raised as she let those emotions return. She did have the Force. Everything she'd been denied all her life, what reduced her to little more than an ornament for her mother to trade. There was a huge thrill that came with that power. To defy the fate she'd been given.

She pulled, and the sphere flew near past her before she seemed to get a handle on it. Her brow twitched. Eyes narrowed. Emotion was strong, but she needed to be stronger. It was a balancing act for the next thirty seconds as Alina tried to dive into the emotions that gave her strength and yet keep control of them rather than the inverse. Too slow but controlled. Too uncontrolled but fast. She would not get all the targets, but she at least kept from destroying the environment with the heavy sphere in the process.

"It would be easier if there wasn't such a disconnect from what I want and what my emotions feel."

Taeli Raaf

 

[Taeli Raaf]

"And thus, you discover the source of every Sith's impatience," Taeli replied quietly as she watched Alina struggle to hit each target within the time frame and control the dense sphere. Each failure was only frustrating the younger woman, but she could see that Alina was trying to do as she instructed. "And if every Sith could master it, we would have long ago defeated the Jedi and came to rule the galaxy, but alas that is not the case. Pause for a moment."

The timer would reset and Taeli willed the sphere back to its pedestal.

"The disconnect comes from what gives a Sith power, our emotions. We rely upon something that is both powerful and volatile, difficult to control and yet always quick to our command. There is a reason why the dark side rushes to one's side during battle, anger and hate give strength and seduces the unprepared to give into them. I want you to stretch out your senses and feel."

As Alina did as so, she wouldn't feel anything from her master... until Taeli dropped the defenses that she constantly maintained around herself. Alina would find a deep reservoir of hatred, born from what the first Alliance had done to her sister's memory and what the Mandalorians had stolen from her. Even decades removed, that hatred, that rage still burned hotly within the Lady of Secrets. She never forgave them, and never would. There was a deep and unending love for her children, a daughter that she saw ever day and the two children stolen away by her former love. There was the deep pain and feelings of betrayal born from that time. But there would be something else Alina would be able to sense, her willpower keeping that vast pool of dark power firmly in check. There was only way for it to be unleashed, and it was only if she willed it to be unleashed.

The defenses would come back up, walls upon walls of focus, discipline, sheer willpower that even allowed her to match Spencer Varanin in illusionary and mental combat.

"Never be afraid of feeling, but always control yourself. Now... again."

The timer would start yet again.

Alina Tremiru

 

[Alina Tremiru]

Alina paused, glancing briefly to the sphere that was so easily handled with a.. Pout? Chuckle? There was a confusing amount of emotion behind it that she was stamping back down now that the lesson had been paused less they show on the surface again. And she listened. Stretched out her sensations to feel through the Force as she had been invited to. Surprise etched itself all throughout her controlled expression.

There was no suppression in all that hate and loathing. No barriers around the love. All of it was just felt constantly and embraced. The realization settled in as Alina retreated her senses back to herself, turned her gaze to the sphere. She'd been doing it backwards. Trying to control how much she felt as if it was dam to control so the river below wouldn't flood. In all reality she was just causing the water to stagnant and the dam to build up pressure.

It wasn't a matter of stopping and going. They were her. All of the emotions she felt.

The realization brought an instant change to how Alina utilized her emotions. She let them go, all of them, in full force. But rather than rage against the stream she'd let run rampant, she floated with it. Always above, always in control. She could swim how she wanted rather than get dragged down. The sphere floated to her side, hovering effortlessly in her mental grasp. Then she unleashed it. A flick of the wrist sent it to the first target, shattering it before moving to the next. A seeming flurry as her very core of emotions were. Hatred for the Empire that had failed her. Grief for all those who had died by her side. The flashes of the Sith she hated most, the Imperials and Jedi who picked at their wounds.

There was no reason to dam them up. Just guide them where they needed to go.

She finished the targets far faster than the thirty seconds before bringing the sphere back before her. Let it settle into her palm. Which had her visibly struggle to keep aloft with her own raw strength. The Sangnir were unnaturally strong, but neuranium was indeed insanely heavy.

"I believe I'm beginning to understand."

Taeli Raaf

 

[Taeli Raaf]

She watched as her apprentice thought on what she said and what she had felt within her master before she rapidly used the neuranium sphere to beat the time and targets down. As she watched the sphere fly around, there was a satisfied look on her face. She truly was beginning to understand that a Sith should never shirk anything they feel. All emotion, everything that one could feel, was a source of power and harnessing everything they were a path to greater strength.

"Understanding this concept will open doors to many abilities the Force can provide," she said. "Telekinesis being the most noticeable, of course, but empowering your already considerable strength and speed, honing your senses, and so on. But it will take time to truly grasp the concept as your body and mind will attempt to whisper limits upon you. The Force is infinite, but our ability to channel it is not. To expand how much and how often you can channel your power, you will need to challenge and overcome the limitations your subconscious throws at you."

This was ultimately how Sith such as Taeli, Carnifex, Empyrean, and other notable masters of the modern era or the Dark Lords of the past could achieve seemingly incredible feats. They had mastered themselves and removed many of their limits.

"But not all doors can be opened this way," she continued. "Some abilities, such as Force Lightning and Force Drain, can only be truly learned by experiencing them yourself and then recalling the feelings and experience to channel that power. And others can only be accessed if one has a natural talent or ability to touch them such as sorcery and alchemy."

Alina Tremiru

 

[Alina Tremiru]

"Oh don't I know it."

There was a bitterness to her tone that she quickly dipped her head in an apology for. Taeli was only speaking the truth on just how limiting sorcery was, but it was a facet of Alina's life that she still despised. The moment she failed her own test among the giants of the Tremiru family who all, all, had the natural affinity for it. Still, she turned a polite smile after a moment. She didn't want to linger on such hateful thoughts.

Not if she wasn't using them to empower herself.

"The Sangnir live off devouring the Force. Specifically Anima. We store it within our Maw, what was our heart before the change. There's a true limit to what we can do. The more we drain from our Maw, the stronger we can get. But there's also the inverse of spending far too much. What is it the Jedi say? The Force is in all things. Surrounds us. What do you think? I believe with that knowledge I could supplement my maw with the Force around to stay empowered. When I fought Lord Carnifex, I felt that limit, but I did not see him feel the same."

Taeli Raaf

 

[Taeli Raaf]

She noted the bitterness in Alina's tone at the mention of sorcery, and Taeli accepted it. The Tremirus had been accomplished sorcerers and sorceresses, and yet Alina had been born without that affinity... at the time. Her gifts lay in a different direction, but Taeli had a theory now that Alina was beginning to wield the Force properly. A test would be required in due course, but to the subject at hand.

"Yes, Kaine does love testing the younger generations," she chuckled. "He never uses his true might, but your experience only confirms what I've said. He has transcended many of the limits his body and mind placed on his command of the Force, and even more so since he and I breached the Wellspring of the Force."

As for the other part of her question, it was an interesting thought and Taeli began tapping her fingers against her side as she pondered it.

"In recent years, I've studied some of the Sangnir teachings, even had the opportunity to examine this "Maw" and the Anima produced from the consumption of blood and the Force. A finite resource, as you say, but one that does provide you with advantages until you run out. I recall one of our training sessions where you used your Warform against me, but it quickly drained you of this anima and all for naught."

She tilted her head, a familiar expression for Alina. There were ideas in her head, but those would require surgery, alchemy, sorcery, and Nightsister magick to accomplish and was extremely risky. She knew that the destruction of a Sangnir's Maw would very much doom that individual. No, that route would only be open after much experimentation on others. There were other ways she could provide the answer for Alina.

"Absorbing ambient Force energies to keep your strength flowing would be possible, I can consider two techniques within the dark side that specifically address this, Force Drain and Consume Essence."

Both techniques had served Taeli well, especially as she had adapted her usage of Consume Essence to help fuel her sorceries. It would fit Alina's idea rather well, but it would need to be in the ideal environment.

Alina Tremiru

 

[Alina Tremiru]

"He showed me a glimpse before he took my leg." She grumbled, just a little, about that. Loosing her arms had shattered her world and sent her on the quest that had her end up a Sangnir. It was only good that she could regrow her leg even after it'd been sundered. Concern filled her expression soon after. The scientist without morals or limitations. Alina understood it well, after all this time. Though, that did bring a different opportunity.

"I've access to the lab of the First on Dromund Kaas. Even this body now was just a vessel that had been created there, under my own experimentation. If I were to change them to that of a Sangnir, I'm sure you'd have ample test subjects to work your theories out on, Master." And not on her. She did, however, raise a brow.

"What is the difference of the two? I imagine learning both would be a benefit. Sangnir absorb through blood, as you know. If I could feed my maw without needing to be so.. Intimate, and also have a way to fuel myself without fear of draining and hitting that limit, well. I don't think I'd loose my leg the next time you entertain Lord Carnifex's desire to test."

Taeli Raaf

 

[Taeli Raaf]

"Oh, there's no need for that," she assured Alina, and leaving just a touch of a vague hint about Taeli not needing additional subjects to test her theories on. "Hold onto that facility for your own use, my dear." Taeli's gaze shifted to the roof, and indirectly, to the moon beyond that served as just one location for her own facilities and laboratories.

"As for the differences between the techniques," she continued, "Force Drain is about taking the very life force from a victim, using the dark side to absorb their vitality and Force essence and leaving them a desiccated husk once you're done. Consume essence is about feeding upon the darker and baser emotions around you such as pain, grief, rage, hatred, and so on to fuel your own powers and strength. More useful where larger populations live or battlefields, both new and old. I myself have used this technique to fuel certain rituals, sorceries, and alchemy as it provided a larger source of power that merely needed guidance from my own."

Alina Tremiru

 

[Alina Tremiru]

"If that's the difference, then I suppose I might as well learn both. The ability to drain life alone through the Force rather than ingesting blood sounds ideal. And just hearing that you have used the ability to fuel your own machinations has me rather curious what I might be able to do." She was already so curious about what her own abilities could do. Anima, the life of the Force within the blood of so many, how much could she truly control of it?

More than most might think. She had even boiled the blood of her enemies before.

"How do we begin?"

Taeli Raaf

 

[Taeli Raaf]

"Yes, both abilities would certainly be on theme for you," Taeli replied with a small smile. She wasn't the only one curious about Alina might be able to accomplish in the near future. She could sense a more... controlled ambition in her apprentice, and her time in the Netherworld had likely given her time to reflect and just think.

"Well to begin, we will need... a different sort of target," she continued. There would be a swirl of dark purple and black smoke that would whirl around both of them, taking them far away from the estate. In a similar eruption of mist, they would reappear in a sterile looking room, much like one would find in most state of the art medical facilities across the galaxy. Their arrival would activate a chime and an attendant with the symbol of Spaarti Creations underneath her own power base's symbol would rush in. A mumbled word to them, and they would scurry off again.

"We will begin with Force Drain," Taeli said, taking a few steps away from her apprentice. "Now, much like Force Lightning, the best way to learn the ability is to first be on the receiving end of it. It was how Ashin Varanin taught me, long ago and under a different identity, that certain dark side abilities you need to internalize how they feel, what they create. Force Drain creates a strange feeling of emptiness, a hole that can never quite be filled in your own presence. To utilize the ability, one must focus on that missing piece and then stretch out towards whatever life they seek to drain away to try and fill it with the dark side. I suspect you might already have some idea of how it feels when your 'maw' runs dry, so it shall be a familiar sensation for you, although a little different."

Reddish orange ribbons of energy would start to form around her fingers as she spoke.

"Are you ready?"

Alina Tremiru

 

[Alina Tremiru]

Alina took a couple quick breaths as they reappeared elsewhere. Cleared her throat. It was good she truly didn't need to breath, all things considered. The fact that she felt queasy was an.. Unnatural sensation. Sangnir didn't get sick. And yet as she forced a smile to stand opposite of her master and play down the brief queasiness she'd felt upon them shifting scenery, it was clear she did still feel some forms of sickness.

"What's another hunger to sate? Adeline seems to be handling it well, all things considered. I'm as ready as I'll ever be."

Taeli Raaf

 

[Taeli Raaf]

"And we never really are as ready as we believe ourselves to be," she muttered. Her hand rose and the reddish-orange ribbons of energy twisted out to ensnare themselves around Alina. For a Sangnir, a being of undeath, the technique itself was not as effective when performed on them as the tethers of life and death were uniquely altered in the vampiric species. And yet, the hunger of the dark side would find purchase nonetheless and start drawing away the energies animating Alina's body, siphoning them back into her Master.

She wouldn't take much; just enough for Alina to understand how the hunger felt, how it would differ from her hunger for Anima... and how it continued to linger even as the ribbons of energy disappeared. The emptiness would be her focus.

"My lady, the subjects as requested," an attendant would announce, bringing in two blindfolded Human individuals and a third that was only gagged, locking into place, and then leaving the two Sith to their session. Mandalorians, captured by the Lady of Secrets' and her followers. Per her decree, any captured Mandalorians were exempt from any protections of experimentation... and these members of Clan... well she had hardly cared about learning what their names or clans were. All that was important was they were a family unit.

"Alina, drain the life from the two who cannot see," she ordered. The gagged man struggled against his chains at the order, panic, fear, and hate pouring into the Force from his emotions. That would be the next part of the lesson. "Focus on the void left by the technique, then use it to reach out through the dark side to their vitality, their very essences."

Alina Tremiru