If you meet the Buddha on the path...

[Elanor Wraith]

@Je'Gan, for whom tags never work.

Metalorn

A great many things had gone wrong on Metalorn, in the past month. Battle, war, death and madness hung in the air the same way incense clogs up the scent in a penitent's chambers. Where war and death went, disease and sorrow were on it's coattails. They clogged the senses, thick and cloying. To a woman introduced to the finer points of the ways of the Force by a man who'd later go on to be the Sith Emperor, it wasn't an unfamiliar thing. Or, truthfully, an entirely unwelcome one. Rage and terror were the batteries which powered the dark side. Tranquility and one-ness were the generator for the light. Surely, the path to enlightenment lay somewhere between. And what better place to explore that thought than in the midst of both?

A lone figure walked through the wreckage of the Unreal city, unsure exactly what she was here to find. The place smelt of blood and discharged laser weapons. And in a non-metaphorical sense, it reeked to high hell. Frowning beneath her white hood, the lean Miraluka planted one end of her staff in the ground and took a deep breath to try and refocus her thoughts. Contrasting with the white hood and cloak she wore, Saoirse had her typical travel attire - ripped jeans and heavy dewback leather boots faded with the light and dust of the many planets she'd wandered in her time since leaving the Lucrehulk.

She wasn't sure WHY she'd come to Metalorn. Truth be told, she didn't know WHY she went practically anywhere. Sure, 'following the Force's will' was a convenient excuse. But most of the time, Saoirse just stowed away on whatever ship had the best chance of a large, warm, easily-hid-in cargo compartment. The latest one just happened to be carrying supplies for Metalorn.

And as far as visiting places of great import and impact, a seer couldn't so much better than the greatest Galactic tragedy since Donaynd and Roche. Such places were FULL of power.

 

[Ashin Varanin]

@[member="Saoirse Jenulia"]

Without question, he was not supposed to be here. The Republic had failed to dislodge the Empire's hold on Metalorn, a peace treaty was in force, and running around wearing the face of the man who'd stymied the Emperor was not an especially good way to keep said treaty in good health.

And thus, to every sense of Force and technology, he wasn't wearing that face. A semi-permanent White Current illusion afforded him enough disguise to walk without scrutiny or fear, while leaving him enough focus to fight or run if necessary. Not like he could do anything truly powerful while fighting and holding the disguise -- but it would be enough for most situations. His current features were unshaven, graying, a little soft around the edges. He'd worn that face as Sky's husband, fifty years ago, right before she fell again. Then again, he'd died four or five times since then (it had been a busy century for death), and his choice of face didn't make him especially maudlin, or distract him.

No, his mind was free to keep tabs on everything around him. The Unreal City loomed around him, a prison arcology that had held millions before Matsu Ike hit it with an earthquake. Helmet cams from dead stormtroopers might provide further evidence to her guilt.

He crouched by a debris pile and slipped a piece of rebar under a chunk of permacrete to serve as a lever. White plasteel glinted invitingly underneath. He'd always liked white plasteel.

 

[Elanor Wraith]

@Je'gan Olra'en

A bit of shuffling and noise caught Saoirse's attention and, ever curious and mindful of the winds of fate, the Miraluka plodded off towards what she suspected to be little more than graverobbers or some other sort of scavenger. Staff in hand, she decided she'd give the opportunistic lout a clout on the shoulders and a stern warning about respecting the sacred rest of a fallen warrior. Nothing fatal, of course. Simply a bit of a cautionary tale. After all, respect was what separated the Sentients from monsters.

Je'gan's illusory face meant nothing to the Miraluka - even if she'd met him before, she was blind. Saoirse set her faded old dewback leather boots in the dust and regarded the person before her with a slightly disapproving frown, her white cloak and hood fluttering around in the light breeze. That Je'Gan had come into direct martial conflict with the Sith who'd trained her was a fact she didn't yet know. She might not ever know.

"You really aught to leave them to their rest." Saoirse advised archly, aware that a slender woman barely out of her teens was far from the most imposing thing in the Galaxy. "They died fighting. They deserve to be buried, not pawed at."

 

[Ashin Varanin]

Illusory features meant nothing to a Miraluka, but that didn't rule out holocams or other watchers, here in the ruined prison. So he kept the cloak up. The girl was young, pretty, a fighter. He could sense, or maybe guess at, confrontational intent, and here in this place where Jedi had killed thousands, Je'gan was in no meek mood himself. Nor could he reveal his errand. There was no reason for a non-Jedi to be hunting for footage of a Jedi killing the prisoners, and this was no place for a Jedi.

"The burying's not my business, kid," he said, glancing around. "The pawing is, at least today it is. And if I was in the business of giving people what they deserved, everything from the Senate Rotunda to Tyrin Ardik's throne would be smoke and cinders. That's not a side of me that likes to get woken up, but this place, what happened here, just might do it. Forcers sent this world to hell."

He stood with a grunt, resting a hand on the curved sabre at his belt. "Imperial ambitions, kid. Never as good as they're cracked up to be."

@[member="Saoirse Jenulia"]

 

[Elanor Wraith]

"It's easy to say that Forcers are ripping apart the Galaxy, because that's the obvious target." Saoirse rebutted blithely. "Idiots always take potshots at the easy target. If people didn't have the Force, they'd kill each other with guns. If they didn't have guns, they'd use knives. And if they didn't have knives? Choking each other with bare hands." The Miraluka pointed out with the flat, unamused tone of a worldy instructor imparting a lesson to a particularly dense student.

After all, she wasn't about to allow this graverobber to just disparage a man she respected and call her 'kid' in the same breath. Not without some barbed language all her own, that was.

"What happened here was regrettable. Good soldiers fighting for causes they don't choose, at the whims of leaders they've never met. Personally, I think that anyone who'd order another person to war should be obligated to stand on the front lines." The martially-minded woman mused thoughtfully. "What I find more curious, however, is why you're adding 'Imperial Ambition' into this. I was under the impression that the Republic attacked Imperial land, destroyed Imperial property, and strong-armed the Empire into a treaty. But then, I'm out of the loop when it comes to politics."

"I certainly wouldn't presume to know more than an old scavenger. Tell me - if you WERE in the business of 'giving people what they deserve', what would an old man disturbing the bodies of soldiers deserve?"

 

[Ashin Varanin]

@[member="Saoirse Jenulia"]

"Nice monologue," he said, voice flat. "Live for six hundred years of Forcers wrecking things and dragging armies around, and you'll have a different perspective, I guarantee it. And if you'd bothered to listen, you'd have heard me say that I'd burn the Senate just as well as Dromund Kaas if I was going to burn anything. Imperial ambition is imperial ambition, whether or not the ambitious call themselves a Republic. But since self-examination seems beyond you, I can only infer that today is a day for others to call us to account. Meaning I suspect it falls to you to give me my just deserts. Kid."

A good man wouldn't have ignited his lightsabre.

Snap-hiss.

 

[Elanor Wraith]

@Je'gan Olra'en

Action was always more pure than discourse. Of course.

Tossing her duffle bag a safe distance away, Saoirse gave her lightpike a small flourish before igniting the white blade and settling into a low stance. Her feet were separated, her grip on her weapon firm with her left hand, but open with the right. The intention of this was clear enough - the Lightpike was a reaching weapon, and Saoirse used a defensive style. Being able to pivot and rotate her pike increased her defensive radius considerably, so long as she maintained solid footing and balance. Soresu, and markedly similar to the style utilized by the Emperor's Shadow Guard.

"You carry a saber - so regardless of age, you are a warrior. We will see who has the stronger ideals." Saoirse promised imperiously, raising the point of her pike so that the blade pointed to her opponent's chest, near his heart, where the seat of his Force Signature lie.

 

[Ashin Varanin]

"I've known pacifists and assassins to carry a lightsabre. For some, it means more than just killing." He shrugged and flicked a Makashi salute her way. "Not for me, though. Ideals don't win a fight. Ever."

The basic fencing stance was simple, what other martial artists might call a back stance, the toes of his back foot pointed out, most of his weight on his back leg. No reversals of stance here, and footwork might cross the legs briefly but the aim remained the same: Straight-line motion, fast as feth, back and forth. That basic stance transitioned into a momentary lunge, arm outstretched, then front foot stamping, knee over the toe. A simple thrust for the chest, blindingly fast, the tip of the blade dipping around whatever block might come -- a disengage, the blade drawing a tiny circle from one perspective while not sacrificing forward momentum.

 

[Elanor Wraith]

@Je'gan Olra'en

A lunge, a thrust, and a flourish. Makashi was a duelist's style. Makashi was a stilleto knife, thin and jabbing. And her opponent was fast, faster than any old scavenger had a right to be. Which was excellent, to be honest. Finding a skilled duelist where she'd expected a bottom-feeder was like ordering a three-credit nerfburger and getting a prize-winning steak instead. The Miraluka's stoic demeanor broke into a wide grin as she took a step backwards to give herself room to parry the incoming strikes.

She retaliated with a quick flurry of thrusts, stabbing her pike forward from a relatively safe distance - testing her opponent's defenses, reactions, and probing for weaknesses. Soresu was a defensive style, and Saoirse was a defensive fighter. When she attacked, she was quite methodical and calculated, if lacking in ferocity.

 

[Ashin Varanin]

Makashi, as it happened, was designed specifically to deal with thrusts and stabs and flurries. Big chops? Not so much. But Saoirse had opted for the one strategy that any Makashi duellist could handle in his sleep. Gentle, quick parries redirected everything methodically. The range worked for him, but he stepped forward quickly in the fencing way, sliding in his back foot then forward with his front, almost a hop save that his head stayed level. The maneuver he chose was known as a beat attack, slamming the pike's blade aside on the way forward, for a thrust to the face.

 

[Elanor Wraith]

@Je'gan Olra'en

So. Confirmed Makashi. She aught to have guessed from the stance, but Saoirse didn't have as much experience in combating Makashi as she did other, better known styles and hadn't recognized it right off of the bat. But, hey - that's why she was out walking the worlds, right? To learn things? And hopefully not die while doing so, of course. Her flurry of thrusts were parried and re-directed, which was to be expected. She'd been testing his defenses, and Soresu's strikes were, at best, clumsy when compared to more offensive styles.

And then he lunged in. Fast. Too fast! Of pure instinct, Saoirse dipped backwards - nearly bending in half to limbo under the blow. Even still, he'd been quick enough to singe off a bit of her bangs. Ordinarily, such a prone position would have been compromising - but a large part of the first forms she'd learned using her lightpike, the part that'd given her the most difficulty, had involved a manuver that required one to bend backwards at the waist. Pulling her pike in a bit, Sao spun it above herself like a helicopter blade, trying to push her opponent away (Or, you know, cut him in half) so she'd be able to regain her footing.

 

[Ashin Varanin]

The pike whirred horizontally under his blade, threatening the underside of his extended arm, and as he raised it high he dipped his blade towards her hand. But that was just an incidental maneuver, a little touch as he shifted his weight back from the lunge. Returning to back stance, he slashed his blade-tip under the edge of her whirling disc of assorted death. The blade-tip raked across at the tops of her planted feet -- the only place where she was in contact with the ground.

And then the main event, as his saber arm crossed his body and came up. His sabre inscribed a smooth half-circle and hammered down at her defenses, and her knees beneath them.