Private Stellar Exchanges

[Astra Sadow]

"What makes reality real, Lysander?" Astra repeated. "Who cares what the objective truth might be when you're trapped in your own, subjective version of it; one you're unable to break free because you can't even fathom that you could if you wanted to. I find it all rather... invigorating. Don't you?"

"It is possible to visit such a world. Somewhere reality has come undone and madness reigns. To visit and return mostly unchanged. You'll at least be able to sleep at night." Provided he didn't encounter certain entities there. The very thought brought a smile to her lips.

Another shrug followed. "Of course, you needn't visit such a place. Plenty of 'real' wonders to see out here where your natural-born senses can appreciate, Lysander. I just think it's important to understand the trappings you're surrounded with. Raises the question: what does it mean to be free? That every boundary dissolve and everything that is or was is at your fingertips? But then how do you interact with any one thing? The ability to move between them? But to what purpose? Or is it simply having the wherewithal to identify, accept, and embrace something you hold to be important while recognizing everything else is merely a distraction?"

"I am but a guide, Lysander, who can show you the paths at the crossroads. Each of us decides which one to take in life. But if you devote yourself to my path, I will show you things not dreamt of in your philosophy."

Lysander von Ascania​

 

[Lysander von Ascania]

Astra Sadow​

Lysander's shoulders rolled forward. "Say someone seals themselves inside their own version of things. They still have to breathe, don't they? The walls might keep the world out of sight, but the wind finds the gaps anyway. Perception isolates.. fine. Does it actually protect? That paradox is what I find myself stuck on."

He reached over and pinched a stem between two fingers. "Of course it's interesting. The idea that confinement itself could feel enlivening rather than suffocating. Do you mean there is a kind of freedom in surrendering the search for an objective truth altogether? Because part of me wonders about the opposite cost. If every boundary disappears, then nothing has shape anymore."

There was undeniably an appetite for the nuance rather than any impulse to refute. "So maybe the question becomes less about removing the frame and more about who gets to draw it, you know? And whether recognizing a boundary as artificial makes it any less useful for holding something."

Devotion was an ambitious word for someone claiming to be a guide. Almost too close to that troublesome word from earlier: fealty. Philosophy was appended to the bargain as well; that was definitely bait.

"Very well. You may count me as accompanying you. That's as much devotion as you're getting today."

​

 

[Astra Sadow]

"That depends on what you consider being free. Earlier I said it was about having the ability to choose. Which is true. But if you were forced to choose one from an infinite number of possibilities, how would you make a choice? Would you spend eternity looking at every one to find the 'perfect' choice? What is 'perfection' anyway?"

"We are creatures within a system, you and I, Lysander. A system with boundaries and rules, made to exist here. If we step outside of those... If we linger too long where the rules no longer apply... It's difficult to know what could happen."

Astra smiled across at the man as he accepted only to step a toe down her path. "You don't need to bow before me and proclaim me your Master, Lysander. Mercy wouldn't appreciate that. In time, you'll understand. In time, you'll know when to turn back or press forward. Everyone has a line they won't cross. I just hope you won't hold it against me as I try encouraging you to cross it anyway."

Lysander von Ascania​

 

[Lysander von Ascania]

Astra Sadow​

Freedom was an open field; thoughts like Astra's made the stretched the horizon. "Perfect for what? Because a perfect weapon and perfect home serve very different masters."

"They're only relative to a goal." Chasing that kind of clarity had always been the engine underneath everything, in one form or another. "But.. if you choose one possibility, you surrender the other versions of you that choose differently."

Clarity for many things would come on its own if given air and time to ripen. "Maybe that's all I need, Astra. More time." He returned her smile easily. "You should know I don't bow to anyone. Not even Mercy." Stubbornness lived in him like old bone; it could've been as simple as pride, or just the scar tissue left from clawing his way up from Korriban. Didn't leave him as flexible in some arenas, though.

"I think holding a grudge would require too much effort. Letting you press my limits? Far more entertaining. Plus that only takes a little patience." Easier to just kill them. Cleared the mind wonderfully. "Guess we'll see when we get there, huh?"

 

[Astra Sadow]

Astra turned her head just so and lifted her brows a hair as Lysander posited his questions. Exactly. "Prepare yourself, Lysander. I'll be here to help you. When the time comes -- when the choice has to be made -- you won't have more time. Fortunately, for now, the choice is on our schedule so there's no need for you to clear yours." One golden eye winked at him.

Life could always force them to accelerate that schedule. It'd have to be for some drastic reason, however. What Astra was talking about was no trivial matter to be used out of convenience, but sheer necessity. Lysander would have to bet everything to see the path through to the end. If that's what he chose to do.

"By the time we're through, you'll never think of anything as 'impossible' ever again." She expected he'd like that. The man might not be blood thirsty, but he had more than enough ambition of his own to carry him forward.

Lysander von Ascania​

 

[Lysander von Ascania]

Astra Sadow​

Lysander smiled at the irony; to prepare a man for a choice was to change him before he ever made it. The wink finally earned the stem its execution. He plucked it free and rolled it between his fingers. "Is that confidence in me, or in whatever you intend to show me?"

Scheduling wasn't exactly an obstacle. Serving the Covenant came with surprisingly few diplomatic appointments these days. Far simpler to arrange another catastrophe with the Chairwoman. He was more excited about the prospect than he let on. Learning had always been a private pleasure of his, whether practicing a new kata or falling into some ancient text.

What Astra was proposing, though, was more discovery, which gave it the air of a gift. Skepticism was one of his native tongues, but he'd always known better than to refuse generosity outright. "Did it happen that way for you? Was there a day when 'impossible' just.. lost its meaning?" At the same time, that kind of freedom sounded capable of becoming a burden. Unless she knew something he didn't. Which, knowing her, she probably did.

 

[Astra Sadow]

"In you, of course. I told you what a waste it was to introduce those that weren't ready."

Astra lips twitched at the corners when he asked how it had come to her. "Yes. Not in the manner you're imagining. Not in a way I can describe. And there wasn't a choice involved." She then stared at him for several seconds in silence. "Not everyone has the benefit of a guide, Lysander. Remember that." There was always a first. Her encounter was not the first, but it was a first in a branch of learning. Someone that learned first-handed without a mentor. Without instruction. The blind in the dark.

"So, what would you like to learn first, Lysander?" The smirk returned as she remain seated exactly as she had been for the last few minutes. His dark companion showed no signs of restlessness or discomfort maintaining the same posture while they talked.

Lysander von Ascania​

 

[Lysander von Ascania]

Astra Sadow​

"And what happens when I start asking you to prove that too?" Rolled off the tongue before it got the courtesy of a second thought.

If there'd been a moment where Lysander suspected Astra was stepping around something.. it was then. He imagined there were very few subjects she was incapable of putting into words. Which obviously made the absence noticeable. Not a big deal, however.

The reminder about having a guide landed. Lysander knew he was fortunate in that regard; knowing a thing intellectually and hearing it spoken aloud were rarely the same experience. Some truths only became real when someone else handed them to you in conversation. "I never forget." Just as Lysander never forgot those who vanished when he truly needed them.

For a moment he looked past her. The sun had climbed a little higher since they'd settled there, marking how much of their morning disappeared into conversation, strange philosophy and all.

Attention then returned to Astra. "Whatever you did with Nightstar earlier, or that other disappearing act you pulled a few minutes ago." His shoulders lifted in an easy shrug. "Dealer's choice."

 

[Astra Sadow]

"Proof? You'll get all the proof you could ever want, Lysander. In time. One step at a time so you're ready." Astra chuckled. Such a bold question to ask. So accusative. Well, he should be wary. Men and women like her was dangerous -- in more ways than one.

A hum rose from within as he made a choice. "One leads to the other. Let's start with the basics, then. I call it 'Folding.' I'm sure there are others that figured out something like it, or perhaps the exact same. Doesn't matter. Very few will have ever learned how to apply it as more than a means of storing a weapon." Though she didn't exactly question whether anyone ever had before. It was an old galaxy. There was always a first, but was it possible Astra had been the first? Perhaps if she became a goddess such truths would be revealed.

"Our world has three physical dimensions. Those in Physics and Maths say there are more than that; but like a two-dimensional creature we cannot perceive dimensions higher than our own. And while we cannot see them, the Force allows us to interact with them. Think of it like a two dimensional creature figuring out how to move something just a little into the third dimension. Close enough to be touching, but imperceptible to other two dimensional lifeforms."

"Others might call it warping spacetime or creating a pocket dimension. All very grandiose, pseudo-science terms. I suppose some might call Pushing with the Force a gravimetric disturbance or localized distortion of the spacetime field." Astra chuckled to herself. "So, I call it Folding."

"What's your first question?"

Lysander von Ascania​

 

[Lysander von Ascania]

Astra Sadow
​

The stem's rotation between his fingers paused before Lysander shifted through the grass to close the distance between them by half.

Folding was an interesting one for it. It sounded like nobody had given her the name directly, which made him wonder where she'd learned it. Or invented it, perhaps. Who was to say? Either way, starting with the foundations sounded like a solid beginning. Most people wanted the spectacle first, the burst of light without ever learning how the fuse was laid.

“If that’s what you call it, that’s what I’ll call it too.”

"So not disappearing. Not summoning, either. Displacing, maybe? That's closer to what you're really saying." Somehow the galaxy was so full of things you could never see and yet you were touching them all the time. Two-dimensional creatures arguing about shadows while their world was being folded just out of sight. It was lonely, in a way. And beautiful.

His mouth quirked while he was still thinking. "Okay, wait. Let me make sure I'm actually hearing you and not just the version of you that sounds smarter in my head."

He lifted his hand, palm up between them, and turned it over. “You don't mean cheating at where a thing is supposed to be. You mean there's another direction entirely.. one we don't have a word for because we don't have the eyes for it, but the Force does? So.. you're not making anything disappear. You're just.. nudging it sideways? Like.." Lysander hesitated, a little sheepish at the image that came to mind. "Like slipping a letter between the pages of a book, and closing it so it's still there, just.. hidden?"

“Could I reach into that higher dimension while remaining here, or does interaction require crossing the threshold myself?”

 

[Astra Sadow]

Astra's eyelids fell a hair as she met the man's gaze. The version that sounded smarter in his head? With a tongue like that it was a small wonder one of two Empresses hadn't killed him already.

"Never cross the threshold, Lysander. There is no air you can breathe there. Every physical law your body requires to live exists, but doesn't function the way your body requires it. Imagine a two-dimensional creature forcibly given a third dimension. Do you think its form has adapted to survive the strain -- the pressures -- exerted in all three-dimensions?"

"And your analogy can work. I would describe it more like... taking a piece of paper and creasing it twice along one length near one another, then folding the sheet upon itself so there is a slight three-layer overlap. Imagine tucking something inside where the folds overlap. At first, imagine something that can find inside of that fold. Worry about larger things later." After all, why should the the size of an object matter? If she were folding space itself in upon itself then the limitations of physical, three-dimensions might matter. They were operating outside of those limitations.

With a wave of her fingers, they enclosed upon the hilt of the Eclipse broadsaber as it reappeared in her grasp. Another wave, and the broadsaber slipped back out of sight. "Think of it as a sleight-of-hand, but it is no illusion." Like any Force ability, a person had to feel it. To know it. It was possible and the only things that kept a user from realizing it were their own preconceptions.

Lysander von Ascania​

 

[Lysander von Ascania]

Astra Sadow​

"That's almost offensively simple. Sounds less like forbidden metaphysics and more like something you do with towels beside a washbasin."

"I've always thought of the Force as giving things depth. Like there's the surface everyone sees, then everything underneath it that ordinary senses never really touch." Fingers traced a vague turn through the air. "What you're describing sounds like using that lower layer rather than simply sensing it. Not destroying distance. Just.. persuading reality there's room for one extra thing." One eyebrow climbed. "That remotely right?"

Lysander leaned forward, hooking an elbow over his raised knee. "Define 'large.' What exactly are we measuring? A corpse? That broadsaber?" The corner of his mouth pulled upward; at least one of them was thoroughly enjoying the lesson. "Or are we talking about whatever the fabric of space can tolerate without objecting? Two points occupying the same place without actually becoming the same point?"

"And that means it isn't really storage, does it?" His focus dropped to Astra's hands, tracking every minute adjustment as the broadsaber vanished once more. "Calling it storage almost seems unfairly convenient. Unless we're being very generous with the terminology here." Lysander raised both of his own hands and held them apart, palms facing each other. Fingertips twitched as though he were trying to feel the shape of the emptiness between them.

 

[Astra Sadow]

Offensively simple? A single corner of her lips twitched at the remark. He was doing his best to dig at her pride. Every Force power appeared 'simple' to the outside observer when witnessing it applied by a Master. Lysander knew that.

"Yes, that is another way to look at it. How you envision it shouldn't matter so long as the precepts are the same." Up. Down. Sharing space or moving it to one side. In any case, the premise was removing it from what was considered 'reality' and putting it somewhere just within reach.

Then the questions kept on coming, and Astra listened patiently as Lysander tried to unpack it. "And swordplay isn't dancing," she replied patiently, but with a note of sarcastic parody. "Storing and retrieving objects is the beginning, Lysander, not the end. I am glad you picked up on that not being all it is good for; but the applications are slightly different. So, before you start running, first learn to stand."

Putting something 'elsewhere' required retooling how one thought about space. Selectively folding space in on itself required a little more skill.

"Focus on a single spot and imagine it is a shelf or a chest before you. Somewhere you can place an object. Envision it there before you."

Lysander von Ascania​

 

[Lysander von Ascania]

Astra Sadow​

That helped; Lysander had once again built an entire scaffold around an uncomplicated idea. Somewhere between here and almost here lay just enough room for the trick to hold. At least that gave his mind something stable to stand on.

He released a slow breath through his nose. Fair enough. Apparently, he'd sprinted several lessons ahead again. "Alright, fine. Not running. Message received." His hand lifted in a gesture of surrender. "Aggressively walking.. mayhaps?"

Astra's instruction followed, and for once, that restless itch to dissect everything would need to wait its turn. So, the stem between his fingers became the sensible choice. Seemed the smarter thank risking something like Nightstar while Astra sat nearby.

Lysander placed it in the grass between them and fixed his attention on a point just beyond it. A shelf? Ok. Something simple enough that his mind couldn't decorate it with six layers of metaphysics. Half-lidded eyes began to soften in focus. Breathing lengthened while the Dark gathered around the edge of his awareness.

Fingertips curled against his knee. This time, he pictured the empty space ahead not as a destination, but as a place where the stem might already belong. The stem quivered as something in the moment clicked into alignment. But its outline was oddly difficult to focus on. Recognition struck; the bright flare of excitement was determined to sabotage him. Even so, it snapped sideways through the grass by a few inches. "Mm, that felt more like inventing telekinesis by accident." He glanced back up to Astra. "Tell me I'm overthinking it. I know you're dying to." Another deep breath was taken; this one felt deeper. "My mind kept treating 'somewhere else' like a destination. As if I had to send the stem there. But you weren't asking me to send it anywhere, were you? Hard to explain.."

 

[Astra Sadow]

"Just as long as you don't experiment with yourself aggressively walking," Astra replied. Should she give him the warning? Well, a responsible person would. Someone worried about life and limb and happiness. But they were Dark Side users. Being overly cautious wasn't their shtick. Still, she'd try to make sure he didn't rip himself in half by doing a 'small sprint' without thinking.

Burnt golden eyes followed the stem to where Lysander had placed it between them. Not quite what she'd had in mind. Truly, reasonably one should start with something manageable, but a stem seemed a bit too manageable. Astra would let him go about his business, however. So long as he was trying.

A soft snort followed Lysander's observation. "You are not wrong. If you think of it as 'moving' yet failed to 'move' it that induced momentum may be redirected in unpredictable ways. My advice is not to think of it moving at all." How would she explain it? "When you face an opponent in battle, rationally you know in order to thrust your blade into their chest you must move. The tip of your blade cannot reach them unless its position changes." Astra paused to make certain Lysander was mentally with her in the analogy. Basic concept, but you had to allow people time to get over any sort of 'seriously?' they might feel at the analogy itself. "When Folding an object -- storing it -- it does not need to move. You are not placing it on the shelf; you simply know it is on the shelf. You're altering reality so the object no longer takes up space. It no longer has mass."

"If you want a more philosophical view, think of it as deconstructing the object back into its archetypal form. To its base concept. When it comes time to retrieve it, you retrieve the archetype and then impose the unique characteristics on it once more."

Lysander von Ascania​

 

[Lysander von Ascania]

So that was it; he' d commanded reality to do something impossible, and in the very act of asking, had handed it momentum anyway. No wonder the stem went sideways.

Lysander's eyes narrowed at Astra when the woman began explaining how a thrust worked. Really? Swordplay? Of all things?

He sketched two points in the air between them, one on either side of an imaginary line. "That's where I went wrong, isn't it? I was trying to show the object moving from here to there. Start, middle, finish. Very normal. Very ordinary space of me."

Lysander's smile tightened. "But Folding doesn't have a middle. Doesn't even want one. The second I picture the object traveling, covering ground or whatever, I'm asking it to perform an action that only makes sense when there's actual distance to cross." He tapped a finger lightly against his chest. "I'm forcing a rule onto something whose whole purpose is to ignore that rule." A fair summary of the Emissary's autobiography, now that he thought about it.

He studied the crooked stem for a moment longer. Then he exhaled through his nose, shook his head once, and reached for Nightstar. "Right. Of course the harmless option would be the complicated one."

As Lysander began to focus, as she'd shown him, he leaned in her direction. "Hey Astra, don't blame me when you get stabbed."

 

[Astra Sadow]

Actual distance. Perceivable distance. "How do you visualize a middle you can't see?" Astra asked in the wake of his realization. Something couldn't pass through nothing -- it was only rational to think that. But 'nothing' wasn't nothing was it? It was merely out of sight. Things didn't cease to exist because you couldn't see them. Objects could pass through 'nothing' from a subjective point of view. Objectively there was certainly something.

"If it helps," she added when Lysander reached for Nightstar, "don't think of it as tucking something inside the Fold -- or inside a book. Imagine the Fold or book closing over the thing you want to store." Rather than 'move' the item, you moved all of creation. It sounded harder, but everything was so large... surely it wouldn't notice if you manipulated such an insignificant part of the aggregate whole?

A smile graced her lips when Lysander joked about 'accidentally' stabbing her. If Lysander managed to actually stab her she'd be impressed not angry. He, on the other hand, might end up quite cross if his mistake necessitated regenerative healing.

Lysander von Ascania​

 

[Lysander von Ascania]

Astra Sadow​

The line between two points hadn't vanished. It'd turned somewhere he could not follow? That was probably the point. He'd abandoned the idea of movement only to make another assumption. Apparently an entire morning spent discussing subjective reality hadn't prevented him from immediately treating his own senses as the final authority?

"Alright, let me work this out. From where I'm sitting, it only looks instantaneous. But that's just the view from here.. whatever actually happens between those points is still real. It's still a process. I'm only seeing the before and after because my eyes can't catch the middle part. Does that make sense?"

He looked up at Astra. "Maybe I need to stop insisting that what I can perceive is the whole process." The realization arrived with comical humility, how easily his senses could sell him a story; he'd have sworn he knew better.

"So, basically, I've been trying to slip the letter between the pages when all I needed to do was let the book close around it." His mouth tugged upward. "You could've led with that, you know."

He let the thought of putting Nightstar anywhere go and went quiet. No path. No distance. Nothing to send. The sword remained precisely where it was. Only the rest of the thought needed persuading. His attention narrowed until there was only his target and the certainty Astra had handed him. The letter didn't need to move. The pages only needed to close.

And then Nightstar was gone.

 

[Astra Sadow]

Astra merely smile when Lysander asked to work it out. That was her intent the entire time. No one could be told how to use the Force, they had to be led to discovering that on their own. Much like most creatures couldn't control another's limbs; their brains had to figure out all those neurological signals all on their own. All a mentor could do was help them perceive the world in different ways so they didn't become stuck thinking any one way was correct -- especially if the one they were stuck on wasn't working.

"It does," was all Astra said when Lysander asked a question. Though, truthfully, he couldn't perceive the 'after' either. Not when he only did one 'motion.'

"Could I?" Lysander wanted her to lead with 'and now you manipulate reality' next time? Much like telling someone how to draw a horse: first, get a pen; then, draw a horse. So many Force abilities were already unbelievable at the onset. This one -- and especially those derived from it -- were certainly beyond the pale.

A soft hum of approval followed Nightstar disappearing. "Nicely done, Lysander. And to think, you didn't accidentally fold your hand along with it." He wasn't the only one with a dark sense of humor.

Lysander von Ascania​

 

[Lysander von Ascania]

Astra Sadow​

Astra's comment pulled an absentminded glance toward his hand, almost as though the joke had reminded him of something he hadn't meant to examine. His fingers flexed before he caught himself.

"I was hoping to keep all ten fingers through your first lesson."

Folding was unlike most of the Force techniques he kept ready in his toolbelt; those hose usually came with some obvious consequence. Impact, resistance, strain, sometimes even a visible demand on the body. This was different. Less like forcing the world to change and more like reality quietly agreeing that it ought to be arranged another way. The kind of thing that could inflate a Sith Lord' s fragile ego, that much he was also certain.

Fascination was certainly part of it; a few other feelings drifted beneath that, harder to pin down with names. Even while he sat there studying the person in front of him, possibilities were already branching through his thoughts: other applications, cleverer uses, at least by Lysander's standards. He could already see three ways to misuse it. But he didn't let those thoughts run too wild; Lysander possessed more discipline than that, more than he had allowed Astra to see today.

"So. Getting it back. I think the storing part makes sense now. I've got something of a working picture of what that asks for." Of course, like anything else, he knew there would be some repetition required. "Retrieving it can't just be the same thought.. backwards, can it?"

Well, he was just the student now. Probably best to let Astra decide what came next before he took off and created new problems for himself. Only one escaped containment. "Unless you'd rather me put something else in there with Nightstar. In which case, I'm gonna need you to hand the glareshades over." Assuming she'd even brought them.