Her nose wrinkled.
“Okay, first of all, rude,” she said, pointing an accusing finger at him.
“I do not decorate the walls. I just…test them. For durability. Repeatedly.”
A nearby scuff mark on the panel behind her offered a conflicting opinion. She flicked a look at it. Glared. Then looked back at Sven.
“Second of all…Lossa totally cheats and you know it.” The image of the Zeltron staring an opponent into surrender made her lips twitch, despite herself. Ala exhaled, some of the fluster bleeding out into a rueful smile.
He had a point.
Annoyingly.
Her hands dropped from her hips, fingers smoothing down the fronts of her tunic as if she could iron out the habits he’d just described.
“You’re not wrong,” she admitted, shoulders lifting in a small, sheepish shrug.
“Ataru, Jar’Kai, all that leaping-around-like-a-hyperactive-lothcat stuff? That’s been my home base for years. If I stay moving, I don’t have to think about how small I am, or how many people in the room could use me as a free weight.”
She gestured vaguely at herself, as if her entire frame were an exhibit.
“I built around what I had. Energy. Speed. A worrying disregard for my own safety.”
A platform chose that exact moment to bump the ceiling with a dull
thunk. Ala winced.
“And occasionally architecture,” she added under her breath.
Her gaze slid back to him, to the calm line of his stance and the steady glow of his blade. Soresu. Centered. Effortless. Infuriating.
“But fine,” she said, lifting her chin,
“if we’re playing games, let’s make it a fair one.”
With a soft snap-hiss, one of her sabers disengaged. She clipped it to her belt, leaving a single blade in hand. The remaining weapon’s golden light washed across her features, softening the usual bounce in her posture into something a fraction more focused.
Just a fraction.
She shifted her stance, less coiled spring, and more grounded line. Feet apart. Center of gravity lower. No dramatic lean forward like she was about to sprint into a speeder chase.
It felt…wrong. And weird. And slow.
Good.
She took a breath. Let it out. Let the platforms drift on the edge of her awareness instead of trying to bully them into obedience. The Force around them wasn’t calm, not in this room, but there was a pattern to the chaos if she listened carefully enough. The rise and fall of the grav field, the subtle pull before a dip, the way each slab responded like a leaf in a current.
For once, she didn’t try to outpace it.
She tried to ride it.
Ala stepped forward. Just one step. No lunge. No leap. Testing the gravity’s mood. When nothing immediately tried to throw her into a wall, she let a second step follow, tracing a small circling arc instead of charging straight in.
Her blade moved first—a probing cut toward his guard, light, controlled, more question than challenge. Then another, from a slightly different angle. A faint shift of her wrist, an aborted feint that never fully committed.
“You want to see what my strengths can do against yours?” she asked, voice softer now, threaded with a spark of genuine curiosity beneath the bravado.
“Then you’re going to have to show me where your limits are, Mister Unbothered.”
She smiled, bright and irrepressible, entirely Ala.
Then she stepped in again, this time timing her advance with the next subtle stutter of the gravity field, letting the brief sense of lightness carry her into a tighter, faster series of strikes…
…still watching, still listening, determined- for once - not to let the walls do all the learning for her.
