Private That Which We Serve

[Itzhal Volkihar]

| Location | MIV Ironsides, Hyperspace

The bond between Srina Talon and Aether Verd was perhaps no more evident than within the confines of the MIV Ironsides, built with techniques and materials from both nations; it was, by all means, a declaration of intent—this was her reward for service. An extension of the contract signed between the Sith Empress and the Mandalorian Empire, both a measure of favour and a tool that ensured those who served were equipped to handle the tasks that awaited them. It was no wonder that so many were quick to accuse the Empire of being a puppet of the Sith Order. They were wrong, of course, though admittedly only by a measure of distance. Mercenaries served; the Mandalorian Empire made no claims to the contrary.

They were the greatest mercenaries in the Galaxy; it was only natural that they would find contractors willing to pay the price. Whether that was in credits or other services and goods, such as the Iron-Eidolon Class Battlecruiser, was merely a matter of details.

Itzhal Volkihar strode through the open doorway, his steps muffled by the layer of Mandalorian Steel beneath his feet. The training room he'd chosen was on the smaller end, with few of the technological advancements that blessed the larger training fields. In truth, it was little more than a rack of weapons arrayed against one wall and a circle painted in the centre of the room, closing off what would serve as a battle circle in the future.

It was simple, elegant and exactly what he desired in the moment.

Tags: Adelle Bastiel​

 

[Adelle Bastiel]

MIV Ironsides, Hyperspace
Tags: Itzhal Volkihar

The MIV Ironsides gave her the creeps.

Initially when she boarded with everyone, she hadn’t noticed anything amiss. Adelle knew its history, knew where the ship had come from and who had made it, but it had seemed like a normal ship. And then something changed. She’d been checking on her Jai’Galaar Basilisk, making sure it was secure, when something hissed. But when Adelle looked around, there was no one nearby.

And her morbid curiosity that had served her so well among the Jedi and CorSec became her undoing.

The hiss led to a strand of Dark Side energy and the more Adelle followed, the more she found. Whispers followed her now. Phantom movement in the corner of her eye haunted her. And soon enough, everywhere, the scent of ozone and jasmine.

Srina Talon.

Her presence had been bad enough to bear in the hall of the Mand’alor’s fortress. It was everywhere now.

She had to check with someone to make sure she wasn’t imagining things. The first person she recognized as someone who might understand was Persephone Halcyon, running around the medbays like the queen of a hive. Adelle hadn’t even got her question out halfway before Halcyon finished it. The other Healer shuddered, confirmed what Adelle felt, and went back to work with an ominous “Ignore it if you can.”

Stillness was a cage right now and running was out of the question on a ship like this—too many Mandalorians using the gym to deal with the pre-fight stress. So when Itzhal had offered to spar, she accepted.

He stood in the middle of a painted circle on the decking, tall and broad-shouldered, a beskad in his hand. Adelle hadn’t met him often but he carried a quiet authority and a strong moral sense. It reminded her of Father’s better qualities.

“Hope I didn’t keep you waiting long,” Adelle said, walking over to the weapons rack and drawing her own beskad. She’d forged it under Warpriest Prime’s direction, the first thing she’d ever hammered out of metal. Prime had kept it from turning out poorly but it echoed with her own presence. A sword she could feel.

Adelle grabbed a guard to place on the live edge, turning the beskad into a blunted weapon. It would still hurt, still bruise, if it landed a hit, but it would not be lethal. After all, the whole point was to keep themselves sharp but alive, ready for the fight ahead.

And in Adelle’s case, distract her from the creepy as feth ship.

 

[Itzhal Volkihar]

| Location | MIV Ironsides, Hyperspace

Mandalorian Iron weighed heavily in the palm of Itzhal's hand, fingers wrapped firmly around the handle—adorned in tightly woven fabric moulded to the base of the grip. History danced across the thick muzzle of the riccasso, the silhouette of figures in beskar'gam with weapons raised towards the tip of his blade, while those who toiled along the sharpened edges of his crossguard formed the foundation of the blade's protection. With a tilt of his blade and the glimmer of light from the ceiling above, the patterns of familiar buy'ce's lurked amongst the tide of greyscale, and just as quickly vanished as he flicked his blade from left to right in the early stages of a faded memory.

Flowing through each manoeuvre with tightly controlled adjustments of the blade in hand, the Morellian moved carefully, working the memory slowly to the forefront of his mind, as he swayed around the presence of a phantom foe. A swipe of his blade, cutting from the left shoulder to the right hip, parted the air with a swoosh that coincided with the arrival of Adelle. His boot clattered against the floor, transferring momentum into a blow that would have cut from groin to neck, and into a sharp elbow that bought time for the decapitating strike.

Adelle strolled towards the weapons rack, an almost nervous energy crawling over her skin as she drew a beskad of her own, the handle moulded to her grip as she searched for a guard.

"Just enough for a short warm-up," He responded, flicking his blade to the side before it returned to its sheath.

With a soft sigh, he stretched out his arms, rolling his shoulders as he brought them back to his sides, then tilted his body to the left, keeping his arm pressed against the stretch of the leg, then releasing the tension, before he replicated the movement to the right.

"Had to make sure I hadn't forgotten everything," he drawled, attempting to banish the scrunched shape of his sparring partner's shoulders, and the slight twitch of their buy'ce that always seemed to end with their gaze plastered on the walls.

They seemed unsettled, unusual as that seemed from what he knew of Adelle, though he was well aware their acquaintance was a short one. Resilient as beskar, and yet flowing like the tide of a river. Quietly, he admired the way she'd continued even after the loss of her planet and people. Not everyone was quite so able to move on.

"But, take your time to get ready, we can figure out how we want to run this in the meantime."

Tags: Adelle Bastiel​

 

[Adelle Bastiel]

MIV Ironsides
Tags: Itzhal Volkihar

“Just enough for a short warm-up,” he’d said. He assured her to take her time, but she knew time was limited. A countdown continuously ran down in the back of her head, fighting for her attention with the ghosts that seemed tied to the ship.

Adelle arched her brows at him, a teasing look on her face, before she remembered she was wearing a helm. “Then you have me at twice the advantage.”

She pulled the buy’ce off, the seals hissing as she did. The recycled air felt better but the scent of jasmine and ozone in the Force was far stronger. The echoes of that gravity in the Dark Side pressed in again, and she found herself staring at nothing while she beat them back.

Adelle shook her head and placed her helmet aside before she began moving through the warm-up her clan had taught her, loose, wide swings meant to stretch muscle and feel the balance of the beskad. The weight of a physical blade was still something she was adjusting to: a lightsaber’s blade had no weight, but the hilt possessed a slight gyration. It meant split-second adjustments could be made whereas a beskad had to commit to the motion. Timing had to be precise. But the momentum was harder to stop and deflect than a lightsaber. Pros and cons.

Rolling her neck and shoulders, Adelle approached the edge of the circle. “How do you want to do this?”

 

[Itzhal Volkihar]

| Location | MIV Ironsides, Hyperspace

Striding around the border of the circle, Itzhal pivoted to a stop, transferring the weight of his covered blade to land against his shoulder with a dull thud that resonated through the beskar pauldron. His eyes narrowed behind the visor, keenly tracing over the flexed muscles of his sparring partner's shoulders and the vulnerable curve of their exposed neck, the clawed marks embedded in the fragile flesh of their cheek.

"Rule number one: put the buy'ce back on," He ordered, lifting his free hand to point towards the discarded helmet.

If he mumbled about both children and Jedi's strange desire to walk into combat with their hair flowing down their backs, well, it was fortunate that the seals on his helmet suppressed audible leaks. Idly, he glanced at his gauntlet and the control system for his vocalizer; currently deactivated with a flicker of eye movements that were practically second nature at this stage in his life.

"I'd recommend a point system; one for the limbs, three for the head and torso, five for gaps in the armour, assuming a clean exchange. In the case of two blows connecting, then the individual with the higher target gains a single point; no points are gained in an equal exchange. A disarm counts as three points, unless it's followed up with a five-point strike, which overrides the initial strike. Avoid using the crossguard to strike, and be careful of the neck; shock-gel should handle lesser blows." He tilted his head in thought, "How's your grappling?"

Tags: Adelle Bastiel​

 

[Adelle Bastiel]

MIV Ironsides
Tags: Itzhal Volkihar

“Rule number one: put the buy’ce back on.”

Adelle glanced back at the helm she’d set on a shelf then looked back at Itzhal with a sharp stare that said: Really?

“Yes, buir,” she deadpanned. He started listing off a points system. When he mentioned points for striking the head, she slammed her buy’ce back down. Was he actually serious? Adelle whirled around, eyes flashing, as he continued explaining the way the system would work. No, he was completely serious.

“My grappling is fine,” she bit out, “but as a Healer, I’m vetoing head strikes. We’re on our way to Yaga Minor right now and you want to risk concussions? Beskar can stop most blunt force trauma but that’s the thing—most of it. We are not going to be aiming for each other’s domes.”

Adelle muttered under her breath as she yanked the helmet on and approached the ring. "I keep the buy'ce on, since that bothers you so much, and we don't hit the head. Deal?"

 

[Itzhal Volkihar]

| Location | MIV Ironsides, Hyperspace

Without even a pause to acknowledge the mocking address, Itzhal continued to lay out the point system that had been a common stipulation in his own time, though with the concealment of his visor, he did concede to an amused roll of his eyes and a slight curve of his lips. How long since someone had been willing to joke like that? He shook his head faintly, dismissing the echo of familiar lines and the hiss of a re-sealed Buy'ce, moments before Adelle slammed her helmet back into place, finished with her unfortunately rational rant.

For a second, he stared at her, his reflection glinting in the sheen of her visor. No discussion about the merits of kinetic gel or the essential techniques of impact absorption would shake her unwavering stance; if he were fortunate, perhaps his efforts would be in vain, dismissed once again with an assertion of the same deal. It seemed far more likely, however, that he would ultimately lose her to the cold, clinical judgment of a medic identifying a patient dangerously set on a self-destructive path.

"Deal," he accepted, shifting his weight with a tilt of his shoulder that allowed the beskad to skim across the angled slant of his pauldron and fall to his side, muscles clenching to stall its swing.

Slowly, he stepped backwards, conceding more of the ring to his sparring partner as they approached, until he stopped around one quarter of the way across the diameter of the circle. "We'll keep grappling to a minimum then, five seconds or less for holds. I don't know the exact specifics of force-enhancement, but I'll leave how you wish to use it up to yourself; there's little point in handicapping yourself when you'll be using all those skills on the field."

Stretching out his free hand, fingers splayed outwards, the slight deformation his crushgaunts created was barely noticeable; it had to be, otherwise it wouldn't be worth the significant strength it provided, not when he needed the dexterity to whip out his pistols or swipe his sword in intricate flurries, then again as he glanced Adelle's way, there was an amusing simplicity to just battering things out of the way. Best not, though, he could already hear the potential complaints.

"For the moment, we'll treat the spar as if we're both using unsheathed beskad's," He intoned, settling back into the easy cadence of words repeated time after time. "If we have the energy left, we can consider whether we want to, then simulate the difference between fighting an opponent with a beskad versus a standard vibroblade, as seems likely for the Diarchy forces."

With a tilt of his helmet, a slight nod, Itzhal offered a simple, "I'm ready when you are."

Tags: Adelle Bastiel​

 

[Adelle Bastiel]

MIV Ironsides
Tags: Itzhal Volkihar

He didn’t argue the deal and accepted it. For a brief moment, Adelle thought he’d push back—like many of her clanmates. When the word “Deal” left his helmet, Adelle let her chest relax a bit. The ship had her on edge enough. She didn’t need to be worrying about potential serious injuries as they were literally headed for war. There’d be enough for her to do in the medbays soon enough.

Itzhal explained the grappling rules, five seconds max for holds. Reasonable. He left Force enhancement up to her judgement. She settled on ‘maybe’: while she was reasonably sure she’d have her full reserves back by the time they exited hyperspace, there was a risk she wouldn’t have recovered. Especially with the Ironsides being what it was.

Adelle stepped into the ring as he stepped back, making room for her. She still rolled her neck and shoulders, a restless energy inside the marrow of her bones, it felt like. His rote recitation told her he’d done this a thousand times. Likely, he’d beat her if she didn’t use the Force. Which was fine. Her goal wasn’t to win—it was to move.

Something Itzhal probably would have a lecture for.

He inclined his head and offered a simple invitation. Adelle took up a wide stance, placing her off-hand on the pommel of the beskad for better stability and maneuvering. Keeping the blade between her and Itzhal, she advanced slow, the Force around them settling into something she could follow.

She took a few experimental swings, testing his guard. His height and experience gave him the firm advantage here. Adelle was going to have to rely on speed and the Force, tainted as it was by the nature of the Ironsides.

Voices that weren’t there whispered next to her ear.

Kriff this ship.

 

[Itzhal Volkihar]

| Location | MIV Ironsides, Hyperspace

Itzhal extended his right arm with a deliberate flex of the muscles running down his limb, the stoppered edge of his blade resting just above the cold surface of the floor below, one hand on the hilt, set to control the next movement. He stepped forward, guided by the length of his sword, one foot in front of the other, angled towards the point of his outstretched main hand, his knees bent, ready to move.

Transparisteel gleamed in the light, a figure clad in metallic blue and silver, standing out against the bleak monotony of the dull beskar-lined walls. Her image grew more defined with every step that closed the distance between the two duelists. Itzhal stared back, an assortment of jet black plates embellished with a crimson frame, reflected in turn upon Adelle's visor. Subtle twitches of her shoulders and neck were replaced by a cautious demeanour, her hands occupied with the weight of a blade and the razor-sharp focus required in the moment.

Ethereal thoughts slipped away, the worries of the world beyond forgotten, the only thing that mattered—the clash of blades.

The distance between them closed. Itzhal's hand twitched—the barest of effort—carrying his blade from right to left, slapping aside the first blow with a clack from the training guards. He stepped forward, transitioning from a cutting guard to a quick, slicing cut across chest height that ended with another clash of blades, which gradually settled into a tempo of exchanges, with measured footwork from both parties as they attempted to reach their preferred distance.

"You've received training," Itzhal noted, inhaling through his nose as he retreated from their last foray with the uncomfortable memory of the last time he'd fought an individual with a preference for vibrodaggers; they'd been a nimble bastard, old scars twinged beneath the synthetic layers with remembered pain.

Bringing his left hand around to grasp the lower-hilt, Itzhal stepped forward with his left foot, twirling the blade with a flourish that brought it from below his hips to head height, intending to slap aside any rushed guard, milliseconds before he brought it back down with a twisting cut from right to left, shoulder to hip.

Tags: Adelle Bastiel​

 

[Adelle Bastiel]

MIV Ironsides
Tags: Itzhal Volkihar

The spar began and Adelle stepped into the flow of the Force. Itzhal proved himself to be every inch a competent sparring partner: intent behind every strike, controlled delivery, precise footwork. Adelle quickly abandoned trying to use the spar to drill beskad-fighting techniques into muscle memory and began to use a mix of Mandalorian and Jedi styles. Makashi for precision strikes and economy of movement, Soresu when she needed to defend, Djem So to counter. But control required all the training she’d received from her clan alor. A beskad had weight all along its length, unlike a lightsaber, and had momentum on its swings.

Itzhal commented on her experience before swinging in quick succession. Adelle executed a guard and deflecting the blade, feeling the next swing even as Itzhal’s wrist started turning for a different angle. She caught his blade and pushed it to her right, away from her center, and lunged forward with her sword quickly, hoping to take advantage of the split-second she had before he recovered.

“I have,” she said, taking controlled breaths. Her endurance in fighting with beskads was nothing compared to when she fought with lightsabers but she was getting better. “Alor Skirata’s a firm believer in weapon proficiencies. All of them.”

Movement in the corner of her eye tried to divide her attention. Adelle gave a subtle shake of her head, clearing the phantom motion from her mind.

 

[Itzhal Volkihar]

| Location | MIV Ironsides, Hyperspace

Mandalorian Iron tore through an arm's width of space in less than a single heartbeat, displacing the air with a swift swish—an avalanche of steel descended upon its target. It should have been unstoppable. In a way, it was. The blades connected with a sharp, rattling clash of wills, the unstoppable force against the shifting current. Adelle didn't so much stop it as reroute the momentum, bending beneath the weight, her guard shifted to an angle, bleeding off speed as Itzhal's beskad scraped down the length of her blade with a tortured wail.

The weight in his hilt shifted, pushed down the easier path.

Muscles committed to the motion strained in a desperate need to reverse their course, yet ultimately, the blade had already decided upon its motion as the tip skimmed over the floor. One hand slipped from the grip of the old, weathered hilt, dismissed for a far more important task, as Adelle turned defence into offence with the work of a moment.

Imprinted in the floor, leather treads pressed down, while his other foot twisted away from the blade that rapidly closed the distance. His own blade continued on an arc that had just begun to skim the tip of the beskar-plated floor, as he himself reached out, fingers brushing over the side of his fellow warrior's crossguard as he guided the blow, skittering against his chest-guard at an angle that tarnished the paint, but would have failed to tear through the plating beneath.

Then, he leaned back, neck chambered for a headbutt that never triggered, held at bay, before his blade returned with a blunt slash of the flat-edge that pushed Adelle's blade to the side as he disengaged again.

Running his fingers against the shape of the previous scrape, a faded line from left to right, he acknowledged the former-jedi's words with a tilt of his head, "A smart woman. Perhaps, we'll share notes sometime."

Did she notice the way her kin drifted towards the familiar, Jedi techniques adapted to the use of a weapon uniquely different from the flowing blaze of contained plasma that was popularly known as a lightsaber? He imagined so. Then it was only a question of whether she had taught the lesson yet.

"I believe that counts as three to nil in your favour," He conceded, before stepping forward once again, starting slowly but building a rhythm as he flowed into a succession of cuts, testing the range of motion, and how much power she could supply at angles that on a lightsaber would be a deadly flick, yet with a beskad would mean nothing without the force to amplify it.

Tags: Adelle Bastiel​

 

[Adelle Bastiel]

MIV Ironsides
Tags: Itzhal Volkihar

“She’d give you dinner and as much time as you’d like if you told her that exactly,” Adelle said, as Itzhal noted the point she’d literally made. His approach was deliberate but his strikes now came harder, building into a pattern and pace she had to match. Redirection was harder but Adelle knew she wouldn’t win in a blade lock, however brief it was.

Her greatest strength was patience, learning not the pattern of blows but Itzhal’s choices with strikes. Her greatest weakness was committing to her own attacks. The beskad demanded it, its weight demanded commitment to the strike. Committing gave it speed and made recovery more possible. However, Adelle had been trained with the understanding that the opponent’s weapon was always lethal: a lightsaber would always cut through most armor and all limbs.

She could see when an opening happened. But it took passing by two opportunities before she heard her alor screaming in her head to strike back.

Adelle blocked a strike aimed her shoulder before launching her own attacks, trying to balance power and speed with control. The first aimed at Itzhal’s shoulder and a second aimed at his side.

 

[Itzhal Volkihar]

| Location | MIV Ironsides, Hyperspace

Momentum flowed through Itzhal's blade, a constant threat chipping away at his opponent's guard, probing for weakness hidden amongst the patient bearing of her deflections. Adelle was quick and competent, but it was clear that for all her experience, the beskad was not her favoured weapon. His strikes forged the pace, a slow build that marched onwards—it could not be denied, only weathered. He would accept nothing else.

One exchange flowed into the next, a lesson in tell.

Mandalorian Iron scythed through the air, a sharp cut that had to be parried, left unpunished in the counter as Itzhal pivoted around his first strike and the momentary gap before the dance continued, "I'll keep it in mind, one never knows what they're missing."

His boots tapped their way across the ring in a spiral around his opponent, a test of their guard with each flurry that followed; fast, precise and most importantly, committed to the strike, as every movement carried the threat of a hit. A feint was not an exaggeration of his blows; instead, it was an adjustment, the twist of the hilt that turned a slice to the right shoulder into a slash across the arms, dangerous because to ignore would be to allow the first strike to commit, while the latter left only a blink of the eye to react.

The second time an opportunity passed, he noted it, a frown concealed beneath his visor.

Hesitation was death.

The third time, he made it so.

Another diagonal slash, replicating his original avalanche strike, provided the opportunity; he committed to his plan, not the strike itself, but to the chain of events that followed as blades clashed, a change in tempo as Adelle shifted from defence to offence. The first, he parried with a step back to bleed momentum, metal scraping down the length, before they detached and twisted into the second blow, a rapid lunge that might have caught him off-guard, if he hadn't prepared for the opportunity he'd exposed, a hand released from his hilt, reaching up to try and grasp the inside of her elbow as he bounced his blade off there beskad, hopefully, into position for a stab, the tip of the blade driven towards their raised armpit.

Tags: Adelle Bastiel​

 

[Adelle Bastiel]

MIV Ironsides
Tags: Itzhal Volkihar

Precognition flashed with her second strike, a phantom pressure of his hand on her elbow a moment before he reached out. Adelle let go of the beskad with her right hand as he grabbed the elbow and flung it up. When the blade of his beskad lunged in, Adelle flicked her wrist and brought her blade up to deflect the point away from her body.

Something cackled in her ear.

Adelle disengaged and stepped back, holding up a hand. “One sec.”

They were loud, these not-voices. Motion flickered in the corner of her eye and she snapped her head instinctively to look. But nothing was there. Adelle worked her jaw, breathing hard from the spar, and shook her head.

The scent of jasmine, petrichor, and ozone stirred faintly in her helmet.

Adelle started to pace but it wasn’t working. Moving meditation had been her go to to find calm, to center herself in the Force. It’s why she’d agreed to a spar in the first place, figuring that it’d help settle the restless energy she felt before a battle. But now it was backfiring. Centering herself deeper into the Force meant becoming more aware of what the ship was, and peeling back the veil of illusion that had been deliberately placed on it.

She felt worse than before.

“Sorry,” she said, swinging the beskad at empty air, mostly to just move. Whispers crawled past her ear and she shuddered. “I can’t concentrate right now. I concede the match.”