The Shape of a Will

[Caelag Vass]

Caelag Vass was not, to put it politely, a capable shaper. Not born on Kro Var, not immigrated, but rather inspired to find shapers and learn from them away from the homeworld of her chosen art, she had little instruction, little control. Her potential, as a Miraluka, was drastically greater than her ability as of yet, and it showed in everything she did. She was not a capable shaper, a warrior of the Force capable of standing in the way of those who stood against her nation. Yet, there were ways to even this disparity, to make the methods she employed greater, even as she herself lacked the power to shape her will as she desired of her own ability. These methods, they would be her crutch, and eventually her tool in the fight to protect all she held dear. To this end, she had reached out to one of the few she trusted, the few she might consider a friend. The Preator, with his duties, would not be suitable, and perhaps the one she had chosen too would have been poor in this regard. However, Princess [member="Aster Rose Baelor"] was hardly a difficult choice for her duty today.

For you see, neither girl was exceptionally learned in the Force, or at the least in Force Imbument of an item. So their duties, Caelag in finding the method and techniques to make the tool with which to shape her will, and the Princess in learning more of her power. So, it was today that they had arraigned to meet, to learn, and the reason the High Colonel, donned in her unusual casual wear similar to what one might expect from a school teacher in winter (which was to say, slacks, a buttoned shirt, and a very thick, heavy coat overtop) carryied the blade made for her by Iron Fury Industries to be imbued to the meeting. After all, if they determined the way to do this, she wished to waste no time in making her attempt to imbue the weapon. A cloth was wrapped around the blade, so it would not accidentally cut anyone, leaving the golden colored hilt visible as she cradled it in her arms.

The first to meet her was a Wolfsglaive member, and Caelag smiled a bit sheepishly. The last two times she'd been around these guards, they'd either been killed in action or had been attempting to arrest her. And she could almost swear this one looked like the man she'd instinctively taken down when she first met the princess. She could be mistaken of course.. in either case she cleared her throat, and spoke calmly and directly to the guard. "Hello.. shall I take it that the Princess is not far off?"

 

[Aster Rose Baelor]

The Wolfsglaive nodded silently staring daggers at the Miraluka, his pride was still recovering from their first encounter. "Follow me," he said making no attempts to hide his disdain for the woman in his tone. As far as he was concerned, he had no obligation to be polite until he was within earshot of the princess.

Displeased that he was tasked with the duty of escorting [member="Caelag Vass"] to the princess rather than the responsibility of her bodyguard, he walked in silence making no attempt at conversation and had no intention of respond to woman if she wished to initiate conversation. Silently and coldly, he led the way down the hallways, up the stairs and into the library where the princess was waiting.

Inside the library Aster and another of her Wolfsglaive, Felix Rourke were engrossed in thick volumes detailing the art of Force Imbuement. "Miss Ayla," Aster smiled cheekily expecting to see Caelag as the doors to the library opened.

 

[Caelag Vass]

It was expected that she would be treated such, Caelag had not at all came expecting anything less. Humans often had such behaviors towards her, especially when she outperformed then for even a moment. Some sort of superiority complex, she supposed, though she'd come to accept a few like the Princess and her adoptive parents existed. Even so, the silent walk had been her expected reception, and she was not at all unexpectedly tense through the walk to the library. Of course she was tense, though she was not at fear for her life she was prepared to be, confronted physically.

Fortunately her tense expectations weren't necessary, as the doors opened and the Princess responded in her usual cheeky fashion. It was just like the woman to call her by her cover name, she had yet to find an informal occasion the younger girl did not tease her. "And greetings to you, Princess. I do hope your visit to my classroom has been comfortable?" She chuckled lightly, slowly making her way over to Aster, and sitting down next to the girl. She placed the wrapped sword on an empty space on a table, safely out of the way, before continuing. "Thank you again for agreeing to help me. I'm afraid reading books isn't particularly my specialty."

[member="Aster Rose Baelor"]

 

[Aster Rose Baelor]

"It was until the pirates interrupted," Aster smiled. "And you're very welcome, it's nice to take a break from my duties once in a while," she said and closed the book in her hands.

"Unfortunately, only able to find basic information on Force Imbuement and was unable to find any information on the technique's process," the teenager spoke, her tone tinged with disappointment. "So I suppose we will have to rely on trial and error," she finished and paused for a moment as she attempted to think up a more effective solution to their problem. Even if it was something they could work out over time, achieving it through trial and error would waste too much time for her liking.

"Shall I send for one of the Iron Legion teachers so we can ask them about the technique and maybe even enlist their help in the process?" Aster asked as Rourke gestured for a librarian to come to their table and place the books he and the princess had removed from the collection back on the shelves.

[member="Caelag Vass"]​

 

[Caelag Vass]

"I was afraid that might be the case. All I know is it risks destroying the crystal or item if imbuement fails, and despite Illum's crystal stores I'd rather not go through a whole cave and armory.." She sighed and sat back, the warm coat hanging off her shoulders like a shawl as she thought. The definitely needed an idea what they were doing, or this would be difficult to do properly. "Much as I would have liked to figure this out on our own, I believe a proper teacher will be necessary. Still it's not, all that bad. Imbuement will be a valuable tool for both of us to know, I imagine."

She hummed a bit, before tilting her head to [member="Aster Rose Baelor"] a bit. "Aster, would you like to see the blade while we wait for a teacher? I'm told its as beautiful as it is dangerous, though I don't know for certain if this is the case. I trust your opinion however, perhaps you could try and describe it for me?"

 

[Aster Rose Baelor]

"Very true," Aster agreed. "It would be a waste of resources and be more trouble than it's worth."

"Sure, though I'm not very knowledgeable about weapons but Rourke should be able to describe it better than I," the teenager smiled then turned to the Wolfsglaive who had escorted [member="Caelag Vass"] to her.

"Send for a teacher of Force imbuement," she ordered and turned back to Caelag.

 

[Caelag Vass]

"Not to mention how hard getting a crystal can be.." Caelag joked to her young friend, remembering how difficult the white crystal housed in her lightsaber had been to find. Traumatic to say the least. Regardless, she was here now with her friend, and she could finally receive a description with both [member="Aster Rose Baelor"] and Rourke's help. So, keeping the tip covered with the thick cloth, she unwraped half the blade, revealing the meaningless runes she had inscribed for them to put in the blade, the only thing she knew she could possibly need to help focus any imbument into the weapon. The hilt, comprised of durasteel like the blade, was colored gold and sky blue, perhaps the hilt was even made with some gold knowing the imbument would strengthen it, who knew? Regardless, the design, the color, these things were unknown to her.

Just as the dull, grey blade had yet to know the power that would be put into it. "Here... please do your best to describe it for me. I can't.. understand color of course, but if you can think of something to compare it to that might convey the feeling the color gives, I might be able to understand. No one who told me of the weapon could describe it in a way I could understand, a way without color."

 

[Aster Rose Baelor]

Aster stared at the blade in silence wondering how she could describe its appearance to the miraluka. "The blade is a lovely design with a blue and gold hilt. The part you hold is blue and the guard is gold. There is also a design on the sword which you can probably feel if you touched it. The raised edges are gold and the rest of the design is blue and the rest of the sword is silver," she said and paused, wondering how to describe the colours to [member="Caelag Vass"].

"I don't know how to describe the colours by anything other than their names," she admitted. "But I can tell you what emotions people commonly associate with the colours I've mentioned. Gold... is a regal colour usually associated with wealth and nobility and blue... blue is a calming and cold colour," she said and paused again. "And silver is elegant and beautiful."

Unsure whether her descriptions were sufficient, Aster turned to Rourke as a Wolfsglaive returned with the teacher.

 

[Caelag Vass]

Caelag hummed quietly while [member="Aster Rose Baelor"] spoke, thinking on her words. They were... difficult to comprehend of course. Colors for the blind were difficult enough a concept, however the young girl did go over what she said, giving some sense of meaning to the words, more than most tried. It made her smile, even if she couldn't perfectly understand what it was that she tried to convey. "Thank you, Aster. It's nice to see the care given to trying to describe it for me." She turned her head as the teacher entered, and bowed her head politely as she moved the weapon into her lap, folding the cloth over.

"Thank you for taking the time to meet with us. Let us not waste time. There is much to do is there not?" She noted the small nod of the teacher as they approached to begin the instruction.


"The process of Force Imbument is a complicated, taxing process that can result in the destruction of the materials if preformed incorrectly. The concept is simple enough, the Force wielder forges the blade, staff, cane, whatever it may be of a material of high carbon content, such as durasteel. In the process, the Force is channeled into the material, reconstructing its form into a lattice that strengthens the material chosen. Are you understanding so far?"

 

[Aster Rose Baelor]

Aster greeted the teacher with a polite smile.

"Thank you for coming at a moment's notice," she said with a simple nod of her head then listened to the teacher as he began his lesson.

Aster nodded again at the teacher's explanation. While the explanation seemed simple enough, the act itself did not and in fact, seemed rather risky. The idea of the item being destroyed in the process sounded like such a pain.

Hopefully everything will go smoothly during the lesson.

Waiting for the teacher to continue the lesson, Aster removed a small DataPad from her purse and began to take notes.

[member="Caelag Vass"]​

 

[Caelag Vass]

Caelag, meanwhile, was sitting back to cross her arms and hang her head in thought, absorbing the information presented to her by the teacher. She knew her sword at least was prepared for her, as its purpose had always been clear. But as the teacher would continue she would begin to understand the reason this process was taxing, and complicated.

"An energy rich crystal is then placed into the weapon's hilt, and the lattice of both blade and crystal are married together. To do so, the weapon's smith enters a deep trance, meditating until they, the weapon, and the crystal are one. Once these two lattices are married, the smith must focus on the flow of the force, flowing it into the crystal, and then into the blade, continuously. Until finally the blade itself glows with a nimbus of energy, and the smith's intention for the weapon's purpose is fully clear in the weapon itself. The process can take some time, particularly for complicated imbuments, making the risk grow exponentially that they exhaust themselves and falter. This can also happen if the lattices are imperfect, shattering one or both items before the process can complete."

They would continue with other details of the process, but Caelag had heard enough to know the idea. Was she confident she could do this? Hardly. Was certain she would eventually get it right? Of course. But she couldn't waste too much time making this her own, and she was lacking in skill to maintain the lattices with ease. Perhaps it would be better to have someone else assist her... she glanced to the side at [member="Aster Rose Baelor"] instinctively, trying to feel her presence to garner an idea what she was thinking.

 

[Aster Rose Baelor]

Aster nodded as the instructor's words. The process of Force Imbuement seemed to be a quite difficult one and time consuming one. Although she had initially been interested in learning the art, hearing about its process had caused her interest to wane. Not fond of the idea of potentially wasting materials, she would've preferred to leave this art to the craftsmen with skills honed by experience.

Breathing a sigh, the blonde continued to jot down notes of the process on her DataPad. Even if she had little intention of making use of this technique in the near future, perhaps it might come in handy one day. One could never know.

"Instructor," Aster raised her hand when the teacher had finished speaking. "Will we be able to put your theory into practice today? For example, will you have us practice the technique with scrap materials?" she inquired.

[member="Caelag Vass"]​

 

[Caelag Vass]

The instructor almost seemed to sigh, and reached behind himself, pulling a few objects out and placing them on the table in front of them. "I assumed that you would ask this. Some time ago it used to be standard practice to create imbued blades, before the creation of the lightsaber, and so there had to be ways to learn besides simply doing. A less, talented, individual broke their weapon trying to make it. So I have the spare pieces of metal prepared. There are spare crystals as well, feel free to attempt to imbue them. However, I would suggest doing the bare minimum, lest you overtax yourself."

The instructor stood back while Caelag grabbed one scrap metal from this broken blade, and a crystal, from the small pile he had put out for them. Whatever [member="Aster Rose Baelor"] was doing, Caelag had a necessity to learn this. So, she placed the crystal against the metal, and breathed slowly, holding the two together tightly. Her knuckles slowly went a bit whiter, and her head lowered down towards the items in her hand as she delved deeper and deeper into the trance as she could. She was twitching slightly, her nose scuffing up, as she slowly drained of color in her cheeks. Longer, longer she sat like this, until the crystal in her hand shattered without notice. Pieces of the crystal cut into her hand, leaving a gentle trail of red down into her lap.

"Heh.. heheh.... al... almost." She breathed slowly.

 

[Aster Rose Baelor]

Like [member="Caelag Vass"], Aster also removed a crystal and a piece of metal from the pile to practice on.

"Ow," Aster muttered having cut her finger on a sharp edge. Rather than attempt to imbue the blade, she cleaned her finger and closed her eyes, channeling the Force into it until the wound was no more.

With her finger no longer bleeding, the teenager turned her attention to Caelag, curious as to the miraluka's progress.

"Caelag, you're bleeding!" she exclaimed when she noticed blood seep out of the woman's hand and onto her lap.

Unsure whether to interrupt or not, Aster paused. She did not want to distract the woman more than she already had if it was going well. Carefully examining the amount of blood that flowed out of her hand, she assumed that the wound was not one that needed to be seen to immediately and could wait until Caelag was finished.

An antiseptic wipe in hand and a pair of sterile tweezers set out in front of her, she waited for the miraluka to finish her attempt at Force Imbuement.

 

[Caelag Vass]

Caelag almost didn't react to [member="Aster Rose Baelor"] speaking to her, likely to some degree of concern, from either her, the instructor taking a seat, or her guard (after all how could they prove their worth over her if she got hurt?). Whatever the case was, she reached out slowly, with the bleeding hand, and took another crystal, once more placing the items together in her lap and taking a slow breath. If Aster was particularly paying attention, she'd notice how the Force swelled around the naturally sensitive girl, through her hand and her blood, onto the blade and crystal.

Another crystal shattered, this time actually getting the instructor to look over with visible concern. Again, the damage wasn't serious, only a few shards of the crystal dug into her hand to add to the trails, but her hand was starting to shake. Her breathing became hitched, and both only became exasperated as she slowly tried to reach for another crystal. Even without eyes, her focus solely on the task, and getting it right, was evident in her face, drained of color as it was.

The Instructor glanced at Aster, uncertain if Caelag (as she called the Miraluka) was approaching a limit. Three at the most, if she tried more than that he would step in. But he wasn't certain if the Princess knew Caelag's limit better than him.

 

[Aster Rose Baelor]

Concerned about [member="Caelag Vass"], Aster debated whether to intercede and have the woman's wound seen to before allowing her to continue with the exercise.

It doesn't look too bad yet... She bit her lip. But it could get worse.

Staring at the wound nervously, Aster frowned. As someone who aspired to join the medical field, could she in good conscience allow Caelag to continue and potentially worsen her wound? The answer was no.

"Caelag," Aster spoke with a firm tone. "Stop for now, you're bleeding," she ordered and reached for the woman's hand.

"Rourke, hand me the tweezers and the antiseptic wipe."

 

[Caelag Vass]

Caelag obviously did not wish to stop, not until the ability was hers and she may begin work on her sword, but at the word "order" she obeyed, her arm almost limp in her hand. She was, essentially, wordless as she let [member="Aster Rose Baelor"] for a while.

Finally she spoke, after what seemed ages. "If... if not me.. then who will make this.. what it must become?" She almost seemed heartbroken in her tone, like she was on the verge of tears. She did not want to feel she failed, at anything, and being told to stop now hurt her greatly.

 

[Aster Rose Baelor]

Aster quietly cleaned [member="Caelag Vass"]' wound, removing the shards of crystals that had embedded themselves into the woman's hand and closed her eyes. Breathing slowly, she channeled her force through her and into the Miraluka's wound, intent on closing it.

"If... if not me.. then who will make this.. what it must become?" Caelag's voice had caused Aster to open her eyes. The sadness in the woman's tone upset her.

"I'm sorry," Aster apologized and let go of Caelag's hand. "You were injured and I didn't want your injury to worse," she whispered feeling terrible that her actions had upset Caelag. "Your well being is more important than the construction of a weapon...I'm sorry, please continue."

 

[Caelag Vass]

Caelag was stubborn, foolishly devout in service to what she percieved the greatest good at times, unwavering in her conviction that she was set apart from the humans serving, seen as an outsider, treated with contempt for what she could not change. But, she was not always a complete fool, when given the chance to breathe, and think, she could understand her limitations far better than she ever seemed to. Thus, when [member="Aster Rose Baelor"] finally let go of her hand, it only took Caelag a glance at the tools before she sighed quietly.

"... no, forgive me. I.. I can't make it. It needs to be made, but I cannot.. my skill is natural but not honed enough. I cannot fail this, but if I continue I cannot succeed." She sighed and pulled her injured hand to her chest. The hand was partially healed, so her chest wasn't being soaked in red, but little blossoms of scarlet formed over her heart. "... Aster... do you.. do you have a suggestion?"

 

[Aster Rose Baelor]

"Maybe we can have the instructor imbue it for you," Aster suggested, thankful that Caelag had realized her limitations. Unskilled in Force techniques beyond Force Healing, she knew she would not be able to assist the miralukan in imbuing the weapon.

"Excuse me!" she called catching the teacher's attention. "High Colonel Vass is in need of your assistance."

"I see," he nodded and turned his attention to [member="Caelag Vass"]. "How can I be of assistance?" he inquired.

Having done all she felt she could do by calling the teacher over, Aster waited for Caelag to speak and ask for assistance.

I wish I could have been of more help.