Private To Be a Mando

[Adelle Bastiel]

Training Yards, Sundari
Tags: Torva Vikar | Mia Monroe

Sundari’s training yards were full, Mandalorians of every clan, belief, and age sparring, testing weapons and each other. Readying themselves. The Great Heathen Army was mobilizing. The Diarchy had crossed the final line and something had to be done. Adelle had spent too many shifts in the emergency ward pronouncing time of deaths for Mandalorians and Domarians, young and old, soldier and civilian, these past few months. She would follow Aether into battle.

Her boots fell near-silently under all the din of the yards as she walked into the open area proper. She wasn’t here for herself today—Aether had asked for her help in training a foundling in the ways of the Force. Adelle looked over the young warriors standing at the edges, either waiting for their turn or waiting for instruction, and tried to pick out the girl the Mand’alor had described: human, nineteen, red hair, blue eyes, pale skin, slightly taller than Adelle herself, plain armor. The Healer huffed. Very descriptive, very specific—the information could fit any number of redheads. However, there was one detail that would help: Clan Verd’s sigil.

A flash of red hair over unpainted armor caught her attention and Adelle approached. The horned skull of Clan Verd caught the sun’s light and glinted.

This was Torva then.

“Torva Vikar,” Adelle called. She watched the girl carefully, and with every sense available. Torva’s presence in the Force was still unrefined, although she could feel the beginnings of control. “I’m Iron Wolf Adelle Bastiel. I’ll be one of your instructors for today.”

She paused before nodding her head at a small sparring ring closer to the edges of the yard. She’d only heard rumors and fairytale-like stories told to young children in her clan about Torva’s other assigned instructor, but a legacy like that didn’t come from nothing. “Come on. Warmaster Monroe will be along shortly.”

 

[Torva Vikar]

Sundari, Training Yards


Nervous blue eyes scanned the scene and the people around and with her, listening to a myriad of noises that cascaded over her senses. Voices of people talking, shouts and sharp cries from the training yards, and the hustle and bustle of a place that was active and gearing up for war.

Torva had heard the whispers, the talks. Some other faction known as the Dyarchy had crossed a line, and now the Mandalorians were rising to the call of battle. Torva, would not be among the many who went to the frontlines. She was still too new, too inexperienced with, well, everything - to be of any real help.

Aether had decided it would be better for her to go to Sundari to truly begin her training in earnest, to prepare her for the conflicts that would come. He was the one who was supposed to be educating her, and he had been, when he could. But he was the Mand’alor, he had other duties to attend to besides holding her hand through every little thing these days. He was leading the charge against their foe, and so he would leave her in the capable hands of others he trusted with her care and training.

She had been assigned into a group embedded within the Great Heathen Army, a collection of warriors - new and old - known as the Iron Wolves. She had been told that she would be meeting two of them this day, to help further guide her on her path.

And thus, there she stood in her plain armor outside the training yards, the Clan Verd sigil marking her as one of Aether’s. She was scanning the people coming and going, unsure of just who she was looking for.

A figure, a woman, approaching her caught Torva’s attention. A heartbeat later, she heard the woman’s voice call her name, and Torva turned more directly to the woman - her blue eyes sharp with both curiosity and uncertainty.

“That is me.” Torva confirmed, feeling her pulse elevate a little further from rising nerves and growing excitement.

“I’m Iron Wolf Adelle Bastiel. I’ll be one of your instructors for today.” the woman, Adelle, said to her before gesturing with her head towards a farther sparring ring that was closer to the edge of the yard. “Come on. Warmaster Monroe will be along shortly.”

Torva stepped away from the sidelines and alongside Iron Wolf Adelle, her nervous energy clear enough - even without Force perception. Her movements were somewhat stiff, her presence alert. Her apprehension made her quiet, as if she had suddenly lost her ability to speak.

As if realizing this on her own, she summoned the courage to glance at Adelle as they walked.

“Apologies for being so quiet. I don’t get out much. This is a bit…overwhelming.”

Adelle Bastiel / Mia Monroe ​

 

[Adelle Bastiel]

Training Yards, Sundari
Tags: Torva Vikar | Mia Monroe

Their interaction had hardly begun and already, Torva was apologizing for something. Existing, apparently. Adelle frowned to herself and glanced over at the young woman, noting how stiff and jittery even just walking seemed to be. Nerves. That would be problematic if Adelle was going to teach her how to use the Force. Control required focus, focus demanded calm. She rolled her shoulders, black and blue armor gleaming dully with the motion, as her buy’ce swung at her hip, clipped to her belt.

Had she ever been so nervous as a teenager? A futile question but Adelle wondered all the same.

“Then it’s a good thing we have a ring to ourselves on the edge,” Adelle said. “You won’t have noise on all sides.”

They reached the training ring, a short empty space buffering the ring from the edge of the training grounds surrounding wall. Adelle had set a bag of items she thought might be useful at the ring’s edge. Weapon racks lined the wall but they would leave those alone for now. She needed to see where Torva was at first.

“Before we begin,” she said, walking over to the ring. “I want to clear something up. Aether’s talked with you about the Manda, I think he calls it, and the power it gives you, right? I was not raised among Mandalorians. I know it by a different name. The Force. And I will probably slip and call it that in training you. But the Force or Manda, I mean the same thing—the power you and I can both wield.”

Adelle reached behind her back and pulled the durite lightsaber hilt from its place on the back of her belt. She strode to the far side of the ring and stopped, then faced Torva.

“I’d like to see what you can do.” She held out her hilt, balanced in the palm of her hand. “There is a crystal in this that feels like me, my presence. I want you to first tell me if you can feel it. Then, I want you to call this to your hand... Don't push the button though.”

Her blue and brown eyes met Torva’s blue ones. “When you’re ready.”