Turn a Blind Eye (open)

[Valx Raizod]

Valx sat on the taxi going to a street near a diner he'd heard about from some other padawans at the temple. He'd had a lot of time to think about life--more importantly his life--and what he was going to do. He fully intended to stay with the Jedi Order, and hopefully become a Master. But he also was conflicted. Valx desired to have a family as well, but the Order would not let him. He felt the taxi come to a stop and the doors slid open.


"Thank you for riding with us," The pilot droid said, "come again, sir."


Valx walked out and into the bright sunlight, not that it mattered, for he couldn't see it anyway. He carefully navigated the sidewalk, taking care to not bump into people. Naturally, he felt watched, people staring at his blank expression, and dull, white eyes. He had to stop and ask for directions because he felt lost.


"Uh...sir can you tell me where the Moonlit Diner is," Valx asked a man sitting on a bench, "I am blind."



"It's just around the corner, to your left," The man replied.


"Thank you.''


Valx kept plodding forward, eventually coming into the diner, sitting down and waiting, staring blankly at whatever was in front of him. With everyone around him, he still felt alone...

 

[Fyor Nayus]

@[member="Valx Raizod"]​

Several days separated from his training. Naturally alone, and absorbed in his work, of the old statement's crew Fyor was the most lone wolf. Today wearing numerous gadgets, computer systems and an onboard computer. Although not blind, Fyor wore a visor so often that people might think he was blind, that or a mechanical man. Bustling at work on an opened up droid, he released a hydro spanner to the seat, and muttered something about shoddy workmanship, more critical of himself than any man alive. Somewhere under the metal, was long haired Lorrdian, with a droid in pieces around his feet, resting on the chair, a shell of a thing. The diner owner offered him a significant glance of aggravation every now and again for the noise, but he couldn't help it, Calc needed fixing up. Besides he'd paid for the booth, and for several hours.

When Calc needed maintenance then the droid got maintenance, after the battle on Coruscant and the sniper taking him to pieces, Fyor had tried to rebuild the bulk of the droid as best he could. Visor scanning over the structure of the silver and red frame, it was a makeshift case of the red droid, made to make even faster calculations than Fyor could, and thus he was absorbed in this, intent to see its completion. Moving his toolset aside, one spanner was missing, he did a quick sweep of the surrounding booths, methodically, looking from one to the next, a smaller spanner, something that could tweak Calc's internal processing clocks to double speed.

"Excuse me do you know the location of a sprite spanner, about three inches across and two deep? It has a red light on the underside, and three black notches on the handle." The voice was monotone, calm and reading off the specifications of the spanner as they came up the visor into his gaze. Considered by an engineer's mind, and a reliance on gadgets vision of the force, or grid as he called it. A few booths down the droid was beeping every now and again away to itself, quietly so but still a distraction to those enjoying a quiet or not so quiet meal.

 

[Valx Raizod]

@[member="Fyor Nayus"]

Valx smiled, "Friend, you need not describe things to me, I am blind as a Miraluka. I am not familiar with your spanner. But I do recognize your voice. Are a Padawan at the Jedi Temple, perchance?"

Valx sipped on a glass of water. He had been listening to the man work on his droid for as long as he'd been there. It was interesting to listen to the sound of the droids components and the "whirring" of machinery. Valx had never had the use for droids or to know how to work on one. He couldn't even fly a ship. Hopefully with enough training, he would be able to see completely through The Force.

"Would you care to sit and have a drink with me," Valx asked politely, "or are you too busy working on the droid of yours?"

 

[Fyor Nayus]

@[member="Valx Raizod"]​

"Fascinating," Fyor appraised the man and the situation, his attention shifted momentarily from his task, instead to the stranger. "Is your sight given by the grid... the force?" He corrected himself, far too many people had questioned what he meant by grid, for it likely to make sense to a stranger. There was little worry that he might be staring, or if he made people uncomfortable, because he was more of the mind that new data to collect on the grid, and on his surroundings here, was of paramount importance to his own designs.

"I am formally enrolled but my attentions have been elsewhere, confined to the medical wing for the most part on a private matter." The search for just how to remove all these crystals from his old crew's chest, that and to rid himself of the biological computer virus, which had infected him several months previous as he fought with it remotely.

"Indeed, I would welcome a chance to converse." It was a rare day the lone wolf intellect sat to socialize with anyone, hence why he had so few friends, and still as yet no Master. Droids and computers were his preferred company, they were more easily anticipated. He did enjoy bars though, usually watching the natural chaos they presented with interest, as well as games of chance.

"I will take a triple distilled fire wine, holding the sugar or additives, aged 15 years or less." Reading off the order as if it was second nature, he was known for a fine taste in wine, which to be honest, he drunk far too often. "Are you locating yourself at the temple also?" Sitting down, he watched the stranger's facial expressions very carefully, Lorridans were masters of reading the subtle nuances in the face and the meanings behind expressions, making him a dangerous poker player.

 

[Valx Raizod]

@[member="Fyor Nayus"]

Valx sat happily at the booth. The man seemed nice enough, though he seemed pretty gruff for a padawan. It had been a long time since he'd sat with someone and talked personally, aside from his master, Tallia. Quite clearly the man had misunderstood what he meant by drink, for Valx did not drink alcohol.

"So, if I may, how long have you been working on these machines? I personally do not care for droids. I view them as a minor nuisance, though some are useful. I have thought about a guide droid...but I think that would be a sign of weakness." Valx said cheerfully.

He stared blankly at what he presumed was the man. He did not mean to stare of course, but alas, he could not help it. He took a drink of his water and flagged down the waitress droid.

"May I have some smoked nerf?" Valx asked the droid politely, then turned back to the man, "That is one appropriate use for a droid." With that, he chuckled.

 

[Fyor Nayus]

@[member="Valx Raizod"]​

Stares he didn't mind, they were part of life, people learning people. Fyor rarely drunk anything but alcohol. That was an exaggeration of course, but only because it was not prudent to be drunk while assembling machinery, which he did daily. In his time off duty, outside of the temple he had a variety of habits any Master would likely give him a talking to about. Fortunately for his vices, and his temperament, he still as yet had no Master. Instead he had all consuming work ahead of him to save his friend's lives, and a major health issue in this virus, bounty hunters after him and his friend's heads, or rather chests, it was enough to indulge a minor vice now and again.

His brow furrowed in shock at the mention of not caring for droids, a very long appraisal of the most appropriate response followed. "You do not care for sentient life?" The tone sounded as if he was about to give a ten page lecture, on just what sentient life should be defined as if requested.

"I do not work on droids, I correct faults in life's programming, reassembling the parts into working order," he answered slightly more interested in the discourse now. A sip of the wine, he let his palette associate its taste with the fineries he was accustomed to in beverages of all flavors, letting the moment linger.

Taking out a credit chip, the Lorrdian ran it through his fingers like a lucky coin, flipping it over to the droid, tipping it as it came, it bleeped. All part of the procedure, the natural way things should be done to smooth relations over, even though it looked highly out of place in a diner to a droid, and more at home in a casino to a Twi-lek girl!

"Yes it is an appropriate use for a droid," Fyor agreed, "droids have many uses, as do people. If anything people, because of their inherent flaws are less useful than the droid you just addressed." Sipping his wine once more, he was measuring just how much he took from the glass almost mechanically so in each mouthful, the taste taken and let linger on the palette each time, a taste for life's data but never understanding the deeper meaning.

 

[Valx Raizod]

@[member="Fyor Nayus"]

Valx smiled brightly. An intelligent man to talk to for once. And though he did not agree with everything he said, it was still a delight. Droids were merely clever programming put together to perform tasks that nobody wants to do. He grabbed his fork and began eating the nerf.

"I do respect your philosophy on droids, and I think it is impressive that you care so much for a machine that you refer to it as sentient. But surely you must know deep down that it is indeed, still a machine," Valx explained.

He continued eating as he listened to the droid bleep and bloop, conducting it's scans and running maintenance on itself. Valx had not grown close to anyone aside from his family. But, everyone had their own hobbies and this man's was droids. Valx's was learning different languages.

"May I ask your name, sir," Valx asked politely.

 

[Fyor Nayus]

@[member="Valx Raizod"]​

"Is your body not made of its own machinery?" Switching on to the conversation more so, he turned his body square on with Valx, a more friendly raise of his defining eyebrows at the conversation's turn. "It all comes down to what you imply sentience to mean."

Despite being heavily engaged and eager for this kind of conversation. Fyor's body language was somewhat withdrawn, many things heavy on his mind, in his posture that was obvious because he spent so much of his mental energy on wrestling with these concepts, even while speaking to Valx. What Valx spoke of, directly related to the biological computer virus in his blood, and indeed the concept of having an implanted force crystal in his chest, against his will. None of this of course may be evident to a blind man.

"Fyor Nayus, and yours?" The Jedi offered, sipping his wine, to about half full now, enjoying the full bodied flavor immensely. "I am a recent addition to the temple, no Master of yet, my crew and I are there to heal, and I, I am there to learn of a way to reverse the damage done to them."

Something else, there was a very faint sense of something else... it was hard to put a finger on it, or where it came from, just a feeling in the air that an event of note was going to happen to the pair. What that was, was hard to say, or feel.

 

[Valx Raizod]

@[member="Fyor Nayus"]

Valx made a gestured bow, "Valx Raizod, at your service."

He smiled and shrugged off his cloak from his shoulders. He could tell by the man's actions and words that he loved his droids very much...almost as if he were a robot.

"Well sir, I wish you luck in finding a master. Mine is a woman by the name of Tallia Farn," Valx said, beaming.

One of his reasons for joining the Jedi Order was to hone his vision problems, mostly through the Force. While yes, his vision loss had been a stitch in his side since he was a lad, he viewed it as a life lesson. He was humbled by this, and instead of complaining about it, he was going to make a difference. That is the other reason for joining.

Valx sensed something was amiss with the man, "Sir, are you alright? You seem...sick."

 

[Fyor Nayus]

@[member="Valx Raizod"]​

"You are fortunate perchance. Do you find your Master's abilities able to cope with the complexities of teaching the grid, the force?" Fyor considered it no small matter to teach the web which wove everything together, "Moreover to convey that to another?" Maybe a twenty thousand word dissertation might scratch the surface he mused to himself, but one individual, the complex thoughts on the grid running through his mind struggled to see how.

The reason for his overly mechanical behavior was the biological computer virus, but Valx thus far had been the only one to pick up on the fact he was ill, Fyor also had no reason not to tell him, Valx didn't know the crew or his friends and he seemed a caring sort of individual. "I would ask it goes no further than this diner. I am infected with a virus I am unable to cure, that and this unwanted crystal in our chests," Fyor took a long gulp of his wine, letting the sense of it refresh his usually dry mouth. "I would have cut it free by now, if the virus itself didn't make doing so almost impossible. Anytime I touch it, it reacts as if I were an foreign invader in the tissue, causing a severe reaction." In honesty it was frustrating, but also fascinating, the crystals seemed to have a hold over each of the crew differently, with their different shards of personality contained with the crystal's matrix.

Somewhere above the diner, well out of sight, someone in pure white upon white clothing sat, with a long focused device, recording, sounds and movement below.

 

[Valx Raizod]

@[member="Fyor Nayus"]

Valx was taken aback, "May I...May I feel it?"

He was extremely curious as to what this crystal was. Surely this man was smart enough to find professional treatment, or maybe he wanted it left alone. Either way, it befuddled Valx. He counted himself lucky that his blindness was only a side effect of insurmountable pain for a 10 year old boy to take. At this point, the only time his eyes ever hurt were if someone touched them. Maybe, this virus granted him enhanced abilities, perhaps increased intelligence, an explanation as to why he was so handy with droids. Perhaps it was a parasite of sorts.

"Is it fatal," Valx asked, "what are the side effects?"

Valx ran his hand across his scarred eyes, a permanent scar. A reminder of what happened on that fateful day.

He thought again: If this man was a padawan at the Temple, why would he not just consult the Grandmaster. Surely the council would be able to find an explanation to all this.

"Maybe you should see the Council..." Valx suggested.

 

[Fyor Nayus]

@[member="Valx Raizod"]​

There wasn't a sense of physical embarrassment, it seemed a satisfactory method of study. He simply guided Valx's hand by the wrist to his chest, the outline of the palm sized crystal evident beneath the tunic's fabric Fyor wore. Valx may feel several things, physically or if he sensed in the force. The crystal would feel as though whole physically but in the force splintered. If Valx went further, he would see Fyor, the personality of this man imprinted on it, his experiences setting within its signature, and its aura. Deep inside each crack of this splinter, each and every cut in the force lay the underlying personality being rebuilt, and made whole again. Hidden to all, even Valx however, would be that Fyor, as with the others, was the one being used to rebuild it, a match for this pieces exact need to glue it whole once more.

Fatal? "It is too soon to tell, soon I will know" he took a longer drink of the wine, ordering another glass, and actually ordering one for Valx even if the man hadn't asked for it, it seemed prudent. "The side effects are an adverse reaction to the other crystal shards, they seem to cause a greater, disturbance to the host if arrayed together."

The Council? "A Master named Syn brought our crew within the temple fold, he was advised when I met him. Yet what good would going before the council do at this stage? All I have are the medical records, experimentations and failed treatments, the Jedi's healers know them thoroughly as it is."

The recording of their conversation continued, this unknown figure in white standing on a ledge above their diner, holding a very long scope, with cat-like grace it seemed. Fyor stroked his beard, "Your concern is appreciated however, but...." a small flicker occurred across his visor, some sort of interference from a random, unseen, yet strong signal which caused Fyor to pause, till it eventually corrected itself, "but, I am not sure what other course is open to us at this stage. Suggestions would be most appreciated." The second glass of wine was raised, brought to his lips, and then settled down.