Private You Wear Cotton, Cotton Breathes

[Niysha]

Kazutal
Wild Space​

---

The area around Mayapan was among the least pristine examples of pre-Gulag societal collapse that Niysha had ever seen. That was quite an accomplishment, and a kind of impressive all its own. It had taken a half-hour of circling on a speeder bike to even find a structure robust enough to be intact and larger than a hut. Eventually, though, she had found something promising. Stone walls with easily marked rainwater paths, steps that were at most 40% moss or dirt by volume, and a few genuine spires inside. Even if they were only a half-dozen stories tall, that was legitimate architecture. This was what she'd been looking for from the moment she'd seen that tablet in Mayapan proper.

The Miraluka's datapad beeped a couple of times when she'd made her way up to the top of the stairs that remained. Niysha had had suspicions, and set it to run geometric scans a bit deeper. Her instincts, as frequently happened, were spot-on. There was what looked to be intense structural damage to the center of the stone courtyard inside the walls, creating a very, very deep pit at the base of the modest spire above. It would likely be pitch black to a sighted species, Niysha could make out several floors worth of destruction heading down into what was at least three basements at the edge of her casual range. Very, very promising.

After a minute or two of pulling her backpack off, futzing with the supplies she'd packed, and finding an anchor point, she was ready to rappel down. She had enough catridges of liquid cable to be able to slowly work her way down, and it wouldn't naturally degrade for more than a week. Unless something tragic happened in the dungeons below, she'd have an easy way out of this pit when she was done.

Her boots hit the wet, very soft moss carpet on the second-floor basement stone, and after a moment to tie her line tight and secure, she dropped to her knees and breathed deep, centering herself. Leaving her body wasn't difficult when she was this alone, when the world was this quiet. Her senses expanded, but without intent or definition. She wasn't looking for details, just detail. Singular.

After a moment, a minute, or a might bit longer, she found it. Deep, deep underground, a single signature. Thrumming with the kind of ancient power that only an old, forgotten artifact could have. That would be her prize... whenever she got there.

Valery Noble

 

[Valery Noble]

​

Outfit: Jungle Valery
Weapons: Blasters | Lightsabers

The wind stirred at the upper edge of the ruins — soft, humid, laced with the scent of moss and crumbled stone. Valery stood on the edge of a shattered terrace, fiery eyes sweeping across the jungle-wrapped structure as birds scattered from the nearby canopy. She didn't speak. Didn't need to. The Force was speaking plenty.

Her gloved hand rested on her hip, near the curve of her belt, where a saber hilt gleamed faintly in the light bleeding through the trees. Sweat shimmered faintly along her collarbone, her vest clinging slightly to her from the heat and the climb. But she hadn't come this far just to admire the architecture.

She could feel it now — the same pulse she'd been tracking for days. Faint, ancient, and dangerous in the way old things were when left alone for too long. And it was below. A less experienced Jedi might have searched for a path down or used a grappling hook. But Valery had a better idea.

She jumped.

Her boots struck the moss-choked stone with a quiet thud, the impact absorbed with ease, her knees bent, balance perfect. She stood smoothly, flipping her long ponytail over her shoulder as she rose and ran a hand back through the wind-blown strands. The corridor ahead smelled like secrets and old power — a place forgotten by most, remembered by too few.

She paused only for a breath, and then she felt it. That same presence. The relic. Beating faintly like a heart too long stilled. Valery moved forward with purpose, unaware that someone else was already down here.

Niysha ​

 

[Niysha]

Two floors down, Niysha had once again stopped to tie her line as securely as possible. She was making good progress. At this rate, provided she didn't hit any particularly resilient walls, she'd be at the artifact by nightfall, and she could likely leave with her catch by midday tomorrow. An exceptionally fast dig. In and out in less than a week! Still, she needed to pace herself. Rushing too fast was how she'd broken her leg that time back at-

Something exceptionally bright flashed at the edge of Niysha's vision. She froze only for a moment before her instincts kicked in and sent her quickly and quietly scrambling behind the nearest, most convenient rock. Anything that bright was strong enough to notice her, too, so she swallowed her presence as best she could. Niysha had considerable practice using fear as a blanket. The trick was overcoming her lizard brain enough to remember to do that in a blind pan-

Don't panic.

She steadied her breathing and became nothing. The rock beneath her. The water in the air. The darkness dancing with light, trailing down into the infinite abyss. For now, she wasn't.

The aura that dropped in front of her was, objectively speaking, blinding. Niysha hadn't been close enough to most Jedi to deeply examine their presence, but she knew the telltale signs. Bright enough to hurt, hot enough to burn. She'd never looked at a star, but this was likely somewhat similar. As close as she was, she could only compare it to the Sith Lords she'd worked with. Less... vibration. Less chaos. Not none, just less. Fiery streaks of very familiar passions blazed through in a whirlwind that almost drowned out the calmer, more subtle hues at the core.

More than anything, Niysha was surprised by how different from a Sith this woman wasn't. Light where she'd normally see darkness, yes, but the searing passion, the blinding strength, and the roiling power... if she'd been looking at the Jedi side-by-side with Darth Ignus they'd look like perfect, identical negatives of each other. There was probably something philosophical to say there.

She noted that she had two options here. One of them was unrealistic; attempting to shadow this woman all the way down would be borderline impssible, considering she was climbing with rocks, lines, and grapnels. Even if she could keep her presence muted, she couldn't keep her footsteps muted. The other was dangerous, but inevitable. So...

After taking a deep breath in a vain attempt to calm down, the Miraluka let it out loudly enough to anounce her presence, then stood where she was, slightly behind a rock. Just in case, she flicked the safety off of her lightsaber, but left her hand nowhere near it. No reason to seem a threat. "Good afternoon. I didn't think I'd have company down here."

Valery Noble

 

[Valery Noble]

​

Outfit: Jungle Valery
Weapons: Blasters | Lightsabers

Valery stopped mid-step, the subtle shift in the Force brushing across her senses. Someone was nearby — not close enough to be a threat, not concealed well enough to be lost. Just there. Faint and folded into the shadows like they were trying not to exist at all. But the Force knew better. And so did she.

Her head turned slightly, eyes narrowing — not in suspicion, but in focus. Then came the voice, calm and cautious, echoing gently from behind a rock formation. Not a stranger to danger, but clearly not trying to start any either.

Valery blinked, then allowed a smile to curve at her lips.

"I could say the same," she said, her voice smooth and warm as she turned fully toward the speaker. She took a few careful steps forward, hands nowhere near her weapons, her posture relaxed despite the tension humming beneath it. Whoever this woman was, she didn't want a fight — and Valery didn't plan to give her one.

The woman's presence in the Force was a strange thing — not Light, not quite Dark. Guarded and measured. Valery stopped a few paces away, tilting her head slightly as her smile brightened.

"Well… if you're not looking to duel for it," she said with a grin, "It's a lot more fun to explore together. Especially when the place is this weird." She ran a gloved hand through her tousled hair again, brushing it back over her shoulder. The humidity had already claimed any chance at looking proper, so she didn't bother pretending.

"I'm Valery," she added, offering the name like an open hand — no rank, no title. Just her.

Then, with a subtle glance toward the corridor ahead and the ancient pulse still tugging at them both, she lifted a brow. "You coming?"

Niysha ​

 

[Niysha]

The tension was clear at every possible level. Whatever wild and untamed there was in the Jedi, it sharpened into a perfect, crystal-cut outline of her body for a flash of a second. Naturally, it then continued roaring. Very familiar, just brighter. A different kind of painful to look at. Somehow Niysha managed not to flinch, and it seemed like she'd taken leave of her good senses, because she also hadn't turned and sprinted at top speed directly away from this woman immediately.

Looking for a duel? "Nope!" Niysha replied immediately and without any room for misunderstanding. The familiar fear of disappointed teachers and tempestuous Lords reared its head.

No running. No fighting. Instead, she calmed herself down with another breath and walked forward, careful not to get within lightsaber distance. Not that that would matter if Valery decided she needed to die. "Niysha," she responded by way of introduction. No rank, no title. She had neither. "I was going to be taking my time, but I can pick up the pace if you're willing to entertain company."

Potentially dangerous. Potentially very dangerous. Possibly the stupidest decision she'd made recently. But, for the time being, this exceptionally terrifying woman didn't wish her any harm, and Niysha was as confident that she'd know if that aggression changed several whole seconds before she died as she was that she couldn't run if she wanted to.

So, student mode. Piss off no one. Irrelevance was impossible, so aim for unobtrusiveness. She fell into step behind Valery.

 

[Valery Noble]

​

Outfit: Jungle Valery
Weapons: Blasters | Lightsabers

Valery felt Niysha fall into step just behind her, quiet and cautious, but not retreating. She didn't look back immediately. Just walked a few more paces into the corridor, the flickering reflections of mossy stone walls casting patterns across her vest and gloves. The air was heavy here — thick with moisture, age, and something deeper beneath it all. The artifact and its presence, she imagined.

Then she paused, just briefly, and turned her head over her shoulder with a faint, sideways smile.

"You don't have to rush," she said gently, her voice like a cool breeze against the heat in the ruins. "I'm not here to beat you to anything."

She offered another soft look, not judgmental — just reassuring.

"And you don't need to worry," she added, her tone lower now, warm in the dim light. "I'm not here to cause trouble. I'm not the kind of Jedi who swings first and questions later." A small shrug followed. "Unless someone really deserves it."

Valery turned again, her fingers brushing lightly along the carved grooves of the nearest wall — ancient designs half-lost to time and moss. She was studying, but not just the stones. The energy she felt, lurking deep inside.

"I just want to know what this artifact is. What it does. What kind of history we're walking into." She glanced back at Niysha once more, brows slightly raised with a hint of curiosity behind her amber eyes.

"Think we'll like what we find?"

Niysha ​

 

[Niysha]

The walls were intensely old. Older than the structure above by probably a few hundred years. That likely meant that the surface settlement had been destroyed at some point, then rebuilt on top of this underground segment. Effectively, it meant the top few floors would be an interesting marriage of multiple different eras, perhaps entirely different cultural groups, while the lower floors would be more uniform. Both, of course, would be fascinating, if Niysha could just stop trembling.

Which, to be fair, she was working on. She'd already managed to steady her breathing and bring her heart rate down from "imminent cardiac arrest" to something closer to a trapped deer. Progress!

Valery continued to talk to her. Filling the silence was helping in its own way. Niysha was at least passingly familiar with the concept that Jedi didn't attack on sight unless someone was actively violating their principles. Her instructors would've said they were "too weak to strike first," but Ignus, time, and experience had long since broken her of that line of thinking, if she'd ever had it in the first place. From what Niysha could tell, it was more like they - internally, mentally - set hard lines and only attacked when those lines were crossed. Not unlike a territorial predator, as opposed to the Sith method, which was far more pack hunter-esque.

"Finding it won't be a problem," the Miraluka replied, barely even shuddering in abject and immediate life-threatening terror any more. "It's not going anywhere. The trick with these things is normally either getting to it, or retrieving it." She took a moment to look a bit further down the path, but didn't dare risk allowing her senses to leave her body now. Not while in the kill zone of a barely contained hurricane. "Judging from the juxtaposition of stonework and ornamentation, this floor was re-settled by a second group. Since the artifact is so deep, the first civilization was likely its creator, which means there won't be as many defensive measures this far up."

Valery Noble

 

[Valery Noble]

​

Outfit: Jungle Valery
Weapons: Blasters | Lightsabers

Valery listened as she walked, the steady cadence of her boots soft against the ancient stone. Her path led a few paces ahead now, the natural sway of her hips matched the confident ease in her stride — not purposeful, just lived-in. She didn't hurry, didn't pressure. This wasn't a mission; it was a dance with history, and for once, she was enjoying the rhythm.

Niysha's voice carried behind her, more composed now — less on edge, more analytical. Valery smiled to herself at the shift. That guarded tension was giving way to something a little more natural, a little more curious.

"The fun part is always getting to it," Valery said lightly over her shoulder. "Anyone can find a shiny trinket. But weaving through ancient deathtraps, navigating long-forgotten puzzles, and figuring out which wall won't collapse when you breathe on it wrong?" She threw a smirk back at the Miraluka. "That's the part that makes it worth the climb."

The corridor narrowed slightly, leading into a small chamber where the ceiling had partially caved, shafts of dim light spilling through from above. She paused briefly, brushing some crumbling leaves from a ledge with the back of her glove, then glanced over at Niysha again.

"You've done this before, haven't you?" she asked, a curious glint in her amber eyes. "You talk like someone who knows her ruins. Not just some thrill-seeker chasing ghost stories."

She leaned a shoulder casually against the wall, arms crossing as she studied the other woman with genuine interest now — a question behind her gaze, but no judgment.

"Archaeologist? Scholar? Or just very determined to find dangerous things in dangerous places?"

Niysha ​

 

[Niysha]

New room, new things to dig into and dissect. Niysha wasn't far behind Valery this time. She was, of course, still more than a little cautious. The moment she dropped her guard would be the most dangerous moment of her life, and she'd been in an actual warship once! The best way to stay safe was to recognize and accept the danger of her situation and the difficulty of escape, then channel that into something productive, like keeping her head on a swivel and maintaining a safe defensive distance.

Still, it wasn't a great idea to ignore or upset Valery. She was carrying enough hardware to kill her four or five times in as many seconds. Also, it was rude to let any conversation stay one-sided. Niysha offered a very nervous, slightly forced smile as she passed the Jedi. "Oh, I like ghost stories, too," she replied. "But you're not wrong. I've always loved old things. It was something of a hobby when I was younger." It was something of the only thing she'd really had to distinguish herself from dozens of other equally-worthless, equally-disposable hopefuls stuffed into a dark room with a sadist. The most noteworthy accomplishment of her life: surviving past the age of twelve.

This room was... interesting. She took a long moment to stare at it, keeping a weather eye on Valery who was, at the moment, outside of her immediate death bubble. The architecture was the same as the previous corridor and the broken floors in the initial pit, but there were indications that it had been in use just a few hundred years ago. Less than a thousand, at the latest. The people who used it then weren't nearly as sturdy in their masonry as the original builders, and so their reinforcements were the first to cave.

Her voice was a little giddy, even if her demeanor was still sheepish. "It's not uncommon to see this sort of marriage, one people living in the reclaimed ruins of another. This one, though..." She swept the room with her Sight, naturally without turning her head. Dark for humans, irrelevant for her. The carvings on the walls offered further details. "...I don't see any signs of shamanism or holy men here. A secular organization? It could've been a response to the failure of their forebears. The mystics of their past being unable to stand the test of time probably didn't inspire much confidence in any form of sorcery going forward."

Valery Noble

 

[Valery Noble]

​

Outfit: Jungle Valery
Weapons: Blasters | Lightsabers

Valery's smirk deepened as she watched Niysha begin to unravel the architecture with ease, her earlier tension now almost completely buried under the thrill of the dig. That quiet giddiness in her voice didn't go unnoticed either — and honestly, Valery liked seeing it. The shift from apprehensive companion to quietly excited scholar was the kind of turn she always found satisfying. Especially when the ruins around them practically begged to be read like a puzzle box.

"See?" she said with a chuckle, stepping further into the half-collapsed chamber and tossing a chunk of loose stone from one hand to the other. "You talk like someone who's been waist-deep in rubble more than once. I'm starting to think I'm the tagalong here." She gave Niysha a teasing glance and then tossed the stone aside with a soft clink against the wall.

"And here I was, ready to explain how temple-dwellers used to carve seating ledges to meditate in direct sunlight, not just because it was sacred, but because sitting in the same spot for five hours was less miserable when your butt wasn't freezing." She gave the ledge she was leaning on a small tap with her knuckles. "These guys clearly weren't thinking about long-term comfort."

As Niysha described the potential secular nature of the newer settlement, Valery tilted her head thoughtfully. "Hmm… maybe. Or maybe they still believed in something — just not the kind that needed robes and chants." She walked a slow circle around the room, eyes tracing the stone, her gloved hand trailing along one wall as if feeling for something hidden beneath the moss and time. Then she stopped and shot Niysha a playful side-eye.

"Either way, Professor," she said, voice playful and a little warm, "Care to lead the way?"

Niysha ​

 

[Niysha]

It was nice to temple-dive with someone who actually had informed opinions about anthropology. Like, maybe not academic, but at least literate. That wasn't just a rare privilege, it was borderline unique. "It's not impossible," Niysha responded, one hand on her chin and the other on the opposite elbow. A classic thinkin' pose. "That could explain the secondary layer of decorations going this deep. We'd need more evidence to form any kind of real hypothesis, which means we'll need to go-"

Yes, that. Further down.

The young lady with the complicated disposition gave a slightly more casual smirk of dismissal at any kind of name or title. "I knew a few professors. Not great people, in general. I'll stick with just 'Niysha,' thanks." She was vaguely aware that, in other cultures, teachers were looked up to as gentle figures of wisdom who offered guidance to children. For her, most of that guidance came in the form asphyxiation or electrotherapy, and the gentle part was largely that she got to walk away from it.

She did lead the way, though. There was an opening with what could've been stares. It was, of course, incredibly dark, but that sort of thing didn't register well to Niysha. She could focus and suss out light levels, but it was normally a little too much work to be practical. She took the old steps with the kind of courage that could only come from comfort. It was nice to be back in a smelly old dungeon, looking for shiny Force baubles.

Valery Noble

 

[Valery Noble]

​

Outfit: Jungle Valery
Weapons: Blasters | Lightsabers

Valery watched Niysha slip into the stairwell. She followed without hesitation, her boots hitting the stone steps with practiced ease, the soft hum of the Force guiding her footing as the light above them slowly gave way to deeper shadow.

"Alright, Niysha it is," Valery said with a gentle tease in her tone, echoing the name without the title this time. There was a pause then — a few more careful steps — before Valery spoke again. Her voice was calm, casual, but threaded with something a bit more serious beneath the surface.

"Mind if I ask something?" she said, keeping her gaze mostly forward, watching the shifting cracks of light through the half-buried corridor. "If we run into something down here — and let's be honest, there's always something — are you able to defend yourself?" It wasn't a challenge. There was no edge in her voice, no doubt in her tone. Just the steady concern of someone who'd seen far too many scavengers, academics, and self-styled explorers get in over their heads when curiosity outpaced caution.

Valery glanced to the side just long enough to meet Niysha's face — or as much of it as she could see.

"Not trying to be overbearing," she added with a faint smile. "I'd just like to know in case something happens."

Niysha ​

 

[Niysha]

An expected line of dialogue, from someone who actually cared enough to ask. Normally those people didn't follow Niysha into ruins. First time for everything, it seemed. "I find it's normally a matter of 'when' we encounter danger, not 'if," she replied in a neutral tone. Her voice, as always, never rose above a soft rumble. "Normally it's a machine or a captive, immortal beast."

Her demeanor shifted, defensive again. A twinge of fear reminded her of where she was, who was with her, and what that meant. Still no ability to escape... unless Valery got caught? Unlikely given the blinding fire of her aura, but not impossible. If that sort of situation were to happen, what help would Niysha even be? Anything that could overwhelm that would flatten her in a heartbeat. Normally, she'd just avoid it.

"I'll admit I'm not fighter," she offered. "Not 'not a great fighter.' I'm awful. But I've been doing this for a few years now and I haven't died yet, so I'm doing something right." She turned down the stairs on a second landing, going even deeper. They were probably... five floors deep now? How deep would this go? "When faced with something too dangerous, my first resort is generally to run and hide. You know, play to my strengths."

The room they entered was absolutely pitch black, save for a few lines of softly glowing... stone? Glass? Crystal? Some kind of floor lamps, extremely dim. Not enough to see by, but enough to identify where the walls were. To Niysha, the whole room was an empty, untouched tomb full of frescos that had a style very different from those above. "I think we're entering the layer where we'll be seeing more of the original creators' work. The murals over here are... actually pretty striking."

She'd only seen stonework that intricate in the middle temples of Korriban. The ones that hadn't been sacked by looters before the academy had been built.

Valery Noble

 

[Valery Noble]

​

Outfit: Jungle Valery
Weapons: Blasters | Lightsabers

"Well, then I guess I'll handle the trouble," she said gently, her voice laced with confidence. "You focus on the history, and I'll handle anything with claws, teeth, or… ancient vengeance spirits." A beat. "Or traps. Definitely traps."

As they stepped into the next chamber, Valery paused near the threshold. The faint glow from the crystalline inlays across the floor and wall gave the place an otherworldly air — like they had slipped into memory rather than ruin. She tilted her head slightly, amber eyes scanning the space.

"It's dark, but not empty," she murmured. "My eyes can track a bit beyond standard spectrum, so I'm not completely blind in here." A soft smirk tugged at her lips. "Perks of being a Keshian."

She stepped further in, letting her hand brush one of the glowing wall lines — not to touch it directly, but to feel the subtle hum of energy in the air. The murals caught her attention next. Different from above. Her eyes lingered on one that stretched across a long, curved section of wall — figures half-carved, half-raised, standing in lines beneath what looked like a tree made of light.

She glanced over her shoulder at the Miraluka, curiosity glinting behind her calm exterior. "What do you see in it?"

Niysha ​

 

[Niysha]

Hmm. What did she see in it?

Niysha focused for a few moments, in that same thinking pose as the floor above. She didn't really turn her head towards the wall as she walked, instead taking in the whole room at once. Her focus drifted from carving to carving, from inlay to embellishment. Those could've been... waves? Possibly a tidal apocalypse, or some kind of mystical catastrophe. The figures in most of the pictures humanoid, but the ones to the side were blockier. Possibly... broad shoulders, pointed head, and some kind of eye in the center. Likely constructs.

On her way to pass up the wall she'd started on and down the opposite one, Niysha made sure to skip over a bump in the center of the path. Then, on her way back, gave a proper rundown. "The civilization seems to have been formed after some kind of calamity. We're not close enough to a coastline for it to be a tidal event, so it was likely some kind of hurricane or mystical crisis." She stopped and tapped on one of what had to be eight depictions of massive, central trees. "They formed around this... tree thing. Considering it's a jungle planet, it might've been an actual tree. It might've been for safety, or to channel its power."

As she passed back to the first wall again, Niysha once again skipped over a bump in the center of the path with an almost childish hop. She was, at the very least, more relaxed than before. "These figures down here seem to be their protectors. Probably sentinel or custodial droids. We're likely to find them further down. They're larger than the people, and the squarish shoulders mark them as physically strong."

Finished with her rundown, the frizzy Miraluka stopped and rested her hands on her hips with a much bigger smile than before. "Also, speaking of traps, this floor has at least twelve. I think two of them have been triggered already, but I wouldn't want to test that theory."

Valery Noble

 

[Valery Noble]

Outfit: Jungle Valery
Weapons: Blasters | Lightsabers

Valery listened with growing interest, arms loosely crossed as she leaned a shoulder against the wall just beside the mural. She didn't interrupt — just let Niysha work through her analysis, her eyes tracking each gesture, each tap of finger to stone. The story unfolding through the carvings was fascinating, and so was the way Niysha told it — steady now, confident, even playful as she skipped over a suspicious spot in the path not once, but twice.

When she got to the part about traps?

Valery straightened.

Amber eyes lit up.

"Traps?" she echoed, clearly far more delighted by the notion than she probably should have been. Her smirk returned, but this one carried something sharper behind it — a gleam of excitement that had little to do with ancient trees or murals.

She took a step toward one of the undisturbed trigger points, crouched slightly to examine it. "Twelve, you said?" she murmured, clearly considering. Then she looked back up at Niysha, a little too enthusiastically for someone who'd just been told the floor might be booby-trapped.

"I mean… we could trigger one." Her tone was playful, but serious underneath. "Not in a 'let's blow the ceiling' kind of way — just a little poke. Controlled. See what they were defending this hard."

Niysha ​

 

[Niysha]

Another tangible spike of fear crested in Niysha's turbulent, difficult spirit.

Well... at least for a moment, this wasn't the worst idea. She had someone (theoretically) durable and competent with her. It might be her best opportunity to test ancient engineering with minimal risk of her own personal safety. Anyone that eager to jump headfirst into a rancor's maw had to have experience and a plan for how to deal with it, right? After a moment of being visibly concerned, her vision swimming in a quick circle around her like a panicked radar, her curiosity caught up with her self-preservation.

Deep breath. "Alright," she replied hesitantly. "I hope it's not a pit, though. I'm not good at pits." She could outrun boulders and guardians, she could dodge flame vents and lasers, and she had been taught techniques to deal with poison gas. Pits were much harder to deal with. Gravity was an invincible enemy, and by their nature they were designed expressly to lack places that would prevent you from falling to your death.

Don't panic. Be brave. Exhale. Her sight penetrated another level deep, and came up wanting. Nothing but stone. Whatever it was, it was hidden deep enough that she'd need to concentrate very hard to see it. "I can't tell what the mechanisms are from here," Niysha eventually explained. "I'd say 'be careful,' but if you had any intention of that, we wouldn't be intentionally triggering a trap."

There were braver mice.

Valery Noble

 

[Valery Noble]

Outfit: Jungle Valery
Weapons: Blasters | Lightsabers

Valery grinned, one brow lifting as Niysha warned her — gently, nervously, but with just enough resolve to let her do it anyway, "Careful?" she echoed, turning her head just enough to give the Miraluka a look full of dry amusement. "I'm careful, just... adventurous." Yep, that was it.

Her hand hovered just above the trigger stone now, fingers flexing once like a pianist before the first note. A heartbeat passed. Then she pressed down.

The floor rumbled.

Not violently — But there was a low click, followed by the grinding of ancient gears far beneath them, like the temple itself had woken up from a long nap. Valery straightened immediately, feet spreading slightly, her stance instinctive. Defensive. From the far wall — one that had appeared solid moments ago — a large panel recessed with a hiss of displaced air and began to slide open sideways. Dust and cobwebs peeled back like skin over muscle as an alcove revealed itself.

Inside stood a construct.

It was humanoid, easily over two meters tall, built of smoothed stone and inlaid with faintly glowing blue lines that pulsed in time with the lights across the floor. Its "face" was a smooth, featureless plate save for a single vertical slit, which slowly brightened as it powered up. A low thrummm filled the chamber — not a roar of warning, but the electric hum of something very old remembering how to live.

Valery took a step forward, expression shifting from amusement to open fascination.

"Well," she murmured to Niysha without taking her eyes off the sentinel, "At least it's not a pit."

Niysha ​

 

[Niysha]

It was impossible for Niysha to go eyes-wide about anything. She also couldn't stare, and her gaze couldn't linger, but damn if she wasn't trying to do at least a couple of those right now. "Not a pit," she replied in the same moment as she tried very hard to hide behind the corner of a wall nearby. It might've been the loudest her voice had gotten since they'd met.

From her position around a corner and safe, Niysha didn't have much to worry about as this single, large, mechanical beastie began to whir back to life after countless centuries of entombed stasis. She would be fine, as long as the other wall behind her didn't also begin to rumble, grind, and click. That would be a severe run of bad luck, indeed, to have her single safe area with an easy hiding spot compromised by an unexpected, latecoming addition to the party. Even then, she'd be fine as long as the escape routes weren't cut off by old ferrocrete doors slamming shut behind them to seal any intruders in with an overwhelming squad of ancient deathbots.

Unfortunately, Niysha was not known for her good luck.

When the door directly behind her slammed shut seconds after the wall on the other end of the room slid down to reveal... not reinforcements. That would imply the fight had already started. Just a second ancient sentinel droid. When that happened, she was already half out of her skin and exuding fear like a first-year apprentice.

For the moment, she didn't touch her lightsaber. Nothing had seen her yet, so it was safer to just run to a corner as quickly as possible and pretend she didn't exist. Avoid the machines entirely. Valery seemed confident. Hopefully the corners of the room didn't also open up to reveal a third wave.

Valery Noble

 

[Valery Noble]

Outfit: Jungle Valery
Weapons: Blasters | Lightsabers

Valery didn't flinch when the second wall slammed shut behind Niysha. She didn't so much as blink. But her posture shifted — subtle, fluid. From fascinated observer to something sharper. Ready. Her fingers twitched.

Snap-hiss.

Twin blades of violet ignited in her hands, casting the already glowing chamber into stark relief. Their hum was smooth, controlled — the sound of someone who wasn't surprised. "Guess we're not the only ones curious today," she said, her voice low, calm, and edged with a smirk.

The construct stepped forward, heavy feet sending faint tremors across the floor. Its arm lifted, rotating open at the elbow to reveal a long, barbed blade of solid alloy — not a vibro-weapon, but something more primitive.

Valery didn't wait for it to strike.

She moved like lightning. In a blur of motion, she advanced, blades cutting wide arcs through the air. The first slash carved a shallow line across the statue's chest — sparks flared, but the stone held. The second strike was lower, and as it brought its arm around to block, Valery twisted, ducked low, and slammed a boot into its knee joint. The stone cracked beneath her impact.

It stumbled.

"Not bad for a museum piece," she muttered, stepping into another flourish — her blades crossing in an elegant, scissor-like strike that severed its arm at the joint. The construct staggered back, sparks sputtering from the ruined limb. Valery turned slightly toward where Niysha was tucked away, her stance balanced and easy despite the tension humming in her muscles.

Hopefully, Niysha managed to stay out of trouble.

Niysha ​