There is no place more sacred to the Jedi

[Tanaski Yumi]

Mountain climbing a good pass time of his when traveling with the family into rather hard to deal with terrain, but more then that being an assassin and a rather light frame compared other men and Tana was quite the proficient wall scaling person. Following quickly behind the young man did not have a lot of trouble keeping pace with [member="Lilla Syrin"], reaching the top of the cliff face just few seconds behind the expedition leader. Well not really the leader but Tana did see her as the person keeping things organized and seeking out the next objective.

Reaching the flat snow field at the top giving a small whistle at the sight of the cave, tagging close behind [member="Varindar Asyt"], watching on with a curious gaze as she picked up a stick and began to focus on it's end. Soon a small flame erupted, shining light in the interior of the cave, not really something Tana had done during his first crystal hunt, having closed his eyes and let the force guide him, still it was good to see the woman had progressed in her training. "Been practicing I see, pryokenisis always comes in handy, so if you need some more light I can help with that", he replied, accompanying the hotel owner into the lightless cavern.

[member="Ultimatum"] - [member="Veera"]

 

[Lilla Syrin]

Lilla bowed politely to the other Padawans gathered at the cave mouth. There was a great bond between Jedi, but sometimes you had to do what was required and that necessitated going alone at times. And this was one of those times.

She threw back the hood of her cloak and stepped into the large cavern that began their journey. From here there were many paths, many tunnels. But which was the right one to choose?

Lilla did what her master always advised her to do. She closed her eyes and connected with the Force, trusting it to guide her.

It was a form of moving meditation. Initially there seemed millions of tiny pinpricks of light – individual crystals resonating with the Force. Her eyes told her as much, with so many green and blue gems around her, punctuated by other colours from time to time – yellow, amber, white – and so many different shades of blue and green.

But soon their power diminished to Lilla and she was drawn deep into the caverns by one particular Force signature. One that called to her and she felt as if it called to her alone.

[member="Tanaski Yumi"] [member="Varindar Asyt"] [member="Ultimatum"]

 

[Lilla Syrin]

After an hour of walking, she came to a small cavern and – ahead of her was a solitary crystal. In truth, it was surrounded, but to Lilla it was alone. She walked forwards and claimed it, tugging it gently from its fixing to the cave wall.

It was a beautiful shade of lilac and the moment she touched it, she knew she shared a special connection to it.

 

[Varindar Asyt]

The makeshift torch, made using her rudimentary knowledge of pyrokinesis acquired by psychometric means, allowed her to keep both warm and lighted while she was closing in on the new crystals. That said, she had to make every second with the torch still lighted up count, and hopefully have at least a little left for the way back. But she then found a blue crystal that seemed a little raw and that she feels need to be polished beforehand. Before she could even think of inserting it in a lightsaber. Now sensing that [member="Lilla Syrin"], [member="Tanaski Yumi"] and [member="Ultimatum"] have fanned out in different directions, Varindar then proceeds to fetch the royal blue crystal, whose color was reminiscent of the water in the fastest pool she swam in on Ceraluen. Now that I have a crystal in hand, time to return back from whence I came, she thought, while she stashed the crystal in a surcoat pocket, safely in hand, while the torch was steadily giving out. And making her way back to the mouth of the cave, but she feels she can't concentrate in there so she holds off trying to build the lightsaber until she is out of the cave.

 

[Lilla Syrin]

A skilled Jedi can complete a basic lightsaber in a few hours or even days, but creating one for the first time can take many months. The most essential component is the focusing crystal, preferably a naturally occurring one. Which is, of course, why the Padawans were here.

Lilla removed the saber hilt from her pocket. Or more accurately the components.

Since she’d acquired the hilt on the moon of Endor, she’d researched its origins and, according to the librarian, was most likely the training saber of Padawan Ob-Wan Kenobi. This was the very saber he’d learned with to begin his Jedi career.

Its design was almost identical to the one he’d created as a Master and was the template he’d committed to print to enable Grand Master Luke Skywalker to craft his own.

Lilla hadn’t replaced any of the parts, she’d merely cleaned the materials and re-charged the power cell. It lacked a crystal but she was here for that very reason.

She sat cross-legged on the floor, and placed the items in front of her as well as the crystal she’d been drawn to. Then she closed her eyes and meditated. It was a moving meditation and she moved the components via Telekinesis without any conscious effort. She placed a back-up energy cell in the
pommel and then began to assemble the lightsaber mechanisms in the hilt.

High levels of energy were generated by a high-output Diatium power cell that was unleashed through a series of focusing lenses and energizers that converted the energy into the plasma blade that everyone recognised as the Jedi’s weapon of choice.

The plasma was projected through a set of lightsaber crystals that lent the blade its properties and allowed for the adjustment of blade length and power output. A power insulator was also installed on the hilt to protect the wielder from any energy discharges.

Once focused by the crystals, the plasma was sent through a series of field energizers and modulation circuitry within the emitter matrix that further focused it, making it into a coherent beam of energy that was projected from the blade emitter.

The blade typically extended from the hilt before being arced by the blade containment field back to a negatively charged fissure ringing the emitter, where it was channelled back to the power cell by a superconductor, completing the circuit. This containment field also caused the blades to make contact with other lightsaber blades without passing through like other forms of energy.

The construction was relatively straightforward. What Lilla needed to do next was to meditate over the lilac crystal she had just harvested from the frigid cavern.

The crystal rotated slowly, then drifted into place within the lightsaber's energy chamber. Focusing all her attention on the components, she sealed the compartment, and then adjusted the locking mechanism. The lightsaber's assembly was complete.

With her lightsaber still floating before her, Lilla began reciting the Crystal Code.

“The crystal is the heart of the blade.
The heart is the crystal of the Jedi.
The Jedi is the crystal of the Force.
The Force is the blade of the heart.
All are intertwined.
The crystal, the blade, the Jedi.
We are one.”

Over and over she said the words until they were no more than a mumble and she was repeating the words in her head. She felt no cold. She felt no discomfort from the stone floor. In fact, she felt nothing. She was at one with the Force and felt no physical body or even spiritual mind. She was nothing more or less than Force energy.

[member="Varindar Asyt"]

 

[Ember Rekali]

Some distance from the other arrivals, a red shuttle touched down in the Ilum snow. Rather than drop a ramp, Ember exited by airlock. His boots sank into the drifts, almost to his knees. Wrapping his cloak a little tighter, he tramped toward the entrance. A decent kyber crystal would go a long way toward rectifying certain issues.

Perhaps the Jedi would feel the Dark Side approaching. Not with any special malice, to be sure, but...

 

[Lilla Syrin]

Which is when her eyes snapped open.

She was on a strange planet. One she had never visited. But she knew it was Corellia. There were lakes and underground caverns and she felt death. Loss. Betrayal. And the darkness.

Then she was back on Tatooine. In a cave. And she was crafting her saber. No, not her saber. Or was it?

Then she experienced a kaleidoscope of images – coming at ever increasing pace. None were hers, yet they all were. She saw death. Death and duty. But no happiness. She saw a grave and felt sadness – betrayal. And then she felt a glimpse of happiness that was overwhelmed with guilt.

Finally, she was on an ice planet. Like this one but not this one. And she stood, with her saber in her hand and knew fear like she’d never sensed it before. She walked through the caverns and, in a similar way to how she’d found the crystal, her feet took her along a path that she instinctively knew to be the right way.

Finally, she came to a small cavern and there was someone else there. They wore a Jedi’s cloak and had their back to her.

Lilla tried to call out but she had no voice.

The figure turned and Lilla saw it was a woman. Like her…but not her.

The woman looked kind. She had a warm smile but there was something in her eyes. Lilla sensed sadness. Guilt. Disappointment. “The Code is clear, but sometimes we cannot see what is written for us. A Jedi must not have wants; self-reliance must be shown. If there is one lesson I have learned that I wish I could pass on to you it would be this.”

“But of course, the lessons worth learning have to be learned by ourselves, not through a book, or the words of a Master – however wise they may be portrayed. Not that I am saying that the teachings of those that have gone before are to be ignored. But rather heard – and reflected upon when we have an experience to relate them to. To paraphrase Grand Master Yoda, ‘Pass on what you learn. Strength and mastery. But weakness, folly and failure too. In fact, failure most of all. The greatest teacher, failure is.’”

“Plan for success, then for failure. Learn from both. And do not avoid failure as if it is something terrible. You should never see life as a choice between winning and losing. Every situation can have many, many outcomes. When you concentrate solely on winning, you sully any victory. Winning becomes worse than failing.”

“Be who you are, not what you wish to become. Be satisfied with your lot and do not seek that which you know in your heart to be beyond you. People will tempt you. They will mean no harm but harm is what will befall you if you lose sight of what’s in your heart – what the Force tells you is right.”

“They say a Jedi sees the thing they fear most in these visions. My question is this. Am I what you fear most, or are you what I fear most? For I see in you the potential to be what I once wanted to be and I lost my way. My fear is that you do not learn from my mistakes, yet I know you have to make them all by youself. So remember this. People make mistakes, mistakes do not make people”

“It is not our ability or potential or strength with the Force that make us what we are, but our choices.”

All the while, Lilla wanted to speak but couldn't. Finally she felt as if her throat was released and she had a thousand and one questions for this woman.

Except she had gone. Lilla glanced around and realised she was all alone. A real Jedi or a vision? Did it even matter? Lilla committed the advice to memory. It was typical master-speak and she knew that, in time, it would all make sense - even if it were just a lot of random sentences to her right now.

And then Lilla looked down. In her right hand was a saber hilt. Her saber hilt. She wanted to activate it, to test it - but there was something in the woman's words that stopped her. The Code was clear - and this was therefore not the time or the place to see how her saber worked. There would be plenty of time later.

 

[Varindar Asyt]

On her way back to the cave's mouth, the hotelier had a psychometry-induced voice ring in her head about what she previously learned of pyrokinesis. If you know enough about chemistry you would realize that cryokinesis is, chemically speaking, the reverse of pyrokinesis, and hence taking thermal energy away from the object. However, I have no right to assume that you actually do know about chemistry, but regardless of whether or not you know about chemistry, remember: wielding a power you do not understand can invite disaster, the phantomatic voice told Varindar, while still being some distance away from [member="Lilla Syrin"]. Or that other dark signature making its approach towards the caves ([member="Ember Rekali"]). She thus made a mental note that she ought to learn a few things about chemistry as relevant to pyro/cryokinesis. Perhaps not to the level of one Jessica, whom she never met in person but heard about a lot since she even started Jedi training in the first place, but enough to get started understanding pyro/cryo. But where did the others go? she thought, while wondering where [member="Ultimatum"] and [member="Tanaski Yumi"] went in that network of caves that had howling winds blowing, at least close to the mouth.

 

[Tanaski Yumi]

Tana continued on as the he departed from [member="Varindar Asyt"] as he felt a pull from the force, deep in the cave an away from the others, the force probably wanting to test him alone, the question was what would his trial be? Tana's first crystal had his patients put to the test, only using the force to find the crystal, no eye sight just following slowly until it finally granted him accesses to him, but this time around it would probably be different. As the light dimmed Tana clenched his first, exciting the atoms in his hand, opening it again to show a flame.. but such slowly being snuffed out due to some unnatural force, "so, that's it, what are you trying to say cave? that I should embrace the dark side? no that is not a path I am going down".

Once more Tana tried to summon the flame, such lasting longer before being snuffed out by something not actually present, making the young Jin raise an eye brow, but he was not going to give up, but how to make a brighter light to abate the dark? "Something to make more light... or increase its focuses? Ah I know". Raising his other hand Tana started to produce ice crystals, conditioning to keep it's shape while he summoned another ball , placing the latter inside the first, the light being made much brighter then before, and this time around the darkness did not envelope. "Ha take that cave, not evil shall escape my light... does not some Jedi among the Alliance use some force lantern"? Maybe he should make a personal one.

In that moment a crystal a seemed to appear in front of him, glowing the light blue most Illum crystal did, the Jin quickly snatching it up, and just in time as some odd presence seemed to come over the area, darkness, but not sinister. Still that did not bode well, this place was a haven for the light side, even his own mother respected that to never come here, so regardless of their intent it did not bode well for the force nexus that surrounded this planet. "Gotta get out and regroup with the others", he thought while quickly making haste back to the cavern mouth, the signature of [member="Lilla Syrin"] and the other becoming more prevalent with each step.

Slowly he saw the figure of [member="Varindar Asyt"] once more, the woman seeming to have found her crystal as well, "heya speedo, you sense that presence out at the entrace? me no think that good".

 

[Ultimatum]

With the others moving into the caverns, Ultimatum decided that proceeding would be advisable. It would have been impolite to force the others to wait on his account. However long it took, Ultimatum promised Upari that they would find a crystal. He had to move quickly though so as not to fall behind the others.

The cavern was dark at first, but the lights of the other people brought brightness to the cave for a little. Upari suggested a different cave and Ultimatum was obliged to follow the direction. Once down the path, the droid began to lose his vision, darkness covering everything. There was no light for quite some time, Ultimatum using his senses to avoid colliding with anything. As they continued down the tunnel, Ultimatum began to wonder how far this went. The passageway continued for what felt far longer than Ultimatum would have preferred. It was only after a few minutes that he realized the pathway was unnaturally straight, the walls were rough, and there were crystals about, but the tunnel was going on too long in a single uninterrupted direction to be natural.

"This is not right. This would be a statistical anomaly."

"It may be an illusion. Don't lose heart. Continue."

And so Ultimatum continued. The droid began measuring the distance. At his rate, the distance covered in the last few minutes may have been about half a mile. He started to run. Still, nothing changed. The pitch black held and Ultimatum felt like he was getting nowhere. The duo guessed at the nature of the situation, a test of patience. Fortunately, both of them had patience in abundance. It was merely the question, would it pull another test into this?

"This seems to be going on for quite awhile."

"Indeed, this tunnel is quite long. The Force surrounds it; perhaps there are crystals here."

As if the thought had summoned it, the tunnel began to glow. The weak blue light started to strengthen, growing until it became blinding. Slowly it subsided so that the crystals became points of light in the darkness. Ultimatum thought it looked like the stars, with a black hole on either end of the universe. The droid did not cease his walking as he questioned, "How are we to know which is ours?"

"This complicates matters, but let's keep going. We shall find a way."

After a few minutes, which felt far longer, they came to a dead end. Ultimatum looked at the points of light dotting the walls, ceiling, and floors.

"None seem to stand out. Perhaps we missed it on the way here."

"Let's stay. I need more time to feel this."

The robot shrugged, and he responded, "Alright, we shall stay for now."

Turning, Ultimatum noticed that the entrance had disappeared. "Upari."

They were trapped in a room, rather than a connected cavern. There was no entrance or exit, only a star field of crystals floating in the void of darkness. "We appear to be trapped."

"Another test, one of the Force. Perhaps once we find our crystal, we shall be free to leave."

"I hope so."

Ultimatum fell silent, hearing only the quiet humming of his parts. It was serene, to say the least. There was calm here, the quiet and beauty. It reminded him of his time in space.

"Help me, focus your mind on the Force."

"Alright, but I do not believe that it will help. I am not the Force user here."

"We are one; perhaps both our minds are necessary for this."

The droid turned his thoughts to the Shard. He imagined the Force, breaking it down into a mathematical formula, as best he could in theory. He fabricated an assumption of a connection between himself and the crystal. This connection would be reliant on the Force and therefore could be identified if they were to search for what had a 'frequency' similar to their own. Stretching out into the Force, Ultimatum began to experience the Force. He felt the tendrils of something more significant than any physical force he had experienced before.

The duo gazed about in the Force. The room glowed in the light of the Force, continually in motion. There was a flowing motion that filled the room, moving from one crystal to the next. It's source, now more brilliant than those around it. In the very center of the room, embedded in the rock a crystal shone and its light filled the room. Ultimatum, moved by the Force, picked the crystal and it parted from the stone with ease. Turning his mind back to the conventional forces, Ultimatum noticed that the room seemed brighter than before. The crystals were stronger but appeared less mystical now.

"See. The Force was the key. Both of us had to use it."

"You were right. This is remarkable," Ultimatum held the crystal in his hand and gazed at it as he walked. He could not identify the type of crystal, but it was elegant nonetheless.

In mere moments they were back at the entrance of the cave, those vast distances they had covered were nonexistent, so it seemed. It appeared some of the others had already managed to finish.

[member="Lilla Syrin"] [member="Tanaski Yumi"] [member="Varindar Asyt"] [member="Ember Rekali"]