Foolish to Think

[Verie Lacroix]

Verie followed him to the lift and waited in silence as the lift took them up, and then followed him down the hall. "Is Mahet here?" Verie demanded, turning to the Prince with a bright smile. She had a soft spot for that wily Noghri. "When Sahti said... well. I feared the worst." She didn't anticipate the Noghri would want to spend any time with her, but it warmed the cockles of her heart that he was alive and well.

The young woman's eyes followed [member="Dissero"]'s gestures, and she instantly decided on the last door on the right. Not only was it close to Dissero's room -- just in case! -- but it was furthest away from Mahet's quarters, because distance was important. "How about that one?" she asked, pointing at the door in question.

When everything was settled, she set her attache case down on the edge of the bed and folded her hands together in front of her. "Speaking of which -- what do I need? I have clothes, of course, clothes for anything that might come up. But I don't have any other kind of tools or equipment. What do I need to get started?"

 

[Dissero]

"Mahet is..." a faint glance around was a telltale sign that, for once in his life, Dissero had no idea where the Noghri was. This was strange, given the Tracking Amulet the Assassin wore, he should be able to sense at the very least a vague direction. Must be that they had yet again grown quite far apart in this galaxy.

There was also the fact that Dissero had not been himself over the last several months. Likely the two were chasing different tail ends of one another now.

He shrugged finally, "I am sure he will return. He never stays away for long."

"What you'll need to start are just simple exercise clothes. We'll get you fitted for proper training robes on Annaj later - first, we're starting with meditation."

[member="Verie Lacroix"]

 

[Verie Lacroix]

"Exercise clothes," said Verie. "I can do that." She lifted her suitcase onto the bed and unzipped it, glancing sidelong at [member="Dissero"] before she opened it. Thankfully, her underthings were in a separate compartment. Now that would be awkward. She drew a pair of black leggings and a grey tank top. She considered her options for a few moments, then held the tank top up to Dissero. "Is it going to be cold? Should I wear a sweater?"

She paused and then shook her head. "I'll just... I'll just bring the sweater."

A few minutes later she emerged into the hall in her exercise clothes, replete with a pair of lightweight athletic shoes and the sweater tied loosely around her waist. She flexed her fingers and approached Dissero. "I think I'm ready," she told him, giving an uncertain smile.

 

[Dissero]

"So do I," Dissero smiled.


He lead her back to the lift and down to the bottom floor - the very same they had entered on from the hangar bay. This time instead of going left to return to the ships, they went right, and walked down a wide hall past several more statues of the castle's late owner and benefactor. The Khaleesh warrior's likeness was just as striking now as it had been the first time he'd laid eyes upon them.

Another doorway on the left took them into what had once been a massive warehouse and storage facility, now refurbished into several different types of training chambers. They entered the first - a meditation chamber.

"Have a seat," Dissero motioned to the raised dais at the center of the room. A sweep of his hands then activated several panels within the tiles of the floor. From them raised grey plinths upon which sat strange stone tablets, each baring different carved markings. On the whole, there were twelve of them surrounding the center, each sitting at clockwork points.

A second motion of his hand dimmed the lights of the chamber and sealed the doors. The effect was both calming yet invigorating, as though the energy of the room was somehow amplified. The truth was not far from this.

"Meditation," he began as he slowly strode from one plinth to the next, adjusting the tablets with great care as he went, "is a crucial method of honing ones mental capability both internally," the man lifted a hand to tap at his temple, "and externally. It strengthens your ability to separate emotion from instinct, to employ logic and sound decisions; something that you'll find the Sith are hardly capable of. It is one of their greatest weaknesses and part of why I no longer follow their code or tenets."

[member="Verie Lacroix"]

 

[Verie Lacroix]

The young woman stepped through the threshold and let her eyes adjust, taking in the room. This place had an air of drama about it, and not just this room but the entire fortress. It suited [member="Dissero"] well, Verie thought. She obeyed his instruction and mounted the dais in the center of the room, effortless in her movements. Once she had leaped easily onto the platform, she dropped into a cross-legged seated position on the floor of the platform and watched as Dissero rounded the room, adjusting whatever was sitting on each of the platforms that had risen out of the ground.

Not a follower of the Sith -- this was intriguing. What she had learned over the last few days seemed to fit all the archetypes of what Verie knew as a Sith. Opportunism, brutality, a lust for power -- oh yes, maybe he was in for knowledge, but she felt in this instance knowledge was only a loose proxy for power. This was encouraging, at least Verie thought so.

"Separate emotion from instinct," Verie echoed, her eyes narrowing as she considered what he was telling her. It seemed, on the surface, a very basic idea. And yet -- "It seems to me that instinct has served an important evolutionary function. Is it wrong to let it run its course?"

 

[Dissero]

"Instinct is what will keep you alive if you can get your emotions out of the way," Dissero replied as he stepped around the pillar to move forward towards Verie. He stopped before the dais and locked steely blues upon her own gaze, "emotion is a very powerful fuel to harness, but you have to learn when to use it and when to ignore it. Emotions are distractions and can lead you astray, can confuse your mind from what is true and real, what is the greatest priority."

Watching her, unsmiling, a solemn expression took his face, "The Force amplifies instinct, if you can learn how to listen to it. This is something that the Jedi have Mastered, despite their own Code being otherwise flawed. You've felt it before, you've experienced the sensation in your mind. The intangible skill of learning to harness it is as difficult as grasping at fog, but I know you are capable of it."

[member="Verie Lacroix"]

 

[Verie Lacroix]

Verie watched him, her dark eyes thoughtful without being judgmental, until his eyes found hers. She listened to his explanation, considering each point. It was certainly a lot to take in. It was like listening to a lecture in a foreign language in which one had taken a survey course. She understood just enough about what he was saying to know that she was miles away from fluency. She tried to follow along, frowning thoughtfully.

"This is so... foreign," she admitted, giving [member="Dissero"] a searching look. She had never felt like she couldn't grasp a concept, and the sensation was highly frustrating. "I can't even really reach into the Force with any measurable consistency. It's been touch and go -- a fleeting sensation in the back of my mind that I can occasionally tap into, but on my own volition?" She closed her eyes and shook her head, mildly frustrated at having to admit her own failings. "Baby steps, I suppose," said the ballerina, straightening her back and shifting uncomfortably on the dais.

 

[Dissero]

"Meditation," Dissero corrected.

All manner of skills could be learned, honed, perfected through meditation. Using the Force being one of key components to everything, meditation was literally the first step.

"You channel your use of the Force through emotion and that is very much how Sith work. But," he broke eye contact with her and moved to step back through the plinths, "you also channel it when you dance. There's a state of mind that you reach when you practice - clarity, unadultered oneness with your own body and your surroundings. It's part of the reason you are so good at what you do. That state of mind is what I want you to seek in here. You will start, first, by closing your eyes and exhaling your thoughts, emotions, doubts ... everything, and inhaling only what you begin to feel surrounding you."

The man's voice lowered, his movements were silent.

"Each one of these stone tablets has an energy signature. They represent 12 facets of existence. As you meditate, each facet will make itself known, some faster than others. A few may take you days, months, perhaps even years to discover. It's not about the end goal of learning them all, but the journey of getting there that is important."

 

[Verie Lacroix]

Meditation -- that shouldn't have surprised her. She associated the word with relaxation and coping with stress for over-indulged office types and monks. And Jedi - or so she understood from her limited understanding of their order. She usually focused her mind by practicing her routines. The endorphins caused by strenuous exercise gave her energy and clarity. The rote nature of some of her routine allowed her to move on autopilot and focus all her mental effort on a problem that required her attention. It was, in retrospect, exactly as [member="Dissero"] described.

But... meditation? She was skeptical. "I'll give it a try," said the onetime ballerina, trying not to sound as dubious as she felt. What he described, she had attempted many times on her voyages, but with varying degrees of success.

She flexed her toes anxiously and then straightened her back, rolling her neck and shoulders back and forth a few times before she settled. Verie closed her eyes and took a breath. The air tasted strange here -- unfamiliar, not necessarily unpleasant. Exhaling her thoughts and doubts was another foxhunt altogether. The amount of unpleasant information she had received in the last few days was still weighing heavily on her, and she didn't know how to let it go. "How do I do this?" she asked, cursing her ignorance. She took another breath through her nose, the oxygen hissing impatiently in.

 

[Dissero]

Strangely enough, Dissero found he had to hold back from scolding Verie which came as something of a surprise to himself. He'd expected that, eventually, he'd have to push himself to push her harder in order to make her stronger. That he'd be too easy on her because of his own feelings.

"I'll give it a try."

You will try until you do.

That had been the way of his upbringing. That had been the way of his training. There had been very little in the way of mercy, but that was how the Sith operated.

I am not a Sith.

The man's lips drew thin, jaw setting, brow furrowing, the feeling of muscles tensing beginning to take over while Verie sat there and tried.

"How do I do this?"

Dissero released his own tense breath as he lifted a hand to rub at his jaw. Seemed today would be a lesson for them both. Patience and persistence for her, creativity for him. What could he do to help her here without having to lead her by the hand? Certainly Verie was capable, but was he maybe moving her training too fast? Meditation was the core of his training - it was the foundation for everything that came after. He had to start here if he expected Verie to be able to handle any training within the Force. She'd spent her entire life training to be a ballerina - nothing to sniff at, so how could he -

"...one moment," a thought struck him. Dissero turned and exited the chamber, telling Verie not to move on his way out.

Several minutes passed by in utter silence until the sound of orchestral music pinged in through speakers in the walls. Verie would recognize it as music from her recitals.

Maybe this would help her center her mind.

[member="Verie Lacroix"]

 

[Verie Lacroix]

Verie rested her hands on her knees as she shifted on the central dais. She sensed that her question was itself a small failure and, despite the revelations she had experienced in the last several days, she bristled at the thought of disappointing @Dissero. Verie opened her eyes when he spoke, frowned when he turned to leave. She remained in place as instructed, closing her eyes again. She could sense the Force in an abstract way - she knew it was out there, knew it existed, knew that she could touch it when it presented itself to her. But how to take hold of it herself was still a foreign concept.

Stop being frustrated. It's not helping. It never does. Deep breaths. Exhale and clear your mind.

She tried again, making a conscious effort to clear the clutter from her mind. Easier said than done, naturally, but she was willing to put in the work to make a success. Verie was acutely aware of the silence in the room. The sound of her breathing filled her ears, and eventually it became regular and rhythmic. She focused on it, listening until everything else faded away. She continued, for an indeterminate amount of time, until some musical notes sounded in the emptiness.

Three notes in, she knew. The overture from The White Queen - she would know it anywhere. A wry smile crept over her lips but she kept up her breathing. She ached to stand, to dance, but remained seated. Instead, she just listened and continued breathing. She could feel her suppressed muscle memory, could almost visualize herself on a stage. The picture became clearer as she sat, listening to the music and watching herself on the stage. Her routine was flawless, perhaps better than any performance she had done in real life. It became obvious as she watched, focusing on the movements of her body, how each muscle group worked together, each organ and vein. She could sense the impulses being sent through the brain.

It was beautiful and terrifying at once. But after a beat of observing this, she became aware that the exhilierating feeling she associated with being in tune with the Force was present. It was refreshing, energizing, nearly pulsing with power. Verie took a deep breath and exhaled, allowing herself to slowly and purposefully immerse herself in its presence. Her lips twitched up at the edges, and she breathed deeply.

 

[Dissero]

He waited by the door, listening to the muffled tones of the music through the wall, feeling the ebb and flow of the Force within. Leaning forward, forehead against the cold durasteel frame of the chamber, he counted backwards from an undetermined number.

Backwards from an undetermined emotion.

He had to make this work.

Please work.

Then he felt it, the established connection of the Force within. Not in use, but simply being harnessed. Delicate, tenuous, but present.

There you go...

The man breathed a sigh of relief.

There you go.

He did not go back inside. She didn't need him now - from here it was all self discovery. Meditation was as much an internal training process as it was external, and for now it all sat with her. Pushing his hands into his pockets, Dissero turned and headed back through the castle to the common room, hand lightly holding the tickets still in his jacket pocket.

[member="Verie Lacroix"]

 

[Verie Lacroix]

Verie didn't make note that [member="Dissero"] hadn't returned until the recording reached intermission, but this, she expected, was part of the training. The isolation didn't bother her, and was soon forgotten. She instead focused on the sensation, on reaching deeper into the connection with the Force. Several hours after the music stopped, Verie found that she had finally grasped what Dissero had said about connecting with with the different stones. She had a strong sense of energy, of life, and earth, and... she couldn't put it into words, but it felt pure and true. But she also felt hungry, so she unfolded herself and stood, stretching a little. She was amazed how comfortable and refreshed she felt after several hours of sitting in one position and one place.

She strolled to the door and went in search of food.

* * * * * * *

A few days later, Verie rose before dawn, as she had taken to doing, bathed and dressed in her training gear and let herself into the chamber. She sat on the central dais, folded her legs under her, and settled down. She rested her hands on her knees and began to breathe deeply. By now, she had mastered the technique of meditating and reaching into the Force. The first few stones came to her relatively quickly - truth and life, earth and body - and began searching for the others in the Force.

 

[Dissero]

Dissero had made no effort to ask about her meditation during the last several days. Her transitory stage of wandering to finding her path was one she had to make alone - so asking how things were going while one was lost would only serve to deter them from continuing. He remained aloof, tending to his own projects while she spent her hours in the chamber. They'd meet for meals, discussing everything... anything but her training. He offered no advice when she asked, and instead insisted that she find her own way, changing the subject firmly afterwards.

Today, when [member="Verie Lacroix"] broke for lunch, he intended to finally breach the subject. Namely to learn if what he believed he sensed in her was on point so that they might advance the training in a new direction. One that did not involve the chamber.

He waited in the Sanctum Overlook - the main living area of the castle in many respects - where he was putting the finishing touches on a small holocron-looking device.

 

[Verie Lacroix]

Verie found that the momentary irritation with [member="Dissero"]'s sudden distance whenever she raised questions about her training melted away soon enough once she resumed her meditation. After such a long time focusing on it, she found that she enjoyed the feeling of freedom and light that it gave her. It was like being on the stage, being in front of an audience and performing perfectly every. single. night. And she could access the feeling whenever she wanted. And so she found that it was with a certain degree of reluctance that she had to leave the chamber. Things did not sit well between Verie and Dissero, and she found that aside from her training she didn't want to open up much to him. Her declaration, that she didn't know him as she thought she had, was not the melodrama of a young woman. The trust was eroded, and in its place was a bizarre mixture of anger and sadness and betrayal, couple withr attraction and a desire to please and prove herself.

It was highly frustrating. But, a woman needed to eat.

Verie strode into the Sanctum Overlook, adjusting her loose-fitting tunic, which had fallen on her walk to the chamber to bare one shoulder. She saw him there and her unconscious half-smile disappeared, her lips turning down at the edges. He looked stern and she wondered if today was the day she anticipated for so long -- the day he told her she was not going to make it, that she should pack her things and be gone. The longer her training wore on without it, the mores he resented the perception that he was stringing her along, for surely if she had been doing well enough he would have told her by now.

She walked over to stand opposite him, a meter away, but didn't say anything, only lifting her eyebrows questioningly and glancing at the item he was working on.

 

[Dissero]

That stern expression she was foolishly believing to be his own disappointment in her was merely what, if Verie reached into her memory bank, represented deep thought and concentration.

He could hardly be disappointed in Verie - where others had failed him truly and nigh immediately, she had already far surpassed.

He felt her brows raised despite not even looking at her, and glanced up at the intangible sensation, "Hassa-may, Gahiji," the Honoghran greeting she received from the Noghri, said with a hint of endearment, smile spreading within the scruff of his face. Her curiosity of the object in his hands noted, he held it up for her to see, "It's an Aoe-locron. A prototype. Bit of a side project I'd been working on before ... well, before."

Setting the device down on the table, he uttered the words postum gyvizas under his breath and motioned to it with a hand, resulting in a sudden and vibrant red glow through inlaid crystal-lattice. Verie would feel a small surge of energies within the Force proceeding an immediate pulsing and mild expulsion from the aoe-locron. Enough that it might feel as though someone had bodily pushed her back, though not strong enough that she couldn't resist.

"Holocron devices design to expell Force powers," Dissero explained, "this one utilizes the very basic Force Push at a negligable power. Something a youngling might toss at you. But enough about my work, tell me about your meditation."

[member="Verie Lacroix"]

 

[Verie Lacroix]

Verie leaned forward to examine the device, stepping a little closer. She had never heard of an Aoe-locron in her life, but then again she had not been familiar with the concept of a Holocron for most of her life, and so she nodded and smiled. "Fascinating," she declared and leaned in to study it a little more closely as he set it down. The glowing little object suddenly expelled some energy in the Force. Verie shifted back a little and put her hand to her chest. "How rude," she said with a smirk.

She stepped back into position and folded her hands behind her back.

"My meditation?" She shrugged. "It's getting much easier to achieve, and much quicker," she told him. "I can't get enough of the sensation, it is quite literally the greatest feeling I have ever experienced. More than hope or joy or love," Verie sighed and shook her head, clearly having trouble explaining her feelings. "it is pure exhilaration. I find myself craving more when I'm not diving into it, and I find myself coming out of it after hours feeling more energized and refreshed than when I began. It is... it is quite unlike anything I have ever experienced before." She paused and looked up a @Dissero. "Is that normal?"

 

[Dissero]

Dissero carefully picked the device back up and continued to tinker with it, pressing his fingers at two corners to unlock a hidden hinge.

"Meditation affects everyone differently. It's a bit like music. Hundreds of thousands of people can all hear the same score, the same orchestra, the same song, and it affects every single one of them uniquely. What I might find to be soothing and beautiful another might find to be dull and grating. What you are experiencing is normal, yes, for the purposes of Meditation. Rejuvenating the mind and body are one thing, for those sensitive to the Force it also has an effect on the spirit and your connection to the Force. It strengthens it, heightening your connection to the world around you. Some Force Users have become so powerful that they can sense occurrences within the Force half a galaxy away during meditation."

His thoughts briefly traveled to his mother at those last words and in return a smile tugged gently at his face as he looked back up to Verie, "What stones have you identified so far?"

[member="Verie Lacroix"]

 

[Verie Lacroix]

"I doubt whether someone could find something both dull and grating at the same time," said Verie with a smirk. "But I take your meaning. More and more I am beginning to think that nothing in life is objective." She wondered idly for a moment if he was trying to make a subtle point about what they had discussed previously -- his role in the holocron heist and the ensuing chaos and death. Morality, right and wrong, weren't these all just constructs each person set up for themselves? Certainly society -- a family or a city, a nation or a planet -- could share a common morality, perhaps identical to within a few percentage points this way or that, shaped by a common culture. But in a galaxy that was home to unbelievable altruism and breathtaking generosity, at the same time as unspeakable tragedy and shocking cruelty, how was it possible that there were any kind of moral absolutes?

But she was allowing herself to wander down the path, now, way into the weeds.

"They aren't labeled," said Verie, a touch defensive. "It's just... a sense -- a feeling -- of what each stone felt like. Oh, that's idiotic," she said. A feeling of what the stone felt like, honestly. "I get the sense of...I don't know. Purity and light and energy, together." She closed her eyes and canted her head to the side, remembering the sensations she had experienced before. "Truth, I think." She took a deep breath through her nose and sighed easily. "And earth. Air." She canted her head to the left, stretching her neck lightly. "Body. Life itself."

[member="Dissero"]

 

[Dissero]

The man's smile spread as she spoke - he always had found a certain sense of amusement in listening to her bluster through her words.

"They are labeled," he responded calmly, looking back to the aoelocron in his hand and withdrawing a small crystal that he then held aloft to the light, "you just can't read them because you don't know the language." Not that he expected her to. Garhan was not a language many knew.

Cracked, he frowned, but that at least he expected. One didn't put high-quality crystals into test-pieces. Pocketing the small gem, the Alchemist then withdrew a larger, more pristine piece and carefully placed it inside the device shell.

"But that is very good progress. You've named quite a few. Life, Truth, Earth, Body, Air - nearly halfway there. Very respectable. Took me a month to register five stones, but I was also eight years old when I first started training with them. Seven years after that to learn them all...they do say self discovery is a journey, not an experience. Speaking of which, it's time for another journey of sorts. We're going to Annaj to get you some proper training attire and some fitted armor."

The device closed with a snap in his hand. Dissero looked up, easy expression back, "And to pick up Mahet."

[member="Verie Lacroix"]