Private My Shadow Runs With Me

[Velok Brokentusk]

"I'm certain you will," Velok said, watching Sonere move off through the grounds and hedges. "Telepathy is very broad. Recognizing and countering influence, mind tricks, stealing and giving knowledge, illusions, communication, translation, sending truth and lies and states of mind, meditation and hibernation trances, reducing others' pain, seeing through their eyes, putting them to sleep, befriending, taming, and controlling animals and even people...endless applications. I don't know how many of those skills these telepaths have or will admit to, or what they're willing to teach.

"I certainly learned a thing or two about monitoring mental states over the last few days. I don't want to push my luck. I think they're much more amenable to teaching you than me."

 

[Lily Rhodes]

Lily looked at Velok, still resting on his haunches as he listed of the different applications. "Well, I'm already pretty good at getting a sense of people, maybe I can expand on that." to be able to walk into a room and know who was going to be a problem? That was something she could absolutely get behind.

"Can I ask something of you, first?" If she was going to learn from the Nagai, she wanted something to protect herself with first. Her mind was open to them and although this discomfort was greatly lessened now she knew they were not her enemy, she still felt exposed.

"Can you teach me to close them out of my head?"

Velok Brokentusk

 

[Velok Brokentusk]

"Yes, absolutely."

It took about an hour and a half for him to run Lily through the fundamentals, at least based on Velok's education and skillset: how to wrap the Force around your mind in ways that would be baffling, if you suspected eavesdropping or influence; how to recognize the eavesdropping and the influence alike; how to use rote chants or songs for mental 'noise' as an extra layer of protection. Velok was no particularly skilled telepath himself, but by the end of their training session he was satisfied that he'd done a decent job of trying to read Lily's thoughts in detail, and she'd done a decent job of recognizing when he was and wasn't. He'd also tried basic mind tricks on her so she could know what that felt like, how to be conscious of it, and how to resist.

"What's most important," he reaffirmed at the end, "is metacognition. Being aware of your thoughts, and being aware of how your judgment and state of mind may be shifting. This kind of thing is easy to practice in day-to-day life in any number of ways. Next time your emotional state changes, or your state of mind - maybe you're angry, maybe you're relaxed or in a state of flow, maybe you've had a drink - pay close attention to how that feels. The more you know yourself, the harder it'll be for someone to influence you."

 

[Lily Rhodes]

Lily took in the information like a sponge, eager to know, to understand and to show that she could do what she was taught. An hour and a half didn't seem like a long time, but this was all new to Lily, and by then end of it she was tired. Stamina would come with time and practice, she told herself as she stifled a yawn.

"Takes self aware to a whole other level, but I understand. If I'm aware of my own moods I can tell when someone is trying to influence me if they have managed to get past the defences already." Nothing was absolute, this much Lily was coming to understand. She got up and stretched. It'd only been a couple of hours since she'd woke and they still had the afternoon ahead of them.

"what else do you think would be useful for me to learn?"

Velok Brokentusk

 

[Velok Brokentusk]

"Knowing you, and what might be available here, and knowing how the Force has and hasn't been useful to me as a traveller..." Velok was sitting on the shuttle's wing by now, his usual spot. "See if they'll teach you how to sense truth and lies. It won't work against them unless they allow it, but it'll work against most people. Closely tied to that - sensing intention. Who's about to draw or cut and run."

He got off the wing to stretch as well.

"I'm going to take that flight now. I believe the Nagai colonial administration has a land registry by satellite, so I'll link up with that as I fly and see what's affordable." Not that he had much in the way of money, but the trade goods he'd acquired by various means on Darronid were a start. If the right purchase at the right price failed to materialize, he still had options. Landowners or settlements might be willing to part with a patch of land in return for labor and protection from someone his size.

He was mildly surprised to realize that the prospect of just taking the land he wanted hadn't occurred to him as an option.

 

[Lily Rhodes]

"Oh!" Lily exclaimed darting back into the ship. She'd forgotten about the little stashes she'd been hiding behind the panels. One in the cockpit, behind a panel below the controls. Another above her pillow in the bedroom and the last by the controls for the landing ramp. "Here." She presented six small pouches to Velok, all filled with coin. "Half of those are your cut from some of the salvage I sold before Skeevi and I went fishing, and the others are mine. Use them."

Giving his arm a squeeze, she bounced down the landing ramp. "I'll see you for dinner?" she asked, walking backwards towards the temple.

Velok Brokentusk

 

[Velok Brokentusk]

After thanking Lily for the money, and assuring her that he'd be home for dinner, Velok got to flying. Frankly his focus was already on the land, the land seen from above, before he even lifted off. Claim maps, satellite feeds, things available by registry or by bargains with existing landholders - he tried to keep an open mind to possibilities.

Jaibrek had no preexisting sapient presence, no indigenous sapient or semi-sapient species, and no complexities or likely regrets around taking land in that sense. That made Jaibrek relatively unique, and Nagai authorities and agencies were happy to capitalize. They'd leaned so hard into the 'guilt-free and easy' advertising angle, in fact, that they'd elided the actual challenges of a land rush like that. Everyone felt entitled to take everything. Everyone felt like an original inhabitant, aggrieved by new arrivals, even if they'd only been here a decade or a year.

Such, at least, were the intimations he picked up in the market and the land registries and especially the supply shops, while scoping out prefabs that might fit his dimensions and budget. The complexity of it all, the unnecessary grief of it, frustrated him for the bulk of the morning. He got little flight time in, reviewed few areas.

But around lunch, sharing water from a Nagai rancher's well and liquor from a flask, a serious opportunity emerged. A little more flight, a little more talk, and a long walk through tall grass, and that opportunity began to take an unexpected shape.

Lily Rhodes

 

[Lily Rhodes]

It was strange, watching the Rest take off without her, though it did give her a moment to appreciate her ship in a new light as it disappeared past the temple and out of sight. She taken time to appreciate the simplicity of the design, and its sleek edges, but not from afar. Turning, she headed for the gardens and the direction Sonere had gone, chewing her lower lip nervously.

The gardens were intricate, and easy to get lost in with crisscrossing pathways flowering arches and high planted walls and hedges. Each area was slightly different to the next, the first few were functional, vegetable patches and herbs for the kitchens and infirmary. After that they shifted into something else, like they were trying to draw in different energies. There were cool crisp courtyards with little planting, save the soft tall grasses in pots at its edges, wild gardens, where the plants had been allowed to do exactly what they wanted almost completely obscuring the cobbled path from view, with large flat rocks dotted around for seats.

She found Sonere under an enormous fruit tree set on a large open green. The ground was covered with a soft spongy moss that felt like walking on lush carpet. Lily enjoyed the feeling so much she was momentarily distracted by it, pressing her foot down and lifting it away to watch it spring back into place. A familiar itch at her mind reminded her she was here for a reason and she looked back up at the Nagai who was watching her with an amused expression. Lily approached, flopping onto the ground in front of her.

"I see Velok has already been teaching you." she commented. "Be careful what you learn from him young one. You know what he has done."

Lily scowled. "I trust him."

"Do you always trust so easy?" Lily hesitated and Sonere smiled. "So naive." shooting her and indignant glare, Lily made to push herself up and Sonere held up her hands. "Stay, Lily, I meant no offense."

Lily contemplated her for a moment before relaxing, chewing her lip again as she mustered up the right words for her next question, instead, she opted to lower the mental barriers down she'd built up, allowing Sonere access to her surface thoughts should she want them.

"You need not ask, Lily. We opened you to this, so it is only fair we gift you some of our knowledge to help you on the right path. It is why I wanted to see you. You have potential."

"Potential for what?"

"To be a telepath and perhaps more, but that will reveal itself in time." Sonere smiled, adjusting her position and gesturing for Lily to mirror it.

"We will start, with the basics."


Velok Brokentusk