Objects in Motion

[Sor-Jan Xantha]

D R A L L
The Boiling Sea

A business like Corellia Digital belonged in Coronet City, but -- and aside from the fact that Coronet City no longer existed -- you couldn't beat the view.

Located on the outskirts of the city of Meccha, the former corporate retreat resided on the side of a cliff overlooking the Boiling Sea. It supplied a picturesque backdrop. Particularly from the upper level of the facility, which doubled as the private residence of the company CEO.

It was a good place to get away.

You were never far. Least of all from the Sith, whose dark influence lay like a funeral pall over the broken remains of Corellia. But, it was good to escape the hustle and bustle that permeated every part of the Silver Temple. With a medical wing, a full Jedi Academy and youngling clans romping about, the Silver Temple was hardly a quiet place for meditation.

So he came here. To Drall. As close as he could get to his former home of Bela Vistal.

But, that didn't mean he'd come alone.

[member="Katagiri Ike"]​

 

[Katagiri Ike]

[member="Sor-Jan Xantha"]

Usually unless the planet was covered in ice and snow she stood out like a sore thumb. The small jedi looking much like her sisters, the same black pools for her eyes. The same pale skin you couldn't really see a difference in when she blushed, the small height though she stood a couple inches taller then her sister and didn't let her forget it. Two inches was a world among short people as the silvery white robes clung to her with as her silver hair was cut short for the first time in a long time and her training saber rested on her hip. The look at the rest of the world when she was following the small jedi knight and never one to judge by size she stood at the ready behind him looking out at some of the world. "it is a beautiful view."

 

[Sor-Jan Xantha]

"It is," the young knight agreed somberly.

In his mind, he was looking past the Boiling Sea. To a little hamlet on Corellia. A resort town for some. A summer retreat for others. And, for a few, home. Year-round. Even after the Jedi of the Old Republic had come and taken him as a child, it remained that. And so what he'd said was as much 'it was' or 'it had been' as it was a comment as to the present.

But, enough with the past.

What mattered was the here and now. And precious little of that had to do with Corellia. Or Drall.

With a distinctive snap-hiss, the verdant blade of Paperweight emerged into view. The weapon of a Jedi Consular, the emerald light had shone brightly for longer than the padawan beside him had been alive. "Soresu," the boy announced, taking a step away from the edge as he broached the topic that they had come out here to discuss. As he spoke, the boy rotated his wrist as he mentally and physically prepared to demonstrate to topic. "...is the third of the seven classical forms of lightsaber combat."

Pulling the handle up, the blade angled perpendicular toward the ground, the boy performed a basic orbit close to his body, then reversed the direction of the weapon and cycled back. "It dates back to around 4,000 BBY, when the emergence of blasters gave the Jedi of the era challenges in facing multiple armed opponents," the historian lectured softly, as the blade continued to weave a series of slow, elegant orbits around his small form. "The idea was not to create a new style or school. Those Jedi relied on blast-deflection techniques inherent to Form I."

Despite what the Jedi Guardians had to say about Jedi Archaeology, there was a lot that had been written about their lightsabers that had been lost. Or forgotten. And was retained only by those few loremasters that had sought to understand the when or why behind the Jedi's signatory style of combat.

"Over time, however, the style that came to be known as the Resilience Form, or Way of the Mynock, emerged as too distinct and varied to be considered a variant of Shii-cho." As the green blade returned to the center of the boy's body, he paused there and looked over at the taller woman. "Since the Jedi Council of the Old Republic had recognized Makashi as a second form of lightsaber combat, this style was dubbed the third."

Moving one foot behind, at a T-angle from his forward leg, the youngling crouched down in the opening stance of the style. Blade lofted overhead, parallel to the floor and pointed outward over the wielder's head. His off-hand empty, stretched forward to provide balance.

"Join me," the youngling said, indicating for the padawan to activate a lightsaber and mimic the stance he was in now.

If she didn't carry her own, there were a few training sabers of different kinds, sizes, and varieties in a case not far from where they'd walked out of the Corellia Digital apartment onto the roof overlooking the sea. While he had specialized in Soresu, as a Niman practitioner as well, the boy tried to vary his routines up from time to time. Saber staffs. Adult sized lightsabers. A small sampling, but some practice in what he might come across in a battlefield with the Sith.

[member="Katagiri Ike"]​

 

[Katagiri Ike]

[member="Sor-Jan Xantha"]

She watched him and listened, the black pools getting deeper more in remembering as she focused on remembering each movement and recalling what was said as she moved when directed. A little sluggish but she was recalling it while gliding to be next to the master with her saber coming out. The white gold hilt looking like her skin and the snap hiss as the silvery white blade came from it. The thrumming and hum like music to her ears as she followed his movements with her hands on the blade as her eyes dilated back to normal pools remaining focused and mouth half opened, tongue resting against the roof of her mouth. "I understand." She moved in his movements and her voice was soft and low but firm.

 

[Sor-Jan Xantha]

As the woman matched his stance, the boy dipped his blade forward and down, stepping through into the first basic Soresu orbit.

He moved slowly, allowing her to see what he was doing, so that she could follow suit. "Like Makashi, Soresu relies on economy of motion," the boy noted. As she was likely realizing, going into the motion of the orbit, the lightsaber was but a piece of the larger puzzle. The footwork, the body position, every step, every movement, blending into a fluid and elegant motion. "You put momentum into the opening move, and seek to maintain that energy in motion throughout."

From out of the first orbit, the youth rotated his body, stepping in a slow circle anti-clockwise as he executed the second and third major orbits. "Inside the orbit, you are the center of the storm," the youth remarked, transitioning into one of the minor orbits to demonstrate how the three basic moves he'd shown her could be improvised. "Calm. Don't allow the fight or battle around you to distract your focus."

[member="Katagiri Ike"]​

 

[Katagiri Ike]

[member="Sor-Jan Xantha"]

She moved and followed focused on the words but also on keeping her momentum she could have going as her saber moved following the orbit and she expanded the force out to maintain her awareness within the area and as she lost sight continue to follow the masters movements. Her eyes and mind working to take it all in and remember in her head for review if she needed it.. The jedi were a wonderful thing she had found while being a politician and soldier before she stopped and had a grin on her face repeating the movements while she was trying to get a rhythm to keep the momentum. "I believe I am getting it, but from being in the protectorate I learned defense all the time was dangerous."

 

[Sor-Jan Xantha]

"There are many who agree with that thought."

Dropping his shoulders, the boy paused to turn toward the woman as he spoke. With a click, the lightsaber in his hand switched off as he did. "That is why Ataru and Shien were developed at the same time, to provide Jedi more aggressive means of addressing their attackers," the young knight remarked.

Which wasn't to say that such an outlook was necessarily correct.

"But Soresu isn't about defense, it's about strategy," the boy said. Activating the green blade once more, the boy took several steps back to create more room between himself and the woman. As he did, three spherical training droids came on-line from near the saber stand. "Observe," the boy instructed quietly, as he again resumed the opening stance of the third form.

As the first bolt was fire, the boy dipped down into the first orbit -- his small form twisting as the blade became like an emerald barrier around him. One by one, the droids fired away at the child. And, one by one, he neatly absorbed each bolt in what seemed like perpetual motion. "From behind a Soresu orbit, you can assess a situation calmly. Seek alternatives. Or wait for your attacker to provide you an opening," the young knight remarked calmly, through the haze of tibana gas and the blur of the lightsaber.

"And when that opening arrives, what you do depends on you, and the strategy you've developed for the opponent you are facing at that moment, at that time."

The droids had the boy in a classic pincer maneuver. One in front, one beside, and one off-center behind him. No matter how he positioned or turned, his back was always to one or more of them. Now, as the droid behind him fired, the boy's angle of attack shifted. He stepped out of the Soresu orbit and instead stepped into a Shien maneuver.

He was, after all, known to study Niman. It was a hybrid form scorned by some and misunderstood by most, but it afforded the boy the thing he found most valuable in combat.

Options.

The blaster bolt was deflected rather than absorbed, shooting out sideways to strike the droid that had been off side of the youngling. And, from that Shien attack, the boy had stepped neatly back into a Soresu orbit whilst maintaining the momentum he'd developed.

Economy of motion. And now there were only two droids remaining. "Remember, no single lightsaber form exists in exclusion," the boy noted as he again stood his ground under a hail of blaster fire. "Even a Makashi or Vaapad practitioner relies on the most basic of forms -- Shii-cho -- for some of their technique. Particularly blaster deflection."

"And your response need not involve your lightsaber at all." Immediately after the two droids had fired, the boy's lightsaber swept up, swept right, and then he pulled his body around anti-clockwise as one hand shot out. Seizing hold of the one remote with his mind, the boy stepped back and around as the remote he'd grabbed was pulled through the air until it collided with the other remote. Smashing both.

Looking back over at the woman, the boy shut down the lightsaber as he said, "It is not what you know, but rather how what you know works in combination."

Returning the lightsaber to his belt, the boy stretched out a hand to recall another remote from the rack near the saber stand. Looking back at the woman, the droid remote hovering over his hand, the boy asked, "Would you care to try?"

[member="Katagiri Ike"]​

 

[Katagiri Ike]

[member="Sor-Jan Xantha"]

She was listening and watching him now, moving back into a place she could observe seeing all of it. His movement with the blade but unlike others she had seen who used the form he wasn't just staying in the single stance saying like one master she had seen that is was superior because the jedi never attacked. It aided her at least in hearing him explain it and while she watched the drones seeing how they were attacking her hand was on the hilt of the deactivated blade. The white gold hilt gleaming as he continued to work and show more undersanding shifting to something to better show options and she waited until he was done.

Taking it in stride while bowing her head and moving towards the center of the drones. She was reaching into herself and that pit of her stomach as she stood still. Her body remaining focused as the snap hiss came and she stood there centering her being with a focus and determination as she expanded her force senses out. To let the drones go around as one fired and the blade danced in her hand rotating to deflect it away, a pause and then two while she moved with her footing to keep rotating and not letting herself be caught in a firing line with the robes flowing around her and the force to maintain her balance.

The deflection came and Katagiri jerked her hand to lash out with a burst of force energy while she deflected one shot towards another to be in the path of the force and knock it down. Her foot movement remaining the same but shifting so she could increase and decrease the speed of her rotation with the saber going around. Larger attention on the remaining two before jumping up and cartwheeling to avoid a shot before she rose up throwing the saber and striking with the hilt to knock the second down with a small tight lipped smirk leaping to grab the third and slam it like a grav ball into the ground for a spike.

 

[Sor-Jan Xantha]

"Very well done."

Inclining his head, the boy gave a bow of respect toward his student in recognition for her achievement. Straightening back up, the boy tucked his hands into the sleeves of his robe. "The rest is merely practice," the youngling remarked. A simple statement, and a harder thing to make habit. "Because it was devised directly from Shii-cho, the movements themselves are quite rudimentary."

Major orbits. Minor orbits. A few transitions in between, but Soresu was perhaps even less complex than Form I for the lack of variation in its movements. Like Form II, much of the emphasis was on the footwork, but even that wasn't as demanding as it would be for Makashi. "The challenge isn't to train to become proficient at them, but rather at maintaining your calm and patience in the thick of combat."

[member="Katagiri Ike"]​

 

[Katagiri Ike]

[member="Sor-Jan Xantha"]

Maintain your calm in combat.... She chuckled a little internally to herself and didn't want to seem arrogant or over confident... it was just. She was a politician and used to not getting worked up. An ice queen as she usually needed to be and her attention went to several of the things before really speaking and wondering about what the master thought. He might look like a kid but well he wasn't by any stretch of the imagination. She was guessing one of the less human races but not on the verge of being other in looks. It was a shorter list then some thought and she wasn't really engaged enough to try and be clever to try and figure it out. If he wanted to tell her then he would as she was moving around a little and working on her footwork. "I understand, focus but try to avoid just going into exploitable patterns. Act without aggression and stay as cool as ice."