Practice Makes Perfect (Self Training Thread)

[Reine Bisset]

Without a master, Reine had to be her own master. This much was perfectly fine for her as she disliked taking orders from those who deemed themselves her 'superiors'. Besides, not everyone had to have a master to teach them. How did the first Force users learn their powers when there was no one to teach them? They taught themselves, of course.

And so she would teach herself the Force. It was better this way, she felt. No master but her to push her along or berate her when she failed. No one there to mock her incessantly or demean her when or if she failed on the first try. This was far, far better. She was her own master. No one else.

For this reason, she found herself on Raxus Prime. She still wore her usual outfit, though she had layered on more protective clothing as well as a respirator. Sith she was, but she had no wish to become horribly scarred from the acid pools on the planet or to succumb to the poisonous fumes found lurking in the lower areas. The thing Raxus Prime did allow, however, was a planet wide obstacle course.

This made Raxus Prime a perfect location to teach herself some of the basics of the Force. Running through the junkyards would ingrain the Art of Movement into her mind while the various debris fields and other things gave plenty of chances to brush up on her Push and Pull techniques. She might even learn how to throw with the Force. The very prospects of this were, put bluntly, exciting and bursting with potential.

Satisfied that she had pondered the thought sufficiently and had finished preparing for the self imposed training, Reine jumped from the ledge she stood on and began to ride the slope of junk down to the lower platforms and junk piles. She used the Force and her natural balance to keep upright, Force Sight to spot and dodge the spots that threatened to tumble her down the slope, and a little bit of luck to not injure herself on the slide. So far, so good.

 

[Reine Bisset]

Reine hit the bottom ledges and rolled to absorb the impact, her red hair flying in it's braid as she did so. She let the roll carry her onto her feet and dashed forward. She tried using the Force to push herself along and while it worked, it made her stumble slightly in the process as she overdid it. No matter, she was upright and still running. She'd have plenty of time to practice and get it right.

She continued running forward through the junkyard and let her mind focus within and without. She leapt over low obstacles and spun around spires of junk emerging from the ground. Chasms and crevasses were traversed with ease. She was getting the hang of moving while attuned to the Force. At least, she tried a Force push again. A durasteel panel the size of a hangar door blocked the path ahead of her course. Thinking quickly, she realized to go around it would take too long and force her to backtrack to find another path. However, she did see that the plate was fractured more or less down the middle. A perfect target for a Force push to shatter the weakened points.

She kept running forward, completely confident that her attempt would work. As she neared the panel, she focused the Force into her arms and hands and let it grow. As the obstacle grew very, very close, she released the Force push in a mighty blast that would splinter the panel and cast it aside. At least, that's what it should have done.

As she drew within a few feet of the panel and the Force was released, she realized that she'd let her focus slip from keeping aware of her surroundings and herself. Her heel hit a wide crack in the door and threw her off balance. The Push that would have sundered the durasteel hit the stronger points of the panel and did nothing to the metal. The loss of balance catapulted her forward the last foot or two towards the door.

Reine was moving too fast to use her arms and hands to stop the fall, though she realized this too late. Her skull cracked off the durasteel plate before her and her world turned black as she was knocked unconscious. Only one thought remained in her head as she fell to the ground in a heap.

Well, this is awkward...

 

[Reine Bisset]

A short while later she woke up with a roaring headache only matched in intensity by the embarrassment she felt at knocking herself out. She pushed herself to her feet and rubbed at the knot on her forehead roughly. Biting back the pain shooting through her skull, Reine angrily glared at the durasteel plate. A low growl rumbled in her throat as she grew angrier at what had happened.

"Karking metal," she barked as she kicked at the huge panel. "Karking planet! Karking junkyard! KARKING BREAK!"

She began beating the metal with a fist, unconsciously augmenting her blows with the Force in her rage. The durasteel bent and buckled slightly under the assault as Reine grew angrier. With an incoherent roar, she jumped back and pulled the Force into her fists. She let the power flow from her core to her hands and let her rage and hate infuse it all. In a sudden, violent movement, she blasted the Force in a massive, rage fueled push at the huge panel. The durasteel cracked, fragmented, and sundered as it was blown apart.

Panting heavily and somewhat exhausted from the display of wanton rage and anger, Reine flicked her crimson hair from her shoulders as casually and calmly as she could manage and began running once more.

 

[Reine Bisset]

She kept up a fast pace as she navigated the junkyard planet. Piles of junk and mounds of debris were deftly hurdled or otherwise overcome by the Miralukan as she ran, her crimson hair flying in the wind behind her. She leapt over a river of toxic sludge and realized that she was now on a small island of metal and scrap steel. Ahead was a huge gap to the other side and the distance was far too long to jump unassisted. Thinking a moment, she then stepped back to the opposite side of the small island and stood there with her arms at her sides.

Reine simply stood silent and focused. She let the traces and vestiges of the rage she felt earlier cling to her mind and body like spider silk in the wind. She could feel the Force working through her and let her anger and emotion fuel it. Slowly but surely, she felt her muscles become energized with the Force. It was only a matter of time before she was ready...

 

[Reine Bisset]

And that time was now. Her body infused with the anger and hate of the Dark Side, she darted forward. Her rage at the earlier embarrassment fueled her. The arrogance that such an obstacle should slow her, a Sith, down at all gave her strength. The hatred of having to compete with the Sith in the galaxy, the arrogant parodies of Sith and the Darkside, let her fly straight and true across the river of toxic death.

She landed on the other side and rolled into a wall. Hard. She was still learning. She was still understanding. Once again, she'd overdone it, but instead of rage and anger at the foul up, she simply laughed. It was a strange thing, that laugh. A mixture of humor and relief, but only as an overtone. Like an oil slick upon the water. Deep down lay anger and rage and raw power. She was making mistakes not because she was weak in the Force and, by extension, a failure to become Sith. No, this wasn't the case at all.

She needed control to keep her power in check. She was powerful, and she knew it. The arrogance filled her heart and soul to bursting and drove her even more to understanding how precisely to control her power.

Still making such twisted sounds, Reine stood up once more and continued on. She wasn't done just yet.

 

[Reine Bisset]

More obstacles came her way. These were less able to be conquered by running around or leaping over them, at least not as simply. Platforms over vast canyons of scrap appeared and were conquered. Gaping pits of sludge were avoided. More rivers of toxic sludge were found and navigated. It was difficult, but not impossible.

Reine let the Force feed into her, into her soul. It was like a furnace of power, in a way. It burned brightly and strongly within, like a great pyre of raw energy. She need only take that power, place her hand within the inferno, and pull from the energy there. At times, she was burned by the furnace, leaving her drained and tired, but with time and practice she was finding the task easier. Simpler. Less and less she found herself with burned hands and more and more she found the power flowing freely within.

It was a beautiful thing. It was power and perfection in motion.

 

[Reine Bisset]

Need met will. Will met energy. Energy became motion. Motion became ability. Ability became power. Power became need.

It was a cycle. The only cycle that mattered. It fed into itself and looped again and again. Those who could understand such a thing, who could harness and weather the endless storm there, would find unlimited power and potential. Those who couldn't either fell away, crippled and broken, or perished in the attempt.

Reine would not perish. She could not. She refused to. Nor would she fall away, a damaged shell of what she once was, left there to gaze at what could have been. There was only one outcome for her and that was ultimate power. The Dark Side was a heady drug and it was one that she planned to conquer.

All of this passed through her mind as she ran. She drove herself onwards, pushed herself past her limits. This was the way she had chosen. This was the only way. The true way.

 

[Reine Bisset]

Fatigue and strain and wear were washed away as she ran on and on. The Force both fed and consumed her, feeding on her essence as she fed upon it as well. A cycle, that was all it was. A cycle of life and death. To die and fade only to be born anew. To fade and reappear. To be ground into dust only to rise a mountain once more.

The Force coursed through her muscles and bones and sinews as she ran and leapt and jumped. Chasms were crossed with mighty bounds, launched upwards and across by the power she wielded. Obstacles were vaulted or blown apart, becoming simple, trivial things in the path of greatness.

She could feel the Force coursing through her, making the very air around her sing from the power she held. She would not allow herself to rest at any point on the ladder save for the topmost rung.

She would master the Force and bend all else to her whim.

Or she would burn the galaxy down to cinders.

 

[Reine Bisset]

The end of her course neared and she saw the last leg of her journey. What she had expected would amount to a final test for new found strengths and abilities seemed... less so.

A steep, nearly sheer slope lay before her. Beyond that, a great chasm filled with empty nothingness. Towering spires lay at intervals amid the chasm, their tops scraped and crushed flat by the junk and debris that fell here regularly. On the other side of the chasm, another steep slope.

It was the ultimate test of her abilities. The final test of this day for herself. She had selected it to ensure the greatest and most dangerous obstacle would test her at the end of the trials.

Now, it was merely a plaything.

The Force lay at her hands for her use. It bowed to her will. Taking only a moment to plot her course down the slope and across, she stepped off the ledge.

Nothing would stop her now.

 

[Reine Bisset]

Debris and scrap and dust trailed behind her as Reine slid down the slop. Here and there, scrap or machinery piled up along the slopes, threatening to slow her descent. What she could not bull through with blasts of Force energy, she pushed herself away or leapt over. The trail of tumbling scrapyard detritus grew larger and larger behind her, threatening to overcome her should she become slowed for any reason. She wouldn't let it.

The edge of the chasm reared up to her and she welcomed the jagged edge of the abyss. Feet hit flatter ground and she immediately picked up a run, pushed ahead by the Force. All around and behind her metal, rock, and rust clattered and smashed to the ground. A veritable avalanche of trash and unwanted metal cascading behind her back to the chasm ahead. She did not hesitate, she did not falter. To do so was to die amid trash and garbage, unknown and unlamented. This was unacceptable.

The Force burst outwards and lent her wings as she leapt from the jagged, rotting edge of the scrap abyss. For a brief moment, motion ceased to her mind. Aloft in the air, looking into the void below. Ahead lay salvation, behind lay destruction. It was, for that slightest second, true beauty. Destruction, hope, nothingness, fear, courage, and a cocktail of so many emotions within such a moment. It was... perfect.

Her feet hit the solid surface of one of the many junk spires. She felt it shift underfoot and ran forward to leap once more. Behind her the avalanche hit the edge of the chasm fully and sent parts, pieces, and jagged metal skywards.

The task was only just beginning.

 

[Reine Bisset]

Feet met scrap, then air once more. Leap after leap across teetering spires as danger rained down everywhere. A single misstep and death would grip the Miralukan in its final, cold embrace. She could feel it even now, on the edges of her senses. A chilling, icy hand just out of view. On the edge of her sight. Hovering over her consciousness and lurking behind each step, each jagged piece of scrap raining from the heavens, each shift of an unstable spire.

She didn't fear the cold touch, she welcomed it. She toyed with the lurking ice. She danced with Death itself. It proved an equal match for her, but each time it gained the upper hand, she took the chance from Death and lead the dance herself. She would not die today and, as if to prove to the universe around, she would prove it to Death itself.

The spires were running out, most collapsing from the cascade of garbage behind. Some toppling over and smashing apart others as they fell. The debris rained down into the chasm and all around. The noise was terrible and the very air shuddered at the crashing, tearing, breaking sounds.

She was closer and closer to the edge, yet further and further away. The last spire between herself and salvation collapsed, forcing her to stop for a moment. To continue as she had was now impossible.

But to stop was to die.

 

[Reine Bisset]

The choice was obvious, the task certain. Death's icy hands recoiled as Reine focused within herself. In a single, massive burst of energy, she launched herself forward. The concussive blast rippled through the dust and debris behind her as her body was rocketed over the gaping abyss.

The air screeched past her ears, the wind whistled around her body. The sheer wall of the opposite side of the chasm rapidly grew nearer and she knew two things as it approached.

She had succeeded where others had surely failed.

She was tired, but could go on proving to her own mind that she had wells of untapped potential.

In her own mind, she was power. She was strength and endurance. She had mastered this much of the Force already and so simply. In her mind, there was much to learn, but if this was the grasp she had on her own power, she would rise rapidly and there was little anyone could do to stop her.

Her awareness heightened and her reflexes guided by the Force that coursed in her very veins, her feet met sloped ground with uncanny precision. Now, it was but an uphill run between her and her goals.

 

[Reine Bisset]

The slope was steep, but Reine found her footing. The Force showed her the way. It danced in her vision, cavorted through her mind. She felt her own balance as she moved, felt the air around her change as she ran, sensed the vibrations beneath her feet and against her skin as she planted one foot ahead of the other. She sensed all around her and felt her own body bend and twist and shift as she ran.

Her feet found holds where there were none to be seen. She found her center of balance at the most steep of angles. The slope changed and warped in her mind, transforming from the obstacle it was and becoming yet one more road to be navigated. Bit by bit, the she moved up the slope.

Where she could not run, she climbed. Areas she could not climb, she vaulted. Those places she could not vault, she blasted apart or tore from their places. Soon, a cascade of debris raced past her and down the slope. Scrap and trash knocked loose from her passing, or ripped apart from her efforts, slid down to the chasm. Ahead, the unstable shelves of debris shifted and slid from their places. A wall of dust, debris, and jagged scrap began its downward descent to the pit.

In its way stood Reine. Her only response was to grin in anticipation.

This is what she was waiting for.

 

[Reine Bisset]

The wall, the avalanche of metal and dust and scrap rattled down the slopes like a runaway train. The noise was deafening, greater than the earlier garbage slide she had caused before. Reine shoved the cacophonous noise from her mind, her consciousness, and drew into herself.

The Force was with her and she wielded it like the weapon, the power it was. Had she eyes and eyelids, she would have shut them in concentration for the moment to come. As it was, she let the power inside focus, condense. She let it flow out from her soul and her body into her hands and arms. Before her outstretched palms, the air itself warped and danced, as if a mighty heat radiated through it.

The first, leading edges of the avalanche were near. Merely a few hundred feet away and advancing in seconds. Reine felt the time was right, the power within was now the power without. The Force flowed through her arms, into her hands and fingers. Her palms ached from the power within them and the raw energy rippled the very air.

With a snarled shout, she released the blast she held contained within her hands. The mighty impact traveled outwards, parting the very air and dust before her. The Force blast smashed into the edge of the sea of moving scrap and rippled through.

It happened as if time stood still for Reine. The blast impacted the front of the sea and the scrap there at the point of contact disintegrated. The blast rippled through the center of the avalanche and blasted the scrap up, out, and away. The massive, powerful blast of Force energy effectively parted the scrap sea, sending debris and dust high into the air and over where Reine stood.

She stood there, out of breath, palms still outstretched. The scrap and trash slid by on either side of her. Ahead was clear of debris, though dust occasionally slithered down. In fact, the way was flattened. No longer was the slope as steep as it was. No longer was it nearly an uphill climb. No longer was the way an obstacle.

Bisset gathered her strength and her breath. She wasn't weak, simply... lightheaded. Elated. She had succeeded where few could. She was not at her peak, but she was not pulling from the dregs of her strength. She was... merely tired from her exertions.

Her breath gathered, her strength returned, and her mind clearer than it ever had been, she made her way up the now gentler slope she had created. She had her ship to return to and more to plan. More to learn.

Her path was far more clear now than it ever was before.