Training Starts at Dawn

[Loreena Arenais-Valhoun]

Lori smirked as [member="Jaster of Clan Awaud"] told [member="Kaine Australis"] to get his armour on. Oh suuuure, as though he figured that she was that tough that he couldn't handle her without armour. Of course in their wn training sessions, Jaster always had his. So...maybe he was being wise in his decision.

She finished her stretching and looked down to the two gauntlets that fell out of the bag. "For me? Thanks!" Lori nearly skipped over to them, picking them up in a swoop and slipping them over her hands. They were a size too big, which she hoped wouldn't be a problem. She had never worn them before, never used them, but it wasn't as though she was unfamiliar with what they could do. At least they'd give her a bit of an advantage in this match where her height did not.

Kaine soon approached from his tent, fully clad in the armour that Mandos were known for. Lori looked waaaaay up at him with her gloved hands on her hips. Now he almost appeared two feet taller than before, and much more intimidating.

Oh boy.

He asked her if she was ready and she nodded. "Yeah, let's go." She started to turn on her heel to walk further into the clearing that they'd fight in, when suddenly she was pushed from behind. Lori wasn't expecting that, and so she gasped as she fell flat onto her stomache, using her hands to help break her fall. How embarrassing! "Hey!!" She slammed her hands into the ground before getting to her feet and turned to face him, one hand pointing behind her. "I thought that we were going over there! But fine! Have it your way!" Lori rolled up her sleeves as her anger began to build. She didn't like being made fun of, and her brother usually help to keep her protected from those that bugged her. But now she was on her own and had to take care of herself.

Lori flexed her fingers and then went in for a tackle at Kaine's knees, wrapping her arms tightly around them so that she could hopefully cause him to lose his balance and fall onto hus back.

[member="Chekīta Awaud"]

 

[Loreena Arenais-Valhoun]

Lori let go of his legs as soon as [member="Kaine Australis"] hit the ground, not wanting to get her arms pinned. But just that movement alone gave Kaine the time that he needed to strike her shoulder. "OW!!"

Did she cry? No. Instead she just overheard his words, and grabbed his left wrist with her right hand. Use her advantage? Well her advantage was that she was a girl and he was a man. So a split second later after she took hold of what she presumed was his dominate hand, Lori balled her left into a fist and slammed it down hard on Kaine's groin. How strong the armour was there, she didn't know. But even some added pressure to it could still cause him some pain. That's what her twin brother taught her anyways. But this was the first time that she had ever attempted it on anyone, let alone an armour-clad Mandalorian.

There were no rules in this fight as far as she knew. Only being that they weren't to hurt eachother too much. Given that Kaine was much bigger and older than her, she knew that she could get away with more.

 

[Jaster Awaud]

Jaster cought the lolly pop that was passd to him by his cousin [member="Chekīta Awaud"], he even began to unwrap it as he watched the beginning of the fight with between his ward and his friend. Lifting the pop up to where his mouth was as the simulated training started, and as the first blow by [member="Loreena Arenais"] to [member="Kaine Australis"] knee, the pop slapped his helmet. At this point he had totally forgotten that he was unable to each such things and was a little disappointed about the whole affair. He looked over to his cousin, "You were hoping that was gonna happen huh?"

The fight overall was good to see, Kain was a trained battle hardened warrior who was unforgiving and methodical. Jaster knew himself that if he alone trained his close friends daughter, he would have taken it easy on her. Yet easy was not the path of a Mandalorian, theirs was a path of struggle and pain and sorrow. Yet with every defeat, every failure that stood in their path, every Mandalorian needed to have the light of hope chained to their heart. The day a single Mandalorian lost hope in their life, was the day time itself stopped. And that was thee hardest thing one could teach to a Mandalorian Vod in training.

He held his breath as Kaine was not easy on her, they had spent the last month or so in deep attachment to one another. Jaster saw the child as family, she was a member of Clan Raxis, adoped niece of Grey Raxis and the heir to the throne of Commenor. Yet Jaster would always see Lore as his family, always willing to cause a problem for the enjoyment of life. That was why it was painful to see her beaten to a near pulp, yet she had to take her beating like all the others who where standing here, willing to train her.

 

[Loreena Arenais-Valhoun]

Well that didn't quite have the effect that she wanted. Darn that armour! Lori had hoped that the gauntlet would have helped, but it failed instead.

No sooner did that thought go through her mind that [member="Kaine Australis"] struck her hard in her midsection. The sheer shock of having the wind knocked out due to the brunt force of the blow caused her to let go. At first she couldn't breath as she fell back, but finally her lungs broke free from the shock and allowed her to gasp for air. Tears streamed from her eyes, partly in pain and partly of embarrassment. This wasn't fair! He had every advantage!

Except maybe speed. She didn't know how fast he was. They were both still on the ground, so Lori quickly got to her feet and then lunged for Kaine's head, or rather his helmet with both hands. She hooked her fingers underneath in a bid to try to pry it off. Her ultimate goal was to distract him into exposing his neck so that she could clamp down on it with one of her hands.

For the moment, both [member="Jaster of Clan Awaud"] and [member="Chekīta Awaud"] were forgotten.

 

[Chekīta Kaie]

Chekita feinted innocents at [member="Jaster of Clan Awaud"], getting close to the man and sitting down, the 24/7 happy persona making it hard to tell when she was actually trying to act smug, "Whatever do you mean cousin, I was juuuust doing what you wanted". Truth be told she had not really known the full extent of Jasters injures so it was not deliberate, but served as a humors tease non the least, still she did wonder is there was a way to restore the man to her original body

Turning attention away from the body suited man here gaze fell upon [member="Loreena Arenais"] and [member="Kaine Australis"], the latter older man being quite strong and rought though she could also see the young girl had speed on her side. Chekita herself was a good mix, though was a little more agile then brute force, perhaps later on she could pass on some skill of her own, how to deal with much larger opponents, similar to Kaine and Jaster earlier spar. So far the young mando had decided to put that speed to use, her method though was more then questionable.

"I have a feeling that strategy will not end well, call it a hutch", more so since helmets where not that easy to simply slip off, meaning Kaine may be able to simply ignore the attack and just knee the girl in the chest.

 

[Loreena Arenais-Valhoun]

Lori wasn't expecting that. While she had her focus on the helmet and wanting [member="Kaine Australis"] to expose his neck more, instead he did the opposite and thrust his head forward against her own.

SMACK!!

She gasped and fell back, letting go of him as colours flashed before her eyes. At risk of getting dizzy, Lori just lay there on the ground, tears brimming her eyes, yet she didn't let them fall. It was embarrassing. Here she was fighting someone fully armoured and ancient, with nothing but gauntlets. It wasn't fair!

Lori groaned a little asshe slowly sat up, checking her head for blood. Was the fight over? She wasn't sure. All that she knew was that she wasn't going to spring on him again just yet. Not if she wanted to stay on her feet. More than likely this was payback for her prank.

"Ow..."

[member="Jaster of Clan Awaud"] [member="Chekīta Awaud"]

 

[Loreena Arenais-Valhoun]

Lori took in a deep breath and let it out in a huff as [member="Kaine Australis"] offered her his hand. She took it and carefully got to her feet. At least she had managed to keep herself from getting dizzy.

Her brows furrowed as Kaine looked her over, not meeting his eyes at all. She swallowed a lump in her throat, telling herself in her mind to not be a big baby. It was just a bump. The fact that [member="Jaster of Clan Awaud"] and [member="Chekīta Awaud"] were watching her made it all the worse. At least [member="Caedyn Arenais"] wasn't here. He'd either laugh at her or want to beat up Kaine himself.

She took the bacta patch and applied it to her forehead, the bump on it tender and probably quite red. He certainly left his mark. Lori did crack a smile however, albeit a small one when Kaine checked on his helmet."I'm not as hard headed as my brother."

And then he met her gaze and asked her what she learned. Oh boy. Now there was a trick question. "I learned to not butt heads with anyone while not wearing a bucket of my own." Not that she really had one. That'll come in time.

 

[Jaster Awaud]

Jaster stopped messing around with his cousin [member="Chekīta Awaud"] as he looked to watch the rest of the fight. She defiantly had a fighting spirit in her, a willingness to never give up and even faced with unwinnable odds, she did not give in. He was somewhat proud of the kid, his other children did not take to this kind of work, Shakk chose to follow the books and Tydus was more interested in finding the force. At the time of their adoption he was still a Dar'Manda, outcast and Exile by the Mand'alor during the recovery period of the Plague. Now though, he was Alor, leader of his people and could no longer let his culture slide off his shoulder like he did in years past.

As [member="Kaine Australis"] finished off his apprentice, the Mechanized Man stood to walk over to Lore. He took the steps and passed Kaine to bend over his ward. With this he lifted his hand to cradle [member="Loreena Arenais"] chin and lifted her gaze to meet his helmets eyes. His other hand made a his sound and his metal gauntlet fell to the ground and a black body suit hand reached up to move Lore's hair from blocking the bump. "You did good kid," He took a look at the rest of her face to make sure her adrenaline rush did not hide any broken body parts. "and it seems you miss the point of the lesson, that you passed," He looked back to Kaine, "At least in my book."

He looked back to Lore and started to get up. His body suite hand fell at his waist and like magic the gauntlet zoomed off the ground and attached itself back to the mans hand. His other hand offered out to grab Lore up. "You've shown that you have what it takes to be Mandalorain, Kaine was holding back enough to not kill you, but even those punches could knock a Rancor on its rear end in one hit."

He continued the lesson however and the reason they were here. "However, you failed to understand why you lose," He got on one knee to really show her his observations. "When you fight, you must keep your mind clear, use all your senses, and watch for the smallest detail," He pointed to Kaine in his armor, "Kaines punches are powerful, but he still needs to ready himself for an attack like anyone else, if you listened closely you would have heard his deep breath before his attack, I am sure he did not even realize he was doing, when fighting for your life, you need to rely more on your head and trust yourself then letting your emotions guide your actions."

He stood up again and looked down to her, "None the less I think you did acceptable for your first time, better then I had hopped though."

 

[Chekīta Kaie]

Chekita approached the 50 year old man as he inspected his helmet after a rather rough head butt, she would not be surprised if the girl got a minor headache from that, but over all the child had fought quite well, kind of made the older woman want to tussle, all in good time. "You knoe Kaine, if your helmet gets dented from a small head smash you may need to check the warranty, if it can't handle a skull how do you expect it to handle an bullet or blaster bolt"? Even if it was just training armor deforming like that was not very common, unless [member="Kaine Australis"] had headbutted the young woman a littler harder then originally thought, but dam [member="Loreena Arenais"] could sure take on hell of a hit.

Turning away from the old man she began to past around [member="Jaster of Clan Awaud"], nodding respectfully at his rather wise council to the young woman, a sly smirk on her face, jut itching to make a small quip about what he was saying. "My my cousin, you bee taking lessons from Jedi lately"? Well being a general in the Republic Remanent probably put the man in many position where meeting and fighting along side Jedi was rather common. "Though you do make a good point, using emotions to often makes you predictable, rash and sloppy, but still you can not totally disregard gut feeling every now and then, it surely has saved my ass more then once".

 

[Loreena Arenais-Valhoun]

Lori looked up to [member="Jaster of Clan Awaud"] as he lifted up her chin. She gave him a small smile as he gave her his praise, yet the pain in her forehead and her ribs reminded her that victory came at a cost. She got to her feet as he helped her up, albeit slowly, her other hand favouring her ribs. Now that her heart rate was going down and her body eased it's tension, she felt exactly where her bruises were going to be.

Jaster continued his explanation and she did her best to understand. She was relying on instinct, going with the first thing that would come to might. She had tried to get to his weak points, tried to get him to expose them, but that just didn't work for her. Maybe when she grew up more she'll be better able to. Of course [member="Kaine Australis"] might be REALLY old by then.

Her eyes shifted to [member="Chekīta Awaud"] while she spoke, glad that there was another that kinda fought in her style, if one could call it that.

Lori then looked up to Kaine. "In a month? That soon?" She lowered her head slightly as he mentioned using the Force when fighting. She didn't even think of it. Of course she wasn't trained in it like her brother [member="Caedyn Arenais"] was doing. "My mom and dad.. they didn't really train me in the Force. Mom said that some would consider it cheating. So...I thought that I'd learn to be good at other stuff instead. Like building things and piloting..." And she was good at that. She didn't really know what she could do with the Force, except creating a small bit of light. She showed her brother that once when they were exploring the caves by their Estate.

 

[Loreena Arenais-Valhoun]

Out of instinct, Lori brought her hand up to her nose and batted at the invisible Force as though it were a fly. Of course that was useless. She wasn't dealing with anything physical. But it was no different than when her twin brother played pranks on her.

She listened to [member="Kaine Australis"] explain his point of view on Force Use. She didn't like cheating. Pranking was one thing, usimg her advantage of being small and light on her feet helped. But that was just for fun. This was....more real. And far less of childish antics. Was this all a part of growing up? Things have already changed, given that she was far from home and living away from her family. But still...taking further steps somehow felt as though she was losing something, something she'd never get back. Maybe that was why her brother had grown more sullen. He was growing up faster than she was. That sort of made her want to cling to her childhood a little more. Maybe that's what the pranking was for.

Reach out with her feelings? But she couldn't see his pokes when they were coming. So how could she react to something that she could only feel when her nose was poked?

Lori tried turning away from him so that he couldn't see her face at all, but that didn't work. She tried to pretend to blow it away with her breath, but that didn't work either. She was getting rather frustrated, stamping her foot on the ground each time she felt that her nose was poked. Finally she just imagined a brick wall protecting her, one that was so strong and it's molecules were so squished together, that not even the Force could penetrate it. Lori kept her focus on it and just waited. Nothing happened for a while. That either meant that her wall had worked, or the more likely in her mind, that Kaine just gave up.

[member="Jaster of Clan Awaud"] [member="Chekīta Awaud"]

 

[Jaster Awaud]

Walking back to his cousin he walked away from the two as they continued their little force training. He was a Force Hunter, and developed a six-sense where he could feel a Force User in the area, though not the direction or strength. He had this gut pinch to warn him of the presence of Force Users all day, though he was able to ignore it and continue through his day he just walked off towards [member="Chekīta Awaud"].

Listening to her comment, he responded, "You may not know this, but I acturally studied at the Jedi Temple on Onderon, Vess, and Coruscant, also was an Observer at a Sith Temple under the One Sith, as well as a ton of other Force Ruins all over the Galaxy."

It was true, Jaster was trained in the Art of Hunting and Capturing Force Users. As such he would have to learn everything about his victims and he did so by learning their combat abilites, reading text about what they can and cant do, as well as observing their day to day life. He even assisted with the creation of a small order of Mandalorian Knights that swore loyalty to Clan Awaud. With the Mand'alors stance on Force Users, he chose to offer his protection to them in exchange of a place to learn. He was no Master, and could never teach someone the Force, but he carried archives of lost information in his database on his Flagship.

Looking to them practicing, it seemed Kaine and Lore were getting along with one another. It was no surprise the young warrior was strong in the Force. Jaster yelled over to [member="Kaine Australis"] and [member="Loreena Arenais"], "Its no surprise shes talented, being the daughter of two powerful people, still she has a hidden power of her own that has the potental of Raw Baskar."

 

[Loreena Arenais-Valhoun]

Lori gave [member="Kaine Australis"] a bit of a proud smile, but deep down she wasn't so sure if she wanted that kind of training. She loved flying and building things. She was even working on her own jet pack so that she could rescue her twin brother if he needed it. "Thanks, but I think that I'll like your training better."

And then [member="Jaster of Clan Awaud"] shouted at them. Her head snapped over in his direction. In her mind, Jaster was giving away her Mom's secret. That was a huge no-no! They weren't allowed to talk about that with strangers. Unless her Mom said it was okay. But as far as she knew, her parents hadn't met Kaine or @Chekïta Awaud . "Hey! You're not supposed to say that!"

Lori placed her hand over her belly. She wanted to go and sit down, have a drink, but she hadn't been dismissed yet.

 

[Chekīta Kaie]

Chekita gave her cousin an odd glance and head tilt in the process, "wow, I did not know that, you sue have had quite the experience, closest I've come to associating with Jedi is sharing a smoke with them while helping to rebuild a small town". "Promptly follow by flipping off a first order storm trooper but that's not important", still it was kind of odd that [member="Jaster of Clan Awaud"] had been all over the place but yet not have half the galaxy after him for on or more reasons. "Guess I have a lot of work to do in catching up, but that is why were are here no, to train in combat, speaking of which sword stuff now".

Her question would be cut off when [member="Loreena Arenais"] said something about not saying that? kind of odd, "What is wrong with that? your father is a powerful force user and you mother a large political figure? or am I missing something"? Eh not her problem, the only time she cared about politics was when she had to guard them, beyond that not really a big interest. "Anways about that training you mentioned Jaster, or do you want to do around [member="Kaine Australis"]"?

 

[Jaster Awaud]

Jaster sat on the seat he was in with his cousin, it was a this time that his ward yelled at him that he had reveiled her mothers secrete. Jaster was one of the few people in the galaxy that knew Queen Kay Arenais, the mother of Princess [member="Loreena Arenais"], was a powerful Force User. However, he did not mean it that way. She commanded one of the strongest minds in the galaxy and a sharp mind was known to be a better weapon then even a Baskar Dagger. But her yelling at her Commander was not something he could stand for, she needed to be taught a lesson of respect.

"Its okay Chek, it seems she wishes to tell her elders how to act," he stood from his chair and went to a supply case near him. From there he pulled out two Vibro-Shortswords and a Blaster Pistol. Placing them on the camp table between him and Lori he stepped back from the weapons, "if you think you are ready to give orders to a Clan Alor then you need to earn that respect and honor through battle, speak to an elder like that will engage battle for the respect owed, so you will have to fight me if you think I am wrong Loreena Arenais, Princess of Commenor, Clansmen of Clan Raxis?"

[member="Kaine Australis"] [member="Chekīta Awaud"]

 

[Loreena Arenais-Valhoun]

Uh oh.

Lori watched [member="Jaster of Clan Awaud"] pull out some weapons. It wasn't often that she had seen him mad and usually whenever that happened, it was at someone else. Not her.

And just as he was mad at her, she was mad at him. Not only did he slip up, but now he gave out her full titles when her identity was more or less a secret in case bad people were after her to get after her parents.

She let Jaster's question hang in the air while she stood there, still holding her ribs and staring at nothing in particular with her anger clearly written on her face. "No sir, not today..." Some other day, maybe, when she was more grown up. But not today.

[member="Kaine Australis"] [member="Chekīta Awaud"]