When Ice Meets Feathers

[Darth Metus]

Denko could not remember the last time he had set foot upon the dreary world, yet in the time he had been away...nothing changed. The heavens were still obscured by a perpetual veil of gray. Icy rain still cascaded down, pelting the cloning facilities below. The oceans raged. The winds howled. Kamino had not changed a bit...Yet the two Masters did. It was almost ironic how they, bound by blood, had ventured down two completely different paths.

On one hand was a man who was mentored by pillars of the Light. Grandmasters of the Jedi Order and heroes of the Galaxy. On the other was a woman who once struck terror in the hearts and minds of men. By her might did ascend to the mantle of Sith Empress. By her will did their borders ever expand.

It was ironic that these two, Light and Dark, just so happened to be on relatively good terms. Yet that did not deter Denko from making a challenge to his cousin. This was not one born out of a desire to prove himself, nor a radical urge to fight against perceived Darkness. No, today the Feeorin needed to sharpen the skills he had allowed to lay dormant for so long. He needed to be at his peak, for the One Sith Empire was ever closer to eliminating the Republic once and for all.

He had to stop them. He had to be strong enough to push back the Darkness.

As such, the challenge was made: a duel upon a world of storms and wind. Standing tall, the Jedi only wore the robes customary of the Order and wielded a weapon wrought of his own hands. Frostfall. Gazing across the platform, he then held the blade in the direction of [member="Ashin Varanin"] before speaking briefly. After this, there would be no more words; but only the symphony of steel upon steel.

"Ladies first."

 

[Ashin Varanin]

[member="Denko"]

It had to be ten, twelve, fifteen years since she'd fought a duel on Kamino. The circumstances had been radically different, and the opponent as well. The last time she'd crossed blades in the Rishi Maze -- so far as she recalled, anyway; there had been a lot of fights -- had been against Darron Wraith, shortly before his ascension to Jedi Grandmaster. And shortly before she took the throne of the Sith Empire. Those had been simpler times, before regret blotted out ambition. A small part of her suggested that she was her Feeorin cousin's charity case today. Another part, more tinted by pride than by suspicious insecurity, made a counteroffer: he might just be looking to prove himself against the best.

And a third, much larger part didn't care. Not for the sake of any overriding concern or objective, but simply because she'd lost track of these moments. Her life contained so many rain-soaked pistes and flat, simple battlefields and complex obstacles -- and a single opponent with a blade. Or a horde of them. Sometimes guns, explosives, special weapons were involved. It all blended into one, in hindsight.

"If you think I'm a lady, Denko..." She shook her head, couldn't hold back a chuckle. The sword she carried was called Ravening. She preferred her lightsabre, but Denko had requested it, maybe out of a desire to see what it was like to fight a major Sith blade, which Ravening both was and wasn't. There were dangers involved in going up against this sword. Of those dangers, she'd only said 'It's an unforgiving weapon, and it cuts in permanent ways.' When going up against a weapon like this, not knowing the full consequences was an indispensable part of the experience. Ravening was longer and heavier than Frostfall by a very small margin, a bit larger still in proportion to their heights and builds. But momentum was the least of its hazards. Ashin held the sword comfortably but carefully, respectfully. She walked to the centre of the platform, boots sloshing in the rain, and took up a balanced stance. Left foot back, weight evenly distributed on the balls of her feet, sword in two hands and held upright in a neutral sort of way -- a simple and noncommittal stance. As of yet, she didn't attack. She rarely attacked first, invited or not. That was Dun Moch, in a minor sense: she had no compunction over instilling a little bit of cognitive dissonance in Jedi by waiting for them to make the first lethal move.