I just wanted to say, TR contacted me awhile ago and had this great idea: disparate POVs from the the same scene. So after some back-and-forth, we both came up with what follows. Hope you all enjoy reading as much as it was to write
. And special props to TR for suggesting this
BTW, this takes place immediately after my "Misdirection" Interlude.
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Interlude-Conflagration in the SnowWith the information given to us by Caedon that Gaetana was on Belessar, supposedly looking for a Sith artifact, we’d made the most direct jump there. And while D’Aylanna and I didn’t trust Caedon, he knew things about Gaetana that most did not. Still, we also knew that Gaetana was probably expecting us…or at least something. So, instead of confronting her at the Sith Temple in the Viridias Forest, I had planned to scout out the landscape, looking for the best route. And my diligence had paid off: D’Aylanna and I had found a part of the woodlands that would work to funnel Gaetana into a shallow-sloped valley with fewer trees and less snowfall. Well, fewer relative to the rest of the forest. For the most part, the entire canopy was as dense as ground below. Still: D’Aylanna and I were able to find an excellent ambush site.
And as the time approached, I went over my mental checklist for the hundredth time. My lightsaber and shoto were ready, my cortosis glove already on my left hand. I had been practicing first primarily left-handed saber combat and then Jar’Kai. I was now as good with both hands as I had been previously with only my right. I also had several concussive discs in my belt. This time, I would not fall to Gaetana. Especially not with D’Aylanna at my side.
Soon, our vigilance was rewarded and we could sense a…dark-side presence. Even though the underbrush was thick, she had made very little noise. Interesting. This…felt…different. Granted, it had been sometime since I’d last seen Gaetana but… My contemplations were cut short.
Gaetana had stopped. Peering from my vantage, I could see a tall, cloaked figure all in black, head cocked slightly to the side. I knew that the time was now. While Gaetana’s head was turned away, I leapt, surrounding myself in the Force, igniting both of my lightsabers. Simultaneously, D’Aylanna nimbly somersaulted opposite me, flanking Gaetana, her purple blade springing into existence.
With speed that defied description, Gaetana reached over her shoulder. But what happened next caused me to pause. Expecting Gaetana’s signature orange lightsaber, the dark figure instead wielded a red saberpike, black metal extending several feet below where a normal lightsaber hilt would end in a pommel. It was a large weapon; its presence usually meant one of two things: the user was going to hunt large game or—more likely—the practitioner was a master.
I had my answer as soon as my lightsaber connected with the saberpike blade. D’Aylanna and I were facing a master. Thinking I’d see Gaetana’s face looking back at me underneath the black hood, I had my second shock: a black and red mask covered the face of a man.
What the hell…? I saw that D’Aylanna had the same realization. Instantly, we both responded accordingly.
Circling around his flank, D’Aylanna attacked while I went in for a two-bladed assault to distract. Incredibly, the man not only blocked
both of my sabers, but then he backflipped out of D’Aylanna’s strike. Coming to rest on an upturned ancient tree root, the man called forth a great gust of dirt, momentarily blinding us.
D’Aylanna recovered first, jumping in front of me while I was still trying to clean my eyes. Her purple blade intercepted the red saberpike just in time. Falling to the side while D’Aylanna began a ferocious attack, I reignited my shoto. Looking for any opening to exploit, I saw an opportunity before I could get into saber range. Instead, I projected a powerful Force Push just as D’Aylanna’s saber knocked the man’s saberpike aside. Before he could properly defend, my Force Push battered at him, knocking him back against another tree and down to a knee. Incredibly, he had already recovered as D’Aylanna and I both re-engaged him.
How..?Using the unspoken rapport that we’d had for years, D’Aylanna and I pressed our attack. This time I engaged while my wife set up for a pincer. But even my lightning-quick double attack was parried, setting up the man’s defense against D’Aylanna. Before she could get into position, he shot a quick kick that halted her. While it did little damage, it caught her off guard, forcing her to retreat as the man followed up with a spinning defense that covered him on both sides. But, it did allow me to find a strong position.
As the man had spun out to kick, he’d been slowly heading towards the trough of the forest floor, giving me the high ground. Using my advantage, I renewed my attack. After a flurry of swings, first low then high and each one parried, the man responded. Somehow he was able to riposte from his high parry. Again, I was forced to break off. However, D’Aylanna had been busy. Before the man could recover from his attack at me, she was within close-quarters to him. Kneeing his ribs, my wife knocked him back. Simultaneously, she attacked with her blade. But even as he was reeling from D’Aylanna’s kick, he was able to get his saberpike up, intercepting my wife’s blade. And while it struck, hitting his shoulder, it did little damage. Still, I could see that D’Aylanna couldn’t believe it either.
Trying to take advantage of the man’s pain and—at least I hoped—his preoccupation, I re-engaged him. Our blades made a flurry of color: blue, red, silver; a plasma cloud that was as beautiful as it was dangerous. But even as I met him strike for strike, I could not find any hole in his defense. Worse, he’d been maneuvering deliberately, keeping a tree between himself and either D’Aylanna or myself, mitigating our numerical advantage.
Damn he’s good, I thought.
Then, as his saberpike turned D’Aylanna’s blade away, he used his physical momentum to project a powerful Force Push at me. Unprepared, it hit me full force, throwing me several meters into the air…and right into the cavernous hole of a taiga cenote. Landing hard on my back, I momentarily had the wind knocked out of me. I was out of the fight, at least for a short time.
<<<<< >>>>>
Seeing her husband fall, D’Aylanna felt her heart in her throat. Reaching out with the Force, she was able to immediately determine that he was alive, if slightly injured. She knew that she could not afford any distractions, and D’Aylanna was up to the task. Switching from Ataru to Juyo, she attacked fiercely. Even the man in black seemed taken aback, so intense was her assault. And as she pressed, she saw an opening…but it was risky. Calculating the risks, she committed. Lunging forward, her blade targeted the man’s leg. And a split-second before she impaled it, he parried, knocking both blades wide also causing a shallow cut on D’Aylanna’s arm. But it was costly…for the man in black. D’Aylanna was now inside his defenses, the saberpike too long at such close quarters. She threw two quick strikes with her knuckles, connecting both times, causing the man to bow forward. And in doing so, his skin touched D’Aylanna’s fingers.
Instantly, her Gift—her curse—took hold of her. Through the Force, she could see within him the inner conflict. Fragmented visions flew past, a deluge threatening to overwhelm her. But, she was a master at Force Precognition. Compartmentalizing, she was able to scrutinize the individual visions without being distracted. And she knew that that was the key to this fight: she had to distract the man in black. Even when her husband was with her, the man was a superior saber practitioner. What was it that she had seen…music? No, not music. A…song? No,
the Song. She knew what she had to do.
“Why do you reject the Song? What makes you abjure it?” Her lightsaber was a purple defense against the man’s powerful saberpike strikes. “I can sense the conflict within you.” Quickly, she had an insightful thought. “Do you even know why you fight the Song?” But even as she asked the questions, she could tell that they hit their target, and hard. The man stopped momentarily, literally stepping back.
“What…the…Song?” However even as he spoke, he shook his head. “No. NO!” And with renewed vigor, he attacked. And if his assault had been assertive before, it was savage now. D’Aylanna was a master at Juyo but even her defenses were being tested. Losing ground, she kept retreating before the onslaught of the man’s violent strikes. Working her saber hard, steam began to rise from her shoulders, the cold of the forest banished with the literal heat of battle. He was able to score another shallow cut on her thigh but, worse, she knew that her defense was beginning to falter.
Before she could spare another thought concerning her retreat, the man called forth with the Force a gale of stones that struck D’Aylanna. One cut her chin bad enough that blood ran freely while the others only caused a momentary distraction. But it was enough for the man in black. Lightning, bright as a star, began to coalesce around his red blade, flowing downward, arcing with the black metal of his saberpike. Simultaneously, the man stabbed the tip of his weapon into the forest floor, an enormous shockwave detonating outward in an expansive electric surge, destroying much of the surrounding fauna as well as propelling D’Aylanna into the air. With a bone-crunching hit, she connected with a tree, sliding down onto the ground unconscious.
Slowly, the man in black walked towards her. He reached a hand out tentatively towards her…
<<<<< >>>>>
Shaking my head to clear the cobwebs, I was finally able to stand without any vertigo. Using a Force technique to augment my injured body, I felt better. Somewhat.
It took me a few moments to find a solid platform in the cenote. From there, it still took me two Force Jumps before I was able to escape the cenote. Quickly regaining my footing, I ignited both of my lightsabers, opening myself to the Force, searching for D’Aylanna.
That way... Running, I closed the distance quickly.
I felt it before I saw anything. D’Aylanna’s presence in the Force erupted with pain. Almost hitting me like a physical blow, I staggered. Panic began to well up. Run. RUN!
And as I crested a hill, I saw the man in black towering over D’Aylanna’s prone body, his hand stretched out to her…
And something…snapped. I saw red; anger, no FURY that I hadn’t felt in awhile washed over me like a collapsing avalanche. Wordlessly, I attacked.
My offensive was brutal, ferocious. The man in black lost ground as he retreated before my assault. Within a minute, I’d scored two hits; one on the back of his forearm and a more serious strike that cut into his helmet, exposing his brown (hazel?) eye. And still, I attacked. The fury of my assault was such that I was able to drive him back, the snow on the ground steaming from the heat in the air.
Sadly, heart can only take one so far. In a battle such as this one, power was the only capital that mattered. The man in black was able to recover enough that he stalled out my attack. Once again, we locked blades. He was slightly taller than me but I outweighed him by almost 40 kilograms. And
he was overpowering
me. Soon, I was forced to jump back.
That was a mistake. Faster than anyone I’d ever seen, the man’s leg kicked out connecting just above my hip, causing my shoto to go spinning off into the entangled underbrush of the forest floor, lost. Grabbing my lightsaber with both hands, I fell into a defensive posture as I adopted Soresu. And it was all that I could do to keep the man’s red blade from striking home. Time and again I was able to parry…only to realize that he’d found another miniscule opening to exploit. He was working away at me and in this war of attrition, it would be a death by 1000 cuts.
Breathing heavily, I forced myself into close quarters, locking blades with him. For a moment, we stared at one another, his brown eye (so close in color to my own…) and my hazel. Suddenly, with speed born of Force-enhanced reflexes, he grabbed my cybernetic right hand. And—somehow—his hand clamped down on it, shattering the servos, positronics, and biomechanical components.
Once again bereft of my right hand, I fell into a left-handed defensive posture, one that I’d been practicing since Gaetana had taken my right hand before. But I knew that it was a futile attempt. If I could not best the man in black with all of my faculties about me and D’Aylanna’s help, what chance did I have now? Thinking about my wife, my anger flared again. Fighting back tears of loss, I charged. But even with my rage fueling me, it was only a matter of time.
On one of my passes, the man followed up his parry with a quick, spinning lunge, the butt of his saberpike connecting solidly to my solar plexus. Using his momentum, his red blade knocked my blue blade low, leaving me substantially open. I knew that I had a split second. I called forth Kinetite, hoping to hit my opponent before he could strike. But he was too quick.
A searing pain drilled into my head as his saberpike stabbed into my left eye, while at the same time I released the Kinetite. Exploding prematurely, I was thrown back several meters. Feeling as if I were swimming in mud, I fought to regain my senses. Looking down, I noticed—with almost detached interest—that I had been impaled by the tree branch that I’d landed on. Pain was a constant. But all that really mattered was D’Aylanna. My
Ereneda. Looking up, I saw the man approach.
“Why did you attack me?” The man’s voice sounded…off. Almost as if I was hearing it through a mechanical filter. The lone brown (…hazel...) eye that I could see was…inquisitive. Not angry. Not contemptuous. Merely curious.
“…Thought you…were…Gaeta…someone else.” My right eye was able to focus on the man, even if the rest of my body was…distant. Almost as if it were happening to someone else.
I thought I heard him grimly mutter “Gaetana” under his breath, but I was probably wrong. Instead, he raised his eyes, saying “…What,” he began, barely audible, “...do you know of the…Song?”
I wasn’t sure if I’d heard correctly.
The…Song?But even as I contemplated what he’d asked, I could tell that the man had disregarded his own question.
Standing, the man raised his saberpike, looking like the executioner that I thought him to be. But as I sat unblinking, impaled upon the branch, he stood, motionless. And then he did something that I couldn’t believe: he extinguished his saberpike, calmly replacing the weapon in the holster on his back. His eyes met mine once more, looking as if he was going to speak. But then his face hardened and he turned to walk away.
Suddenly, slowly, he stopped. Without facing me, he cocked his head to the side. “…I…I’m sorry. About your…woman. But, she’s alive.” He paused. “…Tell her…that Rowahn sends his apologies…” He was quiet for a length of time. And just when I thought he was going to walk away, he spoke in a quiet voice, just loud enough for me to hear, “…and go home to Jorya.” As he walked away, part of my mind thought
Jorya?...But…how?And beyond everything else, the pain, the sorrow, the exhaustion, one item rang through my head like a clarion bell.
ROWAHN.
