Dog Days

[Gambler]

It was another beautiful day in the Jedi Temple. A light breeze carried summer air through the open double doors, the warmth counteracting the artificial cold within. Jedi milled about the entrance, some in a terrible hurry and others simply enjoying the day. Shayla Kiani was of the latter group, sitting cross-legged on the top step. Shining blue eyes were closed to the sun while it beat down on her ivory skin. Her robes were tinged with crimson in the bright light, offsetting her dark hair and accentuating her flawless skin.

She had something to do, but that could wait. Running through the halls looking for some Padawan by name was just so boring. It was too perfect outside for her to want to go back into the cold temple. She really should go find her Padawan though. It wouldn't do to make the young one think that she didn't care about her... Ugh, whatever.

She sprung to her feet too suddenly, startling one of the younger Jedi mulling about. He jumped a bit and almost slipped down the steps. Most Jedi would have helped him up or ignored him in the very least. Shayla laughed at him, turning his cheeks scarlet as he ducked away. Jedi just didn't have senses of humor anymore. Oh well, being one of a dying kind was never a bad thing. Besides, she had the looks to start making mini-Shaylas whenever she wanted. All it would take was a willing guy, nine months, and a lifetime of work. Hmm, when it was put that way, maybe she didn't mind being the last sassy Jedi.

Now, where was she supposed to go again? Training room E-3, or was it E-30? Something with an E in it, at least. "The joys of being a Jedi," she sighed. A few moments later she was bouncing off to training room E-3, wondering if her Padawan would even be there. If not then she'd just have to page the young woman to get her attention.

 

[Valentin]

While it was a beautiful day out, Rachel had not allowed herself to go outside. Instead she had buried herself in studies for the longest time while waiting for the time when she was supposed to meet her new master. While she had never heard of the woman before, she was no less eager to begin training, and so even with all the time spent studying she had still somehow managed to arrive in training room E-3 a good half an hour before she had been told to be there.

The room had been empty.

It hadn't bothered Rachel. Instead the young padawan had found a comfortable spot in the center of the room. There, she had lowered herself in to a meditative position, and tried to clear her thoughts of all her nervous anticipation. She stayed this way for the longest time, trying to focus her thoughts, and with the sudden opening of the training room's door she was nearly put on her back from practically jumping in surprise.

Scrambling to her feet, Rachel bowed. She kept her head slightly down as she turned red in the cheeks.

"Master." She said rather meekly.

 

[Gambler]

Shayla cringed at the usage of her title. "Eww, no. Don't call me that," she said. "My name's Shayla, not 'Master'." The door slid shut behind her. A few steps brought her face-to-face with Rachel. Shayla laughed lightly at the young woman's red stained cheeks, a soft, melodic sound. "Oh calm down. It's not like anything big is going to happen anytime soon." She rolled her eyes in a very impish way. For a Jedi Master, Shayla wasn't exactly the epitome of a responsible, wise old counselor, but then again, she wasn't old either.

"So, yeah, let's get started." There was a stand of training lightsabers on the far side of the room, accompanied with a set of training drones and even a little rock. The lightsabers, she decided, would be put to heavy use. The drones? Maybe later. The rock on the other hand was as good as useless. What to do? Well, for starters she had to know what her Padawan already knew and what she wanted to learn. Then they could get to the good stuff.

Basics, basics, basics. That's where everyone starts. A sigh. So that would have to do for her too. "What have you studied so far? Anything good?" she asked, hoping for at least a little experience. Just a little, please? Some lightsaber combat, a few Force tricks, something she could build off of would be helpful.

 

[Valentin]

The laughter only succeeded in reddening Rachel's cheeks further. She had just met her master and already made a fool of herself. How wonderful. Rachel was willing to bet her fellow padawans didn't react so foolishly! Rachel decided to remain silent and followed Shayla's eyes to the training equipment. All of them were items with which she was familiar. The training lightsabers, the drones, and annoyances of all annoyances: a simple rock. Rachel averted her eyes further to the floor when addressed.

"I know Shii-Cho...and I've been attempting to study the ways of Ataru and Makashi." Rachel was almost whispering now, convinced she had thoroughly embarressed herself.

She wanted to apologize for not being very well trained, but restrained herself. Shayla had not reacted very positively to being called master the first time.

 

[Gambler]

So she knew some of the basics, at least. That was good. Shayla only needed to give her a push in the right direction. Cool, less work and more fun. "Sounds like a plan," she said, making her way over to the training sabers. She tossed one to Rachel, flicking the other on for herself. The blade buzzed to life with a flash of blue. Training lightsabers were less energized than full ones, giving them a duller appearance and more of a hollow glow. The hilts were different too, slightly less weight on the ends and thicker in build. It was a good start, if nothing else.

"Show me what you can do, then." She twirled the blade into her left hand with a dazzling flourish. "You go first," she said, gesturing widely with her free hand. "Don't worry about form or anything, this is just for fun." Her smile was both kind and challenging.

 

[Valentin]

Rachel grabbed the training lightsaber, moving back away from her master, and assuming her Shii-Cho stance. She had never actually faught somebody else wielding a lightsaber. She had trained almost religiously, always trying to become better, but she had never really had the test of facing somebody of even her own lowly rank in lightsaber-to-lightsaber combat. This would be a whole new field of exploration for her. Igniting the lightsaber, it's dull blue blade extended, and Rachel hesitated.

Should she even bother, or was she just going to end up embarassing herself?

She then reminded herself: her master was there to train her, not demean her. If she messed up then Shayla would teach her how to improve.

She took two steps forward and sent a short swing from the left side for Shayla's legs.

 

[Gambler]

Shayla was moving immediately, her arm pumping to get the blade onto an intersection course with Rachel's. Her ankles tingled as the resulting shower of sparks touched them. She stepped back, considering how hard she should push her new Padawan. The problem was that she didn't know anything about Rachel other than her name. If she knew her personality then she could push just enough to encourage her to excel, but as it stood she'd have to leave it to guesswork. Should she push now and see how much Rachel could take? Eh, why not.

After the briefest of hesitations, her blade rose from her side. Then she struck back. The blade sliced through the air, cutting a semicircle between them. The blue aftermaths of the light stung her vision field, giving it the appearance of a consistent, if fading, line. Unlike Rachel's cleverly angled strike, Shayla merely struck out at the largest center of mass - which just so happened to be Rachel's chest. It would hurt if it hit, but there should have been ample enough time for Rachel to block it.

 

[Valentin]

Rachel felt the impact between their sabers. It was obvious that Rachel hadn't been fast enough: her master had managed to block in time. She didn't even need to really evade her strike. Then Rachel saw as Shayla's blade came swinging for her center-mass. Rachel tilted back, her braided hair casting across her face as she shifted back on to her heels, and then threw her weight further backwards. She did a complete back-flip, leaping clear of the oncoming strike. While it was nowhere near perfect, it was still quite good.

Rachel seemed to hesitate, as if she hadn't expected to do that.

Well, that was something new.

Rachel raised her training saber once again. She quickly assumed the Shii-Cho stance once again and charged towards Shayla. She swung with another short swing to her right shoulder. If that was blocked she would follow it up with a similar swing for the left side of Shayla's waist.

 

[Gambler]

"Cool backflip," Shayla said to fill the hiatus. Then Rachel was charging, not even giving her enough time to finish that sentence. What a shame. She had such an amazing line to follow up with and now she wouldn't even have the chance to say it. She took a step back, lightsaber raised at a sixty-five degree angle. One breath, then two, and she was ready. Her blade met Rachel's in an oblige line, diverting the strike rather than blocking it dead on. Then she had to move again, as the blade continued on to her waist. It was a little trickier, but she managed to throw up a quick block while rolling her shoulder out of the way. A shift of feet squared her shoulders in their new position, left solidly facing Rachel while the right was angled slightly behind her.

Shayla sighed, the slightest exhalation of pent up breath. They were too close for her to lash out with any measure of force, but that was all right. She didn't want to overwhelm the young woman yet. Her blade was too high for anything other than a vertical slash, so that's what she did. It came down with every ounce of force she could muster within the two foot span between her arm and Rachel's shoulder. Her wrist was tilted slightly, just enough to angle the slice for a clean collar bone strike.

 

[Valentin]

Rachel moved as fast as she could and was desperate to stay close to her master. She knew that as long as they were close together, her master couldn't use her obviously superior skills in use of the Force against her. That meant they would both be required to fight with nothing but purely physical skill, with only their lightsabers. The diverted blow threw off her momentum and she suppresed a yelp as she had lost control of her lightsaber for the briefest of moments. Then she recovered and brought it towards Shayla's waist, only to be blocked once again.

She wasn't able to get a single hit on her! She was too fast!

Rachel almost wanted to scream, but she was too busy raising her blade to block the coming strike. She had to bend her knees and squat down, unable to stop her yelping as Shayla's blade was stopped mere inches above the young girl's collar bone. That didn't stop it from singing some of her braided hair, which smelled terrible in Rachel's opinion.

Mustering her own strength, Rachel attempted to push up on Shayla's blade. She hoped to send it up and leave her master with her lightsaber up in the air. If that was succesful then she would send a strike for the left side of Shayla's center mass. If that failed, Rachel would most likely have to shift to the defensive, and plan her next move carefully.

 

[Gambler]

Shayla frowned slightly at her apprentice's actions. They were too predictable. Sequence after sequence, and still Rachel didn't seem to learn. She kept trying to chain her attacks together, which was good in premise, but in practice her reaction time was too slow. Well, there was only one way to cure that. It was time for a change in tactics. With that thought, Shayla shifted her weight, sliding her right foot inside the circle of Rachel's legs, balancing herself on her left heel. Her position set, she met Rachel's strike, pushing down against her apprentice's blade instead of allowing her own to rise.

She sighed.

This is going to hurt, she almost said, battering downwards with her blade. Then she pushed out with her free hand at Rachel's chest, utilizing every inch of space between them to build up momentum. Her foot slid further behind Rachel's legs to entwine the young woman. The close proximity eliminated the variable of Rachel being able to see the palm and register the move in time to avoid it. If not eliminated it, at least hindered the possibility.

Shayla opened her mouth, a horrible pun on the tip of her tongue, as her hand closed the distance. She could have said something, but instead her lips puckered shut and she focused instead on following through with tripping up her apprentice.

 

[Valentin]

Rachel instantly realized the predicament she was in at about the time that Shayla's hand made contact with her chest. Rachel had no choice but to fall, her lightsaber flying from her hand as she hit the floor. That didn't mean that she was defeated though. Rachel still had a leg in a position that could throw Shayla off if she wasn't expecting it. Besides that, it would lessen Rachel's currently very vunerable position. So she took action as quickly as possible to remedy the situation.

Rachel swung her left leg to the inside of Shayla's right in an attempt to at least partially throw off her balance, if not disorienting her to the extent that Rachel had been floored.

 

[Gambler]

Ankle to ankle, it was a battle in of itself for Shayla to keep herself on her feet. She had to fight for her balance, struggling against Rachel's falling weight to keep herself upright. Luckily for Shayla, only her right foot was caught in Rachel's fall. Her left foot was still behind her, just far enough back for her to lean against it. It was a precarious perch, one that threw her off for a moment, but she managed. Rachel, on the other hand, didn't appear to have such an easy time of it. The amount of willpower it took for Shayla not to laugh was astonishing to say the least. The very image of her young little padawan flat on the floor was more than comical.

Though embarrassing to admit, her apprentice had caught her off-guard with that kick. A padawan, without any formal training, was almost able to knock her off her feet. While nursing her stung pride, she also felt a flower of warmth bloom in her chest. Her apprentice, it seemed, was a far cry from useless. That, if nothing else, was more than enough reason to ignore some superficial pride. It wasn't like there was anyone in here to see them, after all.

Maybe babying the young woman wasn't the right way to go. It just might be that pushing her to her limits and then some would yield even greater results. Throw a little encouragement in there once in a while, and who knew how much progress could be made?

"That was fun," Shayla said, a warm smile gracing her pale lips. "Almost got me, but you'll have to try harder next time." She winked, then she was on the offensive again. It took her a bit longer than she would have liked to catch her balance and prepare herself for another strike, but that couldn't be helped, so she rolled with it. Her blade, held loosely in her left hand, snapped up and then down onto the floor. The strike relied solely on her agility, ceding almost no momentum into it. It was a quick shot, roughly aimed for that lithe mass of a padawan on the floor.

 

[Valentin]

Rachel had felt something almost like pride bubbling up in her chest. Even before Shayla spoke, she knew that she had caught her master off-guard. It wasn't some brilliant moved that had floored her master, but it was one that illicited a congratulations from her. It also illicited a downward strike from her master that was aimed rougly for her center mass. Bringing her hands up in front of her face, Rachel rolled away from her master, and clear of the lightsaber's path of pain.

Standing, Rachel bolted for her lightsaber, and upon retrieving it she returned to the Shii-Cho stance. Now she could defend herself like a proper Jedi.

 

[Gambler]

"Nice stance," Shayla said. "But your style's getting old. Mix it up a little!" With a laugh she lunged. Her left foot crossed forward, the briefest flicker of motion. Her blade, leading in her left hand, made an oblique line across the air separating her from Rachel. The arc lasted less than a breath as it came crashing down upon Rachel. In her current stance, the angle of the strike threw off the general bubble of defense created by Shii-Cho. Rachel would have to think quickly, react even faster, to have any hope at redirecting the shoulder-level strike.

 

[Valentin]

Rachel almost felt embarassed at Shayla's comment, but she didn't have time as her master came at her. It was a strike obviously aimed to complete throw her out of her comfort zone, which made sense seeing as this was training and all. Rachel fought her instinct to back-pedal away from the strike, instead charging in to it, and ducking below the swing. She aimed to drive her shoulder in to her master's center-mass, and at least throw her off her balance again, if not take her completely off her feet.

That last one was a little hopeful, though.

 

[Gambler]

Blade in the air, Shayla did not have enough time to mouth off to her apprentice before stepping back, twisting out of the way of the incoming shoulder. The impact clipped her side, forcing her to lean with her charging Padawan. Her feet were close together, barely giving way to her weight as she bent to regain balance. That precarious perch, for an instant, was also the perfect opportunity. In the brief connection, Shayla's raised arm had the time to position itself behind Rachel, while twisting out of the way lent to the opening she needed. Rachel's charge, while certainly mixing things up, also gave Shayla an opening to upstage her barely proficient Padawan. Again.

As her blade came down, she almost felt bad about what she was doing. With Rachel's charge bringing her forward, slowed by transferring some of the momentum to Shayla's side, there was almost no way she could turn in time to meet the stabbing blade. In one smooth motion, she thrust her remaining weight behind the training saber, sliding it through the air and towards Rachel's shoulder blade. Had it been a real lightsaber instead of a training blade, it would cut clean through muscle and bone, leaving her apprentice dead on the floor. Luckily for them both, the blade did not have the capacity to cut through anything more than a piece of paper, and even then it had some difficulty.

 

[Valentin]

Rachel cried out in pain as the training saber made contact. If this had been a real fight, she would have just been cut in half by her opponent. She was red in the face now, laying on the ground, and seeming to shake a little as she pulled herself off the ground. It was obvious even though she was facing away from her master that she was crying by the muffled sounds and the way her shoulders were moving. Then she suddenly yelled out, hurling her training saber at the wall. It was obvious that whether she knew it or not, her being upset had tapped in to the force, because she threw the saber hard enough that some unimportant looking piece of metal cracked on impact.

"I knew it!" Rachel cried "I knew I couldn't do it!"

She was like a little kid having a temper tantrum.

 

[Gambler]

Shayla blinked. "Wait... what?" Confusion was etched across her face in stark contrast to her usual bored expression. This was new. In her twenty some years of training, she had never once encountered anything like this before. Most of her students were calm, almost lifeless vessels until she beat that out of them. Never had anyone ever thrown a fit in her presence. Usually they just sulked about a bit, sucked it up, and got back on their feet in the name of learning. It was kind of interesting, to say the least. Here was an actual person for once! A dream come true. Instead of the usual fodder sent her way she had been given someone with a little spirit, albeit on the wrong side of the spectrum.

"Um, you'll just have to try harder next time?" she said, going for a comforting tone. Being a novel experience and all, she didn't know how to approach this. Comfort might work. Yeah, let's go with that. "It's not like you're bad or anything. I'm just better. Y'know, it tends to happen when someone's like twice your age," she laughed, a hollow sound.

She sighed, not really knowing what to do next. Tantrums. Hmm, let's see. How to relate to a young woman feeling defeated? Considering that Shayla couldn't remember the last time something had gone sour for her, it was truly a monumental task. She tapped her lip in thought, chewing on her pinky nail every third tap. "Well," she began uncertainly, "you held up there for a while, which is good. I mean, if this was a real fight you would get props for surviving this long. And if I happen to be a good teacher you will know a bunch of cool Force tricks by the end of this little training session, so the next time you go toe-to-toe with a Master you can survive a bit longer. Maybe even win." She smiled.

"Um, wanna try something new? How 'bout some of those cool Force tricks I was talking about." She pointed at the broken training sabers. "Those things are bitches to break, and believe me, I know exactly how hard it is." She spoke with the self-assured tone of personal experience. It was true, at least. Back when she trained under Rev she had broken a training lightsaber trying to hit him. It wasn't her fault the cocky young Knight had been insufferable...

"What do ya say? Sound good?" She was trying hard, really hard, to make up for whatever flipped the switch in Rachel's head. If that much wasn't evident, then nothing would get the young woman to put herself back together.

 

[Valentin]

It was obvious that Rachel was trying to calm down, even before Shayla was finished speaking. Throughout all of her training she had been continouly nagged by a feeling of inferiority. She didn't know why that was, but regardless of why, it had stalked her through the years. All of the other Padawans were always faster, learned quicker, controlled the force easier, and always seemed to have a better time of things than she did. Whether this was true or not never seemed to effect Rachel's feelings on the matter.

The movement in her shoulder's slowed as Rachel tried to stop her crying.

"It doesn't matter If I'd get props: I'd still be cut in half." Rachel sniffled, "Thanks, though."

Checking to make sure that her nose wasn't running, Rachel used one of her sleeves to quickly dry her eyes, and turned to face Shayla once again. Shayla was obviously trying very hard to comfort her, so she could at least try returning the favor by trying her hardest to calm down and learn. She took a deep breath to make sure she was calm. Then Rachel actually attempted a smile and nod at the offer of force training.

"Okay, I'm ready." Rachel gave a small smile.