It's About Time (Owyn Deak's Training)

[Raif]

Owyn Deak wiped the sweat from his brow as the Ossus Jedi Temple came fully into view. He had just finished up his daily trek through the jungle, and needed to hurry to get cleaned up in order to meet the daily chores awaiting him.

Daily chores that had become more and more mundane over the last six years. It had been six long years that Owyn had been at the temple, since the age of twelve. Now, having turned eighteen not too long ago, the future was uncertain for the wannabe-padawan.

If he did not get picked up by a Jedi to be their full-time padawan soon, he would more than likely be shipped off to Agricorps or some other farming company to use his meager force abilities to help crops grow. He understood that, for some, that was a noble calling - but for Owyn Deak, being a Jedi was the only thing he had wanted for many, many years.

Several years ago, when his classmates began being assigned to Knights and Masters as padawans, Owyn wasn't the least bit upset that he was left behind. After all, he didn't begin his tutelage at the temple until he was 12. But now?

"It's been a long time..."

Owyn muttered to himself, digging into his pocket for a nutri-stick that would consist of his breakfast for the day. Breaking off a small piece, he offered it up to the small creature sitting on his shoulder.

"What do you think, Tikk, will today be the day?"

The creature gave him an incredulous look, as if telling him not to get his hopes up, and Owyn laughed softly to himself. Heading into the temple, he kept his head down so as to not attract too much attention on the way to his quarters. Once inside, he almost didn't notice the message waiting for him on his small cot.

A Jedi had chosen him as a padawan! The young man almost couldn't believe it.

"It's about time!"

Owyn hurried to clean himself up, hoping word would reach him soon on where to meet up with his new master.

 

[Void]

Shingen's eyes slowly opened as he crept from his meditation. He quickly looked around the room to see what had woken him but there was only emptiness. He pondered the situation for a moment before going back into a mediation trance. Only to immediately wake again.

"Hello!"... He got to his feet and checked to see if anyone was outside the room. "HELLO!"... But he received no response. "Maybe I have just been mediating in there for too long, I wonder how Nuka does it?"

He left the room and began wondering the the temple looking for something to occupy himself with.

---01000001 00110101---

He entered his training hall early that morning to watch the sunrise. It had been two days since he had gone wondering and found his way to the training hall. He now stood waiting to great his new padawan.

 

[Raif]

Owyn Deak was a storm of nervous emotion as he stood outside the training hall. Inside was his master, and the next step in his jedi training, but Owyn kept finding reasons to not open the door. First he had to tighten his equipment belt, then straighten his robes, then pick off some lint from his shoulder, then loosen his equipment belt.

Glancing over at Tikk, who was in his customary spot on Owyn's shoulder, Owyn saw the small primate's fur was rippling through several shades of color; a clear indication the small creature was ill-at-ease, which in turn was a clear indication that Owyn was ill-at-ease. The two were connected on a deep level, and often mirrored each others emotions.

"Ah, kriff it..."

Owyn finally built up the courage to open the door, and he bowed deeply upon entering the chamber. He wasn't really sure what the proper action was in this instance, so he just went with his instinct and made the first move.

"Good morning, master. I am Owyn Deak. I understand I am to be your padawan."

Tikk let out a loud hiss, and Owyn laughed despite the formality of the moment.

"Oh, and this is Tikk, my 'familiar' I guess you would call him."

 

[Void]

Shingen was in the center of the room facing the large windows. The light from the recently risen sun filled the room. "Good morning to you to." Shingen span on the spot to face Owyn and bowed his head slightly as Owyn bowed. He quickly noticed the ball of fluff sat on the shoulder of the one stood before him but made no indication that he had.

"Come and have a seat." He gestured to the spot on the floor just in front of himself. "Now before we begin I need to check, is your name is actually Owyn Deak?"

 

[Raif]

Owyn blinked his eyes in surprise, and Tikk's fur flashed yellow in a mimicry of his master's emotions. The young padawan had anticipated many questions in this first meeting with his master, but an inquiry as to his identity had not been one of them.

"Uh...as far as I know, yes, my name is Owyn Deak. Why, is there some sort of problem...master?

 

[Void]

Shingen smiled. "There is no problem, just checking." He began slowly studying the creature. "What would you like to achieve from our training together?"

 

[Raif]

Owyn nodded his head as the jedi asked his next question; this was something more along the lines he had expected.
"I would like to strengthen, as much as possible, my abilities with the force. I know these are dark times, with a war raging and thousands dying, so I would like to solidify my knowledge of lightsaber combat as well. However, from what I have read in the archives, it seems that a Jedi who has the full power of the Force as his ally needs no weapon to win battles. That is what, one day, I hope to achieve.

Owyn hoped his little speech didn't sound overly-rehearsed; he had only been working on it for a few years after all.

 

[Void]

Shingen was very impressed with the speech but was unsure why no one had picked him up sooner, he showed a lot of potential. "So you would like to only rely on your lightsaber as a back up? That in very interesting, so that I don't start teaching you something you already know, what do you know at this point and what would you say you are best at?"

 

[Raif]

Owyn thought for a second before replying.

"Well, master, I have learned the basics of Shii-Cho just like all the apprentices..."

The whole truth of the matter was that Owyn was not the greatest with a lightsaber, but through little fault of his own. Students his own age were much more talented because of greater training, and so avoided sparring against him because of the ease with which they beat him. On the other side of the coin, students who were at his same skill level were often several years his junior, and so avoided him because of the advantages in size and speed he possessed.

"...and I also have a fair grasp of the basic Sense and Alter skills with the Force."

Owyn gave Tikk a quick glance and a grin before he finished.

"Not to sound immodest, but if I had to claim my 'best' skill it would be my rapport with wild creatures. There are times where I swear I can communicate with them as clearly as you and I a speaking now."

 

[Void]

"Very interesting, I have never heard of the force being used like that before, which means no one I know can do it or you are a bit mad." He laughed jokingly. "When did you first find this out?" He wondered what the animal had said when they first walked in the room.

 

[Raif]

"Well, to be honest, I don't remember exactly when it first happened. I was stranded in the jungle, and one day Tikk was just there. I was just a kid still, so the idea that he could talk wasn't all that crazy at the time. When I got older I started to realize it was not so much talking as understanding emotions, but there are times when it feels as clear as a spoken conversation."

Owyn glanced over to the small creature on his shoulder, which blinked its large eyes and then scampered down onto the floor and off into a corner to investigate the room.

"It's not just with him though, I found I could calm down angry predators sometimes, and even track prey animals just by feeling them nearby. Again, it wasn't until later, specifically when I began study here at the temple, that I realized these weren't exactly normal traits."

 

[Void]

"Hu... I to was once stranded by myself, only it was a very dry and warm climate with no vegetation or living creatures, I don't know what I would have done if another ship had not crashed near by or there had not been any survivors, maybe I would have gone mad and started to imagine people... Not to say you are imagining this." He quickly stopped what he was saying when he realised that it might been have coming across as him implying his padawan was definitely mad.

“Anyway let us not spent too much time on this, it would be silly to start with as it is your strongest aspect of the force. Now then I would like you to dodge these. Without using the force to manipulate them.” Immediately after he stopped talking two deactivated lightsaber hilts shot across from either side of the room, one was at waist height and the other at head height.

 

[Raif]

Owyn didn't react to the slight implication that he was crazy. After years of other apprentices coming right out and questioning his sanity to his face, the young man had grown a pretty tough skin.

As the training lightsabers hurtled towards him, a combination of the reflexes honed in the jungle and his own meager Force senses gave him the time he needed to react. Rather than flip about in a big show of acrobatic skill, Owyn did only what needed to be done to dodge the threat. With one hilt at head height and one at waist, Owyn simply dropped down onto his stomach and allowed the threats to pass harmlessly by.

Quickly checking to make sure there were no other threats waiting for him, Owyn stood back up and dusted a bit of dust off of his training robes.

 

[Void]

"Very good, now try as best as you can to avoid being hit by this one, but now you must not move from that spot, you can lean to look at the hilt to watch where it is going but not to dodge it and you may only use the force to push it away, do not try and pull or grab it. Do this for as long as you can." One of the hilts flew over to Shingen's hand and he began moving it around slowly with his finger tips. Where as the other one hovered around Owyn for a bit before flying towards his chest.

 

[Raif]

Owyn took a deep, steadying breath and tried to call on the Force as this new task was laid out before him. He was momentarily distracted by the saber spinning in Shingen's and was only able to Push away the other hilt at the last moment, making it avoid smashing into him by a few centimeters at most.

Come on Owyn, this is just like basic deflection training with a lightsaber...training a six year old can do!

Drawing in another deep breath, Owyn took the few moments before the hilt came flying back at him to imagine a jungle plant he had encountered while stranded. In order to protect its honey from predatory wasps, the plant had several dozen small vines it could whip about to smack away anything that got too close.

With this image firm in his mind, Owyn began using the Force exactly like those vines, whipping out to smack aside the hilt as it came flying in from various angles. He was able to succeed at this for a few dozen passes before, sweat sticking out on his brow from his mental exertions, he missed a push and the hilt sped towars his chest. He thought about jumping out of the way to avoid the sting of pain, but almost immediately thought against it and embraced the pain of defeat.

Hanging his head in defeat, he mentally prepared himself for the repurcussions. After waiting this long for a master, he hated to make any mistakes; he wanted to be perfect.

"I am sorry, master."

 

[Void]

"There is nothing to be sorry about. When training never think of it as failing, think of it as not reaching you goal to know where to improve yourself so that you don't fail. If you feel you can go on I would like to see if you can top that."

 

[Raif]

Owyn nodded his head, took another deep breath, and motioned for the exercise to begin again. This time, he again called to mind the vision of the vine-plant, but with one big difference; rather than try to keep track of the hilt as it buzzed around and predict where it was going to strike, he instead allowed himself to slip into the Force and let it guide his actions like a strong current. In this manner he almost felt trance-like, batting aside one attack after another with little to no forethought or hesitation.

After what seemed an eternity but could have been just a handful of minutes the exertion became too much and one slipped through his defense. Snapping out of his near trance, he blinked a few times before fully focusing on the other Jedi in the room.

"So, how did I do this time?"

 

[Void]

"Much better you seemed more confident in your control that time round." The second saber shot into Shingen's free hand and he began mirroring the other ones movements. "You can have a much time as you would like to rest before we move onto the next training exercise. This time round you can only pull or grab at it while I will try to keep it away from you. Let me know when you feel ready and we will begin." Shingen closed his eyes and began meditating.

 

[Raif]

Owyn allowed himself a quick grin at the praise he received before settling down onto his knees for a quick rest. He had not yet come even close to mastering a true Jedi healing trance, but after a few minutes and several deep breaths he felt a bit of rejuvination flow back into his weary body. Standing back up, he nodded at Shingen and said,

"Ok, master, I'm ready."

Slipping back into that trance-like state of being embraced by the Force, which was luckily becoming easier and easier to do, Owyn this time allowed his senses to reach outward. Grabbing for the hilt with his mind - and, like most force users of his level, simultaneously reaching out with a hand as well - Owyn took a direct approach and simply exerted a mighty TUG on the hilt...

...which amounted to nothing even resembling success. Furrowing his brow, Owyn tried that tactic ceveral more times, but to no avail. It seemed as if whichever way Owyn tried to pull the hilt, Shingen was able to effortlessly pull it back the opposite direction.

Deciding to try a different track, Owyn closed his eyes and reached out with both hands. In his mind, he imagined he was reaching out to gently catch a glow-fly in his hands. He didn't want to crush it, just gently pull it back towards himself. He tried doing with the force what he had just imagined in his mind; surrounding the hilt, giving it nowhere to go, and pulling it in his direction...

OOC: I'll leave it up to you whether that strategy is successful.

 

[Void]

Shingen could feel Owyn's tight grasp on the hilt and allowed him to pull it in. "Good you look like you have got the idea. Now in your spare time I would like you to find another padawan around your level and if they don't know what to do give them a quick tutorial or find someone like Morganis Tartarus who already knows what to do and take it in turns. Sit together and one tries to pull it in as the other tries to push it away. Just like we were doing just then." The The hilts shot back to their place and Shingen got to his feet. "That was the basic push and pull form of telekinesis, from which most force abilities are built on. I would like you to go now and practice like instructed. Which would you like to learn next?"