Ask Kro Var: Seriously Misunderstood Creatures

[Dash Pavan]

KRO VAR
11.38 local time​

Dash jabbed at the edge of the stone with his pick, driving the sharp edge beneath the rim of the huge buried rock and trying to prize it free. He sang to himself as he worked, his voice echoing through the caverns above. Dash had found that song often helped him weave the Force in new and creative ways, but for now it worked better on ice than rock. The boulder refused to give and he paused to catch his breath and wipe the sweat from his brow.

He decided to take a break, loosening the rope on his climbing harness and sliding down until his booted feet met the ground. He had been working to clear this lower corridor all morning but it was slow going. He kept coming across different rocks and minerals at really odd angles and he had a suspicion there had been a cave in down here some time back.

He knew he would get there. It had been nearly two months now and the Rhinnalian was actually quite proud of the progress he had made laying the foundations for a new Jedi temple inside the mountain. Dash had made a wide entrance at ground level, a main reception chamber and a couple of offshoots for sleeping quarters etc. It was all quite crude at the moment, nothing properly carved or ornate, but he would get to that.

He really wanted to get started on the lower halls around the nexus, where Jedi could benefit from the energy beneath the mountain to meditate and focus, and the ice gallery he had in mind to develop his seeing skills. That was why he had left the couple of assistants and droids the Order had sent to their work above, and come down here to try and get ahead. Most of the heavy work needed his powers to get done and he never felt stronger than when near the nexus.

Work. That was why he was hiding down here. It had absolutely nothing to do with the fact Leon was coming, or that the last time they saw each other Dash left him to face death.

Nope. Nothing at all.


@Zay

 

[Leon Baudelaire]

Leon stood at the top of an outcropping. His eyes scanned the craggy horizon, while his skimboard was tucked under his arm. So, much had changed since Kashyyyk. His head still swam with the implications. Not to mention the call to arms and the ever growing laundry list of things he had to do. Everything in him told him to blow this venture off, but he couldn’t.

It was Dash.

Following his return from Adumar, Baudelaire’s circle of close compatriots had become the members of Scrub Squad and Jayna. His family was gone. The resistance he’d grown up with was gone. Everything he’d been or had before the Jedi was gone… and now The Order was under siege, dark side abominations ran rampant, and the Sith were no doubt out and about looking to use this opportunity to their advantage.

It’s what he would have done.

Leon found himself picking at the “X” shaped scar on his cheek. Old habits. Peetwo poked it’s head out of his bag and hummed softly. Baudelaire had watched the tape. He’d watched it hundreds of times. He’d seen Dash leave. He’d seen the look on his friend’s face. It was clear the fight had shaken him. It had shaken Leon. The whole thing had shaken him to his core. The moment his lightning hit his adversary and they got back up lived in his mind’s eye. The glaring disparity between the power of the dark and the light side of the force— No, this wasn’t an issue with the force. It was with him.

Baudelaire glanced at Peetwo, “Hang on buddy, this is gonna be a bumpy ride.”

One bumpy ride later…

Base camp was as sparse as one would expect on a planet like this while The Order was at war. He was directed by the assistants and an overly enthusiastic droid to the mouth of a cave, in the cave he spotted a guy wearing the most ludicrous climbing gear Leon had ever seen and he knew immediately it was Dash.

“How does that harness not chafe your nipples, wait are they ice now too,” he teased.

There was an immense amount of tension between the two of them. Dash looked a lot like he had at Ezra's call to arms. He’d changed. His hair wasn’t blonde anymore... it was… blue and seemed to glitter like ice in the dim light. Leon's changes hadn't been as apparent, but he wasn't the same guy he'd been the last time they'd met.

“You wanna talk about it now, or later?” asked the Adumarian.

@Alhon

 

[Dash Pavan]

The Adumari still got the jump on Dash despite being expected. The Rhinnalian had his eyes closed, hands on the ice wall where he was trying to ease it back to expose another outcropping. The first he knew that Leon was there was the quip about his outfit.

“Gotta have the gear” he shrugged “I guess we won’t tell Ez we chat about my nipples”. It was awkward, but it was something to say. Besides, Dash was not about to admit he was vain enough to have considered exactly how his getup looked. He was the master here after all and was indulging every impulse.

Leon looked much the same in many ways, lithe and action ready, with that tousled hair that somehow always made messy look like a style. There was a scar on his cheek though and Dash thought his cheer was a little strained.

Surprisingly, his friend went for the jugular immediately. Dash fumbled for an answer. “If you mean Kashyyyk, it was…you know…the thing with it all was-“.

Dash broke off as a sudden rumble rose out of nowhere all around them. His head snapped around just in time to see the rock he had been excavating shift suddenly and he felt the ground move beneath their feet. Something gave and the floor began to tilt, pulling Dash down and likely sending them both down into a deep pit that yawned open below them.

The Rhinnalian rolled and fell among the collapsing rock, what few handholds he could grab collapsing no sooner than he touched them. He could do little to stop his fall, tumbling into a cavernous empty space beneath where they had been and hitting the ground hard.

@Zay

 

[Leon Baudelaire]

Leon scoffed, “I’m sure Ole Jabs has plenty to say about your nipples.”

Baudelaire could feel the anxiety radiating from his friend as he tried to fumble through his explanation. Half way through Dash was cut off by a resounding CRACK! Leon frowned looking around the cavern in a vain attempt to locate the origin of the noise.

That’s when the whole world shifted.

Leon was thrown to the ground. His head bounced off a rock and stars burst across his vision. He could feel himself moving… sliding? His senses crashed back into him like a slap to the face as he quickly rolled over onto his stomach and scrambled for any purchase he could find along the sheer cliff face. His fingers grasped a rock embedded into the icy wall. The skin on his fingers screamed in protest as he clung to the cold stone for dear life.

Then it came loose.

Leon’s only reaction was to whimper, “Oh no,” before the weightlessness of free fall wrapped him in its cruel embrace. The landing wasn’t graceful. It was as hard and unforgiving as the slap of a jilted lover. Baudelaire was unconscious for an unknown amount of time, but when he awoke, he did so in a pool of his own blood.

“Ew,” he muttered before wincing and gingerly probing a particularly tender spot on his head just above his left eye. His fingers came away sticky and slick with blood. “Well, that explains the headache,” he mused while running a mental and physical check on himself. To his surprise, aside from his raw fingers and the gash on his head he was relatively unscathed. Then he stood up and realized his whole body felt like it had been put through a meat grinder, so he carefully sat back down.

“Dash?” he called out. It was dark wherever he’d landed and his left eye was blurry and struggling to focus, leaving Leon disoriented and, lowkey, kind of nauseous. He took a breath, then closed his eyes and reached out with The Force. He felt Dash’s signature and gave it a small nudge.

Please tell me you’re not dead, he projected to his buddy, while pushing himself up from the ground and shuffling off in The Ice Master’s direction.

@Alhon

 

[Dash Pavan]

It took Dash a minute to get his bearings. He thought for a moment he had been asleep, perhaps drinking. It would explain the headache at least, wow. Something about nipples?

Slowly his vision cleared and with it his memory. A collapse, it had been a collapse. He pushed against the rock beneath him, slowly sitting up. He examined himself, amazed to find he hadn't broken anything, though that was the only good news. He had several cuts and grazes, including plenty on his midriff he would have avoided if properly dressed.

He clenched his teeth against the jabs of pain as he rose, distracted by Leon's voice sounding from somewhere. Stepping clear of the debris, he staggered in the Adumari's direction, relieved to see him also on his feet.

"So glad you're ok man, you are yeah?". Dash noticed the blood above Leon's eye and groaned inside. could not deal with his friend getting hurt here on top of everything else. "I'm so sorry, I don't know what happened!".

He glanced up, estimating that they had fallen at least fifty metres or so. The cavern around them had the look of having been around a long time, if buried and sealed until now. The rock walls were even more heavily frosted and covered in ice than those up above. Dash supposed they were even closer to the frozen energy that now swirled beneath the mountain.

Slowly, his gaze fell on some small spherical shapes in the semi darkness. "Are they...are they eggs?". What would any kind of eggs be doing down here? Dash took a step towards them, pausing as he noticed some had clearly been crushed by the collapse. A few others though squatted upright beneath an overhang, the splayed holes in their surface apparently made from the inside out.

@Zay

 

[Leon Baudelaire]

Leon shook his head. The cobwebs of concussion clung to his brain, but he could feel the pain slowly receding. That was a relief. Being stuck in a deep ass cave with a migraine sounded like a nightmare. Baudelaire rolled his shoulders and snapped his fingers causing a tongue of fire to leap from his hand and into the air like a will-o-wisp.

WIth his ghost light illuminating the darkness around him he was able to pick out a path through the ruined cavern. The smell of moisture and dust filled his nostrils and he wondered if the ice around them was as stable as they’d thought. Normally, he wouldn't question Dash on something like this, but… well now he had doubts.

Dash’s signature in the force was like a guiding light in the darkness. All of the Squad could pick one another out instantly, it was Leon’s favorite thing about the group. The shuffling steps of another told him Dash was close.

“Yup, I’m good,” retorted Leon with a level of sarcasm that would let Dash know their conversation from before wasn’t even close to being done. Baudelaire shrugged, “It’s fine, let’s focus on getting the hell out of here,” even as he spoke he closed his eyes and opened himself to the force. The preternatural light embraced him with the warmth of a mother’s embrace. Leon breathed in letting his attitude slough away as he prepared for whatever they were about to face.

The Adumarian could feel the churning cold, but the power was devoid of warmth the way the deepest recess of the dark side were. It was alive and that was probably one of the coolest things he’d ever felt. It was kinda like hugging a blizzard.

I know that’s hard to comprehend, but… like, just try.

Baudelaire vaguely caught the word “Eggs” and blinked. He’d slipped off on a mental tangent and had momentarily forgotten the near fifty meter fall. He looked in the same direction as Dash and his heart sank.

“Yup. Those are eggs…” he grumbled. Leon didn’t hate spiders, but given his experience with them on Kashyyyk, he wasn’t thrilled at the prospect of being bum rushed by the freaky little things either. An involuntary shiver went down his spine as he felt something… big. Something really big.

“Uh, Dash?” Leon’s eyes were glued to the mouth of a passage at the north end of this… chasm? “Dash?” Leon tried again, then he felt a rumble in the earth below his feet, “HEY ICE NIPS, CAN WE GET THE HELL OUT OF HERE, PLEASE?”

But it was too late.

An inhuman screech reverberated off the crystalline walls. Then as if to rub salt in the wound Leon heard a sharp CRACK followed by little high pitched squeals. Ah, the circle of life. Leon looked down. A sardonic frown curved his lips and he muttered, “Yup. The Force hates me. It does. It just does.”

@Alhon

 

[Dash Pavan]

Even as Leon confirmed he was not seeing things, Dash saw something white with several legs scuttle from one shadow to another. It couldn’t have been bigger than a hand, but it hardly mattered. Nothing should be alive down here.

Dash had thought he was uneasy about talking to Leon, but what he was seeing and feeling down here unnerved him even more. “We can’t just get out” he breathed, slowly stepping deeper into the cavern “this doesn’t make any sense. This place was buried deep under a churning volcano until very recently. Supposed to be lifeless. Yet these things…look newly hatched”.

Distantly, he recalled how Jadis Charn had frozen this land by her power three hundred years ago. He had reawaken the same process now, by channeling the nexus. Could creatures really have been entombed, preserved, that long, to reawaken now too?

As if in answer, the shrill cry echoed all around them. Dash was not quite sure from which direction it came, but he knew they had no time to prepare an ascent back up from where they had come. They could only go forward.

”If it hates you, it hates us both“ Dash breathed, drawing his saber hilt and gathering the Force. “Come on, we’ve been through worse”.

It was true. At least, it was, until a thousand webs seemed to shoot from the darkness.

@Zay

 

[Leon Baudelaire]

Leon blinked, they couldn’t just leave? Of course they couldn’t… Baudelaire’s curiosity peaked, but Dash’s cavalier comment about them being through worse only made Leon feel worse. If something bad happened down here, could he count on Dash? Leon tried pushing the thought from his mind, but the footage replayed in his mind.

So, he let Dash take the lead.

Baudelaire didn’t retract his consciousness completely. There was something really interesting about feeling the stir of new life— Even if it was a bunch of ugly ass spiders— that Leon couldn’t pull himself away from. As they moved deeper into the cavern they passed plenty of birthing sacs, the confluence of new life within the mountain standing both as an enigma and a miracle.

The Adumarian pulled out a scanner and started trying to determine what in the hell was going on, when he remembered something Dash had said, “Wait, you mentioned,” he gestured to the natural passage around them, “That this was under a churning volcano, but I’m not picking up any thermals at all.”

As if to double check himself Leon ran another scan which spit out a result with a rather nasty blurt of an electronic chortle. Chastised by the device in his hand, Leon, looked to Dash for an explanation. Before receiving Dash’s request, Leon hadn’t heard of Kro Var. So, he hoped his partner would be able to shine a little light on the subject while they wandered through the place’s innards.

@Alhon

 

[Dash Pavan]

Dash stepped gingerly through the winding tunnel, blue eyes scanning the dimness all around. "It was under a volcano" he answered "but Ez and I discovered a force nexus here, one twisted by a fallen Jedi to harness a powerful frozen energy". How could he really explain it. "She froze this place over a long time ago, before she was defeated. I think we've set the same thing in motion again".

His face drifted right into a thick strand of web and he coughed on instinct, clawing it away with his hands. "Jeez, tell me that thing is making some sense of this?". Dash glanced back at Leon's scanner. "Flash-freezing the earth I can about understand, but spiders definitely made these. How can something alive be thriving so quickly?". How had they got into these caverns so quickly?

Maybe they were already here. The possibility made him gulp. Jadis Charn's power here had been mighty and her defeat sudden. Maybe the denizens of her domain has simply been entombed all this time, awaiting the reawakening he had wrought.

Something Dash had thought just an outcropping of rock suddenly moved with surprising speed. He had been engrossed in his thoughts and moved too slowly as the huge spider's limb shunted him into the wall by his shoulder. A shot of web instantly bound his legs together and he slumped, scrabbling to hold himself up as more spiders sallied forth from the dark.

"Look out!" he shouted to Leon, even as his first attempt to strike back was violently shunted aside.

5/20 for reaction success

@Zay

 

[Leon Baudelaire]

Leon’s mischievous little smirk soured into a tight frown as he eased into the tight tunnel ahead. The scanner in his hand beeped and chortled as it received various readingings. A low whistle escaped Baudelaire’s lips as he screen lit up like a kriffing life day tree. Of course, he was paying attention to his instrument and what Dash was saying simultaneously, “She? Sounds like you knew her,” he joked.

Leon followed Dash’s lead and had to admit a lot of this wasn’t adding up which only left force fuckery to be the real culprit. “Well, maybe they all just went back to work?” he ventured to Dash’s question.

“What if the lifeforms in here weren’t frozen in the natural sense?” he managed to ask as Dash walked through the biggest cobweb he’d ever seen. Empathetically Leon found himself wiping at ghost tendrils as Dash coughed.

There was a large blip on his scanner super close to Dash and Just as The Adumarian was about to warn the Knight, the spider attacked, “Holyshitfuck!” Leon screeched as the force exploded from his hand, wrapping around the long pale limb pinning Dash to the wall. Baudelaire pushed with enough force to knock the spider off balance, hopefully giving his buddy enough time to escape.

The snap hiss of Daybreak would follow as he prepared for the inevitable deluge of snapping maws.

He really wasn’t a fan of Spiders….

“Oh, it’s got friends…” Leon muttered as the spiders converged on the Jedi. “Great… Love that for us…”

@Alhon

 

[Dash Pavan]

Leon’s attack gave Dash a brief reprieve from the giant limb pinning him to the wall, but with his legs bound he could do little more than roll across the hard floor like a like a rolling pin. His own saber hilt was encased in the cocoon from the waist down, so he tried to lash out with the Force instead.

Shards of ice formed and flew, infuriating the spiders but doing little to force them back. The attack was too quick and frenetic and the conjured shards mostly bounced off their hard carapaces. Dash didn’t get a second go, as more spiders than he could count suddenly filled the tunnel.

He physically shoved at the legs and snapping maws all around him, but they knew his stingers were his hands and more webs bound them fast before he could do any worse. Dash cried out, expecting the creatures to tear into him any moment. But it never came. Instead, the spiders began to drag him along the ground.

”Leon, run!” He shouted, so many limbs pressing against him he could barely speak. He wanted the Adumari to escape, to get out of here. It was Dash’s fault that he was even here. He tried in vain to glimpse Leon or the glow of Daybreak, even as he was pulled and carried deeper underground.

@Zay

 

[Leon Baudelaire]

Run. Spiders of varying size and ferocity had basically just materialized before them and Dash’s advice was to run. It was pretty good fucking advice. Leon was running, the force was at this back like a tailwind in the sails of a ship. As the kid’s said nowadays: That boy was shmoooooovin’!

In his panic, he barely noticed a prickle at the back of his mind. One that he would have totally ignored in situations like this, but there was something about it, something urgent? Leon slowed, Daybreak’s hum reverberated off the cave’s walls. The spider’s weren’t charging. They… they were just kinda standing there looking at him, and kinda… dancing? The little spiders moved back and forth rhythmically, their forearms raised and arcing like a spider’s version of jazz hands. It was unbelievably cute.

Leon steadied his breathing and risked exposure to the mind touching him. It was ancient. As ancient as anything he’d ever felt. It’s perception of his prodding was patient and measured. He could feel it’s discomfort the same way he’d been uncomfortable with the initial touch. He took a breath.

“Dash?” he looked around, the spiders had receded from him like the tide and he was just sitting there in his cute little climbing harness. Well, the harness and some gross ass looking web.

“Huh,” Leon grunted as he stepped toward his friend. He helped him up and noticed that the little guys were starting to file out of the space in a single file line. Arms still raised and waving back and forth like they were born to live, laugh, and love. It was weird, not like the weirdest thing he’d ever seen, but for sure up there.

“I have a feeling we aren’t the only force sensitives here,” he said. The presence had pulled back from him. It had provided a reassuring: “We come in peace” image of Dash and Leon laughing and doing the same dance the little spiders were.

“We’re either totally safe, or about to get eaten and turned into spiders,” he whispered out the side of his mouth. “What in the hell were we doing here anyway?”

@Alhon

 

[Dash Pavan]

Dash staggered to his feet, pulling at the disgusting web wrapped around his bare skin and entangled with his climbing harness. The thing had been brand new!

He glanced around feverishly even as Leon helped him away, brushing the remnants off. A moment ago he had been certain of being carried off, but something had changed. The spiders had backed off and Leon himself had a strange expression on his face. The freakish little dance the spiders did next was more terrifying than anything yet.

"What the actual-" Dash breathed, completely weirded out. "Only you could get a swarm of bloodsucking spiders to dance L....". But Leon's words got Dash looking at the creatures not with his eyes, but with his senses. As soon as he found the clarity to reach out with the Force, he felt the same presence his friend had. Something down here was guiding these little guys, something that had decided not to dispatch them immediately.

"We go on then" Dash said, realising the creatures were waiting for them to, even lining their route. It took a lot of effort to move his feet at first; they were only going deeper into the spiders' lair. But with no way out and no other options, it had to be enough that they were walking on voluntarily and not being carried as webspun prey.

"We weren't meant to be here at all" Dash answered "I didn't plan the fall, as much as I wanted the ground to swallow me up". He continued, finding their hushed conversation took his mind off the many creatures silently watching them pass. "We were talking, remember, talking about how I left you...". The memory of Kashyyyk still burned, even now surrounded by imminent danger. "I screwed up then" Dash said, recalling his near defeat by the masked Sith "and I've screwed up now. Turns out I'm a curse to have around L, sorry".

He had barely uttered the apology before they turned the next corner and emerged in front of what could only be Moma Spider. Dash felt the ancient presence again, and the distinct urge to piss his pants big time.

@Zay

 

[Leon Baudelaire]

”What can I say, when a horde of little spiders shows up with money and a passion for dance, who am I to turn them away?”

As they walked down the narrow path, Leon couldn’t help but notice the similarity between the spiders and spaceport control workers. Absently, Baudelaire found himself mimicking the motions of the little critters. Now that they weren’t trying to kill him, they were kinda cute.

The Adumarian listened as Dash spoke, he’d totally forgotten about the Kashyyyk thing. The reminder didn’t feel great, that wasn’t one that should have been as trauma inducing as it was, but in the back of his mind Baudelaire wanted nothing more than to cross blades with the Sith he’d faced. He might have won the fight, but he hadn’t been able to capture or incapacitate his enemy and that failure had left a bad taste in his mouth. When Leon won, he liked to do so utterly.

Just before he could brush off Dash’s sad boy words the visage of the scariest fucking thing he’d ever seen in his life manifested before them. His mouth hung open as the chittering jaws of “Momma” came into view. An air of betrayal etched Leon's expression as he whipped around glaring at the cute tiny dancers.

Before Leon’s voice could match the resounding fear in his mind he felt a presence, an ancient one, brush against his consciousness. There was no malice in it, at least not on the surface, but there was worry, and anything that could make this massive force spider worry, worried Leon.

With more than a little apprehension he opened himself to the Mother of Spiders. Like a dam being opened for the first time in years, the images of the Spider’s concern flooded Leon. Roiling magma, a craggy appendage, a slamming fist, screeching baby spiders, and the smell of fetid meat filled his mind. When he was finally released from the spider’s mind, Baudelaire’s whole body shuddered.

“Please tell me you peeked at that,” he said to Dash praying he wasn’t going to have to share the experience, again.

@Alhon

 

[Dash Pavan]

The cavern was vast, reaching high above like a great vaulted cathedral, yet the Mother filled it all. Her many great limbs moved like pillars of the earth, making the ground and walls tremble with every great step. Beneath her great cone-shaped abdomen, rising up above, her vast circular maw hung, huge gnashing teeth flexing as if considering.

Dash saw the Mother's eyes and in that moment seemed to fall deep into their blackness. Images flashed in his mind's eye, a shuttering montage of Kro Var's rise and fall, of the forces both natural and unnatural that had her birthed her in this place. The Rhinnalian felt too, felt the Mother's love for her children, her fear for their survival and her anxiety about the movements and workings up above.

The images and sensations were jumbled, alien, distorted through the eyes of a creature that had lived for centuries.

"More than peeked" Dash gasped "I feel it...". It was like suddenly standing in a mountain gale, being overawed by its strength and made to feel sick. The sensation seem to build and build, until a call half coherent seemed to echo direct from the Mother.

You. Know. The Song.

Dash thought of how the lesser spiders had stepped back on feeling the Force, not sure whether to be amazed or terrified that they were all connected by it.

"Yes" he answered aloud, Yes with the Force. We know the Force.

You. Come. Harm.

No. No! Dash stared into that terrifying maw, praying to everything that the Mother would understand. We don't come to harm you!

He looked desperately to Leon, hissing through his teeth. "Back me up will you?".

@Zay

 

[Leon Baudelaire]

Before Dash could ask Leon knew what he needed to do. His eyes watched the funky little dudes move in their little dance perfectly in unison. He started a count in his head and then hit a dance that perfectly mimicked the little spiders. So, when Dash asked for help, Leon smiled.

“One step ahead of you buddy,” he replied, with the grin of a man who’s positive they’re nailing it.

It very quickly became apparent to Baudelaire that his little dance wasn’t carrying the desired effect when the mother of, probably all, spiders touched his mind with a single question, “Why?” Then she retracted from his mind… and shut him out.

Leon sucked in a breath as if slapped, and if Dash was paying attention he’d hear the Adumarian mutter, “People would pay a lot of money for that dance…”

Leon dropped his hands and straightened his jacket self consciously, projecting his apology to the spider. He had to learn, dance wasn’t the only way to save the day. He just didn’t want to. So, unfortunately, to Dash he re-replied, “Sorry dude, it’s all you!” while still wearing that same confident expression.

@Alhon