‘We were marg through the corridors in a heavy silence. He was dragging me along by my arm, not giving me even the illusion of the possibility of esg again.’
‘Thankfully he was not that angry anymore, I don’t know why he was so irritated st time, but her injured padawan was not the sole reason for that pent-up ahat he was about to unleash on me if I didn’t get away in time.’
‘Well, I don’t really care about his personal problems, at least until the momearts to sh out at me.’
‘I don’t really know why he even came after me now? It must be some kind of reveo show his superiority as a master and to teach me a lesson. Where are we going? I wonder, is he bringio the infirmary to meet with Tano?’
‘It was a ten-minute long silent march when we finally arrived at oal.’
‘Wait, he ’t be that petty, right? Is he really... I looked at him for firmation. He didn’t react. Is this some kind of joke? Does he seriously want to duel with me?’
‘He let go of my arm finally, only to show me his lightsaber he tur down to the minimal energy level. At least he didn’t want to kill me anymore. That’s some progress we've made, I guess. I showed him that my bde was on the lowest energy level, too. He nodded.’
‘I looked around the training field. There were a few other masters and padawans around us occupied by their own training session. Hmmm, at least there are other people around, in case if things got out of hand.’
‘I took up the same form as before, Niman.’
‘While he had chosen a mgressive bat form, form five, Djem So, or in the urban diary; the way of the Krayt Dragoime I will choose that dish for myself.’
‘Heh, but I couldn’t imagine any other bat form that would suit him better. Aggressive, ued attacks built on a solid defense. Well, I guess I will be able to warm up properly after all.’
‘I gave a slight bow to him as my master and I always did towards each other. It was a show of respect that our order in duellis sint times.’
‘It was derived from a sith greeting. The dark lords of Korriba when aowledging another dark lord’s preseh superior power, but never in case of someohat was weaker or an equal.’
‘The gesture was simple, two hands put together in front of your face while barely bowing your head in their dire.’
‘It was a sign to your oppohat you will give your all. He didn’t bow towards me, not that I expected, since he didn’t know what my greeti. Yet he at least nodded, indig that he was ready.’
‘The duel started, yet we were still standing in our inal pce, each other. A heavy pressure fell upon the room, making some of the other masters and padawans stop their own activities. They began to watch our duel with obvious i.’
‘I already activated my force shield that would weaken the effectiveness of any type of force attack. I also used my standard speed and power enhas. They were almost instinctive to me.’
‘About thirty seds passed from the start of our duel when I saw a ge in his expression, he realized that I will not attack. Instead, he decided to do it himself.’
‘He rushed at me with a powerful uppercut aimed at my neck. This was a tohtforward attack for a Djem So user.’
‘Therefore, I decided to roll to the side instead of tering it with my bde. It was the right decision. At the st minute, his attack turned into a half pirouette that ended with a kick which would have hit me iomach if I tered his bde with mine.’
‘Now it was my turn to surprise him. At the very moment my roll ended, I trow my lightsaber at him in a spiraling way, trolling it fihrough the force. He blocked my bde with his saber at the st sed, yet my bde, instead of stopping, suddenly started to turn terclockwise, aiming a cut towards his other shoulder.’
‘Sadly, it missed too. He ducked uhe silver bde and I decided to pull it bay hand. The moment I grabbed the hilt of my bde, a powerful force push hit me.’
‘It was sent by my oppoo unbance me, or even topple me over.’
‘The force shield around me did his job quite well. His interruption attempt failed as I took up my fighting fain.’
‘Now he didn’t hesitate anymore. He charged at me immediately. This time, he used a different approach. To stop me from rolling out of the way of his attack, he u me with a powerful force pull just before I wao make another roll.’
‘I realized that his raw force attack had already begun to weaken my shield. This guy is a damn monster, just as I thought...’
‘Without any other choice, I blocked his saber with one hand, thhly reinforced with the force, yet his two-hatack against my much weaker arm felt like I was trying to stop a battering ram.’
‘He also tried to kick me simultaneously, but I was ready for it. With my free hand, I struck him with a powerful force push from cle.’
‘His kiever reached me as he stumbled backwards since he was standing on o the moment, but instead of falling ft on his ass, he turned his fall into a natural-looking backward roll.’
‘As the pressure disappeared from my right arm that held the saber, I realized that it bee strained from blog that oack.’
‘I immediately began to el healing energies into my arm, but it will take at least a minute for the strain to loosen.’
‘Therefore, I switched arms. Some of my masters were left-handed, some were right-handed, and some had more than two arms. It didn’t matter that mue which arm I used.’
‘The moment he finished his roll, he also noticed that I switched hands. He looked at me, somewhat ahen he charged again, not giving me much time to rest.’
‘He came at me the same way as before, force pull, to block my roll. The only problem was that I didn’t try to roll away this time. Instead, I charged at him at the very sed he used his force pull, which accelerated me even further and I was in front of him in a fra of a sed.’
‘I aimed my attack to his knees, as it was the most unprotected spot at the time, but he was able to jump up and at the same time he attempted to cut my left shoulder, but the moment I saw that my attack failed I tur into a forward roll effectively rolling out of the way of his improvised attack.’
‘Damn, what a mess. I hoped to catch him off guard with that attack, but this tactic would not work aime. I reinforced my force shield, then watched my oppo nd on the ground a few meters away from me.‘
‘He did not attack me immediately this time.’
‘He was zily cirg around me, iing me. Act all you want. I will not let my guard down.’
“Hmmm, I see why Soka had a hard time dueling you.” — ‘He ented in an unamused tone.’
“In the first pce, I never wao duel her.”
“Yeah, I know that, she already told me.” — ‘He answered with a lopsided smile.’
“Then what is your exact reason to provoke this fight?” — ‘I asked.’
“Why do I need a reason to duel with anyone?” — ‘He asked back.’
“Last time I checked, it was the prelude of all duels to agree upon a time and way of the duel. If one partit doesn’t give his blessing, the duel should not ence.”
“I didn’t hear you oppose when we arrived here.” — ‘He smirked.’
“That was...” — ‘I began, but was interrupted.’
‘He attacked me the moment I started to speak. Such a disrespectful d, at least I know from whom Ahsoka learhat habit.’
‘This time I didn’t o roll out of his way. I could simply step back since he was somewhat overextending. Not that I could terattack, since my arms were far shorter than his, and he k.’
‘The moment I lifted one of my legs from the ground, a sudden smirk appeared on his face.’
‘The moment I felt a powerful and this time very trated force pull sweep out my legs, pulverizing my force shield on the way.’
‘The hing I knew, I was lying on my back, more specifically on my right lekku. Staring up at the ceiling of the hall and the buzzing blue sight of a lightsaber tip held a few timeters from my .’
‘Ugh, my lekku hurts. There was a strong pulsing pain in the middle se of my right lekku it was studer my shoulder bde, which made a few drops of tears instinctively appear on the edges of my eyes.’
‘The blue bde ulled back as if it burs holder. There was a friendly palm exteowards me instead. I grabbed it and was easily straightened up bay feet with troubling ease. This infuriating guy was looking at me with a wide smirk on his face.’
“You know, gettien by a master of my caliber is no reason to start g for.”
‘I shook my head, overwhelmed by his natural humility.’ — “Your humility befitting of a Jedi Master has been dully noted.” — ‘I said with thick sarcasm.’ — “Aside from that, I fell on my lekku... and it hurts like a bitch…”
‘There was a brief silence while he began to scratch his face, somewhat embarrassed.’
“Well, sorry about that, Soka told me ohat getting injured on your lekku be infuriatingly frustrating, and painful. Would you like to go to the infirmary? At least we visit Soka on the way. She estering the hell out of me to find you and clear up our unfortunate misuanding.”
“You mean that you are a ga- “
‘A cold palm csped around my mouth, while his owner was looking around in a panic.’
‘Oh, I remembered, we were not alone. I looked around, and there was quite a crowd gathering around our little duel. Three masters and five padawans, even a temple guard, were watg us from afar.’
‘The masters gave me an aowledging nod, while the padawans seemed to be more focused on sending me annoyed gres. The little buggers must envy the attention I got, or just didn’t like the fact that their training aused to gawk at our duel instead.’
‘Hey, it’s not like I was the oo start this duel, but they probably wouldn’t believe it. They were looking at this stupid guy with some sort of reverence appearing in their little shiny eyes. Was he really that big of a deal?’
‘For me, he looked more like a right now. I wonder what they would think if I told them about our first meeting. I may give it a shot ter... as if sensing my iions, said the guy turned his head, lookiraight in the eyes. Then whispered to me slowly while pointing his death gre at me.’
“Not a word, don’t fet...” — ‘He leaned even closer and hissed into one of my ear protrusions.’ — “I know where you live.”
‘I gulped soundly, a cold shiver running up my lower spine.’
‘Maybe I will just shut my mouth this time, should have remembered that he is not a force spirit, not yet anyway.’
‘With that, he let go of me. We began our walk to the infirmary.’
‘On the way, we only exged a few half-hearted sentences since I was too focused on caressing my right lekku. It was distragly painful.’
“So, if I uand, you were sent after me to apologize by your padawan, right?”
“No, I decided to go after you and apologize after the misuanding was cleared by Soka.” — ‘He corrected my assumption stubbornly.’
‘That’s basically the same…’ — “Humph, so then tell me why we ended up in a duel es?”
‘He smirked again. Then told me with a lecturing voice.’
“No, you are wrong. It was a moviation practice.”
‘Moving what? This guy is a pain in the ass…’ — “Obviously...” — ‘I mumbled.’
‘Why did I feel the suddeo roll my eyes?… I wonder.‘
“So, Soka told me that you are some kind of exge student from a different force sect. I never heard anything about this until now, since I only got back from a mission before your duel with her happened. On a side note, you are surprisingly well versed in the use of ford even in the jedi fighting styles.”
‘Surprisingly… of course…’ — “That’s funny, you know? I thought the exact same thing about you.”
‘He gave me a pierg ghen proceeded to ignore me.’
“Your master must be proud of you.” — ‘He said out of the blue.’
‘The pliment threw me off my pace for a sed, then I nodded, accepting the ued praise.’ — “Yes, I suppose he would be.”
‘He gave me a momentary ger that, then we bee silent again for a while. Until I asked another question.’
“Is Tano, I mean Ahsoka, all right?”
“Yeah, she only got a weak cussion and a few bruises. Nothing unusual.”
“That’s good to hear, then.”
‘We seemed to run out of natural versation materials, so we wordlessly agreed on not f ourselves with further attempts at unication, which would most likely bee tiresome anyway.‘
‘At the time we reached the infirmary a purple and yellow bruise was beginning to form on the middle part of my right lekku, I already began to el healing energies into it, but there was no other twi’lek in my memory line before me, so I was not really sure how to heal a lekku effectively. Luckily for me, I knew of a twi’lek healer dy I could shamelessly rely on.’
