light & motion

[ladyofthesands]

Arha drew a breath in, focusing on the curved discs before her as she moved through a graceful set of katas to warm up.  She stretched, letting the sunlight that streaming into the red tiled practice hall warm her back, it glinted of the metal and set her hair afire as she spun through another set.  It was a dance, one she had always enjoyed

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[worm_dancer]

Sheeana felt something jolt, like a thopter having a hard landing on plascrete. She had instinctively crouched. Nothing in the hallways. Hand on her crysknife, she opened the sensorium door.

A columned chamber that could have come from Muad'dib's citadel. Training blades whose design had remained mostly identical for six thousand years.

And Sister Masaari.

She didn't ask what had happened but knew she would be told anyway.

[ladyofthesands]

Arha let out a soft pfft air and sighed before flipping to her feet to face Sheeana. Wordlessly, she collected the discs and folded them back together before setting them down along with the blades and scrubbing at her hair before working at the headache that had begun to build.

"That," she finally said in a voice that she picked clean of any weariness, "was unexpected. It popped. In my head." She frowned and crossed her arms. "I must find real blades, these dull things do nothing for my motivation."

[worm_dancer]

"Hmm...We should consult the Jedi." This wasn't something you'd think a Bene Gesserit would say, with the font of knowledge in their heads. But rely on Other Memory too much and it becomes a trap. Sheeana knew that. Arha probably did too.

She plucked one of the blades from where it was embedded in a marble column. The black plasteel was, to all senses, cold and sharp.

"Precisely why I don't train here. How many?"

[ladyofthesands]

"There were eight, only eight," Arha murmured. "And I shall speak with the Jed-Eye. I should have seen if there were some of these elsewhere. A slice or two would do me well in remembering my skills. They were always my favorite. Very good for peripherals without the blindfold."

[worm_dancer]

"Even in my time eight is an impressive number. False modesty does not suit a Reverend Mother." She regarded the blade oddly, ran her finger along the edge. She had fallen into the role of teaching her fellow, despite being the younger. Her education had in a way been incomplete, the Sisterhood caring me to get her onto [Ar]Rakis than providing her with all the skills she would need. In a strange way she could empathize.

We were fools to meddle with that planet and we payed the price...for three thousand years.

She tossed the blade up where it spun in the air, floating on its suspensor.

[ladyofthesands]

"Poorly executed," Arha said with an arch of her eyebrows. "The modesty is not false if one is disappointed in the results. I should have been sliced on more than one occasion. I attempted nine once and barely escaped with my hide intact. It is always the last that is of the greatest threat. Clearly, I need greater focus."

Arha watched the blade spine, her face clean of expression. She would find real ones.

1/2

[worm_dancer]

"May I try?"

With Arha's assenting nod, Sheeana gathered the things from the floor and walls. She held them between her fingers and flung them out where they hovered in formation in midair.

And she danced.

Like talking to shaitan shai-halud. It was without a rythm for them to track. Nothing in her movements suggested a pattern they could bring their little mechanical brains to bear on. Crisp and soft, she was a blur between modes. They zoomed about, little blind, confused things. In fact, the greatest hazard was that they would continue on their courses without knowing if you were there or not.

She grew tired of decieving them, however...

2/2: the deadliest game of DDR you've never played

[worm_dancer]

...It seemed a little against the point of the exercise

[ladyofthesands]

Arha watched without comment, taking in the movements, how they worked in the space of the hall and against the blades. Wild and Fremen and rhythmless, bladeless. Interesting. Arha pulled the basic principles in, turned them over in her mind, and nodded once.

"I see," she murmured, folding her arms. And she did see; the non-patterns, the use for them, the way it all came together.

[worm_dancer]

There was a small red line across Sheeana's nose that should have been bleeding. Fremen blood coagulated fast.

She got awkwardly to her feet, still breathing hard. "Darwi said...I could eventually teach it."

[ladyofthesands]

"Such would be handy," Arha said after a moment of silence, "and obviously useful." Like a sandstorm, it was wildly unpredictable as well.

[worm_dancer]

Sheeana dropped the blade and it clattered to the floor. There were more marks on her palms and they stung. She cocked her head in silent offering.

[ladyofthesands]

"I could get rid of those," Arha said, her lips twisting is a faint smile. She was already stepping forward, ready to both learn more of this technique and offer to take the sting out. It was the least of things to do.

[worm_dancer]

She nodded in silent thanks and held her hands out. "Leave on on each hand, please. As reminders."

[ladyofthesands]

"Of course," Arha murmured. It was not a difficult thing to do to take minor things from others. A tug, a wash of heat, direction, a soft, hazy weariness. That was all. There were two marks, the rest were healed. Arha let out a sigh and sat, rubbing her hands together to dissipate the heat left in them. It was never a thing she could use upon herself, but her own abilities allowed for faster than common healing.

It was fine.

[worm_dancer]

She felt her hands tingle, then suddenly itch madly. The accelerated healing...It was an irritant as well as a blessing.

She looked at them, suddenly clean of marks except for two.

"Are you feeling up to trying it?"