In the Workshop/Looking for Niil

[Collan]

Collan had settled down in one of the staterooms himself and when he wasn't meditating or practicing with the lightsaber, he explored the ship. He'd finally found the machine shop and set to work building a quick-release clip for the saber to keep it clipped to his belt. Even then, such work was an extension of his training with Ch'lana. He used the Force to settle his mind and concentrate on the machine tools, crafting the simple mechanics of the release. It took very little time and though it was a little rough, the clip functioned and was serviceable.

At one point, Collan sought out Niil, looking for him in his stateroom, hoping he still had that battered old saber. Collan had studied it a little back at base, but it warranted further study now.

[Niil Spaar]

Niil waved Collan in, and invited him to grab a seat.  "Coffee's on the brewer, Collan, so feel free to grab a mugful or two.  So . . . what's up?  Hiding from Master Ch'lana?"

[Collan]

Collan shook his head as he poured a cup.

"Nope. Master Ch'lana has left me to practice on my own. I'm getting a fairly decent feel for it. It only takes me 30 minutes now to really feel the Force," he finished smiling, a small joke about his progress.

More seriously he added, "I think I'm getting it. It's a lot less about taking control and more about letting it happen...if that makes sense."

[Niil Spaar]

Niil chuckled.  "Heh . . . yeah, don't force The Force.  You sort of open yourself up to it instead of trying to bully it or make demands of it."  Niil furrowed his eyebrows.  "Did that make any sense?"

[Collan]

Collan snickered...

"No you don't, and yes it does make sense. I never asked...how much did you study with Master Dhoresh?"

[Niil Spaar]

Niil shook his head.  "Not much, but I guess a good part of that was because I was messed up with mental overload.  Master Dhoresh showed up to the Imperial Academy one day, picked me up, and told me that he needed to get me out of there quickly.  Once we were on a ship, he dropped the thermal detonator on me that I was Force-sensitive, and that the Imperials found that out.  Whoah.  My parents had a sympathetic ear within the Empire, and that ear tipped them off that they were about to yank me out of the Academy and send me for 're-education'."  Niil shuddered.  "I made the mistake of asking Master Dhoresh what that meant.  Not a good thing.  Anyway, my parents told Master Dhoresh what they had found out, and he agreed to get me out of there and get me to a safe place."

Niil lowered his head and stared at his coffee mug.  "Word got out pretty quickly.  Seems that Master Dhoresh used the Force to plant a suggestion into the Academy commandant's head, so when the red suits showed up to seize me the day after, you can imagine their surprise.  Security cams I.D.'ed Master Dhoresh, and the Empire knew that my family knew him for many years.  They backtracked the leak, found my parents' contact, and tortured the hell out of him.  He broke, and confessed.  The Empire went after my parents, arrested them on charges of treason, and they were executed.  The trial was very public, seeing as they had collaborated with a Jedi." 

Niil closed his eyes and went silent for awhile.  "Then the hunters came after us.  Well, when we did have some breathing time, Master Dhoresh tried to teach me the basics of the Force, like meditation and using a training saber."  Niil shook his head.  "I remember most of what he told me about the meditative techniques, but I couldn't connect with the Force.  My mind was in too much of a mess.  Grief, fear and rage were still bubbling inside of me, and there was no way in hell I could get calm enough to focus.  Master Dhoresh saw that, and wisely backed me off.  Connecting with the Force in that state of mind?  The Dark side probably would've snagged me."  Niil smiled faintly.  "I got to be fairly good with the training saber, though, and even without a proper connection to the Force.  To me, it was a lot like archaic fencing, where you're using a blade that has next to no weight.  You just had to get used to the saber's gyroscopic effect and handle-heavy weight."

Niil brought himself back to the subject at hand.  "Anyway, between my emotional turmoil and the hunters, we never really had a chance to go into the real training.  Master Dhoresh didn't have a Holocron to give me so that I could learn on my own, so when he sent me off with his smuggler friend, I was stuck in limbo.  Yeah, I was Force-sensitive, but I couldn't actually connect with the Force.  Well, I suppose I could have, but I didn't want to risk that without proper guidance.  Too risky."

[Collan]

Collan blew out a puff of air. He felt sadness for Niil. To have a family and then lose it. Collan couldn't fathom it. It had been so long for him that those memories were distant now and lacked power to hurt or cause sadness.

"That's damned hard thing. And the Empire didn't try to draw you out? What happened to Master Dhoresh?"

[Niil Spaar]

"Oh, they tried to draw me out, all right.  The first few Bloodhound units that actually caught up with us us tried their little psychological tricks on me before they lost patience and tried to kill us.  First they tried telling me that I was the real victim, and I wasn't at fault for my parents' regrettable treachery.  All I had to do was walk away from the foul Jedi that kidnapped me . . . or better yet, help them bring him into custody, and my family's good name would be restored.  I wasn't buying any of that drek.  The Empire had my parents executed, and I saw and heard enough at the Imperial Academy to turn my stomach.  I told them to go eat poodoo, and that's where they attacked.  Master Dhoresh made short work of them." 

Niil shook his head and snorted in derision.  "The next group . . . or maybe the one after that one? . . . well, they went to the other end of the spectrum.  They tried to goad me into a blind rage by taunting me about my parents' executions, and even went into graphic detail about it."  His fist clenched for a moment, then he willed himself to relax.  "That damn near got me to charge out at them, but Master Dhoresh dealt with them before I could do something stupid."

He stared into his coffee cup, and sighed.  "The last team was the best.  Six of them, and they masked themselves well.  Master Dhoresh had a few minutes to act.  He took me to the local starport on . . . hell, I can't even remember the name of the backwater planet now.  He knew a smuggler there with a fast ship, and told the pilot to get me off-planet.  I was hustled on board the ship even as the Bloodhound team came charging in with their lightsabers.  As we took off, I had to watch out the porthole of the ship as Master Dhoresh took on all six of them by himself.  He took down half of them before the others cut him down."

Niil went silent again, and toyed with his coffee mug.  "The smuggler and I hit a few different systems after the escape.  He had some runs to do, and I had to lay low for awhile.  But the Bloodhounds put out a system-wide alert for the smuggler's ship, so he took me to Karvis III.  The reasoning was that it was pretty well out of the way, and it gave him some breathing room to trade or sell his ship."  Niil rolled his eyes.  "And, as luck would have it, two days after I was dropped off at Karvis, the Empire came in.  And by horrible fortune, some local snitch recognized me from the news holos, and the planet's two-bit bounty hunters came out of the woodwork.  I killed the first two that went for me, and went into hiding.  Storm sewers, culverts, scrap yards . . . wherever I could find shelter away from the public eye.  I didn't have any credits - and I wasn't about to try and sell the heavy blaster pistol I took from one of the bounty hunters -  so I had to hit the damn restaurant dumpsters for food.  I learned to check out the dumpsters behind the all-you-can-eat cantinas; there was lots of hardly-touched food tossed out at those places.  But living like that and not knowing when the next attack would happen was driving me to end of my mental rope."

"I finally lucked out and encountered one of the resistance teams.  I was hiding out in an abandoned depot, and the resistance came in one night and moved a vehicle into an abandoned garage nearby."  Niil laughed.  "I tried to sneak in, but they overheard me.  I could still kiss the guy that chose to hit me with a stun bolt instead of crisping me with plasma.  Apparently the leader recognized me from the holovids, and they took me with them.  And the rest, I guess,  is history."

[Collan]

"Did you ever meet Dawson [insert last name]? Mariah ran with her in the Senator's cell. I was running from the Empire. I'd been free for a couple weeks when I landed...I was in Lendt when the bombardment started. I managed to get out and get some others out too. I fled north after that and made the mistake of doing a search on the Rostiern name. It brought bucketheads done on the cafe I was in. I managed to get away from them and a days later I met Dawson as she was infiltrating...or maybe leaving an imp base. That's how I got hooked in."

[ooc: i don't remember much beyond that and the toxin mission]

"But anyways...what I came to see you about...have you seen the workshop here?"

[Niil Spaar]

Niil shook his head.  "I heard about Dawson, but no, I never got to meet her.  As for the workshop, yeah, I had a look around, but I was afraid to touch anything.  My mechanical expertise isn't the greatest, so I didn't want to try and fiddle around with anything."

[Collan]

Collan smiled.

"Neither am I but I was able to make this," he showed Niil the quick-release clip that held his training saber, "I figured that if nothing else, we could fiddle with that saber you had. Ch'lana would probably be willing to share pointers on how lightsabers work and are built too."

[Niil Spaar]

Niil nodded.  "Sure, no problem.  Let me grab it out of my bag."  He went over to the closet, rummaged around for a few moments, then came back to the table.  What he held in his hands wasn't a pretty sight.  The hilt was a maroon color, but it was badly deformed by the characteristic sign of a heavy blaster bolt.  Setting it down, he gave it an experimental prod, as if he half-expected to ignite into malevolent light.  "This was the Dark Jedi woman's lightsaber, the one we met back at the asteroid base."

[Collan]

"Oh yeah. Her. She was a piece of work," Collan reminisced, "I did a little studying on lightsabers back at base," he felt a pang of sadness and loss at the thought of everyone at base, "I can probably outline the basic systems now but a lot of it seems like parts need to be together before they're together. Do you get what I mean?"

[Niil Spaar]

Niil chuckled.  "Sort of.  Did you find the stuff needed to make one in the workshop?"

[Collan]

"All except the most important piece," Collan noted, "Those will not be easy to get."