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Malcolm Derrial

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  1. Malcolm nodded resolutely. A place like Phu was an ideal refuge from demonic infanticidal cannibals, and she was the grand master. As his master slipped into an apparent nap, he adjusted his posture and began to meditate. Slowly, the brilliant lens of the force came back into view, full of shifting patterns and subtle hues normally outside the visible spectrum. Malcolm had a long way to go before he'd understand a tenth of what he was seeing, but the visual display alone could keep him entertained for hours, and the song... Well, it could bring tears to his eyes. He sat entranced for a few minutes before he began to feel centered. Curious, he directed his sight toward his master, and again observed the "egg" metaphor. Now it was more clearly a child. Malcolm filed that away, hoping to recognize it more immediately in the future, and wondering if a male child would be visibly different. Stay on target... The wind seemed the best focus for telekinesis. He seized upon the ephemeral pattern of the breeze, shifting the atoms in a thousand shimmering currents. He found a stray leaf, and made it the whole of his being, feeling each current as a separate wave of pressure, jointly working to decide his fate. Now what? Try to will in a new current? Flex the leaf: change the pressured surface? Redirect existing currents? Malcolm's mind stayed with the leaf as he tried to figure out his next move. Observing the leaf was easy, in fact it was absolutely exhilarating. Altering the leaf or its environment was different. It felt... invasive. He had to figure out what would take the least amount of force manipulation; the least amount of hubris. Flex the leaf. It already bends. At that moment, the song changed. Malcolm had been so visually oriented during this task that he had practically stopped listening. But now it was clear. The leaf did not flex. But something had, and the song was now a different kind of wind; whistling in his ears. It quickly became apparent to Malcolm that he had sprung directly off of the branch and into space. Ha ha... I'm an idiot! You can't flex something that doesn't have muscles! Malcolm was plummeting a little faster (and a little more face-first) than he liked. Still, in his state, things seemed slower, giving him time to contemplate his error. He examined himself. He had a slight drift away from the tree, which he could perhaps turn into a roll. His upward lift had already succumbed to gravity, which was now powering through air resistance like a lightsaber through parchment. Well, let's try this again. He saw the physics diagram in his head. The planet was huge, and that was a bit of an obstacle for him to combat the gravity. The air, however, was more flexible. He spread out, maximizing his surface area and putting all his will into gathering a cushion of air, which he then, in desperation, pushed at the ground. He saw the grass ripple and grinned with satisfaction before slamming into the ground. "Hua-, hua-, huah." Malcolm hacked up a gasping laugh and waited for the air to return to his lungs.
  2. Malcolm both grinned and blushed at once. "Ah, well.. Congratulations!" So much for platonic union and all that. "So... Have you picked out a name?" Perhaps this will be a new era for the Jedi after all. A cold, somewhat childish fear suddenly seized Malcolm by the spine. "Aren't you worried about Kakuto Ryu? They say he's not even human any more, and that he comes to prominent pregnant women to eat their babies! They told us back at the temple that we shouldn't... erm... copulate, if only because it invites a visit from the sithspawn, and all the pain, despair, and disease-ridden vomit he brings with him!" Malcolm shuddered, remembering the holo-records he had stumbled across on the legendary monster. There was more to this than spook stories from chastity-addled Jedi matrons.
  3. (OOC: Ha ha... Tied down for a bit. Or was it "up?" I can't remember. Anyway, back again with apologies.) Malcolm watched his master type distractedly into a datapad. There was something odd about her motions, but he could not place it. He was more concerned about the 'egg' metaphor the force had shown him. Was she pregnant? Or was it symbolic of the eventual birth of a new era for the Jedi, or even the galaxy? Malcolm's brain raced through progressively less probable explanations. He certainly was not going to suggest something as potentially scandalous as pregnancy, at least not without clearer evidence. "Nothing... Well, I saw things more vividly that time, and I wasn't prepared for that much clarity." His glance moved across Armenia's stomach to the datapad at her side. "Is everything alright?"
  4. Malcolm had indeed heard of bodily acceleration through the force. Metabolic control could stave off obesity for a scholar and starvation for a soldier. Healing, speed, mental acuity; it was all accessible through the force, and it was the first thing he wanted to understand. But first, meditation. "Yes, master." There was little to do in the forests of Gala but run and meditate. This, for Malcolm, was a pleasant combination. He began to stare at a scuff mark on the tree; the result of his undignified ascent. The edges of his senses were ragged, their feral panting led to blind survivalism and the dark side therein. Calm in the face of such a storm was the ultimate necessity. He fixed upon the scuff, where the bark had been scraped aside. He willed it to heal, gazing at the sap as it slowly scabbed over the wound, and the process began. His breathing evened out, and he began to slip into the force. It was the only Force phenomenon that came naturally to him. The tree exhaled, and he drew breath, the sun drifted slowly overhead and the leaves followed, eager for its light. Can you feel it? The words assailed his mind like a handful of pebbles on a placid lake. When the ripples had stilled, he did indeed feel it. Not just his tree, but dozens in all directions, crawling with insects and parasites, full of birds tending eggs, fugi growing in sodden hollows, and his master with her egg beside him. "What?" His own speech startled him out of his meditation. Bizarre.
  5. Malcolm watched his master streak down the path and directly up the trunk of the targeted tree. "... Huh." After a few minutes of hard sprinting, he reached a major root, which he ran up as far as he could, kicked off, and awkwardly clutched the underside of the branch on which his master was perched. With some straining and grunting, he righted himself upon it. "I take it... that was... the force?" Malcolm suppressed his wheezing with a grim smile. Focus. You can't afford to lose it under strain.
  6. Malcolm remained alongside his master as she broke into a full run. Finally! It was now that he was most comfortable; sprinting through the forests on Gala was his only escape from the monotony of the temple. He laughed as he felt the familiar pressures in his chest and calves. It was fun, even with the flailing charge through the cloud of biting flies. Malcolm strained his eyes and picked out a particularly huge tree down the trail. After a moment's debate, he pointed to it and asked, "Race ya'?" He put on some speed and giggled, ignoring for now the slight but building burn in his legs.
  7. Malcolm followed his master for a time in silence. The promise of new lightsaber forms was alluring, but nothing compared to forest around them. "It's so... different than Gala. No pines, and no birds." He glanced up from the path at the trees, marveling at the way they all stretched so dizzyingly into the upper air. A lone raptor flitted overhead on hushed wings, startling some smaller roosted birds. "I stand corrected." Malcolm returned his gaze to the trail, increasing his stride to come alongside his master. Their increasingly frenetic pace was a welcome improvement from the day spent sedentary in cramped shuttle cabins. Still, he was surprised; this trip was less of the "contemplative stroll" he'd expect from the Grand Master and more like a game of "Flee the Rancor" with his classmates on Gala. Perhaps she was just trying to make him feel at home. Perhaps it was a simple endurance test.
  8. (OOC: My original post was interrupted by a rather bizarre incident, and rendered unpostable. In future, that should not be an issue.) Malcolm watched the exterior lighshow with great interest; he'd seen hyperspace portrayed before, but had been too young to remember it from his trip to Gala. As a result, it was wholly novel to him, and he giggled with childish delight. Malcolm turned from the window as his master addressed him, thinking back over his training before responding. "Well... As you say, mostly philosophy. General education, of course: I know my calculus and astromaps. I got pretty handy with a training saber, but only against other classmates. We only learned Shii-Cho, so there's a lot I know in theory that I can't even begin to put into practice. It was the same with the force, we mostly learned sensing, with a few meditative alterations and only theory on control..." Malcolm paused. Reciting the Gala temple curriculum to the Grandmaster seemed unnecessary, but he imagined that she was probably testing him in some way beyond the practical question at hand. "Here, watch this." Malcolm squinted hard at a pencil he drew from his pocket. He reached out to it through the force and -- Nothing. "Well, sometimes it works. I haven't gotten it down quite yet. Anyway, they were leery of teaching us too much outside of the apprenticeship, so I had to study a lot on my own... but I can't seem to make much of it work." Malcolm pocketed the pencil with an embarrassed grin.
  9. (Devotion to the narrative is nothing to apologize for.) Malcolm was persistently astonished at how open his companion could be; speaking frankly of private matters to relative strangers. She would likely be a liability in a relationship, and was at that moment privately glad that the Jedi Order frowned on marriages. After all, without marriage, there would be no mother-in-law to interfere and speak so plainly in front of random children. It was that much more a wonder to him, then, that the Grand Master herself would be the shining example of why marriage was complicated and dangerous. Perhaps it is a protracted object lesson to the Order. This made little sense, but there was much in the universe that Malcolm did not yet understand, and so he was quite content for now to break with logic to give his Grand Master the benefit of the doubt. Maybe theirs is a platonic relationship, like some kind of super-force bond... A pure merging of their souls with the force or something... And therein the classic Jedi "love versus stoicism" conflict is resolved! Malcolm speculated in respectful silence, watching the planet drop away only to rush in again as they approached the base.
  10. (Hey, no worries: I saw your note in the absent thread, and am glad things are working now.) Malcolm eagerly returned her stare, trying to determine if her sightless eyes were looking at him, or at something behind him. It seemed that she was lost in thought, but her eyes had a ferocious intensity he did not expect from the blind. Just as he could stand no more, she mercifully turned away. Wait, what? He stood dumb, watching her depart for the hangar. He had heard her perfectly, yet his desire to hear precisely those words made momentarily him doubt himself. Just like that? Malcolm's hand shot to his side, bracing his satchel as he sprinted after her. "Coming!"
  11. "I thought as much." Understanding this concept was one thing, acting on it was another. For now, it was enough for Mal to master the force. Broadening his philosophical base was a good start, and such studies came easily to him, but eventually complicated things like chemistry and astrogation would complicate his ascension to "Renaissance Man." Mal briefly wondered if he'd have to eventually take up needlepoint. "As for the war, I will follow my path to its end. I do not want the Jedi to show me their path, only to give me the light by which to find mine."
  12. "I see..." Malcolm followed what was said, but did not fully understand. It made sense to him that there would be many force sensitive factions in the galaxy that he'd never heard of, but less so that the Grand Master's mother would be one of them, and further that he would ever meet her and hear all this from her. And yet here he was. "Well, as I said, I'm an idealist, so I'm not prepared to describe my life as 'squandered' just yet. While I share your opinion of the war, I fear that there is little choice now but to fight it; lest one side be permitted to lose. But if that all could be set aside, what would constitute a life un-squandered by your reckoning?" It was foolishness, of course, to talk of war with one so much older. His history lessons were her memories, perhaps even firsthand. Still, she seemed tolerant enough, and had been good humored and patient thus far.
  13. "I was born on Correllia. To traders, I think. I remember... Space docks. Public houses with good bread. Street performers. Flashes of color and sounds I can't place. I was taken in by the order and brought here late in my second year. I suppose that's fortunate, for I'd likely have been planet-side when..." Malcolm's voice trailed off. His tone was more contemplative than sad. It wasn't really his home, so it's loss was more abstract than personal. "So yes, I've been here. Not here precisely, mind you, I've probably spent more time on the surrounding grounds than in these somber halls." Malcolm glanced around briefly, eyeing the rafters with a dismissive gesture. "I know it serves a purpose, but the problems I would fix; the people I would help are out there. No amount of hiking will take me to them, so I need a master to get me off planet and into the company of those in need." Something she had said was stuck in his mind. What was it that had escaped so casually, yet implied so much... Oh yes! "You said that you were no Jedi, yet the force is clearly with you. Your daughter is the Grandmaster, so there is no doubting you are equally blessed. Yet if you were a Sith, I'd like to believe that I'd have noticed by now. Or be dead. At any rate, if the force is with you, and you are neither Sith nor Jedi..." It would seem that it was Malcolm's turn to ask a personal question. "Does that make you one of the Gray?"
  14. ”œAh, but as you say, that is for the lesser creatures. Is it not our obligation to distinguish ourselves from the animal, and from the bestial Sith? Charity”¦”
  15. "”¦ In summation, the complication with contemporary capitalist economics arises from the notion that competition breeds strength. This is grossly parallel to the Sith maxim...”
  16. Malcolm woke up in a stand of pines. The morning mist had beaded the outermost layer of his initiate's robes. He stood stiffly from his meditative position, leaning on a gnarled trunk while stretching. Drops of dew sprinkled to the soft forest floor as he arched his back, popped his sternum, and shook like a hound. After a long yawn, he spied the trail back to the Temple. As he strolled briskly back, he quietly berated himself for falling asleep during meditation”¦ again. Soon the pines gave way to the Temple's clearing, and the gnawing in his belly was joined by a new sensation, like tiny mynocks were persistently attempting to escape his throat. Today was the day he was to be assigned to a master! Malcolm returned to his room with a small bowl of rice from the mess hall and retrieved his latest acquisition from the archives: a hardbound copy of Objectivism, Free Market, and the Doctrine of the Sith, with attached commentaries and Klaff's Notes. His superiors would send for him when he was needed. Seeming over-eager at this juncture would only serve to make him appear childish. Malcolm began to skim the preface, bypassing the obligatory disclaimers about ”œDarkside Power Fallacy”
  17. Real Name: Malcolm Derrial Nickname: Mal Age: 16 Species: Human Height: 1.727 Meters (5'6”
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