Omake: In The Salle
Unlike Mara, Taber had never actually been on board one of the new battle carriers before. Fortunately, all she had to do was log her military datapad into the ship’s internal network and the personnel navigation system would happily provide her with directions to anywhere on the ship she and Irolia were authorized to go.
Less fortunately, the visiting officers’ quarters were located conveniently close to the hangar bays, but the onboard training facility was in one of the utility spaces at the core of the ship; and unlike a cruiser, a capital-weight carrier was extensively subdivided for damage containment and control purposes. Travelling that far through the ship required taking no less than six different turbolifts and passing through three internal security points.
While no ship in the fleet had a dedicated lightsaber salle, the presence of Luke and his padawan on Executor meant that several high-end sparring droids were available. The two Imperial Jedi checked out practice sabers from the training facility armory, set up one of the smaller multipurpose training rooms as a basic salle, then began warming up with velocities.
A few minutes later, Taber and Irolia discovered that the ‘default setting’ on the sparring droids was in fact Luke’s personal workout setting. Turning one droid on actually summoned the entire heavily customized set, operating as a viciously fast coordinated hunting pack and inflicting multiple saber burns on both of them before they could actually call a safety halt.
“Ow. Ow ow ow ow ow ow.”
“Also ow. And a certain Jedi Master needs to remember to have his personal lockout on droids that are hardwired to his personal crazy-death-blender settings! He's even worse than Mara!" Taber groaned, then rolled her shoulders and summoned her training saber back to hand. “Still, it’s been a while since I’ve had a good challenge.”
“You are not serious.”
“Sure I am. Droids, designate Knight Irolia as noncombatant for training purposes, then let's go again!”
Irolia could only roll her eyes and resume her sensible velocities as all ten droids immediately dogpiled the laughing, tumbling Twilek. Apparently, Skywalker insanity was contagious.
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Skywalker insanity was definitely contagious. When Leli arrived in the training salle, she and Taber almost immediately talked Irolia into trying out battle meditation on a more personal scale. Then before she could get a protest in edgewise, they brought in twice as many droids and set them to maximum difficulty setting.
As it turned out, these weren’t just high-end sparring droids. They were Master Skywalker’s personal sparring and bodyguard droids: armored in beskar, programmed with a comprehensive repertoire of both Jedi and Mandalorian techniques, and armed with not only lightsabers but also all the nasty little toys Mandalorians liked using against Jedi. Moreover, they were fully flight capable, and when operating at maximum difficulty, did not simulate damage for anything less than full strength lightsaber hits to their less-armored joints. And with integral tactical links and a networked battle computer, the droids had absolutely perfect coordination and situational awareness.
But with battle meditation, the three Jedi had the universe itself on their side. Reality bent. The most capable combat droids in the galaxy were swept aside in a storm of saber, blaster, Force ability, and even physical blows. . .
. . . and they still took twice as long as Luke's record, the droids cheerfully informed them as they reset, reassembled themselves, and withdrew to their recharge stations. “Try again anytime!”
“Master Luke does that solo?” asked Irolia incredulously.
“No, Master Luke spars all forty of them solo.” replied Leli, “Twenty is just a warm up for him. I can handle two or three, and survive against five.”
“The repeaters are a nice touch, especially since bolt deflection is an area of weakness for Makashi.” commented Taber, wincing slightly at a blaster ricochet that had singed her left lekku. “Jar’Kai would substantially improve that, but I would need much, much more off-hand practice to use it without Master Dooku raising an eyebrow at me.”
“If you’re considering Jar’Kai, perhaps single-handed hilts?” suggested Irolia. While actual lightsaber combat was a personal weak point, the library at Ossus included a massive collection of both historical lightsabers and past treatises on design techniques.
“You mean a shoto?”
“No, I mean a short hilt projecting a full-length blade. They were recorded in the archives as being used by several notable early Makashi duelists, including both Jedi and some of the ancient Sith. I’ve got some information on my datapad, if we head back to quarters. . . ”