Authors Notes: Hello everybody. Finally the new chapter is finished. I'm going to begin experimenting with a new POV, so have fun with that, hope you enjoy it. As always PLEASE LEAVE COMMENTS!
Chapter 25: The Dust Saber
Visions are a funny thing. As a Miraluka my master was very adept with them, it's part of how he was able to fight so well. He told me once that it requires a clear mind to be able to see the future, even more so to utilize it in the middle of combat. I guess that's why I've never had any before coming to Beacon, I was always more concerned with surviving the present than what's in the future.
The one I was having at that moment was very interesting. And by interesting, I mean damn near incomprehensible. It wasn't a solid sequence like the couple of visions I'd had before, it was seemed like it was a flash of clips from a single whole. I saw what looked like a ship crashing nose first into a large space station, a man with twin blue light sabers and short brown hair leading men into battle against soldiers wearing armor similar to clone armor. But the one that stood out the most was of me, wearing traditional Jedi robes, holding Darth Vader at saber point as he lay defeated on the ground.
Before I could delve any further my train of thought was broken. "You know you do have a bed now Jayden, you don't need to sleep outside." I snapped awake and groaned as I stood up, I wanted to continue with the vision but I was still to easily distracted. The sun was beginning to rise over the horizon, Ozpin looked on it as he sipped his morning coffee next to the fountain where I'd been meditating.
I cracked my back and sighed. "I wasn't sleeping, I was meditating." I told him as I picked up my sword.
Ozpin took another sip of his coffee. "Pardon my intrusion then. I was on my way to the administration building when I saw you." He adjusted his glasses and looked at me. "Is something troubling you Jayden?" He asked.
I thought about what I'd seen. What was it? I was sure it was a premonition but I had no idea how to read it. "I... I had a vision of the future." I told him.
"A vision of the future?" Ozpin asked putting his cup down. He stroked his chin and tilted his head forward, he looked like he was thinking, trying to figure out the implications of what I just said. "What did you see?" He asked.
"I'm not sure. It was a bunch of fractured images, I don't know what to make of them." I paused for a moment. Not sure what to say or do. I needed a Jedi to explain this to me, to tell me how to read my vision. But they're in somewhat short supply. I looked at him, he was probably the only one who would be able to help me. "How should I proceed, Professor?" I decided to ask.
Ozpin picked up his coffee and took another sip. "The future is not set in stone. It's constantly changing and shifting, altered by every choice we make." He said.
His words seemed strange to me. "But Jedi have used premonitions to guide their actions for millennia, but you're saying they're useless?" I asked. I didn't understand.
Ozpin smiled. "No, I didn't say that. It's all a matter of how you view it. You are trying to view your vision as an answer to question, when you should be seeing it as part of a larger question." He said. I scratched my head trying to figure out what he meant. Ozpin seemed to see my confusion and went on. "Use your foresight to guide your actions, use it to see what you should and should not do. But do not take it for absolute truth."
I contemplated his words for a moment. "I see. I'll bear this in mind." I said. I'd never considered the things he was saying. It was certainly a new perspective, one I'd do well to keep in mind.
Ozpin looked at me more closely. He used his cane to lift my shirt up slightly. "Jayden, may I ask what happened to you?" He asked as he noticed the bruising from night before.
"long story short, a ghost made me fight an older ghost." I told him prompting a look of disbelief. "Training, am I right?" I said trying to lighten the mood.
Ozpin shrugged his shoulders. "Very well. So, Pyrrha told me you're going to be doing some modifications to your light saber." He said as he began walking towards the administration building.
I followed him as we continued our conversation. "Just for he sake of functionality." I told him.
"May I see it?" He asked.
The idea of letting some one handle my Lightsaber made me nervous. It was my last resort when situations took a bad turn. Even so this was Professor Ozpin, if I couldn't trust my teacher I couldn't really trust anyone. I reached under my shirt and pulled my saber out form being tucked in my pants waist.
He took it and turned it over in his hands, sliding his finger from its rounded hilt to the red activator button. "It's a very simple design isn't it, are all lightsabers like this?" He asked as he held it at arms length. He pushed it causing the sky blue blade to extend.
"No." I told him. "Traditionally a Padawan, that's me, bases his saber design on his masters saber with minor changes for function. My master didn't have eyes so he needed something simple, something he could easily identify by touch." I said as he turned it off.
He handed it to me and smiled. "So simple yet so much meaning."
"Don't suppose you'd care to explain what you mean by that sir." I asked putting it back in my pants.
"It's simple, plain, a blank slate upon which you may build, much like your self. The question is, what will you build? Do you intend to continue down the dark path of you started all those years ago when you came here, or will you blaze a new one?" He said. "Now excuse me, I really must get to the administration office, and I believe you have some red sap to collect today."
He started heading toward the building but there was one last thing I needed to ask. "Professor, why did you assign us to the mission?"
He stopped for a moment and turned around. His head was tilted slightly. His eyes had a sort of empty, dead fish sort of look to them. "Because the Schnee Dust company requested Ms. Schnee be on the team, apparently they think if she is on the mission their property will be better protected. With that in mind it simply made sense for you to go along because of your experience and with that the rest of your team and team JNPR." I couldn't help but think how funny it was eu thought it'd be safe given that I intended to destroy that ship and every last clanker in it. "Have a good day, Mr. Keno." He said as he walked away.
Crimson red leaves crunched beneath our feet as we walked through the Forever Falls. "So why do we need to collect the red sap again?" Ruby asked.
I went over the various uses for red sap in my head. "Well, after carefully analyzing all the wonderful uses the sap has I've decided there's only one possible reason for Professor Peach having us do this. He's going to teach us how to make pancakes so we're going to need syrup." I said nodding my head. "Yeah, that's it."
Ruby snorted while Nora started going off on one of her rants. "Pancakes! I love pancakes! Ren when we get back to the room we need to make pancakes I mean why are we getting syrup if we aren't going to make pancakes that'd just be weird wouldn't it Ren?"
Nora kept going on as they went off to a tree to collect sap. Ruby, Weiss, Blake, yang and I found a tree and started collecting sap. "So how much of this stuff do we need?" Blake asked.
"A jar for each of us. Plus some for pancakes." Yang said
"Glad to see you and Nora are on the same page." I told her as I gave her a thumbs up.
Yang smiled and slapped my had away. "Oh, and like you don't want pancakes?" She asked.
I shrugged and put a lid on another jar of the thick red liquid. "Actually never had any. You'd be surprised what you do and don't find in the trash." I told her.
"You've been at this school how long and you haven't tried pancakes yet?" Blake asked as she filled another jar.
I pushed my braid behind my ear. "No, sorry I've sorely neglected my culinary education." I said as she handed the jar to me.
Blake was about to respond, but suddenly a loud growl sounded off in the distance. "Did you guys hear that?" Ruby asked suddenly alert.
Two students, whom I recognized from team CRDL, ran towards us. "Urea Ursa!" One of them yelled.
Yang grabbed the one with the green mohawk up by the collar. "What, where? She asked him.
"Back there, it's got Cardin!"
Pyrrha dropped her jar. "Jaune!" She said
Ruby turned towards us. "Yang, you and Blake go get Professor Goodwitch."
Pyrrha drew her sword and shield. "You two go with them, there could be more." She said to Ren and Nora. Weiss and I followed them to where Cardin and Jaune were, and what we saw wasn't good. Cardin crawled on the ground trying to escape, but the Ursa was too fast. "Oh no!" Pyrrha said as she assessed the situation.
As the Ursa brought it's massive claws down on him it looked like it was over. But at the last second Jaune slid between them and blocked with his shield. Weiss and I drew our swords ready to strike. I was prepared to jump and stab it between the plates on its back and neck while Weiss would go for the stomach. But Pyrrha stopped us. "Wait." She said.
Jaune pushed the Grimm back and started striking with his sword. The monster stumbled back but regained his balance and counter attacked pushing Jaune back towards Cardin. But that didn't stop him. He rushed the Ursa only to be knocked to the other side of e clearing. He got up and rushed in for a final strike. The Ursa raised his claws and my heart skipped a beat. Jaunes shield was too low, even of he managed to get a kill shot the Ursa would already have begun a strike that would inevitably kill him. But that didn't worry Pyrrha. She reached her arm out and it glowed with a faint black aura, Jaunes shield raised slightly causing the beasts claws to glance off the shield. He swung his sword, severing the head from its body.
"Uh, what?" Ruby asked.
"How did you..." Weiss began to ask.
Pyrrha smiled a shrugged slightly. "Well, Ruby has her speed, you have your glyphs, my semblance is polarity."
"Woah," Ruby said amazed. "You can control poles."
"No you dunce!" Weiss said before I could. "It means she has control over magnetism."
Pyrrha began to walk away and Ruby and them began to talk but I was too busy thinking. Her semblance could prove useful against droids, especially droidekas, her magnetic powers could disrupt their shields. "You coming Jayden?" Weiss asked.
"Huh?" I asked snapping back to reality. "Oh yeah, just thinking." They didn't know it, but the mission just took an interesting turn in our favor,
"Why's there a box on my bed?" I asked later when we got back from classes.
Weiss walked up behind me and crossed our arms. "Well since we're teammates I decided to pull rank and asked the company to rush your delivery, your welcome." She said. "So what are you going to do now?" She asked.
I grabbed the box and ripped the brown wrapping off of it. Carefully I lifted the crystal out. It looked like two pyramids connected by their bases and was suspended in a slim glass tube. It had a faint, ice blue hue to it. Unlike most dust crystals it was almost clear, not solid in color. I grabbed the bag containing the shards of my sword and slung it over my back. "Thanks!" I said to Weiss. "Here, give this to professor port, I'm going to be gone for a few days." I said as Yang took the sword.
"Where are you going?" She asked.
"There's a forge in the south of the city I'm going to be visiting. I'll be gone a few days while I repair my sword." I told them.
Ruby cocked her head and raised an eyebrow. "Uhh, Jayden, I don't think you can fix a sword that badly broken." She said.
I smiled and walked out the door. "Ancient Jedi smithing technique." I told them.
"When'd you learn it?" Blake asked.
"My master made me study it a long time ago in a galaxy far far away. Later!" I told them.
I left and ran down the hall, I couldn't contain my excitement. If this worked both of my weapons would be far more powerfully em they were now. I ran I between students and nearly knocked Auburn down. "Hey! Watch it Keno!" She said as she braced her self against the wall.
"Sorry!" I yelled back. I made it to the forest where I began to run even faster.
Suddenly Qui-Gon decided to speak to me. "This plan is rather ambitious, are you sure you're up to it?" He asked.
I flipped over a fallen tree and began to slow down as I came to the city. "No idea. Guess we'll find out." I said.
"Very well. This will put your force training to the test, you will need to see as your master saw to accomplish this. To see the force as well as feel it. Do so and I'm sure you will succeed." He told me.
"Yes, my master." I said grinning like a child. Several hours later was at the forge. The sound of hammers hitting glowing red steel resounded and I took a station. It was easily over a hundred degrees and sweat immediately dripped down my face. I took my shirt off and grabbed my supplies. I secretly took my saber crystal out and turned it in my hand. It was jagged and nearly cut me. "Well, let's get down to business."
I worked non stop, day and night for three days. I didn't even stop to eat or drink, instead I used the force to sustain me. The head smith grew worried and tried to have me take a break several times but I refused. Qui-Gon was right, I had to see with the force, so I did. Very soon I saw the heat rising off the furnaces, the various auras inside the forge and outside in the street, I saw the molecular structure of the steel alter as I manipulated it with the force with each strike of the hammer, making it stronger and more durable. I saw the glow of the force in my crystal as I slowly placed it in the tang of the sword and cooled it. Several minutes later I took it out of the water and observed my work. The blade was straight and the top came up at a hundred and thirty degree angle. It now had a sky blue hue to the metal, an effect from the saber crystal now placed in the blade. I fixed the hilt back on and put it in its seethe. I now had the first Jedi Sword in thousands of years.
"Never seen a sword like that." One of the other smiths said.
I unsheathed it swung the sword down on a stack of three cinder blocks cutting them in half down the center. "No one has for nearly ten thousand years. Later." I told him as I left. With my sword finished all I needed now was to construct my new saber hilt. I already had all the pieces, now I just needed a workbench I could use were no one would see. My only real option was to use the schools work shop after it was closed. Hopefully Ozpin wouldn't mind.
"When is Jayden getting back?" Ruby asked as they started getting ready for bed. "He's been missing a lot of class." I'd been gone for a while, they where probably starting to get worried.
"Don't worry, Jayden's smart. He'll catch up quickly enough." Yang told her.
"Yeah, I didn't get this far by studying." All four of them turned towards the door as I pushed it open. "Evening ladies." I said walking in.
Yang jumped off her bed. She was wearing her pajamas like the other three. She grabbed me by the shoulders and looked me up and down. "Jayden you look like hell, what have you been doing?" She asked, concern crossing her face.
"I've been fixing my sword." I told her. "The process is a little... Draining." I stretched my hand out and my saber flew into it. "I also did this." She stepped back as my saber ignited. It extended wi they typical snap-hiss and the four of them looked on it with awe. The blade was a lighter shade blue, closer to ice than it's old sky blue. As the blade extended twelve this lines began to light up the same shade of blue. They extended from the base about four inches up. Where they stopped on the side with the new activation pad was a plexiglass window showing the crystal as it glowed. Instead of a button there was a thumb print scanner, so only I could activate it.
"It looks awesome." Ruby remarked. "What's it do now?" She asked looking from on top of her bed.
"You'll have to wait and see." I said putting it away. "Now go to bed. We got a lot of work to do tomorrow." And so we did. We trained like we'd never trained before. Oliver and I worked studying and analyzing our battle strategy. Ren worked on procuring the ammo and Weiss got us land surveys from her company. Our sparring became more brutal, and my personal training drove me past my physical and mental limits. And as days turned to weeks, the day of our mission finally arrived.