"Ayfour do nothing." Skye ordered without stopping her movements. She could hear them talking as they moved to the now working door. Not exactly what they said, but she felt the overall meaning as wariness and resignation with some hope. Hope was good. Any time someone hoped, and you provided something that grew that hope they would work to helping make their needs be realized. With a gesture that was incorporated into my meditation I opened the door. Uber came in first and then Leet. Though I felt the Force urging me to look.
I assumed that was Uber, wearing armor that would identify him as a Mandalorian and Leet wore something an Ubese would wear. She did not change her movements, but once they were fully inside, she had the door slam shut. Their nervousness increased and she was getting hints that their motives were not entirely honest. Another knew or wanted to know about her and where she lived came from? It was not solid enough to figure out but could become clearer soon enough.
"You come to the home of a Jedi as a known species that hunts others and a warrior race that has fought against us for hundreds of years?"
"Well, you see there is this game. Not very well known but kinda cool."
"Ya and Uber is Boba Fett, and I am Boushh, both were in the movies and in the game sort of, but with you claiming to be a Jedi and all."
"Shut up Leet you don't have to ex..." Two lightsabers ignited as Skye moved so fast neither cape had a chance to move. The tips of her blades nearly touching their necks. They did not even have a chance to flinch with how fast she moved from near the center some fifty feet away. Their fear spiked as they realize what she could have done and the threat as the blades did not waver to sudden surprise and awe that almost overpowered their caution.
"Holy shit she has real lightsabers!"
"It is because I am a real Jedi. One who claims to be a Jedi is only fooling themselves if they are not. That or they are a Sith."
"Okay but um they are cool and all, but we didn't come her to fight."
"I know." The blades vanish nearly as fast as they disappear inside her robes.
"So um I like what you did with the place." Leet said right before Uber hit him.
"What? I am making small talk." Skye giggled as she waved her arm to the balcony.
"I have placed to sit if you plan to say longer."
"Right ya we do." Uber grabs Leet as he was going to head another direction.
"Come on I want to look at the ship."
"Not now, maybe later."
"But I want to look." Skye would have offered but it would distract from the reason they were here and if she understood that he was a tinker was like an engineer he might just be able to copy the technology in some way. They went up the stairs and she followed. Both wore a pack on their backs and took them off before they found one of the seats that she prearranged.
"Nice lair. Old office and in good condition."
"Yes, it was fortunate." Skye replied as she sat down. Ayfour whistled loud enough to be a scream from the hall making both of them jump. His blaster attachment was out, and his shield was humming.
"Is that a droid?" She signaled with her hands for them to remain seated.
"Ayfour stand down. They are only wearing costumes." The droid rolled forward with several more threatening whistles and beeps before the blaster retracted, and he did not retreat until his arch welder popped out and sparked a few times.
"Oh, wow that is not R2D2."
"An astromech droid has over thirty different arms and manipulators. Something that is necessary and cannot be so simple as a movie character." To accent her words all those arms extended out with some of them glowing or sparking.
"Ayfour please. Be vigilant but stop threatening them. They are fairly harmless." The many arms retracted back into their resting positions. Each of those arms help such a droid repair equipment on a ship or work on the outside of a fighter. To some it can be intimidating, and others have even come up with combat protocols to use each."
"So, you are a real Jedi, and you have a fighter and a real droid?" Uber wondered.
"Don't forget the lightsaber or her armor. Can I see your armor?" Leet added with the Force letting her feel how eager he was to see those things. She stood and walked to the room she kept her armor taking off her cloak and her robe and tunics with the Force leaving her in her body glove before she walked through the door. With the Force she put all of her armor on a skill many Jedi needed to learn and some frowned on as being an excessive use of the Force for such little purpose. However, Skye had been on enough battlefields to know that putting armor on in thirty seconds instead of several minutes could mean the difference between death and survival.
She ignored their subdued whistle as sexual thoughts radiated from their minds. If she spent any time with them, she would have to ignore them or teach them some basic techniques to form mental shields. She knew Uber would be able to do it simply enough, but it would take time for Leet. His mind was very chaotic. Thirty seconds on the nose she came out of the room with her armor on and her staff attachment for her lightsaber. She felt their excitement grow and so she ignited both blades and were it not for the closeness to the roof she would have spun them. Three meters of focused Force energy held only in check by a special shield generator that formed the blades. The staff came apart as she used the Force to store them on her armor. She then walked back to her seat and sat down.
"I heard micro servos in your armor. Is it power assisted?"
"Somewhat." Her helm popped open. "But a Jedi uses the Force to move faster and to react quicker, but we learned fighting Mandalorians that our weaknesses were easily exploitable without armor."
"So, being a Jedi is what? Like being a soldier? Not some monk who meditates all the time while chanting?" Leet questioned.
"We meditate, but much of our day is used to keep our bodies in top shape. To help others or to study. As knowledge is its own power. I know six languages as if I had been born into them. I can say I am a doctor, a mechanic, a pilot, and an engineer. I fly that fighter. I constructed my armor and my lightsabers. My knowledge of anatomy allows me to know if I am putting someone who is injured back together again correctly."
"You can heal too?" Uber said as he was thinking.
"Yes, and as much as we strive for peace and discussion I have been in many conflicts since becoming a padawan."
"How old were you?"
"I was born into the Jedi Order, and we start our training before we can talk or even walk. Those that have the gift of the Force can learn at any time, but it is better to start very young. I passed my padawan trials when I was ten."
So, you are, were like a child soldier?"
"Being a Jedi is different. I may have been young in your view, but I had already graduated from the comparison of fifteen years of study. At that age we have the skills to survive on a hostile planet. We can repair a damaged ship or other vehicles. We can even defeat a fully grown warrior or soldier without getting injured in return."
"That still does not mean it is right?"
"I have mastered all six forms of lightsaber combat and the eighteen variations depending on what type of lightsaber we use. I specialized in power attacks with one blade and a staff for reach. Though I can use two blades just as well. I chose to train to be a Jedi Guardian. I am a Knight of the Galactic Republic in all but name. Our sacrifice does not allow us to hold to the same moral standards. The Force more than helps us to not become mentally damaged as would a child soldier."
"That is really hard to understand, but why do anything here? This is not the Republic. We have the PRT and the Wards and even the military and the police."
"Uber, it is my oaths and the Jedi code that makes it a decision that I can ignore. The very nature of the Force urges me to help in the way I can. Your society is dying if nothing changes. The Force is telling me this."
"What has this to do with us? I thought you said that she wants to hire us, Uber?"
"I thought so too. Don't you want to hire us? I know we are villains, but we could help." Skye did not want them to do anything other than understand that they would only get killed if they fought her and it would be better to make them forget like she planned, but now the Force had perked up and she felt it wanted them to help.
"I was not planning on it, but what exactly can you both do." Uber had a simple ability that with minimal practice he can be an expert, but she felt that was not very impressive. As he did have the physique, but she was unsure how good that could be or if it only helped in everything he did. Leet built things but as he described what he did she saw he was more and more limited by what he could build with his power as it had to be original. Not related to anything else he made before. They could be useful, but not to have to help you fight. They were if anything hit and run operatives.
Perhaps she could use them as distractions if an opposing cape or two showed up they could perhaps lead one away long enough to she only had to focus on one of them? Still, that would require training. A lot of training before she would be comfortable in allowing them to assist. It would not be the first or the last time a Jedi worked with a criminal element.
"I do not want you to follow through on your plan Leet. Uber has already been warned away from revealing my location. I do want to hire you in the future, but you would be committing to a lot of training."
"We can work with you, and we don't really need to do the game thing, but we probably will."
"Ya but most of the time our stuff backfires."
"That is the reason for the training. I really don't want you relying on your powers. Uber you need to learn the background of a skill. Not only will it allow you to be more efficient, but no amount of skill can trump experience. Leet what you need to do is similar. You need to learn how to build things that do not use you power. There I can teach you."
"That actually sounds good, but I feel it is going to be a lot of work?" She nodded as Uber understood what they would be getting into.
"Oh, and someone does want to know where you live. They put it on the PHO. Kind of breaks the unwritten rules, but if they can get away with it some will."
"The unwritten rules. Explain." She added in a bit of the Force to compel them to leave nothing out. The longer they talked the worse the Force was wavering. Skye had a terrible feeling that it was some kind of medieval chivalry code. She had come across this world's version in both European history and Japanese history. To find both were cruel in their own ways and not to be glorified, but then again, their more modern history glorified pirates and currently they did the same for all capes. Though she had seen this glorification from pilgrims who came from across the galaxy just to see a real Jedi.
If the Force allowed it, she would be horrified that most treated what they did as a game for prestige even as deadly as it got in some places and in Africa it was a feudal system where the parahumans rules and all the rest were their subjects. The more she learns the faster she felt this world was failing. The Force was swirling again with the uncountable possibilities. In the end she gave Leet the same Force compulsion to never tell anyone where she slept. There was trust, but there was also being naive.
"I need things and you have information and skills. I feel I would be hindered by the authorities even with our code saying we must work within a planet's laws. I am better served with the freedom to act with the Force's will. I would visit your lair as you call it then we can work out an agreement that benefits us both.
"Okay how about tomorrow night."
"That will work. I would also suggest if you had the time to come to the lighthouse and help out. You need to see what you villains do to other people and how just a little help can go a long way."
"This is for our Grand Theft Auto video, isn't it?"
"I told you that video would be bad."
"I did not see that one." Which was true from a certain point of view as she left out the word completely. The next hour was Leet inspecting nearly every piece of equipment that Skye had. Even Ayfour allowed him to look him over. Skye felt that Leet had a bit more synergy with the other part of him once they were done. She had no clue what that meant, but the Force was being clear that it was important. With this world cursed with such powerful beasts she hoped she would find out sooner than later or that the Force would show her in enough time to make a difference.
What she did know was the vision she saw just before she freed Taylor from her locker was linked to the blurred sense she got of their minds. It was as if they had, no it was exactly like they had a split personality, but of the subconscious mind? Was that possible? The phrase 'all things are possible in the Force' did not bode well for this world. Skye just had to diligent that her focus was to save this world. Anything less would be a failure, but first she had to free this city. She so wished she could know what happened to her master.
INTERLUDE: COIL
Coil closed down the fifth failed timeline. He knew exactly where this independent cape was, but no matter what he did she remained free and unknown. An encounter at her food bank in the former headquarters of the Merchants lead to one team dying. A second team killed that went to collect her at her lair. A third team she kills and then she would kill him the one time he had one of his selves watching from a distance. He even had all fifty of his men attempt to kill her from a distance and she survived by somehow reflecting half of the laser beams from the tinkertech weapons killing half his team.
She was as dangerous as Lung or Kaiser. he needed her gone sooner than later, but so far everything he did ended with failure. Kaiser, he had a plan all set up that would work once he had a bit more information. Lung was in custody courtesy of the cape named Skye and a new cape going by Fire Bee though with her control of bugs and that the name is tentative Coil felt she would be better named Skitter and after dropping a poll on PHO she would have a hard time as he had even ignored calling her Fire Bee in the comments he added to his reports as he used Skitter. It might not work, but it could push her to working with the Undersiders.
That was his real goal as to have a girl powerful enough to stand up to Lung and nearly take him down. Then Skye interfered and prevented him from burning the cape alive. He had tortured Tattletale several times to find that whomever Skye was she was able to block Tattletale's power. This was another reason he could not have this woman survive.
Perhaps once he has his hands on Dinah Alcott, he could use her to come up with a better way of getting the cape Skye who preposterously claims to be a Jedi. Though a more worrying thought is that was one of the only things that Tattletale confirmed. His suggestion to Uber and Leet had not panned out so far, but he had started it in both timelines just to see what happened different, but nothing had come of it yet. If anything, he would wait until a prime moment when this new cape was too busy fighting someone from ABB or E88 and then add his team in the mix to take her out.
Worst case he would have the Undersiders and the Travelers once they got here to fight her. That was all dependent on how well the bank robbery distraction proceeded. He would get the girl even if he had to sacrifice the Undersiders to do it. Though he was sure that they would have a decent amount of success even if they failed to get inside the vault. Though that was a tertiary goal one that would succeed with the vault being entered as he knew Tattletale's power would have her grabbing the most important documents.
Though with the disbanding of the Merchants he was able to acquire several warehouses that Skye had not found. The merchandise inside was still in good condition and some of the things had not been on the market in a while. It would turn a profit if he sold it all, but one of his company subsidiaries would profit more once they copied the products. In all she had saved him effort of hiring a larger team so he could hold the E88 at bay while he took them out himself.