And so she does, affecting boredom as she turns inward to her sense of the Force. She's careful not to touch anything, just observe: Here's her connection to him, solid and alive, almost pulsing with strength. Over here, on the other hand, are the remains of the Force effect that used to allow her to hear properly, now a twisted mess hastily repurposed to mute her sense of hearing down to manageable levels; the wreckage of the effect that allowed her to speak that fluently isn't even that useful now, though even the remaining intricacy suggests that it must have been amazing when it was whole. These were the first effects I made, she adds, back before I had any training at all - sort of a matter of not knowing I couldn't, really. But I didn't know how to build strong, then. Someday I'll be able to rebuild them.

it’s beautiful.

He wants to reach out and touch it all, though he knows it doesn’t belong to him.

So much of it is ruined, but it’s ruined in a way he understands.

Pleased warm companionship: I don't mind if you touch, but, later; it's not safe right now.

later is good.

He contents himself with looking.

She extends her senses out into the room: here's her master's aura of competence and deadliness, and her own, carefully submissive to it; her danger sense, and his, the latter carefully mapped in hopes that she can one day outwit it; their various guards and protections, similar in sophistication but tuned slightly differently.

He tries to make sense of what he's looking at. He can see the shape of them, get a feeling from them, but the moment he tries to articulate in words what he sees it all slips away. Something in him understands things he doesn't.

can you see the other apprentices from here?

Of course. Her attention widens: the kid is closest, his associated Force effects crude and unrefined; the pair from the engineering workroom this morning appear next, with a set of visible effects similar to her own. She has to intentionally choose to view the last part of the compound, where he and her final co-prentice are, and flinches away from doing so - do you want to see? It's not pleasant.

i have to.

All right.

The entire compound has the subtly unnerving feel of a place where Sith live, but here it's redoubled, not a vague background feeling but a living presence, hanging in the air like a stench and prickling on the skin like the promise of an incoming storm. Her coprentice is obvious, his afternoon 'saber practice sending sweeping ripples through the Force; the other captives are less obvious, but still visible, dim knots of terror and suffering. And between the two - Oh. Of course you're sensitive. I don't know how I didn't realize.

It's a disgusting feeling, and it's familiar. It sticks to him.

He tries to look, tries to cast aside the sudden nausea and actually see what he's up against, but–

i'm what?

Force sensitive. You're one of us, or could be.

It probably isn't surprising that he recoils, a little, from one of us.

But when he really starts to think about it, about what he is...

this could help. with escaping. right? nobody knows.

I'm sure he knows, her attention goes to her coprentice for a moment. It's possible nobody else does. And it'll surprise them if you do anything complicated, anyway, you look untrained.

can you teach me?

Nothing too complicated. But some things, yeah.

He brings back the image of crawling off the freight ship, of telling the two men who caught him that he was meant to be there and watching them walk away.

Yeah, that's - she doesn't remember the name of the technique, but she remembers doing it, in training, and shows him. Mostly doesn't work on us.

what does work on you—us.

Not much, on a trained Sith. The Force is much better at defense than offense.You could learn to counter someone's danger sense, maybe.

dunno how useful that would be. i’m not very dangerous.

Yeah. And Sith are, that's kind of the point.

She considers, running through a memory-palace list of tactical maneuvers - obfuscating yourself wouldn't be useful, but if you learn to work at a distance, obfuscate me... I don't have the focus these days to do that and anything else, it would make a difference.

i can learn that.

He's confident, somehow, despite the fact that he has no idea what "learning that" would entail. It'll make a difference, so he'll do it.

Mmhmm. She swirls around him again, companionable and pleased. We can start tonight, if I'm not too tired.

let's.