Retreat was an option in his mind, just one he hadn't chosen to exercise yet for two reasons.
The first was that he wasn't sure his options for stopping her here and now were exhausted yet. Her power had clearly grown since they last met, supplimented by knowledge of darker things ... but he had faced far more than his fair share of challenges over the past few years as well. He's bested Vrook, Kavar, his own former master, and many of Revan's Sith beyond that. What Kreia was capable of, he didn't know, but the situation wasn't a hopeless one in his mind.
If it was, though ... if the darkest possibility was true and she was somehow responsible for the death at Katarr, then a retreat might not be possible.
That was the second reason.
The lightning arcing from Kreia's finger-tips was not a surprise, but it did catch him at an inopportune moment. The lunge that set him up to slice one of Kreia's levitating lightsabers out of the air also left him open and, quick as he is, he didn't have the time to muster a complete defense. He barely has the time to draw upon the Force to try and push back against the crackling energy - to try and divert it away from him or back on her.
He finds some success in that. The worst of the attack is channeled away from him. Some of the bolts snapping through the ground bend away from him and strike the hut behind him instead, starting small fires along the front of the hovel.
Kreia's attack does find some purchase, though. Thin fingers of light fork up from the ground, stabbing into his legs and lower extremities. He feels the searing pain lance through his body along the pathways of her nerve endings. He feels his strength ebb momentarily, and the mechanical servos of his prosthetic hand begin to lock up.
But he's not done. Far from it.
He pushes through the pain, lifting his hands and pushing back with all the strength he can muster - a wall of telekinetic force that launches from his fingertips with enough force that it churns up the ground between them.
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branchandroot
no subject
Date: 2021-01-08 03:49 am (UTC)The first was that he wasn't sure his options for stopping her here and now were exhausted yet. Her power had clearly grown since they last met, supplimented by knowledge of darker things ... but he had faced far more than his fair share of challenges over the past few years as well. He's bested Vrook, Kavar, his own former master, and many of Revan's Sith beyond that. What Kreia was capable of, he didn't know, but the situation wasn't a hopeless one in his mind.
If it was, though ... if the darkest possibility was true and she was somehow responsible for the death at Katarr, then a retreat might not be possible.
That was the second reason.
The lightning arcing from Kreia's finger-tips was not a surprise, but it did catch him at an inopportune moment. The lunge that set him up to slice one of Kreia's levitating lightsabers out of the air also left him open and, quick as he is, he didn't have the time to muster a complete defense. He barely has the time to draw upon the Force to try and push back against the crackling energy - to try and divert it away from him or back on her.
He finds some success in that. The worst of the attack is channeled away from him. Some of the bolts snapping through the ground bend away from him and strike the hut behind him instead, starting small fires along the front of the hovel.
Kreia's attack does find some purchase, though. Thin fingers of light fork up from the ground, stabbing into his legs and lower extremities. He feels the searing pain lance through his body along the pathways of her nerve endings. He feels his strength ebb momentarily, and the mechanical servos of his prosthetic hand begin to lock up.
But he's not done. Far from it.
He pushes through the pain, lifting his hands and pushing back with all the strength he can muster - a wall of telekinetic force that launches from his fingertips with enough force that it churns up the ground between them.