Makashi Obscura — Field Apotheosis

(A First-Person Account by Darth Vokun’zar)
 
I chose the outpost because it meant nothing.
A forgotten listening station at the edge of mapped space—durasteel ribs exposed to vacuum, gravity unreliable, corridors narrow enough to punish excess motion. No banners. No history. No witnesses worth remembering.
A place where form would have no excuses.
I seeded rumors carefully: relic fragments, lost data, a convergence of Force echoes. Each lie was tuned to a different hunger. Predictable ones. They came exactly as expected.
Three combatants.
Three traditions.
Three errors waiting to be corrected.
I intended none of them to leave.
 
I. The First Duel —
 
He arrived first.
A Soresu practitioner—defensive to the marrow. Tight guard, circular footwork, blade always between us like a ritual ward. He believed survival was proof of righteousness. He believed patience was invincibility.
We faced each other in the central corridor—long, narrow, flanked by fractured conduits that hummed with dying power. The floor plates vibrated beneath our feet, a subtle instability that punished hesitation.
I assumed the Predetermined Stance.
Left foot forward. Weight biased. Torso upright. Both sabers held in Obscura grip, trailing behind my forearms, blades ignited but denied declaration.
He felt it immediately.
Soresu fighters always do. Their entire philosophy depends on reading threat vectors. Mine refused to exist where he looked.
He advanced cautiously, shielded by a tight rotational guard. When he committed, it was correct: a centerline thrust designed to force a bind and reset distance.
I stepped forward into the attack. At the same moment, I wrapped the Force around his nervous system—not violently, not outwardly…slowing him….
Not time stopping—but intention arriving late. His muscles obeyed him. They simply did so a fraction behind schedule. The thrust lagged.
My left wrist rotated upward. The blade rose from beneath my forearm along a precise diagonal, severing his weapon hand cleanly at the wrist. No swing. No telegraph. Just alignment and pressure.
Soresu doctrine demanded retreat. His mind issued the command. His body answered too late.
I advanced again, collapsing distance with a short, decisive step. The second blade entered beneath his guard in a direct thrust to the sternum, driven by hip alignment rather than arm extension.
He died without understanding why defense had failed him.
I released the Force.
The corridor returned to its natural rhythm.
 
II. The Second Duel —
 
She came through the upper gantry—fast, coiled, kinetic.
Ataru. Always Ataru.
Motion as faith. Speed as truth. She bounced lightly on the balls of her feet, blade spinning just enough to signal readiness. She believed unpredictability was freedom.
I let her see me.
Same stance. Same geometry. No adjustment. The blades trailed behind my forearms, partially occluded, their vectors unreadable. My gaze did not follow her movement.
That unsettled her more than aggression ever could.
When she launched, it was explosive—vaulting off a support strut, blade arcing downward in a textbook aerial strike meant to overwhelm guard and timing simultaneously.
I shaped the Force—not as pressure, but as… illusion.
To her perception, my right-hand blade appeared to cant forward slightly—just enough to imply an imminent intercept on that side. Not a false image. A nudge.
She adjusted mid-air.
That was her mistake.
I stepped forward as she committed to the illusion. The blade she tracked did nothing.
The other rose. From beneath my left forearm, the saber snapped upward in a tight oblique cut that opened her abdomen along the muscle line. The motion was biomechanically clean: front foot drive, hip rotation, wrist articulation, immediate recovery.
She landed badly, breath gone, blade coming down to parry a strike that did not exist.
I dispelled the illusion.
Her eyes widened—not in fear, but realization.
The second blade reactivated fully inside her guard as I advanced once more, the thrust short and terminal, angled upward beneath the ribs into the heart.
Ataru failed her not because she moved too much—but because she trusted motion more than consequence.
 
III. The Third Duel —
 
The last arrived last—of course.
Juyo always does.
He entered the command nexus like a storm, blade alive with violent intention. His stance was aggressive, asymmetrical, constantly shifting. Emotion poured off him in waves—anger sharpened into purpose by belief.
He spoke.
They always speak.
Conviction masquerading as inevitability.
I let him finish.
Then I assumed the stance. Left foot forward. Weight settled. Both blades obscured. Gaze lowered—not submissive, but final. I reached into the Force not as power—but as structure.
And I twisted his mind. Not madness. Not confusion. I simply reordered his internal hierarchy of certainty. Suddenly, the thing he trusted most—his conviction—felt misaligned. Not wrong. Incorrect.
His breath caught.
Juyo demands commitment. Without it, it devours itself. He attacked explosively, trying to overwhelm the sensation with motion—wide arcs, violent transitions, power fed by desperation.
I stepped diagonally forward, stealing the angle as his blade passed centimeters from my shoulder. My right wrist snapped.The blade rose from obscurity and cut across his throat in a clean lateral line, severing carotid and spine function in one controlled motion.
No flourish. No excess.
He fell mid-thought.
I released the Force.
The nexus went quiet.
 
Final Realization
 
Three forms. Three philosophies.
All corrected.
Makashi Obscura did not overpower them. It invalidated their assumptions.
Soresu trusted time. I collapsed it.
Ataru trusted perception. I bent it.
Juyo trusted belief. I ended it.
The Force did not dominate the blade. The blade did not channel the Force.
They converged into inevitability.
I stood alone in the outpost, sabers still held in Obscura grip, trailing behind my forearms like truths too late to matter.
Makashi was judgment.
Makashi Obscura is conclusion.
And I had proven it where no one could pretend otherwise.