MATTEO: Life and Death

Chapter 29

On 'Normandy' time passed faster than on any planet - and that's because of the great boredom. Matteo talked to many people and members of his team promising that they would soon get an assignment from the command and go into action. Unfortunately , these words were becoming empty promises. The team was losing patience , and so was the leader - he was slowly becoming impatient.

Shepard was in the training room. He recalled the styles of lightsaber combat. The orange blade buzzed , as Matty spun it. His lightsaber on behind him an interesting history - many years ago Matteo during the 'Year One' traveled around the galaxy , to explore not only other worlds , but also himself. On one of the planets he came across an abandoned Jedi temple. He entered it and found a non-working lightsaber , which was lying on the ground. Shepard then took the weapon in his hand and turned it on , but all he heard was the sound of damage to the system responsible for turning on the lightsaber. After minutes of trying to turn on the 'elegant weapon' he decided to take the weapon apart. After taking apart the lightsaber , he discovered an orange-colored kyber crystal - then he realized that this was responsible for creating the light blade. He took the crystal in his hand and started walking around the abandoned temple. He found more lightsabers and . . . . schematics for making such weapons. One of the diagrams included a lightsaber , which stood out from the rest. He took the tools and began working on the weapon. After an hour he succeeded - he picked up his weapon and walked out of the temple. He lit the blade - orange light illuminated the darkness that surrounded the world - it was already night. Matteo swung his lightsaber - its sound was different from other jedi , whose recordings he watched on the hologram. He turned off the saber and went on , to visit the next world.

Shepard began to take out blows in the air. He felt how the blade was heavy like a medieval sword - heavy and strong for being slow. He repeated to himself the forms of fighting . First , Second , Third , Fourth , Matt repeated them . His strokes were strong , he felt the sword soften in his hands and become lighter as a feather . One , two , three , Matt performed pirouettes in the air. He felt as if he were in Jedi training - Attack , block , attack , block again , hit hard. 'Victory blinds you'. , 'Focus! The Sith would have cut you in half long ago'. - the voices began to appear in his head. Shepard made stronger strokes at the same time rotating his blade - 'You won't win like that'. , 'The Dark Side of the Force is blinding you'. , 'You are a fool Matteo Shepard , and I have seen worse Jedi than you'. - the voices began to speak louder. While training he made a cut on the floor. Damn , it will have to be patched. Shit.

Arla Jareni entered the room along with Damian Reese. The two planned to train today. However, they did not anticipate that the Alliance commander would occupy the entire room. She approached him. "I didn't know you were going to train here."

Matteo stopped swinging his sword and switched off his weapon. He looked at the Umbarian woman." I was just training like that. Nothing interesting."

"Well , I haven't seen you with a lightsaber for a long time. Why don't we train together?" Arla suggested. Matteo let out a breath - he didn't expect that. He turned the handle of his lightsaber.

"I don't know , I don't want to do too much. I was just spinning the lightsaber like that. As I said - nothing special , I was usually bored." He explained. Jareni squirmed and crossed her arms.

"Ah. You talk like that , because you want to escape from here. Stay - don't get stuck in. It will be better together," she pressed. Matt closed and opened his eyes.

"Okay let's. Let's train then," Matteo agreed. Arla smiled-she knew he would agree.

Arla and Matteo stood in front of each other holding their lightsabers. Arla had her double white lightsaber lit and pointed at Matteo. The Canadian lit his lightsaber. The two began walking around the circle looking at each other without blinking. They were focused.