deercountry | sanctuary holiday party

Who: Anyone, open to all
What: Sanctuary's holiday party, low key since it's a hectic irl month. There will be a handwave thread for just that.
When: the last week of december
Where: sanctuary

Content Warnings: alcohol, others to be put in headers

Welcome to Sanctuary's attempt at a holiday party. It's open door, feel free to have heard about from word of mouth, a friend, just walking by and being curious.

It's also half planned by a man who doesn't know the first thing about any winter holidays, so that will probably be fine.

The kitchen is the drop off area for people who brought food. It's also open for people who want to prepare something themselves. The general instruction for anyone who asked what to bring was nostalgic food, something from their world, something from their preferred holiday this time of year. Because of that the selection is a bit wacky, but a lot of the staples are there.

Like cookies of various sorts, hot chocolate, a big bowl of some spiked drink that people are hopefully guarding from the wayward youth. Feel free to take a turn doing so or making it worse. Otherwise it's pretty much just a buffet of people moving in and out, taking a plate to wander.

Ugly sweaters are apparently a tradition so there's a pile of them in one of the rooms, brought by none other than Vi. Anyone is welcome to go and steal one, they're terrible. Imagine what Trench thrift stores would have in terms of ugly holiday sweaters and despair.

Music wafts through the rooms as well, again a weird combination of whatever holiday music seemed appropriate. The central room to the party has a tree, only it's made of metal and looks more on the menacing side than festive. Presents can be placed under there, ones that will be sent to Koz Orphanage for their own celebrations.

Speaking of there's a table for making decorations. Craft stuff, glitter and glue, origami and instructions on how to make stars and simple chains. It's clearly meant more for the Koz kids when they visit but no one's going to stop anyone from unleashing their muse over here. In fact it's encouraged to hang the decorations up when done wherever you'd like, including the increasingly cluttered, dangerous metal tree.

It's more than likely mistletoe ended up tacked up somewhere. Hey, at least it's not Trench bullshit magic mistletoe, it can be easily ignored.

Outside lights are strung up everywhere, the snow is fresh and it's a lot quieter in general. Not a bad place to wander, or to start hurling snow at people so it's immediately less quiet.

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Now that was an impressive display, though the usually impassive expression on Maul's face didn't change expression. "Interesting," was all that he said.

Maul decided not to comment on Daniel. As far as he was concerned, the man could go take a long walk off a short cliff. He wasn't sure how valuable anything the karate man could teach people was. His old foe, at least, he had more complimentary things to say about. "Obi-Wan is a wise man to learn from. His powers and mine stem from the same source. The Force." Maul reached out with the Dark Side and used it to show off his own powerset, using it in a more delicate manner to form the snow into three rough round balls, pretty much making a lumpy snowman with the material.

There's something about that simple acceptance and answer that has Mob's opinion of Maul go up a bit. He wasn't really expecting shock, given the Trench and the fact Maul's clearly seen weirder, but it's still kind of nice.

Ah there it is though, he's seen a little of this power before and it's pretty interesting. More that massive pool it seems to come from, the connection of it all. He regards the makeshift snowman, content to let the snow around them continue floating lazily and freely.

"He said it's tied to your emotions too," Mob answers. "It sounds kind of similar to psychic powers, just you're tied to something really, really big." And a beat, before he asks, "Is it hard to control?"

"Yes. The orders he and I belong to approach it from two different points of view but both use the same power source. The Jedi focus on detachment and control as a way to use the Force while the Sith use passion and heightened emotions." That was the most Maul could say about the Jedi Order without getting into biased territory.

He nodded at the question. "Some of it is. Think of it like a large piece of steel. You can use a lump of the metal as a weapon but it will only take you so far. To wield it properly, it needs to be melted down and refined into a sharp blade. That is the Force." Maul wasn't really good with explaining things but he hoped he'd gotten across the point that some of it was innate but most of what he'd learned had involved being taught to hone his powers into something far more intricate.

That actually does make sense to Mob in a way he hasn't heard someone use before. Usually people talk about skill rather than refining the energy itself. He nods slowly.

"So they control their emotions to shape their power and the Sith use their emotions instead?" he guesses after a beat. "Using your emotions for it like that sounds pretty dangerous. You don't get hurt?"

"Yes, at its heart, that is what the Jedi and Sith's tenants are. Light versus dark, order versus chaos, detachment versus passion." Mob seemed smart enough to pick up on the idea that good versus evil wasn't one of the things that the two sides of the Force really entailed, at least not in Maul's mind, so he didn't include his usual affirmation about that.

Maul paused for a long moment before he answered the boy. "There is always a chance of getting hurt when you have tremendous power. It is the price one pays for having it to begin with. That is why it is important to learn how to use it properly and wisely. The Sith believe our passions free us from any self-imposed chains put on our minds, allowing us to reach our full potential in the Force."

Mob does take note of that, mostly that it sounds like the two sides seem so split down the middle. Is this what it would be like in a world where psychic powers were more common? People thinking about what it really meant, drawing lines in the sand, forming groups and finding both understanding and conflict.

It sounds like a lot to deal with. It sounds really nice too. A little of both.

Admittedly the Sith side of things sets off alarm bells in his head. He's spent so, so long trying to control his emotions, it's everything he's always felt was dangerous. Yet here is a person who seemed to live that way, at a party, making snow float with him.

(He hasn't used his powers so freely like this in longer than he can remember. At least not for something so simple. It was a little scary. It was-

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"But-" he starts, stops, needs a moment before he looks up again. "Emotions, passion, it's what makes us lose control, isn't it? It's dangerous. Maybe not to us always, but other people."

"You sound like a Jedi," Maul said. It wasn't an insult, mainly noting which way Mob seemed to think of how to control his own powers. He went on to explain what he thought.

"Repression, detachment, to me that sounds dangerous rather than using my emotions. To try and keep a lid on everything, obsessing over a control which is unnatural means risking bottling everything up until you explode outwards. It is far healthier to learn how to use your emotions to your advantage. To feel anger, fear, determination, these things are natural. What one needs to do is learn to wield them for a person instead of against them. That is what I try to do with my students here." Maul had found great satisfaction in teaching others here the tenants of the Sith that he still agreed with.

Yeah fair, that did sound a little like what Obi-Wan said. It should probably mean the Jedi thought process makes more sense to him, yet he watches Maul as he speaks, conflicted. He's not even sure why he's conflicted.

(Maybe because everything Maul just said sounds like him. Bottling it up, exploding. How many times did it happen now? More than he wants to count.)

"How... do you learn that?" He sounds a little hesitant, but pushes on. "How do you teach it?"

Maul was happy to explain the philosophy he saw to instill in his students. Most of it were the teachings of the Sith he'd learned growing up, though he had made adjustments as he'd realized things like deliberate cruelty to one's students was no way to get proper results. He was a firm teacher and pushed his students hard but he wasn't sadistic and never sought to break them down the way Sidious had with him.

"First, one must start off with meditation. You cannot built a strong house on shaky foundations. I teach how to let go of trying to control your emotions and keep it all beneath the surface. No, the goal is to bring all of what you are feeling to the front of your mind and simply let yourself be. Feel everything there and not be afraid of it. Only then can teaching how to control the powers themselves can occur."

He'd had great success with this method going all the way back to when he'd first met Eleven in Deerington and with some of his students that had extraordinary powers here in Trench like Sharon.

"But-"

Another pause, because it all sounds right. It's how people handle things, it's how other psychics did probably. It's how Maul does, and others like him. His students even.

'Let yourself be' was dangerous for someone like him though. "What if even that is too dangerous? What if who you are is dangerous to everyone?"

He glances over to Maul again, his powers slowly letting the snow lower, his aura fading. "I wonder sometimes if there are things that just shouldn't exist. Like powers."

"People are always a danger to others no matter who or what they are. Even if you don't have powers, it can still happen. It is just some are a bigger danger than others to people. That is why proper training is necessary." Maul believed that firmly. Even if he hadn't been taken by his master, he would have had to be trained by his mother on the use of his powers.

"I think everyone who has powers feels that way at some point or another," Maul said in a kind tone. He had a number of times, knowing that his master had only sought him out because of his Force-sensitivity. "But you cannot run away from who you are. All you can do is learn how to control your powers instead of letting them control you instead."

sanctuary holiday party

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