Aleister allowed his mind to wander, something he had not yet been able to truly do, and connected himself with the Force. He could feel its living energies in his own body, and he knew at that moment, that it would not allow him to die this day.

He did not struggle, he did not escape, for he knew one simple truth. Patience was a virtue. While the snow did pack around them, eventually their body heat would cause it to melt. They were in no imminent danger, and it was a waiting game.

Realizing this one key truth, he listened to Han tell him stories of the old days of the Force, and how he had chosen the wrong path, out of sheer anger.

He told Aleister of Gash Jiren, and Organa Solo, of his cousin Luke, and of many other stories of the galaxy, that he had chosen to remember. During this time, he also imparted unto Aleister a lesser known language, of Olys Correllisi, the language of Ancient Correllian, something that Han, ever the historian, had picked up through ancient texts, even though the language itself was dead now. Aleister had nothing but time, and as fast a learner as he was, he would easily have the basics down before the snow completely melted.

He smiled to himself as he could feel Master Dolash's eyes on him, wondering if the elder Jedi was simply waiting for him to fail, and to force his way out, and to not see the true test that lay within.

As time passed and the sun came down from the apex of the sky, the light finally made it around the lip of the cave and streamed directly into the snow-filled grotto. Warmed by the sun and the bodies of the entranced Jedi, lying in loose clumps where it had fallen into place, the snow began to melt and break up. Small trickles of icy water and chunks of damp snow rolled away from the cave mouth, causing miniature avalaches to clear more space above and expose more snow to sunlight.

Over a period of hours that seemed to pass like moments, the two Jedi were liberated as the snow around them melted away. When at last Aleister opened his eyes, the cave was as clear as it had been when he had awoke. A more critical eye could now perhaps see the grooves in the stone that had allowed the snow and ice to sluice away and the open spaces above that allowed sunlight to stream in. This was a place meant for the Jedi to meditate in all weathers and circumstances.

Finally, Dolash seemed to wake. Shaking the loose snow from his robes as he rose, he turned to Aleister and gave a slight nod. Shake the mountain and you only bring down more snow upon yourself. Be patient, however, and soon the snow will pass.

They ate and drank late in the day now, spending the rest of the day quietly limbering back up from their long state of inactivity. When they slept, it was to an open sky above, and free of winter's weight on their backs.

Aleister continued to practice the language in his downtime, determined to not allow it to go to waste.

He studied hard over the next several days, listening and meditating, meditating, and listening. It was not yet time for him to attempt to harness the Force, he reckoned, because he did not yet understand that which he was trying to harness.

To do so until he did, he assured himself, would prove folly.

As the next few days passed and their life on the mountainside became routine, the cold began to hold fewer terrors for the two Jedi. If Ilum had a warm season, this was it. The wind bit, but was bearable. The sun was high for most of the day. When they meditated, hours passed as seconds and the snow's touch was gentle.

All this changed one morning when Aleister was woken by the rising, whipping wind. The time of day was indeterminate - the sky was dark with stormclouds. Snow kicked up from the flats below and billowed about, obscuring the horizon. Ice fell in thick pellets from the sky. Each tiny shard was liked a hurled curse, and stung just as sharply.

The weather was not the only new source of cold. Dolash's meditation spot lay bare and untouched, as if he had been gone many hours past. It took no long search to find the Jedi Master, one look upwards towards the mountain peak was enough. Nestled higher among the rocks was Dolash's dark outline, a grim speck surveying the growing storm. The way he had passed was long, meandering, and now guarded by ice and wind. To follow would be no easy task, indeed.

Yet for all forbidding chill, the storm was still quite bearable where Aleister stood. Sheltering in his shallow cave mouth kept the worst of the wind and ice off of him. The sky hardly seemed safe to fly in, but at least the lower parts of the mountain were navigable. Would Dolash return to him, or was he supposed to go up there?

Whatever he did, he would need food and water to do it.

Aleister pondered, feeling the whipping wind at his face, his wings flapping in the wind, watching Dolash stare at the storm as if to wonder "Why have you come to bother us at this moment".

He knew that by the time he managed to get to Dolash, the Master would likely be finished with his ...whatever he was doing and be on his way back, which would lead to more excerise in the return and likely a quirked eyebrow from the aged Master.

Aleister sat down, and patiently peeled some lichen off the wall and ate, cupping his hands in the small pool of water and drank, to gather his strength.

He pondered once again, seeing Dolash having not have moved.

Truly the way Dolash had reached his position was treacherous, but, perhaps this was more of an observatory test. The lower areas were still flyable, but, Aleister chose not to rely on them, instead, feeling the flow of the Force in his body, he ran the lower slope, the manageable area where the weather had not yet conquered, to surveil the area and perhaps give him a better position to climb, or walk up a seperate, easier path, to reach Master Dolash's position.

As he arrived at the base of the area where the weather was not yet torturing the stone, he found himself quite out of breath. He was glad to have remembered to have packed some more lichen, even though the trip was not that far. Carried in the napsack on his back, he pulled some out, rested for a few moments, and ate again, replenishing his strength. Afterwards, he stared up teh face of the mountain and pondered his next move.

As Aleister took in the mountain above him he eventually caught Dolash's eye. Closer now, he could still see the Jedi Master's outline, but it remained mostly obscured. His eyes though, these Aleister could see, shining out like two piercing lamps through the storm.

As they narrowed upon the slight young man below, the wind seemed to grow in ferocity. Snow swirled in thick, airy tendrils around the Jedi Master's resting place, and all at once descended on the mountainside. Hail fell like a rain of pebbles, and snow dislodged in thick drifts to bombard the paths and passages upwards.

No matter from which side Aleister might have approached the sky's fury fell. The sound and fury of the storm was all-consuming, but as the noise grew an attentive listener heard something else. This was no natural storm (that much was obvious to any observer). The Force's wrath was being summoned up, channeled through the storm. The spirits of the mountain were waking, and their voices could be faintly heard howling from deep within their resting place, adding to the storm.

The truth was plain - if it was not placated, the Force would allow passage to no one.

Aleister pondered this, getting the same sense that the mountain demanded something, but...what?

He sat down and ate another piece of lichen before moving into a meditative trance.

He could feel himself relax and slip into a medium consciousness, where he could more easily communicate with the Force.

He could hear its agitated wails, and he waited until there was a break in them, before he spoke up.

What do you desire of me?

The voices that responded were thunderous and unfocused. A thousand different cries went up, each in a different yet equally incomprehensible language. At the same time there was but one voice, divided a thousand times, speaking but one reply that came in a thousand ways. There was a sense of expectation, of anxiety, perhaps of impatience.

The words spoken weren't clear, but the direction they were coming from was. The Force's grip on the storm-clouds was plainly visible. The clouds above were gripped by tendrils that reached up as grasping claws from the mountain below. The spirits - one of whom Aleister had previous met - were certainly a part of this pull, but it seemed to run deeper still. The sensation was difficult to describe yet unmistakably real.

Whatever solution there was to be had would not be found on the mountainside then, but back under the ground. Looking back skywards, the clouds around Dolash thickened and darkened until the bright pinpricks of his eyes disappeared entirely.

Clearly interpreting the Will of the Force, it was as obvious to Aleister as the fact that wet bantha smelled horrible (though coincidently, he'd never actually seen a bantha much less smelled one) that the Force desired him not to seek out Master Dolash on the Mountain at this present moment.

It had...other requirements for him at that present time. He bowed toward Dolash in a sign of respect, and turned back towards the cave mouth from when he had come, returning into the lighted warmth of the torches and the passageway back unto their meditation room.
It was a long trek, and one that exhausted Aleister, but he had much he had to do.

He ate some more lichen, and drank some more water, and immediately slipped back into his deep meditative trance, once again listening to the wails of the Force, hoping that perhaps the inside of the mountain would provide a filter for the many voices that spoke to him, and allowing him to distinguish the goal that they wished to present to him.

He spoke through his trance to the muddled voices.

I am your servant. What would you have me do?

At first, the only answer given was continued silence. Physically, the temple ruins deep under the mountain were lifeless and static things save for the smouldering torch-stubs. Aleister's burgeoning Force sense, however, detected a great deal of movement just under the surface.

Faint whisps, fog-like outlines of humanoid figures, hovered around the edges of perception. Both seen and unseen, they gathered like a cautious crowd, inching into view yet disappearing if focused upon. It was not they for whom the mountain quaked or the winds blew, however, they were mere observers. When that voice spoke, it was to the exclusion of all lesser ones.

No words were passed, for the speaker was not one of words. Instead there was simply the sense that it was so. At that moment, Aleister felt only the mountain's crushing indifference. It did not care for the petty affairs of life. Though infused with the Force presence of generations of Jedi, the land held no special loyalty to their kind. Aleister asked what was required of him? The voice, seemingly the Force itself, replied nothing. Nothing was required, as he served no need the Force had.

Then, with a sensation like a giant rolling over, the eye of the mountain moved away from him and the spirits melted back into the stone. Was it gone? Was it listening any more? What had spoken, really?