Following Double Tap
Trigger warning: Distress and disorientation leading to a near-drowning event;
Efret loses situational awareness in this scene; it is not a suicide attempt.
Trigger warning: Distress and disorientation leading to a near-drowning event;
Efret loses situational awareness in this scene; it is not a suicide attempt.
The smell of salt wafted off the sea up the shore.
Up.
Up.
Past the soft dunes into the coastal hinterland. It diffused as distance from the source increased—not the water's salinity itself but those made by oft-unsung bacterium floating in the clear or the foam.
Efret walked further, trading one smell of spent life in the air for another; until that of decomposing algae masked more and more the stench of smoldered skin and sinew. Of vaporized blood and bone.
She had forgotten the excuse she had given Casimir back at the ritual grounds to bade him to let her depart alone the very moment she had given it. Maybe she hadn't even spoken but bared her teeth and growled.
It made sense that he had heeded regardless. Though he had overcome the allure of the Netherworld rift, it was almost certain that realization had crashed over him as the battle's adrenaline wore off. He had his own demons to reckon with in the wake of today's terror. Whether or not one rooted so far as regret that he had chosen her instead of a chance, however small, to save his sister wasn't on Efret's mind. It couldn't be. There was no room.
Her mind was fuller than full. Her thoughts bust from it at the seams, spilling out to be held by a Force that took no mercy on her. Good. She didn't deserve it. What she deserved was to be gorged on all these things—her horror, her failure, her pain, her hate—until she broke.
Perhaps that was the only way to continue her, as part of the Sith Covenant.
She had somehow convinced herself that some of their ranks were her friends. Varin. Anet. Mercy. A'Mia. She didn't know the exact roles they each had played in the invasion, but she didn't have to; the very air made plain to her that they were all monsters.
The texture of the ground below Efret's boots changed: slightly soft soil held together by wiry blades of windblown, salt-crusted grass, transitioning to unvegetated and thus loose sand. She stopped and stooped to unfasten her footwear, leaving them near the approximately linear boundary.
The Mandalorians had come to Humbarine. The Sith's defense, then, was righteous.
But here...
Every step felt like a potential stumble, the coarse sand giving way not just to Efret's body weight but that of the additional yoke she carried between her ears.
Then her bare feet found the stable upper foreshore. Her throat vibrated, both internally and externally. As frustration bubbled up like foam from her own mouth, the disembodied voice at her throat cried out alongside her.
The sand around her liquified for just a moment before firming back up.
A piece of seaweed high tide had beached burst into flame, bright red and orange lapping high at the sky before sputtering at the contained moisture and immediately snuffing out.
The current wave lapping up the shoreface retreated so rapidly it tore an inch of sand out to sea.
She stumbled, barely remaining on her feet, stalling as she came to the faint high tide mark.
Entering bodies of water was a Lorrdian—or at least a Bepruan—cultural taboo. Crossing this line wouldn't count, of course, but did represent her last good chance to stop herself. If she continued to the water, the chances she'd either step in or let the tide catch her rose to almost certainty.
She closed her eyes and straightened, breathing the fresh sea air into every crevice of her lungs. A memory cut through the mental clouds.
Those words were among the last she had spoken to Elias. At the time, and even now, she had hoped that one day he would teach her to swim, allow her to grow past the trellis her people had bound her to. It wasn't malicious of them, of course; traditional warnings were given with love by not just ones' guardians but their ancestors, and theirs, all the way back to those who had learned a particular lesson, often the hard way. They were bestowed with an immemorial spirit of protection, but when did a certain prohibition become outlive its usefulness to a people?
Though the delayed sigh she let out was heavy, the sea, which had resumed its natural flow, which took its normal tithe of sand from the shore, drowned out the sound.
So much for her romantic fantasy. She'd take the reins herself.
As she moved to take a step, a shivering wave pushed through her body, growing more intense as she walked towards where the waves caressed pebbles and shells embedded in the shore. The saturated sand began to suck gently at her skin as if trying its best to hold her back. Water washed lazily towards her. She held her breath and met it, pushing down the urge to turn away.
The shallow embrace knocked the air out of her lungs. She went rigid—not out of fear but slight shock at the cold.
Her next steps were infinitely easier. Lighter. The hems of her skirt and robe wicked water slowly past their direct contact with the sea. At first, she didn't stray far from the safety of dry land, but it was still too far. The gentle waves shimmered translucent gold in Force Sight, mesmerizing as the froth of distantly incoming crests gathered threads of warmth.
Like pleated silk sheets on a freshly made bed. The smells of salt and soot were equally distant now; present instead was the floral notes of jasmine powder and fig incense.
It felt too good for someone like her.
But still, the comfort of a mattress like that. To straighten her spine. To warm her tired feet.
Somewhere along the way, Efret had grown too weak to resist such temptation.
She stepped further down the shore until the waters, and the demons that they did in fact hold for her, swallowed her ankles.
