Character Perseus

[Perseus]

|| THE BASICS ||

• Full name: Perseus
• Preferred Name: Perseus
• Alias: N/A
• Titles: Cursed Son of Nórrmen
• Species: Nórrmen
• Birthworld: Space-Born
• Homeworld: None
• Faction(s): Mandalorian Empire
• Rank(s): Mandalorian Foundling
• Class: N/A
• Master(s): N/A
• Padawan(s): N/A
• Force Sensitive: No, Force Void
• Force Alignment: True Neutral
• Face Claim: N/A
• Voice Claim: N/A

|| PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION ||

• Gender: Male
• Age: Eighteen Galactic Standard Years
• Height: Seven Foot One Inches
• Weight: Two Hundred Twenty-two Pounds
• Complexion: Fair, Slight olive tint
• Eye Color: Blue
• Hair Color: Black
• Distinguishing Marks: Many scars over his body.
• Voice Sample: N/A

|| ORIENTATIONS ||

• Marital Status: Single
• Sexual Conduct: Undetermined
• Languages:
  
  • Spoken: Galactic Basic Standard, Ur-Kittat, Nor
  • Written: Galactic Basic Standard, Ur-Kittat, Nor Futhork
• Occupations: Mandalorian Foundling
• Residence: Mandalorian Space

|| APPERANCE ||

"Survival is not mercy. Survival is obligation."​

Perseus is a young Nórrman male in his late teens, though his body already carries the presence and strength of someone older. He stands at an athletic height with a lean but densely muscled build. The kind of frame born from both hardship and the biological gifts of his people. His musculature is compact and defined, with corded strength visible in his arms, legs, and shoulders, but not bulky; his body is designed for speed and explosive force rather than mass. Even in stillness, there is a taut, restless energy about him, as though every muscle is ready to react at a moment's notice.

His skin is pale but marked by hardship: scars scattered across his forearms, shoulders, and torso, and faint discolorations where bruises never quite faded. His face is youthful but sharp, with strong cheekbones and a jawline hardened by constant tension. His lips often hold the faint trace of a scowl or grim line, rarely softening into anything resembling ease.

His hair is dark, almost black, and unruly. Usually hanging damp or tangled across his forehead, as though never given the care of a comb or blade. It frames his piercing eyes. Blue-green in color, striking and almost unnatural in their sharpness. The modified PAX-gene of his people gives them uncanny clarity, and in dim light they reflect with a faint green luminescence, like the eyes of a predator. When he fixes his gaze on someone, it feels dissecting, as if he sees more than he should.

Perseus' frame is marked by the hidden resilience of his species: broad in the chest, with a ribcage slightly more pronounced, hinting at the reinforced bones beneath. His movements are unnervingly fluid for someone so raw and battered. The result of his super-myelinated nerves. To an observer, he seems unnaturally quick to react, his balance sure-footed, as though he always knows how to place his body just right.

His clothing is a stark contrast to his biology. He wears ragged, torn garments that speak more of poverty and ruin than of strength. A loose, hooded tunic, its fabric frayed and stained, hangs unevenly against his frame. His shorts are equally worn, uneven at the hems, clinging wet and heavy when soaked. His feet are bare, calloused and scarred, hardened by unforgiving terrain. Altogether, he appears more like a boy abandoned to the wilds than a warrior. Until one notices the strength in his build, the focus in his eyes, and the way his body seems built to endure punishment.

Perseus' presence is unsettling. He is young, scarred, ragged. Yet he looks like someone who has already fought through fire and blood. His body is both weapon and burden: a living contradiction of youth and ruin, fragility and resilience.

|| ATTRIBUTES ||

"Every breath I take is defiance. Every step I take spits in the face of oblivion."​

I was born with nothing, and I carry nothing but myself. Among the Norrmen, family is everything. Sire-names, kindred, bloodlines that stretch back into legend, all carried like banners of pride and belonging. A man does not stand alone. He stands as the voice of those who came before, the arm of those who fight beside him, and the promise of those who will carry on after. But me? I had no sire-name. No family to shield me, no kin to bind me, no legacy to speak my name into the Deep. I was only Perseus. A hollow boy among people who lived and died for the weight of their names. From my first breath, I was already cut adrift.

And as though being nameless was not enough, I was Force Void. To the galaxy, that makes me unseen, untouched, unbound by the current that shapes all life. To my people, it made me cursed. They said when I die, I will not walk into the Deep. I will not hear the voices of my ancestors. I will not join the tide that carries the honored dead into eternity. They said I would fade into nothing, a soul without a home. Imagine living every day with that truth whispered behind you, with every glance reminding you that you do not belong in this world, nor in the one beyond. That was my childhood. That was my curse.

And still, I tried. Spirits, how I tried. I hunted with them, I fought with them, I bled beside them. I thought if I carried their burdens harder than anyone, if I proved myself in every trial, they might accept me. I told myself that maybe deeds could weigh heavier than blood, that maybe my will could carve a place where my name could not. But every time I triumphed, suspicion shadowed it. Every time I failed, it was magnified into proof that I was hollow. No matter what I did, I was always the cursed boy who would never walk the Deep.

Then the Night of Fire.

That should have been the end of me, but it wasn't. I realized then that my survival is not my choice. It is my duty. If I am cursed, if I am hollow, then it falls on me to carry what no one else can. If I stop, if I give in, then I truly fade. And fading is worse than death. Death at least promises the Deep, but for me, there is no such promise. There is only silence. Nothingness. Oblivion. So I endure, not because I want to, not because I hope for peace, but because I must. My survival is the last act I can give my people. If I falter, then their memory dies with me. If I endure, then some part of them endures too.

Outwardly, I wear a mask of silence. I act with purpose, I move with weight. I waste no effort, no words. People see me as hard, cold, unreadable, and maybe I am. But inside, there is a storm I cannot still. Despair that I cannot shake, rage at the curse that set me apart, loneliness that gnaws at me like hunger. I want to belong. I want to matter. I want to hear the voices of my forefathers, to stand beside kindred, to walk into the Deep without fear. But I know I never will. So I bury those wants beneath defiance. I tell myself they do not matter. I tell myself that survival is enough, that my will is all I need. And maybe, if I repeat it long enough, I will believe it.

In battle, I am ferocity. I strike not with elegance, but with desperation, with the force of someone who has nothing to lose. My body is strong, unnaturally so. My strikes carry the weight of broken bones and shattered armor. My eyes see more than they should, picking apart every movement, every twitch. My nerves fire like lightning, carrying me faster than those who should be my betters. My bones do not break. My body endures pain as though it were a companion. I fight like someone who has already been condemned and has nothing left but the act of striking back. And yet, for all of that, I am still just flesh. I am still mortal. My training is crude, my rage blinds me, my youth betrays me. I win not because I am destined to, but because I refuse to fall.

And when the fight is over, when silence returns, the storm inside me begins again. I do not speak of it, not to anyone. I keep my distance, because closeness always ends in loss. I mistrust kindness, suspect betrayal, and hold my heart behind walls so high no one can climb them. Yet beneath all of it, I long for connection. I crave a bond that I will never have. That contradiction tears at me more than any blade.

I do not know what I am. A cursed boy? A survivor without purpose? A ghost carrying a people who would never have accepted me? Perhaps all of it. But this much I do know: I will not stop. I will not lie down. I will not fade. If the Force will not see me, if the Deep will not take me, if the galaxy has no place for me, then I will carve one myself, even if my hands are blackened with blood. Because if I don't, if I surrender, then all of this was for nothing.

|| STRENGTHS ||

"You see a boy with a blade. What you should see is a boy with nothing left to lose."​

• Survivor's Willpower - Perseus' greatest weapon is not his blade or his body, but his refusal to give in. Pain, hunger, exhaustion, despair. These are constant companions, but he endures them because to surrender means vanishing into the nothing he fears. His willpower is obsessive and absolute. Where others collapse, Perseus drags himself to his feet, no matter how broken. This is both his armor and his curse: he does not know how to stop, even when it tears him apart.
• Dauntless Defiance - Though burdened by despair, Perseus carries a streak of unbreakable defiance. He does not bow to fate, to Force-users, or to those who call him cursed. When told he is hollow, he answers by enduring. When told he has no destiny, he spits in the face of destiny itself. His strength is not that he is fearless. He feels fear keenly, but that he never lets it command him. In this way, he is dauntless. Not because he has no reason to falter, but because he refuses to.
• Force Void Immunity - His void nature is rare and terrifying in its implications. Jedi cannot sense him. Sith cannot manipulate him. To Force-users, Perseus is a ghost, a blind spot in their awareness. This makes him uniquely dangerous in a galaxy ruled by those who rely on precognition and control. He is the knife they never see coming, the shadow they cannot touch. His curse robs him of destiny but grants him freedom from the chains that bind others.
• Raw Physical Resilience - Perseus' body is wiry, scarred, and hardened by deprivation. He has learned to live with hunger gnawing at him, with wounds untreated, with cold nights and long marches. He does not fold under hardship. He adapts to it. His pain tolerance is staggering, his ability to fight through blood loss or broken bones born of years of necessity. Though not the most skilled or the most powerful, his resilience often carries him further than his enemies expect.
• Fierce Loyalty (Once Earned) - Though mistrustful by nature, Perseus has the capacity for loyalty as deep as the oceans his people once spoke of. If someone wins his faith, he gives them everything. His blood, his strength, his defiance. His loyalty is not born of naïveté, but of choice. And once chosen, he will not abandon them, no matter the cost. To those rare few, Perseus is not just an ally but an unyielding shield.
• Pragmatic Morality - Perseus is not bound by ideals of glory or honor. He will make choices others shy from. Killing in cold blood, striking from shadows, sacrificing himself or even his reputation, if it means survival or protection. To him, the "right thing" is measured by outcome, not appearance. He does not hesitate, because hesitation means death. This ruthlessness makes him effective, though it often casts him as harsh or monstrous in the eyes of others.
• Symbol of Resistance - Though he does not see it himself, Perseus' very existence inspires. He is cursed, nameless, cut off from the Deep. Yet, he endures. To the few who witness his resolve, he becomes a symbol. Proof that even the forgotten, the broken, and the unwanted can fight back. In this, he carries a weight he does not even realize, embodying survival for those who have none.
• MSTN Deviation (Myostatin Deficiency) - The Nórrmen body is designed for sheer physical dominance. Where a baseline human might train years to reach peak condition, Perseus' body is naturally built to exceed it. His muscles and connective tissues are denser, stronger, and capable of extraordinary feats. Even as a youth, he can lift and strike with forces that fracture bone and shatter human defenses. To him, physical exertion feels natural. Sprinting faster than human soldiers, striking with lethal kinetic force. In battle, this makes him terrifying, a figure whose blows can break through armor and bone alike. To Perseus, this strength is both a gift and a curse. He can defend himself, but every strike feels like another reminder that he is something other, something that does not belong.
• PAX-Gene Structure (Enhanced Vision) - Perseus' eyes are windows sharper than most technology. He can read a banner at eighty feet that a human must approach to twenty. In daylight, his vision is almost overwhelming in detail, noticing shifts in muscle, breath, and tension others would miss. In darkness, the reflective sheen of his tapetum lucidum turns him into a predator. Able to move in shadows, to see where others are blind. This makes him an uncanny opponent, seeming always to anticipate movements. But in Perseus' mind, this too feeds into the whispers of him being cursed. His eyes glow faintly, alien, predatory, setting him apart even in a crowd.
• Osteo-Augmentation (Reinforced Skeleton) - Perseus' skeleton is near unbreakable. Titanium woven into crystallized calcium. His ribs interlock, forming a natural armor cage, his bones resisting fracture even under massive force. In combat, this makes him resilient against blasters, blades, and blunt trauma. Wounds that would cripple or kill others may leave him battered but still standing. For Perseus, this is another layer of survival. A body designed to endure punishment, to absorb cruelty and keep moving. He wonders sometimes if his survival is truly his, or if his bones are simply too stubborn to die.
• Super-Myelinated Nervous System (Reflexes & Grace) - Every nerve in Perseus is wired to fire faster. His reaction time is three to five times that of a human baseline. He sees an attack before most have even begun to swing, and his body responds with preternatural speed and fluidity. To outsiders, his grace is unsettling. He seems to flow around strikes, to move like someone who already knows what is coming. But in truth, it is the architecture of his nervous system, not the guidance of the Force. To Perseus, this is defiance incarnate: though the Force cannot see him, he can still fight as though he walks one step ahead of fate itself.
• Telomere Chain Resilience (Longevity & Endurance) - The Nórrmen body heals from damage more efficiently, ages more slowly, and resists radiation and stressors that would cripple other species. Perseus has the potential to live centuries, his physical prime stretching far beyond human limits. His endurance in battle and life is equally formidable. Where others might fade, he can persist. For Perseus, however, this immortality is bitter. He fears not death, but the long centuries of loneliness that may await him, cut off from the Deep, cut off from kin, cursed to survive when all others fade.

|| FAULTS ||

"I do not fear pain. I do not fear death. I fear only being forgotten."​

• Deep Isolation - Perseus' curse sets him apart, and his lack of a sire-name severs him further. He walks alone, unable to feel truly connected. This isolation eats at him, leaving a hollow ache beneath his defiance. It makes him distrustful of bonds, wary of kindness, and suspicious of motives. His solitude protects him, but it also starves him. In quiet moments, his loneliness is unbearable. And it drives him to make reckless choices to prove he still matters.
• Lack of Formal Training - Perseus' combat skills are born of desperation, not discipline. He fights like a cornered animal. Wild, brutal, and unpredictable. While this makes him dangerous to unprepared opponents, it leaves him vulnerable to skilled warriors with structured training. Against a Jedi Master, Sith Lord, or seasoned soldier, his lack of technique shows. He survives not through mastery, but through sheer will, and against the wrong foe, that may not be enough.
• Trauma & Survivor's Guilt - Perseus is haunted by the destruction of his tribe. He knows he survived only because of his curse. Because the Force could not see him. That thought corrodes him from within, filling him with guilt and self-loathing. He wonders if his survival means anything at all, or if he is just a mistake the galaxy refuses to erase. This burden shapes his every choice, pushing him to prove himself again and again, even when it drives him to the edge of destruction.
• Force Void Limitations - His immunity cuts both ways. He cannot be manipulated or sensed by the Force, but neither can he benefit from its gifts. He has no precognition, no healing through meditation, no enhanced strength or speed. In a galaxy where so many are lifted by the Force, Perseus remains bound by mortality. His flesh is as fragile as any common man's, and he must face battles without the tools his enemies take for granted.
• Mistrust & Guardedness - Betrayal, rejection, and scorn have carved Perseus into someone who keeps walls high around his heart. He does not easily believe in others, and often assumes he will be abandoned or despised again. This makes it hard for him to form alliances, even when he desperately needs them. His suspicion can cost him friendships, opportunities, and peace.
• Destructive Rage - Perseus' anger is both weapon and wound. In battle, his fury makes him terrifying, but it blinds him to strategy, driving him into reckless attacks. His rage often leaves him exhausted, wounded, or exposed. Worse, it can alienate those around him, who see only the feral, bloodied boy and not the pain beneath.
• Fragility of Youth - Though hardened, Perseus is still young. His body is not indestructible, and his endurance has limits. His will pushes him beyond what is safe, but every wound leaves its mark. Without the Force to mend him, his body carries scars that will only deepen with time. His youth also makes him vulnerable emotionally; beneath his defiance, he is still just a boy, uncertain and lost, trying to make sense of a galaxy that has taken everything from him.
• Cardio-Pulmonary Resuscitation (CPR Vulnerability) - The same skeleton that makes Perseus unbreakable also makes him vulnerable in ways others are not. His ribcage is so reinforced that standard resuscitation cannot work. If his heart fails, if arrhythmia strikes, if he collapses without aid, there is no way for another to revive him with conventional means. His survival is absolute until it isn't, and then it is final. For Perseus, this is a reminder that his survival is balanced on the edge of a blade. He endures everything, but when the moment comes, it may all end in silence.
• Cross-Breeding Incompatibility - The Norrmen cannot sustain life through unions with humans or near-humans; children born of such unions die without extreme intervention. For Perseus, who already carries no sire-name, no kindred, this fact cuts deeper. He knows that even if he one day found love, he could not continue his line. The blood of Perseus begins and ends with him. His curse is not only isolation, but the certainty that he will leave no heirs, no one to speak his name into the Deep. Another reason he clings so desperately to survival.
• Exotic Diet (High Caloric & Titanium Need) - Perseus' body is a furnace. He requires more food and water than ordinary men, and titanium-rich supplements to sustain his skeleton's structure. In times of plenty, this is manageable, but in scarcity, it is deadly. On campaign, he becomes a burden to logistics. In isolation, he starves quickly. His survival instinct wars with this biological truth. His body demands much, and without it, even his great strength withers. To Perseus, every meal feels like both necessity and guilt. Consuming more than others, simply to keep moving.
• Flash Blindness (Visual Weakness) - His eyes, sharper than any predator's, are vulnerable to overload. Sudden intense light leaves him blinded, his vision wracked with pain. Where others might flinch, Perseus collapses into temporary darkness, unable to see. Against foes who know this, flash-based attacks are crippling. For Perseus, who relies heavily on his eyes to fight, this is one of the few ways he feels truly helpless. Stripped of the sight that gives him balance and awareness.
• Genetic Mutation (Aging Disease) - Though long-lived, the Nórrmen are not immortal. As their centuries pass, cancer, mutation, and the terrifying "flesh change" take root. Bodies warp into monsters, minds break into madness. Perseus knows that if he lives long enough, he too may fall into this nightmare. To him, this knowledge is a haunting shadow. His curse is not only isolation in life, but perhaps monstrosity in the future. He has sworn to meet death in battle before that day, but the fear lingers.
• Gravitational Atrophy (Environment Dependency) - The Norrmen evolved in heavy gravity. In lower-gravity worlds, their bodies weaken, atrophy, and degrade without constant exercise. For Perseus, this means constant vigilance. If he grows complacent, his strength withers. It makes him restless, always driving himself to motion, to strain, to fight. For to stop is to decline.
• Hypoxia (Atmospheric Sensitivity) - Perseus' lungs crave richer oxygen than most worlds provide. In combat, without supplemental oxygen, he fatigues quickly, his endurance fading faster than his strength should allow. It is a humiliating weakness for one so resilient. To falter simply because the air is thin. Perseus views this as one more betrayal of his own body, one more reason he must never relent in willpower, even when his breath fails.
• Repugnant Culture (Outcast Stigma) - The galaxy despises the Norrmen. Their rituals of blood, sacrifice, and survival of the fittest are infamous. Even if Perseus does not uphold them, they stain him in the eyes of others. He is judged for sins he did not commit, despised for traditions he did not choose. For someone already cursed and isolated, this social stigma deepens the divide. To Perseus, this is salt in the wound. That he is hated not only by his own, but by the galaxy beyond.

|| POSSESSIONS ||
Mandalorian Gear:
Protector-Type Beskar'gam - Entry level Beskar Armor
Ori Sidaki - Battle Rifle
Void Storm SMG - Anti-Force User weapon.
Dral Gaan - Heavy Pulse Hand Cannon
Bes'munit Irud - Polearm weapon
Euk Siha Service Knives - Carries multiple of them.
RIDDS - Quick Healing Injection

Starships:
Fang-Class Starfighter - "Lost"

|| RELATIONS ||

• N/A

|| BOUNTIES ||

• N/A

|| BIOGRAPHY ||

"I am the blind spot in destiny's eye. Forgotten by the current, yet unbroken by it."​

I was born cursed. That was the truth I was given before I was old enough to shape truths of my own. The Norrmen say the Force is not just a current that binds the galaxy. It is the very breath of existence, the song of the living, the tide that carries us into the Deep when our bodies fail. The Deep is everything to us. It is where the ancestors wait, where the voices of kindred resound like waves against the eternal shore. To die as a Nórrman is not an ending, but a return. To sit at the great feasts, to walk the halls of memory, to hear the words of forefathers and mothers echo through eternity.

But for me, there was no promise of the Deep. I was Force Void. Hollow. A blind spot in the current. I could not be touched, could not be sensed, could not be guided by the Force that my people called life itself. To them, I was not only cursed in life but condemned in death. They whispered that when I fell, I would not hear the voices of the ancestors. I would not walk the tide. I would not find my place at the feasts. I would vanish into nothingness, into silence without end.

That was the shadow that hung over my every step: the certainty that I was already damned. Children avoided me. Elders muttered when I passed. Warriors spoke of me as though I were a ghost while my heart still beat. I bore the weight of being unwanted, unworthy, unseen by the Force itself.

And still, it was not enough that I was cursed. Among the Norrmen, every warrior carries the pride of a sire-name, a banner of family and bloodline. Our people are tightly bound to kin, to legacy, to the lineages that reach back into the mists of our history. Brothers fight beside brothers, sons beside fathers, daughters beside mothers. Even in death, their names are carried into the Deep. But I had no sire-name. No family to shield me. No kin to fight beside. My name was my own and nothing more. Perseus. Empty. Rootless. Alone.

I cannot put into words how heavy that absence was. In the trials, I fought beside men and women who carried the strength of generations in their hearts. They drew power from their lineages, from the certainty that no matter what happened, they would not stand alone. And I — I stood with no one. I fought with no one. I carried no names, no voices, no legacy but the silence of my curse. Among my people, that emptiness was a wound as deep as the Force Void that marked me.

And yet, I tried. Spirits, how I tried. I hunted, I fought, I bled, I endured every whisper and every glare. I thought if I fought harder than anyone else, if I carried the weight no one else would, if I suffered more and broke myself against their walls of doubt, they would see me. They would make me one of them. But they never did. Every victory of mine was met with suspicion. Every mistake was magnified until it was all they saw. No matter what I did, I remained the hollow child. The boy with no name. The cursed one who would never walk the Deep.

Then came the night of fire.

Raiders descended without mercy. Sith marauders, pirates, warlords. I never learned who they were. I only remember the screams, the clash of blades, the smell of blood and smoke. My people fought as they always had, kindred against the dark, their legacies burning in every strike. And me? I was overlooked. Unseen. Unnoticed. The Force-guided killers swept past me like I was air. Their senses slid over me as though I did not exist. I watched my kin fall one by one, and I could do nothing. No fight I could muster could stop what happened. Yet I was spared, not through strength, not through honor, but because I was hollow. Because I was cursed. That is the only explanation I have.

When it was over, when the fire died and the night grew still, I stood barefoot among the ashes. The whispers were gone. The scorn was gone. Even the longing to belong was gone. Because there was no one left to accept me. No sire-names remained. No voices remained. No one left to carry me to the Deep. Just Perseus, hollow and alone, surrounded by corpses and silence.

They say freedom is a gift, but what I found that night was punishment. Without my people, I had no place. Without a sire-name, I had no anchor. Without the Force, I had no destiny. I told myself my void was not a curse, that it was my strength, that it was the reason I survived when no one else did. But when I lay awake in the dark, I wondered. Was I spared, or was I damned to carry the weight of being the last one standing?

Now, there is nothing left but this. I endure because I must. I live because it is my duty to live. The blood of my people, their memory, their whispers. All of it rests on me, the cursed one, the hollow boy, the son with no name. If I falter, then their story dies with me. If I fall, there is no one left to carry them. My survival is the only defiance I have left.

Do you understand? I do not live for peace. I do not live for glory. I do not live for myself. I live because my will is the only thing standing between me and oblivion. My will is the only thing keeping me from the nothing my people swore awaited me. If I yield, if I give in, if I stop, then I vanish into the silence, forgotten by galaxy, forgotten by kin, denied even the Deep.

So I will not stop. I will fight. I will bleed. I will carve a place in this galaxy with my own hands, no matter how much blood stains them. I will do the right thing, even if I do it the wrong way, even if I damn myself a thousand times over. Because if I don't, then all the fire, all the ashes, all the silence.

It will have meant nothing.

Yes, I am despair. Yes, I am hollow. But I am also defiant. Dauntless. Because there is nothing else left to be. The Force cannot see me. The Deep will not take me. The galaxy has no place for me. So I will make one. And if I must carry the memory of my people alone, if I must bear every scar, every burden, every whisper until my body fails, then so be it. I will not stop. Because stopping means fading. And fading means nothing.

But that is when everything in my life changed.

I remember the day I first saw him. I was wandering through the ruins of another nameless world, my feet raw against the stone, my clothes clinging to me in rags. The rain had been falling for days, soaking me to the bone, but I didn't stop walking. I never stopped. If I stopped, I would think, and if I thought, I would remember. Better to keep moving, even if every step bled.

I thought I was alone until I heard the sound. Not the shuffle of vermin or the crack of falling stone, but the heavy, deliberate tread of boots. When I turned, he was there, framed in the rain like some phantom pulled out of another life. A Mandalorian. His armor was worn, painted in colors dulled by time and scarred from battles I could only imagine. It carried the weight of countless fights, of a man who had seen far too much and refused to fall. His T-visor glared at me, and in that moment, I felt small even at my stature.

He didn't say a word at first. Just stood there, studying me. I must have looked pathetic. A half-starved boy with no weapon, no clan, no name. But his gaze didn't pass over me like the raiders or the Sith had. He looked at me and saw something worth pausing for. Maybe it was the fact that I was still standing at all. Maybe it was the emptiness in my eyes.

When he finally spoke, his voice came through the helmet like gravel.

"You should be dead."

I didn't answer. What could I say? He was right. I should have been.

He watched me a moment longer, then tossed something at my feet. A strip of dried meat from his pack. I stared at it, then at him, suspicious. My people had taught me not to trust gifts. Still, my hunger gnawed at me until I picked it up. That was the first test.

From then on, he didn't leave me. Not out of kindness. No, he treated me like a creature he'd found half-feral in the wilds, one that needed to prove whether it could be tamed or was better left to die. He drove me into hunts with weapons I had never used before. Forced me to march until my legs burned and my stomach clenched empty. Threw me into fights I had no chance of winning. Each trial was a question. Would I endure, or would I break?

I endured. I always did. Every bruise, every cut, every failure. I bore them all in silence. He never praised me, never softened. But I noticed he stopped looking at me like a stray animal. His gaze shifted, measuring me instead like a weapon being tested at the forge.

It was during one of those fights that he learned what I truly was. Raiders struck while we camped, and we fought them off together. I could see the way he moved, precise and lethal, a veteran of countless wars. But when it was over, he turned his visor on me with something new in his stance. He had noticed it. How the raiders' Force-sensitive leader, some Sith, had trouble facing me in the fray, how their strikes had never seemed to hit me, and I always made contact.

"You're a void,"

he said flatly. Not a question. A statement.

I didn't answer, but he already knew. And instead of recoiling like my people had, he gave a short, rough laugh that crackled through his helmet. To him, my curse was not a mark of damnation. It was value. It was a weapon the galaxy had overlooked, but one he understood.

That night, as the firelight flickered against the rain, he finally told me what he intended. "You want a place? You'll earn it. You'll be a foundling. I'll sponsor you. You'll fight, you'll bleed, and if you endure, you'll have a clan."

His words struck harder than any blow I'd ever taken. A place. A clan. Things I had wanted all my life, things denied to me by my own people. And now this armored stranger offered it. Not as charity, but as something I could prove myself worthy of.

I bowed my head.

"I am Perseus."

That was all I had. No sire-name. No bloodline. Only Perseus. But he accepted it, not with warmth, but with a firm nod, as though a bargain had been struck. And in that moment, for the first time in my life, I felt the faintest ember of belonging.