Acier Moonbound
Forcebound Rebel
Location: Unknown
The world had no name he could find. No settlements. No satellites. Not even a trace of charted trade routes. Just an expanse of pale stone and whispering grass, endless under a bruised sky. That was enough for him.
Ace sat cross-legged on the lip of a ridge, the wind tugging faintly at his olive jumpsuit, the hum of the air thick with life. Below, the valley breathed, slow and steady, like the galaxy itself had fallen asleep. Tic rested beside him in standby, one photoreceptor dimmed to a quiet pulse.
He'd been here for days. Maybe a week. The Flickerfox sat hidden in a ravine to the north, collecting dust while he tried to do what he thought battle could - make sense of himself.
The Force wound around him, a current he didn't fight. Not light, not dark. Just motion. He followed it, hands loose in his lap, prosthetic fingers tracing slow, unconscious patterns. Every breath drew the world in; every exhale let it go again.
Sometimes the silence cracked. A scream from the Death Star. The smoke of Clan Vethrisa. Sibylla's voice fading into the static between heartbeats. They came like echoes through the current, not sharp enough to hurt anymore, but enough to remind him what he'd burned to get here.
The Force whispered back, not in words but in sensation... the faint pull of gravity that meant something was shifting nearby. A new thread brushing against his own. It was familiar in that strange way the Force always was: the kind of recognition that felt older than memory.
Ace's eyes opened, dark brown meeting the horizon's haze. The wind had changed direction.
