D E S T R O Y E R
WEARING: xxx | WEAPON: x | x | TAG:
Efret Farr
He stood at the gate, studying its structure for sometime. Casimir had read about the portals extensively, but he had never studied one in person. His search had become all consuming. Were it not for the pale corruption of his eyes some would liken him to a Jedi Consular, an archeologist, or an archivist. Life had deemed to give him a seemingly unanswerable riddle. The mystery of his twin sister’s disappearance was the one thing he feared he would never be able to explain.
The mountain did not offer comfort. Wind cut across the stone in long, steady passes, carrying a cold that settled into bone and refused to leave. The air was thin at this height, each breath measured, each exhale stolen quickly by the open sky. Jagged ridges stretched out beyond the gate, broken lines of dark rock dusted with pale frost where the sun failed to linger. There was no life to soften the terrain, no movement beyond the shifting wind and the slow drift of cloud beneath him. The silence felt vast, the kind that pressed in from every direction until even thought seemed louder than it should have been.
The Jedi had been of no help. Learning the force through their teachings had not solved the dilemma which haunted him. Their methods wanted to revel in the mysterious ways of the force rather than discover the truth. Kaelis was missing.
She had disappeared.
Casimir could still feel the echo of her presence. It left a void in his soul which longed for the day her life would fill it once more. Every piece of evidence suggested that reunion would never come. The pale skinned warrior refused to allow that despair to take root. It would destroy him.
Hypergates were philosophically simple. They were designed to teleport an individual from one space to another instantaneously. Had this been what happened to his sister? Was she trapped between one place and the next? His reading had suggested the gates did not all look the same. It would be a fact the Echani would search out for himself. His theory for the moment was that Eshan had a gate it did not know about, though his self imposed exile hardly put him in a position to investigate that matter.
Nothing seemed to come to life. There should have been a force signature or power radiating from the device. Casimir had assumed so at any rate.
“Feth.”
The gravelly baritone of a voice that was rarely used and damaged from years of abuse echoed was barely audible against the wind. He sat on a rock nearby as the sickly hue of his eyes regarded the stone structure before taking in the rest of the mountain around him. Had the location not been confirmed for him, there would have been nothing to indicate the archway was a hypergate. There were no markings etched into the surface, no wires or crystals to indicate it was more than just the leftovers of some ancient passage into the mountain which had collapsed over time.
Cas turned his back to the structure and took in the view. It should have been breathtaking, and it was to any other passerby. The wind pulled at his hair and clothing as it moved across the open expanse, carrying with it the dry bite of stone and cold. Peaks rose and fell in the distance, fading into a haze where the sky met the horizon, untouched and indifferent. Natural beauty and the wonder of worlds he had yet to explore did not move him the way it moved others. His soul longed for one thing, one person. Casimir was dead without her. It was a cruel thing for a twin to lose their other half and survive, especially when the force had bonded them so uniquely. Why had it severed them so ruthlessly?
The feeling came without warning. Not a presence at first, but a shift. Something in the Force that did not sit right against the emptiness of the mountain. Casimir stilled, his focus turning inward as much as outward, letting the sensation settle instead of chasing it. It was not familiar, not in the way Kaelis lingered at the edge of his awareness. This was something else. Uneven. Disturbed.
His gaze lifted slowly, scanning the ridgelines and the broken paths that cut through the stone. The wind had not changed, the mountain had not stirred, yet the sense remained. Someone was here. Not hidden well enough to escape notice, not aligned enough to feel at peace in the Force.
Casimir rose from the rock without haste.
For the first time since arriving, the gate no longer held his full attention.