Private Ye Ancient Gates

[Casimir Thorne]

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.

 

[Efret Farr]

A few valleys away from this one, a small and darkly-colored figure clung to the distant rock wall like a fly on the back of the beast. Maybe a spider, but no threads of string connected her to the obscured peak nor any other point on the cliff face.

Efret knew better than to free-solo when the Force was at her back—and she wasn't sure if it was, not here, not in Sith space. The Light had trouble shining in the Dark, even when emanating from powerful and pious Jedi, and she almost surely wasn't that anymore. For all the training that had once made her one, she couldn't let the Dark side flow in all at once. She wasn't sure if she wanted that yet, but she had an inkling that it'd happen regardless.

Metamorphosis was already upon her. Better the trickle than the tsunami.

The idea didn't disgust her, but it also didn't excite her.

She felt the same about the danger of falling from so high up now, on some planet she hadn't bothered to remember the name of. She had simply picked in randomly from the pre-logged coordinates of the TIE fighter she had borrowed from Fondor for this excursion. Or so she thought. The Force, was still working for her, though she thought is had forsaken her.

Leading her to this place of all planets was either a parting gift from Ashla or a welcoming one from Bogan.

Time would tell which.

Casimir Thorne​

 

[Casimir Thorne]

WEARING: xxx | WEAPON: x | x | TAG: Efret Farr

Danger.

The feeling settled over him with a weight that did not belong to the mountain. It did not come from the gate, nor from the empty stretches of stone around him. It pulled, uneven and insistent, drawing his attention away from the one thing he had come here to find. Casimir turned toward it, his gaze narrowing along the ridgeline as he tried to place it. It was not Kaelis. There was no mistaking her. This felt different, disordered, with movement that lacked clear direction.

His jaw tightened as his eyes flicked back to the gate for a brief moment.

"HMMMMM."

The word came low, carried off almost as soon as it left him. Silence had become his habit, and there was little reason to break it now. What troubled him was not the presence itself, but the pull of it. The Force did not often distract him from his search. Now it did, and without explanation. Whether it was a barrier or a guide, he could not tell.

He turned from the gate and moved.

Each step carried him further from what he wanted, yet he did not stop. The wind grew sharper along this path, cutting across the stone in tighter channels that forced him to adjust his footing. His hair broke loose from the tie and whipped across his face, pulled by shifting gusts that came without pattern. The ground narrowed, the rock closing in on either side until the path became something that demanded attention with every step.

The passage opened without warning.

Casimir slowed as the space widened into a valley cut deep into the mountain. He stopped short of the edge, his gaze dropping to the rock face below. A figure moved there, distant but clear enough to follow. Climbing or falling. From this height, the difference was difficult to judge.

He reached into the Force again, not searching this time, but listening.

The same instability met him, stronger now, radiating from the figure below. It did not hold in any one state, shifting without rhythm or control in a way that resisted balance. The presence moved as if the one carrying it could not find steady footing, not in body and not in the Force, each motion lacking the cohesion that should have anchored it.

Casimir remained where he stood.

For now, he waited.

 

[Efret Farr]

Her starship sat somewhere under the blanket of clouds stretching out beneath them both. She landed a few hours ago and had begun to climb almost immediately. Unlike Casimir, she was unaware of the Nethergate hidden in the mountains, but she also had known what she came for. It was for these rock formations. They offered her a chance to match her physical sensations to her mental ones, or at least to try to.

The air was cooler up here, and she could feel it beginning to thin ever so slightly. It whipped across her back, temporarily inflating the back of her long-sleeved shirt and rippling the fabric. The matching scarf coiled loosely around her neck like an enclosed serpent likewise lashed in the wind. Even still, her body remained warm as she reached and grabbed, pulled and pushed her way further up the rock wall.

Ironically, she felt less numb up here exposed to the elements than she did on the ground. That was why safety wasn't her priority right now. She just had to feel something that wasn't shame or regret or any of their derivatives. And it was working. All of those emotions had been forgotten, left behind at her craft, too heavy to be brought on the climb.

She was not calling on Force Sight anymore. She had used it briefly near the bottom of the cliff, but had found it quickly to be unhelpful with locating anchor points. Relying on her sense of touch and a deep, mundane concentration, she felt for every one of her hand- and footholds past that. Her rate of assent had quickened after she made the decision, which had allowed for the amount of progress she had made.

At first, the rushing wind would fill the Force connection but, if Cas listened closely enough, it would fade to the background, giving way to quieter sounds. Rapid but soft breathing. A pounding heartbeat. Hands feeling across jagged stone. Effortful grunts as she drew herself upwards.

Whoever that was was climbing.

But in the next moment, they were falling.

A crack reverberated through the Force if he was still listening. One of her arms dropped away from her, following the general falling motion of the narrow crag she had just been holding. All of the muscles in her other arm and down that side's shoulder flexed, trying to accommodate. Her fingers tried to dig in against their rock.

Then her right foot slipped, and the weight was too much.

One by one, her fingers gave way to freefall.

Casimir Thorne​

 

[Casimir Thorne]

WEARING: xxx | WEAPON: x | x | TAG: Efret Farr

The crack was unmistakable. It cut through the steady howl of the wind and carried along the rock face, sharp against the otherwise constant rhythm of the mountain. It was not like the subtle clues which the Force barely whispered about the wind which whipped about his face. Casimir could feel everything around him slow as his attention locked onto the source. The thin air carried the sound farther than it should have, echoing between jagged ridges and settling into something he could not ignore. Vapor traced the movement of the air in front of him, curling in pale strands as the cold bit into his lungs with each breath. His gaze focused in an instant. The sound of her heart raced as the realization of what happened filled her mind. Her body and breathing betrayed her though everything about her shape in the force was wrong.

For now, Cas saw beyond the chaos. There was only him and only her.

He could not allow her to fall. Normally he would not have cared. The darkness in him did not value life in the same sense others may have. His sister mattered. Survival mattered. This woman did not. Still, the Force would not allow him to remain still. A hand stretched outward as his arm reached for her as though she was close enough to simply grab her hand and pull her up to safety. The invisible tether of the force swirled around her as the strands of air around her shifted and thickened, made visible in the cold as they gathered beneath her.

She did not fall cleanly. The force of her descent met resistance as the air caught her and held. The current beneath her built under his control, guiding her across the open space toward the ledge where Casimir stood. The motion slowed as she drew closer, each inch measured until her lithe form settled into his arms for a brief moment. The stone beneath his boots was uneven and cold, dusted with frost where the sun did not reach. Gently he guided her feet to the ground and his pale corrupted eyes met hers, locking on them for an eternally brief moment.

Casimir cleared his throat.

“That was stupid.”

The words came before he realized she could not hear. Nothing about her had given away that she lacked the capability. Cas did not wait for a thank you before walking back in the direction he came. The nethergate waited for him, and his research was too important to allow any further distraction. The wind pressed against his back as he moved, pulling at his clothing and dragging loose strands of hair across his face. It did not matter to him that his initial reaction to seeing her was to note her particularly unique beauty. The lines of her face and bone structure were distinctly different from an Echani. Casimir found that refreshing in an odd way.

The Sith stopped short of the small crag he had passed through earlier. The rock walls rose tight on either side, funneling the wind into sharper bursts that cut through the narrow passage. A sigh escaped his lips, audible only to him, though it carried more weight than the sound itself. He could feel the force pulling him back to her. This was why his work had been interrupted.

She was the reason.

Cas turned toward her, his lips closed. No sound or speech left them, though his body suggested much more. Annoyance spread across his features. Curiosity found its way to the surface of his eyes as they roamed over her once more. Why had the force pulled him to her? Was she there to help him, or was he there to help her? It was a binary option in his mind. Casimir did not allow for the possibility that they would help each other.

This was a distraction, even if the Force wanted it.

 

[Efret Farr]

Adrenaline punched a hole through the bottom of her stomach. The world, the amount she could see unaided by the Force, fell up around her. She went cold and hot at once, as if neither her body nor mind could decide what was happening.

It wasn't any easier to make sense of when her velocity began to slow.

For a split moment, it occurred to her to worry, more as a feeling rather than a thought. Perhaps Mercy or Lysander had somehow found her and she was about to be chastised.

But she eased like a falling leaf onto the surface of a lake into the arms of a man she didn't recognize. She only saw part of his face at first, a majority of it in her blindspot. She was about to move her head off center to appreciate more of his facial features, but when his arms began to migrate to let her down, her gaze drifted towards the ground too. As shaken mentally and physically as she was from the fall, she seemed unsteady at first as she shifted her weight back onto her legs. Soon, she was anchored, then her natural gaze floated back up to him—or where he had been. But he was gone.

She turned around quickly, but not fast enough to destabilize herself again, to visually trace his retreat best as she could. The monochromatic tans of Force Sight rose to fill out her vision. The world's true color stayed preserved in her narrow natural range of vision. Her brows pulled together as she watched him stop and turn around.

One hand rose to the choker about her neck. Her fingers, decorated past their second knuckles with reddish brown henna, danced across the round pendant's surface, then dropped in against her skin and withdrew. Forming one plane, her fingertip collectively touched her chin. They pulled away, angling downwards into the air.

"Thank you."

The voice was almost entirely lost to the wind, but what little remained did not sound human. And she looked very human. Interesting.

Casimir Thorne​

 

[Casimir Thorne]

WEARING: xxx | WEAPON: x | x | TAG: Efret Farr

The woman didn't hear him. Cas blamed it on the wind. It pushed through the narrow stone with a constant force, stealing sound before it could carry. What did it matter if she had anyway? With his back turned to the raven haired woman, the Echani moved to be rid of her as soon as he could. Were it not for the interference of the Force, delaying him from the path he was determined to take, Casimir would have left her to find her own way back to wherever it was she came from. The mountain did not care if she lived or died. Neither did he, or at least that was what he told himself as his steps slowed without permission.

Her hand moved, fingers shaping a simple gesture that needed no translation. The voice translator at her collar tried to keep pace, but the sound was lost to the wind as it forced its way through the crevice. The narrow passage amplified the noise, turning it into a constant roar that pressed against them from all sides.

She couldn't speak.

Casimir watched her for a moment longer than he intended. He pointed to his eyes, then to his lips, the motion deliberate and clear. He waited just long enough to see if she understood. Sign was not something he knew, but it did not unsettle him. It could be learned. For now, it was not necessary. She had already told him everything that mattered. The shift in her shoulders, the way her breath struggled to settle, the tension that had not yet left her hands all spoke louder than words. Fear had been there. Relief followed it. There was still a trace of disbelief that she remained standing. The rest was quieter, but it was there if one knew how to look.

"You could have died."

The words came steady, without force behind them, but they carried weight all the same. There was a question within them that he did not voice. It lingered in the space between them, clear enough without being spoken. What were you thinking? Casimir did not press it. There was no need to force her to relive the moment or explain it. Whatever had brought her to the edge had already taught its lesson. He had no interest in repeating it for her.

 

[Efret Farr]

"I..."

Her hand signing stilled before dropping back to her side. Arguing didn't just not serve a point; it would be dishonest. He was right. She could have died—would have if he hadn't happened to be there in a somewhat benevolent mood.

But his mood didn't seem so benevolent.

Eyes corrupted pale red stared at her like she had interrupted something. Hers of, for now, pure hazel reflected the curiosity welling in him.

She rose both of her hands.

With them came realization. It drew her a few meters closer to Casimir. She couldn't hear the wind but she certainly could feel it, and imagine in her own way the noise it was making. Though she hadn't have to hear him to understand, she rightly assumed that he had to be able to hear her.

Only once she was situated did she sign again. "You could have let me."

The metallic voice came again, a bit louder now thanks to proximity rather than volume setting. It was impossible to correctly discern the full meaning of her words without a verbal tone unless one could read her face and the rest of her body. Her expressions told stories. The way she held her muscles did too. She couldn't help how she spoke her native language, Lorrdian Kinetic, in its subtler movements as she signed; the former was all but written into her DNA. Not many people knew the language that had risen out of an ancient forbidding to speak and had never stopped being spoken with the body since.

Even if the understanding he could glean from it was limited, there was still plenty to know. Hesitation hung in her shoulders just so. Gratitude softened her cheeks, ready to accommodate a smile that didn't dare come. Practicality twitched across her browbone. Uncertainty tightened her stomach muscles.

"I thought the Dark side allowed nature to run its course." She paused glance past him to wear she had been on the yonder rock wall. Either the bitter cold or the idea of what very easily could have been pushed a small shudder through her. Her gaze shifted back to him. "Though I didn't want to experience the end result of gravity from that high up." She allowed a small inclination of her head, still not daring to smile. "Again, thank you."

Casimir Thorne​

 

[Casimir Thorne]

WEARING: xxx | WEAPON: x | x | TAG: Efret Farr

Casimir did not move when she stepped closer. The distance closed, but he did not meet it. His gaze held on her, steady, taking in the way she carried herself. The hesitation in her approach had not left her. It lingered in the set of her shoulders and the careful way she placed her feet on uneven stone. Relief had softened her, but not enough to settle her fully. Something else held there, quieter, harder to name.

Her hands moved, and the device at her collar gave shape to what he had already understood. He watched the motion as much as the meaning. The control in her movements did not match the instability he had felt from her moments before, and that drew his attention more than her words.

"You think I made a choice."

The words came level. He did not look away from her as he said it.

Her gaze shifted past him toward the rock face. He did not turn. The memory of it remained clear enough without looking, carried in the way her breathing had not fully steadied and in the tension that still held through her frame. Beyond them, the mountain dropped away into a deep cut of stone where the wind moved without restraint. It pushed through the valley and forced its way back up along the cliffs, dragging loose gravel and thin ribbons of frost with it. The sound never stopped. It pressed in from every direction until it became part of the silence.

"Nature does not ask permission."

It was not an argument. It was something he had learned and did not bother to soften.

She thanked him. He let it pass.

"The Force pulled me here."

He said it plainly, without weight behind it.

"It has not let me leave."

His attention lingered for a moment, not on the words, but on her. The pull had not eased. It held steady, fixed on her in a way he did not like.

The wind pressed harder through the narrow passage behind him, funneling between two walls of jagged stone that rose high enough to cut the light. It caught at his clothing and pulled strands of white hair across his face. He did not move to fix them. The cold settled into everything, into the rock, into the air, into the space between them.

Casimir held her gaze for a moment longer.

"Come with me."

He turned as he spoke, already moving back toward the crag he had come through, toward the gate that waited beyond it.

 

[Efret Farr]

Her ability to comprehend his speech through the Force acted as a string as he turned away, first fulling tight, then straining, and finally snapping as his face pivoted from looking at her. Still, it had lasted long enough for her to understand what he had told her.

Not asked. Told. That much was clear too.

And so was his unspoken intention. If she was a tether to him by will of the Force, and he had come here from beyond the crag because of that, he might be able to return with her in tow.

Clever.

Perhaps she should have been stubborn, but she wasn't about to deny him his freedom to wander, especially not after he had saved her. It wasn't the master she had been clinging to her; it was her personality even without Jedi philosophy to be cooperative. After wiping the dusting of chalk from her fingers on her harem trousers, she started after him.

She squeezed after him through the gap, augmenting her mostly artificial sight with her touch, fingers feeling over the rock face. The wind lashed over her as if it was pulling her excitedly on to an unknown destination. A few tresses pulled loose of her high bun and blew in the same direction, like clairvoyance wayfinders.

Casimir Thorne​

 

[Casimir Thorne]

WEARING: xxx | WEAPON: x | x | TAG: Efret Farr

Casimir did not look back to see if she followed. The pull in the Force told him what he needed to know. It held steady, no longer stretching thin the way it had when he first turned from her. Whatever had drawn him away from the gate now moved with him, close enough that it no longer pulled against him.

The path narrowed as they moved through the crag. Stone pressed in on either side, forcing a slower pace where footing mattered more than speed. The wind found them there, funneled into sharp bursts that cut across exposed skin and tugged at clothing with sudden force. It carried grit with it, small fragments of rock that scraped along the walls and skittered across the ground. Casimir adjusted without thinking, each step placed with precision, his body angling slightly to account for the shifting pressure. He did not offer guidance. He did not need to. The sound of her movement behind him told him where she was, and the Force filled in the rest.

The passage opened briefly, revealing the drop beyond before the path curved again. The valley below stretched out in broken stone and drifting frost, the same hollow expanse they had crossed before. From this angle, the distance looked longer. The wind moved differently here, rising in uneven currents that pushed upward along the rock face before breaking apart. Casimir did not slow. He already knew the way back, each turn and step set in his mind.

Time passed without meaning as the mountain gave way to the ridge where the gate stood. The open space came first, marked by the way the wind lost its edge and spread out across the stone instead of cutting through it. The structure came into view soon. It stood where he had left it, a frame of stone that gave no indication of what it was meant to be.

Casimir slowed as he approached it, his attention settling fully on the archway again. The pull that had drawn him away remained, but it no longer led him away from the gate. It had brought him back. He stopped a short distance from the gate before turning to her. His gaze settled on her with the same measured focus as before.

"Do you know what this is and how to make it work?"

 

[Efret Farr]

Her gaze drifted from him to the archway.

"Let me look."

She moved up to examine it.

As he had noticed for himself earlier, the stone was completely smooth. No hints as to its nature or purpose marred its surface. A thoughtful frown weighed down the corners of her mouth as she finished walking around it. Two decades of archeology had taught her many lessons, some the easy way and and some the hard, including to be cautious about what she touched before she had at least begun to understand it. That much was difficult though when an artifact gave no mundane clues as to its identity. When she had to touch it to begin to understand it. In situations like these, she had to turn to the Force to see what wasn't here to see anymore.

Echoes always adhered to artifacts. The question was their quality, not their presence.

Efret sunk to her knees. Stray angular pebbles dug into her skin through the breathable fabric of her pants. Normally, she'd either sweep them away or pay them no mind, depending on how much their shape and size bit, but now she grounded herself into their slight sting. It was helpful when dipping one's mind into the past to have a sensation in the body tying oneself to the present like an anchor.

She laid a hand on the outside of the gate, nearer down the the base than the middle of its bend. Her eyes fell closed.

Retrocognition flashed across her mind's eye in bursts of color and texture rather than the smooth sequence of a dream. A grey tentacle reared up to reveal many round indentations filled with suckers. The swishing bottom of silken red robes. The mottled blue of hyperspace emitting in a single plane rather than a tube, shimmering as if under a sun.

Her eyes snapped open. She stumbled up and backwards, nearly at the same time, not fearful but unsteady again for a new reason. Coming back to the present was always a bit disorienting, even for an expect psychometrist like her. Small impressions of pebbles in the soft skin right below her knee hid beneath the unbroken fabric of her pants. "This is a Gree hypergate," she announced, looking at Cas. "I'm surprised that this one isn't metal. It must represent their earlier technology."

Her unconditional cooperation ended here, giving way to questions. "Who are you? Why do you want it opened?"

Casimir Thorne​

 

[Casimir Thorne]

WEARING: xxx | WEAPON: x | x | TAG: Efret Farr

Casimir watched her move toward the archway without interruption. The wind shifted around her as she circled the structure, pressing loose strands of dark hair across her face before carrying them away again. Frost clung to the stone beneath their feet where the mountain never fully thawed, and the cold bit through fabric and skin with a steady persistence that had long since stopped bothering him. His attention remained fixed on her rather than the gate itself. He had already exhausted what observation alone could offer him.

She approached the structure carefully. That much he respected.

Most people touched the unknown with either fear or arrogance. She approached it with thought. Even before she knelt, Casimir could feel the shift in the Force around her. It moved differently than it did around most who wielded it. There was no pull toward discipline or surrender, no familiar weight that settled into light or dark. The current around her shifted constantly, resisting definition as though it had not chosen what it wanted to become.

That was the instability he had felt earlier.

Not corruption.

Not conflict.

Uncertainty.

Casimir studied her more carefully as she lowered herself against the stone and closed her eyes. The pebbles beneath her knees dug into the fabric, but she anchored herself to the sensation instead of resisting it. He understood enough to recognize that she was reaching for something through the Force, though the exact method escaped him. The currents around her shifted unevenly as if fragments of thought, memory, or sensation moved through her all at once.

A crossroads.

That was what she felt like to him now. Not someone lost between light and dark, but someone who had not decided where to stand. The realization settled strangely in his mind. Casimir had spent so long consumed by certainty that the absence of it felt foreign.

Her eyes opened sharply, and he watched the disorientation take hold before she steadied herself again. When she named the structure, his attention shifted fully back to the gate for the first time since she touched it.

A Gree hypergate.

The answer settled into place alongside years of searching and fragments of research gathered across forgotten worlds. His jaw tightened slightly as he studied the archway again. It looked no different than before, silent stone and empty space.

Then came the questions.

Who are you?

Why do you want it opened?

Casimir was quiet for a moment. The wind moved through the ridge behind them, lower now, less violent than before. It carried through the open space in long passes that tugged at his clothing and stirred the loose strands of white hair around his face.

“Casimir.”

Nothing more followed it. He had not title, and whatever lineage there was to call upon had been abandoned the day his sister disappeared.

His pale eyes returned to the gate.

“I think it leads to the Netherworld.”

The words came easier than they should have for one who was short on words. Perhaps it was because they had lived in his head for so long that they no longer felt strange when spoken aloud.

“I’m looking for my sister.”

That was all he offered. In his mind, it was all that mattered. Everything else, the exile, the darkness, the years spent chasing whispers through ruins and forgotten systems, existed because of those few words. The hollow crevice left behind by her disappearance had shaped every step since.

“She disappeared,” Casimir said quietly, his gaze never leaving the gate. “But I still feel her.”

 

[Efret Farr]

A little smile caught her lips reflexively when she introduced himself, but it was gone as soon as it had come.

She stepped forward as he looked toward the gate to keep his face in sight. His features weren't clear enough as the Force showed them to her for her to lipread, but she still needed a clear view of him to understand what he said. The Netherworld? Her body bristled again. Dread rose goosebumps on her mostly-concealed skin.

It ebbed away when he mentioned his sister.

Strange, auric warmth began to emanate deep in her presence in the Force. For as uncertain as it was overall, that aspect wasn't. It was Force Empathy opening like a rose bud that had coiled tight the moment night had fallen—the moment she had fallen. It unfurled slowly, but steadily and surely. He would be able to feel it from here. The sensation didn't pull. It just sat, waiting for him to notice it, in the same way her subtle scent carried on the chill breeze: two things unique to whoever she was in Covenant space.

"I'm sorry." Sincerity crystallized on her fingertips as frost did the same, the latter just to melt away but the former to stay. "I lost someone to the Netherworld too." Though Elias yet lived, it felt very much like she had lost him. It was a terrible feeling, made worse by the reality that she had never really had him to begin with. They had been colleagues, certainly, and pined for each other, but had never managed to become lovers. Their redamancy had disguised itself from the very first moment as heartache. Now, it would wear that tragic mantle forever.

And he wouldn't know, but she would, enough for the both of them, always.

"I'll help you."

She approached the Nethergate again. Raising a hand to reach for something new, the empty air slowly grew ridges. They were invisible to Casimir, but outlined in glowing gold to her as she traced them with her fingers. Soon, she had traced an interlocking web of shatterpoints, each a seam between this realm and the next. They ran from the sides of the archway into its center, where they pooled densely. The Force puckered, trying to contain the Nether to its Void.

Efret glanced over her shoulder. Her one arm remained extended as she signed with her other hand at her side. He couldn't see the movements, but he could hear, and the concern written over her face was clear. On her more recent journey through the Netherwold, she had benefited from the protection of a Sith Lady, but her first experience had been very threatening. She knew to be cautious.

"Be ready if anything escapes."

Not waiting for his response, she turned back to her work and channeled Force into its fault lines until, little by little, the Netherworld peeked out of the arch at them.

Then, suddenly, the veil collapsed all at once, imploding in on itself with a powerful gust. It picked Efret off the uneven ground and flung her backwards.

Casimir Thorne​

 

[Casimir Thorne]

WEARING: xxx | WEAPON: x | x | TAG: Efret Farr

Casimir did not expect the shift when she spoke.

It was not the words. He watched them form, but the meaning came through the Force. Something in her presence moved differently when she tried to explain. The instability he had felt before did not disappear, but it was not the only thing there anymore. There was something else layered beneath it, something that pulled at him in a way he did not like.

It was not Kaelis. That absence was his alone, carved into him in a way nothing could touch. Still, whatever lingered in this woman brushed close enough to it that it made him pause. It was not the same, not even close, but it was enough to feel.

Empathy.

The thought settled with a quiet weight. It did not belong to him anymore. There was no reaching for it or attempt to understand it. It was simply recognized and left where it stood. There had been discipline in her once. That much was clear. There had been structure and training that had broken somewhere along the way.

Jedi.

The word came without effort.

When she made it clear she would help, Casimir gave a slight tilt of his head. A low sound left him, more acknowledgment than agreement.

“Hmm.”

His gaze lingered a moment longer before he spoke.

“I do not know if that is where she is.”

There was no attempt to soften it. The truth did not change because it was spoken aloud. Still, something in her insistence felt familiar, and that did not sit well.

He turned and moved back toward the archway.

The wind pressed harder along this stretch of stone, sweeping across the open face of the mountain and pulling at his clothing as he approached the gate. The ground was uneven, worn by time and exposure, with frost clinging to the shaded edges where the sun did not reach. Each step remained controlled and measured as the Force stirred again ahead.

The nethergate answered first.

The opening within the archway pulsed, and the Force shifted with it in a sudden release that broke across the space. The pressure struck outward without warning, catching her before she could brace. Her body was thrown back along the stone, boots losing purchase as she hit and skidded across the ground. Frost and grit scattered beneath her as momentum carried her across the rough surface.

Casimir turned as she slid.

He moved without hesitation, closing the distance as her motion slowed just enough to catch. His hand found her before the force could carry her further, the last of her momentum meeting his control as she was steadied. For a brief moment, her weight pressed into him, close enough for the scent to reach him through the cold air.

Saffron and clove.

It settled in his senses, warm against the cold bite of the mountain, and did not fade as quickly as it should have.

Her footing returned, and he released her.

The archway stood behind them, silent again for the moment, though the tension in the Force had not fully settled.

Casimir slowed just enough to glance back.

“Watch yourself,” he said, his voice low against the wind. “Before you fall into my arms a third time.”

 

[Efret Farr]

At first, it seemed like Efret wasn't going to respond. She didn't think it prudent to apologize again, something had already done that enough in the short time she had been back in the Core, and didn't wish to develop a habit that might be distasteful to the Sith, perhaps even dangerously so.

But then she rose one hand, bringing a V of two fingers near her eyes, then flicking it away to point behind him. "Look." He likely did not need the interpretation of that either, but it rung out through the crisp air anyway. Her unit didn't seem nearly as concerned as she did.

Behind Casimir, the air in the gateway sputtered and yawned open again. Its unnatural groan cut over the howling wind. Efret couldn't hear it, of course, but its power pulsed in her chest.

A devil charged out of the portal, the great, gnarled horns atop his head poised at the Echani. Before he could barrel into Casimir, the Force pulled taut and held his attacker back. The barrier was invisible at first, but, as the devil thrashed, its blue tones holding tight to his awful skin began to show.

Casimir Thorne​

 

[Casimir Thorne]

WEARING: xxx | WEAPON: x | x | TAG: Efret Farr

The warning came a fraction too late.

Casimir caught the motion of her hand in his peripheral vision just as the air behind him twisted again. The gateway groaned open with a violent pulse that rolled across the mountain, sharp enough to cut through the howl of the wind. Power burst outward from the archway in a wave that pressed against his senses hard enough to turn him toward it instantly.

The thing that came through barely resembled anything living.

Horns curved from its head in uneven arcs as it burst from the opening with enough force to crack stone beneath its weight. The creature did not hesitate after crossing the threshold. It charged straight for him.

The Force caught it before impact.

Blue light distorted around the beast as the invisible hold tightened across its body, but the thing did not stop. Claws tore through stone as it forced itself forward against the restraint, snarling hard enough for heat and spit to carry into the freezing air. Frost and loose gravel scattered beneath its feet while the nethergate churned behind it in violent pulses of light and shadow.

Casimir’s eyes shifted toward Efret for only a moment.

Interesting.

Whatever fracture existed within her, the Force still answered.

The thought vanished as quickly as it came.

One hand dropped to the hilt at his side. Crimson light exploded into the mountain air as the saber ignited with a violent snap-hiss that cut through the roar of the wind. Casimir moved immediately, boots grinding against the uneven stone as he closed the distance while the creature still fought against Efret’s restraint.

There was nothing reckless in the way he moved. Every step remained measured despite the speed behind it. The mountain narrowed around them, forcing the engagement into close quarters where a single mistake near the cliff edge could become fatal.

The creature tore one arm partially free.

Casimir struck before it could fully recover.

The red blade carved downward toward the exposed limb in a sharp diagonal meant to break its forward momentum rather than kill outright. At the same moment, the Force surged outward from him in a hard collision meant to meet Efret’s hold and reinforce it long enough to keep the thing from crashing fully into them.

The beast roared.

Stone beneath them cracked again.

 

[Efret Farr]

She was acting before she knew what was happening.

The Force ripped through her arm like a flash flood. The shapes of her surroundings generated by the Force faded away until all that was left was her narrow field of vison. Her concentration couldn't hold onto Force Sight and Barrier at the same time.

The wind carried a surprised gasp away from her. Since Naboo, she had only been able to use to Force to augment her sight. Whatever triggered this reconnection lit her nerves on fire.

Desperation to survive?

Not quite.

Even in mostly darkness now, the demon was etched over the large void in Efret's sight. Hunched over, glowing eyes rabid, horns and thorns jutting out of its head and shoulders, it looked like nothing she had even seen—not even in the Dark dreams Malva'ikh had given her. It didn't even resemble the creatures she had encountered in her excursion into the Netherworld from Theed, which had been smaller and almost skeletal.

A different warmth washed over her, not sticky with stress and sweat, but comforting like the Genetian sun she knew only through a particular pair of golden eyes.

Need to protect it conducted her next movements so that they were almost unconscious.

Relying on the spatial awareness of her immediate surroundings she had built when she had been able to see more extensively, she widened her stance. Her other arm rose parallel to her first. The flow of the Force diverted, flowing down and out of it too. Her hennaed fingers clawed and struggled against the air as if digging into the beast's tawny shoulders between the thorns breaking its skin.

The devil still fought her hold, its snarls vibrating through the thinned air. Her boots gave way inch by inch, dragging tracks into the dusted snow.

Something energetic pushed back against her effort, but not as resistance. As reinforcement.

The Force around her cracked as if unlocking with the realization. Its power flowed out of the bounds that had held it back, seeping into her like water into dehydrated soil. Thin, black dendrites crawled over her collarbone and up neck from beneath her tunic. With an effortful yell, she tore one arm away. She felt with the Force along the rocky ridge to their left for a loose boulder. When she found one, she wrapped the power around the boulder's angular edges and hurled it at the beast.

Casimir Thorne​

 

[Casimir Thorne]

WEARING: xxx | WEAPON: x | x | TAG: Efret Farr

The creature forced itself against the combined pressure holding it in place with enough violence to shake the ridge beneath them. Muscles twisted beneath rough skin as the thing dragged itself forward inch by inch despite the Force crushing against it from two directions. Casimir's blade struck the exposed arm just as the limb tore partially free.

Crimson carved across flesh.

The strike did not sever the arm cleanly, but it bit deep enough to send blackened blood spraying across the stone. Heat burst from the wound in a wave that smelled wrong against the freezing mountain air. The devil roared hard enough for the sound to vibrate through the ground beneath his boots.

Then the Force around Efret changed.

Casimir felt it instantly.

Power surged outward from her in a way it had not before, no longer fractured and uncertain. The pressure reinforced his own hold against the creature with sudden intensity. Pale eyes flicked toward her for only a fraction of a second, but it was enough to see the dark tendrils spreading against her skin.

The sight sat poorly with him. Not because it frightened him. Because he recognized it.

The beast lunged again.

Its weight slammed forward against the restraint hard enough to crack the shimmering hold around it. Clawed hands struck stone as it tried to drag itself toward them despite the wound carved into its arm. Casimir shifted immediately, boots grinding against loose frost as the creature forced another step forward.

Then the ridge beside the archway broke.
The boulder Efret tore free crashed into the devil with enough force to drive it sideways into the mountain wall. Stone exploded outward beneath the impact. Cracks raced through the ridge above them, spreading fast through weakened rock as snow and debris broke loose overhead.
Casimir reacted instantly.

One hand thrust outward as the Force caught the falling stone before gravity could fully claim it. The collapse twisted under his control. Massive chunks of rock changed direction mid-fall and slammed downward toward the creature instead of scattering harmlessly across the ridge.

The mountain groaned beneath the impact.
Stone hammered against the devil again and again, burying it beneath a violent cascade of rock and ice while dust erupted outward across the narrow pass. The ridge trembled hard enough to threaten their footing as larger fractures spread away from the archway.

Casimir did not stop moving.

The crimson blade remained alive in his hand as he advanced through the settling debris, boots crushing broken stone beneath each step while pale corrupted eyes searched the collapse for movement.

Because something like that did not die easily.

 

[Efret Farr]

The rock slammed into the devil's flank and, suddenly, there was nothing left to keep back. As it sailed through the air towards a wall, Efret stumbled back, her own exertion from a moment before crashing into her.

She recovered quickly, rechanneling the Force from generating a barrier to making her surroundings visible against her blindspots again. As she straightened, she physically grabbed her lightsaber from her belt. She stood there to even out her breath. The air did nothing to soothe the burn under her skin but, ever so slowly, a few moments at rest drained lactic acid from her strained muscles.

They protested when she stepped her feet together and began to move towards Casimir. Amidst the fallen stones and snow, scanning the rubble for sign of the monster, he was the image of a typical Sith, searching for prey. They had never met before, yet there was something familiar now in his aura. As distantly cold as it was, there was a kernel of something wholly different at its center, warm like beach sand. How hadn't she felt in before this moment? Possibly because her command of the Force had been limited.

She scanned the fight's debris too. The scattered rocks appeared translucent in Force Sight, a characteristic that normally made it difficult to know what object was ahead of you and which was behind it but across the room or it the next one. But in this circumstance, it clarified rather than confused. The demon's sprawled form was clearly visible to her underneath overlapped stone slabs, closer to Casimir than it was to her.

"Your left."

She signed with her nondominant hand as she thumbed the ignition of her weapon. Its snap-hiss might have obscured her vocoded voice.

The blade's glowing orange was not just a strange color for a former Jedi—its rusty undertones suggested that the kyber crystal contained in the hilt had originally been another color—but the way it hummed in the air was not altogether stable. Sure, it mostly was, though the blade periodically and subtlety flickered. The tenor of its buzz modulated. Its plasma tested the bounds of its shape, breeching through tiny cracks.

And the abnormality didn't stop there. It didn't feel like she had bled her crystal. She must have stopped whoever had, but also had made the decision to forgo purification. Nonsensical. Why?

Casimir Thorne​