Reunion : Elrood By Starlight

[Lorraei]

Lorraei's coal black gaze rested on the far horizon. His mind wondered, blank and listless in a haze. A death stick hung loosely in his lips, purple pink smoke trailing lazily from it's burning end. Before him the sun began to sink. Sunset was coming. Just like that fateful days all those years ago.

How long it had been he couldn't remember, not through the cloud of intoxication he had buried his thoughts in. He knew this was the spot, the precise spot, where so long ago he had met his soul mate. Kiera had been his perfect mirror. Their souls had joined through the Force, and nothing could have ever changed the way they had felt for one another. They had never been romantic, nor intimate, and least not physically. Their bond had been one of pure spiritual bliss. And now. She was gone.

Slowly a tear rolled down Ray's caramel cheek, dropping off his chin to land on Shangri-La, the ship he sat atop. He blinked suddenly, and wiped his face without actually thinking about it. With a burst of raw Force, Ray shot to his feet. Dusting off his bizarre red and purple robes, his eyes scanned the horizon once more. Nothing. "Where are you?" He asked the evening air. The same question he had asked that night, though he hadn't been searching for her.

Maybe Keira had died, truly and properly this time. Lorraei shook his head, dispelling the frightening thought. He light a cigarette, took a long pull from it, and stood watching the sunset. Maybe Keira will never actually answer the call he had sent across the Holonet. "What a waste of time." He muttered bitterly, exhaling a cloud of smoke.

[member="Keira Priest"]

 

[Keira Priest]

At first Keira had thought it some sort of mistake. After all, she couldn’t be the only person in the galaxy with that name, and chances were there was another who shared it being searched for on some other world, far away from her home. And she would have believed it, had the name of the planet not caught her attention for a reason she wasn’t immediately able to explain. Elrood. She had been there before, certainly, but when? Clearly it had been enough to draw someone’s attention, but whether that was for the right or wrong reasons remained to be seen.

As always she would approach the unknown with caution, armoring and arming herself, foregoing her rifle for the greataxe while keeping the rest of her arsenal standard. All the while she kept trying to remember what made this planet familiar, but to no avail. It had been over a decade since she’d set foot on its surface, and that was a long period of time to pass for someone to still remember her that well. And usually, in her experience, it didn’t herald a happy memory.

Upon arriving in atmosphere another scan was completed to hone in on the signal, and from there she made her decision to land nearby. If they were going to kill her, well, they’d have to go to a hell of a lot of trouble, because she wasn’t bent on making it easy.

The other ship was within walking distance once she landed, and she stepped out fully armored, helmet included. Immediately her scanners went to work on the surroundings, HUD mapping out useful information, including a bioscan of the only other humanoid in the immediate vicinity. She skimmed the readings as she closed the distance, cursing to herself when she finally put two-and-two together.

Getting to the top of the ship wouldn’t make such an easy feat this time without the Force, but she’d make do. One way or the other she managed to climb to the top, both hands unsealing her helmet and clipping it to her belt, revealing a face he likely wouldn’t find immediately familiar, as time had changed them both. Still, that didn’t prevent her from closing the distance to pull him into an embrace, her affection unwavering. “It’s good to see you.”

[member="Lorraei"]

 

[Lorraei]

The roar of a ship's engines tore Lorraei's attention away from the setting sun. His midnight gaze followed the vessel as it sank toward the planet, his feet carrying him across his ship's back to the edge nearest the landing craft. He watched in silence as an armored figure step out, and began to make it's way towards him. Reflexively he stepped back, his heart hammering in his chest as he watched the figure advance.

As the figure began to scramble up the side of his ship, Ray's left hand spread at his side for a moment as he extended his awareness toward the person steadily climbing toward him. Nothing. No, less than nothing. His dark brow furrowed into a scowl as the person straightened to meet his gaze now atop the Shangri-La. He quickly pulled the cigarette from his lip, and cast it aside. With a breath, hot and anxious, he gathered to him every single thread of power the Force could give him. If this Thing was here for a fight, and it certainly was dressed for one, then it should have chosen a Jedi with less darkness boiling in his heart.

The figure stepped forward, removing it's helmet on the go, and threw her arms around the man. The face was not wholly alien to him, but something difficult to place like a half remembered dream. The eyes that meet his however, those could never be forgotten. His Dark Mistress, his friend, his Kiera pulled him to her armored chest in a deep embraced without a moment of hesitation. "Pateesa?" He whispered, as he was clutched firmly to his Master's chest.

Nothing! The word screamed through his mind, shrieking and fierce. This was wrong! Her voice, it spoke to him. Her eyes smiled with that hidden shine of pride she felt when ever she looked at her apprentice. Yet everything he felt as his awareness flooded toward his mentor was incredibly wrong. Her dark tempest was missing. Her inner storm of raging energy ... Keira was gone.

His right hand pressed to the woman's belly, very nearly as if to embrace her, and abruptly Ray loosed every ouch of power surging through his mind. In a lance of raw kinetic power, Lorraei shook the woman off his chest and leapt backwards into a clean back flip. He landed a few meters away facing what he hoped would be at least a staggered opponent. His dark eyes turned pitch black as the Force whipped around the man in a small cyclone. A halo of spinning throwing knives spun about the man's left hand. Above his right spun a very familiar curved saber hilt. "I'll only say this once, so pay the feth attention! What are you, and what have you done with Kiera?"

[member=Keira Priest]

 

[Keira Priest]

Much like everything else in her life, this one event couldn’t go smoothly. Just as soon as he went to embrace her a tightly wound burst of the Force sent her stumbling backwards, not that she could wholly blame him. A lot had changed since they last crossed paths, most of all her distinct lack of any sort of presence in the ethereal that he was used to. It was an instinct Keira would have praised him for in any other scenario, and perhaps she would later, but for now there was the talking him down to concern herself with.

Her hands were kept visible, and she made certain they were nowhere near any immediately available weaponry. “Okay, okay. I know a lot has changed, and we haven’t spoken in over a decade.” Where to begin? Gods, he’d missed so much, it felt as if they had an entire lifetime to catch up on. “Another of the vode and I had a bit of a...disagreement, that’s how I ended up Force Dead. I joined the Mandalorians not long after we last spoke, I was adopted by a man called Isley Verd.” That alone was a story to tell, but not one to delve into at the moment.

“When we first met here, you were terrified.” She couldn’t help but flash a smile at the memory, remembering it like it was yesterday. How he’d ended up her apprentice was anyone’s guess, but she didn’t regret a second of it. “For one reason or another, maybe against your better judgement, you agreed to have me train you. I didn’t make that great of a teacher, and we fell apart from each other. When you put that call out, it took me a bit of time to remember, but I’m here now.”

Taking a few cautious steps forward, her hands stayed raised. “Let’s sit down and talk, okay? I’ll answer any questions you have, but I don’t want to fight you.”

[member="Lorraei"]

 

[Lorraei]

Ray listened in silence. His eyes remained blackened, his gathering storm of energy whipping his bizarre robes around him as though he stood in a gale. That voice, it rang through his mind, calling up the found memories of his Dark Mistress. Slowly his eyes closed, a new tear escaping down his tanned cheek.

He opened them again to find the woman, his dearest friend supposedly, walking forward, her hands up and to her sides. Immediately his hilt landed in his hand, it's dull lavender blade hissing into existence. He stepped coldly into one of his most practiced saber forms opening stance. "Don't." He said in a pained, but firm command. His blade now leveled at his Mentor's heart. "My Pateesa is Gods damned deadly at close proximity. Do not advance. Please. I don't want to kill you, but I will."

Once she stopped, he stepped back, his saber extinguishing as he did. "Clone? HRD? What are you? You don't even properly look like my Pateesa." He turned away from her, though only to begin pacing. She never left his line of sight, but he couldn't stomach looking at her for the moment. "You don't feel like Keira!" He shouted, the cyclone around him crackling faintly in response to his pain. "Explain it. And Gods help you if you are lying to me."

[member=Keira Priest]

 

[Keira Priest]

An explanation, well, in theory that was simple enough, but she’d be damned if she knew what to say that would ease his conscience. Keira wanted to tell him that of course she didn’t feel like herself, she was Force Dead, and whatever recollection he had of her presence was in the distant past now that she no longer registered on that plane. So much had changed that there was no succinct way to go about it, and to deliver the story in full would require hours of patience that he didn’t have, not that she blamed him any.

Breathing deep and exhaling in a sigh, she sat down on the edge of his ship with her legs dangling off, motioning for him to join her. It was a relaxed position meant to demonstrate that she had no intention of becoming a threat, not that he would take as much to heart. Again, instincts to be praised. “The Mandalorians have never been a unified people, not as long as I’ve known them.” A strange start to an even stranger tale, but a start nonetheless.

“I was captured by one of those that opposed the regime I followed, tortured for information, and implanted with something that made me a void in the Force and cut me off entirely. Going back farther, after we last spoke I pledged myself to the Galactic Republic, and served in their military for a time. Eventually we came to a head with the Clans of Mandalore, and I was offered a place in a clan by a man I barely knew, but one who saw fit to give me a chance in his way of life.” It was a fond memory still, even despite all that followed it.

“After he died I took up leadership of our clan, but I’ve since separated myself from that name and taken up another with a younger Mandalorian, one who wants to establish himself, and I guess you could call me a mentor of sorts.” It was a title she’d worn many times in the past, as he was well aware, and it never quite seemed to leave her.

“There’s your explanation. It’s not perfect, and things are still changing, but all of it’s the truth.” It was up to him what would happen next.

[member="Lorraei"]