Title: Melting Point
Author(s): Layren and Neon Star
Summary: A young Jedi begins to question his role in the Order. His search for answers leads him to discover far more than he ever anticipated and they may be more than even he can handle.
Characters: Carth Rixar and other OC's.
Timeframe: Eighteen years before My Dreams Could Be Tomorrow.
Author's Note: We've been working on this for some time and we do hope you enjoy this experiment we've been working on for awhile. We thought it would be fun to branch out a bit. Feedback is much appreciated
Solemn air.
Grave faces.
The very air stifling in the open room, while the flames rose, consuming nothing but the very few trinkets left behind not more than six months ago. Among them a tattered, old picture drawn by careful, childish hands depicting the youngling face of the man who had died. It was nothing more than ash, just like the body probably was in some distant, wretched war torn planet that had consumed yet another that had tried to save it.
The flames were red, as crimson as his blood must have been when he had been slain. They danced along the wood, the pyre itself, flickering with the life that had been contained within the young Knight. Despite the ice that had covered him all his life. The fire within, that beloved fire, that had so little time to be free before he left, was now gone. If anything, these flames were a last remembrance, and a weak mockery to the intensity of that soul.
There was no peace to be found, in this dance. In the knowledge of the loss of such a life. Even if the Force had claimed a son, it was still a loss, especially to one, who's black eyes reflected those flames, though his own was dying in his broken heart.
The eyes closed as his heart twanged painfully. It hurt to breathe and he suspected it had nothing to do with the smoke of the flames but everything to do with the fact that one he loved, one he cared for was now dead. The intensity of his soul that would have been...gone.
He should've expected it he knew.
He had been a fool to hold on to hope. How many times had his master lectured him on the dangers of attachments and forbidding friendships because he might form them? The Jedi life was a dangerous one and Ke'dran had gone to a place that had been at war for a millennium. Yet he had gone there willingly because he believed in peace. What would the Saren people do for peace now that their beloved hero and ambassador was gone? Ke'dran had failed in his goal. He would never see peace accomplished like he had dreamed of ever since he had known him. That broke Drex's heart further.
Ke'dran had dedicated his whole life to that planet -- and they had snuffed out his life and soul as if it were nothing.
His head bowed as the flames began to die down. He would carry on Ke'dran's work. He knew his Master would not approve, but he did not care.
Slowly people were beginning to leave, one by one. Drex did not move. If he went back inside, Ke'dran would truly be dead except in his memories. He could not bear goodbyes. Some Jedi apprentice he was.
Ke'dran's mentor, Sehan, was standing next to the pyre. The cold gray eyes seemed to penetrate the very essence of his being and the eyes narrowed. Drex almost stepped backward at the look in the Master's eyes. He had never had such a harsh, icy gaze directed at him from that man.
Somehow his heart cracked further. The look in the master's eyes had been enough to confirm his growing suspicions.
He was to blame for Ke'dran's death.
How long he stood there, he didn't know. Eventually his Master's voice broke through the ice that had been growing in his broken heart, "Come Carth."
Drex had no choice but to obey her. Without a last glance back at the flames, he turned and followed his Master inside.
His Master had instructed him to bring his things back from the quarters he had shared with Ke'dran before this cursed mission that had stolen his life. It would be a good test she had said, to face the silence.
He knew he was to bring his life back to her unyielding control.
He entered the small apartment and was almost overwhelmed with the grief of loss. It was too quiet. It wasn't the quiet reassurance that he would return and life would continue.
No.
The silence was cold and piercing much like Ke'dran had been before the Council had assigned them living quarters together as a punishment for their misbehavior. Drex really had never found it a punishment. The harshest punisher had been his mentor, not Ke'dran's chill. In fact the frost that had been Ke'dran had thawed when away from his mentor. That's what was hurting the most. The ice that had melted to reveal the warmth of the soul that he had always known was there in Ke'dran…the soul was gone and so was the warmth and he was left with nothing but the shards that remained.
He took a deep breath and forced himself to enter their shared room. His bunk was on one side, Ke'dran's on the other.
One by one he began piling his clothes and books into boxes.
It did not take long. His Master did not approve of him keeping trinkets, but away from her he had kept a few mementos that were too precious to be lost. Gifts from Ke'dran mostly for Winterfest or a Naming Day.
Now they were all that was left of him.
Methodically he stripped his bed of the standard issue sheets to take to laundry and he emptied the small wastebasket that had been beside the dresser.
The room now looked empty as if no one had ever lived here.
That's what Jedi were after all.
No one to the galaxy.
Nameless servants dedicating their lives to causes and people they were not close to. Was this what he really wanted in life?
He found he suddenly had no answers to his questions.
And he didn't know where to look for them.
His heart was heavy as he said, "Lights off," and the lights went out leaving him alone in the dark.