Windstar's search

Raquel had just dismissed Captain Dante and Master Windstar's apprentice Greyson. Raquel was always smiling, except now. Behind those commanding eyes and that stray strand of sun bleached hair their was pain, pain and the weight of a hundred worlds. Surely a man who had faced down the Dark One himself had little left that could shake him. But yet, here he was shaken, despite his well polished efforts to hide it. If he were not so use to reading people's minds he may not even had recognized it. Truly Dante's tale of this Alan going after his friends rather than him was dark and painful but there was something that shook Lord Raquel on a personel level it seemed.

Though the eternity of silence was just a moment Jeric felt too ackward to let it continue and instead offered to help, "If this Alan is from Dragon, its possible the French Man is involved. With him as important to the future as he is we should silence this Alan." Lord Raquel thinks for a moment seeming to try and bring his thoughts from something else and says profoundly, "Unless this is what makes him capable of being the leader we will all need. I am what I am and you are what you are at least in part because we had to be. We had to be that great to overcome the adversity that we met. Running in and solving his problems could kill us all."
"Who knows what the future will bring we must act with what we know now."
"I have a friend who would say this conversation is pointless because our attempts to change the future may cause it and our attempts to keep it the same may change it."
"A wise man."
"You do what you will Master Windstar, I leave Dante's fate in Dante's hands. To me this adversity no matter how horrific must be faced by him."
"I will consider your words. Then with your leave."

------------------

Jeric held the small metallic glowing green sphere in his hand. This was the spark, or the life force. This was what made that golemn Alive. It was what everyone feared. They had known it for decades know that there waiting for them a future where golemns had developped intelligence and had nearly destroyed all organic life. Mages everywhere had forbidden golemn research and burned what information they had of it. Yet all of that had not stopped that future, at least according to recent accounts from Dante. The golemn sent back from the future to defend Dante and ensure he lives was defeated by Alan and all that remained was this small metal ball. This ball housed the spirit of it or the portion of the force which gave it Life.

Jeric closed his eyes and reached his pool out to find and merge with the pool emenating from the ball in his hand--though there was no hand there was nothing but force. It was like contacting a sleeping mind. Like the rippples of the sea against the shore as the tide shifted away from land, the soul pulsated but slightly less each time. Pushing deeper, Jeric found only one major controlling drive--the need to protect Dante or General Katar, as the soul called it.

Though this was dangerous, Jeric had made a decision. X should live. If he was important enough to be sent from the future, he was important enough to save. The best Jeric could tell X needed a new body a new golemn body to live just as an elf would need a flesh body to house their force. He had heard stories mentioned before of other Golemns that had come back to ensure the creation of the spark. He did not know where they were but accounts left 3 of them still alive-if you could call it that. His plan was simple, find the bad ones destroy their spark and replace it with X's. Though he had no idea how to do that or if it could be done. Even with a country to run and a bickering council to manage and steer and an international alliance to help create, he needed to save this one soul. He had to save it because it would protect Dante and Dante would save them all.

Lifting the spark with the force he caused it to float suspended by the sheet will Jeric exerted though it was not taxing. He would use it as a reference and find something similar. The foot prints these sparks left in the force had to at least be similar to eachother. Folding his legs into a meditation position, he became the world around him.

The multiverse was an ocean. For a time, the force would materialize this ocean into individual waves. These waves would create pools in the great ocean. The pool of temperary existence and illusion of reality that was Jeric, lay calm and serene. He surrendered the illusion, his pool fading into the waves around him. Reaching out his pool was swallowed and engulfed and Jeric became a part of the whole. The whole reached further and further then stopped. There were pools, pools like X but...simpler. It was close, very close and a lot of them, maybe 50. Here in Atlanta under the Palace. Marking in the ocean where those waves broke the surface, he condensed his pool as close as he could to those prints.

He found himself in the sewers under Atlanta. He then used the force to move the rocks and stone to get closer to the pools he had found. Then there was a solid metal slab like a floor. He could not be sure what but there was something extra protecting this floor. He reached out to another spark that was on the other side of the floor. It was again like it was a sleep but somehow Jeric woke it. Alive, I want to be alive. The thought flooded back across the connection so fast and powerful it shocked him. All beings had some sort of survival drive but this was nearly unprecidented. Usually a drive that strong was accompanied by fear or panic of facing the reality life was about to end, but this had none of that just simply a pure hunger for life.

This was something but it was not the golemns he was looking for, and though an army of inteligent golemns under Atlanta warranted immediate investigation by all means necesary, he chose to ignore it. X needed a differnt golemn body not these. He became the ocean again. There were several pockets of these sparks that Jeric could only assume were inteligent golemns from the future. One under Tradecity and 2 under other islands in Geneva. Reaching out further and futher, he expanded his conscieness as far as he could with out loosing it. Like too little butter spread over burt toast he was trying to cover more ground than he could. On the edge of the ripples of his pool there was something else. This was not like the other sparks, it was similar to X but more complicated. Like too little spice trying to flavor too much tea he risked not doing anything and having no impact on the world. He rapidly moved to consolidate his pool of the ocean.

He could not just leave this with out at least telling someone. He materialized outside the room he had been speaking to Lord Raquel. Guards called out "Hold." He threw out the force to keep them off of him. The doors openned and Lord Raquel stood before him. "Is there a problem here Master Windstar?" Raquel said amused and irritated at the same time.

He took the news well, as well as someone could who found out there was a sleeper army of future inteligent golemns planted in strategic locations to invade and destroy Geneva. That problem was someones else's problem. Perhaps this was the moment Dante was saved for. Maybe I should find Dante then. He shook off that thought it was much more important to find a body to put X in. He could offer a wide range of insight into the situation.

Leaping through the force he appeared where the other sparks were located. Well close. He was standing on an invisible dome looking down over a majestic mountain fortress. The walled compound was as well tended and gardenned as any royal estate or druid grove. A large wide tower with open balconies and orante statues was built into a mountian while an arch bridge reached across the saddle between the mountain and small ridge. The rocky ridge had been buit into a massive wind mill. Jeric had never seen any windmill close to that size. Sails larger than the carvel class ships that sailed from Trade City across the great seas of the world spun at a casual rapidness driven by the wind that was funnelled through the canyon.

The mountains and entire site was majestic and wonderful. He was observant but did not let it distract him from his prey. He saw them. Three machines of war sitting unmoving in the courtyard. A small catapult a mobile battering ram and a larger trebuche, that matched the description and it was the spark he felt. Know how to get in there.