Broken Beginnings (A Star Wars: Clone Wars fanfic)

Chapter 43: The Gathering Part 3

Rendal POV

Despite Yoda's confidence and kind words I was still worried about my friend and the younglings.  By now the ice had covered almost a quarter of the door, and with every moment the ice spread further down.  Their time was running out, they couldn't afford to dawdle.

It was hard not to go in there and try to find them, but I knew my place was outside where I was. I needed to stay here, I had promised that I wouldn't interfere.  If I did then I would get into big trouble and the others might be forced to do this all over again with someone else in my place, so it was better for everyone if I just waited patiently for them.  Though to be honest my patience was straining.

They'll be ok and when they come out you'll get to see Alexa and her awesome smile!  Just focus on that and the time will go quicker...  I'm sure of it.

Alexa POV

I was getting ever closer, I could feel it..  It was close and I was getting closer all the time.  I started to run as I could feel the Force call out to me, pulling me toward it..  I was gonna find it!  When suddenly I realised that the thing I was running to was a huge frozen wall of eyes and at the top I could see a glow in the darkness.  That was where my crystal was, that was where I had to go.  The question was how could I climb the wall?

What surprised me was that the ice wasn't entirely sheer.  There were a few rocks that protruded from the ice that I could probably use as foot-holes and hand grips, but not enough of them that I could climb all the way to the top.  I would have to figure out another way to do it..  I could try to use the Force to aid me in a jump, but it was doubtful that I would reach it.  Perhaps a combination of both would work, but that would be risky.  If I missed then I would fall and could possibly do quite a bit of damage to myself.  If that happened then I'd never make it out of here.

So I needed to decide, what was I going to do?  The answer; start climbing and hope I figured something out when I ran out of hand grips.  I went over to the foot of the wall and reached up to where the first indents were in the wall started to climb.

Ayara POV

This place was giving me the creeps, I kept getting the feeling that we weren't alone in here.  Knowing that finding the crystal meant I could get out of here faster I tried desperately to seek it out with the Force, but as I just couldn't sense it.  It was as though my senses were clouded, but I couldn't figure out why.  It was all so confusing..

'We're getting nowhere doing this.' Oblo pointed out.  "We need to change tactics."

'And do what, huh?'  Caller glared at him.  "What do you suggest, eh pipsqueak?"  I frowned as I watched  Caller try to bully Oblo and had been about to step in when Gyakk let out a threatening growl at the mean spirited youngling.

'Gyakk is right, that's not ok Caller.' I nodded in agreement. 'Besides I think Oblo is right, we can't just keep doing the same thing or we aren't going to accomplish our mission.'

'Ok fine then!  So what do we do?' Mr Caller Tanner asked.

'Well...  Since staying together didn't work...  Maybe we should split up.'  Oblo suggested, making my pulse jump.

'B-But it's scary in here, I don't want to be alone..."  I whimpered.

'Aw!  Someone's a little scared baby!'  Tanner sneered as he started to tease me.

'Stop it!'  Oblo shouted, his voice echoing throughout the caves as it bounced off the walls.  "We need to split up into smaller groups then, I'll go with Ayara and Gyakk you can go with Caller."  Gyakk said something that sounded like he was protesting against splitting up, but one look from the Rodian silenced him and he agreed.  "Alright, now let's go.  Good luck guys."  He nodded to them and we went our separate ways.