Rafa's Choice

A legend from the second generation of the Middle Years, Rafa Kyveryk Danelan Zenon was born with a mutation that created a severe imbalance in his throxin levels, causing them to spike at random. The result was a powerful foresight effect that allowed him to see the past, present and future by way of "mental warps." As far as the medical elites could tell, his mind rather than his body was thrust backwards or forwards in time/space, moving between multiple realities during the unpredictable overloads, while his body remained static.

Due to his unique condition, Rafa had trouble with his studies and found it difficult to interact with others. He was often overwhelmed by his affliction and sometimes found himself unable to tell the difference between reality and the visions. When his parents requested special assistance from the elders, his ordeal caught the attention of the famous scientist and philosopher, Mars Xidonis, who made it his business to visit the Kyveryk home every evening in order to privately tutor the troubled youth.

Mars was immediately impressed by Rafa's resolve to overcome his ailment, and discovered that, despite having fallen behind in his studies, the boy was advanced for his age. Interested in what he considered to be a fantastic ability rather than a sickness, Mars was patient with his student's lapses, questioning him about the details of what he saw. "When these visions come, it's like the world just falls away," Rafa once told him. "What I see shatters into pieces and morphs into something new...someplace else. It's terrible, and it scares me."

Quiet, good natured and shy, Rafa wanted nothing more than a mundane life. Unlike his teacher, he had no grand designs and no interest in being of widespread importance. All he desired was to follow his mother into the hunter's trade, to spend his long existence as a tracker for Rydn Park. Mars urged the boy to pursue greater goals, to train his ability and join the Watchmen, but turning his problem into a profession was the last thing that Rafa wanted.

The universe, however, had other plans. Shortly before completing his primary studies, Rafa took a day trip to the planet Axelon, which resided in a small orbit system of three celestial bodies farther out in Chrysalian. It was home to a handful of Xilon whose ancestors had settled there in the ancient days, when their race was still divided into separate tribes. The locals were descendants of those settlers and preferred the quiet, misty outworld to the main planets of the central orbit system. It was also a popular retreat for those on the larger worlds to escape to now and then.

As Rafa strolled along the quiet walkways of a local park, he heard laughter and gleeful shouts coming from deeper within the trees. Curious, he made his way into the forest, where a group of young children were playing in the hot springs. Smiling, he sat down and watched them, wishing that he could have had such a childhood. After a few minutes, one of the little tykes ran over to say hello. Although visitors were common on Axelon, they didn't often enter the inhabited areas, staying in the rural regions and parks. So the presence of a stranger was fascinating to the youngsters. As Rafa leaned over and patted the boy on the head, he felt a familiar surge of warmth rush through his veins, and the glow emanating from his body tripled in strength as the scene before him fell away to reveal a horrific new scene. The location was the same, and the time had barely changed, but the sight in front of him was very different. The children were no longer playing in the spring because the spring was no longer there. In its place was a black void, and the little ones were being sucked into it, caught by a temporal whirlwind.

Suddenly, he was back inside his own body, and the scene had returned to one of comfort and joy. But Rafa knew it would not be for long. Leaping up so fast that he startled the child next to him, the young hunter sprinted down to the spring and yelled for the others to get out at once. He picked up as many of them as he could carry and ushered the rest to the top of the bank and safely down the road. Only moments later, the water began to drain rapidly, sucked down into an unseen abyss. Void pools were common within the Aeradisphere, but very rare in Chrysalian galaxy. Every one of the children would have been lost if he had not seen what he had in time.

A few weeks later, upon completing his studies, Rafa met with Mars to tell him that he might be interested in joining the Watchmen after all. His experience on Axelon had shown him that, in spite of the tribulations, his affliction could be used to do good if he was willing to work with it rather than merely suffering it. Training with the Watchers, Rafa learned how to better control his ability. Alhough he could not stop his body from reacting to the mutation, he discovered that he could harness the excess throxin and use it with purpose instead. By touching other Xilon and allowing their energy to further spike his own imbalance, Rafa was able to channel his mental leaps to focus on particular individuals or their related timelines and, in effect, view their futures.

In spite of his young age, he became well known amongst the warriors and historians for documenting events that would otherwise have remained unknown to the masses. He was the only one to ever fully record the End of Days, describing the death of time itself in impossibly intricate detail. Almost everything that the Xilon ever knew of the final moments of the universe came from his personal accounts.

Despite not having achieved his dream of a normal life, Rafa was much happier than he had ever been. He felt that he'd been given a greater purpose, and his "premonitions" guided the Xilon warriors in their endeavors of universal protection up until the end of his life and even, in some cases, beyond.