Convoy 326 Out of Varonat

[Darth Fett]

The towers of Fett’s compound shrank behind him, drowned in the haze of Varonat’s storm fed canopy. Rain sheeted over the transparisteel viewport in broad diagonals, streaking as the repulsorlifts kicked higher. His Action V transport shuddered once, unavoidable, the lift caught in the magnetic swell of a receding stormfront, and then stabilized, turbines whining as they banked toward the upper atmosphere.

Beside him, the object sat unstrapped on the copilot seat. A four sided pyramid, no taller than a boot, resting in silent equilibrium. Its form gave the impression of a crystalline lantern snuffed mid breath. Each panel of waxen glass carried a murky translucence, as though fogged by something just beneath the surface. Around the edges, a thin beskar framework folded in etched bands, marked with runes copied from sith antiquities old enough to have been forgotten twice. Fett had modified the casing himself.

O-N0’s voice crackled in from the other Action V, half a klick off the port wing. “Secondary c-c-cargo sec-c-c-currrrrrrrred. No irregularities in the clamp c-cy-cycles.”

“Copy,” Fett replied. “Keep the outermost crate bolted until we hit terminal descent. You’ll know the one.”

“Definnnne ‘the one.’”

Fett let the comm fall silent.

The transport’s hyperdrive began to hum as the coordinates finished compiling. The nav system began blinking confirmation lights across the console. The pyramid vibrated imperceptibly.

Fett didn’t look at it directly. He could feel it watching him.

With one gloved finger, he toggled the hyperspace lever. The stars stretched. Light broke.

And the pyramid made a sound that did not reach the ears.

OOC:
Action V "The Plutus": 320 RU
Action V "The Midas": 320 RU

[Darth Fett]

Halfway through the first fold, Fett cut the interior lighting. The dark made certain things easier to detect.

He sat unmoving, eyes closed, attuned to the flow of the Force, not the pure river favored by Jedi, nor the turbulent churn the Sith called home. This was the mineral pulse of reality beneath both: the rhythm of matter in flux, folded and strained by unnatural motion.

The wayfinder beside him pulsed.

It hadn’t moved, but it was no longer quite where he remembered it. The shift was sub perceptual, spatial without having occurred in space. He finally opened his eyes.

Three of the pyramid’s four faces were now lit from within. Not bright, but with a pale internal smolder, like cold embers churning through black glass. The light had no clear origin. The interior angles bent the glow in ways that disrupted linear geometry. Runes whispered inside the beskar lattice, slight tonal oscillations, mostly subsonic.

Then it spoke.

“You’ve deviated.”

Fett’s brow lifted slightly, “still on course, in fact.”

“Not navigational,” said the voice. Male, brittle, yet theatrical in its intonation, like a priest whose breath had long ago dried in his chest. “I felt the lattice recoil. Something in your path holds variance”

Fett said nothing.

The fourth face of the pyramid lit.

“Welcome back, Tevitar,” Fett muttered, more ritual than greeting.

“Do not mistake repetition for return,” the voice replied. “I am not that Tevitar. I am a copy. A copy of a copy. A lattice facsimile cradled in beskar like a shrike in a box. And yet I remember what he remembered. Including what he forgot.”

Fett allowed himself a brief smile. “Then you’ll remember the course. Rhen Var at the terminus.”

“Assuming you maintain course,” Tevitar replied, “and assuming your other transport is not intercepted. Terrible thing, pirates”

Fett’s smile faded.

Outside, the stars reeled.

Tevitar intended to emotionally wound him. This was abnormal behavior, and it was not a welcomed development.

[Darth Fett]

Shockingly everything was proceeding without a hitch.

The primary cargo was the same stock as always.

The secondary cargo... that was another matter. All around the galaxy, Fett had been making trips. Deliveries.

Rhen Var was far from his most vital point of interest, but it was on his list nonetheless.

Another box to tick.

The otherworldly glow beside him churned.

[Darth Fett]

The twin Action V transports descended through Rhen Var’s upper atmosphere, cutting through sleet and vapor, their obsidian hulls standing in stark contrast ashow they *didn't appear* in space. Fett’s ship, the Plutus, touched down first on the flat platform nestled against a rockface south of the main glacier shelf. O-N0’s vessel, the Midas. followed, landing a few meters off. The winds were steady but not strong enough to disrupt cargo operations. Fett descended the ramp with a sealed containment case in hand, the durasteel edges rimed with cold as soon as it hit open air. Snow crunched beneath his boots as he crossed to a recessed alcove carved into the cliffside, one of several precleared vaults he’d prepared years ago for assets like this.

He keyed open the recessed access panel, let the biometric scanner confirm him, and stepped inside. The interior was dry, powerfed, shielded from orbital scans. Fett opened the case and set the Sith Wayfinder on the stand that had been carved specifically for its size and frame. It settled without sound. The interior lighting of the vault adjusted to match the pyramid’s subtle glow. Behind him, O-N0 began offloading the primary shipment crates, unaware or unconcerned about the true value of what Fett had just stored away.