Secret Vaults of the Selab (Levantine Sanctum Dominion of Bayan)

[Mother Arg'garok]

@Ia'raklane Beorht

Needless to say, the warning came, but the results... well... could only be comical to say the least. At least this time, Mother Arg'garok did not end up stuck inside doorway.

There came a squeeeeeeeeeeeeee of startlement, the Nun's tiny little arms rising up in alarm as the loud thuds of permacrete bags landed elsewhere. Thankfully, not on top of her wimpled head!

Her wet snout would quiver frantically, black beady eyes blinking in mild panic. For a woman whose strength lay in Fate bending and healing, this was a rather awkward situation. Then again, the Nun had always been a bit spacey.

Gratitude, none the less, would wash over that olive green face, her jowls quivering as she quickly went waddling towards the Twi'lek's side.

"Snort. Snort. Squeeeee!" < Thank you, my child! > she'd relay her gratitude in thick Gamorrese, each frantic word matching the quickening pitter patter of her heart and ending with a snort. Even the Morrts would seem to twitch in thanks; or that could very well be the sudden massive pumping of adrenaline through her bloodstream and into the bloodsuckers mouths.

 

[Velok the Younger]

The depot, when she found it, was classic Jorus: A shipping container orbiting a Strigari nomad, a sunless world. No defenses that she could sense or detect electronically. The Lethewalker nestled up alongside it, and Rave suited up as fast as humanly possible. She got a pair of EMBUs at her back, just in case, and stalked through the airlock in a sealed hardshell suit.

All right. Let's see what the Chancellor's people thought the Jedi couldn't be trusted with.

A single crate lay strapped to the floor of the artigravved shipping container. Nothing else. Rave drew Entropy and slashed the straps, then levered open the lid, breaking the lock in the process. She knelt to peer at the label.

Dray Holocron.

Ohhh my.

 

[Seydon of Arda]

Seydon gripped a high-backed stump chair fashioned and carved from tree-ring slates, sat across from [member="Chloe Blake"] while she meandered with tickling humour. He couldn't help his smile. Gloved fingers reached, stroked at his cheek-bristles, siphoning drink from the canteen draped over his waist-belting. "Can you tell me how it goes? Does it have a woman telling a tale to an equally pretentious, blunt fool?"

 

[Jorus Merrill]

[member="Jaxton Ravos"]

Jorus blinked, and mustered up a grin. "I never sought this out, but there's room under my seat. You're right, y'know. You can trust a man's heart without trusting his aim." He closed and locked the toolbox, and rose, then thought better of it and unlatched the whole assembly to put the Hammerhead datacron in there too, carving out a chunk with his knife. "Lined this whole thing with nullification resin my sister got me. Dead useful stuff."

 

[Chloe Blake]

The slip of a blonde young woman would set her satchel down upon the wooden table's surface, her own body following suit in the bench nearby. Cerulean eyes would dance with mild devilry, as the loremaster of over a thousand systems would lean in closer, an air of mystery and expectation seemingly growing about her as she would lean closer, "Are you sure you want to know?" she'd ask in a low whisper, leaning against her forearms.

"Are you prepared for such a tale, [member="Seydon of Arda"]?"

 

[Ashin Varanin]

@Mother Arg'garok

A Theran Listener of Iara's experience could pick out the meaning of most languages, maybe all. The Force caught the sense of it and carried it to her mind, and she nodded to Arg'garok as her fists unclenched. "Anytime," she said, and maybe Theran skill carried her words over the language barrier going that way too. "This place will be safe to walk around in a week or less, I think. The work was mostly done before we arrived."

 

[Jaxton Ravos]

[member="Jorus Merrill"]

Jaxton mustered up a grin of his own. He could tell why Rosa and Seydon spoke so highly of the spacer. In a short time he'd shown a keen mind and a good heart. "It's just easier that way. Most people only look at the finished product, but that's just kinda depressing after a while y'know? Everyone screws up at least once." He said, as the man continued carving a slot for his new datacron out of nullification resin.

"I seem to remember the old Shadows using some of that stuff while I was in the Order. Disables evil things if I remember correctly. I'd ask for the recipe, but I'm optimistic I'll never need it out here in the Tingel Arm."

 

[Ashin Varanin]

[member="Nohemi Allaneh"] [member="Ilias Nytrau"]

Nohemi's embarrassment, though he felt for her somewhat as an old friend, bemused him a little. But such was the price of being hundreds of years old. At some point, you just stopped caring about the trivia, it just stopped mattering. So, patiently enough but not obviously patiently, he waited for Nohemi and then pressed on into the catacombs. His glowrod revealed ancient stonework and uneven floors, old enough that shifting land had warped them. Hos boots caught on uneven stone, threatening to trip him.

In time they came to a quiet chamber, where an asymmetric machine of sorts projected an immense hologram of the galaxy. A nuna clucked gently nearby, and nuna droppings daubed the machine. One brilliant yellow point stood out on the galactic projection, a point not too far away from here - a hundred lightyears or less.

"What do you suppose that is?"

 

[Mother Arg'garok]

@Ia'raklane Beorht

Jowls would sway as the Nun would nod, and a small pat of her hand would come to rest against the Twi'lek's left forearm in agreement. The Force would work in mysterious ways, so in this Mother Arg'garok was able to sense the general gist of what the Lethon spoke.

Half a waddle and step would pan her gaze around. There was still much debris to be sorted and shifted. Her beady eyes would widen as an idea formed. Enter the flexing of her girth and arms. Grunt Grunt. Squee. Her intention was clear, to use her strength to help the Twi'lek.

 

[Jorus Merrill]

[member="Jaxton Ravos"]
Jorus clamped the lid shut with finality and slotted the toolbox under his arm. "Fethed if I know how it's made. My sister's the crafts type, not me. Not sure who here you'd ask if you wanted more. Not sure who used to be Shadows or anything along those lines -- feth, I only know the word at all from Selena Halcyon's files getting turned over to Republic prosecutors a few administrations ago. But you're right, this part of space ain't exactly brimming with Sith treasure troves."

 

[Seydon of Arda]

[member="Chloe Blake"]

"Ms. Blake," He said. Seydon was between spinning on his canteen lid, replacing it into a waiting iron-ring left emptied on his waist-belt, and adjusting his seating, hands steeped to a point, exuding airs of conspiratory intent. Wind dragged barley-motes across the table finish; more glass-hornets buzzed idly past their shoulders winging rapidly for their colossal paper-nests. "Give me your story and I'll see if I can't reply with a decent yarn in turn. Deal?"

 

[Ashin Varanin]

@Mother Arg'garok

"If you want to, friend," said Iara affably. "I've not the strength for that sort of work." She tapped one temple. "This is my tool, long as it serves me well enough anyway. The foreman needs thirty of these bags over by the mixer and the spigot, on those pallets. Let's see if we can't hurry his work along."

She raised her hands, and a handful of bags rose too, floating carefully along toward the mixer assembly where droids waited to pour the last of the forms.

 

[Nohemi Allaneh]

The glow rod would light a sphere of soft light high above Nohemi's and @Je'gan Olra'en's form, the Fallanassi coming to a stop beside him. He'd thankfully not prodded the woman over her reasons of her embarrassment, and his question served as a distraction. There, ahead of them, was a holographic star map of sorts.

"How curious," her earlier embarrassment forgotten, Nohemi would take a couple of steps closer. Thankfully, no traps -- thus far. "It... appears to be a starmap." she'd say, frowning. She had only mild knowledge in such objects, and the only one she could reference would be the one used in the former Jedi Archives.

"But this... this one is different. It is certainly not like the one at the old Jedi Archives." No, indeed, the sigils at the base would suggest that it was something else entirely.

 

[Velok the Younger]

The Dray holocron was nothing she'd ever aspired to own. Frankly, like all of the Force artifacts in her possession, it was decidedly third-string, the record of a former Jedi apprentice who had turned to the Dark Side and enjoyed a forty-five-year career as an occasionally mistaken seer. Still, it was corruptive in its way, from what she'd heard, or at least had that potential. It spoke of destiny and of necessary actions, it spoke of fate and degrees of possible interference. It could turn Jedi to the Dark Side by the power of ideas alone, perhaps.

It was beyond minor. But she had a use for all such things, and this one sparked a fire in her brain that would not go away.

 

[Jaxton Ravos]

[member="Jorus Merrill"]

Jaxton nearly winced. He was gone by the time Halcyon was in charge, but he couldn't help but feel guilt, remorse that such things could have happened. People like her were a strong reason he left the Order in the first place. He had heard word that they were cleaning house a bit, but stuff like that took time. He hoped Grandmaster Grayson, if he remembered right, was keeping a good hold on things.

"That's something I'm pretty thankful for to be honest. I know some Sith have taken residence up to the North but other than that we don't have to deal with those kinds of things much. Just you wait though, now that we're talking about it some Sith Menace will pop in the Tingel Arm and give us trouble." He laughed. "Funny how fate works that way sometimes."

 

[Ashin Varanin]

[member="Nohemi Allaneh"]

Je'gan scratched his chin and procured a handkerchief. Once the guano smeared away from various control surfaces, he began calling up information from what he felt sure was a recently activated device. The nuna, perhaps.

"It's a star map, yes, but not a Star Map," he said absently, "not the original kind. This is some kind of a tribute or functional reproduction, centuries old, not millennia. And that point...see the little cone coming off it? That's the probability cone across the past few years, for some kind of shift in relation to the galaxy. This is..."

His eyes bulged. "Holy feth. Nohemi, this is a breach point. A Vector Prime, a point where you could find your way outside the galaxy. I've never seen-"

Wordless, he displayed the relevant information.

 

[Jorus Merrill]

[member="Jaxton Ravos"]
"Aye, if it ain't them it's the Feds poking around. Bayan's close enough to -- well, feth, it's close enough to Styx, and I hear the Feds took up residence there after the Rebellion and I put paid to the Sith research facility there. Feds on one side, New Order on the other. Good thing we've got the Republic to soak up the attention. Though frankly, Jax, if the Republic came to our aid out here, I'd not be pleased to see the aftermath."

 

[Chloe Blake]

​

"Deal." Chloe would agree, lifting both brows with mild suggestion - no flirtation at all - and made herself comfortable. A soft breeze would send one lazy glass hornet her way, and she would give it a whimsical smile before turning her attention back to [member="Seydon of Arda"].

"A long time ago... In a galaxy far far away..." she began to say, before giving a pause, teeth nibbling her lower lip as she studied the man's expression before continuing, as if appraising his mettle.

"... There is a grove. A grove of small trees from which fruit of a most succulent nature would form. Partaking of such a rare fruit would grant increased wisdom and intelligence upon the elderly who ate it. The Tree of Wisdom, they'd call it... every much a myth as the Angels of Iego themselves."

 

[Jaxton Ravos]

[member="Jorus Merrill"]

Jaxton nodded a bit solemnly. "It's sad sometimes that the people with heart don't always have the head." He reasoned, trying not to go off on the tales of Matsu Ike or other's like her, but remaining somewhat positive. "Though, the way the Feds are now I think we could take them if they came knocking on our door. New Order too. We might not have the military or fleet presence that nations strive for, but I'd bet on my boys defending against damn near anybody." He said, with a conviction that amplified his confidence. The Levantines were for the most part a bunch of wanderers, but they knew what they could they could call Free, what they could call theirs, and he'd stake his life they'd all give theirs to protect it.

 

[Mother Arg'garok]

A snort and an oink would be the response. While the twi'lek would use her mind, the Gamorrean would use her strength. Moving items to and fro in the construction site, while dirt and grime began to develop over her plainsclothes, the Nun worked alongside @Ia'raklane Beorht.

Sweat would soon bead at her temples, but she would pay it no mind. Waddling to and fro, picking up large bags and refilling portions of permacrete for workers. If she could lend her strength, all the better.