Private The Midnight Horizon

[Damien Dooku]

ONDERON, THE INNER RIM
THEME & VIBES​

...THE MIDNIGHT HORIZON SPACEPORT​

A little bit of rest and relaxation never hurt anyone's soul. One of his mentors had pressed upon him the wisdom that even the most hardened spacer needed to take some time off and destress, rewire the brain and deflate and all that good stuff.

Damien had took this advice to heart, though admittedly it'd been a long time since his last vacation, if you would even call his current one that. It was his first venture this far close to the Coreward worlds since he left Coruscant in the first place, declaring he'd never be back on that planet for the rest of his life. That made it even more ironic knowing his intention was to head back to the planet he hated so much, breaking his promise, but fulfilling another one more important altogether.

Life on the rim was a difficult affair, after all.

That didn't stop him from living it to the fullest, or managing to get himself wrapped up into things that affected him right down to the, well, core. "Alright, alright Damien.." He rubbed the back of his head awkwardly with one hand, the other cradling a handful of snacks, drinks, and an overflowing bag bearing the Huttaburger logo. The Midnight Horizon was a spacer's paradise on Onderon, and a well-known place of respite for those looking to skirt the usual trade lanes leading in and out this side of the Rim. That made it Damien's preferred hub at times like these, as he was able to sit back and enjoy himself without the worry of bounty hunters, pissed-off syndicates, and whoever else the force tended to throw his way.

As such, it was an uneventful stroll through the wide-open streets of the massive open-air cavern that the spaceport was built into. He was even surprised to see children running around as if this wasn't a hive of scoundrels, despite the beautiful mirage the cleanliness and bright lights provided. A nearby beggar, hunched up against the wall of one of the more seedier establishments off the main street did catch his attention, but only so far as it was to throw the beggar a handful of credits.

Black Sun never skimped on their contracts, and so long as he kept not dying from their increasingly difficult jobs, he was sitting comfortably for the next several months at least. He waved a hand in return for the beggar's thanks, then continued about his stroll back to the landing docks holding his ship.

...AT LANDING DOCK 7​

It wasn't often that he came back to his being watched so closely, but seemingly not of the intent to steal it out of his hands. More than a handful had tried, with half of those being fried by R4 and the other half by himself. Damien cocked his head to the side, studying the back of the person's outline for the tell-tale signs of a hidden weapon on their person. His boots betrayed his approach, though he wasn't aiming for stealth or anything like that. The Spaceport, while still a hive of scum and villainy, maintained enough security to enforce its no-violence policy on its premises.

Damien came to a stop at the girl's right, both his hands cradling the mountain of supplies that would carry him over the week, and turned his gaze to meet her own, once her attention had been acquired. "Her name's Midnight." The hatch popped open abruptly as R4's attention stopped fixating on the stranger and over to him. "From what i've gathered this beaut' is about seven or eight centuries old, though it's had alot of work done in the past fifty." Damien tossed the assorted groceries into the secondary seat. He tossed the huttaburger bag on the hull, removed a burger for himself and leaned his back against the side casually.

Damien bit into the burger, tossing the wrapper into the back seat of the cockpit. The inside was pristine, despite the handful of old wrappers in the typically unused secondary seat.

"Oh– and she's not for sale." ​

Tansu Treicolt

 

[Tansu Treicolt]

​

Onderon was stunning. Pretty. Unlike anything she'd seen before. As soon as they'd touched down, she'd wandered about slack-jawed and entranced. If Onderon was this stunning, it was becoming harder and harder to imagine how Coruscant's alleged glimmering splendour could top it.

And for as gorgeous as Onderon was, there wasn't anything that mesmerized her more than the unignorable, sleek shape of a starfighter parked a few platforms up from where Dax's ship was. The three were all on bio breaks, respectively, fulfilling different needs. And right now, Tansu needed nothing more than to get closer to that ship that seemed shaped for legends.

"Noway." Was just a whoosh that sailed out, unthinking — much like the subsequent actions and quick kick-ball-chain pivot to the direction that led her to Platform 7's most beautiful patron.

She'd tried to be subtle, wandering, whistling, looking as uncaring as ever on approach, but it didn't really matter. Nobody was paying attention to her. People were too busy enjoying the atmosphere. There were arced bars everywhere, dispensers of delicacies, and other kinds of attractions that would get long-haul pilots to loosen up and spend their credits. So, in the last few meters, she gave into the inexorable pull with an eager skip to her step.

Right away, the ship — or, more accurately, the R4 snugly affixed to it — beeped angrily at her. Hands on her hips, she shook her head up at it.

"C'mooon buddy, I was just skipping; you think I'm gonna cause you trouble?" She ducked under the belly of the ship, even just to get out of the photoreceptor's range. The R4 continued to beep at her like a barely-threatening alarm. Her voice dipped to a grumble, "Who hurt you?"

Once her pass beneath the ship was complete, she rounded it again to the side and smoothed her hands along the paint job. That sent R4's persistent twills into a higher pitch, then lower.

"Pull in your horns, bud. I just washed my hands. Don't worry 'bout me."

It was antique even to the touch, but in the best way—the solid way—where craftsmanship meant something and the best materials were used. She recognized laminanium instantly. It was synonymous with the coveted X-02 Sabre class starfighters her parents flew.

And it was stunning. Even without the high-quality build, the paint job alone, all solid and charcoal black all over, with the darkened cockpit tint to match, was enough to pitch Tansu into an imaginary scene where she was inside, just drifting through the stars, unseen without any sort of stealth emitters and just…

"Oh! Jee!"

She hopped back involuntarily and clutched at her chest. She'd been so immersed in the imaginary world where this ship was something she was inside that she'd forgotten she was outside of it. And it was not hers.

Cool as anything, the presumed owner popped open the hatch, and Tansu was split between trying to assess the pilot and the steed. She went for the steed. It was easier. She was right embarrassed and bright flushed from being so easy to sneak up on and didn't want to make eye contact just for that reason while her composure was in scrambles.

"Midnight's a helluva cayuse."

Her nose scrunched, appalled at the casual tolerance of greasy wrappers on the too-pretty black leather.

"Centuries old? I thought so! It was either that, or a right accurate replica of one of those old Imp squints. The ETA-twos! And I don't think they make those much anymore. Rough for business since Kuat and Gee-Ay linked up. I'm assumin'. They're state-owned now right? Yeah, probably would be in bad taste to keep producin' replicas." The idea that this was hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years surviving brightened Tansu right up, and eviscerated that abashment she'd been nursing seconds ago. "But if she's hundreds of years old, she could be one of Vader's even. You think? Do you know?"

She gave no room for an answer, rambling and hopped up on the idea. She was so hopped up that she forwent the previous respectful distance she'd maintained (mostly because the ship was sealed shut) and leaned in to look at the cockpit. A low whistle was the only prelude to the next long-winded rush.

"Is this vintage too? It is! It's gotta be. Look at that paint job. Right out of the old Empire. Man, the hours yarned away talkin' about this stuff and look, it's right here. The symbolism's all maintained! Not faded one bit, which probably means this glasteel's tinted properly too, ain't it. Not like some of that new stuff that Kuat's been shipping out, where some pilots are even getting burned by solar rays. Isn't that insane? I know so many people say they don't make 'em like they used to but look at this." Her pointer extended to "Mini hyperdrive?"

This time, she let the question hang and turned to look eagerly for affirmation.

____________________________________________________________
Damien Dooku
____________________________________________________________
​

 

[Damien Dooku]

Damien remained planted firmly where he was, his back moderately in comfort against the back of Midnight, and the Huttaburger clutched in his hand.

Sheeeeesh.

He wanted to point out that she talked more than his mother did after a few glasses of wine, but he had a better chance in hell than getting a word in as the girl geeked out beyond his belief. His eyes followed her every move, not necessarily out of fear of her messing things up, but genuine curiosity at some of the things she was saying. Most of it was technobabble that proved far beyond his interests, but he knew enough about Midnight and what she was capable of to silently munch and nod.

But Vader? That one was new.

He paused mid-bite, an eyebrow raised up in genuine confusion at that revelation. His mother had never gave him all the full details of Midnight, but he knew it was his fathers, and that he'd flewn the living hell out of it for most of his life. Damien would even call himself a solid pilot too. The old JSF's were notoriously hard for most folks, and he'd survived his fair share of run-ins in space.

Another huttaburger down, but as he reached towards the bag for the third, an open question was directed his way. His hand continued for the burger, and he tossed it over to the girl without thinking about it. He'd regret that later, but chose to grab the fourth and last one out the bag before giving her an answer.

"Yep." He fiddled with the wrapper, balled it up and tossed it into the backseat with the rest of the wrappers. "I'm pretty sure it's custom made. I haven't looked much into her past, but I do know she's been worked on alteast twice."

Damien kicked off the side of the hull, walking up to Tansu as he took a bite out of the freshly-unwrapped huttaburger in his hand. His other hand extended into the cockpit, a finger pointing at the two logos on opposite ends of the dash.

"Locke & Key Mechanics, I think it says." The letters had begun to fade after all this time, but he pointed towards the slightly more visible date next to it. 864 ABY..

His finger swayed to the opposite end of the dash; The logo and year here were much more clearer, but this one he vocalized after swallowing down another bite. "Republic Engineering Corp– 875 ABY." He leaned against the cockpit, admiring how beautiful it all was for himself. Despite the modernization, the cockpit still felt like it belonged in another world, or another period of time altogether. Technically it did, but he couldn't figure out any other way of explaining the sensation while flying it.

He turned to look at Tansu once more, the previous sense of apathy now replaced by the beginnings of a smile. "How do you know so much about all this stuff, anyway?"

He paused for a moment.

"...And what the hell is a cayuse?"

Tansu Treicolt

 

[Tansu Treicolt]

​

Her hands peeled from the ledge of the cockpit just to snap up the wrapped treat. Yellow paper. Orange text. Big letters. HUTTABURGER.

Finally.

"Really?" She gasped, wide-eyed, and felt the goofy grin seep from cheek to cheek. "Thanks!"

The galaxy was turning out to be pretty cool. The scares from the parents days hadn't reared their ugly heads yet — it was only good tidings, one after the other. They shoulda left the farm years ago!

"I didn't know these were on Onderon!" She thumbed it open more carefully than the ship owner. Like a precious gem was inside, rather than a greasy burger.

"I've never had a Huttaburger before. Just heard about 'em." It smelled delicious. And for a few seconds, she was quiet enough just to enjoy the warmth and scent. Oniony. Cheesy.

She took her first bite and it was perfection. Oozy. Flavourful. Chewy. "Mm." Her knees nearly buckled. There was nothing like this back home. She hadn't finished the first bite before levelling a rating. Her mama would have been disappointed by her talking with her mouth full. "This is so good."

Talin Treicolt was going to be so jealous. Tansu made a mental note to ask where the nearest joint was so she could get one for her sister later.

Enamoured with eating the burger, she remained quiet enough to let the generous pilot walk through the years on the dashboard. She watched and chewed, nodding along when it sounded like it made sense. She'd heard of Republic Engineering Corps, but not so much of the other.

After a hearty swallow of a too-big bite, it was her turn to talk again.

"I grew up in a family of flyers. I think a yoke was in my hands instead of a rattle as a babe." She thumbed a blob of red from the corner of her mouth and absently rubbed it into the wrapper. "Not much else to do on Concord Dawn but learn about everything that happens off Concord Dawn y'know? Stories of the war years, yadda yadda."

Mimicking the way he rolled up the wrapper Tansu gloried in the grease. Until her lexicon was questioned.

"A what? Ooh, right, yeah I guess that's a Dawn thing. Like a uh…” she scrunched up her face. How do you describe something so plainly known? “Like .. a steed, or a ride. Like a starfighter. Which is an interestin' choice for a cayuse by the way. Cozy. But real fast, I reckon.

Did you get her all customized like this? Or is some of this you?

No wonder you don't wanna sell her. You must get asked all the time. Ch-eee, if I could I would. In a heartbeat. This is heirloom level stuff."

____________________________________________________________
Damien Dooku
____________________________________________________________
​

 

[Damien Dooku]

The confusion behind his eyes remained out of sight, but only for as long as it took her to veer off into further questions about the one thing the two of them had in common– Appreciating Midnight. Damien munched along with the stranger, occasionally glancing over to R4, who'd been particularly silent ever since he'd arrived back to the Landing pad. He squinted his eyes at the droid, who apparently mimicked the motion with the focusing lens on its camera in a gesture that could only be described as mocking his owner.

Damien rolled his eyes away from the droid, content to leave it alone as long as it did the same. The astromech really wasn't a fan of talking about its past, and that included every bit of information involving his father as well. This made it more of akin to a treasure hunt when it came to finding out new things about Midnight, but at least the droid never interfered whenever Damien did discover a new connection out of the blue.

Like the Vader one, which still hung on his mind, even as the extremely energetic blonde continued to lightspeed her way through every question under the sun.

At least he had a rough idea now of what a Cayuse supposedly was.

"You.. mean a horse?" He'd ask plainly, referring to the pretty huge creatures he'd seen folks use as mounts from time-to-time across the Rim. The question was followed up by two more and a statement of fact that he'd choose to ignore in favor of the continuing the conversation in hopefully a more linear direction.

...UNTIL THE PENDULUM SWINGS
​

A hand glided along Midnight's surface, the focusing lens of R4's singular lens following the gesture slowly. His eyes lowered shut, his breathing crawling to a sanguine pace as he focused solely upon the feeling of the cool metal beneath his skin. He could feel it; the history, the stories fabled from eras long past the current in which the two strangers occupied, and a legacy that somehow breached time and space, like one giant arrow on a collision course for this moment in the present.

There was a legacy behind Midnight that he felt connected to, more than anything else in this world, but so much of it had been locked behind the unknowns. He never felt it until now, though, and he didn't understand why it had come to him now unlike before. Was it this woman and her exposition dump of technobabble, or was it something else entirely?

Damien had only lost his connection to the force after he left the Core. Was.. that it? This was the closest he'd been back for ages, and ever since his run-in with his brother the sensation had almost felt like it'd returned.

His eyes opened up, Tansu Treicolt once more back in sight. She'd notice his hand pull back from the hull as if it were electrocuted, or he'd felt something crawling beneath it.

...THE FORCE LIVES IN DREAMS​

Damien recovered quickly from the gesture, balling up the remains of the huttaburger into its wrapper, then placing it in a compartment beneath the dash. "I've heard of Concord Dawn." He closed the glovebox, then hopped back out to right next to her. "Never been there, but my mom's always headin' out there every summer on vacation. I hear it's real nice, quiet, and backwater as all hell." Damien smirked.

He was a city kid through-and-through. Dusty towns like Mos Eisley and Espa were fine, but you'd have to play hell for him to willingly go live out in the sticks like that.

"I uhh, nah. I haven't done any work on her." He couldn't help but wonder just how a cute girl from Concord Dawn found her way this far southeast. "Couldn't afford it if I wanted to, and besides, I don't think I could ever greenlight the kind of mods my dad put into this thing." Midnight was more than capable of doing some serious damage, the kind you normally wouldn't associate with your average spacer.

She harkened back to a time when his father was busy soloing star destroyers and battlecruisers, or dogfighting hordes of Sith alongside his best friend, Ryv Karis. He wasn't sure how much of it was true considering it was all acquired under intoxication, but the weapons mounted on this thing were definitely no slouch.

There had been a third name associated with his dad and Ryv, but Damien couldn't remember who it was, and R4 was never in the mood to talk about those days for whatever reason. He mentally shrugged it off, then kept on with the sweet talking of his ship. "You wouldn't believe how she flies, either." A hand curved across the air, accompanied by whoosh'ing sounds for better effect. "I can hit the atmosphere in less than thirty seconds if I really gunned the engines to their max– and less than twenty with the 'burners on." He might also immediately get tracked by the Onderon authorities too, but that was only if they caught up to him. "She can hit angles that would put a vintage X-wing to shame, and especially those Gee-Ay knock-offs they keep releasing every five years."

 

[Tansu Treicolt]

​

Whatever was going on with R4 and Midnight's pilot, Tansu missed it. She was still ogling every stitch and bolt that made the ship as stunning as it was.

Plus, the droid had given her such a hard time when she first arrived that she wasn't keen on making eye contact and getting him started up again.

"Yeah a horse." That was the easiest way to understand it. Why hadn't she thought of that?

It wasn't abnormal for boys and their toys to be deeply connected. When the ship owner dragged his hands along the pain, it wasn't unlike how Tansu had been just minutes ago. But it was abnormal for a sudden pull away after a nearly dreamlike trance had overtaken said boy.

Tansu made a face.

"You okay? You doing some psychometry stuff on the fly?" She asked, and laughed it off as soon as it came out. The idea seemed ridiculous. Normally if someone was reading The Force's history, there needed to be more communication than just a wander and closed eyes.

"As aaallll hell." She agreed, and added quickly, "I have an aunt that does the same. Well not really an aunt. You know those long-time-family-friends that just get called family names?" Not considering the unlikelihood of two different people intentionally choosing a backwater planet as an annual vacation. She shrugged and shoved the huttaburger wrapper into the pocket of her oversized Vintage* leather jacket, decorated with patches from years past.

"Twenty seconds? From here?"

A wry grin.

"You're lying." She hoped he wasn't. "I'd love to see it."

And, just for good measure, she finally looked back at R4. Who was glaring into her soul through his photoreceptor.

"Your R4 unit seems a little staunch. He might keep you down to like..forty. Maybe even sixty. How much weight you packin' in there, little buddy?"

____________________________________________________________
Damien Dooku
____________________________________________________________
​

*Vintage in Tansu's perspective, a War Relic in Talin's.

 

[Damien Dooku]

Damien shook his head at the psychometry bit. "Nah, I just uhh.." He paused, considering how to phrase what had just happened. Luckily for them she laughed off the question and gave him the opportunity to segue from the topic entirely. He'd lost his connection to the force a long time ago, and he'd had no need of it to get by in his line of work– or so he thought.

Instead he'd fold his arms over his chest as listen as she went on about a similar situation involved an aunt who happened to not be related by blood, and found the corner of his lips creasing up into a smile as a result. He had a tendency to avoid Protectorate space as much as possible when it came to work. Shooting through beskar wasn't one of his favorite pastimes, and it made it notoriously difficult to get off their worlds in one piece, if at all, for those scoundrels brave enough to run the gauntlet.

His eyes focused upon the vintage bag hanging off her side, a number of the patches being recognized despite the stranger having little connection to himself. Damien figured her folks had once been part of the GA, which would explain how she knew so much about the JSF's, X-wings, and the technobabble that made up the specs of their starfighters.

His arms relaxed from across his chest as he leaned back over the edge of the cockpit, then grabbed the old huttaburger wrappers into the cradle that was his other arm. He tossed them all in the bag outside the hull, then leaped onto the wing with a single jump. Damien pivoting on the heel of his foot as fluid as water itself, coming to a kneeling position with a hand outstretched.

"The name's Damien." He nodded towards the front of the cockpit. "This might be the first and last time you ever get to see a tried-and-true battle-tested relic of the past."

R4 let out a series of binary that loosely asked Damien what in the world he was planning, but fell on deaf ears, or audio sensors or whatever it had going for him. He was a scoundrel-at-heart, with his eyes on the next star system and a mind for gambling and scheming his way through the underworld, that much nobody could deny.

"The front seat is all yours."

But as much of a bastard that he was, he still had his father's charm from time to time.


Tansu Treicolt

: peepoez :​

 

[Tansu Treicolt]

​

"Are you serious? Wait, if you're not, please forget I said anything. Do not answer that. Never look a gift cayuse in the mouth!" Now that he'd caught on to the terminology, she felt it appropriate to reinforce.

This was like a scene from a holofilm she'd watched as a kid, where a little street rat turned prince offered his hand to a princess and they took off on some magical tapestry. The concept of a flying carpet had been ridiculous, but the image still struck and dazzled Tansu while that fabled reality became her own.

Oooh, Talin was going to be SEETHING when Tansu told her what happened.

Absolutely beaming, Tansu took his hand.

"Tansu. X-Wing afficianado, but ETA-two appreciator."

She offset the hoist he provided by finding parts of the ship to offer ephemeral footholds, until she could comfortably slide into the coveted front seat. She couldn't help the girlish squeal that slipped out.

Her body was positively vibrating with excitement. The seat she was in could very well have been one that Darth Vader had sat in years ago. Or his men! Or hundreds of other butts through the year that tore through the skies in this incredible machine. For a few seconds, she was absolutely wide-eyed and silent, taking everything in. Then she dared to smooth her hands over the dashboard and the controls.

Until a thought struck her.

"Oh, oh oh oh, oh, okay, first, do you mind?" She pat around her jacket's massive pockets, searching for her communicator. She found it, and twisted around in the seat, holding the device out to Damien with pleading eyes. "Can you take a picture of me? My sister's never going to believe this if I don't have holopic evidence of the best day ever."

If he said yes, she'd sit as still as she possibly could and donned the toothiest grin anyone had ever seen. With two geeky thumbs up poking out the too-long sleeves of her jacket.

____________________________________________________________
Damien Dooku
____________________________________________________________
​

 

[Damien Dooku]

Damien couldn't help let out a laugh at the whole cayuse thing once more, but the currently wing-mounted droid was seething with rage at the idea of him letting some random girl give Midnight a test drive. Damien snapped a hard glare at the droid during one of the moments that she was occupied marveling at his starfighter, but the astromech refused to back down.

It threatened to shut down the entire thing until Damien completed, which only forced Damien's next card out of his hand in return. <"Ar-Four– Activate Master Code Ex-Five-Two-Two-Yoo-Seven-Nine."> He muttered into a wrist-based communicator. The droid went into a frenzy, somehow managing to string together the binary to deliver a number of flaming insults at the scoundrel before the flared lights on its hull all went dark.

The droid went to sleep, and Damien smirked as he turned back to a now attentive Tansu and reached out to take the communicator out of her hand. He took a few pictures, doing his best to gather a shot at enough angles to capture the whole of the cockpit in the background. "Well if your sister doesn't believe you, I guess that makes you the lucky one then, eh?"

He handed the communicator back to her, then kicked back in the secondary seat and did his best to get comfy. "My astromech is uhh– taking a nap for a manual software update. The sticks are yours whenever you're ready." With a nod of his head, he gave her the go ahead, and hoped she didn't kill him in the process.

Tansu Treicolt

 

[Tansu Treicolt]

​

Years around Buddy, their family BB8 unit, accustomed Tansu to the world of droidspeak. And all her suspicions of R4s apprehensions were validated by its vehement protests. It wasn't really her place to say or do anything about it though, so she focused instead on the luckiness of her afternoon so far.

"Great, thank you!" Tansu quickly checked the screen to approve the photos and found them more than satisfactory. For a few seconds, she debated sending them off to Talin right away, but felt selfishness broaden in her chest. She didn't really want to jinx this opportunity by trying to share it with her twin.

This was one of the first and only memories she'd have all on her own, and Talin would only learn about when Tansu told the story. The edges of that realization felt transformative.

Tansu shoved the feeling of selfishness away before it turned into something guiltier, and flashed a cheeky grin back at Damien while pocketing her comm. "Today's lucky for both of us, Dee. After this, I'll letcha get a selfie with the best pilot you'll ever meet." Her Concordian drawl somehow made the boast sound even more confident. This was an awful lot of trust Damien was handing her.

She almost ruined it by explaining that she didn't normally do this, get in ships with strange boys, but.. that hadn't proven exactly true since she left Concord Dawn. So she opted not to give into any feeling other than full-fledged conviction.

"M'kay, buckle up pardner. We're goin' for nineteen."

After that, she turned around and swapped her wide-brimmed hat for the headgear that would let the communicate with Midnight's shared channel, and connect them to Onderon's flight control.
She strapped herself in, then brought the systems up. All the monitors and indicators came up as expected. Admiring the deadly lines, she recognized that as complicated as the improvements might have been, the instrumentation was necessarily simplified and not dissimilar to the X-02 she'd grown up in.

<Weapons are green 'n go.> She recited, unable to keep the edge of girlish glee from her voice. <Navigation's green, and flight systens are grassy too.> She recited them for Damien's benefit and her own. The more familiarity she got with the system, the more her confidence grew.

She keyed the comm unit. <This is Midnight, LD- 7,> only then did she spare a glance at Damien over her left shoulder, waiting to be corrected. If he did, she'd feed through the right name. <Requesting clearance from Ibiz Traffic Control.>

A few beats passed. Tansu drummed her fingers eagerly around the yoke, vibrating with impatience.

<Midnight-One is clear for departure. You have ninety seconds, second in queue. Outbound vector Mark-25, Head-26.>

<Copy. Thank you, control. Have a real pleasant day.>

In response, Tansu entered in the outbound vector to the navigator and wrapped her hands around the interceptor's joystick, keeping her eyes on the one departing ship that was meant to burst out the hangar before them.

Once it cleared the skies, and was no longer in their flightpath and the trajectory was clear, the countdown queued on her sreen from control turned green and started at 75 seconds to clear.

But Damien had said it could clear the atmosphere in under thirty.

With a flick of a switch, she cut the repulsor lift generators and feathered the throttle so the fighter rose from the hangar deck and suspended, hovering, waiting to go. It took her a second to fight the inclination of her usual roll and yawing start.

60 seconds to clear.

She didn't want any doubt in Damien's mind that she was a steady strong hand on the controls. Barely, she resisted, and used the time instead to settle her heartbeat.

Ba-thump. Ba-thump. The anticipation was a tightness in her throat and in her hands and a thumping in her brain.

55 seconds to clear.

She couldn't wait any longer. She'd lose her mind. There was no moment when she'd be more ready than she was now. She pressed forward on the accelerator and instantly slammed back in her seat. The launching boom was enormous, even through the headgear and confines of the cockpit. It must have been deafening to those in the hangar itself.

Her grip tightened on the yoke and she shoved her heel deeper into the pedals.


"Start the timer nowww!

YEEEEEHAWWWWW!!"


____________________________________________________________
Damien Dooku
____________________________________________________________
​

 

[Damien Dooku]

VIBES​

The anticipation in the filtered cockpit air was palpable with every breath they took. He found himself regretting putting his droid on ice for a while, but it was too late to turn back now the sticks were in his hand. Damien let out the last bit of anxiety with a quiet, but heavy sigh, and strapped the seatbelt over his torso with an audible click from the old metal buckle. It was about the oldest thing in his starfighter, but much like her bag it had given him that good 'ol vintage appeal upon seeing it, and so he never replaced it as its age caught up to it.

Damien grew slowly to the idea of not dying as the count-down to takeoff approached ever so closer. She may have been a hick from Concord Dawn– but she was a cute one.

...LETS START OVER AGAIN, SHALL WE DAMIEN?​

She may have been a hick from Conrod Dawn, he repeated to himself, but she had an intuitive degree of control over what should've been an ultra sensitive set of controls .The take-off sequence had always been the worst, given how sensitive the bottom-facing and rear repuslor.vents were to the smallest activation. Ensuring the entire thing didn't just 360 onto its top and explode in a ball of fusion fire and smoke had taken him the whole of his later teens to figure out.

"Well shit." He leaned forwards a bit, watching her hands closely, taking in her performance like a school-kid aiming to cheat off his buddy's papers. "You're not half-bad, Tansu." Not better than him, of course, but good enough for the anxiety in his chest to not resume its course.

And before he knew it, the time they'd both been waiting for had arrived out of nowhere.

"Start the timer nowww!

​

Damien hit a button of his wrist-comm, activating its timer function manually in tandem with the drawled-out request.

YEEEEEHAWWWWW!!" ​

His back slammed against the much-less comfort secondary seat he was in, and his eyes popped open in a way that they'd never had before as the starfighter veered upward to the sky, the girl seriously intending to test the limits of the priceless treasure under her control. It was different seeing Midnight in action as a passenger, much more scarier too given his much-felt vulnerability. This strange little blonde had their lives in her hands, and he'd activated the master code that would keep R4 as dead as a doorknob for the next fifteen minutes.

"Just.. whatever you do–" He tried to call out, a hand reaching forwards to latch at the divider between their respective corners of the cockpit. "Don't hit the fethin' afterburners!" A radiant aura of red coalesced around the soaring Jedi Starfighter as it punched up towards the atmosphere with little regard to the planet's speed regulations. The last thing truly needed was a high-speed chase in space with this daredevil at the helm of his only source of travel around the galaxy.

Tansu Treicolt

 

[Tansu Treicolt]

​

Insane laughter filled the cockpit, smattered with whoops of joy. Backwater barbie was having the time of her life turning Onderon to a coloured blur. Had she ever gone this fast before?

Deafening yet soundless, the starfighter's overwhelming power made the outlander pilot hard-pressed to hear Damien's advice.

"Whatcha sayin'?" Tansu shouted back, barely able to hear him through the headgear she hadn't taken off yet.

His words came through intermittently. Selectively.

And too late.

There was no world in which Tansu considered not activating the afterburners.

Right from the get-go, Damien's story of Midnight's prowess had allured her with twenty-seconds to atmosphere promise. If she was gunning for nineteen seconds, she'd need the burners in about the next three heartbeats if her calculations were correct. Thrust output, vector and velocity data updated rapidly on the dashboard. Already the engine displays were showing full cells, hastily turning from cerulean stability to warning red. She'd have to offset the power with either reinforcements, or back off the throttle.

And Treicolts never backed off the throttle.

With only a beat to spare, the burners flared to life. Tansu shoved deeper into the pilot's seat. It moulded around her like an embrace to her reckless behaviour.

"Oopsie." came belatedly.

"You said hit them, right?" She sounded sickeningly, convincingly sweet about it. Even speaking through a firm jaw from the sheer force of the acceleration. It was impossible to do anything but bare her teeth.

Onderon's surface faded away. The blur of colours relegated to a streak of black with only a curious pair of red diamonds in the rear view.

____________________________________________________________
Damien Dooku
____________________________________________________________
​

 

[Damien Dooku]

"Whatcha sayin'?" Tansu shouted back, barely able to hear him through the headgear she hadn't taken off yet.​

"I said–" The words fell on daef ears. Literally.

Damien's confidence in his co-pilot had remained steady in spite of her rapid ascension towards the stars above. He had laid it down thick what she was capable of hitting to a woman that did not understand the definition of the words cool and chill. From the secondary seat the view outside would've been a brilliant thing to see, yet he could barely maintain the huttaburger in his stomach let alone enjoy the sights as Midnight's thrust vector reached its maximum crescendo.

Or so he thought.​

His back slammed against the seat as she did the opposite of what he said, and what he should've expected from the start. The rear of his precious Starfighter erupted in shades of blinding blue, the afterburners she carried being among the more powerful upgrades she had.

His lips rippled in erratic patterns, teeth clinched together as small droplets of water welled in the corner of his eyes. He was far from an inexperienced pilot, but even in the most difficult dogfights there had never been any need to reach the amount of speed the girl so readily desired to hit.

"Don't hit the fething afterbur–!!" Damien's words couldn't reach past his own ears, and it was too late to do anything but sit back and hope they survived the sky-high ascent.

Midnight punched through the atmosphere and into the void above finally. Damien stopped the timer on his watch and took a deep, anxiety-ridden breath.

"You said hit them, right?"​

"...No." He leaned against the divider, then glared at her with narrowed eyes. ",,,I said DON'T HIT THE FETHING AFTERBURNERS!" The rise in his voice was cathartic after what he'd just experience. Damien was not new to the wonderful world of misadventures, but this one was a unique experience that he truly would never forget.

He found himself almost wishing he was back on Korriban escaping from a horde of kitted-out gangsters, or dogfighting his way out of a trap laid by the Duskan Pirates on one of Serenno's moons. Anything was preferable to sitting shotgun while the pretty stranger actively attempts to incinerate you both – and your starship, more importantly – on a test drive through the atmosphere.

He sighed deeply, dragging a hand down his face before holding his arm out towards her. "...21 seconds." He figured the extra weight had cost them the extra second. On the bright side of things, at least the view outside the cockpit wasn't half bad. "Next time why don'tcha give me a warning before you decide to kill us both, yeah? It's one thing to go lightspeed across the planet– but a damn near straight shot up into orbit? You could've burned us into ash if Midnight wasn't coated properly!"

His protests were rudely interrupted by the intermittent warnings buzzing from the dash. Several fast-movers were in-bound on their location bearing IFF-beacons from Onderon's Port Authority.

"Sensational."




Tansu Treicolt ​

 

[Tansu Treicolt]

​

Tansu hadn't stopped laughing since the blue skies turned black.

"Oh, Dami—D-d- Damien—" his name was all broken sputters on giggles "I wish I could have seen your fa— WHAT?!" She seemed so jovial and then turned vehement, then pouty with the haste only teenage attitudes could shift.

"Twenty-one? Are you kidding me? All that and we're two seconds over the goal." She pulled off the headgear and twisted around in her seat to look at Damien pointedly.

"It was probably all the huttaburgers."

Once again, the shift in her expression was remarkably changed. From narrow, accusatory eyes to wide and bright in an instant. The stars around her dazzled her view, and she listened to what Damien had to say.

"Coulda." She agreed with a levity that suggested she didn't agree with his reaction. What he should have expected remained unsaid, and she only wordlessly communicated her sentiment with a roguish grin.

The same beeping drew her attention, and she rotated in the pilot seat again to squint at the dots.

Damien's mood dipped behind her. She could feel and hear it.

"Oh..? Is that..?"

____________________________________________________________
Damien Dooku
____________________________________________________________
​

 

[Damien Dooku]

"Oh..? Is that..?"
​

"Yeah."​

Damien sighed through the reply, but not before leaning over the cockpit divider and manually shutting off the warning alert preceding the incoming trio of Port Authority starfighters. "You kicked over the hornet's nest with a giant impervium-tipped boot with that amazing show you put on." Beneath the sarcasm tinged beneath every other word, the scoundrel was genuinely impressed by the display she'd put on. Midnight was one hell of a beast, to say the least, almost so much that he'd forgotten just how much power she was capable of drawing out.

Life on the 'rim called for flying her nice and easy considering she was also his main form of getting around the galaxy. The last thing he wanted was a burnt out engine that he couldn't afford to replace, or for something more important to break and those parts being too old to even find on the market. He could already see the credits he'd saved up for this trip to Coruscant going down the drain as a result of the tune-up he'd need after today.

A second light blinked on his dash, this one coming from the comms' board next to the sticks. "Click that for me." Damien pointed at the button, then reached to her left and grabbed the old-style headset mounted on her side of the divider. "Howdy there fellas." Damien spoke into the mic, doing his best to mimic a half-decent replica of what he thought Tansu sounded like. "Yall done nearly gave me and muh' friend a fright blazin' up from our rear like that, i'll tell ya!"

The response from the other end was business as usual, as expected, but Damien was burning time. <"Unidentified starfighter, You are hereby requested to follow us to Security Station FJ-09 at once to verify your starfighter's registration.">

"I'm sorry fellas–kzztt, y-yall hear tha-–kzzt, havin' trou–kzzt." Amidst the clearly faked disruption noises he clicked the end button on his headset and tossed it back up to the front. Around this time would normally be when Ar-Four would inform him their guns were being primed, so his message across to Tansu was pretty simple.

"Gun those engines again, afterburners and all, unless you're trying to spend the weekend in an Onderani lock-up!"

At least this time he could brace himself before his stomach's contents threatened to exit his mouth.

 

[Tansu Treicolt]

​

"But you admit, it wuz amazin'." Tansu smiled cockily, and scooched out of the way enough for Damien to do what he needed to do with the dashboard. The red blink-blink-blink of a warning light turned off at his gesture and the teen kept her eyes on the fast-approaching authorities.

"Yessir." She acknowledged the command and clicked the button her passenger indicated. He hoisted up the headgear she'd been wearing previously, when corresponding with traffic control, and spoke into the mic with a backwater drawl that sounded twangy and nasally. It took her a few seconds to realize what that meant, and once the comprehension clicked, she puffed out an indignant Hey! of protest.

<"Unidentified starfighter, You are hereby requested to follow us to Security Station FJ-09 at once to verify your starfighter's registration.">

Light eyes widened in horror. In silence, she shook her head fervently side-to-side. Force, oh Force! She couldn't go to jail. Her Ma and Pa would kill her. So would Aunty A! And Kyric. Oh, no, no, that would be so bad.

Gratefully, her impersonator had no intention of going belly-up and surrendering. In fact, he gave her the clearance to do the very thing he'd just scolded her for.

"Ah! Yay!" Squealed out and the little pilot settled back into the seat, still keeping an eye on the trajectory of the law enforcement ships. The red light Damien had clicked off earlier was back flashing intermittently again.

"Don't'cha worry, girl, nothin's gonna happen to you. We're gonna protect your driver, keep us outta jail." She whispered, smoothing a hand over the dashboard as if the ship were truly a cayuse on the range, being saddled up for the ride of its life.

"Hotter than blazes comin' up. You buckled in pardner? Not that the flappin' gums ain't cute, just wanna make sure you're back in one piece for when R4 wails about hell in a handbasket."

Damien scarcely had time to reply before Tansu readjusted the necessary calibrations, read the balances check green, and reignited the throttle. It pitched her deeper into the seat, and the joy from simply flying for speed before amplified into a newer shape of excitement. A real thrill — law evasion.

"S'like driving a getaway caaaarrrrr!" She yelled against the gravitational shift in the cockpit as the interceptor cut through the distance. Even without the afterburners, it left the law's silhouettes behind in a cut of soundless energy.

But with the afterburners? No chance.

"Holler port or starboard out any time!"

____________________________________________________________
Damien Dooku
____________________________________________________________
​