Dominion The Orphaned World [Planetary Expedition Open to all ] [ DIA Dominion of Kiev'ara]

[Laphisto]

MISSION OVERVIEW ​

There are dead worlds in the galaxyruins, husks, and relics of wars long passed. But Kiev’ara is something else. It was not lost to time, or consumed by conquest. It was severed violently and absolutely cast into the dark like a forgotten god’s wound. Once, Kiev’ara was a radiant jewel in the Unknown Regions. It was the sacred home of the Kiev’arian Dragons, an ancient people born not just attuned to the Force, but woven into its very fabric. Each Kiev’arian lived in relative harmony with thier world. shaped by sacred trials and bound in reverence to the twin gods: Dra’ko, deity of life and creation, and Saurav’ix, god of death and war. Their civilization thrived through honor, unity, and a connection to the Living Force so pure it made their world sing.

Then came the Rakatan Infinite Empire. In 30,000 BBY, the Rakata descended with chains instead of ambassadors, intent on harvesting Kiev’ara’s people as living batteries for their dark technology. But the Kiev’arians refused to be broken. And so, the Rakata chose annihilation. They turned the Star Forge upon the system and consumed Kiev’ara’s sun. The world died in an instant. Its atmosphere was stripped away. Forests froze mid-bloom. Oceans cracked and lifted into the void. Cities collapsed under the pressure of silence. The Force itself recoiled.

Kiev’ara didn’t just perish—it vanished from the galactic memory. A Force-dead scar, drifting unmoored through the cold. For thousands of years, no one saw it. No one named it. No one knew it remained. Except Laphisto. He did not find Kiev’ara. It found him. He awoke from sleep with no dream and no voice, just an aching silence that sat heavy in his chest. A stillness he hadn’t felt in millennia. And then, a pressure. Not pain but recognition. The echo of something ancient stirring in his bones.

He saw a sky swallowed by ash. A capital frozen in place. Halls without breath, but not without presence. And deep within that cold vision, he knew—without being told—what he was seeing. It wasn’t a vision from the Force. It was older. Deeper It was Kiev’ara. He remembered it not as a place, but as a part of himself As if its name had been carved into his marrow from birth.

No sensors detected the rogue planet drifting near the Atrivis Fringe. No records matched its trajectory. But Laphisto spoke its name before any scan confirmed it. The Diarchy has since authorized a limited deployment under his command—to assess the anomaly, recover what can be found, and investigate the strange readings emanating from the ruins. But this is not conquest It is not even salvage. This is a return Kiev’ara is not a corpse. It is not silent. It is waiting. And it may not welcome the living. After receiving permission from Diarch Reign and Diarch Rellik Laphisto sent an open invitation to the galaxies scholars, scientists, explorers, and corporations

---

Objective IA – Forward Echo: Establishing the Ice Line

Overview:

The expedition's first task is clear: establish a secure Forward Operating Base (FOB) on the surface of Kiev’ara. The chosen location lies on the outskirts of the ancient capital, Elda’mir, a once-glorious city of marble spires, elemental crystal towers, and carved mountainsides that spoke with light and song. Today, the city is still but not buried.

Its upper structures remain partially exposed, jutting from the frost like the skeletal remains of a great beast. Towering statues, cracked domes, and stone causeways are blanketed in ash and frozen soot, remnants of the moment the world died. The wind carries no sound. The snow does not fall. The silence is complete but not comforting.

The terrain is broken and uneven. Ancient buildings tilt at unnatural angles, twisted by time and shifting gravitational anomalies. Black ice clings to staircases and plazas. Burned banners ripple in windless air. Between these structures, lying as if frozen mid-flight or mid-charge, are the bodies of Kiev’arian warriors and civilians preserved perfectly in death, flash-frozen in the instant the atmosphere was stripped away.

Each corpse bears a Fire Tear embedded in the chest cavity, just beneath the sternum a brilliant soul-crystal, glowing faintly even after thousands of years. No two shine alike. No two are cracked from the same stone. They pulse like they are still alive. The FOB will be built among them. as its the safest and closest place to the Capital

---

Mission Objectives:

• Establish the Perimeter: Deploy modular shield barriers and environmental shelters. The terrain must be cleared of debris, unstable ice, and loose ash before foundations can hold. Motion detectors must be placed to compensate for the lack of atmospheric movement.
  
  
• Excavation & Mapping: Identify structurally sound ruins to repurpose as storage, medical, or research facilities. Unearth possible stairwells, tunnels, or forge conduits leading beneath the city. Engineers must determine what’s safe to approach—some statues and buildings are humming with residual energy.
  
  
• Relay Setup & Uplink Calibration: Because the planet’s interference disrupts standard communication, deploy three hardline relays at pre-marked grid points. Atmospheric scans suggest a window of stable transmission every 72 minutes—timing is critical.
  
  
• Fire Tear Documentation: A specialized team is tasked with scanning the Kiev’arian remains. Do not remove the Fire Tears. Doing so has already triggered strange static feedback through relay uplinks. One engineer reported “hearing” a voice when standing near a particularly intact warrior—despite the planet’s lack of atmosphere

---

Environmental Threats & Anomalies:

• Gravitational Ripples: Elda’mir’s outer district has minor but unpredictable gravity distortion zones. Equipment may misfire or go dead. Some dropships have reported drifting mid-hover during descent. Ground teams are advised to keep magnetic tethers engaged at all times.
  
  
• Frozen Guardians: Some preserved Kiev’arians appear posed defensively—swords half-raised, jaws open in a final war cry. Despite the age of the bodies, almost like frozen stone. Some soldiers believe the bodies shift between patrols—but sensors say otherwise.
  
  
• Crystal Resonance Pulses: At irregular intervals, the Fire Tears across the field pulse in unison. It’s brief—less than two seconds—but measurable. Each time it happens, machinery resets. Static bleeds into comms. Some report “ghost diagnostics” activating strange text on inactive screens.
  
  
• Whispers in the Ash: Ash sometimes lifts without breeze. Sensor readings drop briefly. Audio feedback has included unknown chants, low harmonics, and what might be heartbeat rhythms synced with the Fire Tears.
  
  
• Cut off from the force: the planet seems to silence the force of anyone who stands directly on its surface, but strangely, the moment you step onto a starship or into a building, the force returns. Exposure to the Planet's surface for too long has adverse effects

---

Objective II – Fixing the Void: Charting the Hyperspace Spine

“A forgotten world is only as useful as the road that leads to it.”

---

Overview:

Kiev’ara is a rogue planet—dislodged from its original orbit after its sun was consumed, left adrift in deep space for over thirty thousand years. Without a central star or gravitational anchor, it moves unpredictably along a cold and silent trajectory in the Atrivis Fringe, far from any major trade lane. Its sudden reappearance following the Planeshipt Event has made it accessible—but not reliably so.

Currently, all access to the planet is dependent on short-range manual jumps, escorted by pathfinder vessels using real-time drift corrections. These are dangerous, fuel-intensive, and unsustainable. A long-term presence on Kiev’ara cannot be maintained unless a dedicated hyperspace route can be established and stabilized.

That process begins now.

---

Primary Objectives:

• Establish Orbital Navigational Relays: Satellites must be deployed in high orbit around Kiev’ara to act as synchronized beacons. These relays will allow for precise triangulation of the planet’s drift trajectory and future jump-point predictions.
  
  
• Anchor a Gravitational Stabilizer Array: Without a host star, Kiev’ara’s gravitational signature is erratic. Engineering crews must assemble a stabilizer network to broadcast artificial mass-shadow readings, tricking navicomputers into recognizing it as a “fixed” system.
  
  
• Recover Ancient Star Charts (Optional): Fragments of pre-cataclysmic Kiev’arian stellar maps may exist within the Hollow Spire, an ancient observatory buried beneath ice. These maps may contain forgotten hyperlanes or original system alignment data that can assist in routing.
  
  
• Calibrate Jump Coordinates: Once the relay grid is functional, teams must test hyperspace entry and exit with a series of drone jumps, followed by manned runs. Each success brings Kiev’ara one step closer to true accessibility.

---

Environmental & Technical Challenges:

• Interference from Local Anomalies: Gravity pockets near the planet’s outer shell distort beacon alignment. Multiple calibration passes will be required to keep nav-data stable.
  
  
• Residual Static from the Force-Dead Zone: Kiev’ara’s unnatural severance from the Force emits low-grade electromagnetic pulses that can interfere with jump calculations. Standard hyperspace navigation software may require modification.
  
  
• Frozen Debris Fields: As the planet drifts, it pulls fragments of destroyed satellites, rock, and starship wreckage behind it like a shadow. Navigating through this debris will require precision and coordination between spotters and navigators.
  
  
• Temporal Drift: Early test jumps have returned inconsistent timestamp data, suggesting a minor temporal dilation effect when approaching Kiev’ara at high speed. Long-term exposure risks are unknown.

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Disclaimer - dont worry about turn order. this thread will be free flowing with a GM/ main response coming every 3 days, those on seperate/ solo objectives are free to reply when a GM response is given

 

[Laphisto]

Laphisto sat hunched in the loading bay of the shuttle, one of the first dropships cleared to make planetfall. The hum of the engines reverberated through the hull, but he barely registered it. He was locked in his own private hell. His hands were clenched into trembling fists, knuckles pale beneath the mottled hues of his earth-toned scales. Every muscle in his body was drawn taut, trembling with suppressed agony.

He growled through gritted teeth, the sound low and guttural feral. His jaw ached from the constant tension. Pain tore through him in relentless waves, rolling beneath his skin like magma looking for a fault line to erupt through. The strange affliction one that had haunted him for weeks now had turned rabid, as if something had finally awakened. And whatever it was, it was no longer willing to be dormant.

Veins along his neck blazed with a vivid green glow, like fire trapped beneath glass. It slithered up his throat and jaw in erratic, pulsing tendrils, crawling toward his temples and cheekbones with every beat of his racing heart. It didn't simply glow anymore—it throbbed with sentient urgency, pulsing like a second heartbeat trying to overpower his own. The nearer the shuttle drew to the planet, the more the glow intensified—burning, scorching, as though the very gravity of the world below was dragging whatever plagued him closer to the surface.

He could feel it in his bones no, beneath them as if his marrow was liquefying, turning molten with each breath. His muscles twitched violently, spasms rippling along his thighs and arms. Every nerve ending screamed. The fire inside wasn't content to remain buried—it wanted out. It wanted air. It wanted release.

He had no words for what this was. No diagnosis, no spell or curse he could name. Just a constant, rising sensation that something ancient, something primal, was clawing its way free. Every inch of him burned. Not like fever. Not like illness. Like he was being forged melted and reforged from within and the furnace had reached a point of no return.

He winced as the shuttle hit a pocket of turbulence, the jolt sending a fresh lance of agony through his spine. He bit down hard to stifle a cry, and a thin rivulet of blood trickled from the corner of his mouth. His limbs convulsed in rhythm with the erratic pulses of the green fire fingers curling and uncurling, claws dragging grooves into the metal seat beneath him. The air in the bay felt thin, too thin, as if the walls were closing in. And then the voice.

It wasn't audible. It was etched into the fabric of his thoughts, an ancient will pressed like a brand against his consciousness. It didn't speak in words, didn't reason or plead. It commanded. With the certainty of a falling star, it pulled at him like a tide, demanding he make contact with the world below. His heart thundered in his chest, not from fear, but from the overwhelming need to obey.

He clenched his jaw harder, the muscles in his neck bulging. Another voice his own whispered the truth he was trying to ignore: he wanted it too. Desperately. Whatever was beneath that surface, whatever called to him, it belonged to him. Or perhaps he belonged to it. The line was beginning to blur.

His eyes normally sharp and calculating had gone wild. Dilated pupils. Flickers of green flickering in their depths like a reflection from a distant flame. He glanced toward the sealed ramp, breathing heavily. Part of him wanted to unbuckle, rush the airlock, and tear it open with his bare claws—expose himself to the void, just to fall to the planet and end this torment. The impulse was nearly overwhelming.

But another part, the disciplined part, held on by a thread. He couldn't risk it. Not here. Not now. The planet below had no atmosphere. If he acted, he'd kill everyone aboard the shuttle. The scientists seated behind him had no idea what was happening—some of them were laughing, chatting nervously about mineral scans and geologic surveys. He couldn't endanger them. Not for his own madness.

So he remained strapped into the crash seat, sweat dripping from his brow, every breath a shallow gasp. His claws dug into the armrests, scoring the durasteel with grooves. He was holding himself together by sheer force of will restraining not just his body, but something else, something alien, writhing in his blood like a caged god. Each gasp of breath was a battle. Each second a test. Bound to his seat, Laphisto writhed in silence, doing everything he could not to rip himself free and obey the unbearable call surging in his blood. Seconds stretched into eternities. His body ached to move, to escape, to run. But there was nowhere to go. Nothing to do but endure. For now.

 

[Saga Merrill]

Establish Orbital Navigational Relays: Satellites must be deployed in high orbit around Kiev’ara to act as synchronized beacons. These relays will allow for precise triangulation of the planet’s drift trajectory and future jump-point predictions.

I have deployed 10,490 navigational beacons since I became self-aware.

This is easily one of the most abnormal worlds where I've done so. Mapping probe data and communications suggest a cataclysm of a type that matches no records available to me.

Once Baobab Astrography completes its portion of the navigational plotting and route safety testing, I look forward to teasing out that particular mystery.

KA-CHUNK.

I have deployed 10,491 navigational beacons since I became self-aware.

 

[Merion Oreno]

Residual Static from the Force-Dead Zone: Kiev’ara’s unnatural severance from the Force emits low-grade electromagnetic pulses that can interfere with jump calculations. Standard hyperspace navigation software may require modification.

How fortunate, then, that the Cult of the Central Isopter cultivated the ability to seek out sites of past, present, and future destruction.

A Central Isopter Observatory - fundamentally a small asteroid city with many viewing galleries - plopped itself confidently in Kiev'ara orbit, having navigated past just such distortions. Under his cult robes, Merion was sweating furiously. He'd learned instinctive astrogation from his childhood tutors in a basic way, of course, but the Central Isopter approach was more demanding, audacious, real. He'd even had the honour of taking the lead on this one. He had a knack.

He unstrapped himself from the nav chair and wobbled over to the nearest disaster-viewing gallery, where fellow cultists in identical helmets and robes were already marveling at the extreme deadness of this world. They had no particular interest in the Diarchy's interest in Kiev'ara, as Merion understood it, but he'd made and taken some calls and the Observatory would be contributing to the general collection of nav data in return for standard compensation. Even death cultists needed to eat, mostly.

 

[Zinayn]

Zinayn gritted his teeth as the shuttle bumped and shook upon entry. His body pushed against the crash webbing, threatening to break it and send him tumbling across the passenger bay. Entries usually weren't this bad. He was probably imagining it...but with this weird world, anything could be real. A scraping sound was heard in the bay, just barely audible over the lighthearted chatter of the scientists. His crimson gaze flicked to Laphisto . He was facing away from the Chiss, but any minimally Force sensitive being could have sensed the incredible turmoil and emotional distress within the dragon. Zinayn could partially relate. While all his people might not have been completely wiped out, his world had been utterly annihilated. Though he wasn't sure if having his planet destroyed was better than having your world left intact, just without any life.

Any Force user that was even slightly aligned with the light side would have used their presence in the Force to project feelings of comfort and security to the troubled dragon. But Zinayn, being emotionally unintelligent, instead drew his presence in the Force back into himself, not wanting to be affected by Laphisto's struggle (or possibly make it worse). His eyes couldn't help but see the scratch marks in the armrests, and the neck veins glowing intensely. Zinayn uncharacteristically shifted in his seat, uncomfortable.

Laphisto looked like he was about to go berserk.

 

[Derron Daks]

DDSI Exploratory Fleet
Embarked upon the Umbra
On approach to Rogue Planet Kiev'ara
______________________________________________________

​

Commander Xander sat in his chair as the Umbra came out of hyperspace, a jump enabled by a well-placed hyperspace beacon.

The Umbra was a type of shield ship. designed for the study of pulsars, singularities, and other high-energy environments. As a shield-ship, it had docking facilities behind its huge mushroom-shaped prow, allowing it to carry and protect the entire fleet of research frigates.

Today, the complete assets of Dynamic Discoveries and Scientific Initiatives was deployed to a single contract. Normally, one frigate would perform this duty, but someone in the Diarchy had wanted this world examined quickly and thoroughly. DDSI wasn't even the solitary group conducting this exploration. They were one element of many.

Pulling the physical hardline from the arm-rest, the Commander inserted it into his dataport, and let the ship's systems flow information into his consciousness.

Once he was satisfied about the ship's system status, as reported by the crew jacked into each of their own system consoles, he sent a transmission to the other ships of the fleet.

"Jump Complete. All ships cleared to undock on their assigned vectors. Fleet Command being transferred to the Insight as of... now."

__________________________________________

DDSI Insight - Corporate Flagship

_______________________________________________________

​

Derron Daks' face was impassive as he processed the signal to undock. He might as well have been painting a fence as beginning one of the most intriguing scientific examinations of his career.

The Insight-class exploratory frigates of his fleet began to spread out, taking orbital positions around the rogue planetoid which was the subject of their mission. It was rare to receive enough credits to task his entire fleet on a single assignment. But Derron understood why such a priority had been placed upon this planetary survey. Already, the sensors were collecting a plethora of information about energetic anomalies nestled among ancient ruins on the planet's surface.

If he had been prone to strong emotion, he would have been grinning.

"All frigates, deploy dropships and create basecamps according to the following grid..." He transmitted the locations deemed most promising. Twenty-eight locations scattered across the surface of the world. "Commander Simmerlin, you have the bridge. I'll be taking command of investigation group number three. Notify our employers that DDSI has arrived, and are deploying onto the scene."

With that, he got up and nodded to the Commander before turning towards the lift at the rear of the bridge.

As he departed towards the hangar bay, he could almost be seen to smile.




Zinayn Merion Oreno Saga Merrill Laphisto

 

[Diarch Rellik]

Objective IA – Forward Echo: Establishing the Ice Line​

Rellik stood within the shuttle with his fellow High-Councilor Laphisto. As the main crew and his compatriots sat in the loading bay, Rellik was in the cockpit to the pilots chagrin. The obscure and relentless nature of the planet was ensuring this landing was one for the ages. Under better times he would surely make light of the situation and help those aboard with jokes to ease the worry about crash landings. Yet now was not the time. This matter had meant a lot to his friend and Rellik was doing everything in his power to help ensure it was handled appropriately. For his part - beyond scaring the pilot with the Ruler of the sector being over his shoulder as he struggled - Rellik was communicating with the various corporate entities who were here to study the world. Ensuring stability and promises of credits were to be fulfilled.

With most of his work done, he went back to the cargo hold. His warriors senses began flaring, the itch on the back of his head and the aching of his scars that screamed WARING - prompted him to halt in his tracks. He gauged the room quickly to see most inside were handling the turbulence well. Yet his eyes fell on Zinayn first. He seemed distraught and concerned. As Rellik continued looking around he soon learned why.

Laphisto was a ball of tension and energy. His claws slowly ripping into the chair beneath him, moving in tandem with his labored breaths. Rellik began to move forward - attempting to put a calming energy into the force to help his friend. As he was walking to Laphisto though he took one more glance at Zinayn and realized surely, his closer friend and confidant would have done the same. Perhaps he wanted to be left alone.

Walking over to the Chiss, Rellik would sit next to him.

"Have you ever seen Laphisto this way before?" The Diarch did his best with his tone and posture to ensure Zinayn knew he was coming from a place of caring and not judgement. "If things get to bad and he falls to some form of illness, I want you to give him this for me." Rellik would hand over a vile of Crimson Elixir. A specialty made healing potion from Lyssara Thrynn and Nyva Shei

As the two sat and conversed for a moment, Rellik finally popped the question that lingered on his mind. "How much of the history of Laphistos race do you know? There might be something powerful here. Something deep, like a Force Nexus or ancient engine/machine. Something that could be hurting our friend. Together, we will help him and fix this." He would give a comforting smile as the two focused on what to do for their friend.

Tags: Zinayn Laphisto

 

[Saga Merrill]

The Insight-class exploratory frigates of his fleet began to spread out, taking orbital positions around the rogue planetoid which was the subject of their mission.

"All frigates, deploy dropships and create basecamps according to the following grid..."

Rellik was communicating with the various corporate entities who were here to study the world. Ensuring stability and promises of credits were to be fulfilled.

DDSI was a known professional outfit. There wasn't really such a thing as professional rivalry in the exploration business - the galaxy was far, far, far too large for friction beyond the incidental - but Baobab Astrography's sixty-odd years of files had flagged credible DDSI operations more than once, lately in particular. The scale of the deployment was of interest too. Baobab had sent one two-hundred-metre ship for this job; DDSI had sent its operating fleet or a good chunk of it. An impressive show of resources and coordination, to say nothing of that innovative and gargantuan shieldship.

Saga deployed the next nav beacon and decided to say hello.

"This is the Baobab Astrography ship City of Nar Shaddaa to the DDSI flagship Umbra. Welcome to Kiev'ara."

The Baobab ship had a massive, unique hyperspace lighthouse beacon blazing, very hard to miss even from light-years away; they'd have noticed him before now, relatively small as his ship was.

 

[Merion Oreno]

Anchor a Gravitational Stabilizer Array: Without a host star, Kiev’ara’s gravitational signature is erratic. Engineering crews must assemble a stabilizer network to broadcast artificial mass-shadow readings, tricking navicomputers into recognizing it as a “fixed” system.

The Cult of the Central Isopter had taken on this task. As death cultists, they had an affinity for mass shadow generators to a degree that the cult elders were more than happy to explain to Merion.

The challenge here — and this was hotly contested, had been the whole way here — was whether to sabotage the mass shadow technology on the slim chance it could rip the world apart a la Malachor.

For the moment, the 'this planet is a perfect vista of destruction already, don't mess with it' faction was carrying the day, to Merion's mingled relief and disappointment. The stabilizer network was coming together.

 

[Derron Daks]

Holocomm transmission from the DDSI Umbra
__________________________________________________________________

​

"This is Commander Xander of the Umbra," came the reply across the hyperwave. Xander was a human hybrid, in his thirties or early forties. He wore the same Orange uniform common to all DDSI personnel. "We read you, City of Nar Shada. I understand we owe Baobab Astrogaphy a debt in establishing an easily navigable hyperspace beacon here."

DDSI did its fair share of hyperspace scouting, but it had shaved days of time off of their response to have the beacon already laid out for them. The efficiency of Baobab was not to be scorned.

"I wonder, do you have any sensors pointed at the surface below? We're picking up odd energy readings among the ruins, and would enjoy corroboration from a sensor suite of differing manufacture than our own."

Any sensor suite could have peculiarities unique to its manufacture, regardless of its quality. Cross-checking with a completely different sensor array would allow Xander to cancel out any aberrations and ensure he had a perfect signal.

Then he would be left to explain the bizarre energy waves coming off of the planet. But that's what they were here for, after all.

________________________________________

Meanwhile, on Objective I, Forward Echo...

​

The massive 'Crab' carryall descended through a clouded sky illuminated by no star, but rather by innumerable tiny electrical discharges in the upper atmosphere. Sensors showed that the high-particulate laden atmosphere experienced enough friction from dust motes to create a roiling electrical discharge layer. It didn't form lightning, exactly, but merely a dim gray glow. If anything, it made the landscape seem more foreboding than complete darkness would have.

The carryall dropped off the TREV-1 exploration rover first, then set down beside it. The side ramp opened, and DDSI personnel began to unload scientific equipment and supplies necessary to establish a base-camp. Each of them were dressed in the bright orange suits that marked out DDSI personnel in any company.

Derron Daks came down the ramp as well, surveying the ground before looking off at the nearby ruins.

If he were a man prone to poetry, he might have said that the ruins were whispering their secrets to him. Secrets of a forgotten age, and a forgotten people.

But he was not prone to poetry, of course. So he checked his suit's wrist-datapad and began recording everything his suit sensors told him about the place.

​

Zinayn Merion Oreno Saga Merrill Laphisto Diarch Rellik

 

[Saga Merrill]

"This is Commander Xander of the Umbra," came the reply across the hyperwave. Xander was a human hybrid, in his thirties or early forties. He wore the same Orange uniform common to all DDSI personnel. "We read you, City of Nar Shada. I understand we owe Baobab Astrogaphy a debt in establishing an easily navigable hyperspace beacon here."


"I wonder, do you have any sensors pointed at the surface below? We're picking up odd energy readings among the ruins, and would enjoy corroboration from a sensor suite of differing manufacture than our own."

"Good to meet you, Commander, and I'm gratified that the lighthouse beacon has been valuable. My name is Saga Merrill; I'm Baobab's proprietor." Or had been for the months since Captain Jorus Merrill, Saga's builder and Baobab's creator, had died in combat. They hadn't been close by the end, but that was just family challenges, and these were just family regrets. Normal, so far as Saga's research suggested.

"This ship's sensor suite is optimized for interstellar mapping, not planetary scans, but I can certainly take a look at whatever coordinates you send over. I've almost finished deploying the orbital navigational relays and will have time to spare."

 

[Laphisto]

Laphisto continued to breathe heavily, each gasp strained and uneven. A few spasms rippled through his limbs, his taloned hands gripping tight as they shredded deeper into the seat’s ruined upholstery. His claws had already carved through the padding, but the pain surging through his body drowned out everything else.

Reaching to his belt, he fumbled with shaky fingers and snapped the oxygen mask into place over his snout. It was meant to help him breathe on the planet’s surface now he used it just to survive the descent. Cold, recycled air hissed through the filter, but it did nothing to cool the fire raging through his veins. He could feel it. They were close. So close.

And the planet… it was calling to him Not whispering. Not luring.Screaming. The closer they came, the louder it became—like something buried in the land itself was clawing at his soul. It howled inside his head, pulled at his bones, roared in his blood. He was up and moving before the landing gear touched down, taloned feet dragging against the shuttle’s metal floor as he stumbled forward. His breath came in harsh, rasping bursts through the mask.

Around him, personnel readied their equipment, checking gear, speaking in calm, practiced tones. He didn’t hear them. Didn’t see them. His eyes were fixed ahead on the sealed loading ramp and the world that waited just beyond it. He approached the door with a staggered, urgent pace, one hand hovering over the release panel. It trembled violently, his fingers twitching with restraint. He needed to be out there. On the surface. Now.

He winced and shook his head sharply, growling low in his throat. Why am I like this? What is this pain—this need to tear through steel and be one with the land? He didn’t know. Couldn’t explain it. And he wasn’t sure he even cared anymore.

His body hunched forward slightly, eyes locked ahead—and the moment the indicator light flicked green, his hand slammed down on the panel. The ramp groaned as it began to lower, slow and mechanical. Too slow. Laphisto snarled, thrust out his hand, and let the Force explode from his palm. The loading ramp slammed open with a thunderous crash, the shuttle lurching slightly as the platform struck the ground.

He walked down it without hesitation, breath ragged in his mask, claws clicking across metal and then crunching into the brittle crust of ash and dirt below. The planet’s surface greeted him like a long-lost memory—choked in layers of dust, dry soil, and dead air. The ruins of a once-great Kiev’arian city stretched out before him, bones of towers rising from the graveyard of history, monuments collapsed and half-buried beneath the weight of time. And then—he saw them. Corpses. Thousands of them.

Kiev’arians, petrified or decayed, scattered across the dead landscape like echoes of a final war. Some were slumped and skeletal, long dead before the planet itself was extinguished. Others looked nearly untouched—frozen in the exact moment life had been ripped from them. Warriors locked in their last breath, weapons still raised, jaws agape in silent screams or battle cries. A battlefield sealed in time, a final breath suspended in stillness.

And in all of thier chest cavities, something pulsed.even the petrified ones Faint lights red, white, green, and blue glowing softly from within their ribs. Each one beat in time with the burning rhythm inside him, like a thousand dying hearts echoing his own. Then he stepped onto the surface.His feet sank slightly into the ashen soil, and the world stopped. He gasped. The light in his veins went out. The pulsing glows in the corpses vanished. The screaming inside his head fell silent.

No more fire. No more pressure. Just… stillness. Laphisto stood frozen, staring into the ruins that stretched out around him. The broken skyline. The silent battlefield. The dust shifting in the dead wind.And in that moment of silence, barely audible through the mask, he whispered: “I… I can see.”

---

GM RESPONSE FOR OBJECTIVE 2​

The moment Laphisto's taloned foot touched the surface of Kiev'ara, the world reacted. It did not breathe there was no atmosphere. It did not scream there was no wind. But something ancient beneath the ash and stone remembered its pain. From far below the planet's dead crust, a sudden gravitational pulse surged upward a reflex not of science, but of memory. It tore through petrified roots, fossilized ruins, and blackened bedrock before breaching the exosphere in a silent eruption. Though soundless in the void, its presence was undeniable.

In orbit, the Umbra's hull was the first to feel it. The shield-ship's reinforced prow trembled under the wave's impact, vibrations echoing across its hardened structure like a struck bell. Bridge lights flickered as inertial dampeners reeled from the stress. The gravitational distortion rippled through the ship's decks, sending subtle distortions through its docking arms and internal stabilizers. Smaller frigates following in its wake lurched under the sudden shift some rotating off-course, their flight paths thrown into chaos for several critical seconds. Dropships en route to the surface shuddered mid-descent. Turbulence wasn't possible in an airless world yet their vectoring systems fought to compensate for an invisible pressure that seemed to press back against their trajectory.

Elsewhere in orbit, the City of Nar Shaddaa bore witness to the anomaly. The Baobab Astrography ship's vast hyperspace beacon lit up like a dying star, flooding its systems with raw, cascading feedback. Several navigational relays—meticulously positioned in Kiev'ara's orbital shell—spun wildly out of sync, their triangulation software scrambling to correct for a planetary signature that had suddenly changed. One beacon drifted dangerously close to a debris cluster before its thrusters re-engaged and returned it to position.

Farther out, aboard the Central Isopter Observatory, hull panels trembled. The cult-built observatory dimmed as if shadowed by something unseen. Viewing galleries glazed over with frost. A low hum reverberated through the station's support beams as the gravitational pulse passed through it. The force wasn't merely felt—it was interpreted. Cultists staggered within the silent halls, their senses flooded by a pressure that no sensor registered but every bone acknowledged. Something deep and unseen had pushed back.

Then the signal came. Every ship. Every station. Every monitoring relay. Without warning, a cascade of static overtook visual displays and sensor feeds. For 4.9 full seconds, time seemed to stop. Consoles froze. Viewports glitched. HUDs scrambled with meaningless noise. And then, one by one, the symbols appeared. Not words. Not numbers. Glyphs. Spirals. Jagged eyes. Curved lines woven into fractals. Circles split like wounds. Symbols of something that knew it had been forgotten.

Some crew reported a strange sense of familiarity. Others spoke of dread. Just as quickly as it came, it ended. The symbols faded. Systems recovered. The stars returned to view, unchanged… but not unchanged. Drift metrics lit up across pathfinder consoles. Kiev'ara's gravitational signature had changed not in mass, but in pattern. It was broadcasting something. A pulse. A code. Repeating in soft, steady waves like the rhythm of a long-dormant heart.

Stabilizer arrays, once blind, now locked into alignment Relays began triangulating cleaner paths. Jump-point data became clearer. The planet had not been fixed. It had been awakened. And in the silence that followed, every Force-sensitive aboard every ship if they reached outward felt nothing. But within that nothing, there was presence. A silence that stared back An emptiness that remembered being full. Kiev'ara had stirred. And it had not forgotten its name.

Merion Oreno Saga Merrill Derron Daks

 

[Brakkus]

Man cannot discover new oceans unless he has the courage to lose sight of the shore. ​

~Andre Gide
​

Kiev'ara.

A planet lost to time.

Once thought doomed to drift endlessly through the void, forgotten by all but myth.

Yet its recent discovery—perhaps more of a rediscovery—breathed new purpose into its dark fate. A promise of revival. A place within the ever-expanding Diarchy.

And perhaps, the long-awaited return of those who once called it home. Starting with the only Kiev'arian known to have endured the test of time— Laphisto .

For the High Commander of the Lilaste Order to forge a future for Kiev'ara, he would need more than hope. He needed specialists. Experts from across the galaxy.

The environment was as hostile as they came: subzero temperatures, violent atmospheric disruptions, and electrical anomalies that threatened to bring even the most advanced systems to a crawl.

The Diarchy had the will and the manpower. But will alone would not break ground on Kiev'ara.

They needed experience. Equipment. Survivors of similar frontiers.

They needed the Ando Mining Collective.

---

At Kiev'ara

Around the rogue planet, those already in orbit received an alert—a surge of ships dropping from hyperspace.

The fleet was vast: a mix of heavy civilian mining vessels bearing the insignia of the Ando Mining Collective, flanked on all sides by warships of the Lilaste Order.

Crossing the galaxy from their usual territory, Brakkus Ka'bo, President of the Collective, had secured military escort for the long haul. Fortunately, pirates weren't the problem.

Anomalies were.

Several mining ships failed to arrive at the designated coordinates. Kiev'ara's volatile aura was already wreaking havoc—sensors were shorting, systems misfiring, and hyperspace routes miscalculating.

Aboard the Collective's command vessel, the bridge crew worked under a controlled urgency. Scanners pinged, alarms flickered, and reports flew across consoles.

"Sir, we've located the missing ships. They exited hyperspace in a nearby system. We've relayed tracking beacons—they should be returning shortly."

Brakkus gave no reply. His attention remained on the datapad in his hand, eyes studying the first wave of scans coming in from the surface.

"Multiple fleets in orbit," a communications officer continued. "We've confirmed a Diarchy formation and Lilaste Order vessels. Others remain unidentified, but we're preparing diplomatic pings for contact."

Setting the datapad aside, Brakkus stood and began issuing orders in rapid Aqualish.

"Inform High Commander Laphisto that we've arrived. If he's out of reach, contact the Diarchy command. Offer our services in subterranean mapping—structures, caverns, anything of strategic value."

Even now, communication within the fleet was unstable. If it was this bad in orbit, Brakkus could only imagine the chaos ground teams might face. And knowing Laphisto, the High Commander was likely already on the surface.

"Don't wait for a response, start deploying expeditionary teams immediately. Fan out—cover as much ground as possible. Begin terrain scans and underground mapping. Prioritize identifying a suitable zone for a forward operations base. We'll need stable ground to offload the heavy equipment."

His words set the crew into motion once again. Orders were transmitted, shuttles prepped, deployment teams rallied. The operation had begun.

And soon, the first Ando Mining Collective vessels would descend upon Kiev'ara—a dead world with secrets yet to be unearthed.

Saga Merrill Derron Daks Diarch Rellik Merion Oreno Zinayn
Image Source​

​

 

[Diarch Reign]

​

Location: Objective I
Tags: Laphisto Diarch Rellik

---

Reign was late. A habit that had been forming much more lately, and he was in a cross mood because of it.

His delay was caused by gathering additional science personnel and equipment. The Diarch knew how much this venture meant to his friend and ally, and he wanted to ensure all the resources of the Diarchy were brought to bare.

“Advance party, this is Reign inbound. I’ve got supplies and personnel.. Laphisto, I’m locked on to your beacon. En route”

He advised the pilot to lock on to Laphisto’s transport and the convoy he was bringing fell in line behind him.

When he hit the ground, his breath was taken away. Scenes of an ancient battlefield, covered with the remains of his friend’s people. Reign was moved to silence for a time.

 

[Merion Oreno]

Farther out, aboard the Central Isopter Observatory, hull panels trembled. The cult-built observatory dimmed as if shadowed by something unseen. Viewing galleries glazed over with frost. A low hum reverberated through the station's support beams as the gravitational pulse passed through it. The force wasn't merely felt—it was interpreted. Cultists staggered within the silent halls, their senses flooded by a pressure that no sensor registered but every bone acknowledged. Something deep and unseen had pushed back.

Stabilizer arrays, once blind, now locked into alignment Relays began triangulating cleaner paths. Jump-point data became clearer. The planet had not been fixed. It had been awakened. And in the silence that followed, every Force-sensitive aboard every ship if they reached outward felt nothing. But within that nothing, there was presence. A silence that stared back An emptiness that remembered being full. Kiev'ara had stirred. And it had not forgotten its name.

Standing at the observation panorama with many of his compatriots, Merion did indeed feel those things - the shadow, the frost, the hum, the pressure. He did not like it.

The Cult of the Central Isopter liked to consider things, debate, marvel. The marveling and debate began immediately. Merion could not accept this as just another phenomenon. He felt too on edge, too miserable, even cheated - yes, cheated that the planet felt in some sense un-destroyed.

As the debate went on, Merion absented himself. He went to a shuttle and headed down to the surface. The anomaly down there - the absence of the Force, when standing on the ground - might still be there, or it might not. Either way, it'd be worth knowing, worth the effort. He felt the urge to get something done, get back control that way.

Midway down, he shifted course toward that one observatory site that was rumored to hold old maps. Just to kill two birds with one stone.

 

[Derron Daks]

Holocomm transmission from the DDSI Umbra
__________________________________________________________________
​

Commander Xander nodded, "We appreciate the effort. The readings we've been receiving are so unusual, I'd enjoy an independent confirmation before we-"

He didn't get to finish the statement.

Alarms lit up all over the bridge, both in physical form and in data-streams being fed to the cybernetic crew. Then a gravitic upwelling of incredible proportions gripped the ship, forcing it down and then up again, like a buoy floating on the waves. The gravity event was so unexpected and severe, the inertial dampeners could not quite keep up. Xander instinctively gripped the arm-rests of his chair to avoid being flung into the air. Not everyone was as quick to respond.

The reports from the crew were simultaneously verbal and inserted into the data:

"Hull stress at 87% maximum."

"Inertial Regulators overloaded, Momentum Transfer of .5% total load."

"Injuries reported across all decks."

"Crab Carryall number seven has crashed into the mountainous region in grid 1219. No word on survivors."

"The Innovation reports that their Commander has sustained a serious spinal injury."

"Pioneer reports a coolant leak threatening to poison five-percent of their crew."

The reports kept rolling in. For a moment, Xander forgot that he was still on comms. He dashed off a quick, "We seem to have confirmation. Thank you, Chief Executive Merrill. Advise us if you have need of aid," before returning his attention to the damage recovery efforts.

_______________________________________​

Objective I - Forward Echo
______________________________________________​

On the surface of the world, Derron grunted as a force gripped him and sent him to his knees. He had to plant a palm down to keep from smashing his helmeted head upon the ground.

The particles floating in the thin atmosphere of the planetoid danced and seemed to stand rigid for a moment, like iron-filings subjected to the pull of a magnet. Then, as though nothing had occurred, they resumed their previous static-electric dance.

Derron found he could stand again, and heaved himself back to his feet. Data began to flow into his data pad, via uplink from the ships in orbit. It had been even more serious on the macro-scale of orbital space than it had been here on the surface. Derron wondered if the energetic disturbance was issued via some sort of array in the planet's crust. Not terribly potent in any one spot of the surface, but collectively huge when all the emissions were combined.

Perhaps intentionally directed at the orbiting ships?

Fascinating possibilities.

He quickly bounded 200 meters towards the Dragonoid figure who was the employer of this expedition.

"Derron Daks, Chief Executive, DDSI. Something has triggered a response within the planet," he said, not realizing that Laphisto himself was the reason for it. "It came as a flurry of energies, including a gravitic pulse. There is clearly some mechanism still active among these ruins. Perhaps a defense system. Though... I am unsure. We have sustained casualties, but nothing as serious as I'd expect from an attempt at repelling the gathered forces here."

Just then, he got an audible alert to supplement his datapad's stream of information.

"This is Commander Xander. A large number of vessels have just dropped out of hyperspace. They identify themselves as a mining concern, but are not on the roster of vessels assigned to this job. This could be an attempt to conceal piracy and delay a response."

Derron considered this. "Launch Blastboats. Notify the frigates to prepare for possible violence."

He looked to Laphisto, who was doubtless receiving similar advisories. There was a question in Derron's eyes: Are they a late addition to your efforts here? Or are they enemies?

​

Saga Merrill Derron Daks Diarch Rellik Merion Oreno Zinayn Brakkus

 

[Saga Merrill]

Elsewhere in orbit, the City of Nar Shaddaa bore witness to the anomaly. The Baobab Astrography ship's vast hyperspace beacon lit up like a dying star, flooding its systems with raw, cascading feedback. Several navigational relays—meticulously positioned in Kiev'ara's orbital shell—spun wildly out of sync, their triangulation software scrambling to correct for a planetary signature that had suddenly changed. One beacon drifted dangerously close to a debris cluster before its thrusters re-engaged and returned it to position.

One of the benefits of being a maintenance-turned-navigational droid on home ground was the ability to trigger various important controls without even the minimal delay of servomotor-assisted motion. The moment the anomaly spiked, Saga deactivated the lighthouse beacon — or tried to. Resolving that power flux took precious seconds, during which unknown and armed sensor contacts multiplied widely. The City of Nar Shaddaa mounted a stygium cloak, and he got that up immediately and shifted vector.

That left the ship's lighthouse beacon off and the exploration ship safe for the moment, vanished off most or all screens. But it also left his painstaking work destabilized and, with the cloak up and potential hostiles around, not to mention the planetary anomaly to contend with, rectifying the dispersed beacon network would need to wait.

For the moment he responded to no comms and took no special scans, just got some distance from the area in the cloaked ship.

 

[Zara Saga]

Tags: Laphisto | Zinayn | Diarch Rellik | Diarch Reign​

Zara stood with arms folded tight across her chest, one polished boot tapping impatiently against the cold metal floor of the bridge. Her perfectly styled blonde hair caught the pale light streaming through the forward viewport, the waves cascading down her shoulders like golden silk threaded with frustration. She didn't say anything, yet, but her icy blue eyes were practically stabbing Diarch Reign in the side of the head.

If the man had any emotional awareness left after dragging half the Diarchy behind schedule, he could probably feel it.

But Zara didn't press. Reign's jaw was already locked like a durasteel clamp, and his glare said he was doing his best not to verbally annihilate someone. She got it. He was late, he knew he was late, and no one hated it more than he did. Still, as she stared through the viewport at the planet below, her petty irritation froze and fell away like glass cracking under pressure.

Kiev'ara hung there like the corpse of a god, shrouded in ash and shadow. What should've been a sunlit welcome was a twilight grave. Snow didn't fall, it hovered, suspended in mid-air like it had forgotten how gravity worked. Structures jutted from the surface like ribs from a rotting carcass.

The planet looked wrong. Like the laws of nature had been politely asked to leave.

Zara turned on her heel and strode toward the ship's exit, the usual sway in her hips a little tenser now, more measured. Her breath hitched slightly as the airlock opened. She braced herself. And then she stepped out.

It hit her immediately.

The Force, her ever-present comfort, her guiding hum, the rhythm beneath her skin, snapped out of existence. Gone. Not suppressed. Not muted. Gone. It was like someone had ripped out her soul, then handed her the empty shell and said, "Here, walk in this."

She stumbled, clutching the side of the ramp to steady herself, her breath ragged and shallow. She felt naked, like she'd been stripped to bone and nerve. Her connection, her intuition, her sense of others, all vanished. The silence wasn't just external. It was inside her, echoing, cavernous. She swallowed hard, eyes scanning the land for something to hold onto.

The ground was gray and uneven, slick with black ice and powdered ash. Frozen bodies, preserved perfectly in mid-strike or mid-scream, dotted the terrain like statues in a necropolis. Every one of them had a crystal embedded in their chest, still glowing faintly, like a memory trying to burn through the void.

"Reign," she said, her voice clipped and sharp as a whip crack. "Let's go. I don't want to be on this dustball longer than necessary."

She half-jogged ahead of him, bootfalls crunching softly in the frost. Her arms had goosebumps now, though not from the cold. She could see the others up ahead, Zinayn, Rellik, and Laphisto, all standing still in a loose cluster.

Something was off.

Laphisto… he looked like he'd been struck by lightning. Or revelation.

Zara slowed as she approached, her eyes flicking across their expressions, waiting for someone to explain what the hell was going on. Then Laphisto spoke.

"I… I can see."

She blinked, confused. See? Had he been blind? Was he - had he not been able to see this entire time?

Had no one mentioned that?

She opened her mouth, then stopped, then tilted her head just slightly as her lips curved into a smirk. She stepped closer to him, cocked a hip, and raised an eyebrow.

"Well?" she asked, modeling her environmental suit, voice teasing but warm. "How do I look?"

It wasn't much, just a flicker of light in a very dark place. But right now, even that might've meant something.

 

[Zinayn]

As Zinayn conveniently admired the construction of the transport in the opposite direction of Laphisto , Diarch Rellik came in and took a seat next to him. His gaze was drawn to the vibrant red liquid in the vial in the Diarch's hand. About the same color as the eyes of the Chiss. He took the vial as it was offered and pocketed it before responding, "I've never seen the High Commander this way. I suspect the Force is calling out to him from the planet. Actually, screaming would be a better guess. This elixir...does it heal merely the body? Or the mind as well? I suspect we'll need the latter more, but that remains to be seen. As for the Kiev'arian history, I don't know a lot. Laphisto appears to be the last of his species; some event must have wiped the others out. I suspect we will discover that event this very rotation," he said, his voice growing more determined and confident as he continued. "You saw the planet from orbit. I've rarely seen a planet more hostile to life than this one. This world once teemed with life, and now it is gone. I suspect that this, unlike most things, happened overnight. Without the heat of the sun, everything would have died around the same time. As you suggested, such instantaneous death could have created a Force Nexus. Whatever it is, we'll get to the bottom of it."

The shuttle shook and a shudder ran through the frame. They had landed. Zinayn slapped on his oxygen helmet and donned his thermal suit. It would be a shame if he had to fight something out here; the outfit greatly restricted his movement, which his fighting style depended on. He'd left his katana back on Aurora Station, as it would be to bulky to carry on top of his suit. He approached the landing ramp as it descended slowly. With a snarl from Laphisto, the ramp's hydraulics groaned in protest as the Force pushed it down, slamming into the icy surface. Zinayn followed. As soon as he stepped foot onto the surface, everything seemed to turn upside down. His vision blurred and dimmed, and blood pounded in his ears. The Force was gone. Nonexistent.

As his eyes opened again, he found himself face down on the ground. Head still aching, he lifted himself to one knee and surveyed the land before him. Corpses were frozen, perfectly preserved in the state they died. And dozens of lights gleamed in their chest cavities. This was going to be interesting. He got to his feet and dusted himself off, head spinning.

Zara Saga Diarch Reign

 

[Diarch Rellik]

Objective IA – Forward Echo: Establishing the Ice Line​

Zinayn and Rellik whispered back and forth. Their concern for their friend taking priority over the turbulence of their ride. "This planet is giving off an energy unlike anything I have felt before. It is strange to say the least. The elixir has regenitive capabilities. Not only for tissue but to the force as well. We do not want to overload him but situation depending, it should calm him, help his tissue and attune him to the force gently." As the planet closed in Rellik felt un-ease. His attunement to the force was slowly fading. Something he had experienced before in Null zones. It was a sickening feeling. Yet one he had felt before.

"I will be on my toes my friend. Be careful yourself, I will be right behind you both. Watching."

Rellik stood up and donned his oxygen helmet and his thermal suit. Laphisto was already at the door itching to exit. That itch turned to force as he blasted the doors down. The Diarch had known the man for a long time and never seen him be so forcefully uncontrollable. As he moved to leave the shuttle he noticed there were several others now on the planet but he was on a mission.

He moved swiftly to be right behind his friend but when his foot touched the ground he felt the un-ease of the absence of the force. Wobbling a bit the Diarch continued to put his hand on Laphisto's shoulder but when he reached out the world beneath his feet roared. The vibration was so violent that Rellik fell to his knees. His hand still outstretched to Laph.

"I can see"

Rellik looked at the man. He seemed prophetic and lost. As if staring into the eyes of a god. Knowing how the man usually saw the world either in dynamic versions of color or through blurred vision he pondered the statement. Was it a boon or a curse?

He got to his feet and moved to look out at the hellscape before him of a damned world next to Laphisto. Without touching him he tried to get his attention.

"Are you alright Laph? Look at me, what do you see?"


Laphisto Zinayn Zara Saga Derron Daks Diarch Reign