Coruscant was a vertical ocean of durasteel and ambition, and as Revan Shan steered his temporary Jedi shuttle toward the High Council Spire, he couldn't help but feel that the architects had been overcompensating for something. The city-planet was currently in its golden hour, the sunlight reflecting off the endless streams of traffic like a billion credits scattered across the sky.
"Look at it, D6," Revan said, leaning back in the pilot's seat and propping his boots on the console—a gesture that would have given a Temple instructor a localized stroke. "The High Republic. Peak civilization. Everyone's wearing white and gold, the Nihil are mostly a bad memory, and the Starlight Beacon is... well, it's currently the galaxy's biggest nightlight. It's all so terribly shiny."
R2-D6, who was plugged into the ship's nav-computer to ensure the autopilot didn't do anything "stupidly predictable," let out a series of whistles that sounded suspiciously like a critique of the Temple's landing protocols.
"I know, I know. It lacks character," Revan agreed. "Give me a grimy cantina on Nar Shaddaa or a dusty ruin on Korriban any day. Shines are for people who don't want to see the dirt. And as we discovered on Naboo, the dirt is starting to move."
He checked his reflection in the viewport. He had swapped his field-worn robes for a fresh set of dark, Phrik-weave tunics. He still wasn't wearing the mask—that was a bridge he'd cross when the timeline got truly messy. For now, he just looked like a Knight who had spent a little too much time in the Outer Rim and not enough time in a meditation chamber.
The Grandmasters and the Skeptics
The Council Chamber was as circular as he remembered from the films, but the atmosphere was vastly different. There was no oppressive shroud of the Dark Side here; instead, there was a sense of profound, almost arrogant serenity.
Revan walked into the center of the mosaic floor, his dark robes a sharp contrast to the ivory and gold around him. He didn't bow low; he gave a polite, jaunty nod that suggested he was just stopping by for tea.
"Master Yoda," Revan said, his eyes landing on the small, green figure sitting in the center chair. "Master Vernestra. Masters. You're all looking very... luminous today. Has there been a group discount on robes?"
Master Vernestra Rwoh sighed, her purple lightwhip hilt hanging at her side. "Knight Shan. Your report from Naboo was... unconventional. You claim to have encountered a Force-user utilizing ancient, alchemical techniques to sabotage the plasma mines?"
"Technically, I claim to have played a very high-stakes game of 'Tag' with a shadow," Revan corrected, his hands moving expressively. "They were testing the infrastructure. It was an audit, Masters. A diagnostic of our response time. And I must say, the code they used for the logic-bomb was quite elegant. Malicious, obviously, but the syntax was beautiful."
A large, imposing Trandoshan Jedi to his left let out a low hiss. This was Master Sskeer, a legendary figure of the era. He looked at Revan with a mixture of professional curiosity and reptilian annoyance.
"Elegant code does not hide the scent of blood, young Knight," Sskeer rumbled, his voice like grinding stones. "You speak as if this encounter was a laboratory experiment. This... 'Shadow'... did they strike to kill?"
"Oh, they tried," Revan said, grinning at Sskeer. "But I'm very difficult to kill. I have a very busy schedule, and dying is a massive logistical nightmare. The point is, Master Sskeer, they didn't use the Nihil's brute force. This was subtle. This was... Sith-adjacent."
The word Sith caused a ripple of visible discomfort.
"Extinct for eight centuries, the Sith are," Yoda spoke up, his voice a familiar, rhythmic rasp. "A splinter group, perhaps. The Path of the Open Hand, or remnants of the Nihil's shadows, they may be."
Revan looked at Yoda. The Grandmaster looked younger than the puppet from Empire Strikes Back, but those wise, ancient eyes were just as piercing. Revan felt a sudden urge to offer him a lemon drop, but he restrained himself.
"Master Yoda," Revan said, his tone softening but retaining its sarcastic edge. "With all due respect—which is a lot, honestly, you're practically the galaxy's grandfather—extinction is just a matter of perspective. If I hide a krayt dragon in your bedroom, it's not extinct; it's just waiting for you to go to sleep. This wasn't a splinter group. This was a seed."
"Your imagination is as vast as the Unknown Regions, Knight Shan," Vernestra said. "But without proof—a hilt, a name, a body—the Council cannot declare a state of emergency. We will increase the guard on Naboo, but you... you are a Maverick. Perhaps more meditation on the Living Force would serve you better than chasing ghosts."
"Meditation is just sitting still with a fancy name," Revan muttered, though he kept it low. "Right then. No emergency. Everything is fine. The galaxy is a big, golden sun-shield and nothing can possibly go wrong. I'll just be on my way, then. I have a boat to build."
As he turned to leave, Yoda's voice called out again. "Knight Shan. Stay a moment, you will. Speak, I would."
The Gremlin and the Maverick
The other Masters filed out, leaving the 23-year-old Knight alone with the 700-year-old Grandmaster. Yoda hopped down from his chair and waddled toward Revan, leaning on his small cane.
"Strange, your signature is," Yoda murmured, circling Revan like he was a particularly interesting piece of art. "Fixed in time, you are not. Like a book from the future, you feel. Or a memory of the past."
Revan's heart skipped a beat. He's good. Even 100 years before the movies, he's too good. "I just have a very active internal life, Master," Revan said, crouching down to be at eye level with the green gremlin. "And I remember things... differently. I'm here for the adventure, Yoda. I'm here to be kind. But sometimes kindness requires a bit of a proactive audit."
Yoda poked Revan's knee with his cane. "A dangerous path, 'proactive' is. Hubris, it breeds. But... a heart of gold, I sense. And a great deal of sass. Too much sass, perhaps?"
"Never enough sass," Revan corrected, pulling a lemon candy from his pocket and offering it to Yoda. "Try one. It's a specialized synthesis. Helps with the long meetings."
Yoda looked at the candy, sniffed it, and popped it into his mouth. His eyes widened. "Sour, it is! But... refreshing. Hmmm." He looked at Revan with a renewed intensity. "Go, you should. Build your ship. But watch the shadows, you must. If Sith they are... then the first line of defense, you may be."
"I'm more of a 'scout-ahead and make jokes' kind of line," Revan said, standing up. "But I'll keep the torch lit. Thanks for the candy review, Master."
Building the Black Pearl
Revan headed straight for the lower levels of the Temple, where a private industrial hangar housed his masterpiece. The Black Pearl was no longer just a skeleton. It was starting to look like a ship—a sleek, aggressive XS Stock Light Freighter, but with a profile that screamed experimental.
R2-D6 was already there, buzzing around a pile of Beskar-Phrik alloy plates.
"Good news, D6," Revan announced, tossing his cloak onto a workbench. "The Council thinks I'm a well-meaning lunatic with a vivid imagination. We're officially on our own. Which is great, because I hate committee-approved adventures. They're far too bureaucratic."
He walked over to the ship's primary computer core. "Cortana? You awake?"
A soft, blue avatar flickered into existence on a small pedestal. The AI was still in her early stages, but her logic-centers were already lightyears ahead of anything the Republic used.
"I am online, Revan," Cortana said, her voice smooth and slightly melodic. "I have analyzed the plasma mines' data. The corruption you flushed was indeed alchemical. I have also detected several encrypted signals originating from the Serenno sector. They do not match any known High Republic signatures."
"Serenno," Revan mused. The ancestral home of Dooku. Figures. "Save that for later. Right now, we need to finish the hull reinforcement. D6, get the plasma welder. We're going to layer the Beskar-Cortosis weave over the engine cowlings. I want this ship to be able to fly through a sun and come out with a tan."
For the next several hours, Revan lost himself in the work. This was his therapy—the marriage of Mechu-deru and advanced engineering. He used the Force to hold the heavy alloy panels in place, sensing the microscopic stress points in the metal and smoothing them out with a thought.
He didn't just build; he integrated. He tied the ship's sensors into a Kyber-Quantum computer network that utilized three small Kyber crystals to act as "logical focusers," allowing the ship to process data at near-instantaneous speeds.
"Automatic Stealth Generator is 70% complete," Cortana reported. "The 'Invisible Cloak' logic is successfully mimicking the background radiation of the Coruscant sector. We are, for all intents and purposes, a ghost in the hangar."
"Perfect," Revan said, wiping grease onto his dark tunic. "A ghost ship for a Maverick Knight. Now, we just need the 'Jump-Snapping' hyperdrive to stabilize. I want to be able to exit hyperspace inside a planetary atmosphere without turning into a smear on the landscape."
R2-D6 let out a long, skeptical whistle.
"Oh, ye of little faith," Revan laughed. "It's not impossible, D6. It's just very, very difficult. And I happen to be a doctor of 'Very, Very Difficult'."
The Trandoshan Visit
The hangar doors hissed open, and the heavy thud of boots announced a visitor. Revan didn't need his eyes to know who it was. The Force felt like a warm, scaly pressure.
Master Sskeer walked into the hangar, looking at the Black Pearl with genuine interest. "An XS freighter? Old Republic design. Sturdy. But you have... altered it."
"I'm an improver, Master Sskeer," Revan said, not looking up from his welding. "The Republic builds things to last; I build them to win. What brings a hero of the Republic to my humble, grease-stained corner?"
Sskeer walked up to the hull, running a clawed hand over the Beskar weave. "The Council is blind, Revan Shan. Yoda sees, but he is patient. I am a Trandoshan. We do not value patience when a predator is in the tall grass. I smelled the cold on you. The cold of that shadow."
Revan stopped welding and looked at Sskeer. "You believe me?"
"I believe that you are a maverick who knows more than he says," Sskeer rumbled. "And I believe that the Force is screaming. If you find more of these seeds... you tell me. I will not let the Republic burn while the Council meditates on the beauty of the flames."
Revan smiled—a genuine, kind smile. "I'll keep you in the loop, Sskeer. But be warned: my adventures usually involve a lot of running and at least three things exploding simultaneously."
"A Trandoshan likes a good explosion," Sskeer hissed, a reptilian grin touching his lips.
As Sskeer left, Revan turned back to the Black Pearl. He felt the timeline shifting. The Acolyte, the Sith, the Nihil... it was all converging.
"Cortana," Revan said softly. "Search the archives for any mention of the name 'Revan'. Not my name. The original."
"Searching... data is heavily encrypted and restricted by the High Council," Cortana replied.
"I know," Revan said, his hand resting on the ship's hull. "But I have a feeling we're going to find it soon. And when we do... the adventure is going to get a lot more interesting."
He popped another lemon candy and looked at the droid. "Come on, D6. Let's finish the engines. We have a galaxy to see, and I'm not doing it in a Temple taxi."