kanyounot | voicemail;

[ Rex has every right to be angry, and Kanan is okay with that. He deserves it. He doesn’t expect forgiveness - certainly not immediately, and perhaps not ever. He doesn’t want to make excuses, but Rex is asking for some kind of explanation. Kanan owes him honesty, as well as an apology. ]

You didn’t have one, when I knew you back home. You found it, got rid of it, years before we met. I think, maybe - my mind didn’t want to make the connection, between you and what - what happened, when I was a kid. I learned to think of you in different terms, to protect myself, so I wouldn’t have to - remember. The others.

[ His mind glances over their names - Stiles, Gray. Names he has certainly buried deep, for a long time. ]

But you still deserved to know, and my looking inward was selfish and thoughtless of your situation. I did wrong by you. I’m truly sorry.

[ Rex doesn't say it's fine. It's not. He's pretty damn sure both of them know that it's not. Instead he's quiet, considering. That's not so terribly rare; for all of his bellowing on the field, Rex is a habitually quiet man.

Finally, he says, ] I don't intend to hold it against you. It's a horrible thing, what happened. What will happen.

[ He doesn't want to think about it. And it's all he can think about, sometimes. What's going to happen. What's going to become of them all. Rex would rather they be killed en masse than to be taken over in the way that they were. Hell, if Rex had known there was only one way out back home, that it couldn't be removed, he'd rather...

Well. No need to get quite so grim, here and now. They have enough on their plate without speaking of those eventualities. ]

You should have told me. You put me and quite possibly everyone who knows me, including yourself, at risk. But nothing of the sort happened. Now I know. That's what has to be dealt with.

I need to know more.

[ Kanan takes a deep breath. Maybe, if he's careful - if he draws on his training, the meditation techniques - he can remain detached enough that he will be able to avoid at least some of the nightmares that will inevitably result from this conversation.

It takes him a moment, before he speaks again - and his voice is steady, certainly. ]

I know very little for sure. I know you have a scar, about here - [ He indicates a spot on his own head. ] but I don't know when or how you found and removed it. Everything else I can say is only educated guesses.

As far as I'm aware, the control chips only ever had one function - to turn the clones against the Jedi. They weren't used before that point, and as far as I'm aware, weren't used again after. And I think it was Palpatine himself who activated them - so he might be the only one who can. I doubt more than a handful of people ever knew about them, anyway.

So no, almost no one here was at risk except you, and even that was pretty low, I'd say. I mean, if Palpatine ever shows up here, we'll all be in a damn lot of trouble regardless. But, again - educated guesses. I'm sorry I can't tell you much for sure. You could try asking Master Kenobi, maybe. He survived the purge, as well, and he was older - he might know more. But maybe not.

It was a risk. It remains a risk. The Kaminoans wouldn't put all of that work into making a chip for a singular purpose. And I don't believe we'd stick around for what's coming up next if it were good for the one order. We're bound to our purpose, but we're not men without integrity.

[ The things the Empire did - there's no way his brothers would stand placidly by and let it happen, knowing how it goes contrary to everything that they'd been made for. Destroying innocents? Entire planets? Hurting the very people they were made to serve? No. It does more than that. That's just simply logic.

Why make something to control others if you're not going to go all the way? Rex isn't looking at Kanan as he reasons it out, though he supposes it doesn't matter. ]

We'll find out with certainty once I get the damn thing out. And I will be taking it out. [ A beat. ] Who else?

The clones didn’t stick around, though. Less than ten years after the Empire was declared the last of the clones were decommissioned. Except, apparently, for 622, and no, I don’t know anything about what might or might not be in his head. The Imperial military is made up of volunteers, not clones. Just people, who believe the Empire’s lies, or who don’t have another choice.

[ People don’t need control chips in their heads to do evil things, that’s for sure. Kanan has no problem understanding that people who believe they are good and morally correct will commit atrocities if given some kind of justification. ]

If 622 has something in his head, I don’t know what purpose it would have. The Emperor doesn’t need to forcibly control his troops. Plenty of people are willingly loyal to him. All he did to the clones was make them believe the Jedi were traitors to the Republic. It didn’t take long for him to convince most of the rest of the galaxy, too.

[ He sighs, pinches the bridge of his nose. It’s one of his greatest fears here as well - that the populace will somehow be turned against him, just for calling himself a Jedi. ]

And I don’t know who else would have information about them here. Anakin Skywalker, maybe? He joined forces with Palpatine, or so I hear.

Edited 2019-05-28 03:23 (UTC)

[ Rex has heard that insistence before - but it doesn't add up, not with 622's lived experiences. He leaves it alone. There aren't answers to be had there. Certainly not from anyone who hadn't been involved in every arm of the Empire personally; it wouldn't be unusual for them to reserve their clone troopers for very specific roles, keeping them hidden underneath their armour so nobody knows, for whatever reason that may be.

He can't trust 622 as an objective source. But he can't trust Kanan as an objective source either. None of them are. It's why things are as clouded as they are. At some point, everything in the galaxy made so little sense that every person is given only a nugget of information to call their own. And now, after learning that everything in his life had been a blatant lie, he's not willing to trust anything. It doesn't come down to who he trusts as a person; it simply comes down to an unreliable, senseless galaxy. ]

I can think of plenty of reasons. And I could ask the others, at some point - but if it's all the same to you, I'd rather hear it from you for now. [ There's still a distance between him and Kenobi. And an even vaster one between him and his old General, as much as he hates that fact. They've kept their distance. He thinks that perhaps that's what Skywalker wants. ]

At any rate, that wasn't quite what I meant. I meant... who else escaped? It couldn't have just been the three of us. [ Kenobi would know the answer to his next question. But he desperately doesn't want to hear it from him, for fear of what the answer would be. At least if Kanan doesn't know him, all his dearest brother and best friend will be to Kanan is a name. ] Did I ever mention a Cody?

[ Could he have left without him? Would he have? ]

[ Kanan can't think of many reasons why Palpatine would feel the need to mind control a handful of clone troops, so many years after the Jedi Purge. Maybe to commit sabotage from the inside, so he could then blame the rebels for it? But certainly nothing as widespread as the Purge itself.

Then again, he doesn't pretend to understand all the machinations of a Sith Lord. The guy is, quite literally, an evil genius, and way above Kanan's proverbial pay grade. ]

When I met you, it was just you, Wolffe, and Gregor. You never mentioned a Cody, or anyone else specifically. That's all I know, about all of it.

[ He gives a helpless shrug. ] I'm sorry.

[ Rex has always been fond of stories. But old stories, the sort that get told around the campfire, or after a few too many drinks at the clone bar. It's rarely about the present, and rarely about what really matters. That's the sort of thing that you keep to a few special people, uttered only in precious company, underneath duress. Of course he hadn't mentioned the others to Kanan, if they weren't with him. Maybe for their protection as much as his own. Or maybe it's because they're all gone.

He doesn't know. Kenobi will know. Rex doesn't know if he wants to know. ]

I see. Well. It was worth asking.

voicemail;

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject