voicemail;

[kanyounot]

This is Kanan. I'm pretty busy right now, so leave a message.

TEXT | VOICE | VIDEO | ACTION

Comments

[ct_7567]

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?

[kanyounot]

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.

[ct_7567]

[ 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? ]

[kanyounot]

[ 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.

[ct_7567]

[ 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.