maskormenacelogs | (no subject)

"Luke?"

Jacob's head pokes out of a nearby doorway. His face breaks into a smile when he sees who it is. He doesn't know Luke that well compared to some of the people he went to Mars with, but he likes what he's seen so far. The kid's just... nice to be around.

"Hey, man. Good to see you," he says, stepping into the hall and approaching Aegis' visitor. "What's up?"

Luke relaxed slightly as he saw Jacob, stepping into the room properly as he favored the other man with a small smile.

"It's good to see you again too," he replied, folding his hands in front of him. "I'm interested in joining up with Aegis."

Jacob visibly perks up at that news. His smile broadens.

"That's great to hear," he says earnestly. "From what I've seen so far, you're an ideal recruit. If you've got the time, we can get you started on your testing right away. It's going to take a while, but if you pass everything, we should be able to get you on-duty by the end of the week."

Luke couldn't help but let out a faint chuckle at Jacob's response, a warm feeling settling in his chest. It felt nice for something to go well for the first time he got back.

"I have time," he replied. "I've left my assigned job recently; I intend to dedicate my time to this."

Patrol had been good today. It was starting to feel a little less odd to do it with Akobi of all people. Not inspection, actual patrolling. It'd made him more tense the first couple of days, especially since public relations dictated he patrol without his armor unless necessary. But by now, he'd managed to remind himself: this kept them together. No matter what happened, he'd be there to make sure his commander would be safe. Follow him through the streets, then back to base.

He really shouldn't relax once they got there, he knew that from Ralltiir. But he had. Rounding a corner to see a Jedi standing there caught him off-guard.

His reaction was equally unplanned. He didn't freeze, though. His first instinct wasn't that. He stepped forward to put himself between Akobi and Skywalker, armor reflexively appearing on him.

Patrolling with TK-622 was... better than Akobi had expected. He hadn't exactly been thrilled about being made to do the footwork of a base soldier, rather than the more tactical work of an officer that he's used to, but the time spent with 622 was always pleasant. Seeing his dedication to his duty first hand reminded Akobi why this clone was his friend.

When they arrive back in base, Akobi is satisfied with a day well spent. It isn't until 622 steps in front of him, armor appearing around him, that he feels the tension in the room.

Great. The Jedi Skywalker.

"Commander?" he ventures, cautiously putting a hand on 622's shoulder. "What's this about?"

Of course the two Imperial agents show up at just this exact moment. Of course. Why wouldn't they.

Jacob makes sure to keep the smile on his face as he turns to greet them, trying to keep the friendly atmosphere going through sheer force of will.

"This is Luke Skywalker," he says, putting a hand lightly on Luke's shoulder. "He was with me and 622 on the Mars Mission. And he's looking to join Aegis."

Luke sucked in a breath, 622's fierce over protectiveness hitting him before he even realized the clone was there. He finally turned when he heard Akobi's voice, feeling his heart sink into his shoes. He didn't realize there were Imperials part of this, though he suspected that he probably should have anticipated that.

His shoulders hunched slightly at Jacob's touch, and he let out a breath, pressing his hands together in front of him.

"I'm sorry, Jacob; perhaps this was a bad idea."

The only sense he didn't have much of in his armor was touch. Still, he felt the dull pressure of the hand on his shoulder, reigning him back in. He stopped, upright and eyes locked on Skywalker. Dimly, he was aware that this wasn't an immediate threat. He did know that. He'd been able to keep it in control during the Alke mission. But this was different. Akobi was here, and that added a whole other layer of tension over his still lurking feelings about what happened on the DS-1.

"I'll follow your lead, commander," he said, part of him faltering for a moment as he tried to figure out which one he was really referring to. "But there's more to this situation than I told you, sir."

It goes to show how new Akobi is to the hierarchy of Aegis, that his assumption of who 622 means when he says 'Commander,' is him, and not Taylor.

"Then why don't you fill us all in, Sergeant?" Surely it would be in the best interests to alert Commander Taylor of any potential dangers to having a Jedi join Aegis-- aside from the obvious.

Folding his arms, Jacob stands beside Luke and leans back on one leg as he looks from his agents to his recruit and back. He allows his smile to fade, showing how seriously he's taking this.

"I'll listen to anything you have to say, 622," he says invitingly. "This something you want to talk about alone, or are we good in the hallway?"

"Jacob..." Luke began softly, glancing up at him, before turning his steady gaze to 622. "I know exactly what the sergeant is going to tell you. I'm not afraid of the truth of it, and neither should he be."

Luke paused, folding his hands together before turning to face Jacob again.

"Back home, I fired the kill shot on the Death Star, a battle station capable of destroying an entire planet," he explained. "With the exception of Darth Vader, all crew of nearly a million and a half on board were killed, including the sergeant himself."

Edited (herp derp I know how numbers work) 2019-01-21 03:12 (UTC)

"That's rebel propaganda, sir," he said, flatly. "That's not even possible." Whatever its strategic purpose, it had seemed to be the largest mobile base in the galaxy. The station was so big that most of the people aboard couldn't possibly have known what was coming.

"Furthermore, Skywalker is a member of an illegal sect that attempted to overthrow a major galactic government by assassination of the head of state, and use of a power that grants them mind control." He hadn't felt like he could do anything to change Skywalker's presence on the Alke mission. Orders had already been given, misguided though they might've been. But now he might be able to change things.

"No—" Akobi steps out from behind 622 then, gently correcting his sergeant. "Skywalker is correct. The battle station was designed to take out planets in their entirety." His voice is resigned, disappointed.

"But TK-622 is also correct, that Skywalker is a Rebel and a dangerous Jedi. I understand how you could be tempted by having that kind of power to hand, Commander, but this man is a threat."

Both sides are correct here, in Akobi's estimation. He can't let 622 keep up the illusion that the DS-1 wasn't a planet killing weapon, but he also can't let Taylor allow a Jedi to join Aegis' ranks blindly.

Well. That was a lot to take in all at once. Somehow, despite the massive scale of what's being discussed, the thing that strikes Jacob the deepest is the knowledge that Luke killed 622. It's a lurching sensation, picturing the man he's fought beside dead- at the hands of another ally.

Silently, Jacob damns the Galactic Civil War. Aloud, he shakes his head and says "All right. My office, now. We're going to talk about this, and we are going to handle it."

With that, he starts walking, gesturing over his shoulder for the others to come with him. One benefit of the shared military background between all of them: he can be certain that they'll follow without complaint. It's only a short distance before they're in his office and the door is shut. Jacob goes behind his desk, but does not sit.

"All right," he says once again, looking at Luke. "Tell me more about the DS-1. And the Jedi."

Luke followed without comment, of course; his expression was a mask of calm, but his insides were churning in unease. He knew this would need to be addressed sooner or later, but he had been hoping for later, and not at the expense of someone not part of the political mess that was their galaxy. Akobi, at least, got a small glance from him; quiet acknowledgment that admitting the government he believed in didn't always do the greatest things had to have taken a lot.

He took a deep breath once they were secure in Jacob's office, folding his hands before him again before he began. This was going to be a long explanation.

"As I said, the DS-One, or the Death Star, was an orbital battle station with a laser capable of destroying an entire planet. There was a flaw built into the station by one of the developers, and by the time the Alliance managed to obtain the plans that revealed this weakness, a test shot had already been fired, destroying the city of Jedha and the surrounding area."

He let out a breath, trying to decide how much information he should give. There was no easy way to explain how the weapon was destroyed and his involvement in it, without basically explaining everything.

"My sister, Leia Organa of Alderaan, had been intercepted on the way to delivering those plans, but she concealed them in an astrodroid before her capture. The droid ended up on my home planet, and my uncle purchased him, unknowingly. The droid escaped during the night, and while I was tracking him down, Imperial forces tracked him to my home."

Luke paused, a swallowing past a lump that appeared in his throat. "There was nothing left of our homestead by the time I made it back, and I agreed to help get the droid to Alderaan, along with my first mentor in the Force. By the time we made it there, however, Alderaan had already been destroyed by the Death Star. We were captured, but we escaped with Leia, and were able to get the plans to the Alliance. The Death Star followed us, and we had to act immediately. I was the one that ultimately destroyed the station, and everyone on board was killed in the resulting explosion."

He paused again for breath and to let the others process what he said. He wasn't sure how much of what he had to say would be believed, but the basics of what happened was out there.

"As for the Jedi... there's no simple answer to that," he continued. "The easy answer, the answer I was originally told, is the Jedi were the guardians of peace and justice in the Old Republic. Their power comes from the Force, an energy field created by all living things in our galaxy. This isn't exclusive to the Jedi; anyone that is Force sensitive can reach out to the Force, even unconsciously."

He pursed his lips. "A more complicated answer is... I just don't know what the Jedi were. The Empire was very thorough in eradicating their presence from the galaxy, and it's very hard for someone like me, who was born when the Empire came into power, to find any information on them, and anyone I can ask have biased points of view."

Luke turned slightly, addressing Akobi. "And yes, there are abilities that involve planting suggestions in the minds of others, however, they only work on the weak minded. I can assure you no one in this room falls under that description."

He turned back to Jacob, pressing a hand against his chest. "I can only tell you what being a Jedi means for me. It means showing compassion when others can't, and knowing when to rise up in the defense of others, and when to stay my hand. I don't know if that means I'm a Jedi by the standards of the old Order, and that's fine. I'm a Jedi like my father was before me, and that's all that matters as far as my being a Jedi."

Every time the Rebels had brought this up, it had been with the intent of slander. He'd built up a reflexive, negative reaction to the claim, and to hear Akobi say it set that off. The internal backlash that followed it was instant and overwhelming.

He shut down, automatically following his commander when they started to move. Inside the armor, he didn't have to keep his face perfectly still. Just enough that the tension in his jaw wouldn't show down the muscles in his neck, keep his head forward so no one could tell his eyes weren't focused on anything. Wasn't listening.

He was struggling to determine what to think, when he really wished he didn't have to think at all. If the Empire had built it, it couldn't be wrong. But he could remember how he felt, right at the end--the sudden conviction that the Empire wasn't perfect, that it had been weakened by all the corrupting forces it sought to defend the galaxy against.

So he wasn't sure whether to think of it as a necessity, or a sign that the weakness had spread more than he'd suspected.

If no one else is going to sit once they're back in Taylor's office, then Akobi will. He sits in one of the chairs in front of Taylor's desk, angling himself to still be in view of Skywalker and Taylor. He doesn't want to put his back to a Jedi. It's alright if 622 stands behind him. He trusts 622 with his life. He doesn't trust Skywalker as far as he could throw him.

Once Skywalker had finished saying his piece, Akobi pipes up to clarify things from the Imperial perspective.

"It's true that the DS-1 was an oribital battle station the size of a moon, and it's true that it was built with a superlaser capable of destroying a planet. When I received my transfer orders, I was given a short brief on the project," he pauses to look Skywalker in the eye, "which stated that, as of that date, the weapon had only been fired on a derelict Star Destroyer--" he shifts his gaze to Taylor then, "--a class of warship in our galaxy.

"I have, since coming here, learned of the firing upon Jedha and Alderaan. The timing of which I haven't quite worked out with my own personal timeline, as my time spent aboard the DS-1 was plagued with... other complications." Namely his own death. But as that's both a personal subject and also not relevant, he doesn't specify.

When it comes to the Jedi, Akobi has the advantage of being the only one in the room who was alive during the Clone Wars. He remembers the story of the Jedi, before the Emperor's decisive move to remove them from the galaxy.

"The Jedi, on the other hand, were known as protectors of the galaxy for... generations. As long as anyone can remember. But they became corrupt, arrogant. Turned on the then-Chancellor, and their own clone troops. It was only with total eradication of the Jedi that the safety of the galaxy was secured.

"Jedi are powerful beings. Too powerful to be trusted, Commander. To add a Jedi to the team would be to put all of Aegis Force at risk."

There's a lot to take in, and Jacob listens with his head bowed as though at a funeral, contemplating deeply. But he lifts his gaze sharply at Akobi's last words.

"A lot of people would say that imPorts are too powerful to be trusted, Akobi," Jacob says to him. "Aegis exists to help prove them wrong."

He takes a step forward, and gestures with a sweep of his arm toward the three agents and would-be agents in front of him. "All of you were on different sides of a war back home. All of you were part of things that hurt each other, badly. I'm not here to referee a fight from another universe. I've got a unit to run."

He looks directly at 622 on this note, picturing the man vaporized in the destruction of a moon-sized station. Thinking about how different Luke's actions are from Jacob's own participation in the annihilation of the Collector Base. But the Collectors hadn't been alive in the sense that Akobi and 622 are- closer to cybernetic zombies than anything else.

"Luke, I'll tell you what I already told these two," he continues, shifting to the Jedi. "If you join this team, you've got to leave your past loyalties behind. The Jedi, the Rebellion, your war, none of it can get in the way of me trusting you to follow my lead and give a hundred percent to Aegis' mission. Both of them-" he gestures to 622 and Akobi. "Made that commitment, despite their history with the Empire. If you can do the same, we shouldn't have any problems."

Luke tried, and admittedly failed, not to flinch at Akobi's opinions of the Jedi. He really wanted to correct him, remind him that the Emperor and Vader were Force users as well, but he had no desire to dissolve into what would only be political bickering in front of Jacob.

Instead he kept his focus on Jacob as he was addressed, nodding faintly. If... it was his eventual intent to stay here, to keep his presence away from the Galaxy and keep himself from trying to kill his nephew that way, then learning to set aside such differences would be important. He knew it would take time, but he didn't think it would be as difficult on his end as it would have been before he left and came back after a year had passed back home.

He inclined his head respectfully. "I can do that, Jacob."

That was it, then. They were going to have to work with a Jedi. Not out of last resort as with the Alke mission, just on orders. As much as he'd said he'd follow Aegis...

He needed some sort of structure. He did. But if Akobi decided they were leaving now, he would follow. Because despite, maybe because of what had just been said, he needed to stop having to think about things for now. He needed things to be simple again.

His thoughts were in open turmoil, but physically, he hadn't moved since they'd entered the office. And he'd likely stay that way, frozen and without answers, unless something compelled him to engage.

All throughout Taylor's speech, and throughout Luke's acceptance of the commander's terms, Akobi is distinctly aware of how still 622 has become. Sure, one who was used to having clone stormtroopers around would assume he's just waiting until the higher ups have made a decision, which he'll follow dutifully for the will of the Empire.

But Akobi knows 622 too well for that. They've been together ever since Malastare. He's grown to recognize the subtle cues in his sergeant's posture, when his silence is speaking more than words. And, perhaps more importantly, he's seen the progress he has made here, in becoming more than his clone conditioning and stormtrooper training ever intended him to be.

622's not moving, not speaking. Something is wrong.

"Commander Taylor," he interjects politely. "May I have a word in private with Agent TK-622 before we give you our answer?"

"Sure thing, Akobi," Jacob says readily, understanding this is something for them to talk about. But there's an undercurrent of anxiety inside him, a fear that he might be about to lose two good agents because of this.

He gestures toward the door to the office, then looks meaningfully at Luke. "We'll give you some privacy. Right, Luke?"

Jacob doesn't think he needs to tell Luke to keep his telepathy to himself for this, but for the benefit of the Imperials, he'll show he acknowledges and recognizes the risk of that power being abused.

Luke's gaze lingered on 622 for a moment, concern and worry on his face. He can feel his turmoil and it hurts; it's painful enough that he feels it tightening his chest, and it hurt a little to breathe. He finally forced himself to take a breath, turning to Jacob and nodding, heading out first.

He began to rouse slightly when his designation was mentioned. He'd been noticed. He shouldn't have assumed Akobi wouldn't figure it out. His commander knew better.

Still, that didn't mean he moved, even after Taylor and Skywalker were gone.

"Sir?"

Akobi stands, once the two of them are alone, and crosses the room to stand in front of 622, putting a steadying hand on the clone's shoulder.

"Talk to me. Aegis was your outfit before it was ever mine. Is this a line we can't cross?"

"Sir, I'm not--" He swallowed, trying to formulate a response.

"I can't advise on that, sir," he finally gives up. "Aegis has been good for this planet. But it's not the Empire." That wasn't meant as a condemnation, it was simply a fact. It wasn't. It wasn't omnipresent, it didn't hold his mind, his identity. It didn't own him.

"No, it's not the Empire. The Empire is a long way away." And neither of them would be returning to it, but Akobi doesn't want to belabor that point.

"We can walk away from this if you can't work alongside a Jedi," he concedes. "But... It might be a good idea to stay on, and keep an eye on Skywalker that way." If they had the Jedi in their sights, maybe-- just maybe, they could stop him before he causes any real damage.

"Yes, sir." And he should've been content enough with that, the logic was sound and they could do good for the people here who didn't know what danger they were in.

But there were still words tumbling through his head, about the DS-1, the rebels' claims--

It could wait. Had to. Wasn't right to bring it up now, not when they were still in Aegis HQ and there was a Jedi out there. "Whatever happens, I'll be ready to respond."

Akobi nods solemnly, with a hint of a smile, and claps a hand on his friend's shoulder. "I know you will."

And with that, he turns to reopen the door and usher Commander Taylor and Skywalker back inside.

"Gentlemen. After some deliberation, we have decided that it would be in both our, and everyone's best interests if we stay on and continue our work with Aegis, under your direction." He nods to Taylor. "We are willing to put our galaxies disputes aside for the sake of protecting the people of this planet."

--From the Jedi threat, he doesn't add, though he carefully levels a wary glare in Skywalker's direction.

Jacob is too relived to catch the glare, and he smiles as some of the tension eases out of his shoulders.

"Glad to hear it," he says with warmth, nodding to both Akobi and Luke. "In that case, we'll move on with getting Skywalker processed. And I'll look forward to seeing how you all work together as part of Aegis."

Luke struggled against making a face at that glare, raising an eyebrow at Akobi. Part of him was curious as to how the commander would react when he realized what kind of person he really was, or if he ever would. His expression dropped as Jacob turned toward him, offering him a soft smile.

"Thank you for the opportunity. I'm looking forward to doing what I can to assist."