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On AO3
Chapter 1 on Dreamwidth
Chapter 2 on Dreamwidth
Chapter 3 on Dreamwidth
Chapter 4 on Dreamwidth
Chapter 5 on Dreamwidth
Chapter 6 on Dreamwidth
Chapter 7 on Dreamwidth
Chapter 8 on Dreamwidth
Chapter Nine
The armor … took some doing.
"I'm sorry, we don't have the equipment to fabricate or modify armor here, Sergeant," said the armorer, a Specialist named Tripwire. "And even if we did, I wouldn't know how to use it. Clone armor comes standard, and it fits like a glove because our bodies are all the same." The armory was a tent with one of its sides rolled up, situated next to the mess tent at the center of camp, just where it would have been in a First Order camp. Easy to get to, no matter where you were, if there was an unexpected need to rearm or change weapons load.
"But what about your Jedi?" Finn asked. "They don't have full armor, but they've at least got something. Or Kenobi and Skywalker do, at any rate."
"The Jedi get their armor from the Temple, not from me," Tripwire said. "Not that they wear much of it."
"And what happens if you gain weight? Or lose it, on a long campaign with fewer supplies?" Finn asked. "What happens if you get switched to a different job and your muscle configuration changes because your activity profile does?" Basic Stormtrooper conditioning was always the same, of course, but many specialties had additional special training or duties, and that always affected things.
Tripwire and Kano exchanged glances. "We're all fed the same thing, so any changes tend to be battalion-wide," Tripwire said.
"But if you can't modify the armor, all that means is that everyone's armor fits wrong," Finn pointed out.
"And while you can get food on the black market special, or sometimes when we're on a planet with markets and people are willing to trade with us, they strongly discourage anyone from eating enough to alter your functioning to any degree."
"Fair enough," Finn said; one of the happinesses he hadn't anticipated about leaving the First Order was getting to choose what he ate and when he ate it. "But you can't tell me that ARC troopers and regular troopers have the same musculature, much less pilots and ARC troopers."
"So?" Kano said.
"You're telling me that you still wear the same armor?" Finn demanded. "Doesn't it chafe?"
"Yeah, but armor isn't supposed to be comfortable," Tripwire said. "And that's part of the point of mass-produced soldiers. You can mass-produce the gear, too, and do you think the bean-counters on Coruscant care if it chafes a bit?"
Finn shook his head. "But it impedes efficiency. Oh, well, it’s not like I’m going to be trying to fight in it anyway.”
“If you have to, we’re all screwed,” Kano said.
“The bodysuit is going to be the real problem,” Tripwire said. “It doesn’t have a lot of give in it … and you’re a full two centimeters taller than a brother. It’d be easier if you were two centimeters shorter, instead.”
“The bodysuit is crawling up my ass,” Finn said, shifting uncomfortably. And it was chafing his dick. Two centimeters didn’t sound like much, but it was the difference between fitting perfectly and … not.
“Could we just cut it in half so it’s pants and a shirt?” Jesse asked. “It’d kill the temperature controls and some of the blaster protection, but it’s pretty temperate here and if he’s not going to be fighting …”
"If we need temperature controls, or are going to be in combat, I can change bodysuits," Finn said.
“Here’s the armor,” Tripwire said, handing over a standard armor crate, just like the ones Finn had used all his life before defecting. He felt a lump in his throat, and he couldn’t tell whether it was positive or negative.
“And here’s the paint and brushes,” Tripwire continued, bringing out a container and a package.
“What?” Finn asked.
“Say, what’s your design, anyway?” Jesse asked.
“My what?”
“Your design,” Tripwire said. “Your paint? Armor-tat? Second face?”
“You know, the stuff you paint on your armor to show who’s in it?” Jesse said.
“Any sign of individuality got punished,” Finn said. “If they knew you had any designator other than a serial number, they would punish you for using it. We were only allowed to take off the buckets to eat, sleep, bathe, and for medical purposes.”
Jesse looked more horrified than he had when Finn had told them about the fall of the Republic. Tripwire sat down slowly on the armor crate behind him. It was, Finn realized, the heart of the difference between the Old Republic's clones and the First Order's troopers. Both were mass-produced and conditioned for battle, both were disposable in the service of their nations, both were designed to be interchangeable.
But for the Clone Troopers, that uniformity had limits. As long as they could fight interchangeably, their thoughts could be as individual as they wanted … and so could their armor. That was … he needed to think about that.
“Well,” Tripwire said, with a determined voice, “here you can put whatever you want on your armor.”
“I wouldn’t even know where to begin,” Finn said. “Can’t you just … do something apropriate? Ordinary? The whole point is to blend in, so, you guys know more about what type of paint would blend in than I do.”
“Of course not!” Jesse said, voice rising in horror. “It’s your armor. Your paint! Your second face! Kriff, Finn, you just—you just don’t mess with another man’s paint!”
“So, I’ll think about it, figure something out,” Finn said. “Once I get a design, can one of you paint it? I don’t know how to paint.”
“What do you mean, you don’t know how?” Tripwire said. “It’s just regular paint. I know curved surfaces and plastoid take a little bit of getting used to, but it’s not that bad.”
“I’ve never painted anything before.”
“Well, it’s not that different than drawing, then. Just draw the outlines and fill them in.”
“I’ve never drawn anything before, either.”
There was a silence, for a bit, as the two clones digested that, faces drawn. Finn stood there awkwardly, not sure why they were so profoundly shocked by this. He got why never being allowed to take your armor off was horrifying; even he had known it was bad, back when he’d never had any experiences outside of the First Order. And the Resistance members, the few he’d talked about it with, they’d all agreed with him. But none of them had ever even mentioned anything about art. None of them really made art, that he knew of. But to Tripwire and Jesse, no artistic experience was unthinkable.
“Tempera used to be part of the training cadre, he’d know how to teach art,” Jesse said at last.
“All I’ve got is paint and markers for the armor,” Tripwire replied, “but I think the quartermaster has more. I KNOW he’s got tablets and styluses that are fitted with a basic drawing program.”
“Okay,” Finn said slowly. Looks like he was getting art lessons. It wasn’t very practical, but on the other hand, what else was he going to do while they waited? It’s not like they could send him out on missions, the clones had the regular garrison duties taken care of, and there were only so many hours per day that he could debrief.
The first thing they had done, once reaching Coruscant, was to give Bail every file they had about the contract that had produced the clone army.
"That is all that you know?" Bail asked incredulously, looking over the reports. "I've always known there was more to the story than the bare-bones account that the Senate was told, but I assumed you knew it and just didn't want to share for some reason. Classified for the war effort, possibly. But you never investigated it at all, did you, once you'd discovered it. A mysterious army was dropped in your lap just as war breaks out, and you never asked any questions."
"The Force moves in mysterious ways," Master Windu said stiffly, "and we had rather more immediate problems at the time. You yourself voted for the bill that gave the Jedi authority over the clone army, and turned us into officers. Since then, we have had very little to spare for investigative work."
"Yes, but I assumed I could trust your competence," Bail said, matching his tone. "From this, that doesn't seem to have been the case."
"Oversight is the Senate's responsibility," Master Windu replied. "Even if it had been classified, you had a right to ask—either in person or on the Senate floor—to see that the investigation had been done, even if you were not cleared to see the results. And what do you think would have happened, if we had refused to take command of the troops until the investigation was complete? Or if we had admitted publicly that one of our members had gone rogue and ordered this without our knowledge or wish? Or diverted significant attention from the war to continuing the investigation? You're the Senator, you tell me."
Bail sat back, stroking his beard. He hated to admit it, but Windu had a point. After Geonosis, the whole Republic had been caught up in war fever, so focused on the need to punish the Separatists that any delay or foot-dragging was seen as treason. And that was just public opinion; if Finn was correct, and Palpatine was a traitor bent on destroying the Jedi, he would certainly have been able to use any reluctance to his advantage. "So you chose expediency and political considerations over doing your job fully."
"Yes," Windu said. "And how many times, Senator, have you and your colleagues done the same?"
Bail nodded unwillingly.
"In any case, what's done is done," Windu said. "Recriminations at this stage will get us nowhere. We need proof of Palpatine's treason—or loyalty—and we need to make contingency plans."
"What did you have in mind?" Bail asked.
Ahsoka stepped off her ship and locked it, clasping her cloak firmly against the wind. The problem with going incognito on her own was that anyone who knew anything about Togruta could see that she wasn't fully mature yet. As a Jedi, she had become a legal adult when she was apprenticed. Young, and still needing supervision as far as the Jedi were concerned, but an adult as far as anybody else was concerned.
Undercover, without Jedi status, nobody who knew what an adult Togruta looked like would believe she was one. Her montrals were too small and stubby.
She hoped that as long as she kept her cloak up, nobody would notice. Or maybe mistake her for an adult of another species.
Ship locked and docking fees paid, she got herself a room for the night and began looking up medical supply companies. There should be a fair number—this planet was known in the region for its medical supply companies—and hopefully she'd find one she could order from over the holonet and have it delivered to her ship, with no need to talk to a sentient being who might remark on her age.
She couldn't wait for her montrals to get their full growth. Missions like this would be so much easier.
"The first step," Tempera said, "is just to get you used to creating." They were sitting side-by-side at a table, thankfully with no one else in the tent with them.
Finn was getting really tired of being stared at. He'd been stared at when he first joined the Resistance; it wasn't like they got defectors from the First Empire every day. But they'd all been busy, and nothing he could tell them about the First Order and how it treated Stormptroopers was a surprise to them, not really, and if First Order defectors were rare it wasn't as if they'd never happened.
Time travel made him absolutely unique, and most of what he'd told people about his life experiences was a horrifying shock, and they didn't have much to do until Commander Tano returned with the specialized equipment and droids needed for neurosurgery. They had a lot of time to stare at him. Tempera hadn't, so far; Jesse had talked to him about art lessons out of Finn's presence, and Tempera had been nothing but matter-of-fact since he'd shown up. It was a nice change.
Finn sighed and turned his attention to the functions of the tablet Tempera was showing him, how he could produce lines of different thicknesses and colors, how he could erase what he didn't like, and so on.
"Good," Tempera said, after quizzing Finn to make sure he remembered what he'd been shown. "Now draw whatever you want to draw. Scribbles and doodles and random stuff is fine, don't worry about whether it's good or not. You don't have to show it to me if you don't want to." He turned to his own tablet and began … doing something on it.
Finn pondered the instructions for a bit. "Tempera?" he said. He had an awful feeling this was going to start another round of horrified stares.
"Yes, Finn?" Tempera said, looking up from his tablet.
"What's 'scribbles and doodles'?"
Chapter 10
Chapter 1 on Dreamwidth
Chapter 2 on Dreamwidth
Chapter 3 on Dreamwidth
Chapter 4 on Dreamwidth
Chapter 5 on Dreamwidth
Chapter 6 on Dreamwidth
Chapter 7 on Dreamwidth
Chapter 8 on Dreamwidth
Chapter Nine
The armor … took some doing.
"I'm sorry, we don't have the equipment to fabricate or modify armor here, Sergeant," said the armorer, a Specialist named Tripwire. "And even if we did, I wouldn't know how to use it. Clone armor comes standard, and it fits like a glove because our bodies are all the same." The armory was a tent with one of its sides rolled up, situated next to the mess tent at the center of camp, just where it would have been in a First Order camp. Easy to get to, no matter where you were, if there was an unexpected need to rearm or change weapons load.
"But what about your Jedi?" Finn asked. "They don't have full armor, but they've at least got something. Or Kenobi and Skywalker do, at any rate."
"The Jedi get their armor from the Temple, not from me," Tripwire said. "Not that they wear much of it."
"And what happens if you gain weight? Or lose it, on a long campaign with fewer supplies?" Finn asked. "What happens if you get switched to a different job and your muscle configuration changes because your activity profile does?" Basic Stormtrooper conditioning was always the same, of course, but many specialties had additional special training or duties, and that always affected things.
Tripwire and Kano exchanged glances. "We're all fed the same thing, so any changes tend to be battalion-wide," Tripwire said.
"But if you can't modify the armor, all that means is that everyone's armor fits wrong," Finn pointed out.
"And while you can get food on the black market special, or sometimes when we're on a planet with markets and people are willing to trade with us, they strongly discourage anyone from eating enough to alter your functioning to any degree."
"Fair enough," Finn said; one of the happinesses he hadn't anticipated about leaving the First Order was getting to choose what he ate and when he ate it. "But you can't tell me that ARC troopers and regular troopers have the same musculature, much less pilots and ARC troopers."
"So?" Kano said.
"You're telling me that you still wear the same armor?" Finn demanded. "Doesn't it chafe?"
"Yeah, but armor isn't supposed to be comfortable," Tripwire said. "And that's part of the point of mass-produced soldiers. You can mass-produce the gear, too, and do you think the bean-counters on Coruscant care if it chafes a bit?"
Finn shook his head. "But it impedes efficiency. Oh, well, it’s not like I’m going to be trying to fight in it anyway.”
“If you have to, we’re all screwed,” Kano said.
“The bodysuit is going to be the real problem,” Tripwire said. “It doesn’t have a lot of give in it … and you’re a full two centimeters taller than a brother. It’d be easier if you were two centimeters shorter, instead.”
“The bodysuit is crawling up my ass,” Finn said, shifting uncomfortably. And it was chafing his dick. Two centimeters didn’t sound like much, but it was the difference between fitting perfectly and … not.
“Could we just cut it in half so it’s pants and a shirt?” Jesse asked. “It’d kill the temperature controls and some of the blaster protection, but it’s pretty temperate here and if he’s not going to be fighting …”
"If we need temperature controls, or are going to be in combat, I can change bodysuits," Finn said.
“Here’s the armor,” Tripwire said, handing over a standard armor crate, just like the ones Finn had used all his life before defecting. He felt a lump in his throat, and he couldn’t tell whether it was positive or negative.
“And here’s the paint and brushes,” Tripwire continued, bringing out a container and a package.
“What?” Finn asked.
“Say, what’s your design, anyway?” Jesse asked.
“My what?”
“Your design,” Tripwire said. “Your paint? Armor-tat? Second face?”
“You know, the stuff you paint on your armor to show who’s in it?” Jesse said.
“Any sign of individuality got punished,” Finn said. “If they knew you had any designator other than a serial number, they would punish you for using it. We were only allowed to take off the buckets to eat, sleep, bathe, and for medical purposes.”
Jesse looked more horrified than he had when Finn had told them about the fall of the Republic. Tripwire sat down slowly on the armor crate behind him. It was, Finn realized, the heart of the difference between the Old Republic's clones and the First Order's troopers. Both were mass-produced and conditioned for battle, both were disposable in the service of their nations, both were designed to be interchangeable.
But for the Clone Troopers, that uniformity had limits. As long as they could fight interchangeably, their thoughts could be as individual as they wanted … and so could their armor. That was … he needed to think about that.
“Well,” Tripwire said, with a determined voice, “here you can put whatever you want on your armor.”
“I wouldn’t even know where to begin,” Finn said. “Can’t you just … do something apropriate? Ordinary? The whole point is to blend in, so, you guys know more about what type of paint would blend in than I do.”
“Of course not!” Jesse said, voice rising in horror. “It’s your armor. Your paint! Your second face! Kriff, Finn, you just—you just don’t mess with another man’s paint!”
“So, I’ll think about it, figure something out,” Finn said. “Once I get a design, can one of you paint it? I don’t know how to paint.”
“What do you mean, you don’t know how?” Tripwire said. “It’s just regular paint. I know curved surfaces and plastoid take a little bit of getting used to, but it’s not that bad.”
“I’ve never painted anything before.”
“Well, it’s not that different than drawing, then. Just draw the outlines and fill them in.”
“I’ve never drawn anything before, either.”
There was a silence, for a bit, as the two clones digested that, faces drawn. Finn stood there awkwardly, not sure why they were so profoundly shocked by this. He got why never being allowed to take your armor off was horrifying; even he had known it was bad, back when he’d never had any experiences outside of the First Order. And the Resistance members, the few he’d talked about it with, they’d all agreed with him. But none of them had ever even mentioned anything about art. None of them really made art, that he knew of. But to Tripwire and Jesse, no artistic experience was unthinkable.
“Tempera used to be part of the training cadre, he’d know how to teach art,” Jesse said at last.
“All I’ve got is paint and markers for the armor,” Tripwire replied, “but I think the quartermaster has more. I KNOW he’s got tablets and styluses that are fitted with a basic drawing program.”
“Okay,” Finn said slowly. Looks like he was getting art lessons. It wasn’t very practical, but on the other hand, what else was he going to do while they waited? It’s not like they could send him out on missions, the clones had the regular garrison duties taken care of, and there were only so many hours per day that he could debrief.
The first thing they had done, once reaching Coruscant, was to give Bail every file they had about the contract that had produced the clone army.
"That is all that you know?" Bail asked incredulously, looking over the reports. "I've always known there was more to the story than the bare-bones account that the Senate was told, but I assumed you knew it and just didn't want to share for some reason. Classified for the war effort, possibly. But you never investigated it at all, did you, once you'd discovered it. A mysterious army was dropped in your lap just as war breaks out, and you never asked any questions."
"The Force moves in mysterious ways," Master Windu said stiffly, "and we had rather more immediate problems at the time. You yourself voted for the bill that gave the Jedi authority over the clone army, and turned us into officers. Since then, we have had very little to spare for investigative work."
"Yes, but I assumed I could trust your competence," Bail said, matching his tone. "From this, that doesn't seem to have been the case."
"Oversight is the Senate's responsibility," Master Windu replied. "Even if it had been classified, you had a right to ask—either in person or on the Senate floor—to see that the investigation had been done, even if you were not cleared to see the results. And what do you think would have happened, if we had refused to take command of the troops until the investigation was complete? Or if we had admitted publicly that one of our members had gone rogue and ordered this without our knowledge or wish? Or diverted significant attention from the war to continuing the investigation? You're the Senator, you tell me."
Bail sat back, stroking his beard. He hated to admit it, but Windu had a point. After Geonosis, the whole Republic had been caught up in war fever, so focused on the need to punish the Separatists that any delay or foot-dragging was seen as treason. And that was just public opinion; if Finn was correct, and Palpatine was a traitor bent on destroying the Jedi, he would certainly have been able to use any reluctance to his advantage. "So you chose expediency and political considerations over doing your job fully."
"Yes," Windu said. "And how many times, Senator, have you and your colleagues done the same?"
Bail nodded unwillingly.
"In any case, what's done is done," Windu said. "Recriminations at this stage will get us nowhere. We need proof of Palpatine's treason—or loyalty—and we need to make contingency plans."
"What did you have in mind?" Bail asked.
Ahsoka stepped off her ship and locked it, clasping her cloak firmly against the wind. The problem with going incognito on her own was that anyone who knew anything about Togruta could see that she wasn't fully mature yet. As a Jedi, she had become a legal adult when she was apprenticed. Young, and still needing supervision as far as the Jedi were concerned, but an adult as far as anybody else was concerned.
Undercover, without Jedi status, nobody who knew what an adult Togruta looked like would believe she was one. Her montrals were too small and stubby.
She hoped that as long as she kept her cloak up, nobody would notice. Or maybe mistake her for an adult of another species.
Ship locked and docking fees paid, she got herself a room for the night and began looking up medical supply companies. There should be a fair number—this planet was known in the region for its medical supply companies—and hopefully she'd find one she could order from over the holonet and have it delivered to her ship, with no need to talk to a sentient being who might remark on her age.
She couldn't wait for her montrals to get their full growth. Missions like this would be so much easier.
"The first step," Tempera said, "is just to get you used to creating." They were sitting side-by-side at a table, thankfully with no one else in the tent with them.
Finn was getting really tired of being stared at. He'd been stared at when he first joined the Resistance; it wasn't like they got defectors from the First Empire every day. But they'd all been busy, and nothing he could tell them about the First Order and how it treated Stormptroopers was a surprise to them, not really, and if First Order defectors were rare it wasn't as if they'd never happened.
Time travel made him absolutely unique, and most of what he'd told people about his life experiences was a horrifying shock, and they didn't have much to do until Commander Tano returned with the specialized equipment and droids needed for neurosurgery. They had a lot of time to stare at him. Tempera hadn't, so far; Jesse had talked to him about art lessons out of Finn's presence, and Tempera had been nothing but matter-of-fact since he'd shown up. It was a nice change.
Finn sighed and turned his attention to the functions of the tablet Tempera was showing him, how he could produce lines of different thicknesses and colors, how he could erase what he didn't like, and so on.
"Good," Tempera said, after quizzing Finn to make sure he remembered what he'd been shown. "Now draw whatever you want to draw. Scribbles and doodles and random stuff is fine, don't worry about whether it's good or not. You don't have to show it to me if you don't want to." He turned to his own tablet and began … doing something on it.
Finn pondered the instructions for a bit. "Tempera?" he said. He had an awful feeling this was going to start another round of horrified stares.
"Yes, Finn?" Tempera said, looking up from his tablet.
"What's 'scribbles and doodles'?"
Chapter 10
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Date: 2019-10-22 09:36 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2019-10-22 10:03 pm (UTC)From:... that's what they call "damning with faint praise."