An open invitation

[ezra_of_lothal]

WHO: Ezra, other Jedi Temple residents, visitors, and spectators
WHERE: The Temba Jedi Temple and the area around it/former museum area
WHAT: Lightsaber practice and mingle OTA
WHEN: Several days after Billy’s spell breaks
WARNINGS: TBD (label threads if you can, please!)



Having his connection to the Force fully restored is strangely disorienting and unbalancing for Ezra, and he was never completely cut off from it. He can’t really imagine how his fellow Jedi, who now remember entire lives without sensing the Force, feel. So, for a few days, he does his chores, mediates a little, visits other people, and tries not to hover while the residents of the Temple area regain their inner footing.

Eventually, though, he gets a little restless. Maybe some focused movement with a purpose would help the other Jedi, too.

Network - Text

Lightsaber practice in the open area by the Temple area, early afternoon today. Myself and Master Kenobi at least, still working out details. I guess it’s never actually been said – people are welcome to come watch! It’s polite to stay quiet when there’s actual instruction going on, of course. Also, we’re usually working on lower power, but for safety please stay well back while blades are ignited.



It starts a little slow, warming up with katas, demonstrating and talking through sequences. Ezra’s particularly interested in learning more about Soresu, the defensive form for which Obi-wan had once been well known in the Order. He’s learned the fundamentals from Kanan, but getting to see Master Kenobi go all out in the salles at the Coruscant Temple had been enlightening.

Eventually they get around to the really fun stuff – practice duels. They should really do this on some varied terrain at some point, but for right now, it’s flashing blades, jumps, twirls and flips around the flat ground. Perfect for others to come watch and talk amongst themselves.

Ezra'a soon clearly in a much better mood, beaming as he extinguishes his green blade for a break.

Comments

[noch]

Based on how long she knows Cal has been here, "since the Agrii brought me over" could have been days or months ago, for all she knows. Her head tips slightly to the side, angled curiously, but her gaze lights up with real interest when he mentions his brothers. Interesting word choice, that.

"Your brothers?" she prompts.

[on_repeat]

"Troopers from the 13th Battalion," he explains in short order, drawing a circle in the air where his face is. "Clone troopers, I should say. They all look like me."

[noch]

Congrats, Echo, you managed to find the one resident of a galaxy far, far away who has no knowledge of clone troopers, and it's fairly obvious from her expression. Her brow furrows. "You are a clone?"

[on_repeat]

This is a first. Echo's momentary bafflement by the question turns over quickly. "I am," he says. "I'm human, but my brothers and I are based off of a genetic template of a bounty hunter the Kaminoans used to create the Grand Army of the Republic."

It's a loaded sentence, but it's the most condensed version of his history he can come up with on short notice.

[noch]

The Republic. That's familiar enough to her to connect a few dots. "You fought in the war," she says, realization in her tone. Not that she has much more knowledge than that—Dathomir was left to its own devices until it very suddenly wasn't, and she was just a child at the time. Mother Talzin would sometimes deal with off-worlders, and send some of her sisters off-planet to work as mercenaries, but that had mattered very little to her back then.

"It came to Dathomir when I was a child," she explains, but there's a slight wariness in her now. She... still doesn't actually know who it was that attacked Dathomir and cut down all of her sisters. "Though there were only droids."

[on_repeat]

Echo nods. "Still fighting, in my time," he says, the smile not quite reaching his eyes. "Although I've already been filled in on what happened..."

Dathomir is a name he doesn't recognize, but his expression hardens at the thought of invasion on a planet that had no involvement in the war itself. For all he knows, civilians – even magick-using ones – should be protected, not harmed. "They were battle droids. They make up the Separatist army, and we clones fight them on all fronts."

[noch]

"I see." Separatists. She nods—yes, she remembers something about that. Not for the first time, she wishes that she'd had more exposure to the galaxy outside Dathomir, if only so she didn't have to be so ignorant—but Mother Talzin had kept their coven mostly isolated. If they were uninvolved with the galaxy, then shouldn't the galaxy have stayed uninvolved with them?

"Then you knew Cal, from the war?" she asks, perhaps a little naively. But the Jedi served in the war—she knows that much, even if she doesn't know much else.

[on_repeat]

He doesn't blame her for not knowing too much about the war. Even if it is spread across the galaxy, there are plenty of planets that have been in the same position as Dathomir.

Echo chuckles – not to be mean, never to be mean. He just wasn't expecting it. "I've never met Cal during the war," he says, briefly glancing back over to see if the duel is still going. "There were many Jedi. They all had different ships and different clone units to command, so we weren't always on the same fronts. And then there's the matter of years..."

[noch]

Ah, of course. If the war spanned so much of the galaxy, then it must've involved... many troops. (Thousands? Millions? The idea is a little mind-boggling to her, honestly, as someone who could name every single one of her mothers and sisters.) The Jedi Order must have been a much larger organization than she thought.

She's learning new things every day around here. "Years?" she echoes curiously.

[on_repeat]

So many. Echo doesn't know every single clone, and despite the fact they're all the same person he still considers them brothers. It's a complicated matter.

He shrugs, admitting as much. "That's what I'm assuming, anyway. I actually don't know how long the war goes on for. But if things have turned out the way they have, it hasn't been long at all."

[noch]

The way they have... he must be talking about the Jedi Purge, and this Empire that rose in place of the Republic. The day sticks out in her memory as the day that Taron Malicos had crash-landed on Dathomir—something that had broken up the unending repetition of laying her sisters to rest.

How strange it must be for him, still fighting a war that he now knows the inevitable conclusion of. But they've only just met—maybe she should save more war talk for their second conversation, at the very least.

Instead, she takes a different tack with something that piqued her interest earlier. "You called them your brothers, even though you are clones."

[on_repeat]

He could say it didn't bother him as much anymore, but he would be lying to himself. After all, there were plenty of gaps in the timeline that stayed empty. Details he refrained from asking about.

There's silent gratitude toward the shift in interest, however. "It won't make much sense to anyone who isn't a clone," he shrugs. "First thing we learn during training is to never leave a brother behind. We're all in the war together, so we may as well tolerate each other." Although he laughs, it's halfhearted, giving way to some seriousness when he adds, "But we forge strong bonds. And you can always count on having someone watching your back while you watch theirs. Like a really large, extended family."

As he questions that description, he looks at Merrin. "Do you have any brothers? Sisters?"

[noch]

It's unexpectedly... nice, hearing him talk about his brothers this way. Knowing that these clones were able to form a family. After all, she knows exactly what it's like to have that kind of support—they may not have all been blood-related, or always gotten along, but Merrin always knew, with absolute certainty, that she could rely on her sisters to protect her.

And she also knows what it's like to lose that. She can only hope the clones don't have to go through the same thing, in the future—maybe she'll ask Cal.

"It makes sense to me," she says, and there's a weighty quality to her tone, her expression softening. "I had many sisters and mothers. My coven. Our bonds were like yours—very strong, though we were not all related by blood."

[on_repeat]

To be fair, Echo had never talked to many people who weren't clones. The Kaminoans were languid, yet aloof. The bounty hunters who stayed on Kamino to train the remaining troops weren't interested in anything more than the credits they were being paid as compensation. The Jedi were their Generals and Commanders, but they were open to listening and learning more about them, trading their share of stories whenever there was a chance to do so.

Now that he thinks about it, there isn't much time with the war still going on. And although he's told several others in Temba about this, being able to relate on this level without getting weird looks is nice.

He smiles, pairing it with a loose shrug. "Still counts as a family."