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Who: Kanan Jarrus and you can too!
Broadcast: All
Action: On the Iskaulit
When: If you really try

[Kanan is sitting at the Málum on the Iskaulit, having himself a quiet drink as he contemplates the so-called Space Bar he passed getting to this particular alternate establishment. Neither one were quite like the cantina he used to work in back on Gorse and neither one of them had quite the crowds either. There was always a few here and there, but it would be a real stretch to ever call them packed. Which is what prompts him to take the time to look at the ship rosters.]

I've been looking at the ship rosters today. It looks like all of the ships in this fleet are at max capacity. Is that normal?

[It's not because he was trying to figure out a way to get himself and Hera on the same ship! It was just... professional curiosity. That's all.]

I also didn't bother with an introduction on my last broadcast. My name is Kanan. [And the part where he'd actually give anything about himself is abruptly not included when he decides to end the feed.]

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[He scowls.] For all we know, they were trying to liberate us from the real enemy. Just about now, I'd rather an enemy we could fight than all this.

[ peggy still holds out hope that the atroma can be fought in another way -- but she keeps that hunch to herself, feeling it's not so prudent to announce aloud. ]

Perhaps. But firing at us without any attempt at communication hardly seems like the act of a liberator.

No. Not your normal kind of diplomacy, anyway. But hey, I wasn't there. It could have been a lot of reasons.

[But he wants to know the reasons. It's frustrating having questions without answers.]

And, for my part, I'd barely been here all that long. But I was told it had happened before.

I see. [The more he learns about the place, the less he seems to know. Which when he thinks about it, that's probably the kind of thing Yoda would say.]

So what were you before all this? [From some of the things she had said in response to him before, he had a feeling she was from some pre-space world. But that hadn't stopped her from being on top of the situation regardless.]

[ i work for the telephone company is becoming a harder and harder lie to tell -- not least of all because she's beginning to feel for the plight of those caught up in this mess, and sometimes it simply feels better to offer a broader assurance than that. not that many even know what the s.s.r. is. or was. ]

I work for something called the Strategic Science Reserve, [ she explains with trepidation eating into her voice. how ridiculous that she should avoid saying it back home where the acronym had a chance of being known, but owns up to it here where it means nothing. ] Field work, mostly.

[ not so much of late, but she's a field agent at heart. ]

So... you do what, then? Go out and discover things for science?

[From the name, he could only assume it was some sort of scientific exploration detail. He knows that was a big thing back in the early days of the galaxy, but less common under the Empire. At least not in any capacity he was aware of.]

Something like that.

[ but more like she became a wrangler for the discoverers. the sort of person who keeps a careful eye on projects that could have benefited the war effort. and now? well, now it's all about the uncomfortable slow build of a fresh arms race with the soviets. ] How about you? [ she turns the question brusquely back onto him. ] What's a day in the life of you -- back home?

[... well, until now he's been sidestepping this question for the sake of those from his own galaxy. But there's not a whole lot of point in that now.]

Lately, it's been trying to outrun the Empire and trying to slow their influence. There's a handful of us that have banded together in open rebellion. So a day in the life is either smuggling supplies or trying to avoid being shot at. [A shrug.] I guess I'm just a fool for lost causes.

We all love an underdog, Kanan. [ no mister. nothing fancy. after all, it's the name he gave her. and she's beginning to settle into a more casual atmosphere provided by the fleet. pitching herself to its frequency. ] What's this Empire like, then? What makes it worth rebelling against?

Mostly, it's knowing what the Empire used to be. [But that's... quite the history lesson.] They've taken an expansionist policy since their inception. Systems that aren't willing to accept their 'protection' tend to have less than pleasant occupations. Even the ones that join the Empire willingly don't tend to fare too well if they're not among the core system.

[ an expansionist occupation. well, didn't that sound faintly familiar? peggy scowls, but not at him exactly. ]

Bullies. [ to put it mildly. ]

That's one way to put it. So we're standing against them.

[And it's about as dangerous as can be expected when they have no real support or army behind them.]

I know a little of what that's like. [ vague, and (perhaps) a little self-effacing. ] It takes guts.

It takes a lot of things. [Guts. Anger. Responsibility. Regret. Too many things.] What's your little look like?

A world war. And the mess it left behind. [ inequality and growing pains in a freshly scarred society. it isn't easy for anyone trying to fit back into the world they defended. ]

[War on any scale is never something to be taken lightly. A world without space travel would seem as overwhelming as the Clone Wars had been.]

It's always a mess. What replaces the old is sometimes worse than what you were fighting to begin with.

Millions, I suppose, left to fight. Those who came back returned to a world that had learned how to go on and manage without them. Tragic, really.

[ not that she'd ever advocate for a renewal of the conflict. but the aftermath has been so bungled -- and leads them ever deeper into fresh tension. ]

It wasn't like that in the last war. At least not entirely. The majority of the fighting was done by clones and droids.

[So, less men being sent out to die, but still a huge financial drain. Yet, still destructive and horrible enough to leave the galaxy in ruins.]

[ clones and droids. in theory, she understands the words -- can extrapolate their meaning. and at a very visceral level she feels incapable of thinking about such a conflict as though it were a war. but she understands that's a disservice to whatever cause kanan must support. ]

I don't doubt that'll be the end result of things in my world. Eventually. Superpowers are always racing each other to create the next best weapon.

[He's seen glimpses of what the Empire has been putting together enough to know that's true. He can't think of anything more intimidating than a Sith lord leading armies, but then he hasn't yet lived long enough to know what real destruction looks like.]

There was peace before, right? Before your world war.

Twenty-one years of it. A half-life, I suppose, of peace. [ she'd been born during peacetime, but peace had co-existed with the depression. a tricky existence in england, let alone back in america. ] I'm ashamed to say the war we just ended was the second great war of a century not yet half-finished.

Did you have a choice in joining the fight? [Two wars in quick succession like that was a lot, but Kanan supposed that this would be the fate of the Empire if the rebellion continued to gain influence.]

I did, but -- [ hmm. she bites down on her more venomous reply, understanding (at last) that there are worlds very different to her own. ] Only men were conscripted.

[ she keeps to herself that it doesn't adequately cover the many other people who were never soldiers but who were snapped up in the fighting. french villages and italian countryside. london, during the blitz. it's a reality that even america seems to forget from across their wide pond. but it's not a helpful thing to point out. ]

[That doesn't really surprise him. The clones were all made from a single male template and the current stormtrooper ranks were predominantly men.] But you still wanted a part of the action.

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