Your regularly scheduled creepy visitor

[killedwithlove]

Who: Cole and anyone who needs him... or wants to chat to him
Broadcast: No
Action: On any ship except Marsiva, Tourist or Red Fish because he avoids visiting two and can't visit the third.
When: While the fleet is moving and probably a bit after

[There is this thing Cole does.

He visits other ships. Sometimes he put the Pathstone alongside to visit and sometimes he takes a shuttle, but he's constantly wandering all over the fleet, being with people, circulating.

He hasn't done it in a while. He got a nasty fright and went into hiding for a while.

But the creepy psychic being is back! Sticking his large nose into all the business.]

Comments

[ Huntress ]

[beardstrokes]

[ Obi-Wan had been checking his guitar strings and sliding it back over his back when he spots Cole. He gives the man a genuine smile. ]

Hello Cole.

[killedwithlove]

Hello.

[Cole gives a very small smile in return. He's always calmer with Obi-Wan, drifting towards Compassion more than he usually does.]

You're less conflicted than you were about Anakin.

[beardstrokes]

[ Wryly. ] I never thought that possible.

He seems to be doing fine, for the most part. And he has a lot of support.

[ Not any of them being Obi-Wan but he's not the kind of person to get upset about that. He's glad Padme and Ahsoka are there for him. ]

[killedwithlove]

I did say less conflicted, not not conflicted.

[There is a bit of a cheeky glint to his gaze as he says it.]

I spoke to him on the communicator. He worried about me. He is kind but-

[But. There's something that Cole can't quite catch, or hasn't managed to catch at these distances. Something foreign to Cole, something so not Compassion that he can't understand it.]

The Clone Wars isn't a very catchy name.

[beardstrokes]

No, it isn't but it wasn't my idea.

[ He's confused by the change of topic. ] What about the Clone Wars?

[killedwithlove]

In history. The Clone Wars is very matter of fact, but it wasn't just clones, was it? It was clones and droids and Jedi and Sith and people. So many people.

Bright stars and black stars.

[beardstrokes]

[ He nods, understanding clearing up his face. ]

It's only a name. But it was larger than the Clones and the Jedi.

[killedwithlove]

No. It's not just a name.

Names matter. Names shape things. Thoughts. Memories. Stories.

... what is a clone?

[beardstrokes]

A clone is someone made from genetic material. Essentially a copy of another person.

[killedwithlove]

I don't understand.

[He tried to wrap his mind around it and reaches, for him, the logical conclusion.]

Oh. I'm a clone.

[Nearly, sweetie, but no cigar.]

[beardstrokes]

[ Obi-Wan blinks, surprised. ]

Are you sure?

[killedwithlove]

I'm not Cole... but I have all his memories and I look like him. I became him.

[beardstrokes]

[ Ah. Obi-Wan shakes his head. ]

That doesn't make you a clone. You have to be a genetic match, not an emotional one. The Clones bear very little mental resemblance to Jango Fett.

[killedwithlove]

I look exactly like him. Well, not exactly. He was thinner. Much thinner. Then he died.

[Cole is still painfully underweight for his size, but he's not actively emaciated, nor showing the signs of malnutrition like the original Cole.]

I don't understand genetic.

[beardstrokes]

[ He pauses, thinking. ]

It means your body is the same as his.

How did you become him?

[killedwithlove]

Hm.

[He flickers across the room to Obi-Wan, brackish dark smoke curling around him.]

I don't know. He was dying. He needed someone, anyone, he needed comfort. I was the only one who could help him, and I help people, so that was what I did. I came through to help him, hold him, tell him he wasn't alone and forgotten.

Then he died and... fuzzy. I don't know. Horror. Pain. Despair. Loss, loss of me, of him, mortals stop being, not like spirits, they stop and leave and there's a thing left behind. Like moving out, but gone.

It hurt, maybe. But the Spire hurt more.

[He pauses.]

But the hat is all mine.

[beardstrokes]

I don't think that makes you a clone. At least not in the literal sense.

[ Though Obi-Wan isn't completely sure what happened. ]

[killedwithlove]

[Cole's existence has baffled some of the foremost spirit experts in his world. It's okay to be lost and confused, that's the normal state of anyone trying to deal with Cole.]

So what is a clone then? Someone who looks like someone else...?

[beardstrokes]

[ He nods. ]

Essentially. The idea is we can hone the talents from the original and improve on them. Making them soldiers.

[killedwithlove]

You take clones and make them be better at fighting and then make them soldiers.

... what if they don't want to be soldiers? What if they want to be artists? Or black smiths? Or farmers?

[beardstrokes]

[ Obi-Wan shakes his head sadly. ]

They don't get to make that choice and neither do I. At least, the clones I've worked with . . . have never resented that of me.

[killedwithlove]

... I don't understand.

He doesn't. It's clear on his face, he doesn't understand at all.

Mages don't choose to be mages...? Like that?

[beardstrokes]

No, I mean. They don't get to choose. They're taught to be soldiers.

[killedwithlove]

But you're not meant to make children into soldiers. It's wrong. Children should be children.

[beardstrokes]

[ He shakes his head. He's not disagreeing but it's more complicated than that. ]

Clones don't age the same way people do. And I said, that decision is not mine to make.