Canderous Ordo (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
theheartofwar) wrote2019-01-14 12:39 am
theheartofwar) wrote2019-01-14 12:39 am
for therevanchist
Canderous had once heard Kashyyyk's ecology described somewhere as a layered deathtrap.
Wasn't inaccurate, now that he'd actually spent some time on it. Couldn't say that he was displeased either, to find out that it was true.
Canderous wasn't in a good mood. Not since Jagi's challenge on the dunes, the attack on his honor that he had to address. Prepared for blood to spill on the sand, whoever it came out to be - and he had no intention of it being his. She asked why, but it was almost impossible to explain to a non-Mandalorian. Except Khaar had found another way, didn't she?
He hadn't really touched the thought since. Not just yet. Still, there was plenty on this planet to do, to keep a Mandalorian busy.
"We should have considered this world a little more carefully when looking for targets, if you ask me," he announces, hauling part of a kinrath corpse over his shoulder as he trudges back into camp, mud and much more splattered all over his boots and front. "It would've cleared these damn forests, and these annoying bugs."
But despite his words, there's no real heat or irritation in them. In fact, he sounds like he's in a better mood. At least these actual bugs were a better challenge than the ones he had been crushing under his boot on Taris. He heads straight for the campfire and dumps it on the ground, the corpse already half charred and blasted to bits, courtesy of Ordo's repeating blaster. They're loosely clustered together, a testament to his accuracy with a weapon that's generally meant to be mounted on combat vehicles. He gives the remains a companionable, quietly satisfied pat.
"Think we can eat this thing?"
Wasn't inaccurate, now that he'd actually spent some time on it. Couldn't say that he was displeased either, to find out that it was true.
Canderous wasn't in a good mood. Not since Jagi's challenge on the dunes, the attack on his honor that he had to address. Prepared for blood to spill on the sand, whoever it came out to be - and he had no intention of it being his. She asked why, but it was almost impossible to explain to a non-Mandalorian. Except Khaar had found another way, didn't she?
He hadn't really touched the thought since. Not just yet. Still, there was plenty on this planet to do, to keep a Mandalorian busy.
"We should have considered this world a little more carefully when looking for targets, if you ask me," he announces, hauling part of a kinrath corpse over his shoulder as he trudges back into camp, mud and much more splattered all over his boots and front. "It would've cleared these damn forests, and these annoying bugs."
But despite his words, there's no real heat or irritation in them. In fact, he sounds like he's in a better mood. At least these actual bugs were a better challenge than the ones he had been crushing under his boot on Taris. He heads straight for the campfire and dumps it on the ground, the corpse already half charred and blasted to bits, courtesy of Ordo's repeating blaster. They're loosely clustered together, a testament to his accuracy with a weapon that's generally meant to be mounted on combat vehicles. He gives the remains a companionable, quietly satisfied pat.
"Think we can eat this thing?"
no subject
She feels animal minds outside the circle of the fire, confused by and wary of more light than they've ever seen in their short, brutal lives. She feels the fathomless presence of Kashyyyk itself, like she's resting on the bottom of an ocean of the Force. The others had wondered (aloud, and to his face) if Jolee were insane, to be down here where it's so dangerous. Maybe he is, but not for that reason. No Force-user could be disturbed by this place for long. It's too fully alive, too rich with the Force to be anything but welcoming. Nothing here could possibly challenge her when she can simply fall back into that inexhaustible power. She also feels Canderous's familiar presence approaching before he emerges from the darkness and drops most of a kinrath near the fire, where she can't help but smell the thing.
"Aww, do you want me to squash the bugs for you?" Marila doesn't stir from her spot on the ground. If he's going to haul giant insect corpses back to camp like it's something to be proud of, he can stand a little teasing. "Damn near everything on Kashyyyk is toxic, so I'm going to let you be the one test that hypothesis."
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"Good point. I'll go ask that crazy old Jedi of yours if it's not a waste, but you can always feed it to the Wookie. If he's survived down here that long, he should know."
Dying of food poisoning shitting himself isn't exactly the honorable death he had envisioned, though he had seen it happen before. Poor bastards. Poor, dumb bastards. He crouches down easily next to the fire, taking the opportunity to take out a pebble in his boot that had been bothering him for the last hour. He could have removed it earlier, of course, but it was dangerous to leave yourself unguarded for even ten seconds out there.
"If you were a Mandalorian, that poor excuse for a watch would have gotten you blasted on the spot, hah! Not the first time I'd seen that happen."
He gives his boot another business-like shake.
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"Duly noted," she says instead, amicably but in the same intonation she'd have used for 'I don't care.' The Mandalorians lost decisively to to Jedi, if he'll recall. "Feel free to try to blast me if it'll make you feel better."
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Wasn't much risk of that, as much as some people thought otherwise. The only face in danger of being blasted was his own, out of sheer boredom, and maybe Mission if he caught that kid trying to pilfer another one of his knives again. And Onasi, if that Republic solider could finally muster up the guts to attack him like he'd clearly wanted to but was too much of a coward to.
He thumps the sole of the boot, and the rock finally rattles loose, and tumbles out with a tink. "Heh," he says, pleased. Then puts it back on.
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Regardless what Carth and Bastila think of Canderous, Marila feels perfectly safe around him. Unlike most of the crew of the Hawk, her included, he has a functioning sense of self-preservation, so there's no way he'll try anything on her. Besides, on a deeper level she understands him. She disagrees with him, but somehow, hearing him talk about Mandalorian culture feels like being reminded of something she'd already known, the same way learning about the Jedi had.
Knowing things without trying keeps coming in handy, like just now when she'd passed the test to get by that stubborn computer guarding the Star Map or back on Tatooine where she'd tied Jagi in a philosophical knot so tight he could only see one way out, but those effortless victories disturb her even as she revels in them. The part of her that never drops its guard, the part Canderous would approve of if he knew it existed, won't let Marila rest easy. It says no mastery comes without cost. It says if she's not paying now, the bill will come due with interest one day.
"Canderous," she says, her sudden seriousness signaling a change of subject, "you fought the Jedi for years. What's their game?"
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"If you're asking me why I think they're sending you on this quest, I couldn't say," he says, frankly. "The Jedi I fought were different. Much different. They were the ones who sailed out to fight against us, who followed Revan into battle as she led them into the single greatest war we Mandalorians have ever known."
"The ones left behind were the dregs, the useless and the cowardly. Like Bastila," he says, with a nod in her general direction, never mind that Bastila might have been a teenager when it happened. Not an excuse in his eyes. "And your Council, clinging to their vaunted Jedi code of peace and inaction. I have little interest in understanding the minds of cowards and fools."
Thanks Canderous, that's really helpful.
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"The Council is, too. They're just better at hiding it. I--" she stops, lips pursed, and shakes her head, not sure how to articulate what she's thinking. "There's something I'm missing, but it's like looking at the horizon on Tatooine. Anytime I feel like I'm getting close, the water's not there anymore."
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An interesting analogy. He immediately understands it though, which might have been her intention. Maybe she just needs a different perspective to help her get there.
"You think they're trying to screw you?" he outright offers. "There's something big they're not telling you, that's obvious. Personally, I wouldn't trust them as far as you could throw them. Any of them." Which could still be pretty far, admittedly. "Desperate men without courage make stupid decisions in war. What might seem inexplicably reckless, often is. Especially if they're on the losing side."
His advice is given with an air of take it or leave it, with a side-helping of vague implications that he's learned from personal experience over a long life, as usual.
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"I should be as out of my depth as Bastila. They have no reason at all to think I'm going to survive this, much less succeed at it." And yet she hasn't only survived. She's succeeding. "There's crazy gambles, and then there's whatever the hell is going on here. I want to know what that is before it bites me in the ass."
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Canderous reaches for his combat knife at his side, the one as big as his forearm, and gets to work trying to hack down the Kinrath corpse into something more manageable. And palatable. Might as well get some busywork done while they're yapping.
"Maybe that's - [thunk] - exactly what they think. I'd say you're more expendable to them, considering how few of them there are - [thunk] - left, but that doesn't explain why they'd send off that spoiled Jedi - [thunk] - princess with you. She's important to them, if anything. It'd have to be a hell of a card up their sleeve."
Hm. This is getting messy. He examines his handiwork with a critical eye.
"You could try to corner Bastila, or Organa. I'd try your luck with Bastila first. Get her good and flustered, she might let something slip."
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"Bastila squared off with Revan, and Bastila's the one who walked away afterward," she points out, remembering the vision that's been haunting her since their escape from Taris. Bastila and the strike team had an assist from Malak, sure, but that's still not a claim a lot of people can make. "She's green, but she's not a coward...and I've already tried cornering her." Come on, Canderous. Have a little faith. "She's easy to wind up but hard to get anything out of."
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Two strikes. First for being captured, then not escaping immediately, from Black Vulkars. They're the ones who talked up a big game about not paying, then turned tail and ran just by Canderous showing up around the corner. He still doesn't have much love for Bastila, that's very evident.
"How somebody like her is responsible for defeating the greatest single warrior the Republic has ever known, I'll never understand," he growls.
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She shakes her head as she paces the indistinct border where the firelight fades into the unending night of Kashyyyk's forest floor. "And I don't know if Revan's really been defeated. She might be dead but she's sure not gone."
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"Yeah?"
Dead, but not gone or defeated - Canderous understands. She's obviously been thinking about this for a while, by the way she's pacing, so he waits patiently for her to go on.
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"She hit you--" Marila jabs a finger at Canderous "--so hard you shattered, did the same to the Jedi, and was well on her way to adding the Republic to the list. Even if we stop the Sith, the galaxy will be picking up the pieces for decades. If we don't..." She trails of with a shrug. If they fail in their attempt, none of them will be around to see the results, but a new Sith Empire hardly counts as Revan being defeated.
"Hell, this fool's errand of ours amounts to chasing her down, and she's been dead for months." Marila gestures widely at the forest around them. Being on Kashyyyk at all is ridiculous. Being on Kashyyyk's surface is beyond ridiculous.
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"It's impossible for one such as Revan to be truly gone. Only when the last coward who fled at the sight of her soldiers are dead, when the last living refugees, opponents, and survivors can hear her name and feel no fear - just a faded remembrance - will she be gone. Revan is dead, yes, but an... exceptional warrior like her isn't so easily forgotten in the hearts and minds of men."
The admiration is right there in his voice, no need to dig for it or anything.
"She carved a swathe across the galaxy, and the fires she set are burning yet. Is it really any wonder that we see the smoke of her ghost still?"