World Tree MUSH

  After the last major mission, the old general has retired to the decks of the Salvation to put her battered starship into drydock and get some real repairs done. The same offer had been extended to The Mandalorian; the offer was grudging until Juno's name and rank came up. Then it was yes, sir and anything you need, sir.

  Seems she has a lot of pull in spite of her former Imperial ties. The Salvation is as much of a scarred veteran as its former captain, but they always make sure the Rebel Alliance firebird's paint is fresh. They also immediately snap to attention wherever Juno goes.

  Today the Rogue Shadow is docked near the aft of the ship. It's quieter here and people are more inclined to stay out of Juno's hair. The ship is braced aloft by drydock struts, and a full quarter of it is stripped away. Pieces of the Rogue Shadow lie strewn in obsessively orderly groupings that could be a starship magazine's centerfold.

  Inside, it's not so pretty. The sound of a welding torch hisses and spits in time to the crackling curses of its captain, crammed into a crawlspace as she sweats and struggles with the ship.

  Sometimes it seems like Juno and the Rogue Shadow are both kept aloft by sheer spite and stubbornness alone.

    So it turns out Juno does have some pull with the Rebellion, huh. That title of General isn't just for show, is it? Nevertheless, Mando ended up taking Juno up on the offer for a berth for the Razor Crest.
    It's not long before the heavy clink of beskar armor and boot spurs resound through the dock as he makes his way to the Rogue Shadow, the tiny form of The Child ambling at his side as the pair halt at the entrance to that crawlspace where Juno does her most meticulous of welding jobs.
    And curses up a storm.
    "... How's the rib?"

  To go by the way these guys jump into line and salute her when she walks down the corridor, Juno's title is very much not just for show. She wears the rank sigils on her belt buckle. They're not just decoration; the scarred campaigner has earned every inch of them.

  The welding torch sputters again. A string of profound profanity follows, and the precise clipping of an Imperial accent make it sound that much more ridiculous. Even when she's incoherently angry, Juno is still coherent. Her speech is still precise. Which probably speaks volumes to how efficiently Gideon short-circuited that meticulously careful mind of hers.

  At the sound of Mando's voice, there comes the heavy clang of a tool or two being tossed aside, to land on the durasteel deck plating of the cargo bay. "Hurts like hell," comes the muffled voice from inside the access hatch, "but this won't get itself done."

  The torch sputters again, and blue-white light flickers from inside the cavity. After a few seconds, Juno pulls herself out of the crawlspace, climbing down and landing stiffly on the deck plating. She's down to just a halter top and dark pants, combat boots, and heavy gloves meant for welding. The lack of sleeves demonstrates that she has the scars to back up her service history.

  Juno reaches up and tosses the welding mask aside, setting the torch down. She glances from Mando to the Child, and despite her earlier display, she doesn't feel particularly angry. She just feels hollow; a weariness of the soul as much as the body. "Good enough for now." A hydrospanner follows the torch, clanging loudly as it rings against the deck plating. "What can I do for you two?"

  Going by the look on her face, she has some notion of why he's here.

    Mando and The Child wait. They wait pretty patiently while Juno emerges from her welding hole to greet them while putting her work on hold. The Child stares up at her rather intently as she finally sets the torch down, big ears perked curiously and head following the motion of the tossed spanner.
    "We should talk." It's Mando that actually speaks up. Between the two of them he's the only one who can, anyway, as he sets a hand on his hip.
    "So."
    So, indeed, as a silence falls for a few long beats before he just up and asks what's on his mind.
    "How does someone go from being an ex-Imperial to a General with the Rebellion?"

  We should talk. The flick of Juno's hand suggests she knew this was coming. Wearily, she drags herself aboard the ship, beckoning for Mando and The Child to follow. She doesn't take them all the way to the cockpit, but to the booth and table amidships, bolted firmly to the bulkhead. It's a place to eat while in hyperspace, or to fiddle with small machinery.

  Somewhere along the way she manages to pick up a durasteel cup of stimtea. She probably left it here earlier. It's fragrant and she looks a little surprised that it's still hot. Slumping, Juno casts a weary, red-rimmed eye up at the bounty hunter. "How far back do you want me to go? This can get... complicated."

    Complicated, she says.
    It can't be more complicated than just how Gideon knew almost everything there was to know about everyone that had been on Nevarro that day. Neveretheless, The Mandalorian and The Child follow, with Mando settling into the booth as Juno does.
    "Call me curious." He says. "Let's start from the beginning." He decides, plucking The Child up off the floor to set the little womprat in the seat next to him.

  "I was born in Corulag," Juno begins, taking a drink of tea before setting the cup down. "After my mother was killed, I enrolled in the Imperial Academy. I trained as a TIE fighter pilot, although I flew bombers, too. When my service record didn't impress my father, I signed up for the first Star Destroyer posting I was eligible for."

  She swills the tea around, before ducking down into a cabinet. She comes up with a bottle of water and a smooth durasteel cup, pouring some in and offering it to the Child. Of course, there's no telling if the little guy even likes water, but it is pretty warm aboard the ship. The engines are running intermittently when she needs to run diagnostics, so it's pretty hot even in the main bay.

  "My service record spoke for itself, and Vader assigned me to captain his personal TIE squadron, the Black Eights. I led the Bombing of Callos; what was supposed to be a routine run to suppress rebellion in the region. Vader used Callos as an example. When I tried to argue for clemency, he tricked me into leading an assault on the planetary reactor."

  She wraps her hands around the steaming cup. "That was it for Callos."

    It's a story that starts like many. Enrolling in the Imperial Academy. It's where a lot of pilots learn their skills with a ship. Probably not the first time Mando has heard that beginning, and the beskar helmet dips in a nod.
    It's what follows that's new, different, and unexpected. And as Juno pours a mug of water for the tiny tyke- who picks it up with both hands and begins quietly chugging, Mando remains silent, listening intently.
    That was it for Callos.
    "Go on."

  Those blue eyes flick over to the toddler as he picks up the cup with both hands, quietly chugging water. Although Juno betrays nothing outwardly, he'll probably feel her melt a little. Awww. That is so adorable. She's quick to return to her story, though, when he beckons her to continue.

  "When I returned from the sortie I commed a friend in the environmental sciences and confirmed what I'd already known. Destroying the reactor loosed a runaway chain reaction. Callos' forests would be reduced to a toxic wasteland in a matter of weeks, the whole of the planet sterilized in a matter of weeks." Juno pauses to sip at her tea. "Still toxic to this day, too."

  "After that, I was assigned to pilot for one of Vader's agents." At this point in the story, The Child might sense a shift in tone. Her emotions shift. She stands on the edge of something very deep; a miasma of despair, grief, loss, and pain that she keeps tightly lidded. Aspects of it are still raw after thirty-five years. Her voice drops. "His callsign was Starkiller." Pain. "His name was Galen Marek." More pain. Softer, "But he found that out later."

  "Vader was playing heads-up power games with the Emperor, and Starkiller was his bargaining chip. When he made a gambit and it failed, Starkiller was sacrificed as a loose end. I was imprisoned aboard the Empirical as a traitor. Starkiller was supposedly killed, but Vader secretly had him resurrected there. When somebody or something attempted to shift the Empirical's orbit into the star it was orbiting, he and PROXY only just managed to get me out of there in time."

  "From there... we looked for rebels. We looked for Jedi. Galen needed to learn the things that Vader couldn't teach him." She smiles, sad but fond; there's no mistaking, to the Child, the affection that brushes her mind when she speaks of the martyred agent. "Turned out he was only following Vader's instructions and almost got us both killed again. This time... this time he saw the error of his ways."

  "Vader always lies. When I dug him out of Corellia's snow, this time we sought to build a real rebellion. Nobody had worked up the guts to stand up to the Empire, yet. This was maybe... I don't know what kind of calendar system you're using, but this was all probably... one year before the Battle of Yavin, or maybe within the year...?" Juno scratches her jaw as she considers.

  Eventually she shakes her head. "Anyway. Jedi Master Rahm Kota got us involved with the beginnings of the rebellion. His contact, Senator Bail Organa, wanted someone to rescue a package for him." Her lips thin in amusement. "The 'package' was his daughter, Princess Leia Organa. We helped her settle matters on Kashyyyk and gave the wookies a chance to disappear, before the Empire sucked them all up as slave labour for the Death Star."

  Another sip of tea, and she leans back in her side of the booth. "That's how we--I--know General Leia. That's how I have a place in the Rebel Alliance. If I didn't know her, I'd be rotting in a brig somewhere. Or dead."

  "Where was I? The Emperor managed to round up the fledgling leadership of the Rebel Alliance, and so we left for the Death Star, where they were being held." Juno's tone turns a little leaden. "Galen was able to get them back to safety, and I made sure they were aboard the ship." Her voice lowers further. "But he was caught by Palpatine. Galen..." The scarred campaigner sighs. "He... he didn't make it out."

    The little sprat can feel it. Juno melting. It earns a curious stare as he sets the mug down. But that's not all he can feel. Every twist and turn of her emotions are like a roller coaster for the tiny tyke while his guardian listens in stoic silence.
    Callos is gone. And subsequently the assignment to Starkiller- Galen Marek- is taken in quietly while The Child alternates looking from Mandalorian to General and back.
    Power games are the games of the stih, and the less Mando has to deal with them personally, the better. 
    "But Vader is dead now." He ventures. "He died with the empire. In your universe and mine." He says before pausing. "Didn't he?"
    Nevertheless he falls silent again.
    Galen didn't survive his encounter with The Emperor.
    There's a long beat of silence; the man's expression unreadable behind his beskar mask. Before he ventures to speak again.
    "I'm sorry."

  "We knew the risks." To Mando's apology she looks up, dully. The stimulants are wearing off. She puffs a sigh, fluttering silver-frosted bangs. "When his luck ran out, Galen chose to die on his feet rather than live on his knees. I can't say I'd have done differently."

  "Vader? Yes. Emperor Palpatine, too." Blue eyes slant down. Juno swills the dregs of her tea, mouth twisting. "Small favours." Her sense of loss is profound. Thirty-five years of hardship and loss with a broken heart out of the gate could shatter anyone.

  "I think General Leia knew I was never Imperial at heart. Kota, too. He knew who we were, but he helped us anyway." Her soft laugh is fond. "I spent a lot of time cleaning up his messes, but I have to admit I learned a lot from him. He was always there for me when I needed help."

  Juno leans down to retrieve the water bottle, helpfully topping off The Child's cup. Her smile is tentative; fleeting.

  "After Galen..." Just a peek into that empty abyss; just a peek. Juno recovers with a dry swallow. "General Leia chose the Marek family crest as our banner, when the charter of the Rebel Alliance was signed into being. My signature is on that document, too, as a witness."

    It's true then. Vader and The Emperor died with the last blow to the Empire. It's too bad the rest of the Imps couldn't see the folly in continuing with something that's well and dead. But then again, men like Gideon aren't the type to let go of power easily.
    "I think." Mando begins to say haltingly. "I think I can see why.".
    This he doesn't elaborate for a moment before that helmet gives a slow shake.
    "You're not defined by your past." He says slowly. "I thought it would be a problem when I found out you were an ex Imperial. But now I don't think it's much of an issue. That's not you."
    "So that's what the Rebel symbol is, huh."

  "No. I'm not," Juno agrees. "I used to think that the Imperial Navy could become my family, when I left my real one behind. Callos became a most illustrative catalyst on the errors of my ways. The Rebellion became my family instead; united in shared purpose."

  She shakes her head, slowly, absently twirling her cup. More water is held up and offered to The Child, but he seems just fine for the moment, so she puts it away. "I could never prove it, but I'm fairly certain my mother was intentionally killed by crossfire between hostile groups on Corulag."

  "My father was never the same after that. He withdraw. He still revered the Empire, though, so I thought I could win back his regard by applying myself." Juno shrugs, loose-limbed. "I was the youngest ever accepted in the Corulag Imperial Academy. He never even showed up for my graduation ceremony. So, I took the first assignment aboard a Star Destroyer out of there, and I never looked back."

  She leans back in her bench, bracing her arms over the back of the seat with a weary sigh. "I was furious, at the time, and applied myself even more... but Imperial service always made me just a little uneasy." The old general laughs, low. "How ironic that I wouldn't feel like I had a place to belong until Galen and I gave everything up."

  "That's right." The Rebel sigil is the firebird. Juno leans her head back, to rest it against the back of the seat cushion. "It's a firebird, rising from its own ashes. Aside from the fact that it was tied to Galen, General Leia and Senator Mon Mothma both thought it was appropriate."

    "The firebird, huh." The Mandalorian muses softly to himself. Though for now The Child is good on water, the little womprat is still staring rather intently. After Callos, after her father's adherence to Imperial dogma, and after her time in the Black Eights, The Mandalorian isn't much surprised by just how... Weary Juno is.
    "Family, huh." Muttered lowly. "Like the Mandalorians were for me." He admits. "I was. Glad they took me in." He says.

  Although he stares, there is no answer to The Child's regard. There is no answer, either, to the quiet words muttered by the bounty hunter.

  That abyss of grief, mourning, and rage has banked from an inferno to glowing coals. It may be sparked back into a firestorm, but for the moment Juno's mind is softer against The Child's heightened sensitivities. Relief, even if only temporary.

  She does not mean to frighten him, though. By this point she's already proven the kinds of lengths she's willing to go in defense of one tiny life. Her experiences have both shaped her, tempered her, and broken her: The volatile cocktail that exists below the surface is only an unconscious reflection of that.

  Juno doesn't answer Mando or The Child; as she's considered, her head has gradually tipped forward, until her chin rests against her chest. Those blue eyes are closed, an errant lock of silver-frosted hair fallen in front of her face. It flutters faintly in time to her breath.

  The old general's finally succumbed to her own exhaustion.