a line in the sand [open]

[mismanagement]

Who: Ashoka and Maketh, possibly others
What: Catch all
Where: Guard post
When: Evening
Warnings: tbd



What a goddamn mess. Despite Maketh's frantic cleaning attempts, Sato's nonsense left a mark. There are scorch marks on the floor and little glints of shrapnel embedded in the walls. The door had to be replaced entirely. The whole place stinks of gunpowder and something sour.

But, in the end, the walls are still standing. They're still here. No doubt the gods are laughing.

Maketh huffs, smoothing a hand over her coat. She's spent the past few hours cleaning and organizing, and things are almost acceptable. The system has been restored.

There are still marks on the wall.

Maketh takes a breath and looks away. It's fine. It's just fine, she can ignore that, she can fix it later. Everything can be fixed. She just has to get it right so this won't happen again. Everything in its place. If the system is perfect, then nothing else will go wrong.

She'll start with the reports. Those ought to be rechecked and filed again.

It's late Maketh hears a noise at the door, late enough that nearly everyone else in the city is asleep. But the work isn't done yet. It isn't perfect. She looks up with a start, nearly dropping the file she's working on. "Oh. Ah. I wasn't expecting anyone."

Comments

[fulcra]

Sleeping isn't something Ahsoka is ever particularly good at. She makes sure to never wear herself down entirely, getting as much rest as she needs but sometimes being restless gets the better of her and she's up and wandering around the city when few others are. The guard post, as a general rule, is a good place to go to assure herself there's nothing to worry about. Or, well, nothing more than usual.

She didn't expect anyone to be there, but that there is and it's Maketh of all people isn't that much of a surprise.

"Didn't mean to scare you, sorry," Ahsoka says, managing to look a little guilty as she finishes letting herself in, shutting the door behind her. The familiar, friendly demeanour that goes along with her guilty expression fades away, replaced with the usual sure-shouldered stance Ahsoka most always seems to have about her as she gestures at Maketh's paperwork.

"Is everything alright?"

[mismanagement]

Maketh clears her throat and moves to stand at attention. Despite assuring Ashoka that the need for ranks would be forgotten, she's still a commander even if Maketh is, currently, nothing at all. Proper respect must be shown. It's only right. "I--yes. Everything is fine. Of course everything is fine."

The guardpost is still standing and none of her men are dead. Everything is just fine. Life continues. She glances down at the reports, fighting the urge to straighten the pile. It's not right. Things need to be just right so there won't be any more mistakes. She's made too many. The incident with Sato stands as proof. She needs to do better. Make sure everything is just as it should be. Nothing slipping through the cracks.

"Did you need something, Commander--Ashoka?"

[fulcra]

"No, I was simply awake and felt like checking in."

She'd done this when she travelled or stayed with cells in the Rebellion too, sometimes. Even when there isn't anything particularly comforting to reach out and touch with the Force, knowing that there are others with her morals and values, protecting what needs to be protected- that helps.

Taking a few steps closer, she drops her gaze to the reports for a moment, then looks to Maketh again, adding, "Be at ease, Captain."

[mismanagement]

Immediately she shifts, lowering her shoulders. The rank is wrong but the tone says orders and command and that became reflex years ago. And perhaps she would have been a captain in a different life, if she'd enlisted in the Imperial Navy as a regular soldier instead of graduating the Academy. Perhaps she could have been a storm trooper with their beetle-white armor, a command patch on her shoulder and a numerical title in place of her name. That wouldn't have been so bad. She would have answered to someone like Ashoka either way.

Part of Maketh knows it shouldn't be like this. She's not an Imperial anymore, gave up her right to it a long time ago. But still she follows the rules, still she plays the part.

It's comforting. It's easy. She's already mastered it.

"Ma'am," she adds after a moment, looking away. "I'm sorry. It's--reflex, I suppose."

[fulcra]

"And reflex is hard to retrain," Ahsoka agrees, understanding. How many years did instinctive things woven into her development in the Jedi, in the Grand Army of the Republic, dictate her reactions to situations? Lots. And things still creep in sometimes.

"But as far as I'm concerned, here, you outrank me. You're Captain of the Guard and I'm just one of your soldiers."

[mismanagement]

A Jedi would understand, Maketh supposes. But she stiffens nonetheless at what Ashoka says. It's not right. "I don't--I didn't do this for the rank. It's my duty to protect the civilians."

Maketh sighs.

"I will always do my duty. You needn't answer to me."

[fulcra]

"Nobody goes into peacekeeping for the rank, trust me, I know."

It's a joke, almost. Ahsoka gives Maketh a blunt look, then moves past to find a desk to lean against, her posture relaxing slightly again. She's too tired to be entirely rigid right now, but she's not sure either of them are ready for her to be entirely candid with her former enemy.

"Sometimes, an understanding that everyone will do their duty isn't enough. Organization exists for a reason, doesn't it?" she continues, head tilted slightly as she watches Maketh. "I know you know the sort of war I fought in as a Jedi and we always trusted the clones to do their duty, but they still had rank and we still all followed the chain of command to keep everything in order. Or... well, we followed it as best we could." A wry smile, thinking of her master and that infamous Skywalker ability to do as told. "We weren't perfect."

[mismanagement]

Maketh stays quiet for a moment, just watching her. "I always thought the clones had no choice. They were made to serve."

But they were men too, and men make choices.

[fulcra]

"They were, but that just meant that their choices were often limited. They weren't as free to choose their own lives as you or I have been and certainly not as much as the average Republic citizen -" Because she knows that Maketh isn't the type of person who walked into the Empire willingly. Something must have forced her hand there. "- but they still had free will. It was why we fought with them, instead of the droids that the separatists had."

Which has always been a mixed blessing in her mind. Her men, her captain, had helped define who she was a person, as a leader, but they'd all deserved lives so much better than the ones they'd been slotted to live.

"At least up until the end, they were as free-willed as anyone, just with more dire consequence for disobedience."

[synthedick]

Nick doesn't sleep, but it's late enough that most people should be -- certainly anyone on the Guard who'd had to deal with Sato, and certainly Maketh Tua. Yet, there she is when Nick steps into the headquarters, still trying to fix the mess that maniac left in his wake. While the rubble is mostly gone and that sulfuric smell is starting to dissipate, it's clearly not enough for the former Imperial.

Nick has a bundle of reports tucked under his arm, just more to add to the pile she's working on. He announces himself with his cane, just in case she didn't hear the door, worry etching into his features as he crosses the room. "The paperwork will still be here in the morning, you know."

[mismanagement]

Maketh runs a hand through her hair, trying not to sigh. She hates this, not just the disarray but the meaning behind it. One of their own tried to ruin them and though it was stopped, the attempt was still made. That means the people can't be trusted, she miscalculated, she has to come up with a new and better strategy to prevent future inc indents. People in Hadriel have trusted her this far and she cannot - will not - fail them like she failed Lothal. Not when their enemies are beginning to circle, and number more than just the damned gods. "It needs to be done."

So she's going to do it. Sleep is for the weak.

Maketh glances up. "I--I didn't mean to snap. How are you faring?"

[synthedick]

Nick shrugs, the universal sign that he doesn't mind her snapping. She's stressed -- they all are, and it's understandable after what happened. They've got troubles coming from more than just the gods now, and when one enemy is a guy who is literally immortal, that makes things complicated. They can't even count on Hope being exhausted to keep him down, and that means they're going to have to find some other way to deal with trouble like him in the future. Somehow, Nick gets the feeling Sato won't agree to community work.

"I'm still in one piece, so I can't complain," he says as he drops the files on his desk. "I'm just glad things didn't turn out any worse."

[mismanagement]

Maketh huffs. She's only too aware of how badly this could have gone. Possibilities haunt her if she stays still long enough to let them into her head. She hurries to check on Nick's reports, flipping through them carefully.

Better reports than thinking about her family dying.

"We need more safeguards. I'll develop protocols."

[synthedick]

"Just don't go too overboard. We'll figure all this out, but for now, we could stand some rest."

Maketh might notice a few things of note in the reports: Papyrus has been injured and is in the care of his brother, Nick has been covering his shifts, Shadow is still more or less MIA. Along with all that are a few notes regarding the incident with Sato, including Rey's original report on the guy. Rey's participation has simply been cited as being on a "need to know basis; inquire Nick Valentine," but there is a page of people to keep an eye on, should they look to Sato in the future for such trouble-making, as well as as another on Firo's involvement in the fiasco. What's written there is less than the full truth, but Nick would rather not get the guy into even more trouble, should someone ever steal their records.

[mismanagement]

"No, I have work to do..."

There's no time to sleep. Not for a while yet. Maketh pauses, running her finger down a line in the report.

"What do I need to know about Rey's involvement?"

Whoops, now that some of the aftermath details are cleared up...

[synthedick]

He had a feeling that'd be Maketh's immediate question, even with her exhaustion. Nick lowers his voice.

"She was dealing with some help Sato had on his side. The invisible kind. The important part is that she's trying to keep an eye on him and keep her role with us off the record. That's one reason I'm here."

[mismanagement]

"I see."

That means it can't go in their public reports. Perhaps in the coded ones she keeps hidden. But perhaps not even those, if Sato is as clever as he wants people to think. Maketh rubs her face with a sigh.

"What do you need from me?"

[feelslikeimspilling]

"I couldn't sleep... At least I'm dressed better for a midnight stroll this time, though huh?"

Will stood there in the doorway, looking around at what still needed to be done and at what had been done already. He'd heard there was a pretty big fight, decided to stay away as it wasn't his place to get involved with the City Guard. Still, Will had become pretty close to one of its members, sure, he knew she was safe but he still wanted to check, wanted to see the carnage with his own eyes... If truth be told, he missed the upheaval.

"So... Who's the megalomaniac who stirred up the bees nest?" He knows Maketh doesn't think he's capable of helping the Guard, but he'll still try. It just doesn't feel right, doing nothing at all. "Did they get away?" Picking up the odd piece of paper, glancing over it before setting it down on a burnt and broken table. Stepping around Maketh and going to touch the blackened marks on the wall.

[mismanagement]

Maketh rubs her face with a sigh. She's really not in the mood to yell at anyone, not even Will. The paperwork needs to be rechecked and organized. Her hands are twitching a bit. She closes them into fists. "Yes, you're wearing pants this time. Quite the improvement."

Stars, what a mess.

She exhales sharply.

"Some fool named Sato. He's been dealt with. He would have killed all of us. Thankfully his tactics left something to be desired."

[feelslikeimspilling]

To her comment about him wearing pants, he tipped his head back over a shoulder and gave her a raised brow and frown. To say Will was always so awkward around people, you'd think it would be worse with Maketh? She had seen him naked before, not long after he met her too.

As she started to explain what had happened and who was responsible for it, Will's interest started to pique. Still, he strolled around the crime scene making a mental note of where things had been destroyed or spared.

"Sato? Hmm... Think I've seen him on the network before, doesn't seem very stable if you ask me." Oh, he knows she's got a low opinion of Will's own stability, but this isn't like something he would do when feeling a bit off. This felt planned, rushed, but none the less planned. "Did he say why he did it? Was he after anything in particular?"

[mismanagement]

He's walking through her space. Getting too close, on the verge of touching this and disrupting the order.

Stop that. Focus.

Maketh grits her teeth.

"He wanted to see if Hope could resurrect us all without draining his power. And he was bored. We're lucky he didn't feel like being clever as well."

[feelslikeimspilling]

Will has some painful memories of this room. Like over there, for instance, that's the place he spat up a mouthful of blood, and over there? That's where he almost strangled Maketh on the floor... Let him walk down memory lane, he's not hurting anyone.

He can tell that he's already agitating her, her body language alone, is enough to give her away, but Will knows Maketh, better than he knows himself and she'd displeased with his current activities.

"I see... So he's one of the dangerous ones here? Shame no one saw it coming. No, really it's a shame... I mean, if you'd given as effort into investigating this sadistic Sato then maybe you would have had a heads up. "

Bending over and picking up what looked like it use to be an old folder binder, passing it to Maketh as he walked back around towards her.

[mismanagement]

Infuriating man. Maketh grits her teeth. There's a moment where she imagines hitting him, just cracking him across the face with the butt of her rifle. Seeing his cheek split open so he'd know his goddamn place. It calms her slightly.

It probably shouldn't.

She snatches the binder, eyes narrowed tight. "Do you have anything useful to say?"

[feelslikeimspilling]

" You're welcome." He says, drawn out and sarcastic as the binder was snatched from his hand. Oh, he knew quite well that Maketh was probably musing up some wonderful pain she could inflict on him to please her. It got him wondering why he always found himself seeking out the attention and company of the complicated types?

Dusting his hands off and setting them in his trouser pockets, taking another look around before he spoke again. "Actually, I thought I'd come see if I could offer any assistance? " He raised a brow and tipped his head at Maketh. "Before you scoff at the idea of breaking bread with the enemy, let me just have a go... See if I can dig a little deeper."

[mismanagement]

"Do what you will."

Sato has already been dealt with. If he tries this nonsense again, then Maketh will leverage her relationship - such as it - with Kylo Ren for a more permanent solution.

But. Maketh pauses, hands on her hips. "You want to be useful? Fine. Then consult with me. Not about Sato. Someone else. He's likely insane. That ought to be of interest to you."