Star Wars: Rebels, S1 E2, Spark of Rebellion part 2
Star Wars: Kanan - The Last Padawan, issue #2
Behold some parallels I've been meaning to post for a while now, and decided to post in honor of the 10 year anniversary! And since Kanan's my favorite character, it fits well for the first day of SWR Week
Summary : Caleb Doom is a child in a war. His ability to cope with the stress and memories isn't as strong as he wishes it could be. What happens when he has to do it alone after a long operation?
The Jedi were protectors of peace. That's what Caleb had grown up learning. While they preferred not to fight; to settle disagreements without any bloodshed, sometimes it was not an option. Sometimes, blood needed to be drawn to save the people.
That's what the boy thought about on the battlefield. He looked around at the men that he fought beside and thought about how he had seen them fall. Friends Caleb had made and men he was supposed to protect as their commanding officer, had died right beside him.
It was a colder night in December. The boy had just turned 13 a few days before. He had spent it on a battle field. 13 was supposed to special; it the day you officially become a teenager. Sitting on his bed on his venitor, he thought about his birthday. They year before, he had celebrated it at the temple with his friends. Now he was off fighting in a war he still wasn't sure he completely understood.
Gray checked on him often. While most acted like a child in a war was normal, he watched his commander carefully. Sure, Gray hadn't liked him that much at first. It was frustrating for a child with no experience to come in and take your role in your battalion. As time went on however, the clone started to want to protect him. After all children shouldn't know war the way some of the Jedi Padawan did.
Sighing, Caleb tried not to think about it. There was nothing he could do to protect his men that he hadn't already been doing. He stood up and walked around the room. His lightsaber laid peacefully on his bedside table. The boy shook off the memories of him using his blade to cut through droids and the worse thought of what it could do to a living being.
The memories of disfigured bodies flooded his mind. Frightened, the teenager walked back over to his bed and sat down. Caleb started to shake. Taking his hands to his face, he brushed tears out of his eyes. Still, the memories stayed, poisoning him. It became harder to breathe.
The question of who let a 12 year old fight in a war cake into his head. It was one that had stayed with him for a while now. Adults couldn't handle the stress of war sometimes, why could a child? Caleb had seen men be killed by their grief and memories. They had killed themselves over what they had felt and what they had seen. Still, he walked onto the battlefield not knowing if he would ever walk off of them.
The men who had died, haunted Caleb. As a Jedi, even if he was just a Padawan, he should have protected them. Jedi were protectors of peace, right? Even if they fought wars and killed to protect the Republic? They didn't want to kill, but they did so to protect peace. The Republic wanted peace and so did they.
Tears fell down the boy's face. Voices and screams echoed through his room. Dying words stained his heart. Caleb would be lying if he didn't think about what his own might be.
The memory of Captain Gray sobbing over his brother's, in front of him made Caleb slam himself back into the wall. Gray hadn't meant to hurt him. The clone broke. Gray felt horrible about it. Caleb tried to tell him that it was okay; that it wasn't his fault. He still didn't think the captain believed him.
The pain from slamming into the wall made it harder to think. Still the images of the war ran free through his head. It made the Jedi feel insane. His understanding of the galaxy has shifted when he started fighting.
Trying to get the memories to leave him alone, Caleb slammed his fist into his head. He sobbed as he did it again and again until the only thing he could think of was his hand and head hurt. Standing up, he walked to the middle of the room before he got dizzy and fell. Overwhelmed, the boy just laid on the cold floor.
Part of him wished Gray or him master would walk into the room and comfort him. That they would pick him up off the floor and take him to the bed. There they would keep him company until the pain went away. Caleb would cuddle them until he felt better and they would turn on a nightlight before staying with him until he fell asleep. The other part of him knew no one would come. It was almost 0200.
After a while, Caleb stopped crying and picked himself up and off of the floor; something he didn't realize he would do a lot in the future. There was a nightlight in the corner of the room. All he had to do was plug it in. Instead, he let it go and walked slowly over to his bed. Then he lifted the blanket. It had been a gift to him by his master so it was thicker and softer than republic issued blankets. Crawling into bed, Caleb hoped the nightmares would leave him alone for the night; after all he had lived them a few days ago. Closing his eyes, the child tried to sleep. Maybe one day he would fall asleep peacefully the way he did when he was younger.
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the
Organization for Transformative Works
Ahhh the joys of a wildly inconsistent posting schedule. Hopefully I can make it a little more consistent soon! Anyway, have the last chapter of this particular arc-- I hope you guys liked it! Don't worry, we'll be back to regular Ghost/ Yellow Submarine crew shenanigans next time
First lines under the cut!
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Before they’d joined up with Kanan’s group, Sabine had never met a clone before, particularly not a member of the GAR. She’d heard about them, growing up. How they’d been created from the DNA of a Mandalorian warrior, Jango Fett. How they’d been trained to fight for the Republic, and done so handily. How they had, in the end, destroyed the Jedi, who were later called traitors by those they served. And after that? The Empire had made them disappear, too.
Now that she was meeting some of them, Sabine had to admit, they weren’t exactly what she’d expected. It was getting easier to tell them apart— the armor and the haircuts helped, but there were other differences. Scars, tones of the voice, the look in the eyes.
But mainly, they were a lot less like the stoic soldiers she’d expected. I guess the Empire didn’t create the template for how soldiers act, Sabine mused as she watched a trooper with pink armor throw a handful of grapes at his friend, who yelped in mock protest and immediately retaliated. Their third companion, who had buzzed hair and a tired expression, shook his head in exasperation as he tried to get them to stop fighting.
Turning to face the rest of the table, she said, “Is it weird that I didn’t expect this many food fights?”
Niner snorted. “I’d say no if I hadn’t been stuck in the middle of one for most of my life.” Fi, who was sitting next to him, promptly threw a piece of toast at him, which he ducked to avoid, and shot her a ‘see what I mean’ face.
