Chapter Text
It all began where it was supposed to end. Mace Windu, standing over Darth Sidious. Anakin Skywalker poised to betray the Jedi Order in an attempt to save the love of his life. But at the last moment, Anakin stopped. The two others felt a disturbance, but he was the only one to understand its message. He saw a vision, of a great serpent coiling through the void of space, two burning green eyes glaring at him. This creature was a primal being, with an understanding of the force beyond anything else, and it told him the truth. If he were to continue on his course of action, he would be the cause of Padme’s death. As the vision ended, he saw that Mace Windu had already struck the Sith Lord down. The conspiracy, and soon the Clone Wars, would be over.
Over the coming months, many things were revealed. The disturbing Order 66, preprogrammed into every clone trooper via subdermal chips. Sidious’s manipulation of both sides of the war. And, after his disappearance, Anakin’s marriage and procreation with Padme Amidala. The supposed chosen one left the known galaxy, ashamed at his selfishness and naivety and attempting to reconnect with the Light Side of the force. The Clone troopers were repurposed into police officers, or allowed to leave the service. Few did. Battle droids were turned into either service droids or assistants for the Clone Cops, having no real use now. And finally, both the Jedi Order and the Senate began working through their corruption and faults that the deceptive nature of Sheev Palpatine had brought to light. The Jedi, especially, began allowing more emotion into their teachings. Now, a decade after all this, our story begins in earnest.
A relatively young Jedi Knight stood in his quarters. Although it was five years ago he had gained this title, it is only now that he will be granted...well, not much. Assignments had been slow coming for many since the end of the Clone Wars. He had just been finish his training with Daed Eg’gbort when Master Windu had sent the message to every Jedi that was off-world, to return to Coruscant as fast as possible. This left John unable to take his Knight Trials as close to his friends own trials as they had planned, leaving him the last of the four to become a Knight. But that was years ago. As of right now, one very bored John Egbert had to get some food. He pulls his robe on, clipping his saber to his belt and hurrying to the mess hall.
As he moved through the halls, he nodded to the occasional colleague or worker, wincing a bit as he passes by Master Shaak Ti-He had once left a jury-rigged device that simulated the sound of flatulence on her seat while he and Master Daed were visiting Kamino. He was always a bit embarrassed to talk to her after that. As he passes her by, he glances back to make sure she isn’t giving him a dirty look. The moment his head is turned back to where he’s going, he’s met with an old friend. The Shistavanen Jade Harley, tackling him in a near bone crushing hug.
“Phff-Hey, Jade.”
She pulls away, ears perked up and a smile that showed her rather fearsome set of fangs plastered across her face.
“Is that all I get, Egbert? I’ve been off negotiating with a bunch of bugs for a full on year and you give me a “Hey Jade”??”
He smiles, taking a knee and throwing his arms out. “THANK THE FORCE! THE GREAT JADE HARLEY HAS RETURNED! Is that good enough?”
She laughs, a combination of yips and chuckles that she created as a way of copying human laughter. “Passable. How have you been?”
He stands, smiling back at her. “Bored, mostly. I was going to grab some food and then visit Master Daed.” He glances behind her, finding himself staring at a young boy in padawan robes.
“Wait, is that…?”
She looks back, whipping her head back to him. “I totally forgot! You never met Jake! Jake, say hello to John.”
He watches as the boy approaches him, finding that he looked strangely familiar. Huh. The padawan bows perfectly, in a motion that seems very practiced.
“I am Jake English, Padawan learner of Jade Harley. She’s told me much about you, sir.”
“Stand down soldier, clone wars are over!” He turns to his old friend, raising an eyebrow.
“I doubt you were the one who taught him to be this formal, Jade.”
“Well, I found him working for English the Hutt. The slug was having him float drinks to patrons, of all things...But he was happy to exchange him for a droid I had just bought, with credits from a bounty I accidentally collected because I was there to stop some loony from making more droids and trying to take over the planet, but the only reason he had a bounty was tax evasion of all things so when-”
“Jade. Breath.”
She often got a bit too excited when talking about her adventures. It was adorable.
“How is Jake’s training going? I’ll bet you’re teaching him how to use a DC-17 more than a lightsaber.”
“I am not!”
“It’s more fifty/fifty, sir.”
“Jake!!”
“At least it’s a step up from what your master did, Jade. We had to get Master Yoda to stop him from devoting half his time to teaching you about slugthrowers!”
Jake snickers a little, and Jade growls. John finds himself feeling a bit happier than he had for a while.
“Now, I’m going to guess you don’t have any credits on you for food?”
“I SO do!” She leans slightly towards Jake. “Where’s the credits.”
“Back on the ship, master.”
She slowly stands up straight again. “...I guess we don’t.” She shrugs a bit. “Eh, we’ll eat later. We’ve got a report to give! C’mon, Jake!”
John watches her run off, smiling to himself as she bounded off. Jake seemed to be used to this pace, keeping up quite well. John finds himself wondering if the mess hall still uses Master Daed’s recipe for the biscuits, before remembering that it included some ingredients that were hallucinogenic to Twi’leks. That was a great one.