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Krayten Haval is considered, officially, by members of the Jedi order to be a hardworking and quiet assistant to the Jedi Archival and Educational staff. A Rattataki man who gave up his knighthood to follow a quieter path due to his numerous bad experiences as a Padawan.
Being captured by slavers multiple times is, apparently, not good for his mental health. Nor his Master's stress levels.
Who knew.
Unofficially, Krayt Zihav is a Jedi Shadow who purposefully started to get caught when he realized after the first time that self-defense is a great excuse to deal with slavers in Hutt controlled territories.
No, his master was not impressed by this leap in logic. Yes, she's the one who practically begged him to consider a position in the Jedi Archives before he got himself killed doing something stupid. So he did.
He just never promised to stay there. She wasn’t impressed with that leap in logic either.
Honestly, considering what he’s seen her do for any pretty woman in danger she really has no foot to stand on. She’d topple a whole government if the right person made her swoon enough. In fact, she has toppled a whole government. Not that anyone but them know about that, considering she’d failed to update the council about that particular mission.
Anyway, none of these thoughts are helping his current problem. As a shadow he has a lot more freedom then he would've had as a knight. But also different kinds of restrictions.
It means that in order to keep up with his several different identities he has to actually go play the roles.
Which means he's helping out in the Archives for the next few long boring days. Don't get him wrong. He loves the Archives, loves the knowledge, the organization, honestly everything about it. It just unfortunately does not scratch that itch the way violence and lying does.
That probably makes him a bad Jedi. However, he's found over the years that being a shadow doesn't necessarily mean being a good jedi. It just means being good at the role you're required to play. And Krayt? Krayt is fucking fantastic at playing roles.
He’s also great at finding secrets.
There’s a pull at his thoughts. Like something trying to catch his attention. He hums in thought before placing the book he’d been absently reading on to the table next to him. Lets his intuition draw him to one of the Archives computers.
Krayt tilts his head as he studies it, eyes narrowing as it seems to boot up by itself. There’s nothing on the screen but it’s normal boring welcome page. He touches it, let’s the spark of force that wants to break free from him into it. The screen goes black. Then lines of code begin filling the screen. Interesting.
Not many could hack into the archives, even less would attempt it.
He takes a seat, watches a moment longer, lets them get a bit deeper just to see what they might be looking for. It looks like their trying to find causality reports. Specifically clone causality reports.
Krayt presses a hand to his mouth, watching and waiting. There’s a familiar feeling attached to it. One he’s felt quite a bit since the war started. He knows exactly wh0’s on the other end of this hack.
The code stops. A file is brought up. That’s enough, he thinks as he starts typing.
He sends a simple message.
You are attempting to access restricted information. Cease and desist or face the consequences.
He gets back another line of code attempting to override whatever automated system they think has stopped them. Which is honestly more amusing than it is irritating. So instead he forcibly drags the hacker into the chat function.
Archive Administrator: Hi, fuck off or face the consequences.
M:...You’re not an automated system
Archive Administrator: No, and I suggest you stop hacking this system before you get tracked down trooper
M: How- No fuck it. Jedi. forgot what I was dealing with. I’m just trying to find out what happened to a batch-mate. No one’s telling us anything.
Krayt hums, pulls the chat to the side and reads the file that was pulled up. It’s important. And something about it makes his paranoia itch. He reads and reads and reads. To say he’s pissed by the end of it is too simple of a word. A whole fucking battalion lost. For what? For a single small inch of ground won? It feels too... off.
He narrows his eyes, lets the force work through him. His thought feels right, the suspicion, the need to check. There’s a taste of danger edged in it but most of his life has been that way with the choices he likes to make.
If what he suspects is true, well no one’s going to be happy about it.
Archive Administrator: We’re meeting in person.
M: Wait what.
Archive Administrator: You’re on Kamino, right? I’ll see you soon. Probably on your next deployment.
M: Wait wait what no fuck don’t-
He cuts the troopers connection, immediately patching the hole they’d gotten in through so no one else can. Krayt will give them an easier way to access the archives when he meets them. First though. First he has to convince someone that this needs to be investigated.
…
Malware fucked up. That’s her first thought as she’s shut out of the connection that took her forever to make. Her hands grip into her hair as she tries to breath through her second thought and sudden realization that she’s going to be decommissioned for this.
She knew better than to go digging. But…
Her batch-mate was never supposed to be apart of the battalion they got sent to. It was supposed to be her. There had been a filing error, their numbers one off from each other had gotten switched around. They’d both noticed but decided that at the end of the day it never really mattered, their deployments were going to the same battalion. The only difference was when they’d be deployed.
It didn’t matter.
Then it did. When Malware had found out that Glitch was never coming back. That thousands of her brothers where never coming back. Then it had to matter.
She swallows roughly, breathes and settles herself in a well practiced way. Then she completely scrubs any trails she might have left behind. The only way she’s going to survive this is if she makes sure no one can track which clone hacked into the Jedi archives. Maybe even make it look like a trainer did it instead. There’s no way a Jedi could possibly know it was a clone who’d done the hacking.
Right?…
Yeah, no she’s sure it was just a guess. And any confirmation she accidentally gave them could be played off as a trainer covering their ass.
She’s got this. No need to panic.
Everything is under control.
...
Everything is not under control.
She stands stiff, arms behind her in parade rest as the Admiral in front of her quietly looks at his datapad. Clearly scrolling through some kind of documents. He hums in contemplation to himself.
“There’s nothing here to suggest you’ve been given any training in hacking.”
Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuuuucccckkkkkkk.
“No, sir. I specialize in bomb defusal and recon.”
He hums again, setting the datapad down to stare at her. Malware is very aware of how alone she is right now. In a private room with an Admiral who could easily hurt her if she says the wrong thing.
“Recon, you say?” he crosses his arms, giving her a contemplative look. “Is that only in hazardous environments or would you say that you could navigate a situation in friendly territory that might be in secret filled with Separatist spys?”
She blinks, completely caught off-guard by the question. “I’m… not sure I understand the question, Sir.”
Something about her answer makes him tilt his head, a sharp smile pulling at the corner of his lips. “Right. I guess that’s not too important. What is important however is what you’ve been doing in your free time. That report you were trying to find and read on the Archives server? Well it caught the attention of some very concerned Jedi.”
“I don’t know-”
He holds up his hand, “I’m very aware of who you are Malware and what you’ve been doing.” She’d never given him her name. She swallows, her hands sweaty as she grips them tight together. “Which makes you perfect for my own investigation into these matters.”
“Investigation?”
“Did you know that Jedi are not infallible?” He asks, the piercings on his brow raising in question.
She opens her mouth, closes it. Licks her lips and thinks about her answer. He waits. “I… I would hope they would be infallible.” She says slowly, uneasily.
“But you’re not stupid enough to actually think they are,” he says like he can read her thoughts. “The truth is that it is very easy for a Jedi to fall and the file you were looking for brought up several red flags about how Pong Krell has been conducting himself.”
The blood practically freezes in her veins. Her ears ringing. “You think he got his whole battalion killed on purpose.” The words are out of her mouth before she can even stop them.
“It’s certainly a worry,” The admiral gives a heavy sigh, as if he’s already worn down by just the thought alone. “I’m here to see if that’s truly the case. If it is he’ll be brought before the council.”
She can read between the lines. Brought before the council but nothing about answering for his crimes. “But he won’t be punished for it.” The words are bitter and broken in her mouth.
“I guess that would depend on your definition of punishment. If he has no regret over what he’s done, no will to right his wrongs… He’ll be kicked out of the order. If he’s fallen far enough we’ll most likely have no choice but to kill him. Most likely though, is that he’ll be given over to the Republic to face whatever charges they bring against his misconduct.”
She gives a small bitter laugh. “And if he is repentant? He gets to go frolic in the Jedi temple with no consequences?” The anger burns in her, and she knows she shouldn’t be showing her hand like this to a natborn. Knows exactly how dangerous it is but she can’t help it.
Her hands fall to her side, ball into fists.
He looks her in her eyes and simply says. “If he’s repentant, then for the rest of his life he’ll be working towards a forgiveness he will never gain. For the rest of his life he’ll always be one step closer to the dark and every step forward will be the hardest he’s ever taken.” He gives a soft sigh, the words quieter as he says, “It’s easy to hurt people, to be selfish. It’s hard to look at your actions and see the wrongs you’ve done and admit to them.”
It’s not enough and something must give away that none of that means anything to her because he adds. “He’ll also never be allowed in any part of the war effort. Nor will he allowed access to any clone troopers.”
It doesn’t make her feel better. Doesn’t bring her brother’s back. Doesn’t bring Glitch back. But according to this Admiral that’s the point. Nothing Pong Krell does will gain any forgiveness from her.
She swallows, breathes out. “What do you need me to do?” The most important part, is getting a monster away from her brother’s before he can get more of them killed.
He smiles at her. Soft and proud in a way that actually makes her feel a little better. “I’ve got a few things in mind.”