genessia | [closed] Not looking for a Fight for once

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[closed] Not looking for a Fight for once

Who: Anakin Skywalker & General Grievous
Where: Guardian Highrise in Nova City
When: after this

Reaching the place Grievous had named him didn't take Anakin long. He lived in Nova and therefore knew the city well enough by now.

He was, as usual when he was out, wrapped in his large, dark cloak, hands tucked away into its large sleeves. He appeared more thoughtful and, in a way, more bothered by whatever it was he had on his mind. Once he reached the building, he looked around for the Separatist Commander.

"Grievous." was all he said in a clear enough voice, before adding more to himself: "Don't make me search you now."

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Grievous was coming out through the front doors just as Anakin was speaking.

"General Skywalker...," he said with exaggerated politeness. "You have arrived. I trust that you are here for the right reasons."

Anakin looked up and over to Grievous when he arrived, refraining from greeting the other with a snide remark or a roll of his eyes. Instead, he just crossed his arms.

"If you want to learn the truth about the Clone Wars, then yes. I guess so. And before you accuse me of lying before I said anything: Don't worry. It's not a truth either of us will like." He inclined his head "Is there somewhere we can speak in private?"

The golden, reptilian eyes studied Anakin for a long moment before he gave a short nod of his head and turned, his long cloak gliding along behind him.

"Come with me, to my office."

And he led the way to an elevator, which soon opened for them both to enter.

Following Grievous to the elevator, Anakin looked around the entry hall in silence. He didn't hesitate to enter the elevator either, even if some may have a lot less inclined to enter such a cramped space with Grievous.

But this was Anakin Skywalker, and he couldn't be bothered by such things. He was much rather inclined to make some remark about Grievous having an office in the first place.

As it was, however, their trip to said office went by in silence, the Jedi much rather mulling over what he had come here to speak to the cyborg General about.

It wasn't a place that he often stayed. More often than not he would be outside and patrolling the city - mostly in Nova but sometimes he would also be by the bay in Genessia to see about new arrivals, making sure they caused no trouble. Not needing sleep and only resting occasionally, he had plenty of time for his patrols and now his new project with the Trauma Centre.

He kept an eye on Anakin as the elevator rose to the correct floor. He didn't trust the Jedi and half expected an attack. But he would try to be respectful here, treating Anakin as a citizen of Nova City instead of a potential enemy. This was why he had suggested meeting here instead of his private residence. It was a more official environment.

"After you...," he let Anakin exit the elevator then led the way to his private room. There wasn't anything remarkable about it and he indicated a chair if Anakin wanted to sit.

"Now, what do you have to say."

Anakin accepted the chair without hesitating, resting his hands in his lap as he leaned back. For one more moment he eyed Grievous, but then he spoke.

"Well. As it turns out there's a lot about the Clone Wars that neither side was aware of. First and foremost that they have been planned for over a decade by two Sith Lords. Darth Tyrannus and Darth Sidious. Or Count Dooku and Chancellor Palpatine." the Jedi observed Grievous's reaction with a scowl on his face.

"This entire war we've been fighting has been nothing but some sort of game from the very start. A game with the goal to form that Empire we keep hearing about."

His face-mask being difficult to read, his subtler actions may speak volumes - as would his emotions, if Anakin could sense those.

His head straightened up then arched back slightly as if trying to subconsciously put more distance between them. There was some confusion there; distrust and disbelief.

Then Grievous shook his head.

"Your words make very little sense. You mentioned four names."

But only two Sith Lords. The odd one out, though, was Palpatine. He had no idea what the Chancellor had to do with what Anakin was saying.

"You don't know much about the Sith, do you?" Anakin frowned.

"In our time, there are always two of them. No more, no less. One Master and one Apprentice." he began to explain "When they become Sith, they take on a new name. In Dooku's case that would be Darth Tyrannus. The Chancellor happens to be the second Sith - The one the Jedi have been searching for since the Battle of Naboo. Chancellor Palpatine is Darth Sidious - And as such he is Dooku's Sith Master."

He hoped his words would make more sense to Grievous now. But it was telling that he hadn't been told much about the Sith and how they worked.

That elicited a harsh laugh from the cyborg. But even as he laughed and spoke, he could feel a doubt inside of him. There were things he had discovered when the one named simply 'chaos' had fixed the deeper parts of his blocked memory. He just didn't want to think about that just yet.

Of the Sith, well, he did know very little. It was unimportant to him and he hadn't needed to know.

"You are speaking nonsense now. Palpatine is the enemy of the Separatists. He is leader of your Republic. If what you say were true then he would have been fighting against himself."

On the surface, of course it didn't make any sense. Grievous just didn't want to even believe it could be true. That would make the entire war a joke; one of which he wasn't in on.

"Much rather he'd be controlling the entire war." Anakin retorted, gesturing with his gloved hand "Which he is. It's hardly a coincidence that we found the Clone Army when we did, conveniently waiting for a Jedi to pick it up and bring it to Geonosis."

"Neither is it a coincidence that the Jedi were put in charge of said army. They're Sith Lords. They want to get rid of the Jedi and take over the galaxy. They've been fooling all of us, Grievous. You're just as much a pawn in this as everyone else. Possibly Dooku himself is just a pawn in Palpatine's game, if it's true that he ends up getting killed by the end of the war as I was told." the Jedi kept talking, not sounding too pleased by any of it.

"I have seen footage of the Emperor while he was here. Former Chancellor Palpatine." And at those words, he nearly grimaced. The Sith Lord...

Grievous had never gotten these answers from Palpatine in the short time the Emperor had been around and since then his brain had been readjusted and he'd put the whole incident out of his mind. Anakin's words reminded him about that and other bothersome things go through his thoughts - the shades he'd seen when chaos had worked on fixing his memories. The corruption within had pulled up his enemies in that dreamscape and within them was Sidious and Dooku. It hadn't made much sense to him at the time but the more Anakin spoke, the more things were fitting together.

It wasn't very easy to accept that they'd all been so played though.

"I have heard about this future Jedi purge... and this Empire. Despite the destruction of the Jedi, it does not sound like that political development was a step forward," he certainly didn't approve of the Empire, from what he'd heard about it. "Are you claiming that the powerful Jedi did not notice any of this? That you were all fools to the Sith's game..."

His tone was more thoughtful now and as he was eyeing Anakin his gaze shifted around as if many thoughts and calculations were being made in his head, putting it all together like a tactical maneuver on the battlefield.

"Our senses have been clouded increasingly over the past few years." Anakin admitted and glanced away, feeling guilty for doing so towards an enemy.

"The Force has steadily been clouding over by growing darkness. We hoped finding the missing Sith Lord would lead us to the source. And it possibly would have, if Palpatine was the source all along." Here, the Force felt entirely different.

He sighed "I have been close to him all these years and noticed nothing."

"So you believe now that he was manipulating you? Manipulating all of you?"

And himself, but that's harder to voice and admit.

"If what you say is the truth, Jedi, then we have a common enemy."

Anakin sighed, but nodded "He played us all. Even Dooku. And I know that's not easy to accept."

The Jedi himself was still gritting his teeth. The Chancellor had been his friend after all. He then took a deep breath.

"You already suggested that we should see to work together. And maybe we indeed should..."

There was a short silence in which Grievous watched Anakin and debated within himself. It wasn't easy to simply believe the words but something did feel correct in them, putting that together with what he himself had felt and knew from his broken memories.

"We should, however firstly you have property of mine which must be returned. If you truly believe in doing the right thing and having the city protected to the best standard that it can be, I need all of my weapons and my limbs intact and restored."

He said this in a reasonable manner but he was expecting there would still be some resistance. He would try to remain calm.

"You can have your hand back." Anakin replied with a roll of his eyes, producing the mentioned limb from his cloak but keeping it in his hand for now "I even fixed it. The lightsaber, however, I won't return. It's not your property but belongs to the Jedi Order and you stole it."

He had considered to remove the kyber crystal and hand back the useless hilt, but even Anakin was aware that every lightsaber is unique and in itself a reminder of the Jedi that crafted it.

"Do you not think that the Jedi would be prouder to know that his lightsaber was now being used to protect others? You would deny his spirit this?" Grievous pressed, sounding like he sincerely meant that. He made it sound noble, despite the circumstances in which he'd originally gotten that lightsaber.

At this, Anakin merely snorted "You really don't know anything about lightsabers, do you?"

He leaned back and tapped his chin with the claw-like finger of the cyborg's hand still in his own "There are reasons why the Order has a special place to keep the lightsabers of past Jedi instead of simply passing them on to a new user. The sabers in your possession, they must be weeping."

"I know that the bearer of that particular one was responsible for a thousand Kaleesh dead. They may not have personally murdered them but the result of their actions was the same," there was an edge of bitterness in his words. "If they weep, it is for my people."

He shuddered slightly, leaning forward.

"But I am not here to argue with you about whose tragedy is worse. It is the past and perhaps we can reach some compromise if you at least return my hand to me."

He held out the three clawed hand that was left on that arm.

"That's not what I meant, but I'm not here to attempt and teach you about lightsabers and kyber crystals." the Jedi gave a gentle smile with his words, but then did, indeed, hand the robotic hand over.

"Maybe one day, though." Which was still a very huge maybe.

He took the hand and examined it.

"I trust that you know if something harmful were to befall me due to some fault in this hand then you would be in grave trouble with the Guardians."

Yes, he's suspicious that Anakin has somehow tampered with his hand. Rigged to explode, perhaps.

And he still has to find somebody to attach it back on to his wrist.

Anakin couldn't help but snort again "Hey. I'm a Jedi, not a bounty hunter." He said with a dismissive gesture of his gloved hand.

"Besides, threats like that don't work on me, you of all beings here should know as much. And you will find that I mainly cleaned it up." The Jedi knew his way around anything mechanical.

"So I see... And since you removed it, perhaps you could also put it back where it belongs," he gave Anakin a pointed stare.

He may not trust him but part of Grievous was curious about how well Anakin could work with droid parts. He was more used to seeing the Jedi cut droids in half than repair them.

"I certainly could." Anakin replied with certainty "But you probably have your own mechanics to do that. I mean, would you really trust a Jedi with your parts just like that?"

Reattaching the hand might also require a few more tools than Anakin currently had on his person.

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[closed] Not looking for a Fight for once

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