Entry Twenty-Four – Days after Geonosis One Hundred Forty-Seven
The outbreak is now well contained and on its way to elimination. Despite the inevitable spotting beyond our quarantine zone, for the idea of completely restricting any part of the Bucket is laughable, new regions have been vaccinated via rapid response and the core outbreak zone blanketed. I have even been blessed with a handful of chances to actively participate as a doctor with regard to reformulating the vaccine for a handful of individuals representing species never previously exposed to the virus. The Geranite male was particularly interesting, as the best way to insure the vaccine did not react with the hydron-three gas mix they need to breathe involved rewriting a protein compound extracted from the virus' coat itself. That was a fine day's work, an escape from the endless mind-numbing discussions of 'resource allocation' that form the heart of an incident coordinators job.
It was not until today that Mr. Selless advised me to purchase a management droid for this sort of operation. I felt extraordinarily foolish, having missed such an obvious solution. Of course I cannot actually purchase an appropriate droid for myself and it seemed ridiculous to requisition one with the outbreak almost entirely resolved.
Officer Morne stepped forward and solved the problem through the expedient method of buying a surplus crime scene analysis droid and then just giving it to me outright. It was such a ridiculously gallant gesture, I was completely overwhelmed, and I absolutely gave him a hug that was about three times as tight and five times as long as was proper, which is to say not proper at all.
Honestly, I have no idea what I'm going to do about that. Especially considering how handsome he actually is under his mask, for a human. The temptation to indulge his crush and engage in some sort of torrid assignation is well…despite it being a truly ridiculous idea I confess its becoming very difficult to ignore.
I don't love Morne, not romantically, at least. That helps, a little. He is a friend, and loyal, and I trust him, but I do not think the core relationship will change. It might be fun to sleep with him – actually it would probably be great and would go a long way to pushing down the tide of death – but doing so would surely ruin our friendship and I could not keep working with him afterward. I cannot do that, I need this friendship down here, and I need the support of this man who's saved my life twice, once in person and once by proxy. Asking Prefect Xeril to assign me another liaison, a different one, is not something I'll ever have the strength to do. Yet I cannot let matters continue as they are, not indefinitely. The balance is unstable, vulnerable to the moment when we both let our defenses down at the same time and give in to our hormones in a spectacularly stupid fashion.
By the Force, I wish there was someone I could talk to about this. It is easy to assess that my knowledge of relationship dynamics, such as it is, is woefully insufficient to this mess. A few short-lived flings as a padawan and then medical student are hardly a solid baseline to use in navigating such complexities. Of course, the Jedi Order's rules generally make that sort of counseling impossible. All of us stumble through stupid little affairs without telling each other. I suppose that causing our relationships to crater in a void of silent inexperience does serve to prevent attachments, but there are certainly consequences. I'm glad psychiatry is not my specialty.
For now I have a droid, or technically the Jedi Order has a droid that I have assigned to myself indefinitely. Intriguingly, I learned something when I registered this new unit, named Tesso-ISC. It seems the Order actually owns a number of these droids, kept available for use by Jedi Investigators. Less enlightening is that most of the investigators don't like working with them.
The crime scene analysis unit is fairly obviously a modified SP-4 Analysis Droid chassis. I'm quite familiar with that model, they're used extensively in the Archives, and I suspect this one retains almost all the base functionality underneath its investigative programming. I don't need an investigator, but he can probably be reprogrammed for use as an administrative aide. That's likely a better use for him anyway. The Underworld Police didn't put him up for surplus on a whim. His legs are massively damaged and degraded from endless hours marching across duracrete to the point that he limps miserably when trying to walk. He's also absolutely covered in carbon scoring. Apparently someone shot him with a high-grade ion blaster several times over in a failed effort to erase his hardened case file collection. That evidentiary archive is apparently extremely durable, but the attack scrambled almost everything else. Rather than try to re-imprint such an old and worn down unit from stock the police let him go instead. I can't blame them, a quick diagnostic suggest he's permanently lost about fifteen percent of his processor capacity.
I'm not much good with droids, but I met someone during this incident command sojourn who I think will be able to sort him out easily enough. However, she's extracted a nasty price in return. Isoxya invited me to a traditional Atsev victory feast, and now I've been pranked into agreeing to the invitation. From the way the Stoneweb Runner laughed when I told her I would attend I expect the experience will be harrowing. I have the wretched premonition that I've going to have to eat some sort of spidery creature.
I regret this already.
Notes
Geranites are a canon species based on a brief figure in ROTJ. The hydron-three breathing requirement has been preserved in both versions of canon.
Crime Scene Analysis droids are canon, one of them was shown in TCW as part of the investigation of the Jedi Temple Bombing. Though it is not established in canon is visually extremely obvious that they share the same chassis as the SP4-analysis droid, which is also canonical.
When Nema says she doesn't own Tesso, the Jedi Order does, she's making an important point about the Jedi with regard to possessions. It is not entirely clear if Jedi actually own well, anything, with even their lightsabers reverting to the custody of the Order upon death. This fits with the monastic nature of the Jedi, but at the same time we do see certain Jedi with prized individual 'possessions' such as Starfighters, which suggests that a certain level of informal control exists. Thus, Nema assigning Tesso to her personal use in perpetuity.