Jag Fel, Syal Antilles, and and old family arguments. Is either one right?
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"There are good guys, and then there are bad guys."
"Huh?" Syal looks up at her cousin Jag, surprised. "What do you mean?"
He looks at the holoscreen – some drama about the Jedi purges is on.
"It's just…," he waves his hand at the screen. "You all believe this stuff about that Jedi. The heroics, the idealism, the goodness. You all believe it."
The girl smiles and shakes her head sadly.
"Oh, Jag, it's just 'cause you're an Imperial…"
He frowns at his cousin.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
A tiny frown appears on her face.
"Jag, everybody knows that Imperials-"
"-Are spoon-fed propaganda from birth? Have no minds of our own? Are secretly anti-alien, anti-women bigots?" The disappointment in his voice is easy to hear. "I'm not an Imperial, Syal. I'm a Chiss. And unlike the rest of the world, we get a first class education in history."
Her eyes narrow.
"Right, a first class education in propaganda, you mean. They don't talk about Death Star in their history books, you know. They completely forget it. And they don't talk about the Lusankya or Toprawa or Honoghr. They don't talk about anything, just people and dates."
His hands begin fidgeting with the academy ring on his ring finger.
"Yeah? Your precious New Republic never put any real history about the Republic or the Jedi in it's history books!"
"Yes it does! We spend a whole year covering the Clone Wars!"
Jag snorts cynically.
"Lemme guess – the Jedi fought off the evil Separatists, only to be betrayed by Palpatine and hunted down like dogs as a new veil of darkness descends over the Galaxy," he says in a dramatic voice. "Am I right?"
The ten-year-old pouts.
"I am right, then. I guess they never taught you that once, when the Republic was young, they were its crack troops. But things changed – religion, for one thing…" He stares at her young, disbelieving face and sighs. She is not old enough. "I think it's time I took you home, Syal. Your mother will skin me alive if I don't get you back before curfew."
She giggles at his imagery, and picks her jacket and books up from the ground.
"It was great hanging with you, Jag!"
He grins at her.
"Yeah – just don't let it get out, 'kay? I've got a reputation as a horrible Imperial to keep up…"
He takes her home and passes him into the care of his aunt, and then walks back to his quarters. He really likes his cousin.
It's too bad she's a Rebel.