#maze arc

[sapphic-mad-scientist]

Morella is fighting a monster Lenore: Just stay calm! You already have everything you need to beat it! Morella: The power to believe in myself!? Lenore: No, a sword! Stab it!

[clonememesfrikyeah]

Alpha-17: “The kid has great potential. He may become a captain or even a commander.”

Maze: “Or a psychopath.”

Fordo: *sprinting for his life* “He’s got a weapon! He’s got a weapon!”

Cadet Rex: *sadistically laughing and chasing him with a machete*

[wyvernsrus]

"We arrived on Umbara, Maze."

Maze asked where Fordo and the Muunilist were and all he receives in reply is this holo

[mamuzzy]

Hey dear :D can you tell us about your headcanons on Jango training the Alphas ? :D

I finally got here to answer this ask. <3

And ooooh boy do I have??? Only angsty ones, love.

I use RepComm lore as a base of my headcanons, just to make clear in what continuity I'm creating in. And that means: NO INHIBITOR CHIPS.

The whole idea of the Clone Army revolves around one thing ultimately: to completely exterminate the jedi. To create an army that is ready for the decisive moment of taking down the enemies of the Sith without the jedi even noticing what is coming at them.

The trainers of course didn't know that this is the ultimate goal of the army, but they knew they had to train a whole army for a future war that who knows when will come. They had be loyal. And they had to be effective.

Every trainer had different approach:

Kal Skirata used love and insisted on the importance of comradeship which ultimately didn't necesserily made his commandos loyal to the Republic, but to each other.

Walon Vau used harsh discipline and insisted on the importance to make his commandos remember: they are superior than others and they have the most important mission in their life. Nothing awaits them outside because they have everything they need: their duty. Vau's trainees remained loyal even after the regime change.

And then we have the Alpha ARC Troopers trained by Jango Fett.

The Alpha ARCs in their mind are the unaltered version of Jango Fett. 100 copy of Jango Fett with their brain remained untouched (compared to the Nulls who's brain was tampered with). Meaning, the Alpha's undying loyalty to the Republic is not pre-programmed, it is not in their genes. It is conditioned with traditional methods: And that is FEAR.

More under the cut

Jango Fett didn't care about the clones and I will sparta-kick everyone from this hill who tries to fight me. I don't have a single worldbuilding where Jango was a "good daddy" for the Clones. He was a great, loving and caring father to Boba and Boba alone.

For him, the clones are products, but also they are part of his agenda: Even he dies, there will be millions of Jango Fetts who will fulfill his revenge of killing off all the Jedi.

The books often mention that Jango was a sociopath (meaning he is on the spectrum of ASPD), and this template was able to make the clones to be so effective. His brain is just built different and wasn't cluttered with moral based inhibitions. That's why I think that Jango wasn't actually a sadist who enjoyed tormenting his trainees - The Alphas - out of joy and personal amusement. It served the purpose, it was all pragmatic.

There wasn't any more description what was Alpha's training like on Kamino but these little snippets of lores made my brain go brrrrrrr about the theories. If the Alphas - THE ALPHAS!!!! - were scared of Jango it could mean that their training included something that gave a reason to fear him.

We know that he installed his own commands into the Alphas such us destroying the Clone Facility in case of Separatist attack on Kamino which Alpha-17 almost fulfilled. But also, being unquestionably loyal to the Jedi. For me, these commands weren't installed. I truly love the unaltered brain-Alphas.

-- Physical pain --

When you are in the military and under training, the line between educational violence and actual physical abuse is very thin. Insubordination had to be punished. Jango had to make sure that the Alphas remain loyal despite not having the same inhibitions like the rest of the clones, so there must have been exercises where he tested how far the Alphas would go to fullfill their duties, achieve victory, enforce an order, AT ALL COST.

They had to put through physical hell, pushed over their limits, pushed over their thresholds and beyond. If caught crying, if caught showing pain, if caught showing the single muscle of questioning Jango's orders, they had to be punished. They weren't made to compete with each other, but they also couldn't protect each other publicly when Jango punished the Alphas for insubordination. They had to watch. They had to learn from it.

The Alphas found secret ways to communicate with each other. To find comfort in each other in one way or another. Oh they knew the concept of love and caring. They watched Jango and Boba from the distance. The reassuring words. The caring touches of a father. They watched how the Nulls were running to their precious sergeant for comfort when hurt. They were very much aware that this is not something they would get.

-- RECONDITION: THE ULTIMATE DEATH --

The Alphas needed only one case of serious insubordination to learn their places and that was Alpha-Ø2. He was truly an independent mind and free-thinker, a true inspiration to thrive for individualism in the sea of Jango Fetts. Spar refused to comply and refused to sworn loyalty to "a republic" which he didn't knew.

And one day Alpha-Ø2 disappeared. Only to return without his memories. Returning without his fiery temper, without his free-spirit... and without any knowledge of how he used to love his Alpha-brothers dearly.

The brainwashing of the Alphas were so much successful later in time, when Alpha-Ø2 - called now Spar - actually deserted at age 8, two years before Geonosis, most of the Alphas felt disgust just by thinking about him - they had to.

Alphas had to believe that Spar was the utter disgrace to the Republic, otherwise it would mean, that they were actually treated wrong.

They had no idea that Spar's desertion was orchestrated by Mij Gilamar and Jango Fett himself after Spar regained his memories - probably the only mercy Jango showed for a clone.

-- Jango had to find the perfect balance --

The Kaminoans wanted soldiers who are independent thinkers but still loyal. Completely supressing their individualism wasn't an option, learned from Spar's case.

What the Alphas did in their non-existent freetime wasn't his business. But the Alphas had to drop everything that is them, when Jango ordered them to do so.

Jango hated every form of authority and realized that the Alphas inherited this trait for his disdain. So he used this train in them to be more effective as advisors for the Jedi. The Alphas had to make sure the Jedi survive until the critical point after all.

Alpha-17 is the smartest of them and the closest thing they had for Spar, which made him always walking on thin ice.

Tavo and Sull, lovebirds.

Maze had knowledge of wide variety of things due to reading forbidden literature that wasn't their in their curriculum.

Fordo communicated only through sign language due to trauma, and his closest friends learned too so they can speak to each other. He only spoke when Jango ordered him to do so.

They were smart enough to know what is was truly considered disobedience. And that was going against the Republic and Jango. If they comply to these rules, they will be safe.

-- ALPHA vs NULL conflict --

Jango always had to remind the Alphas that they were expected to be better than their precedessors, the Nulls. If they fail to meet with the standards, they won't have "a kal skirata" to save them from recondition.

Alpha-Ø2 sure didn't have.

The Alphas after a while didn't need outside motivation to be obedient and loyal. Because they were meant to be everything the Nulls couldn't be. Seeing the examples with their own eyes, how chaotic the Nulls were, how the Nulls as children were actually unruly and sadistic toward the kaminoan technicians, how they disobeyed everyone who was not Kal Skirata, they finally saw what is expected from them: BE BETTER THAN THEM.

And they finally found their positive reassurance on their own. How to take pride in being the true servants of the Republic. Only the Nulls didn't give a shit about this rivalry. They didn't care about Jango or the Alphas or being better than the Alphas.

Being obedient without question was totally against he Alphas nature but they tried. They tried fucking hard.

Alphas: We are the perfect soldiers of the Republic because we are obedient, well-behaved, and we don't cause trouble to our trainers unlike you.

Nulls: We are perfect soldiers because Kal'buir said so, nyenyenyeeeee!!!

Indeed. That Alpha's didn't have "a kal skirata" in their life to tell them they are enough. That they are perfect. That they do the best. Because their best was never enough.

And they weren't enough.

The Alpha ARCs deemed to be failure in the end and their template genes weren't put in to mass-production. When the deployment to Geonosis began, they realized that they weren't meant to be used in the battle and it almost broke them.

Despite their effort and hard work, the Alphas still deemed a failure. Unpredictable, unruly, and because they didn't have any inhibition in them, the Kaminoan didn't trust that they would fulfill their roles. Alphas had to watch the Nulls leave to Geonosis while they were put into stasis.

They didn't have "a kal skirata" to save them from this fate. They didn't have Jango Fett, he wasn't there at all.

They were all alone.

-- Did Jango's approach work? --

My answer is: no.

Despite the conditioning, the Alphas had wide-variety of reactions to the Republic, to the Jedi, and Order 66.

Some were able to shake down the effects of the conditioning, and realized that this dead man won't come after them from the grave to punish them for disobedience.

Some Alpha deserted and died by the hands of Clone Assassins sent after them during the Clone Wars.

Some Alpha remained loyal to Jango's orders, the Republic and then the Empire, training the new generation of soldiers.

Some Alpha went into hiding and became bounty hunters.

Ultimately, how they interacted with the world around them as individual and how the environment treated them decided their own fate.

[jacensolodjo]

17: *being an asshole* Maze: Don't you ever just want to haul off and hit him? Tavo: What good would that do? Maze: It would hurt him.

[ihonestlydontknowwhattocallthis]

Movies made around the 2010s to 2016 or so have a level of entertainment that cannot be replicated.

They don’t even have to be good (cough cough twilight cough cough) to be entertaining their just really addictive.

The hunger games movies, the hobbit trilogy, the twilight saga, the hangover movies, the Harry Potter movies, the maze runner movies.

This might be because a lot of them are based on books but still, I think it’s also because the scripts are really well developed, even if the writing is bad.

[mamuzzy-creates-stuff]

That incident caused a few sleepless night for Ordo...

[Ordo spent his freetime to research "boop" because no way he would lose to a lowly Alpha regarding knowledge] Ordo: *hacked into Maze's space-tumblr* I see... [He felt proud of himself for not lacking in any important skills and the immaturity of the Alpha is not something he should lower himself to.] [He can now sleep in peace.]

PART I

(to be continued)

[trashcanmando]

i haven't read 501st in a while but this is what happened right

[wombatttttt]

Do you have thoughts and/or headcanons about Arligan Zey you would like to share? 👀👀👀

YES I WOULD LOVE TO TALK ABOUT ARLIGAN ZEY THANK YOU FOR ASKING

I have a lot of thoughts/hcs, but for now, sticking to my most canon-related ones:

Basics: I think he’s around 49 years old, 6’4, and built like a truck. I imagined he’s pretty clean cut at the beginning of the war and stops caring by the end of it since his hair is described as “shaggy” in 501st. Krad did a really great little comic with Zey and Bardan way back when I was RPing Ordo on tumblr. (circa 2015, wow!) But I'm imagining him younger than that now.

It’s literally nowhere in the books but I feel like Zey deserves to be kinda handsome. That’s my little headcanon treat.

Since he’s a big guy, I think he has a massive lightsaber (SHHHH WITH THE JOKES I KNOW HOW THAT SOUNDS) and wields it with a greatsword style that I am manifesting into lightsaber combat existence.

I have soooo many thoughts about his relationships with Bardan, Etain, Kal, and Maze (and Vau) but they all could probably go in their own separate posts. I really like the 'shssh don't let dad know' energy Zey brings to the story, and the fact that he's only seen through the rest of the cast's perspectives and they all have different takes on him. He gives me professor vibes in the beginning and then someone who's at the end of his fucking rope by the end of it. And I'm obsessed with the fact that Maze saves him and sneaks him to Kyrimorut. A lot of the Skirata gang have mixed feelings about him, but Maze (and Bardan) make the call to save/help him and I just think that's neat.

[clonememesfrikyeah]

Stec: “Hey Maze!”

Spar: “Force sakes, just say corn, Maze is corn everybody!”

Fordo: “He calls himself that because he thinks it sounds more mystical.”

Jangotat/Nate: “Well I like the way he said it; Maze!”

All the other arcs: “Maze! mAze! MaZe!”

Trantos: “It’s fantastic!”

Alpha-17: “It’s a-Maze-ing.”

Maze: ” :/“

[wyvernsrus]

Alpha pile!

I wanted to give Maze some love after reading Triple Zero and what better way for that to happen than for his Kih'vode to drag him into a vod pile?

I finished this right before my copy of True Colors got here so it is time to go continue my journey through the Republic Commando Books!!

From left to right you have

Front: unnamed commander (brightest yellow), Maze, Stec, Fordo, Mar'ek (brightest blue), Jangotat, Tavo, unnamed Pilot (protectors symbol), Sull

Back: Trantos, Muzzle, Alpha-17, Spar, Aven

[mamuzzy]

You mentioned on the poll but would you feel up to sharing about those scenes/scenarios of Ordo and Alpha fighting? 👀

Alpha class ARCs and Null ARCs can fight over the most pettiest thing and no one can change my mind about it. Professional maybe in front of the jedi, but deep inside they are just cocky boys itching for a fight during shoreleave.

Not the fight scene itself, more like the intro for it but Seventeen being a little shit at 79's:

Crazy sod, all of them, he thought and as his gaze sweeped through the counter and behind, he noticed the cup with those annoying, colorful straws the Null captain so obsessed with… no… he was obsessed only with the red ones. That single last red straw among pinks and yellows, greens, those sissies drinking their colorful beverages with, a pathetic excuse for alcohol for a pathetic excuse for a clone. The itching feeling on the back of his neck told him to look up, realizing that certain pathetic excuse for a clone, that ad-of-malfunctioning gestation tube was now staring at him, scanning for his intentions, flaming brown eyes fixated on his every movement. With the nastiest shit eating wide grin spreading on Seventeen’s face, he reached over the counter and with a careful movement he snatched the red straw away before the Null could even react, only to dip it in his own bottle with such smug looking expression like he just have won the entire Clone Wars alone - all this while maintaining eye contact with Ordo. The Null ARC’s face was indeed priceless as the blood ran out of it, silent rage painted it pale instead. Seventeen wanted to immortalize this scene into his brain. He knew that Ordo would never forget it with his own. “Oh my. I think they just ran out of red straws” Seventeen taunted Ordo, like he would babbling to the tubies on Kamino, then taking a little sip from his drink through the straw. “What are going to do now, Daddy’s boy?”

Maze just left them alone five minutes for a fresher break. Five minutes.

One another occassion, Ordo snatched away the last dessert from Alpha in the officer's canteen, but Alpha licked his own finger and dipped it into the cake on Ordo's tray. Maze wanted to stop them from fighting, but Alpha punched him in the nose too for butting in.

I love them being dorks.

[roseaesynstylae]

Maze is as stressed as Fox, but for different reasons. He has to put up with Skirata/Null bullshit day in and day out AND he has 99 deranged brothers who enjoy giving him brain aneurysms.

[isa-ah]

not to beat a dead horse bc I know I've said this a thousand times already but totk sucked. there was nothing to work with after it ended. by this time in botw content circles it was ramping UP. it went for YEARS with elaborate theories and videos and an entire secondary canon built by theorists and fans. when was the last time you saw someone talk about totk? how much positive discussion have you seen about the story, ever? theories, world building, etc? anything at all?

[mamuzzy-creates-stuff]

What is Maze in the resuarant au 🤔 Hitman connected to their mafia family? Hitman for a rival mafia family? Customer who is secretly a hitman (not with any family)? Customer who is just a normal guy?? Health inspector that Ordo has beef with??! 😂

I went with the health inspector because it's hilarious to think about. :D

Imagine this overworked guy, who once came in as a customer and eated the best dishes ever served, especially the desserts, only to get the assignment to check this restaurant because someone in the apartment complex made a complaint about strange smells.

Maze single handedly try to keep this establishment from closing, making sure he is the one who comes and not other colleagues, while trying to avoid the accusations he accepts bribe from them. Just because one time he ate a most delicous strawberry cheesecake made by that psycho chef, who doesn't even have the qualifications and the necessary papers to run a kitchen. The only bribe he accepts is more strawberry cheesecake.

Maze is the necessary bad in their life. They have to sit through his presentations about how to make the kitchen more safe for them and the restaurant for the customers... but sometimes he doesn't get paid enough for this shit.

And once again I took the opportunity to draw Maze with glasses <3

Maze: Alright, aside from that dent on the fire extinguisher, the dining area seems fine. Kal: But of course, my sons are doing their best to comply to the regs.

WARNING: Under the cut there is a comic with cartoon violence, blood and dead body depicted in comically goreish situation. (let's stay on the safe side)

Mereel: Hey~ <3 Prudii: ORDER'S READY! Ordo: It's not for customers.

[delkios]

Still can't get over the fact that after a year (two?) with the Empire, Scorch makes commander while Boss led one of the top commando squads for three years with the Republic and never got promoted passed sergeant.