#rogue squadron vestara au

[magnetarbeam]

I've just been forced to face the fact that Legends fans are a minority and it's really depressing, so now I'm going to think about my ridiculously self-indulgent Rogue Squadron Vestara AU.

The more think about it, the more I question how in-character it actually is for her to choose to do this. If the idea is to choose her own path, it doesn't make a whole lot of sense for her to choose a path that still puts her in a specific defined command structure where she doesn't actually have much freedom. Then again, Rogue Squadron historically isn't known for being particularly disciplined.

I guess if all she's trying to do is find herself. In canon we don't get to see her piloting much, but as far as I remember she enjoys the first flight she takes in Ship. I don't think it's too much of a stretch for her to want to exercise her piloting skill more, especially since the Lost Tribe don't really seem to use any fighters, and the helms of those shitty old Corporate Sector frigates would more likely be reserved for at least Sabers.

She enjoys flying, it's not a skill she's had much of a chance to use - at least not in regular ships - and she's trying to explore herself in new ways and stuff. I think it makes enough sense.

In terms of strict command structures, I think it would make a lot of difference for her that in a regular military, everyone isn't constantly plotting to stab each other in the back.

And, like, at this point Syal's more familiar with treason and knowing when you need to defy the command structure than Wedge was at her age. All that LotF angst has to have been good for something, and I've already talked about some of my headcanons for what happened to her after she ended up among the Jedi in Fury.

I'm operating under the vague assumption that this story is supposed to be continuitous (if that's even a word) to Guiding Star, which is the theoretical story that details the events that Syal and Wedge and Tycho and Gavin went through while Revelation but mostly Invincible happened. An important part of her character in LotF is that by Fury, she's come to question her own judgement as much as she questions her superiors, and I haven't planned it very much, but I assume part of her arc in Guiding Star involves her resolving that, and that she now believes she has enough experience to determine for herself whether the current government is or isn't worth spending lives for.

(Side note: 44 ABY is the year Syal turns 27, which makes her probably the same age here as Wedge is in the first X-Wing book, and I love that symmetry, trivial though it is.)

I've been thinking of it as Vestara actually joining the Rogues three or four months after FotJ (on a ten-month in-universe calendar), so by now Ves has had plenty of time to gain experience with X-Wings, and learn from most of the best pilots alive. Also, at this point, Syal's had enough time to consider Wynn Dorvan's decisions as the next Chief of State and decide the GA under him is worth spending lives for. He is a genuinely good guy, FotJ just puts him in bad situations constantly.

According to at least Luke, Daala was doing a fine job until FotJ. Syal wouldn't have agreed with Daala's actions during FotJ, but in the timeskip, at least, I think Syal would have probably continued to lead the version of the Rogues that she inherited at the end of the Second Galactic Civil War.

(Second side note: I'd like some kind of story that actually demonstrates Daala having done a good job as Chief of State.)

The other pilots on Rogue Squadron at this point are a point of much questioning.

I'm going with the idea that there was another reorganization of the squadron after the end of FotJ, to update the roster. At least half the point of Rogue Squadron is political symbolism and representation and stuff, and there are some educated guesses to be made from that.

In addition to Syal herself, a convenient addition is Zueb Zan, the Sullustan who was her gunner when she flew Alephs. That's a relationship Syal already has, and what little there is to see of him in canon makes me like him enough.

The other canon character I can think of to add here is Drathan Forge, Inyri's great-nephew who shows up briefly at the end of Outcast, when they have to blow up the ancient artifacts beneath the mines of Kessel before said artifacts blow up the planet. In that scene, Drathan claims to be a skilled pilot, and says he has provisional Academy acceptance, and that he'd have to keep his grades up for another year. So the end of FotJ is about when he'd be getting in. If this is a few months after that, I'd find it acceptable for him to get into the Rogues on the basis of skill and family history. Hells, Inyri didn't have any formal training.

Anyway, the implicitly successful diplomatic reintegration of at least the major players of the Confederation during FotJ leads to the roster including a token Bothan and also a token Commenorian. The whole Treaty of Vontor issue results in a token Klatooinian or something. Syal herself is Corellian, obviously.

Drathan, I expect, is a representative of the various corporate enterprises currently operated by Lando. I think in Outcast, Lando has a line about how he's selling to the private sector since the SGCW (maybe before that), and if I recall correctly that implies that he's potentially enabling stuff like YVH droids to end up in the hands of enemies of the Alliance.

I'd buy the Alliance having someone who's from Kessel, another one of Lando's operations, in Rogue Squadron as an attempt to convince Tendrando Arms to be more loyal to them.

Anyway, Vestara's role in this is as both a token Jedi and a token ex-Sith. She's not ready to commit to the Jedi path yet, but if she doesn't fully leave the Order and instead is still being trained by Luke on the side, they might play her up as proof that despite the Jedi Order leaving the Alliance's authority and stuff, they haven't abandoned the Alliance completely. That would be especially important in the aftermath of the end of FotJ, and how I've decided the official line of the GA is that Abeloth was an instrument of the Sith. Especially, but not necessarily, if I decide to work this plotline into Voices of the Force, where her influence stretched far beyond Coruscant.

Also, the fact that Vestara used to be a Sith is useful too. Between Abeloth and Caedus, hate for the Sith is probably the highest it's been since... I don't even know. The highest it's been in millennia, maybe. Even Palpatine, as I recall, wasn't nearly as public about it in his life as Caedus was at the end.

If they can show people a former Sith who's been redeemed, the Jedi might prevent public opinion from going so far as to approve, for example, Kesh being glassed and its mostly innocent population killed. The Alliance doesn't know where it is, so that's not an immediate concern, but it is a concern nonetheless.

That's still only seven out of twelve.

I think Vestara's new girlfriend is someone in a position of a friend to the Rogues, but not actually in their command structure, because that way it won't get weird if one of them gets promoted.

Another headcanon I have is that the age of majority in the Galactic Alliance is 14, a relic of the strategic realities of the late stages of the Vong War, so theoretically there's no rule preventing people Vestara's age from having a position here.