Commander Cody was tired. He'd never used to get tired like this, but he was getting old, at least by clone standards. Or maybe it was the guilt, weighing heavier on his back than any pack he'd ever carried. He did not like to think about it. In fact, he did not like to think at all. The orders were all there were. During the war he had been foolish to think differently. Now they were all that kept him going. He'd been foolish to think he was any different than the droids he'd used to fight. Only a few months ago the war had ended, but to him it felt like years.
It was hot inside his armour, on this backwater moon. Whether it had belonged to the Separatists, or had simply been neutral space, he had not cared to retain. All he knew was that their resistance to the control of the Empire had been short lived.
It had been too calm the last few days. He'd started thinking, and as he walked alone down the busy street he felt a bit like crying. Of course he wouldn't, he told himself. No one had ordered him to cry.
A cloaked figure crossed his path. Brown fabric covered hornlike appendages of some kind.
Unimportant, he thought, not worthy of attention.
He felt a deep urge not to examine the creature too closely. This was an urge the figure didn't seem to share. They'd stopped, staring at him from under the shadow of their robe. He wore the same armour he had during the war. Was it possible? Had he known this person?
With her surprise, Ahsoka Tano's concentration had slipped. She was no longer projecting the aura of unimportance, and as her eyes met Cody's she saw recognition there. In that moment she fought her anger. On leaving the order she had sworn off the ways of the Jedi, but she did not wish to fall to the dark side. All the same, since order 66 fighting the emotions had become almost impossible.
She was in danger, she realized. Before the clone could react she darted for the shadows of the buildings, running down a deserted alley and around a corner. He followed her, as she'd known he would. Off of this alley was the abandoned home in which she'd been squatting. As he followed her through the empty frame she used the force to tear the communicator from his wrist, crushing it to pieces against the wall.
Facing him now, the familiar orange markings on his helmet, the anger won, but more so the grief. She'd trusted Cody, even considered him a friend. But more so she knew Obi-Wan had. They'd been good friends, brothers in arms. She'd seen them laughing, chatting, sharing inside jokes. It was all too much, knowing he'd turned against him like all the others.
"Traitor," Ahsoka spat, unable to fight the tears which had welled up in her eyes.
Cody did not even go for his blaster. He was frozen, as overcome with emotions as she was. She was still so young… but they had killed Jedi so much younger. He remembered the fondness he'd held for the togruta, that he still held.
The inhibitor chip had cycled since the original order. He would not be forced to kill her unless ordered to directly by a superior. She wasn't a Jedi, he justified to himself.
All the same, all he managed in way of explanation was a quiet rendition of, "good soldiers follow orders."
She slammed him against the wall with the force, and he felt an invisible hand tightening around his throat. There was definitely some of Lord Vader in her. Did she know, he wondered. So few did; him being among them only because of Rex.
As in mind began to go fuzzy from lack of oxygen, he came to the calming realization that she might kill him. But sadly it was not to be. She released him and he crumpled to the floor, helmet falling off and rolling away. She'd fallen to her knees as well, sobbing.
"How could you?" she demanded. "Obi-Wan cared for you! I felt it. How could you turn against your friend on the orders of a monster like Palpatine?"
He sat across from her on the sandy ground, unable to give her a good answer.
"It was what I was created to do," he answered.
"You fought beside him for years!"
Cody would have wondered what he'd done to deserve this hell, had he not already known. Order 66 had not been gentle on the mental health of the clones. Those who had survived fell into three main categories: those who could justify it to themselves, who could pretend what they had done had been righteous—as if war ever was—who believed the Jedi to have been traitors. Then there were those like himself, who had been too close to those they'd been ordered to kill, who had simply been forced to accept that they were droids made from flesh and blood. Thirdly there were those like Captain Rex. His best friend had always thought a bit too independently. He'd put a blaster bolt through his own head, and Cody wondered if this encounter with the former commander would push him over the edge as well.
"I didn't kill him," Cody offered, "though I tried."
She must have heard the guilt in his voice, for when she looked up some of the anger had receded from her eyes. A single tear rolled down his cheek, despite himself.
"I know it means nothing, but I'm sorry." He had not predicted how good it would feel to say that.
"Why?" she asked again, this time without anger.
"We never had a choice," he explained. "Got a chip in my head; all of us do. We couldn't have refused if we'd wanted to."
"Did you want to?"
"I don't think about it."
They sat in silence for a few moments, allowing themselves to be crushed by the weight of it. The whole galaxy was shaking, and they were both so small, in the grand scheme of it all. All of Ahsoka's anger had drained away, leaving only the sadness. She did not know what to say, or even if she would ever find the strength to get back off the ground.
"I did not know all the Jedi," Cody said, "but I do know that General Kenobi is a good man. He's one of the best I've ever known. So yes, if I'd had the choice, I don't believe I would have turned against him so quickly."
Ahsoka let his words wash over her, feeling guilty for how she'd reacted. For what he was about to say however, there was nothing in the galaxy which could have prepared her.
"At least I had an excuse," he said, "as flimsy as it is. Your master was like a brother to him, and he has none at all."
Ahsoka's sadness was briefly forgotten in the wake of confusion. She could make no sense of Cody's last few words.
"What?"
A strange look had crossed the clone's face. He looked as if he regretted what he'd said.
"You don't know," he whispered, as if to himself. "Of course you don't."
Something very much like panic gripped Ahsoka.
"What are you talking about? What about Anakin? He's alive, right? I would have felt…"
Cody was laughing. Why was he laughing? No, those were tears. He was crying. He'd lost it. She must have broken him, pushing him to think about what he'd done.
"I'm sorry," he apologized, getting to his feet and dusting off his helmet. "I am deeply, truly sorry."
Strangely enough, Ahsoka got the feeling he was no longer talking about order 66. She got to her feet as well, making sure she was standing between Cody and the door.
"What did you mean?" she pushed, "that Anakin had no excuse? Excuse for what?"
"I don't know if I can be the one to tell you. I don't know if you'll believe me. After all I've done, I can't do this to you as well. I'm sorry."
He attempted to push past her, but she grabbed his shoulder, slamming him back against the wall.
"You will tell me."
"I thought you Jedi were all connected through the force. On some level, I think you already know."
Ahsoka reached inside. It burned there, the foreign anger which had followed her since the day everything had ended.
"I have hurt those I care about," said Cody. "I betrayed General Kenobi, and now I fear I will be your downfall as well. I won't be able to keep this meeting unreported, and I doubt Lord Vader will ignore any sightings of you."
Pictures of the terrifying Sith Lord were pulled from Ahsoka's memory. She'd seen him on the HoloNet, heard his name whispered on the streets: the mechanical monster who hunted the Jedi.
"You should kill me," he continued, adding insult to injury. "It's better for both of us that way."
"Don't say that," Ahsoka shot back, the sadness returning with a vengeance.
"Then I will do what I must not to tell anyone of your whereabouts. It's what General Kenobi would want me to do. It's what Rex would do if he was still alive."
"Rex?" she asked, a tearful question. "How'd it happen?"
He kept doing it, saying things to her he wished he hadn't. It was too late now to turn back. Sheltering her from the weight of the truth was only temporary. She would find out eventually.
"Sorry to be the one to tell you, but he put a blaster bolt through his head. It was the 501st who sacked the Jedi temple, and he never got over what he was part of. They slaughtered children: him and your master both."
Ahsoka's knees buckled, and Cody caught her, setting her gently back on the ground, and sitting beside her. Her eyes stared vacantly at the ceiling, tears running slowly down both cheeks. What she was seeing, he was unsure, but it was clear she was not with him.
"It's my fault," she murmured. "I abandoned him. It's my fault."
Cody touched her shoulder awkwardly then removed his hand. There was little he could do to comfort her.
"No it's not," he said, "you know how close he and General Kenobi were, but there are rumours it was their fight that put him in that suit. I doubt there would have been much you could have done."
Ahsoka knew Cody was trying to help, but he had only made it worse. She knew that Anakin's fall would have broken Obi-Wan's heart, and it only hurt more to know the pain her mentor and friend must have been feeling. She wished she knew where he was. She wished she could be with someone who understood.
Now that she was no longer lying to herself, she could feel the darkness seeping through the bond she'd shared with her master. She realized that some of the anger and agony that swirled in the force was not her sensing the galaxy as a whole, but was her sensing him. And as she cried she cried for many reason, but one of them was that he was in so much pain.
Cody watched helplessly as Ahsoka was burdened with the weight of the truth, but after a few silent minutes the strangest thing happened. Ahsoka sat up, crossed her legs, and closed her eyes. Her breath came smoothly, no longer in ragged sobs. A look of peace had settled across her features.
For she had finally realized the meaning behind the words of her future self, when she'd had the vision of her on that strange planet outside of the galaxy itself. As long as she'd been Skywalker's apprentice, she had been in danger. Anakin had been falling for a long time. It was just recently that he'd finally hit the ground. She would not follow him. She could not follow him. Since order 66 she'd been slipping, giving into her own emotions, and when she'd confronted Cody today it had been with revenge in her heart. That had to stop. The order might have been gone, but at her core she was still a Jedi. She would not let them die, as their teachings would live on through her.
"I will not fall," she whispered to herself, and watching her, Cody couldn't help but have a little bit of hope.
There was still light in the galaxy.
A/N: I know I should be working on Saving Ahsoka, but this one-shot just needed to be written. For right now it's a standalone piece, and is complete, but it could end up being a two part. We'll see.