"Execute Order 66."
Rex dips his head. One finger rests idly over the trigger of his blaster. Yet he does not act. Not as he should. A clone carries out orders immediately, without hesitation. A clone acts in the best interests of the Republic.
He stares ahead at Ahsoka, faltering in his steps and coming to a halt. Acting in the best interests of the Republic had never meant turning against a most loyal ally.
"Rex, come on," she calls back, turning to look over her shoulder at him. "They're expecting us at the shuttle, we cannot miss that rendezvous."
Kill the Jedi. Destroy them all.
The finger he has still resting over the blaster retracts. Tossing the weapon at his feet, he shakes his head. This, he resolves within his thoughts, this he cannot do. Not this order. Not her. Ahsoka has been his closest ally for so many years. Ahsoka Tano is family.
Another clone calls to them through the thick vegetation. Ahsoka is about to call back when Rex slaps a hand over her mouth and tugs her out of view.
"Quiet." She struggles, but it's half-hearted, and eventually she relaxes against him. When the threat has passed, he picks up his discarded blaster and turns to her. "Ahsoka, listen to me. The Emperor has ordered all clones to carry out Order 66."
"What is that?"
"The Clones have been ordered to kill all Jedi. Even younglings. Even padawans."
Her blue eyes start to water. "But the temple...Rex, they'll all be killed! Everyone I know! We need to get to Coruscant before it's too late!"
This time she breaks his hold with ease, but he hisses her name and she stops. "This order came from the Chancellor...the temple would be their first target. They're already gone."
Steeling her expression in a way he recognises too well, she reaches instinctively for her lightsabers. "And you? Does the Chancellor control your interests too?"
He crouches, hand wrapping around his blaster, and she has her lightsabers at the ready in the blink of an eye. Instead of raising it against her, he sheathes the weapon and says, "We need to get somewhere safe. We need to run."
A look of pure relief floods her face as she deactivates and replaces her sabers. Knowing him as she does, she rests a hand against his arm and nods. "Where do we go?"
Rex remembers, abruptly, an old clone on a deserted planet. A deserter to their cause - much as he himself had become. Cut Lawquane, that is where they will go. For now.
#
The farm still looks the same as Rex remembers it. Crops stretch high into the air, ripe for the harvest. Maybe Cut could use some help with that, and he can earn his way until they move on. This won't be a permanent refuge. He doesn't hold to the hope that any place will be safe forever. He glances at Ahsoka, who is crouched beside him. No, they will never be safe. But she is worth the trouble.
He goes alone to the door of the farm, feeling strange inside his armour now he no longer considers himself a member of the 501st. Without having to knock, the door flies open and a fiery-faced Suu comes bursting out, guns blazing. Rex holds up his arms in surrender, helmet in one hand.
"I remember you," she says in awe, lowering her weapon. "We didn't expect to be seeing you again."
"Cut around?"
"Sleeping. Come in, I'll wake him. He'll want to see you. Where is the rest of your squad?"
Rex sighs. "It'll be easier if I tell you both at once."
Cut embraces him as a brother, and one large hand slaps over Rex's spine in welcome. "It's good to see you."
"You too, brother. I would never have brought this to you, but...I had nowhere else to go. I don't know who to trust."
"What do you mean?" Suu asks. She lowers a mug of something warm onto the table before him.
Rex wraps his hands around it, bare skin against the earthen clay. The warmth spreads through his palms. A heavy sigh lifts his shoulders slightly before they drop. "Palpatine executed Order 66."
Recognition flares on Cut's face. "Kill the Jedi."
"But I couldn't..." he growls, hands falling away from the mug. "I don't know what the Jedi did. Whether Palpatine's just full of shit, or they really did rise up. But I know she didn't."
"You didn't come here alone, did you?"
"I only need a place to stay for a few nights. Time to figure out where we go next. Like I said, if I knew anywhere else..."
"Nonsense," Suu snaps, "You stay with us as long as you need. You're always welcome here."
Solemnly, Cut nods. "As long as you need. Go, call your Jedi friend in. It's cold this time of year."
Outside near the crops, Ahsoka's pacing back and forth to keep warm. When Rex walks part of the way towards her and is quickly spotted, she hurries over to him. Breath fogging up the air and skin chilled to the touch, they both walk back into the house.
Suu grins at the Jedi. "A togrutan! Welcome, Jedi. You must be tired. Come, I will make a place for you. You are lucky the children are asleep, they would never let you rest. A real Jedi in their house!"
As the women leave, Cut turns a curious eye on his friend. Rex is watching Ahsoka's receding form, somehow seeming both deep in thought and entirely blank all at once. The trained facade of a clone trooper, and a look Cut recognises all too well. "When you left, you said your family was back where you were going...that family is her, isn't it?"
"She's a part of it, yeah. There were others…they're gone now. It's only us."
"You must be as tired as she is, if not more. Rest, we'll have plenty of time to talk in the morning."
Ahsoka shifts as he enters the room Suu has set up for them. Blue eyes search him out in the dim light.
"Get some sleep, sir."
Blinking away tears, the togrutan manages a weak smile. "We're as far off duty as it gets, Rex. You don't need to call me sir. I'm not a commander anymore."
"Right. Sorry…Ahsoka."
"Better. And Rex? Thank you. If it weren't for you, I might be dead right now."
Forcing a grin, he waves a hand in dismissal. "Nah. I think any clone who went up against you would be in a lot more trouble than you think."
He lies down upon a thin mattress, still facing her, and she reaches out and rests a hand on top of his much larger one. "Thank you."
The Jedi does not sleep soundly that night, though not by any fault of their meagre surroundings. Nightmares cloud her thoughts, darkness that stretches over her, holding her down. She sees things that cannot be possible, yet she knows are true. Anakin killing younglings, eyes the same startling yellow as a Sith Lord. How long has he been walking this path without any of them seeing it? How long has Darth Vader been brewing beneath the surface?
Resting her head on a thin pillow, she stares at Rex. His face is twisted into a frown, though he is still sleeping. Ahsoka reaches for him, her red skin a stark contrast to his dark olive tan. The moment she touches his cheek, the tension in his body seeps away. Only when he has completely relaxed does she withdraw, and even then the action is reluctant.
Rex had been following orders and talking about honour since they met. And now he was a deserter, because of her. For her.
I hope it was worth it, she muses.
Her dreams are plagued by Darth Vader and the dying breaths of a hundred Jedi, but she does not wake again until morning.
#
There is much work to be done on a farm, and Rex is as thankful for the distraction as Cut is for the helping hand. Even Suu manages to get more done when Ahsoka comes in from the fields and looks after Shaeeah and Jek. They've fashioned their own lightsabers out of strong yet light wood, and Ahsoka guides them. But she is plagued by visions. Watching the children, she will suddenly see Anakin battling Obi-Wan, turned fully against his former master. The Dark Side is so strong that she sometimes cannot breathe until the visions are gone.
She doesn't tell Rex.
#
Every now and again, there is a night where Rex wakes to an empty room. Ahsoka has nightmares. He knows it all too well - sees it not only when she sleeps but in her eyes when she is awake. However well the Jedi thinks she hides it, Rex can see that she is affected by something. Until she chooses to tell him, however, he will remain silent. On the nights when he wakes alone, however, it takes more effort than normal to stay out of it. He can't deny the moment of panic that comes over him when he thinks he's been left behind.
Tonight, she's on the roof. It's not easily accessible, and Ahsoka is the only one who can get up there. The closest Rex can get to her is the verandah, and even then he has to twist uncomfortably to get a glance at her.
"Ahsoka," he says, keeping his voice low so he doesn't wake the still sleeping family inside. The kids are impossible to get back to sleep when they get woken up in the middle of the night.
The togrutan seems not to notice him at all, and even from a distance Rex can see the way the cold has set into her skin. Every breath she takes forms a puff of fog before her lips.
"Ahsoka," he repeats, hissing it a little louder. This gets her attention. One of her petite hands moves reflexively to her lightsaber. In the silence of night, the sound of the weapon activating seems deafening. "Just me, sir."
Relaxing now she's identified him, Ahsoka places her lightsaber back at her side. In a move that looks far too easy, she vaults down from the roof and lands gracefully on the verandah. "It's really late. What are you doing up?"
He'd almost forgotten about the two mugs of tea that he'd brought with him, but now he hands one to her and sips from the other. "Couldn't sleep."
"You look cold," she comments, which is putting it politely. The sound of his teeth chattering is, quite frankly, embarrassing. "Come on, let's go inside."
When both of them have wrapped up in their blankets, Rex places down his mug and eyes his friend. "Ahsoka…"
"They're not nightmares." Her gaze comes up, then moves away just as swiftly. "Visions. I wish they were nightmares. But these things I see, they're horrible. And they're really happening. Or going to happen."
"You don't have to tell me, 'Soka."
Her lips curl into a smile at the nickname, but her expression quickly falls. "Anakin turned to the Dark Side. He…he killed younglings. He's a Sith, Rex. My master is everything I was trained to never become."
Even Rex is rendered speechless by the revelation. He tries to imagine this side of Skywalker, but is unsuccessful. It's not possible. And yet, Ahsoka's certain it has happened.
"I think if I were there, he would have killed me too," she whispers, finally devolving into fitful sobs.
Shuffling over to her, he gathers the Jedi in an embrace, one strong hand stroking her skin. It takes time, but she settles. When she has relaxed into his arms, Rex lets her adjust until she has her head resting against his chest.
They fall asleep that way, curled against each other.
#
After that, neither of them can sleep without the other. Rex no longer frowns in his sleep. Ahsoka's visions begin to fade. She starts to sleep through the nights, waking restful and calm, with Rex wrapped around her smaller form. It's almost poetic, the way they fit together so perfectly. Some mornings, when she wakes before him, she'll just stay there. Feel the way his breath puffs against her cheek, or the way his hands curl around her waist.
#
The visions stop. But she doesn't forget Darth Vader.
#
Cut and Rex have a lot in common. They are both deserters now. They had both come upon an order they could not - would not - carry out. And they were both here now, on a nowhere planet with their family.
And yet, in so many ways, they are nothing alike. Rex walked away from the Clone army, from the Republic, but in his heart he's still a soldier. He can't stop. When he wakes, the first thing he does is asses for threats and move immediately for his weapon - a weapon that has not been with him for months. Every time he
enters a room he checks every inch of it for enemies. The sound of a ship overhead still makes him shiver.
They both left the battle, but Rex never left the war.
Ahsoka trusted him with the truth about Skywalker. So he tells her the truth about him. She deserves to know why he wakes up and tenses right to the tips of his toes every morning. Like everything else, the togrutan takes it in her stride. Rex thinks she understands what it's like to miss their old lives. Maybe she understands the feeling better than even he does.
He and Ahsoka ran from the Republic, and sometimes it still feels like they were torn from it.
#
Eight months and three days after their arrival at the Lawquane property, another clone comes looking for them.
Rex is there to meet him, a wary look plastered across his face. "Fives? That really you?"
The ARC trooper has looked better. He's still wearing his armour, but it's brutally damaged and his helmet is partially collapsed, held at his side instead of being worn. But when he sees Rex, he smiles broadly. "Rex…it's good to see you."
"What the hell happened to you?"
"Well, as it turns out, this is what happens when you stand up to the Emperor's new shinies. I, ah, I thought you might've come here. Ahsoka still with you?"
"You stopped taking orders?"
Fives glares at him. "I'm not gonna try and kill her. As if any of us would stand a chance anyway."
"Yeah. She's here. Sounds like there's a lot we don't know about the state of the Republic."
"Well, for starters, it's the Empire now. The Jedi are gone. Those that weren't killed have gone into hiding, according to rumour."
Ahsoka appears at Rex's side, peering at the newcomer. "Anakin…"
"Yeah…they call him Darth Vader. He, ah…he's not exactly the same General you knew. Sorry, sir."
"Don't call me sir," she snaps, disappearing back into the house.
#
It takes a while for Cut and Suu to warm up to Fives, and even when they do there is the small issue of space. The house wasn't built for six, let alone seven. But the house is set on a block of land big enough for expansion, and with no persuading necessary Cut agrees to let them build their own place. Rex, Ahsoka and Fives get started on it as soon as they can requisition the supplies.
They make sure it's got just enough space for three, with easy access to the roof for Ahsoka, and a place for Fives to relax. Without any discussion necessary, the bedrooms are built to the effect of two, not three. Ahsoka moves what few things she and Rex have left into the new room the second it's built, and only the two of them knows about the secret compartment built to conceal two lightsabers.
Eventually, they have a house. It even starts to feel like home.
#
The day the Empire comes to their tiny place called home, it isn't because of the two clones and the Jedi. It's just an invasion. The spread of the plague Darth Sidious has unleashed upon the galaxy, seeping out further and further with every passing moment.
Ahsoka has her lightsabers before the stormtroopers even hit the perimeter of the farm. The glow of green and the hum is soothing, after so long without holding the weapons. The Force feels out of balance when she calls upon it, but she uses it regardless, pushing away groups of clones as they sweep over the farm. Rex and Fives grab weapons off the first troopers to fall, protecting Cut and his family at all costs. They're better shots than the Empire's soldiers, and from their vantage point inside the house they manage to take down a great deal of the invaders. Rex constantly seeks out the flash of green and red plowing through the stormtroopers with fierce determination.
The three of them are a force to be reckoned with.
In the end, though, there are just too many. Fives is the first to go down, when stormtroopers destroy half of the house. Ahsoka retreats to Rex's position, six blaster wounds marking her body. Rex holds her in his arms, weapons forgotten.
She closes her eyes and breathes out, long and exhausted, before whispering, "We did good, huh?" They have. Cut and his family have escaped, and they'll find somewhere new to settle down. Without two clones and a Jedi as their closest friends. Where the Empire will never find them.
"Yes we did, commander."
Ahsoka knows the sound that next fills the air, breaking the sudden silence. Breathing, twisted and contorted by the machines keeping him alive. Even though his face is concealed, she senses and she knows who wears the mask. Her visions have been gone for so long, but Darth Vader will haunt her forever.
"Anakin," she whispers. "Skyguy."
Red fills the air as the hum of a lightsaber comes to life.
"Goodbye, Snips."