Tups and Fives knew they had to be close now.
The rest of it had played out like some surreal dream, another day, wandering the underground. Coming across the house had been nothing special, but then Tup caught sight of the dead bodies by the doors. Curiosity had propelled him and Fives forward, they cautiously entered the house expecting a trap. Tup kept guard, looking around, whereas Fives remembered inspecting the corpses, he realised the superheated slashes on the corpses were lightsabre marks...
Then Ahsoka's screams cut through them both like a knife, they had ran forward and fired openly, seeing her at death's door with Count Dooku descending upon her.
Now they were running, with Asaji Ventress of all people and a weakened Ahsoka herself, they blindly turned down back streets and alley's, but his taunt was there, he laughed hysterically with every passing step they took. He was trailing them and Ahsoka was looking more pale and sickly by the second...
"Ventress, those bars he gave us..." Ahsoka wheezed to her, the former Padawan saw the night-sister looked just as sweaty and sickly looking as she did.
"He was sabotaging us, the bastard!" Ventress exclaimed "He knew Dooku was there the whole time and..." it hit her then. What he'd said and why she had found it so odd beforehand.
"Well then if we live... well we'll get to do this again and Count Dooku and his cronies will be dead, that will make you just as happy..."
How could Count Dooku be dead if he wasn't going to be there? She should have noticed that slip-up right from the start, but she was blinded by foolish love.
Believe me, we will get vengeance for you tomorrow Ventress..."
By killing Cad Bane and Aurra Sing? She was there for Dooku and Dooku alone, vengeance was for Ahsoka. The only way she'd attain her desire is if Count Dooku was there, which he wasn't. Or he shouldn't have been, but that sentence from the get-go struck her as odd. She now knew Quinlan knew this all along, that Count Dooku would be waiting, to surprise them and kill them. He must have used his powers to mask his force sensitivity, Ventress remembered him using it when she worked for him.
It was all adding up, Quinlan himself had used those bars to weaken them, make them sick before the battle. The night sister had put her own stomach pains down to other things and she knew Ahsoka was probably suffering from nerves. Yet Quinlan looked fine, how did she not notice all of this!? She felt foolish, embarrassed and broken, she'd let Quinlan break down her walls and now he was scoffing at her, taunting her, she felt anger bubble away in her again.
How stupid she'd been to trust others.
"Ventress could you help me here, we need..." Ahsoka began breathlessly, the clones supported her but it wasn't enough, she was faltering.
"No" Ventress replied coldly.
Ahsoka blinked.
"I was a fool to let this...this mission... take over" she muttered darkly "I was stupid, we shouldn't have let Quinlan... I shouldn't have let myself..."
"Ventress" Ahsoka began softly "You're hurt. It's okay. It doesn't mean you have too..."
The next moment the clones and herself had been thrown backwards against the murky walls of the alley. Ventress drew her lightsabres and placed them at Ahsoka's throat.
"You're a fool, girl!" she snapped harshly "It's your fault! YOU LET MY GUARD DOWN!"
"VENTRESS!" Ahsoka screeched back, tears starting to well in her big, blue eyes "Don't do this! PLEASE!" she begged "I... I thought of you two as family... as friends...!"
"Don't be so ridiculous and stupid, girl!" Ventress snarled "This whole family act is over! It was a sham! I never should have saved you, you were never ready for this life! You didn't make yourself strong, you made us... weak..."
"Ventress..." Ahsoka now sobbed, everything that had been built up, it was crumbling right before her eyes.
"See, this is what I mean... weak" Ventress emphasised, a malicious smile lighting her face once again.
"You ungrateful bitch"
A furious Ventress turned to see, one of the clones (held in place by the force) had spat this at her.
"What did you say to me, Clone!?" she snapped.
"You're an ungrateful bitch! Ma'am!" the clone exclaimed openly now "How dare you to speak Commander Tano like that..."
"Commander Tano, oh what love they have for you!" Ventress exclaimed in sarcasm, looking back at Ahsoka "It's not just that Rex who might like you, they are mindless clones after all. All of them are probably pre-programmed to like little Togruta girls and you've been entertaining them. Probably charming them and having them run to you and die for you, like the mindless, lovestruck little boys they really are..."
"She saved your life, we saved your life!" the same clone snapped back "We'll die for Commander Tano if need be, regardless of what you have to say..."
"Fives" Ahsoka said gently, touched at his compliment.
"Fives!? You gave the pets names!?" Ventress snapped in amusement.
"They're men, not objects!" Ahsoka spoke up harshly, the tears drying on her cheeks, as her own rage took over "Thinking like that makes you no better than Vos".
"I..."
"You're nothing!" Ahsoka shouted "Nothing Ventress! What are you going to do!? Kill us and run away and hide again!? Even if Vos betrayed you, I wouldn't! There is good in you...!"
"Will you shut up about all this good and evil rubbish!" Ventress exclaimed.
"There is good in you, don't give into your hatred and anger, what Vos did too us, betrayal hurts Ventress. I know you've been through it twice now..."
"Three times!" Ventress corrected her "My master left me! Dooku left me! Now Quinlan left me! What's the point in trusting and hoping for anything!? I know how it all ends, you can't convince me otherwise!" she was fighting back angry tears at this point.
"Your master died, he didn't intend to leave you and Dooku was always going to betray you! and for Vos, yes, it's bad okay!? But he didn't just betray you, he betrayed me as well! He betrayed everyone...!"
"How does that make it any better!" Ventress screamed, angry tears now pouring from her eyes, but she couldn't stand it. She couldn't stand being here anymore, being looked at with such pity and sympathy, by someone far weaker than her. She just wanted to get away from everything, from Vos, these damn clones and Ahsoka herself.
"You've found your place, die fighting Vos with these clones then and I'll leave you and then we're all happy" Ventress snapped.
and with that she released them, as they fell to the ground coughing and recovering, Ventress made her swift exit, wiping her tears from her eyes.
"Never again" she muttered under her breath.
"Commander Tano" Tup said, as he lifted the former Jedi Padawan to her feet, as Ahsoka gazed at them both, she felt a deep shame engulf her in those moments.
"Don't call me Commander" she muttered "I left all of you, I didn't even get to say goodbye, I abandoned you and you came back for me..."
"Skywalker insisted, he knew something wasn't right" Tup muttered.
"Skyguy…" Ahsoka muttered, she should have known.
"Come on Commander" Fives said, ignoring her earlier order "You belong back with us, back with the 501st, we want you back".
"and I want to come back" Ahsoka said "But the council..."
"The hell with the council" Fives said "You're coming back with us".
"I agree" came a new voice, as the trio of them turned to see Vos approaching them in the dark alley, his green lightsabre already lit and his eyes dark "The hell with the council indeed, but you're not going anywhere Ahsoka Tano"
She growled at him and drew her own lightsabre, ignoring the pain in her body as the two clones stood by her side, blasters raised in defence.
"Where's Ventress?" he asked curiously.
"Not here" was Ashoka's only reply.
"Shame, she looked nice..."
"You broke her heart, you slimo" Ahsoka snapped harshly "You betrayed her and the whole republic and for what!? Money!? Power!?"
"Oh please" Quinlan snapped "Those things are nice, but why would I want to stay with such a corrupted republic? With such an ineffective council and pathetic Jedi like yourself..." he teased, taking a few steps closer to her.
"Tell me, why!?" Ahsoka demanded.
"I suppose there's no harm in telling you, before all three of you die" Quinlan said "Very well then. Dooku sensed the darkness in me, he contacted me and... he needed someone. A Jedi to help him, an new assassin with a lightsabre, Asaji Ventress and Savage Oppress failed him. He needed someone likeminded, talented, someone who'd been in his shoes. Who could see the Jedi Council for how corrupt and worthless it truly was..."
"I know what the council is like" Ahsoka growled "But that doesn't give you the right, to join the sith!"
"It gives me every right!" Quinlan snapped "Do you know how many millions are dying every day because of this war! Because of the republic's corruption!?"
"We're trying to end the war...!"
"You think the war ends when Dooku and Grievous are dead!?" Quinlan bellowed "That's the naïve view the Jedi have! That's where all their resources go, the real darkness is injected into every vein of the republic's system. The techno union, the banking clan, they're just a few with representatives in the republic senate who've been caught doing shady business with the Separatists. If the figureheads die, the puppets behind the scenes will continue to pull the strings, until systems are wiped out! Until planets have become all but extinct! Until billions more fall into unescapable poverty, because the republic will tax them to the high heavens!"
"I didn't think you had a mind for politics" Ahsoka snapped, hearing all of this.
"I don't, but Dooku made it clear too me!" Quinlan raved "The way of fighting for the dark-side... it's empowering, it's the freedom I've always wanted! To fight with the Seperatist cause...!"
"and the separatists would do better!?"
"Better than the republic!" Quinlan snapped.
"You're insane" Ahsoka snapped.
"Insane, I'm just another Jedi who realises how wrong it all is!" Quinlan said "Who'd you think was buddies with Pong Krell and backed up his points?"
"Bastard" Fives snarled.
"and Barris Offee, who'd you think lovingly whispered words in her ear?" Quinlan smirked "Who'd you think sowed the seeds of doubt in her mind? Stupid, little girl couldn't think for herself..."
Ahsoka felt like she been dunked in ice at this revelation.
"You... you want to stop violence, by causing more violence!" she snapped harshly "You... you... what the hell do you want to achieve!?"
"TO END THIS WAR!" Quinlan exploded "These pieces of shit..." he gestured at the clones "They're nothing more than droids, programmed by cloning war profiteers, that's why I hate them! They bring destruction and death wherever they go! So that's why when I went to Kashyyyk and Dooku gave me the instructions to fully turn on the republic. I did just that, I learnt the truth".
"What did you do?" Ahsoka growled.
"I ordered the entire 329th squadron to kill the wookies on the planet and the idiots obeyed!" Quinlan mused "Mindless soldiers ready for war, ready for any order... ready to fight alongside the droids to do this! Some... quite a few actually... stopped and demanded to know why. It wasn't their place to ask, I slaughtered them and out of fear, or sheer stupidity the others carried on. Until the deed was done, then myself, the droids and Grievous slaughtered the clones when they were no longer useful".
"You... you..." Tup stuttered in horror.
"Then we caught and framed an elite group of commando's. The droids and grievous left me so I could convince the council what had happened. I succeeded, but the council did exactly as Count Dooku predicted. They tried to hide the incident, hide the fact clones had been brainwashed by the Separatists. That's what I told them. I convinced them, went along with their flawed thoughts that having the republic know would damage the clones further, so the framed Commando's were sent to Kamino to be terminated. The council wanted answers, but who cared? No one will ask about them".
"You took out an entire legion of clones, terminated an elite unit, committed genocide of the wookies and turned an entire system against the republic..." Ahsoka muttered in horror "You... you can't have..."
"I did" Quinlan mused, proud of himself "So what if a few walking carpets and laboratory experiments had to die? My point was proven, the republic was weak, a few lies here and there. A desperately weak council, a greedy senate... of course some Jedi were suspicious. Mace Windu wanted me expelled for failing my mission and being so carefree about it still, but I managed to convince them to keep me by running small errands for them, do you know what got me off the hook and down here with you?"
She shook her head, Quinlan laughed.
"Lying to Anakin Skywalker!" he exclaimed, "But I remember, I promised him I'd bring the true culprits to justice. I meant it, but it's not Sing and Bane, it's those senators and the council. The Jedi themselves, all of you will pay".
"For what!?" Ahsoka snarled "You're the absolute worst of us all!"
"It's a shame, really, we're likeminded too. You left the order, seeing how corrupt it truly is" Quinlan said "If it was down to me, I'd let you live. I'd train you and Ventress, we really could be a unit again. A team. Wouldn't you like that?".
Ahsoka's eyes narrowed.
"No"
"Well then" Quinlan said "That makes it easier, I have specific orders to kill you in particular and I'm not returning to my new master without your corpse".
"Why me?"
"I don't know everything Ahsoka" Quinlan said "I'm part of something far bigger, something I will be rewarded for... anyway, I think you know enough now...
"...so prepare to die".
A/N: Okay everyone thanks for your continued support, and lionkingfactsguy3, thanks for your review and I'm glad the twist has kept you invested, hopefully this chapter sheds a little more light on what's going on, next chapter will be up sometime in the week!