Cauliflower clouds. Hills bathed in humidity, wrapped in a blanket of foliage so dense it veils the ground. Cylindrical bacta silos and processor plants poking out of the sprawling jungle like forgotten temples of some lost history. All of it plays host to the show of light and force rollicking Thyferra's skies as Republic gunships and assault cruisers drop down from orbit, punching through a hail of anti-air fire and flocks of Separatist interceptors as Anakin's fighter group fights through the chaos.

He darts through a murder of vulture droids; he pinwheels like a crane, his fighter swooping and diving, R2 cheering along as Anakin picks droid fighters out of the sky like insects. Nearby orbital strikes drop like rods from the heavens, blue turbolaser bolts ripping apart an anti-air blister and sending a volcano of fire and debris pluming into the sky. "Keep at it, boys," Anakin says to his fighter wing as the gunship wing braves the peril. "Just keep 'em honest. We're clearing the way."

"General?" bleats his comm. Rex and the gunships. Good news, Anakin hopes. "General, I've got a fix on that location you wanted. Fifty kilometers to the west of here, buried in a hot zone of defenses."

The Tath bunker. Maybe Sleheyron wasn't such a waste, after all. Maybe this won't be such a waste. "Set a course, Rex, I'll have the fighters pave the road," Anakin replies, eager for answers at last. "Blue Flight, change heading to two-six—"

He doesn't manage to finish the order before Obi-Wan lights up the channel. "Anakin, whatever you're doing, let it go for the moment and head for Master Luminara's position."

"What? Master, I've got the Taths' compound, my whole landing group's en route right now. What's Luminara's problem?"

"Her problem is more serious than yours," Obi-Wan says. "Let Rex and your soldiers handle the Tath defenses. We have a concentration of Separatist ground forces converging on Luminara and Barriss's landing zone, and they're pinned down. Our offensive in that sector's stalling, and the Separatists are too close for a precision orbital strike. Ahsoka's already headed there with her group, but Luminara can use all the help she can get. Take a few of your landing teams and make haste. We can't afford to slow down now."

He grits his teeth, but he's already violated the plan once during this battle. Besides, how hard can clearing a few Separatists out of a landing zone be? "Rex, keep the main group on course. You're in charge. Grey Squadron, Third Regiment, on me. All power to the engines."

"Affirmative, General."

"Got it, Blue Leader."

Anakin drops down until his fighter races just above the canopy, enemy fire lighting up the thick air all around him. A concussion missile zips by one of his fighters, banks too slowly, and slams into a bacta silo, blowing apart ten million liters of bacta in an explosion large enough to batter a cruiser. A colossal waste of miracle medicine. Anakin shakes his head as he veers around the flame. No time to think about such things now. Only the battle, the fight, the enemies and allies. He accelerates. The ground turns to green marble, the fighters and landing ships smudges against the sky. Faster. Faster.

Then he is upon the landing zone. Gunships drop in and out under heavy fire, unlucky craft hardly making it airborne before missiles snaking up from the jungle pluck them out of the air. "Landing craft, get down there, now," Anakin barks to his regiment. He curls between two rising gunships, glancing down just long enough to see a green lightsaber between a hail of blue and red blaster bolts. Then he grabs his joystick and yanks it hard towards him as a droid gunboat lurches up from the forest, blasters glancing off of his shields.

"Easy, R2," he says as the droid howls. He knifes over the attacking craft, executes an ascending turn, and lances the gunboat's missile payload as the cumbersome ship attempts to evade. Warheads explode under Anakin's laser fire, the blast blowing off half of the gunboat's disc-shaped fuselage and sending the ship careening out of control towards the treetops.

Anakin doesn't bother to watch the results of his handiwork. "R2, take off as soon as I'm out and beeline it back to Rex," he says, uncoupling his shoulder straps and opening the cockpit.

No sooner has the fighter dropped to the soft, wet earth than Anakin leaps out with lightsaber in hand and ready. All around the battle droids have closed in, some so near they trade their blasters for metal fists and wrist-mounted knives, swiping and clawing at clones in a bruising, brutal melee, fighters from each side scattered about. "More Jedi!" cries a battle droid as it spots Anakin, turning his weapon on him.

Too easy. Anakin swats the droid's blaster shot right back at it, decoupling the unfortunate unit's head from its shoulders. Another battle droid looms on his left and he turns, blade spinning, and bisects it from shoulder to hip. A destroyer droid with shields down turns on him, but as he raises his saber to engage a green blade rips through its cannon arms and sends the droid reeling.

"Master Skywalker!" shouts Barriss, immediately turning to fend off an assault by super battle droids.

Anakin grunts, forms up back-to-back with the recently-promoted Jedi Knight, and counters his own attackers' assault. "Barriss. Mind telling me about how this happened?"

"The trees hid them from sensors until we were too low to back out," says Barriss, reflecting a blaster bolt back at one of the super battle droids. The attacker shrugs it off and fires a wrist-rocket that goes awry with a well-timed Force push. "We lost half our fighter cover. We had to get down to ground."

"And they jumped you as soon as you did. Wonderful," Anakin says. It's a messy situation, all right, but nothing to make him sweat. He's had enough of these messes before. He even feels a slip of enjoyment, a burst of glee as he throws his lightsaber and dismantles a destroyer droid assailing a squadron of green-blazoned clone troopers. Ah, battle. Where everything becomes so simple, even as it becomes chaotic. These aggressive negotiations are the best kind of diplomacy. "Let's pull around and—" he begins, but he stops short as a dwarf spider droid clambers out of the tree line and sharpshoots an AT-RT walker behind them. The Jedi drop to the ground as the vehicle explodes, showering the area with debris and launching its driver airborne. "Great time for Ahsoka to be late," Anakin grumbles.

"What was that, Master?"

"Nothing. Where's Luminara?"

Barriss points to her right in between fending off a trio of battle droids. "She and Commander Gree went to pull off our scout walkers and try and cut the enemy line in half. I don't know what happened."

"Can you hold this line?"

"I think so?"

"Do it," Anakin barks. "I'm going after her. Fall back if you have to. Don't get yourself killed for a position that's getting overrun anyway."

Without waiting for her confirmation he peels away, dodging clones and droids alike as he plunges through the lines. One of his flight's gunboats takes a surface-to-air missile to the engine and plunges to the ground, blowing open a hole in the lines. Anakin bursts through the chaos, lightsaber swishing through combatants, battle droids so focused in the intensity of the melee that they do not have time to turn on him before he's there, predator-like, a sprinting carnivore running down his prey. It's almost unfair.

Fifty meters ahead at the opposite treeline, Luminara battles with a contingent of clones. "Master Skywalker!" she calls as her accompanying reconnaissance walkers attempt to stave off the encroaching droids. "Are those all your reinforcements?"

"Yeah, you're welcome," he says, dashing forward. "Obi-Wan said Ahsoka was supposed to be here. You know where she is?"

"I haven't a clue," Luminara says, picking off a screeching crab droid with a well-placed blaster deflection. "You weren't with her?"

"No, I had a mission of my own. Then Obi-Wan rerouted me."

"We're getting through them," Luminara says as her clones surge forward. "Just a little more, Skywalker."

But he scarcely hears her. A pair of lightsabers, one blue and one green, light up in the shadow of the treeline and Anakin turns, instinct kicking in, blood pumping, the jungle heat constricting his chest. "Master, watch out!" he shouts.

Just in time. Luminara dodges as General Grievous hurtles out of the trees, one lightsaber just missing her head, the other swiping off a clone's arm. The cyborg turns, his movements slow, controlled, almost languid amid the fury of the melee. "Skywalker," he chortles, "and here I thought I'd miss you."

"Funny. I wasn't missing you," Anakin says.

Luminara forms up on his shoulder. "Together."

"Together. Let's do it."

Grievous laughs. He uncouples his arms, lights another pair of lightsabers, and aims the second set of weapons at the two. "Send as many Jedi after me as you wish. You're nothing compared to me," he snorts. Whirling the two new blades, he adds, "Just like the two who wielded these lightsabers. Danba Nago and Taron Malicos send their regards. Or they would have, if I hadn't demolished their fleet over Teyr. Just like I'm going to destroy you here and now."

"You're not killing anyone else," Anakin snarls.

"All bark and no bite, Skywalker. We'll see."

Anakin charges. Grievous crouches to accept the blow. Luminara surges forward, lightsaber high.

All three clash in a dazzle of light. Grievous locks Luminara's blade while batting at Anakin's lightsaber. Sidestepping, Anakin hits him with a blast of the Force, but the cyborg digs in to the turf with his clawed feet and holds his ground. "Amusing," he chortles, knocking aside Luminara's strikes.

Anakin lurches back just as another combatant flies at him. Assassin droids. He intercepts the droid's blade, grabs it with the Force, then guts it with his lightsaber. "Assassins," he snaps to Luminara.

"I see them. Don't let them distract you. Stay on Grievous."

"By all means. I wouldn't have it any other way," the cyborg laughs.

Luminara dodges between Grievous's strikes, cuts a charging assassin droid's leg off, then recovers just in time to parry Grievous's follow-up blow. Anakin dives in once more, beating Grievous's defense with his blade as if swinging a war hammer, throwing all his chest and shoulders into each strike. Grievous retaliates, stepping back before driving his foot into Anakin's chest. The blow sends Anakin reeling. He coughs, the wind knocked out of him, raising his lightsaber to counter any follow-up strike.

But Grievous isn't there. Instead the cyborg turns his full focus on Luminara as two assassin droids bear down on her. The picture of patience, she holds her position, engaging each and every swing, her lightsaber strikes conversative, careful. But her caution fails before Grievous's hammering blows, driving her to the ground. He swings like an executioner and Luminara rolls away. She gets to her feet, intercepts a blaster bolt. Turns to engage one of the assassin droids.

It all seems so fast, the world in slow motion. Anakin has only just gotten to his feet, his chest pounding, as the other assassin droid rakes its sword up Luminara's back.

"No!" shouts Anakin.

Luminara stumbles, cries out. She swipes with her lightsaber, taking out one assassin droid, then the next. But all the while Grievous moves in. He grabs her throat with a free hand, uses another to grab her weapon arm at the wrist and twist until bone snaps.

Then he draws back a lightsaber and plunges it into Luminara Unduli's chest.

"Luminara!" bellows Anakin.

He leaps forward, empowered by the Force. Grievous evades, counters Anakin's swing, and engages him in a saber lock. "Worthless Jedi scum," he sneers, his face a foot from Anakin's. "You are impotent. So much for the great Anakin Skywalker."

"I'll kill you!" Anakin howls. He swats away Grievous's blades and brings down an overhead strike. The cyborg pulls away, eyes darting between Luminara's twitching body and Anakin.

Then he laughs, as if seeing something in Luminara's body. "Not today, Skywalker."

"Grievous!"

Rather than continue the fight, Grievous drops to all six limbs and scutters away. Anakin thunders and races after him, tossing aside a battle droid with the Force, cutting through another, and sprinting into the trees. "Grievous, you coward! Fight me!"

The jungle envelops his line of sight. Paths disappear at once. And Anakin has gotten scarcely twenty meters from Luminara when the forest explodes with fire.

The blast throws him back against a cushion of shrubbery. He grimaces, shakes his head, and looks up to see a squadron of Y-Wings pounding the jungle with proton bombs. Battle droids explode in flame and shrapnel. Two gunships drop down in the wake of the bombing, and a familiar pair of green lightsabers blaze to life aboard the nearest.

Ahsoka. Too late. Just too late.

Anakin stumbles out of the treeline as Ahsoka slices through a pair of battle droids. The Separatist attackers flail and retreat, units scattering as the newly-arriving clones pick off stragglers and the gunships rake the jungle with their turret lasers. Ahsoka grins as she sees Anakin approach. "Looks like you had things covered," she says cheerily, but her face drops when Anakin pushes past her. "What? I wasn't that late. Besides, I got caught up in—"

His hand silences her. Nearby, Barriss kneels over Luminara's body. "Oh no," murmurs Ahsoka.

"Master, listen to me," Barriss chokes. "You're going to make it. Just hold on."

"Barriss—" Anakin starts.

She shakes her head and wipes away tears. "Help me get her on the gunship."

"Yeah. Yeah, okay," Ahsoka says, hurrying forward. "Master, help out. We can get her to the medical ship. She might still—"

"She's dead."

Barriss grimaces. "She's still alive, I know it."

"She's dead, Barriss," Anakin says. His voice is harder than he intended, but he feels neither sympathy nor guilt. Only rage simmers in his heart. Grievous. Grievous, you coward. I will hunt you. I will kill you.

"But—"

"She's dead," Anakin says once more, his tone flat. He turns away, back towards the gunship. "Ahsoka, stay with her and help with the mop-up."

Ahsoka's eyes bulge. "What? Where are you going?"

"I have a bunker to clean out."

"Master, you can't just leave! We have to…we have to figure out…er…"

"I can, and I will," he says, whirling on her. "Now stay here and secure this area. And report in to Obi-Wan about Luminara. I already sent Rex ahead, and I'm not leaving him out to dry."

"But—"

"That's an order, Ahsoka."

She scowls. That same look, that suspecting stare from Sleheyron after he had dealt with the Anjiliac backstabbers. Her eyes half-closed, as if she and only she can see something in him that the world would rather bury. "Yes, Master," she says coolly.

"Get us airborne," he snaps at the gunship pilot as he jumps aboard. He does not look at Ahsoka and Barriss as they lift off. He does not look at Luminara. No, he only stares out at the jungle, at the smoldering treetops that the Y-Wings bombed, resentment burning in his chest. If only they'd held back, he could've gone after Grievous. He could've killed him. Could've torn that cyborg menace's head from his shoulders.

It is not about Luminara. She was not a bad person, but she is another casualty like any other. No, it is Grievous—only Grievous. His chortling sneer. Luminara's death is a personal insult, a slap to Anakin's face. Next time they meet, Grievous will die at Anakin's hand. No insult that egregious can go unpunished.

Hyperspace again. It is becoming all too familiar.

Sae reclines in the Evening's pilot seat, watching the endless blue depths rush up to meet her. Her mind drifts. Tamri and Neelotas sleep, and the ship's hyperdrive churns and chugs like a worn beast of burden as they pound towards Ziost. Tamri's coordinates. Tamri's information. The girl found something secret locked away deep in Korriban, hidden nuggets of wisdom spilling forth for her while Sae made her way up the sides of the abyssal canyon deep in that cave. Yet for all that…what? They have a location. They have a goal. The end of the journey is so near, so close she can almost touch it. Just a hyperjump away.

But what they know, so too does Count Dooku. He must.

It is almost a joke by now—where they go, he is right behind them. The leader of the Separatists, a Sith Lord, trailing after two wayward Jedi. Now, more than ever, Sae is convinced that they are on the trail of something massive, something war-changing. Tamri spoke of an ancient power on Ziost, some terrifying old weapon—a Celestial, she called it—with the ability to tell the future. Whether or not the girl's right, Sae knows they will find something on Ziost. Up until Korriban she had never even heard of the world, an old Sith capital planet from eons ago. Now she feels as if they are walking into destiny. But does it really matter in the end? Is it worth all this trouble?

That vision from Ossus. Snow-covered plains. Mountains rising amid fog. Shadowy megafauna marching in the distance. Familiar bodies fallen in the frost. Suddenly it comes to her as Sae tries to close her eyes, as vivid as it was back on the old Jedi library world. Obi-Wan dead, Tamri dead. Is it just a vision? A prophecy? She does not know.

But something might. If whatever waits for them on Ziost really can tell the future, then Sae can have her answers. She can know, truly know, what awaits her. For the first time in her life, Sae can claim control.

Power. Control. Isn't that what she wants? The ability to seize control of a life that has spiraled out of her hands ever since she was born, ever since an uncaring mother dumped her on a Coruscant street?

She sighs and rubs her head. Aches grousing in her temples. It's all so tiresome. Jedi, Sith, war, investigations, work; bloody life itself. No, it isn't the future she wants told to her. It's a specific future. One where she can stop fighting, stop running, stop pursuing. One where she and Tamri can find a measure of peace. Isn't that what this is all worth? Peace. Peace like that moment on Ossus, peace of the same vividness and warmth of seeing Tamri kneeling amid those moon's grief flowers. Is it worth it? Is a lifetime of struggle and ache worth a moment of pure, innocent joy?

She hopes so. She has nothing else to keep her going. And, perhaps, more than anything, she needs someone—even something—to tell her she's okay.

Keep going. Keep moving forward. It's all she's ever told herself, ever since she was a youngling, then a Padawan training under Adi Gallia, then striking out as a Jedi Knight in her own right. Keep going. Forward. Always forward. Tunnel vision, life in two dimensions, only the past and the future. Where she has come from, where she is going. Not once has Sae ever bothered to ask why. The blows have come—Geonosis, Master Gallia's death, Falco's team at Belderone—but she has always assumed that some light awaited at the end of the tunnel. That, one day, all this struggle would be worth it. Not for something vain such as achieving the rank of Master, or gaining a seat on the High Council. Jedi aspirations. Such material concerns, really.

No, Sae wants to find out why. Why. Why, when she looks into the swirl of hyperspace—why do they do it? Why criss-cross the galaxy like this, flitting from one secret to another, life and death and headaches and stars? How many times is she going to cross blades with Count Dooku on a mission she hardly understands yet keeps doggedly pursuing? There has to be a purpose, has to be a reason waiting for her. Someone just tell her what these thirty-odd years of her life have meant, already.

As they entered hyperspace above Korriban, Tamri had looked up at her with those big eyes and asked her the same question as before: Shouldn't we call the Council about this? Again Sae had shot the idea down. The Council. What could they say? Does she even care what they say?

She remembers a conversation she once had with Master Luminara Unduli. You must learn to let go, Luminara had told her. There is a reason the Jedi frown upon attachments. They will bind you to this world. Make you fear the fading of everything around you. Attachment will never let you find peace. What a load of shit. The last thing Sae would have done had Dooku struck down Tamri in that cave was let go. The last thing she would have found is peace. Call it fear, the Jedi can. Call it attachment. Let them. If that's what truly matters in this world, if an attachment is her purpose, Sae can live with that. She just wants to know. She wants a definitive answer. Why is she doing any of this?

Why is she here at all?

She withdraws her lightsaber and angles the unlit hilt at her chest. Blazes, it would be so easy. End all her questions. One flick of her thumb. No one would even care. No one but Tamri.

And for that reason alone she hooks the lightsaber back on her belt. Keep going. Keep going.

Rex holds up at the door. "Fives. Breach it."

"On it."

The veteran ARC trooper plants a shaped charge, backs off, and clicks the detonator. The door blows inward and Rex moves in, blaster pistols at the ready. The air is cold in the bunker reception area, fog billowing out from a hallway at the foyer's far end. Like the jungle stopped at the door and within is nothing but antiseptic and chill, icy science warding back wild nature.

"No one home," Fives mutters as he follows in behind Rex.

Rex shakes his head and waves in his fellow troopers. "We don't know that. Weapons up. Stay alert."

"We going in without General Skywalker?"

"He wouldn't want us to wait. There might still be Tath personnel wiping databanks. All units, blasters to stun. Free-fire zone otherwise. Fives, with me on point."

Rex and Fives move forward at a cautious pace. The Tath bunker on Thyferra teems with darkness and silence and stillness as if in defiance to the hot, wet world around it. This is a world of metal and glass and secrets, not one ounce of nature to be found. Only beeping computer consoles and blurry pale lights and durasteel floorboards clanking underfoot.

As he moves forward, Rex's thoughts shift unexpectedly towards Commander Tano. Don't get too crazy down there, she'd said while he prepared to launch from the Light of Contrition. Coy smirk. Playful eyes. A foolish thing to be remembering right now, but it lifts his spirits amid the hostility of the Tath bunker. He has no lack of confidence and all the faith in his men, but the battle for Thyferra raging all over the world may as well be half the galaxy away in here. Commander Tano, General Skywalker, the other Jedi—he has no idea if they're alive, all right, or thrown back by the entrenched Separatist forces. And in here, he can do nothing but carry on. Do his duty as a clone, as a good soldier. Nothing to do but trust in their abilities and hope that they don't fall.

As if mirroring his thoughts, Fives murmurs, "Bloody wonderful. Comm's out. All except for the local channel. Some sort of jamming."

"Keep your eyes sharp. Our boys are too far out anyway if things go bad. Have your trigger finger ready," says Rex. His certainly is: He has not forgotten Taris. The Taths are certainly not light on weaponry and soldiers to wield them, and a secure research facility on Thyferra must be well guarded—assuming the whole staff hasn't evacuated by now.

Which they probably did once the Republic fleet showed up in-system. "What exactly are we looking for, sir?" Fives asks as they proceed into another steel-encased corridor.

"Cut the chatter. Save it for later."

Another locked door. Another breach. "Fives."

"On it. Stand clear."

The door bursts, and Rex and Fives surge through with weapons at the ready. Greeting them are more than a dozen personnel, all draped in science-white lab coats. All lying on the floor in mangled states of horror; all very dead. Fives looks up at a gashed ceiling, metal and piping and wires jutting down like an enormous stalactite, and sighs: "One of our orbital strikes must've done it."

"Stay alert. Might be some of 'em who survived," says Rex. "And keep an eye out for any operable terminals. Any sort of archives, data, anything useable."

"Got it."

The area opens into a computer station-rimmed room, and Rex holsters his pistols. "Let me check out these terminals. Might be a working one, even with the damage from the strike," he says. "Search the perimeter. Make sure we're alone."

As Fives moves out, Rex punches at one of the computer stations. Nothing. Then another—still nothing. He grits his teeth. It looks like a work room, all flickering lights and ergonomic chairs. So much potential here, yet the damage from the bombardment has knocked out all the computers. Shame.

"Captain!"

Rex rises with blasters in hand. Fives. He rushes forward, barreling into the next room, and nearly shoots when an unknown figure runs into him. Then he pauses—a protocol droid, with one arm torn off, a hunk of shrapnel embedded in its back. "Protocol five-six-a-b-two," the droid mutters, bumping into Rex and stumbling forward. "Emergency recorded—protocol five-six—"

"Captain? Found something."

Rex lets out baited breath. No danger, then. Perhaps Fives and the other clones are just that—clones—but they are still his men. He will kill whoever threatens them, so long as it doesn't contradict orders. A fortunate thing that he reports to General Skywalker—his orders always come with a liberal dose of interpretation, and searching the Tath bunker is no exception. We find out what they were doing here, General Skywalker had told him, and that's that. Everything else is fair game.

He can work with that. "Fives. What is it?"

"Might want to see for yourself, sir."

It is, Rex imagines, the same sort of vault that General Skywalker found in the Tath estate on Taris. The size of a small warehouse, floor littered with preservation cubes within which stand a number of artifacts of unknown make. Some appear to be ancient—stone reliefs of alien language, artistic depictions of creatures Rex cannot name, chunks of metal and rock that seem to serve no purpose whatsoever. Perhaps collectors might favor this sort of stuff, but Rex can see no purpose in it. "Is this some sort of art collection?"

"Dunno, sir, but there's this. Take a look."

In a corner of the vault is, unmistakably, a collection of lightsabers. Not like General Skywalker's, though—these seem old, bulky, with cords trailing from their ends. Beside them in another preservation cube is a stone tablet with a symbol that even Rex can place—the sigil of the Jedi Order. "Jedi artifacts," he says. "Were they raiding an old temple or something?"

Fives raps his knuckles on one display case. "Maybe. Look at this one."

It's a milky white crystal as long as Rex's arm, preserved on a delicate scaffold within its casing. "Something funny about this," says Rex, rounding the display. "Gives me a funny feeling."

"Don't the Jedi use crystals in their lightsabers?" Fives asks.

"Think so, but don't ask me what they look like. They're not gonna be this large, anyway," answers Rex. "Bit unwieldy. But what's the point, then?"

Fives shrugs. "Doubt we'll find too many answers here."

"Yeah," says Rex. He taps his wrist communicator. "Alpha team? Gamma? You there? Status update."

His comm crackles. At least the local channel's still up, even if the rest of the comms are down. "Got a server room here, sir, along with what looks like a research lab of some sort."

Rex frowns. "Anything you can glean from it?"

"Negative, the servers are all wiped. It's just lab instruments and the like now, and we've only come across a few corpses. Nobody alive."

"Keep searching. Report in if you find anything," he says. He shakes his head. "They would've had time before our ships were in position to bombard them. Could've wiped everything clean."

"Must've been a high-paying job," says Fives. "Dunno. I imagine when their lives were on the line that they made a break for it. We might find something."

"Well, let's keep going. Eyes up. Still could be survivors, or at least security droids."

Another corridor, as empty as the last. Rex and Fives press on through the abandoned Tath base, only echoes and silence and crackling machinery rising to answer their intrusion. As they move forward Rex has the unsettling feeling that they will find nothing here; that the assault on Thyferra moved too slowly, too cautiously. Too much time to allow the Tath lackeys to hide their masters' work. But when he and Fives reach a server room of their own, his spirit lights up: "Got something here. One of these terminals is still active. And still logged in. Hm."

Fives snorts. "Yeah. One of the other consoles must've overloaded," he says. He taps a pair of bodies with his feet. A human woman, a Chagrian man. Scorch marks across their bodies. Electrical overload. One minute concealing everything they could, the next dead. Lights out. "Bummer."

"Let's take a look at what they were hiding," says Rex, tapping at the logged-in terminal. He navigates several screens, and within a minute he has accessed a central data depository. "Looks like they wiped a bunch of information databases," he says, "but they didn't get this: It's a list of financial transactions."

"What good's that gonna do?" asks Fives, looking over Rex's shoulder. "These Tath people—aren't they working for the Separatists?"

"As far as I know, but we don't know until we look," says Rex.

He keys through a handful of displays until he finds a readout of transactions on an individual list. "A bank at Raxus, about what you'd expect," he says, reading off of the list. "Dozen or so transactions to Empress Teta. That's Separatist space, the same. And…hold on. This here's a major sell order to a buyer on Coruscant."

"What in the blazes?" says Fives, looking at the readout. "Look, not the only one. There's a whole bunch. Each of these is a sell order. They're sending…something…to Coruscant and getting a whole shipload of credits back in return."

"Give me a second. I'll try to backtrack the planetary coordinates of the Coruscant buyer from the transaction data."

"You can do that?"

"Commander Tano showed me a thing or two. No guarantees."

Fives laughs. "Commander Tano? Really? She's the fighting sort, all lightsabers and whatnot. She knows slicing, too?"

"Eh, said she has a Jedi friend who knows it. Just what I gleaned."

"You know her that well?"

"Well enough. I'm on enough missions with her," says Rex. Yes, he is. And none of them has he regretted. Umbara was enough to see how assignments with the Jedi can go drastically wrong. But General Skywalker and Commander Tano—they understand him and the clones. They see him as a person, unlike the likes of a Pong Krell. As a comrade-in-arms. Even a confidante. It's the highest praise for his work, and if there's anything to keep him fighting besides his duty and his brothers, it's the faith his Jedi superiors show in him. It is…nice…to have someone believe in you. Not just as a means of duty, as all those years of Kaminoan training taught him. But on a personal level. Like he's fighting for something. "Got it."

"That was quick."

"Look, it's…" Rex trails off. "Hold on. Coruscant location data would put the buyer's location in the Senate District."

"What?" says Fives.

Rex shakes his head. "Let me see if I can get transaction data on what they were actually shipping. Give me a moment."

A great deal of it has been wiped—frustrating, for sure—but after several minutes, Rex comes across an answer. "Here, got something," he says. "Specifications for eighty million credits exchanged from…ah, damn it, the buyer's name is concealed—to the Zaltin Bacta Company here on Thyferra. Must be the Taths' shell account. In exchange…a…kyber crystal."

"Huh," grunts Fives. "I got nothin'."

"Here's another one," says Rex. "Eighty million credit transfer from Zaltin to the private account of one Ternon Tath, Empress Teta Planetary Reserve Bank."

"That our man?"

"No, not exactly. According to General Skywalker, he's the brother of one of the Taths we're pursuing leads on. And he's dead," says Rex. "Huh. So looks like someone on Coruscant was buying a kyber crystal, for whatever reason, before paying Zaltin. Along, apparently, with a healthy order for bacta supplies. Then Zaltin, in Separatist space, transferred the credits to the Taths. Money laundering at its finest."

"How is someone on Coruscant, let alone in the Senate District, doing business with someone in Separatist space?"

Rex snorts. "Everyone needs bacta, Fives. Business with Separatists is cleared for important things like that, as far as I know. It's a perfect cover. Would've slipped right past both Republic and Separatist eyes."

Fives shakes his head. "So, what. These Taths aren't working for either the Separatists or the Republic?"

"Or they're working for both," says Rex. "I'm copying this data onto a disk. We need to get this to General Skywalker."

"Does this tell us anything, sir?"

"I don't know," says Rex. "But General Skywalker's been tracking the Tath connection ever since Empress Teta. Then to Taris, then he went to Sleheyron, now here. There must be something. There has to be. And if there's a traitor in the Republic playing both sides, we can't let that go."