The freighter landed on a small planet with an oxygen-domed transport station where everyone disembarked except the dark-haired woman called Ash, the man with similar features who's name Redemption still didn't know, and Jester in the isolated room, who continued on immediately. Redemption breathed a soft prayer in hopes that Jester didn't die.
The rest of the prisoners — none clone — were released and, over the next few day-cycles, were picked up by various freighters and small transports. Sometimes Redemption saw welcoming hugs and a few tears. He wished someone missed him but their faces when they saw him or Rex were usually hard and suspicious. A rare exception was the woman who'd cut open the prison door. She left the first day but had taken a few moments to shake hands with both Captain Rex and himself, slipping a bright blue bead to each of them.
"A token for luck," she said. "A mere token for my life." Then she grinned, Captain Rex touched his forehead with two fingers as though she was a civilian of high rank so Red came to attention for her.
But she was the only prisoner who spoke to them and Red felt more alone than ever. Had deserting the Imperial Army been the correct choice? He wasn't sure.
Except… Jester meant something to them. And that meant a clone could be something more than 'merely', more than 'just'. More than a meat-can or a flesh droid or battle fodder.
In the first several hours of being planetside, they divested him of everything Imperial, much of which required invasive surgery. They ran him through scan after scan, checking for tracers and trackers amid other things like implants, biochips, and hypnotics. They did that to the others as well but his examination was far more thorough. They removed quite a few more items from his body, handing everything to the ex-commander who climbed aboard a one-person ship and quickly flew off. Red's gear went with her. He understood why. He'd been a trooper for more than a decade, but she took all of that with her. Red, in soft civilian clothing, no longer knew who he was in a very different way than reconditioning had done to him.
Rex stayed at his side for most of it, explaining sometimes and otherwise simply talking about inconsequentialities or being quiet but present. Red was glad of that. He'd already been through too many experiences alone where no one had explained anything. Even with Rex there, he wanted to scream and cry several times though he didn't understand why. Rex seemed to know when he was close to breaking. He would pull Red out for a walk or a rest or to simply sit on a nearby bench.
Sometimes he walked the halls of the station during the night shift when most beings slept. He'd rub the small blue bead between his fingers and recite memory for his missing vode, asking them what they'd do.
After several days, the ex-commander returned in a different, much larger ship with Imperial markings. Rex said he was sorry not to be there for Red, but he had a time-sensitive mission. "I'm having one of the Athualla clan pick you up and there should be an accompanying clone. Besides him, there will be other vode to help you."
"What if they knew me as Slick?"
"Chopper did and that's why I'm putting you in his care. He'll understand." Rex gave him a quick grin. "And won't try killing you this time." Then he grimaced. "He'll just tell you the truth."
From his expression, Rex obviously thought that might be worse. Knowing the word 'traitor' lay in his history, Red agreed.
When Athualla's Dream, a small transport, landed to pick him up the pilot was a barely-grown youngling verging on manhood accompanied by a clone medic with a cadet-aged child holding his hand. Red gave a slight, questioning smile to see another vod had successfully deserted. The medic only stared at him and Red sighed. It hadn't been often, but occasionally another clone had recognized him as Sergeant Slick and he'd had to fight as when he'd met Chopper and Jester on Geonosis. Knowing now the word 'traitor' lay in his past, he could understand those strange looks on their faces and why his overtures of friendship had sometimes been rebuffed with more violence than he'd then understood.
"I've been reconditioned. Did I know you?"
Shaking his head, the medic gestured to the examination table off the main cabin. "Have a seat. I'm Kix, formerly 501st."
"Do you know who I was?" Red asked as he levered himself onto the table as Kix pulled the curtain shut. Then, more quietly, "Do you know what I did?"
The medic was still for a moment. "I saw you once, when you were Sergeant Slick, talking to Gus. You looked at me and didn't bother to hide your expression of triumph. At that moment, I understood what you had done to the men of your squad. It was a blazing epiphany into the cruelty of who had bitten Gus."
Red's breath sucked in but the medic continued as if he'd had no reaction.
"Why Punch and Sketch had different schedules, why Chopper wouldn't look anyone in the eyes. Everything. I knew it all and before I could get back to report, I was injured and placed in bacta for five days."
He paused then continued in a quieter voice. "That was two days before you blew the armory. Three days before Captain Rex lost an entire company, less a handful of troopers, on Teth. And five days before you were sent off-planet and all your records sealed." The medic turned, a scanner in his hand that he absently configured with a few touches. "Funny thing though, medical says it was you who gave me more blood than you could afford to lose even after it would have been in your best interest to let me die." He stroked the tiny, white scar on the inside of Red's elbow. "It was you who got me to medical and into a bacta tank in record time. In spite of whatever I think I know about you, you did a blood transfusion on the run and I owe you my life."
Red felt the shift of hyperspace and Gajer's call of 'we're in hyperspace and on auto' as Kix hypo'ed in a mix of nutrient and a cure for the unnatural aging of clones then pulled open the curtain.
"Can I ask where we're going?" Red rubbed his arm where Kix had injected
"Place? No. But we're going to visit Chopper."
"Uncle Chopper," squealed the child at the dejarik table making the pieces dance as she clapped her hands. Red stared at her, trying to reconcile her enthusiasm at visiting Chopper with his hard, dour expression.
Red hissed and dropped his gaze to the floor. "Last time…"
Kix gave a chuckle. "Yeah. I've heard. He said he's not sorry but he won't do it again." He picked up the child and swung her to his back then switched the dejarik table off. The pirouetting savrip fizzled into nothing. "Unless you give him reason."
"Only reason," said the young man, stuffing some pastry into his mouth as he entered the area with a sack, "would be attacking one of his people." He pushed the sack toward Red. "Have some. Your metabolism needs it. You too, Kix. I'll get my ass kicked if you pass out again from working too hard."
Red raised an eyebrow and glanced at Kix who stared at the ceiling. Red knew he saw memories there — army medics working long past battle, not resting until everything that could be done had been done. Then weeping because it was never enough.
He dropped his eyes from the pain he could see in the medic and broke open the pastry. It was filled with meat cubes and gravy, still hot from the cooking and Red salivated, suddenly hungrier than he'd been in a long time.
"This isn't working hard," huffed Kix. "This is…" He glanced at Red with his lips twisting into something akin to a grin of camaraderie or at least understanding. "This isn't working hard."
"Yeah, well, here." Gajer pulled out another pastry and shoved it into Kix's hand. "It's your favorite."
"Eat, papa, eat," encouraged the child on his back. Then she held out a hand. "Me, too, Gajer. Pleeeeeeze."
Gajer laughed, holding a pastry out to the child. "I got your favorite, too."
"Don't get crumbs down my shirt, Cori." Kix warned with a laugh then took a bite, his eyes closed in deep appreciation of the food.
So prosaic, so normal. Tears came to Red's eyes as something inside him screamed this, this, this.