It was a beautiful planet, mostly blues and misty greens, though not identifiable from the landscape. Gajer brought the Athualla's Dream into a large arc running parallel to some river then low, into a marsh with tall trees, keeping well below the canopy. An embankment on one side of the slow-moving river drew up into some rocky hills. It took several blinks to notice the large mansion made of the same stone as the hills.

A man in local clothing waited as the ship landed and the ramp dropped. Red paused in shocked recognition of the scarred visage as the child, Cori, ran down the ramp into Chopper's arms. He laughed and swung her high in a circle as she screeched in pleasure.

Yes, Chopper after deserting would be a very different person than the clonetrooper on Geonosis.

For a moment Red wondered how he appeared to the child. Did he seem harsh and grim to her? He'd been quiet and subdued during the trip. Did he seem angry or hateful? He hoped not. Really, he'd been nothing more than confused and unsure and, maybe, a bit scared at facing the unknown.

Then Chopper let her drop to his arms, gave her a quick hug, set her on the ground and pointed her in some direction where a young woman and several other children waited — most slightly older than Cori and Wroonian or Pantori by their blue-toned skin. The other children called her name and she ran to them laughing in glee.

Kix reached to clasp Chopper's wrist in a tight grip but Chopper threw welcoming arms around the medic.

"Thank you, vod Kix. Thank you. They're fine but you'll want to check on them immediately, I'm sure."

"Reminded me of the old days when I had to be two or three places at once."

"You were always where we needed." Chopper leaned forward, touching Kix's forehead with his own.

Kix put his hand on Chopper's shoulder and his eyes were closed in pain. Then another woman strode up to him and Chopper.

"Kix, this is Nayla. She's our medic and will assist you. Or you can assist her. She's probably more experienced with infants."

Red had turned his face from Kix's pain but caught a few words from the woman. 'She and the baby are doing fine.'

Shocked, he glanced into Chopper's face and blinked at that proud look he'd never before seen on any trooper.

Chopper laughed, the scars twisting around his face. "Come on," he gestured to Red. "Let's get started with your debrief." He waved to the young man. "Gajer, I'll see you at evening meal."

"Til then," replied Gajer with a negligent wave. He slipped beneath the ship's undercarriage, a set of tools in his hands. "Engine's not as smooth as I want."

"It never is."

Chopper had guided him around the mansion, corridors of stone with some arches open to an inner courtyard until they reached a smallish alcove just large enough for the table and two chairs. A tray with two mugs and a carafe of steaming caf sat on the table. A gesture to the chair and Red sat followed by Chopper in the opposite chair. Both chairs were at an angle to see into the corridor.

Chopper reached out his hand and Red handed over the small chip Rex had given him.

"I haven't checked it out."

Chopper's face twisted in thought then cleared. "I wouldn't think so, but you tell me why not?"

Red paused. "I'm not sure. Maybe I'm afraid of what I did. Apparently it was more terrible than mere treason. Maybe I want to know my options first."

Chopper snorted lightly as he set the chip on the table between them and reached for the caf. "Fear is nothing and fear of your memories…" He shook his head. "That's not even a shadow fear. It's already gone.

"Not if I have reparations to make."

"You can't atone for something you haven't done, Red." He emphasized the difference between who Red had been and who he was now. "You deserted and now your options are whatever you decide." He poured two mugs and slid one towards Red.

Red took a swallow of caf then pursed his lips. He looked into Chopper's eyes. "Let's get it done, then. Hard and fast."

Chopper leaned back, contemplation in his expression then a quick nod. "Your name was Slick. You were a Kamino-trained sergeant. CS-21-8644."

Red knew that. He'd heard his old name for the first time on Geonosis when Jester had shoved a deece into his face. Chopper waited a second then continued.

"Your Kamino squad died in the first couple of days you were on Christophsis."

Red nodded. He hadn't been sure they were dead though he'd suspected. Chopper let him recite a quick verse of remembrance. This time, at least, he had their names.

Ni su'cuyi, gar kyr'adyc, ni partayli, gar darasuum. Teknik. Ven. Knife. Roan. Eighteen.

Chopper also bowed his head and spoke some names in prayer. When he was done, he rose from the chair and stalked around the table. He paused behind Red, placing his hands on Red's shoulders, then released Red and moved back to his chair.

Chopper stared at him, then worked his jaw and ground his teeth together before speaking, hard this time. As Red had requested, but each word elucidated with care.

"Sergeant Slick conspired with Asajj Ventress. Sergeant Slick was the traitor at Christophsis and blew the armory. We almost lost Christophsis and, due to that, the 501st was assigned to follow Ventress to Teth from where only six men returned."

A breath burst out of Red as if he'd been punched in the gut.

He'd suspected, when Rex had mentioned the words 'traitor' and 'executed', but he hadn't known, hadn't believed, hadn't thought himself capable of… that.

Darkness edged his vision, though he saw that Chopper was staring at him intently.

Then Chopper spoke again. "That's the public stuff. It was, of course, classified but how long do you think it was before gossip ran rampant?"

"Minutes," huffed Red in a soft voice as he stared at the stone floor. "I'd be taken down to security. They'd check helmet vids, communications." He looked at his hands. They seemed covered in blood. Then he sucked in another breath and snapped his gaze back to Chopper.

"And everyone would know that my squad was involved as well."

Chopper nodded. "Whether or not it was true. None of us were involved and the inquiry board cleared us of complicity. But not even the Jedi could clear us of the gossip. They decided to send us to different companies, companies that didn't know anything. Jester declined and stayed with the 212th. He proved himself, made sergeant." He leaned back with quiet pride. "After my court martial, Rex took me into the 501st, requesting me." Chopper shook his head with a grin. "Too much to go into now but…" he looked around, pride and contentment in his expression. "Here I am."

Red frowned. "Wait, you said 'public stuff'. Tell me the rest."

Chopper shrugged. "It's worse."

Red blinked, his face expressionless. Worse? What could be worse than treason and sabotage? Then he dropped his head into his hands, rubbing his fingers against his forehead. "Tell me."

"Do you know what Sergeant Slick did to me?"

Red — once Slick — shook his head and looked up. "No. I don't remember anything. Even my dreams aren't cohesive. Just… flashes."

"You mocked me." Chopper gestured to the side of his face. "For being scarred. Told me to keep my helmet on. That civilians — especially women — didn't like scars."

Red was shaking his head in denial. "Almost everyone from the battlefield…" But Chopper pressed forward with his words.

"It was early in the war and we were so innocent. All of us, so ignorant. Kriff, even the Jedi were unaware." He spread out his scarred hands, palm up. "Do you know what you did to Jester? To Sketch and Punch? To Gus?"

Red gazed at the floor then lifted his pale face. His mouth opened in the shape of a word he couldn't say. No.

'You made Jester, one of the most imaginative clones I've known, doubt himself. He stopped speaking until he couldn't speak without a stutter. You gave brothers Punch and Sketch opposing schedules, as a start, then coerced Sketch into alienating his brother." Chopper paused and looked at the floor. When he looked into Red's face, his eyes were angrily narrow and his muscles tense, ready to attack.

Red trembled. This was the man who had intended to kill him on Geonosis. This time he wouldn't fight back.

"You raped Gus. You gambled with Gus as your stakes and had civilians rape him. You made him think it was normal and expected for anyone to sexually use him and abuse him. He had more bite-marks than you put on him."

Red bowed his head trying to cover his tears with his hands.

"And though we didn't know it at the time, by doing all that, you destroyed yourself as well."

Chopper rose from his seat and silently left Red alone in the small room with the caf.

When Chopper returned he poured himself some of the caf, now cold, Red was prepared to continue the debrief.

"Some nights, in my dreams, I seem to remember certain things. An explosion, big."

"Like an armory," supplied Chopper with a twist to his lips.

"Face to face with Ventress." He looked at Chopper who shrugged.

"Probably. After all..."

"I was working for her." Red winced.

Chopper shrugged. "From what I understand, she was working for someone else and we were all simply puppets to someone's strings."

"And I remember…" Red paused, letting the memory wash over him. "I remember a dark-haired woman and the shattering of so much crystal that I think that broke me more than Kamino." Red's eyes were shiny with tears, for something he couldn't remember but churned his gut like nothing else.

For a moment Chopper looked into Red's eyes then bowed his head. "Possibly. Slick had rover duties and introduced us to the house of women. Sometimes they spoke about people they'd lost in the war. There's no telling anymore unless you return to Christophsis and no guarantees on finding anyone who knows. Not anymore."

The room opened into a hallway and the doorway was open - there was no door at all. Red wondered about that and knew his gaze kept flicking towards it. Was it freedom or a trap?

Several people had crossed his field of vision, ignoring him and Chopper. Chopper seemed unaware of them but Red knew that was false. After the second battle of Geonosis, he'd kept track of the men who'd been in his second squad. He learned of their awards, their actions, their battles. He learned of Gus's death during Order 66, Chopper's desertion almost a year later, and Captain Punch's company currently assigned to Mustafar. He learned how good they were and Chopper was the best at battle.

After Geonosis, he had hoped their paths would cross again and he'd… Well, he wasn't sure what he would have done to meet them. He hung his head in shamed memory. He had helped capture Jester.

"Da, da," exclaimed a child in excitement. Red jerked up his head to see a toddler run into the room to Chopper.

Chopper turned to the toddler trying to squirm onto his lap. "I guess it depends on if you want to go forward or back." He lifted the child and held it in his arms, giving a slight nod to someone at the door. "Thank you, Nayla." Then back to the toddler in his arms. "Did you see your new baby brother?"

The child mumbled something that Red couldn't make out other than the child's voice grumbled in disappointment. Chopper smiled. "He'll grow up and play with you. Sleepy?'' That was to the child who settled in Chopper's arms with a nod and a yawn, its face against his chest. Chopper smiled fondly down at the child, running his fingers gently through the child's dark hair then turning his gaze onto the clone before him. "So which is it, Slick? Forward or back?"

Red gave Chopper a small smile. "I'm not Slick, it's Red. You named me, you know."

Chopper tilted his head in curiosity but said nothing.

Red picked up the small chip. "It's for Redemption."

Chopper seemed unsurprised.

"I didn't even have the courage to take the whole name." He rolled the chip in his fingers, stroking the smooth material with his thumb. "After Geonosis, I knew I'd done something so terrible that three members of my squad would repudiate me and want to kill me, but not one of you would tell me what I had done."

"Sometimes I thought I'd broken some rule or another but when I searched them, I found they were so conflicting that no one could obey them all. That it was all a smokescreen. Then I realized it was something larger and..." He swallowed. "It scared me because I knew it was bigger than anything else. Bigger than the war itself. Something fundamental."

"We were created to be the weapons for the destruction of the Republic." Chopper rocked the child. "How can a people with the Rights of Sentience have an army of enslaved troopers fight their wars? They can't and that erodes them from the inside. Destroys their integrity."

"So we were tools, just not the tools we thought or hoped." Redemption's fingers curled around the chip, twisting it, bending it. He opened his hand, stared a moment at the bent bit then lightly tossed it into the fire.

"Are you throwing away your past because you're scared of it?"

Redemption gave his head a shake. "No. It has no relevance. It doesn't matter anymore." He glanced up into Chopper's eyes. "I don't mean to say it doesn't matter to you or Jester or anyone else. I don't know all of what happened except that you, the men of Slick's squad, survived as good men and, according to Captain Rex, some of the best troopers in the GAR and out of the Imperial Army. If what I've been told about Slick is true and this is the end result," He gave a pained smile as he gestured to the dark-haired child in Chopper's arms. "Then maybe Sergeant Slick would be proud of his men. Or maybe he'd be angry. But I had nothing to do with that. Slick doesn't exist."

Slowly Chopper shifted the now-sleeping toddler to one arm. "What are you going to do now?"

"I don't know. What I can do, I suppose, to help Captain Rex."

"Earning your name for everything you took from him?"

Redemption frowned in thought. "I don't think so since, as you pointed out, I don't remember what I took. Mostly, it's because he's doing good work and I can see that. Because freeing vode from the Imperial Army and finding lost troopers seems so right to me."

Chopper glanced away, towards the center of the old fortified house. "It was broken." He turned back to Redemption. "If the Republic was broken by disregarding its own basic rights, then we were broken by Order 66. The closeness, the brotherhood of what we were, totally destroyed by Orders 66 and 37. Not from outside of ourselves but by what we did. By what we realized we were capable of doing. Rex is working to rebuild it for us. He might take you for a short time, helping you get used to civilian life but eventually he'll let you go. Like all of us, you have to make your own life."

Slick nodded thoughtfully. "If we're to claim ourselves then we can't simply substitute another leader to blindly follow. At least not until we explore what's out there." He smiled, glancing down at the table then into Chopper's face and there was a shy, hopeful expression on his face. "I've alway thought that, if I had the chance, I might go to Mandalore."

Chopper nodded as he stood, the child asleep in his arms. "You'll have the chance. Stay with Rex and Ahsoka for a while, until you think you can manage a civilian life and learn to stay under Imperial searches. Then go to Mandalore."

Chopper smiled, though Redemption couldn't tell if it was for the child cradled in his arms or for the possibility of him exploring a new life. He'd heard over the past day that Chopper, clonetrooper of the GAR, former sergeant of the Imperial Army, was now Prime Guardian of the Riyocho Clan House Guards. The child in his arms was the middle of three, including a newborn, and he had a wife of importance in the clan.

"It shouldn't take long, Redemption. You were very good at civilian stuff on Christophsis. You had a knack for it."