a/n: season 6 episodes 1-4. Also, I put angst as one of the tags, and this chapter deals with death somewhat. I don't know if this warrants a warning, considering all the "off-screen" deaths I've had so far, but I was worried about it, and so you're warned. Have a good week, or however long it takes me to post again!

Despite his promise, Obi-Wan did not tell Ahsoka everything he had learned. He meant to, but between Ahsoka's worried glances and his own turmoil he decided to wait. Wait, until he could meditate. Wait, until he could converse with Master Yoda. So many strange things happened on the planet, from Qui-Gon Jinn's appearance to the destructive ending. Obi-Wan had only experienced such a maelstrom of feeling once before, with the death of his master. To have his master returned and the Chosen One revealed, he had been bewildered and hopeful; perhaps this perpetual spiral the galaxy was in would halt, order and peace would be restored, and the Jedi would relinquish their warrior title.

But of course, it was not that simple. Qui-Gon remained dead, possibly an apparition of the Dark side. The Chosen One, a known Separatist, charming and ruthless, entangled by the Dark and Light sides of the Force, slipped through his fingers. Disappeared, both of them, leaving Obi-Wan to straighten out the mess.

Obi-Wan sighed, knuckled his forehead, clutched at his beard in thought. He knew what Windu would have done. A pang went through him, loss resurfacing at the thought of the stubborn Jedi master, worsened by the thought that Lars had something to do with Windu's death. It fit the facts: someone strong with the Force, in league with the Separatists and Darth Tyranus, or rather, Count Dooku. But he could sense the good in Lars, even if what the Father said was true and Lars betrayed and murdered the Son and the Daughter, and it confused him.

Obi-Wan frowned and returned to the thought of Dooku. The man had warned him of a Sith lord controlling the Senate, and urged caution around Lars, but Lars couldn't be the Sith Lord. The latter seemed to stem from a severe distaste for the man. Lars was important, of that Obi-Wan had no doubt, but someone else remained missing from the picture. Who was the Sith Lord?

Obi-Wan paced his quarters, brimming with emotion and unable to still himself. He had requested time off for him and his padawan until his mind was calm again. A distracted Jedi was a dead Jedi. Ahsoka, in her usual fashion, had set off on an escapade as soon as they'd reported to the Council. The thought of his rambunctious padawan lifted Obi-Wan's spirits for a moment, and he settled onto a pad to meditate, a slight smile on his lips even as his brow furrowed.

"I can't believe I missed meeting him!" Ahsoka grumbled again as they neared Padme's private quarters. "After all the stories you've told me, and he doesn't even stick around!"

"I haven't told you that many stories," Padme rejoined, bemused. The door to rooms slid open and they entered. With the door closed, Padme relaxed, enjoying the relative safety of her spartan but pristine apartments. She made her way to a holo-terminal, throwing back, "I barely know him, how many stories could I tell?"

"Enough stories?" Ahsoka suggested, following her over. "So what'd he give you?"

Padme pulled out the stick and stuck it into the terminal. An image fizzled into being, a clone strapped to a medical gurney with other figures, Kaminoans with their curiously elongated necks, appearing around the edges of the invisible room, taking measurements and observing him.

A gasp from Ahsoka-"That's Tup!"

At Padme's glance Ahsoka elaborated, "He was in the 501st. A few weeks ago he killed a Jedi, Master Tiplar, and they sent him to Kamino to see what made him malfunction." The girl's face twisted on the last word. "He died at the facilities. The official explanation was that the Separatists managed to infect him with a virus, and the case was closed. Fives, who went with him to Kaminoa, was shot on Coruscant soon after for attacking the Chancellor. He was supposed to have been infected, too."

"What do you think?"

Ahsoka sighed. "It's possible, but a virus that makes you turn on your general? It's suspicious."

Padme nodded slowly, thinking, then noticed that the clone was awake in the holo. "What's that Tup is saying?"

She turned a dial, and a frantic male voice repeated dogmatically, "Good soldiers follow orders. Good soldiers follow orders. Good soldiers follow orders."

A Kaminoan scientist pushed a long hand on his forehead. "Good soldiers follow orders when they're given, not before."

The scientist took a syringe and sedated him, his bleary eyes closing. The image paused and fizzled away.

"That's it?" Ahsoka demanded. Padme leaned back in her stiff chair, and Ahsoka turned to her, arms folding before a frustrated hand made it into the air. "We already knew this. Can't your source find anything else?"

Padme regarded the tensed and trembling girl and sighed. She sometimes forgot that Ahsoka was still a teenager, still experiencing firsts, and some of those firsts were not pleasant. Even if it wasn't the first, it could always be a shock. "Ahsoka, you work with the 501st?"

"Some of the time." Ahsoka lowered her gaze and hugged her arms slightly. "Mostly we work with Commander Cody and the 212th."

"I'm sorry." Perhaps she should have watched it on her own, but how could she have known? "How well did you know him, know Tup?"

"Well enough." Ahsoka's face scrunched. "I could have known him better."

"Do you want to talk about him?" She wasn't sure how Jedi dealt with loss, and the fact that the deceased was a clone made the subject volatile. Many people, even some Jedi, didn't see the clones as individuals worth protecting. Ahsoka was lucky to have a master like Obi-Wan who treated them with respect, but Padme wasn't sure if Obi-Wan alone was enough to share the burden of grief.

Ahsoka shook her head. "I barely knew him and Fives, but it hurts to think about them. Everyone who really knew them seems fine. Master Obi-Wan is fine." She looked at Padme, beseeching. "Is it wrong of me to feel this way? A Jedi has no attachments."

Padme stood and hugged Ahsoka. "This has nothing to do with being a Jedi, Ahsoka. This is part of being alive and surrounded by other beings. It's okay to miss someone you didn't know, it means you recognize there has been a loss in the universe. Even if the other troopers or your master don't talk about them doesn't mean they don't remember. And if you ever want to know more about Tup and Fives, I'm sure the others will be willing to tell you their stories. Some of them probably want to talk."

The Togruta nodded, avoiding Padme's eyes again. Padme pulled back and angled to get a better look at her face. "Ahsoka, trust me when I say what you are feeling is normal. We're in a war, and you're on the frontlines. But don't think you have to handle it alone."

"But shouldn't I be able to?" Ahsoka asked quietly, sniffling. "The Force is supposed to take it all away."

"I think that may be a case of wishful thinking," Padme answered slowly, hesitantly. She knew Ahsoka pushed the edges of acceptable padawan at times, and she had no desire to cause further friction, but, "Unless you're more machine than flesh, you will have pain. What I think your masters want you to know is that there is more to life than pain, that you can still be you after loss. Maybe not the same, but you can miss people and still be alive. Be happy. Don't miss them to the point that you miss out on your own life, or to the point where you become bitter. I doubt Master Yoda shrugs off deaths, no matter how calm he appears to be." He certainly moved slower since this war began, acting closer to how old he looked. "But I don't think he finds life a chore, either."

Ahsoka nodded and put a hand on Padme's, and Padme added, "You can always talk to me whenever you need to, or want to. I know it's not an easy topic, but I'm here for you."

"Thank you. I think I'll take you up on that." Ahsoka tightened her hand, then released. The two stepped apart. "I'm fine, for now."

Ahsoka straightened herself, brushed at her eyes with the heels of her hands. "So do you think this clip is newsworthy? You said a reporter was killed over this?"

Padme scrutinized her for a moment, then nodded. Ahsoka would be fine for the moment, and hopefully reach out whenever she wasn't. Padme settled in her chair and turned back to the holo. "Yes, Kreet Sabal. Was there anything else about their cases other than a potential virus?"

Ahsoka frowned. "There was something about a tumor, but when it got sent here for testing it proved to be unrelated."

"Can they even get tumors?" Padme wondered. "I thought that was engineered away."

"Apparently the later clones have been more likely to experience problems from the code being over-replicated." Ahsoka shrugged. "I haven't really seen it."

Padme blinked at the news. She hadn't thought about that. But the question remained of whether this holo was supposed to hold some key, or if Ani's info was nothing more than what they already knew. "But they don't think these problems would make him kill a general?"

"The Jedi Council think a Separatist plot is more likely," Ahsoka confirmed.

"And what more do you think?"

"I'm not sure." The girl gestured to the holo-player. "Could we rewatch it? I'm sure there must be something we're missing."

Padme paused. "Are you okay watching it?"

"I'm fine." Ahsoka took a deep breath and pushed the button herself. They watched in silence, but everything besides Tup's and the scientist's words were medical gibberish.

"How do they learn their orders?" Padme asked, the images replaying in her mind even as the holo powered down again.

"Part of their accelerated training." Ahsoka moved to a sofa and collapsed, so Padme turned her chair around, thinking.

"So it's training, nothing is implanted in their brain?"

"Not that I know of. They are capable of making their own decisions, nothing actually forces them to do anything." The two twiddled and thought, and Padme tried to consider what, if anything, this holo had to offer them. If the orders were from a Republic war handbook, then they would have to research the medical jargon to see if there was any clues there. Padme felt a headache coming on. It was too bad this had already been cleared with the Jedi council.

"The tumor was in his brain," Ahsoka offered, eyes on the ceiling.

"What?" Padme refocused on her.

"In Tup's brain," Ahsoka clarified. "The tumor was in Tup's brain. And there may have been one in Fives, too."

"But they aren't from the new batches?"

"Not the newest," Ahsoka replied, "But I'm not sure if they're old enough to be considered safe from code-problems."

"And there was a tumor in both?" At Ahsoka's nod, Padme, narrowed her eyes in thought. If the DNA they were being cloned off of didn't have a tumor there, why would the clones have one? Would replication corruption cause the same tumor in two different clones? She didn't know, but this was something worth investigating. If there was a chance that the tumor was related to the troopers' agency, if their orders were implanted rather than learned, they needed to know what exactly the clones were programmed to do. Once again, Padme felt the weird fascination over the question: how human were the clones? She didn't like how they were used as expendable, comparable to the droids of the Separatists, but they inhabited a strange moral plane. Regardless of what rights they had, if they had pre-programmed orders that were part of their beings, the Republic needed to know. Were there orders that the clones couldn't question?

Padme stood up, taking the holo chip. "I'll keep looking into this. See if you can find out how the troopers are indoctrinated."

"Of course, Senator." Ahsoka nodded and bowed in a facsimile of Obi-Wan.

Padme snorted. "Thank you, padawan. Now, you should be getting back."

She walked the girl to the door, grateful for her young companion's help. It had been a strange evening. As always, clues led to more questions, and Ani had absconded without explanation. She was unsure she would see him again in time to ask about this, or at all. It was strange that the one time she'd brought back up, Ani had still managed to catch her alone.

"See ya around, Senator!" Ahsoka saluted lazily, and Padme guffawed. She hadn't told Ahsoka that Ani did that, had she?

"I look forward to it." She smiled at Ahsoka. "Remember, I'm here for you."

Ahsoka's smile tightened to a grimace, but she nodded. "Thank you. And I'm here for you, too."

"I appreciate that, Ahsoka." Padme waved as the girl strode down the hall, bumped into Jar Jar, and then left. She trusted Ahsoka, and she trusted Obi-Wan. They'd be alright.

At the end of the hall a golden droid appeared by Jar Jar, the same droid who'd sought Jar Jar out before. That was another mystery that bothered Padme, but considering Jar Jar's nature she wasn't sure she wanted to know. Padme stepped back and the door whooshed shut.