Chapter 3 – Mortis
Author's Note: We weren't originally planning to write the Mortis arc, but 1. it's an awesome arc, 2. it will be important in the future, 3. it's way too much fun to put Rex in weird situations with "Force stuff" he doesn't understand. Lol. And also, building on Anakin and Rex's friendship is fun! :D
~ Amina Gila
Rex has never been so confused in his life. First, he was following an ancient distress signal along with General Skywalker and General Kenobi in the Twilight; then, the fleet, which is at the same coordinates, can't find them and all he could see was empty space. The next thing he knows, they were being pulled into a brilliant white light. And now they're waking up on the surface of a planet when no one landed their shuttle in the first place.
So, frankly, he has no idea what in the world is going on, but he doesn't like it at all. And something about the air itself around him feels wrong. It's like he can literally feel things he's never been able to before, and it's setting him even more on edge.
"Come on, let's go take a look around," General Skywalker advises, standing up and heading for the back of the ship. The three of them walk down the ramp, onto the grass surrounding them.
The sun in the sky is very bright, and trees surround them on all sides. Mountains rise up in the distance far beyond. Rock formations are floating in mid-air. He decides to not even comment about that. Stranger things have already happened – like how they even landed in the first place.
He scans the horizon through his helmet instead, trying to see if he can make out anything that might tell them where they are. Just then, he sees a sudden flash of light in between the trees.
"Did you see that?" asks Rex.
"I didn't see anything," General Kenobi replies with a frown, as he looks through a pair of macrobinoculars.
"Did you hear that?" asks General Skywalker.
"Hear what?" queries General Kenobi. No, Rex definitely didn't hear anything either. What is going on here?
"Are you the One?" a voice suddenly inquiries from behind them.
"Hello?" General Skywalker asks cautiously, "Who are you?"
"I am Daughter," the woman replies, her voice echoing strangely, "Are you the one?"
"The one what?" What is she even talking about?
"I will take you to him," she decides as if that answers everything. Then she promptly turns and starts walking away.
Rex is only getting more and more lost as they make their way behind the woman along the edges of long seemingly endless cliffs. The seasons seem to literally change by time of day, and the woman is pretty much ignoring everything they ask. And any answer she does give is so cryptic that he almost wishes they hadn't asked anything in the first place.
"Look out!" General Skywalker yells suddenly, and an invisible force throws Rex backwards just as an enormous rock crashes down right in front of him. He hastily regains his nearly lost footing and runs to the edge of the cliff to help up General Kenobi, who barely managed to catch onto the edge.
Rex pulls him to safety, before hastily pushing a button on his comm. "General, are you there?"
"Yes, but our friend here has run off," comes the immediate reply, "Go back to the ship and try sending another distress call. I'll follow her and find out how to get off this rock."
"And if this is a trap?" argues General Kenobi, moving closer.
"Then I'm not going to wait around to find out."
"Anakin, stop!" protests General Kenobi, "Wait for us to find you another way around and meet you –"
The connection promptly breaks. "Always on the move," General Kenobi grumbles under his breath.
"We won't be able to catch up with him at this point," Rex points out. They don't even know where he's going, and by the time they get around this rock, he'll be long gone for sure.
"We'll head back to the ship for now, and hope he knows what he's doing," General Kenobi decides, though he doesn't sound the happiest about the decision.
The sky is steadily darkening as they make their way back to the landing sight, dark clouds slowly covering it entirely. General Kenobi glances around warily with that 'I Sense something is wrong in the Force' expression that Rex often sees on General Skywalker. He doesn't like this at all.
Thunder rumbles menacingly as they finally come to stop... only to see nothing. What? "The ship's gone," Rex realizes with alarm and confusion.
"I can see that," General Kenobi replies, glancing around, "Someone or something must've taken it."
"What now, sir?"
"Did you lose something?" sneers a voice from behind them.
Rex whirls around, spotting a towering figure standing behind them. Glowing red eyes stare down at them. Even with his light-colored skin, the being seems to suck all the darkness into himself. "You didn't do as you were asked."
"And what was that?" General Kenobi replies, tone casual.
"My sister said to wait." His sister? That's who the woman was?
"Did she, now? Well, we were unfortunately separated. We'd like our ship back, if you don't mind."
"Not yet. Is it true that he is the Chosen One?" the being inquires. What? How does he even know about that? Rex has heard an occasional brief mention of this apparent prophecy or something, that General Skywalker is the most powerful Force sensitive ever, but he doesn't really know much about it beyond that. It's not exactly something well known or freely spoken of, so how does someone all the way out here know about it?
General Kenobi instantly whips out his lightsaber at the words, pointing it at the being. "What do you know of such things?" he demands sharply.
"What is about to happen shall occur, whether you like it or not," replies the being as though that answers anything. With a simple flick of his wrist, the General's lightsaber promptly deactivates.
"What are you?" Rex demands, hands on his blasters. Something tells him that trying to use isn't going to do any good, though. He's dealing with things far beyond what he even understands.
"You're a Sith," General Kenobi accuses.
"Sith?" The being laughs, something dark and dangerous about it that sends a shiver through him. Who is this person? "Yes, and no. The storms here are quite lethal. If you want to live, I suggest you find shelter." Rex doesn't even have a second of warning before the being transforms into an enormous... bird? And flaps its wings, taking off into the sky.
"Do you know what that was, sir?" he asks finally.
"I'm not quite sure," the General responds.
A tremendous crash of thunder suddenly splits the silence, a jagged flash of lightning striking the ground only a short distance away. It looks like it's about to start raining and finding shelter would be advisable. General Kenobi throws a hasty glance around. "Quick! There's a cave over there! We can take shelter there."
**w**
Rex knows what he's about to see even before it happens. He's standing alongside several of his other brothers in the cruiser, but this time both General Skywalker and General Kenobi are there.
Kill them. The order is repeating over and over in his mind. And there's nothing he can do to stop it. He can't control his body, can't stop it from happening. Somewhere in the back of his mind he knows this is nothing but a nightmare, but that doesn't mean it doesn't feel real.
Kill them. The strength of the command only seems to intensify as he struggles to resist. With a will of his own, his hands close over the handles of his blasters and he draws them out, leveling them at the Generals. The rest of his brothers immediately follow suit.
"Rex?" General Skywalker asks in confusion.
No, no, he doesn't want to watch this. He's seen himself shooting down people when he can't control himself too many times but never his own general – He can't look away, even as he watches himself pull the trigger.
All of his brothers open fire. He doesn't know why, but neither of the Jedi pull out their lightsabers. Both of them collapse to the floor, as shot after shot tears into them. Sickening horror twists inside of him, and he wants to look away, to wake up from this, to make it stop, but he can't.
"Why?" General Skywalker gasps out, voice strained with pain, betrayal clear on his face as he looks up at him. General Kenobi is already dead. He knows it instinctively.
"You're a traitor," Rex hears himself say, and fires straight at his head.
Rex jolts awake with a start, eyes darting around the cave. He draws in a deep breath, trying to still his pounding heart and shake away the image from his nightmare. Of shooting his own general like that. He would never, never do something like that for any reason. So why does he keep having nightmares like this? And why one this vivid? He's never seen anything quite like it.
General Kenobi is already sitting up from across the cave. "Come on, we should go find Anakin," he says without preamble. Rex couldn't agree more.
The two of them step out of the cave into the early morning sunlight. All of the plants that died the previous evening are coming back to life again. It's too disturbing to watch, so he focuses on scanning their surroundings for threats instead.
And then he spots exactly that. Two bird like creatures are flying through the sky, heading straight towards them. One of them looks like the dark creature they saw the previous evening. "We have incoming," warns Rex, reaching for his blasters.
The black bird swoops down straight for him, and he doesn't have time to draw his weapons before its huge claws close over his arms, and he's lifted off the ground. It soars off into the sky, carrying him with it. The light-colored bird is carrying General Kenobi in a similar position. He tries to free himself, but the death grip on him is unyielding.
He quickly realizes that the birds are flying towards a towering building in the distance. A glowing diamond is literally floating above the tallest tower – not that that's the strangest thing Rex has seen today. They swoop over the top and suddenly begin descending, down towards a platform.
The two bird like creatures land on either end it. General Skywalker is standing in the middle, glaring a tall man with a long white beard. "Let them go! I will not play your games!" he yells.
"Oh, but I think you will," the man insists, "I have ordered my children to kill your friends."
Suddenly, the man disappears, reappearing standing on top of a higher level of the platform a short distance away. Did he just... teleport or something? Is that even possible? Admittedly Rex doesn't know much about the Force, and after seeing this he cares to know even less, but seriously jumping from one spot to another? He's never seen any Jedi do that, not even General Skywalker, who's the strongest he's ever seen. It's disconcerting to see something like that. "The question is, which one will you choose to save?"
"No!" he yells back, "Let them go!"
"Only you can make my children release them," the man shoots back stubbornly.
"Anakin!" General Kenobi's voice rings through the clearing. "The planet is the Force. Use it."
Whatever happens, it doesn't look like they have a way out of this 'test', whatever it's supposed to be. Rex knows that as a clone, he is considered expendable, but his general doesn't and has never treated him as such. Even so, if there truly is only a way to save either him or General Kenobi, he knows what his general would choose.
It's not as though Rex doesn't stare death in the face every day. It's different because this is strange and in relation to something he doesn't and can never truly understand.
After a moment, General Skywalker lowers his head and closes his eyes, Rex doesn't let himself dwell on what will happen if the General isn't able to defeat these two... Force creatures, whatever they are. He can practically feel something shifting around the General, even if he's not exactly sure what it is he's feeling.
After a moment, the General opens his eyes again, throwing his hands outwards, one towards each of the birds. A surge of energy nearly strong enough to be seen rips outwards, sending the birds stumbling back a step, dragging their captives with them.
He raises his hands, lifting the struggling Force-wielders with them. The sky above slowly shifts and changed, transforming from the light of day to the darkness of night. The floor beneath him is practically glowing as cascading a brilliant light across arena.
"You will let them go," General Skywalker calls, his voice echoing the same way all of these Force beings' voices do.
The creature's grip on Rex suddenly gives way, and he manages to land on his feet on the ground, and hastily draws his blasters just in case. Not that they'd do anything against the creature, but still. General Kenobi lands on the ground below the light-colored bird, instantly igniting his lightsaber.
General Skywalker pulls the two creatures closer, then flings them apart into the walls where they fall unceremoniously to the ground. Lightning flashes out from the partly clear, star-filled sky. Rex has seen him do a lot of things with the Force that he can't even begin to understand, but it's never been anything like this. Defeating two literal Force beings like this – assuming that's what they are? He watches in near awe at the sheer power being used.
"Down!" General Skywalker yells, voice still echoing in a strange way, catching the dark colored bird, and jerking him back. He grabs the lighter one next, dragging her away from General Kenobi and depositing her next to the other. "On your knees!"
The lighter one is the first obey, shifting back into the Daughter. The other transforms into the Son next. Clouds blow past overhead, swirling away to reveal the bright blue sky. Sunlight once again covers the area.
"And now you see who you truly are," the man declares, walking over to join us, "Only the Chosen One could tame both my children."
"I've taken your test," General Skywalker snaps, not looking any happier at the praise, "Now fulfill your promise and let us go."
**w**
Anakin jolts awake, the image of the furiously roaring Son charging at him spinning in front of his eyes. It takes him a moment to reorient himself to the small cabin room in the Twilight.
So much for trying to get some sleep. Using the Force so deeply totally wore him out, but he obviously won't be resting right now. He runs an exhausted hand through his hair as he glances out the viewport. Obi-Wan is preparing to take off, and hopefully, they can leave the planet and this whole incident behind them.
Force suddenly screams the warning. So much for that. Anakin is on his feet in a flash, sprinting back into the main hold of the ship. "Leaving so soon?" sneers a voice.
He spins around towards the exit ramp to see the Son standing there, holding Rex by the neck. "Not without this, you won't." He jumps out the partly opened ramp, as Anakin lunges forwards to stop him. He doesn't reach him on time. The Son transforms into a bird creature, and flies away into the darkness.
Panic flares through him, even as he turns and runs for the cockpit. What would the Son want with Rex? It's not as if the clone could become the Son's apprentice. He'd laugh at the thought if the situation weren't this serious. Where is he taking him? What does he want? Whatever it is, Anakin knows it's nothing good. He won't let him hurt Rex.
Since Anakin is technically Rex's superior, he can't actually lean on him for anything, or depend on him for things outside of watching his back in a battle, but they've still grown close. He's Anakin's closest friend ever, really. He's not going to let anyone hurt him.
"The Son took Rex," Anakin explains shortly as he slides into the seat, taking over the controls and blasting off into the air after the fleeting figure of the Son flying through the sky. It's still so dark and foggy that it's hard to see anything, but he can vaguely make out the shape up ahead.
"What in the blazes are you talking about?!" Obi-Wan demands.
Anakin doesn't take the time to answer, focusing on following after the Son, winding his way in between the peaks up ahead. A tower materializes right ahead of them, and he spins the ship aside to avoid hitting it, then direct it down towards the ground. They can't go flying in there when there's not even a place for the ship to land.
They head down the ramp, and Obi-Wan withdraws a pair of macrobinoculars, staring out into the darkness. "Do you see anything?" Anakin asks urgently after a moment.
"No," he declares finally, "But I think it's obvious where he's taken him."
"We need to hurry."
"Wait, this wasn't a mistake," Obi-Wan objects, "He brought us here for a reason. We must not get involved. Any conflict here could have dramatic repercussions for the universe at all." What?!
"I'm not leaving Rex here," Anakin retorts firmly. He might normally back down in a confrontation this major with his former master, but not now. He is not leaving the clone behind no matter what. It's not what he does. In the 501st, the one assurance they all have is that they won't ever be left behind.
"We are in the middle of something we don't truly understand. We'd be wise to confer with the Father, first," Obi-Wan insists. Go in search of him? How long would that take? Never mind that they don't even know where they're going in the first place. Plus, Anakin knows the Father very well might not even want to get involved. He won't rely on a complete stranger with the life of a close friend on the line.
"There's no time," he retorts. He can't let Rex die, not if he can help it. He knows it's a risk that they face constantly on the battlefield every day, but this is totally different. He's never actually been staring the possibility in the face as strongly as he is right now. And besides, he actually has a chance to do something about it. He won't sit back and do nothing. That's the thing about battle; Anakin is constantly on the alert and in the action to help his men.
"You go find the Father. I'll go after Rex," Anakin suggests finally, trying to think through his panic. He knows Obi-Wan is never going to back down.
"That's what he wants: to divide us," the Jedi Master insists.
"There's no time to wait. You can take the ship," Anakin responds.
"You must feel how strong this part of the planet is with the Dark Side," Obi-Wan cautions, "The Father will know what to do."
"He can't help us," he responds bitterly, "I have to go." He turns and heads off for the tower.
There's no way to actually get to the entrance of the tower from the ground, so he starts climbing, pulling himself up the wall wherever there's somewhere to hold. It's going to take a long time, but it's better than doing nothing, while blindly hoping the Father will have something useful to say. More than likely, he'll insist that Anakin has to stay and that there's nothing else they can do either. There's no time to deal with that right now.
It's probably been close to an hour, by now, though Anakin's not exactly sure when he finally pulls himself up onto a higher platform of the building. Right up ahead, light glints off a familiar armored figure, who's standing with his back facing him.
"Rex?" Anakin calls cautiously, taking a step towards him.
Something about his presence feels off. Almost... double maybe. And he can sense the Son right around here, but he doesn't actually see him.
"Rex?" he calls again when the clone doesn't respond, "Come on, let's go."
Finally, he slowly turns around. "We can't," Rex objects, "He's right. Right about everything. You have to join him."
That's... totally unlike him. Both what he's saying, and the way he's saying it. What did the Son do to him? "Rex, what's wrong?" Anakin asks warily.
"What's wrong?" he repeats like that's the stupidest question he's ever heard, "What should I go back for? To fight in a war I have no say in? As a slave to the Jedi?" Anakin flinches back at the unexpected question. He's not exactly wrong. That is all the clones are, slaves to the Jedi and the Republic. They have no say in any of it, and even if they didn't want to fight, it wouldn't matter. He tries to take care of his own clones as well as he can, but he knows other Jedi aren't the same way.
But he needs to focus on the situation at hand right now, not... this. An issue that bothers him all the time even if he never talks about it to anyone. "This isn't you, Rex. He did something to you." That he knows for sure. Rex may have a point, but he would never say something like that in his right mind. It's not the way he is. It's like – like the Son is somehow controlling his mind, and Anakin clings to that hope, because he refuses to believe that the man who's always had his back would turn on him like this.
"He did nothing to me," the clone retorts, "He just asked me to give you a message."
"What?" Anakin demands, cautious and suspicious.
"He said if you don't join him, he will kill me." What?! No, he's never going to let that happen.
"I won't let him!"
"Then you will do it yourself," Rex snarls suddenly, whipping out his blasters and opening fire. Only years of constant training allow him to react in time, diving out of the way as the blaster bolts tear into the ground around him. Anakin hastily ignites his lightsaber, deflecting the shots away, trying to avoid sending any of them too close to Rex as he does so.
No, just no. He doesn't want to fight him. He can't fight him. He's like – something almost like a brother. Anakin takes a few steps back as Rex keeps shooting at him, then jumps down from the ledge and continues advancing towards him. The only way he'll be able to stop this is if he stops defending himself and disarms Rex. Somehow, without hurting him.
"I don't want to fight you, Rex," he says, but the clone doesn't even respond, continuing to fire.
Fine. He raises a hand, Force shoving Rex into the wall behind him, ripping away his blasters with the Force, and holding him in place. The captain strains against the Force grip, but it doesn't break. This doesn't really solve the problem of how he's going to free him from whatever the Son did to him.
He's still pondering it when Obi-Wan runs into view, pulling out his lightsaber. "Any suggestions?"
"The Daughter said she might be able to do something to break the mind control, but she's fighting the Son right now."
Then what are they supposed to do?
He doesn't have to wait more than a minute to find out the answer to that. The sound of shattering glass rings through the air, and he sees and senses the two figures falling down straight towards him. he and Obi-Wan instinctively dive out of the way as the Son and Daughter crash to the ground between them.
The Father appears standing a short distance away, and the Son promptly flies at him in a rage, screaming threats as he starts trying to electrocuting him. The Father merely throws up a Force-shield to block it.
"What can we do?" Anakin demands, turning to the Daughter as she stands up.
"I can try to break my brother's hold on your friend's mind, but it is not without risk," she replies.
"See what you can do," Obi-Wan tells her.
She nods, and Anakin can feel her reaching out with the Force, touching the clone's mind. He's given up trying to fight against Anakin's Force grip, and is sitting on the ground now, glaring at him through his helmet.
It doesn't take the Son more than a moment to realize what she's trying to do. He increases the intensity of his lightning, and the Father's shield finally gives way. He collapses to the ground as the red lightning crackles into him for a few moments before the Son finally whirls away, gaze focused on the Daughter. He instantly reaches out with the Force as well, obviously determined not to lose his hold on Rex.
Watching it, Anakin does not have a good feeling about this. They're literally fighting over Rex's mind, and that's not going to have good consequences at all, no matter how this turns out.
He senses it almost before it happens. The Daughter suddenly jolts back, as though she was almost physically thrown back out of Rex's mind. The same moment, the clone suddenly collapses to the ground. Even if he's not a Force sensitive, they still have a bond, and Anakin can far too distinctly feel it as it wrenches free.
No. No. He can't – "Rex!" Anakin cries, running to his side, uncaring of the Son and Daughter attacking each other in the background.
He drops down next to the clone, reaching up to pull his helmet off. His state is obvious enough in the Force, but that doesn't mean he wants to believe it. Rex has been the only person almost constantly at his side ever since the war started, over one and a half years.
He can't lose him to. Like his mother, like his old friends from Tatooine and even among the clones who are dead now. So many of his friends are gone, and more are dying every day. It's what happens in war, but this hurts deeper, more acutely. "Can you help him?" Anakin asks, hating how helpless he feels as he looks up at the Father.
"I cannot undo what is done," the man insists, slowly approaching him.
No, no he can't believe that. This can't really be the end. "There has to be something you can do." Forget the Jedi's speeches about letting go. Anakin won't give up the life of his best friend without a fight, without at least not trying to find a way to bring him back.
"Father," the Daughter says, practically appearing at his side, "We can do this." She looks pointedly at Anakin. "Don't let my brother distract us."
"Of course," he agrees, turning away. He can feel the Force surging up as the Father and Daughter do... whatever they're doing. The gigantic bird that is the Son lands a short distance away, but doesn't move to attack.
For a moment, nothing happens. Rex continues to lay motionless on the ground. Did it not work? Did they fail? A sickening dread slowly pools inside of him. Then suddenly, Rex moves, coughing as he slowly sits up and looks around, looking – and feeling – hopelessly lost. "What... happened, sir?" Rex asks finally.
"Not much," Anakin offers, resting a hand on his shoulder, the closest he can actually come to outright hugging him, because that would be highly inappropriate, especially right now. "It's good to have you back."
"You must leave," urges the Father, "Before my Son tries to leave the system again."
Anakin couldn't agree more.
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