Heyo! A big thanks to dieFabuliererin for co-writing this with me! Hope you guys enjoy!

The trigger warning from chapter one still applies, so read carefully!

Ahsoka woke up in a cage. It was better than a cell, but considering she was in a Zygerrian slave empire and none of her friends were with her, the circumstances weren't great.

It took a while to orientate herself, the electrocution had taken a toll on her brain. It was hard to think, but she knew enough. Anakin, Obi-Wan and Rex were all captured; great. She hoped one of them had been able to contact the Council for reinforcements.

She sat up, and noticed she was still in her slave outfit and the fancy necklace which felt similar to a shock collar that had been put on her before the auction. Rubbing the dust of her aqua blue skirt, she remembered arguing with Anakin about having to wear that outfit. Her species were sexualized enough without having to put her on display like this, but he thought the Queen wouldn't take kindly to having a slave dressed like a Jedi Padawan.

The cage was spacious, surprisingly. Granted, she couldn't stand or stretch out her legs, but was comfortable enough to sit in with her legs crossed. By the smell, she inferred it used to house animals. She tried not to think too much about the thick, smelly substance coating some of the bars that she knew by the foil stench much be animal urine.

Looking around, her foggy brain slowly realized her cage must have been hung over the side of a tall building, judging by sight of the city beneath her. She tried to locate Anakin or Obi-Wan and tell them where she was, but it was impossible with so many other life forms nearby.

She looked up to the balcony that the cage was attached to, trying to find a way she could somehow escape if she could only get through the tiny bars of the cage. Her lightsabers weren't with her, no surprise, so they couldn't be any help. She weighed her options carefully. Maybe there was a way to lift the cage with the Force.

No, no. That was too risky. If she were to slip up, she would fall to her death. But how else was she supposed to get out?...

"You're awake."

She whipped her head up towards the voice above her, seeing a Zygerrian male. It took her a moment to realise it was Atai Molec, the Prime Minister and Captain of the Zygerrian Royal Guard. He and his titles were mentioned in the mission briefing, but she didn't know much else about him.

"Where are my friends?" She demanded, cutting right to the point. As soon as she found out where they were, she could either fight or flee. Or at least try to.

Atai chuckled, the low sound echoing as he walked towards her. "They are being well taken care of, I can assure you."

She didn't believe a single word.

He leant over the balcony to get a better look at her, and she felt her skin crawl in disgust as a creepy smile crossed his face. "Aren't you something, little Jedi?"

Her top lip curled back as she bared her teeth, letting out a predatory growl.

Atai just laughed, resting his hands on his knees so he was kneeling closer to her. "We're going to have a lot of fun together." His words made her stomach tighten in a knot. "I think I'll call you Blue."

"You will call me Commander Tano." She growled back. She may have been his prisoner, but she was still a Jedi and military officer.

"No," He laughed, reaching out towards the cage as if he was going to touch her. He couldn't, she was too far away, but it made her flinch backwards nonetheless. "Blue is my favourite colour, and you are all blue; your eyes, the chevrons on your lekku..." his piercing gaze lowered and he smirked, "and your outfit."

She shrunk back even further, trying to cover her exposed skin from his attempts to undress her with his eyes.

"Blue," he breathed, standing up so he towered over her. It was an intimidation trick, trying to prove he was the dominant figure, but Ahsoka pretended to not notice.

"I have good news for you. The Queen has gifted you to me to do as I please."

His news was hardly good.

Ahsoka snarled, absolutely repulsed, "I won't play your games."

He chuckled again, looking at her as if she was some sort of pet. "Oh, I think you will, Blue."

"Don't count on it."

He didn't seem phased by her resistance. He just gave a short nod and gestured to the collar around her neck. "I suppose you've noticed your new accessory." He laughed. It was hardly new, she thought. It was what the Queen used to knock her out and land her in this position.

The realization of his words suddenly hit her harder than a lightsaber. He, just like the Queen, could shock her whenever he pleased.

If she didn't play his cruel games, she could end up hurt again.

Tears came to her eyes as reality sunk in. She wasn't just another slave to this man- she was something else.

The thought of being used in such a way made her want to vomit, made her heart start hammering violently in her chest. Before they left for Zygerria, Anakin said to tell him if any of the slavers tried anything of this nature, but with her Master gone, Ahsoka didn't know what to do.

She was alone.

Anakin yawned, checking the time on his chronometer.

0200 in the morning. If Obi-Wan wasn't in the bacta tank, he'd be pissed that he was up so late.

Not that it wasn't normal for him.

Anakin was up late so often, that the clones in the 501st had a running joke that he never slept. That he was just like their homeworld of Coruscant, always busy regardless of the hour, always wide awake while the rest of the galaxy rested.

Kix was never fond of this joke. "Skywalker's insomnia is no laughing matter." He would always say, loud enough to be in Anakin's earshot.

Then he would turn to him with a serious look on his face. One that clearly said, "If you don't fix your sleeping schedule, I will sedate you where you stand."

Anakin would just nod, though he was not planning to seek help any time soon. The pills he'd gotten from the Halls of Healing couldn't ward off the bad dreams, so he just avoided sleep altogether.

That's what he was doing now; finding useless tasks around the Triumphant to avoid even the possibility of seeing the Zygerrian Queen again in his nightmares.

He prepped the med-kits and rations for the colonists to take back to Krios, he took a head count, calculated casualties, cleaned out a storage closet, checked on Obi-Wan and Rex in the med-bay, he did everything he could to just forget.

He was on his way to the hangar to tinker with ships when he suddenly heard his comlink beeping.

Who would be calling him this late?

Still, he answered it.

"Skywalker here." He said into the small device on his wrist. "What's the situation?"

"General, you're gonna want to see this." A very worried clone's voice blurted on the other end.

Anakin's eyebrows crossed. While he was able to tell his own men apart just by their voices, he was clueless when it came to the 104th's members.

"Who is this, exactly?"

"It's Commander Wolffe, Sir. You're needed in the mess hall as soon as possible." Wolffe's usual deadpan tone was shaken with fear.

Something was wrong. Wolffe was one of the calmest clones Anakin had ever met. He rarely batted an eye at even the most distressing of circumstances. (Which most of the men blamed on him being desensitized after the Malevolence incident)

If Wolffe was concerned, Anakin knew he should be too.

"What's the matter, Commander?" Anakin asked. "Is everything okay?"

There was a pause, then "No, it's Ahsoka."

He didn't even need to tell him what had happened. Anakin dropped everything he was doing, running to the mess hall as fast as his legs could take him.

When Anakin reached the mess hall's doors, Wolffe and a few other nervous looking clones were standing there waiting for him.

"Some state the kid's in." Wolffe explained when he approached him. He seemed slightly calmer now that Anakin was there.

"Sinker and I found 'er here while the boys and I were doing routine checks. Since it's gonna be all hands on deck returning the colonists to Kiros, we decided to wake up and do them early."

Anakin was getting impatient. He didn't want to hear Wolffe's ramblings about routine checks, he wanted to see Ahsoka.

"What's wrong with her?" He interrupted.

"She's real upset. Been crying for about an hour now. She keeps rambling on about the color blue for whatever reason, and some Atai Molec."

"The Zygerrian Prime Minister?"

Why would Ahsoka have anything to say about him?

Anakin thought that she was under the Queen's custody, not his. "What about him?" He demanded.

"I can't make out most of what she's saying, General, but from what I can tell, whatever that shabuir did to her is not good."

Did to her.

Anakin's chest flooded with anger even thinking about someone hurting his padawan in any way.

"Whatever it is, I'll tear the bastard's throat out." He muttered darkly, reaching forwards and pressing the button to open the doors.

Wolffe followed him inside the room, and with a lowered voice said, "She's in that corner over there, Sir."

He pointed towards the far wall of the room, where Anakin could just barely make out her small, shaking form from behind Sinker, who was knelt down in front of her, probably trying to console her.

Anakin's heart dropped.

Towards the start of the war, it wasn't unusual to find Ahsoka hiding in some obscure place like the mess hall. He'd found her crying behind munitions crates, in closets, and even once in his own bed without his knowing.

But that was when she was younger.

She hadn't cried after a battle in so long.

"Oh, Snips." He whispered to himself before rushing to her side.

Once closer, he could actually see her.

Her knees were drawn to her chest, held there tightly with her shaking arms. All of her was shaking actually, her chest, her lower lip, her hands. With her teary eyes scrunched up in pain, she looked like a child. A lost, scared child that he wanted- no needed - to protect.

"Ahsoka? Snips, what's wrong?"

Ahsoka's eyes blinked open, and relief flared through them for just a second. "M-Master?"

"That's right," He knelt down in front of her next to Sinker, setting both his hands on her shoulders. "I'm here, I'm here."

"I'll give you guys some privacy, kid." Sinker said to her before he got up and left the room, the rest of the clones trialing after him, casting concerned looks over their shoulders. Wolffe barked at them to speed it up.

Anakin shot the clone a grateful smile before turning his attention back to his crying student.

He had the urge to scoop her up and hold her, but he knew better than to pick up soldiers who were this distressed.

So instead, he reached out and held one of her hands, squeezing it ever so gently as he spoke. "What's going on?"

She didn't answer, she just stared up at him with tears in her eyes.

He had to get her to tell him something…

"Does it have anything to do with the Prime Minister that Wolffe told me about?"

She let out a heartbreaking sob, and nodded quickly, tears falling down her cheeks.

"The Q-Queen," She got out. "Gifted m-me to him."

Anakin felt his eyes narrowing, and suddenly he wished he could bring Mirajj back to life just so he could kill her again. No one had the right to make his Snips cry like this. No one.

She started talking again, and he was brought back to reality. "He k-kept calling me all these stu-stupid names, and he-" Her voice cracked and she shook her head.

Anakin felt his heart go cold in his chest.

He squeezed Ahsoka's hand, letting out a protective growl. "Ahsoka, what did he do?"

A small sob was ripped from the back of her throat, and she shook her head again, curling further into herself. Another sob came, and then another and another until Anakin couldn't take it anymore.

"C'mere, Snips." He murmured, reaching out for her.

When she scooted closer to him, he pulled her snuggly into his arms, letting her head rest on his shoulder. He didn't mind that his tunic quickly became wet with her tears. He just wanted to hold his padawan close until she felt safe, and secure, and free from slavery's chains.

Just like his mother used to do for him.

"I don't w-wanna t-talk, Master."

"Shh, it's okay. You don't have to right now."

The room fell almost completely silent apart from Ahsoka's cries, and Anakin's soft, hushing noises as he rocked her slightly in his arms.

Anakin had given up interrogating her for now. He could ask once she was calmer. Once they'd both gotten home to the temple, and got the slightest sense of normal back into their lives.

Before Zygerria, Ahsoka hadn't noticed how many things in her temple room were blue.

She never paid attention to her bedsheets, or the knobs on her dresser, or the ocean scented candles Barriss had given her for her birthday.

They didn't raise any alarms in her brain like they did now. They were just a part of her everyday life.

But her everyday life seemed shaken now. Just as shaken as gunships that got hit with blaster fire, as boats that sailed through the rough waters on Kamino.

She guessed she could add the kriffing sheets, knobs, and candles to her list of things Atai had ruined for her.

It wasn't fair, she thought angrily as she gripped Anakin's cloak close to her chest.

He'd given it to her as a sort of safety blanket before the council meeting started an hour ago. Right before he'd left her side for the first time since the morning in the mess hall.

He and Obi-Wan (who was finally out of the bacta tank) said she wasn't allowed to go to the meeting. That they were discussing serious matters about the Togruta colonists that she didn't need to hear.

That wasn't fair either, she decided.

She deserved to know about her own people, no matter how bad it was. But because Obi-Wan and Anakin were just as stubborn as her, she was stuck in her stupid room, that had too much stupid blue in it, and everything was just so stupid that she wanted to cry.

Cry out of her stupid, ugly blue eyes Atai had liked so much.

Master Plo used to always tell her she had wonderful eyes. When she was little he would cup her tiny face in his large hands and tell her that they were made from the most beautiful stardust. She used to believe him before Zygerria.

She used to think the stripes on her lekku were a special part of her culture, she loved the sky, and lakes, and kyber crystals, but now they were all as ugly as Atai and she was left wondering how his empty threats and simple words left her world so fucking gray.

Thanks for reading! Love you guys lots! :)