AN: Sorry it's been a little while. Been busy with summer orientation and getting ready for a family trip. I hope you guys like this idea, there will be a follow up story later.

Disclaimer: I don't own anything

Rex sat silently eating the lukewarm mess hall food-like substance before him. Across from him, Ahsoka still hadn't touched her food in the half hour they had been sitting down. Instead she was animatedly discussing something with Fives and Echo, waving her arms around while Fives shook his head and Echo rolled his eyes. Rex stopped eating for a moment, caught up as he was watching his girl.

"How long?" Cody nudged his friend next to him, smirking as Rex blinked rapidly back into reality.

"How long what?" Rex stabbed at his meal and pushed the food around on the tray.

"How long have you been in love with her?" Cody nodded towards Ahsoka who was trying to steal something away from Echo.

Rex was silent for a while, and Cody would look over at him every so often to make sure he was still there.

"From the very beginning I guess." Rex's statement was punctuated by Ahsoka's mirthful laughter over whatever she had successfully stolen from her brother.

She first captured his attention when she sauntered off the empty supply ship and snipped at the general. Her naivety and untainted bright personality made the boys smile for the first time since the beginning of the siege. It made him smile, laugh even, and instilled a fierce sense of protectiveness that even surpassed that which he felt about the brothers under his command. He felt he needed to protect not only the skinny, energetic 14 year old child who barely reached his pauldron, but her bright and tender spirit.

He remembers how she refused to eat in the officer's mess but would sit with lonely brothers or those who had just lost brothers or were waiting for others to get out of the med bay. She learned their names, not their numbers, and they soon became accustomed to her gentle hands resting on their arms in comfort. For the first time he saw a Jedi with feelings and compassion, feelings and compassion she freely shared with the troops under her command; and he didn't understand the forbidden attachment of the Jedi, the commander was attached to her boys, and they were attached to her.

He was mad and worried about her when he found out she not only protected him from being decapitated by Grievous, but fought him by her lonesome. He fought to urge to continue reprimanding her after her master did, and then hug her and thank her for saving his shebs again. He was proud that she was able to hold her own but he couldn't resist telling her with a smirk she should be more careful and watched as she rolled her eyes good naturedly.

The first time he saw her spirit die a little was when Anakin Skywalker was nearly fatally injured. She seemed so small and lost without her master and his heart went out to her. The few words he spoke to her he tried to lace enough comfort to be supportive without overstepping his bounds as a captain. The small upturn of her lips told him that she heard the unspoken and was thankful. When they finally were able to get the general help, he saw her spirits return and some of the tension ease from her shoulders as she watched her master regain his strength.

He inwardly denied any unprofessional feelings when the Blue Shadow Virus killed his soldiers and he watched as it sapped the 14 year olds strength and he raced to catch her as she collapsed. She looked so fragile in his arms, blue poison racing through her veins highlighting the paleness of her face. He held her gently in his arms even as he slowly succumbed to the illness himself, barely conscious as Coric and other medics came racing in, and pulled the two apart and placed them on separate hover-stretchers. The medics pretended not to notice their Captain cradling the Commander in his arms, and Rex pretended not to notice the glances the medics sent his way.

During the second battle of Geonosis, the final assault, he was concerned when she and another young padawan went into the labyrinth of the catacombs, with the tall order of blowing the factory up from the inside. When the battle plan started falling apart, he was even more concerned because Ahsoka had never once failed in executing her part of the plan, even if she was overzealous in completing her task sometimes. He knew when the building came down and there was no sight of the two padawans, something bad had happened, and he felt like his chest armor was a little too tight but chalked it up to the dust in the air. That tightness lessened when he he assisted her and her friend out of the rubble and to their waiting masters.

Rex watched as the child started to grow up into a beautiful young woman, and the protectiveness he felt develop into something more. Her montrals and lekku were longer, her figure was filling out, she stood taller and with more experience and confidence under her belt. His eyes started to linger on her more than usual and for longer periods. He was secretly glad when she changed her uniform into something less revealing; although he thought the change was no less flattering to her figure.

After Mortis, Rex wanted to do nothing more than to wrap his arms around her and hold her; he had never seen her so shaken and her spirit so disturbed. She was confused and scared, not knowing what had happened to her and finding dead ends with the Jediise she was with. When she did find out, the entire legion couldn't find her for two whole days. Rex was the one to find her, her blue eye dulled and haunted. He didn't say anything, just stood there as a solid presence until she started talking. He hugged her once she was done, tempted to hold her tighter and never let her go. She had died, the darkside she as a Jedii fought, had taken control of her and killed her. And it scared him just as much as it seem to scare her. And as he held her sobbing in his arms, he didn't deny or try to change his feelings of protectiveness towards her.

He couldn't deny his attraction to her when he saw her dressed as a slave, and he wanted nothing more than to gut the leering looks of the men who saw her. When they were separated he tried to keep his thoughts from straying to her and what she was going through. In the end he fully expected one of the generals to figure out that what he felt for his commander was more than just camaraderie and friendship. Perhaps General Kenobi did know, Rex tried to ignore the knowing glance from the general when he finally saw her safe and unharmed.

During their time on Onderon, he felt spikes of jealousy towards the Bonteri boy, who seemed to either ignore or not notice the longing looks Ahsoka sent his way. He was even more infuriated when he found out how the two of them met and their second encounter together. Rex wanted to call Torrent Company and have them help him strangle the kid for dragging their little sister into Death Watch's lair. But his jealousy was sated when he saw that Ahsoka accepted that Lux wasn't hers anymore.

The entirety of the 501st was shocked and infuriated when Ahsoka was falsely accused of the temple bombing. It took Rex three hours to talk the men down from going rogue and breaking their commander out of prison, despite how much he wanted to himself. When she was quickly cleared and reinstated into the Order and walked back into the barracks, he allowed the others to hug her and slap her on the back. When she finally reached him she threw her arms around his neck and tightly hugged him. "Thanks for always believing in me Rexster." She whispered and that's when he knew that what he felt for her went both ways.

Since the official end of the war and change of protocol and codes, he had cherished every moment he had with her, glad their relationship was out in the open. He good naturally took the jokes and ribs of his brothers if it meant he could openly hold her hand or kiss her. He knew there was nobody else he wanted to spend the rest of his life with.

Rex shook himself of his musings as he reached across the table and cleared away his girlfriend's tray, his own, and Cody's.

"I've loved her from the very beginning, I just didn't also know it."

AN: I know it's sappy and mushy! I hope you guys like it though! Ahsoka's side next chapter! Please R&R!

Shebs-Butt

Jediise-Jedi (plural)

Jedii-Jedi (singular)