Her heart was still pounding when her legs threatened to give out beneath her, finally succumbing to the strain of hunger and exhaustion. Ahsoka slowed down, struggling to draw breath through her tightened throat. For a moment, she was disoriented. Little of her surroundings had made it through to her through the darkness and the tears in her eyes, and honestly, she didn't particularly care where she'd ended up. She'd believed in order and purpose once, and she'd felt the way it burned to ashes in her heart, leaving an echoing, empty hole. And then there was Rex. The thought of the way she'd left him behind made her sick and disgusted with herself, but he'd be safer without her there. She was the catalyst, she realized as her stomach twisted itself into a knot. She'd been pushing him closer and closer to the brink with her presence. He'd had orders. They'd all had orders, and none of them had known until it was too late. She was certain that they hadn't been aware of the orders all along, but she wished she could be as certain about everything else she thought she'd known. She'd learned a long time ago that the Republic's war was far from simply the light versus the dark. She'd seen people she'd been taught to view as enemies doing what they believed was right, just as she was. And she'd seen those she thought were friends betray her. Nothing was obvious anymore, and it had probably never been to begin with, but there'd been something comforting in following the designs of the Republic, in knowing that there was something at work greater than her own existence.

And then she'd seen it fall. Or rather, she'd felt it, and that had been all the more terrible. She'd felt the wounds and fear and destruction, the voices of her friends and former masters tearing through the horrible roar, only to be silenced. Only silence remained. Silence, and Rex. His voice had guided her out of the darkness, and she'd latched onto it like a crippled starfighter being guided to a docking bay. He'd never questioned her. Whatever misgivings he'd held in his heart, he'd kept firmly there. Mired in her own agony, she hadn't stopped to consider how the news that the Jedi had supposedly betrayed the Republic, and by extension his brothers, had influenced him. Rex had been a fixed point in her universe, and now she'd lost him, too.

Truly looking around her for the first time since she'd run, Ahsoka recognized the jagged rock formations that loomed overhead. She wasn't sure why she'd ended up here again, but somehow the familiar peaks were comforting. Ignoring the weakness in her legs and the shortness of her breath, Ahsoka willed herself to push forward until she was immersed in the chaotic stone. It was a strange place to find refuge, but Ahsoka felt somehow shielded by the rubble that surrounded her. Home was a false sense of security - even on Dantooine, she knew that both she and Rex were easily identifiable. This place was quiet, sheltered. A familiar gap in the rocks drove her forward, and suddenly she stood in the centre of the rocky circle she'd stood in the night Rex had followed her here. In the darkness, the stone fragments that surrounded the edge of the round clearing looked almost like pillars. Ahead of her, a small pile of rocks stood alone where she'd stacked them. She remembered the way her hands had been shaking as she piled them there, the way she tried to delay a confirmation of what she already knew. Every fibre of her being had been searching, grasping for a hint of what once flowed so freely through her. Ahsoka collapsed, feeling the earth claw at her knees as she sunk down onto the cold stone. She felt completely directionless, the way she'd felt for brief moments out in the void piloting her starfighter when she'd lost sight of the ships around her. Space was disorienting. There were no directions, no "up" or "down". Only vast, cold, nothingness. It was enough to make anyone who spent enough time in it lose their sense of perspective.

She let the cold consume her, feeling the night breeze glide over the contours of her body, which was now curled in a tight ball against the cold stone. She felt as though she was bleeding into the ground beneath, her terror, guilt, and fear pooling around her, leaving the silence she'd feared above all. Tonight, Ahsoka did not fight the echoes within her. It was like opening her eyes for the first time in a very long time. Before her, the chasm yawned, dark and endless and ever expanding. She forced herself to look into it and listen to the ringing silence, facing the hole that was all that remained where the Force had once dwelt within her. She was afraid, as she often was, the image of Rex locked away and on the brink of consciousness tearing at her fraying heart. She knew now that there was nowhere she could hide from the reality she'd faced - Rex had been her last refuge, and he'd had his own private storm to weather. The cold wind danced across her skin, and from some distant place, she could feel her body shivering uncontrollably. She'd failed. She'd failed them both. Ahsoka realised how terrified she'd been of this moment her entire life, the way she'd prepared and trained and taught herself to deny the terror that war stirred. She remembered what Master Yoda had taught her.

"Allow yourself to fear, you must not. Down a dark path, fear leads. Calm you must feel, flowing from the Force, if win this war and restore peace, we will."

And she'd believed it. She had lived and fought that way every day of her life, fighting attachment to the clones she might never see again. She'd tried to ease the memories of the deaths of her men, and with Anakin laughing at her side, it had almost been possible. There'd been a cause then, a purpose. The day she left the Order behind her, she'd felt the fear creep into her at last, no longer held at bay by the security her masters had given her. She'd never felt the Force as strongly as she had the day the Orders had come, but in that moment, she'd felt through the agony the way the flames of her former friends' lives burned out like candles. But the worst had been Anakin's suffering, the pain that had been the last throes of agony before the Force had trickled away at last. Anakin was not dead, of this much she was certain. His pain had burned her, coursing through her veins with the heat of a collapsing star. Everything had been colder from that moment on. She wondered where he was now, if he was being held, tortured... She felt her body sag as she released a heavy breath. There was nothing she could do for her old master now. He would know what to do, he always did. It was Rex who needed her now.

I'm scared.

The thought sat alone in the silence of her mind, and the storm seemed to fall somehow silent. She'd fought it for so long that it seemed strange to acknowledge the sensation at last. A shiver ran down her spine, or perhaps it was a breeze?

We all fear, Little Exile.

Ahsoka felt her heart stop. Her eyes snapped open and she scrambled to her knees, squinting through the darkness for the source of the voice. It hadn't come from within her, and yet, she hadn't exactly heard it, either.

"...Hello?"

As soon as the word passed her lips, she felt stupid. Falling back into a sitting position, she dragged her knees up under her chin and pressed her forehead against them.

"I'm losing my head..."

What you sense is real, Little Exile.

Taking a shaky breath, Ahsoka lifted her head and opened her eyes. The air suddenly seemed to feel as though it was crackling with electricity. She stepped away from the void in her chest and rose, wrapping her arms tightly around her.

"Who... what... are you?"

An Exile. Like you.

Whirling on her heel, Ahsoka felt the breath leave her body as her eyes registered what she was seeing before her. Shining in the cold night, a figure stood in the stone ring with her. The figure - a female form - seemed disconnected from the world around her, and Ahsoka felt a shiver run down her spine as she realized that the figure was no more material than the moonlight that lit the night.

"No... I'm seeing things... this isn't happening... you aren't real!"

The figure drifted closer, slowly, but not menacingly. Ahsoka took a step backwards, the fear within her constricting the muscles in her body. She could make out features now - the figure was a young woman, clad unmistakably the robes of the Jedi order. Her eyes were piercing and powerful, but had a softness to them that made Ahsoka hesitate. The spectre smiled, slowly opening her arms in a gesture Ahsoka took to be reassurance.

I am not made of crude matter, if that is what you mean, but I am as real as you, Little Exile. I am a manifestation of the living Force, in the form of one who once walked the path you do.

Ahsoka smiled sadly, feeling the pang of loss in her heart.

"That can't be true. I... I can't feel the Force anymore. It's... gone."

Gone? Little Exile, the Force is never truly gone. But it can cut deeper than any weapon. That is what it did to you. It is not an absence you feel. It is a wound.

"A wound? I don't understand... I can't feel it anymore, it's like I'm walled in away from it..."

You cannot feel it because you try to heal the damage it has caused by forgetting. The Force bleeds from you. The emptiness you feel is the echo of the place the Force once resonated within you. It is not lost to you forever, Little Exile, but to fill the empty spaces once more, you must reopen the wound. You must let the Force return.

Ahsoka felt her throat tighten, her breath shallow and ragged in terror. Her voice was barely a whisper.

"I can't... I could hear them all, feel the way the warmth of each life was taken away... and my Master... I felt his suffering... it would destroy me..."

The Exile bowed her head, a look of deep sorrow in her eyes.

It might. What you felt is a heavy burden to bear for even the strongest Force sensitives. I cannot guarantee your safety. But perhaps I can give you hope. I once bore the wound that you bore, and in healing it, I grew stronger. I restored light to dark places long abandoned. Tell me, Little Exile: Is not there one you love who is lost in that darkness? The many-faced Soldier, blood of the Hunter?

Ahsoka fought the tears, but she could not restrain them.

"Rex," she sobbed, angrily wiping a tear from her cheek. "His name is Rex. He's a clone, something's happened to him I don't entirely understand... he... told me there was a chip in his head... I think he's been... programmed..."

The Exile raised her head, a spark in her ghostly eyes. Ahsoka searched the look anxiously, her breath caught in her throat, praying for an answer.

He is not beyond hope, Little Exile. Tell me, do you know where it is you now stand?

"It's... a ruin or something..."

Long before your birth, the birth of your Republic, the Jedi built an enclave here. This ring in which we stand was once a council chamber. The chamber in which I was pronounced Exile for the final time. But the enclave is strong with the Force. It is why I can appear to you now as I do.

"I don't understand... what does this have to do with Rex?"

In this enclave, one thought lost to the darkness was returned to the light. The Prodigal Knight, they called him. It was here, under Dantooine's plains, that the Jedi reforged his shattered mind.

"Reforged... I do remember a story... Master Nu used to tell it to the younglings. About a great Jedi, saved from darkness by the wisdom and grace of the old masters. He was redeemed... but reforged? I'm not sure I understand what you mean..."

Your masters may not have known the full truth, Little Exile. He was saved, but not by the wisdom of the masters. He was rebuilt through the Force. Together, the masters wielded the Force as a fine blade. They erased the darkness, the memories of hatred and anger. They left a new man, a new life. If you allow the Force to return, you may be able to do the same for your Soldier.

Ahsoka laughed bitterly through her tears.

"But in the story, the Jedi was saved by masters! I'm not even a Jedi anymore, and there's only me. How can I possibly do something that took the strength and knowledge of a council to achieve? What you ask is... it's impossible."

Perhaps. It has never been attempted, you are correct. But the Force is strong in this place, and if you allow it to be, it can be strong in you, Little Exile. Trust in your strength. Your Soldier is lost unless you can return him to the light.

"But the pain..."

Pain is a part of healing, Little Exile. But the choice is yours.

"If it will help Rex, I'll do anything! Please, just... tell me what I have to do."

The ghost was silent for a long moment, and Ahsoka hung on the emptiness with hungry despair. She realized the strangeness of the situation, and wondered if she was risking too much by trusting this entity. She knew next to nothing about whose form the spectre took, and she knew somewhere in her heart that it could be a trick to lure her into the darkness. A Jedi forms no attachments. Perhaps this was why. It made her vulnerable, easy to manipulate, eager to hear what she wished to hear. And yet, it did not matter now. Rex needed her. And he'd do the same for her.

Your wound runs deep, Little Exile. You are a child of the war. Your masters taught you to reject and hide fear, but it dwells within us all. It is a part of us, but it needs not control us. It is when it controls us, when we let it consume us and fill us with regret and resentment, that it breeds the darkness. Face it, acknowledge it, but know that it does not define you. When you stop running from it, the pain may return. It is not easy to hear the suffering of the galaxy. Mourn them, but do not let grief prevent you from feeling the way they return to Force again. Listen for the symphony, Little Exile. It lives within you still.

The fear was waiting precisely where she'd left it, inhabiting the echoing places in her heart. She felt Yoda's words pushing them away as they always seemed to do, but she knew that this denial had always been temporary. With the words of the Exile echoing in her mind, Ahsoka reached out again, clearing a space for the memories. She knew how to fight them. She'd done that since she was a youngling. But tonight, the memories returned, and she did not resist. She watched the faces of those she'd lost pass through her mind - good men who'd known no choice in the way they lived their lives. She felt the sorrow she'd tried to hide now, without the mask she'd worn for her master. They had died for a cause that now seemed distant, murky. But that time had passed.

You know the teachings of the Code, Little Exile. You have known them from the beginning. It was what they taught you first. It was what defined you. There is no emotion, there is peace. There is no ignorance, there is knowledge. There is no passion, there is serenity. There is no death, there is the Force. But there is another way.

Unbidden, the moment returned to her. She stood beside her starfighter once again, dwarfed in the hangar of the Republic warship, now significantly lacking the men she'd been instructed to command. She'd lost them that night, and she'd finally understood what it meant to lead. She'd been fourteen years old, and she'd been their commander.

Emotion, yet peace.

They'd died at her order, and she would never forget them. She remembered every last moment, the strangled screams and bursts of static over their ship's comms as she'd lost them one by one. She felt the pain of that loss completely. She'd owed it to their memories. But with the agony, she felt quiet acceptance. The choice had been hers. The command had been given. But these things could not be changed through hurt or anger or despair. Somehow, that knowledge was comfort.

There had been too many deaths to count, but fighting alongside her masters, they'd seemed rational. She thought she knew where she stood, what side she'd chosen. The Jedi stood for peace, as they'd always done. She was taught to know her rank, know her place, know her Code. To be a master, it seemed to her, was to have accessed the knowledge of the stars, to know the answers. And suddenly, she remembered the fire. She'd been trapped in a warehouse, hemmed in between the soldiers she'd once fought alongside, and a Sith. Or so she'd thought. All of the knowledge of the masters hadn't prepared her for the moment she was put on trial for a crime she did not commit, and for the moment she learned that it was her most trusted friend who had stood against her that night in the flames.

Ignorance, yet knowledge.

She hadn't understood. Barriss had been a sister to her, and something imperceptible had torn her away. The threat of the Dark Side loomed ever present in her life. She'd been trained to see it, and yet for all her knowledge, she'd been unable to save Barriss. Barriss had found an answer, and yet for all her newfound knowledge, she'd been blinded. Her path to the place she now stood had been the path of a padawan learner, just as Barriss' had been, but on her own journey, she found herself confronted with new questions rather than answers. An answer was an ending, but admitting ignorance was an open door. Her mind's eye lingered for a moment on an image of Senator Amidala and her separatist friend as they'd met in a secret moment of unity and peace. The Jedi did not have all of the answers. The Republic did not define galactic policy. And this was as it should be.

Slowly, these shadows died from her mind, and she was left in darkness. This now was left, and it filled her with strange dread. She saw him in her mind's eye the way she'd always seen him - cavalier, bold, fearless. He was everything she'd tried to be. From the moment she'd met her master, she'd wanted to prove herself in his eyes. She'd watched him fight, certainly. Anakin was a gifted pilot, and his lightsaber cut effortless paths across the battlefield. But there had always been more to Anakin than destruction, and it was the light within him that had drawn her to him and filled her with respect and awe. As often as Anakin destroyed, she'd watched him fiercely protect. She'd admired that above all, that when faced with a choice between the mission and the lives of his friends, Anakin had defied the choice altogether. He refused defeat. And he'd won. But Ahsoka had seen Anakin bound up in his concern, rash in his vengeance. In the darkness on Mortis, she'd woken from a deep, cold sleep and found his arms around her. She remembered the way he'd held her for a moment, as though he'd found salvation, but she knew from the defiance still burning in his eyes that there had been a cost.

Passion, yet serenity.

He'd been a slave once, her master. She remembered the look in his eyes as he'd faced the Zygerrian queen, the way they'd flashed like deadly steel in defiance of all the oppression that she represented to him. There's been a time when love had served her master, given him strength, guided his impulses. Passion had aided him, but in conjunction with fear, she'd watched him fracture. He'd tried to suppress his emotions, but they'd forced their way free until he was blind and reckless.

It was the reckless, unbalanced passion that she'd seen in his eyes on the evening she'd said goodbye to him for the last time. He'd been lit from within with despair as he'd reached for her, and she had felt the way he'd tried to stay her with the force of his will. He'd been hard to refuse, but her mind was set. She felt his eyes upon her as she'd turned away, refusing to turn and meet his gaze one more time. She had seen enough to know what she had to do. She'd felt his presence lessen that night, dwindling to nothingness, and a strange quiet took her as the Force calmed, its surface no longer rippling in his presence. Until the day of the Order. Ahsoka felt her body tense as the heat of destruction and death filled her again, the screams and cries echoing in the hollows of her montrals until the vibrations seemed deafening. She felt the white hot pain threaten to tear her body apart, the memories and losses pushing her towards the dark chasm that yawned again before her.

Death, yet the Force.

She could not deny what she felt - it was the sensation of destruction, the sound of final breaths and screams and prayers, the heat of thousands of flames before they were simultaneously destroyed. But it was also life. She felt the voices build within her, the way threads of thought and wisdom bound the memories of the lost to the motion of the future. They were gone, and yet their essence persisted. It could not be extinguished. The Force was eternal. Ahsoka felt her body strain and collapse, and the noise coalesced into song. Harmony. And then there was only silence.

Little Exile... the dawn approaches...

It took a moment for the echo of the Exile's voice to register in Ahsoka's mind, and longer still for physical sensations to return to her. From somewhere deep within her body, her consciousness flickered into being, extending slowly until it filled her once again. Cautiously, she opened her eyes, wondering through her dazed state if any of it had been real. She was lying in the centre of the stone ring, the place that had once been a council chamber. Over the edge of the jagged rocks, a hint of light danced on the horizon. Taking a deep breath, she pulled herself shakily up into a sitting position. She was still weak, exhausted, aching... but something faint within her sparked, and it took her breath away. The empty places that had seemed so vast within her seemed smaller now, the shadows receding back to the corners of her mind. Glancing around her, she noticed the Exile's spectral form watching her, barely perceptible in the lightening sky. Her expression was difficult to read, but a glimmer of something like recognition flickered there.

The wound is healing now, Little Exile. You will not be without pain, but the bleeding has stopped. Can you hear the galaxy's song again?

Ahsoka closed her eyes, centring herself as well as she could manage. The pain and fear were not gone, but they did not impede her. She reached out carefully, spreading her consciousness to the edges of her being, calling out to the world around her. And softly, in what was no more than a whisper, she felt the Force return her call. Ahsoka's eyes fluttered open, tears clouding her vision. Extending one hand, she let her body's rhythms fall in step with her surroundings, gently easing her influence toward the pile of stones she'd been unable to move not so long ago. She felt the way the wound tore at her as she worked, but she accepted the pain for what she now knew it to be - healing. Slowly, unsteadily, the stone at the top of the pile rose into the air, and at her command, drifted to her and settled in the palm of her hand. She curled her fingers around it protectively and turned her eyes upwards towards the Exile, tears rolling down her cheeks.

"I... I think I can."

The Exile smiled, a warm, gentle smile. Although the ghost's face appeared young, there was something ancient and wise in her eyes that filled Ahsoka with determination.

"Exile... how can I help Rex?"

Go to your Soldier, Little Exile. You must bring him here. Here, in the ruins beneath the place you now stand, are the chambers in which the Prodigal Knight's mind was rewritten. Trust your feelings, listen to the echoes of the Force that remain in the ancient stones. I will guide you to the chamber, but I cannot influence what happens within. Now hurry, Little Exile... may the Force be with you.

"But how will I know what I must do? I don't know the first thing about healing, let alone rewriting someone's memories! What if I make it worse?"

Silence. The Exile was gone. Ahsoka released her breath in a tense huff, running her hands along the sides of her montrals in a gesture of frustration. She wanted to believe the Exile. She wanted to believe in this plan. But all she knew so far was spectacularly vague, and the task she was expected to complete would require mastery over the Force. She'd barely been able to draw the stone towards her without it shuddering in her grasp, but to wield the Force as a scalpel? To use it to rewrite programming she barely understood? She realised she was up and pacing the clearing, gripping the rock in her hand as she moved. There were so many things she didn't understand, but Rex's condition was likely only getting worse in her absence. She'd just have to trust that the right course of action would become clear. She'd been gone too long already, and she could see the deep pinks and purples of the dawn streaked across the sky. Straightening herself with purpose, she headed for the edge of the circle, picking her way across the stones and back out onto the plains. She had no idea how she was going to get Rex to the ruins - last she'd seen him he was bound and incoherent, recognising her only as a potential target. The thought made her chest constrict, her grip on the little stone threatening to crush it to dust. She realised dully that her pace had increased - she was almost running now as she pushed herself back towards the farmhouse. She'd figure something out. She had to.

Ahsoka slowed to catch her breath on the bluff overlooking the farm, still dark in the twilight gloom. She could just make out the glow of the light that came from Rex's room. Drawing a breath to steady herself, she made space for the thought that had been lurking in the shadows of her mind. In his current state, her presence might do Rex more harm than good. The memory of the way he'd looked at her the last time she'd seen him flashed into her mind - the cold, impartial look of a soldier with orders to follow. It had terrified her to see the recognition drain from his eyes, but in the light of the dawn, determination outweighed fear. She was going to bring him back. Bracing herself for what she might find, Ahsoka made her way towards the house, hoping for both their sakes that he was sleeping.