Something a little lighter this time!

Once again, sorry it took so long; the chapter decided it should try to top 10,000 words (seriously, what has happened? why are they like this?), but I was inconveniently stuck on the first part, so had to wait until I could finish that bit to cut it and post the first half.

The good news is that the back half is mostly written at this point, so it shouldn't take too long for pt 2 to come out. Aaaand I have big chunks of the next 3 chapters after that written, too, so here's fingers crossed that those won't take as long either.

That first night, Ahsoka and her mother did little more than exchange halting pleasantries while Padmé played hostess to smooth over the worst of the awkwardness. Ahsoka learned that in addition to a mother, she also had a father, a younger brother, and a younger sister, which somehow struck her as the strangest part of it all. She was used to being the little sister, and here she learned she was, in fact, the eldest in her biological family. It didn't compute.

Before leaving that night, Pav-ti ventured to ask, "Would you like to come to dinner tomorrow? Or perhaps later, if you need time?" she added hurriedly. "Bring a friend, if it would put you more at ease."

"I—thank you. I'd like that," Ahsoka found herself saying. She couldn't help being curious, after all, even if she had no idea how to act around a group of close relatives she hadn't known existed before that evening.

"Are you taking someone with you?" Padmé asked her, once Pav-ti had gone.

"Rex, I think, if he's willing. It's something I need to do myself, and…"

"And Rex won't step in to be a mother hen," Padmé finished wryly. "Unlike certain former senators."

"Well… yeah…. I'm glad you did tonight, but…."

She wasn't sure how to explain, but Padmé nodded and hugged her tight.

"I understand."

Maybe that way of taking Ahsoka under her wing was part of why she didn't want to take Padmé with her to meet her family. Rex was her friend, her vod, and her fellow commander. Padmé was like a sister, but she also tended to wax maternal when she saw Ahsoka in distress. It felt a little insensitive to take her motherly colleague to dinner with the parents who seemed to have loved her, though they had given her up to the Jedi.

The next day, Pav-ti once again extended her invitation, and accordingly, that evening Ahsoka and Rex borrowed a landspeeder from the Alliance collection and followed Pav-ti to a village some distance away.

Like the training camp, the village lay deep in the pine forest that covered so much of Shili's land. It consisted largely of rounded pourstone buildings surmounted by rounded, flowing wood-shake roofs. Many of the houses boasted deep eaves which, supported by trunklike poles set some feet from the walls, created the effect of shady verandas. Globelike lights caged by wooden lattices hung along the well-worn dirt streets. Children played outside some of the houses, under the watchful eyes of parents and grandparents. It was a peaceful sight.

This could have been my life, Ahsoka thought, as she guided the speeder through the village.

"How are you doing, Commander?" Rex asked, like she was a kid on her first battlefield again. His concern wasn't all that misplaced. She'd faced Separatists and Sith lords, but this was another matter entirely. So, she gave him a wavery smile and said, "A squad of droidekas is looking pretty good right about now. You never met Jango, did you, Rex?"

"Nah. I don't think he really cared about any of us except Boba."

"His mistake," Ahsoka said. Then, "Thanks for coming with me."

Rex gave her shoulder a reassuring pat. "Of course, 'Soka."

Pav-ti stopped her speeder in front of a modest dwelling, disembarked, and beckoned to Ahsoka and Rex.

"Welcome," she said, as they followed her up onto the shaded porch. The door opened, and she ushered them forward. "Please, enter."

Through the door lay a pine-paneled hall, softly lit by another latticed globe light overhead. No sooner had Ahsoka and Rex entered, than they were met with the sound of scrambling feet. Moments later, a young Togruta dashed into the entry from another doorway, lekku flying, and came up short, her eyes sparkling with barely-contained excitement.

"You're here! Hi! I'm Kaava!"

Kaava. Ahsoka's little sister, just thirteen years old.

"Hi, Kaava," Ahsoka said.

Kaava grinned and crossed her arms.

"So! You're my famous big sister. What's it like being a Jedi? And a Rebel? Have you fought lots of Imps? How many droids did you scrap? What's it like using the Force? How—"

Ahsoka blinked before the unexpected deluge. Pav-ti came to the rescue, suggesting, "Kaava, perhaps you should give our guests a chance to catch their breath."

"Oh, right. Sorry!" Then Kaava's attention turned to Rex. "Who's your friend? Or—wait—is he your boyfriend?" she added impishly.

"Kaava!" Pav-ti exclaimed, as Rex's expression turned to one of mortification. The tips of Ahsoka's lekku flicked in amusement.

Kaava rolled her eyes. "It was a valid question."

"This is Rex," Ahsoka said. "He was a captain in our legion during the war. We've been friends ever since."

Before Kaava could say anything else, Pav-ti, evidently noting the mischievous gleam that lingered in her youngest's eyes, said, "Kaava, why don't you go tell your father and Roshaar we're here? There will be plenty of time for interrogating Ahsoka later."

"Okay, fine."

Kaava disappeared again with an exaggerated sigh, but she still had a bounce in her step.

"I can see the family resemblance," Rex murmured. Ahsoka batted his shoulder.

"She's a bit like the Commander at that age," he explained, when Pav-ti quirked an eyemarking at the two of them.

The Tano matriarch's confusion turned to a yearning so sharp it verged on hunger.

"I wondered," she said. "I always wondered—what you were like, Ahsoka, who you were growing up to be." Again, she made one of those aborted gestures, as if she wanted to touch Ahsoka but wasn't sure how it would be received. Parental inclination, reined in by a respect for the autonomy of the daughter she had given up.

"Shall we go sit down?"

She showed Ahsoka and Rex into a cozy living space, pine-paneled like the entry, with the addition of carved vines that reached from floor to ceiling. Instead of couches, like in Padmé's old Coruscant apartment, there were large, colorful cushions on the floor. The ground of Shili was considered sacred in Togrutan tradition, Master Ti had once told Ahsoka. Some Togruta went barefoot on their homeworld, and many who were not such strict adherents to tradition still favored furniture that allowed them to be closer to the ground.

Conversation bumped along, mostly chitchat about training, until a new voice said,

"So, our daughter is a young rebel."

A smiling Togruta man stood in the doorway, carefully holding a large tureen as Kaava and a teenling boy pushed past with trays of dishes in their hands. The man made a slight bow in Ahsoka's direction, which she returned as best she could while lounging on a cushion, and then he set down the tureen on a low table.

"Nak-il," he said. "Little 'Soka's not so little anymore, I see."

"Jila." Kaava rolled her eyes at her father. "Of course she's not, she's like twenty-five. I can't wait to be twenty-five." She flopped down next to Ahsoka. "Then I can go and do stuff. I want to fight Imps, like you!"

You're reckless, little one. A family trait, it seemed.

"Believe me, you don't," Ahsoka said. She pointed to a jagged scar on her arm. "See this? That's what happens when you get hit by shrapnel, and there isn't enough bacta because everyone else got hit worse."

Kaava leaned away, a little startled by her vehemence. "Okay! Yikes, you know, you're kinda scary?"

"Sorry. I just don't want you to end up like me."

Oops, she thought, feeling a spike of guilt from both her parents. Bad choice of words.

Pav-ti shifted uneasily on her cushion as Nak-il settled down beside her. "Ahsoka… did you, do you resent that we gave you to the Jedi?"

"No," Ahsoka said. She really didn't—hadn't really ever thought about it. "The Jedi were all I really ever knew. I don't remember—I'm sorry, that sounds harsh. I meant—"

Nak-il raised a placating hand. "Ahsoka, shhh. You were so young. We knew you might not remember us."

"It… I won't say it doesn't sting a little," Pav-ti added, "but I don't resent it. We wanted what was best for you. And I'm sorry… we didn't know. If we had known there would be a war, Ahsoka, that you would be made to fight, and as a child—we would have kept you with us. We thought it would be safe. But— I'm sorry. I'm sorry we sent you away, to grow up on the battlefield and running for your life—"

"Pav-ti—Mother—shh. You didn't have any reason to think there would be a war, much less this empire. Until the war, I was very happy. Even during the war, there were good times. That's where I met my master, and Rex, after all."

Pav-ti wrinkled her nose. "Your master? When I knew you were part of the war, on the frontlines, under the care of some kid hardly older than you—"

"Some kid!" Ahsoka choked on a startled laugh. "I don't think I've ever heard Anakin Skywalker referred to as 'some kid' before."

"I thought the Jedi must be mad, giving care of a teenling to someone who didn't look old enough to be a full Jedi himself."

"Oh, they definitely were," Rex snorted.

"But it worked," said Ahsoka. "If I'd had any other master, I'm not sure I'd still be here."

Pav-ti and Nak-il shared a skeptical look, but they didn't argue.

"Tell us," Nak-il said, as Pav-ti began to ladle some sort of stewed meat from the tureen into the dishes Kaava had brought. "Tell us everything."

"That you care to," amended Pav-ti. "And wait until we've all got some dinner. Kybuck with lichen and mushrooms," she added, handing Ahsoka the first dish. "And there are meat pastries in the basket Roshaar brought in."

Roshaar, Ahsoka's teenling brother who come in with Kaava, opened the basket and offered it to Ahsoka with a shy smile. Quiet and retiring, the middle Tano child made a striking contrast to his two sisters, and to all the rest of Ahsoka's family.

"When I was little," Ahsoka began, "I lived in a creche clan with a few other younglings. When the war started, and the Order needed more knights and padawans. Master Yoda assigned me to my master. I think he thought we would run each other ragged and it would make both of us more manageable. I don't know how well that worked."

"It didn't," Rex supplied. "Take it from the vod the two of you tossed off a wall."

"Tossed off a what?" Kaava asked.

"Hey, it was about to blow up—"

"Because you two were blowing it up!"

"—and we caught him before he hit the ground. But Anakin and I—we were a good team. Nothing like him and my grandmaster, but good. Maybe, someday, we'd have gotten there."

But we didn't get the chance.

Kaava bumped the side of her head sympathetically against Ahsoka's arm.

"I'm luckier than most padawans, though," Ahsoka continued. "At least I still have my grandmaster. And two of the vod'e from my master's legion."

And Padmé, and Asajj, and the twins, and the droids.

Caught up in the day-to-day, Ahsoka sometimes forgot to realise just how fortunate she was, despite the many losses. Even mere survival was more than most padawans had managed. But she had survived, and even from the start, she'd had Rex by her side. And now, she had so much of her family around her again. It was a good reminder, and one that she probably needed—to be glad for what she had, and not to allow that to be overshadowed by Vader.

She was lucky. They all were, to have each other.

Ahsoka veered away from the sadder parts of her story after that. The stewed kybuck and pastries were too good to spoil with depressing conversation, so she and Rex regaled the assembled company with some of the lighter tales of the 501st—the pranks, the mishaps, the time a couple shinies had gotten thoroughly bosky on illicit alcohol, following which they'd decided to pour engine oil all through one of the Resolute's halls to go sliding, and then Ahsoka and most of Torrent Company had decided to join in the fun. Anakin had found out and tried to emulate the Kenobi disapproval, but he'd failed miserably after all of five seconds, and mere twenty seconds more had seen him sliding down the hall after Hardcase. The cleaning droids had not been impressed. Nor had Obi-Wan, though there had been a glimmer of amusement behind his frown.

Storytime and laughter did much to ease the awkwardness of the gathering. Kaava started to chime in with some of her own misadventures, and Roshaar followed, then Nak-il and Pav-ti. By the time the twilight gave way to night, they were all merrily exchanging tales, and Ahsoka rather wanted to stay and continue getting to know the family she had been born into. But the hour was late, everyone had training on the morrow, and rebellions did not wait for such trivial things as unexpected reunions—and so the party broke up, Kaava and Roshaar going off to bed, and Ahsoka and Rex starting back to camp.

"Well, Commander, you still wishin' for those droidekas?" Rex asked, gently teasing, as he piloted their landspeeder through the forest.

"Oh, stop it," Ahsoka said. "They're nice. I'm glad they're nice. I think I'd have been happy growing up here, if this was all I'd ever known."

"Do you wish it was?"

It would have been a peaceful life, with a mother and a father who loved her, and a pair of siblings to play with and grow up alongside—a tranquil village, quiet and secluded. An ordinary life. Ahsoka would have been spared so much worry and pain and grief. She wouldn't have a broken training bond that still ached sometimes, and a brother who had Fallen to the dark side. It sounded pleasant, the easier road by far.

At the same time… she wouldn't have known Anakin at all, then, nor Rex nor Obi-Wan, nor Master Plo, nor any of the other family she had collected. She wouldn't have brought Asajj into the Rebellion, or been there for Padmé after she had found out about Vader's identity, or helped any of the people she had ever helped over her life as a Jedi.

"No," she murmured into the wind. She was a Jedi, and the galaxy needed Jedi—now, more than ever. She was a soldier, and the galaxy needed those, too. She loved her family—the family-by-chance she had collected—and any life without them must be the emptier for their absence. "No, I don't wish they had kept me. It's not an easy life, Rexster, this life of ours, and I don't think we can really say it's a happy one, but it's a good life, don't you think?"

Obi-Wan reached out through the Force as the light freighter dropped out of hyperspace in the Geonosis system. The planet lay far in the distance—far enough, it was to be hoped, that the freighter had dropped outside any security perimeter the Empire might have set. Even at this distance, however, he could hear the singing of kyber through the Force, clear and ringing in an endless crystalline ensemble.

In the pilot's seat beside him, Asajj's hands fell from the controls.

"It's…"

She peered out the viewport with a wonder that vanished when she noticed Obi-Wan's attention on her.

"It's a lot," she said, with dismissiveness that couldn't quite smother a note of awe. "Well. That's that verified, and now we can get out of here before—"

"Wait."

Obi-Wan covered the navicomp screen with his hand so she couldn't enter new coordinates. There was something else dancing just on the line between perception and oblivion, like base notes so low they were more felt than heard. It was something he should recognise, he was sure, but the kyber distorted and buried it so that he couldn't sense why it should be familiar, or what its source might be.

"Wait why?" Asajj demanded. "I thought we were just supposed to check whether we could detect kyber in the system."

"There's something else here," Obi-Wan said. "Can't you sense it?"

She stared at him, narrow-eyed, as if torn between concern and annoyance.

"All I sense is kyber. Don't tell me you've having Force-hallucinations, now."

"I am not, nor have I ever heard of such a thing in my life. You can't feel it?"

"No. I told you—just kyber."

"Go a little nearer to the planet."

Perhaps then he would be better able to pick out the familiar thing from the kyber ensemble.

"Are you insane?" Asajj asked. "We don't know where the security perimeter is, and if the two of us get caught, how do you think that's going to turn out?"

But, reluctantly, she started the ship moving closer to the red world in the distance.

Obi-Wan tried to focus on the familiarity, but it was still obscured by the kyber, and by Asajj's growing agitation.

"Kenobi, we've got to leave. The closer we get, the more likely it—oh, kriffing—where did that come from?"

She jabbed a finger at the scanner display. It showed an Imperial Star Destroyer ahead of them, which most certainly had not been there five seconds ago.

"Cloaking technology," Obi-Wan said. The Empire wasn't taking any chances. If anyone appeared in the system without authorization, they wanted to apprehend them without giving them time to escape. They didn't want word to get out that the Geonosis military facility, whatever it was, even existed.

A light flashed on the console, and Asajj cursed again. "They're hailing us."

"You'd better take it. I don't like our chances of making a jump before they're within firing range."

She accepted the call, and a brusque, Core voice ordered, "Unidentified light freighter, state your business."

"I need to refuel," Asajj said. A believable excuse, at least.

"You should have gone to Tatooine. This is a restricted military zone. Civilian craft are prohibited."

"Yeah, well, I'm not on great terms with Jabba, so excuse me for not wanting to stop at Tatooine."

Obi-Wan winced at her combative attitude.

"You have deliberately entered a restricted area. Await further instructions. Attempts to resist or flee will be met with force."

"You just had to get closer," Asajj muttered. Obi-Wan merely crossed his arms.

The ship's comm crackled to life again. "Light freighter, proceed to ISD Ordinance hangar bay five for inspection."

Asajj dumped almost all the ship's fuel, set course for the ISD, and then dug under her seat.

"You're going to be recognised," she told Obi-Wan. "Put these on."

She tossed a pair of binders, which he caught and proceeded to stare at in bewilderment.

"Why in the worlds—?"

"I'm a bounty hunter. If I can say I've captured the notorious Obi-Wan Kenobi himself and I'm taking him to Vader, they should let us go."

He regarded her with a horror formerly reserved for Anakin.

"That sounds like a terrible plan."

"It's actually rather a good plan, if you'll just shut up and do as I say. I know that will be a change for you, but seeing as the other option is being blown to smithereens, please try."

Obi-Wan snapped the binders onto his wrists, and frowned as the kyber, the familiar something, and Asajj disappeared from the Force. Or—no—they hadn't disappeared, but rather the Force itself had. It felt as though one of his senses had suddenly gone missing.

"These are Force-blocking."

"Yes."

"Ventress…"

"Yes?"

"I don't like this."

"Can't say I blame you, darling. That bounty on your head is practically a fortune. It would set a girl up for life."

"Ventress."

"Just think, no more rifling through the trash of the galaxy after bounties, no more fraternizing with a bunch of hope-blinded idealists, no more hanging around a couple of Jedi—"

"Asajj!"

"Oh, wasn't making you nervous, was I?" Grinning, she guided their ship into the ISD's hangar bay. "Get ready to say hello to our hosts. Oh, wait—one more thing."

"What do you— Is this really necessary?" Obi-Wan protested as Asajj lashed him to the copilot's seat with a length of stout rope.

"You don't think they're going to believe I let you roam freely about the cockpit, even without access to the Force, do you? Now, be quiet. I need to put the ramp down."

The plan worked, more or less. When an ISB lieutenant and his men entered to inspect the ship, they found the bounty hunter Vin Xelyss lounging against the console, finger-combing her silvery hair while she taunted her tired-looking captive.

"I got him," she told the lieutenant, with a jerk of her thumb. "The great Obi-Wan Kenobi himself. Was on my way to turn him in and collect the clinkers when my fuel ran low. You boys had better process us quick. Lord Vader won't be pleased by any delay."

The ship was subjected to a thorough inspection, and the identity of Xelyss' captive was verified, as were Xelyss' Bounty Hunters' Guild credentials. That all seemed to go smoothly. The Imps even refueled Asajj's ship. The complication came when a handful of more senior officers on the Ordinance caught wind of the situation and decided to give their careers a boost by becoming a formal escort for Xelyss and the captive Obi-Wan Kenobi.

Wonderful, thought Asajj, standing at the bottom of her ship's ramp as an officious captain explained the scheme. She appraised the escort. Four officers, plus the six stormtroopers who were already onboard to guard Kenobi. Ten soldiers. Easy enough. The hardest part would be keeping Kenobi out of the crossfire. She was beginning to regret the Force-blocking binders.

"Well, come along, boys," she drawled to her entourage, turning to head back up the ramp. "That's right, promotions for everybody. Got any friends you want to bring with you? No? Keeping the laurels all to yourselves? How selfish."

Beside her, one of the younger officers lurched as if he wanted to box her ears for her insolence. She gave him a condescending pat on the chest.

"Kidding, darling. Far be it from me to scold someone for not wanting to share a prize."

She pushed past to the cockpit, where Obi-Wan was in the throes of what seemed to be a severe coughing fit. Rapping him sharply on the head, she barked, "Shut it! I've heard enough out of you to last me the rest of my days." Turning back to the officers, she added, "You fellas sure you want to tag along? This slippery little karker gabs so much he'd make a socialite want to turn hermit."

Obi-Wan's coughing returned with renewed vigor, and Asajj herself had to stifle a chuckle as she swung into the pilot's seat to program the navicomp.

Once in hyperspace, she made quick work of their honor guard, who were all busy gawking at the "prisoner," and fantasizing about promotions and commendations, to notice when she slipped her lightsabers from the hidden pockets in her trousers. The men shouted in alarm as she surged out of her seat, one glowing blade ready to block blasterfire while the other swept a wide arc to catch two officers across the chest. She quickly picked off the remaining two by deflecting their own troopers' blasterfire at them. Taking down the troopers required only a little more effort.

Obi-Wan surveyed the carnage with distaste as Asajj freed him from the ropes and binders..

"You couldn't have left one alive for questioning?"

"What do you want me to do, reanimate one for you?"

"That won't be necessary," he said quickly.

"Squeamish Jedi."

"Sith witch."

She shot him an unamused look. "Just help me get these corpses out the airlock before they start to stink."

"It might be a good idea to take some of the uniforms, first," Obi-Wan pointed out. "We should land somewhere to check for trackers, and there's no telling what the situation on the ground will be. Imperial garrisons have been springing up throughout Hutt Space."

Ahsoka and family were unexpectedly hard to write. It's very easy to be awkward in social situations. It's very difficult to write people being awkward in social situations. This is inherently unfair.

Obi-Wan and Asajj, on the other hand, were a delight to write, and now I'm just wondering why I didn't give them an outing like this sooner. XD