Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Disclaimer: I don’t own Star Wars or the song used here - When You Were Young, by The Killers.

Shout Out: Star Wars has Obi-Wan and clones. That's enough to drag me out of my self-imposed writing hibernation. Order 66 shouldn’t exist, and there ought to have been a happy ending for 212^th as a whole.

This was born as an experimental piece of writing, so there is no clear delineation between past and present, the first life or a new one, and I intentionally left out which clone’s POV ran the story. It’s mostly Cody, Boil, a third POV, and some other troopers. Obi-Wan was almost Sir Not Appearing in this fic, but considering his troopers were making tooka eyes on me to give them their General back, they got their wish.  

 I love the stories about Obi-Wan/212^th - this is a bit of a tribute to Witty_Whit and their story I Was Yours Before I Even Knew It -  I loved it, and from then on, there was yet another rabbit hole to read all the fics with that pairing.  And when I listened to that song, I had to write this out!

I won’t be including Mando’s dictionary because I have faith in gentle readers to know what the words in question mean—if there are any mistakes in use, they were mine to make.

Onward to the reading!

You sit there in your heartache

Waiting on some beautiful boy to

To save you from your old ways

You play forgiveness

Watch it now, here he comes -

“Who lives, who dies, who tells your story. “

They lived. They died. Their stories - forgotten.

Not so much forgotten as whispered and dreamed about among the ones that managed to survive haran that was the Empire rising on the blood of slaughtered Jedi and ashes of Republic. -

If he were a romantic, the man in the shadowed corner of a dingy canteen in some forgotten hole at the Outer Rim would have called this… whatever it was - a beautiful nightmare.

He had on a mix-and-match of armour—the vambraces, pauldrons, and the like—along with a mix-and-match of vibroknives and blasters hidden on his person. He was similarly armed to Mandalorian but diverse enough to be mistaken for a highly paranoid spacer.

The helmet rested beside his left elbow. The corner he was hiding in was dark enough, and thick smoke drifted around, obscuring the vision of any and all visitors who came to sell or buy all the diverse vices in that miserable bit of a hut that masqueraded as a canteen.

The scarred mouth was twisting around the words, soundlessly shaping the remembrances for those marching ahead.

"Ni su'cuyi, gar kyr'adyc. Ni partayli, gar darasuum."

I'm still alive, but you are dead. I remember you, so you are eternal.

It was terrible to remember that he had survived by pure dumb luck –

• “Blast him!”

He had always been saved, whether he had known that or not, and his brothers had always been protected.

Always cherished.

He hoped—almost hoped—in some self-flagellation, he imagined the doors opening and a warm hand on his shoulder, the worn and scarred palm pressing down, as he felt its warmth on the naked skin of his shoulder all through the heavy pauldron moulded to the kute stretching across his skin.

A name was called (his name!), passing across those smiling lips as he turned to look up into those bright eyes, so unlike his and his brothers’. Those irritating robes draped over the unsheltered body they covered—how many arguments had they had over him wearing the armour, only to be rebuffed and shanghaied and tricked right back into grudgingly giving up that particular argument … until next time?

How often had he seen that unremarkable brown robe spread over some shiny, shivering with the first shock of being exposed to the battlefield - to an unending slew of battles, mortality and loss?

How often had he imagined the scent of tea tickling against his nose, dreamed about that bright shock of hair, coloured like fire at their campsites, orange, gold, copper, and red, and how it would feel under his ungloved fingers?

How often have the day and night cycles passed since that precipice of glory turned into tragedy?

He didn’t know. Intellectually, he knew - he was told just how much time he had lost under the accursed order from the Chancellor - now self-acclaimed Emperor - but it seemed unreal and absurd, just like his existence before Jedi, on Kamino.

Dark, pained eyes closed.

It would’ve been better if he had never existed. At least then, he would’ve been alive and well. At least then, his Jedi, his General –

At least then - he swallowed down some bitter, green alcoholic drink that burned through his throat like swallowing a blaster fire on full power; at least then, he wouldn’t have to add his name to the long list of remembrances for his already dead brothers.

At least then, he would’ve been forgiven.

If only.

Instead, he only had his life, useless and pathetic as it were, and his memories.

(If only someone had come back then on Kamino and saved him—or killed him; he wasn’t picky.)

And he remembered, once again, those bright eyes looking at them - at him, acknowledging all and every last one of his brothers standing at parade rest, seeing their General, their leader, their savior, their bright star, for the first time - seeing him and being seen back.

He doesn't look a thing like Jesus

But he talks like a gentleman

Like you imagined

When you were young

Kote had seen him first, the shabuir. Apparently, the jettii was wet as a drowned tooka, and he still caused their erstwhile leader to choke on a nutritional mush the Kaminii had the gall to call food.

(It wasn’t; Gearshift could attest to that. And any number of 212^th. Their General had spoiled them rotten with the spices - it had been the only indulgence in their otherwise dreadfully bland food.)

Wooley heard him first. If one wanted to be technical, Boba really had been the first one, considering he was with Prime when their General came to inspect them.

The soft, cultured and genteel Coruscanti accent could veer off into steel-slick Mando’a just as easily - and hadn’t they been shocked when this happened for the first time?

 Waking up back on Kamino again was a nightmare coming to life. One moment, they had been marching away into Manda and in the next, they were here.

Back in that old haran, weak and small children at the mercy of their trainers. In that all-white, hospital-sterile shelter on the ocean waters, with storms swaying across the swathes of clouds, nature’s lullaby ever since they had been tubies, echoed through the dome structures they had been housed in, as they waited for the time Jedi would finally deem to come and save (-use-) them.

To be among their brothers again, knowing what death awaited each one of them. To feel strangely young and unforgivingly old at the same time, unimpressed with their trainers because they were better (of-karking-course, 212^th was the best,) to being mother tookas to their own batch brothers, from squirrelling away the ones who had been decommissioned in their first lives to standing up against Priest and Reau, to attracting the attention of the trainers who had intentionally and maliciously targeted the rest, just because they could.

(Crys had killed Reau when she had gone too far - Fox may have not been his batchmate, or have memories from the Before, but he was Crys’ vod’ika, and if anything, the clones were highly possessive of their chosen aliit. Priest didn’t count on Alpha-17 of all cadets to interfere in his ‘fun’ and challenge him to a duel.)

Their brothers didn’t know what had caused them to behave so differently, to go against their trainers or squad leaders so readily.

They came from different batches and at different times, but all of them (the 212^th) used battle signs not taught by either trainers or Prime, much to the adults’ consternation.

(Kix and Bones managed to get apprenticed to Mij Gilamar, much to the older baa’ur’s gruff surprise at their competence and entertainment with their no-nonsense attitude with any poor fool who had the misfortune of being sent to the medbay they had commandeered for themselves.)

(Cody once again earned his name from Prime—Kote. Jango Fett remembered the strangely unimpressed yet intimidating glare the child-sized clone aimed at him. Half of his head had been covered in blood as he stood up, his spine made of beskar and spite.)

(Cody. Boil. Waxer. Gearshift. Wooley. They Named themselves again, the syllables echoing the beloved voice they longed to hear again. And they waited.)

The 212^th stood together, and their brothers stood there with them.

Can we climb this mountain? I don't know

Higher now than ever before

I know we can make it if we take it slow

Let's take it easy

Easy now, watch it go -

The future stretching ahead seemed insurmountable, a mountain with its peak so high it couldn’t be seen. There was Geonosis and the massacre of Jedi. There was Rattattak; there was Utapau or any other million different battlefields they had either survived through or died on.

A twist of devastating tragedies and impossible miracles woven together in a string of memories.

There was an inevitable catching of feelings for their General. Whether one was a veteran of several campaigns or a fresh shiny, the 212^th seemed to have it hard for their jettii. In their last lifetime, it was an open secret in GAR - the 212^th were completely and utterly gone for their General. It was a subject of many debates and teasing among the companies when they were land-bound back on Coruscant.

(Thankfully, they were more discreet than Skywalker and Amidala. Honestly, what were those two thinking? That everyone else was dumb, blind, and deaf to their not-marriage, not-romance, not-affair mess? A GAR-wide betting pool had existed when they would finally wise up and admit that they hooked up from practically the first day they had seen those two together.)

It had been a complete surprise when Alpha-17 joined their little band. Rumour had it he stood up against Prime, looked him straight into his eyes and declared the feral shits that called themselves 212^th his, and if Prime wanted to decide otherwise, he was welcome to try and take them back by him-karking-self.

(Kaminii didn’t joke when they said they would make the clones stronger, better, faster and more intelligent than their template. Alphas alone were already an overachievement to the point of being deemed a failure because they were too independent to heed anyone who didn’t earn their respect.)

There was a tentative equilibrium between the three factions on Kamino. Prime with his trainers were one. The second one was Kaminii and their mysterious (not) employer, and the third one was, surprisingly, clones under the not-leadership of 212^th, with Alpha-17 and CC-2224 as their leaders.

But everyone knew the day it would be broken wasn’t far away.

(Much to Jango’s frustration, Alpha-17 still didn’t respect him. And gallingly, the karking brat was also taller than him!)

  We're burning down the highway skyline

On the back of a hurricane that started turning

When you were young

When you were young

The sky bloomed with fire, and a cacophony of sounds shook the air.

(His soul sang with faith as he prepared to descend on the ground to help the jettiise trapped in the area. His brothers were clad in white - unmarked and pure, the colour of Light.

Finally.

Finally, their time has come.)

His soul sang with faith as he prepared to descend on the ground, but his heart was sinking with the knowledge of just how high the casualties would get. His armour was heavy with the weight of unwritten remembrances.

He looked to his right. He gazed at some of those soldiers (brothers), knowing he was looking at them for the last time. The white of his armour was the colour of death, the colour of the Stormtrooper he used to be in some other time and place. Lifeless and blank, he was a flesh droid in a plastid carapace, a killing machine made only to murder and not protect.

He looked to his left.

(He wasn’t here.)

And even bereft, he was strangely grateful for that quirk of fate because he didn’t think he could look his General into his eyes and not crumble like a wet flimsi.

  And sometimes you close your eyes.

And see the place where you used to live

When you were young

Not Kamino, Negotiator, or even this. The home was not a place but a person—him.

Sometimes, he used to imagine what he would do after the war ended. Alpha-17 would say that this was a foolish use of his free time, but he knew—he knew all of his brothers dreamed about the After, even with the knowledge that they were made for war, conflicts, violence, and death. That their graves weren’t to be made, or their absence mourned, except by their brothers.

Where would they go? Where would they live? What would they do?

(Adopting Numa was a faraway dream, a sweet one.)

Would he marry his riduur?

(He liked to think he would. Officially, of course. Kriff being genetic brothers, his riduur deserved the best, and he would find a way to give it to him.)

The home was when they returned to Kamino to see their little brothers hearty and hale and to listen to how they advanced in their learning modules (choosing to forget how close they were to being sent to battlefields and death).

Home were the jokes and laughter on Negotiator and hearing their medic sigh with relief when they told them that they had managed to save their brothers.

(Home was a smile hidden in a beard, a small quip and a joke, and sitting together in the mess hall, their General among them.)

And home wasn’t a planet, or a house or a shelter. Home were his brothers and the 212^th General.

And his After?

“Wherever you may go, we will follow you.”

He waited for their Home to come to them. Waited as he curled up with his riduur through a particularly stormy evening. He waited when CC-1138 - Bacara - was squabbling with Cody before Alpha-17 got fed up and grabbed them both by the scruff of their kute before unceremoniously dumping them onto the training mat to get their shebse in order.

(Kriff, Alpha-17 was becoming a grumpy big brother and wasn’t that a scary thought.)

They say the devil's water — it ain't so sweet

You don't have to drink right now

But you can dip your feet

Every once in a little while

Someone once told him that memories were the devil’s water. He remembered drinking that poisonously green drink in that old canteen as he reminisced about his failures.

(A bartender said to him once that absence makes the heart grow fonder.)

Kamino was a water planet. Because of the minerals in it, the water here was not sweet but maybe bitter, and it had to be filtered out to make it drinkable and usable.

There were memories of small sips of water on Hoth, when it was more precious than beskar itself.

Memories of trudging through the veritable deluge across the jungle, their General wet to the bones as they huddled against a fire in some dank and damp cave.

He tried not to think about memories when he was under. Nobody wanted to remember the time when they had been under, their feelings and personalities locked behind the artificially generated transparisteel of hatred and duty.

(The sheer joy and triumph when they gunned him down - )

He had seen that look in the eyes of his brothers. He had seen that exact look in Prime’s gaze when he trod the dangerous waters of memories… every once in a little while.

That didn’t mean he had forgiven Prime for what he had done. But he had understood him, and truthfully, that was even worse.

You sit there in your heartache

Waiting on some beautiful boy to

To save you from your old ways

You play forgiveness

Watch it now; here he comes         

The war could be summed up in four words - hurry up and wait.

(Waiting was the hardest.)

The time of being under the influence of chips was uncertain. It was being both detached from himself and feeling everything in the same measure.

In a way, it was similar to when they were cadets on Kamino. Everything had to be done in increments, from one hour to another, or they were racing against the chrono to save themselves and their brothers from being decommissioned.

When they came back, time had changed again—from the time of nightmares and hope into the time of standing up and hiding, the time of waiting for that time to begin anew.

And finally, everything was prepared to go, and they were waiting for him, for the heart of 212^th to become whole again.

Finally, there was a rumour of a jettii finding them - but this time, Kote didn’t find their General peeking down from the gallery at them.

(Shame, grub was still as unpalatable as ever.)

And maybe, this time, they would be forgiven.

All of them prayed to the little gods for that one last favour –

-if only –

  He doesn't look a thing like Jesus

But he talks like a gentleman

Like you imagined

When you were young

(Talks like a gentleman)

(Like you imagined when)

When you were young

The one who was talking to Nala Se wasn’t Obi-Wan.

Sure, the being in question had that posh little Corellian accent; he was a jettii.

He was also wet as a drowned tooka, tall and scarecrow-like in his drenched clothes.

He also had a tremendous big shiner on his right eye.

Prime has fled (again), and 212^th was silently satisfied that the man couldn’t win against the Prime.

(Oddball and Longshot called them up this time, and the 212^th had collectively grumbled and criticised the jettii’s fight. The most telling thing was that Alpha-17 straight out refused to watch that comedy of errors happening on the flight deck below. Figured that one Sith couldn’t do him in - by pure dumb luck - but one Jedi Killer almost drop-kicked him into a watery grave.)

(The man lost his ‘saber. Kote refused to comment or pick on that particular detail.)

(They would miss Boba, the little terror he was.)

This time, the one that inspected them (hah,) was Qui-Gon Jinn.

The man had been uncomfortable with them being clones, visibly - to them - struggling to comprehend their existence. The Kaminii may not have noticed it, but to them, it was visible as a day.

The 212^th was disappointed for some reason, which didn’t bode well for the Vode. CC-1010 – Fox - watched the interactions between the 212^th and the jettii carefully; for some reason, this jettii was not well-received. Sure, all of them had grown up with the stories of jettiise being almost supernatural in their capabilities of wielding Force-osik, but seeing this one in action was.. disappointing. CC-3636 - Wolffe - and CC-1138 - Bacara - would have much to complain about tonight.

Kote looked straight out mutinous, and Force help the man if he demanded 212^th be his personal company.

I said he doesn't look a thing like Jesus

He doesn't look a thing like Jesus

But more than you'll ever know

They had to physically restrain themselves from clobbering Skywalker when he came after his Master into the medbay.

(Waxer had to hold down Boil physically, and when Boil calmed down, he had to hold back Waxer so as not to snatch a blaster off his waist and ventilate the brat’s skull. Gentle, kind Wooley came the closest to murdering Skywalker because he stood the closest to him. However, stars were on Skywalker’s side, with Crys holding his vod’ika back.)

Kix and Bones were at their professional best, dealing with their wounded brothers and tending to Skywalker’s arm stump.

(Some things stayed the same, no matter the timeline.)

They hated Skywalker. Even if he wasn’t Vader, the memories of betrayal and deaths remained. And seeing him there, clad in his customary dark robes and wearing short mullet hair with a customary Padawan braid - Kote squirrelled a confused CT-7567 -Rex - straight away from that lonely brain cell—it was either that or strangle the brat with his rat string of a braid.

(So much of the mess would’ve been avoided if only Skywalker hadn’t been involved. Kote swore that Skywalker alone induced at least two-thirds of his headaches, with the last third reserved for their General.)

 Qui-Gon had to be put into a bacta tank (Dooku had done him in good), while Alpha-17 suffered through Skywalker’s clumsy attempts at flirting with that Nabooian senator.

(Fett had fled again, much to Alpha-17’s consternation. The osi’kovid had enormously good luck in surviving Windu of all beings.)

A Shadow interrupted the brat’s flirting with the senator, much to Skywalker’s ire. Not that Alpha-17 was dissatisfied with the interruption - the slant of the shoulders and the shape under the black cloak with a cowl hiding most of the being’s face was painfully familiar.

The 212^th stood in front of its new General. The company was bigger than last time, even if Geonosis was still a clusterkark of epic proportions.

The General’s face was shaded with a cloak’s hood; the only part visible was a jaw, and even then, it was covered with loose dark blue fabric.

The being’s steps were light, almost noiseless, as he walked to the company's helm, seemingly unaware of the many eyes hunting his every movement. The being had a humanoid shape, wearing some of the armour underneath that cloak (thank the kriffing Force, this one was surprisingly sensible in his choice of gear), greaves and vambraces visible - of a simple make and dull sheen ready at a moment’s notice for helping their owner meld back into the shadows.

Alpha-17 stood beside him at parade rest, similar to Kote, with Kote on the man’s right side and Alpha-17 on the man's left.

“At ease, gentlemen.” The well-known and much-loved voice called out to them, and someone had made a wounded noise, causing the being—no, the General - to look at them.

It was Kote. Kote, looking as if he had been shot into the gut, his eyes wide and disbelieving as he stared at their General - their General, yet not theirs, because this was not the one they had gone through the haran and back for, not the one who remembered them, and their betrayal –

Alpha’s arm shot forward, tearing that pesky hood down, and there he was, his hair the colour of fire reaching down to the shoulders with two slender side braids holding the mass back from the face. The beard was still the same, even if shorter than before. Blue eyes, the colour of the summer sky, and beskar looked up at him, warm with affection that almost sent the gruff soldier to his knees.

“General?” Another choked out – Kix, it was Kix, and the cloak-wearing man looked at him unerringly, his eyes kind and bright, not even needing to search for him among the mass of soldiers breaking rank as they stared at him with their hearts lodged in throats and so much hope, love and fear-

“You never stayed properly dead, Kenobi.” Ah, Alpha-17, that pragmatic bastard. But even with that stone-cut face, his eyes betrayed him, shiny with unshed tears.

The man chuckled as he pulled the fabric off of his face. “Neither do you, Alpha.”

And here he was, a pale shadow that placed a hand on Kote’s pauldron, the weight warm and heavy and so very real –

The ranks broke down, men surging forward, screaming, crying and yelling as they swarmed their jettii; as he laughed, that beloved voice calling them out by their names - the ones they were sure they would have to bury deep within themselves to survive and Kote - Cody now, Cody again, for once and forever - tucked his face into the fabric-clothed neck and finally allowed himself to hope.

He was here, alive and whole and glowing and theirs, their, theirs.

Chapter Text

Disclaimer: I don’t own Star Wars or the song used here - Ashes, by Celine Dion

Shout Out: May the 4th be with you! This time, we have a tribute to that wonderful day. I know, I know, I ought to have learn for the exam, but apparently I just have to write things out to get some peace.

So! Someone made a tooka eyes at me to make Obi-Wan's POV, and here, delivered! Dithered some about song's choice, Obi-Wan is surprisingly picky chap about it. This is not beta-ed, as I am trying to catch the deadline for this day, so if there are any mistakes, they were mine to make.

Obi-Wan and his Infinite Sadness Remastered and gone for the good.   And Obi  learns to be selfish, so good on him.  Mij Gilamar has aDeathWish or OneBrainCell -   I am still unsure of it.   And Alpha-17 and 212th get an unexpected competition!

Onward to the reading!

What's left to say?
These prayers ain't working anymore
Every word shot down in flames
What's left to do with these broken pieces on the floor?
I'm losing my voice calling on you

“I hate you!”

Three words were seared into his memory forever, the gate into everlasting nightmares haunting his steps through darkness and nipping at his heels in the light of the day.

Not the kind words of his friends, the good times with his allies, or the soothing memories of his time in the Room of Thousand Fountains.

Maybe he was deserving of hate.

“Blast him!”

Otherwise, why would his own soldiers ever gun him down?

Something had to be wrong with him, he supposed. Ever since he had been but a baby. He was always too angry, too scared, and had too sharp an edge to be accepted by the majority of the younglings in the Temple.

Too broken.

He always lost his voice when he ought to defend himself—hah, what kind of famed Negotiator was he, anyway?  

The most important negotiation of his life - the one when he had sincerely cared about the outcome, about his own Padawan -  no, his own brother -  if not by blood, then in soul and spirit, and he had lost him. 

His words were always shot down in flames, even before their fateful confrontation on Mustafar; Anakin was too stubborn by far, too blinded by other people - Palpatine -  to even consider looking at the problem from any other side than a fearful one.   And Obi-Wan didn’t really help here, did he?  

“I loved you!”

But had he really loved Anakin? If he had loved him enough, it would have been enough to get through to him and save him… instead of leaving him on the hot surface of that accursed volcanic planet to die in agony slowly, his mind destroying itself within hate and agony caused by the suffering of his body.

Had love really spared his hand from killing his brother when he ought to have ended his misery?  Or was that just his hubris, his own unneeded and uncalled-for justification that this was the best he could do back then?

He was a failure, indeed; it was a wonder that anybody could ever love him.

He understood Master Qui-Gon’s reluctance to take him as a Padawan - he wouldn’t have taken himself either if he had known just how bad a decision he would have made in his life.

Master Qui-Gon somehow knew and still took him up, pathetic as he was.

He shouldn’t have been a Knight or Master. Or a Councilor.  Or… a General.

That last title was the heaviest, weighed down by the number of lives he had lost in that nonsensical war against drones – pitting the blood of sentient beings against machinery was an absurd tragedy, the price too great for the gains acquired in the process.

Anyone could say he was protecting the Republic, but Obi-Wan knew it for what it was - a nonsensical slaughter of many lights that were doomed to die since their very birth, not even having the privilege -  no, a right,  of a choice of how would they live their lives.

And he had doomed them all when he had stepped on that miserable, waterlogged planet they called home.

'Cause I've been shaking
I've been bending backwards 'til I'm broke
Watching all these dreams go up in smoke

Muttering  Remembrances, howling them into the wind, the madman, the Wizard of the Wastes, a mournful chant in a fruitless endeavor to wake them all up, bring them to life again, and ask them that one question.

Why?

He was scared. Terrified of going after them, to ask them, face to face, why have they decided to kill him when they had been on the precipice of victory.

(Had he really been so bad? He wasn’t a depur, he had tried his best not to be.  It had been  hard to Free himself from the chains of Bandomeer or any other in his life, and he had no wish for them to be enslaved - )

He was scared of looking into those eyes, once so warm but now so cold and full of hate.

(He couldn’t imagine Wooley, or Waxer hating anyone.  They were too gentle for that feeling -  clankers excluded.  But Cody -  oh, Cody could hate, with the blaze of a frozen supernova -  Obi-Wan knew that he had seen that when they fought on Umbara and against Ventress – Cody may be protective  as  mother tooka, but he could hate with the best of them - )

Sometimes, he dreamed about better times. About times when they were together, under enemy fire, against unwinnable odds, losing and losing and losing, despairing but knowing that nobody was coming to save them because there was no one to call upon.

But they were together, and guiltily, Obi-Wan sometimes wished that the war would never end because then –

- then he would be, once again, an outcast and not surrounded by those bright souls enmeshing with the remains of his own tattered one.

Sometimes, he wondered if he even had a soul left.  His name, Obi-Wan Kenobi, was No Name of No Family - fitting that even his own family didn’t want him enough to gift him a Name and accept him within a clan.  He remembered Satine’s pitying glance when he told her his name.  

He hadn’t understood back then, but when he learned enough of Mando’a, he knew that his… name, given as it had been, was an equivalent of being a naasade, a being without soul.

(Maybe this was the problem  -  he was soulless since his birth – and maybe it would’ve been better if he hadn’t been saved by that wandering Jedi from his mother when she tried to drown him in the mountain river.)

Even as grim as they had been, the dreams went up in smoke, and he was left in harsh reality -  not under the blaster fire, but in the cold dawn before the twin sunrise began thawing the delicate frost resting on the sand dunes.

(Sometimes, he still heard their voices -  when the sandstorms came by, and he shut himself  into his tiny hut, closing his eyes,  clutching to another bottle and praying to whoever listened to let him rest - )

He had been bending too far, for too long, and he was broken now.  Who was he kidding -  he had been broken long before this dustball of a planet he had been forced to make his home.

(He had been broken in the mines Bandomeer.)

(He had been broken on the  plain of Melida-Daan.)

(He had been broken on Mandalore, on any number of planets,  on Tatooine and on Kamino and on Galidraan - )

(Broken on Rattatak and Utapau and any number of battlefields, broken in body and soul, his spirit tattered yet still somehow marching on under the banner of Light - )

(He had been broken, again and again, until he couldn’t remember that he had ever been whole.)

His men were the ones to hold him together, more than they ever knew.

(When he had soothed a shiny, he had firmly ignored the part of himself that trembled and wished for someone to save him, too.  So tell him that he was worthy of love and safety and hug - )

(When he laughed with his men, Cody in the background, trying to keep his serious countenance, only his eyes betraying his amusement - )

(Saving a group of his men from the balance, even if he knew  h would be paying dearly  for that, Force-exhausted as he was -  but those little lights were wort it, worth it every time, worth his life and heart and soul - )

 (Cody glaring at him in tandem with Kix and Bones, all of them eerily similar to Alpha-17 in their disapproval of his antics on the battlefield as he tried to slink out of the medbay once again, never mind that he had broken his leg and nursed a concussion on the top of it - )

(Alpha-17 threats to grab him by a scruff of his collar and stuff him into the armor, once this karked-up  osik of a campaign on Rattatak would be over -  Obi-wan would never admit it to anyone, but he was looking forward to this event, blame his non-existent survival instincts - )

(Cry’s shy laugh when he complimented him on an improvised choco drink, Boil’s gruff softening under Waxer’s soulful eyes,  Longshot’s  bad jokes - )

(Alpha-17 steady presence, sure as gravity  at his left side, a step behind him, the man gruff and never mincing his words, but having a heart of gold under that shriveled appearance of uncaring.)

And Force, how he needed them by his side again.

But it was not to be, so he drowned his pain in the bottle of alcohol that could be used as lighter fluid, intentionally destroying his guts and brain and praying to destroy his heart.

(Luke was there, but what was one light against so many out of his reach, the lights he had failed and continued to fail the longer his existence went on?)

Let beauty come out of ashes
Let beauty come out of ashes
And when I pray to God all I ask is
Can beauty come out of ashes?

Dying at Anakin’s ‘saber was almost a relief. Almost.   His last mistake was redeemed by his life.

He would finally return to ashes, truly No One into Nothingness.

(He wasn’t worthy of rejoining Force.  Not him, not with how many mistakes he had made through the course of his life.)

(He wasn’t ready to see Cerasi, or Satine, or Ahsoka, or any other Jedi and be confronted with disappointment in their eyes.)

(His men weren’t there.)

Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

(Would beauty ever come out of ashes?)

(His men weren't there.)

Can you use these tears to put out the fires in my soul?
'Cause I need you here, whoa

He gasped to life again - he never got used to that feeling of escaping death by the hair’s breadth, but right now, he utterly hated it. Loathed it, loathed the pains in his body the not-feeling of the Force at the back of his head, the weight of the collar on his neck and the fire-like pain crisscrossing his back  -

- sightless eyes staring into the darkness, his nostrils full of smoke and tongue tasting of ashes stinging his mouth –

“Kid?  Kid, calm down, do you hear me?”

A raspy voice whispered close to his ear, and he blinked, still feeling the blazing ice-cold-hot brand bisecting his torso –

“Didn’t I die?”  He couldn’t recognise his voice when he asked –

The being that held him snorted. “Na, kiddo, you aren’t that lucky.”

He felt weak and soft, and when he patted his chest, there were no scars he had remembered having –

- his dizzy head finally cooperated and served him the location of his current hell.

Bandomeer.

Not yet a Padawan.

A foolish, failed Initiate headed to Agricorps and was caught in Xanatos’ trap to mess with his Ma—no, Qui-Gon Jinn.

Obi-Wan inhaled.

Blinking, he tried to force the tears back into his eyes as his body began to shake.

What kind of a kriffed-up Sithspit luck  -

Closing his eyes, he wished he could feel the light of the beings imprisoned in the mine.

Instead, he lifted his hand - small and weak, shaky when it ought to be steady - and touched his collar.

Or attempted to - the electric shock he was jolted with was enough of a punishment that he was truly convinced this was real.

(His men weren’t there.)

'Cause I've been shaking
I've been bending backwards 'til I'm broke
Watching all these dreams go up in smoke

He stood before his disappointed Master, proud and tall, despite Qui-Gon Jinn’s latest ultimatum.

“I will stay with them, Master.”

Calm blue eyes looked into disappointed grey ones. 

“Then cut off your braid and give me your ‘saber. You are no longer a Jedi.”  Those words shouldn’t have cut as deep as they had the first time he had heard them.

He should’ve been used to them.

He was Obi-Wan Kenobi, No One and Nothing.  He was no one’s priority, and about to make another clusterkark he shouldn’t have.

But Melida-Daan was worth it.

Cerasi was worth it.

(At least this time, he snagged a long-range transmitter and had enough knowledge to amplify signals from the safety of the sewers to call for reinforcements.)

He cut his own braid.

Watching the spaceship disappear into the stratosphere, he felt the cold wind on his skin and the heavy weight of lives depending on him again settled onto his shoulder.

(He wondered, idly, how long, this time, until he broke again.)

“Obi?” Nield’s hesitant voice floated to him.

He turned and smiled.

“Call me Ben.”

(His men weren’t there.)

(Obi-Wan’s -  no, Ben’s chest was filled with ashes.)

Let beauty come out of ashes
Let beauty come out of ashes
And when I pray to God all I ask is
Can beauty come out of ashes?

Time was long and short, stretching into infinity while competing for the breath escaping his lungs.

He forced himself not to change too many things - but selfishly, he had changed one.  Just one, just for himself.

He became a Jedi Shadow. After that disastrous mission on Melidaan, he had been recuperating in the medbay when Master Sargis claimed him, much to the ire of Vokara Che. His new Master was apparently just as much of a disaster on the field as Obi-Wan at his worst.

(Their beds were in different rooms. That did not stop Master Sargis from sneaking in and braiding   in a new braid into Obi-Wan’s short hair—he simply compensated by lengthening the scruffy stub with the hairs from his own long mane.)

Obi-Wan almost had a heart attack when he saw himself in the mirror the morning after the fact, the long  dark blue braid hanging off his head onto his right shoulder, longer and silkier looking than his original one, reaching down to the middle of his chest.

Was that beskar bead at the beginning of the braid? Yes, yes, it was.  

(He may have avoided Mandalore, but it seemed that Mandalore still had some claim on him.)

(The Shadows almost compulsorily avoided the medbay with a fervor unmatched by their peers.  Obi-Wan had known this, courtesy of Quinlan and Master Tholme, but having been confirmed of the same flock made things all the more interesting and entertaining.)

(Vokara Che didn’t let either of them out of the medbay until Obi-Wan was enrolled in Advanced First Aid modules good and proper.)

Master Sargis stared Mas—no, Qui-Gon Jinn down when the latter complained about Master Sargis snatching his Padawan and simply said one word - ”Dibs.”

Surprisingly, not even Yoda managed to get the stubborn being to say more on the subject. Master Sargis stared the diminutive leader of the Jedi Order down, and five minutes later, Yoda’s ears folded back in disappointment when he grumbled out an agreement.

(Quinlan had a field day with it.)

(Master Tholme just groaned.)

Time was streaked with ashes as he watched, learned, saved, and condemned in equal measure.

(He had been a silent shadow to Qui-Gon Jinn on Tatooine, saving the man in the last second and beheading Maul before calling for medic and fading into shadows, leaving the glory to his undeserving almost-Master. )

(Anakin got his wish—this time, he was allowed to apprentice under Master Qui-Gon Jinn. After the Melidaan debacle, the man was forced into therapy, courtesy of the indomitable glare of Vokara Che and the all-too-eager help of one Mace Windu, who gleefully grabbed the chance to get the Maverick of the order grounded for the foreseeable future.)

Sometimes, Obi-Wan’s ways crossed with the ones of the famed Jedi Killer, Jango Fett himself.

Sometimes, he saw the glimpses of the kid the man in question had been toting along.  On an occasion or two, he even saved the kid, vanishing before Fett could catch him.

(He still had nightmares and phantom pains from his former life.  The new bonds had soothed them, but the Knight Trial was all the harder for it because he had been confronted with his past in all its glory and misery, and somehow, he managed to hold on enough to come through on the other side.)

(Mace Windu eyed him thoughtfully, but the man never told him what he had seen.)

Anakin grew like a weed, bickering with his new Master and accompanying him on the missions.  To Obi-Wan’s confusion, Anakin’s relationship with his Master was no better than when the kid had been his own Padawan.   At times, it seemed even worse if the rumours were to be believed.  

(Obi-Wan didn't interfere, didn’t connect with Anakin—this was one luxury – misery -  he had let go after a long, hard contemplation. After all, Anakin didn’t need him anymore, at least not this Anakin. )

(The scream of rage and words of hate still echoed in his mind, rattling the marrow in his bones.)

Time went on, and then the dreaded-expected-longed-for call came.

Qui-Gon Jinn found Kamino.

Can beauty come out of ashes?

They hated Skywalker.

Obi-Wan knew it.  The men in the medbay may have looked like model soldiers, concerned for their charges, but - but he knew his men.

He knew Waxer and Wooley when they were in disagreeable moods, and he knew Boil’s tics like his own.

(He heard Cody -  Kote now -  marching away Rex, the blonde confused as to why he was being hidden away from his possible Commander, the man hissing into his ear to stay away from that disaster and stay put.)

Alpha-17 was still his grumpy self, eyeing Anakin and his attempts to flirt with Padme with visible disdain.

Suppressing a shaky inhale, Obi-Wan steeled himself as he strode into the medbay to get some medical aid for himself - saving Fett from his foolishness apparently equalled sacrificing some of his own skin in the process.  Anakin scowled at Obi-Wan for interrupting his flirting, but Alpha-17’s eyes followed him -  

(Maybe this time, Alpha-17 wouldn’t hound him about wearing armour, though having no helmet, it was still debatable, by Alpha-17’s standards, at least. )

They weren’t his men, not really.

(They may have hated Anakin -  Skywalker -  because he had caused most of the losses, in this battle at least  - )

(Killing intent waxed and waned in regular intervals, causing Qui-Gon's comatose body to twitch in the bacta tank. Strange, Obi-Wan could have sworn the man didn’t have an iota of self-preservation instincts… Anakin—Skywalker—apparently didn’t, not with how busy he was ogling the Nabooian Senator in question.)

Mace Windu had contacted him with the news he was to command the 212^th. 

Obi-Wan closed his eyes.

‘So that's how it is.  A full circle again.’

 He had semi-hoped to avoid that particular chapter in his life.  Seeing his men - not his, not really his -  once again, would be an unspeakable torture.

(He had gone through it before, when he returned to the Temple after Bandomeer, breaking down upon seeing and feeling the bright lights housed within it.)

But those lights—he knew them—each and every one, alive and breathing, and each of them candlelight in the Force, tiny and unique, and Obi-Wan loved them so much it physically hurt him.

(But they were his, a tiny voice inside his heart insisted.)

He walked to the company’s help, slowly and silently, like a Shadow would.  There were some habits he just couldn’t get out of after being undercover for so long.  He stopped before the men, looking at them, absurdly grateful for the cowl and cloak.

Alpha-17 stood on his left, like he usually did, and Cody - still CC-2224 - on his right. He felt strangely naked, despite wearing armour.  

(The wheels of fate were rolling again.)

Rows upon rows of men stood in front of him, and Obi-Wan could identify any one of them by their Force signature alone.

Kix. Bones.  Crys.  Longshot. Waxer and Boil standing side by side, despite different batch numbers.   Shrike.  Halo  -  the 212^th in all of its glory stretching in front of him,  their armor painted white, with no discernible marks on it yet (but soon,), similar to that of Stormtroopers,  only the men behind the plastoid were living, feeling, and just being,  burning in the Force,  miniature stars unwilling to be doused out.

“At ease, gentlemen -“

As soon as he spoke, there was a wounded sound on his right -  it was Kote - Cody, whose head whipped to look at him, and then, he felt Alpha-17 briskly rip the hood off his head,  his hair spilling out –

“General?”   Kix, it was Kix, and  Obi-Wan’s heart  was about to stop and burst and dance,  as he held breath, not reprimanding the men when they  broke the ranks slowly encircling  him  into a ring  -  Obi-Wan  should’ve  been terrified,  for those were the men that  shot him down on Utapau, but looking from one face to another, to those wide, hopeful and scared eyes  -

“You never stayed properly dead, Kenobi.”  Obi-Wan looked at Alpha-17 and the man’s eyes were bright with tears he was unwilling to shed, and then he chuckled as he pulled the fabric covering his face down to smile his own watery smile at the dear soul in front of him.

“Neither do you, Alpha.” And if his voice was trembling and a bit more affectionate than expected from a commanding officer, so what?

He placed a hand on Kote’s - Cody’s - shaking shoulder and the dam broke.

Kote-Cody - grabbed him into a fierce, desperate hug, his face tucking into his neck, and Obi-Wan could feel the man’s tears wetting the fabric here,  Alpha-17 squeezed his  left shoulder, not letting go even for a moment –

“General!”  Obi-Wan smiled at the trooper calling out to him. “Crys!” He called back, smiling and feeling the warmth expand in his chest.

“Sir!”   Boil’s voice was thick –

“Boil!  Waxer!”  The chest he once thought was filled with ashes was beginning to expand, feeling lighter and housing a glow that became stronger the more his men called out to him, and he responded to them.

The voices were screaming out to him, crying and laughing and choking out his name as he was folded into the tightest, warmest and biggest hug of his life.

And if Kote was later on called Cody, the man just hugged him tighter and nodded, not willing to look him in the face as Obi-Wan ran his hand through his hair when he had been snuggled in the middle of an enormous cuddle pile in the soldiers' sleeping quarters.

Dustbite

“So your bunch of feral shits finally found their owner.”  Mij Gilamar dryly commented at Alpha-17.

Alpha-17 grunted in answer.

“You must be pretty happy with him, considering you let them roughshod all over him.” Mij wouldn’t admit it to anyone, but he was pretty curious - the 212^th made a good amount of racket when they went out of order upon meeting their General - and for a moment,  Mij had feared that all of them would be decommissioned because surely they were killing their commanding officer.

“He is still in one piece.”  Alpha-17 snapped back.  And ooh, was that protectiveness in the shabuir’s voice?  Mij smirked.

“Yeah, no thanks to you. With how the men ploughed at him, I’d expect him in my medbay the next morning.”  Mij snarked, his lips widening in a wicked smirk.

(Not even an hour, and yes, the 212^th were gone for their General… again.)

(It had to be a record of some kind. Other companies gave them a wide berth—despite respecting their respective Jedi, they weren’t too harsh on them. 212^th was an exception, as usual.)

He was greeted with a narrowed glare.

“Like we’d let you.” Alpha-17 snapped.

His eyebrows quirked, and Mij hummed.

“Chill your shebs, ad’ika. He’s all yours. If I remember right, he saved Fett’s ad a couple of times, and last time, he saved Fett himself, so you may have some competition in that regard.”  Mij was apparently not above stirring the shit pot, just for the amusement’s sake.

(Kamino made all of them a little crazy in that regard.)

Alpha-17 growled.  Surprising Mij, he then relaxed.

“His head can still be parted from his neck,” The massive clone shrugged. "It’s just a question of who would be fast enough to reach him first.”

(Somewhere, Jango Fett felt a chill up his spine - Force osik or no, he felt it was in his very best interests not to court that strange jettii who  had saved him from Windu’s death chop.)

Chapter Text

I want Your Jedi - Girlfriend To Be My –

Disclaimer: I don’t own Star Wars or the song used here - I Want Your Girlfriend to Be My Girlfriend Too, by Reel Big Fish

Shout Out: Well, well, lookie what the tooka and lothcat brought in. Another chapter, same fic. Nothing about the chips on that one, because Jango was being a brat and deserved some space and recognitions for being an unacknowledged buir, unsung beroya and unasked-for pain in the ass for the 212th. (Bad Jango, no Obie for you!)

No Mando'a dictionary,  I know you know the words because otherwise you wouldn't be prowling this particular fandom.

 But seriously, the song was a catalyst for this madness and because I just wanted to write something a bit light-hearted while poking at our favorite beroya aside Boba. I look forward to your reactions to his trials and woes!

Also, can someone tell me how can you do the crossed over words in the titles?

Onward to the reading!

Jango had stupid ideas. His verde would’ve been the first to tell you that. Chief among them Silas and Myles. It was a karking wonder that Jango’s Grunts hadn’t lost their limbs or heads or minds over their erstwhile leader’s little sparks of… shall we say, questionable genius.

But as jare’la Jango’s ideas were, they usually panned out. Usually. People involved in them came out scratched and shaken, with some wounds and broken bones, until they got a taste for it and from then on, it wouldn’t been a mission if something hadn’t exploded, someone lost at least one piece of their armour, a couple of unintentionally dirty jokes. Sharee grabbing Joris by his ear and dragging him away from more … disreputable vendors of pleasurable delights in all shapes and forms, not that it helped any.

Jaster Mereel knew that his ad was a little dini’la, but as like tends to attract like, he didn’t really see anything really wrong with that. All Mando’ade were crazy to some degree - a side-effect to shereshoy and living on the edge and all that. Time blunts even the sharpest edges, so Jaster had hoped it would blunt Jango’s little…. zest, if we can call it that, too.

All had gone well enough, but unfortunately, one Jaster Mereel, the sole wrangler of his ori’buyce kih’kovid of an ad had prematurely passed into Manda on Korda VI. Leaving one shaken, not-yet prepared Jango Fett, back then still a green-behind-the-ears ven’alor to practically overnight step up on the plate and lead Haat’ade to prosperity.

It all had gone well. But Jango, was, despite the tragedy - or because of it - in possession of not only stupid ideas but also a ginormous temper. And hormones, let’s not forget that tiny little bit. Hormones. Because Jango was in a fine, stropping teenagerhood, which hadn’t helped any.

Thus, Galidraaan was a mix of a trap, hotheadedness on both sides and unfortunately oversized use of hormones and teenage posturing.

Jango had paid for that mistake in spades. With his freedom and beskar’gam, his people’s lives, his honour and his future.

Jango fifteen years later was different. An acclaimed beroya, the cream of the crop, not one to be fooled with. Jedi Killer at its finest. Not many Force Nulls could boast that they managed to kill one Jedi, more so six, with their bare hands.

But hormones demanded their due.

Thus, when Jango was hired to be a template for an army for Jedi, he also wanted his own piece of legacy - a son.

Nothing wrong with that, and being a buir on top of being a trainer and a beroya was tiring enough to abort any thoughts about having a relationship outside an occasional jump between the sheets and being amenable to some sexy times.

He tried not to think about his son and multiple copies that masqueraded as child soldiers walking through the white halls of Tipoca City.

When the time came and he had fought with that Wookie-sized jetii, he had been a little bit pissed off and disappointed that he was forbidden to off him for some reason. One less jetii in the galaxy was a good thing in Jango’s book and it honestly rankled that he had to let his usual prey live.

Geonosis had been a clusterkark. Jango had known it from the beginning, but the sheer mess was astounding even by his standards. The kih’jetii who was doing bantha eyes at the Senator was a little amusing, though.

What had been less amusing, was that he nearly lost his life when he had gone against the jetii with a violet colored jetii’kad.

Luck - or Manda - had been on his side, what with the hooded being interrupting his ill-timed duel with the Korun, sacrificing some of his own skin in the process before he lit his own ‘kad and shouted something at the being.

Jango couldn’t have been too mad to have been practically punted aside, away from the dangerous glowing violet blade, especially when he saw his son’s tearful eyes staring at him with terrified relief at his brush with death.

He had seen the lick of that unusual - sunset colored - hair before he scrambled to safety, barely remembering to snatch his buy’ce.

Jango had done his part in the entire charade, and now, he had been free, with his bank account pleasantly padded to the brim for the foreseeable future.

Though the color of that particular jetii’kad - Jango shivered. Maybe he would avoid starting kerfuffle with any wielders of violet colored kad’e, they proved to be unusually violent and unstoppable. Red was dangerous too, their wielder could easily either a) scramble Jango’s brain or b) fry his brain from distance. However, any blue, green or yellow sabres were a fair game.

(Not that he had seen a lot of yellow ones - Jaster had told him Temple guards usually had yellow jetti’kad’e, but seeing that none of them ever participated in fight, it would be a fair point to say they weren’t really good fighters.)

White, though? Jango shook his head. Well.

Considering that his savior had a white colored jetii’kad…. Hm. It would pair quite nicely with dha’kad’au.

 (Jango would deny until he was blue in the face that he had any thoughts of the white ‘kad’s wielder. Nope, not him.)

There's a little girl I know
You might know her too
She looks so good
She looks so cute
Standin' next to you
And I don't know what to do…

That being was seriously copyc.

Attractivness, for Mando’ade, was a straightforward thing.

Good fighter, good with ade, being able to eat inhumanly spicy food and being loyal to their family.

And this being Jango had been stalking - watching for at least three hours and counting - was quickly ticking all the required boxes.

It didn’t hurt that the ad the being was holding in their arms, was Boba, the ad grinning from one ear to another when he regaled the being with one of his stories about wanting to be a beroya.

Boba had inherited his buir’s proclivity for getting into dangerous situations. Jango already lost count of how many near heart attacks his ad has given him with involuntary escapades when planetside. It was for a good reason that Jango usually left Boba in the ship when doing some of the more questionable—or pleasurable—business. Kids were a hot commodity on the slave market if unsupervised.

Thankfully, Alderaan was one of the rare planets that abhorred to do anything with slavery. Jango could let Boba off his proverbial leash when he invited himself to a Queen-sponsored gala for funding war efforts. It paid that nobody really knew his face because of his habit of wearing buy’ce when on business.

(And that didn’t coincide with following a certain jetii who saved his shebs back on Geonosis, nope, no siree.)

The being was clad in floor-length velveteen black dress, with his arms freely on display, two rows of pearls cinching the shoulders while the front had a small, diamond window in the middle of the chest. The skirt was cut almost at the him on both sides, teasingly showing slender, but muscled tights, and legs that ended in black high heels with red soles.

When the being turned around, Jango nearly choked on his tongue. The back was also open, pale skin almost glowing under the lights from the neck down to the top of his tailbone, denoting that the wearer had to wear absolutely nothing underneath the swathe of midnight colored fabric hanging off their hips.

The sunset-colored, semi-wavy hair was short, barely to the being’s shoulders, subtly emphasizing the width of their shoulders in the otherwise feminine attire, looking utterly harmless. The wearer’s bare face was subtly highlighted with silver eyeshadow that made their eyes pop, courtesy of mascara, but their lips were bare, as they smiled at the enthusiastic ad they were holding in their arms.

For a short moment, Jango was honestly envious of Boba.

The being was utterly copyc, completely and absolutely mesh’la and Jango karking Fett still hadn’t had any clue of their name!

His dithering was rudely interrupted by a man stepping close to that vision of beauty. The man was smiling, his dark eyes alit with a warmth that contrasted with the drab grey of his uniform and scar curling around his left eye.

Jango stiffened.

Kote. That kirffing, karking mir’sheb of a shabuir!

 Judging by Boba’s face, he was of the same thoughts as Jango. If his glare were any hotter, Jango would’ve bet that Kote would’ve been set on fire.

For an isolated and not community-taught eyayah, Kote was utterly confident in moving in surroundings so different from the sterile halls of Kamino-yaim. It was as if he had done that a thousand times before—ignoring all and any of the inquiring or even rude glances at his person, the whispers and pointed societal cues that pointed to excluding him from the social circles gathered at the gala.

(Jango never did well with social aspect of being a Mand’alor. He much preferred being alor’ad - less responsibility and more fun in the field. But this eyayah … it was like he had been born for this.)

The eyayah - Kote - looked at the being in front of him, his expression completely and utterly besotted.

Jango seethed.

Even taller than Kote by a small amount, the being looked dainty next to the clone soldier they smiled at, a benevolent deity deigning to mix with mortals for a short time before vanishing to unknown.

It was like seeing through a sick mirror of his innermost wishes—Jango could imagine, intimately, that it was him standing next to this copyc being, smiling and receiving that breathtaking, heart-stealing smile back.

Kote smiled back at Boba, his smile smaller than when he smiled at the being but no less sincere and tinged with a bit of sadness. Jango would’ve expected Kote to glare at his chosen son like the clone had glared at Jango back then—beskar, spite, and not a small amount of hate, as if he had known what Jango doomed them to.

(Maybe he did. Somehow, someway. Jango wasn’t blind to restructuring the clone’s hierarchy. The 212^th had bloomed into being almost overnight, the previously malleable cadets becoming harder than beskar when they fought to carve their own space in the moorless sea of the same faces, and taking other cadets under wings without any rhyme and reason.)

But no – his gaze was softer, causing Boba to still and flounder.

Well, that was Jango’s cue.

Probably.

I want your girlfriend to be my
I want your girlfriend to be my
I want your girlfriend to be my girlfriend... too

The being’s name, Jango had found out from that disastrous evening, was Obi-Wan Kenobi.

He/him/his. Well, okay; no matter. Jango didn’t have anything against that.

For the record, Jango wasn’t the one who had started the mess!

It was a bunch of assassins – how tacky and unimaginative - but they were apparently after the Chancellor and the Queen because some beings were against having the whole shitty war (wonder why?) and of karking course, the guests were to be collateral damage, considering the policy that the guests had to surrender their weapons upon entering the dancing hall.

Jango had a brief flash of panic about how to protect both the ad and the copyc being at the same time, only to be completely dumfounded when the said being used a spork of all things to defend against a vibroblade-wielding assassin, and the eyayah was no less impressive, kicking the besalisk’s chin so hard the being’s jaw broke upon impact before calling in reinforcements. Somehow.)

(Jango didn’t teach them that. He knew his trainers didn’t teach them that. Who the fuck would be jare’la enough to just play get’shuk with besalisk’s skull?!)

(Kote, apparently.)

Eyayah’e were somehow lying in wait somewhere close, practically under Jango’s nose, and he didn’t notice them.

(He should’ve noticed Alpha -17. He should. The shabuir was too tall to avoid Jango’s notice.)

Alpha-17 offered Obi-Wan his arm as if Obi-Wan was a fragile lady and not a being who nonchalantly almost decapitated three attackers with one spork before switching to a butter knife. And that without even ruffling his clothes or letting Boba go.

His own ad’ika turned traitor, looking at the jetii with sparkling eyes and loudly asking him, then and there, to marry him.

Which made Alpha-17 raise his eyebrows and Jinn’s own ad choked on a piece of skraan’ika.

Luckily, Obi-Wan didn’t reject his ad outright, but that only meant Boba insisted on Obi-Wan promising him to be his girlfriend instead.

(Jango silently bid his sanity goodbye. Su’cuy, sex modules and uncomfortable explanations and endless why questions on the subject. He’d rather dance naked in the middle of the Kyr’tsad settlement, but alas, Manda was deaf to his plight.)

Boba’s only saving grace was that he was still a kid, because otherwise, Kote would’ve gutted him the slowest way possible. Judging by Kote’s stiff smile, Jango wasn’t so far off the mark.

Boba had to be the most copikla, and most jare’la kid in the existing universe.

(Jango seriously began thinking about investing in buying his ad a tooka. Less trouble that way and maybe he could avoid all that dreaded sex-ed talk.)

His kid had just done what Jango himself feared—straight out asking the copyc being, Obi-Wan, to consent to a relationship.

The balls on his kid, seriously.

(Maybe he should ask him for tips? He was so outside of the dating game that it was not even funny.)

She's so fucking cute
I wish that she was mine
She's so fucking cute
I'm gonna lose my mind, baby

 The last time Obi-Wan had blown Jango’s mind with his attire was at the gala. Sadly for Jango’s poor, unprepared, lonely brain cell, it wasn’t the last.

Obi-Wan in a dress was copyc.

Obi-Wan in an armor?

Mesh’la.

He absolutely, intimately understood his kid’s insistence on snapping Obi-Wan up ASAP. Even now, Boba had somehow gotten Obi-Wan’s personal comm number. (Shaak Ti was apparently helpless against Boba’s tooka eyes.) The little heartbreaker then proceeded to comm with Obi-Wan, much to the amusement of the bridge and Kote’s annoyance.

Jango somehow enmeshed himself with the 212^th as a strategic advisor - unpaid job, but at least he was close to Obi-Wan that way - and had to suffer practically every day to see that man in an armor.

It's not that his being a strategic advisor helped any—the 212th seemed to have everything under control. Obi-Wan called everyone by their own names, while Jango had to deal with being called the unflattering surname of a Fett.

(It was Vhett. V-H-E-T-T. Well, at least he found out that Obi-Wan could speak Mando’a - and at the most inopportune moment, too, considering he had foolishly foregone the armor for the day.)

(It was mortifying. The eyayahe knew this. Jango himself knew this. Apparently, only Obi-Wan was oblivious - or kind enough - to ignore the whole misery of inopportune stiffies.)

I don't know what to do
I don't know what to do
Maybe I could kill you

Jango wanted to kill Alpha-17. Or Kote.

(The mir’sheb relished in being called Cody for some reason.)

Or Longshot.

Or Wooley. Maybe even Gearshift.

Bones? Excluded on the count of medics being scary. Kix too.

Rangir, at the rate this was going, he may have to off the whole of 212^th.

Scowling, Jango ruffled his hair (he let it grow longer because… Wooley always got his own petted by Obi-Wan? And Crys too, and this was completely unfair.).

Best beroya in the business, his shebs. Jaster would’ve died laughing if he had seen him now.

And these shebse knew it!

Much to Jango’s despair, the shebse in question were shamelessly close to their oblivious jetii. Always close to him, hand on his shoulder (Alpha-17), sidling close when watching over the command table (Kote), nuzzling into his neck (Wooley!! Karking Wooley of all the eyayahe! The sheer nerve!). Boil and Waxer, always cuddling up to him in the LAAT - no, those two assholes can term it completely differently, but Jango had a pair of fully working eyes, thank you very much, and those two practically cuddled Obi-Wan from the left and right, never mind all of them being tied down with safety belts!

And what was that tradition, kissing under Warishan weed called mistletoe?!

(The 212^th didn’t let Jango even close to getting his own kiss in, while everyone else got his own! Even Skywalker’s own ad, Ahsoka, snuck him one! Well, it was on the cheek, while every other kiss was on Obi-Wan’s lips and the man remained completely and stupidly oblivious, just laughing, hugging and kissing them back.)

Right.

Murder, it was.

I want your girlfriend to be my
I want your girlfriend to be my
I want your girlfriend to be my girlfriend (watch out)

I want your girlfriend
To be, be, be, be my girlfriend
Cause she is so cute!

Murder, Jango found out, proved to be completely impossible when the entire 212^th - or almost all of them - slept in an enormous cuddle pile with Obi-Wan in the middle and Alpha-17 and Kote at the jetii’s back and side.

(Wooley was being curled on jetii’s legs, along with Crys.)

It was as if Obi-Wan were some kind of queen bee, enclosed from all sides with cozy warmth while Jango had to suffer space cold.

Fuck the Kaminoan genetic engineering. Why couldn’t they make his body temperature at least ten degrees higher? The longnecks were utterly useless. And space was as cold as ever.

Well, at least Obi-Wan was cute, all rosy-cheeked and snuggled in the cuddle pile.

And, of course, he could honestly tell Darth Tyrannus that assassination was a completely impossible endeavour because…. cuddle pile.

(The man’s face was completely priceless.)

For some reason, Darth Tyrannus demanded the holos of the cuddle piles in action, and thank you, but no, Jango valued his skin.

(Boba still got three holos of that momentous occasion because the kid was being a brat, and Jango utterly relished teasing him.)

(That resulted in Boba’s big, teary eyes version Tooka and to give the kid credit, he almost conned Boil and Waxer into letting him get onto Negotiator and join the cuddle pile in question. Thankfully, the cooler heads - read Kote and Alpha-17 - prevailed.)

I don't know what to do
Maybe she could love me too…
I want your girlfriend to be my girlfriend
I want your girlfriend to be my girlfriend too

“Does he know that he is your girlfriend?”

Ahh, Jango and his utter absence of any kind of tact.

(We now know where Boba and Alpha-17 got it from.)

Kote’s head slowly swiveled to Jango from the right side.

Alpha’s head had done the same from the left side.

Jango suppressed a shudder.

Last time Jaster had done That Move, Jango was neck-deep in bantha poodoo, and it took months for him to earn his ship and armor back, much to his Grunts’ delight.

(Silas and Myles were utterly ruthless in their teasing.)

(Maybe dancing – or at least streaking - naked through the Evaar’ade stronghold with only a buy’ce on to film their reactions wasn’t the smartest idea at the time. But hey, they deserved it! And in the light of the teaching, if they want to have those stupid rules followed, they may as well walk around naked, so Jango just did them a huge favour when he personally exemplified their teachings!)

(The tihaar was strong with that one. At least their goran got a full-on belly laugh out of it.)

But. That Move.

Jango’s Bad Feeling has intensified.

“No.” Surprisingly, it was Alpha-17 who answered him.

Jango frowned.

“Are you even courting him? You know, like taking him on a date, and giving him presents, talking to him, spending time with him?”

“Yes,” This time it was Kote who ground out his answer.

Jango paused.

Did the math.

Kote and Alpha-17…

Then Wooley, Gearshift, Kix, Bones… and everyone else.

Everyone Else. The whole karking 212^th, apparently.

Well, that is, aside Jango.

“I want him to be my girlfriend too.” Jango blurted out.

Finally in the clear.

Silence fell on the small bridge. Luckily, there was no one else present because if there were any of the Ghost Company on, Jango wouldn’t have gotten out alive. He fully expected the two eyayahe beside him to lose their minds and knock him into the ground.

Well, Jango didn’t get to where he was by being a coward.

But to his surprise, the two clones only looked over his head at each other and exhaled a long-suffering sigh almost in unison.

“Kays mirsh solus.” Kote muttered to Alpha-17.

Alpha-17 nodded.

“Kaysh shu-shuk.” He grumbled, smoothly ignoring the increasingly agitated beroya between them.

Jango ground his teeth. Jango’s sole brain cell was lonely? Jango was a disaster?

 The sheer nerve of those two!

“We are courting him, you di’kut. Not as girlfriend or boyfriend but as our riduur.” Kote’s voice was flat, but his eyes were burning with anger.

And whoops, Jango might have stepped on a mine here.

“Copaani mirshmure’cye, Prime?” Alpha-17 always towered over Jango, but right now, he seemed like an immovable mountain.

“I know you’ve watched us with him for a long time. And I don’t think you have as little brain as Skywalker to not put two and two together.” Alpha -17 rumbled out.

Oh, that was unfair. Everyone knew that Skywalker had no brain cells in his skull when it was about Amidala.

And if Jango still insisted, his ass-kicking would be legendary. The 212^th wasn’t lauded as the best on Kamino or in the GAR, respectively.

“We don't share.” Kote bit out.

Well, that was that.

I want your girlfriend to be my
I want your girlfriend to be my
I want your girlfriend to be my girlfriend ... too (too)

I want your girlfriend (to be my girlfriend)
I want your girlfriend (to be my girlfriend)
I want your... girlfriend

The end of the war was strangely anticlimactic.

For something that was in the Sith’s works for almost a millennium, the whole thing has broken down like a house of cards.

Not that anyone aside GAR had known this - the jetiise would be in the know a day or two later, but right now, the 212^th had hightailed onto the Negotiator and away from 000 on the double.

The whole thing had been done with the help of Fox and his Corries, who were also taken along and then given another ship to get to Kamino to save the cadets there.

But of fucking course, Jango. And his idiotic ideas.

He just had to kiss their jetii with a tongue and ask him to be his girlfriend, the karking di’kut.

(The man really had to have a death wish.)

Nobody in the 212^th liked to see their jetii dazed, confused and with that pretty blush on his cheeks, courtesy of their jare’la shabuir of a template.

The emergency of sanitizing Obi-Wan’s lips of Prime’s germs fell on Kote and Alpha-17.

Which they did.

Thoroughly.

And if the rest of the vod’e continued the lip and mouth sanitization via a couple of underhanded kisses while sneakily changing Obi-Wan out of the armor into the courting one, that was a problem well-handled.

The other problem, though….

Boil neatly summarized it in a singular bellow:

“WHO WANTS TO SPACE PRIME!?”

(Fox called dibs.)

(Sadly for Fox and luckily for Boba, Obi-Wan stopped the actual spacing, all the while looking like a right cute mess what with his flushed cheeks, messed up hair and still not noticing that his armor had mysteriously changed.)

(Fox had chewed out Kote and Alpha-17 for not filling out the appropriate files. And then almost blew his top when the rest of the 212^th sheepishly chimed in.)

(“Why are you so pissed off, Fox’ika?”)

(“Because you are marrying my buir and I’d be damned to haran and back if I let your lot of shebse half-ass it!”)

(Obi-Wan’s Secret Ninja Life On Coruscant: Adopting the Corries 2.0)

(All was well… Until Boba’s Hormones began to Act Up.)

Chapter Text

SPECTRUM

Disclaimer: I don’t own Star Wars or that snaggletooth of a song called Spectrum by Florence +The Machines.

Shout Out: Fox wanted his own piece. If you want to blame anyone, blame him. /exhausted/. I am in sore need of a shower and sleep, but this one wanted to be finished, so there’s that. Warning for mentions of rape and a brief but vivid description of coerced sexual encounter. If you don’t want to read it, the part in question had been marked with three stars - ^***  - at the beginning and at the end of the scene. It’s resolved quickly, but if the scenes or descriptions are in any way, shape or form triggering for you, then please avoid them. I am of the mind that despite the relatively lighthearted chapters ahead of this one, the Corries were not taken care of very well, and it’s mirrored in this fic.

Otherwise, Fox and his Woe Years, Corries Got Adopted (their own adoption backfires on them rather spectacularly and Quinlan Vos guest-starring in cameo as Corries’ crazy uncle, always landing in jail for some reason or another. Also, misunderstandings about Best Buir galore.

Fox being called kart’ika - little star.

Um, that would be all. Take it, enjoy it and have a good time.

When we first came here
We were cold and we were clear
With no colours in our skin
We were light and paper's thin

The cold was the first thing he remembered. Cold, and that glaring, bright light.

It would be an everlasting constant through the majority of their lives, not that they had known that.

It was the one thing that caused their skin-hunger, forcing them to huddle in the cuddle piles until they were separated and told to sleep in their pods, away from the skin, the warmth and the rising and fall of the live body beside their own.

For a long time—a very long one—they didn’t know how to name the color of their skin. It was different from the longnecks’, their trainers, and the only one that came close was Prime.

None of the vod’e was jare’la enough to ask Prime of all beings about such an inane thing as what the color of his skin was.

(They were not his sons, like Boba was. They were products. Expendables. They were destined to be an army, destined for Jedi, a meat shield between them and the yet-unknown enemy on the horizon.)

The first color, CC-1010, learned the name of, was red.

Red, like blood sluicing from his batchmate’s skull because training accidents happened, and the only difference between them was whether the accidents would end in the trip to a med bay or one-way trek into a decommission room.

CC-1010 learned to hate red.

His existence was flimsy-thin - all of their existences were. Codes on paper, no more, no less. Codes, statistics, and either passing or failing grades.

(Crys’ murder of Reau hadn’t gone unnoticed, either. CC-1010 had been the main target of that foul woman for the last three battle circles, aside from CC-2424, but last time, Reau had gone too far, breaking CC-1010’s arm because he wasn’t aggressive enough. Prime was, as always, dismissive of the happenings, so the cadets were left to fend for themselves and their kih’vod’e. CC-1010 wouldn’t have participated, but he had volunteered himself anyway to protect some of the younger kids of his batch.

They weren’t kids in the sense of them being younger than him, but they came later on when half of CC-1010 original batch had been decommissioned in a training mission gone wrong - CC-1010 still had scars on his left side from the shrapnel from that one, live weapons were a karking bitch to handle and it was just their luck they had been shot at with live weapon rather than the usual blanks. Sure, CC-1119 was shaken to bones and close to tears when he came to med bay to apologize to CC-1010 - but the damage had been done and as punishment, Reau had drafted both CC-1010 and CC-1119 into the dreaded battle circle, never mind baau’r Skirata’s explicit orders for CC-1010 to rest and recover.)

From then on, CC-1010 got harder. Grimmer. He learned to fight tooth and nail for his vod’ike and if that meant he had to fight dirty, then by all means, he fought dirty. Let his other vod’e disdain him, CC-1010 knew he had to outperform, outsmart and outbitch those shabuir’e masquerading as their trainers by all and any means possible.

Sometimes, when he caught the endless expanse of oceans below the deck, he thought how much easier it would be to just… let go.

To go up one time and let himself be swept away by nature’s might into the wet depths below, inhaling the bitter wetness of the ocean waters raging below.

(But not before Reau got her just desserts.

It was strange. One day, everything was normal and then, Crys, who was usually the most laidback in his batch, changed almost overnight. Of course, the trainers didn’t really notice, but CC-1010 - CC-1010 did. Crys was one of the older ones in the CC-1010 batch, though not in the Command track, and usually in CC-1010’s team for most of the simulations, usually spearheading their attacks. CC-1020 - that was him.

Until, one day, the usually reserved cadet got his wires karked, his self preservance taking a hike, and he attacked and successfully killed Reau.

CC-1010 would remember the scene to the end of his days. CC-1020 - Crys - had tackled Reau down when she had been goading him into battle circle once again despite CC-1010 having broken arm and Skirata would surely skin him after the debacle, permanent damage to arm or not - CC-1020, usually so reserved, suddenly made a complete turnaround, attacking their trainer and liberating her taser from her hands, he then turned the voltage up to the lethal range and stabbed her into the neck, tasing her into death before the woman even knew what was happening.

CC-1020’s - Crys’ - eyes were the ones CC-1010 would remember the most. No fear of consequences. A grim sort of acknowledgement, and the hardness of beskar shining through their dark depths, and a certain shade of deep, anguished, hopeless despair. CC-1020 - no, Crys - as he called himself, stared at the Priest and many a cadet would’ve cringed in the face of the foaming and spitting madman about to attack him, but Crys - jare’la ordinii – just stood here, with taser in one hand and grim face, not moving an inch.

It had been pure dumb luck – and CC-1010 nearly got a heart attack - when Priest had been stopped by - of all people - Alpha 17.

Alphas didn’t really bother with Command class outside torturing them in the name of training and occasional hazing. Alpha-17, though, didn't have any karking reason to intervene. Everyone knew that. Alpha class was subject only to Jango Fett, and even then, Alpha -17 was more of an exception than a norm, the stubborn bastard he was. But for some reason, the ka’ra were spinning in different way that day, as Alpha-17 deigned to grace CC-1010’s battle circle with his presence and … intervene in CC-1020’s, and by proxy, CC-1010’s fate.

Priest had died that day. Completely legally, too. Alpha-17 didn’t even have the karking courtesy to look remorseful about it, for all of his ‘oops, I did it again’ mien when he had been confronted by Fett who was foaming at his mouth at losing  yet another one of his trainers.

CC-1010 didn’t know what exactly had happened behind the closed door, but the fact remained that CC-1012 - Crys, his name was Crys now - remained unpunished, along with Alpha-17, and Fett had a mighty bitchy face when he stormed out on one of his ‘hunts’ again.)

CC-1010 got two new buddies out of the deal - Thire and Thorn.

His batchmates were karking crazy, but it helped him not to be so… alone.

And of course, CC-1010 had been adopted by that jare’la vod - Crys - somehow.

For some unholy reason, he was then dragged under the wing of the newly formed 212^th - nobody knew what 212^th stood for, and there wasn’t any rhyme or reason, because that particular group stretched over all batches and generations, starting with Wooley, who was an unofficial vod’ika of the group, and stretching across Boil and Waxer, not quite batchmates, though thick as thieves, continuing with Longshot, there was Spire and Hail, and those two scary medics in Skirata’s unofficial med bay, called Kix and Bones. Those two had balls of beskar, going even against Taun We on occasion when it concerned decommission of one batcher or another. Judging by Skirata’s entertained little smirks, their verbal battles with the uppity long necks were becoming legendary.

But all of those men - men, because their eyes were too hard and too desperate to be called shinies, even if their biological age hung precariously between the last of childhood and verging on teenage years in body’s development - enclosed him within their ranks, even if CC-1010 - Fox - was still on the fringes on their group, distant and close enough to be taken care of if the need arose.

(Crys had many a spat with Thire and Thorn on that subject until an exasperated CC-2224 - Cody - threw all three of them onto the sparring mat and announced that no one of them was leaving until they got it out of their systems.)

(Grudgingly, Thire and Thorn accepted Crys as their ori’vod, even if they had seniority over him if one went by their batch numbers. )

(Fox’s capsule was worryingly tight that night, what with all four of them stuffing themselves in the small space, in a poorly thought-out approximation of a cuddle pile.

Fox wanted to space the three di’kute.

Sadly, the three di’kute in question were there to stay, and Fox was bound to suffer the indignity of being delegated in the lowest position in their cuddle pile of oxygen deprivation.)

(The state became marginally better when Stone joined Fox in his suffering at the bottom of the pile.)

And maybe… maybe Fox wasn’t as flimsy-thin as he thought he had been.

And when we first came here
We were cold and we were clear
With no colours in our skin
Until we let the spectrum in

Time sped up again. The training became harsher, and trainers were colder.

The newly self-created 212^th was as antsy as ever, topping the training charts in performances and bewildering both the vod’e and trainers with their quirks and sign language.

(Fox tried to learn it. He even suffered the indignity of making tooka eyes at Wooley because knowing that could be useful, even if his batchmates teased him about his baby face and even suggesting to change his name into Babyface about it - Crys, the kriffer, may the gods of holy caf deprive him of the black goodness henceforth, was the main instigator. Fox didn’t even know that he had a baby face - and if he had it, then by proxy, everyone had to have it because all of them were clones from the same source, so –

Never mind. Fox’s name would remain Fox. He wasn’t a karking babyface, kriff them very much, that title belonged to Boba, he was a baby!

Case closed.)

Fox starkly experienced just how naïve they were. Sure, they were told rules, and they knew them by heart and rote, but for all of their knowledge, there was something out there that operated by different rules - the 212^th was one of those things, grim-faced and beskar-eyed, even when they hadn’t even experienced the true battlefield and yet…

The coldness and clarity seeped into his skin as he stared at the roaring waters around Tipoca City, dark and threatening, unforgiving to all.

They learned more. More about colors. More about weapons. More about themselves, growing faster was a pain in the shebs, because urges. The longnecks didn’t really think to edit that out of their genes - not that they hadn’t tried, but nature does as nature wills it, and there was many fumbling in the showers and capsules, even under trainers’ noses.

(Fox didn’t understand. He tried to, honest to Ka’ra, he did, but he just didn’t see any sense in participating in ‘exchanging devices’ or flipping with another batchmate. Sure, there was a pleasure in the act, but Fox just wasn’t… inclined. He deigned to suffer an occasional cuddle or two, but anything sexual just went over his head. It was a biological urge, nothing more, nothing less, and completely useless in a field.)

There was knowledge out there, there was fight out there, and Fox… Fox yearned.

Say my name
And every colour illuminates
We are shining
And we will never be afraid again

They didn’t have names. They had codes because they were products made for Jedi and told to die for the Republic. Not that it stopped vod’e from naming themselves. Be that by defining characteristics, an important happening in their lives, or because their trainers ‘christened’ them so. Names, given by trainers, were rarely complimentary, but what could they do? They were named by numbers - Alpha-17 still held onto his designation like an old massif to the bone, much to Skirata’s exasperation, and CC-2224 – Kote was named directly by the Prime, much to the brat’s disgruntlement. Everyone knew that his name didn’t mean glory, or honor him for his abilities in any way. It just meant that the longnecks made a successful product, and Prime’s high standards had been met. Some names, like Boil and Waxer, didn’t have a lick of sense, with how similar were to each other in their appearance. Bones was a name Fox could understand - the vod worked in medical, so it was understandable he had picked it up from his own speciality - and there was Longshot, the best shooter bar few and then there was his own batch. Stone. Stone cold. Thire. Whatever the kark that meant. Thorn - yup, that one was a thorn in the trainer’s shebs, alright. And for some reason, the di’kut picked the insult and ran with it.

His own name - Fox - was given to him by Alpha-17, out of all beings. Because apparently CC-1010 was as wily as an animal he was named after and well, there was that. From that moment, CC-1010 hid the name - Fox - and maybe someday, he would be called by his name from someone who wasn’t vod’e but would accept him regardless of it.

But the possibilities of that were small, almost nil. They were, after all, products first and foremost, and you don’t name products; you don’t get attached to products, even if they are living and breathing beings with their thoughts, dreams and fears. They were less than animals because animals at least had rights.

Clones, thought?

They had none.

(The fear chilled in the marrow of Fox’s bones. Despite all the glory awaiting them on the battlefield, they keenly experienced the loss and death already - and the overwhelming terror connected to them.)

(Sometimes, Fox wondered if he would ever cease to be afraid to be called out. Called by either his name - or designation.)

Say my name
As every colour illuminates
We are shining
And we will never be afraid again

Remembrances. Not even stationed to a battlefield yet and every vod already knew the remembrances for their departed brothers.

This was the least they could do for their fallen because they weren’t allowed to mourn or bury their decommissioned brothers

Remembrances were spoken whisper-quiet, in the darkest times of the night, at the break of the dawn - this was Fox’s not-favourite time, but at least nobody bothered him when he came up to the edge of the deck, staring at the shades of grey, black and white matted with the blue of the ever-changing ocean when the sun, feeble and pale, rose over the temporarily calmed waters.

Names were hissed out in the corners when the 212^th stepped in with the jare’la plan on how to stop the decommissioning with swaps out - the 212^th were crazy, every clone knew that and the only ones not in the know were longnecks. Oh, the trainers suspected, all right, but they didn’t really bother with uncovering their subterfuge.

Reau and Priest would have, but those two were thrown into the ocean to be fish food after Crys and Alpha-17 decommissioned them with prejudice, and the remaining trainers have not been crazy enough to try anything similar since. Nobody knew where—and when—another 212^th would pop out.

Another 212^th. The crazy ones. The hope of the vod’e. The pains in the trainers’ shebs. They were everywhere - and it was only Fox, aside from the 212th members themselves - who recognized them.

They slipped in and out of the batches, weaving an invisible net of protection over all of them. Decommissioning continued - but there were fewer of them.

Despite being known to exist and even having Alpha-17 claim them from Prime himself, the 212^th were ghosts.

For the first time, they were safe. They could be less afraid –

-but their names were still a secret all of them chose to hold close to their hearts.

Say my name
As every colour illuminates
We are shining
And we will never be afraid again

Everyone prayed that their designation wouldn’t be singled out. Most of the time, it means that something was wrong with them, dooming them to be decommissioned. Why keep a faulty product?

Or, maybe they were singled out to be punted into the command track, like CT-7567. That particular clone was always uncomfortably recognizable because of his unnaturally blonde hair, and only his abilities and skills saved him from being killed for something as minor as a cosmetic variable. Most of the others weren’t as lucky.

Fox, by that virtue, was also shuffled to a command track. More responsibilities, higher standards. Their designations barked out, and Fox hated it.

He hated being called out by his designation, and yet, he was absurdly relieved, too, because that meant that his name was his own. Having so few things to own, his name was secret, special, and safe only in the mouths of the ones worthy of his trust, the ones who had his back.

(Maybe - He dreamed. Maybe on the battlefield, he would be allowed not to be CC-1010 anymore, but Fox. Maybe he would be a little less of a flesh droid and more of a person.)

(He sometimes still had nightmares of being called by his designation - and every time he had been called it, he turned more into of a meat droid, unfeeling, unseeing, but fulfilling the orders all the same, despite them being horrible but for some reason, making a terrible amount of sense.)

When the jetii came for them, the 212^th shifted in a frisson of expectation that rang out as swiftly as it started. Bacara and Wolffe were especially vocal about their disappointment, but Fox - Fox had watched Kote and Alpha-17 with their posse.

(Both of their unofficial leaders looked ready to murder. It made Fox even warier of the mythical jetii than usual, because not all that gleamed was aurum, as the saying went, and Fox had learned that the two of them were fairly accurate to predict whether the person - or situation - would pan out well for vod’e as a whole or not. Ant the jetii in question definitely fell in the latter category.)

(There were rumours of a General being whispered among the 212th - not by name, never by name, but by the reverent voices and far-away gazes; that General person had to be exceptional to tame the feral bunch that was 212^th somehow, even when not seeing them or being seen by anyone else. )

(Maybe this…. General of theirs, would deign to call out to Fox, too. By his name, not his designation. Maybe he would smile at him, like Waxer had been telling to some shinies, something soft and warm in his face at the memories Fox hadn’t been privy to, despite him almost living in the pockets of 212^th.)

And when we come for you
We'll be dressed up all in blue
With the ocean in our arms
Kiss your eyes and kiss your palms

The jetii was here.

But not for Fox.

(Never for Fox, his luck was just that bad.)

After the Geonosis disaster and the official beginning of the war, they were divided into battalions and sent to their postings.

(The 212^th was finally gathered together, all of them a seamless, terrifyingly competent unit, a living machine made of many living parts.)

As Fox’s misfortune would have it, he was awarded the posting of Coruscant Guard, protecting the Chancellor himself—but going by Spire’spitying glances, the post was nothing to write home about, not that Fox would ever waste any amount of flimsy to write back to the waterlogged hellhole that was Kamino.

Aghhh, kark. That meant more learning - and not of the fun variant of shooting enemies, but rules, regulations, protocols and the like.

The 212^th buzzed with nervous expectation while being weirdly subdued. Some would even say they were depressed. Almost no one mentioned General, but there were some feral hisses on the subject, and Kote was sequestering away with Rex, apparently incensed that his vod’ika had been assigned to someone named Skywalker.

This was another oddity of the 212^th. The name - this particular name - Skywalker - was a curse in their mouths. Fox knew his brothers and knew them well - and if that Skywalker person came close to any of the 212^th, the poor sod would be straight out decommissioned the most painful way possible, no questions asked.

Fox himself didn’t have any opinions on the issue. Well, he had Opinions; he would’ve switched with Kote if that meant not going to the den of sludge called Coruscant, but alas, orders were orders.

(Good soldiers follow orders.)

Fox had the honour - or misfortune - of seeing the entire debacle with the 212^th ambushing their General.

The being came in front of them, clad in a blue cloak, dark blue of the color of midnight and ocean depths.

The 212^th didn’t have any color yet, but the lucky shebse—Fox’s own battalion had been given red—and on that account, Fox already hated his posting.

But 212^th made a riot. Kote apparently made a most unprofessional sound, which was a rarity in and of itself (blackmail material, here we come,) and then, Alpha-17 tore the hood off the being’s head, and - oh.

Blue. Blue eyes, kind and warm, looking over the vod’e gathered in front of him, the riot of fire-colored mane tamed by the barest extent with two side braids and -

Their Names. Their Names - not their designations - were called out, despite the being having never met them –

-and the men lit up like fireworks (yes, Fox knew what the fireworks were, courtesy of Hardcase, that di’kut and his … experiments with pyrotechnics disguised as Big Booms, Fox’s ears were still ringing from that last episode, thank you very much, but the sparks were beautiful - )

 -and Fox wondered, foolishly, if he had wandered up there, would his name be on the General’s lips too?

And when it's time to pray
We'll be dressed up all in grey
With metal on our tongues
And silver in our lungs

^***

To say it shortly, they were karked.

The Coruscant Guard knew it, Fox knew it, everyone knew it.

For all of the glory of protecting the beloved 000, the bastion of the Republic and the holy seat of the democracy, this posting was a pile of big, stinking banthashit.

They were glorified nannies, couriers, you name it, they did it. In the name of Senate, of course.

They had been run ragged, especially when they were given more and more work and obligations to fulfill. It had been a small mercy they were afforded to have their buckets always on, because otherwise, Fox would’ve screamed.

One more insinuation about them being things, or meat droids or pleasure toys –

The latest one completely rankled him. As products, they had no recourse or even basic rights to deny the assholes that masqueraded as Senators the access to their own bodies.

Fox had spent many a night with some shaken brother who had gone through that kind of traumatic experience, listening to their sobbing while he held their shaking bodies as close as he could, mentally swearing and making plans to decommission the shabuir’e he knew would never be allowed to come to fruition.

(The terror, the tentacles, the soul-deep shame when they couldn’t defend themselves lest they cause trouble for their brothers, the deep scratches at their wrists and ankles and groins - )

They quickly learned to walk in pairs, though that didn’t really save them - not always.

Fox himself had barely remained on the top of things. Despite the Coruscant post being calmer than any of the battlefield ones, Fox had always dreaded the time when he got new shinies, because he knew, he knew that he couldn’t protect them all, and the weight of his failures sat heavily on his shoulders.

And then, someone had gotten the hold of Fox.

In his defense, Fox had been tired, and the day had already gone disastrously bad with no caff in sight, and there was still an unholy amount of requisitions Fox had to deal with –

- and of course. Of course, there just had to be one karking being harassing his troopers, and Fox intervened, managing to send the shinies away and thus dooming himself to the fate of being a play toy to the sleemo in question.

It hadn’t helped that he had been cornered in a dark corridor when not many beings were traversing, an ideal place for his would-be molester to have his way with him.

He cringed under the unwanted touches, but steeling himself anyhow, even if he felt sick to the bone.

Having been forced to strip off his armor and kute, Fox felt helpless fury and dread at his predicament, his heart thudding with terror in his ears.

“You are kind of cute for being a meat droid. “The sleemo hummed at him, their tongue leaving a slick trail under Fox’s chin as they harshly grabbed him by the privates spikes digging in, causing Fox’s eyesight to darken with blitzing pain.

“Bet you would be even cuter if you screamed. Wouldn’t you?”

Fox clenched his teeth, not willing to make a sound.

His hands were at his sides, clenched in fists. The tentacles encircled his wrists, the spikes scraping at skin and tendons, sending bolts of pain up Fox’s brain. His jaw hurt at the effort of not screaming.

( - this was nothing in comparison with torture interrogation, Fox tried to convince himself. Nothing. The pan should’ve been nothing - )

“I can always find one of those… how you call them. Ah, a shiny. Bet they would sound wonderful. Not as wonderful as you, of course, but - “

Fox barely managed not to flinch at the sleazebag’s voice.

“Oh my, Senator. Your tastes are proving to be as eclectic as always.”

A smooth, familiar voice interrupted the being’s rambling. The assaulter squeaked as they whirled around, completely forgetting about Fox for a moment, their tentacles relaxing a bit, but not enough to let Fox completely loose.

And there he was. A shadow among many, with the hood covering their face.

“Hmm. What would your peers say, Senator? Such an esteemed person, but oh, my.”

The Senator puffed up at the mocking voice. “How dare you!” Then, they gave the shadow a dismissive look. “Besides, it is just a meat droid. It certainly doesn’t have any rights, so who would believe you?” They shrugged.

Fox’s heart fell. Yeah, who? There was just no proof; the corner was completely isolated, with no surveillance - Fox had fallen into a pretty much perfect trap.

“I don’t have to prove anything to see what you are doing to him is completely wrong and an abuse of power.” The shadow shrugged. “But if you insist…” He hadn’t moved yet and Fox felt a curious mixture of burning humiliation and hope roiling in his gut.

***

“D-Do that, and the good Commander here will suffer for your goodwill.” The being stuttered out, and another of the tentacles sharpened, enclosing to Fox’s gut, ready to skewer him –

-and the shadow moved. He moved faster than Fox could even react and definitely faster than the good Senator in question.

One moment, Fox had been abused, and in agony and in another, he felt the abuser let go of him, sprawling in an ungainly heap on the floor, the warm slick of blood puddling on a slightly uneven surface.

“Commander?” That voice called out to him, and Fox saw blue eyes peer up at him from the depths of the cloak.

 No, not the cloak. The being disrobed off it and in a quick move, they wrapped the fabric around Fox’s shoulders in order to prevent his dignity.

The cloak mercifully covered Fox’s face as he hung his head, feeling the warmth permeating the cloak and passing upon his suddenly shaking body. He stared at the cooling body lying sprawled on the floor in front of him. He felt he ought to have moved, but his brain and body were curiously out of sync. Rationally, he knew how to move, but it seemed his body completely disobeyed him, leaving him standing here, still and unresponsive.

“Commander, may I touch your shoulder?” The Shadow asked him - it had to be a Shadow.

Fox parted his lips, but no sound emerged. It was as if his tongue was made of metal and his lungs out of silver, both equally as unresponsive aside their basic functions.

“Kark, you are going into shock.” Warm hands landed on his shoulders, the touch gentle and soft, and it was as if Fox’s body waited for that particular signal to slump, all of his power leaving him at once as he sagged against the Shadow’s embrace, stiff and shaking, barely feeling the pain and feeling it all too much.

There was a soft scent of petrichor and something else curling in Fox’s nose, something soft and warm among the sharper notes of steel and stun discharges. “I’ve got you. Commander. It’s all right; you are safe with me.”

And somehow, Fox believed that.

He believed Kote’s General.

Standing in that world made of different shades of grey, Fox dared to believe.

Say my name
And every colour illuminates
We are shining
And we will never be afraid again

Fox didn’t know how he came to be in the little room he was currently residing in.

The happenings after his assault had been a blur - all he remembered was collapsing in the arms of Kote’s General - he still didn’t know his name - and he woke up… wherever he was, his wrists and privates had been tended to.

He was relieved to find that at least he had the bottoms on, soft, cotton-like things that were obviously well-loved and much-used but loose enough not to cause any undue chafing.

The bed was simple—more of a foldable cot than anything else—but covered with warm bedding and smelling of the same scent as the cloak, Fox relaxed.

He was safe.

There was a knock on the door. snapping his attention to the sound.

“Commander? May I come in?” The familiar voice called out, and upon Fox’s agreeing noise, the man entered.

Kote’s General was clad in nearly the same attire Fox had seen him the last time on Kamino—dark blue clothes, similar to Jedi’s attire but not, missing the armor aside from the vambraces glinting on the man’s forearms.

He was carrying a small tray with a bowl of warm soup, a glass of water, and what Fox presumed were painkillers. Fox tried to struggle up, only for the man to shake his head.

“No need to get up, Commander. At least, not yet. “

“F-Fox.”

Fox’s tongue was clumsy still, but at least this. This, he could do.

Auburn eyebrows quirked up. “Your name?”

Fox managed a tiny nod, even as he felt his ears and cheeks burning with embarrassment. This was completely unbecoming conduct of a commander, stuttering like a shiny in front of General –

He was greeted by a gentle smile in return.

“Then it’s an honor to meet you, Commander Fox. My name is Obi-Wan Kenobi and I’ll be in your care for a time.”

Fox could feel the man meant every word he had spoken. Involuntarily, the Commander of Coruscant Guard began to relax, not even knowing just how stiffly he had held himself before. He felt a hot moisture gather in his eyes, and hurriedly, he turned his head away from that warm sincerity, so different from the coldness and cruelty of most of the Senate.

At least - at least, he had been called by his Name.

Say my name
As every colour illuminates
We are shining
And we will never be afraid again

This had been the first time, but not the last time, when Fox’s paths crossed with the paths of one Obi-Wan Kenobi.

Sometimes, it was because the man needed information. Sometimes, it was because Obi-Wan had stumbled onto one of the men in a perilous position and helped them out—the tiny room Fox had found himself in, one of the Shadow hideouts, became a safe haven for many of the Coruscant guards in the oncoming months to rest, heal, and regroup.

To be called not by their designations but by their Names.

To have their own safe space, where they could be unafraid and free, if only for a little bit.

Ironically, it was Kote’s—now Cody’s—general who provided them with the said safe haven. It was never outright stated, but every clone stated on Coruscant, from the most senior officer to the newest shiny, they knew that it was he who provided the place and the occasional bits and bobs of entertainment and snacks that had been squirrelled away in random nooks and crannies in a playful game of hide-and-seek.

Kenobi wasn’t always here. 212^th had taken to the harshest battlefields, and shore leaves were becoming more of an exception than a norm.

But when he was, then Coruscant Guard quietly closed ranks around the jetii in question in an unassuming manner, not too close, not too far, but always here.

(And Fox had found himself in the small battle of spite for the caff mug Obi-Wan had given him that first time in that small room, with the possession of the said mug changing places from Fox to Thorn back and forth, the mug already bearing the numerous signs of battle scars made by sharpies denoting the possession of the mug in question for either one or the other side.)

Say my name
As every colour illuminates
We are shining
And we will never be afraid again

“Ni kar’tayl gar sa’ad, Fox Kenobi!”

The words exploded in the air, blinding as flash grenade and stunning all of the beings present.

There he stood, eyes glaring with fury and cheeks flushed with indignation.

Huh. It seemed that their jetii’s patience had finally run out.

Obi-Wan Kenobi wasn’t usually of such a short temper.

“Me’ven?” Thire squeaked out, his eyes huge. “You can just go around and adopt anyone like that, sir!”

He shrank back as he found himself a recipient of the infamous Kenobi glare. It wasn’t usually aimed at the Guard, so the effect was doubled.

“Oh?” Kenobi’s voice was mild as blue milk. “So, you just thought you could quietly adopt me and don’t expect to be adopted in return? Is that how you thought it worked, Thire?”

Stone cringed. ‘Oh kark. So, the game was up, huh.’ He fought to keep his stone face but for some reason, he couldn’t look the furious jetii in his eyes, afraid to see disappointment.

“And I am fed up with people saying that you don’t belong anywhere.” Kenobi practically seethed, incensed. He had stormed into their barracks, dragging along a bewildered Fox by the scruff of his kute as if the Corrie Commander was some kind of an unruly tooka before stopping in the middle of the place, the attention of all the troopers present at a time firmly drawn to the pair.

The clones cringed, expecting that their Commander would get an epic dressing down by the apoplectic jetii in front of them, but instead, Kenobi had aggressively adopted the said Commander by saying gai bal manda!

A couple of frantic signs revealed the origin of Kenobi’s meltdown.

Apparently, the Chancellor may or may not have insinuated about the Coruscant Guards’ unfortunate origins and, of course, the usual spiel of them not being natives, without any rights. Of course, what really got Kenobi’s proverbial goat was that just about no one wanted them, either on Coruscant or existing, period.

“I know that Fett didn’t want you, not really.” Kenobi huffed out, and most of the clones present at the time couldn’t help but flinch at the harsh truth. “I know that you aren’t welcomed on Coruscant, despite your best efforts. But!” He made a sharp move, cutting off Fox’s attempt at speaking.

“I am here. And if nobody else does, I want you.” Blue eyes glared into stunned hazel ones. “And before you try to interrupt me and say that I don’t have any right to adopt you because I am not a Mandalorian – you would be wrong. Secondly, if you try to say that you are too old for me to adopt - you aren’t. Despite your accelerated aging, you are technically still underage, so there’s that, not that it matters. You not being natborns is a non-issue. Any questions?”

Fox saw Thorn cautiously raising his hand. Kenobi was still fit to go off at the slightest provocation but…

”What about the rest of us? Sir?” A tense silence wobbled in the air as Fox sucked in his breath, painful as it was. Kenobi’s offer was a thunderbolt of hope – bright and agonizing in equal measure.

“Ni kar’tayl gar sa’ad, Thorn Kenobi. Anyone else?” Kenobi spoke casually, as if speaking about weather, but his words contained kyber and beskar.  Thorn’s eyes got in a watery shine as he ducked his head in a half-nod.  The mood in the barracks brightened with a tentative hope, tingled with shades of wary disbelief.

“Does that mean Fox will have to call you buir?” Another shiny blurted out, much to the group’s amusement and some scattered chuckles.

Kenobi smiled at them, something soft and warm and just for them. “If he wants to.”

Fox closed his eyes. He was unable to see all those eyes looking at him, full of hope and want and a little bit of fear. “I am drawing the line at being given a curfew. And no taking away my caff… Buir.”

He swallowed around the last word, unfamiliar and warm, like the sweetest of honey, instead of the bitterest of absinthe when Boba spoke it to Jango.

He could - he finally could acknowledge that Jango Fett was a dar’manda. But the man had done at least one thing right. He hadn’t acknowledged Fox and his Guards as his ad’e.

Fox and his vod’e were loved. Quietly, but no less fiercely, by that strange man with a too big of a heart.

The din about vod’e clamoring to be the next to be spoken gai bal manda to was rising, from quiet insecure buzz to a cheerful racket as Kenobi laughed. He accepted each and every member of the newly instated Kenobi clan by word and heart. Hugs were also given aplenty.

There was still a concern about Kenobi being a jetii - surely the vows had to contradict here, but if nothing else, Kenobi was stubborn enough to bulldoze over this too - if he hadn’t yet.

Fox smirked. Kote would be in for a very interesting surprise when he’d finally begun to court their O’buir.

And when we come back, we'll be dressed in black
And you'll scream my name aloud
And we won't eat, and we won't sleep
We'll drag bodies from the ground

The Kenobi clan, as the Coruscant Guards found themselves privately naming themselves, was furious. After their adoption, there was a new life burning in the otherwise dispirited Corries - they still battled with exhaustion, unfair working hours and impossible Senators and their O’buir couldn’t have their backs openly, but they finally belonged. They were wanted.

In light of this tiny secret, the Guards also adopted the mannerisms and battle style of their buir. So to say, instead of being out and loud, they learned how to melt into the background, no more interesting as a piece of furniture. They began to pick up more secrets - Senators weren’t as discreet as they thought themselves to be, and there was a curious discrepancy about 212^th being given too little leave in comparison with other battalions. Skywalker had almost triple the amount of leaves than, for example, Plo Koon or Kit Fisto together, but Kenobi? It looked like someone wanted to break him and his men into pieces, with how busy they were.

(Still, O’buir made time to leave them recorded messages, little tidbits of life on Negotiator, small anecdotes and updates, and nagging when some or another trooper on Coruscant went under.)

(Occasional cuddle pile, rare as they were, were the best. O’buir gave the best hugs, too, and even if they had been scolded about not sleeping enough, the scolding was accompanied with a snack and a small, but useful trinket, like jar of bacta or a roll of bandages or something more personal for each of the troopers – and each of them got a small dog tag with their number and a secret message hidden in the bar, just for them.)

(Fox should have been angry because he had to share his buir with the whole of the karking di’kute. Though it was just as well, these di’kute were his, and he was already their ori’vod in a sense and it was fun to have someone to quietly mock the 212^th mooning over their buir. Cody was competent, but he wouldn’t expect Fox and his own to make the 212^th go through ringers when that time came.)

(When there were shore leave gatherings for the space-bound of their brothers at 79’s, and Wolffe once again boasting about his buir - nothing against Plo Koon, but Wolffe honestly struck a nerve, and of course, Stone had to blurt out that their buir was better than Wollfe’s. The sheb then smugly proceeded to deny saying anything more on the issue, with the other present Corries supporting his claim.)

(Wolfpack was still decrying their buir as myth, even trying to goad Thire and Thorn, the two most hotheaded members of the Guard into revealing the name, but no dice.)

(The issue was laid to rest when one of them caught a Corrie dragging in a protesting Quinlan Vos, out of all beings and yep, that was probably their buir. It was a logical conclusion from a certain point of view - Vos had been a stubborn barnacle, hanging the most around the Guard and Wolffe could rest assured that he still had the best buir in the universe.)

(Fox furiously complained about it to Obi-wan through the holo, much to his buir’s amusement, only to get the bad news that Vos could apparently be termed as their crazy uncle. That just spurred him into locking Vos in the cell for the pettiest reasons imaginable and then politely deny being the culprit. Thire and Thorn also gleefully helped him along. Thus the rumors about Vos being Coruscant Guards’ buir began circulating among the vod’e, much to Fox’s exasperation, especially because Vos loudly and shamelessly attempted to use their newfound familiar relationship to slink out of the jail cell every time he had been stuffed into one.)

Palpatine. Palpatine was the name Fox loathed with every fiber of his being. This was the being that was sending his buir to impossible missions and Fox had a good hunch the lovely Chancellor was not as good as he painted himself to be.

Clad only in black kute, Fox huffed as he finished another of his reps of push-ups. His upper armor would have to be adjusted again because of his chest muscles growing again - one of his di’kutla brothers called them tiddies before Fox kindly invited him out on the sparring mat and thoroughly schooled him. Fox was already stressed enough, and pushups were an excellent way to de-stress himself after every visit by that particular politician, which has been happening worryingly often lately.

And Skywalker. Little gods, how could one contain so much stupidity in their body was beyond Fox. If Fox hadn’t known better, he would have thought that Skywalker had hoarded all the easiest assignments and longest shore leaves. And the damning evidence has only gotten worse, what with Skywalker being friends with the said Chancellor, and there was still his paramour - Amidala, was it? - to consider.

Hero with no fear, Fox’s shebs.

 Fox knew that his buir was one of the few chief strategists in Order to lead the GAR charge. Yet, despite their best efforts, there was always a leak. No matter how tightly secured the plans were, the enemies were always a step ahead of the clones. Miraculously, the one with the most victories in the whole ordeal was Skywalker.

Not Kote and his General, but some hotheaded mir’sheb who wouldn’t know the word diplomacy if it danced in front of him naked and then bit him into his pretentious ass. Rex was going grey because of the idiot, especially since he had been given a Padawan to teach, and Fox already knew the entire farce was going to end in tears.

Fox was tempted to throttle the man out of principle alone. Because at least then, he wouldn’t have to cover for his trysts with Amidala - it was only for so long that Rex could play ignorant on the issue, and the possible fallout for Jedi, if Skywalker’s torrid romance managed to be publicized, would’ve been pretty damning. Qui-Gon Jin had taught his charge all his bad habits, it seemed, with none of the good ones sticking for long, especially after Skywalker visited his best friend, the Chancellor.

Oh yes, Fox had a beef with those two, and he would bury them ten feet under. It was just a question of time when he and his men would find damning enough evidence for those two to get ruined.

He wouldn’t sleep, forego eating, and be a literal ghost if this was what it took, and he wasn’t the only one—his vod’e agreed with him.

(O’buir was held in complete ignorance about their plans, though Fox didn’t think it would be held for long - O’buir wasn’t stupid, after all.)

So say my name
And every colour illuminates
And we are shining
And we'll never be afraid again

“Fox…”

Fox had to be in a dream. A good sort of one. Otherwise, he wouldn’t be hearing his buir right now.

O’buir – no, General Kenobi was with Kote on that campaign, far away from Coruscant, and Fox’s head throbbed unpleasantly with migraine pounding away at his skull.

He was lying down. Alright.

 Fox lay on a bed, and the sounds were low. It seemed to be… a med-bay of some sort? Something. The scent of disinfectant hovering in the air caused Fox to cringe.

There was a warm hand in his hair, Fox felt. Stroking, slow, long, languid strokes that somehow managed to allay his monster of a headache.

“Fox’ika, ner ad… what have you gotten yourself into?” The voice called him, soft and exasperated, and Fox wished he could bottle it for his bad days when everything seemed grey and hopeless.

He let out a whine when he tried to curl more into the soothing warmth, only to wince as the numerous aches and pains of his body made themselves known.

And he tried to remember –

-only for the lance of pure agony bolting through his brain, causing him to whimper, and then another hand landed on his head near his temples.

“I will try to draw the pain into the Force kart’ika, alright? The pain should be less that way.” The soft voice murmured to him.

“You shouldn’t have to, General! You are also in bad shape enough that I wonder how it’s that Kix and Bones don’t have an aneurysm yet!” Ah, Scalpel’s dulcet tones were once again in action.

Fox tried to force his eyes to open. Just a little, just enough to see him, a blurry outline made of reds and dark blues dancing at the edge of his karked-up vision.

“Buir?” He croaked out, his throat seemingly made out of sharp glass shards, one more painful than another.

“It’s me, Fox. Rest. You are safe now.” And then, the pain left him in small waves, lapping away from him in small increments and then finally leaving him ashore, weary and exhausted. Fox felt weightless and dizzy, a curious combination that somehow translated into being tired, exhausted beyond measure.

 A warm hand covered his eyes, gifting him a blessed darkness.

“Rest, Fox. You are safe.”

Trusting, Fox fell into a deep slumber.

He was safe.

Say my name
As every colour illuminates

When he woke up next, Fox was more aware and in possession of his faculties.

“That atynic shab refused to leave you.” The medic’s grumpy tones prompted Fox to turn his attention away from the exhausted redhead slumbering on the uncomfortable-looking chair near Fox’s bed.

The man was divested of his usual armor, and Fox could just imagine Kote’s horror at the sight. As the war escalated, O’buir was increasingly rarely seen out of his armor, and the privilege usually belonged to the 212th when they were aboard the Negotiator or when the Corries managed to wheedle the man to join them in one of their cuddle piles. Thorn was curiously close to mastering tooka eyes at the rate they were going, even if the common consensus was that Wooley was still the undisputed champion in that particular sport.

Scalpel offered him a cup with straw. Shakily, Fox put his lips around the straw and sucked, tasting a lukewarm tea with a small amount of painkiller soothing his scorched-feeling throat.

“You were in a very bad shape, vod. Vos had found you in the pile of trash on one of the lowest levels, literally. Three broken ribs, concussion, damage to your throat, it was nearly crushed, and you almost flatlined twice.”

“Ah. The trash panda was finally useful, “Fox croaked. He paid for his snark with a painful cough that shook his body and jerked Obi-Wan awake.

“Mm. Fox?” The man jerked up, desperate blue eyes searching for Fox’s own before Obi-Wan lurched forward, taking Fox’s forehead into a hurried keldabe. “Don’t you ever, ever scare me like that! Or I swear I will ground you for at least a millennium!” The man snapped out before he sighed, his shoulders slumping in defeat.

“You were lucky that the trash panda in question managed to get me onto the comm.” He grumbled. Fox eyed his buir’s face. Obi-wan was also in a bad shape - Fox had seen the man before the campaign, and he had been tired back then, but now, he seemed utterly exhausted, with deep eyebags and a gaunt face that was paler than it was healthy. Mentally, Fox cringed at the image of Bones and Kix completely losing their collective osik at the sorry sight - they had been overprotective of their General to the extreme, but Obi-wan, with his selflessness and stubbornness, tried even the bear-steeled nerves of the head medics of the 212^th. Fox had no doubt his buir had to sneak away to get to Fox - the man was in a bad enough state that no medic worthy of their profession would’ve let him go without a very good reason - and Fox was selfishly glad that he counted as one of those exceptions.

“Are you alright, Fox?” O’buir asked him, his eyes darkened with concern. He was still holding the keldabe, though it had to pain him, judging by the pallor of his skin.

“I will survive.” Fox hummed, gently pushing O’buir back, with the man resisting for a moment before grudgingly seating himself back on the chair. But not before ruffling Fox’s hair in retaliation, causing Fox to flush with pleasure at the affectionate contact.

“I know you are hiding things from me. Is that one of them?” Fox stilled at the question. It was completely open, leaving Fox to choose whether or not to trust Obi-Wan with … whatever this was.

Swallowing, Fox nodded. He saw O’buir pause, and for a moment, he feared the man would be angry with him or disappointed—enough to leave Fox again, alone and scared like he had used to be on Kamino.

Instead, when he forced himself to look at O’buir, the jetii was calm and accepting, and his gaze held nothing but concern and affection for Fox.

“Then I trust you that you hid it for a reason. Do you want to talk about it?”

Fox had to close his eyes.

“Buir?” He inquired, his voice unusually small and soft.

“Yes, Fox?” The immediate response made Fox’s lips wobble up in an ugly smile.

He would have done everything for the sound of his name from those lips.

Steeling himself, he then proceeded to tell his story in halting words, stuttering over the sentences and stumbling with the holes in his memories.

Say my name
As every colour illuminates
We are shining
And we will never be afraid again

“I am not leaving you here. “

Dimly, Fox was aware that it had to be an ungodly late - or early time, and he wasn’t functioning well - still more than half-asleep, his mind buzzing with information and worries, his reflexes were possibly shot to haran and back, but when he received the call from that particular comm number, it had been a shot of adrenaline, fueled with fear and dread because –

Because him being called, it only meant very bad news.

(Maybe O’buir was dead at worst, in a critical state at best, and Fox had to swallow the panic trying to drown him under -)

Seeing O’buir intact, but his eyes lit with fire and determination, caused another shot of fear through Fox’s veins.

“Fox, get your brothers. I don’t care what kind of excuse you have to use to pull them out. All of them.”

Fox straightened up. “Sir?”

The holo version of Obi-Wan pinched the bridge of his nose. A harsh exhale before Obi-Wan let go, once again looking at Fox.

“We know who is behind everything. And we are ending it. Tonight.”

Fox’s gut chilled with dread.

So, his suspicions were at least partially correct.

“We could help.” He offered, fighting to keep his voice steady, even if his mind was hurriedly putting up and discarding a multitude of scenarios in a flash.

“Fox, no. You— “

Fox saw Obi-Wan swallow; his nauseated look didn’t bode well.

And in that moment, Fox knew. He didn’t need to be told, as there was only one conclusion to O’buir’s decision to exclude them from the manhunt in progress.

“We are compromised, aren’t we?” He whispered.

Fox let his eyes close. Out of all the scenarios, out of all the simulations, this was the sole one he hadn’t been prepared for. And it rankled.

“Then who?”

‘Who would have your back? When I am not here?’

‘Will you come back to us?’

“We have a beef with the huut’un.” O’buir straightened out, his spine made out of beskar. This wasn’t the man who joked with Fox’s  vod’e, this wasn’t the General or even a jetii - this was a person - a being - who had suffered for far too long, having been chained down by duties, righteousness and vows.

No, this was the one who stood up to start a fire in Bandomeer, the one who ended the hundred-year war on Melidaan, the one who was bathed in blood and fire of Stark Hyperspace War, the one who had won against all odds when he had slain the Sith, this was the Wizard of the Wastes, the wraith that hounded Vader’s footsteps long after the man’s peaceful death.

Fox hadn’t known that but in front of him, in the fragile shell made out of skin, bones and sinews, stood the giant of old, ready to cast away the chains in order to go against insurmountable fate.

This was the man who had found them and the being Fox had chosen to trust with his life and the lives of his vod’e. This was the man who said gai bal manda to them because his heart was just too big to bear to watch them being abandoned, sneered at and spat upon just because they had been born into a fate worse than death.

 Fox knew there was nothing more terrifying than a survivor. For survivors had lived through insurmountable odds and emerged stronger for it. Survivors were also hunters who eliminated what attempted to put them down with extreme prejudice.

And if Obi-Wan Kenobi was anything aside from his other titles and achievements - first and foremost, he was a survivor.

Fox gave a sharp nod as he thumped his chest, the heart behind the ribcage thudding with the same fire that fueled his buir’s soul.

“Oya!”

Say my name
As every colour illuminates
We are shining
And we will never be afraid again

So, the Coruscant Guard were still stubborn shebse. Why did Fox expect anything else?

But Thire had a point. The Corries knew the Senate building better than anyone, aside from cleaning droids. They knew the secret passages, shortcuts, where and how to avoid the cameras, and looping the feed was practically a joke, considering they had infiltrated the system a long time ago.

And the security? If one knew where to look for vulnerabilities, one could liken it to a sieve. Given how shabby it was, it was a wonder the Senators in question were not assassinated more often.

This otherwise useless knowledge served them well when they smuggled in their brothers from the 212^th.

The 212^th was clad in black and gold, the visors expressionless in the dull light. Personally, Fox was impressed that they had time to disguise their armor in different colors on such short notice.

(Quartermaster Felix had remembered - only too well - the glaring white of stormtroopers’ armour, devoid of any personality, a decorative tool for meat droids. His first order of business after getting his new (-though actually old-) post of Quartermaster on the board of Negotiator was to get the men better armor and weapons - if there was an order or two of slug throwers included in his next request, it was only reasonable. And if the men had a reserve armour for some of their more stealth-oriented missions in dark colors, well, this was just being prepared for all the eventualities.)

The 212^th had a grudge against their adversary, and it showed. The Corries were included only to show them the target’s place. They were also tasked as watchmen at the chokepoints and possible secret exits and entrances, with explicit orders not to accept any comms from outsiders, no matter the priority.

(It rankled the Kenobi clan something fierce to be delegated to the sidelines because this was the man who had nearly managed to kill their buir on a dozen of the occasions, and they wanted to take their pound of flesh too. But Fox’s grim face stalled their more jare’la plans - nobody had wished more to end the shabuir than Fox, and if Fox out of all people abstained from revenge, then there had to be a karking good reason for it.)

All of the 212^th had infiltrated the Senate and closed in on their prey.

Suffice it to say that their prey - one Sheev Palpatine - didn’t manage to get out of the trap with his life intact.

Say my name

We are shining

Say my name

Say my name

And we will never be afraid again

Fox just about sagged in relief when he got the news that the 212^th had made it out successfully.

O’buir was also intact. Kote had made the use of the slug throwers with extreme prejudice, and 212^th remembered well enough to anticipate the Sith’s tactics - nobody wanted to remember, but on this occasion, such memories came into use.

The Corries didn’t have much, so stealing away from their posts was as easy as an Alderaanian apple pie. Fox wouldn’t really miss his armour of white and red, and he’d rather don one in O’buir’s colors.

(Personally, he had a penchant for blue - not the 501th’s blue, but a darker one, the color of O’buir’s cloak, a midnight  blue bordering on black.)

There was still Kamino to consider. Fox didn’t think he would return to the old haran of his own free will, but life had a strange way of turning things around.

Kote also told them about chips in their head. Fox tried to be hurt, but he understood with a horrifying clarity - all of his blackouts, the headaches, the unnatural tiredness, and finding himself in strange places without any memories suddenly made a horrible amount of sense.

The Coruscant Guard had undergone the surgery just in case - one never knew if the longnecks also intended to exploit that kind of vulnerability in their makeup.

Also, Fox intended to collect on the bet with his vote about how he would O’buir finally get told that the 212th was heels over head in love with him. Sure, their family tree would be karking crazy and the Corries as a whole still had to give the 212^th The Talk about not breaking their buir’s heart or else - only the plan in question had been derailed by Fox having been blindsided by - out of all things - paperwork for registering their marriage to O’buir.

Alpha-17 and Kote were doable. But the whole karking 212^th—Fox wondered what he had done in his former life to earn that kind of punishment.

“Fox.”

He turned around toward the beloved voice calling him.

It had been such a small thing, having been called by his name, but Fox relished in it. He savoured knowing that this person calling for him cared enough to move mountains to ensure his - and his vod’e’s - safety.

O’buir was still a mess - clad in his kute, but the 212^th sneakily exchanged his armor for the courting one and the man still hadn’t noticed. And he was glowing - still on the malnourished side, but the weight was off his shoulders, leaving him feeling lighter and freer than Fox ever saw him.

(There may or may not have been a bet about the man’s reaction when he finally cottoned on the fact that he was well and truly engaged, married, and taken off the singles’ market for good.)

“Buir.” Fox returned the greeting, his voice warm. O’buir opened his arms, and Fox stepped into a hug, feeling the warmth and safety and knowing that they would never need to be afraid ever again.

Chapter Text

Disclaimer: I don’t own Star Wars or the song used here -  this time it's a throwback,  Riders On The Storm by The Doors.

Shout Out: Wanted to write something depressive and Amidala-Skywalker critical.  I failed.   This is mostly written from POV of one Padme Amidala and I took some liberty with timeline and happy-ending things around.  As always, it ties  down to 212th and their adoration of their Jedi.   Padme can be a mite bit petty, the girl deserves it for all the trouble she had gone through.  And Obi got himself reverse-adopted.... Again. (He just has that kind of buir vibe going for him!)  Not beta-read, this thought died like a sad lonely brain cell three hours ago.   That's it, the end. 

Dictionary: Cor'ike -  Little Corries, aka Obi-Wan's Other Feral Bunch (Adopted). Led by one Fox Kenobi, and they are still intent on giving the 212th and Alpha-17 a Shovel Talk of Millenium - or at least a heart attack (They are not picky, amrite?).  212th is doable, Alpha-17 is a suicide mission.   Surprisingly enough,  there is more interest in going to do so-called suicide mission than scaring a bunch of 'mere' 212th.

Riders on the storm
Riders on the storm
Into this house, we're born
Into this world, we're thrown

Padme Amidala Naberrie.  A girl queen, a leader, a woman, a senator. So many hats, so little time.

The galaxy she had been born into was a tumultuous place; she had been taught that from day one and realized it when she had been chosen for a child queen.  Sure, it was her burning wish to repair the wrongs of the galaxy and somehow turn the fates of her people to safer tides, but the longer she had been on the throne, the more harrowing this - lifestyle? -  was.

A Queen was never safe, after all. Even when it seemed that she had all the power gathered within her palm, she still managed to feel foolish, small, and full of fear and doubt. Every step could be her first into doom and her last into death.

The house she had been born in was warm, full of laughter and safety.

The house she had to lead - her people, her planet - was a heavy mantle on her shoulders, heavier than those complicated costumes and makeup and itchy hairstyles - their peaceful little planet had been thrown into galactic conflicts without as much as by your leave when the Trade Confederation placed its ultimatum.

Like a dog without a bone
An actor out on loan
Riders on the storm

Acting. It was an ignoble skill, often decried because of its humble beginnings, but politicians had to be fairly good—if not the best—actors in the galaxy.

To convince those wily foxes to lend her a hand.  She’d rather shoot herself in the foot with a blaster on full power, but the needs must.  Begging like a strill for a tiny bone on the corner in the coldest of winters.

How funny! How amusing! Those senators all sang praises to Naboo—the perfect world as it was—but when it came to helping them against the blockade made by the Trading Federation, there were averted eyes, ignorance, and false sympathies.

The only true allies she had back then, were a whimsy Jedi Master, his sourly apprentice, a slave boy, and her maidens-in-waiting.  They were her riders in the storm, and she could only pray that they could manage to weather the oncoming hurricane.

There's a killer on the road
His brain is squirmin' like a toad
Take a long holiday
Let your children play

Many years later, the scars had healed, the betrayals buried in memories but never quite forgotten.

That slave boy, Ani, grew into quite a fetching young Padawan on the verge of being Knighted.   Qui-Gon Jinn got a little bit older, with a lot more silver in his long, semi-bound hair, and his eyes were somehow deeper and wearier, not like when he had been back then when he had taken one Anakin Skywalker.

But Ani - Anakin -  her sweet Ani -  the sweet boy had grown up into quite a fetching young man, and Padme could admit, if only to herself, that she had been… enchanted with the young man, despite him being a fair few years younger than she. 

Heavens have mercy on her, but she must have had a leave of her senses to fall in love with practically underage Padawan and, against all common sense, lose herself in his hands and lips.

(A shadow clad in blue—familiar but not—was in the background when she soothed her man from the loss of his hand.

He had come into the med-bay to get treated for some lightsaber burns, quite serious ones, but behaving so unobtrusively that she was all but convinced he belonged here.  Alpha-17 - that man got a quite a sharp eye on the Shadow, as she had been told later – Shadows were Jedi who were used to the grislier aspects of galaxy’s workings. Anakin’s grumpy face at being interrupted was kind of cute, though.

She hadn’t noticed back then, but the men – the clones – in the med bay – behaved quite oddly around Anakin. Sure, they had been professional, but Padme always felt like there was a sharp blade of knife placed just shy of Anakin’s throat, though no hostile actions were taken. One of the clones even dragged away another, hissing in Mando’a something quite uncomplimentary about Skywalker and staying far away from him and staying put.

• maybe they knew Anakin was a murderer, but surely not -

Padme  had disapproved of it, but oh, there was a galactic disaster on the horizon that dug a heavy pit in her gut -  the war was all but inevitable now. )

If you give this man a ride
Sweet family will die
Killer on the road, yeah

She had a murderer on her hands, Padme thought, dazed with shock.

It was only the Tuskens, and they had done something horrible to Ani’s mother but still!

It was her fault, for listening to his frantic begging and following him to Tatooine, only to arrive at the aftermath of what had been a full-out aftermath of a massacre and Anakin crying hysterically, clutching to his mother’s far too still body.

What could she do but hug him and promise him never to leave him?

Qui-Gon’s  comm was a welcome distraction, calling them to Geonosis.

Getting caught and put into an arena with Qui-Gon Jinn’s disapproving frown was not a happy occasion, and despite knowing that the world was quite cruel, Padme couldn’t help but flinch at the memories of Jedi that had come to save them being practically massacred.

(Fett had escaped from Windu - somehow.)

The only bright point was that they decided to tie the knot, despite Padme’s misgivings about Ani’s idea of a secret wedding. But with the galaxy as it was, her duties as Senator and Ani’s own job as a Jedi, they weren’t left with many choices.  Sure, Padme could have her tryst-long-distance relationship, but with Ani being a downtrodden cute puppy, Padme just about melted into a puddle.

Was that love? To follow a man into unknown, despite knowing that he had done something so horrible and war looming on horizon?

If it was love, then it was madness.

(Ani also met with his new Captain—the blond-haired clone who had been dragged out of the med bay when Ani had lost his hand. Somehow, Ani’s friendly overtures didn’t have much of an effect on the unique clone who introduced himself as CT-7567, though the men he had commanded were a bit more approachable.

The 212^th was the complete opposite. Padme had met them -  the dark blue-clad Shadow wrapped in armour like it had been their second skin with his Commanders on their way to mission briefing -  only once -  but those two had stuck to their Jedi like particularly stubborn burrs, flanking him at all times, and Padme felt that the pair would sacrifice their very lives before allowing any harm to come to their jetti.

They also behaved with complete hostility against Anakin—civilized hostility at that—and it was such a jarring contrast that Padme couldn’t help but pick on. When she thought back on it, the men in the med bay were the same.

Was that because they had sensed Anakin Skywalker was a murderer?

Her mother once told Padme, ‘Like calls to like,’ and Padme couldn’t help but wonder if there was some truth in those words.

But if they were true - then those clones were also murderers. Which was inconceivable because they had been bred and taught on Kamino, and the only murder they had partaken in back on that miserably soaked planet were of training droids.

And yet -  and yet, sometimes Padme could imagine that their arms and the edges of that hand-painted armor were soaked in the warmth of red, fresh blood.

‘Like call to like, Padme, don’t ever forget that.’  Her mother smiled at her, sad and wise and with unnamed grief in her eyes. )

Girl, you gotta love your man
Girl, you gotta love your man
Take him by the hand
Make him understand

Was love enough?

The longer the war lasted, the more Padme doubted it.  If love was all they needed, they wouldn’t have been in such a deep podoo as they were.

Anakin. Ani, her love, the Hero With No Fear, that terrified man.  Insanely powerful in Force but so, so very terrified and burdened with nightmares and visions and the distrust of the Order with the ever-burdening load of being one of the main leaders in this nonsensical war. Organics against droids, really?  What was the sense of it?

Toy soldiers are all the same.  Ones who could bleed or ones who got their marching orders through computers.  Both versions manufactured on demand, both fighting, rising and falling in unending, violent currents, only on different planets or places in space.

Her unexpectedly whirlwind romance didn’t absolve Padme of her obligations, of her trying to - and failing to — act as a voice of reason in the war-maddened Senate.

At least Chancellor Palpatine understood, but the man had his hands tied, just like everyone else, with more powers and responsibilities, being heaped upon him as time went by.

(The Coruscant Guards shadowed the Naboo Senator unobtrusively. In fact, she had once puked in the helmet of … Thire, was it? Because Galactean truffles didn’t agree with her.  She also managed to unceremoniously faint after completing the deed.

*****

‘Kark, she’s pregnant. What do we do?’ One of the clones murmured above her, panicked.  Padme’s head swam. She’d love to sleep all that nightmare off, only waking after the war would end.

Wouldn’t that be nice…

‘Call O’buir, he would know.’

She missed Ani.  The world only made sense when they were together, even though sometimes, her darling love was quite foolish.  

And who in the world was that… O’buir?

Her sight faded into much-blessed darkness.

Padme Amidala, the expecting mother of two, slipped into unconsciousness, heedless of the panicking medics hovering over her bed.)

The world on you depends
Our life will never end
Gotta love your man, yeah

Padme shrank back into the bed.  She knew herself to be quite fearless, but Scalpel’s unimpressed glare when he ‘gently’  let her know that she was a) pregnant and b) she carried twins was a thing to be feared.

(She used contraception, alright.  But. One time. One karking, heated time and now she carried around two tiny troublemakers in his belly without her knowledge or say-so.

She and Anakin had talked about having kids, but after the war!  But no, those little … things just had to be like Anakin and shamelessly will themselves into existence at the worst possible time.

Yes, she ignored her part in their making.  It. Was. All. Anakin’s. Fault.

Oh dear heavens, she was gonna hurl again.

Scalpel’s face was hilariously alarmed and unimpressed at the same time, while a wide-eyed Thire protectively hugged his cleaned out but still faintly stinking buy’ce to himself, not really ready to relinquish it as a temporary hurl bin.

Three months.  She should’ve known that something was afoot, but her periods were spotty at best and irregular at worst and the stress she had been under hadn’t helped.  And now it was too late to do anything but to carry to term and dearly hope that her cover would fool everyone into thinking that everything was normal, nothing karked up.

Force, she loved Anakin, but right now, she wanted to wring her beloved fool’s neck.

(Maybe it was petty of her to decide to spring the news on him in a way that would cause him to faint.  But well.  What goes around, comes around, and Padme was generous enough to share the shock of being first-time parents twice over, most audaciously.)

*****

Gentle blue eyes behind the deep hood watched her, amused, as Padme threw her not-quite tantrum.  From hyperventilating to laughing, to crying and panicking, the whole gamut, and then, the O’buir hugged her, and she felt, for the first time, safe.  Not that Anakin wasn’t safe.  but O’buir was… safer.  If Padme had to compare, it was like with her father, before she had to serve her term of senatorship.  Calm, sturdy and warm, a rock in the storm she could rest upon until the bad weather passed.

“You are not alone, Padme.” A soft whisper tickled her ears as she burrowed deeper into that warm hug over the chest armor.

O’buir -  the  Jedi commander of 212^th and, somehow, also the parent of Corrie Guards, and Padme would dearly love to hear the story behind that.

From the corner of her eyes, Padme saw Commander Fox with his helmet off and pouting. It may not have looked like that because the man was frowning for all he was worth, but Padme knew that look from her handmaidens’ faces, and the man was definitely pouting.

“Buir?” No, Fox didn’t whine. Ever.

Padme repressed her smile.

There was a chuckle thrumming in the chest pillowing her head and maybe –

‘-maybe’, Padme pondered, ‘love was actually enough’.

That didn’t absolve Anakin from finding out he was about to be a dad in the worst way ever.

Riders on the storm
Riders on the storm
Into this house, we're born

The world – and wars - were still spinning on when everything screeched to a halt.

It was not with a thunder, but a whimper.

One night, Padme went into labor, and the next day, there were no Corries to be found anywhere - which was a worrying fact – and the Chancellor – no, Darth Sidious -  was dead.

Bant Eerin was equally shocked when they listened to the holographic news. The Jedi Healer had been taking care of Padme at O’buir’s request, and it was a really big stroke of luck that she had been present because birthing Force sensitives was apparently no joke.

The Chancellor – or better, Sith Lord -  had been besieged by an unknown faction armed with slug throwers and some kind of shield generators that defied the Sith’s Force pushes -  truly the unstoppable force meeting an immovable object -  and they forced the kind Chancellor to show his true colours -  when the Chancellor realized that he was outmatched, he pulled all the stops -  red sabres, calling in droid reinforcements, Force lightning and liberal use of Force choking in an attempt to stave off the inevitable.

But the armored black tide edged with gold couldn’t have been stopped.  Terrifying in their coordination, they trapped the now monster more than the man in an array and the two commanders took on the   Sith despite Sith using some manner of a mind technique to subdue them.  When the Sith asked them who they were, eyes reddened with crazed loathing, the bigger one shrugged.

“We were born into this house.” The voice modulator crackled, revealing absolutely nothing.

“We were thrown into this world,” another one added. Their voices were also unrecognizable, much to the listeners' frustration.

“You could just say that we are riders in the storm.” The first being shrugged as they lifted the slugthrower, and in one small movement, they ended the Sith’s life.

Into this world, we're thrown
Like a dog without a bone
An actor out on loan
Riders on the storm

The Republic was in an uproar.  The Coruscant Guard had vanished, the 212^th was nowhere to be seen, Kamino was also unreachable.

Anakin had stormed into Padme’s house, heedless of the hubbub he caused with his disheveled appearance.

Only to be confronted by two wailing newborn babies and supremely unimpressed Padme, who was not amused at his plight of being stunned, tied up and shipped out in a small escape pod with coordinates to Coruscant.

CT-7567 finally got revenge on him for all those ‘volunteering flights’ Anakin had so loved to send him on.

Ahsoka vanished off with 505th… willingly.  Of course, she had promised to be back and be a badass auntie to two little Naberrie-Skywalkers, but for now… she was tired of war, and she just needed rest. Anakin didn’t like it, but surprisingly, he could understand.  Much to Padme’s exasperation, the foolish man would still  pout for days about it.

There was a surprisingly unpopular opinion that the war needed to end.  If the Separatists wanted to leave, then why hold onto them?  It was that or…. make the Senate come under much harsher surveillance.

Mace Windu was not amused.  In fact, the Korun Jedi straight out lost his temper in the Senate and reminded the Senators that the Reformation Act had been  thoroughly and irreparably broken by the late Chancellor -  and Senators -  and while the Jedi had absconded their military power, their participation in this mess of war was under duress.

And now, the Jedi were left with their numbers in shambles, the entire people who still didn’t have any citizenship or rights and if the much-honored Senate expected them to lead their war again, then by all means, they would be welcome to do that by themselves on the frontlines.

It had been a performance of the lifetime, Ponds later on told his vod’e, awed.  True, Mace Windu was an amateur actor, but this… this was his masterpiece.

(In fact, the holos of Mace’s talk would be saved for posterity for generations to come.   They would be better known as the Day When Jedi Lost Their Tempers.   It was only one jedi, but the thought counted anyway.)

Mace cut a terrifying figure, with pale skin, bloodshot eyes, and rumpled robes that were singed by enemy’s fire.  It didn’t help that the Korun hadn’t had any sleep in five days and a nameless someone (that was Anakin) stole all of his caf.

Riders on the storm
Riders on the storm
Riders on the storm
Riders on the storm

Padme wasn’t surprised when O’buir finally called from Kamino, a small boy clone held in his lap as they conversed over the holoprojector.

But she was surprised when O’buir had been kissed in passing by Wooley and then by Boil and  …. was that  Kix? 

‘O’buir?” she asked, confused.

The amusement only mounted when O’buir was squeezed between Alpha-17 and Kode  - Kote?

“Yes, dear?” came O’buir’s reply, and Padme had to stifle a giggle  at the two clone’s identical not-pouts.

“So… When will you marry them?” she asked, smiling. O’buir’s eyes widened, and he groaned, covering his eyes with exasperation.

“You too, Padme?” He huffed out as Kote pecked his right cheek. “Pay up, cyare. I knew she would cotton on.” The commander smiled a toothy smirk that was warmed by obvious affection in his eyes.

“Cody! You’re mean!” O’buir pouted at the soldier beside him.

“We were so karking obvious and you still complain that we are mean?”  Alpha-17 grumped out, annoyed.

“You were not!” O’buir protested, huffing.

“But buir, you were.” The small boy piped up. Dark eyes looked up into kind blue ones as the boy scrunched his nose in an adorable frown. “How could you ignore being manhandled into a courting armor is beyond me.”  Oh, Padme would love to immortalize that embarrassed blush on Jedi Master’s cheeks.

“Jay!” O’buir’s voice rosed into a scandalized gasp. “That was – “

“If you say uncivilized, I will tell your other husbands that you need remedial lessons on being  our  riduur. “Bones sniffed from above as he put his chin on top of O’buir’s head as he hugged him from behind.

Judging by O’buir’s flushed cheeks those ‘remedial lessons’ were a bit more than described. “I will tell Fox on you.” O’buir grumbled out, huffing with satisfaction as all three of the clones blanched.

“Please, no. Your Cor’ike are a scary bunch.”  Cody shuddered; his eyes wide. “And they still haven’t stopped giving us that shovel talk!”

“Fox still hadn’t forgiven us for saddling him with all the paper to legalize the marriages…” Alpha-17 trailed off.

“So?  I’d gladly host your marriage. Being a Senator has to have at least some perks.” Padme piped up, smiling at their deer-caught-in-headlights look.

The little boy side-eyed her. “I’d thank you for reserving at least 577 days to celebrate.” His high voice made Padme want to coo but… 577 days?

“Why so many?” She smiled at the boy who now sighed, and the three clones in the background smiled all teeth while O’buir hid his face in hand, but there was still that red color showing on the tips on his ears.

“Haven’t you heard? O’buir has 577 riduur’e.”

“577… riduur’e.” Padme slowly repeated foreign word, her brain whirling with new information. Wait.  Wasn’t riduur another world for a husband? And riduur’e was plural, meaning husbands….

“You – “ Padme trailed off when it finally hit her. “You have 577 HUSBANDS!?” she shrieked, prompting Anakin to pop his head into the room.

“Um. Yes?”  Obi’wan’s reply was more of a question than a confession, and the poor man was by now beet red in the face.  

If Padme hadn’t been sitting down back then, she would’ve collapsed with sheer disbelief.  “You utter, absolute, filthy bastard. Do you know just how much time it would take to prepare wedding gifts for so many husbands?”  She snapped out, pointing threateningly at the man on the other side of the holo.

“Padme!” Anakin’s scandalized gasp didn’t deter Senator Naberrie-Skywalker from her mission—er, warpath. "You’d better send me all the names of my new stepfathers and stepbrothers, do you hear me, Obi-Wan Kenobi?” she demanded as she rose, her eyes flashing with manic determination as O’buir squeaked out his assent.

“Well, let’s go tell the boys the happy news, shall we?” Alpha-17 kissed O’buir’s left temple and then, the call disconnected.

Anakin’s eyes were huge.  “Padme, darling…? He trailed off as his beloved wife, the sun of his life, whirled on him as she grabbed him by his mechno hand and tugged him out of the comm room, causing him to squawk at the feral maneuver. “-Oof, what’s the hurry, Padme!?”

Padme gave him a too-wide smile. “It seems, my dear husband, that we have too little time to prepare wedding gifts for too many husbands of one Obi-Wan Kenobi. If we are concise, we need 577 gifts doubled and we absolutely need to book the venue for 577 days and ooh, there’s still honeymoon to consider – “

Anakin.exe stopped working.

Obi-Wan was getting. Married. To 577 beings.  Oh, dear Force.  Mace would have a coronary.

And Anakin couldn’t wait.

It seemed that while the old storm had passed, another one was on the horizon… and they would have to ride it out again.

But well, they weren’t called riders on the storm for naught, were they?

/Finito./