Chapter Text
19 BBY
Rex had fled with Ahsoka and some of his men after the Order had gone out and the Republic had crumbled around them.
He’d tried for days to get back in contact with General Skywalker, days to get back in contact with Cody.
His General never answered, and for the longest time he assumed it meant he’d died with the thousands of jetii. It wasn’t until footage came through on the ‘net about the attack on the Temple, with one particular still frame showing a man leading the rest of the 501 on the march in, that he and Ahsoka came to the slow realization that their General may as well be dead. He’d Fallen and betrayed them in the worst way.
General Kenobi was listed as the single most-wanted man in the entire Empire.
He realized as he watched over his vode as he got their chips removed, that Cody was compromised. He’d protect Ahsoka until he had her somewhere safe, then he would go to Cody and free him.
Then he remembered his General’s barely-secret marriage to the Senator Amidala.
Ahsoka had stared, just as he had, as they’d watched the memorial service being broadcast from Naboo.
He’d asked her if she saw any mention of the Senator’s child surviving their mother’s death.
Ahsoka had stared at him for a very long moment then asked blankly, “What child?”.
Ventress had just laughed from the cockpit, mocking them about how the Light was full of secrets and shadows.
~
It had taken him far longer than he would want to admit to, months of time scouring the ‘net for any mention of Senator Amidala’s child, before he’d stared at a picture of Senator Bail Organa and his wife, Queen Breha, where they’d announcing they’d adopted a little girl.
Most would assume it was just another baby girl, but he’d had a lifetime with thousands of men he called vod who all had the same face with very small differences between them. He could recognize a feature here, a feature there, in the baby’s face.
He looked at the child of his General.
He showed Ahsoka the picture.
She finally asked him how he’d known about a child.
He’d had to explain with a blush high on his cheeks about more than once catching the two of them together while on leave, about how his General had always been protective of the Senator, which had then doubled abruptly and the Senator’s doubles had been seen more in any official footage about ten months prior. Particularly the last couple of months though. And how any footage with the Senator was always showing her in some sort of heavy ornate dress that completely obscured a growing mid-section.
Ahsoka had been very quiet as she’d stared at the picture he’d printed out.
She didn’t need to do anything more to express the hurt they both felt that neither had trusted them enough to even tell them officially about the marriage, let alone about the child they would have had to come clean about in very short order if Order 66 had never happened. Particularly not with how hindsight was twenty/twenty and they could recognize now how the General had never trusted them as much as he’d said.
They didn’t have long to ruminate on the loss of Anakin Skywalker though when the Emperor’s enforcer, Darth Vader, started hunting them. More than once he’d had to pull Ahsoka away from trying to engage him and avenge her Master, with her eyes yellow-ringed.