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When his vod’ad comes back from her first mission, Rex keeps a worried eye on her; he doesn’t know what happened on her undercover operation, but he does know that she had come back unconscious and bloody on a stolen Imperial shuttle and Wooley was dead. He had been the one to sit with his unconscious niece while the medics had fluttered around her, Cody and Obi-Wan having been pulled away by Odd Ball and Thire - the two of them had returned a few hours later, Cody nearly spitting flames and Obi-Wan stiff with a cold fury, and had stayed with their daughter until she had woken up. All of them - Odd Ball, Thire, Trapper, and Cody’s small family - had been tight lipped about what had happened, but Rex hadn’t managed to wrangle himself command training as a cadet with a physical mutation because he wasn’t able to read a room, he could tell whatever happened had been bad.
In the days that follow Wooley’s funeral, he watches as Mara flounders - he watches the way she clings to her family as they bury him, and then pushes them away afterwards. He watches both Cody and Obi-Wan try to talk to her, try to comfort her, but Mara only grows more and more tense as the days pass.
“She needs space.” Ahsoka says one night as she runs a hand over his broad shoulder, kissing his cheek before they head to bed. “She’s a lot like Master Obi-Wan.”
But Rex looks at his niece, and realizes that no - she’s not like Obi-Wan, who prefers to meditate over her problems and think them through in her own time. She’s not like Cody either, who, despite his regularly no-nonsense attitude, prefers gentle words and touches when things get too much for him to handle. Rex looks at Mara, and he sees himself; tightly wound and aggressive, looking for an outlet that won’t present itself. She’s grieving, and she’s hurt and scared, but she just wants everything to go on like nothing happened.
She doesn’t need space, or gentle comfort. She needs to let out steam; she needs to yell and fight something before it overwhelms her and burns her up.
So Rex decides to give her that outlet.
He finds Mara seated quietly in the room that the Order survivors had converted into a library, filled with texts and datapads that they had recovered or written themselves. Mara herself is pressed between two shelving units, eyes unfocused as she half-heartedly scans a datapad, red hair just long enough to curl around her ears and stick up wildly, barely longer than the cut Cody had worn during the Clone Wars and a lot less controlled. She’d definitely lost weight during and since her mission, her already loose clothing nearly pooling around her small frame, and she looked exhausted - the bags under her eyes reminding him of Obi-Wan and Cody at the start of the war.
“Hey kid.” Mara barely looks up and just grunts in response, and Rex lifts his eyebrow, unimpressed, crossing his arms over his chest. “Interesting read?”
“Not really.” She says bluntly, and Rex huffs.
“Then why are you reading it, vaar'ika?” He asks bluntly, studying her. “You hiding?” His niece bristles, shoulders stiffening as she lifts her head to glare at him, and Rex deftly plucks the datapad from her fingers, shoving it onto the shelf without much of a glance. Mara squeaks angrily, jumping to her feet as her cheeks pink in anger, and Rex is grabbing her immediately, tossing her over his shoulder like a sack of flour and marching from the library, ignoring her squirming with the same practise as he ignored the stares they got as he strides down the halls. Over his shoulder, Mara squirms and thrashes, but Rex knows that if she really didn’t want him lugging her around, she could easily escape. He’s annoying her, not angering her, and he figures she’s more stunned than anything else at his actions.
They reach the training room, and Rex punches in his access code with one hand, specifically pinging the bridge for privacy as he steps in and lets the door close behind them. Echo and Fives are the only ones in the room, both sprawled on a bench, shining with sweat, water bottles in hand, and leaning against each other, heads pressed together. One look at their former captain has both men making themselves scarce, collecting their things and retreating into the hall with only a worried look towards Mara’s cursing form laying limply on his shoulder, and a quick nod to Rex himself.
Finally, Rex drops his niece onto the nearest training mat, watching her land with cat-like grace to glare at him. “We’re sparring.” He tells her abruptly, and Mara blinks, eyes narrowing suspiciously. She doesn’t move, so he turns on his captain-voice, and barks, “Hit me, cadet.” A part of him feels a little guilty when Mara immediately jumps into action, falling into a stance instinctively as her expression shutters; he knows the words have put her back into the mindset of an Imperial cadet.
He dodges the jab for his hip smoothly, sidestepping a leg sweep, and ducking under an elbow aimed at his head. Rex loses track of time as he dodges and deflects his niece’s blows, amber eyes sharp on her expression as her attacks grows more and more desperate. There’s a distant glaze to her eyes, cheeks reddening even as the rest of her face pales, and the final straw comes when Mara lets loose a burst of Force, shoving Rex back and off of the training mat, landing him on his back, blinking stars out of his eyes.
Rex sits up immediately, eyes locking onto Mara’s pale face - she looks stunned, shaking faintly, and Rex stands as she crumbles. He catches her around the shoulders before her knees hit the ground, pulling her up and curling her against his chest as she breaks down into sobs. Her fingers knot into his shirt, face pressing against his chest, and Rex eases them onto the mat, letting his niece cling to him as she cries. He stays quiet, gently running his hands down her back, and eventually, Mara’s sobs slow into hiccups, shoulders shuddering, and Rex drops his cheek onto the top of her head.
“I’m sorry.” Mara whispers, voice hoarse and cracking. “I didn’t mean to.”
“It’s okay, Mar’ika.” Rex soothes, “I’ve had worse than a little push.”
She hiccups, tightening her hold on him as she curls closer. “I don’t want him to be right.”
“Who, ad'ika?” He asks, wrapping his arms around her as she shivers, and when she speaks, Rex stiffens.
“The Inquisitor.” Mara shudders, “He - he wanted me to - and he’s still alive . Still out there. I don’t want - I can still feel him - touching me.” Rex muffles the growl rising in his chest, not wanting to startle her, tightening his hold on her; an attempt to protect her from the demagolka who haunts her. The monster who would dare lay a hand on his vod’ad. “I see him in my dreams. He won’t leave me alone. I know that he’s not in my head anymore - but - but I can still feel him.”
“I won’t let him touch you again.” Rex swears, already thinking of plans to make the dar’jetii hurt, of ways to hunt him down and tear him limb from limb, and Mara shakes.
“He’d kill you.” She breathes wetly, horrified. “I don’t want anyone else to die. Wooley - he - it was my fault. I was being stupid, and he got shot because of me. I watched him - felt him - die. I don’t want to see it happen again.”
Rex pauses, gathering his thoughts, choosing his words before speaking. “I can’t promise you that it won’t happen again, Mara. Every mission we go on, every battle we march into - there’s always going to be the chance that one of us won’t return. But we chose to continue fighting.” He lets out a slow breath as Mara sniffles, “Y’know, during the War - I questioned the whole point of things. All those men dying, and for what? None of us had a choice, we were made to fight and die for a Republic that saw us as nothing more than droids with flesh, trained from decanting to sacrifice our lives for people who would never care about us. We couldn’t have said no.” He remembers Cut’s words, Slick’s venom, Krell’s poison - “The Senate voted to go to War, and we were expendable clones, just waiting for our turn to be slaughtered. We paid the price so that all those aruetiise could pat themselves on the back and go to their di'kutla parties. Safe and secure in their fancy apartments while we were falling in the thousands on their orders.” He sighs, “Some of us were lucky - we got Generals and Commanders who cared for us as people, as individuals, but even that was stained by the knowledge that they would still be leading us to our deaths. A lot of us grew bitter - angry - that this was our lot in life. And then the Republic fell and became the Empire, and so many of us were even further enslaved - we became the flesh droids people always thought we were.” He frowns, absently running a hand over the scar on his temple, feeling the familiar sting. “We didn’t choose to fight for the Republic then, but we’re choosing to do so now.”
“Choice is important to us clones.” Mara says, and Rex figures that she’s repeating something she’s heard, and he nods.
“It’s our choice to fight now.” He tells her, “And we don’t have the right to make that choice for you. If you don’t want to fight, I’ll talk to your parents - there’s no shame in not wanting to be a part of a war.”
Mara pulls away enough to stare at him, her golden-green eyes wide, before beginning to burn, “No!” She cries, hands fisting in his shirt and giving him a quick shake as she shakes her head. “No, I want to help - I do! But…” She bites her lip, “But the Stormtroopers - I don’t know if I’ll be able to - what if they’re…” Mara slumps slightly, resting her forehead on his shoulder. “I got close to the other cadets.” She admits with a guilty sigh, “I wanted them to come with us - and now I think of the Stormtroopers and I see them instead.”
Rex gives her a quick pat on the back of her head; and he feels for his niece - he really does. He had gone through the same thing, wondering if the Stormtroopers he was shooting had been his brothers once, wondering who they were under their helmets but not having the guts to pull them off and see their faces. The Clone Wars had been easy, in a way - nothing he was shooting at were living beings, just droids, but now he’s fighting against living, breathing people, with families and loved ones who would miss them. But he had reasoned with himself, that it was him or them - if he didn’t shoot them, would they shoot his men?
“You could do what your mother does.” Rex offers, “Give them a choice to stand down. But just remember, you and your men come first; you could offer them the choice not to fight, but they might not take it, and you’ll have to be ready to do what you need to to make sure you and your team make it back alive.” Against his shoulder, Mara lets out a harsh breath, before straightening and nodding, expression determined, and Rex smiles, gently laying a hand against the back of her neck. He draws her close, and presses their foreheads together.
“I love you, ba’vodu.”
“Love you too, kiddo.”