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She knows they can’t stay together.
She’s sure he knows it too, though he won’t be the one to say it. He doesn’t say much of anything, anymore. The weeks that have passed since they left Berelith have been filled with strained silence, heavy and cold and, as much as she hates it, she understands. He’s still grieving. They both are. She wonders if they’ll ever really stop.
She wonders about a lot of things, now. She tries not to - it won’t do her any good - but the reality of it all seeps in anyways. The Force is quiet too, frayed and dark and bloodstained at the edges. She’s afraid to reach for it; afraid of the raw emptiness that she knows is waiting in the places her friends and fellow Jedi used to be. She wonders how they died; if they were afraid, and in pain, or if it was quick. Had they been shown mercy? Had they even had a moment to realize what was happening?
She thinks, sometimes, on the nights without dreams, that she can still feel some of them. She never knows who. Maybe it’s someone familiar, like Master Kenobi or Master Plo. Maybe it’s a Jedi she’s never met, searching the Force for survivors, for some reassurance that they’re not alone. Some nights, she almost reaches back.
But then she remembers. They are alone. The Order is gone. Their home, the Temple, is gone. And Anakin - the bright warmth at the other end of their bond - is gone. For all she knows, they’re just echoes, and she can’t afford to lose herself in chasing them.
The Jedi are all but extinct. And the galaxy is a much scarier place without them.
They’ve only stopped a few times. First, to go to ground. A Y-Wing would attract too much attention, and there was already chatter about the new Empire’s plans to phase out the older ship models. So, she had risked everything, one more time, and had gone back to Trace and Rafa Martez. The gamble had paid off. The sisters had given them a place to stay, and it had been them - not her and Rex - to sell the Y-Wing for scrap. A few days later, and they had a new ship; shaky, but serviceable. She’d almost gotten Rex to smile when she’d suggested they name it the “Twilight”.
Trace had asked her if it was true; if the Jedi really had betrayed the Republic. She hadn’t had an answer - not one she was confident in, anyways - but she’d given one. Even if they had, even if she truly believed that the Council would have ever gone that far and done the things Sidious claimed, they hadn’t deserved to be slaughtered. Not so dispassionately, not so indiscriminately, and not by the Clones - the men - they had stood and fought beside for so long. Men they’d trusted. Men who hadn’t been given a choice.
She had been glad to leave Coruscant behind.
She wonders about them, too. The rest of the 501st, and the 212th, and the 104th. She can’t bear to do it for long, otherwise she finds herself back there: on Berelith, standing before row upon row of graves filled with the bodies of good men. She wonders if anyone else would have bothered to bury them. She wonders how many they left, corpses twisted and trapped in the wreckage where nothing and no one will ever reach. And sometimes, she wonders if she had had any right to leave her lightsaber there amongst them: men she had not wanted to hurt, but who had died anyways. She likes to think, maybe, they would have allowed her that privilege; to lay herself, and everything she had been, to rest alongside the fellow soldiers who had given her so much.
Ahsoka Tano is, for all intents and purposes, dead. So is Commander Rex. Two more names added to a list: the ten thousand that died, and the six million that died with them.
Which is part of what makes this so hard.
She doesn’t want to leave; to lose what little stability they have left in the turbulence of a changing galaxy. She fought to keep him by her side. He fought to do the very same in return. But if they stay together, that’s what it will be forever: a fight. They’re both soldiers, but he deserves better than that. His war is over. Hers will never be.
The night they reach Adarlon, she decides it’s time. The Minos Cluster is as good a place to disappear as any in the Outer Rim. Without her lightsabers, without her gear, no one will pay her any mind. Looking out over the bustling market from the wall of the spaceport, she imagines herself as one of them, just a face in the crowd, and almost convinces herself it could be her new normal.
Footsteps hit the durasteel ladder. She closes her eyes. It will hurt, for both of them, but it is the right thing to do. The certainty gives her courage.
“Supplies are onboard. Ready to get going?”
Ahsoka takes a breath. Lets it out slowly.
“I’m not coming with you, Rex,” she says. He sighs, so heavily it sounds painful, and sits next to her. She thinks for a moment he might try to dissuade her, but all he does is put a hand on her shoulder. The grounding gesture and the warmth - the acceptance - that radiates from it is somehow worse.
“I know,” he says, and squeezes lightly before drawing away. They’re both silent, but this time, it’s like it used to be. The kind of silence they had learned to read where words didn’t cut it.
“What are you going to do?” He asks, finally.
She shakes her head. “I don’t know. Not yet. But I think...” She stops and considers how to put it. “I think it would be best to get lost, for a while.”
“You tried that before.”
Ahsoka stiffens at his dry tone, but when she glances at him, the anger she expects isn’t there. He’s smirking. She relaxes on a huff of laughter. The snark is new from him, but welcome.
“Yeah,” she says. “I’m not very good at it.” Another gentle quiet, where the sounds of the city and the crowds below wash over them both. She raps her knuckles on the duracrete and grimaces. “I wish I was.”
“I don’t.” He doesn’t elaborate. He doesn’t need to. Ahsoka smiles; small, and tired, but real. It fades quickly.
“I’ll get you in too much trouble if I stick around. They’ll be looking for those that are left.”
“You could let me help.”
It’s not quite an accusation, but she hears one anyways, and just barely fights back a wince. It is his choice. She would never dream of taking that away from him; especially not now, after everything. But she has to make him understand that she’s making hers. So, she straightens a little and nods and finally faces him. Her voice is deceptively even.
“I know. I could also end up getting you killed.” It’s true, and she knows he knows it. He frowns, but she continues before he can protest, tone dipping with the weight of the weeks they’ve spent running and the years of it she knows will be ahead. “I need to know someone’s made it out of this, Rex. That someone lived.”
“So do I.”
“And I did,” she says. It’s not a lie, but it’s also not entirely the truth either, so she amends it a heartbeat later. “I will.”
He looks away. She watches him struggle; turn his own thoughts over and over in his mind, a private war raging behind eyes that have seen far too much yet so little. There are places she wants to tell him to go, things she’s read about in books at the Temple. The galaxy, even under the Empire, has things to offer him, but she’s not sure he wants them to begin with.
As if reading her mind, he shakes his head. “I was bred for war, Ahsoka,” he says, so softly it’s almost lost to the din of the spaceport. “Without it... I don’t know what I am.”
“Then go find out.” She can’t keep the sharpness out of her tone, but it’s one that borders on a plea. Rex sighs again, trembling somewhere just shy of a sob. She finally gives in and reaches out, fingers brushing the stubble lining his jaw.
“Live a life you choose to, Rex. If not for me, then for all of the people who can’t anymore.”
It’s maybe not a fair request, and it sits aching in her chest even as she says it. She’s not trying to be fair, though, because she knows he’d stay, if she asked him to. Watch her back, like he always has. He’d follow her anywhere. He’s also the only bright spot she can see in all the encroaching darkness and, even if by this she dims it, she cannot - she will not - be the reason that light dies.
He meets her gaze. “But not one that keeps me with you.”
It’s not a question. “No,” she replies. “I’m sorry.”
He falls silent. A breeze caresses her face. For one desperate moment, Ahsoka hesitates, and nearly changes her mind. Then, Rex nods, and reaches for the bag slung over his shoulder. He takes her hand and stands, pulling her with him, and then presses something into her palm. She blinks at the device glinting up at her for a long minute before realizing what it is.
“Keep it on you,” he says, gesturing to the comlink. For a second, she recognizes him - the Captain of the 501st, unwavering in his determination - and how much she’ll miss him threatens to overwhelm her. “If you ever need anything... I’ll find you.”
There’s a promise in those words, and Ahsoka smiles again. “I’ll hold you to that.”
She steps forward, movements sure, and wraps her arms around him. She feels him tense, but the next moment, the embrace is returned, strong and warm and safe, and she revels in it one last time.
“We’ll see each other again,” she whispers. “Believe that.” His hold tightens. He says nothing; makes no sound as damp seeps into the fabric at her shoulder. Her own eyes grow watery, and she swallows past the lump in her throat.
She can’t call herself a Jedi anymore, but it takes the will of one to finally, slowly, let go.
She steps away, a hand sliding to his shoulder, then back to her side. “Good luck.”
He smiles, and her heart clenches. It doesn’t ease as they climb back down to the platform, nor as she watches him walk up the ramp into the ship. She takes one more look at him, then turns and heads for the doors that will lead her into the market.
“Ahsoka.”
She stops, and looks back. His hand is raised in farewell. “May the Force be with you.”
She waits and watches until the ship has lifted off, and the crackle of the engine has faded, and she can just barely track the glittering speck careening off to join the stars. The words tumble from her lips softly, carried off into the night with the last reminder of a life she had once called home.
“May the Force be with you.”