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CC-2224 dies clutching a brown robe in his shaking hands like it’s a life-line. He dies with Vader standing over him, ordering him to let go of the one connection he has to his General - to the love of his miserable life, to the life CC-2224 can barely remember anymore; his [TRAITOR] is dead, and CC-2224 wants to die with him, he wants to die with his mind finally his own for the first time in nineteen years. He’s an outdated relic, something that should have died years ago like all of his vod’e, like his [TRAITOR] but - but he hadn’t died, and neither had his [TRAITOR] all those years ago.
But he’s dead now - he died infront of CC-2224’s eyes, and he had felt nothing until Vader had ordered him to collect the fallen robes and lightsaber and dispose of them. CC-2224 had knelt to collect them, a sense of déjà vu threatening to drown him - he’s done this before, CC-2224 knows, he used to hold onto the lost robes and used them as blankets during hard nights - and his fingers had knotted into the rough fabric, and suddenly he couldn’t let go. He wouldn’t let go, and he wouldn’t let anyone else touch the items in front of him, because his [TRAITOR] is gone and it’s up to CC-2224 to look after his things. The lightsaber still sings in greeting in CC-2224’s hands, a mournful tune now, and while the cloak smells different than it had during the War, it still smells like his [TRAITOR] and brings back memories of late night tea and carefully made spiced caff, it reminds him of home and love and hope . It makes him remember tousled copper hair, and loving blue-gray eyes, and gentle touches and words and secret kisses.
CC-2224 dies with tears in his eyes and a lightsaber through his chest.
And Cody wakes up.
He wakes up thrashing and screaming, blood dripping from his nose, his ears, his eyes, and with hands desperately trying to hold him down, familiar voices talking over him. He wakes up on Kamino, surrounded by his vod’e, decades younger than he had been moments before, his scar shiny and new - just like him. He’s a cadet again, the Jedi haven’t come for them yet, the War is still just a pipe dream of whatever constituted freedom to them back then. Sidious hasn’t taken control of the Galaxy, his vod’e are still alive.
Obi-Wan is still alive .
And the Kaminoans are calling for Cody’s decommissioning; apparently, in the moments his ‘attack’ had begun, before it had knocked him to the ground bleeding from all orifices, Cody had torn one of their scientists apart with his bare hands before collapsing in seizures.
Cody refuses to die.
Not when he’s himself again, not when he’s somehow years in the past and has the opportunity to fix things. Not when his cyare is still alive out there. So Cody straightens, lifts his chin, and says no when the longnecks come to collect him from the bunkroom he shares with his batchmates. Ringing silence is the answer he gets, because he’s never said no before - none of them have, it’s against everything they were taught to do, and to so many of the Vode present, they’d never even thought they could . But Cody, he’s survived too much to die now; he’s lived through War, he’s fallen in love, he’s broken every reg he once believed should rule his life, and he knows that everything is a lie.
They were never meant to serve the Jedi.
They were made for the Sith.
And Cody - Cody who is finally himself again and refuses to be CC-2224 ever again - says no , and the Vode follow. He gives them an example, a figurehead, someone to follow. He’s one of them, and they’d always choose him over the scientists and trainers who had tortured them their entire lives; it’s a shocking realization to come upon that they outnumber every single being that had made them miserable, who had made them hurt and who killed so many of them. They’ve been trained to be deadly, they were made to destroy the Jedi, and Cody helps them turn that onto the beings who had created them. Within hours, the facility is theirs, and the other Kaminoans spread across the planet turn the other way, unwilling to associate with the demogolka when faced with thousands of angry, well-trained soldiers. The Cuy’val Dar, while composed of ruthless bounty hunters and bloodthirsty warriors, aren’t stupid, and they quickly come to terms with the fact that they’re outnumbered and not likely to get anymore credits out of torturing them; Jango himself seems to be undergoing a minor moral conundrum, forced to come face to face with the clones that he had considered as nothing more than fancy droids and a way to get revenge as he is.
They may be clones, but they’re also humans; they were children who he had ordered tortured and allowed to be experimented on, and that goes against everything that Mandalorians believed in. They’re as human as Boba is, the only difference between them and their littlest oldest brother is that Boba’s biology wasn’t tampered with, and he got to grow up knowing that he mattered, and that he was loved. Jango has to live with that now, and he will live, if Cody has anything to say about it, because as much as he hates their template and wants him to burn, he doesn’t want Boba to be hurt by the loss.
At least Jango is reasonable, and takes their order for him and his followers to leave the planet seriously; he’s gone within a few days, taking the Cuy’val Dar and Boba with him, and leaving the facility to the Vode. They slice through the Kaminoans’ files, collecting every dark little secret the scientists had hoarded, and Cody can’t help but laugh at the irony as they uncover Dooku’s little contingency plan in the form of a massive datafile full of every single detail about what his Master had been up to, and the truth of what he is.
Cody laughs when he uploads the file onto the holonet, and sits back and watches the explosion that follows. It takes three months, but eventually the Senate manages to gather itself enough to elect a new Chancellor in Onaconda Farr, Palpatine is dead - killed in what sounds like an epic lightsaber duel in the Senate dome, but no news sources reveal who it was who delivered the killing blow - and Dooku had been found dead on Serenno, the bounty on his head claimed by Jango Fett. The Senate is finally getting around to sending a group of negotiators to Kamino to speak with the Vode and organize Republic citizenship for them, and as the Vod’alor, Cody has to be there for the talks, no matter how much he hates it.
Cody and his Council sit in the large conference room they’ve converted for this meeting, and it’s only years of standing at his General’s side during negotiations that stops Cody from showing his boredom and he sits rim-rod straight in the seat at the head of the table, a dour Alpha-17 and a serious Fordo at his shoulder, a stiff Fox on his left, and a slouching Rex on his right - the blond Vode doesn’t fully seem to understand why Cody has chosen him as his third-in-command, but it’s not exactly easy to explain to him that he became one of the most well-respected captains in the GAR in a future that would never happen. He straightens even further when the group sent by the Senate strides into the room, led by Stec and Keeli, with Waxer and Boil taking up the rear. Cody scans the group, but it’s the hint of copper and gray-blue eyes that catches his attention.
Obi-Wan Kenobi stands among the group of politicians, and the moment their eyes meet a hauntingly familiar bond blooms to life, filled with gentle care and warm forgiveness, and Cody can’t help but smile at the face of his love.