Chapter Text
Everything hurt.
Jedi Master Plo Koon had been injured often enough in his life, to know that it was bad. Judging from the effort it took for him to breathe, at least four ribs were broken. Probably more. His left arm felt like it was shredded, all the way from the shoulder to the elbow. Beneath that, he could strangely feel nothing. His legs hardly felt any better, but Plo was a bit grateful for that. If he could feel his legs hurt, it meant that at least his spine wasn’t severed.
The worst of it had to be the agony of the burnings, though. Fire was a foreign element to the Kel Dor, courtesy of being native to a planet with no oxygen for flames to consume. A much younger Plo had learned the hard way that his thick hide was highly vulnerable to it. Burning his fingers on an ignited candle, as a two year old youngling, was actually one of the earliest memories he had. He had always made shure to stay at a safe distance from open fires, since. Now though, every inch of skin, that wasn’t covered by his thick, protective Jedi robes, had been scorched and the pain was so overwhelming that it took every bit of discipline and willpower Plo had, not to scream.
Screaming would do him no good right now…
Slowely, the wounded Jedi opened his eyes and tried to make sense of his surroundings. Easier said than done. His vision wouldn’t stop spinning. So much so that he actually felt seasick. Plo tasted vomit in the back of his throat and shuddered at the thought of throwing up with his mask on. He would have cursed his Kel Dor biology, his inability to breathe on most planets without the aid of an anti- oxygen filter, if he wasn’t so shure that this very biology had saved his life when…
When he had been shot down and crashed into the building.
The memory of the events that had put him into his current predicament just made his urge to throw up even stronger. Plo had sensed a great disturbance in the force, a mere second before the missiles hit his Delta 7 and destroyed the left wings engine. There was nothing he could do to avoid, what happened afterwards. The Starfighter went out of control, hit a tower and then crashed through a neighboring building’s rooftop. The violence of the impact had practically ripped the Delta in half and tossed Plo out of the cockpit.
Luckily, he supposed. While the Kel Dor undoubtedly owned a good chunk of his many broken bones to being smashed face forward into concrete and durasteel, with a velocity that would have killed most sentient creatures in the galaxy, he would be burning alive right now if he was still trapped in that cockpit. He could hear the raging inferno that consumed the wreckage just a view meters from him, even over the constant ringing in his ears. He could also smell the burning jet fuel. And that told Plo two rather unnerving things. One: Since the sense of smell was usually a sensation denied to him, it meant that, in spite of miraculously not being completely torn off his face, his mask was certainly damaged enough to let unfiltered air in. It would only be a matter of time until the symptoms of oxygen poisoning would make themselves known. And two: He would be wise to get out of here. Or else he might end up as kel-dorien barbecue, after all.
Jedi Master Plo Koon did not fear death in service to the Jedi Order, the Republic, the protection of the many Innocent of the galaxy, and the pursuit of Justice in the names of those wrongfully harmed. But that did not mean that he had no self-preservation instincts. And burning to death in a ruined building, after being shot down by separatist resistance forces in such a cowardly fashion, was certainly not his first choice when it came to ‚kicking the bucket‘, as Sinker would probably put it. He just hoped that Jag and Comet had been spared from this fate. Or that they at least had had a softer landing than himself. Plo did not wish the agony he was currently experiencing on anyone, least of all his loyal clone companions. Hopefully, if his wingmen had been brought down in the ambush as well, Wolffe would have the sense of mind to not waste time better spent on rescuing his brothers, by trying to save his ‚General‘.
Force, how much Plo despised that title… He had lost count on how many times he and the, in any other situation so reasonable commander, had argued about the value of Plo's life in comparison to those of the clones. The Kel Dor hated himself for taking command over what was, for all intents and purposes, a slave army. He felt that, treating the troopers like normal humans, like the individuals they were beneath their uniform faces and armors and taking responsibility for their wellbeing and safety, was the least he could do to make it up to them. Even if he had to put himself in harms way to do so.
Wolffe meanwhile stubbornly insisted that the clones where bred to be expandable and that he, if he ever had to choose, would always have to put Plo’s safety first. No matter how much it might pain him to leave a brother behind, so he could save the Jedi’s sorry ass.
The last time they had this argument, it had actually escalated into a full blown shouting match.
Plo was somewhat infamous for his seemingly endless patience. But faced with such a lack of selfworth from a man as intelligent and capable as Wolffe, it had finally run out. Only the sting of his clawtips, digging into the palms of his tightly clenched fists, had kept him somewhat sane and grounded in that moment. It had been all he could do to prevented himself from just grabbing the other man by the shoulders and shaking some force-forsaken sense into him.
The Commander meanwhile was furious that Plo had gotten himself confined to the medbay. Again. All because of some shrapnel that had gotten imbeded into his left thigh, during a the rechent siege. And that the Jedi had not removed immediately, because the 104th was running short on bacta supplies, causing the wound to get badly infected.
Plo had tried to explain, as calm as he could manage at this point, that there where troopers who where actually at risk of loosing their limbs and needed the bacta more than he did.At those words, Wolffe came up so close to him that their faces where mere inches apart and yelled: „Fine then! Get yourself killed! `Cause that is going to help me and my brothers so much, when we get reassigned to some glorywhoreing imbecile like Ozzel! Or a karking traitor, like Krell! I'll make shure to thank your ghost, when I get the order to lead the pack straight ahead into a minefield or something!“
Leave it to Wolffe to unintentionally make Plo feel horrible for existing.
The mentions of the fallen Jedi Master who had decimated the 501st on Umbara, and of the incompetent Republic Officer who was ultimately responsible for Wolffe loosing his eye and nearly getting decommissioned, had the desired effect of hammering in just how important Plo Koons continued survival was for his troopers. Talk about being stuck between a rock and a hard place. If he really wanted to help the clones in the long run, he’d have to live and be their ‚owner‘. The realization had hit him like a runaway train and made the Kel Dor feel even more depressed and disappointed in himself than he already was.
Of course, the Commander had stumbled over himself with his apologys, as soon as he realized that he had hit a very raw nerve. As soon as his general slowely turned away from him and walked towards the door. Head hanging low and looking like a kicked puppy. Plo had accepted Wolffe’s apologys, of course, smiled and promised his Second in Comment that he would take better care of himself from now on. And had not been able to sleep the entire night after their fight. Plagued by nightmares of the men he'd come to think of as comrades, dear friends even, being led to their deaths, by someone who did not care….
The loud rumble of a piece of concrete landing right next to his head, brought Plo back to the present. He mentally scolded himself for getting lost in his thoughts as much as he had, loosing valuable time. „There is no emotion, there is peace." He reminded himself. Now was not the time to let remorse get the better of him and doom him to inaction. His men needed him. Alive! And so, he started to crawl towards a heap of fallen debree from the collapsed rooftop, he had managed to spot near-by, through the haze of his still spinning vision. Plo did not trust his body to be able to stand up and carry him, but he needed to get into a sitting position to properly check on his wounds. And to scout out a way out of the building from the more elevated angle.
It wasn’t a good plan by any means. But it gave him a goal. Something other than his pain to focus on.
o.O.o.O.o.O.o
It felt like hours until he reached his destination.
Had he been able to stand up, it would have taken him but three steps to reach the debree. But he could not and every inch he managed to advance, seemed to ignite new fires in his smashed chest. Ever so often, he had to pause, because the pain was just to much to bare. The Jedi caught himself contemplating to take a break. To close his eyes again and sleep a little. Not a good sign.
Plo’s external injuries appeared bad already. The sight of his right arm, the only of his four limbs that seemed intact enough for usage, was enough to make his stomach turn. The skin was burned to the point of being blackened and cracked open wherever blisters had formed. He found that he did not look forward to seeing how the rest of him looked like. But the exhaustion that was slowly taking over him, was a sign of excessive blood loss. Possibly internal. He really hoped that was not the case, since even a straight-up headdive into a bacta tank couldn’t do much to help with inner bleedings. He would require surgery and perhaps a blood transfusion. At least for the later, his troopers would have take him back to Dorin.
Once again, the Kel Dor cursed himself for causing them so much trouble. He should have reacted faster. Surely, he could have sensed the attack early enough to avoid the crash, had his thoughts not been wandering off, much like they had just before.
Getting lost in his own head, used to be an obnoctius quirk in his youth. One that had taken many years of discipline, and a lot off patience on his Masters part, for Plo to grow out of.
That he was starting to fall back into the old habits of his unbalanced younger self, after nearly two centuries, was concerning, to say the least.
This war must have truly began to take its toll on his psyche. No matter how much he meditated, no matter how often he released all of his bottled up emotions into the force, the guilt always came back with a vengance. So many lives he couldn’t save. Clone, Jedi and Civilian alike. So much destruction and suffering he had been powerless to prevent. Or worse, that he had brought with him when he conquered yet another speratist world for the republic. The reality that he was leading an army of slaves, in opposition to all his oaths as both a Jedi and a Baran Do Sage. Pit, in opposition to his own morals as a decent, sentient being! The disaster that had been Ahsokas trial…
This one in particular weighted heavily on his mind these days. He had known she was innocent, just as much as Skywalker had. And yet, all Plo had done to help her, was to vote against expelling her from the Order. An ultimately futile effort. He had known that from the moment the words had left his throat. If it had not been for young Anakin, going above and beyond to uncover the truth, his little `Soka would be dead now, executed for a crime she did not commit. He could not blame her for leaving. It had broken his heart, to see the little girl he had once carried into the temple for the first time, sleeping soundly in his arms, turn her back and walk away from the Jedi, from her life, without a word. All because the council had been unable to sense the truth. How had the dark side managed to grow strong enaugh to blind them like this? Plo had no answer to this Question and, admittedly, this frustrated him to no end. But holding on to frustration was not the Jedi way. So he suppressed his musings once more, and crossed the final inch between himself and the debree. He had to concentrate on staying alive. Make an assessment of his physical condition and find a possible escape route. If the force was with him, he’d have time to contemplate his failures later…
Plo made an attempt to drag himself into a sitting position. He concentrated all his remaining energy into pulling himself up.
But his wounded body just wasn’t up to the task. The last reminisce of strength the Jedi had, was quickly fading and he collapsed back onto the ground, groaning in pain. Still, he tried again. And again. And again, until he was on the verge of passing out. Colorful lights and shadows, all of which really should not be there, danced before his eyes and the Kel Dor had no choice but to pause.
„Just focus on breathing.“ He thought to himself. „Breathe in. Breathe out. In. Out.“
It worked, after a moment. The slow, controlled intake of air helped him to clear his mind and face the facts. There was no getting up, his injuries where to severe. Plo had already suspected that both of his legs where broken. And, apperantly, from the way it shifted in a way it shouldn’t, so was his hip bone. As for his left arm, it was…unavailable.
Plo shuddered and turned his eyes away from the sight of the bleeding, torn up stump, that had been a healthy, intact limb just this moring. He would require a cybernetic replacement. Not exactly a comfortable thought. Especially not for a Jedi.
A Force Wielder‘s connection to the force was made possible by the medichlorians, the microscopic organisms that functioned as a conduit between the cosmic force and the living force. To loose a part of one’s body, and thus permanently loose cells that produced new medichlorians when old ones died, could severeally weaken a Force User’s bond with the force, regardless weater they where Jedi or Sith. Not to mention that, no matter how many sensors where imbeded into a prosthetic to make it feel like the real deal, it could never feel real to them, as there was no live energy flowing through it.
Given how many battles he’d fought in his long live, Plo should properly consider himself lucky that he had managed to keep all of his limbs intact for as long as he had. Still, it was abhorrent. Unnatural. Nightmarish even.
These days, the first image that came to his mind when thinking about cybernetics, was General Grievous. And the mere thought of the mad Kaleesh warlord, who had allowed the Geonosian scientists to compleatly mutilate his body, just to become more effective in slaughtering Jedi, left Plo rather… disturbed. He had asked himself more than once, just how twisted Grievous‘ mind had to be, to allow this. Even a non-force sensitive had to feel all kinds of wrong, even thinking about a procedure like that. The Kel Dor admitted that he had felt a sense of relief at the news that Master Kenobi had succeeded to finally put the psychopath out of his misery. Normally, Plo would never feel this way about the death of a living being. But he was not shure if anyone, even a droid, could have ever used the word ‚alive‘ to describe Grievous. Undead perhaps. But not alive. And this did not even factor in all the unnecessary death, this monster had gleefully inflicted upon the Jedi and the Republic. Even his own allies, in some cases. Nothing, that the man that Grievous once was went through, could ever excuse this amount of carnage.
No. If Plo was honest with himself, he was not just relieved that Grievous was gone for good. He was pleased. Vindictiveness was not the Jedi way, and Plo lived by that. He was always willing to give second chances. But some indeviduals just went to far to deserve his or anyone else’s mercy…
o.O.o.O.o.O.o
Suddenly, a coughing fit shook Plo’s shattered body and reminded him that his mask was damaged. The oxygen, seeping through the broken filters, was starting to corrode the inner tissue of his lungs and it felt, as if the gas that was so precious to most live in the galaxy, but so deadly to him, was setting what remained of his blood on fire. Burning him a second time, now from within. His situation was becoming more and more dire by the second, Plo realized. If he didn’t get to a medic soon, he would not have to worry about having to live with an artifical arm. But he couldn’t move anymore, his energy was spend for good.
There was no denying it any further. He could not get out on his own, he needed the help of his troopers. He just hoped that Jag and Comet where save and that he would not doom them by taking up the aid they might need.
Plo took as deep of a breath as he dared, released all his pain and melancholy into the force and opened his mental barriers, to telepathically inform Wolffe that he was in dire need of assistance.
Only to release the scream he had been holding back since waking up, as an onslaught of fear and death, echoing through the force, hit him like a raging bantha.
„No. It can’t be!“
Horrible visions began to flood his consciousness.
The Jedi. They were dying!
Unable to close his mental barriers again, or to shield himself from the nightmare that had fallen uppon him in any other way, Plo Koon found himself forced to helplessly watch the Jedi Order, his family, his existence, being slaughtered one by one.
Ki-Adi Mundi. Defending himself fircely but in the end, felled by blaster fire.
„No.“
Stass Allie. Crashing on her speederbike, after being shot from behind.
„Please.“
Saesee Tiin. Reduced to atoms by the fire of a heavy cruiser.
„Stop.“
Aayla Secura. Continously shot in the back, long after she had fallen.
„Please stop!“
Depa Billaba. Gunned down while covering her young Padawans escape.
„Stop!“
Shaak Ti. Stabbed in the back, while meditating.
„STOP!“
Sha, his young niece. Bravely standing her ground, determined to not let anyone enter the council chamber, where the younglings were hiding. Fighting with everything she had, but finally overwhelmed. Dead by a lightsaber through her heart, before her body even hit the ground.
„NOOO!“
More and more horrorfying images continued to wash over his mind like a tsunami. Masters, Knights, Padawans, even the helpless younglings. Shot or cut down, without mercy. Without remorse. Plo couldn’t care anymore that screaming hurt his already damaged lungs further. The pain that his body felt, the dull, ever present self-loathing and guilt, was now nothing in comparison to the agonizing grief that had just shattered his mind and soul. This could not be happening. It had to be a hallucination, induced by brain damage! Or a vision of events yet to come! It was just not possible that the Jedi were destroyed. An Order that had stood strong for thousands of years, could not be wiped out in mere minutes! But Plo Koon had never had a strong affinity for future visions. And deep inside, he knew it was no hallucination, either. The Jedi where gone. His purpose was gone. His family was gone.
He was alone.
O.o.O.o.O
The Kel Dor didn’t know how much time had passed, how long he laid there, still screaming and sobbing uncontrollably. But he couldn’t bring himself to care anymore. Everything he had held dear, Everyone he had cared about was no more. Dead, slaughtered. He still heard their dieing screams, echoing through his mind, as if the force itself was writhing in agony at their demise. He was not shure they’d ever be silent again. He was not shure he even wanted to live to find out. It hurt to much.
……
Suddenly, something caught his attention. The sound of footsteps coming his way. Familiar, military grade boots. Plo opened his eyes and tilted his head, to see a clone trooper coming his way. The pattern of the grey paintings on his armor identifying him as his dear friend, Commander Wolffe. For a brief moment, hope and unbridled joy cutted their way through the thick fog of grief that had overtaken his mind, like a lightsaber through a wall of durasteel. He still had his troopers, his comrades in arms. He wasn’t completely alone…
But it did not last long. There was something, deep in the back of his mind that was not relived at all. Something that screamed: „Danger!“ And he remembered. The ones who had shown up in all of his hazy visions. The ones who executed most of the Jedi. It dawned on him then. The truth he had denied this entire time. There was no seperatist resistence in this city left. The republic had rooted out the remaining strongholds weeks ago. Jag and Comet had not been shot down with him. They were the ones who shot him.
Plo felt a numbing coldness settle into his shattered bones and broken mind. The clones. They had murdered the Jedi. The people who had fought and died with them, for them, for three years. They had murdered them in cold blood. The slaves had overthrown their masters. Plo had feared, from the moment he had learned where all these thousands upon thousands of almost identical looking Mandos came from, that they resented the Jedi for the part they had played in their suffering. Perhaps even hated them. But he had never thought that the clones hated them this much. That Wolffe, Sinker, Boost, Warthog, Comet, Jag, Tracer, Mohawk, Riptide, Shard, Frostbite, Roamer, Snap, Joker, Blades, Folly, Bombshell, Ringer, Hook, Cutter, Scope and all the other members of the Wolfpack hated him this much. He had tried so hard to do right by them. Had he failed?
As if to answer his former generals unspoken questions, Wolffe readied his blaster and aimed it at Plo’s head. For a moment, they only stared at each other. Looking past their respective visors and goggles, into each other’s eyes. Plo wondered if the Commanders gaze had always been so empty, whenever the Kel Dor had turned his back on him. If he had always been so droid-like. If Plo had just imagined the no-nonsense attitude, the blunt honesty, the rare smiles and dry witt. All the things that made Wolffe Wolffe seemed to have been erased, somehow. Had they ever been there? Had Plo just imagined it all? Was he just imaging the slight trembling in the Commanders hands, that where shure to throw his aim off, right now?
There where so many questions.
But Jedi Master Plo Koon only had the strength left to ask one.
„Why?“
The trembling intensified. Then stopped. From behind the familiar helmet, Wolffe answered, monotone and cold.
„Good soldiers follow orders.“
Then he pulled the trigger.
~to be continued.