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“Any luck?” a voice called, echoing through the remains of the crashed venator.
Ahsoka leapt off one metal ledge to another, dust rising at the impact, sifting through the heavy wreckage of a once glorious ship. It was a slow process. One path cleared, another. Then she saw it—orange on white, peaking out from beneath a durasteel beam.
“Just one,” Ahsoka answered, her voice rough. Pain seeped through the words: Just one.
She didn’t know this man’s name. Somehow, that made it hurt more.
The Force felt muted and cold when she reached into it. Once an intricate and proud song, now a low, rhythmic hum, the sound of a fading heartbeat. Even her one remaining lightsaber, whose crystal had pulsed like a war drum only days ago, was silent at her hip. The beam rose along with her hands. She tried to ignore the dried blood covering it as it settled on the ground a few feet away.
She reached for the trooper. Fear still lingered in the Force, his last feelings forever imprinted upon him.
He would be the last one they retrieved.
Ahsoka knew there were more, but the venator was falling apart by the minute. If they weren’t careful, they’d get caught inside like everyone else.
I’ll do a second sweep tomorrow, Ahsoka promised herself, although her body screamed in protest.
Rex didn’t greet her. Instead, his eyes trailed to the armored corpse resting on her shoulder, following as Ahsoka gently put the man next to the others. “Do we know how many are still up there?” she asked, voice barely more than a whisper. Her tears had long since dried. Now she just felt…hollow.
“About a hundred, including the naval officers. But we’re not going back for them.”
Leave them? “We could try—“
“No,” Rex interrupted. Without his helmet, his emotions were raw and clear. He wanted to go back just as much as her—but unlike her, he knew restraint even in the most desperate hours. “It’s not worth the danger, and we don’t have the time.”
Both true. Ahsoka had lost track of the days. For all she knew, they had been stuck on this moon for a week. And I don’t want to stick around to meet whoever’s trying to hunt us down.
They stood side by side for a moment, gazing at the rows of bodies in front of them.
Mangled limbs, missing helmets. Some wore her markings.
It’s all my fault.
These men had trusted her with their lives. They didn’t care about her age, nor the fact that she’d abandoned the Jedi—abandoned them. They had welcomed her back into command with open arms and followed her lead unflinchingly.
And what had Ahsoka done with that gift?
You failed them.
Anakin had once told her loss was part of war. With a clenching heart, she closed her eyes and tried to picture that moment above Ryloth from years ago, when she had gotten her squadron killed in a moment of recklessness. She had been beaten down so terribly, yet Anakin had been there for her. Even when he hadn’t wanted a padawan—and Ahsoka certainly hadn’t made it easy for him to come around—Anakin comforted her in the moments she needed him most.
Always. Except for right now.
Her master had been a wildfire in the Force. His presence so bright that, even in her transport to Christophsis as a fresh-faced padawan, Ahsoka had been able to feel it. At first it had been intimidating, if not downright terrifying, but, as their training bond grew stronger, it came to mean safety, trust, and a friend she could count on in any corner of the galaxy.
Yet something had managed to extinguish those unrelenting flames, leaving only a gaping wound in the very fabric of the universe.
Ahsoka didn’t want to think about it, but her thoughts wandered regardless. Anakin had probably been in the Jedi Temple when it happened. His own men turning on him, just as they did on me. Had he been with Obi-Wan? Or had all of us been separated one last time by a war we were doomed to lose?
The idea of it brought about the hatred and anger that Yoda warned younglings about. The feeling burned in her heart, and for just a moment, another memory flashed: shackles on her wrists, dark veins streaking throughout her, and a dagger in her hand. You are mine, now. The low chuckle of the Son’s voice echoed in her mind, reminding her of every mistake she’d made, every selfish action that put her own life over others.
Not just anger, she realized. Guilt.
Ahsoka swallowed and felt the dryness of her throat, worse than when she had last visited Tatooine.
She turned to Rex. Put a hand on his scorched pauldron. He still didn’t look at her.
“I’m…sorry I couldn’t save them,” was the first thing she thought to say.
He stared into the distance.
“I wish—“ Ahsoka stopped herself, knowing neither of them needed to hear something as foolish as a wish. “I know I could have done more. They all deserved better.”
She dropped her hand and took a step away from him, feeling foolish for saying anything.
The possibilities spiraled in her mind, the things she could’ve done to save everyone: What if I hadn’t freed Maul? What if I had removed Jesse’s chip, too? What if I had stayed on Mandalore?
What if I hadn’t asked for the Republic’s help at all?
There was a beat of heavy silence. The air smelled of blood and dirt and burning metal.
Ryloth. Wasskah. Onderon.
It smelled of death , and Ahsoka found it familiar.
“It’s over now.” Rex’s voice snapped her out of her thoughts. Ahsoka couldn’t help but notice the way his shoulders began to shake. Nearly imperceptible—but not to her.
“My brothers weren’t at fault” —Rex looked down at her for the first time— “but neither were you.”
Ahsoka simply nodded. Did either of them believe that? She sensed Rex’s sincerity, but knew if anyone could fool a Jedi, it was him.
And if Rex never forgave her for letting Maul escape? She wouldn’t blame him. Not that it would make it hurt any less.
She supposed he was something akin to a brother. Master Plo had taken her from her village on Shili when she was only three, saving her from a slaver in the process. She would be infinitely grateful for that, but for a long time afterwards, she had no family; just the other younglings in her clan and the ever-rotating line of créche masters. Then she met Anakin, Obi-Wan, and Rex.
It had been terrifying at first. Anakin’s penchant for un-Jedi-like drama and…well, explosions, had been unexpected, but she’d quickly learned to love the life of rushing adrenaline and constantly toeing the line of danger.
Obi-Wan, on the other hand—not quite as explosive—taught her how to reel in some of Anakin’s more extreme teachings. Meditation sessions and the smell of salu-root tea floated to the surface of her memories, along with the kind smile of the Jedi Master who had cared for her almost like a father.
Then, there were the clones.
She loved those men, and every part of her ached knowing she was at fault for the 332nd’s demise. Anakin had handpicked them: the most promising members of the 501st, veterans and ‘shinies’ alike. Although a gruesome thought, they deserved better deaths. They deserved to have their final moments as themselves. As more than faceless soldiers.
Rex, Jesse, and every clone she encountered had taught her how to fight just as much as Anakin. Not just how to throw a punch, but how to live to fight another day. The 501st had become Ahsoka’s family, and she failed them.
Rex was the only one she had left.
Ahsoka looked up. The sky was getting dark all too quickly, the dusty storm clouds shielding them from the sun; it would be impossible to give these men a proper burial and farewell in time, but they could try.
“We should bury them while we can,” Ahsoka said. She motioned upward. “The weather’s unreliable.”
Ahsoka felt another punch of guilt and wished she could stuff the words back into her mouth. She was asking him to bury his brothers as if it was just another order. They had to, though, she reminded herself. It was only right.
“There are some tools in the Y-wing. We can take shifts if we have to.”
“And then what?” Rex asked suddenly, a ferocity in his tone. Ahsoka flinched. “We’re both traitors, Ahsoka. We have no allies. Are we going to slum away in the Outer Rim for the rest of our lives?”
She fiddled with the fabric of her cloak, a bad habit she’d developed early on in the war to hide bubbling nerves. What would they do? Ahsoka could fix Ar-Seven, maybe try to contact other Jedi. She refused to believe they were gone, even if the spot where she once felt Anakin’s presence burning in the galaxy was replaced by an all consuming emptiness that tore her spirit in two.
“We’ll find people. People who can help.”
“Mandalore still has a detachment of clones,” Rex said, seeming to read her mind. Truthfully, she wouldn’t be surprised if he could.
Ahsoka scoured her memory for other people who might be able to help them. She sifted through the names of different people she knew: Bo-Katan... preoccupied. Rafa and Trace? No, Coruscant is out of the picture. That would mean Padmé couldn’t help either.
With horrified uncertainty, Ahsoka realized she didn’t even know if Padmé was alive.
“ Everyone we trusted is either dead or under Palpatine’s thumb.” Rex enunciated each word carefully, as if the idea were something too complicated for her to understand.
“You think I don’t know that?” Ahsoka snapped, the words tumbling out before she could stop them.
She shouldn’t be fighting him. Both of them had gone through more in the past few days than anyone should in a lifetime, but Rex couldn’t feel each man on the Tribunal crushed beneath the very ship that had been meant to carry them home victorious. He hadn’t heard their screams echoing in his mind, playing over and over again, wanting nothing but to break free of whatever control was holding them back. Even beyond the venator, she felt every Jedi’s life slip through their fingers as if it were her own. It was said in reports that out of the ten-thousand Jedi in the galaxy, a third of them were children. She felt it all.
A few years ago, she might have cried. She could imagine it: Order 66 being enacted while she was still a Padawan, only just beginning to learn the steps to the dance of war and the dangerous politics that poisoned it. She would have reached out for Master Plo, first. Ahsoka still wished she had.
But Ahsoka said nothing. Her throat burned.
“There’s a difference between knowing and accepting.” Rex narrowed his eyes as he spoke. “You still haven’t accepted it.”
Ahsoka shook her head.
“No,” she managed. “I haven’t.”
There was no such thing as impossible—Anakin had taught her that. So Ahsoka made her way to the Y-wing. It was a slow and painful pace, as if walking towards death itself, and when the shovel found itself in her palms, she held it in front of her as she might a lightsaber.
There was a reflection in the shining metal. She saw the markings worn by the men who had tried to kill her and a spiritless face beneath them, one she barely recognized. She couldn’t bring herself to look longer than a second.
With hands too tired to tremble, Ahsoka turned the shovel to the ground. The earth gave way, and she dug.