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The blow to his head isn’t any worse than he’s had before. It just hits in a different spot, knocks something loose, shatters a large section of his helmet. And the pain. The pain is like a lance slowly searing into his grey matter, leaving a spot that feels vaguely numb. As if he’s had an anaesthetic injected directly into the mushy stuff.
It turns something off. Or on. Something changes. Fox can’t put his finger on it, but all of a sudden everything’s wrong. His beliefs, his loyalties. His actions .
He can feel wetness against his temple, then cheek. Blood? The HUD’s reporting head trauma, recommending immediate medical attention, but there’s a voice in Fox’s head that says leave it. Leave it.
Get out.
Vader’s briefing the troopers, spouting off some shit about Jedi traitors, no bodies to be left breathing. Horrific shit that makes Fox’s blood pound in his ears and skin spike with a chill. Then the beat picks up, his vision starts narrowing. Vader’s voice is just a hum in the background until he’s being thrown into violent reminders of the days prior. Minutes prior, when he’d had a speeder thrown at him at some kilometers an hour, and responded with an automatic blaster to the driver’s chest.
His shoulder aches. His head aches and yet, it doesn’t. His thigh plate’s scraped up and crumpled in one spot. That’s going to bruise.
“Sir, I believe I’m in need of medical attention,” Fox scrapes out.
There’s a pause. Fox knows it’s logical that Vader’s helmet has similar readouts to his own. His voice is digitized, so it has a vocoder at the very least, and the visor has that similar semi-transparent haze of a trooper’s. Just enough to see the a flash of light hitting eyes when the sun comes in at the right angle. Yes, definitely a head up display, probably with the ability to target specific vial signs.
The guy’s huge, close to seven feet tall. Imposing in a way that doesn’t just instil a sense of fear, but one of deference. At least until a few minutes ago. Now, he’s just some dude in an over the top outfit.
Fox never does hear the response. The tunnel of light narrows, and his breath quickens, until there’s only darkness, and he becomes nothing.
…
Convoluted, would be how Rex describes the way he receives the message. Ahsoka gets a communication from one of Altis’ crew, who got it from third hand through one of Amidala’s handmaidens. He has a suspicion about who the leak is. Organa’s been quiet over the months since the declaration, but he’s not the type to lie back and think of the Empire.
It could be Chuchi, or Mothma, but neither of them have the I don’t give a flying kark attitude Bail has when he really gets going. They’re too green, too hesitant to take big risks.
It’s been lonely since they split up. Ahsoka’s off somewhere inciting revolution on a backwater moon in the outer rim, and Rex is well… Rex is hanging in there. He acquired a droid with the ship, an ancient C-series thing in desperate need of a reset. When he’d left the Syndullas, after a week bouncing around planets and stations, through a couple of carefully gained and scrubbed freighters, and finally a farewell where Hera had spent more time saying goodbye to the droid than thanking him for the help, they’d made Rex promise to look after the murderous bot.
Too noticeable, they’d said. Not many twi’lek families out there with an antique C-1.
But all that’s in the past now. Chopper’s alright, he supposes. Bit too enthusiastic with the manipulators sometimes. More keen to get out the zapper than R2, but smart. Rex can understand him about half the time, and he suspects the other half is ninety percent profanity anyway.
Organa’s (or Chuchi’s, or Mothma’s, or who-the-kriff-ever’s) intel was about a clone defector. No details on the designation or name, only that he was a high level asset, and it would be beneficial to extract him from Coruscant before The Empire caught up with him.
Rex prays it’s not Bly. The memories of what the inhibitor chip had forced Rex to do — to turn on his best friend without remorse — would be a heavy burden to bear for Bly, who, despite hardass appearances, was prone to bouts of depression and deep, troubling self flagellation.
But that’s a stupid thought. There’s millions of people with Rex’s face out there, thousands of commanders, captains leading elite legions or commando squads, specialists with detailed medical or slicing experience. All just faces behind masks, waiting for their autonomy to be taken.
The clone’s in a safe house in the mid levels. An apartment between a pawn shop and a greasy spoon. The kind of place that serves fries with its oil, and has half its menu items padded with ground grains.
He risks a stop. The beard he’s grown hides a lot of his features, the scruffy moustache covering the telltale bow of his lips. The strong jaw. Can’t do much about the nose other than shove a bit of plastifoam up it and hope for the best, but it’s worth the risk. Doesn’t need to be caught skulking around Coruscant with the way things are, stopping in for a feed’s a smart call.
The posters in the diner are unsettling. Rex has spent enough time evading Empire oversight by now to know what’s going on, but the frequent reminders to dob in your friends and neighbors is a wake-up call. The atmosphere in the building is taught, a tight string ready to be snapped by the light touch of a vibroblade. Even the droid wait staff seem on edge. A clatter from the kitchen has everyone turning to the swing door, and it’s a tense wait before an argument starts between a mechanized voice and an organic one.
The burger’s shit. More grain than meat, soggy greens, sauce that’s more a suggestion of moisture than flavor. Even the pickle tastes like wet flimsi. Rex leaves half of it on his plate, cleans up the fries, and disappears out the back door to the turbolift.
The ride up’s short. Only a few seconds, and the corridor it opens into is typical of a complex in the lower mids. Garbage chute at the end, light gray paint, doors with utilitarian numbers printed on them in a font Rex used to use when reporting battle stats.
Unit 2986-54 Molsume Plaza isn’t any different than he expects - silent and nondescript. There’s the hum of life going on around him, bass from a unit over the way, a scream of a child down the hall.
He presses the call icon on the access panel in the agreed pattern. Count of 7, then 5, then 6, then 7 again. Quick counts, not enough to be conspicuous. When the door opens, there’s a blaster in his face, and a clone with a scarred eyebrow, greying hair, and a deep scowl that sends Rex’s heart hammering in his chest.
“Hi, Fox.”
…
“I don’t need your fucking help, Rex.”
Fox leaves the door open, anyway. He knows there’s no point in resisting Rex’s dogged tenacity, so instead he wanders into the kitchen and pours a cup of caf from the pot, and slides it down the counter.
Rex looks down, dubious. After a few moments, where he seems to be having some kind of internal conflict, he picks it up, blows on it, and takes a sip.
“I’m serious,” Fox says. “Organa’s got me in lockdown until the heat’s off, but as soon as he gives me the all clear I’ll find my own way off-world. He’s got some kind of complex about paying me back for saving his life that one time.”
There’s a thunk as Rex puts the mug back down. “I’m guessing there’s no holonet access in this place?” he asks.
Fox winces, thinking about the last few weeks. He’d woken up in a pokey room in some warehouse in the manufacturing district with a neurotic protocol droid buzzing about, prattling on about thread counts and pillow quality and Goodness, I just don’t know what Senator Organa was thinking going to all this trouble for one clone . Since then he’s been stuck with fuck all to do other than work out, read the few old fashioned flimsi books left in the place, and pace back and forth across blacked out windows.
“Yeah, good luck getting off world without help, you want to get shot in the head or the chest?” There’s a pause. Rex mouth moves in that way he does, where he’s poking his tongue between his teeth, rolling it around, lips pressed together. “Empire doesn’t give clones the benefit of the doubt, at least something’s stayed the same I s’pose.”
There’s the bastard Fox knows. The smug, vindictive asshole who doesn’t come out unless he’s really trying to get under a brothers’ skin.
This is more personal though. That special vibroblade Rex likes to keep just for him.
It’s the first time they’ve seen each other since that fuck-up with the ARC trooper. Not that Fox knew it was a fuck-up at the time. Palaptine had said jump, and Fox had said how high , and that was the end of it. At least until now, after that thing in his brain fritzed, and he’s spent all of the current month and most of the last asking himself what if , he sees it for what it was.
How high indeed , he thinks. It hits different now, though. With Rex standing in front of him, in grubby coveralls, beard grown out and scruffy, hair starting to curl in the way he hadn’t let it do since Kamino.
“I was following orders, you of all people should be able to relate to that.”
Rex screws his face up into something ugly. His eyes narrow, his lip curls, and his nostrils flare. “Yeah, you always were such a good soldie r, weren’t you?”
And there’s the twist. Right under his ribs. Knocks the breath right out of him, and Fox’s chest goes tight.
Because Rex is right. Fox was a good soldier. The best. Top of the class, pushed himself harder and further until the rest of them thought he’d had some special sauce put in his cocktail. That’s why they’d dumped him on Corrie and told him to sort out the mess that was the fledgling Guard. Ten-Ten can do it , they’d said. Better at sorting out the troopers than most of the training sergeants .
Ten-Ten . What a karking joke. The irony of his designation and his uncompromising drive to live up to the superlative was never lost on Fox. He sometimes wonders if that rumour about his genetics was true after all, always intended to be the guy on the propaganda posters, perfect in every way.
He sure as fuck doesn’t feel perfect now. He feels like shit. The ache in his chest spreads, until there’s a lancing pain right through the gash just beyond his hairline.
He doesn’t realize he’s hunched over until there are arms around him, a warm body propping him up against the counter. It’s embarrassing how much he’s missed that, even if it’s less than ideal circumstances.
“Hey… hey Fox, you alright?”
Fox sucks in a breath. It shudders, hisses, stutters until he realizes there’s wetness on his cheek. Not blood this time, he hopes. Or maybe he does, he’s not sure. “I— I don’t…”
He squeezes his eyes shut and there it is again, this time slipping down his cheek. Tears. He’s kriffing crying. What a soft-cock.
It’s the familiar feeling of a rough thumb that snaps him out of it. That moment of grounding memory. That last time he and Rex had been this close, only hours before that blaster shot that’d fucked it all up. Tucked into one of the emergency stairwells, hands digging around, lips grasping at breath, Fox’s heart in his throat until he thought he’d choke on the swell of it all.
“I don’t know how I fit into all this, Rex.” Fox says, barely loud enough to hear over the pounding of his own pulse. “I… I just wanted to do the right thing and it’s all —”
“Karked up, yeah tell me about it.”
“Can you just not be a bastard for five kriffing minutes?”
He doesn’t realize his eyes are still squeezed shut until Rex’s hand slides into his hair, then there’s a forehead resting against his. And oh, shit it feels so good, he’s missed this so much . A flutter of lashes has Fox’s gaze falling square onto matching brown.
It’s not a look of forgiveness, or even really one of tenderness that the scrape of fingers against his scalp emotes.. Nah, it’s more a look of pity combined with a reluctant lust that has Fox lunging for Rex’s lips.
…
Afterward, Rex realizes it was inevitable. Him and Fox, ending up on a cramped couch, sweaty and still half clothed.
And it’s not that Rex can’t resist that pull, he can. He can stand firm, keep his cool even under duress. The problem is, he doesn’t want to.
It feels like a betrayal.
Not a betrayal of his own morals, but one of Fives’ memory. And Echo, in a way. He’d never told Echo who fired the shot, but the look on the other clones’ face, hollow in a way that was nothing to do with malnutrition, said everything Rex needed to know.
They pack up in silence. Fox doesn’t have much, just a few donated clothes, and a book he said he was halfway through reading. Some trashy pulp that’d been popular fifty years ago with bored housespouses and eighteen year olds.
They don’t talk much on the way back to the ship. A few words about which route to take. Hand signals, some innocuous small talk about the weather, and an inspired bit of improv from Fox about their neighbours’ suspicious activity after seeing one of the posters. Then there’s the quiet grousing about the glue around the edges of the mask Rex’d made Fox wear. It’s pulling on my sideburns, couldn’t you have sprung for a custom job? It’s not like you didn’t have a good reference for the bone structure.
Chopper’s unimpressed when they return. No real reason. Rex had told him the cargo was another clone, given him instruction to bang out in a hurry if they weren’t back by oh-six-hundred, head back to the Syndullas, figure out a way to bypass Ahsoka with the after-action because goodness knows she doesn’t need to add Rex to the list of her concerns.
Fox settles into the copilot seat with something like discomfort. He shuffles around a bit, taps his fingers on the armrests, looks back at Chopper with distrust.
“He’s alright,” Rex says, as he starts the launch sequence. Chopper beeps a few times, definitely offensive — Rex picks up a word that he’d never repeat in polite company, and only in exceptional circumstances when in impolite — then whirls around a few times and plugs into the navigation panel. “Homicidal, but alright.”
They don’t have authorization to depart, but that had always been the plan. Land in an industrial area, a bit out of the way but easier to navigate when you’ve got the Imperial Guard on your ass. Fox peers out the viewport, eyes following speeders, transports, freighters as they go about their business.
“Is this going to work?”
Rex shrugs. “Sure hope so.” He’s had worse. A lot worse. “And if it doesn't, hey…” He leaves the sentence unfinished, no idea where he was heading.
Fox unfolds the secondary yoke, and starts doing pressure checks. Automatic, as if he’d been at a set of starship controls days ago rather than years. “Why come back for me?”
“In my defense, I didn’t know it was you.”
Fox barks out a laugh, and Rex can see him biting his lip out of the corner of his eye before turning away and fiddling with some buttons on the port side. “So… where to?”
“Raada, we’ve got a revolution to incite,” Rex replies. “You can say hi to another person with grievances, I’m sure Ahsoka’ll be thrilled to see you.”
There’s a shuddering inhale, then silence.
Dick move, Rex . He reaches out, and grabs Fox’s arm. It’s not that Rex didn’t get it, he does. The more he pieces together bits and pieces of Palpatine’s plan, he realizes Fox was just another pawn in the grand scheme. A piece to move around the board to make sure the Chancellor — Emperor — got his endgame. And he’d be lying if he says he doesn’t love Fox. In a karked up, confusing way that’s in conflict with so many things he’d been taught to believe. But it is what it is, and he shouldn’t be looking gift eopies in the mouth.
Fox turns to him, that yes, sir, whatever you say, sir expression he’s so skilled at plastered all over his face, and Rex’s breath catches in his throat. He doesn’t want this. That shut down, emotionless Fox who represses everything, until he’s so far sequestered from his own emotions it’s impossible to tell when the real, beautiful, brilliant Fox comes out.
So Rex says his truth. Lays it out, honest and unadorned, hand still gripping Fox’s forearm. “Hey so um… For what it’s worth... I’m glad you’re okay I um—”
“It’s okay, Rex. You don’t have to go all soppy on me.”
“I’m not! I just want you to know I’m… I’m glad it was you.”
And then there’s that smile. The tiny tilt at the corner of Fox’s lips that says thanks, I’m glad it was you, too , and then Rex is acutely aware of his own breathing as Fox gets out of his seat, crouches in front of Rex’s, and rests their foreheads together. Kisses him more softly than Rex ever thought him capable.
Ten minutes later, when they’re barking orders at each other, finalizing some last rushed calculations to zap out of orbit in a hurry with three fighters on their tail, Fox lets out a whoop, leans over with a joyful expression, and pushes the hyperspace lever full forward.
“I kriffing missed this,” he says, as he flops back into his seat, and rolls his head to the side. “I missed you .”
Rex smiles back. “Don’t quote me on this, but I missed you too.”
The responding bark of laughter is genuine, not at all ironic or wry. “I fucking love you, asshole.”
The response is spilling out of Rex’s mouth before he can consider it, right there ready to go, like he’s been desperate to say it since the last time. In the stairwell. Before everything went so wrong.
“I love you too, dickwad.”