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The rain was pouring onto the darkly lit concrete, and the scattered reflections of the perimeter lighting danced in the puddles in front of the barracks as the drops fell down. Rex was staring at them, from where he was sitting on the doorstep to the barracks.
Ahsoka was gone.
She had left.
He hoped she would've come by to at least say goodbye to him, but she wasn't here.
He remembered the last time he had seen her.
The way he, Fox and Wolffe had been forced to hunt her down.
The way she had looked at him for a second before she jumped down.
The fact that he had been trying to hunt her down, even though he knew she didn't do anything wrong.
She hadn't even been in the wrong place at the wrong time.
She had been called back to Coruscant because she had had an alibi.
They should've known she was being framed.
And deep down, below all his loyalty to the Republic that had ordered him to hunt her down he had known.
But it didn't matter.
She was gone.
And she wasn't coming back.
He wasn't crying, it was just the rain on his face dripping down his face.
His eyes were getting heavy, and he sagged forward, resting on his knees fully now.
He closed his eyes, hoping she would be there when he opened them again, even though he knew she wouldn't be.
Rex woke up on that same damned doorstep. Coruscant's sun was already peeking over the skyline and his shoulders were hurting from having slept hunched over like that, dressed in full kit, but he paid it no mind.
He was used to sleeping in full armour, in weird positions and with the aching pain of losing a loved one.
He stood up and stretched, his shoulders popping as he did so. He sighed deeply before heading back inside.
The mess hall was full, yet quiet. He was a little later than usual, so the mess was a little more packed than it was when he usually had his breakfast.
He just sat down with his brothers, not saying a word.
"Rex, how are you holding up?" Jesse asked
Rex just grunted angrily.
"I know, she didn't show up." Jesse said
"How did you know she didn't-" he swallowed the "care about me" he wanted to spit out, but as the words formed in his mind he felt terrible because he knew that wasn't true.
"She tried," Jesse said, before pulling up the access logs of the main entrance.
There they were. 12 unauthorized attempted entries at the main entrance of the military complex.
From Ahsoka's access card.
Which had been blocked earlier that evening.
She had tried to come back for him. at least to say goodbye. She tried...
And the Republic had prevented that.
They had taken away her access codes less then a day after she left the Jedi Order, taken away her chance to say goodbye to him, taken away his last chance to see her...
He sighed deeply. He had no more tears left to cry, he had done that last night.
Ahsoka was gone, and no amount of crying would bring her back.
He just had to keep going, like he always had.