Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Following Cody’s verd’goten, the Ka’ra fell quiet.

It wasn’t the silence Cody was used to. He was used to it sleeping, used to it going from some great, looming presence to just hearing its breath rattle around and around his body. Cody knew that quiet, and he had never liked it. He had quickly learned - no matter how hard he hoped and wished - that the Ka’ra would always wake up, shake away its stupor, and go right back to digging its claws into him. The silence of its sleep was temporary, and the taste of freedom it gave Cody was so rich and sweet and promising that it was hard to swallow. It was harder still to let it go.

The new quiet was different.

At first, Cody hadn’t trusted it. He had been burned before by the idea of independence and choices and the soft, slow murmurs of the Ka’ra that were little more than whispers in the dark - Cody was determined not to be burned again. He kept himself on high alert for the first few days and then sank into mystified, relieved disbelief when the days stretched into weeks and then months and then years. The new silence was different, he realized, because the Ka’ra was simply not there. There were no glowing eyes in the dark, no more flashes of images that didn’t belong to Cody - this Cody, at least - and Cody, for the first time in his life, had the power to do whatever he wanted. He savored the feeling. He shouted and screamed and howled at the sky. For a brief while, Cody lived like he wanted to live; he gave himself the luxury of letting his guard down.

That was his first mistake - the whole letting his guard down. Cody had done that a whole lifetime earlier and it had ruined him. The second time he did it, it was no less destructive than the first because - because the war still came. The Republic still split, the droids were still made, and the jetiise were still deployed.

His second mistake was thinking he could escape it. His second mistake was thinking that he had choices and that he could choose to stay far, far away.

That dream had vanished the day the draft was announced.

Cody had laughed himself hoarse when he heard the proclamation, when all the news and radio stations had broadcasted the announcement that Satine, the Manda’alor, was raising a quota of verde to join the GAR like every other good, planetary leader indebted to the Republic was doing. Cody laughed because otherwise he would’ve torn everything in front of him, himself included, to pieces.

“You look awful,” Rex said the following day, stepping into Cody’s dorm room and perching on his bed. “Are you sick?”

“Not in the normal sense,” Cody said and then, immediately after it, “I don’t want to talk about it.”

“It’s the draft, isn’t it?”

“Rex.”

Rex gave him a look. “Cody, we’re from an aliit of eight. If you think you’re the only one worrying - well, you’re not.”

“And here I thought I was special.”

“I already did all the math,” Rex said. Cody closed his eyes. His vod kept going. “Satine swears that the draft covers all of the Manda’yaim sector, but so far the only people who are being pulled are from the outer territories. Dawn, historically, has the highest number of trained Mando’ade out of all of them which means that most of Dawn has to be in the system already. The odds of all of us being put into that pool, therefore, is high. The odds of one of us being pulled soon is even higher.”

“Rex,” Cody said, slightly sick. “Drop it.”

“I can’t.”

“Rex -”

“Cody, this isn’t something we can run from. One of us is going to be taken. One of us, and only one of us if we’re lucky, is going to war.” Rex went silent, then, because Fetts, as a rule, weren’t lucky. They are stubborn and determined and Mando’ade through and through, but lady luck has never once watched out for them. That job belonged to the Ka’ra, and the Ka’ra hadn’t spoken to Cody in nearly a decade.

“Monnk’s gone.”

“What?”

“Monnk,” Rex said, curling his legs up to his chest and looking far younger than Cody ever remembered him looking. “He’s gone.”

“The draft?”

“No,” Rex said. He sighed. “Well, sort of. Satine put in an enlistment clause to the draft, you know. Entire families can be selected through the draft, but if one person enlists on their own - no draft slip in sight - they can list all their immediate family down to get withdrawn from the draft. Monnk did it. Gree’s not…he’s not handling it well.”

Cody leaned back in his chair. He tried to imagine Monnk, their life-long neighbor, getting sent to war. He couldn’t. Cody could, however, imagine Monnk stealing away in the night to the nearest military processing station. Cody could nearly imagine the way that Monnk must have secretly collected all the necessary paperwork without raising suspicion from his family, the way that Monnk must have lingered by Gree’s doorway the night he did it, peering in on his vod and fighting down the strange cry of frustration and desperation and broiling anger that tore its way up his throat. Cody could distinctly make out the way Monnk had caught the nearest transit bus into the center of Dawn, right up to Fenn and Kal’s lair - the Protector HQ that had been unceremoniously flipped into where men marched in to die - and had signed his own soul away. Cody could guess at how his hand had shaken when he had listed out the name of his vod underneath the immediate family category. Cody could see all of that.

Cody could see it because he, himself, had done it not a day earlier.

“It’ll be okay, Rex,” he said.

Rex gave a slim, humorless grin. “You think so?”

“Elek - and when have I ever been wrong?”

“Never,” Rex said, laughing, because that was Rex. Rex with his blond hair that he kept short because Cody kept his short. Rex with the big blue eyes that had never, not once, looked at Cody with anything but love and awe and something that made Cody feel simultaneously bulletproof and not good enough. Rex, the blue to his orange. Rex, the smartest, sharpest kih’vod anyone could have ever asked for and Cody - Cody can’t lose him. 

Cody can’t lose any of his aliit.

Cody won’t let the war do that - not now, not again, not ever. It did, once, and Cody would rather damn himself to fight it all over again than lie back and watch it tear everything he loved to pieces.

Rex left with a Keldabe and the promise that he would grab lunch with Cody the day after their midterms. Cody just smiled back and agreed even though he knew that he would be fully entrenched in the GAR by then. He desperately hoped that Rex would forgive him for not showing up. More than that, he desperately hoped that Rex would understand why Cody did it. Cody had to believe that one of his vode would understand - his ori’vode, he knew, certainly wouldn’t. If Rex didn’t have the urge to chew Cody up and spit him out once he figured it out, Cody was sure that Wolffe or Fox would. Buir would too, but his disappointment had been a staple in Cody’s life since Cody had first decided that his praise wasn’t worth it.

His ori’vode were different because they were vode and that meant - it meant Vode An. It meant that Cody had taken that transit shuttle and had ridden it all the way to Dawn in order to stare into Fenn Rau’s eyes and repeat history. By the time he had done it - had given away his hard earned soul to the Republic - he hadn’t been angry anymore. He hadn’t been anything more than tired.

It was then and there, as Cody wrote down all of his aliit’s name and snatched them from the draft before destiny or fate or the karking Ka’ra did it for him, that Cody made his third mistake. He still, stupidly, thought he had choices. He thought the silence - the new, strange, different silence - still meant something.

That had crumbled, like everything else Cody had thought he knew, when he got his first reporting order. He had stared at the tiny strip of paper it had been printed on for a long, long time.

It said Kamino.

The anger was back then - bright and breathless and all-consuming - and Cody bared his teeth as if he could sink them into the pale, ugly planet that he had dreamed of as a child and tear it all apart. In the same thud of his heart and the same agonized, furious breath, Cody wondered why he couldn’t do exactly that. He may not have been able to choose or make choices or escape from who he used to be, but he could carve out a space for himself in the midst of it. Cody could fight. Cody could make it pay. Cody could take it and take it and take it and refuse to do it quietly.

He could do it. He would do it - Cody pocketed the reporting order and packed his duffel. He made sure to blow the dust off his beskar’gam. The orange paint smiled. Cody smiled back like any Fett would, with far too little humor and far too much sharp teeth.

This time around, Cody entered Kamino on his own two feet. He looked, right down to the bone, just like the kind of man it had once sent out.

Deep inside of him, and so quiet that not even Cody caught it, something opened its eyes and purred.

Chapter Text

Cody wasn’t a pilot.

That didn’t mean that he couldn’t pilot a ship; like any other well-educated Mando’ade, Cody had been boarded up onto a rotation of ships, the Firespray included, for flight training. He had learned the intricacies of each cockpit and ship design until he could maneuver fighters just as well as he could fly freighters. His adaptability and baseline perfunctory skill should’ve made him a pilot, but it didn’t. 

Some would argue that it was because Cody was simply too big for it, that pilots should be small and slim and able to cram themselves into unimaginable shapes in order to get the ship up in the air, and that Cody’s broad shoulders and wide chest were just built for other things. Cody had accepted that, mainly because every pilot Cody had ever met had matched those descriptions, but also because he just didn’t care about why he was or wasn’t a pilot - and that, Cody thought, was the root of the issue. 

Cody just didn’t care about flying.

He could marvel at the technology, could appreciate the ease and accessibility of it all, could respect its job and craft and build, but Cody could never catch the itch for it. He never had the taste for it, and he certainly never craved it.

He knew people that did, though. Bly was one. 

"Karking haran - what are you doing in the dark?”

Davijaan was another.

The room’s lights came on all at once, and Cody shot his hand out to them off again. There came the unmistakable sound of someone cracking their knee against something, and Cody felt his lips twitch up at the stream of ingenuitive cussing that soon followed. There was more fumbling, just for a moment, and then Cody leaned away from the blue-white glow of a comm when it burned through the artificially darkness of a ship’s night cycle.

“You’re a sheb,” Davijaan said, squinting away from the light of his own comm.

“Is that surprising?”

“Naas,” Davijaan responded. He rubbed his eyes. Even in the awful lighting, he looked especially worn down. “But I had hope. I thought I was making progress. But here you are - sitting in the dark, alone, when everyone else in their right minds are asleep.”

“You’re not.”

Davijaan gave a disdainful sniff. “I’m hurt that you think I’m in my right mind. Besides, someone had to figure out where you went.”

Cody gave a vague gesture at the room around them. It was an observation room - the smallest one, he’s sure, to have ever been built - with only enough space for two couches pushed so close together that Cody’s knees touched the one while he sat on the other. What it lacked in space it tried to make up for in the amount of viewports it managed to fit against the wall. Davijaan climbed onto the unoccupied couch and peered forward at the galaxy. Mercifully, he switched his comm off.

“Still in hyperspace, huh?”

Cody shifted. “I have a feeling it’ll be the last day of it.”

Davijaan leaned back. Even in the dark, and even without his jaig eyes, Cody could tell that the pilot was doing the math and the trajectory and the distance and everything else pilots did to figure out where, exactly, they were in the grand scheme of the cosmos.

“Yeah. Sounds about right.”

Cody gave a ghost of a smile and tipped his head back. It ached something fierce - well, something fiercer. Cody had boarded the transport ship to Kamino with a slight throbbing in his temples and, a week later, it had escalated to a full on inferno that began to trail all the way to the stem of his neck. Cody could ignore it during the day because he was busy then. He was busy finishing up all the placement tests and medical history that the Kaminoans wanted, busy revolving through the others that were on the ship with him, busy trying to grasp onto why everything felt familiar and different all at once. One could argue that the latter was a waste of his time because Cody already understood why everything felt familiar - he had done this before, clearly - but it was infuriating to not fully grasp why he felt or reacted the way he did.

In tune with his headache, Cody cursed the Ka’ra.

When he was younger, the Ka’ra had given him glimpses - glimpses of Kamino, of its white hallways and rain slicked platform, glimpses of passing beskar’gam that bobbed among whole seas of blue and red uniforms, glimpses and glimpses of who Cody used to be - but they had been wisps of memories. They weren’t substantial in the way that buir or Wolffe’s were, and they had faded year by year until stopping just weeks shy of Cody’s verd’goten. Now Cody just had gut feelings, strange mixtures of instincts and emotions, that were so painfully powerful that they left him reeling. For example, the war. The moment Cody thought about it, he felt his blood pressure rising, his lips curling back and away from his teeth and gums in a terrifying grimace that he knew he had worn once, felt exhaustion and anger and resignation sink into his bones and joints to age him far past his time. Kamino wasn’t much different. The feelings that Davijaan dragged up, though, were softer and so saccharine that Cody had had the knee-jerk reaction to call the pilot vod within moments of their first meeting.

“It’s strange.”

“Hm?” Cody forced his eyes open again. He nudged Davijaan with his knee. “What?”

“I said it’s strange. The transport, I mean - haven’t you noticed anything weird about it?”

“Sure. It’s paintjob is atrocious.”

“I meant the people, Cody,” Davijaan glanced at him and then away. “Dank farrik, if you don’t see it then maybe I’m just going crazy.”

“Welcome to the club.”

A beat of silence. The push and pull of their breathing - Ka’ra, it was so familiar it made Cody want to scream. He wanted to know, right then and there, who Davijaan was. He wanted to know who Davijaan used to be.

“Everyone here are Mando’ade.”

Cody blinked. “I know.”

“Don’t you think that’s strange?”

“ Naas ,” Cody said. “Think about it. The GAR’s just careened itself into a war where the other side has all the soldiers they ever need - each one fully programmed, each one fully trained. The GAR has no one. They have their standing army, sure, and they have the jetiise, but neither one is fit to fight a war. Enter the draft, specifically Manda’yaim’s draft. Suddenly, the GAR has whole platoons of Mando’ade being filtered into their system, and if anyone in the whole galaxy is already ready for war, it would be Mando'ade. So they separate us. They send us to Kamino. Why? Because they think we’re the only chance to get this army up and running.”

“Are we?”

Cody shrugged, didn’t even think about his response before he was saying, “Why not?”

Davijaan gave a little smile. “Do you think you’re war ready, Cody?”

“If I’m not, I will be.”

More silence. Two, four, six more beats of breathing. Cody had the sudden urge to beat his own head in just to get rid of the pain and to distract from the feeling of not knowing. He stamped that down as fast as it came up because, despite what his vode would say, Cody knew that it would be counterproductive, and if Cody hated not having all the information he needed then he loathed being counterproductive.

“Where do you want to be put?”

“Command.”

“Aren’t you going to ask me?”

“Don’t have to,” Cody said. “You’re going to be a pilot.”

“A pilot - is it that obvious?”

“My vod is one. You’re both twitchy and look at ships in a way that makes everyone feel uncomfortable.”

“Mir’sheb,” Davijaan said, breaking out into laughter so loud that Cody heard a few of those sane, sleeping people turn around in their bunks. Davijaan got up then, still laughing. His comm came back on. He pointed it squarely in Cody’s face, right into his eyes, and he kept laughing even when Cody hissed.

“Easy, boy. Easy,” he said, just compassionate enough to drag the light off of Cody’s face after a few more seconds of pain. “Are you coming back to bed?”

“And suffer through your snoring?”

“A simple naas would’ve been acceptable.”

“Where’s the fun in that?” Cody murmured, watching Davijaan navigate his way around and out of the room. He got a kark-you-kindly for his effort, and then Davijaan was gone. The feeling he created in Cody, though, stayed and stayed and stayed until Cody just had to buckle down and get used to the pressure of it sitting in his chest, right in the crook between his lungs and heart. It wasn’t awful, and one day Cody woke up to find that it didn’t bother him anymore. His headache had faded, too. At the time, he thought the worst of it passed. Cody thought he conquered it.

Alpha-17 proved him wrong.

At first, Cody thought the sudden riot of his body and the way the pile of familiar-but-unfamiliar emotions turned large and molten and loud, loud, loud in his chest was due to exiting the transport and seeing the skyline of Kamino through the rain. It wasn’t. The moment Cody remembered how to breathe again was the same moment that he realized the overwhelming feeling was kar'taylir darasuum - love and loyalty and everything that should’ve belonged to his aliit. When he looked up to see what, exactly, had caused it, Cody caught the eye of one of the trainers.

The trainer tipped his head. Cody wheezed.

“Hey,” Davijaan, then, touching him. “You okay?”

“Altitude change,” Cody said, still staring. The trainer stared back, too, and it wasn’t - it wasn’t the stare of someone who had no idea who Cody was. “‘M not used to being up so high.”

“Tilt your head down. Breathe through your nose, out through your mouth. It won’t last long.”

Cody ducked his head. He focused on getting single-file and keeping a grip on his duffel and learning how to keep breathing. When the wave of dizziness fell and the thing - a thing that felt a little too much like the Ka’ra, a thing that lurked in Cody’s soul and hurt just as much as it soothed - settled back into its spot, Cody risked another look up.

He breathed in. He breathed out.

The trainer was gone. 

Cody shook his head, pointedly ignored the way his chest panged with disappointment, and focused on the world around him. The transport, by that time, had emptied out all its passengers. They scuttled away when its engine kicked back up, sending fine sheets of water onto all of them, and started to make their way into the blindingly white structure before them.

“You know what this place is?” Cody said. The name of it was right on the tip of his tongue.

Davijaan flashed his vambrace. “Map says the outskirts of Tipoca City.”

Cody mouthed the name of the city and - elek, there was the lip curl.

“The real question is what they’re doing with us,” Davijaan said, frowning. “Isn’t it normal to have a debrief when we land?”

“Debrief?”

“Oh, knock it off. You weren’t exactly a Marshal Commander when we met. Sue me for trying out some military lingo - dank farrik, you just lost all your color again. You sure you’re okay?”

Cody waved him off. The title had shaken him, had rocketed right through him so fast it had swept the hard earned ground he had propped himself back up on. “The only people who use the word debrief anymore are the ones on the cheesy action-holos.”

Davijaan rolled his eyes. “Why do I care about you when all you are is mean to me?”

“Don’t know,” Cody said. “Must be my charm.”

“Ah, shut your karking mouth, Cody.”

Cody peered around the pilot. The rest of the transport was being shuffled, slow and methodical, into several separate lines. It looked too regimented to be accidental, but Cody couldn’t understand the pattern except for the last line; that line, clearly, were all the pilots. Every other line seemed thrown together, whole arrays of heights and builds and looks. It looked nonuniform, and then Cody wondered why he thought the lines should’ve looked uniform. The answer crawled its way out of the dark, repressed place he sent everything the Ka’ra had once told him.

“Eyayahe,” he muttered before forcing the word back down again. He closed his eyes, focused, and then opened them again. On the second pass through of the lines, they began to make more sense. He would’ve liked to blame it on finally figuring out the pattern; instead, it was the design of someone’s haircut, the curve of their lips, the way they laughed or stood.

He nudged Davijaan. “Those tests we took - do they have the scores already?”

“They should,” Davijaan turned to follow Cody’s line of sight. Cody could see his eyebrows shoot up. “Yeah, they definitely have them. Wonder which line is which, though. You never got your score back, did you?”

“Naas. You?”

Davijaan sighed. “ Naas , but I don’t think it really matters what my scores were. If I don’t get into that line of pilots, I’m rioting. Best of luck to you, though.”

“Vor entye.”

Davijaan threw back a smile. “Anytime.”

Cody shoved him in the back. “Look alive. We’re coming up fast.”

In the end, Davijaan didn’t riot. The minute he had told his name to the security droid taking attendance, he had been shuttled off to pilots. He turned right back around and knocked against Cody’s shoulder.

“Don’t forget about me, mir’sheb.”

“I won’t,” Cody said, swallowing down the irony of having already lived up to that promise. Davijaan gave him one last shove and then left. 

“Next,” the droid chirped.

Cody stepped forward.

“Name?”

“Cody Fett.”

The droid scanned through the transport list. Cody winced when it made an awful sound and flashed red. “There are no such enlistees under that name.”
“It’s the name I go by. I put it on my paperwork.”

The droid sat, unmoved.

“Name,” it reiterated.

“Kote,” he said. “Kote Fett.”

He watched it scan again. There was another awful noise - different than the first - and the droid flashed blue. Cody felt his stomach clench. It had flashed green for Davijaan. It had flashed green for every other person that went before Davijaan. It should’ve flashed green for him, too.

“Step aside.”

Cody stepped aside. His place was immediately swallowed up by the person behind him. They gave Cody a look. Cody, not to be outdone or, Ka’ra forbid, cowed, gave a look right back. The other person winced, turned away, and got a karking green light from the droid.

Cody sighed.

He turned away from the lines and focused his attention on the white building. From the outside it looked deceptively small and vertically stunted, sprawling across the landing dock more than it shot up into the grey bleakness of sky, but it had to be large enough to house everyone. He looked down at the dock’s grating and saw that the building’s base went all the way down to the ocean. He watched the waves, could almost feel the sting of its salt and the bite of its cold, and shivered. This place was a far cry from Dawn, and Ka’ra did Cody miss his home. He missed the heat of its sun, the sweet sway of its pale wheat, the way its rivers ran red after its sporadic rainstorms, the clay of its soil coloring every house and sidewalk and inch of unattended space. He didn’t miss his vode - not yet - because they had been separated for a long time already; Wolffe had been on radio silence since he earned an engineering job with an Outer Rim mining corporation, Fox was busy working towards his law license on Alderaan, Bacara had his elbows-deep in a marine biologist job for some cushy cruise company, Bly was flying commercial, Ponds had just sent in his application for a social worker license, Rex was where Cody had left him, and Boba had to still be trying his hardest to be a carbon copy of buir - which meant that Cody wasn’t getting back into contact with his littlest kih’vod even if someone paid him.

Cody’s hackles rose.

In the distance, and if he really strained his hearing, he could make out the sound of footsteps echoing about the building. He stilled, flicked his eyes up to the door, and then compelled himself to go back to watching the ocean. The footsteps he had heard kept ringing in his head, though, and his jaw tightened on its own when he realized that they were coming closer.

The door to the building opened. The rest of the dock went quiet.

“Welcome to Kamino,” came a voice. There came a shuffle of robes, the sound of a gait that was graceful but lopsided, hindered by something, and the tinkle of small, intricate bells. Cody knew that sound. He knew it belonged to - he frowned. The name was fuzzy in his mind, right there at the tips of his fingers, but Cody couldn’t hold tight to it. It slipped away. The person, a female Togruta, kept talking.

“Welcome,” she repeated, dipping into a shallow bow. Her hands were tucked into the wide, trumpet flare of her robe’s sleeves. The rest of the robe did nothing to hide the glint of a jetii’kad on her hip. “My name is Shaak Ti and, as a representative of both the Jedi Order and the GAR, it is my sincere pleasure to greet you as the inaugural class to brave Kamino’s military compound. In the next few moments, each line will be escorted by a small team of trainers - the Alphas - and split into squads depending on score level and perceived aptitude. From there, you will be led to barracks and will be further debriefed -”

Davijaan’s smug smile burned into the back of Cody’s head. Cody strangled down the urge to wheel around and throw him a kark-you-kindly.

“- by the Alphas.” Shaak Ti smiled. “Sadly, this may be the only time I meet with any of you. I, along with the Kaminoans stationed here, will oversee your training and review your scores, but the Alphas will be our boots on the ground so to speak. With that being said, it has been an honor to meet you all. Looking around, I have no doubt that the GAR will be all the better with you among its ranks.”

She paused, looked around, and Cody watched as a few of the figures in her entourage peeled away to stand before the lines.

“Gentleman,” she said, “I wish you all the best of luck and a final, customary blessing from the Order itself: may the Force be with you.”

“And with you,” Cody murmured back, not quite recognizing what he was doing. The sound of it was all but drowned out by the sudden motion of the lines as they were taken towards the entrance of the building. As they entered, Cody heard those footsteps again from inside. They seemed to multiply as they came closer and closer.

“Kote Fett?”

He jolted. The droid was back, waiting by his elbow.

“Elek?”

“Your presence has been requested inside the compound. Follow me.”

Cody followed. Unlike where the lines had entered the building from, the droid swung him around the side, barely skimming Cody around when Shaak Ti and a lingering trainer - not an Alpha, that strange instinct spoke up to him, and it wasn’t because Cody knew that paint pattern. He knew it. The name, like always, just eluded him - stayed behind. He watched them sweep into the building right after the last of the lines. Cody, meanwhile, was being dragged to who knows where.

The droid led him to a secondary, smaller door. It wooshed open, as if expecting him. Cody side-eyed it but ultimately stepped into wherever it led to.

“Kote Fett, as requested.”

“That’ll be all, Su’cuy. Shaak Ti and Colt have already requested you again.”

Cody’s breath hitched. He was distantly aware of the droid - apparently given the moniker of Su’cuy - beeping in recognition and then zipping back out the way they had just come in, but Cody was more concerned with who, exactly, he had been left with. 

It was the trainer from the dock, the one that had made Cody’s chest nearly burst open. Up close, the feeling was worse, somehow, and so physical that Cody could taste the lingering, stale emotion from wherever he had first met this person. They were taller and larger than him, intimidating in the way that would give Bacara a run for his money, and they looked - they looked almost Fett-like and were certainly a Vizsla. They were also appraising him, looking him up and down and side to side in a way that would’ve made Cody nervous if it wasn’t for that stupid, syrup feeling in his very soul.

The person moved. Cody expected a hug. He did not expect to get cuffed in the head so hard that his ears rang.

“Ow,” he hissed, stumbling away. “What the kark?”

“What are you doing here?” The trainer said in a voice that meant nothing but business and was far, far more upset than Cody was.

“Vacationing,” Cody spat, feeling torn loose and confused and so unlike himself.

“You di’kut. You atin, karking ad. You -”

Something clicked inside of Cody. His eyes widened. “You know me.”

“Of course I know you,” the trainer said, baring his teeth in a way that was all Wolffe and flashing his eyes in the way that only an infuriated Fox could. “How couldn’t I? You’ve been a thorn in my side since I got saddled with you. You made my life miserable.”

“Liar,” Cody said, still a little dazed. That, too, felt like something he had used to say, and the painful flinch the trainer gave only solidified the idea. “You remember me?”

The trainer pulled back. They seemed to collect themselves. Cody watched all the fight drain out of him - a fight that was all Cody, that was all him, and that strange thing in his chest was beginning to spin around and around and out of control - until it left a perfectly blank face with one crooked eyebrow behind.

“Cody,” they said, and the sound of Cody’s name coming out in that voice made his head throb. “Who am I?”

Cody stayed silent.

“Brat, I’m far more patient than you will ever be, so don't waste your breath on waiting me out.” A pause. Their voice, softer now, “Cody, who am I?”

“You know who I am.”

“Elek.”

Cody breathed out. His pulse thrashed against his skin, pounded in a million places in his body. “But I don’t - I remember but I can’t…”

The trainer’s face spasmed, painful and broken and showcasing a lifetime of bitter hope and grief that was much too long for how old they looked. “No,” they said, “I guess you wouldn’t.”

“Tell me who you are.”

They stared at him. Cody took a few steps forward and hooked his hand into the sturdy ‘gam of their chestplate.

“Gedet’ye,” he said, knowing that whoever this person was couldn’t stand it when he asked them for something; that they never could stand it when Cody had looked up at them and pleaded. “Tell me who you are. Gedet’ye.”

The trainer closed their eyes.

“You never change, do you?”

“Gedet’ye,” Cody repeated, somehow sounding more instant and far more broken at the same time. He rocked the chestplate back and forth. It got the trainer to open their eyes again.

“You used to call me 17.”

“Oh,” Cody breathed.

17 gave a thin smile. “Still don’t remember?”

“I do. I do. But,” Cody used his other hand to gesture up at his head, “not up here. Well, maybe up here. I don’t know. This is all - it’s all very confusing. But I do know you. I do. I loved you, I think. That’s how I know. The moment I look at you it’s like I’m looking at my vode except it’s bigger than that. It’s…”

17 cocked his head. “Elek?”

Cody’s whole body trembled. His eyes stung. “17,” he said in a voice that sounded far too young to be his own. He swallowed. “17.”

“I’m here. I’m right here, Cody.”

Cody leaned forward. His head thunked against the ‘gam that was both familiar and new, and the chill of it was the only thing that kept him sane. He twitched when 17’s hands - so tentative, so hesitant and Cody knew that it hadn’t been like this, once upon a time, knew that 17 had never once been so gentle, so unsure with him - came up to rest against his shoulders. Their weight was grounding. Vaguely, they reminded Cody of how his buir’s hand had felt back when Cody had stars in his eyes and had thought that buir had hung the moon.

After a while that stopped too young and stretched on far too long, 17 squeezed his shoulders.

“Better?”

“Naas,” Cody said, “Elek. Who knows anymore?”

17 opened his mouth to respond, but closed it with a click before he spun around on his heel. It pulled Cody away from him, so fast that Cody swayed, stumbled forward, and nearly fell on his face before he remembered that he had a working equilibrium.

“What -?”

The footsteps were back. Cody’s body straightened all on its own, some ingrained response, and his body practically vibrated with a sudden rush of adrenaline and hatred. It was, admittedly, a much different feeling than the one he got with 17.

A door wooshed open. Cody stared up at the face of Kaminoan.

“Kote Fett,” they said, their head wavering to and fro in a way that could only read as curiosity. “I am Lama Su. This is Nala Se.”

Cody felt 17 reach for him. Cody couldn’t tell if it was to soothe him or restrain him; he was currently battling between the urge to flee somewhere where these two Kaminoans couldn’t find him, or lunging forward to rip open their heads off their ridiculously long necks with just the grit and bone of his hands and teeth.

“Congratulations, Kote,” Lama Su continued, either not recognizing the violence in every line of Cody’s body or not caring. “Your scores were exceptionally high. The highest of this batch.”

Cody paled. He choked. He felt sick to his stomach at the word batch - a word that had never, not once, bothered him before. Lama Su leaned forward, right into Cody’s space with a twist in his neck that made him look more serpent than humanoid.

“You,” he said, “have therefore been selected for more intensive tests.”

Cody, all at once, could understand 17’s first reaction. Cody, with Lama Su and Nala Se staring at him if he wasn’t human, as if he wasn’t more than tissue and DNA strands and test scores, wished he had never come back to Kamino.

Cody wished he had stayed far, far away.

Chapter Text

The more intensive tests ended up being battlesims.

They’re the kind that Cody could do in his sleep - the kind that Cody had loved to do as an ad’ika , hidden away in a darkened room and left to his own devices, watching the holoscreen play out every minute decision he made - and he relaxed, all at once, when they planted him before a holotable and loaded up some modules. They spoke to him briefly, mentioned that they wanted to verify his preliminary test scores, and Cody had looked into their faces and nodded, so relieved by the fact that it was just simulations that he turned numb. They clasped their hands together at his quietness, a sign of compliance to them, no doubt, and gave similar, pleased sways of their heads right before they drifted away to the observation deck that was meant to be a secret - and maybe it was to normal people who weren’t Cody; however, he was Cody and that meant that he had clocked the almost invisible outline of the one-way window as soon as he got his bearings back.

He strangled down the urge to look up at it. In the same breath, he kicked himself over panicking in the first place. Whatever relationship he used to have with the Kaminoans had been made null and void the moment the Ka’ra had done what it did. Cody wasn’t an eyayah anymore - not in the same sense - he was a Fett. He was someone’s vod and ad, but more importantly he was a person. He had medical and legal documentation, he had rights, he had a bank account and a paycheck. There were boundaries now - boundaries that Cody desperately wanted to believe in.

He snorted; the way his stomach was still twisted and his tongue was still thick with that demogolka, paralyzing panic meant that he was being far too optimistic for his own good.

The holotable before him flickered.

Cody tapped it twice, dimmed its lights. At the same time, he bottled up everything that had happened in the past week and a half and shoved them down, down, down into some dark corner of his mind. The pressure in his temples, blissfully, eased. Cody turned his attention onto the sim.

Cody didn’t know how long he stayed in that room. He didn’t know how many modules he did - although he had a rough estimate of it being somewhere up in the teens, maybe the twenties - and he certainly didn’t pay attention to whatever was going on behind that window. In hindsight, that might have been a mistake, might have been a tactical error on Cody’s part but - but Cody, if he was honest with himself, was out of practice. The modules had all but shoved that little fact into his face; had told him that he had gotten a little slow and a little soft and too cocky with his time spent on Dawn. The first ones had been basic enough, but they had quickly escalated into a category that had Cody bent over the table, tapping his fingers against the sides as he took more and more time to find the best route, the best plan. By the end of the preset list of simulations, Cody had to resort to picking solutions that weren’t actually solutions. He wasn’t sure what rankled him more, the fact that he had to finally settle down and compromise, or the fact that Cody knew he had once known the correct battleplan but couldn’t remember it.

The holotable shut off. Cody kept staring at it.

“That will be all at this time, Kote Fett. We thank you for your cooperation in indulging our curiosity. Alpha-17 will introduce you to your barracks and complete your assimilation into the compound,” Lama Su paused just long enough for Cody to struggle between being wary and being hyper-vigilant. “Your responses to our modules were enlightening, Mr. Fett. We look forward to following your progress.”

Cody winced, bowed over the holotable to stretch and save face, and then finally acknowledged the window. He hoped they looked surprised. He hoped they felt the same wariness when looking down at him that they had so thoroughly instilled into who Cody used to be. He hoped, but even he knew that it was still too optimistic.

“It’s Cody,” he said. “I go by Cody. It’s on my paperwork.”

“Of course, Mr. Fett.”

The comm connection clicked off. The window darkened. If Cody focused his eyes hard enough, he could make out the Kaminoans leaving. It did nothing to distract him from the fact that they hadn’t said a single thing about fixing his paperwork or their system. To them, Cody would stay Kote.

He crinkled his nose. That level of dismissal reminded him, vaguely, of buir.

“You alright?”

Cody glanced behind him. 17 was leaning against a far wall, watching, and Cody felt himself flush when he couldn’t remember if 17 had been there the whole time or not. Ka’ra , Cody really did get soft.

“Fine,” he said.

17’s eyes moved to the holotable. “You’ve lost your touch.”

“I know. I was in college before I signed up. I haven’t touched any modules since my verd’goten. I’m out of practice,” Cody said, drifting off when he saw the look on 17’s face. “But you didn’t mean that. You meant before. Did I used to be better?”

“You used to be the best.”

“And now I’m just a washed-up version of him.”

17’s lips thinned. “Come on. I need to show you the base.”

“You’re not disagreeing with me.”

“You’re not the same, but why should you be? You had an aliit this time. You had a buir -”

“I had a buir last time, 17.”

Something flashed across 17’s face. Cody couldn’t catch it fast enough to figure out what it was except that it seemed foreign. 17 gestured to the door, silent and brooding and Bacara in the way his shoulders stiffened instead of slumped, in the way that his jaw went tight but his face went unnaturally slack with feigned nonchalance. It was a mask that Cody had learned wouldn’t budge.

He stepped out of the room.

17 closed the door behind him and began to escort him through the halls. “The base is shared between the two barrack branches. After the first round of medical examinations and inoculations, each squad will be given a personalized schedule. It’ll dictate when you train, when you sleep, and when you eat. You’ll get pockets of freetime, but don’t get your hopes up. This base isn’t yet situated to house this many trainees, so many of you will be shipped elsewhere if your scores don’t meet the basic criteria. If they do meet the criteria, you stay. Don’t get your hopes up for that, either. As it is, this is supposed to be flash training, not a full military crash course. We want your boots on the ground as soon as you can get your head out of your shebs and lace them.”

17 tapped his vambrace. A map appeared, chaotically spiderwebbed with hallways but overwhelmingly minimal.

“This is a map of the base. You’ll get it the same time you obtain your specialized training pad. We’re pushing all of the trainees to memorize it as soon as they can because even with it Kamino is a karking mess to navigate.” He pointed to one section of the base. “These are the barracks. They’ve been split into two branches: the CT track and the CC track. CT’s are captains and low-level medical officers and pilots. CC’s are possible commanders and high-level medical personnel and pilots. You’ve been slated for the CC track.”

Cody looked at the map. “Bunkrooms or full barracks?”

“Bunkrooms. Each squad gets their own room to share.”

“Who’s in my squad?”

“You’ll find out soon enough.”

On a whim, Cody asked, “What trainer do we have?”

17’s shoulders twitched. “None. We aren’t your babysitters. We’ll run the training modules and simulations, but nothing past that.”

“Not even you?”

“Me especially.”

Cody stopped. 17 kept walking, tried to pretend that he would keep going with or without Cody, but ultimately turned on his heel. Cody crossed his arms.

“Is this your plan? Avoiding the situation? Pretending?”

17 raised an eyebrow - tread carefully, it said. Cody ignored it.

“I don’t remember everything 17, but I remember you and those Kaminoans and this place. I remember the war and - and sometimes when I look at my vode or my buir they don’t look like the people I grew up with. I don’t have the fine details, 17, but I can’t shake the feeling that you do.”

The eyebrow lowered.

“Cody,” 17 started, sounding half-strangled. “Cody, you shouldn’t be here. You shouldn’t’ve come back.”

“If you can come back, so can I.”

“That’s - we’re different cases, Cody.”

“Maybe in your eyes.”

17 flashed his teeth. “It isn’t your job to protect me.”

“I could say the same to you,” Cody said and then, pivoting, “and I came here to actually protect Rex. I came here to protect my aliit.”

17’s teeth disappeared. His eyes narrowed. “Explain.”

“Satine’s created a draft. If you get called up by the draft, the rest of your family is at risk to be called up, too. Their names don’t leave the pool. If you enlist by your own volition, they pull the rest of your family out of the pool. I did it so that the rest of my aliit wouldn’t have to come back here. I had a feeling that the war wasn’t kind to them, the first time around and I - what? Why are you smiling?”

“You haven’t changed. Not where it really matters, at least. You always pulled stupid stunts like this the first time around, too.” 17’s smile grew. “Rex was equally good at ruining them. Glad that hasn’t changed.”

Cody stared at 17.

“What did Rex do?”

17 gave him a look that said that Cody knew exactly what his kih’vod did. Cody felt his mouth go dry. He also had the sudden urge to murder someone - specifically, a blond haired, blue eyed pain in Cody’s shebs.

“He didn’t.”

“He’ll be here in a few days.”

“I’m going to strangle him.”

“Not if he strangles you first”

Cody must have made a face because 17’s voice dropped from amused to something that made Cody feel especially small and di’kutla. “Cody, you didn’t actually think that Rex would let you march back in here by yourself, right?”

“Of course not,” Cody said, lying through his teeth before realizing that 17 could smell the blood in the water. He sighed. “I just thought I would have more time.”

“Di’kut,” 17 said.

“We won’t be in the same squad,” Cody said. “It won’t be the same.”

“Cody, if you think that’s a bad thing, then you really are a di’kut.”

“I didn’t say it would be bad, 17. It’ll just be different, won’t it?”

“Elek.”

“This is where we met, isn’t it? Not just the two of us but everyone else.”

The strange emotion was back on 17’s face. Cody soaked it up, tried to memorize the way it molded the strong features into something rounder and younger and more vulnerable in a way that was nearly unrecognizable.

“You used to call yourselves Squad Shebse.”

“Sounds like us,” Cody softly said, trying to keep that emotion in place for as long as he could. “I know why I’m here, 17, but why are you?”

17 closed his eyes. He didn’t sigh - because 17 didn’t sigh, he yelled and raved and got frustrated but he never sighed when they were around, he never made them feel like they were useless and disappointing and not worth his time - but he gave his equivalent of a sigh. Cody could feel it in his own soul.

“You made a choice, Cody. I did, too.”

“Who?”

“Hm?”

“Who was it? I had Rex. Who did you have?”

“You all,” 17 said. “And Spar.”

Cody frowned. The name didn’t bring up anything, no emotion or instinct or barely there memory. He repeated, “Who?”

“Exactly. Now come on, we’re running late.”

The rest of the tour was done in silence. Cody couldn’t tell if it was because 17 had run out of things to tell him regarding the base, or if 17 was simply socially exhausted. Cody wanted to know more - to know everything, if he was being honest with himself - but held himself back. 17 certainly seemed comfortable with Cody, that was clear, but he didn’t seem enthusiastic to have Cody here, at Kamino and in the GAR and, apparently, repeating history. Although it hurt for Cody to even consider, he had a feeling that he couldn’t confide in 17 as much as he used to.

“Here’s your bunk. The rest of your squad should already be inside. Latemeal’ll be served soon in the mess, and you’ll report to the medbay for those inoculations tomorrow morning.” 17 pulled something out of his pocket. “Here. Your military id. That number will follow you everywhere.”

“I’ll get used to it,” he said, holding out his hand. 17 dropped something thin, oval-shaped, and metal into Cody’s palm. Cody flipped it over.

“You’re already used to it, Cody,” 17 said, giving Cody’s shoulder a slight squeeze before letting go and leaving. Cody kept staring at the engraved numbers.

They read 2224.

“Kriff,” Cody said to no one. “Karking haran.”

He took a deep breath and shoved the thing away. It sat in his pocket like a stone, like it held something more than those awful, haunting numbers. Cody, like a hut’uun, ignored it. Cody knocked against the doorframe instead, and laid his hand flat against the door’s biosensor. It slid open. Cody stepped in.

“Cody?”

“Davijaan - seems like I can’t escape you, huh?”

Davijaan smiled from the bunk he had claimed. “Hey, you’re the one following me around.”

“You wish.”

“Cody?” He turned at the sound of a different voice, this one rising up from one of the further corners of the room. “I thought it was Kote. That’s what the droid said, at least.”

It was the person who had glared at Cody back in the attendance line. Out of the rain and the cold of the landing dock, and no longer being held up, he still looked annoyed. He also looked disappointed, as if he expected more out of Cody.

“Kote. That’s quite a name.”

“I didn’t pick it,” Cody said. “Take it up with my buir.” 

Davijaan rolled his eyes. “Easy, you two. I’d rather not asphyxiate on oversized egos and testosterone this early in the game. Neyo, this is Cody. Cody, this is Neyo. Play nice. I want to pass all the training modules we’re stuck doing together, you know. Some of us want to place well in GAR’s ranks.”

Neyo made a clicking noise with his tongue. “Asphyxiate. Big word there, Davijaan.”

“What did you expect? Another Doom?”

Cody blinked. “Doom?”

“‘S me,” came a voice, deep and low. Cody watched as a thick-set Mando’ade - there wasn’t mistaking his accent anytime soon - got up from the floor and dusted his hands off.

Cody looked at Neyo. “We’re bunking with a Doom and you make fun of my name?”

“He didn’t get held back by the security droid.”

Doom crossed his arms and leaned against his bunk, either not hearing or not caring when the metal frame groaned under his weight. “Why did you get held back, by the way?”

“Rumor says it’s because he got the highest score on those aptitude tests.”

Cody turned to the side just to catch someone stepping out of a small side room.

“How do you know about that?”

The person shrugged. “Who doesn’t?”

“Grey’s just playing around with you, Cody,” Davijaan said. “Our scores got released after the main briefing, and the Kaminoans put them all up on this big scoreboard looking thing. You’re right at the top.”

Grey gave Cody a small smile. “Guilty. Seriously, though, where’d they take you?”

“Some simulation room. They wanted to make sure my score was right, so they made me run through some modules.”

Neyo looked intrigued. “And?”

“And they aren’t messing around. Some of them were practically impossible.”

“Practically?”

“They had solutions,” Cody said. The frustration of not being able to solve them was still fresh in his mind, but so were the sims. If he could get his hands on another holotable, he was sure he could recreate the specific scenario qualifications and manually find their solutions through trial and error. “I couldn’t find them in time.”

“Shame,” Neyo said, drawling. Grey held his hand out, as if he was already done with Neyo’s exquisite imitation of aloofness, and kept interrogating Cody.

“How did the Kaminoans respond?”

“They seemed pleased. They mentioned that they would be following my scores.”

“They’ll be following ours too, then,” Doom said.

Davijaan sighed. “Worse than that, I bet they’ll give us the hardest sims to run.”

Cody shifted. The sudden guilt that crashed into him felt familiar. The older Cody must have made other people’s lives harder, too. “Sorry,” he said.

“Don’t sweat it, Cody.” Davijaan’s vambrace lit up. He snatched it up from the locker by his bunkside and waved it around. “Latemeal, boys. On to the mess.”

The rest of the day, in comparison to the morning, flew by. Before Cody knew it, lights in the hallways were dimming, and he was following his squad back to his bunkroom. They weren’t his aliit - Cody had to get that thought through his head immediately because it wasn't fair to him or them - but they fell together easily, as if they had already learned how to work together and work together well. No one carried the same tug as Davijaan did, but no one had the emptiness of Spar, either.

“Cody, you comin’?”

Doom was waiting for him, one foot keeping the door propped open.

“I’ll be there in a little while.”

“Going exploring?”

Cody raised his vambrace. Unexpectedly, although maybe not as much as he originally thought, the Kaminoans had let all the trainees keep their beskar’gam. Cody hadn’t seen a single pot of paint in any of the armories or storm rooms, a stable for any place that cared for beskar’gam, so he chalked the miracle up to either the combined work of the Alphas or the possible fallout of trying to take ‘gam from a whole platoon of Mando’ade. Based on the feeling he got from the Kaminoans, Cody had to believe in the power of the former.  

“Tying up some loose ends.”

“Don’t stay up too late,” Doom said, taking out his foot. “We got check-ups tomorrow.”

“I won’t,” Cody promised, waiting for the door to shut before he scrolled through his contact list. It didn’t take him much time to find the number he wanted. His comm crackled to life, and Cody heard someone drowsily clear his throat.

“Su’cuy?”

“I’m going to kill you,” Cody growled.

“You’re gonna kill me?” Rex said, half-whispering but fully furious. “That’s a little too hypocritical, even for you.”

“Rex -”

“Cody,” Rex said, hiccuping through the last half of Cody’s name. It was the telltale sign that Rex had been crying - or that he had gotten close to crying. Cody blinked.

“Rex?”

“Cody, do you have any idea how terrified I was when I realized what you did?” Rex’s voice was wavering. Cody closed his eyes and pressed his head against the wall.

“You weren’t supposed to find out.”

Rex snorted. “Oh sure, Cody. Sure. Let me just not care or notice when my ori’vod disappears in the middle of a war. Let me just shrug my shoulders and go on with my life when my idiot of a vod goes missing. Let me not run around and panic and do everything in my power to figure out where he went because Ka’ra forbid I worry about him - and stupid of me to do that, too, because he’s just going off to war. I mean, what’s a war? Sure, people die. Sure, lives get ruined. But it’s Cody that flounced off without a war. Clearly he has it in the bag, just like he had that one feral tooka in the bag.”

“Rex,” Cody said, pointed at first but softened in degrees. “I just didn’t want you to worry, and I didn’t want you signing up. I didn’t want anyone in our aliit getting drafted.”

Cody heard Rex shift around. He also heard his kih’vod give his customary heaving sigh that made him sound more like an old man than a young adult.

“Yeah, well I did. Both things, actually, so there.”

Cody snorted, paused, and then gave up on being frustrated. It was never worth holding onto when it was directed at Rex. They were too close, too similar, too much to each other for a grudge to ever find its footing between the two of them.

“I thought we agreed never to talk about that tooka.”

“You said we would never talk about the tooka. I made no promises,” Rex said, giving a strange, stifled laugh. Cody made a face.

“Where are you?”

“Home,” Rex said. “Dawn was threatened the other day by the Separatists, so all the colleges shut down and sent us home.”

“Ka’ra, Rex, it must be the middle of the night there.”

“Yeah, it is.” There was more shifting. When Rex spoke again, his voice was even quieter. “And you aren’t the only one who wants to kill me.”

Cody paled. “Rex, tell me it’s only you and buir and Boba at home. Tell me it’s just the three of you.”

“I wish I could.”

“Who else?”

“Um, everyone.”

“Do they know about me? Or just you?”

“N'eparavu takisit, Codes.”

Cody groaned and thunked his head against the wall, whining, “Rex.”

“If it’s any consolation, I didn’t mean to get you in trouble, too. Apparently I’m not as good at hiding enlistment paperwork as you are. When they found it - kark, Cody. I thought I was a goner.”

“I bet,” he said, a little dryly. “Who found it? Wolffe? Fox?”

“Neither, actually. It was Ponds.”

Cody blinked.

“Ponds freaked out about it?”

“I don’t think freak is a strong enough verb, vod. Ponds went supernova insane. You would’ve thought I had pissed on my beskar’gam and streaked naked through the town square. Wolffe and Fox were the ones that had to calm him down. Buir stayed far, far away from it.”

“Of course he did. He’s no idiot.”

Rex hummed. “Yeah, but Ponds. Cody, I’m being serious. He’s out for blood, vod. I think he’s considering just marching up to wherever you are and dragging you home. I’m also convinced that he’s mangled to wrangle Wolffe into and -”

Rex, suddenly, stopped talking.

“Rex?”

There was some loud shuffling, one sharp crackle of static, maybe sound, and then silence. Cody had a bad feeling. He pushed his vambrace further away from him, as if to buffer whatever was going to come out of the comm, and tentatively called out for his kih’vod again.

“Kote.”

Cody winced. As a rule - or perhaps a warning - his vode only called him by his birth name when they were particularly infuriated with him. He tilted the vambrace away even more.

“Su’cuy, Fox.”

“Kote, we’re coming. All of us.” A perfect little pause, one inserted only to give Cody time to squirm and realize just how badly he had messed up. “Do you know what we’re going to do, Kote? Can you guess why we’re coming?”

“Fox -”

“We’re coming to beat your shebs six ways from Taungsday, Kote,” Fox said. Another pause. “And then we’re going to help you win a war.”

“Vor entye,” Cody said.

“It’s sweet that you think that’ll save you. You’re welcome, by the way. Now - Kote, are you listening?”

“Elek, Fox.”

“Here’s what you’re going to do, Kote. You’re going to behave. You’re going to keep your little boots on the ground, and you’re going to stay wherever they’re sending you and Rex - and on that note, just where are you, Kote? What base?”

Cody murmured the name.

“Speak up, Kote because I’m not in the mood.”

“Kamino.”

The silence was deafening. It stretched on for so long that, by the time that Rex had rescued his comlink, Cody was half convinced that he had lost connection.

“Cody, what’d you tell Fox? He just went from being furious to looking like he was going to hurl. He let me take my comm back without a fight.”

“He asked where I was stationed.”

“Yeah? It’s going to be where I’m going, I think. Where is it?”

“It’s Kamino, Rex. I’m on Kamino.”

The comm hissed out some static. 

“Kark,” Rex said, voice so soft that Cody almost missed it.

“Kark indeed, Rex. Kark indeed.”

“I - dank farrik, Cody. I gotta go. Fox just pulled the alarm and the whole house is up, buir included. I’m pretty sure if I let anyone talk to you it won’t be nice.”

Cody huffed. He could practically feel the chaos from here - the horror, too - and felt awful for making Rex go through it all by himself. “Goodnight, Rex. I’ll see you soon.”

“Ret'urcye mhi,” Rex said and Cody could hear the smile in his voice. “Don’t die until I get there.”

“I won’t.”

The comm clicked off. Cody took a few minutes to just breathe in the hallway, watching the strip lights on the floor dim further and further until he was standing in what Kamino considered a night cycle. He brought a hand up to pinch the bridge of his nose, as if he could starve off the headache he felt approaching. When he conceded to the fact that he couldn’t - and that the migraine, therefore, was just going to hit him - he turned around and entered his bunkroom.

He dreamed of Kamino - the wrong Kamino, the old Kamino - that night.

In the morning he woke up with his shirt and sheets sticking to him, damp with sweat and tears and stifled cries, and the taste of bile and blood on his tongue. His head hurt differently this time, right along the curve of bone connecting his temple and eye, pounding out a type of pain that made his vision go in and out. He laid in his bunk for a while, listening to the sounds of his squad, the wrong squad, he thought, sleeping all around him. He never fell back to sleep; his mind was too full of small bodies bruised and battered, of the feeling of terror that was so overwhelming it rivaled the crest of Kamino’s own ocean, of failed training sims and modules with live rounds.

Cody didn’t sleep. He wondered if he would ever sleep peacefully in Kamino ever again.

Later that day, when Cody filed in through the medbay doors and found the place swarming with Kaminoans, he was simply too tired to feel horrified - or so he thought. He ended up surprising himself when, busy fitting back into his beskar’gam after his tests, he overheard a few of the scientists talking.

“Here,” one said, passing a stack of files to another. “These are from the last squad. Careful, CC-2224’s results are in there.”

The other one cocked its head. “The one Lama Su and Nala Se are intrigued by?”

“Yes. His blood work and genome test came back with particularly fascinating results.”

“Should I make a note to request further procedures for him?”

The first Kaminoan’s nostrils flared, narrowed, sucked up air in a way that Cody could only consider excitement. “Yes,” they said. “It would be a good idea.”

Cody, very, very carefully, finished putting on his beskar’gam. He exited the medbay, stopping once to have short conversation with Doom and Grey, and continued down the hallway that would lead him to the rest of the base. He than, just as calmly, pulled open a door, shouldered his way into a thunderstorm, and proceeded to wretch so violently that it drove him to his knees.

When the fit finally passed, Cody tipped his head back to the sky and screamed.

Hidden by the noise of the rain and thunder and his own personal turmoil, something threaded into his very soul screamed with him.

Demogolka, it said, demogolka hut’uun. It will not happen again. Not to my ade. Not to my Kot’ika. Naasnaasnaas.

Chapter Text

Kamino wasn’t the same.

From the outside, it looked the same. It still had its barren, white walls, its constant conniption of thunder and rain and ocean, its stampede of water from every direction. The Kaminoans still drifted down the halls and into training stalles to peer down at squads or lone trainees with their strange, off-putting serpentine motions. The training was still rigorous, crafted to bolster someone’s strengths and tear out their weaknesses, and it sometimes made Cody ache in ways he knew would make Fenn or Kal happy. He didn’t mind it; 17’s words were still stuck in his mind, as were those first failed sims, and Cody knew, frustratingly, that he wasn’t prepared enough for the war. He wasn’t where he needed to be, and that meant he needed help to get to where he should be.

Cody, therefore, found himself at a crossroads.

Kamino wasn’t the same - it was craftier. Despite all its differences, despite its ability to smuggle whole weeks past without imparting one ounce of anxiety into them, something still lurked. Cody couldn't prove it, but he felt it. There were moments when his hair would raise, when everything would turn crystalline and so, so bright, his pulse roving up into his teeth and setting them on edge. There were nights where Cody would wake up to hear soft, languid footsteps out in the hallway, snapshots when he would glance around a room on a whim and catch every hidden camera out of the corner of his eye. Something moved about in its shadows, and it felt wrong for Cody to keep letting it linger.

A small part of him hated himself for selling his soul, for forcing himself to ignore all the warning signs, for allowing Kamino to gain so much ground with so little resistance while he was busy trying to climb up to the level he should have been at. It was irritating on multiple levels. On one hand, Cody wanted to hunt down that clever, skittering thing and crush it under his boot, and on the other he was distinctly aware that the reason he couldn’t was due to his own choices. For the first time in his life, Cody wished he had listened to his buir more. As it were, Cody had to live with the bitter thought that if Kamino had the tools to shred him alive and piece him back together into who he needed to be, then Cody needed Kamino.

Later, he would realize that he had been wrong - it had been Kamino that needed Cody, and Cody had walked through its gates like a beskar’gam wrapped present. In the meantime, though, Cody tried to walk a fine line between acceptance and rebellion. He needed people, information, and training.

He collected the people first.

“Cody?”

He went to turn around, but a sharp poke between his shoulder blades stopped him. Cody played along, dutifully keeping himself before the caf machine. He fished out a mug from a nearby stack.

“Make it two,” said the voice behind him.

Cody cooperated. He caught a glimpse of something trying to rise over his shoulder. It looked deceptively human, but Cody had known enough medics between his buir’s payroll and stories about ba'vodu Mij to know that many, if not all, were just bloodthirsty jawas with a penchant for weaponizing needles.

The thing over his shoulder dropped back down. “You’re taller than I’d thought you’d be.”

The accent was different, Cody noted, but that was his medic. He was sure of it.

“Maybe they marked it down wrong in my medical file." Cody paused and then, in a carefully drawn out voice that would've had his vode preemptively hitting him, said, "Or - ”

The jawa took the bait.

“Or?”

“Or,” Cody said, dropping the cups below twin spigots, “maybe you’re just smaller than you thought.”

He barely dodged the kick to the back of his knee - a miracle of old muscle memory - and snorted when a socked foot went wide and hit the counter right before him. The sound of the caf machine drowned out a string of curses that were so familiar that Cody mouthed right along with them. He turned around.

“Cream?” He asked. “Sugar?”

The jawa - a short, sturdy Mando'ad with a recently buzzed crew cut - looked unrecognizable as Kamino’s most promising medical officer with his combination of mismatched, oversized sweatpants, shirt, and socks. He looked vaguely horrified by Cody’s questions. “ Naas ,” he said, making grabbing hand gestures and inching more and more towards Cody. “You don’t dilute caf - don’t you know anything?”

“I know that you have an addiction, Caf.”

“‘S not an addiction,” Caf said, finally snagging a cup and pulling it close to his chest. “It’s a perfectly healthy, mutualistic relationship.”

“Pretty sure mutualism means both sides benefit,” Cody said, watching Caf all but swallow the cup whole. “What you’re doing looks a lot more like parasitism.”

Caf waggled one of his fingers. “Don’t quote biology to me, Kote Fett.”

“Don’t call me that.”

Caf gave a small smile, and pushed the cup back at Cody. Cody sighed and switched it out with his own. “Pardon the sugar,” Cody said. Caf gagged as if Cody had laced the thing with poison but still powered through to finish it within record time.

“Why don’t you like your name?”

“Never fit right.”

Caf squinted at him. “Dunno, seems pretty fitting to me. You’ve certainly made your mark on Kamino.”

"I can't tell if that's respect or disgust in your voice."

"Jury's still out. The Kaminoans, though -"

"Obsessed?"

Caf shrugged. "Someone could argue that all of the CC medical files are far more in-depth than the CT, but others could make a point to say that your squad is observed and tested far more than the norm - which is saying something because everyone in Kamino is being overly tested."

"Any reason for it, you think?"

"Besides feeding all of your egos? I don't know," Caf said. He wiggled past Cody to fill up a third cup. "I'm being paid to get myself combat ready, not to theorize about the plethora of medical checks the Kaminoans do. Maybe there's something in the atmosphere. Maybe they just want to make sure the training works. Maybe they caught something in one of the tests and want to keep an eye on it."

Cody leaned against the counter, staring out into the rest of the mess. The tables were slowly filling in as latemeal officially started. Cody should've been entering around this time with his squad, but he had manipulated his schedule by doing an extra workload of training sims the day before in order to carve out a chunk of time to get some personal affairs straightened out. Meeting with Caf was one of them. Hunting down Colt was another. Doing it all before greeting Rex made it all, admittedly, a hard timetable to keep to.

"If something was in the atmosphere, they wouldn't have picked Kamino as a training base," Cody mused. "Our training should only get us into better physical shape, so if they're really measuring body fluctuations, they shouldn't be doing it right on top of each other - and if they caught something dangerous in one of our exams we either should've been notified or shipped back out."

"I never said it was normal or made sense," Caf said, shifting back and forth on his feet. "In fact, it doesn't make sense. At all. I've thought about it, and it all seems strange. Really strange. Especially because they don't let any of my boys complete them. The extra ones are all headed by the Kaminoan's medical team - which I didn't know even existed except for a few days ago."

"Any personnel or names that I would know?"

Caf shook his head. “I couldn’t find any names, but I did make a schedule.”

“You made it?”

“They certainly didn’t - I told you, the Kaminions have no medical rhyme or reason for their check-ups. The days they did pick, though, have something of a pattern. I tried to replicate it."

"Send it to me."

Caf clutched his cup tight. "Cody, the pattern's weak at the best. The schedule could be useless."

"Emphasis on could."

"I'll send it to you," Caf said, his easy acceptance surprising Cody. By reputation alone, Caf should've bitten Cody's head off, yet he had yielded to Cody stepping into his life and asking him favors without so much as batting an eye. It made Cody wonder if Caf remembered anything. Cody did; Caf had been singled out of the rabble of the other medical squads by the odd taste of faded frustration and respect he conjured - Cody made a mental note to return back to that conversation at another time when he spotted Colt entering the mess.

"Caf?"

"Hm?"

"Vor entye," Cody said, gently touching Caf's arm and moving to leave. Caf turned with the touch, lowering his third cup until it was nearing the improbable zone of being forgotten.

"I don't like it," Caf suddenly said. He dipped his chin right after, keeping his eyes low and half-hidden by his lashes, as if he had said a terrible, awful secret. He glanced up at Cody. "The tests, I mean. The strangeness of them. I wished they would let my boys do them."

"You think if you asked they'd let you?"

"Honest answer? Naas. But I can try."

Cody thought it over. "Not now," he said. Colt was moving with a purpose, snatching a tray of food and moving towards an adjacent exit. "Let's try out the schedule first. Right now they're just medical exams, and I'll try to make sure they stay that way. If they don't -"

"You'll comm me."

"Elek."

Caf huffed. He finally dragged his eyes off of Cody and back to his cup. He frowned at it. "You'd better. I spent hours looking through all those stupid medical files. Hours. I don't do that just for anyone."

"I know. Vor entye, Caf. Really."

Caf’s response was to down the third cup and turn away from Cody. Cody stayed around long enough to make sure the medic didn’t try for a fourth - enjoying, slightly, the way a slow flush traveled its way up Caf’s neck and into the tips of his ears - before leaving to corner Colt.

“Commander Colt?”

Colt looked over his shoulder, spotted Cody, and lost some of his momentum. He seemed hesitant to completely stop, something that Cody didn't blame him for. Colt and the other commanders stationed on Kamino - Havoc and Blitz - stuck to dealing with the CTs and left the CCs to the mercy of the Alphas. As Cody looked every inch of a model CC trainee even dressed down in civvies, Colt was no doubt already calling foul. Cody quickly threw up a half-wave and a small smile, a stereotypical CT move, and watched as something eased in Colt's posture as the commander finally slowed to a full stop.

"I don't think we've met," he said when Cody pulled even.

"We haven't, but everybody's been telling me that you can answer my question."

Colt snorted. He gave Cody a look that was disbelieving and amused all at once. "And you are?"

"Cody."

"Cody -?"

Cody ignored the ploy for his last name. There was only one Fett on Kamino, and Kote had been plastered right at the top of the CC scoreboard for weeks without budging. Cody was famous throughout the base in the loosest sense of the word; Kote was famous, so was Fett, and until Cody confessed and owned up to either one of those names, neither were easily recognizable as him. The novelty of near invisibility was heavenly, especially when the only limitation it gave Cody about crafting together a white lie was his own acting skill.

“I’m under Commander Blitz, sir.”

Colt barely blinked. “My condolences.”

“He’s not all that bad. He tries.”

Colt’s lips twitched. He readjusted his tray and settled back onto his feet.

“You said you needed something answered?”

“Elek, sir. See, one of my buddies just got shipped out, and I’ve had a hard time tracking him to his new assignment.”

“You and everyone else,” Colt said before moving into a memorized speech. “The relocation process takes anywhere from a handful of days to full weeks depending on the base selected. Besides that it could be entirely possible that your friend was determined to not be applicable to any station within the GAR. In that case, they were most likely sent back to their home planet and that trip can take months.”

“Oh, I know that, sir,” Cody said. “They covered it in the main debrief.”

“Ka’ra, I guess miracles do exist - a trainee paid attention to the debrief. You’re sure you’re one of Blitz’s boys?”

“I hope so. It would be a shame if I spent my time with him and not with you or Commander Havoc.”

“My, a charmer.”

“I prefer honest, sir, but charmer does have a nice ring to it.” Cody dipped his head a little. “And if I’m being honest, I really don’t understand why my friend was transferred. He was meeting standards - exceedingly them, actually - and we all had him slated to be moved into the CC barracks the next reporting cycle. Then one day we woke up and he was just gone.”

Colt’s eyebrows barely twitched. From the outside, it was a solid sabacc face, clearly well-trained and professionally neutral. Cody respected it, and he almost believed it. If he hadn’t smelled the sudden layer of sweat that began to unspool on Colt’s body or heard the way the man’s heart began to pound double-quick against his breastbone, Cody would’ve been fooled. As it were, Cody did catch both. It helped less than he thought it would as the mixture Colt was giving off wasn’t exactly fear - that smelled bitter and burnt - but it was headier than plain adrenaline.

“How was his attitude?”

“Fine. I certainly didn’t hear any complaints filed against him from anyone.”

“Was he ever singled out? Did the Kaminoans ever take a special interest in him?”

Cody faked a thoughtful look, watching Colt all the while. The commander had slipped right from amused to serious, his smile drifting away to be replaced with a clenched jaw and a pair of carefully neutral eyes. It put Cody on edge for all the wrong reasons. The rumor of disappearing CTs was relatively new to the CC barracks, but Colt’s reaction seemed too dramatic for a tall tale.

“Never in training,” Cody said. “Medical checks were different. It always seemed like he stayed longer or had more tests done. In fact, a few days before he left they pulled him aside and took him somewhere.”

The scent spiked.

“Where?”

“He didn’t say. Said something about the Kaminoans medical team wanting to ask him some questions. We made some jokes about it, you know. Wondered if they found something stupid in one of his tests.”

Colt shook his head. “The Kaminoans don’t have a medical team. They’re scientists not -”

Cody flinched. Amateur move, really, because Colt saw it and immediately stopped talking. There was a strange beat of silence - Cody trying to breathe through the scent and memorize it, Colt trying to find his footing again - and then the commander gave a sigh that was more of an idea than it was a motion.

“Listen,” Colt said, “don’t worry about it, kid. Transfers take time and get bad comm signals. Your missing buddy is probably just missing in transit.”

“You really think so?”

“Absolutely.”

Liar. Cody bit down the urge to wrinkle his nose and smiled instead.

“Sounds like something that could only happen to him, sir. He always had the worst luck. Thank you for the help, sir.”

Colt used his free hand to wave Cody off.

“No problem, Cody. I just wished I could’ve been more helpful.”

“Sir, you’ve been more helpful to me in the last five minutes than Commander Blitz has ever been.”

Colt burst into laughter, that strange, unidentifiable smell - Dread? Shock? Worry? - dissipating. Cody clapped him on the shoulder once, pleasantly surprised when Colt let him, and then wandered off towards the CT side of the mess. He dipped behind a corner, waited, and then re-emerged into the heart of the mess from a different angle. He caught Colt leaving the mess with Havoc, their heads bowed together and the latter furiously typing on his vambrace, and then glanced at his own. He had one old, unread message from Rex, no doubt his vod telling him that his transport had landed, and glanced over at the time. Estimating that Rex was halfway through his debrief by now and still needed to be sorted into the barrack system, Cody had a handful of minutes to play around with.

He looked back out into the mess. A few of the Alphas were milling about, just watching. Cody caught 17 leaned against the second-floor railing and then, right below and within 17’s eyesight, saw 98 blankly looking out at the sea of trainees.

Cody debated it only for a moment. He had the people, certainly, but he needed the holotables. He needed the training.

“98?”

The Alpha glanced over. When he saw it was Cody, he lost some of the slouch in his posture and gave a quick, brief smirk. “Call me Nate, Kote.”

“Only if you call me Cody,” Cody said. “And how’d you know it was me?”

“Every Alpha knows who you are - you keep breaking our sims.”

“Breaking is a very strong word. Reinventing is much nicer.”

Nate waved a finger at him. “See, this is why we’re all talking about you. You’re trouble. Big trouble.”

“Is that bad?”

“Not to me. I like trouble.”

Cody smiled. Out of all the Alphas, Nate was the closest to the CCs. Doom thought it had something to do with his age as Nate was, unmistakably, the youngest of the Alphas - and one of the smaller ones, too - but Neyo seemed convinced that it was just because Nate was simply the most immature. Cody didn’t care either way; Nate was Nate, and that meant that Cody could raise his eyebrows and cross his arms and ask in a low, even voice if Nate would like to help him make more trouble.

“Intriguing,” Nate said. “Go on.”

“The special training squads -”

Nate perked up. “Shh,” he said, drawing Cody closer. “You’ve heard about those?”

“Most of the CCs have.”

“I’m sure,” Nate said. “Yet you’re the only one asking about them.”

“Guilty, but I want in.”

“You’re not already?”

Cody jerked his head up. Nate followed the motion, spotted 17, and clicked his tongue. “17’s been hesitant to put it nicely. I caught him talking about the ARC program with my squad the other day, but he hasn’t mentioned it to me once. He’s got the others studying for it, I think - extra modules, sparring practice, survival sims - but he’s got me on some rotations that feel more like busywork than actual practice.”

“The ARC entrance exam’s next week.”

“Hence, my problem. I’m hoping you can be my solution.”

“You want me to sponsor you,” Nate said. He looked over at Cody with wide eyes. “You want me to go behind 17’s back to sign you up for ARC training, put myself down as your sponsor, and lie straight to his face about it?”

“The lying’s optional - sounds fun, though.”

“You’re going to go places, Cody. I can feel it.” Nate held out his hand. “Your comm, please.” Cody handed it over. He watched Nate add himself as a contact and immediately send Cody a file.

“The official pamphlet for the program. I’ll get you signed up by tonight. You should be able to get through all the entrance paperwork by tomorrow morning,” Nate said. His head cocked. “And whoever Rex is seems a little impatient to meet up with you.”

“Isn’t everybody?” Cody took back his comm. “Vor entye, Nate.”

“I should be thanking you, Cody. How often do I get to pull on 17’s leg?” Nate nudged at Cody’s shoulder. “You’d better get to Rex fast - 17’s coming this way.”

Cody left the mess to the sound of Nate cackling.

The hallway outside was blissfully quiet, patrolled only occasionally by service droids, and Cody soaked it up. He had once assumed that nothing could be louder than the Fett house when it was full, but Kamino had proved him wrong. It seemed everywhere that Cody went on the base was bustling with other trainees or Kaminoans or Alphas - constant surveillance, he wryly thought, peering up at one of the hallway’s cameras. He ducked his head right before it swung around and caught him looking, but couldn’t resist another glance at it. He didn’t mind the cameras because despite being as plentiful as they were, they were equally easy to manipulate; Cody had become adept at only appearing in their footage for no more than a handful of moments at a time and, in the training rooms, for sticking to their corners in a way he knew covered his face in static. Cameras never made Cody feel watched. It was a small blessing, a compromise, because everything else in Kamino certainly did.

Case in point, the moment Cody entered the CT barracks, he felt eyes on him. Some were easy to pick out: the wide-eyed stares of the new trainees, the quick glances of the curious but older cadets, the casual side-eye from the trainers who were wondering, no doubt, what a CC was doing. He ignored them. They didn’t feel any different from the ones he grew up under - and none had the same clinical, nauseating gazes as the Kaminiise.

“Looking a little lost there, vod.”

Cody turned. Rex was standing a little way down the hall, smiling and blond and looking every inch what Kamino hated.

“I’m lost?” Cody said, maneuvering around a squad of CTs. “You look like you’re playing pretend with buir’s ‘gam.”

“That hurts, Cody. Deeply.”

It was Rex who lunged for a hug first, but it was Cody who met him halfway. Cody could feel Rex stretch up to his tiptoes - his old pair of boots scuffing against the tops of Cody’s, his head suddenly hitting the bottom of Cody’s chin before turning to the side - and hid a laugh in his vod’s ridiculously blond hair. Rex all but stood on Cody’s feet to pull off a semi-respectable Keldabe.

“This you?” Cody asked when Rex finally stopped smothering, knocking his hand against one of the barrack room doors.

“Guess so,” Rex said, snatching up his duffel and dragging it into the room. Cody followed after, shutting the door and looking around. The dorm wasn’t much different than the one Cody was stationed in save for the fact that it seemed to be built to house more than a standard squad. Most of the bunks already had something strewn across them, and Cody watched Rex go still in the center of the room.

“Is there a problem, Rex’ika?”

Rex threw a kark-you-kindly behind his back on reflex. Cody let it slide; the Ka’ra was clearly on his side by the fact that the only bunks left were the ones fully pressed up into the ceiling, lofted to their highest setting and straight from Rex’s nightmare.

“They aren’t that high.”

“Uh-huh,” Cody said. “Sure. The ladder on the side is just for decoration.”

“Shut up,” Rex said. To his credit, he tipped his bag into the bed with only a mild, fleeting case of hyperventilation. He turned back to Cody with a smug look. “Unlike you, Codes, I’ve matured.”

Cody smiled an ugly smile. “How was the fly up, Rex? Rough? Very high up in the air?”

“Mir’sheb.”

“Language.” Cody gestured at the other beds. “Are these all of your squadmates?”

“'Lek. One of the trainer’s said they were running out of room, so all of the dorms and squads got double-bunked. It’s also why I’m here and not wandering about the CC barracks with you. Too many CCs already, apparently. Most of my squadmates should’ve been in the CC training based on those preliminary tests they gave us, so they just paired us all up together.”

“Just wait for the start of the next reporting cycle. Some of the CCs are slated to be transferred out of the program into some specialized training.”

“Why do I get the feeling that you know that for a very specific reason?”

Cody raised his hands up, pretending to be the very picture of idyllic innocence. “If I’m slated for transfer, I’m slated for transfer. I’m certainly not going to argue with the military trainers who are paid to spot talent.”

“Wow,” Rex said. “I thought it was physically impossible for your ego to get larger, yet here we are. It’s a good thing the rest are following me to knock all that layari out of you.”

“They’re really coming?”

“Oh, they’re really coming. Within a few days of each other, actually.” Rex rubbed at the back of his neck. “On a normal day I would pay credits to see you get your shebs handed to you, but they’re going to kill you. They nearly killed me and I was innocent.”

“Innocent? Rex, I hate to break it to you, but you signed up for the GAR, too. No one twisted your arm on that.”

“No one twisted yours either.”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“You never want to talk about things, Cody. Ever. You do something stupid, you try to deal with it on your own, and then you can’t understand why we’re all upset. You shut down. You shut all of us out.”

Cody didn’t respond.

“Boba’s upset, Cody. Ba’buir’s upset. Buir? Practically inconsolable. Do you even know when the last time buir was inconsolable? Because I sure don’t.”

Cody stayed silent. Rex seemed to deflate.

“Ka’ra, you’re so atin.”

“I’m Cody,” he finally said, saying his name like it explained everything - and maybe it did by the way Rex gave a shallow nod and looked down at his feet. Cody crossed his arms. “N'eparavu takisit, Rex, for what it’s worth.”

Rex flexed his hands against his hips but kept looking down. “Are you sorry for doing it, or are you sorry for messing up and letting us figure out what you did?”

“That’s a very specific question.”

“I’m Rex,” Rex said and - and Cody knew exactly what that meant; it meant Rex was the king of specific questions, of weeding and wiggling truths out of Cody that not even Cody knew were inside of him, of leveling a look that never failed to cut straight through the Fett hard-headedness of their aliit and leave them scrambling. It was the look he was giving Cody now. Cody stared into it, met that battle head-on, and died as a hut’uun.

“This place isn’t like we remember it.”

Rex sighed. He closed his eyes, packing that look away, and then opened them again.

“Is that a good thing?”

“In some ways,” Cody said. “It’s not as heartless, I think, but it’s dangerous. Some things don’t make sense. We have medical checks every other day - sometimes just measuring or weighing, sometimes blood samples and cranial nerve exams - and we’re watched by the trainers and the Kaminoans and cameras. Some CTs have gone missing.”

“Missing? CTs, whole people, have gone missing?”

“It’s being blamed on transfers, so either keep your head down or hold it up so karking high that the whole base will know if something happens to you. Stick close to people. Make friends - befriend some trainers. 17’s here.”

Rex frowned. Cody watched his face carefully.

“Do you remember him?”

“17? Naas. Should I?”

“He definitely remembers us. He’ll be nice to you, but don’t expect a helping hand. He’s kept his distance from me, and I’ll bet anything that he’ll keep his distance from you.”

“You sure that’s not just because you’re annoying, vod?”

“Ha. Hilarious, Rex. Really.”

“Thank you,” Rex said. “Any other rules I should know about?”

Cody shrugged. “Not really - anything I’ve missed you’ll just figure out. You’re going to be fine here, Rex. The things they’re going to throw at you aren’t anything you haven’t seen before. You’ll probably be bored out of your mind half the time and stir crazy the rest.”

“I hope so,” Rex said. He opened his mouth, closed it, and then sighed. “You really think this place has changed?”

“Elek,” Cody said. Rex relaxed because he was Rex - trusting and loyal and without an ounce of the Vizsla genes that would’ve all but screamed at him that Cody was lying through his teeth - and Cody felt something cold and heavy sink down into his stomach. “Besides, you’ve got me. The CC barrack is only a few minutes away.”

“Show me?”

Cody made a show of sighing and checking his comm. “I don’t know, Rex. Some of us are busy.” The resulting punch to his shoulder was painful enough to make him flinch and to tell him that Rex was still angry - furious with him, probably. Cody refused to rub at it; he supposed it was only fair to let the pain linger. “Alright, alright. No need to get violent. I’ll give you a tour, Rex’ika.”

“You’d better.”

They exited the CT barrack together, shoulder to shoulder. Cody divided his time between listening to Rex ramble on and on about everything Cody had missed in the weeks he had been gone and guiding them around the cameras. Between the walk from the CT side of the base and the one with Rex, something had shifted. The cameras were more daunting. The hallways felt smaller and colder and far more observant. Cody, forcing his way through it all, was hyper aware of Rex standing at his side, relaxed and smiling and confident that Cody would keep him safe. It was enough to make Cody’s heart stop and start between breaths, between footsteps and idle chatter. Rex had always been Cody’s weakness - Cody had no doubt that Kamino had already figured that out.

Later that night, he walked to the CC barrack alone, staying just a few steps ahead of dimming lights and the soft noises of a military base heading for bed. Rex had been swept away by his squadmates at one point, and Cody had spent the rest of his time messaging Caf to ask him to look into the Kaminoan science team and to watch out for altered CT files and wandering about. By the time he finally decided to turn around and head back to his dorm, his comm lit up with the ARC paperwork.

“Vor entye, Nate,” he said to no one, feeling Kamino hold its breath and then release all the same. His skin crawled. It reminded him, all at once, of the Ka’ra.

Cody rubbed at his face.

He wished, fleetingly and desperately, that he had the Ka’ra instead; they at least cared for him in their own strange way, and it was an enemy he knew intimately. He had once known Kamino. He thought he had relearned Kamino. He wondered how wrong he was, and he wondered just what he had gotten his vode into.

“Kote.”

Cody stopped. He lowered his comm. Outside of its protective, blinding sphere of light, Cody could just make out a shape lingering by his dorm’s door. He shuffled back a few paces, covered his comm, and felt his pupils expand to peer through the dark.

“17?”

17 didn’t move.

“Is something wrong?” Cody’s mind turned to static. His throat went dry. “Did - has something happened to Rex?”

“He landed today.”

Declarative, not a question. Cody’s answer was soft and drawn-out, unsure. Unmoored.

“Elek. Just a few hours ago.”

“Seems like you’ve had a busy day.”

“I suppose.”

“Tired?”

“I’m not sure how to answer that.”

“Come with me.”

They stared at each other in the darkness. Cody’s mind flickered from Colt to Caf and back again.

“Where are you going to take me?”

“Training stalle.”

“Seems a little late for that.”

“Is that a no?”

Cody took a step forward. 17 turned around and began walking. Cody followed before he knew what he was doing, reaching a hand up to press where Rex hit him, sinking into that bruise - the pain was too sharp and hot on Cody’s tongue to be anything but real. It didn’t comfort him as much as he thought it would’ve.

They stepped into one of the recreation rooms. 17 hardly slowed when they crossed the threshold, kept walking with long, sure strides that were oddly familiar. Cody maneuvered behind him, the whole room cut into great shadows and grey highlights. 

“No lights?”

“I didn’t think you needed them.”

“I don’t,” Cody said. “I just thought…”

17’s face twitched, as if going to look over his shoulder. He didn’t complete the motion - maybe didn’t think he had to. It had given Cody a look at his eyes, and that had been far more than enough to make his point.

17 had Vizsla eyes.

He had a Vizsla build, too, Cody realized; tall and wide, evenly proportioned except for the great slope of his shoulders. He didn’t look like Bacara - not quite. Bacara was more top heavy and thicker through the waist, a heavy gunner in stature and spirit. Bacara had dark jaig eyes and a form of silence that managed to be loud and violent and colorful. Bacara was a Fett.

17 wasn’t.

Cody slowly bent down and undid his boots. 17 was already stepping onto the mat, all clean lines and confidence. Cody had the sudden sense that he was going to get his shebs handed to him.

He stepped onto the mat anyway.

“Any rules?”

“I won’t break any bones,” 17 said.

“Tap-out rules?”

“If you can get an arm free.”

Cody gave a little laugh and tried to make it sound docile. “Should I be concerned?”

“I wasn’t aware you had enough self-preservation to be nervous.”

“Maybe not,” Cody said, sliding his feet out, together, out, beginning to circle. 17 copied him with crossed arms and thin, quick flashes of his eyes. “But I have enough sense to know that you’re upset.”

17 stilled for a moment. “I really hope that’s not new information to you, Kote.”

“It’s Cody.”

“Is that what Jango Fett calls you?”

Cody bit down the urge to lunge for 17. By the way that 17’s weight shifted forward and then fell back again, he had certainly expected Cody to go for the bait.

“Rex calls me Cody. You called me Cody.”

“I first called you Kote.”

Cody froze.

17 caught it. “You didn’t know that, did you? That you were Kote first.”

“I was never Kote.”

“Who are you then?” 17 said, planting his feet. “Because you’re certainly not Cody.”

Cody, admittedly, lunged. 17 was ready for him, taking on Cody’s forward momentum and using it to spin him to the mat. Cody hooked a leg up and caught 17 around the shoulder. He knew it was useless to try and throw 17 down next to him - 17 was too broad and had to be expecting it - so he threw his other leg around, braced against the front curve of 17’s shoulder, and rechambered to the side, pushing 17 to the left. Cody slid up onto his back, planted his forearms, and levered himself backwards. He got his feet back under him only moments before 17 threw a punch. Cody ducked, rolled, and hit the opposite edge of the mat. 17 stalked forward.

“You dodge more than you used to.”

“Stop it,” Cody hissed.

“Stop what? Stop telling you the truth? Stop pointing out the things you’re not willing to look at?” 17’s foot, crashing down in an axe kick and landing on Cody’s block with a force so hard it made Cody’s teeth click together. 17’s hands, reaching down and snatching him and spinning him around. “You aren’t Cody. You’re someone else.”

17 twisted Cody’s face around, pressed Cody’s chin into the crook of his elbow.

“It’s the same face,” 17 said. “I’ll give you that. It’s the same attitude. The same confidence, the same stubbornness, the same karking interest in meddling in things that don’t concern you.”

Cody gasped. He squirmed. His feet didn’t even skim the ground. He dug his nails into 17’s arm, tried to kick behind him to catch 17 somewhere soft and painful. 17 kept talking.

“You’re bold as brass, kid, and you’re good,” he said. “But you’re not great. I didn’t sign you up for ARC simply because you can’t survive it. I know you can’t. You’re soft and slow and can’t even solve simulations that you once did in your sleep.”

Cody choked.

“This war is going to swallow you whole and spit you out. You’re a CC, sure, but you aren’t remarkable for one.” 17 squeezed. Cody gave a full-body spasm, chest aching and burning from the inside out, and loosened his hands from 17’s arm. 

Cody could tap out. 17 would release him. Yielding would hurt, but it would be short and quick and would only wound his own ego -

“You aren’t my Cody, kid.”

Cody reared his head back - felt 17’s nails score down his face, felt finger shaped bruises erupt along his jaw - and bit down. It was all instinct and fury, oya and akaanir rampaging through his soul, an easy glide of fangs into muscle and blood to scrape against bone.

When he got thrown across the mat, he was ready for it. He was already turning his head and spitting, watching the salt and sweat and copper arc into the air and sink immediately into the foam, bracing his shoulder for the impact and clawing his way back to standing when he landed.

17 was busy staring at his arm.

“You bit me.”

Something thrashed in Cody. Something broke apart and turned bitter and he growled, hissed, turned into an animal shoved into flesh and a pair of black socks and a karking military base that wanted him on an operating table. He spat again. “Did the old Cody not do that?”

17 turned to Cody. Cody barreled into him.

They hit the ground together. They writhed in the dark. Cody’s hands slipped on blood that could’ve been his, could’ve been just 17’s, caught only enough traction to throw themselves back into the fray. Kal and Fenn and buir had been hard. They had broken and molded. 17 was - 17 was Cody’s head slamming back into the mat, knuckles cutting on teeth and bone, the strain of muscles and will, fire and ash and rebirth; it was cracking Cody open until everything spilled out and over and drowned the two of them in everything he couldn’t remember.

At one point, 17 laughed. Full body, head back, a deranged noise.

“Su’cuy,” he cowed. “Su’cuy, Kote. Atta verd.”

Cody’s head spun.

“I’m Cody,” he said once, straddling 17’s chest and making his own hands ache, ache, ache with the force he was putting behind them. The words spewed out of him, meaningless and nonsensical, and hurting when they came up. “Kark you 17. Kark you. I’m Cody. I’m Marshal Commander. 212th, mir’sheb. CC-2224. I’m Squad Shebse and ARC and Ghost - shereshoy and gold and Vod’alor and the only one karking crazy enough to come back to Kamino to finish what I never got the chance to -”

Cody stopped just as suddenly as he started.

Blasters, came a voice. So uncivilized.

Bright hair. Red. Not Fox. Not Fox, but - but the General. Obi-Wan. Something in Cody’s hand. Blaster? Grenade? Naas , jetii’kad. Blue. Vibrant and bright and the same shade of the General’s eyes. The reek of smoke. Scrap metal thrown across the ground. A smile. Cody’s own and Obi-Wan and relief drifting in and out of Cody’s blood like the Force, like the Ka’ra, and he is briikase, briikase, feels like singing because Cody finished what he was made for and now he gets to live. Gets to go back to Kamino. Gets to fade into the background and stop being CC-2224 to everyone, stop being Kote to his vode, start being Cody because that is him and Obi-Wan loves him.

Commander? Cody, dear, what’s -?

His head riots. Pain.

Blast him.

His own voice. Not his voice. More pain, blasterfire, bright orange and a scream, and then a silence so loud it echoes.

“Cody?”

The war. Swallowing Cody whole and spitting him back out into thousands of tiny, sharp pieces that scattered in the wind and cut deep when they caught him. Something hearing him scream out in the night, in the darkness of space, in the thundering sound of millions of his vode and jetiise marching on without him. Something picking him up, calling him home, holding him close and soothing away those sharp, poisonous edges until they fit together again, until he is whole, but there are still cracks, Cody thought, he is just still one big crack that is bending and breaking -

Shh, Kote. Breathe.

A voice. The same voice from the darkness, sinking into his body, into his soul.  

Breathe, it gently said. In, out. I’m here. I’ve never left and will never leave. I have you, my alor. I have you.

“Cody?”

He became aware of himself in shapes and touches. The mat, slick and forgiving under his hands. His knees, aching and bent, howling at the injustice of staying in a position for too long. His chest heaving, out of breath and desperately searching for it. The way the rest of his body trembled. His head was on something - resting. It moved underneath him. Cody rocked to its rhythm.

“Speak to me, Cody.”

Cody dragged his head up. 17 was beneath him, his head craned at an awkward angle to be able to see Cody’s face. One of his hands rose up - already bruised yellow and purple, swollen and flaked with dried blood - and guided Cody’s head back down.

“Easy, kid,” he said, voice rumbling through his chest and into Cody. “Take your time. Ain’t nothing happening right now, Cody. It’s just you and me. Go ahead and breathe - we’ve got all the time in the world.”

Cody sucked in a breath, held it, and let it go in a wheeze that meant something was wrong with his nose. He tried to move it, gasped as it released a fresh wave of blood and pain, and let 17 wipe it away with the tips of his fingers.

“There you go,” 17 said. His hand moved up, pressed into Cody’s cheekbone and swiped; Cody frowned and raised his own hand. His cheeks were wet. “Feeling better, Cody?”

“I remember.”

“I didn’t mean for that to happen. I didn’t want you to -”

Cody struggled to sit back up. He stretched out his legs, bent them again, and fully sat back on 17’s stomach. 17 grunted, tried to close his eyes, and Cody knew that face - it was the same one he pulled when he didn’t want to talk about something. He took a page out of Rex’s book and gave a solid slug to 17’s shoulder.

“Mir’sheb,” 17 said, looking back at Cody.

“You didn’t want me to remember?”

Silence. It was, admittedly, like looking in a mirror.

“Or did you just not want me to repeat it?”

“Both.”

“The old Cody,” Cody started, swallowed, felt his throat click. His throat was sore. Bruised. His voice came out rough. “The one you remember so well. Don’t you think he would want to repeat it?”

“Repeat the war,” 17 said, all declarative and disbelieving. “It destroyed him.”

“But it made me,” Cody said, quiet and soft. “I know I’m not him. I know it must hurt to look at me and be reminded of who you lost. I know I’m different from him. I know I’m not as - well, I’m not sure what I’m missing. You certainly seem to know, and I guess it must be so obvious that all you needed was one look at me to find what’s missing. A part of me is still him, though. A part of me still knows him. The war destroyed me, destroyed him, but don’t you think your Cody would come back to it. Don’t you think he would try to finish what he barely got to start? Don’t you think he wouldn’t give up?”

17 stared up at him. Something was different in his eyes; something had shifted.

“'Lek,” he said. “Cody wouldn’t.”

“I’m not going to either.”

17’s lips twitched. “‘Lek. I’ve realized that.”

Cody gently tipped over to the side, off of 17 and away from those eyes. He curled up on the mat, let the chill of it soothe his overworked muscles and cool his blood. The lights were coming back on, slow and steady, and Cody let his eyes adjust between blinks.

17 touched his back.

“If you let Nate sponsor you through ARC, I’ll kill you.”

Cody snorted. He let 17 trace over his vertebrae, let 17’s hands run over his sides to check for any broken ribs or splintered collarbone or dislocated shoulder. It was the same thing buir would do after a particularly nasty bounty mission. Cody would wander out of a warm sonic just to get swept up in buir ’s arms and held. He missed those days. He missed that feeling.

“Are you going to do it, then?”

“Hm?”

“Are you going to sponsor me?”

“Of course.”

Cody snorted. “Did you really have to beat me before you decided that?”

“I had to make sure you still had it in you,” 17 said.

Cody closed his eyes. He felt tired. He wondered if 17 would let him sleep on the mat.

“Do I?”

“You’re different,” 17 said. “You’re different in the little things. The big things - elek. You still have that, Cody.”

“Good,” Cody said, drifting off to the sounds of Kamino waking.

Chapter Text

Sparring with 17 became a routine.

Cody wondered what that said about him - that every few days he would wander back to that darkened stalle room and let 17 throw him around. It probably meant that Cody was dini’la, that he was karking crazy, that he had collected one too many head wounds and now wasn’t able to think straight anymore. He wondered what it meant for 17, too. The Alpha was always there, waiting, armed with gauze and bacta bottles and the mystic power to shove Cody’s head around and screw it back on straight. Cody needed that. He needed the anchor, the grounding, the promise of 17 peeling him off the mat and setting him back on his feet. Cody needed the pitch-blackness, the solitude and sweetness of just hearing his and 17’s hearts beat together.

17’s face, leaning over him once. Speaking.

“Most people just ask for help, Cody. None of them ask to be beaten half to death.”

Buir had once told Cody there was no shame in needing help. Unsurprisingly, the lesson had never sunk in. To Cody, asking for help had never once felt like anything other than failure - but under the cover of darkness of that training stalle, falling apart became possible. It wasn’t easy, wasn’t painless, but Cody could squeeze his eyes and lean into the pain and take a particular brand of mercy he loathed.

17 was watching him. Cody rolled up onto his side, scrubbed a hand under his mouth to collect stray saliva and blood.

“You started it,” he said.

“You didn’t have to continue it.”

Elek, Cody did. He needed 17 like he needed CC training, like he needed ARC. He was clawing his way back up, slow and sure, forcing his feet back into boots that were once his.

“The memories are coming back.”

“Still?” 17 again - different night. He wrapped Cody’s hands with a tenderness that made Cody want to twist away and tear the bandages off. He remembered too much now and understood far too little.

“Some of them…”

Cody took a breath, felt air whistle into his mouth and burned from where his own teeth cut into him, closed his eyes, sank into the velvet darkness of the room.

“Some of them are so real it feels like I’m back there. Like I’m still living them.”

“Are they good?”

“Sometimes,” Cody said. “Sometimes not.”

Night cycles came and went. Bruises healed, were re-applied, and healed again. Cody lost weight, gained muscle, felt solid and secure in his body even when his mind scattered away to a lifetime lived and lost. Some nights he hardly slept - either kept awake by the memories that drifted back in or lost in the plethora of modules and simulations he had been tasked with - and those nights were the ones where he felt something tapping, tapping, tapping at his ribs.

Something else had woken up during that first fight.

Kote, it said, tap-tap-tapping. Kote.

During the day, Cody succeeded in ignoring it; in the daytime, Cody went out into the world as the shining star of the GAR’s military program, drowned himself with strategy sims and survival training, smiled free and spent his nights exchanging tips and easy conversation with Rex, Caf, and his squad. It was harder at night. Sometimes Cody would be dragged to a memory - blast him - and the Ka’ra would be waiting. 

Awful. Awful, demogolka hut’tuun.

“Who?”

Dar’jetii, the Ka’ra said, frustratingly vague. Cody looked down at his hands. He looked across at where Obi-Wan had disappeared over the side of the platform, the sounds of whatever creature he had been riding on turning high and screeching in fear as the verde behind Cody kept shooting.

“Obi-Wan became a dar’jetii?”

The Ka’ra laughed. Naas. Never. He is too beloved by his Force.

The memory ended, like it always did, with Cody having his head karking caved in by a particular brand of pain that was razor-thin and internal, radiating out from the soft, sensitive area between his ear and the side of his head. The pain came as abruptly as his order to shoot Obi-Wan, and it often left Cody waking up, sweating in his cot, with white-hot stars erupting behind his eyes.

Your last memory.

Cody languished in a field of wheat. That, too, became common; the Ka’ra occasionally snatched him away from the pain, the memories, the escape of consciousness to take him to a field that looked like Dawn, felt like Dawn, but was distinctly not Dawn. The wheat shone, whispered in a breeze that sounded like an old, familiar language, and the stars - Cody swayed in the moonlight and, out of the corner of his eye, caught figures moving past in beskar’gam. He tried to hate it and never could. A part of his soul - the same part, no doubt, that enjoyed the security of ‘gam and shereshoy and oyaoyaoya - devoured it, adored it, preened and postured and made Cody stretch his arms out and feel the world shift around his fingers. Cody tried to fight that part of him; sometimes he won, other times he lost.

The Ka’ra continued to tap-tap-tap. Looking for a way in, Cody mused, or asking for permission? Either way, Cody left it knocking.

“My last memory,” Cody repeated. “I died?”

Elek and naas. You were not yourself after. You were not Kote. You were not Cody. You were not mine, not yours, only his.

“Who’s?”

The Ka’ra growled, but no name tumbled free from its claws. Cody huffed. Despite the clamor of all the memories coming back in, there were still gaps. Big ones. Cody couldn’t put everything together without them, and his inability to even cobble a basic timeline together made him itch something fierce.

“You know what happened,” he said. “All of it. Every moment - but you won’t tell me?”

You are young and stubborn. Brave. Bright. I have watched that all be taken from you once. I have watched it be denied to you. I will not watch it happen again.

“That should be my choice.”

You wish to die, it asked. When Cody didn’t answer right away it gave a high, concerned trill that set his teeth on edge. He winced. He answered. 

“Naas. I’m trying to do the opposite.”

You joined a war to live, it said.

“That’s a poetic way to put it.”

You don’t deny it.

“I am trying to salvage my life.”

What is so wrong with it?

“You,” Cody said, closing his eyes. The wind changed - someone was singing. Cody leaned into it, wondered what it was, felt its emotion tug him down to the ground and wash over him. “My name. The war. I want to live normally. I want to be like my vode.”

Your vode aren’t normal.

“They’re certainly closer to it than I am.”

The song again, louder. Cody’s fingers twitched against Dawn-not-Dawn’s damp earth and tried to make sense of it. It was sweet, soft. He almost convinced himself that it was a lullaby, one that buir used to sing above his cradle, but then it shifted into something enticing, alluring.

Come back to me, the Ka’ra said. It sounded nice, almost. Cody could certainly see it; the sunlight of Keldabe streaming into the city’s throne room, the hilt of a jetii’kad against his hip, his beskar’gam coated in gold; painted finally in his color, the color that he should’ve chosen -

Come back to me, Kote. Let me keep you safe. Let me make you Mand’alor.

Cody hauled himself awake and far, far away.

Kamino waited for him.

Cody, admittedly, had been lax with his surveillance. Caf’s schedule ended up being close enough that Cody had a vague notion of when to give the CC barrack a warning for a medical inspection, but the CT mystery had stayed a mystery. Rex would occasionally mention something, a squadmate getting singled out for monitored sim training or a CT from two dorms down being transferred without telling anyone, but - and here Cody was selfish - if it didn’t directly affect Rex, Cody didn’t worry about it. He couldn’t, really. As much as Cody tried to appear unruffled by his workload, he was still a man and that meant he was still held, however finely, by the boundaries of the human condition. When Rex would mention something that did affect him, Cody would reiterate him to be careful, to keep to the top of the CT scoreboard, and would illegally share old CC training material to keep his vod out of trouble and ahead of his squad.

“I know,” Rex had said, taking the data chip that he and Cody passed back and forth and sliding it into his datapad. “I know. Watch my back, keep my nose clean, and continue to kick some shebs. I get it.”

“You’d better. I swear to the Ka’ra, Rex, if you do something -”

“I won’t, ori’vod. You Fetts are the rabid ones - it’s why I’m buir’s favorite.”

“Boba is buir’s favorite.”

“It used to be you.”

The sound of Cody’s caf cup hitting the table was nearly deafening.

“Cody -”

“Just keep yourself safe, Rex,” Cody said, trying to soften his voice. 

Rex gave a tentative smile, an apology and a fresh start all at once. “If anyone’s going to do something to get themselves in trouble, it’s going to be you, vod .”

Sometimes Cody hated when Rex was right.

A week after that conversation, Cody graduated from basic CC. If he had taken the traditional training route, he would’ve been shipped out a few days after the announcement, already saddled with a battalion and a jetii and a front line to hold. As it were, Cody’s inclusion into the ARC program meant his CC training was extended, technically, by a month. By the time Cody would finally complete his training, the second batch of CC’s, the batch including the rest of his vode, would be finishing up their training. The housing need for the second batch meant that the Kaminoans had cleared a section of the Alpha barrack for a small, ARC exclusive barrack for all the CCs that were staying. Those that weren’t - those who either didn’t make it into ARC or who decided to drop out to take their command slot - were busy looking over their first battle orders and gearing up to be transferred to their posts. Cody, meanwhile, had said his goodbyes, packed his things, and made his way over to his dorm.

The Kaminoans managed to corner him, alone, on the way there.

“CC-2224.”

Cody stilled. He turned, pressing his back into one of Kamino’s white walls, and saw Nala Se and Lama Su moving towards him.

“I have a name,” he said, almost missing the days when they called him Kote or Fett. By now the Kaminons had just resorted to listing them off by their numbers. Everyone on the base had made it a joke when it became clear that the numbers, not their names, were staying, but that had failed to cover up the fact that it refused to sit well with anyone.

“Congratulations on graduating,” Nala Se said, ignoring him in order to dip her head. Cody knew the action was a sign of respect amongst the Kaminiise, had seen a few of them do it when Lama Su entered a room, but Nala Se’s was quick and looked practiced - so jerky that even Cody had to bite down the urge to ask if they were alright. “We were very pleased with your scores, as I am sure the GAR will be.”

“We have very high hopes for you in the ARC program,” Lama Su said.

“And high expectations, no doubt,” Cody said.

“Of course,” they both said, falling short of overlapping each other by only a handful of seconds. Cody looked between the two of them.

“Do you need something?” He asked.

“Your blood sample,” Nala Se said.

Before he even realized what he was doing, Cody was stepping away from the wall, more into the hallway, and loosening the grip he had on his singular box of personal items. If he had to leave it, he reasoned, he would. He could certainly use it as a distraction; neither of the Kaminoans looked well-versed in dodging.

Lama Su’s cranial fin rose, fanned out, and then fell sharply back down.

“Excuse Nala Se, CC-2224. She misspoke.”

“You don’t want a blood sample?”

“We don’t wish for one. We require one.”

Cody’s hackles rose. Lama Su kept talking.

“All ARC candidates are tasked with a full medical examination. The ARC program is far more competitive and complicated than basic CC training, and the Alphas have made us aware that certain accidents may occur. As we have been tasked to deliver you to the GAR without complications, we wish to be fully prepared for any possible occurrences in order to minimize their damage.” Lama Su spread out his hands. “A blood sample, therefore, will be kept in storage until needed. If needed, the sample will then be taken out and replicated to be used for transfusions or experimental treatment trials.”

Liar, the Ka’ra hissed, liar. Naasnaasnaas, Kote.

Kaminoan biology was just different enough that Cody couldn’t read it. He understood nothing in the nuances of their heartbeats and smells, of the concoction of chemicals that could rise to the surface of their skin and waft out like some exotic perfume. He only recognized the movements they let him see, and could successfully guess at a handful of others; the faces and postures of Lama Su and Nala Se didn’t fall into that category. 

Dangerous, Kote. They are dangerous.

Cody, at least, knew the Ka’ra. He knew the way it twisted and turned and held tight to him. He knew that it called him by name, even if it was the wrong one.

Cody, for the first time in his life, chose the Ka’ra.

“Thank you for telling me. The requirement for a blood sample must have gotten lost amongst all the other paperwork,” he said, knowing full well that it had never been in the paperwork to begin with. If it had, 17 would’ve never sponsored Cody, and Cody would’ve never joined.

“With your impressive schedule it was only a matter of time before, eventually, something got forgotten,” Nala Se said. “Mistakes happen, and can easily be rectified. If your schedule allows, you can simply allow us to escort you to the nearest medical - "

"No."

Nala Se's head pushed back into their neck. Their nostrils flared.

"Pardon?"

"You said if my schedule allows," Cody said. He raised up his box. "As it is, my schedule does not."

Nala Se blinked. "We assure you that the procedure will only take a few moments. You will still have plenty of time to collect your belongings and move them to your new room assignment."

Cody shook his head. He threw his own lies around. "I have an engagement with one of the CT classes."

"CC-2224, this is your block of leisure time. You should have no engagements, especially with -"

Nala Se caught herself. A fine wave of dark blue was beginning to creep up her neck. Cody watched it happen with a feeling of satisfaction so strong that it even surprised him.

Lama Su's fin lifted and dropped.

"CC-2224, this procedure is non-negotiable," he said.

"I can't do it at this time," Cody said. "As you have mentioned, I have a very impressive schedule. I also don't like breaking promises. I will, when I have the time, find a medical officer and get some blood drawn."

"Medical officers are not equipped -"

"You haven't trained them to draw blood?"

More waves of blue.

"We would prefer it to be handled by our medical team."

"I would prefer to have it handled by a medical officer."

They both stared at him. Cody tightened his grip on his box, turned on his heel, and made his way to the ARC dorm. Behind him, trailing after his footsteps, Cody could hear a bout of furious, hissed conversation. He made it to his dorm in record time, nodding to the Alphas who were lingering about to study the incoming ARCs, and claimed a bunk. In the security of the quiet corner Cody had called for himself, he rested his head against the bunk frame and just breathed - his shoulders gave one painful, lurching twitch when he realized that Nala Se had followed.

“Kriffing Kaminiise,” Cody said, raising himself back up. He glanced at his comm, paused, and then had a rather wonderful idea. One of Rex’s strategy classes was starting and kark it all, Cody was going to run it.

He stepped out of the dorm, pointedly gave Nala Se a look and a grim, frustrated smile, and then turned on his heel. He all but stormed into the CT training room, high on fake confidence and disarming adrenaline, and caught the overseeing trainer - Havoc, it looked like - with his most winning smile.

Havoc’s lips twitched. “Can I help you?”

Cody gestured to the doorway. Havoc leaned to the side to see over Cody’s shoulder. Cody could tell the exact moment Havoc saw Nala Se because not only did the man’s eyebrows raise, there also came an inkling of the same unidentifiable scent Colt had given off.

“Do they need someone?”

“Naas - they just want to test out a new training method.”

The scent dissipated. “Are you the method?”

“I’m a CC, recently graduated -”

“Name,” Havoc said, quick enough that Cody had to admire the man’s ability to realize that something, despite Cody’s reassurances, was still off. “Number, too, while you’re at it.”

Cody dug out his military id and handed it over.

“Kote Fett. CC-2224,” he said.

“I’m honored,” Havoc said. He sounded sarcastic, but something had softened in his face. “What’s the method?”

“Practical practice of the chain of command during an operation, basically. I’m to load up a CC strategy module and guide the CTs through it.”

“Interesting - strange, though, that I didn’t get any standing orders for it.”

Cody nodded, leaned in as if he was sharing something confidential. “I didn’t, either. Nala Se swept by my new dorm assignment and said I was needed. She explained the whole thing during the walk here. I thought she was joking - they generally stay out of the way of our training - but Kaminoans don’t tend to joke and she’s not budging from the door.”

Havoc looked over Cody’s shoulder again. He seemed to make up his mind.

“Here,” he said, handing Cody back his military id. “I’ll patrol through the class.”

Cody gave another smile - this one real and relieved and halfway to devolving into hysterics at the fact that his di’kut’la plan worked. “Let’s give this a try, sir.”

Havoc snorted and stepped down from the commanding platform. Cody stepped up.

It felt familiar. The hum of a holotable against his fingertips was comfortable, the glare of its blue-white glare was almost nostalgic. He half expected to look up and find the bridge of a ship before him; instead, he found himself facing a sea of confused CTs, one being Rex, staring up at him. Cody refused to be intimidated. He had done this before. He could do it again.

“For the next hour, I want you to pretend that the person behind you, before you, and those at your side are not there,” he said, sliding his datachip into the table and beginning to scroll through its stored training modules. He paused on one. It was one he had created during a rare bout of freetime, a sim meticulously crafted to replicate one of the failed sims the Kaminoans had thrown at him. He selected it, watched it load into his holotable and all of the CTs. He almost enjoyed the murmur of surprise it wrung out of them. When he looked back up at them, the murmuring stopped. “The only person who is still with you is me. Su'cuy - I’m your commanding officer, and you are going to listen to my orders very, very carefully. Tayli’bac?”

“Elek, sir,” the room of CTs thundered back at him.

“For the next hour, I also want you to pretend that this is not a sim. This is your reality, CTs. You are to free the civilian vessel, keep your squads from unnecessary danger, and leave the skirmish field victorious. It is entirely possible to complete each and every one of those requirements; you simply need to pay attention and listen. If you don’t, you’ll fail.”

He tapped the middle of his holotable. The sim opened, started, spilled out across their screens. Cody took a breath - shallow and unnoticeable and just enough to lower his heart rate into something not dangerous - and then faced the sim. He had turned this one over and over in his mind for weeks now, and he finally felt confident in a few possible plans. The CTs, if they were broken up into groups, could run through each of the possible options far faster than Cody could do it himself. He quickly pulled up another screen, this one filled with the military ids imputed into the CTs’ holotables, and began to section them off. For each group, Cody loaded up the first round of each plan.

He looked back up at them. A few, he was sure, were hardly breathing.

Cody sent out the first wave of orders.

The moment the CTs acquired them, there was an instantaneous wave of ducked heads and typing. Cody left them to it, splitting his attention between monitoring one screen from each group and the chat he had created. He kept himself busy by prepping new rounds of orders and answering any questions that got lobbed back at him from the CTs, but the steady rise of heartbeats all around him and the scent of surprise and excitement and nerves made it clear that the CTs, surprisingly, were enjoying this. Cody could understand; if he was being honest with himself, he was enjoying it, too. Before he knew it, the hour was over, and the CTs were stepping back from their tables, giving each other pleased looks and nearly vibrating in place.

Havoc wandered back up to the commanding platform. “Success rate?”

“Eighty-two,” Cody said. “Not bad.”

“Nala Se must have thought so, too.”

Cody powered the holotable down. The class was slowly clearing out, some of the CTs giving him looks and lingering by their tables, and Cody saw Rex shoulder his way to the base of the commanding platform. Rex, in typical Rex fashion, had listened to the first section of Cody’s orders before promptly stopping to try and figure out where Cody was trying to lead him. He had ended up needing a few hints to finish the simulation, but Rex had been close. 

“You think so?”

“She didn’t stick around for the end - she either thought it was a success or went back to call it a lost cause. I think the former is more believable,” Havoc said. He also gave Cody a side-eye. “You said you graduated?”

“‘Lek, but I’m sticking around for ARC.”

“After that sim you pulled, I believe it. For a long time I thought you were fake. I thought you were just some fictional name the Kaminiise slapped up on the scoreboards to rattle the ranks.”

“And now?”

“You’re welcome to come back here,” Havoc said. “Provided that you can keep my boys on their toes.”

“Can they keep up?”

“Ka’ra help them if they can’t.”

“Cody?”

“Shh, Rex,” Cody said, looking down at his vod. “The adults are talking.”

Havoc looked between the two of them and gave a slow, understanding grin. “Ah, vode then. A lot is starting to make sense.”

“Is Rex causing trouble?” Cody asked, pointedly ignoring the kih’vod practically fuming up at him and focusing on Havoc instead. “Is Rex being bad?”

Rex made a strangled sound. “I am a delight.”

Havoc snorted. Rex gave him an affronted look and then turned back to Cody. He tapped his wrist where his vambrace would sit.

“It’s time for latemeal.”

“So needy,” Cody said, still talking only to Havoc. “You would think he would know how to walk there by himself by now.”

Havoc's jaw ticked, and Cody could hear a lurching wheeze rise up in his chest and die. The commander cleared his throat, gave another look between Rex and Cody, and then took his leave. “I’ll leave you boys to it. Kote, that offer I gave you was genuine.”

“Vor entye, sir.”

Havoc clapped Rex on the shoulder and wandered away. Cody finally stepped off the commanding platform and down to his vod’s level. Rex flicked his arm.

“What was that about?”

Cody slapped his hand away. The flick hadn’t hurt - certainly not like the punch he had given him days ago - but the principle of the thing insisted that Cody responded. The two began to make their way to the mess.

“You’re going to have to be more specific, Rex. Did you mean the sim? The solution to the sim?”

“I meant the reason for you taking over my strategy class.”

“It was a new training method.”

“Banthashit,” Rex said, flicking Cody again. “Tell me the truth.”

“Stop touching me.”

“Cody -”

“Stop whining, CT.” Cody nudged Rex’s shoulder. “Say please and I’ll consider it.”

“Mir’sheb.”

“Hm? Sorry, that didn’t sound like a please.”

“Okay, fine. Please tell me what was going through your karking mind to decide that playing teacher for an hour and lying to a commander was a lovely way to kill some time, Cody. I’d love to be enlightened.”

“Someone’s grumpy today.”

Rex stopped walking. Cody tried to continue forward, but leaving Rex behind made something inside of him bend out of shape. It felt wrong, like breaking some unwritten law of nature. Cody sighed.

“Rex.”

Rex crossed his arms, frowned, looked content to try and wait Cody out.

“Rex. C’mon, we’ll be late to latemeal.”

Rex sniffed. Cody, for a brief moment, wished that he and Rex weren’t as close as they were; Cody had no one to blame for Rex’s stubbornness but himself. Cody retraced some of his steps.

“The Kaminoans wanted a blood sample.”

Rex’s eyes went wide. “What?”

“Wanted isn’t the right word for it,” Cody said, shaking his head. “They demanded that I had one taken, sprouted some stuff about precursory measures for ARC to try and convince me, and then tried to force me to follow them to the medical bay. I decided that wasn’t going to happen so I gave them a little white lie that I had agreed to help out with a CT class. Nala Se followed, and I had to run with it. Havoc was just easy to convince.”

“Cody, do you know how insane that kriffing sounds?”

“It’s me, Rex. I’d be more worried if my life sounded normal.”

“Cody,” Rex said, grabbing at Cody’s arm. “Kote. The Kaminoans are starting to get aggressive - more of the CTs around my dorm are getting transferred and never heard from again, our check-ups are getting longer and more extensive, and they’re monitoring everything - and they’re setting their sights on you. They want you. My memories of this place aren’t as vibrant as they are to anyone else’s in our aliit, but I still know that when the Kaminiise want you it doesn’t mean anything good.”

“Rex, it’s okay. I’m okay.”

“For now,” Rex said. He gave Cody a look. “You keep telling me to keep my head down and nose clean, but you’re the one running around doing the exact opposite. Something’s going to happen one day. Something bad.”

Sometimes Cody really hated when Rex was right.

It was, in the end, Cody’s fault. In fact, it ended up being the crescendo of all of Cody’s mistakes, all compounded on one another to leave him like he was later that night: furiously pounding on the door of 17’s dorm with an unconscious Rex slipping through his fingers and onto the floor.

The night started, bewitchingly innocent, with a pudding cup.

Specifically, it was a small, plastic tub that was slid onto Cody’s mess tray. He hardly glanced at it, busy balancing his attention between Rex and the results from the CT class. Dividing the simulation replays saved onto his datachip into the groups he assigned showed that the more time intensive plan out of the four had the highest rate of success in terms of its casualty rate and damage of surrounding civilian structures - words that would have any self-respecting commander salivating, but Cody always had a knack for being picky and a perfectionist; the plan just took too long to complete. He mindlessly ate the rest of his tray, and only noticed the pudding cup when a familiar hand reached out and tried to snatch it from his tray.

Cody slammed his fork down. Rex took his greedy fingers back.

“You’re not even eating it.”

“Not all of us are endless vacuums, Rex. Some of us take the time to chew like normal people.”

“First, normal isn’t even a word in your dictionary. Second, you’ve been staring at that pad for fifteen minutes straight which means you’ve forfeited everything on your plate - Fett rule, remember?” Rex dipped around Cody’s fork, snatched the tub, and moved it into his territory. “Besides, it’s pudding. The only type you like is, ugh, butterscotch.”

“How do you know it’s pudding? The lid isn’t even open.”

Rex popped the container open. “If you managed to pull yourself away from your pad for two seconds, you would have realized that all of the graduating CCs have one. Must be a prize for good behavior.”

“If it is then you don’t deserve one.”

Rex took up his spoon, gave it a slow, emphasized lick, and then stabbed the center of the pudding. He held it back out to Cody.

“You want it?”

“You’re such an ad.”

“That means naas,” Rex said, proceeding to free his spoon and murder the poor pudding. He gestured to Cody’s pad and asked, through a mouthful of pudding, “What are you so focused on, anyway?”

“The training results. The sim I gave was one of the ones the Kaminoans gave me that I hadn’t been able to solve. I used your class to try and find the solution.”

“And?”

“And I’m still not happy with the results.”

“No solution, then?”

“Naas, each solution worked. None of them were really successful, though. The first plan saw an uptick in civilian structure damage. Plan two was the fastest, but had the highest casualties. The third plan split the difference. The fourth plan had the lowest rates of both but was time intensive and needed far more micromanaging.”

“Have you considered the option that there isn’t a perfect plan?”

“I’m not looking for perfection.”

“Just a stress ulcer, then?”

“Eat your pudding, Rex.”

Rex cackled, but left Cody to his self-inflicted misery. At one point Rex left the table, taking the trays with him and chasing after a group of CTs he knew, but Cody vaguely waved when his vod announced his departure. In the ensuing silence, Cody contemplated the sim until it gave him a headache and then finally switched to take care of personal messages. His email was thankfully empty, but his messaging system was full of well wishes and chatter from his squadmates. It seemed that nearly everyone had sent out their battle orders into the group chat, and Cody drew up a file to note them all down - he didn’t doubt that he would eventually need to contact one of them. When he had finished with that, he took a dip into messages from his aliit. It was, like he expected, an utter cluster kriff. Buir, thank the Ka’ra, seemed to be keeping his distance, but Cody’s vode seemed to fluctuate between wanting to smother him in his sleep or keep him around just to watch him suffer. Bacara was the only one that sounded close to nonchalance, sending Cody only a singular message that mentioned the day they were all set to arrive by.

Cody blinked at the date. He opened the calendar on his pad.

His vode, it seemed, were coming the next day.

Cody finally pulled away from his pad. He wondered if it was too late to take his battle orders and ship out while he still had all of his limbs attached. He doubted it. He rubbed at his face, pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes.

“Rex,” he said, calling out without looking around the mess. “Are you good to go?”

He didn’t get an answer. In fact, the mess was dark and empty all around him. Cody stared through the darkness, his eyes struggling to adjust after staring into the datapad for so long, and pivoted to focus more on his hearing. Something was shuffling about in the mess, and Cody knew that Rex wouldn’t have left without telling him - kih’vod procedures were hard to break, and Rex had been trained to not wander off. That lesson, though, didn’t necessarily correlate to Rex not hiding himself.

Cody stood up, stretched, gave a little rumble when his back popped. He placed his hands on his hips and viewed the room at large. “Don’t you think you’re a little old for geroya, Rex?”

Silence. Cody cocked his head to the side.

Kote.

“Not now,” he said, keeping his voice low. “Go away.”

Kote.

“Ka’ra.”

The Ka’ra hissed - reprimanding and serious. It made Cody’s spine straighten. KOTE. The foundling. Something is wrong with the foundling. Something is wrong with -

Somewhere in the darkness, Rex gave an odd, hiccuping groan.

Cody’s body was moving before he gave it orders, throwing him over tables and sprinting through the mess. His eyes finally, finally dilated enough for him to make out the tables’ sharp edges, the gaping maw of the galley’s window, the lone figure curled into and against and practically boneless against one of the benches.

“Rex?”

Cody fumbled around, found his vod’s pulse. It was slow. It was faint. It was everything Cody didn’t want it to be. He took hold of Rex’s leg and manhandled him into a basic recovery position - leg and hip cocked at a right angle, hand curled against his shoulder - before running his hands over the blond’s sides and shoulder and any possible place that could end up broken or bruised. 

“ Rex. Rex’ika - kih’vod.”

Rex’s eyelids fluttered, slid open, gave Cody one look at glazed, muddy eyes before closing again. Rex’s skin was covered in a film of sweat, but he felt cool to the touch. His normally pale skin was even paler, looking almost ghastly and an odd ashen-grey, and his breathing puffed out at Cody in ragged, erratic pants.

“What the kark happened to you, vod?”

Danger, Kote.

Cody swung around, baring his teeth. The empty mess greeted him, looking deeper and darker and far more cunning. Cody felt the Ka’ra slide out from where it nestled inside of him; it turned his head to the side, toward one of the doors. People were talking outside, soft and low, and Cody held his own breath to try and hear them better. 

“The drug should be in full effect by now,” came a voice.

“Regardless, extreme caution must be used. Lama Su wants perfection.” 

“Of course, Nala Se. We will retrieve CC-2224 and obtain all the materials you want from him. We’ve done the liberty of prepping the medical bay ahead of time. All that’s left to do is to -”

Cody tuned them out. If they entered, he would kill them. It was a decision he didn’t have to think about, a fact instead of a possibility; suns rose at dawn, moons pulled water by the strength of their orbit, and Cody would fight even the powers of kyr’am to keep Rex. He kept his eyes trained on the doorway the Kaminoans were behind, but slid his arms underneath Rex. He tilted his head down. Rex’s skin was slick, clammy, felt hard to the touch. Cody rested his cheek against his vod’s for a short moment.

“Rex,” he murmured. “Rex, I’m going to move you. Can you hear me, Rex’ika?”

Rex’s fingers twitched.

“I’m going to take that as elek,” Cody said. He moved his legs around, getting ready to deadlift his vod. He had never thought there would come a day where he was glad that Rex didn’t wear his ‘gam, but Kamino, it seemed, kept surprising him. “Alright, you just relax, kih’vod. I’ve got you, okay? You just keep breathing. I’m not going to let anything hurt you.”

Cody stood, lifted, tried to rearrange Rex to get him curled inwards as opposed to runaway, heavy limbs, but only ended up wincing when Rex’s head lolled against his shoulder and slid off. Cody was taller and broader than Rex, almost forty pounds heavier, and if the Kaminoans had tried to drug Cody but got Rex instead - Cody needed Caf. Suddenly and desperately and immediately.

He took one of the other exits.

He couldn’t go to Rex’s dorm and he certainly couldn’t go to his. Caf’s dorm was all the way on the far side of the base, and despite the adrenaline running through Cody’s system, he didn’t trust himself to be able to carry Rex the whole distance in a reasonable manner - time intensive, he thought, why did it always boil down to time - without having to stop, and stopping was not an option. Period.

Cody headed for the only safe place left on Kamino.

He made it to 17’s dorm in record time, only having to pull the two of them into some supply closet or alcove to circumvent a pair of Kaminoans or droids, and gently lowered Rex to be vertical. Cody pounded on the door.

The door swung open. 17 looked a little rumpled and half-asleep, but he seemed to sober up considerably when he recognized who was standing across from him.

“What are you -?”

“Here,” Cody said, shouldering Rex up and over. 17 caught him easily. “Back inside.”

17 backed up, carrying Rex with him, and Cody slipped into the room. The other Alphas - Nate, Muzzle, Maze, and Trantos - began to rouse, their bodies turning unnaturally still in perfect battle-ready procedure, unsure if they were needed but shocked out of sleep anyway. 17 guided Rex over to his empty bed, dropped the blond onto it, and stared down at him.

“Kote.”

“17,” Cody said, fishing out his comm. “I know.”

“Do you?”

“Not really. I’m - I,” Cody trailed off, making some vague gesture at his temple while hunting down Caf’s number and sending out a message that simply had directions to where he was and a singular order to get there fast. When that was done Cody shouldered 17 to the side, checking over Rex’s vitals. “He’s been drugged.”

Nate finally sat up. “By who?”

“Guess,” Muzzle said. “And the first two don’t count.”

“Ka’ra,” 17 said. He crouched down to be eye-level with Rex, snapping a little to try and get Rex's eyes to focus on him. Rex only gave a weak garble. Cody pinched his side in a place he knew should have had Rex hissing, but only got a weak lurch out of his vod.

Someone knocked on the door. 17 went to answer it. Cody snagged his wrist and looked up at him.

“Rex wasn’t the target - I was.”

17 frowned. “Are they still after you?”

“I don’t know. Elek, probably, they were waiting in the mess for me. A few have been patrolling the halls. I’m sure a few are down by the ARC dorm.”

All of the Alphas shared a look.

Trantos got out of his bed. “Bring him here, Cody. No one will be able to see the two of you from the door.”

Cody scooped up Rex and moved deeper into the dorm.

"Stay," 17 said, making his way to the door. Cody hunkered down, all but covering Rex with his body despite Trantos’s words, and watched as the rest of the Alphas circled around them. Nate rested a hand on Cody's shoulder - Cody couldn’t tell if it was supposed to be restraining or comforting. It felt like neither and both at the same time. Maze - or who Cody thought was Maze - tapped his other as 17 opened the door.

Maze kept his voice low. "Who's is he?"

"Havoc's," Cody said. "But you should probably get Colt, too, and - and you should contact the other Alphas. I didn’t see a single CC or ARC on the way here."

Maze muttered a few choice words. “You think they may have drugged all of the CCs?”

“They wanted me to take a blood test. Said it was required for ARC training.”

“It isn’t,” Nate said.

“‘Lek,” Cody said, sliding onto the ground and twining his hand with one of Rex’s, “I thought so. But if I had gone with them, then Rex wouldn’t’ve had this happen to him.”

“Cody. Stop.”

He wasn’t sure who said it. Haran, Cody wasn’t even sure if that mattered. Rex had gotten hurt on his watch, had taken the brunt of his di’kut’la choices and mistakes and decisions, had paid the price that Cody should’ve. If Cody hadn’t stepped foot on Kamino -

He bowed his head, laid it down next to Rex’s chest.

The Ka’ra gave a gentle, soothing coo. It clung tight to him, forced his lungs to breathe when Cody couldn’t do it himself, and he could feel it slip up past his ribs and into his blood and around his heart. He felt it butt against his chin and hands and Cody squeezed his eyes tight.

It will be okay, Kote. Rex will be saved.

He heard the door swing open. There was some muffled conversation, a handful of raised voices, and then 17 was bodily pulling someone into the room. Cody jerked his head up. 17 shook the person.

“You call for him?”

It was Caf.

“Mir’sheb,” Caf said, slapping at 17’s arm and glaring and not scared in the slightest of the Alpha that towered over him. “You think people are just visiting you? In the middle of the karking night?”

“Definitely a medical unit,” Nate said. “C’mere, kid.”

“Kid?” Caf’s nose wrinkled, but he didn’t continue; 17 had pivoted him around and the Alphas had shifted just enough to let him get a look at Rex’s face. “What happened to him?”

“He was drugged.”

Caf got down on his knees, tugged his sleeves up, and started taking vitals. He took Rex’s free wrist in his hand and pressed his fingers hard into the pulse point. Cody watched Caf count along to the beats of Rex’s heart. “Do you know what he was drugged with?”

“Naas, but it had to be a sedative.”

“I’m thinking more of a hypnotic,” Caf said, dropping Rex’s hand to pull up one of his eyelids and flash his comm into them. “But some of his symptoms look more like an overdose.”

“It was meant for me.”

Caf went quiet. He glanced around the room. “I’m guessing we all know the perpetrator.”

17 cleared his throat. “Does he need the medical bay?”

“I would like to take him there, but that doesn’t look like it’s on the table. Cody, when did you notice he was like this?”

“‘Bout an hour and a half ago.”

“Has he looked like this the entire time?”

“He was making more noise when I first found him, but everything else has stayed the same.” Cody clutched Rex’s hand harder. “Caf, if we have to take him to the medbay, we’re taking him. I’d rather rip out the throats of the Kaminiise and face those consequences than let my vod die.”

“He’s not going to die. He’s not. Here’s what we’re going to do - we’re going to put him in the recovery position and we’re going to check his vitals every thirty minutes. If this was meant for you, the dosage would be off, but it wouldn’t be long-lasting. He’ll probably be awake by morning.”

“And if he isn’t?”

Caf looked at Cody. “Then we take him to the medbay - consequences be kriffed.”

“Havoc and Colt are up, ETA is ten minutes. The other Alphas are doing some rounds in the CC and ARC barracks. A few of them show signs of being drugged, but not all of them,” Maze said.

“It’ll be all the ones that graduated.”

“You sure?”

Cody nodded. “They gave us all celebratory karking pudding cups. Rex ate mine. It was the only thing we had differently.”

More typing. The Alphas talked. Caf commed his boys and sent them to work.

“Cody?” 17 again, touching him. Cody almost asked if they were done, if the sparring match was over, if the reason that Cody felt so broken and pained was because 17 had finally managed to snap his ribs and spine. “Cody.”

“Elek?”

“You didn’t take any of this stuff, did you?”

“Naas. The pudding wasn’t butterscotch, so Rex ate it all.”

“Right,” 17 said, sounding for all the world like Cody’s sentence made sense. “Listen, you and Rex are going to bunk down here. Caf’s going to stay, too, to watch over Rex. The rest of us have to go deal with the other CCs. We’re going to be locking the door behind us. No one will be able to get in, and we haven’t asked anyone to come here. Do not open the door unless both you and Caf can answer it together, or unless I tell you to. Comm if you need us.”

Cody nodded.

“Okay. Okay - we’re going now. Here, lay behind Rex. You’ll keep him from turning.”

Cody let 17 maneuver him into the bunk with Rex. It was a tight fit - military beds weren’t made for Mando’ade - but Cody and Rex had shared worse; they had once curled up together in the guest cot of the Firespray, drifting off in between smothered giggles and the occasional, amused threats from buir to go sleep.

“Go to sleep, Cody,” Caf said. “I’ve got the watch.”

Cody shook his head, slotted it between the dip of Rex’s shoulders. He vaguely heard the door open, close, and the unmistakable sound of it being locked. The room echoed with Rex’s give and take gasps. Cody felt someone reach out for his other hand - Caf - and hold it tight. It was nearly as grounding as getting his shebs handed to him, and with Rex all but blocking out Cody’s grip on the world, Cody shuddered and shook and let the whole galaxy melt away into the miniscule pinpricks of him and Caf and Rex.

Gal ni Gaa’tayl gar, the Ka’ra said. Let me help you.

It wasn’t 17. It wasn’t Caf or Rex. It wasn’t his vode. It was the Ka’ra - intrusive and controlling and something far larger than what Cody could ever hope to be - and the Ka’ra was cradling him, pressed against the curve of his spine and purring soft and steady. It reminded Cody of his buir. It reminded Cody of the day he had gotten his scar, the sting of bacta and the stench of blood and the betrayal of pain forgotten the moment buir had swept him up from the medical bed and held him close.

Let me help.

Cody closed his eyes. He let himself be dragged to Dawn-not-Dawn. He sank to his knees on the damp, moonlit soil. Darkness, Cody remembered, covered his shame. It took him under its wing and hid his failures away in the nooks and crannies of its shadows. Cody appreciated the darkness - but the Ka’ra was only dark in parts, and they slid away from him. Cody found himself surrounded by the stars instead, gilded in gold and silver and streaks of comet fire.

Rex will not march with me tonight.

“Swear it.”

Bic cuyir te haat, it said. I promise. You will have your Rex with you still.

The light, Cody found, burned. It warmed. It turned his skin pale and reflective, showed his muscles and bones and soul like they were beskar’gam, like they were something beautiful and precious. The Ka’ra had promised life, but Cody could still see Rex’s face in his mind. It was blond, blue-eyed, gray with death. It was something pretending to be Rex, and Cody could hardly stand it. It made him feel sick; he had dragged Rex here, had dragged all his vode back, and Cody - Cody shifted. The light followed.

“Ka’ra?”

It twitched in the wheat, pushed the stalks aside to stare at him. Cody fell into that pool of starlight. He let the place sweep him away, let it try to pry that image of Rex out of his hands.

“Ka’ra, I have something to ask you. A deal.”

Anything, Kote. Anything.

Cody spoke into the light. The Ka’ra heard and listened and for all its problems - for all it tapped at his ribs and called him Kote and tried to press alor into his hands and soul - it bowed its head and promised.

“Vor entye,” Cody said, feeling sick and relieved all at once.

Sleep, Kote. Rest. I have the watch - and I will come for you when it’s time.

Cody slept. It was deep and easy, the kind he used to have on Dawn, and he dreamt of gold paint and a dark kad’au and second chances.

He woke up to second chances, too.

“Rex?”

Blue eyes blinked at him, flickered back to the ceiling.

“He’s coming back,” Caf said from somewhere further into the room. “Slow but sure.”

Cody raised himself up, careful not to jostle his vod too much, and ran a hand against Rex’s chest. It pushed up against his palm and then sunk back down in a full, deep cycle. Cody leaned himself over and gently brushed their head together in a Keldabe. Rex gave a little sigh and closed his eyes.

“Do you want the good news first of the bad?”

Cody turned to Caf. “Good.”

“All the drugged CCs have made a full recovery. The CT commanders contacted Shaak Ti, so now the jetii is with us, the Alphas have shuttled out those with battle orders, and my boys have kept the medbay closed.”

“And the bad news?”

“The Kaminiise know that we’re on to them - or they know that there’s a group of us that knows what’s going on. Based on the fact that they didn’t get you last night, they probably figure you to be the leader.”

Cody gave a dry grin. “Aren’t I?”

Caf snorted but didn’t answer. He did, however, stretch his back to give off some concerningly loud cracks. He also gave Cody a quick side-eye. “I need some caf.”

“You always do.”

“You look like you need some caf.”

“I’m not leaving.”

“You also need food, some water, a quick bout of exercise, sunlight -”

“Caf.”

“Watching him won’t make him suddenly get better.”

“Do you have vode, Caf?”

“I’ve got nobody, Cody, but I used to. Watching them didn’t make them get better, either.” Caf crossed his arms. Cody could tell he was already going to lose this battle, but he dug his feet in anyway. “Listen, Cody, Rex is going to be fine. Trust me on that. Your kih’vod’s survived the night, the worst is over. You look two steps away from tipping over the edge.”

“I -”

“Shut up and listen - impossible for you, I know, but just try. I have a boy coming; he’s a good one, solid and stable and perfectly capable of watching over Rex for the thirty minutes where we will be out getting firstmeal, caf, and meeting up with the others. By the time we return, Rex should be able to talk and eat a little. He’ll have a killer headache and fatigue, but he’ll be fine.”

“Fifteen minutes.”

“Twenty,” Caf shot back. “And I expect a clean plate.”

“I can clear a plate in ten.”

“And you’ll get a karking stomachache, so naas. Twenty. Say it with me. Twenty - you’re not saying it with me.”

Cody sighed. “Twenty.”

“There we go. That wasn’t so difficult, now was it? Now, up. Change your clothes, take a sonic, try to make yourself look a little more human.”

“I don’t have clothes.”

“Steal some.”

Cody rose up from the bed. He felt brittle despite the amount of sleep he got, like he had been shredded and torn apart. He wondered what he must look like, caught Caf’s face, and then decided he didn’t want to know. Instead, he snatched up some of 17’s clothes and then slid into the Alphas’ sonic. He almost wished it was a real shower - with water that boiled his skin and steam that settled into his lungs - but Kamino, the cesspool that it was, didn’t have those. They just had vibrating sonics and broken moralities and, apparently, laced pudding.

Cody let out a single, defeated snort. The sonic whisked it away.

When he stepped out, dressed in sweatpants and a shirt that were entire sizes too big, Caf’s boy had arrived. Caf gestured to him.

“Cody, this is Kix. Kix - Cody.”

“Sir,” Kix greeted.

“I’m not a sir.”

“Not yet,” Kix said. He settled at Rex’s side. “You can leave him with me. I’ll take care of him.”

Cody stayed standing, staring down at his vod. Caf gently touched his arm.

“Kix is my best medic. Rex’ll be in good hands. Besides, the war council needs you.”

“War council?”

“If we’re fighting Kamino, we’re going to do it right.” Caf touched his arm again, more insistent this time, but lowered his voice. “Would it make you feel better to know that Kix has vode? He’s got one of them here - Keeli, I think.”

“Is Keeli okay?”

“You ori’vode are all the same. Keeli’s good; none of the CTs were targeted.”

“Probably because they’ve been getting taken,” Cody said. He made his way to the door, opened it, and tried not to look at Rex again. He hadn’t left Rex behind since buir had first brought the Kryze down to Dawn; in fact, Rex’s childhood had been monopolized by innocently following after Cody and getting into trouble. He would then stand trial by Cody’s side, always bemused at how he got there and practically vibrating with guilt, but still standing. Spinning around on his heel and turning his back on Rex now - after getting him poisoned, after dragging him to Kamino, to the war - felt like betrayal.

Not betrayal. You will be back, and Rex will be safe. You asked. I promised.

He glanced over. The Ka’ra curled around Rex’s feet, narrowed its eyes at Cody.

I keep my promises, it said. Will you?

“Come on, Caf,” Cody said, stepping into the hallway and trying to forget those great, pale eyes that had looked into him and had seen something that Cody couldn’t. “The war council’s waiting.”

The walk to the mess was quiet. The mess itself was quiet. It was barren, too, only saved from extinction by the lone table filled up in the back of the room. Around them, Kamino was silent, holding its breath, and if Cody allowed himself the mercy of being optimistic, he would consider it a victory for them. But Cody wasn’t optimistic, he was perfectionistic and picky and that meant he wanted nothing more than domination; he wanted to be the one to tell Kamino when it could breathe, wanted to be the one to press his palm into its throat and leave it there.

Caf loaded up a tray for him. 

“Blitz’s CTs ran the mess this morning,” Caf said. “The food’s safe.”

“Did they find anything?”

“Just some unused pudding cups. Blitz confiscated them and sent them to Shaak Ti. She’ll keep them away from the Kaminoans until someone on our side can run some tests on them.”

They approached the table.

Colt gave a wane smile. “You’re not a CT.”

“No, sir,” Cody said, sitting down. He glanced over at Havoc. “And that move I pulled in the CT classes yesterday wasn’t a training method, either.”

“Coerced blood test, was that it?”

Cody nodded.

“Dank ferrik,” Havoc said. “I thought they couldn’t get any crazier.”

“Cody mentioned something on the way here, and I’ve heard rumors,” Caf said, leaning onto the table. “By crazier, do you mean more insane than CTs going MIA?”

Someone nudged him. Cody held out a hand without looking, let out some wordless, thankful noise when someone put a cup of caf into his grasp, and focused on his tray. The rest of the table went around and around, filling in each other's gaps and sharing intel. Cody soaked it all up but kept quiet. Something was forming inside of him, some combination of bright, biting white and a headache - Kamino revolving around in his body like some sort of parasite.

“The medical team -”

“There is none. Kamino doesn’t have one of those. Your boys are supposed to be the medical team here. A few of them will stay on base after graduation and join Blitz, Havoc, and I while the rest goes to the frontlines. If the Kaminoans said they have a medical team, they lied to you.”

“What do they have then?”

“A research team. They’re scientists, I think. There’s not much about them on the web, and even if they were they wouldn’t let us access that information.”

“What are they researching?”

“Genetics,” Cody said, staring into his caf. “They’re researching genetics.”

“To do what?”

Cody had an idea. It was an odd mixture of memories that were and weren’t his; broken fragments of dreams and a string of the Ka’ra’s mutterings, the smoke and mirror and secret-that-wasn’t-a-secret of Cody’s own birth. There was only one man Cody could ask to confirm the idea, but Cody didn’t want to call him. Cody didn’t want anything to do with him, hadn’t since before his own verd’goten, and was about to strike that solution down because Cody was a man of many faults and pride was one of them - but the image of Rex came up unbidden, carrying with it the lingering weight of his vod’s body in his arms, and stopped him. Cody took a deep breath.

“I know someone I can ask.”

The rest of the table pulled away with amused looks. Nate huffed.

“I bet you do,” he said, “but what’s the plan until you confirm it?”

Cody rubbed at his face. “Muzzle said the official word from the Kaminoans was a small outbreak of food poisoning, but Shaak Ti has unused, hopefully laced, pudding cups to test. When that test finally happens, the report would have to be sent to the Republic leaders - that’s out of our hands. We can go to the Senate and make our case, get a few of the drugged CCs to talk about it, but who knows how long that would take or how willing the victims would be. On that front, we’re fighting against time and bureaucracy. Our hands are tied. On this front, we’ve got CTs missing. We’ve got a Kaminoan research team trying to disguise themselves as a medical team who will actively endanger trainees to get blood tests and marrow splices and whatever the kark they want.”

“We’ve got a second wave of CCs and CTs coming in,” 17 said. “Sheep’s to the slaughter.”

“On this front,” Cody repeated, rapping his knuckle against the table, “we’ve got to hold on to our own. The base is kept secret and there’s more of us than there is them - we can use both to our advantage. Start making stories. Nasty ones. Or, kriff, just tell the truth. Threaten low performing trainees with the fact that they will get taken if they don’t clean up their act. Warn the risky ones that going off on their own will get them snatched. If the Kaminiise want to play at being monsters, let's give it to them. Make older batches of CTs and CCs watch over the younger ones. Make lights out mandatory. Do a buddy system.”

“Squad system,” Colt murmured. “Just more intense.”

“Vode An,” Cody said. “No one gets left behind.”

The others at the table repeated it, and the sound of their voices, tender and intense all at once, reminded Cody of other voices a lifetime ago. The moment rose and ebbed. Cody felt like it was drowning him.

Colt’s comm buzzed.

“Second batch of CCs are here,” he said. “Battle stations, everyone.”

The Alphas and commanders stood up with an energy that left Cody feeling more tired than before. He watched them go, slightly leaning into the shoulder squeeze 17 gave him, and swirled around the dregs of his caf.

“Well, that’s fifteen minutes,” Caf said, making a show of looking at his own comm. “Although you look worse than when I first dragged you here. Are you sure you didn’t get a drug dose yesterday?”

“I’m sure. Rex ate all of it.”

“Then tell me why you look so close to burying yourself into a crisis.”

“I don’t think I can do this.”

“Elaborate on ‘this’, Cody.”

Cody made a vague motion at the room around them. “I’m not leadership material. In the past twenty-four hours I’ve gotten my kih’vod overdosed, pissed off some demogolka scientists, dragged the people I care about the most into a karking war, and somehow managed to lie to half of the people who are on our side.”

Caf sipped his caf, maintaining eye contact with Cody all the while. “Counterpoint,” he said when he finished. “You’ve gotten Rex medical attention, unearthed some karking insane, CT stealing conspiracy by said scientists, and brought together the entire leadership team of Kamino, jetii included, to work together to fix said conspiracy. Cody, if anyone in this place is leadership material, it’s you.”

“Yeah,” Cody said, inelegantly and terrified.

Caf patted his hand. “That’s worse, isn’t it?”

“Much.”

“Sorry,” Caf said, not sounding sorry at all. “There’s something else, though, isn’t there?”

“The rest of my vode are in the second batch. My ori’vode.”

“Don’t worry. I’ll go to the funeral.”

“Thanks,” Cody said. He got up - the galaxy had graciously granted him almost a mouth of freedom, so Cody supposed the least he could do was face the music head on now that it had finally crawled to his doorstep. “With the way the trainers looked, I don’t think the processing will take too long. I don’t have the time to -”

“I’ll send Kix your comm number. He’ll update you when Rex begins to ask where you are.” Caf headed over to abuse the poor caf machine more, but he threw over his shoulder, “Good luck.”

Cody headed off to his death.

His comm was already erupting by the time he had wandered into the CC barracks he had, just the other day, left behind. He checked it only for the dorm assignment, and almost lost it when he realized just what dorm his vode had gotten shoved into. He tip-toed into the room.

“Hey,” he said, hating how quiet his voice sounded. “That’s my bunk.”

The reaction was instantaneous.

The twins rose up together, fixing him with matching frowns, and Wolffe and Fox stepped out from the far bunks shoulder to shoulder, a great wall of disappointment and fury. Bacara was behind him, actually, and Cody let him take his elbow to really pull him into the room. Bacara then maneuvered around them all and made his way to Doom’s old bunk. It stung; Bacara was quiet, but he was gentle. The fact that he had left Cody to the Loth wolves meant that he not only agreed with the mob, but also wouldn’t step in to keep them from tearing Cody apart.  

The door slid shut.

Wolffe crossed his arms. “Where’s Rex?”

Cody could lie. Cody could smile sweetly and fake his own body out and lie straight to their faces. He could tell them what the Kaminoans were telling everyone, that Rex had gotten taken out by a small case of food poisoning and would be back on his feet by tomorrow.

Cody didn’t.

Cody, instead, took a seat on the nearest bunk, folded his hands, looked all the world like he was pleading for forgiveness - and maybe he was. Cody could face the Ka’ra any day; he had cut his teeth on that, had grown them stronger and sharper, but even beskar’gam had to bend and break under the hands of the people who made it. Cody could hurt his vode, but he wouldn’t. He didn’t have that fight in him.

“Rex was poisoned last night.”

Fox’s face gave a complicated twitch. Cody would’ve called it fear if it wasn’t for the fact that Fox hadn’t leapt at him like some raging nexu. His mouth moved a little. It ended up as a thin line, a hint of teeth when he split its seam to say, “Explain.”

Cody explained. He coughed it all up, let it burn up his throat and bubble out of his mouth to spill into the room as Cody rolled onto his back and showed his stomach. When he was done, Bly took a breath.

“You’re okay?”

“Define okay.”

Wolffe uncrossed his arms. “You look pale. And thin.”

Ponds made a noise. He jerked his thumb over at Cody. “I’m sorry, what happened to dragging him through the coals? What happened to kicking his shebs six ways to Taungsday? This always happens, you know. Cody does something stupid, Rex gets dragged in, then we get dragged in, and Cody flutters his eyelashes at us and pretends he’s sorry.”

“I am sorry.”

“Are you sorry for doing it or for being caught?”

Cody dropped his head into his hands. Ponds and Rex had gotten that question from buir. How many times had Cody had that lobbed at him? How many times had Cody split the difference and picked one over the other just to lose either way? 

Ponds kept talking.

“Does no one remember the time with the tooka? Buir nearly killed us. And the bounty puck incident? Buir did kill us and then brought us back to life just to make our lives miserable for the next months. Wolffe, he grounded you and you were in your twenties.”

Bly snorted. Deep inside the dorm, Bacara copied him.

“This isn’t funny,” Ponds said. “We’re fighting a karking war, one that we didn’t -”

Ponds stopped talking. Cody could understand why. Talking about it made the air turn heavy, made it dangerous to take in.

“Was it scary?”

Cody dragged his head up. Fox was staring down at him.

“Huh?”

“Was it scary when you found Rex?”

“What kind of question -”

“Did you have a moment where you looked down at him and had to imagine your life without him? A moment where you had to look into his pale face and only saw your own reflection staring back at you? Was it scared? Panicked? Explain it to me.”

“Ka’ra, Fox,” Wolffe whispered.

Fox ignored him. He crouched down before Cody, titled Cody’s chin up to make him look into jaig eyes that were a shade paler than his own, and Cody felt so much like the ad’ika he tried to run away from.

“I bet it was,” Fox said. “I bet it scared you out of your mind. I bet for the first time since you signed those papers and got shipped out here, it felt real. Let me repeat that - it felt real. This isn’t Dawn, Cody, it’s Kamino. This isn’t you dragging Rex into the woods buir told you to stay away from and getting scraped knees and elbows. This is real life, Kote. This isn’t a game. I bet you learned that last night, didn’t you?”

Cody nodded.

“You go right ahead and be sorry for whatever reason you want, Cody because that face? It’s never going to leave you. Ever. And out of all of us, you’re the only one that has to live with it. That face is going to haunt you - jate, I think. Let it. We lost the war the first time. Are we going to lose it again?”

“Naas.”

“Naas. We aren’t. Why?” Fox cocked his head. “Because Rex is fine now, but…well, despite how much of a di’kut you can be, I still think you’re smart enough to figure out what I’m getting at. Are you?”

Cody nodded again. Fox stood back up.

“There,” he said. “I believe that’s enough sheb kicking.”

“Ka’ra, Fox,” Ponds said, horrified. He took a handful of steps and curled himself around Cody’s shoulders. “I meant physical trauma, not psychological. You’ve broken him.”

“‘M not broken,” Cody said. He turned into Ponds, though, hiding his face into his vod’s shoulder to not have to look at anyone.

“Atta boy, Cody,” Bly said. “As atin as always.”

Cody hiccuped, hated himself for it, and wished Fox had cut into him deeper, cut into him like 17 did. He got Ponds’s hug and gentle murmurs instead. Cody despised it and wanted it and gave himself up to it. Letting himself be held was a different kind of pain, he supposed. It showed off all of his rough edges, the places where someone could grab him and get cut deep, and Cody was always catching someone with them. Ponds didn’t care - had never cared - and so he held on even as Cody began to twitch and made small, escaping motions.

“Di’kut,” Cody said, still muffled by Ponds’s body.

 “That’s mean,” Ponds said. One of his hands drifted through Cody’s hair, tried to work out the tangles in his curls, but ultimately just tucked them behind his ears. “What’s the rush, anyway?”

“I need buir’s comm number.”

“Alright,” Fox said. “Maybe I did break him.”

“Very funny, but I still want the number.”

Cody knew, without looking, that his vode were exchanging looks over his head.

“I’ll behave,” Cody said. “I know that’s a little hard to believe, but I can be good. I’m not in the mood for a fight today, and buir ’s getting older. He won’t be in the mood for one, either.”

“You’re underestimating just how similar the two of you are,” Wolffe said. “One of you says something and then the other has to respond and then everything goes tits up.”

“Maybe I just need my buir.”

They all looked at him. Cody clutched at Ponds and tried to be braver than he really was; that truth had been buried so long that Cody hadn’t thought he still had it inside of him. He and buir were messy. They were broken. They were twisted too far apart to be little more than acquaintances to each other, but if Cody had sunk so low as to let Ponds hold him, what was calling buir up?

Besides, Cody needed to ask a question.

Bacara came forward.

“Give it here,” he said. Cody handed over his comm. Bacara inputted the number and, right before he gave it back to Cody, shook the comm. “Careful.”

“I will be.”

Bacara returned his comm. Even with it back, Cody lingered in the dorm. He hadn’t realized how much he missed everyone until they were there, right in front of him, unpacking and moving about. If Cody closed his eyes, he could almost imagine they were back on Dawn, preparing all of Fox’s stuff for college, and, if he kept them closed even longer, it felt more like it used to be - Squad Shebse through and through, 17’s feral ade that were built to do impossible things.

Cody left the room before it became too much. Cody left Kamino, or at least its hallways, before that became too much, too. He shouldered open a door and breathed in the scent of rain and ocean. The sky was grey and heavy, but there was light, occasionally, poking out from between clouds and skimming the landing platform.

Cody dialed.

Someone picked up on the other side.

“Who is this?”

“Cody.”

“Huh?” Boba said because he was a mir’sheb in training and didn’t give two karks about pacts of brotherhood or peace. “Who?”

“Kote,” Cody said, trying to ignore the way the Ka’ra rose up in his body at the sound of all those syllables thrown together.

“Oh.” A beat. “Why?”

“Is buir there?”

Boba sniffed. “I thought you didn’t have one.”

Cody walked the landing dock. A few of the transport ships that his vode had come on were just finishing the refueling process. He watched them circle the runway, one by one, before lifting off. He wondered, briefly, what it would have cost him to board one.

“I said that a long time ago, Boba.”

“Wasn’t that long ago.”

“Is he there or not?” Cody waited. He could be patient. He could.

“Buir,” he heard Boba shout, “Kote wants to talk to you.”

Bootsteps, coming closer. Some shuffling around. Boba being shooed out, the instant rebuttal, a rebuke so soft it barely felt like anything. Cody felt like he was listening to what could have been if he wasn’t who he was. Breathing, now. Slow. Steady. Cody tried to match it.

“Hey,” he said.

“Hey,” buir repeated, and kark it all if Cody couldn’t hear his smile. “What’s up?”

“I - I graduated the other day,” Cody said, stupidly, acting all for the world like the little ad he used to be, hanging onto buir’s greaves and wanting nothing more than to be told he did well. “Won’t actually get shipped out for a while, though. I’m doing some program. An ori’ramikad thing.”

“That so?”

Neutral. Unsurprised. Maybe a little amused.

“Are you…are you upset with me?”

Buir sidestepped the question. Cody should have expected that. He hadn’t, though, and Cody wanted to smack himself. Instead, buir asked, “Why’d you call?”

“Couldn’t I have called just to tell you that?”

“Maybe,” buir said. “Maybe not.”

“Rex got hurt last night.”

“Hm. Bad?”

“He’s okay. I got him looked over by a medical officer.”

“But -?”

“It was my fault. Kind of.”

“Ah.”

Cody tried to smother his frustration. He doubted he managed it. Buir spoke again - distracted, reticent. Cody wondered if Boba had come back into the room. When Cody had done that, he had gotten scolded. When Boba did it, buir let it slide.

“Is that it?”

“I have a question.”

Buir sighed. Cody vibrated, clenched his hand so hard his nails dug into the meat of his palm. “Is it about Rex?”

“It’s about Kamino, actually. And all of us.”

“Kote -”

“It’s Cody. Co-dy.”

“Fine. Co-dy,” buir said, and Cody’s name dripped like venom from his mouth. “I’d rather not answer.”

“I haven’t even asked the question.”

“Not yet.”

“What do the Kaminoans -”

“There it is.”

“The Kaminoans,” Cody ground out. “What do they do?”

“Currently training up members for the GAR. You know that better than I do, Co-dy.”

“They’re scientists. What do they research?”

A pause. Buir sighed again.

“They’re taking people. Whisking them away. Some of them haven’t been seen since the beginning of the bootcamp. They tried to take me away the other day - and you’re the only person in this whole karking galaxy who knows why.”

“Did they hurt you?”

“That doesn’t matter.”

“Maybe not to you.”

“I’m fine. What do the Kaminoans do?”

“They’re geneticists. They're known for their cloning techniques.”

“Cloners.”

“Elek.”

Cody blinked. Distinctly, he was aware of the frustration draining out of him. It was quickly replaced with a sense of dread so poignant and sudden that it made his head swim. There were memories there, flashes of colors and conversations and eyayahe - a lost generation of Mando’ade that were too young and lived too fast and died too brutal.

“They made us,” he said.

“Naas. They made the technology, but -”

“The first time. They made us the first time. I - oh Ka’ra. We called you Prime. We called you Prime and there were Mando’ade here to teach us but they were bad, bad, bad and people disappeared and -”

“Kote.”

“- and you let them. You,” Cody couldn’t finish the sentence. He was bowled over by a myriad of emotions that made him see red and indigo and a violet so violent it froze him. In its wake, Cody was only sure of one thing: he hated Jango Fett, and Jango Fett, once and maybe still, hated his existence.

“Kote?”

“I have to go.” His voice didn’t sound like his. It sounded like - blast him ! - aloofness with a veneer so thin it was already cracking to show contempt. “Don’t call this number again. Ever.”

“Kote, stop -”

Cody hung up. 

It was raining, he realized. It stung where it hit bare skin, little icicles that turned his clothes sodden and plastered his hair to his head, but Cody didn’t care. The sunlight had vanished, no doubt swallowed whole by the low clouds that thrashed and rampaged around him, and Cody missed it. A tiny voice in the back of his mind, different than the Ka’ra, and so, so quiet asking him - had he actually seen it in the first place?

His comm vibrated. 

Cody breathed in the rain. Once, twice. He checked his comm. Rex was awake and asking for him. Casualty, his mind whispered, and, suddenly, the numbers all the sims shot back out at him meant more; they were Rexs and Wolffes and Foxes and Blys and Ponds and Bacaras.

Fives and Waxers and Thorns and Keelis and Tups and Echos and Hardcases and -

Cody stepped back into the building.

The death toll kept ringing in his mind. Cody marched to its beat, mapped the tune of it into his heart. Fox had been right. This was reality, and reality was that Cody was fighting a war. He also wasn’t going to lose it. Not again. The Ka’ra had promised and so had he and he was going to be the victor this time around.

Cody was going to build that reality even if it killed him.

Chapter Text

Cody was the last to leave Kamino.

It was hard to watch his vode go; Cody, apparently, was used to leaving. He wasn’t used to staying, wasn’t used to being the one left behind. It hurt more than he expected, itched and festered under his skin, but he tried to take it in stride, tried to adapt and overcome and keep moving. That was the trick, he found - constant motion. If Cody kept himself busy, the growing loneliness didn’t feel so crushing and the war stayed distant. Distractions became more valuable to him than freshly mined beskar, and ARC was generous enough to provide an outlet. On his more manic days, days where ARC’s grueling physical and mental demands simply slipped off his back like water, Cody ricocheted around places he knew were safe. The Alphas let him come and go as he pleased. 17 would often ride herd on him, but sometimes the others would wrestle him into training stalles or their bunks to test training material. The CT commanders tried to wind him down, too, but it often devolved into Cody derailing a CT training by simply existing in the same room. He became a regular fixture in the training stalles. He charmed a keycard off of Nate and got access to individual simulation rooms. He avoided the Kaminoans. He kept moving. 

His vode kept leaving.

Rex was first. Cody had expected it - Rex had been on Kamino almost as long as Cody - but it had snuck up on him fast and furiously, suddenly standing between them in the form of Rex’s unsure, pleading smile.

“You look good,” Rex said, a little weak, trying to gauge where exactly Cody was. He tapped at one of Cody’s arms, made a hand gesture around Cody’s chest. “ARC’s bulking you up.”

“Not by much.‘Gam still fits fine.”

“Guess I just haven’t seen you in a while.” 

Naas, Rex hadn’t. ARC kept all its candidates separate from the rest of Kamino, isolated and secluded. Cody wasn’t sure who it was meant to psych out more, the basic trainees or the actual candidates, but it managed to infiltrate both. Within its first few days of life, ARC already had a reputation for being brutal, and was leaving its candidates feeling brutalized. The Alpha teams in charge of it all had to have felt very accomplished. 

The isolation of the program made it hard to see his vode. Cody managed it, occasionally, by sneaking out after lights out or wheedling his way into different areas of the mess, but he stayed far away from Rex. The overdose had made it clear that the safest place for Rex was the place where Cody wasn’t. Cody had explained his reasoning to the ori’vode in blind faith that they would let it trickle down to Rex. Looking down at his kih’vod, Cody wasn’t so sure that they had.

“I’m not supposed to mingle,” he said. He took Rex by the elbow and away from the Alpha barracks. Cody supposed he could disappear for a few minutes, and he did have something to show Rex. “ARC keeps us under lock and key.”

“To keep you guys secret or to keep the Kaminoans out?”

“Both, probably. Are the Kaminoans -?”

Rex shook his head. “Nothing. They’ve either gotten better at hiding what they’re doing, or they’re scared to do it. I hope it’s the latter, but I guess we’ll see. It’ll depend on how they act when you leave.”

“Me?”

“They may be disgusting, but they’re smart. You’ve already rang the alarm on them once, and they know you’ll do it again.”

“Right.”

“I would’ve helped, you know. I could’ve done something.”

“It wasn’t your job.”

“It wasn’t yours, either.”

“I didn’t want you involved. You being with me -”

“So you have been avoiding me.”

“Did I say that?”

“Didn’t have to, Cody,” Rex said. “I’m not used to being left behind when it comes to you, so it’s hard to miss when I suddenly am.”

Cody glanced over at his vod. Rex blinked, stared back at him, frowned. He tried to stop but couldn’t because of the hold Cody had on his elbow; instead, Rex gave one single, shocked whisper of Cody’s name. Cody ignored it. Cody kept moving. Cody tried to forget that he was the one being left behind this time.

“Here,” Cody said, pushing open a door that led to the outside dock. “Hold tight. This part of the platform is always more slippery than the rest.”

Rex moved their arms. They locked hands. Cody led them out.

Cody hadn’t meant to be the one always leading, always leaving. He hadn’t. A long time ago, Cody had been in Rex’s position, pulled along by the whims of his ori’vode and content to be the sixth ad of six. Then Rex had come and Rex - Rex had issues with himself. It was like someone had forgotten to ever tell Rex that he was important or mattered or wanted. Cody spotted it the first night Rex was with them, understood the problem the moment he had caught Rex trying to be small and forgettable around the ori’vode, and Cody remembered thinking that that just wouldn’t do. Cody then proceeded to snatch up Rex’s hand and refused to let it go. The blond went with it, probably recognized that he couldn’t fight it, because Cody had decided then and there to have enough self-confidence for the both of them until Rex got his own.

“You’re a little young to adopt, Kote,” buir said once, looking down at them from Cody’s doorway. They were sprawled together on his floor, too sore from training to try the climb up to their bunks, and Rex had decided that Cody’s shoulder made an adequate pillow.

“He needs me,” Cody had responded, simple and blunt, staring up at his ceiling.

Nowadays, Rex rarely needed Cody. He was self-sufficient, experienced, a reputable Mando’ad in his own right. Rex had grown up, filled into his beskar’gam, began to take his first tentative steps into finally, finally believing all the praise the Fetts - Cody especially - had thrown at him. There were still moments, sometimes, where Rex would push too far or too fast to try and prove himself, but they were becoming few and far in-between. Their relationship mutated over the years, turned more into a partnership than whatever unbalanced communalism they once had, but Cody was still the bolder one. He always knew that that would alter at some point, that he and Rex would take shifts on who led and who followed, but he hadn’t expected it to come so fast or to be like this. Cody, perhaps selfishly, thought he had more time.

He didn’t.

Now it was Rex’s turn to lead, his turn to be the first one to push into the war’s great unknown and - and Cody couldn’t follow. Not yet.

“Watch your step,” Cody said, taking an auxiliary staircase down.

“Where are we going?”

“You’ll see - just pay attention to where you’re stepping and don’t look down.”

Rex hissed from behind his teeth. He took tentative steps down the stairs, kept his boots far away from the gaps that just emptied to the ocean below. Cody gave him all the time he needed. The stairs deposited them on a smaller, circular platform that was relatively dry and kept dark by the shadow of the main platform above them. When Rex was just stepping down, a low, vibrating noise sounded from the water. Rex paled.

“What was that?”

“Aiwhas,” Cody said. “Air whales. C’mere, we can catch them eating.”

Cody got down onto his stomach and peered over the side.

“You’re insane,” Rex said. “Absolutely insane.”

Cody didn’t move.

Eventually, Rex wiggled up next to him. He took some gulps of air, raised his eyes up to the sky as if to ask for strength, and then tipped his head over the edge of the platform. Immediately, he gave a pained, nauseated groan.

“We’re so high up.”

“You’re okay, Rex. I’m not going to let you fall. Just focus on the aiwhas.”

Rex blindly groped for Cody. Cody let him. Rex didn’t need him as much, but when he did, Cody made sure to be there.

“Wow,” Rex said after a while, sounding strained but impressed. “I - wow.”

“Their wingspan has to be over forty feet, but they can swim faster than they can fly.”

“They’ve never attacked you?”

“They’ve never noticed me. Besides, I doubt they would. See the curve of that one’s back? It’s a saddle. The Kaminiise ride them, so they have to be halfway domesticated,” Cody said. He watched the waters froth below them and threw an arm around Rex. “Hold on tight. They’re breaching.”

“They’re what -?”

Rex broke off with a short, sharp scream as the ocean erupted. Cody flattened the two of them into the platform as hard as he could, felt his cheek stick to the cool metal and watched his breath fog out across it, and braced himself for the waves of water that rose up and sluiced around them. Over the resulting crescendo of it all, Cody could make out the sounds of the aiwhas unfurling their wings and heading back to the sky. Cody peeled Rex off the ground when the worst of it was over and sat back. Rex copied him.

Shoulder to shoulder, drenched to the bone, they watched the aiwhas fly.

“You’re going to be fine, Rex,” Cody said. “I know it.”

Rex tugged at his shirt. Cody moved with it, let Rex cup the sides of his face and press their foreheads together. Rex’s fingers thumped against his cheekbones from a shiver so aggressive it couldn’t have come from the cold.

“Why the freak out?” Cody asked. He gave a cocksure grin that had been his staple years ago because Rex couldn’t create his own. “You’re going to be fine. You think I would let you go if I didn’t know you could handle it?”

“You’ve always thought too high about me.”

“You’ve always thought too low.”

Rex choked something out - a laugh, maybe. Cody covered his hands with his own. The trembling softened to a murmur.

“What are your battle orders?”

“501st Legion. I’m working under someone called Skywalker.”

“Shiny jetii,” Cody breathed, remembering. Rex hummed, eyes knowing, but the furrow between them stayed.

“Cody, I - you don’t live.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I do. I do because I remember it. I remember you and I arguing about something and we didn’t speak for so long and then everything changed. Everybody changed. Wolffe was the only one who didn’t, but everything else fell apart. The whole galaxy, Cody. It just crumpled in on itself and turned awful.”

“I didn’t know I was so important.”

It was the wrong thing to say. Instead of wheedling out a laugh, Rex only drifted away. Cody could see it happen. The shadow fell over Rex’s face and his eyes dulled and Cody could see the Ka’ra’s gifts at work.

“You gave the order,” Rex said. “And then you disappeared. I couldn’t find you. I tried. I tried so hard, did everything, chased down every lead but I - I couldn’t find you.”

“Shh, Rex. I’m right here, vod. You’ve found me.”

“But I didn’t. I didn’t. You and I argued and then you were gone. Gone. You went somewhere that I couldn’t follow, Cody. I couldn’t. Why would you make me -”

“Rex.”

Rex jolted. Some of the clouds cleared. Cody softened his voice.

“Rex. Have I ever gone somewhere that you couldn’t?”

“ARC.”

Cody tapped at one of Rex’s temples. “I mean somewhere that mattered, Rex’ika.”

“Naas.”

“No, I haven’t. Have we ever had a fight that made me stop talking to you? Have I ever turned my back on you? Have I ever subjected you to being stuck with Wolffe?”

Rex shook his head.

“No, I haven’t,” Cody repeated. “Not in this lifetime, at least, and I’m not starting now. Things will be different, Rex. We know more about this war than it knows about us. We’ve fought it once. We can fight it again - and this time we have beskar’gam.”

Rex breathed against him. His eyes kept flickering over Cody’s face.

“Promise me.”

“I promise.”

Rex closed his eyes, fought against whatever he was remembering. He took a breath in. He released it. Cody waited for him, waited for Rex to get his feet underneath him and find his way back, and spent the time wrestling with the promise he had made. It had slid so easily from his mouth, the same mouth that -

This is CC-2224. Initiate Order 66 immediately. Blast him. Blast them. Initiate Order 66.

“Cody?”

“Skywalker’ll drive you kriffing crazy.”

Rex thunked their foreheads together one last time. He then struggled to his feet. Cody followed, hung back, decided he had to get used to it eventually. He let Rex lead the way back up to the main building, trying all the while to swallow down that promise until it settled into his heart and lungs and every safe place where he could keep it. It shunned his attempts, rose up and up and up into his mind instead. Cody kept hearing himself say it, kept seeing Rex’s pained face and pleading, unsure eyes. It felt all very familiar, Cody thought - the promise. The face. Cody struggled through the sludge of his own mind, hunted down the memory he was looking for, tried, tried, tried to find it -

Cody, I’m being serious. We’re tools. Weapons. They have chips in our heads, Cody. Listen to me, please. I - I know you’re busy, but we’ve always - Cody! Cody, this is serious!

“I’ve survived him once.”

“Hm?”

“Skywalker. I’ve survived him once. Besides, I can punch him this time around.”

Cody forced out a laugh. Rex flashed a smile over his shoulder that could only be described as blinding, so bright and sure that Cody couldn’t look at it. He had seen that smile, too. It was the smile that Rex had given him when Cody had finally caved, when he finally looked away from the battle plans to stare at his vod and said -

We’ll talk, Rex. After this mission.

Promise me?

I promise.

Rex left the next day. He took the secret of the aiwhas with him while Cody got the promise and all its formless memories and omens. He thought it was a good trade even if it wasn’t particularly fair - as close to a proper send-off as Cody could get since he had been too busy doing suicides in full kit to actually wave goodbye to Rex’s transport ship.

It was better that way - constant motion, Cody reminded himself. Constant, unabating action. Cody’s demons and fears and frustration couldn’t dig their claws into him if there was no prey, no Cody, to latch onto. He only slowed down when Rex finally sent him a message confirming that he had his boots on the ground and was already trying to whip the 501st into shape.

“Showtime,” Bly said when he had read it. The words sank into Cody’s bones.

The ori’vode went next.

Ponds was snatched by High General Mace Windu - the jetiise were regularly sent the results of Kamino’s reporting cycles and could select specific trainees to get additional information on - and Bly was selected by Aayla Secura. Wolffe was taken by Plo Koon. Fox and Bacara were held almost until the end of Cody’s ARC training, but eventually got their battle orders.

“Marshal Commanders,” Fox explained. “That’s where we got put. I’m going to head the Guard on Coruscant. Bacara’s going close to the front. He’ll get a jetii. I won’t.”

“You’ll get politicians.”

Fox made a face. “I’d prefer the jetii. I doubt they complain as much.”

“I’ll miss you.”

Fox pulled back. He looked Cody up and down. “Getting a little big to be saying that, don’t you think?”

“It might be the last time I get to say it.”

Fox stared.

“You’re not planning anything else stupid, are you?”

“Naas. This was it. I just have a feeling that we’re all going to be very, very busy soon. You especially. Pompous politicians, remember?”

“Right,” Fox said. He tipped his head to the side, gave a little grin. “I’ll miss you too.”

They parted ways. Too soon, Cody watched their separate ships take off the next morning from the confinement of the mess, tracked the way the vehicles wheeled off the platform and shot into the sky. He kept watching even after they left, stared out past the window and desperately bit down the urge to do drastic things to the poor caf cup he was white-knuckling. 17 ended up by his elbow. Cody didn’t know when; he was hyper focused on Kamino’s low sky, on the way his whole body seemed to vibrate and split apart and collide back together again into a shape vaguely humanoid. 17 must’ve realized he was being ignored, or perhaps he just knew when Cody was about to lose his karking mind, because he bodily tugged Cody back a little ways from the window - from the edge of something dangerous. 

“You’ll see them again.”

“Of course I will,” Cody said. The assurance felt like ash on his tongue. Cody wasn’t used to being left behind. He wasn’t used to being the backup, the slow one, the survivor; Ka’ra, Cody didn’t want to be a survivor again. Not like he had been. Not like that half-life he had lived.

He saw his eyes widen in the glass. He searched his own face.

Cody had fought it. He had woken up from it, from that excruciating, vibrocord thin, all-encompassing pain that was manually drilled into his temples and head and neck, and Cody had thrown himself against it until it bent, finally, under his weight. He tore it down, shouldered his way through it all. What he found made him want to put it right back up -

Black armor. Red splatters of paintbloodpaint. Grey at his temples. Bruises on his knuckles. Who had he hit? Who had he hit?

“Cody?”

Vode. Vod. His face, different body. Scared. He was scaring them. His hand rose. His boot twisted. The vod went down. CC-2224 reached around them, dug his fingers into the thin arm of an ad’ika, a cadet, a jetii cadet that needed to be destroyed. A scream. The ad crumpled, thrashed at his feet.

Someone touched him. Cody jolted. Something crashed to the ground, splattered against his hand - bloodbloodblood. Vod and jetii’ika - and Cody screamed.

A hand clamped down around his mouth. Another one took hold of his arm. Cody stumbled when he was pulled, his boots skidding, and naas, naas Cody didn’t want to be led. He didn’t want to follow. Cody wanted to be in charge and know where he was going and he wanted to be with his vode. He bit at the hand.

“Kote. Quit it.”

Cody swung out. He slammed into a wall. He tried again.

“Kote,” someone thundered. “Karking Ka’ra, stop that. That’s an order.”

Kill them for the Empire, CC-2224, said the dark. It wheezed poison with each strained inhale, exhale and Cody loathed it, felt disgusted by it - felt disgusted with himself for listening to it, for following what it said even when it made him scream and bleed and shatter from the inside. That’s an order.

“Kote!”

Kote, came the Ka’ra. To me. To the light. To the starlight, my beloved. Step with me.

Cody stepped, wobbled, fell down onto his knees and crawled. The Ka’ra applauded his effort, pressed feverish little touches to every slip of skin it could find, and Cody lunged for the words, for the touches, for everything he could to try and stem off the landslide he was being caved in by, the landslide of black armor and dead jetii’ika and all the memories he wished had died with him.

The real world pushed through in flashes. Cody turned towards them and ran. He couldn’t fight this. He couldn’t face whatever he had unearthed - not yet, not now, maybe ever. It stained him with its acrid reek of death and violence and the twisted, malnourished vision of what he became.

“‘S not me,” he said. “‘S not me.”

“Shh, naas. Naas. Not you Cody, not you. Can you come back to me, Cody? Can you do that? Follow my voice. Breathe. I need you to breathe. One big one, okay?”

He breathed. The world rushed back. His chest ached.

“Jate. Again.”

Cody worked through the ache. Air came in. Air left. The simplicity of it all made Cody want to sob. He made some strange, hitching sound. It sounded pained and frightened and things Cody hadn’t been in a long time.

He wanted buir. He wanted his buir. Buir could fix this even if he and Cody -

Cody watched the floor heave beneath him. Someone was helping hold him up. Cody stared down at their hands and boots, caught the curve of their profile underneath the lights.

“17,” he said.

17’s jaw clenched. He leaned over to the side and snatched a handful of towels. He soaked one under the faucet, wrung it out with one hand, and then settled it over Cody’s neck. It stuck immediately, heavy and cold and grounding. Cody dropped his head down, soaked up the relief, and then realized what he was looking at. 17’s other hand was shoved into a sink fluctuating between being a frothing pink or a dark red.

“Whose -?”

“Yours.”

Cody raised up his hands. One of them came up out of the water unhindered. The other was being held down by 17 hard enough that Cody knew his wrist was going to be bruised. Cody tugged on it again.

“Stop.”

“What happened?”

“You’re in crisis.”

“I’m not,” Cody said because Cody was never in crisis. He helped people through crises. That was Cody. Cody wasn’t this; he wasn’t standing in some industrial kitchen with his hand drowning in a sink with 17 at his elbow. He wasn’t.

“You are,” 17 said, to the point and insistent. “I’m trained to know the signs, Cody.”

“So am I.”

17 ignored him. “This is the second time this has happened. First time was when you and I beat each other to a pulp - remember? I do.”

“I told you the memories are coming back.”

“You didn’t tell me that they were coming back like this. This,” 17 said, holding Cody’s other hand up from the sink. It looked pale, moreso because of an ugly cut going through the meat of his palm. “This is dangerous.”

Cody flexed his hand. The pain was instant. The blood was far too red.

“You’re going to need stitches.”

“Naas.”

“You can’t say no to this, Cody. That’s not going to stop bleeding on its own.”

“I just have to put some pressure on it.”

“What the haran do you think I’ve been doing for the past half hour? I only moved you to the water when you bled through two gauze pads.” 17 jerked his head to the side. Cody followed the motion, saw the gutted remains of a medkit.

“Half an hour?”

“Dangerous,” 17 repeated. “You’ll be on a battlefield soon, Cody. If this keeps happening -”

“It won’t.”

“Some things can’t be forced into submission,” 17 said. “If this keeps happening, then I can’t let you leave Kamino.”

“You have to. You have to let me leave.”

“The only thing I have to do is protect the GAR, Cody. If you can’t be relied on to stay in the moment, you’re a flight risk. You can’t be that on a battlefield, Cody. You can’t. And as the commanding officer over ARC and CCs, I can’t send you out.”

“You can’t.”

“Cody.”

“You can’t,” Cody said, loud and frustrated and pleading. “I’m the best karking trainee here, and I know how this war works. Nobody, absolutely nobody, can do more for the GAR. You know that. You know what I’m capable of. You know I’m the best shot at getting most of the GAR home - because that’s what I did last time. I can do it again. I can do it better. I swear I can.”

“So can your vode.”

Cody went cold. 17 continued, low and even.

“Your vode all have the same information you do - maybe a little less, maybe a little different - but they have it. They don’t have these attacks, either.”

“Wolffe has nightmares,” Cody said. “Fox obsesses. Bacara doesn’t speak. Bly hates staying in one place. Ponds can’t let people go. Rex has moments. Attacks. They all have something.”

“And you’ve got them all,” 17 said.

Cody stared at him.

“Naas,” he said, stupidly. It seemed like the only thing he could say.

17 sighed. “Stick your hand back under. The water should still be cold enough to get the bleeding back down. I’ll find an icepack and some more gauze, and we’ll walk down to the medbay.”

“Just comm Caf. Please.”

Despite the extra precautions the Alphas and the CT commanders had made regarding the running and overseeing of the medbay; the overdose was still too fresh, still a copper tang in the midst of soulless sterility, and Cody would rather hotwire his own stitches then slink in to get real ones. 17 must have been able to sense that boundary, or understood it, because he relented and fished out his comm.

Cody groped at his neck. He took the towel and scrubbed his face with it. It made him feel more human, but he could tell he still didn’t look like himself. He wondered what was different. The eyes? The curve of his mouth? Both had been mutated in his memories. His eyes had been dull. His mouth had kept twitching at the corners. His face had looked smooth and plastic, more mask than man, but there had been twitches, little tremors, that had shown a soul that wasn’t meant to still be breathing.

“Alright 17, what’s the emergency?”

Cody raised up his hand. Caf sucked in a breath.

“Kark. We’ve got to stop meeting like this, Cody,” Caf said. He hustled over. “What even happened?”

“He broke a mug.”

“The caf,” Cody said, giving a pointed look at 17. 17 gave a miniscule nod in response. “Guess I just wasn’t awake enough, and I lost the grip on the cup. I tried to catch it when it fell - on reflex - and one of the shards caught me pretty badly.”

“Horrifically, Cody. It caught you horrifically.”

“Well, I -”

Cody clutched the side of the sink so hard it groaned. Caf had, without warning, doused his hand in a bacta mixture so potent it burned his nose.

“What the kark, Caf?”

“Don’t lie to me.”

“I didn’t.”

Caf rose the bacta bottle up. It shouldt’ve been menacing, but the combination of Cody’s hand all but igniting and the look on Caf’s face - Cody suddenly remembered all of the horror stories buir used to tell about Mij.

“Alright,” Cody said. “I lied.”

“Uh-huh. What happened?”

“17 thinks I was in crisis.”

Caf looked down at the wound. He wiggled out a suture kit from somewhere and handed it to 17. Cody watched the two of them get the needle and thread ready. Caf stuck it into him as soon as it was ready.

“Ka’ra,” Cody said. “Don’t you have a bedside manner?”

“Waste of time.” A pause. Cody watched the thread go back and forth, watched his own blood bubble up. “Were you?”

“Naas.”

Caf shot 17 a look. “Was he?”

“Elek.”

“Ah, denial. Cody, do I need to give you a pamphlet? I have a whole stack of them. Very nice, tri-folded pamphlets.”

“You give me a pamphlet and I’ll choke you with it.”

“It’s cute that you think you’re scary.” Caf tugged particularly hard on the thread. Cody bore it by nearly biting through his tongue. “But you aren’t. I’ve faced bigger and meaner threats than you, Cody. You know the west side of Keldabe? I was raised there. Whatever banthashit you’re trying ain’t going to work.”

“It’s not banthashit.”

“And what would you call it, Cody?”

“Desperation,” he said, sudden and startling even to himself. It pulled a laugh out of Caf and then a knowing, almost sweet look.

“What triggered it?”

“Thinking,” Cody said because that wasn’t, technically, a lie.

“So you’ve been spiraling for a while?”

“He’s been a menace for weeks,” 17 said. “He’s all bruises. I doubt he’s eaten or slept much, either.”

“I can talk for myself.”

“Yet you can’t take care of yourself, huh?” Caf said, finishing off the stitches with a complicated twist and sharing a look with 17. The thread pulled taunt, relaxed, and Cody’s hand throbbed to the beat of his heart. Caf scrubbed at the last of the blood with more bacta and then pressed a bacta strip over the wound. He then took Cody’s other hand and dropped a packet into it. Cody squinted at the package. He could feel 17’s pleased nod.

“Sleeping pills?”

“Take them for a ride. Come talk to me in the morning.”

Cody promised nothing. He pocketed the pills, thanked Caf for the help, and then left the room. He emptied out into a deserted mess, trying hard not to pay much attention to the muffled conversation that had erupted behind him or the window he had originally looked out of. He could head down to the CC dorms and see if Ponds would -

Right. He looked down at his hand. Footsteps came up from behind him.

“I’ll take the pills.”

“This isn’t a punishment, Cody,” 17 said.

“You threatened to keep me here.”

17 didn’t respond.

“I’ve never been a danger to others. Never. You know that. I would never put my verde on the frontlines if I didn’t know I could bring them out of it,” Cody said. He had meant for it to sound assertive. It only came out as hurt.

“I know,” 17 said. “But I don’t trust you to not be a danger to yourself.”

“I’ll bring myself back.”

“Will you?”

“Are you asking me that because I didn’t manage it the first time?”

“I didn’t know you didn’t.”

Cody looked over at 17. 17 looked back, let his eyes drift back to the hallway they were walking down.

“You’ve got to realize that I have a different role in the war than you do, Cody. That first time around I was just a glorified trainer. I still am. I saw some action - I’m slated to see the same action in a few weeks - but my boots, for the most part, were stuck here. When you boys left it was the last time I ever really got to see you. I don’t know what happened to you.”

Cody thought about the pain in his head. He thought about that toxic, ominous breathing. He thought about Rex - the old Rex, not his Rex, the Rex that argued with him over the static of a holocall, the one going on about weapons and chips and needing, needing, needing Cody to listen. 

“How did you go?”

17’s eyes narrowed. “It’s hazy. I think I was in a lot of pain and on a transport. There was some screaming. Some demogolka started killing the people around me. I tried to get up - and then nothing.”

“I think I lived too long.”

“Not the kind of thing I want to hear, Cody.”

“You would understand it if you remembered what…”

“Elek?”

“I have to go out to the field, 17. I have to,” Cody said. “You said you were seeing action soon. So go. When you come back, I’ll be fully rested and not malnourished and whatever the kark you and Caf want me to be.”

“Yeah? That’s a big challenge.”

“I like challenges,” Cody said. He took the packet back out, waved it around to make sure 17 saw it, and then tore it open. He downed the pills dry. “And there hasn’t been a challenge yet that I couldn’t take.”

17 took the empty packet. “We’ll see.”

17 left a few days later, headed for some planet called Jabiim, and Cody made sure to stick to the other ARCs. When they ate, he did. When they trained, he did. When they slept, Cody would head to his bunk and shut his eyes and drift through the Ka’ra and his memories and, occasionally, sometimes sleep. On the rough nights he just pretended - turned onto his side and kept his breathing even and acted so well he should’ve been given a kriffing award for it. The whole pattern was slow. It was tedious. Cody was sure it would make 17 ecstatic.

Then Geonosis happened.

He, along with everyone else on Kamino, watched the battle commence through live video footage of the Petranaki Arena. The fresh trainees all clamored over the sheer number and sight of jetiise in action, but Cody was hyper fixated on the soldiers. He caught sight of Rex and Bacara and Bly and Ponds and Wolffe, saw them dodging blasterfire and droids, saw their colors reflected in the swirling torrents of battle. Cody watched it long enough to see the tide turn, to see the droids begin to falter, and then he got up and left the mess.

He ended up in a stalle. He ended up with bloody knuckles and a body that shook so aggressively with exhaustion he could only lay against the foam of the mat. He raged in the dark. He stayed until the lights shut off, stayed all through the dark and quiet and the wading tides of his own sanity, and only sat himself up when dawn came calling for him.

Cody, disgustingly, felt better. More centered. The bruises and contusions he had hoarded ached and stung and burrowed deep into his body. With them, Cody could almost pretend that he had been on Geonosis, too. He could imagine that he had been right alongside his vode and protecting them - that feeling, his penance, was worth the pain.

Cody dragged himself to a sonic. He appeared in the mess that morning.

He hid weakened ribs and muscle spasms underneath his easy smiles, smuggled in an unhealthy amount of painkillers into his coffee under the guise of adding in sugar, played his disappearance off as nothing more than bad observation skills. He avoided Caf and Kix and the slew of medical officers that always came with them. He circled around the Alphas, made sure they hardly batted an eye when they heard his voice or caught sight of him. Cody covered his tracks so well that he nearly believed himself.

“Here.”

17 certainly didn’t catch a whiff of it. Cody wasn’t sure if that was because he had actually managed to keep it secret from the Alpha, or if it was because 17 spent the returning week from Jabiim stuck in the medbay, recuperating from torture after a run in with a dar’jetii named Asajj Ventress. Cody had tucked that name away the moment he saw 17 laid out in a medical cot; he and her had a score to settle, and Cody was going to make it painful.

Cody took the offered holopad.

“There’s footage on that. Watch it.”

“Footage of what?”

“Your general,” 17 said. He gave a long, pained blink. “Obi-Wan Kenobi.”

Cody drew the pad to his chest. He cradled it.

“Stop it.”

“I’m not doing anything.”

“You’re vibrating,” 17 hissed. “It’s shaking the bed. Get a hold of yourself.”

“Did he choose me? Or did you choose me for him?”

“Cody -”

“It’s important. Very, very important.”

“Cody, I would’t’ve put the two of you together even if you were the last commander and general left - quit vibrating. Quit it. It’s disgusting. He’s your senior officer.”

“He chose me.”

“Senior officer, Cody.”

Cody hardly heard him. The first time around, Obi-Wan was given Cody. The Cuy’val Dar and Alphas reviewed both of their files - or realized that Cody and Obi-Wan were both destined for crushing amounts of responsibility and military clearance - and had decided that they would work well together. They had. They worked so well it felt that they had been destined for one another.

The Ka’ra chuckled.

Destined, it said. How sweet. More like dreams, Kote. 

Cody ignored it. He was too focused on the fact that Obi-Wan chose him this time around, that Obi-Wan had looked through each CC file and had deemed Cody the one he wanted. Cody wondered what had caught his attention. Had it been a whim, a quick tug from the Force? Had it been some statistic or trainer note? Had it been, miraculously, just a quick glance at Cody’s file picture?

Cody wondered, wondered, wondered.

His last nights on Kamino were as close to nice as they could come; Cody dreamed of serene, lilting words and the stench of shig, a blue jetii’kad and bluer eyes. He watched the videos so often that they were burned into his mind, that he had memorized each twitch of footwork and each flourish and forgot himself in one of the only wonderful things that had made his old life worth living. The other soon followed in the form of battle orders. Cody hardly looked at them; Wolffe went to the 104th, Fox to Coruscant, Bacara to his Novas, Bly and Ponds to the 327th and the 91st, Rex to the 501st - Cody knew exactly where he was going. Cody was going to his Ghosts and his verde, his vode, the 212th with all their shereshoy and skill.

Cody missed them. He missed them so much it hurt.

You’ll have them, the Ka’ra said. 

Cody paused over his ‘gam . Come morning, Cody would finally be shipped out of Kamino, so he had decided to use the sleepless night to drag out his whole beskar’gam. Kamino didn’t have a drop of paint in it, but it had polish. Cody teetered between being egotistical enough to want to look nice and needing to check over the beskar to find any dents or weak spots. There were none, of course, but Cody still reverently looked over each and every piece.

“All of them?”

Each one, it said. Redemption. Redemption for you all.

“Second chances,” he said, staring down at his reflection. 

And destiny.

Cody watched his face twist.

“I don’t like that word.”

You only hate it when I say it. No matter. You will embrace it one day.

Cody turned back to his task, fell into the motion. The Ka’ra, having a captive audience but knowing Cody, quieted eventually. Besides, he figured, it had him caught. Cody had asked and the Ka’ra promised and Cody had -

Well. Cody had given away something important to keep another. 

He supposed he should’ve considered the deal fair, but the fact that Cody had to resort to bartering set his teeth on edge. Leaving Kamino behind had the same effect. On one hand, Cody was practically frothing at the mouth to get his boots on the ground. On the other, the trail of missing CTs was still cold. While Caf and most of his medical team had already been released into the GAR - Caf to the 212th and Third Systems as the chief medical officer, and Kix to the 501st - a few decided to stay behind as medical trainers. The medbay, then, was overturned into a secure place for trainees to go, but the missing CTs had begun to drive Cody insane. No matter where he sent probes out, nothing solid turned up. The CTs were never transferred, even if their paperwork said that they had been, but neither were they on Kamino anymore - or, if they were, they were in a section of Kamino that wasn’t in the maps. By the time ARC’s graduation rolled around, Cody knew more about the CTs than their own buire. 

“We’ll figure it out, Cody,” Colt promised, squinting up as Cody’s transport ship dropped out of the sky and threaded its way over to the dock. “You just focus on everything else.”

“You’ll keep me posted, though?”

“You want to be?”

Cody gave him a look. Colt accepted it with a slow nod, glanced down at the lower half of Cody’s ‘gam .

“No kama?”

“Put it in storage. It’s too restrictive. Can’t move right in it.”

“Shame. You’re one of the few boys that look like you belong in it.”

“The other ARCs earned it just as much.”

“Only one of them got Marshal Commander of the whole Third Systems, though. Largest part of the GAR, you know,” Colt said. He paused. “Congratulations, by the way. I was too busy wrangling your drunk bunkmates to tell you that yesterday. If I’ve got my math right, that makes, what, three Marshals in your aliit ? Your buir must be proud.”

Cody made a noise. It wasn’t a particularly nice noise, something caught between a grunt and a sharp whistle of air, but Cody felt that it said enough. After their last call, buir had commed him twice. The first time, Cody had let it ring itself into silence. Come the second, Cody had manually refused the call. Buir stopped trying after that.

“17’s proud. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him smile like that before.”

“It’s the drugs. Medics’ have him on something good.”

“If that’s what you believe.”

“It’s the truth.”

“Uh-huh.”

The transport docked. They watched its ramp lower.

“Keep me posted about him, too?”

“Funny,” Colt said, watching Cody gather all his things. “He asked me to do the same with you. I’ll tell you what I told him - ask him yourself. You’ve got access to priority chat, backcomms, a whole team of communication officers. I won’t play secretary between two di’kute who try to act tougher than they are.”

 “Vor entye.”

“Anytime.”

The lights on the ship came on, flooding the dock. It was so early in the morning that not even the clouds were awake; the airspace was silver ink, dark and liquid with streaks of starlight. Cody didn't know that Kamino had stars, let alone ones so bright. Cody almost felt like the whole thing was some sort of dream. He took one step forward, rocked, came right back together.

“Take care of yourself, Colt.”

“You too, Commander.”

The title burned. Cody couldn’t tell if it was wicked or wonderful - it seemed to simultaneously numb his chest and send it thundering. While the other ARCs drank themselves into a stupor, Cody had been shuffled into a secluded room and given flash instruction over what he was now responsible for. The full list included a minimum of 20,000 verde, tens of thousands in expensive military equipment, the mobility and performance of several battalion corps, and far more than Cody ever thought one person should control. Not even Fox and Bacara combined had that extensive of a list - a list that Cody would only ever admit to two people.

Someone waved from the inside of the ship.

“Commander,” they called. “Commander Cody?”

Cody raised his arm up in greeting. He took a step. Then another. The stars lit his path, turned the metal of the landing dock into something decadent and drawing. He let it carry him. The air reeked, vaguely, of ship fuel and war and the bristling ocean below. The scent would stick with him for days, even after countless showers and skirmishes, and would follow him for years.

Cody boarded the ship. The pilot - young, sweet, too tired to smile - began flicking switches. Cody watched him. The landing ramp closed.

“Commander Cody?”

“That’s me.”

He settled into a seat, twisted his fingers in just a way that the starlight streaming in through the windshield broke into beams.

“You know where I’m taking you, sir?”

“212th,” he said. “The Negotiator.”

The ship rose up, off of Kamino. Cody watched the clouds slink in, saw their curves and color to the backdrop of dark and light and motion, motion, motion. He had followed. Once, twice, a whole lifetime ago, Cody had followed. He had been drowned in orders, suffocated with them, made a pawn in a game that he had never wanted to play - but he was playing now.

And Cody - moving his hand just so, rearranging the stars - was going to win.

Destiny, the Ka’ra said. How sweet it sounds. How sweet for my Kote.

Chapter Text

The shuttle lurched.

Cody woke up in the cradle of its hull, right in the bunk he barely managed to fold himself into, and braced himself against the roll of gravity, smacking his elbow against the wall in the process. He hissed, hooked his feet around the bunk’s supports, and wormed his way out.

The transport banked to the side. Hard.

“Kriffing Ka’ra,” Cody said, sliding about. He threw a hand out and grabbed onto the cockpit ladder, used the first stirs of adrenaline to hoist himself up and get his arms curled onto the floor of the upper deck. He strained, grunted, and got his torso into the other room despite the sway of the ship.

“Hey,” he said, trying to find the pilot. “Pilot -”

Cody was cut off by the ship suddenly dipping down, and Cody sacrificed his shoulder to save his face from getting slammed into the durasteel floor. The shuttle shivered and the walls moaned. It made the hair on the back of Cody’s neck stand up because he knew that noise. He knew it - and it didn’t mean anything good.

“Pilot!”

The only answer Cody got was the sudden wailing of the ship’s warning system and the room being taken over by flashes of red so bright they stole the power of every other color. Between the noise and the light and the pain in his shoulder - sensory overload, fresh haran to any Fett - Cody couldn’t keep his grip on the ladder. He fell, crashed, tried to hold tight to something, anything because Cody knew what that sound meant and it meant that the transport was going down.

The ship quieted. 

Cody curled up tight, tucked his head between his knees and pressed himself into a corner, presenting all the beskar’gam covered pieces of his body to the ceiling and the open air of the ship. All the lessons buir and Kamino gave him about ship crashes rushed, unorganized and formless, through his mind. Cody let them; he knew he wouldn’t be able to catch one before -

The transport fell. It dragged Cody with.

The following minutes - hours? Days? - were a blurring spiral of motion. Cody’s whole body seemed to vibrate out from underneath him, sending him up and down and to the sides and back up again as the ship crashed through atmospheric membranes and the very laws of physics. The alarm screamed, the red kept blaring, and Cody had his head slammed, mercilessly, into the wall. He floated afterwards. There was pain - an old friend, pain - and red light and the face of a planet rising up to meet him.

He met it brutally, turning over and over again, dragging deep furrows into its earth and snagging on its features. The windshield caved in. Cody saw the glass spit down the ladder and line the floor. He was sent straight into it in the next turn around, crushing it under his weight and feeling the leftover, microscopic pieces wiggle under his flight suit. The alarm system gave one final, feral noise before shutting off. The rest of the ship went dark with it.

Cody laid still. 

He wondered if he was dead. He wondered if he was alive.

He smelled the concept of fire - a sudden leak of fuel, the burn of heat, the want to destroy - and he finally, finally got to moving. Ship crashes were one thing; they were quick deaths, all sudden and surprising, and altogether everything Cody would prefer. Ship fires were slow, they were torturous, and Cody had lived through both of those. He had no intention to live through them again.

He managed to roll onto his side and stomach, sliding his hands against the - the ceiling? The wall? Cody didn’t know. His head was still syrupy from the hit it had taken, and the room was unnaturally twisted into a diagonal slant. The whole thing was nauseating to look at, and it made balancing hard. He ended up sliding back into a heap of beskar and bone more times than he would ever confess to, but he, eventually, got back on his feet. His stomach tried to revolt. Cody refused to acknowledge the plea and looked around. He found his buy’ce easily enough. Aside from small scuffs and a massive chunk taken out of its paint job, it was relatively still intact. Small miracles, it seemed. He clipped it onto his belt and kept going.

The ladder leading up to the cockpit was gone, broken off and crumpled nearby, and Cody, silent and slightly murderous, collected enough coordination to jump up and dig his fingers into the floor above. His own weight pulled at his shoulders painfully, but Cody ignored that too because he hadn’t come this karking far to be killed in some di’kut’la ship fire.

He grunted. He pulled. He gracelessly slithered up to where the pilot should’ve been but wasn’t. Cody looked around for him but saw and heard nothing - no heartbeat, no noises of pain, no breathing pattern except for his own. His foot slipped on something, almost sending him sprawling, and he looked down. From the center of a sizable pool of blood, a hand, palm up and open-fingered, stared back. One of the fingers twitched up at him. 

His stomach lurched again. Cody, this time, let it.

When the fit passed, he traced through the rest of the ship. The fire, steadily heating the whole corpse of it up, came spilling out of the pilot’s quarters from the underbelly. Cody avoided it and headed forward. The windshield was gone, save for the edges which had stubbornly held on to jagged teeth of thick glass. Cody scowled. If he had been any smaller - Wolffe of Rex sized, maybe - he would’ve been able to crawl through. Instead, he was forced to place his gloved hands on the very lip of the outer rim and vault  himself the rest of the way out. He met rock when he landed - no grass, no bushes, nothing except rock and craters and a film of dust that put Dawn’s to shame. The impact made his body rattle inside of his beskar’gam, a long, low vibration that Cody would feel for millennium, and he spat grit and soil and gravel out of his mouth.

“Kark,” he said. He watched little beads of blood slide from his hair and down into the soil. He drew a hand up, and only mustered up the energy to feel tired when his fingers sunk, deep and heavy, into a slick line of heat along the front and side of his head. Touching it made the world dizzy again, and Cody jerked away from his own touch, hissing in pain and disbelief. His glove was tacky when he pulled it away. He rubbed his fingers together, repeated that lone, solitary, curse because dank farrik it made him feel better.

He was busy peeling open a bacta strip, one sacrificed from the meager medical kit all verde were required to carry, when he heard talking in the distance.

Cody paused. He concentrated.

The concussion made everything gauzy and thick, but Cody had dealt through worse - had trained through significantly worse, first with Skirata and Rau and then 17. He pushed the pain of it away and focused on the noise instead. It came in and out at first, as if he had a bad signal, but Cody caught enough.

There were motors coming. Cody doubted they were friendly.

He finished opening the strip. He threw its packaging into the fiery furnace the ship was morphing into and found the wound again. The strip burned when he pressed it into the skin - too little for something too big - and Cody let his exasperation go; there wasn’t any time for it.

He retraced his steps back to the ship and then around, skirting away from the open windshield and under one of its destroyed wings. Very carefully, he crouched in the shadows. He unhooked his buy’ce and slid it on, not caring about the pressure against his head or the way that blood was already soaking straight through that little bandage of bacta. His HUD was grainy - no signal close by and Cody wouldn’t risk turning on his personal one - but the heat detection worked fine. In the sea of oranges and reds the ship and ground created, the lone cluster of velvet blue making its way toward him practically glowed.

He waited. He wasn’t, exactly, disappointed.

“Here is the wreckage,” came a voice, distorted and inhumane. “Orders are to search it for lifeforms. Any lifeform found must be taken to the General.”

“Roger,” the rest of the group chanted. “Roger.”

The word set Cody’s teeth on edge. The droids - the pale, thin ones from his memories, the ones that made up oceans and crypts and useless destruction - mechanically fanned out. Two of them marched, uncaring, into the flames. The other two swung to the sides. Cody pulled tight to the ship. Either it would hide his heat signature or the thing would spot him. By the way his luck was going, Cody prepared himself for the latter. He made his body sink into the earth, made it look loose and lifeless, let his head loll like it wanted to. He kept his HUD on, watching it approach. The wait, this time, was much shorter.

Cody spotted the exact moment the droid saw him. It stilled its sweep with an unnatural stop, its long, thin face panel staring straight into his HUD. 

“Lifeform detected,” it said. It raised its weapon. Cody gave it a once over. It was an E-5 model, nothing fancy but something Cody could work with, especially as the droid came closer. Cody could hear it crush rock under its feet, the steady plod of its stride, the slight stench of oil. It all made something start stirring in Cody’s blood; something dangerous and sweet, something addictively brutal and beautiful. Cody couldn’t decide if it made breathing hard or if it made it possible.

Oya, the Ka’ra whispered. Oyaoyaoya. Tear and shred and pull everything apart, Kote.

“Lifeform detected.”

Cody stayed still.

“Lifeform found. Condition: alive.”

The droid came closer. It nudged at him with his blaster.

“Lifeform -”

Cody hooked his leg. The back of his knee gripped one of the droid’s legs and Cody twisted. For a brief moment, the droid did nothing but waver, a solid frame of metal and wirework, but one of them had to bend and Cody spurned the idea that it would be him. He kept twisting. The droid teetered over to the side. It pinned Cody’s leg, made an awful noise against his ‘gam, but Cody just swept his other leg up and slammed the heel of his foot into the droid’s hand. Sparks flew. The droid dropped the blaster. Cody whistled in a breath at the immediate throb his foot gave off, but rolled to the side to snatch the weapon.

“Unit B-1 2224 down. Unit B-1 -”

Cody shoved his open hand under the thin head. He got his fingers into its sides.

“That’s my number,” he sneered, shoving the head up and to the side just to press the blaster into the vulnerable collection of wires connecting it to the rest of its body. “Mine.”

“Unit -”

He shot. The droid died with a crackling croak.

Cody heard more footsteps. He spun around, away and off the droid. He landed back on solid rock, facing behind him, and saw the head of the droid’s twin poke forward from the backside curve of the ship. Cody pulled the trigger. The droid spun to the ground, its head spinning clear from the rest of it.

The Ka’ra purred. Cody almost joined it.

He went over to the second one’s body. Using his foot as leverage, he pulled open the chest panel. Most of the parts were foreign to him - his robotics lessons only went so far and so detailed; he regretted not paying more attention - but he found a small, compact engine. That was the problem with droids, he thought, hearing the motors still going. Killing the access to their programming would put them out of commission, but everything else could be remade and shipped out again. The GAR, on the other hand, was less reusable.

Cody carefully pulled the engine free of the wires and frame and trudged back to the front of the ship. He came across the first droid and snagged its foot, dragging it a few feet from where he had butchered it. The thing had said General, and Cody knew the title couldn’t be referring to anyone, or thing, good. When he deemed the body was far enough away, Cody threw the engine straight through the windshield, right into the heart of the fire. The resulting explosion made his head ring around and around even as the heat glossed over his ‘gam. That thing in his blood grew bolder - he could almost taste it.

Beautiful, the Ka’ra said.

“Talkin’ about me?” He asked. “Or it?”

Both, it answered, smiling.

“Hm,” Cody said, more preoccupied by the droid’s head. He found the memory chip and tore it free. Miraculously, the model was compatible with his vambrace. He slid it in and watched the information appear on his HUD screen.

“Comm channel. Programming procedures. Order directives,” he said to himself, squinting at all software names and shaking his head to the side when they became too blurry. The concussion was getting worse. Cody wasn’t too surprised by that - he’d had enough concussions to know how they worked - but he was surprised by how fast it was going. He’d have to use another bacta strip. In the meantime, he kept reading. “Planetary layout. System regulation. Mission objectives - there we go.”

Cody opened the software.

“Destroy and demobilize GAR ground forces. Capture or execute General Obi-Wan Kenobi. Deposit Kenobi to General Grievous. Leave no other survivors.”

He cleared his throat. Grievous, he thought. 

Grievous.

Spinning jetii’kade. A multitude of colors. Metal, robot, freak of nature. Rough. Rough voice. Obi-Wan, sprawled before him, talking. Talking a mile a minute. Talking to buy Cody more time -

“Alright,” he said, pushing the memory away before it could drag him somewhere he couldn’t come back from. “I know him.”

Cody sorted through the rest of the memory card. He tried finding anything as to where Obi-Wan and the GAR forces, most likely some section of the 212th, were on the planet. He found nothing, not even information about where the Separatist forces were.

“Useless,” he said, nudging the metal head with his boot. He looked up at the horizon, swinging his head to the right and left. “But how did you get here?”

The droid, of course, doesn’t answer.

Cody started walking. The horizon went from flat to sporadically rising up and down by only a few steps. It seemed relatively natural; no anti-air guns or strange, explosive divots. Cody tried to remember his battle orders but couldn’t. All he knew was that this hadn’t happened the first time. The old Cody had been sent off with everyone else, had been with Obi-Wan since the beginning, and he didn’t remember anything like this. 17’s mission to Jabiim had ended up reaping the same consequences, right down to the wounds and the meeting with Ventress, and all of his vode seemed to be similarly stuck in their given missions, but Cody’s - Cody’s changed. He hadn’t expected that. He’d expected some discrepancies, but nothing quite this new.

I’m not the only one.

Cody lowered the sensitivity settings on his HUD to make the sun stop burning. Afterwards, he tried to grasp onto what the Ka’ra said.

“What?”

The changes, it said. It flicked its claws out at him, sending a wave of frustration up and through Cody’s body that wasn’t his. I’m not the only one trying to alter things.

“Who else is?”

It is complicated. Strange.

“Try me.”

The Force. It is shifting. Shifting like I did.

“It’s helping us?”

Not quite. It wants balance. I want victory.

“Aren’t they the same thing?”

Naas. Not to it, the Ka’ra said. It sighed, the noise gentle even as Cody felt its undertone of fury and betrayal and confusion. It raised his own hackles. The Ka’ra clicked its tongue and smoothed them down. Don’t worry. I will take good care of you.

Cody gave a dry, broken laugh. His head rattled.

“Have you ever considered that that might be why I’m worried?”

The Ka’ra was silent before -

You are strange. So much stranger than your aliit.

“Yet you chose me,” Cody said, trying to sound sardonic but not quite making it.

Elek. I did.

Cody slowed. He swayed on the face of that rocky planet, run wild by the kriffing head wound and the feelings the Ka’ra kept pouring down his throat. He didn’t understand them. He couldn’t. Kark, why couldn’t it just hate him? Why couldn’t it just let him go? Buir had done it easily enough and Cody was his ad . What was he to the Ka’ra?

Everything, it said. You are everything.

“Can’t be.”

Why not?

Cody doesn’t answer because he can’t. He can’t open that up. Not now. Not ever. Naas.

You’re scared.

“Stop,” he said, more pleading than ordering. “Stop. I have to focus.”

Kote, the Ka’ra said. Kote, you’re bleeding.

Cody looked down. Red was smeared all down his chestpiece. Cody unlatched his buy’ce, giving some odd combination of a hiccup and a gurgle when it pressed against his bruised temples, and took it off. The inside of it was red.

“Karking head wounds,” he said, shaking the thing out. He clipped it back onto his belt. There wasn’t any point of putting it back on when all he was going to do was hemorrhage in it. When he looked back up, his eyes caught the front end of a partially hidden speeder bike. He walked over to it. By the time Cody circled around the rock, he could hear the rattle and hum of its engine.

“Here we go,” he said, swinging onto its seat. Its twin sat a few paces away, no doubt used to carry the other duo of droids, and Cody considered it. It didn’t take much convincing to level his blaster and punch a hole right through the side of one of its repulsorlifts. He then shouldered the gun and turned to his vambrace, using it to create his own hotspot. He hated to do it and knew that one of his trainers would’ve given him haran for giving away his own position, but Cody would rather run straight to Obi-Wan than stumble upon the Separatists. It was easy enough to find the GAR channel patterns - too easy, actually. Cody didn’t like how they were bunched together, so close they were positively overlapping, and the activity they were putting out. It had all the makings, Cody mused, sluggish but still sharp, of an SOS. In the next thought, Cody decided he didn’t, exactly, care for that idea.

He revved the engine. The speeder bike flew.

The speed and the wind and the sudden possibility of the 212th being routed shook off some of his stupor. The increasingly loud noises of artillery cannons tore the rest of it into pieces. Cody kept himself as low and flat as possible, weaving around rock structures and skidding across chasms. He fled through a canyon and then out of it. To the left were more open fissures, but the right had been twisted into a battlefield.

Cody stared at it as he forced the bike’s engine as fast as it could go. It was u-shaped, clustered heavily into shallow, natural trenches, and he smelled the blasterfire and blood even from where he was. He had a terrible feeling about this; it was too different, too new. He wasn’t prepared for this; this new game that the Force and the Ka’ra were crafting between their fight for dominance. Cody felt pulled from the game before he could even play, and he wasn’t sure if he had what it took to step into the one just thrown at his feet.

“Medic,” someone screamed, the sound of it echoing in the wind. “Me-dic!”

Cody headed towards the scream, twisting around complicated rock structures. Red stone flashed by, ending as abruptly as it began, and Cody was dumped out next to the cramped, natural trenches. He hardly got the chance to look at them; a group of verde were running through the rocks, sprinting into the open plain with someone dragged between them and a group of B-1s closing in from behind. Cody saw a figure start to climb out of the trenches and sprint. The gap between the groups spanned entire cosmos, and the droids kept advancing. The verde slowed. The medic - because only a medic could manage to break from cover at a dead run - wasn’t fast enough. Not even the concussion had enough power over reality to make them reach one another in time.

Cody pressed his legs around the bike. He unholstered his blaster.

The bike spun onto the battlefield, right behind the advancing group of droids. Cody laid up a steady line of fire, aiming for the head and that thin little neck, and the Ka’ra laughed, laughed, laughed inside of him.

Play, it purred. Play, Kote.

Cody clawed his way onto the new game board. He’d play. He’d play and tear everything apart and he’d win. He’d win. Kark, Cody would win even if he had to fight the Force himself and destroy himself in the process. He’d tried it once, almost snatched the victory, and this time - this time Cody would make the galaxy have to pry it out of his hands before he ever let it go again. 

In the meantime, though, he’d do a little shooting practice. 

The droids turned around, yelled at him with those demogolka voices, and Cody gave off as many shots as he could before they returned fire. He let his ‘gam take the brunt of the attack, felt the heat of the shots try to sink into the metal and fail, and Cody kept himself as small as he could. He hurtled through the middle of the group but threw himself to the side. The bike pivoted around. Cody kept shooting. 

He wasn’t sure how long it was just him, wasn’t sure how many bolts his ‘gam took, but by the time more bolts were flying from behind him than coming at him, the E-5 was melting in his hands. He kicked the reverse gear on the bike and let it drag him backwards. He passed by the group of verde, 212th men even if their colors were spontaneous, now setting up a flexible line. Cody kept going until he drifted even with the medic and the downed Mando’ad.

The medic stared at him.

“Ka’ra,” they said, sounding so exhausted it was almost exhilarated. “Kark.”

Cody smiled.

“Su’cuy, Caf.”

“Hey, Cody. Welcome to haran.” Caf greeted, working the wounded verd’s buy’ce off. Cody dismounted and moved to his side. The verd was laid out before them, placed on his back, and Cody’s heart ached when his face was bared to the world. Cody crouched. He softly pressed his fingertips against one mottled, likely broken, cheekbone. The verd’s hair - Ka’ra, his hair was so blond, so obnoxious that Cody couldn’t help but pet through it. 

“Crys,” he whispered, touching that canary yellow hair. “Crys.”

Crys’s eyelids fluttered.

“He got caught by a thermal detonator. His ‘gam, of course, took most of the blast, but the force of it,” Caf shook his head. “You’d best get to the trench, Cody. They need you down there. They need you bad.”

Cody’s jaw clenched. He backpedaled from Crys, from Caf. He saw the thin line of soldiers he’d left behind break and begin to fall back to where they were. Blasterfire didn’t follow them, and Cody felt something relax in his stomach even as adrenaline burned through his body.

The soldiers approached.

“Caf?” One of them called out. “Who’s he?”

“Cody,” Caf said, lips twitching.

“Cody?” A voice - Gregor, that was Gregor - repeated. Someone else shifted, straightened up. Cody saw the way he stood, saw the way his shoulders curled forward even in his ‘gam , saw the thin fingers and knew, without having to see his face, that he was looking at Longshot - Longshot without a sniper rifle, it seemed, and that was so egregiously wrong that it was almost funny.

“You,” he said, pointing at Longshot. “You’ve got the wrong gun, verd.”

“I - what?”

“Sir,” Caf said. The twitching was becoming the ghost of a full blown smile. “You’ve gotta say sir at the end.”

“He doesn’t, Caf. I prefer Cody.”

Someone pulled a breath in. The whole group seemed to let it go.

“Commander?”

“Cody,” he corrected. “On the battlefield I’m just Cody.”

“Ka’ra,” a small voice came. “Ka’ra - we’ve got a commander.”

He sighed. Caf’s shoulders were trembling. Laughter, if the muffled gasps were anything to go by. Cody nudged the medic with his boot.

“Don’t you have a person to save, Caf?”

Caf fell back to serious so fast it must have hurt. “He needs bacta. I can’t do much against internal bleeding planetside, and the ship’s not responding to our comms.”

“It’s a blocker,” Gregor said. “Crys was talking about it before he…”

Cody bent back down. He slid open Crys’s vambrace and took out his memory card. He switched the droid’s card with the new one, and watched the files load in. Unsurprisingly, most of them were heavily coded and inaccessible, but the newest spots of activity were wide open.

“He pinged the location. He’s got a string of malware code running, too.”

“Good job,” Caf whispered, so quiet that only Crys and Cody could hear. “You hear that, Crys? Good karking job. Now you just hang on, kid, because you’re going to get a karking medal of honor for this. I’ll do the paperwork myself -” 

“Take the bike,” Cody said. Caf’s head rose up to look at him, partly confused. Cody jerked his head towards the speeder. “Take the bike. It’ll be easier for him and faster for you.”

“Can you get him on?”

Cody didn’t hesitate. He cradled Crys in his arms. It pulled a broken little breath out of the tech genius, one that had Cody clenching his jaw and trying to conjure up all the gentleness he was possible of. Cody lowered him over the front of the bike, stomach down, and held him until Caf slid in behind him. 

“Where’d you get this bike from, anyway? Seems brand new.”

“Probably is,” Cody said. “My shuttle got shot down. A few droids came to sweep the area, and I stole their bike.”

Gregor whistled. “Your shuttle got shot down?”

“It was a haran of a wake up call, I’ll tell you that.”

The group went silent. Caf stared, shook his head, and then took off on the bike while muttering something under his breath. Cody ignored it. He could already guess what the gist of it was. He turned back to the barren squad he was left with.

“Gregor.”

“You know my name?”

“Gregor,” Cody stressed. The verd straightened up. “Do we have scouts? Reconnaissance units?”

“Two teams, sir.”

“Drop the sir. It’s a waste of breath,” Cody said, and Gregor nodded as if he was going to take the request seriously. “Who are the two fastest?”

“Team one -”

Cody held up a hand. Gregor fell silent. The other verde - vode, Cody thought. They’re my vode - huddled closer. “I don’t want a team. I want the two fastest men we have.”

“Boil,” Longshot answered. “Boil and Waxer. They’re on different teams, but they can run as fast as you want them too, sir.”

“Comm them.”

Longshot commed. The group headed to the trenches in the meantime.

“Sitrep, Gregor.”

“There’s not much to give,” Gregor said, keeping a step behind Cody. Cody, without looking, grabbed at his elbow and dragged him forward until they were side by side. Gregor tripped a little but kept walking, his buy’ce swinging around to openly gawk at the taller Mando . 

“Gregor.”

“The 212th was deployed here to look into rumors of Separatist movement. When we first landed, we thought it was going to be a droid factory or processing plant. Current information is a bit vague as we’ve been cut off from our fleet and we’re stuck to these rock formations, but we think it's less droid factory and more a trap. Either this planet willingly lured us here, or they were forced. The last we heard from the General and the platoon he took -”

“The last you heard?”

“The General got a feeling, sir. He decided to check it out.”

“He? Just him?”

“Yessir. Once we realized what he’d done, we dispatched a rescue team. The last contact we had with either party was confirmation they encountered one another - and one flank of the Separatist line.”

“How far off?”

“A few klicks.”

“How long ago?”

“A few hours.”

“Which area has Grievous been spotted in?”

Gregor made a strange noise. “Nowhere, sir. He’s - we haven’t spotted him. None of our information said he was even here.”

“Then we need better information because he’s planetside. Send out a priority alert about it for me, would you? I don't have access to those channels yet. Go ahead and call just the commanding officers we can spare to meet us where we’re heading to.” Cody stopped Gregor’s hand from going to his comm. “But don’t tell anyone I’m here. If they’re blocking our messages starside and planetside, then they can probably read everything we send, too. It’s enough to let them know we know who’s leading them. They don’t need to know who’s leading you.”

“Understood sir.”

Cody whistled. “Longshot.”

“Sir?”

Kark, Cody hated that word. There was leading and then there was - there was that word.

“Are Boil and Waxer in position?”

“They say they are. They want to know their orders.”

“Tell them to hold. I don’t want orders going live over channels anymore, but I don’t want that to be common knowledge, either. The droids are all clanking bolts, but Grievous isn’t.”

“Grievous?”

Cody craned his head around. It was Trapper, and that made him blink. Trapper had come under Cody’s direct jurisdiction late, only officially being siphoned into the 212th after a particularly rough mission on Geonosis. Ponds had been unhappy with it, but Cody hadn’t cared. He had liked Trapper, liked him a lot, and when Cody liked vode, well, he found a way to keep them close. Besides, Trapper had fit right in with the rest of Ghost, Cody’s hand-selected and personally trained company of his best and brightest. Ponds’s mutinous mutterings had been easily swept under the rug after that had happened because if Cody was greedy in regards to vode, he was downright confidential about his Ghosts. Not even Obi-Wan had known the final rosters of its squads and battalions. It had been Cody’s company, his boys, and Trapper had been one of them. Eventually. Him being here now was two years too soon.

A gift, the Ka’ra said. For you. Something you wanted.

“Some Separatist general. A cyborg, I think,” Cody said. The Ka’ra’s words swirled inside of him. “You’ve never encountered him before?”

“We have,” Trapper said. “Didn’t go well.”

“That’s about what I expected.”

“He’s here?”

“He’s certainly giving out orders.”

The group went quiet, the sort of withdrawn sullenness that only came from a matured and heady mix of frustration and desolation. Cody could understand the frustration - hadn’t that been the center of his life so far? Couldn’t it all boil down to the endless sprint and false start of everything Cody wished for? - but only felt the desolation when he finally sunk his boots into the low, shadowed section of trench the 212th had chosen to squat in. It was all dust and chips of beskar’gam and blood, endless waves of verde replacing and retreating to the tune of death and low, exhausted whispers of hope. 

To Cody, it nearly felt like home.

He glided his way through, twisted and turned around moving guns and bodies and formations like it was some morbid dance. There was an ebb and flow, a series of tides, and Cody knew them all. He waltzed into the heart of the formation and waited, slightly, for the rest of his group to break their way through. By the time they had, a meager collection of verde approached the edges of the area. One of them - Gearshift - gave him a side-eye.

“Who’s this?” He asked.

“Our commander,” Gregor said. “Marshal Commander Kote. He goes by Cody.”

Barlex squinted at him, arms crossed and four hours late to a good shower and better sleep. Barlex had always been one of Cody’s more problematic vod . He was extraordinarily talented - had to have been to catch Cody’s eye - but his attitude was grim, Neyo-esque aloofness. Ghost had had a special talent to melt it down, make it a boon instead of a bane, but this 212th didn’t have Ghost yet. More importantly, Barlex didn’t have Ghost yet. He caught Cody’s eye and they were bloodshot, hollowed out by something Cody hadn’t been around to fix.

“How’d you get here?” Barlex asked. “Airspace isn’t exactly open.”

“I was inbound on a shuttle. The Seps aircraft guns shot it down, and I crash landed a few klicks away. A droid team was sent out to investigate the wreckage and take any survivors to Grievous. I dealt with the droids, stole one of their bikes, and made my way here by following your comm channel outputs.”

Barlex’s arms relaxed. They hung a little limper. 

“You dealt with the droids?”

“There’s a weak spot under the chin, right where the wires connect to the facial plate. Enough force and it’ll cut the programming. Headshots at that range weren’t difficult, either.”

“Sounds -”

“Believable?” Gearshift supplied, murmuring under his breath in a way that was only meant for Barlex. Cody heard it anyway. “Look at him.”

“Sirs?”

Cody’s eyes fluttered shut. The voice hurt. It hurt deep.

“You called us, Long?”

“Boil. Waxer,” Cody said. He opened his eyes again. There was a span of distance between the two scouts that was as unnatural as seeing Longshot with just a basic carbine. “Waxer. Boil. Get used to each other because I’ve got a mission for you. C’mere.”

The two stepped forward, almost in harmony - would’ve been in harmony if it wasn’t for that damned distance. Cody buried the urge to shove them together and get rid of it all at once; instead, he gave them Crys’s memory card.

“It’s Crys’s. He pinged the location of what’s blocking our channels and left us a malware code that can take it down.”

Waxer’s eyes lit up because he was quick enough to know what Cody was getting at.

“We’re on it, sir,” he said.

Boil held him back because Boil was quick enough to know what Waxer was getting at. He was smart enough to know that Waxer was faster than him, too. He plucked the card out of Waxer’s hand and put it into his own vambrace. A rudimentary holomap appeared above his wrist.

“Do you want us to grab our teams?”

“Naas. Just the two of you. A bigger group would draw their attention, and I can’t spare any men. Not now, at least. If you still need help after, send something abstract on the comms and keep spamming it. We’ll see the channel levels jump.”

“Understood,” Boil said. He gently touched Waxer’s elbow. “Let’s go.”

They left. Cody watched their boots rouse up a fine mist of dust. It made his eyes water. He rubbed at them and spat a little. He could feel the grit on his teeth, in his hair, caked into the blood that was drying on his face and neck. He rubbed some more. His eyes kept watering.

“You have a plan?” Gregor asked.

“Mm,” Cody said. “We’re leaving the trenches.”

Silence.

Gearshift let out a puff of air. It might’ve been a laugh. “Pardon?”

“We’re shifting our front,” Cody said. “Without assistance or relieving forces from our fleet, our force is too small to be split like it is. We’ll engage the enemy, draw him into our left flank here and push back on our right. If we do it well enough, we can link up with the General’s last known location.”

“Holy kriff,” Gearshift said. “You’re serious.”

“I am.”

The group didn’t know how to handle that answer; Cody saw the surprise run through them all like some strange electrical current. His hair rose when it passed him, leaping from Barlex to Gregor and then to Trapper. It felt like responsibility and soul destroying decisions, like action and reaction, a whole myriad of consequences that Cody would valiantly bear until no one needed them held anymore.

“Alright,” Gregor said, soft. “How are we going to do this, sir?”

The title bore down at him, leering with far too many teeth. It was the type of pressure that would take someone and either spit them out or mold them into something unrecognizable. Cody hoped he would be the latter. The former would destroy him. It had done it once, and Cody doubted it was satisfied. He felt its hunger pains, its vitriol, its greed. It didn’t scare him. It couldn’t really, because Cody wasn’t scared of dying. He wasn’t scared of pain. Cody was scared of - Ka’ra help him, he was scared of the way his verde were looking at him.

He took a breath. He let it out. The plan spilled from his mouth accordingly. The group disbanded soon after, each of them heading back to their units to start the whole process. Only Barlex held back, watching him.

“‘Lek ?” Cody asked.

“This is either going to be a miracle,” Barlex said, “or a death sentence.”

“I know.”

“But you’re going out there with us? You’re leading us?”

“I’m not going to ask for things I won’t do. If it's going to be a miracle, I’ll be there to greet it. And if it’s a death sentence, well, I’ll greet that too.”

“You’re crazy.”

“Elek.”

Barlex smiled, the type of smile only Cody could pull out. It burned into Cody’s soul, slotted into a place he never knew was split, and Cody cherished the flash of pain and longing and guilt it drew to the surface. Barlex walked away with it on his face. Cody walked away with it imprinted in his mind.

The rest was chaos - chaos and history and the prodigal return of an ad swept from the board before he could ever be crowned king. 

The Ka’ra roared. Cody fought. The whole world bowed at their feet.

His blaster seared into his gloves, melted the material and sunk into the rough skin of his hands, but Cody never quit shooting. His hands ached from when a droid ventured too close and something feral inside of him woke up, some instinct to destroy with just the muscle and sinew of his body and relish in it. At one point, he was up on the higher ground, straddling the trench, a figure outlined in the dust and the sun, and screaming into the battle, giving out orders and upheaving his unit by the strength of his own conviction. He dragged more bodies into safety than he destroyed, managed to be everywhere all at once without taking a single breath, and entered the war with a ferocity that felt immortal.

His boot caught something. Cody scooped it up - laughed.

It was a jetii’kad. Bluer than blue, no doubt, and something Cody missed dearly.

“Su'cuy,” he said to it, tenderly rubbing away the dirt with his fingers. The metal preened as if it remembered him. Maybe it did. Jetii’kade were like beskar’gam; fragments of souls and scriptures sentenced to always be bared to the world.

“Where is Obi-Wan?” He asked. He’d gotten the forces connected again. They were holding a significant frontline better than he would’ve expected them too - good training and hope, it seemed, beat out the supreme power of exhaustion - but the General still hadn’t been spotted. He bounced the jetii’kad against his palm. “Hm? Can you tell me?”

His vambrace lit up. Boil and Waxer, it seemed, had succeeded.

“Sir,” called a voice.

“Give the order,” Cody said, not looking up from his vambrace. He scrolled through the comm channels, trying to pick out individual numbers. It was a difficult task without official access, but buir had shown him how to find which trace belonged to who just by pattern alone. He wheedled most of the traces out, but couldn’t pinpoint which one, exactly, belonged to Obi-Wan. “Get our ship down here.”

“Incoming, sir!”

Cody flung himself down into the nearest trench. He snatched at the bodies of other verde as he went, dragging and pushing them into safety.

“Heads down,” he yelled, fighting to get his voice heard over the increasingly loud and unmistakable rumble of a ship dropping in fast. “Brace positions. Hold!”

The sky opened up. Cody watched the wave of airsupport come in,  all righteous lightning and furious thunder, and saw the face of the planet turn bright white. Bits of droid rained down on his head and shoulders, celebrated by the punch of cannons and repulsorlifts. The men vibrated but stayed quiet. They waited. The retort of Separatist anti-air cannons came unbalanced and deceived. Their ship - not The Negotiator because Cody had to draw the line at some things being too risky even for him - pivoted. The Separatist guns went up in flames.

Cody whistled piercingly. His vode moved with the noise, planted their boots against the walls of the trenches and began to hoist. When Cody stepped out into the sunlight, the 212th unflinchingly followed.

Half-destroyed droids teetered in response. They were swept away by a revenge so poignant it was poured into beskar’gam molds and taught how to shoot. Their ship drifted ahead of them. It laid waste to the reinforcing lines of the Separatist force and swiveled back, raking the field with blasterfire whenever a squad asked nicely for it. Cody came close to drifting back into that rampaging mindset, but was plucked out of its sweet haze by the sight of -

“Surrender.”

Cody froze. The battle swirled around him.

“Surrender,” came the voice again, rattling and frayed. Cody stared. Grievous was atop an elevated rock formation, looming above Cody’s commanding officers. In a set of his arms dangled a phantom with hair the color of victory. Cody could smell blood. Cody could smell pain. It made the thing in his blood tear its way to the surface, made it come out roaring and vicious - made Cody come out roaring and vicious. He was on the rock formation before he realized what he was doing, and he had his buy’ce in hand before he recognized that he had unhooked it from his belt.

He slammed it into Grievous’s head without a single thought.

Cody felt the impact in his fingers and wrist and shoulder. The noise it made was unholy, terrifying, a death knell chime. The cyborg shrieked, his face crumpling inwards, and dropped his prize. Cody caught the body before it hit the ground and planted himself in front of it.

The consequence of it all was the sound of ignition and the little platform being bathed in green and blue fire. The cyborg wavered in the light, a shadow of hideous proportions, and Cody looked into his eyes. There was anger there, painful and indignant, but there was surprise, too. Cody’s buy’ce dropped from his hands. He shook out his arms.

“You will regret that,” Grievous said.

“I won’t.”

Grievous growled. It drew nothing out of Cody. He had heard scarier chips from Boba as an ik’aad. The jetii’kade didn’t do anything, either. It was difficult, Cody supposed, to scare someone who had already seen and done so much. It was harder still to scare someone who had already died.

“You are nothing - just the soldier of a rotted republic.”

“Come see,” Cody said. He shifted his weight around. “Come see exactly what I am, Grievous.”

Grievous took a step forward, his stolen jetii’kade singeing the air around him. Cody kept his stance exactly where it was until he was suddenly sprinting forward again, fearlessly deranged - and maybe, really, that was the real reason as to why Cody wasn’t scared. Grievous acted like a monster, but even cyborgs had a scrap of humanity inside of them. Eyayahe didn’t. They were soldiers and numbers and pounding, impossible orders of getting the job done. When Grievous was threatened, he turned human.

When Cody was threatened, he turned monstrous.

The chest, the Ka’ra whispered. His chest. Go for it, Kote.

Cody went. Cody went and went and went. He ducked and dodged whirring, molten blades in order to slam himself into Grievous. His heel shot out to splinter the cyborg’s leg. That got another squeal of electronic pain, but Cody just pressed his boots into the fracture to leverage himself up to chest level. He threw his fist into the center plate. It groaned under the force but held fast. Grievous snatched at his backplate and threw him away. Cody hit the dirt, rolled, and came right back at him because Cody would never stop coming after him. Never. He caught a jetii’kad with his vambrace. Cody braced his arm with his other and shoved back. The blade took off one of Grievous’s arms.

“You -”

Cody grasped onto the ‘kad’s hilt and the cyborg’s wrist. His fingers dug in so hard that the metal groaned beneath them. He spun under the arm, used the momentum and the length of his legs to hook his knee around the pole of Grievous’s neck. He let Grievous lift him up, using the height difference to chamber his trailing leg and hammer away at the chest panel with his boot. The metal cracked. Grievous tried to drop him.

Cody held on. He kept kicking.

“Off,” Grievous said, mindless and thrashing. “Off!”

He pressed the other ‘kade into Cody’s sides, let the heat linger there. His ‘gam , blessedly, took the brunt of it. Cody took all the leftovers with a clenched jaw and a wrist that was slowly being squeezed into decimation. Cody’s foot hit again and again until it sunk in and stayed. Grievous snapped his wrist in response. When it became clear that Cody wasn’t going to faint from the sudden explosion of pain, one of the jetii’kade swung towards his head.

Cody let go. The ‘kad went high. Cody felt it whistle past his head and go wide, wide, wide against Grievous’s side. He then forced his foot loose at the same time he clinched his knee tighter around the cyborg’s neck. Cody had let go - but he did it to go up, not down. He hoisted himself up, ignoring the strain in his stomach and legs, until he was straddling the top of the Separatist’s torso. His good hand fell to where Obi-Wan’s ‘kad hung, and he snatched it free. When he turned it on - oh Ka’ra, its blue seemed to fill the sky.

Not your color, the Ka’ra said. But it’ll do. For now.

Cody flipped the hilt around. His legs squeezed. Grievous wrought himself forward, tried to buck him off, but Cody stayed on.  That little clause of life and death and survival, the necessity of retreat, had never been forced into the part of him that had been morphed into something human.

He drove his hand down.

The blade cut through Grievous - through his head, past the spindle thick neck, straight into the concave of his chest - like silk. Grievous crumpled. The rest of the battle turned to satin; sweet and supple and perfectly moldable in the hands of the 212th.

Cody tottered off of the dead. He clicked the ‘kad off. His whole arm still shivered from its low hum, and the Ka’ra was right because it wasn’t his color. His color was as dark as the night and as ethereal as the stars. His color was war and victory and the thin edge of danger.

“Oh,” said a voice.

Cody turned. Obi-Wan was gazing up at him from the ground, wide-eyed and breathless. Cody stepped towards him

“Oh,” the jetii said. “Bòidheach.”

“What?”

“Bòidheach,” Obi-Wan repeated, wispy and wondrous when Cody kneeled at his side. His pupils were wide and unwieldy. Cody twined his finger around a ginger curl. He tucked it back into the rest of his hair, swept it away from the high, pale forehead and the bridge of a thin, broken nose. “Gràdhach. Mo aingeal. ”

“You’re hurt. Bad.”

Obi-Wan’s hand lifted between them. Cody let it skim across his face. Fingers laid against his lips, cool and bruised. His lips twitched.

“Do you remember me?”

Obi-Wan hummed. His hand drifted down to hold onto his ‘kad. Cody gently tugged it away. Obi-Wan let him, half lucid but so, so trusting. Cody felt the world revolve around them. His body, in a little lurch, drew closer. He cocked an eyebrow.

“Did you do that?”

Obi-Wan’s hand splayed, hovering an inch above Cody’s beskar’gam. Cody caught it before it could pull on the Force again, but let the tips of his fingers touch the metal. Obi-Wan took in a little breath.

“Òr breagha. Glòir ghràdhach.”

“You need help,” Cody said. “Medical aid. I’m going to carry you. Is that - are you alright with that?”

Obi-Wan looked at him. It was all that Cody needed.

He got his arms under the jetii ’s knees and shoulder. He lifted. Obi-Wan fluttered in his arms, more weightless and divine than he had any right to be. One of his arms curled around Cody’s neck. It shocked the skin it touched. Cody breathed through that feeling - far lovelier but just as painful as what Grievous had done to him - and caught himself. 

Down below, the 212th waited for him.

“Area’s secure, sir,” Gregor said.

Cody blinked.

“Ships are being loaded up. The Negotiator landed a few klicks away.”

“Grievous is up here.”

“Yessir, we - we saw.”

Elek, they had. In the dying light of the planet, Cody could see his reflection in all of their buy’cee. It was one made of gold; the paint on his armor was faded and distorted by the scars of blaster bolts and dust, and it turned the orange into the same color of his eyes. He seemed to glow, turned radiant and rousing and altogether someone Cody didn’t know.  He turned his head away. That wasn’t him. That wasn’t him in the reflection - it was Kote.

“I want a team to retrieve the body. Tell them to be careful with his head. He’ll have a memory card there, and once Crys is back on his feet we can try to get his system back online for interrogation.”

“I’ll send Boil and Waxer.”

Cody stepped off the platform. His verde parted to let him through.

“Is Caf back on the ship?”

“He’s settling in. The first wave of wounded have already been taken care of.”

“Comm him. Give him a heads up that the General’s going to need a bacta tank.”

“And you, sir?”

Cody cracked his neck. Gregor cleared his throat.

“Sir, I asked -”

Cody went to the medbay. Caf whisked Obi-Wan away, leaving Cody suddenly alone with empty arms. He wandered over to a cot and sat down, slowly beginning the process of digging himself out of his ‘gam and stopping, every once in a while, to just watch the medbay work. He hardly noticed when it stilled for the night.

“Sir?”

Cody pulled himself back to the present. Barlex was standing in front of him.

“‘Lek , ‘Lex?”

Over the verd ’s shoulder, Cody could see Obi-Wan floating in a bacta tank. He looked peaceful. Cody couldn’t stop staring at his face.

“Sir,” Barlex said. “I’m pretty sure what happened on that battlefield can be considered a miracle.”

Out of the corner of his eye, Cody could see Caf making his way over. By the look on the medic’s face, the previous relief of seeing Cody with his boots on the ground had been torn apart by the fact that Cody had - completely unintentionally, of course - squirreled himself away into some corner. Cody took a breath.

From inside the tank, Obi-Wan copied him. 

“Elek,” he said. “I guess we can call it that.”

(The 212th kept the holos of their commander to themselves for a whole week. They were unfailingly proud of them, of all the scenes they managed to capture of Cody wading through the battle like something inhuman. They were passed around and around again until they were, ultimately, leaked to the 501st. It’s their fault that the rest of the GAR ever gets to see them. The holos, soon after, spread like wildfire. Cody woke up one morning to chaos in the priority chat and his face plastered on every news channel. He shied away from it, withdrew. The 212th scrambled to fix the thing they hadn’t meant to break, but it was only the smile of their recently medbay released General that managed to do the job.)

Chapter Text

Butterfly wings, Cody found, were fickle little instruments.

The Ka’ra could pluck and tune and cater them to whatever song it wished. Its decisions were folded into the rhythm of wingbeats and delicate wing membranes. The Force could do it too, apparently. It could pick at a cord for as long and loud as it wanted, could set the course and steer it. There were some twists, some vague hints that things had been modified, but the heart of it all stayed the same. Either from some innate talent or whole millenniums to practice, both unseen, undying forces played the damn things perfectly.

Cody, unfortunately, didn’t have the same talent.

The war was four years long the first time around because it was a war. It was four years long the second time, too - penance, it seemed, for Cody’s premature killing of Grievous. 

Cody took that brand of irony as best as he could, buried it right next to the voiceless guilt he had because he should’ve remembered that every kriffing action had an opposite and equal reaction. Grievous had been a warmonger. It only made sense for his death to have turned the war more vicious. The other Separatist generals - Dooku, Ventress, the rest of their army’s nameless rabble - went into hiding. They rarely stepped out onto the battlefield in the same blatant style Cody remembered, rarely got anywhere close to the front lines. Their plans got craftier. The Wolfpack, despite Wolffe’s best efforts, were still wiped off the board in one mournful smear. Cody had stared at Wolffe’s troop requisition paperwork for a long, long time.

He had stayed awake that night, sitting up in a dark room with his head in hands, for much longer. He wondered, not for the first time, why the Ka’ra picked him. He was clearly destined to stay a failure if even his best intentions came out wrong. Cody hadn’t done it right once, and now he was - 

A year passed.

Most of the GAR, Cody included, scarcely flinched. The only calendar they kept were battleplans, and the majority were raised as Mando’ade - grown in an abundance of pragmatism and half-filled cups that needed washing. Cody doubted if even half of them would, if given the liberty of leave, celebrate anything. Cody certainly hadn’t when he was growing up. There had been his birthdays, of course, but those had been punctuated with necessities, not toys, and Manda’yaim ’s holidays were supplied with good food and aliit, nothing material, because they were a militant community first and foremost. The mere decades of peace after the civil wars had yet to cull the feeling of hunger pangs, and buire felt it was their job to teach the importance of making do.

“Nothing?” Wooley, the shiny in their midst, the only non-Mando’ade in all of the 212th, once asked. “Not a single candy or something?”

“Candies, elek,” Waxer said. “Sure, we got those for Life Day. Sometimes for the Festival of Love. But toys? Games? Puh-lease. If it didn’t have a use, you didn’t carry it.”

“What’d you do for fun, then?”

Waxer made a swirling motion with his hand. “Run around. Go find other groups of ade and knock our heads together until our buire finally called us back to wherever we were staying.”

“Didn’t it get boring?”

Cody snorted. The whole table quieted as if he had said something momentous. Without looking - the boys liked patterns and reliability; their seats they had uninvitingly snagged at his table were the same ones they snagged a lifetime ago - he pointed his datapad’s stylus at Wooley.

“You don’t use the word ‘boring’ in a Mando’ade household. Ever. You can think it, you can feel it, but the minute you say it aloud you’re dead. Someone will gladly find you something to do, and it won’t be very pretty. You keep ‘bored' to yourself. It’s safer that way.”

“Yuck,” Wooley had said, making a face.

The second year followed on the heels of the other. Nameless and necessary, two was just a stepping stone, overshadowed by the beginning of it all and three - the start of the end.

Year three started with Cody leaning back into his pillow, sighing. He stretched out his legs to get the blood circulating again, mussing up his sheets, and glared at the half-dimmed datapad resting in his lap.

“Yuck,” he said because by three years, Wooley’s habit of using the word to describe any inconvenience, major or minor, had successfully infiltrated the upper echelons of the 212th, Ghosts included - official Ghosts now, actually; Cody had slapped that bundle of flimsiwork together as soon as he could. The boys had been hesitant when he’d first lowballed it at them, shocked and confused and who knew what else, but each of them had softened, in degrees, to the idea. By now, Cody was torn. On one hand, they were a dream to command - all succinct, instinctual talent. On the other, they were toeing very close into ramming their heads right into Cody’s personal business. He nearly missed the days when they’d keep their comments to themselves, or, better yet, the days when Caf didn’t use them in his overbearing campaign to pester Cody about healthy living habits. Despite their best intentions, Cody didn’t need a protection detail.

He was a big boy. He knew his limits - the fact that he just didn’t care about them didn’t void the fact that he had the ability to know when one was approaching.

He blinked again.

Well. Cody knew what he wasn’t ever going to say to Caf. He could already imagine his CMO’s face if he ever breathed that philosophy out loud, and it wasn’t a particularly pretty one.

He shook himself, half an attempt to get the scenario out of his mind and half to rouse himself. He had a mountain of flimiswork piling up in his box, and Cody wouldn’t be able to sleep if he didn’t shave it all down to a boulder at minimum. Or a hill, he thought, yawning so loud his jaw cracked. He could settle for a hill.

He hadn’t even re-opened the requisition form he’d been looking at before he heard shuffling outside his room. He stilled. Save for the light built into his bunk and the datapad, his room was dark. No one should’ve been able to know he was still up just by passing down the hall, but if it was one of his boys or, Ka’ra forbid, a medic, Cody doubted they would be fooled - and if they weren’t fooled, then Cody would be in for it.

He slunk down into his bed, flipping the datapad down. It wouldn’t look like the most natural sleeping position in the world, but it was still a sleeping position. If Cody just closed his eyes and evened out his breathing, pretended a little -

The shuffler knocked on his door.

Cody immediately relaxed. Only one person on the ship ever knocked, and they weren’t vode. He climbed out of his bunk, leaving the datapad discarded on the sheets, and headed towards the door. He waited to open it, putting his head against the door to let him hear the other person’s heartbeat, the easy lull of their breathing, the way they kept rocking on their feet. There was a rustle of movement from the other side. Cody stepped away. He let the door open.

Obi-Wan stood on the other side, hand poised to knock again.

“You know you don’t have to do that, right?”

Obi-Wan’s eyes flickered up to his face. Cody crooked an eyebrow.

“I - pardon?”

“The knocking,” Cody said, miming the action. “You don’t have to do it. My door’s never locked. All you have to do is wave your hand at the motion sensor.”

Obi-Wan’s hand dropped. His lips twitched, unsure and unbalanced. Cody knew that face. Obi-Wan was trying to find the best way to respond, trying to drink up all the meager things that, despite Cody’s best efforts, trailed after him.

“Maybe,” Obi-Wan said, all quiet and searching for a sense of solid ground that had never existed between them. “Maybe I just wanted to be polite.”

“Politeness isn’t a concept Mando’ade know very well, sir. Bluntness -”

Obi-Wan’s face crinkled.

“Oh, don’t call me that.”

“Call you what?”

“Sir,” Obi-Wan said. “I’m only Obi-Wan when it’s this early in the morning.”

“Does that make me just Cody then?”

“It makes you whatever you wish,” Obi-Wan said, so simple and easy that Cody almost believed the nonchalance of it all - could almost disregard the runaway patter of Obi-Wan’s heart. The jetii stared up at him. Cody stared back.

“I’d like you to be Cody, though.”

Electricity, then, all sudden and sharp in Cody’s blood.

“Would you now?”

Obi-Wan smiled. “I believe so, yes.”

“Ah.”

“Is that a no?”

Cody didn’t answer. Not yet. There was something heady about having Kenobi scramble after him, something fluttering and dangerous and too much like karking butterfly wings. The feeling of it always made him wary of tiptoeing too close to the edge of whatever he and Obi-Wan were creating - a wariness that meant that Cody didn’t answer, didn’t rise to the bait laid out at his feet in the shape of figurative rose petals and metaphorical candles. 

But the wings kept beating, and Cody hadn’t learned to stop being carried away.

“What’re you doing up?”

“I could ask you the same thing.” Obi-Wan’s response was fast, but had little fire. Cody had thrown him again, then. In the same moment, Cody began to wonder just how dangerous that look in Kenobi’s eyes was. Very dangerous, if past Cody had anything to say on the matter. Extremely dangerous. Do not engage, it said. Abort.

Cody didn’t. 

He toed the dizzying dropoff, let the game keep unraveling until one of them would tug just a little too hard and finally drag the other over.

“But you haven’t,” Cody said. Reminded, really. Tried to warn. Tried to tell Obi-Wan that Cody knew all his tricks and wouldn’t ever be fooled, that Obi-Wan could turn around and leave anytime he wanted and Cody would get it, would understand. “Spying on me?”

“Spying implies that you need to be watched.”

Cody lifted one of his eyebrows. Obi-Wan’s heart hammered on and on and on.

“You aren’t watching?”

“I’m not spying.”

“Just looking?”

“Just looking,” Obi-Wan repeated, agreeing because he had found his footing again. “And I couldn’t help but notice that you were awake.”

“So you came here?”

“I would like to get some caf.”

“Alright.”

“I would like to get some with Cody,” Obi-Wan said. “If he’s here.”

Cody stepped forward.

“Is that a yes?” Obi-Wan asked, not moving. He let Cody tower over him, let their chests just skim shy of touching one another. Obi-Wan’s fingers twitched. “Is that a yes, Cody?”

“Why would I say no?”

Five words. An uptick at the end - more playful than Cody had meant, more giving than his wit was supposed to be. It bared his soul, a little, those five little words and tone, and it surprised them both. The ground was torn out from underneath Kenobi again. Cody was taken with. They ended up sprawled into a heap that was unsure and far too bold for either of their own good. Neither of them saw the point in untangling.

They walked. Shoulder to shoulder.

Obi-Wan was silent. So was Cody. There was no safe ground between them, no place to land in the strip of something they’ve created over the past years without tripping straight into dangerous territory.

The mess was dark, lit only by dulled emergency strips on the floor, and Cody took the lead. Obi-Wan wasn’t far behind, and Cody felt those twitching fingers skim across his back, barely moving the fabric of his shirt even as they sunk into whatever measly Force presence Cody managed to wring out of Jango’s genes.

“What’s it like?”

“What is what like?” Obi-Wan asked, inelegant. Nighttime, Cody realized, did funny things to Obi-Wan - or perhaps it was impossible; perhaps it was all Cody’s doing.

“My force presence. Ahsoka said -”

“Ah.”

“It’s strange.”

“Yes,” Obi-Wan said. “Sometimes I hardly think it’s the Force at all.”

“What’s it like, then?”

“Like a sun. Some great star. But it -”

“Elek?”

“It’s bright. It’s bright even in your beskar’gam, and that’s strange. Everyone else's becomes dark. Murky. Yours glows.”

“Like Anakin’s?” Cody asked. He remembered Ahsoka rambling on about it. Skywalker was an anomaly, it seemed, something as uniquely unusual as Cody. It should’ve made them close - they, the lone two strangers circling around the idea of normalcy - but it didn’t. In the beginning, back when the 501st was part of the 212th and it had been two jetii and two Mando’ade, Skywalker had tried. He had stuck close to Cody and tried.

Cody hadn’t.

Rex had asked, once, why Cody disliked Anakin so much.

“He’s your headache,” Cody had said. “Not mine.”

Except he was. Somehow. Anakin was Cody’s problem in a way that went deeper than the disregard of military red tape and the endangerment of the 501st on a regular basis. Something about Skywalker struck Cody wrong - struck the Ka’ra as wrong - and Cody’s answer to that conundrum was just to bare his teeth in warning and keep clear.

“No,” Obi-Wan said. “It’s not like Anakin’s at all. Anakin’s is its own force. Like a hurricane. Like some great storm. It’s difficult to look at. It’s hard to wade through. Yours is…”

“Gentle?” Cody said, almost laughing because he had never, ever been gentle.

“Blunt,” Obi-Wan shot back, mouth tipping upwards. “Clear. It’s warm and bright and gold. It’s like a beacon. It almost looks like your paint.”

Cody’s breath caught in his chest. The laughter died, sinking back down inside of him even as he felt the Ka’ra rise. He swallowed.

“Like my paint, huh,” he repeated, maneuvering them into the heart of the mess. The caf machines were in the main dining hall, but the materials to make caf were kept under strict lock and key. Too many verde, the medical team told him, would abuse it. Cody had refused to notice their pointed looks because he didn’t have a problem. Cody fixed problems - even if he wasn’t, apparently, particularly good at it.

The lights came on. 

“Ka’ra,” Cody hissed, closing his eyes against the sudden brightness and immediately running his hip into a durasteel counter. “Kark.” 

Obi-Wan laughed. 

“I’m beginning to regret my decision.”

“No you aren’t.”

Cody opened his eyes into little half-slits. Obi-Wan’s smile took up most of his vision.

“How do you know that?”

“Because you’re far too smart to agree to things you don’t want to do.”

Cody snorted. Obi-Wan disappeared behind a row of counters, rifling through its contents. “You’d be surprised. There’s a lot of things I’ve been forced to do that I haven’t wanted.”

“Like what?”

“Flimsiwork,” Cody said, ignoring every other reason that tried to break out of him.

Obi-Wan snorted, but didn’t laugh. It made Cody’s stomach twist because Obi-Wan was, despite the war, despite everything, a laugher. 

“What?” He asked before he could stop himself. “What’s wrong?”

Obi-Wan glanced up, just two blue slips, and then back down. One of his hands waved about, brushing through the air. Cody followed the fingers for a brief moment, mesmerized by how thin and straight they were. Cody was seven when he first broke a finger. His hands had never been straight ever again. 

“Nothing,” the jetii said. “Just tired.”

“You’re lying.”

“I’m -”

“Obi-Wan. I can smell it.”

“Well,” Obi-Wan said, standing with caf packets in hand. He cleared his throat, clicked his tongue. “That’s entirely unfair.”

Cody shrugged, but didn’t look away. “What’s wrong?”

“It wouldn’t be polite -”

“Bluntness, sir.”

“Don’t call me -”

“You’re breaking the rules,” Cody said. “I’m only Cody if you’re Obi-Wan.”

“Are you?”

“What?”

“Cody,” Obi-Wan said, coming closer. “Are you Cody right now? Really him, I mean. Sometimes I - well, sometimes I feel like I only get the Commander. And he’s no Cody.”

The lights shut off - not catching enough motion, probably - and the hazy blue glow of the emergencies came on. Cody watched the light slide across Obi-Wan’s shoulders and neck and head. Those straight fingers reached for him, beckoned him close, and Cody listened. He leaned forward, using his arms to bracket the jetii. Obi-Wan tipped back with a little noise that was so soft and breathless it was silken.

“You,” Obi-Wan said, trailing off, losing his feet and balance and all sense of logic because he and Cody were sharing the whole universe in between the scant space of their bodies. Obi-Wan’s heart picked up again. Cody could practically feel the rhythm in his teeth, in his soul.

“Who is he?”

“Who?”

Cody smiled. Obi-Wan’s breath hitched - Cody saw what he looked like, saw exactly the picture he was making in the liquid starlight of Kenobi’s eyes.

“Cody,” Cody said. “Who is he?”

“I don’t know. You don’t let him out all that often.”

Cody hummed.

“Cody’s the sixth ade in his family. Did you know that?”

“No.”

“He is. The sixth of eight. Big family - even for Mando’ade - and he guesses he was pretty lucky to grow up with that. A family like that, I mean. A big one. A loving one. Well, some of them were loving. He doesn’t talk to his buir, or his youngest vod. Bad blood, there. Not great.”

“Does he - is he okay with that?”

“Maybe. Maybe not. He doesn’t think much about them. They don’t have a place in his life anymore, really, because Cody’s busy with more important things.”

“Like winning a war.”

“Elek and naas. He’s trying to win a war,” Cody said. He kept still when Obi-Wan’s hand touched his arm. It trailed up, the touch so light he nearly thought he was hallucinating, and curved around his elbow. Obi-Wan's fingers felt like brands. Cody wondered what they were going to leave behind. “But he’s also trying to fix some of mistakes.”

“Does he have a lot of them?”

“Enough for a whole lifetime.”

“Why?”

“He’s stubborn. He’s arrogant. Sometimes he’s so stupid its unbelievable.”

“I think he’s hard on himself.”

“You do?”

“Yes,” Obi-Wan said. “I think he’s very hard on himself - or maybe he’s just used to others being hard on him - because when I look at him I see someone different.”

Cody tipped his head forward and laughed, a low, throaty one. Obi-Wan’s other hand was on the move, the caf packets forgotten somewhere, and Cody let it skim the side of his arm and shoulder and up to the shot hair on the nape of his neck. It pressed. Cody arched to the side and preened, looking down at Kenobi through his lashes.

“And what do you see, Obi-Wan?”

“Sometimes I look at him, and I see my whole life play out before me like I’ve already lived it. Like I’ve already lived it with him.”

“Sounds impressive.”

“It’s enough to take your breath away.”

“Does he do that?”

“Does he take my breath away?” Obi-Wan echoed. “Constantly. Every time I think he can’t surprise me anymore and then he…”

“Blue.”

“Hm?”

“My favorite color,” Cody said. “It’s blue.”

Obi-Wan’s mouth opened. It closed. It opened again.

“I’ve,” he started, swallowing. His throat bobbed. Cody dropped his head and put his lips there, right over the velvet-thin stretch of skin that protected Obi-Wan's pulse. “I’ve always been a fan of oranges. Bright ones. Gold -”

The lights came on.

By the time the initial glare vanished, Cody was back on his side. Obi-Wan was left hanging over the threshold, hands still outstretched and eyes still wide, wide, wide. The caf packets were on the floor. Cody bent down, frustrated and cowardly and right back to hating the whole galaxy, to snatch them up and throw them deeper into the room. When he returned to standing, Obi-Wan was a safe distance away, hands gripping his own counter.

“Sirs?”

They both turned their heads.

Preach, the bridge captain, stood in the mess kitchen’s entrance. He looked pale. Cody felt his stomach drop out from his body, felt the excitement and ashamed heat curdle into something that approached terror.

“What?” He asked.

“Sirs, we’ve just received an SOS from the 104th. It sounds serious.”

“How serious?”

Preach hesitated. His eyes went from Obi-Wan to Cody and then back to Obi-Wan. Cody winced. The kitchen went cold and silent. It was too small for all the things Preach didn’t want to tell him.

“Wolffe?” Cody said, ripping open the wound so Preach wouldn’t have to. Preach still winced, and so did Obi-Wan, but Cody - Cody’s wince was dragged into the shadows, kicking and howling, to be locked in a cage until Cody had the time to let it out. Cody had a feeling that the grimace would be waiting for a long, long time.

“Commander Wolffe is MIA, sir.”

Cody moved.

He hit the bridge like a hurricane, all frothing water and thunder. A few of the skeleton crew jumped at his entrance, but they weren’t his Ghosts; all Cody got was wounded, sleep-addled looks of surprise. 

He reigned himself in.

“The SOS,” he said, tempering his voice. “Can you play it?”

“It’s just an emergency signal, sir,” one of the verde said. “There’s no video. It’s just the automated distress wavelengths.”

“Where’s it coming from?”

“Depends on which one you’re asking about, sir.”

“There’s more than one?”

“There’s two,” Preach said, appearing at the doorway and sounding winded. To his credit, he didn’t slow – had probably realized back in year one that slowing down around Cody only meant getting left behind - and pulled up to the bridge’s holotable. “The louder frequency is stationed at the 104th’s last known location. We’re having trouble tracking down the weaker signal.”

“Interference?”

“That and distance.”

Cody crossed his arms. He looked out at the viewports, at the streaks of hyperspace. He took a little breath, tried to settle in his chest, and realized he felt small. Miniscule. For the first time in decades, Cody reached inside of him and scooped up the Ka’ra. He had a feeling that the wings were twitching again, ready for flight, and he didn’t think it was the Ka’ra giving them orders. Not this time, at least.  

“All of the 104th is gone?” He asked.

“We don’t know. We haven’t been able to make contact with -”

“Preach?” A verd called. “The 501st just pinpointed the stronger signal and are going for it. They’re going to contact us from The Resolute. ETA’s about an hour.”

“Focus on the weaker signal, then,” Cody said, still staring out at the stars. “And tell the 501st to not engage if Separatists are within the area. The 104th’s already MIA. I’m not going to lose the 501st, too.”

“Yessir,” the verd said, cutting off a yawn. The rest of the skeleton crew went back to work, hunching over their monitors and occasionally rubbing their eyes. Cody turned back to Preach.

“How close is it to the next crew rotation?”

“An hour. The boys aren’t always this tired. We switch the shift schedule around whenever we leave a campaign area, so this crew’s been going since the afternoon. The other shifts are catching up on sleep.”

“So is everybody else.”

“Including you, sir?”

“I got enough, Preach.”

In the first year, Preach wouldn’t’ve been brave enough to ask that particular question. In the second, he had built up enough courage to ask. In the third, Preach was comfortable enough to call Cody on his banthashit.

“The shadows under your eyes say differently.”

“Remind me,” Cody said, “to start looking for a new bridge captain.”

“Good luck, sir. I’ve spread rumors.”

“Ruining my reputation?”

“Never. Just trying to…,” Preach stopped. He cleared his throat. “You should still be sleeping, sir. You and the General. The other captains and I can handle the 104th mystery. We’ll wake you when you’re really needed.”

“It’s better for me to be here, Preach.”

“Sir -”

“I won’t sleep. I wouldn’t be able to.”

“You could try.”

“I’ve tried. It’s never worked.”

“But -”

“Preach.”

“Cody.”

The bridge quieted. Cody saw a few of the crew glance over, half-horrified and half-amused, and made a motion with his hand. They quickly spun back around. Preach was stiff next to him.

“While your concern for me is sweet -”

“I spoke out of line, sir.”

“I don’t care that you called me Cody, Preach. It’s my name,” Cody said. He gave a small sigh. Hyperspace kept flying by. “Besides, when it’s this early in the morning all I want to be is Cody.”

“Still,” Preach said. “Still.”

“I’m not going to yell at you, Preach. That’s not my thing. I just wish you and the others would realize that I know how to take care of myself.”

“We do, sir. We know. It just seems that you’d rather take care of everyone else.”

“That’s my job.”

“If you think so, sir.”

Cody glanced over. Preach was staring at the holotable, absently tapping his knuckle against it. The bridge captain hadn’t meant for Cody to hear his last statement - or maybe he had. Preach was a lot like Rex in that way.

The holotable flashed blue.

Preach stepped back from it, and Cody stepped up.

“Commander, call from the 501st.”

“Send it,” Cody said. He readied himself. The Ka’ra was still dead to the galaxy - of course it was - but SOS signals were never nice. Ever. Most companies had yet to use an SOS or had only used them once. After this and the Malevolence, the 104th would be in the lead for the most uses. It wasn’t a title Cody was particularly happy about. He doubted Wolffe would enjoy being saddled with it, either.

One of the table’s buttons glowed. Cody pressed it and watched a holo appear out of its blue static. The figure was 501st, but it took Cody a few seconds to recognize the paint.

“Jesse,” he said. “No Rex?”

Jesse removed his buy’ce. He looked good, Cody realized. After Umbara, Cody had signed off on a mandatory leave of absence for the 501st members flagged by the medical team. Rex had been particularly pissy about the whole thing when the orders went live, something that Cody couldn’t blame him for, but had later thanked Cody for doing it. Cody was just glad that he could do it this time around. It had been the first set of formwork that had surprised him - past Cody, apparently, had never been given the luxury of coming into contact with it.

“Captain’s busy with cleanup.”

“You engaged?”

“Against your orders? No sir. We’re scouring the battlefield and looking for survivors.”

“Have you found any yet?”

“A few, mostly shinies. We’ve only been able to find one officer. Comet, I think? His ‘gam had medical markings on it. Wolfpack ones, too.”

“He’s the 104th’s field medic,” Cody said. Wolffe was fond of the kid. “No one would’ve left him behind.”

“They might’ve. His leg was badly broken, and he was hidden away pretty well - in a place he couldn’t’ve gotten to without help. ‘Gam had some bad scuff marks, too, like he had been caught in an explosion. The rest of him seemed fine, but he was unconscious when we found him. Kix’s looking him over right now.”

“Any sign of where the rest of the Wolfpack is?”

“Nothing,” Jesse said. “But we’re trying to break into Comet’s HUD to see its video recording. The other signal, though -”

“Let the 212th worry about that. You just worry about what you're already doing. Has Plo Koon already been notified?”

“Yes.”

Jesse’s eyes went up, over Cody’s head. He gave a little smile.

“Hi, Kenobi.”

“Hello, Jess.”

Something nudged against Cody’s arm. He looked down. A cup of caf - the good, caffeinated kind - was suddenly balancing on the holotable. Cody looked over, and there was Obi-Wan, peering up at him over the rim of his own cup.

“Commander,” he greeted, somehow making the title sound like Cody. His eyes shined, large and bright. Pleased with himself, Cody thought. The look suited him.

“General,” Cody said. He tried, all for the world, to make it sound like Obi-Wan. He might have managed - Obi-Wan’s eyebrows jumped ever so slightly and his lips twitched. That, too, looked good on him. Cody almost hated to see it wiped away for the sake of professionalism and directed at Jesse instead.

“The 212th and the 501st have new orders,” Obi-Wan said. “The Council wants us to lead a joint effort in finding the 104th. There were rumors that Ventress was at the battle.”

The Ka'ra suddenly rose.

It did so fast and without warning, shaking inside of Cody so violently that he nearly stumbled back. There was an uncomfortable pressure in his stomach, climbing into his chest, and he felt its rattling hiss - warning, threat, anger - vibrate his own throat.

Ventress, it said. Ventress has my Wolffe.

Cody locked his jaw. The Ka’ra, as the war went on, had changed. Altered. It had grown as weary as something of its kind could, prone to sleeping more than slinking around. Most days, Cody appreciated the silence. He didn’t, however, appreciate the reason for the silence; the war was wearing down even the Ka’ra, and that idea was unsettling.

Not the war. The Force.

Cody glanced over at Obi-Wan on instinct. The jetii was talking, inputting a new set of coordinates into the holotable for the bridge crew, and Cody - only for a moment - thought he caught the air moving on its own, silver and wispy.

Cody turned away. He drank his caf.

A series of images came. A starship, a crash, the sound of Wolffe and of his Pack, the flash of a dar’jetii’kad, Ventress - but they were all wrong. Those images had 501st members in them too, their ‘gam more bare than blue, and the ship had been an older model. That memories times had come without being realized, and Cody was subjected to what should’ve been.

The Ka’ra sighed. It nearly sounded human.

It has taken Wolffe. Wolffe isn’t theirs to take. I will not have Wolffe taken.

“‘Course,” Cody said.

“I’m glad you agree, Commander,” Obi-Wan said.

Cody almost asked what the kark Obi-Wan was talking about, but then realized where he still was. Another thing about the Ka’ra - the more the war continued, the more its power over Cody grew. It was getting easier and easier to lose himself in it, to let it carry him away to the star-painted plain of Dawn-not-Dawn. A part of Cody wanted to act horrified. Indignant. The other part of him craved the security and peacefulness the place provided. Cody wasn’t a commander there. He wasn’t some beacon of the GAR. He was just Cody - Kote, the Ka’ra still called him. It wasn’t fine, not really, but it was closer to his name than sir - and Cody was all he had to be.

“I’ll relay all of this to the Captain, General.”

“Thank you, Jess. May the Force be with you.”

Jesse nodded. He made a motion to cut off the recording.

“Jesse?” Cody called. The other man froze. 

“Sir?”

Cody’s eyes drifted to Jesse’s vambraces. One was certainly his, but the other - if it had been possible for Cody to feel any emotion other than fear for his missing vod, he would’ve been drowning in affection.

“Congratulations,” Cody said.

“Thank you,” Jesse said, his voice high-pitched and strained. It was a shame, Cody thought, that holos didn’t capture color. He was sure the shade of Jesse’s face could’ve been categorized as a new shade of red.

“Tell Kix su'cuy for me, hm?”

“Yessir.”

“Alright, then. Dismissed.”

The call went dead. The bridge’s doors opened. A new bridge crew came in, and the old went out. Preach wandered about the monitors, directing the new flight path information and giving a brief summary about the sudden change. Most of the verde stiffened, either having aliit or good friends in the 104th, and a few glanced over at Cody. They, he was sure, knew exactly who Wolffe was to him.

A hand touched his arm.

“Are you staying?”

Cody stretched over the holotable. For a brief moment, he stared at his reflection on the table’s screen. He looked young, surprisingly. Younger than he felt, at least. Maybe it was because he was tired, still soft with sleep deprivation and the faint allure of caffeination, or maybe it was because Cody was actually young. Only in his twenties.

“You’re younger than I was,” ba’buir had told him, once. The old Mando’ade had tracked Cody down during a 212th refuel on some Core planet. Cody had never dredged up enough confidence to ask why, exactly, ba’buir had been there, but he could guess that it had something to do with the Grievous holo and Cody’s promotions and the mess of war.

“You’re younger than I was when I first started leading the Haat,” ba’buir said. “But you’re about the same age that Jango was when he took over Tatooine.”

Cody gave him a look.

“Not quite the same, I admit. This is,” ba’buir spread his hands around, gesturing at the fleet of starships and the verde coming and going. “This is a lot, Cody.”

Cody snorted.

“It’s too big for one person. Tell me you know that.”

Cody had nodded even as his eyes slid over his verde, his vode.

“You can’t save them all, Cody. Don’t try it. I know that’ll be difficult. I know. But you can’t -”

Cody had stopped listening. He knew his limits, knew exactly how far and fast to push himself before his body gave up. He knew how long he could stay up before he had to stick himself with a stim or choke down some sleeping medication, how much water or food he could skip before hunger pains or dehydration kicked in. He knew the bare minimum his blood sugar could be before the world started spinning and didn’t stop. He knew how much blood he could lose, too. Cody knew all those things. He understood their importance - but nothing was quite as important as his vode.

Nothing.

“Commander,” Obi-Wan said, his face a delicate, pale thing in the table’s reflection. “Are you staying?”

“Elek,” Cody said.

Obi-Wan didn’t question. He didn’t prod. He just settled into the space next to Cody’s side and nursed his caf because Obi-Wan understood. He knew. He knew about limits and their expectations, knew about the pressure of responsibility and the weight of thousands of lives pressing, pressing, pressing into the palms of his hands and - and Cody was in love. Head-over-boots and drowning in it, tipping closer to the chasm, the dropoff, the place that could spell so much misery for them if history chose to repeat itself.

“Thank you,” Cody said.

“Hm?”

“For the caf.”

“Anything,” Obi-Wan said, and his voice did the little trick again, making it sound as if he was promising Cody the world - as if Cody even deserved the world, deserved this jetii. Obi-Wan had said one word, yet all it had sounded like was, “Anything for you, Cody. Anything at all.”

Cody doesn’t say anything. Not verbally, at least.

Jetiie were polite. Mando’ade weren’t. They were blunt and direct and practical. They whisked each other into Keldabes and held tight. They changed vambraces in secret and went about their business. No fuss. No dramatics.

Cody took Obi-Wan’s hand. He threaded their fingers together.

They stood on the bridge, in silence. Shoulder to shoulder. The Ka’ra paced in Cody. The Force swirled in Obi-Wan. Somewhere, in the little spaces where their fingers intertwined, the two lived in harmony.

Diving into the chasm was as easy as breathing, an instinctual urge to grip tight to one another and not let go. They fell together, hands interlocked.

A lifetime ago, it had started the same way.

Cody rubbed his thumb over the fine ridge of Obi-Wan's knuckles.

He would make sure it ended differently.

Butterfly wings, he mused, were so easily broken. What were a few more to destroy?

Chapter Text

It took a month to piece the 104th back together.

It ended up being the slowest recovery in GAR history. The retrieval stretched twelve planetside raids, an abhorrent amount of decoding official Separatist channels, and a steady, constant stream of 104th verde into medbays throughout the military system. Most ended up under the combined care of Caf and Kix - Comet, too, when his leg was no longer a mangled mess of bone and muscle. The Wolfpack, Wolffe’s collection of officers, were the last to be found. Finding Wolffe - the second SOS signal had been his - had heralded the end of the whole ordeal.

Naas. 

That wasn’t entirely true.

Twelve deployments. A month. Whole tankards of bacta. Late nights filled to the brim with the knowledge that his ori’vod was hurting somewhere. Early mornings wondering just who, exactly, would have to be the one to tell buir. As Marshal Commander, Cody wrote the condolence letters. The thought of starting one had made him so violently ill that Caf had given him anti-nausea medication, and Cody had taken it.

He’d tease them all when he woke up, Cody knew. Wolffe would ask why the kriff it had taken them so long to get their heads out of their shebs and rescue him.

“Didn’t buir teach you anything, Cod’ika?” He’d say.

“Big words from someone who needed saving,” Cody would respond.

Wolffe would grin, then. Sharp. It would pull at his stitches and it would hurt. Wolffe would try to hide it and Cody would swallow and they would both pretend that Wolffe’s eye -

Naas. It wasn’t over. Not yet.

Rex had been the one to find Ventress.

Cody was furious when he first got the comm. More than furious. It was the type of anger that bordered on insanity. Wolffe had been ten hours deep into surgery with no end in sight when it came. The message had lit up his vambrace right on the heels of watching Caf look up at the operating room’s window with something close to defeat on his face, and Cody - 

Rex had found Ventress. 

Cody wondered if she knew how grateful she should be. He wondered if she knew just how gracious life or the Force or luck was to have her stationed on The Resolute instead of his own territory. She probably didn’t. The insanity rose again, a brief flicker. It died.

Wolffe opened his eyes.

The medbay ceiling was the first thing he saw. The second was Cody.

“Camping out?” He asked. His good eye - his kriffing only eye, Cody wanted to scream. He’s only got one now - squinted at the makeshift office Cody had set up next to Wolffe’s medical cot.

“Waiting,” Cody said.

“Sucks, doesn’t it?” Wolffe said. “Try waiting for a month.”

Cody closed his eyes.

“Didn’t buir teach you anything, Cod’ika?”

Cody’s throat clicked. Wolffe’s smile burned in his head, behind his eyes.

“Cody?”

Clumsy hands poked at Cody’s face. A thumb caught his cheek. Cody couldn’t understand why until he realized that he broken from the script. 

“Cod’ika. Vod, ” Wolffe said. “Hey. Why the crying?”

Cody pushed Wolffe’s hands away. Gently. He had to be gentle with his ori’vod, now. Caf had told him that. Kix had repeated it. Comet had stayed awfully, awfully quiet.

“Cody.”

Cody wiped at his eyes. He opened them. Blinked.

“I’m fine.”

“Uh-huh. Sure.”

“Are you good?”

“Kriffing fantastic. I’m pumped so full of osik I can hardly feel my legs.”

Nerve damage, Cody wanted to say. That’d be the nerve damage, Wolffe. A low dose of it, but a dose all the same. He had a shattered knee, too, one more susceptible to dislocating again, a viper’s nest of post-traumatic arthritis just waiting to bite. It would bother him for the rest of his life.

So would the eye.

“This isn’t anything new, Cody.”

The hands were back on his face. The blaster calluses were familiar. Cody remembered them slipping over his face as an ad’ika, hiding his eyes from the world and covering everything in darkness so he could sleep. He remembered them pinching the bridge of his nose tight, shoving it to the side to fix the bone, their tips slick and warm with his own blood. He remembered them scrabbling into his side, trying to pull out a giggle that Cody didn’t know he had stuck inside of him.

“Cody. You hearing me? This isn’t new. This happened last time, too.”

Cody was up, suddenly. His chair tipped back and hit the floor and he was wild. Loose. Cody felt like he was floating inside of himself. None of his breaths felt like his. His heartbeat was foreign. Everything seemed to race, and Cody raced with it. Running, running, running because he couldn’t face Wolffe. He couldn’t face his ori’vod. Not after it had taken him a month to find him. Not after Cody had brought him here, had destroyed him with his own stupidity, had let Ventress get her karking claws into Wolffe when Cody could’ve stopped it -

Someone whistled. Loud and sharp.

Cody fell back into his body. His skin felt too tight. His bones ached. The medbay came back into focus, and all the lights were so bright they scalded.

The whistle came again. Cody whipped around.

Wolffe was sitting up in the cot. One of his hands was thrown out to the side like he was holding something back. He was. Caf was posed in the tight hallway between the cots, shocked and frozen. There was something scared in his eyes.

“You need to sleep,” Caf said, still not coming closer. “Cody -”

Wolffe made a noise. Caf quit talking.

“Pick up the chair, Cody,” Wolffe said. “Pick it up. Put it back.”

Cody’s whole body twitched. Shivered. He had the sudden urge to throw himself out of the airlock. Or go raiding the medical cabinets. He had a blaster. Vibroknives. Cody didn’t have to -

Another whistle. The noise hurt.

“Stop it,” Cody said. He didn’t sound like himself.

“Then get that look out of your eyes, and pick up the damn chair.”

Cody retreated. He picked the chair up, and set it back up straight. He wasn’t quite sure he got the look out of his eyes, though, because Caf was still frozen. Still staring. Cody couldn’t stand it. Wolffe was laid up in bed, held together with stitches and bacta strips and high-grade painkillers, and Cody was the one getting the side-eye.

“I’m fine,” Cody said. His teeth bared. “I’m fine.”

He was. He had to be. If he died, the whole GAR command system would collapse by the strength of the power vacuum alone. Cody wouldn’t let that happen. He wouldn’t. He wouldn’t die and wouldn’t do anything because he still had a job to do and too many people relied on him to do it. He couldn’t let them down. Not like he had let down Wolffe - the slowest rescue in GAR history, Cody remembered. The slowest in their history.

“I can give him something. Not a sedative. Just…”

“Shh, Caf. Let him be. I’ve got him.”

“You can’t have anybody,” Cody said, a little numb. “You’re hurt.”

Wolffe gave him a look.

“Not as bad as you, vod.”

For a moment, Cody almost believed that he had, somehow, gotten hurt. He had been injured in some way, hadn’t realized, and if he looked down he would see his blood splattering on the floor. He looked. There was nothing - nothing to explain the way he was feeling or the way that Wolffe and Caf were looking at him as if he was the permanently injured one.

“I’m not hurt,” Cody said. 

Wolffe turned away from him. He only addressed Caf.

“Caf, put him on the list. Send an order out to reroute all personnel and campaign changes to somebody else. I don’t care who. Rex, Jesse, one of my boys, Waxer, Boil - whoever. Close this section of the medbay for a few hours. Put him on the list.”

“List?” Cody asked, lost. “What list -?”

Cody’s brain finally caught up to the rest of his body. His synapses fired, connected, and he was back. His body fit right again, his senses were his own, and there was no way that Cody was being put on the watch list.

“I’m not in crisis.”

“Of course you aren’t,” Wolffe said. He turned back to Caf. “Put him on the list.”

“Don’t. Don’t put me on the watch list. I don’t need to be watched.”

Caf and Wolffe shared a look. Wolffe didn’t outrank Cody - hadn’t for a long time - but Caf certainly did. Caf had never outright used the privilege before; when he threw down a law, it was for the entirety of the 212th, commanding staff included, to either keep them clear of infectious disease hotspots or clear up space in the medbay for patients. Cody had never been singled out before.

“One of these days,” Obi-Wan had huffed, limping out of medbay after a particularly long stint of forced recuperation. “One of these days, Cody, Caf’ll decide to chain you to a cot until he’s had his fill of you.”

“He’d have to catch me first, Obi-Wan.”

Staring between Wolffe and Caf, Cody felt singled out. He felt caught.

Caf’s shoulders straightened.

“Cody,” he said, “I’m going to put you on the list.”

“You do it and the whole ship’ll know.”

“That’s the point,” Caf said, but he sounded uprooted. The CMO didn’t want to be doing this, Cody knew. Caf had told him, once, that he hated pulling people on medical leave.

“I hate being the bad guy,” Caf had said. Boil had been the one pulled that time, and the Ghost was deep in the medbay, petulantly curled up on his side. “I hate it. Everytime I try to save you di’kute from yourselves I just get hurt looks. Why? What am I doing that’s so wrong?”

“It’s not you, Caf. It’s just the situation. You’re not doing anything wrong.”

Caf had thrown his hands up a little. Cody watched from his own cot, laid up with a bad ankle and some particularly bad bruised ribs.

“Why Boil?”

“Huh?”

“Why just restrict him to the medbay?” Cody asked. “Why not me too? You keep threatening, but you never go through with it.”

“It’s wrong.”

Cody had cocked his head to the side. Caf shrugged, fiddled his hands together in a very un-Caf like gesture, and sighed.

“It’s wrong to see you here. It’s like taking a strill and putting it in the ocean. I know you won’t complain if I did it - well, you’d do it, I guess. Ka’ra knows you’d whine about it, but you’d do it. And you’d hate every minute of it and so would the men and I would too because you wouldn’t be on the battlefield or the bridge looking out for us all. It freaks the men out when you aren’t with them. I swear to the Ka’ra they’ve all become codependent on you. Like ducklings.”

Cody had smiled.

“Does it freak you out too, Caf?”

Caf had snorted back then and refused to answer. Cody hadn’t pushed. Despite all the verbal and physical abuse his medic threw at him, Cody always heard the way Caf’s heart would pound when he had to patch Cody back up together.

Caf’s heart was pounding now. Cody felt it more than he saw it.

“I’m putting you on the list, and I’m taking you off rotation, Commander.”

Cody turned to Wolffe. He forced himself to look into the singular eye - still grey, still slightly luminous from whatever the Ka’ra flooded their bones and blood with, still Wolffe. Cody swallowed.

“Wolffe. The whole ship’ll know.”

Wolffe hesitated. He was a commander, too. He understood.

“Just the Ghosts, then,” he said.

“Wolffe -”

“You don’t trust them?”

Cody hesitated.

“I do, but -”

“Naas,” Wolffe said. “Not if you don’t trust them with this. You trust them on the battlefield. You trust them to run the fleet when you’re away. But you don’t trust them to take care of you?”

“I don’t need to be taken care of,” Cody said.

“There’s no need to shout, sir.”

He stilled. Caf’s voice had come out small. Cody looked at him. Caf looked small too, dwarfed by whatever the haran was spilling out of Cody in tidal waves. Cody’s chest ached. He made sure to lower his voice. He tried to round out some of its edges.

“Caf?”

Caf met his eyes. They were filled with the scared, skittering thing again.

Cody felt like a monster.

He half-turned, stared at the rows of empty medical cots. He thought of Wolffe. He thought of what Ventress did to him, thought of what Cody had dragged his vod into.

Maybe, Cody thought, maybe he was a monster.

“You don’t have to put me on the list. I promise that you don’t have to. I’m not going to do anything,” he said, speaking to the barren cots. It was easier than speaking to Caf or Wolffe. Less mortifying. “But pull me off the roster. Tell the Ghosts. Only them. Please.”

“I’ve got him, Caf.”

Cody could feel the medic hesitate - torn between staying to help and wanting to run far, far away - but Caf eventually chose to leave.

“Comm me,” he said, whispering to Wolffe before he went. “Comm me if he gets any worse. I’d hate to do it, but I’ll sedate him if he doesn’t wind himself down.”

“He will.”

Cody squeezed his eyes shut. Wolffe had said those two words with so much confidence that it left Cody reeling. Caf left. 

“You don’t know that,” Cody said.

“I do. You’re too stubborn of a shabuir.”

Cody snorted. It came out wet and gross. He felt like an ad’ika, hated it, and tried to regain some of his dignity. It fell flat, so flat that it sounded as if Cody had plucked it clear of some other space and time where everything was okay and perfect and nothing was wrong.

“I’m a shabuir?” He said, hating the words that tumbled free of his mouth. He hated them because everything was wrong. Wolffe had one eye. One. That wasn’t supposed to happen - not again, at least. Cody was supposed to stop that. He was supposed to fix it from happening. 

The words kept tumbling.

“What does that make you, then?”

“The di’kut that loves you.”

The words broke him. They snapped his spine and lacerated his lungs until his breath came and went in great, gulping whistles that took too much and gave back far too little. He felt like he was dying. Or maybe he was drowning. Drowning in all the mistakes - mistakes that he was supposed to fix. That was his job. The Ka’ra had given it to him, and Cody was failing at it because that’s just what Cody did. He failed. It’s why he couldn’t be Kote. Kote would never fail. He would never let people down. He wouldn’t let his ori’vod bleed out for a whole karking month -

“You’re having a panic attack, Cody. Or an anxiety attack. It’s one of the two.”

“I don’t get those.”

“Just like you don’t go into crisis?

Cody wheezed. His head spun.

“Cody. Cod’ika. Breathe. Breathe.”

Cody tried to suck in air. It burned. The room spun. Distantly, he was glad that Caf left. Cody doesn’t think he could’ve looked the medic in the face if Caf had seen him like this, bent almost in half and chasing after the most basic human function imaginable. Wolffe was bad enough, especially because his vod kept watching.

Cody sunk to the floor. The durasteel was freezing against his hands and legs - it was early in The Negotiator ’s morning cycle then, too close to the end of the night cycle to start heating up the floors - and it shocked his system enough to rattle loose whatever had taken hold of him. He ducked his head, put it between his knees.

He breathed.

Wolffe stayed silent through it all, though one of his hands dropped down to bury themselves into Cody’s hair. It was overgrown, wild. His curls had spiraled out from their tight coils to broken waves, erupting out of the regulation style cut, and Wolffe huffed when he tried to corral it.

“Been busy, Codes?”

“Finding. You,” Cody gasped.

“Oh, ad’ika…”

The sympathy in Wolffe’s voice made Cody’s skin crawl. He didn’t want it. He didn’t deserve it. Naas, naas, naas.

Cody tried to gather enough strength to bat Wolffe’s hands away. He got one, two feeble slaps in before Wolffe just slid his hand down and covered Cody’s eyes. The room disappeared. It was replaced by the familiar callouses, the ones plucked straight out of Cody’s childhood, the ones that always meant aliit and love and Wolffe, Wolffe, Wolffe.

Cody wasn’t sure how long he sat on the medbay floor. He wasn’t sure how long Wolffe kept his hand there, blocking out the world just so Cody could reorient himself. He wasn’t sure and, afterwards, he was too afraid to ask. He wasn’t sure he could’ve handled the answer.

“Better?”

Cody peeled Wolffe’s hand away.

“Was it me?”

“Naas.”

“Liar,” Wolffe huffed. His hand tugged at Cody’s ear. “Was it me?”

“Maybe.”

“Why?”

“It’s wrong,” Cody said, echoing what Caf had said to him years ago. “It’s wrong to see you…”

“To see your ori’vod like this? Laid up in some medical bed and high out of his mind on pain meds?”

“‘Lek.”

“Happens more than you think, Codes. I’m only human.”

Cody’s ear got tugged again.

“You’re only human,” Wolffe said, as if Cody needed any more reminding.

“Stop.”

“Stop what?”

Cody pulled away. He rolled up onto his knees, got to his feet. Wolffe’s hand dragged up his shoulder and spine. Cody felt it linger in the air when he moved too far away from it.

“You gonna look at me anytime soon?”

Cody swiped his hair back. He surveyed the room. His hands kept flinching, so he dug them into his hips hard enough to bruise. He moved his jaw from side to side. The muscles burned from being so taunt, but Cody soldiered through. He had to.

“Are you not looking at me because it’ll set you off again?”

“Of course not,” Cody said. “That’s di’kut’la.”

“So look at me.”

Cody turned. He looked.

“Codes…”

“Shut up,” Cody said, his voice wavering. He scrubbed his eyes. “Stop talking. Please.”

“Why, Cody?”

“Because,” Cody said. “Because.”

“Cody, you’ve seen me like this before - haran, this is what I looked like for most of the time we knew each other the first time around. This shouldn’t surprise you.”

“Well it does.”

“Why?”

“I don’t -”

“Because it sure doesn’t surprise me. I’ve been waiting for this day since I was tiny, Cody. Buir even trained me on overcoming depth perception distortion. I’m prepared for this, Cody. They’ll give me a robotic eye, I’ll slap it in and -”

“It wasn’t supposed to happen.”

“It was. It was inevitable.”

“It could’ve been stopped.”

“The Malevolence happened, too.”

“That wasn’t supposed to happen, either. Not this time around. Not when we know what we know. Not with the kriffing Ka’ra on our side. Not with buir actually being a buir and all of us growing up in a real household. This wasn’t supposed to happen. We should’ve been able to stop it. I should’ve -”
“You?”

“Me.”

“What about you?”

“I should’ve fixed it.”

“It wasn’t your place.”

“Banthashit,” Cody said. “Of course it’s my place. I’m -”

“You’re what?”

“I’m Kote.”

Wolffe raised an eyebrow. He waited. When it became clear that Cody wasn’t going to elaborate, he sighed. “Is that supposed to mean something?”

“Of course it does. I’m the Marshal Commander of the Third Systems, I’m -”

Wolffe held up his hand.

“Stopping you there, Codes. Marshal Commanders are in charge of running a section of the army.” Wolffe paused and gestured to the room around them. “This looks to be running, and I’m pretty sure the rest of it is, too. The 104th was given a mission. We failed. The 212th and the 501st were assigned to recover us. They did. Do you know who isn’t, technically, a member of any of those companies?”

Cody bristled.

“You - that’s who, Cody. You. You may think you are, but you aren’t. I’m the commander of the 104th. Rex heads the 501st. I don’t know who heads the 212th, but somebody does. Somebody on this ship was responsible for the 212th before you came along. You’re a Marshal Commander stationed in a battalion. You aren’t the battalion commander.” Wolffe threw up his hand a little more when Cody went to speak. “You’ve made yourself the battalion commander, but that’s not your job.”

“It is,” Cody said. “It has to be.”

“Why?”

“I - you won’t get it.”

“Why?” Wolffe repeated - again - stressing the word so hard it turned sharp enough to cut. It cut the soft part of Cody, a part he hadn’t realized he still had, and, for a moment, everything seemed to gush out of him.

“Because that’s why I’m here,” Cody said. “I’m here to be Kote. I’m here to fix things and make them right and do what I should’ve done the first time around. That’s why I’m here. I’m here to be Kote, that’s why the Ka’ra dragged me back, and I’m failing at it. Failing. I can’t be Kote, clearly. But that’s what I’m here to do, why I’m living again, and afterwards the Ka’ra will - I’ll -”

Cody broke off. The words were sticking together in his throat again, choking him, and it was always easier to swallow them back down than trying to make sense of them.

He swallowed. Silence rang.

“Come here,” Wolffe said after a moment. “C’mere.”

Cody went. Wolffe grabbed his wrist, tried to maneuver him onto the cot. Cody huffed, nudged at the thing with his knee.

“I’ll crush you,” he said. “I’m too big for this thing, Wolffe.”

Wolffe kept pulling. Cody ended up on the cot. It was a tight fit - Wolffe was smaller, but they were both broad. Beskar’gam was heavy, blasters were heavier, and Mando’ade were built accordingly. Cody ended up serpentine against Wolffe’s side, his knees tucked up and on his side. His feet hung over the edge. His cheek rested against Wolffe’s collarbone, shoved under his vod ’s chin at a neck-breaking angle. Wolffe’s breath ruffled his hair. His heart pounded against Cody’s own. Underneath it all was a steady hum, throaty and warm like a speeder engine. Cody frowned. He spread his hand over Wolffe’s chest, felt the thin edges of bandages and raised lines of stitches, and his fingers vibrating.

“What’re you doing?”

“Purring.”

Cody’s throat flexed in sympathy. All the Fetts - save ‘Cara who could only give a low growl - could purr. They could do it manually, muscles were muscles after all, but it often rose up in them unbidden and uncalled when they were comfortable or felt safe. Rex had had a field day drawing it out of Cody when they were kids.

“Drugs must be really good, then,” Cody huffed.

“Not the drugs,” Wolffe said. “Though they are spectacular.”

“Then what?”

“You,” Wolffe said. “Been a long time since we’ve seen each other, Cod’ika.”

Cody snorted. His vod smelled like bacta and sweat, the low undertone of blood still clinging to his skin, but he almost smelled like aliit. Cody surprised himself by missing it so much. He rumbled. Wolffe rumbled back.

“Wolffe…”

“I know,” Wolffe said. One of his hands drifted up Cody’s spine, counting over each vertebrae. “Cody, I know.”

“I’m sorry.”

“‘S not your fault.”

“I should’ve -”

“Cody.”

“I was so scared.”

“Oh, Cod’ika.”

Cody tucked his face into his vod ’s neck. Neither of them mention the way his shoulders shake or his breath hitches or when Wolffe’s neck grows damp and warm. They don’t have to. They were vode, and that meant that Wolffe held him tight and purred so long and loud that Cody knew his throat would be sore for days afterward. Cody couldn’t understand it. He had failed Wolffe, failed him bad. His vod was wounded for life because Cody couldn’t do anything right and -

And Cody, somehow, drifted off. 

It was a peaceful sleep, the kind he hadn’t had for years, and its dreams were vague, downy things. Dawn-not-Dawn. Flickering images of his childhood when buir still smiled and scooped him up over his head, when just being Cody was enough. The Ka’ra sprawled in his lap, purring. Cody trailed his hands through it. His fingers trailed a multitude of colors - silver and red and black and green and blue and gold, gold, gold.

Cody woke up slowly, in bits and pieces.

His arm was asleep. He was half-smothered by Wolffe who, despite teasing Ponds for how grabby he could be, had locked Cody in a death grip. His body felt heavy and supple, warm and sleep-addled. He yawned. For a brief moment, he forgot where he was. He toyed with the idea of falling back to sleep.

“Comfortable?”

The idea crumbled to dust.

“Rex?”

“Hey, Cody.”

Cody tried to roll to the side, nearly fell off the cot, and caught himself. He squinted. Rex stood at the foot of the cot. His eyes flicked between Cody and Wolffe.

“Sorry. You looked…”

“Stupid?” Cody rasped, slowly sitting up. He felt woozy. He made a grabbing motion for the water placed by Wolffe’s bed and Rex, the angel, snagged him a cup. “Squished?”

“Peaceful.”

“Wolffe was feeling sentimental.”

“Just Wolffe?”

Cody downed the water. He stared at the empty cup.

“He’s getting sappy in his old age. And the painkillers were particularly good.”

“He's gonna be okay?”

“‘Lek. Wolffe said he was prepared for it, anyway. He doesn’t seem too bothered by it.”

“And you?”

“I’m great,” Cody said and then, right on its heels, asked, “Those memory cards we found from the last raid - have we gotten anything interesting from them?”

“Crys and his tech team cracked open the data cache from the last Separatist base. They’re working through decoding it right now, but they’ve already caught something interesting. A battle plan, maybe. One involved with Dooku.”

“The last general standing.”

Rex made a face. “The craftiest, too. Even Crys was struggling with the code. It’s new. It’ll take some time to crack.”

“Ventress would know.”

“She hasn’t mentioned anything about it,” Rex said. “Though our interrogation efforts haven’t exactly produced much except for odd insults and Separatist manifesto.”

“She’s bluffing.”

“You think so?”

“She’s Dooku’s apprentice and one of Separatist old guards. They’re close, either by camaraderie or necessity. Besides, Ventress commands - or commanded - a hefty portion of the leftover Separatist forces. If there is a plan in motion, her clankers would have to be a part of it.”

“Everytime we think we have them cornered,” Rex said, breaking off with a sigh.

Cody cracked his neck. The rage was back. The insanity. It lingered under his skin, churning closer and closer to the surface with his guilt and the last dregs of his panic - di’kut’la, he thought. It was stupid for him to break down like that. Embarrassing, too. Cody was better than that. He should’ve been better than that, smarter and realistic enough to know that no matter how hard he tried it just wouldn’t be good enough. Ever.

The Ka’ra made a noise. Cody pretended he didn’t hear it. He focused on the burn of his anger instead. It was safer, more familiar.

“Is she on my ship?”

“Ventress? Naas. She’s still on mine.”

Cody got up. He stretched. Being taken off of rotation meant that he couldn’t be on duty, or close to anything that remotely looked like duty, for the next twenty-four hours - but Rex didn’t know that. None of the 501st did.

He glanced at Wolffe. He was still dead to the world.

“Let’s go.”

Rex blinked.

“What?”

“I’ve got some time, and I don’t really feel like wasting it behind a desk.”

“You’ve got time?” Rex asked. “And you want to spend it visiting Ventress?”

“Ghosts have the bridge,” Cody said and it wasn’t exactly a lie. Cody just couldn’t stand still. He couldn’t. He had his emotional breakdown, had a nap, and now he needed to look Ventress in the eyes and see what reflected back. He prayed it would be fear. He hoped it would be terror. For all the horror the war kept throwing at them, Cody wanted to throw a little back. “They wanted to give me a little time to get all my personal things sorted.”

“Again: you want to waste it on Ventress?”

“Elek. Is that a problem?”

“Naas -”

Cody smiled. “Let’s go then.”

They left the medbay, Cody leading and Rex staying a half-hesitant step behind. Caf was surprisingly missing - a miracle, Cody pondered, or the sign of the end times - and the rest of the med team just waved when Cody and Rex moved past. Cody’s heart threatened to flutter. Lying was still lying, and misusing everyone’s unconditional trust in him left a nasty taste in his mouth.

Cody looked back over at his kih’vod again.

“Are we going to talk about it?”

“Talk about what?”

“That shiner you’ve got.”

“Naas,” Rex said. His face hardly twitched, but his stride - well, maybe Cody wasn’t the only one hiding something.

“Ventress?”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Something stupid, then?”

Rex’s jaw worked. “'Lek. Something stupid.”

Cody wanted to push. He did. Rex was hiding something, the black eye was painfully vibrant, and Rex was clearly lying to him. The urge to pry was instinctual, a reflex curated over years of being a vod, but Cody let it rise and sink. Cody had his secrets. Rex had his.

They disembarked The Negotiator. It and The Resolute were docked for maintenance and recuperation, though Cody couldn’t remember what exact planet they were stationed on. The sunshine pleasantly burned his skin, the air felt cool and clean, and Cody caught whiffs of something floral trying to rinse out the scent of ship fuel. If he was anyone else, Cody might’ve taken a few moments to enjoy it - might’ve had the time to enjoy it. But he was Cody, and Cody had work to do.

He kept walking. They boarded The Resolute.

It used to be Cody’s ship. When the great split occurred - when the 501st was finally pulled free from the 212th - Cody was the one to flip through all the flimsiwork and wander about the hangars, selecting ships to spearhead the christening of the new company. The Resolute had been one of the first he had selected. It was smaller than The Negotiator, a newer model that missed the same level of glamor, and over time it had become more of Rex’s territory than it had ever been Cody’s. Despite that, bounding into her cargo bay never failed to make Cody feel nostalgic or welcomed.

“You’re slowing down, vod.”

“I am?”

Rex made a show of looking around. “Doesn’t look the same, huh?”

“Blue isn’t her color.”

“Pry her out of my cold, dead hands, Cody. She’s not a shiny you can steal.”

“I don’t steal shinies. I simply relocate them to better opportunities.”

“Whatever helps you sleep at night.”

They kept walking.

“It’s quiet,” Cody said. The silence pricked at him.

“A miracle.”

Cody didn’t answer. There was something heavy in the air, something strange about the ship and the world he and Rex were wandering about. The feeling was coming from inside of him, too. The Ka’ra kept shifting about, impatient and perturbed. Cody rolled with the motion. He poked at it. It flashed its teeth, shook him off, and went back to flexing its claws. It made all of Cody’s senses ride on the edge of being too much - the Ka’ra clearly thought something was a threat, and Cody wanted to see it coming.

Not yet, it huffed. But soon. Soon.

“Should I be worried?”

Cody saw something flash in the Ka’ra ’s eyes, something molten and quick, and it sat back on its haunches.

It is nearly time.

A shudder racked through Cody’s body. It started at the base of his spine and shot through the rest of his body, fast and ominous.

Trust me.

“I’ll try,” he said. The Ka’ra gave a distracted chuff and fell into unintelligible mutterings. Cody tried to make sense of them but quickly withdrew; they were ancient and unending, a whole multitude of voices that ushered out of it all at once. It was enough to give anyone a headache.

“Sirs?”

Dogma stepped out of the brig lift, blinking against the hallway’s bright fluorescents and openly staring at Cody. He snorted. Rex shoved an elbow into his side and had the audacity to hardly hide it - the 501st were the 501st, and to them Cody was still larger than life, the hero of all the GAR holos that kept getting leaked to the public. 

“Dogma,” Cody greeted. He waved their salutes away before their arms even crested their chests. “Anything?”

Dogma’s face twisted. “Not a thing, sir, but she’s drifting. I think the Force suppressors are doing more damage than she’ll admit. And she keeps asking to see Skywalker. Or you, sir.”

Cody raised an eyebrow.

“Me?”

“Maybe she wants to get you back for Grievous,” Rex mused. “Or maybe it’s just a trap.”

“Has Skywalker seen her?”

Dogma’s eyes went to Rex - went to Rex’s black eye - and then back to Cody. 

“No, sir,” Dogma said, perfectly even. “We haven’t contacted the General yet.”

“Why not?”

“I never gave the order,” Rex said.

“Why not?”

“Because I just never did.”

Rex’s voice was hard. It was the kind of voice he used when commanding, the quiet, steely one. It lacked the impressive sarcasm of Fox, the roaring timbre of Wolffe, the unsaid expectation of Bacara’s, or the loudness of the twins. It almost matched Cody’s - except Cody’s had an unnatural weight and volume, it echoed and thundered and swept through the ranks like the wind. Rex’s was just there, an ultimatum presented before you even realized you were making a decision. Cody was edging close to something. It might’ve been a line, and Cody knew that Rex wouldn’t let him cross it.

“Alright.”

Rex reeled, a little. For a brief moment he looked miserable - betrayed and haggard and too small for his beskar’gam - and in the next he was put back together again. Cody looked around and, elek, Dogma had seen it too.

“Has she given you any trouble?”

“Not since the very beginning.”

Cody made a motion. Dogma stepped away from the lift.

“I’ll go visit her.”

“Cody -”

“Just me, Rex.”

“Cody.”

Cody gave a blasé smile.

“Give me half an hour.”

“Kote,” Rex hissed, and Ka’ra, Cody forgot just how much Rex could sound like buir when he really tried. Dogma, smart Mando’ad that he was, took a few more steps back.

“Twenty minutes.”

“She’s a wanted criminal, Cody. She’s killed thousands. Thousands.”

“I know.”

“You know. You know?” Rex snorted. “Unbelievable.”
“Twenty minutes.”

“I can just come with you -”

“I’m the one she’s asking for. If it's a trap, then I’m the only one that’ll spring it.”

“You’re playing dangerously.”

“Naas,” Cody said. He stepped into the lift and entered his security code. The pod flashed a dull green in recognition. The doors began to close. “I’m playing to win.”

“Twenty minutes,” Rex said, growing louder as the lift came to life. “Not a minute more, or I’ll come after you.”

The doors shut.

The lift shuddered once before starting its descent. The lights dimmed down to nothing, bathing Cody in a rather soothing glow. It felt like moonlight - reminded him of Dawn-not-Dawn. He leaned against the wall and tipped his head back. The Ka’ra wasn’t pacing anymore, but it was tense. Waiting. Cody half expected it to try and tunnel right out of him.

“Can I help?”

You wish to help me?

He pressed a hand into his side and dug his knuckles into the muscles, trying to release the growing tension there. Cody winced. “More to help myself, really.”

The Ka’ra laughed.

Ah, it said. I see.

“Is that a no?”

Your time will come soon. Very soon.

“I know,” Cody said, staring up. The lift shaft’s lights flashed by, pinpricks of starlight, and the heavy thing in the air mutated. It began to feel like destiny, and it sounded like the promise Cody had made years ago. “Am I ready for it?”

You’ve always been ready.

Cody closed his eyes. A whole lifetime unspooled in the darkness, full of the patter of rain and the reek of blood. Its depths pulled at him, urged him to dive deeper and wade through it. He had done it a few times - either accidentally, like the moment in Kamino’s mess hall, or on purpose - but each time he had eventually been snatched out of its grip by others or his own survival instinct. He had a rough idea of what happened to the old Cody. None of it was good, save for the odd moments of joy he got around Obi-Wan or his vode that were so powerful they left him shaking, but Cody wanted to know the full story. He wanted to know every moment, every cruel turn, but, more importantly, Cody wanted to know the person who had given up their life to let him live this one. He felt he owed that Cody a thanks. An apology, too.

The lift slowed to a stop. Cody opened his eyes.

Another lifetime greeted him. It spilled out in front of him, pooling around his boots and trailing off into the light.

Cody followed it.

Every GAR flagship had a brig. None of them were ever shown on any official blueprints or ship maps - for security reasons, Cody had to guess - but they all were placed in the same spot and had the same layout. The only way to tell them apart were their size, and The Resolute had a particularly suffocating one. Cody’s shoulders nearly brushed the sides of the hallway, and the sudden movement restriction made him strangely nauseous. 

Something shifted in the slim hallway. A light flashed.

“Sir?”

“Appo.”

“Surprise inspection?”

“Not for you.”

Cody came closer. Another thing about the brigs - even in use they looked desolate and forlorn. The doors were all nondescript durasteel, only told apart by the series of numbers carved into the side of each of their door frames, and everything was soundproofed. Someone could wander through the entire section and never find a prisoner if they weren’t looking close enough. Cody cocked his head. To the left, over Appo’s shoulder and behind the security terminal, came the familiar crackle-hiss of an energy shield.

Appo glanced up and followed Cody’s eyes.

“Ah. For her, then? I’m wounded.”

“I’ll only be a minute.”

“Take all the time you want, sir. Maybe you’ll get something out of her,” Appo said, holding out his hand and looking back at the brig cameras. Cody felt his heart go out him. Playing security guard was never fun, and with how notorious Ventress was Cody didn’t doubt that Rex only had a handful of teams handling her.

“Sir?” Appo said, clearing his throat. His hand was still waiting, but he was back to looking at Cody. He squinted. “Are you alright, sir? Your eyes are, uh -?”

“They always do this,” Cody said, catching their reflection in Appo’s holopad, two glowing suns. Even to him they looked too bright, too yellow. His pupil was almost washed away, just a spot of dull darkness, and the longer he stared the more the gold circlet of color kept growing. The last time they had been like this was right after Grievous.

He blinked, held, and then opened his eyes again. They were microscopically dimmer.

“Here,” he said. He slid his identification chip, the same one that 17 had given him on Kamino, off from around his neck. The metal was thinner now, older, rubbed flat by the hours spent crushed under the weight of ‘gam. Like most verde, Cody had punched a hole through one of the oval’s foci and had threaded a chain through. It was easier to carry that way. Simpler. 

He dropped it in Appo’s hand. The verd inserted the chip into the brig’s security terminal, stretching out as it ran through Cody’s information. He tapped at Cody’s reflection. The eyes pulsed.

“Kind of spooky, sir.”

“Vor entye.”

Appo gave a little laugh. The terminal, like the lift, flashed green.

“Almost makes you look like a tooka.”

Cody smiled, the kind where his lips pulled back to show his gums and teeth. 

“Careful,” he said.

“A very scary tooka, sir.”

“Better.”

Appo waved him on.

“Enjoy.”

Cody slipped past Appo - a tight fit - and kept walking. The hum of the energy-shield grew louder, and Cody imagined that he could feel its heat seeping through the cell door. He swiped his finger against the door’s terminal and watched the countdown begin. The humming dimmed lower and lower. The locks on the door began to compress. Cody would have a minute to get in before the doors closed and the shield went back up. He’d get another minute to leave when the time came.

“Will she be able to see you?”

Talkative today, the Ka’ra said. Naas, she can not.

“Will she be able to feel you? Like Obi-Wan does?”

If I make myself known.

“Will you?”

If you have a need for it, elek.

“Will it scare her?”

It laughed again, and when it spoke its voice was low and pleased, heady.

Do you wish to scare her, Kote?

“Not scare,” he said. “Terrify.”

The door opened. Cody stepped in. The Ka’ra purred.

The brig cell was equally claustrophobic to the hallway. Most of the room was dominated by the prisoner’s chair - an uncomfortable slab of durasteel roughly carved in the shape of something that could be sat in - and the restraints trailing from its arms and legs. It left Cody only enough space to stand before the door, blocking the window of freedom, and this time he felt the sear of the energy-shield when it regenerated. A figure, wraith thin and pale, swayed within.

“Commander.”

The voice sounded torn, stripped from her throat and painful. Cody almost wished he had brought water to torture her with.

“Asajj.”

She tried to click her tongue, but all that came was a puff of air. She spat, forced out nothing, and rearranged her swollen mouth to sneer. “First names already, Cody?”

“Well, we’ve known each other for such a long time.”

“Overjoyed to finally see me in person?”

“Disgusted, mostly. I’ll have to remind the technicians to cycle the air again. I don’t want anyone contaminated with your disease.”

“Disease?”

“Defeat,” Cody said. “Though with such a terminal case it’s a miracle you ever found a battlefield.”

She tried to growl at him but the noise caught and snapped into pieces. Ventress stretched her neck up, choked, and Cody saw the whites of her eyes flash. He stared at the heavy collar around her neck, right under the curve of her jaw. The collar used to be Obi-Wan’s. Cody remembered forcing it apart with his own hands while Obi-Wan clawed at it from the front. Cody was glad it had been given a better purpose.

“Does it burn?”

“What?”

“The suppressor. Does it burn? Itch? Remind you of how far you’ve fallen?”

She stared at him. Slowly, she dipped her head back down, hiding her throat from his too-bright gaze. Ventress stared at him from under her lashes with a kind of fire and fury that Cody could sympathize with.

“Why are you here?”

“I was told that you asked for me.”

“I have my reasons. What are yours?”

“I want to know where Dooku’s going. I want to know about those plans.”

“So forthcoming, Cody.”

“We’ve played coy for years now, Asajj. I’ve grown impatient.”

She regarded him. He stared back.

“I won’t tell you.”

“I know.”

“You think I’m stupid?”

“Naas,” he said. “I know it. You join the Separatists. You want to be a -  what are they called, again? Ah, right, a Sith. You want to be a Sith. You consider Dooku your master. You captured 17, spat him out, and then moved on to Wolffe.” He inched towards her, crouching to be a little lower than eye-level. “Then you’re captured and get dragged here. The GAR shackles you. They throw a little Force suppressor on you. They think they have you beat, that they have the Separatists beat, and you’re stuck here in a little cage. Then you ask for me because - because you aren’t afraid. Not even a little. You think you’re too smart for that. Too powerful.”

The Ka’ra moved. Ventress’s eyes widened.

“Well, here I am, Asajj.”

Cody raised his eyebrows, titled his head to the side and felt the Ka’ra’s claws caress the curve of his face, the tips wicked sharp and razor thin.

“Do you think you’re still smart? That you’re still powerful?”

The Ka’ra laughed, surged up and out of him. The air pressurized. The energy-field by the door wavered, sparked. Cody’s body turned fluid, felt lighter. Ventress’s chains pulled taunt, rattled. She croaked.

“What are you?”

Cody turned the question through his mind. There were so many answers to it, he realized. So many things he could respond to it with. There was CC-2224, of course, but that name festered. There was Marshal Commander, but that one lacked allure and soul. There was Cody - but Cody didn’t do this. Cody wasn’t this. Cody was Dawn. He was shereshoy and sunlight, all warm and whole. Cody was the one that curled in a too-small medical cot to mourn the vod he almost lost. Cody was the one that held Wooley’s hand when he got his first tattoo. He was the one that drank too much spotchka and danced under the neon of Corescant’s lights with Obi-Wan’s hands in his.

He picked up one of Ventress’s fingers.

“Depending on the type of wound, did you know it's possible to bleed out from your hand anywhere between ninety seconds and forty-five minutes? Ninety seconds if you catch the artery. Forty-five for anything life-threatening but not immediate.”

“Commander -”

He shook his head. That name felt wrong, too. More personal than Marshal Commander, but still not him. Commander was flimsiwork and the reg manual, the scent of overheated blasters and ship fuel.

He turned her hand around. The wrist gave a defeated crack and pivoted.

There was Kote, he thought. Bloody, brutal Kote. Keeper of the Ka’ra, shining star in its crown, its glory and vengeance - gold through and through. Kote with the strange jaig eyes. Kote with the unnatural hearing and smell and sense of danger.

Kote with the merciless teeth.

“I wonder,” he said. “How long it would take to bleed out from a finger. From fingers. Most of the medical research has been over hand wounds. Severed hands. None of them have ever been over severed fingers. A shame, naas? I certainly think so.”

Asajj went still. She lost her stupidity.

“Should we take a bet, Asajj?” He said, softening his voice. “Ninety seconds or forty-five minutes? Hm, what’s your choice?”

“You wouldn’t, Cody. You couldn’t.”

“You’re right.”

Her hand twitched. It seemed very cold in his grip. Damp, too. Clammy.

“Cody wouldn’t.”

The Ka’ra paced. Ventress stiffened when it passed behind her, tried to throw her head to the side to see what it could be. Her eyes, though, stayed on him. Scared to leave and scared to look. He saw fragments of his eyes reflect back. A flash of gold. A score of insanity. They were almost beautiful.

“Cody couldn’t, Asajj,” he said. “But Kote can.”

Kote bit.

Ventress screamed.

The clock started ticking.

He left the cell after some unknowable time, the door shutting behind him as he wiped at his mouth. He walked back down the tight hallway, a little unsteady. The Ka’ra fitted itself back into place.

Rex was waiting.

“I said twenty minutes, Cody. It’s been five after. You know, I should kick your shebs for even doing this. She’s dangerous. Even with the suppressor she’s - dank farrik, I - Cody?”

Appo turned around and blanched.

He stopped a few paces short of either of them. He pointed at his identification chip. He held open his hand. Appo kindly handed it over.

“Comm a medic,” Cody said. He slipped the chip around his neck. When he caught himself in the pad's reflection his eyes were dark. They looked tired. Maybe he was. His mouth was a mess. He wiped at it again. “She needs one.”

Appo relaxed. He gave a little smile.

“Yessir.”

Cody stepped up to Rex. He gently turned his vod around and gave him one single push in the middle of his back. Rex started walking. It was silent for a long while. They crammed into the lift. The moon came back. The stars started flying upwards.

“You’re a lot like buir, you know.”

“I know.”

“Does it scare you?”

Cody’s teeth felt gritty. They tasted like copper. He tried to pretend it didn’t bother him.

“Not anymore.”

“And does that scare you?”

“Did it ever scare buir?”

“ Naas ,” Rex said. He paused. “Did it work?”

“Dooku’s invading Manda’yaim.”

“Timetable?”

“Soon. Very soon.”

“The last push,” Rex said. Cody hummed in agreement.

The lift jolted to a stop. The doors opened. They both stepped out. Cody turned left, started walking. His vod stayed on his heels. Cody guided them to one of the communal freshers and went inside. At that time of day it was devoid of anyone else. Their bootsteps echoed. Cody picked a shower at random - a real shower, water rations and all - and inputted his identification chip. It gave him ten minutes of water. The spray came out immediately, painful and hot. Cody dropped his uppers on the floor and stuck his torso in. He gargled the water. It dived down the drain stained pink.

“Both the 501st and 212th will go. All the usable members of the 104th will be auxiliary troops if we need them. I don’t want to need them,” Cody said. “I want to be planetside as fast as we can, and I want to contact Satine - but I want to warn the Haat.”

Rex left. 

Cody felt the ship lurch into hyperspace five minutes later. He bowed his head under the showerhead and let it pound. The steam felt particularly luxurious. Cody breathed it in. He braced his hands against the shower tile.

The fresher was empty. 

No one - save him and the Ka’ra and Kote - heard him heave.

The next few days ran together. They were mountains of battleplans and meetings, tearing himself into little pieces and sending them out to wherever they were needed. He met with the jetii council, bore all their expectant gazes and unasked questions. He met with his commanders, all of them and more, the entirety of the GAR squeezing in together to listen to him, on a holocall. It hurt more than the jetii council. Their gazes were heavier and their questions were harder to answer. He even met with ba’buir, giving the old Mando’ade a thinly veiled courtesy call. For all ba’buir pretended that he was no longer involved with the Haat - too old, he would huff - he still had connections. Cody was already getting comms from the current leaders only an hour after he had wrapped it up with the man.

It still wasn’t enough.

Cody woke up. Obi-Wan was standing outside his door.

“We’ve entered Mandalore’s airspace.”

“And?”

Obi-Wan sighed.

“We’re late to the party.”

“How late?”

Obi-Wan waved at him to follow. Cody did. They entered the bridge in moments, and the scene that greeted them was enough to steal someone’s breath away. The whole bridge was covered in light - whites and blues and a whole forests’ worth of green - as the ship fell out of hyperspace and right into the battle for Manda’yaim’s very soul. Cody could hardly count the ships circling the planet, and they flew too fast for him to make note of who was an ally and who wasn’t.

The ship rocked.

“I want communication lines open with Sundari right now,” Cody said, raising his voice to be heard over the sudden chaos and activity. His voice hitched as he watched an outskirt city shatter apart from a ship’s turbolasers. “And somebody start spouting an evacuation notice on every radio signal from here to Dawn for kriffssake.”

“Sir, the 501st -”

“Tell them to deploy their fighters - just their small ones. Nothing bigger than a starfighter. Those ships out there are powerful, but they’re slow. I want them out of our space. Understood?”

“Yessir.”

“Sir, Mand’alor Satine -”

“Send her to the table.”

The holotable flashed white, then blue. Cody reached it just as Satine phased in.

“Commander.”

“Mand’alor.”

Satine flickered. Something loud and fiery erupted behind her. She hardly flinched.

“Commander, they’re asking me to surrender.”

“Don’t.”

“You’ve seen the skies, Commander. You’ve seen our airspace. You haven’t seen the ground yet.”

“Mand’alor, you give Manda’yaim up and you’ll kill us. They’ll take the beskar, the weapons, and all the Mando’ade we have left. Don’t give up our planet. Don’t. It’s the only reason some of us are still fighting.”

She closed her eyes. Cody hated her in that moment - hated her nearly as much as he hated Ventress - and he couldn’t tell if it was because she had the choice to close her eyes and hide, or because she was hiding at all. 

“If I don’t,” she said, “they’ll still kill us all.”

“Satine,” Cody said, snapping.

She jolted. Her eyes opened.

“Give us an hour.”

“Commander -”

“You give us a karking hour, Satine, or I’ll kill you myself. Understand?”

“That would be treason.”

“So is handing over Manda’yaim.”

They stared at one another. Satine’s image flickered again.

“An hour,” she finally said. “You have an hour, Commander.”

Cody cut communication. He shifted the holotable to its battle mode, pulled open all the battlemaps they had spent days manufacturing, and erased them all. A clean one loaded in.

“Crys,” he yelled through the room, not looking up from the map.

“Sir?”

“Did we ever crack that Separatist code?”

“Created the cipher just last night, sir.”

“Give it to me.”

Crys slapped a data card into Cody’s hand. Cody plugged it into the holotable and watched the cipher string appear. He pulled open the Separatist transmission and let the computer translate. He turned back to Crys. “I want eyes in Sundari. I don’t care what you hack into, just do it.”

“On it, sir.”

Cody caught Obi-Wan out of the corner of his eye. The jetii seemed -

“Obi-Wan.”

Obi-Wan’s head snapped up.

“Cody?”

“What’s wrong?”

Kenobi gave a dry laugh. “You’re concerned with me at a time like this?”

“You should know by now that I’m always concerned with you,” Cody said, so straightforward that it was almost devoid of emotion. Obi-Wan’s lips twitched anyway. Cody went back to the battlemap. “What’s the matter?”

“I have a bad feeling about this.”

Cody flexed his hands. Inside of him, the Ka’ra kept repeating the same thing.

“I know.”

“This is different,” Obi-Wan said. “Something is waiting down there for us. Something dangerous. The Force is disturbed. Confused.”

“Dooku?”

“Worse.”

“Who could be worse?”

“That’s what I’m afraid of.”

The ship rocked. Cody jerked his head up. The 501st starfighters had been successfully deployed and were tearing through space, already clearing a path for Cody’s armada to get planetside.

“Engage, sir?”

“Engage. I want the 2nd Airborne joining in the 501st effort. Get the order to Davijaan.”

The Negotiator stilled, all of its engines turning and heating up, and then shot forward fast enough that those standing and caught unaware stumbled back. Cody caught Obi-Wan.

“Obi-Wan,” Cody said, cajoling and commanding at the same time. It was the tone he used on particularly shaky shinies, the ones that trudged in from their first development with round, lost eyes and a new, fathomless ache in their souls. “Obi-Wan, I’m going to need you to pay attention.”

“Cody -”

Cody saw the words on Obi-Wan’s tongue. They scared him more than the battle erupting around him, and he turned away before he could see Obi-Wan’s clever lips give them life.

“Cody -”

“Later. After.”

Obi-Wan’s hand slid over his. Cody tangled their fingers together in reflex.

“Something awful lurks on Manda’yaim, Cody, and we're going to have to meet it.”

“Us?”

“Us. So I -”

“Naas,” Cody said. “Don’t tell me like this - don’t tell me under duress.”

“It isn’t a military treaty, Cody.”

“Of course it’s not. It’s more important.”

“Cody,” Obi-Wan said, lowering his voice. “Bòidheach.”

“Please,” Cody asked, begged, pleaded. He shifted his head just enough to press his forehead to Obi-Wan’s temple. He exhaled. Obi-Wan inhaled. The room flashed a pale, upsetting blue-white that only came from a ship explosion. The aftershocks shook the bridge. “Please.”

Obi-Wan’s throat bobbed.

“Later,” he promised. “After, Cody. I swear.”

They broke apart. They turned to their duties.

The rest was a rush, a montage of adrenaline and curt orders and the steady roar of blood. Cody’s heart thundered in his chest and it sounded like a war chant, like the Ka’ra ’s multi-voiced songs, and he held tight to its rhythm. 

“Sir,” called a voice. “Landing in two.”

The bridge’s doors opened. Wolffe and a few of his Pack came in. Cody rounded on his vod, a whirlwind of a person drowning in the single-minded haze of a storm. He gestured at the bridge and the dogfight happening on the other side of the windshield. 

“Can you handle it?”

Wolffe looked around the room, one real eye and the other still hidden by a heavy layer of bandages. He flicked a few of his fingers out, and the Pack scattered, taking up battlestations and pulling 212th verde  clear of the chaos. Wolffe tugged Cody into his arms, gave him a Keldabe that was as grounding as it was short, and then all but shoved Cody away from the table. 

“Go,” he said. “I’ve got this covered.”

Cody whistled. The bridge quieted.

“I want Ghosts and all active squads in the hanger bay in five.”

He left the bridge when the order went live, Preach’s voice resounding through the comms, with Obi-Wan hot on his heels. The rest of the ship was a sea of verde gearing up for battle. Longshot ran by - with the right gun, this time, a long, beautiful thing of a sniper rifle - and Waxer and Boil - their names always said with hardly a breath between them now, never separate but always together - were pulling squads out of the bunkrooms. Caf was turning the medbay over to Comet, Trapper was standing on an ammunition crate and directing companies into combat order, and the Trio - Gregor, Gearshift, and Barlex - were beacons at the hangar bay’s far end. The bedlam parted around Cody, splitting down its ever-changing center. He made his way to the front.

The floor dropped. The 212th rode it out, clenched their teeth against the harsh rattles that breaking atmosphere always brought.

“The 501st are deploying to the south with Skywalker and Ahsoka, sir, but Torrent and Captain Rex will be with us,” Gregor said. “Paratroopers have already been launched. A few of our ships have made contact with Sundari air forces.”

“Only a few?”

“Either Manda’yaim underestimated, or the Separatists overestimated. We’ll be taking on most of the groundwork,” Barlex said, squinting into the crowds. He glanced down at his vambrace. “We’ve got thirty minutes before that hour is up, sir.”

“We’ve worked tighter schedules.”

“Feeling another miracle?”

Cody hummed and moved behind them, as close to the docking ramp as he could get. The noise in the hangar rose to a crescendo and then trickled down to a murmur. The silence hung in the air, as tense and impatient as the rest of them. Obi-Wan had his eyes closed off to the side, meditating. Cody soaked up the sight, committed it to memory, and then faced his verde, his vode.

“Satine wants to give up the city. She wants to give up the planet.”

The verde rioted with strangled breaths and shifting feet.

“We have half an hour to make sure she doesn’t,” Cody said, looking about the bay. A sea of orange-gold stared back at him. He blinked - and it was another sea, a different shade of paint, the same people - and watched the tide rise, rise, rise. 

If Cody was still capable of fear, he would be terrified.

“I’m not going to tell you how important this battle is. You all know. Dooku is the last general. Manda’yaim is home. It's been three, almost four, years. The end of the war is here, and it’s going to be decided on our planet. Ours,” Cody said. “We are its ade. Its spirit runs through our blood, its beskar protects us. It’s wild. It’s dangerous. It’s asking us to be the same. It’s asking us to come home, to reap skira on the ones who have stolen too much from us - from it. It’s asking. Will the 212th answer?”

“Elek,” roared through the hangar, the sound echoing around and around until it was the promise of the multitude, the voice of the Ka’ra. Cody felt the Ka’ra twist through the company, saw it writhe in the odd flashes of beskar’gam and the soul of shereshoy.

Cody tasted blood and grit on his teeth. He unlatched the part of himself that reveled in the taste and feeling, and turned Kote loose. The Ka’ra crowed, delighted and already battle crazed, and Kote reached for it. Dug deep and skimmed his hands over where he and it began and ended.

The ship lurched again.

Oya, it said. Oyaoyaoya. It is time. Time. Kote, come. Come. Oya.

“I’m here,” Kote said. “I’m here. Always.”

The Ka’ra purred. The noise rampaged through his body, set his blood alight. The 212th turned into a wall of fire and starlight and buruk, buruk, buruk. He pointed at the ramp behind him. “This is going to open soon,” he said. “And I want haran to come streaming out of it. I want Mando’ade, not men. I want the 212th - the Ghosts of the GAR, its best and brightest, the sun in its sky. Am I understood?”

“Elek, alor.”

“Oya'cye,” Kote yelled, shocking himself with the word that rolled out of his mouth and delighting in it. The chant was an old one - ancient and ceremonial and sung by their bui’tsade - and there was a vague, foggy memory of buir whispering it into his skin when he was younger and drifting off to sleep. “Oya’cye.”

“Kyr'am,” his akaan'ade responded.

“Mare'cye. ”

“Darasuum.”

A breath. A heartbeat. The sound of the ship finally settling on the planet’s surface, the hanger lights flashing, the ramp mechanisms turning. The ramp disengaged from the ship. Sunlight streamed in. Kote turned around to face it, the rest of the 212th pressing tight to him, having his norac and his everything. Something ignited. The durasteel turned blue under the power of Obi-Wan’s jetii’kad. The jetii tipped his head back, the Stewjoni part of him run loose, and when the outside world crashed into the bay, he and everyone else cried out a deafening, haunting,

“Oya! Oya!"

Kote led the charge.

Later, when it was years old and being transcribed into legend, the charge would be known as the end of the Battle of Sundari and the collapse of the Separatists. History would consider the conflict a rout and a massacre - the annihilation of the Separatist forces against an unbelievably small force of GAR verde. To religious devotees, it would be considered the will of the Ka’ra. To the galaxy at large, the charge would become just another reason why someone should never, ever piss off a Mando’ad.

To Kote, the first footfall of that charge would signal the day of his birth - his real one, the one that mattered. To Cody, it would be the day of the promise, the day the Ka’ra called for what he gave to it years ago. The rest of their lives unraveled from there.

The 212th reached Sundari’s capital with five minutes to spare, dressed in blood, oil, and frenzied smiles that even the last of the clankers began to run from. It was Kote and Obi-Wan that opened the palace’s gates. Kote put his shoulder against the fortified beskar and pushed, his boots shoving furrows into the ground and the Ka’ra urging him on. Obi-Wan extended one hand and nudged.

“After you, dear,” Obi-Wan said. There was a streak of blood on his cheek that wasn’t his. Kote reached over and smeared it around. Obi-Wan caught the edge of his wrist, the thin part where his glove gave way to his blacks and his blacks gave way to the fragile section of skin stretched over his runaway pulse, and pressed a kiss there.

Kote purred.

“Tome, cyare.”

“You know I can’t understand you when you speak Mando’a, Cody.”

“Together,” Kote translated, the Basic strange on his tongue. Cody helped guide him through it, kept repeating that Kote had to stay gentle with this one, kept saying that Kote couldn’t edeemir - Kote huffed. As if he would ever hurt Kenobi.

“And the other?”

“Cyare. Love.”

Obi-Wan laughed. “Alright,” he said, flicking out his hand again. The doors opened wide. “Alright. Together, love.”

Kote looked over his shoulder. The 212th smiled back. Rex, wandering out of the fray, looked torn between disgust and giddiness. Kote shoved a hand against his chestplate and pulled. Rex wheezed.

“Easy, vod. I’m here.” He patted Kote's hands. Cody said to release and Kote did. Rex was aliit, his kih’vod. Kote loved Rex more than he loved the air he breathed.

“You and your jetii, huh?”

“Elek. Ner’jetii.”

“Yeah, yeah. Yours. You’d better go chase him, then. We’ll follow.”

Kote stepped into the palace.

He’d seen holos of it before, but had never seen it in person. When buir took them to Manda’yaim, he took them to Keldabe or the smaller, less commercial cities. The old palace on Keldabe was awe-inspiring, a sprawling, plain fortress of beskar dotted with minimalist statues and shrines. In comparison, Sundari was too busy, all ornate and grandiose. It was more glass than function, more coloring than durability. The only beskar it had were its gates, and even those had felt more like an alloy. The whole thing rose upwards when it should’ve embraced the ground. Looking at it, Kote had no lost love for its destruction. Buir must have felt the same way.

When you are Mand’alor, the Ka’ra said, Keldabe shall be your city.

He tore.

There was Kote - enthusiastic and ready, holding out his hands with a smile and a vor entye, Ka’ra - and then there was Cody - frozen in uncertainty and disgusted by his own failures. They tangled and wrestled and turned one another over and over and inside out. When the dust cleared, Cody, surprisingly, was the one left in charge.

The first thing he realized was how tired he was. A headache was blooming spectacularly across the back of his head and threatening to strangle his forehead. All of his muscles felt pulled taunt and weak. Kote and the Ka’ra always came with their price, and Cody never failed to be the one who had to pay it.

Danger, Kote. Danger.

Cody drew his rifle. It felt weightless from low ammo, but Cody knew even a dead rifle had its benefits. The last time Cody had broken his hand by punching a clanker, Caf had threatened to cut it off to save him the trouble of continually resetting it; Cody wouldn't put it past his CMO, so sacrificing the rifle as a blunt weapon instead of his first would be preferably economical.

“Obi-Wan,” he called, watching the jetii out of the corner of his eye as they entered.

“It’s here.”

Rex cursed. He drew his twin blasters and, in a wave, the combined forces of the 501st and 212th mirrored him.

“The awful thing?”

“Yes.”

“Any hint as to what it is?” Cody asked. He gave a quick scan with his HUD and picked up very little - only a few unpromising heat signatures that were too cold to be clankers. “Or where it is?”

“None. It’s just hanging in the air. It almost feels like it’s waiting…”

“Barlex. Boil.”

The two appeared next to him, flushed and sweating but not exhausted.

“I want the palace surrounded and the rooms flushed out. There are dungeons here. See if anyone important was thrown into them.”

“Cody,” Rex said, low and important.

Cody waved Barlex and Boil away. He knew they would get the job done, and he was more concerned about what Obi-Wan was doing. The jetii seemed half-dazed, slowly ascending a flight of stairs with his jetii’kad, unignited, leading the way. Rex was following but at a distance, throwing Cody a look that clearly meant he wasn’t confident about where this scenario was heading. Cody understood. He was half sure he was wearing the same expression - without Kote’s confidence he was more man than werlaara.

“Obi-Wan?”

Obi-Wan threw out the hand not holding his jetii’kad in a shushing gesture. Cody took the stairs three at a time to catch up to him.

“Talk to me.”

“I’ve felt it before.”

“Where?”

Obi-Wan answered with a frustrated noise, his eyes squinting. His jetii’kad seemed to ignite on its own, so close to Cody that he felt the kickback of its heat and its energized hum in his bones. He fell back to Rex. 

“A Force thing?”

“A Force thing,” Cody said. They kept climbing up, the stair’s tread growing smaller the further they went before spilling out into a second story platform. “Do you remember much of this place?”

“Enough, I think. If Obi-Wan keeps going straight he’ll hit the throne room.”

They glanced at each other.

“Twenty credits says that’s where osik will hit the fan.”

“No deal,” Cody said. “I’m pretty sure it’s already hit.”

Obi-Wan put his hand out. The air compressed, shifted, turned into something living. The hair on the back of Cody’s neck rose. The ornate doors at the very edge of the stairs groaned and bowed inward. Obi-Wan grunted from the strain of trying to pull them open. He dropped his hand, shook it out, and stuck it out again.

“Blasters,” Cody said, throwing his rifle into its proper position. Rex raised his blasters in response, giving a determined grimace. They side-stepped Obi-Wan and circled to either side of the doors. Cody flashed through some battlesigns. “I’ll push. You trail.”

Rex sent back an affirmative and hunkered down, waiting.

Danger.

“Elek,” Cody said. The venom in his voice was a particularly potent dosage of weariness. He felt as old as the galaxy itself and twice as battered. “It’s nothing particularly new, Ka’ra.”

Death, it said.

“For who?”

Cody never got an answer. The Ka’ra was too distracted, still waiting to rip right through him when the time called for it, and whatever it was trying to piece together was washed away the moment Obi-Wan chose to rid the hinges of their doors. Rex and Cody ducked away from the doors, wincing at the noise the whole process created, and then swept into the room.

“Dank farrik,” Rex whispered.

Cody snorted, grimly agreeing.

The throne room was destroyed. The windows were all blown in, punctured by blasterfire and cracked open by a sizable hole in the main pane, and Cody flicked on his HUD’s noise cancellation to muffle the sound of wading through glass shards. The throne was scored deep and dark - Cody hesitated to label the garish scars blasterfire; they were too long and straight, no sign of deflection - and half toppled. Blood pooled strangely on the floor. Cody followed it with his eyes. Buir had given them all basic lectures over reading blood splatters - for tracking, he had said, and for hiding - and Cody tried to remember them. The blood seemed thickest by the throne, but descended into haphazard splatters and droplets that moved away from the throne’s platform.

“My HUD isn’t picking up anything.”

“Nothing?” Cody asked, still looking at the blood trail. He began to follow it. Rex’s voice drifted away. The Ka’ra practically vibrated.

“Well, I’ve got a few signatures around the glass, but the sun…”

The blood trail ended abruptly, a solid inch away from a back wall. Cody glanced around. The rest of the area could’ve been called pristine, only littered with glass, and none of the blood had gotten on one of the walls. He flashed his HUD again, picked up nothing, and unlatched his buy’ce. His nose crinkled. The area he was standing in positively reeked of blood and burnt skin, but underneath all of that was the strange, ancient scent of dust and decay. Cody tipped his head up, focused. His hands trailed over the wall. One of his fingers caught on a slight lip, barely big enough for his gloves to dig into it. Cody pulled.

The wall opened inwards, heavy and thick. Cody stared at what it had been covering for a long while. The smell of blood hit a fever pitch. The decay tried to smother it.

“Rex. Obi-Wan.”

The other two appeared behind him.

“What the kark -?”

“A tunnel,” Obi-Wan said. “A secret passageway?”

The room behind the door was small, cramped. It had a small, squarish landing before it dipped down into the dark maw of a tunnel. Cody hunched over and stepped in. The blood trail diverged. One section made its way to the tunnel, and the other - the other belonged to a curled figure that faced away from them. Cody went over. He turned the thing over.

It was a person.

“Korkie,” Rex said.

“Who?”

“My cousin. He’s been Satine’s heir ever since buir took me.” Rex crouched next to the body. His fingers prodded at Korkie’s throat. Most of it was bruised an awful purple color, but Cody couldn’t make out any distinct fingerprints. “He’s got a heartbeat. Slow, though.”

“Drag him out into the throne room. I’ll comm Caf and flag the location.”

“We’re not staying with him?”

“You can,” Cody said. “If you want to stay behind. More blood trails down the tunnel. If he’s really the heir, then he would’ve been close to Satine at the time of the attack. If he’s here and Satine isn’t -”

“Satine must have fled this way, then,” Rex said, already maneuvering Korkie over his shoulder. “But why she wouldn’t take Korkie with her doesn’t make any sense.”

“Unless she couldn’t,” Obi-Wan said. “Unless she didn’t flee and was taken here instead.”

“There’s no signs of a struggle,” Cody said.

“There wouldn’t be. Those marks on the throne are from a lightsaber.”

“Dooku?”

Obi-Wan opened his mouth, looked lost, and then closed it again. Neither Cody or Rex pushed. Cody moved closer to the tunnel and peered down, trying to see through the dark, and Rex carried Korkie out. For a short while, the only noise was their slight shuffles and breaths, large and loud, and Cody felt his body try to salvage as much adrenaline as it could. He shuffled around his vambraces and pulled out a stim. He carefully slid out the needle and broke off the cap.

“Cody,” Obi-Wan said, half chiding.

“Shh. Come here. We’ll share.”

Obi-Wan came. Cody took a short shot of the stim - it ached going down, unnaturally cold and leaving behind an unfortunate taste - and handed the rest over to Obi-Wan. Jettise didn’t necessarily need sims, but Obi-Wan had mentioned that doses could help ward off Force exhaustion. Cody had been around enough to recognize exhaustion’s signs in all of the jettise he worked with. Obi-Wan grew dangerously pale and became prone to paralyzing visions, Ahsoka's lekku grew still, and Anakin lashed out. Not so different, Cody thought while watching Obi-Wan drink the rest of the stim, from his vode. When the Ka’ra decided to run, it ran. His aliit just had to hope they were fast enough to keep pace.

“Ready?” Rex asked, coming back into the room.

Cody stared into the tunnel. There was something unsettling about it, but is also pulled at him. The urge to explore it was as strong as the pull to turn around and pretend he had never found it. He edged into the descent. “Elek,” he said. “You should be in the middle, Rex. Your HUD won’t be able to see as much as Obi-Wan and I can.”

“Right behind you then, Cody. Lead on.”

They went.

The tunnel was a mixture of steps and steep, sloping ramps. It smelled of the earth, damp soil and old rock, and the sides of it were shorn smooth. Whoever had made the tunnel had done it professionally and on purpose, though it felt too wide to be an escape tunnel. In fact, the further down they descended, the larger the tunnel was becoming. It even had clear landings, spaces where the walls formed whole rooms before tipping them deeper down.

“Cody,” Obi-Wan whispered. His voice echoed. “Cody - the walls.”

Cody looked over. He heard Rex’s breath catch.

“Are those -?”

“Carvings,” Obi-Wan said. “Pictures and words.”

“Of what?”

Cody pressed his hand against one side of the room. His fingers brushed over a series of engravings. Half were embossed, pressing back into his touch, and the rest shied away, hunkering back into the stone. Over his shoulder, Obi-Wan had ignited his jetii’kad again as he and Rex searched the carvings.

“Mando’a,” Cody said.

“Not the modern script, I’m guessing?”

“Naas. This is - Ka’ra, this is prehistoric.”

“Can you read it?” Rex asked.

Cody followed the symbols. A few drew something out of him - a feeling, a sound, an image that wasn’t his and wasn’t the old Cody’s - but it was hazy. The more Cody tried to hold onto them, the fainter they seemed to get.

“Maybe,” he said. “If I had more time.”

Obi-Wan pointed to one. “This one repeats. Multiple times. Almost in every section.”

Both Rex and Cody leaned in closer. The symbol was of a buy’ce, its edges sharpened to points and its T-visor a wicked line, with a rising disk behind it.

“Looks a little like your sunburst, Cody,” Rex said. “But that helmet had to be out of date when ba’buir was an ad’ika.”

Obi-Wan nudged both of their shoulders. “Look at the symbol below it.”

“Is that -?”

“The Jedi Order crest,” Obi-Wan said. “Yes, it is.”

“Tarre.”

Obi-Wan and Rex looked back at him. Cody didn’t pay much attention; he was still riveted by the sequence of symbols. That was his sunburst behind the stylized buy’ce, and the more he stared at it the stronger the Ka’ra seemed to grow inside of him.

Tarre, it said, sounding pained. Mesh’la Tarre.

“Tarre?”

“Tarre Vizsla,” Rex said. “He was one of the original Mand’alor’e. He was a jetii but a Vizsla first. His jetii’kad became the darksaber.”

“Odd. I’ve never heard about a Mandalorian Jedi before. Or the darksaber, I suppose. Are you sure it’s real?”

Rex gave a little laugh.

“‘Lek,‘lek Kenobi, the darksaber’s real. There’s an old superstition that only the Mand’alor can wield it, so if you find it and use it - well, most of the planet would consider you to be the rightful ruler.”

“Satine didn’t have it.”

“She didn’t,” Cody said. “The last time it was ever seen was when Pre attacked Sundari with Kry’tsad. Buir - Jango Fett - he managed to take it from Pre.”

“So shouldn’t he be the Mand’alor?”

“Naas. He never used it. He just threw it somewhere.”

“Into one of Sundari’s old beskar mines,” Rex said. “People were outraged.”

The room fell silent. They all stared at the symbols.

“Boys,” Obi-Wan said at last. “Where do you think we are?”

“Manda’yaim.”

“Ah, very helpful, Cody. I meant this tunnel. Where do you think this tunnel even goes?”

“Someplace we shouldn’t be going.”

“The Ka’ra telling you that?” Rex asked

“Naas. Just instinct,” Cody said. The Ka’ra wanted Cody to come down here, he knew. It kept trying to move his feet forward, kept trying to make him take one step more. The gaping mouth of the rest of the tunnel called out to him. Cody wasn’t sure he wanted to answer.

Cody also wasn’t sure if he had a choice.

“Come on,” he said, touching the others’ shoulders. “Let’s go. Satine is still missing and so is Dooku. I want to find them.”

“Sure, Commander,” Rex said.

“Cut the sass, Captain.”

“Gentlemen,” Obi-Wan chided, trying to hide his smile and failing. “Must we fight?”

“Welcome to the aliit, Kenobi. Fighting is all we do well.”

“Ha,” Cody said, dry as Tatooine and far more sarcastic. “Speak for yourself, vod. I’m a Mando’ade of many talents.”

“Like kicking clankers?”

“Obi-Wan?”

“Yes, Cody?”

“Remind me to demote Rex after this.”

Rex snorted.

“Oh, don’t be hasty, Cody,” Obi-Wan said. “Demoting him would only give him less paperwork. If you promote him, however…”

“Outstanding point, Obi-Wan. Rex? Congratulations. You’re promoted.”

Rex gave an indigent squawk.

“You karking shabuir -”

“My, what language Rex’ika. Ponds would be disappointed.”

“You’re a shebs.”

“And proud of it,” Cody said, continuing on. The tunnel seemed to stretch on endlessly, switchbacking and turning the further they went. The platforms appeared randomly, some so close together they could be considered connected and others so far apart that it took an entire lifetime to reach them. The only things that stayed the same were the growing darkness and the symbols. Both seemed to grow in number with each room they passed through.

“We’ve been down here for an hour.”

“Think anyone will send a search party?”

Rex snorted. “I would hope so -”

Kote.

Cody winced. The Ka’ra was loud, the loudest that Cody had ever heard it, and its voice echoed in the tunnel. He shot a look at Obi-Wan and Rex. Neither of them did so much as twitch, so Cody turned back to the darkness. His hair prickled. 

Something, he was sure, was in the tunnel with them, and he had a feeling that it wasn’t entirely human.

“Ka’ra?”

It didn’t answer. In fact, Cody hardly felt it inside of him. Without realizing it, the Ka’ra had slipped out of him, pried his ribs apart just wide enough to wiggle through, and vanished - he squinted in the dark. His name was still echoing, still bouncing off of the rocks and endless stairs and the ancient symbols. Maybe, he thought, maybe the Ka’ra hadn’t vanished. Not really.

“Are you here? Around us?”

No answer. Something cold began to trail up and down Cody’s spine. His name was changing, morphing, mutating into a language that no one could or would ever understand. He faltered a little.

“Ka’ra?”

His name reached a crescendo.

The thing in the tunnel attacked.

Cody hardly knew what happened. One moment he was walking, and in the next, he was flat on his side and getting dragged. Obi-Wan and Rex screamed for him. Blasterfire whizzed over his head. Cody tried to kick out, tried to catch whatever was holding onto him tight enough to bruise, but couldn’t move his leg. He felt a hand there, one that was long and thin, its fingers reaching up to the back of his knee, and it clawed into his beskar’gam. The plates pressed hard enough against his skin and calf that he felt them grind against bone. Cody twisted his back. He tried to grab onto something, anything but the floor was too compact. All he accomplished was skinning his gloves down to his skin and further.

“Cody!”

Cody thrashed.

The thing kept pulling. Obi-wan and Rex kept chasing. Cody desperately tried to escape. When it became clear that the only option was to break his own leg, Cody finally stilled. Even if he did break his leg, he wasn’t sure it would stop whatever was kidnapping him.

It pulled him sharply to the side. The abruptness of the turn ended up slamming him into the wall, spitting out the cloud of dust the impact created, and his stomach dropped when he realized he was careening into empty air.

Cody braced.  

He landed hard on his side, the kind of landing that came with its own shocked gasp. He wasn’t sure how long he lay in the dark, breathing against the ground and riding out the waves of pain radiating from hiss shoulder. He eventually drew his knees up, shifting just enough to kneel on them to take stock.  Aside from the pounding in his side and shoulder, the rest of his body felt functional. He snorted. Functional. 

Fantastic, Cody, just fantastic.

He fought to his feet. The hand on his leg was gone, but Cody could still feel the thing’s eyes on him, watching from the dark. He shivered.

“Cody?”

He tilted his head up. The ledge he had been pulled off of hovered entire miles above where he was standing. A pillar of blur light illuminated the heavens. Cody edged closer to it.

“Cody!” Rex. That was Rex. “Kote - vod!”

“Here,” Cody said. “I'm down here.”

He heard some distant shuffling. Over the lip of the ledge, he saw a pale figure hang over the edge. Obi-Wan stared down. Cody stared up.

“Are you alright?”

“I think so,” Cody said. His shoulder pulsed. “I’m certainly breathing.”

“What grabbed you?”

“Don’t know.”

“Rex and I -”

Cody felt the thing - the creature, the something, the owner of the awful hand - edge closer. It eyes burned between his shoulders. Cody let it creep forward before he spun on his heel, tense for a fight. He blinked.

Nothing was there.

“Cody!”

“I’m here.”

Obi-Wan made a relieved noise. Cody didn’t turn away from the shadows. He took a handful of steps back, just enough to find a wall to flatten himself against. His eyes dilated, found nothing, and tried to shrink back down. Cody forced them as wide as they could go.

“Cody, Rex and I are going to try to come -”

“Don’t.”

“What?”

Danger, the Ka’ra had said. Death.

“Don’t,” Cody repeated. “Don’t come down. I’ll find a way up.”

“Cody, you can’t,” Rex said. “It’s a sheer dropoff.”

“Exactly. It’s better for one of us to be lost than all three of us. I’ll find a different way.”

They argued. Cody heard the back-and-forth hisses, the wavering undertones breathed under the safety of Obi-Wan’s jetii’kad ’s azure light. Rex grew louder. He softened. Cody waited.

“Alright,” Rex said. “Alright. You try to find another way up. We’ll just…we’ll -”

“Follow the path. Try to find Satine.”

“Cody, if you can’t find us -”

“I’ll find you,” he said. He glared back into the dark. “I will.”

“Don’t wander,” Obi-Wan said, his face appearing over the edge. “Don’t go where I can’t follow.”

“Never,” Cody said. He had done that once. Later, he would come close to doing it again. Back there, though, in the bowels of Manda’yaim, alone and stalked, Cody meant it. He meant it in his very soul.

Rex and Obi-Wan moved on. Cody watched until the bluish light faded to navy and then the natural pitch of the tunnel. He dropped his head. The place he had fallen - naas, he told himself. The place where he was taken - seemed like a larger replica of the main path’s landings. The walls were professionally cut, the floors were so level and oddly detailed they almost looked tiled, and, craning his head around, the symbols were still crawling about the place.

Cody fumbled around his vambraces, tugging at the compartment situation between his arm and his ‘ gam , and let out a hissed curse when he couldn’t find a single glowrod. Fett eyes, while impressive, weren’t miracle workers. Cody could make out the odd shapes but no details - and he had a feeling that those were important.

He sighed. He tightened his vambraces. He stared into the space the eyes were, debated if the flush crawling up his neck was terror or fury, and settled on the latter. Cody was too old to be terrified of things that lived in the dark. He was too familiar with them, too. The old Cody had ended up as one, and Cody had a feeling that he had been good at it. Great, even.

“I’m not hurt,” he said, even as his shoulder felt numb and hot. “So if that was your goal you failed. You also let me go. That was your mistake because I’m not going to let you catch me again.”

Something slithered. Cody saw a wisp of it trail through the gloom, and he started towards it. If it wouldn’t come to him, he thought, he would go to it. Di’kut’la, he would say to himself later. Di’kut’la. He should’ve known that things like it liked to tease. They liked to plot and ensnare and capture.

Cody kept walking, naïve and full of the same confidence that buir always scolded him for. When he had been younger - a little more than an ik’aad and a little less than an ad - everyone used to say it was the same type that buir had. Buir always smiled. Cody remembered him looking fond. Proud.

“He’s reckless,” buir said. “But he’ll grow out of it. I did.”

Cody hadn’t.

Cody, when it came down to it, was the one to jump at a problem and meet it head-on, regardless of how di’kut’la it was to do so. He was good at strategizing and planning; that skill set had been easy to pick up - had been easy to excel at - but it had been learned. The urge to rear back his fists and flash his teeth and use his body like a battering ram had been natural. Innate. Cody couldn’t begin to count the times during his verd’goten training that he had run wild, either foregoing a plan or not even dedicating the time to make one. Whether it was by his own luck or the Ka’ra’s meddling, none of the instances ever spiraled into something Cody couldn’t handle. It had never stopped buir from scolding him, though.

Cody still remembered all the aftermaths, all the times he boarded into The Firespray with a sick feeling in his chest that made all of his breaths feel heavy and wrong. He would toe around the cockpit, lingering by the cots or the sonic until his name would be called. Cody would always go, unsteady and uneasy. Sometimes he would argue. Sometimes, if he really deserved it, he would just bow his head and pretend that buir’s eyes didn’t bore right into him.

“Kote,” buir would start, low and heavy.

Kote.

Cody shook his head. He raised a hand up, felt around his skull, and dropped it back down. He didn’t have a concussion. He didn’t have a headwound. Nothing was altering his senses or body - but the Ka’ra didn’t sound right. Its undertone sounded strange. Something lurked.

“I’m here,” Cody said, whispering. “I’m here.”

Kote. Come.

“Where?”

Come.

Cody huffed. The Ka’ra had only been this monosyllabic back in the very beginning, back when Cody could hardly grasp the voice inside of him. There were moments when it reverted - often when Cody was diving into a firefight - but it had never done it for this long.

The room curved.

Cody curved with it. The smell of blood was growing heavier, made sharper by the stench of fear and burning, and Cody kept himself close to the wall, half-crouching. He had lost his blaster in the fall, and the only weapon he had besides himself was a stray vibroknife tucked into his boot. He unsheathed it. He flipped it around in his hand.

The room opened up, the path he had been on suddenly turning into a doorway. Cody stepped into the room, expecting another landing.

It wasn’t another landing.

Cody had emptied into a throne room of sorts, one just as large as Sundari’s but much, much older. The walls were sleek and compacted, identical to the tunnel’s, but they were clear of symbols. Instead, certain sections of them seemed to glow, poking through the darkness with every odd drop of light it swallowed. He knocked a few of his knuckles against one and held back a gasp. They were beskar veins. Real ones.

The sides of the rooms were dominated by columns. They led down to the throne - or what Cody thought was the throne. From this distance he couldn’t clearly make the structure out, but the size of the room alone defined it as something important. Cody moved to one of the columns.

“Oh,” he said.

It wasn’t a column. It was a sculpture.

It depicted a Mando’ade in the same abstract style of the symbols. Its buy’ce and beskar’gam were so outdated it was laughable, but the urge to laugh wilted down to nothing the longer Cody stared at the stone’s impassive, hidden face. He looked over at the statue next to it. Same style, same size, but a different silhouette and beskar’gam model. Cody took a few steps. The next statue was nearly identical but, again, had a different model. He kept going. The beskar’gam kept changing.

Cody slowed.

He was suddenly, fully aware that he was looking at a timeline. Of beskar’gam, he wondered, or of Mando’ade?

“Where did you bring me, Ka’ra?”

It didn’t answer. Cody moved away from the sculptures and tore his eyes away. It took more willpower than he expected, and the feeling of walking below their covered gazes made his stomach twist. He walked. The throne loomed but, like his guess about the columns, Cody had been wrong. The throne wasn’t a throne. Instead, it was a rectangular slab that sat in a dark, reflective pool of water. 

Cody looked around. 

There was nothing to suggest where the water had come from, but the closer Cody walked the softer the ground became. At one point, his boot sunk into the floor. When he lifted it back up, the footprint was immediately filled with water. He made a little noise, half fascinated and half confused. He made his way over to the slab. At one point, the ground merged into the water, and the water into the ground. Cody flinched when it rose higher to his boots, his greaves, and up to his mid-thigh. It felt cold even through his ‘gam and kute. Freezing, almost.

He reached the slab.

He grabbed onto one edge and pulled himself up, resting his knees on the top of the platform. The slab rang when he settled over it, as sweet and clear as a bell, and Cody nearly fell right back into the water.

The slab was made of beskar.

“Ka’ra,” Cody said. He gently eased himself backward, trying not to scratch either his ‘gam or the largest amount of beskar he had ever seen before. He trailed his fingers across its surface. It was cold too, and its surface was bare. Surprisingly, it was clear of any signs of rusting or water damage. There was an indention around its edges. Cody dug his fingers in and tugged. The top section of the slab shifted. He removed his fingers.

“A lid,” he murmured. “It’s a lid?”

Something was etched into it. Cody squinted at the lines, tilting his head this way and that to try and make sense of them. It seemed like an outline, but Cody couldn’t get the full image from his perch. Going back into the water wouldn’t’ve helped, either. He leaned forward. The top half of the lid had a series of symbols carved into it. Cody recognized most of them, but it was only the Jedi Order symbol that had his whole body still.

Slowly - so, so slowly - Cody lowered his eyes.

A buy’ce stared back. Behind it sat his sunburst.

Cody’s breath hitched, released, and then hitched again. He had been wrong. Very wrong. This wasn’t a throne room, Cody realized. It was a tomb.

KOTE. CC-2224.

Cody blinked. He was back in the water, somehow, and the air screamed with the aftershocks of beskar hitting beskar. His beskar’gam burned across his chest.

He looked down.

There was a diagonal slash from his shoulder to hip, unnaturally bright and hot, and Cody swallowed with a click. The vibrancy dimmed the longer he stared at it, but the beskar remained discolored. His paint had been fully seared away.

“Tarre?” He asked, his voice tight and soft. “Ka’ra?”

CC-2224.

He winced, his hands instinctively reaching for his head. The word came in as a scream. The noise of it almost covered the sound of splashing. Cody stumbled back onto his feet. His chest and shoulder rioted.

Across the tomb, a red-skinned Zabrak stared at him.

“Who -?”

Cody got yanked forward, his face colliding with the tomb. He felt his nose crunch, felt the heat of his blood splatter and warm the beskar of the lid, and Cody jerked himself back. There was resistance there. It was the same resistance Cody felt when he had been dragged clear of the trail.

The Force, he thought distantly. The Zabrak had the Force.

Cody managed to break free. He struggled to his feet, moving backward and tripping over his feet in the water. A good thing, too, because the Zabrak lept over the tomb and, in a distorted parody of Obi-Wan’s jetii’kad, lit the room red. The place where Cody had been standing suddenly became overcome by a shower of sparks and a veil of steam. Cody ducked low, felt the dar’jetii’kad swing over his head, and lunged forward. Instead of finding a waist to barrel into, Cody’s fingers slid through empty air. He tucked, rolled, and spun around. He slammed into the tomb - another awful noise protest coming out of the beskar - and then dove to the side. The dar’jetii’kad came down again. Cody stumbled into something.

“Commander Cody,” the Zabrak said, his voice a tone nastier than a sneer.

“I’m afraid you’ve got me at a disadvantage,” Cody said. Whatever he had run into was large, roughly the size of a person, and heavy. He pushed against it. It moved. “I’m not sure who you are.”

Another ignition. Cody saw the other end of the dar’jetii’kad erupt into red through the fog. Fantastic, he thought. Truly.

“Kenobi has never mentioned me?”

“Never,” Cody said.

“Shame that you’ll never know the name of who killed you.”

“Bold words,” Cody muttered, finally rolling clear of the water and dropping whatever he had found in the water. He glanced a look at it. It was a person, he realized. Someone with blonde hair and -

Something seared into his back.

Cody instinctually twisted away, his eyes fluttering against the pain - he was in beskar’gam, for Ka’ra ’s sake, he shouldn’t be feeling pain - only to get kicked halfway across the room by a leaping Zabrak. There came an electrifying type of pain afterward, a type that sank deep and dark into his bones. Cody skidded on his side, his bad shoulder taking most of the brunt. His vision blurred, trying to fade to black. Cody forced it to come back. When it did, he found himself face-to-face with Satine.

Her face was pale and waxen. There was unnatural bruising around her neck, and the delicate skin of his hands and collarbone were singed. Her eyes were dark and half-bloody. They stared at him with the odd bluntness of death, heavy and hard.

Cody felt something rise in his throat. It could’ve been bile. It could’ve been a hysterical laugh. It could’ve even been a half-choked sob. He pursed his lips and bit his tongue instead, desperately willing the urge to wither and die.

“Your arrogance has made you lackadaisical, Commander.”

Cody’s head snapped up. 

Dooku was on Satine’s other side, standing clear of the water. He held out his hand. Cody was dragged forward against his will, Dooku’s grip demanding and too furious to fight. He was released when he landed near Dooku’s boots. The Separatist General made a disappointed noise.

“If only,” he said, soft and patronizing, “If only you had been five minutes faster, Commander. She may have survived.”

Cody didn’t glance back at Satine’s face. He didn’t have to. The image had already been seared into his brain.

“You killed her.”

Dooku raised an eyebrow - an Obi-Wan gesture in body and soul, and Cody remembered that this was Obi-Wan’s ba’buir, the Master of his Master - and made a singular tutting noise. “Come now, dear Commander. You act surprised. This is war, after all. You of all people should understand.”

“She would’ve given up the city. The planet.”

“She would’ve. The people wouldn’t. I believe you put it nicely - give us an hour, Satine, or I’ll kill you myself.” Dooku gestured at Satine’s corpse. “I simply did it for you, Commander. A thank you shall suffice.”

“Demagolka hut’uun -”

Cody’s throat closed on its own. His lungs collapsed.

“I said a ‘thank you’, Commander. Your manners, please.”

Cody didn’t say a word. He focused on drawing in enough air through the space he was being given, fighting off light-headedness and the dimming of his vision. After an infinite span of time, the pressure was released. Cody slumped against the ground and gasped.

“You Mandalorians. Easier to kill than to break,” Dooku said. Cody heard his footsteps come closer but couldn’t raise his head. The Force was pressing against him again, keeping him flat on the ground. He tried to thrash against it, tried to scream into it - you’re Obi-Wan’s, he tried to say, you’re also his and not just Dooku’s, please - but all it did was press tighter.

Balance, said a voice that Cody knew, knew, knew in his soul was the Ka’ra ’s. It sounded distant, and that frightened him. All it wants.

“Help,” Cody said, mouthing into the ground of Tarre’s tomb. “Ka’ra -”

Dooku pulled. Cody bent upwards.

“But you shall serve your purpose, Commander. Destroying you will do much more damage than Satine’s death.” A few of Dooku’s fingers tapped against his cheekbone. “You are a thorn in my side, Cody. A nuisance. Killing you will be a gift I’ve long waited for. The benefits of your death also killing Obi-Wan and the GAR simply make it all the sweeter.”

“They’ll survive.”

“Optimistic,” Dooku said. Cody’s head flew to the side, a blurring, burning warmth erupting on his cheek. Dooku guided him back into position. “Optimism is the thing of children, Cody. It has no place among a man of your caliber.”

“It isn’t optimism if it’s true.”

“How sweetly you talk, Commander. Though I should’ve expected nothing less than the hope of the GAR, its tranyc’la Kote.” Dooku’s fingers trailed down to Cody’s ‘ gam . “How awful this orange is, how annoying. It is entirely too optimistic.”

His fingers tapped at the scorch marks, the ones that had peeled Cody’s paint right off. Dooku’s dar’jetii’kad came close.

“Let us change that, yes?”

Everything turned red.

Something slithered into Cody, something foreign and cold and liquid. It filled the space the Ka’ra left behind, pushing the boundaries of the space too far too fast. Cody’s back arched and he choked, nearly blistering his own face on Dooku’s dar’jetti’kad. 

The foreign thing stilled, heavy and ill-fitting. It felt like ice.

CC-2224, it said, sounding like the crackle of some distant thunder, the eruption of rock and ash, the downpour of a typhoon. Cody felt like screaming when it ran its hands - the long, slender things from the dark tunnel, the ones that had gripped him so tightly - under the curve of his ribs, cutting open his skin. CC-2224.

“Not my name,” he said.

The red hurt. It was agony.

You are CC-2224 and he is you. You are no Kote, the voice said. Cody nearly swallowed his tongue when it said his name. It was the same voice he had been hearing the entire time, a smoke and mirror imitation of the Ka’ra.

“I’m Cody.”

Cody has no place with me. Only CC-2224.

“He doesn’t -”

The memory again. The worst one. The one with blasthimblasterssouncivilizedCodydear. The one with executeordersixty-sixexecuteordersixty-sixblasthimblasthimblasthim.

Cody jerked his head away. He gasped. Something warm and wet slid down his face. It could’ve been tears. It could’ve been blood. Cody thought it was a mixture of both, an ill harmony of pain, and one he was beginning to become acquainted with.

The voice shifted. It came out gentler, the rustle of tree branches and wind, the swirl of water over sand, the sweetness of the sun. There was joy in this voice, joy and love and longing. It reminded him of Obi-Wan. It reminded Cody of anything and everything that was good in the galaxy.

And it was here to kill him.

I am sorry, CC-2224, it said. I am sorry.

“Naas,” Cody said, screaming, pounding on whatever it was. “Naas.”

Destiny -

“I refuse,” he said. “I refuse. Ka’ra, Ka’ra!”

It cannot help you.

Cody’s mouth hung open. His pulse quieted down to nothing but the occasional rock of his chest and the odd rattle in his throat.

It cannot help you, and I am sorry. You cannot live. I cannot let you live.

“Force?”

The fingers were back. They tore at him from the inside. Dooku handled the rest of the places it couldn’t quite touch. Cody’s head rolled. Everything spun. He saw Satine. He saw the tomb. He saw the water.

There must be balance, CC-2224. And you are the tipping point.

Satine. Tomb. The mesh’la shine of beskar. The water. Water.

I am sorry.

One of the Force’s fingers nicked his heart. He wheezed out breaths between his teeth, felt heavy and weightless at the same time. Sleep pulled at him - again.

Cody burned.

Tomb. Tarre. Beskar. Water.

Cody had never feared death. He had done it once. He knew what it felt like, knew what it entailed. Pain and death never rattled him. He jumped into things because he didn’t fear the fall. That made him brave. It made him insane.

Tarre. Mand’alor. Water.

Naas, Cody didn’t fear death. He feared failure. Perhaps that was what made him great.

Mand’alor. Water.

You would have made my Obi-Wan very happy, CC-2224.

The nick grew to a tear, then a gouge, and then Cody -

Kote.

Quiet. Faint. Ka’ra.

Kote, the water. Quickly.

Cody obeyed, somehow. He went from kneeling before Dooku to drowning, watching his fingers trail through the water down, down, down, far deeper than he should’ve been able to go. He heard a scream - the shake of the earth and the shattering of the stars - and he opened his mouth as something crawled up his throat. He watched a line of wispy silver leave, followed by the thick sludge of blood. It shot for the surface, towards the mesh’la reflections of beskar and the weight of the tomb.

Cody kept sinking.

It was quiet in the water. Still. His heart slowed. His breathing evened. His eyes grew half-lidded and distant, his pupils shrinking to fit back into their normal size. He felt weightless. His chest didn’t hurt quite as much. His shoulder didn’t, either.

The water changed. It grew darker and darker until it was the same shade as the night. It should’ve been concerning. It should’ve been discomforting.

Cody thought it was peaceful.

The dark lightened in spots, brief pinpricks of gold and silver suddenly appearing. Cody watched the orbs of light and plasma and intangible things drift through the water closer to him. He watched them morph shapes. The orbs elongated and spread out. They gained bodies and arms and legs and -

One smiled at him before their buy’ce covered their face. Cody recognized the buy’ce. It was the same as the one carved into the first statue.

“Mand’alor’e,” he said, his voice echoing only inside his body.

A voice laughed.

“Ka’ra?”

One of the figures stepped forward.

“Hello, Kote,” it said. There was a garble of voices just behind it - whispers of the multitude. The greeting of the sea. “Hello, my Kot’ika.”

Cody shut his eyes.

“I’m dead,” he said. “I’m dead, then.”

Fingers touched his face. They skimmed over the place where Dooku had hit him. Cody could feel its anger, its hate. He felt its vengeance and cruelty. It was feral. It was dangerous.

“Naas,” it said. The fingers burned - like starlight, like cool beskar - and Cody knew that this creature felt love. It knew amusement. It shared his happiness and grief. It was loyal. “You are not dead.”

“I failed.”

“Nonsense.”

“I didn’t think,” Cody said, repeating the same words he always said to buir. “I didn’t think and I just jumped ahead. The Force tricked me. I should’ve known. I should’ve thought about it. I should’ve known.”

“There is no failure in mistakes. There is only failure when you give up,” the Ka’ra said. It hummed. “And you, Kote, aren’t quite there yet. Are you?”

Cody remembered his anger. He remembered his insanity. He thought of Wolffe and all his vod had suffered from - thought about what all of them had suffered through. The list was staggering and monumental and aggravating. He remembered Satine. He remembered Dooku’s pleased smile. Everything seemed to swirl together inside of him - hate and anger and frustration and love - until Cody couldn’t tell where one emotion began and the other ended.

Obi-Wan had once told him that the Dark side of the Force fed on negative emotions. Staring at the Ka’ra ’s knowing look, Cody knew that his entity thrived off of them.

“Naas. I’m not.”

“There is still one last battle to fight, Kote -”

“I’ll fight it.”

The Ka’ra shushed him. Its fingers wiped at his cheek and then went up, petting over his hair. It curled a lock around its fingers and gazed at it. The look in its eyes made Cody want to shift; it was the same look that Cody occasionally saw buir give him, one filled with sharp fondness and awe, as if shocked that Cody lived, breathed, and was their ad .

“I know you will. You have fought everything I have asked and,” the Ka’ra gave a wicked, sly smile, “and even the things I didn’t.”

Cody flushed.

“But this will be the last. It will be difficult. Life and death. The Force will try to stop you again.” The Ka’ra ’s lip curled up, so Fett-like that Cody almost copied it. “But it will be the end of something no matter the outcome. Do you understand?”

“Elek.”

“You will fight a dar’jetii, and he is dangerous.”

Cody thought of Ventress and Dooku. He thought of the Zabrak.

His hair was tugged.

“More dangerous than that, Kote. If you win, everything will be saved. If you lose…”

“Help me.”

“Of course,” it said. It didn’t move.

“Please.”

“You know what I’m going to ask you, Kote.”

Cody’s throat felt tight.

“Elek.”

“You promised me a very long time ago. Promises are important to keep.”

“I’m scared.”

“Why?”

“Because,” Cody said. “Because I’m - I’m not Kote.”

The Ka’ra tugged his hair again. That, too, was a buir move - or was it a Ka’ra move first? Cody didn’t know. The longer he spent with the Ka’ra, the more it became like buir.

“Jango was very young when he came to me. Very young. And being a beroya comes with its own challenges, and solitude is one of them. I was often his only companion for long periods of time.” The Ka’ra stared at him. “He didn’t want to listen to me when he was younger either. But when I called, he came.”

“Did you promise him anything?”

“You,” it said, simply and blunt. “And your vode.”

“Oh.”

“He asked for you. You asked for their safety. I have delivered both.”

Cody remained silent.

“You are thinking,” the Ka’ra mused, “very hard. Is it about your name?”

“It isn’t mine.”

“Why not?”

“Kote is - he’s…”

“Mm? He’s what?”

“I’m not good enough to be Kote,” Cody finally said, the words pulled free from somewhere open and hurting inside of him. “I’m not glory. I’m not revenge. I’m not a future or somebody to believe in or Mand’alor. I’m not good enough.”

The Ka’ra gazed down at him. Cody couldn’t meet its eyes.

“You, my foolish Kot’ika are the only thing good enough in this galaxy for any of those things.”

Cody’s mouth opened. “I -”

The Ka’ra held up a hand. Cody’s mouth shut with a click. The Ka’ra dropped its hand. It took Cody’s hand instead and began to maneuver him through the water and past the other silent figures.

“Come. Let me show you something.”

They walked. Cody wasn’t sure for how long - the entire place was an endless depth of cool water and starlight - but he nearly tripped over his feet when he heard voices. More specifically, they were his voice. His. A few more steps and Cody’s breath caught in his throat. The Ka’ra gently guided him before it, placing Cody in front of a rapid, colorful current of memories.

Why don’t you have a name? The others all have names.

Prime, I don’t need a name. Everyone already knows who I am.

You should have one.

That word you taught me the other day - ?

Kote.

Mm. I think it fits.

That was the old him, Cody realized. The was the old Cody.

Kote. We have to leave.

Leave? But Prime -

A jetii is here. It’s dangerous. Here, take my hand.

I can’t.

Kote -

I’m not leaving my vode.

I can’t come back for you, Kote.

Alright.

Take my hand.

Naas. I belong with my vode. I’m going to lead them, or I will die trying.

The rest of old Cody’s memories flashed by, only snippets and hazy snatches that Cody soaked up like sunlight, like rain, like anything that would fill the missing section of his body and soul he had had since birth. His own memories quickly followed. They were starbursts of aliit and laughter, pockmarked by blood and war, and Cody felt his lips twitching.

Boil? Waxer? What’s going on?

Nothing, sir.

Nothing?

Absolutely nothing.

Where are the rest of the Ghosts?

Busy.

All of them.

Yes.

Why do you have paint?

We wanted it, sir. Now if you excuse us -

The 212th, all decked out in gold - Kote’s color. Paint matching was difficult in peace; it had been nearly impossible during war. His verde still tried, though. They had scrubbed their ‘gam clear of their own paint, their own styles, and had redone it all in his color.

We’re your army, sir. GAR may fill out the paychecks, but you lead us.

When you call, sir, we’ll come. Always.

You’re our Commander, and that means more than any clan, sir. I’ll wear gold or I’ll go bare.

Obi-Wan next, framed by the background of Dex’s diner. The jetii had taken Cody there once on a rare stretch of extended leave. Cody had spent the night making himself positively sick with all the food he ate - it was delicious and warm, entire leagues above whatever the mess hall served - but everything paled to the way Obi-Wan looked at him. Cody, caught between wanting to run from the gaze in Obi-Wan’s eyes and wanting to purr from the attention, had finally asked what Obi-Wan was staring at.

You.

Me? What’s so strange about me?

Not strange. Remarkable. You’re quite special - do you know that?

I bet you say that to every Mando’ade.

No, just the ones who really deserve it. I - there.

What?

Your smile.

What about it?

I can’t tell if I like it more than your knack for every talent under the sun. I think I do.

The Ka’ra squeezed his shoulders. It bent down to whisper in his ear.

“The only one who doesn’t think you are special, Kote, is you.”

“I’m only special because of you and my luck.”

“You are special,” the Ka’ra said, “because you are determined to be. It is a fact that lives in your soul. You have no reason to be scared, Kote. Not for something that so obviously belongs to you.”

Cody peered at it.

“I never said I was scared.”

“You didn’t need to. I have known you for a long, long time, Kote.” The Ka’ra tilted its head to the side. Cody followed the movement and saw the silver figures waiting. “And all Mand’alor’e are scared. The ones that weren’t didn’t deserve to rule. They didn’t understand what they were taking. They wanted power.”

“What did they want?” Cody asked, pointing at the figures.

“A variety of things.”

“What do I want?”

“That,” the Ka’ra said, “is a question for you to answer, Kote. I don’t meddle as much as you think I do. What you’ve done to be here has been by your own violation - and what you do afterward will be your own choice. I’ve pushed. I’ve pulled. I’ve reminded and urged. I’ve done all those things, but you were the one to walk.”

“It never felt that way.”

“I came whenever you asked me to, whenever you needed. Sometimes you didn’t realize you did, and other times you wished you hadn’t. But every time you were already moving here, to this place.” The Ka’ra waved its hand. The figures came closer. “Just like them. I don’t take Mand’alor’e that want power, Kote. I take those that already have it.”

The Mand’alor’e surrounded him. They were far away enough for Cody to not feel trapped but just close enough for him to feel like an ik’aad next to them. One stepped forward. Cody saw the sunburst first, then the buy’ce. The figure undid the latches and the buy’ce dissolved from their head.

Tarre Vizsla smiled at him. His fangs were wicked, but his eyes were soft.

“It’s been a while since I’ve seen a Vizsla here.”

“I’m a Fett,” Cody said.

Tarre lifted one shoulder in a lazy shrug. “You are the more dangerous ones of our clan. The better ones.” His smile came back, a slow reveal of predator's teeth in a man’s face. “I’ve enjoyed watching you. Ventress was especially interesting.”

“Vor entye,” Cody said. He couldn’t think of anything else.

 Tarre’s face shifted into seriousness. It fit him as much as the smile did - the Pond to his Fox, the Bacara to his Bly - and Cody felt his posture stiffening in response. He lifted his chin. He squared his shoulders.

“The Force is dangerous,” Tarre said. “There is darkness in it, one that knows very few bounds. It wants you dead. It will try to get what it wants.”

“How do I beat it?”

“You fight it. Willpower is a double-edge kad’au. It’s used to control the Force, and it’s used to destroy it. It has only as much power as you give it, so give yourself and the Ka’ra more. Train with your jetii. Prepare your vode.” Tarre’s face softened again. “Remember that we are always with you. You have our strength and wisdom - but you also have your own and it’s more remarkable than you give it credit for.”

“Right,” Cody said. His chin dipped back down on its own. His shoulders tried to twitch down.

“We have faith in you, Kote. We only ask that you have faith in yourself.”

“I’ll try.”

“That’s all we ask. We don’t need perfection - you are enough.”

Cody took a deep breath. He let it out.

He raised his head again. He felt the Ka’ra pace around them, circling. If he focused hard enough, he could feel its excitement. Its joy. Cody pulled away and blinked, blinked again. Despite everything, he still couldn’t fathom why it loved him as it did.

“You are my Kote,” it said, laughing and purring and happy, happy, happy in Cody’s veins. “My Kot’ika. My Mand’alor. What is there that I can’t love?”

A lot of things, Cody wanted to say. Too many, almost - but so many people seemed to look past them all. They swept aside his mistakes and celebrated his victories again. They picked him up when he needed to be pieced back together, not caring about his sharp edges that caught at their skin and lashed out. They stayed even when Cody couldn’t stand himself. They told him to trust, to love, and Cody -

Cody was ready to try.

“Alright,” he said. He took a step towards Tarre.

The Ka’ra pressed against his back. It wrapped itself around his beskar’gam, around his spine and heart and lungs. He felt his muscles stitch back together, felt his bones shift back into place. His beskar’gam shone. It sang. Cody stretched out his hands and grinned like a fool.

“Ready?”

Cody held out his hand.

“K'oyacyi,” Tarre said. “And good hunting.”

Something dropped into Cody’s palm. It was heavier than he expected, cold and cylindrical, and in the water, it glowed. He pulled it closer to him. It felt like aliit. It felt like home and destiny and - and it felt right. It felt jate in his hand.

It ignited.

Cody smiled, and it was Tarre’s and the Ka'ra's wicked smile.

It was, for all intents and purposes, the grin of a Mand'alor.

Chapter Text

Jetii’kade calluses were different than the ones earned from blasters.

Blasters rubbed the skin clear of the trigger finger; improper form would have it kick back into the soft muscle between the index finger and thumb. It would bruise, crack the skin, heal over. Cody had those. He had plenty of them. Jetii’kade grew calluses along the bases of each finger, their sides, the back of someone’s knuckles. They made the palm hard, the rounded edge below the pinky tough, the curved cavity of the middle worn down like a piece of sanded wood. Cody would know. 

He had plenty of those calluses, too.

Hardly anyone recognized them - why would they? He wore gloves. Not enough people looked hard enough and, if they did, the little spots of pale skin just melded with the rest of him, dangerous and well-trained. Besides, if someone did ask, there were munit’kade, long beskar spears. Cody could’ve trained with one of those.

He hadn’t.

“Here,” buir had said one day, gently prying Cody’s fingers off of a vibroknife. “Let’s try this instead, Kot’ika. Just for a little while.”

Cody had been young when that - the first lesson - happened. Buir had put the weapon into his hand and Cody had dutifully held onto it. Buir mimed something with his hands.

“Turn it on,” he said. 

Cody turned the thing around. He found the activation switch. The ignition scared him, a sudden eruption of yellow painting the room and burning into his eyes. Cody had lurched and stumbled back. His hand held fast to the weapon - or had the weapon held to him? - and it followed when he ran. Buir clicked his tongue. He gripped the back of Cody’s shoulders, held him steady.

“Easy, ad’ika. There’s nothing to be afraid of.”

“It burns,” Cody had said, turning his face away from the light. The air around it roiled with heat, and Cody’s body had begun to break into a sudden, wild sweat. Buir raised an eyebrow and circled around. He peered at the grip of the weapon and then stared at Cody again.

“Your hands?”

“The air.”

Buir relaxed. “No more than the sun, Kot’ika.”

Cody looked longingly back at his vibroknife. Buir leaned forward. He turned Cody’s face back to the weapon before him.

“Let’s practice with this, hm? Just for a little while, Kote.”

So Cody practiced. He practiced for years.

He told no one about those lessons. Not his vode or his burc’yae - not anyone. The hours spent under yellow hazes and strange calluses and back-straining katas stayed between him and buir. In the beginning, Cody hadn’t realized it had been a secret. He had been the sixth. He had thought all of his ori’vode had gone through the same thing, decided the lessons and weapons were useless, and let the experience die between them. If they didn’t speak about it, he figured, there was nothing to speak about. The longer their silence continued, the more sure he had become.

Then, one day, something changed.

Cody became aware in brief, disorienting moments that his ori’vode’s silence was natural. It was organic. It came from not knowing anything, not having the experiences or images to churn into words and secrets.

“What is this?” Cody had asked. “What are you training me with?”

“A weapon,” buir answered. He shook the thing, offering it up to Cody.

“What’s its name?”

Buir looked down at it. He cocked his head as if he had to think about it. “It doesn’t have one.”

“It does too. You just aren’t telling me.”

Buir shrugged.

“Look it up, then.”

Cody had. When he found what it was - when he pieced together just how buir got one - he buried the whole experience deep inside of him. He scrubbed himself clean of the lessons, the lectures, the minute repositionings of his body, the specific burn in his muscles. The only evidence left behind was the constellations of calluses branded into his hands. He kept it secret. He kept it quiet, devoid of air and noise.

Mando’ade were Mando’ade. They dealt with beskar and blasters, a world of gritty, cloying dust and doggedness. What buir had trained him in -

Obi-Wan’s jetii’kad had not been the first one Cody had touched. Neither had Grievous’s.

That title belonged to buir’s.

Cody told no one. He let the calluses scream out their silent story, let them tell whatever history they wanted to. Over time, they gasped out little more than a whisper. Dying, Cody had thought.

Naas, the Ka’ra said, tucking the gift more fully into his care. Just waiting.

When Cody emerged out of the water, it was to kill. 

Jate. May it serve you well.

Cody shifted the thing, the gift, around in his hand. It was shaped like a blade, the edge and tip wickedly sharp, and it pulsed with a familiar heat and hum. Through its self-created fog - the water rushed over Cody’s boots to get away from the thing’s glare - it glowed a color so devoid of light that it sucked the rest of the world into it and swallowed. Its edges were lined with the white of molten beskar. The same color was carved into its length, writing lines of primordial Mando’a. 

Cody came out of the water to kill, and the Dha’kad, the Darksaber, did, too.

The Zabrak was gone - his goal was Obi-Wan; Cody had been collateral and revenge, a way to break the jetii, and being made into a cruel tool made Cody furious - but Dooku was still in the tomb. Cody stood clear of the lake, water sloshing around him, just to look up and find the Separatist staring at him. He looked affronted as if Cody was some pet that hadn’t listened to its master. Cody couldn’t wait to rip his head off his shoulders.

Dooku’s eyes trailed down. They narrowed at the sight of the Dha’kad. Cody wanted to claw his eyes out just for looking at it. “And what, Commander, do you expect to do with that?”

“I’m going to kill you.”

“Truly?”

The Dha’kad glowed. Dooku sniffed.

“Do you even know how to use it?”

Cody laughed. Something lurked in the undertone, unhinged but whole, and the Dha’kad fit so perfectly against his calluses, sliding right into place beside them. Cody shifted into a high guard position, the ‘kad ’s hilt held in both of his hands and angled up and behind him. Dook gave a brief, sharp cackle. He raised his own ‘kad.

“Well then,” he said. “Shall we begin?”

They engaged. Red on black, black on red. Dooku became concise, elegant twists. Cody fell into forward pushes, all wrist numbing and shoulder screaming slashes. Dooku retreated. Cody hunted. Throughout it all, over the incessant hums and shouts of the ‘kade, Dooku spoke.

“Despite appearances, I don’t hate the Jedi. I only hate what they’ve become.”

A side sweep. Dooku parried, stumbled, and pulled himself upright. He took several minced steps backward, rotating his wrist. His ‘kad flickered. Cody wondered if it was possible to break the very blade - could he? He wanted to.

“For instance,” Dooku said, softly. “I have no ill will against my grandpadawan. You are aware of that, yes? That Obi-Wan and I are of the same lineage, the same blood?”

“Blood doesn’t mean family.”

“Ah. That is how you Mandalorians see it, isn’t it? Consider us having the same spirit, then. We both wielded a blue blade. We both draw from the Unifying Force.” Dooku lowered his ‘kad. Cody’s footing slipped. He readjusted. They were both sweating. “I’ve never meant Obi-Wan harm. Ever. He is - perhaps - the only Jedi worth saving. There’s hope in him, a grand multitude of it, and it blinds him. I’ve tried speaking with him. I’ve tried to make him see reason.”

“My condolences,” Cody said, grunting. Their ‘kade caught. They disengaged with sparks and a horrifying screech. Cody’s ears rang. “He would never join you.”

“No, he wouldn’t. There is too much Qui-Gon in him. Yoda, too. Still, I held out hope that I could open his eyes. He’s always been smart. Far smarter and more sensible than his padawan. I’d hoped that he would see the truth.”

Cody slashed. Dooku threw his ‘kad up and caught the attack in the middle of the blade. Cody bore down with all of his weight. Red sputtered. Dooku gave a slow, unconcerned blink - he doesn’t care, Cody realized, he’s not afraid.

Cody withdrew. There was too much of himself in Dooku’s eyes. Too much familiar desperation and sleepless nights. 

“Why did you come here?”

Dooku’s lips twitched. Cody thought the Separatist might’ve been trying to smile.

“Here - in Master Tarre’s tomb specifically? Or just Mandalore in general?”

Cody swiped Dooku’s ‘kad away. It went flying, skittering against the ground, and Dooku winced. The tips of his fingers had been caught by the Dha’kad. They turned dark and brittle within moments. Cody watched them rain ash onto the ground. Dooku hardly twitched. He simply stared at Cody, half-lidded and expectant with the Dha’kad hissing by his head.

“You’re not afraid to die?”

“Have I ever said I wanted to live?” Dooku countered.

Silence stretched between them.

“You tried to kill me. Your companion’s going to kill Obi-Wan.”

“He’s not my companion,” Dooku said. His nose crinkled in disgust. “He killed Qui-Gon. He’s actively hunted Obi-Wan. If I had known he had been sent here as well, I would’ve killed him before he stepped foot on the planet. I’m warped, Commander, but I’m not heartless.”

“Who sent him here, then?”

“Darth Sidious.”

Cody drew the Dha’kad even with Dooku’s neck.

“I’m not lying,” Dooku said. “All of us are far too desperate for that. The war is winding down, peace will be had, and the entire galaxy will be thrown into ruin.”

“Who is he?”

Dar’jetii, the Ka’ra said. The dar’jetii.

“I don’t know.”

“You’re aware of how useless that is?”

“Of course,” Dooku said. His lips twitched again. “But you have an extraordinary knack for figuring things out.”

“You think I’m what, exactly? Some lap dog to do your errands?”

“I think you are something rather special, Commander.” He made a vague motion toward Cody. Cody glanced down. His beskar’gam was bare but unscathed. The ‘kad burns and scratches were gone. The beskar gleamed. Cody’s body felt better as if he had spent a whole cycle in bacta. “Obi-Wan has visions. Did you know that?”

“Elek,” Cody said. Obi-Wan dreamed of dark, ugly things at night. Fire and brimstone, amber eyes, the entire galaxy falling to pieces. Cody often woke up to Obi-Wan’s stiff and cold body against his, his eyes fluttering under his eyelids. It scared Cody almost as much as it mystified him.

“I have them too. They haven’t been pleasant lately.”

“And that’s my problem?”

“Forgive me. I thought you and Obi-Wan -

Cody raised the Dha’kad from where he had let it lower.

“Don’t.”

“They haven’t been pleasant,” Dooku repeated, smart enough to realize that he had stepped too far. “But you’ve been featured in them for a long while now. Most of the ones you appear in are better - though that isn’t a particularly high bar.”

“What am I doing in them?”

Dooku pointed at the Dha’kad. “You have that. And a circlet around your head. The paint on your armor was changed.”

“Brighter?”

“Like the sunrise.”

“And that’s all? You just saw me like that?”

Dooku hesitated. Cody tilted the Dha’kad closer.

“Desperation, Dooku,” he said. “What else was I doing?”

“Fighting,” Dooku said. “Although I don’t know against who or what. Afterward, it was you and Obi-Wan. He was bent over you, covering your face, but the two of you were talking. There was blood. That was all I saw. The Force doesn’t…”

They exchanged a look.

“Why tell me all of this?”

“I’ve already told you. I tried to convince Obi-Wan, but he wasn’t hearing it.”

“So I’m your backup plan?”

“Yes,” Dooku said. “But you weren’t where I needed you to be. Something was in the way there. I don’t know how I knew that - it certainly wasn’t the Force telling me - but when I landed on Mandalore, I knew what I had to do. A few nights ago I had a vision of this place, of a man standing in the water and staring at the tomb. I remembered enough from my old historical lectures to know it was Master Tarre. From what my other visions told me, I knew I had to bring you here.”

“And Satine? What’d you really kill her for?”

“To keep up appearances,” Dooku said. “And she was an obstacle to what you need to be.”

“That wasn’t your choice.”

Dooku’s eyes softened. It was something Cody neither expected nor wanted. Dooku was his enemy, the last great hurdle Cody had to overcome before he could finish the war once and for all, yet looking at Dooku only made Cody recognize the man he had once been. “It wasn’t quite yours either, was it?”

“I should hate you.”

“Yes,” Dooku said. “You should.”

More silence. It echoed around and around. It was enough to drive someone to madness.

“Darth Sidious.”

“He controls the Senate. He controls the Jedi. He’s powerful.”

“You have anything concrete?”

Dooku made a show of flashing his palms at Cody and slowly pulling his outer robe to the side. He held a memory chip out to Cody. Cody took it.

“There’s enough in there to prove that he’s real and that he has control of the Republic. As to his identity -”

“I know. It’s a secret that needs to be found.”

Dooku stared at him. The softness was back in his eyes. Cody wondered what Obi-Wan saw whenever the two crossed paths. Was it Count Dooku, the Separatist General, or was it just Dooku, the grandmaster with soft eyes and an acerbic wit?

Dooku cleared his throat. “I wish…”

Cody slid the memory chip into his vambrace.

“I was going to kill you,” Cody said. “Do you want me to?”

“You’re giving me the option after everything I’ve put you through? I’ve slaughtered GAR members. I’ve desecrated your armor. I’ve killed your ruler -”

“It’s a yes or a no.”

“Yes, then.”

Cody hesitated.

“Problem, Commander?”

“You’re sure?” He asked. “I can arrest you. You’ll be sentenced to treason, but I’m sure the jetiise …Obi-Wan would…”

Dooku flinched.

“No. No, I couldn’t. I’m too selfish to rot the rest of my life away in a prison, but there is still enough Jedi in me to know I don’t belong in a temple anymore. There’s too much blood on my hands. Too much pain.” He gave a humorless laugh. “I’ve done terrible things to thousands of people, Commander. There is no salvation from that.”

“I wish you hadn’t done it. Not this way at least.”

“I don’t. It needed to be done.” 

The Dha’kad felt heavy in Cody’s grip. The adrenaline was wearing off, the novelty of the situation. Cody was just beginning to balance out Kote, and with it came the ever-present sense of weariness. He knew who he was now, and he knew what he needed to do - it needed to be done after all - but Cody just wished the job had been given to someone else.

“You’re very good with that, you know.”

Cody’s calluses stung. They were old and unused - more prone to blistering than protecting - and he’d have to dip them in bacta when he got back to the ship.

“I know.”

“Good luck, Commander. I would’ve liked to know you better.”

Cody said nothing. The Dha’kad lurched.

The tomb fell back into silence, stinking of blood and burned skin and regret.

The 212th found him hours later, bright headlamps punching through the darkness. Cody threw a hand up and whistled. They clustered around him, quiet but so, so concerned, and Cody stared into their buy’cee , all painted a proud, sympathetic gold, and felt the memory chip sear against his skin.

“Alright, sir?” One verd asked, looking up at him. He sounded young.

Cody’s heart ached.

“Fine,” he said because it would be. Cody had been chosen, and that was that. It was his responsibility, his duty, and he’d see it through. He curled his hand around the verd ’s buy’ce . Skin touched beskar , eye to eye and breath to breath. “Everything’s going to be alright, kid.”

Cody was escorted back towards the surface, back into the fresh air and a world that felt new and strange, darker and sweeter and full of untied ends. Cody climbed out the mouth of a beskar mine, loaded into a speeder, and shipped back to the palace. He turned around, bracing his hand against the dash, and looked behind his shoulder. Figures lined the entrance of the mine, cloaked by the unique light of a bruised sunset, and Cody watched them disappear as the miles dragged on.

They unloaded back in Sundari.

Dooku’s body stayed in the speeder, covered with a dusty tarp, but Cody carried Satine in. While waiting for a rescue, he had done his best to clean her face, drawing water from the lake and spilling it over her hair, working out the tangles.

“Is Korkie conscious?” He asked Rex, his vod falling into step beside him.

“Do you know how long you’ve been gone?” Rex said instead. “Maul said you were dead - dead, Cody. Obi-Wan took it hard. Really hard. The rest of the GAR -”

“Rex. Is Korkie conscious?”

Rex blinked. He looked a little harder at who was in Cody’s arms.

“Naas,” he said, looking away; Satine was Rex’s ba’vodu by blood, but Cody had never been sure about their relationship. He wondered if there was no love lost and then thought better of it. That had never been an option for Rex - the not feeling. Cody’s kih’vod ’s heart bled too easily and often.

“I’ll sit with her tonight,” Cody said. He’d watch over her body when her spirit finally drifted up to the Ka’ra.

“You don’t have to. I should…it’s technically -”

“It’s technically my responsibility now, too.”

“Huh?”

They entered a dining hall. The 212th and 501st had made quick work of converting the space into a temporary mortuary. Tables spanned the space, some laden with fallen Haat and palace guards. Cody maneuvered his way around. He gently placed Satine on one of the empty tables, snatched a fallen sheet from somewhere, and let it cover her up to her hairline. Her blonde hair spilled out in half-dried curls.

Cody looked away. She reminded him too much of Rex.

“Cody?”

Cody unhooked the Dha’kad from his hip. He held it out to Rex. Rex backed away.

“Naas.”

Cody snorted. “‘Lek.”

“But Cody -”

“Rex.”

“Oh, vod,” Rex breathed. “Why’s it always you?”

Because, Cody wanted to say, it had to be someone. The answer sat on his tongue, ready to be brought to life between them, but Cody reigns it in. A Kryze was dead. He didn’t need to drag another one in any closer. Cody clipped the Dha’kad back on his belt.

“Where’s Obi-Wan?”

“Recovering. He and Maul -”

“A Zabrak with red skin?”

“Elek. They dueled. It got pretty violent.”

“Is he in the medbay?”

Rex nodded. Cody straightened out Satine’s sheet. Some of the wrinkles disappeared.

“I’ll go see him,” Cody said. “And then I’ll spend the night with her. You get the 212th and 501st ready to ship out. Dooku’s dead, but I doubt the Separatist planetary leaders are going to give up. There’ll be one last push. Maybe a few more small campaigns.”

“I can stay. I can stay with you, Cody.”

Cody tugged on the sheet. More blonde hair revealed itself.

“I’m okay, vod. Really. The Ka’ra and I, we, well, we talked. I’m good.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“Then just trust me, ‘lek?” Cody looked up. Rex’s eyes were big and his lips were pressed tight. Cody gave him a small smile. “I’ve never been too wrong, have I?”

Rex rounded the table. He drew Cody into Keldabe, boots shuffling against boots, and Cody’s mind went back to Kamino and Dawn and all their history before that. He cupped Rex’s face, let his vod lean into him, and drew his fingers against the shaved hair, so close-cropped and blond that it was almost invisible.

“I’m ready for it, Rex.”

“You don’t want it.”

The Dha’kad was heavy again, dragging Cody down. The memory chip sunk right into his skin. His calluses waited.

“Naas,” Cody said, “but it’s mine anyway.”

Rex held onto his chest plate. They rocked.

“Everything’s going to be okay, Rex’ika.”

“It’s not fair.”

“It isn’t, but I’m going to be fine.”

Cody pulled away, slow and steady. Rex slumped away from him. The distance between them stretches. Cody stared at it. He’d have to get used to it, he supposed, that space. It would only grow through the years.

Rex waved a hand at him.

“Go,” he said, his voice half-choked. “Go see your jetii.”

“Rex?”

Rex turned.

“I love you, Rex.”

“I know, Cody,” Rex said. “That’s the thing that scares me.”

Cody left the room. He went to the medbay. The rest of the palace is silent. He spotted a few Haat mingling with his army, and he saw some of the panic rooms being hacked into, important councilmembers and politicians spilling out. Satine’s death would be confirmed within hours, Korkie would be shuffled into the vacuum left behind while the clans bucked and bit at the chance to control the court, and all of it made Cody’s skin prickle. When word got out about the Dha’kad there would be opposition - tribunals and testimonies and a handful of challengers. Cody couldn’t abdicate without losing the karking thing, and the thought of stepping to the side and letting someone else take the title of Mand’alor - while a pleasant daydream just a few hours ago - made him feel violent to the point of nausea. He couldn’t claim the title just yet, though. There was still Sideous.

He pushed into the medbay.

He’s accosted by Caf and Kix, the two medics up and on their feet before the door finished closing behind him. Cody diligently stripped and sat on the edge of a medical cot, letting the two poke and prod.

“I’m fine,” he said, and he was. Like his beskar’gam , the Ka’ra had healed all of his wounds. The only things left behind were the twisting, pale twine of scar tissue and the pink, unhappy skin around it. Kix stared at the closed wounds incredulously. Caf just scrubbed down the split skin on Cody’s hands with a level of fervor that could only mean Cody’s CMO had been terrified. Cody leaned forward. Caf wasn’t as tactile as the rest of the Ghosts - or like other Mando’ade in general - but he occasionally needed something more tangible than just the knowledge Cody was still alive. 

“Obi-Wan?” Cody asked, murmuring it into Caf’s hair.

“Further in. Force exhaustion.”

Another wave of bacta. It burned. Cody barely moved.

“Anyone else?”

“A few bumps and scrapes. Nothing bad. I’ve sent most of the medical team to the perimeter around the palace to check up on the hostages and closer neighborhoods. They didn’t like the silence. Or waiting.”

Cody took the information in.

“Maul?”

“The Zabrak? Fled. Obi-Wan made to go after him but collapsed.”

“Did Skywalker follow?”

“No,” Caf said. “Skywalker was wound up - I’m talking karking crazy. Gregor was close to giving me the go-ahead to sedate him, but Rex managed to wind him down.”

Kix shifted. Cody looked at him.

“'Lek?”

“He had a concussion,” Kix said, lying. Cody could smell the guilt and anxiety and frustration roll off the medic. There was a certain emphasis in Kix’s words as if he was trying to convince himself of the truth. “It was just a small one. He’ll be good to go by the morning.”

Cody hummed, not quite responding. He wasn’t completely in the dark - there had been rumors, small and lurking, about the state of the 501st - but none of them had come clean to him. Rex kept it under lock and key. Rex’s captains and lieutenants just gave tight-lipped smiles and waved Cody away when he finally carved enough time to ask them about it. Cody supposed he would just have to hit lower. He could win over the younger Torrent members or the Dominios enough to tell him the truth. He shelved the issue alongside Sideous and the memory card and the Dha’kad . He’d eventually solve them all - somehow.

Caf stepped away. The cool, recycled air from the vents made the sanitized cuts throb in unison. Cody let Kix wrap his hands. He redressed.

“Can I see him?”

A snap of plastic gloves. Caf’s back was towards him. Cody diligently pretended not to see how the medic’s shoulders shook. “He’s sleeping.”

“Can I look at him, then?”

“You should be sleeping.”

“I can’t. Satine’s dead. I have to perform cabur ja’hailir for her.”

Both medics gave a measured, deflating exhale that resonated in Cody’s soul.

“Caf, can I -?”

Caf opened up the medbay’s divider. Cots were sporadically filled on the other side, half 212th and 501st ‘gam stacked next to each one, but Cody spotted a solitary, crumpled figure at the very end of the medbay. 

He made his way over. Caf pulled the sheet closed behind him.

Obi-Wan was on his side, his body curled like a crescent moon and his eyes closed. His breathing was deep and easy, the kind that came from a well-medicated sleep. It was very convincing. Cody sat on the wickedly small stool next to him.

“I know you’re awake,” he said.”

Obi-Wan’s eyes fluttered.

“Maul said he killed you.”

“He didn’t.”

“You were gone,” Obi-Wan stopped, his voice breaking. It sounded like an open, gruesome wound. The snap of bone, the roar of blood, the noise of a dar’jetii’kad splitting Cody open like it had once killed Obi-Wan’s master. “You were gone for a very long time.”

Cody worked Obi-Wan’s hand away from the pillow it was strangling. He kissed the straight lines of Obi-Wan’s fingers, felt twin calluses against his lips, and then slipped the hand under his shirt. He held it against the divot in his chest, the space right over the place where his heart was still miraculously beating. Obi-Wan’s hand dug into the muscle and then relaxed. He took a shuddering breath.

“I killed Dooku.”

“I know.”

“He still loved you.”

Obi-Wan knew that, too. Cody tried to stem the pain but could only kiss away the tears.

“I’m sorry.”

“How did you do it?”

Cody hesitated. After a small while, he unhooked the Dha’kad and placed it in Obi-Wan’s hand. Obi-Wan’s eyes finally opened. They were confused and then mystified and then -

“You must have been very lucky. Dooku was one of the best duelists in the Order.”

Cody didn’t tell Obi-Wan that Dooku hadn’t been dueling - not really. He didn’t tell Obi-Wan that Dooku hadn’t wanted to live, that he hadn’t wanted to win. Cody kept that secret close. He wasn’t quite sure who that decision protected more.

“It’s heavy,” Obi-Wan said, staring at the Dha’kad.

“That’d be the hilt.”

“Beskar?”

“Did you expect anything else?”

“Does it mean that -?”

Cody took a breath. He braced himself. “ Elek . When the war is done.”

“You don’t want to do it.”

“There’s a part of me that does,” Cody admitted. “A large part now. But there’s still a section that wants to go be a farmer in some backwater, unknown and unmarked Outer Rim planet - someplace I won’t ever be found.”

Obi-Wan gave him a tight, knowing smile.

“You’re going to have to learn how to use it,” he said. Cody loved him a little more for it; there are no half-hearted promises about farming and Outer Rim planets. They are two in the same, he and Obi-Wan, and mellow dreams have no place in either of their lives. Instead, Obi-Wan offered, “I can teach you.”
“Teach me?”

“If you want.”

Cody wanted. He wanted it badly. He hid his calluses and all the lessons and told Obi-Wan elek , he had been lucky and he needs to learn. Some joy returned to Obi-Wan’s eyes. Cody wished he could bring back more.

“Cody, did something happen down there in the tunnel? Did something happen with Dooku? I felt you for so long when Rex and I were trying to find Satine, but then you just disappeared -”

“Nothing.”

“Nothing?”

“I fell unconscious,” Cody said. The lies came easily. Cody tried to hate himself for it but couldn’t; Obi-Wan looked small and drawn and two steps away from drifting to a place too far for Cody to rescue him from. Besides, Dooku said he had already tried to convince Obi-Wan. Even if Cody tried to convince him again, he doubted he would get very far. Obi-Wan was stubborn but idealistic. To him, the Separatists were evil, the jetiise was good, and any mixture of grey - especially one backed by Cody - would hurt more than it helped. It would break something Cody wasn’t sure either of them could fix.

Optimistic, Dooku had called Obi-Wan. Too trusting.

“I fell unconscious,” Cody repeated, “and that’s all.”

“Promise?”

Cody’s throat went tight. The memory card felt like a brand against his skin. Elek , he thought. Too trusting. Too hurt and damaged and still utterly, wonderfully beautiful. There was still light in his eyes, still enough hope to try to heal the whole galaxy. There was still enough love in his heart to welcome Cody, bloody and sharp and broken all on his own, and keep him. Cody couldn’t destroy that. He wouldn’t. Maybe that made him a hut’uun and an aruetii - or maybe it just made him a fool in love.

“I promise.”

Obi-Wan relaxed. His eyes slid shut again.

“Sleep,” Cody said. “Sleep, cyare.”

“I like that.”

“Like what?”

“Cyare,” Obi-Wan whispered, drifting into real sleep. “I like when you speak Mando’a to me. You make it sound beautiful. You make me sound beautiful.”

“Naas, the word doesn’t have that kind of power.”

“Oh?”

“Oh,” Cody said, drawing out the noise. “Cyare only sounds beautiful because it stands for Obi-Wan. It stands for the last thing in this galaxy that’s still worth calling cyare.”

“Cody,” Obi-Wan said, voice half slurred and weary. “If you had died, I would’ve destroyed the whole galaxy. I would’ve made everyone else pay the price.”

Something molten hit Cody’s bloodstream. His head spun, his breath caught, and he gave a surprised, ragged laugh.

“That isn’t a very jetii’la thing to say.”

“No,” Obi-Wan said. “It’s Mandalorian.”

Obi-Wan fell asleep. Cody watched him for a long while, struggling with the guilt and the molten thing and the knowledge that - blasthimblasthim - he might not be good for Obi-Wan. Not quite.

“Jedis aren’t supposed to form attachments,” Obi-Wan had told him at the beginning of their relationship. “It leads to too much pain and pain leads too often to the Dark.”

Cody’s heart had beaten double-time. Dark and Obi-Wan did not exist together, save for acting as one another’s binary opposition.

“So why tempt yourself?”

“Sometimes you can’t help it. And in others, you can’t bring yourself to fight it.”

“Which one am I?”

“All of them,” Obi-Wan had said. “All of them and more.”

Maybe, Cody thought, that should’ve been the end of them. He could’ve - should’ve - put his foot down and ended it, leaving Obi-Wan to cling tightly to his optimism and open, lovely faith in everything. Obi-Wan would’ve been better without the temptation. He would’ve been better without the distraction.

Cody left eventually. He went back to Satine.

He stopped by the palace’s Armory beforehand. The Armorers were out and the forges were darkened. Cody tried the door, found it was locked, and tried again. On the second time, the door opened. He walked in. There was no fanfare, no celebration. The Ka’ra purred but it was quiet and content. Personal. It warmed Cody in the places that had chilled - his heart and soul and the half-dried bacta under his bandages. He made his way to the back room, crested the entryway, and picked up the paint he should’ve had at the very beginning.

“Should’ve, would’ve, could’ve,” he muttered to himself, turning the pot of paint around in his hands while swallowing down all the regret that rose to the surface.

Perfection doesn’t suit you, the Ka’ra said. There is more worth in mistakes. More beauty. More Cody and Kote and my alor.

“Right,” Cody said, feeling all for the galaxy that he was trying to convince himself. He desperately wanted to believe it. Trust, he remembered. He just had to trust. Give up a little control, and a little worry - it certainly sounded easy.

He went back to Satine. 

He did his rounds among the other bodies, wishing them safe passage during the night when their spirits ascended to the sky, and settled in for the night. He’d never done an official cabur ja’hailir before - the ceremony in which those closest to the dead would sit by their side and keep them company until the Ka’ra finally called their souls to march. He had done unofficial ones; ones where the entirety of The Negotiator was quiet and aching, huddled together in a room while Cody plodded through a particularly long remembrance list.

Naas, Cody had never done a real cabur ja’hailir before. He only knew what it entailed.

“I’m sorry,” he said to her. “You didn’t deserve to die like that.”

She didn’t respond.

Cody carefully sat back. The Dha’kad prodded uncomfortably at his hip, incessantly needy, so he unhooked it and laid it at his side. He unstacked his ‘gam - following his medical examination, he had opted to just stay in his kute - and opened the pot of paint. The color shined.

He dipped a paintbrush in.

“Did it ever speak to you? The Ka’ra, I mean.” He painted a line onto his ‘gam , pulled back and squinted, and then bent over it again. “Buir always said that Bo-Katan couldn’t hear them, but just because she didn’t doesn’t mean you didn’t.”

Silence. More paint.

“You weren’t in front of the mine,” Cody said, “and I can’t stop thinking about it. Will you join all the others tonight? Or can you not?”

The Dha’kad rolled closer to him as if pulled by gravity. Cody ran a few of his fingers against the hilt. Obi-Wan had been right; the ‘kad was heavier than most jetii’kade, and it was cooler, too, as if insulated.

“Is it because you didn’t have this?” He asked. “When I was younger, I always thought it was silly that the Dha’kad held so much power. We would’ve followed anyone if they just had this in their hands and flashed it around a little - buir said it was half the reason why Tor was allowed to live so long.”

Cody paused. Underneath the smell of death, there was a gentle undercurrent of paint that felt like spring buds and summer heat, rebirth and regrowth.

“I didn’t know you very well, Satine. I can’t even say we would’ve gotten along. If I’m being honest, I know we would’t’ve. There’s too much of my buir in me, you know, and there’s not enough Bo-Katan in you. So we would’ve argued. We might’ve even hated each other’s guts.” He paused, focused on finishing one last detail, and then put the paintbrush down. “But I’m sorry. You should’ve lived longer than Tor. You should’ve been given the Dha’kad and a long, solid reign. You should be able to join all of them in the mine - you’ve got a place there. I know you do.”

Kote.

Cody spread his ‘gam out. It would take a while to dry.

Kote, the Ka’ra came again, it is time for her to go.

Cody ran his hand through blonde hair. He held his forehead against hers, felt the Ka’ra leave him and enter her. It pried something out of her. Cody squeezed his eyes and breathed against cold, unflinching skin.

“It should’ve spoken to you instead of me,” Cody said. “And I should’ve grown up faster and backed down easier and - and I should’ve been Kote from the beginning. Maybe things would’ve been different. Better. I guess that’s what I’m really sorry for.”

Satine never heard him. The Ka’ra had whisked her away too fast.

Cody sighed and pulled away. He took the top part of the sheet, lifted it out, and covered up the blonde hair. He looked at the shrouded figure for a little longer - would he look like that, Cody wondered. Would someone throw a sheet over him and pretend there was nothing left underneath it? - before he turned on his heel.

The sun was rising. Gold covered the room, honey and amber and new beginnings. He looked up at the windows. He looked back at his ‘gam .

It outshone the sun.

The day was rising, dawn laughing and calling out to him, and Kote finally answered.

He left the room. Boil and Waxer - most likely sent to collect him - paused.

“Cody?”

Boil’s throat bobbed. Kote felt the sunlight from the hallway sink into him. The gold ran, ran, ran. It spiraled out from him and through the rest of the palace.

“Tell everyone I’ll be back soon. Maybe in a few days. No more than a week, I promise,” he said.

Waxer choked. It seemed to break the spell the two of them had been under. Boil jolted back as if shot.

“Days?” He croaked. “Cody -”

“I’m going home. I’m sure you boys can handle the cleanup.”

“Home?”

“I’ve got some things to settle.”

“But -”

“A week.”

Waxer and Boil looked at each other. Kote watched them - the pointed eyes of Waxer, the concerned curl of Boil’s lips, the slight twitches of their eyebrows.

“I’ll go with you,” Boil said, still watching Waxer.

“Naas.”

“You can’t go by yourself,” Boil said, whipping his head around. “It’s too dangerous.”

Waxer had a different tactic.

“Korkie’s regained consciousness. He wants to talk to you. There’s a rumor going around that you have the Dha’kad. There’s a bigger rumor going around that the clan alore are on their way here.”

“It’s not a rumor.”

“Then you really shouldn’t go,” Waxer pressed. “You have to talk to them.”

“If they want to talk to me, I’ll be home. Most of them know where that is.”

“Sir,” Boil said. He sounded scandalized and nervous. Kote didn’t envy the two; Caf and Obi-Wan and Rex would lose it when they heard he left. It would hurt them - everything Kote still had to do would hurt them.

“A week. That’s all.”

Waxer and Boil, in the end, relented. They set Kote free, and he wandered out into the new day clothed in gold and beskar’gam, in Ka’ra and his destiny.

Kote went home.

It took him half the week to get there; his face was too recognizable to take any commercial flights so he dipped and dove between freight shipments that looked the other way when he put credits into their palms. Sundari turned into small, rural towns that Kote lingered in between flights. He rolled up his sleeves. He dug his hands into the dirt and planted, swung a scythe, let ade climb onto his greaves and hang, remembered what kindness and peace felt like.

All of this is yours, the Ka’ra kept telling him. All of it.

Kote looked out windshields and the open top of running speeders. He watched sunsets and rises, heard the distant roars of oceans, shuddered as Manda’yaim opened itself up to greet him. At night, he saw the stars fall planetside, saw Tarre’s smile in each well-beaten road, and Aga Awaud’s hope in each refreshing rainstorm. He caught Shae Vizla running alongside him, laughing, her red hair a whipcord of comets. Artus Lok followed in his shadow. Canderous Ordo often joined him for meals, slumped and relaxed in a chair, tapping one of his boots to whatever tune was playing in that night’s cantina.

They became an aliit ; a multitude of orphans pulled together in the same direction, each burdened with the same duty and the choice of meeting it head-on. The bond was strong and odd and Kote - well, Kote ditched his packs and chased Shae, laughing. He traveled Tarre’s roads and danced under Aga’s pouring clouds. He drank with Ordo. He slept and walked and learned to breathe with the Ka’ra.

When he made it to Dawn - made it on the boundary of the Fett homestead - Kote was almost ready for it.

The fields were flushed with tall, white wheat. Kote plucked off a few absentmindedly as he edged nearer to the main house - a sprawling, one-story estate made of dark, lacquered wood and curved roofs. Buir never collected the wheat, but always let the neighbors take as much as they wanted. The Fetts were always more concerned about their fruit trees - the jogan and sweet pear trees - thought buir occasionally did spend Kote and his vode out to spend the day harvesting the wheat if he felt they needed a refresher course over patience and hard work. Ponds had been his favorite victim in that arena.

Kote made it to the house. He plugged in the security code, hoping beyond hope it hadn’t changed since he had left, and some of the tension in his body faded when the panel flashed green. The door, engraved with the Fett aliik on its front, slid open. Kote stepped in.

The inside was so familiar it made his head spin.

He soaked everything up as he wiggled out of his boots. For both ease and secrecy, he had packed his ‘gam into a backpack and dressed down. A cotton shirt and straight-legged pants breathed easier than kute and were more comfortable. Kote had nearly forgotten what it felt like to wear them. He nudged his boots next to the door and dropped his backpack beside them. He kept the Dha’kad clipped to his pant loops. Kote wouldn’t part with that. Not now and not ever.

He floated through the rest of the house, half-dazed and bittersweet.

The kitchen was the same save for the dishes soaking in the sink and the photos on the conservator. The former was new, maybe minutes old, and the latter was always replaced biannually. The last time Kote had looked at the conservator, it had been dominated by photos of his vode in their new jobs, he and Rex’s graduation, and snapshots of Boba amid his verd’goten training. Now there were pictures of a stranger in freshly painted ‘gam - Boba only recognizable anymore from the infamous Fett bone structure and the sheer look in his eyes.

The others were from the rest of his vode , snapshots that were clearly caught during campaign lulls or while they were on leave. Kote drifted his fingers over each of them, remembering when each of them was sent through the groupchat. There was Wolffe, the man a blur as he rammed into a shrieking Sinker during a game of get’shuk that broke the GAR’s broken nose record. There was Fox, slow dancing with some senator and watching the sunset from his office window. Bacara shooting the holocamera a relieved grin after the fall of a particularly bloody blockade, Neyo just to the side of his elbow. Bly and Ponds in a candid shot, caught fingerpainting with Jetii’ika in the Temple’s crèche while one of the ad’ika drowned in Bly’s buy’ce . Rex was caught half-asleep on Echo’s shoulder, snoring. Another one showed him looking at something on his vambrace, a young Ahsoka hunched up on his shoulders like a tooka and peering down over his head. And then -

And then there were photos of him.

Kote’s breath hitched.

There was him next to 17 and his ARC squad, his kama fresh and new and hanging around his hips. There was him in his dress whites, recently pinned with the Marshal Commander stars and shaking hands with Organa. There was him with his Ghosts, holding Wooley up on his shoulders in some lake while the kid wrestled against Longshot - the other Mando’ade perched on Barlex’s shoulders. There was him with his vode, him laid up in a medbay, him bent over his captains’‘gam and repainting them, him getting half-crushed in one of Dex’s hugs, him - him bright-eyed and young, so young, little more than an ik’aad, with his hands held in buir’s and one of his feet high in the air, wobbly and determined. 

Kote slipped that photo clear from the conservator. It was old and worn, more of a butter-yellow color than the other photos’ modern white. He ran his thumb against his own face, and then let it trail up to memorize the look of pride on buir’s beaming face. He flipped it over.

Kote’s first steps were written in buir’s handwriting along with the date. Right underneath it, slanted and hasty, was another sentence. Ka’ra, it said, it’s like looking in a mirror. Jas’buir nearly died recognizing the look on Kot’ika’s face.

Kote’s hand trembled. He took an unstable, whistling breath.

“That’s my favorite.”

Kote jolted. He looked over his shoulder. Buir was there, holding open the backdoor with his hip and grease-stained up to his elbows. Kote heard the hose come on, hissing and spitting water. Neither of them said anything as buir washed off. When he was done, Kote snatched the towel hanging from the sink and threw it. Buir caught it without looking.

“That photo,” he repeated. “It’s my favorite.”

Kote looked back down at the photo. He looked back up.

“Out of all of them?”

Buir cocked his head. He threw the towel over his shoulder and made his way into the kitchen. “Well, maybe my favorite of just the two of us.”

“Really?”

Buir shrugged, nearly dislodging the towel. “It’s a good photo. Why - do you have a better one?”

“I - I don’t have any photos of us.”

“'Lek,” buir said. “I figured.”

They stared at each other. Kote bit down the urge to fidget. He was the Mand’alor for Ka’ra ’s sake - he shouldn’t be nervous about this. Jango Fett was only a man. He drank too much and made mistakes. He couldn’t parallel-park a speeder to save his life. He bled when he was hurt. He was only human.

Naas, Kote thought. That wasn’t exactly true.

Jango Fett was a man, but he was also buir. That title was larger than Mand’alor and stronger. It made him a towering myth, a legend Kote could never stop listening to, some celestial being that watched and knew all and expected so much from Kote and - and kark it, Kote had never learned to outgrow that tiny, wobbly-footed ik’aad who wanted to be the reason behind the man’s smile.

Kote cleared his throat, broke eye contact, and tried to hide behind the act of putting the photo back. Buir didn’t let him.

“You’re thin.”

“It’s been hectic. I’ve been busy.”

Buir didn’t call him out on his banthashit upfront because he never did. Instead, he just hummed. Kote heard him lean against a particularly creaky cabinet.

“Thinner than the rest of your vode,‘lek?”

Kote looked down at himself. ARC had packed him full of muscle - shifting his prewar leanness into something that finally matched the shape of his shoulders - but now he was tipping into the weight category that made Caf give him long, pointed looks as the Ghosts tried to secretly trick him into eating more.

“Not by much,” Kote said, feeling naked in his civvies. He wished he would’ve put on his ‘gam. The extra thirty pounds it gave him would’ve made up the difference. “I’m still…”

Kote doesn’t finish. If he said healthy it would’ve been a lie, and no one lied to buir. Something in buir’s face shifted.

“Why’re you here?”

“I can’t just visit?”

“You can,”buir said, “but you don’t.”

The statement hit Kote in a place that hurt. He had forgotten just how good buir was at sniffing those places out, of weeding through all of Kote’s barricades and roadblocks just to find the pieces still prone to bruising.

“I’ve been busy winning a war,” Kote responded, the words coming out of his mouth before he realized he even strung them together. “A war.”

“You want a medal?”

Kote’s hands clenched around the countertop, hidden behind his back.

“You left yours’,” he said. The words felt like poison. It would’ve been enough to fell a lesser man, but this was buir Kote’s fighting against. The insult barely scraped his skin.

“That doesn’t make me particularly sympathetic to deserters, Kote.”

“It’s Cody,” Kote snapped and - and that was lying. He rocked back on his heels, sick and pale. Buir’s eyebrows furrowed. His eyes narrowed and grazed up and down, looking for wounds or maybe one of those weak points. Kote felt them stop at his hip, right where the Dha’kad was half-hidden by the overhang of his shirt. He wondered which one of the two buir thought the ‘kad was.

“I’m not a deserter,” Kote said.

“Jas’buir ’s not in. You should’ve stayed in Sundari if you wanted to catch him.”

“I didn’t come to talk to him.”

Buir gave a wry smile. “I’m no Mand’alor, Cody.”

“You don’t have to call me that.”

“Mand’alor?”

“Cody.”

“You’ve decided to take the role, then? No more hiding?”

“It was never hiding.”

“It was never owning up to it, either.”

“I didn’t have a choice,” Kote said, lashing out again. He released the counter, threw out his hands, and tried to disengage. He walked to the far edge of the island. Buir stayed where he was. They divided the room between them. “Or I didn’t think I had a choice.”

“If you didn’t have a choice, it would’t’ve left you alone as long as it did. It was trying to give you time to sort out your issues.”

“At least it was nice enough to give me that. You certainly didn’t. You never did and - and they weren’t issues -”

“Why are you here?”

Something broke in Kote - or maybe it had been broken for a long, long time. Regardless, his shoulders slumped. His voice cracked.

“Can’t I just come home?”

Buir said nothing. Kote wiped at his face.

“I’m going to be Mand’alor. I just can’t do it now. The war’s so close to being finished. Just a few more months and it’ll all be over. I can claim the title then. I’ll have the time for it.”

“This isn’t some afterschool club. You can’t just pick when you want to start. You having the Dha’kad means that you’re the Mand’alor now.”

“Satine didn’t have the Dha’kad.”

“And where’s Satine now, Kote?”

Kote shook his head.

“I still need approval from all the clans.”

Buir laughed.

“Kote, you’re a national hero. You’re on every news station across the galaxy, on every trending holo. People have painted murals of you in the market. People go to rallies with your aliik on their signs and painted on their ‘gam. The clans need your approval, not the other way around.”

“It’s not my aliik.”

“It is,”buir said. “Because they certainly don’t mean any of the rest of us when they use it.”

“And what? What? You want me to apologize for that?”

“I want you to start taking responsibility.”

“Start taking -?” Kote whispered, more to himself than back at buir, and then louder, “I’ve always been responsible. Always. When have I ever let something go? When have I ever just said kark it and gone wild? When? Wolffe did it. Ka’ra knows you let Bly and Ponds run wild. Everyone else in this family got to do it except me - and why? You never let me do any of that. Never.”

“That’s not what you needed.”

“How the kriff do you know? How do you know what I need?” Kote stalked back to the conservator and yanked the di’kut’la photo off the side of it. He threw it on the island. It slid across, tipped over the edge, and buir caught it before it could tarnish the ground. Kote pointed at it. “Newsflash buir ,” he said, his mouth twisting the name into a cruel insult. “Newsflash - I’m pretty sure that’s the last time you ever gave me what I needed.”

“There’s a difference between needs and wants.”

Kote vibrated. The old Cody flickered through his mind; all the memories and echoes of feelings and the brief blurs of Prime. Kote’s face scar - the long, old, and ugly one - burned. It wasn’t his memory, wasn’t his to use, but Ka’ra it had happened. Prime had once pressed a knee against his chest and a vibroknife against his face, looked down at him like one would at a prized pet that had misbehaved, and had called him -

“Well I’ve always been greedy, haven’t I?”

Buir flinched and it should’ve felt like a victory. It didn’t.

“I didn’t come here to fight,” Kote softly said. His voice sounded too loud in the suddenly cramped kitchen. The shake in it is harder to hide. “Really.”

Buir let out a breath. He leaned his arms on the island, stretched out.

“Naas,” he said, low and in the back of his throat. “You never do.”

“I just need,” Kote cut himself off. He cleared his throat. He tried to find somewhere safe in between them. There wasn’t any, really. There were too many open trenches and landmines and barbed wire. Kote tried anyway. “I would like it if you could be Mand’alor until I can claim the title.”

“I’m no Mand’alor.”

“You could’ve been.”

“Naas. I couldn’t.”

“Can’t you try?”

Buir stared at him. Kote edged nearer to the island. He rested his hip against it.

“Ba’buir ’s too old. The Haat ’s nearly destroyed by the Sundari attack. Korkie can’t do it. No one knows where Bo-Katan is. The other clans will know that I have the Dha’kad so they can’t exactly fight over who I appoint, and you’ve still got enough political pull to stop any serious infighting.”

“You’ve got a lot of faith in me.”

Kote looked down at his hands.

“You’re buir,” he said. “If anyone can do it…”

Buir studied the photo. There was grey in his hair, Kote realized. Just a little around his temples and climbing up, but it was there. He looked smaller. Kote couldn’t tell if it was just because he had forgotten - buir always seemed bigger than he was - or if it was because buir really was smaller. He had stubble, too.

“It wouldn’t be for long and, even if it somehow turns out that way, I’ll leave the GAR. You wouldn’t have to completely leave bounty hunting -”

Buir laughed. It was short, but it was also real. Kote flushed.

“What?”

“I’m retired.”

Kote blinked.

“You’re what?”

“Retired,” buir repeated. “Since the beginning of the war. Boba’s picked Tatooine up and running everything now. I couldn’t stay in the business forever.”

“No one told me.”

“Would you have cared?”

“I would’ve liked to know.”

Buir snorted. He put the photo down.

“Alright.”

“Alright?”

“I’ll do it. I’ll go play Mand’alor.” He backed away from the island, squared his shoulders, and got the look on his face that was all Kote - stubborn and determined and ferocious all at once. “Clans should all be gathered in Sundari by now and I’m sure the news about you having the Dha’kad will be rampant. I should manage to catch them and take the office before any of them can get any real challengers together -”

“Buir?”

He stopped.

“Why?”

“Because,” he said, rounding the island. The photo regained its place on the conservator. He doesn’t touch Kote. There’s no Keldabe, no quick hug. Nothing. There’s no offer to stay for dinner or to spend the night or to come to join him on whatever project he’s working on. There’s only his voice, steady and matter-of-fact. “Because that’s what buire do.”

He turned. Moved away. Left.

Kote remained stuck in the kitchen, rooted to the spot. The backdoor slammed close, he watched it, and then - and then Kote just cried.

He cried for a long time.

When he finished, he went back to the front door. He put his boots back on. He picked up his backpack. He left, heading back to the 212th. On the way, he peeled open Dooku’s memory card. Kote was only two files in when he realized this whole mess was bigger than him. He was fifteen files in when he realized that it had always been bigger than him. By the time he reached the halfway mark, he was already bent over his pad and scribbling down plans.

He paused, rolled up his sleeves, and started working.

Sorting out Manda’yaim took an entire week of debates. Kote acquiesced to the torture, stood in the circular hall of the Tsad Droten , and let the clan alore pluck at him until they had their fill. Having the Dha’kad suddenly reappear helped sway most of them. The other half quickly realized that most of Manda’yaim ’s population, who were either outright serving under Kote or had an aliit member under his care, wouldn’t be swayed to vote against him. Additionally, besides Kote, Korkie was the only other possible candidate on such short notice. Between the two of them, it wasn’t a difficult decision. Korkie admitted defeat easily enough, taking the time to shake Kote’s hand before shipping out to live with his father - as sweet as the kid was, there wasn’t a single Mandokarla bone in his body. Kote couldn’t help but wish him well. 

Buir swept into Sundari. His prodigal return to Manda’yaim politics gave Kote enough room to slip back to the 212th. By the time the clan alore realized what had happened, Kote was already halfway across the galaxy. He tried to muster up enough guilt to appear socially appropriate, but never quite managed it. The memory card Dooku had given him had been crammed full of sensitive information - Separatist troop movement, financial backlogs from droid manufacturers and tech companies, saved correspondences between Senate leaders and Separatist leaders, and, most importantly, an overlying pattern of Senate, GAR, and jetiise manipulation.

Kote poured over it all during lights out, sorting out the most damning evidence and trying to connect all the pieces Dooku was kind enough to collect for him. He told no one; not Obi-Wan, not his vode, not his Ghosts - not even Seventeen. Those late hours and early mornings stayed between him and the Ka’ra . Kote wasn’t arrogant enough to know he could do it all by himself - he would need help at one point, he knew - but in the beginning, the information was too new and dangerous. Kote was already wrapped up in it. He couldn’t stomach the thought of dragging others into it just yet. Despite appearances, Kote could learn. He’d left a trail for Rex to follow regarding Kamino. He wouldn’t be making the same mistake again.

Outside of his work with the memory card, Kote was still juggling his Marshal Commander duties and Dha’kad lessons with Obi-Wan. The former saw a drastic decrease in responsibility; the rest of the war was just extended and tedious cleanup. Battalions were already being consolidated, sent on extended leave, or disbanded altogether. For each planet that made concessions and rejoined the Republic, a platoon of Mando’ade would march back home. Most of Kote’s day was spent filling out the correct flimsiwork and saying goodbye. The rest of the hours were spent with his Ghosts or Obi-Wan.

“If I didn’t know any better,” Obi-Wan said, wiping the sweat off his forehead, “I’d accuse you of already knowing ‘saber katas.”

Kote shrugged. The Dha’kad bobbed in his hand.

“I’m a quick learner.”

Obi-Wan spun his own ‘kad around, the afterglow of its blade hovering in the air. He settled into an opening position. Kote fitted into his.

“You’re magnificent is what you are.”

“Easy, Kenobi. Someone might think you’re flirting with me.”

“Is it working?”

 A ‘kade battle. A shower. Clean clothes and twined hands and Obi-Wan drawing mindless shapes onto Kote’s bare back in the aftermath, touch featherlight and reverent. There was an odd peace in their shared quarters - in the same species as the one Kote had found on Manda’yaim but poisoned, slightly, by all the time Kote would slink out from underneath Obi-Wan’s grip in the dead of night to focus on unearthing Dooku’s conspiracy. The double life chafed occasionally, but Kote reaped more benefits than hurt. Obi-Wan was happier, the peace treaties were on their way, and Kote efficiently picked the finishing details on a whistleblowing masterpiece. The only thing missing was Darth Sidious’s real identity.

Patience, the Ka’ra told him. Let him come to us.

“You think he will?”

You’ve been a problem. He will want to see you gone.

“Why wait this long, though? The end’s nearly here.”

Ends are often new beginnings. He is crafty. Skilled. He will wait and try to hurt you when it will serve his wants the best.

Kote sighed.

“You really don’t know who it is?”

Naas. The Force is hiding him from me. I used to remember…

Kote waved his hand around.

“It’s fine. I’ve waited this long, haven’t I?”

He waited for a month. Then two. Then three. On the dawn of the fourth, peace treaties were made. They went to the Senate for ratification, headed and overseen by the jetiise , just as the new year dawned.

Four years, Kote thought, half delirious. Four years.

Kote woke up one morning - the bed empty beside him. Obi-Wan had been called back to the Temple, teaching dueling classes and philosophy and everything else a jetii should be doing - to a message from Padme. It ended up being an invitation to a preemptive celebration of the war’s end. In a move even more surprising than the invitation itself, Kote agreed to go.

Rex, looking remotely horrified, asked him why.

Kote just shrugged, marked the date in his calendar, and said, “Why the kark not? It’s free booze, good food, and the excuse to visit Obi-Wan.”

“Somehow,” Rex said, “I doubt that.”

“Pessimist.”

“Born again optimist,” Rex retorted, his face twisting up. Kote dragged him into a particularly vicious head ruffle not long after, leading into a 212th and 501st free-for-all, and the whole absurdity of the situation was dropped from their minds - almost. The closer the date got, the more tightly-wound Kote became. He didn’t fight the feeling; after so long, he’d learned to trust his instincts, trust himself. The old Cody still knew some things even if they weren’t articulable. 

Kote went to the party. 

Darth Sidious did, too.

Kote hardly knew it in the beginning, wading through all the glitz and glam and congratulatory handshakes to escape towards the ballroom’s windows. Coruscant's nightlife glowed neon on the other side, sprawling and lively. Kote considered leaving and just walking the streets. He did that more now - had sudden, spontaneous thoughts about going out and living life. He partly blamed Obi-Wan for it. The other half rested solely on Kote’s shoulders. 

Kote glanced around. Without his ‘gam and Dha’kad, which were both safely docked on The Negotiator, he was nearly anonymous. If he could leave without anyone seeing much of his face -

“Cody!”

The plan dissolved as quickly as it came. He turned. Padme was gliding over to him, looking every inch at the ex-royal and esteemed Senator she was. Dressed like she was, in folds of pale satin and her dark hair let down, she looked ethereal. It was her eyes though, large and brown and reflecting the room’s light, that made her beautiful. She smiled. Kote smiled back.

If things had been different - if Kote had been Rex or Fox and either one of them had been him - Kote might’ve been spending his nights on Coruscant surrounded by perfume and the cloying, delicate bodies of Naboo flowers. Maybe. Maybe not.

Padme approached. She held up her hands.

“May I?”

“I suppose,” he said, raising his eyebrows. She gave a sly smile in response, beckoned him down as if to tell him a secret, and pressed their foreheads together. Kote barked out a laugh.

“Rex showed me,” she said, her eyes sparkling and large. “I feel it’s a much better way to greet someone than handshakes and bows.”

“Most Mando’ade would concur.”  

She blinked. Her eyelashes brushed against his face.

“Though it’s dangerous to put yourself so close to people.”

They pulled away. Something wicked was in her eyes. Kote’s stomach lurched - he was beginning to see why she and Obi-Wan got along so well.

“Are you insinuating that you’re dangerous, Cody?”

“Not as much as the politicians.”

“You forget,” she said, her eyes glancing out to Coruscant, “that you’re a politician now, too.”

“I know. How far I’ve fallen.”

She patted his arm.

“How are the twins?”

Padme huffed, looked down at herself. “Did Rex tell you?”

“Two heartbeats,” he said. Her dress hid her stomach well but not nearly enough to trick Fett senses. Besides, underneath her makeup, she looked drawn. Tired. “You can hardly hear your own under all the noise.”

“It has been getting rather cramped.”

“Difficult, then?”

“I’ll be glad to see them in person.”

“I’m sure.”

“Have you ever thought of children, Cody?”

He choked on his drink. Padme’s face hardly twitched, but Kote knew she felt disgustingly pleased with herself. He gave her a half-hearted glare; she practically cowed.

“I’m a Mando’ad.”

“So yes?”

“Naas,” he admitted. “Not really. I haven’t had the time with everything going on. Sometimes it’s too hard to dream about the future when it's a struggle to live during the past.”

“But you want them?”

“I’m a Mando’ad,” he repeated.

“And what does that mean?”

“It means I don’t have to think about them. If they come, they come. If they don’t,” he shrugged. “Maybe I was never meant to be a buire .”

“But if they came - you’d want them?”

“Of course.”

The music changed. Padme held out her arm.

“Dance with me?”

Kote stared at it. It felt very much like a trap. Of what, Kote wasn’t quite sure. Padme titled her head. A cascade of hair moved, embroidered with curls and braids of flowers and gold strands. Kote narrowed his eyes.

“Are you going to behave?”

“Are you implying that I’m not?” She countered and elek - Kote was in some serious danger. “I’m always a picture of civility. I hardly ever tread on my partner’s toes.”

“Physically, maybe. Metaphorically…”

“Dance with me, Cody.”

Kote danced.

Padme, for all her charm and vinegar, was minuscule. Light. Fragile. Her head came just short of Kote’s shoulder, and swaying with her to the music felt like moving with air. It felt like dancing with a ghost. Her hand curled over his shoulder, pushed a little. Kote tilted accordingly.

“The Organas are here.”

Kote craned his head around. Padme reached up, pinched his chin hard, and drew him back to the front. She let go. Kote stopped himself from rubbing the sting away but pouted.

“What?”

“Discretion, my dear Mandalorian. Discretion. It’s the cornerstone of politics.”

“Not Mando’ade politics.”

“On the surface, certainly. The Senate’s the same way. But you know what they say about still waters.”

Kote’s hair prickled.

“Anything as of late?”

“Trying to get Senate secrets out of me, Cody?” She let her head rest on his chest. Kote softened in degrees, flexed the hand holding hers. Over her head, he could see the rest of the crowd realizing what was going on. More than a few gave secretive, glances at the two of them. Kote wondered if it was too late to abdicate. “We are, technically, opposed.”

“We are?”

“Mandalore has a strained history with the Republic. Satine was the first Mandalorian leader in a long time to send representatives to the Senate. With her death and your appointment, her treaties have to be reapproved. Almost everyone in this room is trying to gauge exactly where you stand on certain issues.”

“No one’s asked me anything.”

“They won’t,” Padme said. “Discretion, Cody. They know your past - can guess where you stand on certain veteran rights and security issues - but you’re an odd mixture. You’re proudly Mandalorian, dating a Jedi, and have respectfully represented the Republic in the public sphere. You’re new and curious. Those two things hardly appear together, and certainly not right on the cusp of a war ending and important treaties being signed.”

“I’m beginning to think you invited me here just to play politics, Padme.”

“Never,” she said. “You’re far too sweet of company to do that.”

Kote laughed, loud and sudden. The rest of the party jolted around them.

“Sweet isn’t a word most people use to describe me.”

“Most people are fools.”

He dropped his face down. He lowered his voice.

“Padme, why did you invite me?”

“I wanted to warn you.”

The prickling came back - stronger and more violent. Kote shuffled Padme closer to him.

“Warn me about what?”

“There’s been some rumors going around - awful ones - that you’re going to try and overrun the Senate.”

“Excuse me?”

Padma hushed him. Kote bit his tongue.

“Some senators think you want to capture the Senate.”

“Why?”

Padme hesitated.

“Padme -”

“The Senate,” she began, “has always been wary about a strong Mandalore. They like weak Mandalores, like Satine, and if they can’t have that they can at least rely on clan infighting. But now the clans are united, the Darksaber has been recovered, and you’ve already proven yourself to be capable of wielding centralized and capable executive power.”

“I’m not looking to reform the Empire.”

“Of course not,” Padme said. “But that’s not the point. The point is that you could if you wanted to - and that scares them. The war did a lot for Mandalore. It put you back into the public sphere, boosted the economy, built up a cultural identity that Satine had destroyed, and it made you a galaxy-wide hero. Mandalorians are everywhere, in every corner of the galaxy. Don’t you understand, Cody? You already have an empire. The Senate’s terrified you’ll realize it.”

“Manda’yaim doesn’t want any trouble. I don’t want any trouble. I’ve fought a war for four years straight now. I’ve had my fill.”

“Yes, but the senators haven’t. They haven’t fought that war, Cody. They don’t understand. Through the whole thing they hardly treated any of you as human; the last few rounds of policy cut your pay, the GAR budget, benefits -”

“Shh,” Kote said. He swayed from side to side. Padme’s heart had picked up and so had the twins’. It struck Kote as being too loud and fast. Unhealthy. “You’re getting louder.”

“They think you control the Jedi.”

“No one can control the jetiise.”

Padme gave him a slim, humorless smile. “The Senate thought they did. They really did. Some of the committees have begun to work on incorporation bills.”

“The jetiise will never agree to those.”

“The Senate doesn’t care. They’d push the bills through, regulate the Order, and turn it into some despotic police force. If the Jedi argued against it, the Senate would just point at the regulation and argue that they were going against the Republic’s law.”

“It’s Obi-Wan, isn’t it?” Kote asked. “That’s why they’re so worried about the jetiise . They see Obi-Wan and I and immediately think politics.”

“It’s what triggered the worst of it, yes, but it’s been a concern for a while. Most of the Jedi were given entire units of Mandalorians, and the bonds that were made…the Senate doesn’t understand. They can’t.”

She pressed her head harder against his chest. Kote held her as close and tight as he could, dipping his head to rest his forehead on the crown of her head.

Naboo flowers and twin heartbeats. There, at that moment, it struck Kote as a dangerous combination. It made his stomach flip. It made him uncharacteristically nervous.

Danger. Danger, Kote.

He shivered. He felt something begin to tip - some great galactic scale.

“Padme,” he said, speaking into her hair. “Padme. Who started the rumors?”

“I don’t know. They just started one day.”

He tipped her back. Padme stared up at him. Her eyebrows furrowed.

“Cody? Your eyes…”

“Think, Padme. Think hard. When did the rumors start?”

“Cody, you look pale.”

“Padme. Please. It’s important.”

“They only got loud a few months ago. It was right about the time that the Chancellor -”

“Ah, Padme!”

They both turned. The party was still in full swing around them, though Kote could spot the occasional side-eye, and the Chancellor was just to the side of them. His smile was nearly as wide as his sleeves but neither was large enough to hide the fact that, despite addressing Padme, his eyes were focused on Kote. He only broke eye contact when Padme dipped her head and returned his greeting.

“I was beginning to think you weren’t here, Padme.”

“I’ve been here all night, Chancellor. I was simply dancing.”

“Not with Anakin, I see.”

“Me’ven?” Kote said, the Mando’a shocked out of him. Padme’s hand clamped around his arm - using it as a lifeline, maybe, or to hold him back - and her face went a spectacular shade of red. Palpatine waved his hand about, ignoring Kote’s outburst.

“Oh, nothing to worry about my dear. Nothing at all. It’s just something interesting I picked up on. That’s all,” he said, leaning closer to Padme. Kote reflexively pulled her back and behind him. Padme didn’t fight it.

“It was still rude,” Kote said.

Palpatine’s smile dimmed. He looked at Kote.

“Ah, Commander -”

“Mand’alor,” Kote corrected. He got a perverse sense of pleasure out of seeing Palpatine’s face twitch at the title. “I’ll be stepping down from the GAR tomorrow morning after the treaties get ratified.”

“Of course. But you’re still a member of the GAR tonight, yes?”

Kote said nothing.

“It’s an honor to finally meet you, Commander. You’ve become quite a public figure.”

“Not on purpose.”

Palpatine laughed. Kote’s ears rang.

“So humble, Commander - something I never thought I’d find in a Mandalorian!”

“Is that supposed to be a compliment?”

Palpatine didn’t take the bait.

“It seems almost shameful that it’s taken us this long to meet. I’ve heard so much about you from Fox. The two of you look remarkably similar, you know.”

Kote didn’t need his enhanced senses to know the Chancellor was banthashitting him. First, Fox was too exhausted to talk about anything besides work. Second, if Fox wasn’t so exhausted and had the time to talk, it wouldn’t be about Kote or to Palpatine. Third, the old man had to blind if he thought that Kote and Fox looked remotely similar to one another.

“We’re brothers.”

“That explains it. With all the Fetts running around I simply thought it was a common last name.”

“Those would also be my brothers.”

“Really? All those commanders…your family must be quite powerful.”

“The GAR isn’t a patronage system. We earned our spots. I’m sure our track records can vouch for that.”

“They certainly do lead to some conclusions.”

“Look at the time,” Padme said, slightly louder than necessary. “I fear that if I stay up any later I’ll be no use to the Senate efforts tomorrow morning.”
“A tragedy,” Palpatine murmured. “You’ve been such a rallying figure for those treaties. It would be a shame for you to be unable to attend.”

“Thank you for understanding, Chancellor. Cody? Escort me to my room?”

“Him, Padme? Wouldn’t you prefer Anakin?”

“It’s no trouble,” Kote said, placing a bolstering hand against Padme’s back. Her heartbeat sounded fainter, almost. Kote wanted her far, far away from the Chancellor - kark Kote wanted to be away from the man. “Really.”

“Still, I’d hate for your reputation to be hurt, Padme -”

“If someone finds fault in Marshal Commander Cody escorting me back to my quarters, I’d be more concerned over their reputation, Chancellor.”

“Of course,” Palpatine said. “Of course. I simply - hm. No matter.”

He held out his hand.

“Commander Cody.”

Kote, despite the rising urge to rip Palpatine’s throat out, took up the olive branch. He extended his hand, grabbed Palpatine’s, and planned to give it the barest amount of shakes to be socially acceptable.

That had been the plan.

The reality went like this: Kote extended his hand, grabbed Palpatine’s, and the Ka’ra screeched when skin met skin. A wave of memories rose up - unbidden and violent, blocking out the noise of the party and Padme and whatever kept spewing out of Palpatine’s mouth.

The Empire. Coruscant. Dark rooms. The scent of blood and electricity and decay. CC-1010 standing next to him. CC-2224 in perfect parade rest. Voices. The swish of a heavy robe.

A hand, pinching his chin. Turning it. This way and that. Inspecting.

“CC-2224 should be capable enough for the job. Take him, Vader. I can exist without my personal guard for a small while.”

Blasterfire. More blood. Screams. Jetii’ika. Vode. Drowning and dying and his own dead eyes screaming at him.

CC-2224, the voice called. CC-2224.

Always by his side. Loyal. A caged strill. Traitor. Jetii killer just like Prime. A perfect eyayahe.

Palpatine’s mouth moved. All Kote heard was -

Execute Order 66. Blast him. Execute Order 66, CC-2224. Blast him.

Palpatine’s hand slipped away. Darth Sidious is the one to smile at him.

“Goodnight,” they both said, one in the same and right under everyone’s nose all this time. “Do sleep well, Commander.”

Kote doesn’t sleep well that night. 

He doesn’t sleep at all.

Instead, he spent the night pacing in front of his window, drenched in Corscant’s neon light and an avalanche of memory. He remembered the pain, the order, the aftermath. Kote remembered the hatred, the fear, the guilt and despair. Everything. The old Cody wept. Kote held him close, tried to patch up the holes in a soul too young to have been so old. At one point, the man Kote had been - the one who had given him everything, the one who had made him into something beautiful this time around - crumbled. He turned to dust and failure. Injustice and dead jetii’ika. Ruined temples. A spotless track record and impeccable loyalty. A soldier. The prized soldier of the Empire. CC-2224. CC-2224 - Ka’ra, what had he turned into? What did Palpatine do to him?

Kote could kill him.

The rest of the Senate was quiet. Sleeping. No one would notice if Kote left his appointed room and wandered over to the personal quarters of the building. Kote was a Fett, an ad of Jango and Manda’yaim, a beroya before anything else, and sneaking into Palpatine’s suite wouldn’t be difficult. Shoving a vibroknife straight through his throat wouldn’t be too difficult either, dar’jetii or not. Kote could do it. He had been karking trained to do it -

Patience, the Ka’ra said. Patience, Kot’ika.

Kote stopped. The world rushed in, caught up, and he stifled a scream from behind clenched teeth. He tasted blood - it was his own, not Palpatine’s. The disappointment he felt was as immense and unmeasurable as the sea.

Patience.

“Let me kill him.”

Soon, it told him. It sounded - some of the tension left Kote’s shoulders. Tarre’s words came back to him. Danger, they had said. Danger and deceit and death. Victory and failure so close together they shared the same body and breath. You will face him soon.

“Ka’ra?”

The Force is with him. It will not let him go so easily and it will not be gentle.

“Isn’t supposed to be good?” Kote asked. He wanted to run his fist through the wall. The Ka’ra hooked itself into his shoulder. Turned it stiff. He couldn’t have swung his fist back if he tried. “Isn’t there supposed to be some Light to it?”

The Light has waned. It isn’t its time.

Kote stared out the windows. The galaxy spun on. His eyes glowed in the dark.

“Too bad,” he said. “Too karking bad. I’ll drag Palpatine out of its hands even if I have to bite them off.”

The Ka’ra laughed.

My Kot’ika. My alor. So brave. So fearless - but reckless. Always reckless.

“Patience,” Kote spat. He dropped onto the edge of his bed, his entire body heavy with enflamed blood and taut nerves. He pushed his hair back. In the Ka’ra ’s silence, Kote let his mind catch up with the rest of his body.

“I can’t,” he eventually said, whispering it in disgrace.

Naas. Not now.

“If I do it tonight, I’ll just be proving the rumors right. People’ll take it as some act of war because I’m a Mando’ade and Palpatine is -”

The urge to hurt something grew again. It festered.

“I won’t start another war,” he said. His head tipped forward. Kote couldn’t look at Coruscant anymore; he couldn’t look at its lights and vibrancy, couldn’t take its naivety and ignorance. He knew too much. The rest of the galaxy knew too little.

Something in his room clicked.

Kote didn’t stiffen. He didn’t tense. He simply slid to the side of his bed, took a few steps into the darkness of his room, and waited.

He didn’t have to wait long.

His door slid open. Someone stood in the doorway, smaller than he was but masquerading in a familiar silhouette. The lights from the hall kept their face hidden. It didn’t matter. No amount of shadows or careful subterfuge could hide the sleek, silver nose of the person’s blaster.

They entered the room. Kote waited.

He waited for them to edge nearer, waited for them to duck their head into the bathroom before swinging back to the bed. He watched them approach the bed, his haphazardly flung pillows making a poor body double, and he saw the blaster raise. It shot.

Under the blue light of the bolt, Kote moved.

He cleared the edge of the bed, and swung his legs out and behind. One hooked on the person’s ankle - touched the cool surface of ‘ gam - and the other hit the ground, shifting his weight. Kote’s arms snapped up. He hooked a hand into the grooves between a chest plate and pauldron, pulled with all of his momenta, and the other pressed tight and hard over the bulge of the person’s thyroid cartilage.

They choked, flailed. Their own weight dragged them into Kote’s hold. Shifting his hand against their jaw, bruising the soft muscle there, had them drop the blaster.

“Who are you?”

They squirmed. Kote shook them.

“Who are you?”

They rammed themselves into him. Kote’s breath left him in one great whoosh, forced out by the assault of ‘ gam against his chest, and Kote squeezed tighter.

“I’ll kill you,” he said. “‘S no skin off my nose, nibral.”

The person gurgled. Beskar’gam could protect against a myriad of things, but strangulation had never been one of them.

“One last time since I’m feeling generous - who are you?”

They spit and hiss and thrash. Kote didn’t let up, let them dive straight into unconsciousness, but he didn’t kill them. Something stopped him. Something good; Kote dragged the body into the window’s overflow of light, and he stared. He stared for a long time.

It was Tup.

Tup’ika, Rex’s shiny-not-shiny. The 501st equivalent of Wooley. Tup, the vod with long hair and a sweet smile and just the right blend of ferocity and gedin’la that screamed Torrent from a full klick away.

Kote kneeled at his side.

This was the kid who shadowed him every time he boarded The Resolute , building up the courage to finally ask Kote to teach him hand-to-hand tricks to finally trip up the Dominios. This was the kid who had, once, accidentally shipped out with the 212th, sheepishly sneaking up to Kote with hungover written all over his face. This was the kid who volunteered in the medbay, who recalibrated all the training blasters, who spent hours resting against Kote’s back as they repainted squadmates’ beskar’gam, humming folk songs and reciting old poetry because he enjoyed quiet sunsets and the reflective shine of water.

Kote started stripping him of his ‘gam, searching for some slip of proof that it wasn’t Tup. He could hardly look at the face, at the bruises beginning to bloom around the next, because this was Kote’s vod . One of his verd . Kark , the kid had even outlined the blue stripes on his ‘gam in 212th gold. He was Kote’s and Kote was his and Tup had just tried to kill him.

The chest plate falls free. Tup’s identification chip tumbled down, swinging in the dark.

CT-5385, it said, the numbers boring into Kote’s mind. They catch on to something, get stuck. Kote doesn’t realize why, can’t figure it out, and forced himself to step back. The numbers revolved. They were familiar, and it wasn’t just the old Cody telling Kote one last thing. They were familiar to Kote. He knew them because -

Kamino.

Kote knew them because of Kamino. Those four numbers belonged to the list of missing CTs. More importantly, they belonged to Tup.

“Tup’ika,” Kote said, his heartbreaking and screaming and tearing itself apart in equal measure. “Oh, Tup. Tup. What happened to you?”

Tup breathed.

Kote opened Tup’s comm. The last message was still burned into the screen, a singular line of text from an unknown number.

Execute Order 66, it said. Target CC-2224.

Kote’s ears ring. The taste of blood sharpened. The want for blood did too. It was just powerful enough to keep him sane, to break through the hurt and wrath. The world came into focus. Kote tasted cool, sweet air and the reek of his own emotions. Tup’s heartbeat gave mellow thunderous crashes. Two doors down the left, Kote heard an Organa turn over in bed and keep sleeping.

Kote hacked into the comm.

It was easier than he expected; either Tup hardly worried about security breaches or the person sending Tup the message did. Kote, knowing exactly who sent the message, would put credits on the latter. Regardless, Kote broke in. From there, he infiltrated the sender’s comm.

Execute Order 66, it repeated. Target Padme Amidala.

Kote ran.

He sprinted, barefoot and half-dressed, armed only with his anger - and that would be enough. Had to be enough because what else would it be good for if not this - down the Senate halls. He threw himself down staircases. He let the Ka’ra pool into his body. He took its strength, prayed that he would get there in time, that Kote would be able to save all three of those heartbeats.

He reached her door. Kote dug his hands into the lip of its frame.

He forced it open.

Someone - not Padme - stood in the room. A blaster rose.

Kote lept.

The room broke into a supernova of blue flashes, each one punctuated with a blaster’s retort. There was the first shot. A scream, Padme raising in her bed and rolling to the side, her hair hiding her face. Another shot. Kote tumbling down with the shadow. A stray shot. Beskar’gam colliding with skin. Kote colliding back. A misfire. Pain branded into his arm, blue and red and red and blue -

Silence. Darkness.

Kote slid off the body, panting. His foot pushed out. The blaster went skittering across the room, far away from any of them.

“Padme?” He croaked. “Padme?”

He tumbled onto the bed. She was still curled onto her side, her arm curled over her stomach. Kote touched her, bunched his hands into her nightgown, and Ka’ra she was still warm. She was still warm and smelled of Naboo flowers, not blood, and her body trembled underneath his touch. Kote dropped himself down. He breathed against her shoulder.

“Padme,” he said.

“Cody,” she answered, turning. Her hands slid into his hair. “Cody, someone just…”

“I know.”

“He just shot at me. He shot at - Cody, he aimed at my -”

“It’s okay,” Kote said. “It’s okay. He missed. He missed and he won’t hurt you again.”

“He missed me. He didn’t…you’re bleeding.”

Kote drew back. Padme followed him up. His bicep was scorched by a bolt’s collateral heat, the wound ugly with a chance of healing into a mess of scar tissue, but it wasn’t awful.

“I’ll live,” he said. “You’re alright?”

Padme nodded. Her jaw clenched.

“And the ade?”

“Fine. Kicking.”

Kote slipped off the bed. Padme tried to follow him again, but Kote held up his hand.

“Stay there for a minute. Please.”

She stayed. Kote took the minute to search the verd ’s face and vambrace. His ‘gam was unpainted, but Kote recognized his identification number. His throat clicked.

“The GAR’s been compromised.”

“What?”

Kote told Padme. He told her mostly everything; he told her about Kamino and the missing verde , the hours they spent looking for them, and their sudden reappearance. Kote let it all spill out save for Palpatine. That was his burden to hold and his secret to keep. Everything else they could share. She listened and watched - watched with those brown, knowing eyes of hers - and it was only when he finished that he realized she was crying.

“Padme -”

She wiped at her face, and tilted her chin up. She opened her mouth to say something but shut it with a click when footsteps came racing up to her door.

“Hide,” she said, eyes wide. Kote grabbed at the verd and disappeared into a cavity of Padme’s closet. The door to the room slid behind him. Kote braced himself against it. Through its mechanized body, he heard someone enter Padme’s room.

“Anakin,” she said, her voice steady.

“I heard you scream.”

“It was a nightmare. Nothing more -”

“You’re lying to me.”

“I would never - Anakin!”

Something crashed and shattered in the room. The door behind Kote’s back vibrated. His body broke out into shivers, the wave of Force energy making him feel turned inside out.

“You’re lying to me,” Skywalker said, louder.

Kote’s shivers morphed into clenched fists. The Ka’ra hunkered inside of him. Low. Ready. It liked Padme as much as he did.

“No, I’m not. You know I wouldn’t, Anakin. I’m your wife.”

“Wives don’t dance with other men.”

“Wives don’t -? I danced with Cody, Anakin. Cody. Marshal Commander Cody.”

“I know who Cody is,” Anakin said, and his voice was dangerous. Kote didn’t trust it. “I know exactly who Cody is. I’m not stupid.”

“I never said you were stupid -”

“You don’t have to, Padme! You implied it.”

Silence.

“Where is he?”

“Where’s who?”

“Cody. Where’s Cody?”

“He isn’t here -”

Another crash. Kote reared against the door, almost opened it. He forced himself to shuffle back. In the darkness of the closet, poisoned by the tension seeping in from under the door, dots connected. Synapse fired. Rex’s face swam into the forefront, bruised and half-defeated.

He was going to kill Palpatine, Kote decided. Afterward, he would kill Anakin Skywalker.

“Cody isn’t here,” Padme said, her voice low but steady. “He isn’t here because he had no place in my room. He is a friend, like Obi-Wan, and that means that I will and can dance with him. I will and I can because I am your wife but not an object. You cannot control me, Anakin. More importantly, you cannot scare me.”

Silence. Kote waited.

“I - I didn’t mean to -”

“Out.”

“Padme.”

“Out. I’ll see you in the morning, Anakin. If you don’t leave, I’m afraid you’ll do something you’ll regret.”

“I would never hurt you, ‘Me. You know that. You have to.”

“Out.”

More silence. Kote tuned it out; it said things that were far too personal for even him to eavesdrop on. He only relaxed when he heard Anakin leave, the door closing behind him, and Padme opened up the closet.

They stared at one another. There was a bruise on her arm.

Kote gently reached out and brushed his fingers over it. Padme gave a pointed sniff, spun on her heel, and walked back into her room.

It was Kote’s turn to follow.

“You must think I’m an idiot.”

“I don’t.”

She flashed him a smile - sad and wobbly - over her shoulder.

“Thank you for saying that, but you do.”

“Do you know what happens to spouses who do this back on Manda’yaim ?”

Padme shook her head.

“They’re sent to jail. Or killed. Their spouse gets to choose.”

“I can’t.”

“Padme -”

Padme swayed in front of her window, bathed in a glow of neon and moonlight.

“I still love him. I know I shouldn’t, but there’s still some good in him. I know it. I can’t stop finding those moments where he’s Ani again. And I still love them. I don’t know how to not.”

“You’re not safe here.”

“He wouldn’t hurt me,” Padme said, not looking at Kote. “Not really.”

“Maybe. Maybe not. You may love him, Padme, but Anakin isn’t thinking straight. The GAR verde aren’t, either. They want you dead.”

“They want you dead, too.”

“People have wanted me dead for four years now. I can handle myself, but you’re -”

“What should I do?”

Kote stepped into the light. Another thrill - horrified, chilled, unsteady - ran through him. Padme seemed transparent as if Kote could reach right through her. Starlight reflected off her face. Moonlight ran through her hair.

“Go to the jetiise. They’ll protect you. Warn the Organas. They can lead the Senate and finish the peace treaty ratification.”

She gave one slow, somber nod.

“And you?”
The galaxy settled over his shoulders. It hurt a little to hold. Kote was going to hold it anyway.

“I’ll deal with the GAR,” he said. He closed his eyes and all the memories - Order66CommanderCC-2224 - drifted through his mind. Looking at them felt like swallowing poison. It made Kote ache and rave and settle deep into his skin.

The Ka’ra called.

Kote listened.

“I’ll deal with the GAR, and everything will be alright. I promise. By this time tomorrow, everything will be okay again.”

“You sound certain.”

“I am,” Kote said because Palpatine - Darth Sidious - wouldn’t live to see the next sunrise. Kote would make sure of it.

Even at the cost of your life?

“Go to the jetiise.”

“I will.”

“Tell the Organas.”

“I will, Cody.”

“Trust me, Padme.”

She looked at him. Those three heartbeats cried out to him.

“There isn’t anyone else I could believe in.”

Kote kissed her, faintly, on her forehead. He pulled away, heading to the door. Palpatine would die, Kote would be the one to do it, and the rest of the galaxy had to know the truth. His ‘gam and the Dha’kad were back on The Negotiator. Kote needed them. He also needed to cauterize the last wounds of the war - Kamino, Dooku’s memory card, Obi-Wan.

Kote fished out the verd from the closet. He went to the door.

“Cody?”

“‘Lek, Padme?”

“If you had children, what would you name them?”

Kote paused. He thought.

“Luke,” he said. “If it was a boy.”

“And if it was a girl?”

“Leia.”

“Luke and Leia.”

“Be careful, Padme. Please.”

“Somehow I think I should be telling you that, Cody.”

Kote turned away.

“I’ll be careful.”

The words tasted like ash. They tasted like the promise of a dead man - and maybe it was. Padme stayed in the starlight. Kote left for his destiny.

In the end, they were both doomed.

Chapter Text

Kote went back to his room. The verd, still unconscious, sagged and slid in step with him. The hallways were empty but echoed, filled with the punches of blaster bolts, Padme’s scream, the haunting, scrutinizing call of her heartbeats. Kote dropped his head. His feet kept walking, kept pushing forward. Kote supposed they were smarter than he gave them credit for.

He made it back to his room. The door opened.

“Put it down.”

Tup lurched, spun sideways. His long discarded blaster hung from his hand.

“Cody -?”

“Put. It. Down.”

Tup threw it onto the bed and stepped back as if burned. Kote continued into the room, dropped the verd into an empty chair, and stared at his face. He glanced over at Tup, crooked his finger.

“Come here. Stay five paces away.”

Tup came. Kote took hold of both of his wrists. Tup winced.

“Him,” Kote said, pointing with his free hand. “Do you know him?”

“Naas.”

Kote shook him none too gently. Tup groaned and swayed, still freshly conscious and no doubt aching.

“Think harder. Do you know him?”

“I - I don’t know, Cody. Really, I -”

“Think,” Kote ordered.

Tup’s eyes shot from Kote to the verd and then back again.

“He looks a little familiar, but so does everyone in the GAR.”

“Where did you meet him?”

“I - do you think I’ve met him?” Tup’s eyes were wide. He leaned away from Kote. “I don’t think I’ve met him. I dunno his name. It’s just his face that…”

Kote kept moving. He kept pushing forward.

“Was it Kamino?”

“Kamino? What’s Kamino?”

Kote stared at him. Tup looked back, so young and lost and scared.

“Sir,” he said, throat bobbing, “what’s happening?”

“Padme Amidala was nearly assassinated tonight.”

Tup paled. It made the bruises on his neck look darker. Meaner. Kote wanted to scrub them away with gentle hands and a bucketful of bacta. Tup’s jaw worked. His eyes flickered around the room - jumped between the blaster and the verd and the grip Kote had on his wrists - and he grew very, very still.

“I didn’t kill anyone, did I?”

“You tried to.”

“It wasn’t Padme, was it? Because I would never hurt her. Ever. She’s always been so nice to all of us and - and I would never.”

Kote tilted his head. Underneath the stale scent of his own fear - Ka’ra, if he had been a little slower, a little less quick than Padme would’ve - he could smell that Tup was telling the truth. Or, at least, what Tup thought was the truth.

“It wasn’t her. You targeted someone else.”

“Who?”

“‘S not important.”

“But -” 

“What’s the last thing you remember?”

Tup shifted on his feet. His hands gave a single, defeated flutter. Kote kept his grip tight; Tup or not, he wasn’t taking any chances. Not anymore.

“I was on The Resolute’s. In the barracks, I think, and all alone because…because the others had just come back from 79’s and wanted to know if I was up for a game of get’shuk. They sent me a comm about it. When I looked down at my comm, though,” Tup drifted off. His eyes grew unfocused as if drawn somewhere neither he nor Kote could see, and a few of the muscles on his face gave sporadic, odd twitches. Kote shook him. When it failed to drive out the hollow, dead look from Tup’s eyes, Kote shook him again. Nothing. Tups’s hands began to curl, into stiff boards at first but eventually into fists and then finally to dig his nails -

Kote slapped him.

Tup’s head flew to the side, sudden and sharp.

“Tup?”

Tup took a breath. He released it. His hands unclenched.

“Ow,” he muttered. “Ow - ow!”

He swung back around to Kote, his eyes half-wild but his.

“I need you to focus, Tup,” Kote said.

“I was focusing.”

“'Lek? What was the last you thing said to me, then?”

Tup opened his mouth. He closed it. He opened it again.

“I dunno. I can’t remember.”

“Focus. Stay with me,” Kote said. “The others had just asked up to play get’shuk with them. You looked at your comm because the message came through.”

“Right,” Tup said. “Right. My comm.‘Lek, I looked at my comm because Fives just sent me a message and it nearly made it buzz off the bunk. I grabbed it before it could fall, and then it gave another buzz. I thought it was Fives again, but the number was different. I didn’t recognize it. I opened the message anyway because it had to be someone I knew.”

“And then?” Kote urged.

Tup gave him a slow, distracted blink. A muscle in his cheek jumped.

Kote slapped him again.

This time, Tup was lucid enough to cry out immediately after the hit. His head didn’t swing as far, and Kote reached out to turn it the right way. 

“Sir,” Tup said. “Sir. You hit me.”

“I did,” Kote said. “I need you to focus, Tup. Please. The comm. What happened after you got the strange comm?”

“I looked at it. I think I read it. The next thing I know I’m waking up in this room and there’s a blaster on the floor and everything hurts. Really hurts. My neck and ankle - but my head’s the worse. It’s like someone tried to crush it or something. It still hurts.”

“Between now and after you read the comm, what happened?”

“I’m sorry, sir, but I can’t…”

Kote hit him. Again.

Tup’s whole body turned with it, and he stumbled over his own feet, falling towards the floor. Kote held him up by the wrists.

“Up,” he said, tugging. “Tup. Get up.”

“I don’t know what happened,” Tup said. He cringed closer to the floor, away from Kote, and all of his words came out in a jumbled, half-hiccuped mess. “I don’t know what happened. Please. You’ve gotta believe me. If I knew I would’ve told you already, sir. You know I would - I want to tell you. I do. But I just don’t remember. I don’t. Everything’s dark and it hurts. My head hurts so bad and I can’t focus but you keep telling me to and good soldiers follow orders-”

“Tup.”

Tup burst into tears.

“Please don’t hit me again,” he said. “Please don’t be mad at me.”

“Never,” Kote said, melting. He let go of Tup’s hands. Maybe it was a di’kut’la decision - buir wouldn’t’ve done it - but Kote couldn’t do it anymore. Not to Tup; Tup with the long hair, blossoming bruises, and head warped by some sick, twisted old man. “Naas, I’m not going to hit you again, cyar’ika. I promise. No more hitting.”

“Ni ceta. Ni ceta. I don’t wanna be bad -”

“Shh. Easy, cyar’ika. You’re not bad.” Kote kneeled on the ground and opened his arms. Tup dove in, nearly bowling them both over. Kote held on. He held Tup as tight as he dared. “I don’t let bad people into my army, Tup. You know that.”

“But I did something bad.”

“It wasn’t your fault.”

“Was too,” Tup cried, muffled and watery against Kote’s chest. “I tried to hurt somebody.”

“It wasn’t you.”

“But -”

“Tup, look at me. It wasn’t you. Do you get that? It wasn’t you because I know you. The Tup I know would’ve never even thought about hurting someone, let alone try to. It wasn’t you. Say it. Tup - c’mon. Say it.”

“It wasn’t me,” Tup said. Hearing the bare desperation in his voice hurt Kote worse than having to slap him. Kote scrubbed at Tup’s face, made sure to catch his eyes. They were red and glossy, full of the type of terror that Kote knew so well. It was the kind that came from realizing you were your own worst enemy and, no matter how awful or disgusting others were, that you could always dig down deep and pull up something crueler.

“Again.”

“It wasn’t me.”

“I promise it isn’t,” Kote said. “Something’s wrong - with you and him - but you aren’t the problem here. You’re just the victims, okay?”

Tup nodded, still looking wary. He’d believe if Kote believed because that was how Kote’s verde worked; it was why all of them, no matter what company or commander they served under, had gold paint on their beskar’gam. The GAR was his, and he took care of them - all of them, every single verd, and that meant that Kote got Tup up off the ground, reattached the nameless verd to his side, and shuttled them both into The Negotiator ’s medbay.

Kote kicked open Caf’s door. A lump on the cot shifted, groaned at the noise. An arm flopped out from the covers.

“Caf,” Kote said, ripping off the blankets. “Caf. Emergency.”

Caf blinked.

“Oribru, alor?”

“Elek. Tsikador. K’olar. K’olar.”

Kote rounded into the actual medbay to the noise of Caf hitting the floor hard, shoving himself into a pair of pants and a set of upper blacks that had seen better days. Tup sat on a cot, docile and stuck staring at his hands, and Kote laid the other verd down nearby.

“Din’kartay?” Caf asked, sliding into the room. “Ka’ra - what happened to you, Tup?”

Kote caught the medic’s arm before he could descend on the Torrent member.

“Give them a head scan.”

Caf frowned. He looked back at Tup.

“You woke me up to patch up some barfight bruises and some possible concussions?”

“Naas,” Kote said. “I woke you up because not even fifteen minutes ago Tup tried to assassinate me. The other one tried to shoot Padme Amidala. Both of their identification numbers were from Kamino’s MIA list - and Tup doesn’t remember anything. Not the assassination attempt, not what happened before the attempt, not even Kamino.”

Caf stared at him.

“What,” he asked, low and quiet, “what am I looking for in the scan, Cody?”

“Whatever you can find.”

Caf rolled up his sleeves. He went to work.

Kote didn’t watch. His mind was spinning too fast to focus, too wild to notice anything but the plan it was haltingly piecing together. Back on Kamino, Kote and all the others - the first war council of Alphas and medics and CCs - had focused on the verde’s names, not their identification numbers. Besides himself, Kote wasn’t sure if anyone else even knew which id code matched to which verd. They’d also only focused on Kamino. They’d checked rosters in the beginning, back when the missing CTs were barely scraping a hundred even, but had stopped when nothing pulled up. They had to be on Kamino still, they all thought. The kaminiise wouldn’t send them back on the field.

Di’kut’la, Kote thought, pulling up the MIA list, one constantly updated by the Alphas and CCs still on Kamino, and the GAR roster side-by-side on his comm. He watched, a little furious and overwhelmingly nauseous, as every MIA id code was plucked out from the GAR database. He scrolled through the new list; it spanned hundreds of names, the whole collection of CTs that had been snatched from Kote before he could meet them.

He stared at the list. It seemed to laugh at him - and Kote bet Palpatine was laughing at him, too. Kote bet Palpatine was high on power and life and the heady flavor of plans coming to fruition.

Kote clenched his jaw. He pulled up the priority chat. He dropped the new list, the one that highlighted the missing CTs and all of his mistakes, in the server. He gave the order to pull the selected verd from the roster, to monitor them for any signs of irrational behavior, and, after catching sight of Caf’s face, to get them into their local medbay as soon as possible.

‘Lek, Palpatine was laughing. 

Kote was going to make him choke on it.

“Well?” He asked, staring at something past Caf and Tup and the whole karking ship. He was back with Padme, with the kaminiise, with the old Cody. He was wandering up the halls of the Senate, gilded in gold beskar’gam and the Dha’kad, feeling his heart pound and the taste of death enter his mouth -

It’s time.

Kote closed his eyes. He cleared his throat.

“Come again?”

“I said they’re both chipped. Like - like strills. Animals. They’ve both got a little scar line there. It’s hardly noticeable,” Caf touched the side of his head, right by his temple. “It’s right here. Somewhere between the fontal and temporal lobe - right where your scar is, actually.”

Kote gave a little nod. The old Cody had had a similar scar. If the chip was in the same place the first time around, the head trauma from Cody’s original wound might have been enough to mess with it’s programming. If it had messed with the programming enough, then the old Cody must have lived a horrific half-life, stuck somewhere between acting on the chip’s instructions and being overwhelmingly aware of his own actions. He must’ve known exactly what he was doing every day and hour and - and Kote mourned for him. Cody’s battles, all of his guilt and hatred and terror, had become Kote’s.

Ka’ra, Kote thought, let my victories become his. Let him have peace.

“I don’t know what the chips actually do, but from all the memory gaps, erratic behavior, and whatever comm message Tup keeps talking about -”

“Can you take it out?”

Caf winced. “Brain surgery isn’t my forte, but I’ll try.”

“Call up your team. You’re going to have to record the procedure and send it around the GAR so the other baar’ure know what they’re doing.”

Caf was already on the move. He shoved his arms underneath an industrial sink, started scrubbing up to his elbows, and gestured at Kote with his chin.

“That button there, Cody - see it? Press it, would you?”

Kote pressed it. The whole medbay flashed blue before shifting into a sickly green color.

“Internal triage,” Caf explained, still scrubbing. “My team should be ready to go by the time Tup’s fully prepped for surgery. You can head down to the observation deck if you want. We’ll be in soon.”

“I’m not watching.”

“It’s Tup.”

“I know.”

Caf glanced back at him, frowning. His scowl slid away when he caught sight of Kote’s face. His hands slowed under the water. He gripped the edge of the sink.

“Cody?”

“Get those chips out. Keep it as quiet as you can. Comm Jesse. Have him sit with Tup.”

“Cody.”

Kote stared at Caf, straight and even.

“Cody,” Caf started, stopped. He bit his lip. “Put something on that blaster burn, okay?”

“Caf.”

“Please,” Caf said, turning back around to the sink. “Please. It would just make me feel better to know that you - that I -”

Kote moved to Caf’s collection of goodies. He shifted through the different cabinets to the noise of running water, deep breaths, and a baar’ur coming to terms with losing one of their patients. Kote broke open an bacta wipe, scoured the blaster wound with it, and covered it with a bacta strip. His arm thumped. The pain tried to drive him up onto his toes. Kote refused. He kept his feet flat and all his own; his to control and move. His. No one elses’. Not buir’s or the Ka’ra’s or Palpatine’s. 

Naas, the steps he had to take were all his, all CC-2224 and Cody and Kote.

Kote stared at Caf’s cabinets. That half-baked plan was back again, circling around in his mind. The longer he chased after it, the more it pieced itself together.

Kote looked over his shoulder. Caf exchanged the sink for Tup, talking to the 501st verd in a tone too low for even Kote to eavesdrop on.

Kote yanked open another cabinet. He took out two packets of stim mixture - the heavy dosage ones - and, from the shelf right below that one, a packet of hypo mix. He paused, thinking, and then took a second hypo packet. He had a feeling he would need it.

Kote left the medbay.

He stopped by his quarters first, sliding into the second skin of his beskar’gam and hooking the Dha’kad onto his hip, before heading to the barracks. He navigated through all the sleeping verd, through the piles of boots and half-stacked ‘gam, between and around all the occupied cots. He stopped short of one berth.

“Crys,” he said, tugging the verd out of bed.

“Me’bana?” Crys said. His head gave a groggy roll backwards, as if trying to return back to his pillow, and his hands rose up to push weakly at Kote. Kote pulled him up. He began to march him into one of The Negotiator ’s meeting rooms.

“ Alor - alor! Me’bana?”

Kote thew the two of them into the room. Crys stumbled into an empty chair, nearly tipping the whole thing backward, and groaned when Kote turned on the holotable. Crys squinted through the avalanche of blue light.

“What the kark, Commander?”

Kote fished Dooku’s memory card out. He waved it under Crys’s nose.

“How soon can you upload this to the net?”

“Dunno. How big is it?”

“I don’t know. Big. I want it securely uploaded. No tracks or traces. Nothing.” Kote leaned over Crys. The tech genius slid down in his chair and stared up at Kote as if he had gone din’la - and maybe Kote had; sanity and insanity were slippery slopes that Kote never stopped tumbling down. “I want it to open on a timetable, all at once and together, and I want it to broadcast on every major news network in the whole galaxy.”

“‘S that all?”

“I want it up and counting down in an hour max. And I don’t want you to look at any of it. If you do, I’ll know. I won’t be happy.” Kote paused. He waved the chip around. Crys took the hint and pulled it free of Kote’s grasp. “Tayli’bac?”

Crys’ voice came out hushed. His eyes kept flickering over Kote’s face.

“Elek,” he said.

“When you’re done with that, I want you to open a similar channel on my buy’ce recorder. Manual, this time, but on the same scale.”

“What’re you gonna do?”

Kote leaned further down. One of Crys’ legs started bouncing.

“Tatugir ibac.”

“Cody -”

Kote took back the chip. Crys lurched after it, standing up. Kote shoved his shoulder.

“Get out. Back to bed.”

Crys stared.

“Go. If you’re not going to do it, then go. I’ll get Tech.”

“I only asked a question. Just a question. That’s all.”

“I don’t have time for questions.”

“Why?” Crys said. His voice echoed. “Why not? What’s wrong with you, Cody? Why’re you acting - stop it!”

Kote paused. His hand hovered right above the button on his vambrace to call Tech.

“You’ll do it?”

“I’ll do it,” Crys said. His voice wavered. He slowly - painfully - sat back in the chair. “‘Course I will, Cody. I’ll do it. You don’t have to call Tech. I won’t ask anymore questions.”

Crys held out his hand. Kote gave him the chip and his guilt crawled up and out of his throat to settle in the space between them. He swallowed. 

“Crys,” he said, a little gentler. Softer. 

“It’s important, huh?”

“Very.”

“It’s fine, then. I get it. You’ve got your reasons and I’ve got a job. I’ll get it done for you. You don’t have to worry about it.”

But Kote did. When Kote left, leaving behind the chip and Crys’s curled shoulders, it was to the manta of fear and worry - Crys was drenched in both, some mixture of betrayal by someone he trusted in and the sudden confusion, and Kote wore both like his beskar’gam, open and ready for war. He’d worry. He’d worry about all the things he could’ve said to put Crys at ease, to tell the verd’ika that everything would be alright and Kote would explain the entire mess after he finished cleaning it up; he’d worry about all the things he could’ve shared with Crys to make him understand why Kote acted the way he did, why he was so desperate and unraveled, why he had slapped Tup and pushed Crys and - and why he was carrying around two hypo mixes.

Between all of the that, Kote should’ve explained, he was just as scared as the rest of them. The scales were tipping, the galaxy was hanging in the balance, and Kote was trying to keep it all steady. The possibility of him achieving it - of saving the life he should’ve had and the one he had pieced together for himself - seemed laughable.

Even at the cost of your life, the Ka’ra had asked, you’d do it?

Of course, Kote wanted to respond, of course I’d do it. Me for everyone else. One for the multitude. A sixth born  Mando’ad in exchange for Obi-Wan and his vode, for all the ade with far too much life to still live, for peace and prosperity. Elek , Kote would do it. He’d try. He only regretted having to leave so many behind.

If he died Manda’yaim would fall into chaos. Maybe even the whole galaxy. Worse, Kote was pretty sure his aliit would suffer, too. Even more awful, there would be Obi-Wan. If Kote died, Obi-Wan would - 

He looked down at his feet. He kept moving. He mauled and mangled the fear, tore it to pieces and refused to let it piece itself back together. He ripped it out of himself.

Kote left everything behind. Everything.

He went back to the Senate.

The halls were still empty. Still silent. The only reflection in the windows were his and, occasionally, the silver forms of the other Mand’alore. To give him strength, Kote wondered, or to take him home?

He never asked the question aloud. He had a feeling that he already knew the answer.

Kote stopped. He knocked on a door.

“Tenn.”

Kote stepped inside.

“Hey,” he said. Across the room, Fox’s head jerked up. Kote found himself smiling despite everything. He hadn’t seen Fox in person since Kamino. His vod looked a little older, a little more run-down, but the curl of his lips and the color of his hair were the same. Kote wondered what he must look like. Stange, he bet. Altered. 

“Cody?”

“You’re still up?”

“Obviously,” Fox said. His nose wrinkled. “Why’re you -?”

“The war ends tomorrow.”

Fox tapped his pen against his desk. He sized Kote up as if he wasn’t quite sure what to do with him anymore. The bounds of brotherhood had shifted, been turned around. The sixth had become larger the life while the rest tried not to be left behind even as Kote pushed further and faster.

“Nervous?”

Kote shrugged. Fox’s eyes moved down. They rested on the Dha’kad . He leaned back in his chair, scratched as his week old stubble. Kote certainly felt torn apart, but Fox looked the part. It was odd seeing his ori’vod so rumpled - Fox was clean cuts and predatory elegance, all sharp and quick. His eyes were still his, though. Kote wasn’t sure he could say the same. 

Fox gestured down at his hip. 

“So it’s true?”

“I’d rather not talk about it.”

Fox opened his mouth, closed it, and then gave a breathy huff. Kote had the sudden urge to ask what his vode talked about when he wasn’t there. What had all the leaves at home been like? What about all those late night dinners that turned into early breakfasts that they occasionally shared? Kote had never gotten the privilege of going to one. He wasn’t quite sure if he had ever been invited.

“What do you want to talk about, then? We’re both still too busy for social calls.”

“Maybe,” Kote said. “Maybe not. You want some caf?”

“It’s early.”

“So?”

“Cody,” Fox said, “why are you here?”

“Do you want me to go?”

“Stop avoiding my questions.”

“You haven’t exactly been answering mine.”

Fox frowned. Kote watched his eyes. His ori’vod was trying to regroup and find the best way to tear down Kote’s walls, and that meant that Fox would need time.

“Caf?” Kote offered again. He kept his tone light. Harmless.

Fox took the bait. 

“There’s a caf machine back in the office lobby,” he said. “Don’t ruin mine with sugar.”

Kote left. Fox’s eyes followed him on the way out, and the space between his shoulder burned all the way down to the office lobby. Kote ignored it - he was good at doing that, too - and instead shook packets of instant caf and watched the water boil. He made two cups. One became a combination of sugar and stim. 

The other housed the hypo mixture.

Kote went back to Fox.

“Mm - not that one,” he said, swinging one of the cups out of Fox’s reach. “You said no sugar.”

Fox took the other cup. He gave it a pointed tilt in Kote’s direction.

“You don’t like sugar either.”

“I’m celebrating.”

Kote laid out on the office’s low futon.

“That’s too small for you.”
Kote’s feet dangled off. He drew them back in, readjusted himself, and stared out the window. The sky began to turn grey in splotches, and Kote watched as a few stars sent themselves off to bed. Dawn was coming. Kote was running out of time.

Fox drank his caf. Kote shifted.

“Do you think I’d make a good buir?”

Fox’s pen clicked once, twice -

“Come again?”

“Am I buir material?”

“You’re an ad,” Fox said. He sounded half-scandilized. “You’re too young for ade.”

“Pretend I’m older, then. Make me Wolffe’s age. You’d think I could be a buir?”

“Of course you could,” Fox said, emphasizing the last word. Kote glanced over; his ori’vod had returned to his flimsiwork, but the cup of caf stayed in his other hand. It looked half empty already. Kote turned back to the window, shut his eyes, and counted all the way up to ta’raysh. More pen clicking, Fox speaking. “What brought that question on?”

“Can’t I just be curious?”

“You’ve never talked about ade before.”

“Padme asked me about it.”

“After or before you danced with her?”

Kote left out a laugh. “Ka’ra, Fox. Don’t you ever get sick of knowing everything?”

“Never.”

That there, Kote thought, was the problem. Fox had connections. He had the Guard. He had knowledge and the willpower to use it. Out of all of his vode, Fox had always been the one to give Kote a run for his credits. It was a competition Kote couldn’t afford. It would only be dangerous.

“I think the real question is if you want them. Ade, I mean.”

“I haven’t really thought about it.”

“But with the war wrapping up…”

“But with the war wrapping up,” Kote repeated, letting Fox bully him deeper into the conversation, “I don’t know.”

“For such a mirdala’la strategist you haven’t paid much attention to your own future, huh?”

“What’s the point? I could either die by tomorrow or I could live to be Mand’alor .”

“Don’t say that.”

“Huh?”

“That you might die tomorrow. Don’t say that.”

Kote looked over at Fox again. His vod had put the caf down and was pinching the bridge of his nose. Kote tried to remember what repentance felt like.

“Maybe you should take a break, Fox.”

“I’m fine,” Fox said, waving Kote off. “Just a little tired. I’ve worked through worse.”

“Drink some more caf. It’ll help.”

Fox grunted. He drained the rest of his caf. Kote sipped his.

“What are you going to do?”

“After the war?” Fox asked. “Probably finish law school. Palpatine might be a sha’buir, but he’ll give me a letter of rec good enough to pick up where I left off without any trouble.”

“You don’t like him?”

“He gives me the creeps.”

“He doesn’t like me.”

“You’re popular,” Fox said. He yawned, covered it with his hand, and then shook himself.  “Popular and powerful. Senators don’t like that.”

“I’ve realized.”

“What about you?”

“Me?”

Fox made a motion with his hand. “Naas, the other person in the room - ‘lek, you, Cody. What are you going to do after the war?”

Kote gestured at the Dha’kad. “Isn’t that a little obvious?”

“Your job is, sure. Everything else, though? You want me to believe you’re going to let your Ghosts go? That you’re never going to finish your degree -?”

Kote squirmed.

“I never wanted to go to uni anyway.”

“I’m going to pretend you never said that,” Fox said. Kote griped his cup tighter. “And don’t sit there and tell me that you’re not going to do anything with Obi-Wan.”

“I might not be able to.”

“You two haven’t been fighting, have you?”

“Been waiting long for the wedding invitation, Fox? You almost sound concerned.”

“Of course I am. We all are.”

“We? There’s a ‘we’ here?”

“There’s always been a ‘we’, Cody. Our aliit. The GAR. The jetiise. If anyone in this whole karking mess deserves happiness, it’s you and Obi-Wan. We’ve all been waiting for the two of you to finally have the opportunity to have it.”

Kote laughed, soft and desolate. His heart began beating faster, a combination of sugar and stim. His pulse jumped and jolted, swung around and around. Kote nearly felt alive.

“I wouldn’t hold your breath, vod.”

“Why not?”

Kote stared out the window.

“I don’t think I was made for happiness.”

Fox said nothing. Kote felt him staring, though.

“The Ka’ra,” he started, swallowing, “well, it says stuff. Nice stuff. Sun and starlight and little images. I think it wants the best for us, but sometimes I just - I just think about everything. I think about the first Cody. I think about me - this Cody. I think about why it brought us all back.”

“It wanted to give us a second chance, Cod’ika.”

Kote rubbed at his temples. His fingers slipped over the familiar curve of his scar. He’d been young when he got it. He’d been messing around The Firespray, walking on one of its wings, and had falled. He’d woken up on the hangar’s floor, sticky and hot in a pool of his own blood, and when he had tried to get back up, he couldn’t.

Kote had laid there for over an hour, blinking up at the ceiling as The Firespray’s wing rained his blood back down on him.

Fox had been the one to find him.

Kote wasn’t sure his ori’vod ever recovered. He didn’t blame him.

“Does it feel like a second chance to you?”

“A lot of things have stayed the same, if that’s what you’re asking. But so many have changed, too. We have buir. We have eachother. Haran, we’re getting paid this time around. I’ve got weeks of sick leave I can use at any time. We’ve got a home, a real aliit. The war’s even ending.”

Kote’s comm vibrated. It was Crys.

“If you weren’t made for happiness, Cody, what were you made for?”

He thought of the Dha’kad. He thought of the Ka’ra. He thought of the GAR, of all of his vode back together and painted gold. Kote remembered his childhood, the agonizing moments in ARC - of crying and having Seventeen piece him back together, of pulling his body too far past its limits and having to keep going - and all the campaigns. Pain and love so entangled that he could hardly remember which one wasn’t supposed to hurt him. 

Kote tipped his head back.

“Fox, if someone offered you the chance to save everyone you loved, would you say yes?”

“What’s the catch?”

“You don’t know. You never asked. Not really.”

“Depends. Could I trust the person offering it to me?”

“Elek.”

Fox was silent for a while, thinking.

“I’d ask for the catch.”

His comm glowed again.

It’s ready, Crys said. Good luck, sir.

“I didn’t,” Kote said, voice soft. “I never asked.”

“Cody?”

“Satine was the oldest Mand’alor, you know. Forty. Except she was never Mand’alor. The others - they were all younger. They didn’t live as long. Most died before they were thirty.”

“What’s that have to do with anything?”

“They all asked for something. The Ka’ra gave them an offer, and they took it.”

“I don’t understand, Cody. You’re talking -”

“This entire time I thought it was just asking me to be Mand’alor , you know? It promised me a different life. A way out. Second chances. I asked it something, it offered, and I took it,” Kote said - and Ka’ra the stim was really hitting him now. He felt like he could fly. Maybe he would. “I never asked for the catch. I just thought I was going to have to give up Cody, that I would have to give up that life - but Mand’alore die young.”

“Kote -”

Kote smiled.

“Yeah,” he said. “That’s my name.”

Fox stared at him. His eyes were glassy. Slowly, so slowly it hurt, Fox turned his head to look at his cup of caf. He reached one of his fingers in, dabbed at the bottom, and came back with his finger littered with white particles. He looked back at Kote.

“I’m sorry.”

“What - what did you do?”

“It’s going to be okay, Fox.”

Fox tried to lunge up. He couldn’t. Instead, he rocked forward a little, unsettled his desk, and then slumped back into his chair. His pen rolled out of his hand. Kote caught it, leaving behind the futon, and his hands trembled. 

He didn’t think it was because of the stim.

“Kote,” Fox said, and there was something in his eyes, some genre of betrayal that only a vod could read, and there was anger, too. Ferocity. Kote was suddenly glad he had grabbed two hypo packets.

“It’s okay, vod. I promise.”

Kote approached. Fox bared his teeth, but Kote wasn’t sure if it was at him or at himself. Maybe both. Kote approached with caution, sinking down on his knees. He started to unlatch Fox’s ‘gam one piece at a time. Fox jerked his head around.

“Don’t -”

“I’m not made for happiness,” Kote said. He stacked the ‘gam in a tidy pile. “But that doesn’t mean that you aren’t.”

Fox stared.

“You can go finish school. Become a lawyer. Bully people around.”

“Kote.”

Kote placed his hand against Fox’s chest. His vod’s heart was slow. Steady. Falling down, down, down into unconsciousness. His eyes, though - Kote couldn’t meet them.

“It’s gonna be okay.”

Fox’s head drifted down. Kote felt his vod hiss in a breath, and then his head was on Kote’s shoulder.

“You’re scaring me,” he said. “Don’t do whatever you’re planning. Don’t.”

“Go to sleep, Fox.”

Fox struggled again. Kote held him.

“Please go to sleep. Please -”

“Mir’sheb,” Fox said, and his voice  - you’re okay Kote, you’re okay. I’m here. I’m here. Buir’s coming. It’s just a little blood. Please don’t go to sleep. Stay awake, Kote. Stay awake for me, please - was high and strained, pulled taunt. “Mir’sheb don’t you do this. Kote, don’t you karking do this.”

Kote slipped Fox clear from his chair. His ori’vod was heavy even without the beskar’gam , and Kote grunted. He took a few wavering steps over to the futon and gracelessly dropped Fox onto it. He rearranged his brother’s legs and arms.

They stared at one another.

“I just,” Kote started, hiccuping. He scrubbed at his face. Took a breath. “I just want you all to be safe. Happy.”

“Not like this,” Fox said, slurring. “Don’t do it like this, vod -”

Kote stood up. Fox reached for him, got his fingers hooked into Kote’s chest plate, and held on as tight as he could. Kote caught his hand. He peeled the fingers away.

“I’ve gotta go.”

“You don’t.”

“You don’t get it,” Kote said. He looked out the window. Coruscant’s lights were fading. The sun was rising. “But you will. One day, I hope.”

“Kote -”

Kote left.

He was running out of time.   

He sent the Guard to the Senate - making a specific note to protect the Organas and watch against other assassination attempts - and checked through his comm. The priority chat was a mess. Obi-Wan was concerned. Rex was wondering where the kark he was.

Kote?

“Give me a minute,” he said. “Just give me - I can’t just leave them.”

I have them.

“I know. I know. I - Ka’ra.”

Shh. I have you Kote. The galaxy can wait for a moment.

It does. Somehow. Kote stood outside of Fox’s office, watching the day dawn, and held his buy’ce before him. The visor stared, recorded. Kote blinked, cleared his throat. He recorded the messages - the letters. One for each of his aliit; his vode and Obi-Wan and buir. He talked until his throat gave up. He told them everything. Everything and all of it and at the end Kote bowed his head against gold-streaked beskar’gam and cried.

“It’s calling,” he said, wiping at his face. “It’s calling, and I’ve gotta listen to it.”

Kote.

Kote closed his eyes. It was Tarre this time. Tarre and Shae and Ordo. Everyone. 

The letters sent. Kote saw them all delivered.

His aliit opened them.

Kote shut off his comm. He started walking.

People rushed by him. The Senate was beginning to wake up. He caught glimpses of the Guard, of senators, of some diplomatic jetiise. No one stopped him.

Kote marched on.

We’re with you. I am with you.

He went up a set of stairs. He turned. He went up another set.

Kot’ika my Kot’ika. Everything will be alright.

He stood before a set of doors, the air electric and twitching.

You’re ready.

Kote turned the handle. He walked in.

The room was red. Red walls, red carpet. Gold detailing. Coruscant spread out on the far wall, skyscrapers and ships and the lifeblood of the galaxy. Against one wall was a set of screens. Each one was turned to a different news channel. Each one had the same countdown timer ticking away. Kote placed his buy’ce on a table. He pressed the recording button, tapping into the backdoor Crys had made for him. One of the far screens flickered. It came back on with Kote’s output.

“Fox? Is that you?”

Kote said nothing. Palpatine swept into the room, making for the window.

“I’m glad you took the initiative to come here. I was planning on visiting you today, actually. One last order to give before we part ways.”

“Sir?”

“Order 66, Fox. Send that out to the GAR.”

Kote stepped up to the low dais.

“Have you sent it?”

“Yes sir.”

“Wonderful,” Palpatine said, practically vibrating under the folds of his robe. He managed to calm himself. “I met your brother last night - well, one of them. Cody, I think? Yes, Cody.”

“Oh?”

Palpatine shook a finger.

“He’s dangerous. Wild. There are rumors, you know. I’m not much of a man for gossip, but there are rumors, Fox. Ugly ones. I didn’t want to believe them - he did play such a critical role in the war - but there was something in his eyes, and it didn’t spell peace for the Republic.”

Palpatine sighed.

“You Mandalorians have such a poor reputation. I’d hate for it to be destroyed so thoroughly.” He cocked his head as if expecting Fox to respond. Kote didn’t. “He was dancing with Padme last night. Cody was, I mean. And this morning - I’m sure you’ve already read the report.”

“Report?”

“Padme, bless her, has been killed. Assassinated. The camera footage -”

“Sir, there wasn’t any report.”

Palpatine half-turned. His voice grew crueler.

“Pardon?” He said. “I believe you’re mistaken, CC-1010.”

“Padme Amidala left her room this morning. Perfectly healthy.”

“And your brother? Cody? There were rumors that he -”

“I wouldn’t put much stock in rumors.”

Palpatine stiffened. He turned around. Behind both of them, the countdown ended.

Dooku’s data went live.

Kote ignited the Dha’kad.

“You’re going to kill me? I’m the Chancellor of the Republic - that’s treason.”

“So is working against the Republic.”

Palpatine’s face gave an ugly twitch. Kote felt the thing from Manda’yaim ’s tunnels - the Dark side of the Force - flow into the room. The Ka’ra growled, extended its claws, and snapped its teeth. The Dha’kad burned.

“I see,” Palpatine said, and then -

And then there was war.

Palpatine threw out his arm. Kote expected a Force push, braced himself for it, and was rewarded by a wave of lightning careening towards him. He threw up his arms. His ‘gam sang. His jaw clenched.

“Beskar,” Palpatine spat. “I’ll melt it off of you if that’s what it takes, Cody.”

Kote swung the Dha’kad around.

“It’s Kote,” he said. “And I’ll like to see you try.”

Another wave of lightning. Kote ducked, felt it skim across his shoulder, and let the Ka’ra flow into him. He felt it twine around him, into his blood and bones and soul. The Force hissed. Kote snarled back. He sprinted forward. Palpatine flipped, fell behind him. Kote spun. Their ‘kad met. The contact tore at both of them.

The Force washed over him. Kote breathed through the sudden wave of nausea, at the way it was trying to push him clear of his own body.

You have meddled, it said, so violently angry that Kote’s legs stumbled. Palpatine came at him, whirling. Kote blocked and took and tried to give back as much as he was given. Red and black clashed. The Ka’ra and Force twisted and turned. The room spun. You have meddled and that cannot stand. The balance must be fixed.

“Then let me fix it,” Kote said, parrying. “Let us make a new balance.”

Never.

Red. Floors, walls, ‘kad. Red like Guard armor. Red like Fox’s hair. Red like blood dripping from his ‘gam and from The Firespray - hold on Kote, hold on for me, please. Buir’s coming. Do you hear that? Everything’s going to be okay - and life and love. Red like his heart and his hate and the taste of his rebirth.

“There’s good in you,” he said. “So much good. Let me see it. Please. There’s Dark in you - but there’s Light, too. Let me see that, please. Let me see what Obi-Wan sees.”

The Light isn’t here. It isn’t its time.

“Please,” Kote said. More lightning, charring the breath out of his lungs. His head spun. His arms began to ache. He pushed through it. He had to. The Ka’ra chanted. Kote drifted in and out of its song, coming back in moments of tangled ‘kad and snapping teeth. Palpatine fell back. Kote pushed. The Force shoved him away. Kote fought it. He clawed and yelled. He thrashed. His ‘gam cried.

Red and black. Black and Red.

Gold. Flashes and sparks of it. Flecks of paint. Sunlight.

Naas, Kote wasn’t made for happiness. Not quite. He was an eyayahe; a Mandokarla soul forced into a body that didn’t quite fit, filled with a Mando’ade’s spirit and fervor, and baptized in Kamino’s lashing storms. Kote was made for vengeance. He was made for redemption and justice, the bringer of second chances. He was made for war and pain. Work and toil, shereshoy. Kote was made for the rising of the sun - burning, burning, burning until he didn’t have any more light to give.

Kote hit the ground. He skidded. Ka’ra, his chest hurt.

“You’ve meddled, Commander,” Palpatine said. “I won’t allow you to continue.”

More lightning. Kote writhed. He couldn’t breathe.

Kote.

The Ka’ra pet his head, his sides, his back. It hooked itself into his ‘gam.

Kote. Oya. Oya, my Mand’alor. One last fight.

Kote struggled to his feet. For the first time in years, he was aware of himself - really aware. He was too light. Too weak. His ‘gam was big on him. His scars ached. Blood fell from his mouth - but his hand was still curled around the Dha’kad . He still tried to get up.

Die, said the Force. Die, CC-2224. Die -

“Cody!”

Blue. Something wounded and scared ripped itself free from Kote’s chest.

CodyKote, something said, mellow and sweet and like a balm.

Kote closed his eyes. Blue and red fought behind his lids, dancing around and around as they did for eons. He fumbled in his vambraces and pulled out the second stim pack. He swallowed it dry, chased it down with blood and some new, unknown fear he didn’t know he had.

Get up, CodyKote. He needs you. We need you.

Kote got up.

He’d keep burning.

The room glowed. Red and blue and the blinding purple they made - and black, so dark it drowned out the rest. More lightning. More pain. More ‘kade swinging together and disconnecting. The Force fought. Itself, the Ka’ra, everyone. Palpatine launched himself at him. Kote held him off, felt one of his feet drag out from underneath him, and went down. Blue fire covered him, so bright he couldn’t look.

“Not him,” the blue screamed. “Don’t you take him again!”

The world split. Cracked. Rearranged.

It turned blue and then red and Kote was sprinting. Running. Red slashed down.

Kote didn’t feel the pain.

He didn’t feel the ‘kad enter through the weak spot on his ‘gam - the same spot that Palpatine had hit over and over again. He didn’t feel the burn or the way the Ka’ra screamed. He just saw blue eyes, ginger hair, and that chasm stretching before him.

The Dha’kad swung. It connected. Kote watched Palpatine’s eyes - gold, dark and murky, a poor mirror of Kote’s own - grow wide. There was fear in them.

Kote smiled.

Palpatine stumbled back. He slid clear of the Dha’kad. His lips pulled back. He looked down at Kote’s ‘gam .

“I’ve killed you,” he wheezed. “You’re dead on your feet.”

“Elek,” Kote said even though it still wasn’t hurting, still hadn’t connected. He grabbed for Palpatine’s robes and dragged the Chancellor and Sith Lord closer. “And so are you. You’ll go first. I’ll follow.”

Kote raised the Dha’kad again.

“I’ll follow,” he said, “and I will never stop hunting you.”

Kote lowered the Dha’kad.

Palpatine’s head rolled.

The rest of his body went with, slipping out of Kote’s hands to pool on the floor. Kote staggered away. He tried to breathe. He couldn’t. He looked down and saw the wound. He shut his eyes.

“Cody?”

Hands. Hands on his arms. Kote leaned into them.

“He got me,” he said, throat bobbing. “He got me bad.”

He fell. The hands followed.

“No - no. You’ll be alright, darling.”

Kote swallowed. He opened his eyes.

“Obi-Wan.”

Obi-Wan’s hands fluttered. They eventually rested on Kote’s face. They tucked his hair back, ran over his nose, and pressed against his cheekbones. Kote squinted at him.

“You weren’t supposed to be here.”

“I felt you. You shined and the Force called. I - how could I ever leave you?” Obi-Wan cupped his chin. His head dipped. “Our battles, Cody. They were supposed to be ours.”

Kote shook his head.

“This one,” he said, “was always mine.”

“You -”

Kote grabbed Obi-Wan’s hand. He twined their fingers together.

“The others are coming,” Obi-Wan said. He squeezed Kote’s hand so hard the bones shifted. “The other. Your vode . Fox and the Guard and Wolffe and - and everybody. There’s coming, Cody. They’ll be here. Just stay awake for me. For me, please. Please.”

Kote, the Ka’ra whispered. Kote.

“Obi-Wan.”

“Don’t,” Obi-Wan said. “Don’t. Cody, please. Stay with me. Don’t leave. I - I can heal you. I can -”

Obi-Wan’s hand wandered down. Kote felt the Force rise - the Light, screaming, and the Dark, laughing - and he stopped his jetii. Obi-Wan’s eyes flashed gold.

“I can heal you -”

“Naas,” Kote said. He dragged Obi-Wan’s hand to his lips. He searched the man’s face. His other hand came up, traced those blue eyes he loved so much. “I’m not worth that.”

Obi-Wan’s whole body shivered. The room copied him.

“I can’t live without you.”

Kote. Kot’ika. My Mand’alor. Come. Come, Kote.

“Do you hear me, Cody? I can’t live without you. I don’t know how to let you go. I can’t. Don’t make me. Please. Don’t - it’s supposed to be us, Cody! It’s supposed to be me and you. Don’t just let it be me.”

Dangerous, Palpatine had called him. Dangerous and wild.

Ha. 

Kote knew what danger felt like. He knew what wild felt like.

It felt a lot like love.

“Obi-Wan,” he said.

Obi-Wan froze. He stared at Kote.

“Don’t,” he pleaded. “Don’t say it. Not under duress. Not like this.”

“Cyare,” Kote said, smiling a broken little thing. “Cyare, when else am I going to say it?”

“Don’t.”

“Obi-Wan.”

“I will never forgive you,” Obi-Wan said, crying. “I will never…”

Kote. It’s time.

He heard bootsteps. The news channels kept rolling. Kote held Obi-Wan’s face and drew it down to his own. Obi-Wan sobbed.

Kote. Come.

Outside of it all - outside of the office, the Senate, the Ka’ra and the Force, and the binding ties between him and Obi-Wan - dawn was breaking. The sun rose. It streamed in through Palpatine’s windows, turning everything gold and new.

It looked beautiful. Kote hoped it was full of happiness.

“I love you,” he said. He pressed their foreheads together. “I’ve never loved anyone else.”

“No. No, Cody -”

Kote, the Ka’ra called. 

Kote’s eyes closed.

“I love you,” he whispered. “And I will always love you.”

(Starlight. Dawn-not-Dawn. Kote swayed. The other Mand’alore waited, just watching.

You’re not happy.

His hand, sifting through the wheat.

I want you to be happy, Kote. I want you to be happy. )

Chapter Text

(Kote lingered. The Ka’ra followed. Sometimes it spoke to him.

Tarre says you wish to go back .

He didn’t answer. Didn’t turn. He just kept walking forward in that slow, new way of his.

You wish to go back .

He stared out, out, out into the wilderness of time and space.

Would that bring you happiness, Kote?

Kote turned. His eyes - beautiful jaig , so rightfully earned - pleaded.

The Ka’ra couldn’t ignore them.)

In the beginning, there was darkness.

It spiraled in space, ink-like and endless, and it was the kind of darkness filled with bruised blues and violets, slivers of silver and shadows. In the midst of all those colors there came a heat, a spark, the culmination of the darkness and its boundless depths, and the first star was born. 

It was called the Ka’ra .

It walked alone for a long time. Its steps echoed in the dark, glowing with the light of dying comets and the bloom of new stars. It was gold and bronze, warm and molten, and when it smiled, it showed too many teeth. When it laughed, it sounded like a hunting call. Its eyes shined in the dark. The other gods steered clear of it. They didn’t like it. They didn’t trust it. The R’iia was too aggressive, filled with sandstorms and hate; it called only to the ugly parts of the Ka’ra . The Holy Mother was too aloof, too easily swayed to stay stationary and simply watch its people. The Force was the worst of them both - too fickle and vulnerable until you tipped too close to its leaf-littered planets. The Ka’ra was cut by the Force more times than it was greeted. They swung out of each other’s orbit, the Force clinging to planets while the Ka’ra fled to open space. It wandered. There was no place for it. There was only darkness.

It was called the Ka’ra , and it was alone for a long, long time.

Then came the Taungs. Coruscant and the Zhell, bloodshed and honor, the volcano - fleeing into the endless darkness, fleeing and searching and looking. The Ka’ra followed their ships. When they strayed, it corrected them. When they flagged, it urged them forward. It searched with them. It looked.

“Spirit,” a Taung said to it once, prowling the front of his ship and looking out. “Spirit.”

The Ka’ra edged closer.

Ka’ra , it said, speaking the old tongue of the cosmos. That is my name .

The Taung had nodded, a slow, graceful dip of its neck, and looked straight at it. The Ka’ra felt something sear through its form; the Taung knew, he understood, and - and he was unafraid. Brave.

The Ka’ra crept closer.

“You have followed us, Ka’ra . You have watched over us. We give you nothing - no offerings, no praises - and yet you aid us.”

Elek .

The Taung stared at it.

“ Ka’ra ,” he said. “Aid me. Guide my path. Let me lead my people to a brighter future.”

The Ka’ra paused. It stretched out, dragged its claws against the ship’s window, felt something calling to it from inside the Taung. Distantly, it knew what the Taung was asking. Supplies were running out in the ships. Ade were dying. The Taungs needed a planet. The Ka’ra knew how to make one. It tapped its claws.

It was called the Ka’ra , and it was tired of being alone.

What do I call you ?

The Taung paused.

“My people,” he said, “call me Mandalore the First.”

In the beginning, there was darkness. Then there was the Ka’ra - and when it put its hands together and drew from the darkness, drew from itself, to make a planet for the people who showed too many teeth when they smiled and whose laughter sounded like hunting calls, there was Mand’yaim ; there was Mand’yaim and Mando’ade and Mand’alore and shereshoy -

Live.

He breathed, his chest hitching, hitching, hitching upward.

Live.

Darkness, syrupy and cool behind his eyes. His body ached. His heart hiccuped. Everything felt wrong and new and scrubbed clean. He felt too big for his skin and then too small for his bones. The air burned in his lungs, whistling past his teeth.

Easy, my alor. It’s not your time yet.

Starbursts. Sharp and colorful. Silver and bronze and a ve’vut so bright it swept him away.

Live. Live, my alor. Come back to your aliit. Come back to them.

“Cody!”

His eyes opened. The world spun. His head tilted back. Stars and comets tore through the sky like fireworks, like blasterfire, like -

“Cody!”

He squeezed his eyes closed. Memories were rushing into him, years and years of lifetimes lived, and he pressed his hands against his temples to try and slow the avalanche. Between that and the noises and scents and lights, it felt like he was going through the transformation again - the night every Fett ad dreaded; the one where their bodies turned traitor and tried to kill them, rewarding their desperate attempts to stay alive with pointed teeth and far too many senses. Unlike the rest of his vod , he hadn’t been on Dawn when his transformation began. Instead, he had ridden through it in the stomach of the Firespray . That night felt gauzy, nearly opaque, in his mind. There had been the ship’s landing ramp and the cockpit - laying down in a cot, his limbs straight and bowed outwards from the agony, and buir speaking to him.

“Cody! Cody? Just breathe ad . Just breathe.”

Kote panted. The scent of bacta was in the air, sanitized and eye-watering, but there was also blood. Blood and fear and joy so strong it made his nose wrinkle.

A hand slid over his eyes and his head was tucked into someplace quiet and warm. Soothing. The world, for a moment, stopped revolving.

“Focus,” a voice said, rumbling straight into his chest. “Just focus on breathing.”

Kote shuddered. His body bent forward on its own - like a puppet with its strings suddenly chopped away - and he curled, unseeingly, into whatever was holding him. Something moved against his back, wide and so much hotter than his own skin, and it spidered up and down his spine, tugging at the avalanche of memories.

“Can’t sleep, Kote?” Said a voice and then, echoing, “Can’t sleep, CC-2224?”

“Not tired.”

Laughter. Sweet and hushed - free - and then, underneath that noise, a low, acknowledging hum.

“So full of energy.”And, in the same breath but with that different, harsher voice, “Not worn out enough?”

Being scooped up into the air so his legs dangled. Hands tightened around his arms, the grip so tight it burned, constraining instead of comforting, hands probing for bruises along his back - Prime, it was Prime holding him. Prime right at the beginning of Kamino, right before he changed CC-2224 into Kote, into someone that CC-2224 didn’t quite know. He let the touch happen, too scared to move and too curious to make it stop. Prime never touched them. Prime never even looked at them, yet he was touching him. He was touching -

“C’mere, ad’ika,” the other voice said and - and there was love in this one. There were soft hands and a soothing rumble, his body slotted against someone’s side. Fingers, calloused and large, drifting so gently against his back he hardly felt them. “Better?”

“‘Lek -”

His lips moved. His throat clicked.

“C’mon, ad’ika . Focus. Breathe.”

A name. A name - there was a name right on the tip of his tongue.

“Pri -?”

Naas. That belonged to the other voice. That name didn’t fit.

“Focus, Cody. Focus for me.”

The hands. The voice - the name, the name, the name.

Kote focused.

The world clicked into place.

“ Buir ?” He managed, his voice so brittle that it broke halfway through. The hand left his eyes and he blinked, blinked again. The world kept sliding from side to side, fading in and out with each meteor that careened through the sky. Kote tipped his head back. His breath caught.

The sky was alive. The sky was alive, the stars were falling, and the Ka’ra -

“It’s celebrating.”

Kote looked down again.

“ Su cuy'gar , Cody,” buir said, smiling. It was a relieved smile, one that made him look older. Weary. Mortal. Kote didn’t quite like it. Buir loosened his grip slightly - keeping his hands close when Kote swayed - and touched Kote’s face. Kote tipped into it.

“Kote,” he said against buir ’s palm. “My name is…”

“Kote?”

Kote stared at him. 

Buir stared back. His eyes flickered. They were red, Kote realized. Red and pink where they should’ve been white. Kote raised up his hand and dragged some of his fingers close to the mess of red-amber-pink buir had become.

Buir ’s lips twitched. He carefully, oh so carefully, moved Kote’s hand away. He flipped it over, tucking a few of his fingers under Kote’s sleeve to press against his pulse point. Kote felt the thin skin there rattle; his heart was stuttering. Struggling. He pulled away to feel at his own chest, stumbling away from buir .

“Easy,” buir said. “Easy, Cody.”

“Kote,” Kote murmured, trying to find his heartbeat. “‘S Kote.”

He found it. It felt different. It sounded different, too. Kote couldn’t remember it ever beating the way it was now, all quiet and slow and fluttering. He opened his mouth to say something about it - catching another whiff of bacta and blood - but stopped. He took another step back. He looked down at himself.

He was barefoot. His skin felt damp. He was wearing white - the kind that could only be described as pristine, the kind that glowed even under the moon and starlight, the kind that seemed too soft and delicate against his skin.

Kote skimmed his hand against it.

He stopped.

There was beskar in the shirt. He could feel it. Amidst all the white fabric - which felt weightless in the way that silk or velvet did although Kote couldn’t quite feel which it was; there was a lingering numbness all throughout his body that set his teeth on edge - beskar was woven in. Kote wondered why until he twisted just enough to catch the Fett aliik emblazoned on his shoulder.

Kote’s heart gave two of its lurching, lumbering beats.

“Why,” he started, swallowing. “Why am I dressed like this?”

Buir was touching him again. The points of contact felt like electricity, like lightning - 

Lightning.

Kote squeezed his eyes shut.

“I died.”

Buir exhaled, slowly and measured. His hands dug into Kote’s arms as if afraid that Kote would slip right through his fingers and - and Kote swayed. Squeezed his eyes tighter. His memories were coming back, snowballing into a mess of blue and red and black and pain; an eruption of pain, searing the entire length up his side, and Kote choked. He stumbled back.

Red-pink eyes, damp skin, white clothes - the makings of any good cabur ja’hailir - and Kote suddenly felt endlessly, violently sick; the kind that sank in his stomach and poisoned his soul because Kote had killed Palpatine and Palpatine had killed Kote and yet Kote was standing, breathing, certainly not dead and if he wasn’t dead then Palpatine -

“Kote. Breathe, ad’ika . Breathe for me. You have to breathe.”

“Palpatine,” Kote gasped, opening his eyes and squirming because he was alive and if he was alive then he had failed and the Ka’ra had sent him back to fix it, to fix everything again, and Kote would get it right this time even if it truly destroyed him. “I have to - let me go! I have to go stop him. I have to -”

Buir shook him. Hard.

Kote’s head rattled. His equilibrium snapped from the motion, and Kote slipped, slid, couldn’t stand up straight on his shaking, foal-like legs. He fell. Buir fell with him.

“Kote, look at me.”

Hands on his arms. Comets in the sky.

“Kote?”

Kote turned his head. His breath - as fleeting and fragile as it already was - caught. Buir leaned over him. He pushed some of his hair back, searching Kote’s face for the ad he had given away to the war, to the Ka’ra , to the galaxy. Kote stared back at him.

Buir was crying.

“ Buir ?” Kote said, sounding lost even to himself.

Buir tugged him closer. Kote went with it because - because buir was crying. Crying over him. He tugged and Kote went, tucking his legs and rising onto his knees and letting his buir hold him like he really was an ad’ika again. Kote’s shoulder grew hot. It grew damper. Buir drew feverish hands up and down Kote’s back, digging into the muscle, and Kote only bent his head, burrowing it into buir ’s hair, and held on.

It took him one, two, three minutes to realize that he was crying, too.

“It’s alright,” buir whispered. “It’s alright, Kote. You’re alright. Everything’s alright. Do you hear me? Everything’s okay. Everything’s going to be okay.”

Kote shivered. Buir petted his head.

“You’re okay. You’re okay, Kot’ika .”

“I died.”

Buir held him harder and tighter. Kote felt buir take a breath - deep and quiet in the way that meant it was supposed to be grounding, meant to be head-clearing - and they press against one another chest to chest. Kote didn’t mind. He had died - died like Cody, like CC-2224 - but there had been mourning this time. Crying. Kote had died, but he hadn’t done it alone this time.

More importantly, he wasn’t alone now.

Kote wasn’t sure how long they stayed there - minutes? Hours? Everything felt muzzy and nebulous; his body seemed more preoccupied with restarting itself than paying attention to the world around it - but one moment they were leaning into one another and in the next buir was guiding him up by his elbow. Kote’s head spun.

“You’re dehydrated,” buir said, steadying him. His voice was rough. Kote wondered when he had stopped crying. “And your heart…we should get you to a baar’ur .”

“Caf?”

“I don’t think caf would be the best thing -”

Kote shook his head. The world tilted.

“Not caf,” he said and then, stressing the word, “Caf. My medic.”

Buir frowned.

“He should,” Kote paused. He swallowed. He began to slide out from buir ’s arms. Kote wasn’t heavy anymore - was wirier than even Ponds - but he wasn’t coordinated. There was an odd numbness throughout his body. His feet felt shackled. His hands hardly moved. His fingers kept twitching but it was sporadic, uncoordinated. Kote focused. He clenched his fists. “He should be in the medbay. He’s always in the medbay. He’s - I trust him. He’ll help us sort this out.”

Buir let him sink to the ground. It felt cool. It felt like tile. Kote pulled his knees up and stared between them. The world was still filtering in, shapes consolidating into objects, and he followed the slow progression with his eyes. There was water nearby. There were plants. He was sitting on tile, some old mosaic that was drained of all color and texture. The air smelt fresh. He heard frogs, crickets, the odd chirp of some nocturnal bird.

“Where are we?”

Buir looked up from his comm.

“Coruscant,” he said. “The jetiise Temple, actually. I think they call this place the Room of a Thousand Fountains.”

“Does it really have -?”

Buir gave him a look.

“I don’t know, Kote. I haven’t exactly been exploring.”

“Why am I here? Why not Mand’yaim ? Or Dawn? Shouldn’t I have been sent to Dawn?”

“We didn’t think you would die.”

Kote stared at him. He didn’t quite know what to say.

“There was hope,” buir said, “there was hope that you would make it. Kenobi did something - don’t know what - but we were able to get you into a bacta tank. Most of your organs regrew enough that we pulled you out for surgery.”

“And then?”

“And then…and then you died.”

“During the surgery or after -?”

“Kote,” buir said, closing his eyes.

Kote shrank back.

“Sorry,” he said. “Sorry. There’s just something morbidly fascinating about all of this. I - I didn’t think a lot about death during the war. I didn’t. Is that strange? Maybe that’s strange. I wasn’t numb to it. It happened and I mourned but I never…”

“Kote.”

“I wasn’t scared to die.”

Buir turned away.

“I wasn’t scared to die, buir . That wasn’t what terrified me.”

“Does this?” Buir asked.

Kote looked down at his hands. His twitching, half-dead hands. He looked at them, felt that numb ache through the rest of his body, and then slowly tucked the things underneath his arms.

“I don’t know,” Kote said. He blinked. “You said the Ka’ra are celebrating.”

“ Elek. ”

Kote tipped his head back. The meteor shower had finished, leaving behind a dark sky studded with stars. He squinted his eyes, searching.

“What do you think I missed?”

“ Me’ven ?”

“The Ka’ra brought me back. It had to be for something. They must’ve had a reason.”

“Or maybe they didn’t.”

“The Ka’ra always has a reason. It wouldn’t’ve done this if it didn’t. There has to be something I forgot to do. Something I overlooked.”

“Or,” buir said, drawing out the word, “maybe you did exactly what you were supposed to do.”

“But why would I be back? Why would it send me back?”

“Did you want to come back?”

“I never wanted to leave.”

Buir gave a fleeting smile.

“Well,” he said, “there you go.”

Kote opened his mouth to respond - to say that naas, buir that wasn’t how this worked - but buir ’s comm began to flash. Kote groaned and looked away, blinking away the bright spots that had appeared. He jolted a little when buir touched him again, crouching in front of him.

“Wolffe’s trying to find your baar’ur .”

“Wolffe’s here?”

“Nearly everyone’s here.”

“Shouldn’t - the war’s over, right? Shouldn’t everyone be home by now?”

“Most of them wanted to say goodbye to their companies and their jetiise and you.”

“They know I’m dead?”

“Only those closest to you. We’ve been keeping it quiet. Unofficial. A few of the command track - the ARCs and commanders mostly - have visited you. Your Ghosts,” buir said, giving that fleeting smile again, “they’re a close bunch.”

“I’m lucky to have them,” Kote said.

Buir hummed. One of his hands touched Kote’s face, cupping his cheek.

“You’re getting warmer. Your face is getting more color, too. You almost look…”

“Normal?”

“Like yourself again.”

Buir’s fingers traced his face as if he’d never seen Kote before. Naas, Kote thought. That wasn’t right. Buir was mapping out Kote’s face as if he couldn’t believe it was in front of him, moving and blinking and alive. For a brief moment, Kote wondered how long he had been dead - truly dead, not just suspended in a bacta tank. Following that, Kote wondered just how long buir had stared at him, stared at his motionless, pale face. Buir had done cabur ja’hailir. He had to have spent at least an hour in some cool, quiet room, tenderly scrubbing all the remaining grit and blood and bacta off of Kote’s body. He had to have gone out to purchase the white clothes, the funeral clothes, in Kote’s size and to maneuver him into them - or maybe, Kote thought, maybe buir already had the funeral clothes. 

Maybe he had had them for a long, long time.

“ Ni ceta ,” Kote said.

Buir shook his head.

“This isn’t your fault, Kote.”

“I scared you.”

“ Ade always scare their buire . This isn’t your fault.”

“I started this whole mess.”

“You didn’t.”

“I did! If I hadn’t gone to Kamino then -”

Buir laughed, weak and strained and not quite sane enough to be convincing. Kote quieted. That was his laugh, he realized. There wasn’t mistaking the sigh of regret between each inhale or the struggle for control in every exhale.

“If I hadn’t gone to Kamino, you mean,” buir said. “You didn’t appear out of nowhere, you know. I came first. Prime came first. Everything else followed.”

“Not this time around.”

“This time around you were fixing my mistakes. Making things right. That wasn’t,” buir trailed off, “that wasn’t ever supposed to be your job. When you were born…”

He stopped completely, turning his head to the side. Kote could see his jaw tense in the low light, saw the muscle in it work and work and work.

“ Buir ?”

“I wasn’t supposed to have favorites.”

Kote blinked. Blinked again.

“Favorites?” Something bubbled in his chest. Confusion? Hysteria? Kote couldn’t tell.

“I don’t remember why I went to Kamino. It must have been something to do with money. Maybe revenge. I didn’t particularly like the jetiise back then, and from what all of you have told me over the years…revenge and money, I think. Had to be,” buir said. His voice was even. Measured. He didn’t look at Kote. “I got the trainers together. I gave the material. The Kaminiise let me do whatever I wanted there - no restrictions, no rules. I could’ve been nice to the Nulls. I could’ve treated the Alphas kindly.”

“But you didn’t?”

“I didn’t,” buir said. “And then the CC classes came.”

Kote frowned.

“But you didn’t train the CCs. The Alphas did that.”

“I trained one squad.” Buir made a noise, shook his head, and sighed. “I trained one CC.”

Kote went cold all at once. His skin prickled.

“You were first. Blew through every simulation and training module the Kaminiise had. Then you got bored, got your nose into things you shouldn’t have gotten wind of, got tangled up with…Priest, I think? And somehow you tumbled straight into my life. Just appeared one day and didn’t leave.”

“Why’d you keep me?”

“There were a few reasons,” buir said, shrugging. “The Kaminiise wanted to start phasing out the Mando’ade trainers I had snagged from the gutters so someone - the Alphas - had to fill their place. That meant that someone else had to fill the command positions in the GAR. The CCs were the only ones old enough to make the age and experience quota in time. The Alphas put in recommendations from their squads on who to train for which rank slot. We handled the rest. You had potential. A lot of it. Enough that no one really batted an eye when we became closer. More than that, though, you reminded me of who I used to be. Who I could’ve been.”

Buir looked at him. Kote froze underneath the weight of his eyes.

“You still do.”

“You hate me.”

“Never,” buir said. “Never. You’re my ad . How could I ever hate you?”

“But -”

“When you were born, I was so afraid.”

“Afraid?”

“I wanted you to be happy. I wanted all of you - all of your vode - to be happy. But there were still signs. Whispers. We had changed, but the galaxy hadn’t. At some point I knew I would have to send you all out to war again. I knew that. But the Ka’ra had plans for you and I couldn’t stop them. It didn’t listen to me, didn’t deviate even when I asked for it to take me instead, to make me the Mand’alor and the verde and the person to stop everything from karking falling apart - I couldn’t save you. I couldn’t do it the first time, and I couldn’t do it now.”

“ Buir ,” Kote said, his voice wavering.

“I always knew you would die young,” buir said. “Always. The Ka’ra didn’t tell me, but I knew. I knew from the minute you were born that you would. And I remember thinking to myself that that wasn’t fair. This whole thing wasn’t your mistake, wasn’t your mess to fix. It was mine. Mine. I should’ve been the one to deal with the aftermath. But the Ka’ra wouldn’t let me, wouldn’t - you always had potential. Always had something inside of you that just made people want to follow you, and the Ka’ra liked that. Wanted that. So it took you.”

Buir looked down at his hands, holding them out as if he was holding an ik’aad .

“It got you before I could. It took you from me, from your vode , and I - I couldn’t protect you from it. I’m not as strong as you are, Kote. I didn’t know how to fight it.” He paused. “I wonder if I even could. Would it have changed things, you think? If I had stolen you back, run somewhere so far away that not even the Ka’ra could’ve found us, would it have made you happier? Made us happier?”

He dropped his hands.

“I couldn’t save you from it, from the plans the Ka’ra had for you, but I thought - I thought that if I trained you, pushed you, acted like Prime, I could prepare you for what you would have to go through. I thought I could save you that way. I thought I managed it, too. You hated me, of course, and we didn’t get along, but you were alive by the end of the war. For the first time since you were born, I thought I would be able to watch you grow old. But then you appeared with the Dha’kad …”  

Buir scrubbed his face.

“I wasn’t supposed to have favorites, but I did,” he said, laughing that broken little laugh. “I just wish the Ka’ra hadn’t had them, either.”

He suddenly shook himself, as if remembering who he was and who he needed to pretend to be, and then turned to look back at Kote. Kote recoiled. Buir ’s eyes were bright and sharp, and they burned like Kote’s did. Staring at buir was like staring into a mirror - one twisted and warped, certainly, but one not prone to lying.

“Why are you telling me this?”

“You died,” buir said. “I lost you.”

“But I came back.”

Those searing jaig eyes flashed, flickered. Kote had seen buir angry enough to recognize the signs, but he wasn’t sure who the emotion was aimed at. Was it him? It wouldn’t be unusual if it was.

“ Ni ceta -”

“Don’t apologize,” he said. “You’ve been stuck having to reap what I’ve sown for two lifetimes. That wasn't on your shoulders. It never should’ve been on your shoulders.”

Kote squinted his eyes, searching buir ’s face.

“It’s not on yours, either,” Kote said. “Not anymore. You aren’t him. You’re not Prime. You’ve never sunk as low as Prime. You - I’m not Cody. I’m not CC-2224 anymore. And you aren’t him. You’re buir .”

“Haven’t been much of one.”
“You were enough,” Kote said. “You did your best.”

Buir opened his mouth. Closed it. Cupped Kote’s face instead.

“I don’t deserve you.” He fell back. “I never did.”

Kote leaned forward. He moved his arms - his numb, stiff arms - around buir . He tugged him close, held him, wondered if he looked and sounded as broken as buir did to everyone else. Probably. Seeing it from this angle, from the outside looking in, Kote could understand all the pitying looks, all the nudges from his Ghosts, and the prying-not-prying questions from his med team. They were broken, him and buir . Codependent.

“Kote,” buir whispered, right into his shoulder. Kote just did his best to hold him - he didn’t think buir was held much - and hold him tight enough to pour into him all the things Kote couldn’t quite articulate. “ Kot’ika .”

They were broken, Kote realized, but broken things could be fixed.

“You’re shaking.”

Kote pressed his cheek against buir ’s head. “I am?”

“You need a baar’ur .” Buir twisted. Kote tucked his head away when buir flashed his comm. “Wolffe’s found one.”

“Caf?”

Buir didn’t answer the question.

“Can you walk?”

Kote got up. He walked, following buir through the Room of a Thousand Fountains, through the jetiise temple, through darkened hallways that soothed the ache growing behind his eyes. His equilibrium was still atrocious - corners had him gripping the walls and sweating, feeling sick down to the very pit of his stomach - but his body finally began to feel like his again; those were his feet moving, his legs, and he was the one directing them. He was moving, breathing. He was alive. Alive, alive, alive.

He snorted, tried to collect himself, and then burst into a set of off-pitch giggles.

“Kote?”

“This is insane. Insane.”

Buir forged ahead, hardly slowing.

“ Elek ,” he said. “It is.”

“It doesn’t bother you?”

“Things stopped bothering me a long time ago.”

“ Buir ,” Kote said, cutting off his odd laughter, “when the Ka’ra called you, did you want to follow it?”

“I thought it would help me fix everything.”

“So elek ?”

“ Elek .”

“Were you upset when I didn’t?”

“I thought it would help you, that it wouldn’t let anything bad happen to you - or nothing overwhelmingly bad.” buir said. “When I realized why it wanted you, what it really wanted with you - naas , Kote. I wasn’t upset.”

“Oh.”

“I ran away from it once.”

“Oh?”

“Back when I was Prime. I ran. I thought I escaped it.”

“But you didn’t.”

“No one ever does.”

“I learned that lesson, too,” Kote said.

“Do you still want to run from it?”

“I don’t know. I never wanted to be Mand’alor . I still don’t want to be. But the Ka’ra …”

“It believes in you. It loves you.”

“‘ Lek .”

“So you won’t run?”

They emptied into a hallway. At the far end, Kote spotted a familiar figure.

“ Naas ,” he said, slowing down to linger behind buir . “I’m done with that.”

The figure down the hall turned on his heel. It wasn’t enough to face the two of them completely, but it was enough for Kote to catch the flash of a lone silver robotic eye. Kote’s blood rushed to his head, down to his feet, throughout his chest - an odd flush that made him feel like he was on fire. It only worsened when Wolffe fully faced buir , the shadows catching each deep groove and sleep-deprived bruise on his face. He needed to shave, too. Kote couldn’t look away from it. He’d never seen Wolffe with stubble before. He knew his vod shaved of course. There were fond memories treading out of his post-death memory haze of him watching Wolffe shave; the ‘fresher still filled with lingering steam from Wolffe’s shower, a can of shaving cream deposited into Kote’s care when Wolffe was done with it, the nose-scrunching scent of aftershave when it was all said and done. Haran , Kote was pretty sure Wolffe was the one to teach him how to shave - naas , Kote was sure. He knew that memory was somewhere.

“I couldn’t find Caf, but I did find Vet. Why do you need a baar’ur this late at night anyway? I thought you were with -”

Silence. It was the delicate kind, the type that buzzed in someone’s ears and faded in and out of reality with their heart. Kote waited through it. He waited and waited, still looking at Wolffe’s dark scruff of a mourning shroud, and his whole body vibrated when Wolffe sucked in a breath.

“ Buir ?” Wolffe said, his voice cracking. Kote looked up, caught Wolffe’s wide eyes, and dropped them again. It was easy to forget that Wolffe wasn’t so much different from the rest of them. He had always been - had always seemed - so older and wiser and tougher to Kote that it was hard to imagine him being lost in any situation.

Wolffe cleared his throat.

“ Buir , what -?”

“It’s him.”

“Jehaat,” Wolffe spat. “Jehaat. Cody’s dead. He’s dead.”
“He isn’t. He’s come back -”

“People do not come back from the dead!”

“Wolffe,” Kote said, almost whispering. It didn’t matter; Wolffe heard him anyway. His ori’vod rocked back on his heels, stumbled, and went pale enough that Kote stepped up to try and catch him. When his hand skimmed Wolffe’s arm, Wolffe groaned as if shot.

“Stop. Stop.”

“Wolffe.”

“We buried you.”

“I’m back, vod .” Kote reached forward. He caught one of Wolffe’s wrists and tugged it towards him. He held it against his chest, Wolffe’s palm against his heart. “I’m here.”

Wolffe went completely and utterly rigid. Slowly, so slowly that Kote almost thought he was hallucinating, his ori’vod ’s hand started to curl, his blunt nails digging into Kote’s skin.

“Can you feel that?”

Slowly, oh so slowly, Wolffe’s hand began to relax.

“‘ Lek .”

“You’re warm.”

“I’m alive,” Kote corrected.

Wolffe’s face pinched.

“You were cold,” he said, choking. “You were real cold, Cody.”

Kote moved his arms around his ori’vod . He pressed their foreheads together, tipping the two of them until their noses touched. Wolffe made a noise - wounded and strange - at the contact.

“‘M not cold anymore.”

“ Naas ,” Wolffe said, his hand turning around to rap his knuckles against Kote’s sternum. His other hand came up to curl over the back of Kote’s neck, squeezing it. His head dipped. It fell against Kote’s chest, and each of his ragged, wavering breaths spilled out against the skin and muscle and sinew - all warm, all warm and working and alive - there like a balm. There was a memory there, too; Kote, so young he was cadet sized, curled into Wolffe’s chest like a tooka and sleeping, openmouthed, in the midst of one of Dawn’s summer storms.

“ Naas ,” Wolffe repeated, his voice coming out in waves, in sheets of rain hitting cracked and bleeding ground, in memories and feelings and everything that was drawing life back into Kote. “You’re not cold - you’re alive.”

“For good,” Kote said. “I’m alive for good. To stay.”

Wolffe trembled once, twice -

“I promise.”

“Don’t,” Wolffe said, “don’t promise me things you can’t keep.”

“I can keep this.”

“Cody -”

“I want to keep this.”

“ Elek ?”

Kote held his vod tight. For Wolffe, that was enough of an answer.