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It starts, unsurprisingly enough, with General Skywalker complaining.
The 501st is in the hurry-up-and-wait phase of the latest cycle of the war, and that means downtime. Rex and a few of the others are in the officer’s lounge, joined by General Skywalker and the little Commander. The lounge is mostly used as the backup office when the shinies get too uppity and start coming to their actual offices with reg violations that are… well, they’re technically the sort of thing that’s meant to be reported, but they’re also deeply petty and always about getting one over a brother that’s proven annoying, rather than anyone actually caring about reg violations.
Well.
Echo and Dogma actually care, but Echo is an officer these days, so Rex just has Dogma go to Echo, and now those two only have to deal with each other. Echo’s loosened up enough that Rex finds him quizzing Dogma on obscure rules and occasionally sending him on wild nuna chases. It’s kind of mean, but at least Echo only ever seems to do it when Dogma’s reports are doing more harm than good.
Last few days, everyone’s reporting each other—tattling like cadets—at Dogma’s rate.
So, the officers are hiding.
Rex spends most of his time in the lounge either doing flimsiwork or watching bolo-ball. Right now, most communications are down save for military, so nobody’s getting anything interesting in or out of the ship. That means he’s down to flimsiwork and gossip.
He tries to get through his flimsiwork. He really does. But the General…
The General.
“I’m just saying,” General Skywalker huffs, overdramatic and draped backwards over the side of the couch in a way that looks supremely uncomfortable, “I deserve to be the pretty one!”
Rex has no idea what’s going on. He hasn’t been paying attention. Still, he’s a loyal trooper. “You're pretty, sir.”
That sounded platonic, right? Right.
General Skywalker groans. Ahsoka giggles at him, and he swats at her. He doesn’t bother to get up from his ridiculous sprawl. “No, I meant… I'm always with Padme or Obi-Wan, and they're both super hot. I'm normally a nine, okay, I know I look good, but around them I look like a seven.”
General, what.
The General finishes with a massive arm gestures that half the room cannot see due to the couchback. “I deserve to be the pretty one.”
Hardcase perks up at an opportunity, and Rex jumps and starts running for him. He is too late. “What, you don't think Rex is pretty?”
Rex tackles him, and hisses “shut up, vod!”
Somehow, the General does not appear to notice the violence occurring behind him. He scoffs instead, once again gesturing like he’s on a Shili telenovela. “Rex is ruggedly handsome, Hardcase. Different scale entirely.”
Rex feels himself go red. Hardcase, despite being halfway to choked out, snickers below him. “What do you think of that, Captain?”
With a shove, Rex pushes himself up to standing and brushes himself down. The General’s looking at him in confusion.
Echo’s got a hand over Ahsoka’s mouth to keep her from laughing.
“Er,” Rex manages, looking at the General and absolutely at a loss for what to do. “Thank you, sir.”
It takes a few moments for his brain to catch up, and then he adds, just a tad too late to be natural, “on all our behalfs. We’re identical, after all.”
Ahsoka lets loose a noise that Rex has only heard from recordings of shriekhawks.
“Yes, yes, you’re all very handsome,” General Skywalker says, flopping back into his position of extreme drama. “I guess I can be the pretty one on the Resolute, since Ahsoka’s still got the corner on being cute for a few more years.”
Ahsoka giggles, still through Echo’s hand.
“Of course, sir,” Rex says, unsure of what else he can say. “You’re the pretty one.”
--
General Skywalker spins in heels that he should not be that comfortable in, and poses. “So? What do we think?”
One of Senator Amidala’s handmaidens examines her handiwork. “Well, I think you can pass for the role, General.”
“How can you walk in those?” Hardcase prompts.
The question is met with a backflip that Rex momentarily panics will rip the dress. The General lands on his feet, and poses again, this time with an incredibly corny thumbs up.
“I use the Force,” he intones, and Commander Tano groans.
The Nabooan aide circles General Skywalker with a critical eye. Rex tries to keep his eyes from wandering to the General as well.
There are sheer tights. There is a clinging dress, with a heavy metallic thread woven all throughout. There are stiletto heels. There are hair pins and jewelry and what he thinks is a corset, going by the stiffness of the top part of the main garment.
A boned bodice, the handmaiden had said. Rex isn’t sure what that means.
Rex keeps getting distracted by the bare skin of his General’s shoulder. The sleeves—shimmering purple-red like the rest of the piece—fall to the upper arm, which means the path from deltoid up is clear until the bottom edge of the truly ridiculous necklace starts.
It’s like a collar, except more. Rows upon rows of clear and glittery stones march down the General’s throat, and then drip in delicate lines to trail down past his collarbone, and even some shorter ones spill out towards the shoulder.
There are… so many gems. Rex can only assume they aren’t real, or that this is a loan from Senator Amidala.
It’s probably a loan from Senator Amidala.
A very expensive one.
Rex isn’t sure who gets the blame for this, but Ahsoka’s usually safe bet. Her and the handmaiden that’s helping the General get ready.
General Skywalker stretches, legs flashing through the slit of what Rex has been told is a ‘sheathe’ dress. It hugs curves the General doesn’t actually have, which means the handmaiden definitely stuffed something to pad out the rear while Rex was busy trying to figure out how cuff links work.
(General Skywalker is pretty, yes, but he is… as Hardcase put it, ‘cursed with an ass like a pancake.’)
(Rex would’ve given him janitorial duty as punishment, but the General had laughed.)
“How’s the makeup?” the handmaiden prompts. “Anything sticking in a way that could be a problem?”
The General shakes his head. “No, the mascara’s fine.”
The handmaiden grins. Rex assumes his General just got a question right. Maybe mascara’s the only thing that could stick in a way that can cause mission problems?
“Rings limiting the mobility too much to fight?” she prompts.
“We’re good,” the General confirms. “And yes, I can lift my arms despite the off-shoulder sleeves."
“It’s Nabooan terry knit, it should stretch,” the handmaiden scoffs. Rex should ask someone her name. Jesse probably remembers. “It’s an interlock.”
“No idea what that means,” General Skywalker announces cheerfully. “I’ll assume it’s a good thing.”
The woman rolls her eyes and circles him again. “I think you’re good.”
General Skywalker beams, and then traipses over to Rex, already dropping into character. “Shall we, my darling?”
Rex’s brain goes blank, and he offers his General an arm on automatic. “Unto the breach, sir.”
--
Rex knows the mission. He knows the plan, the reasoning, the whole… situation.
Each individual step makes sense, mostly, but then he has to step back and ask himself just how he ended up sitting in a VIP armchair at a semi-legal club frequented by the Pykes, wearing a fancy pinstripe suit, with his General dolled up and perched on his lap like a particularly giggly escort. Male, still, but… dress. Heels. Fancy. Rex’s head is going in all different directions.
“You seem uncomfortable, Captain,” The General whispers in his ear. General Skywalker unfolds and recrosses his legs, and Rex knows the General is taller than him, but the man feels so small in this dress, except his legs go on forever and one pops out through the slit of the gown as he moves, perfectly shaved under the sheer tights and—
Rex’s hand tightens on General Skywalker’s hip, and he can only think that the stiffness of that maybe-corset is doing a lot to keep his dignity intact. Not enough, because he drops his forehead to the bare skin of his General’s shoulder a few seconds later, and breathes with a shudder, but at least something. His nose brushes the purple fabric of the draped sleeve, threaded through with ruby red metallic thread, and the material itches. He holds back a sneeze.
“Rex?” the General prompts, mostly still in character, and running fingernails along Rex’s buzzed scalp. “You good?”
He cannot kiss his General. He cannot bite his General. He absolutely cannot—
The General shifts closer, and then pauses and looks down to where his leg is… pressing against a very particular element of Rex’s anatomy.
“I’m sorry,” Rex breathes out. He can’t speak up, not when there are so many hostiles around. “You are… the disguise is a very good one. I can generally control these things better, or at least hide behind my armor.”
The General makes a considering noise, and then shifts closer. “Probably better I play your armor, then. Keep the weak spot covered, right?”
Rex’s mouth is immediately dry.
The General’s mouth is at his ear, lips brushing skin. He whispers. “Do you want to kiss me? I don’t mind, honest. And nobody here is going to care.”
The General’s hand comes up to his chest, with yet more gems on rings and a dramatically fancy bracelet, and toys with the pocket square. Rex closes his eyes, trying to keep his composure as he tells himself it’s just an act.
“It doesn’t have to be an act,” Anakin whispers to him. “Not if you don’t want it to be.”
Rex’s breath hitches.