Chapter Text
Somehow I thought we’d never be anything other than friends. I was wrong.
There is an inescapable sorrow in revelations. That moment when you finally find out everything you’d ever known was wrong. Tainted. And now- ruined. And all you are left with is the pain that comes along with it.
The Jedi just never hoped that pain would come from such a familiar face.
She ignites her saber too late, the clone’s hand is already around her throat, lifting her off the ground as the pink hue of her weapon glows uselessly against their faces. It only harshens the blank slate of her attacker. There is nothing behind those eyes that had been engraved in her memory. She’d seen them too often for the past three years to not have every blink and inch of them memorized. Though there were billions of the same pair, each held something different. She’d know them through any mask or veil or emotion.
But now there is nothing but an absence of everything this one had ever been.
She can’t recognize him.
“Please. Commander,” She begs, hoping just hoping she can get through to him. Hoping she can get through to all of them. Hoping she won’t have to do it with her saber through their chests. “Don’t do this”
His grip tightens. She tries to claw at his fingers but whatever has his mind now has taken away his pain as well. She draws blood. It does nothing to him.
More words come up in her throat. They begin to tumble out, without thought, as if they were meant to be said for a long time. “I-”
Then he throws her across the room and her back smashes into the console. The wind punctures out of her lungs and she falls to the floor in a heap of bruising and strangled breaths. But she senses his movement. The sound of his gun leaving its holster. His emotion.
The intent. Murderous. Vengeance. Hatred.
And it is powerful.
Had she known him any less she’d suspect it had always been there.
But she knows. The intent is falsified. He is not in his right mind. None of them are.
That only makes this harder.
Before he can finish his mission, the lightsaber flies across the room and collides into her hand and she brings the hilt of it into his stomach and strikes .
He flies into the back door, his head knocking first. His body is out cold before he even hits the ground. Still breathing-the only thing that’s still the same about him.
The Jedi is already at her knees, sobbing. Mourning.
“I’m sorry.” She says, trying to block out the sound of the door being broken down from the other side. The rest are coming. She will not be able to not hurt them.
She must run.
Leave.
Leave them.
“I’m so sorry.”
And she ran.
Three Years Earlier, At the start of the Clone Wars
Rouge has never been one to break protocol. Were he anything but a clone he would say it’s because it is just the way he is. But that implies a level of choice- an intention or decision to be the way he is. And he’s never had such a privilege. The extensive training and discipline on Kamino tend to burn out any sense of rebellion against authority that isn’t already expunged at their creation. So it is more accurate to say this is the way he was made . The way they all were.
There are exceptions, of course, some of his brothers who decide to reject what guidelines of their shared existence they can. Whether that be hair, face tattoos, painted armor, verbal rebellion, or some other wild individualizer. Because though Rogue can tell the difference between his brothers, as they can him, even with their chosen differences, the rest of the galaxy cannot. And perhaps that is all the individuality a clone like them can get. When not your face, your body, your voice, not even the way you speak or walk is only yours, what else do you have to own other than your actions? How else can you claim some semblance of identity if not from defiance?
But someone has to be pliant. Someone has to keep the mold from breaking apart completely so they aren’t the last ones made. Someone has to stick to protocol.
It is what Rogue was made for after all. His purpose. And in a crowd of those who resist purpose, is it not defiance to choose to stick to that mission? His choice is what keeps his brothers alive. It is what made him Commander of his soldiers. Because of that choice, this position, he’s able to guard them, know them separately, from the world that would call them all one and bury them in a single grave.
But perhaps he is thinking too deeply into it.
He has bigger things to worry about.
“Pst. Roguie.” The clone commander groans. Rogue takes a look at the brother who whispered to him, his own face meeting him with a curious childlike gaze Rogue himself has not been able to create. Another stark difference that somehow most people seem to gloss over. Hawthorne, the clone brother in question, leans to him for another whisper in the crowded ship hanger. The rest of their brothers, all members of the 32nd Legion of the Grand Army of the Republic, wait in perfect rows. If anyone else were to look at them all, they’d assume Hawthorne was a faulty copy.
Only Rogue really knows that’s far from the case. After all, he strived for Commander so his brothers could be wild and free right? Within certain rules of course.
Somehow, as Captain, Hawthorne seems to think he’s above those rules. “Any idea when our warrior nun is supposed to show up?” Rogue cuts his brother a glare- that kind of glib language would get him latrine duty back on Kamino if the scientists or hired trainers heard him. They never did- Rogue was always there. But perhaps he should have let his batchmate get caught and reprimanded a few times to learn some discipline.
But there is no point in trying to reign that in now. So Rogue responds with an extensively practiced eye roll.
He’s asked this question about a dozen times by now. And in that hour's timeframe, Rogue has responded with the same answer a dozen times.
Thirteen. “No. But we wait, like the rest of our troop.” Rogue says, gesturing to the perfect rows and columns of soldiers taking up considerable space in the ship's hangar. This is not even a fraction of their legion though- as most of the troopers are keeping this ship flying in Outer Rim space. However, when Rogue and the rest of the troopers received word on Kamino that they would finally be getting assigned a general, they, in perfectly trained fashion, hurried to prepare on a cruiser and await their new command. While the majority of their legion maintained the ship, Rogue had Hawthorne collect any idle soldiers to gather in the main hangar to welcome their new general. Proper protocol dictates that the Commander and Captain must meet the General before the foot soldiers, however, Rogue thought it beneficial to have their new General see the shape of their new legion at first glance. Proper, strong, trained. Ready.
They’d been training, waiting, to be assigned a general and launch into action for what felt like years. Rogue has seen many brothers leave Kamino before him and watched their exploits on the holo nets. He has seen too many on the obituary records- listed by number instead of name. As if they died without ever having one in the first place.
And the entire time, Rogue had sat idly on the rain-soaked prison of that planet. Watched aimlessly as his brothers left, fought, and died in numbers he’s lost count of.
But now? Now he will join their cause. He’ll fight and bleed for his brothers just as they did for him. And when someone is to die- it will be him listed as a number long before he lets himself watch anyone else fall.
“Got any update yet?” Hawthorne quirks, interrupting Rogue’s train of thought.
He groans again, resisting the urge to yank out his brother's stupid mohawk. It is beyond regulation anyway. Rogue still isn’t sure how he managed to get off Kamino without meeting the unfriendly edge of a razor.
“Do we even know the name of our dear general?” Hawthorne continues. After so many years together, paired in a squad from the first day out of the tube, Rogue has gotten used to Hawthorne's unexpirable energy and restlessness. When there is any quiet, he feels the need to speak, to do something, to ask something. Even if he already knows the answer.
“Like I said yesterday. No. We will find that out when we meet them.” Rogue responds, rechecking the data log on his holopad. He’s meant to get updates on the status of the ship every half hour- so far everything looks good. All in formation for their inaugural mission.
The one that can only start once the leadership arrives.
“If we meet them.” Hawthorne sighs, throwing his head back and groaning to the ceiling. “They were supposed to show up an hour ago.”
There Rogue can’t argue back. As a man of protocol, general tardiness is a pet peeve of his. Something that he’s made clear to the rest of his men. All of them enact their duties efficiently, and appear on time and in cohort. Rogue wonders how well his command is going to coincide with a general who can’t even keep to a schedule.
Though there may be a reason for their future leaders' lateness. The general is a Jedi after all. Rogue and his men grew up with protocol, with preparing for the necessities of proper timing in war. The Jedi…did not. Whatever missions they had were not deliberated by the delicate schism of war- the need to strike hard and fast in battle to prevent the scales of an overall conflict from being tipped against them. They do not have the tension of battle engraved in their bones. They have bodies ready to lift into the ethereal at any moment. The Jedi are peacekeepers. Not soldiers.
But that’s the thing about peacekeepers. They work to maintain peace in peaceful times. Not defend peace in war. Those are two different roles. They have very different stakes. And consequences.
The Jedi aren’t made for war and its demands. Unlike Rogue and the rest of the clones, who are bred for combat, tactics, and battle, the Jedi have other obligations. Other duties. Other priorities and values. It’s for that reason that Rogue believes the Jedi should not be as involved in the war as they are. Perhaps there is another way for peacekeepers to assist in times of war- but it is not by turning them into soldiers.
But what can he do against that? He is just one soldier. One clone. The rest of the galaxy doesn’t even care enough to distinguish him from the rest of his people, why would they listen? Why would they trust his actions and decisions? After all, they clones are made to be foot soldiers, captains, commanders-
But not generals. They are trusted to die for this fight but not lead themselves into battle. Instead they must follow the command of the general equivalent of holy civilians.
Rogue cannot find the sense in that.
But he cannot argue against it.
So there is nothing to do but wait. Sit idly while the rest of an inconsiderate galaxy is stained with his brother’s blood. Waste minute-by-minute reading and rereading the same status reports of a ship that has nothing wrong with it.
His grip on the holopad tightens. Rogue hopes the anger filling his veins does not come out on his face instead.
If the Jedi are to lead us, the least they can do is be on damn time.
Hawthorne, as usual, piques with another out loud thought. “How are we supposed to go on our first mission without a general?”
Rogue runs an anxious hand through his hair. When he’d heard about their assignment, Rogue had re-done the standard military cut to his hair. It raises off his head, cut completely flat, all sharp angles. Without any scars, tattoos, or unique haircut he looks just the same as any shiny fresh out of the growth chamber. Everything is from the mold- except his armor. Which, like the rest of the men in his legion, is painted light red.
He remembers the moment they first received proper battle armor. It had only been a few days ago in fact. Hawthorne had asked Rogue if they could finally use the paint they’d been stocking up in preparation for this day. He’d been too damn excited for Rogue to say no, and anyway, Rogue had been itching to use up that paint too. Many of the legions had their own color. The boys in blue of the 501st, the gray wolves of the 104th, even the Coruscant Guard- their vibrant red a stark contrast against the shelled blue of the far more incompetent Senate Guard. Fox, commander of the Coruscant Guard, had been the one to start the 32nd’s collection of paint by donating a few cans. Rogue took it from there, but he didn’t miss how one of his favorite brothers conveniently suggested a color close to his own. Fox would never admit it out loud of course, but even Rogue’s not as much a stickler to protocol to not point out the clear sign of brotherly affection.
Hawthorne had nearly tackled the poor Coruscant guard with a bear hug. Though Hawthorne was the more unfortunate one, as he was then a direct target of Fox’s wrath. He should have known better than to test the limits of Fox’s distaste for physical affection.
At the memory, Rogue laughs to himself. He tries to hold onto the feeling for as long as possible because stars know his present is only full of disappointment and seething.
There must be some higher presence out there- a god, a force, a spirit- because Rogue wants to believe that someone is to blame for this turn of events. That he and his troops getting an assignment, leaving Kamino for the first time and hopefully last time, and launching a ship on their own only to get backlogged by a tardy general is not just his shitty luck. He needs to believe there is some plan for his misfortune.
Because otherwise he might be tempted to disregard the plan completely.
Technically the only thing keeping them here is an unsupervised order. The thought by the Jedi Council and Senate that Rogue and the soldiers will wait to be given another command. That they will do nothing until they are directed. That they are still, like inactive machines of war just waiting to be turned on. He tries not to think about how degrading of an image that paints of him and his brothers.
Their mission is to help another battalion take the capital of a separatist city on the planet Nabron that’s been terrorizing it’s people. The residents of the capitol were forced to flee to surrounding provinces when the Separatists came and took root in their city. Now they control all flow of commerce and use that location as a launching point for their domination of the planet. Rogue and his men are meant to take over the siege so the prior company can retreat and regather. Rogue hasn’t seen the Separatists’ onslaught first hand yet, but he has seen its aftermath. He’s seen what it does to the few brothers that manage to come back to Kamino. He can imagine what it is doing to all those people down there.
And every moment they waste here, waiting , is another innocent life that is put in senseless danger.
It’s times like this that Rogue wishes he hadn’t condemned himself to protocol. His duty to protect his brothers and protect the freedom they fight to grasp comes into conflict every time he’s reminded of what brought them into existence in the first place. Because he wants to guard his brothers, yes, but they were still made to protect others. To fight. To serve. Call it programming, instinct, whatever- but he cannot deny its constant existence in his moral mind.
And this kriffing protocol is keeping them from doing exactly that.
It’s keeping his brothers from danger.
It’s keeping those people in danger.
The holopad cracks under Rogue’s grip. He hadn’t realized the strength of his frustration until the sound made Hawthorne flinch beside him.
Rogue quickly pockets the holopad and turns to the comm on his wrist for distraction instead. There’s another, smaller screen, on the armor and Rogue tucks his helmet under his arm to tap a few buttons with his other hand.
A notification appears at the top. His heart stops beating entirely. He isn’t sure if it’s fear or relief.
“We’ve got new orders men!” Rogue shouts to the red and white armored crowd in front of him. They all jolt to attention, Hawthorne smacking his helmet in glee.
Rogue jumps off the platform and connects his comm to the speakers of the ship, relaying the message as he walks. “Pilots! Get these ships started and packed with soldiers- we’re heading to the surface.”
They start moving instantly. Like nature's true course for them was in the chaos of battle, the men who were once in perfect lines start moving with new energy to grab their weapons and organize into their troops. The engines come alive all around Rogue as the pilots strap in and Rogue jogs to the nearest ship.
Hawthorne grabs his shoulder and yanks him back. “Woah hold the kriff up. What about the general?”
Yes, what about the general? Rogue has a few choice words.
“They will meet us on the surface.” Rogue reassures his brother. Though to be honest, he’d skimmed over that part of the message. “Let’s move out!”
Hawthorne nods before sliding on his helmet. Surprisingly enough, it falls right into place without interference from the strangely tall hair. But he runs into the crowd of anticipating soldiers. Not blending in, but joining.
Rogue holds his own painted helmet in his hands. The red lines take up minor space against the original white, but they still took a while to dry. Hawthorne had suggested Rogue paint the kama around his hips too, to ‘complete the look’. But that likely would have taken even longer. Besides, artistry is not the point of the paint. The point is to identify themselves. Individualize. So that when one of the many citizens of the galaxy watches them save them, they know who to thank. They know who is watching out for them.
That mission starts now.
He puts the helmet on. It fits perfectly.
Rogue hops into the nearest ship and the metal doors slide shut right behind him. He takes hold of one of the handles just as the shuttle roars to life and the ground shivers- the ship lifting off the station floor and exiting into free space.
Rogue takes a glance at his fellow men. His responsibilities. Though they all are masked behind the white and red faces of helmets, Rogue can sense the unanimous feelings in the cramped air. Anticipation. Fear. Courage. Worry. A strange twinge of excitement fueled by purpose. He feels it all himself.
The ship rocks once, twice, as it enters the atmosphere and breaks through the sky. For a moment it’s smooth sailing. All of his men and Rogue and Hawthorne readying blasters and steadying their hearts for when they finally reach the ground. Rogue breathes heavily beneath his helmet, hoping it doesn’t translate over the comms. His senses are both dulled and heightened, the reality of what is about to happen suddenly setting in like the weight of a rancor. The moment the ship settles and those doors open, he’ll never be able to sit idly on Kamino again. He’ll never have to imagine what is it like to be in battle, to fight and to lose.
But he’ll also never feel powerless again. He’s going to fight, he’s going to keep fighting, he’s going to protect as many of his brothers as he-
Something smashes into the ship and batters it. Rogue only remains standing because he holds onto the handle but a few of his men tumble around the metal interior. Live fire. “Keep steady men!” He shouts.
The battle is already raging. By some grace, their ship reaches land. And the second the doors slide open, they rush. The world is sand and fire. Smoke and singed machines. A metallic taste stains the air and Rogue can only hope that at least most of it is dead droids and not blood. The other battalion they were sent to help holds a line against the swarm of clankers slowly pushing in, tanks bombarding with shots that arch in the air. That’s probably what downed his ship.
“Troopers!” Rogue shouts to his men. “Take formation C dash rush at the gorge over there. Flank the clankers. The rest of you- man the line!”
There’s a slight hesitation in their movement, as there would be anything that is the first time, but they go. Assimilating into orders as perfectly as any general could ask. If they even bothered to show up.
Focus. Not the time.
He can be irked later.
Rogue takes out his twin blasters and joins the firefight.
It almost comes naturally, running into battle like he’d done it a thousand times. Shooting where the droids come forth and providing himself cover. The rest of his men are already shearing down the enemy's numbers and he joins a few of them in cover behind a downed ship.
To the side, Hawthorne’s blasting left and right. His sniper gun that he customized proves useful even in close combat and he rushes in with joyful aggression that barrels through his opponents.
Rogue refocuses on his own targets. One clanker. Two down. Another few. He ducks behind the ship again as a blaster rings off its hull, singeing just where his head was a second ago.
“Cutter, Roundout,” Two light red painted helmets turn to him. “Get the machine guns and start an offensive line. Cover the rest of us and we’ll rush to the next point.” They nod and run back to the ships to grab the ammunition. Rogue pops out from behind his cover and sends out another round of blasts.
With the added numbers of their legion, the 667th and 32nd together should be able to push through this onslaught. This is the last defensive line of the Separatists before the capitol, once they’re down the GAR can take back the city. But they’ll have to be quick- take down the droids and the tank behind them before the Separatists can send reinforcements. Then they’ll fortify the perimeter of the city with the ammunition that is waiting for the all-clear to land, and make sure the Separatists won’t try twice to come back here.
It’s a good plan. A solid strategy.
And in all his confidence, Rogue makes a quick mistake. He turns away from cover without looking out at the danger and rushes into the field, blasters at the ready. But before he can even get a single shot out- the ground explodes. One of the tanks had shot a volley of fire at the front of the battle- sacrificing a slew of their own droids but taking out the republic's advantage.
Rogue is sent flying back by the outskirts of the blast. A wave of sheer power knocks his armor against his lungs and crushes them and he tumbles to the ground in a heap. He groans, trying to find the adrenaline to pick himself up. His ribs are likely bruised, worse to say about his back and legs. But nothing feels broken. He can keep going. He can keep fighting.
Then he hears a whining noise. Up in the air. His head tilts up just in time to see the white tail of a rocket heading straight for him.
He can’t even scream.
Rogue nearly laughs. He wants to cry out in anger. All of that time, all of that training, all of that promise, and he meets his end a mere ten minutes into the battlefield? What will his brothers do then? Who will protect them? Maybe he should have stayed on Kamino. Maybe someone else should have stuck to protocol. Someone who did it better, someone stronger, someone more useful . Rogue thought that if he’d done everything right then he’d be able to protect his men, protect the galaxy. He’d have shown them that they all matter. Individually.
What will his brothers say when he meets them in the afterlife? What will he say to them?
I’m sorry.
The rocket takes up his vision. Rogue covers his head with his arm. He hears a slash and an explosion and-
When Rogue opens his eyes, a woman is leaning over him.
Her face is like a princess-or a witch. High cheekbones, soft and delicate, but sharp at her nose and jaw strangely in the most threatening ways. She has golden brown skin a bit darker than his own, even darker brown eyes that bore into him framed by waves of deep brown hair that cuts off at her shoulders. There’s a pink hue against her face that Rogue slowly realizes is her lightsaber hanging to the side- the follow-through of the attack on the rocket she’d just saved him from.
The title appears instantly in his mind. Jedi.
“Commander Rogue I assume?” The woman warrior says, her voice surprisingly rough for what he’d expected of a Jedi. In fact, he'd imagined quite a few details about the Jedi, only having met one- Shaak Ti, and otherwise merely caught glimpses of them on holo screens. The two experiences together paint the picture of a regal, poised, traditionally garbed warrior priest. Dressed in unassuming robes of neutral colors, conserved and placid.
She is not what he’d expected.
The Jedi is dressed head to toe in black, red, and white. What seems to be a cutout of a robe sleeve drapes over her right shoulder and crosses her body to pin at her other hip. Her right arm bears black arm wraps while the other is bare, only the strap of a plain tank that covers her upper body. A skirt of cloth and metal chains wraps around her hips and cuts open at the other mesh-wrapped leg.
Rogue had assumed red was the color of the Jedi’s enemy. A simple part of his mind assumed they were averted from the color. Though it’s not exactly the vibrant red of the Sith, more a muted burgundy, it adorns most of her outfit. From the top of the cutout robe to her ankle-length skirt. Everything about this woman screams dissident. At least in terms of what he’d expect of Jedi. And because of that, something tells him this arrangement isn’t going to go very well.
But she’d saved his life.
The commander leans back, straightening his posture in a failed attempt to stick to protocol. As if he isn’t almost lying on the ground with her over him. The effort is pathetic.
This is not how this was supposed to go.
“Yes,” He starts, taking a breath to gather whatever remained of his pride. “General.”
Three Years and Some Days Later- On a planet somewhere in the Inner Rim.
Taya Sitari, Jedi Knight, has been many things. Former padawan of Master Aminah Kielia, former Knight of the Jedi Order, former General of the 18th Legion, then the 32nd, former friend, former ally, former….she’d been a lot of things.
And now she is Taya Sitari. Fugitive. Vagabond. Survivor. Simply, Taya Sitari.
Not even that. She can’t claim her real name anymore. It’s too much of a risk. The galaxy had come to know her through holo screens and chatter, like so many other once reclusive Jedi. She wonders if that was part of the sick bastard's whole plan. To spotlight all of them so that it would be that much easier for the few Jedi that did escape to be hunted down. After all, now the galaxy knows their faces and names. They can’t disappear into a crowd as easily. Now it is that much harder to hide from….everything.
She does it anyway. Under the shroud of a cloak she stole off a clothesline, she slips through the night-lit streets of a planet she doesn’t remember the name of, just that it was farthest from the star cruiser she abandoned that she could get in an escape pod. She’ll need to get further away. Somewhere remote and distant from any “Imperial” influence.
Kriff, they sure were quick to change the name . The imperial forces she is now trying to hide from is the same side she used to fight on, if only far more violent. As she knows. But the irony is almost suffocating. How many people did they label separatists and refuse to see why they were separating? How many warned them about the infection spreading from Coruscant all throughout the galaxy? All in the name of a democracy that was hiding a wrinkled old dictator.
Taya pulls the side of the hood further around her cheek. Any and all money she had in her account as part of “Jedi funds” is sure to be contaminated now. If not completely erased, then an easy way for the empire to track her if she uses that account. No, she’ll have to find another way to get some credits. Buy a ticket and get the hell out of this system. Maybe go somewhere where there are no cities. No mass of people to wonder who’s looking at her, who recognizes her, who’s actively looking for her.
At that thought she whips her head around, feeling the ghost of someone watching her prickle the back of her neck. But if anyone is watching her, they have the sense to look away as soon as she moves. Anyone in the streets around her are in their own business, gazes down or straight ahead like they couldn’t care less about a random woman spinning around in her place. Her skin still shivers though.
Or maybe it’s just her paranoia. Or lack of rest. She hasn’t been able to sleep as well since that day. She isn’t sure if she’ll ever be able to again.
She turns into an alleyway. The buildings are low and wide, the lamps marking the street dim and golden, making for a place that by all means, to everyone else, would be considered peaceful. Quaint even. The night sky above is glimmering with stars alongside the large moon of this system peeking over the horizon. It’s not nearly as busy as Coruscant. In fact, now that Taya looks away there are far fewer people about than she’d initially thought. Maybe a few dozen, walking up and down the sidewalks without a single other care. This planet hadn’t been under Separatist control prior to the end of the Clone Wars. And neither had any soldiers been stationed here for protection.
It’s just…people.
But then again, “just people” had tried to kill her only a few days ago.
A few days ago.
Taya slumps against the wall, her chest suddenly heavy. She remembers it vividly. Like a fresh wound that refuses to stop bleeding in her mind. She hasn’t been able to stop thinking about it.
About what happened in the three years she realizes was a setup for something larger. About what it all means now. About what everything that had already happened had turned out to mean. About how both of them had been so cavalier, joking about gardens and farms, just moments before they’d raised their blasters at her. Three years.
So little time and yet so many things transpired. And she had to disappear so quickly. She couldn’t even check on everyone else.
What would happen to Heathen at the barracks?
Did Cerise ever make it off Coruscant?
Are they still keeping Imara’s secret? Is she safe?
What are Rogue and Hawthorne doing now?
She still remembers the day they first met. She’d saved Rog…Commander Rogue from a missile. The helmet had masked his face, but she could tell he hadn’t been happy with her sudden, tardy, appearance. And she hadn’t been happy with his insistence on disobeying her orders. Granted it took a while for them to figure each other out, and figure out how to work together-but eventually they did. Hawthorne had been a bit easier, though wrangling him in is probably part of what made her and Rogue work together faster.
Still, she’d learned from both of them more than she’d ever be able to say.
All of that time. All of those adventures. All of the memories they made and moments they had and…and it ended just like that. With him pointing a blaster at her face.
It wasn’t his fault. She could tell, no she knew that much. There was nothing that could make him, all of them , turn so violently just like that. Cutter and Felix were joking with her over the comms just moments before it happened. Hawthorne had tried to hold back. Rogue warned her. If he hadn’t she wouldn’t have turned around in time to see the gun trained at her back. She has no idea what happened, but something changed them.
She wants to blame the Kaminoans. Everyone knows they picked around at the mens’ biology from conception like little experimentations to make them more compliant. Taya wouldn’t be surprised if their violations of the clones went so far as actual programming. If the galaxy weren’t hunting her down, and Kamino wasn’t the belly of the Empire right now, she’d take a ship over and get them revenge. She’d char the insides of every scientist there. She’d remind them of every name they chose to ignore.
But there was a higher game at play. Only none of them ever realized it until their dried-out senior citizen of a Chancellor proclaimed himself Emperor. She doesn’t believe the lie that Mace Windu and the Jedi cornered him in his office and tried to kill him and that’s why there’s a kill order on the Jedi. How would some regular old man survive being cornered like that? Why would they try to kill him rather than make him face the Senate for his lies? It doesn’t make sense. The Chancellor did something. He planned everything. Down to the final seconds, he was manipulating them all.
How did none of them see it coming? It seems so obvious now- his suspicious rise to power. The convenient timing of the clones. The connections between Jango Fett and the Separatists and how they kept picking themselves up during the Clone Wars. Palpatine had been playing both sides until he got what he wanted. The galaxy in chaos, prime for his taking. And all it took were the deaths and submissions of all her friends- Rogue, Hawthorne, Aminah, Anakin, Raisa, Fox- all of them disappeared or dead.
Beyond that even. She’d lost thousands of people. Twice. In different ways. The first time she’d been responsible. The second she’d just been a fool.
So much happened. So much changed. She changed. She had begun to think the rest of the universe could too.
And turns out it had all been for nothing.
They’d fought and bled for a system that hadn’t existed in a while. All the lessons she’d learned, the ways she’d figured out how to live and see the world? And now all of that has been thrown out of motion. What did it matter what kind of Jedi she chose to be when the Order no longer existed? When no matter who you are, and what code you follow - your own or the tradition - you will be hunted.
After so many years of fighting, of serving, of living, all she can do now is try to survive.
She’d done that already. When she’d left behind two people she promised to never abandon. Taya heard what he said though. She knows she did what she had to do. If she’d done anything else, she wouldn’t be here. Thinking. Avoiding the galaxy she promised to protect. Trying to survive its hunt.
She didn’t use to have to survive. Her whole life with the Jedi, and then with the 32nd, she’d been with other people. Sure, not in the closest sense it could have been. And not in any way that she would be able to express. But they were there- watching her back, picking her up, fighting alongside her as she did all of that to them. And now? Now her life is nothing but a long stretch of endurance.
That’s the thing about surviving though. About prioritizing your own safety and life. Survival is when it’s you against the world. And when you are fighting against everyone and everything else- you do it alone.
Though perhaps that is how it was always meant to be. She found and made attachments when she wasn’t supposed to and this is her punishment. To be completely and utterly disconnected. Drifting. Fleeting. Like she, along with everyone else that had died prior, had never even existed. There would be no one to mourn them. No one to remember them.
Taya imagines if her family before she was taken from her home world of Amabatara were alive, they wouldn’t know who to think about anyway. During the war, she’d had some missions there. Cerise, her young Queen of a friend, had shown her a bit of where she’d come from. Well, as much as was appropriate for a detached Jedi. She was there to protect the world, not become part of it. There had been one mission, where Taya and the 32nd were charged with guarding a collection of precious items that would be revealed at a celebration on Amabatara. Taya had thought “precious items” meant gold or spice of some kind. She’d been pleasantly surprised.
On the night someone on Amabatara is born, certain stars appear in the sky. And when those stars return, it is time for the next stage in that person's life. A revelry- a celebration for when a person's inner self- their passions and their future- is revealed in the item they forge. Something that will be imperative to their future, maybe even a hint at where that future will lead. The most precious of items for Ambatarans.
Cerise had invited Taya to participate in her own revelry. After all, as an Ambataran she had a revelation waiting for her. But back then she had another obligation. Something else holding her back. She was sure the Council would have considered a cultural ceremony as an “attachment” to be severed.
But the Council is gone now.
Taya looks up, a blanket of stars above her head unlike any she’d ever seen on Coruscant with all its light pollution. Here it is almost completely clear. A dark blue sky whisked with purple backgrounding the cosmos that even after so many journeys across, Taya has never stopped being amazed at how beautiful it is. She imagines this is what the night sky on Amabatara looks like and wonders what stars would have been revealed if she’d taken Cerise’s offer. Oh, if only. Maybe she could have made her revelation into a ship to take her away from this damn Imperial galaxy.
Then again if she had taken her friend's offer, her life may have been jump-started on a completely different part. After all, Cerise said that the revelry is meant to show an Ambataran their true self. The revelation, the tool they are gifted at the revelry, is supposed to help them on the path they walk on, or will walk on, even if they don’t realize it. In a way, the revelation tells them what they are meant to do. Who they truly are.
A curious thought echoes in Taya’s mind. One that she hadn’t been able to let breathe because of her loyalties and obligations. All of which have since been dismantled or died.
But…maybe now? Now that she has nothing telling her to let go of her past, now that she has nothing and no one else to look forward to in the future, there’s nothing keeping her from going after what she had been so curious about.
Strangely enough, mixed within the sorrow and pain, the loneliness and disparity-
For the first true time she’s actually, completely, free.
She’s always been something. Jedi, student, General, friend, something more. And yet she’s never really called herself Ambataran. She’s never gotten to see what that means for her. What it could have led to. What else she could be. Not that it would ever be one answer. After all, a friend once told her to choose who she wanted to be. It was just that, for the longest time, she had struggled with figuring out her options.
So if the revelry is meant to show someone where their future could lie-
Perhaps it’s time for her to go back home.