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If all it took to get Fox some time off was murdering his boss in cold blood, he might have done it sooner.
Of course, ‘time off’ was probably different when he was stuck in a jail cell, but the Republic cells were almost cushy, considering the accommodations he’d had for most of his life.
And he even had a friend who was willing to visit him!
Though, again, said friend did not look entirely pleased by his new status.
“I just… never thought you were capable of this, Fox,” Cody said quietly. “You’ve always been a good soldier.”
Fox smiled.
“I am a good soldier,” he assured his vod. “I always follow orders. I’m dedicated to the protection of the Republic.”
It was one of his strong points, frankly. Who else could stomach the work that he did? Cody was tough, but it was only an outer shell, created to help shield his squishy insides. Fox was rot, all the way down.
That was what Palpatine had liked most about him, after all. He hadn’t had to do anything to break Fox – little CC-1010 had already arrived on Coruscant with an expired warranty.
“And assassinating the Chancellor was protecting the Republic?” Cody said tightly. It looked like he wanted to lean closer, wanted to get up in Fox’s face, but the shield in place of his cell wouldn’t allow it.
“I think it was murder, technically, since I didn’t kill him over political reasons,” Fox said thoughtfully. If it had all been about the politics, Fox would have strangled the natborn ages ago.
“That’s not the point, Fox!” Cody snapped, and the frustration on his face peeled away to reveal the true emotion hidden underneath – fear. “You’ve confessed to killing one of the most important men in the galaxy, Fox – ”
“Because I did,” Fox piped in helpfully, only to be summarily ignored.
“ – and it’s only the investigation and the upcoming peace conference that are preventing them from marching you right to the firing squad! This is no laughing matter!” Cody finished, panting, hands clenched in tight fists.
“Would they use natborn executors, or vod’e?” Fox mused. “Not sure which would be better, honestly.”
He thought he would have preferred his last sight to be that of his vod’e, even if they were pointing blasters at him, but Fox rarely got what he wanted. And besides, apparently such a thing would be ‘traumatizing to witness’ and ‘not an appropriate remark to make during shiny orientation’, but what did Nightingale know, she thought she was so smart just because she was the CMO and sewed his guts back together on a regular basis. Fox could learn to do that too, probably.
“Fox!” Cody snapped, and that tone still managed to pierce through the fog, despite it all, catching Fox’s attention immediately.
“Yessir?” he said, almost automatically.
Something in Cody’s face crumpled, and he moved as close to the shield as he could, just inches between them.
“Fox, I want to help you,” he said, voice trembling in a way it hadn’t since they were cadets. “Please work with me here. What happened? I know you. You wouldn’t have done this for no reason. The Jedi are working as best they can, but they might not be fast enough. Please, let me help you. Give me something.”
And suddenly, it felt like there was a boiling volcano inside of Fox’s chest, about to explode.
“Give you something?” he said, low and deadly. “How many times did I try to do that, Cody? How many fucking times did I ask you to control your men, to teach them some goddamn manners, to keep your games off this planet while we’re all just trying to live? How many times, Cody?!”
This wasn’t fair, and Fox knew it. He wasn’t really angry with Cody – he was angry with the Chancellor for fucking everything up, with the Republic for allowing it –
And himself, for standing back and watching it happen.
At least Cody had been out there doing something. At least he had actually saved lives with his grand, Jedi-assisted bullshit. It felt like Fox was perpetually scrambling to pick up the pieces, his troopers' lives falling through his hands like sand, always one step too late to change anything.
All the fight abruptly left him, and Fox slumped against the wall, reaching one hand up to scrub at his face.
Cody had paled at Fox’s sudden venom, but to his credit, he didn’t do more than flinch.
“I do wish I had been better to you,” he admitted, folding his hands together. Cody always did that when he was nervous, which was a rare enough occurrence that Fox blinked through his lethargy, trying to pay attention. “I wish… I wish I’d done a lot of things. But I’m trying to do something now, Fox. I’m trying to help you. Will you please let me?”
His vod would know better than anyone that Fox was an utter contrarian, and loved nothing more than refusing desperately needed assistance, if only for the chance of pushing through regardless and being able to brag afterwards.
Fox was the kind of trooper who saw the punch coming and let it happen, just so he could complain about it later.
The kind of man to spend years working under a complete and utter despot, to let it all happen without a single word of censure, until the moment it finally touched his bottom line.
“I don’t want to tell you,” Fox finally admitted.
He didn’t want Cody to know. Of course Cody was better than him, he always had been. But he didn’t want to tell his shining, heroic vod that Fox had been perfectly fine with Palpatine committing treason until the moment it actually affected him.
“Did… Did the Chancellor hurt you, Fox?” Cody said quietly, expression drawn and already full of grief.
Fox barked out a laugh. He wished that burst of anger could come back, that he could numb himself to the reality of what he’d done – or what he didn’t do.
“Not really,” he replied, voice airy. “Not more than anyone else, at least. Natborns can be tetchy, especially those used to being obeyed, but we’re clones. We’re good at obeying. It’s what we were made for.”
Cody frowned, squeezing his hands together over and over.
“Fox, what did he do? Why did you kill him?”
And this was the moment of truth, he supposed. This was the opportunity to spin a convenient web, to tell the world that he’d done everything he could, really, and the Chancellor had to die for the sake of the Republic, for the sake of the democracy that he was slowly consuming into an ever-darkening void –
But Fox loved Cody, so he didn’t lie to him.
“D’you remember Fives?” he said. At Cody’s mute nod, Fox smiled. It was a crooked, bloody thing. “Chancellor started getting paranoid in his old age, I think. Killing one rambling idiot wasn’t enough. He wanted all the witnesses gone, too. Anyone they could’ve told. Anyone who might know the truth.”
Cody sucked in a breath, horror beginning to dawn in his eyes as he realized where this was going. “Fox – ”
“Rex was too valuable,” Fox barreled on. “Chancellor had plans for Skywalker. Didn’t want to break him too soon. But you? You were the perfect option. A distraction for both Kenobi and Rex, and therefore Skywalker; the perfect pin to pull out of the Grand Army of the Republic.”
“Fox,” Cody repeated, a strangled, agonized sound.
Fox looked into his vod’s eyes, and did not flinch.
“I could’ve killed anyone else. I wouldn’t have even hesitated. I would’ve killed Rex, if he’d asked.”
If it wasn’t Rex, it would’ve been Fox’s men who paid the price. For a long, long time, that particular stick had been enough to keep Fox in line, reaching for that carrot.
“But not you, Cody. Not you. So there was really only one option left, you know?”
And now, looking into Cody’s eyes, turning faintly red as he tried to hold back tears, devastation written into every line of his face, Fox didn’t regret a thing.