Curses, Cocoons And Clones Part 4

I just had a thought

So this one day Rex comes back to Coruscant and he just doesn’t seem to be acting right. No one can quite put their finger on it…but something is just…off.

The next day Cody returns, and it’s the same thing. Something is just…off.

When asked if something’s wrong they both just kind of shrug it off. ‘I’m fine.’

They don’t talk as much. Their habits have changed just a little. No one can figure out what’s happened and it’s driving everyone crazy.

Then Ahsoka goes to talk to Rex and stops mid-sentence.

“…”

“Problem, Commander?”

And she rubs her hand across his head and the blonde comes out and it’s BLACK and ‘Rex’ starts cracking up and ‘Cody’ is almost crying because he’s laughing so hard and everyone realizes they switched armor and Wolffe almost shoots them both because THat wAS SO unNECESSARY.

Trial Run

Just a little piece inspired by @jasjuliet‘s beautiful piece. Can be read as shippy or not. Up to you. Under a cut because it got a little long. Also available on ao3.

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How to lose your beastly murder cyborg

Covid sucks. My symptoms are mild, a testament that my heart condition is currently in remission—it is psychosomatic, though no less potentially deadly. ANYWAY

My biggest comfort has been an AU with @spacingstars and @ninjigma were Vader crawled out of his eggie one day and found a tiny little blonde bebe on his floor. Took a moment, Sith-juice fried his brain, but he eventually recognized it as a Clone!

Anyway, because though we can think of a more serious plot and context for all this, the comfort stuff is totally crackish. It is Vader losing what's left of his damn marbles because...

Baby.

Tiny. Baby. Bouncing. Blonde. Ickle. Clone. Who looked UP at him, grinned a toothless smile, papped his oversized boots, and... giggled.

Vader was done. He is over. Sanity, all of it questionable and tainted, has completely flipped. It reset something in him, like it was hands that found his hidden reset button in his back. Might have been his mother's ghostly touch or Padme's. Eithe rway. DONE.

Our little comfort scenarios skip to Vader eventually realizing bebe was in danger, and hightailed out of there. How did he find Obi-Wan? Who knows. But, he did. Pretty much knocked in the door to his old master's sad-man cave.

Where can he put the crib?

Stop gawking at him! He needs a charging station for the Nanny Droid! Here, hold baby.

Little Rex (because, of course it is) just stared at Obi-Wan. He honestly hadn't seen a lot of PEOPLE with faces. He saw Vader with and without his helmet. He'd seen plenty of droids. He'd seen Kaminoan. But...

Little fingers reached up, gently edged the old man's—Obi-Wan's eyes are already wet—beard, curled his fingers deep into that greying tuft of thick fuzz, then...

YANKED real good!

"Ow!" Infant death grip made all efforts to extracat little fingers almost a lost cause.

The crackle of static heard out of Vader was laughter. Obi-Wan didn't recognize it, but bebe does—Rex just giggled more.

Hnnnng I told myself I'd restrain myself, bit I can't XD Can you do Oh No or Double Trouble for Rex XD I know those were in my ehhh 'list' XD

Thanks for the prompt! This is the last of these I’ll be doing, so please don’t send any more requests in! I got way more than I expected to get, which isn’t a bad thing at all and I’m super grateful for (and surprised by) all the requests I got, but now my brain is like “why are you doing this to me.” Thank y’all!

Double trouble— character is sick and injured

Rex hadn’t meant to let the cut on his arm go untreated for as long as he did. It was difficult to get things treated in the midst of endless battle after endless battle, and Rex hadn’t had time to go to any of the medics to get it looked at. It was a pretty long gash, but not very deep, so Rex figured it would probably be fine.

He didn’t really like the way that it was getting red around the edges and was hot to the touch, though. That didn’t really bode well, but it probably was fine for a little while longer. He’d get it looked at after this next battle. Ignoring the way his arm twinged with every movement and the waves of nausea that coursed through him with every step, he continued on with his duties and led the men from the very front as he always did, General Skywalker by his side.

Getting slammed against a wall and then falling off a short ledge in the midst of battle certainly hadn’t been in his plans for the battle, but it happened nonetheless. He heard someone yelling his name and jumping down into the small crevice he’d found himself in, but he was too busy blinking back stars and ignoring the way his arm was screaming at him to pay attention to who it was. Now his head hurt a lot, and he realized that his helmet had gotten knocked off at some point during that whole ordeal. Opening his eyes ever so slightly, he found himself looking up at Anakin’s worried face.

“Go back to the men, sir, I’ll be fine,” Rex managed. His stomach decided then was the time to do some flips, and he barely managed to roll over in time to throw up. His arm screamed in protest, and one of his ankles felt like it was twisted, if not worse, and he was somehow both cold and hot at once, but he’d be fine.

“Sith hells, Rex, you’re in rough shape,” Anakin said, obviously ignoring the fact that Rex had told him to leave.

“Sir, the men—“ Rex began as he rolled back over onto his back (with a little help from Anakin, although he didn’t really register that fact).

“Will be fine with Obi-Wan and Ahsoka in the lead. I’ll help take you back to camp and to the medics, and help them with anyone who got injured along the way, okay? There’s no way you’ll ever make it there on your own,” Anakin said, holding out a hand for Rex to take. Rex begrudgingly took it, but realized a moment too late that it was the wrong arm. He bit back a scream when Anakin pulled him up, causing Anakin to look at him in concern.

“What all’s hurt?” Anakin asked, using the force to call Rex’s helmet to him.

“Ankle, arm, head, nausea,” Rex muttered, “Not all of that’s new.” Anakin lifted an eyebrow at him but didn’t comment on anything, instead using his real hand to feel Rex’s forehead.

“And you’ve got a fever, Rex!” Anakin exclaimed, “Yeah, no way are you going back to that battle.”

Rex merely grunted in response. Anakin warned him that they were about to jump out of the little crevice they were in. Rex nodded, but as soon as they lifted up and landed, he nearly threw up again. There was a rushing behind his ears, and he gasped as pain overtook him. He could vaguely hear Anakin talking to him before he passed out.

Rex woke up to a very unhappy Kix standing by his bed, tapping this foot and looking at Rex expectantly.
“Why, pray tell, did you not get that cut on your arm treated when it happened?” Kix demanded.

“Let a guy wake up first, Kix,” Rex muttered, gingerly sitting up in his bed, grimacing when his arm flared a little, along with the way his ankle protested at the movement..

“It got infected. Do you know how difficult it is for things to get infected with all the medical technology we have? If you’d taken 5 minutes to come get it looked at, it would’ve been fine, and I wouldn’t have had to fight for your life over something that was entirely avoidable,” Kix scolded, “Infections are deadly if they aren’t treated, Rex. If you hadn’t been injured out in the field today, by the time you came to finally get it checked, it may have been too late. We might have had to amputate your arm.”

Rex paled at the realization, eyes going wide. He really hadn’t thought it was that serious, but he certainly wasn’t the medic in the room.

Kix sighed and smiled at him kindly, “I’m just worried, is all, captain. I don’t mean to sound cruel. Just stating the facts. You’ve gotta take better care of yourself.”

Rex nodded, “Sorry, Kix. I won’t let that happen again.”

Kix smiled at him again, “I know you won’t. Now, General Skywalker was worried sick about you and I’m sure he’ll want to talk for a little bit. Should I let him in now, or let you sleep a little longer?”

Rex paused and sighed, “I suppose let him in now.” Kix went to go fetch the general, leaving a glass of water by Rex’s bedside.

Anakin came in not long after, going straight to Rex’s bed.

“I’m glad to see you looking much more… alive,” Anakin said as he sat down, “You passed out after I jumped out of that crevice. I had to carry you the whole way back— you are heavy!”

“Most of that’s the armor, probably. Adds about 70 pounds or so,” Rex said with a smirk, “But sorry about that, sir. You shouldn’t have had to leave the battle field because of one man.”

“When will you get it through that head of yours that I do that because I care about you guys? I would’ve done it for any of you. After I got you back here, I went back and helped with some of the other injured,” Anakin said, stroking his chin thoughtfully in a way that was reminiscent of General Kenobi, “We Jedi should do that more often.”

“I’m sure it would mean a lot to the men if you did,” Rex replied, “It’s not a horrible idea.”
“Ah, that’s basically saying ‘I love that idea’ in Rex-speech, so I’ll take it. I’m gonna go check on some of the other men— just try and take better care of yourself next time, okay? I don’t know what I’d do if you weren’t with me. Probably go insane,” Anakin said, smiling and patting Rex’s shoulder as he drifted off to the next patient. Rex settled into his bed with a smile and slipped back into an easy slumber.

Many years later, after the Battle of Endor was won, Rex would find out from a certain blond-haired Jedi exactly what Anakin would do when Rex wasn’t with him.

Rex, trying to give a motivational speech but then it evolved into him casualty talking about his really really fucked up cadethood:

“-I mean yeah all the other kids bullied me, hated me even, and no one liked me or even came near me. Come to think of it I did get shuffled around a lot, but that’s just because my entire original batch was decommissioned. And yeah I did have a lot of near death experiences, but I only needed to be resuscitated a handful of times. Ha, there was that one time a trainer threw me off a platform because they were sick of dealing with all my paperwork, but I pulled myself up by my bootstraps and hauled myself out of the ocean. You know what they say; you want something done you gotta do it yourself, because no one else is going to do it for you! I think I came out the other side just fine and I’m stronger because of it! :)”

The entire 501st: “…whAT THE FUUUUUCK!”

I just thought of a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad au where during Umbara it’s Rex that’s injured and he’s begging Kix to leave him behind so Kix can keep outrunning the tanks. And Kix still tells Rex he sounds like General Krell but he’s more frustrated and afraid than angry. Kix manages to group Rex with the rest of the wounded and Rex orders Kix to leave them behind and initially Kix is like no Fucking way I’m leaving you all out here but Rex reasons with him that he’s the only medic with the company right now and he had to keep moving with the group and Rex would keep an eye on and defend the rest of the wounded. At this point Kix knows he’s right so he leaves with them with a bunch of supplies and keeps going with Torrent. At the end of the battle when their recovering everyone’s like oh Kriff where’s Rex?! Did we loose him?! Is he dead?! And Kix speaks up and tells them he’s with the wounded, which spurts Fives and company to try and go back and look for them but in the name of progress and sacrifice Krell forbids it. He temporarily promotes Jesse to captain because i think at the time he was Rex’s lieutenant but mostly because Krell liked Jesse’s attitude more than he liked Five’s. The rest of the arc continues the way it originally did but with Jesse and fives at the lead. Meanwhile, Rex and like 25 other troops are lost in a foreign environment in the center of hostile territory on a planet far from any republic system, dwindling rations and medical supplies trying their best to live off the land for weeks. Rex had found a cave for the men to hide out in and made a camp there. Since he’s the captain and one of the least injured he goes out trying to locate and contact the gar while finding food and supplies. Between encounters with natural predators and Umbaran squads he always comes back more injured than he left. At this time Anakin gets back and he’s also like umm where’s Rex?? When the 501st tells him what happened he’s pissed and immediately goes out into the jungle to find Rex. And he does, just in time too because Rex had gotten his legs caught in a trap and was too injured to walk or fight and was surrounded by enemy Umbarans. Rex and the others wounded are rescued and get shipped of to a medical station for a while. When they get back hella comfort ensues and torrent is never letting Rex out of their sight again. Over the next few months however it’s clear that Rex has developed a significant amount of trauma and ptsd from the experience and is finding it hard to integrate back into and function within the gar.

Angstober Day 21

Can’t Save Everyone

Spoiler: This is an excerpt from Sea Shadow

He exchanges a look with an equally desperate, confused looking Ahsoka. It’s reminding him so much of Mortis suddenly, of when the Son was controlling her and she attacked him. He doesn’t want to have to face that from Rex too, only months later. Everything that happened there still haunts him sometimes.

“Rex, it’s doing something to you,” he says, “Remember what I said about it influencing minds?”

Rex blinks, staring at him. “Yes. But it’s not here. This is…”

One of the Gungans yowls and jumps at them, half-blindly. It hits Ahsoka, and they tumble to the ground, rolling through the grass.

Why is he attacking her?

What’s happening to them? It’s like they’re all being mind-controlled, and he doesn’t know what to do, to stop it. Probably, they have to kill that thing.

Anakin yanks the Gungan off her with the Force, sprinting over to position himself between them and her. They’ll never be able to take everyone with them, either way. They’ll have to take Rex now, and come back for the others, as much as he doesn’t want to leave anyone else behind. There’s no choice. That doesn’t make him loath it any less, how it feels like he’s abandoning all the rest to their fates.

“Rex come, we need to go,” Anakin urges. Distantly, he can hear loud splashing. This is bad. The creature must be coming. “We have to leave now.”

“I can’t do that, sir,” he objects, though he takes a few steps closer.

They don’t have time to wait. If they don’t get out now, they won’t. And he doesn’t want to get Rex to the ship like this, but there’s no other choice. He picks him up with the Force, pulling him closer, setting him down lightly in the back, before he and Ahsoka Force-jump after – She obviously picked up on the same level of urgency.

The Gungans are snarling in noises Gungans shouldn’t even be able to make, starting towards them.

Whumptober Day 7: The Way You Shake And Shiver

Prompt: Shaking Hands & Silent Panic Attack

Warning: Mentions of Suicide

Summary: Rex isn't doing so great when they're finally on their way back to 000 from Umbara...

[Sometimes in moments of weakness we turn to old coping mechanisms. Whether that's a good thing or not is up for debate... Sometimes it makes it easier to lie to yourself that something broken can still be fixed.]

THIS STORY IS ALSO ON AO3

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Before Fox had given him his name, Rex had made a list of options just like every other cadet in his age group. It was almost a tradition for most young clones who still only had their numbers. The task of compiling potential names that may one day suit them in some way, shape, or form.

None of the ones he'd considered had ever stuck.

He'd been rather unsure of himself (the sole golden haired child among a sea of dark curls), often made to hide behind his batchmates. Keeli and Jek had both found their names quickly, and they'd been quite indecisive themselves. But they'd never been as nervous as he had been, so finding something to claim as theirs wasn't hard for them in the slightest.

They knew who they were.

Rex thought he knew who he was. A king with a crown of gold growing naturally upon his skull. A fellow misfit among the CCs that had adopted him. Fitting of a title that had his ori'vod beaming with pride. Fox had made him believe he was a leader.

Fox was a very good liar.

The trip back to Coruscant is a slow one. Umbara long gone from their radar, but still closer than home. Its darkness following the vode well into the flight. The hollowness behind their eyes... It makes his stomach twist and his heart hammer in his chest cavity like there's a parade in town. For once in his life a campaign has left Rex unable to think.

Or rather, unable to process the sheer horror of what he had witnessed. What he had let happen. What he had done.

Little Force Gods what had he done?

So many brothers dead. So many brothers left for dead. So many more dying inside.

He swallows thickly around the lump forming in his throat, and stares ahead unblinkingly. Watching the blue-tinted lines of hyperspace zip by as he considers what's to come, while a voice in the back of his head that sounds suspiciously like Keeli whispers for him to take deep breaths, to start counting.

If he counts it'll help ground him. But does he want to stay grounded? When there is too much going on right now?

Three troopers have eaten their own blasters before departure from Umbara. The death tool rising steadily. Many more might follow. Will follow. The guilt is killing them all, and he doesn't know how to help.

They should be incapable of breaking. Should be impervious to diseases of the brain. But Krell has left an infectious mind. One that makes it hard for Rex to breathe even in the safety of this ship.

His eyes sting, his chest hurts, his heart is breaking into a million pieces, and there's a good chance he might throw up.

His hands are shaking. They shook back on Umbara too.

Dogma's hadn't.

He comes back to in the refresher. Jesse and Fives are at his sides. They look shaken and tired, and a little of something else Rex can't identify right now.

Angry? Disappointed?

Disgusted with their oh so great captain who couldn't even take the shot himself? Who'd let so many brothers die needlessly when he could have acted immediately and avoided disaster?

The thought makes him vomit up more bile. Salty shame runs down his face, snot bubbles up in his nostrils, foamy sick lands in the toilet. Rough but gentle hands rub at the small of his back. He knows whatever relationship he had with both Jesse and Fives is strained now. Justifiably so. But they still have his back. They're holding him through a panic attack.

He counts each circle, each finger on his back. Then counts the murmurs he can hear. Then the instances where he hears Kix at the door, checking up on them. Making sure he's not going to eat his blaster like the others who just couldn't bare the guilt anymore.

Counting helps. It helped back when he was a cadet. It still does now.

He can't for the life of him recall how many names he'd compiled before he'd been given his own. Maybe someone else knew. Rex doesn't think he knows anything anymore. But he has to move on, regardless of what happened on Umbara.

He had to believe in the cause.

After the Captain

They haunted him at night.

For a while, Rex had convinced himself he was doing okay. He kept moving, place to place, camp to camp, never packing more than he could carry. If it wasn’t in his armor, or tucked into the pockets of his cloak, he didn’t need it. He got up in the morning before the sun, of whatever planet it was today, did. He kept a low profile, watched the gazes of those around him slide over his face without recognition. He collected what he could - bits of data from loosely guarded corners of the networks, bits of food people forgot to chase after, spare parts and necessities from those who forgot to remember them.

In a sense, they’d forgotten him too - him, and the thousands and thousands of people who shared his face. The vode were fading already, sinking to the back of public memory as the Empire hung its gaudy trappings and spread its newly-hatched wings.

But those endless faces never left him alone.

Identical.

Unique. Given the same blank canvas, each person who picks it up will paint something new.

And they had.

He had.

That was the thing. Because he had been one of them, once. There hadn’t been a moment when he hadn’t had someone to turn to, a piece of advice, a shoulder to lean on or a hand to hold or the person next to you, ready to fall in step as you go.

Captain.

They all said it differently, and he did too. It was wry, or joking, affectionate, or sincere, respectful or hopeful or a thousand things he couldn’t name.

For him, it was weighted. Thankful, in a way, desperate, in another. It was the responsibility of all of those faces, all of their newly-painted canvases warped from a galaxy they never knew. But they had never cared, stacking themselves on themselves until someone could make their identity out of the pieces of the others. He could see them without asking their names or finding their faces.

Tup’s smile bled into the horizon, the vod’ika he couldn’t save.

Fives’s laugh echoed in his ears, and something tore in Rex’s stomach every time.

Echo’s hands lingered on his, after the thousandth battle plan, and Rex could only see them shocked thin and wizened and paper-white, abandoned and alone.

Hardcase moved in the corner of his eye, off to his next adventure, and he was gone because Rex hadn’t the strength to stop him.

Kix’s side of the bed was empty, lost to the wind without a word.

Jesse was gone, stolen away, nothing but a body inside of a helmet Rex had helped him paint.

Captain.

There were so many things he could have done. So many things he should have done, would have turned the impossible upside down if it meant saving them for a day, a rotation, a year, a life they never got to live, trauma they never had to have.

Captain.

He heard it in their voices, in Hawk’s voice, in Charger’s voice, in Appo’s and Sterling’s and Koho’s and Vere’s and so many more that he never got the chance to save. He heard it in General Skywalker’s, barely-hidden humor and a kind of sarcastic optimism that infused his steps and his words. He even heard it in Ahsoka’s voice, and he knew she was fine, knew she could take care of herself. But it’s her as barely a Padawan, thrown into a war too big for her, it’s her as a newly-minted commander, it’s her growing into a kind of maturity she shouldn’t have to understand. But he did, because they all did.

It’s Ahsoka’s voice, broken, her hands bloodied and battered from digging their graves. She’s shattered, and there was no one there to hand her a needle and thread and teach her how to sew her scars together.

Captain.

Tup cries, and Fives gasps as his heart fails, and Echo’s hands are cold, and Hardcase closes his eyes before an explosion swallows him whole. Kix’s absence says more than his words ever could, but there’s a ghost of him in all the places he isn’t. And Jesse watches them all. Rex’s mind can imagine what his face looked like, behind his helmet. His eyes glaze and his mouth sets and his newly blank canvas amounts to nothing more than kindling.

Rex wakes up with the salty taste of tears on his tongue. He’s never had to be alone before.

So they haunt him at night, and still he tried to convince himself that he’s okay. He doesn’t deserve not to be. He couldn’t save them. It’s up to him to deal with the ghosts.

He woke before the sun, of whatever today’s planet was. He kept a low profile. He collected what he could.

He kept moving.

*******

oof I hurt myself with this one.

I love Rex. I write for him all the time. But when the prompt was "Captain Rex" I was like....uh....what do I do? (find the full list @clonetober - I can't believe it's been 20 days already.)

It took awhile, but this is what I came up with. What does our boy do after the end of the war?

(it'd be a humanitarian effort to a. give him a many hugs and b. teach him healthy coping strategies.)

so i've given glinda anxiety. i've given her adhd. i've given her autism. all of those kinda make sense. next thing I've got in my personal arsenal to project onto her is pots tho. so. um.

a glinda that faints into elphies arms all the time?? idek