Chapter Text
General Secura, finally within an enclosed, safe space and most importantly alone, let out the frustrated sigh she’d been holding in for days. She let her head hit the door behind her with a thump and didn’t bother to shift her Lekku out the way. Let it hurt, she thought mulishly, give me something real to hang onto. Closing her eyes that felt like they were made of grit and sand and blood as her eyelids scraped down, she tried to bundle up the hurt, the pain, the anger and throw it out of the proverbial airlock.
The battle (the war in general) was bloody and hard fought. The pain of the clones, the Jedi, the galaxy, grated on her senses. If she thought about it too much, or more often than she currently did, she could feel the ebb and flow of the life around her. Before the war, Aayla had found peace in that cycle. For the most part life and death were natural, there was balance in the Force as a whole. But now, but now… the death was magnified, twisted and warped as these men who had been bred for the slaughter fought and died over and over and over and over and over-
She took a steadying breath. Focusing on these emotions was of no use; all it did was feel like her own brush with the Dark Side. Strange, how now she viewed that as an advantage when once it was her biggest embarrassment. She could feel the signs of it, the pull of it, hooking into every crack it could in any Jedi who faltered, even for a moment. A crack can easily be eroded to a bursting fissure. Aayla fought it always, and even then she could hear it’s call in the din of war. She guessed she was more active in this than most Jedi, who viewed themselves as above the ability to fall unaware that that weakness would be their undoing.
After a while of leaning against the door, General Secura pulled herself together, slapping her face lightly to shake off the morose trance she was slipping into. Her quarters were Spartan, at her request. Whilst she couldn’t exactly bunk with the boys, she wasn’t that blind, she didn’t like the pedestal that they tried to put her on either. With every opportunity she was trying to demonstrate to them that the keys to being a good Jedi were being humble and selfless. Not that they were really getting the message, asides from maybe Bly. She smiled to herself fondly. Bly the Good Guy, as she’d heard Cody mutter to Rex who’d hidden a snort in a strangled cough sound, when they’d once witnessed him attempt to help her out of a transport. The Good Guy, indeed.
Aayla removed her trappings of war with quick, practiced motions. Her Lek twitched and curled with relief to be free for the first time in a while. It had been the usual ‘Great Plan But Actually a Cluster Fuck’ that the GAR seemed to prefer on their day to day. A space battle, a boarding, a cruiser down, hostile troops on the ground, imprisonment, breakout, a dog fight for the air support to break through. The 327th Star Corps had fought bravely. They were an unbroken chain of strength, tied together by her and Bly. Aayla dumped her clothes in a heap and sat down in the sonic, her head in her hands as her Lek curled around her neck to protect her. They had lost many, many men. Many of them boys. Just boys, fresh off of Kamino with stars in their eyes and her horrified face reflecting off of their armour as they died.
Aayla sat in the sonic for long after it turned off, and softly cried, naming the fallen troopers before letting them go into the Force.
+
“Commander, what am I looking at here.”
Bly jumped to attention at the sound of his general’s voice. He hadn’t even noticed her come in, she moved like a fucking Tooka and it wasn’t even 0700 yet-
“Bly? I didn't scare you again did I?” The General softly teased, patting his shoulder as she rounded on the war table, hands spread on the edge as she leaned across from him. Bly coughed to clear his throat.
“No Sir, just… uh… you’re early.”
Aayla raised an eyebrow at this, and Bly fought the urge to rub the back of his neck.
“I couldn’t sleep.” She said, simply.
“Me neither.” Bly agreed. They stared at each other for a moment.
“Do you have the final count?”
“87 from the 327th, 567 total casualties. 80% of those where shinies, Sir.” Bly said after a pause. The numbers hung heavily in the air. As he’d watch her do several times, the General seemed to gather in on her self, eyes closed, before breathing out slowly. The tension slowly drained from her shoulders. Bly catalogued it under “weird force stuff” and sub folder “Gen Secura specific traits”. He waited till she said her prayer to carry on.
“They are one with the Force now, and the Force is with them.” The General said quietly to the universe. The room’s ambient noise seemed to press in. the whir of cooling fans, soft beeps of comms and the usual chatter from the night team in the comms bays drifting down the hall. The General shook herself slightly, then looked at Bly.
“So what is your distraction today, Commander?”
Bly huffed a laugh. “Well, I’ve been looking at the read outs for Kamino, Sir. How we can prevent another attack, what we can put in place for the cadets, so they feel safer.” Bly pointed to something, and enlarged it. The General narrowed her eyes and nodded.
“The lower levels, and submerged platforms.” She said, point to what he’d enlarged. “whilst they're difficult to reach, their location shouldn’t be their first and only defence. And with their closeness to the youngest cadet quarters it is an easy target. Good thinking, Commander.”
Bly nodded and tried not to squirm under her praise, despite having been her Commander for over a year now.
“Thank you General. It’s… well, the life of a clone may not be much, Sir, but we defend our brothers.”
“Bly…”
“No, I’m serious General. I know what I am, what we are. And that’s fine. It’s a mighty honour to fight and die for the Republic,” the fight for you was a silent but heavy thing in his words, “I just want to make sure as many get a chance to as possible, especially to serve with a Jedi like you, Sir, who makes it worth a little more.”
The General was watching him with sad eyes. She hadn’t moved, just watching, and impossibly sad. Bly shook himself for his wayward tongue.
“I wish you could see yourself in the Force.” She said. Low, solemn, intensely focused. “I wish you all could. Just because you were made, does not mean you are things, Bly. And fighting to die is no way to live. The war will end someday, and you will continue to exist.” She stretched her fingers against the desk, her claws scratching as they flexed. It was a tick he’d documented when she was frustrated. Bly sighed, and took off his bucket so she could see his face. She hated talking to the helmets, she once had told him. They look like death masks was her explanation.
“Pardon me, General, but the Force isn’t exactly looking out for us clones. Not that we don’t appreciate the Jedi!” he hastily added as her eyebrows shot up, “but it’s not like we have the best run of things, as the galaxy goes.” Aayla sighed again, claws tapping, before she straightened up and stretched. Bly wished he had his bucket back on as her hips and stomach flexed with her, lekku swinging.
“I agree that you’re not treated fairly, as living beings should. But maybe one day, Bly, you’ll see you and your brothers how I do. But, until that point where I can convince you of your worth, shall we go about setting Kamino to rights?” She moved to his side, spinning the read out around again. Bly ducked his chin and gave a quiet ‘yessir’ before pointing out further weaknesses, as she nodded or added to his comments. He appreciated the distraction, especially from a topic that could have him written up for treason. He appreciated even more how, when leaning to point at something, she rested her hand on his shoulder. She left it there for the rest of their impromptu strategy meeting.
+
“What’s the plan Commander?” A coughing Shiny wheezed at him from the darkness. Fuck all, thought Bly. The plan is ‘Fuck all the other plans we had that let this happen’.
“Establish comms. And everybody sound off, who’s not dead?” Bly snapped.
Groans and grumbles echoed around the newly sealed cavern they found themselves in. he flicked his torches on and did an area sweep. Bodies and droids had fallen with them as the cavern collapsed, creating a horrifying wall that would’ve had him puking onto his boots before Geonosis; he didn't spare it a glance. Convinced there were no Seppies in here with them, he got Galle to catalogue their supplies and set the perimeter. All the while Bly was mashing his comms, both personal and general, to get through to his Jedi. Just before the rocket that exploded seemingly beneath his feet, she had been leaping to the front with him on her heels, taking down tanks and throwing them at other tanks. His comms only fed back garbled battle droid binary and static.
“Fuck. Anyone else got comms yet?” despondent ‘no’s’ came back to him, echoing around the cavern. It was already starting to get hot, and those bodies (both dead and alive) would soon start to smell.
“Galle, a word.”
The lieutenant came to him.
“Yessir?”
“We need every comm link in here, and I don't care if you have to wrestle it off the fuckers. We need a bigger signal, otherwise the General is never going to find us in all that noise.”
“Of course Sir. But could you not just…?” Galle stopped, and gestured a hand around his head in a vague fluttering manner.
“What the hell does that mean?” Bly said, imitating him. Galle shrugged.
“Force comm her I guess? You two are weirdly in sync, surely you just think really hard and she’ll appear?”
“She’s not a mirage, Galle, you can’t just will her into existence.” Bly bit out, incredulous. Galle shrugged again, unrepentant.
“You didn't deny you’re weirdly in sync though.”
“Just get the fucking comlinks, Galle, before I smash up your visor with my fist.”
Galle laughed and smacked him on the back before going off and gathering comlinks. Bly looked around again. The rocks were likely unstable from the outside, judging by the rumbling and flakes of dust falling around them, but seemed to be holding this side. As long as there where no explosions, and no shouting, they should hold out until Aayla got there. (if, if she got there)
“Hey! Commander! Come look at this! I think it’s a-” A hysterial sounding Shiny shouted, pointing to something probably not that exciting as the roof came tumbling in on them at the volume of his voice.
Fuck this, Bly thought, fuck all of this, before being hit hard enough that his head slammed the inside of his helmet and knocked him out.
+
General Secura was blue fury, darting across the field like a spirit of death. Death for droids, mind you, but death all the same. Blood, probably her own but also probably not, was smeared up the side of her from hip to cheek, catching in her nostrils and mouth so it felt like she was surrounded by blood. They’d had bad intel, and were paying the price. The next time she saw Vos she was going to kick him up the ass to get him to sort out the Jedi Shadows.
She was struggling with the tanks, but couldn’t let the boys know. Her power to cut them a path was the only thing keeping them from being cornered and with every one she disabled and took down, there was a matching roar from her men and renewed ferocity. She knew that they fed off of her power to keep them going, but it had never been so vital for survival before. They had to reach the ridge before sundown.
She felt the rocket being loaded, along with all the others she was stopping, but this one slipped through her grasp. She felt it coming, and she misjudged; just at that moment, a glancing shot skimmed Bly’s helmet (the shot was good, but somehow bent it mid air) Intending to catch the blast in the tank she was launching into the air, she missed by a hair with her diverted attention. The rocket pinged off the tank, and headed down sooner than it was supposed to. Right behind her. In front of Bly, and the front squad.
Chaos and silence. Aayla was thrown into the air, barrelling through droids as rocks and debris followed her, she saw the earth open and close again, stealing away the bodies and the survivors. She hit the ground, then nothing.
+
“There are better place to take a nap than on the ground, you know.” A drawling voice said as she was hoisted up and deposited on a stretcher. The gentle but firm hands, combined with the lack of cuffs, suggested clones. The reinforcements. The 212th. Aayla drew in a croaking breath.
“Kenobi?”
“Yes, you’re safe now, old friend.”
“The men?”
“Getting treatment, more survivors than expected.”
“Bly?”
A pause.
“Bly?” she said again, as firmly as she could.
“Missing in action, Sir.” A clone voice responded. Maybe Cody from the way it hitched, but her eyes were closed and her head was swimming. Her lekku hurt so much she could barely hear.
“He’s alive. There was a cave in, close to the initial impact. Dig carefully, I can feel them.” She murmured, before passing out entirely.
Kenobi looked from his unconscious friend to his commander and squared his jaw.
“Get everyone you can, and emergency supplies. You’ve got 5 minutes.”
Cody was already sprinting to the supplies tent.
+
His HUD was down for the count. Frazzled LED’s sputtered making it difficult to keep his eyes open without being blinded. The rocks were weighing down, it had been hours. Days, maybe? He wasn’t sure. He was sure though he would soon be dead. His left arm was pinned, and had lost feeling long ago. He was pretty sure that it was broken beyond repair and probably festering. The rest of him didn't feel much better. Bly sighed.
Time passed. The oxygen was thinning in his suit and he thought he could here the broken alarm trying to warn him of toxicity levels, but it all sounded like his ears ringing now. He’d started to drift in and out of consciousness, flashes of blue and brown behind his eyelids and he sighed. Poor little clone, he thought, in love with his Jedi. Just once, he should’ve said something; anything. Called her by name, not Sir or General. Aayla. Rounded out the vowels on his tongue out loud. A-a-y-l-a. The boys thought her beautiful, and she was, but Bly thought of her like a hurricane. A calm, unmoving place surrounded by fury and passion that took out anything in it’s path. It had certainly taken him out; the 327ths swirled around in her vortex. But sometimes, less as the war dragged on, he saw the Jedi she wanted to be all the time; peaceful, strong, but fair and compassionate. Soothing, but steadfast. A life where she’d have never had to take life to survive, where she didn’t lead at the front because there was no front. A life without him, his brothers, even existing to cause the conflict in the heart of the Jedi Order (how do you respect life when it was not created by the Force) Bly smiled sadly and let out a quiet gasping sob as the rocks shifted on his crushed arm. He knew in his heart, that they were all slowly eroding the Jedi, killing their way of life. But he was too selfish to want the war to end; he’d happily slip away here, buried in rocks and the bodies and the thought of her, than let it end. (in the dark, he knew somehow, he knew, they all did, what was waiting and coiled in their brains, good soldier’s follow-)
The rocks shifted again, more intentionally. Bly could hear the pattering of something up there. Could be friendlies, could be hostiles. He did a stock take of his person on autopilot; a flash grenade, a switch blade in his vambrace, maybe a working blaster in his holster. It was on the crushed side though, so probably not. Digging noises. Faint shouts. His vision blurred, it was all blue.
+
“Where are the medics?!”
“They’re all here Sir!”
“Get everyone then! Anyone who’s ever done field first aid, get them in here now!”
“pass me that scalpel-“
“There’s too much missing! I can’t stitch back together nothing!”
“don’t worry, it’s not as bad as it-“
“Is that the General?!”
General! General Secura, Sir! Can you hear me?
Is she-
She’s alive! Holy shit she’s alive!-
General!-
What’s wrong with her-
Get out the way, shiny, clear the table-
General Kenobi, is she-
Breathing! We have breathing-
General, can you open your eyes-
Nothing can keep OUR General down-
First wave of the dig out coming in hot, poor bastards-
I can’t get the armour off! The bone’s gone thro-
Commander?!
COMMANDER-
+
Bly came round slowly. The beeping of life support was loud and irritating, but there was a soothing presence to his left. He became aware of the pain, everywhere, and was dimly surprised that he could feel his left arm but couldn’t remember why. It felt like he was on high grade morphine, the commander part of his brain told him sluggishly, which made everything take on a slow feel, and he could taste the fresh air dragging through his lungs. A cool hand rested on his brow, turning over to test his temperate. He moved his face with it when it tried to move. A soft chuckle drifted through his ears, then his eyes blearily opened. General Secura, banged up but not broken, was sat next to his bed.
“Sgenrl?” he mumbled, trying to get his tongue unstuck from the roof of his mouth. She smiled at him and, apparently satisfied with his temperature, slid her hand down to cup his cheek.
“You gave us all quite a scare, Bly. Try not to bury yourself again.” She said softly. Her voice was cracked and strained, like she’d taken a blow to the neck, but her thumb was gentle as it swiped over his cheekbone. Probably due to the drug high, Bly snuggled further into her hand, too far gone to give a fuck.
“Sorry.” He mumbled, looking up at her with unfocused eyes, “see what hap’ns when you’re gone? I can’t do shit. You’re my carer.”
She laughed, her eyes seemed to glisten in the half light.
“I’m your CO, not your carer Bly. And I’m sorry I jumped ahead. I’m sorry… I’m sorry I let something through my defences and you got hurt.” She said quietly again, scooting closer to the bed. His eyes suddenly focused on hers.
“Don’ worry about it General. You can’t lose me when millions of me exist.” He said that last part to himself, into the side of her hand. Aayla’s heart squeezed in her chest.
“Oh Bly.” She said quietly, as he drifted back to sleep and certain he would remember none of it. “My sad, beautiful Bly.”
She sat with him till he awoke again, more cognitive and a lot more angry.
“What the fuck happened General?” he blazed, eyes alight with fire.
“I missed.” She said simply. It through him off.
“What do you mean you missed? You never miss, missed what?”
“I missed the rocket that buried you and hurt countless others. I was supposed to hit it with that tank and control the explosion. But I was… distracted.”
Bly frowned at her from the bed. He attempted to cross his arms then looked down at his left side and sighed, muttered a curse in Mando’a.
“Yes, it was crushed quite badly. It’s pinned though, and once you’re clear here you’re going in bacta for a while, but it will heal.”
“I don’t give a fuck about my arm General, what in karking hell distracted you? I’ve seen you wrestle a wampa and headshot a sniper from a mile away at the same time. What could be that important that you were distracted, General and ended up looking like you probably can’t fight for weeks?”
There was concern there, she knew. This was being spoken as her commander but the root of it was concern. She knew that they thought her fighting was flawless, that she couldn’t loose. The idea of her failing, even for a moment, was petrifying to them. Aayla scrubbed a hand over her face before continuing.
“You should’ve died, there was a shot on you that was good. It would’ve taken your head off your shoulders. I stopped it, and I missed with the tank because I tried to do both at the same time.”
Bly’s mulish frown dissolved, she thought he was going to cry for a moment before the rage resurfaced.
“With all due respect General, that was incredibly stupid of you. I’m just one clone, and it looks like you put your life at risk.” He spat, gesturing to her bandages. Aayla scowled at him for a moment.
“My choices are my own, Commander.”
“Well, I think it was a bad one.”
“I think you’re wrong.” She said with finality. “I need a Commander I trust. And more importantly, I didn’t want you to die.”
“There are other Commander’s that could’ve taken my place, Sir.”
“Bly, no one could take your place. If I am to remain whole in this war, I need you by my side.”
She stood up, then thought for a moment, then sat back down.
“Let me show you something, Commander, if you’ll let me.” The General extended her hands towards his right one. He hesitantly reached back, still seething and glaring. Aayla took his hand in hers and breathed, closing her eyes. She had done this occasionally, but it was still hard. She saw him in the force, currently boiling with anger, but the heart of him underneath still glimmered. She reached for it, surrounding it and supporting it, and heard a faint intake of breath. Stretching out her feelings to encompass both of them – Bly, I want you to see what I see.
A shiny Commander, dropping from an airship in the Geonosis sand. A stiff salute, stiff posture, finger on the trigger. Aayla clipping him in the back of the knee with her boot to loosen his stance, an affronted and undignified yelp. A man falling onto a bench and banging his head on the table in frustration, Aayla laughing and doing impressions droids. A strong hand on her shoulder, kind eyes, tactical read outs casting shadows. You know what General, I’m still pissed that the 501st shot gunned blue I mean, you ARE blue and – why are you laughing..? Here, extra rations, you need it more than me. Arms around her, tight and strong, and staying, just staying, please don’t die don’t leave me don’t leave me here alone. I am with you General, to the end. And you, Commander. Till whatever end.
Bly opened his eyes and, through hers, saw himself.
He pulled her closer with his good arm and she curled around him, her chin on the top of his head, her lekku reaching round his chin to the warmth of his neck. He wept. She wept too.