TWISTED.
❝ i'm not a jedi, but I'm not a sith. i'm me, and that's what matters.❞
Despina Anseris never asked for her mission. She never asked to see the place she called home get torn apart because of her best friend's rath. She never asked to see...
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My eyes were glued to the sky as I watched Poe's black X-Wing fighter fly through the atmosphere and into space from the back of one of the Futinis' wolves, my heart too heavy to even panic about being on a creature I held so much fear for. I had assumed that I would follow Poe back if he was ever called back to the Resistance base, but staying behind not just to continue my training but to keep him safe... it felt wrong. BD-1 gave a sad whine from my shoulder at the sight of his friend leaving, and I consoled him by lightly rubbing my thumb across one of his metal feet.
"Stop here," I told the creature quietly as we approached the entrance of the Carlac village, and it gave a huff before complying. As I slid off its back, I couldn't help but look into its somber gray eyes. She was clearly one of the younger members of the pack and had no idea that she and her family wouldn't be seeing their masters for quite some time. I could sense her anxieties about being far from her home, her tenseness on whether I would strike first or leave quietly. "Thank you." The wolf's eyes seemed to twinkle back, and with an earsplitting howl, she turned and ran back the way we had came. As I watched her leave, I heard my Master's light footsteps in the snow behind me.
"You let your friend leave without you?" she inquired, following my gaze. "Why?"
"It was the only way for him to stay safe," I answered, not yet turning to face the old Togruta. "He had to warn the others, and I still have training to finish."
"You're protecting him," Ahsoka hummed. She took my free hand, and I followed her through the village. "I never told you about Order Sixty-Six, did I?"
"No, but I know of it," I nodded, confused at her sudden urge to speak about her past. We both sat down side by side on the front steps of the chieftain's house. BD-1 rushed off to the building he and Poe had shared, perhaps to escape the chill. "The Republic's clone troopers turned against the Jedi and killed almost all of them to join the Empire. They were creatures of war and became the first Stormtroopers."
"Not always," Ahsoka disagreed quietly. "They were my friends." I turned my head to the side in surprise, and she gave me a sad but knowing smile. "Every clone had a chip put into them at birth, programmed to commit the order whenever it was spoken. For years I fought alongside them, grew with them." Her face fell, and she tore her gaze away from me to look up at the night sky. "After I... left the Order, I thought they'd forget about me. I certainly tried to; it was too painful to think of all the people I never got to say goodbye to."
"... but you couldn't," I finished for her, a cold wind blowing through my shortened hair and against my bare arms. Ahsoka shook her head, pursing her lips as she continued to face away from me.
"One final mission," she chuckled to herself. "Bring Maul in and save Mandalore. My old Master wanted to come with me, but he couldn't, so he gave me half of his squadron. We never prepared for the attack to be the way it was; we had no idea it was planned..." My Master had to close her eyes to keep her composure, but I could hear the sounds of the soldiers's screams of death echoing through her head as if I was there myself.
