#Glowing Heat | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

lamaenthel · 28 days ago

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Body Heat

[read on ao3][Rexsoka Monthly: Oct '23- Body Heat]

Rex thought he knew what blue looked like. He'd been raised atop the oceans of Kamino, had seen the stormless skies, even had the color painted on his armor. Meeting the eyes of the Togruta in the escape pod, though, he felt like he was seeing the color blue for the first time. Captain Rex accompanies General Anakin Skywalker to check the debris field of Abregado for survivors, on the lookout for two in particular: High General Plo Koon, Jedi Master, and his Padawan, Commander Ahsoka Tano.

Characters: Captain Rex/Ahsoka Tano, Anakin Skywalker, Commander Wolffe, Plo Koon Rating: E18+, Minors DNI Wordcount: 9,263

Rex respected his General. Skywalker led from the front, bent over backwards to prevent unnecessary casualties, and never asked his men to do anything he wouldn't do himself. It inspired loyalty and kept morale higher than any other battalion.

His one flaw was how attached—ironic, being a Jedi and all—he became to his little shitbox ships. The Twilight was the one he'd stolen during his mission to rescue Jabba's Huttling. He'd fixed it up. Mostly. But it rattled unnervingly as they exited hyperspace, and that made Rex nervous.

Give me an honorable death on the battlefield, he thought, a bolt to the head or even a mortar strike. Make it quick, make it clean. Not a slow one suffocating in space.

It's how most of the poor sods of the 104th had probably gone. Rex hoped that his brothers had taken their helmets off and ended it quickly instead of suffering after their air had run out. He put it from his mind and focused on his terminal.

"R2, modulate the scanner for any signs of this mystery weapon," Rex ordered.

"Negative," Skywalker corrected. "Tune it for life-forms. Highest sensitivity."

Rex turned from his terminal, confused. "Sir?"

"What's the matter, Rex?"

"Sir, I thought you said we were scouting ahead of the fleet. Why would we scan for life forms when we…" Rex stopped when he noticed the bright red star through the viewport. "Sir, is this the Abregado system?"

"Sure is." Skywalker turned around wearing a tooka's smirk.

"Didn't the Council say that we couldn't risk any more ships?" And there had been a right fight about it too, with Skywalker ending the holocall with the Jedi Council by walking away in a huff.

"We're still on our way to the staging area, we're just taking a quick look around Abregado first." Skywalker's smile thinned, took on a bitter edge. "The Council may be willing to give them up as dead without even trying to look, but I'm not."

"As far as I know, this mystery weapon doesn't leave any survivors." Rex crossed to the co-pilot seat, his heart aching. He'd already said his goodbyes to his lost brothers in private. It was too painful to hope.

"There's a first time for everything." Skywalker boosted the power to the console with a few typed commands and a flipped switch. "Have you ever met Plo Koon's Padawan?"

"Commander Tano? Not directly." He'd heard plenty about her, Wolffe never shut up about her whenever they met up at 79's—I'm telling you, Rex, the girl is crazy but she has the heart of a warrior—but he never would again, Rex realized. He was dead, and she probably was too.

"She's an old friend of mine." Skywalker's eyes softened. "We're the same age. I… I came to the Temple later than most. I didn't always get along with the other kids. The one person who was always there for me was Ahsoka." Skywalker's eyes were feverish with hope. "If there's a chance she's alive, I'm not going to write her off without even trying."

"As you say, Sir." Rex felt as though they were treading the line of insubordination, but he trusted his General with his life. Even if his little friend hadn't made it, there was a chance that a brother or two was out there clinging to the wreckage.

And if he needed to drag him out of the system because fierfecking clankers were still hiding in the debris field, there was always his stunner.

Skywalker bowed his head and closed his eyes, one hand out like he was reaching for something. He was using the Force. It wasn't the first time Rex had seen him do it, but it never stopped being impressive.

The lifeform scanner wasn't coming up with anything. "Sir..."

"Just wait."

Rex wanted to believe that at least someone had survived, but it didn't look like it. "Sir, we don't have much time before the fleet misses us—"

"She's alive!" Skywalker cranked the ship hard to starboard. R2 wheeled across the floor, screaming his dome off. "I can feel her. She's this way."

Rex held on for dear life. "As you say, Sir."

Skywalker's search light illuminated a floating pod with a small, shadowy figure clinging to the top. "There! Prepare the cable!"

"Yessir!" Rex rocketed out of his seat, aimed, snagged the pod, and dragged it into the cargo bay.

The shadowy figure had been a Jedi, General Plo Koon. He had collapsed next to the pod by the time Rex slid down the cargo bay ladder. And two brothers, Rex joyfully realized. "General, don't move. Easy does it, now, I'll activate the med-droid."

"Captain Rex." General Koon looked up, and although he didn't know how to read a Kel Dor's facial expressions, he was fairly certain that he was smiling.

Rex was just surprised he'd remembered his name.

"Master Plo!" Skywalker jogged into the cargo bay, relief clear on his face. "Are you alright?"

General Koon shivered. "I believe I am suffering from hypothermia."

Rex eyed his black fingers. "Frostbite as well, I fear, Sir. You should let the med-droid treat you."

"Such damage cannot be undone, but the damage will not progress further. Once my men have been seen to and we have escaped from this system, I will happily allow it to tend to me."

Rex spotted movement inside the pod. "General Skywalker, there's men inside!"

Skywalker yanked the pod's door off with a frantic gesture. "Ahsoka!" he shouted. "Ahsoka, are you in there?"

"Skyguy, is that you?" A high, musical voice like a bell called from the back.

Skywalker sagged with relief. "You had me worried, Snips!"

"Is Master Plo—"

"Alive, little 'Soka," the General rumbled. "And the two of you?"

"I could use some help with Wolffe!"

"Captain, help her while I get us out of here," Skywalker ordered, Koon's arm around his neck.

"Yessir." Rex climbed up, trying not to slip on the frosty buildup, poked his head inside, and—

Oh. Oh.

Rex thought he knew what blue looked like. He'd been raised atop the oceans of Kamino, had seen the stormless skies, even had the color painted on his armor. Meeting the eyes of the Togruta in the escape pod, though, he felt like he was seeing the color blue for the first time. Her eyes were bottomless, a crystalline lake of true blue that made him dizzy. Her skin was contrasting orange, with crisp white markings on her forehead and cheeks. Her lekku—striped the same blue as his armor—reached her navel, and she had a headdress of wicked-looking teeth decorating the seam of her forehead.

Her lip curled up in a smile, exposing the tip of a sharp fang. "Can I get a hand, trooper?"

Rex closed his mouth, painfully aware that he'd been staring. "Yessir," he mumbled, clamoring inside with the grace of a drunk bantha.

"I'm fine, but Wolffe is severely hypothermic." She rubbed the clone's arms.

"What's he doing out of his armor?" Rex asked, voice cracking embarrassingly. Idiot. Calm down before you pop a blood vessel like a fierfecking shiny at a peeler show.

"Out of armor rotation." She smiled, and Rex wished he had his helmet to hide his burning cheeks.

"Well, let's get him out of this ice cube." He chanced a glance back at her. She wasn't wearing the heavy robes of her Master, but a backless red battledress with the tell-tale sheen of armorweave. "You're not cold?"

"I'm freezing, but I can use the Force to protect myself from extreme temperatures for a short amount of time." Her eyes shone with grief, and it took everything Rex had to not wipe away the tears that threatened to fall. "I tried with Wolffe as well, but we were running out of air and…"

"I'm sure you did your best, Sir." Rex winced. Please don't think I'm sassing you. He hopped out with Wolffe's arm over his shoulder and laid him on the ground. "Alright, let's get some—"

"Strip." Commander Tano ripped the uniform jacket off of Wolffe like she was skinning a thimiar.

"S-Sir?" Rex stammered.

"Body heat is the most efficient way to rewarm a hypothermic patient, so lose the armor, Captain. Your brother needs you." She tore Wolffe's boots and uniform pants off, leaving him in only a pair of compression shorts, and wrapped her long arms and legs around him from behind, clinging to him like a spider.

"Commander Tano is correct." The med-droid draped a blanket over them.

Rex shucked his armor as quickly as he could until he was down to his blacks, then joined her under the blanket, trying to look anywhere but directly at her; not easy given that they were practically nose-to-nose and there weren't many other places to look. He focused on the row of teeth on her forehead so he wouldn't drown in the endless blue of her eyes.

Commander Tano grinned. "An akul."

Rex jumped like he'd been zapped with a nerf prod. "What?"

"They're akul teeth." She tapped the big one in the center. "It's a beast on Shili. It's a traditional rite of passage for my people to slay one."

"Oh." Rex swallowed. "Was it… hard?" Was it hard? Are you stupid?

Her lip quirked. "Hard?"

As if it were answering her orders, Rex felt—oh kark oh fierfek—his cock jump to half-mast. He adjusted his hips away from Wolffe's icy hip and prayed.

"Let's just say I earned them." She blinked at him slowly. There was a tiny ring of dark sapphire around her pupils. "Do you have a name, Captain?"

"Yes, Sir. It's Rex, Sir."

"Rex. I like that."

"Thank you." Rex cleared his throat. Blood. Vomit. The Sickener. Why are you hard, just go down, please go down… "So, ah, how long have you been a Padawan?" How long have you—shut UP, trooper, why are you asking her that?

If she found him impertinent, she didn't let on. "Eight years. I was eleven when Master Plo chose me as his student." She smiled wistfully. "He's the one who found me on Shili when I was little. He brought me to the Temple where I belonged."

"That's good. Good that he found you, I mean. Or else you wouldn't have become a Jedi." Why were her eyes so hypnotizing? Why were her lips so perfectly plush and full? Why did the backs of her hands feel so good pressed against his chest?

The lights died. Commander Tano looked around, confused.

"Hey, what's with the lights?" Sinker demanded.

Boost struggled to his feet. "We should get up to the bridge." He tripped and almost knocked himself out on the ladder.

The med-droid caught him before he hit the floor. "You're too weak. I will go see what is wrong." It clambered up the ladder with a noise like a toolbox being shaken.

"I hope that ship hasn't returned." Commander Tano looked troubled.

"Ship?"

"The Seppies' secret weapon. It's a ship armed with a massive ion cannon. It disables—"

The lights flickered back on. The ship lurched violently, throwing them all across the hangar into a pile.

"Kriff!"

"What in the—"

"Ow!"

"I really hate it when Anakin flies," Commander Tano groaned. "Sound off, men."

"Sinker."

"Boost."

"Rex," Rex wheezed, his diaphragm still in spasm.

"Wolffe, you alive?" Commander Tano reached behind her and awkwardly took his pulse. "Oh, good. He'd never forgive me for letting him die naked."

The ship tilted again. The group tumbled across the floor and slammed into the side of the escape pod in a tangled heap.

"Ow!"

"Get your karking knee out of my spine!"

"I'm trying—"

"Um, Captain?" Commander Tano patted his shoulder.

To his horror, Rex realized he was flush against her—on top of her—stars, between her legs—he still had a halfie—karking, kriffing son of a Hutt—

"I-I-I'm so sorry, Commander!" He threw himself to the side, rolled over Wolffe, squashing him a little—sorry brother—and frantically searched for the blanket.

"Stay with Wolffe and get him warm," Commander Tano ordered, smoothing her dress. Her hands slowed on her hips. "I'm going to see why Anakin's flying a skiff like a podracer." Her eyes lingered on Rex before she turned and darted nimbly up the ladder with an alien grace that left his mouth dry.

" ...Yessir." He finally spotted the blanket stuck to the side of the pod. He wrapped up with Wolffe again on the floor and willed his roaring pulse to settle.

She didn't notice. She didn't. Stop panicking. Rex took a deep breath in and let it out, shaking. He was stupid, so stupid—stars and tides, he was a Captain, why was he acting like a shiny who had walked into 79's and seen a woman for the first time in his life?

"Commander?" Wolffe murmured, stirring.

"Easy, brother," Rex began. "You're—"

"Saber's poking me," Wolffe mumbled.

Rex shut up.

A week later after the massacre at Abregado was avenged, Rex found himself sitting across from a drunk Wolffe at 79's. He looked haunted in a way that Rex wished he couldn't empathize with.

The survivors of Abregado—they called them the Wolfpack, now—were the last members standing of the entire 104th. Their numbers were being replenished, word spreading of hundreds of shinies on their way from Kamino, but who would lead them was unclear. General Koon needed time to recover, and according to Wolffe…

"They don't trust a Padawan to lead us," Wolffe said bitterly. He finished off his beer, swiped his hand across his lips. "A load of kung. Commander Tano is brilliant, you hear me?" He swayed in his seat. "Brilliant."

"I hear you." Rex shifted uncomfortably. The music was loud and gave him a headache. The nightclub was packed with clones and chasers in equal numbers, flirting at the bar and grinding on the dance floor and necking in corners.

"General Koon'll come back someday. He… he won't let this beat him." Wolffe looked like he wanted to cry. "I tried. I couldn't boost the signal any more than I did. The power died, and so did the life support, and—"

"You've got nothing to blame yourself for, brother." Rex clasped his shoulder. "You've had enough. Let's get you back to the barracks, alright?"

"They're empty," Wolffe whispered.

Rex felt his stomach clench like a fist. He remembered that first quiet night back in the barracks after Teth and fought the burning sting of salt behind his eyes. I'll see you on the march, brothers. "Sleep at the 501st's. All three of you."

Wolffe nodded miserably. He didn't thank Rex, but he didn't need to.

As luck would have it, Coric had just hailed a cab and was headed back. He waited for Rex to hunt down Sinker and Boost and then tucked Wolffe in between them. "Come on, Captain, squeeze in. There's room."

Rex realized his helmet wasn't clipped to his belt. "Wait for me?" he asked the cabbie.

The Ugnaught snorted. "Buddy, there's twenty cabs circling this block this time o' night. I ain't gotta wait for you, and you ain't gotta wait for me."

"He'll only be a minute!" Coric protested.

"It's fine. I'll catch the next one." Rex waved them off and headed back inside. His helmet was sitting right where he'd left it: in a corner booth a few strides away from the bar, overlooking the dance floor.

The hooded figure sitting beside it, nursing a shimmery, pink-purple drink in a cocktail glass, had definitely not been there a minute ago.

"C-Commander Tano?" Rex stammered.

She peeked out from under the brim of her heavy brown cloak: her blue eyes made him instantly dizzy. "Captain Rex." She stroked the jaig eyes on his helmet like they were markings on a tooka's forehead, her orange fingers just a tad too long with an extra joint that Humans didn't have.

"I, um…" Rex cleared his throat, shifted his weight. "What're you—I mean you're—are Jedi allowed to be in bars?" What is wrong with you?

"I can't say that it's encouraged, but neither is it forbidden." The tip of her upper left fang caught the light as she smiled. "Have a drink with me?"

"O-Of course, Sir." Rex sat down, ramrod straight, unsure of what to do with his hands.

"What are you drinking?"

Rex had already had two beers and the last thing he wanted to do was start belching in her face. He eyed her drink curiously. "What's that?"

"Half shimmerwine, half jogan fruit juice. The favored drink of Padawans trying to stretch their contraband. Anakin calls it a dizzy zeltron." She swirled the glass and took a sip. "It's not very strong, but it certainly tastes good. Would you like to try it?" She handed it to him without waiting for an answer.

Rex started breathing manually. He stared at the delicate imprint of her lips on the glass as he took a sip and—oh, that's karking delicious. Sweet and tangy, with the astringent bite of alcohol only at the very end. He nodded with appreciation and handed it back. Her bare fingers just barely brushed his, leaving behind tingles. "Very good, Sir."

"You can drop the Sir for tonight, Rex." She brought up the holomenu, plugged in an order for a second dizzy zeltron, and waited for the bartender droid to wheel it over before she raised her glass. "To my knighthood."

"You were knighted?" Rex asked, surprised.

"This morning." Her smile thinned. "It was… bittersweet. It was decided that Abregado and the hunt for the Malevolence were fit to serve as my trials. Master Plo said I was ready, and as his injuries are too severe for him to continue to teach me…" She shrugged.

"How severe?" he asked, dreading the answer.

She took a deep breath. "All of the fingers on his left hand, his right arm up to his wrist, and his left foot were amputated. And he has deep scarring where his mask burned his skin. He almost lost a pedipalp, but thankfully it should heal as long as it doesn't go septic."

Kriffing hells. "Wolffe will be sorry to hear that," Rex said after sitting stunned for uncountable seconds.

"Yes, he's a Kel Dor and his biology grants him some resistance, but he spent two hours exposed to the vacuum of space." Commander Tano shook her head. "He's truly a Master of the Force. I'm honored to have been his apprentice." Her eyes went misty. "But unfortunately I have been deemed too inexperienced to lead the sixth systems army in his stead. That is a role for a High General, a Council member, not a freshly-knighted Jedi."

"Oh." Rex sipped his fancy drink, unsure of how to answer as he didn't exactly…

"You don't disagree." She watched him impassively, giving away nothing.

"I…" Rex hesitated.

"Don't worry. Regardless of what Anakin may have told you, I'm not that cocky." She chuckled, and Rex's heart started beating again. "They're still deciding where I'll be assigned. They may be putting together a new company from a few depleted ones."

"Why not stay with the 104th?"

"The 104th is the battalion attached to the High General. They're… reserved, I suppose you could say." She finished off her drink, shook her head. "I wish I knew where I was going. I don't like not knowing the future."

"Can't… Can't Jedi see the…" Rex stopped, his cheeks on fire. Be normal. Be NORMAL.

"I've had a dream or two that proved to be a premonition, but I'm no seer." She traced the rim of her empty glass. "If only I was. I could have foreseen Abregado."

"No one could have foreseen it," Rex said immediately, feeling the strange need to reassure her.

Something in her blue eyes seemed to tremble. "I will miss working with Wolffe." She looked away. "He's a very good man. And a good mentor. He's taught me a great deal about strategy." Her lip twitched. "And how to play Corellian Spike."

"He's cleaned me out more than once." Rex's smile faded. "He won't be happy that you're being reassigned, especially if General Koon's not coming back."

"Perhaps… no. He'll stay with the 104th. That's where he's meant to be, and the memories of our time together will be enough." She shook her head and gave him a watery smile. "So, Rex, what's it like working with Anakin Skywalker?"

"Well, General—"

"Ahsoka," she interrupted. "No ranks tonight, if you don't mind. Just call me Ahsoka."

"A-As you say… Ahsoka." Her name felt as beautiful as it was impudent in his mouth. "Well, I'm proud to serve under General Skywalker, first and foremost. He cares about his men. He'd never ask any one of us to do something he wasn't willing to do. When we drop into a hot zone, he's right there leading the way."

"He always did like being the center of attention." Gen—Ahsoka—her smile grew. "So be honest, how many times has he crashed a ship with you onboard?"

They traded stories about Anakin Skywalker for what felt like hours. The lights from the dance floor spun hypnotically in her huge eyes. The dark kept her pupils enormous and pushed out the endless blue into a tiny ring. After his third dizzy zeltron, the edges of the bar started to turn fuzzy around the edges, the diluted shimmerwine finally bringing on a small buzz. When he managed to escape her eyes he lingered on her plush lips, the winged markings that kissed her cheeks, the curve of her jaw, the soft breaks in the pattern of blue stripes on her lekku, her delicate hands. Her nails were painted dark gray. Does she know what that means to us? he wondered, watching them trace her glass and drum on the table and once, squeeze his wrist in an overly-familiar gesture that started his pulse racing, turned his throat tight and made it hard to swallow.

She was so beautiful, especially when she laughed. But as she started to share stories about not just his General but her men, he saw the sadness grow in her eyes. She kept her hood up—she hadn't said so, but she didn't seem to want anyone else to notice her—and used it to hide those fathoms of blue once they started to redden with unshed tears.

"This is nice." Ahsoka's smile returned, sending his heart racing yet again. "It's… it's nice to be around clones again. It's comforting."

"Comforting?"

"I can feel you. All of you." Her lip quivered. "All of my men are dead. I couldn't save them. But I can… I can pretend, here, for a little while. That these beautiful minds that I feel in the Force are the minds of my men, and they're safe and happy and full of life and joy, not…" She took a deep, shuddering breath. "That they're not…"

"Hey." Rex had reached out and put his hand over hers before he could stop himself. "Abregado wasn't your fault."

"I know. I still… I wish I could have saved more. I felt their lives wink out like stars out there as those horrible droids were hunting them down, and I felt so helpless." She laughed humorlessly. "I can say without a doubt that helpless is my least-favorite emotion." She turned his hand over and traced his palm with a delicate touch.

"I agree." He could feel her pulse in her fingertips. Is it supposed to be that fast?

"I…" Ahsoka trailed off. She stared at his fingers, haunted. "I'm a Knight now. A General. They… promoted me for failing the 104th, and now they want me to do it again."

"You saved Wolffe, Sinker and Boost," Rex immediately said. "It's… it's not many, but it's better than saving none at all."

"How can you even look at me?" she asked. "Thousands of your brothers died. Thousands. I'm supposed to protect them, and I f-failed them." She wiped her eyes before tears could fall.

Rex wished he could wring Dooku's neck for making her cry. "You saved who you could. That's all anyone could have asked." He took a deep breath. "Did you hear about the battle on Teth?"

"Teth." She bit her bottom lip. "It… it sounds familiar, but I'm sorry, I can't recall the details. When was it?"

"Only a month ago. General Skywalker was called upon to rescue the son of Jabba the Hutt after he was kidnapped by the Seppies—"

"That's right. It was right after Christophsis was secured. They framed Anakin as the kidnapper." Her lip curled up in disgust. "Idiots. Anyone who knows Anakin even a little bit knows he would never have anything to do with the Hutts of his own free will."

"They were holding the little stinker in a monastery on Teth. It… was a rough fight. Torrent Company landed with a hundred and forty-four men. By the time General Kenobi arrived with reinforcements, we were down to six."

Ahsoka's jaw dropped. "I'm so sorry," she whispered.

"General Skywalker had been personally tasked with returning the Huttlet to Tatooine. He fully intended to come back and support us, but he was forced to leave us behind after discovering that the Huttlet was sick and on death's door."

"He left you?" Ahsoka's eyes bugged out of her head.

"On the orders of Chancellor Palpatine and the Jedi Council." Rex fought to keep his voice steady and his tone neutral. Judging by her reaction, General Skywalker hadn't told his friend about Teth for a reason. "He was not pleased, but he followed orders and completed his mission."

"But he left you." Ahsoka's eyes shone with tears.

"He completed his mission," Rex repeated gently. "I don't resent him for it. The mission comes first, always."

"The mission." Ahsoka stared down at the dancers writhing under the colorful lights below them for a few silent moments. "The mission of the Jedi," she began, "our purpose, our lifelong oath, is to protect and preserve life. Not abandon it to certain doom."

"It wasn't that certain," Rex joked lamely. "I'm here, aren't I?"

"Yes, you are." She laughed, then, and the bitterness that clung to the edges of those musical notes shocked him. "No thanks to him, clearly, but you survived. The Force protected you that day. I'm grateful that it did."

"Don't think too poorly of the General," Rex said, suddenly swamped with guilt. If I just turned Skywalker's oldest friend against him… "I didn't bring it up to lay blame, but to tell you I've been where you are and I know how hard it is to be one of the few who survived. There's still no one I trust more to lead the 501st. He's a good man, and he… wasn't happy about it, believe me. If the choice had been up to him, he would have stayed."

Her hand, still resting in his, twitched like she'd been shocked. "I do believe you. I suppose that unlike Anakin, I'm having trouble reconciling my upbringing with my new role. I never expected to be in a position where I would have to… to decide who lives and dies on such an enormous scale. Until Abregado, I thought nothing would be worse than Geonosis. Nothing could be worse than Geonosis. But it was just the beginning of the carnage, wasn't it?"

Rex fiddled with his empty glass, unsure of how to answer. "Hopefully we can turn it all around," he said feebly.

Ahsoka pulled her hand away. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't be burdening you with all of this—"

"You're not!" Rex interrupted. "I-I mean, it's, um, it's…"

Ahsoka raised one brow marking, a curious tilt to her head.

"Whatever… b-burden you need to unload, I can handle it. But it's not a burden. It's just talking, and talking's good. You can talk to me." Shut up you karking moron, shut up, shut up—

"Thank you, Rex." Ahsoka smiled. "You're a very kind man. Anakin is lucky to have you as his first-in-command."

Rex wasn't sure that he'd ever been called kind before. "Thank you, S—Ahsoka."

Her smile widened. She leaned forward. "I like the way you say my name."

"Y-You do?" Rex asked, head spinning and not from the shimmerwine.

"Yes. You say it like it's… precious."

Rex's mouth was drier than the deserts of Tatooine. He couldn't tear his eyes away from her lips. "Yeah. Yeah, I suppose it is. It's yours."

"And that makes it precious?"

"It's, um… it s-suits you." Rex's ears were on fire. The roars of his brothers' distant laughter, the clinking of drinks, the thumping bass music; all of it disappeared into the background, leaving them in an isolation chamber of his own imagination.

"Are you calling me precious?" She traced the stem of her fancy glass with one long finger.

Rex was either going to have a heart attack or he was already having one. His pulse was like a bass drum in his ears, fast and loud and pumping blood away from his brain and into—stop it, stop it, not now, she's still got tears in her bloody eyes you pervert—it didn't matter how bad he felt about it, his codpiece was getting tight and he had no idea what to do about it.

"Rex?" Ahsoka licked her lips innocently.

"I should get back to the barracks. It's, um, it's getting late, a-and PT starts at 0600." Rex awkwardly clambered out of the booth, praying that the plate preserving his dignity didn't pop off.

"Oh. Alright." Ahsoka took to her feet far more gracefully than him. "May I fly you back?"

"You have a speeder?"

She shrugged. "A bike."

He'd… he'd have to hold onto her… waist…

"I don't want to be a bother," Rex forced himself to say.

"It's no bother. The barracks are actually on the way back to the Temple."

"Oh. Yeah, alright, um… you're… you haven't had too many to fly, right?"

"I'm fine. Jedi are trained in the ability to control our body chemistry and eliminate toxins in the blood. I'm as sober as a judge." Her smile faltered. "Unless you'd rather take a cab. I, ah, I don't want you to feel like it's an order or any—"

"No!" Rex exclaimed, panicking. You hurt her feelings, idiot! "I'd be grateful for the lift… Ahsoka."

She beamed at him. "Then follow me. Don't forget your helmet."

Her speederbike was parked in the back of the lot beside 79's. It wasn't a model he recognized; or rather it looked like a mish-mash of three different models he sort of recognized, but had never quite seen in that configuration.

"It's a Skywalker special." Ahsoka's eyes shone with a green, felinoid flash in the low light.

"Sorry?"

"My bike." She lifted one long, long leg and threw it over the seat. "Anakin helped me build it for my advanced mechanics module. The frame is a T-85 with handlebar extensions to accommodate my wingspan, the engine is a rebuilt Undicur modified to work without that dumb hydroxofluxazine coolant, and the repulsorlift coil is from a Renatta swoop that I tweaked to give me a little faster lift without sacrificing horizontal acceleration speed." She patted it fondly, like it was a loyal hound. It was painted bright green.

"And it's… skyworthy?"

"Of course it is." She frowned. "Don't you trust me?"

"Of course!" Rex exclaimed embarrassingly fast. His cheeks burned. "I just, uh, well, General Skywalker's mech projects aren't always…"

"That's why I asked if you trusted me." She kicked it to life, and it came to with a throaty purr. "Hop on."

He slid behind her, never more thankful for the protection of his hardshell in his life. His bare fingers rested gingerly on her waist.

"Hold on!" she said cheerily. She punched upwards and forced him to grab her before he tumbled ass-over-tit off the back. "You alright back there?"

"Fine," Rex said faintly, his heart screaming along at a thousand miles an hour. You're not dying. You're on a speederbike with a pretty girl. She's giving you a ride home because she's a Jedi and a nice person. She doesn't know you're hard. You're not dying. You're not dying. Shut up shut up shut up—

An orange arm shot backwards and pulled him closer. "You can come closer, Rex, I don't bite," she laughed. "Not without a good reason, anyway."

His groin throbbed with a new rush of blood. His stiff length felt like it was being squeezed with a fist, his codpiece strangling him as much as it was protecting her from his depravity. You're so pathetic that sitting behind a pretty girl has you ready to shoot off? Idiot, mutant, freak—

"Do you like music?" She didn't wait for him to answer. She flicked a switch without taking her hands off the handlebars and soft, slow-tempoed electronic music filled his helmet. "I got tired of not being able to hear it over all the honking," she said, tilting her head; a thin, transparent sticky disk on her left montral caught the headlights. "It's a mini tightbeam modded to have only point-five meter range, so I don't accidentally start blasting skonk in some poor grandfather's hearing aid in the speeder beside me."

"Smart." He focused on the music, and lowering his blood pressure, and not his cramping thighs, quivering in his desperate fight to keep them from resting against hers. The pressure of his cod pressed up against her back was not helping, nor was the vibration of the engine.

Her lekku caught his eye. She was leaning forward, but if she tilted back they would rest on his bare hands. He couldn't help but stare at them, wonder how they felt to the touch—soft, they look soft and heavy—if they could move like a Twi'lek's or if they were static. They jiggled and swayed with the wind like—stop it—and their blue stripes matched his. It's a shame there's no room for her in the 501st. She was born wearing our colors.

But maybe it was a good thing she wasn't. How could he ever keep his mind on the mission if she was in the line of fire? General Skywalker led the charge with a laugh, was she secretly as insane as he was?

Wolffe had called her fearless, a warrior that would give the Alphas a run for their credits; he didn't give that kind of praise to just anyone, which meant… She's probably worse.

They glided to a stop at a red light. "What're you thinking about?" she asked.

Rex gaped like a fish for a few seconds. "Not much," he forced out, trying to sound casual.

"I sense that you've got a lot on your mind." She glanced at him in the side mirror; she was smiling.

"Just, uh…" He coughed, stalling. "I was wondering, um…" He spotted a billboard with an orange Mirialan enthusiastically licking a small glowing treat on a stick. "What's a quasicle?"

"You've never had a quasicle?"

"No?"

Without signaling or bothering to wait for the light, Ahsoka banked hard to the right and left the traffic lane for one directly below them.

"What are you doing?" Rex yelled, hanging onto her waist for dear life. Oh she's definitely worse.

"Getting you a quasicle!" She barrel-rolled into the traffic lane—and there was that honking she'd mentioned—and passed over the gates of Monument Plaza.

"It's really not that important, Comman—Gen—Ahsoka!" Just let go and fall. It'd be less embarrassing.

"You'll love it. All of my boys had a sweet tooth." He watched her smile sadly in her side mirror. "Master Plo used to order them in bulk." She laughed suddenly. "Oh no, I just realized… there's probably quasicles floating around in the debris site."

Her laughter was infectious. It was a stupid thing to laugh about—it wasn't even funny—but it was so absurd that he couldn't help it.

She glided down into a parking space near a fountain. "Come on. I know a stand not far from here." She lowered her hood, slung that long, long leg over the front of the speeder like an acrobat, and took off down the stone path at a brisk pace. Dark gardens with the odd photoluminescent something-or-other lay on either side. "Before the war, Master Plo and I would come here sometimes to meditate and do our Salutation to the Force." She glanced over her shoulder; her big blue eyes were wet again. "Perhaps the last time was the last time. It's a shame I didn't commit our visit to memory more thoroughly."

As soon as she looked back around, Rex discretely adjusted his codpiece.

"We would always get a little treat afterwards—that's what Master always called it, just a little treat to end our lesson on a sweet note." She swiped at her eyes. "Gah, I'm speaking as though he's dead. He's not, he's alive and in bacta. He's changed, and he will need time to recover before he returns to the field, but our time together is not over."

"That's right." Rex inwardly sighed with relief knowing that General Koon would eventually return. Wolffe would sleep better not tossing and turning about it.

"It's just down here." She broke into a jog towards a brightly-lit machine, stark-white sides bearing the same orange Mirialan that had graced the billboard. "Okay, there's lots of flavors—my favorite's the Elixir, it's a mix of meiloorun, snozzberry and leemeh—and Master Plo's favorite is Winterberry, that's cinnamon, butter and parna berries, but something about cinnamon ice just tastes odd to me. I've also tried—"

She babbled on, more animated than he could have imagined a Jedi could be, as excited as a cadet with a pudding cup. The machine's white lights made her markings glow. She's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen.

She blinked at him. "Rex?"

She'd stopped talking, and he had been too transfixed to realize it. "E-Elixir," he sputtered after an embarrassingly long silence, unable to remember any other flavor if he'd had a blaster to his head. "Elixir sounds perfect."

"Great choice." She fed the machine credit squares with a grin. "Bucket off, trooper" She handed him a glowing chunk of orange ice on a stick and ripped the cover off of hers immediately.

"Reckon it's radioactive?" Rex examined the glowing treat with a little apprehension.

She burst into laughter. "No. It's made with a special kind of bioluminescent sugar from Mirial. A fellow Padawan of mine, Barriss, gave me some candy once that glowed just like this. It tasted like roses." She took a small nip off the top and sighed happily. "So, have you ever been here?" She made off down the path at a slow walk and gestured for him to follow.

His eyebrows went up at the fruity treat—it was tangy, sweet, ice cold and made his tongue tingle like he'd licked a battery. "Monument Plaza? No. The barracks and the bar are really the only places I've been for the most part. Biscuit Baron once."

She laughed. "Let me guess who took you there. Master Plo has a weakness for the place as well. He only allows himself to indulge once a year." Her smile grew. "My birthday."

"He sounds like a good man."

"He is." She smiled wistfully. "I'm honored that he chose me as his Padawan. I love him very much."

Rex's eyebrows went up. "Love? Is that… er… I thought Jedi weren't supposed to…"

She shook her head. "Everyone gets that wrong. Jedi are allowed to love. In fact, it's the core tenet of our philosophy. We must show endless compassion, unconditional love, for all life in the galaxy, whether they be friend or foe. What we as Jedi forgo is attachment to that love. We must accept that treasured items can break or be lost, friends can leave or d-die." She cleared her throat. "We must stay in the moment and accept that nothing is permanent except the Force. I will miss seeing Wolffe every day, but I accept that our time together is over, as is my time as Master Plo's Padawan. I will always hold those memories dear in my heart, but I must not become so attached to what was that I lose sight of what is."

Rex fought his need to stare at her, to commit every millimeter of her face to memory. General Skywalker had told him about Angels once, beings that lived on one of the moons of Iego and were said to be the most beautiful creatures in the galaxy—"Though I'm sure I've seen better," Skywalker said, his mouth twisting in a wry half-grin—and now Rex couldn't help but wonder if he'd been thinking about the Togruta in front of him, too.

"I like your hair," Ahsoka blurted out. Her stripes seemed… Are they darker, or is that just the light? "I wasn't sure if it was rude to ask or not…"

"Ask what?" Rex asked, slightly dazed.

"Is that your, ah, your natural color or is it bleached?"

"Oh, uh…" Rex ran his hand over his buzzcut self-consciously. "It's natural. Pops up every now and again. The Kaminoans engineered slight gene variations among us, you know, just to make sure that a whole generation doesn't get knocked out by a virus or something, and sometimes… recessive traits in the Prime pop up."

"The Prime. Jango Fett?" A shiver went down her spine. "I heard he was a force to be reckoned with. He managed to face off with Master Kenobi and not just survive, but come out victorious. I assure you that is no easy feat."

"I agree. I served under General Kenobi in the 212th Attack Battalion before the 501st was created. I saw how fierce of a fighter he is firsthand."

"That's right, I forgot about that." Her lip twitched. "I have to say, blue suits you better than marigold."

Rex's cheeks burned. "H-he—Jango Fett, I mean—he was the best fighter in the galaxy. It's why they chose him as the template. But he was also a traitor to the Republic, an assassin, a snake. It is our honor to erase his stain on the galaxy."

"Well, I like the hair. It makes you unique." Her cheeks hollowed out as she sucked on her treat.

The fabric inside his codpiece was getting uncomfortably damp. He took a deep breath in and focused on the glowing ice thing in his hand. It tasted heavenly. It's what kissing her would taste like.

They entered a wide open pavilion with a big rock sitting near the opposite edge. It was almost empty of any other visitors, only a few dozen… couples, judging by the way they were holding hands, wandering about chatting while a little guardian droid zoomed through them. "Oh, have you seen Umate?" Ahsoka sped up. "It's the peak of the tallest mountain on Coruscant. Technically, it's the only piece of the planet's surface one can still touch." She approached it reverently, closed her eyes and leaned on it with one hand.

Rex gave the monument a once-over. It looked… well, it looked like a big rock. But Ahsoka looked radiant, whatever she was sensing bringing a soft smile to her face.

Her eyes fluttered open. "Do you want to touch it?" She stepped to the side. "Go on. It's good luck."

Rex stepped forward, humoring her, and reached out. "You're sure this is allowed?"

"You just saw me do it, didn't you?"

Rex threw a wary glance at the patrolling droid and gingerly touched the gray stone. He… felt nothing. It was rough and cold.

Ahsoka stepped behind him. "Trillions of souls on this planet, all living and dying in an endless cycle in the air," she murmured, "but right now, you are the only living being touching the surface."

"I suppose when you put it that way…" is what Rex said. Whatever you say, beautiful, is what he meant. He took a step back. "There's so little exposed. I wonder if they'll build over it one day."

"It will be a sad day if they do."

Rex bit off the last of his quasicle. The whole inside of his mouth was pleasantly tingly.

"I suppose we ought to get back." Ahsoka collected his stick and passed it on with hers to a little roving MSE droid. "Thank you for indulging me."

"Thanks for the quasicle."

"I'm happy you liked my suggestion." She ducked her head with a smile. "I, ah… You know, I'd originally planned to celebrate with the Wolfpack tonight."

"Oh?"

"Yes. I was going to surprise them, but then I started feeling doubts over whether or not they would want to see me. It's not that I think they bear me ill-will, but… well, 79's is a clone space, one you should feel free to relax in. The chance that I would be imposing my presence on them when it was unwanted was too much to risk."

"I can assure you that your concerns were unwarranted," Rex said. "Wolffe thinks it's egregious that you aren't entrusted with the 104th. It's all he could talk about. He thinks the galaxy of you."

"Oh." Those stripes of hers were definitely darker. "That's reassuring. But it's… not the only reason."

Rex heard a distant rumbling. "What other reason?"

Ahsoka turned her face to the sky, squinting. "I don't remember rain being programmed for tonight."

"Maybe a flash update." The wind picked up. "Run?"

"Run!" Ahsoka bolted. Her rear lek wagged like a puppy tail as she ran.

Rex put his helmet on and followed. He couldn't help but imagine that view on the front lines, chasing her into the face of death. He'd follow her into hell itself. You'll never see her again after tonight.

"We're not going to make it!" she called back. Raindrops smacked against the ground. Ahsoka darted to the right though the greenery towards a covered picnic pavilion, dark and empty of any visitors.

They were halfway there when the sky opened up in a torrential downpour. Rex was protected, but Ahsoka was drenched to the bone in a matter of seconds. A scant meter from the pavilion's edge, she tripped on her soggy robe and almost face-planted into an aura blossom bush.

"Gotcha!" Rex caught her by the waist halfway to the ground, his bucket an inch away from her face.

Her big blue eyes blinking hypnotically, rain smacking against the back of his helmet, her mouth hanging open in surprise—

He snapped to his full height so fast that he nearly blacked out. "Almost made it," he said, hurrying them under cover.

"Almost. Thank you for the save."

"That's my job, Sir."

She snorted, shrugged out of her robe and tossed it onto a far table with a wet smack! "Well, this was unexpected." Her bare back glistened with raindrops.

"I'll say."

"At least you have your helmet." Ahsoka rubbed her arms and shivered. "And of course the temperature dropped. How rude. I'm filing a complaint with the weather bureau in the morning."

Rex immediately looked around for something to make a fire with. Everything was ferrocrete and durasteel.

"I guess I'll get to see how good that water protectant really is." She hopped atop a picnic table and rested her feet on the bench. "The seats on my bike are real akul leather. I harvested it myself on my last trip to Shili. The Togrutas at the Temple like to go as a group for an Initiate's coming-of-age hunt." Her hands twisted in her lap, fiddling with the edge of her damp skirt. "Most of the akul will go to whatever tribe's lands we're hunting on, of course, but we all usually take a little bit. Master Shaak Ti takes two teeth on every hunt she goes on. Master Altair Raj inlaid bone shards into the hilt of his lightsaber. I like to take leather—well, the skin, I mean. I tan it myself. I've made a few things. I made my belt." She smoothed her hands over the leather straps hugging her hips. "It's… nice to work with your hands. Rewarding." She was overtaken with a full-body shiver.

"I thought you could control your body temperature?" Rex yanked off his helmet, trying not to panic.

"I can maintain it a lot better than I can adjust it, and I'm trying to bring it back up." She shivered again and rubbed her bare arms.

"Body heat is the most efficient way to rewarm a hypothermic patient, Captain."

His erection, which had barely eased, made a painful resurgence out of sheer adrenaline; he knew what he had to do, he just didn't know how he was going to do it without humiliating himself. Rex's brain felt like an unstable, staticky supernova and he moved slowly, like he was in a dream, but he unclasped his pauldron and let it rest on another table.

"Rex?" Ahsoka's eyes widened.

"Can't have you getting hypothermia on my watch, Sir." That's right, Captain. General Tano requires medical assistance and you will provide it. His cuirass came off. His greaves. He finished stripping to his waist, then hopped up beside her and tugged her into an awkward side-hug. "Body heat, remember?"

"Oh." She cleared her throat. "Yeah, you're right. Good thinking, Captain."

They sat in stone silence and watched the rain. Rex's groin throbbed like he had a tourniquet wrapped around his member. Ahsoka's arms snaked around his waist and her head rested on his heart. She slowly stopped shivering and melted against his side. At some point, he closed his eyes and just listened to the rain. He could feel her pulse in the vein that ran down the outside of her lek, a thomp-thomp-thomp against his heart, a fluttering sensation like the wings of a trapped sparrow.

She felt good in his arms. She felt right in his arms, like she'd been engineered to fit perfectly in them—or that he'd been designed to hold her—but either way, even if General Grievous himself had started coughing behind them he wouldn't have been able to let her go.

One long, elegant hand came up and gently traced a tingling meridian down his chest. "The other reason why I didn't join Wolffe was because I saw you there," Ahsoka murmured.

His stomach clenched. "Oh?" he asked, his voice cracking like a cadet's.

"I don't know what it is about you, Rex, but I…" She sounded so unsure of herself. "I feel myself drawn to you and I'm not sure why."

Rex's heart pounded like a drum, like a bomb ticking down, 5…4…3…

She watched him closely for a few moments. Her eyes changed, became… hungry, almost predatory—Togrutas are an ambush predator—then she cupped his cheek. "May I kiss you?" she whispered.

The world shorted out and turned white, like a flash grenade had gone off in his brain, every anti-fraternization regulation in the manual streaming across his scrambled mind like a news ticker; even so, he couldn't do anything but nod, stunned into dumbfounded silence, unwilling to deny her anything she wanted—and what he wanted, more than he'd ever wanted anything before.

Ahsoka's lips delicately pressed against his, soft and full and delightfully cold. Her mouth opened just slightly and her tongue darted across his lips, the taste of Elixir blooming behind it. He groaned and pushed helplessly back into the kiss, clumsily meeting her tongue. Is this happening? Is it really happening, am I kissing her? Kissing a Jedi?

Her fingers scratched the back of his head, searching for purchase and finding none. His hand came up, slid up her bare back, traced her lek—soft, so soft—and finally cupped the back of her neck, pushing up against the silkiest, hottest skin he'd ever felt. She gasped, and before he knew it his lap was full of warm, writhing Togruta, one leg thrown over him before he could even register she'd moved. She ground down on his codpiece, so painfully tight that the pressure nearly made him scream—in pleasure or pain, he wasn't sure, but either way it was the best thing he'd ever felt. Her fingers traced over his chest, ten lines of fire that burned from within. She slipped over his cod and cupped him through the plastoid, and all he could think was is this what dying feels like?

She deepened the kiss, licking into his mouth. She took his free hand and put it on her soft breast—fierfeck, hold it together trooper—and moaned, "Rex," as she ground down on him again and again. She wasn't cold anymore, she was on fire in his arms, burning like a star. Her arms wrapped around his neck as she rode him, gasping with pleasure.

It was too much. He'd been fighting his arousal for too long. With a sharp cry into her mouth and a helpless upwards thrust of his hips, he lost the fight against pleasure and came, a tidal wave of pure, devastating sensation that left him floundering. She sped up, circling her hips, rubbing against his codpiece until a few moments later she finally stiffened and threw her head back with a rapturous moan of her own. His spirit slowly floated down and climbed back inside his body, painfully aware of the warm, sticky mess inside his blacks.

"S-S-Sorry," he forced out, cheeks burning with the mortification. You. Idiot.

Ahsoka paused, panting softly, and kissed him again. "The rain has stopped," she whispered after a few moments, pulling away. He hadn't even noticed. "We… we should get you back to the barracks."

"I, uh…"

She dismounted him with a wince and pulled her battledress back down, concealing the giant wet spot at the apex of her thighs. She carefully climbed off the table and hobbled over to her wet cloak.

The horrifying clarity of what they'd just done slammed into him like a turbo-train. You'll be sent back to Kamino and decommissioned for this if it gets out. "Commander Tano, I…"

"That's General Tano, trooper." She winked. "And I'd appreciate it if you could keep this between us. No bragging to the boys. Especially Wolffe."

Wolffe's miserable face flashed across his mind's eye. You won't have to worry about Kamino if Wolffe finds out. "I'll take it to the grave, Sir," he said hoarsely.

She smiled. Why does she look sad? "Good man."

Neither of them spoke a word on the ride back. When they arrived at the barracks, she let him off with a soft smile and a nod, then took off into the night like a dream spirit.

Rex wandered into the barracks in a daze. His office clock said he had an hour before PT started. He didn't bother sleeping. He dekitted in his office, chucked his blacks in the laundry then headed to the showers to scrub himself clean.

He could never tell anyone what had happened. They wouldn't believe you anyway.

He grabbed a fresh set of blacks and headed to his office to clean his armor. It didn't take long to wash all traces of Ahsoka Tano off of the plastoid.

You'll never see her again.

It was probably for the best.

So why do I already miss her?

Taglist: @starwarsficnetwork / @rexsoka-monthly Divider: @saradika-graphics

#my writing #bloodfeather #body heat #captain rex #ahsoka tano #rexsoka #rexsoka monthly #october 2023: body heat #star wars #star wars tcw #anakin skywalker #plo koon #commander wolffe #clone trooper sinker #clone trooper boost #79's bar #quasicles (glowing treat) (derogatory)#aged up ahsoka tano (she's 19)

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