Brave Souls Yet Unbroken

by Bythoseburningembers

Summary:

Anakin is slipping further into darkness. Obi-wan is helpless to protect those around him. Rex is worried that his generals might do something irreversibly stupid. Ahsoka's sense of self is stronger than ever.

On the bright side, they may be a little bent, but not broken. Not yet.

The moments during and after Escape from Kadavo.

Notes:

As I was rewatching scenes from Escape from Kadavo, I realized that they never showed Anakin reuniting with Obi-wan and Rex before they escaped the base. So I decided to write it.

Be warned, r*pe is hinted at here, even if its not explicitly shown. There is some comfort at the end, but please take care of yourself first and foremost.

Chapter 1: Rex's POV

As he sprinted through the cold halls of Kadavo, Captain Rex was only certain of three truths. 

One: he had just murdered a slaver – an unarmed man- and there was not a single atom in his body that regretted it.

Two: if he could at all help it, he was never accompanying the blasted Jedi on another undercover-op again.

Three: if Kenobi died here, Cody would never forgive him.

The third truth was the one which concerned him most. Despite their long history, Rex had only worked with General Kenobi one-on-one a handful of times. The man was calculated, witty, and patient, a stark contrast to Skywalker, who was spontaneous, blunt and impetuous.

In the beginning, Rex had been puzzled to find that the two Jedi worked well together. Even more shocking was the revelation that Skywalker had been Kenobi’s apprentice, like Ahsoka was to the battalion. They seemed to exist on different planes of existence.

But all the similarities were becoming apparent to him now.

Both men were stubborn and prideful to a fault. They clung to their own set of ethics with unshakeable – and often contradictory- faith. They were undeniably noble and generous. Oh, and perhaps this was a Jedi trait, but they were also insane.

Recklessly so.

“This room is clear, sir!” Rex called. He stepped backward, letting the doors slide shut behind him.

The base continued to quake, tiny vibrations sending shivers up his spine. Rex swiped a dribble of sweat off his forehead. He knew a heated space battle when he felt one, and the one outside felt explosive. They needed to leave before this whole place collapsed, preferably sooner rather than later, but true to his character, General Kenobi had insisted they check every room in the damn base first.

Rex understood, of course. He, too, had seen those Zyggerian slaver scum drag women and young girls away from their sleeping quarters in the night. Most returned. Some did not. More importantly, he had seen the indignant fury in Kenobi’s eyes when they were short a few individuals in the morning. It was the same ire-mingled-with-disgust that had burned in his gut, too.

So yeah, he understood.

Obi-wan wanted to find them, the missing ones.

Selfless? Yes.

Smart? No.

Yet, because of truth number three, Rex continued to search empty rooms for people who were most likely long dead.

“All clear!” he yelled when he had finished scanning another closet. Technically, all this shouting wasn’t necessary. If he did find one of the missing girls, Kenobi would probably sense it, but Rex wasn’t straining his already sore vocal chords out of protocol. He wanted a response.

It was the only way he knew Kenobi was still alive.

Rex waited a beat, listening. The floor shook and he nearly stumbled into the wall, which had been perfectly straight and normal a second earlier; but was now beginning to tilt precariously. They were running out of time.

And Kenobi still hadn’t answered.

Cursing, Rex sprinted back the way he’d come. Kenobi was two halls away, leaning against the wall for support as he vomited a thin stream of blackish mucus onto the floor. Rex skid to a stop, cringing. Despite weeks of training on Kamino, he had never truly managed to stall his instinctive revulsion or gag reflex when he saw someone else throwing up. 

Thankfully, Kenobi seemed to be at the tail-end of his misery. The Jedi looked up with glassy eyes. His auburn locks were draped across his forehead and temples in sweat-soaked coils. A few flecks of blood dappled his beard, and the dark purple and black bruising across his face was so vivid it practically throbbed.

“Sir!” Carefully avoiding the remnants of charcoal (and probably a nasty lung infection) Kenobi had just spat onto the floor, he approached. “I think we should go now, sir,” he said, squeezing Kenobi’s shoulder.

His best friend’s general nodded, but did not move. He was doubled over, gulping for air. Every inhale sounded as if he were trying to suck sludge through a pockmarked straw. Not good.

“I don’t think anyone else is here, general. If they’re alive, they’ve been sold off-world,” he added. Only an idiot would continue searching a building that was near to collapse, but he’d heard enough of Cody’s stories to guess that Kenobi was that kind of stupid. And Rex couldn’t leave. Cody would kill him.

“I-I know,” the Jedi finally rasped. “I…I found their bodies.”

Rex closed his eyes and exhaled a long, slow breath through his nose. “I’m sorry.”

They lapsed into a painful silence. He didn’t realize he was clenching his fists until his fingernails bypassed the gloves and bit into the flesh of his palm. Some of those prisoners had been children, younger even than Ahsoka when she first joined the warfront.

He hoped they had died quickly, painlessly. A quick blaster shot to the head. However, he knew it was unlikely. Those Zyggerian monsters had probably tortured them in unimaginable ways before leaving them to bleed or starve to death. He wondered if he should ask Kenobi, allow the other man to share the burden of the truth.

He opened his mouth, then closed it.

Rex never wanted to go on another Jedi undercover- op again.

“We should go,” he croaked, opening his eyes.

“I just need a moment.”

Rex sighed. “Sir, I don’t think we have a…”

Before he could finish, the adjoining hallway echoed with the clang of rapid, heavy footsteps. Rex pivoted on his heel immediately, already unclipping a blaster from his thigh holster.

“Stay here!” he hissed to Kenobi as he flattened himself against the wall.

Hearing about the girls’ massacre had awakened a bloodthirsty rage in him. If he could take more Zyggerians off the map, he would be happy. No, not just happy. Avenged.

Rex positioned himself at the edge of the hall’s corner. The steps grew louder as they neared him. He tightened his grip round the trigger, and…

Kenobi gasped. “Rex, wait!”

Captain Rex leapt from his hiding spot, already firing a volley of blaster fire. Kenobi’s shout brought him up short, cleared the fog of vengeance from his mind enough to notice just who he’d been trying to kill. Rex’s heart skipped a beat.

Thankfully, General Skywalker had pulled out his saber in time to deflect all of Rex’s shots. “Good to see you haven’t lost those infallible reflexes, Captain,” he breathed with a crooked grin, refastening the saber to his hip.

“I… Yes, sir,” Rex murmured, flushing with embarrassment. He could have killed his general, his friend, a Jedi. It was a Rookie mistake, worthy of decommissioning.

But when Skywalker clapped him on the shoulder, there was no resentment in his eyes. He actually looked concerned. “You ok, Rex?”

If he were honest, Rex was craving something strongly alcoholic that would render him unconscious for a few days, but Anakin’s regard was nice too. “Not dead yet, sir,” he supposed with a weary shrug.

Skywalker huffed a humorless laugh before striding past him. Rex followed at a slower pace. He well knew the importance of reuniting with one’s brother.

“Obi-wan!” Skywalker cried. Kenobi raised his head, and his jagged smile was an exact copy of the one Skywalker had just given Rex.

“Anakin,” he breathed, reaching up to gently cup the back of Skywalker’s neck in a strangely intimate gesture. “I’ve been worried about you.”

Rex expected a quip. Kenobi and Skywalker thrived off clever banter. Instead, his general caressed one of the bruises marring Kenobi’s face. “Who?” He growled. “Which of them did this to you?”

“A man who thought he could break me,” Kenobi explained, poised as an undisturbed lake. His eyes glinted with steel, and the corners of his lips quirked up into something both manic and courageous. “He thought wrong.”

His bravado sparked an answering smirk from Skywalker. Rex turned away. While these two were not shy about showing their regard for one another -one would have to be very stupid or completely blind not to notice how close they were – he had never seen them act like this. The Jedi were stoic and reserved as a rule. Always in control.

It felt as if he were intruding upon a sacred moment.

“Lets get out of here,” Skywalker declared.

Rex cleared his throat. “General Kenobi is pretty badly injured.”

“What?”

“I’m fine,” Kenobi insisted.

Rex was unimpressed. He had been warned about this. Don’t let him bullshit you about his injuries, Cody said. “You’re showing signs of cracked ribs, a lung infection and possibly internal bleeding, sir,” he drawled.

Kenobi narrowed his eyes. “Y-you’ve been talking to Cody.”

“I’ll carry you,” Skywalker decided, already positioning himself to fling Kenobi over his back. The other man took a few unsteady steps away, as if to ward off an attacker.

“You will not,” he wheezed. “I’m fine. I-I just might need to borrow a bit of your strength.”

Rex did not roll his eyes. But only because he had been trained better than that. What did that even mean, borrow a bit of strength? He couldn’t speak for Skywalker, but Rex was running off adrenaline and rage. He did not have any strength to share.

The statement evidently meant something to Skywalker though. One of his hands curled around his lightsaber, while the other gently rested on the back of Kenobi’s head. Kenobi copied his posture until they were standing close enough to share breath, clutching their sabers and each other, foreheads touching.

“Anything you need, master,” Skywalker whispered. “You know that.”

Then, something moved. Not physically. One second Rex was shuffling from foot to foot, desperate to leave this accursed place, and the next it felt as if time itself stopped. The listing floors and walls stilled. The burn of his overtaxed muscles and bone-deep exhaustion dwindled to nothingness. He floated, weightless, in his body.

For a pure, joyous minute, Rex was completely at peace.

As it ended, he snapped back into his fatigued and anguished body like a rubber band. It was so sudden and disorientating that it sent him rocking backward on his heels, saved from face-planting only by Skywalker’s solid grip on his arm.

“Now lets go,” the Jedi chirped.

Rex shook his head. With his mind cleared, he realized that some of Kenobi’s bruises had faded in intensity, and the choked rattle in his chest was now a shallow wheeze. The older Jedi’s eyes were glistening with renewed vigor. He cocked a blood-speckled eyebrow as if to ask well, are you ready?

Damn it, but these two were far too similar. It was a miracle they hadn’t either taken over or burned down half the galaxy in their wild pursuit of justice.

Captain Rex heaved a sigh and waved to their crumbling surroundings. “Ready when you are, sirs.”

Chapter 2: Obi-wan's POV

Master Yoda always cautioned them that their abilities, while substantial and special, only lapped at the shores of infinity.

As a youngling, Obi-wan had wrinkled his nose confusedly at such odd advice. It was only after the Clone Wars began that he truly understood. War had a way of humbling even the mightiest warrior, even the almighty order known as Jedi.

Even with Anakin’s boost, Obi-wan only managed another three hours before his body gave out completely. Perhaps Master Yoda believed that they were all luminous beings, but his aching lungs begged to differ.

Both to save his pride and avoid stealing undo attention from the Togruta colonists, he relinquished control of the situation to Master Plo and turned himself over to Gauze’s medical team before he collapsed. Which, in his opinion, was not so rare and miraculous that Gauze needed to make an affair out of it.

Yet he encouraged his troops to find and lean into their personhood, so Gauze skipped about the med-bay and grinned like a lunatic throughout the entirety of Obi-wan’s examination. In fact, he was still grinning when Obi-wan was lowered into a Bacta tank.

Sometimes, Obi-wan had a difficult time believing he had any real authority.

Several hours later, he woke from a drug-induced stupor to find himself lying in a medical bed. A whole nest of pillows kept his torso partially elevated, and the hot, painful weight of his injuries was gone.

Despite the fact that Gauze had left instructions (orders) that he remain in bed for at least another forty-eight hours to allow himself time to heal, and someone (Gauze, undoubtedly) had confiscated his lightsaber, Obi-wan still managed to convince a rookie clone to bring him a data-pad.

He was almost finished typing out his mission report when he sensed Anakin approaching. On cue, the younger Jedi careened into his corner of the medbay like a spiraling comet, nearly shredding the thin curtain separating Obi-wan’s bed from the rest of the ward.

Any normal day, Obi-wan would have scolded him for excessive use of the Force, but today… Well, he was just glad to see his Padawan alive.

“I heard you came to the med-bay willingly,” Anakin announced before the poor, abused curtain had even finished settling back into place. “Just how bad were you hurt?”

Obi-wan shrugged. “Rex’s assessment was surprisingly accurate. I had two cracked ribs, a bruised kidney and a lung infection. Nothing permanent, thank the Force.”

“Some of the colonists told me what went on down in those mines,” Anakin stood over him, arms crossed. Others might have assumed he was angry. Obi-wan knew better. “You’re lucky it wasn’t worse.”

“I am a hard man to kill,” he agreed. “How long have I been in the tank?”

He could tell from a preliminary sniff that Anakin had showered and changed his clothes. And the med-bay was surprisingly calm, the few who shared the room beyond the curtain either asleep or unconscious. Evidently, some time had passed.

Anakin lowered himself to sit at the foot of Obi-wan’s bed. “Eight hours. We’ll be on Kiros soon. Finally, the colonists will be able to see their homes again.”

Obi-wan shuddered. The memory of dried blood tickled his senses, followed quickly by the recollection of a dark room dotted with mutilated body parts. It would be a very long time before he stopped seeing those girls in his nightmares. “Well, not all of them.”

Anakin gulped. “Yeah.”

Obi-wan wanted to say something wise and comforting (Qui-gon would have known what to say, a traitorous voice in his head whispered) but before he could, one of the med droids strolled into the room. “Your test results have returned, sir,” he informed Anakin. “Would you like to see them now?”

It was as if someone had taken hold of Obi-wan’s heart and squeezed. He had an idea what test the droid was referring too. He would not ask Anakin to stay or share the results with him. Either way, a piece of his heart was already shriveling into a corner to weep.  

Anakin held out his hand as if nothing were amiss. “Sure.”

The droid’s chest cavity opened, and a single sheet of flimsy rolled out from its built-in printer. Flimsy was only used in the medical field these days. It was only fair, Obi-wan supposed, to give the patient a chance to burn their own death sentence.

Anakin snatched the report, scanning the contents with appropriate Jedi aplomb.

Obi-wan noticed the tiny quake in his hands.  

He waited, barely breathing, afraid that if he made a single noise Anakin would storm from the room and never speak to him again. After a tense moment, Anakin’s shoulders unwound. He glanced up and flashed a small, reassuring smile.

“Negative,” he said.

For a moment, Obi-wan feared he might faint, such was the force of his relief. It would have been terribly embarrassing. Then he remembered why Anakin would have requested such tests in the first place, and he had to wrestle down a sudden burst of pure, undiluted rage instead.

They were Jedi. Their lives carried innumerable risks. Anakin was handsome and strong and charming. It was not outside the scope of possibility that someone should try to… break him in that way, but Obi-wan had raised this man.

He had known Anakin when he was a mere reed swaying in the breeze of his own potential and curiosity. He had seen him shivering in fear and stalwart in determination. Where others saw a hero, a Jedi, an untouchable, near unbreakable object, Obi-wan saw the person who was dearer to him than any individual since Qui-gon had died in his arms.

Unintentionally, tears stung his eyes. He had always been more prone to sorrow than anger. “Oh, Padawan,” he choked past the lump in his throat. “I am sorry.”

He wasn’t quite sure why he was apologizing. Because he had experienced such violation himself, and knew how it obliterated you? Because Anakin didn’t deserve to suffer in such a way? Because Obi-wan had failed to protect him?

Anakin’s cocky smile crumpled slightly, then regrew as a defiant snarl. “Slavery didn’t break me the first time,” he growled. “I will not allow it to break me now.”

This was the thing the Jedi Council did not understand about Anakin Skywalker. They saw unfettered power and a rebellious soul and distrusted him for those reasons. Yet Obi-wan saw a boy who had spent his formative years in constant fear and trauma, and instead of becoming apathetic and cruel; he had twisted that pain until it bloomed into passion and fearlessness and generosity of spirit.

It was, he imagined, what Qui-gon had seen in him. No wonder he had died convinced Anakin was The Chosen One.

But Chosen One or not, he was still Obi-wan’s Padawan, so he shifted position and patted the empty spot next to him. “Come here.”

At twenty-three years old, an accomplished strategist and battle-weary warrior, Anakin had every right to reject his offer. As Obi-wan had suspected, he did not. Instead, he shoved his boots from his feet with the Force and climbed into bed.

“When did you get even larger?” Obi-wan wheezed as Anakin trampled over his legs. Gingerly, the younger man plopped his head onto Obi-wan’s shoulder and curled up as much as the narrow cot would allow. “And your hair is longer than a Iawazzan vine. Honestly, Anakin, at some point you’re meant to stop growing.”

“Its your fault for making me drink all that blue milk as a kid,” Anakin informed him.

“Yes, how dare I insist that you consume vitamins and minerals,” he gently tugged at a snarl of hair along Anakin’s temple. “I spend eight hours in Bacta slush, and you cease looking after yourself. I know you have a hairbrush somewhere.”

Anakin closed his eyes and nuzzled into his shoulder. “I was worried if I didn’t give you a reason to lecture me, you’d never wake up.”

Obi-wan snorted. “Anakin, please, I was not going to die of a bruised kidney. That’s so… anticlimactic. Boring, even.”

He expected a laugh, or a roll of the eyes if nothing else. But Anakin just wound into a tighter coil. He had done that as a little boy after particularly violent dreams had forced him from beneath the covers, screaming for his mother or Qui-gon.

 “I don’t know what I would have done had that slaver witch been lying when she told me your location,” he confessed. Not for the first time, a trickle of apprehension sent goosebumps across his arms. Obi-wan didn’t know what Anakin might have done either. These days, he increasingly relied on Ahsoka to keep him in line.  

Was it fair? Most definitely not.

Did he have any other options? Not particularly.

Anakin played with a stray fiber of his robe. He looked so young like this, so innocent. “I had nightmares that she sent you to some filthy, vicious prison lightyears away. I can’t do this without you, Obi-wan. I can’t.”

Yes, and that was the problem, wasn’t it? Jedi were forbidden from forming attachments, but he and Anakin toed the line of that rule every day. It was core to their strength and efficiency as a team. It was also Obi-wan’s greatest failure as a teacher. He had never been good at keeping an emotional distance, and he seemed to have passed that weakness onto his student.  

“Anakin, you know better,” he gently scolded. “No matter how far apart we are, so long as you are in the Light, I am always with you.”

Anakin was silent for a moment, and Obi-wan sensed he had said the wrong thing. Force knew what he should have said instead.

“I did what you taught me,” Anakin murmured, so softly Obi-wan had to strain to hear him. “Because she treated me like I was nothing, like I was her plaything, and sometimes it was like I never left Tatooine. Like everything between was just a dream. I sat awake chained to her bed reminding myself who I am, and it… it helped.”

Obi-wan bit back a sob. He rested his chin on Anakin’s head and tried to breathe the guilt and pain away, as he’d been taught. Every Jedi was trained to withstand torture.

This piece of their education was a closely guarded secret, rarely taught by one’s own master but the Council as a whole. However, after he escaped from Jabiim, Obi-wan had taken Anakin to the Garden of a Thousand Fountains and trained him in the tactic that had kept Obi-wan sane.

“My name is Obi-wan Kenobi. I am the third son of Anasi Kenobi and Ju-ven Kenobi. I am a Jedi Knight, one of a thousand strong. I was trained by the great Jedi Qui-gon Jinn, who was trained by the distinguished Jedi Yan Dooku, who was trained by the wisest of us all, Master Yoda. I am the master of Anakin Skywalker. I am one with the Force and the Force is with me.”

Obi-wan didn’t remember how many times he had spoken this creed aloud. He had also recounted the Jedi Code, spare bits of poetry, the entire written history of the Republic and every mathematical equation Qui-gon had forced him to learn.

Anything to keep his mind off the pain. Anything to sear the memory of himself into his psyche while Ventress did her utmost to pluck it out and replace it with the Dark. He had curled into a ball and whispered the same words on Zigoola while demonic voices shouted in his mind.

The words kept him alive, but more importantly, they kept him anchored in the Light. He had shared the technique with Anakin out of an abundance of caution. He had dearly hoped that his friend would never be forced to use it.

But the Force was not a nursemaid.

“I am glad,” he replied when he had finally managed to wrest himself from the brink of tears. “But I still wish…”

“Yeah,” Anakin said, because they were far past the point where they needed words. “Me too.”

Finally, the dam of control Anakin had erected collapsed. He exhaled a shaky breath and wept, long and hard, sobs muffled by Obi-wan’s shirt. They had been in this position many times, so Obi-wan knew better than to speak or attempt comfort. That was not his role here. He was merely an anchor to which Anakin could cling while he floundered.

Time passed. He did not know how much. He only knew that eventually Anakin was finally too exhausted to cry anymore, and thus he briefly raised his head to give Obi-wan a semi-exasperated glare, accentuated by the red rimming his lashes.

“I’m going to fall asleep on you,” Anakin threatened.

Obi-wan sent a desperate glance at his abandoned data-pad. “I have reports to…”

Suddenly, without so much as a whisper of her presence, Ahsoka Tano waltzed into the room with the same soaring fierceness as her teacher. “Oh, good,” she breathed when she saw them. “Move over, Sky-Guy.”

“Get your own Obi-wan,” Anakin grumbled as Ahsoka flung her shoes haphazardly into the corner and proceeded to trample Obi-wan’s legs on the other side. He cringed. They were both very heavy.

“Ugh… And how are you, Padawan?” He asked, trying to wriggle into as comfortable a position as one could get with one grown man slathered over his right side and sharp Togruta montrals jabbing into his cheek as she inhabited the space on his left.

“A Zyggerian pubak-tintoo thought he could break me by locking me in a cage like a bird and torturing my people,” she harrumphed.

“Who taught you that word?” Obi-wan demanded, thinking that it had been years since he last heard someone called a mother-fucking baby-eating titty-stabber.

“Him,” Ahsoka yawned, jabbing a finger at his first Padawan and crossing her ankles contentedly.

“Anakin Skywalker,” he gasped.

“Obi-wan, she’s old enough to curse,” Anakin huffed, rolling his eyes.

“Its true, Master Kenobi,” she agreed, as if her age and not the expletive itself was the real issue here. “Anyway, is there a way we can petition to never get another slave mission? Not that I couldn’t handle it,” she promised, as if her abilities were ever in doubt. “It’s just that I think my true talent is scrapping droids.”

Anakin looked at him expectantly. Technically, Jedi did not choose where they were stationed. They lived to serve, no matter where that service took them. However, historically, it was not unheard of for a Jedi team to request certain roles over others…

“Moving past the insults you’ve just hurled upon our Zyggerian adversaries, I assume you are not in any way broken or injured?” he continued, rather than give them false hope.

Ahsoka smacked her lips. “Not even close, master. He just wanted to degrade me, but it didn’t work. If he knew who I was, he would have figured that out before all his captive animals tore him limb from limb.”

“And who are you?” Anakin asked, as if he were merely curious.

Ahsoka popped one eye open to give them both a shrewd stare. “I am Ahsoka Tano, first daughter of Pa’ali and Foran. I am a Jedi, one of a thousand strong. I was trained by the prophesized Chosen One Anakin Skywalker, who was trained by the Sith-killer Obi-wan Kenobi, who was trained by the great Qui-gon Jinn, who was trained by the distinguished Yan Dooku, who was trained by the wisest of us all, Master Yoda. I am one with the Force and the Force is with me.”

“Not bad,” Obi-wan supposed, even as pride suffused his every vein. “But must I really be known as the Sith-killer? Can’t I have a less… murderous legacy?”

“I like my name,” Anakin said.

“I already memorized it, Master Kenobi. Sorry,” Ahsoka told him unapologetically.  “I’m going to fall asleep on you now.”

“But my reports…”

As if they had choregraphed this movement beforehand, both Anakin and Ahsoka wriggled around until they had trapped both his arms at his sides. Obi-wan chuckled gently and decided that perhaps, this once, he should probably surrender to the inevitable. After all, he knew perfectly well who had taught them such stubborn behavior (though in his defense, Qui-gon had been the one to pass it along to him) and arguing would only expend energy he didn't currently possess. 

"Very well then," he yawned. "Very well."