Chapter Text
~~~*~~~
When the Incident was recorded for the files of the Order, it was laid out in a very deliberate and factual way, suggesting that all had been as it should have and that the entire thing was, from beginning to end, The Will Of The Force.
What really happened was more along the lines of –
Jedi Padawan and al’verd’ika Anakin Skywalker, twelve, saying “Oops,” sheepishly as his de facto adoptive mother, Jedi Master and General Depa Billaba, said “Anakin, don’t touch that,” with practiced calm.
Jedi Knight and General Anakin Skywalker, twenty-two, saying “Oops,” in an entirely different breed of sheepish as his de facto exhausted older brother-dad, Jedi Master and High General Obi-Wan Kenobi, said “Anakin, don’t touch that,” with practiced despair.
To be fair to Padawan Skywalker, he had genuinely tripped on the uneven floor and caught himself by the pedestal in the middle of the room and hadn’t meant to touch the shiny rock thing on top of it.
Knight Skywalker had thought it looked weird and decided to poke it anyway.
Sometimes wisdom does not come with age.
The Force said hey, sibling-in-infinity, finally here is something I can work with, if you’ll allow a brief field trip?
The Force said back, happy to help, universe-sibling, looks like you’re having a rough time over there. Send them through, I believe the kids are calling it a ‘sleepover’ these days.
And so two startled scouting parties suddenly found themselves staring each other down on opposite sides of a room in an abandoned temple in the middle of nowhere.
The native party far outnumbered the other, for General Billaba was not an idiot and had brought friends on her expedition to teach her padawan about clearing mildly dangerous ancient sites, though her Force-sensitive backup who had wanted to come inside so late in the day had vanished into a maintenance shaft ten minutes after entering and was currently roaming about the place unseen. She did have the support of Grey, the commander of her newly-formed company, and Cody, Designated Anakin Wrangler and the Rightful Wielder of the Singular Shared GAR and Order Braincell. She felt pretty safe.
The two invaders were on their own, having been idiots and left their friends behind to worry and get things done while their own edition of the shared GAR-Order braincell was free of obstruction in their absence.
Without needing to consult with each other, Depa and Grey stepped in front of Cody as Anakin darted away from the small tear in space-time and did exactly as they had practiced for unexpectedly dangerous situations – climbing onto Cody’s back, yanking the environmental protective gear of his armor on, and holding on tight. All three of the adults prepared to defend themselves, and waited for the invaders to notice them.
~~~*~~~
“Master Billaba?” Anakin said, confused. Where had she come from? It had just been the 501st and the 212th out here, looking for a supposed Separatist base that was nowhere to be found.
She was dressed weird, too, wearing light armor along with what looked like an absolutely epic mashup of a cool edition of an open-style Jedi robe and a trooper undersuit – the robe was heavy and had metal mesh incorporated into it, fitted close to her upper body and flaring out into a full knee-length skirt at the waist. There was armor plating on the fitted parts and on the dark bodysuit beneath, less covering than the armor Anakin was used to seeing on the clones but quite a bit more than the scattered pieces he had seen some Jedi occasionally wear. The cool robe had a deep and ominous hood, though she was wearing it pulled back far enough to see her face clearly, and she had gorgeous boots that laced halfway up her shins into the armor plates there, and everything was all matte black and dull silver with dark green and burnished gold accents painted on the armor. It looked fucking amazing and he wanted an outfit just like it. Where had that kind of style been during his time in the Order so far? Not everyone wanted to dress up like toast.
“I’m afraid you have the advantage of me,” she said, cool and flat. “That is my name, but I do not recognize you.” Her eyes flicked back and forth between him and Obi-Wan. Anakin suddenly felt like he should probably have done more laundry in his life. His robes were . . . fine, they were in a warzone after all, but so was she and she looked like something out of a high-budget holofilm. Even her commander looked more put together than his men had lately, a weird sense of weight and solidity to his white and dark green and gold gear that Anakin wasn’t used to seeing. There was another clone half-hidden behind the two of them that they were protecting for some reason – injured, maybe? His aesthetic brain was busy remarking on how damn good the contrast between the Jedi black and clone white looked when combined with the matching accent colors and being annoyed he hadn’t thought of that himself. Him and Rex and Ahsoka could have been absolutely killing it with coordinating outfits this entire time.
“I’m . . . Skywalker?” he said vaguely, brain entirely preoccupied with fashion, then wanted to kick himself.
“This is General Skywalker and I am General Kenobi,” said Obi-Wan, putting a hand on his arm. “We know you – or a version of you?” Right, he knew Master Billaba pretty well, both of them being on the Council. He must be sensing something weird from her now that made him think it wasn’t their Master Billaba. Was that possible? Then again, Mortis had happened. Who knew what was possible with the Force.
And that was a way better sense of style than anyone in his version of the Order had.
Her eyes narrowed, glancing from them to the shiny thing on the pedestal. It wasn’t shiny anymore.
“Did one of you touch the . . . whatever that thing is?” she asked, nodding to it.
“Anakin – General Skywalker – just did, yes. Unfortunately.”
She glanced sideways at her commander, who made a little head-tilt-shrug motion that Anakin couldn’t read. It was similar to his men’s body language, but different enough that he couldn’t guess what it meant. That was . . . disorienting.
“Anakin,” she said softly. “So, where am I, then? I’m not you.” She was looking suspiciously at Obi-Wan.
“I’m not sure where you’re posted at the moment; you’re not working with me and the 212th or even in our division of the GAR,” Obi-Wan said carefully. “I last saw you during a Council meeting a few weeks ago. We both had to call in by holo, if that helps?”
“A Council meeting? The Council does the work of the war room for you?”
“No, we’re colleagues.”
Her mouth went thin and flat. “If you’re going to spend time here, I’d advise you not to mention that, or to first pick a better alias, Master Kenobi. It may be plausible, but the Order has not forgotten, and it is not advantageous.”
Obi-Wan looked calm, but he felt very bewildered in the Force.
“That’s his name,” Anakin protested. “It’s not an alias.”
“I’m sure,” Master Billaba said, sounding like she didn’t believe him for a second. “How old are you, An – General Skywalker?”
He stared at her. “Twenty-two?” He hadn’t meant to make it a question, but she was intimidating.
“Ten years’ difference,” said the clone behind her. “Maybe that’s where things diverged?”
She twitched one shoulder in a shrug. “Maybe. That’s not really important at the moment. We have other priorities.”
“I get tall,” said a young voice, breathless with excitement. A little body clambered higher up the back of the clone Master Billaba and her commander were protecting, bracing a knee on his shoulder and planting a hand on his helmet to balance atop him in a wobbly crouch and stare at Anakin and Obi-Wan through dark eye coverings and a half-mask hiding the rest of their face. A hood like the one Master Billaba wore flopped over one of their shoulders as they yanked it aside to see better, and from what Anakin could tell, the padawan was wearing a complete junior version of her outfit, though theirs had less green paint, being more accented with copper, gold, and some blue. “Wizard.”
The padawan had darkish blond hair swept into five neat braided rows running back down their head, and pale skin was visible on what could be seen of their face and where their fingerless gloves didn’t cover.
Master Billaba and her commander hadn’t been protecting the clone, he realized. All three of them had been hiding the padawan.
“Who’re you, though? I feel like I know you but I don’t recognize you,” they added, staring hard at Obi-Wan.
“Anakin,” said Master Billaba, in a tone so like Obi-Wan’s ‘please stop before something explodes’ voice that Anakin reflexively twitched in vague guilt.
“What? That’s me with the neat scar, but I don’t know the other guy.” The padawan contorted to put their hands on the clone’s shoulders and kicked off the wall behind them into a brief handstand over his head before flipping down and landing neatly on the floor beside Master Billaba. Anakin flinched again, startled by the sudden acrobatics, but the clone didn’t even twitch. He did manage to convey a sense of fond exasperation, though. Master Billaba put a hand on the back of the padawan’s neck as they moved forward and they subsided with a weird birdlike noise, staying at her side.
“He does feel like you,” she said.
“He is me. Well, not me-me, I won’t ever be him, but he’s a me. I know,” said . . . tiny-him? firmly.
There was a pause. Anakin noted that their epic outfits weren’t completely identical, though they were very similar. The padawan’s armor was configured differently and seemed to be made more of the mesh than the plates. Understandable, for someone who was still growing.
“All right then,” Master Billaba said, and looked at Anakin a little less coldly. “I take it our universes diverged some time ago, and to a fairly great extent.”
“Huh?” he said. Universes? Why couldn’t she talk to Obi-Wan instead? He was the smart one about stuff like this. She was very pointedly leaving him out of the conversation.
The padawan unhooked the mask and pulled down the lenses and yeah, that was him, back when he’d been a kid. He looked about eleven. The only real difference he could see was tiny-him’s bizarrely long hair, and maybe the kid had more of a tan than he’d had then. But why was he with Master Billaba, of all people?
This wasn’t feeling like time travel, just like tiny-him had said.
“This is my Anakin,” she said, her hands on the kid’s shoulders. “My padawan and recently apprenticed al’verd’ika of my newly formed company, Starwalker of the 212th.”
Beside him, Obi-Wan went still in confusion. Anakin didn’t get it either; that wasn’t a company name he knew and she wasn’t part of the 212th. Why would a Jedi be leading only one company that was part of a battalion already under Jedi command? That was incredibly wasteful.
Also, imagining life as Master Billaba’s padawan was melting his brain a little. That would mean Master Windu was his grandmaster. What. No. Why. How. They probably had conversations. Frozen Sith hells, what would he even have talked about with Master Windu at that age, podracing? Droid schematics? How to glare at people? Girls??
Master Billaba inclined her head towards the green-and-gold-painted clone beside her, freeing Anakin from his panicked thought spiral. “My al’verde of the same, Grey.”
The clone that tiny-him had been climbing all over moved forward, and –
was that –
“This is Cody, alor’al’verde of Ghost of the 212th, lead alpha to the Temple pack.”
Anakin knew what Ghost of the 212th was, that was the same, but what the fuck was the Temple pack? What was a lead alpha?
“Who is in charge of the 212th, then?” Obi-Wan asked, shields tight but bewildered anxiety leaking through.
“General Unduli and al’verde Offee, on our side of it,” said Master Billaba. “But since we are still very much learning how to fight a war, for all practical purposes, the pack runs itself. We merely provide . . . “ she trailed off.
“Something to tell the idiots at the Senate,” said Cody.
“Excuses,” she amended. “Cultural translation services. The illusion of control, for everyone outside the Order. And, of course, not a few of us are in training to lend our specialized assistance to the war as akaan’runise. In return for this, we receive the considerable benefits of the pack’s protection, guidance, and expertise in this mess we find ourselves in. We had a bit of a rocky start but it has worked out satisfactorily all around.”
“What about the 501st?” Anakin asked, and got blank stares.
“We only have the 212th, and three companies in it. The first, Ghost, and just this year we formed Starwalker and Huntress, respectively overseen for the Order by Knight Unduli and Padawan Offee, myself and Anakin, and Master Koon and Padawan Tano,” Master Billaba said. “A fourth company is likely to form soon for Knight Vos once Padawan Secura is a little older and more experienced as she has no unusual advantages like Anakin does, but we are still not enough for an entire new battalion. I think our war is not as advanced as yours – how long was the cold period?”
“The what?”
“After the failed trap at Geonosis, after Kit discovered Kamino and we learned of the clones. How many years was it before the war began again?”
“None,” said Anakin, when Obi-Wan was quiet. “Uh. Everyone who went pretty much got wiped out on Geonosis before the clones arrived to save the dozen of us that were left alive and then we’ve been at war ever since.”
Tiny-him grabbed Cody’s hand and hung on tight, eyes wide. Cody made a weird-ass rumbling noise that he was pretty sure was physically impossible for his version to make, but it meant something to tiny-him, because he looked a bit less spooked. He kept clinging to his hand though.
“Kit discovered Kamino,” Obi-Wan said softly.
“Knight Kit Fisto,” Master Billaba clarified.
“Yes, we know him.”
“I take it someone . . . else found Kamino in your universe?”
“I did.”
She gave him another extremely doubtful look. Obi-Wan tucked his hands into his sleeves and Anakin relaxed, just a bit. If he was doing that either it was fine and they weren’t going to have to fight or Obi-Wan was about to shred their opponents and didn’t need help.
Tiny-him had given up on holding Cody’s hand and was plastered to him in a full-body hug instead. He only came up to about his elbow and was having to make do with his limited reach and the obstacles of his armor by hugging one of his legs. Anakin didn’t miss being short. Cody seemed fine with having a padawan glued to his side, rather like Rex with Ahsoka.
“Hey,” said Anakin’s mouth without input from his brain. “Why’re you here if Master Billaba’s not the general for Ghost?”
“She is pack,” said Cody, and glanced down at tiny-him before rubbing his hand along the top of his head in an odd gesture, more of a wrist motion than anything else. “My bondmate is helping her raise Anakin, and so he is my child, and through him she is also mine to look after. This place was unknown and slightly dangerous and sounded exciting, so we came along.”
“The definition of pack is quite flexible,” said Master Billaba in an aside, seeing their confusion. “It sort of – expands exponentially once they decide someone is family-shaped.”
“He means, Ghost thought digging through old space-mage trash piles sounded exciting and gave him the hopeful tooka eyes until he agreed to come with us,” Grey said, removing his helmet. “Not that it took that long, he lasted about three seconds.”
“And that,” Cody said, unmoved. “They like getting out of the Temple now that they can leave it safely. It’s good for them.”
“Your entire company wants to explore this place?” Anakin asked, confused. He received four looks of confusion back, as Cody had also removed his helmet. He looked eerily similar to the Cody he knew, but somehow younger, and he had earrings, which was weird.
So did Grey, now that Anakin looked. The same style too. And so did Master Billaba – was it some part of the armor? Implanted comms? Sensors for something? That was sort of a neat idea.
Even tiny-him had a little crystal stud sparkling in each earlobe, a single pair instead of two like the rest of them wore. Were they some kind of rank markers, like padawan beads? But then why did the clones have them too? Tiny-him’s padawan beads were lined up neatly along the lowest braid on the right side of his head instead of on a braid that hung loose, which was a smart choice for a warzone. He wondered if the colors still meant the same things here. There were a couple he didn’t recognize, gold and teal.
“Ah, Ghost-the-person,” Master Billaba said after a moment. “It confused me too when I first met them. Cody named Ghost-the-company for Ghost-the-person, like how Grey named Starwalker for Anakin and Wolffe named Huntress for Ahsoka.”
Tiny-him wriggled slightly, cheeks flushing pink. Cody’s hand slid down to grip the back of his neck in the exact same way Master Billaba had earlier, like they kept scruffing the kid or something.
“We don’t know a Ghost, but we have equivalents for the rest,” Obi-Wan said, finally finding his voice again. He had been pretty preoccupied with staring at Cody ever since he’d said why he was there. Anakin didn’t blame him; if it had been Rex he’d have been confused too.
Wait. Ahsoka got a company named after her? That was awesome, and he said so.
“You know her too?” tiny-him asked, unsticking slightly from Cody’s leg. “Isn’t she great?”
“She sure is.”
“And she’s so pretty,” tiny-him said, and whoa. He knew that look. It was the same one he knew he got when he was thinking about Padmé.
“Um, she’s actually my padawan,” he said. Tiny-him looked flabbergasted.
“But she’s older than I am!”
That was different. “She’s younger than me. Not by a whole lot, but enough.”
“That’s weird. Wait, how old’s Barriss then?”
“Barriss?” Anakin asked. The name was vaguely familiar. “Oh, Luminara’s padawan? Uh, no idea. I’ve only met her a few times.”
Tiny-him was looking like someone had kicked his mouse droid and Cody was also looking rather put out for some reason.
“She’s only a year or so younger than Anakin, but they never ran in the same circles,” Obi-Wan said gently. “She and Ahsoka are friends in our world, though. I don’t think she knows any of the rest of you except in passing.”
Tiny-him looked up at Cody. “That’s weird,” he said in apparent despair. Cody squeezed his shoulder and made the weird-ass purring noise again. How was he doing that? Why was he doing that?
“As enlightening as this is, I think we should work on fixing whatever happened,” Master Billaba said. She had been looking at the thing on the pedestal that caused the entire mess and suddenly swept it into a small bag with the Force. “Unfortunately, this thing is dead now. If you don’t have any other suggestions, come back to the Temple with us and we can work something out.”
We don’t really have another choice, do we? Anakin asked.
Not that I can see, no. They seem perfectly amicable to you at least. Maybe I’m a Sith in this world, Obi-wan answered with a slight tinge of worry. There was something else under his shields, something tight and aching and raw, but Anakin didn’t want to poke at it. It felt overwhelming, not to mention personal. He did what he did best and ignored it.
Ridiculous, Anakin said, with as much exaggerated cheer as he could gather. Let’s go with them for now. That thing looks dead like she said and I don’t even know how we got here to begin with. They’ll figure out you’re nice in a while. Maybe there’s someone here with the same surname as you who’s an asshole but totally unrelated and that’s why they’re being all squirrely.
“That sounds good, thank you,” Obi-Wan said out loud.
“Hey, wait. You’re his equivalent of Master Depa,” said tiny-him, pointing accusingly at Obi-Wan, who gave him a small smile.
“Yes, I trained him, if that’s what you mean; he was my padawan.”
Tiny-him looked like he was putting two and two together and getting eight. “You’re tall,” he said, personally offended by this for some reason, and also exaggerating a bit. Obi-Wan wasn’t actually very tall at all for a human. “You’re like, as old as Quin. Barriss was right. It is weird and I don’t like it.”
“Enough of that,” said Grey, picking tiny-him up under the arms and swinging him up onto his shoulders, which was evidently the cue for all of them to start walking. “Your brain’s going to melt if you keep thinking and then where will we all be?”
Tiny-him hooked the toes of his tiny kickass boots – Anakin was not envious of an infant’s footwear, he was not – into unusual grooves in Grey’s armor with a quick practiced movement and balanced there on his own without holding on or being held, rolling his eyes vigorously. “Yeah, but I’m right though, aren’t I, alor’tran?”
“I don’t know,” said Cody, whom this remark had evidently been addressed to. Anakin searched his brain for the scattered bits of Mando’a he knew and came up with . . . leading sun? Central star? What? “They don’t smell like anything and I don’t have your depth of perception even when Ghost’s lending me their abilities. They’ll know, I suppose, if you did.”
Tiny-him hummed and fidgeted with the armor on their legs, smoothing out the heavy folds of the skirt of their robes. Anakin was dying to know what it was made of; it moved like no fabric he’d ever seen.
“Ah,” said Master Billaba, looking surprised. “That’s what’s so off. They don’t smell like anything, do they? Are you using that high of blockers, or do you not have secondary dynamics?”
“I’ve never heard of those,” Obi-Wan said after a pause. “What are they?”
“I’ll get you a guide to basic Jedi clan etiquette when we get back to the Temple,” she said, pinching the bridge of her nose. “You’ll both need to know the basics even if you only spend a day or two here or you’ll be terribly confused about some things, I’m afraid. For now, just be aware that nearly every species existing here has them, though there are a few who are null and that’s what people will compare you two to. It’s a . . . social thing, mostly.”
“Wait, you don’t have pack?” said tiny-him, sounding distressed.
“Ani’khen,” said Cody, something curling around the word, not quite a Force suggestion but way too fucking close to it for someone whom Anakin knew wasn’t Force-sensitive.
Tiny-him subsided with another weird bird noise.
A second, less high-pitched weird bird noise echoed all around them. Anakin jumped and was glad that Obi-Wan felt startled too.
“That’s just Ghost,” said Master Billaba calmly. “They must have gotten bored and come to find us, or sensed it when that artifact activated.”
Above them on the wall, a grate detached and floated out to hover on the ceiling. Anakin watched in mildly horrified fascination as a pair of arms reached down and a small body slithered out, back to the wall and unhesitant as they blindly reached down and backwards into empty space before Cody’s next few steps brought him underneath and the person landed in a handstand on his shoulders just like tiny-him had done earlier. They balanced there for a second, the flaring skirts of their armored robe that was identical to Master Billaba’s floating like they were in space for a heartbeat before they kicked forward to drop into a fluid movement that somehow ended up with them swinging down and up and around to be back on Cody’s shoulders but sitting there just like tiny-him was on Grey.
They weren’t wearing the kickass boots of the outfit for some reason; their feet were bare and dusty and looked like they’d never worn shoes in their life. Anakin questioned their life decisions.
Cody didn’t even blink during the entire process. He did make yet another bizarre noise and the newcomer made one back.
“Stupid vents got too small,” said the newcomer in a soft, eerily familiar voice, though the accent was wildly different. “Didn’t find anything interesting. Felt something step through the world between worlds though. Was itchy.”
“Yeah, that was them,” said Cody, pointing at Anakin and Obi-Wan. The hooded head turned to regard them intently.
“Hm,” was the pronunciation, after Anakin felt like someone had tried to shove his Force presence through a scanner. “Yeah, they’re from another world. That’s An’ika but older. A decade or so? And . . . a future, lost.” The newcomer made a querulous noise, hands feeling for purchase on Cody’s shoulders beside their legs though there wasn’t really much space.
Cody squeezed their ankle. “I think I like the one I have.”
“Quin will be interested.”
“I like you travel-sized.”
The newcomer relaxed. “Thank you. I do too. If you could not carry me when I am sleepy I would be very sad.”
Cody had a point in calling them travel-sized. They didn’t sound like a child, but they were somewhere between the size of tiny-him and Ahsoka, short and with a slim build that didn’t help them look older.
“We were going to take them back with us and try to figure out how to send them home,” said Master Billaba.
The newcomer made a muffled snickering noise. “On the star-roads?”
“ . . . ah.”
“Well, there’s only two of them. There’s enough of us to bring them along, and Tall Anakin should be able to pass the gates without help, shouldn’t he?” Cody said. “He said he was a skywalker.”
“This is Ghost,” Master Billaba said belatedly. “Ghost, this is General Skywalker and General Kenobi.” There was another ripple of distaste-annoyance-hurt at Obi-Wan’s name.
“Yes,” said Ghost. “They are, Depa. It’s okay.” They flipped their hood back and stared intently at Obi-Wan.
Anakin stared at Ghost, his mild affront at being called Tall Anakin entirely vanishing from his head. They looked and felt vaguely familiar, but he thought he’d remember if he’d ever met a tiny eldritch being that looked like an angel before. He hadn’t known anyone could be as beautiful as Padmé, but between the incredible outfit and their iridescent Force presence and their entire face, Ghost was giving her some serious competition.
Ghost, apparently getting bored, slumped down bonelessly and put their gorgeous face in Cody’s hair. Anakin was briefly jealous of it both for getting to touch it and for blocking his view. “Ow,” they mumbled. “Thank you, Kote. So much. Something’s gone wrong with them; I don’t think their you can fix it like you could fix me.” They snuffled, inhaling deeply, which was . . . kind of weird, Anakin wasn’t going to lie, but some of the tension left their shoulders. “Or maybe just needs a lot more time.”
Cody squeezed their ankle again.
Master Billaba was looking at Ghost with consideration.
“And I thought I got the Bad Timeline,” Ghost mumbled before straightening up.
Master Billaba, briefly, went pale.
“Less, hm, dramatic, but longer and slower,” he – she? – Ghost said to her. “And no gold-curls-bright waiting at the end of it. No yellow-braids-soft to be friends with both after and before. Nothing to hope for.”
“What are you?” Anakin’s mouth once again had decided to submit an entry to the conversation without consulting the rest of him. “I mean, pronouns?”
“Any are fine,” Ghost said with a shrug. “I didn’t have them for ages, so I’ll answer to anything. Kote gave me they/them when he named me his Ghost and those are the ones most everyone uses.”
“But are you a boy or a girl?” Ghost was stunning but in an extremely androgynous way and it was hurting his brain a little; he’d always thought he was straight, but if he hadn’t been married already and this hadn’t been apparently an entire different universe to his own . . . Maybe Ahsoka had had a point when she kept calling him a disaster bi. He’d always assumed she just meant the disaster part literally, but . . .
For some reason, that reasonable question for his own peace of mind got him weird looks all around before Master Billaba’s expression cleared.
“Ah,” she said softly, an aside to her commander. “No scent; they must not have more than the two.”
“Neither-both,” Ghost said, singsong. “I don’t remember what I was before I presented; I’m just omega now, so. Any and all work. I suppose I could ask Quin; he’d probably know and remember. The files called me a boy but that feels wrong, somehow. And people were so stupid during then, I can’t know if anything there is reliable that I can’t verify for myself. Over half my kyber only answer to she, if that helps, and the others all want to be neutral.”
“But how can you not know?” Anakin asked, bewildered. He understood what it was like to not know what one felt like, but it wasn’t like bodies were invisible to not know what one was stuck with.
“Presenting omega writes over what a child was born as,” Master Billaba said. “It’s . . . an in-between state, mostly. Someone’s got to protect and preserve the clan, after all, and that’s what they do.”
Ghost gave him a small smile that looked utterly deranged and incredibly attractive. “I’m happy as I am. If I was different, maybe I wouldn’t have wanted to come out and meet my Kote, and everything would still be sad and cold and lonely and dark. Maybe people would be dead.” Their eyes were going far away. “Maybe everything would be a little less kind, and a little more doomed.” Their half-gloved fingers were stroking restlessly through Cody’s hair. He reached up and took their hands, stilling their fingers by trapping them in his.
“Do you need paint?” he asked, wildly off-topic.
“No. Not now,” Ghost said, shaking their head so hard Anakin expected some of their incredible, elaborate copper-gold braids to come out of the blue and yellow-topped pins keeping them held fast to their head in a winding coronet that looked more like something Padmé would wear to a formal dinner than something someone would hide under their armor in a warzone. “Maybe later. The Force is loud, but playful. Not like it wants to make me see things. I think it’s relieved about something, and kind of amused, but it doesn’t want to give details. Not yet, at least.”
“What exactly is an omega?” Obi-Wan asked. Anakin would rather have had clarification on how the fuck Ghost could be so certain about the Force, but maybe that would be too difficult of a subject. And he did kind of want further explanation on what Ghost was, besides possibly an actual angel.
He was pretty sure that if Ghost had chosen to climb him like a tree instead of Cody, he’d have done something really embarrassing. Cody looked utterly unmoved by it and Anakin was wondering if he was blind or something. Ghost was draping herself – themself? all over the clone and he was just. Walking along like he didn’t have one of the most luminous of beings Anakin could ever have imagined twining themself about him and petting his hair and holding his hands.
Maybe Padmé would like to sit on his shoulders sometime? She was a bigger person than Ghost, but she was probably small enough relative to Anakin that it’d work without being too awkward. Even with Cody completely ignoring them, Ghost was making it look really alluring.
“We – as in the Jedi – consider them to be nature’s last line of defense for clan and family,” Master Billaba told them, falling into a teaching cadence and providing a welcome distraction from Ghost’s everything. Ahsoka would be teasing him so much if she was here. “They are, generally speaking – though of course every individual is different – the fiercest and most naturally adept fighters, have the strongest senses which give them a large advantage in direction-finding and scavenging, and can both bear and sire children much more easily and prolifically than any other gender although they are, again generally speaking, not that great at caring for them. Sink or swim is rather the instinctive omega philosophy on childcare, but that’s why we have alphas, I suppose. And it’s possible for an omega to do just fine as a sole parent; I mean, I had a very happy and stable padawanship and Mace was quite young when he took me on with minimal support from his own masters. Anyhow, a clan can rebuild from near nothing as long as they manage to keep just one omega with them.”
“I’m gonna be one in a couple years when I grow up!” tiny-him announced, happy and proud. “Then me an’ Ghost can run missions together and absolutely terrorize Grievous an’ Dooku an’ all the annoying politicians.” He leaned over, Grey obligingly moving closer to Cody, and high-fived Ghost. They both looked smug.
“But you’re a boy now,” Anakin said, still confused on how someone could be physically neither as a matter of course, without some kind of artificial intervention.
“Yeah, but I won’t be then, though I don’t mind being called a boy so I’ll probably keep it. Like Grandmaster Mace did. It won’t matter a lot at any rate, ‘cause I think the only alpha I’m ever going to want is Ahsoka an’ she’s not gonna care what I am, or I’ll be like Ghost and not want anyone.”
“Best life,” Ghost said, nodding solemnly. “Best puns. Automatically ace at everything, excellent. I will teach you my ways. You will be magnificent.”
Cody sighed.
“Love you very much, sunshine,” they cooed hastily, patting his head. Anakin’s brain briefly shorted out. That was going to haunt his dreams for weeks even if it hadn’t been directed at him at all. “Also, best way to learn to delegate and coordinate schedules with someone else.”
“Ahsoka likes Barriss too, and Barriss likes her, I think,” tiny-him said thoughtfully, then looked at Cody. “But then she’s also already with you, but I don’t think Ahsoka really thinks about you like that? I don’t know. It’s not like I asked her or anything, but I know I don’t, and probably won’t ever. But I might with Barriss? I don’t know.”
“And that’s fine,” Cody said reassuringly. “You don’t have to know until you’re older and it’s relevant. Intergenerational packs can get a bit tangled up but as long as we all keep being kind and honest, it will work out. For now, don’t worry about it, and if for some reason anyone tries to pressure you into anything, show them your no means no and they are owed no explanations for it.”
“Please don’t tell me any more about your conspiracy theory string board pack polycule dynamics,” Master Billaba said wearily, turning to tiny-him. “It’s bad enough hearing about them now when you’re too young to be sleeping with them and they’re actively shielding you from all but the pure facts of it in the packbonds. I know that when the time comes they’ll all be very safe and responsible with you and you won’t get pregnant until if and when you want to be, so I don’t want to know about it unless you have questions about the physical or emotional mechanics of it, which I will of course always help you with.”
“I’m good at sharing,” said Cody, much too thoughtfully for the setting. “If Ahsoka’s interested in Barriss and Barriss wants to share too, I don’t care what they do. And Rex won’t care either way as long as they don’t make a lot of noise. Ghost?”
Ghost shrugged, beginning to play with his hair again. “Don’t care, as long as everyone’s happy and nobody makes me join in after you move on from kissing. I’ve got important shit to do while you’re all out of my way being hormonal.”
“Please don’t tell me,” Master Billaba said again. “Though I do respect the consistent absolute lack of fucks you all give about everyone knowing everything about your personal business.”
Cody shrugged. “We forget you don’t all just know from the packbonds. Ahsoka’s fifteen now, she can make her own choices.”
“No,” said Ghost, pointing at tiny-him. “Not until you’re fifteen at least.”
Tiny-him wrinkled his nose. “I don’t wanna, anyway. I don’t care about it yet except sort of for planning things.”
“Good. I will drag you out by your ear and sit on you if you try.”
This version of the Order apparently had both spectacular fashion sense and let its members get into weirdly complex webs of familial and romantic relationships and discussed them openly. Anakin wanted to immigrate. His tiny-self was also kind of badass, talking about his . . . potential future girlfriend? girlfriends, plural, who were also into each other? right in front of his master like that and not even blushing.
Hey, he’d heard Rex’s name. That was a nice safe non-awkward subject. “Rex is here?”
“Yeah,” said tiny-him. “He’s out with the rest of everyone at the camp. They didn’t want to come in here until we found out if this place eats Force-nulls or not.”
Anakin gave the two clones a confused look.
“Oh, Grey’s bonded to Master Depa enough that he can pass, and of course Cody and Ghost are . . . Cody-and-Ghost. And if things got really dangerous I could smother Grey’s Force presence with mine to hide him, and Cody could borrow a saber from Ghost and pretty much be functionally Force-sensitive for as long as he’s got it.”
“What,” said Obi-Wan, sounding rather choked. Oh yeah, their universe’s Cody was always finding his lightsaber. Usually he just came up and handed it back while glaring at Obi-Wan, though. No sign of any functional Force-sensitivity, whatever that was. There was usually some kind of weird tension in the air but Anakin had always just assumed that it was Cody barely repressing homicidal urges at Obi-Wan’s casual neglect of his own safety because he didn’t want to have to do the paperwork that major injury or death always created. That’s how he’d have felt in his place, at least. He still wasn’t sure if Obi-Wan and their version of Cody were friends or frenemies or hated each other but were both too professional to let that get in the way of their jobs or what. Him and his version of Rex were cool, they were bros. Rex wasn’t afraid to let him know when he was being dumb and he wasn’t afraid to tell Rex off when he was being too impulsive even for him. It worked, and it didn’t have a bunch of weird unsaid conversations through small facial expressions like Obi-Wan and Cody kept doing.
This universe’s Cody, who didn’t know an angel when one was literally sitting on his shoulders, shrugged. Hm. Maybe Cody in any universe was just kind of hugely unobservant about everything and that annoyed the hell out of Obi-Wan, but otherwise they got along fine as colleagues. That’d fit. It was a shame he couldn’t have ended up with a second in command who was a bit smarter, though that would probably have been absolutely terrifying. If he hadn’t had to keep dumbing things down for his version of Cody the war would probably have been over in six months.
“Xe likes me, the purple one anyway. The white one and I are professional allies. The black one is a pest, and really only enjoys hanging out with Ghost; I don’t think she’s liked anyone since about Vizla’s time.”
What was he talking about again? Oh yeah, lightsabers. How many did Ghost have? Did they collect them? They only had two arms and two hands that he could see.
“She likes you,” Ghost said, unmoved. “She did think you’d be a good Mand’alor.”
“She likes you,” Cody corrected. “She tolerates me. Vizla was the one who thought I should be formally responsible for a whole additional few planets’ worth of fucking natborn morons after we clear up the Separatist mess, if I can’t talk my way out of it by then.”
“She likes you,” Ghost insisted. “Well, she likes Fox and Faie a bit more, but still. She lets you fight with her and gives you tips afterwards, not just insults.”
“I’ll stick to Blueberry, thanks.”
“Xir name is not Blueberry,” Ghost hissed.
“Xey respond to it.”
“A good Mand’alor,” said Obi-Wan as Cody and Ghost began to bicker, ignoring everyone else. He sounded rather distant and his shields were almost completely solid. It was weird, seeing how similar yet different this world was; Anakin was fairly sure when he met this universe’s Rex he’d be having the same reaction.
“It doesn’t really matter much right now, but it probably will in the future,” Master Billaba said serenely. “And of course we of the Order are very glad that he has such a positive opinion of us, and has taken a Force-sensitive as his bondmate and a Jedi as a pack-spouse, even if she is still a padawan. None of us really wanted the Jedi-Mando wars redux to happen anytime soon, or at least not a version where we’re fighting against each other instead of alongside each other. We’ll stand behind him when the time comes.”
“Who . . . ?”
“Ghost as his bondmate, of course, I don’t think you could pry them apart with a crowbar, and then Cody and Barriss hit it off pretty much immediately when they were introduced, though she was only fourteen and nothing happened between them until she was closer to sixteen. The clones have firm but rather odd boundaries about age gaps. And he’s only four years older than she is, developmentally, and actually five years younger biologically.”
“Oh, the accelerated aging thing,” Anakin said, because Obi-Wan seemed to be having a crisis. “Yeah, that’s funky. I’d never really thought of it like that though.”
“Cody and Anakin are almost exactly the same age,” said Master Billaba, a little sadly. “It was . . . eye-opening, when we learned that. It changed quite a few things.”
“Oh!” said tiny-him, leaning forward perilously on Grey’s shoulders. “Have you done a DNA test with them yet? Are you first cousins too?”
“First cousins with who?” Anakin asked warily. As far as he knew, he had no blood relatives anywhere.
“The vod’e, of course! Mom was captured on Concord Dawn when she was about my age, and Jango’s my uncle. And he’s their genetic donor through the Kaminoans like mom was through Ar-Amu for me, so we’re all clones and also first cousins, though it’s kinda weird ‘cause some of them are more like parents and some are like older siblings and some are just normal siblings and some are little siblings and . . . you know. It’s kind of complicated. Are you all right?”
“What,” Anakin managed to say.
Tiny-him gave him a sympathetic look. “Yeah, I was pretty overwhelmed when I learned it too. Having family is really nice. But I don’t know if it’s true for you; you should at least investigate a bit when you go home.”
Ghost snorted. “I think you broke him.”
Tiny-him scowled. “Give him a minute! I went an’ hid under your bed for the rest of the day after we did the first test.”
Anakin wished he could sort through his confusion with Obi-Wan, but when he tentatively reached out across their bond he was met with a storm of bewildered misery so strong it almost made him trip. Absolutely none of that was showing on his face or in his body language, but now Anakin was kind of worried about him. What was upsetting him so much? It wasn’t like everyone they knew was dead here or anything. This world almost seemed to be doing better in a lot of ways. Even if Master Windu was his grandmaster here, eugh.
And even if Obi-Wan didn’t have a counterpart anyone here knew about. That was a bit weird, but he’d probably had enough of the Order when he was young and run off somewhere else. Anakin rather thought his Obi-Wan was inhumanly patient for not doing exactly that and he’d only read like a quarter of the files from his youth.
They turned a corner and finally found the doors to the outside. Beyond them in the empty field there was a distinct lack of ship, but there was a wide area cleared of the tall grass with a fire burning on some stones in the middle of it and an entire company’s worth of clones, half visible in the firelight as the dark set in. It wasn’t midday anymore; either they’d been in there for a long time or there was a time difference between universes.
“What’s up, buddy? I can feel your excitement,” said a voice from the semi-darkness as they passed the doors. Anakin jumped, but it had been directed at tiny-him, who twisted around on Grey’s shoulders.
“Look, Quin, I get tall when I grow up!” he half-shrieked, pointing at him. A shadowy figure melted out of the brush around the walls and stepped forward; Anakin assumed it was another Jedi because once again they had the fucking amazing black robe and silver armor outfit.
Seriously, why did he get stuck living in a world with such lame fashion sense? Why had his version of the Order only discovered sand colors and boring hairdos?
“Who’s this, then?”
“There was an artifact in the inner chamber that Anakin accidentally touched,” Master Billaba said. “And it seems that there was another version of the same artifact in the inner chamber of another version of this temple that another version of Anakin also accidentally touched in another universe, and the Force decided we needed to meet. This is General Skywalker, approximately ten years older than ours, and that is General Kenobi.”
The new Jedi stared hard at Obi-Wan, who barely seemed to notice.
“Yeah,” said Ghost. “Feels like it. But. Sad.”
The new Jedi turned to them, taking off their gloves and half holding out a hand. Ghost took it and they stood in silence for a moment. “Ah,” said the new Jedi, putting their gloves back on and stepping back. “Fuck me. That’s . . . unfortunate.”
“Yes,” Ghost said quietly, dreamily. “But. We can help, here. The Force is singing; can’t you hear it? It is so bright, copper-gold and deep ocean sunlight.” They paused, suddenly snapping back to alertness. “We need to recharge the artifact.”
“Oh?” said Master Billaba.
Ghost nodded sharply. “Incomplete.” They gestured at Anakin and Obi-Wan. “I’ll need a sketchbook when we settle for the night, and. Hm. Pencil should suffice. I don’t think colors are needed beyond what I can make for myself. It feels like it’ll just be a pattern for a circle or something like that, maybe a binding to ink on them for an anchor to safe travel. Something in lines, not colors.”
“I’ve got you covered,” the new Jedi said, patting them on the back. “But first you’re going to eat.”
“I’m fine.”
“If Quinlan says you can hold it off until you eat something, you’re going to eat,” Cody said. “Can they?”
“Yeah,” said Quinlan . . . wait, Quinlan Vos? Wasn’t that one of Obi-Wan’s weird friends’ names?
“Oh, fine,” Ghost said huffily. Anakin found himself smiling a little; they sounded a lot like Obi-Wan when someone called him out on missing food and sleep but telling other people to get the same. “I will eat, and then I will let the Force tell me whatever the fuck it’s insisting on, and meanwhile you will give him a hug. I don’t think he’s had one.”
“Since . . . ?”
Ghost frowned. “About the same as me, but without meeting Kote. So. No hugs, no food, no naps. Just. Always empty.”
“Shit,” Quinlan said, quiet and intense. “That’s not good.”
Both of them were watching Obi-Wan, who looked like he was paying attention but actually wasn’t. Anakin knew that expression. He just needed some time to figure out whatever was going on in his head.
He kind of wished they’d let their versions of Rex and Cody come along instead of insisting they’d be fine without them. The clones were really good at making people give them some space when they needed it. Of all the times for Obi-Wan to disappear into his head, this wasn’t the absolute worst, but it wasn’t good either. He just did that sometimes and Anakin was trash at figuring out how to help. Cody was a lot better at it; maybe this universe’s Cody could develop an Obi-Wan Intuition Skill really fast and be able to tell him what to do?
“What in the Force did you get into now?” said an unfortunately familiar voice, and Master Windu loomed up out of the dusk. In yet another iteration of the badass outfit. Anakin internally wailed in envious despair.
“Look!” said tiny-him, pointing ecstatically before standing up on Grey’s shoulders and leaping off.
Master Windu caught tiny-him in midair and . . . Anakin blanked. Held him. In his arms. Tiny-him was acting like this was expected and perhaps even owed.
“Look, ba’buir, I get to be tall,” he said. This seemed to be a major feature of life for tiny-him.
“So you do,” Master Windu said indulgently, and now he was smiling at Anakin. “It is nice to meet you, grandpadawan of mine from another world.”
“Uh,” said Anakin.
“He’s in a different lineage-clan there,” tiny-him said in a bad whisper, looping his arms around Master Windu’s neck and ruining Anakin’s entire worldview. Master Windu did not hold small squirming hugging children in his arms, but he was staring at him doing that exact same thing. “With . . . “ He flapped a hand at Obi-Wan. “I don’t know who else? He’s missing his Kote? He feels, like, shattered, almost? Something’s really, really wrong with big-me’s Ghost. Our Ghost says we need to fix the thing that brought them here so we can yoink his Kote over here and figure out how to make it better.”
Anakin had no idea what to make of any of that. Big-me’s Ghost? He knew who Ghost was in his universe? He was sure he’d never seen anyone like them before.
“It should work,” said Cody. Anakin felt like he’d missed some of the conversation while trying to figure out if he knew who Ghost was in his universe. “I’m here, and presumably he’ll be also looking for his Ghost and will touch the artifact too.”
Ghost was nodding. “He will; the Force will make sure of it. Then you can make plans and fix everything.”
“I appreciate your faith in me, little sprite, but I’m not invincible.”
“No, but you’re sensible,” they said with the air of someone winning a debate. “Unlike most people. And he’ll know what he needs to tell us to start planning to fix things. You know I’m terrible at that kind of thing.”
Master Windu snorted. “They’re not wrong.”
“Double Kote,” Ghost said, half to themself, sounding very thoughtful. “Hm. You will have to teach him the secret of the squish, I think? Maybe just give him a copy of the List.”
“He probably has his own list,” Cody said. “There will be differences, you know. I mean, obviously there already are; I can carry you, so that part of the list won’t be very useful.”
“Hm, yes. I – don’t – I would miss that. Very much.”
“Does he know me, in your world?” Master Windu asked, looking right at Anakin and motioning to Obi-Wan.
“Uh. Yes? He’s. You’re both on the Council and he works with you a lot,” he stammered, wrongfooted by the sheer cordiality of it. “I think he knew you before that too?”
“So he would not react badly to my guidance?”
“I . . . don’t think so? He doesn’t generally react badly to anything, really? I mean, it’s Obi-Wan, he’s practically the perfect Jedi.”
For some reason that made everyone look at him. “What?”
“Fucking weird,” said Ghost under their breath with intense irritation. Probably-Quinlan-Vos was trying not to laugh. “And now I’m feeling grateful to Xanatos. Atrocious. I’m out.” Ghost did the same thing as tiny-him had, standing up on Kote’s shoulders, and then leapt off and . . .
Anakin’s mouth dropped open. They were floating, suspended as if in space, curled up in a cranky little ball about eight feet over Cody’s head.
“Yeah, you need to eat,” said Probably-Quinlan-Vos.
Master Windu went over to Master Billaba and transferred tiny-him into her arms. He molded himself easily to her side and put his head down on her pauldron, looking content and rather tired. She rubbed the underside of her chin over his head and made a weird-ass purring noise very similar to the ones Cody had made earlier.
Everyone in this universe seemed way more tactile than his. It was a little unnerving, but he kind of liked it too. The Jedi here felt much less isolated, and even the Force was a little clearer.
Master Windu went up to Obi-Wan and just stood there for a moment before taking him by the elbow in a loose hold. Obi-Wan didn’t react, but followed at a very gentle tug. Master Windu turned him towards the fire and began to walk, slow and careful.
“Sensory overload?” Probably-Quinlan-Vos murmured to Cody, who nodded. They began to follow Master Windu; Ghost moved with Cody like they were attached somehow.
“At least, as far as I can tell. They’re both nulls so it’s hard to read them and their tells have diverged pretty far, but all of you generally have the same look when everything gets to be too much,” he said, looking up at Ghost floating over his head. “At least that Ghost can’t float, apparently?”
“Hey,” Ghost huffed.
“Hold my hand,” Cody said, reaching up. “Ghost. Hand. Now.” That weird not-really-Force-suggestion feeling curled around the edges of his last word.
Ghost sulked downwards until they could reach Cody’s hand, but they clung to it when they had it.
An arm slung itself over his shoulders. Anakin shied away, but it was warm and solid.
“C’mon, bigger version of my little buddy,” said Probably-Quinlan-Vos. “Let’s get you something to eat and somewhere comfortable to sit down. Multiversal travel’s got to be tiring. I’m Quinlan, but you probably already knew that.”
“I kind of know who you are but not really,” Anakin mumbled, trying not to lean in too obviously. When was the last time someone had held him? Padmé did sometimes, but she didn’t really like to cuddle that much because people were always touching her all day. The Jedi in his world would rather cut their arms off than be snuggly, even with each other much less him. The clones . . . were friendly enough, but always a little stiff when they remembered he outranked them, which sucked. “You’re Obi-Wan’s friend.”
“Yeah, we grew up together,” Confirmed-Quinlan-Vos said. “And now I’m your friend too, both you and your anklebiter counterpart. He’s a good kid.”
“Long hair,” Anakin said. Was Quinlan’s arm tightening? It felt nice.
“He likes how it feels when people braid it for him. We think it’s a maan’mando’ade quirk; all the clones have a thing about it too. I take it you don’t care so much about that?”
“My version of Jedi don’t . . . emotion,” he tried to explain. “There is no emotion, there is peace. Uh. No . . . this. Hugs and touching and stuff. Honestly it’s fucking awful. I want to move here and I’ve only been here like an hour and most of that’s been inside a moldy ruin.”
“Okay,” said Quinlan. “We’re going to come back to that later, when you’re rested and more ready to talk about it without me feeling like I’m taking advantage of you. For now, how about we just sit here and have something to eat, and if you’re tired you can take a nap? Your, uh, Obi-Wan’s right over there with Mace, see, and he’ll be fine. Mace’s a useless turnip when people are emotional, but he’s really good at bringing people back gently from the quiet places in their heads.”
“Oh, yeah,” Anakin said fuzzily, slumping to the ground beside Quinlan and leaning on him. He’d kept his arm around his shoulders, so it was free real estate. And he was incredibly warm. “Master Windu likes him just fine 'cause he’s, you know, all proper and follows the rules and stuff and isn’t a giant loser like me. I’m pretty sure he hates me. I don’t understand how tiny-me can be so comfortable with him.”
“With Mace?”
“Windu fucking hates me,” he mumbled into Quinlan’s shoulder. “Always disappointed. Thankfully he’s never taken it out on Obi-Wan but I know he makes him feel like he didn’t do a good job raising me and I hate that. I hate how everyone is so aloof. I hate . . . so much. Everything. Fuck. I didn’t even realize how much I hate everything until I got here and the Force isn’t so full of pain that it drowns mine out. I don’t wanna hate everything. I don’t know how to stop.”
“Shh,” Quinlan murmured, making the rumbling noise and gently wiping at his face with a tissue for some reason. Oh. He was crying.
“How the fuck are you purring,” Anakin slurred. He felt Quinlan laugh.
“I take it from your lack of scent that you’re dynamic-null, which is fine, just a bit odd from my perspective; I’m an alpha, and I’m an adult, so I can croon and purr and it’s an instinctive comfort response.”
“Weird,” Anakin said, and then felt that was rude. “But nice! Don’t stop.”
“I’ve got you, buddy,” said Quinlan, and he was lying down, his head on something warm and soft and something heavy draped over him. The thing under his head was moving slightly; breathing? When had they laid down? “Close your eyes, Anakin. You’re safe here. We’ve got you.”