We reached the outside of the tunnel with Tor slung over Grek's shoulder when we saw Wylan storm up to Tarrec, "I call the Code!" He shouted the words, and I swear that every single Mandalorian froze. Helmets turned back and forth from Tarrec to Wylan and then back again over and over.

"Wylan, ner vod-" Tarrec tried to calm him down, but Wylan drew his rifle and aimed the thing directly at Tarrec's chest.

"Draw," Wylan snarled out the words as several other Mandos drew blasters, but to my surprise, others drew to counter them.

"You know the Code," One of the older Mandos had a rotary gun pointed at the group of Tarrec's cronies. They seemed to think twice and stepped back before the Mando turned to Wylan, "On what grounds, Jai'galaar? This is a serious calling."

"He shot my son and his brothers without provocation. I demand payment," Wylan snarled through his helmet as Ros and the Beroyas moved in beside us, pulling Tor down off of Grek's shoulder and hurrying him away as Ros made for Wylan.

Tarrec snorted, "Why should I even think of drawing a gun over the life of one Kaminii?"

"Because it is our way," the older Mando spoke and turned to Tarrec for the first time. "We honor our codes, Tarrec."

"Even you, ba'vodu?" Tarrec had turned to stare at me with a look that made my veins ice over, "When Tal'buir died, where was Wylan? He was off playing beroya with that renegade Ros and his clan of castaways and Jango's test-tube babies! Now he has the gall to come here with another one and act like it has any right to be one of us!"

Wylan turned to look at the older Mando and shook his head, "Stay out of this, Jorun."

"You attacked the son of your brother," Jorun stepped in and looked between the two of them. "While I don't agree with you bringing a Kaminii into our Clan, our Way is final. These are grounds for a duel."

"I want a second," Tarrec snarled as he gestured to a tall woman beside him, who stepped in and nodded. "Kasta will be my second. Pick yours, Wylan."

"Nothing personal, Wylan," Kasta muttered as she seemed to reluctantly draw her weapon.

Wylan glanced behind him and Ros stepped forward, "Get back, Ros. This is Ordo business."

I knew I could be walking into a serious fight, and my arm wasn't even doing that great. But I was not going to let Wylan fight this alone. I pushed past Kote and Kade, who had placed themselves and their own rotary guns between us and the Ordos, and I made my way up beside Wylan. He glanced at me as I unholstered my blasters and squared my shoulders. I had jaig eyes, after all. As far as these Mandos were concerned, I wasn't afraid of anything. Frankly, seeing Tarrec bite the dust for even thinking about hurting my brothers was still being too kind. The chakarr deserved to get everything Wylan and I had coming to him. Death was going to be way too fast for me.

"Shoot me, I can let it slide. Shoot my brothers, and we have a real problem, Tarrec."

Tarrec didn't say another word before he snapped out his vibroknife and went after Wylan. I would have been just fine watching them considering how impressive it was to see them matching blow for blow, but Kasta quickly reminded me that I had to focus when she sprinted forward and swung her leg up in a kick directly to my skull. How I managed to stay on my feet was beyond me, but I barely got my own knife out before she was back on me with her own ready to go. This wasn't just a brawl - this was a legitimate fight to the death.

I couldn't keep track of Wylan and Tarrec, but Kasta was impressive. The sheer physicality this woman was able to pull off alone was something to admire, and I was half hoping that Wylan would finish Tarrec off so we wouldn't have to keep fighting each other. I heard Tarrec hit the ground beside me before I saw Wylan go flying over him and hit the ground with a grunt just before Kasta managed to kick my legs out from under me after I had dropped her with a solid punch to the helmet. When I rolled my head to the side in an attempt to get a better angle on where I could go, I caught sight of Tarrec giving a quick motion to another Mando as Wylan tried to stand up.

The chakarr planned to cheat, but the motion was so quick that I didn't even notice, "Wylan! On your six!"

The Mando that had been closing in from my back left hit the ground as the shot died away and when I looked around to see who had done it, I saw a very surprised Red and a grinning Grek, both watching Tor, who had his sniper up on his wounded shoulder and was peering over its scope from across the way.

All eyes had gone to Tarrec who found himself backing into groups of Mandos that weren't happy if we were judging from body language alone. One woman shoved him forward back towards Wylan. "Get back in there, Tarrec, and reap what you've sown," she snarled as other Mandos began pushing him back into the half-circle.

He knew that if he took a pot shot at any of us, he was doomed. He did what any coward would. He snapped his blaster up and took three shots off to his left. It took me a moment to register what he was aiming at, but when I saw Talen snap a hand up and stop one of the three and batted the second away with his lightsaber, but it was the third shot that hit him directly in his stomach and made him drop like a brick.

I don't think I've ever recovered so fast in my life. To this day, I don't think I've ever recovered so quickly from being knocked half-unconscious as when my blurred vision saw that kid drop. I kicked out and heard Kasta's knee snap before I kicked her leg out from under her. When I was back on my feet, I unloaded one whole blaster cycle into her exposed side before I turned on Tarrec. I shot out Tarrec's wrist launcher when he went to guard and when my blaster's overheated, I grabbed Talon's beskad from its holder on my thigh and snapped it out. I wasn't aware swords could cut blasters in half.

The only thing that stopped me from decapitating him was Wylan, who caught my wrist when I shoulder slammed Tarrec straight to the ground, "Ad, go check the kid." Something about hearing him speak broke me from whatever haze had fallen over me and I turned to see Talen being treated by Vex.

I ran over to him and was down on the ground next to him faster than I had anticipated. He looked over at me and smiled despite the obvious wince when Vex applied that bacta pack, "Missed one."

"That... the way you stopped that one without..."

"Didn't help much. I should be okay."

"I should have seen him, Talen, I'm..."

"He caught even me off guard. You did perfectly," Talen's eyes went to Wylan and he frowned, "but now Wylan needs your help. Vex and Jent Squad have me under control." Vex looked up at me and nodded as I stood back up and found myself back beside Wylan, staring down an absolutely terrified Tarrec.

It never ceases to make me smile when you finally catch a rat without any way out. Wylan was glaring at him. He had taken his helmet off and passed it to Jorun, who watched me approach. "Shooting kids is a pathetic move."

"He's a Jedi," Tarrec snarled out through gritted teeth. "He's no innocent."

"Still pathetic," he held out his hand and I passed him my rifle. He looked at it for a second before he passed it back with a shake of his head, seeming to change his mind. He walked towards Tarrec and seemed like he made to pass him as he patted his shoulder.

For a second, Tarrec's eyes seemed relieved - that was until Wylan wrapped an arm around his neck. He looked around desperately for someone to help him as Wylan grabbed ahold of his chin with his other hand. Not a single soul moved to help him.

"You will die unmourned, unspoken, and forgotten," Wylan had him by the throat, and Tarrec grabbed desperately at his wrist. "You will have no name spoken at sunrise. No children will ever know you as anything more than an aruetii, chakarr, and a dar'manda. That much I can promise you as the new Ordo'alor."

He snapped his brother's neck in one quick motion and let his bloodied body fall to the ground at his feet as the other Mandalorians watched on in silence. Wylan turned to one of them, the woman from before, and gestured to Tarrec's corpse, "Grab his beskar and give it to the forgemaster. Melt it down for a new set to forge for my ad. Anything left goes to the foundlings."

"On your orders, alor."

They all began to crowd around him, patting his shoulders and back affectionately and congratulating him on the accomplishment as the woman from earlier and several other knelt down and began stripping Tarrec's body of his beskar'gam. I moved back to where the Beroyas were gathered and sat back down on a rock as Wylan began issuing orders like he owned the place, telling them to reinforce Ros' positions and to give us whatever aid we needed to keep helping push out the remains of the dar'manda so we could retrieve what was left of the Isotope-5.

Meanwhile, Tor came over to me. He was banged up and had a blaster hole through his shoulder, but otherwise, he seemed perfectly fine. He sat down beside me and smiled, "Are you alright?" All I did was smile back. He seemed satisfied and rested back on the rock with a sigh, "When I saw that third guy coming at you, I knew I had to help. Sorry."

"Sorry? You probably saved my life."

Tor just gave me a half-smile and shrugged, "Technically wasn't supposed to get involved."

I clapped him gently on the back and laughed, "Just... Don't get shot next time, yeah." I looked over my shoulder and saw Cobalt helping Talen to his feet with a wave of relief. The kid was okay. Seku had gone over and was doting over him, and I could see Talen keeping level face to assure her that he was okay. Likely sore, but okay.

When she had finished with him, she came over to me. Tor took a hint and hastily made his exit, for once being surprisingly tactful. She had sat down beside me and reached up to push back some of my hair from my face with a smile. She didn't say anything. All she did was begin pulling bits of rubble from the joints of my armor, her fingers lingering just a moment over the burned hole that just barely stopped Tarrec's shot. One of her lekku twitched as she looked at it, so I let the fingers of my right hand brush over hers and saw the lekku curl in response.

I was still learning how to read that unspoken language, but judging from her face, she appreciated the gesture.

"You had me worried," she spoke quietly so that only we could hear one another, "but I knew you'd be alright."

"Luckily one of us thought so," I chuckled and she looked at me with another soft smile. "You came."

"We're here to help Major Venn move the fuel, but..." her fingers never strayed far from mine, "I will admit that my intentions were a little more selfish."

"Hate to break this up," we looked up to see Wylan standing over us, his shoulder cape still thrown back over his shoulder and his helmet still off with Jorun, "but I need you with me for a bit, ad. Mind if I borrow your cyare, Seku?" I felt my ears get a bit hot at the mention of the word cyare, but Seku didn't even seem fazed by it. She gave the corner of my mouth a quick kiss and gestured up to Wylan, who just gave me a knowing smile as he gestured for me to follow him.

"What's going on?" I asked him as he led me back to a now smaller group of assembled Mandalorians. The ones there were all veterans with dented, battered armor and a way that they stood that was all too familiar to me.

"The Forgemaster needs to get a good look at you. Size you for your beskar'gam," Wylan nodded to one old Mando who turned with two or three others in tow. The craftsmanship of his beskar'gam was something out of a dream. It was nearly perfect. Now, I respect the talent that went into designing our armor as Clones and how they drew from the Mandalorian beskar'gam anyway thanks to Jango, but this...

The metal was as smooth as glass and was polished to a near perfect shine. He had sigils on both shoulders belonging to a Clan I didn't recognize offhand, and his helmet design was one of the most intricate I had ever seen. "This is your ad?" He asked in a voice that betrayed his age. "He stands well, broad at the shoulders... matches your height. He looks like Talon, but also like Jango. He stands taller than him by..." he looked me up and down quickly before he nodded, "almost thirteen centimeters. Yes, the hut'uun's beskar will be enough to make a fine set of armor. My apprentices and I will get to work on it at once alor."

"I can't ask the goran for a full set by the time you leave," Wylan turned to me, "but I can get you a signet made - the aliik of Clan Ordo, to mark you as my son and as one of us. I'll have it for you by tonight. Give me your pauldron."

He held out his hand as I unclasped the plasteel from my shoulder and handed it to him before he passed it to the forgemaster. The old Mando turned it in his hands and nodded before he passed it to one of his apprentices. "You'll have your aliik by sundown, Ordo'ad. Welcome to the Clan."

*

My tent was vacant that evening. Red and Grek took watch and Tor was sitting in the makeshift medical center with Talen. When Wylan finally entered, I was almost surprised to see him as I was sitting there with my torso armor off and thinking about things, and he motioned for me to stand and held out the pauldron of my armor. Pushed into it was the aliik, and I was almost surprised by how beautifully it shined. The metal had been tinted to match the red stripe that went down my pauldron, and I smiled up at Wylan.

"We need to chat, ad," he gestured to my cot and we both took a seat on it. He pulled off his helmet and set it on my weapons locker before he rested his elbows on his thighs and leaned forward. "Ros meant to talk to you before we went off, but Tarrec's little appearance threw us off on our time. It's about your brothers joining Clan Beroya."

I had a feeling it was something we would need to talk about eventually, but I never really wanted to go into it. "What about it? Is there some plan?"

"In short, yes," Wylan nodded. "We have contacts within the Kaminoans. I'm sure you know about the few that stay on Coruscant to provide care for your vode, right? They're headed by a Kaminii named Sana Bre, sister of the one that ran your particular program. She is our go-to for getting any tracking removed so our boys can live out normal lives away from the Republic. You're going to need to get them in to see her and then get back to us as soon as possible."

"Wait..." I turned to face him completely, "Are they leaving? For good?"

Wylan hesitated a moment and then nodded, "Ros asked them earlier. They were going to wait until he talked to you to bring it up. Once their tracking components are removed, they have to be immediately taken out of service or it gets shown that they're gone. You know what happens then."

"Defective" brothers got sent back to Kamino.

They never came back.

Wylan continued when I fixated on the far wall of my tent with my jaw set, "You need to make them disappear on a mission. When they "die", Ros will be there to pick them up and bring them home. Ideally, I want you to go with them."

That made me stop. I looked back at Wylan with my surprise written cleanly across my face. "Me?"

"You're my son, Kando. I want you to be living the life you've earned with that pretty twi'lek cyare of yours. Not... Not slaving away for a senate that would rather throw you into an incinerator than see you walk free!" There was a hard edge in Wylan's voice when he spoke, a certain venom when he mentioned the Senate and my job, that was impossible to miss. "I won't lose you to those vultures the way I lost my father, and I'll shoot every bastard in that senate if I have to in order to see you walk."

My eyes went back to the aliik. I didn't recognize what the symbol for Clan Ordo was, but the fact it was my symbol now too was finally starting to hit home. I lingered on the thought of being able to have a home to have a real family with none of the sneaking around and averted eyes that I had to deal with then. I could have had it all if I walked that path.

But then I remembered Tor. If I left, he was going to be all alone, and then where would I be?

"I can't leave Tor, and Tor will never leave the GAR until he gets a discharge or they stab him in the back," I looked up from the aliik and back to Wylan with a shake of my head. "I go where all of my brothers go. Not just some."

I watched Wylan's face, and through the disappointment came a look of respect as he nodded and looked away from me. "Alright. I can respect that, even if I don't like it." He reached out and patted my shoulder before he stood up and grabbed his helmet, "Just... be sure it gets talked about, yeah? And be sure to think about it yourself."

I nodded as he put his helmet on and left the tent, leaving me on my own in the silence. I had a lot to think about. On the one hand, I had a duty to the Republic, and that duty was to fight in this war until either it ended or I died. That was just the way things would be. On the other, I had a chance to have everything I had ever secretly wanted in the long nights on Coruscant. A home, a family, a legacy - all at the expense of one of my brothers.

I could make a lot of hard bargains, but I couldn't make that one.

I looked up when I heard someone else come into my tent and saw Seku again. She smiled and sat down beside me, taking up the space that Wylan had vacated smelling of the sweet uj'ayl that had been permeating the camp all night, "Been cooking?"

"Only because the cakes smell so nice. That big woman that's always with Wylan told me that if I ate that many, I had to help make them. After I took some to him, Talen asked me to come and check on you," she looked over at me as she spoke.

"How is he?"

"Sore, but managing. His primary concern is, as always, not himself." Seku pulled her knees up to her chest and rested her cheek on them, "He's like the Jedi in all of our storybooks and in the tales they used to tell around the campfire." I remembered stories about Jedi we got told as little kids by some of the older defective Clones who worked around Kamino. They were always heroic tales of these great warriors who roamed the galaxy defeating evil everywhere they went. All of us secretly hoped we were Jedi at one point. "Still, how are you?"

"Been worse."

"Fair enough," as she raised her head, I saw the thin scar around her neck from her shock collar for the first time, and when I looked at her wrists, ill-healed pale scars caught my attention. She lowered her legs from the bed and watched me like she expected me to say something. Don't know why she thought that scars here and there would bother me of all people.

"Think if I take Wylan up on his offer we could hunt down whoever did this?" I asked as my fingers traced the line across the side of her neck. "I'd let you shoot them."

"Is this how Clones are romantic?" She laughed and leaned into my hand.

"Depends. Is it working?"

"We'll have to see."