Leaving was probably the part we all had looked forward to the least at the end of everything. It wasn't even having to pick everything up and head out so much as it was getting that little taste of freedom in being away from Coruscant and out from under Fox's thumb.

Well, that and we enjoyed being with Talen. By that point, we had practically adopted him, and considering that missions like these were usually the only places we got to see him, the part where the mission ended and we had to go back to picking up our drunk brothers from 79's after they suplexed the local security guards was... well.

Not to mention some of us had newly adopted families we were starting to get used to.

That... also tended to throw a bit of a wrench into everything.

I decide to say goodbye to Talen first considering that he and Jent Squad had to leave first thing that morning. When I walked up to him, I found him chatting with Venn, who stood flanked by his droids. The Major actually seemed satisfied for once, and that surprised me.

Venn was never the type to seem pleased about anything. He was always a stoic sort of man, but as we loaded up the last few canisters of Isotope-5, he actually seemed happy. Or at least pleased, if nothing else. He was standing by and talking to Talen when I walked up, "I owe you a great debt, Master Jedi," he had nodded and glanced at me, "and to your Clones."

"Jedi don't keep score, Major," Talen had smiled at him and bowed as Venn made his exit. He turned his attention to me and smiled again, blue eyes sparkling and looking beyond pleased. "Despite the hiccups, I'd say that went well..." He paused as he looked at me before he gave a knowing smile my way, "and I'd say your night went well."

"Kid, someday that power of yours is going to get you into trouble," I had frowned as Talen laughed at me and turned his head to watch the transports load up. "Everything going alright?"

"We're loading up and heading back to Coruscant as soon as we say our farewells," he replied as he began making his way down the landing pad with me in tow. "It's been good getting to work together again, Captain," he looked over his shoulder at me, "and I got word from Commander Fox that should any of the Isotope pop up anywhere else, the Eighty-Second and I have permission to take your squad with us."

Occasionally, Fox could make decent decisions. Occasionally. "Wouldn't want to work with any other Jedi," I smirked at him and Talen grinned back at me over his shoulder.

Trill and Cobalt were waiting at the entrance of their shuttle and snapped to attention as Talen approached, "Sir, Jent Squad has boarded and is ready to return to Coruscant on your orders."

"Thank you, Captain." Talen turned back to me and nodded, "Then we should be going..." His smile fell slowly as he clasped his hands behind his back. "I... I get the feeling we won't be seeing one another again for a while, so..."

I snapped to attention and smiled, "It's been my pleasure serving with you, sir."

Talen seemed surprised more than anything, and he debated on whether the salute was going to be enough it seemed before the smile returned to his face and he gave me one last hug, "I'll see you on the other side, Kando."

Watching that kid turn back to his squad and jump up into the transport hurt more than I'd like to admit, but I knew that we both had a job to do. His was to serve the Republic in a way that was different from mine. We were fighting the same war on different fronts, and I hoped against hope that someday those paths would bring us back together again when things were calmer. He was family, too.

I waited until their transport took off before I returned to my squad and found them waiting to board when I arrived. "All of our gear is loaded and we're clear to head out, sir," Tor nodded as I approached and Red turned to me with Grek. I looked and saw the Beroyas and some of the ordos coming to bid farewell as we picked up our packs.

Ros came forward first and pulled Red and Grek into a hug, "K'oyacyi, boys. Give those Seppies our regards."

Kote smiled over at me, "Hope we get to crack some heads again soon, vod. You can hunt with me anytime."

"Thanks, Kote," I smiled and shook his outstretched hand as Tor and Kade exchanged a friendly half-hug.

Wylan and I stood face-to-face next and all I could do was give him a smile, "Thank you, buir, for everything."

When I called him father, his face filtered just a bit and he looked away for a moment, "I silly did what any good father would do. Nothing more."

"It's more than I've ever had before."

Something about that made him go to speak, but I saw something like conflict in his eyes, and whatever speech he was going to go on stopped as he put a hand on his hip, "Well... the beskar'gam will be waiting for you at home..." Home. I liked the sound of that. Wylan nodded and frowned as he looked at me. He seemed conflicted before he seemed to throw caution to the wind and pulled me into an embrace. "Ret'urcye mhi, ner ad. K'oyacyi."

Like I mentioned before, I didn't do hugs with the sole exception being Talen. Something about this felt right, though. I embraced him in return, and the two of us didn't part for a long time. I think Wylan knew that when he let go, that was the end of it. I was going to be marching off again on another battle on another planet several parsecs away. I didn't want to leave, either. I knew that on the other side of the Clone Wars that there was a little farm on Concordia waiting for me. It gave me something new to fight for.

When we finally parted, Wylan gave a nod, his face set and neutral. I don't think either of us needed to say anything else, so we settled for quiet nods as I turned to my squad and gestured for them to load up.

Seku caught me by the arm as I did, and we stood there for an unspeaking second before she stepped up and kissed me. In front of everyone. It took me months to hear the end of that, but everyone kept it amongst themselves, thank the stars.

"Holo me once in a while," she chuckled as she looked up into my face, "and try to stay safe."

I threw caution to the wind and kissed her forehead before I spoke, "Of course, and I'll try."

"Kando Ordo," she put one hand on my cheek with a sad smile, "you are sweet, and you are an awful liar."

I smiled at her before I put my helmet on and stepped up into the transport. My eyes never left her as the transport door closed for good. We were going home.

*

Passing time on the journey back to Coruscant was almost agonizing. Everyone had gone quiet as we removed our helmets and took seats on the hard benches. Red had drawn into himself and was tracing the lines of his paint job with the very tip of his index finger so lost in thought that I knew it was going to take a miracle to get him back again. Grek had leaned back and looked ready to take a nap, stretching his legs out so that they were almost touching the opposing seat. Tor had also withdrawn in on himself and was going over the mission debrief again and again, eyes skimming over the same line two or three times before moving onto the next.

I wasn't making much conversation either. Didn't much feel like it. Everything that had happened on Concordia had given me a lot to think about, and for the first real time in my life I had a future on the other side of the war and suddenly all of that talk in the senate really started to scare me.

Tor finally stood up, "I'm going to the medbay to get some more treatment for the shoulder."

Almost as soon as he was gone, Red stopped tracing his patterns and looked at me, "Wylan said he had talked to you. About our plan."

"Yeah," I replied and watched Grek pull his legs back in and lean forward. "Why won't you talk around Tor?"

"Because he'd rat us out" Grek snarled.

"I love Tor," Red nodded, "but he'd turn us in in a heartbeat if he felt we were betraying the Republic."

As much as I hated to agree and keep Tor in the dark, they were right. Tor could let a lot of things slide, but that was one thing we all collectively seemed to agree would never be allowed to happen. It was bad enough that he was suspicious of them leaving after the war was over, but he had an inkling that they were planning to skip town and go with the Beroyas anyway.

"What's your plan?"

"You know how we occasionally get scouting ops in the lower sectors, right?" Red asked. "If Talen can't get us out on an off-planet op, we "fall" off the edge and eat it that way."

"It's so far down that they won't even bother with body recovery," Grek nodded with a cocky grin on his face.

I had to admit, it wasn't the most inspired plan, but it definitely served the purpose.

"Talen's in on this?"

"Yeah, he's going to try and set up the op for us."

The kid never ceased to impress me.

"How long do we have?"

"Not long. Talen said he's trying for within the next two weeks. How fast do you think we could see Sana Bre?"

I shook my head. Depending on how hard Fox went on us when we got back, that could be a day or a solid week before we had any time to spare and sneak out for a bit to see those Kaminoans. Just getting to phase two of this plan alone was going to be a trip and a half. "We'll have to see what Commander Fox does with us when we get back."

Red moved to say something else, but Tor reemerged from the room looking like he'd lost a fight with a rancor. He glanced between us as we all looked up at him, and Red instead turned his full attention to him instead, "How are you, Tor? Arm alright?"

"I've been better, but I've also been worse," Tor sat down and crossed his arms over his chest before he shut his eyes. He was going to try to sleep, so all of us decided to do the same. It would be the easiest thing to do on the way back home.

If I could even call Coruscant home at that point.

*

We had all crowded around the bar at 79's the night we returned and tried not to be conspicuous. We were all done up in the standard uniforms instead of our armor, and we just sat there staring into our cups. No one really drank anything. Even the bartender was starting to look concerned, and usually drunken Clones were the ones getting looks.

"You boys alright?" He asked and looked at us like we were growing second heads or something.

"Yeah. We're good. Just... Long mission, that's all," I replied. It seemed to satisfy him enough as he turned away to focus on other, more raucous brothers beside us who had blissfully left us alone for most of the time we were there.

"I miss the kid already," Red finally spoke after an hour of us just... staring.

"Yeah..." Even Grek was crestfallen.

I didn't want to admit it but knowing we likely wouldn't see Talen again for a long time even had me down in the dumps. The kid had grown on us like some tumor, and frankly, he was just as much part of our family as my brothers. I may not have had faith in the Jedi, but I had faith in him. Seeing the young man he was becoming was doing something to me. I was proud of him, I think, looking back on it. At that moment, I didn't exactly have a word for it.

"Miss the Beroyas, too," Red added after a beat. "Think we'll see them again?"

"With luck," I replied as I thought back to Wylan.

We were all finally starting to have families. Real ones. It was surreal.

I glanced over at Tor and saw him frowning into his cup. Talen, he could agree on missing. The Mandos were a sore spot. Recognizing a fight, I decided to change the subject, "Any news from Talen since we got back?"

"Just that he landed. Jent Squad wants to meet up for drinks before they ship out soon. Rumor has it the Eighty-Second is heading to Mandalore to help with the Siege," Tor chimed in finally. "No word on whether Talen is going with them or not."

"Who else is going?" Grek asked with news of the combat off-world grabbing his full attention.

"The Five-Oh-First is apparently going. Heard there's a new Legion, too."

"A new one? Poor bastards..."

We were getting over it. We always did.

Soon, drinks were flowing and talk about the war was getting everyone's mind off of Concordia. Funny how talking about something so dire seemed to lift everyone's spirits, but when it's about the only life you know, you don't have much else that's easy to relate to. You could hear it in all of us that we almost wanted to be out in the thick of it. It was what made the time on Concordia, on Ryloth, and Zeffo so exhilarating. We were taking the fight out there. Our job was vital, of course, but we were made to fight. Taking out gangs and guarding senators wasn't exactly exciting work most of the time. You can only fight one too many gangsters before it gets old real quick.

For those few hours in that bar, we felt like the old Breaker Squad again. There was no tension, no secrets, it was just us sitting and talking and being brothers again like we were before all of the craziness happened. It felt... It felt nice. Tor and Grek were actually joking and laughing while Red told some absolutely insane joke that took way too long and made him double over laughing before he could drop the punchline. They even managed to convince Tor to tell a story, and before long he had a small crowd of Clones at the bar roaring with laughter when he told the story about Grek and the loth cat in his backpack. I even got convinced to tell the story about how Wylan and I fought a Mandalorian duel and briefly became the most popular man in the bar.

I might have exaggerated some of the details a bit.

Just a bit.

By the end of the night, we were all blissfully tipsy and heading for the cab with thoughts of the mission marching somewhere far away.

*

We returned late and only found the nightshift boys awake. They let us pass without much questioning besides asking after us. We managed to meander our way back into the room despite Grek nearly falling over and crushing Tor once or twice.

I took a look around our room and sighed. Over the years, the boys had taken time to customize it to their liking. Each member had their own little piece of the room tailored to their style.

Grek had his pinups, as he did, littering the section of wall that belonged to him with every manner of alien female that he had ever come across - and one of a Naboo handmaiden he never specified where he got.

Red had taken time to paint swirling designs across his wall and even some of the floor, and I recognized the designs of Kothe and Orar's rivers and fish blended into the art of our Gundark mascot and one of a rather artistically done Jedi Order symbol.

Tor's was always the funniest to me. He had propaganda posters of the Jedi put up all over his wall. He claimed it gave him inspiration, but I had come to realize that he secretly was a massive fan of the Jedi, just still one of those tiny Clone cadets of Kamino who used to crowd around Ninety-Nine's knee and listen to the stories he would tell us with wide eyes.

I kept my side blank. I never felt the need to put anything up before, so I never did. That night though, after the boys had turned in, I stood up and plucked up some of Red's paints and got to work. It didn't take much to integrate the Clan Ordo sigil and the one for the Coruscant Guard into one another, but I managed. I was a Mandalorian, but I was also a Clone.

I'm still not sure which part of me is stronger. I don't think I'll ever know.