Commander Sato was reading a report when Rex walked into the command center of the cruiser. "You wanted to see me?"

"Yes, Commander, if you have a moment," Sato affirmed, setting the datapad on the counter. "I was just wondering how much time you and Agent Skywalker have had together since you've returned."

"Not much, he's been running around grabbing intel and I've been with the Ghost crew," he explained. It was still really weird to refer to Skywalker as an agent rather than a general. Rex had the feeling he wasn't going to remember it often.

Sato pointed out a slot on the screen next to him, which showed the docking schedules for the day. "He's been assigned a mission to extract information, and he's supposed to leave in a few minutes. I don't think he'd mind a bit of company if you'd like to join him."

Rex nodded folding his hands behind his back. "I'll go ask, then. Thank you."

"You're quite welcome," Sato replied. "Do try to reel him in a bit, if you can."

He was tempted to laugh. "I wouldn't get your hopes up, sir," he admitted before walking out the door again. Reel in Skywalker? Fat chance, the only person who could accomplish such a thing was Kenobi, and Rex hadn't seen him yet.

It was true, there had been no time to catch up since Rex had joined the rebel fleet. It wasn't anyone's fault, but getting to spend time with a familiar face would be nice. Probably bittersweet as well, but it was going to happen sooner or later, right?

When Rex got to the hangar Skywalker kept his ship in, he was tuning up the engine with R2-D2. Most people wouldn't have been able to hear someone approach with the racket they were making, but Skywalker sensed Rex getting closer and paused his work, looking up. "Hey, Rex."

Rex smiled, and even laughed a little when Artoo also offered a greeting. "Commander Sato suggested you could use some company on your next mission. Is there room for one more?"

"Hey, there's always room for you, Commander," Anakin assured him, pointing up the ramp to the interior of the ship. "I'll be up in just a second, as soon as I finish this. Make yourself at home."

"Thanks, General," he told him, fully aware of the rank he decided to use. As long as no one else was around to contradict him, might as well call him 'general' for old times' sake. Rex climbed the ramp and took the opportunity to have a look around.

It was a worn ship, but well-used and well-loved. The entire thing had been renovated at one point or another, but the paint job did a good job of making it seem natural. Rex suspected Skywalker had been the one to make the modifications himself, probably as a hobby or something. It wasn't quite as cozy as the quarters on the Ghost, not in the sense that this was anybody's home, but it wasn't as harsh as a Star Destroyer either. This was a work ship, but it was Skywalker's work ship.

There were even a few signs of nostalgia when Rex took a closer look. A blue stripe had been painted on the walls in the exact same shade the 501st ships used to be tagged with. Small tinkering projects were lying around on counters, as well as random parts that probably went to something but Rex had no idea what. As he walked from the cabins to the main turret, he saw that someone had carved their name into the side of the seat: 'LEIA'. Not only that, but when he found the secondary gunner position, 'LUKE' had done the same. He didn't know who Luke and Leia were, but it was clear they visited often enough to call dibs on gunner seats.

Rex heard Artoo beeping and assumed he and Skywalker were done with the tune-up. He found his way to the cockpit and saw that Skywalker had already settled into the pilot's seat. "Not bad," he praised, settling into the co-pilot chair. "You've done some work on her."

"Oh, you have no idea," Anakin told him. "This ship was a piece of scrap when I first got my hands on it. The engine didn't work, hyperdrive was totally outdated, dents everywhere. It probably wouldn't have gotten off the ground if I hadn't replaced everything."

"How long were you working on it?"

"Most of the repairs took the better part of...five years?" he guessed, thinking back on it. "I had to take my time since I was in hiding. Worked on it for a while, maintained it, then repainted it right before I joined the Rebellion," he explained, firing up the engines. "Works fine, now. Hasn't failed me yet."

While Anakin completed the takeoff sequence, Rex sat back and watched. There wasn't anything for him to do, but there was no harm in observing the process. Every ship was a little different, even if most of them had the same basic ideas. The takeoff was really smooth and quiet, which Rex was sure was in no small part to Skywalker.

In less than a minute, he had them out of the cruiser hangar and they made the jump to hyperspace. That was told Rex how much work Skywalker had done on the ship: a piece of scrap would have lurched much more than this one did.

Once the sequence was complete, he shut off the main engines and sat back in his seat. "If we had tried that in the beginning, the ship probably would have blown up."

"Eh, wouldn't be the first time," Rex joked, and the two of them laughed at a few choice memories. Once upon a time, some of their ships had habits of exploding. It was also the first time Rex had laughed in a while.

Internally, Anakin was itching for a chance to talk to Rex, really talk to him. They hadn't seen each other in fifteen years, and not everything could be the same after all this time. He didn't know how much Rex wanted to remember, though, so he couldn't just ask how the past decade and a half had been.

So he started with something more shallow: "You're a lot younger than I expected you to look."

Obviously, this wasn't a normal sentence to start out with, but for a clone it was appropriate. Rex grinned. "Yeah, ya think? Kix says I should be about thirty-seven by now. Physically, anyway."

"How?" he asked, leaning forward on his knees. "I would have thought you would be at least sixty by now."

"It was Kix who figured it out, actually," Rex admitted, rubbing his temple where a faint scar still remained. "It took him a year of research to figure it out, but he managed to reverse-engineer the accelerated growth. I've been aging normally for the past fourteen years."

"That's insane..." he murmured, spacing off a little bit. "I can't imagine how complex that had to have been."

Shrugging, Rex laughed. "That's why he's the medic. I can't even try to pretend I understand it."

Anakin paused for a moment, before backtracking in the conversation. "You said Kix did it?"

"Yeah, he joined up with us a while ago," he explained, leaning back in the seat. "Not that he had much of a choice, none of us did if we wanted to survive."

"I'm glad you avoided those riots," Anakin said softly, looking out the windshield at the hyperspace tunnel. "I was trying to lay low myself, but they were all over news channels for months. I was always scared I was going to recognize someone in the footage."

"We couldn't avoid them completely."

The monotone voice Rex spoke with gave away generally what had happened. Anakin's imagination filled in the blanks as he clarified. "The younger boys kept straying too close to the streets. I don't know if they forgot to cover their face or just couldn't stand the protests, but they didn't come back now matter how long we waited. Eventually, Jesse and I had to move or we were gonna join them."

Anakin could almost hear the debate that took place once one of them suggested it, probably Rex. There was a day when a clone would never abandon his brother, but no matter how much Jesse had protested to stay, he would realize that staying meant suffering the same fate. There had to have been so much shame in knowing that you arrived on a planet with a group of men and leaving with only one other. They were shinies too, but Anakin couldn't decide if that made it better or worse.

"We found Kix next," Rex went on, unable to think about the subject for too long. "The Republic had put him in cryo-freeze for what he knew about the inhibitor chips. It was a miracle we found him at all, really, but we thawed him out and brought him up to speed. Brought him on board the shuttle along with some of the medical equipment with him.

"After the Separatists became the Empire and attacked Kamino, we ran into Wolffe and Gregor. They managed to get their hands on a walker, of all things, so we joined with them and hid out somewhere we didn't think the Empire would come looking. We ditched the shuttle and gutted it, taking anything we could with us. All that medical equipment came in handy once Kix started doing his research, and we used the rest of the shuttle parts to renovate the walker. Been wandering the Seelos system ever since."

Nodding, he tried not to show that he was rejoicing internally. Better to be with family than alone, that much Anakin had learned a long time ago. Five was much better than two. "Did the Empire ever come around?"

Rex shrugged. "Eh, once or twice. It was just hoards of those stormtroopers, though. We managed to pass off as scrappers and they were none the wiser," he scowled, crossing his arms. "I assume you've run across 'em a few times."

Groaning, Anakin let his head fall back and he looked at the ceiling. "I take back everything I ever said about battle droids. If it came down to them or the stormtroopers, I'd take the droids, hands down."

The commander laughed, familiar with the feeling. He had no special love for them, not even fifteen years later, but at least he understood the droids. They were predictable and somewhat competent in large quantities. The same could not be said for the Empire's armies.

"You'll be happy to know that Dooku practically copied the Republic's coding system," Anakin told him, running a hand through his hair and sitting up. "He recruited Palpatine sympathizers that defected from the Republic once he was killed. They revamped the Separatist's military up to our standards since they wanted to phase out of using droids. It was simpler to reconstruct the same system again rather than make a new one. All of the old codes check out."

"That's good to know," Rex agreed, letting his gaze drift. "It's a stupid move, but it works out for us. It'll make it a lot easier to bypass their security."

"What security?"

It was a joke, obviously, but it still made Rex laugh. The Empire didn't seem as horrifying when you imagined incompetent soldiers rather than the military force that had coerced an entire galaxy into either submission or rebellion.

Folding his arms, he asked, "You didn't get your stripes back when you joined?"

Anakin shrugged, not looking too distressed over the fact. "It wasn't what they needed at the time. There are plenty of commanding officers all over the place, people who had to go into hiding during the rise of the Empire. When Senator Organa approached me about helping, he said he was looking for someone who could operate outside of the military hierarchy but still alongside it, if need be. My main job now is intel."

"Is that what I'm here for?"

"You're here as a commander," he assured him, smiling. "Hopefully this time, it'll last longer than a day or two."

"I'm just saying, it wouldn't hurt to put you back in the chain of command," Rex suggested, though he knew the Jedi would never ask for such a thing. "There's a lot of people willing to listen to you and I don't blame them."

"If they're already listening, why do I need a rank?" Anakin asked, sitting forward in his seat. This was a short hyperspace jump and they were already almost at their destination. "Officers around here like their 'advisors'."

Rex shook his head grinning as Skywalker pulled the ship out of hyperspace. They came up on a small system, nothing too fancy or notable about it.

"Besides," Skywalker went on, "if I was a general, I wouldn't be sent on missions like this. You know me, Rex, I'd rather be out here than stuck in a command center."

"That much, I remember," he agreed, leaning on an armrest. "So what's your strategy for these intel extractions?"

Beginning the descent into orbit, he rattled off his thoughts. "Get in, make a mess, copy some data, corrupt the rest, get out. Preferably without getting captured or injured. I'm assuming you don't want to jump down?"

"No thanks."

"Then we'll come in from the north side," he decided, looking back at Artoo. "You want to fly us in, buddy?"

Artoo whistled and plugged into the center console, relieving Anakin of pilot duty. He and Rex stood up and went to the cargo hold, where they could jump out of the ship and get moving as soon as Artoo opened the hatch for them.

From behind Skywalker, Rex commented, "It's weird seeing you with a blaster. Not really your style."

"I know, it's so uncivilized," he said in Kenobi's accent, holding himself upright and proper.

"How's he doing these days?"

He saw Skywalker smile. "Good. It took him a while to recover, but he's been safe and making progress." Turning back around, he added, "I'll have to let him know you're still alive. We've been wondering for a while."

"I could say the same. You usually don't keep this low of a profile."

Skywalker laughed, mostly at himself. They both knew it was true, but 'usual' was over fifteen years ago and nothing about their world was 'usual' anymore.

The Jedi turned back around as they arrived at the cargo hold, but right before they stood side by side, Rex caught a glimpse of an extra pack on his belt. It wasn't his blaster or his lightsaber because both of those were hanging at his side, but it was too big to be carrying most other things. That narrowed it down, and Rex thought he knew what it was holding.

In response, Rex reached to a holster that he hid out of plain sight. Out of it he pulled an old, worn blaster, but not his. Skywalker looked over and saw it, recognizing the weapon. It was hard not to; the paint job was all too familiar even if it was faded.

"For good luck," Rex explained, and Skywalker nodded. Pulling a lightsaber that wasn't his out of the pack Rex had seen earlier, he repeated the same thing to him.

"For good luck."

The cargo bay hatch opened, and the two warriors, Jedi and clone, jumped out to face the Empire in all its cruel glory.

At the end of the day, when Imperial agents would be sent to diagnose the damage inflicted by the rebel attack, the security footage wouldn't show what happened. These rebels were smart enough to hide their tracks and their identity. The security system was completely obliterated and all their data was corrupted. When the few survivors were later questioned, it seemed that all they could remember were blue blaster bolts and a bright white light.