#arrika

Traitor was a clone trooper who, together with the brothers, fighted under the command of general Verra Montari. Traitor was a good soldier with a cheerful attitude towards life. He usually didn't take many things seriously if he didn't have to. Even his own name, Traitor, was a joke. People often reacted strangely to it and Traitor loved it. He also loved to dye his hair in all sorts of crazy colors.

One day he met Arrika, the daughter of the Chiss' senator. Her father wanted her to follow in his footsteps, which she didn't want - she didn't like politics, she preferred to help people in a more direct way.

The couple quickly liked each other and what at the beginning was an innocent flirting quickly turned into a romance. They both knew they had to keep their relationship a secret.

Traitor only told one of his vods Fuss about it and he didn't react very well, accusing Arrika of treating this relationship as fun and using his brother. After all, she was risking much less than Traitor. However, Traitor managed to convince him not to tell anyone about it.

Unfortunately, they didn't manage to hide their relationship for a long time. During one of thekr meetings, Arrika's father caught them and gave them a choice.

Either they break up with each other, Traitor will return to the army without any consequences, and Arrika to his family house where she will wait until she finally "grow up", or they can stay together, but he doesn't want to see them again - Arrika will be disinherited, and Traitor may be considered a deserter.

After a long conversation, the couple, to the senator's surprise, decided to stay together. They left Courscant and started to live on their own traveling all over the Galaxy.

At first it wasn't easy, especially since Traitor felt bad about leaving his brothers, and Arrika that she couldn't see her family anymore, but after a while things started to get better.

About two years after the fall of the Republic (luckily the Traitor chip hadn't been activated) the couple adopted a human baby girl they named Era. Soon after this they settled on a small, forgotten by Force planet, got married, and adopted Joy two years later.

Traitor started working as a mechanic, and Arrika started working in a local school, of which she later became the headmistress.

The entire family helped the Rebellion, and both Era and Joy joined the Resistance when they were older.

Calmer, though more pessimistic, Joy became a medic and the more energetic and friendly Era found herself a great pilot.

Moreover, years later, Era decided to write down stories about the former Republic mainly from the perspective of the clones.

ALSO

if you want to see more of Traitor, @twinkofthedink this amazing drawing of him and his squad.

Rhys was passed out in the bed of their apartment.  Technically, it wasn’t their apartment.  It belonged to someone who was out of town until two weeks from now, and upon finding this out by digging through the registries of the building, Arrika had figured it would be a good place to stay while they were on Corellia.  She had figured correctly - a semi-full fridge and plenty of food in the kitchen, plus a great extranet connection and a decent amount of space.

Faking entry cards was so easy these days.

They had been here for a few days already, continuing on their whirlwind tour of the galaxy so Rhys could avoid going back to Mandalore.  Arrika had been back twice now, and when she was back, she couldn’t wait until her duties to the clan could be put aside so she could pursue her own wants.

In this case, her main want was lying down about 6 feet away, fast asleep under the covers.  It was about 0320, if her chrono was correct, so it made sense that he was asleep, and no sense that she was not.

Then again, not much of this made sense.

She was sitting in a chair by the window.  The sun had set some time ago, and the lights of the city had sparked into being.  Thick curtains could block it from the bedroom, but she had slid one half open and was gazing out into the city.  Thick rain was falling against the window, dull taps against the class, casting strange distortions and oddly shadowed patterns of multicolored against Arrika’s white face.  A perfect canvas.

They were high up above the streets and air travel lanes to avoid the noise, and so all seemed quiet, save Rhys’ heavy, slow breathing and the splatter of rain against the glass.  Arrika herself was breathing slow as well, passing the time until sleep came to her once more by watching the night go by.

She looked over to Rhys.  Shirtless, under the sheet, on his side, dark hair fluffed out from his moving around.  He blended with the sheets on the bed, creating a slightly differently colored dark blur among the consistent dark blur of the sheets, but Arrika didn’t need to see him to know what was there.

Strong hands, ones with fingers as good as hers.  A dark expression, often clouded by thoughts of home, often caused him to furrow his brows.  When he smiled, it was a beautiful thing on a face that so often avoided doing so, a moment when the sun would break through the perpetual cloud cover.  His eyes would often find hers, inquisitive, accusatory on occasion, but softening the more time they spent together.

The quiet moments that she got to just sit back and think about this, about him, about how crazy all of this was, were the moments that she was divided the most.  He was running, and he knew it.  She was encouraging this, and she knew it.  She was deep into this, too deep.  She’d kissed him when she found him, and it had just gotten worse from there.  The terrible ache she felt in her chest when she thought he might be gone forever, the dull hurt when she was on Mandalore and he was not, the blending of all the days apart until she saw him...she was gone by now.

A song came unbidden to her lips, a soft melody, one of the better know Alderaanian songs.

Wise men say, she sang quietly, her wavering voice drowned out by the rain against the window, only fools rush in.

But I can’t help, she continued, thinking of the thrill of her hands wrapped in his larger ones, of his fingers on her bare skin, of his anger and his rage and his quiet and his concern, falling in love with you.

Her sister had burned him so much, and he had burned her, and the wound had festered for so long before he’d opened it up again to heal properly.  He would go back someday, she knew this.  He would speak with his former lover, he would speak with his mother, he would speak with everyone else he had left.  And what would happen then, she didn’t know.

Shall I stay, would it be a sin, and yet it was too late for her already, because she knew that she had to hold it in.  This relationship, whatever it was, that had formed between them was something she could never control, because if she tried, if she showed him how she felt, what she really wanted, he would run away from her as well.

But I can’t help falling in love with you.

Or maybe he would understand.  Maybe he would get it, he would know, maybe he would feel as she did, that she wanted more than anything to say that she loved him and not have him pull away from her.  Maybe he, too, was in too deep.  Maybe he wanted this as well.  Maybe he…

Maybe.

Like a river flows surely toward the sea, she knew it wouldn’t last forever.  She knew that this was temporary, that it had always only been temporary, that they were just two people with a relationship of convenience, and it tore open her heart to think of them as only that.  What she felt ran deeper, much deeper, than a simple fling.

He didn’t know how much she truly cared, and he probably never would.

Darling so it goes some things weren’t meant to be.

Rhys stirred, prompting a protesting squeak from the bed, and Arrika watched him adjust himself before turning back to look out the window.  She tried not to think about the oncoming end, but in these quiet moments, it was difficult to keep her thoughts away from the inevitable future.

Take my hand, take my whole life too.  She got up, closing the curtain to prevent the sun from leaking in in a few hours, and she climbed back into bed.  She slid under his arm and curled up around a pillow, resting on her side and cradled within his curved body.  She loved it here, as she loved him, and she snuggled back against his warm chest.  His arm instinctively tightened, drawing her close to him, and she felt his warm breath on the top of her head.

The last words of the song were whispered as a few tears slid down her face, temporarily staining the pillowcase.  She wished she could say them to him without being so afraid of what would happen next, but at the end of the day, she was a coward.

A coward who knew that the end was coming, and it would ruin her.