Author's Note: Thanks to everyone for all the support! You've been great with inspiring me, and I am highly appreciative of your input. If you have any tips writing tips, please feel free to comment.

As always, I continue to hope that I am doing justice to the spirit of Star Wars as well the respective authors and characters from which I borrow. Again, I gratefully accept constructive criticism as a means to help me develop my skills further as a writer. I believe this is a chapter that many of you have been waiting for, and I hope it meets your expectations. Enjoy!

This chapter's opening quote is taken from Karen Traviss' novel, The Clone Wars: No Prisoners.  

Mandalorian (Mando'a) words

Ika (EE-kah): diminutive suffix written as 'ika - also added to a name as a very familiar or childhood form, e.g, Ord'ika - Little Ordo

Ner vod (nair-vohd): my brother/sister"; colloquially also "my friend" 

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Chapter 25

I'm a soldier. It's all I am. I don't know a lot about the outside world, but I'm pretty sure that other soldiers have families and lives outside fighting. We don't.

Clone Captain CC-7567 "Rex"

Tochin Moon III, 785 Days ABG  

Jas flashed instantly back to the moment when they were alone yesterday, and the hunger of it filled him again. He looked to her troubled blue eyes and saw the maelstrom of confusion in them. He felt her gentle trembling and realized that part of it was his own. He took in her face, the soft curvature of her profile, and he looked to her wild curls, tracing them with his eyes as they fell freely about her shoulders. 

His eyes then moved to her lips, and the hunger that had been locked in his mental box had finally broken free. Jas had the overwhelming urge to touch her and move closer, and he didn't stop his free hand as it moved of its own accord to her cheek. His palm cupped her face gently while his thumb softly brushed some of those wild curls back from her face.

The touch of Jas' hand on Arlesse jolted through her, and her eyes instantly came to him, finding his dark irises.

Jas thought he had done something improper with the speed of her reaction to his touch. He feared that he was about to further lose her trust, and he was angry with himself for breaching the protocol of her position as a princess. He pulled his hand back from her face but found his fingers were unwilling to detangle from hers. His voice came out as a bare whisper, his embarrassment for what he had done clearly evident. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have..."

"You feel it, don't you?" Arlesse asked, refusing now to turn away from him, and she hoped that he was experiencing the same maddening excitement that she did whenever they were so close.

Jas looked to her eyes and didn't understand what it was that he was supposed to feel and what exactly she was feeling. He could only describe what he experienced as a pang of hunger, a need for her closeness and her touch. He wanted nothing more than to protect her, yet at the same time, he wanted to discover the entire galaxy with her. Her touch made him feel like he was crazy at times, how it confused him and filled him with excitement.

Jas knew his uncertainty reflected in his eyes, but as he looked to her blue irises he saw that hers shone with...hope, expectation. He saw the fear in her eyes, the hesitancy that she was still anticipating him at some point to turn from her and reject everything about her. And, for some reason he will never know, the idea of someone rejecting her made him both angry and pained that anyone could be so cruel to this caring and compassionate young woman.

Arlesse felt her heart pounding and her breath quicken. She wondered if such emotions were always to be this confusing, this awkward, and she wanted to find some way to prolong the sweet ache of his touch, his stare. Breathing softly, Arlesse forced herself to be brave, even though she had mentally prepared herself for the usual dismissal. Bringing a shaky hand forth, she gently touched her fingertips to Jas' chin.

The touch of her fingers sent a flush of warmth through Jas, and he was aware of how soft they were as she lightly grazed them over his chin. He took comfort in the contact of her petite fingers and didn't fight the reflexes that slowly eased him towards her, the space between them shrinking to mere inches.

Arlesse allowed the soft, but shuddering breath to escape her as the thin layer of stubble on his face brushed roughly against her fingertips, leaving a trail of sharp-like burns over her fingers. In the seconds that had passed, she brought her eyes back to Jas, realizing that there was nothing but a mere breath separating them.

Consumed by the maddening closeness between them, Jas still felt his inner turmoil as the soldier within him fought to find a reason to break the moment and remain in protocol. However, what he saw in Les'ika's eyes was something intangible, something that seemed to beckon him closer.

Her blue irises showed him so clearly the contradictions that made up a female, and he understood finally why the Kaminoans never bothered to teach them anything about women. Their gender was too complex, too multi-layered. Les'ika had intelligence and attractive features, despite how she didn't think she was comparable to other women. She was soft and fragile as a human woman is thought to be, but she was also strong in compassion and kindness. Her contradictions made her harmonious, and it would have been impossible for the Kaminoans to ever put together a lesson plan to explain a woman.

Similarly, Arlesse was drawn to the man she now saw in Jas's irises. He was this being who was protective and considerate and cared nothing for anyone who saw him as anything less than a good soldier. He was truthful, brutally so, and his honor couldn't be questioned because his integrity had been ingrained in him since he was a mere child. No hidden agendas or matters of dishonesty existed with Jas because he had nothing to hide and everything to live for in his shortened life.

Jas felt himself nearly drowning in the haze now, and as he fell deeper into it, part of him argued one last time that they were far too close than he ever should have allowed. They were far too different to be falling prey to an invisible fog of emotions. He was merely a soldier, a clone. Clones were disposable beings who did their time and died on a distant planet away from real humans. Les'ika was a privileged princess, a normal human who would live long after he passed on. Her duty was to help her planet and marry someone who would bring her family worthy heirs.

The simple blue of her eyes, however, brought him back to her, and he understood finally what Dusty felt in that moment on Denon with Cerina. Jas was compelled now to ignore the mission protocol just this once, as this might be the only time in his life he would know such contact. If he wasn't dead within the next twenty years from the aging process of a clone, he could be dead in the next second because his life as a commando expected such risks. Something deep within him, emotions he thought he wasn't supposed to experience had grasped his attention, and he could no longer ignore those feelings.

Arlesse found the innocence in Jas' eyes, the truth that he had no more knowledge in such an encounter that she had. She understood now why the connection they shared was always so awkward and confusing, and the realization attracted her to him even more. Whatever this moment would entail, they would learn about it together because neither of them ever had the opportunity before to share such affections.

Jas' gloved hand returned to her face now, and her head tilted upwards as his hand gently brushed across her cheek. He saw her eyes softly close at his touch, and her breath gasped quietly while the warmth of her exhale grazed over his chin.

Instinct promptly took over and Jas closed his eyes as his lips brushed against hers, experimenting with the feeling of the soft touch. He felt the princess tremble slightly, as her lips returned the gentle graze.

Carefully, nervously, they pressed to each other and both of them shared a flush of warmth that sent a tingle of emotion through them. Instead of squelching the maddening excitement, however, the gentle kiss fueled it. In mere seconds, they leaned in closer growing more emboldened at the sensations.

Jas gently buried his hand into her hair and pulled her tighter to him as his other hand remained securely laced within hers. He felt her fingers stop trembling as they grasped steadier to his hand, and she leaned in closer letting him know that she trusted him completely and with no reservations.

Jas felt her small hand fiercely grasp his, her petite fingers seeming to be stronger than he thought was possible. He was aware of how soft her lips were against his and that there was the faint taste of RubyFruit left on them. He heard her inhale heavily and realized that part of it was his own need for air. Neither of them had any idea how long they had been sharing the embrace, and it seemed that neither one of them was concerned about it.

They dared to fight against their need to breathe, to prolong the separation that would occur once they parted. However, they were left with no choice but to succumb to the needs of their lungs, and they were forced to gently pull back, breaking the seal of the kiss shared between them.

Jas opened his eyes and felt his lungs burning. He took a heavy breath watching her eyes flutter open while she sucked in the cool night air.

After a few moments, reality began to return to Jas' senses, and against his desires, he forced his hands to pull from her, freeing her from the gentle capture of his embrace. He tried to think of how he should apologize for breaking the protocol of the mission and allowing himself to forget his objectives. He never should have touched Les'ika like that, and he had no idea what possessed him to take her in such a manner. He wasn't Dusty, and unlike his brother, Jas looked ahead to the end of the mission, not just the moments that took place within it.

Arlesse couldn't break her eyes away from Jas' dark irises, and as she caught her breath, she could see an entirely new world in his eyes, a world that she wasn't sure she could ever understand but knew she belonged within. She saw for a moment that he regretted his actions, fearing what he had done was wrong and dangerous to her, and as his hands suddenly came away, she took a soft but saddened breath. Even after such a connection, she saw that he was now trying to find some way to gently reject her.

Jas swallowed hard, fighting within himself. He knew he felt something when he was with her, and he felt something for her. Embracing her had freed the feelings he fought to keep locked away, and he was not certain any longer that he could contain the rampant feelings when it would matter most.

As the silence between them grew heavy and long, Jas tried to listen to his logical and militaristic side, the one nagging at him to walk away. However, his emotions, the part of him that made him a man, a human, understood how the battle to follow protocol was worth losing. He could not deny how he was attracted to Les'ika and could not ignore what he saw within her eyes any longer. She cared about him without shame or concern, and he meant something to her.

With sudden comprehension, Jas now understood very clearly was it was to be a member of the Reject Squad, a squad known for breaking rules and finding loopholes because that was what they did best. Jas decided that if he was going to ignore protocol, he had to do it for the right reasons, and right now Les'ika was the only reason he needed.

Taking a soft breath, Jas stared into her blue irises. He saw again the intangible world there that he wanted to share with her, and he decided that the world in her eyes was worth any punishment that the GAR or those within power on her world could devise for him.

Abandoning caution and protocol, Jas brought both his hands to her face and cupped her cheeks gently. He leaned forward, his voice soft and honest as it brushed against her lips, "I do feel it."

Then, he kissed her again, allowing the uncontrollable haze to overtake him once more. Arlesse responded without hesitation, and they both decided that drowning in their emotions was better than fighting against the tidal wave caused by them.

Blind to the world around them and the night as it moved about its subdued life, neither of them had the slightest concern that Dusty watched them through his bucket's HUD.

Keeping the helmet communications open, Dusty heard Gath curse softly over the speakers, and he immediately responded, "Don't, Gath."

Dusty sensed that his brother was about to interrupt Jas and the princess, and he was not going to allow that to happen.

"It's against mission protocol," Gath grumbled. "We're not..."

"Supposed to be men, right?" Dusty finished for him. "We're flesh droids, I know. Then, you go tell the Kaminoans that they kriffing screwed up. You tell them that we're not supposed to care or be cared for. And, you be sure to tell them that one of their reject clones developed an attachment to a princess."

With that, Gath breathed heavily, and Dusty knew that his brother was unable to find a convincing argument. It was Gath's subdued way of admitting defeat while still trying to find some way to win the battle.

"Let it go, ner vod," Dusty said gently. "Just let it go."

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