Work Text:
Anakin watches calmly as Echo walks into the room, armor on but helmet at his side. Anakin forces himself not to stare at the scars still left on his trooper from the ordeal. Echo had… well, he’d seemed to have recover very quickly from his ordeal, but Anakin knew what it was like to fake a quick fix for his loved ones, and, in retrospect, the entire thing had been a mess.
To be fair, he hadn’t exactly been in a very good mental state.
“You asked to see me, Sir?” he asks. Anakin waves his hand in the air.
“Enough of that, Echo,” he says, “This isn’t a meeting about the war, it’s… well, it’s about you.”
Echo cocks his head.
“I’m sorry, sir,” he says, “I’m not sure what you mean. I assure you that I am well and able to fight-”
Anakin interrupts him.
“Your body is? Yes. Your mind, on the other hand…” Anakin trails off, sighing, “Your partner came to me, not long ago. He’s worried about yo-”
“I’m fine , sir,” Echo says again, but Anakin believes it even less this time. He sighs.
“How much of what happened while you were gone do you know?” he asks, and Echo shrugs.
“Just the basics,” he says, “But, sir, what does this have to do with your previous question?”
Anakin sighs again, gesturing for the ARC to sit down, which he does.
“I’m assuming that you know Dooku captured me, and that I attempted my own life during my duel with the former Chancellor.”
Echo laughs.
“It’s still hard to believe that Chancellor Palpatine was secretly in charge of the Separatists, but, yes, I’ve heard about those instances.”
Anakin closes his eyes, reaching for the center that he’d only recently begun to properly develop.
“Well,” he says, “It’s actually quite a bit more complicated than that. You see… yes, Dooku did torture me. Yes, he is why I discovered the Chancellor’s identity, but… those weren’t the defining features of my struggles when I was captured. I…”
Anakin trails off. In all this time, almost a year since his rescue, he’d never really told anyone the full story…
“Sir?” Echo asks.
But Echo deserved to know.
“Nobody came for me,” he begins, “I called out, but nobody answered. Dooku told me that we would only be found when he wanted us to be, and… and all could think about was the fact that it was the love of my life who put me there… I… maybe the pain was easier at the beginning? I don’t know. I just…”
Anakin found himself trailing off again, cradling his mechanical arm in his real.
“They… they took my arm , replaced it with a metal rod, it… my arm was made to redirect electricity, but…
“That wasn’t… that… my mind… ”
Anakin buries his face in his hands, pretty sure that he was visibly shaking. Blast it! It’s been almost a year now since Obi-Wan found him, and talking about his capture still hurt .
“Sir?” Echo prompts, “Are you alright? You don’t have to do this, sir.”
Anakin looks up, and shakes his head.
“No, Echo,” he says, “I just… I’ve never told anyone the full story all at once before now, for many reasons, and… well, it’s hard. I… did you know that the Sith can… can force a Bond on someone, without them knowing? And… well, they hurt like nothing imaginable when they’re removed. Dooku, he… every layer of my mind was decimated , in his search, and… well, he showed me something that I wasn’t supposed to see along the way. That… that was the part that helped me fix things, but… Obi-Wan found me, and I… well, it wasn’t pretty. I… broke down, honestly, but… well, I made myself seem fine, and nearly everyone wanted it to be true enough that they believed me…”
Anakin looks straight into Echo’s eyes as he completes his story.
“I’m not saying that I know what you went through,” he says, “Because I don’t, and I’m not saying that either of us had it better or worse, because that’s entirely an opinion. I’m also not going to try and pull you away from the fighting, because I understand the need to divert your attention to something important, and yours is much healthier than mine… All I’m saying is that I can try to lend an ear if you don’t want your brothers worrying, and that you should tell the people that love you what happened, someday, when you’re ready.”
Echo sighs.
“It’s… hard to describe, General,” he begins, “It was like… being a part of a machine, which, did you know just how different they are from humanoids?”
Anakin nods. Artoo had tried to explain it more than once, and he was pretty sure that he’d just about got it. It made sense, of course. After all, different classes of species had different needs, different brain designs…
“Well, the more lucid times were like that, but mostly… mostly it was like time was at a standstill, like it was a moment and an eternity all at once. It’s… it’s still hard to believe that it’s been over a year. I… when I could, I wondered how long it would take until I became a part of the machine.”
Anakin’s lips twitch as he internally laughs without humor. He knows the feeling, to an extent.
“I just…” the clone trails off, “I’m sorry, sir. It’s just… there aren’t words to properly describe it.”
“There rarely are.”
Silence descends, but it’s not awkward, just two men with trauma that nobody else can understand. Eventually, however, it has to be broken.
“Thank you, sir,” says Echo, and Anakin smiles.
“Any time, trooper,” he says, and, with those parting words, the ARC trooper leaves.
After all, Echo's loved ones had probably saved him.
The next day, while he’s visiting Padme, Fives pulls him aside.
“ Thank you ,” Fives says, “I don’t know what you said to him, but… I thought I’d never get him back.”
Anakin smiles.
“Of course,” he says, “You know what I’d do for my men, and you’ve practically become the personal bodyguard of my wife.”
It was still a strange thing to think about, but Fives and Padme had become close ever since his battle with Sidious, and Fives had actually been largely away from the front for the last several months, helping the home guard and the Loyalists root out the remains of the Chancellor’s corruption. (With some notable exceptions, such as when they’d recovered Echo not four weeks ago.)
(He looks back on the Mortis Vision, now half-forgotten, and knows that this was always meant to be.)
Fives nods, taking off his helmet.
“Nevertheless, sir,” he says, “Thank you.”
Anakin feels his smile soften.
“You’re welcome,” he says.