Work Text:
Tup looked down at his legs and wiggled them experimentally. Or at least, tried to wiggle them. There wasn’t much wiggling to be done when they were stuck together by a flexible, sparkly purple casing that felt like it might start cutting off his circulation if he left it on too long.
“I’ve never seen a fish that colour,” Hardcase said thoughtfully. “I guess we haven’t seen that many fish, though.”
That was true. The only reason Tup even knew how to swim well was because of his friendship on Kamino with one of the cadets marked for the SCUBA branch. Speaking of which -
“I still think General Skywalker should’ve asked Commander Monnk to send one of his men instead,” Tup said. “I feel ridiculous.”
Hardcase made a sympathetic face and patted him consolingly on the shoulder. Kix, walking up at that moment with some kind of drink in hand, made no such effort to be emotionally supportive.
“Stars but that thing looks uncomfortable, ner vod,” he said with a too-wide grin. “If Rex had volunteered me to wear it I’d have deserted on the spot. Speaking of, are you feeling any numbness in your feet? Let me know if you start to; I don’t want to have to cut you out of that in front of the kids.”
“I’ve got my greys on,” Tup protested.
Kix shrugged elaborately. “It’d still be traumatic.”
“What’d be traumatic?” Jesse asked, walking up with two drinks. Tup hoped one of them was for him. “Seeing Tup with a fishtail? I think so, too, but the kids don’t seem to mind.”
It was hard to look stern and formidable when one was sitting on the ground wearing nothing but a sparkly purple fishtail. It didn’t stop Tup from doing his best.
“Quit teasing and give me one of those, will you? Please,” he added as an afterthought.
“Oh, no,” Kix said quickly. “No alcohol for you. It’s dangerous for swimmers.”
Tup groaned and flopped onto his back. This was too unfair, and he didn’t know exactly who to blame. Maybe Skywalker - he was the one that started this whole situation, after all, by promising his girlfr- ahem, Senator Amidala he’d bring along some clone troopers for little Ryoo Naberrie’s birthday party. Or maybe that meant it was Amidala who was to blame? Why she’d given into the child’s demands Tup couldn’t imagine. Nobody had given him anything he’d wanted as a child. Not that he’d asked for much, just a pillow that was actually soft and the one time he’d been in the medical ward with a fever and thought he was dying, to see one of his brothers. He’d quickly learned to keep his desires to himself, though. Why couldn’t Ryoo?
But he couldn’t really find it in himself to blame the child, so perhaps it was wisest to blame the senator. Or Rex. Definitely Rex. The captain had, in what Tup felt was a betrayal of the highest degree, told Skywalker that Tup was the best swimmer in Torrent and would definitely love to be the “mer-clone” at little Ryoo’s party. Normally Tup would consider it an honour to be recommended for special assignments, but in this situation? This was not the kind of thing he’d been made for.
“It’s kinda funny that the kids are so - obsessed with us,” Hardcase said, breaking Tup out of his thoughts. “What kind of little girl wants a clone-themed birthday party?”
“A weird one,” Jesse said. “But a nice one. Have you talked to her yet? She’s a cute little thing; she asked me if my tattoo hurt when I got it and seemed awfully worried when I said yes.”
“Speaking of, here she comes,” Kix said.
Sitting up again, Tup saw that a little brown-haired girl was indeed hurrying towards them as fast as her short little legs could carry her. Jesse shoved one of his drinks at Hardcase and threw the child a sharp salute. She stopped abruptly and started giggling, putting something behind her back.
“Hello, little lady,” Kix said. “What’ve you got there?”
“Um,” Ryoo said, still giggling. “Um, nothing.”
Kix gave her one of his most charming smiles. “Why don’t you come here and show us?”
“Ummmm,” Ryoo said, ducking her head before looking directly at Tup. “Are you my mer-clone?”
“He sure is!” Hardcase said brightly.
As embarrassing as his current situation was, Tup couldn’t help but feel a little better upon seeing Ryoo’s face light up. She clapped her hands, dropping the item she was holding, and before she could snatch it up again, Tup caught sight of it.
“Is that a seashell? For, er, for Tup?” Jesse asked, a slow grin starting to spread across his face.
“Ummmmmmmmm,” Ryoo said, her forehead furrowing.
Tup waved his hand at her. “That’s my name, little one.”
“Oh!” said Ryoo, her face clearing. “Yes, yes this is for you. It’s a seashell clip!”
She ran the rest of the way over to their group, ducking under Jesse’s arm with another giggle as he tried to scoop her up, and held out her hand to Tup. The “clip”, he saw, was covered in sparkly stones and looked suspiciously like jewelry.
“It’s for your hair,” she said, turning very serious all of a sudden. “It’s so you can be a real mer-clone.”
Tup looked at his vode for help and got nothing but delighted grins in return.
“That’s awfully nice of you, but I’ve never - “
“I don’t think Tup knows how to put it on,” Kix interrupted.
Ryoo’s mouth formed a little “o” and she looked at Tup with wide eyes.
“You don’t have hair clips?”
Tup shook his head. “‘fraid not. I don’t think those are regulation, little one.”
“What is reg-u-lay-shun?” Ryoo asked, sounding out the word with painstaking care.
The troopers looked at each other. Jesse shrugged.
“It means we’re not allowed to wear anything except our armour and bodygloves, or our civvies - casual clothes. Uh. They’re clothes that all look the same…” he trailed off uncertainly.
Ryoo blinked. “But, but Tup’s hair is so long and pretty! He needs clips!”
That got a smile out of Tup - if he was vain about anything, it was his hair…or maybe his biceps, but that was beside the point - and he sighed a little in resignation. After all, he was already wearing a bright and glittery false tail; a hair clip couldn’t damage his reputation much further.
“All right,” he said and held out his hand, but Ryoo shook her head.
“I will help you,” she said firmly. “My mama helped me put them in until I learned how.”
Next to him, Hardcase choked on his drink and came up spluttering. Kix whacked him on the back and smirked at Tup, who glared back half-heartedly. Apparently Ryoo noticed and she turned to glare at Kix, too, with a severity that belied her round cheeks and small stature.
“Everybody needs help sometimes,” she said and reached up to tug Tup’s hair out of its band.
He bent down to accommodate her and tried not to wince. He didn’t have to try very hard, really; Ryoo’s little hands were very gentle. They were also very warm and slightly sticky, and he didn’t want to think about what she was getting in his hair. Probably something sugary, and now that he was thinking about it, where were the refreshments he’d been promised? There’d better be a whole platoon’s worth of dessert waiting for him when he was done playing “mer-clone”.
“All done,” Ryoo finally said proudly, patting his hair and then his cheek. “You look very pretty, Tup. Just like a princess.”
This time it was Jesse who spluttered with poorly-concealed laughter.
“Oh yeah, he’s definitely ready to get in the water now,” Kix drawled.
“Yes! Yes, yes it’s time now,” Ryoo said, clapping her hands again. “Come on, Tup!”
“Yeah, come on, Tup,” Hardcase echoed, putting his drink down to grab Tup’s arms and start tugging him towards the edge of the pool.
The next two hours were a bit of a blur, albeit a surprisingly pleasant one. The enormous saltwater pool was pleasantly cool and calm, unlike the icy, turbulent pools the Kaminoans had used to mimic battle conditions. Under the circumstances, it didn’t take Tup long to get used to maneuvering with his legs stuck together, not that the children paddling around him seemed to notice his mistakes. They just “oohed”and “ahed” over his tail, asked him a never-ending stream of questions, and invited him to play several games with them, all of which he ended up enjoying immensely, though he quickly discovered that his innate competitive streak was a bit of a problem amongst tiny civilians with fragile egos.
Eventually, most of the kids abandoned the pool in favor of the refreshment table, and Tup pulled himself out of the water with the “assistance” of two of Riyo’s small friends. They’d latched onto him more closely than the others and now, instead of making a beeline for cake, they handed Tup a (very fluffy) towel and plopped themselves next to him where he was peeling the tail off his legs.
“Can we braid your hair?” Yadra asked.
“I have a ribbon,” Selin added.
“I’d love that, but don’t you want to go eat with your friends?” Tup asked.
He tugged the last few inches of casing off of his feet and kicked it away from him with a heartfelt sigh of relief.
“Please please please,” Yadra said, snuggling up to him and batting her eyelashes.
“Pleeeeease,” Selin said, snuggling up to his other side and pouting in what Tup had to admit was an adorable manner.
The glittering promise of sugary, non-rationed food would have to wait a little longer. Tup smiled and pulled the girls in for a one-armed hug each.
“Okay, little ones, do your worst.”
Their worst turned out to be a complicated braid that took three ribbons and several hair ties to stay put, along with the seashell clip. The little girls were still working on their masterpiece when Amidala herself came over with three plates of cake and what looked like an extra plate with lunch for Tup. He sniffed the air hopefully.
“Here you are, girls,” she said, setting two plates down next to them. “And I’ve brought you something to eat, Tup; please tell me if you would like anything else. You must be ravenous.”
“Thanks, ma’am,” Tup said, reaching for what looked like some sort of fried tentacle.
“Thank you, Senator Amidala,” the two girls chimed in, still focused on Tup’s braid.
The senator smiled warmly at them and gracefully lowered herself to the ground, settling the floaty material of her skirt around her.
“It’s very kind of you to do this for the children, Tup,” she said. “I don’t know where Ryoo got the idea of mer-clones, but she’s been talking about nothing else for weeks now.”
“’S my pleasure, ma’am,” Tup said around his mouthful of seafood.
Now he thought about it, it was probably bad manners to speak to a senator with one’s mouth full of food. He gulped hastily and would have apologized if Yadra hadn’t spoken up.
“Well, duh! Ryoo and us like mermaids, and we like clones, and mer-clones are just mermaids and clones put together.”
Tup cocked his head at that, earning himself a sharp tug from Yadra.
“Have you ever met any other clones, little one?”
Selin grabbed one of the little fried tentacles off of Tup’s plate, grinning mischievously at Amidala.
“I haven’t, but my daddy talks about them!” she said. “He said they are the bravest ever.”
“And we watch you on the holonet! And I have a clone doll!” Yadra added. “Ryoo has five. She says she’s going to get a whole quadron of them.”
“Squadron,” Tup corrected automatically. “Though five is already - “
“And now I’ve met you and Jesse and Kick and Hardcase and Rex!”
“Kix’s name is Kix,” Selin said seriously. “And Captain Rex’s name is Captain Rex.”
“Whatever,” Yadra said. “I’m going to paint my clone doll like Hardcase. His armour is fancy.”
Selin narrowed her eyes.
“Well, I’m going to ask for a clone doll for my birthday and I’m going to paint him like Captain Rex because he is a captain.”
Her eyes twinkling, Amidala leaned over to swat Selin’s hand away from Tup’s plate as the little girl tried to sneak another piece of his lunch.
“I’m sure both Captain Rex and Hardcase will appreciate the thought,” she said. “Is no one going to paint their doll to look like Tup’s armour, though? He’s been so nice to you girls, and I’m sure he’d tell you what it looks like if you asked him politely.”
Tup shifted uncomfortably and earned himself another reprimanding tug. Okay, maybe he’d like it if one of his new friends wanted their doll to look like him, but he didn’t want them to feel pressured into it. Paint was such a personal thing and it should never be designed out of obligation, something that the senator obviously didn’t understand.
Thankfully, Yadra saved him from the embarrassment of having to try to explain the significance of paint.
“Oh, Ryoo is already painting her new doll like Tup. Rex is helping her.”
“Captain Rex,” Selin muttered.
“Really?” Tup said. “That’s nice of her. And the captain.”
He hadn’t seen much of Rex all day, and he had a suspicion Rex was feeling guilty and trying to avoid him. Hopefully he’d get a chance to thank the captain once they were back on the transport, though; this was turning out to be one of the best days of his short life.
“I hadn’t heard that, but I’m certainly not surprised,” Amidala said. “Ryoo has taken a liking to you, Tup.” Standing, she gestured at his plate. “Please don’t hesitate to let me know if you want more to eat.”
“Yes ma’am, thank you ma’am,” Tup said gratefully.
The way Selin was scarfing down his lunch, he probably would need more. Just as Amidala started to walk away, he remembered something.
“Wait, do you want to take Ryoo’s clip thing back to her?”
“Uh-uh!” Yadra said. “We need that!”
Amidala shook her head with a smile. “No, Ryoo meant for you to keep it, Tup. Though if you wanted to - um, leave it behind on accident, that’s perfectly understandable.”
“Wouldn’t do that, ma’am,” Tup said quickly. “I didn’t realize it was a gift. I’ll take good care of it.”
He meant it, too. And if any of his brothers noticed that a certain sparkly accessory started making an appearance in his hair from time to time - well, Tup made sure they didn’t say anything about it.