Chapter Text
Crosshair had never hated his enhanced eyesight more than he did now. The smoke had cleared, the remains of Tipoca City long since claimed by the raging sea, but he could still see where it had once stood, and he couldn’t tear his eyes away. Even if he could, it’s not like there was anything better to look at. Just an endless ocean and whatever monstrous creatures lived within it, dark and blurred through the sheen of rain crashing down from the stormy night skies.
It was cold and the air reeked of ozone that smelt familiar—smelt like home—but Crosshair had never felt farther from home in his short, war-torn life than he did in that moment.
Closing his eyes wasn’t any better. There wasn’t the comfort of darkness, just the flashes of memories playing out behind his eyelids in some cruel imitation of a truly pathetic soap-operatic holodrama. Hunter’s thankful gaze after he’d rescued the girl. Wrecker truly not understanding why he hadn’t come back. Tech’s understanding—as conditional as it may have been. Omega’s desperation to save him from drowning. Even Echo had shot him one or two pensive looks that didn’t spell out death, and coming from the untrusting reg, that was almost too nice. Their faces when he’d told them he hadn’t changed his mind. All of them boarding the Marauder without another word.
And the girl, Omega, stopping to tell him that he was their brother—her brother, too—before disappearing in a rush. He’d wanted to follow her. For a split second, he almost had. But then there was Hunter, standing at the top of the ramp with a resigned expression, his pack and rifle strapped to his back. And then he remembered. The thrusters of the Marauder flaming blue as it flew out of the hangar that stormy night on Kamino, and the screams—his screams—in his head; pleading with himself to break free, begging them not to go. It was enough to keep him grounded, firm on the platform where he stood. And as soon as the memory faded, he relived it.
No sooner had he burned the image from his brain, when he saw it again. But this time it was sunny, the waters on Kamino uncharacteristically calm, as the Marauder made its steady ascent. He watched as it disappeared and stared at the skies long after, until the sun had taken its place and he could no longer see through the glare. It was then that he had turned to the dwindling smoke-plumes of what had once been Tipoca City, and he hadn’t looked away since.
But he didn’t think of Tipoca City. He thought of his brothers.
Echo may have been a reg, and they didn’t exactly get along, but they had respected each other. Tech never showed it but he cared for him on a fundamental level; fastidious in his brief medical examinations and thorough in his tailored enhancements to Crosshair’s kit and equipment. Wrecker couldn’t help but show it. He was always invading his space, shoving that stupid tooka doll in his face; quick to rise to his challenges and games, unrelenting and insisting in his love for Crosshair even when he did nothing but brush him off… But that was all gone now. Every one of them, even Wrecker, had their guns trained on him after he’d rescued the girl. Even when she was safely huddled, coughing and sputtering, in Hunter’s arms. It was only after a terse nod from Hunter that they stood down.
And that brought his thoughts to the one brother he’d tried to avoid thinking about at all costs. Hunter. The oldest. The leader. It was his responsibility to make sure the team stayed together. It was his judgement that the others obeyed unquestioningly and without complaint. It was his decision to return to Kamino to rescue the girl. And it was his decision to leave Crosshair behind. On Bracca. On Ryloth. His judgement. His call. If there was anyone Crosshair wanted to blame, it was him.
But… he couldn’t.
Hunter was looking out for his brothers, his sister—his family. He had kept them together for all those months. And even on the run from the Empire, he had kept them safe. Even the Marauder was in fighting shape, as was everyone on board.
And Crosshair may have been bitter but he wasn’t blind. Hunter did care. ‘Just not about me.’
The rain had cut through his armour, soaked his blacks to the skin, and he was shaking uncontrollably in the harsh, biting wind. But a small part of him was glad for all the mist and the rain when he felt tears sting his eyes.
Hunter had left him, and that wound still ached, but then he let him go like he meant nothing. Like he had never meant anything. And he couldn’t stop the tears from falling, nor the sobs from wracking his thin frame, when he realized that he may have never meant as much to his brothers as they had all meant to him.
***
“We shouldn’t have left him there.” Wrecker couldn’t bear to say the word behind. As if that one little word made all the difference in what they did. “How do we know the Empire's even gonna send scouts?”
Tech adjusted his goggles on his forehead, squinting at the blur he knew to be Wrecker as he laid down the sparking tools he had been using to autopsy AZI-3. “Because the Empire was once the Republic. Whilst their core values and priorities have shifted, their operations for the most part will remain the same. Besides, it is common practice to ensure that no endeavours are left half-finished, especially coming from a military stand-point as rigid as the Empire’s appears to be.”
Wrecker didn’t understand most of what he said, but he didn’t like the sound of what he did. “If they’re just making sure it’s all gone who says they’re gonna be in a rush to get there. He could still be stranded there.”
Wrecker hadn’t said his name yet. None of them had. And from his place in the cockpit, glaring out at the blue-blur of hyperspace, Echo was sure that if any of them did, it would shatter the fragile peace they’d established since take-off. For the sake of his sanity, he sure as hells wasn’t going to say it, but he knew there was only a short amount of time before Tech did.
“That is highly unlikely.” He said, avoiding the name out of convenience more than guilt. “We must remember that the bombardment of Tipoca City occurred hours before we reached the landing pad. They will have collected him by now, there is no need to worry unnecessarily.”
“It’s not unnecessary!” Wrecker barely contained his shout, if only to spare Omega from their argument. “If the Empire’s got him then that’s something worth worrying about!”
Tech took a deep breath, barely restraining a sigh, and swiveled his chair to direct all of his attention to Wrecker. Tipping his goggles back down his nose with a pointed look.
‘Uh-oh.’ Echo was glad he caught the shift when he did. ‘This isn’t gonna end well.’
“Wrecker, staying behind and joining the Empire was Crosshair’s decision.”—‘Strike one: acknowledge we left him behind. Strike two: say his name.’ Echo was keeping a mental tally.—“We made it abundantly clear that he had a place among us should he change his mind.”—‘We did not.’ Echo almost said.—“And what’s more, as I said before, he would not have changed his mind even if we had provided a solid argument at length. Just as you are prone to emotional outbursts and destroying things you do not like, the stipulations of Crosshair’s character dictate that he is resistant to emotional output and set in his ways. More simply referred to as: cold and unyielding. He would not have agreed to come with us. No matter how much you wish he would.”
‘Amazing.’ Echo thought at Tech with enough ferocity that, had he had the Force, he would have been shouting directly into Tech’s mind. ‘You just managed to say everything that you shouldn’t have said.’
Now, where Wrecker had been sulking and petulant, he was riled up and retaliating. But not with the fiery anger Echo had been expecting. This rage was cold, something reminiscent of the time spent under the influence of the inhibitor chip—or, at least, that was the only time Echo had seen Wrecker look quite as frightening. Tech didn’t look perturbed, but he had retreated his hand closer to his blaster.
“Understanding is one thing.” Wrecker said, closing the short distance between them until he was towering over Tech, eyebrows furrowed and expression severe. “But knowing is another. And I know Crosshair cares about us. If we tried harder… maybe…”
And all of a sudden he was unsure, and Tech leapt at the opportunity to interject. Though this time with enough sense to be soothing instead of blasé. “Wrecker, you are a very emotional person. Crosshair is not. Whilst it would be extreme to reflect on our lives this way, we must consider the possibility that Crosshair never cared about us the way we thought he did. Watching our backs in battle is one thing, exchanging in banter with us is another, but genuinely caring for our emotional, physical and mental wellbeing is completely different. I believe he severely lacks the capacity to consider our feelings alongside his own. It would make sense when regarding his overall disposition.”
Wrecker didn’t even pretend to understand what all of that meant. “If you’re trying to say Crosshair didn’t care about us, you’re wrong.”
“Am I? How so?”
“Well, I can’t speak for you guys, but Crosshair definitely cared about me. He never got too angry when I annoyed him and we had that competition to see who could take down the most droids. And he was never too boastful when he won. And when we were cadets he even let me have Lula!” Wrecker seemed thoroughly pleased with his standing ovation to Crosshair’s apparent emotional spectrum.
Now, Echo knew Wrecker wasn’t the best at translating feelings to words. He felt so deeply that it was hard for him to convey everything with the limited vocabulary he had bothered to learn. Wrecker never needed words to express himself before. He collapsed everything into gestures and expressions, and now that he was being forced to explain the intricacies of everything he felt, it was coming out very lackluster and lame.
Tech wasn’t as good at reading between the lines as Echo and was about as stubborn as Crosshair—or Maker-forbid, Hunter—when it came to letting things go. “Wrecker, if Crosshair is truly angry he will distance himself from a situation, so you will not see the brunt of his anger if you have earned it. That competition to take down droids was something you never won. Looking back at it with renewed context, it appears as though Crosshair could have construed the façade of a game to better catalogue and show off his superiority—because that is something he seems so focused about.” That mumbled afterthought had Echo inching into the galley on stiff legs with half-a-mind of what Tech was actually talking about. “And when we were cadets, he passed off Lula because he didn’t want to be seen as weak, and an attachment to a stuffed animal would lend to that appearance. It was around the same time that he began advanced training and taking an attitude with us and everything. The fact that you got her was purely because Hunter and I had no interest in her.”
Where Wrecker’s defense of Crosshair had once been so solid, it was quickly crumbling. Wrecker himself had slumped into one of the chairs in the galley, face pinched in fretful discomfort as tears beaded in his eyes. His hands were shaking, balled to fists in his lap. And Tech was staring not at him but at his feet, with a pensive and reproachful gaze awash with hurt and something else Echo couldn’t discern behind the yellow-tint of his goggles.
“So, you’re saying that was all a lie?” Wrecker’s voice was broken on a sob that he swallowed back down. “That Crosshair… didn’t love us?”
Tech blinked heavily and that was when Echo realized he too, was crying. “Logically, I believe—”
It was beyond time for Echo to step in.
“Enough.” Wrecker and Tech startled, as if they just realized he was there. “We can’t get hung up on what-ifs. Crosshair isn’t here to defend himself and none of us are in a position where we can explain his thoughts and feelings.”
“But we can deduce—”
Echo shook his head, placing a hand on Tech’s shoulder in a move uncharacteristic for both of them, equally shy to physical affection with the other. But it was necessary. “No, Tech, we can’t. You said so yourself, in a roundabout way. Crosshair is reclusive, private. He’s not unemotional. No one is. He’s just concealing his emotions, for whatever reason—”
“—to not appear weak.” Tech quietly interjected.
“Maybe. We don’t know. The only way to know for sure would be to ask him and we can’t do that, so let’s give it a rest. We’ve all had a long rotation and we’re overdue for a break, but Tech, just try to finish up the work on AZI-3 before you conk out.”
Tech nodded and silence settled between the three, until—
“He should be here.” Wrecker let out the sob he’d been holding back, dropping his head into his hands as he wept for his lost brother for the first time since their escape from Kamino all those months ago, and Tech stood to console him, Echo’s hand slipping from his shoulder with a parting squeeze. “We shouldn’t have left him behind.”
Wrecker’s crying wasn’t a sound any of them enjoyed. Even Gonky warbled over to console him with muted beeps while Tech took the seat to his side, retracting and amending what he had said in a tense offer of comfort.
Reflecting on Wrecker’s words, Echo couldn’t help but agree. They didn’t trust him. Couldn’t, after everything. But there was a gaping wound where Crosshair had once been and with every reminder of his absence it dug deeper, bled harder and hurt all the more. He may not have wanted to come back. Just like he may have truly wanted to stay with the Empire. But that was a bad call and they all knew it, and they should have fought harder to keep him from making that mistake again.
Meeting Tech’s unflinching gaze, he knew he thought the same. But—
“It was his choice.” Hunter pulled apart the curtain separating Omega’s room from the rest of the ship, clambering down the ladder with an unsteadiness that betrayed his sleepless state. He must have heard everything. “We gave him the opportunity to come with us, and he didn’t take it. There’s nothing more we could have done. End of story.”
“We could have groveled.” Echo found his snark as Hunter moved passed him to the cockpit, swiftly ignoring the emotional turmoil unfolding in the galley. “He would’ve probably been more susceptible to that.”
“You be sure to do that the next time we see him.” Hunter said, detached of any emotion Echo could be bothered to discern.
“And what will you be doing?”
Hunter didn’t turn, just inclined his head to peer over his shoulder as he stepped into the relative darkness of the cockpit. “Depends on the situation.”
“Meaning?” Echo pushed but Hunter didn’t budge.
Instead, he said. “Wrecker, don’t beat yourself up over it. Crosshair’s always been single-minded. He wouldn’t have come with us no matter what you did. And Tech. Finish up AZI-3. We’re gonna want him online before we touch down on Ord Mantell.” And with that, he keyed the doors to the cockpit shut.
Tech gave Wrecker another fleeting pat before returning to his work, now with an imperceptible tremor to his hands that Echo soothed with a pat to the back before taking his place at Wrecker’s side. Hunter’s words hadn’t had the same effect on Wrecker that they used to. He was trying to pull it together but… he missed Crosshair, in spite of everything. Echo didn’t share the sentiment, but he knew a thing or two about missing brothers, and stayed by his side well into the night-cycle even after everyone, Tech included, had long since fallen asleep.
He could only hope Crosshair was resting easy, wherever he was. For Wrecker and Tech’s sake.