Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

this is stitch:

he is ct-4181, pronounced forty-one-eighty-one, but he always thinks of it as four-thousand-one-hundred-eighty-one because ct-4182 (fractal when it’s safe) tells him that his number is in the fibonacci sequence and that means it’s lucky.

fractal asks him if they can change numbers. stitch says no. stitch says that he will need all the luck he can get.

(fractal is gone the next day.)

stitch had been joking about the luck.

stitch doesn’t joke anymore.

it’s against the rules to carve into your armor, so stitch doesn’t use a knife. he runs the edge of his fingernail along the inside of his plastoid breastplate until– just before– his fingers start to bleed.

if they bleed, the long-necks will see, and stitch will be gone as well.

it’s the same pattern. over and over again. it’s not enough to make a dent, so stitch isn’t breaking any rules, but the names are there all the same, and only stitch can see them, so it’s okay. it’s safe. he’s safe.

(he is not safe.)

there are three of them left.

blue’s hands jerk towards his ears when someone drops a plate in the cafeteria.

it’s nearly nothing. just a twitch. but a twitch is still something. still enough.

blue does not come back from firing practice.

(he is not safe.)

there are two of them left.

combo chews at the collar of his blacks. stitch tells him to stop every time, but it’s not enough, and when they wake up one morning there is a hole in his blacks.

they look at each other.

“stitch?” combo says.

his voice is shaking. they both know.

“stitch, i’m sorry.”

combo’s bunk is empty when he comes back that evening.

for any other trooper, this would have been an opportunity to learn. to train. but lilo was the first of them to be caught crooked, and since then the long-necks have watched them for any– any sign of crookedness.

anything is enough.

(reese fights, when lilo is taken away. stitch does not. stitch is too afraid. stitch watches reese’s frontal and sphenoid and temporal bones scatter along the white white floor and is always so afraid.)

(reese is the bravest brother stitch has ever known.)

there is only him left.

(he is not safe.)

he is a good soldier. he does not flinch. he does not chew, except for food. he watches and is watched and he is a good soldier. a good soldier. a good soldier. the fear seeps into his bones and he is a good soldier. they patch him in for medic training like fractal always said they would and he is good at that as well. he is a good medic. a good soldier. he is good at what they ask him to be good at. he does not know how to be anything else. he cannot afford to be anything else.

(stitch was named for the skill in his steady hands. he does not feel very steady at all.)

a jedi comes. shaak ti.

stitch hears that troopers do not get decommissioned anymore.

stitch does not believe this.

he cannot believe this. it could be a trap.

(he does not remember how not to be afraid anymore.)

they tell him he is being sent to the 212th.

the 212th is new. the 212th is confusing. the 212th is not safe.

they use their names, here. not numbers. the chief medical officer introduces himself as helix. his second, as needle.

they are good names.

they ask stitch for his.

“ct-4181, sirs,” he says.

(the fear in his bones sings traptraptrap .)

they say that he doesn’t have to do that here.

stitch says, again, “ct-4181, sirs.”

(he is so afraid.)

helix and needle look at each other.

“okay, ‘81,” needle says, and stitch– stitch doesn’t flinch, not at all, but helix is watching him and watching him and watching him.

they get him set up. he settles in.

he meets the general.

the general is a good one, they tell him. he sent shaak ti to kamino. he found out about the decommissioning. he stopped it.

this is what stitch finds out about the general:

he is a terror on the battlefield. he is worn ragged around the edges. he likes tea and tolerates caff. he doesn’t like the medbay but he likes the medics as long as they don’t try to be medics at him. he is impossibly gentle.

(he carries them home, and they do the same for him, when the lightning comes for him.)

he is ct-4181 and stitch in secret, and he carries all the names on his breastplate, and things are (not safe) better.

then he wakes up in the medbay.

then he looks to his right and sees his armor piled up neatly beside his bed.

then needle comes in, and says, “that blow knocked you flat, huh?”

then needle says, “i’m glad you’re okay, '81.”

then needle says, “i cleaned your armor for you.”

then stitch picks up the breastplate and flips it over and–

and–

“–close the door and help me with him–”

“–swear i didn’t see anything, you think i would have–?”

“–anyone asks, I’m working, keep everyone out of the office–”

when stitch blinks back into himself, he’s under the desk in helix’s office.

the names are gone.

all the names are–

“hey,” helix says, quiet and gentle, “it’s just me. only me. you’re okay.”

stitch shakes his head.

the names are gone.

all that’s left of them and they’re–

“'81, what happened? needle’s an idiot, if he did something–”

stitch is so afraid–

but he is also very tired.

and helix– helix has been nothing but kind.

(he doesn’t want to go back to kamino.)

“the names are gone,” he croaks. “the names are gone.”

helix is not like the long-necks, when he looks at him.

“needle said he didn’t see anything,” helix says.

he’s so gentle. so gentle.

(he doesn’t want to go back to kamino.)

stitch shakes his head.

“i didn’t carve them. that’s against the rules. i just traced them. with my– just. with a fingernail. and i did it enough so i could– i could still see it. but only because i knew they were there. so it was safe. and now they’re–”

he hiccups.

“i’m sorry,” he says.

(he doesn’t want to go back to kamino.)

“i’m sorry,” he repeats, and then he starts to cry.

he feels a hand on his shoulder, and shudders all over, and leans forward. helix catches him, pulls him into a proper hug, and–

it has been a very long time since stitch was hugged.

fractal was the last one. fractal had given him a hug and his name and his luck and then he was gone.

blue and combo didn’t like hugs.

then they were gone too, and it didn’t matter anymore.

helix hugs him, pulling him close, rocking him, and stitch is getting snot and tears all over his blacks but helix doesn’t seem to care and stitch is tired so he lets helix hug him, and when he blinks needle is there too, his expression cracking open, saying i’m sorry '81 i’m sorry i should have asked, and helix says–

tell us. tell us the names, and we’ll remember them, so they won’t go forgotten.

stitch tells them.

eleven names, in total.

(one batch is a dozen troopers.)

they don’t ask any questions.

instead, they hold a remembrance of their own, crowded together under helix’s desk.

needle says, “you need a bigger desk.”

helix says, “my desk is perfectly fine, i just need you out from under it.”

and this is when it clicks for stitch–

they aren’t being cruel.

they never were.

it’s just– teasing.

jokes.

“my name’s stitch.”

he doesn’t even realize he’s said it, at first.

he knows only that he doesn’t want to be remembered as ct-4181.

he wants someone to remember his name.

“stitch,” needle says, testing it, and then he grins, bright and proud. “a good name for a medic.”

“that’s what fractal said,” stitch admits, and helix’s grip tightens.

“easier to say than '81, anyways,” needle says.

“for you, maybe,” helix says, not missing a beat. “a whole three syllables, what a struggle–”

so.

they are helix-and-needle-and-stitch.

needle doesn't mind when stitch taps too much on his vambrace. sometimes he hums along. stitch starts keeping a pen behind his ear and helix tells him it’s a good idea and tucks one into his ponytail. helix is always free with his hugs and when stitch hugs needle for the first time needle doesn’t stop smiling for three days. they sit on the floor to do paperwork and clean their armor together and sometimes they talk and sometimes they don’t.

stitch has always been a good medic. 

now he wants to be one.

they are at war, but stitch is the safest he has ever been.

(And bit by bit, Stitch learns how to be big.)

Chapter Text

It starts like this.

Helix has been awake for fifty-three hours.

Laviod had been a disaster. Bad intelligence. Outnumbered fifty to one, and they’d nearly gotten caught in a pincer, but the General had dove deep into the lightning and carved cracks into the dead earth before them that swallowed waves of clankers whole, and they’d made it– barely, but they’d made it– and it had taken nearly four hours to pull him back from that one, and when Helix had not been changing bandages and palpating swollen abdomens and shining a pencil light into uneven pupils he had been pacing and pacing and pacing and Stitch and Needle had been trading off sleep shifts and at hour forty-eight Needle had declared that enough was enough and had gradually swapped Helix’s stims out for weaker and weaker ones to avoid throwing him into cardiac arrest and now they’re back on the Negotiator in the depths of hyperspace and Helix is finally, finally sagging at his desk.

He blinks blearily at the datapad in front of him, scowling.

Stitch peers over his shoulder. The magnification is so high there’s barely two words on the screen.

“That’s not normal,” he says helpfully.

Helix mutters something unintelligible.

“Helix,” Stitch tries, “maybe you should go to bed?”

“‘m fine.”

“You most certainly are not,” Needle says cheerfully, materializing next to the desk. 

“Am too.”

“Are not.”

“Am too.”

“Are too.”

“Am n– I am not playing this game with you.”

Needle raises his hands in surrender, grinning, and takes three large steps backwards until he hits the other wall. “I’ll make you a deal, boss. Make it to me without stumbling, and both me and Stitch will wait until you pass out to dump your lifeless corpse on a bed. We’ll even tuck you in. Stumble, and it’s bedtime for you.”

Helix jabs a finger in Needle’s direction. 

(Stitch assumes this is his intention, at least. The finger ends up pointing eight inches to the right of where Needle has positioned himself. This is not a mark in his favor.)

“Stumbling is not a decisive indicator.”

“Fine,” Needle amends easily. “Stumble, and lie down for ten minutes. Sleeping doesn’t have to come into play.”

Helix sighs.

“You’ll go away afterwards?”

Needle beams at him, undaunted. 

“Cross my heart.”

Stitch shuffles carefully next to him as Helix, glaring balefully, rises to his feet.

“Fine.”

One, two, three long strides forward, and Helix and Needle are standing toe to toe, one of them grinning, unfaltering, the other drawing himself up to his full height, scowl darkening–

Then, finally, he begins to fold forward.

Needle catches him easily.

A quiet, muffled grumble–

“You messed with my stims.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Needle says, winking over Helix’s shoulder, and Stitch grins back. 

He is officially part of a Plot.

It’s a nice feeling.

“Get some rest, Helix,” Needle says gently, easing his arm over his shoulder, and Stitch ducks forward and wraps an arm around his waist. “We can handle things.”

Very quietly–

“M’ head hurts.”

“I bet,” Needle says, his voice softening. “You’ve had twelve stims in the last forty-eight hours.”

Helix’s shoulders slump, and his next words are nearly a whine– so wildly out of character that Stitch nearly trips over his own feet.

“Really hurts, Needle.”

“I checked you for a head injury when you hit thirty hours upright,” Needle says patiently, steering him towards a secluded corner of the medbay. “Stitch will grab you some painkillers once you lie down.”

“Send me for reconditioning,” Helix suggests sulkily. “Should get rid of it.”

Stitch knows this is a joke. He is getting better at recognizing those.

But then he sees:

The lines around Needle’s eyes tighten.

Just a little bit. Just for a moment.

Then he grins. Says, “Helix, believe me, it’s not worth the effort of pulling yourself back together again.”

And the tightness is gone. Just like that.

Helix tucks his face against Needle’s shoulder and grumbles something incomprehensible.

Needle laughs and plants a smacking kiss on Helix’s forehead, neatly dodging the clumsy attempt at a swat that follows. “My charm and charisma render me undefeatable,” he says cheerfully. “Come on. Into bed with you.”

They get him into bed. Needle sends Stitch off for painkillers while he strips Helix of his boots and armor with practiced hands. 

When he gets back, Helix is already asleep, and Needle is tucking the blanket around his shoulders.

Stitch sets the painkillers on the table next to the bed, feeling suddenly uncertain.

Then Needle smiles at him– Needle does a lot of that, he’s always smiling and meaning it and Stitch loves him for it– and drops a hand on his shoulder.

“Thanks, Stitch,” he says quietly. “And when’s the last time you slept, hm?”

“Twenty-two hours ago,” Stitch replies promptly, and the hand on his shoulder squeezes.

“Off to bed with you, then,” Needle says, and, very suddenly, Stitch is too tired to argue.

He clambers up next to Helix and tucks himself against his side, curling into a ball.

After a moment, he hears a sleepy snuffle, and an arm curls over his shoulder.

It’s very easy to doze off, after that.

He drifts back to waking only once– to the feeling of a blanket being draped over him, nimble fingers tucking the edges in neatly, a gentle hand pressed to his forehead.

It’s nice.

Needle is nice.

(The way his eyes had gone– all flat, for a moment–)

Stitch ponders this sequence of events over the next few weeks, in every spare moment he has. He chews on it in his own careful, methodical way, turning it over and examining it carefully from every angle:

First. The tight eyes.

What that could have meant:

1. Needle does not like the thought of Helix getting reconditioned. This is fair. Stitch does not like the thought either. 
2. Needle has lost a batchmate to reconditioning, and Helix’s crack had brought up bad memories. This is also fair. Stitch does not have any more batchmates to lose to reconditioning, but he has heard– it can be terribly, terribly difficult, watching a stranger stare at you through eyes that used to hold someone that you loved dearly. To watch them rebuild themselves. To watch them pick a new name. 
3. Needle was reconditioned himself. 

Stitch does not like this last assumption.

He really doesn’t like it.

He knows, before the long-necks had refined their process, that reconditioning was as good as decommissioning. Just because it was slower didn’t mean it was any less effective.

Stitch thinks of Needle being not Needle anymore, smile gone, face slack, eyes empty– thinks of folding a limp hand between his, of telling stories to an empty shell, of trying to pull back someone that’s already long gone–

Then he very carefully stops thinking about it.

So. Evidence in favor of point three:

1. Needle had said it’s not worth the effort. If he had meant that it wasn’t worth the effort of filing the paperwork, he would have specified. But he’d just said it. The only thing he could be referring to would be the act of being–
2. Needle had said believe me. If he had just been supposing– theorizing– then he wouldn’t have claimed that level of ownership. That suggests– a level of experience–
3. Sometimes, Stitch has to call Needle’s name three or four times before he looks up.
4. Sometimes, Stitch sees Needle’s shoulders relax disproportionately when Helix tells him he did a good job. Compliments from Helix make Stitch feel warm, but he thinks they make Needle feel relieved.

Stitch pauses and considers this last point.

There is an implication there that he cannot quite identify, but it leaves an acid taste in the back of his throat.

So.

Whether or not he likes the assumption– the conclusion– is irrelevant, as much as he wishes it wasn’t.

It– it seems to be the most likely one.

So. Next question. What does he do about it?

1. Nothing. The reconditioning– it would have already happened, after all, if he's right. And Needle is Needle is Needle, now, and even if he seems a little– off, sometimes, there’s not much Stitch can do about it. But he had done a whole lot of nothing on Kamino, and the thought of doing nothing again does not sit easily with him.
2. Talk to Helix. This is– he doesn’t know, after all, not for sure. He is drawing conclusions based on the best available evidence, like he’s supposed to. But he would like to know for certain before he acts. And Helix would– he’d probably know, right? They’d been a team for a while before Stitch came in, and Stitch has the distinct sense that Helix knows everything.
   
   (But– what if he doesn’t? If he doesn’t know, then that would mean Needle hadn’t told him, and that would mean that Stitch would be telling Helix something Needle didn’t want him to know, and that would not be right.)
3. Talk to Needle.

Stitch considers this.

Reconditioning is painful for everyone involved, he knows. For the victim. For the batchmates who loved who you were. 

There is a thing you say to a brother who has to rebuild himself anew. An acknowledgement of grief, of loss, a release of the burden of replacement:

I would not trade you now for anything.

Should he–?

He’s not Needle’s batchmate.

But he likes Needle.

Needle helps him carve out space for more rules– his own rules, this time. Helps him expand fit to fight into healthy. Helps him reorient himself to his own framework instead of hierarchy.

Needle sings to himself when he thinks no one else is listening. Needle is very good at sabacc and uses his winnings to buy pudding cups for the medbay. Needle tells terrible jokes and nearly laughs himself sick. Needle folds scraps of flimsi into tiny swans and tucks them into out-of-the-way crevices in the medbay, and Stitch tucks each one that he finds into a pouch on his utility belt, and Helix sometimes grumbles and grouches but Stitch had found a dozen of the little folded birds lined up neatly inside one of his desk drawers.

They are Helix-and-Needle-and-Stitch and they are not batchmates, but– that counts for something, right?

Maybe–

Maybe.

Chapter Text

Helix is in a terrible, terrible mood.

His order of stims got misdirected to the 501st and Kix is refusing to give them back.

His arm hurts.

The shelving in the secondary supply closet collapsed onto his foot.

His arm really hurts.

The cast itches, bacta-infused or not.

And as if all that weren’t enough, his arm still fucking hurts.

He slams his datapad onto his desk hard enough to hear the screen crack and bites back a scream of frustration. 

A knock on the door sounds.

“Go away.”

“That was a courtesy knock only,” Needle says cheerfully, peering round the door, and Helix drops his head onto his desk. “I wouldn’t have to interrupt you if you’d remember to take your painkillers, you know.”

Something clatters in a cup, and footsteps move up to the desk. 

“You’re nearly four hours past your last dose running out. I bet your arm hurts like hell, doesn’t it?”

Four hours?

Shit.

He’s right, but that doesn’t mean Helix has to tell him that. 

“When did you turn into a mother hen?” he grumbles, sitting up at last and tossing back the proffered pills.

A beat of silence, and Helix cringes, because he knows–

Needle sighs, cracking open a hydropack and pushing it into Helix’s hands. “Drink.”

He does.

“You scared the hell out of both of us,” Needle says quietly. “Stitch cried. I think I’m allowed to mother-hen for a bit.” 

He draws up a chair and kicks his feet up onto the desk, grinning when Helix tries and fails to shove them off.

“What’ve you got in those boots, rocks?”

Needle waggles his eyebrows. “Pure charisma, boss. All the rocks are in my head.”

Helix will not laugh. He won’t.

But Needle grins anyway as he leans back in his chair, bright and self-satisfied. 

“Anyways,” he drawls, “the Commander put me on KP duty again, and I don’t know why.”

“Really.”

“Don’t look at me like that, I mean it this time,” Needle says indignantly. “I just overheard him and the General talking about this museum, it’s– natural history, I think?– and then Kenobi said–” 

He affects a Coruscanti accent, shifts his weight, raises a hand to his chin, and despite himself, Helix feels his lips twitch upwards at the shockingly accurate imitation– 

“I can take you some time, if you’d like, and I just asked if it was an open invitation, because it sounded interesting and I was bored, and he said yes, of course, and then he said we could go tomorrow afternoon, and then ten minutes later I got a message from the Commander–”

He pauses for breath, and shoves his datapad under Helix’s nose–

“Telling me I had KP duty for the next three rotations!”

Helix blinks, and the blur on the screen resolves itself into words.

The message is characteristically terse, revealing nothing–

But.

“You really don’t know why?”

“Should I?”

A smirk blooms across his face. “Think about it. It’ll come to you.”

He picks up his own pad, the display still functional despite the shattered screen, and taps out a message.

pHzero-helix212: you cannot put my medic on kp duty

mccody: i am the marshall commander

mccody: i most certainly can

pHzero-helix212: we’re already understaffed

mccody: we are on leave

pHzero-helix212: pissy because he accidentally cockblocked you?

Radio silence.

He looks up at the sound of a thud to see Needle’s head resting on the table.

“Helix,” a muffled voice groans, “tell me I didn’t–”

“I won’t, then,” Helix says, feeling more cheerful than he has in a week. “Sounds like you’ve figured it out, anyways.”

An incoherent burst of grumbling is his only response.

The datapad in his hand buzzes, and, grinning, Helix glances back down.

mccody: he no longer has kp duty.

pHzero-helix212: thank you.

He considers for a moment, and then, for good measure–

pHzero-helix212: :) 

“Got you out of it,” he says. “You’re welcome.”

Needle rolls his head to the side and beams at him.

“Best brother, like I said, light of my life, my darling delight,” he croons. “You’re coming, then?”

“What?”

“To the museum?” Needle asks, sitting up properly now that the looming threat of Terror has been averted. “I thought it’d be good for Stitch, and you know we’ll only convince him if both of us go.”

Hm. Right.

This is Stitch’s first time on Coruscant, and he’s seemed–

Well.

They’d docked yesterday, and as far as Helix knows, he hasn’t left the ship yet.

“Yeah, alright,” he decides.

“Excellent,” Needle declares, looking very pleased with himself. He rearranges his sprawl into something approaching verticality and snags Helix’s datapad. “You. Nap. Fret not, for all will be well by the time you awake! Your datapad repaired, your stims returned to their rightful owner–”

“How did you know about–?”

“I have my sources.”

“Will you stop doing that with your eyebrows?”

“Jealous because I’m eyebrow-dextrous, are we?”

“You’re a brat.”

“That wasn’t a denial–”

“You aren't half as funny as you think you are,” Helix mutters, valiantly fighting off a grin. Ammunition will only fuel him.

Mischief dances in dark eyes. “You’re right. I’m twice as funny.”

Helix throws the empty hydropack at him. Needle catches it easily.

“I mean it, though, if you can,” he says, his voice softening. “Because Stitch trusted you when you said you’d remember your next dose, but I think you got too deep in your own head last night and forgot it, so you lay in bed staring at the ceiling telling yourself that you’re already in bed so it would be a shame to get up and you can go to sleep without it, deliberately ignoring the evidence that was mounting by the second that you couldn’t, so by the time your alarm went off you were in a piss-poor mood and so sleep-deprived you forgot to take your dose again and that made everything worse.”

Helix opens his mouth, but nothing comes out.

Needle squeezes his shoulder, grinning. “But it’s okay. That’s what you got me for. Now, I’m off to perform miracles. Take a nap, boss, we’ve got a field trip tomorrow!”

He’s halfway down the hall before Helix thinks to mutter a thank you.

Probably for the best. He’d hate to have to admit exactly how right he’d been.

Sound advice, though.

And, he realizes suddenly, Needle has neatly made off with his one source of paperwork.

“Bastard,” he says, half-laughing, to the empty room.

He hauls himself to his feet and makes his way out into the medbay, sprawling onto the nearest cot.

He’ll have to remember to thank him tomorrow.

Stitch is fine.

He’s fine. 

He’s really, really fine.

His hand twitches before he forces it down.

He’s a soldier. And a medic. He doesn’t need to–

(But he wants to.)

It’s not even that crowded. 

He would have been fine staying on the ship. 

But then Needle had found him and told him that he and Helix were going to a museum tomorrow, and the General and the Commander and Decker and Waxer and Auks and Crys and Boil and maybe a few others were coming too, and did he want to come–?

And Stitch had found himself agreeing without thinking about it.

And it’s not– it’s not like–

It is interesting.

Auks has already vowed to train an army of Coruscanti pigeons. Trapper’s hair is standing on end from when he’d plastered himself against a sphere of purple lightning, and Wooley keeps waving a hand over his head to get zapped. Stitch thinks he looks like a hedgehog.

He had resolved to keep that to himself at first, but that had lasted approximately six minutes and twenty seconds, because Helix had gotten a very strange look on his face when they reached the planetarium that made something in Stitch’s chest twist uncomfortably, so he’d tugged gently on his good arm and told him what he’d thought about Trapper and hedgehogs, and Helix had blinked at him, and then he’d smiled, properly this time, so that was– good. 

Better.

Shouting erupts from behind them, and he recoils, nearly stumbling backwards into Needle–

But it’s just– people. A group of– students? Maybe? Loud and boisterous, hustling by them, and Stitch reaches again, instinctively, before stopping himself–

Then a hand wraps around his own and squeezes.

“Is this alright?” Needle asks, grinning at him. “A bit worried about getting lost, not gonna lie.”

Oh. Yes. Okay. If Needle’s nervous–

He nods, and then, belatedly, squeezes back.

The General hums, peering into the hall they’d been about to move into. “That one’s a bit crowded. I may have a better idea.” He grins, clapping his hands together, and turns to the left. “This one’s always been my favorite, anyway. Have any of you heard of terrasaurs?”

“We watched that one holo with the raptors,” Decker offers. “Those were terrasaurs, right?”

Whatever is said next, Stitch doesn’t hear, because they’ve entered the hall and–

And–

Oh.

Oh.

They’re amazing.

“Excuse me, sir?”

“Yes, Stitch?”

“Why would the diplodocus have needed longer vertebrae?”

“I’m… not quite sure. Does it say what it ate? Maybe that’ll provide a–”

“Excuse me, sir?”

“Yes, Stitch?”

“How strong is gravity on Coruscant? Do you think that would have affected growth?”

“I–”

“Oh, how big do you think they would’ve grown on Liopot–?”

“Excuse me, sir?”

“Yes, Stitch?”

“Do you know what shape teeth the camarasaurus had? The sign says the diplodocus had– had peg-like teeth at the front of its mouth to strip leaves off of branches, but the camarasaurus display doesn’t say anything, and I– I–”

“Would you like to find out?”

“Yes, please!”

“Helix!”

Helix turns around at the sound of his name, scanning the room–

“Up here!”

Oh, for fuck’s sake–

Stitch is bobbing nearly thirty feet in the air, next to a skull that’s bigger than he is.

“It’s got spoon-shaped teeth, Helix!”

“What?”

“Spoon-shaped teeth! For cropping plants!”

“Climb in the mouth!” Crys hollers, to a chorus of agreement. Helix sees Stitch give the skull next to him a considering look and pinches the bridge of his nose.

“Do not climb into the mouth, Stitch!”

“Okay, Helix!”

“Aw, Helix,” Needle mutters next to him, his lips twitching, “you’re no fun.”

Helix elbows him.

“Ready to come down?” the General asks, grinning, and oh, oh, of course–

“Can I count them first?”

“No rush,” Kenobi says cheerfully.

And Helix drops his head into his free hand and laughs, helplessly, for a moment–

Because he means it. Because Stitch is laughing. Because Needle is next to him with a sunshine grin that’s gone soft around the edges.

Because he’s alive, and so are they.

Stitch is full of bubbles.

Well. Not really. That would kill him. 

But he feels like it. In a good way. All– all light, and fizzy, and almost– unfurling, because Waxer had called him over to look at fossilized blood vessels in a stegosaurus’s plates and had asked what he thought they were for, because he wasn’t a medic and he didn’t know, and Stitch had suggested maybe for temperature regulation, because they were reptiles and cold-blooded, and Waxer had nodded and told him that made sense–

And then Longshot had asked him what he thought of the raptors, and Stitch had considered this and concluded that the diplodocus was still better, and Longshot had said but imagine if you were riding a raptor, and Stitch had said but a blaster bolt could still hit you, and Longshot had countered that they’d be moving fast, but Stitch had said that he would be out of reach entirely on a diplodocus, and Longshot had paused for a moment and then told him that he’d convinced him–

And then Gearshift had gestured to an ankylosaurus and said imagine having armor like that, and Stitch had said it looked like a tank, and Gearshift had agreed and said that they should mock up one of the walkers and maybe Stitch would like to help him with the paint job when he’s free, and Stitch had decided that he would like that very much–

And then things had gotten– a bit loud. 

Not too loud. 

But maybe– close. 

So Stitch had carefully removed himself from the middle of things before it did become too loud, and he’d found a display in the corner to occupy himself with until the buzzing feeling went away, and then it did go away but Stitch had stayed in the corner because the cyanosaur isn’t a sauropod but he’s finding that he likes it very much anyway and there’s a lot to read.

Someone crouches down next to him.

“You know,” Needle says, “this one kinda reminds me of you.”

Stitch brightens. “Really?”

“Oh, for sure, look at him!”

“How?” he asks, scanning the display text. He doesn’t eat bugs– well, he doesn’t choose to. And he doesn’t hunt small animals and shred them. And he doesn’t have four arms or retractable spines, as much as he might want to.  And he doesn’t–

“Small and cute,” Needle croons, ruffling his hair as he unfolds himself. “I can see the resemblance.”

Stitch sticks his tongue out, and Needle cackles, backing off obligingly.

He returns to the display panel outlining theories on the cyanosaur’s social habits–

Then he pauses, and looks back at Needle.

His older brother is facing away from him, humming under his breath as he examines a display on prehistoric millipedes.

Stitch eyes his back consideringly.

(Well. The cyanosaur is a ferocious predator, after all.)

Helix jerks at the shout from where he’s staring up at a hanging pteranodon, pivoting on his heel only to see Needle, staggering dramatically past him with a giggling Stitch clinging to his back like a Kowakian monkey-lizard.

“Help,” he wheezes, his eyes glittering with laughter– “Helix, help, I’m getting eaten alive by a cytanosaur–”

“Cyanosaur,” Stitch corrects, resting his chin on Needle’s shoulder. He beams, and Helix, his lips twitching upwards, offers him a little wave.

“Right, that– like I said, getting devoured whole–”

“They actually tore their prey into pieces, did you see–?”

“Correction, I’m being shredded to bits– the blood loss is getting to me, Helix, I require immediate medical assistance–”

“Sorry,” Helix deadpans, gesturing to his cast. “I’m horribly injured myself, actually.”

“Abandoned by my own brothers in my hour of need,” Needle groans. “Can’t trust anyone.”

“You can trust me,” Stitch pipes up.

“Oh, I know that,” Needle says, grinning, and hitches Stitch a little further up on his back. “Wanna go see that guy? The one with the frill? Ten credits says Decker will try and modify his bucket to match.”

“I don’t have ten credits.”

“In spirit, then.”

“Okay,” Stitch agrees cheerfully, and the two of them are off again.

Helix rocks back on his heels, grinning helplessly as he watches Needle and his laughing backpack weave their way through the crowd. 

He should’ve known, really.

Someone steps up behind him.

“You’re a soft touch,” Cody says, his smirk audible.

“You think I’ll hesitate to tell the entire battalion why you tried to put Needle on KP duty?” Helix says, not looking around. “Try me.”

“I don't know what you're talking about."

“Deleting the chat won't save you.”

Cody huffs a laugh, moving forward to stand next to him.

From the other end of the hall, he hears–

“–the third horn for?”

“Good question,” says a new voice, and the crowd shifts enough for Helix to catch sight of a grinning Kenobi. “As far as I know, no one knows for certain. But it would have been useless in a fight– it’s made of keratin, just like–”

“Fingernails?”

“Oh, I should’ve known a medic would know that, well done. Anyone have any guesses?”

Helix glances sideways.

Cody’s very good at maintaining a poker face. 

Just not good enough.

“Well,” he says, smirking, “you sure know how to pick them, I’ll give you that.”

Excellent timing. Cody chokes on his next inhale, and Helix, laughing, breaks into a jog towards the group gathered around the three-horned skeleton. 

A soft touch. 

Well.

Stitch catches sight of his approach, lights up, nudges Needle– Needle looks up, grinning, and raises a hand–

Warmth blooms in his chest.

He’s kind of impressed he’s managed to keep it.

Sometimes, Needle knows, he can be a bit annoying.

Too loud. Too brash. Too funny in not-funny ways.

But then again, sometimes, he can be brilliant.

And when he sees the sign for the gift shop, he knows– 

This is a brilliant moment.

He slows, dropping towards the back of the group, just a foot behind, then two, then five, and turns–

“Needle?”

Damn.

He pivots. “All right, Stitch?”

“Where’re you going?”

Double damn.

“Just going to hit the fresher while we’re here.”

“Oh,” Stitch says, relaxing. “We won’t leave without you.”

Triple damn.

“Knew I could count on you, Stitch,” he says, and the kid beams at him. “Be back in a minute.”

He peels off, makes his way back around the corner, glances around– 

Aha.

A gaggle of Drovians are making their way towards the exit, and Needle falls into step on their right, ducking his head, watching as they move forward, passing the ticket stand, the bubblers, and– now–

He’s safe behind shelving in the gift shop before the group clears the entrance.

I’m so good.

He grants himself half a second to bask in the effectiveness of his evasive maneuvers before turning his attention to the shop.

Right. Mission.

He’d won ten credits off Waxer during a sabacc game on their way back to Coruscant, and had been planning on getting some of those jellies that Helix will never in a million years admit to liking–

But.

Waxer's overconfident anyway. He'll have more in hand in a week.

He plucks a stuffed terrasaur off the shelf– one of the long-necked ones that had earned Stitch’s uncomplicated adoration– and checks the tag–

Oof. 

Next time.

Books, maybe, might be cheaper? He picks up a full-color encyclopedia, flips through the pages– oh, he can just imagine Stitch’s face, yes, this would be–

Then he sees the sticker on the front.

Ah. Okay. 

He replaces the book gingerly, scanning the shelves.

Someone coughs behind him.

“If you are not planning on purchasing it,” a voice says archly, “please refrain from handling it.”

Needle turns. The man behind the counter– tall, skinny, sour-faced– is eyeing him suspiciously.

He offers up a smile his brothers have reliably informed him is disarming.

“Sorry, sir,” he says. “Just trying to find something for my brother. I’ll be careful.”

When he turns back to the shelves, he can feel the old man’s gaze boring a hole into the back of his head, and makes a face seen only by the stuffed raptor in front of him. 

Right. Move along. Time’s running out.

Backpack? Hell, that’s worse than the encyclopedia. The mug seems promising at first, but no, that too– and Needle nearly coos when he catches sight of the hoodie with the fabric stegosaurus spines, but he doesn’t bother to check the tag on that, and besides– he eyes it carefully, assessing, calculating– yeah, he’s pretty sure he can recreate that, if he has the time, it’ll be something to occupy him on hyperspace jumps–

And then.

Finally.

Stickers. 

And two for ten credits, too. 

They have nearly two dozen on offer, and he scans the rack, the timer in his head counting down– he’s hit three minutes already, and if someone thinks to go looking for him then they’ll figure out real fast he’s not where he’d told them he was going, and that’ll start off a whole clusterfuck and his surprise will be ruined–

Ah. There. Perfect.

He can’t identify the terrasaur on sight, but he’s pretty sure Stitch will– it’s one of the long-necked ones, the– superpods? Sourpans?

Saucepans, he thinks suddenly, and grins at the wall.

Anyway, it’s perfect, and then, on the next shelf down– a cyanosaur. The one Stitch had been looking at, the expression on his face mirroring the model’s look of fierce concentration with such accuracy that Needle hadn’t been able to stop himself from snapping a holo before interrupting–

Excellent. 

Prizes in hand, he makes his way up to the counter, meeting the accusatory glare with a winning smile.

“Hello, sir,” he says cheerfully, rummaging in his belt pouch. “Two stickers, please.”

A sniff is his only response. Well. That’s alright. He’s worked with less.

“A wonderful museum you’ve got here, sir,” he continues, stacking his credits carefully on the counter. “My brother loved the terrasaurs, it was the most I’d seen him talk in–”

“Where did you get these credits?”

Oh. Oh.

This is that sort of natborn.

He adjusts in less than half a second. Soften the tone, soften the eyes, soften the stance. Drop the shoulders, bow the head. Agree, agree, agree, and make it out unscathed. 

Don’t argue. Definitely don’t argue.

His smile doesn’t change. Doesn’t falter. 

Give him no fear.

“Won them off a brother in a game of sabacc, sir.”

“And where did he get them?”

Give him no cause.

“I couldn’t tell you for sure, sir, but– sometimes we meet civilians who give us– gifts, after a tough battle. Maybe from one of them.”

“Hm.”

Give him no reason.

Breathe it out. Shake it off. Like water off a duck’s back.

He says nothing.

Already, plans are shifting in the back of his mind, thinking– they’ve got labels, plenty of those, he could cut a couple of those into stickers, and it wouldn’t be the same, but at least Stitch would probably still–

But it looks like the profit motive wins out.

The man– Brian, his tag says– scans the stickers and pushes them back towards him, and Needle waits until the credits are scooped into a pale hand before picking them up and tucking them carefully into a side pocket on his bag.

“Thank you, sir,” he says politely– still smiling, always smiling– and turns to go–

Something catches his eye.

A sheaf of fliers to the left of the register advertises a docent program in the museum’s paleontology unit. Docent– he squints, sees something about conducting guided tours, and reaches for one–

A spidery hand closes over the top of the stack.

“I’m sorry,” Brian says, not sounding very sorry at all, “but these programs are open to Republic citizens only.”

Don’t argue. Don’t argue. Don’t argue. You don’t fucking argue with natborns–

But.

The way Stitch had lit up– blooming like a sunflower–

He recalculates in an instant and pulls one out from the bottom instead, tucking it behind his breastplate. Brian’s expression twists, and he opens his mouth–

“Well,” Needle says. Quietly. Cheerfully. “The war’ll be over someday, right?”

And then. And then, maybe, maybe–

He snags his receipt off the counter– better safe than sorry– and makes his way toward the door before Brian thinks to call security on him.

Brush it off. Brush it off. It’s not worth it, it’s not–

“Fresher, huh?”

Shit.

He’s too slow to rearrange his expression, and Helix’s stern look melts away as soon as he makes eye contact.

“Needle?”

He jerks his head toward the door, and Helix falls into step next to him.

“Asked me where I got my credits,” he mutters, once they’re out of earshot. “You know what they’re like.”

A beat of silence–

Then a hand lands on his shoulder and squeezes.

“I’m fine,” he adds belatedly, and offers him a grin that doesn’t sit quite right.

Helix exhales, long and slow. 

“I know you are,” he says quietly. “Come on. Let’s catch up to the others.”

Later:

Ace has a very ominous look on his face when he places his drink on the table, and Helix sighs.

His brother had asked to meet up, had promised him a drink on his tab, and, well, they hadn’t seen each other since that last supply transfer in the Tarraba sector nearly six months ago. So he’d peeled off from the group as they made their way back to the Negotiator, telling Needle and Stitch that he’d see them in a few hours–

Now he’s regretting it.

That expression means that there’s something serious he wants to bring up. 

“You could have at least done me the favor of letting me stay sober,” he mutters. “What is it?”

Ace leans forward and folds his hands on the table.

“I heard there was a crooked kid who made it out,” he says bluntly. “True or false?”

Helix gapes at him. Apparently, his silence is enough of an answer for Ace, who takes another swig of his drink. “Your new medic?”

“Is it important?”

“Don’t look at me like that.”

“How’d you know?”

“Helix–”

“Who told you?”

“Helix, I’m not a long-neck–”

“Ace.”

Ace eyes him for a moment, then sighs. “Fuse spilled when we got drunk on Eriadu. We were doing remembrances, and he added– he had a crooked brother that got caught pretty early on. Nitro. And then he mentioned a kid he got paired with in demolitions drills. 4181. He thought he might be–” he gestures, slashing a hand through the air– “too, and he tried to help him– he was a quick study, it sounded like, knew what he was doing– but he wouldn’t say his name, and Fuse didn’t see him again after that unit was over. He assumed– so we added him to the list. But I thought the number sounded familiar.”

He leans back in his chair. 

“It is your new medic, isn’t it?”

“And if he was?”

“Helix.”

“Out with it.”

“I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

“You need me to say it?”

He’s so infuriatingly calm. Helix briefly considers the merits of decking him, and shelves the notion for later consideration.

“I’m fine.”

Ace raises an eyebrow.

“He’s brilliant,” Helix says, feeling like he needs to defend him and hating it. “He knows what he’s doing. Caught a pancreatic bleed in Trapper that I missed. Told us his name, too. Stitch. He’s a smart kid, Ace.”

Ace nods. “He’d have to be, to make it out.”

He’s missing something. There’s something in Ace’s voice, in his eyes–

Helix takes a gulp from his neglected glass. Hell, he can’t even remember what he ordered. It just– burns.

“What’s your point, Ace?”

Ace heaves a sigh and downs the rest of his drink. “Crooked doesn’t survive, Helix.”

“He did.”

“How?”

“That’s his story to tell.”

“Or to lie– Helix, listen.” He leans forward, seizing Helix’s arm from where he’d jerked halfway to his feet and dragging him back down. “Mimic had all of us looking out for him, and he still got caught. Same with Twig. And Dystro and Rollback had a batcher– I don’t know his name, but he still– and you’re telling me this kid’s whole batch got picked off except for him? That doesn’t strike you as the slightest bit suspicious? You know about Slick same as I do–”

“You think he made a deal with the Seppies–?”

“They aren’t the only enemy, Helix! Come on, we both know crooked doesn’t make it out! I’m not saying he’s a traitor, just that– maybe the long-necks are using him, maybe he made a deal for survival and there’s– there’s something you don’t know. He might’ve just been lucky– gods, I hope he was, but– listen, I just want you to be careful–”

Helix doesn’t know what expression is on his face, but whatever it is, it’s enough to make Ace drop his hand.

“Helix,” he tries, more conciliatory this time.

(Stitch, tap-tap-tapping on his vambraces, sitting on his hands whenever Helix walks in–)

“This is why I asked, right?”

(Stitch, folding forward, heaving sobs tearing through him like a dam giving way–)

“I didn’t want what happened to Mimic to blind you to something else–”

(Stitch, becoming Stitch–)

“Mimic did not have all of us looking out for him,” Helix hears himself say, from somewhere far away. “He had me.”

“Oh, don’t act like you– I helped–”

“You helped for my sake, not for his–”

“At least I did,” Ace snaps. “And it still wasn’t enough. So you better hope he made a deal, Helix, because if not–”

“Oh, fuck you–”

“I’ll keep him on the list, then?” 

The words land with a sniper’s precision.

Helix stares at him.

Ace closes his eyes. 

“I’m sorry,” he says. “I shouldn’t have said that.”

I shouldn’t have said that. 

Not I didn’t mean it.

Not that was stupid.

Just–

I shouldn’t have said that.

“Do what you want,” Helix hisses. “But I’ll see him through.”

He slams his glass onto the table and rises to his feet.

“Thanks for the drink.”

He’s shaking with rage by the time he makes it back to the Negotiator. 

His comm had started buzzing less than ten minutes after he’d left 79’s.

This is what they do, after all. Tempers rise. Words are said that should have maybe remained unspoken. There are some types of anger only a batcher can take the brunt of. And normally– normally, Helix would have replied already. Just to let him know he’s okay, that they’re okay, because they don’t hold onto words said like that–

But this–

Ace had gone too far.

And Helix thinks he knows it, too, and that’s why his comm still hasn’t stopped buzzing.

Mimic. 

Mimic, Mimic, Mimic–

"Mimic had all of us looking out for him–"

Helix scoffs, stalking down the empty hallway.

Sure.

None of them had thought he could make it out. 

Not really.

Helix had been the only one who'd bothered to believe in him, and the worst thing– the worst thing was that Mimic knew. 

He'd get this– look in his eyes, sometimes. This quiet, hollow resignation. He’d go all small and silent and still, and the stillness was the worst of it, because he was never still, he didn’t like to be still– so full of life he was nearly bursting with it, forced down into the promise of a future–

(And Helix would pull him into a hug, those times, tucking him under his chin, and tell him stories– promising, promising, promising–)

He scrubs a hand roughly across his face.

Ace had helped. That’s true. They all did. 

But the rest of his batch helped only because it was what you did for a brother.

And Ace had only helped– really helped, more than any of them– because it was Helix asking.

(There’s a reason why Ace is the only one of them he still talks to.)

They hadn’t believed in him. Not like he had. 

(Maybe, if they had– maybe–)

Helix shakes his head reflexively. No. That’s a dangerous path to go down.

He takes a deep breath and lets it go in a slow whistle from between clenched teeth.

Ace is steady and solid as a rock. He doesn’t make bad judgment calls. Not as bad as that. 

So.

He picks up his comm.

“I’m sorry,” Ace says immediately, sounding ragged. “Helix, I–”

“What happened?”

Silence.

Helix leans against the wall. 

He’s got time. And he knows that sometimes, Ace needs it.

“Dystro got hit hard on Tetri,” his brother says at last. “Woke up blind. I– I got scared.”

Right. He knows what that’s like.

“It was just– just swelling, in the brain. Too much pressure on the optic nerve. It was only short-term, went away after a few days, but–”

Helix waits.

“I got scared,” Ace repeats. “And then I– Fuse mentioned ‘81– Stitch, fuck, I’m sorry– and all I could think was– what would you do to keep him safe if you didn’t have a whole batch to protect, Helix? I didn’t want you to get hurt, so I thought– I thought maybe if I could– if he was–”

He stops.

“They don’t do decomms anymore,” Helix says. Reassurance and reminder– for himself as well as Ace, perhaps–

“I know,” Ace says heavily. “I’m sorry.”

He does know. They both do. But that sort of fear–

It becomes a habit, doesn’t it?

Helix slides down against the wall and pokes the comm gently.

“Spiritually,” he informs his brother, “I am flicking you on the forehead. Idiot.”

“I accept that.”

“Like you had a choice.”

A quiet laugh breaks through the static.

“He’ll make it through.” Ace says finally. “They both will. If they’ve got you? How could they do anything else?”

Helix swallows around the lump in his throat.

Oh, don’t say that, he thinks helplessly. Now you’ve gone and given me hope.

A gusty sigh crackles from the comm. 

“We good, Helix?”

“We’re good,” he croaks.

(If his voice cracks, Ace is kind enough not to mention it.)

When the call cuts out, Helix tilts his head back, blinking rapidly at the ceiling.

“If they’ve got you?”

Very suddenly, he desperately needs to see them both.

Right.

He unfolds himself, inhales until he can’t anymore, and makes himself move.

The lights are turned down low when he reaches the medbay, empty as it is. But he can hear excited voices spilling out from the supply closet, light pooling underneath the door. 

Unbidden, tension he hadn’t realized he was holding evaporates.

His office door is cracked open, and when he peers in, he sees a box of stims and his datapad stacked neatly on his desk.

The screen's repaired.

Helix huffs a ragged laugh and runs a hand down his face. 

He really does have the very best, doesn't he?

“How could they do anything else?”

It’s a dangerous thing to promise. Promises can’t be kept, not in wartime, not like this– regardless of how much he tries, how much he’d be willing to give–

(After all, he’d promised Mimic, and that had–)

And yet.

He promises himself, instead.

He promises that they’ll make it out. That they’ll make it through. He doesn’t like to think too much about the future, about what that might hold, but he promises that they’ll have one anyway.

And if he has to break it–

Well.

At least it’ll only be to himself. 

Stitch thinks this has maybe been his best day yet.

1. The museum. The terrasaurs.

2. They’d split from Helix on the way back to the Negotiator, but he’d told them he’d catch up with them in a few hours, which was… not as precise as Stitch would have liked, but it still meant tonight, so that– that was good.

3. He’d held Needle’s hand all the way back, not because he was scared of either of them getting lost, but because he wanted to. And Needle had reached out the first time, so it was only fair that Stitch be the one to reach out the second time. And it had worked, because Needle hadn’t pulled away, so that– that was good too.

4. The whole world seems a bit bigger than it had this morning. And that– that’s best of all.

He drops onto a cot, grinning to himself, and adds another thing to the list:

5. He’d talked about terrasaurs the whole way back, and Needle had listened, and had asked questions, so he’d known he wasn’t annoying him. 

He likes terrasaurs.

“Hey, Needle? Did you see the clefts in the neural spines on the neck vertebrae?”

“You,” Needle says, swinging his bag off his shoulder, “got a bit of a better view than I did. But I’ll take your word for it. You think that’s evidence of the, uh–” he snaps his fingers, searching– “the environmental adaptations?”

Stitch nods decisively. “And the same were on the tail, too! So that–”

He stops.

Because Needle’s opened his bag, and he’s taking out–

A blanket. 

And headphones.

His headphones. The ones the General gave him.

Why does Needle–?

As if reading his mind, Needle glances up at him.

“Just in case,” he says offhandedly, smiling easily. “You seemed a bit nervous, and I thought it might be crowded. I just grabbed them on the way out.”

“Oh,” Stitch says slowly, feeling something warm and brilliant unfurl in his chest.

“I pulled them from the rag bin in the closet. Is that where you always keep them?”

He nods.

He hears Needle humming as he vanishes into the supply closet, and scuffs his feet against the floor, considering.

“Hey, Needle?”

An inquisitive noise emerges from the closet, and, feeling unaccountably nervous, Stitch shuffles in behind him.

“Can you help me paint my armor?”

Needle freezes, crouched over the rag bin, and for one terrible instant Stitch thinks that maybe he’d miscalculated–

But then he rises to his feet and turns around, and all the worries dissolve immediately. 

“Stitch,” Needle says, and his smile is soft like a blanket, soft like sunshine– “I would like that very much.”

So.

They grab two spare sheets and spread them out onto the floor of the supply closet. Needle helps him lay his armor out and disappears to the barracks to fetch some paint, and Stitch turns down the lights in the main medbay (but not off completely, because that’s against protocol), and leaves the door to the supply closet cracked open so Helix will know where they are when he gets back, and then he folds himself onto the floor and stares at his armor and lets the plans take shape– really take shape– in his mind. 

“Okay,” Needle says, settling cross-legged onto the floor with a bucket of paint in one hand and three paintbrushes in the other. “What’s the plan?”

In lieu of answering, Stitch shows him the picture on his datapad.

A slow smile spreads across Needle’s face as he studies it.

“I like it,” he announces at last, and Stitch beams at him. “Knew it reminded me of you. So. How are we doing this?”

“Like this,” Stitch says, and shows him.

This has been his armor for a very long time, but now he’s choosing to make it his.

So they paint it together, the two of them, and Stitch talks and talks and talks more than he ever has. And sometimes he falters, because he really is talking a lot, but then Needle asks him another question and he's off again. And sometimes he stops talking because he feels so full of bubbles that he can't quite get the words out, and he doesn't know how Needle knows the difference, but he does, because he doesn’t ask a question when that happens. He just starts talking himself, about nothing and everything all at once, and sometimes Stitch has to put down his paintbrush because he's laughing so hard, and Needle's laughing too and it's the best thing in the galaxy, better than the museum, better than the terrasaurs–

And bit by bit, each piece is finished and set aside, until they’re both examining the helmet.

Needle leans over Stitch’s shoulder, studying his datapad.

“What if we do the eyes here–?”

Stitch makes a face, and Needle snorts a laugh.

“We could always–”

A knock interrupts them, and Stitch looks up to see Helix peering around the edge of the door, a tired smile etched across his face.

“I hope I’m not interrupting?”

“I think,” Needle says, “you’re just in time.”

“We saved the helmet for you,” Stitch says hopefully, and holds out a paintbrush. 

And because Helix is Stitch’s brother, he takes it.

Eventually– after an enthusiastic debate that ends with all parties splattered with paint and Helix getting purposefully squished between Needle and Stitch in a successful attempt to wring the exhaustion from his smile like a sponge– the job is done.

And the bubbles are back.

Stitch can’t stop grinning. 

It looks good. It looks better than good. It looks great. It looks like his.

“Oh!” Needle bursts out. “Hang on, hang on–” 

He scrambles for his bag, tucked neatly out of the way next to the rag bin. “I nearly forgot– but I think, for this momentous occasion–”

Helix leans back on his hands, a slow smile blooming. “Is this when I get to see what you disappeared for?”

Stitch glances between the two of them, confusion knotting into an uncomfortable lump behind his sternum. 

“‘Disappeared for?’” he echos. “I thought– when did you–?”

Needle turns, clutching something in his hand, and his smile dims slightly when he looks at Stitch– who doesn’t even know what’s on his face, but it must be something bad to make Needle look like that, and–

“Aw, hey, Stitch, I’m sorry,” he says easily. “When I said I was going to the ‘fresher, earlier, in the museum, I– I went to the gift shop instead.”

“Oh.”

He scratches at his arm.

“Why didn’t you just say so?”

Needle shuffles next to him, throwing an arm over his shoulders and squishing him companionably. “Because I wanted it to be a surprise. But next time, I’ll tell you where I’m going, and then I just won’t tell you what I got. Okay?”

“Okay,” Stitch agrees, annoyed at himself. It’s stupid. But he doesn’t like not knowing where they are. Not knowing means not being able to get to them if they need–

He carefully redirects that train of thought elsewhere, and something snags.

“A surprise?”

Needle grins at him, his eyes bright with anticipation, and presses something into his hands.

“I won a few credits off Waxer,” he says, “and I saw how much you liked the terrasaurs. And I figured– the store might have something you liked.”

Stitch looks down.

And stares.

“You got stickers?”

“I did,” Needle says, his smile audible.

That’s a– that’s a cyanosaur, to match his armor, and an apatosaurus, except it’s yellow, to match his paint, and it’s the greatest thing Stitch has ever seen, because they’re– they’re his?

“For me?”

“For you.”

Stitch can’t stop staring.

Something huge balloons in his chest. Something so bright and hot that it clogs his throat, something too big for words, too big to be contained, and he swallows once, twice, and glances up at Needle, Needle who’s his brother, Needle who got him stickers–

“Do you like them?”

He nods.

Needle beams at him and rises to his feet. “Right. You–” he points at Helix, who sighs– “are forbidden from caffeine. However, hot drinks still sound good, and I have it on good authority that Terror’s getting pissed at 79’s tonight and there’s cocoa in the kitchen. So. Hot chocolate? Any protests? No? Fantastic, tidy up, I’ll be right back.”

Stitch looks up, wanting to say something– something important, except he doesn’t know what, or how, but the door slides shut and Needle’s gone, and he doesn’t know what to say–

“Helix,” he says, very quietly, disbelieving– “he got me stickers.”

“He did,” Helix agrees, and when Stitch looks up at him, he’s smiling, soft and easy and not sad anymore–

Then he realizes.

“Can I–?” he starts, scrambling to his feet– “I think I have to–”

Helix rolls his eyes, but he’s still smiling, so Stitch thinks he’s not really annoyed, and waves him off. “Yeah, yeah, go on. I’ll take care of this.”

Stitch bolts.

He does know what to say. He knows exactly what to say. He’s been meaning to say it for ages and ages and ages, but every time he’d gotten– not scared, exactly, but nervous, because Needle has his own batchmates so he’ll have heard it before already, and Needle isn’t Stitch’s batcher but he’s his Needle and that’s more just as important, and he’d bought Stitch stickers and he knows Stitch doesn’t have any batchers left so Stitch is almost certain that he won’t be mad, and anyway he can’t stand the thought of Needle not knowing for half a second longer–

He catches him three hallways away.

Needle turns when Stitch shouts his name, and waits for him to catch up.

“All right, Stitch?”

All of a sudden, his words abandon him.

He nods.

“Is there a reason you came pelting up that fast?”

He nods again.

Needle’s expression sharpens, and he glances up, behind Stitch– “Did something happen? Is everyone okay?”

“Yes,” Stitch blurts out, because he doesn’t want Needle to worry, they all do a lot of that all the time anyway–

“I mean,” he clarifies, “no. To the first one. Nothing happened. And then yes. Everyone’s okay.”

“Okay,” Needle says slowly, looking slightly puzzled, and Stitch fumbles for the words–

“I just–” he starts, and rocks backwards on his feet, feeling the words try to freeze again on their way out and hating it–

Then Needle steps forward and cups his cheeks. 

“Easy, Stitch,” he says gently. “Take your time.”

And it’s this– this quiet, kind permission, this easy reassurance– that frees the words at last.

“Needle,” he says, and then he reaches up and squishes Needle’s cheeks as well, mimicking him, because this is important– “I wouldn’t trade you– you now– for anything. Or anyone. Ever. In the galaxy,” he adds belatedly. “The whole thing. Not ever.”

A beat passes–

Then a slow smile creases Needle’s face.

“Well, thank you very much, Stitch,” he says. 

Stitch hesitates, studying him carefully. But there’s no sign of any sort of anger, and Needle still doesn’t let go, and slowly, he feels himself relax.

“So it’s okay?” he asks uncertainly.

“Of course it’s okay,” Needle says, his brow furrowing. He squeezes, once, before dropping his hands, and when Stitch mirrors him, he wraps an arm around his shoulders and pulls him close as they start walking again. “Stitch, I know Kamino was– well. But of course it’s okay to tell one of us that. Why did you think otherwise?”

Oh. Oh. Well. That’s good.

“Because I thought it was only for batchers to say,” he says quietly, warm relief bubbling through him like a river. “And you’re not my batcher, but then I thought about it and decided that you’re still my Needle, which counts for something, right? And when I realized you’d gotten reconditioned–”

He nearly trips when Needle stops walking.

“Needle?”

He glances up–

And all the warmth inside him freezes at once, because Needle’s smile is gone.

“Stitch,” Needle says, very quietly, “how did you know?”

He’s done something wrong. He’s done something wrong, and he doesn’t know how, or where, or why, but he’s done something wrong–

“Your eyes went tight when Helix said to send him back for reconditioning to get rid of his headache after Laviod,” he recites obediently. “And you said it’s not worth the effort. And you said believe me. And sometimes you don’t respond the first time someone says your name. And sometimes–”

He stops. Needle’s gone gray.

“Needle?”

“Does Helix know?”

“I don’t– know,” Stitch says, nonplussed. “Did he tell you?”

“Tell me what?”

His voice has gone thin and reedy and Stitch doesn’t know how to fix it.

“The– the thing,” he says helplessly. “The– that he wouldn’t trade you for anything. Ever. It’s– it’s what you say to reconditioned batchmates, right? And if I said it, then he definitely would have, right?”

“He– hasn’t.”

“Then he doesn’t know,” Stitch says decisively. “If he did, he would have told you. I know that.”

He pauses. 

“I’m glad I didn’t ask him first,” he confesses quietly. “I thought about it, because Helix knows everything, and I thought he might know if I could tell you or not, but then I thought that you– that if he didn’t know, then he shouldn’t hear it from me, even if it would be an accident.”

“Right,” Needle says faintly.

Stitch stares at him.

Something prickles at the corner of his mind, a realization not yet fully formed–

But Needle nods once, decisively, and starts walking again. Stitch falls into step next to him, feeling itchy all over, missing the warmth of Needle’s arm across his shoulders.

“What was that–” Needle coughs, clears his throat, scrubs a hand roughly across his eyes– “what was that thing you said?”

“‘The thing?’”

“That you, uh– that you say to recon– to batchers who’d been– who’d gotten–”

He stops, but Stitch doesn’t notice, because the embryonic thought has very suddenly hatched.

Needle hadn’t realized he’d known until he’d said reconditioned.

Needle hadn’t recognized the words. 

Needle hadn’t known the words.

But that–

That means–

“Needle,” he says, and then again– “Needle. Needle. Why didn’t you know the words?”

Needle’s shoulders are drawn nearly up to his ears. Stitch reaches out, tugs at his sleeve, pulling him to a stop–

“Needle, you’ve still got batchers–”

“Stitch–”

“Needle, did they not tell you?”

Needle’s mouth snaps shut. His gaze skitters down and away.

It’s as good an answer as any.

Stitch, something horrible constricting in his lungs, steps forward and hugs him tight. 

“I’m sorry they didn’t,” he says. “I’m sorry. It’s not fair. They’re supposed to. It’s what you say.”

Needle’s arms hang limp at his sides, his breathing coming quick and shallow–

Stitch presses his face into his shoulder and squeezes.

Then he hears, at last, hoarse and hurting–

“Don’t be angry, Stitch.”

Stitch carefully doesn’t respond to that.

If Needle doesn’t want to be angry at them, then that’s– that’s fine.

Stitch will be angry for him.

“They– they loved him very much, I think. And,” Needle adds, his voice getting steadier, “I don’t– look. It’s– nice. Thank you. But you don’t– have to say it. Just like they didn’t– they didn’t– have to say it. Either. But just– just because you’re supposed to say something– it doesn’t mean you have to. So I’m sorry you felt. Pressured. To say it. But–”

Okay. Ow. That– that hurts.

“Stop,” Stitch says, feeling bruised all over. “Please.”

He knows he’s crooked, but he’s not stupid. Sometimes he just– needs a minute. To put his thoughts in order. Especially when they’re important. Especially when they’re this important.

He breathes in. Feels Needle do the same.

“I said it,” he says carefully, “because you smile with your whole body. I didn’t even know people could do that. And I don’t know how you do it. But you do, and it makes me smile too. It feels safe.”

He hears a tiny, hitching inhale, and continues, feeling encouraged–

“And I said it because you’re always there on the bad nights. I don’t know how you do that, either. But sometimes I wake up and I hear you talking to Helix, and you’ve got a hand on his back, and you’re making sure he’s okay. And sometimes I wake up and you’re with me, and then I stop thinking I’m back on Kamino because I know I’m with you instead.”

“Stitch–”

“And I said it because I like your stupid jokes. Even when they’re really stupid, because my favorite part of your stupid jokes is how much they make you laugh. And then sometimes you laugh so hard that you can’t even finish telling it, and those ones are my favorites. I’ve kept a list so I can ask you how they end.”

“You– really?”

“Yes. And I said it because you make good noise, all the time. I like your songs even though I don’t think you knew I could hear you, so now that you know, please don’t stop, because it’s wonderful. It feels like you. And I keep all of your paper birds that I find, and I know Helix does too, and I keep meaning to ask you if you’ll teach me how to make them– will you?”

“I– of course–”

“And I said it because you packed my headphones and a blanket just in case I needed them on the trip that you invited me on. And because you noticed when I was nervous and knew that I couldn’t reach for you, so you reached for me instead and said that you were scared, even though I don’t think you were, because you knew it would make me feel better.”

He gulps in air, and finishes triumphantly–

“And because you helped me paint my armor.”

“I bet buying the stickers didn’t hurt,” Needle murmurs, sounding shell-shocked.

Stitch pokes him. “I knew I wanted to say it before you got me stickers. The stickers just let me know I could. I would have done it eventually, once I got brave enough. The stickers helped make me brave.”

He considers for a moment, and then adds–

“I have a longer list, if you want it.”

“I– I think I’m good,” Needle says hoarsely, and when Stitch tilts his head up, he realizes with a shock that his eyes are wet.

That’s– not right.

But then something occurs to him, and he grins suddenly.

“How old were you?” he asks, and then corrects himself– “how old was he?”

Needle swallows, squeezes his eyes shut–

“Seven,” he says at last. Stitch nods, does some quick math–

He knows Helix is fourteen. And he’d thought that Needle was twelve, but if he was reconditioned, then he wasn’t Stitch’s Needle for seven years, so that means–

“I have just realized something,” he announces. “This means you can’t call me the baby anymore.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah,” he says, beaming at Needle’s inquisitive expression. “Because technically, you’re the youngest.”

(Stitch doesn’t know this yet and won't for some time, but this is the best thing he could have possibly said.)

A moment of silence as Needle’s eyes widen–

Then he laughs, a sudden burst of it, and finally, finally returns the hug.

“That,” he says, “is not how it works.”

“It is now,” Stitch says stubbornly, and Needle laughs again, full-bodied and aching and maybe a bit wet–

But it’s okay.

They’re okay.

Later, Stitch will find Needle again, and ask him, very quietly, how it does work, if not like that.

And Needle will tell him about waking up in a chair, staring at a white and blinding light, with a throat scraped raw from the screaming of a dead boy and wrists rubbed bloody from straining against metal cuffs. 

(He will tell him how he’d found no blood on his ankles, because he’d had socks on, and to this day he doesn’t know if this was standard procedure or a last act of kindness from the person who’d been in his head first.)

He will tell him about the tests they’d administered. Assembling a blaster. Interpreting a map. Reading out loud, in a dead, dull voice. 

(He will tell him how his hands hadn’t shaken, not at all, and how he thinks they should have.)

He will tell him about the sensation of being the last survivor of a shipwreck. Alone, at first, in a vast expanse of empty blue, knowing something enormous has fallen and you are all that remains. Fragments of shattered memories bobbing to the surface around him. Stripped of context, jagged-edged, hurting– a flicker of laughter, an elbow to the side, a muttered warning–

(A name.)

He will tell him about stealing a name.

He will tell him how he hadn’t known, at first. It had only been a word. A word without meaning, but a word that wouldn’t leave, and so he’d taken it, made it his own–

And then he’d seen the expressions on his batchers’ faces, and knew.

He will tell him about trying to rebuild himself in the image of a dead brother. With pieces that didn’t fit. With a stolen name. He watched his batchers and took note of what he did that made them smile and what he did that made them flinch, and he tried, he tried, he tried–

But he’d tried too much, and too desperately, because their grief never had a chance to dull, never had a chance to fade, and eventually it sharpened and bled into a fury that had no other outlet.

Going off to war had been a welcome relief.

Needle will tell him all of this, quietly, in the dark, and sometimes he will squeeze his eyes shut because there are times when it’s easier to talk to the darkness behind your eyes than to another person. And when the words run out, Stitch will hug him again and tell him that he doesn’t have to be his batchmates’ Needle. That he can be their Needle instead.

But that’s for later.

Now, when they start walking again, Needle tucks Stitch against his side, and the world realigns.

He teaches Stitch how to make hot chocolate. He rummages through the cabinets and shouts when he finds cinnamon, and Stitch carefully adds two shakes to each mug. He tells Stitch that although he will never in a million years admit it, Helix is a sucker for extra whipped cream.

(As it turns out, Stitch is also a sucker for extra whipped cream.)

They walk back together, Needle balancing two mugs and Stitch cradling his own. Stitch asks him to finish the joke about the senator and the loth-cat, and Needle tries, but then he has to stop because if he laughs too hard he’ll spill his drinks. Stitch tells him that he will find out one day. Needle says maybe when he’s older.

When they get back, Helix has laid his armor out along the wall of the medbay. He cuffs them both gently on the back of the head and asks them what had taken them so long, because he was about to send out a search party. Stitch tells him that he has discovered the wonders of extra whipped cream, and Needle gives him a grateful look.

It’s not a lie. It may be the closest he’s ever gotten, but it’s worth it, because this is not his information to share.

They squish together in the supply closet, and Stitch asks Needle again about the joke, because now he’s older by a whole four minutes. Needle puts his drink down and finally manages to tell the whole thing at once, and Helix takes a gulp of hot chocolate at exactly the wrong moment and spits it all over the floor.

“That’s wasteful,” Stitch informs him, and Needle flops backwards into his lap, hooting with glee. 

Helix’s lips twitch once, twice, and Stitch studies him carefully.

He’s got whipped cream on his nose.

“You’re allowed to laugh too, you know,” he adds. Needle howls, and Helix cracks at last, dropping his head into his good hand and shaking with laughter.

He doesn’t get the joke, but he’d meant it when he’d said that his favorite part was hearing them laugh. So that’s okay too.

(The warmth curling through him can only be partially credited to the drink.)

And later–

Later, someone eases his empty mug from his slackening grip.

Later, someone tucks a blanket around his shoulders and lifts him, humming something quiet and gentle.

Later, he dreams of this– of museum trips, and terrasaurs, and hot chocolate, and saying the right thing.

Because they are not batchmates but they are Helix-and-Needle-and-Stitch, and that counts for more than something. 

It counts for everything.