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Hacksaw settled down on the ground with a deep sigh, armor scraping against the wall behind him.
It wasn’t sanitary at all for a medic to be hiding in a tiny alleyway on one of the busiest planets in the galaxy, where filth and detritus gradually collected after being disturbed from the wider streets and populated walkways. But it was one of the few places he’s found so far since his arrival three weeks ago where he could sit and quietly decompress outside the eyes that continuously watch him.
Coruscant wasn’t like anything he’d been expecting. All he’d known before were the sterile white halls and rumbling skies and seas of Kamino, and then the cracked, dead dust under Geonosis’ scalding sun. Here there was an endless roar of engines and voices and of towering walls that caged him into a new prison of metal and glass, the landscape so foreign and strange to him that he was still trying to find his footing, couldn’t assess fast enough what was safe and what wasn’t as the whole planet churned around him.
The only thing that stayed the same were the judgmental eyes of the other clones.
The Alpha-class was notorious among the other clone classes. The trainers were infamous for dragging an Alpha into their sessions for no little reason beyond the sick thrill of watching someone bigger, stronger, and far more dangerous beat down another soulless husk into the mats until they were broken and bloody. Tough love was prevalent among his class, the concept of sink or swim etched into their genetics by their cold progenitor.
Hacksaw hadn’t been part of those types of sessions. He’d been assessed and then pulled away for a different training program, but there was still cadet blood on his hands from tasks that he could still see clear as day behind his eyelids.
He never did quite get along with the other Alphas. He was too quiet, too forgettable, too much of a million other little things, and the differences between training types constructed a chasm between them that neither felt the need to cross.
Being assigned to Coruscant after recovering from his numerous injuries from Hellfire rounds on Geonosis had felt like a second chance. It may not be what he trained in for the most part, but he was resourceful, and they requested for a medic, and he was a qualified medic. He’d hoped, for just a quiet, single moment, that the Coruscant Guard would be different than on Kamino- where cadets watched him in fear and the other Alphas watched him like hunting anoobas on a crippled nerf.
But Coruscant was loud. It was crowded. The smoggy, filtered air only made his still-healing lungs ache and rattle on bad days. The natborn civilians were overwhelmingly indifferent to them, and CorSec had nothing but pure contempt.
As for the Guard, they were wary. Of him.
It hurt, feeling as if he was being lumped in the same general category as any other natborn. But he understood. He was an unknown, and there were many who’d come to learn that an Alpha’s presence meant to be a punishment. They needed extra medical staff, and he was what they got, and they didn’t know it wasn’t meant to be treated as if they were failing their jobs, or that he was trying to pinpoint weakness.
He was put on rotations, moving from Guard station to Guard station across the planet. He’d been to over thirteen different stations from as low as Level 1282 to as high as the posting on the outskirts of the Entertainment District. But he’d never been to headquarters, not even during his arrival, when the Commander took one look at him descending the ramp and almost locked up in place before filing the paperwork right there on the foot of the landing pad.
Hacksaw knew he was being shuffled out of sight. Knew when sometimes he was the only person stationed at a certain location. Or when there were people, his fellow Guards would stop talking as soon as he entered the room, or would attempt to give him a wide berth if they crossed paths in the hallway. There was one incident where he’d found a Trooper raiding the dingy medical room for bandages instead of waking him up, and had bolted from the room as soon as Hacksaw pinned him down enough to clean and stitch up the wound.
When they thought he wasn’t present, Hacksaw could see how much the Guard cared for each other. They teased. They joked around. They let one slump against the other in a power nap while the other continued to monitor the security feeds. Troopers off shift would return with food and treats or the occasional gift for the ones who were on shift. Sometimes after a grueling shift two or more would simply pass out on the same bunk, oftentimes still half in armor.
The soft ache in his chest would crawl into his damaged throat when he lingered too long. So he didn’t try to, not wanting to disturb their peaceful moment in the chaos of sounds and lights of Coruscant, tucking the quiet yearning deep under layers of plastoid where no one would see.
He was unwanted here. And that was okay. He’ll make do, as he always have.
Small claws scratched at his thighplate, causing Hacksaw to stir from wallowing inside his head. A motley orange tooka opened its wide mouth and yowled, whining as it pawed at a pouch on his belt.
A soft huff escaped him as he gently pushed the creature away with the back of his hand. It immediately latched onto his gauntlet, teeth clacking uselessly against the plastoid as he reached into his pouch. It took to booping a second tooka- a black-and-white tuxedo with a torn ear, on the nose and pulling a grey-striped third’s finger-like paws from hooking around a belt loop before he could successfully remove the half-eaten sandwich he’d rescued from a trashbin several blocks away.
He’d found this colony of strays within the first few days of being planetside. Even with his consistent bouncing from level to level, he always made time to try to come to this alleyway, slowly coaxing the creatures out of hiding with slow movements and plenty of food.
They didn’t need him, but Hacksaw didn’t mind being used as a speckled brown feline climbed up his arm to roost on his pauldron while he tore off pieces of the sandwich to feed them. They were the only company he had on this planet of billions, and so he could forgive them for their impatience and tendency to gnaw and scratch at him when they deemed him taking too long with their easy meal.
Sauces and grease stuck to his gloves as he tore away bread and meat into smaller chunks before feeding each tooka their fair share. Granted, tookas weren’t creatures who cared about fairness at all, and he had to curl his fingers around a chunk while holding the sandwich up in the air with the other to prevent greedy others from getting second helpings. The caterwauling increased tenfold at that, one going so far as to flopping on its side as if it’d been shot and wailing on the top of its lungs. He ignored the dramatics, instead feeding the piece to almost a blue-green hued lady who sat primly on his knee and could pretend had manners despite him knowing full well she’d shoved another off the same leg not even five minutes ago with plenty of spitting and hissing.
He wondered if any of the others would like to feed the tookas too, but Hacksaw doubted they’d want to with him around. Having a little station pet would be nice, but the Commanders would never agree to it. Hacksaw didn’t have the charm of a shiny or the stubborn “ask for forgiveness not permission” of a more seasoned Guard. Besides, headquarters already had a whole kennel full of massiffs- why would they waste more resources feeding tookas as well?
Hacksaw sighed, the sandwich now gone, and the tookas wrestling or lounging around him. The ever-gluttonous tuxedo was lounging in his lap, licking the leftovers from his gloves as if it’d waste away if it didn’t. He let it, sitting still to not disturb another whose tail was currently half blocking his vision, swishing it in front of his visor.
They weren’t people, but they did make him feel less alone.
For now, it was enough.