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It was never too much to ask for a little time to think. As though Crosshair felt no ill will because of his rescue from Hemlock’s grasp, he still felt like he needed time to adjust. There was only so much he could cope with in silence before his chest would grow too tight with the specter of guilt, and he’d feel like he’d need to scream.
It was an experience he had only felt a few times before. When he’d screw something up or be too cruel to one of his squad mates, but he’d never let them see it. He’d never allow himself to be so blatant with his emotions. Often times too much was on the line for him to fully portray what he was feeling in the moment. Expectations that had long since been set up by the Batch, and if he strayed too far from that there was always a side eye to be met.
Not an unwelcoming side eye by any means, but a side eye nonetheless. Giving him a sudden pause that perhaps he shouldn’t go anywhere– unnecessary.
However, then arose the question of what was unnecessary in that regard? If emotional honesty fit that bill then how could he express himself outside of sarcastic quips and gabs. It was all he, and the whole of the Batch, knew for him to do.
It was all he had really.
And it was infuriating.
Such confining standards that bound him from all sides. Even before his departure it made it difficult to open up, if his vods even wanted that in the first place.
They may have offered their ears here and there, but that didn’t stop the doubt from sinking in. The lingering feeling of uncertainty if the meant what they said or not. And if he were to actually tell them the truth, would they care? Would they react how he wanted them to, or would they instead be far more visceral than he was looking for. Or even worse, brush aside his pain and concern because “There wasn’t time for this.”
Because there hadn’t been.
They always had a new assignment, they always had a new post, they always had a new jedi, they always had a new squad to work with. There was always something in the way. So time was never left open for his thoughts to be shared. They didn’t expect to have to, because he was the cold one. Callus compared to Tech’s more smart wit to such a degree that practically ever clone that met him knew the difference instantly.
Expectations had to be met.
No exceptions.
Now, though, things had changed so quickly and so drastically that anything seemed to go. The structure they once possessed having been shattered in the span of a single order. Not to mention the lose of a vod, a member of his aliit ignoring orders, and the damage done to his hand. So much had been shattered, and only in the span of two years.
They’d lost a vod. They’d lost a part of their aliit and he wasn’t there to mourn with them. His ori’vod had given his life to try and save his. Omega had told him that behind his bars, but he refused to believe it.
Of all of his vods it didn’t make sense for Tech to be the one to ignore Plan 88. He’d sent them that message for a reason. He’d warned them with a purpose in mind. And to think that the most logical of his brothers would be the one to push for his rescue, it felt wrong.
Out of everyone hearing that message he should have been the one to recognize the dangers the most. He should have been the one fighting for them to be smarter than risking their lives for his sorry ass. He was supposed to be the one he could trust to talk their vods away from that dangerous edge.
Yet he was the one to enact Plan 99.
He still had a hard time grasping it. It was quite literally antithetical to everything Tech had stood for. Still, he’d broken all foreseeable logic to try and save him. It would almost be sweet, if it hadn’t ended in his death.
When Omega had told him there wasn’t any time for it to set in. He hadn’t believed it for a second, fully anticipating him to be standing there with the others when they were reunited, but when he had considered the option it was hard to grasp.
There was no body for him to see. No detailed recountings of how the event had gone down, Omega seemed too traumatized to begin going in to meaningful detail, or any indication of attempts to find him.
So how could he trust that his ori’vod really had given his life for a miscalculation?
Well, now he had no choice.
There were no orange goggles waiting for him as he stepped off of the stolen cargo ship. Just the skeptical stares of Hunter and Wrecker as they cautiously let him on board.
It hurt more than he wanted to admit. Knowing that he was the reason his ori’vod couldn’t be there with them today. And even if he’d warned them to stay away his message still had been the catalyst for that eventual fate. He’d done what was right, but it just caused something so much worse to occur.
“Sulking isn’t going to help things, you know.” Crosshair watched as Echo approached him, “Omega’s been looking for you. Though, I gotta admit, I wouldn’t exactly think finding you hiding in a corner of the ship would be hard.”
Crosshair had find a small enough cubby between their bunks to fit himself in to. The island was too large and open for him to not expect to be found, so this was just easier. Besides, no one was supposed to guess that he’d think to curl up in the one place that was easiest to access to them.
“She’s always looking for me. Always trying to make sure that everything is fine, that I’m fine.”
“There isn’t anything wrong with that.”
Echo sits down in front to Crosshair, already seeing that there was no way his metal butt was going to get anywhere close to the cubby hole that his vod had nestled himself into.
“I am aware there isn’t anything wrong with it. I just don’t always need her following behind me like some lost Loth Cat.”
“She just worries about you. Between the both of you, Hemlock was clearly more okay with messing you up than her.”
“He needed her to keep that scientist in check. He couldn’t touch her without causing a disturbance in the chain of command.”
“No such luck with you though?”
“You don’t even begin to grasp what your talking about.”
Echo cocked his head to one side. The melanin had returned to most of his face by now, with hair following behind it, but it still seemed strange for him to be trying to lift an eyebrow. “To be fair, Cross, I’d think of everyone here I’d get it the most.”
Crosshair felt a shock run through his body. Of course the half metal clone would understand something about being locked up and experimented on. How foolish was he to imply that that wasn’t true?!
“I didn’t mean that.”
“I know, I know, sometimes it’s hard to imagine me any other way, right? You’ve only ever seen me like this, with a cage wrapped around my body being the thing to keep me going, so it makes sense that it would slip your mind. Still, I do get it. Rex doesn’t know about everything that happened to me.”
“Really? And here I thought you and the commander were so buddy-buddy.”
“We are. That part will never change now. Rex may be my ori’vod, but that doesn’t change that things are still complicated. We all went through the ringer during the war somehow. We all saw our fair share of horrors and experienced our own kind of hells. But he knows that he’ll never be able to get what it was like for me. So he doesn’t feel the need to push what happened. It just, happened. Not much to be done about it now besides keep fighting, and heal when I can.”
Crosshair’s chest squeezed. A nauseating feeling of guilt ran through his system as Echo went on. Hemlock had been bad, but he had been working so hard not to think about that either. He knew that if he tried to deal with more than one tragedy at a time he might split in two.
“You don’t owe it to anyone to say what happened. Sure some of us are gonna have some questions. It’s still a switch up compared to what happened on Kamino when we last saw you. But it’s still your experience to talk about. Whenever you’re ready we’ll be here, but it’s just as fine to never be that ready.” Echo turned his head toward his vod only to see his fists bunched up and eyes taught with what he thought was frustration. “Do you need me to leave?”
“I don’t need to be focusing on what happened with the Empire now. I just need to get over what happened with my ori’vod. Hemlock is another issue. An entirely other thing. It’s not necessary. It’s just not necessary to be-”
He felt Echo’s cold hands on his back before he’d been able to finish.
“That’s enough then. One step at a time is all we can ask for now.”
Touchy-feely things were the complete opposite of what Crosshair thought he wanted now. He wanted to be treated like any other member of the Batch. He wanted things to go back to how they were before the Empire. When it was just the four of them and all they had to worry about was whether or not there were one to many clankers around. He wanted his peace of mind back. He wanted his brother back.
That wasn’t going to happen though.
So all he could do now was rest his head on Echo’s shoulder and let himself feel what he never wanted to, grief.