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Omega giggled and splashed in the stream. “This is fun!”
Crosshair was perched on a rock, keeping a close eye on her.
“Glad you still think it’s fun,” he muttered. They were waiting for the others to finally show up - had been waiting for quite some time. He understood that Hunter and Echo were trying to find a way for them to get credits, the ones they had gotten from selling all the weapons and explosives were draining fast, with six people to take care of. Still, he was getting impatient.
Omega had taken a liking to anything with water - streams, rivers, lakes, oceans - and it was time to teach her how to swim. They had picked a small, secluded lake on a warm planet. Surrounded by trees that provided shade, it was the perfect spot.
“Cross?” Omega pulled him out of his thoughts. “I know you said to wait for everyone else, but can we start?” Those puppy eyes should be banned. She was too powerful.
“I guess,” Crosshair gave in and slid down from his rock.
“Yay!” Omega ran ahead towards the lake, stopping at the shore. “What do we do?”
Crosshair shrugged off his shirt and deposited it on another rock, happy Omega was already wearing swim clothes. Then he swept her up in his arms. Omega giggled happily.
It had taken some time, but Crosshair had stopped trying to hide his smile at her antics. How could he, when she was such a ball of pure sunshine?
He waded into the water until it was deep enough, coming up to his stomach.
“Ready?” he asked, getting an excited nod. Without another word, Crosshair dropped her in the water. And watched her sink like a stone. He blinked, waiting for her to start moving and coming up again. When she didn’t he started cursing and fished her out of the water again, holding her up under the armpits.
Omega was sputtering and coughing, her eyes big and her lower lip trembling. Kriff.
“What happened?” he asked. This was not supposed to happen? “Why didn’t you swim?”
“I don’t know how?” she finally managed. Crosshair made a confused noise and hoisted her onto his hip. “What do you mean? That’s how you learn.”
Instead of answering, she buried her head against his shoulder and he felt hot tears.
“Hey, no need to cry.” He tried to keep the distress out of his voice, carrying her back to the shore and sitting down on the beach with her, trying to comfort her. “It wasn’t so bad was it? I was there the whole time.”
He really didn’t understand what had gone wrong. He’d done the same as the trainers did on Kamino, hadn’t he? She was a clone too, wasn’t she supposed to … know?
“What happened here?”
Course everyone had to show up now. Crosshair looked at Hunter briskly walking towards them, worry lines etched in his face.
“Tried to teach her how to swim.” Crosshair tried to act nonchalant and shrug it off. Hunter would never get off his ass if he thought Crosshair did something wrong. He couldn’t blame him, but still.
“That does not look successful.”
“Really?” He glared at Tech, then Hunter who knelt down beside them. “It didn’t work out as I wanted.”
“Cross dropped me in the water.” Omega’s voice was shaky and she twisted out of Crosshair’s grasp to hug Hunter. Crosshair didn’t know why that hurt so much.
“You did what?” Hunter sounded downright hostile now, making Crosshair bristle for a moment.
“I did the same they did to us on Kamino! That’s how you learn, isn’t it?”
Before the fight between them could escalate, Tech stepped in, literally and figuratively. He stood between the two, separating them and asked: “Did you show her the moves before?”
“No?”
“Crosshair, they showed us the moves before pushing us in the water! Not that it is a good strategy to learn.” Hunter was still angry, hugging Omega tight.
“They didn’t.” He tried to remember, but couldn’t. There was only the feeling of hitting the cold water and struggling to stay above it. But they had learned, hadn’t they?
“I can assure you they did,” Tech chimed in. “And I agree with Hunter. We can teach her the proper way. We have time.”
Crosshair only huffed and crossed his arms.
At least Omega had calmed down, now wiping her eyes. “I don’t know if I even want to swim again.”
If Hunter could have murdered Crosshair there and then, he would have.
“Swimming is a very good exercise and-”
“Shut up, Tech,” Hunter and Crosshair growled at the same time. It earned them an annoyed look.
“Fine. Tell me if you require the presentation on swimming I prepared. It’s only half an hour.” With that, Tech sat down a bit away and stuck his nose in his datapad.
“Look, Omega,” Hunter tried. “Why don’t you give it a chance again? We can start where you can still stand and I will be there the whole time.”
Omega still didn’t look convinced.
Where was Wrecker when you needed him? He would have known the right words to make her try again. It was strange anyway, she usually was curious and didn’t let a setback affect her. Usually, it was hard to get her to stop anyway.
Crosshair tried to remember what Wrecker would do in a situation like this. He would … joke with her, but Omega didn’t look like she was up for that right now. Or try to, ugh, validate her feelings? Ugh.
“Omega, I …” Crosshair hesitated. It wasn’t how he usually did it with his brothers, but she was different. “I’m sorry, okay? I think I made a mistake there.” Stars, that felt awful to say.
Unfortunately (Fortunately) it did make Omega look a little less uncertain. She was still pouting, but now it was her thinking face.
“Maybe if you and Hunter are both there?” she eventually said, looking to and forth between them.
Hunter was still torn between anger and relief, but in the end the relief won.
“Alright,” he said. “And we're taking Tech up on that presentation.”
Crosshair and Omega both groaned, which made Hunter chuckle.
“Where are Echo and Wrecker anyway?” Crosshair asked. Omega was still swimming - she was a natural, he had known that. She just needed a little more instruction. Hunter and him were now only standing in the water, occasionally letting Omega hold onto them when she needed a break and keeping an eye on her.
“We lost them somewhere.” Hunter shrugged.
“You lost them and are not concerned?” That was not the answer he had expected.
Hunter shrugged again. “I think Echo is using it as an excuse to get some alone time and a nap. I don’t know what Wrecker is doing right now, but he can’t get in trouble. I think.”
“That’s reassuring,” Crosshair mumbled, keeping his eyes on Omega. She was concentrated, taking this very seriously.
For a moment, silence lingered between them, before Crosshair felt something wet hit him and squeaked indignant. “Did you just splash me?”
Hunter was looking anywhere but him, trying to hide the grin on his face. “No.” “Liar!” Crosshair started splashing back.
They ended up splashing each other a bit, until Omega almost sunk because she had to giggle so much at them.
“Okay, that’s enough for today,” Hunter decided, dragging both of them out of the water. “You can continue almost drowning tomorrow.”
It was late afternoon already, so Crosshair didn’t even argue. They’d stay on this planet for at least a week, they had decided, so it gave Omega plenty of time to practice more. And she was tired, yawing every few seconds and trudging after them.
Crosshair couldn’t watch that long, and scooped her up in his arms.
“You’re spoiling her too much,” Hunter complained. Omega and Crosshair only stuck their tongues out at him at the same time, making him snort. It didn’t take long for her to fall asleep, her head resting against Crosshair’s shoulder. He was relieved she wasn’t holding this against him, seemingly already forgot about it. He hadn’t though, and Tech seemed to read his thoughts.
“And what have we learned from this?”
Crosshair scoffed, but answered. “Kamino techniques might not be the best way to teach a child something.”
Tech shook his head, only a little exasperated. “There are definitely better ways. Even though they are very efficient, especially since they had to train an enormous amount of troops. Flash trainings proved to be effective in-”
With an eyeroll, Crosshair tuned his brother out.