Just for Kix
Disclaimer: I do not own the rights to Star Wars: The Clone Wars or any related titles, characters, plots, settings, etc. These rights are the sole property of George Lucas, Lucasfilm, Dave Filoni, the Walt Disney Company, and their various publishers and distributors. I own only the original elements of this story, the writing and publishing of which earn me no money.
Disclaimer Two: I have not read The Crimson Corsair and the Lost Treasure of Count Dooku, on which most of this chapter is based. Therefore, there are likely to be some mistakes. I apologize.
Displaced
Gone.
They were all gone.
Everyone was gone.
Every person, place, or way of life Kix had once known were lost now, tucked away where he could not reach them. They were all memories, relics of almost half a century of time. Time in which the galaxy had moved on, uncaring of the sacrifices that had been made for sake of a war that turned out to be ultimately pointless.
Because that's what it all had been.
That was one of the first things Kix had done when he learned where he was - when he was. He was a clone trooper of the Republic, trained to take in information and use it to formulate a new understanding. He had researched the clone wars. Thousands of his brothers had died to take down the Jedi, and it was only on dark corners of the Holonet that he read the truth about the implants. Fives's truth. But it had never been told, even after the Empire had fallen.
His brothers had been recorded - branded - in the public's mind as traitors, notable only for their willingness to turn on their generals with one single order. Palpatine had turned them into the very droids he had forced them to fight, and the bitter irony was not lost on Kix.
Such heavy thoughts were what had driven Kix to sit in the small hangar bay of the Meson Martinet, watching hyperspace flash past in a hail of stretched starlight. It was one of the few things that hadn't changed while he was in stasis - interstellar hyperspace transport was apparently as good as it would ever be.
It was only a small amount of time before one of the Martinet's crew members would come searching for him. Since they had pulled his cryo-shocked body from the remains of the Separatist ship, none of the crew had really trusted Kix. He supposed that he couldn't blame them. They had been expecting to find a treasure and instead, they had only gotten the galaxy's last clone trooper, carrying information that had become irrelevant long ago.
The last clone trooper.
The weight of loneliness was too heavy on his mind and Kix returned his attention to the viewport he was sitting in front of. For a few stolen minutes at a time, he could stare out into rapidly passing space and pretend he was aboard the Resolute, hiding from his brothers for a moment's peace before the next crisis hit.
If he closed his eyes and quieted his mind carefully enough, Kix could almost believe that Jesse would be coming by to tease him, or Rex would comm him about Hardcase, who was too stubborn to get an injury treated. Or even further back - that Fives and Echo would be wandering around, looking for rules to break or shinies to lead astray.
He didn't notice the soft smile on his own face until a tear trickled over his cheek and down the path of his curved lips.
With a sigh, Kix opened his eyes and swiped the tear from his face. There was no point in looking back. Clone troopers had been made expendable by nature, created for the sole purpose of fighting wars and losing people. True, no other clone trooper had experienced this hollow isolation. Even if they hadn't known it, there was one other vod in the galaxy.
If the burden of being the last fell on him, so be it. Kix would rather face eternal suffering than think of one of his brothers doing the same.
The sound of the hanger door opening broke Kix from his reverie. That would probably be a member of the Martinet's crew. It had been over an hour since he had slipped from the small barracks, unable to sleep with such a noisy mind.
To his surprise, Kix didn't find himself summoned by an impatient voice, or peered at with suspicious eyes. Instead, the newcomer began shuffling crates around, giving a huff every now and then. It was fine with Kix - the hanger bay on the Resolute had held many such noises, but amplified a thousand times.
The steady sound of shifting crates paused for a moment too long, then Kix heard muttering, followed by a grunt, and finally a scuffling slam. The huff of air that was expelled by the unseen person would have been easy to ignore if the hanger wasn't so quiet, but the sharp curse was enough to make him jump.
Someone had just gotten hurt, and it was enough to snap Kix back to himself.
He rose to his feet and rounded the wall of crates he had been leaning against, taking a quick look at the scene to figure out the situation. A crate tipped over on its side was a hint that something had fallen, and the Ishi Tib male holding his hand said that the crate hadn't fallen on its own.
"Is everything all right?" Kix asked, standing a polite distance away from the Ishi Tib.
"Smashed my hand," he grunted.
"Let me take a look," Kix ordered, before remembering that he didn't belong to this crew and that no one actually had to obey him. "I mean, may I take a look? I was a medic, before..."
"Yeah, I've seen the symbol," the male's uninjured hand gestured vaguely in the direction of Kix's shoulder, where the medic symbol was prominently displayed on the armor he had donned out of habit. "I guess you can see it."
He held his arm out to Kix, who gently maneuvered it where he needed it to be. "What is your name? I haven't met anyone yet, not really."
"Pendewqell."
Kix hummed at that. "Can you make a fist for me, Pendewqell?"
"Call me Pen," the male offered gruffly, not moving his fingers.
"Okay, can you make a fist for me, Pen?" Kix pressed, undeterred.
Slowly, Pen complied, squeezing his thumb and two fingers together. Kix was satisfied with the range he saw, fairly certain that none of the bones in Pen's hand were broken. "Good, now open your hand."
Pen complied and Kix nodded, pleased. "Well, it's difficult to tell if there's any subtle damage without the use of a medscanner, but it's safe to say that nothing is broken. Still, I'd like to do some checks by pressing on your fingers. Is that all right with you?"
"Go ahead," Pen agreed, shaking his head and muttering, "Medics."
"Yeah, we're the worst," Kix agreed lightly. "Tell me if there are any sharp pains that feel a little too intense given the pressure."
"I'm surprised you're still sticking around," Pen said. "Figured you would have run off the first chance you got."
"Where am I supposed to go?" Kix countered. "Everyone I know is dead."
The silence that fell was a bit uncomfortable, but Pen didn't seem to look down on Kix for his moment of self-pity.
Eventually, he said, "Most medics I know can't rest if they know there are people out there who need their help. But you just finished fighting a war. I'm sure you're not rushing to get into another one."
"Another one?" Kix asked as Pen hissed.
"That hurt!"
"Sorry," the medic apologized. He had gotten a bit carried away with applying pressure to Pen's fingers. "What war are you talking about?"
"The one between the First Order and the Resistance, of course," Pen snapped.
And so the two stood in the hanger bay, Pen's hand thoroughly forgotten, and discussed the current state of affairs in the galaxy.
Kix learned that the First Order was trying to take over the galaxy much as the Empire had, opposed by the aptly-named Resistance and most free systems who opposed the idea of a tyrannical rule. The whole thing was uncomfortably close to the information Kix had just gathered about the Empire and the Rebellion, and he had made up his mind before clearing Pen to go back to work.
He was going to do what he had been made to do. Kix was going to fight.
Author's Note - Have I ever mentioned how strongly I despise Kix's fate? Because it hurts me every time I think about it, and yet I've written a chapter about the aftermath of that fate. It's fine, everything is fine. I'm just sad. I also don't think Kix would hear about a war going on and still stay with the Meson Martinet to be a pirate. (Not saying I'm any kind of authority on Kix, of course, but I just disagree.)
Thank you to those who followed or favorited this story! Special shout-out to those who reviewed the last chapter (and put up with me rambling in their PMs): Falconress, TheLoneRebel's Stories, SwimmingClara, KarajeJinsta, Sandriassaber, Revee, Sued13, and dieFabuliererin! I deeply appreciate you all!
Sorry about all the sadness in this chapter. I'd like to say the next one will be better, but... Thanks for reading, have a wonderful day, and I'll see you soon!