The quaking was coming from outside this time. He was sure of it.

Fives took his hands from the glass and glared at his shivering limbs. He cast about for another idea, then turned and leaned his body against the glass. He took a breath, willing his legs for a moment of steadiness. They, at least, complied..

Fives closed his eyes and felt. Yes. Yes, the room was shaking in the slightest.

Fives trotted to the door and pressed a button on the panel, turning off the light bars in the room. He returned to the glass wall and squinted outside.

A flicker of light, from somewhere beyond the locked door. Someone was coming.

Fives shook his arms out, then scoffed in defeat. There was no stilling his treacherous hands and arms.

He returned to the panel and turned the lights back on. He stood still for a moment, silently wishing for the hundredth time that a blaster had been left for him.

Fives circled the room, considering. The recreational sort of room had nothing but a bench and table attached to the floor, the food and water dispensers, a shelf of useless knick knacks from the war, and an equally useless datapad. And a floor-to-ceiling tank he refused to acknowledge for any reason.

Across from the locked door were two other doors. One for the refresher and one leading to a tiny bedroom with a single bunk, bedding, a spare-still-too-thin blanket, a spare set of day clothing, and night clothing. Actually, the night clothing was on the floor of the refresher.

Fives frowned. Nothing resembling a weapon whatsoever. Fine, he could work with that. He knew hand-to-hand combat, after all. And if whoever was coming had ill intentions, they'd be armed. Fives could also work with that.

Fives pressed his face against the glass closest to the door, but he couldn't see anything beyond. He gave up after a moment and went to the locked door.

The walls around the door weren't glass, but metal. And over the door was a ledge. It was narrow, but Fives had balanced on it a few -dozen- times. He knew he could do it, as long as whoever was on the opposite end of the door showed up within five minutes, the longest Fives had managed to keep his legs still enough for balance.

Luckily, the door opened quickly. Fives listened to the murmur of voices floating inside. None sounded Kaminoan, which was a surprise, but he didn't recognize them. Underneath, someone entered the room. Fives took in the unfamiliar dark armor and weapons, and dropped.

The stranger turned almost as soon as Fives moved, twisting so Fives collided with his shoulder instead of his back. His weight still threw them both to the ground, and Fives scrambled to grab the stranger's blaster, instead catching the stranger's hand as they did the same. His searching fingers found some sort of handle, and he grabbed it just as powerful arms wrapped around his middle.

Before he could fight back, Fives was hauled into the air and flung to the floor. He tumbled roughly across the floor and slammed into the wall. Fives shoved off the wall and into a crouch, ignoring the ache in his chest. His hand tightened on the handle he'd dragged along with him, which he saw belonged to a knife.

Standing at the door were two strangers, though Fives saw another helmet bobbing around the taller of the two. The one who'd entered first was already on his feet as well, blaster out and pointed at Fives.

"Who are you?" the leader demanded.

"You break into my place and ask my name? Rude," Fives thought with a huff of laughter. Aloud, he said, "I was about to ask you the same thing."

"We didn't know someone was here," the leader said levely.

"Yeah, I thought we were coming here for something," said the giant, who hadn't bothered to draw a weapon.

So, bounty hunters, then.

Fives opened his mouth to retort, but broke off at a flurry of movement. The giant stepped aside, and a third bounty hunter stumbled awkwardly into view. Fives did a double-take at his right hand. Was that a scomp link? Any questions in Fives' mind fled a second later, when the third hunter spoke.

"Fives?"

Fives was instantly on guard. "Who's asking?"

The leader jerked down his blaster and looked at the scomp-arm. "What?"

Fives narrowed his eyes. "What?"

"Oh… oh, Force, no," the scomp-arm muttered. "I-I need to sit down."

The giant grabbed the scomp-arm as the bounty hunter all but fell. He sat down, his helmet remaining pointed at Fives.

"No, really, what?" Fives demanded.

"You're dead," the scomp-arm whispered.

Fives waggled his stolen blade. "Despite everyone's best efforts, nope. Who are you, anyway? How do you know my name?"

A fourth, goggles-wearing bounty hunter appeared from the doorway. His head tilted, then he looked at a datapad in his hand. Behind him, a young girl watched the scomp-arm with concern.

In a blur of motion, a medical droid popped over the hunters. Fives instinctively tensed, then blinked.

"AZI?"

"CT-5555, it is good to see you again," AZI said cheerfully.

"Yeah, you, too," Fives said distractedly. "Maybe you can explain what's going on."

AZI swiveled, tilted his head, then turned back to Fives. "CT-1409 just wasn't expecting to see you here."

"Oh, so he's a-" Fives broke off. He shook his head. "AZI, say again?"

"CT-1409 just wasn't expecting to see you here."

Fives took a step back. "AZI… that's not CT-1409."

The scomp-arm flinched. Pushing aside his companion's hands, he rose slowly to his feet.

"Echo's dead," Fives said, taking another step.

The scomp-arm shook his head. "No… no, Fives, it's me."

Fives shook his head. "I saw him die."

"And Rex said you died in his arms," the scomp-arm said.

"A trick," Fives spat. His back hit the wall. "But you- Echo died that day. Nobody could have survived that."

"Well… I didn't make it out in one piece…"

Fives looked at the metal arm, then the hunter reached up and removed his helmet. Fives flinched at the pale, gaunt face underneath. Some blinking device was attached to the hunter's skull.

Fives turned his head away. Echo was dead! He wasn't some creepy, half-dead cyborg thing come to haunt him.

"Fives, look at me, please."

Fives caught his breath. It… it didn't look like Echo anymore… but that was his brother's voice!

"T-" Fives swallowed. "Tell me something only Echo would know."

"You're ARC trooper Fives of Torrent Company, under General Skywalker, Commander Tano, and Captain Rex."

"Anyone could know that," Fives bit out.

"Formerly of Domino Squad, our brothers Droidbait, Cutup, and Hevy died at the Rishi Outpost, where we met Rex and Cody."

"Not good enough."

"Should I replay your speech from the time we defended Kamino?"

"I know the cadets told everyone. Try harder, scompy."

The silence stretched on. Fives gave a bitter laugh.

"Can't think of anything else to say?"

"The night before the Citadel mission…"

Fives jerked his head forward. The scomp-arm had approached without Fives noticing, and stood in arm's reach.

"You woke up to find me in your bunk. I told you that we shouldn't go to the Citadel, that something would go wrong. I wanted to pretend we'd gotten sick. You told me everything would be fine."

Fives' breath caught. The hunter stared back, sadness and remorse in his gaze.

"You told me the Jedi would protect us. That they'd never let us down. To trust the Jedi."

Fives felt like he couldn't breathe. Nobody had been around to hear the conversation that night. Fives hadn't thought of it at the time, except to tell himself to tease Echo when everything turned out fine.

But then everything had gone horribly wrong, and how many times had he regretted ignoring his brother's fears. He'd gotten his brother killed.

Yet, this scomp-arm hunter with his brother's eyes and his brother's voice, he couldn't be-

"Echo?"