If submissive behavior and world-weary attitudes didn't convince them of his sincerity, Crosshair wasn't sure things would ever level to where he could freely maneuver. That would take trust again, and for now, artificial management could hopefully win him some freedom. Perhaps the kid...
He left Omega standing in the cockpit and followed Wrecker down to the hold. Tech and Echo were arguing over the droid which turned from right to left, its photoreceptors somehow managing to look confused.
Crosshair huffed. AZ was a rather entertaining little droid.
"Hey, Hun'er! You ready?"
Hunter turned at Wrecker's call, and even the dim light couldn't hide the surprise on his face when Crosshair walked past him and seated himself on the makeshift exam table.
"Let's get this over with," said Crosshair.
For some reason, Wrecker flinched.
Hunter stared a moment too long, so Crosshair broke the silence for him. "We left the kid looking a little lost up there," he said. It was a bit difficult to keep the sneering tone from his voice, but Crosshair managed. "Better go spend some time with her. She misses you." Whoops. The sneer came through, but the sergeant didn't seem to notice.
Hunter's eyebrows disappeared behind his bandana and he looked at Wrecker with eyes so confused Crosshair was sure he would never see an expression like that again for as long as he lived.
Wrecker shrugged and whispered, not too subtly, "He was like this a while ago, too. I think he wants to be fixed!"
Hunter cocked his head at Crosshair. "You want your chip out now?"
Crosshair smirked and lay back. "I never chose to have it put into me, Hunter. I've been working on fighting it for a long time now."
"I guess you have," said Echo, also tossing him a curious glance.
Tech blinked behind his round goggles and said nothing.
"So you can...think a little more clearly?" Hunter ventured. "You actually...feel in control?"
"Enough," Crosshair muttered. And it was true. But Hunter's thoughts on the results were most likely different - drastically different - then the truth behind Crosshair's motives. But he didn't need to communicate them to Hunter now. Better to just leave things where they were until he was ready to tell Hunter the truth.
Hunter's face had relaxed to an expression of profound relief though his features did pinch somewhat with anxiety. "Crosshair, I'm...very glad to hear that."
"Aw, quite stalling," Wrecker groused, swinging his arms impatiently. But Crosshair knew he was really nervous.
"Very well, we shall proceed," Tech stated, and shuffled around AZ to plug something into the back of its head.
Crosshair decided to push just a bit further.
"I left the datapad near the door," he told the pilot. "And yes, the file is gone."
Tech quirked his mouth up while Hunter, Echo, and Wrecker exchanged looks of varying awareness and intelligence. Then Hunter turned to leave, and Wrecker followed him.
Tech and Echo turned to the droid. "Let's get started," said Echo.
"Oh, yes!" exclaimed AZ, spinning in a circle while its head remained stationary. "I am always happy to do this! I remember I helped two clones before this one here. Are you ready, CT 9904?"
"Yes," said Crosshair shortly.
He didn't feel ready - the prospect of going under yet again while mechanical parts messed about in his head was far from inviting. If he were honest, it was scary.
But Crosshair was not an honest person, at least when he needed to employ deceptions, so he closed his eyes and clenched his fist, and forced himself not to move.
He opened his eyes in surprise when a hand closed over his, and Echo spoke into his ear.
"Hold on, it'll be over before you know it."
Crosshair tipped his head so Echo could insert the hypo in his neck.
"It's when I don't know it that I hate it," he whispered back.
Echo chuckled. "Don't I know it," he said.
Crosshair let his body sink into that strange weightlessness - he floundered in his mind. Echo warped into a literal echo, his voice floating about in the empty spaces between Crosshair's ears and his brain, and Tech shifted into a wild blob of colors with eyes that were too big.
AZ was the most frightening - because when Crosshair looked at fhe droid, the room shifted, and he found himself back on the table in the Kaminoan lab...
The familiar tone of the gray ceiling disappeared in a flash of lights. No matter how many times it had occurred, it was startling and always caused his eyes to burn. Crosshair squinted against the glare, narrowly observing AZ whizz around the lab. The droid floated past the wide control panel, then hovered up to the table and blinked down at Crosshair.
"It seems Admiral Rampart wishes to again test the functionality of your inhibitor chip," it warbled.
Crosshair gradually let his eyes open again. "Did he say why?"
AZ fiddled with the restraint straps before securing them over Crosshair's arms and ankles. "He did not." The droid floated past to check the readouts on the monitor. "You did displease him, though."
The round photoreceptors flickered down at him for a moment. "I am sorry," said the droid.
"Sorry?" Crosshair tugged the restraints, trying to sit up. The table was hurting his back unpleasantly.
AZ bobbed. "Yes. I am sorry, CT 9904."
"You're a droid," Crosshair deadpanned. "You can't be sorry."
"I am a droid," said AZ. "But I am programmed to learn and respond to the environment I am placed in in like manner. I have absorbed and communicated with the speech patterns and personalities of both mistress Nala Se and Omega for over ten years now."
"Omega?" Crosshair couldn't care less about the little intruder, but the conversation did distract him - at least a bit - from the impending...procedure.
"Oh, yes," said AZ. "Omega and I are good friends. I have spent much of my time in the lab with her and Nala Se. Omega always said I was good company."
Crosshair tried to snort, but instead he gave a slight laugh. Then the rush of fear.
Rampart was at the door.
"AZ," Crosshair hissed. "Will you..."
"Stay? I shall have to," said the droid. "I am in charge of monitoring your chip enhancement."
With a sinking weight, Crosshair realized too late the chance he'd had and missed. As Rampart stepped in, he twisted on the table and jerked his chin at AZ. "Can you change it? Not enhance the chip? AZ, don't...! I wasn't supposed to have one anymore!"
AZ rotated smoothly as Rampart approached. "I am afraid I cannot, CT 9904. You are not in charge right now. The admiral is."
Rampart came to a controlled pause by the head of the table and looked down his nose at Crosshair. "I am indeed."
The slick voice and even slicker appearance had Crosshair wrinkling his nose before he could stop himself.
Rampart frowned. "I see."
AZ hovered right over Crosshair's face. Crosshair tried to direct the droid away, but it didn't seem to understand. Rampart looked on with curiosity, and AZ said,
"I would stay anyway, however. Do not worry."
Rampart's delicate snort and pointed look would ordinarily have encouraged resentment and anger for protection, but, with a surge of alarm, Crosshair found himself all but squirming. A miserable worm under the scrutiny of both derision and scorn. Everything he had ever offered in anything he wished to avoid. Offered and forced on even his own squad...
A pang of regret stabbed him through, and he turned away from both sides of himself - the inhuman, blank emotions of AZ, and the model appearance, cold and calculating, of Admiral Rampart whom he now knew wished to give him nothing but pain.
How else could Crosshair - CT 9904 be controlled?
The orders for Daro had come through. The Batch had been sighted, the base was in confusion, and Crosshair scanned the mountainside for any sign of movement. He knew what had happened to him, but he didn't care. He would retrieve his squad, and despite Rampart's orders, it wouldn't work this time. That would cause further tension between Rampart and his commander, but Crosshair was seeking for that. Only ruining the admiral's reputation.
He'd succeeded in one thing at least. Convincing Rampart he was now the mindless slave the admiral wanted. Obeying without retorts, accepting and ignoring mistreatment to himself and others with no retaliation...but that would come.
His mind was crushed behind a wall of steel, but he was aware enough to realize...once Rampart was gone, he would be free...
He was informed of Hunter's capture, but it was still to early. He needed them all before he could execute his plan fully.
So he hid everything away and let the anger push through instead of the greeting he wished to give. That was the hardest not to regret.
Crosshair had seen Cid slip the transmitter into the kid's bag. Perhaps it was ordinary, but it seemed deliberate. His personal suspicions were only intensified by the way Cid had spoken to him, and though the others moved to leave, he stayed.
He knew they'd seen him stay. Echo and Tech exchanged glances, Wrecker looked suddenly concerned and Hunter utterly ignored him as they headed back to the Marauder.
Cid was at his elbow in seconds.
"Seems you've got a lot to tell me, toothpick," she said.
Crosshair shook his head.
"Want that job?" She lifted one claw to poke at him, but Crosshair batted her hand away and stalked into the bar.
It was full of patrons, some happy, some looking a little too happy, some passed out on their tables, and some looking downright miserable. Crosshair pushed his way through the crowd to a table at the very back of the room. No one paid him any attention as they jostled their way back to the bar, loudly talking, rolling dice and flipping cards.
Three or four booze-happy specimens wandered up to his table at different intervals, but Crosshair dismissed them all, coolly responding when necessary (in the form of a dark look), and utterly ignoring them when he could.
The air was thick with the scent of different smokers' picks as well as warm and stale from the milling throng. The music beat into Crosshair's brain, making his head throb, but he resisted the urge to leave.
Here was noisy, full of activity - the perfect spot to avoid the thoughts that had been haunting him since he'd first revived on the Marauder.
It may have been the flashing lights or the heavy thrum-dum of the jukebox mix, but recalling that he'd been pursued by a hurricane of disturbing ideas only set them in motion again.
Crosshair ordered a drink.
Someone smoking potent weed passed by, leaving an acrid clenching in Crosshair's gut. He clamped down on it and drained his glass. The burn was relieving in an angry sort of way -
The smoker was back.
He leaned across the table and snarled at Crosshair. "I don't like your face."
Crosshair sneered and signaled for a refill. A rip-roaring fight would have soothed him somewhat, but he'd already aggravated his injuries from the walk to this dump hive. Kriff Hunter.
The smoker, his selected material obviously being inhaled on top of a drink too strong even for Crosshair, was waiting, seeming to drift.
Crosshair fingered his side and released his cup to put pressure on his leg. Confrontation didn't seem the most prudent.
"I don't much like it either," he muttered back, tossing just a hint that he shared the man's sentiment, but on the other's face, into his look.
The man's attitude completely changed. "'S what ya got," he shrugged. He shifted awkwardly and dragged one filthy hand down his cheek before clapping Crosshair's wrist.
Rampart would have run screaming from hands like that.
"Hey, take it easy," the smoker rasped. He turned to leave, but paused to give Crosshair a parting nod. "Cool tat."
Crosshair lifted his glass and didn't respond.
The trees were dark and the air that pumped in through his helmet filters was moist, pungent, and almost full of the scent of filtered out rotting foliage.
Signal, move out. Send the troopers in. His own rifle weighing comfortably in his hands - an angled shot, slide the scope right, pull right, fire -
The rebel pilot flopped over the transport's controls.
The others hid behind the blast shields in the bay, and CT 9904 marched over the fallen branches and tangled foliage, signaling the final attack by ES 04.
The flames burned at his eyes, even through his helmet's protective visor - the muted colors were hidden comfortably, though, outside of his helmet and the tinted darkness inside that - stifling - bucket...!
Crosshair clawed to get out, shot ES 01 dead, and retreated in his mind while the refugees were executed -
CT 9904... just had to follow orders...
Cid's stick smacking his shoulder jerked him from a fitful doze. Crosshair's start sent the remainder of his drink into her face, for which he thanked the Force.
It had been some hours since he'd taken the table, Crosshair realized. He glanced about the empty bar, ignoring Cid's splutters and threats as she tried to clean the drink from her face.
"Hey, this ain't a soup kitchen, buddy," she snapped. "You ever planning on getting back to that ship of yours? What do I have ta do to get you people to respect the hours of the place? Turn each table into a parking meter?"
Crosshair pushed himself out of the chair and started towards the door.
Cid called after him. "You look a little lost!"
Crosshair kept going.
Cid hurried in front of him and shook her stick in his face. "I recognize 'em when I see 'em," she said. "My place is crawlin' with folks lookin' for a way out of their lives."
Crosshair just looked at her, too tired to even snark back.
Cid shrugged. "I try to help 'em out. As long as helping me out is in there, too. Keep my offer in mind."
Crosshair nodded and she herded him out the door. The entrance was locked, and everything outside the dirty yellow light by the steps was in darkness. Hunter's words crawling back into his memory:
"No one who risks valuable time, their position and their life in order to prevent another's capture or death is going to do anything to harm a child. I don't believe you ever valued the Empire, Crosshair. Either for itself or for what it does."
He couldn't pretend any longer... And yet, he thought as he looked up towards the sky and the stars inside of it, he would have to.
He started back towards the ship, more confused in his mind than before he'd heard Cid's offer. The shadows beckoned to him - he tried to scoff, attributing the startlingly sentimental and emotional ideas to his rattled senses. He wandered between those patches of darkness back the rest of the walk, and didn't look upwards again.
He could barely see by the time the Marauder's lights came into view.