Not Ever
Chapter Summary: The other members of TBB join in and things get... physical. Echo suspects that, deep down, their surly sharpshooter cares way more about them than his icy demeanor lets on.
According to the intel provided by Easy and his boys, the best way to extract Echo and Tech will be to approach the target ship on foot. With a lot of stealth and a little luck, the three Bad Batchers can rapidly infiltrate the vessel and take out the enemy targets one by one. After they spring their guys free, they can all hightail it back to the Resolute together. It really won't be that much at odds with the hostage rescue missions they've completed several times before now.
...
"Everything looks good, lads. Are we ready?" Hunter asks Wrecker and Crosshair. They brought the Marauder down about 200 meters to the southeast of what Easy verified as a Techno Union vessel. They're likely on their enemy's scopes already, but thanks to the moon's terrain, Tech and Echo's captors won't have a direct line of sight on them until they overtake the Skakoan ship.
"Ready," says Crosshair with a firm nod.
"Awh yeah!" Wrecker shouts, punching at the small layer of air that exists between his shoulders and the ceiling. "Let's do this! Tech and Echo, here we come!"
"Alright then. Let's go," Hunter says as he leads them down the ramp and they begin their advance toward where they know Echo and Tech are being detained. Jogging smartly, it's all Hunter can do to stop himself from breaking into a full sprint. He gets the feeling that his brothers are also resisting the urge to rush in and extract their absent vode.
…
They make quick work of the distance between the Marauder to the Skakoan's ship, and they've yet to be engaged. Taking cover using the structure of the parked shuttle, they're able to get a visual on the target ship. Crosshair reports that there's one lone sentinel guarding the bounty hunters' ship's side port.
The sharpshooter's up first. Hunter gives him the signal to proceed as planned, and Crosshair takes careful aim with his deadly 773 Firepuncher. It only takes him a few seconds to line it up before he caresses the trigger with a long, practiced index finger. He spends another second or two peering through the scope, then signals to Hunter that his shot hit home. Hunter never doubted that it would. But now they can be certain that their enemy will know they're under attack and be on high alert when the three commandos arrive.
They abandon the cover provided by the Skakoan ship and Crosshair splits off from the other two. The goal is to approach the bounty hunters' vessel from two strategically disparate angles.
When Echo wrenches his scomp link free from the dead Skakoan's skull, Voltaro's body sinks to the floor. The stench of the gases seeping from Skakoan's corpse is overwhelmingly putrid, and Echo gags a few times as a result. Now, he needs to find a weapon, and he needs to get down to the brig. As he glances around the room looking for anything he can use to inflict some serious harm to the bounty hunters, he realizes that someone's noticed his most recent "slicing" exploit.
Abruptly, an enemy blaster bolt passes within centimeters of his arm. It's the TG-2 droid, dutifully investigating the ruckus Echo's caused in the ready room and returning to subdue the recalcitrant prisoner.
Instinctively, Echo gracelessly heaves himself and the exam table down onto the floor so that he can take cover behind the sturdy apparatus. Two more blaster shots sizzle over the edge of the toppled workbench as the TG-2 unit draws nearer to its target.
Frantically searching for anything he can use against the formidable droid, Echo's fingers find the long, narrow shaft of the deactivated electro-jabber and he decides it's his turn to be on the offensive end of it. He takes one quick peek over his makeshift cover to gauge his mark and to ensure the door's still open for his mad dash to escape the room. TG-2 is tactfully approaching the ARC's position and Echo knows he needs to mount his assault before the clanker gets the drop on him. He holds the spear by its rubber handle, and activates the shocking mechanism, and cocks it back behind his ear.
"Cease and desist," orders the TG-2, creeping ever closer. "Put your hands in the air and-
Without another moment to lose, Echo hurls the spear at the droid like a javelin and waits for an opportunity to make a break for it. The buzzing shaft slashes through the air, on course to strike the droid dead-center in its chest plate. But wily as ever, the TG-2 unit catches the weapon in its claw-like appendage mere inches before it hits. Luckily for Echo, the electric current works all the same.
The moment the droid locks up under the influence of holding the live electro-jabber, Echo forces his legs under him and starts running for the door. Long before the events following Lola Sayu unfolded, Echo was a fantastic sprinter. Now with his state-of-the-art synthetic lower half, he's just plain super-human when it comes to short, powerful bursts of speed. Especially with a healthy dose of good, old-fashioned adrenaline in his veins.
But high on adrenaline or not, Echo doesn't get very far. He's only able to manage a few strides toward the hallway before he learns that his body is still suffering heavily from the exam and the effects of the paralyzing shock attacks. He's woozy. His arms and legs don't want to work how and when his brain tells them to. He only gains a few meters before he slows and clumsily stumbles.
However, Echo doesn't let himself fall. Though it feels like he's wading through an especially viscid Dagobah swamp, he continues his painstaking journey to the door.
Just when Echo thinks he's gaining more control of the frazzled servomotors in his legs, he hears the whine of a blaster shot and he feels the searing burn of a round making contact with the back of his right thigh. It's a muted version of the pain he would typically experience, but his leg immediately locks up on him anyway. Always adapting to any situation, he finds he's able to stay upright and keep moving if he just puts most of his weight on the left. As he takes a shambling step toward the door, he glances behind to confirm that the TG-2 has already discarded and overcome the effect of the electro-jabber. But when the droid's next shot goes far wide, Echo realizes that it's not yet fully recovered either.
Without waiting to see how accurate TG-2's next shot is, Echo turns away from his pursuer and forces his legs to keep hauling him forward. He also attempts to execute a loose zigzag pattern, hoping it'll force the droid to keep checking its aim. But the blaster wound to his exposed cybernetic thigh makes it near impossible and unworthy of the extra effort.
That was a damned well-placed shot, Echo thinks irritably. Ever loyal to Thaxx and the prospect of a large bounty, TG-2 is likely aiming to disarm and immobilize only. A blaster shot to his dominant thigh was an excellent way to hinder his progress while simultaneously minimizing the risk of damaging his more profitable components. If B-1's were ever made with half the wits this clanker has, the war would have probably been over years ago.
Before long, Echo's forced to lean into the bulkhead and use his left arm to grab onto whatever he can to help drag himself along. He just has a few more meters to go like this, and then he can get down to the brig to help Tech. He can do this. He-
Pew!
Echo grunts as another well-aimed blaster bolt connects with the dorsal surface of his left shoulder. The limb falls painfully slack down to his side and is no longer useful in pulling himself toward freedom. It was an absolutely beautiful shot. Not only does it maximize pain via a strike to his bare flesh, but it ensures that he can no longer effectively use his grip to compensate for the damage to his leg.
Quit complimenting the damn clanker and find Tech, he scolds himself. He's by no means displaying any of the finesse expected of a battle-tested ARC trooper, but he's still making headway toward the door. Once he's out into the hallway, he'll search for a blaster or a weapons cache. Maybe he can find something to hide behind and then ambush the relentless droid. The TG-2 unit will undoubtedly be in hot pursuit of him until the day it's disintegrated, after all. A day that can't come soon enough, Echo grumbles introspectively.
At long last, Echo hauls himself across the threshold and out into the open passageway. But his intended strategies lose their potential as his body starts to further succumb to the effects of the blaster wounds. Determined that he's not going down, he weaves on his feet, desperate to ignore the overwhelming feeling of lightheadedness and find a way to get to his brother's side. He's panting heavily, trembling, and he knows the last thing he needs is another hole in his body courtesy of TG-2's blaster.
He takes another stubborn, shaky, step forward, furiously trying to blink away the grey void that's encroaching around the edges of his sight. All at once, the corridor is spinning turbulently around him and the next step he tries to take is wildly erratic. His feet somehow lose their purchase on the deck, and Echo dimly collapses forward against his will.
As they draw nearer to the bounty hunters' ship, Hunter, Crosshair, and Wrecker split off further into their agreed angles of approach. Crosshair takes a sharp turn and veers off into the terrain. His objective is to approach the vessel from the far side, scale the ship's starboard structures, and covertly gain access through an exhaust hatch that's common to the platform model. To make this easier for him, Hunter and Wrecker will approach the port side and central access point almost head-on, making noise and drawing fire and attention as they go.
Up ahead, Hunter sees a large, muscled Twi'lek male peering down the ship's access ramp at the droid Crosshair just blasted to scrap. The bounty hunter immediately draws his blaster and makes a hasty report into a commlink on his wrist. Then, the Twi'lek's eyes fall on Hunter and the shooting begins.
Wrecker breaks off to take a more angled approach to the ramp while Hunter zigs and zags his way toward the bounty hunter, trying to draw all of the fire, and popping off a few rounds of his own. The Twi'lek learns just how nimble Hunter is when several of his well-aimed shots fail to connect. As the clone commando leaps over the fallen heap of TG droid and gains dangerously on the bounty hunter's position, the Twi'lek quickly gives up trying to defend the access with just his firearm.
Furious, the bounty hunter backs up and retreats to the top of the grade, then slams the controls to raise and lock the access ramp. In a typical firefight, this would surely buy the bounty hunter time to regroup with the others as the two clones are forced to find another way to breach. But the commandos of Clone Force 99 are anything but typical and they've anticipated that the bounty hunters would try to slam the door in their faces. To Hunter and the boys, abducting and harming two of their own is the same as openly inviting them to come aboard and bring wraith and ruin to their hosts like a party guest might bring a fine wine. And they're not going to let a closing ramp indicate they've been uninvited to the festivities.
Wrecker's sure as hell not about to let his own Sergeant feel unwelcome to the riot. Thanks to Hunter, he's already advanced close enough to reach out and touch the hull of the ship, and he's running aft along the port side. As the ascending ramp makes it just past halfway to its fully raised position, Wrecker makes his first move.
Hunter watches as his massive brother takes a flying leap, grabs hold of the ramp's edge, and tugs the entire transparisteel gangway back down toward the surface of the moon. The mechanisms of the ramp shriek in protest as the clone uses his size and strength to overpower the mechanical lift capacity. As all hinges and hardware are bent out of shape, Wrecker's essentially preventing the ramp from being able to fully close now or anytime in the near future unless it gets a complete overhaul. Once he's overpowered and ruined the feature for good, Wrecker gives the ramp a mighty tug and it shoves it down into the rocky soil of the terrain.
Likely trying to get the motor to work harder, or simply in denial about the unthinkable situation, the Twi'lek is unable to retreat far enough into the ship to keep his balance when Wrecker forces the ramp into the ground. At some point, the bounty hunter loses his footing entirely and tumbles down the gangway. In a flurry of curses and blue head tails, the burly Twi'lek spills directly into Wrecker's path.
Mildly winded from his insane feet of strength, Wrecker's caught off-guard when the Twi'lek barrels into him and starts aiming his blaster to pump the intruder full of point-blank rounds. Luckily, Wrecker recovers quickly and is able to swat the enemy's blaster away before any decent shots are fired. But the Twi'lek bounty hunter is big and powerful in his own right, and when Wrecker draws his own blaster, it too is smacked roughly from the hand wielding it. Before Wrecker can even think to draw his knife, the Twi'lek bellows a savage war cry in Ryl and launches himself at the large, armored clone.
Hunter briefly watches the beginnings of the savage hand-to-hand scrap between his brother and the Twi'lek before he works his way to the far side of the ship to check on Crosshair's progress. Gazing up the centerline of the starboard side, he just catches a glimpse of a black boot as the sharpshooter breaches the ship's interior. Satisfied, the sergeant returns to the port side of the vessel to check on Wrecker and the potentially formidable brawl that's unfolding between him and the big Twi'lek.
Detecting the hormone levels of the two fighters and glancing at the pattern in the soil, Hunter can tell there's been a titanic exchange of colossal blows and brutal tactics. Wrecker's helmet has been knocked off, and both men are showing evidence that they've each eaten a few hits. Yet even though the Twi'lek is large and a very seasoned fighter, he's no genuinely durable match for the power behind Wrecker's punches. The large clone finally gains the upper hand in the fight when he lands a punch to the Twi'lek's cheek that almost sends him to his knees. To his credit, the Twi'lek doesn't go down, but merely shakes his head and spits out a tooth before attacking Wrecker with renewed savage and determined fury.
But Wrecker's blood is up just as high and he's ready for the Twi'lek's rebuttal. With agility impressive for his massive size, Wrecker sidesteps the attack and grabs the madly shrieking bounty hunter from behind in a chokehold. As the Twi'lek struggles furiously to lash out and claw at any piece of his opponent he can reach, Wrecker meets Hunter's gaze and flashes his brother a wide, shit-eating grin.
He's enjoying the kriff out of this, Hunter knows. C'mon, we've got work to do, vod...
The sergeant doesn't encourage his brother's merriment. Instead, he uses his body language and posture to remind Wrecker that they're short on time.
Make an end, he expresses sternly, then nudges his head in the direction of the open side port. Remember why we're here.
Wrecker gets the message and sets to finish up the fight for good. He grabs the hotheaded Twi'lek by the lekku and yanks him down onto the ground. Before the bounty hunter can recover, Wrecker keeps one hand gripped tightly to a long, blue lekku and grabs ahold of one of the bounty hunter's ankles with the other. With a fierce growl, Wrecker throws his body weight away from the enemy and starts to spin.
As the big clone's spins build rotational kinetic energy, he hefts the helpless Twi'lek off the ground and continues to spin until he has him just about forty-five degrees from parallel. But apparently, Wrecker's going for height on this one, so he spins a few more times for good measure, then releases the bounty hunter into the air like some grotesque new sport.
Hunter watches as the airborne bounty hunter gains in distance and altitude. Eventually, the involuntarily flying Twi'lek reaches the apex of his trajectory and then plummets back down toward the surface of the moon. The Twi'lek flails and wails with high-pitched and pitiful screams before landing atop an especially jagged outcrop of rocky terrain. He's then killed instantly when impaled by one of the sharpened spires of rock.
"Uhhhhhh," says Wrecker, noticeably abashed as he turns to look at his sergeant. "Whoopsie."
"I'm betting he earned it," says the sergeant, drawing his blaster and approaching the ramp. "At least it was quick. Let's go."
"Aye, sarge," says Wrecker recovering his helmet and obediently falling in behind Hunter.
By some miracle, Echo doesn't land facedown on the deck when he falls over. Instead, he collides bodily with a blackish cuirass and is encircled by a pair of long, lanky, plastoid-clad arms. And so, the miracle's name is Crosshair.
"Got you," drawls the scout sniper in his characteristically raspy tone.
Before Echo can track his eyes up and praise his brother's extreme timeliness, those lanky arms clench onto him and jerk him sideways into the bulkhead. An instant later, a blaster bolt fired from the ready room singes the open space that Echo's back had just been occupying. A moment after that, Crosshair makes answer with deadly-precise return fire.
Echo hears the gratifying clatter of a deactivated metalloid frame as the TG-2 droid hits the deck for good. Feeling compelled to ensure the clanker's truly been rendered inert, Echo drunkenly turns his head, trying to peer into the compartment. Instead, a gloved hand firmly cups his chin and forces him to meet the piercing gaze of the sharpest, most intense eyes of any humanoid in the entire galaxy.
"Echo, look at me," Crosshair urges, his glare scrutinizing the ARC down to and through his very soul. His eyes flit worriedly to the massive energy contusion on the front of Echo's wounded shoulder and the pieces of foreign cable still attached to various ports on his brother's injured body.
Still reeling from the events of the past few seconds and beyond grateful that his squad is finally here, Echo doesn't do much but blink stupidly back at him. Crosshair frowns and roughly taps the side of his cheek.
"Echo," Crosshair insists, tapping a few more times. "You're alright, Echo. I need you to focus."
Echo blinks slowly again as Crosshair continues to hold him tightly and prevent him from pitching sideways.
"Echo," Crosshair says again. "Stay with me."
"Y-yeah," Echo forces out with a nod. "Yeah, I… I am. But Tech…"
"We'll get him too," Crosshair assures him, as he drapes Echo's socket-arm over his shoulders and leads him back toward the ready room. "Ugh. Why are you always ass-naked for your escapes?"
"Because... I'm sexy," Echo deadpans, leaning heavily on the taller man and accepting the wicked irony of the question.
"Right," growls the sharpshooter, adjusting his lengthy gait to accommodate Echo's painful limp. "A real centerfold."
Echo's about to agree mirthfully, but he realizes his wily brother is trying to sidetrack him. This isn't the way to the brig.
"Stop squirming, di'kut," Crosshair snarls without any real malice. Conversely, he sounds borderline concerned. "You're going to do more damage."
"But Tech," Echo insists.
"So you said already," Crosshair complains, continuing to guide Echo along, not giving up a single inch of ground. "Hunter and Wrecker are already on it. Any chance you know where they're keeping him?"
"Deck below," Echo slurs. He's horribly tired and becoming increasingly aware that there are still Techno Union tools jammed painfully into some of his cybernetics. "They have -nnn- a brig."
Crosshair nods and quickly reaches for his commlink.
"Secured Echo," he reports to their sergeant. "These fucking slobs kriffed him up. We're headed back to Marauder. He says Tech's one deck below main, held in their brig."
"Copy," responds Hunter in nothing more than a terse whisper.
Crosshair guides Echo back into the accursed ready room. He's sagging painfully in his brother's grip, and the heavy stench of methane feels like a punch in the face.
"Yeah. Fucking foul," Crosshair agrees, noticing Echo's disgusted grimace just before his keen eyes sweep across the room's entirety and the departed Skakoan adversary. "Huh. Through the ear. Nice."
Echo flashes his brother a lopsided grin but then feels his knees start to wobble.
"Echo, stay with me," Crosshair says, alarmed and searching the room again. "Kriff you're heavy. The least you could do is stay vertical."
"Cross," Echo pleads as his thoughts return to their brother still trapped in the prison. "Tech's… he's hurt."
"Oh he's hurt, is he?" Crosshair snaps at him, distractedly. He's spotted the Skakoan's expansive gravsled. It's still loaded with an abundance of sinister Techno Union equipment, but the sharpshooter remedies that with a swift kick that topples and scatters it all to the deck. Echo suspects he kicked it much, much harder than was necessary to get the job done.
Crosshair then guides Echo to the empty sled and helps deposit the ailing ARC onto the flat surface.
"Sit."
"Not your akk hound," Echo grumbles with a scowl, taking the much-needed seat.
"True," Crosshair scoffs, mindful of Echo's wounds as he helps the ARC get as comfortable as possible on the rigid surface. "You're not half as smart as one."
Crosshair gives him one last glance-over, looking for and assessing injuries. He frowns deeply but seems content with the convenient transport resource.
"Stay," he commands, just to piss Echo off.
Once he gets Echo situated on the sled, Crosshair unholsters the extra blaster he brought and places it in the palm of Echo's hand. Then he stalks over to the fallen TG-2 droid, studies the wiring coupling on its neck, and toggles the mechanism to release the droid's neck post. He pries the metalloid cranium free, carries it over to the gravsled, and places it in the front- as far away from Echo as possible.
"For Tech," the sniper declares when Echo issues him a weary and confused moue. "He'll have fucking field day with it," he adds with a gratuitous eye-roll.
"That he will," Echo agrees wistfully, wondering how much longer it'll be until they can get Tech the medical attention that he's in dire need of. Lost in worry and fatigue, Echo's startled when the sled jolts forward.
Crosshair's already donned his helmet, activated the gravsled, and positioned himself at its rear just behind where Echo's seated. The lanky bastard started pushing the sled and likely neglected to warn its lone passenger before doing so, for the exact purpose of startling him. Echo wants to be annoyed by this but instead finds himself grateful for the adrenaline provided by the abrupt scare. He can't very well watch Crosshair's six if he's nodding off before the ride even starts to get good.
They've just about left the hellish room behind forever when Crosshair suddenly pauses and turns to take one last curious look at the deceased Skakoan. He lowers the sight on his visor, draws his sidearm, and fires a single blaster shot at the Skakoan's stinking carcass. The blast hits the metal pressure suit with a thwang and ricochets harmlessly away somewhere further into the room. But the sniper somehow seems satisfied with this because he holsters his blaster and returns his attention to the gravsled. Vigilant as he is, he also notices Echo's wide, golden eyes staring up at him in confusion.
"What?" Crosshair, hisses at him. "Did you want to kiss him goodbye?"
"Huh- n-no, I just…," Echo stammers. Crosshair can be a real asshole most of the time, but Echo's never known him to desecrate a sentient enemy's corpse nor to take an impulsive pot-shot without reason. But he's way too tired to puzzle it out and far too weary to challenge his sullen brother's methods. "Let's go."
"Super," Crosshair mutters darkly, leaning his weight against the sled's handle and pushing it into motion once more.
…
Crosshair guides them smoothly through the corridors of the shockingly large shuttle as Echo refuses to let his own exhaustion prevent him from defending his brother's back. They make one stop when Crosshair notices a storage locker and pries it open to find most of Echo and Tech's stolen effects. The sharpshooter dumps the pile of black, white, and red armor, along with several tools and weapons, onto the bed of the sled. He also finds Echo's bucket and hesitates before offering it to the wounded ARC.
Echo looks at his beloved Bad Batch helmet but knows it could do more harm than good if he tries to fit it over his damaged cybernetics right now. He shakes his head gloomily and looks away.
"Don't worry," Crosshair says confidently, carefully stacking Echo's helmet in with the rest of the collection. "Won't need it anyway."
After that, the sniper takes off at a jog and guides the sled down the ship's horribly warped access ramp and into the crisp night air of the moon. Once they're away from the ship, Crosshair picks up the pace and, at some point, reports their status to Hunter again.
Echo's mainly in a tired daze by now. He's watching their six for any sign of movement and ready to take aim with the borrowed blaster, but he's fading quickly. The bounty hunter's ship shrinks away into the distance as they approach and overtake another grounded shuttle. Echo's never seen the shuttle or any remotely similar model before, but somehow, he instinctively knows it's a Techno Union vessel. A sharp pang of dread claws at Echo's stomach unexpectantly and he feels himself start to hyperventilate.
Crosshair notices his sudden surge of anxiety and reaches forward to squeeze Echo's trembling shoulder. He grips the ARC's shoulder tightly, almost painfully.
"They won't take you from us again," Crosshair hisses with conviction. Then raises his helmet just enough to spit disdainfully at the enemy ship. "Not ever."
Knowing well that Crosshair typically doesn't speak unless it's genuinely important to him, Echo feels the fiery panic in his gut start to abate. He flashes his brother a weary but appreciative half-grin.
Not long after that, the sled pitches upwards as Crosshair drives it into the familiar central compartment of the Havoc Marauder.
Next up: 1 down, 1 to go. Hunter and Wrecker hold up their end of the mission. Explosions may result.