TBB - Delete those files! (CROSSHAIR/ECHO/HUNTER)
By Gun Roswell
Preface
The morning after
Running amok
Delete. Those. Holos. Now!
Preface
Set somewhere in Star Wars the Bad Batch and the Clone Wars galaxy (multiverse?) of things
A night out?
The buzzing town all around?
What could possibly go wrong?
Too much booze perhaps?
Spiked drinks at that?
Delete those surveillance holos!
Part of Crosshair/Echo/Hunter series
Notes: A poor attempts of humour kind of a tale as inspired by the "Boss Baby" himself! (Yeah? So? I have a varied tastes as my fav fandoms!)
The morning after
'Don't accept drinks from strangers! Those just might be… spiked? The drinks, and perhaps even them strangers? There are varied species in the galaxy far far away after all!'
"What the kriff?"
Hunter cracked his eyes open. His vision still blurry, the slicing headache like a tiny worker with a jackhammer having made a permanent residence inside of his brain. Holding on to his head with a tight grip around it like willing it to work for the ache. It never did of course. But Hunter kept on holding the cursed head between his hands just the same, trying to push the pain away, somehow.
Having asked the stupidest of questions of the morning, Hunter was only getting several groans in response. Trying to clear his eyes, he glanced around him. Bad move! The nausea hitting him hard making Hunter want to hurl and barely managing to hold it in. Seeing his partners in crime looking worse to wear than he himself felt. They all looked rather sad and totally off from their usual shining selves. "I… wot… the kark… is going on?"
Echo was the first one up though. His scomp arm whirring by itself for some reason. Echo desperately trying to make it stop as he felt it too. The pain inside of his head most likely rivalling that to Hunter's. Echo usually the one managing to handle his liquor much better than the rest of the team did, As he had to assume it was the drinks the three of them had gone the night before which was causing this… achy-shaky feelings in them all. And why did his mechanical arm seem to have a mind of its own all of a sudden?
"My head!"
Crosshair growled from somewhere on the floor, not moving though. As clearly he was in a smiler state as the other two were too. The three of them having managed to get back to the Marauder however even if their memory was gone for the most part of the happenings of the night before. The trio lying across the floor of their bunk room, never having managed to reach their beds apparently.
As they started to come back to the reality of I all soon enough, only to realise they were all in various stages of undress.
"Wh-what the hell happened to us anyway?"
Hunter felt his naked bottom being exposed to the cool air of the ship, the wrong kind of shivers running across his body. Having clearly lost his pants at some point during the night. He could see Crosshair being shirtless while Echo was dressed in his underwear only. It did hardly match up with any former activities of theirs. Well, to some extent at least. Usually, things were a tad more, sedate as far as their bedroom activities went.
The three of them having gone out in their civilian clothing the night before for a barhop, nothing odd there. As the Bad Batch team was having a week off in a longest of whiles and the trio having decided on having some fun for a change. Spending a night out on the town just the three of them. "Looks like we did something… to loose our threads?"
Echo was trying to access his memory, usually the cybernetic files having stored whatever he was doing each given moment before he purged the unnecessary stuff. Alas right now, Echo wasn't able to get into them. As each time he tried, his head was having a slicing pain run through it like someone had stuck a knife into his brain. Not that Echo had even experienced such a thing, not that he recollected such a thing happening? "Yeah, but how and why?"
Hunter had only a faint memory of where they had gone. The first few bars they had hit before… well, before his memory went dark. And as to loosing their clothing? Hunter was sure they had not had sex either. As. well, there was really no evidence of the same. Besides, Hunter was leaning against his bed, Echo was lying farther away in the middle of the room with Crosshair closest to the fresher door. And so Hunter deducing quickly this was not part of their usual nightly entertainment routine with the three of them usually in the same spot during and afterwards, all curled up into each other.
That's how it worked after all. Having sex. Together.
"I can't access my memory, something is blocking me from doing it." Echo winced, the sheering pain once again making its presence known. Something which bothered Echo as this had never happened before. He would need Tech's help to figure it out for sure.
"Cross?"
"I… I have no idea."
Crosshair had finally managed to get into a seating position. Even if he felt the nausea with the rest of them, he was usually able to cope with such things better than Hunter. Echo being the one exception being better at it than Crosshair was.
"So, we are in a really bad shape, having lost time and part of our clothing and none of us remember what happened? We really did not drink that much. Did we?"
Hunter looked from one to the other, only getting confused stares back in return.
"O-kay. We need to figure this out."
Hunter tried to move, but he felt the shakes of his body taking over. The other two unmoving as well.
"In a moment."
Running amok
'Caught on several holo cams for sure! Butt naked, no faking this, while running around the streets in bare feet!'
"Thanks!"
Tech had come to their rescue, giving them all hypos filled with strong painkillers.
As it was, after some time the three of them not having emerged from their quarters, having left Wrecker and Tech to ponder as to what was going on.
After all, usually after a night of partying, the trio was up early and curing their hangovers with caf and whatever concoctions they managed to think of on the spot. Alas, on this morning, or rather afternoon, none of them had come out and there was not even one peep heard at the door when Tech had gone to check up on them before.
"You're welcome, I am sure."
Tech could not help the small smirk forming on his lips. Having seen the other three in a really bad shape, the groans and complaints having started as soon as him and Wrecker had entered their room. Hunter, Echo and Crosshair clearly having been doing something worse than usual the night before. Which was not unheard of per se, but this state they were in now? Well, even Tech had to admit it was a first.
"So, what happened to you guys?"
Wrecker was already wanting to know the gossip side of things seeing as his squad mates clearly had run into some kind of amok the night before. But he too was as worried as Tech had been, the man having paced the ship from stem to stern while trying to figure out why the trio had not come out from their room.
"You tell us!"
Crosshair's snarl raspier than usual, despite the medicines giving him some relief from the worst of the pain. But his mind was a void as much as the other two's were. The memory pretty much ending where Hunter had commented earlier.
"Well, as far as I can tell from the medical scans." As Tech had totally ran those as soon as he had gotten inside the room seeing the three in pretty bad shape and so checking them again after applying the medicine to them first. "There are remnants of some kind of compound I am not familiar with. I need to investigate this further." Tech looked up from the scanner, his gaze wandering from one culprit to the other. "Part from the pain in your heads that is and the clear memory loss…" Tech having deduced they were having trouble remembering the happenings from the night before. "Is there something else off with you I should know about?" Seeing their state of dress, or rather lack of.
Echo glanced from Hunter to Crosshair and then back to Tech. His scomp now under control, but he knew he should have been able to access his memory files just the same.
"I… I had problems with my arm before, the scomp was moving of its own accord. And like the others, my memory is also blank. And cannot access my files."
Tech was looking at Echo rather thoughtfully, being familiar with the inner workings of Echo's cybernetics and so agreeing that those were rather odd occurrences for sure.
"That should not have happened unless there was some malfunction."
"Well, as far as I… remember, there was nothing wrong with my system before… well this morning."
"We should run further scans on you. All of you. As whatever it was you digested clearly had a worse effect on Echo than the rest of you."
Hunter, Crosshair and Echo could only nod in agreement.
As this was all unfamiliar territory. And if there was indeed someone targeting them, the clones, the troopers even? Well, they needed to report it to their commanders. If this was just a simple case of being in the wrong place at the wrong time, then that too, they needed to figure out.
"Good, then we'll start as soon as you are feeling better."
The meds were kicking in soon enough, the nausea and the shaky feels letting go of the three. Because none of them wanted to do any kind of mopping either, cleaning up anything they might have had the need to expel from their stomachs.
"Meanwhile, try to make yourselves as comfortable as possible. Wrecker and myself will get you something bland to eat and drink."
Tech worrying they had not eaten or replenished their liquids since the night before and taking medicine by itself would most likely cause nausea of its own.
"Sounds like a plan Tech. And thanks, again." Hunter was only too glad Tech was as knowledgable as he was and that they could keep this in the team. At least for now if it turned out to be nothing except some bad luck on their part.
"You're welcome, I'm sure!" Tech let a hint of a smirk form as him and Wrecker left the three to recover.
Delete. Those. Holos. Now!
'It all stopped being funny about a minute ago.'
"So, you figured out what it was we were subjected to then?"
Hunter had been summoned by Tech. The bulk of the tests having been run, several hours having been since that. With Echo, Crosshair and Hunter simply lounging in their bunks, not only healing their aches but also trying to mend their bruised egos. It was a somewhat of an embarrassing moment for sure, loosing ones memory, not holding your liquor and all.
"Yes, I have Hunter." Tech looked up from his console he had been working on. "This is something of a new drug, which there is some buzz on the holonet about I found. It seems that there are some fractions trying to launch it and apparently, some blind testing is going on on unsuspecting targets while those creating it are trying to fine tune the product itself." Tech had done his research alright. "And it looks like you weren't the first ones to suffer through similar circumstances." Tech pulled up a few comments, none of them clones thankfully, from people sharing their stories of being drugged. Loosing all memory and ending up in somewhat embarrassing situations because of it.
"So, it's not like we were a specific target then." Hunter clarified.
"No. It was simply bad luck ending up in a place where someone spiked your drinks." Tech told Hunter as much, feeling confident in his findings after all.
"Oh-kay. So what happened last nigh, stays inside our team then?" Hunter still needed the validation, as this was something he should report if there was even a hint of them having been targeted.
"I am sure Hunter. The evidence is right here." Tech motioned to the screen.
"Well, then good. And we three are out of danger?" Hunter asked to be sure.
"The drug has dissipated all your systems. You should be back to your normal selves soon enough."
Hunter only nodded his understanding.
"But the memory loss of the happenings during the night might be permanent." Tech paused and glanced at Hunter… his sudden silence leaving Hunter worried once more.
"What is it Tech?"
"Well, I did find something else too. Something, you should see."
"What, did you find?"
"Um… I dug into the security holos, naturally, while piecing this all together. Figuring out from where you were at the time you remembered being in the beginning of your… journey and then where you might have gone from there." Tech's eyes were darting suddenly, something he did when feeling nervous.
"And?" Hunter sounded clipped suddenly, seeing the evasive look on Tech.
"Well, suffice to say, you were all under the influence of something you really could not control and guess, the inhibitions were lowered considerably… and… well…"
"Tech! What. Did you find?" Hunter pressed between clenched teeth.
Just then, Crosshair, Echo and Wrecker joined the two as well, hearing the conversation between Tech and Hunter getting somewhat, heated?
"What's going on?" Echo asked first.
"Yeah, we're clean, right?" Crosshair wanted to know too.
"You are. All three of you are alright. Now that is." Tech assured them then.
Alas all four of them were staring at Tech now and so.
"Fine. This is what I found in the security holos."
Tech loaded up the three holo videos he had found after a thorough search. Surprisingly, not so much surveillance going on around the area as he had initially expected there to be there.
What they saw was somewhat of amusing though. At least to those not playing the parts in said holo vids. The setting that of a park in the middle of the city, empty mostly part from the three Batchers, sans a few passersby hooting at them as they saw the trio in action.
It seemed that Hunter had lost all inhibition and having ridden himself of all his clothing. Running amok in the green grass with his well rounded ass flashing in the pale street lights. Among other naked body parts flashing there as well. Echo had gotten down to his skivvies as he hollered and hooted at Hunter doing his little show off bare skin for the other two's benefit, something of a naughty dance for sure! Crosshair joining with Echo, ridding of his shirt while using it as some kind of a rope to trying to catch Hunter. The two of them then continuing on their dirty dancing, Echo joining in soon enough. The few passersby causing the whistles and cheers staying a moment to watch the show before moving on. Because it did not take long for the trio to be rolling in the grass, the lot of them butt naked in the end and well, having sex…
After the holo ended, there was a moment of silence in the small work space they all occupied.
Hunter glanced at the others, before giving the order.
"Delete those files."
"Are you sure?" Echo and Crosshair asked in unison then, seeing the wide eyed confused look on Hunter.
"Yeah, Hunt. Looks like you were having lotsa fun!" Wrecker commented with mirth in his voice.
"I… you…" Hunter was in a loss of words, clearly!
"We could download them to the Marauder's database and then delete from the holonet." Tech simply stated like it was nothing they had seen, simply some mission files they had all observed.
"Let's do that!" Crosshair agreed his pleading eyes on Hunter who seemed to be the only one embarrassed of this whole ordeal.
"Yeah, Hunter, pretty please." Echo joined in, with large puppy dog eyes.
Hunter's eyes went from one to the other.
"Fine!" He finally yielded. "But make sure they are all deleted from any public viewing and our versions are locked up tightly!"
Hunter bolted the room, leaving the rest of them there, standing behind Tech. Hearing the door to their bunk room close, Crosshair leaned in and in a low whisper close to Tech said.
"Play it again Tech!"