Hello there! So funny story, I think I saw the base idea for this floating around on Twitter some months back, about what if the clones carved things into the insides of gunships, and it stuck with me. I wrote a bit of this, got very busy with work, and was finally able to finish it all these months later now that I actually have some free time. It turned out much longer than I was expecting, and I even tossed in a clone pilot OC, Skipper, just for the fun of it because why not. I hope you all enjoy!
I still don't own anything.
"I feel naked without it, I look ridiculous, I could've kept it on."
"With your sling, you could not have. And it's only half your pauldron."
"Exactly! It's uneven!"
Echo resisted the urge to pinch the bridge of his nose in exasperation. He could have, given the fact that he was holding his damaged helmet in his hand. But doing so would only aggravate his headache, and he didn't want to mess up the bandages Kix had so painstakingly wrapped around his forehead. "Rex wears a one-sided pauldron all the time," he pointed out.
"Yeah, but he's used to it," Fives replied without missing a beat. Two more injured troopers entered the LAAT/i and Fives dropped his voice. "I'm all off balance."
Echo smiled at his brother's antics as Fives mimed tilting back and forth. The blaster shot Fives had taken to the shoulder had mostly been stopped by his armor, but not all the way. Kix, with the promise that Fives could requisition a new one from the quartermaster, had to toss the scorched half pauldron to wrap the injury before putting Fives' left arm in a sling.
It was a lucky injury, all things considered. So was Echo's. A chunk of shrapnel forceful enough to penetrate his helmet could've ended much worse than some stitches and a concussion. It didn't even hurt that badly. Probably on account of the painkiller Kix had dosed him with, but still.
So many brothers had ended up worse. Their defense of the mining mountains on Polpis Major against the Separatist assault had been successful, but not before they'd been pushed to the neighboring farmland, where there was no cover.
He could still remember the visceral terror that flooded his veins when Fives had taken the shot and been flung backwards before Echo could even see exactly where he'd been hit. He'd only had time to scream Fives' name before a rocket punched through their lines, sending shards of hot metal in every direction, including towards Echo's head.
Things had gotten very fuzzy very quickly after that. It wasn't until he made it back to the aid station that he saw Fives again and got confirmation that his brother was still alive.
But now they were fine. Echo just had to keep reminding himself of that. Skywalker, Tano, and Rex were coordinating cleanup, the seriously wounded had already been evacuated to the Venators in orbit, and now the walking wounded were being loaded aboard transports to take their turn.
"You see the nose art on the Lartie?" Echo asked, hoping to distract his brother from his tirade.
Fives had an affinity for unique nose art. It brought some class to the ships, he always said, and was disappointed that more weren't painted in a similar fashion. "You even have to ask?" Fives said. Echo could hear the smirk in his voice even from behind Fives' helmet. "It's good. Frag 'em and drag 'em." He repeated the phrase plastered on the gunship, along with an image of a clone trooper lobbing a thermal detonator at a super battle droid.
"Don't let Skipper hear you say that," said a trooper from behind them. As Echo turned, something in his chest relaxed upon seeing the red medic symbol on Kix's shoulder. Even with his helmet on, Echo would know him anywhere. He was supporting another trooper, Jinx, with an arm around the waist, likely to keep weight off what looked to be a lower leg injury. "Any kind of praise goes right to his head."
"You know one of the pilots?" Echo asked. It was a somewhat uncommon occurrence, what with how the pilots shifted between battalions as needed, and spent most of their time in the cockpit, unseen by the troops they were transporting.
Kix nodded as he led Jinx to a stop beside Fives and Echo. "We're batchmates. He's got an eye and a hand for detail work. He flies by morning, draws and tattoos by night." The way he said it made it clear that he was reciting something Skipper himself had said, probably many times.
"He to blame for your head slogan?" Fives teased.
"It's a great piece of art and you know it," Kix fired back. He had told Echo once, during one of his first stays in the med bay before he was even an ARC, that if Kix himself found his tattoo funny, some of his brothers probably would too. If he could make a brother in pain smile without even having to say anything himself, well, that was just another tool in his medic's arsenal.
"Yeah, yeah."
"You two holding up alright?" Kix slid back into medic mode without breaking stride.
The engines began to hum as the gunship prepared for takeoff. Echo shifted ever so slightly to allow the doors to close. The added noise from the engines and the enclosed space made his head throb in time with his pulse, but it was manageable. "Never better," he said with a smile.
Fives mimed tipping to his left again, and Echo tugged on his right arm to get him to knock it off.
Kix shook his head. "Maybe next time you should take a hit in the right one too, even it out. Or, better yet, take none at all."
Fives lifted his right hand in a mock salute. "Sir, yes, sir!"
Echo shook his head in similar fashion to Kix. As he did so, his eyes landed on something that had been previously obscured when the doors were open. He shifted closer to see better.
There were names and small pictures carved into the metal of the door's interior. Echo ran a hand over a few of them and felt his glove barely catch along the scratches.
"Skipper said yes to that one time, and now everyone's gone off and run with it," Kix filled in for them. Fives turned his head to look at what Echo was investigating.
"It's against regulations to deface Republic property," Echo said quietly, partly for the truth of it, and partly because he knew it would rile Fives up.
It worked immediately. "Oh, please. Kix literally walks around with a droid-killing slogan on his karking skull. This is just…another form of artistic expression." Fives kept his helmet on as he leaned in closer to the door to read some of the names. After a few moments of reading, he pulled his vibroblade from its holster.
"You're not serious," Echo groaned.
"What? I'm adding to the mural. Kix doesn't mind."
"Kix," the medic drawled, "will also not want to hear about it if Rex gives you a demerit for defacing Republic property." Echo could hear the smile in his voice as he repeated the regs back to them.
Fives didn't pay the comment any attention, instead set on beginning his carving. Not long after, the gunship shuddered and took off, causing him to nearly lose his balance without a free hand to hold onto the hand strap.
Echo caught him around the waist with the hand that wasn't holding his helmet and steadied him. Fives shot him a quick smile and got back to work. His masterpiece didn't take long. When he ran the fingers along the design to rid it of any metal shavings, a '5' stared back at them amongst the names. It didn't take up much space—smaller than the palm of a hand. Fives looked proud of it. "There," he said. "Now they'll know we were here."
Echo looked away from the marking to the other names. Some were clustered together, clearly done by a group of close brothers. There were other symbols in similar groupings, or single carvings here or there. He wondered how many of these men were still alive. How many of them only had a scratch mark on the inside of a gunship to signify they ever existed in the first place.
Maybe this was as good of a memorial as they would ever get. It was certainly one that the rest of their batch would've loved adding to, Cutup especially. So Echo couldn't let Fives be the only one to make a mark.
Before he could think about it further, he unwound his arm from Fives' waist and plucked the vibroblade from his hand. "Hey!" Fives protested. He was able to steady himself now that the gunship was on a stable course back to the Venator.
Echo leaned in closer to the door and thought for a second. If it came down to it, he'd blame Kix's painkiller for his breach of regulations. In the gunship's red interior light, their armor took on a similar red hue, save for the spots of 501st blue that adorned it. The blue handprint on his armor looked almost black in the light, standing out from the rest of his kit.
The decision was made for him.
He handed off his helmet to Fives and put the tip of the knife just under the '5' on the door.
"Don't you dare—" Fives started.
"Relax." Echo carefully scratched in the outline of a right hand around the '5', positioning it in the middle of the palm. The focus made his head pound, but it was worth it. A few of the fingers looked a little wobbly, given the slight swaying of the gunship, but the proportions were right, which was what Echo really cared about. If it ended up looking like a pile of nuna sausages, Fives would never let him hear the end of it.
When he was done, he similarly brushed it off before he returned the vibroblade to Fives' holster. There weren't many moments where his brother seemed to be at a loss for words, but this was one of them. Echo found himself wishing he could see through the helmet, because Fives' blank stare wasn't giving him much in the moment.
Then he slung his good arm around Echo's shoulders, Echo's helmet in his hand clattering against his armor as he did so. "We'll make a reg-breaker of you yet."
Echo found himself grinning.
"Remind me to put you on the docket for a head scan when we get up in the med bay, I think that blast shook something loose," Kix said from behind him, but it was clear he was smiling too.
The hum of the engines changed in pitch, signifying their slow down and approach towards the ship. But Echo didn't move just yet, held in place by Fives' arm around his shoulders and the signs of so many brothers that had come before them, laid plain against the metal.
After joining up with Clone Force 99, Echo honestly never thought he'd get the chance to serve with the 501st again. The thought still brought forth mixed emotions. He fit in well with the Bad Batch and the group as a whole was effective. But even so, he at times found himself missing the easy camaraderie he had with the others like Rex and Jesse, a bond that could only truly be formed through months and months of brutal combat. The Batch had that with each other. Slowly but surely, Echo was growing into it with them, but the thought still snuck up on him.
Like now, as he walked through the hangar of the Venator and saw hundreds of brothers in blue and white armor milling about, laughing, and getting the ships ready for combat. Their joint campaign with the 501st and 212th was officially kicking off and the Bad Batch had been brought in to be deployed behind enemy lines, and hopefully create a breach that the normal units could utilize to punch through the lines fully.
They'd be forced to tag along in the normal gunships instead of flying in on the Marauder, which the rest of the group seemed silently displeased about. Echo didn't mind so much. The hustle and bustle of hundreds of troopers all working together to take an objective was normal for him. Hunter had stayed to get the mission briefing from Cody, Rex, and the generals, while Wrecker and Crosshair took a look at the armory and Tech ran through some possible solutions to comm problems they may have once they reached the planet's surface due to the atmosphere.
Which left Echo by himself. But he wasn't technically alone, not with so many brothers around him. There weren't many armor designs he recognized from his time with the legion, a fact he desperately tried not to think about.
They already had a gunship number that would be taking their squad and how ever many other troopers could fit down to the surface. Echo figured a good use of his time would be to find the gunship and offer any help he could until the others were done with their tasks.
He counted in his head as he walked past rows of gunships just waiting for the launch order. Some had nose art of clones smashing droids, or female figures sitting atop rockets aimed at the enemy. He couldn't help but notice there were fewer pieces of art than the last time he had been in this hangar. Even with both Kenobi's and Skywalker's forces in the assault—two of the groups that were even allowed to be creative in regards to nose art in the first place—there was more bare metal than painted.
The gunships that did have paint had clearly seen some action. Scratches, blaster burns, and other carbon scoring marred many of the designs. Some of them had clearly been touched up in a paint color that was similar to the original but not quite a match.
Not even the ships would come out of this war unscathed.
When his eyes flicked across the row to the gunship number that matched their orders, something about the nose art gave him pause. Echo could read the slogan, frag 'em and drag 'em, even from where he stood. He slowly walked the last few steps until he stood under an image of a clone trooper tossing a thermal detonator towards a super battle droid. Unlike many of the other gunships, the paint hadn't been touched up. The scratches and battle damage made it clear that this ship and its pilots had seen more than their fair share of combat.
Some of that combat, Echo remembered, was entered while Echo himself was a passenger on this very gunship. What were the chances it was still operational?
"Appreciating the artwork?" One of the pilots asked as he came over. He smiled just a little in greeting, but it was guarded. He probably didn't know what to make of Echo, what with his prosthetics and out-of-unit armor and all.
"It's definitely unique," Echo said with a nod. He looked to the pilot and then back to the nose art. It took him a second, but then the name of the pilot Kix had mentioned a lifetime ago came back to him. "You wouldn't happen to know if Skipper still flies this one, would you?"
The pilot crossed his arms. "Depends who's asking."
"The name's Echo," he introduced. "If I'm remembering correctly, that exact gunship helped medevac my unit from Polpis Major about a year and a half ago. The medic in my unit, Kix, said he was batchmates with one of the pilots named Skipper."
The tension in the pilot's stance bled out of him and his shoulders slumped ever so slightly forward. "I remember that extraction," he said quietly. "All that flat farmland. They ripped you to shreds." Then he stood a little straighter and held out his hand. "I'm Skipper."
Echo had to physically force himself out of his momentary stupor so that he didn't leave Skipper hanging. He'd never actually seen Skipper, just heard the few stories Kix told about him after that particular mission was over. He knew there was always a high turnover in their flight ranks. He had fully expected this pilot to not even know that a clone named Skipper had once flown this very gunship. And yet, here he was.
He squeezed Skipper's forearm in the traditional Mandalorian-style greeting. "It's nice to finally put a face to a name. I guess I owe you a belated thanks for pulling us out."
Skipped shrugged as they dropped their hands. "I just flew out and picked up who they told me to. It was your boots on the ground that made the difference."
Echo knew that was true for that particular battle, but not overall.
There was silence for a few moments before Skipper asked, "So, Kix, huh?"
"The one and only. He said you were the one behind his tattoo?"
Skipper's smile gained a touch of soft fondness. "I was. He was adamant that he wanted it on his head, no matter what I told him. The discomfort only got to him once, then he powered through the rest of the session. It was madness."
"It seems to run in the 501st," Echo informed him. "If you see an ARC wandering around with a Republic cog on his helmet just know that underneath, he's got the same thing on his head too. He and Kix are close." He chuckled just a little at that. It figured that the troopers with the head tattoos would band together.
"I need to know what they're putting in your mess hall rations," Skipper said as he shook his head slightly. He paused again and his jaw clenched before he took a small step forward. "Speaking of Kix, I don't suppose you've heard from him? The only thing in his file is that he's MIA, but no one tells me anything."
Echo frowned. "Missing?" he asked, just to be sure he heard right. Kix wouldn't be one to ever willingly desert his post. Rex kept a careful eye on the 501st, and the long-time members of Torrent company especially. If Kix had been injured or killed in battle, Echo had to believe that Rex would've known about it. The fact that he hadn't even told Echo that Kix was missing in the first place was concerning.
Rex just had a lot on his plate with the upcoming campaign. That was all. Echo hadn't even seen him yet, beyond a holo call requesting the Batch's presence. There just hadn't been time.
"Truthfully, I didn't even know that much," Echo admitted sadly. He should've figured though, when Kix didn't search him out the moment the Batch touched down aboard the Venator. Just like how Fives hadn't been there when Echo had woken up on Skako Minor… He blinked forcefully. "I only saw him about two months ago. He was on Anaxes when Rex and the Batch pulled me out from under the Techno Union's thumb."
Skipper looked crestfallen, any momentary hope that sparked in his eyes at the thought that someone had information about what happened to his batchmate immediate snuffed out. "He say anything to you the last time you saw him? Out of the ordinary, I mean."
Echo thought back. Kix had been with him right after the rescue. He was a constant, reassuring presence amidst the haze of drugs, pain, and testing. Echo could still remember fighting his way through a fog of unconsciousness and being greeted by just the sliver of a humorous tattoo mostly covered by Kix's grown-in hair. That in and of itself was odd, now that he thought about it, but it was something Skipper probably already knew about. "No, sorry," he said with a sigh. "Told me to not get myself blown up a second time."
"And if you do, make sure I'm around, alright? I'll fix you up, good as new, there and then. None of this waiting over a year for proper medical treatment, alright?"
Echo could hear it in his head as clearly as he could the the cacophony of boots and voices in the hanger.
"Sounds like him," Skipper said. The corner of his mouth quirked up just a bit in a sad smile. "I just—" he trailed off.
"The not knowing is the hardest part. Believe me, I understand." He did, and deeply, with Fives' death still so shrouded in secrecy, and no amount of asking or researching was bringing him closer to any answers. "I can have one of my squad look into it, he has a way with computers," Echo offered, knowing Tech would take him up on it. The Batch had met Kix on Anaxes and begrudgingly declared him "okay for a reg", which was high praise—from everyone except Crosshair, that was, who declined to give an opinion.
Skipper perked up a little at that. "If it's not any trouble. I'd appreciate it. He's—he's all I've got. Not even a token to remember him by."
Echo's heart clenched at that. He at least had Hevy's medal, given to 99, then Fives, then Rex in the wake of his death. To have nothing…
They exchanged comm frequencies and Echo promised to contact him if he learned anything. Skipper promised the same.
"It's good to see you, Echo," Skipper said, a tinge of sadness to his voice. "K'oyacyi."
Echo nodded. "You too."
With one final look, Skipper turned around to finish up the rest of the pre-flight checks and Echo watched the bustling in the hangar reach a fever pitch. He took a deep breath in and blew it out slowly. As soon as this mission was done, they'd get to the bottom of this. He owed it to Kix for all he had done for Torrent throughout the war. He owed it to Fives because he hadn't been able to do it for him.
"Looks like someone made a friend!" Wrecker's voice boomed from a few gunships down. Echo turned to see the whole squad making their way over.
He cleared his throat and stood a little straighter.
"You know him?" Hunter asked, sounding equal parts wary, interested, and protective as they came to stand beside him.
"A little," Echo said. "Skipper, our gunship pilot. Pulled myself and a lot of the 501st off Polpis Major a while back. I wasn't expecting him to still be around."
Tech looked up from his data pad. "Statistically speaking, your surprise at his survival is warranted. He is either a good pilot, or very lucky."
"Let's hope for both," Hunter said, back at ease, and motioned them towards the gunship right before the engines began to hum. They clustered together next to the far door as another squad of five clones filed in behind them. When the doors shut, they switched to internal comms and Hunter pulled out a holo map of the objective and relayed the debrief.
Echo was wholly focused on absorbing the information and adding what insight he could strategy-wise as the gunship left the Venator and began descending towards the planet.
When Hunter had finished, he turned the holo off, leaving them bathed in the gunship's red light. "Any questions?" They all shook their heads. It was a fairly simple mission, at least for them. Infiltrate the enemy lines, use the canyons to wind around behind the lines the rest of the troops would be attacking, and either create a distraction or quite literally blow through them to give the other troops a way in.
Wrecker was quite fond of the second option.
"Only if it can be accomplished by not harming troops in the vicinity, should they be that close at the time," Hunter reminded.
Wrecker just nodded his head enthusiastically. Echo could picture his smile behind his helmet. Wrecker had, after all, visited the armory to get materials for that very plan. It would be a shame not to use them.
"A blast that large would give away our position," Crosshair pointed out, arms folded across his chest. His fingers tapped against his armor.
Wrecker leaned away from the door to playfully shove his shoulder. "We'll be blasting through droids anyway. They'll already know where we are!" Also a solid point, considering once they made contact with the enemy, it was no longer a stealthy infiltration.
Echo found his eyes drawn to the metal door of the gunship, now visible behind where Wrecker had been standing, and didn't focus much on Tech's reply. He narrowed his eyes and took a step forward.
The number of engravings had grown substantially since he had last been on Skipper's gunship. It seemed that brothers from every battalion had contributed. Names, remembrances, and small drawings littered the door. The red interior light seemed to cast them all in their own etched shadow. Echo took another step behind Wrecker and he vaguely noted the comm chatter dying out.
Kix had been standing to his left, and Fives in front of him on the righthand side of the gunship…
There.
"I don't believe it," he whispered, mostly to himself.
"Believe what?"
"Echo?"
Nestled in amongst the other carvings, some much newer and still shiny, was a dark engraved '5' with a hand outline around it. Echo reached out his scomp and traced the markings. The hand and brother he no longer had. So much had changed since that evac. Since Fives had convinced him to go against his training and freeze that moment in time for all their brothers to see.
Echo had never been so glad Fives got him to break a reg.
"Echo?" Hunter's question was punctuated by a gentle hand on his shoulder. He had come up somewhat behind Echo, shielding him from the other squad in the back of the gunship. Crosshair and Tech had similarly closed off the left side, and Wrecker turned around from where he was in front. "Everything alright?"
"Yeah, sorry," Echo apologized and tried to pull himself from the memories. They clung to him, sticky and bittersweet.
"Appreciating the art?" Crosshair asked. It was his usual tone of voice, but Echo thought he detected some interested concern there. He was still getting used to the Batch and their mannerisms and inflections, especially Crosshair, so he was surprised to hear it in the first place.
Echo smiled to himself. "You're looking at the artist, so, yeah."
"You carved that?" Wrecked asked and leaned forward to brush his fingers gently over the hand.
"I did the hand. My brother, Fives," even saying his name caused his voice to crack in a minuscule way he was sure the others heard, "put the five."
Crosshair scoffed. "How original."
"You deliberately damaged Republic property against regulations?" The disbelief was evident in Tech's voice. The whole squad was familiar with how Echo had gotten his name and had agreed that the name still fit, despite his current status as a member of a particularly deviant squad. "That is quite surprising."
"In my defense, Fives did it first. He only had one good arm and he still managed. Kix wasn't as pleased, but he didn't rat us out." Echo dropped his arm from the etchings but didn't take his eyes off them. If Skipper and his gunship survived the mission, he'd have to show Rex. It would be worth the demerit—not that he believed Rex would actually care about such regulation breaking—for him to see some small mark that Fives was able to make on the galaxy.
"The same Kix that Crosshair fought with before we got you?" Wrecker asked, to which Echo nodded.
"You two did good work, left your mark," Hunter said before squeezing Echo's shoulder and dropping his hand. "Sounds like he could've given Wrecker a run for his credits, carving our mission totals into the wall on Kamino."
Wrecker shifted, seeming mock affronted. "Hey, that's my job!"
"It was self-appointed," Crosshair said.
"Yeah, so? I didn't see any of you lining up to do it!"
Tech raised his hand. "Technically, you did not give us the option, nor was it an agreed-upon addition to the barracks."
Wrecker raised his voice to defend himself and the conversation soon devolved into good-natured bickering, as Echo was coming to find was the norm of the group, especially before a conflict. It gave them something easy and familiar to fall back on before they were swept into the unknown.
Fives had always been extra talkative before the start of a campaign, too.
You would've liked them, Echo thought as he looked at his brother's etching. The top line of the '5' was a little wobbly from Fives almost losing his balance as the gunship hurtled back towards the Venator. Maybe not at first, but eventually, you would've fit right in.
"Sixty seconds to the drop zone, boys!" Skipper's voice crackled over the intercom. The comm chatter in Echo's helmet died down to anticipatory silence. Wrecker rolled his shoulders, Crosshair stretched his fingers, and Tech secured his data pad on his utility belt.
"You ready?" Hunter asked from behind him.
Echo thought of the way Fives would rest his hands on his pistols before the gunship door would open. How Kix would adjust the straps of his med bag that didn't need adjusting.
Echo rested his left hand on his holster, his fingertips brushing his kama as he did so. "Always."
Crosshair snickered something about Echo waking up on the cocky side of the rack this morning. Before he could even finish the barb, the rattling in the hull increased until a sudden thunk had them hitting the surface of the planet. The doors opened and they immediately exited into a cloud of disrupted dust.
After taking a second to get their directional bearings, the squad departed, leaving Skipper and the gunship shrouded in dust behind them.
K'oyacyi: come back safely/stay alive
Thank you so much for reading! I have lots of thoughts and feelings about Kix, and Fives and Echo, so this was a lot of fun to write! If you have any thoughts, I'd love to hear them, especially since I haven't written a ton for this fandom yet. Also if anyone knows where the original post for this came from, please let me know so I can credit it!
