Chapter 34 - I'm Stuck in Fleeting Moments (2:8)

"I don't want to steal you from your new squad." My head pops up at Five's voice – he and Echo have been arguing in heated whispers since we left.

"It's fine," Echo promises, "This is what I want to do. It's my choice."

"You've made a life without me. You don't need me."

I blink at the dim, blue datapad light, biting my lip.

"I want you."

"You have a kid. I'm not their dad."

Echo's full body jerks. "You're their brother. So am I, but so are they."

"Hey, Vision loves you. What do you think it would do if you said you weren't coming back?"

"She'd get over it."

Ouch.

"These lives are dying because we aren't helping, and you've been gone long enough, Fives. Let me have this."

"I can't stop you, but what about your squad? You keep putting everything over them, Echo. I'm just saying –"

"We have a duty –"

"Maybe it's time for you to stop –"

"The coordinates you told us are right ahead," Rex interrupts their squabble, speaking to me.

It's an overside Imperial building. It's something in the Works, a virtually uninhabited place compared to the rest of Coruscant, and I don't know what that means. "We need to get inside," I tell them. We can't go any closer in a speeder without being detected.

"Hold on," Echo interrupts, "We don't even know anything about this place. It's going to be dangerous, and I don't know if we'd all make it in and out undetected."

The whistle is louder. It's inside. I can feel it. "I have to go."

"We should go in together," Hunter objects.

I feel something. A twinge. This is my mission, and there's something waiting inside. I See it in a way I don't know how to explain, but that instinct, that feeling is never wrong. I don't wanna drag them into danger because I'm being dumb. "Nope. I'm taking Echo so he and Fives don't kill each other while I'm inside. Besides, gonna need him to scomp doors."

"I can fill that role sufficiently as well," Tech protests.

"Tech, I love you, but that's a terrible idea. Us two sneaking into an Imperial facility together, and it won't start a fire that's the beginning of world doom?"

My brother twitches.

"Nope. That's what I thought." I swing around, hair flying across my face as I hop over the speeder's edge. Or maybe this is just what I want right now – I've seen Echo leaving from a hundred klicks away – I just never expected it to be so soon. I wanted this with Crosshair. Closure. Hope for a future together. It's what I need with Echo – one last time together, just us, a battle that's ours alone.

Echo and Fives belong together. After all that time they've been apart, he deserves this. I'm not gonna try and take it from him. If I had the chance to make things right with Crosshair, I would do something crazy, too. Even if it meant... anything.

Hunter sighs. "Alright. We'll be right outside."

"I would suggest getting our ship in case we require a fast escape," Tech interrupts.

"Not a bad idea. Go. We'll be fine." I draw my blaster, eyeing the building up ahead. "Oh, actually, I think we'll be fun."

Hunter climbs over the speeder's edge, touching my shoulder. I jerk to a stop, turning back to face him. Kneeling, he's shorter than me now. I used to be hardly up to his shoulder. I've grown so much. I... sometimes wish I didn't. "Be careful, Vision," he requests, "We don't know what you're walking into."

I nod along, listening but not really. All I can hear is the whistling. Calling. And I know I have to go.

"If something's wrong, get out of there. You don't have to do this."

"Yeah, I do. It's what I was made for."

"You don't have to be. You're still a kid. You should get a chance to be one for a little longer."

"I've already had more of a childhood than you ever did. You've taken care of me all this time. Let me try this on my own."

He doesn't like it. I wouldn't, either, but it's what I need, and he knows that, even if it's killing him.

I jerk forwards, flinging my arms around his neck in a tight embrace, burying my face on his scarf. Hunter's hands lift to press to my back, hugging me close. When he pulls back, his face is strained, but he doesn't object again. "We'll be there if you need us," he says instead.

I nod, and Echo and I take off together.

**w**

They have the area walled off, but we're good at stealth, and Echo gives me a few boosts to climb over fences and other obstacles. The building is tall, and Echo finds a small hatch we wriggle inside of. I yank it shut after us, and squeeze past Echo to try going in front.

I can hear it louder now, and we have to stay in the vents a while longer. They have some sort of droids watching the halls everywhere.

"I don't know what this place is," Echo tells me finally, "But I don't like it."

"Relax," I whisper back, "We're just here for a kyber crystal, and then we never have to see it again."

"I'd like to know what it's made for. Imperials don't build without a purpose."

"I think it's a few halls down. I'll need a diversion to get inside. Can you get down there and deactivate one of the droids?"

"Sure," he answers unconvincingly, prying the grate off. I hold it for him while Echo jumps down, landing on the floor with a loud clank. I wince, fingering my blaster trigger.

Stealth is fun, but I like loud. Haven't had much action in a while, but I don't want to go up against an Imperial base. What if Crosshair's here? I don't want to fight him. I'm not gonna let everyone get jeopardized because I want to slap him. I shouldn't feel like that, anyway. He's my brother. Or, he was. Before he left us.

But when you give your heart to someone, you never get it back. I realize that now. My brother. Crosshair. My – everything.

I would do anything so I could get him back, but this isn't about Crosshair. It's about everybody I have left. Omega. Hunter. Wrecker. Tech. ...Echo.

Echo, who will never learn what it means to have peace. Echo, who is working himself to the ground and can't let go, no matter what we've all tried so hard to tell him. Echo, my oldest brother who I won't get to sleep beside anymore, who came the same time as me and we shaped each other so much. And maybe I'm doing this for him as much as me, because Echo needs to know the Jedi will always live on in some form or another, even after they're long gone.

Legends never die. Not as long as we carry them with us.

Echo throws a deactivator at a droid and it drops, sparking. He plugs into the wall, opening a door in front of us. I jump down, catching myself with my gloved hand and standing again, flipping hair out of my face.

"Let's get going," he advises, and we sprint into the next hall. There's another seeker droid, and I shoot it through its center eye, moving to the last door.

The whistling is louder. "It's in here," I breathe, staring fixedly at the tall, gray door. "I'll go inside."

That's when an alarm starts shrieking.

We jolt, looking around as the doors close and the halls go dark.

"We have to go," Echo says immediately, "They've jammed comms. We can't hold out a shootout like this."

I try my comm to verify, but it's just static. "We came this far. I can't stop now."

He looks at the door, considering. "Go," he orders, "I'll hold them off."

I nod and run for the door. It won't open, so I just straight up take a knife to it, shorting out the controls, and the door slides open. I skid inside, looking around.

It's not a kyber place. It's a vault.

Of lightsabers.

There are shelves and boards, lining the walls. Hilts like the walls, silver to gold, some wood and brown, curved and straight, grooved and smooth, leather-coated or plane metal. Each sing their own song, of times so long ago.

But it's not a crystal that calls to me.

It's a lightsaber, a hilt lying on a burgundy velvety cloth, set to the side of a small box, the other half open and vacant, for an identical hilt forever missing. It's a storage place, but this is a... memorial. A blade singing the song of someone long lost and forgotten, just like me, of another half missing forever. Gone with the mist, into a world violent and dark. Smoky and ashed.

It's calling for me.

My hand closes over the long hilt.

My mind jerks, spiraling, pulled forwards by a thousand threads

"You're reckless, little one. You never would've made it as Obi-Wan's padawan. But you might make it as mine."

"All I've ever been since I was a padawan is a soldier."

A world of snow and ice, Crosshair kneeling in the center of it all, looking skywards, faded over to another figure, a black flame, holding a lightsaber in his hands, standing over a graveyard.

Someone's screaming, voice far away and broken. Crosshair.

Rolling smoke, twisting fog, obscuring my sight from below and all around, doom impending in on us, cyclic and certain, a promised knowledge that nothing will be the same. Rumbles in the distance, fighters overhead. "Wrecker, get him on board!"

My hand reaching, reaching for nothing and always getting nothing because there's never anything and I'll never make it to anything – the end will always be the same – I can't save anyone.

My brother far below, his voice whisped over and unreal. "You must sever the connection hinge. Now!"

"Tech!" Omega's scream. Falling.

Something falling, air washing in around me, rushing and rushing into oblivion – I See it. Tech –

I feel it then, a fire, black and burning, spitting with smoke and ash, but vacant with a pit of emptiness that I know so well. The emptiness of when everything is torn away with nothing but a shattered whole in its wake. Anakin.

"The Dark Side –"

Something sounds, cutting through the haze on my mind and I whirl around, whipping my blaster up and firing at the figure in the doorway. Someone's coming towards me fast, a red laser sword in hand. The bolts fly away when they hit center, and then I'm thrown backwards. I roll over with a grunt, landing on my back, air knocked out of me.

The black-clothed Imperial stalks towards me. "What's this?" he snarls, "A lightsaber thief?"

"Well, technically," I snap back, scrambling to my feet, "Lightsabers belonged to the Jedi, so you're the one stealing them."

"Or perhaps," he continues, raiding his lightsaber, "You are a surviving Jedi."

"Okay, now that's just insulting. I don't think even the dumbest, stupidest Jedi known to all of Jedi kind would take me as one of them. Do I look like a Jedi?"

"You appear as wild as all insurgents fighting the Empire."

"Okay, ouch. There's no need to be so rude." I pull out my knife and throw it at his ugly gray face. He bats it away with his lightsaber, and it flips over, clanking onto the floor. And leaving me defenseless.

My heart is racing, and I scan the room for a way out, but there's nothing. Just the lightsabers. Energy burns in my palms, and I lash out, shoving him back and ducking into a roll, grabbing the lightsaber I came for.

He stands, blade slashing at me and I ignite the lightsaber, blocking. The weight is hard. I stumble back, grunting. Where's Echo? He is still alive, right?

I rock back, twirling around lightsaber lifting to hit his again. I think it lasts exactly five clashes before my stolen lightsaber that feels perfectly right in my hands sails away across the room. I gasp, diving away from the blade that comes down at me, shoving outwards again.

I could really use Hunter's help. Where in the stars is Echo?

"What did you do to my brother?" I demand. The shooting in the hall has stopped. He must be hurt.

"The same thing I will do to you and all other traitors."

Anger spills in, raw and burning. Echo's not dead, but he is hurt, and this person hurt him while I was distracted. "Well," I snarl back, "Anakin won't be very happy if you kill me."

He stares at me incredulously. At least I think it's incredulous.

"Yeah, he's here," I add, "And he's my bestie. He'll murder you if you hurt me."

"Do you expect me to be foolish enough to believe that?"

"Well, you are really ugly and stupid."

I'll be feeling that shove for the rest of the night.

**w**

"You can't leave me here," I yell at the dark gray prison walls, struggling against the stupid restraints. I've only been in prison once, and I hated it. It was pretty maddening, but 'mega and I had been together, and we had a certainty of getting out. I knew our brothers would come.

I can't stop thinking. Remembering what I saw. Crosshair. Tech. Omega's scream. Hunter...

My visions have always had truth to them. I – I saw Tech fall. Of something. The white and orange armor, blurred over through smoke. I know it was real, and I can't stop thinking. Is he going to be okay?

And... and Crosshair? I heard my brother screaming. He needs us. He was in pain. I heard it. His screams echo in my mind, distant and far off, but present and fast coming.

But the cell is empty, and I'm stuck here alone, waiting for someone to show up. I need help, and it feels stupid. I came all this way because I thought I could get that crystal and I could be helpful. So much for helpful – I've screwed up so much, I don't know how to get out. I need to get out of these restraints and get the door open, but there's no way to.

I know there's guards outside the door.

And what am I even waiting for? Crosshair to show up and make fun of me? Ughhh. I feel Hunter so bad. The helplessness is grating on me. How could he deal with this? The raw terror of being prisoner in Crosshair's custody would...

Someone could get hurt when they try coming in, because I know they will. Our squad will come for us, and with these... Force-using freaks here, that could go really badly.

All I can do is wait, and try not to think too hard about how I'm trapped and the metal over my wrists are making them ache.

I can See the black flames outside the door before it even open, but still jerk at the mechanical hissing sound.

The figure in the doorway is tall. He's black armored, lights on his chest, a cape spilling out behind him, a lightsaber on his belt, thick leather gloves that make Wrecker look almost pathetic, and a helmet as crazy looking as Tech's.

And I thought Tech looked like a bug.

I blink, lips parting.

I've wanted to see him again for so long. "Wow," I breathe. "Anakin?" I remember this. His hand on my shoulder. The brightest, fieriest blue eyes I've ever seen.

I'd never see blue until then, and it was so strange.

And I don't think anyone could pull off the bug-eyes quite so stupidly.

"I am not Anakin." His voice is deep, cycling in and out with his respirator, rumbling and mechanical. It reminds me of Wrecker but it's not real. That's not his real voice. I know what he sounds like, and I feel his pain.

He's Imperial. Has Echo seen him yet? This is going to kill him.

"Then who are you?"

"My name is Darth Vader."

"Wow. Weird name." Is this an alias, or what he's changed his name too?

"You are a clone. Why are you fighting the Empire?"

I have a thousand things to say to it. None that really... "I'm not fighting the Empire. I can't. We were just..."

"You infiltrated an Imperial facility you would have been guarding under... different circumstances."

I groan. "Look. The Empire destroyed my home. I was there. I saw them blow it into the sea. I've had my whole family ripped apart because of them." Tears prick at my eyes, and I struggle to find words. "We weren't gonna hurt people for no reason. And my brother –" I choke off at Crosshair's name. "Because someone forces loyalty through mind-control, you know they're wrong."

His black helmet is staring at me fixedly. He doesn't look away from my face. "You believe that to be true."

"I believe that to be true because I know it is true. They're controlling us. Fives found out about chips. He tried to warn us. But nobody got it until it was too late." My eyes narrow on him, wet with tears. "They took everything. I – all Wrecker had to say was those stupid words and I tried to slit my sister's throat." Tears spill down my face, and I inhale sharply, biting my lip when it quivers, furious at myself for crying. I haven't breathed a word about Bracca in a long time, and I can't get it to stop. I shouldn't be crying right now. That's weak.

I'm weak.

"Words," he repeats solemnly, "Like Order 66?"

I flinch. "Yes. Sure. Say that back to me. Good thing I got my chip out, or I'd be trying to kill you."

"I am no Jedi."

"Oh. Right. You're... a big... black... something. But you feel the same, you know? I Saw this. I knew this would happen."

"Anakin Skywalker saw your future," he says slowly, "Your future was not always Dark."

I toss my head to flick a few stray, annoying strands of hair form my face. "And neither was yours." I smirk at him despite my tears. Playful, to cover the gutted emptiness.

"I am not –"

"Like I wasn't Viz when I went a bit feral." I gave up on Crosshair. I can't do that with him, too. I can't make it right with my brother, but maybe I can with someone else.

He stares at me, flicking a hand and releasing my restraints, yanking me off the table-thing by the front of my blouse.

"Whoa! Hey! Where are you taking me?"

He deposits me on the floor in the hall, opening another door. "The Inquisitors told me they captured a conspirator, so I will –" He freezes when he sees Echo. "Echo?"

**w**

"This... is a horrible looking office. Just gray, gray, blah, gray, blah blah. I mean. Really. Can't you have some... decoration? A picture at least?"

"And what picture would you suggest?" Vader asks crankily, sitting across from us on his Big And Fancy chair.

"I don't know. Just – something. This looks horrible. I mean, all there is is that stupid window that looks over a boring city."

Beside me, Echo sighs loudly. "I can't believe you sided with the Empire, Anakin."

"I am not Anakin. Not after he fell to the Dark Side. I have become something... else."

"Wow. Someone's stubborn."

They both ignore me.

"I believed it to be the right thing."

"My first mission with the Empire was to exterminate a group of innocent civilians," Echo replies, "I find it very, very hard to believe you haven't seen what they've done."

"I serve the Emperor. That is the only life there is to me."

"Do you know who it was that taught me right from wrong?" Echo asks, "It was you. You, general. You taught me everything I know. And I know somewhere, you know this isn't right, even if you somehow managed not to see. The Empire destroyed Kamino. They're – they're going to phase us out."

"After all you have done for the Republic, you deserve to rest."

"They're not retiring us as some gesture of goodwill." Echo gestures wildly with his scomp, scowling. He's scary when he's mad. I swear. But he's my brother, so I'm pretty used to it. "They're going to kill us off. They are killing us off. You used to be a great Jedi."

"All who shaped Anakin Skywalker are either traitors or corpses."

"I'm still here, aren't I? You might serve the Empire, but you can still try to make this galaxy into a better place."

Crosshair's voice flares in my mind. Jagged and broken. It's the first time I've heard him in months. I missed him. He haunted my dreams, then there was nothing, and if all he's here in is dreams, maybe that's not so bad. I've missed him enough it doesn't...

At least he's here.

"I do not have that level of power."

"You must sever the –"

Air, rushing, whooshing –

"Yes, you do," I argue, "I know you do, because I Saw where you end, and it isn't here." I wave my hands at the walls. "It's not here in this miserable gray hole. You say the Dark isn't fully over my future? It's not over yours, either. I Saw the Dark. And I Saw the Light, too. You can still love. You can still... change this. All it takes is the will to fight. You have to. Because I – I need it."

Vader studies me, silent for a few long, loooong cycles of his respirator, and I decide to let him breathe for a minute, gnawing on my lip as I wait. "What troubles you, young one?"

"I – I just had a dream. When I touched that lightsaber hilt. I Saw something. It's been calling me for hours, and I when I felt it... I saw things. Some girl... a togruta." Echo inhales sharply. "Your commander. And... I saw the future. We were on a mission somewhere. Real high up. And one of my brothers... he fell." I swallow hard, ducking my head. "You know better than anyone. Will they die?"

"This is the real world, Vision," he replies, "No one dies from falling."

I know what he means, but I can't help twirling it on him as a joke, because that's much, much funnier than Tech going splat at a thousand feet. "You know what that means?" I tease as he eyes me warily. "You're still Anakin."

He pulls himself to his full height of twice my size.

I spread my hands, grinning wildly. "No one dies from falling!"

He scoops us up with the Force, radiating more annoyance than I have ever felt on anyone. Not murderous-level annoyance, just annoyed annoyance.

And then he throws us at the window.

And out the window.

The glass shatters, and we fall.

That was some express exit.

Air rushes past me, and I spread my arms out to guide myself downwards. I choke on a laugh, breathy and gasping, but Echo's laughing, too. I flick my hands out, closing my eyes against the rushing air and focusing, slowing us, reaching to Echo and slowing him, too. Enough we're still falling, still dropping, but can still breathe and won't splat.

I think I'm crazy. Echo's crazy, too, because we can't breathe but we're still laughing.

But we did it. I didn't get the sword, but I got something. An even more important something for Echo. I got his general. He might be a bit stupid, but he's alive. He's still alive.

I'm almost disappointed the fall is cut when the Marauder's ramp, Hunter's hands yanking me aboard. I crash onto the floor, panting and giggling at once, Echo thumping beside me when Wrecker hauls him up. I try to talk, but all that comes out is a faint squeaking giggle as I try to catch my breath. "I told you," I wheeze finally, "We would be fun."

Echo breaks into another bout of laughter, and I've hardly even heard that before. It sounds amazing. He should do it more often. Really. "You got him, Vision," he tells me, "You got through to him. He just needed a little push."

I cackle again. "Really?"

"Yup."

I understand it, though. Really, I do – I've been there myself. If I lost everything, I'd try to get as far as possible from my past self, too, but we can't do that. I know him. And I know he deserves better. He doesn't deserve that life. Not one alone.

Neither does Crosshair. But I made that choice for him, didn't I?

"What's happening?" Hunter asks in complete bewilderment.

"We had a run-in with my general. He's alive, and he's Imperial, but he helped us out."

"Ah," Tech says dryly, "Was the window cascade on him, or on Vision?"

"Both. Thanks." I salute him snippily, then look back at Echo, heart aching. "Do you really have to go?"

His smile is sad. "Yes, I do. Sorry, kid."

"It's okay. I'm not gonna stop you. I already did that with Crosshair. I'm not making that mistake again." I can't imagine going back without Echo there. I never knew he would be there, but I've accepted him, and he's a part of me. But this isn't forever. It's gonna be hard, but Echo's not a reg. His path is always gonna come back home.

Just like Crosshair.

"Sometimes, we have to go whatever our heart leads us... even if it's hard."

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