Chapter 36 - You're Still The Only Thing That Matters (2:9)
Warning: Panic attacks. Really the usual Viz.
~ Rivana Rita
That's how we start the 40-klick trip to the town. It's a very long distance, and we're going to be dead on our feet by the time we get there, and we have very, very little water. It's... ugh. It is very ugh. The sun is even more sweltering now, beating down on us even as we move down a crevasse between two towering canyon walls. Sand kicks up around my boots, and I bat at it, grumbling.
"Does it really have to be so hot and sticky out here?" I whine, "Hot is bad, but sticky? Come on. It's a desert. It's not supposed to be humid."
"That could be the storm nearby," Hunter points out, "Though there's very little rain here."
"Wait, there's rain? You can feel rain?"
"Yeah, it flows the other way as electricity."
"Wait, really? I thought magnets did that. Does that mean water's magnetic?"
"I was kidding."
I deflate. "Oh."
"Talk less, walk more," Omega reminds tiredly, "We have a long way to go. Save your energy."
Wrecker takes a drink from his bottle and passes it onto her, who passes it onto me. I'm thirsty, but we don't have much. The sand blows mercilessly, and the sun beats mercilessly. "How much further?" Wrecker asks tiredly.
"You will not like the answer," Tech answers shortly, typing on his datapad.
"Havoc-4, this is Havoc-5," Omega says tiredly, pulling her comm from her belt. "Do you copy? Echo? Are you there?" She's comming Echo now? Not that I blame her. He could answer and help, too, but we can't keep relying on someone who's gone to pull us out. I did that with Crosshair. I know how it ends up, and it's nowhere good. And we're okay, too – Hunter will figure this out. We wouldn't be any better off if Echo was here. Tech's the only one who could've scanned something out here. But Echo couldn't rescue us any more than Hunter can.
"He's too long-range. Echo won't pick up our signal," Hunter tells her.
"Especially since he disabled his communication device," Tech adds.
"What?" Omega demands, jerking, probably as stung as I am. "Why?"
Hunter jerks to a stop, hand lifting to motion for us to stop. I freeze, glancing around – his stopping is an automatic bad sign.
"I assume he's on a sensitive mission," Tech explains.
Yeah, idiot. He's not ignoring us because he feels like ignoring us. I really need to stop being so sensitive.
Beneath us, the ground is rumbling, shaking. "Is that an earthquake?" I ask, but it sounds too repetitive and wrong for that. No, I See something coming, something fast.
"Run," Hunter orders, yanking his helmet on and reaching for Omega and I, pushing us forwards. We run, sprinting away from what I realize momentarily is a rapidly closing group of stampeding animals, which means we need to get off the ground somehow.
"There," Hunter pants, pulling a grappling hook from his belt and throwing it's end onto the top of a bridge between the canyon walls.
"Go!" Omega hisses at me, and I climb the grappling line without argument, even if doing so first feels wrong. Omega follows, then Hunter, and Tech grabs on right below us. Wrecker's trying to reach us, but he's too slow, and the creatures just – drown him.
"Wrecker!" Omega yells, panicked, looking down.
Wrecker's grappling hook shoots out from between the creatures, lifting him off the ground. I exhale in sharp relief when my brother lifts back into my sight. He resurfaces a minute later, still gripping his line and hauling himself upwards.
"You must protect the ipsium case!" Tech yells over the stomping.
"Well, what about protecting me?" Wrecker whines. My head whips up to look at him, wide-eyed – he'll be hurt from that. They're moving fast. They'll be stepping all over him, and Tech's just going to tell him to go back down?
"If it explodes, we'll all be dead!"
Wrecker groans, but looks down, dropping himself back into the stampede and scrambling for the case, throwing himself over it.
I bite my lip hard, wincing in sympathy. They're stepping on him, and even if they're small and Wrecker has armor and a backpack, that's gonna hurt. His head is facing them.
The stampede only drags on a couple minutes longer, but that still definitely bruised. I know Tech's trynna keep us alive, but Wrecker was still hurt. That counts for it, too – and. We don't have our medkit to treat the million bruises he probably collected.
Hunter motions us down, and he and Tech slide down the cord. Omega climbs down beneath me, and I slide down after.
"My back!" Wrecker groans, pushing himself upwards and leaning backwards, hands on his back.
"I would advise not dropping it next time," Tech snips, walking over and bending down to right the ipsium case from where it was dropped.
"Why don't you carry it?" Wrecker throws back angrily. Yeah, please. I'd like to see that.
Beneath me, Hunter lifts Omega to put her down, and I jump the rest of the way from the grappling line, landing on the rocky ground. Something's coming, though. Something loud and dark and dangerous.
"Fine," Tech snaps, lifting the ipsium case and flinging it over his back. He looks tiny compared to it.
"Wow." I eye him pointedly. "Nice. Don't get squashed. I don't want to scrape you off the ground."
"Unlikely," Tech grunts.
The rising wind and distant clap of thunder has all of us looking skywards. We can't see much of the sky down in this ravine, but I definitely see the dark clouds, flickering with cloud lightning, growing in on us. Right on cue. Time to move. "I'm starting to think we should've followed those creatures," I announce dryly.
"That would certainly explain the stampede," Tech remarks.
Hunter doesn't need to tell us to run. He turns, and I just break for it. With Tech lugging the ipsium case, he's slowed a bit, but we have a long way to go. Thanks, rude creatures, for interrupting our run for survival. I really should've Seen that one coming.
Idiot.
The wind is howling, sand grains assaulting my back. I grit my teeth, and don't stop running. Wrecker and Omega yelp as we go. I dodge a small rock – thanks, wind. It's like a tornado. It's worse than I thought.
"We need to find shelter!" Hunter yells over the roaring wind and rolling thunder.
The clouds are on us now, whipping and spinning, and I try to shield my eyes with my hand. They're just – thick. I've heard about sandstorms, but never been in one, and I know they can be deadly. Between the sand and lightning, we're screwed if we don't get out of sight. At least the boys have helmets. Omega and I don't, and we'll be breathing sand. I can taste it already, hot and stingy and yuck.
"There is another mine!" Tech yells, releasing the case one-handedly to pull his visor down and scan. "Thirty meters ahead." He's slipping, and quickly grabs it again. Maybe being squashed isn't that funny after all.
I want to demand he be fine, but Tech's not going to get himself zapped or murdered for no reason. I still wish I could ask him not to do anything stupid. Because Tech being Tech, I know he will.
Omega trips on something, I think. I can only see a blur, but Hunter hauls her up and shoves her forwards. There's some thumping behind me, and Wrecker breaks away, but then my foot catches something and a rock hits my back sharp enough to bruise, flinging me forwards. I roll, taking it in slide, and just keep on running.
Hunter enters the mine, and Wrecker lifts Omega and I up inside. Hunter grabs my other arm, tugging me into the one doorway. Wrecker's last, passing Hunter who was waiting in the doorway just around the bend.
My hand connects with the wall, and it's like I'm being sucked into it. Fire flashes in my eyes, falling smoke and debris.
"Where's the ipsium?" Omega is asking, panicked, from a thousand miles away.
It's – gone. That's where it is.
I rip my hand from the wall, teeth gritted against the wavewashing of my vision. "Everyone, get down!"
Wrecker tackles me, shielding me as something explodes behind us, bringing in a crashing wave of smoke and sand.
Crosshair's voice rings in my head. Words. A voice. Voices.
Fire. A fire. Tech's hand on my arm. Ground is shaking, air thick.
"He can't talk if he's dead." Soft but sharp. Familiar, but foreign. A voice that sounds like my own but too soft, too clinical. Too Tech-y.
"Take a breath. Think this through!" A blaster is leveled at the girl's face, though Crosshair's hand is shaking and he's pale, teeth gritted in pain.
"Release me."
The restraints his open, and she backs away, hands raised. "You cannot make it out of this facility. Not in your condition."
Crosshair stands, anyway. "Give me your access card."
"It won't get you outside. But even if you do manage that, the hounds will find you within minutes. Don't make this worse, Crosshair!" She's terrified. Not of him. For him. She cares about him. Loves him. And I've never met her in my life.
The scene flickers into blurs, shooting, Crosshair stumbling through an icy world and nearly falling into a control panel, gripping the edge to remain aloft. "Plan 88. You have to hide they're after –"
"Don't you do it, Tech!" Wrecker's voice blurs over Crosshair's loud and raw with panic.
Tech sighs, blaster raising. "When have we ever followed orders?"
He pulls the trigger.
I gasp, head snapping up, hand scrambling to find something to grip, chest heaving. Crosshair. They were torturing him, and he was trying to – to –
And Tech. Tech, my brother, who I've fought with for so long. I saw it, clear as day, not in blurred flickers like before. Suspended by a grappling hook over a thousand food drop, something no one could survive.
"No one dies from falling."
"The real world –"
A light turns on, breaking the darkness, and I flinch violently, shoulder slamming the wall as I try to shield my eyes.
"So, now we are trapped." Tech's voice. Tech. I could cry to hear him. Cranky, too, but I'm honestly just happy to hear him. He was gone. I saw. "And we have lost all of our ipsium."
That can't be real. It can't be.
I won't let it.
Except when have any of my visions ever not happened?
Their voices fade in from far away, angry and overlapping. Wrecker and Tech are arguing about the mineral and the fact that we're trapped. And Tech is being an idiot again. " – suppose that's my fault, too?" " – yes, if you had not let our ship get stolen –" " – aboard right now –" " – the mineral –"
I grit my teeth, panting, palm digging into my temple against the jagged light. It burns in my eyes, grates in my skull and I want it dark, but I hate the dark and the rocks are too close. It's closing in. Everything's closing and crashing and there's no light no light I can't breathe my lungs are burning –
"Viz? Viz!" 'mega's hand is shaking my shoulder, my head tilting to look at her through my dark curls but they're dark and everything's dark too dark too –
Tech.
Tech shot himself into freefall.
"No one dies from –"
I grit my teeth, trying to force a breath in.
"Are you okay?" I lift my head again and finally, actually focus on my sister's dimly lit face, brows pinched with worry. "Are you hurt?"
My back throbs noisily. I saw Tech fall, Crosshair being tortured by some weirdo who I think cares about him like I haven't hurt him enough for the all of us I never thought for one flippin' second about how he'd hurt to be yelled at and left alone and how could he come back when I told him he wasn't one of us and he still risked his life to try to warn us that the Empire is after us like we don't already know that – "A mean rock broke my back," I chirp instead, flashing a fake smile and then scowling. Owww, okay, with the adrenaline rush gone, it hurts worse than I thought. "I could use some bacta. I could really, really use some bacta. Owwww."
"Did you See something?"
"Nope! Tech pulled us from a fire." I shrug. "Happens every day." My throat feels tight, and I can't breathe. My eyes are wet. Stinging. I try to rub them, but it stings sharply. Oww. I blame the dust. It's itching in my lungs as I try to breathe. There's not enough air in here. Just like Kamino. We're gonna die. And it's gonna hurt.
Hunter bends down to help me to my feet. "You good?" he asks.
"Yep!" No. I can't stop thinking about Crosshair screaming.
Not thinking about anything at all. I saw Tech fall, I saw that girl who was that girl she was so familiar I've seen her before...
"Sincerely," I grunt, wincing, trying to steady myself, "Ow. I didn't actually break anything, did I? Okay, I think it's just bruised. But I could use that mirror – ohhhh. Rrrright... We don't have a mirror."
Our ship is gone. That doesn't... it doesn't feel real, though it's starting to now that I'm talking about it. I never Saw us loose our ship, but I suddenly can't remember Seeing it in the future, either. For something this big, I should've known it was coming, right? We have to get it back.
"I can try to locate the Marauder's transponder," Omega volunteers.
"Worth a try," Hunter replies, "We'll start digging our way outta here.
Wrecker groans. "Fiiiiine." He stomps passed Tech, fingers digging onto a rock and shoving it aside.
"You work on that," I ask 'mega, "I'm gonna see if I can help." Because all I can hear is screaming and Tech falling and we're all gonna die here if we don't move. It's too dark, and if I look at the walls in front of me it feels like they're closing in. I hate claustrophobia – got that from Kamino. The water, salty and ocean and icy cold. But mostly, just the darkness.
The Marauder's gone. Our home is gone. The only home we have left, because Kamino was burned to the ocean floor with blue fire, like I saw every night for weeks.
We'd still have the Marauder if Echo was here. We wouldn't have lost it, and I don't want to think about that at all, either. Omega can't let him go. Not that anyone can. He ought to be here with us. Just like Crosshair.
Who's gonna be next?
Rolling rocks is not an effective distraction, but it's a distraction, even if disintegrates into furious growling as I try to roll a rock three times my size before Wrecker comes to save me. That was video-worthy.
But seriously. My back.
"Something's not right," Omega declares over the datapad's beep, fidgeting where she's been agitatedly pacing the area's length. "The Marauder's transponder isn't relaying a signal."
"It was probably disabled by the thief who commandeered it," Tech replies, losing a fight with a rock and looking to Wrecker for help, who's assisting in doing the same. Wrecker grunts quietly, continuing to shove. There are way too many, and we have way too high to go. We are so lucky there's miserable airflow down here.
But. The ship. We don't have any way to get it back.
"Well, then, how are we gonna track it?" Omega demands.
"The ship's not important right now," Hunter objects, motioning towards the towering boulder heap, "We need to get outta here first."
I straighten, wiping my forehead and sighing. "Hey, you guys know we could walk right back into that storm and get cooked to death before we even find another way off-world, right?" I really wanna sleep. Can't stop thinking about Crosshair.
He needs us. I can't ignore him again. I did that once already. I can't do it again.
"It is most unlikely that the Marauder will be recovered," Tech has the audacity to point out.
What? No, no, no that can't be true. We have all our things on there – Gonky, Lula, Sophie, Crosshair's things that we can never get back. "Then why wasn't I dreaming about it?"
"What?" Omega hisses simultaneously, eyes widening with hurt. "Don't say that. We have to get it back!"
"We can always acquire another ship. It is merely a mode of transportation," Tech replies flippantly.
What the – okay. Honestly. Sure, we can get another ship, but nothing else would be the Marauder, and that's not the only thing of importance. "Okay, first of all," I argue loudly, shifting forwards and circling the rock I'm standing behind. "That's not true." Secondly, could he please cut the attitude for one second and act like we actually lost something of genuine importance to us? "Secondly, if you wanna whine about the fact that we lost our ship, I should've Seen it, too. And I didn't." I cross my arms, scowling.
"Yes, and you do not always See everything that is about to happen."
Wow. That was mean.
"The Marauder's our home!" Omega half yells, stalking closer and climbing onto a rock nearby. "We already lost Echo. We can't lose that too." She turns away, eyes filling with unshed tears.
Anger burns in my chest, hot and fierce. He's been nasty to everyone since Echo left. First Wrecker, now Omega?
"Omega, we didn't lose Echo," Hunter protests, climbing down from his perch. "He's just..." He looks at Tech for help, but our brother says nothing. "On a different mission."
The mission. The only real mission, and I wish I could tell him about Crosshair, because he's out there, and he could help, but I have no way to. And I don't want to drag Hunter back into that nightmare when he's already been through so much. And I don't want to endanger Omega. Or Wrecker. Last time we went back for Crosshair, he got a hole in him.
"But he's not here. He's... he's not with us. We're supposed to be a squad." Her hand presses to her heart, a raw, gaping hurt on her face that I know so well. But I know family's more than that. Crosshair left us, but he's our family, no matter what he's done or where he is. Because I still love him.
And Fives was Echo's family even while he was gone, and we are, too. He is where he needs to be. And so are we. Even if we're not in the same place.
Echo had to go, and I couldn't make him stay when he didn't want to. There's something wrong with us. Everything inside of us is empty. And we're just... drifting. Like we have been ever since Crosshair walked away from us. Echo could only bear it for so long.
(Who's next? Who's going to be next?)
"This squad existed before Echo was a part of it," Tech replies, "And it will exist after. What is your issue?"
Omega flinches, looking down and away before throwing the datapad back at Tech. Hunter jerks back as the object whistles past his face. Tech jerks a little, too – he's lucky that wasn't me. I would've aimed for the face.
"And what's yours?" I throw back. "If you think everything's fine," I throw my arms up, gesturing to where we're happily drowning in rock. "Then why are you being so snappy?"
Omega snatches a lantern up from the table, heading for the back of the cave. Everyone's gaze follows her, and Hunter jumps off the rock he's on. "Omega –"
"I want to be alone," she snaps back, shortly.
Heh. Liar.
Been there. Done that.
She can't let Echo go. Can't accept that he needed a life other than us, but I get it. Because there's something missing for me, too, and until I find it, I'll never be satisfied, either.
I twitch, tempted to follow 'mega, but pause when I remember Tech.
"I am merely stating the truth," Tech defends.
"They already know the truth," Hutner points out obviously, "That's why they're upset."
Tech's gaze jumps to Wrecker, who shakes his head at him, glaring.
I scoff, rolling my eyes and spinning on my heel. "Good luck digging," I call over my shoulder, detaching my flashlight from my belt and heading into the darkness in search of my sister.
Wrecker's angry, Tech's angry, and Hunter looks the same familiar chest-crushing misery that I know so well, too.
The hallway is dark. Very dark. And broodingly miserable. There's a sudden, crushing heaviness in my chest. I don't know where it came from. I want to cry, and I don't even know hwy. I hate fighting with my brothers. I'm so tired of everyone fighting. Constantly. It never gets better.
Crosshair, Tech...
Omega and me.
Ugh.
I feel awful for yelling at Tech. He's not accepting what happened any more than we are, and I wish he'd stop pretending he is. It makes it very, very hard to be close with him. Plus is that I don't find him scary anymore.
Omega misses Echo. We all do, but she can't let him go.
I turn a corner, twisting sideways and sliding down a slight incline in the rocks. I know she came through here. I can See it, a flower-soft orange-gold laced on the walls, and I trail my fingers across the rock. I can think about Crosshair later. Take care of Omega now.
What do I say to her?
Because I don't even know. We've been living in the same tiny, closed space, and I feel like I don't know her at all. She's not the only one getting distant from me. I've been getting distant from her, too. That's on both of us. Well, at least that means I can do something about it.
I shut the light off, sighing. There's a dim light ahead of me, shining off another wall. That's where she is. I flick my flashlight back on, because she'll probably want to know I'm coming, slowly rounding the next corner. It's some sort of doorway, but this is where she is, lantern beside her, knees tugged up to her chest.
"I said I wanted to be alone."
"Yeah, and I know you don't." I sit down, sliding down the wall, knees tugged up and arms crossed over them, light shining dimly towards the wall we're sitting up against.
Omega sighs, looking away. It reminds me of Crosshair. "Echo's gone and it's like none of you care."
"I care. I care," I repeat again, louder. "We all miss him. We do." I sigh, leaning my head back against the wall and closing my eyes. My finger hangs over the flashlight's switch, thinking about shutting it off, but I don't. "Echo's been a part of us as long as I have. But he's got his other family, too. A family we could never be a part of. He believes in the fight. In what we've refused to fight against. Echo is war. He was made it in. Forged in it. He can never let it go. And if it's what he wants, it's not our right to tell him no."
Omega sniffs quietly, discreetly wiping her eyes. She's crying. I haven't had to deal with this in a long time. "He's supposed to be with us."
"He is," I protest, shrugging one shoulder. "He's still one of us, even if he's gone."
"But we needed him, and now..."
"Yeah." That's the way it's been ever since Crosshair. Things always go to disaster when we're not together. I trust Rex and Fives to take care of Echo, but who's taking care of Crosshair? He has no one. "I know. But he's gonna be fine. Echo made his way back to the 501st once, and he can do the same for us. He'll be back. He'll come home."
Omega looks up at me, hesitant, but not objecting.
I sniff quietly, ducking my head to wipe my own eyes and thumb off the flashlight. Her lantern's already off, so it plunges us into darkness – except it's not dark. A dim blue light filters in from the wall beside us.
"What's that?" Omega breathes, shifting forwards.
I tilt my head, shifting forwards onto my knees. It looks like... I stand, tiptoeing towards the rock carefully and pressing my hand against it. There's a small hole in it, and I slide my knife out, pressing it into the rocks and cutting downwards. It chips and sand slips out. I pull back and look. There's some sort of... expanse.
"We need to break this wall," I say, whipping around. "I think there's more ipsium here."
"Maybe we can use your drill to fracture the rock," Omega offers.
I pull it from my belt, flicking the drill out. "You wanna try?"
"Sure." She takes it from me, pushing the bit into the rock. The wall fractures, chipping away and falling into pieces with a wave of dust. I jump back, pulling her away from the falling rock. It's thin, but when it falls and the dust settles, I see a towering expanse, up and down, another slanted wall just up ahead, covered with million wells of ispium glistening like stars in the sky.
Out of genuine curiosity, who do you all think the next Bad Batcher to be misplaced is? Hunter, Tech, Wrecker, Omega, Vision, or no one? 👀
Final Notes: Reviews are always appreciated! ^-^
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