Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“We’ve lost contact with recon team two,” the mission coordinator back on the Resolute reported.

Rex felt his mind pause, and his body go still, as if a very large threat had just appeared on the horizon. Fives and Echo were leading that team, and while both could be unconventional, neither was the type to disregard communication protocol. If they’d dropped out of contact, something was wrong. Something more than being too deep in the caves they were scouting.

“Acknowledged, Resolute. We’re just wrapping up here, I’ll take a team and see if I can't find them,” Rex replied, then turned toward the generals, who had been listening to the exchange.

“Looks like those caves weren’t as harmless as they looked,” he reported grimly.

“I agree,” Kenobi said thoughtfully. “Something is wrong here.” He turned to Skywalker. “I think we should help the captain find his wayward ARCs.”

“Absolutely. It was getting boring here anyway,” Skywalker agreed readily.

Rex nodded in acknowledgment of the general’s words. The Jedi would make this a lot easier; he mentally downgraded his search party from twenty men to just eight.

“Jesse, Kix, Hardcase. You’re with us,” he called out, the men in question appearing promptly. “We’ll rendezvous with Recon Team One on the way, and then proceed to the last point of contact.”

“Yes, sir.” They saluted and began collecting their gear.

General Kenobi addressed Cody. “You’re in charge, Commander. When the technicians have finished their checks, proceed back to the ship and wait for us there.”

“Yes, general.” Cody nodded. “Enjoy your spelunking. Try not to aggravate any cave-dwelling megafauna while you're down there.”

“Oh, you know me,” Obi-wan laughed. “I’m always up for making new friends.”

Cody did not heave a sigh, proving to Rex that he had the self restraint of a Jedi master.

“Yes, sir,” Cody answered with a perfectly neutral face. “That’s the problem, sir.” Or maybe not. When had they gotten to the point they could sass their generals?

It was somewhere around Geonosis, Rex decided. The second time. Between Rex getting thrown off walls by the force, and Cody having to pull his general out of increasingly elaborate ways to die, a lot of the legend had deflated, leaving the Jedi much more approachable.

The generals led the way to the gunship, which was already warmed up and waiting. They wasted no time in boarding, and soon, the roar of the engines was kicking up a cloud of dust from the makeshift landing zone, and they were on their way.

Rex was currently shoving all of his emotions into a box, compartmentalizing the way that all troopers who’d made it off of Kamino had learned to do. Something must have bled through, though, because his posture was stiff and forbidding. Jesse knocked their shoulders together, offering silent support. Rex gave him the barest of nods in acknowledgment, and braced himself for a long flight.

The recon teams had been deployed fairly far afield; the GAR brass had wanted to make extra sure the planetoid was uninhabited when they established their listening post. (Never mind asking why they had sent two of their highest profile battalions to do the job if it were so important that it remain secret.) So it was a long, tense ride to the first meet up point. Once they had picked up Team One, a squad of scouts from the 212^th, Rex gave them the rundown.

“One hour ago, we lost contact with Team Two. 501^st scout team Tango, led by ARC troopers Echo and Fives, disappeared here, about two hundred meters into the cave system.” Rex used his holoprojector to display the map that Team Two had compiled before disappearing.

“The mission is to go in, neutralize whatever threat they encountered, and hopefully, rescue Team Two.” Skywalker stepped forward, taking the lead. “Orbital scans didn’t detect any seismic disturbances, so don’t expect anything as simple as a cave in. Assume hostiles.”

The men indicated their understanding with curt ‘yes sirs,’ but didn’t speculate or chatter. They’d all picked up on Rex’s mood.

Finally, an hour and a half after team two went dark, the gunship touched down at the entrance to the caves. Rex was the first on the ground after the Jedi, and even that only because he’d have needed a jet pack to beat them to it. They took point, and Rex shadowed Skywalker, the rest of the men fanning out behind him.

“Helmet lights,” Rex ordered softly as they entered the cave. It might give away their position, but the Jedi needed to see too.

One by one, thin beams of light lanced through the darkness, illuminating the cave walls, revealing them to be a strange reflective black, shot through randomly with some rusty orange ore. A moment later, everything took on an eerie blue hue as the generals ignited their lightsabers and held them aloft.

“This way.” Skywalker beckoned them forward, and they began their descent.

This cave system was treacherous, hence warranting a pair of ARC troopers leading the mission with their specialized terrain training. The black mineral was slick and brittle, and formed edges that cut like a knife, as Anakin discovered to his dismay when a jagged point caught his sleeve, ripping his robes and nicking his arm.

“Ouch! The rock bit me,” he complained.

“It’s obsidian, Anakin. Volcanic glass. Of course it can be sharp,” Obi-wan replied.

Without a word, Kix moved forward to clean and dress the cut. Skywalker allowed the treatments with a roll of his eyes, but he knew better than to try and dissuade the medic.

They moved on.

The air got worse the deeper they went, growing stale and still. Rex thought he could detect the scent of rot, even through his helmet. The smell grew stronger as they neared their destination, until there was no mistaking the smell of decay and old bones.

It wasn’t long before they discovered the source. The passage they were in opened up into a large chamber that was absolutely littered with bones. It looked like a rancor’s den, except that the skeletons were too intact. They also, without exception, looked to be the remains of sentient beings.

A flash of white plastoid caught Rex’s eye, and his heart dropped.

“Over here,” he called out in a rough voice. He picked his way through the bones to find the bodies of two troopers. When he got close enough, his helmet’s sensors were able to pick up the embedded ID tags in the dead men’s armor and tell him who he was looking at.

Not that he needed that; their armor was painted, and their faces were unmarred.

“It’s Sortie and Pom,” Kix reported, already running a scanner over the bodies. It paid to be thorough, of course, but if Rex had to hazard a guess, he suspected their throats being torn out might have had something to do with their deaths.

“What kind of animal did that?” Jesse asked, scanning the room apprehensively, his rifle held at the ready.

“Something humanoid,” Kix answered, studying the scanner.

“Like, Trandoshan humanoid?” Hardcase asked queasily.

Kix shook his head. “Like Human or near,” he corrected, voice stony.

“Near-human?” Hardcase exclaimed. “What kind of near-human could do that? I couldn’t get that much of a brother’s throat between my teeth if I tried!”

“Focus!” Rex snapped. The generals didn’t need to hear about what kinds of things Hardcase was trying to put in his mouth. “Where are their buckets?”

“Over here,” one of Cody’s scouts announced, shining his light on not just Pom and Sortie’s missing helmets, but a third as well. The Rishi eel was impossible to mistake.

“Fives…” Rex breathed.

While the vode had been conversing, the Jedi had been slowly moving through the room, investigating. Kenobi had a holocamera out and was recording images of some of the bodies, as well as what appeared to be hieroglyphs carved into the walls. Something had changed though, because both Jedi tensed, and that drew Rex’s attention immediately. He had both pistols drawn and leveled almost as quickly as the Jedi brought their blades to a battle ready stance.

And a good thing too. No sooner had his DCs been drawn, than a gaunt, pale creature dropped from the shadows above, right toward Kix.

Rex shot twice, the impact of the bolts throwing the monster back, away from Kix. Kix scrambled away, putting more distance between himself and the thing. A wise decision, considering it was still moving very fast for something that had just soaked up two rounds of plasma. It was moving fast in general. Like, Jedi fast. A couple of other troopers managed to get some shots off in the seconds after it landed, but it dodged them.

“Check your fire!” Rex roared as the Jedi leapt across the room to engage the monster directly. He kept a bead on it as Skywalker and Kenobi darted around it, firing off shots when he had a clear line of sight, which wasn’t often. He was largely forced to watch as the thing danced between the blades of two Jedi, hardly taking any hits.

What blows it did take didn’t seem to trouble it greatly. Rex observed carefully. It seemed to have some sort of healing ability; a long burn Skywalker had managed to score on its ribs had already faded to nearly nothing. His suspicions were confirmed when, after Obi-wan sliced its arm off with a skillful twist of his saber, it picked its arm back up, dashed away, and placed the arm back over the stump. Rex and his men opened fire when it disengaged from the Jedi, but it kept moving so fast that it could barely be seen, let alone hit. Then, after a short time playing defense, it let go of its arm, and it stayed in place. Several men swore in alarm as it flexed its claws with a sharp grin. When it was satisfied with the mobility of its arm, it launched itself at the nearest trooper, which happened to be Rex.

Rex backpedaled steadily, firing all the while, but it wasn’t slowing. It crouched and leapt, its claws outstretched and fanged maw wide. Rex brought his arms up and tucked his chin, preparing to defend himself, however futile a proposition that might be.

Then, without warning, it stopped dead in mid air, a look of almost comical surprise on its face. Behind it, general Skywalker stood firm, his hand outstretched. With a casual flick of his wrist, he pulled it back toward his waiting blade. Still hanging in the grip of the force, it was powerless to stop him as he neatly beheaded it, and then flicked his saber downward to stab the fallen body through the heart.

There was silence for a moment, everyone breathing heavily and watching the monster’s corpse.

“Are you sure that was enough to kill it?” Kenobi asked at last.

“Should be,” Skywalker shrugged. “Head and heart. At least, that’s what I think it said.” He gestured to a section of hieroglyphs on the wall.

Obi-wan stared at him in astonishment. “You can read Ur J’dai?” he blurted out.

“Some,” Anakin said defensively. “Not as well as you, I'm sure, but I paid attention in class.”

“Well, Anakin, your devotion to your lessons just saved us all.” Obi-wan clapped him on the back. Anakin smiled brightly.

Kix approached the body with his medical scanner in order to double check. Even as he declared it dead, it began to rapidly decompose, crumbling down to a grey, ashy substance before their very eyes.

“What in the stars!” he exclaimed, drawing his pistol in surprise. He (and the rest of the troopers, for that matter) kept his weapon pointed at the remains until the process had completely finished.

They were thoroughly spooked, but they still had missing men to find. Though Rex had to admit, things weren’t looking good.

“Come on. There are five brothers who might still be alive. Let’s find them.” Please, Force, let his ARCs all of his men still be alive.

The troopers burst into a flurry of activity as they snapped out of their shock, getting ready to delve further into the caves. Rex turned back to address the Jedi.

“Should we expect more of those things?” he asked.

“I don’t think so. The force feels much clearer now,” Kenobi replied, stroking his beard.

“There’s still something that feels… off. But nothing with ill intent,” Skywalker added.

“Good. One was enough,” Rex said, holstering his DCs.

Before they pressed on, Rex picked up Fives’ helmet and clipped it to his belt, hoping against hope he’d find its owner still alive.

They gathered at the mouth of the tunnel that would lead them deeper in, and general Skywalker took the lead once more as they got moving.

The tunnel they were travelling now wasn’t long— not ten minutes later they could see a faint glow around the bend, like somebody’s bucket light was still on. As they drew closer, the noises started filtering in; deeply disturbing noises that did nothing to inspire hope as to the fate of his men. Grunts and growls, the occasional whimper, underscored by wet sucking sounds. Rex’s mind flashed back to Sortie and Pom— throats laid open, but bodies otherwise unmarred.

“Are you sure there was only one of those things?” Rex asked General Kenobi in a low voice.

“Yes,” the Jedi replied, though his expression was uncertain. “Or... well, whatever we’re about to find, it means us no harm.”

“Lets hope it still feels that way once it’s met us,” Rex quipped, resting his hand on his pistol.

The closer they came, the louder the noises got, not just from proximity, but because the voices were growing more agitated. The growls became snarls, and the sounds of drinking changed to the snap of teeth and the tearing of flesh.

Finally, they rounded the corner, and Rex’s heart stopped.

“Ka’ra…” somebody whispered in horror. Rex thought it might have been himself.

They’d found the missing men. Stripped down to their blacks and imprisoned in a primitive barred cell, two lay unmoving, and a third watched with wide eyed, unblinking horror as Echo and Fives tried to rip out each other’s throats with their teeth.

Rex felt sick; what had happened to the twins? What could possibly have reduced his ARCs to this?

“Weapons to stun,” Kenobi ordered sharply. “Bring them down before they kill each other!”

The general’s voice snapped them out of the awful spell the scene before them had cast, and Rex wasted no more time in firing through the bars. It took more stun rounds than it should have, but with eight men firing, the twins were soon slumped and unmoving, one half on top of the other.

Skywalker then used his lightsaber to cut through a wide swathe of the bars in two quick slices, allowing the metal to clatter to the floor with a series of jarring clangs, the noise too loud in the tense atmosphere.

Kix was the first through, already triaging the occupants of the cell. He confirmed the two at the back were already dead, then moved on to the Dominoes, leaving Rex to comfort the traumatised shiny— Tup, he thought the kid’s name was. He took his helmet off and knelt in front of him, then gently pulled Tup’s hands down from where they’d been pressed against his mouth in horror.

“Hey, soldier. Look at me.”

Slowly, the shiny’s eyes refocused, seeing Rex instead of what was behind him.

“What happened here?” Rex asked.

“It—” Tup’s voice cracked, and he had to swallow before he could continue. “It tried to change us… to be like it.”

Chapter Text

Two hours earlier:

It all happened so fast that Tup barely had time to react. One moment Fives was making an off colour remark to Echo, the next they were stumbling into some sort of mass grave. Pom and Sortie were already dead, Fallout was down, Grist was wounded, and a monster had its jaws around Fives’ throat.

With an angry shout, Echo opened fire, and when three shots point blank weren’t enough to deter the thing, he bodily tackled it off of his twin. He was thrown across the room for his trouble, and Tup scrambled back as it turned its attention to him. Its eyes flashed in his helmet light as it sprang at him, and then everything went dark.

-

The first thing he noticed as he came to was that the comforting weight of his armour was gone. He’d been stripped down to his blacks. Opening his eyes, he discovered to his dismay that he was in a cell, the only light the fitful flickering of his own helmet lamp sitting atop a pile of jumbled kit on the other side of the bars.

A choking sound caught his attention, and he turned his head toward the interior of the cell, only to stiffen in terror at what he saw. The thing was in the cell with them. It had a cut on its wrist, and was forcing its blood into Grist’s mouth.

Tup may have been terrified, but now he got angry. What was it doing to his vode? He sprang to his feet and tackled the monster before he really had a chance to think things through. That worked about as well as it had for Echo earlier, only instead of throwing him against the wall, it wrestled him to the ground with embarrassing ease.

It used its teeth to reopen the wound on its arm before forcing its wrist into Tup's mouth. Tup tried to fight it, but its strength was implacable, and a flood of iron hit his tongue.

"You're a feral one aren't you?" The creature spoke in antiquated basic, its voice soft and fluid for such a ghastly thing. "You would certainly be worthy, if the blood takes."

Tup fought not to swallow, tried to push the blood out of his mouth, but the creature was having none of that; it seized his throat and forced him to swallow. It was like he'd eaten a charge pack— his whole body started tingling, and a low burn set up in his belly.

“Of course, you’d have to have the stomach to be the last one standing. Only the strongest of you will be worthy of being my child,” it continued, forcing him to swallow again.

Tup’s limbs were shaking now, and his struggles against his captor weakened as his muscles seemed to lose all power. At last, it released him, and he hardly had enough strength to roll himself onto his side. He spit and tried to retch, but nothing would come up.

Above him, the creature moved on to Echo, kneeling down to repeat the process with the still unconscious ARC trooper. It forced several mouthfuls of blood down his throat before Echo woke up. The ARC’s body tensed and his eyes shot open, and he began to struggle and yell around the obstruction in his mouth. Tup wanted to help him so badly, but he couldn’t move. He could only watch as the anger smouldering in Echo’s eyes faded to confusion and pain, his struggles growing weak just as Tup’s had.

After finishing with Echo, it stood, leaving him gasping raggedly. It swept its gaze across all five of them appraisingly before turning and leaving the cell, locking them in behind it.

When they were alone, Echo turned his head as best he could, taking stock of what was left of the squad. Tup did the same. Everyone was still breathing; he and Echo were the only ones awake, but Fives was beginning to stir. The wounds on Fives and Grist’s necks had stopped bleeding. It was hard for Tup to see Fallout from where he was, but he looked to be in about the same condition as the rest of them.

Echo’s eyes met his.

“What the hell did it do to us?” the ARC demanded.

“It’s… trying to change us, I think,” Tup answered, trying to hide the tremor in his voice. “Something about being worthy of being its child.”

“Kriff that,” Fives mumbled groggily.

“Kriff that is right. We’ve managed without parents so far. I'm not about to change that for some horror holo monster that just killed two of my brothers,” Echo scoffed, voice strong despite his weakened state.

“OK, yeah,” Tup agreed, trying to take heart. “So, what do we do? Because I can’t move.”

“Kark,” Fives cursed. “I can't either.”

“I don’t think any of us can,” Echo added. “Its blood seems to be paralytic.”

“Its blood! Is that what that taste is?” Fives made a retching sound.

Some more moans of pain distracted him.

“Grist? Fallout? You back with us?” Fives tried to roll over to see them, but barely moved an inch before flopping onto his back again.

More or less affirmative noises answered him.

“Can either of you move?” he continued.

Their breathing came faster as they realised they could not.

“No.”

“I can’t—” The fear in Grist’s voice was palpable.

“Hey. Hey, calm down. We’re not done yet. The captain is bound to be looking for us by now, and I bet he’ll bring the generals with him. They’ll show that monster what for. We just need to last until then,” Fives said firmly. Tup rallied to his words.

They just had to last. And try not to think about how much his stomach hurt. Or the way Echo’s fingertips had gone blue.

Things got hazy for Tup after that; he could hear the ARCs trying to keep them awake and responsive—did his best to respond—but the pain in his gut was growing worse, and now his bones were hurting.

As the pain in him grew, the voices of his brothers became more infrequent. Grist was the first to fall silent, and Tup had the presence of mind to peel his eyes open after a particularly vicious spike of agony through his skull and jaw to see that Grist had lost consciousness again, his breathing shallow and his lips blue.

The next was Fives, trailing off mid sentence.

“Fives?” Echo asked, voice rising. If the lurch of despair Tup felt was bad, he could only imagine how Echo must be feeling. It was strong enough that through force of will alone, Echo dragged himself to Fives’ side. Without the strength to reach for his face, he took Fives’ hand instead.

“Fives, cyare, wake up! The captain’s still coming, remember?” he pleaded, an edge of desperation bleeding into his voice.

There was no response. Echo took a deep breath and exhaled shakily, then went back to trying to keep the rest of the squad awake. He kept Fives’ hand in his own, though, and his eyes fixed on his twin’s face.

Fallout stopped responding not long after, and then, finally, Echo. Tup kept waiting for his turn, but though everything hurt, and he felt like he couldn’t catch his breath, darkness never took him.

No, the universe seemed to have much worse in store for him. The pain had plateaued—a single, drawn out note of agony that would have left him sobbing if he’d had the breath for it, but that was nothing—nothing, compared to the pain of watching helplessly as his brothers died.

Fives stopped breathing first. Tup watched him disbelievingly for several long moments, sure that he was mistaken, and that if he only watched long enough, he’d see the rise and fall of his chest. Fives was an ARC; surely he couldn’t be dead? But it wasn’t a mistake; Fives was dead. Not long after, so was Echo.

It felt inevitable, after that, when Fallout and Grist followed suit, leaving Tup wretchedly alone.

His physical pain faded to the background, paling in comparison to the horror he felt at what had just transpired. Tears squeezed from the corners of his eyes as he stared at his brother’s bodies.

He couldn’t help them; their medkit was out of reach with their gear— for that matter, he couldn’t even move to perform CPR.

This was Hell, he decided. Alone, in the depths of an alien world, having failed his vode, unable to do anything but watch over their cooling bodies.

He couldn’t bring himself to turn away, or close his eyes. He thought he should maybe be watching for the return of their captor, so he could be prepared to do… something, but he couldn’t.

He supposed it had failed; whatever it had been trying to do had just killed them instead. Or in Tup’s case, just plain hadn’t worked. His pain was fading, and aside from exhaustion, he didn’t feel any different. All that, for nothing.

Tup tried to sit up, hoping to regain his mobility. His vision swam when he tried, and he was left panting and coughing from the attempt, but he managed to slump himself upright against the wall. He probably should have waited, for the effort robbed him of what little strength he’d regained, and once again he was helpless.

He didn’t know how long he’d been down here—how long it had been since… but it had been long enough that Grist and Fallout were starting to look properly dead, their skin sallow and sunken.

Everything was still with only the dead for company, but there was a tension in the air, like a thunderstorm about to break.

Fives’ body jolted upright, shattering the heavy silence with a terrible, rattling gasp. Tup screamed, and tried to flinch back, but his trembling, leaden limbs trapped him in place.

“Fives? But you were dead!” Tup stammered. Fives’ eyes cut toward him, and Tup froze when they flashed in the darkness like a tooka’s. Just like the monster’s.

“Fives?” Tup repeated, not liking the intense, predatory look in Fives’ eyes at all. “Vod, are you in there?”

Fives’ expression flickered, his face tightening as though he was in pain, then he shook his head and turned away from Tup. His eyes scanned frantically around the cell, as if looking for something to distract himself from Tup’s helpless form. He looked down at his hand, still holding Echo’s, then to his unmoving body. Fives whimpered; a tiny, wounded noise that hurt Tup’s soul.

“Echo…” Fives’ voice cracked as he gathered his twin in his arms. “Echo please? Wake up?”

Tup watched as Fives tried to wake a dead man, his emotions over Echo almost enough to dim the strange new hunger in his eyes. Tup really did hope that he would succeed, that Echo would come back as Fives had, though he didn’t know what that would mean for him.

Fives’ pleas were answered when Echo jerked in his arms, back arching as his eyes snapped open. Tup felt a flood of relief wash through him.

The relief dimmed somewhat, when Echo looked at him with all the cold calculation of a master strategist, but with none of the humanity, and Tup realised he was locked in a cage with two hungry monsters that had ARC training. If Fives lost control of Echo, or himself, it would be over laughably fast.

“Echo!” Fives cried in relief, hugging him tighter. Echo remained stiff, not fighting the embrace, but not returning it either. He was still staring at Tup.

Fives put his hand on Echo’s cheek, turning his face away from Tup.

“Hey. Don’t look at him. We have to keep him safe,” Fives said, holding Echo’s gaze. Echo blinked, and reason returned.

“Fives, it burns…” Echo’s voice was gravelly. “I need—”

“I know, vod,” Fives agreed quietly. He brought their foreheads together in a keldabe kiss, holding Echo’s face between his hands so that his peripheral vision was blocked. After a moment, Echo brought his hands up to do the same for Fives.

They held each other like that, each keeping the other’s focus as best they could. When one would slip up and begin to turn away, the other would drag him back. All to protect Tup, a wet behind the ears shiny barely two weeks off Kamino. Tup could only imagine what they were going through, but given what it seemed to be costing them, Tup supposed he ought to feel lucky that they were ARC troopers. Any one else would have snapped by now.

Unfortunately, even ARCs have their limits. They were losing coherence, and starting to resist each other’s efforts to pull them back. There came a moment when Fives broke free, and instead of stopping him, Echo fixed his gaze on Tup.

Tup froze, wondering if this was it.

“S-sirs?” he tried, fearing it may not even be possible to get through to them any more.

Fives tensed, moments from pouncing, but before he could, Echo managed to shift his attention away from Tup, and tackled his batchmate from the side. They went tumbling, rolling across the slippery stone until they hit the bars with a jarringly loud noise. They scuffled some more, moving with unnatural grace, fighting like a pair of nexu.

“Fives!” Echo shouted, pinning him. “Fives stop! We can't keep going like this.”

Fives grimaced, showing teeth that were definitely not standard issue. “Then what do we do?” he asked.

“We take what we need from each other,” Echo suggested bluntly. “If we’re like that thing now, we can take a lot of damage.”

“That’s not actually going to feed the hunger. What if we can’t stop?” Fives pointed out.

“It won’t, but it will buy us some time, and if that’s not enough, then at least we’ll go out together, protecting a brother.” Echo eased back, taking Fives’ hand and pulling him up so they were kneeling face to face.

“Right,” Fives nodded with grim determination. “Together.”

Tup watched in horrified fascination as they drew close, embracing tightly and burying their faces against each other’s shoulders. Fives started nuzzling against Echo’s neck, and Tup felt like he should turn away and give them some privacy, but knew that would be a bad idea in their current state. Never turn your back on hungry predators. At least, that’s what flash training had taught him.

Echo lifted his head to meet Tup’s eyes.

“Whatever happens now, it’s not your fault,” Echo told him. It was the first time since they’d woken up that either of them had spoken directly to him. Tup hadn’t known how much he’d needed to hear that. He nodded solemnly, and Echo turned back to Fives.

With one hand cradling Fives’ head, Echo used the other to pull down the collar of Fives’ blacks. He hesitated a moment then, eyes shut, and lips ghosting over Fives’ exposed throat, when Fives took the initiative, biting down hard just below Echo’s jaw. Echo shuddered and gasped, pulling Fives flush against him, practically into his lap, as he replied in kind.

Fives’ moan as Echo’s fangs pierced into him was not one of pain. Together, they began to drink, the noises soft at first, but growing louder and more obscene as they became lost in each other.

Tup didn’t know how, given the setting, but it looked as if they were taking a great deal of pleasure from the act. Initially at least; for after a time, their demeanour changed. The set of their shoulders became rigid, hands gripped tighter, and they began to make sounds of frustration.

Despite the blood loss inherent in what they were doing, they did not seem to be weakening. Indeed, Echo was right; whatever that thing had done to them, it looked like they were incredibly hard to kill now. But also, Fives had been right to worry. Tup could only watch, wide eyed, as they descended into some sort of feedback cycle.

They grew steadily more aggressive, pulling at each other and growling in a way that shouldn't be possible with human vocal cords. Still, they seemed determined not to truly hurt each other.

Then, without warning. Something changed. They stilled for a moment, as if listening, and then exploded back into motion. They snapped and snarled, legitimately trying to rip each other’s throats out. Echo and Fives weren’t there any more, only their hunger remaining.

Tup had recovered enough to move now, but the terrible reality before him had rooted him to the spot. He could do nothing to help them, and if he tried, he would likely make matters worse. So he watched, transfixed, not looking away when the light increased, or when he heard voices, or when a flurry of stun shots brought down the feral ARCs. It was only when the captain was kneeling in front of him, blocking his line of sight, that he was able to tear his eyes away. He answered the captain’s question, still feeling a million light years away. But then, because it was important for Rex to hear, and because they lived in a galaxy where the Kaminoans could decree if a clone might live or die for the slightest reasons, he added, “They were protecting me. That monster wanted us to kill each other, but they refused.”

The captain’s jaw flexed, and he nodded.

“I believe you,” he promised.

Chapter Text

Echo woke up to the singing of a heartbeat, and knew even before he opened his eyes who was sitting beside him.

“Rex…” he breathed in relief. The captain’s armour creaked and his breathing changed as he straightened in surprise. Echo opened his eyes, then squinted against the bright medbay lights and the glow of a ray shield. Given everything he could remember (the beacon of Tup’s pulse. Fives’ blood in his mouth) that was… fair. He felt much more in control now, but who knew how quickly that could change?

“Does it have to be so bright in here?” he groaned, because one thing at a time. Rex’s brows raised in surprise.

“Kix already dimmed it to thirty percent. Do you need me to turn it off?”

“Please,” Echo nodded. “At least for now.”

Rex fiddled with the remote, and a moment later, the lights dimmed to a tolerable level. Off, apparently, though with the ray shield still emitting its soft light, it didn’t seem like it to Echo.

Rex turned back toward him and met his eyes for a long moment.

“That’s going to take some getting used to,” he muttered.

“Which part?” Echo joked.

“Your eyes are glowing like a Loth-cat’s,” Rex informed him.

That was news to Echo, but hardly a pressing concern compared with everything else. He glanced behind Rex at the other bed, where Fives lay unconscious. Echo could hear his heartbeat— incredibly slow, but steady. What he couldn’t hear was his breath. Echo frowned.

“Is he breathing?” he asked, nodding to his twin.

“He is not,” Rex told him evenly.

“What?!” Echo asked sharply, sitting up.

“You’re not either, except when you need to speak.” Rex’s expression was unreadable.

Echo felt his brows draw together and his head rear back, knowing he looked offended at this blatant disregard for basic biology and chemistry. Fangs and blood drinking he could just about accept, but not needing to breathe? That was too much.

He drew in a deliberate breath and held it. A normal human could hold their breath for two minutes without too much preparation. A clone trooper could last an average of ten minutes. Dive troopers were practically marine mammals, clearing thirty to forty minutes easily. (Commander Monnk’s battalion was a lot of fun at parties.) In all those cases though, you’d still feel the need to breathe fairly quickly, and for Echo, it just wasn’t there.

Rex chuckled weakly as Echo released the breath after a couple of minutes.

“Well… don’t like that,” Echo sighed and scrubbed a hand down his face.

“I don’t blame you. This is a lot,” Rex commiserated. He shifted as if he wanted to reach out and comfort Echo, but the ray shield still separated them. Echo felt the isolation keenly in that moment. He felt cold, and wanted very badly to accept the comfort that Rex had offered. The captain’s skin seemed to glow with warmth to Echo’s eyes. It was similar to the draw he had felt to Tup down in that cage. It was manageable now, but distracting.

“How’s Tup?” he asked, looking away.

“Recovering. He gave his report on what happened down there, what that thing did to you all. Coric is monitoring him for complications, but you kept him as safe as you could,” the captain reported.

“Didn’t feel like it,” Fives grumbled as he woke up.

“Well, you did. And he made sure I knew it,” Rex replied.

Fives sat up, scanning his surroundings with the practised eye of an ARC trooper. He met Echo’s gaze briefly, and Echo saw what Rex meant; Fives’ pupils were wide and reflective, glowing eerily through the ray shield in a way that made his expressions seem flat.

“So, you uh… gonna let us out?” Fives asked, waving a hand at the shield.

“That will be up to Kix when he gets here,” Rex said, crossing his arms.

“What, not allowed to give us hugs without a doctor’s note?” Fives pouted. Echo arched an unimpressed eyebrow at him, though he could hear the uneasiness beneath the quip.

“Given the state we found you in?” Rex’s tone was equally unimpressed.

“Right. I'm sorry you had to see us like that, sir.” Fives coughed in embarrassment.

“About that. I'm almost afraid to ask, but how are we… not like that any more?” Echo asked. The door opened as he spoke, letting in Kix, a med droid, and entirely too much light. Kix noticed them flinching back with a clinical eye and looked around at the dark room.

“Even more photosensitive than I thought,” he noted. “We’ll have to order you specialised helmets.” He directed the med droid toward Echo, one wall of the medical isolation shield doubling up to form an airlock, then cycling on and off in sequence to admit it.

“And to answer your question; we fed you,” Kix informed them, his voice carefully professional. The med droid started running a scanner over him.

“Fed… us?” Echo’s stomach gave a nervous flutter as he noticed Rex’s vambrace was off and his sleeve rolled up, a small bandage on the inside of his elbow.

“Yep. Your bodies had just undergone massive cellular restructuring. You were starving, and your higher brain functions were shutting down. We deduced from Tup’s report what it was you needed, but there were some hiccups along the way. Your bodies did not respond well to plasma, or even cold stored blood packs. It wasn’t until General Kenobi had a chance to translate more of the writing we found that we learned how finicky your condition is,” Kix explained.

The med droid finished its scan, then indicated he should hold his arm out so it could take a blood sample.

“Finicky?” Echo asked, to distract himself from his disproportionately negative reaction to the blood draw.

“Echo, if you thought you were a picky eater before, you were positively adventurous compared to your options now,” Kix told him tiredly.

“Which are?” Fives asked as the med droid finished with Echo and moved on to him.

“A kriffing headache is what they are. Whole, fresh blood from a sentient, still at body temperature. The captain and I donated today, but I'm going to have to set up a roster.” Kix folded his arms, looking disgruntled.

That was so arbitrary it was absurd. Echo rubbed his temple.

“Force osik?” he asked.

“Force osik,” Kix confirmed. The medic looked so tired. Echo wondered what kind of chaos had actually been going down as the medical team tried to figure things out. The realisation that they weren’t breathing must have been a bad shock, for one.

“Is this… reversible?” Fives asked carefully.

“What part of massive cellular restructure did you miss?” the medic asked incredulously. “I wouldn’t even know where to start. The Kaminoans might— might be able to do something with aggressive total gene therapy, but with the insane rate your cells can regenerate, I doubt it.”

“We are not sending them back to Kamino,” Rex said sharply.

“Of course not. We’d never see them again, and I shudder to think of the collateral damage if the long necks decided to study it in earnest,” Kix agreed, accepting the scanner from the droid and checking the results. “No, there’s a good reason General Kenobi has redacted the entire affair. He’s not even telling the Jedi council the whole story.”

“He can do that?” Fives asked, wide eyed.

“Are you going to try to tell him he can't?” Rex asked with a snort.

“Not me.” Fives shook his head.

“Now, your results look good, and you seem to be in your right minds again. Are you feeling any overwhelming urges to bite me?” Kix asked, entirely serious.

“No more than usual.” Fives grinned cheekily at him. Echo huffed a fond laugh.

Kix gave him a withering glare, then looked to Echo.

“Not overwhelming, no,” Echo admitted when it became obvious Kix expected an answer out of both of them. “Though I have to admit, it’s disconcerting to be able to hear your heartbeats.” and smell their blood under their skin. “It’s different.”

“Well, of course it’s different. You're not biologically human any more.” Kix raised the lights a little, and deactivated the ray shields.

Kix’s words hit Echo hard, and it was apparent from Fives’ face that he was just as stricken.

“Are we… are we even still vode?” Fives asked with a brittle edge to his voice.

“Yes,” Rex answered decisively. “No blood drinking demagolka can take that away from you. No matter what it’s done to your bodies, in your hearts you’re still our vode.” And then, despite what he had seen they were capable of, he clasped forearms with Fives, and brought their foreheads together in a mirshmure’cya. Fives’ eyes flickered closed, and he relaxed.

When Rex pulled away he turned to Echo.

“You too, vod.” Rex’s hand was searingly warm on the back of Echo’s neck, and he felt the tension drain out of him as he melted into the keldabe. He could feel his sluggish heart picking up its pace until it synced with Rex’s, and he felt more human for it, despite the strangeness that it could do such a thing in the first place.

It ended all too soon, in that it ended at all, with Rex squeezing his shoulder, then rolling down his sleeve and putting his vambrace and gauntlet back on.

“Coric and I need to report to the Generals now that you're awake, but I’ll be back later,” he told them.

“See you later, Captain,” Fives replied, trying to sound upbeat. He was only marginally successful. Rex gave them a nod and took his leave.

Echo decided it was time to ask the hard question that Rex had shut down so vehemently earlier.

“Kix, why aren’t we being sent back to Kamino?” The question caused the crease of worry between Fives’ brows to deepen. Realising there was nothing stopping him now that the ray shields were down, Echo stood up and moved to his side. They pressed their shoulders together when he sat down beside him on the bed.

Kix watched them silently for a moment before answering. “I’ve already told you—”

“You’d never see us again, yes. But can you really afford to be sentimental?” Echo interrupted.

“I don’t leave brothers behind,” Kix said simply.

“What about the rest of the 501^st? What if we’re a danger to them?” Echo argued.

Kix tipped his head to the side and acknowledged the point with a nod. “You may be, but neither Rex nor I are going to condemn you over ‘what-ifs’. You scared us, it’s true, but we weren’t going to make any decisions until you’d woken up. Now that you have, and are back in your right minds, I see no reason why, with careful management, we can't keep you there.”

“But the risk—” Echo argued.

“Is actually greater if we send you back. General Skywalker killed the monster that infected you. He stands the best chance of dealing with you should the worst come to pass. Better that you’re here with him, than on Kamino with all of the cadets.

“There are also other factors at play; things we learned while you were still unconscious. The physical changes are impressive: enhanced speed, strength, senses, a healing factor that defies everything I know about biology…” Kix trailed off for a moment shaking his head. “but it’s not what you can do that represents the greatest danger; It’s how you became this way.”

“Our blood…” Echo realised.

Kix nodded with a grim expression. “It’s not just carrying the disease, it is the disease. One with an eighty percent mortality rate.”

That math didn’t add up. Fives frowned. “That’s not—” he started.

“You died, brothers,” Kix said bluntly. “You may be walking and talking now, but according to my scans and Tup’s report, you were clinically dead for half an hour.”

Echo glanced at Fives, and they shared a wide eyed, horrified look between them.

“We… died?” Fives choked out. Kix nodded.

“You died and changed, Grist and Fallout weren’t so lucky. The process started, but it was just too much for their bodies to handle. Post mortem scans indicate massive internal haemorrhaging, disintegrated organs, and bones fractured from uneven muscle enhancement. They died in agony, and so will almost any other brother who’s exposed. Even those who survive will have complications.”

Fives sucked in a sharp breath, immediately reading between the lines. “Tup has complications?”

“It’s up to Tup if he wants to tell you about that. Unless he’s assigned to your command again, you are not entitled to that information.” Kix reminded him, not unkindly. “The point I'm making though, is that I would rather be decommissioned than be party to handing you over to people who would use this disease as a template to create some sort of ‘enhancement’, killing who knows how many vode in the process.”

“Oh,” was all Echo could say, deeply moved by the strength of the medic’s convictions. When laid out like that, Echo agreed with him. His concern for his brothers in the 501^st was the small picture compared to the well being of the vode as a whole.

“Yeah,” Kix agreed, clearing his throat, becoming more business-like. “Now, the captain, Coric and I intend to get you back into active duty. The Jedi agree. But we want to keep you here for observation for another three days, as well as put you through a physical assessment. That won’t start until tomorrow though, so in the meantime, do you have any other questions?”

Echo shared another look with Fives, and felt the weariness in his eyes as if it were his own.

“I’m sure we will later, but for now, could we just have some time to process?” Echo said for them both.

“Sure vod. Call if you need anything.” Kix gestured to the buttons at the side of each bed. They promised they would, and he left, warning them before he opened the door so they could close their sensitive eyes.

“What the fuck?” Fives asked the galaxy at large once they were alone. “Does the universe hate us, in particular?”

“Sometimes it feels that way,” Echo agreed, picking up the bedside remote and turning the lights off completely. With no windows, and even the emergency lights off, it was near total darkness. Even so, Echo could still see the details of Fives’ face, though they were desaturated. Fives blinked at him, then looked around the room.

“Huh. OK, that’s actually pretty cool,” he admitted.

Echo smiled; there was his irrepressible bondmate. He put the remote down and took Fives’ hand, drawing him close and laying down so that they faced one another, their noses touching and their hands clasped between them. They lay like that for a while, studying each other in the dark with new eyes.

Fives’ skin was a shade or two off, as was Echo’s own. No longer that beautiful, vibrant bronze, they both looked sickly.

“We look two days from dead.” Echo sighed in annoyance.

“Well, I suppose we are, when you think about it. We’re just... marching a lot closer than most brothers.” Fives shrugged with a crooked grin.

His teeth were changed too; both upper and lower eye teeth sharper, and the uppers much longer than they had been. They flashed roguishly at the corner of Fives’ grin.

Echo shuddered, remembering what they felt like breaking his skin, what it felt like to bite down in turn. Heat sparked in his core at the thought, but he couldn’t tell if it was lust or hunger.

Fives’ eyes were luminous—the brightest points in the room as they darted over Echo’s features, scrutinising the sudden change in his mood.

“You okay?”

“I’m okay.” Echo nodded, bringing a hand up to Fives’ face and brushing a thumb over his cheek. Then frowned as he looked closer at his own hand.

“What is it?” Fives asked, so Echo pulled his hand away and showed him.

“Claws?” Fives exclaimed, because indeed, that’s what they were; long and sharp, almost glasslike in their texture, but hard as durasteel. Echo knew, because he tested one against the bulkhead, and left a deep mark in the metal.

Fives, impulsive idiot that he could be, tested his own against a finger. They both went utterly still as blood welled up from the cut and began to run down his finger. Echo watched in fascination as it pooled in his palm, and then began to trickle down his wrist.

That surge of heat was back, growing in Echo’s belly as he watched, but it was remembering Kix’s words about how dangerous their blood was now that made him move. Sitting up, he took Fives’ arm by the elbow and the back of his hand. Before the red rivulet could track any further down and potentially contaminate anything, Echo caught it on his tongue, licking a languid stripe back up his wrist and into the palm of his hand.

“Oh fuck…” Fives breathed, watching him through heavy lidded eyes.

“Fuck,” Echo agreed breathily, lapping the blood from his palm. The taste was electric; coppery and molten. It was the best thing he’d ever tasted, somehow even better than it had been before. Flavours of despair and fear had been replaced by love and strength—Fives tasted so much more like himself now.

Finished with his palm, Echo moved on to his finger, drawing it into his mouth and sucking gently. Fives inhaled sharply and moaned.

“Why is that so hot?” Fives asked, not really expecting an answer. Echo knew he wasn’t talking about having his fingers sucked on. He wished he had an answer; he still couldn’t decide if what he was feeling was arousal or thirst. It was arousal enough as far as his cock was concerned; he was half hard already. He opened his eyes, taking in the sight of Fives with parted lips and his own growing erection tenting his pants.

He released Fives’ finger with a soft pop, noting that the initial wound was completely gone. Fives didn’t even spare it a glance, grabbing Echo’s shirt with his freed hand and surging forward to kiss him, licking the taste of his own blood from Echo’s lips.

Now that was hot. Echo kissed him back, running his hands down Fives’ arms and then bringing them to the hem of his shirt, mindful of his claws as he ran his fingers over the bare skin underneath. He worked upward, rucking up Fives’ shirt and smoothing hands over the rippling muscle of his back.

Fives took that as his cue to climb into Echo’s lap, straddling his hips and grinding down. The shock of pleasure as their pricks slid against one another, even through clothes, left Echo gasping, breaking the kiss and throwing his head back.

Fives tucked his head against Echo’s neck, trailing kisses along his jaw, until he reached the pulse point. His lips parted, and Echo slowed his rocking as he felt teeth press against his skin. He thrilled with anticipation, not knowing if Fives was going to bite down or not. Before he could say anything on the matter one way or another though, Fives pulled back, pressing a sucking kiss to the spot instead.

“You know,” Fives started, face still hidden in the crook of Echo’s shoulder. “Everything down in that cave was awful. Except that. Those first few minutes of… of drinking each other in; I don’t think I’ve ever felt so good in my life. It’s like we were—”

“Finally close enough?” Echo finished for him, putting a finger under Fives’ chin and guiding his face up so they could look at each other. There was a deep, burning need in Fives’ eyes.

“I want that again,” Fives admitted.

“I do too,” Echo said, allowing his own longing to colour his voice.

Relief flooded Fives’ expression, but so did a flicker of uncertainty. A few minutes ago, Echo might have shared it, but with blood still on his lips, he was beginning to understand the shape of his hunger.

“There’s no one to protect this time,” Echo reminded him. “We’ll be able to stop when we need to.”

“You’re right,” Fives said, expression clearing.

“I usually am,” Echo teased.

They smiled at each other, and Echo slid his hands down to Fives’ hips, pulling him close and setting them moving again.

Fives pulled his shirt off in one smooth motion, tossing it to the side and then tugging at the hem of Echo’s for him to do the same. Echo’s came off with slightly more haste than grace, but Fives seemed more than happy with the results, drinking in the sight of him with hungry eyes, but waiting for Echo to make the next move.

Echo thought about jumping straight to it, but instead, he took his time. It was as much to prove to himself that he was capable of waiting as it was to enjoy the pleasure that had already been building between them. So he ghosted his nails along Fives’ flank and thighs, kissing him slowly as he did. Fives let him, dutifully keeping his teeth to himself as Echo dipped a hand below his waistband to give a firm squeeze to the nice thick cock he found there.

Fives’ rhythm stuttered, and he cursed, arching his back as Echo pulled his prick free and began to stroke him.

Not to be outdone, Fives returned the favour, and then one upped him by taking them both in hand. Echo relinquished his grip, his eyes falling closed as their dicks pressed together, shuddering at the delicious sensation of velvet soft skin gliding together in Fives’ fist.

Echo moaned as the pleasure built, but as good as it was, it wasn’t enough to make him forget the well of want that was aching within him. He brought his hand up to run his fingers through Fives’ hair, gripping the back of his head in order to pull him closer. Fives’ pulse quickened, and his eyes flashed with excitement before they closed as Echo kissed him. It was a quick but firm kiss before he moved on— the corner of his mouth, his cheek, the line of his jaw, then finally, his throat. He pressed a wet kiss over his pulse, feeling it flutter against his lips. Fives mirrored him, and he could feel his chest rise and fall as he deliberately breathed in the scent of Echo’s skin. Echo shivered at the feel of cool breath tickling over his stubble.

Echo was still reeling from that sensation when a particularly skilful twist of Fives’ hand around their cocks had him seeing stars. He stiffened, fingers tightening in Fives’ hair as he could no longer hold himself back; he surged forward and bit down. The feeling of skin yielding under his teeth was unexpectedly thrilling; he found himself revelling in that almost as much as the feeling of Fives’ prick twitching against his own.

“Yesss,” Fives hissed triumphantly. “Oh, Echo…”

Echo bit down a little harder, to remind Fives that he had better things to be doing with his mouth than talking. Blood hit his tongue then, pulse after pulse of it. So much more fulfilling than the barest taste he’d had earlier. Everything that had been hinted at before was there in full strength now; his conviction, his love, his lust. The taste of everything that was Fives clouded his senses— narrowed reality down to just the two of them.

Then Fives bit him, and he jerked as if he’d been electrocuted. Bucking up into Fives’ hand and pressing harder into the crook of his neck, he moaned a wordless exclamation.

To drink was one thing, but to give added a whole new dimension. It enervated him, amplifying every touch, and sending shivering waves prickling up his spine. Even the dull ache of the bite pulled at something deep in his core, igniting a powerful, steady pleasure that throbbed in time with his heart.

It was more than just physical pleasure though. The circuit had been completed, and everything felt right.

Echo and Fives had always felt like two halves of a whole, happiest when they could face the world side by side. They seized every moment they could with the other, but it never seemed to be enough. No matter how tightly they embraced, their souls remained just under their skin, unable to touch.

Until now, it seemed. As their bodies moved together (Fives, impressively, still keeping up his rhythm), and their blood flowed over eager tongues, they could feel their souls entwining, their minds touching in a way that should simply not be possible for a pair of force null clones like themselves.

There were no longer any boundaries between them, and for the first time, they were able to see each other completely. All strengths, all flaws, seen… and accepted. For anyone else, such a connection might have been terrifying, even damaging, but for them, it settled a longing that they were pretty sure had been there since they were decanted.

As they drank each other in, the bond between them grew in strength. Each sank into the other so deeply that it was hard to tell who was Echo and who was Fives. Sensations began to double up, and the shock of pleasure echoing between them was too much.

They welcomed the climax as it built; indeed, they were powerless to deny it. Fives’ hand gave them one more stroke, squeezing tight, and for a dizzying moment they were one entity with two bodies, feeling with perfect clarity the pleasure that was thrumming through them, body and soul. Then the wave of ecstasy crested, and every muscle in their bodies went taut. Their vision whited out, and pure bliss flooded them as they were pulled into an absolutely bone shaking climax.

-

When Echo could see again, he found he was laying down, Fives squarely on top of him, still insensate. The bite wounds had healed over, and he could feel the intensity of the bond fading.

Two hundred pounds of muscle laying on your diaphragm wasn’t actually much of an inconvenience when you didn’t need to breathe, so he snaked his arms around Fives’ broad back and held him close.

“Well, that’s one way to make sure we stop,” Echo commented, mostly to himself.

There was a groan in response. “Force… that was amazing…” Fives stretched and wiggled on top of him before settling into a slightly more comfortable position, still on top of Echo.

Echo hummed in agreement. “Though we’re lucky that didn’t fry our nervous systems,” he added.

“Speak for yourself, vod,” Fives muttered. “My brain is soup”

----------------------

“You’re not telling the council?” Anakin’s expression was guarded, as if trying to figure Obi-wan out.

“Not everything, no. I told them of the creature we found, and sent them a holoscan of the cave. What I will not be telling them anything about is the ultimate fate of your ARC troopers. You’re welcome, by the way.”

“But why?” Anakin was looking at him as if seeing him for the first time. As though Obi-wan had never hidden anything from the council before.

Obi-wan sighed heavily. “Our troopers already have so little say in their own lives, this is the least I can do. If word of their condition were to get out— to anybody: the council, the chancellor, the Kaminoans— then Echo and Fives would be taken away, separated from their brothers because their ‘masters’ willed it so.”

The change in Anakin’s posture was immediate, and Obi-Wan wondered if he had gone too far by touching on his old student’s trauma, but it was the truth. A truth that Anakin compartmentalised more and more as the war went on. The clones were slaves in everything but name, and Anakin was powerless to free them. Anakin didn’t like feeling powerless, and he believed in the Republic’s cause, so he chose to take the clone’s assurances at face value; they meant their oaths, and would have sworn themselves to the republic regardless of the circumstance.

“The Chancellor would never—” he began to protest.

“I mean no disrespect to the Chancellor,” Obi-wan absolutely did, “I know you are friends, but he is the ultimate leader of the Republic and the GAR. By your own admission he sometimes has to make unethical decisions for the greater good.” Obi-wan had hoped that lumping the council in with Palpatine would prevent Anakin’s offence on his friend’s behalf, but he should have known better.

“Would it be for the greater good?” Anakin asked, folding his arms.

Obi-wan massaged the bridge of his nose. What have they come to when that’s the question Anakin asks? There’s a Jedi’s duty to serve the common good, and then there’s; ‘maybe we should allow the Kaminoans to create an army of Darkside touched slave soldiers that would eat itself from the inside out, on the off chance it gives us an edge in the war’ as if they needed better soldiers and not, say, naval superiority. Obi-wan really hoped this was just a case where Anakin hadn’t realised the implications.

He didn’t actually want to know the answer, so instead he said, “It would not. But if he were backed into a corner, he might come to an erroneous conclusion on the matter. Surely you have noticed he sometimes lacks perspective? Just look at what happened with the Zillo beast.”

“You lose a giant lizard on Coruscant one time and nobody ever lets you live it down,” Anakin joked, trying to lighten the mood.

“You jest, but that creature died because he disregarded our advice.” Obi-wan reminded him. “Its death, and the destruction it wreaked on Coruscant, were completely unnecessary.”

“I’m sure he learned from his mistake,” Anakin countered.

“Are you willing to stake Fives and Echo’s lives on that?” Obi-wan asked, a little more sharply than he meant to. “They may be happy to die for the Republic, but there’s a vast difference between dying in battle as a hero, and being dissected in a lab.”

“He wouldn’t—” Anakin tried to protest again. It was getting very one-note.

“If that’s the case, then he doesn’t need to know anyway. Come now, Anakin, you can't tell me you’ve never kept secrets to protect those you care about?” Obi-wan tried to take a more conciliatory tone.

“I don’t know what you mean.” Anakin’s reply was stony and evasive.

Obi-wan rolled his eyes. “Look at it this way; by giving your ARCs the privacy they should have by rights, you’re not only protecting them, you’re protecting your friend from being pressured into committing a sentient rights violation.”

That finally seemed to get through to him.

“I see your point.” Anakin said with a nod.

“I’m glad.” Obi-wan smiled and patted him on the back, finally allowing himself to relax. He didn’t know what he would have done if Anakin hadn’t agreed. The scale of the crisis he’d probably just averted was breathtaking.

“I still can’t believe you’re not telling the council,” Anakin teased.

“Contrary to popular belief, I don’t tell the council everything.” Obi-wan’s reply was pointed. As usual, it sailed right over Anakin’s head.

--------------------------------

“Dank ferrick!” Crosshair hissed.

“What is the matter?” Tech asked, blinking at him curiously.

“It’s going to take three weeks to replace my cracked visor.” Crosshair brandished his broken helmet at the room.

“That doesn’t seem right. Supply had two extra in reserve last time I checked the records.” Tech frowned and picked up his datapad.

“Well, they don’t have them any more,” Crosshair seethed.

“Who could possibly need a visor that fine tuned beside Crosshair?” Hunter asked. “Not even I need that level of light suppression.”

Tech tapped at his datapad for a moment. “According to this, they’ve been requisitioned by the 501^st,” he informed them.

“What do regs need with Crosshair’s special gear?” Wrecker wondered.

“They don’t. Someone’s taking the piss,” Crosshair grumbled.

“While not impossible, I think that’s unlikely. This was authorised by their CMO. Unless Crosshair’s abrasive manner has managed to make an enemy of a clone two years our senior, who’s been deployed since the first battle of Geonosis.” Tech raised an eyebrow and cocked his head to the side. “CT-6324, sergeant Coric?”

“Doesn’t ring any bells,” Crosshair was forced to admit.

“I thought not. I wonder who they are outfitting?” Tech mused. “Perhaps I will monitor the 501^st for further unusual requests…”

Chapter Text

The Resolute and the Negotiator lingered in orbit, General Kenobi wanting to more thoroughly explore the monster’s lair before bowing out to Exploricore archaeologists, so Echo and Fives didn’t miss much while they were stuck in the medbay.

The three days they spent under observation were a learning experience— for everyone involved. They had scraped together some guidelines in the form of the translated hieroglyphs that General Kenobi had provided, but some points were vague, and there were definitely still some surprises.

The fact that they were fast enough to reliably dodge blaster bolts, or that between the two of them they could lift a gunship had been expected, not just from the general’s notes, but from Kix’s scans as well.

Acute hearing, near total dark vision and a sense of smell to rival an anooba’s had also been anticipated, though they proved troublesome. Fives and Echo could, with effort, adjust to the light levels in the rest of the ship, but they could still get overwhelmed easily by all of the other stimuli. Kix gave them earplugs and shaded medical visors for when it got to be too much.

This had all been addressed and measured before midmeal the first day, with nothing more untoward happening than accidentally leaving hand sized dents in the superficial plating of the LAAT/i they lifted when they performed their strength test. (It was fine, really. The superdispersive plating underneath prevented the damage from being anything more than cosmetic, Hawk, and anyway it was all Kix’s idea.)

Less expected, though not completely surprising, were things like their extreme resistance to drugs, or their tolerance for vacuum. The first was discovered as they were testing to see if they could eat anything else at all; the answer being that they could eat just about anything, but they’d get absolutely no benefit from it. (This was perhaps on account of the fact that they had no stomach acid. Or gut biome. And the Force only knows what their intestines were doing, because they certainly weren’t digesting food!) Nothing tasted right either, so there wasn’t even much point in eating just to indulge in flavour. (Not that they had much access to food worth eating for its flavour alone.)

All of this was less distressing to Echo than it was to Fives; who, after realising this meant that it was no longer possible for them to get drunk, wondered dejectedly what they would do on shore leave. When Echo suggested that there were actually whole planets outside of the cantinas, Fives rolled his eyes and playfully accused him of making things up.

Some things though, came as a complete surprise. The first one Fives and Echo discovered on their own, shortly after their... bonding experience. They could purr. Like tookas.

Fives had still been laying on top of Echo, breathing slowly and deliberately, enjoying the scent of his skin, when a deep rumbling had started up unbidden from somewhere in Fives’ chest.

Echo, who had been half dozing, cracked an eye open and looked down at him inquisitively. Fives twitched and the rumbling stopped, having startled himself. He met Echo’s eyes.

“Was that…?” he asked, wide eyed.

“Yeah, it was.” Echo smiled faintly.

“Well... you’ve always wanted a tooka,” Fives said with a wry expression. He lay his head back down on Echo’s shoulder, and the purring started back up again.

After a couple of minutes, a second rumble joined it.

They hadn’t quite found the time to tell Kix about that one yet. It’s not that they were ashamed; they were ARC troopers, anything they did was by definition badass. It just... didn’t seem that important in the scheme of things.

The second was the discovery that they could take conscious control over their regenerative abilities. Fives learned this thanks to pure, petulant vanity. He had finally found an effective tool for trimming his claws, because as cool as it was to be able to slice through plastoid and durasteel with his bare hands, he, like most troopers, was used to keeping his nails closely trimmed. Suddenly having a couple of extra centimetres of wickedly sharp talon on the end of his fingers was messing with his proprioception, and he kept nicking himself and putting holes in his medbay reds. However, as soon as he’d finished and set the plasma cutter aside, they had already visibly begun to regrow.

“Hey! Stop that!” he found himself childishly scolding his own nails, and astonishingly, it worked. Further trial and error revealed that regrowth could be activated at will, with no concentration required to maintain. It worked with their hair too, and Fives promptly used this power for mischief, growing his hair so long it went past his knees, and striking various poses as if he were a model in an effort to make Echo laugh. He threatened to keep it, even, despite the impossibility of wearing a helmet over it, sticking to the bit right up until he sat on it and nearly broke his neck.

After taking clippers to it and divesting himself of several pounds of hair, Kix and Echo watched with him as after a few minutes the shorn coil of hair began to crumble into dust.

“So that’s what will happen to us if we die?” Echo asked thoughtfully, sucking all of the levity out of the room.

Kix nodded, his eyes distant. “Yes. If your brain or your heart are destroyed, that’s it for you.”

They all contemplated that for a sombre moment before Fives shook himself back into the present.

“That hasn’t actually changed, you know,” he reminded them. “Most things die when you shoot them in the heart.” he mimed shooting a blaster at the left side of Echo’s chest.

Echo rolled his eyes and brushed Fives’ hand aside.

Kix shook his head. “Wrong side,” he informed them. The twins rounded on him in astonishment.

“Excuse me? Aren’t you a medic?” Fives demanded in a strangled tone.

“Don’t you two read your own files?” Kix countered.

The rejoinder left them nonplussed. “What?” they asked in tandem.

“You split a little later in development than most monozygotic twins, and you mirror each other as a result. So Echo is left hand dominant, and has situs inversus,” Kix explained. After their blank looks became concerned, he elaborated. “It’s fine. More or less a cosmetic variance for all the impact it will have. His organs are laid out in the opposite configuration from normal. Which means his heart is on the right side.”

Fives shared a surprised and somewhat delighted look with Echo.

“So that’s what SI stands for.” Echo had read his medical file, he just had never had a medic or doctor he trusted enough to ask what it meant during his cadet days, and after leaving Kamino he hadn’t actually had time to read the medic manuals that he’d been denied access to before. (He had just about finished reading up on the slicer track while on Rishi, but after joining the 501^st he’d been kept very busy.) He grinned and elbowed Fives in the ribs. “I guess that means my heart’s in the right place,” he joked.

Kix groaned, and Fives snorted.

“Who knew Mr. Regulation Appearance was such a deviant?” Fives asked.

“Well, I love you, so something had to be wrong with me,” Echo replied with a faint smile and a shrug.

Fives gasped in faux surprise and clasped a dramatic hand over his mouth.

“You love me?!” He seized Echo’s hand, and dropped his voice into a smouldering imitation of his favourite holodrama actor. “Let us elope at once.”

“What, again?” Echo asked, struggling to contain his laughter.

“You’re right. We should just jump to a second honey moon.” Fives said thoughtfully.

“We never had a honeymoon to begin with.” Echo pointed out.

“Then we’ll have a double honeymoon!”

“Is that like a normal honeymoon, but we invite all of our friends?” Echo asked with a smirk.

“It is now!” Fives replied enthusiastically.

“Are you two finished?” Kix asked before they could one up each other into starting an orgy. They both turned their heads to look at him, tempted for just a moment to stick to the bit, before dropping each other’s hands and stepping apart.

“Now, shall we see if your control extends to injuries as well?” Kix asked.

The answer was yes, it did. Kix theorised that this was to allow them to triage any damage they sustained, allowing them to ignore superficial problems in order to conserve energy for more important things. Since their energy levels were now dependent on one precious and limited resource, this could only be a good thing.

After all, clones were hardy, and they could replenish lost blood at twice the rate of a natborn, but they could still only afford to give so much before it became a risk to their health. When Kix said he was going to have to draw up a roster, he meant for the whole of the 501^st, carefully managed so that no one trooper was tapped for too much, or too often. Echo and Fives were now dependent on their brothers like never before.

It was humbling. News of their condition had spread through the entire legion (though officers had been diligent in ensuring that it had not spread further, not even to the natborns aboard the Resolute.) By the time Kix announced the blood drive, every trooper knew what it was for, but not a single brother begrudged them. In fact, the first day, when a pair of troopers named Ringo and Oz reported for their donation, they were quite cheerful; happy to help even though they’d never directly interacted with the ARCs before. They would have stayed longer, but Kix shooed them out so the twins could have some privacy for what came next.

The vode were familiar with blood; it held no horror or revulsion for them. It was, generally speaking, something you wanted to stay on the inside of your body, but with their purpose in life, that wasn’t always practical. They had all been trained for best practices when coming into contact with it though, and deliberately drinking the stuff violated every single one of them.

So when Kix presented them both with a pint of still warm blood like he was handing out kriffing hydro packs, while Fives happily started on his own, Echo’s conscious and subconscious reactions had a brief moment of disconnect. This was different than it had been with Fives; it was too clinical and impersonal. With no heartbeat or warm skin to overwhelm his senses, the old Echo had quite a lot of things to say about how uncomfortable and weird this situation was.

Even so, he could not look away from the blood pack in his hands, the heat of it quickening his pulse and making his fingertips tingle. Though he hadn’t been able to smell it inside the sealed pack, he’d somehow known as soon as he touched it whose he was holding.

It was like he could feel Oz’s willingness to help seeping in through his fingertips. He wanted to taste it, wanted to hold that good cheer and warmth in his core and taste copper on his tongue. Since the other option was to let it go to waste, he quieted the voice that was quibbling about biohazard training and opened the valve on the pack.

The rest of his uncertainty was washed away when the smell hit him. The thirst he had been pushing into the back of his mind awoke, simple and clear this time, with no crossed signals to his libido; he needed to feed. After that, it was the simplest thing to close his eyes and drink.

It was the first time he had consciously consumed human blood. Where Fives’ had been sweeter, electrifying like a stim pack, this had more body, and was so deliciously warm it made him shiver. He drank and drank, savouring every mouthful until there was nothing left. It left him feeling content and alive, with a strong lingering affection for Oz, a brother he barely knew.

Echo blinked down at the empty pack as if he’d had an epiphany. He supposed he had, though he couldn’t put it into words.

“Oh…” he exclaimed. It was a pleased sound of realisation. He looked up and found both Fives and Kix watching him with very different expressions. He chose to focus on Kix and his professional curiosity, because the knowing smoulder in Fives’ eyes promised the kind of debauchery they simply didn’t have time for.

“How are you feeling?” the medic asked them.

“Like maybe alcohol was overrated,” Fives admitted, leaning back on his arms. His pupils were blown wide, making his eyes look nearly black.

“Can’t order blood at 79’s, though,” Echo pointed out, his voice a little fainter than he’d intended, still feeling hazy, and yes, a little intoxicated.

“Not with that attitude,” Fives joked, getting to his feet.

“Please do not try it,” Kix sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “We’re trying to keep this classified.”

“I’m more worried about outing ourselves on the battlefield. Troopers from other battalions are bound to notice if we start flipping tanks over,” Echo said. Enemies too, he thought, but the seppies would probably just assume it was the result of further Kaminoan genetic engineering.

“Nah, you’re thinking about this too hard.” Fives sat beside him and threw an encouraging arm around Echo’s shoulders. “We’re ARC troopers. Most of the GAR already think we’re superhuman. Would you bat an eye if Alpha 17 flipped a tank?”

Echo snorted. “I wouldn’t even blink if he ripped an enemy’s throat out with his teeth,” he retorted dryly.

“There you have it!” Fives said brightly, his point made.

“Or you could just… not flip tanks while on joint operations?” Kix suggested.

“Unrealistic,” Echo laughed. “Fives loves showing off too much.”

“And Echo could never hold back if vod’e lives were on the line,” Fives pointed out fondly, tightening his arm around Echo’s shoulders.

“This is going to be a disaster,” Kix muttered.

-

The second day had been a little rougher; both Fives and Echo growing irritated not just from confinement, but from lack of sleep. The first night after their rescue, they hadn’t slept well. They’d assumed it had been from nerves and shock. But the second night was the same. They had only succeeded in dozing fitfully, never sinking into a deep sleep. They did not dream at all.

Kix had thought it was overstimulation; all of their senses had been completely rewired, after all, and they had no practice yet at filtering it all out. Since soporifics and sedatives were no longer a viable solution, he switched them to a different room with better sound proofing and an isolated air supply. But even in a room designed to allow a Jedi to heal from the ravages of a psychic attack, they still could not sleep.

“Just shoot us,” Fives begged grumpily.

“I beg your pardon?” Kix asked, taken aback.

“He means with stunners,” Echo translated.

“That’s how you got us back on board, right?”Fives went on. “And we were unconscious for hours.”

“Stunned unconsciousness is not the same thing as sleep,” Kix chided them.

“Can you be sure when it comes to us? Everything about this is unscouted territory,” Fives challenged. “Please, just try it.”

Clones didn’t need a lot of sleep; the Kaminoans hadn’t been able to engineer the need for it out of them entirely, but they had certainly been able to make them more efficient about it. Most brothers were perfectly functional with just four hours a night. Six was positively sleeping in. They could also go several days without before it impacted performance, but just because something was possible didn’t mean it was advisable. Two days without any deep REM would put any vod in a bad mood, and when these brothers could dent durasteel with their bare hands when they got frustrated, getting them some damn sleep became a priority. So against his better judgement, Kix acquiesced to their request.

It took four stunners each to knock them out, and when they came to a couple of hours later, they didn’t feel any more rested than they had before.

This was actually deeply concerning. It was obvious that they still needed sleep, they just didn’t seem to be capable of it any more. Feeding seemed to wash away some of the fatigue, but not enough, and Kix refused to consider the further ramifications of that until he had exhausted every other avenue. Still, he quietly bumped up the donation rota so that the twins would get extra today. Hopefully he could figure this out before it became unsustainable.

“I’m going to loop the Generals back in. There may be some trick to it that an understanding of the force will reveal,” Kix decided.

Skywalker arrived first, Kenobi still being busy down in the cave, and upon being informed of the problem, without so much as asking their permission, waved his hand and commanded them to sleep. Fives and Echo promptly slumped back on the exam beds they’d been sitting on, out cold.

The general’s smug smile faded when Kix scanned them and shook his head.

“They’re already waking up,” he announced.

“It was worth a try,” Skywalker said with a shrug as the ARCs opened their eyes.

“It wouldn’t have been a viable long term solution anyway, sir,” Kix replied.

“Would have been a nice interim solution, though,” Echo grumbled, sitting up.

“Well, we could try some meditation techniques, but Obi-wan is the better choice for that, so why don’t we look at the problem from a different angle while we wait for him? Tell me what we know so far,” Skywalker suggested. “about all of their abilities, not just the sleep problems.”

Kix sighed, sure that Coric had already told the general most of what they’d discovered during his report, but began anyway, giving a brief overview of the tests they’d run yesterday.

Skywalker listened attentively and asked astute questions, but they mostly focused on the strength and speed tests. Kix privately thought that his general had become distracted from the problem at hand, but it was not his place to say.

Skywalker was warming to the task, and marshalled them into testing some of the stranger edge case scenarios he could think of, like ‘what happens if we feed them Jedi blood?’

Chaos. The answer was chaos.

Echo had been chosen as the recipient, Fives being the control, as Kix had mistakenly assumed that Echo would have better discipline over… whatever effect the blood of the most powerful Jedi in the galaxy might have on him. This was a mistake.

Echo downed the half ounce of blood like a shot, then blinked, his pupils dilating. Kix swore the ARC was practically vibrating as he shared a glance with Fives, smirked, and then kriffing disappeared.

Kix and Skywalker were immediately on alert, worried that this had somehow sent Echo into a frenzy, and that he could attack from any direction, but Fives was laughing.

“Oh man, he can turn invisible? I'm jealous,” Fives leaned back, at ease.

“You can't do that?” Kix asked cautiously.

“Nah,” Fives shook his head. “I just tried. That seems to be an Echo special.” he grinned devilishly, showing all of his sharp teeth. “It’s so over for the Seppies now.”

“Echo?” Skywalker asked the empty air of the med bay. “Are you still here?” There was no answer. He looked to Fives to see if he had any input.

“Can’t smell him. Can’t… sense? him, either.” Fives supplied. Kix made a note to follow up on that later.

The general huffed. “I can't either. This isn’t just invisibility; he completely suppressed his presence.”

“So how do we find him?” Kix asked.

“You don’t,” Fives replied confidently. “Neither of us have our comms on us, so you can’t track him that way. Security cameras won’t work for obvious reasons. Face it; he’s in the walls by now. You’ve got an invisible ARC trooper in the walls.” He seemed far too pleased with this turn of events.

“He’ll come out on his own eventually, right?” Skywalker asked, trying to project an aura of unconcern.

“Oh, sure. Eventually.” Fives shrugged. “After everyone’s left boots have been swapped, Rex’s hair has been dyed green, and all the pinup posters in the barracks have been replaced with art of anthropomorphised star fighters.”

“Would he really do all that?” the general asked, almost impressed.

“It’s what I’d do. But maybe not, Echo’s a lot smarter than me.” Fives told them.

Skywalker seemed to take that to mean that maybe Echo wouldn’t commit pranks after all, and relaxed, but Kix knew better. He felt his dawning horror creep across his face.

“If we don’t find him soon, we’re going to be discovering new mischief for months,” he said urgently.

Skywalker’s face fell. “Come on!” He ordered, and dashed out into the hall.

Fives and Kix looked at each other, Kix in utter disbelief that the general had just ordered the medic on duty and a patient to follow him on a manhunt, and Fives smiling brightly as if he’d expected nothing less.

“After you,” The ARC gestured, with mock Coruscanti manners.

Kix gave him a hard look, but because Echo was also his patient, whom it was his duty to find, and because Fives was the only one who had a chance of tracking Echo down, he started moving, sending a message to Coric explaining the situation as he ran after the general.

They came across evidence of Echo’s intentions pretty much immediately. The first trooper they met outside of the med bay had several large googly eyes stuck to his helmet. The trooper seemed unaware of this.

Even Fives seemed impressed. “Did he just… have those with him?” he muttered. Kix couldn’t see how, it’s not like med bay reds had pockets. But he also couldn’t see how Echo could have made it to the ARC barracks and back in the time he’d been missing, enhanced speed or not.

“You’ve, uh, got something there,” Fives warned the trooper as the three of them hustled past, moving in the direction the soldier had come from.

Skywalker pulled out his comm as they passed two more vode similarly adorned.

“Security, this is General Skywalker. ARC trooper Echo has gone missing. I want all on duty personnel to be on the look out for any sign of him,” he ordered. “You won’t be able to see him, so be on the lookout for anything unusual. Compile the results and forward them to my comm.”

“And if anyone catches any good footage, send it my way!” Fives chimed in over the general’s shoulder. Skywalker rolled his eyes and clicked off the comm.

As Skywalker considered whether to go left or right at a junction, Fives fell back to Kix's side.

“Hey Kix, do you remember how we lured Commander Tano out that time she started hunting Hardcase from the vents?” Fives asked innocently.

“We flooded the vents with the scent of vinegar and baited her out with a live nuna, but I don’t think that’s relevant here.” Kix replied impatiently.

“No?” Fives’ voice was a hair too high.

“Of course not. The smell of vinegar doesn’t have a repellent effect on him because he’s not Togruta, and he doesn’t even need to breathe. We could flood the vents with chlorine gas and it wouldn’t phase him.”

“Well yeah, let’s not do that.” Fives waved a hand in the air, dismissing the idea. “No need to go committing war crimes on our own ship. But what about the live nuna?”

Kix levelled Fives with a very unimpressed look. “Would that work on you?”

“Oh sure,” Fives lied. Kix continued to stare, even as they followed behind Skywalker.

“Maybe? Okay, no.” Fives admitted.

“What are you up to?” Kix asked suspiciously.

“I'm just trying to help!”

“Yeah, help Echo, maybe,” Kix muttered.

“What can I say? I just love to see my evil twin thriving,” Fives shrugged, a fond smile on his face.

Fives often insisted that Echo was the evil twin, a notion he’d gotten from natborn holodramas. Echo would usually counter that it was the evil one that always had the goatee, to which Fives would reply that he was ‘reclaiming’ it.

Before, Kix would have said, without a doubt, that Echo was right, and if either of them was the ‘evil’ twin, it was Fives. Now, passing a group of three troopers accusing each other of being the one responsible for the new helmet decorations that jiggled goofily with every angry motion, he was rapidly reconsidering.

“Quit arguing,” Kix ordered the trio. “It was a drugged ARC trooper, just be thankful you still have your shoes.”

“A drugged ARC?” He heard one of them ask as they sped by.

“That’s what he said.”

“This should be good. Wanna get some bangcorn and hang out with Cam in the security office?” another suggested. Kix didn’t hear the reply.

Skywalker was on the hunt, following the trail of pranked troopers until they arrived at the ship’s gym. At first it didn’t seem like anything was wrong, aside from several puzzled brothers in workout gear looking around in bewilderment. Then Kix realised what had them at a loss. All of the weights had disappeared. Dumbbells, barbell plates, even the weights from the machines were gone.

“Well, it’s gonna be fun to see where those ended up,” Fives remarked.

This was the problem with designing clones to be smarter and stronger, Kix thought to himself. To need less sleep and then give them a drive to always be busy. They needed so much damn enrichment, and when it wasn’t provided, they’d make it themselves. The Dominoes had been menaces before, now their new condition had compounded those issues ten fold.

“Where would you have put them?” Skywalker asked Fives.

“Somewhere really inconvenient,” Fives said after a moment of thought. “High up, but narrow, so you can't just use a grav sled to get them down.”

“I think I know where he’s going!” the general announced, and led the way.

They arrived at the hangar to see Echo had already been and gone. Plenty of pilots with googly eyes on their armour, or in the case of the deck crew, their high vis vests had been decorated with hearts and stars cut out of reflective tape, but the rogue ARC himself seemed to have finished his mischief here.

They found the missing gym equipment in the aft section of the hangar, some engineers already puzzling how to get several tons of weight down from hundreds of feet up, where Echo had secured it behind the enormous conduits that powered the hangar doors. It wasn’t just the placement either; Echo had secured it very thoroughly. The crate wasn’t budging an inch until they de-encrypted the mag locks that held it in place.

So, with nothing to be done about that until Echo was found or the locks were sliced, Skywalker got moving again, using his Jedi intuition to unerringly find Echo’s victims. They found themselves in one of the rec rooms next. ‘What’s new, Loth-cat’ was playing on the music system, and several shinies were struggling with the controls, frantically trying to shut it off.

“Make it stop!”

“I can’t, it’s on loop!”

“Just shut it off!”

“The controls aren’t responding!”

Not even slowing down, the general waved his hand, and the entertainment centre unplugged itself from the wall. The song trailed off mid word, but the Jedi and his entourage were already out of the room.

Security had begun forwarding reports to Skywalker’s comm; any trooper who noticed they’d been pranked showing up as a dot on a holographic map of the Resolute. The trail led them to the barracks next, where the next shift was just waking up for duty.

“This isn’t my boot…” a sleepy and confused Hardcase remarked, looking lost. He wasn’t the only one. It was as Fives had said; everyone’s left boots had been swapped, apparently at random.

That wasn’t the only thing Fives had been right about.

“And I thought the pin-ups were bad!” a shiny named Dogma was staring in outrage at a poster of a V-19… fraternising, with a delta-7 Aethersprite. “This is pure filth!” Filth that the kid could not apparently make himself look away from, his brows drawn into an angry ‘v’ and his face getting redder by the minute.

“Should we help them?” Kix asked, making a note to talk to Dogma about managing his blood pressure later.

“No time, we almost have him!” Skywalker declared.

“What’s the plan when we find him?” Kix asked, dutifully following and trusting that the general did, in fact, have a plan.

“Once we’ve narrowed down where he is, we’ll use the security force fields to contain him. Even if he’s still in stealth, that’ll keep him from getting up to any more trouble,” Skywalker replied.

Kix was a medic, not a tactician, so it sounded like as good a plan as any to him.

“What do you think, Fives?” Kix asked, because if Fives wasn’t in the medbay, it better be because he was being useful.

“Could work, Just make sure you put a hold on his security clearance before you try it,” Fives answered helpfully.

“We should have done that from the beginning…” Kix realised, chagrined.

“Well, it’s done now,” the general announced, typing something into his comm. “Now come on, I think he’s heading for the officer’s quarters.”

They managed to arrive just behind the reports, Skywalker breezing through the corridor even as Jesse stumbled out of his quarters being chased by several mouse droids armed with paintbrushes.

“Kix!” Jesse shouted in alarm. “What is going on?!” He hopped to the side to avoid an enterprising lunge from one of his assailants.

“Echo’s loose,” Kix explained, trying to keep up with the general.

“Wait! Kix, help me!” Jesse ran after him and tried to climb onto his back to avoid getting paint on his armour.

Kix stumbled and tried to shrug Jesse off. He loved his riduur, but he wasn’t about to get paint on his medbay whites for him. Armour was much easier to clean. Jesse clung to him like a monkey lizard though, slowing him down and throwing off his balance.

“Get off! I’m supposed to be helping the general.” Kix grunted. Fortunately, the mouse droids didn’t seem to consider him a viable target and were merely following, waiting for Jesse’s ankles to be in range.

“I can carry you, Jesse,” Fives offered with a grin.

Jesse eyed Fives’ fangs, then the lurking mouse droids, then the general already well ahead of them.

“Take him,” Kix decided for him, and Jesse squawked as he was unceremoniously deposited into Fives’ arms

“Hey!” Jesse protested. Then Fives effortlessly hoisted the lieutenant into a bridal carry, and Jesse’s dissent went suspiciously silent. A glance assured Kix that he was fine, just wide eyed and breathless. Kix rolled his eyes and ran after the general.

They caught up right as Skywalker sprung his trap.

“Activate security fields E-6 through E-20, now!” he ordered into his comm. Instantly, ray shields flickered to life down a long stretch of seemingly empty corridor.

“Did we get him?” Kix asked.

Skywalker was watching the holo map of the Resolute, waiting, but no more dots appeared, meaning there were no new reports of mischief. Satisfied, he closed the map and crossed his arms.

“Okay Echo, you’ve had your fun, but it’s time to come out now,” he called, but was met only with silence. He frowned. “That’s an order soldier.” Still nothing.

“I… don’t think he’s here, General,” Fives said. “He wouldn’t ignore a direct order.”

“Poodoo,” Skywalker cursed under his breath.

“Are you sure?” Kix asked Fives. “He does seem to be in an altered mental state.”

Fives shook his head. “Not altered enough. I’ve seen him jump to obey orders while blind drunk.”

Skywalker pulled a set of macrobinoculars out of his robes and toggled them to thermal imaging, scanning the corridor, but found nothing.

“What’s that?” Kix asked, pointing to a piece of flimsy he’d just noticed laying on the ground at the general’s feet. Skywalker bent to pick it up. It was a note from Echo.

‘The discrepancy between contact, and notice of the incident seems to be about thirty seconds. Allow for an additional fifteen for it to be reported.’ He had finished the note with a tiny doodle of a smiley face.

“How helpful,” Kix said with a sigh.

“Our timing was off. He’s slipped the net,” Skywalker concluded. He opened his holomap again, but there were still no new reports.

Jesse, still in Fives arms, looked from Fives to Kix and back again.

“Okay, what is going on?” he asked. Right, the general had only informed on duty personnel, and the watch was about to change.

“What isn’t going on?” Kix muttered, but filled Jesse in. He was halfway through the story, and the general’s map was still unchanged, when Skywalker interrupted.

“And of course, he’s changed tactics! We’re going to the bridge,” he announced frustratedly.

“Yes, sir,” they chorused.

“You know, the mouse droids stopped following a while ago,” Kix told Jesse with a knowing smirk. “Fives can put you down now.”

“Eh, when we get to the bridge,” Jesse shrugged, and Fives smiled.

Officer’s quarters weren’t far from the bridge, so it didn’t take long before they arrived, Skywalker striding in and immediately directing the various stations in how they were going to go about locating Echo remotely. Jesse, on his own feet now, took his station, but kept an eye on them over his shoulder.

Rex entered the bridge then, just coming on duty with his nose in his datapad and his helmet tucked under his arm. Kix noted with relief that his hair was not green, nor were there googly eyes anywhere on his person. Perhaps Echo thought the Jaig eyes joke would have been too obvious. Or perhaps his affection and respect for Rex had exempted the captain. If so, he was the only one. Rank hadn’t protected Jesse, after all.

“Rex! There you are. Echo’s disappeared, and we can't find him,” The general greeted him.

“What?” Rex asked sharply. “How? Has someone kidnapped him?”

“Easy, Captain,” Fives gestured soothingly. “He’s still on board. Probably. And having the time of his life, probably.”

“Echo has the ability to become invisible,” Kix said bluntly. “Which we found out because someone wanted to see what would happen if we fed him force sensitive blood, and it induced a manic state.”

Rex’s face took on a bleak expression, and he carefully tucked his datapad away, then put on his helmet with a weary finality.

“Start from the beginning,” he requested, his vocorder mostly hiding the resignation in his voice.

So they did, Skywalker taking the lead, with Kix clarifying certain points about their efforts to track Echo down. Fives, who did have some sense of decorum, kept his thoughts mostly to himself, though he couldn’t always silence his snickering.

“So, you’ve been trying to track someone who’s undetectable?” Rex asked slowly when they had finished, letting the question hang in the air.

“What else were we supposed to do? Let him run amok?” Skywalker demanded.

Rex stared at the general for several long beats of silence.

“Shall I use the ship wide intercom and order him to report to the bridge sir?” he asked finally, voice carefully neutral.

Kix honestly couldn’t believe none of them had thought of doing that. Then Fives groaned, as if his fun was over, and Kix narrowed his eyes. Apparently someone had thought of it.

Skywalker blinked, and coughed.

“Er, yes. Yes, do that,” he agreed.

Rex nodded crisply, face unreadable under his helmet, and turned to the communications console.

“ARC trooper Echo, report to the Bridge, on the double.” Rex barked into the intercom. After a moment of thought he added: “Visibly, please.”

“Reporting as ordered, sir!”

Kix jumped a foot in the air at Echo’s voice just behind him, spinning around to find the ARC trooper standing at attention, the very image of professionalism.

“Echo, good. Now what’s this I hear about googly eyes, boots, and missing gym equipment?” Rex addressed him, hands behind his back.

“A training exercise, sir, to test the Resolute’s readiness to detect an infiltrator.” Echo was a much better liar than Fives; he barely twitched, the corner of his mouth curving upward by the barest millimeter, his face remaining otherwise impassive.

He stepped past Kix and Fives, falling into parade rest, only the fey glint in his eyes betraying the energy that had brought them to this point.

“I see. Was the appropriate flimsiwork filed for this training exercise?” Rex asked.

“Yes sir.”

Rex pulled his datapad out, scrolling through to check. “Funny that I don’t remember seeing it.”

“Perhaps the delivery lagged.” Echo suggested. “I assure you it has the appropriate time stamp.”

“I’ll just bet.” Rex’s voice was dry as Geonosis. “And the barracks posters?” he went on.

“Per regulation 4236a there are no barracks posters,” Echo said smoothly. “However, the infantry barracks and the flight crew barracks might find it beneficial to check in with each other. Some personal items may have been misplaced during the exercise.”

“I’m impressed,” Rex praised. Echo somehow, stood even straighter. “You’ve thought of almost everything.”

“Almost, sir?” Echo arched a polite brow. Kix wished they’d get a room.

“You’re still on medical leave. You’re not authorised to participate in training exercises until you’re cleared for active duty.”

“Of course, sir.” Echo did not sound like he’d been caught out at all.

“Your punishment will be to set everyone’s boots straight, get the gym equipment down from the hangar ceiling, and actually write your report on this little training exercise of yours. Any thoughts you have on how we might expect to catch an invisible infiltrator will be reviewed for implementation. Since this is you, Echo, I trust that you will have some useful suggestions.” Rex decreed. “Because if you’re just being cute, I’m gonna have you scrubbing the plasma manifolds until your hands fall off.”

“Yes sir. Just as soon as I’m released from medical and am allowed to perform my duties again, punishment and otherwise.” Echo confirmed.

Fives made a strangled noise, his body trembling in an effort to keep quiet. Skywalker was actually laughing behind his hand, as if this wasn’t all his fault. Kix felt his jaw drop. The sheer gett’se of it leaving him a little in awe.

Rex’s shoulders moved as he drew in a deep breath, and Kix could easily imagine the thousand yard stare behind the captain’s visor. They shared a glance, and Kix shook his head; he could not, in good conscience, clear the twins for duty yet. The troops would have to spend two days wearing the wrong boots, or sort them out themselves.

It was diabolical, when Kix thought about it; they all wore the same size, so it wouldn’t actually impede anyone’s battle readiness, but they’d all be broken in a little differently, and the contrast over the course of a duty shift would be maddening.

Before Rex could decide whether or not he needed to take further disciplinary measures, General Skywalker added his two credits.

“I think that should be enough; this was all just a test that got a little out of hand, and is mostly my fault,” he said. Then he smiled brightly. “And I think we learned a lot! So let’s give Echo a chance to burn off the last of that energy, and leave it at that.”

“Very well, sir,” Rex agreed. “But new rule: no more Jedi blood.”

Fives made a disappointed noise, but the Dominoes nodded.

“So, wanna see how high up you two can safely jump from?” Skywalker asked after a moment.

“Yeah, all right,” the ARCs agreed. Madmen, the both of them.

-

They were back in the hangar, the lartee pilots and deck crew watching warily as the general held Fives sixteen meters in the air using the force, when General Kenobi arrived.

“Anakin, what are you doing?”

“Oh, hey Master!” Skywalker’s focus broke as he turned to face Kenobi. There was a collective gasp from their audience as Fives let out a startled “Whoa!” and began to fall.

“Anakin!” Kenobi shouted in warning, throwing his own hand out to catch the ARC Trooper.”

“No, wait. It’s fine.” Skywalker pushed his arm down. “Watch.”

Despite the unexpected start, Fives kept his wits about him, pinwheeling his arms and twisting in the air to maintain the right orientation, falling the nearly five stories to the deck and still landing perfectly on his feet, though he bent his knees low to absorb the momentum.

He straightened and walked over to his brother, who was watching unconcernedly. Echo had mostly lost the fey look in his eyes, but there was still an energy to him in the way he held himself on the balls of his feet, waiting for his turn again.

“You’re right, Echo. We’re gonna need better boots.” Fives stuck his foot out so his twin could see the damage, where the tread of his boot was pulling free.

“It’s almost like the GAR didn’t expect their soldiers to be lifting gunships or landing on their feet after a fall of sixteen meters,” Echo remarked dryly.

“How short-sighted of them,” Kenobi joked airily as he joined them. Echo, Fives, and Kix all straightened and saluted him belatedly, the motion rippling through the rest of the vode in the hangar when everyone realised the general had landed quietly without being announced. Kenobi waved it off.

“Wait, you lifted a gunship?” Skywalker asked at his side.

“How else do you think we tested at that weight?” Kix asked in disbelief.

“I dunno. I thought you had equipment, or scans or something. But if that was you…” The general trailed off. “I have an idea. Meet me back in the med bay.”

They all watched the general dash off.

“What’s his idea, do you think?” Fives asked.

“We’ll find out soon enough, I'm afraid,” Kenobi sighed, before clapping his hands together and turning to face them. “Now, gentlemen, how can I help you?”

-

Back in the medbay, Kenobi was going over some mental exercises that could help clear the mind and ready it for sleep when General Skywalker returned. He had a set of force suppression cuffs with him.

“Hold out your arm,” he said, gesturing to Fives.

Fives gave a worried side eye to the restraints his general was brandishing at him.

“Am I under arrest?” he asked hesitantly.

“What? No,” Skywalker assured him. “This is just the easiest way to test what effect force suppression has on you.”

“But we’re not force users?” Echo pointed out.

“Maybe not, but I felt something weird in the hangar yesterday.” Skywalker opened one side of the cuff and advanced on Fives. “Come on. We don’t even have to cuff both hands.”

Hesitantly, Fives held out his arm, and allowed the general to close the cuff around it.

A second later, it powered on, and Fives crumpled like a puppet with cut strings.

The medbay was thrown into disarray as everyone shouted and tried to move at once. It was Echo that managed to get to Fives first, despite the fact that Skywalker had been closer. He snapped the cuff open and flung it away as if it were venomous, then he leaned over him, cradling Fives’ head in his hands and searching his face for any signs of life.

“Fives?” he asked breathlessly.

Fives stirred and the room let out a collective sigh of relief.

“Ten more minutes…” he groaned, and threw an arm over his face as if he were a cadet begging for more sleep.

Echo laughed and shook his head.

“I don’t believe it… force suppression puts us to sleep?” He stepped back from Fives as the latter sat up, realising that he could not, in fact, roll over and go back to sleep. “How does that even work?”

Kenobi’s face was grave. “I may have an explanation. If I’m right, then we took a very foolish risk just now.” He pulled something from within his robes that Kix recognised after a moment to be a Jedi midichlorian reader. It was one of the advanced ones with the analyser built in and a screen for seeing the results. “May I take a blood sample?” he asked, and only after Fives nodded did he move to take the sample.

“Not without gloves, you don’t, sir,” Kix interrupted him. The general accepted the gloves without comment, and donned them before resuming his task.

Fives frowned at the device as it drew a blood sample. They both did that now, Kix had noticed. It wasn’t the usual squeamishness he sometimes saw either, but grumpiness, like they were angry at the waste. No wonder the twins were becoming fractious; stuck in the medbay, couldn’t sleep, and Kix had been poking them full of holes because the samples broke down so quickly. He really hoped that they were about to solve at least one of those problems.

The device beeped, its analysis finished, and Kenobi’s eyebrows climbed toward his hairline as he examined the results.

“Well. That’s certainly not what I expected.”

“What is it? Let me see.” Skywalker crowded close so he could read over his master’s shoulder. His eyes widened in surprise when he got a look. “What the fuck are those?” he exclaimed.

Which was a question that inspired neither confidence nor tranquillity.

Kenobi took a steadying breath. “Those, Anakin, used to be midichlorians.”