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snarkys-malarky · 5 months ago

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So here's a little drabble that has been eating at my brain like a Geonosian brain worm so I had to get it out! Please like, reblog and tell me what you think!! I'm still trying to figure out how to make posts look really good like some of the others I see on here so any tips on that would be appreciated too! Hope you enjoy The Book as much as Tech and Echo!!

Tech and Echo discover a lending library on Ord Mantell and Echo shows Tech the joys of book borrowing. However, Tech discovers something unexpected and has trouble deciding how he feels about it. Big Bro Echo to the rescue!

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Tech had been delighted to find that Echo liked to read. It was one of Tech’s favorite activities, especially when between missions, if he wasn’t working on one of his many projects. There was a time when Crosshair would sit and read with him on the spare padd, the two of them sitting companionably in the cockpit en route to wherever and reading whatever was on their respective padds.

But Crosshair wasn’t there to sit with him anymore… and Tech had not realized how much he had missed that simple companionship until Echo had joined them. The first time Echo had hesitantly inquired about something he could read on, Tech had nearly jumped from the pilot’s chair in his excitement. When Echo had mentioned the existence of places where you could actually find books in flimsi form AND touch them and read them, Tech had been hooked. It was on his list of Things To Do When The War Is Over Or I Have A Chance To Try.

That was a particularly long list.

Unfortunately, they were never on any planet that A. wasn’t in a state of war and B. had enough time anyway to look for something like that. It wasn’t until they were on Ord Mantell and running from the Empire that it struck either of them that Echo had promised to take him to one someday. When it had come up in conversation, they had both paused before sharing identical looks. It was only the work of a moment before Tech had his padd in hand and coordinates to the nearest book lender to their ship marked out. They wound their way through the seedier streets of the city until coming to a slightly more reputable part of the town. Tech was afraid they might be a bit conspicuous in their armour in this nicer area but Echo assured him it would not be an issue. As they received no odd or curious glances, he could only assume Echo knew what he was speaking of and continued on til his HUD map showed them at the right place. It was a small, inconspicuous-looking building with only a sign beside a doorway declaring what it was. However, when they entered…

Oh, when they entered!

Tech was very glad he had his helmet on because he knew he was most likely gawking. There were flimsy books everywhere! Echo directed them to a side area where an older Rodian was sitting behind a desk. It wasn’t long before Echo, with fake chain codes in hand, had acquired them both lending numbers which they could use to pick out books to take with them. Tech had long since sliced the padds that they kept on the Havoc Marauder so that he could access other things on them besides just mission related information. He had access to as many things to read as he might want thru that but there was something about this riot of readable items surrounding him that made his insides feel like they were quivering in excitement and happiness. He followed Echo as he showed him how the areas were divided into general topics and how things were arranged. It wasn’t long before they were each browsing through their selected section. Tech was fascinated by the colorful graphics on the covers. He picked up one after the other, examining them and seeing how they were put together. It was all fascinating. He began to wander, trying to see how many sections and topics were available to chose from. It was then he saw it. An entire shelf of books of what looked like several different species in various states of dress and arousal. He glanced around and stepped closer, curiosity peaked. Upon further investigation, he realized these books all had a common theme of romantic, and rather sexual, overtones. He didn’t know how to quantify his thoughts on them. Why would beings wish to read about what he assumed was a largely private issue for most sentients? Granted, there were several species that were overtly sexual by nature but even so it didn’t strike him as a topic usually read about but something more of a participatory activity.

The artwork on the covers was quite fascinating however. It was as he was examining those a bit more in depth that he saw it.

There, right beside one depicting what appeared to be several Jedi in ridiculous poses with scantily clad Twi’lek females hanging over them, was one with what seemed to be a clone, in full armour, arms clasped about a quite curvy female human.

He tried to resist but his curiosity was too great.

He picked it up and turned it to read the blurb on the back.

It was indeed exactly what it appeared to be.

A clone romance.

He had never even imagined that nat-borns, of any species, could or would think of clones in this way. It had seemed that most sentient nat-borns in the galaxy, if they gave a single thought to clones at all, usually only had bad thoughts of them.

This was…intriguing.

He cast another glance around before flipping it open randomly and beginning to read.

He felt his face turning red.

Was that even possible?

He flipped to another area and began to read.

He could feel himself beginning to sweat.

He shut the book abruptly and, after a moment of deliberation, slid it to the bottom of the small set of books he already had in hand.

He left that book section before he could get caught and hurried to another. It wasn’t long before he was engrossed in another section. It didn’t take him long to hit the maximum amount of books he was allowed to check out at one time and he returned to the counter where the elderly Rodian sat and tried not to fidget as he ran his scanner over the bar codes on the spine of each book. As soon as he was done, Tech grabbed them up and stuffed them in the rucksack he had brought along just for this purpose. Echo had one as well and Tech was relieved since he didn’t want to risk getting The Book mixed in with Echo’s. Tech began to wander around, looking for Echo and it wasn’t long before he found him, a pile of books of his own in hand. Tech offered to carry them for him since balancing them in his scomp arm looked a little difficult. Echo accepted with a grateful nod and less than 30 minutes later they were headed back to the Marauder, respective goods in hand…or sack, as the case may be.

Echo went directly to the bunk that used to be Crosshairs and sat his sack down as he began to rummage. Tech headed for the cockpit with his. Thankfully, Hunter had gone for supplies and Wrecker had taken Omega and headed to fulfill their after mission Mantell Mix tradition. Often they wandered around the outdoor markets as they enjoyed it so he knew they wouldn’t be back for a bit.

Enough time for research.

At least, that’s what he told himself as he pulled out The Book and began to read. Tech could read incredibly fast when he needed or wanted to. As he progressed through the first few chapters of the book he found himself slowing down a bit in order to catalogue the rather fascinating physiological responses he was having to the content.

His slow was still a lot faster than most people and he had completed reading the book by the time the others started coming back to the ship. It was a fortunate thing as he had found the contents to be exceptionally arousing, both physically and mentally. He had found it necessary to, as Hunter liked to say “take care of the problem”, caused by the very viscerally worded content and the imagery provoked by it. He had also been quite surprised to be so emotionally compromised by the storyline and he could not help but wonder if the writer had any personal experience they were drawing from as the way they had written and portrayed the clone protagonist of the story felt very real to him. So much so in fact that he had found himself resonating in sympathy several times with his conflicted points of view.

He had also been surprised with his feelings regarding the female protagonist. Tech would be the first to admit his experience of the female of any species was lamentably limited. He was, after all, a clone, raised amongst other clones and spending the majority of his time on missions and in the battlefield. There were few females to be encountered in such scenarios and of the ones that were, the type of scenario set forth in the novel had certainly never occurred. Even so, he found himself, confusingly, echoing the feelings of the clone protagonist of the story toward the female.

Even now, having finished the book several hours earlier and hidden it away in his secret spot, he found himself ruminating on the story and feeling both satisfied that they had been able to escape to Wild Space together and simultaneously upset. It took him until several hours into the night cycle to conclude the reason for his upset. When it struck him, it was both so simple and so profound that he was somewhat shocked at the revelation.

He wanted that for himself.

He wanted to be noticed and fixated on, desired and dreamed about. He wanted someone to feel that depth of emotion for him that they would fight the galaxy and give up everything they knew just to keep him in their life. He wanted to experience that level of passion and sexual gratification and connection to someone who felt it for him as well.

When the revelation hit him, it felt rather like a strike to his solar plexus. It left him feeling winded and uncomfortable, more so when he realized that such a thing was highly unlikely to ever happen with the way he and his brothers lived their lives.

He couldn’t quite understand why it hurt as much as it did though.

He tried to put it out of his mind by immersing himself in the other books he had borrowed but the thought continued to pick at the edges of his mind until he felt unusually irritable.

It was inevitable that one of his brothers would call him out on his oddly bad mood. He was just extremely grateful that the one that eventually did was Echo as, of all of them, he was the most likely to be able to understand and have an idea of how to address the issue.

They were in hyperspace on their way to yet another job for Cid when Echo finally approached him late into a night cycle and asked him what was bothering him. He simply dug out the book and passed it to him and asked him to read it. Echo took it silently, his eyebrows rising ever higher as he surveyed the cover then flipped it to the blurb on the back. Tech did his best to ignore the curious and rather impish look his brother cast him before he nodded and agreed. He focused himself on his own book as Echo settled in beside him in the co-pilot’s chair to read. This was a familiar and comfortable scenario for Tech. Echo often found it as hard to sleep as Tech, with his always busy brain, did and frequently found his way to the cockpit to sit in quiet companionship with him as they read or occasionally talked.

Echo, for his part, was deeply intrigued by what Tech had passed to him. He’d never pegged Tech as the type to be interested in sex, much less a secret romantic. Tech had always tended to keep himself to himself, and while he could be physical if a brother was needing comfort, he wasn’t at all what Echo would call the cuddly type. Really, none of the batch were, with the notable exception of Wrecker who, for all his size, was much closer to what Echo was used to with the brothers he had known. It was Wrecker who had most often physically comforted him with hugs and cuddles when he was first with the batch and trying to adjust to, well… everything.

Echo settled in and began to read. He could see at first glance why Tech had been caught by the book. Clone/nat-born romance was, while technically banned by the Republic, still something that had happened quite often, if scuttlebutt was to be believed. Hell, Cut and Suu were proof that the idea wasn’t so far-fetched as the nat-born purists and politicians wanted everyone to believe. Clones were still technically fully-functional human males with fully functioning sex drives and, once they discovered the power of their own physical appeal to certain beings in the galaxy, they were as prone to sexual encounters as any nat-born. The GAR and Senate had recognized that early on and turned a selectively blind eye which in turn meant 79s had been a hotbed of hook-ups and the neighboring GAR sanctioned 69s pleasure house had done a banging business (Echo chuckled quietly at his own unintended pun). There had been much less care given to the occasional sexual encounter but the deeper feelings that could develop into a relationship? That was something else as it undermined the whole argument that clones didn’t count as sentient beings deserving of autonomy. So, while relationships did happen, it was kept much lower profile since they all knew the consequences it could hold for a brother caught or even accused.

As Echo read, he tried to see it thru his brother’s eyes. Why would this have upset Tech to the point of becoming so off-center they had all noticed? Echo had to admit, the sex scenes were pretty steamy and, had he still had all his parts intact, would probably have had him squirming in discomfort from some needs of his own. As it was, he could still mentally appreciate the details and, as the story progressed, could feel himself connecting with certain aspects. The idea of being loved so unconditionally as Tayla loved Jax was rather intoxicating. Echo had long since accepted the fact that such things were beyond him now, it was an old pain that occasionally pricked but no longer ached as it once did but connecting with these characters was causing that old pain of wanting love to rear its nasty head.

Echo paused.

Could this be why his brother was so out of sorts?

Could it be that Tech, the one who, out of all his now brothers seemed most unlikely to, actually wanted to have love? Wanted to have a relationship and a sexual one at that?

Echo took a deep breath and slanted a side-eyed look to his lanky brother draped sideways in the captain’s chair beside him as he considered the thought. While at first it had seemed rather absurd, the more he thought about it, the more it made sense. Tech was the most brilliant person he had ever met, of any species but, with that brilliance came differences too. Echo had been quick to take note when he had joined the Bad Batch. As an ARC, he was no fool himself and had applied himself to learning as much about his new batch as he possibly could as fast as he could and one of the glaringly big things he had noted was that Tech didn’t tick like the rest of them. He wondered if the others even noticed how they accommodated some of his more quirky traits. The longer he was with them the more he doubted that they did notice, it was just second nature to them. None more so than Crosshair though. It had actually not surprised him a bit to learn that they had been tube twins. They seemed to almost have another sense when it came to one another. Echo often noted Crosshair helping Tech to calm when he got agitated or taking him away before he had one of his shutdown episodes, something that had terrified Echo the first time it had happened until Hunter let him know it was just part of how Tech worked. Likewise, Tech always seemed to know when one of Cross’s migraines were incoming and would dim the shipboard lights which everyone knew was a sign to quieten down. They did the same for Hunter on the occasions his senses got overstimulated but it wasn’t as instinctual, often wasn’t until Hunter was showing clear signs. Wrecker had once told him that Tech and Crosshair had always used to sleep together until they got too big to fit in the bunks and even then, if one had a bad night, the other would find a way to fit in with them. It had struck Echo hard as he had already noted how much less prone to physical comfort the batch, and especially Tech, was with one another compared to every other clone batch he knew and made him wonder for the thousandth time what this group of brothers had been through to make them the way they were.

Now that Crosshair wasn’t with them, did Tech long for that comforting connection he no longer had? Was this a case of transference or had Tech always harbored these secret hopes and desires like so many other brothers had?

As he finished the story, he sat for a minute and contemplated how to approach the issue.

“Have you finished the book?” Echo couldn’t help the involuntary quirk of his lips at the question. He should have known even if Tech was doing 5 other things he would still be keeping watch and waiting to pounce as soon as he perceived he was finished.

“Yes I have.”

Tech fidgeted a bit and Echo let him stew til he could ask his question, “Well, what is your opinion?”

Echo looked over at him and cocked a brow, “Is it my opinion on the book you want or something else?”

Tech grimaced, “In truth I do not really know.”

Echo gave the book a little wave, “is it something to do with this that has had you in a, shall we say, less than pleasant mood lately?”

Tech stared out the front of the ship into the swirling blue of the hyperspace lane for a moment before turning back to Echo.

“I know that you are someone who could understand what it is to wish you could be someone other than who you are. You were once whole in body and now you must deal daily with what was done to you by the Techno Union. I can see that this has caused you much distress at times, and not just because of the pain associated with your cybernetics,” Tech paused a moment as he began to fidget restlessly, bouncing his leg and tapping his hands against his thighs. Sure signs of his discomfort with the topic, Echo knew, but he soldiered on, “But did you ever desire before that happened to be someone other than you are? To have a life other than the one you had? To want things that, as a clone, are by nature, denied to you?”

Echo had long since learned to look past the occasionally painfully blunt words Tech used to reach to the heart of what he was trying to say. And what he was saying now was what Echo had been suspecting. Now he had to find a way to say what Tech needed to hear in a way he could understand it. He considered for a moment before answering.

“I don’t think there are many brothers who haven’t, at some point, wondered what life could have been like if we weren’t soldiers, didn’t wonder what we could be if we had been given the opportunity to be free after the war. For myself, I…met someone, once. She,” Echo shifted uncomfortably, dredging up old memories was hard, “she made me want the chance to be something else. But I… couldn’t leave my brothers to do it. I couldn’t be like Cut and… she understood that. I had hoped after the war that clones might have a chance to live free like other sentients in the galaxy, that maybe I could go back and find her but then… the Citadel happened and… a lot of other things and I realized that that dream was just that, a dream.”

Echo looked over at Tech who was regarding him with wide eyes. Echo tried not to smile. Sometimes he forgot that he had not been with them forever, that there were parts of his story they didn’t know.

“Did you?”

“Did I what?”

Tech gave him a Look.

“Did you ever try to find this woman again?”

Echo gave an uncomfortable shrug before turning to look out the viewport, “It doesn’t matter. Sometimes its better to leave the past in the past and go forward. I’m a different person now and am on a different path.”

It was silent for a few moments before Tech spoke again.

“Do you ever wish to find something like that again?”

Echo shot his brother a sidelong look and quirked his lips at the question and the very nonchalant way Tech tried, and failed, to ask it. Echo turned and leaned his head back against the seat headrest.

“It would take an extraordinary woman to want me as I am now but, sometimes, I remember what it felt like to be with her and I… miss it.”

He watched from the corner of his eyes as his brother took and absorbed his words. He waited a bit more before he turned his head to look at his troubled vod.

“There is nothing wrong with wanting to love someone and be loved in return, even for clones, no matter what the Kaminoans, or Senate, or GAR or any other being says. We are just as human as any nat-born and have all the same wants and wishes. And there’s nothing wrong with not wanting that either. What is good for one person may not be the same as for another, everyone is different. But don’t ever feel like you don’t deserve something just because the galaxy makes you feel like you shouldn’t Tech.”

Tech gave him a faint smile before leaning back in his seat as well. They sat in companionable silence for a bit before Tech spoke again.

“I… know that I am at times somewhat… difficult to communicate with. I have never learned the knack of easy communication with other beings. I try but, something in me is just too…different. At times I know I even exasperate my batch, who have had since our decanting to learn to deal with me.”

Echo looked over, his heart clenching in compassion at Tech’s unusually halting speech. It hurt him to hear Tech speak of himself in this way. It wasn’t that it wasn’t true, it was just that Echo had never realized Tech was so aware of it, felt so keenly his differences. Echo had learned soon after joining his new batch that Tech loved to talk about the things that interested him, which seemed to be everything, and that the others often lost patience with his chatter. Not that they ever were intentionally cruel or indifferent to him but it was obvious that they often just considered it background noise. Echo made it his mission to engage Tech a bit by asking questions occasionally and was rewarded with surprise, shock and a painful amount of hesitation at first, and then, when Tech realized he was truly asking and not just messing around with him, unbridled enthusiasm and joy at having someone to engage with. That alone sealed Echo’s intent to make sure to listen to his younger vod. Maybe not always but often enough that he knew he was heard. And Echo found he quite often enjoyed listening to Tech and finding ways to try and trip him up on his knowledge or get him to debate his point on something. Soon, picking at his younger vod and getting him to reveal that sharp and biting wit and humor he had was a valued pastime. And he could tell that Tech enjoyed it too by the simple fact that he would seek him out to bounce his thoughts off of sometimes.

Echo paid attention now as his vod turned to him with a surprisingly vulnerable expression.

“I have worked to adjust my parameters so that this failing of mine is less intrusive than it used to be but I still have never been what one could consider an easy companion. I doubt that is something I will ever truly master,” he looked down, “I am grateful to have all of you as my brothers and companions but I have lately been struck with the desire for more and cannot help wondering if I am too different for anyone to…consider.” He ended, somewhat lamely, with a small, awkward hand gesture.

Echo’s heart clenched yet again for his vod. This, at least, was something he could address. He turned the chair so it was facing Tech and leaned forward til he could clap a hand on his brother’s knee. He knew Tech was iffy about physical gestures but he needed to get his undivided attention. Tech jumped and shot his gaze to Echo’s and Echo let go now that his mission was accomplished.

“Listen vod,” he began, making sure Tech was tuned in to him, “Every brother I know who has ever felt that way has, for lack of a better way to say it, felt that way as well,” Echo huffed a chuckle before continuing, “when you’re a clone though, the worry is often how can I make someone see I’m not exactly like all my other brothers? How do I make someone see me for me? We all have worried that there is either not enough special about us to stand out or, like you, if we are too different for anyone to want to see us and still want us. I have it on good authority of several nat-borns I’ve known that this is a problem they share and worry about as well. Everyone sometimes wonders if they are worthy of love and I’ll tell you what I was told when I posed that question myself.

You. Are. Worthy. No matter who you are or how you feel about yourself, you are worthy because you are a living being and every being that exists is made to give and receive love because love is the basis of the Force. Love is the greatest thing you can ever give or receive.”

Tech simply looked at him with his big eyes, so similar and yet not to his own. Echo looked back, hoping like everything that his little brother understood what he was trying to say. Finally, Tech slowly nodded and leaned back again into the capacious pilot’s seat.

“Thank you Echo. I… will have to think on what you have said. It is a difficult concept to… internalize.”

Echo smiled, “Just as long as you eventually do. I mean it vod,” Echo felt the need to lighten the mood a bit, “After all, I love your quirky shebs and if you can win me over, you can win anybody.”

Tech smirked over at him. “You are entirely too easy. The better descriptive would be, if I can get Crosshair to not threat me daily with death, I can win anybody.”

Echo laughed. It was true, Tech was about the only one Crosshair didn’t threaten to shoot daily. Whether that was because he actually did love him more or simply didn’t want to consider twin murder one couldn’t tell.

After a few moments of comradely silence, Echo looked over at Tech.

“So, you gonna show the others the book?”

“Absolutely kriffing not.”

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