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Why was everything shaking so much? Not only that, but light seemed to sear and pulse into Tech's eyes, his head. Something was hurting. Maybe his head. It was hard to tell with all the shaking, and that ringing… what was that from?
Tech tried to keep his eyes open, but all he saw was brilliant blue, his vision doubling. Oh, he felt too sick to move, suddenly; probably thanks to all that light.
Someone was touching him.
He wondered if his training should have kicked in, but at the moment he had no idea what training that could be.
Training?
He had training?
And why was he on the ground?
The light was beginning to not hurt so much, but where was it even coming from? And why was he all wet? Salt burned on his tongue.
Someone was touching him, and he tried to shove them off, but the small hands were insistent. They held his face, and he was met with what he assumed was supposed to be a face, but his vision kept dancing around.
"Rex?" he asked, mouth feeling a bit difficult to move, almost like it was numb, disconnected.
That was blonde hair he was looking at right?
No, no, not Rex.
"Omega."
She was helping him sit up, blue lighting her features.
Tech immediately slumped forward, head hanging, body not enjoying sitting up.
Through his stupor he could make out that her lips were moving. The ringing was still too loud.
Omega was pressing at his head now, and his vision seemed to triple as she touched the right side of his head.
Her shaking hand came away dark with… what was that? Blood?
Oh, why am I bleeding?
Tech suddenly had a hard time keeping his body upright. He was exhausted for some reason, his muscles not responding to his brain's instructions like they should have. Was his brain even giving instructions?
He splashed into something warm and salty, and he closed his eyes, feeling it lap against his skin. Ah, this was nice.
That was… until he tried to inhale.
In a flash, Omega was yanking Tech back up again, and he coughed, which turned into retching as nausea seemed to rush through his whole body. Omega rubbed his back, feeling him over for other injuries.
Wait, I'm injured?
Hmm, he supposed that could explain all this.
"Tech, can you hear me?" Omega asked, the ringing in his head subsiding as he finished retching.
He gasped, trembling all over.
A moan left him as pain started to bloom in the side of his head once more. he hunched over, Omega trying to hold him up. She was talking into something, and the noise was starting to hurt.
"All right, Tech, we have to stay where we are till the others arrive, but let me get you out of the water."
"Water?"
He looked down, realizing that he was sitting in a pool of it.
Oh, so that's why I'm all wet.
"You have to try to stand, okay?"
Tech nodded, then instantly regretted it, his shaking suddenly worsening, nausea building in him again, pain pulsing deep into his head like someone had hit him with a blaster.
Omega gave him some time to recover from nodding, but she was insistent about getting him dry.
And she probably doesn't want me losing consciousness in a pool of water.
It was very pretty water.
Maybe if I could just stay here… lie down for a bit…
His body started drooping.
"No, no, no!" Omega cried, catching him with a grunt.
She steadied him. His abdominal, and back, muscles burned as he tried to hold himself up. Thankfully, he managed.
With difficulty, Tech clambered to his feet. With Omega's help he managed to shuffle and limp over to a sandy alcove where he could rest against a rock wall. he was glad it wasn't far because he'd lost feeling in his legs fairly quickly. Sensation came back, slowly, in pulses. His breath came in heaving pants, as his heart pounded, and he was sure he was sweating.
Omega took off of her jacket to make a pillow for his head, and forced him to sit with his knees bent. Then she starting ripping off the bottom of her tunic.
"What are you doing?" Tech asked, voice slurred.
"I need to stop the bleeding."
"Bleeding?"
"You hit your head."
Right. He'd already seen his blood on her hands, though that seemed like a memory ages past that he could hardly dredge up.
Hitting his head. That certainly explained a lot. Or maybe it didn't. He didn't know.
Perhaps she was right.
Tech's head started to throb, and he gritted his teeth, squeezing his eyes shut.
He tried to keep his eyes closed as Omega bandaged his head, but the body's natural response to unknown stressors had him blinking open his eyes, blue light from the water and across the rocks illuminating Omega as she worked. Water dripped from her, and her hair was plastered to her head, but she didn't seem to mind.
"There," she said as she finished up.
Tech winced, wishing to hold his head, as soon his biggest problem became the bandage. It ached worse than the wound. Kriff!
His fingers shook as he resisted pressing against his injured head.
"Good… good job," he got out between grunts and pants.
Omega took his hand as it crept closer to his sore head.
"Sorry, I know it hurts."
"I… I know it has to."
He'd always learned that if the tourniquet became the chief complaint then it was tied tight enough—same for bandages on the head. He just hoped he wouldn't have to put up with this for that long, or else he was going to go insane.
"All right, I got his head bandaged," Omega said into a comm.
Oh, the others. Right. His family.
"We'll be there soon," Hunter said. "How's he doing?"
"I'm not sure. He only just started speaking. I haven't been able to properly assess him yet. I'll get on it."
Omega then took out a small torch attached to her belt.
Oh no.
"I need you to keep your eyes open," she told him.
Kriff, kriff, kriff.
He really didn't feel like having a light shined in his eyes.
Tech did his best to keep them open during this part of the assessment, even as his eyes watered, and his vision became a whirl of lights and colors.
"Hmm."
"W—what?" he managed to ask.
Omega ignored his question, and asked him to follow her finger with his eyes.
That ended with him gritting his teeth, squeezing his eyes shut, and trying really hard not to vomit.
"What's your name?"
"T-Tech," he answered, holding his stomach, other hand grasping at Omega's, her bit of warmth the only thing he could cling to, the only thing that gave him even a modicum of comfort.
"CT number?"
Tech tried to search for it, a groan leaving him as it made his head throb, and blue light pierced him through his eyelids.
"I don't… I don't know."
His heart rate kicked up despite him remembering this was a symptom of hitting his head, it was nothing to panic over. Yet it didn't feel right. He was supposed to know this. He had known this.
Omega squeezed his hand, her other hand going to his knee.
"It's okay."
"Y-yes," he agreed, though most of him didn't.
"Name of our ship?"
"The Marauder, and it's my ship."
She might have smiled, but part of his vision was still a glowing blur.
"Well, seeing as it was given to us by the Kaminoans at the request of the GAR, and we became deserters, it's a stolenship."
"Echo, shush," Omega said. "Not helping."
"It is my ship," Tech argued.
"Sh, it's okay. We all know that. Right, Echo?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"Where are we?"
Hmm.
"I can't recall."
"What were we doing?"
"I'm not sure."
And then it really hit him.
"I don't know where we are."
"Shh, I know. It's okay."
"Where are we?" he asked, looking around, the turning of his head somehow straining his neck, stomach rolling. "Are we safe?"
"For once, yes."
"And you wouldn't be lying to make me feel better?"
Tech eyed her now, wondering if he would be able to catch her in a lie.
Two Omegas stood out in his vision, a third forming between them.
Never mind. He could hardly tell what she looked like with these overlapping images.
Maybe if I just closed my eyes, and went to sleep.
Tech might have done so, or perhaps his brain was doing too badly, because next thing he knew Hunter was in front of him, a hand on his arm.
Tech's brain and body were too exhausted to jump at there suddenly being someone else with him.
"You did a good job on the bandage," Hunter praised Omega.
She shrugged, clearly too concerned to be looking for praise. "Can we get him out? It was hard just getting in here."
"We have to try." Then he spoke into his comm, "Wrecker, Echo, get the stretcher."
"I can't fit in that cave, Sarge," Wrecker said.
"I know. We'll get him to the entrance and you can carry him from there. And keep an eye out for those scavengers."
Tech closed his eyes again. When he opened them he was being laid out on a stretcher, Echo keeping it steady.
A shudder ran through the ground, the water vibrating, Tech feeling it like a booming in his chest.
What…?
"Hey, uh, Sarge, hate to be the bearer of bad news, but those scavengers found us!"
"Why…?" Tech started to ask, but couldn't finish his thought.
He winced at sounds he could only describe as flashing stabs coming through the comms. Hunter quickly collected Tech's helmet and got it over his head despite the clenching in his neck.
"Keep them away from the cave entrance. Is there still a clear path to the Marauder?"
"Negative, negative," Wrecker cried out.
The cave shook, Tech finally realizing that's where he was.
Oh, this couldn't be good.
What did scavengers even want with them? Why had he been in this glowing cave with Omega?
There was a flash through the darkness, and a roar threw them backwards, the cave seeming to fall in around them. Sound ripped through Tech's ears, salt water suddenly seemed to surge and splash up into his nose, burning, before it was choking him. The darkness seemed to get closer, the cave shrinking. Agony roared through Tech.
The next thing he was aware of was the way his sinuses, lungs, and throat burned, as his body retched up water.
Someone pulled him up onto a ledge, and he couldn't help but collapse against them.
"Wrecker?" Hunter called on his comm. "Wrecker, do you read me? We're trapped in the cave. An explosion caused a collapse. Though, I think I see some of the algae on the other side. I think we can find a way out."
"I read," Wrecker answered. "I'm a bit tied up at the moment. The scavengers went after the Marauder. I had to take to get her up in the air. I'll circle back around, see if I can shoot into the cave."
"No, no, no," Hunter said. "You'll just get us all killed."
"How's Tech?"
Tech didn't know the answer to that. Pain was keeping him a little busy.
"Not good," Hunter responded.
Oh.
Well, then.
"Hunter, maybe we have to go with Wrecker's plan," Echo said.
Hunter whirled to him. "What?"
"Tech needs help. Now. What if we can't dig out in time?"
"Then we start digging."
Torches turned on, and Tech had to squeeze his eyes shut against the sudden onslaught of light. Omega had glowing… whatever it was… stuck to her boots. He was sure they all had a bit of this… bioluminescent stuff on them at this point.
Omega and Hunter started digging.
"Hey, how are you holding up?" Echo asked Tech.
"Head… hurts."
He didn't have the energy to say more.
Echo pulled him close. "We'll get you help soon."
"All right."
Echo checked the bandage that was so tight it felt like it'd squeeze Tech's head till it popped.
"Well, you stopped bleeding, at least."
"Mm hmm."
Hunter was sitting in the water beside Omega, panting hard. There was a little more light coming from a hole in the wall of fallen rocks.
Tech couldn't remember what they were doing.
"Hunter, face it, we can't get out."
"And these scavengers are not liking me," Wrecker said. "I'm gonna shoot the cave."
"No, you are not!" Hunter argued, straightening.
Wrecker didn't answer.
"Great," Echo commented.
"Wrecker, don't do anything stupid," Omega said into the comm.
"It's not stupid if it works."
"Maybe Wrecker's right," Echo argued.
"No," Hunter said. "It's too dangerous."
"Tech needs help!"
"I'm gonna do it."
"Wrecker, no."
"Okay, incoming!" he warned.
"Get down!" Hunter cried.
Even as Hunter yelled, he got Omega down and covered her with his body. Echo did the same for Tech.
The world seemed to light up, pressure driving Tech down into the rock so hard his chest ached and he couldn't breathe.
Air and water rushed in, a rock tore a gash down his arm.
In seconds it was over, and Tech could lift himself up enough to get in a breath of air.
Huh. My head feels fuzzy.
Tech was rushed into the Marauder under a night sky lit with a thousand stars.
Hyperspace swirled around them, the hyperdrive like a calming hum through his body. Tech tried to roll onto his side, but someone grabbed him.
Pain struck him as a device was pressed against his head, and something tight was wrapped around his arm, trying to pull it off.
A groan left him, sharp tingles coming from his head where the device was.
"We're almost done," Echo reassured. "We have to make sure you don't bleed everywhere."
"Yeah, you already ruined my tunic," Wrecker complained.
Tech started laughing, and everyone joined in.
"We shouldn't have taken the stupid mission to begin with," Hunter muttered from somewhere on the ship.
Tech couldn't remember when he'd closed his eyes again.
A jolt woke him, and Tech tried to sit up, but his aching body argued against it.
"Where…?" he began to ask.
"You're safe," Hunter told him. "We just jumped out of hyperspace, we're almost at Ord Mantell. How you feeling?"
"Like Wrecker used me as a punching bag."
"I did not," Wrecker called.
"It was a simile," Tech responded, voice akin to a groan as his body was slow to wake up.
Finally, he opened his eyes, and saw Hunter sitting on the bunk across from him.
"What happened?" Tech asked.
"Cid sent us to collect some rare algae, and we didn't have time to wait till daybreak. You and Omega went in to collect it. She says you slipped and hit your head on a rock."
"Oh." Yes, that makes sense.
"And your arm got cut pretty badly too. We had to staple it shut."
Great.
He tried to rise, failed, and then settled back into the bunk with a sigh.
"I suppose AZI will tell me I can't do anything for a week or two," Tech said. "Do you know how boring it is being in my head with nothing to do?" he asked. "Sure, I can go over ideas and equations, but then I can't even do anything with it. And to rest for that long? I don't even wish to consider the exercising I will need to do to get back in shape. I'm going to feel so… inadequate."
Hunter gave him a smile, and put a hand on his shoulder, Tech relaxing beneath his touch.
"It'll all be for the best," he told him.
"Did we… did we get any of the algae?" Tech asked.
"No," Omega answered, jumping down from her room to join them. "But it's okay. You're safe. That's all I want."
"I assure you, Cid will disagree," Tech informed them.
"I'll handle Cid," Hunter grumbled. "Your job is to get better."
And it wasn't a job Tech was looking forward to, but this was the price of being a soldier, a deserter.
Well, he was more than that. He was part of a family.
Omega squeezed his hand, and for the moment, Tech's worries were smoothed away.
"I am disappointed we didn't manage to collect any of the algae," Tech eventually said. "Its bioluminescent nature was quite captivating."
"I'm sure we can find more beautiful algae somewhere else in the galaxy," Omega promised. "And we won't have to do anything for anyone then, either. We'll be free."
Tech tended to argue this point, but he knew that being beholden to Cid wasn't freedom.
Tech smiled at Omega, thankful to have her by his side. He'd probably be lost without her.