Alternate Start (ARCHIVE)

Chapter Forty Five: Grief

He panted heavily at the steady beat of his fists against the punching bag. Droidbait had never felt so angry in his entire life.

He let out a yell, slamming his fist against the punching bag with a sharp crack. The bag came back and hit him in the face, knocking Droidbait to the floor. He rolled onto his back, holding in a cry of pain, now that he had both a broken nose and, at the very least, an incredibly bruised hand.

"Droidbait..."

He looked over at the sound of his voice said in a disappointed tone. Kaar pulled Droidbait onto his lap. He was half dressed, clearly sensed Droidbait's fury. Kaar tucked Droidbait's head in the hollow of his throat, holding him close as he started to cry.

"Hey, hey it's alright. You did all you could, meu amor. Now come on, I'll carry you to Bones so you can be patched up."

—
-
—

"Vod!"

Droidbait leaned on his crutch with a gentle grin as the hologram of Hardcase, Dogma, and Tup appeared. His hands were wrapped up, a reminder of the previous night in the gym.

"Hey guys."

"Kriff man, what happened to you?" Tup asked, furrowing his eyebrows.

"Oh, Geonosis uh... went wrong. And kind of right, I guess."

"Oh?" Hardcase smirked, "Right how?"

"Well, I... kissed the General. And multiple times since then."

His brothers, shamelessly, whooped and hollered in excitement.

"Nice going Droidbait!"
"Yeah, we knew you had it in you vod!"

His face, however, suddenly dropped. His expression became more sullen. "Yeah that's... not all that happened. You all know that Geonosis, every time without fail, gave us heavy casualties. Less so this time, but still." He furrowed his eyebrows, "We... We lost Fives."

His brothers stared quietly. Hardcase let his head drop respectfully. Tup covered his mouth with a horrified look. Dogma reached out and set a holographic hand on his shoulder.

"Vod, I'm... I'm so sorry. I didn't expect... I'll miss him."

Droidbait looked up. His prosthetic made their images just a little too sharp on one side. He sighed, "Yeah. I'll miss him too. He—... Kriff, he didn't deserve that. Trigger didn't either, but at least I ensured Trigger had a quick death."

They all stood quietly. It was exactly a month and three weeks until they'd be home.

And life, it seemed, was still moving on.

—
-
—

Kaar didn't think he'd ever pick up his master's old job.

With the help of the Coruscant Guard and cooperation of the troopers, Kaar was maintaining a list of the clone'ade.

Over 200 of them existed.