Vision

Chapter 19 - Far Away From Home (1:15-16)

Author's Note: This is the point where everything... blows up. As we all already know.

~ Rivana Rita

I slash through the last droid, and Omega fires a shot through it with her bow. I roll off, standing, panting a little, but despite the tenseness, I haven't felt so – so happy . We're here, and maybe this is where we need to do it – to get Crosshair back, and...

I take off down the tilted part of the floor, skidding a bit. It's fun, and maybe I'm a bit high on something right now, but I still feel oddly euphoric.

Our brothers are standing, and Hunter raises his blaster towards Crosshair – the fact that they're both standing I take to be a good sign. Crosshair's back is facing him, and he's rubbing his forehead. Don't know if that's from his chip, or if Hunter hit him that hard when he threw him off.

I wince a little at that thought. I've seen my brothers fight before, but they've never hurt each other. I can't really imagine what that'd feel like for Crosshair. Hunter's always taken care of us, and he'll understand it – I do, and did when Omega threw my knife at me – but it still hurt. I've never talked about it, though.

"Hey," I chirp when no one says anything. "Everyone okay?"

Crosshair turns around, hands tightening over his rifle when he sees us. Echo has his blaster raised, though not aimed, and Tech and Wrecker have their own weapons out. Omega does too, though her energy bow isn't powered up.

What? Am I the only idiot who doesn't have my weapons out still? I'm holding my knife, but who even cares about that? And, hey, is no one going to answer me?

Crosshair looks different now. I don't know. Darker. Emptier. Thinner . And he has a scar on his head that somehow looks worse than Wrecker's. It's much deeper, like something burned nearly down to the bone and it never quite healed. ... And I miss his hair. What? It was kinda pretty.

"Crosshair, forget the Empire," Hunter requests, half begging. "This isn't you. It's your inhibitor chip. We can help you."

No, he is begging – this is as close to it as Hunter would ever get . We need his consent, his agreement to carry this out so he won't get someone hurt or killed. Hunter told me that, but I don't quite know how to go about convincing him. Nothing they would've said could have stopped me .

"Wrong," Crosshair says finally, turning a little sideways, and there's something assessing about his expression that I do not like. I've never seen that expression on him before, and it looks so jarringly wrong , but it's what I'd think is him just testing out our reactions. "I had my chip removed. A long time ago."

I can't breathe. I can't anything .

I can't see Hunter's face, but the smokey-forest-y-ness of his presence just freezes . All of us do.

Wrecker and Tech jerk back simultaneously, and Wrecker looks back at Tech like he's somehow supposed to fix this . Tech just deflates altogether, and the sharp-smooth-ness of his presence just... freezes, icing over, dying, like I'd have thought it would if someone got their heart ripped out.

I think it just was.

"Since when?" Hunter breathes out, and he sounds so lost and broken and I don't know, scared, that it just – I'd think it'd make me feel something.

It doesn't.

I feel like throwing up. That's the only thing I can feel.

This is Crosshair, and – and –