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perfectlywingedcrusade · 6 months ago

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@clonexocweek

I didn't have time to create posts/pieces for each day of the event, so I'm using this final catch up day to catch up! I've combined excerpts and sketches that follow the six themes, all from the current (unpublished) story I'm working on for Crosshair and OC Senator Dala Vardis.

Working title: Between Sea and Stars Story summary: Immediately prior to his mission to Barton IV, Crosshair is assigned to Senator Dala Vardis as her security while she undertakes a diplomatic tour of the Elrosian system. Young and new to the job, Dala is still finding her footing as a leader, and she discovers an unexpected source of support and something more in her cynical Imperial companion. Together, they attempt to solve the problems facing a region undermined by recent Separatist influence, and in doing so, they must confront deeper questions about their own place in the galaxy. Rating and warnings: Mature (18+; minors DNI); smut; nudity; angst; intimacy; lovesick and confused; undefined relationship but desperately wanting more; reluctantly Imperial; clone troopers who have defected; a constant, quiet crisis of conscience. Recommended soundtrack: Disco Elysium OST by Sea Power

(Below the cut: 5 SFW excerpts and 4 SFW sketches; 1 NSFW excerpt and 1 NSFW sketch. Individual word counts and warnings given.)

1. Introduction

(795 words; some snark from prickly sniper)

Dala blinked and stared on finding somebody leaning into the closed door of the ship to examine it with one gloved hand passing over its smooth seams.

The stranger noticed her and immediately straightened up to look her over with narrowed eyes. Eyes that looked somehow familiar in their golden-brown gaze. But the rest of him didn’t match the description of anyone she recognised.

‘You’re with the senator,’ he guessed in a strange, rasping drawl, the expression on his thin face showing wary interest. His eyes flickered over her, assessing her with a level of scrutiny that made Dala blush and shift her weight from one foot to the other while he spoke again. ‘He’s not here.’

‘Actually, she is,’ Dala managed to say, feeling rather awkward about it. ‘I’m the senator.’

A frown pulled at the stranger’s brow, and she finally noticed the tattoo of a … what was it, a crosshair? It circled the socket of his right eye as it now looked her over with intense suspicion.

‘You’re the senator,’ he echoed flatly, clearly not ready to accept it.

‘Yes. Am I supposed to be somebody else?’ she returned lightly, though she didn’t feel particularly amused. The man’s sharp-eyed stare was uncomfortable in a way that she couldn’t fully describe, except perhaps it felt like being some kind of wriggling lifeform trapped under the all-seeing lens of a microscope.

‘I was told the senator was a man,’ the stranger said slowly, his gaze continuing to linger on her.

Dala swallowed and glanced up at the ship, where its name had been painstakingly hand-painted in a gleaming sheen of gold by Dalon himself.

‘I think your information may be outdated,’ she said, barely able to hold in the deep sigh that was swelling up within her. It took some effort to tear her eyes away from the ship’s lettering to look back over at the stranger. ‘You are thinking of my late brother, Dalon Vardis. I’m afraid he is no longer able to serve as senator, so I am here in his stead.’

The man looked at her in silence for a long moment, and she couldn’t tell if he was judging her or privately sympathising with her. She was making no secret of her obvious grief that was ongoing. She felt no shame in mourning the loss of a brother. Her champion and closest friend.

‘Commander CT-9904,’ the stranger finally introduced himself. ‘I’m assigned to your security detail.’

‘Oh.’

Dala had been expecting an officer, like the ones she frequently saw throughout her days on Coruscant, with their smart black or green military suits and crisp, ironed caps fitted over neatly-combed heads. Someone who had grown up on Core worlds or had at least attended the Imperial Academy on Coruscant, and would be able to fluently converse with her about the political landscapes they would be grappling with on their upcoming tour.

The man she found standing before her was nothing like that at all.

She couldn’t tell where he was from exactly. He didn’t have a particular accent or physical features that belonged to a known region of the galaxy. But she did think the outline of his nose looked a little familiar, now that she looked at him more closely in the gathering gloom of dusk. And then she realised the clue was very obviously in the name that he had given her.

CT. Clone Trooper.

Dala surveyed him again and couldn’t help the slight frown that pinched at her brow. He didn’t look like Tracker or Brakes, whose broad, tanned faces had a kind of rugged appeal to them.

Commander CT-9904’s face was much thinner and harder, with a mouth that was drawn in a tight line over a toothpick wedged in one corner. And he looked back at her with what she assumed was a perpetual expression of pointed displeasure. His complexion was paler, too, contrasting more sharply with the close stubble brushing roughly over the lower planes of his face and the head that he had kept shaved. A cluster of circular scars were knotted into the skin high above his right ear, giving the impression of the mottled surface of a moon.

All in all, nothing like what Dala could have expected. And of course, Tracker had been right. She shouldn’t have thought that the Imperial addition to their team would be anything close to being a friend.

‘Is there some other name that I could call you by?’ she asked politely, having realised that they had been staring at each other for a little too long.

The commander chewed on his toothpick for a moment, seeming to be considering the request with reluctance. Then he was begrudgingly volunteering the information in a slight growl.

‘Crosshair.’

[First meeting sketch from an Anna Karenina AU]

2. Quality time

(357 words; some hyperspace travel; developing a lifetime habit of being together)

The subsequent days of travelling through hyperspace appeared to go more smoothly, with everyone seeming to have found firmer footing within the new hierarchy that Dala had set for them. Tracker and Brakes largely kept their range of movements contained to the span between the small kitchen and the cockpit, while Commander Crosshair had taken to being upstairs whenever the confines of his cabin felt too cloistered.

Dala, too, was spending most of her waking hours in the upper lounge space, her head bent over her datapad as she read up on everything she could for the first visit they would be making. She was always aware of the clone commander sitting a short distance away, with his long legs either crossed with one ankle on a knee or stretched out before him while he sat with arms folded over his chest. But she did her best not to let her thoughts wander despite her curiosity on what he was even thinking as he sat there staring out the window for hours on end, seemingly without any need to do or say anything.

She had tried offering him a datapad to browse or even watching some of the holovids that they kept on board for entertainment. But Commander Crosshair hadn’t seemed the slightest bit interested, so she had had to content herself with simply letting him be.

They now also sat together for mealtimes like they had done on the first day, although Dala had barely learnt anything more about him in that time since he didn’t care to share much beyond some perfunctory responses. But he didn’t seem to mind her talking about this or that, and there had even been a few times when he had shown enough interest to ask her a question or two.

Mostly, though, the clone commander ate in unaffected silence while Dala described to him some of the sights and customs they could expect to encounter at their upcoming destinations. She could tell he was always listening, too, even if he kept his eyes on his food and busied his hands with methodically cutting everything up into neat little portions.

(A peaceful moment from a sequel story set post-season 3, when they reunite on Pabu after an unexpected year spent apart.)

3. Conflict

(1020 words; first argument; face injury; mention of death/killing; Crosshair is an ass)

The commander stared down at their hands for a moment, seeming to be deciding something.

And then he laughed. A low, strange sound that rattled in the back of his throat before it slowly died away.

‘We should’ve met sooner,’ he said, surprising Dala with the ironic smile twisting along his lips. ‘Senator Death Dealer. I don’t mind killing civilians. And you could’ve killed Sharp Eye for us. Would’ve been a fair trade.’

‘Is that really something to joke about?’ Dala asked quietly.

The commander just shrugged, his fingers rising slightly with the gesture. ‘The dead don’t care.’

She sighed, wishing that he wasn’t right. It made everything seem so meaningless when he put it that way.

‘I think your face will look presentable again in a few hours, Commander,’ she said, straightening up in her chair and pulling her hand away. ‘It would be best if you stayed here until then.’

But Commander Crosshair leaned forward suddenly and grasped her fingers, pinning her hand lightly to the table.

‘Aren’t you going to use the Force to heal me.’

Dala blinked, too stunned by the question to notice his hand over hers.

‘The Force?’ she repeated dumbly.

He was staring at her intently, eyes narrowed as they traced over her features with precision. ‘That thing you do … using your hands to heal.’

‘That isn’t the Force,’ said Dala, still utterly bemused by the assumption.

‘Then what is it.’

She hesitated before admitting, ‘I’m not sure. In Elros, we only know it as having the healing touch. But I don’t think it has anything to do with the Force or the Jedi.’

Commander Crosshair was still eyeing her closely as he abruptly released her hand and leaned back in his seat.

‘Did you want me to use my hands to heal you?’

He looked almost sullen as he glanced over at her reproachfully, seeming to suspect her of playing some kind of game.

But it was a simple question. And Dala had no real designs on him, other than to make sure that his injuries were manageable before she left to meet with Governor Roshyn again.

‘No,’ said the commander after a brief moment.

Dala looked at him for a few long seconds, trying to discern why he had suddenly turned so prickly and defensive.

She sighed before sliding forward in her chair until her knee was almost touching his while she reached over to lightly cup her hands to his still-bruised cheeks.

‘What are you –’

‘Quiet, please, Commander. I need to concentrate.’

He was glaring at her, but he stopped talking as ordered. And Dala closed her eyes as she visualised the warmth coursing gently through her arms and directed them down into her fingertips resting against his stubbled jaw.

She let a minute pass before she opened her eyes and quietly lowered her hands from his face.

Commander Crosshair was frowning at her.

‘You know, most people would say thank you after receiving preferential treatment,’ she told him lightly.

‘I didn’t ask for it,’ he sneered in response.

‘Well. You didn’t have to.’

His frown deepened, and it began to look a little angry now. ‘Don’t think you know me after one little story, Senator,’ he growled in warning.

‘What is there to know?’ sighed Dala as she rose to her feet and began to pack away the bacta wipes. ‘You are the perfect soldier who will do whatever is required, without hesitation. I have known many of those.’

Commander Crosshair actually looked offended, and then incensed. His seething resentment becoming quite apparent in the burning intensity of his tightened eyes.

‘You’re too soft to know anything,’ he retorted, his sneer more pronounced than she had ever seen it. ‘You’ll keep making the same mistakes and be the death of everyone you know.’

Dala froze as she stared at him. Her heart had lurched with the tightness in her chest that was almost robbing her of her breath.

He knew what that meant to her. She had shared her side of things with the hope that he might better understand. But he was choosing to use it against her now, twisting that particular blade because he knew its reach was the longest.

‘That was low of you, Commander,’ she murmured, her voice struggling past the constriction in her throat. ‘I will be taking my leave now.’

Commander Crosshair paused, but Dala didn’t care to look at him anymore. She wanted nothing more to do with him just then as she turned away to leave the room without a single glance back.

~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~

Crosshair found his thoughts returning to the way the senator had looked at him before leaving.

She would surely hate him now, after he had thrown it all back in her face. Telling her that she was, in fact, the very thing that she dreaded being and her presence marked death for everyone.

He stabbed the lean cut of steak on his plate with his fork before sawing it into bite-sized pieces with single-minded vehemence.

He shouldn’t have told her about Sharp Eye. He hadn’t told that to anyone, not even the rest of the Batch. About why he had done it. They had all just assumed that he had wanted to take out the competition and graduate early. And none of them had spoken to him for weeks afterwards.

But the senator had understood him. She had made him feel like he wasn’t the only one who brought the shadow of death with him wherever he went.

He had even wanted to reach out and take her hand at one point. And that had been when Crosshair had realised the depth of that dangerous delusion.

Shattering the sense of understanding between them had been the only way to be free of it. And hurling her words back in her face had been the quickest way to do it, even if it had been unpleasant to watch her eyes fill up with horror and disdain.

She wouldn’t be speaking to him again in confidence. But that was how it needed to be, regardless of how anything felt.

4. Intimacy (NSFW)

(1510 words; barely established relationship; first time nudity for Cross; showering together; sharing sexual thoughts through mild telepathy; handjob)

He had never been one to worry about much when he could simply seethe instead. But there was no escaping the quiver of uncertainty that had him doubting what she might think at the sight of him.

‘Like what you see,’ he tried taunting her. Feeling acutely aware of his shoulders that lacked the broadness of other men, and the low sculpt of his chest that lay flatter without the bulk of his armour.

She just considered him with a slow sweep of her gaze before answering, ‘Yes.’

It had him feeling awkward again, not having expected to be met with such simple honesty. There was nowhere to hide when she was being so earnest and guileless. Her quiet appreciation of him giving him little reason to mask his thoughts behind a cutting remark or a jeer. So he found himself standing there, almost lost for words as he let her stare at him.

‘May I touch you?’ she asked, her voice a tender murmur. And he just swallowed hard and nodded again, trying not to shift and shirk from her gaze.

Her hands were soft as they came to gently brace his waist. Fingers curving slowly to fit him while her thumbs passed a small stroke over his ribs. Then her eyes were tracing over the silvery outline of faded scars that he had forgotten about until then.

‘Did the bacta not work?’ she asked in a quiet hum.

‘Didn’t always have enough on us,’ he said, his breathing having turned a bit shallow.

The senator looked thoughtful again while softly smoothing a fingertip over the ridge of muscles running down his abdomen, making him inadvertently clench and tighten his gut.

‘You truly are made fit for purpose.’

She sounded awed. Maybe even a bit envious, though it was harder to tell as he watched the flutter of her lowered lashes.

‘You should get in the shower,’ muttered Crosshair, glancing towards the fresher door. ‘You’ll get cold.’

She was still smiling as she lowered her hands to let him finish undressing by himself. ‘You won’t keep me waiting long, will you, Commander.’

‘No.’

‘Good. It wouldn’t do to waste steam.’

He waited for her to slip inside the fresher before pushing down the rest of his blacks. There were a few beeps and the faint hiss of steam releasing next door as the sonic shower was turned on. Then came the steady, low buzzing of the shower pod emitting its subtle vibrations that would see dirt sifted from the pores of skin and clothes.

A heady, hot mist hit him as he finally stepped in, now fully naked and with his boxers in one hand. It was left to hang on a hook beside the door that had slid closed, the senator’s own underwear already placed on the hook next to it.

Her smile was a bit bashful again as she shuffled back some inches to make room for him in the tight cubicle taking up half of the already compact fresher. Her arms instinctively rising to cover herself while the faint billow of steam left the rest of her half-obscured.

‘Is that alright?’

‘Mm.’

‘I can make more space, if you like.’

‘It’s fine.’

Silence fell over them as they stood there, feeling the muted pulse of sonic reverberations massaging their flushed skin. Their bodies separated by only a few breaths, though they took care to maintain that tiny distance so that the shower might take full effect on all unobstructed surface areas.

Slowly, the senator lowered her arms as she tried relaxing her stance, her eyes flitting up to catch at his with another embarrassed little smile.

‘Do you mind if I clean my hair?’

‘No,’ said Crosshair.

There was a nod and a sigh before she was steadily turning around to search the bottles of granular cleansers tucked into the indented shelf behind her.

It gave him the chance to eye her more closely, letting him observe the supple shift of her slender shoulder blades. And how her back followed a slight curve that cupped over a tidy little behind. Tempting his thoughts to wander and conjure up images of his hands pressing their fingers into wet skin to spread apart those rounded cheeks …

‘Crosshair,’ the senator laughed softly.

‘Don’t like it?’

‘I never said that.’

He watched her steadily work her fingertips through her long hair, inhaling the deeper scent of night flowers and hearing her release a sigh into the steam.

It wasn’t her usual fragrance, and he wrinkled his nose at the thought of her smelling more like Dunn. But he wasn’t going to complain over getting to see her quietly savour the soothing sensation of a light misting.

‘I think it is your turn,’ she said, once the fine granules had been rubbed and combed through her hair to leave it clean.

‘To do what,’ Crosshair drawled back, arching an eyebrow at her when she turned around to face him again.

His attention ticked down to her hand that held a small mound of cleansing powder in the hollow of its palm.

‘Do you trust me, Commander?’

‘Depends,’ he said, returning his gaze to her face with some wariness. It didn’t look like she intended to try cleaning his head for him, though that could only mean …

‘We shouldn’t touch too much, but …’

She lowered her hand in a wordless offer, coming to hover beside the upward curve of his cock.

Crosshair’s eyes shuttered closed a moment later while he clamped his mouth down to stifle a groan.

The powdery finish of the cleanser was quick to dissolve against his veined member as a warm hand passed over him in a silky stroke. Fingers curling more closely around him as they slid down to brush against the dusting of hair at the base of his erection.

The senator’s grip gradually tightened to slowly squeeze him once. Twice. Then her hand was steadily drawing back in an achingly slow tug that had his eyes opening to stare at her in a panting daze. Seeing her smiling back at him through the haze of steam continuously tumbling up between them.

It left their bodies damp and glistening, and yearning for more than the gathered droplets that now ran down over heated skin. The moisture rolling away the invisible specks of dirt shaken loose by the ceaseless vibrations rippling over them.

Crosshair bit back another noise as the senator’s smaller hand gently fisted the flushed head of his cock, the tip now gleaming with a slick of precum. Her other hand had gone lower to cup his balls, those pliant fingers flexing ever so slightly to tease the idea of squeezing his sac, though she was careful to keep it a mere suggestion.

Still, he hardly knew how he was managing to keep from reaching for her when it was all he could think about. Feeling desperate to have her pulsing around him again.

He wanted to swirl a tongue over the wetness between her legs. To slide his fingers inside her and see her squirm and clench down on him as she had before. To kiss her while his nose was still full of the smell of her sex and his mouth, lush with her taste.

Without thinking, his hips lurched forward as he thrust deeper into her hold, nerves sparking and muscles jerking as he pictured fucking her. Knowing she would sense it when they were standing there, a hair’s breadth away from tangling together in the steamed air.

Darker eyes stared back at him as he imagined it all for her. How fingers would dig into flesh and chests would heave over rocking hips. Their lips parting to drag in panting breaths while their gaze would stay locked together. Filling every facet of their senses with only each other, and moaning out their rising pleasure over the throbbing thickness pressing into a lusciously wet clasp. Cock sliding into a juicy little pussy that would grasp at him even more closely than the hand now stroking away steadily over his straining length.

Crosshair couldn’t contain the growl that slipped past the snarl of his teeth.

Fuck, he was already getting close.

The feel of her hand was too tactile and the thought of her too tantalising for him to last long. Nor did he want to hold out when he could tell she wanted to see him cum. The curiosity evident in her expression while she tended to him with endearing concentration.

‘I’m not going to last,’ he warned her between ragged breaths, not caring how hoarse he sounded just then.

‘Please don’t,’ was her murmured response. ‘I want you to cum for me, Commander.’

The order, spoken so softly, sent him suddenly over the edge. Making him spill himself over the back of her hand while choking on a groan.

‘Fuck …’

He let his eyes squeeze shut as he collapsed back against the shower wall, his thighs trembling while a series of shudders wracked through every muscle, completely flattening him.

5. Future

(545 words; nudity; post-sex softness; a not-proposal)

Dala sighed before pulling back slightly to look at him with a sad smile. ‘It seems there is no reality in which we can know a life together, at least in this galaxy. And yet somehow, I can’t help feeling that I still belong with you and only you.’

Crosshair stared back at her for a long moment, his expression hard to read. But then he was leaning in to touch his lips softly to hers, slowly drawing her into a kiss filled with all the unspoken words that he couldn’t bring himself to say.

He loved her already, she knew. It was evident in each glance of his eyes and every touch of his fingertips on her bare skin. The way he would inhale the scent of her hair while holding her close. The press of his body against hers as he trapped her in the tight circle of his arms, never wanting to let her go. He hadn’t let her doubt his feelings for even a single moment since that first, fateful kiss. He was always there beside her, kissing her and caressing her, and she knew he would have stayed with her, if he had only felt that was a choice that he could make.

But their lives didn’t belong to them, let alone to each other. And only forty-eight hours more of barrelling through the dreamworld of hyperspace separated them from the reality to which they would soon be returning.

Dala wondered if she would even get to see him again after the Cadence touched down in Coruscant. She wasn’t familiar with the ins and outs of military life under the Empire’s rule. But it wasn’t difficult to imagine that the Imperial need to exert absolute order and control extended into the lives of its soldiers. Crosshair in particular was marked for that role, with no margin for having a life outside of it.

‘Wait here,’ he told her as they broke off their kiss to catch their breath. She could only watch him with dazed curiosity as he untangled himself from her to slink out of the cabin, deftly fishing a towel off the floor on his way out to wrap around his waist.

He returned a short moment later, one hand holding the towel at his waist while the other was curled in a fist around something that was too small for her to see.

‘Here.’

Dala blinked up at him in surprise before glancing down to see his hand open up to reveal a single, tiny, black screw sitting in the hollow of his palm.

‘What is it?’ she asked, peering at it with puzzlement.

‘A screw from my Firepuncher.’ He paused and then added, ‘I want you to hold onto it for me.’

A sudden tightness constricted her chest as a swell of emotions threatened to overwhelm her senses just then.

‘Don’t lose it,’ he warned her firmly while she carefully plucked the screw from its resting spot to hold it securely in her own palm.

‘Crosshair, I …’ Her words seemed to get caught in the squeeze of her throat as she blinked through a vision that was beginning to blur a little. ‘Please … don’t forget to come back for it.’

‘I won’t,’ he promised.

6. What if…

(107 words; pondering the past)

He wondered how different things might have been, if he had only known her earlier. Before all his beliefs and ideas about life had been set into place through the endless hours spent straining and suffering on the training room floor.

Maybe nothing much would have changed. He would have still been a clone, destined for the highly specified role of a special ops commando. But it was equally possible that everything would have been different, if he had only had the thought of her to break up the bleak monotony of his days on Kamino and to soothe the nights filled with the rumble of thunderstorms.

#clonexocweek #clonexocweek2025 #clonexocweek2025 day 7 #crosshair x oc #nsfw #crosshair x dala #crosshair #tbb crosshair #the bad batch #wip #Between Sea and Stars

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