#yeah thats right im tagging it esprit de corps

[meridiansdominoes]

For the prompt challenge - any of Domino (but especially Fives) somehow finding out how Order 66 went down in canon? Alternatively, if you don't feel like writing angst - Rex being a bastard little brother to Cody and being overheard by one of his men.

ohohohoho. When have you ever known me to not be in the mood for angst, please! This is more of an esprit de corps type thing than a dominoes thing, but oh well. Also, it’s kind of a really long ramble, not my greatest drabble by far, but I’m blaming that on the plane.

 Fives is dead.

If anything, it means that he gets to see Droidbait, Cutup, and Hevy again, which is far more than he’d ever hoped for. Tup and Hardcase, too. And Ninety-nine.

But Echo is not dead.

Fives watches as Echo navigates life with prosthetic limbs and a role with the Bad Batch. He does his job well, as he always does, even though some small part of Fives sometimes wishes that Echo wasn’t so good at surviving, so that he could join them and all of his batchmates could be together again but—but—but no, he’s grateful that Echo is alive. He can’t afford to be selfish, not with something like that. Echo deserves every moment of life he can get, especially considering everything the Techno-union stole from him.

Commander Fox is also not dead.

Fives doesn’t know how he feels about that.

If he’s being honest, he’s trying not to think about it too much. Fives is little more than a ghost now. Most of the time he follows Rex around and laughs unheard at Jesse’s half-hearted jokes. Jesse’s an ARC trooper now, but he’s tired. They all are. Everyone wants the war to end. Fives wants it to end, too.

When it actually does end, Fives regrets that thought.

Fives had been right. He’d known that he was right, and he watches in muted horror with the rest of his ghostly brothers as the living clones are stripped of everything but life itself. Fives had been right, and he’d failed to stop it. The living become tools under a Sith’s hand, devoid of emotion, devoid of agency. Jesse goes down with his ship, doesn’t even attempt to escape, consumed by the incessant demands of the chip to hunt down Commander Tano. Rex lives, somehow. Fives isn’t surprised.

The knowledge that he could have stopped it all is crippling. Fives doesn’t know if he can die again as a ghost, but he thinks he comes close. He doesn’t want to exist anymore, doesn’t want to see what he had failed to prevent. It’s so much easier to close his eyes and block everything out and mourn—for himself, for his brothers, for anything, everything. His chest aches constantly, like he’s been shot all over again, like he’s burning up inside, like he’s drowning and choking and incapable of drawing breath. The guilt tears him apart. He’s helpless to do anything but watch as the Jedi are destroyed and his brothers are turned into mindless pawns.

Droidbait, Cutup, and Hevy don’t leave his side. Droidbait curls himself next to Fives and mourns with him while Cutup keeps a grounding touch on Fives’ shoulders and Hevy stands watch, silent and grim. They stay like that for a long time.

It’s Jesse who snaps him out of it, in the end, once he finally finds them in the crowds of dead men. He marches his way up to Hevy and shoves him aside. Hevy doesn’t put up a fight, allowing Jesse passage. He knows how close Fives and Jesse had been in life—he’d watched it, after all.

Fives doesn’t look up when Jesse approaches, but he does go tense when Jesse reaches out to run his hand down Fives’ back. Jesse doesn’t say, “It’s not your fault,” or “It’s gonna be okay”. Fives is grateful for that. He wouldn’t have believed them anyway. What Jesse does say instead is just enough to ensure that Fives decides to keep existing.

“Fives. Echo is still alive.”

 It doesn’t take away the guilt. It doesn’t make things right, doesn’t change the fact that Fives should have tried harder, should have run faster, should have done something more, should have told someone else. But it is enough to tear Fives out of the spiral of helpless, howling agony that he’s descended into since Order 66 was issued.

Echo is alive. Echo is still fighting somewhere, and even though Echo can’t see or hear them, Fives could never leave one of his batchmates alone like that.

Echo is alive, and that’s enough for Fives to keep fighting. Just a little longer.