Beat beat beat

Your heart was beating out of its chest, your eyes shoot open and you let out a soft breath. Sweat beaded down your temple and you didn’t want to move, not yet.

Your eyes flickered to your surroundings, durasteel, bunks, snoring. The Marauder. You swallowed deeply and gripped the covers that you were tucked under.

You slowly turned your head to the side and exhaled shakily. You gazed at the bunks, Hunter, Wrecker and Crosshair.

No Tech.

Right, nighttime watch, so somebody was awake.

You slowly sit up and rubbed your forehead, your fingers shook as you moved the blanket off you. You tried to look in the distance, there was a subtle flutter of neon blue in the cockpit.

You swivelled your legs around and started to walk to the door slowly, once it opened up, you stood there, not quite moving.

Tech heard the door open and he turned around, he tilted his head and stared. “Hello...?”

You swallowed deeply and rubbed your palms before exhaling shakily. "Hey."

"You're awake early."

You let out a small hum and slowly sat down on the co-pilot seat. You leant back and let out a shaky sigh, your arms circling yourself.

"You seem to be trembling."

"Just a bad dream, that's all..." you whispered, you curled your legs up against your chest.

Tech would've lectured you about your feet on the seat, but he held himself back. He observed you, you seemed to be extremely shaken up. "Seems to be... a little more than bad?"

"Y'can say that again," you chuckled dryly.

He gave a small nod and fidgeted with his data pad, he wanted to comfort you, but he wasn't the greatest with words or even actions. He took in a deep breath. "Maybe I can... talk to keep your mind of it? That's if you don't want to talk about your dream."

You smiled and gazed at him. "Yeah that—that sounds real good, Tech. Thanks."

Tech gave a small hum and put down his datapad on the nav-console. "Anything?

"Yeah, just... talk to me about your special interests, I just need a distraction, that's all."

"I wouldn't recommend that, I can be... quite talkative about them," he mumbled and glanced down at his pad.

"That's the exact reason I wan' you to talk, Tech."

"...very well.'" he replied a little higher pitched than he meant, but, he was excited to talk to you about his hyperfixations.

You snuggle up against the chair, leaning your head against the seat as you stared at the clone. He was really talking for once, like excitedly yapping.

It made you smile, you loved seeing the happiness in his eyes and the movement in his hands as he spoke about what made him happy. It distracted you a lot, the fear in your brain had dimmed quite a bit.

"Is this... helping?" Tech asked quietly.

"Extremely, keep goin', don't uh—be offended if I fall asleep."

He shook his head. "At least I'll know that I'm soothing you, I suppose."

You carried on listening to Tech ramble on, and you could feel your eyes droop, the voice calmed you and not long after, darkness filled your eyes.

Tech paused and tilted his head as he looked at you, a small breathy laugh escaped his lips and he stood up. He walked to the bunks and grabbed his blanket before making his way back.

He wrapped the blanket around you gently, tucking it around your body. He took a step back to make sure you were comfortable enough.