౨❅To Be Loved Is To Be Known❅ৎ
The 12 Days of Batchmas 2025 - Day 8
🎁 Pairings: Echo X GN!Reader
🎁 Word count: 1.1k
GIF by theroguesully
Plot Summary: Echo notices you’ve been giving everyone else thoughtful gifts but haven’t mentioned wanting anything yourself. He quietly takes it upon himself to observe what you need rather than what you say.
Echo had been a soldier long enough to recognize patterns. The way Wrecker checked his reflections in polished surfaces after that explosion left scars across his face. How Tech adjusted his goggles three times before speaking when he was uncertain. How Hunter touched the left side of his head when the sensory input overwhelmed him.
And how you never asked for anything.
You'd spent the past week making sure everyone had something for Christmas. You'd tracked down a rare manual on prototype ship modifications for Tech, found Wrecker some kind of explosive compound he'd been wanting to experiment with, and somehow acquired a set of vibroblades for Hunter that were perfectly balanced for his enhanced senses. Even Omega had received a hand-carved tooka doll that you'd clearly spent hours on, working late in the cargo hold when you thought everyone was asleep.
But when Hunter asked what you wanted, you just shook your head. "I'm good. Really."
Echo knew that response. He'd given it himself too many times after Skako Minor, when the others tried to make up for limbs and brothers and a life he'd never get back. I'm good meant don't look too closely. It meant I can handle what I'm carrying.
The problem was, he had looked closely. Not intentionally at first. He'd simply noticed things because that's what his conditioning had drilled into him: observe, assess, adapt. The Techno Union had stripped away his ability to ignore details. Every computation his scomp link ran, every system he interfaced with, every battle calculation that scrolled through his neural implants had sharpened his awareness until he couldn't turn it off.
So he'd noticed.
You wrapped your left wrist at night, methodical and tight, before climbing into your bunk. Some old injury that probably ached in the cold of hyperspace. You'd chew the inside of your cheek when you were worried, leaving it raw. And your gloves were falling apart. Not dramatically. Not in a way anyone else would see. But the stitching along the index finger of your right glove had unraveled, and you'd tried to repair it yourself with the wrong thread weight. It wouldn't hold much longer.
You needed new gloves. But more than that, you needed ones that would work for the kind of repairs you did, the delicate wiring and precision work that kept the Marauder flying. The kind that were hard to find and harder to afford.
Echo had always been good at slicing. Even before the Separatists rebuilt him, he'd had a knack for getting into systems he wasn't supposed to access. Now, with ports built into his body, it was even easier. He found a supplier on Ord Mantell, a black market vendor who dealt in military surplus. The gloves were listed as "tactical," designed for demolitions experts who needed dexterity and durability. They were expensive. More than he should spend.
He bought them anyway.
Getting them altered was harder. He'd had to comm an old contact, someone who owed him a favor from back when he'd been with the 501st. It took three days and most of his personal credits, but they modified the fingertips with conductive threading so you could work on live circuits without shorting anything out. A practical feature. Something you'd actually use.
Christmas morning came with the stale recycled air of the Marauder and Wrecker's enthusiastic shouting. Omega tore into her gifts with the unselfconscious joy of someone who hadn't spent most of her life in a Kaminoan facility, and for a moment, Echo let himself feel something adjacent to contentment.
You were smiling. The real kind, not the one you used when you were trying to convince everyone you were fine. You watched Omega's excitement and Tech's genuine appreciation for his manual and Wrecker's immediate desire to blow something up, and your shoulders had finally dropped from where you usually held them up near your ears.
Echo waited until the chaos had settled, until everyone was distracted with their new acquisitions. Then he crossed to where you sat on the edge of the cargo hold, legs dangling, nursing a cup of caf that had gone cold an hour ago.
"Got something for you," he said.
You looked up, startled. "Echo, you didn't have to—"
"I know." He held out the package. Small, wrapped in plain brown paper because he'd never been good at presentation. The scomp link on his left arm whirred softly as he adjusted his grip, a sound he'd long stopped being self-conscious about around you. "You need them."
You took the package slowly, like you weren't sure what to do with it. When you pulled the paper away and saw the gloves, your expression did something complicated. Surprise, maybe. Something else underneath it.
"These are..." You turned them over, examining the quality, the reinforced palms, the conductive fingertips. You went very still when you noticed that detail. "How did you know?"
"You've been repairing the starboard thruster coupling with your bare hands," Echo said. "Saw you flinch last week when you touched the wrong wire. Figured you could use something that wouldn't get you shocked."
You were quiet for a long moment, running your thumb over the stitching. When you looked up at him, there was something in your eyes that made his chest feel tight in a way that had nothing to do with his cybernetics.
"You pay attention," you said softly.
"Yeah." He sat down beside you, his prosthetic legs extending with the faint hydraulic hiss that accompanied most of his movements now. "Someone has to."
You smiled, and this time it reached your eyes. "Thank you, Echo. Really."
"They're just gloves," he said, even though you both knew they weren't.
You pulled them on, flexing your fingers experimentally. They fit perfectly. Of course they did. He'd measured your old pair when you'd left them in the cockpit three days ago, had calculated the exact dimensions and sent them to his contact.
"They're perfect," you said.
Echo felt something warm settle in the hollow spaces the Techno Union had left behind. He'd spent so long feeling like he was assembled from spare parts, like he was less than what he'd been before. But sitting here, watching you examine the gift he'd chosen, seeing the way you looked at him like he'd given you something that mattered—maybe being observant wasn't just another side effect of what had been done to him. Maybe it was something he could choose to be good at.
"Merry Christmas," he said quietly.
You leaned your shoulder against his, a gentle pressure that didn't demand anything. "Merry Christmas, Echo."
Outside the ship, Ord Mantell's artificial lights flickered in patterns that almost looked like stars. Inside, for the first time in a long time, Echo felt like he'd done something right.
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