"You did that on Skako Minor when you rescued me. I'd still be trapped in that place if you hadn't."
So I was thinking about this quote and began wondering. What would have happened if Echo had never been rescued?
Order 66 would still have happened and with that the GAR would have still been disbanded. With the clones being phased out in favour of stormtroopers, there would have been no need for Echo's intel.
So the Techno Union would have had two options.
1. Carry on using Echo for experimentation: testing different machines, fiddling with cybernetics, prolonging his torture until his body simply gave up.
2. Disposal.
With the Empire coming into power, the Separatists wouldn't need the information from the TU and so they would stop paying for intel. Without the funding to keep the experimentations going, it would have been likely that Echo would simply be disposed of.
And it all links back to the idea of clones being disposable. Echo wasn't a person to them. He was simply "The Algorithm". Once he was no longer needed they would just get rid of him.
And that would be that.
No-one would come for Echo.
No-one would be there to tell him that it was going to be okay.
No-one would be there to take him home.
Because he's just another clone among many. Just another number.
It doesn't matter that he was someone's twin, someone's brother, someone's batchmate. It doesn't matter that he aided in the salvation of who knows how many people. He played his part and now he's done.
And so Echo would spend the last few months of his life, trapped in a stasis chamber, repeating his CT number over and over and over again in the hopes that someone would find him.
But no-one ever does.
No-one knows that all this time he was still there.
And all the times his brothers would talk about him, share memories, honour his sacrifice, none of them would know that somewhere in the galaxy he was crying out for help.
Echo would spend the rest of his life trapped and alone waiting for someone to save him.
But no-one comes.
And once the Techno Union is done, they simply get rid of him.
Because he's just a clone.
A number.
Disposable.
