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You’ve never seen Jesse’s skin that pale before. Clone skin in general yes, obviously, you’re a medic. Brothers bleed out every day. You can’t save everyone. You have to save Jesse. You can’t lose Jesse. You refuse.
Mentally, you trace what’s organs and blood vessels. You’re not sure. Too many hours to count studying diagrams, and you don’t know. Even clones, even Kamino clones aren’t perfectly identical under the surface, and millimeters of difference matter here.
Your medpack isn’t on your back. You can’t turn to look for it. You can’t get your eyes off of Jesse. You haven’t frozen in the face of blood in years, but you can’t move. You’re begging, begging the universe itself maybe not even for Jesse’s life, but that you might move, to have the chance to save him.
No good. Jesse skin grows paler. Coric walks by, pronounces Jesse dead. His body is cleared out, another dying brother taking his place. You still can’t move. You lost Jesse (youLostJesseYouLostJesseLostJesseYouLostJesse) but there’s still more brothers to save if you could just mo—
You’re lying down. Someone’s touching you. You don’t know what’s going on, but you can’t move. You can move so you move. You roll right out of what turns out to have been a bunk.
“Kix?” someone asks. Jesse. He’s not dead. He’s not dying. He skin isn’t death pale. You go limp in relief. You didn’t fuck up.