Thank You So Much @amalthiaph For This! I Commissioned Tech Meeting Batcher So That Even If The Show

Thank you so much @amalthiaph for this! I commissioned Tech meeting Batcher so that even if the show doesn't give us this, we still get to see it. Seems fitting to share this right before the finale and right after this piece is finished. I love them so much!!

I agree with all of this.

I understand that people are going to cope how they are going to cope, and trying to find meaning in the handling of Tech in season three is part of that, but it’s also okay to criticize the show.

I like a good character death. Tech’s departure was not that. My issue is not that he’s presumed dead, my issue is that it and the handling of it is nonsense. So (I once again get very negative about my favorite show under the cut):

1. When you kill off a main character, you really have to kill them off. How you do so can vary from story to story, but you really have to do four things:

One, you need a good reason to kill them off in the first place. (“Stakes” is not a good reason. A secondary character, sure, but not a main one. More on that in a minute.)

Two, you need to make it perfectly clear that the character is, in fact, dead.

Three, you need to show the other characters processing and accepting that death. This is important because doing so will allow the audience to do the same and let the character go. This is especially important if you’re writing for a young audience.

Four, you need to make it explicitly clear that the character cannot come back. This is especially true in sci fi or fantasy. Especially if you’re the Character Resurrection franchise.

And guess what the show didn’t do?

Any of that. Any of it. What it did instead was ambiguously remove Tech from the story (uniquely in a show that loves making us watch characters die on screen; last time we saw Tech for sure he was alive), never gave a good reason for doing so in or out of the show, never showed us any character working through the impact of his loss (even though there was ample opportunity for Omega, especially, to do so), and ripped the “could he come back?” box wide open by parading CX-2 in front of our faces. It is never, at any point, handled like an actual main character death. It’s handled as a plot point from which the narrative moves fairly quickly, and treated by all parties as an absence. By all the rules of storytelling, Tech isn’t dead. He’s just ambiguously gone. And that means the writing team did a terrible job if what they wanted to do was kill him off. We should not be debating this after the show has ended if he’s actually dead.

2. I understand why some fans are trying to find meaning in losing Tech. I am not, because that meaning is not offered by the text itself. And, if the plan was to never bring him back, it should have been.

We are not, for example, offered a lesson about how not everyone comes home from the war. In order for that to have been the case, we would have needed to see someone, probably Omega, working through that. We would have needed to see her refusing to accept that Tech is gone—like we do in Plan 99, by the way—and slowly coming to terms with the idea that her brother isn’t coming home. But we don’t get that, not even as subtext.

Something else we could have gotten that would have worked with all the little visual reminders of Tech, empty chairs, name-drops, and even the CX-2 leading? The batch being so haunted by losing Tech and not really knowing what happened to him for sure that they start seeing him everywhere. But for that to work we would have needed, again, to see that as an explicit subplot where someone, probably Omega, again, gets really invested in the signs that Tech is coming back and even starts assuming that CX-2 is him, only to realize that she’s seeing what she wants to see and having to accept that Tech isn’t coming back, but that she can still keep Tech’s memory alive by following in his footsteps. That’s something you can kind of project onto what we’re given in the epilogue, but you do have to project it, because it’s entirely absent from the rest of the show.

As is, Tech’s sacrifice isn’t given any weight. From a narrative perspective, it was an incredibly contrived set of circumstances that accomplished nothing except punting Tech off a train, and gave Tech no choice but to remove himself from the story—exit, stage down. Losing Tech doesn’t, even sub-textually, serve as anyone’s motivation. It does nothing to move the plot or anyone’s character development forward. The primary motivators of season three were Omega’s kidnapping, Crosshair’s PTSD, and Hemlock needing to get Omega back.

Tech’s absence does nothing to move anything forward and only really serves to slow the plot down and make the others struggle to do anything because he’s not there to carry the team like he did in the first two seasons—and nothing about that would have played out any differently if Tech spent the season in a coma in a bacta tank. The only part of Tech’s sacrifice that has meaning is that he loved his family enough to offer it. And that is profound, but that’s not something that would be negated by a return because the love and the offer remain. As for his presumed death? His return couldn’t have taken meaning away from that, because the show never gave it any meaning in the first place.

And no, Tech “dying” isn’t something I have to accept. Tech isn’t a real person, he’s an idea, and an idea that didn’t come to fruition. I can point out the ways the handling of his departure didn’t work all day if I want.

3. CX-Tech was not an overly online theory. I need people to understand this. It was an assumption made by most of the casual audience. My sister, who has no contact with the fandom and doesn’t like me discussing the show at all until she’s seen it, assumed he was Tech. My brother-in-law, who was a die-hard Tech-has-to-be-dead-shut-up guy for the entire hiatus and the first half of season three, was convinced he was Tech. Every kid I’ve spoken to who watched the show thought he was Tech and is deeply confused that he got speared like that. My brother, who doesn’t even watch the show but who does walk by when I’m watching it sometimes, thought he was Tech. You can’t get more casual and away from the fandom than that.

The thing is, the answer we get isn’t that he’s not Tech. It’s, “We’re not telling.” Which means that as it currently stands, a season-and-a-half of CX buildup amounted to a five minute boss fight and a non-answer. That’s…not something that works! That’s atrocious writing if that was the whole sum of their intent all along.

And you can say, well, that was a clever misdirect! Plot twist! Except, one, misdirects and twists only work if the real answer is more satisfying than the false one, otherwise it just falls flat. Two, if it was a misdirect, it’s not one the creative team is willing to own. No one will touch the Tech-CX-2 parallels with a twenty-foot pole, except the Kiners, who have incredibly meaningful explanations for every musical choice but then say shit like, “that chord just sounds good in brass” about Battle of the Snipers (…before going on to say that the four note lose motif from “Plan 99” is Tech’s leitmotif…which is also all over Battle of the Snipers…and is only there according because the batch is divided in that scene, a scene in which Crosshair’s leitmotif is entirely absent even though he’s just supposed to be fighting his own dark side represented by a guy who’s totally not Tech. Sure. I’m going to go eat drywall.) Because acknowledging that and saying that was supposed to be Tech will just make the audience angrier, and they may not even be allowed to do so, and saying that it is Tech—you can understand why they can’t do that, right? The implications are horrific. But that horrific implication is probably what at least some of the casual audience who will never interact with the fandom or a single interview is going to walk away with.

4. The thing that bothers me most about all of this is the combined toxicity of the fandom and the leading from the marketing and social media. Part of the fandom saying that there were never any signs Tech could have survived (in Star Wars, no less) is starting to feel like gaslighting; and while I don’t think there was any malice in the leading in the marketing and social media—I’m even willing to give a tiny bit of leeway for the creative team maybe knowing something we don’t yet—it was handled badly, expectations for this season should have been set early and clearly, and as of right now it all feels like an incredibly cruel prank at autistic fans expense, whatever the intent may have been or may still be.

5. And finally, here’s the thing: I’m willing to give the writers a bit of leeway on this. I’m willing to grant that some choices may have been out of their hands for unknown reasons. I’m even willing to say that maybe they’re not really done with this story yet, that The Bad Batch could just be the first chapter of a longer show that was split up for stupid business reasons, and that the finale is the way it is because they had to have an ending of sorts without actually resolving anything. I’m willing to grant a lot of grace there. In fact, I actually think there’s a very good chance we’ll still get Tech back alive in canon, and sooner than later, if only because no one (not even the voice actors) seems happy about this, most fans are coping but disappointed at best, the creative team got asked about Tech non-stop for a solid year and a half, and the writers don’t seem at all committed. We know from the rest of the show that they know how to definitively kill a guy, and, frankly, Tech in the first two seasons comes across as something of a writer favorite. They like using him!

But whatever I’m hoping or suspecting, and whatever leeway I’m willing to grant the creative team here, the final product is all we have right now. And I am going to criticize that final product for badly handling a (presumed) character death and straight up breaking the central conceit of the show in doing so.

Night Three

Full fic on Ao3

PAIRING: tech x fem reader

SUMMARY: You’ve spent the last two nights hooking up with a handsome stranger. You promise yourself this is the last time.

WORDS COUNT: 1311

RATING + WARNINGS: 18+, spicy, porn with minimal plot, PiV, oral sex (female receiving), touch of Dom!Tech

NOTES: This is Part 3 of the first installment of my reverse harem “Bad Choices” smutlet series on Ao3. Yes, this is how I channeled my extra energy after the Season 2 finale.

Although it’s written in second person, my heroine eventually has a very established relationship with the Batch.

“This is the last time,” you tell yourself. You’re not waiting for this man at a bar anymore. It doesn’t matter how this night ends, good or bad. At the moment odds are 40/60 bad, based on the fact that you’re lying on the cold floor of a spaceship, dress gone, underwear lost, legs spread, and half fucked. He’s fixing something and not giving you any relief. This is not ideal.

When he finally appeared, you didn’t stay long. He kissed you ravenously, paid your tab, then pulled you out of the bar. He put you on top of a speeder, which you assume he stole since he ditched it a short way from the spaceport. He seemed hungry for you tonight, based on the way he’d been kissing you, pressing you against walls and ships to manhandle you. Finally, one of the ships had a gangway open, and he practically carried you up the stairs before shutting the door behind you both.

He immediately stripped off your dress and panties and lifted you so your legs hooked around his waist, your lips locked together, and you ground yourself against…some kind of pouch. Maybe a tool belt. You couldn’t tell. After what he did to you last night, you were beyond horny and were desperate to feel him inside you again. He pinned you to the wall, his hands between your legs, two fingers sliding knuckle deep into you. You whimpered, needing more. And then he…just put you down. A noise from the ship’s console had distracted him, and he’d turned to it immediately.

“That should not be happening,” he’d said, echoing your own thoughts, as you watched him pull a tool off his belt, crouch under the control panel to examine the issue, then lie on his back and start working.

Your brain could not process what was happening. One moment you were ready to get absolutely railed by this tall, handsome stranger, and now he’d gone full mechanic mode. Legs unsteady, you staggered over to one of the chairs and collapsed into it. You watched him work for a moment before noticing the large bulge still in his pants. He wasn’t so far under the panel that you couldn’t get to him, so you decided to throw caution to the wind. What was the worst that could happen?

He didn’t make any noise when you straddled his thighs, and he barely twitched when your hand stroked the length of him through his pants. You did it again, this time cupping his balls with one hand as the other worked up his shaft, feeling him harden fully, and then began undoing the fastening that kept him from you. You groaned when you finally saw his erection, feeling its heat in your palms. Since he still hadn’t stopped you, or the work he was doing, you eased yourself up, rubbing the head against your wet opening, then sinking yourself down on him.

That got his attention. He paused and looked at you. You could see your reflection in his ever present goggles. You could not suppress your cry as you felt yourself spread around him. He watched you fuck yourself on him, one hand holding on to the console to support yourself, knees screaming in protest against the cold hard metal floor. You felt him shift slightly to meet you and heard the clink of his tools placed next to him.

His hands grasped your hips, and then, in a move that was truly incomprehensible to you, he lifted you off of him and deposited you on the floor.

You lay there stunned for a moment, watching him refasten his pants and hearing his tools clinking again as he worked under the console.

In response to your cry of frustration, you hear him say, “You began prematurely.” Defeated, you don’t move until he finally gets up and offers you a hand. “Don’t pout,” he says, putting you back into one of the chairs.

You sit still, the cold torture against your hot skin. He tinkers around the ship for a few minutes more before returning, having removed his belt and a number of the pouches that were strapped to his body.

“Do you want to leave?” he asks, coming down on one knee in front of you, spreading your legs, pulling your hips toward him, while pushing your torso back. You whimper, feeling his breath along your thighs. He lifts your hips, his face dipping between your legs, taking in the mingled scent of his musk and your excitement. His tongue traces around your swollen labia, tasting you, then flits against your clit, making you moan. He holds your wrists firmly, as he fully presses his lips around you, sucking roughly, using his tongue to ravage your sensitive tip. You’re so close, so tantalizingly close, that of course he stops, but just for a moment. He’s undone his pants, thick cock ready.

Demonstrating his strength again, he lifts you onto him, before switching places with you on the chair. You sink down on him, moaning in sweet relief. He moves with you this time, thrusting into you as you fuck him. You use his shoulders for leverage as you bring yourself up and down on his length. His hand reaches between you, collecting your wetness from his shaft, then catching your swollen nub between his fingers, tugging and stroking it, while your cries become wilder and louder. The orgasm is blinding and made more intense by the rough rhythm he is keeping inside you, taking you through waves and waves of bliss.

“I don’t think I can move,” you whisper as you collapse against him, your pussy pulsing around his thickness.

“That will not be a problem,” he answers, almost snarkily, not that you care anymore. He holds your hips down as he pushes deeper into you. When you tighten around him, he gasps, his thrusts losing their rhythm but making up for it in force. The friction stimulates you again, and you’re moaning against his shoulder, trying to ride him. He groans and starts to say something.

“I don’t object,” you answer before he forms the words. His hands grasp your hips firmly, moving you in time with his thrusts, until finally with a loud gasp, you feel him orgasm inside you. You keep rocking your hips on him as his cock twitches. Finally he stops you, and you press yourself to his chest, taking a few minutes to recover. With great effort, you lift yourself off him, his cum spilling out of you, onto his softening cock, down your thigh. He catches you as your legs give way and gently places you back in the chair, which is now much warmer than earlier. He cleans you both up with a soft towel he produced out of nowhere, and lets you rest.

You jerk awake from a light doze. You hadn’t been asleep too long since you’re not yet chilled by the cool air of the ship. You retrieve and slip on your dress, but your underwear are nowhere to be found.

He’s sitting in the pilot’s chair, working at the console, and turns to you as you approach.

“Would you like me to return you to your domicile?”

“Hmmmm?” You pretend to contemplate as you lean down to kiss him. “But I’m not tired.”

Your hand drifts into his lap, your fingers stroking along the outline of his hardening cock. The console beeps, a comm signal. He answers.

“Tech. We’re ready for pick up.”

“Understood. I will leave momentarily.”

You sigh. “Well that’s disappointing.”

“Transit time is 1.12 hours…if you would like to accompany me.” He’s already stood and lifted you against the console, your legs wrapped around him. You can hear him pushing buttons behind you, but you don’t care.

He really is impossible to refuse.

*

The rest of the series can be found here.

Warning: It gets kinky.

Tech Lives

Wow. I thought I’d be better by now, but no, I’m still not ready to interact with any media or opinion or art (fan and official) that assumes Tech isn’t coming back. That they lived out the rest of their days without him. That shit is too bleak for me.

I saw some art earlier that said “They all survived” with no inclusion of Tech, and I immediately had all the feels.

Yeah, I’m firmly “no body/no death” and we’re talking about Star Wars so I expect him to show up in a future show/comic/book with zero explanation for his survival. I mean, he’s Tech. We don’t think he had a number of scenarios cooked up while hanging there? Bitch, please.

Before it all went horribly wrong 😩.

But also, Tech is so fucking hot in this.

For @bad-batch-lurker

Tech being a badass in "The Summit." He and Hunter's shootout with the Stormtroopers. Lightened, brightened, sharpened and slomo.