Author's Note: This fic was requested by Thsle on ao3, and I hope you enjoy it! It was written for the Clone Bang. :D Our artist for this fic is ReadingBlueWolf on ao3 (@DivilusCorner on tumblr). ^-^
There's three parts to this fic, and we'll update weekly. :)
PS. This is for the square "depression" on the 501st bingo, and the square "apocalypse" on the Bad Batch bingo.
~ Amina Gila
It's the eighth Imperial base they've hit in the last fifteen days, and they aren't stopping. They can't stop, not until they find Omega and bring her back. They gave up everything for her, and she's only a child. They failed to protect her when they should have, and because of that, she's been taken.
But they're going to get her back, no matter what the cost.
She's their kid. They aren't going to stop until they find her.
Echo is worn, tired, but he's also angry, angry enough that he can push past the exhaustion, the grief over Tech's death, the fear for Omega and what she's going through. He's angry enough that he can ignore everything else, even logic, which tells him that this ninth base they've hit has maybe been too easy. They haven't attacked with any type of pattern, and they've left everything in flames and ruins when they leave, if only out of spite.
And still, there are no signs of Omega or of Hemlock. But there's got to be something. No one is a ghost, even if Hemlock is very good at hiding. They'll find something eventually, they will. They just... need to keep looking.
"This seems too easy," Hunter murmurs over comms as they sweep through the halls, blasters at the ready. There's no signs of resistance of any kind, and that's weird. It's setting off alarm bells in Echo's mind, the faint worry that this could be a trap. Maybe it would be better to pull back and do more recon first.
But looking at the grim, determined profiles of his brothers, remembering the broken way they've all but clung to each other over the days, being the last members of their batch, and Echo can't even say it. He's angry. Angrier than both of them, because they – the Bad Batch took him in, and they took care of him when he didn't have a place anymore. They took him in, and now, they've lost Crosshair and Tech. And Omega. They have to find her, get her back, and if Hunter and Wrecker will plunge headlong into this, no matter that it's probably a trap, Echo will be there with them, to the end.
"Yeah, agreed," he says, cautiously glancing around the corner, looking both ways. "Feel anything? The control room is up ahead?"
"There's... something there," Hunter replies, backing against the wall, blaster raised. "I don't know what it is, but I don't like it."
"Something what?" Wrecker asks.
"It's a concentrated energy source. Similar to a droid, but not quite."
"Cyborg?" Echo guesses, because Hunter had said the same thing about him."
"Maybe. It's similar, but much stronger than any one I've met." He sighs. "Let's move." He's afraid, and Echo is too, just a little bit, but it's fine. They have a mission, and they are going to get Omega back, no matter what it takes. Even if none of them are left to see it through, he won't rest until he knows it'll happen.
Echo scomps into the wall, opening the door ahead of them.
The control room is mostly dark, except for the lights on someone standing right inside waiting for them. The armored figure towers well over them, but what makes Echo momentarily freeze is the... ignited red lightsaber.
No Jedi would be here waiting for them, so it must be a Sith, fighting for the Empire. Maybe he really should have advised a recon after all.
Wrecker instantly moves forwards, ready to charge into it like he is everything. Though the childishness of the way he used to be is mostly gone; now, it's more angry. Echo once didn't know it was possible for Wrecker to be that way.
"Wait!" he warns, before either of the others can do something foolish. "He's a Sith. They have... electric fingers." Yes, there was a proper term for that but he can't remember off the top of his head, and doesn't have time to worry about that right now.
"The correct term is Force lightning," the cyborg replies immediately with the pause of his cycling respirator. His voice is deep, mechanicalized.
That's something the General used to say, something he had said one time when the boys were talking about it. That memory sends a sharp stab of pain shooting through his heart, and Echo forces that away, refocusing on the Sith. He has never faced down a Sith before, and he doesn't know what to do. They're completely outmatched.
"Where are Crosshair and Tech?" the cyborg answers, but it sounds like a genuine, confused, curious question. Not mockingly, the way Echo would have expected from an Imperial.
And that doesn't make any sense.
Why would he care? Why would he ask? Echo's eyes narrow. He's a Sith, and he's Imperial. What game is he playing?
Hunter's hands tighten over his blaster at the mention of their names, and Wrecker outright snarls, about to lunge at him. Echo steps forwards, pointedly positioning himself in front of Wrecker, half defensively and half to keep Wrecker from doing something that would get himself killed.
"Why do you endanger yourselves coming here?" the cyborg asks, when no one replies.
The sheer oddness of the question strikes Echo the most. 'Endanger'? As if the Empire doesn't want them here, to trap them and kill him, as if the Sith, whoever he is, wasn't sent here to kill them.
"What does it matter to you?" Hunter throws back sharply, fingers twitching towards his vibroblade. "You're going to try and kill us regardless of our reason."
"I know you do not take risks without reason," the cyborg says, "So I merely question what has happened which has led you to do this." He pauses, extinguishing the lightsaber, though he keeps the hilt in his hand. "What has been done to you?"
Did he used to know them? Echo can't imagine who he could've been, for that to be true. They worked with many Jedi, though, and he's heard rumors of... Dark Siders who may have been former Jedi. (But the odd way he is speaking so painfully reminds him of his General. Sometimes, Anakin would say the strangest things that were altogether bizarre, and he suspects it's because he didn't grow up speaking Basic; it was his second language, and he learned it... differently. He always spoke very unusually.)
And he still doesn't understand why the cyborg is even asking, but he's clearly waiting for an answer. "I've lost enough of my brothers to the Empire," Echo throws back, finally. Even if this time, it was his little sister who was lost. (Caring for Omega reminded him so much of how the General used to treat Ahsoka. It was what made Echo truly understand what it was like to have a child to care for.)
"They were... harmed?" he guesses. His vocoder doesn't convey any emotion, so Echo doesn't know how he's feeling. He's... unreadable. A threat he doesn't know how to assess. It would be easier if they could just fight, and get it over with, but this is a Sith, and it's not a force they understand.
None of them answer verbally. Echo doesn't know what he would say, anyway. There are no words that can describe what happened to them, how the Empire took Crosshair, how Tech died trying to get him back, and how Omega was taken from them.
