The Bad Batch: One Shot Collection

Febuwhump Day Two: Solitary Confinement

Author's Note: More canon-compliant missing scene fills with Omega! :D

~ Amina Gila

Omega is no stranger to being alone. She has been ever since her brothers left Nala Se's lab. Being trapped alone in a prison cell is somehow different, though. Maybe it's more closed and prison-like, or maybe it's just that she knows she'll never see them again. Or, Omega's thoughts in the prison cell on Kamino before her brothers returned.

Omega is no stranger to being alone. She has been on some level or other ever since her brothers left the lab. She spent years mostly alone down there, except when Nala Se takes her to places, though that was a little more... recent.

AZI was the only friend she's ever had. She can't stop remembering seeing him fall from the shot. She can't believe the clone shot him. He was only trying to help her. Her arms still ache from where one of them was gripping her as he dragged her from her brothers' barracks.

What happened? Why are they doing this? Are her brothers okay? She told them not to come back. Is that why this is happening?

Omega misses them. So much. She hates being alone. It hurts. It always hurts. The room is so... dark here. There's nothing to see here except gray walls and the light blue ray shield in front of her.

Nala Se will probably come get her out, but... when?

Not that it even matters.

It really, really doesn't.

She feels empty inside.

Omega had been so excited when she finally laid eyes on them again. Hunter had seen her then, or at least she thinks he had. She remembers every moment she talked to them in the hall when she slipped away from Nala Se to see them again in the mess hall. She got to fight with them for the first time, and it was fun, even if it ended with Echo being hurt.

She tried to stay with them. She tried as hard as she could, but her brothers left again. They're gone again.

Maybe she should've just told them she's their sister. That she knew them. But – but Omega didn't want them to care about her because of who she used to be. They're not the same. They don't remember her.

She remembers every millisecond of Hunter walking back to the Marauder, of how he and Crosshair had the briefest exchange while looking back at her before disappearing. She remembers the dark markings of his tattoo – the one she never knew how or why he got. She can't understand why he got it – Omega can guess it has some significance to the clones, but that's another thing she was never there to see. She can't really understand why someone would want permanent markings on them, but... she's hardly seen her own reflection except on glass walls or windows on occasion.

She saw their ship fly away.

They're leaving Kamino. She told them not to come back, and at least they'll be safe. She knows that Imperial was going to hurt them. She was so afraid of something happening to them. He was going to hurt them. She knew he was. The way he kept pushing, asking about them was... it unnerved her.

She misses them.

She just wants them back.

"Our squad's nothing but trouble. For your sake, keep your distance."

"Kid, you're not a soldier. It's dangerous."

"Change takes getting used to. You'll see. Just give it time."

She doesn't know if they even want her back. Hunter told her to stay away.

That's the only life she's ever wanted.

It's so dark here. So – she wants to get out of here.

There's nothing to do. Nothing to see.

Nothing, except the spiraling company of her own thoughts.

She already lost her brothers once. How is she supposed to deal with it again?

She pulls her knees up to her chest, curling up on the bench in the back.

The clones guarding her aren't paying attention. Not that there's anything to see. Nala Se can tell her any number of times that she wasn't meant to be a soldier, but that's the only thing Omega has ever cared about.

She just wants her brothers back.

She's tired of being alone.

Omega has no idea how long it's been when the door opens, and she perks up. She was expecting Nala Se to have come, but it's... her brothers? The regs are shoving Hunter and Tech in, and seeing it makes her boil with fury.

They enter the cell – all five of them, minus their armor – and the ray shield is turned on again.

"Smells weird," Wrecker announces loudly – it's so jarring to hear how deep his voice is now. She remembers when he was little so vividly.

"That's because it's clean," Echo says dryly. He's a little more unfamiliar. Omega never knew him when he was young, but that doesn't make him any less her brother.

Tech is the first to turn to her, and the goggles he wears now do well at hiding his expression, but she thinks he nearly brightens a little. "Well, the plan wasn't a total failure," he interjects.

Plan? What plan? What were her brothers doing?

She can't even say how happy she is to see them again, but she was so certain they'd be gone forever.

"Goody," Crosshair mutters in the background. His voice sounds so different, too – Omega still remembers when he and Wrecker were little, and they'd scream until they should've been hoarse and chase each other in circles around Nala Se's lab.

Hunter gently tugs Tech aside, crouching in front of her.

"I warned you not to come back," Omega says, because that's what worries her the most. She wants to get out, but why are they here?

"Had to," Hunter shrugs, "We were looking for you."

"Me?" Omega repeats, blinking.

"What do you say, kid? You wanna come with us or did we get captured for nothing?"

They came back for her? "You came back for me?" She thought they'd just ignored her warning, that Hunter maybe hadn't taken her seriously, hadn't really... listened. That he didn't believe her. She thought they'd forgotten her, that she would never... but here they are.

"That's right," Hunter replies, looking away, as if suddenly double thinking his request. "Or, you can stay on Kamino, if –"

They came back for her, even if they knew what could happen. For her. For –

That's all she's ever wanted. To mean something to them. To someone.

She could almost cry from the sheer onslaught of emotion, and she pushes hirself to her feet on the bench, just because it's something to do, and this is supposed to be a happy time. She doesn't want to look him in the eye if she's about to cry. That's – it's stupid. "No, it's like I said before. I want to go with you."

She has the chance now that she's always wanted. A chance to be free. To be home.

To have her brothers.

How could she ever say no to that?

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