The Bad Batch: Oneshots

Standing Next to Me

     The mission had gone south. Cid's information had been wrong. The group of pirates they were stealing from knew they were coming and had prepared a trap. The batch had been separated from each other. Their comms had been jammed as well. With no way to communicate with one another, they were completely at a loss trying to navigate the complex structure of the facility. Only Tech knew the layout through and through, which would have been great if they were all together.

Hunter grumbled a line of curses under his breath as he rounded a corner which led to another dead end. After the explosion– which was the source of the squad's separation– he was looking worse for wear. He was in pain, dazed, and discombobulated. Typically, he would have been able to find at least one of the batchers by now. The sergeant leaned against the concrete wall, breathing heavily as he tried to focus on sensing anyone.

Unfortunately, he was met with silence. Frustratedly, the sergeant carried on, pressing a hand to his aching head. He swore he could feel a warm and wet liquid starting to ooze from somewhere under his sweaty and grimy bandana as the fabric was beginning to stick to his head. He hoped that no one else was injured. It made him nervous not knowing the conditions of his brothers and Omega.

As the sergeant was about to turn down another corridor, a loud crash stopped him in his tracks. The sounds of struggle were prevalent as they echoed from the end of a different hall behind the leader.

"No! Don't hurt him, please!" a strong accented voice pleaded.

Hunter's heart did a flip in his chest. He instantly recognized that voice. As fast as his concern came, it was replaced with rage upon hearing a pained grunt coming from Omega.

"Shut up, kid. You don't give the orders around here."

"Harm her again and I swear I'll shoot your brains out," a much different, much colder and threatening, voice snarled.

Hunter, still in possession of his blasters, checked his surroundings before revealing himself. He wasted no time taking out two of the four targets in the room. As the luckier two readjusted their grips on their hostages, Hunter took that spare time to blast the door's controls so no one else could get in.

Without having to worry about someone sneaking up to ambush him from behind, he could finally take a good look of the scene in front of him.

Crosshair and Omega were both mirroring each other. Both were kneeling, their hands restrained by stuncuffs as a blaster was pointed at their heads from behind.

The two Trandoshans responsible had smug looks on their faces.

Hunter pointed his DC-17s at the two remaining targets, unsure of his plan for now. When his eyes met Crosshair's, the sniper took the moment to give his older brother a slight shake of his head.

"Don't even think about it, clone," the Trandoshan behind Omega said.

Hunter glared at him as he not so lightly jabbed the tip of his blaster into the back of Omega's head.

"Here's how this is going to work," the second Trandoshan flicked his tongue. "You're going to let us out of here with one of our hostages."

"Funny, either of you think you're leaving here alive at all," Hunter scoffed, tightening his grip on his blasters.

The Trandoshans both chuckled sickly to each other.

"You misunderstand, clone." This time, the blaster behind Crosshair clicked, pressing dangerously close to the temple of the marksman's head. "You get to decide which of your precious squad members leaves this room alive with us."