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Emerie’s still tossing in bed when the door lifts. Omega stands in the doorway, a fire burning in her eyes, something Emerie’s never seen on her before. “It’s time to go,” is all she says, and Emerie knows.
She’s almost terrified enough to argue, to protest the risks of leaving Tantiss, of facing the monsters in the forest, of the galaxy beyond, but this is her sister who swore to protect her, and Emerie trusts that more than she fears the world.
So, she goes.
She follows her, grabs the blaster her sister hands her, stolen from somewhere she’s too afraid to ask the whereabouts of, and heads down to where they kept the hounds so long ago.
And then through the chutes, into the unknown beyond, to… a forest.
“I’ve never been in a forest before,” Emerie murmurs as they sprint through the halls, running before the ray shields cut them off.
“Just stick close,” Omega reassures. “We’ll be okay.”
Emerie tries to stop thinking and just keep running. “Do you know where the ship is?”
“That’s what the datapad’s for. Come on!”
They make it out. Omega pushes her forwards as the shields start closing, and then dives forwards into a roll herself, picking herself up at the bottom of a short incline.
Emerie stands, free in the uncomfortable, warm air, and looks around the planet’s nearly endless darkness. She can already hear the animals, out there and – and dangerous. Growling. And everything. She hears branches crunching and cracking and forces herself not to gasp our scream or any of the things that threaten to come out.
An engine sounds nearby, though, and she looks up, scanning the ship’s movement. “The shuttle should be somewhere that direction,” she says, pointing.
“Flight path,” Omega agrees. “Good idea. Come on, let’s move.” She breaks into a run, covering the rocky, uneven ground easily. Emerie, though, for all she’s been somewhat trained in this, is struggling. Training isn’t reality. Omega’s hard to keep up with, and the sergeant is being slowed down with how much she has to keep stopping to collect Emerie.
“We have to hurry,” she adds, motioning Emerie forwards, “I can hear the lurca hounds. Hemlock must already know we’re out here.”
“Are you sure we’ll make it?” Emerie asks. She feels so cold. She's never done something like this. Of course, she can do it in theory, but that's completely different, and she has had no training. But Omega doesn't need her to say that she is hopelessly underprepared, because she already knows that.
“We’re the Bad Batch. There’s never been a mission we haven’t failed. Come on.”
They keep running. The datapad in her sister’s hands flickers. “Okay, gut it,” she says, pointing, “I think the ship’s this way. We’re catching a reading.”
“That has got to be it,” Emerie replies – it’s the only thing that could be out in the woods on this planet. The hounds are gaining, though, and she stops at a strange, loud cracking and low snarling that isn’t a sound she recognizes.
Omega grabs her shoulder. “Stay still,” she warns, standing frozen and carefully peering over their shoulder.
“What is it?” Emerie barely dares breathing, shaking, heart racing way, way too fast. Were her other siblings like this? This frozen and terrified?
“One of the creatures from the jungle,” Omega whispers back, and then Emerie hears the lurkas again, and thumping. The hounds attacked that thing instead. “Run!”
The monster distracted, they both run. The shuttle is nearby, at any rate. Emerie scrambles to the controls, trying to get the thing up and running while her sister watches her back. It’s… a strangely nice feeling, despite the tension and terror. The ship does power up, though flickering nicely.
“We will obviously not be flying this ship,” Emerie says pointedly, “I am not even certain it has a viewport, or how much of the engine is intact.”
“Try to get a signal out. Echo, Anakin, someone.”
She tries to get the comms, but the thing just sparks. She tries again, and again, rewiring a few things as fast as her fingers can move, but nothing’s working. “It won’t work! The comms are dead. We will need to find another way.”
“Come on, we need cover.” Omega touches her shoulder and guides her off, scrambling behind some nearby trees. Emerie mimics her, pressing her back to the wood and shivering, clinging to her blaster and relatively uncertain of where to go now. She has never been this far out on her own, and there are troops coming in, and –
“I’m sorry,” Omega sighs. “I thought this would work. I tried so hard to get us out here, but I didn’t even think this through.”
But Emerie’s not going back to that place. She doesn’t care what it means. She won’t. Omega has given her the first taste of love in her life, the first place to belong. She isn’t letting them both die here. Okay. Think. She needs to think objectively, for something that can get them off this planet… “You got us out this far. I’m not going back inside that place.” She scoots closer to the tree line, carefully peeking out the other side. There are a lot of troops out there, scanning the area. Many less on the ship. “We need a distraction. Somebody can get onto that shuttle and get it airbound.”
Omega makes a soft little amused sound. “You’re already thinking like a Bad Batcher. That’s one of our plans.”
Emerie smiles for what she thinks is the first real time, bright with longing and for the first time in her life, hope. The little straw tooka-doll feels warmer where it’s hidden under her clothes.
“I’ll draw their fire. You get on board.”
Emerie nods, no time to protest orders, and Omega dives out from behind the trees and starts leading them away.
Alright, this is it. Her sister is counting on her. Emerie can’t let her down. She dives for the shuttle, blaster raised and ready to fire, but makes it as far as getting to the ship when someone yells “stand down!”
“Uh,” Emerie squeaks, slowly turning back around to face the trooper, “Hello?” Yes, she’s talking in an embarrassingly, high-pitched squeak right now. She can’t fire without getting shot, or at least shot at, and then she won’t be flying the ship anywhere. She needs help. They need more than two people.
And if she fires, she has to fire to kill. Not think about how this is maybe her own brother. It doesn’t matter. Omega does.
“I said, stand down,” the man barks.
“Uh. Behind you?” she tries, because sure enough, there indeed is a lurka hound bounding right towards him from behind.
“I’m not falling for that,” the man says, but indeed falls for it as the lurka hound jumps him. Emerie runs. She jumps on the lift, takes it up above, fires her blaster at the pilot, and gets the engines running. He has to work around the body to fly, which is awkward, but no time to think right now.
Omega’s easy to spot. She flies to her sister, who boards, with the hound, and sends the ship upwards.
Omega takes over flying. Emerie has no objection. She likes it, but has little space battle experience. “At least we got Batcher,” is all her sister says about it right now, and they keep moving, dodging the incoming ships.
Omega sends her up to the guns, which she has no idea how to use, but figures their attackers will find terrifying enough when it’s entirely uncontrolled, even if they are wasting important power
The ship’s taken a few hits already, and something is sparking and smoking. “Systems are failing,” Emerie calls panickily.
Batcher barks loudly, as terrified as Emerie is herself.
“We’re taking the jump,” Omega calls back, and the ship jolt, speeding forwards into hyperspace. Emerie still doesn’t dare breathe relief. She’s still shaken and terrified to the core and maybe beyond, still with no idea what the world holds out there.
She… ran. She escaped Hemlock. He’ll be after them yet, but they made it.
Emerie, for all she thought about it and wanted to be away, never thought they could pull it off. She regrets doubting now. But the ship is still shaking and shuddering beneath them.
“Comms are down,” Omega calls, frustrated.
“Isn’t making sure we land in one piece more important?” Emerie asks. “I think something in the fuel line might be leaking.”
Omega groans. “Right. It doesn’t matter where we land, so long as it’s breathable, and has life. We’re off Tantiss, that’s what matters. I’ll try to take us down.”
Take us down means crash landing, and Omega is screaming and Emerie is screaming, and Batcher is howling, and by the time they’ve finally made it ground, she’s entirely a wreck of nerves and never wants to ride a spaceship again. Also, everything hurts from between fifteen and seventeen separate electric shocks, not counting bruising.
Basically, ow.
“You okay?” Omega queries worriedly.
“I will live?” Emerie confirms miserably, which is true. “I… scanned a nearby spaceport. I would suggest leaving as quickly as we can.”
Omega sighs. “We never had time to pull the coordinates form the ship.”
“The ship is about to blow up.” Emerie edges herself from beneath the controls.
Her sister sighs, exhausted. “Fine. We’ll go, but I still need to find a way back there.”
“Why would you ever want to go back there?”
“There are other prisoners. Other brothers who need our help. I won’t let Hemlock do the same thing to them he did to Fives.”
Fives. Who just disappeared, probably killed, and if not, perhaps worse. Emerie cannot spare energy to think about him, but it is sad. Omega told her a lot about Echo. Fives was his twin brother. Just like Tech is hers. Even if she’s never met him, she still feels… a connection. It’s important.
Omega, it turns out, knows really well how to blend into the streets of a normal society. Emerie almost envies it, stunned and awed by everything she lays eyes on, wanting to touch everything, to figure out what it is, but also knowing better. She steals someone’s bag to get enough money to buy them both some clothes, enough to blend in quite nicely, and then takes them into some sort of… building.
They tried a spaceport where the creature at the counter reluctantly agrees to take a bribe to let them onto the ship for fifteen thousand credits each. Omega just sighs and walks off, then leads Emerie off to some kind of… bar? Cantina? Something like that. The terms are as unfamiliar as the sights.
“How are we supposed to get thirty thousand credits here?” Emerie asks, eyes scanning the room.
“Betting,” Omega answers with a grin, “I’m good at any game involving strategy. Your job is to keep quiet and keep an eye on Batcher.” She gives Emerie’s shoulder a pat, and she offers a reluctant nod as her sister turns awa y to… whatever it is she’s about to try going at.
Emerie scoots to the far, far back bench in the building, and the hound sits quietly at her feet, red eyes watching their surroundings with interest and just as much wariness as Emerie herself feels. She doesn’t know much about lurka hounds, only that Omega insists she somehow tamed the beast, though Emerie is still a bit wary about her. Hemlock never ceased warning her of their danger.
And everything’s danger, so the little voices keep whispering on in her head, worrying and terrified and jittery about everything, whether there are things to fear or not.
She doesn’t know how not to be afraid. Are her brothers like this? What are they like? Who are they? Will they like her? She should have grown up with them, but didn’t. Will that mean something different to them…? Emerie supposes, begrudgingly, that such anxiety is most likely normal under these circumstances.
She endeavors to not keep worrying, and watches her sister instead. Omega, as she promised, seems really, really good at gambling and whatever all she’s doing. People keep betting, and Omega keeps gleefully swiping their credits. It’s a fast way of making easy money, even if not precisely… the most honest?
Either way, it is not something they probably want to keep up for long, and her worries are confirmed when a man dressed as an Imperial comes in. She takes one look at him and somehow instinctively knows he’s a thug, but he goes up for a round on Omega, anyway.
Batcher must sense something, and Emerie knows she certainly does, itchy and really uncomfortable. The worried looks the hound is giving her are freaking her out, too. Emerie tries patting her back and really hopes that helps, though it doesn’t really seem to. Then again, what does she know about comfort, much less a hound?
“Your mutt doesn’t seem to like me,” the Imperial says. Emerie feels herself tensing more. The attention on them, and her sister being roped into this, it’s… not great.
“She’s harmless,” Omega promises.
“She’s a distraction,” the man snaps back. “Get rid of her.”
Emerie jolts, looking wide-eyed at her sister, who waves her to the door.
“It’s okay,” she calls. “We’ll just be a few minutes or so.”
Batcher whines some more when Emerie leads her outside, takes one looks at the empty halls and immediately slinks back inside, whispering a promise to the hound to come right out.
Emerie keeps careful in the shadows, trying not to overthink how people are calling Omega her mother of all things, and just waits.
Omega wins the game, and just when they’re turning to head out – information about the crashed shuttle has come back to the Imperial, and Emerie keeps feeling like she’s right where they started again – that the man demands them to pay a fine. Of ten thousand credits, which is half of what they just got from him. It’s that or prison, so Omega pays it, tight-lipped and angry, and ushers Emerie outside as quickly as they can.
“We still have enough to get off world,” she whispers, “For the, uh, shuttle and the extra fees.”
“That’s good,” Emerie replies, “I suggest we move, quickly.”
“Wait a minute.” Omega’s voice rises with alarm. “Where’s Batcher?!”
Emerie’s head whips around frantically scanning up and down the streets, but there are no signs of the hound. “Maybe she got hungry?” she suggests, though she also has a really, really bad feeling about it.
“You looking for that hound?” someone asks. It’s a random bystander, another odd species Emerie doesn’t remember the name of on sight. Also doesn’t really care.
“You know where she went?” Emerie can’t help feeling a little hopeful – probably too hopeful.
“Sure do,” the creature replies with a devious little smirk and crossing their arms. “But the answer’s gonna cost you. Ten thousand credits.”
They need those credits. That’s not gonna be enough for the ship, and Emerie instantly tenses up with anger. “Tell us where she went!”
“Alright, that’s enough.” Omega’s face is cracking with fury, and for the first time, Emerie’s seeing something other than her older sister, the part that fought through a war in her teen years, the part that’s been trapped and caged and hurt for months, the part that’s been struggling beneath responsibility of raising kids all on her own. And then she’s moving and grabbing a fistful of the creature’s clothes and ramming them into a wall. “Tell us where she went!”
“Okay, okay, five, but that’s my final offer,” the creature splutters, waving it’s arms.
Emerie doesn’t even know if this is enough to make it off the ship, but they need Batcher. She grabs a fistful of credits from the bag, hopes it’s close to five, and flings them at the creature’s face. “There! Now tell us what happened to her!”
“That Imperial officer and his troopers snatched the creature and headed for the Cargo docks,” they say, pointing, “Down that way.”
“Something is telling me this is a trap,” Emerie murmurs.
“Me, too,” Omega agrees, “I think that person was set up by him, but we don’t have a choice. Come on.”
Yeah. Emerie was thinking that, too. She has no pity for gangsters. And is actually relatively proud of her sister for hitting.
They break into a run, sneak up to the cargo area and climb over the fence, heading inside in search of Batcher and finding a large assortment of other animals. Omega, predictably, spots her first and sprints to the cage, getting it open, but not before – again – they’re cornered.
“I thought you might come searching for your mutt,” the same Imperial says mockingly, “Unfortunately for you, Lau has a very strict pet policy. No license means a hefty fine.”
“Please tell me we are shooting out of here,” Emerie whispers, because she has officially had it with this place. She would prefer to avoid another blaster fire battle, but at this point, she is also not seeing many options.
“Really?” Omega snaps, eyes narrowed on the man and the troops around him. “How much money would you like this time?”
He scoffs. “Credits won't do you any good when Hemlock shows up. Did you think I wouldn't piece it together when I found that crashed shuttle? Nothing gets by me. I run this town. So, hand over the credits and surrender.”
“Wait for my signal,” Omega whispers discretely. She throws the bag of credits forwards, and then everything explodes into chaos.
Emerie has no idea what she’s supposed to do, so she fires off a few shots once the shooting starts, and dives for the nearest animal cage. Massive stampedes should be enough to deter everyone, right?
It is. Emerie gets aboard the nearest ship with Batcher to get the engines on while Omega covers for them.
This time, it’s a safe and sound escape. It’s a cargo freighter, but it’s safe enough, she thinks, except…
Once they’re safe in hyperspace, Emerie turns to her sister again, still shaken, but also relieved. They made it, even if they’re not safe yet. “What if the Empire tracks the ship?”
“I expect they will,” she relies, “That’s why we’re ditching it on this moon. My brothers will be there.” And then, finally, safe again, her hand tightly grasps Emerie’s shoulder and she offers a bright, relieved smile, no longer shadowed by the horrors haunting Tantiss’s halls. “You’re coming home, Emerie.”
Yeah. And… she’ll finally learn what home means.
***
The moon of Ryloth looks the same. Just like before when Omega came here, and her family was still… happy.
And more than that is the ship that beat them here. The Havoc Marauder sits amongst the rocks. Home. Her home, the only home Omega’s had since Kamino, the home she and Echo lived in, then the home they raised her brothers on. Even after everything the Empire did, the one thing it could never take was this. Their home. Even for all they tried.
She’d be lying if she said she wasn’t crying at least a little bit as Omega squares her shoulders and heads for the ramp.
The moon is dark, of course, but the Marauder is a light against it all, and she slowly walks down the ramp and waits.
Echo is the first one there. Echo, the brother she had from the start, who she fought beside, who left her, who she left to the same fate. Echo, who she fought through the war beside, who she shared everything with. Omega doesn’t remember who moves first, who breaks into a run first, but then she’s being wrapped tightly in his arm and feels his scomp on her back, as hard and boney and obviously metallic as it is. And, also, the first and obvious hug he’s ever instigated himself.
One she’s more than happy to respond in kind to.
“We kept looking for you,” Echo says, “I wasn’t sure we were ever gonna find a lead. Wasn’t expecting you to make it out first.”
Omega pulls back and laughs, her eyes wat, but still smiling. She tries not to think about Fives and about who she should’ve brought back and never will. “Got tired of waiting. It was – wasn’t the greatest situation. But we made it.”
“We?” Echo repeats, but then the other boys are coming out.
Wrecker’s next, with a quiet little gasp, then a light, free laugh. “Now there’s a sight!” Wrecker, smiling, for what Omega hopes so, so badly isn’t the first time since her capture. Wrecker, who always tried to be the cheerful one, who she’s wondered so much how well he’s held himself together, if he’s been fighting to exhaustion to keep that role in.
And Omega sprints across the dirt to scoop him into a hug, too. He’s hit another growth spurt, because he definitely feels taller and bigger against her, which makes her heart ache again all over. Another sharp reminder of the time lost, and that not all time can ever be made up. “I knew you boys would make it here.”
“When we got the message, I wasn’t… entirely certain it was real.” And that’s Tech, who Omega readily invites in on her other side, one arm around them both and clinging as tight as she can. Tech who, she knows without saying, exhausted himself researching and looking and trying to find something, only to meet with nothing, who must have struggled so, so much with his brilliance and how he couldn’t find her.
“I got something for you,” she tells Tech, mostly, because it’s true for all of them, but especially Tech.
And then the other two are crowding in, and she scoops Crosshair into a hug. Tiny, little, half-demon Crosshair, who struggled so much with hope in and of itself, despite all his mischievousness, Crosshair, who she’s wondered and worried about so much, wondered if he’s been hurt, how much he was hurt, if he’s ever learned to keep hoping. “We were lookin’ everywhere for you.”
Hunter comes in a moment later. Last. Omega can see the newfound heaviness in his eyes, can see the exhaustion and responsibility without him even needing to say it, can see how much he stepped up and tried so hard to take on responsibility where Echo couldn’t, how hard he’s tried to keep their family from falling apart while she was away. “I can’t believe you found us first. We never stopped looking, but… how’d you escape?”
“I had some help,” she answers, giving Hunter’s shoulder a reassuring pat and turning back for the door. “Emerie? Batcher! You can come down now.”
The hound is first, barking happily and wagging her tail.
Emerie comes down slowly, hesitant, eyes wide. She’s nervous, of course. “This is Batcher,” Omega introduces, motioning to the hound, who barks happily at the sound of her name. “Emerie, this are –”
“I know who they are,” she finishes, staring.
“Okay. I know, I went to Tantiss hoping to find Echo’s twin, but instead, I found Tech’s. Hey, Tech, say hi to your twin. This is our sister, Emerie.”
“Hi,” Emerie squeaks out. All the boys stare back.
Then – “What?!” Wrecker screeches.