The Bad Batch had just returned from Coruscant. They had lost Echo, and they were all processing it in their own way. Omega was contemplating calling Echo again just to make sure he was okay, Wrecker was eating tons of mantal mix, Tech was working on the ship, and Hunter was laying face down on his bed trying to tune out the world. His head hurt.
Of course, his head had just stopped pounding when he heard Omega start to shout gleefully.
"Hunter! Hunter! We have a transmission from Rex and Echo!"
Hunter got up, his interest peaked. The four of them gathered around the hologram of the two soldiers.
"Didn't expect to hear from you so soon, Captain. What seems to be the trouble?" Hunter asked.
"Back at ya. We received a distress call from Wayland. Mount Tantiss to be exact." Rex replied.
"Mount Tantiss? Where we found Gregor?" Asked Wrecker.
"That's the one."
"Who's the call from?" Hunter asked.
"Nala Se." Echo said.
Omega gasped.
"Yeah, we think she meant to call you guys, but Echo accidentally grabbed Omega's transmitter when he was leaving." Rex said.
"So that's where it went" Omega mumbled. "Why's Nala Se calling us?"
"She said she's being held against her will."
"Why should we help her? What's she ever done for us?" Wrecker asked.
"Wrecker, we have to go! She was responsible for your genetic enhancements! And.. and she was the only reason I was kept alive after Jango Fett left!" Omega said.
"Send us the information, we'll talk about it tomorrow." Hunter said.
"Alright. Talk soon." Rex said, before closing the call.
"You aren't actually thinking of helping that long neck, are you, Hunter?" Wrecker asked.
"It may be beneficial for us to help Nala Se." Tech said, analyzing the information he was sent by Rex. "The area she is being kept in has many imperial secrets stored on databanks."
"Let's talk about it in the morning. It's late, head to bed." Hunter said.
Omega was asleep. But she dreamt about Nala Se.
"Nala? I'm bored." A much younger Omega said.
Nala Se looked looked down at her, and glided over to a cabinet where she pulled out a small toy ship.
"There you are." She said, handing it to Omega."
Omega gasped. "Thank you Nala!" She said gleefully.
To Omega's knowledge, it was actually quite disrespectful to call a Kaminoen only by their first name, but when Omega was younger, Nala Se let it slide.
Another time, Omega was running around the lab, toy ship in hand, pretending it was flying.
Nala Se was working on an assignment from Lama Su.
"Take care when you are running in the lab, Omega." Nala Se said.
"I'm being careful, Nala!" Omega said. "I'm the most care-" Omega crashed into a counter, knocking over several vials and spilling them onto the floor. Nala Se's eyes narrowed, but that was her only reaction as she went to pick up the vials and sending for a cleaning droid.
"I'm sorry, Nala! I-it was an accident! I-"
Nala Se put her hand up. "I know. Be more careful in the future." She said.
Omega nodded, as Nala Se walked over to restart the experiment Omega knocked over.
That night, Omega felt bad about what happened, so she had tried to recreate the experiment. She had little success, but she succeeded in waking Nala Se when one of the vials exploded.
What Nala Se came in, Omega stood in the middle of the lab sheepishly.
"Omega-"
"I tried to fix your experiment, did I do a good job?" Omega asked.
Nala Se surveyed the lab. Omega had just blown up months of work. Any other clone would be decommissioned after this.
"...Yes, thank you For.. fixing it." Nala Se said.
Omega smiled gleefully and skipped off to bed.
Now that she was older, Omega knew Nala Se was just being nice, but she could have gotten her in trouble, but she took the fall when Lama Su inevitably asked what happened.
Omega woke up suddenly.
They had to help her.
Wrecker laid in his bed, in a deep sleep like his batch mates. But he still thought about how Omega reacted when Nala Se was brought up. The kid clearly missed Nala Se, and even Wrecker had to admit, she wasn't as bad as the other Kaminoen's, at least to his batch. That night, he dreamt about a time in the infirmary, when he was only about eight.
...
Wrecker had taken quite the fall from their last training exercise. Him, Hunter, Tech and Crosshair were all scaling a huge wall with no safety equipment, for some reason, and Tech was struggling. Wrecker and Hunter stayed behind him in case he fell, but something unexpected happened, something started to fall at them from the top, and they soon recognized that they were being shot at with stun blasters.
"Duck!" Hunter yelled.
Wrecker gave the Kaminoens a dirty look before he climbed above Tech to protect him. Of course, just then, Wrecker was hit with a stun blast and fell.
He woke up hours later in the infirmary, Hunter arguing with a kaminoen at the door with Tech and Crosshair behind him to let them see Wrecker. The Kaminoen shot them down, and eventually older clones came to bring them to their barracks. The Kaminoen did notice that Wrecker was awake a moment later.
"Ah, CT-9903 is awake. Send the medical droid in." The doctor called.
"It's Wrecker." Wrecker said.
The Kaminoen ignored him.
"What happened? How long have I been out?"
"I have no reason to tell you that."
"Lon-to." A voice called from the door.
"Ah, Doctor Se. CT-9903 is awake, but heavily damaged. I recommend reconditioning, or applying this clone's genetic makeup to another embryo and-"
"I.. will take it from here, Lon-To." Nala Se said.
"But, doctor, the clone-"
"I will take it from here, Lon-To." Nala Se said more forcefully.
The Kaminoen looked like he was about to argue with her, but he closed his mouth and left the room.
"You fractured your arm and broke several ribs. You have been unconscious for approximately eight hours." Nala Se supplied.
"Oh. Why can't Hunter come it? I wanna see him. Are the others alright?"
"I cannot allow the other clones in your batch to come in as of the moment.." Nala Se said.
She noticed Wrecker's disappointed look.
"I did however, order this for you, studies have shown that it effects young children who have trouble sleeping." Nala Se
Wrecker gasped and reached for the stuffed Tooka with his good arm, and Nala Se handed it to him.
"Thank you, Doctor Se!" Wrecker said, hugging the toy to his face.
A ghost of a smile passed Nala Se's face.
"AZ-107, escort clone force 99 into see CT-9903 'Wrecker'." She said into a com-link.
She didn't acknowledge Wrecker as she left the room, but she did hear him excitement as she left.
...
Wrecker opened his eyes. He groaned.
They had to help her.
Tech laid awake in bed. He didn't have his googles on, and was staring across the blurry room at Hunter, fast asleep. He was thinking about Nala Se. When he was very young, 5 or 6, he remembered hearing Lama Su and Taun We discussing a surgery to improve his vision, make it like Crosshair's. He remembered getting out of surgery, his vision clouded. He was hysterical, the medical droids were all around him, Kaminoens were yelling at eachother.
He had to stay in the infirmary for quite some time, and no one would let his batch come to see him. One day, he heard Lama Su outside of his room.
"He can't see, he needs to be decommissioned, Nala!" He said, trying to stay calm.
Nala Se slapped him.
"We have put too much on him to throw him away. He isn't like other clones, I tell you these ones are special. We cannot discard him." Nala Se argues.
"Our other option is to keep him, spend more on training, food for him, etc, then his first battle, he won't be able to see, and he'll die." Lama Su argued.
"This is your fault, you decided he wasn't good enough, and now you want to throw him away. I won't let you."
"You have until the end of the week to come up with a solution." Lama Su said, and Tech heard their footsteps disappearing.
The following morning, Nala Se walked into his room. She looked tired.
"Good morning, CT-9904, how are you feeling today?" Nala Se asked.
"I wanna see Hunter. Where is he?" Asked Tech.
"He cannot come in right now, but I need you to try this pair of googles, they will stay on during battle, and should improve your vision." Nala Se said.
Tech took them, and smiled. He could see!
"I can see! They work! Now I don't have to be decommissioned!" Tech said happily.
Nala Se smiled. She liked the clones in clone force 99, they were special. She had come across some other special clones, but these ones really stood out to her. They were her pet project, after all. She was glad to see Tech happy again.
...
Yeah, they had to help the long-neck.
Hunter was fast asleep, but like the others, he was thinking about Nala Se. She was around the Bad Batch a lot when they were younger, she seemed to be quite interested in them. When Hunter was only around 9, the Kaminoens started testing his senses.
...
Hunter and his batch mates were doing separate training today to test their individual skills. This was their first individual trial. None of them liked the idea of being separated, but they weren't given much choice. Hunter was lead into a room with speakers in the corners of the room.
"Commence the testing." A Kaminoen said from the lookout over the training area.
On his command, the room shifted. Hunter noticed it started to heat up, and the walls seemed to shift. He picked up on small noises coming out of the speakers, but the volume soon turned up, full optical illusions were playing on the walls before him and the room was becoming increasingly hot.
Hunter started to get dizzy.
"CT-9902, there are disks placed around the room, find them, and the simulation will end." The Kaminoen said.
Hunter barely heard him. "...02...disks...end"
Hunter's breathing quickened, and he backed up against the wall, which he quickly discovered was burning hot. He yelped and drew back. Hunter felt tears start to prick at his eyes as he collapsed from dizziness. He couldn't think straight, there was too much to process. The Kaminoens did nothing to stop it, and it continued for minutes before everything came to a stop at once and he heard the door opening.
Nala Se reached down to help him up, which normally he refused, but he didn't have the energy.
Another Kaminoen and a trainer came storming into the room.
"Doctor Se, what is the meaning of this?" The trainer asked.
"Listen to me, Saio Malik, you will not use tactics as harsh as to damage experimental unit 99. Kamino has invested too much in them to see them destroyed by a brain dead Toydarian." Nala Se said.
"And you, Lon To, I would like to see you later." She continued, eyes narrowed.
The toydarian trainer narrowed his eyes. "Doctor Se, I know what I'm doing when I'm training these creatures-"
"And I realize that. However I do hope you realize that I am forbidding exercises like this on grounds of danger to CT-9902's health." Nala Se said.
"I will do as I wish, Doctor!"
"They you are dismissed." Nala Se said calmly.
Hunter stared up at her with his mouth open as the Trainer angrily left, Lon To following behind.
She looked down at Hunter. "You are excused from training for the next several days, we will need to monitor your mental health after that faulty exercise." Nala Se said.
Hunter's head was still spinning, and he didn't fight back when Nala Se lead him slowly to the infirmary.
...
Hunter woke up slowly. He looked at his clock, 5:30AM. He got up. He knew they had to go on the mission, he went to start preparing.
The Bad Batch gathered in the main area of the ship that morning to start planning for the mission. They were off in minutes, with the four of them hitting a rendezvous point to pick up Rex and Echo.
"Have you two ever met Nala Se?" Asked Wrecker.
"I was with you three on Kamino in the end, remember?" Asked Echo.
"Only once. She was talking to the prime minister about.. my hair." Said Rex.
"Your hair? You dont dye it?" Omega asked.
Rex shook his head. "The Long-Necks weren't fond of unplanned genetic defects, but I did well in training, so they kept me around."
The batch was quiet for a while.
"So what's the plan, Rex?" Hunter asked.
"Well, you went in to rescue Gregor a while back, so we can use some of your saved schematics. Nala Se is being kept it the research division, here." Rex pointed to a spot on the hologram of the facility. "This will be a stealth mission, we can't go in guns blazing." Rex reminded them, mostly Wrecker.
As the batch arrived on Wayland, they hurried into the facility to find Nala Se.
The Kaminoen in question was currently in one of the labs, looking at several samples of the Emperor's DNA. She sighed. So much of her work was destroyed in the fall of Kamino. She'd never tell her fellow Kaminoens, but she did have a soft spot for the Fett clones, the little ones in particular. And then there was clone force 99, the others were right in calling them her pet project, they really were. The clones had grown on her throughout the years.
She knew she could trust them with Omega. She hoped she was okay. Clone force 99 wasn't known for being the most responsible, but, at least three of them and the ARC trooper were compassionately enough to want to take her. She certainly didn't blame them if they didn't come, she knew none of the clones were fond of her or the other Kaminoens, she wasn't even fond of many other Kaminoens.
Just then, she heard the door to the lab open, and blaster fire.
"Well, so much for stealth." A voice said. A figure ran past her to the database, and started to collect the information. A closer inspection revealed the figure to be CT-990... Tech. He was closely followed by the batch's Sargent, Hunter, the ARC trooper, a clone Nala Se had never seen before, and..
Omega.
The large clone, Wrecker, stood guard at the door.
Omega ran to Nala Se.
"Nala Se!" She cried. Omega hugged her, even though she barely reached above her waist.
"Reunion later! We've gotta go! Tech?"
"Data transfer complete." He verified.
"Great, let's go!" Hunter beckoned for Nala Se to follow him, and she did so.
After the 7 of them were back of the ship, The 6 clones had some questions.
"Thank you for coming, I was unsure you would." Nala Se said.
"Yeah we were as well, seeing as you probably don't even know our names," Wrecker said.
"I'll admit many of us were unhappy when clones started giving eachother names, however I did take the time to learn those of my experimental unit, Sargent Hunter, Privates Tech and Wrecker, and ARC Echo."
"Point being," Hunter said, "you've got Omega to thank. She was probably responsible for convincing Wrecker.. and, I remembered the times you helped me in training."
"I believe we all did, with the exception of those two" Tech motioned to Echo and Rex.
"Ah, yes, thank you for coming along, Arc Trooper Echo, and.." Nala Se turned to Rex.
"Former Captain Rex," Rex told her.
"Rex, then." Nala Se said. "I do apologize for the treatment you were given in your youth."
"H-how did you..?" Rex stuttered
"Your hair, Lama Su was not fond of blond clones." She said.
"W-well, thank you, mistress. That means a lot." Rex said.
"Point being Tech, Wrecker, Omega and I remembered how you helped us when we were younger," Hunter clarified.
Nala Se dipped her head, and soon felt Omega's arms around her again.
"Thanks, Nala." Omega said.
Nala Se smiled.
Yeah, they would be okay.