Chapter 1 - Resurrection

Plot: Hunter doesn't remember what happened after he died. He just remembers Crosshair shooting him through the heart on Ryloth and waking up in a strange place in front of an even stranger Sith. Only, he's in the body of a nine-year-old, and the remainder of his squad are about to walk into a suicide mission which will lead them straight back to Crosshair.

Author's Note: This is for the square "reincarnation AU" on the Bad Batch Bingo. :D It'll be updated weekly!

~ Amina Gila

Consciousness fades in far slower than Hunter thinks it ought to. Maybe. Something feels... weird. Off. Distant. Breathing is hard, and – something's nearby, he thinks.

He expects to feel the same burning agony in his chest that he did on Bracca, but he... doesn't? Which is weird. He was shot. He felt it, and that's the last thing Hunter remembers.

This planet doesn't feel like Ryloth, though – the magnetic field arcs entirely differently, only half stable, shifting and twisting like they've never been fully able to settle out. It makes his head throb dully. What – what happened? He was on Ryloth, and now...

Whenever he is, it's dark. This – this isn't a cell, is it? He was shot. He walked out the door and –

That was Crosshair. It was Crosshair – he's the last person Hunter saw, and he'd just known what was about to happen. It was too fast for him to react. It was all so fast, so what is this? Where is he? He thought... thought he was gone.

"Hunter," a voice says, not one that's familiar, but it feels like he knows him. It's deep and mechanicalized, and he blinks a few times, turning his head to the side towards the machine he feels nearby. It must be a cyborg, similar to Echo, though far more electrical.

The figure is in all black, and he's familiar, but Hunter can't remember anything. "Who are you?" he rasps and freezes. His voice sounds wrong. He feels wrong. Not not-him wrong, but just wrong. Hunter shoves himself upright.

He's too small. That's what's wrong.

He was this size at – five maybe? Or was it four? He's not sure. He's even dressed wrong – his armor and body glove are gone, and what is happening –

The helmet tilts a little while hardly moving, still fixed on him. "You don't remember?"

Tentatively, he shakes his head. Who is this person? What – how is he alive? He thought he was dead, or – is he captured by the Empire? That wouldn't explain the... age change. He could've sworn he died, remembers... being somewhere and nowhere at all. It wasn't a pleasant feeling, but that's something from a far off, distant memory.

"You came to me," the cyborg replies, "You asked my help to bring you back."

Bring him – "I did die, didn't I?" He sounds way too young. Everything feels different. It's easy to forget how much his mind changed as he grew older. It feels different. Too – not thought through enough. Lacking the control that let him take care of his brothers in the first place.

He can't think about Crosshair right now. He doesn't know who this person is, and figuring out where he is right now is far more important.

"Yes. You asked me to take you home."

"Why did you help me?" He stands up, brushing himself off – the rock feels warm. The area is warm and sticky, and the air is thick. It's hard to breathe. Hunter's eyes fall on the lightsaber on the person's belt. "Are you a Jedi? I thought they're all..."

"No," he replies fiercely. Hunter still doesn't have his name. "A lightsaber does not make one a Jedi."

Uh. Okay. Sure. Hunter could swear he didn't used to be this tiny. He's about at the person's waist, which is to say, very small. He has no idea if he is just small, or if whatever-his-name-is is just big. "Why am I so small?"

"Evidently, when I brought you back, the doorway interpreted your mental age as your real one."

He was not nine mentally, thank you very much, whatever-his-name-is. "I think I would've been four or five at this size."

"Yes."

For some reason, Hunter thinks he finds it funny. Which it is not, thank you very much.

Actually – wait. He was on Ryloth, and Echo was standing right next to him when Crosshair shot him. Stars. No. "Where's Echo?" Hunter half-hisses. He doesn't even know where he is. Yes, he might've needed to come back to help his brothers, but Echo was with him, too. Wrecker and Tech should've been safely in the Marauder, and – and Omega was with Hera and Chopper, and are they okay?

"You said you were the only one."

"The others are – are alive?" he nearly chokes over the last word – he doesn't even want to ask. It was always a guarantee that they'd survive because that's just what they did. Crosshair shot him. Crosshair – no. Not going to think about that right now. They must think he's dead. He needs to get back to them.

"Of the last that you had seen. Come." He turns away, black cape swinging dramatically as he moves for the doorway. Hunter glances around the room – it looks like he's in some sort of maybe cave – and runs after.

He has to run to keep up with him. Ugh. He's so tiny.

"Is there a way to fix this?" Hunter asks.

"There should not even have been a way to bring you back," the cyborg replies. "I was... unaware it possible, but you were... persistent."

Ghosts are a thing too, apparently. Not any stranger than mind-control chips or whatever. Definitely no stranger than the fact that Crosshair shot him. It's so, so strange to think of how apparently, something happened while he was... gone? Or whatever it was.

"Where are we?" Hunter questions, following the cyborg. Something is definitely wrong with the air here. It stings his eyes and burns all the way down his throat to his lungs. Ugh.

"Mustafar. Do not return here."

He's heading for a shuttle, and as they get farther outside, he can see why the air here feels so wrong. It's a lava planet, and it's so hard to breathe.

The still-unnamed-cyborg leads him to a shuttle, and it's the only one here, so Hunter – very reluctantly – follows. He doesn't know that he should trust him, but for some reason, everything he's been told feels oddly right, even if it makes no sense.

"How long have I been... gone?" Hunter asks, climbing into one of the seats in the back. It's actually a very small ship, and he feels awkwardly out of place. He misses his armor. He feels so... small like this. He doesn't feel like a soldier. He doesn't feel like... anything, except someone terribly misplaced from their own time.

And body because that's apparently a thing?

"I am unaware of the passage of time."

That reminded him of Tech, except Tech always knows those things. Hunter always loses track of time. So do his brothers. At least they did in the Sieges. He just – he wants to get back to the others and he needs to know what happened to them. Are they alright? How could they do anything without Hunter there to lead them? Trying to keep them out of trouble is more than he can even handle. How much worse would it be without him?

Hunter settles back in his seat, crossing his arms. He really, really misses his knife right now – he'd like something to hold. To do. It's distracting. He – he needs that right now.

He felt the burning agony of it as the blaster shot burned through his heart.

Crosshair shot him.

His little brother shot him, and Hunter wants to cry just thinking about it.

He killed him, and Hunter's alive now, but he still wasn't, and –

He doesn't want to think about this.

"Where're we going?" he asks finally, because the silence is so, so loud, and the cyborg's cycling respirator is practically screaming through the cockpit.

"Ord Mantell. That is what you told me."

That doesn't answer the obvious why he's helping Hunter in the first place, though. "Do you have a name?" Hunter asks him finally because he wants to... know that. Names are Important.

"Not one of consequence."

Huh.

Definitely trying to stay anonymous, then.

Hunter tugs his knees up to his chest. He gets why Omega does that now. It's – it feels like he's hiding, and he's not usually good at that, but he also is. He always hides – hides from his brothers, for his brothers because they can't know he's hurt or hurting. They don't have time for it. His hair is falling loosely into his face, and it's simultaneously weird and annoying.

Crosshair's the one who cut the fabric for him to tie it out of his face, who embroidered the skull into it. That was Crosshair, and he's the one who...

What happened to his body?

Did Crosshair... Can he feel enough to know what he did?

"I still don't understand why you're helping me," Hunter says again.

The helmet turns back to look at him, pulling the lever to send them into hyperspace. "You are a clone, and I know you."

"You do?" Hutner doesn't remember him at all. "From – from before?"

"Yes."

"I don't remember you." Maybe it was – before he became a cyborg? Because Hunter knows he'd remember the feel and even the look if he'd seen him before. Even now, something about him is familiar, though Hunter can't place what. Something about the... warmth, maybe. Can't be the scent, but that... doesn't seem wrong, either. He smells like machines drowned with soot and motor oil. A bit like Tech and Echo, actually, just... different.

"No one does," he says, and his vocoder makes it sound flippant, but Hutner thinks it's anything but. The words are too bitter, even toneless.

Hunter sinks further into his chair. He doesn't have anything else to say, even if he has so many questions. Nothing about this makes sense. People don't help the clones because they're clones. Nobody does that. Some natborns tolerate the clones, but very, very few, and no one wants to help them for it.

That doesn't make sense.

Hunter doesn't ask for his name again, but he really wants to know. He's... important. Nice.

He has a lightsaber too, so... maybe he is a Jedi? The Jedi were always nice. Echo had said General Shaak Ti had helped him and his squad. She saved their lives. She didn't hurt them. Nobody does that.

Hunter can't count the number of times his superiors – even Cid – have hit him for the slightest misstep.

And this... Someone brought him back to life. He could've ignored him. Hunter couldn't have been that annoying as a ghost. Or convincing.

**w**

He keeps watching. Keeps expecting something to turn on him, but no.

The cyborg lands the ship, lowering the ramp. "If I find a way to... reverse your age, I will return," he says, and Hunter straightens from where he'd been half sleeping in his chair. Sleeping is easier than... brooding.

Crosshair killed him.

He died.

"Where'll you go?" Hunter queries, trotting towards the doorway.

"It doesn't matter."

Yeah, it does. Hunter doesn't say that, though. The ramp closes the millisecond he steps off it – clearly, he's awfully impatient to get rid of him. Not like Crosshair couldn't say the same?

Hunter doesn't want to think about him.

His squad is going to be... overwhelmed to see him again, no doubt. It will be hard to talk to them again. Very hard. The most Hunter can say about this is that at least he's nearby where the Marauder is landed, so it doesn't take long to find it, and thereby, the rest of his siblings. And how did Wrecker and Tech react to hearing about it? They already lost Crosshair. And Omega?

He was standing right beside Echo when Crosshair shot him. Another brother Echo lost. There's no way in the galaxy Echo is okay from that.

How does Crosshair feel about it? Wrecker had been so torn up after Bracca.

"Omega, focus," Echo's voice is the first to catch his ears. Hunter freezes in his tracks, heart clenching painfully at the sound. It's only been some hours, but he misses him. How long has he been away? Do they know that he was going to come back?

Stars. How is he going to explain this to them?

"I can't," she says – they're outside, and from the clanging, it sounds like they're repairing something on the Marauder. He already doesn't like the sound of it. "We have to get back to Daro and get Wrecker!"

Get – Oh no. What happened?

"We will, but we can't go anywhere until the ship's fixed," Echo replies.

Omega is the first to see him – Echo's working on reconnecting something, and the bad feeling Hunter has just grows even worse.

She freezes up, no doubt recognizing his clothes, but... that doesn't mean she recognizes him. Which really, really isn't what he needs. How is he going to convince them that he's Hunter? They wouldn't believe him.

"Hi?" Omega half asks. Her eyes are heavy. Dim. Like something sucked all the energy out.

And she's taller than him.

She's taller than him.

Ugh.

This is awful.

Well, at least he's alive?

His throat feels tight. Dry. Doesn't know how to say anything. Like he forgot how to talk. "Hey," Hunter whispers. His eyes feel wet.

Echo pauses, turning back. He looks confused, but mostly wary, and definitely angry.

Oh, and... there's a still-forming bruise on his face that isn't that big but certainly does not look pleasant either – Echo's skin is already deathly pale and bruises stand out glaringly.

Hunter wants to ask if they're okay, but that's not what they need to hear. "Where's Tech?" Hunter asks finally, because it'd be easiest if he could explain it to all of them at once.

"Who are you?" Omega asks, and she looks closer to going for her energy bow (why not? She's not the first sibling to shoot him, much less shoot at him, or anything – thank you, Crosshair) still strapped to her back than answering him.

With her already this tense, they're definitely not going to believe a word he says. "Maybe. Um." All his brain is offering right now is an incoherent scream, so he has no idea what to do. "I can talk to you all at once?"

"We don't have time," Omega starts saying – it's ridiculous how badly that hurts – and Echo holds his hand out to shush her.

"Hear him out," he requests, "He's one of our brothers."

"You said that before you left on Daro!" she snaps back, glaring up at him, a sheen of tears in her eyes.

Hunter feels terribly out of place. He wants to cry, too. His throat feels tight. The pressure is there and real, but if he started crying, he doesn't think he'd ever stop. "I know you're not gonna believe me," Hunter says, "But I – after Ryloth, I –" Ugh. What is he even supposed to say? He sounds and feels like an idiot.

"You better come aboard," Echo decides, glancing around.

"We're not done with the ship yet," Omega mutters, following the two of them in the back.

Wrecker's apparently not here, and Hunter has so many questions. He needs to – to explain who he is to them, but they have other things to be worrying about, too, and he feels out of place here. Like – like things have somehow changed enough that they don't need him, and he doesn't belong here this isn't him he has nothing nowhere –

"Finished already?" Tech calls from under the control panel up front.

"No, not yet," Echo replies, "You can come out from there if you're not gonna hit me again."

"I hope you are not expecting an apology," Tech snips back, and he's not joking. Tech doesn't really joke, ever, and there's an entirely unveiled and completely uncharacteristic aggression to his voice.

Wait.

Tech hit Echo?

Is that why he's –

"You hit Echo?" Hunter half shrieks, and he knows everyone instantly turns to stare at him, and he sounds way, way too childish, but they don't do that. They changed everything so Echo would feel safe there because he wanted them and he's the first and only person who ever chose them. "You don't hit people! You never..." He cuts himself off, sighing.

It figures, actually – Wrecker's apparently left somewhere, and Hunter has so many questions about that, and Omega just said something implying that she blames Echo for that, and – of course, everything fell apart without him.

"I don't remember what happened after Ryloth," Hunter goes for – what? There's literally no eloquent way to say this. "I remember Crosshair – and then I woke up like this. I think there was something... something happened between then I don't remember. Someone was there – I think he might've been a Jedi, but he said he wasn't. He brought me back somehow. I never asked why."

"Whoever you are," Echo says, and he sounds sharp. He's grieving. They all are. Because in their minds, Hunter's dead. "Hunter's gone."

"No one does," the cyborg had said bitterly, about someone knowing him, and Hunter finds he can relate to that far more than he is proud of. No one knows him, because he's supposed to be dead, and it would've been easier even if that's selfish. Coming back to a different world is even harder than the gutting moment he saw Crosshair shoot him.

"I can't explain it," Hunter insists, shaking his head. "I don't know why... but he brought me here. I don't know why he helped me, either."

He can't read Omega's expression. Echo is angry. Tech snatches up his datapad, and Hunter stills automatically, as Tech scans him. He's done it so many times over that there's nothing to it. This is familiar. This is – where he wants to be.

Just like Omega had said about herself.

"Wait here," Tech says, moving for the back. Hunter watches him, because that's easier than staring at how Omega is pressed up against Echo's side, clinging to the hand he has on her shoulder.

Tech comes back with the scanner he'd used for their chips on Bracca, which is weird, but Hunter suspects it's... something about the brain scanner. Hunter knows his brain is different than the regs because of his mutations, and he assumes that's why.

He has no idea what it's like at this point, either. Is this him from the past, or was he just de-aged? Nothing about this makes sense. Hunter doesn't really care, either, except he needs to see Wrecker again and – actually, he has no idea how to handle any of this.

Cid will laugh at him.

He'd laugh at himself if he didn't want to cry so badly.

He feels so stupidly small next to Tech – it's insane when it's one of his little brothers. At least their normal height difference is only a couple feet. He stands there for a few minutes, waiting, until Tech takes it off and sets it on the floor.

There's recognition in his eyes now, though he still looks hurt and lost.

Young.

He looks young.

Hunter doesn't know which of them moves first, but somehow, he ends up pressed against his little brother's chest, arms around his neck. Tech doesn't hug people, but he is now, and something in Hunter's chest cracks and wrenches and he gasps as tears flood his eyes and slip down his cheeks.

Tech's hand is pressed against his back, holding him close. "I'm sorry," Hunter mutters into his shoulder. "I should've known he was out there."

"Don't," Tech orders firmly, pulling him back. He always does well at hiding his emotions, but Hunter knows him, and he can see them. "It was not your request to return to Ryloth. The point of the diversion was to distract him."

"It wasn't your fault, either," Hunter argues. He wipes his face off on his sleeve, sniffing. Come on. Really? He's nine. Not four. He doesn't get to cry about everything and nothing at all. It's fine. He's alive. He's alive – there's nothing to fuss about. How childish can he get? How is he supposed to be their leader when he can't stop acting so – so – ugh.

"Then you're not fit to lead this squad," Crosshair's voice hisses in his mind, and he winces.

Going to Ryloth was Omega's idea. She'd insisted, and Hunter couldn't refuse. He – he should have. He turns back to Echo and Omega, who are still standing side-by-side.

"How?" Omega whispers, still squeezing Echo's hand.

"I don't know," he confesses, "It doesn't make sense to me either, but I'm here."

Omega inhales a sort of half-gasp, half-sob and tackles him. Hunter yelps, stumbling back, and Tech grabs his shoulder, so he doesn't fall. It's ridiculous. Omega's not heavy. At all. Well, at least little-him isn't scrawny. Crosshair was at this age.

Omega buries her face in his shoulder, shaking. He feels his tunic slowly soaking with wetness, and Hunter hugs her back awkwardly. "I'm okay, kid," he mumbles to her. "I'm okay. Even if I'm tiny."

She lets out a choaking laugh-sob, squeezing him tighter.

"Where's Wrecker?" Hunter asks, looking up at Echo, because while he's very, very glad he hasn't already had all his ribs broken by his way-too-strong little brother, he also really wishes Wrecker were here for that to be a concern. He needs to know he's okay. Hunter had been so afraid they might have died, or – or something. Something else just as bad.

Echo visibly winces. He looks guilty.

The dread inside him grows tenfold.

"Rex... requested we retrieve a contact of his on Daro," Tech interjects, "But the mission rapidly went sideways. It was a massive Imperial facility. Echo insisted on entering himself when we did not agree." Hunter slowly looks from Tech back to Echo. "We entered to retrieve him. Wrecker had gone to cause a diversion. We were... overwhelmed, and the Marauder was damaged in our attempted escape."

"You left Wrecker," Hunter repeats, feeling sick, "Inside an Imperial facility?!"

"Why did you think I hit Echo?"

Ugh. Fair, but still! "That doesn't mean you can hit him!"

Tech looks far more apologetic from Hunter yelling at him than Echo's annoyance – no surprise there. The one person he's always receptive to is Hunter.

"We need to finish fixing the Marauder," Omega pipes up finally. "We hafta go back to get him."

"Yeah," he agrees, and they finally peel apart from each other. Hunter has to pause by Echo, anyway, because he just – he can't believe this happened.

They left Wrecker.

They already left Crosshair.

And got him killed.

This – Hunter has no idea how this is happening. "Echo," he whisper-hisses, grabbing his hand which feels way too high over his head. "What's always made us different is that we – we don't leave each other. We always put each other first. That's what we were supposed to do." He wants to cry again. He feels so... lost. So helpless. He hates it.

"I know," Echo sighs, "But one of our brothers was in there, and he needed our help. I couldn't turn my back on him."

For Echo, it's always about what's right. It's not about each other. He feels far, far more hurt than he ought to be.

Hunter pulls back from him, heading for the door, because he just – there's nothing more to say about it. He feels empty inside. Gutted. He wants to curl up in a ball of misery in a corner and just be. He's so tired. So much happened, and he feels lost. He really, really is lost, and there's no objecting to that. It's a fact.

He pauses midway down the ramp as Echo calls his name after him. "It's good to have you back," he admits, "It's just... a lot to process."

Hunter makes a sound of agreement. He gets that. Echo thought he was dead. It can't be easy to have him dumped back on them when they thought they'd never see him again.

**w**

Finishing the ship doesn't take long, and Tech calls them back aboard as he gets the engines on. Omega's already up at the front, itching to get back there which is the last thing Hunter wants to do, but Wrecker needs them. He's captured by the Empire, and they have to get him back. It's not even a question, no matter how far downhill this could go. It'll be hard when he's so small, though.

Tech leans over the controls, expression tightening as he reports Wrecker's comm was activated and that he's been transferred off Daro. "He appears to be headed for Kamino," Tech reports.

Hunter promised Omega she'd never have to go back there. So much for that, but that isn't the greatest of his worries. That's what'll happen there. Hunter sighs. "It's a trap," he warns.

"But we have to get him back!" Omega protests.

He tries his best not to think about how this is so much like what happened before Ryloth.

"Considering the circumstances, I would say we have little choice," Tech points out, "Wrecker is there, and we cannot leave him."

"Our only advantage is that the Empire doesn't know about me," he asserts. Though why the Empire is trying to get all of them, he doesn't know. Doesn't matter, either – they just have to be fast, and hope against hope they don't get to Kamino to find Wrecker's – to find out that he's dead, too. Being on the receiving end was bad enough, and Hunter does not want to know what it would be like to lose one of his brothers, one of the only people who actually matters to him.

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