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Children could not become soldiers.
This was explained to Boba when he was very young, or young enough. It was a simple matter of muscle development and coordination. They could not satisfyingly build up muscle; developing nerves did not retain muscle memory. Children could point a gun and shoot, but they were not capable of battle tactics in any successful manner. Children could make fine lackeys, trained in nothing else but how to follow orders, but a leader was made and not born. When math and science could be taught by flash training in the matter of hours, when resilient brains didn’t need social training, why bother stretching out long wastes of time?
Personally, Boba found all of these points highly convenient affirmations meant to support a straight-forward truth: that Jango Fett really, really, really didn’t like children.
The minute Slave II hit hyperspace, Boba screamed.
He pushed his chair away from the console, sending it spinning on the thin railing that kept the single pilot easily moving between pilot, co-pilot, nav, and weapon stations. He punched a fist in the air and yelled again, letting his voice echo throughout the durasteel chambers of the narrow ship, before yelling a final time for good measure.
“Free!” Boba cried, entirely because nobody could hear him. “Free, free, free, free!”
The adrenaline rush from the one hour fight was fading, but the sheer euphoria was pumping him full of energy again. He hopped up from the chair, grabbing one of the ceiling’s handholds and swinging on it just for an excuse to kick his legs. The ship jerked a little, unfortunately reminding Boba that he had forgotten to set the controls to autopilot, and he kicked away from the handhold to land in the pilot’s chair again, swiveling over to double-check the coordinates.
Speed: as fast as possible. Trajectory: away from Dad. Destination: as far away from Kamino as possible. Idea: intelligent. Dedication: unmatched. Soldier: super. Handsomeness:
“Stars,” Boba whispered, eyes widening. “I can have sex now.”
Idea: best idea .
It wasn’t neccesarily about the sex. Dad had dumped him off at a brothel when he was fifteen and told him to get it out of his system. The only thing Boba had gotten out of his system was the desire to have his father instruct him to behave in developmentally appropiate ways so he could return to the murdering and shooting. He was going to do developmentally appropriate things because he wanted to. Now Boba could do so much more than the murdering and shooting. He had options. So many options!
Boba sat in mounting terror over the sheer quantity of options.
But the terror was what Dad wanted. He hadn’t exactly stolen a submarine and proclaimed that he was going to run off to live with the nephilim-krakens, like the Commandos’ first attempts to unionize. This was different. This was independence. This was difference .
Boba kicked back on his chair instead, blasting his favorite pop-punk anti-authoritarian albums, steadily pumping self-confidence into his bloodstream. It was easy, because he was a genius. A hunter knows where he’s going, knows how to get there, and knows what he’ll do once he’s there. Check. A hunter has the means, motive, and opportunity. Check. Boba had motivation in spades. There were no circumstances in which he’d come crawling back. He’d rather live in a tidepool. He’d rather live in a whirlpool.
Time for step .5: the most selfless and generous step.
Boba swung his chair around to the nav station, plotting out a drop from hyperspace. He wasn’t so much using a hyperlane as piloting very fast down an almost invisible dirt road in the vague assertion that he would eventually reach the single most hick hyperlane in the Outer Rim. From that hick hyperlane you could eventually reach proper Hutt Space, scare the highwaymen and enforcers away with the prestigious name of your legendary ship - the sequel! - and eventually maybe reach an actual pathway into the Core.
It was two weeks to Coruscant, best case scenario. The longest trip Boba had ever taken by himself was into Hutt Space. But that was fine! Dad had never pulled over into Space Buc-ees, and now Boba could pull into all the Space Buc-ees he wanted. He could buy fast food now - bantha sandwiches fried in fat, blue milk pancakes… and have sex without parental approval…
The ship rattled and jerked, shaking out of hyperspace. Boba blinked the white streaks out of his eyes, letting them adjust back to the pitch-black. He could swear that the black was blacker out here in Wild Space. It wasn’t as if there was light pollution or sound in space, but sometimes it felt as if having other planets within a few light years made the black seem like a color instead of a sinking nothing. As if the lack of sound was a quiet purposefully kept instead of the crushing emptiness of silence. If you turned off your ship’s engine and let it float dead in space, you could almost hear the nothing.
He slid slightly to the left towards the comms array, punching in the long distance coordinates before the highly familiar comms number. He made a point of arranging himself before the call went through, kicking up his heels on the console and folding his hands behind his head. His ship was especially modded to handle the calls to Kamino - the place was so off the grid it didn’t know the definition of a line - but he still had to suffer through the awful dial-up sound until a small figure flickered onto the holodisc, image crackling and fuzzy.
It was difficult to make out Alpha-17’s features through the terrible connection, but he didn’t really need to. What was there to look at?
Just to assert his authority, Boba Fett jumped in first. “Boba Fett calling in. You’ll never guess where I am, vod’ika !”
“Is it off Kamino?” Alpha-17 panned. Like the rest of the Commandos, the guy was so serious it was painful. His most pleasant facial expression was attentively listening to instructions. And he even did that grouchily. “Because trust me, everybody knows.”
“Really?” Boba asked, pleased. “I haven’t even been gone a few hours. It made that big a splash, huh?”
“It’s not every day one of us escapes Kamino because of a hissy fit,” Alpha-17 said flatly. Boba opened his mouth to contest the ‘one of us’ thing before closing it. He was not on Team Dad today. It was Team Clone all the way. “Prime’s totally blowing it off but I think you’re giving the Batch 2s some bad ideas.”
That was a problem. The Batch 2s had all of the confidence of the Batch 1s with none of their Dad-installed competence. They were also tremendous bullies and occasionally hilariously sociopathic, but that was probably just because they were thirteen. Boba opened his mouth to comment on it, but instead what he ended up saying was, “He’s blowing it off?”
“What are you, actually eight? He’s not reprimanding you and you’re complaining about it?” Not this again. “If one of us pulled this shit we’d be on the chopping block.”
Boba waved a hand, ignoring the familiar ugly squirm in his gut. “Please. You’re his real favorite. If you did it then he’d commend you for your valor and initiative. I bet he’s just calling me a brat.”
“Because you’re being a brat.”
“I’m still older than you,” Boba retorted. It had become an unfortunately familiar refrain among himself and the Commandos. “Don’t give me that brat shit, you’re the one who’s never left Kamino.”
“We’re nineteen,” Alpha-17 snapped testily. Boba snorted. “You’re eighteen and you’re acting like it, so cut the crap.”
“I was decanted six months before you were,” Boba said loudly, “so last time I checked that definitely makes me older -”
“We’re both eight!”
“So which is it?” Boba demanded. “Or am I older, younger, and the same age as you?”
“Shut up with your logic tricks,” Alpha-17 snapped, which Boba took as the win. The Commandos always got tetchy every time Boba could actually answer Dad’s riddles. And they were the creative, tactical ones. It got kind of sad sometimes, like Boba was constantly surrounded by a million massif puppies running around underfoot. “I don’t know or care what you and Prime fought about. He’s blowing you off as doing teenage boy shit, but Prime’s not a patient man. If you aren’t back here within the day he’s going to blow his jet fuel.”
“Then it’s a good thing I’m not coming back.” Boba dropped his legs from the console, leaning forward so he could stare Alpha-17 in the eyes. Between the flickering of the holoimage, he could just barely tell that Alpha-17 still looked unimpressed. “This is it. My ship’s packed, my room’s cleaned out, and I’m not coming back to Kamino. I’m an adult and I’ve made the decision that I don’t need Dad controlling every second of my life like he controls yours. I’m already a bounty hunter, and I’m done with my training. So you just turn right around and tell him that.” He paused a beat, fully aware that Dad’s favoritism only went so far. “Or send him this recording.”
Alpha-17 was silent for a long moment, jaw working. For the first time, Boba wished he could see the expression on his face. Alpha-17 didn’t really like Boba, but he was a brother that even Dad couldn’t deny. He probably hadn’t intended for them to keep interacting out of Alpha-17’s childhood and early training, well into his adulthood on the cusp of his deployment, but Boba was a son and not a soldier. If he had wanted somebody who jumped when he said how high, who never played with eager tubies tugging at his shirt, then he should have ordered a soldier.
Finally, Alpha-17 said, “Prime’s made you delusional.”
“Shut up about that -”
“Nobody cares that you’re made to kill the Jedi instead of serve them,” Alpha-17 said shortly, and Boba shut up. “That just sounds like a longer leash to me instead, Boba.”
“I know! Why do you think I’m leaving?” Boba couldn’t be a real beroya , an actual hunter, tied to Dad like this. Dad had raised a true Mandalorian, not an add-on. When would he get that? “Dad raised me to be a beroya and that’s exactly what I’ll do. When I’m rich and successful and a Jedi killer he’ll see that I’m right. I can’t become a named warrior if I’m constantly trailing at Dad’s heels. He has faith in me. He’ll understand one day.”
“You don’t get to decide when that happens, Boba,” Alpha-17 said, and Boba fell silent. “He decides when you leave. He decides when you kill the Jedi. You know he doesn’t want independence from you. You’re lucky that he’s expected you to do this, but the minute you go too far you’re going to see what happens to us when we fill our heads with that independence you keep talking about.”
The squirming feeling in Boba’s gut drew tighter, making his heart vibrate with a strange tension and filling his belly with weak nausea. “I’m not disrespecting Dad. This is what he wants for me.”
“Really independent of you, vod ,” Alpha-17 said. He sighed and scrubbed the back of his head, perfectly aware of how uncomfortable Boba felt. “I’ll pass this onto him. Just know that I warned you.”
Of course. “Nobody knew, nobody was involved, and everybody else told me to be a good little clone,” Boba panned. “And you’re all the good ones.”
“You could be a good one if you just tried,” Alpha-17 said. “We all know you’re capable.”
Boba hung up on him.
No more brothers out there in the black. No more teenagers running around yelling their heads off and no more small children yelling even louder. No more wrestling matches, fightfights, grudge matches, pit fights, dares, fishing expeditions, or flight sims. No more Alphas 1-100, endlessly smug that they were just two centimeters taller than him, and no more little CC group that was composed of both the weirdest and most competent clones around. No tubies, an age that he had never been.
“My gratitude to the stars ,” Boba said loudly. He stood up from the chair, cracking his neck. “Tired of looking at my own damn face, anyway.”
Something rustled.
Boba froze.
He slipped his blaster into his hand. He craned an ear, immediately picking out the direction the sound had come from. It could have been the cargo on the lower deck rattling around in hyperspace - but that would have been muffled. It was sharp, quick, like the rattling of a grate. Straight above him. But the cockpit was on the highest level of the ship. The only thing above his head was the black box and the cooling unit, complete with a miniscule storage compartment for emergency oxygen masks and space suits - left empty, since Boba’s top quality beskar’gam could seal for space readiness. Not very securely , but he could survive in the vacuum in a pinch.
Boba eyed the console speculatively. Very, very, very carefully, Boba crawled on top of the console. He carefully balanced at the very rim, feet half-hanging off the side and carefully avoiding every button or switch. He really didn’t feel like blowing himself up in hyperspace. The g-forces compressed your corpse into a five cm cube.
With complete silence, Boba reached up and unlatched the hatch to the storage compartment.
Obviously, a child fell out.
He managed to save himself halfway down the fall, hooking his legs on the rim of the hatch just in time and saving himself from cracking his head open on the pilot’s chair. It did not, however, save him from the indignity of hanging upside down from the storage compartment by his legs, swinging ignobly as he made offended sounds of protest.
The first thing Boba registered was a mop of blonde hair, and his brain immediately jumped to Rex. But even Rex was larger than this cadet, and he kept his hair shaved down to the skull anyway. Boba hopped off the console, walking around until he could see the figure’s face. To his credit, the kid looked very sheepish.
“I can explain?”
“Oh, you better explain,” Boba said shortly. He knew that he cut an intimidating figure in full beskar’gam , and every younger cadet was suitably terrified of the very oldest. To the cadets, the image of power was an eighteen year old. Their deity, of course, was pushing forty. “Can you explain to me what you’re doing hiding away in my ship, cadet?”
“Uhh…” The cadet dangled loosely on the rim, unbothered by the strain. “Yeah, give me a second.”
“You get three before I knock you off that hatch,” Boba said. “One. Two .”
“Hey, hey, that’s unfair -”
Boba opened his mouth to hit three and promptly break the skull of a small child before he stopped. The cadet’s whiny voice was…a little high pitched.
Boba slowly craned his head until he was almost looking upside down. He mentally transposed a short ponytail on the shaggy blonde curls. He mentally put the figure in a little labcoat.
“Kriff me,” Boba said, “ Omega ?”
“Uh,” Omega said, hands dangling downwards, “I really can explain.”
“Acceptable.”
Boba lowered the blaster, struggling with its weight. It was a rifle, the barrel as long as his torso, and he fought not to wobble as Jango squinted at the flashing accuracy readouts on the screen. Boba squinted with him, in the opposite direction.
“Seventy percent accurate,” Jango announced. Boba applied the ‘acceptable’ label onto seventy percent for future reference. “You were at sixty percent yesterday. You’re a quick learner.” Boba experimentally poked Jango with the muzzle of the gun. Jango stepped out of reach. “Don’t do that, it’s dangerous.” Boba stepped forward and did it again, and Jango finally pried the blaster out of his hands. “Stop it! Don’t you know what dangerous means?”
Boba stared up at him. He squinted.
Jango sighed, setting the blaster to safety mode and holding it carefully away from Boba. This consideration for child safety would not stop him from continuing to teach Boba marksmanship. He had the complete expectation that Boba would be capable of perfection, and he was simply waiting for Boba to catch up to that perfection. The certainty was gratifying. “Your body is ten and you barely talk. They gave you five languages, you should be able to talk.”
Boba squinted up at him, looking for accuracy readouts and finding none.
Jango held the blaster further away, as if he wouldn’t give it back unless Boba did what he said. “Just say something, will you?”
It was an incentive. Obediently, Boba said, “Something.”
Jango looked at him, unimpressed. “Tell me that you understand what I’m saying.”
“You understand what I’m saying,” Boba mimicked.
Jango rubbed his forehead. “That’s fine. That’s fine. Your brain is…still cooking. Can’t expect you to understand all of this two weeks in. Another month or so is far better than ten years. I just have to be patient.”
Boba grinned toothily at Jango, who seemed somewhat startled. “You’ll understand what I’m saying in a month!”
Jango blinked at Boba, startled, before realization dawned over his face. “You’re fu - messing with me, aren’t you.” Boba giggled into his hands, and Jango relaxed. “That’s good. That’s a good sign. You’ll be along in no time, ad .”
He cleaned up the weapons, carefully demonstrated so Boba could mimic him, and packed everything away. The shooting gallery was fresh and clean, the slight electric smell from the replicator machine lingering in the walls, and the Kamino’s contractors - a strange, fish-like species that blinked but never spoke - were busy building more rooms for future waves of fresh cadets. Boba liked to wander around and watch-wide eyed as the contractors built the home and the Kaminoans built the inhabitants. The contractors didn’t let him touch the vibrosaws and the Kaminoans didn’t let him touch the genetic splicers, but they probably would when he was older. He could help.
When they exited back into the shining white hallway, Boba reached out and grasped Jango’s fingers. Jango looked down, startled again, and Boba happily squeezed Jango’s fingers. He slowly adjusted Boba’s grip until he was holding Boba’s hand, the small and smooth unbroken skin swallowed by the coarse hair and tough calluses.
“You do it like this.” They stood in the hallway next to each other, Boba experimentally pulling at Jango’s hand as he patiently let him. “Like this, see?”
Boba swung their hands in a smooth arc, like the curve of a thrown grenade in the air. “Like this!”
They stood in the skeletal hallway, devoid of life or the ability to support life, and swung their hands together. Jango still seemed confused, as if he didn’t understand these things any more than Boba did, and Boba watched curiously as fear seemed to shadow at the tail of confusion.
“Come on, enough of that.” Jango tugged him forward, and Boba obediently let him tow him along. “We have to assess your spatial reasoning now. How do you feel about standardized testing?”
“Uh…”
They dodged the construction crews and returned to the apartment, hand in hand. Once they stepped inside, Jango wrinkling his nose at the plasteel prefab smell, Boba broke free and started running around. He hopped on the furniture and hopped off, laughing, and immersed himself in the joy of jumping as Jango shed the outer layer of his armor and disappeared into his room.
When he came back he had a stack of datapads and flimsi in his hands, and Boba casually started tossing cushions off the couch as Jango deposited them on the kitchen table. He looked up just as Boba sent a throw pillow flying, letting it land limply on a side table and collapse with a wheeze.
“What are you doing? Don’t do that!”
Boba froze, cushion held above his head in preparation for the inevitable. “Don’t do what?”
“ That ! Stop wrecking the place!”
“Hm,” Boba said. He attempted to interpret the question and failed. He tossed the pillow above his head, letting it spin in the air and bounce off the couch. “What’s that?”
Jango looked a little dazed. He pinched the bridge of his nose hard. Boba mimicked him. He held his breath experimentally, before realizing that he needed to breathe. “Wrecking is when you…please come sit down. Please.”
This wasn’t fun anymore anyway. Boba hopped off the couch and trotted over to the table, scrambling onto a chair and kicking his feet in the air. Jango sat down next to him, slipping a datapad out of the pile and putting a piece of flimsi in front of Boba. He put a stylus next to it.
“How are you at calculus?”
The answer, of course, was that Boba was great at calculus.
Jango had to show him how to hold the stylus, and how to press it firmly to the flimsi and make marks, but afterwards Boba happily sketched out his physics problems with ruthless simplicity. Jango checked his work and slid him a new page as he finished each one, and the topics began to range from math to science to slicing.
Boba started doodling little boxes on the geometric proofs halfway through finishing yet another mathematics page. He stuck his tongue out, coloring in the triangle diagrams with more triangles and boxes. Jango looked up from checking his work, staring at Boba’s work as he slowly drew over it.
“Are you bored or something?” Boba kept drawing, so Jango tapped on the flimsi to get his attention. Enunciating slowly, he said, “Are you bored? You don’t want to do that anymore?” Boba nodded vigorously. Jango sighed. “They were supposed to increase your focus. Alright, give it here.”
When Boba looked at the clock, he saw that they had been testing for an hour. He wondered if Jango knew many children.
Boba kicked his legs and watched Jango assess the scores. His face was stone, and Boba couldn’t tell what he was thinking. Boba was halfway out of his chair to start tossing things around again by the time that he looked up.
“Okay,” Jango said finally. Boba mouthed the word ‘okay’ to himself. “These are…very good. And you just come with theorems?” Boba didn’t know what that meant, so he just stared blankly. “Right. What else do you come with…”
He pushed the papers aside and grabbed a datapad. It was a very familiar datapad. Boba had seen it a lot so far, and it was mostly pulled out whenever Jango was trying to decide if he should give Boba a rocket launcher. Or when he just looked stressed in general.
“You aren’t augmented physically,” Jango muttered to himself. Most of the things Jango said seemed to be to himself. “I asked for optimization , not a super-soldier. Don’t trust anybody who calls themselves a super-soldier, Boba. They’re always just spice addicts. Spending half your life and all your money on spice isn’t warrior material.”
“Uh,” Boba said.
“Life lesson.” Jango nodded firmly, clearly congratulating himself. “Right. Where’s the freaking index on this thing… life skills, life skills…I should have paid more attention to this part. I want a damn lawyer….here we go.” Jango held up the datapad, squinting slightly at it. Boba squinted at a piece of flimsi next to him before dragging it over and scribbling on it with the stylus. “It says…this is all wilderness survival. That’s not life skills. Yes, I know he can swim…what? This is useless.”
“Useless life skills?” Boba asked.
“Everything I asked for is in here…but why didn’t I even stop to think…” He looked up at Boba, who was clearly confused. “Okay, come on, get up. It’s assessment time.”
Assessment, this time, meant walking five steps into the kitchen and standing inside the kitchen. Boba experimentally started banging drawers until Jango pulled him away, placing him square in front of the electric stove. He turned a knob, and Boba watched in fascination as a circle near the front grew red.
Jango stood back, crossing his arms. He looked at Boba expectantly. Boba looked at him expectantly.
“Go on,” Jango said.
Boba wondered where he was supposed to go.
“We’re assessing your domestic survival skills. Go on, do what you would do.” Boba slowly reached out for the handle of a drawer. “No, not that.” Boba clasped the handle. “No.” Boba opened the drawer. “Boba, please don’t -”
After fulfilling the inscrutable exhortations of his soul, Jango successfully redirected Boba back towards the object of assessment. Boba stared at the stove, wrinkling his face as he felt the heat emanate from it. It was warm and nice. Kamino was always just a little humid, perpetually running slightly cool, and the heat felt nice.
Boba was pretty sure the hot stove would feel nice, so he reached out and smacked his hand on the growing orange circle.
At first, his hand just jerked away. Boba had only enough time to wonder why before his hand started exploding in pain. His skin felt red-hot, as if it wanted to peel away from his hand, and the pain overwhelmed Boba’s senses.
“Okay,” Boba faintly heard Jango say, barely perceptible over the consuming pain, “so that’s the first assessment you’ve failed.”
Boba burst into tears.
He had never cried before, but he knew how to do it. It was easy, like swimming or calculus. It was like the pain had built up in his chest until it threatened to burst him apart, and his tears were how it escaped.
He didn’t want to fail an assessment. He didn’t want to be in pain. He didn’t want any of this to be happening, but he couldn’t make it stop. He couldn’t leave the room and leave it behind; he couldn’t make Jango take it away or give it back to him.
“Jango!” Boba sobbed, born from an impulse that he did not understand. “Jango, please! Jango, please stop it!”
Legendary warrior and greatest bounty hunter in the galaxy Jango Fett abruptly panicked. He froze the second Boba broke into tears, as if he had no idea that Boba was even capable of it, and as Boba continued calling his name he grew more and more panicked.
“Oh no. Oh no, oh no - please stop crying, Boba, it’s alright. Come on, Boba, come on.” He stepped over, quickly bending down to pull Boba’s hand away from where Boba was clutching it hard to his chest. “See, it’s just a… big - Boba, please, come on. Daddy’s here, Boba, it’s going to be okay. Let’s get you some bacta, come on.”
Jango efficiently packed Boba away to the fresher, where a gigantic med kit was stored under the sink. Jango put Boba on the rim of the bathtub as he crouched on the floor and dug around in the med kit for bacta, strangely frantic.
The pain was beginning to subside - or Boba was no longer so overwhelmed with it. He was still sniffling, but he reached out with his unburned hand and picked out the bacta gel. He started rotely applying it to his hand, rubbing it in carefully and cooling the pain as Jango eventually stopped and stared at him.
He was about to start wrapping bandages around his hand to set the bacta when Jango grabbed the bandages first, quickly taking Boba’s wrist. “I have better dexterity, let me do that. Do something - what, you have first aid protocols but not ‘don’t touch the damn stove’ protocols? Fucking - I’m sorry, I shouldn’t curse -”
“I’m sorry I failed the assessment, Jango!” Boba sniffed hard, before breaking out into tears again. “I didn’t want to!”
For some reason, that made Jango panic even more. “Don’t worry about the assessments,” Jango said quickly, wrapping his hand tight. He was right: his hands were calm and steady, where Boba’s would have been fumbling. “No more assessments. You get a perfect in assessments. You get a perfect in everything, Boba. You’re perfect.”
Despite himself, Boba couldn’t help but brighten. “I’m perfect?”
“Yes,” Jango said empathetically, tightening a bandage. “Cushions and drawers and all. Bang all the drawers you want.” This was a highly promising sign for Boba’s future happiness. Jango must have caught the look on his face, because he quickly added, “Do you do that because it’s fun? If you - if you cry, then you like fun, right? We can get you toys. All the toys you want, no more assessments - just don’t do that again.”
“Do what?”
Jango faltered. Boba’s hand was neatly and perfectly wrapped, but Jango hadn’t removed his own hand yet. His thumb was on Boba’s wrist, as if he was feeling for the pulse. “Scare me.”
Boba didn’t know how to do that. He didn’t even know if he could. Jango seemed scared all the time. Scared, anxious, unsettled. He was tough and calm in front of the Kamino and the contractors, but when it was just him and Boba he always seemed to be teetering on the edge of some great precipice.
But he had the feeling that Jango wasn’t used to being scared - or that he hadn’t been scared for a very, very long time, and that looking at Boba always brought him back to that strange and foreign place a long time ago when he had last felt this scared.
Slowly, Boba said, “Jango? What’s Daddy?”
Jango froze. Every centimeter of his body stilled, and Boba felt a little bad. He had already scared him again. Finally, Jango said, “Where’d you hear that?”
“From you. You said -”
“Right,” Jango said quickly. He looked down at Boba’s hand - at his hands, folded over Boba’s. “Well. I suppose that’s me.”
“Really?” Boba asked. “You said you were Jango.”
Jango didn’t say anything for a long second. He didn’t stop staring at his and Boba’s hands, intertwined. After a minute, he said, “I haven’t felt a lot like Jango lately. I keep on doing things…and feeling things…that Jango wouldn’t. I don’t know how to - but that’s obvious.” He stopped short, then started again. “I guess that’s me now. I hadn’t really…”
“Hadn’t really what?”
“Never mind,” Jango said quickly - almost guiltily. He released Boba’s hands, and before either of them could register it or think about it, he leaned in and hugged Boba tightly.
It was a strange sensation. It should have felt constricting, like Jango was an enemy trying to put him in a chokehold. But, for some reason - the same reason that made Boba cry out for Jango when he was in pain - it made the hurt in his hand go away.
“I guess Daddy would be me,” Jango whispered. “I guess that’s me.”
And Boba just hugged him back, burying his face into his shoulder. “Okay, Daddy.”
“ - and you’re the only one other than Jango who ever makes trips off-world. Your ship is much easier to sneak onto than Jango’s, and your pattern of established behavior is very clear. I merely waited for my moment, like a marsh-slither hunting a crimson slug, and when I heard your fight with Jango I struck and snuck onto your ship. That is my explanation.” Omega folded his hands on the table, neatly avoiding the sticky smears on the linoleum. “I am very similar to marsh slithers, but I think I’m going to grow up to become a Corellian sand panther. Did you know their claws are venomous? I think I can design venomous claws.”
“You can’t grow up to become an animal.”
“Not literally . It’s about letting their spirit into your body. I’ve already made my own venomous claws.”
“You know what,” Boba said slowly, dragging over the wide flimsi menus scattered on the sticky and tacky table and shoving it at him, “Why don’t you pick something out to eat.”
Omega brightened.
Of course, Omega’s explanation was not much of an explanation at all. He gave an extensive explanation of the logistics, but accidentally skipped over all of the actual information that Boba wanted to know. He could already tell that Omega was a very literal person. Which made sense - it wasn’t as if the Kaminoans had taught him any social skills beyond a customer service voice.
Boba knew Omega, but not well. He was holed up in the Medical Wing where they housed the defects. Most of the clones thought Omega was a very creative defect, but Boba knew that Omega was so over-designed that it was a miracle his brain wasn’t leaking out of his ears. He was a living science experiment for the Kamino, every brain wave monitored, and Boba was pretty sure that they tweaked him every few weeks. The Kamino didn’t like waste, so he spent most of his time not on an operating table or in an observation room acting as a laboratory assistant.
That was how Boba knew him. He had check-ups with the Kamino every three months, and for the last few years he could usually see Omega running around with a little scanner and pressing mysterious buttons on one of those big consoles that Boba wasn’t allowed to touch. He was also apparently biologically female, which was just weird.
Apparently he was Boba’s one and only batchmate: the two mostly unaltered clones, one for you and one for me. One to serve as a prototype and lab rat, the other to rapid-develop to physiologically ten within the tube so he could exit a soldier ready for perfection. By the end of the road neither of them could be called unaltered - Boba did not have a human’s brain - but they were the only two clones without the programming every other clone had. This meant that Boba had always felt a strange pull towards him, as batchmates always did towards each other, but it also meant that their lives were so different that they were incomparable.
Dad knew he existed. A lot happened on Kamino that nobody else knew about, but it would be a little difficult to hide a full, highly visibly defective clone in the Medical Wing. But Dad never visited the Medical Wing, and although he always stared just a little too long at Omega he never said a personal word to him. It was impossible to tell how Omega felt about it.
Boba had only heard Dad say one thing to Omega. He was receiving his regular ‘is this weird clone getting weirder’ check-up, and Omega was operating the small and overly complicated machine that was testing his muscles. Dad had been standing next to him, but he had stared at Omega the entire time.
Finally, he said, “You don’t look anything like her.”
“Uh?” Omega had said.
He sounded a little frustrated. Boba tried to crane his head up to see the look on Dad’s face, but he was moderately strapped to a table. “I had a sister. You don’t look anything like her.”
“Uh,” Omega had said, “that’s kinda your fault, isn’t it?”
That was the last thing Dad ever said to Omega. Omega kind of deserved it.
It was probably for the best. If Omega had looked like Dad’s sister, he would definitely be the favorite. No question. Dad only talked about his sister when he was super drunk. Apparently she had died tragically or something. That was a running theme in Dad’s life, or what scraps Dad had shared about it. Boba was even named after her, kinda - Arla Bonita Ban Fett, her two middle names. Boba was terrified that Boba wasn’t actually a real name, but he was too cowardly to double-check.
The situation was problematic at best. Boba could not have sex with a physiological eight year old tagging along after him. There was no freedom associated with eight year olds. He had no doubt that Omega was more than capable of taking care of himself, but he seriously put a crimp in Boba’s hedonism plans. Forget about the bounty hunting ones. The Kamino had probably only given Omega the most rudimentary combat training. Without the clone’s soldier programming, what could an eight year old even do ?
After six tense hours in hyperspace, during which Omega was sentenced to the cargo hold and Boba was left to moan in the cockpit in peace, they finally reached the first truck stop. He fought hard to maneuver tightly between the docked giant freighters, some of them as long as a small moon, ballooned and lazily drifting in space. Omega, somehow liberated from his cargo hold, gave him backseat piloting tips.
The truck stop was like any other tacky Outer Rim truck stop off the beaten tourist track: half diner for the weary pilots, quarter droid recharge section for the droid components of the crew, and quarter tchotchke shop for the poor lost idiots who took the wrong turn at Tatooine. It was perched on a small, dusty moon straight off the course of a hyperlane, with space in front for planetary docking and a long series of atmospheric supports so the oversized ships could dock, and that was basically all it had going for it. The flickering gaslit sign in the window proclaimed it THE STOP AT THE END OF THE GALAXY, which was depressingly untrue.
Or maybe it was true, in its own weird way - that everything past this point was not real, or at least had no place in the galaxy. That serpentine aliens who crawled up from the sea could not live in a respectable society chained by morals and ethics, that artificial humans could not exist in the same space as organic ones, and that a small army of disgraced Mandalorians could never return to the society that they rejected. Or that rejected them.
That was, roughly, how Omega ended up running around gawking at desert themed keychains and flasks decorated with images of blasters as Boba silently chanted ‘I’m normal, I’m normal, I’m normal’ to himself in preparation for natborn interaction.
The human waitress approached them suspiciously fast. She had to be the owner - place couldn’t have a good profit margin if she couldn’t even afford a droid for waitressing. She smiled at the both of them, which made Omega blink in confusion and Boba smile very widely back in a perfect display of social competence. Omega quickly copied Boba, until they were all smiling at each other.
Then the waitress seemed to get weirded out, and she dropped the smile. Boba quickly dropped it too. After a beat, Omega followed. “Hello there, sweetie. Are y’all waiting on y’all’s folks?”
“I don’t have any parents,” Omega corrected eagerly. “I’m a genetic mistake.”
“I wasn’t conceived, if that’s what you mean,” Boba agreed. He held up the menu and pointed at it. “Can we have two orders of blue milk pancakes? I have five different forms of currency.”
The waitress stared at them for a long second. The holoscreen, attended to by two half-asleep vagrants, droned. Finally, she said, “I’ve never met a Mandalorian before.”
“Oh, we’re all like this,” Boba assured her. “Not a single parent between us. Someone walks in here claiming he has a son that left home very suddenly, he’s a liar. So - pancakes?”
The waitress accepted the pancake order. She refused the caff order, for reasons that upset and mystified Omega. The minute she walked away, scratching her head, and disappeared behind the swinging doors into the kitchen, Boba and Omega breathed a heavy sigh of relief.
“I think that went well,” Boba said.
Omega nodded fastidiously, very impressed with himself. “My first interaction with a human aruetii ! I knew I could do it!”
“I interact with aruetii all the time,” Boba felt the need to add. “I’m kind of the expert in it. The trick is to shoot them before they try to talk to you.”
Omega, unthankful for his big brother wisdom, looked dubious. “You didn’t shoot the waitress.”
“She wouldn’t have given us any pancakes if I shot her, dork. Think with your head.” Boba leaned back, folding his hands behind his head. The truck stop smelled strange and unique, nothing like prefab or duraplast or sweat at all. It was a strange smell, like a box that held wet training gear for too long. Everything was foreign and colorful in this space - even, to a strange degree, Omega. “We’re just two Mandalorian brothers out on a road trip. Nothing suspicious about us. Now all I have to do is get you home, and -”
But Omega’s face just twisted, sitting up empathetically in his vinyl booth seat. “Brother and sister . Not brothers!”
“Sister?” The word made no sense in relation to Boba. “What? Where?”
“ Me ,” Omega stressed. He pointed at himself empathetically, as if Boba had forgotten who he was. “I’m a girl, so I’m your sister!”
“What?” Boba stared at her blankly. “Seriously? That’s just a defect.”
“I have two Xesh chromosomes! I have all of the reproductive parts! That makes me a lady. So I’m your sister .”
“That’s not how gender works.” Or Boba was reasonably sure. The flash trainings on basic society were a while ago. “Look, Omega, don’t listen to Alpha-20. I’m not a jerk. I don’t walk around calling Rex ‘Blondie’, do I? I’m not going to define you by your sad little birth defect. You’re a…” He struggled for a proper word. He was not a strong, well-trained, or martial clone in any sense of the word. Maybe that’s why he was confused - not enough combat sims? “...intelligent clone. Have some pride.”
“I have pride.” Omega sunk in his seat a little, folding his arms. Left unsaid was the fact that he had nothing to be prideful about. “I’m not embarrassed to be different. I’m proud to be a girl.”
“You’re not a girl,” Boba said, in his ‘I’m the big brother so I know best’ voice. He got a lot of mileage out of that one. “You’re a clone.”
But Omega just sank lower in his seat and refused to say anything more.
Boba looked around, comfortable in the silence. The Holoscreen was churning out some news that made no sense to him, about a busted drug ring. Men clutching drinks slowly slumped over the table until, like mighty behemoths, they fell. Two Dugs Boba immediately recognized as bounty hunters were standing in front of a bulletin board, combing through flashing wanted posters and leaflets advertising a pirate crew’s stolen wares. Dad took Boba to those cargo bay sales sometimes so they could comb through for good stuff. Some of it was really weird. Boba had found a taxidermied Jawa one time.
Omega didn’t say anything until the waitress came back with their blue pancakes and small jars of curd. Boba immediately began scooping the curd into his mouth as Omega restlessly stabbed at his pancakes with a knife.
Weakly, as if he needed to convince Boba but knew that he couldn’t, Omega said, “If you get to pick your own names then why can’t I pick my own gender?”
Boba licked at his curd bowl before slowly putting it down. He picked at the edge of a pancake with one finger, grinding the goopy batter under his glove. Finally, he said, “I dunno. I’m not the natborns. Or Dad. If you wanna be a girl, then I don’t really wanna stop you.” He shrugged. “I guess I’ve had a sister for eight years. Weird.”
It wasn’t that big of a deal. But Omega’s face lit up in sheer, pure, powerful happiness - the kind that Boba had never seen, the kind that no clone ever felt - and Boba realized that it was a very big deal to him. Or her. He’d get used to it.
Did the Kamino know? Boba couldn’t remember how they referred to her. Did the Cuy’val Dar know? Some of them got super attached to their trainees, remembering all their names and boasting about them to Dad. Even boasting about the dumb stuff, like so-and-so finally getting over their fear of heights. But Omega didn’t really talk with any of them, did she? Whatever existed between her and the other defects, that was something only they knew.
Boba thought about an aunt, never met. Dad, of course, had always known.
“You don’t have to worry about me, I have it all planned out.” Omega picked up the top pancake before eagerly stuffing it in her mouth. Her eyes widened before she immediately spit it out. “It tastes so weird !”
“It’s called sweet. And don’t spit up on your plate. Wipe that up.”
Omega guiltily wiped it up before bundling up the napkin and dropping it down the small trash chute at the end of the table. She fished around in her little backpack - that was, in retrospect, suspiciously purple and sparkly - and held up a bound stack of flimsi. She flipped through it eagerly, showing off an unnecessary amount of diagrams. If Boba squinted, he could see stylized little cartoons. One of them showed a small figure with long hair and a dress holding a test tube. “I wrote it all down, see? Accounting for different probabilities and back-up plans, it’s a decision tree of about two hundred steps. We’re already four steps down into - look, stowed away on ori’vod ’s ship, make him agree into letting me travel with him -”
“What makes you think I’ve agreed to travel with you?”
“ - ride with him until we get to Coruscant -”
“How did you know I was going to Coruscant?”
“ - and then I can stay in a Women and Children’s Shelter!” Omega flipped the notebook around, proudly showing him a drawing of a lot of little girls in a big house doing experiments together. There was a name, address, coordinates, and comm number next to the drawing. “See, it’s a big house where women and children hang out and live for free. I’m a woman and a child, so it’s perfect. I’ll make friends with all the other girls, then I can get a job as a research assistant in a genetic synthesis laboratory. I have three years of job experience so I’m a shoo-in. Then I’ll have lots of friends and lots of money! And by then you’ll be really rich from bounty hunting, so we can live together in a two bedroom apartment in Coruscant’s Jungle District. That’s because I like plants. So what do you think?”
Boba stared at her. She stared back hopefully.
Finally, Boba said, “You don’t even know how to eat a pancake.”
Omega put the stack of flimsi down, almost pouting. “I have an eidetic memory, I can figure it out. It’s more of a plan than you have.”
It was, admittedly, more of a plan than he had. Boba’s plan was roughly ‘make it to Coruscant, falsify a lot of information, then become a bounty hunter’. In his defense, it was all he needed. Bounty hunting wasn’t hard . “To tackle the first problem in that plan,” Boba said, reaching out and tapping on the flimsi, “I’m not letting you ride with me. You are going straight back to Kamino where you can do your nerd stuff in peace. I’m dropping you off right back home after we get out of here.”
“No you aren’t,” Omega said blankly.
“ Excuse me, cadet -”
“But you aren’t ,” Omega protested. “Because that would mean going back to Kamino. And no matter what the reason is, you would rather die than go back home after only a day! You can’t put me on a commercial liner because there are no commercial liners to Kamino. You can’t call anybody to come pick me up because nobody leaves but you and Jango. And you’d rather die than talk to Jango right now. So you have to let me travel with you.”
Boba opened his mouth, then closed it. He felt extremely trapped. “Is this why you waited until Dad and I had a fight until you snuck on board.”
Omega slurped the next pancake cautiously. Judging from her wide eyes and delighted smile, she liked it much more than the first one. “Yeah, kinda.”
Boba was a tactical, strategic, and martial genius. He thought faster than any natborn human, and with his increased sensory capacity he could assess a situation in seconds. He also had an eidetic memory. Which is why he remembered that Omega had half a dozen brain mods designed for superior tactical thinking. Outwitted by the eight year old. Awful.
“The second problem,” Boba said quickly, vowing silently to never verbalize this, “is that you are not a legal citizen of the Republic. You can’t get a job or somewhere to live without ten different identifications. Clones aren’t even legally sentient.”
Which was super dumb. It was for a dumb reason, too - apparently the Kaminoans were actually the inventors of intelligent, sentient clones. It was a weird point of pride by association, like somebody from your hometown becoming a movie star. There were a hundred million cloned objects like organs, or million non sentient clones like livestock, but Boba and Omega might be the first successful sentient clones ever made.
Boba had snuck a peek at Dad’s contract with the Kaminoans and The Client years ago. It hadn’t made any sense then, but he understood now that the other clones were the legal liability of the Republic. Omega was actually legally Kamino, in a similar way that the genome sequencers were legally Kamino. And Boba…
“That’s why you’re going to score fake IDs,” Omega said, and Boba froze. “Probably with a contact on Coruscant you made while bounty hunting. I’ll just ask your contact to make me some too.”
“With what money?” Boba asked incredulously. “What makes you think I won’t just ditch you on Tatooine and fly off? You’re making a big gamble here that I actually want to help you. I don’t, by the way. I don’t want to help you.”
But Omega just looked downwards, tearing off a large shard of pancake and slowly nibbling at it. She liked it more and more as she ate it - accustoming herself to the sweetness, preparing herself to tolerate a good thing. She wouldn’t stop until she finished the whole plate. Boba hadn’t even touched his own. “You’re ori’vod . The ori’vod . Everybody always says…everybody always says that if you’re in trouble, Boba’ll help you. And I’m in trouble, so…”
Damn it. Boba sagged. The one thing she could have said.
Ori’vod was sacred to the clones because Boba had made it sacred. The Cuy’val Dar beat clan into their heads, taught them Mandalore, but Boba was the one who taught the clones to look out for each other. It was Dad’s fault, obviously - by the time Boba was old enough to understand that his promises about protection and family didn’t include the clones, it had already been too late. Granted, he might have started the ori’vod thing just because he wanted the children to worship him, but it was too late to backtrack now. He was about 90% certain that the natborns did not understand that a large chunk of clone culture was, actually, kind of his fault. Dad would ground him so hard.
“Why are you in trouble?” Boba asked, giving up on any pretense that Omega hadn’t hooked him. “What did you do wrong besides run away from home?”
“I didn’t do anything!” Omega protested immediately. “Honest, I swear, I’ve been good!”
“Then why are you in trouble?”
She looked down and played with her hands. Boba squinted at her. She nibbled on the edge of a pancake.
“Omega.” Boba pinned her down with the patented ‘I’m the ori’vod so tell me ’ stare. “Why are you in trouble?”
Omega took a deep breath.
“So the point of all the guys is that they’re going to go fight in the war and the point of you is that you do natborn things like you’re a natborn, but the only point of me is act as a test subject for the edits to the next batch of clones. Current projections for the beginning of the war place its first battle at two years from now, give or take a couple months depending on which senators get elected in the next election.
“The order was for two million clones, and the contract explicitly allows room for increased orders of clones. However, if my theory about the war is correct - I’m not going to talk about that, I think I might get disappeared - then it is only going to last for three to five years. Six years if one padawan survives to adulthood, two years if they do not. Taking into account the time it takes to grow a batch to adulthood, then taking into account how they’ll implement the super-rapid aging they prototyped on you on Batches 5 and 6, one can expect about six batches of clones over the course of maybe four years.
“At the end of those four years and once the six batches are completed, my purpose will be defunct. The soldier’s purpose will be fulfilled, and I still don’t know what’s going to happen to them. I’m working on it. But my purpose will be fulfilled too, and there’s nothing you can do with a lab rat for an experiment that no longer exists. I will be decommissioned. I will be decommissioned at best eight years from now. I will die in eight years without ever leaving Kamino. Or having a girlfriend. There are no girlfriends in Kamino, ori’vod . None. I can’t stay at home. I want to live past sixteen and I really, really, really want you to help me.”
Omega exhaled, a full-body motion that left her slumping over her table. She dejectedly started cramming her pancakes into her mouth as quickly as possible. Boba’s had long since gone cold. Boba stared at her, watching her nibbling desolately as batter smeared down her chin. She hadn’t touched the curd. She probably hadn’t realized that you’re supposed to spread it onto the pancakes.
Finally, Boba said, “You’re eight. Should you be thinking of this stuff?”
Omega threw up her hands, sending batter splattering everywhere. “I’m a supergenius! I have no choice!”
“Of course you have a choice.” Boba felt abruptly uncomfortable. Omega’s word vomit - projections, suppositions, guesses, nothing at all - had left him on the back foot. “You know, uh - sixteen years is a long time. That’s better than most of you guys get. And you don’t know that they’ll decommission you. Maybe the Kaminoans will - I don’t know, hire you to make more clones. There has to be more clients out there, right?”
Omega slanted him an unimpressed look. Boba fought the urge to sweat. She had a piercing gaze - a little like Fox’s, when he bothered to look at you instead of stare vaguely into the distance.
“The Kaminoans don’t care about us,” Omega said, which was a blatant statement of the obvious. “The Cuy’val Dar don’t care about me . It’s ‘cuz I’m a girl.” It’s because she wasn’t a soldier, but whatever. “And Jango can’t even look me in the eyes. He hates me. None of them care about me enough to keep me alive. I have to take care of myself. And everyone says us clones take care of each other, so that’s why I need you.”
“What’s with this ‘Jango’ stuff?” Boba snapped. It was better than focusing on the rest of it. On the idea of never living past sixteen. Sixteen had sucked, but seventeen had been so much better. “It’s disrespectful. Call him ‘Prime’ like the rest of you.”
“What do you mean the rest of you?” Omega protested. “You’re a clone like me, aren’t you? You and I are batchmates. And you learn the same stuff the soldiers do. If we’re vod’e , then what’s the difference?”
“I’m not like them,” Boba snapped. “I’m not even like you. They’re soldiers, you’re a scientist, but I’m Dad’s son . My mission is to carry on Dad’s legacy, rebuild our clan, and pass on his skills. Their mission’s just to go fight someone else’s honorless war for no pay. There’s no comparison. I’m not the one here with an expiration date.”
But Omega’s expression just intensified, as if she had finally found the one problem she couldn’t solve. “Then how can you be Jango’s son and our brother? Isn’t that mutually exclusive?”
Boba opened his mouth -
His comm rang, harsh and shrill. Boba immediately moved to slap it off before he recognized the number. Unbelievably and improbably, it was Alpha-17. He had the comm in his armor hooked up to the ship’s comm, and incoming messages could bounce from the ship to his armor. He quickly swiped up on the screen fixed into his vambrace, letting a holo-image flicker to life. Omega pushed herself over on the table, both small hands fixed on the surface as she gawked at the blue figures. Figures - Boba realized with a start that there were two people on the holoscreen. The connection was even worse than the ship, and it was impossible to make out which clone the second figure was. Judging from the height, it was probably a Batch 1…
“ Ori’vod ! Reporting in!” The figure saluted snappily. “We have a report to make!”
Oh. It was Kote.
Nobody else was that prissy. Only Kote’s extreme-even-for-clones respect for hierarchy kept him from constantly berating Boba for everything from putting his feet on the table to sassing the trainers. But he had a way of berating Boba anyway. With his eyes. The endless judgment of a sixteen year old knew no bounds.
“We do not have time for this.” Alpha-17 pushed Kote aside, ignoring his dignified squawk. “ Vod , you’re fucked long and hard. What the fuck did you think you were doing, snatching Omega?”
Omega’s eyes widened, and she quickly ducked away as far as possible from the shot. Boba just scowled back at Alpha-17, replacing guilt with indignation. “She snatched herself! The brat stowed onto my ship.” Omega mouthed ‘brat!’ loudly and with extreme indignance. “I’m going to drop her off back home as soon as I can figure out how. It’s not that big of a deal.”
“ Not that big of a deal ? There’s a bounty out for you two, di’kut !”
“Uh,” Boba said. “What.”
“There was a seventy percent chance of this happening,” Omega said apologetically. “Sorry I didn’t tell you. I assumed you knew.”
Bounty? Bounty?! That was ridiculous. Dad wouldn’t put out a bounty for him. That was insane. Worst case scenario Dad would come and chase him down himself.
But Dad wouldn’t even do that. Dad would get pissy, but he would understand . Dad would get it . Mandalorians his age always split from the clan to get some independent work under their belts. The time away from home helped them grow as warriors, refine their skills as hunters. Dad wouldn’t - maybe Omega - definitely Omega - this was her fault!
“Look what you did!” Boba hissed, looking over the holo at Omega’s guilty expression. “We’re both going to get dragged back home by our hair because of you ! You got the Kamino putting out a bounty on both of us!”
Kote grimaced. “Actually, ori’vod …”
“Oh, don’t tell me.”
“He was teaching our combat sim class when he got the report that Omega had left with you,” Kote said, telling him. “I’ve…never seen him that mad. It was kind of impressive. Bly almost started crying.” Boba’s stomach sank lower and lower. “He put the bounty on you right there, then he left. Cut class short . I think he’s going to leave to chase after you really soon. If you want my professional recommendation, ori’vod , I’d say that you should come home.”
Boba’s stomach sank like a rock. He didn’t get it. Dad blew him off when he ran away. But the minute they realize Omega is missing he goes thermal? Why?
Maybe his thoughts were obvious, because Alpha-17 cut in. “You leaving Kamino unauthorized is your teenage boy shit. Omega leaving Kamino unauthorized is theft . You stole him. And you know how the Kamino feel about that, vod .”
Shit. He totally did. It wasn’t his damn fault, but running off with a clone -
“It’s her ,” Omega insisted from off-camera. “And does anybody think Boba’s smart enough to steal a clone? Why is he getting all the credit?”
“Get your ass back home before this gets worse,” Alpha-17 said. But Boba was distracted - the doors to the kitchen were swinging again, the waitress holding two full trays of food but stopping to make conversation with a Dug anyway. “I swear, one of these days even you won’t be able to -”
The waitress pointed at their table.
Omega’s eyes widened, and she pointed over Boba’s shoulder. He whipped around so fast his neck almost cracked. “Look!”
The wanted posters. The other Dug was still staring at one, and with dawning horror Boba saw two images clear as crystal. They were mugshots of him and Omega, perfectly copied from their official files at Kamino.
He could just barely make out the text. Their heights, ages eighteen and eight, siblings…the bounty , why the fuck was it so big…awarded upon arrival if alive, no payment if dead…
The Dug standing in front of the poster turned to face him. The Dug talking to the waitress turned to face him.
Boba didn’t hesitate. His WESTAR practically jumped into his hand, and in the span of two seconds he had aimed and squeezed the trigger. A glowing hole appeared on the Dug’s forehead, a perfect shot, and before he could crumple to the ground Boba hit his friend by the posters. The Dug, halfway to drawing his own pistol, crumpled on the ground a beat after his friend.
He grabbed Omega’s arm, pulling her out from where she was hiding underneath the table. He slapped his comm, disconnecting the call and disregarding the shouts of alarm from the other end. He grabbed his helmet with his other hand, jamming it on his head, and dragged Omega out of the truck stop at the speed of light.
She tripped on her feet as she followed after him, short legs struggling to keep up and arms struggling to stuff her flimsi back in her backpack, and Boba silently cursed as he scooped her up. She yelled - in fear or in indignance, he didn’t know - but he didn’t pay attention. One of the small freighters docked outside was blasting its engines, way too close to his face, and Boba was forced to duck aside as the hot exhaust coursed against them. When Boba looked upwards, he could see another Dug sitting at the controls. He must have heard the blaster shots, damn it -
Thankfully, Boba’s ship was docked on the ground of the moon in front of hte stop with the other smaller ships, and he rounded on Slave II in only a few minutes. The roaring of the Dug’s ship echoed in his ears, and he just barely had time to call the boarding ramp down. The sound of another ship slowly rising from the ground rumbled above them, and the minute that the boarding ramp began to disengage, Boba unceremoniously chucked Omega into the crack.
To her credit, she caught the edge of the ramp and swung herself over easily. She ran into the bowels of the ship, and Boba knew that she was sliding towards the cockpit. He followed after her as soon as he could, jumping up from the rumbling ground, and he rolled onto the durasteel grates of the cargo bay with a heavy exhale.
The cadet had probably never flown a ship before outside of sims. She had definitely never piloted his ship, and definitely had no idea how to do so. But she was a supergenius, and a clone besides, and when the Slave II began to rumble with the liftoff procedures Boba couldn’t help but smile to himself.
Then the ship shook as it took a hit, and he scrambled to his feet.
The take-off was awful, and the minute Boba slid into the cockpit he waved her away from the controls with a barked command to take weapons. That was far easier, and Boba quickly pulled hard at the controls as the ship began to rise.
At the same second that Omega squeezed off the first shot from the canons. The shot completely missed the Dug’s ship and hit the cab of a truck, melting the hood.
Omega winced. “This is a little harder than the simulations.”
“Just shoot !”
When he flipped the shields on the ship just vibrated with the hits instead of shook with them, but it still took three more hits and several strategic shots from Omega before they broke free of the truck stop. The ship immediately began chasing after them, ducking in low and follow their tailwind as Boba pushed to escape.
One of Omega’s shots clipped the wing, sending it dipping and spinning. Boba’s heart lifted in victory, but the ship quickly righted itself back on its course. Another shot shook their shields again, and Boba watched in horror as the shield energy outputs began dipping.
And the shots from their ship had stopped. Omega stood at the weapons station, frozen.
“What the fuck are you doing?” Boba called. “You have a clear shot, take it!”
Omega jerked forward, squeezing the control stick, but she didn’t take the shot.
The ship behind them ducked low, and Boba cursed and he fought to realign the Slave II to sieze an opening in their defenses. Their shields were failing, they were weak - there, if Boba throttled forwards and drifted the ship to the left, Omega had a direct shot to the cockpit.
“Take the shot, Omega!”
“I can’t!” She cried. “He’ll die if I do that, he’ll explode!”
He had no time for this. He jammed autopilot on the controls before swiveling his chair to the weapons system. He pushed Omega out of the way and leaned forward to take the control stick from her, pressing the buttons to fire with both cannons.
Boba’s shot was true. Thin red shots erupted from the canons and impacted the engine with a neat double tap. The ship exploded, shattering instantly in a white explosion, and Omega screamed. Boba ignored her, swiveling back to the pilot’s station so he could turn off autopilot and plug the controls back in for hyperspace.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Omega was saying. He could barely hear her, with all of his attention focused on plotting out their route. “I’ve just never killed anybody before, I froze up. I won’t do it next time, I promise.”
“You didn’t freeze up,” Boba said. “You didn’t want to kill him. Which is worse .”
Then he pulled the lever for hyperspace, and the truck stop fell far away.
Silence stretched across the cockpit. Omega was still leaning against the weapons station, her little body shaking. Boba’s heart hadn’t stopped thumping either. He had piloted some fast getaways before, and he’d been caught in a tight spot by himself.
But he wasn’t by himself, was he? He was with Omega.
There was no real danger. Really. Hells, those Dugs were the only ones fighting for their lives. Worst case scenario was just the most humiliating scenario - that Boba let three no-name bounty hunters get the best of him and he’s dragged by his ear back home. Worst case scenario, Omega…
“You didn’t take something into account.”
Boba slowly turned to face Omega. She was breathing hard, hands held up to her heart and tightly fisted together. She was fighting to look strong and brave in front of Boba.
“You said that there was no way you could get me home without compromising your own mission of avoiding Jango and home. But there’s an easy way to get me back to Kamino. You could have just left me for the bounty hunters. They’d capture me alive, and they’d get me home.”
Boba didn’t say anything. He just looked at her, exhausted.
She played with her fingers, interlacing them and bending each digit back and forth. “My plan hinged on you deciding not to do that. That you wanted to help me get to Coruscant. I wrote a speech for it and everything. But you made me think that I had failed. When you talked to Alpha-17 and Cody, it sounded like you still wanted to drop me off back home.” She paused again, expression tightening. “You didn’t stop to realize that you could have gotten rid of me right there in the diner.”
Boba stared at her. She leaned against the console miserably, and for the first time Boba wished that he hadn’t dissembled and packed up that extra chair. Nobody else ever sat in the Slave II except for him. When he and Dad travelled together, they always took the Slave I. He’d have to dig up where he stored it.
“No self-respecting clone would abandon a brother on the battlefield. Or a sister.” Boba turned back to the console, flipping a few switches and looking away from her. “And a Fett wouldn’t either. I’ll get you to Coruscant.” Omega perked up happily. “ Just Coruscant. After that, you are way on your own.”
Omega beamed, bright and big and happy, and her smile made it easy to pretend that he was doing the right thing.
“Five thousand years ago, when the seas boiled and the rain froze, the Mandalorians were a great Empire.”
Boba carefully looked over the entire crowd. The key to good storytelling was making sure everybody got a glimpse of your face. They had to feel like you were talking to them personally. The kids almost never had anybody speak to them personally, it drove them wild.
They were all staring up at him now, utterly still and silent, expressions raptured. From his position sitting on a small stack of training mats, Boba could see nothing but a wide sea of black-haired heads.
“We were fierce, brave, and intelligent. We had the best technology. We were using slug throwers when the other guys were using sticks and stones. Our generals were the smartest in the entire galaxy.” On cue, every kid leaned forward. They were well educated on intelligent generals. Yeah, right . “And we won every! Single! Fight!”
Boba leaned forward, propping his hands on his crossed knees. Every kid was beginning to vibrate with excitement, second-hand glee over the very cool lives of people who were much cooler than them. “When foolish planets tried to challenge us, we crushed them! When arrogant kings declared themselves better than the Mand’alor, he defeated them! And we took their planets and made them Mandalore too. We helped all of the dirty, weak, backwards planets become strong and powerful, like real Mandalorians!” Boba opened his eyes wide, as if he was sharing a secret. “Do you guys know why we always won?”
Roughly thirty hands rose. The clones were very literal.
“It was because our enemies didn’t know the meaning of honor,” Boba finished theatrically. The clones slowly lowered their hands. He’d have to stop asking rhetorical questions, they never got it. “They didn’t understand the importance of clan or family. When we attacked, they scattered. When we conquered, they surrendered. Mandalorians commanded respect all across the galaxy because we respected others. No Mandalorian was ever a liar, cheat, or thief - and the entire galaxy knew that we were strong and wise.”
The clones leaned forward, expressions strong and intent. The clones weren’t liars, cheats, or thieves. They were making Mandalore proud! Or so their little brains thought.
“But after thousands of years of conquest and victory, we faced our ultimate villain.” Boba didn’t know if it had been thousands of years. That felt about right. Great Empires weren’t, like, two hundred years old. That was lame. “They were evil magicians who used black magic. They didn’t know the meaning of honor. They had no family. Every magician was out for themselves. They lied! Betrayed! Backstabbed!”
Boba rose his hands higher and higher with each point, until even the clones looked scandalized. “And they lied to the galaxy and turned them against us. With their evil magic and honorless lies, they tricked the entire galaxy into attacking us. They ransacked our nurseries - kids just like you. They attacked our homes. They slaughtered our people. And so the Mandalorians scattered to the four winds.”
Boba let the silence linger, watching the crushed expressions ripple through the crowd.
Finally, to give a nice little ominous ending, Boba mysteriously added, “But we will be back. One day, when people realize that only family and loyalty can save the galaxy…Mandalore will return.”
He held up his hands in victory. The crowd erupted into cheers and hoots. Kids punched the air so hard that they fell over. Boba grinned, high on the attention.
One of the clones in the very back twisted around, ready to shout pro-Mandalore slogans, when he stopped short. Boba saw the other clones turn with him, and eventually he turned too.
It was Dad, leaning on the doorway with his arms crossed. He seemed faintly amused. He raised a single hand. “ Su’cuy , all.” The children blinked up at him, eyes wide. Dad faltered. “That…means hello.”
The children stared at him.
Finally, one very brave child piped up and yelled, “ Su’cuy, Prime!”
Followers to the end, the entire room began calling a complete chorus of “ Su’cuy ”s and “Prime!”s. Dad leaned back, unwillingly frightened.
“If you don’t come inside they’re going to keep greeting you,” Boba said, amused. Also lying somewhat.
But Dad bought it. He cautiously walked inside a little, as if he was stepping into a gundark pit, and the children near him eagerly scrambled up and stopped just short of tugging at his pants. They just stood as close to him as they dared, looking up at him with wide eyes. Dad stared down at them, eyes equally wide.
“Teach us more words!” A very brave child demanded. “Train us in words, Prime!”
“Yeah!”
“Prime, train us words!”
“Hey, Prime, look at me!”
“Prime!”
“ Ori’vod was telling us a story, Prime, do you know the story?”
“ Su’cuy , Prime!”
“Ah,” Dad said.
Time to rescue him. Boba stood up on the mat and whistled a long, sharp note. All of the children halted in their tracks, turning to look at Boba.
Boba put his hands on his hips, casting a judgemental gaze down at the assembly. “Does anybody here want to tell me what time it is?”
Every kid looked at the big clock on the wall, then started mumbling.
Boba picked a random number. “Alpha-45, do you want to tell me what time it is?”
“Time to go back to the nursery!” Alpha-45 piped up. That was right - he was a bit of a know-it-all, wasn’t he?
“Then assemble, men!” Boba chopped an arm in the air, cuing the kids to scramble into formation. They pushed and shoved at each other, fighting to be there first. “Do Mandalorians shove at their brothers?”
Mandalorians definitely did not, and the kids quickly assembled into their neat formation. Boba didn’t know a lot about four year olds, having never experienced the process, but he couldn’t help but be impressed at their organizational prowess. By the time they were eight they’d be doing synchronized swimming.
“Alpha-1, lead the way. And…march, my minions!”
Dad watched in muted wonder as Boba efficiently packed the kids away, transferring them from free play back into the nursery. When Boba felt like being a great big brother - or when he was extremely bored - free play turned into storytime, which seemed to be the highlight of their baby lives. Within the span of a few minutes the room was empty again, clean and empty save Boba’s little stage of training mats. Dad untensed the minute that all of the kids were gone, and Boba bounded over to meet him in the middle of the room.
Dad smiled down at Boba, and Boba beamed back. “I liked your story.”
“Really?” Boba asked happily. “I told you I read that book you gave me. I took notes and everything!”
That was high praise. Boba didn’t like history or philosophy very much. Dad found it funny - he didn’t like it very much either. “You certainly adjusted it for your audience,” Dad said wryly. Boba shrugged. “It was almost unrecognizable as the history of the Mandalorians.”
Boba fought the urge to bristle. “What did I skip over, then? I left out the Republic and Jedi bits like you said.”
“Oh, not much.” Dad’s mouth twitched upwards, but it wasn’t really a smile. “Just the mauradering, pillaging, conquest, colonialism…the usual.”
“The book didn’t mention anything about that,” Boba protested. “How am I supposed to know?”
“It’s called reading between the lines.” Dad's eyes creased, and this time it really was almost a smile. “Sometimes somebody will tell you nothing but the truth, and they’ll still be lying. Never take anybody at their word.”
“You said I should take you at your word.”
“Yes, but I’m your father. I have your best interests at heart.” Dad levied a sharper look at Boba, making him freeze a little. “So what’s this ori’vod business?”
Uh oh. Boba knew how Dad felt about that. He shrugged helplessly, playing it cool. “They just jumped to conclusions, that’s all. I’m obviously a clone too, I’m older…can’t blame ‘em, right?”
Dad narrowed his eyes at Boba, who just smiled brighter. “Not a single lie in that sentence, huh?” Boba’s smile stretched wider. He doubled the innocence. “Right. I don’t think you’re encouraging their assumptions by hanging around telling them stories, ad’ika .”
Ugh! Boba threw up his hands, stomping away from Dad. “Maybe I wouldn’t hang out with them so much if you were here more often!”
He exited the training room, weaving around the construction materials and half-constructed floors. Dad was forced to jog to catch up with him, which Boba already knew wasn’t helping his case. Boba easily stepped over a wobbly floor tile, but Dad almost stumbled on it.
“There’s not exactly a reason for me to be here,” Dad said. Boba walked faster. Dad, with his dumb long legs, did not have to walk faster to keep up. “I won’t start training the alpha batches for another six months at least. The Kamino don’t need me for any more sequencing. Beroya have to take jobs off-planet, Boba. It’s part of life.”
“Oh, come on. I know how much they paid you for us. You live here for free and you don’t need to work for the rest of your life.”
“You were part of the payment.” Dad abruptly stopped himself, before saying very quickly, “They paid me for my genetic imprint.”
“Whatever. You don’t have to work and take jobs.” Boba stopped, making Dad stop too, and he rounded on him. He had been practicing his big brother voice, and for some reason it even seemed to work on Dad. It seemed to spook him a little when he heard it. “You just think Kamino’s boring and you don’t want to be here.”
“I don’t know how a city with a hundred children is this boring,” Dad muttered darkly.
“So you think I’m boring?” Boba demanded. “You think I’m boring and lame and that you’d much rather be out taking jobs for scumbags than spending time with your own son?”
“ Ad’ika , no, come on. Let’s talk about this.” Dad clasped both of Boba’s shoulders and knelt down, which made Boba fall into sullen silence. It was hard to be mad at Dad when he was looking you in the eyes. They reminded him of the Alpha’s eyes sometimes - except, of course, for how they weren’t the same at all. “You’re right. This is - this is an important time in your life and I’m missing out on it. There's not much time left until you’re an adult.”
“I’m practically an adult now,” Boba grumbled, but that just made Dad smile.
“Of course. Tell you what, alright? There’s six months left until I start the Alpha’s training. How about I don’t take a single job for those six months?”
Boba lit up. He didn’t fight the giant grin spreading across his face. “You mean it? Really?”
Jango smiled back, squeezing his shoulders. “Sure as shooting. Six months just for you and me. Training, field trips, you name it. How’s that sound?”
“Like a bootcamp?” Boba asked excitedly. “Six month training intensive? Just you and me? That sounds awesome!”
“You’ve had my intensive training bootcamps,” Jango said, giving him an odd look. “You’d call that fun?”
“Kamino’s boring,” Boba said flippantly, and he was rewarded with Dad’s silently huffing laugh. “The babies are the only interesting things here. But everything off Kamino’s awesome! You’re the coolest, Dad!!”
“Yeah?” Jango smiled wider, something strange and loose in it. “Your old man’s cool, huh? Does this mean you aren’t mad at me anymore?”
Boba made a show of rolling his eyes, looking at the ceiling and pretending to think about it. Then he tackled Dad in a big hug, making Jango grunt and straighten back up so he could let Boba hug him tightly. He hugged back very carefully. Dad always hugged carefully and cautiously, as if he was afraid he might get it wrong.
Into Dad’s tunic, voice muffled and distant, he said, “ And I want juice tonight.”
“Don’t push it.”
Boba got juice that night. He sucked it down as he sat on the couch with Dad watching a movie with Dad, nursing his vacuum sealed pack while Dad slowly decimated beer after beer. The movie was some coming of age thing, about three young humans who make a pact to have sex before they’re conscripted for their planet’s military.
Boba had wanted to watch a Mandalorian movie. He wanted more stories that he could pass onto the kids. But Dad had just shrugged and said that there were no Mandalorian movies.
“We don’t really bother with any of that stuff. There’s a theatrical tradition, but it’s all histories. There was a good tragedy when I was young…I forget what it’s about. Some Siths prophesied that a man kills his alor so he could become the alor. Or something. Stuff like that.”
What? That didn’t make sense. “But there’s always animations and mpop on the holo and stuff,” Boba said, confused. He watched a lot of holos. He had Holonet friends that he talked about the animations with, which was how he didn’t go insane. They thought he was from Corellia. He wished he was - he desperately wanted some of the figurines of the girls but nobody shipped to Kamino. “Everybody loves Mandalorian media.”
But Dad just snorted, standing up and flipping through the tv menu as he cursed under his breath about technology. “That’s New Mandalorian shit. They’re so damn desperate to ‘Republicize’ themselves that they’re producing all this crap and exporting it for interplanetary audiences. Paintings and media and commercial music and…whatever. It’s crap.”
“Oh.” Boba silently wished very hard that Dad did not try to ban mpop from the house. “So the fake Mandalorians are the only ones with art?”
Dad pointed the remote at Boba empathetically, who leaned back. “A well-made weapon is art. A perfectly fortified home is art. Do you think forging beskar into beskar’gam isn’t art?” Boba quickly shook his head. It looked hard ! “Exactly. It’s hypocritical. Those New Mandalorians are selling the rest of the galaxy the romanticized, cheap mass media version of Mandalorian warriors. So we can be - what, the stoic warrior character in the romance novel? It’s pathetic.”
“ Super pathetic,” agreed Boba, who was mostly checking out by now.
“They betray our ideals, disgrace them by pretending to be Republicans, then turn around and sell a caricature of our lives to the highest bidder. Disgusting. No more respect for a true warrior than Death Watch. Hate that woman -”
“Hey, Dad, look! More beer!”
By the time the movie started Boba had been forced to distract Dad with beer to keep him off the subject of traditional values. Boba didn’t know how all of this fit in with Dad’s free admission about the marauding and pillaging thing, but maybe Dad was talking about values from five hundred years ago instead of five thousand. Or that Supercommando Codex his dad preached. Or something. It was becoming difficult to keep track. He’d have to simplify it for the kids.
Maybe Boba could watch some of those period mdramas and summarize them. The kids loved the romantic warrior stuff. With all the nonsense stuffed into their head about how they needed to grow up to become great warriors, sacrifice themselves for a useless military, etcetera, it was no surprise. If it wasn’t historically accurate, if it wasn’t quite right…
Well. Hearing about Mandalorian imperialism wouldn’t make them smile. It wouldn’t make them proud to be themselves. And the kids didn’t have much to smile about.
Some of the trainers were telling him to call them cadets when they started their training. Cadets? They were four!
By the time the movie ended Dad was kind of tipsy. Boba cleaned up the kitchen for him, washed the dishes, and kissed him goodnight. He brushed his teeth, washed his face, and said his prayers. He changed into his sleep clothes and burrowed under the covers, covering his eyes with the comforter. The soft noises coming from the kitchen made it difficult to sleep.
After almost an hour Boba got out of bed. He slid his bedroom door open as slowly and silently as he could, but he probably shouldn’t have bothered. When he walked down the hallway into the kitchen he saw Dad sitting at the kitchen table, one hundred percent conked out. Boba squinted at the bottle in front of him. That was the nice whiskey.
Dad drank as much as any other adult warrior, but he rarely got drunk in front of Boba anymore. Boba suspected that he did that while he was out on his useless jobs. Two years ago, when Boba was kinda-sorta-ten, Dad used to get drunk in the house and smoke and do all that stuff. But when Boba started trying to drink the whiskey and try the smokes too they magically disappeared from the house. By the time he turned eleven-or-one, Dad was a good influence.
But the Cuy’val Dar had no such qualms, and their drunken parties were how Boba got all of the good dish. He assessed Dad carefully, who had yet to truly process his presence. A true hunter strikes his enemy when his defenses are lowered. It wasn’t unfair. The enemy shouldn’t have lowered his defenses.
Dad didn’t tell Boba everything. Maybe for the same reason that Boba didn’t tell the kids everything. But when the enemy’s defenses were lowered…
Boba poked Dad in the side. Dad batted his hand away. Boba poked harder. “Hey, Dad. Can I ask you a question?”
Dad grumbled something that may have been an affirmative.
“Because I’ve been wondering, Dad. Why didn’t you just get a surrogate? Or adopt?”
Into his arms, Dad announced, “I was adopted.”
Was…this relevant? It could be a non-sequitur, or it could be the answer to his question. “Okay…if you didn’t want to deal with a little kid, then you could have just adopted an older kid. Right? That’s what your dad did. Why didn’t you just do what your dad did?”
For some reason Boba never felt comfortable calling Dad’s dad Grandpa. He didn’t really know why. Dad never said ‘your grandfather’ - only ever ‘my father’ - so maybe that was why. But that finally made Dad raise his head, leaning on the table with one elbow for support.
“A warrior doesn’t hedge his bets,” Dad said.
“Uh…”
Dad huffed, as if it was Boba’s fault he wasn’t making any sense. “I’m genetically perfect. Freak accident. Had no way of knowing that, but I am. No history of mental illness in my birth family. No record of cancer or physical illness. The women in my family live to 130 and the men live to 120. I don’t fucking know where some other kid’s from.”
Oh! “And if you introduced another genome to that, then you might get defects.” For some reason, Boba felt a huge and powerful sense of relief. It was like discovering that he passed an important test, or that a huge weight was lifted off his chest. “That makes sense. You don’t want me to get cancer, right?”
“Yup. Not going to spend a decade of my life on a kid that can’t hack it.”
The weight was back. Boba wasn’t sure why. He gently grabbed Dad’s arm, as if they were on a rocking boat and he needed the support. “So…if hypothetically…not that it would happen , but…if your kid can’t kill the Jedi…or if he doesn’t want to…not that he wouldn’t want to, who doesn’t want to kill the Jedi…he’d still be your kid, right?”
Dad didn’t shake him off. For some reason that felt incongruous to Boba - that he let Boba lean on him, feel the hair of his arm under his hands, and still said it. “Not much of a clone if he can’t fulfill his mission.”
“But he’s not a clone,” Boba said frantically. “He’s your kid. The others are the clones.”
“If I didn’t want a clone I would have gotten a surrogate with a designer genome. I could afford it.” He still didn’t shake Boba off. Boba didn’t know why he was stuck on that. “Normal humans can’t kill a Jedi. I sure couldn’t fucking hack it. Needed something better. Smarter and faster. Focused.” Jango’s hand reached up and curled around Boba’s, trapping it in comforting warmth. “Being a father is about protecting your kid. I won’t let them kill anyone else in my family. They killed all of them, Boba. All of them…it won’t happen to you. You’re better than that. You’ll avenge them.”
Boba packed Dad off to bed after that. He put a bottle of water by his nightstand and cleaned up the whiskey. He kissed Dad on the forehead and went back to his own bed, burrowing under the covers.
He didn’t sleep. He stared at the ceiling, his hyper-intelligent and super-perfect mind churning furiously to make sense of something that was nonsensical. To bring logic to an illogical thing. To make his ordered and neat life make sense, when there was nothing about it that made sense at all.
You’re a clone, you’re not a clone. You’re my kid, you’re not my kid. You’re a child, you aren’t a child - you’re some kind of whatever , some kind of half-way between real and fake.
What was a lie told only in truths? What was a lie told to children?
Boba felt his breathing come harsher. He could do it. It wasn’t an easy mission, but he’d trained his entire life for it. Even if Dad couldn’t do it - Dad wasn’t a clone. He was perfect, but Boba was more than perfect.
He curled up in bed, digging his face into the pillow. If he was a clone, then he’d be the best clone. He’d be better than every other one, good enough to be Dad’s son. Mandalorians looked after their family. Even if Dad didn’t agree on who that family was. It wasn’t his fault he wasn’t a clone. He just didn’t know what being a clone meant.
He had a responsibility to his family. If he had a responsibility to Dad, then he had a responsibility to them too. He was the oldest, the smartest. Who would protect them if it wasn’t for Boba? Even if the clones weren’t Mandalorian, Boba couldn’t call himself a real Mandalorian if he didn’t take care of them.
He’d be the best ori’vod . A real warrior told their brothers that they were more than the mission. A real brother never lied to his clan about who they were…he’d never do that. Ever, ever, ever.
Boba was a True Mandalorian. He was fierce, brave, and intelligent. He wasn’t a liar, cheat, or a thief. He knew honor, he knew family.
It was only then that Boba could finally fall asleep. Boba was intelligent. Boba was great. Boba was perfect. Boba…
Boba was sitting in the kitchen cleaning his weapons when Dad finally woke up the next morning. When he stumbled into the kitchen, Boba silently pushed a plate of extra-spicy curry and a bowl of soup across the table. Dad mechanically fell into the chair and started shoving it into his mouth as fast as possible as Boba fastidiously sharpened his vibroknives.
Halfway through his meal, Dad seemed to register reality. He dropped his spoon, looking up at a prim Boba. “Oh no. Boba, I -”
“Sorry, Jango, this clone is too busy cleaning his weapons.” Boba meticulously arranged his vibroknives, making a show of aligning them perfectly. “I wouldn’t be much of a clone if I didn’t do manual labor that suited my dumb clone brain.”
After that Boba got all of the apologies and hugs and frantical denials that he wanted. Just ignore all of that, Boba, your mission has nothing to do with how much I love you, Boba, you aren’t like the other clones, Boba…
“Why?” Boba demanded. Maybe it was the question he should have asked instead - the one question Dad had never answered. “Why aren’t I like them? I’m artificial too! I have the edited brain too! What makes me so different?”
“Because you’re my son!” Dad cried. He bent in front of Boba, grasping his hands. Did he knew that Boba never stayed mad at him when he looked him in the eyes? The eyes that looked so much like the children’s, and yet nothing at all? “You aren’t like them because you’re my kid. Your responsibility is to our clan, to this family. Their responsibility is to the aruetti, the outsiders. It doesn’t matter how you were born, okay? Being a clone is just - it’s just how you were born. That’s it .”
“But it’s my body too,” Boba protested weakly. To his horror, tears pricked at his eyes. “It’s who I am.”
“It’s not. My body - I was adopted, Boba. Do you think where I came from mattered to my own father? Do you think my body mattered? He didn’t even know about my genome. The only thing that mattered was that I carried on his legacy.” He stopped harshly, as if he had run up against a brick wall. “I - but you’re better than I am, Boba. You’ll do it. You’ll do it right. How you were born - it’s not you. Got it? Those clones aren’t you. They aren’t your family. Okay?”
Boba nodded, clutching Dad’s hands. “Yeah. Okay.”
Then Dad gave him more hugs, and gave him a million more promises, and sent Boba off to get ready for the day. Boba dressed in his dumb uniform, the same uniform that every other clone wore. He’d have to leverage Dad guilt for different clothing. He wanted different clothing so badly, but Dad always brushed him off. He said…what did he say? Did he ever say anything?
By the time that Boba got back into the living room, Dad had already changed into his beskar’gam , helmet tucked under his arm. Boba couldn’t fight a little pang of hurt. He loved helping Dad put on his beskar’gam . He didn’t need the help, but it always made Boba feel special. Like Dad’s accomplishments were his too.
But then Dad looked at him, and Boba stopped short. He didn’t know why. There was something different in his face.
“Boba.” Dad’s face didn’t harden or look severe or anything. He never glared at Boba. But… “Very clever of you to strike while your opponent’s guard is down.”
“Learned from the best,” Boba said proudly.
But Dad just hummed. He didn’t look away. “But you heard some things you didn’t want to, did you? You didn’t come out of that one the victor.” Boba was silent. “Count it as a lesson. Don’t ask questions you don’t want to know the answer to. You don’t need philosophy or introspection. Focus on your mission.”
Like a good clone. “Yeah, Dad.”
“I’m speaking as your alor , Boba.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Good.” Dad stared harder at him, hard brown eyes piercing, and Boba fought the urge to shift. Dad hated it when he acted anxious. “I don’t want you spending time with Alphas again. I’ll be here, so there’s no need to entertain yourself with them. They’re filling your brain with nonsense ideas. Stay away from them.”
Boba opened his mouth to protest, but at Dad’s look he shut his mouth. How were four year olds filling his brain with nonsense ideas, giggling too loudly? “Yes, sir.”
“Good.” Dad flipped his helmet upwards, catching it easily by the rim. “Your tactic was useful for the enemy. But we don’t use enemy tactics against our family.”
“I know,” Boba muttered. Warrior was a way of life …
“I’ll never be your opponent, Boba,” Dad said, as if he could hear Boba’s seditious thoughts. “We’re clan. So don’t treat me like one again.”
“Yes, sir,” Boba said hurriedly.
But then Dad smiled, and it was like everything was okay again. “Then let’s roll out, kiddo. We have a lot of training to do today, don’t we?”
“Aren’t you hung over?”
“A true warrior -”
It was stupid. Dad was right, it was pointless worrying about all of this stuff. The confusion was distracting, and the hurt in his chest was useless, and he had to focus. It would affect his training.
But he couldn’t help but wonder which one Dad had meant - if Dad would never be Boba’s opponent, or if Boba would never be Dad’s opponent. They were the same thing, right?
Then why did they feel different?
The six months with Dad were amazing. The field trips, the new and exciting food, time alone with only Dad. It was tough, but Boba loved becoming stronger. He loved being off Kamino, experiencing everything just like a naturally born person did.
And, like a naturally born person, he didn’t see a single clone.
It was a long two weeks to Coruscant.
Boba had been looking forward to it. Finally, true solitude. Back home he always had Dad pulling him off for eight hours of training. If Dad wasn’t home then he always had one brother or another knocking on his door wanting something. If was off-planet on a job with Dad, then they never split up for more than a few hours at most. He had taken three solo missions in his life, which were so easy that they were totally boring - except for that one time in the fish market, but he had escaped before they arrested him for it - but they never lasted more than a few days. Boba would have purposefully stretched them out a little if Dad hadn’t been timing him for ‘efficiency’.
Two luxurious weeks of solitude. Two wonderful weeks.
Interrupted by an eight year old.
To Omega’s credit, she was a clone eight year old. They weren’t as annoying as natborn children. The trainers frequently complained about how creepy clone children were, but Boba had to take their word on it. Dad probably thought he didn’t remember, but the first few months of Boba’s life he had constantly been muttering under his breath about how creepy he was. That was before Boba discovered acting cute. Or, rather, it was before he discovered how to act cute successfully. He accidentally increased the creepy level before he got the hang of it.
She was also a supergenius, and even for clones she didn’t talk or think like an eight year old. Boba had more than his fair share of the physiological eight year olds, and Omega’s behavior was closer to the physiological sixteen year olds. It didn’t make her any more mature, but you couldn’t buy maturity. The Kamino hadn’t figured that one out yet. Even the Alphas still dared each other to jump into the ocean.
This did not stop Boba from engaging in the time-honored tradition of his family and sitting Omega down with his educational modules so she wouldn’t bother him. Thankfully, she hadn’t received the same education that Boba did, and they delighted her. Like a weirdo.
Also like a weirdo, she finished a month’s worth of modules in three days. So that didn’t work.
He gave her more notebooks for her to draw in, but she ended up sitting on the floor trying to draw Boba. Disturbingly well. He gave her all of his puzzle and logic games, usually meant to entertain himself on long flights, but she finished each one in roughly ten minutes. So that was a bust. He dug up his old workbooks and gave her a flimsi of unsolvable math problems, which thankfully kept her busy for about two days before she solved them.
Finally, Boba did something Dad would never forgive him for. He did something every Alpha would scorn him for. He broke a cardinal role and committed the ultimate sin.
He fished out his holo full of recorded files illegally downloaded with a virtual array, put Omega on a chair in front of them, and pulled up the first episode of his favorite animation Mercenary Calypso .
“Watch this,” Boba said. “It’s your cultural heritage.”
That did it. You didn’t need brain power to watch animation, and it was frequently a bad idea to try. He finally went back to his battle and training sims, free of little sisters asking him questions about every planet he ever visited. If he had ever seen snow or grass; if he had ever touched sand or duracrete. If Boba had ever seen a green sky or a purple one. If he had met very tall people or very short people. Did he know any Twi’leks? Omega loved Twi’leks, they were so pretty and graceful.
Boba got a little bored.
He wandered back into Omega’s cargo hold prison only to find her lying on the floor watching an entirely different show. It seemed to be Pilot Centax, currently featuring a young woman using a magic blaster and curing her enemies of evil.
Slowly, Boba said, “That show isn’t on my holodisc.”
Omega didn’t look away from the screen, watching the shower of pixels. “I figured out how to download files from hyperspace.”
“ You did what ?”
“You don’t have a thrust converter anymore, by the way.”
After the prerequisite ten minutes of bitching, Boba found himself lying next to Omega in front of the Holo watching Pilot Centax with her. Omega solemnly informed him that ‘Beautiful Warrior Pilot Centax’ punishes bad guys in the name of Centax. She mostly just seemed to punish them in the name of camaraderie, but he wasn’t going to push it.
A Coruscant moon. Dad would have never let Boba watch this.
“Hey, Omega.” They were on the third episode now, where Pilot Centax’s mysterious love interest Buc’ye was flying away mysteriously on his jetpack. “You ever think about what it would be like if Dad adopted you too?”
With no hesitation, Omega said, “Yes.”
Ah. None of them ever mentioned it, but Boba knew that some of the more creative clones - the ones capable of fantasizing or imagining things - felt the same way. Bly had plotlines. Boba didn’t know what to say, so he just said, “Uh. Yeah. But not as fun as the lab, right?”
“It’s fine. I don’t really want a parent. They seem inconvenient. He wouldn’t like me, anyway.”
“In this hypothetical situation he would like you,” Boba corrected. He had to explain these things to the clones sometimes. “It’s a situation where you were his kid too.”
But Omega just shook her head. “No. I know who I am. It’s not a person he’d like. I know I ask too many questions. The Kamino don’t mind, but Jango doesn’t like a lot of questions. I bet he told you not to think too hard about things, right?” Boba grit his teeth. “Right. I worry about stuff a real Mandalorian doesn’t worry about. All the happy stuff that the guys believe…I can’t tolerate it. I won’t. That’s why I left. I can’t lie to myself.”
“Dad wouldn’t ask you to lie to yourself,” Boba said heatedly. “He just - he just likes focus. You’re just upset that you get distracted from your mission.”
Omega looked at him, expression serious and placid. Pilot Centax twirled in a shower of glitter in front of them. “I don’t have a mission. I’m sure I would if he adopted me. Have babies or something.”
“Ew.”
“Or be a cool warrior and kill the Jedi. Whatever. It’s all the same.” Omega looked back at the holo, propping her chin on her fists. “Science is always changing and evolving. We learn new things and change our minds after every experiment. We don’t try to make the entire galaxy fit how we think it should be. We just learn, and change with it.” The shining light of the holo reflected against her face, turning it a soft dark blue. “I don’t want a mission. Because then everything I learn and experience would have to fit the mission. And if I learned anything new, then it wouldn’t fit. And it would be confusing. I don’t like to be confused.”
Boba was silent.
Finally, he said, “Yeah. You wouldn’t fit in with us.”
“I don’t fit in anywhere,” Omega said sourly. She lifted herself up on an elbow, pointing at the screen. “But I’m going to fit in there . On Coruscant, I’m going to be just like everyone else. There’s going to be other little girls and other people who like plants. I’m going to meet a lot of scientists who want to save the nephilim-krakens instead of experiment on them.” With whispered reverence, she said, “I’m going to meet people who believe in ethics .”
“What’s ethics?”
“It’s not easy being me,” Omega said grimly. “But it’ll be easy there. I just know it.”
Boba sighed. It was the job of a big brother to crush dreams. A heavy burden. “You’re so right, Omega. You never fit in with the people who are a quarter as smart as you, but you’ll really connect with the people who are a third as smart as you.” Omega didn’t say anything. “And you’ll really be able to relate to anybody who talks about their mothers or fathers or parents.” Omega’s lip twitched. “And I’m sure your science lab will have lots of other eight year old girls holding test tubes. If that doesn’t work out, then the other eight year old girls would have a lot of fun talking to you about what you learned in elementary school, right?”
“I know that,” Omega whined, “but I still -”
“This is my fault,” Boba said seriously. “I should have kidnapped you from the Kamino sooner. If I just socialized you better then you wouldn’t want to look for this - I don’t know, community, outside of us. We’re the only ones who are ever going to understand you, Omega. Natborns just don’t understand. They never will.” Dad flashed through his mind, drunk at a kitchen table, and Boba banished the image. He carefully bumped his shoulder against Omega’s, smiling at her. “Tell you what. If you get bugged out when you get to Coruscant and see the freakshow, then just remember that your old batchmate will be right there, okay? I won’t ditch you.”
Omega turned her head to look at him with an emotion he had never seen. Not on the vod’ika , not on Dad - not on anybody. How could their faces hold a new expression? How was that even possible? “Do you promise?”
“Sure,” Boba said loyally. “Your big brother will get you what you want. Come on, what is it? Want me to teach you how to be a real clone? I can do anything.”
Omega’s face creased in seriousness, intent and determined. That, at least, was more familiar. “I want to be free.”
Free. Boba opened his mouth to tell her that she was free, she wasn’t like the other clones who had their lives sculpted out for them. That she was like him. That she was…
“Sure, Omega,” Boba said. “I can do that.”
“And you won’t leave,” Omega insisted. “You’ll stay. Because - because I’m always alone, and nobody ever spends time with me, and -”
Boba carefully slung an arm around her shoulders. It was awkward and weird, his armor pressing against her skin at an angle that had to be uncomfortable, but she just leaned into it. “How can I train you to be a famous bounty hunter if I’m not there?”
“I don’t want to be a bounty hunter!”
“Your bounty will be science,” Boba said flippantly, and Omega stifled a giggle. “You will capture…what do you capture, again?”
“Grant money!”
“You will capture grant money!” Boba said dramatically, ruffling her hair. “And you will vanquish it !”
“I’m going to vanquish cancer!”
“You’re unbelievably weird!”
Before Omega could protest - unsuccessfully, she was a freak - a beeping echoed throughout the ship.
Boba was on his feet before Omega could even move. He jumped up the ladder to the cockpit, skipping every third rung, and in a scant handful of seconds he was in the pilot’s seat looking at the alarm system. But he recognized this alarm: it was just the sign that they were being hailed by another ship.
Okay. Great. Wasn’t going to answer that . But when he checked the tags on the incoming hail, he saw to his horror that they were Republican codes. He frantically double checked the navigation system, assessing their location. He had dropped them out of hyperspace about twenty minutes ago and set the course for the border from Mid-Rim to Core space, but they were still a solid two hours away. Had the border changed or something?
The hail kept beeping, and Boba knew that he couldn’t ignore it without finding a few cops on his tail. He smacked the intercom button just as Omega swung into the cockpit, scrambling into the co-pilot’s chair. It was still hilariously too big for her, to the point where the seatbelts weren’t safe. He’d have to buy some kiddie ones. Or something.
“ Vengeance VI reporting in. How can I help you, officers?”
“This is Republic Security Control, Vengeance VI . Please transmit your ship’s identification codes now.”
“Sending codes now, Security Control.”
Boba easily fished out one of his dummy identification code cylinders and plugged them into the console, letting the information upload and transmit. He had a handful of them, mostly because the Slave II wasn’t flying legally. Boba’s entire existence was under the radar.
He waited a couple minutes, tapping the console impatiently as Omega stared at him with wide eyes, before the intercom blared. Finally. There wasn’t a border patrol like this from the Outer Rim to the Mid Rim. Damn rich people places always had their own cops.
“ Vengeance VI , what are the names of your crew?”
Boba and Omega looked at each other. What?
Did they normally ask that? Boba didn’t know. He had only been to Coruscant a few times, and he’d always been in the back of the ship bored out of his skull. Did Dad always have to submit his personal identification? Did he use a fake one?
He didn’t know. Omega was looking at him as if he was supposed to know, fully expecting that ori’vod would know what to do. He couldn’t look like an idiot in front of the supergenius.
Boba pressed down on the intercom button, fighting to keep cool. “It’s just me in here, officer.” He flapped his hand at Omega, who quickly got the picture and hid under the console. “My name’s on the identification logs.”
“Pilot, please provide your SSSN.”
Boba froze. He was not a citizen of the Republic. He did not have a SSSN.
He jammed the intercom button again. “I’m from a self-sovereign tribe in the Outer Rim, sir, I don’t got one of those.”
The intercom’s voice was still cool and smooth. He didn’t even sound exasperated. “Then please provide your tribal identification number.”
“...don’t have one of those either, sir,” Boba, who was not a citizen of anywhere, said. “Look, you have my ship logs, can I just -”
“If you have no identification, then you have to come back with a proper identification before you can come into Core space. There’s no access to the Core for those without identification codes. You can pick up replacements at your home planet’s government center, pilot.”
Yeah, government center. Because Boba had one of those.
Omega was looking up at him with wide eyes. Boba couldn’t believe this. He had to keep going. He had who knows how many bounty hunters on his tail, he probably had Dad on his tail - he had to keep going. He couldn’t afford to waste any more time. How was he supposed to become the greatest bounty hunter in the galaxy and kill the Jedi if he couldn’t pass a stupid checkpoint?!
Out of the hundreds of possibilities his brain created in seconds, only one of them was feasible. It was his least favorite one, but it was feasible. Bad outcome later, good outcome now. That was the important thing. Nothing else was important.
“Oh, that SSSN,” Boba said loudly. “Sorry, my Basic isn’t real good. I think I know what number you mean. Uh, Xesh-Aurek-...”
Boba gave them Jango Fett’s SSSN, his birthday, and had his console take an eye scan. There. Dad let him borrow his body for a lifetime, he could let Boba borrow his identity just once. It wouldn’t hurt. Well, it would, but that was a problem for later.
Finally, after what felt like ages, the intercom crackled again. “Please prepare for boarding, Vengeance VI. ”
“What!” Boba cried. “I gave you -”
“Routine inspection.”
“Is this because I’m from the Outer Rim? Am I being profiled?”
“It is a routine inspection, Mr. Fett. Please prepare for boarding.”
Routine inspection his fucking shebs .
Boba prepared the ship for boarding, fuming the entire time. Omega crawled out from underneath the console, now staring at him a little judgmentally.
“If Jango checks immigration logs -”
“I know, Omega.”
“ - and he sees his own name in the logs, then he’s going to know we passed through this point.”
“I know , Omega.”
“And this is the main tunnel to Coruscant, so it’s going to be obvious that -”
“It’s the main tunnel to five different planets,” Boba snapped. “And ten different Coruscant suburban moons! It’s fine. We’re fine. Go hide in the ceiling again, I told them I was the only one here and you can’t pass for Dad.”
Neither could he, but Omega was finally tactful enough not to mention that. She just looked thoughtful instead, biting her lip as she looked at the comm number flashing on the console. “I don’t know. Something’s a little…”
The ship shook as the Republic vessel docked. Boba could barely see its corners out of the front windshield. It was definitely one of those dinky Republican ships, but it looked like it had been through the wringer. There were cannon scorch marks along the side. What kind of toll officer had a firefight?
“Something’s a little off,” Omega said slowly. “These comm numbers have the wrong extension.”
“And that’s not border patrol,” Boba said. He slid his pistol into his hand before walking to the other wall of the cockpit and unlatching another blaster from the wall. He tossed it to Omega, who fumbled to catch it. “They’re already boarding. Stay behind me and stick to cover. Don’t fire until I give the signal.”
“Uh.”
“If you get injured then fall back, there’s a med kit under the console.”
“I’m eight,” Omega said plainly.
Boba gave her a bizarre look. “Then you’ve had two years of practice at that blaster. Hop to it.”
She held the pistol like it was a dead eel, but Boba didn’t pay any attention. He walked over to the console and locked down the ship, shutting off all controls unless he input the right activation sequence.
Boba stood against the wall, beckoning Omega to do the same, before smacking the release button on the door. He peered around the hatch, sweeping the ladder, before grabbing the side of the ladder and sliding noiselessly down.
He landed silently on the floor, moving aside so Omega could do the same. The ship was a series of four levels. From top to bottom, he had the cockpit, kitchen and living area, his cabin, and the cargo storage area. Cargo usually meant bounty, so he knew that there was an eerie amount of plasma chains fixed to the walls, but that wasn’t his problem. It was also where he had most of his weaponry, but those should be securely locked up.
His helmet was on the side table, and he grabbed it and slipped it on. It felt like he could breathe easier in it, as if he had been claustrophobic in the open air. He flipped on the heat sensors, scanning downwards underneath their feet. If he ramped up the audio sensors, he could hear the sounds of their feet stomping and clicking around.
Republic routine inspections didn’t come inside your ship without meeting you at the boarding gate. These were, without a doubt, some particularly clever pirates. It was kind of like those spam messages that were always popping up on your datacomm - we’re from the tax office, give us your banking information, and so on.
He peered down the ladder chute again, clearing the space and looking for any heat signatures on the cabin floor, before he silently dropped down that chute too. He heard Omega scrambling after him.
Lower down, he could hear the pirates. He heard the distinct clink of his guns and weaponry shuffling around, and the faint thumps as one of the crates of food provisions was tipped over.
One of the pirates spoke, with a harsh and twangy voice. Distinct Duro accent. Duros were a good people, honorable, but Boba supposed that every nest had a few worm-infested eggs. “Go upstairs and kill the pilot. Druto, search for the second life form you detected. We don’t want any surprises.”
“Fela, can you wait? I’m still running the identification search in the records.”
“Is that important right now?”
Boba and Omega looked at each other. Boba palmed something from his belt.
“I think I recognized the name, though. Look, see, the search finished running. Take a look at this.”
“Druto, I swear to -”
Silence stretched. Boba grinned.
Boba dropped the smoke bomb down the shaft, watching the billowing clouds of white rush the cargo hold like a wall of flames. Three yells, one barked command - four adversaries.
Nothing for it. Boba switched his vision entirely to infrared before sliding down the ladder, landing easily on the balls of his feet.
He brought his blaster up, immediately identifying the first infrared signature. Taller than a human, wrong proportions, hand falling down to his waist. Boba easily aimed at the area next to where the other hand dangled and took a clean shot to the gut.
Boba heard his shot rip through the Duros’ two vital organs, a muffled scream choking the air. He half-turned around to check his flank when he felt a hard impact on his beskar, like someone knocking on durasteel armor.
Blaster fire, even at close range, didn’t stop beskar. His mind instantly worked through the trajectory of the blast to find the origin point, and he took a clean shot at the point. Another figure - muted in the infrared, definitely wearing a helmet or armor of some kind - stumbled, groaning, and Boba squeezed off three more shots to the head. The last shot ruptured the helmet, caving in the figure’s skull.
The smoke had triggered the Slave II ’s atmospheric control sensors, and the onboard fans whirred hard and worked to diffuse the smoke. The infrared’s colors smeared, caught in the white smoke and the dim cargo hold, and Boba was caught up trying to adjust the aperture and take aim at a Rodian taking cover behind one of the crates when a tall signature advanced on a much smaller one.
It was Omega, who had taken cover behind one of the crates. She had ducked out of her cover when the smoke began to clear, looking around, but Boba had been focused so on trying to hit the ducking Rodian that he didn’t notice. He turned off his infrared, dimming the cargo bay back into ordinary cover, and took a shot at the human behind her. The Rodian’s blaster shot hit his arm at the same time, sending his shot askew, and the human screamed in pain as Boba rolled out of the way of the Rodian’s next shot and got a decent angle facing his cover.
The Rodian didn’t last more than two seconds. Boba watched the Rodian slump over onto the ground, the clean shot through his forehead burning through his skull and showing the burning fat underneath. Rodians had thick and fatty heads, didn’t they?
Boba shot him in the gut a few more times just to be sure.
He was about to holster his gun when he heard another scream. Boba whirled around, gun coming back up, but he saw that the enemy was already on the ground. The human’s kneecap was almost burned off, flesh smoking and popping, and his blaster was far out of reach. He was weakly trying to push himself up on one elbow, but Omega stood directly in front of him. She gripped her blaster tightly, but its muzzle had drifted to point at the floor. Her back was turned to Boba, and he couldn’t see the expression on her face.
He knew that the shot had gone off-center, hitting his knee instead of his heart, and nothing prevented Omega from taking the shot. But she was just standing there as the man gasped and swallowed screams.
“What the fuck are you doing?” Boba asked harshly. “Finish him off.”
It wasn’t until Omega turned her head to look at him that he realized she was shaking. Her entire body was shaking, the blaster almost jumping around in her hands. Her face had paled, turning her skin tan, and her eyes were wide. “I - he’s disarmed, I don’t -”
He could have another fucking blaster, idiot! Boba strode over and double checked the man for any hidden weapons, but he only seemed to have a vibroknife in his boot. He turned to Omega instead, and whatever she saw in his expression made her shrink back.
“Why are you hesitating? You’re going to get us killed. Shoot him, Omega.”
“I’m - I’m -” Omega’s face flashed through a dozen different expressions, each one more disturbed and frantic than the last. But she seemed to settle on a strange realization, as if she had figured out a puzzle she hadn’t known existed. “I don’t want to.”
“Tiny gods.” Boba casually lifted his gun and shot the human in the head. He fell back, red burn mark on his forehead smoking, and Omega screamed in surprise. “There. Not that hard.”
“You didn’t have to kill him!” Omega protested. Boba ignored her, scanning the cargo hold one more time and double checking for any more pirates. There could be more on their ship, but it wasn’t moving. Any pilot would have heard the carnage and beat feet by now. He’d have to sweep in a second. “He was dearmed, he wasn’t a danger to us -”
“He could have been a danger to us before his blaster fell out of his hand. He could have been a danger to us with that vibroknife in his boot. You’re acting insane.”
“We didn’t have to kill him !” Omega cried, voice cracking, and Boba stopped short. She really was upset. “We didn’t have to kill that Dug at the truck stop! We were almost in hyperspace, we could have gotten away without hurting them! Why are you always killing people?”
“Because it’s the quickest way to end the fight? What are you even talking about?” Boba carefully holstered his blaster, but kept his helmet scanning for any other life forms. “Look, if you don’t want to kill people then you can go back to Kamino. If you want to live in the real galaxy then them’s the breaks.”
“Stop acting as if you have no choice!” Omega yelled, and Boba tilted his helmet at her until she lowered her voice. “You want freedom, don’t you? Freedom means there’s always a choice!”
“If you want to be free, Omega, then you have to enforce that freedom.” Boba stepped forward, and he watched Omega force herself not to step back. “People will try to take it from you. They will try and steal it from you. You have to protect it, because nobody is going to give it to you.”
“ Most people go their entire lives without killing anybody, why can’t -”
“Are you most people, Omega?” Boba asked shortly, and Omega shut up. “ Most people weren’t born in a test tube. Most people were born free. You have to work ten times harder to get something other people in this galaxy were born with. If you don’t accept that then you’re not going to make it very long out there.”
“But that’s not fair!”
Boba rolled his eyes. Time for more big brother advice. He had no idea that he would ever have to say this. It was like explaining that water was wet. “Life’s not fair. I should have stolen some of those desensitization modules they gave the clones. Do you want to watch some of those , Omega? They’ll cure you of this real quick.” Omega cringed. “Dad wouldn’t have let you walk away until you killed that man. That’s what he did with me. Everybody else has to do this. Life’s not fair for any of us.”
“It’s not my fault that everyone else is brainwashed but me,” Omega muttered. She was looking away from Boba, and he had the urge to make her look him in the eyes. That was what Dad always did when he was doing the alor thing. When would Boba be as strong and decisive as Dad? “Free people have choices. It’s not like I don’t want to spare lives because I’m too afraid to kill them. I want to make the choice to spare them.”
“The inefficent choice? The choice that leaves openings, that weakens you?” Boba couldn’t believe this. Killing people wasn’t a choice , unless you were just walking down the street deciding to murder pedestrians. Boba didn’t make the choice to kill people, he just did it. He couldn’t be somebody who didn’t. That wouldn’t save Omega. “What would have happened if they took advantage of my weakness?”
“Saving people isn’t a weakness -”
“We would have died,” Boba said bluntly, and Omega’s lips thinned. “They could have sold us off to slavers. Best case scenario they see the bounty on our heads and we’re dragged back to Kamino. If I refused to take care of the problem as efficiently and effectively as possible, then that puts you at risk. Okay? I have a responsibility to you. These pirate’s lives aren’t more important than your safety.”
Omega was silent. She looked back at the corpse, and Boba could tell that she was forcing herself to look at it. Her eidetic memory, perfect and beautiful, would memorize every feature of that face. She would replay this moment in her life, when she was only eight years old, for the rest of her life. In perfect detail; in perfect clarity.
She’d understand when she was older. She really was only eight. Boba hadn’t killed his first guy until he was thirteen. Maybe he was being hard on her. But when she was older - when she had her own children to look after, or when she found a mission that was more important than anything else - she’d understand.
A mission that was more important than truth was more important than life. Omega's only mission right now was some nebulous and ill-defined idea of freedom. When she learned what every clone knew, when she discovered that you had to accomplish your mission no matter what, she’d learn to fight for it. Boba would have to protect her until then.
He made himself soften his voice, walking over until he could put a hand on her back. She tensed, like he always did when Dad tried to hug him after a fight, but after a second she leaned into the touch. “It’s a nice goal, vod’ika . Maybe you’ll reach it someday. But it takes a lot of strength to allow weakness. If you work hard and get strong, then you can protect your family too. You’ll save the lives of people important to you.”
Omega was quiet for a long second, looking around the cargo hold and memorizing every corpse. Finally, she said, “You were really good at that. You were like an eel. I could barely see you, like you moved at light speed. You were better than any human your age could be. I was scared, but…I knew you wouldn’t let anything happen to me.”
“Well, I have a lot of people to protect,” Boba said lightly. “More than any human does, right? Need all the skill I can get just to keep up.”
“I’m sorry,” Omega said. “I’m really sorry, Boba.”
He clapped her on the shoulder. “You’re forgiven. You’re only eight, I was probably being harsh. Come on, do you want to raid the pirate ship with me? We can steal all of their stuff.”
But somehow, for some reason, Boba couldn’t shake the feeling that Omega hadn’t apologized for her hesitation. She wasn’t even apologizing for talking back to him. If it wasn’t that, then what was it?
Why had Omega apologized?
“Take your time, Boba.”
The man was a human. He had matted light brown hair stretching down to his shoulders. There were little twigs and pieces of grass stuck in the brown tangles, and one of the ends was seared off. His clothing was handmade and simple, the same kind you’d see in any small village in the Outer Rim.
The jungle air was hot and sticky. It sent sweat rolling down Boba’s neck, making his hands clammy. It made the man sweaty too, his brown hair clinging limply to his neck and cheek. Small bugs were already crowding around the man’s bare feet, injecting drops of poisons that would make the meat easier to rip off. He was already returning to the soil, and the thousand new deaths that lay within it.
Boba’s hands tightened on the blaster grip, then loosened. The sweat on his neck was really distracting, but he didn’t want to wipe it off in case it looked like he was fidgeting. He was just taking his time.
Dad stood patiently to his side, arms crossed. The patience would only last so long. Boba had to focus. The rope tying the man’s hands to the branch above his head, pulling him onto his feet, was frayed. Why was it frayed? Dad’s rope was never frayed. Oh, right - he had pulled it from the guy’s own supplies.
What was his name? He probably didn’t have a name. Maybe he was from one of those little cultures in the Outer Rim who didn’t give each other names, and just referred to each other with random descriptors. They probably called him…Brown. Brownie. Skinny? Boney? Pale? Green eyes?
“You don’t need to be scared. He’s unconscious, he’s not going to move. Just a single shot is fine.”
Boba’s tongue felt heavy and fuzzy in his mouth. The muzzle jerked a little bit to the side, even though he didn’t mean to.
Dad walked over, gently putting a hand on Boba’s back. Normally he would lean into it, but now it just made him feel overstimulated. He bent down a little and spoke softly into Boba’s ear.
“This is a very important ritual for us, Boba. It’s what makes you a warrior. Under our laws, once you do this you’ll be old enough to fight in battle. My father did this with me when I turned thirteen. His mother did it with him. Her father did it with her. His parent did it with him. I know it’s scary, but we’ve all done this. I know you’re a Mandalorian, so prove it.”
“You killed your first guy when you were eight,” Boba whispered.
“Which means that you have no excuse.” Dad straightened, stepping away. “Come on. We aren’t leaving this spot until you do it. I can stand here all day.”
Eight. Boba was already behind. He had never even been eight.
Dad didn’t have a lot of patience for mediocrity. He’d only have so much sympathy. If he didn’t get it done now, then he was going to get a bad score in killing people. Or in ancient Mandalorian rituals. You shouldn’t be able to fail a ritual . Boba had already said all the prayers and stuff before this. It was supposed to be super hard to memorize all the relevant god’s names, but Boba had it down in a snap. He had an eidetic memory. Perfect clones could do this.
He had to. There was no choice. So it wasn’t his fault.
That was a profound relief. He could breathe again, and he could feel his head clearing. Real soldiers, Mandalorians, hunters, clones, sons - there was nobody Boba could be who did not do this. There was no way out.
The only difficult part had been raising his blaster. It wasn’t difficult to aim, to get the mark right. It wasn’t hard to squeeze the trigger.
The man didn’t really look like a person. He didn’t have curly black hair or the right skin color. He was tall and lanky instead of stocky. He didn’t look like anybody Boba knew. He didn’t look like anybody Boba loved.
One of the billions of random, unwashed masses. A person that you knew wasn’t a true person, and thus expendable. There were way more guys where he came from. More bounties, more criminals. More nobodies. Just a randomly created body, jumbled together with mismatching features and weak muscles. His hair was brown.
Boba fired. The electric charge filled the air with a bright zap, and the red bolt shot a clean hole through the man’s heart. The smell of burning flesh punctured the air.
Dad whistled. “Perfect shot. Wonderful job, Boba.”
Boba lowered his blaster, flicking the safety on. He opened his mouth to say anything, but found that his teeth were chattering. He quickly forced them still, calmed the weird shakes in his arms.
“You did great. I’m very proud of you.” Dad clapped Boba’s shoulder, looking down at him. He must have seen something weird, because the second Boba holstered his blaster he gave him a very tight hug. He ran a hand through Boba’s hair, running his fingers through the curls like he always did. “I know that was hard, but I love you very much.”
Boba clutched very tight to Dad, not trusting himself to talk. His body was humming with adrenaline, designed to easily produce it and mitigate any adrenaline crash. It put him into sharp gear, focused him. His brain itched for another fight. But all he saw was Dad, and the jungle behind him. He had won the fight. Wasn’t much of a fight , but he had won. Boba had won!
But Dad was wrong, just a little. It hadn’t really been that hard. The anticipation had been bad, but once Boba made the decision everything else just fell away. And it didn’t return.
Dad separated, but his hand stayed on Boba’s shoulder. “Do you know what you just did?”
Somehow, Boba found himself saying, “Uh, kill a dude?”
Dad cocked an eyebrow, but he just said, “You protected your family. You just learned a skill that will someday save the life of somebody important to you. You were very brave.”
Boba found himself nodding. He felt his heart slow its thumping, returning to a normal heart rate. “Yeah. Like…like on the battlefield .”
“Yes, like that. Although you won’t be on that many battlefields.”
But Boba was already imagining it, drawing up the image in his mind. He put the battle sim in his mind, imagining the little Alphas running around with their little guns. They had to be sized for a seven year old’s hands. It was ridiculous. “The guy could have been aiming at Alpha-50. He’s distracted saving the life of Alpha-13 on the field. And then he aims…” Boba lifted his blaster up and flicked off the safety, pretending that the corpse was coming right at them. “But boom! I’m there. I get a perfect shot in his heart.” He shot the corpse again, ignoring Dad’s startle of surprise. “Alpha-50 doesn’t even notice. He’s so focused on field dressing. And Alpha-13 doesn’t lose his leg, and he promises to be my minion forever .”
“That...likely won’t happen,” Dad said. There was a strange, confused note in his voice - as if he didn’t quite disapprove, but didn’t quite understand. “But maybe something like that.”
“But wait. The guy was just faking it!” Boba pretended to be surprised, putting his blaster over the side of his arm like he saw Dad do when he was taking a hard shot. “He has cybernetic parts! He has a mechanical heart! He stumbled back up, just when my guard’s down. But my guard’s never down. And as he makes a grab for Alpha-17, who fell in the mud because he tripped, I get him again. In the head!” Boba squeezed off another shot, hitting the man in the temple. The smell was even worse this time, cooking his brain. “He was the leader of the enemy forces. They all fall back when they see that their droid hero is dead. He was more machine than man, and they’re finally free of his clutches. They all run back home and tell everyone that a Fett took him out.” He raised the blaster again, and -
“Boba! We do not shoot the corpse!”
The blaster dropped immediately, and Boba winced. Not even five seconds and Dad was mad at him. But when he looked up at Dad’s face, he didn’t really see anger or a scolding look. It was more…almost something he hadn’t seen in three years. A lifetime.
“What?” Boba asked. “What did I do?”
Dad didn’t answer the question. He turned away from Boba, running his hands over his own bristly hair. When he spoke, it was almost to himself. He hadn’t done that in a while either. “Did they program you with that? I didn’t order them to put that in. I think they put it in the clones, maybe they gave you a prototype…I didn’t fuckin’ tell them to do that. Long-necked bastards…”
“Dad? What did I do?”
“It was nothing you did, Boba,” Dad said dismissively. He didn’t even look at him. “It’s not very Mandalorian, but I guess it’s useful. Teach me to take their word on anything…”
“Dad!” Boba cried. “Did I do something wrong?”
It was only then that Dad seemed to remember Boba was there. Or, maybe, that Boba could understand what he was saying. He turned around, eyes wide, and he immediately cut himself off.
“No, no, of course not. It’s fine, don’t worry about it. It’s not your fault.” Dad grimaced at Boba, still running his hand over the back of his sweaty neck. “Do you…still need ice cream? We were going to do something fun after this, but if you’re…alright, then…”
Boba brightened. “I want ice cream!”
“Wow, really?” Dad said sarcastically. Almost a little mean. “You didn’t get all of your fun by shooting a corpse?”
Boba stared at him.
As usual, Dad realized what he said a second after he said it. “I - forget I said that. I’m sorry, my mind’s just - elsewhere. This is your big day, let’s focus on you.” He forced a smile, but Boba didn’t mimic it. “Time for ice cream. I think there’s a city a few klicks west of here. Or whatever their cultural equivalent is, we’ll figure it out. Maybe we can get you some of that new clothing you’ve been asking for, too.”
New clothing?! “I don’t have to wear the uniform anymore?” Boba cried. “Finally! Thanks, Dad! No more of the baby’s stupid uniforms -”
“Well, you can just wear the new clothes off planet -”
“ What !”
Maybe Dad didn’t like it when he imagined doing cool hunter shit, but he didn’t have to tell Dad about it. He silently sat in the co-pilot’s chair instead, staring out the window into the black and dreaming about all of the heroics he was going to do when he grew older.
He’d take on three Jedi at once and get ‘em all. Their dumb laser swords could deflect blaster bolts - but could they deflect flamethrowers ? He’d chop off one of their heads, and the other ones would know that he was a great Jedi Killer and that they had to take him seriously but they’d be too scared to put up a real fight, and the Sith would try and give him a medal…but he’d kill Dooku too, he sucked. If you had a laser sword you were out of here.
And if Dad complained , then he could just get over it. Imagine bringing Dad a Jedi’s head and him whining that we don’t behead people in this house, although they totally do…what was his problem, anyway? This was his idea.
He wouldn’t complain next time. And Boba would act all professional and cool about it. Maybe that was what he wanted.
Dad sat in the pilot’s chair next to him the entire trip back into the city, and if his eyes flickered to Boba a little more often than usual then Boba didn’t really care.
The last two days to Coruscant felt like two minutes.
Both Boba and Omega were on edge. Omega filled up a datapad with her notes and plans, all of which grew increasingly obscure and improbable, until Boba forced her to start doing physics problems for fun to keep her occupied. Boba, a simpler soul, just cleaned his entire weapons cache before making useless repairs to the ship. He organized the loot from the pirate ship four times, setting aside some good shit that he could pawn on the black market. With Omega, his savings wouldn’t stretch as far…
Why had he promised to keep her with him? He had meant to ditch her. Boba had finally found his freedom, and now he was chaining himself to yet another little sibling to run after and protect. Hadn’t he finally earned some time to himself? Some space to grow and become a great hunter?
The strange and obscure definition of freedom that Omega wanted, that stretched so far into abstract dreams that Boba couldn’t begin to understand it, wasn’t possible by herself. She could probably survive by herself out there, but she would have to fight and scrape. That was life, that was what you had to do in this world, but he knew it wasn’t the freedom she wanted.
If he had to sacrifice his freedom for hers…
Boba looked down at the rifle on his kitchen table, half-disassembled.
If he could, someday, create a person who Omega could be. A person who wouldn’t have to kill anybody - who wouldn’t even have to think about it. A little girl who only hunted grants and who only vanquished cancer. If she could grow up choosing everything about who she was, just like she needed so desperately…
It was too late for Boba. But maybe, in some strange and foreign way, it wasn’t too late for her.
Boba finished assembling the blaster, wiping it clean. Mandalorians took responsibility.
Thankfully, they had pillaged a fair bit of fake IDs from the clever pirates, and they were able to enter Coruscant airspace without tipping off Dad’s radar. Omega was obviously stunned by the insane sight of Coruscant, bristling with buildings and speeders, and it made Boba think about the first time had seen the planet. He had played it cooler, but he had been just as impressed as she was. She kept running around looking out every viewport, practically climbing on the console to get a look around. Meanwhile, Boba was stuck in traffic.
But it made Boba breathe easier. Billions on billions on billions of people lived on this planet. If you wanted to disappear, you either went to the Outer Rim or came to Coruscant. Dad and Boba took a few jobs on Coruscant, and they would take more if it wasn’t so inconvenient. Even Dad had trouble sometimes. Nobody even knew their neighbors on Coruscant.
Omega’s noises ramped up in volume and amazement as he slowly lowered them onto the planet. He had to throw something at her and make her shut up so he could listen to the nav system plot out their exit, guide them through the tunnel, plot out another exit, almost get into a collision with some loser in a starfighter…
But he couldn’t help but get excited too. You could hear the speeders through the walls of the ship, watching the huge flow of people around you like a cloud of flies. The endless chaos and lights streamed around them, but if you looked for long enough you could almost see something organized in the tumult. Like dragon ants in their den, every one of the million pieces moved with exact purpose, in perfect flow with each other.
Two speeders crashed in front of them. Omega clapped. Boba sighed.
“Look out the left viewport, Omega,” Boba said, and to his surprise he found that his voice was soft. “You can see twilight begin.”
Omega ran off immediately, and Boba lay back and relaxed as he heard the excited squealing over the dim purple light diffracted by an endless haze of fog and light.
He thought that he’d be excited. He was supposed to be excited. He should be bouncing in his chair and yelling, just like Omega. But he found himself worried instead. The cops bugged you if you slept in your ship outside of a spaceport, and he had to figure out how many nights in a motel he could afford. After the money spent on two fake IDs, it wouldn’t be much. Boba didn’t even really know what to do with money. Didn’t you put it in a bank or something? How did you do that? How were you supposed to get it back?
It would be easy to get money once he started going on jobs. If he was running around all the time then he wouldn’t have to worry about the motel situation either. But what about Omega? He would have to drag her along on every job until they got someplace to stay. And once they did find someplace to stay, he’d have to leave her alone in the apartment most of the time. Were you supposed to leave eight year olds home alone for a week at a time? It was probably fine. Clone eight year olds definitely. No big deal. He could do this.
It was like he told Omega. You had to enforce your freedom. Everybody else in the galaxy will try to steal it, and you have to protect it with your life.
Boba found his mouth widening into a grin. It was going to be tough. The hardest thing he’d ever done. But when he came back, Dad would know…they all would know… Boba would know…
…that finding parking on Coruscant was fucking impossible.
He finally bullied another ship out of a spot three platforms away from their destination, and Boba paid way too much money to finally dock his ship and jump out. He’d have to buy a speeder to get around remotely effectively, but that was more money. He also didn’t know how to drive a speeder, but that was a later problem. Omega could probably figure it out in a few seconds. She could be his getaway driver. If she could reach the pedals.
Omega held on tightly to his hand, head twisting on a swivel as they walked down the platform. It wasn’t even exciting: their destination was underneath a highway, with nothing but speeder lots and dilapidated buildings around them. Not a great neighborhood, but even on Coruscant few people were stupid enough to jump a guy in full beskar’gam . Mandalorians fought hard for their rep and they reaped the rewards. Sometimes Boba wondered if the reason why so many Mandalorians went into private security was the fact that everybody paid a premium for the sheer name.
“Where’s a clothing store?” Omega begged. She clutched on tightly to Boba’s hand, thin fingers digging into the ridges of the glove. “I want a dress. Can we get a dress right now? And hairbands? Hair clips? Hydrochloric acid?”
“Let’s put a pin in that,” Boba said. “Are you hungry?”
“Starving!”
Boba grinned at her. “Then let’s get some food. I’m going to show you my favorite place on Coruscant.”
“Really? Where is it?”
Boba stopped where he stood, sending Omega skidding to a halt too. He waved dramatically at the building in front of them, showcasing its many delights. “Right here!”
Omega squinted at the building. “A shipping crate?”
Dex’s Diner was Boba’s favorite place on Coruscant because it was, basically, the only place on Coruscant Boba had been to more than once. Dad had a terrifying amount of contacts basically everywhere, and Dex was one of them. He knew everything that happened in CoCo Town, and had a terrifying amount of knowledge just in general. Man knew as much about teeth as a dentist, as much about obscure and overly specific weapons as a Mandalorian, and as much about obscure planets in the far reaches of the Outer Rim as someone who is just generally a freak.
He had always been nice to Boba. Actually, he was somewhat problematically nice to Boba - the first time he had given an eleven year old Boba a free milkshake and asked about his mother, Boba had enthusiastically spilled the genesis of his birth and nature of his humanity. Dex was, in order: freaked out, threatened, bribed, and then Dad’s favorite contact on Coruscant. Boba suspected that the man had a good ear for venting about crazy clones.
It was exactly the same. Somewhat cleaner than the truck stop, boasting a dizzying amount of neon wall hangings and almost-clean tabletops, and almost completely empty. The only other patron was a frumpy ginger-haired man picking at a plate of greasy eggs and looking very hungover. Who was hungover at 2000?
Boba quickly flagged down the waitress droid and asked for Dex (“Tell him it’s Fett”) as Omega gawked. She was probably quickly gaining the assumption that the galaxy was mostly diners, which - well, there were worse impressions.
Just being in public made Boba’s skin prickle. His helmet was firmly attached, but he and Omega stuck out like luminescent sharks in a bathtub. They had to get out of here fast. The wanted poster had a description of his beskar’gam , but there was lots of green armor throughout the galaxy. If he kept his helmet on he’d be fine. If he got Omega out of the freaky Kamino mad scientist lair outfit they’d be fine.
He quickly guided Omega towards the bar, standing at the very end next to the entrance to the kitchen. She tried to tug away at his hand, eager to go explore, but he just redoubled his grip.
Dad had given him everything, and his name always came in handy. Dex was out almost immediately, holding two rags and wiping off four hands. A cloyingly thick smell from grease and meat burst from the kitchen as he entered, and Omega pinched her nose shut.
“Fett! What’s this I hear about - ah.” Dex stopped short, taking a second to take in the green armor and the grossed out little girl with wide eyes. “Howdy, Boba. It seems as if you’ve entered some trouble.”
“A Besalisk !” Omega whispered reverently. “I’ve read anatomy books about you! Is it true that your heart pumps five times the amount of blood per minute as a humans? Your superior vena cava is composed of a very unique type of cell that is normally only found in -”
But Boba just pulled his helmet off. He felt every ounce of tension and fear in his bones, and without his helmet it all seemed to come crashing down. “We need your help, Dex,” Boba cried. “ Please .”
Dex looked between the both of them - at Omega’s excitement, at Boba’s strung-out gaze. One rocky molar chewed at a scaly lip, and Boba felt his very normal heart with a very ordinary vena cava thumping a hurricane in his ears.
“You two sit down at the bar,” Dex said. “Tell me what’s wrong as I get you two some ice cream.”
“I’ve read about ice cream too!” Omega piped up. She was practically vibrating out of her skin. “Is it true that you can make it with dry ice?”
Dex shot Boba a pointed look. Boba effortlessly made a, ‘runaway baby has never even had ice cream ’ face. “I’ll make an extra-big one, then,” Dex said. “If you’ve never had the different flavors.”
“ Flavors ?”
That was how, in short order, Boba and Omega were deposited on bar stools with copious amounts of sugar on the bar and an anxious Besalisk in front of them. For some reason Boba felt a little sick looking at the ice cream, as if it smelled of burned flesh, and he pushed it away. Omega, who learned from her last experience with the sweet pancake, was taking very small bites and interrogating them thoroughly. Her bowl had four different flavors, and she was comparing and contrasting each one in her notebook.
“We just need identifications,” Boba hissed at Dex. Omega was engrossed in her ice cream and scientific method, but Boba was fully aware that she was paying complete attention. “Neither of us are citizens. We don’t have any identification whatsoever.” Outside of Kamino, which had volumes of identification on both of them. They even had the legal stuff, like Dad’s contract and the order of commission. “Birth certificates, SSSNs, everything. I can pay, I have more than enough. I know you have a guy for these things, I just need his name.”
Dex wiped at a glass with two hands, the dirty rag only smearing the glass. “Neither of you have ever once mentioned a ‘sister’. How does that…”
“You don’t know a lot about why I exist,” Boba said flatly.
“Yeah, no kidding. I’d get disappeared.” Dex shot another look at Omega, who was putting on her best innocent expression. “Boba, I can’t help you. I’m going to be one of the first people your father shakes down for your location. I like to think I’m a tough guy, but if Jango Fett decides that he wants information from me then he’s going to end up getting the information.” Boba waved a hand in acceptance. It was objectively true, and didn’t make Dex a coward. It mostly made him a sentient person. “Once he has the name of my ID guy, then he’d go shake him down. You’ll be right there at the end of that tail. You know his methods.”
Boba did. He didn’t even have to guess - it was the same thing Boba would do, and anything Boba did was something that Dad would do. At least when it came to hunting. When it came to tastes in siblings not so much.
“There has to be something you can do,” Boba pressed. “Do you know anybody he couldn’t track down? Any way we could get them for ourselves?”
“I’m sorry, Boba,” Dex said, and Boba knew how genuine his words were. “I’m sorry, but there’s nothing I can do.”
Dammit. Dammit! “Even just the name of a neighborhood, I can track something down there. I just need something -”
“No we don’t.”
Boba stopped short. Dex stopped wiping his glass.
Omega tore her hand out of Boba’s, expression scrunched up and furious. It was the first time Boba had seen her look angry - the first time her face had ever really reminded Boba of his own. “It’s okay you that can’t help us, Mr. Dex. We can take care of ourselves.”
“Uh,” Boba said. “ I can take care of myself. You’re -”
“Not actually a little kid. You know it, Boba.” He did. Boba sobered as Omega stepped away, drawing herself up as tall as she could. “We don’t need real identities. Your work as a bounty hunter never asked for them, right?” Boba shook his head silently. You got a job in the guild if you paid a fee and someone vouched for you, they gave you a membership, and that was that. “I can get a job under the table. It doesn’t matter what. We’ll find someplace to live that takes cred, or I can just stay on your ship with you, and - and it’ll be okay! We don’t need all that stuff.”
“We need all of that stuff for your scientist job, Omega,” Boba said, incredulous. “We need it for a decent place to live, or for you to ever get a real education. That normal life you planned out to the five hundredth step -”
“Doesn’t matter .” Omega set her jaw stubbornly, looking up at him. “I’ll - I’ll earn it someday. I promised that to myself. Even if it’s not today, or - or the next day. But I’m not going to ruin your life over it. The bounty’s my fault. Your life on Coruscant would be just fine if it wasn’t for me. I’m not going to keep holding you back.”
“Come on, don’t worry about that.” Had she been worrying about that? If Boba knew that she had ruined most of his plans, then so did she - had she thought that she could make up for it? Or had she just thought things would work out alright no matter what? “Look, we’ll figure something out -”
“You’re the one who said that we had to fight for it, Boba!” Omega cried. “You’re the one who’s been taking care of everything. I can’t take care of things for you, but - but I’ll fight for you too.” She faltered a little, looking back up at him. “If you fight for me. Okay?”
“Wow,” Boba said dumbly, “I crushed my little sister’s hopes and dreams in two weeks. That’s a new record. It usually takes me two months to crush my brothers’ spirits.”
“There’s no time for self-flagellation. I need to learn how to embezzle money for our slush fund.”
“Embezzle what -”
“Self-flagellation, huh.” Dex hummed, stopping both siblings short. “That rings a bell, actually. I might know somebody who could help you.”
What? Boba straightened, grabbing Omega’s hand again. She subtly tried to tug it away, as if she was an adult now and too cool to hold hands, but he persevered. “And your guy wouldn’t talk?”
“A Rancor couldn’t squeeze anything out of this guy,” Dex said cheerfully. “Heard he got flesh eating worms one time and still didn’t talk.”
“Wow,” Omega said, “flesh eating worms? I read about those in my -”
“Hey, Kenobi! Get over here.”
The sole other patron looked up from his food. He pointed at his chest in a ‘who, me?’ gesture.
Dex snorted. “Yeah, you. Get over here. I’m always doing you favors and now you’re doing one for me.”
Kenobi made a ‘must I really’ face.
“I’ll wipe your tab.”
Kenobi wiped his mouth, surprisingly prissily, and stood up. “And how may I assist my lovely friend today, the light of my life -”
“Say one more word and I’ll double your tab.”
Boba and Omega looked at each other. They both made identical faces at each other - ‘do we really want this guy’s help?’.
But Kenobi slouched over anyway, and Boba couldn’t help but notice the way he walked. Guy was trained. He couldn’t tell in what , but there was a sense of purpose to every movement. And when he smiled at Boba and Omega it was strangely kind. His smile widened when he looked at Omega, who stuck her ice cream spoon in her mouth.
“How can I be of service?” Kenobi asked, holding his hands inside his jacket sleeves. For some reason. “I’m not a very busy man. I certainly have all day.”
“I could have sworn you types were supposed to be gentle and wise.” But Dex sobered, and Boba saw Kenobi sober too. “These kids are on the run. Bounty on their heads and everything.” Kenobi raised an eyebrow, and Dex hurriedly said, “It’s not their fault. But neither of them are citizens of anywhere. No legal identifications of any kind. They need someone to help them out, but the bounty hunters after them…”
“I understand.” Kenobi looked between the two of them, eyes sharp and clear. “Have you two ever once had citizenship?” Boba shook his head. “Well. I do think I can handle a few bounty hunters. And I’m not as well-connected as my dependable friend here, but I can think of a few trails who can help you. Nothing much I can do about the bounty right now, I’m afraid, but if you give me some time I should be able to figure that one out. If you two will allow me the honor, I will promise to help the both of you. ”
It felt like Boba could breathe again. As if heavy durasteel bands around his chest had been loosened, and he could come back to solid ground. This was good. This was something. Even if…
“Why would you make a promise like that?” Omega asked suspiciously, grip tightening on Boba’s hand. She looked at Kenobi with intent, penetrating eyes, and Kenobi seemed a little disconcerted. “Handle bounty hunters? Remove our bounty? That’s more than Mr. Dex asked.”
But Kenobi just smiled down at her, and for the first time he almost felt like a gentle man. “Why, my own boy is around the age of your brother now. And you remind me very much of him too. How can I disappoint him by not helping two fine young people find their happiness?”
“You’re putting yourself in a lot of danger,” Boba said weakly. “The man after us - he’s not messing around. You can’t - nobody can -”
But Kenobi just smiled at him too, easy and calm. “I know it’s difficult to put your faith in a stranger. It’s a rather senseless choice. But I believe those are my favorite kind.”
“That didn’t help at all,” Boba said blankly.
“Kenobi can kill roughly anybody on this planet outside of the Jedi Temple,” Dex said.
“You could have lead with that -”
“Please, Dex, don’t be crass. I could beat Mace if I really applied myself.”
“Sure. Keep telling yourself that,” Dex said. The bell at the front door of the diner tinkled, and Dex waved a hand. “I’ll be with you in a second! Look, Kenobi, I’d still take this seriously. I know you’re allergic to the concept, but if anybody could gank a guy like you, it would be -”
“Someone who is out of patience.”
The voice plummeted Boba’s heart into his stomach.
He turned around very slowly. Omega gasped, almost a scream, and Boba automatically moved to cover her. Of course, of course, of course, the most familiar voice in the galaxy -
Dad stood at the entrance. He was fully kitted up, a Mandalorian in every way. He always carried himself with that powerful, effortless confidence, and he moved like a wildcat on the hunt. When a bounty saw him he might as well surrender now, because he was never going to escape. It was pretty cool when you weren’t the bounty.
Boba tensed hard, his heart thumping in his chest, every inch screaming violently with despair. This was it. They were through. But maybe they just needed to talk, if they could talk it out and Dad would understand -
But Dad had never once called him. Not in the entire two weeks. And looking at him now, Boba knew that he was not interested in talking.
In Mando’a, Dad said, “I am not at all interested in fighting you. We are going and we are going now.”
“You’re not dragging me back!” Boba snarled, also in Mando’a. Omega looked a little pissed that they were speaking a language she couldn’t understand, but that was far from important right now. “I get to decide when I come back! I’m an adult, you can’t keep me there anymore!”
“I’m not listening to this,” Dad said. He stalked forward, Boba drawing up tight. “If you want to have another argument we can argue in the ship. But we are not doing this now.”
“I’m not going with you!”
“I don’t care what -”
Kenobi stepped in front of Ben. In front of Dad, who stopped halfway across the diner. Dad stopped short, as if he couldn’t believe someone was stupid enough to get in his way.
“Excuse me,” Kenobi said pleasantly, in Mando’a, “I believe you heard the man.”
A Mandalorian? That accent was pure Sundari. A New Mandalorian, that was a thousand times worse. Dad’s posture tightened up even further, almost bristling.
“Go ahead and give me an excuse to punch a peacemonger.”
“Go ahead and give me an excuse to arrest you,” Kenobi said frankly, and Boba winced hard. “Of course a non-Republican wouldn’t know anything about it, but there is no slavery in the Republic. All slaves are emancipated in Coruscant space. I am more than willing to enforce that if you’re willing to contest it, but I cannot let you break the law and steal these children.”
Boba grabbed at Kenobi’s jacket, mortified out of his mind. How could he - that was insane - well, from the outside, maybe, but it was insane - “That’s my Dad , Mister, that’s just my Dad! He’s just mad I ran away from home, he’s not -”
But if Dad was bristling before, then he was furious now. He strode forward, nothing but pure fury. “Those are my children! How dare you call me a slavecatcher?”
“How dare you act like one,” Kenobi said frankly. Boba wanted to die. “And if they’re your children then that’s even worse. If you’re a Mandalorian, then what are they doing without citizenship to the Mandalorian nation? Without identities? I won’t profess I know the situation, but I know that I have two terrified children on my hands.” Kenobi smiled winningly, and somehow deeply offensively. “I’m certain we can all sit down and figure this out so everyone’s happy. Hopefully with an agreement that clears up what a Mandalorian is doing placing a bounty on two children who are desperate to escape wherever you’re trying to drag them back to.”
“If only for the insult on my honor and family alone,” Dad said calmly, “I am going to kill you.”
“Why does this always happen?” Kenobi asked, as if he did not know that he was insufferable.
Then Dad shot at Kenobi.
Boba dove, grabbing Omega by the waist and tackling her to the ground. Motherfucker! How dare Dad? He could have hit her! Idiot, hot-headed, asshole - how dare Kenobi, he just shamed their entire family with that disgusting accusation - from the outside, it was a very understandable misunderstanding - he was just a dumb teeanger running away from home, how did it get so blown out of porportion - Kenobi was definitely dead -
Omega was underneath him, with Boba pressing her to the floor. She had blown it out of proportion. Boba would have slunk home with his tail between his legs in less than a month, and if he didn’t then Dad would come home and drag him back by his ear. Boba would complain but he would go with him, and they’d have another fight. He would sulk for a few weeks, but they would make up with each other. And everything would go back to normal. For months, for a year, for years, for a decade. For as long as Dad wanted them that way.
Omega didn’t have a decade. She had eight years at most. Much, much less, if the Kamino decided that they didn’t want to keep around a rebellious product. After all of this trouble, after two weeks away from Kamino, they almost certainly would. This wasn’t an adventure to her. This was her life, and Omega was fighting for it as hard as she could. How could he not protect that? How could he abandon that?
Boba rolled off her, grabbing her by the waist and pushing her forward. He saw Dex by them, crouching away from the firefight. He had come over to help them immediately. Heartwarming, but Dad’s righteous anger was only going to distract him for so long.
He grabbed the back of Omega’s shirt and pushed her forward at Dex. She looked backwards at him, betrayed and frightened.
“Get out of here,” Boba hissed. He glanced at Dex, whose head fins were flapping nervously. “Kenobi’ll help her. Get her out of here, now!”
“You’re coming with us, right?” Omega cried. She had an expression on her face that Boba had seen many times: absolute terror, absolute desolation. “We have to go together, you promised -”
“I’ll cause a distraction.” Boba summoned a smile for her, dredged from the corners of his heart. Omega frantically stretched out her hand, scrabbling for his grip, but he couldn’t take it. “I’ll be right behind you. I love you. Remember to fight, okay?”
“ Boba - !”
But Dex was already pulling her away, hiding her in the back, and Boba was already standing up.
He was looking at a disaster. Dad was still firing at Kenobi, who somehow hadn’t been hit . The man was just everywhere a blaster bolt wasn’t; every trajectory seen and knocked off course. There were shards of glass and bottles lining the floor, as if Kenobi had chucked random items to intercept the bolts. How - why - he had to be unarmed, he was going to die -
“Dad!” Boba called, jumping back into the open space switching back to Basic. “Cut it the fuck out, he’s just some asshole! He’s not even armed! What’s wrong with you?”
Dad didn’t answer. He just pressed a button on his gauntlet, and by the time Boba realized what was happening he couldn’t dodge. The electrobolos shot from Dad’s gauntlet, and they collided with Boba’s chest with kick like a Ged’s. He fell backwards, losing all breath as the bolos wrapped around his torso and trapped his arms to his chest, and before he could recover his breath another one hit him on the legs. He immediately felt the electric tingle in his teeth, the charges crawling up his armor, but when he tried to flex the current flexed with him. Damn it, Dad!
But when he glanced backwards he saw a door swinging shut. So that was something, at least. Maybe the only thing.
Yeah. That was the only thing.
Kenobi’s eyes widened when he saw Boba fall to the floor cursing, and something in him seemed to sharpen. He stood up straighter, no longer melting into the slovenly clothes and poor posture. A presence erupted around him, even more tangible than Dad’s, and Boba found himself scrabbling back until his back hit the bar.
“I can’t let you leave with that boy,” Kenobi said calmly. Half the diner was smoking, his dumb mullet was singed, he had barely dodged ten shots, and he said it calmly. “You have no right to take him.”
“Do you think I’m going to turn my own son in for his damn bounty?” Dad demanded. His voice was low and dangerous, the vocoder bending it into staticky crackles. “I’m taking him home.”
“A legal adult has the right to leave his home, then,” Kenobi said. “I am obligated to stop you from doing this.”
Dad scoffed, loud and mocking. “Obligated by who? I’m not impressed by some hero cop with delusions of grandeur.”
Kenobi reached around his back, sliding something out of an almost invisible compartment on his belt. It was a long, thin, metal tube, with gold ribbing at the top and a black grip. “Obligated by my vows to the Republic as a Jedi. I swore an oath to uphold law and justice in the Republic, and I intend on keeping it.” He spun the tube - the lightsaber - and ignited it with a snap-hiss. A brilliant blue beam shot from the tube, glowing and hissing in the dim diner, matching only the popping neon signs. It made Kenobi almost fit into the space, as if he was meant to stand there among the neon and vinyl. Much softer, Kenobi said, “And an oath to my apprentice. Which is far more weighty than all the rest, I’m afraid.”
Dad froze.
Huh, Boba thought frantically, wild and insane. Jetii are kind of nice. That was…that was…that wasn’t right.
The thought of getting rescued by a damn jetii was horrifying. Boba started frantically trying to reach a hidden button in his armor, angling his wrist backwards so he could peel away a layer of the glove.
Finally, Dad said, “A jetii . Then that turns your death into more than an obligation. I’d call it my pleasure.”
“Ah,” Kenobi said, “you’re one of those Mandalorians, aren’t you?”
“The kind whose people the jetii killed,” Dad said calmly, “yes.”
“That’s unfortunate,” Kenobi said, just as Dad shot at him.
It was now obvious that Dad had been going easy on him before. He had probably refused to shoot seriously until the man drew his own weapon. But that was before the ‘I’m your worst enemy and I’m going to mortally insult you’ thing, and Boba watched in horror as the fight flashed before his eyes.
In any other situation, it would have been the most incredible thing he had ever seen. The galaxy’s greatest bounty hunter against a Jedi who was apparently highly skilled even in comparison to his siblings. It was obvious to watch. Every bolt was perfectly deflected, sending holes burning into vinyl and leaving scorch marks on the walls, and every whistling bird was disintegrated by the lightsaber. None of the projectiles would work - the man had a perfect and impenetrable defense.
Dad realized that at about the same time that Boba did, because he dropped his blaster and moved in close as he swung for a punch. Lightsaber burned against beskar, the sound splitting the air, and Kenobi was pushed stumbling backwards.
Boba finally peeled off the superficial layer of the globe, exposing the electrical components of the suit. Yes, yes, here! Press this hidden button, electrify the suit, destroy the electrobolas, get the fuck out of -
Dad saw him. In the middle of a fight with a Jedi, and Dad still saw him. He pressed a button on his own gauntlet, and Boba felt every electronic in his suit fizzle out. Boba jammed the hidden button, but nothing happened. Had he remotely deactivated the suit? Why could he do that? Why would he -
Then Dad dived in again, pressing his advantage, and Kenobi was forced to block a punch again at close quarters. Boba could smell the melting beskar, the seared fabric. He constantly fought to disarm Kenobi, but he never penetrated the defense. Kenobi was sweating but his face was implacable, completely and utterly focused, and Dad was a mystery behind his helmet. He had never been as easy to read as a brother.
Dad pressed in close, telegraphing a punch, but at the last second his blaster jumped into his hand. He fired a shot at close quarters, inside the lightsaber’s range of movement, straight at Kenobi’s head -
It was almost too quick to see. The lightsaber sang as the bullet narrowly ricocheted off the sword and Kenobi deflected the bolt away from his gut.
It felt like Kenobi had pressed the lightsaber against Boba’s side. Kenobi had deflected the blaster shot straight at Boba, and it grazed Boba’s side with a hot flash of pain. It hit his flight suit directly, narrowly hitting the gap between the beskar, and Boba groaned with pain.
Both men stopped, weapons halting in midair. Dad stepped away immediately, and to Boba’s shock he saw his weapon drop. “Ceasefire.”
“You can’t just call a ceasefire in the middle of a fight!”
But Dad wasn’t listening to him, and despite Kenobi’s protests he lowered his lightsaber. Dad just ran to Boba instead, bending down to check the wound. Boba jerked back, baring his teeth, but Dad just grabbed his shoulder.
“Stay still! Let me see the wound.”
“It’s barely a scratch.” Boba pushed him away, and Dad let him. “Getting into a firefight while I’m tied up on the floor, good fucking going, Dad -”
“Quiet!” Dad barked, and Boba instantly fell silent. He looked between Boba and Kenobi again and again, his slow human brain frantically trying to think something out. “I -”
“If you think I’m going to let you pull him out of the way so you can get back to your grudge match then you’re highly mistaken.” Kenobi raised his saber again, aiming it directly at Dad. “Did you not notice I was deflecting the bolts away from him the entire time? Or was your vision blinded by your anger?”
Dad’s spirit fought with himself. Boba watched it happen, heart thumping heavy in his ears. This fight couldn’t be easily won. It couldn’t be won so long as both he and Kenobi were trying to avoid the trussed up kid in the corner. Kenobi couldn’t die today, and it was Boba’s fault.
But he had to win this fight. He had no choice. In Dad’s mind, at least, victory was the only option. Victory at any cost.
“We won’t fight anymore,” Dad said finally. Kenobi sagged with relief. A million alarm bells began to ring in Boba’s head. Dad never decided not to fight .
“I knew diplomacy would work eventually,” Kenobi said, pleased. He let his lightsaber drop. “Now, if we can talk about this like civilized adults - and perhaps leave the genocide thing a topic for later discussion -”
“We’re not going to fight because you are going to let me walk out of here with Boba.”
Kenobi froze, smile still plastered on his face. “Excuse me?”
Dad looked down at Boba. He looked for just a little too long. Boba’s heart thumped in his chest, screaming in his ears, and he felt his pulse race up his throat.
Dad bent down, seemingly to grab the metal part of the bola. Softly, with a whisper turned strange and static by the vocoder, he said, “I’m sorry. I’ll explain later.”
Then Dad hoisted him up, leaving Boba to shout as he dragged him to his feet. Kenobi tensed, ready to surge forward. “I said that we are walking out of here. You’re an officer of the peace, jetii ? You can’t possibly break the law, can you?”
Kenobi had the obvious sense that he was being led into a trap, but he saw no way out of it. “Within reason, I suppose, but what does -”
“You were wondering why my son had no citizenship, no identifications?” Dad’s voice was drawn and tight, but strong. It projected strength in every way, almost arrogance. “It’s because sub-sentient organics can’t be citizens. It’d be like giving a SSSN to a bantha. A waste of all of our time. So I’m afraid that I’m not breaking any slavery laws. This isn’t illegal at all.”
What?
Kenobi was just as confused as Boba. He looked at Boba, crystal blue eyes scrutinizing him. “He’s not sentient…?”
“I am!” Boba yelled. Why was - why was - why was Boba so embarrassed? He fought against Dad’s grip, but it was like durasteel. “He’s lying, he’s just -”
“That boy cannot possibly be subsentient,” Kenobi protested. “If this is some sick -”
“Check it yourself.” Dad carefully reached into his belt, bringing out a small datapad. “I can pull up his bill of sale right now.”
“No, no - come on, please - come on, you have to be joking -”
“Here it is.” Jango lightly tossed the datapad to Kenobi, who caught it in midair. Kenobi stared at Boba with wide eyes, almost seeing through him. “Read it and weep.”
“Stop it!” Boba cried, humiliated beyond all measure. “Come on, please - Prime, please - Prime, just stop -”
“I can’t believe it,” Kenobi muttered, scrolling through the datapad. Boba didn’t have to wonder what he saw. He knew what was on it. He had read it, all of it, a long time ago, and he had never forgotten, but - but - “I don’t care what this says, Fett. I don’t understand how, or - or why , but that boy is a person in the Force.” Kenobi pressed his lips together, looking directly at Boba. “You are sentient and unique in the Force. You are not an item , Boba.”
Boba opened his mouth, meant to reassure Kenobi that he knew, he had never doubted it once in his life, because Dad had always said so. He had never felt like anything less than Boba Fett, because Dad had said so, but if Dad said he wasn’t, then - then -
But Dad spoke over him, voice strong and decisive. “Of course he’s not. He’s my son. A Mandalorian. But he is, legally, my property. So you stay the hell away from us, jetii . We’re leaving. Together.”
Kenobi dropped the datapad on the ground, heedless of the scrolling jargon about clones and payment and everything in-between. “I can’t let you do that.”
But, just like a Jedi, even as he said it he did not know how. He only knew his conviction and his faith - like an eight year old girl, he only knew that the galaxy ought to be fair. What was happening in front of him was not fair, and Boba almost wanted to laugh. Talk about someone who wasn’t powerful enough to save the people he cared about.
Because of his weakness. His morals and values. His dedication towards life and justice. It made him weak, and men like Dad exploited that weakness for all it was worth. Like he had exploited Boba’s weakness.
“Will you take him from me, jetii ?” Jango mocked bitterly. “Will you forcibly steal what is mine? What will your precious Republic think about that? What spectacle would that make the Jedi?”
Kenobi’s eyes darted between Dad and Boba and Dad again. He was paralyzed. He didn’t know what to do.
“I wonder if even a jetii can be arrested?” Dad didn’t stop. He pressed down, harder and harder, trapping Kenobi. “Does he like his face on the Holonet? I can see it now - reclusive wizard tries to kidnap a man’s child from him. Like they kidnap all those other children, I believe.”
Kenobi didn’t say anything. Boba could see him strain. He desperately searched for words, for the right thing to say, for some logical trick. But he couldn’t. No retorts sprang to his tongue; no whispers from his magic wind to tell him what to do.
“That’s what I thought.” Dad pressed a button on his gauntlet that shut the bolas on his legs off, letting two metal discs fall on the ground, and Dad kicked them back into his hand so he could stuff them back in his pocket. He grabbed Boba’s helmet, left abandoned on the scorched bar, and latched the helmet on his belt. He began pulling Boba backwards, ignoring his thrashing. “When we meet again, jetii, you’ll find that I am a much less forgiving man without my son in the room.”
“Boba,” Kenobi whispered, “I’m…I’m sorry, I…”
He really was kind of nice, for a jetii . Useless. But he seemed like an honorable man. For a jetii .
“I don’t care ,” Boba hissed, as Dad dragged him out. “Just keep your promise !”
“The massiff of the Republic isn’t going to help you,” Jango said, tugging him along. Boba kicked his feet and dug his heels in, determined to make this difficult for him, and Dad was forced to physically drag him out. “ That’s a lesson to you, Boba. Those people are weak and cowardly. Now stop being difficult.”
But Kenobi’s eyes just widened, and Boba saw him subtly look around the room. He, of course, had remembered what Dad had not: Omega.
And, despite everything, Boba couldn’t help but grin. He couldn’t believe that he had entrusted this useless do-gooder type with his little sister. The galaxy had to be upside down.
Dad stopped at the doorway, propping the door open with one foot. He looked back only once, ignoring Boba’s writhing in his hands.
“So sorry you broke your oath to your apprentice. At least you did your duty and kept it to the Republic. We’ll meet again, jetii .”
“Yes,” Kenobi whispered, eyes large and wild. “We will.”
That was the last Boba saw of Kenobi as the door fell shut behind them: a man, frozen in place, straining with the desperate need to do what was right yet finding himself impotent and incapable. Unwilling to fight for it.
Twilight had fallen on Coruscant. The streets were paved in yellow and lavender, illuminating the thick layer of smog above their heads with a healthy glow. Pedestrians had begun to crawl over the streets, slouching their way throughout their small and circular lives.
They all saw Dad drag Boba outside. He refused to walk. Kicking at the floor was useless, so he made himself dead weight and let Dad physically drag him along.
“Help!” Boba yelled. “Someone help , please! Someone help me!”
Everybody looked away. Boba knew Kenobi could hear him. Nobody helped him. Nobody even looked. He knew nobody would. But he yelled anyway, just to embarrass Dad, because he couldn’t be any more humiliated himself, until Dad dragged him down the block to the Slave I ’s throughly illegal parking job in the middle of an empty lot.
The docking ramp ground downwards, and Boba’s happy and safe second home was turned into a prison. Dad tugged Boba upwards, carefully dropping him on the grated floor of the cargo hold, before he shut the loading bay doors.
The second the bay door clanged shut, Dad collapsed.
He fell onto his knees in front of Boba, beskar’gam ringing against the grate with a heavy thump, and he ripped his helmet off. It rolled on the floor, an abandoned weapon tossed in surrender, but he didn’t take a second look at it. He hugged Boba instead, clutching at him fiercely, his fingers digging into the edges of his beskar plates. Boba almost wheezed as Dad squeezed the daylights out of him.
“Damn it, Boba,” Dad said. “I was so worried. I didn’t know where you were. Damn it, Boba, don’t do that to me again.”
Dad’s beskar was scorched, marked with black residue. He would have to polish it hard, smooth away the harsh black scars for hours until they gleamed shiny and new. Somehow, that was all Boba could think about.
“Boba, please don’t scare me like that again…”
He separated from Boba, clutching onto his shoulders and looking him up and down. Boba didn’t look at him, keeping his eyes steadily on the floor.
“You’re still hurt,” Dad said, almost to himself. “Damn fucking Jedi almost killed you. He could have got you in the gut. I have the med pack in the cockpit, come on. I’ll - if I take off the bola will you -”
“You’ve disgraced my honor,” Boba said.
“Right. Let’s…until you calm down.”
Boba could get to the cockpit by himself, and there was no point in making a scene anymore. He sidled through the narrow hallways himself, avoiding the now horizontal ladder chute, and he ignored Dad carefully following after him and minding his leg.
The cockpit was the same as ever. Still immaculately clean, efficient and top of the line. Nothing but the best. There were a few more flimsi and datapads around, and Boba recognized that the navcom was set to display a list of recent identification checks into Republic databases.
Well. That explained that. Boba was so stupid. He collapsed against the wall next to the med pack bolted to the floor, kicking his legs out and slouching as best as he could with the electrobolas still making his armor tingle.
Dad would probably call this sulking. He didn’t really feel like he was sulking. He felt like his mind was crowded and clear; like his vision was flooded with so many colors that he could only see white. The only emotions he felt were deep and terrible humiliation, thick in his throat, and the burning embers of rage climbing in his gut. But they felt so dark and distant, almost as if they belonged to somebody else, and Boba mostly just felt a little numb.
Dad came in right after him, already talking. Dad was not a nervous talker - he wasn’t much of a talker at all, really. He was only talkative with Boba. He had the feeling that it had been a compensatory mechanism for those first few months where Boba didn’t talk much and he didn’t have many people to absorb language from - or, maybe, when he knew that Boba didn’t know enough to judge him for it. Some of the other trainers acted all shocked when they saw Dad and Boba hanging out together, making cracks about how they heard more words from him in five minutes with Boba than in a week. Dad usually flipped them off.
“We can save the fight for after we’re in hyperspace. Escaping this place is even worse than entering it. Let’s just focus for right now and we can talk this all through later.”
“Mhm,” Boba said.
Dad sighed, as if Boba was just being a difficult teenager. “Come on, let me take a look at your flightsuit. Didn’t even get the bastard’s name…”
Boba silently resolved not to tell Kenobi’s name to Dad. Least he could do.
The longer Boba went without talking, the more anxious Dad seemed to get. The wound really was just a scrape, a light burn about the length of a finger, and Dad wrapped it with his usual neat and precise efficiency.
“None of what I said back there was true. It was the only way I could get us out of there and keep you safe. It was the only way to keep you safe. I know I - I probably hurt your feelings, Boba, and I’m sorry, but I didn’t mean any of it.”
“I’m not really in the mood for the apologetic father act,” Boba said blandly.
Dad stood up, packing back up the med case. “Don’t give me that. You’re lucky that - what happened in there could have gone a lot worse, Boba. Jetii like that, he could have killed you. I did what I had to do. You aren’t ready to kill them yet, and seeing you two so close together - you have no idea what it was like.”
“So you aren’t apologetic.”
“Let’s escape this cursed planet before we get into a fight, Boba.”
Boba was silent as they escaped the cursed planet. Dad had to stop and call some tow company so they could collect the Slave II and get it delivered to some way-off planet for probably some astronomical expense that Dad could more than afford. Leaving Coruscant required a lot of active piloting if you didn’t want to get smeared against the nearest skyscraper, and he wasn’t dumb enough to distract him. From the way Dad kept glancing back at him he knew that Dad was already kicking himself for not taking off the bolas already, but it was fine. It wasn’t any different.
And Dad was so stressed out about Boba and his virulent teenage hatred that he continued to forget one important thing. Boba wasn’t about to remind him.
When they finally escaped Coruscant air space Dad sagged. He propped his elbow on the console, rubbing heavily at his forehead, and Boba saw for the first time how tired he looked. He really must have been worried.
As always, Boba broke the silence first. “You didn’t lie.”
Dad sighed. He scrubbed his face one last time, refusing to turn around and look at him. Boba had only moved to roll with the ship flipping upright, and he was now leaning against the durasteel wall of the cockpit with the medpack fixed to the wall above his head.
He didn’t pretend that he didn’t know what Boba was talking about. “I was - you know, like I told you when you were a kid. Sometimes you can say entirely true things and still lie. All of that - that stupid legal bullshit, it’s meaningless. It’s not how I think about you. It’s just semantics. You’re a Fett, Boba, you aren’t anybody’s property.”
“Then why can’t I leave?”
Dad stiffened, but Boba didn’t look away. He just kept staring at him, and no matter how uncomfortable Dad looked he didn’t look away. “It’s a father worrying about his son . It’s not like that. The bounty was - well, it was me giving you a hard time -” Typical. “ - but I wasn’t being serious. You just aren’t ready to be out there yet, Boba.”
“And I’m the adult, fully human sentient person who just doesn’t get a say in any of this.”
“A family isn’t a democracy , Boba,” Dad snapped. “Kamino isn’t a democracy. There’s too much at stake to give in to your temper tantrums. I’ve spoiled you long enough, and - and we’ll discuss you running off later , but - but I just need you to know that you’re mine , but you’re not - it’s not like that. It’s never been like that.” Dad pushed hard at the controls, and the ship jerked as it escaped Coruscant’s gravitational well. “It wasn’t my intention to - to make you feel any differently.”
“Really?” Boba said snidely. “Because it looks like everything that happened back there was exactly your intention.”
“Having to drag you out of there and force you into the ship was not my intention!” Dad cried. He thumped the controls on the console harder than necessary, but Boba knew that he wasn’t really paying attention to the console. “Your refusal to come home was not my intention! The last thing I want is disobedience -”
“What are you talking about? I did exactly as you asked.”
Dad swiveled around, expression incredulous. “This isn’t the time for jokes, Boba.”
Boba shrugged easily. He felt calm and sharp - as if a great clarity had settled over his shoulders, and he could truly see his father for the first time. But Kenobi’s words came back to him, and he couldn’t help but wonder if he was looking with eyes clouded by hate. “You ordered a perfectly programmed clone. That’s what you received. You’re the one who taught me that Mandalorian teenagers leave home for a few years to hunt independently. I haven’t done anything you didn’t program me to do.”
“Cut it with that crap,” Dad hissed. “You know I didn’t mean that you should run off without my permission.”
“You taught me that Mandalorians are independent. They take initiative. They train and test themselves. I acted according to those parameters. Those values. You programmed a perfect Mandalorian. You should be happy.”
“You need to be quiet,” Dad said harshly. But Boba had scared him. He knew it. “We’ll talk about these ridiculous ideas later.”
“Why aren’t you happy?” Boba asked, faux confused. His voice was low and steady, and when Dad looked at him he couldn’t look away. Boba wondered what kind of figure he cut like this - bound, sitting on the ship’s floor and leaning against the wall. His own expression, dark - his own eyes, unblinking. “You’ve done it. Eight years of work and you’ve finally done it. You have the perfect warrior to kill your enemies. The perfect son to carry on your legacy and make you a legend. Something that’ll love you unconditionally - worship you. Something for you to love. You have a family again. After all those years -”
“Shut up, Boba!”
“You loved that look on his face, didn’t you?” Boba said lowly, and Dad froze. “Making the Jedi feel powerless and helpless was the best victory you’ve had in years. You’ll humiliate your son just to humiliate him. You’ll do anything for your victory over the jetii, and your son will always come second. And you’ll win everything you want.”
“Boba, I swear -”
But Boba wouldn’t stop, and he knew that he couldn’t. His voice was slow and steady and unceasing, and it seemed to suffocate Dad. “More money than any ex-farmer kid like you can imagine. The Jedi decimated like they decimated you. It doesn’t matter that your father would be ashamed of you. You have a perfect clone and a perfect son. Depending on whatever you want at the time.”
Dad was scared, and Boba was pressing, and maybe Boba’s clarity was just cold and awful hate. He had never hated his father before. But Dad had never looked so scared of him before.
“Congratulations, Jango Fett. You have everything you ever wanted.”
And Dad just stared at him, terrified, as if he was looking at a stranger. As if he was seeing the Boba of a long time ago: a Boba that he did not understand, a child who was not a child. A weapon that woke you up at midnight out of boredom and a child who was incapable of forgetting anything.
He had never seen who that child grew up to be. That child was replaced with Boba Fett, his spoiled son who laughed and fought. Boba wondered if he was seeing that child now: if his vision clouded by love had cleared, and he saw the only thing that Boba had ever been.
Everything he wanted, in front of him. And everything he could never have.
Dad flipped a few switches for autopilot on the console and stood up. He left the cockpit, dropping down the ladder chute, and Boba didn’t see him again.
He sat there for a long time, staring out into the black. He didn’t feel much like moving.
The hatred and anger was melting away, and the guilt and hurt began to creep back in. The sadness returned and crushed his heart, and suddenly Boba just wanted this all to stop.
It hadn’t felt good to hurt Dad like that. Dad had hurt him, but he didn’t want to be the kind of person who hurt back just so two people were hurting instead of one. He knew that wasn’t the kind of person he was, and he wasn’t going to let Dad’s idiocy change that.
He watched Coruscant fade further and further away until it disappeared. Omega would know exactly how far away he was from her right now, how much further he grew every passing second, but Boba didn’t have to know.
All of her notebooks were still on his ship. Would she miss them? She could just make more, but she had worked so hard on them. All of her possessions were still on his ship. Wherever she was now, she had nothing to her name. No money, no clothing, no brother.
Boba had done the right thing. Just like Dad, he had to repeat the words over and over to himself. Nothing was certain, and she was far from safe - but the moralizing and softhearted Jedi was there. If he’d do nothing else, he wouldn’t leave her alone.
It was stupid. That weakness and vulnerability had fucked over Boba. It hadn’t helped him one whit, from the first second that he tried to help to the very last second that he couldn’t.
But it was only the kindness and sympathy, given freely with no expectation of reciprocation, that made Boba feel okay now. He couldn’t be somebody who gave it to her, like Dad hadn’t been able to give it to him, but Kenobi could. That kindness didn’t feel so useless now. And for some stupid reason it made Boba feel weird that this was the first time in his life it had ever felt important.
Dad swung back into the cockpit only twenty minutes later. He looked faintly guilty, and he immediately walked over to Boba and unlocked the restraints. He didn’t touch Boba as he did it - only carefully deactivating the metal disks in the back and setting them aside.
The release of the restraints was an immediate relief. Boba sagged, exhaling heavily, before drawing his knees up to his chest. He looked away from Dad, staring fixedly to his left. After a second, he heard a sigh and a thump. Dad had sat down next to him on his right, and when Boba peered at him out of the corner of his eye he saw that Dad’s head was tilted back against the wall. He was staring at the ceiling, at the soft curve of the durasteel wall that fixed seamlessly into the glossy viewport glistening with soft smears of stars.
Space was different when you weren’t flying in hyperspace. Boba was almost always in hyperspace, rushing from one destination to another. It felt a little strange to just fly lazily, walking as slowly as they wanted.
For the first time, Dad broke the silence.
“A long time ago. You asked me why I ordered an older clone instead of finding a son.” Dad’s voice was hoarse, as if he was speaking from far away. “I wasn’t completely honest. I never am with you. It was only that…babies, you know, they need you to love them. They depend on you. And I didn’t think I would be able to love one. I was scared. So I asked for something that didn’t need me to love it. If I couldn’t love it, then nobody would be hurt.”
Boba buried his face into his knees, inhaling deeply.
“But I did. Quicker than I thought possible. More than I thought possible. And I realized that I had made a mistake. Because I could have loved that baby. I lost ten years of his life because I was scared. And I lost something else, but I could never figure out what it was.”
“I’m sorry,” Boba said, “I’m sorry.”
Why was Boba apologizing? He wasn’t sorry for being harsh and he didn’t regret anything he had done. Why couldn’t he stop thinking of Omega and the broken-hearted look on her face as she apologized for something she didn’t regret?
Boba had felt sorry for Dad a lot. Dad never asked for pity and he never wanted it, but Boba knew that losing his family had hurt him in a way that couldn’t be healed. Now, at this moment, Boba just felt a long and slow sadness - sadness that Dad had lived his adult life alone, without a single brother, loving nobody. That Dad had eliminated every option and choice, and that he did not know what freedom looked like.
Was that what Omega had felt as she looked at him? That sadness?
It wasn’t anything that could be fixed - in Boba or in Dad. It was too late for them both. They were both cold and cruel, and neither understood how to be kind. Was it too late…?
Dad didn’t say anything. Carefully and slowly, ready to retreat if he wasn’t welcome, he slung an arm around Boba’s shoulders. And Boba leaned against him, resting his cheek against the comforting cold of the beskar, and they sat together in silence for just a little longer.
Then Dad straightened. “Wait. Did I forget something?”
A grin slowly stretched over Boba’s face. Judging from the look on Dad’s face it was a little creepy, and seemed to panic him more. “Forget what?”
“I feel like there’s something I forgot to do -”
Dad stopped short. Boba started laughing. It wasn’t very nice laughter. But it was very, very satisfied.
Dad stood up suddenly, realization dawning with panic at its heels. “The female one. She was in the diner with - where did the female go?”
“I don’t know, Dad!” Boba felt almost light-headed. He wasn’t sure if this elation was happiness, but it was the closest thing he had. “But she’s long gone by now. She’s a fierce one, you know? I even think she has the spirit of a Mandalorian.”
“This isn’t funny,” Dad snapped. “The Kamino were very insistent that she return. She’s a security breach.”
“No wonder. She has to know everything that happens in that place, huh?” Boba found himself laughing again, light and loud, as Dad’s expression grew darker. “You have no idea how smart she is. I’ve never met such a smart kid who was so stupid. She’s resourceful and brave. She makes me feel like a coward. You’ll never find her.”
Something strange crossed Dad’s face. It wasn’t sour or uncomfortable, like when he saw Boba playing with the Alphas. It seemed a little lost - as if, in the two weeks Boba had spent in the galaxy and away from him, some part of Boba’s heart had become unrecognizable. “That’s how I caught you. You played distraction.”
“Yep!” Boba said cheerfully. His laughter was more of a cackle now, and Dad leaned back a little. “The galaxy’s greatest bounty hunter let his teenage son trick him and let a little girl escape. She’s long gone by now, and you’re never going to find her. Go choke on it.”
“Boba, this isn’t funny.” Jango clenched his jaw, obviously thinking hard. “The bounty’s still on her. The Kamino would never remove it. They’re never going to believe that I just - got distracted -”
“Guess they can’t handle the truth,” Boba said cheerfully. “What now, Dad? We going back to Coruscant so you can look for her? Am I going to hang out in the ship while you shake down a planet for a kid lost in the wind?”
Dad stared at him for a long, long time. He was making a decision. Boba looked at him expectantly, waiting to see what he would choose. If he would do the right thing and finish the job. If he would fulfill his mission and never compromise his plan for revenge.
Finally, he said, “She’s all on her own.”
Boba nodded in agreement. “Mostly.”
“The bounty on her head’s no joke. She’s not going to make it out there.”
“Maybe. I can’t help that.” Boba shrugged. “I just gave her the chance. Everything after that’s up to her, right?”
“Coruscant’s twenty hells stacked on top of each other.” Was it Boba’s imagination, or did Dad look a little nervous? “An eight year old girl with minimal combat training and nothing to her nonexistent name is going to end up dead in a gutter. Even a clone couldn’t -”
“Dad,” Boba said. “Chill. She’ll be okay. She takes after you, you know?”
Dad stared at him for a long moment, then two, before turning sharply on his heel and dropping in the pilot’s chair. Boba stiffened. Was he really going to -
“I’m not wasting my time with one defect,” Dad said gruffly. “The Kamino want her so bad, they hire their own bounty hunters. I got what I came here for. Let’s get out of here. I’m sick of this shit.”
And Boba couldn’t help but smile. “Chin up, Dad. The girl estimated around another two years before the war breaks out. We all just have to hang in there for another two years, right?”
“Yeah,” Dad muttered, as he thrust the lever, “just two more years.”
The ship jumped forward into hyperspace - leaving Coruscant and all of its crazy, naive, kind people behind.