Bad Batch AU: Omega and her many, many uncles ✨
This is a continuation of the "Five Clones & a Little Lady" Bad Batch AU/headcanons about The Bad Batch raising Omega from a baby. Let's talk about how our favourite clones would be as uncles to little Omega growing up! This was so fun to write, honestly.
Thank you @scarlettroseog for the help with these!!
Note: I've finally been decisive and this AU assumes everything up until and maybe just after the Citadel arc happened, meaning all our faves are still alive, except the Domino Squad; please accept my apologies to Droidbait, Cutup and Hevy for not being included in this. If its any consolation, this means Fives would absolutely for sure been there to help rescue Echo on Skako Minor.
Oh, and 99 is alive. He just is. Don’t question it.
Ad'ika: daughter/little one
So, the many, many uncles, let's begin with the 501st (I will do other clones in another post!). I haven't fully decided where they are/what they're doing in this AU. Maybe they're on a nearby planet, I don't know. The main thing is that they visit often and Omega loves them.
Hands down, the most trusted uncle of them all (you'll see why as I go on), besides Cut Lawquane. When Rex is in charge of babysitting, Hunter in particular can actually relax and get on with whatever he's doing, because he knows Omega is in good hands.
Rex is nervous to begin with, but Echo picks up on it and guides him through how to hold her safely. Tech quietly offers to show Rex the extremely useful baby care videos. Rex quietly accepts.
Due to incessant teasing from the 501st, Omega first refers to him as Grandpa Rex and calls him Ba'buir, but eventually she switches to Uncle/Ba'vodu Rex. She adores him, though, particularly because they're both blonde! He always has time for cuddles (no really, he will drop everything if Omega calls for him), is full of stories to tell her, and he might just secretly be her favourite.
The self-proclaimed favourite, coolest uncle in the galaxy. Cried when Echo first called and told him about Omega. Due to being so close to Echo, Fives seems to believes himself to be the uncle-est of uncles. They're all her uncles, but he's the most uncle of them all. In fact, he was offended that no one got him a "congratulations on becoming an uncle" card. Rex writes a half-assed one on the back of a receipt to shut him up. Fives wasn't amused.
Fives is not allowed to babysit Omega alone and especially not with Jesse and Hardcase, because the three of them caring for her only ends in disaster, or Hunter crying. Case in point; Fives was once left in sole charge of Omega for 30 minutes and she wandered off without him noticing. It took him ten minutes to realise the child had disappeared. Cue panicked clones, Hunter in hysterics (can you tell he is the Anxious Dad™️ of the bunch?). Omega was found napping under Echo's bed. Turns out Fives had forgotten they were playing hide and seek. For Hunter's own sanity, Fives is never left in charge of Omega anymore.
Assumes he is in charge when Rex isn't around to babysit but he isn't. In reality, he isn't allowed to babysit without Kix of Dogma around to keep him and the others in check. Fives and Hardcase are the ringleaders for mischief, but he eggs them on and joins in, making him just as untrustworthy.
Once, he just stood back and watched as Fives and Hardcase allowed tiny Omega to eat her bodyweight in junk and candy, despite Crosshair having specifically left a meal for them to heat up for her. Crosshair gets home to his ad'ika looking a little green, and receives a lovely welcome home gift in the form of vomit. All over him.
For real though, Jesse is a sweetheart, and he was so honoured to even get to hold her when she was a baby. He turns into a total softie around her, making faces, playing peekaboo, all the baby talk. He listens so intently whenever she babbles or talks, and will fight any of the others to get to read her a bedtime story. He would quite literally kill a man for this little girl.
The Funcle™️, or so he claims. Heard once that babies are made of rubber (and therefore bounce), and believed it. He loves Omega to bits, but can't figure out why her buire (especially Hunter) look so fearful everytime he goes near her. Might have been the time he tried to yeet the weeks-old Omega into the air because he saw a guy throw his child in the air once, and the kid seemed to love it. Or when he brought an old 501st jetpack for four year old Omega to play with (Rex did not see him smuggle that on the ship when going to visit them, or he would have confiscated it). He means well, he does. But he also has little to no sense of danger, and for that reason, mone of Omega's buire allow him around her unsupervised.
Much to their despair, Omega adores Hardcase's chaos and often tries to copy him, which has previously ended in upset or injury. If Omega is hurt on his watch, though, Hardcase feels utterly awful. But then he never learns.
Now being a full time medic, the Bad Batch (mainly Hunter, Wrecker a very close second) practically have this guy on speed dial. Seriously, that little girl will fall and graze her knee and you'd think she was bleeding out. When Omega bumped her head because Wrecker wasn't looking where he was going with her sat on his shoulders, it was as if her head had been sliced clean off. Kix finds it adorable though, they just want their ad'ika to be safe and healthy, although he knows for a fact that Tech self-taught himself basic medical aid, and almost definitely extended that to baby and child care. He doesn't mind too much, Omega might just be the sweetest kid he knows, she comes out with the funniest and most profound things, so he'd never turn down a call from them.
He got Omega a tiny medkit because he'd always catch her trying to look inside his when he visits. One time they had a great day where he taught her some basic first aid, and her buire and many of her uncles ended up all wrapped up in bandages.
Kix is the actual second in command if Rex can't babysit, although he has on occasion allowed Hardcase, Fives and Jesse's antics as long as Omega is in no immediate danger. He is still one of the most trusted uncles, though.
MY SWEETHEART. THE MOST PURE. THE GENTLEST BOI. Tup knows two things when he goes to visit. First? He'll have a little shadow the entire time. Second, he will have his hair braided (with added flowers) at least twice. Omega will fight anyone who mocks him, usually Hardcase. Tup doesn't think he looks lovely, Tup KNOWS he looks lovely.
Tup is such a gentle soul and little Omega always ends up gravitating towards him. He's such a natural, and he's just so sweet with her. She'll chat away to him about anything and everything and he'll just sit and listen and talk about whatever she wants. He'll play dolls with her, take her out for walks (even if only to give her buire a break), read her stories, he'd do anything for his little niece. Their favourite activity together is probably painting, they create all kinds of masterpieces together, and usually Omega ends up putting a blob of paint under her eye like his teardrop tattoo. In fact, they often give each other face "tattoos" when they get bored of painting on paper.
Has absolutely no interest in babies and barely knows Clone Force 99 anyway, so why should he care. He will emphasis his disinterest until he's blue in the face, and yet almost always ends up taking charge when the 501st babysit. Not to mention that he's been caught making faces at Omega to make her laugh and doing aaalllll the baby talk. And the fact he is consistently able to sooth Omega to sleep (something that annoys Hardcase endlessly, she always cried whenever he held her). Rex also found a holo picture of Dogma holding Omega, both of them smiling away. But sure, Dogma doesn't like babies.
Omega's Ba'buir! 99 might just be Omega's favourite person in the world, and her buire quickly realise that they have to take her to visit him every single day, or she will take matters into her own hands and take herself. No, really, Hunter was walking home one day to find little Omega toddling along on her own, Lula dragging behind her, on her way to 99's house. He only lives down the road, but its obviously too far for a small child to go alone.
99 was a large part in why the five of them committed to raising Omega. In the early days of her arrival, they were full of self doubt and didn't feel they could give her what she needed or be who she needed them to be. 99 reminded them that she was their blood, and that they never leave their own behind. He was so proud to see his squad become such great, loving buire to little Omega. They were so grateful that he helped them see sense.
Omega adores her ba'buir (who she called Ba/Baba when she was very little) and loves hearing all his stories of her buire growing up as well as all the clones he met on Kamino. She chats away to him about anything and everything, and they'll often bake all kinds of creations together. He also starts teaching her how to fish! He always enjoys her company, she reminds him so much of each of her buire, and he's so proud to he the one she calls her ba'buir.
- Fives, Jesse and Hardcase once had a great time tormenting Hunter by sending him constant holo-images of Omega in various staged hazardous situations. One of Fives pretending to put Omega in the oven, another of her sleeping on the couch surrounded by empty beer cans (this one freaked Tech out because he thought she really had been given alcohol, bless you Tech), you name it. Hunter did not enjoy his child-free night and went home early. Kix was in charge that night, but he saw it as harmless fun, so didn't put a stop to it.
- sometimes the 501st have a contest where they all kneel down and try to get Omega to run to them. Fives always insists it'll be him, but it never is. She usually runs to Rex or Tup, although at least once Dogma was the lucky clone. One time, Omega stared at the line of clones staring back at her and instead just burst into tears and ran right back to her Cross'buir, who scooped her up into his arms and very smugly said "I win."