Chapter Text
Seth snarled and raised his lightsaber as he lit it so that he could bring it down on Osiris’s face—only to be met with Osiris’ own bright red lightsaber, holding him back, barely pushing him towards the elevator bay.
“Can we not have a civilized conversation?” Osiris asked, still smiling at Seth, as patronizing as ever. The red light gave him a more sinister look. “You belong at my side, Seth. You know this.”
“Shut. Up!” Seth snarled, ducking aside to kick Osiris away. He looked at Horus and Anubis.
Horus grabbed Anubis’ left arm and pulled him along to the now empty elevator.
Osiris sprang up and swiped at them with his lightsaber. Seth was there to block his attacks, and batted Osiris away from the elevator bay.
Seth called back, “Go!”
“Why do you waste time with people like that?” Osiris practically purred at Seth. His lightsaber would have crushed a weaker person to the ground, but Seth stood his ground. “Anubis has potential, but your tagalong doesn’t. And even Anubis is nothing in comparison to what you’ll have once we’re together again.”
Seth slowly pushed back. The brightness where the sabers touched burned his eyes, and there was an ever so slight tremble to his hands that he despised. This was the last place he wanted to be, but he knew he might end up here once he heard about Anubis’ kidnapping. Somehow he always knew he’d end up back here in the end, facing down Osiris, under the weight of his own past mistakes.
“It’ll be like old times,” Osiris continued. “You and I, ruling the galaxy together. As we should.”
Seth wanted to gag. “That was never the reality, and it was never what I wanted!” He couldn’t look back to see if the elevator had moved, but he could still sense Horus and Anubis behind him. What were they waiting for?! He focused his energy into his lightsaber, and shoved it out, knocking Osiris back. He reached out with his mind for part of a computer terminal, yanked it out of the floor with a screech of metal and flickering electric cables, and tossed it at where Osiris fell. Then he turned and ran for the elevator.
The door shut behind him with Horus pressing the button, and they raced away, in a direction Seth hoped led to the docking bay. The elevator itself was small, but had room enough for two adults and a tall teenager.
Anubis leaned against the side of the elevator, staring at the shut door. “You… You killed him, again?”
Seth was breathing quickly, and checked Anubis over, happy at least he was physically fine, and glad to see he was aware. “Hopefully.” Then he looked at Horus. “We need to get out. He’ll have precautions for this.”
“He can just make more of himself?” Horus said, alarmed. “You cut his head off! And he came back whole!”
“He’s got a cloning facility,” Seth said. “It’s on one of his private worlds. He controls them from a central body. He stockpiles clones for emergencies, so he can send them out as needed.”
“…Do we have to destroy the cloning facility?” Horus asked. “To make sure he doesn’t follow us?”
Seth shook his head. “There isn’t one here. He’s just got some clones here, probably with a brain hub of some kind. We could destroy that, but it’s just part of the network. He probably just sent a lot of his clones here because he knew I was coming.” To trap me here.
“You said Anubis’ kidnapping was targeted,” Horus said, his gaze hardening. “This was why.”
Seth grimaced. “I knew he sensed I was still alive, just not where. But I knew he’d come after me, considering our history. I’ve kept off his radar, or so I thought. I didn’t know he knew about Isis.”
“…If he knew you were coming and was after you, why do you think he’s not here himself?”
“He has to run all the hubs from somewhere. This would be too exposed. He probably filled the place with clones, though.” Seth grimaced. “But if Osiris is here, then I’ll… I’ll kill him. You have to get Anubis out, though.”
Horus grimaced.
“Uncle Seth?” Anubis asked, quietly, drawing Seth’s attention back to him. He still looked too pale and a bit frightened, but he still sounded more and more aware. The drugs seemed to be wearing off. “Are you all right?”
Seth forced something of a smile. “I’m fine, Anubis. We’re going to have to move quickly when we get out of here. Stay by Horus, okay? He’ll get you home.”
“…Okay.”
Seth could still hear his nervousness and asked, “How are you feeling? Do you know what they gave you?”
Anubis put a hand to his head. “Something in the food, maybe? I just felt so tired. And my mouth tastes kind of chalky.”
“We’ll get you checked out when we’re out of here.”
“Okay.”
The ride was quick after that, and Seth didn’t let himself rest, but he was grateful, because he though Osiris might cut the power and trap them in the elevator. Horus had enough time to show him the map of where they were headed, and Seth was ready to lead the way once the door opened. He had his red lightsaber up and was blocking shots from guards down the hall, and leapt ahead. Horus and Anubis took shelter outside the elevator behind him, in case Osiris somehow did bring the elevator back.
It had been a while since Seth fully cut loose, and he had to admit there was something cathartic in it. Normally he was a bit limited: he couldn’t reveal his powers for fear of discovery. He was just a bit stronger and faster than others and well trained in relatively normal martial arts, most of the time. He could use various weapons, but he missed fighting this way, and there was a fluidity his body fell easily into, as he brushed aside shots with the lightsaber or picked up large objects with his powers and tossed them at enemies.
Perhaps some of his old teachers would be upset with him for how he was letting loose this way. How even the people who worked on Osiris’ horrible experiments deserved a chance for something. But Seth had seen the reports about this place. So he kept cutting down. He had to get Anubis and Horus out of here.
At a break in the fighting, Seth stepped back, his lightsaber raised high, his breathing fast, looking around for his next opponent.
“You’re always beautiful when you’re fighting,” Osiris said as the latest clone stepped forward, no different in appearance from the others. His own lightsaber was off at his side. “I’m so glad to behold it again.”
Seth snorted and nodded back to Horus and Anubis to move down the corridor with him. “I’m just going to go through every one of these you have.”
Osiris grinned. “Please do. I have more for you to fight.” He picked up his lightsaber and switched it on, moving into a combat stance. “And when you’re exhausted from it all and unable to move, we can still be together.”
Seth breathed in, centering himself, before leaping forward.
In the end, the facility nearly collapsed under the weight of Seth’s attacks. Osiris didn’t wait for his first clone to die this time. A second arrived to take his place, and when Seth saw two of them, he started hitting harder, and faster. He knocked down walls, made circuits explode and glass shatter… It was a mess.
Seth was breathing hard, standing over a mess of limbs and green cloth on the ground, when he heard Horus shout, “Seth, come on!”
So Seth blinked, recalled where he was, and fled towards Horus’ voice. Alarms were blaring, and guards largely ignored them as the facility seemed to have bigger problems.
“Get the ship ready to go!” Horus said into his comlink.
“What the heck did you guys do?!” Apollo said loud enough for Seth to hear it.
“JUST DO IT!”
There were no more obstacles on the way to the landing bay. Seth assumed most people were heading to emergency stations. No one was really paying attention to the Falcon, and the three of them easily ran aboard. Horus went to the cockpit while Seth pulled Anubis to the lounge to settle down and breathe. As much as he wanted to see what was happening, he didn’t think an upset teenager recovering from being drugged would be a good idea in a cockpit during an escape.
“What’s going on?” Anubis asked, looking around. “Where are we?”
“Your mother heard about what happened,” Seth explained. “She asked for help.”
Anubis frowned.
“I hired this ship, Horus, and his copilot to help me.”
“Oh.” Anubis looked around more, his eyes brighter with curiosity. His skin was already less pale, which Seth hoped was a good sign.
Seth searched around and grabbed a first aid kit, which had a scanner he used to quickly check Anubis’ vitals. “Nephthys said you went looking for your father.”
Anubis blushed and looked away, but stayed still while Seth checked him over. “Yeah…” He sighed and shook his head. “It was stupid. I thought I had a lead.” There was a rumble in the ship and they both looked up for a moment, alarmed. But things grew quieter, and calmer. They could hear the engines going, that was all.
“What lead?” Seth asked, to distract Anubis.
Anubis swallowed. “He said he had access to genetic records spanning multiple star systems. That he was able to track anyone down…”
“…You gave him something to scan your DNA.”
“Yeah.”
Seth shut his eyes and breathed in deeply. Osiris knew Seth and Nephthys were close. If he’d gotten a ping on her DNA being somewhere, he’d have tracked her down. And snatched Anubis up immediately.
“I know it was dumb…”
Seth put the equipment away, and replied, “You’re okay for now. We’ll get you checked again with a proper doctor when you get home.” He turned to meet Anubis’ gaze. “And it was very dumb.”
“I just wanted to know!” Anubis said, banging his hand on the table. “I’m tired of you and Mother keeping it from me!”
Seth breathed out. “It’s not easy to explain this kind of thing, Anubis.”
“How? He’s one man. It’s not hard.”
“…Not for this man.”
Anubis frowned at him.
Seth grimaced. “Osiris. Osiris is your father.”
“…What?”
Seth leaned back in his chair. “Your mother was a Jedi, once, you know? She still is, but she’s quieter about it. Happier to teach, to run her clinic. And Osiris… we thought he was a better man. Your mother and he had a bit of a fling and… well. You were conceived then.”
Anubis frowned. “But he’s been Emperor since…”
“Your mother put the embryo in cryo. Some years after the fall and things were more stable, she wanted a baby, so she took you back. And had you.”
Anubis stared at the table. Seth wondered if he was thinking of all the stories people told about Osiris’ atrocities. The stories Nephthys and Seth had told him, as much as the local gossips. Nephthys and Anubis lived in an area with decently strong Rebel ties. The only reason Osiris had grabbed him was because Anubis had been trying so hard to find help outside the usual channels.
“…We aren’t our fathers,” Seth said. “We aren’t our parents. Who he is has nothing to do with who you are.”
“He’s evil.”
“…Yes.”
“You should have told me.”
Seth winced. “I know. We just… didn’t know how.” Seth sighed. “And we’re going to have to talk about you being force sensitive, too. Have you heard or felt weird things you couldn’t explain?” Seth should have noticed. Nephthys might have and dismissed it.
“…I didn’t know what it was. Not until the people who caught me pointed it out.”
Seth sighed. “I know. We’ll… talk about it when we get to your mother.” He got up to get them drinks, and froze when he saw Horus walking to them from the corridor.
Horus’ expression was unreadable. “We’re away. Apollo has the controls. It’s fine.”
Seth breathed in deeply. “Good.”
Horus looked at Anubis, who was staring at the table. “Everything going okay here?”
Seth shrugged. “A lot of big things, I guess.”
“Ah.”
Seth reached out for Horus’ arm, then pulled back at the last second. “I’d like to talk to you in private later. About… About things. If you’re okay with that.”
Horus blinked at him, then reached out and took Seth’s hand, squeezing it lightly. “Yes. Yes, I’d be okay with that.”
Seth smiled, and almost dared to hope.
Horus’ room was one of the bigger rooms on the ship, with a bigger and more comfortable bed, and a minifridge where he kept a variety of nice drinks and snacks. There were posters of ships, schematics, and some pictures of different people Seth hadn’t asked about, but they seemed to be having a good time in all the pictures.
Seth sat on the edge of the bed, and Horus joined him. Horus was a large, warm presence nearby. Seth wasn’t sure he deserved it.
“I imagine you have a lot of questions…” Seth finally offered.
Horus snorted. “Yeah.”
“Your mother never spoke about me, right?”
“Not a peep. She just said you were trustworthy. That’s a big reason I let you back onto my ship while we were getting away.”
Seth winced.
“And also because I trust you,” Horus said.
Seth blinked and looked up at him.
Horus’ expression was serious. “You’ve been decent in the short time I’ve known you. And you care about that kid. No Sith I ever heard of did that.”
Seth snorted. “Osiris did, once.” He picked up the lightsaber from his hip and rolled it in his fingers, feeling the cool dark metal there. “He was good about it. He knows how to butter anyone up. Make them feel like they deserve more. Deserve everything.” He sighed and lowered the lightsaber. “I fell for it.”
“You became Sith?”
“Almost. It’s why my lightsaber is this color. But it didn’t really… It’s complicated. I was angry, yes. I had difficulty meditating sometimes, and fitting in, as it were. And I had to work off my feelings in unique ways that weren’t always the idealized in temple life. Still do, honestly. Sometimes I felt like any day, they’d kick me out. Osiris made me feel safe, like what I did was normal, and even the more right way to act.” He smiled grimly. “I was one of his followers, for a time, going on missions where he bid.” He sighed. “But I was lucky. Other Jedi reached out to me, to talk to me about my difficulties fitting in with the Order. I learned a lot of alternate techniques, things that didn’t necessarily make me feel the same as everyone else, but that at least let me breathe more comfortably. And suddenly I didn’t always want to be at Osiris’ side. And I realized just how stifling he was.” He looked down at the lightsaber. “But I regretted many of the things I did for him. And I realized how lucky I was to get away. I always left the Order of it, but friends convinced me to stay.”
“Don’t Jedi not have red lightsabers?”
“They don’t. But no one was going to tell me to change it. Even then, I was strongly associated with Osiris’ faction. And when he took over, well… That was that. And I went into hiding.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I know a lot of good people who died,” Seth said. “Most people do, but… They were my family, too. And I couldn’t help them. I could barely help myself.”
“That’s awful.”
Seth shrugged. “It’s what I chose.”
“He took advantage. That’s not on you.”
Seth grimaced. If he’d been stronger, paid attention… He’d made so many stupid mistakes in his life, thinking power meant strength, and cruelty was better than compassion. Because it meant Osiris smiled at him, and people respected him. Or, really, feared him. “You don’t know how much I dug my own grave on that front. I’ve done a lot of terrible things. It’s honestly amazing that the Order didn’t kick me out several times.”
“I heard the way he talked to you. I’ve seen people like that before. It’s not on you, Seth. Whatever happened in the past, you’ve grown. You’ve moved on.”
“I’m hardly perfect, Horus. You really don’t know me…”
“I know you were willing to throw your life away to get me and Anubis off that station. Most people would sacrifice us in a heartbeat to save their own skin. You didn’t.”
Seth’s cheeks burned.
“And I know why Osiris knew about Isis.”
Seth blinked and looked at Horus, who looked uncomfortable. “What?”
Horus grimaced. “Mother… She had difficulty conceiving. So she looked into medical programs to help. There was a big one around the time I… Well, it worked. It was only afterward the story got out that it was another of the Emperor’s testing labs.”
Seth stiffened.
“He’d been sending out his… genetic material to impregnate different species. No one was really sure why. The general consensus was he was just curious. It was too late, anyway. I’d already been born by that point.”
“I’m… Sorry isn’t right, but… that’s awful.”
Horus shrugged. “We aren’t our fathers, right?”
Seth blushed. “You were listening.”
“I needed some air, and Apollo was in a mood to handle maneuvers during the escape. You two weren’t being quiet.”
Seth snorted.
Horus smiled briefly before it faded away. “Isis had a suspicion the Emperor put a tracker on her from that, to see how I developed. She’s done her best to evade it, but they got a big data dump on her when she used the program, and throughout her pregnancy. It pissed her off a lot.”
“That’s so…” Seth scowled at the floor, and wished he’d stuck around to kill more of Osiris’ clones. “He just… finds all new ways to be fucked up.”
Horus grinned bitterly. “Yeah.”
“You’re nothing like him, you know,” Seth said, looking up at Horus with a firm gaze. “I’ve known him for decades. You’re nothing alike. And you take more after your mother in your looks.”
Horus grinned. “You’re lying.”
Seth stiffened.
“It’s a gift I’ve had since childhood, being able to tell when people are lying. Makes smuggling easier.”
“…You’re kidding.”
“I’m not!” Horus grinned. “You were lying, weren’t you?”
Seth scowled.
“It’s okay. I don’t mind hearing the truth.”
Seth looked away. “I didn’t notice it before, but now that I know… In little ways I can see him in you, and it’s becoming more obvious the more I look at you. There are bits of him in your physicality… but also your drive. Your thoughtfulness. They’re things he had, too.”
Horus winced. “I didn’t mean to… bring up things from your past.”
Seth shrugged. “Those aren’t bad traits. It’s Osiris who twists everything, not you. It’s more likely you just have them, yourself, and he’s the one who does it all wrong, not that you have those traits because of him.”
They were silent for a while, until Horus said, “Is this it then? We drop you off and we go our separate ways?”
Seth blinked and looked at Horus thoughtfully. Horus was staring at the carpet.
“Did you… not want that?” Seth asked, confused.
“Honestly, I feel like I don’t,” Horus asked, looking at Seth thoughtfully with those terrible bright blue eyes and fervent gaze that were all him. “I like you. I like being honest with you. And yeah, I… get it’s a sore thing with Osiris. But you are really hot when you’re just going at it in a fight.”
Seth snorted. “I bet you say that to all the force-using killing machines you’ve met.”
“I sure do.”
Seth studied Horus for a while, and reached out and cupped Horus’ right cheek, brushing the corner of Horus’ lips with a finger. “You really want more of this?”
“If you’re okay with it.”
Seth swallowed. “I don’t know that it’ll be easy. I’m a Jedi in hiding, one of the Empire’s most wanted. Osiris will be after me.”
Horus nodded. “I am in fact a smuggler a good portion of the time. I kind of work with illegal stuff. Part of the job description.”
Seth snorted. “Oh well, if that’s all, then…”
Horus wrapped his left arm around Seth’s back to pull him in for a kiss, crushing their chests together. It made Seth feel warm.
Seth clawed the back of Horus’ shirt, keeping him close. He hadn’t been with anyone in so long. And he didn’t know how this would work. But he was curious.
When they finally broke for air, they leaned close to each other, just existing in each other’s space.
“Does it bother you that it’s red?” Horus asked.
“What?”
“The lightsaber. Does it bother you that it’s red? I know they come in different colors…”
Seth laughed. “Sometimes. And sometimes it’s easier to pretend I’m one of Osiris’ people that way. It helps.”
“…I could help you change it, if you want. If that’s a thing we could do.”
“It’s a thing… but, you’d do that for me?”
“Yes.”
Seth chuckled and pushed Horus back on the bed, letting his legs tangle with the bigger man’s. “Let’s start slow. We need that after getting out of Duat, and getting Anubis home.”
Horus grinned up at him, and Seth moved down to meet him.