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Synopsis:
Aboard an Imperial cruiser, Corporal Wayson Dower is one
of two hundred Marines listening to a briefing from
their commander, Captain Janzor. Moff Tarkin has ordered
the stormtroopers to land on Kashyyk and march north,
destroying any communications arrays they encounter, and
then secure a site. Janzor and the stormtroopers laugh
at the Wookiees, which Janzor claims are descended from
Banthas, and are convinced that they’re only
marginally intelligent.
After the briefing, Dower and his friend, Corporal Milo
Strander, stop at the Trooper’s Canteen, where they
see Janzor angrily talking with three new sergeants
attached to the unit – three sergeants with the exact
same face. The three men, First Sergeant Oswald Strepp,
First Sergeant Tak Bazierre, and First Sergeant Dalia,
are all clones.
But they’re not the only ones. Dower notices that he’s
the only member of the platoon that isn’t a clone –
a “GeNode.” They’re all clones, programmed from
birth not to realise that they’re clones, and too
polite to discuss cloning with other GeNodes from the
same production line. The three sergeants are from anold,
discontinued line, but most of them are from the same
line as Strander. GeNodes don’t retire; they never
leave the service, because the Empire is everything to
them. And they all have different personalities;
Strander, with the personality of a street urchin,
offers to sell Dower an illegal Vollusk hand bolt for
300 credits, for some extra insurance against Wookiees.
On the way down, Dower and Strander are in the transport
carrying Janzor’s platoon, where Dower is harassed by
the three sergeants. Soon, the transport runs into a
highly-flexible branch, and is rolled to its side,
losing Bazierre, who spine gets snapped in half when he
lands on a branch. Strepp orders Dower to take charge of
unloading the transport, which leaves him alone and
unprotected for several minutes. Once the stormtroopers
are ready to march to their destination, Strepp orders
him to take point, and then orders him to take guard
duty that night. The stormtroopers then take control of
a small Wookiee outpost, which they then set about
fortifying against Wookiee attackers, while the
exhausted Dower takes watch.
That night, the Wookiees attack the outpost, routing the
stormtroopers. Strepp orders all survivors back to the
drop site, and sets off a thermal detonator, trying to
save Janzor and fifteen others, but while the blast
kills a lot of Wookiees (and Strepp himself), Janzor and
most of his men don’t make it, either. Only a half
stormtroopers are left, out of 200.
Dower tries to regroup with the survivors, but is forced
to watch while a horde of Wookiees savagely rip to
shreds a pair of stormtroopers who tried to hide in a
tree, and then discovers that a TIE fighter-sized
spider, so cold its IR signal is blue, is watching him,
hidden beneath the floor of metre-thick branches....
Strander and Private Sterns Yennich find Dower, and they
head toward the drop zone. Dower notices that the spider
is still beneath them, even though they’re far from
where he first found it – and then he realises that it’s
following them. Yennich zigs where he should have zagged,
and the spider spears him through the leg, and impales
him with its mandibles, and drags him back down to its
lair beneath the floor.
Dower hyperventilates, and throws away his helmet; its
audio equipment was broken, anyway. Shortly after, the
lone pair of stormtroopers is discovered by a trio of
scouttroopers, bearing excellent news.
The Wookiees have won the battle, but they’re losing
the war. Kashyyyk is now under Imperial control.
The three sergeants had told Janzor a secret, one he
didn’t want to hear. His platoon was never intended to
succeed; it was a ruse. Central Command had ordered
Janzor’s platoon to attack a minor outpost, to lure
away Wookiees from the main invasion force – a force
which landed with Arakyd XR-85 tank ’droids, TIE
crawlers, and AT-STs. The Empire had already conquered
most of a continent by the time Dower, Strander, and
Yennich had made their last dash for freedom.
Strander and Dower are awarded medals, and promoted to
first sergeant. They’re shipped back to the cruiser,
and won’t see any more combat in the Kashyyk campaign.
Dower thinks that perhaps he’s seen too much combat,
period, and thinks about retiring to somewhere quiet,
orderly... but then he realises that he’ll never
retire, because order can only come from a strong,
guiding hand. He can never leave. He loves the Empire.
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