Clone Wars: Underground - Chapter 10

 

    Brenni watched warily as Kisha suited up and took up position next to the sealed boarding ramp. She was all business, far from the button-pushing teenager Brenni was used to. Something about the commanding tone that Fives used seemed to set her straight. Brenni knew that if she tried to command the girl in the same way, it would never work. It was hard to admit, but there were just some things she wasn’t in the position to do. Kisha had grown up without a father. Maybe she needed Fives more than she needed her right now. 

Fives gave the order and the hatch was opened. The team exited the ramp in an orderly fashion. It was second nature to the clones, but Kisha had to remember the lineup and what Burnout taught her about doing a recon mission.  

Brenni went back to the cockpit and stared out at the view. The wreckage was massive. She could still see scorch marks on the ground. She watched the teams begin scouting the area. Kisha fell into line well with the troopers. She wore thick leather padding as makeshift armor. Her headset fastened high on her forehead was held in place by bracers on her small montrail bumps. Brenni knew there was something special about Kisha. She was quick. Nothing ever slipped her notice. Brenni wandered if it had something to do with having to survive after losing her mother. At least Brenni had a choice to leave her parents. Or maybe it was the other way around. Maybe she shouldn’t be so blind to the blessing of having parents. She watched Kisha pick her way around a huge piece of scrap that had once been part of an engine casing. Brenni flipped a switch on the comm console and was instantly patched into the feed. Ty set up the Ladalum’s comm to work effortlessly with the troopers’ helmet feeds so that Brenni could remain, engines ready, in the cockpit while listening to everything going on surface side. Brix’s voice was the first. 

“-nothing but scrap.” Brix looked back toward the main carcass of the Destroyer. 

“No way anyone could survive that.” 

“Commander Tano was on the ship.” Burnout reminded everyone.  

“Keep looking. There has to be some clues.” Kisha chimed in. 

“Skirt the outside, then we’ll work our way in.” Fives called. The two groups were on opposite sides of the main wreck and headed towards each other on the far side.  

“Hey!” Burnout shouted into the comm so loud Kisha jumped. “Over here, I’ve found-” He looked over the terrible sight before him. “-a graveyard.” Both teams zeroed in on his location. Jace was the first to arrive.

“This is them.” Jace huffed between breaths.  

Rows of mounded-up dirt spread before the two troopers. Each mound had a stick at its head with the helmet of a trooper positioned on top.  

“The 332^nd.” Burnout shook his head. He knew what to expect, but it was still shocking to see. 

Fives made his way over. He looked at the foremost helmet and slowly took his own off. He dropped it as he picked the one up off its post, the blue symbol of the Galactic Republic proudly painted in the center of the white plastoid.  

“Jesse.” The name came out a whisper. 

Everything seemed to freeze in place as Fives studied the helmet. Finally, he replaced his helmet and called recon on the inner wreckage.  Everyone went about somberly at their task. They were aware that they were working at the graveyard of their own brethren.

“Everything’s clean.” Jace pronounced. “No sign of the Captain or Tano.”  “They could have escaped before the wreck. No sign of a shuttle.” Ty suggested. 

“No. They were here.” Fives insisted. Who else would bury dead clones? It was true, they all knew it. Clones had no one to bury them when they died but one of their own. No one cared for the non-citizen, no family, soldiers of the Republic. Someone had certainly visited the crash site and buried the dead.

Kisha followed Fives’s line of sight. He was looking back at the graves. Brix walked past her to their leader. He had something in hand, another helmet.  

“Sorry, Boss.” His voice was quiet and his hand shook as he handed another helmet to Fives. Fives took it and turned it over in his hand. He felt the whole moon they were standing on fall away as he looked at the blue-painted jaig eyes staring back at him. 

“No.” He choked.  

In the complete silence that followed, Fives heard the soft click of a deece seventeen safety switching off. Fives recognized the sound instantly. He knew instinctively that there was an active weapon pointed at his back. The sound was from a military model blaster, probably scavenged from the wreckage.

“Don’t move.” A harsh voice called from behind. “Drop your weapons, all of you.” The voice was modulated through a breather to sound nearly mechanical. 

“Do it.” Fives ordered the others. He put his own hands up. 

Everyone complied slowly. Kisha’s eyes darted back and forth at the situation. The scavenger had snuck up on all of them. It was impressive. She knew the clone troopers had keen senses, but she usually didn’t miss such things either. Standing back up with her blaster now at her feet, she looked at the mysterious scavenger. He, or it, wore a flight suit with a tattered dirty brown wrap. The mask had a large visor across the center. It was dark and she could see nothing of the person within. Below the visor was a breather in the form of two vertical slits with filters. They resembled the mandibles of a large insect.  

“Turn around.” The intruder ordered. Fives slowly turned. The intruder seemed to freeze in place for a long moment. Fives was about to try and talk it down, but a new instruction came. 

“Take that helmet off.” Even through the vocal filter Kisha could hear the cold stoicism in the intruder’s voice, as if giving orders was second nature. She watched Fives slowly put two hands on the sides of his helmet and tug it off. 

“Fives. How?” The intruder questioned, though the blaster was still pointed at his chest. Fives was now completely baffled. The intruder knew his name. 

“Yeah, well, if we’re gonna be friends you got some explaining to do, too.” There was an edge in Fives’s voice. He didn’t like games that involved others knowing more than him. Not after what happened to Tup on Kamino and then on Coruscant with the Chancellor. After another short pause the stranger put the blaster down and unsealed the alien-insect helmet. It came off with a suction hiss. 

Now it was the others staring frozen at the person in front of them.  

“Captain?” The man who stood before them had the same features every clone did. His hard face was worn creased with disbelief. His head of close-cropped blonde hair partially hid a scar above his right temple. 

“Removed your chip?” Fives asked. Rex rubbed the scar on his head. 

“Yeah. I owe it to you for that.” His gaze drifted over Fives’s shoulder to the graveyard of clones. If he would have listened to Fives’s warning earlier, how many of them could he have saved? It was pointless worrying about “what ifs”, but it still hurt to think about.

“We’re here looking for survivors. Wanna give ’em a chance to make up their own minds.” 

“Not have their minds made up for them.” Brix added. 

“Thought about going after the Emperor himself but decided we could do more good liberating clones.” Jace joined in. 

“Sorry, Fives. No other survivors.” Rex said, shaking his head.

Fives felt a pang in his heart. He didn’t personally know most of them, but he knew Jesse. Losing brothers always hurt.

“We’re on the same track. I’m looking for a few soldiers-” Rex paused and corrected himself. “brothers. I need a computer connected to the military mainframe and I came back to see if any of the terminals on the destroyer still work. And I want my bonnet.” He said pointing to the helmet in Fives’s hand. He promptly handed it over. Rex inspected it and a sad smile fell across his lips.  

“We’re looking also. We’re rounding up as many as we can.” Burnout said. 

“You could come with us. We could use your support. Besides, this was our only lead.” Fives looked like a relieved teacher when parents finally came to pick up their students. Now, he didn’t have to lead the rag-tag group of troopers. Still,  he knew his days as a cocky ARC trooper, blasting up the trenches, were far in the past. 

Rex looked at each of them in turn. He knew them all except the girl and one of the other troopers.  

“Alright then. Let’s go find that computer.” Rex pulled his helmet on and led the teams into the wreckage. 

            Kisha followed Burnout closely. Everyone’s spirit seemed boosted with the return of their captain. She noted how each trooper gave him respect. That reverence seemed to transfer to her, and she knew he was someone to look up to. 

            The depths of the starship ruins were haunting. Twisted metal protruded at every angle. The ground was stained with leaked liquids mixed with dust and cluttered with debris. The smell of burnt plastic and oil came and went in wafts. Kisha felt a cold shiver run up and down her spine. 

            There were smashed computer terminals everywhere. Their best bet would be the crew pit in the bridge. It was a sunken area on the bridge that could possibly have survived much of the impact. It took over an hour for the team to pick their way up through the decks with their glow lights until finally coming to a turbolift shaft. The shaft had a ladder on the inside making the climb much quicker. They hurried up, Rex in the lead. The bridge was a mess of shattered transparasteel and smashed bulkheads. The crew pit was covered over with the wall of a mostly intact, albeit fallen, bulkhead. One by one they slid underneath the durasteel barricade.  

            Much of the equipment here was in almost acceptable condition. Rex used the power cell he brought to check each terminal. When they found one that was working, he entered a code brought up a list of active soldiers. He entered an order the readout showed that only fifty-eight percent of the military remained clone troopers. 

            “Those numbers went down fast.” Fives commented. 

            “What happened to them all?” Kisha asked. 

            “Don’t know, kid.” Rex replied, pulling up another screen. After a few more commands Rex found what he was looking for. 

            “Who’s that?” Burnout asked. 

            “Commander Wolffe.” Rex replied. 

            “Our next target?” It was Jace who had been hanging back keeping an eye on their surroundings. 

            “Yeah.” Rex unhooked the power cell and the screen went dark. Then he opened the casing below the terminal and pulled the board out completely. “Got room for this in your ship?” He asked. 

“Sure.” Kisha replied, not knowing who he was actually asking.  

“If we can get this thing working. We can track more clones.”  

“I can get it working.” Ty offered. 

           “Why would they just leave stuff like this behind?” Fives asked. 

            “They got no reason to fear. No enemies. No more Republic verses the Seppies. Everything is the Empire now.” Jace snorted. 

             

            Brenni noticed the new helmet walk up the ramp and into her ship. Rex nodded in acknowledgment of her. Brenni was sure she’d seen that helmet before.

            “This is Brenni. She and her daughter are lending us their aid and ship.” 

            “Ma’am. I’m Rex. It’s a pleasure to meet you.” He held out a hand. Brenni felt like she was back running supplies for the army again. She knew Rex from a couple of missions. She had brought supplies to many cities and even villiages that were liberated by Skywalker’s 501^st. Skywalker’s escapades always seemed to involve a lot of cleanup and lots of thankful people. She smiled broadly and returned the handshake. 

            “Pleasure’s mine, Rex. Welcome aboard.” 

            “So, Captain. Where we going to find Wolffe?” Fives asked. 

            “Got the coordinates ready to go.” 

            “Then we’ll punch them in.” Brenni led him to the navicomputer.  

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