History is written by the victors. The Empire is remembered for Alderan, The Jedi Purge and all their other massacres. I'm not saying that theses weren't horrible, but the Empire was a great stabilizing force. After the Clone Wars with whole systems were ravaged, local governments were bankrupt a perfect storm for pirates, marauders and other forms of scum to flourish. One of the Empires primary duties was keeping the shipping lanes safe.
I joined the Stormtrooper Corps three years before the Battle of Yavin. Mostly out of a sense of adventure rather than patriotism or duty. It was either become a Stormtrooper or break my back in the mines like my dad. I choose the latter.
A week after basic training I was assigned to the 733rd Stormtrooper legion. We were attached to 516th Star Destroyer squadron our primary duty was hunting down pirates on the border between the Mid and Outer Rims.
My first assignment was busting a pirate base on Craxus-6. A barely habitable rock home to a particularly nasty band of raiders. Normally a Star Destroyer would just blast the base from orbit, but these guys had captives so we had to go in on the ground. The officers in a rare display of tactical intelligence decided the best way in would be to take over one of their frigates smuggle a team on to base to secure it.
My Star Destroyer found and captured a frigate. The captain made a deal with the crew help the Empire and live or take a one way trip out of an airlock. The raiders decided to be good Imperial citizens for a change.
They stuffed a hundred of us into the cargo hold. The pilots were able to get past their perimeter security and into the hanger. I remember touching down, sweating not just from the hundred bodies stuffed into a cramped durasteel box generating heat. It was my first fire fight and I'm not ashamed to say I was afraid. I'm not sure when I stopped being nervous, I guess when the hold door opened and I just knew what I had to do.
We took the pirates by surprise there at least a two dozen from several different species either loading crates or lounging about drinking or smoking death sticks. They barely had time to pull their weapons before they were cut down by blaster fire. We swarmed into the cargo hold blasting as we went. The first man I killed had snipped the squad mate to my left, Teir was his name funny guy easy going dead before he hit the ground. As he fell I turned lined the man up in my sites and fired twice. I hit him center mass both times knocking him into the wall. I got the order from the squad leader to secure the catwalk. Five of us broke of from the main group. We march up a metal staircase I was in the middle scanning the other side of the catwalk ready to take out anyone taking a pop shot at us.
As we reached the first landing a human with a metal patch bolted to his face jams a spear into Dax our pointmans neck, didn't know much about him mostly kept to himself and read in his spare, think he wanted to be a doctor or something. I remember hearing him choke on his own blood I tried to get a bead on the pirate but our skewered squad mate was blocking my sights.
The pirate jerked his spear out of our point mans neck sending his body crashing into the man behind him. He raises his spear to strike again and I put a blaster bolt through his eye socket.
My friend Senta tried to stop the blood flow. Didn't work we continued on after the gurgling stopped leaving his body behind. I still hear the gurgling in my dreams on occasion.
When we reached the catwalk proper there was the air splitting screech of a wookie scream. The grey furred monstrosity swung its giant arm at our rear man Jango son of a clone trooper, sent him flying off the catwalk screaming until he hit the durplaster floor of the hanger. He grabbed the next man by the neck squeezing with both his hand until his neck broke. To that Troopers credit he blasted the wookie three times point blank before he died. Me and Senta my only other surviving squad mate fired at the wookies legs before they both fell down the stairs. His name was Kron, just some ice fishers son from some Force forsaken frozen rock in the mid-rim. Didn't like him to much, to mean, never socialized with anyone. Whenever anyone did approach him he'd just insult you and leave.
I didn't have time to check on our fallen squad mate before a tusken raider shrieked and slammed his gaderffii stick into Senta's neck. Senta I were close, we were in the same class during basic we graduated together. He wasn't that different from me, just a kid trying to escape the boredom and tedium of his home world. He fell to the ground clutching his neck trying to stop his blood from spurting out his neck. The Raider swings his crude weapon at my head I held up my rifle to block the blow. The head of the club bit into my riffle. The power battery in my weapon was punctured I could see arcs of plasma and electricity running up and down the weapon. I shoved the tusken raider letting go of my rifle at the same time. He stumbled back a few meters. He tried to pull his Gaderffii stick out. He couldn't the rifle exploded, I had to shield my eyes. Only his legs were left, they fell over.
I knelt down and pulled off Sentas helmet, his face was covered in blood his eyes unmoving and unresponsive. "Wake up Senta. WAKE UP" I shouted.
"He's gone trooper." A Sergeant said coming up the stairs with five other troopers in tow. "Pick up his weapon and follow us. We still have work to do."
I picked up my dead friends weapon and fall into position. We march through a dimly lit hallway the lights flickering and walls shaking with every blast from a TIE fighter making a bombing run. We were pretty deep inside the complex when we came across resistance a group of four human and a green skinned Twi'lek. They were all caring crates not one had a weapon in their hands we had them dead to rights. The Twi'lek pulled out a blaster pistol and fired hitting the ceiling above our heads. The humans dropped their crates, we didn't wait to see what they would do we cut them down. All except for the Twi'lek he ran down another corridor.
"You two go after him." The Sergeant barked indicating me and the man next to me. We followed the corridor the Twi'lek went down he was twenty meters ahead of us firing blindly behind him we returned fire forcing him into a room. Then we heard younglings screaming in terror. We ran down the hall full sprint. I entered the room first my squad mate behind me. The room was filled with twenty younglings all dressed in rags. The oldest couldn't of been more than ten standard years.
The Twi'lek had a young human boy in his arms and blaster pressed against his head. "Let me go or I'll kill him. Believe me I'll do it."
"I believe you." I said before shooting one of his tendrils off. He dropped the boy and screamed. I put another blaster bolt into his chest. He dropped right next to his tendril. The younglings were all screaming and crying, the little boy held by the pirate was on the floor sobbing.
"It's ok were here to save you." I said. They kept on crying. I took of my helmet.
"It's ok," I said in my voice not in the mechanically altered voice of a helmeted stormtrooper. "Your all going home."
That calmed them down. I put my helmet back on and asked if the hanger was clear. I got an affirmative. Me and my squad mate moved all of the children out. We put them on the ship that brought us in with another group of hostages. The pirates kept forty hostages on their base. Before the boy walked into the ship he hugged my leg.
"Thank you." He said before leaving. I nearly cried right then and there. The ship took off. We waited for the shuttles to escort the prisoners back up to the Star Destroyer for interrogation.
I was reprimanded for taking my helmet off during duty. I was also given a commendation for courage under fire. My first mission twisted me up inside. On one hand I felt pride at having done my duty. I helped dismantle a pirate ring and rescued a group of younglings. Because of that all those kids will have a future. On the other hand I lost friends and teammates. I didn't know all of them some I didn't even like. They died and I didn't though even though I easily could have. Pride, guilt, fear and relief all twisting inside me at once. The one thing I was sure of was that I did my duty and people were safer because of me. And that is one thing history will never take away from me.