Clone
Chapter 54
"Our ship is docked just outside of town," Bly said, as they joined in with the throng of workers fleeing the collapsed mine. He pointed imperiously and jerked his chin impatiently. "Let's move."
"We our own ship," Dalso said, a hint of annoyance slipping into the squad commander's voice. "And, we have to collect our kit. We're not leaving without it."
Bly hissed with annoyance, knowing every minute they delayed here placed them in danger. "Where's your kit?"
They were a half click out when his HUD lit up with a call from Jang. "Bly. Slate. Get your shebs out of there. We're detecting a cruiser inbound and some smaller traffic ahead we can't identify, but we think it might be a pair of the Empire's new assassin droids. Sending you scans."
"Acknowledged," Bly said, quickly looking over the data burst. The new droid looked like a cross between a commando droid and a spider droid. Very ugly. And, very deadly.
"If we're right," Jang continued, "this is the Empire's latest toy. A very nasty addition to the arsenal. Watch yourselves," Jang turned his attention to Slate, "how's my armor holding up?"
Slate chuckled slightly. "I believe you gave it to me, so it's my armor now. Bly and I were discussing paint schemes."
Jang smiled fondly. "That's good, vod. Make it your own." The smile left his eyes and sadness chased across his features for the briefest of seconds before being being schooled away. "Orders from Kal. He wanted me to give you alternative coordinates. With this cruiser chasing you down, he wants you to go to the alternate landing site. You're not to come back here. Understood?"
Bly sucked in a breath. They'd discussed this possibility before they ever left Mandalore. He knew he might not be able to come back.
But, he'd never told Aayla, or she would not have let him go.
"Bly," Jang prompted, when he took a half beat too long to reply.
"Understood," he acknowledged. "Bly out."
# # #
Back on Mandalore, Aayla woke up before dawn. She raced for the refresher and retched up everything in her stomach. Once the sickness passed, she staggered back to the bed that seemed so empty without Bly's presence.
# # #
"This is it," Dalso said, pointing to the worker housing comprised of recycled feracrete. A few people gazed at the armored Mandos in fear and then quickly scurried into their miserable hovels. Dressed only in their mining uniforms and without their electronics, the four commandos walked in a careful formation and constantly scanned their environment for any threat. They slipped into the shanty town which made up the worker housing. It was crowded and dismal and filled with panicked workers fleeing back to their homes. They slipped up the stairs to the top floor. "Our quarters," Dalso pointed. Cort and Jang worked together to quickly disable a series of traps set up around the entrance. The six clones swept inside and the commandos immediately stripped down naked, aware of the Empire bearing down on them. The filthy mining uniforms fell to the floor. There was no time to wash off any of the grime. The four slid into their bodysuits and immediately plied on their thick plating.
Slate eased himself down on one of the cots, taking a moment to rest his ankle, and watched them quickly armor up. He couldn't quite suppress a pang of jealousy at their heavy armor. When he lost men under his command, he often thought they might have survived their injuries if they'd had better armor like the commandos. Even more fascinating than the armor, though, was seeing them add their weapons. Fek. He'd heard rumors of how many weapons the RCs had but this surpassed anything he'd been told. In the two minutes it took them to armor up, the four of them tucked away an entire arsenal onto their bodies and backpacks.
"Ready," Dalso said, his voice coming out filtered from his helmet, as he stood in front of his squad of fully armored commandos.
Slate regarded them, trying to see them as the civilians would. They would scare the bantha piss out of anyone.
He considered asking them to patch him in on their frequency, but decided to let the squad have their moment and chat privately back and forth in their buckets. It was a sacred tradition among clones. He'd done it more times than he could count when he was with Gamma.
Thinking back to his time with Gamma didn't twist his gut up in knots like it had before. He'd always mourn his former squad, but he'd put his feelings of guilt to rest. It was good to be back in action again. They slid out the door and made their way down the stairs. The corridors were abandoned. Eerily quiet.
Too quiet.
They made their way down to the street level. There was a lone worker still making his way home who shrieked at the site of them and ran the other way.
Bly sent over the data burst from Jang to the RCs. "This look familiar to any of you?"
Cort immediately chimed in. "We're all familiar with the design. RI came up with it."
Bly took a moment to absorb this new piece of news. "Republic Intelligence? Why were they designing droids like this?"
Esok manipulated the image and sent it back to Bly's HUD, highlighting several key features. "It was meant to be a droid killer. RI came up with the idea of fighting droids with droids. This was the first batch of them; geared specifically at taking out the commando droids. Those shab'buirs had a habit of targeting our officers."
Both Bly and Slate hissed in acknowledgement, having lost many friends to the deadly droids.
"There was a plan for a second phase of these things," Dalso added, "to take on other types of droids. B1s. Rollies. Spider droids."
"Fek," Bly's mind boggled at the concept, "what would the clone army do?"
"Couldn't tell you," Cort said, "they brought us in one time to try to fight these things. Not a pleasant experience."
"That bad?" Bly asked.
"Thankfully, everything was set on stun rounds. If they hadn't been," Dalso admitted, "the whole squad would be dead."
They were almost at the edge of town, when a whirring noise behind them drew their attention.
"Down!" shouted Dalso, whirling around to fire. Pedestrians screamed as a streamlined black droid came screaming around the corner, looking every bit the deadly predator the commandos had described it to be. It sighted on the clones and immediately began firing, issuing a deadly blast of bolts. The clones threw themselves behind a nearby dumpster, the durasteel absorbing the impact for a few seconds before shattering apart under the barrage of fire.
It was enough time, though, for Jarg to throw an EMG charge which temporarily dropped the shields on the droid. "Go! Go! Go!" The commando yelled and the six clones ran for better cover managing to make it around the next corner before the deadly assassin droid starting firing again. Chunks of duracrete flew off the building as they rounded the corner. They took shelter in a large abandoned factory, taking up positions behind large supports as the droid flew inside scanning for them.
"Now!" Bly said, and the six clones circled around all firing on the droid at once. Their shots had no effect. The droid spun around firing at the clones. Bly and Slate dove out of the way. The commandos were hit, but their armor absorbed most of the impact. But, the assassin droid was highly intelligent, adjusting it's shots as it went.
Jarg went down, clutching his leg as a shot found a weak point between the plates.
"Jarg," Dalso called out, his voice steady, "status."
"I'm alright," the commando said, pulling himself back behind the support post, his voice slightly strained, "it's not bad." He pulled a sharp off his belt and injected himself. "I'm OK," he said again, seeming more to himself than the others. He pulled himself back to his feet and into firing position again.
"They've added ray shielding. We need to do something different," Dalso said, his voice calm in the way of someone who'd faced countless bad situations and made it through. "Jarg, do you have any ideas?"
There was a slight pause and Bly wasn't sure if the weapons expert on the squad was out of commission due to his injury, or thinking over his reply.
"A combination approach would take this thing down," Jarg said after a moment.
Bly listened in fascination as the team coordinated their efforts. He'd noticed in the mining office how adept the commandos were at working together. RC squads were legendary for such things, and this was a squad which had been intact since the beginning of the war. "Ray shielding is particularly tricky," the weapons expert continued, as the six of them continued to exchange shots with the probe droid and duck back for cover. Jarg called off a strategy with the abbreviated efficiency of having done plans and drills together thousands of times. "Cort, EMP. Esok, array. Dalso, conc gun. Dals and Es, be ready for a cross X."
Esok snorted. "You think there will be anything left after I hit it with the array?"
Jarg chuckled, but didn't respond. All of his energy was focused on the target.
Bly smiled to himself, hearing the friendly banter between the brothers. At the same time, he missed the men of the 327th whom he'd commanded for three years. It was all so familiar; the good natured ribbing as they took down droids together. It was as if the events of the past two weeks had never happened and everything in the galaxy still made sense. But, part of him could still feel Aayla as if they were connected somehow and he knew that his reality did make sense. It was a different reality now. But, he could make it through with a vod like Slate and a woman like Aayla.
"Now!" Jarg called off, and the commando squad worked in unison. Bly hung back, and watched with satisfaction as they took down the droid. It was a well coordinated symphony of action.
Esok gave a whoop of triumph as the droid exploded in a cross fire between him and Dalso. "Fek, yes. Told you, J."
Bly's attention was diverted by the scene in front of him, and he didn't hear the second assassin droid slipping into the factory behind them and taking aim at their backs. He was at peace, and thinking of Aayla, as the droid opened fire fire on him.
# # #
A/N: And, so we come to the end of "More Than Just a Clone." I thank all the readers who have stuck with the story this far. There will be an epilogue posted later this week.
As I mentioned in my profile, I have very little time to write these days so I will update my stories when I can but have no set schedule. As always, thanks for reading.
