Captain Samson ████████

[Captain Samson ████████ is the chief of operations on a small Republic outpost located on the front lines of Felucia. Samson was the commander of the squad Rats belonged too. While he was here, his squad was charged with clearing large forested areas in Felucia using incendiary weapons. His squad had run into the most conflicts with the indigenous animals compared to any other unit. Another reason for the nickname Rats. Me and Samson meet in his small tent.]

I wish he would stop calling himself Rats. It was never a good name for him. Others might disagree, but I think a better name for him would be Rec. You could ask him any question regarding the handbook and he'd spew it out. He was like a human tape recorder. All you had to do was press play, and he could recite the whole fucking handbook on memory.

Rats was hated around here. Yeah yeah, he was "socially awkward", said command. But that wasn't it. Just the way Rats looked at you... With those beady red eyes... He was sizing men up, almost as to say: "How much is your life worth to me?"

Rats was assigned forest clearing, correct?

You could say that, yeah.

Why did you assign Republic Commandos menial tasks like forest clearing? That sounds like a "shiny" job if I ever heard one.

Samson gave me a serious stare Forest clearing? In Felucia? Maybe in Curiscant. But here, things are different. Droids are the least of your worries when you have a 10 ton Rancor in the bushes behind you. And it was Rats job to walk right up to it and try and cook it with the little plasma powered safety match we gave em'. And it wasn't glorious either. Other Republic Commandos were given glamorous tasks like sneaking behind enemy lines or assassinating generals or rescuing POWs. But Rats? His job was to kill, kill more, and kill until it hurts. Then kill some more. That's what he did.

And it's not like we just sent them out to clear out a couple bushes, oh no. Baker(1) was the ONLY squad in the whole HEMISPHERE that were daisy burners. Baker had to clear out hundreds of square miles of nothing but plants, trees and beasts. Sometimes it would take them a whole month or two of no radio contact from base OR themselves, as they were usually split up to cover more ground, just a month all by themselves. For every 501st PLATOON that took out a rancor, Baker SQUAD took out two more.

You said they had month without contact, does that include ammo drops?

Yup

But... How could they clear out a forest without plasma for the flamethrowers?

Simple, light one tree and just watch as it spread. Occasionally they had to relight the bushfire, but not much. Most of the time they saved the plasma for the Rancors.

And food? Water?

Samson raises an eyebrow You don't think a commando knows how to hunt?

I was told here was where he got the nickname, Rats, but I recently found out that Kamino was originally where he got it. Why?

A lot of people think that too. It's true that Kamino is where he got the nickname, but most called him Teeth when he got here. Bit a guy in the ear, long story. But it's here where he got respect for his original name, and I guess he switched back.

How so?

Well, one mission we sent out Baker squad to clear out a relatively small island in the middle of a large river. They got there and immediately split up, it's better to split up and burn the area from all sides. Covers more ground. Anyway, when the commandos met back up at the center of the island days later, Rats was gone. No contact. After a week of combing the island and poking around through fields of ash and smoke, which by the way, is harder than it looks, we found Rats. He had fallen into a large wild womp rat den. Broke both his legs in the fall. Survived by actually tricking the rats to come close enough to stab with his vibroblade, then ate them raw.

Wow...

Right? Won him a lot of respect at base. Alot of fear too.

What's that supposed to mean?

Samson thinks for a moment Clones arn't as good as they seem, both in the morale and combat term. Clone's are just as good as soldiers, if you look at it. The only difference is that clone's are cheaper... But... Behind the helmet there's... Well, a dark side. Not like the sith, never like the sith. But a little bit of Jango Fett's dark side, I guess. And Rats had that in surplus. Clones like to be honorable, to be noble. But when you look closely, fear is how you gain power as a clone. After that, No one messed with Rats anymore. They just kept their distance. Rats didn't mind the loneliness... Actually, now that I think about it, he liked it... All those days and nights, spending whole weeks not saying a word... Must have been mind AND soul crushing... If he had a soul, that is.

What happened? I mean, how did he, you know, move on?

Good question. One minute he was in the base, the next he was gone. I just woke up one morning and someone told me he was re-assigned, packed up, and left all in the same night.

(1) The four man squad Rats was put into. Ironically named as his squad would invent the phrase "Bake forest", meaning deforestation.