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The holo changed to show the image of a tall, two-legged creature covered by thick golden-brown fur from head to foot. It had a wide mouth and small black eyes. "Depending on how big this thing is, I might give one to my little nephew for a pet," I whispered to Milo Strander, a soldier I'd met when I joined up three years ago."

On the way back to our quarters, Strander and I stopped by Trooper's Canteen – a cruiser bar made especially for elite forces. Strander was the new generation of soldier – a genetic clone, not that he believed it. Part of his genetic programming made him overlook the fact that 40 percent of all stormtroopers had his exact same face, hair, and voice.

Most clones also had the same build as Strander, something that gave me great comfort. Corporal Milo Strander has a square chest, thick shoulders, and sinewy arms. If he grabbed your arm and pulled you, his fingers left distinct bruises in your flesh.

The curious thing about cloned soldiers was that while the Empire created them all alike, they invented their own personalities as soon as they came out of the tube. Some became lazy and fat, some became machines of destruction and distinguished themselves in battle. No GeNode, the street name for genetically enhanced soldiers, ever retired from service.

Some soldiers showed up at the bar earlier than we did after the briefing. Captain Janzor sat with three sergeants who had recently joined our platoon. I had never spoken with the new sergeants, but I knew their kind. They would fear nothing and no one, give absolute and unquestioning obedience to superior officers, and run us foot soldiers into the ground. They came from the first generation of genetic Marines – tough, dutiful, cruel, and stupid. They felt no pain and had no regrets

"Look at those GeNodes, Wayson," Strander whispered. "I'd kill myself if I were a clone."

"How you going to do it?" I asked.

Strander laughed. "You keep saying that. I wouldn't joke about that if I were you."

That was another thing about clones – they were genetically programmed to believe they were real people. Strander could sit at a table with five other Stranders, all identical in every way, and never notice that he was one of them. In fact, he was also programmed to be too polite to discuss cloning to other clones of his issue. "Smart programming," I thought. "Nothing beats it."

Our little invasion Force included three scouts. They came from a different cloning issue, one with wiry builds and small bones. Speeder jockeys with muscular builds tended to weigh down their bikes.

The more of an individual each trooper is, the less potentially effective he’ll be in the sorts of situations that the Empire sends troops into. Thinking is for officers. Fighting and following orders is the Stormtroopers’ job.

CaptainChewbacca wrote:We make poor pets.

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Title: Pax Empirica - The Wookie Annihilation

Author: Steven L. Kent
Format: Short Story
Published: 2001

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.

Chronology:
This storyline occurs 3 years before the Battle of Yavin.

Availability:
This short story was published in Prima's Official Strategy Guide: Star Wars Galactic Battlegrounds.

MKSheppard wrote:I hate the entire stormtrooper = clone concept - it demeans the evilness of the empire

"Oh, those aren't the guys who you grew up with - they're just vat grown clones"

Sort of how the SS was evil - they were quite literally the guys next door
who were shooting and gassing the undesirables and then coming home
to their families for a nice family meal

CaptainChewbacca wrote:.....