The first victim of the incubation abort approached Mara with a grin that not only didn't adorn her but could send a herd of rancors into panicked flight.
She was ready for hand-to-hand combat.
Jade stepped forward and struck her opponent's nose with a spinning kick.
A distinct crunch sounded, the "Defiler" staggered.
Mara finished the attack with a kick to the chest, sending the clone flying several meters back.
With indifference not matching reality, Thrawn's Hand faced her opponents again.
A lightsaber swing—and two headless female corpses lay at her feet.
A blaster shot from her left hand—and another cloned fighter collapsed onto the platform.
The first opponent took her place.
Blood flowed from her nose, but in the short respite, the "Defiler" had recovered and assumed a combat stance, shifting most of her weight to her support leg.
She watched Mara intently; the clone's face was focused, but only that—no tension, anger, or threat. With such an expression, one could admire a sunset or watch butterflies.
But the absent compassion in the eyes of the genetically enhanced killer was a direct indication that mercy shouldn't be expected.
"I won't admit it in public, but thanks, Mol," Mara muttered, calling on the Force.
As if hearing his words, the clone lunged forward swiftly.
Her "sisters" to the left and right repeated the maneuver, aiming to pin Mara against the railing.
The redhead instinctively retreated, but that shouldn't be taken as her ceasing the attack while keeping distance.
Having emptied the entire power cell from the blaster and destroying a good dozen clones, the Hand tossed aside the useless blaster, created solely for killing (the specialists in weapons had removed the stun function).
The clones, perceiving this as weakness, rushed forward.
Those on the right were sliced to pieces by a circular spin with the lightsaber.
Returning to initial position, Mara thrust her right hand forward, sending a Force wave at the "Defilers."
This physical embodiment combined her rage, pain, and dissatisfaction with herself.
As with Winter, she had wanted to capture the enemy specialist alive.
Yes, she could have severed arms and legs, then there'd be no clone activation.
But she assumed Orun Wa could be persuaded to cooperate with the Dominion.
And when a representative of the employer, before HR formalities, cuts off your arms and legs, motivation for voluntary cooperation suddenly evaporates.
Whether artificially grown limbs could be reattached afterward, Jade didn't know.
But in her memory, after cauterizing the wound site with a lightsaber, severing nerve endings and tendons, no one had acquired cloned limbs.
In the best case—mechanical prosthetics.
Fine, lesson learned.
And now it was time to correct it.
Don't want it the nice way—it'll be the hard way!
Filled with her hatred, the Force swept through the clone ranks like a kinetic round.
Bodies flung aside broke with a disgusting sound, like dolls.
Blood and other fluids, chunks of flesh scattered everywhere, carving a breach among the clones surrounding her.
The girl shuddered as she was splashed with warm liquid droplets.
The red-haired beast nearly retched when she wiped chunks of bleeding warm flesh from her cheek.
Infusing her body with the Force, Jade dashed forward toward the receding back of the Kaminoan cloner.
A couple of "Defilers" stood in her path, but Mara dealt with them without much effort.
Bodies mangled by the lightsaber fell far behind her.
Halfway there, she didn't react in time—one of the clones threw herself under her feet.
Mara, rolling forward, slashed the "Defiler" with the lightsaber, severing the upper from the lower half.
That was a mistake—they were immediately surrounded by more and more female "Defiler" clones.
Mara made another circle with the saber in hand, expanding the free space nearby, and rushed forward.
The "Defiler" in her way swung her left leg for a high kick but slipped on a blood puddle.
Mara grabbed her opponent's leg, yanked it higher, unbalancing her, then swept the legs.
The "Defiler" hit the deck butt-first with a grunt.
Jade continued the attack, but the opponent rolled away, preparing to block the kick.
Thrawn's Hand thrust her fist forward and clenched it.
The opponent crumpled in a silent scream, exploding like an overripe fruit.
Another stream of blood splashed Mara.
For a moment, she instinctively closed her eyes.
And the enemy took advantage, grabbing her from behind by the helmet, yanking it off, and striking her back with it.
The girl didn't strike: she dived forward like a fish, rolled.
Spreading her arms, she Force-pushed a good dozen opponents to both sides of the platform.
And at that moment, she felt someone grabbing her hair, pulling to cause pain.
Jade knew this move—now they'd damage her spine with a knee, taking her out.
But she had entirely different plans.
Ignoring the tears bursting from her eyes, Mara lunged forward, avoiding injury, then swung the blade, severing the arm.
Pain and rage filled her.
Her body literally boiled with adrenaline.
Jade turned to face the opponents behind.
The scarlet haze before her eyes demanded bloodshed.
And she found the culprit.
The one-armed clone attacked with a jumping kick.
Mara thrust the lightsaber forward and lunged, simultaneously dropping to one knee.
Two neat halves of the one-armed opponent fell to the sides, showing perfect cauterization from pelvis to nape.
"Which of you bitches wants to touch my hair next?!" Mara growled, looking at the clone faces.
It turned out all of them.
Several meters separated them, so Mara did the simplest thing in such a situation.
She slashed the metal of the suspension bridge, gripping the railings and retreating back to the support.
The clones rained down like Jawas into a sarlacc's maw.
It somewhat reminded her of Boba Fett's last flight on Tatooine.
Pity she could judge the accuracy only from eyewitness accounts, not having been present at the epochal event personally.
Avoiding the fall to the cave bottom, accelerating with the Force, Mara crossed the collapsing bridge and ended up on the platform near the cloning cylinder cave exit.
Turning, she noticed the clones, clustered at the edge of the destroyed walkway, staring at her blankly.
Rage receded briefly.
Her brain connected to situation analysis, and the girl shuddered.
Turning from the silent enhanced clones, she wiped blood from her face with her palm.
Orun Wa had vanished, fleeing into the adjacent corridor.
And she would follow him now.
Leaving behind nearly one and a half thousand cloned killers.
"I don't know what Orun Wa improved there, but if all commando clones were as weak as these, no wonder they died in batches until they gained experience," Mara muttered, peeking into the corridor.
Empty.
She reached to the Force, envisioning the Kaminoan.
The Force pulled her right.
The girl immediately broke into a run.
Couldn't let the scum escape.
In the agent's head bounced the thought that she'd probably figured out the reason for the "weakness" of the clones she faced.
Orun Wa had said the information upload to their brains wasn't complete.
Moreover, clones produced in Spaarti cylinders need skill honing—and only then would their muscle memory work properly.
In simpler terms, she got lucky.
Though she'd finished off a fair number of opponents, if Makus Kaynif had bothered to give Orun Wa time to complete the upload, she'd have had far more serious problems.
"Damn it!" the girl groaned, braking in the middle of the corridor.
What a smart one.
Chased the cloner, leaving the Zann Consortium leader with a bunch of underdeveloped clones.
"Charming, just charming," the girl muttered, assessing her chances of catching up in at least one direction.
Making her choice, she activated the comlink.
"Chimaera, respond."
"Captain Tschel speaking," the tiny speaker came alive. "Identify."
"Access code..." Mara dictated a sequence of old Tion alphabet letters liberally mixed with number streams.
"Code accepted. How can we assist, Thrawn's Hand?" the commander's voice clearly cheered up.
"I'm at the enemy base. A Kaminoan cloner discovered here. Preliminarily—he has a work group. I injured Makus Kaynif but can't catch both. The Kaminoan is heading to the central base entrance, it seems. I'll return for Kaynif personally. Also, about one and a half thousand female clones activated on the base. These are Defilers. I locked them in the cloning cave. With Kaynif," she added, thinking Thrawn was still near his flagship Star Destroyer's commander. "I need support."
"Information received," Tschel stated. "Handle Kaynif. Boarding parties of guards, Noghri, and 501st Guard Legion subunits already deployed to the base. Your position fixed by scanners. Sending nearest squads your way."
"Thanks," Mara said, turning back.
Relief faded from her face as if it had never been.
Right before her stood several dozen women in standard underwear.
With absent regret in their eyes.
"You're kidding," Jade groaned. "Did they learn to fly or what?"
Then she saw the disfigured half-face of Makus Kaynif in the back rows, who with a beckoning gesture directed more clones toward her, appearing at the far end of the corridor.
"Fine," Jade sighed, gripping the lightsaber hilt tighter and infusing her body with the Force. "Hey, you mute bitches! Whoever grabs my hair—I'll bisect!"
The clones didn't answer.
They simply attacked.
***
The pilot guided the shuttle into the main entrance square of the Zann Consortium base on Smarck. The hangar was mostly filled with similar shuttles and cargo containers, among which a pair of cargo skimmers huddled forlornly in the corner.
No people in sight.
TNX-0333 didn't like this circumstance.
No guards, no duty mechanics, no loaders, no battle droids.
Strange situation during an attack on the facility.
With a characteristic hiss, the landing ramp dropped, and the 501st Legion stormtroopers silently began rapidly disembarking the assault bay.
In the first moment, as the half-platoon quickly spread across the hangar territory, taking it under control, it seemed they were capturing an absolutely abandoned object.
This behavior of the defenders didn't fit the usual picture a "torch" stormtrooper could accept.
During an attack, any base except an abandoned one would pulse, choking with life; vibration would be felt through the soles, usual for metal surfaces with people running on them.
For a base built in rock depths, not only the presence of working machine sounds, service droid buzzing, but also personnel!
Where were the defenders?!
Why were the droidekas and B-2s advancing without resistance?
Why weren't scouts reporting ambushes, resistance, corpses even?
"Maximum vigilance!" the stormtrooper commander ordered, who also disliked this.
TNX-0333, gripping the flamethrower more comfortably, ordered his three subordinates—former 501st fighters assigned to storm-commando training—to move toward the main tunnel leading from the base depths to the hangar.
They would advance further, while the half-platoon took defense here, relying on droid corridor clearance actions.
This was right—assaulting such a key direction as the main entrance with small forces would be foolish.
Especially since two more shuttles were already landing.
The squad advanced without resistance.
They passed several corridors equipped with checkpoints unmanned, which only heightened the storm-commandos' suspicion.
The first encounter was in armor adorned with the Black Sun symbol.
As befitted the enemy.
He appeared when a hydraulic hiss opened the door to the personal quarters section, and a viking pulling on his helmet strode out, sharply turning right, leaving the stormtroopers behind.
"What the hell is this general assembly when there's a battle in orbit?" the viking muttered, taking several steps from the Fourth special squad.
And stopped, began turning, tried to raise his carbine, apparently reflexively realizing that four figures in black storm-commando armor shouldn't be in the base corridors.
"What the...?" was all he managed.
TNX-0333 reacted a second earlier.
He swept the legs, knocking the fighter down, simultaneously wrenching the weapon from his hands.
With an open palm without wind-up, he struck upward under the enemy fighter's chin.
The unlucky soldier's helmet flew off his head and rolled into the darkness of the side passage.
The Zann Consortium soldier hit the floor.
TNX-033 sat atop, pinning one enemy arm with his foot, the other with his knee, and continued holding the jaw shut with his open palm.
His squad stormtroopers seized the prisoner's weapon; he tried but couldn't free himself or even open his mouth.
"I ask questions—you answer," TNX-0333 laid out the setup, sidelong observing how his fighters spread to dangerous directions, securing against unexpected enemy appearance.
The viking nodded.
As soon as the pressure on the jaw eased slightly, the fighter immediately tried to twist away, earning a sharp slap to the side of the head.
"Last warning," TNX-0333 announced.
The viking whimpered and nodded agreeably.
"Where are this base's defense forces?" the storm-commando squad commander began the interrogation.
"Alert declared," the viking said hastily. "Everyone rushed to posts. Then it was canceled. All ordered to report to the third-level B zone parade ground. Everyone obeyed."
Implausible.
"Why are you here?"
"Well, I... uh... stomach growled."
"Why did no one stay? At least duty personnel."
"So it's a general assembly," the viking explained. "Droids were supposed to remain at posts."
"None in the main hangar."
"Uh-uh..." the prisoner mimed thinking. "Looks like they were recalled for maintenance. Some stupidity. I don't know, I'm a simple mercenary. They pay me, I work. Haven't paid salary this month, like all our garrison— I pretend to work."
Exactly so.
Nothing else to expect from mercenaries.
"What's the base garrison size?"
"A thousand sentients," the prisoner replied readily.
"Weaponry?"
"Mostly small arms."
"Droids?"
"About thirty droidekas, heavy repeaters, grenade launchers..."
"Where are the Kaminoans located?"
"Well, third level, B zone, two passages from the parade ground. They live there and inspect clones on the parade ground..."
"Understood," TNX-0333 without the slightest moral hesitation drew his blaster pistol and stunned the prisoner.
"Deliver to company position," he ordered one fighter, the Sniper.
He was least effective with his rifle in current realities.
And having a blaster carbine didn't particularly improve things.
Further, following wall signs, they three headed to third level toward block B.
The rest of the way was calm; they only encountered janitor droids, machines so brainless and primitive they could identify only their assigned deck sections.
At the needed intersection, the storm-commandos, already reporting all known info to command, turned left into the corridor.
Lift ride two levels up.
Half-kilo run in full gear—just child's play.
They found the needed zone very quickly.
And it wasn't that they weren't surprised by what they saw on the parade ground.
Hundreds of bodies of various sentients, armored and not, men but mostly women.
The first—armed, the second—not all.
Huge blood pools—on the parade ground, walls, doors...
Several living but torn-apart sentients tried crawling toward the commandos at the sight, but, weakened, stilled and died before the newcomers could reach them through the body piles.
"Forward," TNX-033 commanded, seeing at the far end of the parade ground, behind large viewglass, several Kaminoans.
Who behaved as if nothing threatened them, and around wasn't such a nauseating scene that both his soldiers vomited, barely removing masks.
Non-clones, in a word.
Regular recruits who'd served over ten years in the Storm Legion and joined the Dominion right after its creation.
In that time, they'd passed all possible checks and recommended themselves in the best light.
But compared to Selid clones, they were cadets who still had to learn to fight.
And TNX-033, the last sentient in this galaxy with Colonel Selid's face, would ensure they met the high efficiency bar of the Fourth special storm-commando squad.
The foyer, unlike the corridors, was brightly lit, but the soldiers' eyes protected by helmet light filters entered without delay.
"Don't move, and no one gets hurt!"
TNX-0333 for emphasis spat a short flame stream ahead.
And immediately, switching to tactical comm with command, reported discovering the cloners.
The fiery warning, judging by the pale long-necked Kaminoans' faces, made no impression on them.
"Finally," a Kaminoan in a white-black jumpsuit rose from an egg-like hollowed-out chair and stepped toward TNX-033. "I am Orun Wa, leader of this group. Whom do I have the honor...?"
TNX-0333 without warning spat fire on the floor a meter from where the Kaminoan froze.
"How interesting," the Kaminoan tilted his head sideways, as if wanting to view the storm-commando squad commander from another angle. "You're a clone. The other two aren't. Does the Dominion have access to cloning tech? Unlikely you're from the Grand Army of the Republic—you're larger but shorter than Jango Fett's products...."
The other Kaminoans began discussing what they'd heard among themselves, utterly unconcerned that two blasters and a flamethrower were aimed at them, which could make their lives bright but painfully short.
"Cease talking!" TNX-0333 ordered. "Answer questions! What happened on the parade ground?"
"Demonstration of my group's skills," the cloner said indifferently. "I released eighteen hundred improved Zann Consortium Defiler clones from incubators. Unarmed and unarmored, they tore apart a thousand armed viking mercenaries with bare hands. Your command, having capacities for clone creation and purposefully coming here, will surely be pleased to have the opportunity to hire specialists like us."
"Scum, you mean," a female voice sounded behind the storm-commandos.
TNX-0333 spun around before finishing hearing the objection.
In the doorway through which his group entered this room stood... probably still a woman, if matching voice to figure.
With a hand push, she sent a stocky man, clearly human-gened, to the floor.
Unable to stop his fall with hands bound behind, he crashed down.
"This is Makus Kaynif," the woman said.
From head to toe, she was covered in dried blood droplets and streaks smeared across her face and body.
In several places, her jumpsuit was torn, burned clearly by energy weapons.
Once bright-red hair matted, with flesh chunks in it, acquiring the look of long-dried dirt.
If not for the lightsaber hilt in her hands and eyes burning with molten aurodium irises, the girl could be taken for a vagrant who just crawled from a trash container.
"Identify!" TNX-0333 ordered, aiming the flamethrower at the arrival.
"Get that thing off me, 'torch'," the woman said threateningly. "We fought side by side on Mustafar against HX. I saved your squad from death when the deranged clone scattered you like bowling pins."
"Understood," TNX-0333 replied, lowering the weapon and ordering the same for his fighters. "Glad you're alive, Hand. I'll report to command."
"Do me the favor," the Hand said. "I shoved my comlink down one of these cloned ladies' throats."
"Agent," Orun Wa stated, not taking his black eyes off the uninvited guest. "You're alive. Strange, I thought you weaker and my clones would replace you."
"Ah, so that's it," the woman grinned, more resembling a psychopath's menacing grimace due to her appearance.
"Obviously, you won due to your Force sensitivity," the Kaminoan continued. "Familiar type... I'll ask your master to work with your DNA. I'm sure you can be made much better than you are now..."
In the next instant, several things happened at once.
The first and barely noticeable—the Hand clenched the fingers of her left fist.
The second—and obvious—Orun Wa's knee joints exploded in bloody sprays.
The third—the Kaminoan collapsed to the floor in his own blood puddle.
The other members of his race didn't even stir to aid the compatriot.
"I'll climb a Star Destroyer's engine shaft faster than you touch my DNA with a finger, bastard," Thrawn's Hand said, shifting gaze to the other Kaminoans. "Now a small clarification, you long-necked scum. You're prisoners of war and henceforth will do what you're ordered. And if I learn that any of you voiced any condition regarding further work for the Dominion to my lord, lameness for life will seem the best outcome. Clear?"
"Yes, Hand," the female Kaminoan replied quietly.
"Well, excellent," the red-haired woman bared another grin. "Now, you long-necked bastards, quickly bandage your comrade's wounds before I get angry."
TNX-0333 was first to hand the Kaminoans his field medkit.
If knee joint explosions were what the Hand did in good spirits, seeing what she could do when in a bad mood was something the last clone of Colonel Selid didn't want.