Subject 37
The Cracked Mirror
NAME: Jorg Tierel, TK 1079
FACTION: N/A
RANK: Major
SPECIES: Human
Homeworld: Bastion
AGE: 32
SEX: Male
HEIGHT: 1.93m
WEIGHT: 81kg
FORCE SENSITIVE: No
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STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES:
[+]Sharpshooter: Jorg has excelled at Marksmanship since even before the early days at the academy. He grew up in a family with heavy martial traditions, and as such most of his life revolved around what would eventually become his career in the military. His father often pressed him to spend extra time at the shooting range or go on hunting outings with his friends in some of the reserves. All of this eventually lead to Jorg being quite the shot.
[+]Leadership: As a result of his family's heritage, and his own high self-expectations, Jorg has been molded into quite the leader. In his group of friends back on Bastion he had always been seen as the leader, during the Academy he had a meteoric rise to squad leader, and later during his career he showed clear indications of his abilities in both strategy and tactics. This eventually lead to him being promoted to Major, a rank he has held since the defense of Empress Teta.
[-]Computers: Though he has many good qualities, Jorg is hopelessly lost when it comes to computers. He can operate a terminal just enough to utilize things like the holo-net for basic searches, but anything more than that and he’s lost. Usually this weakness is covered by one of his team members, but in an ever increasing chaotic world his lack of knowledge might be more than a detriment than one would think.
[-]PTSD: Jorg has seen more of war, battle, slaughter, and genocide than any human being has a right to. He was on Alderaan during it’s Vongforming. He took part in the murder of prisoners of war, fought in dozens of battles, and has seen dozens of his friends died. As a result of all this trauma Jorg has a straining form of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, something that manifests itself in different ways at different times.
PERSONALITY:
Stormtroopers are rarely thought of as actual people. Their armor denotes an almost robotic appearance, the voice modulators inside of their helmets sets them apart once again, and their martial nature presses them into almost inhuman territory. When most people think of Stormtroopers, they do not think of the man behind the mask. This is natural, and of course on purpose. People do not see humans, they see something else, something more.
Yet Stormtroopers very often are in fact Human, with the same flaws, fears, and hopes.
Jorg has been a Stormtrooper for over a decade, his service commencing before the Rise of the One Sith. During that time he has served the Empire loyally, following orders, doing his duty, and marching ever forward to demands he did not fully understand, nor tried to. Jorg has always been a good Soldier. His entire career he has followed his Orders, only questioning when a better alternative existed. Though insubordinate at times, Jorg never pulled so far away as to be dangerous to his superiors, only fighting them on issues which he thought were right.
This attitude has stayed with Jorg his entire life, he is in essence the perfect soldier. He is not the strongest, fastest, or smartest, but he has qualities which render him perfect for the job he does. As a leader he is much the same way. Though headstrong, he recognizes when he requires input or help, not shying away from asking questions or demanding more information. He is reasonable to almost a fault, watchful of things that seem odd or out of place.
BIOGRAPHY:
This Personal Account Was Published by the CoruscaTimes, It is unedited from its Original form.
849 ABY
Bedunday; 2:23pm
I want to set the record straight.
The History books won’t exactly be kind to us, and the Sith won’t even remember who we were. There won’t be any trials for us, not now, no one will ever give a poodoo about what we have to say. I can’t really blame them, who cares about a bunch of stormtroopers? Most people don’t even see us as humans, they just see drones. I don’t hold it against them, it’s what we were designed to do. We were the faceless Legions marching behind the Sith, doing their bidding as we went along.
Oddly enough, I don’t resent the Sith either.
I’m getting ahead of myself.
This record, though I doubt anyone will care about it, will be a comprehensive account of my time within the Stormtrooper Legions of the One Sith. It is not propaganda, nor is it wholly unbiased, It’s my look back, and my explanation of what was done. There is truth in it I suppose, but it will also be tinged with lies. I’m not stupid enough to think that I know everything, and in a war...I know less than half of what I do in peace.
We’ll start with what’s easy, me. My name is Major Jorg Tierel, designation TK 1079. I was born on Bastion to the Tierel family and I’ve been a member of the Stormtrooper Legions since before the One Sith took Coruscant.
A lot of people would think that’s impossible, after all, The One Sith had operated in almost complete secrecy since before the Gulag Plague, but the reality is a bit more complex. My family served The Empire hundreds of years ago, my Ancestors were everything from TIE PIlots to Admirals. We Settled on Bastion along with the other Imperial Remnants and stewed their until someone finally came for us. My father liked to constantly remind us of the greatness that we were destined for, telling me that one day The Empire would rise again.
I didn’t believe him, not until Moridin came along. I was young then, too young to serve, but I remember my Uncle marching away. My father stayed back on Bastion to administer our estate, but my Uncle fought, and fought well apparently. He served within the war that The Emperor began, fighting valiantly until he died.
When the Empire fell my Father wasn’t concerned, for his future or mine. Apparently he’d known that the Empire had been ‘false’ that something else was growing within the darkness.
That was my first taste of the One Sith, the night my father sat me down in his study and told me the truth.
It was interesting, I was incredulous at first but it made sense to me in a way. An Empire didn’t belong on the fringes of the galaxy, it belonged in the core. My father told me of The One Sith, he told me of their plans, or rather what he knew of them, and then he told he I would be joining their academy.
I wasn’t skeptical, I didn’t need to be, after all this was the duty of my family. We serve, we’re soldiers, and if my father thought that this group was the correct one, then I as the dutiful son agreed. I still don’t think it was the wrong decision. What else was I going to do? Become an administrator? Marry some nice girl and settle down? No. That wasn’t me, that wasn’t who or what I was supposed to be. So I went to the academy.
My experience, I imagine, wasn’t all that unique. Stormtroopers in the old Empire were considered the Elite of the Elite, they were the best soldiers in the galaxy because they were quite literally picked from the best stock.
The Academy on Prakith was much the same way. The One Sith had access to a surprisingly large pool of candidates, and only the best of those were chosen. I didn’t have any military experience, but my family’s history and my father’s own influence with the Sith was enough to allow me access. Those first few days were the worst. Most already there were soldiers in one way or another, former Sith Empire troopers, mercenaries, disgruntled Republic Guard. I was new, fresh meat.
In all honesty, I thought I would die. The training was grueling, harsh beyond anything I’d ever experienced.
In the end though I imagine that you can look up ‘Stormtrooper training’ on the holo-net and you’d see exactly what we went through. About the only interesting thing about my time at the Academy was the fact that it was on Prakith, a planet that at the time was controlled by The Republic. That was really the amusing part. The One Sith were building an army right under their enemies nose. Whenever we got leave to go out that always struck a cord with me.
Eventually though, the training ended. I was promoted to squad leader, those around me having come to respect my word and skill. In truth I wasn’t really sure why, but I knew better than to question it. I was nineteen at the time, leading men that were three or four years my senior. They all trusted me, that was what mattered.
The war started not long after we graduated.
The Siege of Coruscant was like something out of the History books, or maybe story books depending on who you ask.
Everything about it was so secretive. We didn’t know what was going on until the very last minute, until after we’d boarded the dropships for deployment. When they told us our target half of us didn’t believe it. It seemed so surreal, Coruscant? The Jewel at the center of the galaxy, crown world of the Republic.
The plan was even stranger. At the academy it had been drilled into us that we were the elite, the best soldiers the One Sith had, but we weren’t even going to be on the frontline. The Sith were at the head, the spear, and we would come in after them. Part of me was relieved, any fight that was spearheaded by the Sith was surely to be a bit easier, but I couldn’t have been more wrong.
We landed a few minutes after the Sith crashed into the Temple. Our dropships fell into the courtyard when there were still dozens of Jedi and Sith fighting all over the place. Battle is chaotic, that’s the very nature of it. Blaster bolts, artillery, tanks, all of that makes a hell of a racket. Add Force Users into that mix? Things go to a whole new level. I remember stepping off that Dropship to complete and total hell. It was like all forms of Hell had broken to the surface of reality and had come to life. Describing it wouldn’t do the scene justice, words can’t even begin to explain it. It was utter Chaos.
The Sith did most of the fighting. Whether they did it for glory, bloodlust, or a dozen other different reasons I don’t know, but to say that we were outclassed was an understatement. We had blasters, a few concussion launchers, some Thermal Detonators, the Sith? The Sith had lightsabers and the Force. I watched Lord Shara smash a Jedi into the temple steps, breaking the duracrete around him and roaring loud enough to make my helmet dampen the noise. It was awe-inspiring, terrifying really. I saw things that day that made me question why they even needed soldiers.
The answer came after the Temple fell; Clean up.
The Sith did their work, they broke the Coruscant’s back, we just had to break the rest. It was easier than you might think. After the Jedi fell and the Republic left things went relatively quiet. The people of Coruscant could sense that the wind had changed, and after that realization hit things quietly shifted.
We spent the next week clearing out pockets of resistance. A few left over Republic Guard, a Jedi here or there, each fight was met with brutal and swift measures. Oddly enough, there were no massacres on Coruscant, no back alley executions, those wouldn’t come until later.
Carida came next, the most disastrous military campaign I’ve ever been a part of.
The invasion was supposed to be a show of force, swift, strong, and without remorse. We only had a few days after Coruscant settled down before we were shipped out again, the Army took over occupation and we were moved to transport ships in orbit. That was my first introduction to the Yuuzhan Vong, the troops that would eventually outshine us. They were brutal savage, everything I’d ever imagined.
We got along with them well enough. A few of them despised our armor for what it looked like, but the creatures respected us for what we were; warriors. We had a mutual understanding, they would leave us alone, and we would leave them alone. That truce held longer than most would have thought.
The invasion came two days later, and as most know it was a complete disaster. Our fleet completely failed to break through, not even a single boot touched the ground before retreat was sounded. For the Navy it was humiliating, for us it just meant a better meal that day.
The Republic hit Empress Teta soon after Carida failed. We hadn’t redeployed from Carida yet, so I wasn’t there. From what I heard the fighting was brutal, the Jedi came pretty close to killing a few of the Sith Lords but they were ultimately stopped. It was the last time the Sith faltered. It was also the last time anyone saw Lord Shara in battle. Half of me was glad for that, I’d seen what the Sith could do back on Coruscant, it terrified me.
After Empress Teta there was a lull. It was only for half a heartbeat, and most wouldn’t have even called it that, but it was obvious to most of us. Lord Shara had backed off from the Front Lines, Lady Apparine was still there, but there was a looming question, who would replace Lord Shara? The answer came in the form of Lady Mierin. She was a Pureblood, Sith to the bone. She brought a new found spirit to most of us, but she also brought brutality.
Alderaan was Lady Mierins first command, and it set the groundwork for what would become the way of things.
The assault was swift, concise, and above all brutal. The Initial invasion was a rush, faster than anything we’d done before, quicker than Coruscant was. Within the first twenty four hours we captured dozens of key points all over the planet, millions died, thousands were captured, hundreds of nobles were executed without trial or even a statement. It was just a matter of fact, as soon as the Sith seized power the massacres began. Alderaan was systematically purged at our hands. Men, women, even a few children were shot because they refused to swear allegiance to the Sith.
I questioned it for a moment, one brief moment, and then it was gone. I’ve never considered myself a bad person, but I’m sure somewhere on Alderaan there’s someone that considers me a monster.
I can’t blame them.
It didn’t take us long to figure out why the Sith were so eager to execute loyalists. Only a few days later The Republic came back, bigger fleet, bigger army, ready to seize what was theirs. The Sith had known it was coming, and so anyone that had refused to swear to them was a potential rebel when the Republic returned. It was smart in a way, a bit overkill, but the word basically described how the Sith worked.
The second battle of Alderaan was some of the worst fighting we saw, coupled with what happened after, it nearly broke us.
I don’t even remember what day it was when they came. Most of us were in the barracks at the time, trying to get what little rest we could. The hours before had been filled with executions, firing squads, half a dozen different massacres that probably don’t even have names. We were tired, some of sick to our stomachs, others gleeful. I felt numb. I didn’t think about what I had done, what we had done, only thought about what lay ahead. We were on the edge, all of us.
But when the klaxons started to blare and the call went out, none of us hesitate. We grabbed our rifles, threw on our armor, and ran out. Maybe it was instinct, maybe it was some twisted form of loyalty, it didn’t matter. We fought, just like we had fought on Coruscant. This time the tables were turned. The Republic assaulted the positions, we held them. It was a bitter battle. The Republic wanted their planet back, we didn’t want to give it.
By the time The Republic withdrew, I’m pretty sure even the Sith were dead. Calling it a victory didn’t come naturally. The Republic retreated and left, but we’d lost so many men that it was hard to celebrate. Most of us staggered back from the lines, armor half broken, blasters jammed, dozens of powerpacks strewn about. We were tired. Half of us no longer identified as soldiers, we were butchers, cutting down whatever was in front of us.
The worst part is, Alderaan wasn’t even the end.
Three hours. That’s how long we were able to rest. The Republic began their withdrawal and we were pulled off the front lines. Most of us thought we were finally getting rest, that others could take over, but instead we were told what was happening back on Coruscant. The fight had to continue, and within a days time we found ourselves once again on the Jewel of the Galaxy.
Ask anyone what the worst kind of fighting is, they’ll answer with Urban Combat. Coruscant is the worst kind of urban combat. Instead of city streets, you have levels, instead of skyscrapers, you have buildings that crest the surface of the planet. Fighting on the streets of Coruscant was like fighting inside of a Womp Rat Nest. Around every single corner there was something trying to kill you. It was brutal, exhausting, and bloody. My armor was red by days end, tinted and stained by a dozen or so dead men. So many soldiers died that day. Stormtroopers, Coruscant Security, Protectorate. No one remembers that of course, they only remember how the battle ended.
The Imperial Palace was rubble, half of Coruscant burned, but we had won. We thought that finally, finally we could get some rest.
Again it was only half a hope.
During the second Battle of Alderaan, and while the Protectorate had moved on Coruscant, The Mandalorians has seized opportunity and struck at Empress Teta. We were bewildered when they told us we would have to fight again. Some of us threw up, others just broke down, a few tried to desert only to be met by blaster fire.
There was no retreat. There was no surrender.
Those were the words Lady Mierin told us as we boarded the Star Destroyer, the words that rang in our heads as we flew through hyperspace. Every one of us expected to die. We knew the reputation of the Mandalorians, we knew what they were, that we stood no chance if they showed up in force.
Somehow though, somehow we never had to face them. By the time we arrived on Empress Teta the battle had already been fought. The Mand’alor had been slain and his people had been pushed back.
We didn’t care about how it happened, we only cared that we finally got a break.
There was still things to do on Empress Teta of course, clean up, but it wasn’t so bad. Unlike on Alderaan, the residents didn’t resist us, in fact on Teta we were like heroes. The people cheered us, helped us, gave us food, it was probably the only time i’ve ever felt welcome while wearing the armor. The Mandalorians had been beaten back, The Protectorate had been thrown out, and the Republic was bandaging its wounds.
I got promoted a few days after our arrival, for the service I’d rendered to the One Sith. It was nice, but I couldn’t help but feel they were only filling the slots that had been left open by now dead men.
A few weeks passed after Empress Teta, things were surprisingly quiet. There was the occasional border skirmish of course, The Republic lashing out or a small strike on some facility, but no real battles. My squad and half our battalion was moved to Copero, assigned to set up defenses for the planet. It was a nice vacation of sorts, no battles, no fightings, just endless trench digging and turret building.
Cold as bantha balls.
We stayed there a few months, but all good things come to an end. Things changed with the Sith. Lady Apparine and Mierin disappeared, dead probably, others cycled in and took power. The Vong became more and more central to everything. It was odd at first, but in all honesty none of us really had an issue with it. A few of the new guys, glory hounds, were upset, but If the Vong wanted to fight and die instead of us, who were we to argue?
So with more and more of the frontlines being occupied by the Yuuzhan Vong, we became something else. The One Sith all and all weren’t all that bad to most of their planets. Coruscant remained mostly unchanged, so did Byss, Anaxes, half a dozen others, but eventually...eventually some planets just couldn’t take it. The circumstances didn’t matter much to us, we always went where we were told, but it became pretty clear that not everyone was so happy under the yolk of the Sith.
Calling them rebellions would be wrong, they never really made it that far.
The job was easy enough, no real soldiering too it. We were more like a roving firing squad that went from place to place to do the local governors dirty work. The term ‘war crimes’ gets thrown around a lot today, that thing on Roche, and then what happened a few days ago on Korriban. Sure those are bad, mass murder, but they’re really just a statistic. When numbers get that high you stop seeing faces, people, and start just seeing populations.
What we did? That’s different. We saw their faces, each and every time. Planet after planet, world after world. We did our duty. Some couldn’t handle it, they were either reassigned or sent back to Prakith for revaluation. I never thought about it really. I was following orders.
It wasn’t constant of course, even Sith knew that we couldn’t keep that up. They rotated us around, sometimes we’d get guard duty on some planet, sometimes we went on patrols, a few times they even set us loose on some unsuspecting Republic Outpost, but we’d always return to the Core, and we’d always end up doing the same thing. Eventually it just became a part of who we were.
Executioners.
It went on like that for years, half a decade really. I didn’t see another invasion until Lujo, and by then the tables had turned.
They relied on them more and more, and eventually they paid for it.
The Rebellion wasn’t as shattering as it should have been. By all rights the Yuuzhan vong should have been able to split the One Sith in a single night, but for some reason...they couldn’t. I’ll never really understand it, but in the end they failed. Some Vong stuck around after that, but they were never really trusted the same way.
Stormtroopers came back, though half of us wore different armor and the other half had different names. Things started to fall apart then, became more disorganized, desperate even. Nobody within the leadership would admit it, but there was a feeling...everyone knew that things weren’t the same as they once had been, everyone knew that things were going down hill.
That’s when Lujo happened.
The Alliance hadn’t been much of a threat until then, hadn’t even really been a thought. They’d attacked us a few times, but each time they’d been thrown back without much real effort.
Lujo was different.
We were on a defensive rotation at the time, checking defenses and making sure that everything was secure. It had never been a terribly important world, just another in the long list of planets that had been mostly forgotten. Then the alarms began to blare. At first I didn’t even recognize the sound, it had been so long since i’d heard it that It startled me, but a few minutes later...they came.
They moved with surprising speed and efficiency, fast enough that they were able to catch us off guard. It was impressive really, reminiscent of what we’d done to Alderaan. The fighting was similar too, close quarters, brutal, neither side wanting to cede a single inch. I remember feeling oddly calm throughout the whole ordeal, any semblance of fear had long left me.
Maybe the others felt the same way, maybe it was what helped us win the day. Eventually the Alliance decided that they had taken too many losses, that the gains they had made simply weren’t enough justification. We won the day again, bloodied, bent, but not broken.
It was a pyrrhic victory. We all knew that Lujo was the end.
It wasn’t because the Alliance was any different than The Republic, it wasn’t really, it was their momentum. The Republic had been broken by then, every fight with them had been controlled by us. This? This had been different. We’d clawed and scraped, fought to a bitter standstill and allowed them to retreat on their terms. It was the start of the end.
After Lujo we were transferred again, this time to a far more important world; Coruscant. The planet where it had all started. We were tasked with the defense of the Senate District, the coup against the Dark Lord happened a few weeks later.
A lot of us didn’t even know what side we were on. Few of us even remember who originally lead us, some...old timers like me, those that had gone through the Academy with me, still held fast to The Dark Lord, the man that had supposedly lead us all this time. We tried fighting our way through, but by the time we reached the Citadel things had already rolled out of control. The domino's had fallen, and as any good soldiers would do, we simply followed the next set of orders.
It didn’t take long for the Alliance to strike at us again, a year or so maybe. Dulvoyinn fell, and we prepared for the worst.
When it became clear that the Alliance was gearing up to strike at Coruscant we were moved once again. Our new station was as guards to Admiral Helioth, a man who had supposedly seen to logistics for many of the One Sith invasions. The writing on the wall became clear when we met the man. He was shaking with fear, sweating, blanched white.
We knew it was done then.
None of us talked about desertion. None of us even thought about it. We had long since abandoned any notion of the idea, and even when things were so obvious...we were still soldiers.
The Alliance came, just as everyone had thought. They took Coruscant by storm, hundreds of Jedi, millions of soldiers, it was a battle that I was sad to miss. As I stood by the window, watching the fight and ignoring the cowering Admiral behind me, I couldn’t help but wonder what would have happened had these two great powers met at their height. The One Sith had been strong once, stronger than three of the greatest powers in the galaxy.
A certain hint of pride still hung on inside of me, at the battles we had won, at the people that we had liberated. It was an odd mix of emotion as I heard the Admiral speak. It was a blubbering cry, a demand, but more of a question really. He knew what was coming, capture, trial, imprisonment. The Alliance weren’t us, they didn’t hold executions. I watched the man from behind my mask as he finally stood from his desk and worked up the courage to ask, to spit out the Order.
I’m a Soldier, so I followed it.
My squad left the building soon after, setting charges to deny the enemy an asset. The Admirals smoldering corpse was buried under the rubble, left abandoned as we evacuated to the nearest airbase.
We left Coruscant on a shuttle, a dozen of us. We headed towards Anaxes, a nearby fortress world, but things had already devolved. Thousands of troopers had defected, hundreds of Admirals and Generals had been captured. Things were rapidly falling apart. Over the next two years I watched as one of the greatest Empire’s the galaxy had ever seen slowly fell apart. With the loss of Coruscant things seemed to spiral further and further, until finally...everything collapsed.
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irective 1898:
irective 1898:o not return://1898 was a complete collapse of the government, one of the hundreds of protocols that had been drilled into us on the academy on Prakith.
Of the twelve men that came to that world with me, three stayed.
The majority took 1898 as a directive to go home, to head back to where they had come from, that their war was finally over, but for us? For us there was no home. We had fought for so long, done so many things...we weren’t the same people anymore. Home belonged to someone else, not to us. We weren’t the same kids that had trained on Prakith, we were Soldiers.
So that was what we would be.
I don’t know yet where we’ll go. I don’t know yet whose Orders we’ll take or what we’ll do, but I know that eventually they’ll wonder about us. The few Troopers that made it all the way through the One Sith Empire and out the other side.
They’ll call us monsters, heroes, psychopaths, liberators, murderers, any name you can think of, but let me set the record straight.
We’re just soldiers.
