The Bad Batch had been called away to infiltrate a Seperatist factory that made engines and vehicles for their army. Hunter didn't understand why a regular battalion couldn't come and take out the facility, but he didn't ask questions. He and his team got the job done, and that was that. "Everyone ready?" He asked the in the comms.
"Yeah, we're ready!" Wrecker answered loudly.
"No one is present at the facility?" Tech asked to confirm.
"That's the intel I received. No one should be here so it will be an easy in and out," Hunter said.
"You set up Crosshair?" Hunter asked.
Crosshair was set up on the roof of the facility, looking down through some windows.
"Confirmed, the lights are on, but no one is home," he said.
Hunter, Tech, and Wrecker broke into the facility. Tech went to the main office to download any plans the factory had that would be turned over to the Republic. Hunter and Wrecker went around placing charges on key supports of the building. "Man, this place is gonna fall like a raptor's nest," Wrecker said with a grin. He loved his explosives.
The clones finished their duties and commed each other, heading out of the facility when Crosshair came on the com. "We've got incoming. A single speeder approaching the west employee entrance," he said.
"Don't blow it yet," Hunter said to Wrecker.
Wrecker's shoulders slumped. "Aww, come on, everything is ready to blow anyways," he said.
"Just wait until we find out who it is. Maybe it's a seppie officer and we can take them down," Tech suggested.
Wrecker growled and then said, "Finnne..." as they waited for Crosshair to report.
"Who is it?" Tech asked.
"A single female, an employee, it seems. She's going through the employee entrance. I'll go inside and get a closer look," Cross said.
The minutes were ticking by as the team waited for this unknown person to do whatever they needed to do and then leave.
"It looks like she is leaving," Cross said. The female had taken a small package from inside the factory to her speeder. Just when she was about to leave, one of the explosives triggered and went off, causing a chain reaction to the rest of the explosives in the factory. The clones gasped and ran farther away from the factory to escape the aftermath.
Jaylen was miffed. She had misplaced her favorite set of tools and thought she had left them at work at the factory. She didn't agree with the separatists and the war, but she needed to make a living. She needed those tools because she also made small repairs on speeders in her village. She did whatever she could to earn credits or goods, sometimes working 18 hours a day. Jaylen let herself into the factory and went to her locker where she found her pack and carried it back out to her speeder. She was just tightening the straps on it when the wall behind her exploded. White light consumed her eyes and a deafening roar filled her ears as she and her speeder were launched flying through the air. Pieces of metal pierced her skin and patches of her clothes were set on fire. It was an act of mercy that she wasn't conscious for the next few seconds as blood began to drip down her face and through her clothes.
"What the hell, Wrecker! I told you not to blow it!" Hunter yelled at him.
"It wasn't me! I swear! There must have been a short in one of the detonators!" Wrecker shouted back with a worried look on his face.
Crosshair had just narrowly escaped the blasts as the roof collapsed as he ran and jumped off to the ground. "Trying to kill me again, Wrecker?" He asked in anger.
"What about the girl? Is she alive?" Tech asked as he read his scanner.
"I don't know. I was too busy trying to keep myself from getting blown up," Cross answered as he stared at Wrecker. "We need to get out of here."
"We have to help whoever that was at the entrance. We can't just leave them to die," Tech said.
Hunter was already running towards the west entrance of the factory with Wrecker right behind him. Hunter and Wrecker sifted through the burning debris as Tech scanned the area and listened for emergency responders. "There!" Hunter called out. He could smell her blood and sense her weak heart beat before he saw her.
Jaylen was slipping in and out of consciousness as she felt pain stabbing her body. She also smelled burnt flesh and hair. She struggled to breath and was trapped under a large piece of debris. She squeezed her eyes shut, hoping for a miracle to happen when she felt the pressure being lifted off her body. She opened her eyes but her vision was blurred by blood dripping into her eyes, to see a figure in armor with a menacing looking painted helmet.
Wrecker came up next to him and lifted a large piece of debris off of her small and broken body. Blood covered her face and was seeping through her jacket and pants. "Oh, no... oh, no..." Wrecker kept saying as he cleared debris from her body.
"Just pick up her and take her to the ship. We have to get out of here," Hunter said.
Wrecker carefully picked up Jaylen's still and broken body as guilt coiled in his stomach. "Help me," she rasped out just before she fainted. They ran back to the Marauder and Wrecker placed her in the tiny med bay. Tech began to scan her body as Hunter applied gauze to the cut on her head. She had dark curly hair with streaks of teal and blue mixed in. She also had blue patches of skin in a pattern down the sides of her face and neck. Upon further inspection, she had the same blue marks on either of her arms. She wasn't a human, but they had never encountered her species before.
"She has multiple lacerations, a concussion,...some burns...and a broken left radius," Tech said with a sigh. "I can treat most of her wounds here, but she will need further medical care."
Wrecker was standing at the end of the table, rubbing part of his arm in worry. "I, I don't know what went wrong, but I promise I didn't set off the charges.." he said in his gravely voice.
Hunter put a hand on his shoulder in comfort. "I know you would never intentionally harm a civilian," he said. "I'm sure she'll pull through."
Tech pulled a blanket over the woman's still body as they each left the room. Wrecker watched her for a moment before he went to his room to take off his armor.
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