Ysanne Isard (clone)

The clone of Ysanne Isard, the Director of Imperial Intelligence, was created by Isard herself circa 4 ABY. Shortly after the demise of Emperor Palpatine, Isard discovered the Emperor's private cloning center within the Imperial Palace on Coruscant, the galactic capital. She destroyed all but one of the Spaarti cloning cylinders, transferring the remaining one to the Lusankya, her personal Executor-class Star Dreadnought hidden beneath the Manarai Mountain region of the planet. Aboard the Lusankya, Isard secretly cultivated a clone of herself, intending to utilize her when circumstances required Isard's direct involvement, but the original Isard was unavailable to attend to them. To this end, the Director maintained her double in a state of suspended animation, constantly updating her memories so that upon awakening, the clone would believe herself to be the genuine Isard.

In late 6 ABY, the New Republic, thanks to the efforts of Rogue Squadron, its elite starfighter unit, seized Coruscant. Isard was compelled to retreat from the planet with the Lusankya and the still dormant clone aboard to the planet Thyferra, where she assumed the role of the planet's leader. Just prior to her departure from Coruscant, the Director of Intelligence had her clone's memories updated a final time. In 7 ABY, Rogue Squadron, against the wishes of the New Republic, launched a military campaign against Isard, aiming to overthrow her Thyferran regime. The Rogues' secondary objective was to rescue captives held aboard the Lusankya; among those imprisoned was General Jan Dodonna of the Rebel Alliance.

Isard sought to prevent the liberation of the prisoners and decided to disperse them throughout the galaxy, a task she only entrusted to herself. Isard was needed on Thyferra, however, and so she decided to assign the dispersing of the prisoners to her clone; she planned to dispose of the clone afterward by killing her, believing that there was a place for only one Ysanne Isard in the galaxy. The clone was finally awakened and dispatched on her mission. When the clone returned with her task complete, Isard wanted to kill her, but was not able to do so as at that time Rogue Squadron attacked Thyferra. Isard was overthrown and presumed to have perished in battle.

Isard had in fact survived, as had her clone, who had no memories of the events on Thyferra as a result of a head trauma she had sustained. Because of the same trauma, the clone was forced to surgically repair her face, and it became asymmetrical and bore a network of raised scars below her right temple. After the loss of Thyferra, both Isards went into hiding, each unaware of the other's existence. While the Republic was engaged in combat with Imperial breakaway warlords such as Zsinj and Grand Admiral Thrawn, both Isard and her clone maintained a low profile and developed their own strategies to retaliate against the Republic and Rogue Squadron. During the Thrawn campaign, the clone gathered the Lusankya prisoners back up and had them transferred to a facility that belonged to the bioengineering corporation Xenovet on the planet Commenor.

Prior to leaving them on Commenor, however, the clone had been moving the prisoners from one location to another, but had been keeping the interior of their cells, the food, and the prison staff the same, so that the prisoners believed that they had been held at the same place all the time. At some point, the prisoners were stationed on Distna, a moon in the Corvis Minor system, where the bodies of those of them who had died were buried. While the prisoners were being kept at the Commenor facility, the clone paid for their housing to Xenovet's trustee, the attorney Mem Wooter, from her financial institutions also in the Corvis Minor system. Eventually, Xenovet went bankrupt and the clone took direct control of the facility.

Following the defeat of Thrawn in 9 ABY, the clone received information from her contacts on Coruscant that the New Republic Provisional Council had decided to target one of the Imperial warlords, thus convincing the others that the Republic had not been weakened by Thrawn. The Council selected Prince-Admiral Delak Krennel, the leader of the Ciutric Hegemony, as their target. Krennel had previously allied himself with the real Isard after she promised to make him the new Emperor if he brought her the Grand Vizier Sate Pestage.

Krennel, however, had murdered Pestage and claimed his holdings, the Ciutric Hegemony, for himself. Possessing the memories of those events and the knowledge of the Republic's plans, the clone Isard made her way to the planet Ciutric IV, the capital of the Hegemony, and offered Krennel an alliance. She provided him with a political program that would crumble the Republic and once again promised to make him the new Emperor, on the condition that he would provide her with resources needed to destroy Rogue Squadron. Believing that the clone was the real Isard, Krennel agreed to the alliance on such terms.

The clone's scheme was based on the fact that ever since its creation, the New Republic had been aiming at providing equality between Humans and other species. This meant, however, that many Humans were losing their wealth and power toward non-Humans. Acting on his new ally's advice, Krennel began a pro-Human political program, meant to make the Hegemony appear as a safe-haven for those who did not wish to share their wealth with aliens and felt abused by the Republic. This way, if the Republic were to attack him, it would look as though the aliens had enough influence on the Council to raise arms against someone merely protecting his own species. According to the clone's plan, the program would provoke further fear in Humans and might even force Imperial warlords to unite and become a bigger threat to the Republic's stability. Additionally, Krennel debunked the charges against him via the HoloNet, lying that by killing Pestage he had only done what the New Republic had wanted to do all along. Meanwhile, the clone began to leave a long trail of clues to the supposed location of the prisoners, a trail that eventually led the Rogues to Distna, where a large force provided by Krennel ambushed them.

While crafting that deceptive trail, the Isard duplicate intentionally left only subtle breadcrumbs for the Rogues, aiming to give the impression that she was actively hindering their pursuit of the captured individuals. Having finalized the agreement with Krennel, the clone orchestrated the relocation of a majority of the prisoners from Commenor to Ciutric, condemning the remaining captives to perish from starvation. She made a personal appearance at the Commenor facility, informing the remaining prisoners of their impending demise. Furthermore, the clone exhumed the corpses from Distna and reinterred them in a cemetery situated near the Xenovet installation. Subsequently, she erased the memory of one of the living prisoners, specifically Urlor Sette, and implanted a cybernetic device containing a lethal toxin developed at the Xenovet facility within his brain. Sette had a prior association with Corran Horn, a Rogue Squadron pilot who had successfully escaped from the Lusankya while it was stationed above Coruscant.

The clone pre-programmed the implant to release the toxin into Sette's brain upon Horn uttering Sette's name. She then dispatched the prisoner, carrying a "message" for Horn, to a celebration held on Coruscant in honor of Rogue Squadron. Upon Sette's arrival at the party, and after Horn identified the amnesiac man by name, the toxin was unleashed, resulting in the prisoner's death. Sette's presence provided the Rogues with clues regarding Isard's survival. They quickly determined the cause of death and the origin of the implant, prompting them to launch an attack on the Xenovet facility. The clone's strategy hinged on Rogue Squadron discovering the deceased prisoners on Commenor. She anticipated that they would also locate the graveyard and scrutinize the state of the buried remains. The analysis would reveal that the bodies could not have decomposed to such an extent in Commenor's soil. The clone expected the Republic to develop a profile of soil composition required to achieve the observed decay and leave the appropriate trace elements on the bones—specifically, the soil composition of Distna.

During the assault, Rogue Squadron successfully freed a number of prisoners who had managed to survive. The clone had anticipated the attack occurring later, after all the prisoners had perished. However, even with some prisoners still alive, she remained unconcerned, believing that their knowledge was limited to what she had intentionally conveyed: that Isard was alive. The clone reasoned that, with the Republic now aware of her continued existence, the Republic's command would deduce that she had formed an alliance with Krennel. To further this narrative, she instructed Krennel to initiate negotiations with the refugees from the destroyed planet of Alderaan regarding the provision of a world within the Hegemony for them to settle on, while intentionally withholding the specific planet's identity. She also directed him to issue a public statement, apologizing for the Empire's role in the planet's destruction. When the Republic inevitably attacked a world within the Hegemony, Krennel was to assert that it was the same planet he had offered to the Alderaanians, a declaration intended to exacerbate internal conflicts within the Republic.

Despite Krennel's initial reluctance to relinquish one of his worlds, the clone persuaded him that it was a necessary sacrifice to secure long-term victory. As predicted, the Republic attacked the Hegemony, aiming to destabilize Krennel's regime. Following the Republic's conquered of the planet Liinade III, Republic Chief of State Mon Mothma announced the discovery of a research station operated by Krennel, containing information about a superweapon akin to the Death Star, known as the Pulsar Station, which was reportedly under construction by the Prince-Admiral somewhere within his Hegemony. Neither Isard's clone nor Krennel possessed any knowledge of the facility's existence. The clone dispatched her agents to investigate the alleged site of the laboratory, but it had already been dismantled, leaving only a void in the ground where it was supposed to be located. Lacking concrete evidence linking the facility to Krennel, the clone dismissed the news as Republic propaganda intended to discredit him. However, she readily exploited the situation to her advantage, hoping to integrate the Pulsar Station into her scheme as another lead pointing towards Distna.

Following his ally's guidance, the Prince-Admiral refuted the accusations regarding his involvement in the project, and additionally asserted that Liinade III had been designated as the sanctuary for the Alderaanians. Concurrently, the clone released a series of files purportedly demonstrating that Krennel lacked the necessary resources within the Hegemony to construct the Pulsar Station. However, one particular file, the Corvis Minor file, had been deliberately altered by the clone to present the exact opposite conclusion. The clone assured Krennel that, once Rogue Squadron was eliminated, the Republic would launch a major offensive in the Corvis Minor system, leaving Liinade III vulnerable to a counterattack. Such a counterattack would demonstrate Krennel's ability to maintain the integrity of his state and bolster his popularity.

Unbeknownst to the clone, the research facility on Liinade III was actually under the control of the real Isard, who had discovered her double's survival and her clandestine agenda. Isard recognized the clone's machinations and planned to rescue Rogue Squadron from the clone's ambush. This was to gain their trust, form an alliance, and ultimately use the squadron against her clone. Isard, however, deemed the trail left by the clone to be excessively intricate. To ensure the Rogues fell into the trap, she fabricated the files pertaining to the non-existent Pulsar Station within the facility on Liinade III. Given that Distna was a hollow moon located in the relatively uncharted Corvis Minor system, Rogue Squadron concluded that Krennel was constructing the station within the moon. The squadron walked directly into the trap and initiated a scouting mission to Distna to confirm the existence of the superweapon. There, they were ambushed by six squadrons of TIE fighters, TIE interceptors, and TIE bombers. Without the clone's knowledge, they were rescued by the real Isard's TIE Defenders under the command of Colonel Broak Vessery and escorted to Isard's clandestine hideout.

The clone's elaborate scheme culminated in the destruction of the starfighters provided by Krennel and the deaths of two rookie Rogue Squadron pilots, Lyyr Zatoq and Khe-Jeen Slee. Two additional Rogues, Wes Janson and Asyr Sei'lar, were initially presumed dead but were later recovered from the battle site with severe injuries that required treatment. When Krennel and the clone received no communication from the ambushing force, the Prince-Admiral instructed the Victory-class Star Destroyer Aspiration stationed in the system to investigate the battle site. The Aspiration found nothing, although its crew reported that another Star Destroyer had visited the battlefield. However, the Aspiration's captain had not contacted it, assuming it was one of Krennel's ships on a mission related to the ambush.

Since the only entities possessing Star Destroyers besides the Republic and the loyalist Empire were a few independent warlords and the criminal Booster Terrik—who was Corran Horn's father-in-law—and none of the warlords had claimed responsibility for destroying Rogue Squadron, the clone correctly deduced that the Star Destroyer belonged to Terrik. She surmised that Terrik had attempted to locate any survivors and that any information he had gathered would have been reported to the Republic. Given the overwhelming odds faced by Rogue Squadron, the survival of any of the Rogues would have been immediately publicized. However, as rumors of Rogue Squadron's demise circulated, Mon Mothma issued a public statement on the HoloNet, stating only that she could not disclose any information about the squadron's fate to avoid jeopardizing the entire Hegemony campaign. Upon hearing this statement, the clone concluded that her plan had succeeded.

Following the Republic's conquest of Liinade III, it initiated the dispatch of convoys carrying supplies to the troops garrisoned there, prompting Krennel to launch attacks on these convoys. Simultaneously, the clone analyzed the economic conditions on the planets from which the supplies originated. Upon receiving news of another convoy, she conducted her own investigation and realized that the convoy was a diversion intended to lure Krennel's fleet into a trap. This conclusion was supported by reports of New Republic starships engaging in "maneuvers." She communicated this information to Krennel, who then formulated a plan to exploit the absence of the Republic ships by launching a daring raid on Coruscant itself.

During this period, Requiem Squadron, a squadron of TIE Defenders led by a man identifying himself as Colonel Antar Roat, arrived at Ciutric, expressing their desire to join Krennel's forces. The squadron—which was, in reality, composed of disguised members of Rogue Squadron—was accepted into Krennel's military and placed under the command of Colonel Lorrir. The Rogues had formed an alliance with the real Isard and infiltrated the planet with the intention of disabling Ciutric's planetary shield and neutralizing ground defenses surrounding the prison building in the city of Daplona, thus paving the way for Isard's forces to rescue the prisoners. Following the Rogues' instructions, the New Republic force was to engage Krennel's fleet concurrently.

As Krennel prepared to advance on Coruscant, he initiated a battle alarm. Requiem Squadron was scheduled to be transported aboard one of Krennel's ships for deployment to Coruscant. However, Colonel Lorrir suddenly disappeared, delaying the loading process, as the rest of the squadron was instructed to wait for him. When "Roat" was instructed to proceed without Lorrir and get his people airborne, Krennel contacted the clone, requesting that she dispatch someone to locate the missing Colonel Lorrir. The clone, however, decided to search for Lorrir herself and found him in the operations room inside the hangar. "Roat," who was actually the leader of Rogue Squadron, Wedge Antilles, had stunned Lorrir with a blaster and confined him there. She also discovered Antilles's prosthetic two-fingered arm and recognized his true identity. As the Republic fleet appeared and engaged Krennel's staging ships, Antilles and his men launched an assault on the prison. Horn and another Rogue, Ooryl Qrygg, soon liberated the prisoners and began escorting them out of the prison building.

Meanwhile, swiftly implementing her escape plan, the clone revived Lorrir and compelled him to pilot an Imperial Assault Shuttle toward the prison, while she positioned herself inside the Daplona base training center. Patching her comlink through the shuttle's comm unit, she initiated communication with Antilles—who was providing cover for Horn and Qrygg in his TIE Defender—to create the illusion that she was aboard the shuttle. As a final measure to deny Rogue Squadron their victory, she ordered Lorrir to destroy the prison facility, and the Colonel fired two concussion missiles at it. Antilles intercepted and destroyed one missile in mid-air, but the other reached its target. However, Antilles had alerted his men inside, and they assisted the prisoners in bracing for the explosion, preventing any casualties. Following the failed attack, Antilles revealed the clone's true nature to her. Initially, she refused to believe that she was merely a clone, but Antilles presented irrefutable evidence. Overwhelmed by Antilles's revelation, the clone cried out in anger over the comlink.

Simultaneously, Antilles, having participated in training simulations against Lorrir, recognized the Colonel's tendency to sideslip to evade attacks. The leader of Rogue Squadron recognized the clone's deception, as the real Isard had previously attempted a similar tactic to escape from Thyferra. Consequently, he signaled two of his Rogues to attack the shuttle from different angles. After Myn Donos struck the shuttle in the aft port, Lorrir maneuvered to starboard, where Gavin Darklighter delivered the final blow. The damaged shuttle crashed into the Daplona River and detonated. Feigning death, the clone transmitted static through the comm system. However, Antilles traced the comm signature to the training center and, after informing the clone that he had deciphered her plan, launched a pair of missiles at the center, killing her. Krennel had perished in the space battle, and without a leader, the surviving Hegemony forces surrendered to the Republic.

It was subsequently revealed that the real Isard had orchestrated the entire scheme to eliminate the clone as a diversion for the Republic, while she—under the direction of the reborn Emperor Palpatine—attempted to recover the Lusankya, which had been transported to the shipyards in the Bilbringi system for repairs following the Battle of Thyferra. Accompanied by Imperial troops, Isard infiltrated the Lusankya. Isard proceeded to her quarters, while the Imperials attempted to secure the ship. However, Terrik had anticipated the Imperial's plan, and he, along with his daughter Mirax, Sei'lar, and Republic agent Iella Wessiri, were already awaiting Isard aboard the Lusankya. Terrik lured Isard's men into the auxiliary bridge and captured them, and Wessiri shot Isard in her quarters, killing her.

Being a clone of Ysanne Isard, the clone's height was 1.8 meters. She possessed the same distinct characteristics, like fair skin, black and white hair, and different colored eyes. The left eye was red, and the right eye was blue. Clone Isard was cunning, manipulative, and merciless, having inherited these traits from the real Isard, along with her memories and her animosity towards Rogue Squadron. The clone was resolute in her mission to destroy the squadron at any cost, regardless of the number of lives that would be sacrificed. She was willing to let the prisoners on Commenor die of starvation, and she showed no concern for Krennel's people when they went missing after the ambush.

To lure her adversaries into a trap, she constructed a complex web of deception, investing considerable time and resources in its creation. Anticipating the New Republic's actions, she also provided Krennel with political counsel, which aided him in increasing his popularity and gaining support in his struggle against the Republic. She frequently employed a deductive approach, correctly identifying Terrik's ship as the one that had visited the ambush site and connecting the economic situation in the Republic to the impending attack on Krennel. The clone preferred to contemplate her next steps in a dimly lit room surrounded by computer monitors. When events deviated from her plan, she responded swiftly and adapted to the situation, as demonstrated when she incorporated the Pulsar Station into her plot to ensnare Rogue Squadron.

Despite the scars resulting from her trauma and subsequent surgery, Krennel still considered the clone to be reasonably attractive. She was also capable of maintaining her own spy network, which extended as far as Coruscant. Furthermore, she possessed self-assurance, consistently assuring Krennel that her plans would succeed, dismissing the New Republic's claims about the Liinade laboratory's connection to Krennel as a fabrication, and believing that Rogue Squadron had been destroyed after hearing Mon Mothma's message. Despite all of the clone's planning, however, the real Isard was able to easily see through her schemes simply because the clone had the same mentality as her, and Isard considered her clone's plan to be too complicated. The clone was initially reluctant to believe that she was a mere duplicate, but when Antilles told her facts that proved it, she cried in anger. The fact that she was a clone ultimately resulted in her death as well, as she attempted the shuttle trick that Isard had already used.

The clone of Ysanne Isard was initially mentioned in X-Wing Rogue Squadron 35, a 1998 comic book authored by Michael A. Stackpole and illustrated by Steve Crespo and John Nadeau. The clone made her first appearance in the 1999 novel X-Wing: Isard's Revenge, also penned by Stackpole.