Setting the Stage

A- Prior to the Clone Wars, Captain Zozrider Slayke and his crew on board the Scarlet Thranta defected from the Republic in a move to attack the Separatist, whom they saw as a great threat, even though war had not broken out. They began to attack Separatist targets in the Sluis sector, and became legends throughout the mid and outer rims. Their forces were bolstered by other like minded individuals, and a small fleet was formed. The Republic was not pleased, and sent Jedi Mater Nejaa Halcyon to take back the Scarlet Thranta, giving him a cruiser, the Plooriod Bodkin. Halcyon tracked the renegade down, but before he was able to capture the man, Slayke stole his cruiser, leaving him the damaged Scarlet Thranta. Nejaa returned to a sort of disgrace, with only one prisoner, who he left on Coruscant with orders to stay there until needed.

B- Praesitlyn contained a vital communications node for Coruscant and several other of the Core worlds. Led by Admiral Pors Tonith, the Separatists attacked the planet, landing a massive force that quickly overwhelmed the local defenses. The local defense commander, General Khamar, was sent to face the first fifty-thousand droid army, which turned out to be a diversion. Another million droid army was landed behind him, and destroyed his forces. Two soldiers, Pilot-Lieutenant Erk H'Arman and Recon Scout Odie Subu escaped the destruction. Odie was out on a recon mission and rescued Erk when his fighter crash landed. They escaped into the deserts to escape the droids. The communications base was unable to send out a distress call, and the Republic was unaware of the attack until Zozrider Slayke found the planet under attack and made one of his own. He then landed his own forces to keep the droid armies at bay, while they all waited for the Republic to come.

The Battle

Erk and Odie were rescued by several Freedom's Sons and Daughters soldiers, and brought them back to their main base, where they were holding off the entire droid army in fortified postisions. Their own location was very close to the droids, and could not be bombed from orbit. Nor could the droids easily attack the fortified positions without being taken down easily. The pair were ordered to man an E-Web repeating blaster on the front.

Meanwhile, back on Coruscant, Anakin and Nejaa were selected to lead a rescue force of twenty-thousand clones to the planet. They began their planning immediately, gathering the proper equipment that would be needed, and went over their command. Along the way, they picked up Sargent Grundo, whom Nejaa had taken from the Freedom's Sons forces earlier. They then set out for Praesitlyn.

As the Republic fleet traveled to the planet the separatist leader, Pors Tonith, sent a huge force to assault the Freedom's Sons lines. Despite arguments from his staff, the attack was carried out, and thousands of battle droids advanced on the lines. Odie and Erk were the first to spot and engage the droids as they advanced. They cut down hundreds, but the droids kept coming. They were soon cut off and trapped as their bunker was destroyed, trapping them inside. The droid army continued their advance on the main positions, knocking out all of Slayke's aircraft and artillery. They did pause before they reached the main positions, allowing Slayke to consolidate his forces for a final attack.

At that moment, the Republic reinforcements arrived in system and began to attack the Separatist ships in orbit around the planet. Pors Tonith had moved his ships into a box formation over the battle on the planet, and the Republic moved to break it by heading straight into it. The Republic opened fire, taking out the jammer that had prevented communications outside the system. The battle in space began, and Halcyon's ship was boarded. They were able to take all the incoming droids out, but the ship was scuttled. Nejaa ordered Anakin to take control of the fleet. The gunships and transports were ordered down to the surface. The ground troops landed in four waves, first combat engineers, infantry, then Anakin's and Halcyon's soldiers. By that time, Tonith had withdrawn his forces to occupy the higher ground in the battlefield, and learned who he was facing from Count Dooku. The Count ordered him to take the leader of the Communications center, Reija Momen, and put her up on the Holonet, where she would read a prewritten message for the Republic to stop their attacks, or the hostages would be killed. Reija was put on the air as a live broadcast, but urged the Republic at the end to attack.

As Slayke saw the Republic forces land, he went out to greet them after the droids withdrew their forces. He mistakenly greeted the military's quartermaster as the Republic leader, and was very displeased to find that a Jedi was in command of the force, and was even more displeased to find that his pursuer, Nejaa Halcyon was in command. He told Anakin to meet him at his command post. As they did so, the promised reinforcements for the Confederation forces were on their way.

In the command base, Nejaa and Zozrider met for the first time. Neither held anything against each other, and got down to planning their next moves. The two did argue over what had happened, and Nejaa was forced to bring out his lightsaber to intimidate them. After that, they began planning, and were interrupted by an officer from Coruscant, who sent them a copy of the hostage's message. After that, Slayke placed his forces under Republic command. The continued to plan, and decided that their best course of action would be a feint at the center of the droid emplacements, while the main force would attack the side. The attack would be preceded by a recon force of ARC and Clone Commandos. A small group was formed, with Sargent L'Loxx taking the right flank, the Clone Commandos taking the center and left. Corporal Raders, Private Vick and Sargent Grundo would accompany L'Loxx. They promptly set out. While the recon was going on, Odie and Erk were still trapped, trying to dig their way out of their collapsed bunker. Erk discovered that a vibroknuckler would help them dig out easily. They set out digging.

As the recon groups went out, the Republic forces set off a series of artillery barrages, covering their advance. On the way, they met with a single droid, whom was beheaded by Sgt. Grundo with a vibroblade before he could make a sound. L'Loxx went ahead into the enemy territory, and scouted out their emplacements and got out. As their group was leaving, they were attacked by a pair of battle droids, which became more as they ran. Grundo and Vicks destroyed several, and Grundo was hit by glancing shots. As they were escaping, Odie and Erk finished their escape from the bunker, and were nearly run over by the recon group. Startled, Odie shot Grundo in the side of the head, nearly killing the Rodian. They debated waiting for the Troopers, but left anyway. They made their report on the enemy forces and went about preparing for the main assault. Grundo was brought to the infirmary, where he was visited by Anakin. During the visit, he died.

Meanwhile, the Clone Commandos probing the central and left flanks had their own troubles. One Commando named CT-19/39, or the Green Wizard, infiltrated the Separatist compound and found that they would be better off attacking the left flank rather than the right. On his way out, he was hit by the Republic artillery and was killed. The other six commandos met similar fates.

The attack would be preceded by a unit of Clone Commandos led by an ARC trooper who would create a diversion. The main attack would then commence. Anakin would be the battle field tactical commander. The commandos took off and Anakin went to his transport. By this time, the Confederation troops found the Commandos that had been killed during the recon, and knew that an attack was on it's way. They began to strengthen their lines and prepared for possible ARC Trooper infiltration.

At 0603 Local time, Anakin's force began their attack. Master Halcyon's Artillery started, then the troops advanced. At 0613, Anakin moved his tanks into the battle. The Separatists began to target the transports, and Anakin began to target the tank droids. In the mean time, Odie and Erk helped man the aid station in the Republic base. They moved to the Fire Direction Center, where they learned a little bit about the artillery and that the attack had failed.

The attack did not go well for the Republic. While they were able to breach the first line of Confederation defenses, the droids pulled back to pre-prepared postisions, not allowing the Republic attackers to find cover before being shot down. They were pinned down on the Mesa that was the enemy postision. The Republic had sustained several hundred casualties at this point. They were forced to pull back. Captain Slayke used his soldiers to create a defensive line at the river that was their start point, allowing the Republic soldiers to retreat- retroactive movement- under covering fire. Anakin's transport was hit on the way out, but he and the pilot were able to get out before it was destroyed. They got into another transport and moved out. Once they were out, the Fire Direction Center was able to bombard the assault area with heavy mortar rounds, forcing the droids into bunkers. Once they pulled out, Anakin ordered three battalions to take the hill. Unfortunately, while they were doing so, the Separatists tapped into the communications center and ordered the shells to keep falling. The clones began to be taken apart by their own artillery. The Republic was forced to call off the attack.

The Republic forces regrouped and planned out their next attack. They ruled out another frontal assault, given the entrenched positions of the droids. Anakin suggested that they go in to get the hostages, and try to capture the Separatist command while they were at it. Instead of a large operation, this would consist of only two shuttles. Odie would accompany Anakin because of her knowledge of the Communications center where the hostages were being held. Erk would be one of the pilots of the shuttles. They would also bring along several of the guards and a contingent of ARC/Commandos.

Meanwhile, up in space, the Republic fleet was preparing for a possible Confederation intrusion to bring in reinforcements. They spotted an object, moving fairly slowly.

The commando rescue group pulled out. They were piloting two transports, with several ARC troopers and a contingent of armored clones. The clones would secure their landing site, while the ARC Troopers and the non-clones would move into the buildings and rescue the hostages. Anakin and Erk were the two pilots of the transports. They landed and secured the landing zone, and the ARC Trooper blew the doors open. The rest of the group went into the building. Droids began to appear and Anakin used his lightsaber to deflect the bolts as they came in. They reached the prisoners, who were all in the same room, and took out the droid guards. As they finished off the droids, the leader, Reija Momen, got up and hugged Anakin. As she did so, a droid appeared in the hallway and took a shot at Anakin, who was saved when Reija took the shot in the back. The droid was dispatched when Anakin went on a sort of rampage.

Up in space, the Republic fleet came into contact with the reinforcements, a massive fleet. They used a type of stealth that allowed them to get closer to the Republic ships. The Republic ship that first came into contact backed off to the main fleet.

The hostages on the ground were brought out and onto the transports, and the crews were delayed when they realized that Anakin wasn't with them. In their wait, the Clones holding the droids off were quickly dying and the ship that Anakin piloted out was destroyed. The survivors took Erk's transport and quickly left, leaving Anakin behind. The clones, Vick and Raders, who were left behind, reentered the building. Anakin was inside, moving quickly towards Pors Tonith's bunker. He destroyed the doors and entered the bunker, where he captured the Separatist Admiral. Anakin was about to kill the commander when he heard Qui-Gon Jinn tell him that the force should only be used for good. Anakin took the technicians and commander prisoner and left the building. The droids had been turned off. Anakin hooked his lightsaber to his belt, which remained on until an ARC trooper reminded him to turn it off. The ground battle was over, but a massive enemy fleet was on the way.

With the ground forces out of the way, the Republic concentrated on their upcoming battle. Anakin and Halcyon got their fighters and went up to space to join the fleet. The Republic and Confederation fighters were launched and advanced ahead of the fleet. Anakin and Halcyon breached the fighter screen and flew among the larger enemy warships, moving too fast to be hit or targeted. Anakin destroyed one warship by using a missile against it's engines. By then, they had disrupted the enemy formations enough. Halcyon ordered the fighters back, but Anakin was damaged while leaving. He told Halcyon to say goodbye to him for Padme and then engaged the Separatist flagship, destroying it, but was caught in the blast. Halcyon landed and was met by Zozrider Slayke, and he learned that the enemy fleet was withdrawing, and that the ground troops were destroying the battle droids on the ground. The entire ground staff was in celebration. Halcyon broke the news of Skywalker's death, which sobered the crowd. At that moment, Anakin's ship landed. The maintenance droids opened the top, which had been fused shut, and they found the young Jedi to be alive. They found that he had used the force to enter hyperspace just as the missiles detonated on the ship. He then returned to the planet, alive. Just after he arrived, Odie and Erk asked him to marry them.

The Jedi Council decides to grant Anakin Skywalker the rank of Jedi Knight. The communications array on Praesitlyn is still in Republic hands. Freedom's Sons and Daughters are now part of the Republic, after a Pardon from Supreme Chancellor Palpatine. Anakin Skywalker is brought to the eyes of Darth Sidious and Count Dooku/Darth Tyranus. Sideous found that he would be useful in the future, which will come to fruition in Revenge of the Sith.