Malen sat down in the LAAT gunship with Leroy and six other troopers with their blaster carbines at the ready. Malen was confused with the design of the rifles; they were so large – not bulky, but too long to look practical. Somehow the troopers made them work. Leroy put his hand to his helmet and then nodded.

"Roger that!" he said. "Okay men! I just got word from the bridge that we've broken through the atmosphere; get ready to get on those turrets! 43, 65, you two get in the Pin-point laser turrets!"

"Yes sir!" two of the troopers said as they opened the sliding armored doors and opened the orb-like protrusions on the side of the ship, apparently those were the turrets.

"76! You and I will be using the repeater turrets I've got here!" he leaned on one of the turrets that were leaning against the door before picking it up and securing it to the floor of the ship. The clone pilot in the cockpit of the ship turned around and gave an A-Okay symbol.

"We're good to go at any time, Commander!" he said.

"76! Crack open your door and get that turret set down!"

"Yes sir!" said the clone identified as 76. He slid his side of the hull open and slammed the turret down onto the floor, securing it magnetically to the ship.

"Are you ready, Master Malen?" Leroy asked. Malen laughed a little to himself.

"I'm not a master…"

"When you're with us, you are." Leroy scrambled to the cockpit and put his hand on the clone's shoulder, "Whenever you're ready." He said. The clone pilot reached up and pulled a lever and pressed a few buttons before Malen could feel the ship begin to lift off the floor of the hangar. Malen left his seat beside another clone trooper to peer outside of the ship. The hangar shields hummed with energy as they readied to depart through them.

"You'll wanna hang onto something, Commander." 76 said before they rocketed forward. Malen grabbed the railing on the ceiling to stop himself from being flung against the back wall of the gunship. They phased through the hangar's shields and into the dusty air of Geonosis. Even through the sound of the engines roaring he could hear the explosions and laser fire banging throughout the battlefield. A prototype ARC-170 fighter sped past the gunship, shaking the crew and startling Malen.

"I haven't seen one of those in action yet, can't wait!" Leroy commented as he grabbed the sticks of his turret. Ten other LAAT gunships hummed past their own ship, charging in the same direction toward the gargantuan CIS Core ship. It looked more like a large metal sphere than a ship, but it was their target. Malen leaned out the side of the LAAT to behold the massacre that was happening below them. With only the cover of the sandstorm, as clone troopers and droids marched toward each other, flashing lights of red and blue shot in all directions. Jedi were leading the troopers into battle with their blades of colorful light gleaming through the dust clouds as they sliced through the droids in their paths.

Commander Leroy began to fire his turret as Vulture-droid star fighters zoomed through the sky beside them. He hit one of the droids right where its processor was housed and sent it spiraling into one of the many up-jutting red rock faces on the surface of the desolate planet. The fighter/droid erupted into a fireball before sliding down the cliff and crushing some droids below it.

"Chalk one up!" Leroy called as if it were a game of some sort. Malen watched as Geonosian ships and Vulture-droids began to explode and rocket forward flaming to the ground. Their fellow LAAT gunships received heavy fire as well; they soon lost two of their ships in their own explosive infernos. The bodies of the clone troopers were sent falling to the battlefield with the wreckage of their vessels. More dust and sand was kicked up when the ships impacted into the dry soil of the planet, skidding and rolling fierily to their stops. Malen could feel so many voices fading from the force that he had to hold his head for a moment. He had the feeling that it was a pain he would be getting used to soon enough.

"Are you okay Master Malen?" 76 asked as he continued firing off blaster bolts into the ships flying past them. Malen watched while missiles flew past – possibly shot by the LAAT behind theirs – and destroyed two spider-walker tanks on the ground, sending their spindly legs flying away from the explosion and crushing a few other droids in the process.

"I'm fine!" Malen screamed over the battle. "Focus on getting us through alive!"

"Of course commander!" 76 agreed as he pegged another Vulture-droid, clipping its thrust dampers and part of its wing. Suddenly, the pilot was hammering buttons on his console furiously.

"Aw Hell!" exclaimed the pilot in his Mandalorian accent. "Everyone hold on!" The pilot jerked his control sticks to the far right, and the ship diverged from its original course completely. Four missiles with purple vapor trails zoomed just passed the ship and exploded behind them. The clone beside Malen jerked back and forth as he tried to remain seated. The LAAT began to stabilize again.

"Are we good 10!?" Leroy asked to the pilot. The pilot turned around and nodded his head.

"It looks like we can keep going si-!"

The cockpit exploded before Malen had time to warn the pilot about the incoming missile. Another clone hanging onto the railing beside Leroy lost hold of the rail and plummeted out of the side of the condemned ship, screaming.

"Goddamn it! 76, 51, Malen, Hold on tight!" Leroy abandoned his turret and slammed the door on his side shut as the ship began to pivot downwards, nose first toward the ground. The ship rocked back and forth as it plunged down faster and faster. Malen focused all of his force energy to level the gunship out before it crashed. The ship vibrated violently still as it glided to the ground and lurched back and forth as it scraped against the rocks below its belly, creating sparks against its steel hull. Malen was thrown brutally against the cockpit wall, scorched still from the explosion, and then he hit the floor just as hard when the ship had begun to slow. They thought that it was over, until the ship then tipped over onto its side after ramping halfway off of a protruding boulder in the ground. If the trooper in the right capsule turret wasn't already dead, he would have certainly been crushed now. Malen grabbed 76 off of the wall of the overturned ship, pulling him to his feet before seizing his fallen lightsaber as well.

"I have a plan!" Malen called out.

"Well then do it fast, Master Jedi!" Leroy said as he grabbed the rifle off of his back and readied it against his shoulder. Malen activated his cyan-bladed lightsaber and plunged its laser blade into the sideways floor of the ship. Within ten seconds he had cut a large oval in it.

"They only destroyed the cockpit," he explained, "The shields may still be working, which means that we can use this as cover!" he punched out the hole in the floor to unveil the slaughter outside.

"Good thinking, sir!" 51 commented before reaching into the back compartment of the ship. He pulled out an extra clone blaster carbine and thrust it into the Jedi's hands. Malen laughed.

"At least I'm a better shot with these than most of my fellow Jedi." He shrugged as he and the three other soldiers leaned out of the wide hole in the ship. Leroy was the first to begin firing, hitting a B1 battle droid in the head. The droid's dirty chassis slumped heavily to the ground as its allies continued marching forward without it. Malen began firing into the crowd of droids with desperation in his eyes. He hit a B2 super battle droid twice in its sensor upon its silver duranium frame, sending the now blind droid firing in all directions destroying two B1s before finally falling to the ground and being trampled by its allies.

A few of the slightly more intelligent Geonosians quickly spotted the crashed ship and made their path toward the downed ship with their green insect limbs thin as bone. The four crash survivors quickly retaliated when the Geonosians raised their sonic rifles and began firing off blasts of green energy at them. Some of the insectoid sentients flared their wings out and began hovering toward the ship, still firing their strange alien weapons.

The shipwrecked troopers killed a total of ten Geonosians before 76 was hit with one of the green flashes from the strange rifles. His whole body was covered in a green static aura as he was blasted back against the roof of the overturned LAAT. He slumped to the downward facing wall of the ship, dead from the initial hit. Neither 51 nor Commander Leroy went to check his pulse; they knew that just one hit would end them as well.

Malen heard a strange array of clicking and whistling noises coming from behind and above him, so he looked up. Two Geonosians had noticed that their top was exposed through the open door of the LAAT and they used that to their advantage. The two bug-men jumped down into the fuselage of the ship with them and grabbed at the troopers. 51 fell down with the Geonosian atop him, both grappling to get the upper hand. Malen ignited his saber and strapped the rifle onto his back.

"Duck!" he yelled to Leroy who was still on his feet struggling against the spindly, yet surprisingly rigid and strong arms of the native. Leroy quickly ducked forward pressing his helmet against the chest of the sentient insect. The confused Geonosian was not prepared when the Jedi separated his shoulders from the rest of his exoskeletal torso. Leroy shrugged the body to the side and grabbed his vibroknife from its sheathe on his chest armor before sinking the blade into the neck of the Geonosian on top of 51. Sickly green blood splattered the troopers as they threw the carcass to the side and grabbed their rifles.

"These things are vicious!" 51 said as Leroy grabbed his hand and helped him to his feet. Leroy did not hesitate as he turned back towards the battle and fired at the still approaching hostiles. Malen's head suddenly shot to his left.

"Leroy! Grab that Heavy repeater turret and sweep those bugs off our windshield!"

Leroy laughed.

"It'd be my pleasure, sir." Leroy said before grabbing the large laser turret off of the wall of the ship and positioning it through the hole in its floor. The humming sound of the turret charging up was heard followed by the sound of lasers flying at their enemies. The charging Geonosians and some of the droids behind them were ripped apart by the laser fire as Leroy swept the repeating blaster back and forth across the battlefield. After that spectacle, a large amount of the droid forces that were advancing on the other clones were now aware of their other targets. A few of the super battle droids turned toward the LAAT and their squads of B1 droids followed after them. Smoke rose off of the turret as Leroy ducked down, avoiding the lasers being fired at them now.

"Dammit!" Leroy swore, "How are we going to get out of this?"

Malen closed his eyes and calmed his emotions, focusing his thoughts on the situation at hand. His eyes reopened and he quickly pushed his back up against the roof of the side turned ship.

"Do like I'm doing! Now!" the clones decided not to argue. They pressed their backs up against the roof and watched as Malen scrunched his face and held his hands forward. With all of his available strength in the force, he flipped the ship completely upside down, leaving for them an exit facing away from the battle. They scrambled off of the roof that had now become the floor and darted out of the ship as the droids crept closer and closer to their condemned LAAT. 51 and Malen went to continue running, but Leroy grabbed something from his belt and stopped, waiting for the droids.

"What are you doing!? We have to go!" Malen pleaded. Leroy slowly raised the metallic orb in his hand; a thermal detonator, ready to activate and throw. As soon as a B2's leg crossed the corner of the ship, he pressed the red button on the explosive and hurled it at the LAAT. The detonator landed in the ship's fuselage beside the bodies of the Geonosians and 76, beeping. Malen was quick to draw his saber and fend off the laser fire of the droids as he and his two soldiers were fired upon.

"Get back!" Leroy shouted as he tackled Malen to the ground behind a rock. 51 dived behind a similarly sized boulder. The fusion-based grenade exploded, collapsing part of the ship and atomizing it and the bodies in the process. The rest of the ship exploded with the force of the grenade behind it, sending the nearby droids flying if they had not already been scrapped by the shockwave. Malen watched the cloud of fiery smoke bellowing skyward as he raised his head from the sand. The head of a dusty and charred B1 droid landed beside him, spouting some droid gibberish that was inaudible now that its voice processor had been nearly destroyed.

"We've got to move!" Leroy said as he climbed off of his prime-clone's son and helped him off of the ground.

"We should rendezvous at the communications outpost to the west." Malen suggested. Leroy grabbed his once more fallen rifle off of the ground.

"Then let's go."