A/N: I think this is quite obvious, but one of my betas suggested I put this, so- All Xankatra sections are FLASHBACKS, and HUD stands for Heads Up Display.

And remember: if you find a clone commando in your backyard, take your medication, spin around three times, and blink. If he is still there, check his number and please return him to me. Thank you for your time. This has been your public service announcement for today.

Did anyone notice my shameless Lord of the Rings mention? Eärendil? Anyone have the faintest clue who he is? :Sigh: Ah, well. random-idiot-v2, at least you better have noticed it! I'll be very diappointed if you didn't...

right, I'll shut up now.

CHAPTER ELEVEN...

TUTAKA ONE SEPARATIST BASE

Zeke and Barriss were silent as a cleaning droid hosed the remains of Jader'hade off the wall with a high-pressure spray. The bloody fluid and chunks of charred flesh flowed into a container attached to the droid.

"You boys are on your own now," she had told Gamma Squad as the prepared to board a dropship that would take them to battle. Zeke remembered it clearly- it was raining heavily as the four clone commandos gathered around the petite Twi'lek woman on the landing platform. "The real fight is just as deadly as the Kaminoan simulators. But I have no doubts about your ability- you are one man, but the right man for the job!" She clenched a fist in the air. "In water you're born-"

"In fire we die!" the commandos finished.

Jader'hade had smiled, turned, and left. And that was the last they ever saw her.

And now she was dead.Another nameless, faceless casualty of the Clone Wars. Another corpse in the service of the Grand Army of the Republic.

Like Max.

Like Apollo.

Like Blaze.

Just... gone.

"Tell me about them," Barriss said softly.

Zeke looked up, startled. "Who?"

"Them. The men you led." She smiled sadly. "I may be unable to touch the Force, but I can still tell what you're thinking. You're as transparent as the rest of your..." she hesitated. "Brothers."

"Well ma'am, first thing is that I wasn't Lead. That was Blaze..."

XANKATRA FOUR

The four commandos jumped out of the hovering gunship to the ground below. They had been forced to put down roughly a kilometer away from the Republic outpost due to Separatist anti-aircraft weaponry. The dropship's repulsorlifts kicked up dirt, twigs, and small stones as it lifted off and headed back into space.

The commandos hoisted their DC-17s and prepared to move out. They walked in a diamond formation with Blaze leading, Zeke taking up the rear, and Max and Apollo on either side. Before leaving the gunship, each commando had downloaded an objective tracker to his visor's HUD that gave him a rough approximation of the outpost's location.

"Hey Lead?"

"Yeah Apollo?"

"Are we starting with zero kills, or do the kills from last mission still count?"

"Let's start from zero," Max suggested. He was still slightly annoyed that anything he blew up only counted as half a kill- consequently he had the lowest kill count of the team.

Apollo snorted. "I think not," he rasped. As a sniper, he had the highest kill count.

"We'll start from zero for this mission," Blaze said, eliciting a groan from Apollo, "then add them to the other kills."

Max sighed unhappily. "Fine, ruin my moment."

There was silence as the commandos of Gamma Squad refocused on their mission.

"Do you think this war will ever end?" Zeke asked quietly.

"What kind of question is that?" Blaze quickly glanced over his shoulder, the tilt of his helmet suggesting disbelief.

"I'm serious," Zeke said ernestly. "It can't go on forever. Eventually the GAR will crush the Separatists," (Of that no clone had any doubt), "but what then? Who will there be to fight that will compare to the immense chaos of the Clone Wars? The occasional terrorist group, or relatively small interplanetary war, but what about the GAR? Are we to grow old and die in the barracks, doing nothing? There is nothing that will ever compare to this war, so what will become of our brothers? Where will we go?"

"We will serve the GAR," Apollo rasped. "We always have, always will."

"To what purpose? After the war, what point will the Grand Army of the Republic serve? There will be no more missions for all of us. Where will we all go? What will we do?"

An uncomfortable silence followed, broken only by the whistling sound of mortars overhead and the occasional groundquake accompanying a close hit.

-xXx-

Zeke stopped his narration, seeing that Barriss was weary. "You should rest. We may need all our strength for the coming days."

"This isn't exactly the ideal position for sleep," she replied, painfully shrugging shoulders that were sore from the constant strain of hanging from wrists attached to stone.

Zeke laughed bitterly. "We'll be here a while. You get used to it."

A/N: replying with the review-reply service is a bitch and a half, so I'm not even attempting it. (Well, I attempted, and it pissed me off SOO bad...)

Anyways, apologies for the long time uploading and the short chapter. I'm working on chap12 while y'all are reading this, though! Hope you liked it, and please review!

One more thing, then I'll shut up. Thanks to everyone who returned after my long hiatus (did I spell that right?). Means a lot, thanks!