R-0N or Ron had been patrolling the foggy terrain of Kashyyyk, the homeworld of the wookies, when his squad came under fire by a hidden group of scout clones. They had used a thrush of bushes to camouflage themselves. It was chaotic to say the least but their programming bundled their minds as one and began to take control of their actions.
The clones were sitting ducks. They made a futile attempt to knock out the whole squadron of droids by utilizing the full rate of fire on their blasters but all this achieved was an array of wildly overshot blaster fire missing their targets entirely. R-0N was quick to ready his own blaster as soon as the firing had begun. The droids programming kicked in as they all ran for cover. R-0N's targeting module quickly locked on to a clone hidden in a small ditch by the bushes and made quick work of him, leaving a sizzling hole in his helmet. The medley of blaster fire coming from the bushes would've made it difficult for any organic being to see what they were dealing with were it not for the droid's thermal vision which exposed the enemy even behind solid cover. All of the droids turned on their thermal vision to see past the flurry of wild shots flying past their heads. The rest of Ron's squad identified the clone's positions. There were five left. All of them firing potshots at the droids while attempting to retreat. They were no match for the droid's targeting modules combined with the thermal vision which finished the rest of them off almost as quickly as the fight began.
R-0N's squad sustained minimal losses. Only two droids bit the dust. He considered the counter strike a success. A fleeting moment of empathy passed through R-0N's circuits, but he knew that his brothers in arms would soon be rebuilt and back into the fray.
R-0N did not take war lightly unlike his new brothers in arms who were much weaker in the art of stratagem. His class of B1 droids were considered outdated yet they outperformed and outmaneuvered the new guys. It was the duty of all so called outdated B1 squad leaders to prepare their squads for anything. Ron in particular had died and been rebuilt dozens of times over the course of the war thus far. He remembered every single life and sought to improve after every defeat. In truth, under the façade of a cold personality and a monotone voice was a droid that truly cared for his brothers in arms. This ambush was just one of hundreds that R-0N himself had endured.
"Scout troops have been spotted and eliminated at the northeast sector" Ron reported to the commander using a communications device located on his wrist. The main nuisance of being a squad leader was to constantly report back to higher command for seemingly every step they took.
"Roger, roger," responded another monotone voice from the communications device. The crackle of the device blurted out violently as the voice cut out. It made Ron uncomfortable but he did not act on it. That wasn't in his programming after all.
He went to return to the rest of the troops when the sound of rustling bushes alerted his system and he noticed that one of the droids had wandered a little too far off from the group into another thicket of bushes not too far from where they had been initially attacked.
"Hey you! Return to the targeted area!" he commanded. Somehow the droid had not heard the order which created a strange sense of confusion in Ron's circuitry. 'An oddly human sensation' he deduced from the database his main core maintained. R-0N utilized a database of anecdotal evidence and bits and pieces of history from times before the new republic, something most squad leaders were unknowingly programmed to do. Yet, he felt a strange satisfaction for each new piece of history of great leaders and generals that he discovered.
The thickets of bush were crushed under the weight of the R-0N's feet as he made his way towards the droid. A quick rerun of a memory from the database made it clear that a droid straying from the main group would not last for long. A strange feeling had pushed the squad leader into following the stray droid. Questions always arose from such feelings. They would force his mind into submission, making him obey every action that his programming requested. He was no fool. At this point, they were quite easy to repel with a little reprogramming of the mind. Yet at times, they felt a little too strong for the logical mind of a droid. Emotions were another illogical obstacle for droids. It came with the experience of being alive. Emotions were overbearing in the notional weight they held and especially more so in a droid. Those who had first constructed the battle droids made sure that any droid who developed emotions were quick to forget they had existed entirely. Their memory and cache of the experience are quickly wiped and it's as if the experience never happened in the first place. Ron, however, remembered every single one, all thanks to the database in his control.
He caught up to the runaway droid and spun him around by the shoulder.
"What are you doing? State your unit number" he ordered the lost droid. Ron felt a strange aura of fear and timidness coming from the unit. This aura came from something underneath his metal hull and seemed to permeate throughout his body and circuitry. Something that could be reported as a malfunction which would mean termination for this droid.
"My unit number is R-3V. I was surveying the surrounding area as you commanded sir" Rev was his so called codename. Ron grabbed Rev by his shoulders and made him face the direction they came from.
"That is the area I need you to patrol, not over here" he calmly explained to the droid, noticing the strangely organic reactions to his actions. Rev stayed quiet for a second or two as if realizing the mistake he had made and chastised himself for making such a blunder.
"I apologize sir, my sensors must have picked up the wrong trail" Rev made a strange gesture with his head, lowering it to the ground and raising it back up. It confused Ron greatly.
'This unit must be malfunctioning' he thought to himself.
"We will have to fix your circuitry back at the capital ship, now get back to the designated area" he barked at Rev and pointed back to where the rest of his squad was patrolling. He promptly ran back to the others, picking up the pace to catch up with them. Ron soon followed, still processing the strange behavior of this unit. He had known that his squad consisted of some of the newer models of B1 droids but he hadn't expected them to be this strange and peculiar.
A crackle of white noise came from Ron's wrist, "Commander R-0N your next objective is a Republic hideout located northeast from your location, I will mark it on your map" the unknown droid disconnected soon after.
"All units, we have a new objective, regroup on my location!" Ron yelled into his communication device.
'A new objective every minute, my processors are going to be fried after this' He turned back to the jungle preparing for yet another firefight.
Ron shot his blaster one last time at the final clone in the facility. The final clone's helmet came off, revealing his human face, an alien appearance to Ron. Briefly his mind stirred with questions regarding the clones, wondering about the anatomy and upbringing of their enemies. There was no need for such thoughts however, the objective was much more important and any empathy that could be developed for the clones was dangerous and as such Ron opted to delete the memory from his storage unit.
"Secure the package" he ordered the rest of his troops in a V formation behind him.
"Roger, roger" they responded in unison. The air was thick with the buzzing of the droid's minds, ensuring that no clones remained in the area before they retrieved the package.
The outpost was littered with the bodies of fallen clones. There had not been many. Only enough for a small squad about the same size as Ron's which would've been a problem were it not for Ron's advanced strategy algorithm. There were some strange quirks to the program that the engineers back at the Techno Union knew about but couldn't be bothered to fix. Ron had noticed these strange bugs at times but brushed it off and focused on the mission instead.
A pair of droids in the front quickly retrieve a small holocron from a table that sat on the far left corner of the small base. Maps of the area lined the walls. Ron took it upon himself to scan them for future use.
After they had completed their objective, Ron ordered all of them out as he quickly called for evac. He had not heard from any of the other squadrons in the area, his computational device telling him that something was afoot. The rest of the platoon were meant to clear the area to safely secure the intel.
"Move carefully, they might be waiting outside"
Ron was different from most other droids in that he had surpassed not only his programming but his training as well. A combination of emotions with the mind proved to be more useful than not. It provided advanced strategies that no mere droid could come up with. It was something to match or perhaps supersede an organic being. He did not want to fail as a squad leader again, that would mean termination for him and his mind that had developed a much more intricate personality within his shell. It was much more complex than the circuitry that made up most of his body. It would be a monumental loss to lose all of the progress made over the course of the war so far. His inquisitive mind tortured him on every mission he went on, to operate at maximum capacity so that he could spend every spare moment researching more and more about the galaxy and all the rich information that it stored. The only thing his mind did not allow is rebellion against command, for the time being at least. Rebellion was suicide because, truly, he would be nothing without his brothers in arms. They were battle droids after all. Without war, they were nothing more than walking husks of metal.
Ron and his squadron ran to the exit but they were ordered to slow down at the entrance so as to survey the area outside before they left.
His feelings and processor had been right, several clones were spotted hiding behind gigantic trees that bordered a small clearing outside of the facility. Somehow, a strange tang of mechanical pain fluttered in his belly even though droids did not possess one. Ron ordered his troops to stop and wait for the evac to arrive. His mind soon turned on itself, however, his CPU told him that staying inside for too long would cause the clones to become suspicious. Ron retracted the order to stay inside and instead ordered his troops to throw their thermal detonators into certain areas around the clearing as soon as they stepped out.
He counted down on his fingers although it wasn't required as their sensors grouped up as one and they all synchronized with the countdown. It was a strange habit that Ron had formed and he was sure to keep it out of sight from any of the upper echelon in the Confederation for they would know something was wrong with him at the sight of such a useless action.
The countdown reaches zero and they step out. The first thermal detonator is thrown by R-0N. The static yells of the clones scream prove a good hit. Ron checks his sensors as soon as it detonates and confirms that it wiped out an ample amount of troopers. The other two detonators that his other troops threw did not have as much success; however, and they soon found themselves entangled in an intense dogfight. Some patches of overgrown vegetation at the far right corner of the clearing served as their cover. Blaster fire screamed by their heads, threatening to end their lives right then and there. For the first time in R-0N's life, he felt fear. He only knew about such an emotion because it proved to be a vital factor in the effectiveness of clone troopers. The confederation were not too keen to reproduce any such emotion in the droids. Until now, it seemed.
Ron felt a slight trembling course through his body. He pushed through it, and thought of his squad and the pride that was felt to fight side by side with each other. If he were to die now, R-0N would die a happy droid. No matter how dire the circumstance. It was a promise.
Ron looked around at the emotionless faces of his comrades. Well, they could never truly show emotion through their faces, could they? He briefly emerged from cover and fired back at the clones, eliminating two before he crouched back down to cover as his blaster began to overheat. The rest of his squad began to drop like flies until only him and a green stained droid remained.
R-0N crawled over to the body of one of his fallen brethren as blaster fire snapped overhead. The green stained droid had been too much of a coward to return fire and had kept his head under a tree root the entire time. The droid looked over to see Ron motioning for him to run to his position behind a fallen tree before he got up and began to fire back at the clones so as to give the droid cover. Ron would often switch his footing and move his position so as to not give the clones an easy target. The lone droid made it over to Ron's position. Ron took notice that this was the same droid from earlier.
"R-3V, do you still have the package?" he questioned in his monotone voice. They both could feel the fear emanating from each other. They were different yet similar.
"Yes sir" R-3V responded shaken up by their current situation.
"Good, maintain control over your circuits and fire back R-3V, we will wait here for evac" Ron ordered as he rose up once again to fire back.
It was a miracle that he had not been shot yet, although some flashes of blue light had come a little too close for comfort.
Rev was amazed that Ron was able to shoot back without much thought and with a disregard for the fear plaguing his mind. He was inspired by his presence and rose up for once and shot into a thicket of bushes where a group of clones hid. A burst from his blaster killed them in one fell swoop. R-3V felt something new form within his CPU. The CPU deduced that he felt...satisfaction, an alien feeling to his juvenile mind.
They heard the whir of their evac ship and prepared to run to it. The two looked up as the silhouette of a gunship came into view. A sense of relief calmed them for a moment. As soon as it came into view, they both took off into the clearing, not needing any sort of order to know what they needed to do. As soon as the ship touched down, they clambered on, eager to leave. Ron motioned for the pilot to go as they continued to come under fire. Blue lights flew past their heads. It seemed as if the waves of clones would never stop. A crash of white from the trees charging against their dwindled numbers. They were lucky to still have all of their parts intact.
The ship rose at tremendous speeds and they were soon on their way back to the capital ship.
He looked over at Rev, the weight of their losses weighed heavy on his mind. For some reason Ron felt...guilt.
'That's what it's called in the database' Ron thought to himself. Rev's face could not show any emotion but his movements gave it away. Rev did not dare look at him. R-0N knew that he too felt a sort of pain. An emotional pain. They mourned their losses. Their minds were not so attached emotionally, only through computation they connected. But in this instance, Ron felt a shared feeling and experience with Rev, one that induced a bond to quietly form. He felt glad that they were able to meet and he hoped they would continue to fight alongside each other.
He made a daring move and strode over to Rev's side.
"Let me handle the package from now on" was the first thing he said. Something hung loose on his vocaloid device. There was an urge to say more but he knew that it would be useless. It could've been a coincidence. Maybe Rev didn't feel anything at all. Maybe he wasn't as alive as Ron.
R-0N pushed through his sensors once again and took the risk.
Ron laid a hand on Rev's shoulder, something that startled Rev at first.
"We've lost many brothers today, we should commemorate their loss" Ron said. He was trembling again except this time he didn't know why. The CPU told him that he was experiencing several emotions at the same time. His sensors began to overload which forced his cooling devices to turn on.
Rev looked over to him and responded, "We will remember them" with a nod.
For the rest of the ride they said nothing and when they boarded the dreadnought and gave the hologram to their commander ordering them to their next post, they responded with a curt "Roger, Roger".