The clone known to his brothers as Ace, and to his superiors as CT-7330, stood just outside the room containing Sabacc Squadron's final test, The Citadel. He breathes slowly in his cadet armor and casts quick glances to the rest of his squadron, he thinks back on the last few years of training they have shared.

At some point a few years ago CT-3883's annoying tendency to complain about a lack of cover had actually gotten him somewhere. He now stands with a low hunch, the majority of his body protected by a handheld energy shield which he wields along with a pistol. That shield, Ace thinks to himself, has been the difference between success and failure on numerous occasions. In particular, Ace thinks about a sim battle just after he had acquired it, the whole squad had been mocking him for hiding behind it the entire time, until they entered a tight corridor which had a hell of blaster fire coming from the other end.

Similarly CT-1252 continuously took vantage points, sniper positions and anything raised slightly for nearly every sim battle. Of course he was ribbed for it by the rest of Sabacc Squadron, but none of them made fun of him on the battlefield, where his sniping skills made him invaluable for open terrain engagements. The entire squadron was having trouble coming up with a proper name for him for a long time, until they had a run in with one of the Nulls. Despite being utterly terrifying he was extremely friendly to his younger brothers. The Null had told them about Mando'a and given them some contraband datapads containing information on how to speak it. It eventually led the squadron to give CT-1252 the name 'Laamyc Taap' or Tap on the battlefield, meaning 'High Place' in Mando'a.

Ace then swept his eyes to the last two members of Sabacc Squadron. CT-9347, or Chance as his brothers knew him, was undoubtedly the biggest risk taker of the squadron. He earned his name in a number of sim battles in which he came up with the riskiest plans. Some of his plans worked while others didn't. It was no surprise that he eventually took to gambling with the other cadets and even some of the actual troopers.

CT-4826 was the last brother in the squadron to get his name, Tyy. He had always been one of the best soldiers in the squadron mostly due to his well rounded nature, if Ace told him to get something done, it would get done. Though he has no true strengths he has no real weaknesses. Tyy became the real jokester of the squadron and often balances out the competing natures of the other members.

Finally Ace thought back on how he earned his name. A simple mix of luck and skill resulted in Ace always being the last one alive in the hardest sim battles, he also always volunteered himself for many of the riskiest plans chance could come up with, and usually succeeded. As a result the rest of the Squadron had begun calling him the ace up their sleeve, and eventually he just became Ace.

Finally Ace snaps back to the present as a light switches on over the door to the citadel training area, he grips his blaster tightly and prepares himself for the upcoming battle. They know what they are about to face and have all checked and triple checked their equipment. The door slides open and the squad silently rushes through the breach and into their final test. They immediately take in the surroundings, it's a large open field with lots of cover positions and a divot in the middle. Two towers are near them and two ledges stand closer to the final and larger tower which has their objective at the top. Training droids stand deactivated behind nearly every cover position except for the closest ones.

As they begin rushing towards the nearest piece of cover Ace instinctively looks up at the observation balcony to see something strange, instead of one of the bounty hunters observing their test alongside the Kaminoans, it was a strange man in a brown robe with his hood up. Instinctively Ace knew it had to be a jedi, but that didn't make any sense. The Jedi they had been created for hadn't visited once since Ace had come out of the tube. Ace realized as his back hit the covered position that it could only mean one thing, the war they had been created for had begun.

But before Ace could think over the consequences of the war in his head a Kaminoan voice came over the loudspeaker informing them that their objective was to reach the top of the citadel and capture the objective. Tyy looked annoyed and muttered over their private channel, "yeah yeah, we get it, just start the karking test already would'ya"

Ace briefly rolls his eyes before the voice returns and signs off saying, "Good luck Sabacc Squadron."

Instantly the droids spring into action, firing bolt after bolt towards the hunkered down positions of Sabacc Squadron. Ace shouts over the comm lines with a finger pointed to one of the towers, "Tap! I need you on that tower. Tyy, me and you will lay down covering fire for his approach." Ace then directs his attention to Border and Chance, "I need the two of you taking out the droids on top of that tower! Get over there and stay down."

At once the team moves into action, Tyy and Ace laying down covering fire so that Laamyc Taap has a clear run towards one of the towers, once he makes it there he climbs the side of it while dodging the bolts coming from the droids at the top. Seconds later he vaults over the edge of the tower and lays deadly blaster bolts into the droids at the top.

Ace lets out a sigh of relief upon seeing Tap's success and directs his focus to the other pair he sent out. He sees Border crouched behind his shield marching slowly towards the other tower. Ace raises his blaster and nails a training droid about to flank the two who barely acknowledge that before reaching the base of the tower and shooting up grapple lines to the top. The droids at the top fire down on them but Border's energy shield keeps the pair safe until they reach the top and vault over, shooting every droid there.

Border quickly hops back down, leaving Chance in the elevated position, and runs at a low crouch towards Tyy and Ace so they could regroup for their next assault. Once regrouped the trio advances from covered position to covered position until they are within range of the droids manning rapid fire mounted lasers. The droids lay down a spray of blaster fire on the cadets as they hunker behind cover. Tyy shouts to Ace, "Sir! Those guns will tear us apart, what can we do about them?"

Ace stays still for a moment as if thinking, before shouting back, "Stick to the plan, border will reach the wall while Chance and Tap get back over here, then Border will take out the guns and we'll rush the ledge."

Tyy nods and Border steels himself for the task ahead, before slowly marching out into the line of fire with his shield raised high. Despite the covering fire all the other clones are providing, Border's shield still takes a beating from the spray of droid fire. His shield begins to falter just as he reaches the wall and it sputters out and dies the second he is out of the droid's arcs of fire.

Seeing Border's success Ace breathes a sigh of relief and hunkers down for a second as Tap and Chance reach their position. Ace then shouts the order over the comm and watches as Border reaches to his belt and pulls out a training grenade. He lobs it over the ledge and it detonates, taking out the droid manning one of the cannons. Sabacc Squadron takes this opportunity to rush the wall, avoiding blaster fire as they go. After climbing the ledge all of them open up on the remaining droids manning it. Following that it's a simple matter of Ace getting up the main tower and grabbing the pole, deactivating the remaining droids and shutting down the test.

Then Ace suddenly has a strange feeling and looks back up to the viewing platform, he sees the Jedi from before turn and walks away. At that point the Kaminoan congratulates them on their graduation to become full fledged troopers.

Ace can't shake the bad feeling he has for the rest of the day.