Chapter 2: Mission One: Tatooine

The Vorpent orbited Tatooine, a shoddy transport flying out of the hangar to the desert planet. The clones would be in disguise, to prevent any Separatist suspicions, with the exception of Noctus, who would remain cloaked for the mission. In the corner of the shuttle, the clones huddled, discussing the upcoming mission in hushed, whispered tones. Uliia narrowed her eyes, reaching out with the Force to eavesdrop on their conversation.

"…follow the plan," Rhino whispered. "Don't let Commander Uliia find out the true story. General's orders."

What? What the hell are they talking about? How dare they! Keeping secrets from their commander! The Twi'lek Jedi glanced up at her Master, Jiana's face expressionless as the surface grew nearer. General's orders? What is Master Razhuli doing?

"We're here." The door opened, and a stinging wind whipped into the shuttle as the clones and two Jedi filed out. Uliia looked around in awe at the sheer size of the Mos Eisley spaceport. Hundreds of people of all different species went about their business, the ceaseless chatter overwhelming.

"Come on," Rhino said. "We're meeting a spy in the cantina." They went in the direction of the cantina, clones scanning the area for threats. A few people whistled at Jiana, but sharp glances from the clones told them to back off. At the cantina, Jiana turned to Uliia.

"You're too young to come into the cantina, Uliia. Wait outside for us. Noctus is somewhere close by. If anything happens, he'll be there in an instant."

Uliia groaned, but listened to her Master. The clones and Jiana went into the cantina, and Uliia leaned against the wall in an alley across the street. A few minutes passed, then Uliia smelled alcohol and sensed someone behind her.

"Hey, pretty girl…" A Weequay, completely drunk, had been stumbling around, aimlessly wandering through the alley when he encountered the Padawan. "How much ya charge?"

"I'm not a whore, you creep! Get lost." Uliia turned her back, trying to ignore the drunkard, then a rough hand clasped around her mouth and yanked her back, the smell of alcohol overwhelming.

"Come on, baby, you're a Twi'lek." His other hand began wandering down her body as Uliia struggled against him. "Everyone knows Twi'leks are-" There was a crunch and a pained screech behind her, and the hands fell from Uliia's body. Gasping for air, she turned to see Noctus, red visor glowing, standing over the Weequay who was pinned against the wall by his vibrogauntlet, pistol pressed to the drunk's forehead.

"Do. Not. Touch. The. Commander." With every word, the dagger pressed deeper into the creep's shoulder, wringing out pained grunts. He yanked it out, shoving the Weequay down the alley. "Get out of here."

As the drunk staggered away, cursing, Uliia huffed as the clone cloaked himself once again. "What are you doing?"

"Protecting you, Sir."

"I don't need protecting. And why do you call me Sir? I'm a girl, you know."

"Well aware, Sir. It's in our programming to address everyone above us as Sir."

"I thought I was 'little girl', though?"

"When we're on missions, you're a Commander. Otherwise, you're a little girl. I mean no disrespect by it."

"Whatever." Uliia walked away, still sensing the clone behind her. "Why are you following me? Shouldn't you be in the cantina talking with the spy?"

"I'm protecting you, Sir."

"I'm a Jedi. I don't need protecting."

"Well aware of that."

"So go away!"

"Not happening."

Uliia spent the next few minutes stewing in anger until the rest of the team came out of the cantina. She immediately stomped over to her Master's side as the team left, following Rhino. "I swear, they only chose that clone to piss me off. Why won't he get it in his head that I don't need his protection?"

Jiana glanced over at a seemingly empty spot. "Noctus?"

"Just as you said, Sir. She was accosted by a drunk within five minutes. I sent him home after slicing him up a bit." Uliia glared at the spot, but Noctus didn't seem to care. "You know, Commander, you could have fought back any time." Her eyes widened, and she almost stopped walking. "I was waiting for you to hit him or do something, but you didn't, so I took over."

She didn't say anything. They continued walking in silence for a few minutes, then Falcon drew his pistol and ushered them into an alleyway. A squadron of super battle droids marched past, shoving people out of the way. Behind them, a tactical droid followed, flanked by two commando droids. "Be on the lookout for the Republic spies. They are around here somewhere."

"Not here, Falcon." Jiana put a hand on the clone's shoulder, encouraging him to holster his pistol. "Too many people. We'll have to lead them away."

"No time!" Quint pulled out his shotgun, blasting the super battle droid that had spotted them. The rest of the droids turned and opened fire. The clones ran down the alleyway as Jiana activated her green lightsaber, deflecting blaster shots back at the droids as Inferno Company retreated.

"Lead them outside the city!" Jiana followed the clones, routing the droids through an alleyway to the outer wall. Smokey threw a grenade, blowing a hole to the outside desert, and the clones ran through, taking positions on either side of the entrance as Uliia drew her lightsabers: dual tonfa-handled sabers. Jiana leapt through the hole, turning and slicing through a droid as they charged out of the city. The Jedi and clones attacked, lightsabers and blaster bolts filling the air. One of the commando droids leapt over the wall, swinging its vibrosword down at Noctus, who had uncloaked himself. He swung his gauntlet up, blocking the sword, and rolled, pulling the droid to the ground and flinging it into the side. Uliia saw it and swung, slicing its head off. Noctus nodded at her, and she grumbled, but nodded back.

Speedy and CT-4-8264 knelt on either side of the hole, blasting at any droid who dared exit the city. Falcon heard an engine behind them, and looked into the desert with his rifle's scope. Spotting a droid transport, he fired, hitting the engine. An explosion rocked the desert, a severed battle droid arm landing beside him. Jiana cut through the droids' lines, deflecting blaster shots back at them, then ducked as the other commando droid swung its sword where her neck had been moments before. A metal foot kicked her down, and she rolled over the top of the dune, blaster bolts missing her by mere inches. Three neatly placed blaster bolts slammed into the back of the droid, Rhino charging forward to shoot again. The hum of the vibrosword made his body instinctively recoil, the tip of the weapon leaving a small cut across the surface of his armor.

The commando leapt into the air to miss the dual lightsabers, backflipping as it swung its sword in an uppercut slash at Uliia. Suddenly, a shower of sparks burst from its chest as it landed on Quint's shotgun, a vibrodagger slung underneath the barrel like a bayonet. It craned its head around to glare at the clone and swung its sword, but the trigger on the shotgun clicked and the commando vanished in a cloud of sparks and shrapnel. A final snipe from Falcon, and the last droid was no more. The team let out a sigh of relief, which was cut off by an alarm ringing through the city. Above them was a massive Trade Federation landing craft, nearly two hundred meters long and packed to the brim. The ship began to descend, and Jiana brought her commlink to her ear.

"Bring The Vorpent down to us now!" she yelled to the ship's crew. "There's a Separatist landing craft approaching! I need you to open fire as soon as you're in range. I don't know if there are Vultures in it, but we'll come up to you!"

"Copy that, General." Hovering above the atmosphere, The Vorpent began its descent towards the landing ship as Inferno Company raced back to the transport that had brought them down. The clones, bar Noctus, threw open utility lockers in the back and threw their armor on, ditching the farmer disguises they had been wearing. Within minutes, the transport was landing in the hangar of The Vorpent and the Jedi and clones rushed to their starfighters. Just as they launched, the hangar doors on the droid transport opened and a fleet of vulture droids flew out, beelining straight for the Republic cruiser. Inferno Company, piloting their modified interceptors, quickly engaged the droids, halving their numbers in the first few minutes as The Vorpent opened fire with its laser batteries.

"Speedy, you got two on your tail!" CT-4-8264 swerved around, hoping to pick off the droids targeting his friend, when Speedy suddenly cut the engines. His fighter rapidly decelerated, the droids passing by harmlessly. He fired the ship back up and launched his torpedoes, leaving two fireballs as the only evidence of the vulture droids.

"Don't worry about me, 8264. I feel so alive!" Speedy laughed as he swooped around the droid transport, which was now returning fire with The Vorpent. Trigger and Jiana followed him, blasting at the transport's weapons as a few particularly brave battle droids leaned off the edges of the wings to shoot at the clones. As they picked off the remaining defenses, Uliia noticed the hangar door remained open.

"I'm going inside! Quint, Noctus, cover me!" The young Jedi swooped up, looping around as she swung towards the open hangar. The two clones followed after her, launching torpedoes into the hangar bay as battle droids panicked and ran. The three landed inside the ship, leaping out of their fighters and immediately ducking under a barrage of blaster fire. Noctus quickly disappeared as Quint threw a grenade at the super battle droids pinning him and Uliia down, charging as pieces of shattered droid landed all around him. As she fought, Uliia noticed a steady stream of blaster bolts coming from the shadows, expertly picking off any droid that got past her defenses.

"I've got this under control! Don't interfere!"

Uliia turned back around, only to immediately run into something. A droideka, fresh off the transport rack, had just uncurled, its shield flaring up.

"Commander! Get back!" Quint chucked an EMP grenade at the destroyer droid as the Jedi leapt back, batting away a hail of fire. The grenade bounced once, rolling through its shield and releasing a surge of energy that shut down the droid. As the two sighed in relief, nine more droidekas rolled in from the racks. They surrounded the two, blasters trained on the intruders. Quint set his shotgun on the ground, raising his hands. He motioned for Uliia to do the same, which she did reluctantly. As a super battle droid picked up their weapons, Quint noticed a small explosive charge suddenly appear on one of the droidekas. Another appeared on the one next to it, and they continued to appear down the line. Must be Noctus sneaking around. There was a click, and there was a ring of explosions all around the two. Noctus uncloaked himself, dropping from above onto the super battle droid and tearing off one of its arms with his vibroblade. He flicked something inside the arm, and a stream of blaster bolts shot out, slamming into the droid. It fell, broken, but when it hit the ground its remaining arm fired a shot at Noctus. The bolt struck the clone in the head, knocking him back.

"Noctus!"

"Sir!"

Uliia and Quint raced to the clone, but screeched to a halt as the commando simply shook his head, wiping his hand over his helmet.

"Relax. I coated my armor in a thin layer of the beskar. My it's blaster-proof and lightsaber-resistant."

"Damn, I wish I had some Mandalorian armor," Quint said, picking up his shotgun and tossing Uliia's lightsabers to her.

On the bridge of the transport, a battle droid swept bits of debris and broken glass off to the side, sighing as he watched the others actually doing something fun (to him, anyway). "There can't be anything worse than this, at least." The door opened, and the three Republic intruders ran into the bridge. "I was wrong."

Uliia's lightsabers flashed, slicing the poor droid in half as Noctus and Quint opened fire. The bridge filled with light, red and blue lasers crisscrossing the air while two green blades hummed as they danced through droid necks and blasters. It only took less than a minute for the bridge to fall silent, the only sounds in the room being Uliia's heavy breathing. "Did we get them all?"

Her commlink crackled to life. "Inferno Company, group up with me. We're gonna bring that transport down."

"Rhino, wait!" Uliia beckoned the two clones, and the three ran for the turbolift. "We're still inside the ship!"

"What? Why are you inside the ship? Get out of there!"

As the turbolift doors opened into the hangar, Uliia suddenly used the Force to push the two clones down as a battle droid, thought to be dead, fired a shot. Uliia pulled out her lightsabers, but the bolt struck her in the chest. The clones were stunned for a moment, then Quint grabbed the injured Jedi and rolled on top of her, protecting her as Noctus rushed forward. Dodging shots left and right, he kicked the blaster out of the droid's one remaining hand and threw it across the hangar by its head. He slammed his vibroblades into its chest, tearing the control unit out of its body and kicking the broken droid out of the hangar bay doors.

"Noctus! She's hit badly!" Quint grabbed a first aid kit from his utility belt, pulling the Jedi's top down enough to spray a bacta solution over the wound and pack it with gauze. "Help me get her in her fighter! The droid can fly it back to The Vorpent!" The two clones carried the unconscious Padawan to her fighter, carefully strapping her in. Noctus knelt before the astromech droid in the wing socket.

"Get her to The Vorpent, now!"

The droid chirped nervously, Quint hopping off the wing as the fighter rose into the air. He followed Noctus' ship out of the hangar bay and streaked towards the cruiser. "The Commander got hit!" he called over the commlinks. "We're retreating to The Vorpent! Destroy the transport and meet us in the medical bay! 8264, come with us!"

The medic instantly pulled a hard left, turning on a dime as he hurtled towards the cruiser. Behind him, a final volley of blaster shots and torpedoes erupted, and the droid transport sheared in half, the explosion ripping through the air as the lifeless vessel crashed into the dunes a few miles from the city. Jiana took one final look at the flaming wreckage before turning her starfighter around and flying to The Vorpent, where her injured Padawan lay waiting.

Meanwhile, Quint and Noctus, having already called ahead, were loading Uliia onto a stretcher, droids already inserting an IV drip into her arm. As the medical droids rushed to the infirmary, 8264's fighter landed behind them. Leaping out and casting his helmet to the side, the rookie clone took off after the medical droids. Quickly catching up to them, he reached into the medical pack he carried around, pulling out a vitals scanner as they rushed down the hallway. Bursting into the infirmary, 8264 sighed in relief as the scanner showed no immediate critical wounds. Removing his combat gloves and slipping on a pair of sterile ones, he set to work, removing the gauze padding and examining the wound with an unnatural precision. It was nearly on top of her heart, slightly below her left collarbone. The bolt hadn't penetrated all the way through her body, he instantly noticed. Rather, it appeared that instead of the energy dissipating naturally as it entered her body, it was abruptly stopped by something, as the wound had a clear, defined bottom in it. He held out a hand, and the medical droid instantly placed a set of forceps in his outstretched palm. Were it in its programming, the droid might have felt awe as the clone worked nearly as fast as the purpose-built droid.

8264 pulled a vibroscalpel from his toolkit and set to work removing the burnt, charred tissue around the wound. Smearing a bacta gel around the injury, he placed a layer of synthetic skin over the wound and swiftly sewed it onto the Jedi. "Bacta patches," he said to the droid, hand outstretched.

"In a moment, Commander." The droid was looking through the various cabinets and lockers in the room, searching for the supplies.

"Droid! Patches! Now!"

"This is a new ship, Commander. I am unaware of the locations of many medical supplies."

"That should have been the first thing you did!" As the clone yelled at the droid, Uliia groggily opened her eyes, lifting her head. The first thing she saw was a clone in orange armor yelling at a seemingly unfazed droid, then her head tilted to the side to see the rest of Inferno Company rush into the room.

"Commander!"

"Uliia!"

She sat herself up, frantically pulling the covers over her bare chest as Jiana rushed to her side. "Are you okay? Oh, I knew something was up when I didn't see you in the air with us! I should never have-"

"With all due respect, General," Quint interrupted, placing a hand on the distraught Jedi's shoulder. "The Commander saved my life. I owe her." Glancing up at the clone, Uliia nodded, looking back down.

"I just didn't want someone to get hurt because of me. That's not the Jedi way," she said quietly, almost a whisper. "It's not like I was scared or anything…"

"For fuck's sake, you stupid droid!" 8264 stormed over to the frantic medical droid, pushing it aside and throwing open the locker. He grabbed a metal box out of it, exasperated. "When I say get the patches, you don't open every FUCKING locker in the infirmary! There's a box labeled 'Patches' right in front of you! Just open the box and give me the FUCKING PATCHES!"

The infirmary was silent. 8264 turned around, gently pushing Uliia back down to the bed and placing the bacta patch over her wound. "You just stay there. You won't recover fast enough if you keep trying to move."

"But-"

"No. When I am in this room, I am a Commander. I have all authority in any medical regards. Just relax. You'll heal in a few days."

The clones all found seats so they could discuss the mission. "Hey, 'Patches'," Rhino called, waving 8264 over. "Get those bloody gloves off and come over here." The medic blinked at the name but nodded and pulled over a seat.

"Hey, I have a question." They looked over at Uliia. "How did you guys get your names?"

"Well, there are legends about a great horned beast called a rhino," the Major began. "They were basically a living tank, able to take a lot of damage and deal even more. I chose that as my callsign, and it stuck." Removing his helmet, Rhino revealed a tattoo of a bulky horned creature on his neck.

"Mine should be obvious." Quint pulled off his, too, following the rest of the clones. "My serial number is CT-5-5555. Five fives. That's where Quint comes from."

"Mine's pretty clear too," Speedy said.

"I got eyes like a falcon," the aptly named sniper said. "I can find a target no matter how far away it is."

Smokey patted his backpack. "I'm all about explosions."

"And I'm all about shooting," Trigger said.

All eyes turned to the only clone who hadn't removed his helmet, standing behind them.
"Well, Noctus?" Jiana asked. "What about you?"

He was silent for a few moments. "It sounds cool." The clones burst out laughing at him, the Commando's finger twitching.

"Hey, Noctus?" Uliia asked, once the laughter died down. "Why are you so adamant about protecting me? And what was that I heard about not telling me the real objective of this mission?"

The clones looked at one another, and Jiana placed her hand on Uliia's shoulder. "The real reason we were sent to Tatooine was to eliminate a slave dealer. He was abducting children and selling them to the Separatists as slaves." Noticing the fear in Uliia's eyes, she embraced her Padawan in a motherly hug. "I know how… difficult, that topic can be for you. I decided it was in our best interest, and yours as well, for you to remain behind while we eliminated him."

Noctus stared in the direction of the Twi'lek Jedi, though she suspected he wasn't looking at her. Finally, after several moments, he reached up and pulled on his helmet. Beneath it, his face was so battered and scarred that she could hardly believe he was a clone. Aside from a long, jagged, angry red scar straight down the center of his face, there were patches of burnt skin dotting his face like craters, as well as a chunk of his jawbone missing, like something had taken a bite out of his face.

"The first mission with my commando squad after Geonosis was during the Battle of Ryloth. We tried to shelter the villagers during the airstrikes, kept them inside one building. I heard a sound outside, so I went to examine it. The moment I stepped out of the door a bomb hit the building. It killed my entire squad and all of the villagers. Except for one little girl. She was sobbing, holding the body of her mother as fires raged around her. Poor thing couldn't have been older than three or four, but she looked just like you, Commander. Blue skin, brown eyes… she was so innocent in all this. I would have taken on the entire droid army myself ."

"And now, I'm seeing this Twi'lek girl who looks exactly like her being drafted into a war that I was supposed to fight in. Do you understand how I feel? It's like the ghost of that girl come back to haunt me. I was made to protect people like her, and I'm damn well gonna do just that."

The infirmary was silent, the air heavy with repressed emotions. Noctus stood and walked away, muttering something under his breath as he slipped his helmet back on, vanishing from sight. For the clones, seeing one of their own so shaken up, so beaten up, it terrified them. How could something like this happen to their brother? Is this what the war they fought so earnestly in was like? Was that how the universe repays their efforts?

Author's note: I updated Noctus' background here because I rewrote his entire character from the ground up as I was working on these last few chapters.