Thank you all for the great support, I'm happy to see most of you really enjoy this and are full of good questions. I apologize for the long wait. I didn't expect time to go by so fast.

Chapter 2

The first thing Captain Cheng realized when the communications ended was how unusually calm she was when speaking with the alien human. She noted to herself how she felt when the link ended, Cheng realized she felt, at ease, when around the 'alien' human on the alien ship. She figured that it would obviously be easier to speak with another human than some alien or robot, but she began to feel strange, like butterflies in the stomach. She felt calm yet uneasy at the same time.

She shook off the feelings and looked around at the many questioned faces. No one was expecting to see a human, nevertheless one that could speak english.

"Captain, Minister of Planetary Defense is trying to contact us." Dick said, holding a small datapad in his hand. Cheng nodded and waved for Dick to patch him through.

The screen above her lit up with a friendly looking man in a large desk. It was cluttered with files and paperwork, he had obviously been working for some time.

"Captain. Pleasure to see you." The Minister of Planetary Defense, Sir David Eslinger, a man of German descent, said softly with his big mustache covering half his top lip. The man was bulky, with a bald head and striking mustache. "I've heard there's been a bit of a breakthrough in our endeavors of space expansion."

"Likewise sir. And it's true, we've found alien's. English speaking, polite, humans."

"Like us? That can't be! I must notify the council immediately! Captain Chen, secure our guests to the Martian colony base, there we'll send whatever diplomat the men at the UN say."

"Of course."

"And be careful! We have yet to meet very friendly visitors to our home. Even our new droid companions met with hostility at first!" He warned.

"We'll be fine. I'm ordering drones to circle them as they arrive." She assured with a warm smile.

"I knew you would, you're always one of the smartest of us. I'm confident you'll be fine, it's the aliens I'm concerned for. But nonetheless I must depart, good luck Captain." The link ended, the man's face disappeared from the screen.

"Alright people, get to work, I want this ship over Mar's a soon as possible!" She ordered, waiting for the simultaneous 'yessir' from the crew before leaning back in her chair.

Corellian Freighter Excellence

Mars

The Excellence slowly flew past the odd looking orbital station over the red planet below. Edwin was glad to see the people weren't just basic primitives stuck on a single world. His workers readied equipment and weapons, in case of however the first actual contact would go down.

Edwin wasn't worried, however. He knew how shocked they must have been seeing someone from outside their small system. If they were even somewhat competent, they'd know shooting beings they never met before could only spell disaster.

"Are we able to contact the company?" Edwin asked out loud.

"Not yet sir, but we'll keep trying." A worker called back from the other end of the bridge, clearly annoyed that he was being questioned while working.

"Good, because it looks like we've arrived."

The Excellence touched gently down on the landing platform outside the Martian base. The platform was surrounded by thin walls, stretching nearly half a kilometer similar to the rest of the base. Several meters away from the ship, the walls seemed to slowly angle up, and a roof raised over the ship, pressurizing the large bay.

Edwin was third to step off the ship, waiting for two of his workers to make sure things were safe before he exited the Excellence. The room was dim, lights slowly powering up and illuminating the room. A set of seven foot tall doors opened swiftly, revealing a muscular man with brown hair and blue eyes, wearing a white jumpsuit. A second man in the same suit was much leaner, with darker skin and brown eyes, holding a sort of scanner device in his left hand. And a third, a woman, the same one that he had spoken to while in the asteroid field.

"Welcome to the Martian Base, I'm Captain Chen, I'll take you to the meeting hall." She greeted him with a hospitable tone. The other two looked cautious, their eyes darting to the weapons a human and a strange tentacle head looking creature had.

"I look forward to that." Edwin replied with a friendly smile.

He followed her and the door sealed behind him, the rest of his crew went to work trying to contact the company. If profit was to be made, they would want to know.

Mars Meeting Hall

A dozen men and women sat on opposite ends of the table in the center of the meeting hall.

Edwin leaned back casually in the chair, his chosen security calmly stood behind him, blasters ready but not in any threatening way.

The opposite side was much different. The diplomat, Joshua Robinson, a UN official on space exploration, sat straight up in a serious manner, and those begin him stood like statues. Carefully watching everyone in the room. Cameras were recording the scene from various angles, the footage was live streaked to the UN council, NATO headquarters, and Washington. The world leaders were watching.

"Greetings." He paused for a moment to think of a proper word for the aliens, as many were strangely also human. "Greetings travelers. I hope you've had a pleasant arrival. I heard you've come to trade?"

"That is true." Edwin responded quickly, clearly anxious to get things going.

"I apologize if I seem, slow and uncertain. It's just, we haven't exactly met any friendly aliens that arrive in our little part of the universe. And I am understandably shocked to see humans that aren't from our home."

"At this point I'm not surprised that humans exist in the unknown regions. Odd, yes, but what matters is what happens next. Now I see you have a lot of untapped gas planets nearby, ripe for mining. Many worlds easy to use for colonization and large scale agriculture. We offer a way to collect materials in exchange for free access to your space as well as protection while we work." Edwin figured they wouldn't try and tax him or anything, and without any restrictions, he hoped to strike tibanna.

"Interesting proposition." He scribbled notes down on the notepad with his pen, then looked back up to Edwin with curiosity in his eyes.

"We have the ability, you have the resources. I don't see any actual reason we can't get to work."

"I'll contact the officials at Washington, if things go well with them my friend, trade can begin." He smiled before standing up. Edwin did the same, not wanting to stay long in an alien environment.

Mr. Robinson offered his hand, Edwin figured it was some sort of signal of goodbye. Being friendly but careful, he raised his hand to match the man, who grabbed his and shook it up and down. Edwin coughed awkwardly, not expecting the shake and slowly walked back to his two crewmen, who both looked at him with surprise. Edwin shrugged and began walking back the way he came. He wasn't going to stay, no, he need the cold comfort of his freighter.

Saturn Mining Yard

Two Weeks Later

The gas giant known as Saturn was a truly massive world, with sixty three moons, some of which were the size of small planets.

"Get those gas tanks moving! I want them frozen in carbonite and shipped to Corellia as soon as possible!" He yelled from the railed walkway by his office. The Twi'lek workers nodded, some stopping to wipe their heads of sweat before resuming their work.

Tanks of the gas headed off to the carbonite chambers in record speed, the valuable gas

The planet was called Saturn by the people of Earth, and it was rich in Tibanna gas. Edwin was pleased on his skills of sweetening deals with the Terran humans, and now had full access to the entire planet and all its resources, whom originally thought the planet only housed basic gases such as hydrogen and helium. All he had to do was give them some of the gas his workers had mined from the planet. They had helped station various gas mines along the planet's atmosphere, although they had no experience in anything Edwin was doing, so they let him run the show as long as they made a profit.

And as far as Edwin was concerned, everyone was making a profit, and most importantly, he was. Ships were coming in from Corellia, all ready for the new boom of business. The higher men of the trading company were pleased with Edwin's success, and he was now in charge of the entire investment in the Sol System.

Business truly was booming, both sides were eager to work on the new mining projects. Apparently, the humans of Earth still relied on fossil fuels and lacked the same energy cells and reactors the wider galaxy had commonly of, which he generously gave in small supply to sweeten the deal further. Edwin smirked at how astonished their so called 'geniuses' were by simple things like moisture evaporators and power converters.

The same devices were now being used in desert like environments on Earth and experimented with on their colony he learned was called Mars.

A large freighter was arriving shortly, bringing workers and supplies in, and gases out. It was good trade, and it was expanding to other means. The people of Earth wanted starship technology and better terraforming equipment for their future colonies, and were willing to trade more gas and foods for it. Which was all good for him.

He was becoming rich, his bosses were happy, and the company had found new opportunity.

Jabiim

Southern line

Thunder echoed violently across the cloud covered sky. The dark clouds hung over like the ghosts of malevolent warships, and they sounded like them too.

The rain had been pouring nonstop for hours now, reminding Alpha-17 how bad the weather was on Jabiim. Rain had been constantly going on and on ever since he landed on the mudball. Battles on the planet were intense, with the people split in a harsh civil war.

The Nationalists had sided with the Separatists, while the Loyalists had always been with the Galactic Republic. The two sides been fighting violently against one another for a while now, with the Nationalists being backed by the CIS, the situation was looking grim for the Loyalists, until the Republic arrived recently.

Jabiim was rich with ores, the only real reason the Republic even set a single foot on the planet was so they could have access to it's mines. No 'for the good of the innocents' poodoo. It was all about the ores. The battle started off well, with many victories and lots of dead droids and Nationalists, until the tide quickly changed in the Separatists favor. The Nationalists proved tricky and resilient, having a home field advantage, the clones were surprised to see the enemy having such an unflinching resolve.

The bad conditions made it a terrible time for Republic forces, the severely harsh rainfall and muddy landscape made it difficult to transport troops and for the walkers to advance, leaving them vulnerable to attack.

"The droid's have fallen back again, wonder if they realize we're not falling for their kriffing traps." A clone kept his eyes locked on the enemy through his macrobinoculars, his mud covered armor fit nicely with the trenchlike mud barriers that covered their line.

"Good, I want the area sweeped and survivors to be interrogated. Sergeant!" Alpha-17 turned to the clone behind him. "Are we able to contact General Kenobi?"

"Damn it!" A clone sergeant by the name of Lars kicked his radio onto the ground. "No sir, our communication signals are too fuzzy for a clear transmission and the radio doesn't even want to function anymore." He shook his head in defeat and sighed.

"Oh add it to the list of bantha poodoo we have for us." Another trooper stared into the storm covered sky. "Like all this damn rain!" He aimlessly waved his hands in the air, hoping for it to just stop. All of it; the rain, the bloodshed, the cries of civilians being gunned down, the final gasps of air his brothers had before they succumbed to death. All of it.

"This is the third defensive line we've taken this week." Alpha-17 turned to his left, seeing a half dozen mud covered AT-TE walkers slowly trot through the mud. Smoke expanded from one of the hinges of one of the big walkers, sparks tried to ignite into flame, only being stopped by the rain. The walker slowed down, clearly limping the leg that puffed more and more smoke until it finally gave way, a fuel coil sparked and produced a small flame with the cracking of the leg.

"And it won't be the last." Sergeant Lars stretched his arms and walked up the ARC trooper. "Not by a longshot."

The walker's crew tried what they could to move the metal beast, but realized they were better off just leaving the tank where it fell. No point in wasting energy and equipment on something so it could just stand in the same place it kneeled on.

The line had stopped, cannons aimed across the once forested land that had recently teemed with life, but was now full of blood and machinery. An image that easily illustrated the entire situation that was Jabiim.

Alpha-17 blinked twice, realizing he had been holding his breath, and slowly took in air through his filtered helmet. He kept his rifle pointed in the air, waiting for whatever could rush his position.

A dozen troopers marched by Alpha-17, not one cared to look up at the ARC trooper, only to get to their next assignment. He recalled many rookie clones once looking at him in awe, like children would do when they saw Jedi. The idea of people just like them having the ability to fight off entire platoons alone seemed extraordinary. But that was long ago.

Thunder carried its way across the planet, reaching the ears of every soul that still breathed. Alpha-17 took a deep breath, tasting the sweat the slipped into his mouth and thought for a whole second about taking off his helmet to rub his eyes, but the marching of droids and explosions reminded him of the warzone he was stuck in.

Several hundred battle droids began to march in, firing into the Republic line without any hesitation. Their clanking followed in program pattern, flattening the ground under their metallic feet, and completely unphased by the rain. Larger walkers fired their heavy cannons, targeting the tanks and walkers while the droids assaulted the clone line.

The walkers retaliated quickly, taking down many of the spider droids with their mass cannons. The beasts of war continued their barrage towards each other, hoping to gun the other down first.

A pair of clones were caught in an explosion that tossed them into the air like ragdolls, their bodies turning to jello when making impact onto the ground. More troopers rushed to their comrades, keeping their defenses sturdy and showing the clone trooper resolve, not even thinking of retreating, only fighting back.

Alpha-17 felt a wave of heat go around him, as one of the mighty AT-TE's blew apart, the cannon melted back as well as the cockpit, the pilot vaporized by the heavy blaster fire. The walkers stood firm, continuing their barrage onto the dwindling number of droid walkers. The battle droid forces grew closer, and the clones opened fire with blasters and grenades, hoping to push back the droid advance.

Droids and clones alike fell like flies, their bodies quickly buried by the mud and water that fell from the skies. They in a way became part of the planet, a part of the battlefield. The battlefield was the complete opposite of the simulations they trained with on Kamino. Large, open fields proved to bring millions of casualties already, and only two people secretly knew when the war would end. And Alpha-17 wasn't one of them. He was stuck to wondering when the war could, if ever, stop. All he knew was they had to win, regardless of the losses. He wouldn't let the droids win, not now.

The legendary ARC trooper picked up a fallen comrade's rifle, which was stained in blood that dripped from the dead clone's hand, and began duel wielding his way towards the end of the hill the droids marched towards. The ARC trooper readied his weapons towards the mindless droids and opened fire, not caring to aim, and surely not caring to count how many droids he already killed, because it would quadruple before he would even blink again.

It was just gonna be the same mess all over again.

Thanks again to you patient fans who take the time to enjoy the story. Life got really busy for me, and I'm glad to finally publish this. Also this chapter was a little bit shorter than normal, I promise that future chapters will be longer.

See ya'll next time!