The Clone Wars 3 Sides Chapter 6, a Star Wars + Naruto Crossover fanfic

The Clone Wars-3 Sides

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or Star Wars but I do own any oc's that I come up with.

Well, with all that's going on in Star Wars: The Clone Wars cartoon, it looks to really focus in on certain factors that lead up to events in episode 3 of Star Wars. That is a really enjoyable part for me and I hope the rest of you like it as well. And if you don't, well that's too bad then.

By the way, as of the current timeline, it has been 3 months since Naruto first set the Turian and Salarian people against each other and it took them that long to gather their full forces against each other. So now a whole year has passed since Naruto left his homeworld.

And now, on with the story.

(Update: This entire beginning author's note was written sometime when the Clone Wars Cartoon was on that Balmora arc with the jerkass Jedi that wielded two double-bladed lightsabers, so the first half really isn't as relevant anymore.)

It had been near pathetically easy for Xion's forces to conquer the Salarian and Turian people. Exhausted as they were of their military might, both forces simply didn't have enough manpower to fight against the Sith Empire. Of course, Xion hadn't sent out his forces to attack immediately after the destruction to both forces. He had waited for a week before sending out his own military so as to avoid the Salarians and Turians blaming him and his forces for their trouble. Not that it wasn't Xion's fault, but he felt it would be somewhat harder to integrate the Turians and Salarians if they were as a whole, united against him in their hatred of him. As it was, they were mad at being invaded and not because they thought him to be the cause for their weakness, and Xion indented to keep it that way.

The Salarians, after a few one-sided battles realized that there was no hope of combating the Sith Empire and surrendered to Xion quickly enough. It was the Turians that proved the harder. Their stubbornness, sense of civic duty, and pride all rolled up into one tough body made them fight even in their hopeless condition.

At first they had tried to stem the tide, but as it became apparent that they couldn't hold back the Sith's superior numbers they did a mass retreat into their capital planet. By pulling just about all of their military forces left from the defense of their other worlds, the inhabitants felt more or less betrayed and most had joined Xion's Empire willingly enough.

But the Turian capital still put up quite a fight, as by pulling everything for the defense of their capital they gained enough strength to adequately defend their capital from Xion. And they were quite eager to prove this fact, if the failure of Xion's forces to take the Capital was any suggestion.

Location: Turian Homeworld Palaven

The 5th Fleet of the Imperial Armada had the Turian Homeworld blockaded and was currently sending down troops and supplies to the army stationed there.

A Centurion-Class battlecruiser moved through the fleet and from out of its hanger bay a small transport shuttle left and began to make its descent onto the planet surface below.

As it landed on the planet, it came across a city that had been turned into a battlefield. Buildings were burning, streets broken, starfighters strafing places, armies from all around besieging the city, artillery thundering across, antiaircraft guns firing into the sky.

The shuttle came to land in a safe spot behind Imperial lines in order to bring its very important cargo down. As the landing ramp came down a figure dressed in black and red robes and armor while wearing a Mandalorian mask came down it.

Emperor Xion was not pleased at all. As he started his descent, he noticed the dozens of starfighters flying towards the city and large amounts of troops and armored vehicles moving forward.

Walking across the field, Xion was greeted by a very nervous looking General "E-Emperor Xion! W-What a pleasure i-it is to see you! I would ha-"

"Save your pleasantries, this isn't some spa resort." Xion cut off.

"Y-Yes my lord." the general said.

"Now tell me General, why is it that my forces have yet to break through the city defenses. It has been 5 days and we have suffered enormous losses for a campaign of this size!" Xion exclaimed angrily.

"O-Oh, well you see, when I, through no fault of my-accccckkkkkk!" the General never got to finish his sentence as Xion had already begun Force Choking him. The sound of the General struggling to breath could be heard for a few seconds before the man's neck was snapped in two by the strength of Xion's Force Choke.

"Mistakes, I can forgive. Incompetence, I will not forgive!" Xion said. He already knew why the assault was going so badly. The General had thought to try and just attack en mass and sent all of his forces careening at the defenses of the Turian Capital. Sadly, with no prior knowledge of defenses, no scouting of perimeters, no previous bombardments to soften up defenses, and no coordinated way of attack, the entire operation had gone to hell. Many Sith Troopers had already been killed and more were dying still, tank divisions had been wiped out, and starfighter squadrons destroyed.

This all made for a less than happy Xion.

As a Sith Commando came up to Xion, Xion spoke "So Commander, I want to congratulate you on your promotion, Lieutenant. I hope you'll perform well in the future."

The Sith Commando was obviously stunned by the sudden promotion but nodded and saluted "T-Thank you my lord! I will serve you to the best of my capabilities."

"I'm sure you will. But right now I want you to get all of our forces to fall back for now. We won't be taking the city with the way we're currently attacking. We need to reorganize and regroup." said Xion

"Yes my lord!" the Sith Commando hurried to carry out Xion's orders.

Fighting was fierce along this breach in the wall surrounding the city. Several artillery shots had landed here and destroyed much of this segment's structural support. When the Imperial troops began their attack they managed to collapse this segment of wall. The Turians however were defending this area with everything they had, trying to stem the tide. It was going well for the Turians as the Imperials had attacked without sufficient support, and had taken heavy losses. The Imperials had tried to get reinforcements over, but attacks from wall defenses had been holding them up.

Suddenly, the Imperials attacking the breach began to pull back.

"H-Hey, you guys look! They're pulling away!" one of the Turian soldiers said to his comrades.

"Hey, he's right! Look at 'em! Those bastards are pulling away." another confirmed.

The Turian defenders began to let out cheers at the sight of the Imperials retreating. Most of them were really just trying to fool themselves, but there were some who believed it would be possible to hold the Capital.

Losses for the Imperials were heavy. They had already lost 5 tank divisions, and several battalions of troops had come back with half of their number gone or injured. Entire starfighter squadrons had been wiped out. Xion was for lack of better word furious; this shouldn't have been as costly as it had been. The lives of many good men had been laid to rest thanks to the foolishness of one General.

"Now, it's obvious that we can't attack en mass like we did in the beginning with no coordination amongst our troops. So, fist we'll start by having a massive artillery barrage followed by starfighter attacks. During these attacks, we'll send Battalions 45, 76, and 23 over to the breach over on the eastern side of the city. This is where their defenses have taken their greatest hits, so these depleted battalions should be able to win. The Turians won't be able to repair their defenses in time for our next assault. While the breach is being attacked, I'll have several groups of skilled Commando's transported by air and under the protection of starfighters land on the western side of the city and bring down the shields keeping the defense there. Lastly, as for the main gate, I'll assault it myself." Xion finished.

There were immediate protests from the other ranked officers in the tent where the meeting was taking place.

"But my lord! That gate was responsible for the loss of 3 of the 5 tank divisions! It's suicide to go out and lead the assault yourself!" one of the officers said.

"I agree, let's think of another method, surely they can't withstand another assault, can they? Let's just use some of our stronger battalions to assault the main gateway." another tried to convince Xion.

"My, my gentlemen. It looks as if you have no confidence in me. That really hurts, really, really hurts." Xion said in a sarcastic tone.

"Look, you will follow through with the planning that I have gone through. I will lead the attack on the main gate. And the rest of the attacking force will follow me in, am I understood." Xion asked, but it really sounded like more of a statement.

"B-But sir-"

"Am I understood." this time Xion fully stated it.

"Yes my lord." all of the officers said.

"Excellent" Xion ended the meeting.

Several Day's Later

"Hey Serge, what is that?" one of the Turians patrolling the main gate wall asked.

The Turian Sergeant took out a pair of binoculars and looked down at where the soldier was pointing at. What he saw nearly had him on the ground laughing himself to death. It seemed as if the Sethelonians (1) couldn't take the heat and were now going to try and talk them down. Well, it wasn't working.

"HEY, SEND THIS TO YOUR ASS FACED WIMP COMMANDERS! WE'RE NOT SURRENDERING, AND THERE WON'T BE ANY NEGOTIATIONS OF ANY SORT!" the Sergeant yelled out while his troops cheered out in agreement.

The 'diplomat' was dressed up in red robes and looked like it had on armor while it was also wearing a mask. It was easily the weirdest dress up any diplomat could have as far as the Turian Sergeant was concerned, but he really didn't think it mattered.

The oddly dressed 'diplomat' suddenly brought his hands together. The Turians looked on confused but quickly switched to shocked as a large amount of energy began to form between the diplomat's hands. The Turians quickly wasted no time in aiming their weapons at the diplomat, or at least they tried to. Instead, they only felt this hopeless sense of dread, as if didn't matter what they did, that they wouldn't win no matter what. This was true in a way, but this feeling of hopelessness only magnified that fact.

As the 'diplomat' was finished charging up its attack, it fired the ball of energy forward and watched as the destructive force went on its way, completely blasting its way through the previously unassailable main gate, destroying all the defenses and defenders.

Xion gave a smirk behind his mask as he watched his powerful Force Push do its work. He had also used the power of the Dark Side to instill hopelessness and fear into the Turian's minds. He was slowly doing this to every soldier defending the capital as well. This would make them far easier prey for his own troops to fight.

Meanwhile, the stunned Imperial soldiers behind him could do nothing but stare in shock that their Emperor was capable of destruction like this. Their shock turned to cheering however as they started to gain hope that they would win this battle.

As Xion walked forward, his soldiers started to charge in, giving out battle cries and chanting "Xion!" over and over again in their euphoria.

Tanks rushed in, blasting away and pushing back the Turians who didn't have the equipment necessary to deal with medium vehicles. Soldiers stormed in as well, blasting away at every Turian they saw, the only ones out being soldiers anyways as all the civilians had been evacuated to shelters.

The Turians were on an en masse retreat and those that were staying behind were firing at the Sith Troopers trying to kill as many as they could. Their bullets however proved to be very ineffective against armor made to stand up against lasers. Turians and the Salarians were at the lower ends of technology compared to the Sith Empire, even though the Sith Empire itself was 4000 years behind that of the Republic's tech.

As the Imperial forces stormed down the main gate, the other forces were attacking their targets.

"Blow em open!" a Turian yelled as a cannon fired its shell over at the oncoming Imperial forces.

"TAKE COVER!" yelled out the commanders as their troops jumped out of the way of the shell. Several were still mauled by it, but the Imperials just kept coming even as more were taken down.

Good thing they weren't the only ones taking losses.

As one raw Turian recruit tried to take careful aim with his rifle his head was pierced by a laser while others had their torsos hit, their legs and arms burnt, or completely blown off due to missiles that were streaking past.

Several Turians had taken shelter behind the rubble that used to be a part of the wall. They had set up a Gatling gun and were now causing a lot of trouble for the assaulting Imperials. Slowly, the Turians began to rally around the Gatling gun, determined to stop the Imperials for as long as possible.

"Sir, their position is unassailable. We can't send any attacking force there without having them get slaughtered. Even with their primitive tech, their just too well concentrated." one Sith trooper said to his commander.

"Blast it! We need to get through there. Does anyone have an idea?" the Sith Commando asked.

"Sir, if possible, perhaps we could fool the Turians into thinking that we were attacking from one point en masse, and then we could sneak in several of our best troops to start taking out that Gatling gunner and his friends." one trooper suggested.

"Alright then, let's go with that! Haven't got anything else anyways." the Sith Commando said before splitting the troops he had with him up and giving orders to one group to begin gathering up the rest of the assaulting troops while the group the commando was with went over to the side of the Turian defenses.

The groups had agreed on waiting for the larger force to send out a flare signal to show the smaller force that their attack was beginning. That way they would know that when the Turian guards left their positions they wouldn't be back soon.

The Sith Commando and his squad waited for a while, some trying to deal with their nervousness in various ways such as checking over their weapons, pacing, or trying to talk to each other.

Once the diversionary force was prepared, one of the troopers there launched a green flare high into the sky where it went up with a bang of green light. The Turians saw it and the subsequent large number of Sith Troopers that were now revealing themselves from their hiding places. The large amount of Sith Troopers that were now beginning their attack were on the far left side of the Turian defense while the smaller group was on the far right.

The Turians were easily panicked by the large assault force that was now threatening to overwhelm their right flank and they quickly tried to pull all of their defenders onto covering their right. This left their left (Imperial right) open to the Sith Commando and his squad.

"Come on, move out!" the Sith Commando gave his order as his squad now rushed up the abandoned left flank of the Turians. Climbing up the mountain of rubble that had been a part of the wall proved to be more trouble than it was worth. The Turians had taken to blasting away at the initial parts of the mountain, creating less than ideal climbing spaces. This did use up some valuable ammo, but it was well worth it as the Imperials on all sides were having trouble climbing up the rubble pile and assaulting the Turians directly.

From what the Sith Commando and his squad were slowly starting to hear, things weren't going good for the assaulting Imperials. After the initial attack, there had been a large number of battlecrys and the sound of boots hitting the ground as the Imperials started their assault.

Now, those sounds were being replaced by repeated gunfire, mortar shells firing and landing, and the screams of people dying. Since most of those screams didn't have that grating sound that a Turian has when it speaks, it was sadly assumed by the squad that their fellow soldiers were the ones screaming.

The squad eventually managed to get up onto the first trench that had been dug out by the Turians in the rubble. The Turians had dug a series of trenches, with the final trench being the peak of the rubble mountain where the Gatling gun was mounted.

They continued climbing to where the Gatling gun was, making sure that the Turians at the top of the rubble didn't see them climbing up. However, as the team continued climbing, they nearly came to ruin when a Turian was seen in one of the upper trenches walking around. It seemed like he was just doing patrols around the now defenseless parts of the trenches, but it was obvious he didn't believe that anyone would be here as he just grumbled and walked on, not even looking down where he would have seen the approaching Sith Troopers.

One of them breathed out a sigh of relief once the Turian was gone. They all increased their pace to a frenzied state, as if the devils of hell were after them. Eventually, once they got close enough to the top of the rubble mountain, the Sith Commando let his men have a short rest before beginning their attack.

First, the Sith Commando sent up a grenade into the Turian's position. They were all too busy shooting at the rest the Imperial attacking force to notice the grenade. It was only when the explosion went off and the Turians at the top of the rubble pile were thrown down by explosion that the rest of them noticed the grenade, which at this point was redundant.

With the Gatling gun defense taken out, the Turians held much less firepower than before, and now, they had also lost several of their number that had held the highest points of defense, which were now occupied by the flanking Imperials.

"Yeehaw! Let's blow the shit out of these raptors!" one of the Sith Troopers said before firing his rocket launcher at one of the lower trenches and taking out a group of Turians there. Other Sith troopers had taken firing at those closest to their position, taking out many of the Turians at the top.

With the Turian's focus now split between defending their fronts and backs, the outnumbered defenders quickly started to fall apart as they were picked off one by one. Those who were able to fled as they realized the situation was hopeless.

The Imperials wasted no time in charging through the breach and into the city, trying to insure that the breach they took would remain theirs. It wasn't long before the superior numbers of the Imperials was countered however, as street fighting took the Imperials down to small groups where they were more vulnerable to the Turians, whose knowledge of the city streets gave them the advantage.

Still, it wasn't long before the Imperials were pushing the far more tired and demoralized Turians back, and several large explosions over to the west signaled that the shield generators were down and the Imperials had pushed through there.

Location: Turian Government Bureau

"Sir, the 8th battalion has been wiped out!"

"The 54th Special Squad is requesting reinforcements!"

"Our shield defenses along the western front have fallen!"

"We've lost contact with commander Gravalian!"

"Our forces are being overwhelmed, what do we do?"

These were some of the many panicked cries that the Turian console men gave as the situation deteriorated. Imperial forces were now pushing in from all sides, and Turian defenses were falling apart. Reports were coming in from everywhere about continuous loss of life and ground to enemy forces.

The remaining Turian Hierarchy members were wringing their hands nervously, pacing, or doing anything they could to relive their stress while they tried to think of a way out of the situation that they were currently stuck in. While some could only think of cursing Altimus for weakening of their military at a time like this, others were trying to dish out orders to their surviving forces in an attempt to push back the invaders.

"Damn it, we just don't have the strength to resist for much longer!" one of the Turian Hierarchy members said.

Another member then made a suggestion that shocked everyone down to their core, mainly because it was the suggestion most wanted to follow.

"Why don't we just evacuate ourselves while our remaining military forces cover our retreat." one of the members whispered.

"Are you mad, we can't just abandon our people! We would lose all credibility anyways if the that every got out to the public." another Hierarchy member argued.

"We've already lost. All that staying here serves is to provide moral support. If we escape however, then we can raise another army to take back our home and eventually free our people." the first one responded.

"And just how do you plan on escaping anyways? Even if we could get to a ship, where would we go? And also, in case you haven't noticed, the entire planet is surrounded by the enemy fleet! How the fuck are we supposed to get pass them?"

"Don't worry, my ship is equipped with a cloaking device. We'll be able to sail right through the blockade and they won't even know."

The other Hierarchy member was slowly starting to come around as he did want to escape, but was afraid of what people would think of him for abandoning the battle.

"B-But won't people call us cowards for abandoning the battle. I don't think that anyone would even listen to us if they knew we ran away like cowards!"

"Haven't you ever heard of a tactical retreat? Besides, everyone's going to hate humans ruling over them more than they will us over abandoning the battle. In fact, they're likely going to be glad that at least some leadership managed to survive and make a focal point for them to rally behind. Besides, do you want to die? Cause you seem to try to find a way to keep staying each time I offer you a way out!"

"Ergh, very well then; but aren't we going to bring any of the others along?"

"Of course we'll try to save as many as we can, but we are pressed for time, and the sooner we leave the better. So don't bother convincing any of those military types, they'll just get angry and moan about loyalty to the troops and duties of the commander." the Hierarchy member mocked.

Both of them then went around trying to secretly convince as many Hierarchy members as possible to leave with them. They generally went after the ones with fear on their faces or those who showed other obvious signs of wanting to abandon the battlefield.

Once they felt that enough members had been gathered, they began leaving down a relatively unknown passageway that was originally thought to have lead to some minor storage room. Well, technically it was a storage room, but it just stored their escape ship.

Once everyone had boarded, and the preparations for takeoff were made, the ship rose out of its underground storage room and lifted off, much to the shock of the invading Imperial soldiers who tried their hardest to shoot it down. As the ship took off for the vast reaches of outer space, one of the Hierarchy members said to the pilot "Hey, take us to these coordinates." and handed the pilot a data chip which contained said coordinates to an outlying planet in the former territory of the Free Kingdoms.

"Alright then, but you better tell everyone to strap in. We're about to pass by the fleet soon and we may have to take some moves that'll make you sick to your stomach." the pilot responded.

As the Hierarchy member went back to inform his comrades, the pilot activated the cloaking device, which wasn't really as much of a cloaking device like the Hierarchy member had bragged it to be but rather a stealth system that pretty much just decreased heat emissions of the ship. It still kept the ship very visible, but now thermal scanners and other such devices were useless. With the heat emissions being lowered, the pilot went and pressed several other buttons activating a communicator which brought up a hologram of the very person who the Hierarchy members were fleeing from in the first place, Xion.

"My lord, I have the Hierarchy members aboard and I've already activated the heat emission dampeners. We'll be approaching your fleets soon. Do you want me to land the ship in one yours and turn the members over?" the Turian asked with what could be described as a smirk.

"No, instead head over to these coordinates. Don't worry about the fleet, I've already told them all to just shoot in your general direction. They'll take careful aim to ensure you're not hit." Xion replied while sending over the coordinates to the pilot..

"Yes my lord." the Turian pilot responded.

Xion smiled under his mask as he closed the transmission. He had paid off several Turian mercs and had given them the mission of going around and taking the place of the pilots of the various transports that the Hierarchy members used. That way, when several of the Hierarchy members would inevitably flee the battle, they would fall right under his control. The best part was that there was no way for them to know that several Turians were going to betray them. They would still be laboring under the illusion that most of their kind worked for the benefit of the state as a whole. While one could say this of Turians in a normal and peaceful world, and even in times of hardship where they had to sacrifice a great many things for the state, there was simply no way that every member would be this sacrificial of themselves in such a time of crisis as when over 90% of their military force had been wiped out in the Altarian Nebula.

That, and money always happened to sway even the most stalwart of hearts.

Focusing his attention back to the battle, it was obvious that the Turian defenses were falling apart all around them. Imperial troops were overrunning them at every defensive position they set up, and anything heavier than a Turian with a machine gun ended up being destroyed by Xion. He used the Force like a weapon of mass destruction, pulling artillery shells out of the air and sending them right back to their owners, crushing defense turrets, bringing down walls atop their defenders, choking the life out of enemy commanders, blasting back tanks, and stopping bullets in midair.

Most enemy troops were losing the will to fight at seeing how easily one man managed to crush their defenses. Most of the Turian troops that were still alive were starting to surrender upon seeing the devastation Xion alone caused to their forces. Large groups of Turians were now being rounded up as more and more of them put down their weapons and began to surrender. Whatever little fighting was still going on was also starting to come to a close as those who continued to resist were killed by the overwhelming force of Xion's troops.

Many Turians had bitter looks on their faces as they saw their last bastion of resistance crumble beneath the might of the Empire. Yet there was nothing they could do. Further resistance would only lead to their destruction in the end and with the grand majority of their military might exhausted from Altimus' disaster it was a foregone conclusion that the Sith Empire would win.

'And now, the process of rebuilding starts.' Xion thought to himself.

Timeframe: Back three months

Varison's ship came out of hyperspace over the planet that held Ralaba's safe house. The planet itself seemed to be sparsely populated with island landmasses all over its surface, and as the ship descended it was obvious that it was a tropical planet. The safe house was located near the beach of a larger island. As far as safe houses went it was pretty noticeable, being a mansion and all, and it was located in a pretty open area with a beachhead that was quite easy to access from the sea. Its safety instead came from the fact that the planet wasn't really marked on Sethelonian maps. Even Xion's maps didn't have this planet marked as Revan had never discovered it.

The mansion however wasn't vulnerable as it looked by any means. It contained a very powerful planetary shield generator that could defend the place from orbital bombardment. Now, when one thought about such a large, powerful, and expensive type of shielding being used to defend one mansion, one might think that that was going overboard. But, the shield was actually a very cheap and easy to set up model. The reason for this was that the shield, while very powerful, was only going to last for a few hours, and most planetary bombardments when on for up to a day or two depending on the size of the planet or amount of ships available to a fleet. The point of this shield was to aid in escape. It would last long enough for a person or group of people to be able to get to their escape ship and blast off.

The other defenses included a ray shielding defense system that once activated would coat all of the mansion openings in ray shields, a point laser defense system against missiles, and it also came with an underground hanger bay for the secret storing of ships.

Once the Bartel-Class ship had landed, Thrace, Varison, and Bethany had gotten out and entered the mansion. This was where they were greeted to a rather unpleasant surprise.

A group of armed men were in the entrance hall of the mansion, and all of them looked to be highly trained soldiers that were armed to the bone with blasters, thermal detonators, rocket launchers, shotguns, vibroblades, and many more weapons.

"Ah, welcome my dear. It is nice to finally meet you." A man with a heavy grey mustache and beard said with an accent.

Varison and Thrace immediately stood in front of Bethany and raised their blaster lances in response. The soldiers in the room just laughed at them, confusing the hell out of Varison, Thrace, and Bethany who were at this point very stressed out due to the fact of running for their lives for the last few weeks.

Being constantly stressed out about how you were going to survive an entire empire full of angry people coming after you and your head generally had a negative effect on one's tolerance. This was made evident if Thrace's outburst was any indication.

"What the fuck are you people laughing at us for! We might be outnumbered, but we've managed to survive against worse odds than a bunch of over compensating assholes!" Varison looked at Thrace with look that clearly said to shut up while the bearded man who had first spoken just laughed harder along with his comrades.

"My apologies. I didn't mean to stress you out. You are right to be suspicious of us, but you needn't have any fear. Your Captain Ralaba contacted me and gave me the coordinates to this place like he did with you. He wanted you guys to have some help in your coming trials, and I don't think help would be unwanted."

Thrace was still distrusting of the new group, but Varison saw an insignia on all of their shoulders.

"No way! You guys are all Grinshi Special Ops. I've heard about you guys. Supposedly you're some of the best forces out there in the Free Kingdoms. But how'd Ralaba manage to contact people like you? And furthermore, how would people in your positions be able to get the chance to come here anyways?" Varison said.

"Ah, so one of you recognizes us. I'm pleased. As for how Ralaba managed to contact us, we have been friends for a very long time and we always like to keep in contact so that we can inform each other of the latest news. As for how we found the time to come here; well…the Grinshi Kingdom is no more! In fact, none of the Free Kingdoms exist anymore! Xion and his Empire have taken that all away from us!" the bearded man said angrily.

"What! He's already conquered the Free Kingdoms!" Thrace said, voicing the shock of Varison and Bethany as well.

"Yes. 1000 years of constant warfare is no good on any nation's health. Combine this with the fact that it was all contained within a relatively small area that was filled with too many contenders…and death really is the only outcome that can occur. And with such a vast amount of death happening in the Free Kingdoms, there was no one left to work on the infrastructure. Basic necessities like food and water became gems that each nation fought over like rabid dogs given steak. Without any stability to be found whatsoever, there was no way for any of the powers to recover their military strength properly. We were all just easy pickings for that Xion and his Empire!" the bearded man said angrily.

All three of them saw the situation as the bearded man described it. Xion had pretty much walked in as an overpowered body builder on a bunch of anorexics and beat the shit out of them.

"Damn it!" Thrace said angrily. He dropped down to the ground and in anger punched it while saying " How can Xion just keep winning? Isn't there anyone out there who can stop him! Or is he truly unbeatable?" Thrace said in a depressed tone.

The bearded man walked over to Thrace who seemed to at least have put aside his suspicion of him and his friends in favor of depression.

"Now look here. It may seem dark right now, but we aren't as hopeless as you might think. There are likely to be many troops within the Free Kingdoms that are angry at their loss. And is still the Turian Hierarchy and Salarian Union to try and reach if we must. Those places have plenty of military strength to take Xion and his forces on. The hardest part would simply be getting them to fight him. So you see, Xion hasn't won as yet. There are still those with the strength to combat him It is just all about finding and uniting them!" the bearded man said.

Thrace's eyes widened at hearing this.

"You're…you're right! We can't just give up because it seems like there is no way to fight him. There are still people out there who can fight him! And they'll want to fight him after hearing about all the crimes he's committed against you Bethany! I swear, I'll keep fighting until I've brought him to justice!" said Thrace,

The bearded man just smiled in seeing Thrace get his enthusiasm back.

Bethany smiled at Thrace, touched by his declaration, but soon turned her attention towards the bearded man and said "Um, e-excuse me, but what might your name be?" Bethany stuttered at first before gaining a bit more confidence, "It seems a bit impolite for us to not know it since you're trying to help."

"Ah, my name is Dorgovitch Reznof. And, while I'm sure it would be lovely to get to know all of you, you'll all probably want to get some sleep. I'm pretty sure that your flight from Xion didn't exactly give you the relaxation that you need. Now come, the rooms are over on the left side of the stairs." Dorgovitch said and pointed to where he referenced.

"You may have first pick of the rooms. My men and I have not yet settled down so do not worry about the room you choose." Dorgovitch explained.

Varison, Thrace, and Bethany all decided to follow Dorgovitch's advice and settle down, exhausted from the physical and emotional tolls of their journey.

3 months later

In the time that would pass Thrace, Bethany, and Varison would come to know the Grinshi Special Ops group very well. Thrace and Varison went out with several of the other members looking for support for a rebellion against Xion. They started by looking in the former areas of the Free Kingdoms. They asked around the black markets and other more criminal places for information on any resistance groups that were still fighting against Xion's forces.

They talked, bartered, threatened, and in a few cases fought in order to find and bring all these resistance groups together. The problem was that the work it was taking to find and get these groups to join was disproportionate to the actual benefits of getting these groups. Most of them were low on everything, from money to quality weapons to even moral.

While they had a little success in the former Free Kingdoms, they had next to nothing in talking with the Salarian Union or Turian Hierarchy. Both it appeared were already planning their own massive military operations, and the contacts Dorgovitch had throughout those places said it would be pointless trying to get any military aid of any kind from either power.

It was depressing to learn that the only powers which stood a chance against Xion didn't want to help and in fact seemed to be gearing up to fight each other if the rumors were true. That was something no one was able to understand. After all, the Hierarchy and Union had lived in peace for many decades, and there had never been any real tensions between the two. Sure they had had their squabbles, but nothing that created any lasting animosity.

So why were they suddenly deciding to attack each other now? It made no sense. Everyone agreed however, that Xion was somehow involved in it. After all, everything was fine before Xion ever showed up. They tried their best to ignore the voices in their heads which told them that things had been bad before Xion showed up.

Meanwhile, Varison, Thrace, and Bethany all received advanced and regular training respectively. Thrace and Varison trained to fight against sword wielding enemies and how to more effectively dodge or use natural covers instead of their shields for defending against blaster bolts. Not only that, but they also trained their stamina and physical prowess to a greater extent as well.

With Bethany, she was being trained in the basics of combat after he wish to become less of a burden on Thrace and Varison. They both quickly denied that she was such, but the evidence wasn't in her favor. She was trained in how to use a stun gun which had a lethal switch just in case, and her body was being put into shape with a small workout course as being a princess didn't make for an ideal image of physical fitness.

She was also trained in nonlethal combat, learning how to stun and distract her opponents rather than outright beat them.

While all of this was going on however, everyone learned of disastrous news at the end of the three months that nearly had them all in tears figuratively speaking.

"Long live his Imperial Majesty, Emperor Xion! His glorious conquest over the Turian Hierarchy and the Salarian Unions are miracles that have evaded us for so long!" a news reporter said over the holovid.

"Don't forget, he also managed this with such a minimal loss of life! And the speed at which he's done it is spectacular! These new conquests have allowed our empire to grow large enough to encompass the entire northwestern galaxy! As of now there are only a few spots down to the south that we don't control. I think I speak for everyone when I say that this is a new era for everyone and that we're so lucky to live in such an amazing time!" another news reporter said.

Everyone looked with horror at the holovid as they saw Imperial flags flying over the Salarian and Turian capitals and said species both signing and agreeing to treaties of complete and unconditional surrender.

"And it seems like our emperor is being truly gracious to our defeated compatriots. He's actually giving the peoples of the Union and Hierarchy full Imperial Citizenship with all the rights that come with it!" the original reporter said.

"Yeah, well you did hear what he said on that. Full on integration with our conquered foes! It seems our emperor is a supporter of equal rights." the other one said.

"Exactly. Now, for more on the situation, please tune in to our 9:00 p.m. broadcast. Thank you for watching!" and then the news broadcast ended.

"He…he's already taken over the Salarians, and Turians." Thrace said with despair.

"Hmm." Dorgovitch and the other Grinshi Commando's had contemplative looks on their faces.

While Bethany tried to comfort Thrace (honestly, who should be more depressed) Varison said "So, I assume we'll have an easier time now getting Turian and Salarian support?"

"What? What are you saying? Didn't you hear? The Turians and Salarians have been crushed. They surrendered! How can we possibly get support from them now!" Thrace said and stared incredulously at Varsion.

"What he means is that now all of the bureaucracy interfering with their aid is gone now, and that there must still be individual groups of soldiers who are still willing to fight, regardless of the surrenders." Dorgovitch explained.

At seeing Thrace beginning to understand what Varison was implying Dorgovitch went further "You see Thrace, the thing to know is that not everyone follows what their government says. This should be obvious to you if Xion is any indicator. Normal law abiding citizens can disobey any law if it goes against their personal beliefs. When a person feels strongly about something, then they will fight for it no matter what. And something that you must also realize, before Xion invaded them, it wasn't likely that we would get any support from either one of them. Now that he has, it is far more likely that the remnants of the Hierarchy and Union will be willing to give us their support, or at the very least work together."

Thrace grimaced as he began to realize what Varison meant. 'Damn, I really need to start thinking things through.'

Dorgovitch saw Thrace's anger over his thoughts and spoke again "Thrace, I know that you may be angry over your inability to see past what is in front of you, but don't let it get to you. You are still young, and Varison is much more experienced. What you need is more time and training my boy. Come now, there is still hope for the fight against tyranny. We just need to have some faith and continue fighting." He patted Thrace's back and gave an encouraging smile.

Varison just rolled his eyes. As far as he was concerned the kid needed to be given a heavy dose of reality if everything else that had happened to them so far wasn't eye opening enough. Tell it to him like it was and fix it, that's all there was to it.

"Well, now that the pep talk is over, I believe we have work to do. Like finding out where the Turian and Salarian resistance groups would be." Varison said.

"Yes, that would be a good goal to st-" Dorgovitch was interrupted by another Grinshi Commando who rushed in and began alerting them to a new problem.

"Sir, the scanners have picked up an oncoming ship! Strangely enough, it has Turian designs!" the Commando spoke.

"What! A Turian ship! Well how did they find this planet? I thought it was supposed to be only on the Sethelonian charts!" Dorgovitch exclaimed.

"We're not sure sir! What should we do?

"Give it a signal to land over next to us. A ship of that size can't have more than a dozen or so people at best. If they are actual Turians, then we may just have some allies, and if they are enemies, then we should have the strength to fight them off easily." Dorgovitch reasoned.

"Yes sir!" the Commando began to send out a signal for the Turian ship to follow.

Meanwhile, on the Turian ship.

"What the hell! This isn't the place we asked you to go to! What's going on?" one of the Hierarchy members asked.

"Well, it seems there was a malfunction in the hyperdrive system. It forced us to come out of hyperspace early and I'll have to land to make repairs, or do you want to die in between dimensions, because that seems very bleak to me." the pilot retorted.

"Fine, you've made your point." the member conceded.

"Well, would you look at that, it seems that there's already someone else on the planet." the pilot commented.

"What!" several of the passengers said alarmed at this, not knowing if the inhabitants were friend or foe.

"Yeah, and they seem to have picked us up already, if the blatant way they're signaling us is any clue." the pilot said. "Well, might as well land next to 'em."

This drew even greater alarm from the passengers who wondered if their pilot had finally blown a gasket.

"No, but if you think about, it, they wouldn't be signaling to us if they didn't want us to land here, and if it's a trap like you're all worried about, then it really won't matter if they're enemies, because they already know we're here and they'll likely find us no matter where we hide. Plus we still need to make repairs anyways, so we won't be going anywhere for a while." the pilot reasoned out before turning the ship over to where the signal was coming from.

Upon landing, the ship's inhabitants were greeted with several humans dressed up in combat gear and armed to the bone with various weapons.

"So, it seems our hopes have come true. Come with us, there's a lot that we have to start talking about, and don't worry, we're not here to harm you, at least, not anymore." one of the Grinshi Commando's said to the Turians.

Location: Planet Coranda, Imperial City

Kaemon sat meditating, trying to become one with the Force.

Breathing in deeply, and then expelling the air, Kaemon calmed himself as he felt the power of the Force flow through him, enveloping him, and become one with him. He was now but a mere extension of the Force, letting it guide his mind. He could feel all of the life forms that were close to him. From the people outside the room to even those wandering in the renovated city, he could feel the differences in the energy that was within each person. From the amount, to how it felt, to even where it was aligned.

These meditations of his served to further increase Kaemon's own capacity to use the Force, and they had the added bonus of making him feel very calm and relaxed. But, it seemed he would not be able to finish his meditations, as someone had the forethought to interrupt him.

"Sooooooooooo" a voice drawled out "you're the brat that the big bad's been training eh?" Koga Kuchiki said.

"You mean Lord Xion, right?" Kaemon stated, annoyed at the disrespect that was being shown to his master. Especially after all the effort Xion had taken to releasing that ungrateful ass!

"Oh tomato, tomato, I really don't care. So kid, what exactly do you think your future holds?" Koga asked.

"What are you talking about?" Kaemon asked back, confused.

Smirking, Koga said "Well, I mean once you've outlived your usefulness, you're just going to be thrown off to the side, so you'd better start planning." Koga taunted.

"What! You think that Lord Xion would just abandon me like you're superiors did to you. You're a fool then. Xion is different! He raised me up from the filth and made me strong, just like he's doing with the Empire! I don't know your plan here, but if you think you can just insult Lord Xion, then you'd better start rethinking your mindset pretty soon!" Kaemon threatened as he brought out his lightsaber, the red beam igniting as Kaemon made a stance; prepared to do battle.

"Hahahahahahahaa!" Koga laughed. "Do you honestly believe I'd fight a runt like you? I'd be a waste of energy and time. And besides, all I'm trying to do is give you good advice kid."

Koga then suddenly appeared right next to Kaemon, his speed having been too fast to follow for Kaemon's inexperienced senses. "I suggest you remember this for the rest of your life. You can't trust anyone out there. Somehow, in some way, the people you serve are just trying think of ways to get rid of you. It's a fact. All you are is just and expendable tool that's meant to serve a singular purpose. And once that purpose has been fulfilled, it's bye bye shrimpy!" Koga started laughing wildly at the end of his lecture.

"Bah! Just because you've been betrayed doesn't mean that Xion will do that to me! He wouldn't have bothered even taking me in if he was that kind of person!" Kaemon said. "Lord Xion is great man! He's far better than those old Sethelonian coots you worked for!"

"Sure he is. And I bet he's adopted a million puppies, cured all diseases, and brought peace to the galaxy. Please, he's just a dictator who stole power from older dictators. There's nothing good about him. I just can't wait for that little bubble of yours to pop when you figure that out!" With a final snort, Koga left Kaemon alone again.

'Aw what does he know. He's just trying to fill me with doubts! As long as I stay with Lord Xion I'll always be needed! Unlike that old sack of bones.' Kaemon thought to himself as he tried to go back to his meditations.

'Heh, what a moronic kid. I don't really care whether he believes me or not. But it sure is fun messing with him and watching him get all riled up! Who knows, maybe if I screw him up enough he'll get killed! That would be funny as hell!' Koga thought to himself as he smirked, thinking of various other methods that he could use to cause chaos.

After all, anything he could due to make the lives of his superiors miserable was just one more obligation he had to do, right?

Koga's maddened laughter answered that question.

The old Turian sighed as he heard the door to his home being opened from the outside.

"He's in here sir!" he looked and saw a Sith Trooper say.

Then, the old Turian saw the very figure that was responsible for the conquest of his people walk into his own home. It was a modest home too. It contained an average sized living room, a couch, chair, coffee table, holoscreen, small kitchen and dining room, a single restroom and a bedroom. It was more like an apartment than a house, but that worked out just fine for this old Turian.

"So, the great Emperor Xion comes to visit this old Turian. I wonder, what is it that you need from me that you don't already have?"

"You." Xion said.

"Oh?"

"Yes. I've heard about your exploits retired General Sergas. You once put a stop to the Revolution Crisis twenty years ago. Not only did you put as stop to it, you managed to do so in such a way that the rebels were completely and utterly destroyed without a single loss of life to your own forces. Even to this very day you are still regarded as a hero to your people, retired as you are."

"Heh. Those days are long gone. Don't believe otherwise. I served my nation loyally, I did my duty, and look at me now. Alone. My family is all gone. Kids died in Altimus' Disaster. Wife left me for someone else. Brothers, sisters, uncles, aunts, cousins, nephews, all of them are dead now. I'm a broken man. I've seen too much and lived too long. Now, I'm just calmly waiting for death to come and take me."

"So essentially life's got you beat and you're just going to sit there and take it all?" Xion mocked.

"Heh. Well it isn't as if it matters whether I do anything or not. You said it yourself. I'm still seen as a hero. I don't need to do anything else."

"Yes, because I'm so sure that sitting here, lazing around is so fulfilling. I mean, it isn't as if you don't have important affairs to attend to. Oh wait, it is like that. Tell me, how does it feel, knowing that right now you're essentially doing nothing but wasting air by being alive?"

The old Turian leapt up to his feet in anger while two Sith Troopers trained their guns on him.

"You want me to join you and you insult me like that! Well like hell I will now!" Sergas said in anger.

"Oh? But what I'm saying is true. After all, I bet you feel this way too. Sitting there, alone, doing absolutely nothing. Maybe at first, your retirement was appealing to you, preferred even. With all the family that you had, and your great reputation, you'd always have someone to spend time with you. But now that they're gone, you're all alone. And you feel miserable. You want something to distract you from that pain of being alone. You want to feel useful again. You want to feel like you belong. I can offer you that. Join me, and you'll belong to something again. The old Turian Hierarchy is dead. Giving it your loyalty serves you no purpose anymore. But with me I can make you a hero again."

And here, Xion took off his Mandalorian mask, revealing the face of a blonde haired man with whiskers on his face who had to have been in early twenties. Sergas, was quite startled to see that the conquer of his people was nothing more than a boy who had only just reached the dawning age of his adulthood. What Xion did next surprised him even more. His face becoming sympathetic, Xion grabbed Sergas by the shoulders and said "I know what it's like to be alone. To have no one to care for you. To believe that you suffer for a no good and unjust reason. I know that pain well."

Sergas's eyes widened, his mandibles twitched, and he swallowed, his nerves threatening to overwhelm him as he looked into Xion's eyes. Because in his eyes, Sergas could see all the emotions that he felt every day of his life. Those eyes, which seemed to be looking into his very soul, told Sergas that he wasn't alone.

Meanwhile, the two Sith Troopers were inwardly crying their hearts out at Xion's heartfelt speech. 'Emperor Xion!' both troopers said in their minds as their sympathy went out to their master.

"Of course, you don't have to join me right away." Xion said, all traces of sympathy disappearing and his face becoming impassive again.

Putting on the mask, Xion continued "You don't have to join me at all. The choice is entirely up to you. But remember this. I'm offering you the chance to escape your decrepit lifestyle, and you won't get many more offers like mine. And all I'm asking for you to do in return is lead my armies. Think about it. I'll expect an answer eventually."

And so, with the final defeat of the Turians, Xion and his empire had just suddenly emerged as the supreme rulers of the northwestern part of the galaxy. It was a tremendous victory. Now that the Sith Empire ruled over the entire area however, a new challenge had just come along. Trying to actually get all of the conquered people to work together.

This had started Xion's Integration Process. One of the first things that had been done after the Turians had officially surrendered was for the Imperial Military to completely absorb both the Turian and Salarian Militaries, or rather what was left of them.

All surviving soldiers were to still keep their jobs, but now they were to swear allegiance to a new master. Many honestly felt disgusted with themselves for being forced into working for the very people who had just conquered them. Others were eager to please their new masters and rise up the ladder in rank and prestige.

And others still were either grateful to finally have someone getting their lives back on track or were completely indifferent to the situation.

These people were generally the civilians whose misery had started with Altimus' Disaster in the Altarian Nebula. As the Sith Empire was adopting a policy of trying to integrate the conquered peoples into the Empire, they were going with earning goodwill and rebuilding that which had been destroyed in their invasion and getting lives back on track.

Easier said than done, but at least there was a attempt being made, which is easily more than what any other Sith Empire ever tried to accomplish.

In order to make things easier for everyone, it had been decided that those who were in positions of power such as governors and the like would be allowed to keep their positions so long as they had proven themselves competent in the past and swore allegiance to the Empire.

One of the best benefits for being benevolent conquers was a far more compliant populace. Xion wasn't foolish enough to believe that total benevolence or total ruthlessness would get rid of all the dissenters. But benevolence did have the benefits of weakening the rebellious factions support bases as they would have less to criticize the Empire with unlike ruthlessness which would only give them more reasons to rebel.

Another part of the Integration Process had been to grant all Salarians and Turians Imperial Citizenship status, thus ensuring that they got the same rights as the former Sethelonian people.

It was going to be a lot of work, but getting the entire Empire unified would, in Xion's eyes, do wonders for everybody.

As Xion walked around the massive lab, he had to admit, he was impressed. It seems the Salarians spared no expense when it came to their Research and Development Departments. Then again, Xion mused, when you were a race that depended on it for supremacy, then it was no wonder you'd pour everything you had into it.

The lab Xion was currently in was one of the best. It had massive computers with vast processing power, hundreds of different tools and supplies stocked in order to meet various demands, warded off testing rooms for ensuring that certain more dangerous projects didn't threaten those who made them, and state of the art security systems for keeping the many works in progress a secret.

Thank goodness this lab had remained unscathed during the short conquest of the Salarians. It really helped that they had been smart enough to realize as soon as the Sith Empire had invaded them that they were no match and had surrendered as quickly as possible, unlike the Turians.

The lab was known as the Kaliris Institute. Despite what one would think, it wasn't all that well known to the population at large. It was a totally secret government sponsored lab that dealt with top military research projects ranging from experimental and illegal weaponry to biochemical warfare products to new ship designs to even the occasional limerick.

The only people allowed to work here were all at the top of their respective fields of work. No less could be accepted. They had all made great contributions long before they ever were accepted to work in Kaliris. Once here however, any work they did was kept top secret so no one worked here for the fame. Of course, the pay and other benefits were quite excellent, more than enough to keep every person employed comfortable for the rest of their lives even if they quit.

Xion had learned of this place from the surrendering Union members who tried to keep things a secret. Of course, a bit of secret mental probing here or there had quickly let him look at their unguarded minds and take the info he wanted. Xion had afterwards had those members put to death while putting up the official story that they had gone into a quiet retirement.

As for the reason Xion was here, he wished to meet up with the head of the Kaliris Institute. The head was a Salarian of about 5ft in height, had blue-tinted skin, and had a burn mark running diagonally from the right side of his face. The Salarian's name was Heleon Torris.

As Xion walked up to him, Heleon turned around from watching a group working on another project to address his new boss.

"Ah! Sir! Didn't know you were coming! Would have given warmer welcome otherwise." Heleon says at a fast pace, making it seem like he's in a rush.

"I'm not here for pleasantries, so it works both ways for us. You don't have to lie to my face, and I won't need to kill for it. Good, is it not?"

"Quite." Heleon says, giving a nervous gulp at that fact.

"Anyways, I'm here to inform you about the recent changes that are going to be coming about soon." Xion said.

"Oh." Heleon said, not liking the sound of that. Then again, scientists rarely did like outside interference with their work.

"Yes, you see, I'll be reorganizing this Institute and others like it into the Imperial Research and Development Division, or the IRDD for short. The remnants of your STG will be taken apart as well and melded into Imperial Intelligence as well, just to let you know." Xion informed.

'Well, not as bad as originally thought.' Heleon thought to himself.

"So, work here will go uninterrupted?" Heleon queried.

"Of course. The results that the Kaliris Institute provides are invaluable, and I see no reason to interfere with that." Xion answered.

"Excellent news then." Heleon seemed happy to say. Then, he seemed to get nervous again and started wringing his hands together, his mouth forming into a sort of grimace as though he were arguing with himself.

"Is there something you wished to ask me?" Xion said, doing the work for Heleon.

"Ah, yes. You see, I've been working on a big project, revolutionary in fact. Only, nobody else believes so."

"Oh, really? Well, what is it."

"Come with me. I'll show you."

Heleon then lead Xion away from the main hall where most of the work was being done and took him down several floors with an elevator. Arriving on intended floor, Heleon guides them both to a massive door.

Pressing down the necessary numbers and unlocking the door, Xion was greeted to an impressive sight.

As the lights illuminated the object, Xion saw that it was a large humanoid machine. It had green armor plating going on in several places, a rounded head with a visor that was segmented by strips of metal, a rectangular right shoulder and a rounded left, and several tubes going all around it.

It still looked incomplete as there was armor missing around the right arm and left leg, not to mention the torso was partially uncovered as well.

"What…what is this?" Xion asked, somewhat confused by the massive machine in front of him.

"Ah. Well, you see. To start with, have always been concerned with droid capabilities. Always too limited, never able to think outside box. Security mechs, service drones, doesn't matter what they were built for or why. Can't ever work outside of parameters made for them. Creating an A.I. also possess' its own inherit risks. Sure you know of them, won't bore with details. Any who, I thought what if I gave the benefits of droids to organic beings. Afterwards, I decided to hypothesis various methods of doing so. Ruled out cyborgs for now. Still feel like they're more machine than organic. Then thought of improved armor systems equipped with multitude of weapons. Scraped that idea too. Thought to myself 'anyone can just put more weapons on a suit of metal, too easy'. But then I thought, make the suit bigger. Then I began thinking instead of suit, what about body, with someone to pilot that body. Thus, the Mobile Suit was born." Heleon explained.

"Mobile Suit?" Said Xion.

"Yes, from my original idea to make a suit of armor which evolved into this concept." said Heleon.

"And why does it look incomplete?"

"Ah, that would be because of funding. Superiors thought it pointless to make a larger droid piloted by organic. Saw it as redundant considering the purpose of droids. Personally, think it would help revolutionize the military. Again, superiors didn't agree." Heleon says this last part bitterly.

"So, does this unit have a specific name or is it just Mobile Suit for now?" asked Xion.

"Yes. It's called the MS-05A Zaku I Early Type. Am hopeful that one day I'll be able to make more, so early it is for now. Plus, still many kinks in it to work out, excluding it not being finished yet."

"Does it have any battle data for me to go off of?"

"Oh yes, plenty. Did many tests against tanks and other vehicles. Live ammunition used too. Needless to say, bit too risky sometimes. But data gathered as realistic as possible. Save if actual enemy was trying to kill me."

Xion took hold of the results that Heleon handed over to him, and needless to say, he was quite impressed. It seemed that this Zaku was very effective against ground based vehicles. It was successful 80% of the time. Against air based ones it had less success due to their higher mobility and the Zaku's still uncompleted state, but still, a 60% success rate wasn't bad considering.

"Well Heleon; you've managed to impress me with this. So I'm going to give the go ahead and get you the funding for this project."

"T-Thank you!" Heleon's composure broke for a second before he controlled himself. "Don't worry. Won't waste opportunity given to me!"

"I know you won't."

Timeframe: 5 months ahead

"As per Emperor Xion's orders, the Imperial Rearmament Plan is going underway. Right now, even as we speak, soldiers are trading in their old supplies for brand new equipment. Archaic vehicles are being retired, and old naval vessels are being torn down for scrap." an anchorman on the Holonews Network said.

"That's right. New technologies are being constantly introduced, helping to improve the lives of not only the military but of all of our citizens. Advances in medicine and agriculture have insured that better survival rates and surpluses in food supplies. Improvements are being made to infrastructure all around the Empire, and the recently admitted Turian and Salarian territories are being rebuilt at a pace faster than what analysts initially assumed. The wonders the Empire is performing for us continue to move us forward from the old and bygone days of the failed Sethelonian regime." an anchorwoman said this time.

"Quite correct. Why one of the easiest examples to see are the new uniforms of our soldiers." the anchorman said before an image appeared of Sith Troopers putting on and wearing new armor, finally changing out the style of armor worn from the days of Revan's Sith Empire. Now the armor was the same kind as that used by the Resurgent Sith Empire. Thus, it was black in color with red on the knee and shoulder guards and possessed a helmet that was influenced somewhat by Mandalorian design. The armor even possessed the symbol of the Sith Empire on the forehead of the helmet and the shoulder guards.

"Damn." Thrace cursed under his breath as he looked at what the Holonews was reporting. He, and the rest of their group were currently watching as just about everything within the old Sethelonian Kingdom was being changed to fit the new ideals and doctrine of the Sith Empire. It was a painful change to say the least. Everything that they had ever known and loved, from the time they were young and saw everything as new and exciting to right now, was being torn down and replaced with this cold hard visage of the Sith Empire.

Of course, even Thrace was forced to admit that what was going on seemed to benefit a lot of people, if the many news reports were to be believed.

But even so, it still hurt him, and Bethany to for that matter, to see everything he knew growing up change. Especially since it was all due to the actions of the very man who even now was out for Bethany's head (2).

"Wait a sec, look at the screen!" one of the Grinshi Commando's called out.

Everyone, whose attention had been wandering due to their own thoughts brought their focus back to the screen as live footage was now being shown of the Turian Dockyards over their homeworld of Palaven.

"What the hell does Xion think he's doing?" a Turian said as they watched dozens of warships entering the docks.

"As you can see here, the old vessels of the Imperial Navy are all heading towards the Turian homeworld of Palaven where they will be decommissioned at the massive dockyards over the planet." the anchorwoman said.

"Yes. These vessels have served us well in the centuries that they've been in service. But there just comes a time when you have to say 'out with the old and in with the new'. Though we don't know what that new will be, rest assured that it'll be a powerful replacement of our old Navy."

As the holonews began to move off onto other subjects, the rebel group became a furious hive of conversation as everyone began to wonder what was going on.

An orange tinted Salarian with one horn only by the name of Moltron spoke up above the rest "I think it's possible that with his conquest of our systems, Xion has grown overconfident. He now no longer believes that there is any threat to his rule save for a few pockets of isolated resistance cells. It's obvious that he doesn't know about us or the rebellion we've been forming."

Ever since the Turian Hierarchy members had landed on the planet and met up with the resistance group, they'd put in a huge amount of effort into contacting their old forces for support and members. They'd found many Turians, even those not a part of the military, who were willing to join up and bring down Xion. It wasn't as many as they had hoped, but it was still a huge booster for the group.

Another stroke of fortune happened for them when members of the old STG had managed to find them out, having heard the rumors about their resistance group and following as many clues as they possibly could until they found them. They had summarily joined up and added their invaluable skills in infiltration, espionage, tracking, hacking, and so much more.

Since then, their group had gone from just a measly few hundred, to a small army with several thousand members. Most were Turian and Salarian, the Free Kingdoms areas not having many resistance members to begin with and no one in the Sethelonian areas would even think about, let alone want to help them out.

"Hm, a good possibility." Dorgovitch said.

"Xion isn't a fool. There has to be a reason he's doing this. Isn't it a bit too brazen for him to practically ditch every ship in his entire navy all at once and then show the very location that he'll be doing so." Varison tried to point out.

"Not if he believes he's won. So far there hasn't been a single threat to him ever since he's conquered Turian and Salarian space. We're easily the largest resistance group out there and all we've done so far is recruit ourselves and try to fortify our position here. There's no reason for him to even expect any type of threat to his rule at this stage." Moltron said.

"Xion isn't a fool. A fool could have conquered the entire Sethelonian Kingdom with such ease." Varison reasoned.

Moltron gave a derisive snort at this and said "No offense, but a fool actually could have conquered your Sethelonian Kingdom. Our STG only kept a light watch on your people, but even from that we were able to gather that your military was inept, your economy in shambles, and that there was no competent leader whatsoever. It was no wonder that Xion was able to take over so easily. Your people must have been furious with the Royalty. We never kept that much of a watch so when Xion did take over we didn't really know, or care about it. Then came that complete screw up in the Altarian Nebula and then Xion's forces just overwhelmed us with their superior numbers. Honestly, I bet you anything that that's the only reason he even won against us. Much less the Turians who actually had a competent military before that disaster."

Thrace and Varison grit their teeth at that insult to their Kingdom, but conceded the point. The Royals had been awful rulers in their last days, and their only decent member was with them now. And though both were loath to admit it, Bethany really wasn't cut out for any of the situations she had been put into so far. They were trying to get her up to par, but by her very nature she was against violence. And in this galaxy, that was very liable to get you killed.

Yet, Bethany had still allowed herself to become a sort of symbol to rally behind. She was being used by their recruiters as a tragic figure who had lost her rightful place of kind and just rule to a complete monster of a tyrant. The sympathy factor, as well as the fact that she was a blatant sign of Xion's failure to destroy the Sethelonian Royalty had really helped in gathering support. Many of those who hated Xion were more than willing to join up with a symbol that literally said 'FUCK YOU' right to Xion's face by merely existing.

Her willingness to be used as a symbol came from the fact that she wanted to help, but knew that she wasn't much of a leader.

"Be that as it may, underestimating Xion may not be such a good idea." Varison tried to warn them.

"Yes, we must proceed with caution. But I don't think we should just ignore what Xion is doing either. We have a glorious opportunity here. Xion is practically throwing away his entire fleet. For newer ships maybe, but still. The rate at which he is getting rid of them is astronomical. It would simply be a shame to waste it. I say, we take this opportunity." Dorgovitch reasoned.

"Oh, and what do you have in mind?" another Turian asked.

"Simple. Lets steal every ship we can find there." Dorgovitch suggested.

Location: Rakata Prime, Star Forge

"Magnificent" Xion breathed out as he stared at the design schematics for the newest ships that would make up the Imperial Armada.

"Hope so. Put some of my best work into it." Heleon said.

"These new ships trump our old ones by light years!" Thrawn said amazed as he looked at the schematics as well.

"Yes. Helps that your I.I. has been continuously sending in new tech for me to study over and use. Where does it all come from again?" Heleon asked.

"The Galactic Republic. It is across the Hyperspace Disturbance Line. It's about 4,000 years more advanced in technology than we are. My Imperial Intelligence agents have been scouring the Republic for just about every good bit of tech they can find and then send it back to us." Xion had sent the members of Imperial Intelligence to spy on the Galactic Republic from the moment he made the organization.

HK-47 gave Xion periodic updates about what the members were doing, and constant complaints that he didn't get to kill enough things.

The I.I. agents themselves ended up having a pretty easy task as they went about infiltrating the Galactic Republic. Their hunts for advanced tech to send back to the Empire pretty much just amounted to getting the common tech that could be found everywhere and sending that back. Since they were just taking what was considered easily accessible to the rest of the public, with only a few cases of some really advanced tech, no one even realized that they existed.

"Well, with their help. I was able to design these ships. As you can see, based them off of former Sethelonian designs. Compared with Turian and Salarian designs. Sethelonian wedge shape considered superior. Allows for full frontal assault and gives decent side coverage too. The largest ship is one of the first of the new line of what I call the Annihilator-Class Star Destroyer (3). " Heleon said.

"Star Destroyer. Interesting name. Why give it that?" asked Thrawn.

"Simple. Sounds intimidating." Heleon said.

"Well, can't argue with that logic." Thrawn responded. Whether it was a compliment or not was entirely up for debate.

"The Annihilator-Class is the largest and most powerful of the new ships. 2000 meters in length, possesses one of the fastest hyperdrive cores available, and has 16 main twin heavy turbolaser batteries, four on each side on top and bottom, along with various other medium turbolaser, laser cannon, anti-fighter batteries, missile tube, and proton torpedo tubes. Shield generators are also some of the best, the command bridge being especially well protected. This is a ship that's been designed to fight other ships, hold its own, and take the battle to them. Also possesses 3 hanger bays, one on each side and another main one on the underside of the ship; right below command bridge. Shape is forward sloping wedge, thus allowing for gun emplacements to be used at full capacity at the front. Not only that, it has massive storage capacity. Can store a whole army if needed."

Thrawn widened his eyes, impressed with the powerful armament on the new warship.

"Also, heavy turbolaser batteries have a special configuration. Can be used to fire extremely powerful and long reaching beam attack. Takes longer for the guns to recharge though." Heleon finished up with the rest of his explanation on the Annihilator-Class Star Destroyer before moving on to the other ships.

"Next is Specter-Class Star Destroyer. 1600 meters in length, ship is well suited for ship to ship combat, not as good command center though. Also lacks as good of starfighter compliment as Annihilator-Class. It comes with heavier armor, lack of underside hanger found on Annihilator-Class, and new type of experimental shielding tech." Heleon then went to show how the new shielding tech was supposed to allow for short bursts of extremely powerful shielding. It came at the cost of weaker weapons systems when active, but it allowed for the ship to be used in far more various ways.

"Then the Eradicator-Class Star Destroyer. Not nearly as powerful or large as Specter and Annihilator-Classes. Only 870 meters in length. Made more for escort roles. Would need greater numbers to take on heavier Capital ships. Does have very good speed though. Good for catching blockade runners." Heleon finished his explanation on the new ships of Xion's Navy.

"Well, there's certainly nothing on this side of the galaxy that can take these monsters on." Thrawn said, clearly impressed with the powerful additions to the new navy.

"Yes, and from what I can see, the first of each of these ship lines is about to be completed soon." xion said, looking out from the observation tower that had been built on the uncompleted Star Forge. There were large dockyards that had been moved over to the Star Forge Construction Site so that new ships could be built and then sent right to the Star Forge for mass production.

Right now, each of the three new ships that Heleon had designed were under construction and were close to being finished. Final tests on the engines, hyperdrive cores, weapons, structural integrity, and paint jobs were being completed along with any additional parts that may need to be built onto the ships.

"Sirs, the trial run of the MS-05A Zaku I Early Type Space Model is about to commence soon. It should be easily watchable from the viewport, but we can pull up vidscreens of it from the camdroids if you wish." a Salarian Scientist said to all of them. "You're not the test pilot? Considering it's your creation one would think you'd wish to take it out for its first drive in space." Xion said surprised. "Yes, well not the best pilot. Wanted to get maximum results. Looked through Imperial Rosters and found best starfighter pilot. Had him learn the mechanics, so should know how to pilot suit at least." Heleon replied. "Hm, well then let's see how well this pilot does." Xion said.

Anavel Gato (4) breathed in and out as he tried to calm his nerves. To think, he, he had been selected from all the other starfighter pilots out there to pilot the Empire's newest weapon. He had just been a recent recruit in all honesty. Sure he had scored really well in the Academy, but even then he was still a rookie. Hell, he hadn't even graduated soon enough to participate in the Tursal War as the conquest of the Turians and Salarians was being called.

"Attention Ensign Gato, the test is about to begin. Are you ready?" came the voice of one of the Salarian testers.

"O-Oh, yes sir. I'm prepared to begin" Gato said, a bit startled by the voice.

"Good. Start with flying through several of these rings. We want to see how fast and maneuverable the suit is so we're going to have the rings constantly moving. We'll be timing you as well so try to make this fast." the Salarian tester said.

"Right." Gato confirmed before pushing the thrusters and causing the mobile suit's engines to ignite.

Blasting forward, the suit flew towards the holographic rings that had been set up. The rings were themselves moving up and down, side to side, turning around, and speeding up or slowing down in order to test just how well Gato could react. Gato pushed his suit forward and sent the Zaku through the first ring, which was just trying to move off to the side, before immediately backing up and heading towards a rapidly spinning ring. Getting inside of it just before it completed its next rotation Gato watched as it disappeared, all the rings he went through would disappear upon him getting through them.

Flying to his next ring, Gato saw that this one was a very complex one to get through as it was spinning on its horizontal axis, was moving at a high speed, and seemed to also move down in a spiral motion as well.

Heading towards it, Gato tried to get through with extreme speed, but that failed as the ring just moved away faster.

"Damn." Gato cursed at his initial failure before stopping and trying to get around the ring. Hoping that there'd be an opening, Gato moved the suit, and when he reached the side found that the ring was already flipping in another direction.

Gato then decided to stop and watch the ring for a while, trying to figure out where and how the ring moved. Upon figuring it out, Gato saw where the ring was going to be eventually, and then started calculating in his head when it would be at the point he was aiming for. Once he figured out where it would be and at when he headed over to that place, being sure not to arrive too soon or the ring would change direction.

He made it just in time and the ring itself moved through him and disappeared. Gato then went on to finish getting through the rest of the rings, and ending the test.

"Excellent work Ensign. The next test will be on combat capabilities. We will be sending out Sith Interceptors. They will be piloted by VI's so don't hesitate to destroy them. The interceptors are also going to be armed with lethal weaponry to get as much realism out of this as possible." the tester said.

"Understood. By the way, when will you send out the fighters?" Gato asked.

"They're already out." was the reply.

Just then his sensors flared up in warning, showing five figures coming at him.

Quickly maneuvering his suit to face them, Gato was greeted to the five Sith Interceptors that had been sent after him.

All of them started firing at him immediately, forcing Gato to make some tight twists and turns to dodge them. He started hearing some of the suits parts start to creak and groan at the extreme movement, causing him to wince in worry.

The starfighters meanwhile had been moving so fast that they went past Gato and out of their own range for shooting at him. They had to turn around and speed towards him, but now, Gato was ready to fight back. And he did so by first aiming the Zaku's left arm which contained a single grenade launcher. Firing it, the grenade went and hit one of the starfighters, smashing its cockpit to pieces and then blowing up, engulfing the entire starfighter in fireball.

Gato then took out the 105-mm machine gun that was attached to the back of the Zaku. He pulled out the handle that was on the side of the gun and held it with the left hand of the Zaku in order to stabilize it.

He then unleashed a heavy torrent against the remaining starfighters. The bullets flew past them as the fighters made their way towards Gato, their own guns preparing to fire. Yet as they got closer, the bullets became more accurate, and one of their number was felled by a bullet smashing into its cockpit, causing the starfighter to explode.

Another was torn apart by a bullet ripping through one of its wings, showing the light construction that was a part of the Sith Interceptors, and also causing it to veer off course and crash into another starfighter, making them both blow up.

Gato meanwhile tsked at the amount of recoil that the gun was giving and its overall lack of accuracy. Deciding to ditch the gun, Gato went for the heat hawk that was also stored on the back of the suit.

Activating the blade, Gato watched as it turned an angry red signifying that it was heated. Heading towards the starfighter which was now blasting away at him, Gato dodged around the laser bolts that were fired at him. The fighter also launched two missiles which were cut in half by Gato, exploding behind him as he went for a final boost of speed and slammed the axe down on the starfighter.

It worked well at first, but then the heat hawk started to malfunction, forcing Gato to put a lot more power into pushing the axe through than what should have been necessary. Cutting his way though, the now halved starfighter blew up, the Zaku's mono-eye glowing as it sought for anymore enemies.

"Good work Ensign. Please bring the suit back now. The test is over." the Salarian tester said.

"Understood sir." Gato replied as he brought the mobile suit back to the Star Forge.

As he looked on, Gato started with awe at the massive structure that was before him. The Star Forge was easily one of the largest construction projects the Sethelonians turned Imperials had ever done in their long history. It easily eclipsed the length of the old Centurion-class Battlecrusiers times 100. It was around 220 kilometers in length when one counted the massive fins that were under construction. The central ball was already nearing completion along with one of the fins, and the other two fins were beginning to be build on as well.

'This…this is a symbol of the success of our empire.' Gato thought to himself, a patriotic pride coming to him as he thought of how much life for everyone had improved since the Sith Empire had come into power. His father had been unemployed before the Star Forge construction project and his family had been in danger of losing their home which had forced Gato to quit school and entire the military in order to start making some money.

Yet when the Sith Empire was made, suddenly his father was recruited along with thousands of others to aid in building the Star Forge. Suddenly his family was in the clear again. They could afford the food they needed, pay the plumbing, electricity, and now his siblings were able to get their educations. Everything really had been made better with the coming of the Sith Empire.

And that was why Gato had decided to stay in the military rather than go back to school. The military was not only giving him his degree anyways, but Gato felt that it was the one way he could truly repay the Sith Empire for making a better future. He'd fight for it and ensure its success, no matter what the cost.

Once he got to the correct hanger bay, Gato landed the mobile suit and walked it over to the storing rack. Opening the hatch, Gato got out of the suit and activated a cable that lowered him onto the ground.

When he reached the ground he found himself being greeted by the two people he least expected to meet in his entire life. Emperor Xion and Grand Admiral Thrawn were both there in the hanger bay walking over towards him.

Standing at attention, Gato immediately saluted them both and said "Y-Your majesty, Grand Admiral Sir, it's an honor to me you both!" He was somewhat nervous meeting the very people who had been the cause for his better familial life.

"At ease soldier." Xion said amused at Gato's nervousness.

"So you're the test pilot eh?" Thrawn asked.

"Yes sir!" Gato said.

Thrawn smiled and replied "Relax soldier, like Xion said, at ease. We're not going to bite your head off. Well, I won't." Thrawn smirked at Xion while he said that.

"Oh come now Thrawn. Do you really think I spend my time bothering my soldiers in such a manner as that? Well you're right. I do. " Xion joked.

"Well at least the troops get a good sense of fear in you. After all, far be it from me to suggest that actual awe inspiring loyalty tends to work better."

"What! And have them like me? Oh perish the thought!"

Gato looked on in wonder at the interaction between the two. They were more friends than subordinate and superior. 'Although, I guess I shouldn't be surprised. They did plan the whole uprising together.' he thought to himself.

"Well now. We didn't come here to joke around, despite contrary evidence. Instead we're here to see you." Xion said.

"M-Me?" Gato was shocked. A part of him still couldn't believe that some of the most powerful people in the Empire wanted to meet with him, a lowly grunt.

"Yes. You see, you quite impressed me with your piloting skills with that machine over there. Despite the flaws that it seems to have, you pushed through and completed the tasks." Xion complimented.

"Thank you." Gato said, happy that he had been able to please what was essentially one of his idols.

"Tell me, I'm curious to know, why do you fight for the Empire?" Xion questioned.

"Because, I believe in the Sith Empire. It's a chance for us to correct the mistakes of the old Sethelonian regime. It's a chance to move on and achieve a brighter future for all. I'm fighting for the Sith Empire because it's the best bet this galaxy has for order and peace." Gato said this time with full confidence.

Xion's eyes widened. Hidden by his mask, the young man in front of him had no indication that he had just surprised his leader.

Xion honestly was shocked by what he was hearing. To see someone who so heavily believed in him and the goals that he was working towards. It made Xion feel somewhat happy to know that there were people who were grateful for what he had accomplished. That there were those who had faith in him, even if it was only one person.

"Well then soldier, looks like you're an impressive sight. I have feeling that you'll go far in this galaxy. Anyone with a faith and conviction like yours also has the will to fight for their future. Keep that will, because it shall serve you well when the time comes." Xion said to Gato.

Proud to have impressed his leader, Gato stood at a salute as Xion and Thrawn started walking away from him.

"So, you weren't just prasing him because he inadvertently gave you praise right?" Thrawn asked.

"No. You saw his combat skills. Even when the suit was revealed to have several flaws in it he still pushed through and defeated the starfighters in record time.

"Yes. But is that is sign of perseverance or stubbornness; I wonder?" Thrawn responded.

"Often times perseverance and stubbornness mean one and the same thing. It depends on the success of the individual that separates the two. That, and I can feel it. Gato. He will grow into a legend in his own right." Xion said.

"Well, if you say so. You're the one with the shaman power after all." Thrawn said.

A tick developed over Xions head, not that anyone could see, and he said "It's the force. Not some hillbilly backwater nature crap!"

"Whatever you say." Thrawn smirked.

An Interdictor-Class crusier appeared out of hyperspace and headed towards the massive dockyards over Palaven. This Interdictor appeared to be very old if the battle scars and many scratches and patch-jobs over the hull were any indication.

"Man! Look at that old thing! No wonder we're getting rid of these old ships." one of the men stationed in the space station that was connected to the docks said.

"Looks a little bit too old to be in our navy honestly. One would think a ship in that condition would have been retired ages ago." another man said.

"Well obviously the Royals" and here this was said with as much disgust as possible "didn't put the proper funding to the military. So of course they were going have to use stuff that should be sent to the trash heap." a woman said, getting nods of agreement from her two male compatriots.

"Alright, enough chatter. Hail the coming ship." this time a Turian commander spoke and got them back on their jobs. With a quick 'yes sir', everyone was at their console, wringing again.

"This is Palaven Dockyards Control. Interdictor-Class, do you copy?" one of the guys said.

"Yes. We hear you. Which one of the docks should we go to?" the accented voice said.

"First we'll need your access code."

"We've transmitted it."

"Hm. One of the older codes. Weird. But we are still using it. Alright then." one of the guys pondered before giving the vessel the all clear.

"You may proceed to dock 5435. Is that understood." the Turian commander spoke to the vessel.

"Loud and clear sir!"

"Very well then." the Turian commander responded.

Aboard the newly arrived Interdictor-Class Cruiser, Thrace, Varison, Dorgovitch, and nearly all of his commandos along with a bunch of other rebel fighters were preparing themselves to board the docks and seize control of the space station.

"Man, I really don't think this will work." Varison said.

"We're already committed, I don't think saying that will help." Thrace reasoned.

"Yeah, but that still doesn't change how I feel. That space station is likely to have thousands of personnel aboard it. Soldiers included. Compared to that, we only have a few hundred. Unless we can signal the rest of our forces in time, then I fear we're doomed." Varsion said.

He then closed his eyes and breathed deeply for a few seconds before opening them and saying more to himself than anyone else "Alright, enough of this worrying crap! What comes comes. If I die, I'll take as many with me as I can!"

Thrace was uncomfortable with how Varison seemed to regard his own death, but let him be.

"Well my friends, this is the hour!" Dorgovitch said as he came towards the two and threw each arm over their shoulders.

"We will fight and either die or spread our struggle across the stars! So, as is a custom of my people, let us share in a drink!" Here Dorgovitch brought out a bottle of Grinshi Carvarian Whisky and three shot glasses.

"Don't see why not. Always nice to go into battle with a good shot." Varison said.

"Couldn't have said it better myself!" Dorgovitch said happily as he poured the shots out.

"Um, I'm only 16." Thrace said in weak protest.

Varison gave him a deadpan look at Thrace's abhorrently weak attempt to follow the age limit on drinking.

"Kid, get your priorities straight one of these days. It'd really make you a lot less stupid." Varison downed the shot as he said this.

"Oh come now! There's no need to be harsh on the young lad. He is only representing the morals that were taught to him. There's never any shame in that. It's when you form your own morals that you can be held accountable for them!" Dorgovitch then brought the shot glass over to Thrace "Now, drink up my boy! You are only young once, so might as well enjoy it!"

Thrace took the glass nervously and drank from it. However, his inexperience showed when he drank slowly instead of at once as he started coughing heavily from the burning sensation of the whiskey.

Laughing at the youth, Dorgovitch and Varison allowed Thrace a few moments to recollect himself.

"I have to say, damaged as it is, this is an impressive ship. It's really luck for us that you managed to get it." Dorgovitch commented.

One of the prep-phases leading up to their hijacking attempt was getting a ship that would enable them to get into the dockyards and let them carry enough people to take control of them. This was where Thrace and Varison had become invaluable.

As Royal Guardsmen, they had a lot of knowledge about the former Sethelonian Territories. There was a specific area that was seldom known about due to its relative uselessness as anything other than a garbage dump.

It was a planet by the name of Sardonis. It was once used by the Sethelonian Kingdom as a dumping ground for old naval vessels. It had been abandoned for quite some time save for the native wildlife, some of which had been mutated by the more potent energies used to power the ships.

The group had gone and found a ship that was in the best condition possible and would require as little work on repairing needed. The old Interdictor-Class Cruiser was the best they had found and it wasn't in a very good condition anyways.

They had done what was needed to make the ship habitable for people and able to travel through hyperspace, but beyond that it had nothing else. Its defensive systems were all shot to hell, so the ship was essentially just a fancy transport, if one could call it that.

As the ship docked into its designated area, everyone on board prepared themselves for the assault. A boarding ramp was then attached to the airlock, and two Sith Troopers entered the ship.

Before they ever got the chance to even voice their surprise, they were cut down by blaster fire.

"FORWARD!" Varison yelled out as he lead the charge into the station.

"EAAARRRGGGHHH!" was the cry of many of the soldiers as the followed Varison.

As they made their way onboard, they encountered many Sith Troopers who were unfortunately for themselves were still wearing their old Revan-era armor. Most were cut down in an instant, having been caught completely unawares.

As the Rebels spread throughout the station, Varison, Thrace, and Dorgovitch lead the Grinshi Commando's towards the command center.

"On your left!" Thrace called out to Dorgovitch who in turn saw the oncoming grenade and moved to smack it back to the owner with the butt of his rifle.

Exploding and killing the former owner, Dorgovitch soon switched his attention to the other Sith Troopers in the area, swinging his blaster rifle to face them and firing, the heavily modified weapon tore through their old armor with ease and they fell down with great burn holes all over them.

Other Grinshi Commandos made short work of their opponents as well, one throwing a rocket launcher to another compatriot and bringing out their own, firing and blasting through a whole platoon of Sith Troopers.

Another brought out two vibroknives and sliced into the necks of two Troopers. A group of five worked together to set up a rapid-fire laser turret and shielding positions in order to establish a defensive perimeter.

Others used sniper fire, smokescreens, or sheer overwhelming firepower to bring down more Sith Troopers.

Each Grinshi Commando proved just why they were the elites of their former Kingdom.

As the group advanced its way towards the command center, those in the command center were frantically doing everything they could to halt the advance.

"Activate all defensive turrets! Sound the alarms and get every soldier stationed here to fight! Somebody call for reinforcements, we've lost too many men in this fight already! We may not be able to hold out much longer!" the Turian commander tried to reign in the situation while his panicking subordinates tried to do as they were told.

"Damn! Why'd this have to come when the majority our guard was transferred?" the Turian commander cursed.

Meanwhile, Thrace and Dorgovitch had decided to go on ahead with their detachment of Grinshi Commandos to the command center while Varison would protect their backs with his detachment along with being reinforced by a squad of Turian soldiers.

"Alright then. This pathway should lead us to the command center." one of the Grinshi Commandos who'd hacked one of the station's terminals for a map of the station said.

"It feels weird that we're making it towards our goal so quickly." Thrace said as he blasted away with his lance at the Sith Troopers guarding the way. They fell before his barrage, their lower armor unable to keep up with the amount of blaster bolts coming out of his lance.

"Heh, I'd like to give a toast! To Xion, for being so overconfident that you let us waltz right on in here!" Dorgovitch raised his hand in a mocking gesture of a toast before moving on with the rest of the group.

Fighting their way through, the group made it to the entrance to the command center. One of the Commando's set a detonator on the door and signaled the rest to get into cover. Once the charge exploded, everyone rushed in to seize control.

The Turian commander panicked at the sight of the invaders and pulled out his pistol, intending to shoot at them along with this compatriots. They were all quickly blasted apart though by the higher skilled group who then proceeded to take control of the place.

One of them immediately sent a signal to the rest of their forces who were on board Turian transport ships.

Another immediately went to work gaining control of the defense turrets so and retargeting them on the Imperials.

Meanwhile with Varison's group, they were holding the line, but with the heavy assault they were under from Imperial forces, the situation wasn't looking too good for them.

Blaster fire flew all over the place as people were forced to just aim somewhere and duck in order to avoid having their own head shot off.

Varison had activated the shield on his left arm and was using it to keep himself well protected while he used his lance to spray blaster fire over at his enemies. The Grinshi Commandos had set up several shields and were currently hiding behind them while taking fire at their leisure.

One of the commandos held a spike launcher and was using it to great effect on the Sith Troopers. A fast, accurate, and powerful gun, the spike launcher suffered in that it was slow to reload, only fired one shot at a time, and was big to carry.

Yet, the weapon proved its effectiveness in the hands of a skilled owner, as the commando fired carefully; a spike piercing through the head of a Sith Trooper, causing blood and gore to spray over the walls.

The weapon was dead useful for piercing through the armor that the Sith Troopers wore, much like Varison's blaster lance. And it proved itself just as bloody, if the shower of gore it was continuously causing was any indication.

The Sith Troopers who were confronting them had to take walls and corners as their cover, and there wasn't much in the way of good cover where they were, making them far easier targets. Yet, they were still in greater numbers, and they were starting to become more organized.

Still, Varison and his group held their ground. It was only as a grenade came in front of one of the shields the Commando's set up that things started to go wrong.

The Commando's, thinking the grenade to be nothing more than a regular one didn't even bother dodging it; opting to hide behind their shields instead. It was the fact that the grenade was disc shaped instead of spherical that served as a warning to others who immediately got out of its range. Upon activating, the grenade didn't go up in an explosion of fire and shrapnel, but instead sent out a wave of electricity, disabling all electronic devices in the area, including the shields set up by the Commandos.

Shocked that their shields went down, the Commandos were helpless when Turian troops began to arrive and actually began assisting the Sith Troopers much to their confusion. Several Commando's went down at once due to the additional barrage of fire and lack of shielding.

When openings in the walls began appearing and turrets revealed themselves, things only got worse for Varison and his group as their heavier firepower began overwhelming their shielding. It was only a matter of time before the group was reduced to Varison's shield and whatever cover they could find.

It was only thanks to the turrets suddenly turning against the Imperials, that Varison and his group made it, and the arrival of reinforcements from another part of the station didn't hurt either.

Varison then started getting a transmission on his communicator. Activating it, he was greeted to a hologram of Thrace.

"Varison, good news. We've alerted the rest of our forces! They'll soon be here! It's only a matter of time before we've got our fleet!" Thrace said optimistically.

"Yeah, just wish more of us could have survived." Varison said looking out at all the bodies that were around him and his group.

A sad look passed across Thrace's face as he looked at the bodies as well.

"I'm sorry for taking so long Varison. I wish we could have helped sooner." Thrace said.

"It's not your fault. You did your job and I have to do mine. Now tell me, how long before the rest of our forces get here?"

"We had them hide out in a place not too far from the Palaven System; so it shouldn't take more than a few minutes for them to arrive. Once that happens, we'll be able to take just about every ship we need."

"Yeah. I have to admit, it's a bit hard to think that we'd ever make it to this stage. After that disaster with Ralaba, I thought we were screwed to be honest." Varison said.

"Yeah…" Thrace contemplated how their situation had changed so drastically. From a floundering rebellion with next to no hope for survival they were about to in what was probably the greatest hijack ever steal themselves a mighty armada and form the nucleus of their rebellion against Xion.

Varison leaned against a wall and took out a small bottle of water to quench his thirst. Sweat rolled down the side of his face as he panted from the exhaustion of his latest fight. He hadn't been able to completely block every shot with his shield otherwise it would have run out of energy far too quickly, thus forcing him to move and avoid the blaster bolts. His armor would only protect him for so long after all, so better to let it take damage when he really needed it. Having to constantly roll around and dodge grenades was no laughing matter either, and spearing some of those troopers hadn't been as easy as he would have liked.

"Man, I'll be glad once the rest of our forces arrive. We'll be in a real good spot then." Varison said.

"Yeah. Well good luck watching our backs. We're still going to have to count on you for a little longer."

"Yeah yeah. Don't worry." Varison responded.

While that conversation went on, those in the auxiliary bridge were in a panic trying to regain control of the situation. The loss of contact with the main command bridge had certainly not helped to allay their worries, and when the defensive turrets had turned on them it had nearly been a disaster. They had managed to deactivate the ones in their room, but were less fortunate in regaining control of the others, dooming many Imperial soldiers to their deaths.

They had also come to see that most if not all of their forces within the station were now becoming badly outnumbered by the rebels due to their control of the turrets and surprise attack. Their lack of adequate numbers in the defense of the station was no help either.

And yet, just when the auxiliary command thought that things couldn't get any worse, they were proven wrong again when they started to detect a several large vessels coming out of hyperspace. They were revealed to be Turian transports, which began heading towards the space station at top speed.

Once they docked and started unloading their payloads, the auxiliary crew was treated to the sight of thousands of rebels storming the dockyards and boarding the vessels designated to be scrapped.

As far as auxiliary command was concerned, everything was a disaster right now. Especially when the boarded vessels turned their guns on the ships that weren't boarded and began to rain down fire upon them, determined not to leave the Imperials with anything.

The only good thing about the massive theft of the ships was that the rebel force had now left the station as well, thus letting the remaining Imperials try and get a semblance of control. It really wasn't much of a comforting thought however.

It was only when a reinforcement fleet of Imperials consisting of a Centurion and several Sith Interdictors arrived that the rebel fleet decided to scram. Even though the rebel fleet had technically outnumbered the Imperial one by a large margin, the ships were considerably understaffed, and the disorganization of the rebels meant that they wouldn't be an effective fighting force against the newly arrived Imperials.

Meanwhile, inside the main command bridge of the station several figures appeared as though they had come from thin air. They were all dressed in black armor with glowing red outlining on the segmented parts that seemed to do a good job of hugging their figures better than regular armor and thus being more flexible. They wore helmets that covered the entirety of their faces and that had four glowing red eye-holes, two over the regular eyes and two on the forehead.

They were the newest addition to I.I., Imperial Shadows (5).

They specialized in stealth, infiltration, assassination, tracking, and subterfuge. Using technologies brought over from the Republic and the brilliance of many Salarians, the armor that the Imperial Shadows wore was capable of generating a cloaking field around the wearer and sending out a signal that blocked communications, scanners, and radar in an area of about 100ft, creating a virtual dark spot for them to move through. The armor also had the ability of long range communications and was highly durable, not to mention the cloaking field could also be used to create disguises by creating a movable hologram over the wearer.

Their helmets meanwhile were equipped with several ranges of vision going from normal to infrared to heat based to night vision. The helmets also transmitted feedback data in the form of local temperature readings, to how many of the enemy were in a surrounding area to, targeting schematics, to various other info. The Imperial Shadows came equipped with a left arm mounted high caliber blaster, and wielded a vibro-tantō and a rapid fire sniper rifle.

One of the Imperial Shadows activated a holoprojector that was mounted in the right arm of the suit and activated it. An image then appeared. It was the droid HK-47, leader of Imperial Intelligence and thus their boss.

"Sir" one of the Imperial Shadows spoke, their voices altered by the speakers in the armor so as to make it more difficult to identify them "the rebels have taken over the ships. It's just as Lord Xion wished. The rebels will now be easy prey."

"Statement: Good. Master will be pleased when he hears of this. Order: You will now report back to HQ at once. Lament: Oh, how I long to be out on the battlefield again." HK-47 said this last part as it looked around at the dead bodies inside the command bridge.

The humiliation that this assault on the dockyards of Palaven caused was astounding.

People were angry, they wanted someone to blame, they wanted to make the rebels pay, and they wanted solutions to their problem now.

Thankfully, Xion proved to be a master at shifting the blame. Instead of taking any for himself, he showed the rebels in the worst light possible. He envisioned them as a horde of monsters who were coming to destroy everything that people had worked so hard to build.

He used every possible slander that was out there to describe them, and he showed just how 'ruthless' and 'savage' they were when they had assaulted the station. Altered images taken from the security cameras on the station had them slaughtering the 'innocent civilian' workers on board along with their all around 'ruthless treatment' of the bodies of their fallen foes had greatly aided in turning public anger solely on the rebels.

Yet perhaps the biggest factor in letting Xion shift nearly all the public anger onto the rebels was his revelation that Bethany, the last Sethelonian Royal was their 'leader'.

I.I. had easily been able to pick up on the rumors of Bethany as the 'leader' of the rebel army that was forming. Those Salarians within the growing rebellion may have thought that they managed to hide the information well enough, but they seemingly forgot that the Sith Empire now had Salarians too.

The actual effect that Bethany being the leader of the rebels had varied amongst the different populations. Most of the former Sethelonian territories were literally foaming at the mouth demanding her head on a platter. Such was their hatred for their former rulers that it even extended to one who had genuinely tried to help them at one point. It had increased recruitment rates however, as more people joined up with the intention of ending Bethany and by proxy the Sethelonian Royal Family once and for all.

The Turian, Salarian, and Free Kingdom territories had far calmer reactions in comparison. Here, Xion had to use the images of treacherous Turians slaughtering their former comrades who had become part of the Imperial Military and were thusly a part of the legal governmental body. Turians, with their society being built around the point of serving the government, were understandably confused at this point as too who to follow; the rebels who were trying to bring down the Empire, or the Imperials who were the legal government now.

Those who had sided with the Sith Empire however were now greatly enraged at the deaths of their Turians by those they considered traitors and the humiliation of it happening over their homeworld, pushing them further onto the Sith Empire's side.

The Free Kingdom areas had to merely be threatened by the fear of losing the peace and order they had just finally achieved in the Sith Empire to get them into a frenzy against the rebels.

The Salarians were the least responsive to the situation as a whole and thus, Xion had no real problems with them.

With Xion managing to completely turn the near entirety of the population against the rebels, even in a situation where the public backlash should have affected him more severely than the rebels; one would thing that things couldn't get any better. That person would be wrong however. The best news of all times had reached Xion. The Star Forge had finally reached a stage where the production facilities on it could finally be put to use.

The now completed starships for Xion's fleet were thusly being put into mass production. The Star Forge however wasn't even close to being able to utilize its full capacity and was only producing ships and weapons at 20%. It would be enough however to crush the rebel fleet as far as Xion was concerned.

Location: Coranda, Imperial City Hospital

Thrawn sat on a stood beside the beside of his little sister Veracia who was laying down in a bed, now dressed in a hospital gown instead of the outfit Benarce had forced her to wear.

Thrawn was absolutely miserable right now as he looked on at the blank look that was in his sister's eyes. She just looked forward, staring out into space, looking at and recognizing nothing. She had nearly the same look as soldiers who got the thousand yard stare.

It twisted his insides to think of what had been done to his little sister and how powerless he had been to stop it. He had sworn from the time that she was little that as her big brother he would protect her. Yet when she had needed him most he hadn't been there. He had been forced to just bury the pain inside of himself as he could only imagine what kind of horrors Benarce had put her through.

When the doctors had finally been able to give a medical report on Veracia, Thrawn had nearly screamed with rage at what he had seen.

The medical report told him of numerous bruises, broken bones, cuts, and internal damage that Benarce had done to Veracia. His repeated rapes of her had also gotten her pregnant repeatedly, and thus she had been forced to take multiple abortions as Benarce didn't want any pregnant girls. That, combined with his brutal rapes had taken their toll and left Thrawn's little sister infertile. She would never be capable of starting a family of her own.

The bruising and scaring had thankfully been easily removed as it looked like Benarce didn't like his girls looking like bruised tramps. He had given them constant medical treatment on the cosmetics department.

It was a small and shallow comfort for Thrawn to know that at least his sister wouldn't have to deal with any physical deformities at the least.

Yet Veracia's horror story wasn't over yet. Not only was she practically beaten while she was raped, but she had also been filled with drugs according to what the doctors found in her bloodstream. Severl narcotic substances had been found, indicating that Benarce was trying to twist his victims around and get them to try and enjoy what he was doing to them in his sick and twisted ways.

The psychological abuse had destroyed Veracia as well. Being called all manner of insulting names, being shown her constant powerlessness, having to witness the same thing be done to other women, and when the narcotics were given, the horrid fact that she would take some pleasure from the drugs at least had all contributed to the total breakdown of Veracia's mind.

Now essentially a vegetable, Veracia rarely moved, didn't talk, and just stared forward, lost in her own nightmares.

Tears ran down Thrawns eyes as he knew that the sweet little girl that he loved so much had been destroyed so utterly and by abhorrent monster like Benarce.

Benarce just brought up a feeling of such malice and destructive potential, that to call it hate or rage would be insignificant. This was a primal need, a desire so great that it was nearly embedded to Thrawn's instinct. This was the need to cause such great suffering upon Benarce and the rest of the Sethelonian Royalty that if they ever had descendents a thousand generations from now then they too would feel the fury and pain that Thrawn would cause upon their line.

He honestly never wanted to destroy someone as much as he did Benarce. And his only regret with Benarce was that he wasn't around to suffer some more. With the newer technologies coming in from the Republic, so too were coming new tools of torture.

Yet, looking upon his little sister, Thrawn felt all those emotions wash away as he tenderly looked at her and reached out slowly to try and at least give her a comforting shoulder pat.

Yet the second his hand moved an inch towards Veracia, she automatically flinched. If there was one thing her mind had retained, it was a fear of men, and heartbreakingly enough, this extended to her older brother as well.

Thrawn was visibly hurt by this, yet in no way blamed Veracia for her response, knowing that there was no logical way for her to not be afraid of men is some way, shape, or form.

He loved his little sister with all of his heart, and was willing to do anything to see her recover; and if that meant staying away from her and never getting to see his sister again, Thrawn would do just that.

"Oh Veracia. If mom and dad could see me now. What a failure I am. I couldn't protect you. I was your older brother. It was my duty, my responsibility, my greatest task, and I failed. If I burn in hell after all this is over for my failure, I won't complain. But Veracia, I know you can't hear me, but maybe…if any bit of you is still left in there then please, listen to what I have to say! I vow, that no matter what reason, what situation, what person tries to stop me, I will protect you! Even if I die in the attempt! I will never let you get hurt again! I'll take any scar, bear any burden, fight any foe if that's what it takes to protect you. I know, those words are shallow now. They do you no good, but still; they're all I can offer." Thrawn said sadly.

As Thrawn kneeled by the bedside of his sister, a polite knock sounded from the door.

"Come in." Thrawn said.

The door opened and an Imperial Officer came in saying "Sir, it's time. The rebel fleet has been found. Our forces are to head out and destroy them soon."

At this, Thrawn gave a vicious smirk. Soon, the last Royal would die. Maybe then, some form of greater comfort could be offered to Veracia.

Location: Asteroid Field

Within a large asteroid field, the new rebellion that was now publicly calling itself the United Liberation Forces had gathered practically every resource it had there.

The entire fleet of stolen ships was hidden here with the purpose of keeping them hidden and protecting them from outside attack. They were deep enough in the asteroid field that any enemy who wished to engage them would have to do so by entering into the asteroid field themselves. The United Liberation Forces' Navy had blasted themselves a large space within the asteroid field so that they wouldn't have to worry about the big rocks while staying there. Instead, only the enemy would have to be concerned with them when they would have to enter the field to reach a close enough range to fire upon them.

Right now, the fleet was currently doing logistics and gathering more numbers to their cause. About two weeks after their attack on the Imperial dockyards over Palaven and their mass hijacking of ships, many other resistance groups in the Sith Empire were willing to join up.

Even groups like the Democratic Movement, a group of Sethelonians who wished for a democracy and had been fighting the Royals and now the Sith Empire were willing to join up, if only because the United Liberation Forces held the most success so far. They were drawing more and more numbers, and subsequently attention to themselves as well. Yet so far the Sith had yet to find them, which boded well.

They had whatever was left of their fleets scouring the cosmos for them, yet couldn't seem to locate their position.

All in all, the United Liberation Forces laughed at the Imperials for what they perceived as their arrogance at thinking that they had vanquished all their foes.

Spirits were very high and even though Xion's portrayal of them was outraging many members, it wasn't enough to overwhelm their high spirits.

"These images you see here are disturbingly graphic and I do hope that those parents with children are doing their best to keep them away for now. These rebels, or rather terrorists have shown their true colors. They make the claim that they are trying to free us. But their actions have taken a meaning that is the exact opposite of what they are trying to say. They assaulted a place that was extremely vital to the Empire for our trade and safety and they did so in a brutal and uncouth manner. These terrorists are monsters that must be brought to heel before they end up destroying everything that we've worked so hard for. We must ga-"

"Enough with that crap already!" a turian said as he changed the channel to something more pleasing rather than the insulting news footage that was being shown all throughout the Sith Empire.

Many of those on board the command bridge of the Sarthowa a Centurion-Class battlecruiser were displeased with the news reports going on about them. Yet even so, they still were getting people to join them. Admittedly, the amount of people joining up were only in the few thousands and came from low population areas. Thus, regardless of the increase in recruitment size, the United Liberation Force only numbered in the few tens of thousands. And sadly, recruitment areas were beginning to dry up. Even with their hijacking of the Palaven Dockyards, many still believed that their forces held no hope of victory.

Numbers wise this was true. Even with the massive theft of ships over Palaven along with the rest of the Imperial Navy waiting for their new ships, they were still near hopelessly out numbered. It was also only a matter of time before the Sith Empire got their navy back into shape and really began to hunt them down. Not to mention that the recruitment centers for their army had been in low population areas, away from the center of Imperial control, where loyalists would have reported them in the second they heard of such a recruitment.

It was all about time. Right now the rebels had the momentum and they had to push it forward. That was why plans were being made for a new target to attack. They were going to take the war to Xion and work to free the galaxy from his grip.

"Why don't we try to take back Palaven! Trust me, we can win if we try!" a female Turian by the name of Ixecis said.

Female Turians, as opposed to the male Turians tended to have shorter crests, were somewhat thinner, smaller, and curvier; held a duller skin tone than male Turians, and had a higher pitched voice.

Ixecis was a former Turian general who had fled rather than join the Sith Empire upon its conquest of her homeworld, especially after the deaths of her entire family during their assault on Palaven.

"Palaven is deep in Imperial territory. Even if we did liberate it we wouldn't be able to hold on to it for very long. The Imperials would have us surrounded. I'd suggest taking a slower approach and starting out with outskirt territories. We'll want to take over areas that have high food production and can support a large population." Moltron, the single-horned salarian said.

Bringing up a hologram of the galaxy, indicators appeared around the outskirts of Imperial territory, pointing out to several planets that may be ideal for Moltron's suggestion.

"I'd recommend starting from this planet here." Moltron pointed to a planet that was in the northern outskirts. "It's a great garden world, lots of already established farms, very little military presence, and the surrounding planets are also weak in defense as well. If we attack here, we can start a movement that may grow into a full on scale war." Moltron finished.

The idea was appealing to many people. They all liked the ease with which they would be able to conquer the place, and having a strong place from which to gather resources from was sounding like a very good idea. There was one however who wasn't impressed.

"Oh yes, and just how is that supposed to do any damage? The Sith Empire has hundreds of worlds just like that! I we go with your plan we won't do any damage at all. Right now the Sith are in chaos after our attack. Failing to do more damage now will only cause them to come back stronger sooner. We need to press our advantage now! If we attack Palaven we will deprive the Empire of a massive source of industry and military strength. My people, regardless of what occupation they choose, are warriors. Its required by all that at the age of 15 you sign up for the military. Military is our way of life, we're a race that knows how to fight! From the youngest solider to the oldest veteran we can all fight. Our parents teach us how to use a gun when we're kids. All we have to do is free Palaven from the Empire and we'll have one of the largest recruiting bases in the galaxy!" Ixecis called out, much to the support of her fellow Turians and several other bolder members.

"If you're people have such a strong will, how'd the Empire beat them in a matter of weeks?" Moltron pointed out.

Ixecis flexed her mandibles slightly in anger at that statement.

"We were beaten because we had just lost most of our professional military and before we were even able to get word out we found ourselves under attack. The Empire had surprise and numbers on their side! That's the only reason we lost!" Ixecis grounded out, furious at what she considered the greatest humiliation of her people ever.

Dorgovitch chose at this moment to speak "We must not be too hasty with our decisions. Let us remember that while we may have scored a great victory, the Empire is still vast as well as powerful. We have merely cut a deep gash into a ferocious Rancor. A great injury to be sure, but one that makes the Rancor no less dangerous. If we move too quick, I fear we will lose everything we have gained."

Varison agreed with Dorgovitch "Yes, we need to consider all options first. But I do believe that your plan Moltron will work out for the best. Its patient and lets us work towards building ourselves and our reputation up. A conquest of Palaven so early in the game may just end up destroying us. Plus" here Varison brought up a hologram of Palaven, "from what our spies say, the Imperials have only increased security in order to prevent another attack. So any attack on Palaven will be expected by them. We'd lose the valuable element of surprise."

Thrace nodded in agreement with Varison, Ixecis becoming incensed at that.

"I-I also agree with Moltran." their leader, Princess Bethany as she was now called by most said.

Ixecis turned her ire on Bethany and said "Oh really, and why is that?"

"Because, we need to think about how we can supply our people, and we also need a place for all the non-combatants to stay. Not everyone who joined us knows or even can fight. It isn't fair if we bring them into the battles too." Bethany replied, her voice regular in volume, but containing a surprising amount of conviction for what Ixecis assumed to be a weak willed princess.

Knowing that she was outnumbered on this decision Ixecis conceded "Fine then, since all of you want to take the easy way out, there's nothing I can do to stop you. Just hope we don't regret it in the future." Ixecis grumbled out the last sentence, but everyone heard.

Meanwhile, while that conversation was going on, a Salarian that was monitoring the computer systems of the Sarthowa noticed that there was something strange going on. There was a minute transmission that was being sent from the ship. Entirely unnoticeable and mostly it was due to luck that this transmission was spotted. Trying to see if the transmission was to somewhere else in the fleet or to one of their recruiting stations, the Salarian went over to the communication systems and started searching.

Upon his discovery that this transmission wasn't anywhere in the communication systems, the Salarian grew understandably confused. He began searching for just where this transmission was coming from. Scouring every relevant system he could think of, the Salarian became more and more bamboozled when he couldn't find anything. Curiosity growing, the Salarian began searching everywhere in the computer database for the transmission signal.

Eventually, after several hours of searching, the Salarian found it. It was really well hidden within the regular operating systems of the ship. Again, had it not been for the luck of noticing the tiny transmission signal in the first place, the Salarian speculated that he would have never found it at all.

The next thing the Salarian did was wonder, if this transmission was hidden within this ship so well, what about the other ships?

So he began to contact the other ships and as for access into their computer systems as well. Working his butt off to find each signal being sent from each ship, the Salarian was starting to get worried. Why was this even in here in the first place? What purpose did it serve. It was starting to become obvious that these weren't a natural part of the ships' systems otherwise they would have been in the communication systems. The fact that they were so well hidden also pointed to them having been planted in there.

It was only when the Salarian began tracing the signals to where they were being sent that his eyes widened in horror. They were being sent directly to Coranda, Capital of the Sith Empire!

"SON OF A BITCH!" the Salarian cursed quite loudly, drawing the attention of many.

The Salarian had come to the horrid realization that the Sith Empire had known where they were the entire time. Every ship in their entire fleet had likely been transmitting their location back to the Empire. The fact that the transmission signal was so well hidden also meant that it had to have taken some time for the signal to be put in, thus leaning towards the fact that the Empire had been expecting them to take the ships! Hell they had practically planned this now that the Salarian thought about it!

The Imperials had presented a very tantalizing target by practically ditching their naval vessels and then broadcasting this across the holonetwork! Too tantalizing. There was no way anyone would have been able to resist such a target. And that was what the Imperials were counting on! They had planted that signal in the ships with the intent that the rebels would come to steal them!

"They wanted us to steal the ships!" the Salarian breathed out in anguish over the fact that they had just played right into the Empire's hands.

Even while others were coming over to check up on him, the Salarian began trying to activate the alarms, contacting the commanders to warn them, do anything to try and save their forces.

And, as if Murphy's Law had been triggered by the Salarian's discovery, an Annihilator-Class Star Destroyer appeared from hyperspace right in front of their fleet.

"Sir, the rebel fleet is within the asteroid field. It'll be very difficult to reach them with a ship of our size." an officer onboard the Annihilator-Class, which was aptly named the Annihilator, said to Thrawn.

Thrawn, who was sitting in the captain's chair, looked out in front towards the asteroid field where he could see the fleet of stolen ships.

"Sir, our scanners report that the enemy fleet currently holds 8 Centurion-Class battlecrusiers, 23 Sith Interdictors, 14 Turian battleships, and 13 Salarian frigates." Most of the men on board the command bridge got really nervous at that. Hearing themselves be so badly outnumbered was never really a great moral booster.

Thrawn however only smirked, saying "I quite like those odds. And I suggest the rest of you bulk up. If you think we're going to lose this engagement for even a second, then you've severely underestimated the firepower of this ship!"

Thrawn then raised one of his arms and pointed it forward "Now, set our turbolaser batteries to beam cannon configuration and fire at these coordinates!"Sets of coordinates immediately appeared on the consoles of the bridge workers, causing them to get to work.

Meanwhile, the United Liberation Forces' fleet was in at state that while it couldn't be described as panicked, was decidedly uncomfortable right now.

"The Imperials found us! But how? We never left a clue as to where we were!"

"Damn! We didn't even get to start our plans yet!"

"Aw man, I'm spoiling for a fight! Bring it on you Xion dogs!"

From the varied reactions of the people onboard the Sarthowa, it was clear they weren't as worried as they ought to have been.

The reason why "Don't worry. The Imperial ship can't shoot at us from our position. We're too deep in the asteroid field. They'll have to move in to get into range. And we'll be free to shoot at our leisure all the while." Ixecis said smugly.

"But General, this Imperial ship is completely new! We don't have any information on it in any of our databases. What if it doesn't need to move in?" one of the bridge officers asked Ixecis.

"Oh? And tell me, how else are they going to fight us?" Ixecis responded haughtily.

A moment later, massive green beams arced across space, blasting through or burning holes in all of the asteroids in their path and continuing towards their intended targets. 32 beams in all, each in a pair of two, hit their targets.

One of the first ones hit was a Turian battleship. The pair of green beams tore their way through the main hull of the ship, completely punching through the shielding it had activated. Once the beams had done their work, what was left was a ship with a melted, burning, twisted, and warped hull. The Turian battleship soon went under, exploding in a brilliant flash of light, signaling the end of the 800m long warship.

The other beams also hit their marks, completely tearing though and obliterating their targets, causing bright flashes of light to be seen everywhere as the ships were destroyed. All in all, 16 ships were destroyed in the first few seconds of the engagement. One for each pair of beams.

Thrace, Varison, Bethany, Dorgovitch, Ixecis, Moltron, and many other survivors could only look on in horror at the sight of what was effectively a third of their fleet gone before they had even been able to engage the enemy. To make it worse, it was only a single enemy that did this!

Meanwhile onboard the Annihilator a mini celebration was going on at the first successful use of the beam cannons in an actual combat senario.

Thrawn smirked, pure satisfaction rolling off him in waves "Now do you all see? These arrogant insects thought they could rise up and destroy our civilization! Look at em now, cowering most likely! We, a single ship have just managed to destroy one third of their entire fleet! This is our time to crush this insignificant little stain upon our galaxy! Let us rid ourselves of this menace once and for all! THE LAST ROYAL DIES TODAY!"

Cheers all throughout the ship were being made as Thrawn had broadcasted it to everyone on board. They were all eager to fight now!

Meanwhile, the rest of the United Liberation Forces' fleet had just come to another horrible realization. The very strategy of taking cover within the asteroid field which was supposed to protect them had now just backfired on them! The Imperials could hit them but they couldn't hit the Imperials. Instead of acting as a shield all the field did now was block their way towards the Imperial warship.

"Damn it! All forces move out! We have to retreat! We'll move the fleet back and out of the asteroid field. Once that happens we'll be able to jump into hyperspace." Varison ordered.

"Are you nuts? We can't have all of our forces retreat. Some have to stay and fight back otherwise the Imperials will just overrun us!" Ixecis said.

"You want to sacrifice our own forces. That's monstrous!" Thrace yelled out angrily.

"Better that some survive rather than none!" Ixecis retorted.

"But they joined us because they believed in us. Abandoning them now we they need us, especially when we're responsible for their lives, is too cruel. I'm not some heartless butcher that'll let my allies die before me just so I can run!" Thrace called out, his unwillingness to abandon the rest of the fleet concrete.

"Enough. Ixecis speaks sense. We can't win this battle. And if everyone retreats, then we will just become easy targets. I pains me greatly, but we must sacrifice the body to save the brain." Dorgovitch grounded out, even though it was clear by the sound of his voice that he didn't want to do so.

Varison nodded and began giving out orders for the remainder of the fleet to engage the enemy. Starfighters were launched, ships began moving forward, and people readied their shaken nerves to do battle.

As the Imperials saw that the enemy was moving to engage them, Thrawn moved to give out his commands "Tell me, how many of the enemy will engage us and how many are fleeing?"

"Sir, from what our scanners show, 42 ships remain. About 32 of them are moving to engage us. 10 however seem to be moving farther away. Likely to move out of the asteroid field to escape into hyperspace."

"How long until our cannons are recharged?"

"A minute sir."

"Very well then. Launch our fighters and bring out our new toys. I wanna test these new mobile suits against an actual foe." Thrawn smirked as he thought about the end of the enemy fleet at the hands of this new weapon.

The side hangers on the Annihilator opened up, a set of four catapults launching out of them. Mobile suits, this time new combat ready MS-05B Zaku 1s, were lined up and ready to launch.

Gato Anavil breathed deeply, trying to calm himself. This was going to be his first real battle against enemy forces! This would be his first chance, a chance to show that he was a loyal solider of the Empire ready and willing to do what it took to fight in the name of Emperor Xion.

"This is Gato Anavil, launching!" Gato pushed the controls forward and had his mobile suit launch out off of the catapult and out into space. His mobile suit was a MS-05B Commander-Type Zaku 1. There wasn't much difference between it and the regular Zaku 1 save for the fact the Commander-Type had an antenna on the forehead and had increased communication abilities along with additional thrusters for greater movement. Gato's was painted in a white color scheme with the symbol for the Sith Empire on its right shoulder.

As mobile suits launched from the side hangers, the Sith Empire's newest starfighters launched from the ventral hanger. These starfighters were known as MK. IV Imperial Interceptors. With solar panels designed like trapezoids at their sides and two additional ones shaped like rectangular fins that could fold onto the bigger panels these starfighters had a large capacity for energy. Their laser cannons were also quite powerful and capable of blasting the much more heavily armored mobile suits to pieces should the need arise along with their proton torpedoes, which they carried in total four shot out in sets of two. They had less speed and maneuverability, than a mobile suit, but were still superior to their old Revan-era Sith Starfighters. They also had more armor than Sith Starfighters around their cockpit and could actually take a few hits.

All in all, superior to the elder Sith Starfigters in every way possible.

As the mobile suit and starfighter forces headed off into battle, the Sith Starfighters, Turian Interceptors, and Salarian Drones flew out of the surviving ships to intercept the oncoming Imperial forces.

The total mobile suits launched from the Annihilator numbered 52, 26 stored in each side hanger. There were a total of 102 Mk. IV Imperial Interceptors on board in the ventral hanger bay. In total, there were 154 manned fighter craft capable of engaging in dogfights with the enemy, with all being armed for ship bombardment as well.

The United Liberation Forces were capable of bringing to bear some 1000 starfighters, yet all of them were of a far more outdated quality than what the Sith were bringing to the table. This would be a test, not only for the newly formed United Liberation Forces, but for the new Imperial Military. Outnumbered as they were and yet armed in superior machines, it would be up to skill and superior strategy and tactics in order to win this battle.

Of course, having help from a big ass ship firing its long range beam cannons never hurt either.

As the fighter forces of the two sides engaged, bright flashes of light began to envelope the battlefield, the telltale sign of someone or something dying in a blaze of fire and light.

Gato moved quickly, his suit flying around and dodging enemy fire. Taking his machine gun, Gato fired upon the slower moving enemies, quick to obliterate five Sith Starfighters before they knew what happened.

Proving faster than what the enemy could match, Gato flew his suit around, taking aim and firing his far more accurate shots this time around. The far more fragile enemy starfighters blew up from the damage they took or veered off course and crashed into asteroids. The Imperial forces faced the same problems with asteroids as well, but were able to fight much more effectively than their technologically inferior foes. The asteroid field also did a wonderful job of regulating the Liberation Force's fighters, not allowing for swarm tactics and forcing one on one battles, which the mobile suits were excelling at.

One Zaku blasted apart a Turian Interceptor with its bazooka, another cut apart a Salarian drone with its heat hawk, several joined together and began mass firing their machine guns all over enemy fighters, blasting them to shreds.

The Imperial Interceptors were proving their worth too, chasing down enemy craft and blasting them to smithereens. They also acted as a distraction from the more dangerous mobile suits, forcing pilots concentrated on them to move and avoid their fire or risk getting destroyed. This made them easier pickings for the mobile suits once they were distracted.

"You four, on me! Wedge formation! Break up that mass of Sith Starfighters!" Gato commanded as the four suits joined up with him. Raising their guns, the four Zaku's blasted towards the incoming group of some 20 Sith Starfighters. Charging forward, the suits forced the starfighters to scatter.

Taking aim on the fleeing fighters, the Zakus turned and blasted with their machine guns, each one taking down a Sith Starfighter. The rest of the fighters regrouped and once again made their way towards the mobile suits, firing their lasers en masse trying to hit one.

It didn't work for them. The Zaku's proved nimble enough to evade the fire, and even then when a stray shot did hit it was a relatively weak blast compared to the armor that the Zaku possessed.

Some, seeing no need to evade the blasts, fired their guns instead, taking down three more. Seeing the need to split them up, the remaining fighters split off into 6 pairs of 2.

They hoped to separate the mobile suits, yet some took the initiative and charged the fighter pairs. One brought out its heat hawk and sliced through one, the other hand carrying the machine gun fired and blasted it apart.

Another kicked one of the starfighters right into another one, blowing them both up.

The other fighters launched their missiles at their intended targets, yet the other three Zakus proceeded to shoot those down. Turning on the remaining fighters, all five Zaku's fired a mass of bullets that proved too much for the fighters to avoid.

"Good work! I we keep this up, the rest of this battle will be cinch." Gato told the rest of his wingmen.

Massive beams tore through space as the Annihilator fired, taking down several more enemy ships. Most onboard were simply amazed at the sheer destructive firepower that the ship possessed.

So to were their enemies.

"Damn it! We can't even get within range of that thing and yet it can blast us to pieces! What the hell the Imperials do?" asked Ixecis.

"Mam! We've lost around 50% of our fighters! The enemy has only lost around 2%!" an officer alerted.

"What!" Ixecis was outraged.

Moltron grimaced "I think I can explain our devastating losses so far. Most of the forces we gathered were troops who specialized in ground combat. The majority haven't had experience piloting starfighters, and unlike the Imperials, we don't have the luxury of recruiting trained pilots. Thus, the only people we could send out to fight were inexperienced joes who only know how to steer the things and fire the blasters. Compared to the Imperials who've obviously received actual training and are in superior machines and I'm surprised we're holding out as long as we are."

"But we out number them 10 to 1. We should at least be slowing them down1" Ixecis protested.

"We are slowing them down. Just not by much. You of all people should know the effectiveness that a well trained army can have on an untrained one." Moltron responded.

Ixecis grit her teeth, mandibles twitching in anger as she acknowledged the truth.

Their pilots were untrained, Sith Starfighters were too fragile and lacked firepower, Turian Interceptors were despite their name unsuited for intercepting enemy craft as they were too big and bulky, and Salarian Drones were essentially a gun with engines on it; no capacity for intelligence was included in them.

As more of their ships went down in large flashes of light, everyone on board the Sarthowa felt their despair get worse as they realized just how superior the Imperials were proving themselves to be.

"Sir, the rebel fleet is falling apart. Our forces have broken through and are starting to attack their ships directly." an officer started to inform Thrawn.

"Alright then, cease bombardment of the enemy fleet. We don't want to hit our men. Move our ship closer though. We don't want to lose range of fleeing ships." Thrawn commanded.

"But sir, if we get too close then the enemy fleet can bombard us! We might be superior in tech, but even so, we're just one ship." the officer replied.

Thrawn offered a smirk at the officer, knowing that this ship alone could take down the entire enemy fleet, but he offered his version of condolences "Don't worry, reinforcements should be coming…right about now."

Even as he said this, two more ships exited out of hyperspace near the Annihilator. These new ships were the Specter-Class Star Destroyers Specter and Shadow. With the appearance of two more ships to support the Imperials, it looked like the rebel fleet had lost all pretence of fighting. Every ship there was turning tail and running. Yet, their strategy of hiding amongst the asteroids had done them no good. In moving out to confront the Imperials and get into firing range, they had gotten into the asteroids and made themselves more disorganized. The 10 ships that were originally fleeing were blasting away at the asteroids in front of them, but it was taking them a while.

The rebels were doomed, and they seemed to know it. As the Specters launched their fighters and mobile suits, the battle was considered a victory for the Sith Empire now.

The Specter-Classes had each launched 30 mobile suits and 60 starfighters, giving the Imperial fighter squadrons 180 new reinforcements.

These new additions speed to the battlefield as fast as they could, eager to aid their brethren all ready fighting.

With the enemy fighter squadrons largely being eliminated by this point, the Imperial fighters soon began attacking the relatively cut off rebel ships who were blocked off from each other due to the asteroids.

Three Zaku's moved in and began firing at a Sith Interdictor, their machine guns aimed towards the engines of the ship. The ships shields held for a time, but when the Zaku's fired their grenades, designed for piercing through a ships shields, the engines and thusly a major portion of the hull was lost. With the awkward design that the Sith Interdictors had, the hull really wasn't very big to begin with, and most of it was located near the engines. Now the ship had just been blown in half from the destruction of its engines.

Another Zaku fired its bazooka at as Salarian Frigate. The missile went and hit the command bridge, cutting the ship off from its main control center. The Zaku then continued firing at the main hull, using up all of the bazooka's ammo in the process, but getting the very satisfactory result of the main hull exploding. The entire frigate was destroyed by the blast, and the pilot inside cheered at his minor victory.

A Commander-Type Zaku, this one colored in the normal green, charged at a Turian cruiser, firing its machine gun all the while, destroying the turrets that the ship used to defend itself. It blasted apart one of the main guns of the ship and fired its grenade at the other.

Upon reaching the command bridge of the Turian Cruiser, the Turians inside were scared out of their wits. The mono eye flashing, gave only an ominous feeling towards all on board. Yet, something strange was noticed when the mobile suit still hadn't destroyed them.

One of the Turians was taken by surprise and was quick to voice this "Sir, we're getting a transmission from the enemy machine!"

"We are?" the Captain said confused.

"Y-Yeah. I'm patching it though."

"H-Hey, is that you?" a voice that the Captain recognized asked.

"N-No way! I can't believe this! It's so great to see you…well hear from you at least! I thought you were dead!" the Captain couldn't have been happier. He had just reunited with one of this oldest friends around. During the Sith Empire's invasion of Palaven, he had thought that his friend had perished in the dogfights that had been happening all across the Turian capital. Yet here his friend was, alive and well.

"Yeah, I'm glad you're alive too. But…" and here the Captain's friend's voice became strained "but why did you join rebels? Why did you betray your government!"

"Betray my government! What are you talking about"

"You always told me that no matter what happened you'd always remain loyal to the state! That no matter what they did, you'd stand behind it; because you were a proud Turian soldier!"

"Don't you get it? I am loyal to the state! I haven't left it! I'm the one fighting for it right now! The state is our old Hierarchy! It's the old government that we used to fight for! You have to understand this! Join me! Join all of us! Help us fight for the state! The right state!"

'The…the right state.' the Turian pilot thought to himself. What was the right state. Was it the old Hierarchy composed of Turians who had ruled for centuries or the new Sith Empire whose conquest of the Turians had been swift and brutal? Yet…hadn't the Turian Hierarchy government officially surrendered? Hadn't they been dissolved as a sovereign entity? Hadn't the Sith Empire already assimilated most of the running government into itself, becoming the State in the process?

As a Turian, he had been taught that a good Turian always gave them self up for the state. They thought about the well being of the government. The well being of society as a whole. It had given them a strong and hardy military doctrine and nature in general. Turians, whether they were from the same family or not had generally come closer as a race because of this attitude and were oftentimes quite friendly with one another; always willing to help out those in need and in turn receive aid when they were the ones in need.

As the pilot thought to himself, what he was supposed to do, he looked at himself and saw his suit, which bore the symbol for the Sith Empire, and the machine he was in, the epitome of the Sith Empire's new war machine. The pilot steeled himself.

"I-I'm sorry man. Please…PLEASE FORGIVE ME!" the pilot raised his Zaku's machine gun and took aim at the command bridge.

"W-WAIT! LISTEN TO ME! YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND WHAT YOU'R-AHHHGGGGGG!" the Turian Captain screamed as he was destroyed along with the command bridge. The Turian pilot shed a few tears of sorrow for his departed friend, and flew off, his future set as a soldier of the Sith Empire.

The rest of the Turian Cruiser soon followed its brethren as the damage it sustained proved too much and it went up in a fiery explosion.

With the Imperial warships closing in on the remnants of the United Liberation Force's fleet, the battle was soon coming to a close. The warships switched to their turbolaser configurations for close range combat with the enemy ships, but this proved to be no true hindrance to them as they destroyed the enemy ships just as easily. Asteroids weren't proving to be much of a problem with their superior firepower and smaller numbers.

Once they broke through, they immediately made a beeline for the escaping remnants of the rebel fleet, unconcerned with the ships that were left.

The running rebels were desperately blasting away at the asteroids, praying to whatever gods were out there to let them survive this ordeal.

The Imperials were having none of that however. They began blasting away with impunity, trying to bring down every ship that was escaping.

An unlucky Centurion-Class became the focus of their firepower, turbolasers and proton torpedoes hitting the ship causing massive amounts of damage to the superstructure. Unable to take the sustained bombardment and focus on blasting away the asteroids, the ship fell, breaking apart in the numerous explosions that rocked its hull.

Mobile suits and starfighters raced on by as they intended to aid in stopping the fleeing ships. Several Imperial Interceptors fired their proton torpedoes at a Salarian Frigate, engulfing the ship in destructive blasts that tore it apart.

Some mobile suits grouped together and took on a Sith Interdictor, swarming around it and firing all over it. Machine guns destroyed the turrets, heat hawks cut apart the hull, and missiles destroyed vital substructures. The Sith Interdictor collapsed under the assault and went down, destroyed.

3 more ships went down due to the relentless Sith pursuit, yet for all their hard work, all their time and effort spent in luring the rebels to this exact position, this day total victory was not achieved.

Five of the rebel ships broke though the asteroid field.

"Where do we go?!" Thrace asked, the relief of having finally broken through not entirely having been reliving of the stress of their overall situation.

"Anywhere! Just type coordinates in!" Varison yelled.

"Without a planed rout! Its suicide!" protested a console man.

Varison walked up to the console man, grabbed him, and tossed him aside before typing in a random set of coordinates himself. Transmitting these coordinates to the remaining ships, which beside the Sarthowa included three Turian Cruisers and another Centurion-Class Battlecrusier, Varison activated the hyperdrive and sent the ship careening into hyperspace.

"GOD DAMN IT!" Thrawn raged, even as one of the Turian Cruisers before it jumped was hit by several blasts. They had gotten away! Thrawn was furious. Now they had no idea where they might be. Sure the ships were still transmitting the signals, but those signals had been designed to be very weak and worked best when used in conjunction with other signals, such as with the larger fleet the rebels once had.

Thrawn raged about the command bridge now, acting on his fury and smashing or cutting to bits with his vibrosword whatever he could find. Everyone was wise enough to stay out of his way right now otherwise they feared that they might be cut down too.

"YOU HEAR ME! I WON'T REST TILL YOU'RE ALL DEAD YOU FILTH! DEAD!" Thrawn roared out, getting more crazed by the minute.

As Thrawn lost himself in the throes of his madness, he cried out once again, this time in anger and misery for his failure to full avenge his sister.

One Week Later

A detachment of the Imperial Fleet orbited the world of Ibonihs. Made up of 1 Annihilator-Class, 6 Specter-Class, and 8 Eradicator-Class Star Destroyers, this was a very formidable force. As to what it was doing over the old home planet of Naruto, now called Xion; well that was up for him to decide.

'Do I send in an invasion force? Do I bother to conquer the pitiful fools down below who play their petty little power games? Never knowing that all the while bigger forces have existed that are so large that they could swallow up the Elemental Nations. I wonder.' Xion thought to himself.

He had brought this fleet over his homeworld for the specific purpose of revenge. He was out for payback, pure and simple. A world that had seen him suffer for a burden he never had the choice to accept or deny was now ripe for retaliation against.

But again, how did he do this? Did he just bombard it from orbit, or send in his military to conquer it. Both had their merits. On one hand, he could just be quick and done with it, on the other, he could meek out his vengeance, slowly savoring it like a fine wine.

Of course, invasion had the downside of costing a large amount of manpower, and it would be for a world that he really didn't need. It wouldn't really serve any purpose to take over Ibonihs save for revenge, and he did have the lives of his soldiers to think about.

Besides, did the dwellers of this world truly deserve his wrath?

'Jiraiya, my sensei, my friend, my godfather, the man who was supposed to look after me but abandoned me to a life in a village that hated my guts! Tsunade, my mother figure, a woman who always had her heart in the right place, my Hokage, the woman who failed to protect me; the woman who saw me banished from a village that I gave the utmost loyalty too, that I strove to protect with all my heart, the woman who was too weak to control her people.'

As thoughts of the people Naruto knew of that world continued to pour through him, they became more and more negative.

'Iwagakure, it would have seen me with my head on a pike just for being related to my father! Kumo would made me into their slave! Kiri would have left me to rot! Suna never even tried helping me!'

Naruto's thoughts soon began to go onto the nations whom he felt were also responsible for the tragedies in his life.

"Move the fleet into position. We'll begin an orbital bombardment of the planet surface. Is that understood?" Xion commanded.

"B-But sir, our scanners only report that primitive life forms inhabit the planet! Bombarding it from orbit seems like too much! If we really need this planet can't we just send an invasion force?" protested one of the bridge officers.

"It is precisely because we don't need this planet that I'm ordering its bombardment. I'm not about to waste my perfectly good soldiers on such worthless endeavor. But, do send probe droids to these specific coordinates." Xion said.

"Y-Yes my lord." the bridge officer said, somewhat subdued and definitely disturbed with what was about to happen.

Arashi Susitu, an 8 year old boy, excitedly set up his brand new telescope. Son of a member of the Civilian Council of Konoha, he lead a very privileged life. It showed in the telescope that had been bought for him for his birthday.

It was easily one of the most advanced ones out there, with several layers of sealing to amplify the power of it, allowing the telescope to see as far out as the moon in great detail. With Arashi's great love of astronomy, and his desire to study as much of outer space as he could, it was little wonder that the boy had wanted this telescope for his eight birthday.

Looking into the telescope, the boy was greeted with what had to be one of the greatest sights of his life.

He was actually seeing the movement of triangluar shapes in space. Looking at the instruction manual and then focusing the telescope more, Arashi saw that those triangular shapes were actual space ships!

"A-Aliens! No way! I saw real aliens!" Arashi yelled out happily to himself.

This was so exciting! He had to tell someone. He knew his parents were both out late on some date, and he didn't live next to any of his friends, but the news was so exciting that he just had to tell someone.

Even as Arashi began looking for someone to tell, a meteor streaked past and landed in the center of the village.

Screams and shouts of surprise could be heard even as ninja went down to investigate.

As soon as people arrived on the scene however, they saw that the meteor was something else entirely.

The probe driod rose up and deployed its holographic transmitter, showing the entire village an image of a figure that was very familiar to those of the elder generations.

Many could have sworn that Minato Namikaze had just come back from the grave. The blonde haired man whose image now stood over the entire village certainly looked enough like him. It was the whisker marks on his cheek that gave the identity of this man away however.

"Attention denizens of Elemental Nations. My name is Naruto Namikaze, formerly Naruto Uzumaki! I am the banished jinchuuriki of Konoha, container of the Kyuubi! And I am also the son of Minato Namikaze and Kushina Uzumaki! I now speak to you to assure you all of your certain doom! After this day not a single one of you will survive the upcoming events that are about to befall you! Consider this my payback upon the entire world for their sins against me! If you wish for someone to blame for your future, turn your eyes onto Konoha!"

Arashi widened his eyes at the speech the man gave. He wasn't old enough to understand who this man was, but he understood what he said.

Looking back in the telescope, the last thing Arashi saw was a green light come off one of the ships that got closer and closer until it eventually surrounded his entire field of vision. Arashi, and so many others would die, bathed in this green 'light'.

"Heheheheehe Aahahahahahh AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!" maddening laugher came from Xion as his fleet blasted the world below them into rubble.

His laugher did nothing to reassure the bridge crew onboard. And as he laughed, an entire world burned as millions found their lives taken from them.

FINALLY DONE! HELL YES!

I am amazed that I ever managed to complete this chapter. I started somewhere around late 2011 or early 2012 and its only now that I've finally finished. At least I wrote a lot so maybe you guys will have something good and meaty to read.

I deeply apologize for making everyone wait for so long. I know that some or maybe all of you are going to want something to make up for that wait like additional chapters or faster update times, but sadly, I just can't promise anything beyond me still writing this story. I know that I'll never make any time limit that I set up for myself so I won't bother.

For those of you who thought I was dead, I'm not, but your nonmembership reviews didn't leave me any way to respond. Really not a good enough reason on my part though, and all I can do is say I'm sorry for not responding to your reviews.

For those of you who want a more detailed layout of the Ship schematics for the new Star Destroyers, here you go:

Annihilator Class:

General Info: Largest ship in the Sith Empire at 2000 meters long and 800 meters wide. Is capable of launching planetary invasions due large carrying capacity, has good fighter compliment, is good at assaulting enemy fleets directly, main capital ship of the Sith Empire

Appearance: Blue in color, triangular in shape with downward sloping, giving focus for frontal firepower. Command bridge is supported by small but wide tower, command bridge itself is like a square shaped trapezoid

Armament: 16 heavy dual turbolaser batteries/beam cannons, numerous lesser turbolaser batteries, many point laser defense cannons, 4 tractor beam projectors, 8 proton torpedo tubes, 24 regular missile tubes

Compliment: 52 Mobile Suits(Zaku 1's currently), 102 Mk.4 Imperial Interceptors, 40 X-Type Imperial Bombers, 8 Garuda-Class Transports/Landing Craft, numerous other vehicles and walkers

Crew: 3000 members, 5000 soldiers

Other: 3 main engines, 4 side engines, Class 1 Hyperdrive with backup, max power output 4.0 x 10^24

Specter Class:

General Info: Second Largest ship at 1600 meters long and 600 meters wide, makes the backbone of the Imperial fleet, best at ship-to-ship battles, less fighter capacity than usual, advanced hyper shielding capabilities

Appearance: gray with blue coloring, triangular in shape, flat in length, command bridge connected by downward sloping tower

Armament: 8 heavy dual turbolaser batteries/beam cannons, numerous lesser turbolaser batteries, many point laser defense cannons, 4 tractor beam projectors, 6 proton torpedo tubes, 20 regular missile tubes

Compliment: 30 Mobile Suits(Zaku 1's currently), 60 MK.4 Imperial Interceptors, 20 X-Type Imperial Bombers, 4 Garuda-Class Transports/Landing Craft, numerous other vehicles and walkers

Crew: 2000 members, 3500 soldiers

Other: 2 main engines, 3 side engines, Class 1 Hyperdrive with backup, max power output 3.7 x 10^24

Eradicator Class:

General Info: Smallest Star-Destroyer in the Imperial Navy at 870 meters long 400 meters wide, fastest ship too, great at defending against and hunting down smaller ships such as missile cruisers, blockade runners and other starfighters

Appearance: Mostly grey colored, triangular shaped, small downward sloping command bridge

Armament: 2 heavy dual turbolaser batteries/beam cannons, 10 lesser turbolaser batteries, many point laser defense cannons, 2 tractor beam projectors, 8 proton torpedo tubes, 40 regular missile tubes

Compliment: 10 Mobile Suits(Zaku 1's currently), 20 MK.4 Imperial Interceptors, 10 X-Type Imperial Bombers, 2 Garuda-Class Transports/Landing Craft, several other vehicles and walkers

Crew: 950 members, 1500 soldiers

Other: 3 main engines, Class 1 Hyperdrive with backup, max power output 3.5 x 10^24

(1): The Turians don't know the Sethelonians have become the Sith Empire yet

(2): They don't know that Xion doesn't really care about her dead

(3): All images for the ships can be found on my profile page

(4): Yes, the same Gato from Gundam Stardust Memories

(5): The image for them can also be found on my profile page

Hope you all enjoyed the chapter! See you next time!