Chapter 38
(The Stardestroyer Repentance)
"Order all ships to ready all primary weapons after immediate reentry into normal space, and give them fire-at-will authority on all space bound vessels and leave the world to the ground forces. Kamino is to be conquered not annihilated." Kellia commanded without looking to the captain of her own Stardestroyer as the ship flew through the swirls of hyperspace. She stood with her arms crossed and folded within her bulky blue Jedi robes as she stared numbly out the viewport with nothing but the vision of the water world in her mind and the coming battle.
"Yes madam Supreme Commander. What forces will you be deploying to the world?"
"Droids. Twenty-eight thousand B1 battle droids, thirteen-thousand B2 super battle droids, and five-thousand droideka units, and a light armor support of fifty dwarf-spider-droids. I want this world to fall and the Kaminoans to be shown the folly of their foolish ways and allegiance to an empire that all but despises and uses them. No matter whether they tried to gain freedom at a point or not does not matter at this point. Either you rise and fall in your endeavor to gain freedom or your succeed. Failure and retreat into complacency is worse than failure and death." Kellia said more to herself but she could sense the one time Imperial officer behind her feel not as content with her reasoning, but she didn't need his approval. Only his obedience, and efficient following and carrying out of orders. Kellia could care less; to be honest, what an ex Imp-Officer thinks of her and her mindset.
"Yes ma'am. We are but a few moments from reentry. Do you want to make for the hanger bay and load up?"
"I think I'll do that captain. Be sure to manage the battle to the best of your ability and wipe out the Imperial fleet to the last. If we do not get them all they will call for assistance and bring lord Vader himself upon us, and we will not hold back that tide." Kellia turned and made for the exit as the captain nodded and readied his ship for the coming fight and Kellia made quickly for the hanger bay where the transports were being loaded with battle droids. The fleet she brought with her to Kamino were a mix of all manner of ships. Three Stardestroyers, seven Victory-I's and nine Victory-II's, along with twenty-eight Munificent-class star frigates, and twenty further CR90-corvettes, plus five Mon-Calamari MC80 Liberty-type Star-Cruisers. This seventy-two ship strong fleet, Kellia believed to be more than enough to break the Imperial fleet that would be waiting for them. For the Empire would guard this world with great ferocity, but Kellia also knew it wasn't the biggest fleet in all existence, due to the spreading war, and desire to keep the world hidden, and their complacency before the Moff betrayal the fleet would be lax and that gave her a cold smile of satisfaction. She would see these cloners, these people who would play the Force and make life, and force their seeds of destruction upon the galaxy burn for their transgressions, and every cone she came across would fall to a droids blaster, or rebels blaster, or her saber and she will smile into their dying faces and let them see. Let them see that they have failed in their endeavor to kill her and the Jedi, and to serve their creator and master Palpatine. All clones of the Fett strain would die, or she would in trying to do this. Then the next strains would come and she would savor them all. Dark side, or light side be damned! This was for the betterment of all life in the galaxy, and if she needed to sacrifice her soul to see it done. Then so be it. Besides, seeing the clones all killed by the very reason for their creation, the droids would make Kellia laugh, and she would revel in this laugh, and planned on doing so by the end of this day on Kamino.
"Hear this, all flight officers, and technician units make for your designated posts aboard the ship and prepare for battle! All troopers, and flight officers are hereby on standby and will not be joining the ground assault! I repeat, all troopers and officers will not join in the assault at this time!" The captains voice came booming over the ship wide com system and Kellia nodded to herself. She wouldn't dare bring or trust these ex-imperial troopers. No droids were far more...reliable to her, and Force, that sounded weird after the Clone Wars, but times have indeed changed.
She rounded through the halls of the sterile ship and brushed past troopers and officers who were now wearing emblems signifying URM allegiance which were for now simple Aurebesh letters for URM painted onto their shoulders in a bright blue color to hopefully signify ally from enemy. Though Kellia would not trust a single white armored trooper for a damn, but kept her tongue in check for now. However, she knew that in time even these men, these fools would fall by her and her droids, and once more clean the galaxy of their stench.
She finally then reached the hanger bay and then felt the ship lurch and the first booms of battle followed not thirty seconds later and the ships came to life and outside the hangers ray shields she saw massive bolts of turbolaser fire fly in all directions and slam into the Repentance. She ran into the hanger in full and found dozens of already activated droids running onto their designated ships and she smirked as she joined one ship without needing to say a thing as the droids were all programmed to recognize their SC, and she nestled her body in between two massive B2's that held their arms at the ready and watched the ramp close in front of her and plunge her and the droids into darkness. Then she felt the rumble of the ship beneath her feet and then felt it take off with great speed and forced her to lurch forward some as she could sense and feel the blasts from fighters and ships attempt to fire at her ship and she added her own power into protecting her ship as it banked and swerved to miss being fired upon and destroyed. The ship then took a hard nose dive and she felt the old rumblings of atmosphere entry as the fires coiled around her ship and wee kept at bay by the shields she unclasped her saber hilt and allowed her robe to fall off her shoulders and left her standing in the normal Jedi tunic she kept from all those years ago.
Outside the rumble of what was no doubt anti-air fire blew by her ship and the others falling to Kamino below as the fleet of drop-ships filled to the brim with battle droids punctured the atmosphere, and made for Tipoca city. The ship continued to nose dive before suddenly and with great force banking back up and coming to a hard lurching stop and landed on a landing pad of the city, and lowered its ramp quickly and Kellia dashed out into the raging endless rain of Kamino and activated her saber that sizzled with every rain drop that fell upon her cerulean beam of energy. Her wild hair was pulled back into a messy ponytail as the rain immediately made it dampen and stick to her tunic and her clothes all stuck closer to her body, but she cared not a bit.
She found herself being fired upon by massive amounts of enemy blaster fire from all directions, above, below, her front and sides, but every one she blocked with expertise and skill she reveled in as very bolt went flying back and struck most the fools who fired it, and she smiled a brutal smile in turn. Fro her side the battle droids filed out and her B2's went into their usual slow walk with their arms extended and fired back at the Stormtroopers who she sensed were struck with horror at the sight of the droids. Three droideka units rolled past her and along a connection ramp and uncoiled before a set of glass doors and fired into them and blasted them open and bypassed the troopers lining the walkway along the dome building, and entered the facility as Kellia allowed the B1's and 2's to take up positions on her landing pad and fire back at the troopers in a flurry of fire between both parties. Kellia continued to send bolts flying back in all directions as she gave her B2 units time to walk up the walkway and close in on trooper posts on the opposite walkway connected to the main dome building complex, as her massive swarm of B1 battle droid units flooded out of the drop ship and fired into the troopers converging on her position.
Kellia glanced and saw more ships land on other pads and unload their own company's of battle droids, and one blew in a great heaping fireball as rocket firing troopers lined the upper landings and fired down and made Kellia sneer at the fools.
Running forward and jumping over the B2's she skid to a stop and rolled before coming onto the enemy walkway and dashing forward into a line of troopers who she cut down one by one in a flash of speed. When she fell upon the last who turned to shoot her down she spun fully around and took his head off but then spun again and ducked form more blasts and threw her saber spinning into a squad of enemy troopers who all were sliced into bits and fell to her saber, which she jumped back up to grab, and fall to the ground facing the opposite direction where more troopers fired on her.
One trooper neared closer and fired a furious bout of endless red bolts on her and she blocked everyone and was stunned herself when the trooper flew into the building wall from a bolt striking his helmeted head and she glanced to her right and saw her B2's nearing and firing their arm blasters in great bouts into the troopers and sick smirk fell upon her face as she sensed the awed horror from the troopers, some of whom were apparently old enough to remember these...clankers. She held her saber in a backwards position and ran forward into a crowd of troopers as her B2's fired on them she ducked low and sliced through their legs or struck up cutting them full in half, and leaving burning corpses laying about in scattered nothingness. A distant bolt of lightning flashed and Kellia saw from the illumination, many hundreds of ships descending to the world and coming for the city or perhaps some of the other scattered about the world, but those were secondary, nonetheless all the ships were loaded with her droids and she couldn't help the smile on her face broadening at the sight evermore.
"All of you droids are on me. We move into the city and you will cut down every organic you come across save myself!" She ordered and the B2's replied with a 'roger roger,' with their deeper artificial voices and the B1's did so with their own, and all of them readied their blasters and she entered into the blown out doors made by the droideka advance team. She posted four B1's on the door, knowing full well they could fall, but she wanted whoever came from there to have trouble nonetheless, and she took a slower stride into this great domed building and its even more sterile walls and interior made her nearly go blind from the shine.
They swept through several sterile white halls and marched their way in massive clanks of metal hitting the floor with her at the lead with her blue saber adding a sheen of brightness to the halls. The council would never know nor dare to ask what had happened with her assault upon this world. All of them wanted the Empire dead and gone, and so what if a couple thousand...million, the whole billion even died? Stopping at the first hall with lined doors, she brought her right hand up and with two extended fingers pointed towards the doors on either side in military order fashion and three B1's swept past her and the B2's who stood hulking over her like guards. The B1's pressed the pads and the doors swept open and they entered inside and Kellia wait anxiously for the sound of fire, and was not disappointed.
The resounding booms of blaster fire came from both sides of the hall as the droids killed every organic they found and Kellia didn't bother wondering if they were clone or Kaminoan. They were nothing to this failed Jedi. The droids came back out and she enjoyed that these machines did not give a single care about what they'd done, and she moved past them through the hall and then with every past set of doors on either side pointed to every one and droid teams entered them all and began their act of coordinated massacre and Kellia continued on with the droids that remained and those that finished came back into her group as they neared the more city sector of the dome building they were in. They swept into a new hall via a right turn and she stopped when a burnt husk of a droideka met her sights and five dead troopers, and she could faintly hear blasters exchanging ahead and she flung herself forward to a large door. She pressed her ear against the wall and definitely heard blasters going off, and she backed away and formed her droids into a metal wall facing the door and opened it where the sound doubled and inside was a large open area that was brimming and lined with clone cylinders, and Kellia recoiled in disgust at the sight.
There were the last two droideka's firing into a huddled down squad of troopers behind metal crates and more troopers on an upper balcony firing down on them as more droids came flooding in from a lower doorway and were hit or took a few bows and returned fire.
"Fire!" She called and moved away as the droids marched on in a stomping synchronous manner and the B2's broke rank first and fired up toward the balcony and the troopers fell or ducked down in fear, while the B1's ran to a railing and lined their blasters along it and fired down into the troopers behind the crates and made their cover worthless and quickly riddled the room of troopers and left their smoking bodies where they were.
"Kill all those within the cylinders as well. Leave not a one remaining." She demanded in a loud echoing voice and all droids affirmed the order and fired flurries of bolts into the cylinders and the sound of exploding glass and blowing cylinders filled the room. Kellia could sense the lives if these small beings fading and she could sense the pain radiating off many, and she hardened herself and swallowed a horrified cry rising in her throat. Even as a flood of tears filled her eyes she did not acknowledge them. She couldn't feel sorry for these...things. They had to die for what they took from her, and for what the Emperor took from her she would take from them, and not a single dead child's form would sway her mind even as the charred smell of flesh reached her nose and made her want to vomit. She did not and looked away and found herself numbly heading for another door, and her droids followed as the lower leveled ones moved on themselves and the droideka units rolled past her again, and into deeper halls of the domed city. Kellia followed after them and with her droids they entered into a vast hallway that acted more as a storefront lining either side, and within this room were hundreds of troopers and droids firing in a great battle melee, and she found herself on an upper balcony looking down at the left flank of the forward troopers using kiosks and store walls as cover, and were setting up repeater positions.
"Fire down on their positions and cover the other droids now!" Kellia commanded her droids units who took up a line and fired into the unsuspecting troopers who fell quickly before they caught on and turned to return fire as she jumped off her high position and threw her saber as she did and ran one, two, three, troopers though and called it back as she landed connected her boot into a near trooper and sent him sprawling before she ran past him with her saber across the floor and cut him in whole half before jumping into her next kill and brought her saber across his chest, and dodged a flurry of allied droid fire that his a squad behind her, and she slid her saber into backwards held position and stabbed into another trooper.
She was facing advancing Stormtroopers as she did this and smirked as she brought her free hand up and sent a massive wave at the group and they flew back over other troopers in cover who called and yelled at one another to fire on her. The she flung herself over a kiosk and dodged a bout of blaster fire, and now faced her droids who were slowly inching forward.
"Thermal detonators! Rain them down on their positions!" She yelled and without needing to be told twice they all stopped save for the droideka's and B2's and they pulled to their grenades and threw them all in a vast rain of destruction upon the troopers positions.
"Look out!" She heard on call but then a succession of floor quaking blasts rocked the area and she stumbled a bit even crouched and the droids waited the rumble out and immediately opened fire again as more of their nits flooded in from wherever they entered from, and did not relent on the Stormtroopers. Her own high leveled droids were raining down a great deal of havoc from their elevated positions that the troopers that remained began to fall back further into the shopping district. Kellia stood back up and before she turned she heard a familiar sound and watched as more droids came walking steadily in, but behind them was a dwarf spider droid that after rounding a winding hall into the area she was in stopped and leveled its main gun and fired a succession of three blasts into the trooper lines and she saw five of them fly into the air from impact and slam into the sterile walls now scorched with blaster burns.
She fully looked out over the trooper lines and saw a whole army in full retreat from her and her droids and the floor was riddled with black scorch marks, and ripped and torn from the detonator blasts and whole floor sections were blown apart revealing the next floor down through broken and jagged metal.
"All forces advance and follow through with current objectives!" Kellia yelled and all droids seemed to acknowledge her, and move forward. It was beautiful to her to see all the B2's with their arms extended fire without care, and the B1's moved with great speed and ability to crouch and fire and move without a care for their own life, and Kellia waited for the dwarf-spider droid to close in and she hump atop its domed head and it didn't seem to care or even know where she went and kept moving as she kept herself level on it as it moved into the deeper sections of the hall. Below her seven droideka's rolled past the walker and ahead of the army into a curved bend were the other droids were firing, and when she rounded as well she saw the Imps were making another stand at toppled over stands and crates being used for cover.
"Hey, you," Kellia dipped her head in front of the eye of the spider droid and it stopped walking. "Fire on their covering positions and force them into the open." The droid did nothing to acknowledge but Kellia felt as if it understood, or at least hoped so and moved out of its way as it took three more steps forward and Kellia began deflecting oncoming fire at her and the walker with her saber, and it stopped moving, and took up aim, and like she ordered it aimed at covering positions and blasted great big chasms in the floor where its fire hit and sent troopers screaming into the air and dying.
The droideka's from before were advancing with three or more B1's on their backsides into the fray with their shields acting as mobile cover and with the walker firing on them the troopers began panicking and retreating again with officers from the far back yelling out orders and Kellia allowed herself to smirk again as the walker fired at random into their retreating figures. More were blown hard into walls or high into the air and slammed into the ceiling, and the walker neared a large pane of window where outside Kellia could see plenty of landing pads lighting up with blaster fire, and from above a string of fife hit a trooper position and she saw a Vulture droid drop low and make another pass firing at random at enemy positions and this proved to her that the battle above was going well if the captain saw it fit to divert fighters to close air support maneuvers.
The walker continued its advance with the rest of the droid forces that no matter how many the troopers down more swarmed in and soon she was swelling with droids left and right. Soon however they came upon a large set of doors and above it was some sign in Aurebesh that read 'Imperial Command,' and she smirked broadly. The fools had a military center connected to the Kaminoan/Imp shopping district. She could have laughed at the idiotic placement, but settled when she noted that a massive door had closed in on the whole sector and blocked all enemy access from the droids. Then again she had a spider walker with her.
"Alright big boy, you fire on that door and make a nice big hole for us." She ordered once more blocking the view of the droids eye. She moved away and its main gun focused on the door and began relentlessly firing on the door, and she also began placing pressure on the door even more through the Force and in time the waiting droids and Kellia heard the metal begin to whine and bend more and more with the walkers fire.
It fired several more successive blasts and she sent a final massive wave at the door and the whole thing unhinged and went flying back into a large circular shaped room.
"All units advance!" She cried and all the droids moved in with droideka's leading the way. She dismounted the walker and followed behind its hind legs as it entered into the massive room where Imps lined on the bottom floor behind barricades, the first and second floors as well and automated turrets and all of them fired down into the droid mess, but they kept coming and she had to admit seeing B2's get shot and hit but shake it off and fire back with no less ferocity was grand.
She walked in closely behind the walker as it entered the room and fired upwards into the higher levels and sent rubble cascading all around and men flying away in death and chaos.
Kellia saw a chance to move and dashed out of her cover and immediately sent a bolt flying back at a trooper who fell back with a shot to his head. She skirted left and right and dodged more fire coming at her, and then ran toward a trooper and cut him down before running one foot onto a crate and using it to leverage her body and used the Force to propel upwards and land on the next floor up and slice through and around into two troopers before sending their bodies flying.
The men were so busy trying to stop the continuous swarm of droids they hardly noticed her and she cut those that got in her way down and made for a stairway and climbed up it two steps at a time and was on the next floor up. She threw herself back as the walker fired near her position and three dead bodies flew past her. However she pushed through, jumping over a trooper while slamming her saber down into him, and landing and running it through the chest of another before spinning and bringing her saber across ones chest and sending a wave into a whole group and they fell to the bottom level with droids firing at their fallen bodies and even their dead bodies on the floor in ruin.
She proceeded on and passed by several troopers who were too busy firing down into the droids and didn't see her and she didn't bother with them either. Rather, she found the last stairway and rounded up the case, and was faced with two troopers guarding the top stairs, and she sent her saber flying into both of them before they got a shot off and came to the top over their bodies and recalled her saber to her hands, and she came face to face with a large computer room lining a furthest back wall with a large viewport behind it, and a single Imperial officer at the computer console and staring at her.
"I'm afraid you're far, far too late rebel scum. I have already sent a priority emergency hypercomm to Coruscant." Lord Vader will crush you all and your petty little uprising." He said with an air of smug anxiety, and Kellia rolled her eyes.
"Oh shut up." She intoned and lazily waved her left hand and the man went flying into his relative right and was knocked out cold. She cast him a lingering sneer and neared the command computer and found the console she wanted. Activating it and keying in a very old command she remembered from the old man she nearly jumped for joy when it allowed access. On the large computer display came the cloning operations, production rates, conditioning protocols, and directive, as well as the list of all identified deceased clones, and designations assigned to the new line numbering into four million production to be released and entered into the advanced clone growth program. She entered the command console of the computer and found what she was looking for.
Tipoca was central command of the cloning operations on Kamino, and the Imps had long ago take over operations from the Kaminoans while using their expertise.
"What a shame it will be to terminate all your next generation of Kamino bred clones old man. Maybe killing all your 'children' will give you a taste of experiencing the real thing." She sneered and numbly registered the massive explosions taking place out and below her. She stared at the 'Immediate, Emergency Termination Protocol,' and felt her stomach twist into a knot but she forced it down and away and entered the command into the Production facility command console. She watched as the command processed and then the computer informed her it was sending out the command to all production facilities across Kamino. A secondary computer screen opened and began listing in sequence all infant clones being terminated by appropriate addition of toxin into their gestation cylinders.
"One down, one to go." She numbly said aloud and then entered into the emergency command console and on the screen came the facility ventilation system and entered into the computer to bring up the toxin she knew for a fact the imps created to keep their clones under thumb on Kamino should another uprising occur. An uprising she knew happened some years ago.
"Now, enter the toxin into the ventilation system...execute, and vent." She said in a low voice and the command went out to all city units across the world and she smirked as the computer processed the command and the facility began to rumble to life and she turned around to see a vent system begin filtering in a smoke, but she sensed no danger to herself. The toxin was specific to a gene in clones alone.
"The very people who birthed you are your biggest weakness." She intoned and she walked over and grabbed the officer by the collar and dragged his limp body with her back downstairs where she noted the droids stopped firing as the clones began falling over and coughing through their masks and she stepped on and over the falling troopers. Some of them gagging so hard she swore they hacked up a lung. The droids all stood at the read and seemed to see that their enemy was being neutralized for them, and Kellia slowly made her way down to the bottom floor and threw the officer to the ground.
"All units. The enemy is being taken care of for us by a toxin aimed at them alone. This however does not take care of all your objectives. Sweep the city and eliminate all organics of threat to you and send out new mission parameters. All threatening organics alone. Unarmed are to be left alone." Kellia commanded and the droids turned on their heels and made back into the halls and flooded into all the doorways to begin their sweep.
"Wha...what have you done Jedi?" The officer asked coming to but apparently hearing her.
"I've used that moronic open console you had up there to kill every, last, clone on Kamino you sniveling fool."
"Impossible! No Jedi has access codes pertaining to the Kaminoan Imperial security network.!" Kellia keeled to his eye level and smirked in his face, and brought a hand to raise his chin up to look her dead in the eyes fully.
"I used to be like you. A servant to that old skeleton you call an Emperor. I was before that a Jedi, and a kriffing bad one at that now that I look back. Then, he took from me more then anyone should go through, and I wanted out of his madness, but he wouldn't let me go, and locked me up and sent me for Kessel, where a rebel cell freed me, and ever since then I've promised to bring him nothing but pain, annoyance, and suffering every day. No matter how small or petty, but you gotta admit, taking Kamino out and all his pathetic next line of clones was pretty good on my part. Now you see I had access to your little ill secured computer console because I was once an agent of his, and the old fool didn't bother to change the codes. Why? Well his arrogance never allowed him to think on the possibility that I would ever dare come to this world again, and use what knowledge I had against him and his little clone armies. Now one would be foolish to think Kamino his only source of clones, but it's the height of cloning tech and research in all the galaxy. The birthplace of the cloning program for the Republic and now Empire itself. To think it was this simple all this time..." She chuckled and the officer stared at her with a mix of horror and hatred.
"He will send his Kath hound to Kamino and will no doubt wipe out my fleet above, but I won't be here. What will lord Vader find on your world? Millions, upon millions of dead clone babes, whose blood is on HIS hands, and many thousands if not millions more dead battle ready clones that could have aided him in his pathetic little war against the Moffs and my URM movement. I would have struck a chord so close to his mind he will feel my joy from across the galaxy, and I will revel in his discomfort. Then, lord Vader will tell him all the top Kaminoan scientists would have bee rounded up and killed as well by my saber, whose blood is on his hands. Then lord Vader will report all military hardware, and cylinders were broken, or taken by me, for future use against him and his Empire. He will be told I have brought my wrath upon Kamino. The very birthplace of his grand army, and he will know that Kellia Nelrain has come for him." She intoned darkly with a passive and cold look upon her darker features, and the officer now looked disturbed.
"Just to make sure however, I'm gonna leave one man behind who can spit out in a hurry what I've done to this world my dear officer. You shall live this day, and you will tell the Empire your story and you will tell them Kellia Nelrain comes for them, and not a one of their kind is safe from me and my droids."
"You're insane." Kellia smiled sadly and patted his head.
"Yes...yes I am. Now sleep officer." She sent a very powerful suggestion into his mind and the man fell limp once more and she proceeded to tie the man against a metal pillar beside a pile of dead troopers fallen over from the vented, and apparently odorless toxin floating in the aid, and gagged him for effect and patted the mans head once more before slowly leaving the room and watched as her droids filed in and out of the buildings rooms, stores, plazas, and facilities.
"Now..." She placed her hands on her hips and let loose a breath. "Where are those Kaminoan scientists. I have appointments to keep." She smirked once more and swallowed every feeling that would weaken her resolve. The death of millions were already on her hands and she knew that someplace deep down, but for the next couple of hours she would blame every kill on the old man upon the throne. Every death would fall upon Palpatines hands this not and absolve her of her crimes.
Authors Note: I would've added another section to this chapter, but something told me this one sits better on its own. I feel this whole story will be quite long so bare with me people. This chapter better cements the attitude of the new rebel movement, the URM. It also shows the type of person Kellia is as a rebel fallen Jedi. I know you guys don't want me to focus on the rebels but there will be times when I must show them and their story. I would appreciate it if you guys don't tell me what you think of the rebels, I already know that part ;) rather can you guys tell me what you think of the chapter just as a piece showing the horror of this war I'm trying to get across. I'd really appreciate it. :)
Beyond that, as usual, please point out or excuse any and all grammatical errors, and enjoy the chapter.