Project Ares Gold Edition

Chapter 39 - What's the next move?

Lakeside home - Naboo

It had been 5 days since the events on Coruscant and so far there was no sign of Palpatine, the Empire or any trouble for that matter. Padme had given birth to twins with the help of the Royal nurses supplied by the Palace. The twins, Luke and Leia were not even a week old and already showing signs of being strong with the Force. Kix, Midas and Jester were of course all over Senator Amidala and the twins, meaning that essentially each of them had their own personal doctor that watched them like a hawk. Ahsoka also helped out where she could but was for the most part very occupied with spending time with her captain.

Anakin and Obi-wan had walked off into the fields a few hours after Luke and Leia were born and vanished for three days. In those 72-ish hours, Obi-wan allowed Anakin to truly open up about his fears of losing Padme like he did with his mother. How the constant ignorance and lies of the Council angered him so much that it basically drove him right to Palpatine's arms. But most of all, Obi-wan comforted his brother as Skywalker had to process the guilt and gravity of what he had done.

With Fordo leading all the scout missions with his ARC troopers and Thorn in command of the fleet, the rest of the clone commanders had come to Naboo so that they could plan their next move given the intel Blue Team recovered from the Senate building. All the Jedi Masters came along as well, mostly because some of them wanted to see the babies but also to see what Anakin had to say for himself. Unfortunately, Windu was still in a coma and was being closely guarded along with the younglings by Jocasta Nu and the remaining Temple Guards.

So while the Jedi all gathered to discuss the actions of Skywalker, Chief along with all the other clone officers met inside Padme's villa in the lower basement they had setup a makeshift intel room. Removing most of the large wine collections and old dusty paintings and replacing them with large screens the decorated the walls with statistics and intel regarding the last known fleet positions of both GAR and CIS forces. But most of all, Static and Canny, a 212th slicer, were decrypting and organizing all the top secret intel that Static got on Coruscant.

While all this was happening, Blue Team was taking a semi-vacation while maintaining security around the Villa. Essentially they were on standby should any of the motion detectors Gears had setup go off. But given that the chances of that happening was essentially non-existent, it was very common to see most of them walk around with only their bottom half of armour on or even in civvies. Fives and Hardcase had gone on a recon mission inside Theed to see what effects the newly proclaimed Empire had installed. From their last transmission back to Rex, the Empire was claiming to be a new beacon of order and security the likes of which the Republic never provided, to which Rex passionately replied; "What a load of bullshit that is."

"I KNOW RIGHT?!"

"Hardcase, would you do us all a favour and talk a little louder, I don't think every Imperial from here to Coruscant heard you very well." Fives quickly spoke in a hushed but condemning tone, resulting in his fellow soldier simply putting his hands in the air and making himself look like an idiot while stammering; "Whaaaat, me? Nooooo."

Back inside the villa, the commanders were currently getting a detailed inventory of everything they had in their arsenal. Starting from the top down, they had:
- The Pillar of Autumn, a superheavy battlecruiser that could probably fight off a small fleet in terms of firepower.
- 2x Venator class cruisers; the Intrepid and the Triumphant
- 3x Arquitens class light cruiser; the Phoenix, the Scalpel, and the Reverence.
- 3x Consular class cruisers including the Spirit of Fire
- 9x Nu-class attack shuttles in addition to the Forward Unto Dawn
- 28x ARC-170 starfighters
- 30x Y-Wing bombers
- 60x V-Wing interceptors
- 90x V-19 Torrent starfighters
- 50x LAAT / LAATV gunships
- 15x AT-TEs
- 2x AT-OTs
- 46x AT-RTs
- 8x AV-7 heavy artillery guns
- 5,000x 501st troopers
- 2,500x 104th Wolfpack troopers
- 300x 212th Attack Battalion troopers
- Blue Team
- Alpha Team, which consisted of Fordo and his six Alpha-class ARC troopers.

If this was in any other situation, the commanders would feel pretty confident in their numbers. They had certainly made do with less, but given the force they were facing, they were so far outnumbered and outgunned that there wouldn't even be a point in trying to do the math.

"Chief, I think you and the commanders would wanna see this." Static called from his station, coming over 117 gazed over three project names; Longsword, War Mantle, and Orion. Opening the first one, the soldiers looked on the big screen as blueprints appeared for a large triangular shaped warship. Designated as the Imperial Star Destroyer, or ISD for short, it boasted a weapon compliment that could directly rival the Autumn in a head-on fight. However, the good news was that it looked as if its starfighter compliment was only 72 and it was made up of the inferior TIE fighter design, likely to make up for the immense cost of the project.

War Mantle truly disturbed the clones because it showed just how little value they really had in Palpatine's eyes. 10 years of rigorous training plus dozens if not hundreds of battles worth of experience per clone, traded for what? An army that was made up by arrogant teenagers or the bottom of society that had no other alternative. And the worst part was that this project had been going on for at least 9 months now and had at least 5,000 infantrymen ready to deploy. If he wanted, Palpatine could've sent them out to fight alongside the clones and save hundreds if not thousands of brothers from dying in a war that he started in the first place.

Lastly was Project Orion, and half-way though reading it all the commanders slowly stepped away from the Master Chief. Turns out that after being kicked out of the RSA, Tarkin gave all the files regarding 117 to a secret R&D group that then proceeded to try and recreate the original Project Ares. Using battle recordings, simulator intel and stolen Jedi medical reports, this clandestine research group was attempting to mimic the science behind the original Spartans. But according to the file, candidates were given less invasive augmentations than what Chief had received way back in the Old Republic days.

The candidates were given a cocktail of drugs that amplified their reflexes, muscle density, vision and speed. But because Tarkin wanted quantity over quality, less dangerous methods had to be taken, resulting in their performance not coming even close to the levels that Master Chief displayed during combat. However, the file did state that the new generation of 'spartans' would be equipped with power armour that could apparently put them on par with 117.

Fury wouldn't even begin to describe how Chief was feeling, hence why all the clones in the basement had slowly backed away to a safe distance. Storming out of the lakeside home and marching off into the forest, the clones soon lost sight of Chief. Deciding that they should probably go get Fives or another member of Blue Team to go talk to him, the commanders started running towards the Villa as if they were once again cadets being chased by Alpha-17.

Meanwhile deep within the forest, Chief was decimating the plant life, punching holes through trees that would be able to take a rocket and kicking over boulders that a normal person would never be able to budge. 117 was angry beyond expression, would Tarkin's betrayal ever cease? How could they desecrate the memory of John's family by spitting in their image? To be a Spartan was more than just having augmentations and a set of power armour. To be a Spartan was to be the ultimate warrior, closing off emotional ties with everyone besides your fellow Spartan, to channel your mind to pure warfare, and to keep pushing on, even when your body is broken beyond repair.

That's what it meant to be a Spartan, that's why they were the best warriors in the galaxy. Because no matter the odds or the thousands of enemies they had to fight, Spartans never gave up and fought to their last breath. That was how the original Blue Team went out, along with every other original Spartan besides 117. Taking off his helmet, John let a silent tear fall down his cheek as he relived the memory of how he lost his brothers and sisters in the line of duty against the Sith.

Now it here he was, in the middle of another galactic wide conflict against the same enemy that he had fought a 1,000 years ago. From behind him Chief heard rustling as he turned to see Blue Team, fully geared up and ready to go. Fives spoke up from the front. "What's the next move Chief?"

"We take the fight to Palpatine." Chief answered after putting his helmet back on. They were going to hurt Sidious and his Empire so badly that the Sith Lord was going to wish that he never joined the Dark side in the first place.

Returning back to the villa, Chief explained to the clone commanders that he was going to take Blue Team and do as much damage as possible to this new Empire and try to slow down Palpatine's expansion. With nothing against that idea and opting to rather not try and talk the pissed off supersoldier out of this, they all gave the go-ahead. "Blue Team, say your farewells, we leave in 10."