Forward - Into Shadows

Prologue

14:02:07 – Republic Venator Eclectic, Low Geonosis Orbit

    After a year's worth of hunting, futile negotiations, and subsequent skirmishes, it was finally over.

    The burnt orange surface of Geonosis stretched out ahead of the venator's viewport, marbled by its signature yellowish clouds of haze. Clone Marshal Commander Ledger let his eyes wander across it tentatively. Sandstorms. He'd spent weeks of his life buffeted by those blustering winds while the airborne sand particles slowly shaved the paint off his armor and found their way into the most uncomfortable crevices imaginable. In fact, if he thought about it hard enough, he could still feel the grit riding between his undersuit and his skin. He hated to think about how long it would take to rid his gear of the bothersome red dust.

    You'll keep finding it for months, he muttered in the buzzing stillness of his mind. Years.

    Even in leaving the planet behind, he'd never be able to escape it. It felt like he'd never be able to escape the exhaustion the campaign had smothered him with, either. It was the kind of exhaustion sleep couldn't erase. The kind that lingered like a suffocating fog in a swap.

    Whether fortunate or unfortunate, at least it was a delirium he was used to.

    He blinked slowly, the movement aggravating the headache budding behind his eyes. Looking away from the absurd brightness of Geonosis, he turned his muddled attention to the void of wild space beyond. The abysmal blackness filled his vision, devoid of all life and color, just like the venator's dimly lit bridge around him. Just like its reflective black floor. Just like the gray uniforms of his fellow clones, seated quietly at their stations on the deck's lower stage, monitoring various systems across the ship. In fact, the only color tossed around the venator's cave-like bridge was the gentle glow of the holochart displays lining the wall. It washed the place in artificial blue light—a hue that was often hard on his eyes, but was now a welcome change from the blinding seas of orange he'd become accustomed to staring at.

    Never once had he preferred the grim décor and dry, recycled air of any starship to fresh breezes and unfiltered sunlight, but after all the time he'd spent exposed to the less-than-hospitable elements of Geonosis, a short hiatus aboard the Eclectic was not only needed but also oddly desirable. Even the din of pattering keys and muffled radio chatter was music to him now, like hearing the voice of an old friend after years spent apart.

    The moment Commander Guess stepped through the bridge doors to relieve him of duty, he wouldn't hesitate to rinse off with a cool shower and treat himself to an hour or two of rest. He could almost taste the sweetness of sleeping in a safe place already—drifting off to the quiet drone of the Eclectic's sub-light engines.

    His wrist comm pierced the still air with a shrill chirp while the blissful daydream floated in his mind, making him flinch. He reflexively clasped a gloved hand over it to accept the call—anything to get the cheery tone to stop stabbing his ears.

    "CC-oh-one-nine-one," he murmured tiredly into the comm. The greeting came on impulse, the same way blocking a blow to the face did.

    A crack of static was his only answer, followed by silence.

    Ledger clenched his teeth at his blunder. Between noticing his gauntlet was still hot to the touch from the Geonosian sun and the realization that he hadn't checked to see who was raising him, his identification number had slipped out of his mouth on reflex rather than his name. He bit back the urge to mentally curse the moniker his Jedi general had given him. Most men in his position would feel grateful—honored, even—to have a name bestowed upon them by a guardian of the Republic itself, but to Ledger, it only served as a source of confusion. His number was already enough of a name to him; what was the point of bearing a second? Unfortunately, most of his subordinates knew him by name now and not number, thanks to the general's insistence that names were easier to remember. Most of his men likely wouldn't know who 'CC-0191' was without checking a database.