The Rebel Faction

"Admiral, ten seconds until reversion from hyperspace." said the Navigator.

"Very Well," said Kraken, "Begin to bring up the shields, I want them up when we exit, and also charge up weapons batteries. And get the pilots to their fighters."

Then the starlines stopped swirling in long lines, and they faded away back into their normal winking existence. Ahead of him lay the small but important world of Vladet, with it's lush green beauty, and mountians. Orbiting the planet was a moderate sized Military Space station. In it's docking bay sat the skeleton of a Victory Star Destroyer, with construction obviously having begun very recently. Guarding the station was a modified Strike Cruiser, the Havoc, along with an Adz Patrol Destroyer, and several smaller customs ships. Upon seeing the Imperial Fleet arriving, the Strike Cruiser, and the rest of the ships broke orbit, and formed into an attack formation. The comm signal began to buzz at his side,

"This is Warlord Brill of the Vladet Imperium, who dares to attack my world?" said a cheeky voice full of rage.

"This is Vice-Admiral Kraken of The New Order. Order all your ships to surrender, and do likewise with your base, and you will not be harmed. This world is now under New Order control. Any objections will be met with the buisness end of a Turbolaser Cannon." said Admiral Kraken.

The communications station went dead then, and the small Imperium force accelerated to combat speed, and deployed their fighters, seventy two in all, three squadrons from the Strike cruiser, two from the planet, and one from the Adz patrol destroyer. Those consisted of sixty TIE Fighters, and twelve TIE Bombers, according to the data strolling in. Kraken countered that move by sending three squadrons of TIE Interceptors to meet the incoming enemies head on, and kept a squadron of Interceptors, and almost two full squadrons of TIE Fighters back to screen his ships. He then ordered his ships to move forward at full combat his speed. Kraken's battle plan was simple. Disable the Strike Cruiser with Ion Cannons, and use the Turbolasers to destroy everything else, including the Shipyard and incomplete Victory Star Destroyer.

The Bellicose lumbered forward making good speed, and soon the world of Vladet dominated the view out of the front viewport. The Star Destroyer began a stately turned to starboard in order to orbit the planet. Inside the Destroyer, Kraken met with his ground commanders in a breifing chamber;

"Commanders, welcome to our first ground assault. Our target is the world you see out the viewport, called Vladet. A former Imperial Base, it is now controlled by a Warlord. His fleet has now been decimated, and all he has left are his planeterey defenses, and his ground troops. This volcano," Kraken gestured to the holoscreen, "was the site of the former Imperial Base, run by one Admiral Devlia. The base itself was turned into rubble by Rebel Y-wings in the Battle of Vladet shortly before the appearance of Thrawn, during which Ysanne Isard ruled the Empire. A hole was blown in the Volcano wall which allowed the Y-wings to go in under the base shields. But I have a better idea for getting in there. The warlord has no shields, and insteads relies on AA Batteries inside the base for dealing with fighters, and a wide array of ground weaponry for preventing any ground forces from climbing into the Volcano. Even if any do make it into the Volcano, they will be facing the Warlord's most elite troops, former Stormtroopers with E-Web heavy repeating Blasters. Fortunatly, I have a way around this obstacle."

"And how may that be, Admiral," asked Commander Harrier, "Even if we simply crush the ground weaponry with our AT-AT Walkers, those walkers won't be able to scale the mountians, nor will the AT-ST scout walkers. Our infantry and speeders could do it, but they would be slaughtered by the stromtrooper corps on the top of the Volcano rim."

"Good question, Commander. That is why I had shipped aboard two platoons of ten each MT-AT walkers. For those of you who have not seem them," informed Kraken as he brought up a holopanel display of the walkers, "They have many legs, much like a spider, allowing them to easily scale up a mountian. They also have a formidable array of many laser cannons, allowing them to quickly rip through the stormtroopers armour."

The Commanders smiled as they saw his plan, so he dismissed the Commanders to get to their stations, then ordered the Star Destroyer to launch the invasion. Dozens of pods shot from the belly of the Destroyer, consisting of 10 AT-AT pods, and 16 AT-ST pods. Soon the First Ground Battle will begin.

The Imperial Army took hold of the ground installations with realtive ease. Now that that work was out of the way, the volcano lay open, ripe for the picking, thought Admiral Kraken as he prepared to send down the second wave. Twelve pods left the launching bay of Bellicose and descended to the surface of the lush green world Vladet. The pods each contained a Mountian Terrain Armoured Transport, or a MT-AT. These vehicles were suited to climbing up mountians, and each had eight legs, and the main body, exactly looking like a Tatooine Dromp Spider. As for their armament, it was quite exetensive, and perfect for the anti-infantry role they were playing today. The pods landed all around the side of the Volcano. Then they split to reveal the Mountian Terrain Armoured Transports. Leading this assault was a Commander by the name of Drake. He is a MT-AT veteran that was trained at Carida several years ago, and even served with Ambassador Furgan's dreadnought, the Vendetta, for a while, but luckily was reassigned before the dreadnought's suicide mission to Anoth that resulted in it's destruction, and the capture or defeat of the eight MT-ATs that had been with it on the mission to capture Anakin Solo when he was an infant. Now the walkers would be used to scale the dormant Volcano, and kill or force to withdraw the infantry stationed to knock off anything that came over the top of the ridge. The MT-ATs did have blaster proof armour, and as for their armement, they carried eight twin laser cannons, one on each of their joints in their legs, and an additonal two laser cannons and a grenade launcher under their cockpit. The walkers emerged from their pods, and took up position under the volcano ridge. At their signal, the Bellicose loosed a bombardement upon the shields of the base. By doing this the Warlord knew that the Imperials were about to send troops over the Volcano and into the base. By doing this the Imperials hoped to lure the Warlord's troops out of hiding and into combat to where they could easily be slaughtered by the MT-ATs. The tatic worked, to an extent, that is. Most of the five thousand Warlord Stormtrooper corps came out of hiding, but some one hundred elite units remained hidden inside along with the Warlord himself. As soon as the five hundreth bolt expended itself on the shield, the Mountian Terrain Armoured Transports started up the side of the Volcano. The walkers accelerated to an amazing speed of forty kilometers an hour, and had reached the top of the Volcano after ten minutes. The Warlord's troops saw the walkers coming up the Volcano, and opened fire with their E-Web Heavy Repeating Blasters, and Grenade Launchers. The Mountian Terrain Armoured Transports responded to this by firing their blasters into the ranks of Stormtroopers. Some one hundred Stormtroopers were cut down in a matter of seconds, and many more made to retreat back into the shelter. Suddenly, though, the table shifted back to favour of the Warlord's troops. Two Mountian Terrain Armoured Transports exploded as grenades blew apart their main structres. And on top of that, a hangar bay opened up to reveal four All Terrain Scout Transports trodding out. One Scout Walker blasted apart an MT-AT with its chin laser cannons, and another blew up the cockpit of one with its side mounted grenade launcher. But the sudden reverse of fortune for the Warlord's troops would not last long. The Mountian Terrain Armoured Transports responded to these new threats by shifting laser cannon fire to the Storm Troopers that were carrying the grenade launchers, while they also fire their own grenades at the Scout Walkers. Three Scout Walkers of the four were immediatly destroyed by the barrage of grenades, with two having their cockpits exploding, and having one leg blown off the third, from which it fell over and exploded. The fourth one retreated back into the maze of buildings that comprised the main infrastructre. The infantry were falling like flies by now. The Warlord's army was in full retreat, with the remaining eight Mountian Terrian Armoured Transports in full pursuit. Suddenly, as one Mountian Terrain Armoured Transport rounded a building corner, the last Scout Walker suddenly appeared. It fire two grenades, and disabled four of the Mountian Terrain Armoured Transport's legs. The Mountian Terrain Armoured Transport fired off two of it's grenades, but they overshot the Scout Walker, and killed another one hundred infantry instead. Both of the vehicles fired their laser cannons at the same time. The shot from the Mountian Terrian Armoured Transport ignited the remaining grenades in the side mounted Scout Walker Grenade Launching pack, igniting a large explosion that blew the Scout Walker apart. The shots from the Scout Walker also ignited the remaining grenades in the under the cockpit grenade launcher pack, and so both vehicles went up in a large explosion that killed many nearby Warlord General Infantry. Now that the resistance had been crushed or routed, it was time for the Special Navy Troops to go in, and do their jobs on the base shields.........

The rebuilding of Vladet had progressed well ever since the last remaining enemy troopers had either been killed or detained by the New Order Stormtroopers. New buildings were being constructed, factories being brought online, and groundworks being laid, all by an army of construction and utility droids, all under the watchful eye of the New Order security guards. At that time Vice Admiral Kraken had come from orbit along with a good bit of the command staff to personally oversee the reconstruction of the Volcano base as a New Order Head Quarters. The base of the Volcano was being leveled off so that deep Command Bunkers could be installed below it, covered by other structres. Starfighter, Fleet, and Ground Command would all be in this main base, with training facilities for each either located elsewhere on the planet, or in the case of one or two, offplanet. The main warroom and command building would also be located here. Lining the walls of the Volcano would be the site of future ground weaponry, such as Planeterey Ion Cannons, or other power generators as the future need arises. The New Order troops permanently assigned here would be one full general infantry division of twenty thousand stormtroopers, first line regulars who were well seasoned, and a mechanized armour division consisting of twenty All Terrain Armoured Transports, or AT-ATs, thirty All Terrain Scout Transports, or AT-STs, and nine thousand specialized general infantry, plus crewers consisting of one thousand enlisted men, and fifty officers. An addition to this force was a company of ten Mountian Terrain Armoured Transports, or MT-ATs as they were more commenly referred to. Crewing this force was twenty enlisted men, and officers, plus a force of fifty Special Navy, or SpecNav commandoes. As for base personnel, there was a total of ten thousand engineers, technicians, and others milling about that would be assigned permnanent posts at the base. The buildings outside the base would consist of at least three starfighter landing platforms, and four hangars, being enough to house nine squadrons of starfighters, totalling one hundred and eight starfighters. Whenever the fighters would be constructed, thought Kraken, he would assign the starfighters seventy two Twin Ion Engine (TIE) Defenders to the base, along with thirty six Twin Ion Engine (TIE) Bombers to the base, with the bombers acting as an anti-captial ship defense, while the fighters acted both as a starfighter interceptor, and capital ship interceptor. The fighters each carried four laser cannons and two ion cannons, and six missiles, either concussion or proton warhead based depending on the mission involved. The bombers carried two laser cannons, mainly for starfigher defense more than anything, and upward of either sixteen concussion missiles, fourteen proton torpedoes, or ten heavy anti-ship or platform rockets. This force of fighters and bombers would make mincemeat of any minor threats the world may encounter during the reign the New Order had over the world, which it's commanders intended to be a very long time. In addition to those starfighter capacities, the new base would also have eight hangars to maintain and take care of it's complement of ground walkers, three large barracks for it's troops, and various machine and mantinence shops. The barracks could each hold up to twenty thousand soldiers, and so each would be filled with upwards of fourteen thousand troopers. The cafeteria provided the better than usual field rations with wildlife slaughtered in the surronding area for the meantime. Kraken concluded this tour with these facilities and walked off to the Command structre, where he was due for a meeting with his command staff..........

After the major fighting had come to an end, and with the last of the Warlord's troops either surrending, or having been killed, with the last of the old buildings being disposed of, and with mines, factories, military buildings being constructred or having been constructed in their place, with human colonists from other worlds now living a nice, free life, with the world having been liberated from the clutches of the evil warlord, and placed into the hands of the well meaning Imperial New Order, Kraken decided it was time for a speech to celebrate the triumph of his troops.

Taking the main communications relay station on Vladet, being newly constructed, Admiral Kraken began to speak, "I want to thank all of the men, women, and personnel involved in this operation, this takeover. Thanks to all of your efforts, and efforts of your comrades who fell in battle, this operation was a success. Even now the last troops of the enemy Warlord have been captured, and his military and navy being disbanded, and replaced with our own. The natives of this world, combined with new colonists, will now live a peaceful and free life thanks to your efforts, as well as providing the Imperial New Order with a important military and Naval Base. For all this, I congratulate you. Thank you, for your efforts. Gloria Imperium.!"