Into the Flames (Game Event 2/23/17)

[Akirapryde]

Had to fix a series of misspelled words

Into the Flames
City of Jaoppolis
Outer Rim World of Olivan
Date: 2919 AOK (Seven Months after Auro’s Birthday)

The city of a million lights, as it has been known for over ten thousand years, now was consumed in death and suffering. For as far as the eye could see, this once gem of the Outer Rim is in ruins. War had come to Olivan, and its hand touched all corners. By the morning's first light the Coruscant Jedi had lost almost a thousand lives. Most of whom parishes when the Resolute was blown from the skies over Jaoppolis.

When the mighty warship crashed down upon the city, tens of thousands of civilians were rendered homeless. And those were the lucky ones. While the debate still rages in the Senate over who fired first, lives were still being lost on Olivan. Master Milani, was quick to regroup her forces and encircled the capitol city of Jaoppolis and the seized temple on the outskirts of the city.

As both sides started to recover from the bitter opening hours of the conflict, the Vengeance under the command of Lord Sembla, made a daring landing just outside the city. From here, he quickly negotiated a deal with the Olivan leaders, and the Rogue Jedi to allow the Vengeance and her crew to help civilian caught between the two factions.

It was critical for Lord Sembla to have the Olivan factions and Master Milani's support for his mission. And in securing this support all sides agreed to allow observes on sight to ensure that the Vengeance and its satellite base, called Base Camp Mercy, are not unfairly aiding one side or the other. The brilliance to Lord Sembla's plan was that now there was an unofficial line of communication between the warring factions. His masterful plan meant that each morning the three factions would meet to talk about daily inspections, and hopefully a means to reach a peaceful resolution to this conflict.

For the first few days, the Vengeance's two civilian refugee and aid stations were hardly at capacity. Which was all the better for Auro. This allowed his troopers, who were deployed (in light blue armor) searching for civilian casualties to have a secondary mission. That mission was searching for his missing droid, Nines. Just because Auro and his group were hardly being utilized dealing with civilian casualties, that was far from the truth for the two warring factions.

The first week of the battle for Olivan was enough to tell anyone that this was not going to be the easy or as quick as many in the Core Worlds had expected. Master Milani was faced with a determined enemy fighting for their homes. The destruction of her flagship was a demoralizing blow. To cap it off, nearly a thousand of her troops were trapped near the heart of the city. Endless fighting over the fallen Resolute meant that many of her supplies were now out of her reach at best. At worse, those supplies were now in the hands of the Rogue Jedi and their Olivan allies.

After being forced from the city by overwhelming odds, Master Milani deployed her the remaining of her division around the Jaoppolis. She deployed the last of her battalions and supporting units near the captured Temple. Their mission was to attempt to contain the Rogue Jedi there. She knew that their numbers could upset the battle for Jaoppolis.

For the defenders, they had their own problems. Lacking modern advanced weapons, like their Jedi counterparts, many militia units were deployed with surplus from the last great war. Thanks to Master Milani’s advanced ARC troopers, command, control and communication centers were knocked out. These acts of sabotage were a constant hinderance for the local militia. For the Rogue Jedi, they lacked any resemblance of a core, unified leadership structure. This was felt further down the chain of command.

Because of the lack of leadership, most militia units’ counter attacks were unprepared and badly coordinated. This meant that during battles the militia should have won by sheer numbers, they suffered defeat. The training of the Twenty-seventh often made up for the odds against them. Despite the overall situation or the long odds, the local militia held their ground in the face of defeat and inflicted growing losses on the Twenty-seventh.

While heroic militia units made stands against the Twenty-seventh, rumors of bickering between leaders of the Rogue Jedi started to make their way around. Rumors that Master Milani welcomed. Despite calls from her own staff and Lord Sembla to sue for peace, she pressed her advantage. Her focus was the rescue her troops trapped in a place named on her maps as simply as 'The Pocket'

The Pocket was a location roughly the size of a city block. There survivors who had escaped the Resolute managed to land. It was near the main campus of the University of Olivan. The Pocket was made up of a series of shops and restaurants on one side. And a large park where the landing craft and escape pods landed. The landing craft offered defenders of The Pocket places of cover, while the park offered fresh water from a small lake.

Once communication was established with The Pocket, it was learned that nearly a thousand troopers led by Jedi Knight Louis Pelig, were held up there. Master Milani and her staff learned that the survivors were well supplied and their moral was high. Based on those facts, evacuating the wounded became a priority. However, this proved to be much more difficult.

Local militia units throw everything that they had at approaching shuttles and craft. Soon would-be rescuers became trapped as well. It slowly became clear to Master Milani, that she would have to fight her way in to The Pocket street by street. However urban warfare risked civilian casualties. At the moment, that was a risk that Master Milani was unwilling to take.

Holding back her heavy weapons and walkers, Master Milani did everything she could to spare civilian casualties. She sent her troops in by foot and supported with light walkers in hopes of breaking through to her besieged troopers. Unfortunately, this approach led to more casualties suffered by the Twenty-seventh. Reports started to surface of partisans, however there was no solid evidence to support those reports.

This limited warfare approached ended at the end of the first week. Master Milani’s light handed approach started to pay off. Her lines were pressing forward as they inched closer the Pocket. It was then that reports of partisans became a reality. A group of partisans led by a Rogue Jedi ambushed a company from the Twenty-seventh. The battle was short lived but brutal. Thirty of Master Milani's troopers were gunned down by partisans who fired from windows and roof tops of nearby apartment buildings.

Using old blaster-carbines, make-shift incendiary, and an old blaster cannon the small band of partisans proved to be more than a match for the company from the Twenty-seventh. As losses continued to mount Jedi Padawan Branish Caropan heroically led a final push through the ambush in an attempt to break it.

Witnesses claimed that the partisans pressed the counter attack cutting the company off from retreat. Survivors of the battle last saw Padawan Caropan locked in a battle with a grayish skinned female Rogue Jedi who welded two short curved blades. The Padawan and most of his company were wiped out.

Angered by the loss and active civilian partisans, Master Milani ordered up another push in the area. She also ordered up her heavy weapons. Local militia aided by partisans attempted to hold off the push in a series of short but intensive battles. By midnight, Heavy walkers and artillery made short work of the remaining resistance fighters. By the end of the night, the Twenty-seventh had linked up with the Pocket.

Now, the Twenty-seventh a bulge that stretched in to the heart of the city. It was the first time that the city was under threat of falling to the Jedi. Wounded were evacuated from the Pocket, as fresh troops were brought in. The headless body of Padawan Caropan was discovered in a butcher’s shop near the Pocket. As Jedi artillery drove the defenders deeper in to the city, the change in the conflict had a much sadder effect.

The change was signaled at the Vengeance with the first arrivals of civilian wounded. Lord Sembla was sitting down for dinner with his staff and discussing new search areas in hopes of finding Nines. The droid had been missing for almost a week and the situation was having a toll on Lord Sembla. It didn't make him appear weak. It was the contrary, it showed his staff that he would never give up on any of them, should they go missing.

As they were searching maps of the city, Lord Sembla was notified about a flood of new civilian casualties that were coming in. By midnight the Vengeance's medical bays were beyond capacity. Jedi Knight Demaya organized a make shift triage center under the mighty Vengeance. The death toll was horrific! By morning nearly, a hundred civilians were dead and more maimed. One sad loss, was that of a small unnamed boy who died in Lord Sembla's arms. The small Olivan boy, would hunt Lord Sembla.

Outraged over the escalation in the conflict, Lord Sembla took his grievance straight to Master Milani. While normally Master Milani would be more sympathetic to Lord Sembla’s requests, this was not the case. Master Milani informed Lord Sembla that her prize catch of the campaign, Jenna, was to be handed over to him. In a unanimous ruling by the Senate's Security Council, Jenna would be transferred to the Headquarters of the Grand Army of the Republic for questioning.

It had long been known that elements of Frey's Jedi Academy had been recruited by Olivan. What was not known was which other Academies across the Outer Rim had been compromised. An answer the Republic Senate demanded to know. This answer would indicate the scope of the crisis the Jedi were dealing with in the Outer Rim. Because Jenna was a well-respected member of Frey's Jedi Academy, it was suspected that she had this knowledge.

This knowledge trumped Jenna's ‘other’ crimes. In violation of Republic Law, Jenna was a force sensitive clone who attended a Jedi Academy under false pretense. She had taken arms up against the Republic in the cause of equal rights for Clones. Even though she fought bravely during Frey’s civil war in support of the Republic and her pregnancy, these factors didn’t sway Master Milani’s opinion. Under Republic Law, Master Milani had signed Jenna’s Death Warrant.

It was an execution that Master Milani had hope would give other clones on Olivan a chance to rethink joining the fight against the Jedi. Jenna’s life was spared only by the timely arrival of a Chancellor Stay, for the time being. Now, thanks to this special order, Jenna was transferred to Lord Sembla's custody. Locked in one of the Vengeance's brigs, Jenna awaits transfer back to Coruscant.

The turn of the second and third weeks saw the conflict become bogged down as the two factions lacked the resources to overcome the other. Jaoppolis was reduced to rubble as urban warfare took on a more sinister situation. During the third week, a middle of the night raid carried out by a small band of partisans managed to breach the security lines at the headquarters of the Twenty-seventh and Base Camp Mercy. The two groups released nerve gas in the troop barracks of the Twenty-seventh and in a ward for off-worlder aid workers who had been working with the Twenty-seven.

In total, over a hundred people died and twice as many would not return to the battlefield. Thirty of the off-worlders caught in the attack were from Balkid VI. The world of Baklid VI had long reaffirmed their support for the Jedi's operations on Olivan. Despite this act, they have provided thousands of aid workers who were working hand and hand with Lord Sembla's group. The ten partisans who carried out the attack were all killed.

Reports showed that three of the Partisans were a Tommy Clone. Tommy Clones were designed to be household servants. A discovery that has given Master Milani reason to pause. There are reported a quarter million clones on Olivan. While none have any measure of combat training, that fact could easily be changed in time.

To make matters worse for the Twenty-seventh, it became known that a band of Rogue Jedi were targeting Jedi on the battlefield. This group would trap, overpower their targeted Jedi and behead them. Currently the Twenty-seventh lost six total Jedi (four Padawans and two Knights) to those who had become known as the Headhunters. The fact that their headless bodies were being discovered on the battlefield was demoralizing to her unit.

Somehow, Master Milani's most versatile tool, her Jedi, had been removed from the battlefield. She dare not deploy her remaining four Jedi Knights. And this left her troops without key leadership on the front lines. A weakness, both the local militia and partisans took full advantage of. Master Milani’s next crisis came when Master Cotan Han, the second in command of the Twenty-seventh, was shot down behind enemy lines. Fearful that he would become a target of the Headhunters, Master Milani offered to sit down and speak with the leader of the Rogue Jedi.

As the fourth week began, there was hope in the air as a limited cease fire was reached between both sides. The deal was negotiated through the help of Lord Sembla and his group that brought about a ceasefire and the hope of peace talks. While the cease fire only covered the capital, many suspected that it also covered the Temple. Which was not directly agreed upon by Master Milani despite the Rogue Jedi demanding it being included.

Regardless of what was agreed upon, fighting at the temple had slowly silenced. By midnight, the fighting in and around the capital had all stopped. By one in the morning aid craft from the Vengeance and Baklid VI started to move in. Even Lord Sembla took to the capital in hopes of locating his missing droid. Both sides watched the other with suspicion, but neither side dared blink.

During the cover of night, a group of ARC troopers led by Master Milani's four remaining Knights managed to breach the Olivan’s Temple. In hopes of locating Master Han, the group searched the Temple. They came upon several Rogue Jedi, who were silenced and dispatched with prejudice. While they didn't locate Master Han, the Jedi group managed to liberate the other hostages being held there. The mission was ruled an overwhelming success.

By morning the betrayal was discovered as the Rogue Jedi cried for revenge. The delegation from Olivan walked out of that morning's peace talks. And their representatives at both the aid stations left. Lord Sembla watched as his hard-worked peace fell apart. By noon the fighting had resumed across the city. Both sides used heavy artillery on each other while civilians were caught in the middle.

With help from partisan groups, local militia attacks left the Twenty-seventh unable to gain any traction. Revenge for the Temple raid would come fast and without mercy. Master Han’s naked, headless body was found by patrols near the Pocket. Written in animal blood on the body were the words, “Milani Thậng s̄xng phūd khuy”. Translated, it means Milani, she who speaks double tongue in Olivanese.

The partisans launched a series of ambushes and raids that left the Twenty-seventh reeling. The base camp used for the Temple raid was gassed by Partisans. While the death toll wasn't high, the casualties from the attack was the single largest for a Partisan attack to date. But their next attack would not only top that record, it would risk shifting the balance of power on Olivan for the duration of the conflict.

Near the end of the fourth week their attack came. A Republic Fuel Shuttle, making a scheduled resupply run started it's approached for Base Camp Mercy. Due to heavy rains, which were common on Olivan, the shuttle had to make an instrument approach. Everything seemed to be normal until the shuttle dropped under the clouds and the troopers at Base Camp Mercy realized that the shuttle was not one of theirs.

The alert went out as gun crews did everything they could to stop the incoming shuttle. But there was no stopping the suicidal pilot. Despite taking heavy damage, the shuttle slammed in to the prefabricated base. The impact sprayed unrefined fuel oil over the base and the refugee settlement next to the base. The fireball was so large that Lord Sembla saw it from the bridge of the Vengeance on the other side of the city.

As the camp was engulfed in flames, a spokesperson for the partisans took to the airwaves, warning of more attacks against all enemies of Olivan. That if Lord Sembla and his troops were not in league with the Jedi, they were free to leave. But if they remained, they would be considered targets of the Olivan Liberation Front, the official name of the Partisans.

The aftermath of Base Camp Mercy saw nearly two hundred Republic soldiers, Lord Sembla’s soldiers, Knight Demaya’s soldiers, killed and hundreds more badly burned. Over a thousand civilians were left dead, burned and homeless. The partisans warned all Olivan civilians to remain clear of the enemy from this moment on. For they could no longer offer guarantees in regards to safety.

Lord Sembla fared much better during the reprisals. At the same time of the Base Camp Mercy attack, a five-man raiding party were shot and killed while attempting to detonate a gas bomb at his headquarters. The team had penetrated the Vengeance and were going to detonate the bomb within the ventilation system of the ship. The raiding party signal the 2nd Battalion, that they were no longer protected.

Another surprise came when the identity of two of the raiders were Charley Clones. Charley Clones are created for farm service and manual labor. The other three raiders were Olivan civilians.