Georgy Petrok thought he was luckiest man in the galaxy at the moment. He had a beautiful and kind wife as well as three wonderful young children that always brought him joy, even after the worst of days. Georgy also had a job that he deeply loved and had started up all by himself a few years ago. This job was really a business venture that he had come up with to help the community that was Anoat City.

Anoat City existed as one of the only livable areas on the polluted planet of Anoat. This once lush planet had been over polluted many centuries before and had even been abandoned until only recently. It was just some years ago that former settlers had started to come back and repopulate the planet in the hopes to establish a growing and thriving community. With the help of the New Republic, citizens had begun to clean up the areas around Anoat City to make living possible and also to preven all the diseases that existed from the filth around the planet.

Work had progressed smoothly with the new influx of credits and new recycling facilities had been scheduled for production. Even without these facilities yet completed the citizens had taken to the street by themselves and had quickly started to clean up the streets of the city. Everything had started to look positive, until the war broke out that was.

With the Empire's attack on the New Republic all hope of ever reclaiming Anoat from the pollution that had swallowed it whole was washed away. The credit flow quickly ceased as more and more money was put into the war effort. The scheduled recycling facilities were left as only frames and foundations, remaining unfinished until credits and resources could be found to finish the work.

The credits and resources had never came, though. The New Republic had been beaten in the war and was restructured into the Galactic Coalition. This new government had little money to spare on anything, let alone a cleaning operation on Anoat. Georgy Petrok had witnessed the suffering of people in Anoat City first hand and had decided to do something in order to help his people survive.

With the support of his family Georgy set out to establish his own business on Anoat. The business was based around the unfinished recycling plants that had been started around the city. He flew to meet with the Coalition government and almost begged them to help out the people of Anoat. During this meeting Georgy brokered a deal in which he would provide the majority of the credits needed to run the recycling plants if the Coalition would provide the remaining credits and resources needed to finish their construction.

After the agreement had been reached Georgy had gone to his family and told them good news. Within weeks his business was up and running, while resource shipments slowly trickled into Anoat City. This small supply of resources made Georgy question the Coalition's commitment, but he was still happy to see that one of the plants had become operational. It was better than nothing, however, the man's bank account was drying out in the process. The estimates about operational costs had been wrong and the Coalition was not willing to supply more credits than it already was.

With so much pollution around Anoat City this single recycling facility could not keep up with the load and had required much maintance to keep operational. This had also turned out to be the time of the Black Dragon Empire's attacks on the galaxy and once again the Coalition was drawn into a costly war. The war made sure that no more credits or resources would go towards Anoat and its effect to fight off the pollution that plagued the entire planet.

Georgy had no where else to turn. He was fast becoming broke and also had his family to think about. The only fund contributors that could be found had wanted something in return, such as to run the facilities or reassurances that later they could install factories on the planet's surface. Even if Georgy was willing to accept these offers, some of the population were not. A radical movement had emerged among a small percentage of the population. These people believed that industry was the evil that had polluted the planet and should not be brought back to it. In their minds that civilian population of the planet should be glad to live on it and with time the planet would heal itself.

This movement had quickly turned militaristic in their dealings with anyone that would try to come forth and offer credits for future land. Threats were usually the favorite technique and was almost always more than enough to dissuade those individuals from doing business on Anoat. Meanwhile people were dieing from disease as pollution started to move back into the city from other parts of the planet. To this, the Old Ways Movement, as it called itself, responded with the saying that the planet was punishing those on it that did not wish to go back to the old ways of life.

All this had made Georgy a very sad man. He had tried to help his people, but soon could not even help his people. That was until Stellar Enterprises had signed a deal with the Galactic Coalition. According to this deal the corporation could establish businesses on Coalition planets. Many planets had been looked into and out of them all Anoat was picked before of its sever problems. It was also picked because it was close to a very traveled trade route and that could prove to be very profitable. In helping the population clean up the planet, Stellar Enterprises would earn good PR with the other systems around the galaxy. It would earn an image of a corporation that was willing to spend money on helping people for the sake of people and not just profits.

In Rob Stellar's quest to truely make peoples lives better, he came to Georgy and offered to purchase his company outright for a large sum of money. In turn Georgy would still run the Anoat recycling facilities and also the whole reclaimation effect that would consist of thousands of droids, designed specifically for pollution cleaning. Nothing else was demaded of the planet. No land was requested for future factories or anything of that sort. It was said that afterward, if the population wished to talk about this issue, Stellar Enterprises would be more than willing.

The company had quickly recieved threats from the Old Ways Movement, but Rob Stellar was never a fan of threats and responded with more security on the planet for every emplyee. In the weeks since the purchase of Georgy's company, no actual hostile actions had been witnessed from the radical movement and more threats were dismissed. Meanwhile resources poured into the planets small starport and construction of the rest of the recycling facilities had restarted.

It was for this reason that Georgy was once again a very happy man. His family was once again well provided for and he was helping the planet as best he could.

As he looked himself in the mirror, he thought about how much his people had endured to continue living on this wasteland of a planet. Readjusting his tie, Georgy turned towards his wife who had been standing in the bathroom doorway, watching him. He smiled and went over to her slowly, running his hand through her long dark hair before kissing her lips softly.

"Have I told you how much I love you lately?" He asked with a grin.

She smirked and gently snudged his side. "Not since like an hour again." She let out a giggle that melted Georgy's heart before kissing him quickly and turning around so he could leave the bathroom.

"You better go my love, wouldn't want to make you late."

He laughed gently and hugged her tightly. "Alright, Alright, I shall go, but only because your making me. I should be back a little early today."

With that he winked, acknowledging that he had not forgotten what today was. It would be his twentith anniversary and he had something very special planned for the day. With a smile, he kissed his wife one last time and picked up his briefcase. He look back with a smile and left the house. As Georgy walked to the car he had no idea that today things might be different and the day might not turn out as he planed.

Three Hours Earlier...


The location was an old abandoned warehouse on the very outskirts of Anoat City. This large rusted out building had been deemed the prefect staging area for a plan that had been set into motion just a week before. It would be the first ever show of force by the Old Ways Movement, a movement that had been born from the polluted streets of Anoat City. A movement that had so far only issued threats of force against outside corporations that they saw as hostile to their way of life. Those threats were no longer working and today a new tactic would be tried out. A tactic that would prove to all the severity of the Movement's resolve.

And so now they all gathered in this run down warehouse that stood from times long ago. Times before the whole population of Anoat was forced to leave the planet in search of another home. As the first morning light pushed its way through the filth covered windows that lined the top of the building, this group of eight men and women stood in that scrattered light and looked upon a lone man who paced before them all.

Each person that stood there waiting was no older than twenty years of age. They had all been raised for very young ages on the planet after their parents reimmigrated back into Anoat City. Everyone of them had grown up in poor and dirty neighborhoods that had been highly polluted. Neighborhoods in which they had witnessed people suffer at the hands on the planet's wrath and the many sicknesses that it spear among the populous.

These conditions of childhood had created people that were easily able to be manipulated by others with skills for it. It had been the man pacing before them now that had brought them all into this group and it had been this man that had shown them the "light" as they called it. In their minds the man in front of them spoke only truths and would be one to lead them into a better life. All his promises had come true and since they had all joined the Old Way's Movement neither they nor their families have gotten sick as results of diseases. This alone was a reason to stay with the group and do anything they were told to. They trusted the Leader completely and would all die for him.

"Alright, take your seats." Spoke up the man in front of them, who had stopped his paced and had turned towards the group.

In front of them was a semi-circular table with eight chairs positioned around it. The five young men and three women all replied, "Yes great Leader" and qiuckly sat down in the chairs. As they faced their Leader they could see a board full of pictures and maps on it. Obviously they had no idea what it all ment, but each one knew that the past month of training would probably be put into use soon.

"Good, now that all of you are gathered here, I shall reveal the mission we must go on today." The Leader spoke and turned towards the board behind him, his long robes flowing as he turned.

"This mission is most important and the planet itself cries out to me for its completion. As you all know, not long ago a large corporation, Stellar Enterprises, has invested money into the planet. They say that it is for the good for Anoat, but we all know this is not the case. Why would any company waste their own money to help out a planet with no hope of regaining those profits. You all know they wouldn't. Stellar Enterprises is trying to buy out trust before they simply take over and start using this planet for their own good. They will exploit anything they find on it and hurt Anoat even more than it is already.

"I have personally asked them to leave Anoat for us to deal with it, but they have not. They do not take the Old Ways Movement seriously and do not believe in the spirit of the planet. The spirit is alive, however, and it is begging for them to leave the planet. You yourselves have seen the power of Anoat. She has healed your families and you and has kept all your loved ones safe ever since you joined to protect her. Will you answer her call and stand upto Stellar Enterprises no matter what it takes?!" He turned and pushed his hands down on the table while looking at each of the group with cold eyes.

"Yes leader! We will die for Anoat so that she might live!" They responded as one just the way they had been trained to.

"Good. Your faith is strong, but hopefully giving your life would not be necessary. The reason I have gathered you all here today is impliment a plan that would hopefully make Stellar Enterprises leave the planet for good." He turned and pointed towards one of the pictures.

"This is Georgy Petrok, he has lived on Anoat for many years, but he has sold us out to Stellar Enterprises and has allowed them to take root on this planet. We will kidnap this man on his way to his office and hold him untill Stellar Enterprises promises to leave. If they don't, we will have to excute this man for crimes against the planet. We will continue to inflict pain upon the corporation until it withdraws all person from the planet and leaves the planet alone so that it might recover from the centures of damage."

With that is started. The whole plan was gone over in a small span of time and every detail was made clear so that they could be carried out. Every member of the group was given a duty and once the briefing ended, each one moved to a long table at the rear of the warehouse to gather up their weapons. With weapons in hand, they all gathered together to pray to Anoat to keep them safe and pledged their loyalty to the Movement. Once complete, they all moved into the speeder waiting for them and took off.

The blue beam came out of no where and impacted the side of the speeder. As it struck blueish ripples spread from the point on impact and traveled around the whole landspeeder. Systems within the enclosed speeder started to short circuit almost instantly and quickly computers tried to switch to the backups, but were not fast enough. Before these redundant circuits could come online two more beams struck the side of the cabin in quick succession, shutting down all systems completely.

The repulsors instantly shut down and caused the whole speeder to drop to the ground instantly. Its momentum carried the landspeeder some distance before it finally came to a stop, its front damaged and smoke coming from the power generator at the rear. Anyone who wanted to run to help was quickly discouraged by the large transport speeder that came out of a side alley and halted beside the downed one. Its side door slid open and eight men and women jumped out with weapons in hand, pointed towards the speeder now in front of them.

Inside the black armored landspeeder, seated in the back, was Georgy. He looked around in shock as all this went down in front of his eyes. Not knowing what to do, panic over took him and prevented him from moving. All this senses ceased to function as his head slowly tilted towards the driver and passeger who were seated in front of him. These men had been assigned to protect him by Stellar Enterprises and had quickly pulled out their holstered blasters. Had Georgy been able to think, he would have been amazed at the calmness of those two individuals, both of whom reached towards buttons located on their doors and pressed down on them.

With an instant pop both doors flew open, blown off by emergency charges that had been built into them for situations such as this. It was so sudden that one of the men standing beside the car had the door crash into him and send him down to the ground. In this moment of surprise both guards jumped from the car with blaster ready and fired at the attackers. They had been charged with protecting Georgy and would do so to their best ability.

That ability was good, but not good enough in this case. They were both out numbered and out gunned, however, fought as well as they could.

Two of the eight attackers went down instantly, but the others returned fire and tried to seek some shelter. Shelter was something the bodyguards lacked, however, and one quickly took hits to this shoulder and then chest before dropping to the ground never to get up again. The other got struck on his thigh and then in the back as he tried to get into the armored speeder for cover. Right before Georgy's eyes, the men feel on the passenger seat unconscious.

In all both of these guards had killed four attackers and injured two others. These injured ones got into their transport speeder as their leader jumped out and calmly walked to the side of the other speeder and peered in to look at Georgy, who sat at the rear with wide eyes, unable to speak or act. Reaching into the speeder, the leader pulled Georgy out with two large hands and held him in place as one of the attackers tied up his hands. With this done Georgy was thrown into the back of the transport speeder. With their mission accomplished the large speeder sped off and quickly turned into an alley. It would proceed towards the city's outskirts and a large abandoned warehouse.

The Old Way's Movement had now sent their message loud and clear to anyone who would dare ignore their threats.

The black landspeeder pulled up slowly towards the curb and stopped among the other speeders gathered in the area. From this lone speeder emerged a man wearing a dark suit and light shirt. He looked around slowly, eying the other speeders and men in uniform as they moved around the property. These speeders had insignias of the Anoat City Police Department on them and had their hazard lights on to block off the area.

Investigator Morlov adjusted his suit and started his walk towards the house before him. He saw the open door as he got closer and could see a woman sitting in the front room, talking to another suited man. Morlov could see this woman was distraught and held her child against her tightly while speaking with the man. Before he could enter the house, however, the investigator was stopped by one of the uniformed men. After showing his paper, though, Morlov was quickly let into the house.

He stood beside the room and listened to the wife explain what she knew about the day. All the questions asked were routine and in her state still hard to answer quickly. Over the years Morlov had picked up a good ability to read people and could see her pain was real and that she loved her husband very much. Morlov also knew something that the Inspector who was questioning the woman did. He knew that the man who had been kidnapped was not being help for ransom from this woman, but from Stellar Enterprises.

The company had been contacted by those responsible within hours of the event occurring and were asked to transfer almost half a billion credits into an indicated account as well as to leave Anoat immediately. Morlov had been sent to the planet to investigate this kidnapping and locate where Georgy was so that the criminals could be found. Stellar Enterprises had a policy of never negotiating with terrorists, but also one of protecting all people that worked for it. To this end, the company was interested in freeing Georgy as well as arresting the kidnappers so that others would be discouraged.

Morlov waited for the other man to get up and leave before stepping into the room. He slowly approached the woman and apologized to her about taking her time.

"My name is Inol Morlov and I'm an Investigator with Stellar Enterprises Security Service. Mr. Stellar sends his deepest regrets that he could not be here personally, but wants to reassure you that we will do everything in our power to get your husband back safely. I also give you my word that I will find those responsible and you shall see your husband soon enough."

The door at the rear of the transport speeder slide open and let light pour into the dark cabin inside. It contrasted completely with the black armor clad figures that arose precisely from benches attached to each of the transport's inner walls. This transport speeder was much like the many others that travels around Anoat city to deliver goods to one business or another. Throughout its travel from the spaceport to the current location not one person had even taken a second glance towards it.

Were there people to witness the emergence of the armored figures from the rear of the speeder, they would know how wrong they were to quickly dismiss it. Luckily for the men and women that had traveled within it, the only people around were law enforcement officers. These men were a small mix of Anoat police and Galactic Coalition security personnel. They had cleared the area specifically for the arrival this new team, which belonged to no government agency. This fact alone made the personnel a little uneasy, but orders had been issued from higher ups and would be followed.

As the waiting uniformed men watched, they grew somewhat impressed at how these new arrivals acted. They moved wordlessly from the rear of the transport towards an open side bay. From this long compartment they withdrew rifles of a design that none of the personnel recognized. The rifles seemed to be colored in the same black as the armor and seemed to possess two different barrels, one on top of the other. Each of the figure's turned their weapons slightly sideways and peeked at the display screen placed there, checking for the ammo count and power pack charge.

After everything had been inspected the group formed up in a pack. One figure strode forward towards the security men sending off the side. They could not see the figure's face for it was covered in a darkened helmet, but could not help being slightly intimidated. As the figure got closer a rank marking could be seen on one of the shoulders. Upon recognition of rank, the security personnel quickly straighted.

"Is everything set up Captain?" The figure, Colonel Stevenson, asked the top ranking man in the small group of law officers.

"Yes, sir. All teams are in place and awaiting the order."

"Very good. Do you have the updated information for me?"

The Captain reached into one of his pockets and pulled out a small disk. "Everything is on here."

Stevenson reached out and took the disk into his large padded hand. He slowly pushed open a port on the armor's waist and inserted the given disk into the proper slot. Almost instantly a three dimensional map of a warehouse appeared on his helmet display. Two red dots blinked into existence at the top of this building and quickly vanished after that as the image zoomed in and cut away that layer to show a representation of the warehouses internal space. Inside this image new red dots appeared, seven of them.

The Colonel looked at the Captain standing before him and nodded his armored head slightly. "Thank you Captain, this will do nicely."

With his left hand holding the underside of the large rifle that rested against his chest, Colonel Stevenson reached out with his right and shook the Captain's hand. "I hope this operation goes well on your side as well. Tell your men good hunting."

Once done the Colonel quickly turned on his heel and advanced back towards his team. He looked each one over and knew they would do great today, they had to. A man's life rested in their hands and it was up to them to free that man. They had all gone over the mission plan en route to Anoat, but each one of them knew that plans went only so far in a real operation. All of them would improvise and adapt if need be.

With a nod each member withdrew a specialized pistol from one of their holsters and moved towards the nearest wall of the four story building that was situated before them. As one they pointed into the sky and pressed down on their triggers. From these pistols shot out grapple hooks, which upon reaching the roof of the building attached themselves. Tugs from each of the soldiers ensured that the grapples would hold and within seconds the whole team of eight men and women shot into the air, quickly ascending the building.

In mere seconds they were all gathered on the rooftop and huddled close to one of the edges. From this edge they could look down and across the street at a warehouse that looks similar the one they had all seen in premission planning. The reason this was so, was because that was the very same warehouse.

As the new data had indicated, upon zooming his helmet display, Ilium could see the two armed hostiles patrolling the roof. These two men were looking every way possible, except for the direction that most threatened them a the moment, up. Without another word having to be said, two members of the team crotched down and brought their rifles up, aiming towards the warehouse below them. They had all been through many missions together and could work whole engagements with little being said. Each member knew the tendencies and actions of one another and could almost reach each others minds. This would just be another success along with the rest. A success because failure was not an option.

In his heads up display, Colonel Stevenson watched the chrono. When the proper time was reached, the order to engagement was given out through the cognitive interphase. Within seconds, two triggers were pulled and two rifles silently fired their deadly rounds. At two kilometers per second the hollow point, magnetically accelerated rounds arrived at their designated targets only milliseconds after the trigger pulls. Each round could have torn through flesh and born and kept going, had they not been designed to shatter on impact.

Both roof sentries fell simultaneously as the slug ripped through their clothes and skin before shattering into numerous pieces as they impacted the soft muscle of each man's heart.

Colonel Stevenson watched the recticle on his heads-up-display move sideways along with the motion of his IR-18 rifle. With a secure wireless connection his helmet received feeds from the rifle's built in scope, allowing the Colonel to accurately shoot from the hip if need be or look around corners without having to expose himself. While these new rifles were somewhat heavier than what he was used it, they were also very powerful and very useful. Also the weight hardly mattered since the powered combat suit worn by the whole team took up the extra weight on itself.

From his crotch position Colonel Stevenson swept the roof and once satisfied that no more threats existed, looked back to watch the last members of his assault team travel down the lines that stretched up to the previous warehouse. Those two men quickly descended down the lines and once over the roof jumped off to land silently with their weapons up at the ready. Stevenson nodded and mentally issued commands for this team to assemble and breach the roof door. Once it was breached they could all move into the warehouse and start the other phase of their operation.

To achieve this, Diller moved forward and reached into one of her suit's compartments to bring out a slicer unit. She attached the thing to the door's input pad and started to punch in some keys. Along the slicer's top red lights began to flash in sequences. Quickly one by one each light turned from red to green and finally the door slid open, revealing a flight of stairs.

The team knew exactly what to do and when, so as soon as the door slid open Diller moved aside and let a group of soldiers run past her to secure the staircase. Stevenson followed this group inside while others moved up behind him. They all slowly moved down in the darkness towards the bottom of these stairs. This darkness having been provided by the first group that had rushed inside. One of that group had disabled the lone glowrod embedded within the ceiling. The only light came from the bottom of the staircase and the inside of the warehouse.

Their descent came to a halt when the pointman lifted up his fist. The Colonel's helmet display quickly opened up a small corner box and began showing a feed from the lead man's rifle holocam. The feed showed a lone guard moving towards the staircase along a catwalk that stretched all around the top of the warhouse's inner space. He had probably seen the light go out and was moving to investigate.

"Permission to dispatch?" Asked the soldier who was now standing in the point position.

Stevenson thought carefully and checked his chrono. If the guard discovered them, the operation would be a bust and he couldn't let that happen.

"Permission granted Permen. Rest, against the wall."

At the command, every member of the assault team pressed their backs against the wall and waited. Only the lead man had the ability to do something at the moment and when the guard came to front of the staircase and turned to look, Permen acted with lightening speed. The suits each soldier wore not only enhanced their strength, but also their speed and reaction time. In a blurr, and before the guard could even utter a single work, Permen had grabbed his throat and pulled him into the darkness of the stairway.

With the dead guard now slumped against the opposite wall, the team advanced once more. They split into two groups and took one side of the wrap around catwalk each. They moved slowly and at a crouch for at each end stood another heavily armed guard. They would have to wait for the right time to strike and that time would be only moments away.

While waiting for this moment to come, Colonel Stevenson took a quick glance at the warehouse floor below. He could see other armed men walking around and more importantly got a chance to see the location of the hostage they were there to rescue. The man sat half naked and off the side, tied down to an old looking chair. His location was surrounded by numerous crates and close to him stood one armed man and one armed woman. Both seemed to be talking with someone that wasn't visible yet. Someone probably against the wall of crates facing Stevenson. With a mental command, the Colonel activated his helmets thermal imaging system and quickly say the hidden person's heat outline on the other side of those crates.

These three personnel around the hostage were quickly designated primary targets and the snipers attached to the unit acknowledged those updates. When everything went down, those three would be the first ones to die. Colonel Stevenson also made the team understand that if possible, the hostiles should be taken alive. It would be a good thing to have people that could be interrogated later on. With all orders given, the Colonel once more checked his rifle and watched the timer count down.

When the timer hit zero, nothing happened for a few long seconds and then suddenly the whole world turned upside down, for the enemy that was. At first the lights inside the whole warehouse winked off and almost instantly after that the long front door of the building buckled and folded internally to either side down the whole middle. This was followed by large concussion milliseconds later.

The Colonel stood up in a half crouch and raised his rifle towards the stunned guard on his end of the catwalk and opened fire.