Recaps

Huang Yehao and Cummings led Fourth Civilization troops in capturing the Melas Hotel during the assault on Cloud City, where a B-2 droid killed civilians despite Huang Yehao's attempt to make them surrender. The Fourth Civilization captured Cloud City within four hours, and Bespin's Defense Fleet fled with Miera Figo and Santamaria.

• Huang Yehao briefed 4th Platoon on its mission to seize the Melas Hotel as the assault on Cloud City began.
• Huang Yehao and Cummings led their troops into the hotel, using machine-gun fire and alternate entrances to break through Bespin resistance.
• Huang Yehao tried to persuade armed civilians to surrender, but a B-2 super battle droid fired on them and killed several guests.
• Fourth Civilization troops cleared the hotel and set up a Missile Turret on its roof.
• The Fourth Civilization captured Cloud City four hours after the battle began and advanced on Bespin's other Floating Cities.
• Miera Figo, Santamaria, and the Bespin Defense Fleet fled as the situation became hopeless.

After Bespin Planet fell to the Separatists, Sheev Palpatine and Wilhuff Tarkin planned a counterattack designed to make fear a weapon against both the Separatists and neutral worlds. Shaak Ti agreed to provide Jedi support, and Palpatine prepared to send sixty Hunter Class Battlecruisers toward Bespin.

• Governor Miera Figo and military commander Santamaria escaped Bespin Planet to Dolla Planet and requested aid from Coruscant.
• Sheev Palpatine contacted Wilhuff Tarkin, who warned that fear of the war could turn the Republic’s people against the Republic itself.
• Tarkin urged the Republic to use Bespin’s defeat to strike the Separatists and punish neutral planets for refusing to fight.
• Shaak Ti agreed to a counterattack if the Republic had the capability, and Palpatine revealed that sixty Hunter Class Battlecruisers were ready.
• Shaak Ti assigned Jedi Masters Glynn Beti and Aiden Ward and their apprentices to join the expedition.

The Republic fleet arrived over Geonosis and began battling Admiral Trench’s Confederacy forces while Depa Barris ordered the first cruisers to hold out for reinforcements. As Luna Phantom and Luna Dream joined the fighter battle in a modified ARC-170, the Republic’s fighter count suddenly surged from a few hundred to more than a thousand, leaving both sides stunned.

• Depa Barris sensed countless deaths and ordered Luna Dream and Luna Phantom to lead the fighter squadrons and buy time for the follow-up fleet.
• Admiral Trench kept his ships in formation and launched Vulture droids, whose attacks broke the shields of three Dreadnought-class heavy cruisers.
• The Republic launched its fighters, including a modified ARC-170 piloted by Luna Phantom with Luna Dream as copilot.
• Luna Phantom and Luna Dream prepared to enter the dogfight as over a thousand Vulture droids engaged the Republic fighters.
• Alarms sounded across the Confederacy ships and Vulture droids when the Republic fighter force suddenly registered as more than a thousand real fighters.

Luna Dream and Luna Phantom’s battlefield illusions turned the tide of the Battle of Geonosis, allowing the Republic fleet to overwhelm General Trench’s forces. The Republic broke through the blockade around Geonosis.

• General Trench ordered the Vulture droid fighters to attack, but they were confused by the Dream Sisters’ illusions and destroyed by Republic pilots.
• Luna Phantom charged into the fiercest fighting in her modified ARC-170 while Luna Dream warned her to be more careful.
• Republic reinforcements arrived, including four Invincible-class heavy cruisers, as Depa Barris assembled her mismatched fleet against General Trench.
• The Invincible-class cruisers’ main guns crippled a Generous-class frigate, and the Republic fleet advanced while fighter numbers rose above six hundred.
• The Dream Sisters maintained more than a thousand illusions as General Trench sent every Vulture droid fighter into a futile defense, and the Republic broke through the Geonosis blockade.

General Trench withdrew from the Republic fleet and agreed to bombard Geonosis after Tang Xiao revealed Count Dooku’s betrayal over Bespin. On Geonosis, General Grievous’s reinforced droid army overwhelmed the exhausted Republic forces, leaving Clone Troopers facing two charging NR-N99 tank droids.

• General Trench told Tang Xiao that Jedi Knights had devastated his fighter squadrons, then withdrew his fleet toward a moon of Geonosis.
• Tang Xiao explained that Count Dooku and Darth Sidious were working together to leave Bespin exposed, and ordered General Trench to bombard Geonosis.
• The Republic Clone Army captured the ruined main hive, while General Grievous led hundreds of thousands of droids and Geonosians in relentless attacks.
• General Trench’s fleet arrived and deployed reinforcements, including B-1 and B-2 battle droids and NR-N99 tank droids.
• General Grievous launched attacks from multiple directions, destroying Republic transports and pushing the Clone Army into grave danger.
• A Clone Trooper squad destroyed nearby B-1 droids but then saw two NR-N99 tank droids charging toward them.

Cody led the exhausted 212th Attack Battalion against Separatist tank droids on Geonosis until Republic reinforcements arrived and the army began evacuating. As the Republic fleet covered the withdrawal, General Trench launched a full-force surprise attack on its defensive line.

• Cody and his combat squad disabled two NR-N99 tank droids by destroying their rear engines, then Cody ordered the 212th Attack Battalion to charge and draw enemy fire.
• Master Windu and the Jedi fought alongside the Clone Troopers as Republic reinforcements led by Depa Barris descended over the battlefield.
• Master Yoda ordered the army to withdraw, and the Republic began evacuating wounded and exhausted soldiers aboard the newly supplied warships.
• General Trench contacted General Grievous, then sent the Separatist fleet out from behind the moon to attack the Republic ships covering the evacuation.
• Fleet Commander Wullf Yularen ordered the Republic fleet to return fire as Trench's ships charged its defensive line.

Wullf Yularen's Republic fleet struggled to hold off the Separatist assault while the Clone Army evacuated Geonosis under General Grievous's final droid attack. General Trench's fleet sacrificed itself to devastate the planet and cripple the Republic, leaving Master Yoda to send ships back into the fight.

• Wullf Yularen ordered the Republic fleet into a defensive formation, but the Separatist ships charged through its fire and badly damaged the Invincible-class cruiser Elf.
• Luna-Meng and Luna-Huan joined the Republic fighters, while General Trench ordered his ships to ignore the fighters and concentrate their fire on the Republic fleet and Geonosis.
• General Grievous committed nearly six hundred thousand battle droids to a final assault as the Clone Army retreated behind improvised barricades and boarded ships.
• Wullf Yularen warned Master Yoda that the Separatist fleet had broken through, and destroyed warships began crashing onto Geonosis with the force of an orbital bombardment.
• Master Yoda ordered ships carrying soldiers and half the smaller warships back into space, where the Separatist fleet redirected its fire against them.
• General Trench's droid-controlled fleet continued trading its ships for Republic vessels as part of his plan to cripple the Republic and destroy Geonosis's factories.

As the Republic fleet and ground forces faced mounting losses on Geonosis, Master Yoda chose to evacuate most troops and leave forces behind to hold the line. The chapter ended with the abandoned regular soldiers nearly mutinying as Clone Troopers enforced the retreat order.

• General Trench exploited the Republic fleet’s weakened position while General Grievous launched a massive droid assault on the ground forces.
• Luna Dream and Luna Illusion damaged several Separatist warships, but the Republic fleet suffered heavy losses before reinforcements began shifting the space battle in its favor.
• Mabel Gassen told Master Yoda that the ground forces could not hold and that the remaining assault ship could evacuate only about twenty-five thousand more people.
• Mabel Gassen proposed evacuating the Clone Troopers and remaining behind with the regular soldiers, but Master Yoda decided to issue the retreat order himself.
• Master Yoda ordered twenty thousand regular soldiers and five thousand Clone Troopers to stay behind, with the regular soldiers allowed to surrender after the fleet departed.
• The regular soldiers nearly mutinied, and the five thousand Clone Troopers forcibly suppressed them.

The Battle of Geonosis ended in devastating losses for both the Galactic Republic and the Confederacy of Independent Systems, while the Fourth Civilization gained strategic and political advantages through Tang Xiao’s intervention. The chapter left Tang Xiao working to protect Dawn Star Planet and the Fourth Group as Darth Sidious’s fleet threatened Bespin and Francis Underwood built support on Luks Major Planet.

• The Republic fleet escaped Geonosis after nine days of battle, leaving behind heavy casualties, captured troops, and nearly all of its largest warships.
• The Confederacy of Independent Systems also suffered severe losses, while wrecked warships and fighting damaged Geonosis’s factories and reduced its productive capacity by one-third.
• The chapter revealed that Sai Francis Tann’s intervention, arranged through the Fourth Civilization and Tang Xiao, had prolonged the battle and prevented the Republic from crushing the Confederacy.
• Tang Xiao sought to keep Count Dooku from attacking Dawn Star Planet and the Fourth Group by preserving the Confederacy’s dependence on their industry and by weakening it through continued fighting.
• Darth Sidious and Count Dooku sent a Republic fleet toward Bespin, while Francis Underwood promoted Dawn Star Planet’s standing in the Confederacy Parliament on Luks Major Planet.

Matt Hona prepared Bespin’s defenses against a looming Republic attack and planned to hold the planet for fifteen days. Meanwhile, Fourth Civilization Fleet B arrived at neutral Cerea, whose ruler urgently sought talks with its commander.

• Matt Hona learned that the Republic was sending sixty Hunter Class Battlecruisers and prepared to defend Bespin until Sefrans Tann’s operation began.
• Matt Hona oversaw construction of hidden Gauss Fire Platforms and Hangar Platforms, along with minefields and missile platforms around Bespin.
• Matt Hona recognized that the Fourth Civilization could not afford the losses the Republic could and began forming another battle plan before contacting Igor Zavalov.
• After Cerea declared neutrality, Fourth Civilization Fleet B departed on May 23 and arrived at the planet in the early hours of May 24.
• Grand Elder Dor Femi Bongmi panicked at the sight of Fleet B’s sixty capital ships and ordered diplomats to contact its commander.

Lin Nanyi pressured Cerea’s Grand Elder Dor into abandoning neutrality and joining the Confederacy of Independent Systems through a mutual defense agreement with Dawn Star Planet. As Cerea mobilized its industry and troops for the war, Admiral Sefrans Tann’s secret operation began.

• Lin Nanyi rejected Cerea’s neutrality and demanded that it sign a mutual defense treaty with Dawn Star Planet.
• Grand Elder Dor argued that Cerea followed the Galactic Republic, while Lin Nanyi insisted the Confederacy represented the freedom of the Mid Rim and Outer Rim.
• Lin Nanyi sent a Kohl-class Battlecruiser over Cerea’s capital as a show of force and called it a delivery of the treaty.
• Dor signed the agreement, bringing Cerea into the Confederacy and aligning it with Dawn Star Planet.
• Cerea shifted factories to wartime production and planned to send a 500,000-strong expeditionary force to the battlefield after three months of training.
• Admiral Sefrans Tann’s secret operation officially began.

Sefrans Tann and Edra Kestis raided Kyl Station to find the captured spy Berga Bu Dai while the Geonosians attacked the facility. Tann diverted the Clone Troopers by ordering an assault on the Energy Center and began using her shuttle’s power to restart the station’s combat machinery production.

• San Hill hired Sefrans Tann to search Kyl Station for Berga Bu Dai and reclaim the industrial platform if possible.
• Sefrans Tann and Edra Kestis arrived at Kyl Station and found Geonosian forces fighting the Clone Troopers inside.
• Edra Kestis attacked a Clone Trooper patrol with her Lightsaber while Sefrans Tann avoided the guarded control center.
• Sefrans Tann used Trabo’s authorization codes to order the Geonosians to attack the Energy Center and cut the station’s power.
• Sefrans Tann directed her shuttle to the factory district and used its energy supply to resume combat machinery production.

Jor Drakas led Republic clone troopers against Geonosians who had sabotaged a power station, then confronted the Dark Side warrior Edra-Kestis. She revealed herself as Darth-Lilim and overwhelmed him before an ally arrived to help.

• Jor Drakas learned that Geonosians had sabotaged a power station and ordered his clone troopers to attack while a communications platoon stayed behind.
• Drakas told Jett to guard a spy who could lead them to a mysterious Hutt buyer, then raced toward the control center’s other side.
• Drakas found Edra-Kestis beside several dead clone troopers and challenged her as a Dark Jedi Knight.
• Edra-Kestis named herself Darth-Lilim and attacked Drakas with her Lightsaber and the Force.
• Darth-Lilim overwhelmed Drakas with Force lightning, and someone shouted that they had come to help him.

Darth Lilim overwhelmed Jedi Knights Joel Drakas and Jett as they tried to protect the spy carrying intelligence on the secret weapon. When OG-9 Nest Spider battle mechs emerged from the factory, Jett charged Lilim to give Drakas a chance to escape and warn Master Yoda.

• Jett arrived and told Joel Drakas that the Mabrus were on their way and the spy was secure.
• Darth Lilim revealed her mastery of Ataru and attacked Jett and Drakas, preventing them from reaching her.
• Explosions at the factory revealed OG-9 Nest Spider battle mechs, which began destroying the industrial platform.
• Jett told Drakas to escape with a warning about Darth Lilim and the secret weapon, then charged Lilim to hold her off.

Sefrans Tann used the factory’s unfinished battle mechs to attack the Clone Army’s control center and ambush the troops escorting Bo-Dai. Before dying, Bo-Dai revealed a lead on the Republic’s secret weapon: the Hutt Boorka on Tatooine.

• Sefrans Tann restarted San Hill’s factory and assembled its remaining OG-9 Nest Spider and DSD1 Dwarf Spider battle mechs.
• Tann sent the Geonosians to attack the energy facilities, drawing the Clone Army’s attention away while the mechs assaulted the control center.
• Clone Troopers began evacuating Bo-Dai as an Acclamator-class assault ship, the Mabrus, approached the industrial platform.
• Tann attacked the escort with her yellow Lightsaber and the Force, but a Clone Trooper captain shot Bo-Dai before she could recover him.
• Tann ordered the mechs to destroy the control center, then questioned the dying Bo-Dai, who named the Hutt Boorka and Tatooine.

Jett sacrificed himself to trigger an artillery beacon, forcing Darth-Lilim to retreat while Republic forces came under attack by three Revelation-class light cruisers. Joel-Drakas evacuated wounded personnel but had to abandon more than two hundred Clone Troopers, while Sefrans-Tann and Edra-Kestis departed.

• Jett used his remaining strength to delay Darth-Lilim, then pressed a button that activated an artillery guidance beacon and killed him in the bombardment.
• Darth-Lilim survived the shelling with an injured head and vowed revenge, while Sefrans-Tann insisted they contact Tatooine about the intelligence held by a Hutt.
• Three Revelation-class light cruisers arrived beyond Siskeen and attacked the Acclamator-class assault ship Mabrus, overwhelming its defenses.
• Joel-Drakas evacuated wounded personnel aboard a shuttle and ordered a retreat, leaving more than two hundred Clone Troopers on the industrial platform.
• Sefrans-Tann and Edra-Kestis departed the industrial platform in their shuttle.

Gaddula-Besadi refused Count Dooku’s request to let either side’s fleets pass through Hutt Space, then learned that Boorka had put a valuable logistics record tied to the “Extractor Project” up for auction on Nal Hutta. The record was worth the equivalent of twenty thousand tons of spice.

• Count Dooku offered to recognize Hutt rule over Hutt Space and rebuild the Hutt Empire if Gaddula-Besadi helped the Confederacy, but she refused to let either fleet use Hutt routes.
• Gaddula-Besadi ended the call with Count Dooku and went to sleep, but Magtan-Scar soon woke her and asked where Boorka was.
• Gaddula-Besadi contacted Boorka, who said he was on Nal Hutta conducting business and invited her to join him.
• Boorka revealed that he had put a logistics record mentioning the “Extractor Project” on Nal Hutta’s black market for the highest bidder, and valued it at twenty thousand tons of spice.

Hutt Boorka sold the Extractor intelligence to Big Boss of Titan Security in exchange for five million Upiupi coins and a promised attack on a Republic outpost. Meanwhile, the Republic formed the 19th Legion under Sulama, and a fleet led by Jedi Masters Green-Betty and Aiden-Ward set out to strike Bespin.

• Big Boss confronted Boorka in his mansion on Nal Hutta and offered five million Upiupi coins for the Extractor intelligence.
• Boorka accepted the deal after Big Boss threatened him, but demanded that Big Boss destroy a Republic outpost blocking his smuggling route.
• Big Boss agreed and left with a squad of Titan Security's Caladanian warriors.
• The Republic divided the galaxy into twenty theaters and formed the 19th Legion, Dark Saber, under Governor Sulama, with its headquarters on Javin.
• After Bespin fell, Sheev Palpatine ordered a counterattack, and Jedi Masters Green-Betty and Aiden-Ward led sixty Hunter Class Battlecruisers from Coruscant toward Javin.

Tang Xiao learned that the Republic had sent its newest warships to Bespin while Dooku refused to spare reinforcements, leaving Matt Horner to face the fleet with limited support. As Tang Xiao prepared to join the battle and target the Jedi, Republic commanders reached Hoth to ready the 19th Legion for deployment.

• Tang Xiao learned from Count Dooku that the Confederacy could not send reinforcements to Bespin because its fleets were committed elsewhere.
• Tang Xiao recognized Palpatine and Dooku’s maneuver and decided he had to destroy the Republic fleet to strengthen his standing in the Confederacy.
• Tang Xiao ordered Matt Horner to win the battle without support from Fleets B and C and said he would personally eliminate the Jedi Knights.
• Tang Xiao told Justin Levis that the Fourth Legion could not be deployed on a large scale against the Republic’s ordinary troops.
• Sulama welcomed Generals Green Beatty and Aiden Ward to Hoth and reported that the 19th Legion’s 200,000 ground troops and available transports were ready.

Jedi Master Green-Betty and Governor Sulama prepared a fleet of sixty Hunter Class Battlecruisers to attack Dawn Star Planet, while Matt Hona’s forces set a trap at Bespin’s outer defensive line. The Hunter fleet emerged from hyperspace as the minefield detonated, bringing both sides to the brink of battle.

• Green-Betty briefed Sulama on the operation, and he promised to provide the support it required.
• Sulama watched the Hunter Class Battlecruisers receive troops and imagined them destroying Dawn Star Planet’s fleet at Bespin.
• Matt Hona ordered his forces to enter combat status and detonate a minefield near the Corellian Trade Route.
• The minefield exploded, and sixty Hunter Class Battlecruisers emerged from hyperspace near Bespin.

Matt Hona led Fourth Civilization, Fleet A into battle against the Galactic Republic fleet near Bespin, as both sides exchanged heavy fire and launched successive waves of fighters. The second Hypermatter Railgun salvo destroyed one Hunter Class Battlecruiser and crippled two more, but Fourth Civilization also lost two immobilized warships as another fighter battle began.

• Matt Hona ordered the Kohl-class Battlecruisers to fire their Hypermatter Railguns, but the Republic fleet avoided the minefield and blocked the barrage with its shields.
• Matt Hona ordered a full-force attack, and both fleets exchanged fire while Republic V-19 fighters clashed with Fourth Civilization Vulture droids and Guard-class anti-aircraft ships.
• Matt Hona deployed the Gauss Fire Platforms, and the Republic sent V-19 fighters and Y-wing bombers to destroy them; a Y-wing pilot blew up one platform with a Proton Torpedo.
• The Kohl-class Battlecruisers fired a second Hypermatter Railgun salvo, destroying one Hunter Class Battlecruiser and disabling two others, while concentrated Republic fire left two Fourth Civilization warships immobile.
• The Republic launched its third wave of fighters, and the brutal air battle resumed.

E-3 Squadron attacked the Separatist Kohl-class Battlecruiser Jianghai amid the brutal fighter battle around Bespin. Squadron Leader Maxto sacrificed himself to land Proton Torpedoes through the ship’s damaged hull, while cloaked Wraith fighters continued slaughtering Republic pilots.

• Republic and Fourth Civilization fighters suffered heavy losses as the second wave of Republic fighters entered the battle.
• Maxto led E-3 Squadron toward the damaged Jianghai despite orders to continue attacking it and heavy anti-air fire.
• V-19 fighters distracted a Garda Flak Frigate, but the Republic lost several fighters when a Hiigaran-class battlecruiser and its point-defense guns struck their formation.
• Stealth Wraith fighters ambushed E-3 Squadron near Jianghai and destroyed most of its fighters.
• Maxto charged Jianghai’s largest breach and launched two Proton Torpedoes into it just before his fighter was destroyed, severely damaging the battlecruiser.
• Matt Hona received Jianghai’s withdrawal request as cloaked Wraith fighters continued destroying Republic squadrons.

The Galactic Republic’s fighter advantage faltered when Matt Hona unleashed stealth-equipped Wraith fighters against its forces at Bespin. Green Beatty ordered a retreat and recognized that the campaign would be more difficult than expected.

• The chapter explained that the Republic’s 60 Hunter Class Battlecruisers carried a huge fighter force, while the Fourth Civilization prepared stealth fighters, Garda Flak Frigates, and another weapon to counter it.
• Matt Hona launched 300 stealth-equipped Wraith fighters, which struck the Republic’s third fighter wave by surprise.
• Green Beatty ordered the Republic fighters to retreat, but fewer than a quarter of the third wave returned to their warships.
• Green Beatty recalled the second-wave fighters, leaving more than 90 Gauss Fire Platforms free to keep attacking Republic ships.
• Admiral Magellan warned Green Beatty about the Kohl-class Battlecruisers’ kinetic cannons and the strain on Republic shields.
• Green Beatty ordered the Wraith fighters’ combat data sent to the Research Department and admitted that liberating Bespin Planet would not be simple.

Admiral Magellan persuaded Green Beatty to force a landing on Bespin, arguing that the Republic needed to use its numerical advantage in fighters to counter the Separatists' stealth craft. The Republic fleet pushed into Bespin's outer orbit and began a full-scale assault on the planet's Floating Cities.

• Admiral Magellan and Aiden Ward discussed how Dawn Star Planet's Wraith fighters had been improved through years of combat and export experience.
• Admiral Magellan proposed forcing a landing on Bespin, and Green Beatty agreed despite warning that the ground forces could suffer devastating losses.
• Gori Beatty pledged that the Jedi would join the battle and protect the landing troops.
• Matt Hona sent the Fourth Civilization fleet to meet the advancing Republic fleet, while the Republic deployed three thousand V-19 Torrent fighters and fifteen hundred Z-95 Headhunters.
• The Republic fleet endured the Separatist barrage, reached Bespin's outer orbit, and launched transport aircraft toward the Floating Cities.

Admiral Magellan launched a Republic assault on Bespin, but Jedi Masters Green Beatty and Aiden Ward uncovered hidden Separatist forces and disrupted their ambush. As the battle spread from space to Cloud City, Tang Xiao’s Stilat and Shriken craft turned into a dangerous new threat to Republic fighters.

• Green Beatty and Aiden Ward sensed over a hundred concealed Separatist Hangar Platforms, and the Republic fleet exposed them with probing fire.
• Matt Hona launched 700 Wraith fighters and 2,400 Vulture droid fighters as the Republic committed its fighters and landing ships to Bespin.
• Republic Y-wings bombed Cloud City's landing zones, Marines began landing, and Admiral Magellan expanded the assault across the Floating Cities.
• A V-19 squadron destroyed one Wraith fighter with support from a Fire Sea Battleship, then encountered five unfamiliar Separatist craft.
• Stilat Class Light Corvettes crippled Republic fighters with engine-disrupting beams, while Shriken Class frigates and Stilat craft revealed themselves as Tang Xiao's specialized counters to Republic fighters.