the aat and its squad of battle droids was altogether another beast. it was luck again that they faced droids and not humans, for a smart commander would have sent the droids to flank while engaging with the tank from the front. instead of accurate damage, the indiscriminate fire served more to create additiona rubble for the fist's men to fire from.

three of the men towards the front, currently in the cover of a large crater, behind some rubble and at the corner of a building, respectively, took two pop shots each with a plx-1 rocket launcher. with seeking warheads that homed in on repulsors, the tank and, by association, the troops behind it were in for a nasty surprise. if the street was cleared successfully, they would move up again, though two men had been injured by debris.

Meanwhile the ground troops were taking hits from an AAT, that killed ten and wounded two in its brazen assault until a Spacetrooper indeed took it out. As they came near Facility G, the fire from the snipers proved to be formidable, but the Spacetrooper's armor held, at least for now. Meanwhile, the Stormtroopers would scatter throughout the streets, and attempt to use quick movement by now running towards Facility to throw off the Snipers, as well as use the limited cover the buildings provided as well in their movement. They weren't all that far from the building and closing in on the shield. Above them, ten TIE Fighters were shot out of the sky, but they continued their assault on the capacitors in the general area of Facility G, surely knocking out at least a few by now and lightening the amount of fire they were taking. The AT-ATs did help, when not dealing with charging AATs, by taking ranged and accurate shots on the capacitors as well.

On the far side of Cato Neimoidia, while the Assault on Koto To raged on, the Neimoidian tactic did indeed work, and the TIEs broke off their attacks on the platform and swarmed towards the X-Wings. When the X-Wings began to come upon the Vanguard however, to counter the high risk, high damage tactics Cross was becoming accustomed to when dealing with Neimoidian pilots, while highly uncharacteristic of them, their engines were immediatly cut and the spare energy was poured into the shields. This halted the Vanguard's approach, now safely out of the way of the falling Lucrehulk debris, but allowed for its shields to hold against the barrage from the X-Wings. In truth, Cross had no intention of destroying the platform, until it seemed that most of the civilians had escaped. To ensure the escape of the civilians, he was stopped outside of the range of his guns, so no uppity gunners could take pot shots on the transports.

Captain Augustus Valerian
Star Destroyer Vanguard

But it was more than Kav Dowry cared for. "Jam their sensors!" he shouted, pointing uselessly out the viewport at Koto To in the distance, "I don't want another missile to get thwough!"

"That would be ill advised," one of the tactical droids said in its annoying, soothsaying voice, "We would also be jamming our own sensors, Commander. We would have no real time tactical information."

"Oh," Dowry said tentatively, then forced some haughtiness into his voice as he added, "Of couwse. As you were."

The MTT, meanwhile, would continue to exact its devastating toll on the walkers. As noted before, it was not unreasonable to expect a single MTT to topple all of the walkers on this avenue. It would proceed through the large plaza where the two avenues converged on Facility G, cruisingly obliviously over the advancing Imperial troops as it rounded the plaza and came to face the next line of walkers head on, this time adding its formidable blaster cannons to its assault as it barrelled toward them. It would do so without the support of its AATs at the rear of the formation, however, as they would be easily disposed of by the Assault Gunboats—here too, however, the Assault Gunboats would pay a price. At least one would inevitably be felled by the laser defense grid, which was still operational and quite busy; the remaining Z-95 headhunter and R-41 starchaser from the Ebon Fist's formation had been torn to shreds, as had many, many of the Imperial TIEs.

The remains of the R-41 starchaser, engulfed in flames, slammed into a highrise—shattering all of the windows on the street—and tumbled into a crushed, charred heap of durasteel and spilled fuel on the pavement very near to the Ebon Fist's men as the battle raged around them. They apparently had enough firepower to dispense with the STAPs, but they, the AAT, and its accompanying droids would succeed in stopping their advance for the time being. The PLEX missiles would naturally home in on the AAT, one of them impacting on the heavily armored nose of the tank and accomplishing little, the second missile striking at an angle on the turret block. The explosion sent the tank careening to one side and foundering into a pile of rubble. Its turret remained operational, however, and exacted its revenge on the men around the corner of the building by blasting the corner into particulate glass and durasteel debris. Its mobility diminished, however, the AAT wouldn't pose much of a threat to the Ebon Fist's men as long as they remained on the move.

The droids continued to fire, however, tactlessly standing in the middle of the street as they did so. No doubt they themselves would be debris in a few moments. But with a flight of STAPs, an AAT, and a squad of battle droids destroyed, Commander Dowry would not underestimate these men again. A couple of blocks later, as they neared Facility G, another pair of AATs would cruise down the street at 35 miles an hour, in close formation on either side of each other. Together, they spanned the width of the street and barreled toward the Ebon Fist's men and PAWNs with guns blazing. They showed no intention of slowing down or stopping, either, and would run them all down if they were able. One thing was certain—they would not miraculously escape with mere injuries this time.

The Imperial troops, meanwhile, would be in a predicament of their own. As they charged Facility G, they would have to cross the broad, open plaza where the two avenues converged, and where the MTT had rumbled past a moment ago. No doubt, it would later be known as the "red plaza," "blood plaza," or the "plaza of death" by the men of the Iron Fist, as they had no cover for quite some distance. The snipers would have a field day. One of the spacetroopers would be shot four times before finally being taken down. Another was shot twice to no effect, then a lucky shot through the eyepiece sent him cluttering to the ground. Seeing how stubborn the spacetroopers were, however, the snipers turned their fire on the more vulnerable stormtroopers where they could do far more damage.

Stormtrooper after stormtrooper was cut down, and no one would survive this charge without having at least one member of their squad killed. More problematically were the wounded, who would be difficult to evacuate from the plaza. Fortunately for the Imperials, the Neimoidian AATs, MTTs, speeders, and other support vehicles seemed to be ignoring them. Unfortunately, it was because they were closing in on the apparently undefended barges and landing ships behind them. Two pairs of AATs would close in on either side of their landing zone, blasting away at the ships with everything they had. If their doors and ramps were still open as one assumes they would be, the particle shields would be down and, thus, the AATs would punch through their hulls like tissue paper.

The good news for the Imperials was that their tireless offensive on the capacitors would finally succeed in knocking out enough power to the laser defense grid around Facility G to diminish its firepower. With the resounding crumbling of one of the duracrete housings and the crunching of the electrical equipment within, the lasers in this area would be so weak as to be effectively useless. This small victory would have come at a high price, however—surely no fewer than 25 of the TIEs, in all, would now be strewn across the streets and rooftops of Koto To and the impenetrable mists beneath it. Not to mention the Assault Gunboats.

Meanwhile, the Facility G's defenders remained in place, and as soon as the Imperial troops came within range, the four AAT's arrayed around the building's entrance would open fire on them, causing them still more misery. There was an explosion from among their ranks, as one of the snipers landed a shot on the mounted grenade launcher on one of the spacetroopers and blasted him apart in front of his brethren.

The tactic might have been uncharacteristic of Neimoidians, or, at least, uncharacteristic of the stereotype of their species. Two factors were at work here, however; 1.) Cato Neimoidia, as with all worlds, was not home to only one species. Indeed, many different species resided there, many involved in commerce, and all of them shared the responsibility of defending the planet. As it was, the pilots of these X-wings were not only Neimoidians but also Humans, Duros, Rodians, and others, and 2.) Neimoidians had a strict, stratified society, and any of them who served as mere starfighter pilots were extremely low in the social hierarchy (comparable to droids since, indeed, Neimoidians preferred the use of droid starfighters). In short, they had far less to lose and far more to gain, because success provided much craved opportunities for advancement.

In most societies, the most compassionate are found in the lowest classes, and with less to lose, these Neimoidians could afford to be more self sacrificing than their stately superiors, especially since those superiors had abandoned them without any orders. And there was nothing more worthy of self sacrifice than ensuring that innocent civilians would be unharmed. Even Neimoidians, for their common stereotype, understood this. Some of them, anyway. The X-wings would keep on the offensive, losing quite a few of their number and eventually breaking off the engagement once all of their proton torpedoes had been spent. The XQ6, by now, had evacuated as many people as it was going to—there simply weren't enough ships or escape pods for all of them (since the Neimoidians had used most of the ships for their possessions), and the rest of them, perhaps 200 men, women and children, were stranded.

The Vanguard was still in a difficult position, however. Literally. It had accelerated deeper into Cato Neimoidia's gravity well to avoid the debris from the Dhow and Dromon, and then cut its engines in order to divert more of its power to shields. As a result, the ship, even at rest, would be descending at a ponderous but steadily increasing speed toward the planet. With stronger and stronger gravitic forces working upon it, it was now going to be a rather diffficult task to pull up without devoting a significant amount of power to the engines, and soon. The point of no return, as the Vanguard's navigators had no doubt calculated, would be approaching in a matter of moments.

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¹ From "Multi-Troop Transport," on Wookieepedia: "The MTT has been known to have one of the strongest armor the Baktoid have ever made" [sic], and "With heavy armor and weaponry, the MTT was almost unstoppable."

It was obvious the Imperials had reached the facility first. It was distressing that their air support had been lost as well; a small comfort that the Imperials and Neimoidians were slaughtering one another wholesale, though the Imperials were by far getting the worst of the lot.

In the plaza, Colonel Netus directed his men. The Space Troopers quickly took care of the AATs, and the Stormtroopers continued their push within the shield. After a few moments, and some heavy casualties, the first waves of Stormtroopers began to enter Facility G, with the doors being blasted open by rocket fire, and the Snipers now being targetted by the rocket teams and what fire the running Stormtroopers could bring about. Collection of wounded was a secondary priority. Right now, two objectives were their primary goal. Getting inside Facility G and taking out the Snipers; and that they did, as they continued their push to swarm the facility and make their way to their target.

On the other side of the planet, the moment the X-Wings broke off, the Vanguard immediatly fired its engines once more, and began to accelerate, not only away from Cato Neimoidia, but upwards, slowly, but surely, moving out of its gravity well. It was a risky manuever, but the shields had held against the assault, and the fighter wing now gave chase to the X-Wings. As Cross commanded his bridge crew on moving the Vanguard back into a advantagous position, the Blue Hawk moved in on the XQ6, assaulting its shields with its entire array of weaponry, with intent to bring them down.

Captain Augustus Valerian
Star Destroyer Vanguard