In a Galaxy far far away....

Anakin zoomed through the air in his ship leading a formation of about five others trailing behind him. Those who knew Anakin knew he wasn't happier than when he was flying in a ship. It was a stark contrast to his master and mentor, who hated flying. His exact words were "flying was for droids." That caused Anakin to smirk slightly remembering his masters distaste for flying especially the fancy parts of it.

"Artoo decelerate all forward thrusters." Anakin ordered.

The small astromech droid beeped to show it understood the order it was given. Anakin flipped a few switches inside the ship and pressed a few buttons and his ship slowed down a bit. Following his lead the following ships behind him also began to slow down.

"Rex, this is Skywalker do you copy?" Anakin asked into the headset that he was wearing which was connected to the inside of his ship.

"Reading you loud and clear General." The man named Rex replied.

"The area ahead is all clear, feel free to accelerate to catch up. After we clear this next sector you should be home clear." Anakin informed the main ship.

"Copy that General we'll be approaching your position in a few moments, you're clear to go ahead and finish scouting the last sector." The lead ship responded.

The mission was simple. That was nothing new to be honest, but this was a simple escort mission. Fly out ahead a few Republic fleets carrying stormtroopers set for deployment on a planet the enemy were holding captive. It was imperative for the full battalion of troops to reach the planet so that they could liberate it from it's oppression by the Separatist army. Anakin had seen his fair share of action since the beginning of the clone wars five years ago and had risen through the ranks as both a Jedi and a commander. He'd also seen his fair share of action, and an escort mission was one he'd usually ask out of. The only reason he didn't this time was because he'd be cleared to lead the mission of liberating the planet as well. 

Anakin hit a few more buttons on his ship as he prepared to speed it up to the maximum speed again.

"Alright Blue team on me, one more sector to clear and then we can move on to phase two of the operation." Anakin instructed.

"Roger that General, Blue team is following you, ready to move whenever you are." The voice of the Blue team leader responded.

"Don't worry boys, when we get back to Coruscant drinks in the cantina are on me." Anakin said in an effort to hopefully boost morale.

"Whoa General, you're actually offering to pay for drinks?" The voice of one of the Blue team pilots asked.

"Do Jedi even drink anyway?" Another one asked.

"Hey hey! I said I'd buy the drinks, not that I'd actually partake... But what the council doesn't know won't hurt it." Anakin joked.

There were laughs heard over the radio.

"Alright men focus, we actually have to make it back first. Everybody prepare to accelerate all thrusters to take us to the last sector." Anakin ordered.

Just then Anakin felt a shift in the force. An extreme feeling of danger was on him just as he prepared to launch his ship into full acceleration. It was then he saw it. A Separatist dreadnought ship followed by a second and third pulling up to the fleet they were supposed to be protecting. Then a Separatist cruise appeared and launched smaller fighter ships to attack the formation that Anakin himself was leading. It didn't take Anakin very long to realize they pulled into an ambush.

"General Skywalker, the fleet, it's under attack!" Rex yelled over the ships comms.

"Sir, multiple fighters approaching, we're gonna be greatly outnumbered like this!" the Blue Team leader yelled.

'Dammit!' Anakin thought to himself.

Both the formation of fighter ships and the fleet carrying a bunch of troops themselves were under attack. Anakin wanted to help them both but he knew he was only one person and even he couldn't work such miracles. He knew the order he had to give even though he knew how useless it would be he was obligated to give it anyway.

"All ships, fall back to the fleet to protect it. Take down any fighters you can. Rex, radio back to all open channels and try to reach out to anybody nearby for help." Anakin order to the squadron he commanded. "Artoo, activate all forward thrusters now along with evasive maneuvers."

The droid beeped it's response and Anakin tried his best to block out everything else going on around him and only focus on what was in front of him. He HAD to get that fleet ship out of this ambush. Once his personal ship droid activated the evasive maneuver program on the ship and the thrusters kicked in he gained an extra advantage of speed and zoomed by many attacking ships. He could hear the screams and final calls of his men over the radio of how they were unable to shake the ships on their tail or get past the ones that were attacking. Everyone he heard broke Anakin's heart more and more. Unlike most Jedi, Anakin actually did grow attached to the men he fought alongside, it was hard not to. These were his brothers in arms during this war. He fought with them, talked with them, ate with them. To hear them lose their lives and he not be in a position to do anything about it angered him greatly.

He clenched his teeth and tried to channel it into the force. Obi-Wan would tell him not to use his anger with the force as it would lead him down a bad path, but right now he didn't care too much about that.

"Artoo, activate advanced blasters and homing missiles." Anakin commanded in a focused and deadpan voice.

This time the droid beeped back its hesitance to do so. Anakin took note and wasn't very pleased.

"Just do it Artoo!" Anakin yelled.

He didn't mean to do that, but it had the desired effect. Artoo activated what he told it to do. Anakin focused in on the fighter ships he was approaching as he made his way back to the fleet that was under attack. As he flew by enemy fighters he made sure to shoot down everyone that he could. The advanced blasters he installed into his ship helped him do that by way of giving him more shots to use at his disposal as opposed to regular blasters, and a shorter cool down time. It also enabled him to shoot faster. It brought him a sense of satisfaction to know that he was avenging his fallen troops with every enemy ship he took down, a feeling he knew he shouldn't have, but at this moment he didn't care.

Before he knew it he was reaching the fleet which was under heavy attack by the enemy dreadnought ships.

"Rex, on my signal prepare the ship to jump to hyperspace, have reinforcements reroute to your location whenever you come out of it." Anakin instructed.

"Sir, we're blocked by three enemy large ships, there's no way we'll be able to jump through them, not to mention the remaining fighters. You took out a lot of them but there's still plenty more left." Rex replied.

"You leave it to me. I'm gonna blow through the middle dreadnought, when you see your chance to make the jump do it and don't hesitate." Anakin responded with no hint of doubt or hesitance in his voice.

"But sir-"

"Just trust me!" Anakin yelled again.

He was doing a bad job keeping his emotions in check. He never was the best at doing such a thing in a high pressured situation anyway. His masters didn't like it but he felt his emotions gave him strength, as long as he could focus them they were an assistance, not a hindrance as most Jedi like to teach.

"Yes sir. Waiting on you mark." Was the response that Rex gave after a moment of radio silence.

Anakin exchanged no more words. Blowing up a dreadnought with a single fighter was damn near impossible, but Anakin had done the impossible in a ship a bunch of times before. He would just have to trust his abilities and the force to guide him through again. He brought the homing missile controls online as he would need them to be ready. He only had one shot at this and he didn't particularly have time to take all the proper steps. He'd have to bypass taking out the defense turrets and just go for the shield generator itself, then he'd only have a few seconds to fire the missile at heart of the ship to hopefully bring it down.

He focused fully on what he had to do clearing his mind and focusing on only his objective. Once he saw it clear in his head he knew he'd be able to pull this off. He was always confident but with this focus he was more confident than usual. Like complete belief in himself. He quickly lined up his shot at the shield generator and pressed the button to fire repeatedly at the shield generator. He hit it multiple times and performed a barrel roll to evade the oncoming fire from the defense turrets that he was sure he had the attention of now. After the roll he continued straight in the middle ships direction. He clicked a button to his side to line up where he wanted the homing missile to go. He heard beeping from the screen as he waited for the screen to lock onto it's targets. He could've had Artoo do it but was afraid he'd meet some resistance again. No, he had to take care of this one.

He waited and waited for what felt like forever for the shot to line up. Once the screen beeped a few times showing that the shot was locked on, he pressed the button finally. Once he did the missile fired from his ship. He focused his fire on the turrets that could possibly shoot the missile out the sky before it reached it's destination and took care of those. He saw the missile hit it's target at the heart of the enemy ship and it slowly began to explode and fall apart. Once he saw it he aimed his ship to fly low and drop it's altitude so it would no longer be at the same level as the other two dreadnoughts and the fleet. Once the explosion finished clearing and blocking the fleets direct flight path Anakin hopped back on the comms.

"Rex NOW!" He ordered.

There was no response but with his eyes glued to the fleet ship he could tell that his orders were being followed. It only took a few seconds but once they passed he saw the fleet accelerate to speeds that his eyes couldn't follow and jump out of the former space it was in. Anakin allowed a slight smirk to grace his features as he had performed another unbelievable feat he was sure. He couldn't wait to tell Obi-Wan about this one. His musings were interrupted by Artoo's beeping and Anakin was instantly aware that he was now the sole survivor in an enemy owned area of air space.

"I noticed." He replied to the droid's attempts to make him aware of the situation.

If he was honest the situation was very grim. His ship didn't have much left in the way of offense and he would need to make the impossible happen again. He took out a fair number of fighters a few moments ago but there were still a good amount left now focusing their fire on him, not to mention the cruiser, and the two remaining dreadnoughts.

"Drat." Anakin muttered as reality was beginning  to set in.

He attempted to duck and dodge and weave his way from enemy ship's blasters, but seeing as he was the only thing for them to focus on with their superior numbers, they were bound to get lucky eventually. He held his own defensively for awhile but his luck ran out. First a shot to the wing, then one to the engine, then lastly somehow one got to the windshield of the cockpit and caused it to crack and a piece to go missing. Air was getting into the cockpit and making it hard for Anakin to breathe. He fumbled around for his emergency air mask, while trying to keep the ship up in the air. The beeping in the cockpit telling him the ship was in critically condition didn't help. As if luck wasn't through with him yet, his wing completely abandoned his ship next.

He begun falling through the sky at a very high speed. So high a speed, that his ship was falling like a comet. This was not good, Anakin's ship was in no condition to try and work around it. He was falling through space at an extreme high rate of speed. Artoo tried to activate the ship's coolers but he was barely hanging on himself. Anakin was falling but could see that he had entered a planet's atmosphere. He was still coming in too hot but he believed he could make out a body of water. He tried his best to angle his ship toward it. Once he was over it he fired it's blasters to shoot at the water and hit it to get it moving. Crash landing in moving water would be much better than still water. It would increase his chances of survival as well though he wasn't holding out too much hope.

Anakin's thoughts turned to those he would be possibly leaving behind. He knew that Jedi were not supposed to fear death, but such was not the case for him. He thought about Padme, Ahsoka his padawan, and Obi-Wan his master. He thought about Rex and the rest of the 501st company, his company of troops. He thought of the Jedi order and how he never officially made it as a master of the council. He thought of the Chancellor and the war and all the things that he was leaving behind. So much to get done so much that he didn't get done. He couldn't die, he didn't want to. The thought of leaving so much undone scared him greatly. It also angered him, he should've done more, he should've been more. He shouldn't have even been on this mission in the first place. It wasn't fair. These were the thoughts that accompanied Anakin's mind into unconsciousness. In his emotional state he didn't notice that the ships free fall had slowed significantly. He was still coming in and dropping through the planet's atmosphere fast, but he had slowed enough for his droid to activate the cooling systems. It might've been enough to save his life.

He wouldn't know or find out, until he woke back up again.

The first thing Anakin heard on his return to consciousness was the beeping coming from Artoo. It was closer to him then it should've been if he was still in his position in the ship. Anakin was guessing that his ship was very wrecked. He was sore all over. The damned beeping wouldn't stop and... Oh great now Artoo had started to poke and prod him. Anakin allowed it to go on for a bit hoping that the droid would have enough sense to knock it off, but apparently it didn't. Anakin smacked whatever it was Artoo was poking him with away gently.

"Would you quit that? You obviously know I'm awake." Anakin said irritably. 

Anakin shook the cobwebs out of his head and tried to get his wits about him. He wasn't exactly in a rush to move and his body didn't really want him to do that either. He unbuckled the seat belt or what was left of it and stepped out of his ship. There was nobody around where he had crash landed and that was pretty good. As he stepped out he cracked his neck as it was extremely stiff. He then begun to look around and take notice of where he was and his surroundings.

"Sand." He noted dryly. "Of course it had to be sand. Why couldn't I have just died in the ship?" Anakin groaned.

He really hated sand. It reminded him of his home planet. There was nothing left there but painful memories. He gave a heavy sigh before he took stock of his ship. It was a wreck, almost completely destroyed just about like he thought. He wouldn't be moving anytime soon and also that meant most of the things he'd came here with wasn't gonna be in working condition either. He gave another sigh before turning to his droid.

"Artoo where are we?" He asked.

Looking around, the time of day seemed to be early dawn. Maybe that's why he was lucky there was nobody around. Either way it worked out for him just fine. The droid began to beep it's response and it wasn't one Anakin wanted to hear.

"What do you mean you don't know? You're supposed to be able to tell this kinda stuff." Anakin argued back.

He received apologetic beeps in response which evoked another sigh from him.

"What about a signal do we at least have a signal to send a message?" Anakin asked.

More beeps to the negative. This situation was beginning to frustrate Anakin.

"Great so we're stranded somewhere on an unknown planet and we have no communication." Anakin growled frustratedly.

He closed his eyes and tried to reach out to feel the planet through the force to see what kind of energy it and its inhabitants gave off. He didn't feel much in the way of force compatibility and the inhabitants showed little in the way of people who were sensitive to it. 

"Well it seems that's about all I'll be able to gather from here. I'll have to go for a walk. Artoo stay with the.... Or whatever is left of the ship" Anakin ordered.

Anakin then headed off toward the direction of what looked to be a sign. Once he got there he had to look hard to see exactly what it said.

'Venice Beach' The sign read.

He let out a scowl of distaste.

"Of course I'd survive just to land on a beach." He said with a shake of his head.

He really hated beaches especially due to the sand.

Anakin was beginning to find out that this planet wasn't so different from many of the other ones his travels had taken him to when he was on a mission or had some kind of work to do. He used the force to search the feelings of the people he had passed and sense a wide array of differing emotions. Happy, sad, eager, ambitious, annoyed, excited, they were all there from different people. Most people walking around had varying styles of dress. A lot of the men wore jackets with matching pants along with ties while others didn't wear the tie some didn't wear suits either while the women wore dresses, some longer than others and a few daring to wear shorter ones. Some of them even wore suits like the men. 

Funny enough it seemed that out of all the differing styles of dress he had seen while he was out, he was the one who was out of place. Most people looked at him not with fear or hesitance, but like he was the odd one out. They didn't avoid him because he was a jedi like he was used to, they seemed to avoid him because he was dressed odd to them. They looked at him with curiosity, the ones who could be bothered to do so did anyway. 

Anakin ignored the weird looks he received, he needed information if he was going to do anything about his situation. As he knew, the one place to gather the best kinds of information was where drinks were being served. The weak minded like to frequent that place and a few drinks also helped loosen the tongue and that was when the best information came out. He begun to ask the citizens of this world who didn't give him a wide berth if they could point him to the nearest cantina. Some looked at him like they had no idea what he was talking about and others just avoided him completely. He met one of them who seemed to understand what a cantina was since they repeated the word a few times, but then continued to say a bunch of other words in a language he didn't understand. 

After awhile Anakin figured it was time to change tactics. He would describe the place he was looking for differently. Asking people if they knew where one went to gather for drinks. Apparently people then began to look at him with a different kind of look. It was one of disgust and disgrace. Apparently people only drank at certain times of day on this planet, as he was told by a few people it was too early for drinks. Other places he had been often had their cantinas filled with more people at night but that didn't mean others didn't go in the morning for drinks. 

Anakin decided to wait a little while before he went around asking again. Judging from the suns position in the sky it had to be around mid afternoon. This time when he asked he received better answers and was pointed in the right direction. He also learned people here called cantinas, bars. He was directed to one that was serving something called happy hour drinks. It really didn't matter to Anakin as he wasn't much of a drinker anyway. Once he arrived at the place he was given directions to, he wasn't surprised at what he saw at all. It seemed cantinas remained the same no matter where you were in the universe. 

He quickly made his way to the bar area and sat on one of the stools in front of it. The bartender who was in the middle of cleaning a glass, stopped and stared at him for a minute. It wasn't anything out of the norm that he'd been receiving lately. The bartender then let out a dismissive snort. 

"Strange getup you got on there son." He commented. "Anyway what's your poison?"

Anakin kept an impassive face even after the man's comment. At least this one had the courage to say what he thought and felt to his face. 

"Information. I'm not interested in your drinks." Anakin replied flatly.

This caused the barkeeper to raise an eyebrow.

"If you're not interested in drinks then what the hell did you come to a bar for? You can get information anywhere." The bartender shot back. 

"The kind of information I'm looking for isn't exactly going to be found out there just anywhere. Besides I know these places are the best ones to obtain information from. It just comes down to how much it's gonna cost and how trustworthy it is." Anakin said. 

This brought out another snort from the man. 

"You seem like you know a thing or two about how this works." The barkeeper noted. "So what is it you wanna know friend?"

Anakin looked around to make sure people weren't paying him too much attention. He then used the force to sense if anyone was feeling curiosity or anticipation from listening and waiting to hear what he was gonna say next. When he didn't feel any of that he decided it was safe to continue. 

"I need a ship or parts to repair one at least, and I don't have a whole lot of credits to spend." Anakin informed the man. 

The bartender looked at Anakin weird as he finished the last of his sentence, but Anakin didn't really pay it any mind, figuring he was just trying to figure out where to point him to.

"What kinda ship is it?" The barkeep asked. "Not too many people come here asking for ship parts. You should try by the docks." 

"Why would I try the docks, I'm looking for ship parts. A flying ship like the ones in space?" Anakin tried to clarify. 

The man shot Anakin a completely incredulous look this time, almost like he couldn't believe what he was saying. 

"You sure you haven't been hitting the sauce already buddy?" The man asked in disbelief. 

This caused Anakin to scrunch his face up in confusion. 

"What are you talking about? Look do you know where I can find what I'm looking for or not?" Anakin asked irritated.

The man seemed to take on a calmer demeanor but yet held his stance of not being able to believe his ears. 

"Look I don't know if someone put you up to a prank or if you got a couple screws loose upstairs, but there's no ships in space here and there ain't no place that sells em that or anyone around here is gonna know of. Now if that's all your craziness I have actual paying customers to go tend to." The man said moving like he was going to walkaway. 

Anakin quickly searched the the man's facial features with assistance from the force to tell that the man was not lying. 

"Wait!" He called out stopping the man in his tracks and getting a few other pairs of eyes paying attention to him now. That he didn't need but he would just have to deal with it before he lost this man who again was at least conversing with him.  

"Then what is it that people DO use to fly around here?" Anakin asked. 

The man shot Anakin another one of those looks of  disbelief. He then gave a deep sigh and rolled his eyes. Anakin could feel the irritation oozing off this man and he didn't need to use the force to help him this time. 

"You mean a damn airplane? God what do they teach kids in school these days?" The man complained. 

"An airplane?" Anakin repeated confused. 

"Yeah those big ass things you see flying in the sky making a whole bunch of noise. If you're looking for those why don't you head to the airport. It's not too far from here. LAX it's called or Los Angeles International Airport. Go bother those bums with your crazy ass flying questions." The man said and fully walked away this time. 

Anakin was excited himself. That was the first real tip he had received since he started talking to people. The man was gone and he wasn't gonna shout out his thanks. He reached in one of his pants pockets and pulled out a couple of coins. He laid some down on the bar where he was once sitting and took off out the door. 

The bartender eventually made it back to the space Anakin was occupying and shook his head at the sight of what he thought was change left on the bar. He scooped the coins up in his hand and looked closely at one. It wasn't like any coins he had ever seen before. He then looked at the rest of the coins in his hand and felt anger well up inside of him. 

"Sonuvabitch couldn't even give me real change. Gonna have to start banning the unpaying whackos from coming in here at all from now on." The man said angrily as he tossed the coins in a trash can and continued on doing his job.