Rage Against The Dark Ch 7
Good afternoon y'all! And happy father's day.
I could probably do a few more editing passes on this one. But it's storming outside and I'm perpetually afraid that I'll lose power and internet. So better to do it now, cause I don't wanna leave y'all high and dry.
Can't be breaking my streak!
Some more stuff to talk about, but I'll save that for tomorrow.
Hope you had a good weekend. Hope you enjoy this chapter.
=][=
CT-7567, better known as Captain Rex had been somewhat reticent about the General’s new Padawan.
Yes, he had proven himself twice over, but both of those times the General had been around to catch the pieces in case he miss stepped. With the General leaving for an away mission with the VIP, Torrent had lost its safety net.
Yes, the General’s Padawan had yet to disappoint him, but two operations, one of them ongoing, was not enough to be certain their new Commander could handle himself.
This ran through the clone’s mind as Rylanor jumped from the ground to the top of the AT-TE and roared. “Alright men listen up!”
Torrent company stopped and looked at the warlike Jedi.
“We have gotten our hands on something the Seps want! They want it so much they are scrambling over each other to get it!” He said, his voice carrying as he paced back and forth, his helmeted head turning, seemingly gazing at each of the troopers. “Well I don’t care if it’s the Force’s own child or a giant slug! We are not gonna let ‘em have it! What we will let them have, is a belly full of plasma, and a pool of their own oil to drown in! AM I RIGHT, TORRENT!?”
Despite himself, Rex found himself roaring alongside his men.
“Damn right!” Rylanor said, his voice carrying over the noise, as he continued speaking, the men all quieted. “Now, I won’t mince words. We are outnumbered over twenty to one.”
On a different army, perhaps a different Legion, there would be shuffling feet, or worried murmurs. But not the 501st, and certainly not Torrent. The only thing that met the Padawan’s declaration was grim, determined silence.
The Padawan continued. “Too bad, for that only makes it an even contest! Keep your eyes downrange, fingers on your triggers, and the moment those doors open? Let them have it!”
He gestured, and one of the tanker troopers he’d saved yelped as he was levitated onto the tank’s turret. “You! What’s your name!?”
“Uhh, Gunner, sir!” Gunner replied, coming to attention as best he could.
“Gunner, aim that cannon at the biggest, most heavily armed thing, and fire only when I tell you to!”
“B-But sir! The overpressure!” Gunner began.
“Put your trust in me and the Force trooper.” The Padawan said, turning to the gate and aiming his rifle at it. “Trust me and the Force. But fire only when I tell you, clear!?”
“Sir!”
Before Rex could open a private commlink to the Commander to ask for further details, the enormous gate to the monastery groaned as it retracted toward the ceiling.
“FIRE!” The Commander roared, loosing a fusillade of laser shots into the opening, scything down a squad of B-1 battle droids in seconds, the rest of Torrent opening up an instant later. “For the Republic! For the Chancellor! But most of all, for the Brother at your side! Fire until they melt under the glow of your barrels!”
Torrent roared, explosive blue death streamed out of the monastery gate, scything down entire platoons of B-1 battle droids, squads of B-2 Super battle droids turning cherry red under the onslaught, guarding the smaller machines until their systems failed.
The onslaught of blue plasma released by Torrent was such that the filthy Separatist machines could barely get a shot in. But, slowly, by sheet weight of metal, they began to gain ground, pushing the piled-up scrap metal of the destroyed droids as cover from Torrent’s blasters.
And that’s when the AT-TE opened up with its front mounted Quad-RHE-Enforcer Repeater Cannon. It all but deleted the piled-up droids being used as cover, under its ruinous light what metal did not detonate was rendered liquid.
Even so, by numbers alone, the machines marched on. Red blaster bolts peppered in, most of them sinking harmlessly into the cover the Republic soldiers had prepared. But it was inevitable that a few would strike his brothers.
After all, it was all about numbers.
What he didn’t expect, was for the struck clones to flash with a green light, look around confused for a few seconds, then stand up and once again add their fire to the battle.
Unable to stop himself, Rex looked to the back line, where the Commander’s diminutive companion raised her staff, it flashed green, and on Rex’s HUD, a Brother went from critical condition to wounded, another flash and he went to fighting fit, and eagerly rejoined the battle.
Destroyer droids walked forward, their shields screening an entire platoon of battle droids behind them, and before Rex’s very eyes they crumpled like crushed beer cans, their shields shorting out and allowing the weight of the Clones’ fire to obliterate the platoon they’d been shielding.
“Keep firing! They cannot break us!” The Commander roared. “Show them that unliving steel cannot defeat the spirit of Man! Show them why you are part of the greatest fighting force in the Galaxy! Show them why Torrent is the best company in the GAR! Not a centimeter shall they take without paying for it in an ocean of oil! Concentrate fire on the left quadrant!”
Fire intensified in the battle space the Commander indicated, an instant later, a platoon of B-2 droids pushed it and were gunned down by the concentration of plasma. Despite himself, Rex found his spirits lifted by the Commander’s impromptu battlefield sermon.
At least until he saw the tank. Blaster bolts ricocheting off of and detonating harmlessly against its vaguely aquatic looking front.
“AAT incoming!” Rex called out, highlighting it in his HUD, lighting it up on the HUDs of his men. “Ready the rocket launcher!”
“No need!” The Commander called out, he slung his blaster rifle so it locked to his backpack, then took a strange stance, his knees bent, back hunched, his arms pushed forward, his hands coming together into a rough cone. In front of the tank, Rex saw the air wavering as if there were a heat haze. “Gunner! Fire!”
To the Tank Trooper’s credit, and Rex’s horror, he did not hesitate to follow his Commander’s order.
The cannon flashed, the tank rocked, Rex’s ears popped.
Outside the monastery, the AAT gained a new molten hole in its chassis before almost immediately exploding into a ball of shrapnel and plasma as its magazine torched off, several platoons of B-1 battle droids were knocked off their feet by a wave of overpressure that tore the stone tiles off the floor as a sound like thunder shook the walls of the monastery.
But Torrent was unharmed by what should have turned the Commander, Rex, and all of his men, into a liquid.
“Give them another Gunner!” The Commander called out amidst Torrent’s exultant cheers.
“YES SIR!” Gunner gleefully answered, firing another oddly silent round that shook the walls of the monastery, exposed the sand and soil under the paving stones out front, and collapsed part of the monastery’s outer wall.
“Last one Gunner!” The Commander yelled, his arms trembling.
There was a third shot, the foundation out front sheared off by the air pressure, the battle droids that had managed to almost climb to their feet, those that had survived the ruinous overpressure, were scythed down a third time, a group of spider droids, perhaps the ones that took out the sister tank, were rendered into molten metal and shrapnel.
The Commander sagged, falling to a knee, his breathing visibly impaired, but even then he pulled out his blaster rifle and added his fire to Torrent’s. “Do not let up! For the brothers they’ve taken from you! For the brother at your side! Shatter steel! Spill oil! Kill!”
A united cry of “SIR! YES SIR!” went up from Torrent’ as their firing once again intensified.
Rex began to worry however, as the charge on charge-packs was not infinite. They would eventually run out of ammo.
That said, being miserly would not serve them at all if they were overrun, and the tinnies weren’t smart enough to know to take cover when under suppressive fire.
Suddenly the Commander gestured to the side, there was a nearly inaudible boom! And several of the men were knocked off their feet by the Commander’s Jedi magic.
And a svelte form wearing a dress was knocked backwards, and into the monastery’s interior wall, a pair of red lightsabers clutched in her hands. Had the Commander not acted, she would have landed on and killed Torrent’s newest and already favorite medic.
The Dark Jedi, Ventress.
“Captain Rex!” The Commander called out, dropping his blaster rifle so its cable automatically retracted into his backpack power-pack, snapping the rifle to his back. His lightsaber igniting in his hand, bathing him in blue light. “You have command! Keep our boys alive!”
The Commander roared, a scream of rage that shook the walls as he threw himself at the Dark Jedi, who threw herself to the side, barely dodging the detonation as the Commander landed where she’d fallen. Ventress hissed, and moving far faster than a humanoid had any right to, slinked back into the darkness of the monastery, the Commander hot on her heels.
“You heard him, Torrent!” The Captain called out. “The Commander’s busy, so it falls to us not to let the tinnies interrupt him!”
Torrent roared its agreement.
But even as his men fought even harder to make up for the Commander’s sudden exit, one of his men, CT-3635, Keeper, fell, and when the green flash covered his body, he did not get back up.
=][=
Asajj Ventress grunted, her arms trembling as she blocked yet another slash from the armored Jedi Knight. He twisted his body as he stepped forward, forcing her to follow his motion or be bowled over by his momentum, then drove forward and slammed his shoulder into her side, pushing her back and driving most of the air out of her lungs.
She screamed and used a Push to both stagger the Knight and fling herself away from him. And nearly lost her head as he drove forward once again, his lightsaber coming down on a ruthless Falling Avalanche that nearly collapsed her arms when she crossed her sabers to block it.
“Slow!” He growled, Pushing her back, then Pulling her toward him, forcing her to slash with her lightsabers or be impaled on his. “Weak!” He twisted his hips, pushing with his blade, forcing Ventress to maintain the blade lock or be cut in two, her feet leaving the ground as he swung her like a rag, she Pushed, once again attempting the gambit to gain space.
He snatched a slug thrower from his waist and fired a three-round burst. Ventress dodged two rounds and slashed the third out of the air, to her surprise, it detonated. The concussive force struck her like a punch, peppering her arms and legs with shrapnel, though thankfully the majority of the material had vaporized on contact with her lightsaber.
“Sad!” The Knight declared, having taken advantage of her distraction to close the distance, forcing Ventress to once again cross her lightsabers to block yet another two-handed Falling Avalanche. “Your form is unrefined! Poor! Sloppy!”
Each word was a strike, physical and on her psyche, she could feel his use of the Force stabbing into her brain with each utterance, driving his disdain into her with each swing of his lightsaber.
That his words stung as much as the injuries to her flesh made her angry.
She took that anger, stoked it into rage, and threw it at the Knight with a howl as she launched into a flurry, putting him on the back foot, forcing him to switch from Form V into Form III.
He didn’t dare block her strikes, instead redirecting each of her blows into the floor, walls, and ceiling.
“You know nothing, Jedi!” She snarled, pushing him out of the hallway they’d been fighting in and into a large room, crumbling stone columns holding up the domed roof. “You do not know the true power of the Force! You are blind! Blinded by your hubris! Blinded by your dogma! I know the power of the Dark Side! You cannot stand up to it!”
She finished her declaration by successfully managing to lock the magnetic field of her blades against his, then kicked him square in the chest, channeling the strongest Force Push she could through her foot, sending the Jedi Knight skidding backwards.
She threw herself forward with a hiss, but rather than the Form III deflection she expected, he used a Form I parry and repost that nearly sliced her belly open. Ventress backpedaled as his blade swept into a sideways figure ‘8’ which would have left her in pieces.
“You know nothing of the Force!” He snarled, forcing Ventress to dodge around the wide sweeps of his blade, using his advantage in reach to once again push her. “So blinded by your ignorance that you do not realize you’ve already lost the battle!”
Ventress laughed, jumped backwards, swept her lightsabers through a pillar then Pushed the stone at the Jedi.
To her surprise and chagrin, rather than dodge it as she’d expected, or capture it mid-air to set it gently down as she’d hoped, he roared and Pushed it back at her, twice as fast as she’d flung it at him.
Rather than contest his strength, she dodged, leaving the projectile to crash through another column, and was nearly skewered by a quintessential Form II thrust.
They fell into an exchange of thrusts, before the Knight transitioned once again into Form V as the roof above them groaned. After a few exchanges he pushed her into another of the monastery’s hallways, their duel leaving molten scars on the floor and walls.
Suddenly he stopped, Ventress jumped back, settling into her preferred stance, waiting to see what trick the Jedi would try and pull.
“You can’t even feel it, can you?” He said, chuckling, his mirth making her rage climb higher. “Your ‘master’ isn’t teaching you very well.”
“I won’t fall for your tricks, Jedi!” Ventress hissed.
“What trick?” He asked, keeping his lightsaber’s blade between them. “Just open yourself up and feel it. Hell, you don’t even need to concentrate, it’s obvious.”
Ventress scowled but spared just enough concentration to truly feel the Force, and while she couldn’t place her finger on it, she could tell something was different, something was…missing.
No, not something; someone.
Her eyes widened in recognition.
“Correct.” The Knight said, his amusement cutting into her like a blade. “Anakin Skywalker has left the system, with him left the huttlet. Your mission ends in failure.”
He was right, Anakin Skywalker’s presence in the Force was always suffocating. Where he walked, all Force Sensitives simply knew it.
The handles of Ventress’ lightsabers groaned as her hands tightened on them.
“Do not count your victories yet, Jedi!” She hissed hatefully. “Now nothing is stopping me from leveling this worthless building with you in it!”
“But there is one thing you fail to realize, little puppet.” The Knight whispered, his tone almost loving. Then, with a quick application of the Force, he’d shut off his lightsaber and swapped it for the handle of another one at his waist. “Now that Knight Skywalker, my Jedi Master is no longer in the system, I no longer need to hold back.”
The Dark Side howled in rapturous glee.
And the lightsaber on his hand ignited into a blood-red blade.
=][=
Obi-Wan Kenobi felt the Negotiator leave Hyperspace, the main hangar doors opening to disgorge the ship’s compliment of star fighters and LAAR-Is as they immediately launched into an assault of the planet Teth, his Delta-7 Aethersprite-class light interceptor shook as he broke through the planet’s atmosphere at the head of the formation.
Reports came in over the comms, the Resolute was currently battling a trio of Separatist Frigates, they’d suffered severe damage to their main hangar which had stopped them from launching their full complement of fighters, leaving the carrier ship on the back foot.
“All fighters, aid the Resolute. Negotiator be ready to accept fighters from the Resolute for refit and resupply.” He ordered calmly as he turned his fighter toward the monastery. “Royal Squadron, with me, our job is to escort the 212th to the Monastery and bail out my former Padawan.”
He let the affirmative replies wash over him as he turned his fighter, squeezing the firing stud on his controls at the Force’s prompting, his shots streaking out and destroying a vulture droid that was bearing down on a clone pilot from the Resolute.
[Thanks for the assist, sir!] The pilot commed him before returning to the battle.
“Give me whatever information you have on what’s going on at the Monastery, R-4.” Obi-Wan said. “Last we knew, Anakin was in a battle, meaning that’s where we’ll find him.”
Hopefully. Obi-Wan couldn’t feel his former Padawan in the system, meaning he either wasn’t in the system, or he’d remembered to put up his shield to spare others his presence in the Force.
With Anakin, it could be either.
He shouldn’t have bothered, even from several kilometers out, the huge amount of battle droids swarming at the monastery’s entrance were very easily visible. Furthermore, he could feel the Dark Side surging from somewhere in the building.
Worrisome.
He activated his comms. “Royal, do some strafing runs, soften up the battle droids before our ground forces arrive.”
He flew in a circle above the monastery, destroying three vultures that attempted an attack run on the LAAT-Is, then angled his fighter in the direction of the monastery as Royal ran several strafing runs on the swarming droids. The machines utterly exposed, packed in tightly and without cover, were decimated six times over in seconds.
“Take over R-4.” He said, before popping the fighter’s canopy and jumping out. His fighter’s astro-mech made a few panicked beeps before the fighter was too far away for him to hear any more.
He landed on a spider droid, Pushing down to soften his landing and crushing the machine beneath his feet.
An instant later, the first LAAT-I landed and disgorged its fighters, the troopers of the 212th gleefully firing into the confused mass of droids, who soon were under fire from two fronts as more and more men joined the fight.
He waited, spotting the ship that held his Padawan, reflecting the occasional blaster bolt that came too close back at the droid that shot it, and waved Asami over to join his side as she disembarked.
“Battlefields are chaotic, young one.” He said, his voice serving to center the young woman, visibly overwhelmed by the cocktail of emotions of the men around them. “Feelings fly very high, do not let the anger and fear of those around you infect your mind, only if you remain calm can you properly channel the Force.”
She nodded, she thankfully did not close her eyes as she forced herself to take deep breaths, her hands trembling less as she regained her center. She flinched, and deflected a blaster bolt that would have otherwise hit her into the ground.
Her lightsaber was a thin yellow blade, most unusual that, Ilum almost exclusively produced blue and green crystals.
“Good.” He praised with a nod, deflecting the other three that would have impacted close enough to spatter molten rock into her robes, then began walking calmly forward. “Let the Force flow through you.”
“Master.” She said hesitantly, her face pinching in worry. “I feel…I feel something. I don’t know what it is but, but it feels vile.”
“That’s the Dark Side, young one.” He answered. “Only the weak willed succumb to its call. Nonetheless, you must become familiar with this feeling. You will battle it, so long as the war continues.”
“Yes, Master.” She said dutifully.
“Now, try to keep up, but above all things keep yourself safe.” Obi-Wan ordered. “If you cannot keep up, that is to be expected. You are a Padawan learner, not yet a Knight. Do not take foolish risks trying to stay by my side. My duty is to see the battle ends quickly, yours is to keep yourself safe and learn. Understood?”
“Yes, Master.” She answered with a nod.
“Good.” He said, opened himself up to the Force, let it flow through his body, and threw himself into the greatest concentration of B-2 Super Battle Droids he could see. As he closed the distance, he deflected the blaster bolts that would have slammed into him as he bounded forward.
He reached the battle droids he’d targeted, and with a quick flurry of strikes, the twenty or so Super Battle Droids were so much scrap electronics, and the back of the resistance that had been forming in the droids was broken. The scattered and confused Separatist forces were encircled, cut off from each other, and destroyed piecemeal.
As the last droid fell, cheering could be heard from inside the monastery, echoed by the 212th.
He rushed inside the monastery, where he saw troopers dragging the wounded toward the back wall, sheltering them next to a tank that had been squeezed into the building. He spotted Captain Rex and made his way over.
The Captain stopped giving orders to his men and turned to address him, standing at attention. “General.”
“At ease, where is General Skywalker?” He asked.
“Sir! He’s left the system.” Rex said.
Obi-Wan blinked. “Then…who is that fighting in the monastery?”
“That’d be Commander Rylanor, sir!” Rex said. “When a Dark Jedi infiltrated the monastery and tried to kill our medics, he drove her off and engaged her in single combat, ordering Torrent to hold the line. I’ve dispatched a squad to meet up with him and back him up!”
Anakin had left without his Padawan?
The saddest thing was, Obi-Wan wasn’t even surprised.
His new Padawan arrived, subtly escorted by a platoon of men. “Cody, work with Captain Rex and get organized, I’ll go see about the Force User. Let’s go Asami, we need to go rescue my former Padawan’s Padawan.”
“R-Right, Master Obi-Wan.” Asami said awkwardly, falling into step behind him as he jogged into the Monastery. Obi-Wan hoped she’d quickly leave behind the fear that he’d return her to the Order. So far her greatest fault as a Padawan was that she was a little too timid.
Then again, the girl was fifteen, quite late to be taken as a Padawan, not quite on the cutoff for being sent to the Council of Reassignment. He supposed the fear of rejection was quire logical. Chances were that if he did reject teaching her, she wouldn’t find another Master to take up her education. There being a certain stigma to rejected Padawans, unfair as that stigma often was.
The Dark Side was like a beacon drawing him forward, as he got close, he saw obvious signs of a lightsaber duel; molten scars on the floor, walls, and ceilings, shattered walls, toppled columns, the occasional spiderweb of cracks along with a vaguely body-shaped indentation on a wall.
Looked like the duel had been quite fierce.
He eventually came out to a stone bridge linking the main building of the monastery to a tower, where he saw Anakin’s armored Padawan and ten Troopers, all of them firing at a shuttle that was quickly disappearing into the distance.
“Sir! I’ll comm our air forces, she won’t get away!” One of the troopers said.
“Don’t bother, Hose.” Rylanor said. “All we’d achieve would be to get some of our boys killed. She’s running with her tail between her legs, that’ll have to be enough for now. Let’s head back to the monastery, we need to get our exfil figured out.”
“Sir!” The troopers said, turned, and twitched as they spotted him. They all stood to attention. “General!”
Obi-Wan nodded at the troopers and waved at them to indicate they could relax. “Rylanor, I see you’ve been busy.”
“Oh, you know.” He said, his voice so calm it was nearly mocking. “Just doing my soldierly duty.”
“Something feels weird in the Force.” Asami said, her brow furrowed and her nose twitching. “It’s, like a miasma, or something.”
“That’ll be the Dark Side.” Rylanor explained. “The woman, I think Anakin called her Ventress. She was all but swimming in Dark Side Sauce. Said all the cliché lines too, ‘you know nothing, Jedi!’ and ‘fear the power of the Dark!’ and other such nonsense.”
Obi-Wan scowled and ran a hand through his beard. “If she leaves a residue in the Force, then she’s fallen far farther and faster than I’d feared in a remarkably short time.”
“Dark Side Sauce.” Rylanor repeated with a shrug. “Thanks for the save. I was running out of ways to stall her escape. The moment she was away, I feared she’d have bombarded the monastery to rubble.”
“Right, speaking of which.” Obi-Wan glared at the Padawan. “Why are you not with your Master?”
Rylanor shrugged. “We split up, he extracted the sick huttlet and is on his way to deliver it to Jabba. I stayed with the men to counter Ventress. She’d have gone through them like a bloody lawnmower if I hadn’t stuck around.”
“Be that as it may, a Padawan’s place is beside their Master.” Obi-Wan chastised.
“And a Commander’s place is beside his men.” Rylanor stated. “Master Skywalker had to leave because the mission comes first. But the two of us judged that there was no reason to sacrifice Torrent if we could achieve the objective without that sacrifice.”
Obi-Wan sighed, but chose not to pursue the matter further, not in front of the men, at least.
To his surprise, Rylanor seemed to naturally take charge, first of the squad of troopers sent to reinforce him, then Torrent Company once they rejoined the larger group, Captain Rex seceding command without complaint or reservation as Rylanor arrived, surveyed the room, and began issuing orders.
All in all, Torrent had been subjected to some terrible odds, outnumbered almost two dozen to one, they’d fought off wave upon wave of droids and while they had suffered several dozen casualties, they’d suffered less than a dozen fatalities. A truly miraculous performance. For comparison, the 212th had suffered twice what Torrent had just in their assault into the back of the Separatist forces.
He did take note of the diminutive near-human who seemed to have taken the position of head medic, with the Torrent Company medic seemingly content to, essentially, act as her second and assistant. He’d have to look into that regulation that allowed for ‘Command Squads.’
It wasn’t long before they received news that the two Venators had successfully driven off two of the Separatist Munificent-Class frigates, the third being mission killed, then scuttled by the Separatists once it was too crippled to make an escape.
Both the Clone Companies retreated in good order, the Resolute transferring the 501st to the Negotiator before retreating to a friendly port for refit, the damage their main hangar had suffered being too much to repair on their own.
The Negotiator for its part, turned its prow toward Tatooine and jumped into Hyperspace. It would pick up the 501st’s wayward General, and finish negotiations with Jabba the Hutt.
Leaving behind a scarred, crumbling ruin, where once a magnificent edifice had stood.
Entrar
