The False Apocalypse

Book 2: Rise of the Guardians

Chapter Eight

Carving a Path

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Disclaimer: I do not own any of the worlds or characters from the crossovers. If I did I would be working on them and not this. The original characters and world in the first chapter are however of my own creation.

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"Alright boys; you know your missions. Get out there and kick some clanker shebs. I want you all back aboard the Arbiter by nightfall, you hear me!" Kal Skirata shouted over com-links as Shadow Company approached Utapau's atmosphere in their drop ships. He received a 'Hu-RA!' over the link and with only a few more commands they all entered com silence. They would be making a stealth drop in the night and make their way to the rendezvous locations over the following couple hours. If everything went as planned, Grievous wouldn't know what hit him.

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It was well past noon though that fact was impossible to tell from within the Separatist fortress. Deep within the confines of Utapau's mountains a few key members of the CIS Council looked upon the red holo-image of what they considered to be the ultimate battle station. Stone walls layered with ceiling high computer screens surrounded a council table where the designs glowed in ominous red hue. Any who could understand the specifications would be terrified at the ramifications of such power; the power to destroy entire planets!

"As you can see here, we do not have the resources to complete the battle station without significant cuts to our other resources." Nute Gunray announced to the council. It was quite unfortunate. The construction of the battle station had been delayed for years already. They planned all the logistics involved in constructing such a massive object in secret. It was nigh impossible but a suitable location had been recently identified. It would seem that fate was conspiring against them. Now that they had the logistics in place they simply did not have the resources to construct the weapon in any reasonable amount of time, not and continue the war.

"How long." Grievous demanded. After the loss of Count Dooku, General Grievous was effectively the most powerful man among the separatists with the exception of Darth Sidious himself. While Grievous was known for his violent outbursts, Sidious was an even worse person to cross. Neither were very accepting of failure and while Grievous was more emotionally unstable, Sidious wielded far more power.

"Nearly twenty standard years, General." Gunray replied, it was a simple matter of numbers.

"Unacceptable, and if we do cut production." Grievous demanded.

"Three years if we put everything we have on it, but that's impossible; we would all have to go into hiding to produce at that level." Gunray replied yet again. They would have to give up on the war, feign surrender and return at a later time. Such an action would put their planets and resources back in the hands of the Republic and make the superweapon impossible to build.

"I don't want to hear excuses. We need that battle station. If it takes conscription then do it! Thanks to you we have to get off planet before Kenobi finds this base." Over a month ago Grievous was ready to hunker in and fend off a few Jedi and a few assault squads. Now he had thousands of clones bearing down on them across the planet. If it weren't for the Nemodian's lust for luxury goods he wouldn't have left his hover-chair where the Republic could get critical locations out of it. Now all his battle preparations were for nothing! He may have had control of the planet's defense shields but that would only protect them from bombardment, not thousands of ground troops.

"My lord." A battle droid with red marks clanked its way into the chamber only to cringe in pre-programmed fear routines when Grievous shouted "WHAT!"

"My lord, we have been picking up multiple anomalies from around the base."

"Impossible, Kenobi couldn't have found this base so quickly." The cyborg chortled in disbelief.

"I don't think so General, We think it may be a sensor array malfunction. There has been no detection of any beings sentient or otherwise approaching the base."

"If it's a malfunction then go fix it!" With one of his four arms, Grievous grabbed the droid's datapad and kicked the droid out the room's entrance and forced it shut.

It took only a moment of glancing over the data for him to raise his head in alarm. "Put the base in lockdown, we have intruders! You, go get the rest of the council and bring them to the chambers. I want the guard outside tripled!" The Cyborg shouted, pointing to one of the guard droids as the door to the council chamber slid open with another whoosh. Yet another droid stumbled in as the other droid could be seen attempting to stand.

"Sir, we're being hailed through an open Republic channel!" Grievous looked to the droid in bewildered shock and looked to the council to see them equally confused. "Put them through." He responded with an annoyed shrug. Perhaps he would be able to access his situation with whatever this was about.

"Roger, Roger." The droid replied and looked to the council table where he sent the link through. The person on the other side was easily recognized.

"General Windu, what a pleasant surprise. Come to surrender?" The cyborg asked full of sarcasm, knowing that the odds were unlikely, especially as the war had been going since the loss of Dooku.

"General Grievous, we have the planet under blockade and we know your current location. Surrender or we will bombard your location into glass." The Jedi stated, his face as stern as it was legendary.

"Republic lies, we've detected no –" Grievous stopped as the planetary monitoring computers came to life picking up the signatures of no less than half a dozen Republic Venator class Star Destroyers exiting hyperspace within bombardment range.

"Uh-oh…" Several battle droids sounded in unison. "Sir, we have –"

"I can see that, fools!" Grievous shouted as he clutched one of the droids by the head and threw it to the ground. If there had been any time in the last year that he had been furious, it was now. "Put up the planetary shields!"

No later than Grievous had given the order the base rocked with an explosion that their sensors detected as coming from orbit. Three more ground shaking hits struck before the planetary shields were in place, flickering lights all over the planet form the power drain.

"That was your only warning shot. You have one hour to surrender. Ground forces are converging on your location. You cannot leave the system, even if you do lower your shields; escape is impossible." Windu gave his ultimatum and cut the connection. Grievous promptly smashed the droid that had projected the image. His fury was clear and none in the room wanted to interrupt the general's thoughts for fear of him turning his anger their way.

This shouldn't have been happening. It was not the Republic's style to glass a planet, even in part. It was even less like a Jedi to do the same. Perhaps the Jedi council had finally built up the backbone to do what was necessary to shift the war solidly in their favor. Regardless of the reasons they were trapped.

"Connect me with our forces in this sector, we need reinforcements to break this blockade. We have enough droids to hold off a ground assault but we can't get the council off planet with this blockade in effect." One of the remaining droids in the chamber did as commanded only to receive static.

"The relay's down sir. They're jamming our communications!" A battle droid called from their planetary monitor console.

"Uh-oh…" Several droids looked to each other, clearly uncomfortable with the situation

"Roger, Roger." Yet another droid replied in agreement.

Today was looking to be a very bad day.

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High in orbit Kal Skirata stood beside Nilus Sarn, watching Utapau's holographic image, overlaid with the locations of Shadow Companies' squadrons. They had just cut communications with General Grievous in a most spectacular ruse. It had taken a couple weeks to make it foolproof but Kom'rk had set up an impersonation array that would replace Skirata's voice and image with that of Mace Windu over a holofeed. Master Sarn was currently operating it as the two controlled their troop's movements from the sky. He couldn't help but think back to earlier that day when they went through the briefing.

xxxxx Flashback xxxxx

The planet Utapau could be easily seen overlaid by its holographic counterpart on the bridge of the Arbiter 9. Side by side, Kal Skirata and Mace Windu paced around the holo-projector going over the pre-op briefing while the rest of Shadow Company stood at attention in their own squads. Five teams were balanced based on experience with each other, individual skill sets and liabilities.

"I will be leading the Alpha Shadows through here, taking this path up through the facility to the primary command bunker, here." Master Windu explained the game plan to each and every group as they prepared for their date with destiny. Skirata would be acting as ops master from orbit with the assistance of Master Nilus Sarn.

Master Windu would lead Alpha Shadow with Hiko, Kenshin, and Sanosuke. Overall it was a heavy hitting assault team, designed to tear through all opposition and head straight for Grievous.

Everyone present had grown greatly over the last month. Hiko and Alden's plea to learn Vaapad had been accepted if only by a margin. This gave the Alpha Shadows two users of the overwhelming style. Hiko himself was fast and strong, these features were only enhanced by the Force. In fact he had gained one rather intriguing ability to absorb and redirect energy. The man would truly be the team's juggernaut. While Hiko was fast, Kenshin was faster and he had a balanced set of close and long range skills to compliment that speed. Sanosuke on the other hand was physically the strongest of the group. There was little doubt that a Force enhanced punch from him could crush boulders to dust. Their mission would be to cut through the enemy lines and head straight for the freshly identified council safe house.

The Beta Shadows would be led by Alden, as balanced in skills as ever, he had accumulated quite a variety of abilities, as had his squad. Kenji, Aoshi, and Kaoru stood with him and they had all developed abilities that made them a bit of a wildcard group. Between Alden's advanced skills in telekinesis, Kenji and Kaoru's striking illusionary skills, and Aoshi's ability to alter the state of matter; they would wreak havoc on the enemy's plans. This team was charged with harassing droids near a back entrance to the facility and draw as many forces that direction as possible while carving their own path towards the council chamber.

That was where the Omega Shadows came in. With two demolitions experts, Etain and a sniper they would harass the droids that came to fight the Betas while Niner got Atin and Kom'rk in to slice the communications network with their own false data. By controlling the enemy's commands and information network they would control how the enemy would react to their plans and force them into reacting as intended.

While the Omegas were running interference, the Delta Shadows would be hitting the Holo-net transceiver on the eastern side of the facility. While this wouldn't shut down the droid army it would hinder their ability to communicate wirelessly and receive orders directly from Grievous. Trapped and with communication hindered, Grievous would be forced to acquire backup from off world. The attempt would be futile.

The remaining Null Shadows had orders to plant countless explosives around the facility and perform general harassment until they received orders to converge on the council's location.

The Delta Shadows with the addition of Jusik would follow behind the Alpha Shadows as a cleanup squad to make sure Grievous could be dealt with without reinforcements. They had the added responsibility of making sure that no council member escaped. Deadly force was more than authorized but taking them alive was preferred.

Outside the facility Jedi General Obi-wan Kenobi had been contacted on a private channel. He was to get his troops to the facility ASAP once a he got a pre-determined signal. He would be providing air support and Megumi would be joining him as a Jedi healer for Air-evac while making use of battle meditation until then.

Timed correctly, Grievous should have little time to react to each development as another more serious matter is brought to his attention.

Xxxxx End Flashback xxxxx

"Like herding nurfs" Atin commented as he plugged away on the console he had located near the entrance of his part of the base. All according to plan they had snuck in before the Betas went to work on their distraction and sliced the communications network. By now Grievous should be getting the feed from orbit and should be 'sensing' the approach of a half a dozen Star Destroyers. It was all highly amusing what a little slicing could do.

"Stow it, you've never seen a nurf." Niner snapped, hoping that the comment hadn't been loud enough to catch the attention of any droids outside.

"They make good steak though." Kom'rk threw over his shoulder as he started inserting a few nasty viruses he had cooked up. It wouldn't do enough to damage any of the data in the systems but if he couldn't syphon off any credits from the Republic for the 'Clone Retirement fund' then he might as well get it from the Seps while he had a chance. This op was going to sting the Seps hard.

"Shhh…" Niner looked around, making sure his stealth was active as he peered around the corner. There were a few droids a couple hallways down but nothing heading this way yet.

"You're no fun Niner. Where's the fun if we don't get caught? Watch, all I need to do is this right here aaaand…" With a push of a button Kom'rk sent countless droids into changing their patrol routs.

"That should lighten Alpha's load a bit." Atin commented as he watched the countless red dots on the facility map shift away from the designated path.

"Don't worry me like that. I thought you were going to send them our way." Niner sighed in relief. These two really were going to be the death of him.

"Me, why would I do that? That's Beta's job. Send command a yell, there's several squads heading to the chambers. Probably escorting the rest of the council." Kom'rk replied with a knowing grin.

"Copy that, Monkey lizards are approaching the cage."

Just outside, explosions began to pierce the silence.

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Back in the council chambers Grievous had locked the council in the moment the last one had made it. There was only one way into that chamber and that was through him and the twenty Super Battle droids, four shielded droidekas, and a dozen of his own personal Magnaguards. That dident even include the mounted turrets that were ready to burst from the floor at a moment's notice. Fortunately for him blasters were a much more conducive weapon to hallways of this size than blades and lightsabers. Grievous had a bit of an advantage there. Though he was larger and had more arms than the typical Jedi he was also far stronger than one too. His style would add little resistance when carving through the walls with spinning blades while his enemies had to at least be conscious of where their blade went. His duty was quite clear now. Grievous and his personal guard would be the last line of defense if by some miracle these Jedi got through. The Jedi couldn't have spared more than a few Jedi on this mission. Kenobi was likely to be out there, plus the other couple Sidious had warned him about.

With his droids moving into place, Grievous thought himself fortunate that he had got the planetary shields up before Windu could get on world. The man was a fool calling for surrender before he even landed. Unless – there was a possibility that the orbital display was a ruse to distract him from the true threat on the ground. "Impossible…" he thought. Why would the Republic sacrifice so many Star Destroyers in other campaigns for such a complex ruse? It would …

Another explosion rocked the facility as powerfully as the first. That was when it hit him, those explosions were bombs, not orbital bombardment. Sidious had said they were sending special operations troops. If that were true then it was possible that they got someone inside the facility and were controlling their communications array. That would fully explain how the Republic was jamming their signals and if they had a good enough slicer with them then it was possible to forge sensor readings.

If Grievous could still smile he would have smirked at the sheer ingenuity by this group. This would work out in his favor. If his suspicion was right than he was in much better shape than anticipated.

"You, I want macrobinocular scans of those Destroyers. You have ten minutes." Grievous commanded one of the traditional battle droids under his command. He had to keep his best close in case his hunch proved wrong but if he was right then he could send troops to re-take their communications systems and get reinforcements here within the hour. Those Jedi slime would rue the day they faced General Grievous!

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Aoshi peered over a stony ridge that separated the Beta Shadows from a several hundred meter run sprint to the nearest facility entrance. Robotic turrets flanked the blast doors from above while a station of four standard battle droids stood guard. There were sure to be more just inside. A blue light began to ping silently from the wrist of each squad member. It did not even cause Kaoru to flinch. She was deep in a battle meditation and it was up to Kenji to protect her while Alden and Aoshi commenced with their diversion. It wouldn't be too terribly difficult a thing to do thanks to their stealth gear but they couldn't put it past the Seps to have some way of detecting the gear.

"Looks like phase two is complete. Our turn" Alden stated with a grin. Reaching out with his right arm he visualized a stone pillar in the distance and closed his fist in a crushing motion. In an instant stone snapped and shattered near the base. The motion was duplicated, splitting the pillar in two before hurling the two boulders to crush the security turrets. The guards had noticed the moment such massive stones started making their way over their heads. Electronic eyes followed the path of the stone before truly processing what was happening.

"Intruders, blast them!" One droid shouted as it opened fire. The other three complied the moment they had uttered their designated "Roger, roger!" Red streams of plasma littered the air between the separatist facility and the outcropping where they knew the enemy resided.

A figure robed in black soon blurred from behind the stones, twin blades of dark blue plasma ignited, reflecting blaster bolts back at their droid masters. The man was fast, far too fast for most humans to keep up with, much less low end battle droids. Fortunately for the droids they had numbers that were now pouring out the facility's entrance. Still, command droids knew that the numbers they had at the moment would mean little against a Jedi. Perhaps if they had the element of surprise, but not now. It would take time to get the numbers they needed.

"It's a Jedi, call the General. We need reinforcements!" A droid shouted frantically. By reinforcements the droid hoped it would be super battle droids, maybe some magnaguards. Regardless they had some numbers but unlikely enough to defeat a Jedi.

No sooner had the droid given the command than its head was blasted off by a high caliber armor piercing round. It was impossible to tell exactly where the round had come from. One thing was sure though, the weapon was likely a Verpine sniper rifle, a powerful railgun capable of silently shooting a wide variety of rounds without the telltale evidence of a standard blaster round.

More droids continued to pour out of the facility as the Jedi effortlessly deflected and returned every bit of blaster fire that came close to him. Then things got worse. The bright blue glow of a superheated plasma blade burst through the chest of a droid in the middle of their loose formation and vanished just as suddenly as it came.

"What was that?" One droid announced, perplexed as it looked at the smoldering body of its fallen comrade.

"Whatever it was it wasn't - " The next droid to speak was cleaved from hip to shoulder as the blade appeared from nothing yet again only to vanish just as quickly.

"It's got to be another Jedi!" Another exclaimed as the foretold Jedi finally came into view. Four lightsaber blades appeared, cleaving half a dozen droids in under a second as they came to hover around the black clad Jedi who held a single blade in hand and another still on his belt.

As many droid as had been falling their numbers continued to grow, bathing the air in an increasingly think mesh of blaster fire. Regardless the two Jedi looked to be no worse off than they had been at the start of the conflict. Explosion after explosion burst all around as stone and durasteel went flying. Some droids seemingly burst to pieces or had their oil reserves catch fire out of nowhere. Others simply began flying at untold speeds, some far into the distance and others into nearby stones where circuits shattered under the impact. Others still seemed to have electrical malfunctions out of nowhere, electrocuting other nearby droids into uselessness.

The droids could only hope that Grievous sent reinforcements soon because they were fighting a losing fight, even with their vastly superior numbers. The few droid commanders that hung back to give orders soon realized that that one advantage was soon to evaporate. They could hear the distinct sound of Republic LAAT gunships dropping off AT-TE's and countless clone troopers.

"Uh-oh…" As innocent as the simple phrase seemed, the other droids knew what it really meant. It was more of an, "awe fuck…"

"Why do we always get the bad jobs?" Another droid complained, knowing its likelihood of surviving the day just dropped significantly.

"Roger roger…"

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Entering earshot of General Grievous the droid he sent earlier had just returned as Grievous manipulated his army from a wall mounted holo-terminal.

"General! The Republic ships have left the system. There's nothing up there. Our independent scanners can't pick up anything either. Odd though, our systems still show them there."

"That's because they were never there you fool. Clones have clearly sliced our systems to make us think we're blockaded." Grievous explained, hoping he wouldn't have to waste any more time with the obvious.

"You want us to drop the shields?"

"NO! They may at least have a battleship at the edge of the system. Search every major access point to our systems and report back the moment you have contact."

"Roger, roger; there was one more thing General. Our sensors weren't picking it up but we have visual on Republic Forces. We're engaging two Jedi at the back entrance with the clone army on their way."

"A direct attack, with clones already in the facility…" That was peculiar. He would go and take care of them himself it he didn't already know there were clones in the base. For all he knew there would be other Jedi with them, however unlikely that was. "How many are approaching?" Time was of the essence, he needed to know how many clones and how many Jedi he was dealing with. Without knowing where his enemies were, it would be foolish to separate himself from the council. It was clearly their target and he knew there were enemies he couldn't account for at the moment.

"Oh, I'd say a few dozen LAAT ships." The droid replied matter-o-factly. The General had to pause for only a moment to process the sheer magnitude of his predicament. The Republic had to be diverting most if not all their forces on planet to this location!

"- WHAT! Divert all droids not on specific command to that entrance! We can't let them take this base." Turning to a couple of his magnaguards he then gave further orders.

"Ready the council's shuttle for launch, I want every ship at our disposal to act as decoys." The Republic was playing a major gamble here. As far as they had gotten they knew he had literally thousands of droids at his command. It would be a close battle if the Republic brought half their planetary forces, but he wouldn't stand a chance if they brought everything they had. The Republic was clearly hedging their bets on crushing the CIS here and now. No… he couldn't think like that. His first priority was ensuring the safety of the council. This was one mission where failure was not an option.

Grievous would throw every droid in the facility at the clones while he readied their escape. It would take some careful timing to open the planetary shields without risking bombardment but with enough decoys he may actually pull it off. For the moment though, he had to hope the Jedi wouldn't penetrate so far enough to secure the hangers. If at all possible he would create a bloodbath that would leave the Republic presence in this sector crippled at best while spiriting their goal away in one fail swoop. After all, sometimes it was best to retreat with a self-destruct sequence on a carefully placed timer.

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Stealth had served the Alpha Shadows well. So far they had bypassed dozens upon dozens of droids who could not so much as hear their footsteps. Based on the facility map on their HUD they were three fourths of the way to a confrontation with General Grievous himself. Even if they were supposed to be a front line assault team there was no purpose in wasting their energy fighting cheap battle droids when they had a trained Jedi killer and his personal guard to face. The strategy unfortunately had to change when alarms began blaring around the facility and a horde of droids came charging down the halls. There were simply too many to avoid and a fight was necessary.

Hiko Seijuro was the first to reach this conclusion and remove his stealth mode. It was a perplexing sight, a single darkly robed Jedi with a mask covering his face stood alone before more than fifty droids that filled an entire hallway. Hiko smirked beneath his mask as the droids opened fire only for their wall of plasma bolts to be absorbed by an invisible wall of energy that began to glow more and more profoundly as more blasts were absorbed.

"What's happening?"

"I don't know, our blasts aren't going through."

"This'll get him" Another droid stepped forward from the mass with a rocket launcher.

"But you'll bring down the whole floor." Another replied, knowing it was too much firepower for a base mostly build into stone.

"Who cares, were abandoning this rock pile anyway."

"Roger, roger."

Just as the droid prepared to pull the trigger Hiko shoved the wall of energy towards the droids, using the force to stabilize the wave that seemed to self-destruct as it came in contact with the first droid in its path. There was nothing but an explosion of red electrical discharge that tore the droids apart like a wall of powder snow. Before the explosion had even finished, the Jedi leaped towards the remaining droids, shrugging off blaster fire as if it were dust. He thrust his lightsaber forward and struck from what seemed to be a dozen locations at once. He may have been outnumber, but the droids were far outclassed.

As Hiko prepared yet another attack, a barely visible streak of air flew from over his head. More than a dozen droids were scythed down in an instant as the two remaining Jedi joined the fight. There really wasn't much left at this point and the few remaining droids were quickly reduced to halves, all dripping molten slag.

The march over broken droids continued in silence as the four warriors faded back into thin air.

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Back outside the droids had barricaded themselves into the facility. Enormous blast doors slid shut as droids fought the crowd to get in before they were permanently locked outside where certain doom awaited. One last glance out the shrinking opening revealed a horde of approaching AT-TE's just over the furthest hill in visual range.

"How long do you think that door'll hold'em." One of the dozens of droids asked from their secure location behind the door.

"Not long enough. Depends on how much air support they bring in."

"Any word from the General?"

"Only to hold our position while they're preparing the evac-shuttles."

"Oh good, for a minute there I thought we were going to - " An enormous thud slammed against the blast door, rattling it but doing little else. The droids looked to each other, each expecting someone else to have some idea of what that was. Another even harder slam rattled the door to the point that it began to creek and bend under the stress. The bend was small but noticeable.

"See – They don't have anything that can - " A droid commenced in the silence that fell after the most recent blast. For a moment it seemed like they were giving up, until an electrical surge sent the droid closet to the door flying into the rest like a row of dominoes

"That's new…" one droid replied as they tried to rise from the floor. Several minutes passed with nothing interesting happening, until they noticed the wall begin to glow an increasingly bright red.

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Outside the door the Betas had got a signal from the Alphas to breach the base but it was slow going. What few droids had failed to retreat inside the base were dealt with in short order but the blast doors were simply too thick. Master Kenobi would arrive in a matter of minutes with the army but blasting the door down with raw firepower would cause too much collateral damage. With the facility being made into the stone mountainside they could easily collapse the entire side of the complex, forcing them to take a different rout entirely.

Time after time Aoshi tried smashing the door down with Force waves that would have crushed trees like toothpicks. Both he and Alden had even tried doing so in unison but to no avail. Even Aoshi's manipulation of the electricity in the door didn't work.

"Might I suggest cutting through? It could take a while but you'll make more progress than what you're doing." Kenobi suggested as he rode a varactyl over the nearest hillside. He had been forced to use such tactics a number of times before. A Jedi like Master Yoda could have bent the blast doors in and made it look like an exercise, but even experienced Masters with Alden's aptitude for telekinesis would have difficulty doing the same.

"Perfect timing Master Kenobi and thank you for the suggestion. I think I have an idea now." Alden replied, his grin hidden by his mask. Raising his right arm every lightsaber on his belt flew into the air and activated with a synchronous hum. Closing his eyes and reaching out through the Force he aligned each lightsaber in a circle with all blades facing the door. Then, they began to spin. Pushing forward the blades approached the door. The sound of lightsabers drilling a door out of the blast shielding was cringe inducing, like a hundred hydraulic actuators straining to perform. Metal slag dripped down the door as more than half a dozen lightsabers treated the door like a giant wall of sand in the face of a water hose. The process was far slower but no less effective.

"Creative, I have word from Master Windu. He should reach the Council chambers by the time we have the door down." Obi-wan could feel their impending victory in the Force. As powerful as Grievous was, he was no match for a Jedi of Windu's caliber, much less Windu and a handful of other skilled Jedi.

"Then tell him to pick up the pace if he wants to deal with Grievous himself." Alden replied jokingly. His lightsabers were making short work of the door. In fact… the Jedi withdrew his lightsabers and breathed deeply, reaching out to grab the door in the Force. Straining and sizzling, the blast door warped as Alden tugged at it through the mysterious Force. Finally, in one deafening snap it broke loose and was tossed away with immensely less effort.

"Perhaps we should be the ones to pick up the pace?" Kenji stated as he noticed the figures behind the door. Where they had been expecting a horde of droids they only saw clones. It was the slicing team they sent in earlier. As far as they could tell the clone geniuses had used the systems to electrically fry all the droids in the area.

"Orders General?" Aoshi asked Master Kenobi as he looked upon their approaching army.

"Let's get inside. Commander Cody, hold our position and lock down all exits. I want anti-aircraft batteries at the ready. Shadow Company with me." Obi-wan commanded and began to march forward when he caught the glint of a droid in the sun from high on top the cliffs above the base. "GET DOWN!" He shouted as a missile was released from the droid's shouldered weapon. The Jedi tied to grab the projectile with the Force but he didn't have the time to concentrate.

The missile flew over Obi-wan's head and exploded a few yards behind him. Dust and debris rained down as Master Kenobi used the Force to pull the droid from its perch into a 20 meter drop.

"Is everyone alright?" Obi-wan asked as he turned to survey the damage after dealing with the droid. What he saw sank his heart.

"Men down, get an evac-shuttle STAT!" Everything was happening so quickly that nobody really noticed who made the call but two men were down, Kenji and a clone. Darman had sustained heavy concussion damage and was unconscious but Kenji had taken the brunt of the damage. When he saw the missile heading towards his mother he tried to block the explosive projectile with the Force as he knew Hiko would have. However, that was not his forte and he practically watched in slow motion as the missile barely slowed from his efforts and exploded the moment it came in contact with his dominant arm.

The smell of burning flesh still hung in the air as the nearby medic clones rushed the downed warriors. Even at a glance it wasn't difficult to tell how bad the damage was. Kenji's armor had done much to save his life but little to save his arm which was now a stump mere centimeters from his chest. Syringes filled with a heavy dose of Kolto was immediately injected to stabilize the fallen Jedi but more would have to be done.

"We have to get them to Megumi and fast." Alden commented, trying to split his attention between the urgency and their mission at hand.

"I'm going with them!" Kaoru shouted, barely able to stand seeing her son in such a state.

"No, we have a mission to complete. The clones can get them to Megumi and they will be fine, I promise you. Right now we have a war to end and we'll need your battle meditation even more if Megumi can't use hers." Alden stared into Kaoru's eyes with all his presence as a commanding officer. This was war. Friends and family were hurt and killed all the time. This was exactly the reason they went through tests to become Jedi. They all had a duty and couldn't toss it aside just because an ally fell in battle.

"He's right ma'am, they'll be in good care. Us clones and you Jedi have strong constitutions. They'll be alright." Commander Cody tried to assure her as his medics got the two injured men loaded onto a LAAT shuttle. It was easy to tell that the young woman was torn but she eventually let out a sigh of resignation as the LAAT ship began its preflight routine.

"You make sure they're alight!" Kaoru commanded, unwilling to accept anything less.

"We'll do our best ma'am"

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