Serene. This planet sure has that feeling. We're still stranded and stuck on this planet but overall things are still alright for us. Those animals still haven't attacked us now that we're in the village so the only thing we have to worry about is stepping on any of the lurmens toes, so to speak. Apparently, these guys didn't like the idea of war or fighting in general so its why they are here far away in the first place. Their pacifists in that regard so even though we're the good guys, we are still fighters in a war so its why we often get some weird looks from some of them, especially the village elder. Despite that, in the short time we've been here we've done what we can to help out around here. Mostly manual labor stuff like moving some stuff and baskets filled with fruit around, just anything that we can do to help and trying not to come off as warmongers in our war. Their still willing to help Master Skywalker and I with our injuries. They used some type of liquid grown from the pods to help in the healing process and from the conscious state Master Skywalker has been in, plus the completely gone headache I have, it's very good stuff. The elder is still wary of us considering we're fighters but I am glad he's still willing to treat our injuries. Even though Jedi are regarded as defenders of the peace, the fact that we have weapons in the first place and fight in the war directly also establishes the elders view of us being a cause and adding to the war.
The DC-15A rifle in my possession doesn't help either. After my carbine broke from the jaw of the animal, now known as Mastiff phalone, I decided to switch my weapon for a spare rifle variant. I don't expect to put it in another one of those things mouths but at the very least I'd like to keep them at a distance.
Unfortunately, that isn't the only thing I would be focusing on keeping at a distance.
"You see that?" I ask the clone next to me.
"Yeah, not good." He says as he looks through his binoculars. We decided to go about checking the perimeter to make sure we don't have any company and lo and behold, we see a droid carrier entering the atmosphere.
"Radio it in." I order him to do. The others need to know ASAP.
"On it." He keys in his commlink. "Commander Bly, we've got company."
"Friendlies?" The commander asks through the comm.
"Not even close." I mutter as I stare through the binoculars.
"Negative, sir. A droid ship coming straight our way.
"Acknowledged. Get back here."
"On our way." I reply and we cut the connection before standing up. "Let's move before we're spotted."
"Right." Rex replies and we begin sprinting back to the lurmen village as fast as we can. Even though that particular ship doesn't have any major reconnaissance moves, the faster we get back to the village, the better by far. We didn't go too far away from the village so soon enough we make it to the village just as the droid ship lands and we head straight for the pod hut that's been housing Master Skywalker.
"See to it that they leave. I must see what our new visitors want." Just as we enter, Tee Watt Kaa, the elder of the village, finishes saying and heads past Rex and I off in the direction the Separatists landed. 'Guess we're not staying here anymore.' Immediately we begin grabbing anything we have and brought that wasn't grown or in any way made on this planet by natural means. Namely, any blasters, backpacks, military rations, thermal detonators, and armor to name a few. Once everything is gathered, what's left is getting Master Skywalker on his feet. He grunts as he tries to stand before Rex and Bly pick him up.
"Take it easy, sir."
"We'll assist you." We waste no time in trying to get out of here because we don't have any. As soon as we step outside do we hear the distant stomping sounds of a squad of droids stepping in unison towards the village. We soon make it to the edge of the village but we have to hide behind some of the pod huts because the droids have already entered the village and begin hitting, bashing and breaking stuff, even shooting into the air to freak out the lurmen.
"Why are they tearing apart our homes? We've done nothing to them!" Wag too asks in surprise as he, Ahsoka and I peak out to stare at the carnage, not enough where we'd be easily seen. I guess when they've been living in isolation for so long, suddenly being attacked is something they're not used to.
"Violence, that's what those droids are programmed for." Ahsoka states and I don't think that's inherently, but at the very least, being ordered to do so won't make them question the morality of their actions. We continue to watch as they ransack the place. "Can't we do anything?" She asks frustrated and I am too. I really don't like just standing by and doing nothing but we needed to leave before we were spotted. Doing something kind of defeats the purpose of leaving.
"No, and if we are discovered all of the Lurmen will be slaughtered." But Master Secura makes a good point as to why we are leaving in the first place.
"We'll be okay if we make it to the tall grasses." Without much else for us to do here, we follow Master Skywalkers advice and retreat into the grass and out of sight of the droids.
Once we're sufficiently enough away, Wag Too goes back to his people, mostly to see how things went and to hopefully help with any injuries. 'I hope their weren't any. Those Lurmen may be stubborn and set in their beliefs but they don't deserve to be hurt.' Still, we're plenty alright so even though we're a little slowed down by Master Skywalker at this point, he just needs rest then he'll be back in proper fighting condition, we head as far away from the village as we can to the point where we are sure we won't be spotted by droids but hopefully able to go back and help should things get dicey. We take a moment to rest in a small section of cleared grass and come up with a plan to get off this planet.
"You know, I can't figure those villagers not wanting to fight." Rex speaks up while Ahsoka and I sit on the ground munching on some rations. "No pride I guess." He bitterly says.
"I call it no courage." Ahsoka voices her opinion too.
"Sometimes it takes courage to stick to one's beliefs, young padawan, as any Jedi well knows." Master Secura reminds us. They could be scared of fighting to the point that things would get worse if they do fight so opting to stay out of fighting would be the way to go in hopes of not escalating things.
"Well, I call it no choice." I add my own opinion on the matter. "I don't know about you but the Lurmen don't really come off as fighters to me. Seems like not fighting is the best thing they can do."
"Whether they fight back or not won't really help us now." Master Skywalker speaks. "We need to find a ship, and I think the only one around here belongs to the Separatists. We know they have a landing ship. They might have a shuttle." He surmises.
"Sir, you talking about stealing from one of the clankers? Count me in." I'm not really surprised that Rex is all that interested in stealing from our enemies. I'm not opposed to it either.
"We need to find them first." Master Secura says. To be honest, that doesn't seem like a hard thing to do. That ship was pretty big so it shouldn't be too hard to find where it landed.
"I think we just did!" Ahsoka points out something more pressing we have right now. A floating scout droid is revealed to have been spying on us and takes flight.
"Blast it!" Master Skywalker orders and those of us carrying blasters open fire. Rex, Bly and I try to take the droid down but the thing is slippery as it quickly evades our shots and ducks back into the grass, cutting our line of sight.
"Jam its signal!" Master Secura orders and Bly complies.
"After it!" Ahsoka calls out and we plus the clones start sprinting after the droid. The droid doesn't have that much power to get it to fly over the tall grass and it isn't strong enough to push through the tall grass. Flying along the pathways of the grass is the best option for it. At least for us it just means we have to catch up to it.
"Which way did it go?" Until we come to a small split in the paths as we try to figure out which way it went.
"Split up. I'll go this way, you three that way!" I quickly order everyone and begin running towards the right.
"You heard him. Hurry!" I hear Ahsoka say and they take off down their path.
As I run as fast as I can down my path, I keep hearing it whir as it moves along the cleared grass pathways but I can't see it. It sounds close but continues to feel so far away everytime. "Screw it." I slip the strap of my rifle to my back and push through the thick grass in hopes of cutting through as a shortcut. While my speed is reduced, I hope the cut distance will more than make up for it. I do what I can to hear the machine as it floats on by but its hard to do. It's when I hear Ahsoka's lightsaber turn on do I get an accurate place of where they are. I push forward as hard as I can towards where I hear the running and humming of the droids flight. Looking to the top of the grass, I smile as I spot the top of the droid scout. "There you are!" I shout triumphantly and push the last leg of it just in time. "Come here!" I yell as I burst out of the grass as I jump through, grabbing the legs of the scout before it passes me.
"Mat?!"
"Nnnhhh! Your not getting away from me!" I grit my teeth and grunt as I dig my feet into the ground and hold on tightly as the droid can be heard whirring loudly as it desperately tries to get out of my clutches. A quick look to my left shows Ahsoka and the clones standing several feet away with Master Secura on my right. "What are you waiting for?! Take it down!" I yell as my grip begins to slip and my feet ever so slowly slide across the ground. All four of everyone goes into action. The Clones open fire and each fire one shot, impacting the side of the droid but not killing it. At the same time, the Jedi sprint forward with their lightsabers ignited and Ahsoka strikes first, cutting its legs off and forcing me to step back while Master Secura finishes it off with a saber swipe right down the middle, completely destroying it. With the possible threat of discovery gone, we take a moment to breathe from the sprint we just did. I drop the legs in my hands and take ins some deep breaths. "Wow, nice one."
"You too." Ahsoka replies back to me with a smile before staring at the wrecked slightly sparking remains of the droid. "I wonder where it was headed."
"Maybe we can see them from up there." Master Secura points out to the top of the tall tree we are nearing. As good a place as any to get the lay of the land. With a destination in mind, we go ahead and begin the climb up the tall tree. Although some more than others. I'm talking about Master Skywalker. While us healthy Jedi can simply jump the long distances up, and the clones have the ascension cables on their blasters, Master Skywalker still hasn't fully recovered from his injuries so getting him up the tree was… interesting and complicated.
Nonetheless, even though I still have the weird feeling we are being watched, all of us are up the large tree and staring out the horizon towards where our enemies are. "I hope you're feeling better, Master, 'cause look what we found." Ahsoka grimly tells her master and hands him her binoculars. He's not going to like what we're seeing.
"I'm getting stronger all the time, snips." He boasts before it disappears as soon as he sees what we found. "But I'm not sure I'm ready for that." 'I was right.' Using my own binoculars, I spot the small shuttle parked deep inside the base. "That shuttle's our ticket off this rock." He notices it as well. That's as close a ship as we're going to be able to take to get us off this planet and back to Republic space.
"It's not gonna be easy, sir. There don't seem to be any flaws in their security line." Rex points out. While that is something that might pose a problem for us later on, I can't help but notice the small tank column and squads amassing outside the base.
"Well that's an interesting design." I comment as I see the oddly designed droid tank coming out of the base.
"Apparently, the Separatists have a new toy." Master Skywalker sees it too. "Mat, you're our weapons, vehicles and tech expert. Got any ideas?"
I smile at the compliment and his assessment of me. "The Armored Assault Tank, or AAT for short. Lots of small blaster cannons for sustained fire with a massive heavy laser cannon on a turret in order to aim anywhere while stationary. A common vehicle in the Separatist army with little to no known variations to its design… until now." After my brief explanation, I put down the binoculars and look at everyone else. "That… is an entirely new weapon down there and I have no idea what its capable of." I look again, "Especially since it looks like they forgoed the most powerful weapon on the tank to put… whatever that is, there."
"Anything new from the droids can't be good." Master Skywalker says before looking at Bly. "See if you can get a closer look."
"Yes, sir."
"I'll go with you, Commander." Rex volunteers to go with. Bly doesn't object to the help from his brother.
"I got you guys covered from up here." I tell them and pull the rifle from my back before taking a kneeling position. They nod and begin to descend down the tree. While they move to scout out the new weapon, I begin fiddling with the sights to help with my accuracy, as well as making sure the cells are working and fully charged so if I need to fire, I won't have any problems. "There we go." I smile and shoulder the weapon, keeping an eye on the clones as they begin to make their way away from the tree.
"Is that necessary for you to have?" Master Secura asks me from the side. Ahsoka and Master Skywalker are a little further away so they aren't really part of this conversation as Master Secura moves closer to me.
"Can't be too careful, Master." I say to her as I look at her before I reshoulder my weapon and aim down the sights again. "I don't see us being able to provide much backup from here with only our lightsabers."
"They are not going to attack the enemy. Merely moving in to observe them, that's all." She counters.
"That's the intention, but things can still go wrong." I reply. "I want to keep at least something on me to help them from a distance. My lightsaber can't really help with that."
"Be careful when studying how to fight with different weapons. Your lightsaber is your true and absolute final weapon you must have and know how to use. Do not neglect your Jedi training." Master Secura reminds me of what's important for a Jedi. I know that the lightsaber is the most important weapon for a Jedi and I haven't neglected training with it. I feel like she might also be referring to my knowledge of vehicles and weapons used in this war.
"I can assure you Master, I won't forget about it. Just having a blaster on hand is nice to have options. Not every combat engagement can be used with a lightsaber. Having knowledge of the hardware we fight with and against helps too." Everyone goes into a moment of silence as we watch and wait for Captain Rex and Commander Bly to give us any useful information on what the weapon is. "Master, you see them?" I ask when I get eyes on the two droids slowly making their way towards our men.
"Uh-oh. Stay down, boys." Master Skywalker mutters. I train my sights on the droids but from this distance, I don't have much confidence in my shots being able to hit nor make it for that matter to the droids. Before we can call them to warn them about the close enemy troops, a soft boom echoes through the air. We don't need the binoculars to see some kind of large caliber artillery shot was fired from the enemy's side. We look up and watch as the shot streaks high and through the air before slowly angling downwards. We on the tree jump down to the lower branches as Rex and Bly run towards us and away from the impact location of the shell..
It's a small defining noise but the shot going through air didn't seem all that intimidating. As soon as it landed on the ground however does it reveal its devastating power. A massive circle of inferno sprouts out from the center of the landing and spreads out faster than the clones can run. Luckily, they are close enough to the tree where they fire their ascension cables to get up here and out of harms way.
"Commander!" I shout as I notice he missed his shot with his ascension cable. Taking a step forward, I aim my rifle down towards him and fire my own cable down towards him. He picks himself up after he tripped but immediately spots the cable I shot next to him. He lunges for the cable and immediately begins climbing up. "Ahh!" I grunt as his weight immediately hits me. I do what I can to hold it steady so he can climb up but my feet almost begin to slip and I can barely hold onto the rifle from my angle.
"Hold on!"
"We got you!"
The pressure is let up as Master Secura and Ahsoka grab on and begin pulling on the cord. Throwing the rifle at my feet, I grab more of the cable and help in pulling the commander up to safety. Rex soon lands next to us and with his help the commander is back up here with us and in safe hands. We all sit back on the branch and let out sighs of relief that no one was hurt. Meanwhile I grab my rifle and disconnect the spent cable attachment and toss it over the edge. "I can see you were right, Matthew." While we breathe a little at the effort, Master Secura speaks, making me look at her. "There is some benefit to carrying a blaster." Not really the best moment to have convinced her of that little fact, I smile nonetheless and nod to her.
"Uhhh, everyone?" Ahsoka says and when we look at her, she points out to the landscape where the enemy is at.
What we see is bad, very very bad. "Oh my god." I mutter in horror at the devastation that weapon caused, with one shot.
"That's some toy. It took out every living thing." Ahsoka says grimly. I'm pretty sure I see some bodies of the animals from before completely charred. I shiver at the thought of that being our men in open combat. While we admire the devastation for a bit, we soon notice the column of droids begin moving and walking elsewhere away from their base.
"Where are they off to now?" Master Secura questions.
"They must be going back to the Lurmen village. There's nothing else in that direction." Master Skywalkers assessment is on point as I remember the layout of the land we took, that is the only place of note in that direction.
"Those villagers won't stand a chance." Master Secura says and she's right. They will not lift a finger to fight at all.
"First we'll take out the droids' communication station. Then after we get a shuttle, we'll go back and help them." Master Skywalker immediately comes up with a plan for us to do, one that I can get behind.
"But Tee Watt Kaa said he doesn't need our help." Ahsoka reminds us of that little insinuation by the elder of the village. He was VERY firm in telling us he didn't need our help.
"There's a difference between pulling innocents into a war and leaving them to extinction."
'Well put Master Skywalker.' "I'm good with helping. Let's be quick." I voice my support for helping the lurmens. With nods and agreements all around, we get ready to storm the Separatist base under the cover of a quickly approaching night.
Because of the Separatists move to head to the village and supposedly test out their new weapon, they left a skeleton crew of droids to protect their base. We completely cleared the place out of all droids without any trouble or being spotted, sabotaged their comms and stole the shuttle we were going to use to get off the planet. Instead, we use it to head back to the Lurmen village ahead of the main droid force with our newly acquired shield generators. They should do well for us in hopefully tanking that new weapons attack and protect the village.
It's morning by the time we make it and thankfully the Separatists haven't made it yet. We still have time to set up and get ready for the coming battle. We land and descend the ramp in the middle of the village.
"Everyone, please, please listen. The Separatists will be here in moments." Master Secura calls out to everyone and begins to warn them. Amidst the crowd of villagers gathering, I mentally groan as I spot the one that hates us the most.
"What are you doing here? I told you not to return." Tee Watt Kaa demands of us but we're not going anywhere.
"Sorry but no can do." I tell him.
"I'm afraid the Separatists don't care whether you're in the war or not. We need to get you to safety before they arrive." Master Skywalker informs him.
"We will not abandon our homes." The elder is still firmly set in staying and not fighting.
"But they've got a new weapon. It'll burn this place to a crisp. Is this what all of you really want?!" Ahsoka begins to say before yelling out the last part to everyone. Some of the villagers seem torn by the news but as always Tee Watt will not have it.
"If it is our destiny to be destroyed in your war, so be it." While Tee Watt walks away, I see the look of surprise on his sons face. Anymore and it would mirror the look of horror on my own face. I know he wanted his people to stay pacifists but he really knows that if they don't do something, he really is willing to let himself and his tribe be slaughtered? 'We can't let that happen.' I answer my own question. That still doesn't stop us though as we begin working on getting this place ready to be defended. While we begin to get the shield generators down from the shuttle, Rex has been set up as our scout to keep an eye out for the droids from the direction they'll be coming from.
I've never really worked on generators before so I'm not as knowledgeable of them as I would have liked. Thankfully these things aren't too complicated so it's a matter of setting the radius of the shield and the connection between the two generators we snagged. "Droids inbound." We don't get as much time as we would have liked in setting them up before Rex warns us of the enemy finally making it. "We've got eight minutes tops."
"Come on, guys. Let's get these shield generators in place!" Master Skywalker orders us to do. With as much as we could do to the shield generators given our short time, we begin placing them at key points around the village for maximum coverage without sacrificing power to the shield itself. Once they're setup, we move onto fortifying as much of the front entrance of the village as we can with whatever barricades and debris we can muster. Thankfully, there are some spare pods littered around the village not in use so we go ahead and start moving them into a large makeshift blockade in the direction the droids are coming from.
"Pray stop what you're doing! Stop building that wall." Even though we've got the entirety of the lurmen village covered from direct view from the ground with dozens upon dozens of pods stacked together, the elder still doesn't like what we're doing. "I did not ask you to defend us." He angrily states as we Jedi finish using the force to place the pod into position.
"This battle is inevitable." Master Skywalker firmly states with a tone that says 'we are not stopping' as he stares at him. "You can stand by your beliefs, but let us stand by ours." Whether its out of frustration or enough is said, Tee Watt Kaa leaves us while his son stays.
"Thank you for what you're trying to do." He thanks us, which is a refreshing change as of late. "I'm sorry, but I cannot help. My father is very strong willed and set in tradition. Many others agree with me, but we were raised under a very strict code. We must respect it, even if we don't agree."
"That's fine with us." I tell him and take a break from moving the pods. "These are our enemies. We may be outnumbered but these are the ones we fight on a normal basis. We'll be the ones to fight when you never had a stake in it to begin with." My piece said, I go back to helping the others in setting up the barricades and preparing for the coming assault. As expected, none of the lurmens came to help but I did notice a bunch of them staring at us but not with the same annoyed and angry expression as the elder but something else. Wag Too did say others of his village were in favor of us but because of their upbringing they couldn't actually help us in shoring up the defense.
Nevertheless, we do what we can with the resources we have available and once we're ready, as well as they enemy, all we can do is hope for the best. "They're holding position." Rex calls down to the others from on top of the pods with me when the enemy has finally stopped.
"They're not going to charge us, not if they can hit us from long range first. But if we can withstand that weapon, we'll draw them in." Its nice to see Master Skywalker up and about without any signs of obvious discomfort. Whatever stuff it was exactly that they had added to the bandages really did do wonders. As I think about it, my headache is completely gone at this point without any lingering or phantom pain for that matter. Still, he's right about the enemy. Their main focus is their new weapon so once they fire it will determine whether they move in or not.
As I stare at the group far away, I notice the new weapon moving. "Their aiming their weapon. Get ready people!" I call out to everyone in warning. Not long after, the defining boom of the weapon going off can be both heard and felt from here.
"Incoming!" Rex calls out and jumps down from the top of the pods with me following. We look back as we all watch the artillery shell fly high up into the air before arching down.
"Power the shields!" We waste no time in following Master Securas orders and turning on the generators. The blue and clear hum of the shield generators dome appears over us and covers the entire village. Just in time too because the shell hits the ground and the fire spreads out, right towards us. It's both beautiful and scary seeing the flames crash into the shield dome and spread out over it, noise is freaky too. Still, we manage to survive the attack.
"Now, they'll have to get their hands dirty and meet us face-to-face." We climb over the pods until we are staring at the squad of droids making their way to us, a mix of B1's and Supers.
"That's a lot of clankers." Ahsoka comments about the size of the force we are about to face. I simply smirk and put my rifle down against one of the pods before pulling out my lightsaber.
"Then its business as usual for us." I comment. It's not the first time we've been placed in a situation where we're facing off against overwhelming odds. Not deterred in the least, we step through the shield and we Jedi ignite our lightsabers to get ready to charge while Rex and Bly get ready to cover us.
"We got to stop them before they get through that shield." Master Skywalker voices our main objective: keep the enemy away from the lurmens. Easier said than done but that's not going to stop us.
Already the first wave of droids open fire on us while the majority of the force hangs back. Rex and Bly open fire on them while the rest of us charge forward. Seeing as theirs for Jedi here going up against them, the odds are better placed in our side as we deflect the shots back at the enemy with little trouble until we finally make it to them and begin cutting them down. I duck under a B1 droids attempt to shoot me before coming up in a rising slash, cutting the droid in half with a diagonal cut and letting the pieces fall to the ground. Deflecting a blaster bolt to another droid, I dash forward and run my lightsaber right into the B2's chest before spinning around the droid, tearing out my blade out the side before cutting down the B1 right behind it. The rest of the droids fall easy enough to our combined attacks until they all fall down destroyed. We take a momento breathe and examine our work.
"That wasn't so tough." Ahsoka boasts a little but the others aren't as easily impressed, neither am I. 'It's never that easy.'
"That was just the first wave." Master Skywalker speaks and he's right. As soon as we look at the rest of the droids, we see the leader ontop of his tank wave forward, singaling the remaining squads of droids to begin their march towards us. We sprint forward to engage the droids like before. However because there are over twice as many droids as before, taking them down isn't nearly as easy since a lot more blaster fire is raining down on us so we have to be more defensive and strike when we have the opening. Because of how far we pushed, we don't have as much covering fire from Rex or Bly against the droids so its slower to take them down. As I lop off the heads of two droids, a quick look around shows that a large number of the droids have forgotten about us and are nearing the village.
"Masters! The village!" I shout over the sounds of battle as I see the enemy getting too close to the shield.
"Snips, Mat, get back to the village! I'll take care of the new weapon." With the lurmens being the priority, we agree without question, especially when Rex and Bly are forced to retreat over the pods when the enemy passes through the shield barrier. Master Secura joins in as she, Ahsoka, and I run as fast as we can back to the village, cutting as many droids down as we can along the way but a lot have already gotten into the village. Just as we pass the destroyed pod barrier, the others continue running further on while I grab my rifle lying on the ground and put it to use. I don't want to waste time and energy running around and chopping them to bits so instead I opt to shoot them from a distance. Turning off my lightsaber and gripping the blaster rifle with both hands, I get to work sniping the droids as fast as I can. Their main focus is destroying the village so it gets easy enough in popping them in the back of the heads and bodies. But I'm not concerned with myself as we barely manage to take down some droids before the giant shield dome around us disappears.
"Oh no… no. Not good!" Without the shield, theirs nothing stopping the enemy from launching that horrific artillery shell at us now that we're vulnerable. I redouble my efforts in taking down droids left and right while I hope Master Skywalker destroys that weapon soon. I spot one droid getting ready to enter a pod home and I can hear the occupants cry out. It doesn't have the chance to enter the home before one of my shots hits it right in the side of its head and making it fall to the ground to the side of the home. With them safe, I get to work in taking more of them out all over. My friends and allies have spread out all over the place in trying to secure the village but there are so many droids spread out all over the place. It doesn't take long for the droids to notice us fighting before they shift their focus to trying to destroy the lurmen and us as well. I'm forced into cover a few times as they try to shoot me but I manage to get the better of them eventually. Still, eventually isn't good enough and we need to coordinate. After passing a few houses and ushering the civilians to head to the outskirts of the village and to the tall grass, I begin to notice that some of the lurmens aren't running away from the droids but instead are moving and rolling to them. Because of their small statures and quick movements, the droids are having a tough time in getting a bead on them. "Wow." I comment at their willing to fight now as I watch them trip up droids and beat them. My moment of awe at their actions is short lived as I spot Rex hunkered down behind a pod house with droids closing in on him from multiple sides. "Rex!" I yell and head to him, firing as I go. While he's focusing on some droids to left side of the pod home, two B1's and a B2 Super moving in behind him from his blind spot. Rifle in hand, I launch a flurry of shots towards the droids, destroying the B1's with shots to the back of their heads and forcing the Super to the ground when I hit the back of its knee. The droid doesn't have the chance to turn around and shoot me before I pull out my lightsaber one-handed, stab it right into its back before I roll over it from the top and with my lightsaber cutting through it all the while until its split down the middle. "Rex, you okay?" I ask the clone as I roll into cover right next to him as I holster my lightsaber.
"I'm fine sir. But I don't know how long we can keep this u—" Before he can finish speaking, he gets a call on his communicator.
"The weapon has been disabled." Even though he has a helmet on, I can tell he has a smile on his face just like me when we hear Master Skywalker inform us that the biggest potential threat we were facing is gone now.
"Copy that, General." Rex replies and shuts off his comm before grabbing both his blaster and as one, we both pop out from both sides of the pod and begin dropping droids with precision shots. Since we no longer have to worry about getting burned to death by the Separatist weapon, we are a bit more at ease in fighting and mopping up the last of the droids in the village. With what little droids there are clustered together, the lurmens quickly use their dexterous movements to tie long lengths of rope around their legs before they toss the end of the rope with a spear through the air. Amazingly, other groups of lurmen do the same thing, connecting that same length of rope with theirs using other spears and pitchforks until finally it lands on the ground. With a mighty heave by the peaceful race, they pull the rope until every droid that was left in the village call fall down one after another. It's cleanup now as we Jedi simply use our lightsabers to run it along the ground where the droids fell and slice them to bits.
The battle has been won as cheers go out all over the place. I let out a long sigh at the quick but tough battle we endured. Not only for our safety but having to protect an entire village of civilians who at first were not willing to fight. It was a relief to see a good number of them take up arms and fight back, especially that rope trick at the end. That helped out. "Thank you, Wag Too." Master Skywalker says to the lurmen once he returns to the village, with a small group of separatist commanding officers that no doubt led the attack.
"Thank you." Wag Too replies the thanks. "Our village would certainly have been destroyed without your protection." He turns from us to see his father walking up to us. I'm expecting to see him angry towards us but instead he has a neutral pensive look about him. "Father, I was just offering the Jedi our thanks."
"Perhaps we do owe you thanks," I smile at his words, "But I still wonder, at what cost?" He asks in a sad tone. I think I get what he means by that. For a long time he taught his fellow villagers the benefit and importance of staying out of fighting under any circumstances and now, his people were forced to fight in order to be defended. Something that's been a staple for them for so long being broken can't be easy to swallow.
Several Republic cruisers, come out of hyperspace and begin descending on the planet. Our rides finally here, allowing a massive weight to lift off our shoulders to see friendlies now after being stuck here.
"Well, you get to live." I speak up before I turn to the elder. "And continue to live by your ideals. Should chance others come across your tribe, maybe you can convince others of what you stand for. I'm sorry our war made its way to you and you got mixed in. For what its worth, I am glad we were able to help protect you and to be honest, the galaxy just might possibly be a better place if others followed your ideals." My piece said to him, I turn and begin making my way to the outskirts of the village to hopefully try and flag down the cruisers. I turn on my lightsaber and begin waving it back and forth to hopefully get their attention.
"Well said Padawan." Master Secura speaks as she walks up to me. "Your Master would be proud of you."
I smile at the compliment as I look at her. "Thank you, Master. I'm just glad all this is over and we can get back to Republic space." I shut off my lightsaber as I spot some gunships leaving the cruisers.
"As am I, Matthew. As am I." She pats my shoulder a final time while we wait for our rides to get here.
I am soooooo sorry everyone. I have NO excuse for the reason why this too so damn long to write. Honestly, my drive and feeling to write just took a hit over these last few weeks and I just barely got any work done at all. To top it off, I went to RTX so that took up a bunch of my time, was fun as hell by the way but exhausting, hence even more why I wasn't feeling up to writing as much. I'm sorry about this and hopefully I'll feel the force of writing in earnest sooner rather than later.
In any case, my set of chapters for this series is done so I'm going back to writing for my other stories from now on.
Reviews:
Storm Dragon King: Yeah, sticking to the shows episodes is what I'll do most of all but just to make sure I don't come off as making the episode chapters into retelling of the actual episodes themselves, I do what I can to add my own stuff to it to make sure things seem at least somewhat interesting. Eventually, I'll do my own chapters sometime in the future but for now, hope you enjoy my version of the episodes.
Eclipsed934 (Ch.8): Sorry for the confusion. I'm not sure if the title of the arms company is meant to be in all caps or not but the majority of all text I've seen of it have been all capitalized. Pretty much as long as you see an exclamation point "!" then you'll know when someone is angry or yelling.
Ironknight3307: Mmmmm, sorry about not updating soon. Totally my bad. As for the droid, yes he will make an appearance eventually but at first I wanted him to appear on the second battle of Geonosis but now… I think I know an opportunity for him to appear early. Won't say when, but B1-218 will return, don't you worry.
Cf96: Thank you very much.
This is something I wish to discuss with you all and that's the order in which the series is portrayed. A lot of times I've been getting mixed messages as to when happens when and so forth. As it turns out, the hostage crisis that introduced the bounty hunters but more so Cad Bane, doesn't happen until later on than when it was aired, after Bane did the holocron heist. Then theirs also the outpost destruction several chapters ago that led to the Kamino invasion even though it happened far later in the show. I'm going to be following the chronological episode order list on from now on to properly set up how I'll be going about writing. To better make sure I have everything consistent, I want some of you to go to the website, check out the list and see if everything seems on the up and up from here on out. I don't want anything being out of place for future chapters and I especially don't want to be wrong AFTER I've already posted the chapter. That would just be annoying to move the chapters around. I would appreciate the help everyone.
Also one other thing, I saw the new trailer for Season 7 of Clone wars. #CloneWarsSaved. This is going to be amazing everyone.
Again, I'm sorry everyone for the long delay. Hopefully it won't happen again in the future. Thank you all for your support, go ahead and fave, follow, review, whatever you want, but most of all everyone, have fun reading and have a great day.