Storming the Castle
Authors Note: This takes place the same time as the last chapter
Ahsoka POV
We were crammed into the gunship like sardines. Rex and I had one squad that was going to take the South tower. My heart thudded in my chest, and I wished that Anakin was by my side. I knew that it was best for everyone that he was far away from Palpatine as possible, but he was an animal on the battlefield, and I needed that strength.
"You okay, Commander?" asked Rex on private comms.
"This feels weird without Anakin," I said. "I know why we did it this way, but I have this weird feeling like…"
"We are splitting up the gang," he finished for me. "Yeah, I got that feeling too. But Obi-Wan said Palpatine is like death stick to Anakin. He gets so angry about what happened, he forgets the big picture, or the opposite can happen, he could get sucked into the Dark Side, and we could lose him again. Either way, not good for us."
I nodded. I thought back to the monster of Vader, and the moment that I realized that he was both Vader and my beloved master Anakin. Everyone had different theories about what went South, what was the moment that damned him. I had my own speculations that it had a lot to do with when I left the Temple. I turned my back on the Jedi Order, and in effect, him. If I would have stayed we could have spied on Palpatine together, and I would have known it was too much for him.
"Do you ever think about what happened the first time? Like if we could have been there when he went to arrest the Chancellor, maybe something would have been different?" I asked.
"I know it would have been different. I would have put a blaster beam between Palpatine's eyes and forgotten about it."
"So that's your plan? We are supposed to get you close enough so you can shoot him in the face, knock him out, and arrest him?"
"Maybe not that simplistic. But basically, yeah."
I laughed. "I love you." But, it was not going to be that simple. Somehow I was going to have to defeat a Sith Lord with the help of Obi-Wan. Yeah, I thought, we needed Anakin's help, but he could not get to close to Palpatine.
I cursed Palpatine under my breath. Also, I was harboring feelings of guilt and anger towards myself that I abandoned him. Force bless Luke Skywalker for seeing the good in him and drawing him back to the light. If he hadn't, I would have lost my best friend forever.
The light switched from red to green, signaling that we had put down, and the gunship was about to let us out. The side doors flew open, and I ignited my saber and hopped out of the gunship. As I ran through the fighting and began cutting my way through the droids, I gave into the force and let it flow through me controlling my actions. Form IV was best executed at a fast pace by using wide powerful swings. I capitalized on this as I ran through the front lines slashing droids as I went.
We made slow but steady progress towards the South Entrance and from what I could tell, this was going pretty well, but I knew that we needed to be on the lookout for something that seemed insurmountable.
I focused on leading the charge, like Anakin would, attacking battle droids destroying them with my lightsaber. Form IV relied on a lot of my natural agility as a Torgruta, as I jumped from droid to droid, leaving a pile of parts in my wake.
There was a tank guarding the South Entrance, along with four walker droids, a host of super battle droids and regular battle droids. We dived in.
"Crash!" I yelled while deflecting enemy fire. "Take care of the infantry. I will handle the tank."
"Yes, commander!"
I ran towards the battle lines, giving myself into the force, allowing it to dictate my actions moving my lightsaber to deflect enemy fire that came near me. I jump up on the wheels and slash both of the left side gun, then climb up to the top and opened the lid and threw two detonators in there, then ran down to the right side and slashed the last gun, hopping off before the thing exploded.
I looked around and saw that we were making progress, and I could see the entrance to the Sith fortress. Rex and Crash had caught up with me and I could see that a lot of the droids were scrap metal. We kept going together, inching towards the Sith castle slashing any droids who attacked us. Finally, we got to the doors of the Sith fortress, and I examined the panel to get the doors open.
"What would Anakin do?" I asked myself. I slashed the panel with my lightsaber, and the doors rattled open.
"Well done," came Obi-Wan's voice from my left. He came up walking backwards battling a battle droid, and ricochet the bullet to hit the droid in the head. "You did not think I would let you handle Sidious alone?"
Suddenly, a walker droid set its sights on Obi-Wan, ready to fire. Before I could say anything, the thing exploded in a ball of flame, and Lee came around with a DLT-19 heavy blaster rifle.
"Got your back, Sir," said Lee.
"Is that standard issue?" Obi-Wan asked.
"Normal people say 'thank you'," I said.
Obi-Wan shook his head. "I'm sorry. Your timing is impeccable, Lee."
"Your welcome, General," said Lee.
"R3, can you get the door open, please," asked Obi-Wan.
The little yellow droid glided over to the control panel and attached his terminal in the port. After a few seconds, the door opened.
"Well, lets not keep his Excellency waiting," said Obi-Wan, and we all walked into the formidable fortress.