Star Wars 2.0
Episode 6
Chapter 1
A cacophony of blaster fire and debris, zipping starfighters and lumbering starships, explosions and death filled the orbit of Coruscant. The droids had come to the planet to bring a swift end to the war. Victory would mean the death of the Republic, and the beginning of a new era where droids rule the galaxy.
The battle raged on the surface as well, along the streets and rooftops of the global city. The clone troopers struggled to contain the droid landings while Jedi warriors shielded them and protected the public with their lightsabers.
It was near one of these landing sites that Obi-Wan Kenobi and his close friend Anakin Skywalker fought, speaking through their wrist-comms to each other and the rest of the Jedi while also sending orders to the clone troopers they commanded. The battle wasn't going well for them, and they found themselves stepping back, giving ground, and leaving behind good soldiers more and more. They both knew that soon there would be no more ground to give.
Anakin detected a hint of worry in his friend's voice when he said they were holding their ground. He knew that Obi-wan had too much pride to admit when he needed help, so he led a squad over to him. Moving perpendicular to their position, they found themselves not lining up with Kenobi's troops, but on the flank of the enemy. Anakin had his soldiers held their fire until they were on top of them, then he ripped through the droids with his saber while his troopers fired. Kenobi pushed forward, pressing back the enemy, and meeting Skywalker where he stood among a pile of droid parts.
"Glad you could make it," Anakin said with a sideways smile.
Obi-wan answered with an embarrassed grin as he looked over the situation. The lines of their troopers had met, and they had a strong defensive position. Kenobi called to one of his top officers, Commander Cody, ordering him to use formation beta five. They had all of their maneuvers listed in code for ease and speed of passing them along.
Skywalker called his top officer, Rex, and told him to hide half his troops to make them look more thinned out than they were; then pop up when the enemy got close and overconfident. It took him a little longer to explain his idea, so Obi-wan was waiting for him by the time he finished. "In the time it took you to give an order, they could have circled around you," he said.
"Every battle calls for a new situation," Anakin said shrugging. And they leaped forward into the second floor of a ruined building to charge into an isolated group of droids. This part needed no orders or codes or even any words at all. Each of them knew the instincts of the other as well as they knew their own. They had been through enough battles together to know one another's mindset at any given time.
The droids, however, seemed to also know their minds. The group that the two Jedi had charged into turned out to be bait. Though they went down with ease, droidecas rolled up along both sides, halted and threw up personal shields around themselves, and began firing. Obi-wan and Anakin immediately took position with their backs to each other, their sabers guarding against the large blasts coming at them. But this couldn't go on forever.
Obi-wan tried to Force push a couple of them, but their claws dug into the cement floor and held themselves in place. Anakin instead pulled down part of the cement ceiling, crushing one of the droidecas. Seeing this, Obi-wan did the same to one of the neighboring droids. With a way cleared, they rushed out of the hole they were in.
Running back to their lines, they saw that Anakin's ambush had worked, and they were pushing the droids back. But Obi-wan's formidable defensive position was being overrun. This was turning out the opposite of the way most battles they were in had gone. While Anakin was more powerful with the Force, Obi-wan was the one with more leadership skills. He knew every maneuver in the Republic playbook, and in combat, his units were the ones more often to turn the tide, even if Anakin himself was ahead of everyone leading in the assault.
But then it hit Obi-wan. That was exactly why he was being beaten. General Graves had probably analyzed every move the Republic used in former battles to predict their present maneuvers. Some of the droids' recent attacks had seemed pointless. But that's because they were rehearsals; experiments for the main event. Now they knew all their tactics and were countering them perfectly. But not Skywalker's.
"It's your unpredictable nature," Obi-wan said.
"What?" Anakin said, starting back toward his own troops.
"They're having trouble adjusting to your unpredictable nature." Then Obi-wan called into his wrist com, telling all other Jedi generals to forego all standard maneuvers, and utilize tactics they'd never tried before.
He was met with confused responses, but Skywalker repeated it. "We might just be able to fool their circuits," he concluded.
The two friends combined their forces and protected them against incoming volleys together. Anakin called the shots, aggressively pushing in among the droids' lines where they had difficulty adjusting to what to do while the human clones could each think for themselves. Obi-wan noticed a strange expression on Anakin's face. "Stop enjoying this so much!" he insisted. Anakin laughed, and leaped in among the droids, chopping off their flimsy limbs.
The rest of the Jedi followed suit, though many of them had difficulty improvising. This turned the tide enough to stall the droids. But the clones had grown tired with the relentlessness of the battle. This was a problem the droids did not share, and they continued to press their advantage.
That was when the sky seemed to open up with blazing reentry trails. Hundreds of ships were bearing down on the planet. Obi-wan looked up with despair. Anakin looked on with anger. The droids would be bringing in reinforcements and air support. All would soon be lost, and their best hopes would be to hide within the depths of Corscant and try guerilla tactics against the droids whenever they could.
But then the flames dissipated from the lead ships. They bore the sigil of the Republic! They were clone reinforcements! The gunships opened fire on droid emplacements, blowing them out of their bunkers. Fighters strafed the Separatist lines. Transport vessels headed to friendly spaceports to disembark. One of these vessels was out ahead of the others, still cocooned in flames as it streaked toward the ground. It was heading in the direction of Anakin.
Inside it, Owen was at the controls, struggling with them to keep the ship from tumbling. If that happened, they would fall apart and their pieces would land all over Coruscant. Fifty troopers were counting on his ability to hold it together, and Baroo's skills at repairing the damage that was sending them hurtling toward the ground in the first place. She shouted at two other engineers who were patching up a damaged part of the engine.
The velocity dampeners had been hit by debris when another ship had blown up near them. Now they struggled to keep their feet, holding one hand on the machinery while the other worked at re-welding the pieces back together. "We need those controls working!" came Owen's voice over the comm.
"We're working as fast as a body can when it's being thrown around!" Baroo shouted back.
"We'll be thrown around the whole planet if it's not ready soon!" Owen shouted.
Baroo scoffed with frustration. She knew her engineers wouldn't have the pieces ready in time. So she glanced over the engine to see what she could do. She noticed a patch she could use to bypass the dampeners to place a short burst of energy into the reverse thrusters. This would only be a short solution, but it might buy just enough time for the others to repair the more long-term damage. It could also place them into a spin, but she knew Owen's piloting ability. Most other pilots would lose control of the wheel, but he could maintain it.
"Hold on tight!" she shouted to everyone, and she leaped up to the corner of the engine she had been looking at and grabbed on to its ridges. It was scalding hot, even through her thick gloves. She grit her teeth and held in a scream. If she fell, that was it for all of them. She was climbing up its side, her feet using every notch she could find to lift herself up further. The ship was at a 70 degree angle, and what was normally horizontal was now almost vertical.
Baroo reached the wiring and tubing in question. There was no time to grab tools. She just twisted and yanked what she needed removed. Steam flew everywhere, and she had to reattach everything by memory and almost instinct. But once she got the last tube in, she felt a satisfactory shake.
It was not so satisfying for Owen, who learned what she had meant by "Hold tight." The ship slowed dramatically, and began to tilt to one side. He had to compensate, but as he began to, he immediately realized he had to turn the opposite direction, as if he was going in reverse. When he overcompensated, he had to turn the other way. The ship was still out of control, but at a slower pace. "What's going on back there?" he shouted.
Baroo looked down at her engineers. Their welders slowly sealed the last patch, and one of them pressed a button. The ship shook again, but this time it steadied out. Baroo fell to the floor, injuring her shoulder, but glad to make the sacrifice to save the ship.
Anakin had cleared his troops out of the way of the crashing ship. But at the last moment it turned its belly toward the ground and slowed significantly. Its landing gear dropped just before hitting the rubble, and crumbled under the weight and velocity. But they had served a purpose in dampening the fall, and saving those inside.
The door dropped open and clone troopers emerged. Owen stumbled out of the cockpit, looking around to make sure he was in the right area. Anakin rushed to him and hugged his brother. Owen hugged him back, but quickly released to go in search of his wife in the back of the ship.
Obi-wan directed the troops into holes in the line, improving several positions. When they were ready, they pressed forward. More reinforcements arrived, boosting their lines even further, as well as those of other generals.
Anakin leaped ahead, and Obi-wan rushed to keep up. They cut through the droid positions, and got into their rear lines. "We should maneuver around to envelope them," Obi-wan suggested.
But Anakin interrupted, "No. That's in the Republic playbook. We push forward. They won't be expecting that."
Obi-wan was used to arguing with Anakin's overzealous nature. It had been a point of contention while he was his master. But he could not argue now; Anakin was right. So they rushed forward, deflecting blaster fire on the run.
The decision worked better than anticipated, for through a thin layer of battle droids, they came upon the headquarters of none other than General Graves. They could even hear its voice as it shouted Kenobi's name and turned and ran on all fours like a spider. Its elite battle droids put up a fight with its rapid shots and deadly aim. The two Jedi even had to take cover, their advance slowed.
As their troopers arrived and their numbers showed, the elite enemy unit found itself the one having to pull back into cover. Obi-wan and Anakin were then able to rush forward and chop through the last of them. As they did, they spotted Graves' ship taking off. It had a distinct look to it, and an unusual sound, so they knew it was making its escape right away.
"Let's get to our…" Obi-wan began to say, but he turned to find Anakin was long-gone, already heading to his starfighter. They were luckily not far from where they were parked. Their units had been defending the landing platforms. So getting to their ships and jumping in took about a minute; less for Anakin since he had had a head start, and because he chose to forgo the recommended instrument check before taking off. Obi-wan glanced over a couple of the more important aspects, then took off after his friend, who was rapidly catching up with their enemy.
Graves had gotten past the tallest skyscrapers, and was getting to the upper side of the cloud cover. He was plainly heading toward the command vessel. Droid ships that came near him turned away from the battle and headed toward landing bays. "He's calling for a retreat," Anakin said.
"It looks like some of the capital ships are disengaging," Obi-wan agreed.
"We can't let him get away," Anakin said, soaking every bit of thruster energy he could out of his fighter. It had more thrust and maneuverability than Graves, but the droid commander had a substantial lead.
As Anakin began to close that lead, a swarm of small drone droids rained down on him from both sides. About a quarter of them latched onto his ship, while the rest tumbled down toward Obi-wan further below. The small droids crawled across the hull, pulling out little tools which they used to cut holes in the hull. Anakin shook his ship back and forth, trying to get them off, but it was no use; their claws were sunk into the metal hull. He straightened the ship and dug into the Force; then used it to push off the droids with his powers.
Obi-wan did the same thing, but the net result was that it bought Graves a little more time. He managed to land in his capitol ship just as it was turning to face away from the battle. The blast shield came down, and a moment later, the flagship disappeared into hyperspace.
Within seconds, other capitol ships were taking off as well. Some of the droid starfighters could also make the jump to light speed and did. Those that were left behind were dispatched with some ease as their AI skills counted for very little without their programmers and leaders.
Everyone throughout Coruscant breathed of a sigh of relief. The soldiers and Jedi were congratulating each other for their courage and fortitude. But Anakin and Obi-wan found it hard to congratulate anyone. General Graves had gotten away yet again, and it still had all of its knowledge of Republic and Jedi tactics. They had simply fed it more information.
"We'll get it next time, Anakin," Obi-wan said. "For now, let's go check on the wounded."
