Ash stood behind his Master and Master Mundi, looking out of the bridge window as the venator dropped out of hyperspace, the orange sanded planet of geonosis before them, he had heard many stories of this planet and the beginning of the clone wars, it was a dark day for the order, with many losses within the arena and the further battle that followed.
Of course, many confederacy ships had managed to make it off-world as the only fleet ships available to the republic had been the acclamator, a ship less suited to the littoral combat needed to prevent escape, a role now taken up by the venator star destroyers within the republic navy.
"I cannot believe we're back here." His master said.
"It is unfortunate, the resistance from the native geonosians was stronger than we anticipated." Master mundi followed, his eyes too lay on the barren world in front of them."
"The same can be said for their loyalty to Count Dooku."
"A fact that is often overlooked."
The doors to the bridge then opened with a hiss, Ash recognised Ahsoka's force signature, and presumed the second one to be her master's.
"You're late." Obi-wan informed the arrivals.
"Sorry, Master. Ahsoka and I were busy routing the seppies near Dorin."
Ash was surprised with the casualty at which Anakin addressed his former master, but did well to keep his face blank, though his silver eyes did twitch slightly, before Ahsoka brushed past him to lean on he console in front of them, before turning to address her master.
"My squadron alone had 55 kills." She bragged light-heartedly.
"Yeah, but mine had 76."
"Show-off."
"I'm glad you two are enjoying yourselves." Obi-wan remarked, brow raised.
Skywalker turned, "It's just a little friendly competition master. Nothing to worry about it."
"What I worry about is the way this war seems to be drawing out with no end in sight." Ash's master commented, ever-philosophical.
"Which is why is is crucial our invasion of Geonosis meets with success." The cerean master commented.
"Contact outer rim command, we're ready for briefing."
"They're already waiting on us Master." Ash spoke up for the first time. Doing so earning a look from Master Mundi, one the council members that had been against him staying within the order.
The group turned and walked to the holo-table further back in the bridge.
Ash listened to the briefing, as his master explain their plan to Masters Yoda and Windu, alongside the supreme chancellor, looking up as three high ranking clones walked onto the bridge. Ash recognised the colours of the 212th and Cody, but didn't know of the other two.
He followed up on the advanced briefing, before the group dispersed down towards the hangars.
The hangar was normally the busiest part of any acclamator, yet such was exaggerated on one that was about to dispense it's troops for that of a planetary invasion. Ash followed both his master and the clone commander as they approached the cluster of gunships that bore 212th colours.
"Right, Ash." Obi-wan began, gaining the attention of his padawan. "when we land stay close to me, and don't stray far, stay near the other troops and keep your head down, It wouldn't look great for me if I lost a padawan so soon."
"Im glad to know you're concerned for me, master." Ash jibed. "I'm guessing we take separate gunships?"
"Its probably for the safest, we don't know how well equipped their air defences are." Cody informed them. Ash nodded, looking around before settling on a gunship where the nose-art stood out.
"May the force be with you." Obi-wan wished.
"And with you master." Ash returned, before turning and placing his beskar helm on his head, waiting a second for the seal to take place. He entered the gunship, taking note of the camouflaged armour the soldiers wore, alongside the ARF helmets. It appeared that this squad with him were equipped with jetpacks and Ash was thankful for his helmet for hiding his jealousy. While he had started his training in that of the Rising Phoenix, he had yet to complete it. But he thought himself competent enough to where he could use on if needed.
The craft juddered as it took off, slowly taxiing inside the hanger before dropping down through the bottom doors. The sky was peaceful, surprisingly.
That was, for all of about three seconds, before a flak shot detonated near the port side, throwing the gunship of to the side. Looking out the slits in the doors, it appears all the ships in the flight group were facing a similar fate. The blast shields on the slats then closed, leaving the interior to be lit by the dull red light within. Ash tuned his helmet frequency to that of the other ships, his ears immediately met with chaotic chatter.
Fighter's imbound!
Where's our air cover?
Taking heavy Flak fire!
We're hit! Gunship 1024-21 - The radio cut, Ash could only imagine what had happened to it.
He reached out, trying to sense his master, before his ship was hit, shearing a chunk of the ship off, sending it into a hard descent and roll.
Ash held onto the hand grips as the gunship plunged downwards, the incessant wailing of an alarm and the flashing of red light filled the compartment. Ash heard the pilot call out. "This is Gunship 931-412, We are hit and going down, mayday mayday!"
This ship dived further, the apparent fire upon it becoming more intense. One of the clones inside called out: "Brace yourselves!" Ash tensed before the ship slammed down into the sand, before skidding and rolling a couple times before it finally set into the orange sand. Ash took a breather before he sat up.
"Any of you guys alive in here?"
A couple of coughs answered him, "Yessir,"
"Come on then, no time to waste." Ash got up, and settled himself on the now awkwardly angled floor following the crash, before pressing his hand to the locked shut door of the ship. he felt the force, and pulled it through him, before expelling it all out through his hand and blasting the door off, launching it meters away.
Ash and the four other living clones clambered out, and the padawan assessed them, they were in the 212th geonosis camo. Their armours were unified in the fact that they each had an old compass painted onto their breast plate, each with an emphasis on their own cardinal direction.
Ash turned around, looking into the bay of the of ship, and the other clones that had been killed on impact. He paused for a second of thought, before he set down, removing the jetpack off the back of the closest clone, saying a prayer in his native mando'a. "Ni ceta, verd. Mar'eyir naak"
He set it onto his back, getting a conformation ding from his helmet and HUD to confirms a link between his current equipment and the addition of the jetpack. He turned to his men. "You guys got names?"
"North, sir."
"East, sir."
"South, sir."
"West, sir."
Ash smiled. "Your squad lead?" North stepped forward, Ash nodded, he could work with this. "Try scavenge as much as you can from the gunship."
"Yessir!"
The troops began opening the compartments and grabbing extra equipment, whilst Ash turned to assess their situation. Overhead, gunships still roared over heading towards the square set out by Cody. The group was heavily beset by both flak fire and that of geonosian fighters flew in ranks of three and whipped through the cluster of republic craft.
The gunship they had been in had fallen far from the square, let alone the any amount of terrain that was nearby. Looking up again, he could see a tank carrier limping along, clearly damaged yet determined to continue, with some quick thinking, he called out: "North!"
He responded quickly, "Yes sir?"
"Raise that carrier on comms, tell them to drop the walker with us, and we'll take it to the square. That transport's in no condition to fly."
North tapped his wrist comm a couple times, before holding his hand up to the side of his helmet to make contact. Ash watched the carrier begin to descend towards them, before the feet of the walker touched down, and the carrier limped back to the acclamator.
"Hey!" He called out to the clones, "Mount up, we'll take this to the square." He ordered. The squad rallied together, before jetpacking up onto the roof. A clone opened the hatch, looking around before he found Ash.
"Commander!" He called, beckoning them inside. Ash and his newfound squad dropped inside, before sealing that hatch. Inside the tank the clunking of the walker was suppressed, the beeps and humms of the consoles inside were really audible. Ash looked to the trooper that had invited them in whilst Compass squad sat down on the benches within.
"Trooper, does this tank have functioning communications?"
"No sir, the hit we took in the air knocked them out."
Ash cursed: "osik. We need to get in contact with somebody. Can you try fixing it?"
"I can give it a go sir, im not sure what state it's in." He replied.
"Go for it, im going up top." The clone nodded as Ash opened that hatch and sat on the top, before removing his helmet to look open the open dunes of geonosis that lay before him. Overhead, the aerial battle still raged. Geonosian fighters tore through the groups of gunships that were being dispensed by the low flying acclamators.
Up ahead, a cannon fired, a flak shell flew upwards and nearly knocked a gunship out the air. Ash grabbed his helmet and tapped the side of it, lowering his range finder to zoom into the position ahead of him. Multiple CIS J-1 cannons and a couple geonosian sonic cannons were dug in on a ridge, manned by the planet's native race.
Ash reopened the hatch and dropped into the inside, before speaking up. "Theres a flak position up ahead of us, just under a klick out, we need to knock it out to safeguard our air support."
"Affirmative sir." North registered, before turning to his men. "Gear up! lets get these filthy bugs!"
"Sir yes sir!" The rest of the compartment echoed.
The tanks gunner climbed up from what appeared to be some repairs on the tank to take up position in the main cannon, whilst himself and Compass Squad sat on the outside of the tank as it trudged further to the rock sculptures and the intense fighting raging on where the square was supposed to be, if his guess was correct.
Ash tapped his range finder again, checking on the gun emplacement, to find its gun turning round to face them. "Ready for incoming fire! Their guns are turning towards us!" The movement upon the walker suddenly turned to rushed hassle. The gunner turned the turret to bear, before squeezing the trigger to set off a shell towards the ridge.
The blue laser arced towards the position, before hitting their ammo reserve, if the following explosion was anything to go by. The cliff collapsed, burying the geonosians manning the guns under a mountain of terrain that had fallen on their heads.
The scream of their comrades signaled their charge, as a swarm of bugs flew towards them. The smaller guns on the walker, alongside that of the rifles of the clones fired at the bugs, but their numbers seemed unstoppable. A number landed on the tank, resulting in Ash igniting his orange saber to hack away at the bugs, Ash scowled under his helmet as some green bug blood splattered on his beskar armour.
One dived down on him whilst letting out a guttural geonosian scream. The force of the hit knocked his saber away, but Ash reacted quickly. He ignited the flamethrower on his gauntlet, incinerating the bug and its allies as they continued to fight.
After some intense fighting, and only one clone suffering a light wound, the bugs had been killed, leaving the advance open. Ash sat down on the top of the tank, the slow rhythmic thumping of the walker proving unusually therapeutic.
"Commander Valinn sir?" A clone called out, Ash turned, removing his helmet. "We've managed to repair the short range communications, who do you want us to try reach?"
"Try reach Commander Cody if you can."
"Yessir." The soldier dipped back inside the walker, and a couple moments passed, before the white plastoid helmet poked up again. "Sir I have Commander Cody on the line.
Ash got up and dropped into the tank and was met with the hologram of Cody before him.
"Commander Valinn, good to see you're alive." Cody greeted.
"Likewise Commander. How is everything at the square?"
"Hectic to be honest sir, we managed to secure the drop sight but we're still waiting for Generals Mundi and Skywalker to make it here. General Kenobi is out of action for a while due to his gunship being down but he's safe. We are waiting on air support to clear everything up." The commander sighed.
"Well, I'm going to be a while I believe, My gunship got shot down and I've managed to commandeer a tank, so I'll get there eventually."
"Roger that sir, I'll await your arrival. Cody out." He said, before the transmission cut, leaving the walker to trudge on.
Upon arriving at the square, Ash realized he was the last to arrive, and by quite a margin as the shield had already been disabled. He approached Ahsoka and Anakin, who was giving his own master help into a gunship, alongside master Mundi.
"Ah Ash, I'm glad you're still about." His master greeted him.
"You too master, all though you look slightly worse for wear."
"Ah yes, well, crashing and rolling in a gunship tends to have that affect."
"I'm aware. Am I going back to the ship with you?"
His master considered it before replying. "You can stay here if you wish. I'm sure it's no trouble to Anakin to watch out over you." He said, giving a look to Anakin.
"Uhm, er, no of course not." The chosen one stumbled.
"Very well then." Kenobi affirmed. "May the force be with you, padawan Valinn."
"And with you, master Kenobi." He beckoned.
The doors to the gunship closed, and it lifted off before flying up to a nearby star destroyer.
Ahsoka turned to Ash. "I'm looking forward to hear where you were, you missed out on all the fun."
"Oh I had a bit of fun myself actually."
"Well I guess you'll have to tell me all about it then."
AN:
Bam, 2,500 words.
Im writing bc I finally got covid, right after bragging to my friends about being "Super-immune."
Yeah Karmas a bitch.
Stay safe guys.
:)
- Dudududhehe