When the tanks were about a hundred meters apart, Depa lept off of the one she had hitched a ride on and ran to attack the droids. The clones shouted and followed her, rather glad that the Separatist tanks couldn't fire.

They started demolishing what was left of the tanks after the Republic cannons did a number on them. It was steady, somewhat easy work, but Depa kept an eye on Grievous the whole time. He was waiting for something, she could feel it.

That something came in the form of walkers. Low, fat ones, but much more heavily armored than the tanks. These also seemed to have operational cannons. They started firing at the Republic tanks, and though there were only two of them, it made the battle much more difficult for the Republic.

Depa blocked more blaster shots with her lightsaber. It would be really nice to have Grey right now, she thought, referring to the commander of her own battalion.

She saw Grievous pull out his lightsabers, four of them, and she braced herself. She knew what he was capable of. He ignited them and began to spin them as he walked steadily towards her and the clones. She took a defensive position, opting to let him make the first move.

Grievous lunged at her, and she blocked two of his lightsabers with hers. She pushed him back and used the Force to launch him back towards his tanks, and one of the Republic cannons hit very close to him. He growled as the smoke cleared, and got to his feet. Depa let him recover, not really wanting to get very close to the cyborg, but not willing to let any of the clones deal with him. She did let them fire the tank cannons at him, though.

The walkers had caught up with the remaining Separatist tanks, which were few compared to the thirty Grevious started with. Their shots were much more accurate now that they were closer. Grievous laughed.

"Give up, Jedi," he told Depa. "Before you and your clones die."

She didn't answer but continued the fight.

Behind her, Commander Wall was alerted by a clone that had just run up from one of the tanks. "Sir," he said urgently. "We've lost contact with command. They've taken out the coms."

"Fight without them, then, soldier," he told him. "As long as they can still see us, they can help us. Grab some of the rocket launchers!" He pointed towards the tanks. "Let's take out these new walkers for the general."

The elevator doors opened and Caleb stepped out. He could still sense the presence above him, but it was getting closer. He ran down a hall and pushed the door to the generator room open. Doubtless, this person already knew where they were going. No point in trying to draw them away.

He ran to the center of the room and stopped. He turned to look up and reached out with the Force. The newcomer was two floors above him and seemed to be cutting their way through the floors. They obviously didn't care about damage control that much.

They cut through the final floor, and Caleb stepped back as they jumped through the sizzling hole in the ceiling. As they landed, Caleb took the few seconds that he had to figure out who this person was.

The overwhelming feature was black. The clothing was all black but layered with dark grey armor. They had red skin and black and white montrals. Montrals meant Togruta. The Inquisitor, thought Caleb. She also had a pack on her back. Not good.

Caleb pulled out his lightsaber and ignited it. "I've heard a lot about you lately," he began. "Everyone's been calling you the Inquisitor. Is that true?"

"Yes," she said, and Caleb flinched at the sound of her voice. How did she manage to sound evil as well as look evil? "Although I go by the 'Sister' as well, if you'd rather."

"I'm good," he said, and he set his mouth. "I was right, you aren't Ahsoka Tano."

She looked up at him, almost incredulously, then laughed suddenly. "Finally! Someone who believes me!"

Caleb didn't really know what to make of that but he wanted to stall for more time. "What?"

"I tried to tell Skywalker and Kenobi that I wasn't Tano the last time I saw them, but I didn't think they believed me. At least someone does."

"The Council doesn't believe you either," he told her, trying to think of something else to say. "Everyone is arguing about it."

"Well, if you'd do me a favor and convince them otherwise, I'd appreciate it." She shifted her pack so it balanced on her shoulders.

"Already have been," he said. "I knew you weren't her when they first told me. She would never fall to the Dark Side."

"Good for you," she said curtly. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to be destroying your generators."

"Sorry, Inquisitor," he told her, holding his lightsaber in front of his chest and shifting to his defensive stance. "I'm supposed to stop you from doing that."

She twisted her face, then sighed. "If you have to," she told him, and she pulled out her lightsaber. "I'll try not to kill you, though. You seem decent."

"...Thanks?" Caleb said, then narrowed his eyes. She ignited both ends, and he started to realize how difficult this was going to be. Then it started to spin, and he failed to hide his surprise on his face.

She jumped and brought her lightsaber down on top of him, but instead of trying to block the strike, Caleb dashed out from under her, still staying between the Inquisitor and the generators. He aimed for her midsection, but she blocked it easily. She used the Force to push him back, and he slammed into the casing of the nearest motor.

Caleb sprung to his feet, ready to block an incoming hit from the Togruta, but she had stopped paying attention to him. Caleb couldn't see her, but he could feel her jumping out to the middle of the generator grid, away from him. He lept on top of the casing he had been thrown into and looked in her direction, and saw her unloading her pack ten meters away. He ran and jumped, trying to separate her from whatever she had brought into the base, but she stopped him midair with the Force and let him hover for a minute.

"I'm trying to not fight you," she told him, before turning back to her work. Caleb stared and saw a small metal package with a screen on it. A bomb, he realized, and she already took out coms, so I can't warn anyone.

He had to distract her. "What are you going to do after that?" He asked her. "There's still tons of clones here. They'll fight you."

"What did you think the tanks were for?" She retorted, snorting. "There was a reason I told Grevious to bring all thirty of them." She reached down and made to activate the timer.

"They aren't working!" He yelled, desperately.

She hesitated, her finger hovering over the activation button. She turned and stared at the Padawan, whom she was still holding in the air. He wasn't lying, she could feel it.

"What do you mean?"

"The cannons aren't working. Grievous is losing!"

The Inquisitor stared for another moment, trying to sense if he was lying or not. Her eyes hardened, and she threw him back to where they had talked earlier. It wouldn't knock him out, but it would give her time enough to check for herself.

She activated her wrist com. "General, is it true that the tanks are disarmed?"

He didn't answer right away, but she waited, patiently. Eventually, his robotic voice broke through the static. "I brought in walkers," he replied, growling. "Just plant the bomb!"

"The bomb is useless if we can't get the droids in here!" She insisted. She looked up and saw that her time alone was up. Caleb was charging towards her again.

She blocked his lightsaber with hers in her right hand while she listened to her left. "The walkers will get us in there, just get rid of the generators!"

A chain of multiple explosion sounds transmitted through her wrist com as she fought the Padawan. A few moments passed, and she dueled half-heartedly, not really focusing on the fight. She was more interested in what was going on outside.

Eventually, she couldn't help it. "What walkers, General?"

Grievous growled through the airwaves. "I'm ordering a retreat, Inquisitor. If you don't make it onto the gunships, you'll have to find your own way back!"

He severed the connection, and Caleb couldn't help but smirk.

"Sounds like I was right," he told her and pushed her backward. Unfortunately for him, it was back towards her bomb.

She landed on her feet, and glanced at the explosive. If she couldn't take the base, at least she could damage it.

The Inquisitor reached out with the Force and lifted Caleb up into the air again. She threw him violently down and kneeled to the bomb. She activated the timer and ran back to the hole she had entered from.

"If you want to live, Padawan, I suggest you leave in the next 60 seconds."

She jumped through and ran back towards the fight outside. She didn't care what happened to the bomb now. The mission was a failure.

Caleb did a few quick calculations. He didn't know what kind of bomb it was, so he couldn't disarm it right away. He didn't know if he could get it outside in time, and even so, it could still hurt somebody. His only option was to run, and to keep people away from the bomb as much as he could. The generators were going to have to go.

He ran and scanned the floor with the Force, and when he saw that no one was close, he took the piece of the floor that the Inquisitor had cut away and set it back in place. He welded it together as best as he could, then ran as far as he could away from it. The walls of the room were meant to be blast resistant, in case of a machinery malfunction. Hopefully, it would hold enough to keep the base intact.

Caleb barely made it to the command center before the bomb went off. He felt the blast beneath him but it didn't reach the other floors. He was worried that he would have to use the Force to protect the clones in there, but the blast walls had done their job.

He sighed and leaned up against the wall. Hopefully, Depa wouldn't ask too many questions later. He hadn't really gotten many answers.

Depa and the clones were pressing back on the Separatist forces. Grievous had long since retreated, but the droids were still running back to gunships, trying to save their battery packs. The tanks and the walkers were demolished, and not worth saving. The only problem was that they were creating a lot of barriers between the fleeing Separatists and the advancing Republicans.

She was charging at the battle droids, slicing as many of them as she could in half before they reached the ships, and the clones were shooting at them beside her. As she fought, though, she sensed a Dark presence behind her. Since the droids weren't shooting back, she had no reserves about diverting her attention for a few seconds, and she turned to see what it was.

She saw the same Togruta from the image that Kenobi had shown her a few days ago. It was the Inquisitor. She left the droids alone and the clones took over driving them back, and she jumped to intercept the Sister. The two women met on top of a nearby building, but when Depa swung to knock down the Inquisitor, she lept far over her head and out of her reach. The Inquisitor wasn't interested in fighting the Jedi Master. She was far more intrigued as to how Grievous had managed to ruin their mission.

Depa never had a chance to fight her. She didn't really mind because that meant that she was leaving, but she felt disappointed all the same. It would have been nice to give a report on the girl to the Council.

She watched the Togruta board one of the ships without chasing her. As the doors closed around her, the Inquisitor made eye contact with Depa. She focused in on her, trying to pry anything useful out of her from a distance, but the Sister's golden eyes hardened. She stared at the Jedi Master coldly, and Depa felt that there was an unspoken tension between them. She wasn't sure what it was from, but a wave of guilt washed over Depa. Then the doors closed and the ship flew away, and the brief feeling was gone.

"General!" Commander Wall ran up next to the building she was on top of and yelled at the Jedi. "We think the building may have taken some damage. Some of the other men heard an explosion."

Depa then remembered that she had not seen her Padawan recently. She turned to the base and saw the smoke rising from the bottom of it.

Where was her Padawan?