Chapter 5: To Hell
"No! No, no, no!"
"Get these flames out, now! Go!"
"Where the hell is Nathan? Nathan!"
Derek groaned, trying to force his eyes open, but utterly unable to do anything but lay there, body paralyzed, unable to move or speak or even open his eyes in the slightest. He was lying on something hard and scorching hot, the heat searing right through his military jacket and cooking his skin.
"Move it, everyone, hurry!"
It sounded like Obi-Wan's voice. Yes, so the team had Obi-Wan to help lead them. Good. These were the last thoughts that ran through his head before unconscious dragged him down.
"C'mon, Lynn, get those med supplies over here, now!"
"There's not enough…"
"Then send someone up to get more from Central, right now!"
And he was oblivious to the world.
xXx ((The Colony)) xXx
"Then send someone up to get more from Central, right now!"
It was Nathan's voice, filled with anxiety and fear, that finally snapped Anakin out of whatever daze he'd been trapped in since the explosion. All of a sudden, he was sickeningly aware of the smoke in the room that clogged his lungs, the stabs of pain radiating from several burns along his body, and the fact that the Colony was in full. Blown. Panic.
"We can't afford sending a team up there now…" It was Josh, protesting again.
"We don't need a whole team," Nathan snapped, voice more angry than Anakin had ever heard him. "We've already cleared the whole building! Send two guys up there to get some better med supplies. I need bandages, antibiotics, burn treatments…" He started rattling off a list.
His eyes swept over the room. Derek lay unconscious in one corner, side by side with an equally knocked out Karis, both looking in bad shape. Josh was holding a bloody rag to his face, Jason was nowhere to be seen, and Nathan and Lynn were running around trying to take care of everyone. Each and every person was covered in ash and Force-knows-what-else from the explosion.
Then his eyes rested on the familiar, bearded Jedi Master struggling to help Inya distribute the medical supplies, and part of the choking weight lifted from his chest.
At that moment Obi-Wan turned, and stormy gray eyes clashed with ocean blue; and moments later, the older man was at his side, somehow managing to check all his injuries without breaking eye contact. "Are you alright?" He spoke in a low whisper, already knowing that Anakin was certainly not alright – and that none of them probably would ever be alright again. Still, it was a routine that he and his friend had gone through during the Clone War battles, and hell, they could all use a bit of the past right now.
"I'm fine." Just like the question, the response was automatic, spoken hundreds of times in the Halls of Healing, aboard the Resolute's med-bay, or simply crouched behind a flaming piece of debris while the battle raged on only yards away.
Obi-Wan released a soft snort that spoke "Yeah right", and tenderly began wrapping bandages around the worst of the younger man's wounds – an angry red burn that glared from his upper left arm. "You probably feel as terrible as you look," he said as he ripped off a piece of medical-tape.
Anakin allowed the faintest trace of a smile to appear. "That bad, huh?"
"Count Dooku has seen better days than you right now."
The name of the Sith lord that had once plagued Anakin's nightmares now sent a strange, undecipherable feeling pooling in his gut. Had it really only been a few months ago when he and Obi-Wan were running around the galaxy, chasing Dooku and his stupid droid army? The war and the galaxy of the past seemed like such a distant memory, along with memories of the grand Jedi Order, the Republic, Ahsoka…
He felt a warm, familiar hand ghost over his forehead, and snapped out of his reverie to see Obi-Wan staring at him with concerned eyes, his hand quickly running through Anakin's dirty golden locks of hair as he searched for any head injuries. Taking his pupil's silence as a sign of exhaustion and/or illness, he offered the faintest of smiles. "Just rest now, Anakin," he said, voice barely above a whisper, the same tone he had used when his small, ten-year-old Padawan caught some exotic flu or perhaps a small injury resulting from another wild escapade. Damn. What he wouldn't give to have those times back. "I'm going to go with Nathan to grab some supplies from Central," he added. "Lynn will be over here in a sec to check on the rest of your wounds."
Something, very similar to the feeling of liquid metal, churned in his gut when he saw those intense blue eyes, just seconds ago glassy and hazed, suddenly grow wide and full of fear. Fear. Anakin had once been the Hero with No Fear. That title was just another ghost now.
"Don't go." The words came out a plea, and Obi-Wan suddenly realized he had never, ever, witness his partner plea before. "Don't…"
"It's alright, Anakin," he cut in, gently using the Force to send gentle, comforting waves to the boy. "We've cleared the entire building, remember? I'll be back in a few moments."
He only lingered a second more before getting to his feet reluctantly, and jerking his head, gesturing for Nathan that it was time to move.
Anakin watched his mentor move away, and disappear up the stairwell that led out of the basement and into the main part of Standards hospital. And at that moment, he felt something very similar to flat-out-terror grip his heart, sending ice-cold rivers down his spine; and when the heel of Obi-Wan's boot disappeared from view, Death's face appeared before him, yellow teeth exposed from her full smile. Tiny black eyes winked at him, and when Anakin desperately tried to contact his Master, warn him that something horrible, terrible was about to happen, he found the link blocked.
That was his last conscious thought before Death suddenly flew at him and rammed against his chest, causing him to collapse onto his side, unconsciousness plaguing him even as he heard Lynn and someone else screaming his name.
xXx ((Obi-Wan and Nathan)) xXx
The halls were empty except for the lingering stench of death in the air, and the grimy pools of something that squished beneath his military boots. Obi-Wan resisted gagging, and instead used the Force to create some kind of barrier between him and the worst of the smells; and after a moment's thought, spread the wall so it reached Nathan too. The soldier didn't say anything, but Obi-Wan caught the man's eyes flicker over to him for just a second, showing he acknowledged the act from the Jedi and was grateful.
They started out at a paced walk; but by the time they reached the end of the first floor, they were jogging. Then running. Then sprinting. Clanging up and down the metal-grated stairways, slamming doors and not bothering to keep everything "hush-hush", as Derek had ordered earlier. After all, they had cleared all of Standards, right? The doors down below were sealed and shut, and right now, the fact that some of their teammates were seriously injured down below outweighed common sense. Later on, Obi-Wan would curse their ignorance and overconfidence greatly.
It was only when they entered the door just outside the twentieth floor, the hall which led to Central, did Obi-Wan shove his arm out in front of Nathan to stop their movement, and then just stood there, listening. Inside the hall, there were sounds, sounds similar to shuffling feet and a few minor crashing noises, like that of a pot falling against a kitchen floor.
But the building is empty. But the building is empty. But the building is empty…
Nathan heard it as well, and muttered a few profanities, quickly cocking his sub-automatic, chewing on his lower lip, shattering Obi-Wan's hopeful illusion that his ears were playing tricks on him. Nathan opened the door, and both men winced as the creaking from the hinges echoed loudly through the hallway.
But the building is empty. But the building is empty. But the building is empty…
Denial is a funny thing. The same, stupid, worthless mantra kept rolling through his head even as he pulled out his own weapon, keeping himself positioned side-by-side with the brown-haired soldier next to him. Even when he heard a few guttural growls that could only one thing, he kept begging the Force: Please. Let me be wrong.
Cause the building is empty. The building is empty. The building is empty.
We cleared it. We checked every kriffing nook and cranny. We cleared it. We cleared it. We cleared it…
There was the sound of scrambling feet, and Obi-Wan's heart jumped into his throat.
They were just two doors away from Central when both he and Nathan noticed something: a( the door to Central was wide open, even though Anakin and Derek had sealed it shut, and there were vicious claw marks scarring the outside.
And b( the door to the rooftop was also wide open, hot sunlight streaming down into the dust-filled air of the hospital.
The building was not empty.
Obi-Wan wasn't sure who acted first – it was either he or Nathan. But what he did know was that suddenly, mutts came crashing through the door, out of Central, screaming and howling. And then there were bullets everywhere, Nathan himself letting out his own frustrated shout that mingled with the mutts' screeches. By now, the gun in his hands felt automatic, and Obi-Wan didn't have any problem blowing the brains out of the creatures that charged him – something that, admittedly, frightened him in a way. But at the moment, a different kind of horror was clawing at his consciousness, and he could tell from Nathan's sick expression he knew the same thing.
Central had been taken over by the mutts.
He didn't know how long he and Nathan stood there, rooted to the ground, blowing away mutants. Scared to death, with the strong urge to just back away and run; but furious, furious 'cause the one place they had deemed at least partially safe had been infiltrated by these animals. Time stopped meaning anything, as did their surroundings, and fifteen minutes later, bodies blanketed the ground, along with empty shells.
Obi-Wan's eyes fell on the face of one mutt, a blonde woman in a white lab coat, face that may have once been attractive now contorted and shrunk like a rotting gourd, black blotches mottling gray skin, mutilated beyond recognition. It was the hair that caught him, still yellow despite the horrible grime and grease mixed in with it. Silky blonde hair, hair that reminded him of Satine, the pretty young Duchess of Mandalore he had once dreamt about as a young Padawan Learner…
He stopped those thoughts immediately, and locked them up behind carefully guarded mental doors, not to be let out again. At least, not now.
Automatically, as if in a trance, Nathan and he matched strides and strode over to the door of Central, peering in with fearful hesitation. The blinds had been drawn before the Colony started their assignment, so only a few fragments of light shown through; but it was enough.
Cots and blankets were ripped open, the tears and gashes so wide Obi-Wan would've believed it had been a pack of rancors that tore through them. Foul puddles already spread across the tile floors, and one or two mutts growled from where they were pinned down beneath crates of supplies – crates of supplies that now lay spilled open, their contents ransacked. Even the heavy steel chest, with about a gazillion locks on it, lay wide open, the weapons that had been inside crushed and bent. Obi-Wan saw bags of rice, canned goods, survival rations, all spilt out along the ground, mixing with the contaminated ground and puddles and gore.
Neither man moved to speak, too stunned to do anything but gape. Something in the back of Obi-Wan's mind registered that this was bad, super bad, that now the Colony had nothing. Whatever was left in this room was now tainted to the point it would be suicide to use it – who knew how else this horrible virus spread. Everything was gone, everything.
Of course, neither one thought of everything. At least, not until they heard three chilling explosions ring off. From the rooftop.
xXx (45 Minutes Later) xXx
Less than an hour. It took that long for Obi-Wan and Ax to put out the flames from the wreckage. The wreckage that screamed their inevitable doom.
The wreckage that had once been three lifesaving, state-of-the-art, Yaazix-5 military transports. The only working ships that Obi-Wan knew about still on Coruscant.
It took ten minutes to put out the flames – though the dry weather worked against them, Obi-Wan used the Force as an aid. And then another fifteen minutes were spent searching for an explanation to just how those damn-kriffing monsters had managed to get on the rooftop in the first place, raid Central and their ships, destroying everything they had left to help the Colony survive. Nathan had been the one to find the few, staggering metal beams that had once been a sky bridge, broken off in the middle so that it didn't quite reach the lab across the street. The gap broke the sky bridge, yes; but it was not quite so large that the mutts hadn't been able to jump from one side to another. Which, apparently, they had done.
"We're screwed," Nathan had muttered, shaking his head bitterly. "We're so screwed!"
This time, Obi-Wan had to agree with him, hope and rational thinking shattered beyond repair. They were trapped in this hell, for weeks, months, years. Now, the thought that he could spend the rest of his life fighting these awful beasts didn't seem so far away, and it clogged the man with a fear that he'd never, ever experienced before. It was like a monster itself, breaking from the chains that Obi-Wan had used to restrain it, taking over his body, paralyzing him.
But there was something else, something screaming at him from the Force, swirling around at him, telling him to "move, Jedi, move!"
He and Ax, after destroying the remnants of the bridge, had simply collapsed on their knees on the rooftop, both of them understanding their fate without words.
They had no medical supplies. No clean water. No food. No supplies. No ship. No communication with help for any matter of time.
They knelt there, both stunned with fear and horror and every other emotion imaginable; before there were footsteps behind them, rushed ones, followed by Inya bursting onto the rooftop, words already flying out of her mouth for several minutes before she finally realized what was going on.
Obi-Wan didn't really hear what she was happening; until his brain picked out several important pieces of information. Karis was dead. They needed medical help now. They had been getting very worried, and finally sent Inya to find them. Because they needed them down there. They needed Obi-Wan down there.
Because Anakin had had a seizure.