Awe

Companion piece to Fear

His breath rasped in his ears; his pulse thrummed in his neck. Gaff's throat was dry and his muscles were tensed and sore. It seemed like he'd been holding the Deece for an eternity instead of five hours.

The Seps were pushing hard, going at the Republic lines with tanks, as well as B1s and SBDs.

But what was really threatening to break their backs were the three octuptarra droids advancing steadily and relentlessly. From high atop their three spindly legs, the octuptarra were spitting a steady stream of cannon fire down onto the Republic lines.

The result was utter chaos.

Around him was an endless hailstorm of red and blue blaster fire. In the private world of his bucket, his ears rang with shouted orders, panted breaths, curses, cries, screams and the endless calls for a medic. His HUD was alive with streams of information, windows continuously popping open to provide him with a new scan of the territory, another hazard analysis, an all too accurate count of wounded and dead troopers.

Gaff let loose with shot after shot, taking down one clanker after the other, but there were always more. He concentrated on the flash of green light ahead of him, of sticking as close to his general as he could.

General Arhen was cutting through the droid lines, spinning and pivoting, deflecting and avoiding the blaster fire aimed at him with what seemed like no effort at all. But Gaff was close enough to see the sweat trickling down his general's face, see the way his chest rose and fell in rapid breathing. General Arhen was spearheading the attack, cutting a clean line for the troopers at the back to follow and deflecting as much of the incoming fire back into the enemy's ranks as he could. But it wasn't enough.

Gaff's ears rang with cries of pain and surprise as the droids' fire found its mark - in the bodies of his men.

The spherical top of one of the octuparra swiveled in their direction and fired three shots - one after the other - into their line.

Whoomp-whoomp-whoomp!

The ground exploded around Gaff, flinging him backwards. He hit a downed AT-RT, the edge of the miniature walker digging painfully into his back.

Sound vanished; the cacophony of battle was reduced to a muffled buzz.

Gaff shook his head violently, scrambling back to his feet as his ears popped and sound returned to his world.

"Medic! Medic!"

His HUD scrolled frantic warning messages, the filters switching rapidly back and forth between polarization to try and see past the whirled up dust and dirt. Everything was brown and muted sunlight.

A beam of green light appeared in front of his face, so close to the visor that he could smell ozone through his bucket's air filters. He reared back instinctively even as a red plasma bolt ricocheted off of the blade.

General Arhen, his beige and brown robes making him almost invisible in the flurry of dirt, stepped in front of Gaff, protecting the commander while he regained his bearings.

"Commander, are you alright?"

"Yes, sir." His back ached, but admitting to anything else would have been unacceptable.

Gaff sighted up and aimed past the general at the hazy outlines of the droids still descending on them. In one window of his HUD, the KIA count kept ticking upwards, as relentless as the droids.

"Sir," he yelled over the noise of battle, "we can't take another hit like that!" He hated saying it - this was his first real battle - but it was his job to give the general a tactical overview. "Sir, we have to retreat! Regroup!"

General Arhen's lips tightened into a thin line. "We can't!" he replied. "We retreat and O'sic's entire left flank will be exposed."

And the casualties would rise rapidly.

The general's eyes tracked up to the octuptarra. "Hold the line," he ordered and leaped.

Gaff caught sight of the whirl of robes as the general performed a backwards flip, landing atop of the slagged AT-RT. But he couldn't keep a clear line of sight on the general. The droids were on him.

Gaff threw out his empty clip, hammering a B1 with the butt of his Deece. The clanker's head snapped back under the force of the blow, giving Gaff a clear shot at the vulnerable neck. He jammed his blaster's muzzle into the tangle of wires, snapped in the new energy pack and fired. The droid went down.

And then the air went still.

For a moment, he was caught up again in that seemingly endless second after slamming into the AT-RT. His ears popped anew and there was pressure, as if a giant were coalescing around him, making the very space around him too small for Gaff to inhabit.

He glanced up and saw General Arhen, balanced and utterly exposed atop the AT-RT, his lightsaber extinguished and hanging from his belt.

Gaff tried to shout a warning, but his vocal cords refused to work. Time itself slowed, as if the seconds needed to crawl through clinging mud.

General Arhen raised his hands, his eyes half-lidded as he stared out over the battlefield.

The nearest octuptarra rose into the air, its arching legs kicking out frantically as it lost contact with the ground.

"Kriffing hell."

Gaff didn't know if it was his voice that had uttered the words or someone else, but he agreed with the sentiment wholeheartedly.

The general's eyes snapped open and time sprang forward with a roar. The Jedi Knight flattened his palms and the octuptarra crashed back into the ground, right atop two squads of clankers. He whirled on a second octuptarra and his hand thrust out again, palm flat, as if he were striking out at a foe.

The clanker was flung backwards violently, carving a deep furrow into the earth. B1s and SBDs went flying to either side.

Taking a deep breath, General Arhen faced the third and final octuptarra.

The clanker's droid brain had finally caught on to what was happening and was spinning its cannons towards the source of the invisible threat.

His face a mask of concentration, the general squeezed his right hand into a tight fist.

The octuptarra's legs snapped together, as if bound by an invisible rope. With an electronic squeal audible across the entire battlefield, the clanker toppled over. General Arhen relaxed his fist, then pushed his empty hand out, as if he were pushing against a durasteel wall.

The downed octuptarra went careening backwards, rolling like a log downhill over its own forces.

It had taken less than six seconds for the general to devastate the Separatist forces and turn the tide of the battle.

Gaff tried to swallow and found he couldn't. He'd seen it happen and yet, he was frozen in place as his mind argued that what he'd just seen was not possible. He had never before seen a Jedi use the Force. He had never seen such a display of raw power, cupped and cradled in the bare hands of a single man and the sheer awe that gripped him left little room for anything else.

Said man jumped off of his perch atop the AT-RT, landing beside Gaff in a crouch. The Jedi looked at Gaff, meeting his eyes through the T-shaped visor.

"It's time to advance, Commander." Sweat ran down his face and strands of pale blond hair clung to his dirty cheeks and forehead.

And awe was replaced with harsh reality; the powerful Jedi once more a general in the midst of battle.

Get moving, his mind screamed at him. The battle was not yet won.

Snapped out of his daze, Gaff stepped smoothly in front of his general, Deece firing a steady stream into the still advancing line of droids. Now it was his turn to buy his general some time to catch his breath.

"Advance," he shouted over the comms. "Take those clankers down!"

The men of Elix and the Battle Dogs regrouped around commander and general and pushed forward.

General Arhen rose, his lightsaber once more in his hand and ignited. He and Gaff moved with the rest of the men.

Now it was the droids' turn to drown in an overwhelming tide of blaster fire.