Sorry for the long delay. I got a new job last month, and that sucked away most of my time and energy. For a while, I was reduced to writing just a few hundred words per day. Combine that with the Battle of Corellia continuing to be a complicated mess of intersecting plotlines, and getting this together was a chore. It's finished now, though, and I think the final product was worth the effort. I had hoped to post this chapter several days ago but, as I'm sure you're all aware, the entire site went down for a few days.

Please show all the support you can to Ukraine and her people during their fight against Russia. Thank you.

OoOoOoOoOoOoO

Chapter 57

Just a week ago, Naruto wouldn't have believed it was possible, but he was actually getting bored with running around an enemy ship scrapping battle droids. Unlike on the Firecrest, here the droids hadn't formed stationary defenses. Instead, they prowled (or blundered) about the corridors, hunting for him and Jiraiya. The unlucky ones found them. He didn't have the marines backing him up this time, but he had Jiraiya and Ponds. The Toad Sage was worth an army all on his own, as droid after droid learned to their (brief) dismay, and Ponds was easily the equal of any ten ordinary troopers Naruto had met. Between the clone's blaster, Jiraiya's green blade, and his orange, most of the droids they ran into never had a chance to raise their blasters. Those that didn't fall to a weapon were shredded by a rasengan or slagged by a fireball. He even saw Ponds spin kick a B1's head clean off its neck servo. And the commander complained about him being a showoff.

His flashy combat moves aside, Ponds was quiet, even by his taciturn standards. There was an aura of focused intensity around him, as of a nexu ready to pounce. Naruto understood the feeling. They were close to their goal. So close. It wasn't just the ship, either, though that alone would be a worthy prize. It was Grievous. If they could take down the cyborg general, it would go a long way to ending the war. Ponds wasn't the only one straining at the lead for a victory. He was just more obvious about it.

"So, do you know where we're going or are we going to spend the next ten hours running through corridors?" Jiraiya asked as they left yet another pack of B1s lying in a heap of smoking metal. Naruto rolled his eyes.

"Of course I know where I'm going. Would I just run off without a plan?" He paused as his own words played back in his head. "You know what? Don't answer that."

Jiraiya chuckled, and his hair swung as he shook his head. "Perish the thought. Oh, it's been too long since I've seen you in person, brat. How have you been?"

He spoke as casually as if they were strolling through the Temple halls, rather than sprinting through the innards of an enemy superweapon. Naruto grinned under his mask. He loved working with Mace. Learning under him was the privilege of a lifetime, something he was only now starting to comprehend. But Jiraiya was family. Jiraiya had believed in him when literally no one else had. Not his friends, not his teachers, no one.

"Oh, you know how it is. Defended some planets, smashed some droids, threw a couple of tanks like shot putts. The usual." His smile faded as he thought back on the last few days. "We lost a lot of good men getting here."

"They did their duty," Ponds said. It had the sound of a rote expression, one he'd uttered so often it had long since lost meaning.

Jiraiya slowed and put a hand on his shoulder. He knew what it was like to lose people in war, and there was nothing but empathy on his face. "I know how much that hurts. Now, we honor them. Focus on that."

Naruto took a deep breath and nodded. He didn't know the names of most of the clones who'd died when his cruiser had gone down, and part of him hated himself for that. They'd given themselves names in defiance of their cold-blooded creators, declaring themselves people rather than things. It wasn't right that, for many of them, no one would ever know their name. Just their number. The symbol of everything they weren't. Nevertheless, he took Jiraiya's words to heart. It didn't matter if he would never know the men who'd died for the mission. He would honor their sacrifice by taking down Grievous' monster of a ship.

He pulled his commlink out and keyed it. "Hack, it's Naruto. Give me a sitrep."

The response came back muffled and mixed with the sounds of blaster fire and explosions. "We made it through five decks, but they've slowed us down. Casualties aren't bad, yet, but resistance is getting heavy. I can't guarantee we'll reach the bridge anytime soon."

Naruto frowned. Hack wasn't one to exaggerate issues. The opposite, in fact. If he said the marines were having trouble, then they were likely up to their necks in droids. "Copy. Stay mobile. Don't get pinned down, or they'll flank you. I'll see what I can do from here."

"I'd appreciate it, sir." The comm went silent, and he mulled over the problem in his head.

"Let's divide Grievous' forces a bit more," he said and crossed his fingers. "Tajū Kage Bunshin no Jutsu!"

Smoke filled the hallway around them. When it cleared, there were two dozen Kage Bunshin around them. Half of them made a single hand seal and transformed into perfect copies of Ponds. Jiraiya took one look at their new companions and added a dozen Kage Bunshin of his own.

"You all know the drill," Naruto said. "Go break some shit."

The bunshin gave a mixture of salutes, nods, and rude gestures, but they all moved off to, presumably, follow his order. He wasn't too worried. When his Kage Bunshin went off mission, they usually ended up causing even more chaos than normal, which would only serve his purpose this time.

"You know, sir, that's kind of creepy," Ponds said. "And I say that as one of a billion identical brothers."

Naruto shrugged. He'd gotten used to people's odd hang-ups about his Kage Bunshin. "They ought to keep the droids off Hack and his men, at least."

"Maybe," Jiraiya said. "But a ship this big will have a lot of droids. We need to get out of sight for a while, let the diversions do their work. You can bet Grievous is listening to the droids report, and he'll be heading towards us. I'd rather not face him in his territory on his terms when we're on a time limit."

It was a good point. Naruto pursed his lips and pulled up the schematics on the little holoprojector Luc had prepared for him. His eyes scanned over corridors and turbolifts looking for the ideal spot. Somewhere no one would see them, but where they could also make progress towards the reactor room. Somewhere like-

"Here." He pointed to a broad tunnel running along the length of the ship. "It looks like they use internal mag-rails to move supplies around the ship. If we get on this one, we can hitch a ride almost all the way to the reactor."

Jiraiya nodded. "Then let's vanish. You've been practicing, right?"

Naruto smirked. Rather than answer, he flipped through a dozen rapid hand seals while wrapping his chakra around his body like a shroud.

"Tōton Jutsu!"

A feeling like hoarfrost crept over his skin for a second before fading to vague coolness. When he held a hand up in front of his face, he couldn't see anything. Not his hand, not his armor, nothing. Jiraiya chuckled.

"Well, I guess that answers that." He performed the jutsu himself and faded into invisibility. Even with his preternaturally acute vision, Naruto couldn't see a trace of his presence. A moment later, Ponds vanished as well, as Jiraiya extended the jutsu around him.

"That's… weird," Ponds' voice said from thin air.

They set off again, though at a much slower pace. The technique was chakra intensive when stationary and grew even more so when you moved. At anything faster than a light jog, it became unstable and exhausting. For now, though, speed was secondary to stealth. Between Thrawn and Hack, Grievous would have enough on his plate to keep him occupied. If all went according to plan, the cyborg general was in for a nasty shock. Naruto couldn't wait.

OoOoOoOoOoOoO

Thrawn had directed battles from all sorts of locations, ranging from underground bunkers to the engineering section of a neutral observation vessel. However, this was his first time commanding his forces from inside an enemy flagship. It was a uniquely rewarding experience, if only for the irony it presented. He had to make do with a small holographic representation of the battle, compiled from the Malevolence's own sensor data and the Republic fleet's transponder broadcasts. It was far from an ideal view of the action, but the poetic justice of orchestrating his foe's defeat from within his place of power made up for it.

One of the clone troopers, the same Corporal Luc who'd sliced into the Malevolence's sensors for him, stood to his side, ready to assist if he needed technical help. Thrawn would be the first one to admit his knowledge of technology in this part of the galaxy was severely limited. The ships and weapons of the Chaos were generally decades, even centuries, behind the marvels they had here.

The Separatist forces presented an interesting puzzle. He had no experience with the species in this part of the galaxy, nor much experience with the technology available. Grievous' fleet numbered almost 200, with at least a dozen different species represented in the command structure, and a similarly diverse array of warships. With a strong, centralized commander, it might have proven a highly adaptable foe. Naruto's ploy to have Grievous cripple his own ships had thrown the rest into chaos, however. It was not truly a single fleet any longer. Rather, it operated as a collection of flotillas who coordinated their actions internally, but obviously kept communication with the other groups to a minimum. Whether it was from suspicion, panic, or some type of standing order, he didn't know, but that didn't stop him from taking advantage of the chaos to pick the enemy apart. However, first he required data. As luck would have it, Corporal Luc was a veritable nyix-mine of technical information on both the Republic and Separatist ships. After a few minutes of intense questioning, the last piece fell into place, and he entered the game.

"Republic fleet, this is Captain Thrawn," he broadcast. "Stand by for orders."

"You really have a plan then, sir?" Luc asked. "That quickly?"

"I've had the outline of several plans prepared for the last few days. All I needed was a detailed look at Grievous' forces and the technical details you so kindly provided. Observe."

He keyed the comm. "Reliant, on my mark, fall back 75 kilometers and list into the gravity well. Albedo Brave, Impavid, Endurance, you will move as if to assist, but not too quickly. Let the Separatist cruisers outpace you, then close in from three directions."

"Copy that."

He switched channels to speak with the leader of the Corellian orbital defenses. "General Iblis, this is Captain Thrawn. On my signal, send your fighter and bomber wings along this course." He transmitted the flight path he'd just created. "At the same time, drop your frigates to the edge of the atmosphere and assume this formation." Again, he sent the details of what he wanted done.

There was a pause before a gruff male voice replied. "Are you mad? That'll open up half our line and get my fighters killed at the same time."

He smiled tightly. "I assure you, general, it will not. Stand by."

The voice came back even louder this time. "I will not karking stand by while you-"

"You have your instructions, General Iblis," he said, a touch less patiently than he had a moment before. "I have command of the blockade, and you will follow orders. There is a plan. Is that understood?"

"… copy. Standing by." Iblis sounded reluctant, disgruntled, and skeptical, but Thrawn was confident he would play his part. Men like him did not give their word lightly and consequently did not renege on their word once given. Corporal Luc, on the other hand, seemed to share in the Senator-turned-general's concerns.

"Sir, he's right. There's no way the Corellian fighters can fight the droids and defend the frigates at the same time. They'll get torn apart."

"Observe," he repeated. "Have patience."

He switched back to the Republic Navy channel.

"Aspiration, Accuser, Negotiator, Defiant, and Odyssey, there are several dozen crippled Separatist ships in your sector. Use your tractor beams and move ten of them to the following coordinates."

"Understood, captain." He didn't recognize the voice that answered, but it didn't sound like a clone. From the serenely unbothered tone, he guessed it was a Jedi.

He watched the holodisplay as a cluster of the dead Separatist ships drifted away from the rest of the hulks and into the space between the Republic blockade and the main body of the Separatist fleet. The Venators had powerful tractor beams, and with no functioning propulsion systems to resist, the Separatist cruisers were as easy to move as small asteroids. In minutes, the ships were in position, blocking the Separatist field of fire along the left quarter of the blockade. Ten wasn't enough to form a total shield, but it sufficed to force the Separatist captains to reposition their ships to regain their firing solution. The display didn't show real-time firing data, but he could picture it. Those darkened hulks, barely visible without their lights and unable to sound warning with their comms fried, would silently drift into the path of the turbolasers. There would be a moment of delay as the Separatist captains figured out what was happening, perhaps another as some indulged in anger, and then they would all see the inevitable. Shooting through their own ships would be a waste of time, equipment, and ammunition. Better to shift the plane of battle so the obstacles were a non-factor. From his left, he heard Luc gasp as he saw the plan.

The moment he saw the Separatist ships start moving, he pressed the comm. "Reliant, begin your maneuver."

The captain of the Reliant sent his acknowledgement. Ten seconds later, the cruiser put on a remarkably convincing show of losing engine power. Convincing enough to lure in the five Separatist ships nearby to break formation. By falling back as it had, the Reliant hadn't merely made itself vulnerable, it had opened up a subtle but critical weakness in the Republic line. A clever tactician would see the opportunity to fracture the blockade. Thrawn had watched that the lead Separatist ship in the area over the last few minutes. Its captain was clever. Now, he would use that against them.

Just as he'd ordered, the other three Venators responded sluggishly to their sister ship's apparent distress. Before they had fully turned to offer support, the Separatist ships slipped past them. Behind them, the other Separatist ships shifted their formation to compensate for the five overeager commanders. Thrawn watched for a count of twenty before he again keyed the comm.

"General Iblis, begin your attack."

"With pleasure," the man replied. His tone was now markedly more enthused. He'd seen the trap Thrawn had just woven. None of the Separatists had, but then, he'd designed it to be invisible from their perspective.

When the Separatist left flank had repositioned itself, the adjacent formations had had to redeploy as well, to prevent gaps in their line where the clone bombers could slip in and hammer them. Simultaneously, when the five Separatist cruisers broke formation to pursue the Reliant, the right flank shifted to cover their former position and exploit the vulnerability of the other three Venators. Taken separately, neither of those would have much of an impact on the Separatist forces. However, when both flanks repositioned simultaneously, it opened up a gap in the center of their lines. At the same time, no one had been looking to notice the dozen Corellian frigates he'd ordered repositioned now sat below the main plane of the battle, with a perfect firing solution into the lightly armored bellies of the Separatist cruisers. If Grievous had still been overseeing his forces, he would have spotted it and prevented it from growing dangerous, but Grievous was presumably still beating his head against the stone wall that called itself Naruto Uzumaki. Whoever he'd left in command was good enough to prosecute the battle as it had been, but was too slow and inflexible to adapt to the rapid changes Thrawn had just implemented. Without a centralized command structure, no one in the Separatist fleet had a broad enough grasp of the battle to recognize and avoid his trap.

The frigates opened fire first. Their weapons couldn't match the heavier guns of the cruisers and dreadnoughts, but they still ripped into the vulnerable Separatists. Thrawn could almost hear the mad scramble as the commanders of those ships tried to figure out what had just hit them. It wouldn't take them long to spot the frigates, but they would still have a dilemma. If they turned their fire to destroy the frigates, the Republic Venators would have free rein to maneuver and destroy them. If they kept up their assault on the Venators, the frigates would cut them to pieces. Thrawn could think of several solutions to the quandary, but the Separatists would never get the chance to implement them. Long before they could make any decisions, the Corellian fighters made their move.

Rather than rushing to their deaths against the heart of the Separatist fleet, as General Iblis had feared, the Corellian fighter and bomber wings raced into a gap in the enemy lines all but unopposed. Several wings of clone fighters recognized the opening for what it was and followed as well. Thrawn smiled to see that. If anyone had needed final proof the clones were superior soldiers to droids, there it was. No droid could have ever spotted such a subtle weakness so quickly, nor would any droid have had the initiative to exploit it without orders.

Droid fighters tried to stop them but, as with the larger ships, most of their forces had followed the cruisers to the flanks. The few remaining in the middle were no match for the hundreds of Corellian and Republic starfighters that met them. The holodisplay couldn't show individual fighters, but the way the droid formations vanished in seconds told a story all its own. From there, all he had to do was watch as the Corellians and clones went to work. With the Republic cruisers in front of them, Corellian frigates below, and Republic and Corellian fighters and bombers behind, the Separatist forces had nowhere to go. In the first two minutes, five Separatist destroyers and two heavy frigates were burning and disabled. As the enemy ships crumpled under the bombing, the Venators moved up to support the fighters. Just like that, in under ten minutes, the Republic went from being on the defensive to pressing their own attack.

"You knew they'd split their forces like that?" Luc asked. "How?"

"It was not a certainty. However, the only other option was for the Separatist captains to shoot through their own crippled ships. I judged they would be hesitant to expend the time and resources necessary to do so. The Corporate captains are motivated by greed. It is evident in the designs of their ships, even if it were not so in the very nature of their organizations. In this case, that manifested in a desire for glory. There is little glory to be found in vaporizing your allies while other captains notch victories."

"And what if you'd been wrong?"

He eyed the holodisplay again. "Little would have changed. Even without their shields, the disabled ships have sufficient mass to withstand a barrage long enough for our forces to outmaneuver theirs. Indeed, the psychological toll of firing on their own helpless companions may well have proven more valuable in the long run than the material cost the Separatists will suffer now."

The corporal stiffened. "Sir?"

"In war, one must not disregard any potential weapon or sphere of combat. We must fight our enemies, not only militarily, but also politically, economically, and psychologically. The survivors of this battle will return to Separatist space with tales of Republic military prowess, of how their own weapons were turned against them, how their own comrades became tools in our arsenal. Those stories will spread, no matter what steps Count Dooku takes to stifle them, and fear will spread with them. Fear of us. Fear that not even the mighty General Grievous and his droid army can withstand the fist of the Republic. That fear, that doubt, that myth, will undo them, and they will lay the groundwork for their own destruction."

He didn't bother to wait for Luc's reply, if he made one, before turning his attention back to the battle. In a game of tactics, he would have waited for his opponent's next move and responded accordingly. But this was not a game, and he had no intention of allowing the Separatists a next move at all.

OoOoOoOoOoOoO

The duracrete and transparisteel maze of the Corellian industrial district was about as far from the forests and plains of Shili as it was possible to get. Dirty pavement and smog were no substitute for the soft grass and clean air of nature. Nevertheless, Ahsoka was a huntress, and right now her prey was any droid stupid enough to try sneaking up on a Jedi.

When Anakin told her to guard this side of the compound, he'd probably imagined she would set up sentries to keep watch over as broad an area as possible. To be fair, she'd done that. However, the thought of just passively waiting while enemies could be creeping up on her men made her lekku itch. So she crept through the shadows like a ghost, scanning for any sign of movement. Next to her, she knew Rex was doing the same. The captain wasn't as stealthy as she was, and his senses weren't as acute, but she wouldn't turn down the extra pair of eyes. Even more valuable was his tactical proficiency. Though he was technically only ten years old, and arguably had less experience fighting than she did, Rex was a genius when it came to warfare. Aside from Naruto and her master, there was no one she trusted more at her side.

Anakin had only assigned Rex to this duty because he was worried about her safety. As first in command of Torrent company and Anakin's right hand in the 501st, his place was by his general's side. Jesse or Hardcase both would have made more sense to accompany her from a logical perspective. She should have been upset that Anakin would willingly weaken his own position out of concern for her safety, but she wasn't. Jesse and Hardcase were her friends, and she knew she could rely on them, but they weren't Rex. They hadn't taught her how to field strip a blaster rifle or rig a thermal detonator as a booby trap. They hadn't given her tips on how to best fight in her armor. She refused to admit it, sometimes even to herself, but the idea of fighting a true battle terrified her as much as it thrilled her. Rex… Rex made her feel safe. So she'd said nothing when Anakin sent him with her.

Behind them, on the other side of the power plant, she could hear the moment Anakin's battle began. With her montrals, she could make out both the launch and impact of the artillery, the staccato scream of the heavy repeaters, even the roar of the clone's blasters. The droid's weapons were fainter, and fired at a different pitch, but she heard them as well. Through the Force, she felt the first clones die. Thankfully, at that distance, the screams were too faint to hear. Enough of those haunted her dreams already.

"Eyes out," Rex whispered. Even with his helmet speakers turned off, she could still make out his voice. "If the clankers want to sneak up on the power plant, they'll move now."

-Acknowledged- She used the clone hand signals Rex had taught her. They weren't as well-developed as Jedi hand signals, nor as subtle as the ANBU twitch code Jiraiya had introduced, but they would do until she and Anakin could teach the other two to their men. -High ground go. Agree interrogative-

Rex signed back in the same code. -Bad sight lines-

-Good hearing warn me- She meant her hearing would warn them of droids long before either of them saw anything. Hopefully, Rex would grasp it. She didn't want to risk any more noise than necessary.

He picked up on her intentions and nodded once. She nodded back. With as little noise as possible, she leaped up to the roof of the nearest building, and then levitated Rex up to join her. To his credit, he didn't even grunt, though she knew he detested it when she or Anakin used the Force to move him without warning.

On the rooftop, she could hear much better. Buildings were marvelous at disguising the distance and direction of sounds, but up above them, the echoes were easier to distinguish from the source. She used a cantrip Anakin had taught her to enhance her hearing even further. With it, the faint rustle of Rex's blacks against his armor as he breathed was as loud as a strong wind. The heartbeats of all her nearby men sounded like drums. She shifted one foot ever so slightly, and the scrape of her boot nearly made her jump.

Despite the disorienting influx of sensory input, she did not hear any droids. Plenty of machinery, plenty of vermin, and even a few of what she assumed were street urchins. Corellia had a seemingly endless supply of grease-stained, smart-lipped children who, for whatever reason, had no home to go to. She longed to go to them, to find them food and somewhere safe to stay, away from the active warzone they were in. But that wasn't her duty right now. Right now, the best way she could keep them safe was to find the droids trying to shoot Anakin in the back.

Because there were droids coming. She was sure of it now. She couldn't hear them with her physical senses, but there was something off in the Force. A dissonant screech, faint, like metal scraping metal a long way off, but definitely there. She dropped the technique enhancing her montrals and focused on the Force, instead.

'Which direction? Come on, come on, give me a direction.' Master Leem would have been appalled at her impatience, but she didn't have time to meditate and wait for the Force to reveal its secrets. Sometimes, Anakin had told her, you needed to kick the Force in the shins to speed things along. It wasn't exactly the Jedi way, but she figured it was the Skyguy way. That meant it worked. Sure enough, after a few not-so-gentle prods, the answer came to her.

-Reposition. Follow- She signed. Rex acknowledged, and they set off.

For the next ten minutes, they followed a routine. She would dart across the rooftops, silent and all but invisible. He would follow, jumping what gaps he could, and using a Force assist to get over the wider ones. After a few hundred meters they would stop and she would listen, both with her montrals and with the Force. The industrial complex was enormous, though, and she had no idea how close the droids were. She just had a direction. Three times they stopped, and three times she found the infiltrators beyond her senses. On the fourth, though, she finally heard something. Metal footsteps. Dozens of them. There was something even more worrying, though. Beneath the clank of metal on pavement, she could make out the panicked breaths of a child.

'One of the street kids,' she realized with horror. From the sound of it, they were right next to the droids. Without pausing to consider, she launched herself towards the sound. Behind her, Rex called her name, but she was already gone.

It took just two long jumps to get a visual on the droids. As she'd feared, they were the new commando model. Their footsteps had been too light for anything else. It looked like a whole platoon of them, too. Her eyes immediately went to the terrified human boy crouched behind a low wall on the side of the street the droids were walking down. They hadn't seen him yet, but from the way he was trembling, it was only a matter of time. She could feel his fear from fifty meters away.

'Just stay still,' she thought, as if she could send the words into his mind. 'Don't move. Just keep quiet. They'll pass you by. They don't know you're there. Just stay still.'

But he didn't stay still. Of course he didn't. He was a terrified kid with battle droids less than a meter from his hiding spot. His heart was beating so hard she could hear it from the rooftop. She had half-a-second's warning from the Force before his panic overwhelmed him and he made a dash for the nearest building. The commando droids lived up to their fearsome reputation. The boy hadn't taken two steps before the nearest droid pivoted and raised its blaster.

"No!" She yelled as she thrust a hand forward. In the instant before the droid pulled the trigger, its blaster jerked to one side. The shot missed him by a hair and slammed into the wall next to his head. Chunks of hot duracrete exploded from the impact and, to her horror, the boy went down with a scream. Worse, her yell got the attention of every droid on the street. In unison, fifty blaster rifles swung her direction.

"Fierfek!" She pulled out her lightsaber just in time to deflect the volley of blaster bolts that would have burned holes through her head and chest. It was the first time she'd ever faced commando droids, and she could see why Rex had warned her about them. These weren't B1s, who shot with all the accuracy of a kicked sponge. These shots were rapid and precise. Only a few went wide. She had to backpedal away from the edge to avoid the follow on shots, and even then her blade work was barely fast enough to keep her alive.

The commando droids were agile, too; another difference from the basic model. One after another, a dozen of them jumped up to the roof and opened fire. Once again, she had to backpedal.

'Kriff, kriff, kriff! This is what I get for leaving Rex behind.' With her echolocation, she could feel the opposite edge of the roof getting closer and closer. Fighting on the roof was a better option, but the kid was still down there. He was alive, but she didn't know for how much longer.

'Gonna have to get down there,' she told herself. There was just one problem. Namely, the twelve commando droids between her and the street. No, make that eleven. She finally got the deflection angle right and nailed one of them with its own blaster bolt. That was a lot trickier in real life than it was in training. The rest didn't look bothered by their comrades "death", though, so her problem remained.

She needed cover. A wall, a pillar, anything. At this point, she'd have taken a dense bush. The roof was flat, though, except for one tiny environmental control unit. It was barely big enough to crouch behind, but pickings were slim and her blade arm was already getting tired from how fast she was having to deflect. She waited until the Force told her it was safe and then shut down her blade and rolled behind the EC pod. It ranked among the scariest things she'd ever done. Glowing red streaks of death burned the air all around her. She could smell them, they were so close. Her armor gained a few new scorch marks and one shot melted the sole of her boot before she could curl up completely, but that was the worst of it.

Of course, the droids just shifted their fire onto the EC pod, which, oddly enough, had not been built to withstand sustained blaster fire. That was definitely a flaw in the design, and she fully intended to contact the manufacturers and complain. If she lived. Which was by no means likely, because her only source of cover was the inadequately armored EC pod. It began to disintegrate rapidly, but she only needed a couple of seconds. She channeled chakra and ran through six hand seals as fast as she could. With all the practice Anakin had put her through, that was pretty damn fast. As she finished the last seal, she rolled back out from cover and held her fingers up to her mouth.

"Katon: Hōsenka no Jutsu!"

Burning heat curdled in her gut. She exhaled, and dozens of fireballs the size of her fist sprayed from her mouth. They peppered the commando droids with a sound like fireworks. Smoke and dust filled the air, blocking out the meager evening sunlight. Luckily for her, Togruta weren't limited by their vision, and Jedi even less so.

Anakin could make fire hot enough to melt right through droid armor. She wasn't there yet, but that wasn't to say her attack was ineffective. Two of the droids went down when a fireball struck their vulnerable necks and knocked their cranial units off. The rest survived, but not unscathed. Her fire might not have been able to burn holes through their chassis, but it still stuck with enough force to knock them off their feet, and it burned hot enough to fuse joints and melt circuits. The smell of burning plastic joined the other pollutants in the air.

The attack had bought her an opportunity, and she meant to capitalize on it. She re-ignited her saber, drew the knife Naruto had made for her, and charged. The knife glowed a searing yellow-white as fire chakra suffused the blade. Before the fallen droids could regain their feet, she struck like a meteor. It was almost comically easy. A dozen fully functional commando droids with blaster rifles and vibroswords made for a deadly enemy. A dozen half charred, blinded scrap heaps was another matter. Green plasma and glowing steel worked in tandem to slice the droids to pieces.

Even working as fast as she could, it still took an uncomfortable amount of time to dispatch the droids. She kept part of her focus on the life she could sense in the street below. Every second made it more and more likely the droids below would figure out the boy was still alive and kill him. Anakin and Rex had both told her over and over not to rush in battle, but she had no choice. Letting the kid die wasn't an option.

The last of the droids died with her lightsaber through its cranial unit, and she jumped off the roof. It had been just over a minute since the droids had spotted her, and thankfully they hadn't returned their attention to the boy. Even more thankfully, as she dove through the air, she sensed a welcome new presence getting closer. Rex had found her, and he wasn't alone. There were several dozen troopers with him. Some of the tension in her gut relaxed. All she needed to do was keep herself and one human child alive for the next two minutes, and they'd be safe. Easy.

Right.

She was already running through more hand seals as the ground rushed up to meet her. Keeping part of her power in the Force while still channeling chakra was still tricky, especially in combat, but it was something Anakin had drilled her on extensively over the last few months. Now, those endless hours of practice paid off. She finished prepping the ninjutsu just as she landed and released it into the ground with one hand.

"Doton: Retsudo Tenshō!"

For a moment, it felt as if she was in a contest of wills with the ground itself. There was a sense of immense weight, like a boulder, but in her mind. She pressed against it with her will and with her chakra. Briefly, just for a fraction of a second, it resisted. Then the boulder shifted, and the jutsu took hold. In front of her, the ground split apart. Dirt and boulders heaved through the cracks and upended the street. Some sections rose and others collapsed, until the road was a churning, uneven mess of rubble. The commando droids, for all their agility, just couldn't keep their balance when the ground bucked like an unruly blurrg. A few got shots off before they fell, but they missed by meters.

Ahsoka winced at how much chakra she'd had to pour into that technique. Obi-Wan had taught it to her, but her Earth affinity was weak. With one jutsu, she'd gone from almost fresh to panting from exertion. She wasn't exhausted, far from it, but that had taken more out of her than she'd hoped.

Behind her, she sensed the kid start to sit up. With the Force, she tugged him behind the same wall he'd been hiding behind earlier. It was the best cover available.

"Stay there and keep your head down," she ordered, in what she hoped was a tone of authority. Rex and his men were getting closer, but the droids would be back on their feet before they got here. Sure enough, the first of them were already standing up. They didn't even look damaged. She readied her saber and knife.

"Alright tinnies. You're going down." Then she charged.

The Force was with her, and she met the first line of droids before they readied their weapons. Durasteel melted and circuits boiled to nothing as she slashed them to pieces. However, even unarmed and off balance, the commando droids were deadly. One of them flipped over her slash and lashed out with a punch. She dodged it, barely, and drove her knife through its eye. The Force gave her a warning of an attack, and she twisted to one side. Too slow. The awful screech of metal on metal pierced her montrals as a vibrosword scraped against the mesh on her back. It bit through the armorweave flak jacket, but the mesh saved her spine. Fire still boomed across her back and shoulder blades as the blade sliced into skin and muscle, just below her rear lek. She could actually feel the buzz of the blade pressing against the very tip of the lek.

"Aaargh!" Her body jumped away from pain as if electrocuted. Not even Jedi self-control could dampen those sorts of instincts. Warm blood soaked her shirt, and the wound stung awfully, but she didn't think it was serious. Before she could turn and dismantle the droid that had cut her, the Force gave another warning. Her blade moved almost on its own to deflect the incoming fire. More droids had gotten to their feet, and these had found their blasters. More warnings came, and with them, more blaster fire. She darted and ducked and flipped, trying everything to keep their attention focused on her, and it worked.

Sort of.

None of the commando droids bothered with the boy hidden behind the wall, which was good. Instead, they focused all their effort on killing her, which was less good. The cut on her back screamed. Sweat poured down her face and slicked her limbs. Her chest heaved desperately, trying to get air into her breathless lungs. It was only thanks to the Force giving her extra strength and speed that she was still alive, but that technique was draining. Each shot came closer than the last. She deflected a few back to the droids, but there were dozens of them.

Finally, the inevitable happened. A shot snuck past her defense and hit her in the stomach. She went down with a gasp. Heat kissed her skin, but it wasn't the awful burn of a blaster wound. More like the feeling of walking too close to a fire. Her armor had saved her life. The smell of burning armorweave stung her nose, and it might have been the most welcome smell of her life. Unfortunately, she was far from in the clear.

The shot had still knocked the wind out of her and left her sprawled on the broken ground. She looked up, right into the barrel of a droid's rifle. The muzzle seemed to suck in all the light and color around it, until her world consisted of nothing but a pitch black hole, ready to end her life. She gathered the Force to push it away, but even as she did, she knew it was too late.

A blaster shot echoed through the street. Light flashed in her vision. She flinched, and then blinked in surprise. She wasn't dead. That hadn't been the droid's blaster, and there was only one other option. Sure enough, the commando droid that had been about to kill her slumped over, a glowing hole burned through its cranial unit. She rolled out from under it before it could crush her and scrambled to her feet. When she looked down the street, she saw what her echolocation had already told her. Rex had arrived, and he was not happy.

"Watch your fire!" He barked. "We've got the commander and a civilian. Commander, get clear."

It was unmistakably an order, relative rank or not, and she followed it the same way everyone followed Rex's orders when he spoke like that. Quick, fast, and in a hurry. She made straight for the boy, and her lightsaber carved a path through the suddenly distracted droids. Most of them had identified the dozens of clones as the greater threat. Only those nearest her kept up their assault. Forty odd commando droids had quickly overwhelmed her. Ten found themselves in a very different situation.

She went low and took two out at the legs. Her blade met them coming down and cut them in half. Another took a swipe with its vibrosword and wound up holding a melted stub. She drove her lightsaber through its chassis, vaulted over its shoulders, and cut the next one in half from crown to waist. There were still droids behind her, but she ignored them. Getting out of the field of fire was all that mattered now. A few blaster bolts flew past her montrals, but the Force gave her enough warning to avoid getting a plasma lobotomy. One last burst of Force-enhanced speed took her to the boy, still curled up behind the wall. She wrapped an arm around his waist and pulled him to her chest.

"Nnggh," she grunted as the motion pulled at her lacerated back. Black spots swam in her vision and it took all her willpower not to collapse. She clenched her jaw, her fists, her eyes, her toes, everything that she could clench, until the agony died down. That really hurt. Maybe that cut wasn't so superficial, after all.

"Hold on tight," she growled through her teeth, putting a bit of the Force into her voice. The boy was scared beyond words, but his limbs dutifully clamped around her torso like a dianoga. With a shout that was half cry of determination and half scream of pain, she jumped for the roof.

It was barely a ten meter jump, the sort of thing younglings did for fun. Normally she could clear three times that with only moderate effort. Now, she only just cleared the lip of the roof. Her feet actually caught on the edge and the two of them went tumbling over each other. The wound in her back slammed against the rough duracrete. Hard. Pain swallowed everything. Her muscles tried to tear themselves from her spine as she arched away from the searing agony. It was so bad her lungs seized up. She couldn't even scream. Her vision flashed white and, mercifully, she blacked out.

…

…

Blackness. Inky darkness surrounded her. She floated in nothing, weightless, numb, barely aware. It was like hovering on the edge of sedation. Her thoughts moved with glacial reluctance. Something niggled at the edges of her mind, but turning her focus on it was like diverting a mudslide with a trowel. Impossible. The effort sent her plunging deeper into the nothing, and her mind drifted.

…

There it was again. Like an itch under her rear lek she just couldn't find. It was stronger this time. Something intruded into the peaceful darkness. A swirl of gray fog. It felt… familiar. She'd seen this before. This fog stirred a memory somewhere deep in her sluggish mind.

'A vision. I'm having a vision.' The rest of her thoughts remained stuck in tar, but that one came crystal clear. As if recognizing it removed some stopper, the vision opened wide. It wasn't the disjointed torrent of images she'd seen before Naruto's mission to Kamino. This was simpler, but more abstract. She saw Corellia from above. She didn't know how she knew it was Corellia; she'd hadn't seen the planet from orbit when they arrived, but it was. There was something wrong with it. A sickly pallor hung over the planet, and it was focused near her. Something burned in the industrial district, a black fire that polluted the world with darkness. The fire wasn't just fire, though. It had purpose. Intent. It also reeked of the Dark side. Now that she focused on it, she could feel the Dark sliding across her skin like rancid oil.

The vision focused. She could see Anakin. He was burning. The black flames kicked at his skin, consuming him. He didn't seem to notice until it was too late. She tried to call out, but she had no voice. No mouth. No body of any kind. She was just an observer. As Anakin crumbled to ash, so too did the world around him, and there was nothing she could do but watch.

The vision ended. Her brain jolted back to awareness all at once, and she shot up with a gasp. That almost sent her straight back to unconsciousness when she pulled at the cut on her back. Again. She really needed to stop doing that.

When the pain receded, she took stock. The battle was still going on. She could hear the blaster fire below. The kid was even still in her arms, wrapped around her as tight as his skinny limbs could manage. He hadn't stopped trembling yet. She couldn't have been out for more than a couple of seconds.

Anakin. Anakin was in danger. She had to get to him. She had to warn him. The bond didn't give the impression he was under attack at the moment, but she was still new to reading it. They couldn't even send proper words to each other, yet.

A thousand things clamored for her attention, from the ongoing fight below to the Darksider she'd seen in her vision, but one thing took precedence. She couldn't do anything until she dealt with the kid who'd gotten her into this mess in the first place.

'That's not fair,' she told herself. 'He's just a kid, and he's caught in a war zone.'

"Hey there," she said in her most soothing voice. "You're safe, now. It's okay. You can let go." It took a few more assurances, but eventually he loosened his death grip on her torso and rolled off. Her lungs inflated gratefully.

She sat up, careful not to move her back too much, and looked him over. He was a human boy, maybe six, maybe eight. Human ages could be so hard to guess when they were young. They didn't have any skin markings or cranial ridges to make it easier. He had the typical brown hair and strong features of a Corellian native, though his were sharpened from too many missed meals. There was a nasty cut on his chin, probably from a chip of duracrete from the blaster shot that had nearly taken his head off. Other than that, though, he looked fine. Filthy, skinny, and scared to death, but uninjured. He stared at her, obviously unsure if she was trustworthy.

"I'm Ahsoka Tano." She longed to join Rex on the street, but the line of fire on her back told her that would be ill-advised. Besides, her men could handle the remaining droids without much trouble. Best to make sure this kid was calm enough to follow instructions. "I'm a Jedi Padawan. I'm here to help. Can you tell me your name?"

He eyed her warily for a few more seconds before responding. "I'm Han. Are the bad droids gone?"

"My men are taking care of that. I'm going to check on them. Can I trust you to stay here?"

He hesitated before nodding and she decided that was the best she was going to get. She took a moment to release her pain into the Force before she crawled to the edge of the roof and looked over. As she'd expected, Rex and his men had the situation well in hand. With her and Han out of his way, he'd flanked the droids and caught them in a kill box. She saw clones on the roof opposite hers, firing down on the few remaining commando droids. Rex had set up two L-shaped firing positions, one on the street and one on the roofs, to box the clankers in. As she watched, the intersection storm of blue blaster fire whittled the droids down from a platoon to a squad, with no sign of slowing.

Satisfied, she turned to her comm. "Master, it's Ahsoka. Do you copy?"

No response. She tried again. Nothing. She tried an actual holocomm, and all she got was static.

"Rex, do you copy?" She asked, trying to keep the worry out of her voice. Maybe it was just her comm unit. Maybe something had damaged it.

"Loud and clear, commander. What's your status?"

That confirmed it. Her comm was fine. Someone or something was blocking Anakin's communications. Worry tried to promote itself to proper fear, but she strangled it in the cradle. She would not lose her head. Not when people needed her. Anakin had taught her better than that. She could hear his voice in her head, telling her to solve the problem in front of her, then move on to the next. To live in the moment.

Well, in this particular moment, Rex was no doubt anxiously awaiting her reply, and if she didn't give him one soon, he'd probably start tearing through the droids with his bare hands and his teeth.

"I'm fine. Minor injuries. I'm with a civilian child, but Skyguy is in trouble. His comms are down. I need to get to him."

There was a pause. She could almost hear Rex's blood pressure rising. No doubt he had orders from Anakin to keep her safe, and those were conflicting with his general orders to keep his commanding officer safe.

Finally, he came to a decision. "Copy that, commander. The boys and I have things handled here. Get to the general. We'll be right behind you."

"Will do. Make sure you send someone up here for the boy. He's called Han."

"We'll look after him. Go."

She sighed. That was done, at least. Now she just had to figure out how to get to Anakin with her back laid open as it was. She couldn't reach the wound herself, which left just one other option. She turned and crawled away from the edge.

"Hey, Han?" she called. "Do you know how to use a bacta spray?"

OoOoOoOoOoOoO

A lot of firsts happened in this chapter. It marks the first time we've seen Thrawn direct a full scale battle, the first time we've seen Rex and Ahsoka fight together, and Han freaking Solo's first appearance in this story. With regards to that last one, he obviously isn't all that important yet, but there was no way I was going to put my characters on Corellia at this point in time and not show Han Solo. He'll have more to do in the future, and you can bet he'll remember the Jedi who saved him from the droids. I have plans for him.

The hardest part of this chapter to write, though, was Thrawn's scene. I'm pretty sharp, but Thrawn is on a whole other level, and it's tough to write someone as smarter than you are. I also don't know crap about naval warfare, and no one knows anything about space warfare, so I was inventing things as I went. Hopefully I captured his unique blend of genius, compassion, and ruthlessness.

If you want to let me know how I did, or just want to babble incoherent nonsense, please leave a review. Thanks, and I'll see you next time.