Chapter 101: 101. Chapter

-From the perspective of Grievous-

Inside the bridge of the Confederacy, flagship.

-Cough, cough... cough... Look at the cowards. They could barely hold their line without fleeing blindly in panic. Ha! How low the Republic has sunken, now that they have lost their precious clones. Too bad! Hah hahaha! Concentrate your fire on the third ship on the left side. Their shield is about to give in. Let’s see how long you are able to stand the might of the true Separatist Systems.

-Roger roger, General. We are redirecting fire to the designated target.

Stated joyfully one of the droids nearby.

A different droid walked up to Grievous and stated in a worried tone.

-General, our sensors are picking up a squad of fighters escorting light bombers heading towards our position. They likely intend to attack our left flank.

Grievous eyes narrowed slightly as he asked.

-How many fighters are there? 

The droid seemed to think over its next words than stated.

-Four fighters and four bombers, that means two whole squads, sir.

-Cough... stop wasting my time with such useless reports... cough with those numbers. They will be disintegrated before getting close enough to do anything meaningful.

The droid stared at Grievous without saying anything else, which clearly annoyed the General as he asked.

-Do you have anything else to report?

The droid shook his head and said.

-Oh, no, sir. I was merrily waiting for an order.

Grievous was on the edge of losing his patience. He stepped closer to the annoying droid. His face was almost touching the droids as he asked.

-About what exactly?

-Ohh… I mean… What should we do with the incoming fighters?

Grievous rolled his eyes with a sigh as he pushed the damn droid out of the way while shouting.

-Argh! I am surrounded by fools. I have already stated just ignore them! Now get out of my sight while you have the luxury to do so!

-Roger-roger.

Stated the droid and walked away.

Grievous turned back to look at the ship’s form that was about to be blown into smithereens. Finally, their cannons finished turning and a series of red beams were fired. They were heading towards the already damaged ship, which couldn’t hold up against the concentrated assault.

Its energy shields gave out, letting the massive energy shots hit the middle of the venator class ship, literally melting through its spine, which resulted in an enormous explosion breaking the whole cruiser into two parts.

The multi colored explosion reflected in the still biological eyes of the famous jedi killer as he enjoyed the sight of utter destruction.

-Hahaha... I can’t wait to see the rest of your miserable fleet burn similarly. Count Dooku will be pleased to hear about this…

 

-From the perspective of Adi Gallia-

Inside a Venator-class Star Destroyer at the forefront of the space battle playing out over Coruscant. This particular ship’s right side was heavily damaged.

Large chunks of the ship’s board were missing. Miraculously, the left side was still covered by an energy shield thanks to one of the still functional shield generators. The spine of the ship was not damaged, and the venator was currently trying to retreat from the front, seemingly with success.

The main reason for the retreat was not just the damage that the ship’s surface layers had received, more like that it was invaded with droids trying to take over the ship’s controls from the inside. 

Adi Gallia, and a bunch of troopers were currently struggling to hold back the invading forces. They were fighting in a narrow corridor that directly led to the bridge. It was a critical area to defend.

They were under heavy fire from the droids that launched waves upon waves of suicide attacks, trying to push closer and subsequently forcing the republic’s forces backwards. The fearless and crazy attacks of the droids were not something to disregard. They might have lost a lot more units, through such tactics, but they were indeed overwhelming them slowly but surely.

One of the retreating republic soldiers, after trying to take another step backwards have hit his back against a wall. He had to realize that they were pushed back to the entrance of the bridge.

-We are back against the wall! There is no more place to retreat!

He screamed over the various noises of blaster fire after the cold realization sank in. The other soldiers, who had the time to spare, also glanced back in fear at seeing the wall that was just behind them. While another wave of droids were pushing forward.

-FUCK! How many of these bastards managed to climb on this damn ship? If we let them inside the controls, we are done for... might as well try our luck and surrender...

Another soldier spits on the ground, sparing a short disdainful look at the one who gave the earlier proposition. He immediately flushed with anger and shouted at him.

-What? Do you have something to say, then say it in my eyes, bastard?

The other man only shrugged and added, while shooting down an incoming B1 who was too ambitious for its own good. 

-It’s just that I would rather die with a gun in my hand than be enslaved to a bunch of thin cans, but suit yourself, kid.

-... not everyone is a fucking maniac, like you... 

Adi Gallia was fighting at the forefront of the troopers, trying to deflect as many of the incoming plasma beams as she could. Her body was long since drenched in sweat, she was panting from the continuous effort. While being forced to listen to the soldiers’ constant banter. 

I swear these men could not shut their mouths for a single minute... At these times I am seriously starting to miss the clones... but, thinking back to the fight, and how many of us were killed in cold blood... eh, maybe... maybe, these men ain’t that bad.

The very moment she thought that, she sensed the heat of a blue laser beam which flew by her head, missing it just an inch. The sensation of the heat coming from the molten plasma made her skin crawl. She wanted to scold the idiot who almost hit her, but couldn’t really afford the time to turn around and rant at the fool. Instead, she just shouted between two breaths.

-Watch... were you aiming!

One of the soldiers stepped in and banged on the helmet of the younger soldier, who almost hit the commander. 

-Apologies Lady Jedi, we will handle this idiot... have no fear.

Adi did not say anything else, but was certainly hoping that it would indeed be the case. 

Let’s hope that is true... 

With that, she refocused on the battle, feeling a new series of incoming force warnings. 

I need to focus, or we won’t survive this encounter.

 

-From the perspective of Anakin.-

The battle was intensifying in every direction, growing more and more chaotic by the minutes. Even with the intense ground artillery fire and occasional heavy ground ion cannon shots, that were rendering useless an entire enemy battleship with every hit for minutes to come, which time was usually more than enough to completely destroy the helpless ship, but even with all of this support, the battle wasn’t going in our way. 

The female soldier that is responsible for the communicating devices stood up on the bridge and shouted over to him.

-General, I have an important report. 

This immediately caught my attention.

-Go on, soldier. 

-New report coming in asking for immediate reinforcement. They need at least ten venators on the right flank. The enemy’s flagship, led by General Grievous, is there, and they are about to be overwhelmed. The troops are constantly being forced back, sir.

Damn it... we don’t have sufficient units to send them over... but if they are forced back, the entire balance of the battlefield will be turned over. Do these idiots think that venators grow on trees or what? 

-Notify them that we will send reinforcements. They must hold the line, give the order to reposition three venators to the right flank, from the center.

-Sir, they are asking for ten...

My eyes darkened as I added.

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-I know.

There was a moment of silence, then the trooper stated.

-Understood, I will relay the command.

Dammit, we have to deal with that flagship somehow, but we simply don’t have the sufficient resources. Damn it! If I ever get my hands on that fucking traitor, blasted damnable Darth Sidious, and to think I almost... no... I will fucking gut that bastard... 

Anakin’s expression turned pale as the memories of what he had almost done blinked into his eyes. The revelation that was shown to him in Unity had never ceased to haunt his dreams. He liked being a Jedi, and missed the feeling of his lightsaber, but... if having that sense of comfort could lead him to such an inhuman path... then it was better to never take one into his hand ever again.

 

-From the perspective of Alu Marlos, a newly recruited Alderaanian soldier.-

Every kid’s dream was to join the army, the glorious republic army that is. 

A red beam of plasma passed over my head. I could sense the heatwaves created in its cursed path. 

-Fuck!

Was the only thing I could say, as I realized... If I ducked a single second later, I would be gone... so where was I? Ah yes... Every kids dream was to join the republic army, to partake in the parades of thousands and hundreds of thousands of soldiers stepping up as one single entity. 

-ARRGHH! 

A painful scream filled the air as I saw the body of a soldier fall on the cold metal floor of this fucking hangar bay. A stream of smoke billowing off the now seemingly lifeless body spreading over the floor, still holding onto the gun with rigid hands. A gun that was accidentally pointing in my general direction.

I saw as the body convulsed; the hands closed over the still grasped weapon. Wait... OH FUCK!

I rolled to the side in a panicked, disorganized motion as the gun shot… A few blue laser streaks flew in my general direction. I felt the heat behind me, saw the shroud of sparks filling the air around me as I jumped behind another hastily created barricade.

-Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuuuuck! 

I cursed seeing that my recent actions gained the attention of two super battle droids that were now determined to blast my barricade with a continuous stream of red beams. I tried to cover my head and face from the flying cloud of sparks with my left arm, while my shaking right hand was trying to open one of the bigger pouches on my right leg, eventually succeeding in the attempt.

I immediately reached into the pouch and pulled out a round heat detonator. I closed my grasp around it, seeing the slight change in color. The grenade will start its count down when I release it from my hold. I will have to wait until these fuckers overheat their gun...

 

-From the perspective of Net Myrec a Clawdite ex-headhunter who decided to enter military service on the side of the republic, under the disguise of a Danthomirian woman who had disappeared in an unfortunate space accident, only to now reappear through her, she was named Jesh Jinsa.-

I can’t believe that these fucking idiots actually pulled an attack on Coruscant. I only joined the military ranks, because thanks to the existence of clones, it was a reasonably good job to do nothing and earn an acceptable amount of credits. How could I have foreseen that those bastards are going to betray everyone, along with that gray-haired piece of crap that called himself a chancellor of all things? Chancellor my ass! 

It wasn’t supposed to be like this; it was supposed to be easy money, if I knew this was going to happen, I would have never left behind my bounty hunting job with the hutts... in that work I would only have to face a few cowards from now and then, not a complete chaotic and ridiculous space battle. People are dying left and right. I can’t even count how many... 

-Damn...

If things are going to be like this, I might as well change my appearance and run away while I have the chance to do so. It was a last resort thing, since I worked so much on this particular disguise. My race was capable of changing shape to any generally similar creature. We never really liked to wear our real face... it was an internal thing... an urge to be masked as someone else... and I liked my shape and form as a dathomirian.

I wasn’t willing to lose it. I even managed to claim a nice inheritance in this poor girl’s name, but it seems I don’t really have any other way... Do I? 

-Damn! 

I was on the edge of breaking down in tears... I mean, I didn’t harm this girl; I have no idea what happened to her; she was stated lost in space, went out with a tour ship and never came back. Such accidents were rare in this time of space travel, but still nobody would raise much of an eyebrow when they heard about such cases... Space was not kind to those who traveled through it and accidents were bound to happen. 

What I mean is that... this girl just bought a house on Coruscant, and a pretty nice one too. She worked for that for quite some time. Now she was lost, probably dead. She didn’t have any close relatives; me being a clawdite and a former headhunter. I naturally had the ways and connections to make fake identities based on the files I managed to gather on her. 

In the end, I managed to pull it off, and stole her identity. It was not a small feat to do such a thing in this time and age of modernity. And now it seems I am going to lose everything, just like the original girl did... Jesh… I also inherited your damned cursed luck as well!

-sh, esh, Jesh! What are you daydreaming? We are going to bomb the crap out of this ship... look at the size of that thing, you won’t be able to miss it even if you tried! 

I was suddenly startled by the shouts coming through my com-link. I looked around in a moment of panic, only to realize the cold reality... 

-Fuck it...

I said in a broken whisper, remembering that I had already missed the chance to get out of this in one piece... I was too greedy to let go of my persona. I sighed heavily. That train was already gone, Jesh... there is no reason to dream about it now.

I was inside a Y-wing bomber flying in formation with two squads of starfighters. 

Another frustrated shout reached me through the com-link.

-Jesh, what are you doing, girl? Stay in formation! 

I clenched my teeth and directed my ship back to the formation. I could no longer get away from this... might as will pray to get through it alive.

-That’s my girl. For a moment, I thought you were going to bail out. 

-... ugh, me too... Jack... me too...

-What, seriously? 

I rolled my eyes with annoyance, forced a smile on my face and said with a sarcastic voice. 

- What do you think of me, you bastards? I would never leave you guys behind. You are like my family...

There were a series of loud smirks coming through the com-link.

-That’s the spirit. I would never believe that you would run away from challenges like this one. 

Hearing those particularly cheerful words, I felt an overshadowing sense of worry run over my body. The reason behind that was the following.

My current squad commander was this crazy son of a bitch called Jack. I heard that he actually used to fly in formations with clones. He even participated in a few missions led by Anakin Skywalker himself.

He was not even a clone and was still flying with them in battle. That meant two things: he was a pilot on level with the best of the clone ace pilots, and he was nuts.

Because of this, I couldn’t help but ask while growing increasingly worried.

-What challenges are you speaking about, Jack?

There was a moment of radio silence, then the familiar voice sounded again.

-What now, were you really daydreaming at times like this? Didn’t you hear the order? Look in front of yourself, we are going to bomb that shit back to the border of the Independent Separatist Systems right from here, haha!

I hastily looked around and my eyes quickly focused on the form of a huge... and I mean enormous ship that was literally shadowing out the sun if you looked at it from this direction.

I felt a knot forming in my throat... looking at the abomination of a battleship. It was constantly spewing thousands of heavy turbo laser blasts outwards, actually creating an opening in allied defenses.

No… It was practically pushing back the republic’s frontline. The ship itself was already terrible to look at, but seeing that it was flanked by an entire fleet on both sides was even worse. 

I ran a quick scan on the particular ship. It was a fucking flagship controlled by none other than the infamous jedi killer, General Grievous... 

Seeing the data written across the panels, I felt faint. I clenched my jaw and hands tight over the consoles... while trying to hold back the tears which were starting to flood my eyes. 

I am going to die with a bunch of fools in tow. Why am I so unlucky... bruh-huh nooo! I don’t want this!

-We got the order, guys we must distract that ship until the frontline gets the incoming reinforcement. Fighter squads, cover our bombers and shoot down enemy interceptors, because there are bound to be a few determined to ruin our plans. Head out! 

No... damn, I don’t want this. Nobody told me that I would be sent on a fucking suicide mission escorted by a bunch of brainless deep shits! Uwwaa!

-Jesh, I told you not to break the formation! 

-... Sorry, I didn’t notice... 

-Typical Jesh, you are such an airhead, haha!

-... ha-ha.. 

Why don’t you just die, you piece of crap? Without you, I could have sneaked away already! Curse you, I will haunt you if I die! Forever and ever! Bastard!

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