The Wolf Pack

Chapter 22

Ahsoka was already scouting ahead, so it was her who set the bombs that would burst the lab hatches open. She would enter the lab from her position on the ground and both her team and mine would make an airborne entrance. When we had boarded the gunships on Theed, Rex had joked about seeing me more often than he did his brothers on the 212th or the 104th, which was pretty accurate. "We might have to add some blue to that armour of yours if you keep this up, Commander." Later I found out he hadn't been entirely joking.

The pilot opened the blast doors and a few seconds later, the ground in the swamp beneath us shook with the force of three explosions. It was dark and the woods around the area lit up for a few seconds before the smoke covered it all up.

I jumped off the LAAT/i and into the open hatch, landing on a seamless squat with the aid of the force so as not to injure my legs. I turned my lightsaber on and started to intercept enemy fire as the rest of Ahsoka and I's squad rappelled down the opening. We were in the middle of a corridor, so both of us padawans took position on opposite sides in order to shield the troops. The lab was more heavily defended than we had originally expected. It was counterintuitive to have so many battle droids in a Republic aligned planet such as Naboo. Especially in Naboo.

The system was one of the most notorious defenders of peace within the Galactic Senate, to target such a political presence in the eyes of the galaxy was bold. But there was no time to consider the political implications of the lab's placement. The CIS had gone too far when they decided to resort to biological warfare. They were trying to leave the Republic, fine, but there was no reason to kill hundreds of thousands of life forms because of it. We were not going to let that happen.

The plan was going smoothly. Ahsoka, our troops and I had managed to gather the attention of almost all the lab's security personnel. We were taking the brunt of the defense, true, but that meant Master Skywalker and Master Kenobi could carry out their own missions without having to worry about battle droids.

The thing about close quarters fighting is that it's rather restrictive by nature. There is no place for maneuvering or taking cover, or getting a little creative with one's attack. And in such circumstances, numbers often have the upper hand, especially if those numbers don't have the disadvantage of being irreplaceable life forms. Normal battle droids in big numbers were annoying enough, SBD's were a nuisance no one wanted to deal with, but Droidekas? yeah those were a problem. Their deflector shields were bad enough in open combat where you could sneak past them if you were stealthy enough, but in close quarters? Bad news.

The rolling balls of death rounded the corner like a clunking stampede of metal boulders. I cursed underneath my breath and resisted the urge to roll my eyes. Of course they had Droidekas in this Force Forsaken lab.

"'Soka! I won't fit," I yelled, "You jump, I'll throw you!"

"On three!" she answered, "Rex, take care of these for a second."

"Boil, lay cover fire!" I instructed. "THREE"

"Two!" returned Ahsoka as she turned her saber off and got ready to jump.

"Go!"

Ahsoka ran the couple of meters that separated her from me and jumped. I force pushed her in order to get above and across the destroyers. The gap between the droids and the ceilings had been too narrow for me to do it, so we had to make do. Ahsoka was agile, flexible, small and light, she was the perfect person for the job, and she was skilled. With all the training and natural ability of a Torguta she landed on one of the droids and turned her saber on, right on top of its head. The first one went down. I ran forward to draw the second droid's attention while Ahsoka repeated the process. Behind us, our squad finished turning the other battle droids into scrap metal. We were done, for now.