Shadows of our Past

XVIII

Obi-wan's POV

We were stuck on Christophsis in the empty city as Separatist forces pushed forward, I sighed as I deflected bolts next to Ahsoka. I've been to this planet more times than I can count and the city was constantly being evacuated when Separatists attack. We've only been here for 2 days and we've already lost a lot of men, Ahsoka was pushing on much like her Master always did and I practically had to force her to go back and get some rest last night. 

We had already contacted Coruscant for reinforcements but the Separatists jammed our signal before we could get a reply. It had been a few hours since we had contacted them and the 212th was beginning to lose hope that help would come. 

"General, have you heard anything from Coruscant?" Cody asked.

"Unfortunately no, but I'm sure they'll send reinforcements," I replied.

The battle raged onwards and the 212th was beginning to tire, we had defeated all the battle droids and just had to deal with their heavy cannons. 

"There's no way we're taking down those heavy cannons on our own, we don't have enough troopers," Cody argued.

"If we don't take them down now then they'll wipe out what troopers we have left,"

I heard a screeching sound in the air and the loud roar of thrusters and all the troopers looked up to the skies. The sound became more high pitch and louder while everything else was silent, no clone made a sound and neither did the Separatist droids. 

A black and yellow fighter appeared from behind a building and spun towards the heavy cannons firing a stream of green laser bolts. A few of them blew up and the starfighter pulled up and weaved between buildings going full speed, the vulture droids lifted up into the air and pelted after the fighter. 

"If that fighter's here then the gunships won't be far behind," I announced, "We'll just have to hold out until then,"

"Another wave is approaching General," Waxer shouted.

I turned back around and saw a fresh new wave of super droids and type one droids, clones sheltered behind broken pieces of buildings and began firing as I ignited my lightsaber and began deflecting the bullets. 

I heard the roar of engines approaching and multiple gunships appeared and landed behind our front lines. The doors slid open and the 501st spilled out and immediately took shelter and began firing at the droids, easily picking them off. The 212th drew back a bit as the 501st took over and Ahsoka went up the front to deflect the bullets as I dropped back with the 212th. The fighter flew past and hot on its tail were two vulture droids, the fighter spun around and went straight for a building at full speed. My heart rate sped up but at the last second, the fighter pulled up into the air as one of the vulture droids smashed into the building, the fighter and vulture droid disappeared again behind the buildings and I focussed my attention back on the fight.

"Rex, rush them now!" I commanded.

The captain nodded and relayed the order to the battalion, they charged forward and I did as well blocking bullets and slicing through droids. The remaining heavy cannons began firing and we were forced to retreat and take shelter as the blasts hit the ground, clones were thrown through the air some of them were injured but most of them died as they hit the ground. I connected my comm to Anakin's who was in the fighter and patched into his channel.

"Anakin, you need to take out the rest of those heavy cannons otherwise we're not going to last very long down here," I said. 

"I know, I know, I'm working on it," Anakin replied distractedly.

I saw the black and yellow fighter streak over us and shoot at the heavy cannons, more of them exploded but there was still one left. The vulture droid that was tailing Anakin had finally managed to hit his wing and smoke billowed out from it.

"Anakin land immediately, you're fighters going to blow," I ordered.

"I've got to do something first," he replied.

I watched as his fighter disappeared beyond the buildings again with the vulture droid still firing at him. Anakin came back around and he flew low to the ground and aimed straight for the heavy cannon, he quickly opened the lid and jumped out as the fighter crashed into the heavy cannons making everything explode wiping out some of the droids. 

"Move forward!" I shouted.

We moved forward again blasting the rest of the droids as Anakin attacked from behind slicing through droids as easily as walking. 

"I doubt this is the last wave, I sense that the Separatists are still here," I told Anakin as he sliced down the last droid.

"I think their orders are coming from a tactical droid, not a sith or person," he replied.

"Why don't we just go to the headquarters and destroy it?" Ahsoka suggested.

"That place will be crawling with droids and we definitely don't have enough troopers to take them all down," 

"Why don't Ahsoka and I just sneak through and destroy the tactical droid and maybe place some detonators while we're there?" Anakin asked.

"I don't know, it is risky," I replied stroking my beard.

"We'll be fine Master we've done this sort of thing before," Ahsoka pleaded.

"I'm sure you have but I don't want to put you in harm's way if we can avoid it," 

Ahsoka grumbled but held her tongue from saying anything else. 

"Okay, what's your idea then?" Anakin asked raising an eyebrow.

I tried to think of any other idea that didn't involve too much danger but came up with nothing, I could sense Anakin's smirk that he was hiding on the outside and sighed.

"Alright you two can go but do not engage any other droids and try to lay low, Cody has some detonators so you can place them around the place," 

"I'll get them," Ahsoka said walking off to where Cody was.

"When something goes wrong I'll have an evacuation team ready to pull you and Ahsoka out of the mess you've created," I sighed.

"Most of the time it's not even my fault, droids blow more things up than I do," Anakin argued.

"Okay," I replied, sarcasm laced in my voice.

Anakin rolled his eyes and walked over to where Ahsoka was, she had a backpack of detonators and two speeders were waiting for them. 

They spoke to Rex for a second before hopping onto the speeders, Anakin nodded to me before they took off leaving dust in the air from broken bits of building that had fallen. 

"Don't do anything stupid," I muttered under my breath as they both disappeared beyond the buildings.