A nearby explosion forced me to duck. Debris and clumps of dirt rattled against my helmet. Bitches. Another one… what number is it now? Twenty-seven, I think… doesn't matter, I'll ask Tano later, she likes to keep count. The attack had begun. Enemy positions lit up on the auxiliary screen inside my helmet. There were a shitload of them—and then some. Again and again, those damn droids rolled toward our lines in an endless tide of metal and death. Again and again, we rose with weapons in hand to repel their onslaught.
It had been three days since we secured the bridgehead on this cursed planet. And for all three of those days, the fighting hadn't stopped. Shit happened, and there was nothing I could do about it. If not for the defensive perimeter, the losses would have been catastrophic. As it was, they were merely enormous.
The Marat had been forced to take off in a hurry and withdraw from the system, as had the surviving light cruiser. They wouldn't have lasted even a couple of minutes against seven Separatist ships. The remaining fighters, which had covered the ships' retreat until the last moment, also pulled back. Against an enemy air force more than a hundred times stronger, that was the only sane choice.
The Vultures ruled the skies. Our anti-aircraft gunners were on constant alert, and every man capable of holding a blaster fired into the sky during raids. Even so, the droids sometimes broke through, and then we bled. The wreckage of one of our light cruisers still burned on the improvised landing pad. After several failed attempts to shoot it down, the Separatists had sent in a couple dozen fighter droids to ram it. They succeeded. The ship would never fly again.
The captain of the light cruiser had already worked a miracle—he'd managed to deliver nearly four thousand tons of cargo planetside for the stronghold. A pity, a great pity. He would have been a valuable asset. But it wasn't meant to be. None of his crew survived.
While the advance units retreated under the cover of darting speeder bikes and AT-RTs, the engineers set up the defensive perimeter. According to prewar plans, building such a base should have taken at least two days. We managed it in six hours by discarding anything unnecessary.
Our unfinished base sat at the junction of mountain valleys, which were plentiful on this planet. The peaks were covered with something like fir trees, the valleys below choked with thick jungle.
The base itself was laid out in a rough hexagon, with defensive nodes at each corner—something like the pillboxes of my homeworld—housing several laser cannons of varying power.
With one regiment and two battalions of the tank regiment, I held the widest part of the front, where the valley stretched more than three kilometers across. Two regiments dug in to my left and right. Ahsoka remained behind me with one regiment, though after a day she moved up to my side. Either she was bored on her own, or there were simply more droids here. The clone battalion was held in reserve—or rather, what was left of it, as many of its units were already committed all along the line. At the center, beneath a small protective dome, were the engineers, the hospital, and the defense-system reactors.
Along the perimeter we'd cut embrasures and loopholes for firing. The missing sections of wall had been reinforced with whatever we had on hand—stones, logs. Later, the "bodies" of destroyed droids and the wreckage of shattered vehicles were added. To be honest, the perimeter wasn't continuous. The terrain dictated much of the layout, and we hadn't the time or manpower to cover every direction—only the most dangerous ones.
***
After gauging the distance, I settled the DC-15A comfortably into my grip, issuing orders through the internal comm system.
"All troops, attention! This is General Vikt. Prepare to repel the attack!"
The clones silently took position in their makeshift trenches. The Z-6 gunners ravenously spun up their barrels. Mounted on improvised tripods—welded from the "arms" and "legs" of B-1 droids, since welding was child's play here—the machine guns gained extra stability. More importantly, it let us hook them to power cells weighing forty kilos through a cable; the standard packs barely lasted thirty shots. Idiocy.
A grin crept across my face. The perpetually dissatisfied Ahsoka, after half a day, was already pouring fire into the advancing droids, practically hopping with excitement. As far as I remembered, younglings were barely taught to shoot blasters—a couple of lessons on mechanics, maybe one trip to the range.
And here she was, wielding a six-barreled monster. Enough to make your head spin. Credit where it was due, though—almost all her shots hit. As the Togruta herself told me (read: bragged, her emotions gave her away), during one attack she cut down three full companies of B-1s in under seven minutes.
Meanwhile, the droids pressed closer. Dense columns of B-1s marched interspersed with lines of B-2s. Among them lumbered massive Octuptarra magna-tri-droids, with smaller DSD-1s skittering at their feet. AATs and NR-N99 tanks—huge, bug-eyed contraptions on treads—followed behind, holding at a distance and fired heavily on our positions, cautious after bitter lessons learned.
The battle was heating up.
By my estimates, the Separatists had landed at least four hundred thousand droids, supported by some fifteen thousand armored vehicles.
An AT-TE near me lost its gunner to a lucky hit. Damn. That made three today. Enough.
"You," I pointed at the nearest clone, "take the gunner's seat. I'll cover you."
Discarding my now-useless rifle, I leapt across the gap to the tank, vaulted onto its roof, and ignited my lightsaber. The vehicle was damaged, its drive gear crippled, but thank the Force the reactor was intact. The laz-cannon and antipersonnel blasters were still operational. The kinetic cannon tanks had long since fallen silent—by the third day their 96-round ammo racks were dry. We'd never had the chance to unload the supplies from orbit before the ships were forced to flee.
Having already habitually given in to a sense of peace and contemplation of the universe, I began to deflect the droids' shots. Each time it grew smoother, more natural. I could even redirect some bolts back at the droids. Meanwhile, the clone hauled his comrade's body from the seat and manned the gun.
"I'm ready, General!"
"Tank at three o'clock. Spider at twelve. Droids at ten." I gave the coordinates, and the clone began pumping charge after charge into the thickest knots of the enemy, sneaking glances at me. Well, I must have looked ridiculous, standing there on the tank roof, saber blazing.
The clone operators inside the tank were generously pouring their blaster cannons into the droid columns. A brilliant blue lance of energy shot over our heads, shredding four droid tanks in an instant. The SPHA were speaking at last. I had worried most about those forty-meter, eight-story beasts, but somehow they'd endured. Of the ten, three had been destroyed, three more sheltered under a protective dome that drew power from their reactors. The last four, bristling with anti-air, hammered the advancing droids and shielded us from orbital strikes.
In the distance, Ahsoka blazed away with her rotary blaster cannon—the Z-6, as it was officially designated in Republic, I later learned. At this rate the barrels would melt. I'd warned her—short bursts, short bursts! Leaving the overheated weapon to cool, Togruta activated her lightsaber, eagerly batting aside incoming fire.
The clones fought with grim resolve, firing from every scrap of cover. Twice during the battle the droids nearly breached our lines, but somehow we pushed them back. EMP grenades proved invaluable.
This time the droids broke and withdrew, suffering heavy losses, without ever crossing halfway from the treeline to our trenches.
Strange. And still no Vulture raid.
"Report!" I snapped.
"Sector One: attack repelled.
Sector Two: attack repelled.
Sector Three: attack repelled.
Sector Four: clankers are retreating. Teacher, maybe we should pursue?"
As always, Ahsoka couldn't help herself.
Switching to our private channel, I growled, "I'll say it again, for the umpteenth time—we will NOT pursue."
"Yes, Teacher." Her voice carried her disappointment.
Here we go again. Force, give me patience.
***
I was interrupted by a tone on the comm.
"Sir, the Marat has contacted us. Reinforcements have arrived, General. Six ships—all Acclamators. And a swarm of fighters. They're engaging the enemy fleet."
Ah. So that was why the Separatists had pulled back. They were being hunted.
I allowed myself a smile. Not bad. We'd survived.