The temple assault Force of Clones couldn't save everyone. Nor could they block off every route. But they were trying. A number of squads were already dead, but the Clone Offense Troopers pressed the battle both inside and outside the temple.
On the outside in particular,
Clone Offense Trooper forces would come into direct contact with
Domaric Mordane
's Stormtroopers.
The Exchange was very bloody. The Offense Troopers moved fast on foot, and had ground support from LAAT's which began to rain missile and beam cannon fire on the 181'st as it descended,
They were also deadly accurate, pulling off sniper shots once their weapons got in range. But in truth, they were fast moving, aggressive and had been loaded out to get in very close range, massed attacks, while the
Clone Defense Troopers in the city close to the temple set up traps and defensive barriers with whatever they could find, blasting away at approaching Stormtroopers that dared to try and advance on the temple. Other LAAT units swept the artillery pieces they tried to set up with sudden barrages of missile, though a few crewman paid with their lives as a result, their craft getting blasted apart by modern weapons with modern tracking systems. Their weapons were powerful, and still effective but were outdated by more than a few millennia. Only their discipline, massed and squad tactics and fearlessness kept them in the game as they aggressively pursued the Enemy, while the Defense Troopers tried to set up ambushes in any tunnels imperial forces tried to move through to delay them from reaching the temple.
Magdalena continued to move through a now chaotic, blood soaked temple, her saber being used in the Niman form as she dueled a Dark Side Elite savagely employing Juyo in her offense.
Magdalena blocked the chaotic strikes of the Elite, using her Niman defensively, the light surging through mutated muscles that visibly bilged everywhere as she became stronger and faster, gradually overpowering her lone opponent before the gate filled Elite grew desperate and unleashed a Force Repulse that flung the witch crashing through a wall, and partly collapsed the passage they had been fighting in.
Magdalena barely managed to get her Dark Blue blade up as the Elite frantically, psychotically crashed her red blade down again and again, as she went into a Force Fury to counter Magdalena's Force Valor.
As the Elite raised her blade to execute a heavy, meteroric crash, a blue lightsaber blade erupted through the Elite's chest from behind and she fell dead stop Magdalena, who looked up, seeing a golden armored
Bladed Mystery standing behind them, having concealed his presence in the Force.
"Who the hell are you?" Magdalena asked, expertly faking surprise in case there were any working cameras that might be recording them. It was necessary to do so: She could not afford to tip off allies that she knew an unsanctioned Light Side user anymore than she could afford to reveal that she was working with the clones.
"You tell me..." The Mystery replied, playing along, backing off, concealing their presence in the Force once more to look for more ambush opportunities.
The dark ritual from
Ashin Cardé Varanin
hit like a brick.
Magdalena had killed a metric
feth-ton of people in her long existence. Didn't matter why she had done it. They all surrounded her in a void, staring, accusing.
Magdalena took lives as a means to an end, trying to safeguard innocent people from truly depraved beings so beyond the pale in terms of evil that taking them prisoner wasn't a realistic option. In the beginning, she had thought nothing of it. Her mind was so alien she viewed it as a simple necessity, putting down Dark Side users with more force and permanence that none save the Ashlans might have agreed with. She had thought nothing of taking injured, unresponsive Padawans so close to death no amount of normal medical care or Force Healing could save them, fixing them up with her own blood in a ritual and reprogramming them into tireless warriors against the Darkness.
But the more time she spent around her son, the more she had...
very slowly...come to understand that perhaps her outlook was a bit TOO pragmatic. Too utilitarian.
Too heartless.
This for Magdalena, it was not just those she had killed, but every Padawan she had ever turned into one of her
Deputies. This included her own adopted son, Nathan. He had been her favorite Deputy.
Magdalena snarled in pain, clutching her skull as her flesh bubbled and shuddered disgustingly all over her body, like rats were moving underneath it.
She immediately hissed out a counter-spell, cutting her palm open on shrapnel and letting glowing green blood fall out, which she used to trace runes in a circle around her, and chanted in ancient languages long since forgotten to counter the dark ritual affecting Alliance forces, her efforts bolstered greatly by those of
Thurion Heavenshield
, as well as the crystal in her own lightsaber. She would gradually drive back what was affecting her own forces (Though a lot of them were doin excellently, having been genetically engineered to be Pierce Brosnan-sky-diving-after-a-falling-plane levels of fearless, fighting off the sensation just hard enough to barely keep their head in the game, though a large number collapsed in shock and had to be dragged to safety by their clone comrades.
Magdalena let the Light Side flow through her, body stabilizing as she sent out a light side wave to power up and reinforce the minds of allied troops...
Meanwhile...at the Rotunda...
The Clone Siege Troopers moved slowly, but once they got into position, it proved extremely hard to dislodge them from an area they had taken. Their centipede like tanks erupted from underground strategically, taking out while floors of Imperial troops while depositing reinforcements at the same time.
One female
Model 0 named Matilda had sliced a security terminal after massacring a pair of Dark Side Elite with her obsolete, back pack mounted LMG System.
"Uh, folks? We done got us a right
pickle of an issue here..." Matilda trailed, showing one of the Siege Troopers the feed.
Damian du Couteau
was holding
Alicio Organa
hostage.
"Chit." The Clone Siege Trooper snarled, hefting a massive blaster chaingun on his shoulder.
"Sarge. We got a problem." The Siege Trooper said to his Sergeant, ST-787.
The Clone Sergeant looked at the feed.
"That one is out of our hands, but stand by...we may need to extract him like we're extracting the others..." He replied, the Siege Troopers escorting absolutely baffled, injured government personnel out for transport in their tanks or directing them through tunnels they had made. The action was costly...they had already lost three squads to the Sith Counter Attack and the Dark Elites had gone crazy trying to purge them. It often required an entire squad and their Model 0's to kill especially powerful ones, and they always took casualties doing so. The Siege Troopers, their mindset naturally pitiless and uncaring of who they killed, were hardly affected by Ashin's ritual. Padawans and injured Knights were being carried out on stretchers, too injured to question or resist their mystery rescuers. Meanwhile, in the Rotunda, a presence waited, made invisible and signature shrouded by ancient magics. She had shadowed The Chancellor, having a had a vision of him in danger days prior. She had appointed herself Alicio's insurance policy. His final line of defense.
This creature in question was Surt'r, once known by a very different face as
Syd Celsius
. She was sometimes in the presence of Clones moving through the building, gunning down Imperials, getting ever closer to the Rotunda interior despite taking heavy losses. But other times she kept isolated, ambushing imperials, keeping well away from clone forces to avoid drawing any connection
The Force Spawn that had sworn an oath of protection on Alicio and his son, but couldn't risk it being known she was aiding the clones.
The only question was...how should she execute her scheme that she was developing?
Vera Noble
Shannic Wulf
Kain Aldore
Katherine Holt
Valery Noble
Ran Serys
Ren
Sahar
Da'Razel
Ellayina L'lerim
Caltin Vanagor
Any one else I missed, much apologies
Velis Arden
|
Koda Fett
|
Tobi Sharpe
|
Mercy
|
Okuma Milogen
|
Zark San Tekka
|
CT-312
|
Quinn Varanin
|
Allyson Locke
| 
