Star Wars: Downfall/Chapter 2 - Rage

Chapter 2: Rage Pix grinned. Catching Tetsu had been even easier than she’d thought, he seemed to have had no guards at all and those who had defended him hadn’t lasted long. She now held him a foot off the ground with the force in the junk filled alley behind the cantina and watched him twist and turn in her grip. The Rodian clearly hadn’t come across a force user before and seemed confused by and scared of her power, which the Jedi realised she slightly enjoyed. Suddenly realising the implications of such feelings she hurriedly knocked the criminal unconscious by hurling him into one of the grim coated alley walls and jumped back as though trying to escape her previous emotion. Pix knew enjoying another’s fear of yourself was a sure fire sign of the dark side and combined with her doubts in the force earlier that day she felt suddenly frightened and fragile, as though the dark side was slowly dragging her closer in her isolation from other Jedi. She needed to return to Coruscant, to the grand Jedi temple there and the reassuring words of the masters within. Pix sighed with relief as she remembered that Tetsu was due a trial on Coruscant; he was her ticket back from the outer rim just when she needed it most, perhaps the force was guiding her after all. Suddenly Waker burst through a doorway at the end of the alley, the same one she assumed Tetsu had come from, and stared around quickly taking In the scene around him. As Pix watched she saw his shoulders sink and, following the direction he mournfully stared in saw why. The two clones she had sent to check the alley before the attack, Bunker and Marty, lay in a crumpled heap amongst the debris that covered the alley floor. Several blaster marks stained there once pearly white armour and even before Pix asked Waker, who now knelt by his fallen comrades, she knew both were dead. She put a small hand on the captain’s broad shoulder. “I’m sorry Waker, I…” She paused, lost for words, then finished lamely “They were good men” Even to herself Pix’s words sounded weak and meaningless but the clone silently nodded and got up signalling for the remaining men, who had just entered the alley in search of their commanders and quarry, to pick up Tetsu as well as Bunker and Marty. She noticed one was already carrying a body, Salt, who she remembered she had seen hit in the cantina, perhaps the mission had not been so easy after all. The Pix and the troopers were silent during the long trudge back to the ship. No one in the town troubled them as they marched back through and it seemed almost as though nothing had happened in the dead end little star port. Pix wasn’t surprised, for the people here it made little difference that Tetsu was gone, one of his surviving subordinates, where ever they all were, would step up and take his place and it would be as though the clones had never been there at all. Of course the Rodian’s predecessor would now probably think twice before attacking a Republic transport and that’s all that mattered to the senate and the various companies that practically owned it. Pix silenced these new troublesome thoughts, she really did need to return to the temple to purge herself of these doubts and fast. Tetsu didn’t awaken until long after they’d hauled him into his cell on the Resurrection and it was just before they ship took off that Waker finally got round to explaining his fate to him. He remained surprisingly quite after that and just sat on the single bunk in his small featureless cell and stared at the wall opposite, not even looking at Pix when she came in a few hours later to check on him. She felt she should hate him for causing the death of her clones, but couldn’t really bring herself to, it was they who had barged into his home town and attacked him; she knew she would have done the same in his position. As she thought about the mission Tetsu finally spoke. His voice lacked not only the arrogance it had held earlier but also the fear, to Pix it now just sounded like the Rodian had accepted his fate. “So they sent an actual Jedi after me, I’m guessing that means I was more important than I thought” He shrugged “or you Jedi are less important than I’ve been told” Pix twitched, Tetsu has hit upon the very issue she was struggling to understand herself, but she successfully repressed a second outburst and merely shrugged herself. “Clearly you underestimated how much the Republic cares for its people and how far it will go to defend them from thieves like you. You were willing to attack a Republic vessel full of loyal citizens and soldiers and that makes you important enough to take out” Tetsu sat up as she finished and looked directly at her, with an almost quizzical look “Are you really naive enough to believe it was the people onboard the republic cared about losing?” “Of course it was! What else would they send me here to arrest you for bar there murder?” Pix was now standing. She had taken offence at her captives naivety comment and what made it worse was she didn’t know what else he could be talking about, almost proving his point. Tetsu smirked “The cargo. The loss of the cargo and the precious credit’s it was worth was what your grand Republic cared about. Think if they cared about life why would they potential waste more sending you here to fight me?” The criminals cold logic shocked Pix and she stood still with no response. Her mind raced to the three clones who now lay in the ships makeshift morgue down in the Cargo bay and she knew at least partially that the Rodian was right. Without another word she turn and left, storming out of the prison room, unwilling to accept Tetsu’s victory. Tetsu said nothing but merely turned back to the wall to contemplate his own fate once more. Pix tried to meditate but couldn’t, she was too distracted. Her own rebellious thoughts and now the pirates words haunted her and she couldn’t shake them off. She sat on the cold bunk and stared at the room around her trying to make sense of her confusion but had little luck. Suddenly an idea occurred to her and she grabbed up the data pad that lay discarded on her small work desk nearby. It contained the briefing for the mission and she hoped it contained the evidence she needed to prove Tetsu wrong. Finally she found the paragraph describing the ship Tetsu had attacked, the Samaritan and she read it through carefully. As she finished her heart sank. The few short lines explained the ship had been attacked while on route to and that Tetsu had stolen the forty thousand credits worth of hardware that it had been transporting. The crew were not mentioned once. No casualty list, no survivors reported, not even the captains name. Tetsu had been right. The crew didn’t matter one bit. Pix felt lost, the previously impervious and wonderful image of the benevolent Republic that had always existed in her mind was crumpling. The more she thought about it the more fractures appeared in its magnificent structure and actions, the greedy senator of Thustra, Navi, who she had helped to arrest crawled to the forefront of the turmoil in her mind. She had always thought him an isolated incidence of corruption but was he just one of many? Pix stopped herself, she was drawing ridiculous assumptions from what was just a string of unfortunate circumstance. Burying the doubt deep within her conscience she laughed, she was being foolish. In fact she was going to go an tell that stupid criminal Tetsu just how foolish the idea was, and when he saw how wrong he was it would all be find. Pix practically ran to the prison room, although she didn’t want to admit it to herself she was desperate to defend her precious Republic against Tetsu’s arguments, and to defend it against her own. When Pix reached the prison room door she stopped and caught her breath not wanting to look flustered infront of her captive. However as soon as she enter the Jedi knew something was wrong. The cell door stood open and to either side of it a clone trooper stood staring down at the cells occupant; Tetsu lay on the floor in a pool of dark green blood that was rapidly expanding as it drooled from the Rodians swollen lips. The cause of Tetsu’s injure was instantly obvious, Waker was crouched down over the criminal his helmet off and his eyes full of rage. The clones hands were bare, his gloves also removed, and covered in the thick blood which slowly ran from the dripping to the cold transpisteel floor. He had still been beating the helpless alien when Pix walked in but now the captain stopped and stood up. The troopers either side of him stood to attention upon seeing their general enter, something they normally wouldn’t of bothered with in a less horrible situation. Waker stared at Pix and then turned away looking ashamed and trying to mumble some kind of excuse for his beast like rage. “General, I… the men we lost, I felt that… somehow I thought that this, this would make it right” He ungracefully mumble to a stop and then just starred at the floor. Pix simply stood horrified. Her minor victory over her own doubts about the decency of the Republic had been completely overshadowed by this sudden show of cruelty and anger. She knew that the separatists tortured their prisoners but not even they just beat them senselessly out of rage or some kind of sense of vengeance. Lost for words she simply stared at Waker and then the unmoving form of Tetsu. Was he dead? It was impossible to tell, she couldn’t see his chest moving. She opened her mouth to try and form some kind of response when suddenly a static warped voice cut sharply across the silence. It source was Waker’s discarded helmet which lay a few feet from the disgraced solider, where he had thrown it off in anger. Everyone in the room turned to the crackling helmet which suddenly started to speak more clearly. Pix recognised it as the voice of the head of the senate, Supreme Chancellor Palpatine, whom she had met during the arrest of Navi in the Senate hall. The message was short and smiple “The time has come. Execute Order 66” As soon as the transmission ended Waker charged at Pix. Before she even understood what was happening the full weight of his body smashed into her small frame and they both fell to the floor the large clone on top. As she tried to reach for her lightsaber the captain grabbed it and threw it away before starting to pound his bare knuckles into her jaw. She felt a huge amount of blood leave her mouth and saw it spray across the floor next to her as pain engulfed her face. In sheer self defence she called up the force and threw the commander from her sending him crashing into a nearby table. She quickly leapt up, blood still rolling over her thin lips and was instantly greeted by the sight of the two other clone troopers, Vent and Mace, aiming their blasters at her and opening fire. She only just managed to leap out of the way as the two clones fired their shots gouging deep black burn marks into the floor. Still scared and confused as to what was going on Pix launched at the two if only to stop them firing, and was on the first before he could turn to face her. She landed on his chest, her meagre weight enough to throw him to the floor, where his gun flew from his grasp and he struggled to push the Jedi off him. Mace, who was still standing, rammed his blaster into the side of Pix’s skull and she realed back in pain toppling from atop Vent. The standing clone took this opportunity to fire another shot at Pix and it caught her shoulder filling her mind with even more pain and keeping her on the floor for a moment. This gave Vent a chance to jump up and he raised his fist, swinging it to hit Pix’s head again. This time however she was ready for the attack and managed to roll to the side before using the force to throw Vent into Mace sending both to the floor. Pix was on top of them before they could get up. A dark rage consumed her and blood and anger filled her eyes as she grabbed Vent, the closest to her, and grasped her hand around his muscled neck. Such was her anger and pain that she didn’t even use the force and simply pushed harder and harder crushing the man’s windpipe slowly with her bare fingers. He gurgled trying to say something, but her hands prevented whatever final insult or plea for mercy he was attempting and he slumped lifeless a moment later. Mace, previously trapped beneath the forms of both Pix and Vent finally managed to throw them off with the anger brought by seeing his brother’s death so close up. Pix also caught sit of Waker moving amongst the remains of the table and knew she was about to be out numbered once again. She grabbed a leg from the ruined table with the force, bringing it to her hand and swung it up into Mace’s head as he started to get up. The rage still fuelling her every move she then drove it deep into his stomach with the strength only a force user can muster. His armour shattered under the hate filled blow and the leg easily pierced his unprotected flesh beneath becoming buried in the soliders guts. The man choked up a torrent of blood, much of it coating Pix’s face and mixing with her own, as he died convulsing beneath her. A strong blunt force threw Pix into the nearest wall and looking up she saw Waker now standing over her holding another of the tables legs. Blood covered his face, a mixture of his own and his troops as well as even Tetsu’s, still from the earlier beating. As she looked into his eyes, which were coated in a thick layer of tears, she saw the same rage that drove her own strength and realised the danger she was in. Before the man could bring the leg down into her unshielded flesh she grabbed out with the force and lifted Waker into the air as she had with Tetsu earlier. Waker screamed in rage and hurled the leg at her, which she dodged and then, once again inspired by her earlier tactic,s found the helpless  man’s wind pipe and began to crush it, this time using the force. Waker cried out clutching at his throat and kicking out madly trying to hit Pix. But it was no use, she was to far away and slowly the jedi felt Waker’s resistance fading and his muscle bound form went limp. Dropping the corpse Pix stood shakily. The rage drained slowly from her and was replaced only with the greatest and most inescapable fear she had ever known. It gnawed at her mind and consumed her entirely as she stared at blood covered corpses of the men who had previously been her comrades. As she stood there she heard a commotion in the corridor outside and saw sketcher suddenly standing in the door way staring in terror at her. He yelled and raised his blaster but was suddenly silenced by a blaster bolt that caught him between the eyes and threw him like a ragdoll into the wall behind him. Pix turned half expecting to see the men she had killed rising up to tear her to shreds, but instead saw a hunched over and wounded Rodian holding a DC-15 blaster and staring emotionlessly at her. As her vision began to fade and she collapsed she saw the bein walk slowly toward her and crouch by her side before she vomited the entire condense of her stomach onto the crimson floor before her and then darkness consumed her completely.

End of Part 2