Attack of the Clones (37 page)

Into this maelstrom marched C-3PO, his body at least, with the head of a battle droid fixed firmly upon it.
Shortly, however, this motley droid caught a blaster bolt in the neck. Down it went, the battle droid head bouncing free of the torso.

Across the arena, in a tunnel and marching toward daylight, 3PO’s head, attached to a battle droid body, felt the sensation, but distantly.

“My legs aren’t moving!” he cried, though of course his present legs certainly were. “I must need oil.”

It was a time for improvisation, too wild a scene for coordinated and predetermined movements.

Just the kind of fight in which Padmé excelled. Firing a blaster with every step, she rushed to the same execution cart that had brought her and Anakin into the arena and scrambled atop the confused orray pulling it.

Right behind her came Anakin, his lightsaber a blur of motion, turning laser shots back at the battle droids. He leapt into the cart and Padmé kicked the orray away.

They charged the circuit, bouncing across the fallen droids and Geonosians, Padmé firing shot after shot and Anakin sending an even greater line of destruction out by turning aside all shots coming their way.

“You call this diplomacy?” said Anakin, deflecting blasts.

Padmé grinned and shouted back, “No, I call it ‘aggressive negotiations’!”

C-3PO entered the maelstrom, and if his eye sockets would have allowed him to widen his eyes in surprise and terror, he surely would have.

“Where are we?” he cried. “A battle! Oh no! I’m just a protocol droid. I’m not made for this. I can’t do it! I don’t want to be destroyed!”

This mixed-up droid lasted about as long as his other half had, across the way. He came around to face the Jedi
Master Kit Fisto, who slammed him hard with a Force shove, knocking him to the ground. Next, the agile Jedi did a pirouette movement and with a vicious slice of his lightsaber, took down the battle droid that had been in line right beside C-3PO. It collapsed on top of C-3PO’s prone form.

“Help! I’m trapped! I can’t get up!” C-3PO wailed, a call that caught the attention of none.

Save one.

R2-D2 rolled into the arena and wove his way about the carnage and danger.

No number of battle droids could hope to separate Mace and Obi-Wan, so perfect were their movements, so attuned were they to each other. But the sheer bulk of the reek was too much even for a pair of lightsabers, and when the furious beast charged at the two Jedi, they had no choice but to dive apart.

The reek followed Mace, and he had to slash wildly to fend it off. He did manage to drive it back, but was butted and lost his lightsaber in the process. He came up facing the reek, and figured that he could outmaneuver it to get his weapon back easily enough, but then an armored rocket-man flew down in his path, blaster leveled.

Mace reached out with the Force and brought his lightsaber flying to his hand, moving like lightning to parry Jango’s first shot. With the second shot, Mace was more in control, and his parry sent the bolt right back at the bounty hunter. But Jango was already in motion, diving sidelong and coming around ready to launch a series of shots the Jedi’s way.

He was stopped by the reek. Unable to distinguish friend from foe, the reek bore down on Jango. He scored a couple of hits, but they hardly slowed the beast, and he was tossed away. The reek charged him, trying to stomp
him as he rolled about desperately. Jango was fast, though. Every time he came around, he fired again, and again, his bolts burrowing into the furious reek’s belly.

Finally, the huge bullish creature swayed, and Jango wisely rolled out the far side, opposite Mace, as the beast collapsed.

The Jedi was on him immediately, lightsaber weaving through the air. Jango dodged and lifted into the air with his rockets, trying to keep one step ahead of that deadly blade and to occasionally fire a bolt at Mace.

The man was good, Mace had to admit. Very good, and more than once the Jedi had to parry desperately to turn a bolt aside. He kept up his offensive flurry, though, keeping Jango on the defensive with sudden stabs and slashing cuts.

One misstep …

And then it happened, all of a sudden. Mace started to slash to the left, cut it short and stabbed straight out, then reversed his grip and sent the lightsaber slashing across, left to right. He spun a complete circuit, coming around to parry a blaster shot, but there was no shot forthcoming.

That left to right reversal had cleanly landed. Jango Fett’s head flew free of his shoulders and fell out of his helmet, to settle in the dirt.

“Straight ahead,” Obi-Wan told himself as the acklay came at him, its huge claws snapping in the air.

He went left, then right, then rolled forward at the beast, between the mighty arms and snapping claws, coming around and over with his borrowed lightsaber stabbing straight ahead, burning a hole in the creature’s chest.

The acklay dived forward, trying to crush him under its bulk, and the Jedi leapt straight up as he connected.
He came down on its back, landing lightly and stabbing repeatedly, before leaping away once more.

“Straight ahead,” he told himself again as the enraged beast charged yet again.

Obi-Wan noted the blaster bolt coming at him from the side at the very last second, and turned his lightsaber down and under, deflecting the bolt right into the acklay’s face.

The creature hardly slowed and the Jedi had to throw himself to the ground to dodge a swiping, snapping claw.

He rolled out to the side, to avoid a stomping leg, and managed to slash out again, cutting a deep gash.

The acklay howled and came on, and more blaster bolts came at the Jedi.

His lightsaber worked furiously, brilliantly, turning one bolt after another right into the charging beast, finally slowing it and stunning it.

Obi-Wan rushed in and leapt and stabbed, right in the face. He caught his foot on the creature’s shoulder and ran right past it. He heard it fall behind him, thrashing in its death throes, but he knew that battle was done and went back to work on the battle droids.

That larger fight seemed far from won, and far from winnable. Mace Windu had finished with Jango Fett by then, and to the other side, Anakin and Padmé continued their perfect teamwork behind the overturned execution cart. Anakin turned all shots aimed at either of them, and Padmé picked off droid after droid. But even with that, even with all of the remaining Jedi fighting brilliantly in the arena, the droids continued to press in, herding them all together in a hopeless position.

“Artoo, what are you doing here?” C-3PO asked when his little friend rolled past his trapped body.

In response, R2-D2 fired a suction cup grapnel from a compartment, attaching it firmly to C-3PO’s head.

“Wait!” C-3PO cried as R2-D2 began to tug. “No! How dare you? You’re pulling too hard! Stop dragging me, you lead-head!” He felt the sparking as his head tore free of the Battle Droid body, and then R2-D2 pulled C-3PO’s head over to its rightful body. R2-D2 extracted his welding arm and began reattaching the protocol droid’s head.

“Artoo, be careful! You might burn my circuits. Are you sure my head’s on straight?”

More Jedi went down under the sheer weight of the laser barrage. Less than half of them were still standing.

“Limited choices,” Ki-Adi-Mundi said to the exhausted and bloody Mace Windu.

Soon they were down to just over twenty, all herded together, and in the stadium all about them stood rank after rank of battle droid, weapons leveled.

And then all movement stopped suddenly.

“Master Windu!” Count Dooku cried from the dignitary box. His expression showed that he had truly enjoyed the spectacle of the battle. “You have fought gallantly. Worthy of recognition in the Archives of the Jedi. Now it is finished.” He paused and looked all about, leading the gazes of the trapped Jedi to the rows and rows of enemies still poised to destroy them.

“Surrender,” Dooku ordered, “and your lives will be spared.”

“We will not become hostages for you to use as barter, Dooku,” Mace said without the slightest hesitation.

“Then I’m sorry, old friend,” Count Dooku said, in a tone that didn’t sound at all sorry. “You will have to be destroyed.” He raised his hand and looked to his assembled army, prepared to give the signal.

But then Padmé, exhausted, dirty, and bloody, raised her head to the sky above and shouted, “Look!” All eyes turned up to see half a dozen gunships fast descending upon the arena, screaming down in a dusty cloud about the Jedi, clone troopers rushing out their open sides as they touched down.

A hailstorm of laserfire blasted the new arrivals, but the gunships had their shields up, covering the debarkation of their warriors.

Amid the sudden confusion and flashing laserfire, Master Yoda appeared in the dropdoor of one of the gunships, offering a salute to Mace and the others.

“Jedi, move!” Mace cried, and the survivors rushed to the nearest gunships, scrambling aboard. Mace climbed in right beside Yoda, and their ship lifted away immediately, cannons blaring, shattering and scattering battle droids as it soared up out of the arena.

Mace could hardly believe the incredible sight unfolding before him, as thousands of Republic ships rushed down on the assembled fleet of the Trade Federation, dropping tens of thousands of clone troopers to the surface of the planet. Behind him, Yoda continued to orchestrate the battle. “More battalions to the left,” he instructed his signaler, who relayed it out to the field commanders. “Encircle them, we must, then divide.”

After many minutes of a glow so bright that it hurt C-3PO’s eyes, R2-D2 retracted his welding arm and tootled that the job was finished—C-3PO’s head was back where it belonged.

“Oh, Artoo, you’ve put me back together!” C-3PO cried, and with some effort, he managed to stand upright. He realized then, from the hailstorm of fire outside the arena tunnel, and with many of those bolts ricocheting inside, that he was far from safe, and so he
turned and began to amble away. Unfortunately for him, though, R2-D2 had not yet disengaged the sucker projectile from his forehead. The cord went taut, and C-3PO tumbled backward to the ground.

R2-D2 gave an apologetic whistle as he rolled by, disengaging and retracting the sucker as he went.

“I won’t forget this!” C-3PO cried indignantly, and he scrambled up again and shuffled off after his infuriating friend.

With the gunships flying off and the battle droids in pursuit, Boba Fett finally found the opportunity to slip down onto the arena floor. He called for his father repeatedly, rushing from pile of carnage to pile of carnage. He passed the dead acklay, and then the reek, calling for Jango, but knowing what had happened, simply because his father, who was always there, wasn’t there.

And then he saw the helmet.

“Dad,” the boy breathed. His legs giving out beneath him, he fell to his knees beside Jango Fett’s empty helmet.

A
rchduke Poggle the Lesser led Dooku and the others into the Geonosian command center, a huge room with a large circular viewscreen in its center and many other monitors about the walls, where Geonosian soldiers could monitor and direct the widening battle.

Poggle rushed to the side to confer with an army commander, then came back to Dooku and Nute Gunray, his expression fierce. “All of our communications have been jammed!” he informed them. “We are under attack, on land and from above!”

“The Jedi have amassed a huge army!” Nute Gunray cried.

“Where did they get them?” Dooku asked, sounding perplexed. “That doesn’t seem possible. How did the Jedi come up with an army so quickly?”

“We must send all available droids into battle,” Nute Gunray demanded.

But Dooku, staring at the myriad of scenes, at the many battles and explosions all about the region, was shaking his head before the Neimoidian could begin to
argue his reasoning. “There are too many,” the Count said, his voice full of resignation. “They will soon have us surrounded.”

Even as he spoke, the three winced as the central screen flashed, showing the explosive destruction of a major Geonosian defensive position.

“This is not going well at all,” Nute Gunray admitted.

“Order a retreat,” said Poggle, and he was trembling so forcefully that it seemed as if he might just fall over. “I am sending all my warriors deep into the catacombs to hide!” He nodded to several of his commanders as he finished, and they turned back to their comlinks, relaying the orders.

“We must get the cores of our ships back into space!” one of Nute Gunray’s associates cried, and Gunray was nodding as he considered the words and the devastating scenes of battle flashing across the viewscreens.

“I’m going to Coruscant,” Dooku announced. “My Master will not let the Republic get away with this treachery.”

Poggle the Lesser rushed across the room to a console and punched in some codes, bringing up a holographic schematic of a planet-sized weapon. With a few keystrokes, he downloaded the schematic onto a cartridge and pulled it from the drive, turning to Dooku. “The Jedi must not find our designs,” the Archduke insisted. “If they have any idea of what we are planning to create, we are doomed.”