Renphi was yelling, yelling as though his voice could reach the clone Captain. Dr. Shina felt a strange pang echo within her as she watched, her eyes fixed to the sensor readings as Captain Kraken's Venator briefly paused and oriented itself in an all too familiar way. She saw the sensors register a sudden spike in power levels, and then, as another reading streaked across the screen, her eyes snapped up in open disbelief. Cronau radiation.
"Captain!" The Jedi called one last time, panic riddling his voice like maggots in rotten meat.
It was over in an instant. A terrible, shining instant.
Renphi's wide jaws gaped suddenly as he gave voice to an inhuman scream, a reptilian sound of teeth, and tongue, and throaty horror which reverberated in the air. Dr. Shina felt it as well, felt the cold, sickly panic rising within her, the realization that something terrible and permanent had just transpired before her own eyes. The Knight collapsed, overwhelmed, his claws grasping his broad head as if to hold it together as bloodshot streaks painted the yellows around his corneas and thick veins of drool ran between his peg-like teeth in uncontrolled rivulets.
And yet, Dr. Shina empathized with the Trandoshan then more than at any other time. A hyperspace ram, illegal under Republic law, illegal under Separatist law. Even the Hutts forbade such unthinkable use of hyperdrive technology, even the old Sith knew enough about the danger of that kind of trend to avoid it whenever possible. And Captain Kraken had just broken a million laws across the breadth of known space to kill the flagship of a potential enemy. A potential enemy.
Dr. Shina liked to think of herself as heavily pragmatic. She was fast to know what should be done, even in the face of petty moral considerations and cultural aesthetics. Logic was ruthless, and she liked to think of herself as an acolyte of logic. But this was madness on a level she could never have expected, and would never have recommended.
The outsider ship had been hundreds of times more massive than the Venator that had smashed into it, but clearly it had not been shielded, nor even as armored as a ship of that size should have been. The entire frontend of the massive vessel was blown open and curling away like a junker artist's rendition of a flower made from a steel can. Blue and white scars of superheated metal glowed like filigree across every scar, every rent and tear.
"R-Rescue…" Renphi muttered, still on the floor.
"S-Sir?" Asked one of the clones, the captain of the ship.
"Rescue!" Renphi yelled, rising to his feet unnaturally, deck plates bending from the force of...whatever energy field he had used to lift himself.
"All Venatorsss! All KDY Vesselsss! Move in towardsss the outsssider ship, commence emergencccy ressscue operationsss! Sssave asss much asss you can!"
"Yes General!" Called the captain of the ship, and the clones manning the communications systems got to work relaying his orders.
Dr. Shina said nothing, after all, what could she say? She couldn't even pull her eyes away from the cloud of metallic debris forming around the carcass of the vessel. Distantly, she was impressed by the ruggedness of the vessel's engines, still burning, turning the ship in a sputtering, slow spiral, despite its structure having been disemboweled.
She didn't want to think about it, wanted to look away, away from the glowing metal, away from the encroaching venators surrounding the ship, away from the cloud of debris. But too much of that debris was squirming. Too much of it was shaped like...like…
Finally her eyes broke from the scene as she threw up onto the floor. It wasn't much, her breakfast had been light, and so she had recovered when the sensor operator next to her called out his next observation.
"More anomalies sir!"
"How many? How far?" Renphi almost groaned.
"Near our edge of the system General. Current readings show 12, no 20...one moment sir."
The sensor operator began checking his equipment, and Dr. Shina, still standing nearby, couldn't help but turn back to look at his console screen. Her eyes bulged.
"Withdraw the fleet!" She gasped.
"There are over a hundred anomalies sir." The Clone said.
"More are still appearing...Transmission is being detected, being sent out from the downed dreadnaught."
"Intercccept that transssmission. Continue the ressscue operation."
"Yes, General."
"Are you listening to me?!" Dr. Shina shouted.
"I heard from you doctor." Renphi said.
"And?" she insisted.
"And I believe the outsssidersss will sssee that we are trying to ressscue their people, and will not open fire on usss in the midssst of that."
"That-That's not a given! They could just as easily blame us for its current-"
"Transmission intercepted sir!"
"Play it." Renphi ordered.
The clone obeyed, playing the message over the speakers. It was a man, or at least, it sounded like one. He or it was almost shouting, his voice rich with panic and zeal of a kind that sent shivers down Dr. Shina's spine. The language was alien and guttural, and yet not nearly as Alien as the doctor would have thought from an extragalactic species.
"Get the protocol droid working on Deccciphering that." Renphi ordered.
"Yes sir!"
"Update me on the anomaliesss." The Jedi said.
"Right...Sir, you're not going to believe this."
"Ssspeak trooper."
"I'm counting well over two hundred vessels, General."
"Then we ssstill out number them. The KDY fleet isss massive, well over a thousssand ssshipsss to dissscourage an attack."
"Sir, the smallest vessel in their Fleet is two Kilometers long! The largest I'm seeing is...twelve, maybe thirteen kilometers long! And it's not just one or two, I'm detecting six, no, more of such vessels. General, they are accelerating!"
"Open hailing frequenccciesss, try to contact them."
The clone nodded, strapping on a thick communications headset as he began to scan frequencies for active use..
"Stop this! Look at that fleet! We can't fight off that many dreadnaughts, we have none of our own! Everything in that outsider armada dwarfs us by-"
"Doctor, I can appreccciate how ssstresssssful this must be for you. But thisss isss now an active operation. If you cannot control yourssself, then I encourage you to return to your laboratory."
"But are you mad? Look at how large all their ships are!"
"SSStrength doesss not come from sssize alone."
"This is no time for your philosophical moralizing! That fleet is going to eat us alive if we aren't gone before they close with us! Stop acting like a peacekeeper and start acting like a commander-"
"Enough! SSSnapper, Clear, pleassse essscort the Doctor back to the laboratory. Ssstand guard outssside and make sssure the ssscience ssstaff ssstays sssafe."
"Aye General." Said two clones standing guard beside the captain.
"Come on Ms.." One coaxed as both came along either side of Dr. Shina, clearly intending to seize her by the arms if she did not comply willingly.
Dr. Shina scowled, but would not surrender her dignity to the Jedi, turning without a word, and walking towards the lift which would take her back down towards the other members of her team.
But before she left, she bore witness to the following exchange, an exchange that ensured she would be dragged out of the room, screaming to all the ship that Renphi was a fool. She bore witness to the next, translated message and final actions of the gutted dreadnaught. The sight and sound of it would mark her for all of her remaining breaths.
"Sir, we've got another transmission going out from the damaged Dreadnaught."
"Isss that transslation complete?"
"Aye Sir. TC-4 on the Statesmen has completed a translation matrix. Applying for it now."
They all waited for a few seconds, all but Dr. Shina and her escort, who moved slowly but steadily towards the doors, both the clones and the doctor being more than slightly curious in hearing what the split vessel was trying to transmit. They didn't have to wait long, as the frenzied voice of the ship's captain blared over their com speakers.
"-are lost, and the Atlas is boarded! We will destroy the ship, and take the enemy with us! Do not pity our end, pity our failure, for it is better to DIE for them than live for yourself!"
00000000000000000000000000000
Every witness was stunned, shocked, horrified. The outsider dreadnaught had just exploded, its hull, which had already been a glowing wreck from the unexpected and unbelievable hyperspace ramming maneuver Captain Kraken had just performed tens of minutes ago, bursting in a way they could never have conceived was still possible. As destructive as the hyperspace ram had been, this...this was somehow even worse!
The massive, rent vessel had appeared to darken, as if consuming the light of the stars around it for several, horrible seconds, before the molten hull violently blossomed outward with silent, radiant light. Spikes had been wearing his helmet, a quirk he maintained, even in his new role as captain of his own Venator-class Star Destroyer. The lenses darkened to shield him from the sudden flash, but most of his bridgecrew were not so lucky. Either blinded or gawking, they watched as the explosion began to spread out, sweeping through the venators and KDY vessels that had positioned themselves around the dreadnaught before them.
"Full reverse!" He ordered, almost yelling the command into the room around him.
No one responded. That was understandable, what they were seeing was rather shocking, but Spikes was dead to novelty, and unimpressed by power. He drew his blaser pistol and fired it into the floor, the sound and heat jolting his crew back from the oblivion of disbelief.
"Full reverse!" He repeated, and the clone crew scrambled to obey.
Spikes had earned his name at the battle of Jabiim. He lost all his pod brothers in that fight, and had been separated behind enemy lines when the nationalists of that muddy hellscape had overwhelmed Shelter base. Alone, standing atop a rapidly sinking pile composed of the burnt bodies of his brothers, he had held for three days.
Three days. They came at him, every hour, on the hour, for three days. He used all his power packs, all his brothers power packs. All their thermal detonators, all of their equipment that wasn't sucked into the planet's muddy maw. With every assault the separatists would lose more men, and after every assault, he somehow managed to survive. Eventually he was rescued by the Padawaan Pack led by Anakin Skywalker, and was named after an intercepted transmission sent by the Nationalists just prior to his retrieval.
They'd found him plastered and hiding, sleep deprived and starving, in the side of a half buried fortification. Anakin had taken the gun out of his hand before he could make good on firing on them, but had smiled, not scowled at the lone clone. He had taken Spike's hand with his own metal grip, and hauled the clone from the mud.
"You must be Spikes!" Anakin had said, grinning through the horror around him.
Though he had not understood it then, later another of the Padawan had explained to him what had prompted Commander Skywalker to use that name. It had come from the transmission which had led them to him. To help him understand, they played it back for him, and he listened as a voice speaking in a thick Jabiimi accent, half muffled in static, issued a warning to his men.
"Avoid the southern dessent. Single enemy position, no strategic importance. Assault will bleed you, the position has spikes."
The term had been common military slang among the Nationalists of Jabiim to refer to a heavily entrenched enemy position, one which could not be taken without heavy losses. Spikes had taken the name like a wounded soldier takes a medal of honor, and had carried that experience throughout the entire war, and it had served him well many times. And this situation, at the edge of the galaxy, against these unknown foes, with this exploding behemoth of a ship, was no different in that respect.
His venator, the Trusted Victory, didn't even turn, all retro thrusters firing in full reverse, sliding the wedge shaped ship backwards. He watched as other Venators, most of which were sliding into view of his bridge as his own vessel continued to reverse course, were slower to react. Many did nothing, a few didn't even cut their forward engines, and of those that did begin to take decisive action, most tried to spin their Venators around, wasting precious time.
When the rolling wave of the scorching blue and purple energy reached them, it rocked the ship like an asteroid collision, sending the star destroyer tumbling and turning through the void like a kite caught in a hurricane. Systems flickered, alarms sounded, gravity died, and then, it passed.
"Damage report." Spikes called, sitting in one of the com officer's chairs, having strapped himself down mere moments before the impact.
The replies were sluggish at first, but soon the clones snapped back to their instincts, listing off fluctuating systems, damaged components, and resequencing protocols. The ship was battered, but far from dead, and soon gravity reasserted itself as all main systems came back online. And that was good, because there was no time to lose.
"I need the current status of the enemy ships!" Spikes said.
"Just over 200 hundred ships, all closing with the fleet. They are opening fire!" Shouted one of the bridge officers.
Spikes unstrapped himself, jogging to the massive holo display in the center of the bridge.
"Show me!" Spikes ordered.
The holotable flicked to life, showing the disarrayed elements of the KDY defense fleet, already partially devoured by the explosion caused by the dreadnaught. It also displayed the outsider fleet, numerically smaller than their own Armada, and yet so much more. All of their ships were massive, but they had appeared at a great distance compared to their initial dreadnought, and Spikes concluded their opening slavos to be more a show of force and fervor than an effective attack.
He quickly realized his error when the Courage and the Coruscanti Honour, two fellow Venators that were drifting nearby, were suddenly struck by pillars of crimson light. The beams were almost as wide as the star destroyers themselves, and while the shields seemed to hold for a moment, they quickly collapsed under the weight of those enormous beams. Spikes was dead to novelty, was unimpressed by power, but even he nearly paused as he watched the two sister ships melt like candles under the crimson touch of the outsider weapons. Nearly.
"Angle the ship to face the enemy fleet, lower our profile!" He called, and his crew responded with practiced efficiency.
And not a moment too soon, as a similar pillar of red streaked past their starboard side, skimming the shields and scorching the plating on that side, but it was just a scratch, a scathing hit, a small thing carrying a large lesson which Spikes took to heart.
"Contact all surviving Venators in our area, tell them to drive for the destroyed Dreadnaught, tell them to use the debris and skeleton of the ship as cover. We will lead the way!"
His orders were carried out, and even parroted by other, canny officers of the Republic navy, and soon he and eight other Venrators were cruising, full thrust, for the drifting, white hot wreckage of the explosion that they had just barely escaped. Already he knew turbolasers would be ineffective at this range, far slower than the truly light based energy weapons that were being fired at them from so many thousands of miles away.
"Sir, shouldn't we close with them? Get into effective weapons range?"
"No need, they are coming to us. We need to survive their salvos until we can engage with our turbolasers... get me in contact with the ships around us, let's link up into a fleet grouping. I've got the start of an idea."
His orders carried out, soon the Trusted Victory and the eight other venrators were flying in formation, having nearly reached the debris of the massive ship corpse. Checking the sensors on the holotable, Spikes could see the fragmented response of the Armada taking form. He was not receiving any order or directive from the Jedi general in charge of the operation, so he assumed no one was.
Half the surviving fleet was forming up around his flagship, the Honor Hound, a quarter were charging the enemy fleet, mostly made up of dedicated, none clone crewed KDY ships. Even that quarter matched the actual numbers of the charging ships, but they looked like a cloud of fleas charging a pack of Rancors, and Spikes did not expect them to do much but slow them down.
Then two more ships near him were struck. This time they weren't sitting ducks however, and instead of burning through the shields and ships with persistent pillars of light, as had happened before, this time the beams strafed the surface of both ships, veering off their surfaces after only a second or two of contact. The Captain of the Ever True, one of the stricken ships, appeared on the holotable.
"Captain Spikes." He said.
"Captain Touchy, what's the situation on your ship?"
"Shields are almost out, and it just got a lot hotter in here, but we seem to be doing alright. Having our sides to them helped reduce area of contact, but I'm not using my port hanger exit anytime soon. I think they are using some kind of composite laser weapon to attack us from this range."
"Captain, the Republic's Glory is drifting out of formation!" Called a trooper.
Before Spikes could even ask for it, an image of the stricken Venator was displayed for him. Still mostly intact, save for the two bridges located at the top of the ship, both smoldering with molten metal. Already escape pods and fighter craft were launching from it, while its engines, mindless and rudderless, continued to burn at full thrust, gradually veering away from their group.
Spikes thought it would surely collide with the debris they were aiming towards, but he was wrong. A second strafing pillar of red waved across it, and then a third firing between the formation, hitting nothing. But the one additional impact was all the Republic's Glory could take, and its hull was sheared away, a quarter of the ship departing on its own momentum while the mostly intact remnant of the Star Destroyer spun wildly, its damaged engines twirling it through space before it terminated forty eight seconds later with an explosion.
Spikes considered retreating then, and decided that even if he did ultimately do so, he would not leave before drawing blood for the Republic. Soon he and the seven surviving Venators were among the debris, and no more fire came towards them, for it seemed the enemy knew that their light based weapons would be rendered vastly weaker if they fired them through the particles and lumps of the debris field. Yet clearly they were not forgotten, for it was easy to see that an entire squadron of their smaller, yet still large craft had peeled away from the main charging force to address them.
As they waited, Spikes set about arranging the ships, watching the enemy approach, and finally, biding his time. As he did, he redirected his attention briefly to the battle being waged by the KDY assault and the encroaching battle fleet. He blinked, they were gone, almost all gone. The enemy ships had not slowed down, did not take firing positions or angles of attack in any conventional sense, as the KDY ships had. They merely plowed through them, never halting, never stopping, literally ramming their way through the enemy in suicidal charges that saw ships two kilometers long colliding with the smaller vessels of the KDY Starfleet.
And yet, they were not suicidal charges. Even as the KDY vessels began their haphazard assault on the faster, leading ships of the enemy armada, even as they rained turbolasers and concussion missiles upon them, the ships did not stop, and they did not break, not one!
Upon getting a cleaner image of the ships, he realized why. They had prows, giant armored prows. Most of their guns seemed, paradoxically, to be mounted as...as broadsides, as on an archaic ocean transport, with only the occasional long weapons battery or two slung under the prow or over the port or starboard shoulders of the ships.
And as proton torpedoes impacted onto those massive, wedge-like heads, as they were beaten by turbo laser and concussion missile and ship hull alike, they dented, burned, sizzled, melted, and were still too thick to overcome! Those few KDY vessels who evaded the charging noses of the outsiders, were torn to ribbons in the cascading broadsides that let loose as they passed.
The guns were so large, massive. Where a republic vessel of that size could carry fourty or more weapons batteries intended for ship to ship combat, some of these vessels had as little as ten, some perhaps less. And yet to call the ships lightly armed would be more than understatement, it would be a lie. The guns were larger than many of the KDY's whole starships, dwarfing freighters, light frigates, and all starfighters deployed against ships which bore them.
Watching the red pings of the enemy meet the blue pings of their own fleet, and then watching all the blue vanish, like snuffed candles, was making him sick.
"We can't just sit here sir!" One of the men, the helmsmen, said.
"They need our help! We could flank them from here, we could charge and-"
Spikes did not speak, he was too afraid of what his voice might come out as, but instead he shook his head, cutting the clone off.
"Badder, you know we can't." He managed after a moment.
"We'll be cut to pieces by those broadsides. Besides, those larger ships are still hanging back, waiting for us to break cover so they can do to us what they did to the Republic's Glory. There is a whole group of them coming for us anyway, we won't have to go to them. We need to stick to the plan."
And, as Spikes watched the red pings heading in their direction grow closer and closer, he knew that even with his plan there was no certainty.
"Launch all starfighters." He ordered.
Barely a minute after the order was given, the Red pings had become visible ships. They fired, had been firing, despite the debris in the way. Their laser weapons were proportionally weakened, something Spikes was relieved to discover as one of their beams strafed across the deck of his ship and over his second Bridge. No damage to anything but the shields, and the shields were holding.
He breathed, the laser was smaller, clearly it was not these weapons batteries that had been destroying the other Venators, and since they were coming at them head on, he and his men were not being pelted the same way the hapless KDY defenders had been. And then a solid slug moving nearly a quarter the speed of light flew eight meters past his bridge. It had been larger than a tri fighter, possibly larger than an arc fighter.
"All power to the shields, give them everything for the next twenty seconds. Weapons power, internal lighting, engine strength, Life support, everything but the tractor beams!" He called, and not a moment too soon.
A second massive shell struck them, this time blasting into the body of the venator, bouncing off the recently strengthened particle shields in a blinding flash, spinning up and striking the bridge with another flash of light before bouncing away into space. Their fellow Venators did the same, and survived the opening salvos that came, one after another. Then the outsider ships stopped firing, now clearly of one mind, ramming.
"Steady." Spikes called.
The ships were drawing closer, engines leaving trailing plumes of plasma fire in their wake. Those plumes suddenly doubled in intensity as the ships sped up even more.
"Shut off all shields, redistribute power. Stay Steady troopers!" He yelled, seeing his crew shuffle and tighten their grips on their controls.
They did, and the familiar, safe hum of the shields died. It didn't matter, as he had already seen, it was a false comfort when dealing with these extreme weapons. Their maneuvers would save them, or nothing would.
"NOW!" He yelled.
At that moment, 56 heavy tractor beams, all of which had already locked onto an enormous slice of the broken dreadnaught, swung their emitters in unison. The piece of metal, easily large enough to cover them all, even while scattered, flew through the void on invisible tethers of energy, and stopped abruptly right in front of the charging ships.
They attempted veer, fiery engines sputtering and dying as they labored to slow their momentum. But it wouldn't be enough, not nearly enough, not when the next part of the plan kicked in.
"Push! Full forward!" Spikes yelled, and the venators did as ordered, their own sublight trails glowing brightly as their engines flared to full.
The momentum of the outsider ships, and the sudden countercharge from the massive slab of metal the venators had put between them, was too swift and unexpected a maneuver for the outsider pilots to compensate for, and one and all, they slammed into the veritable wall of debris.
The outsider vessels crumpled somewhat, windows blowing out across the lengths of all twelve ships and small explosions and balls of fire bursting from seams and strains. All but one were completely halted, with the single exception having been the only vessel to speed up, instead of slow down. Terrifyingly, this ship punched clean through the wreckage, suffering similar damage across itself, and yet not dead or disabled. It plowed directly into the Freedom, a Venator to the right of Spikes own vessel, and he watched from close range as its massive prow nearly cleaved the star destroyer in half, annihilating it.
"By the many moons! One breached the wall!"
"Ignore it for now! Starfghters, stick to the plan, hit them with everything you've got, aim for the rents and breaches! Go go go!"
At his command, the ARC wings, Y wings, and other attack craft they had launched prior came out of hiding from the debris clouds all around them. The wounded, halted outsider ships were trying to back out of the sudden predicament they had found themselves in, but they were sluggish, stunned or unable to understand precisely how they were being stopped, as the Venators continued to drive the wall forward, keeping them taught against it.
Without a fighter screen to fend them off, the Pilots had little trouble finding their marks, using all of their heavy ordinances, launching every last proton torpedo, concussion missile, and area control mine they had. The effect was eleven crippled, dying ships, all falling apart in the void of space. Now there was just one left, but that may have been one too many.
Crippled, burning, and firing all the while, the ship's head was still buried in the broken body of the Freedom, firing into the ship to either side with its broadsides. The Tempered Trooper was rented into pieces with the large shells that had been fired before, having no shields to defend itself with as it aided its fellow star destroyers in pushing.
The Vermillion Senator activated itse shields before the volleys of metal death reached it, but it only survived marginally longer than its sister, the shields taking two strikes before collapsing, leaving the ship defenseless as it was filled with more munitions. Five star destroyers remained now, and only for a few more seconds at this rate.
"Open fire! All Venators, all turbolasers, all weapons! Fire fire fire!" Spikes yelled.
His whole ship shook violently as one of the shells pierced its hull, ripping open the hanger to space. But it was too late to worry about damage, all that could be done now was to shoot and shoot and shoot until nothing remained, either of their enemy, or of them. And it worked. The ship seemed to stall as, from all sides, the Venators opened fire, covering it with sprays of blue and green turbolasers as its space frame was pelted with missiles and torpedoes from every ship.
Like a salt sculpture suddenly blasted from all sides with fire hoses, the outsider vessel seemed to simply fall apart and disintegrate under the concentrated outpouring of their weapons. Despite this, not one ship halted or stopped its bombardment until the wedge shaped head of the enemy had come fully off the rest of its body. The crews cheered, both his and those of the other Venators.
"Eight on twelves and we still won!" Said the helmsmen.
"That's the might of the Republic!" Yelled another.
But the sensor operator was not cheering.
"Sir, we've been receiving...transmissions from the General. We are to retreat, pull back immediately."
Spikes nodded.
"Sure, as soon as we pull his saber out of this fire. How is the main battle doing?"
The sensor operator looked sick.
"The battle is over sir. It's been over for at least a few minutes now."
Spikes felt his feet go numb, but he didn't show it.
"Show me." He ordered, and the trooper obeyed.
The holotable displayed a sight which made even his heart sink. He had thought he'd never be part of a battle as disastrous as those they had lost on Jabiim, not ever again, not this late in the war. But when he saw the graveyard that was all that remained of the vaunted KDY defense fleet, when he saw those massive, ungodly ships prowling in the wake of that burning wreckage, like enormous beasts, when he saw them orienting in their direction, Spikes knew he had just become a survivor to a battle that would live in history for as long as the Republic existed. And for all the wrong reasons.
Spikes tapped the holotable and brought up holograms of all four remaining captains around him.
"We need to retreat immediately. We will rendezvou at Rothana, the Republic needs to know what happened here."
"Right, we will dock our starships and follow, you should get going, Spikes. I've got room enough for your squadrons." Said Captain touchy.
Spikes nodded, remembering the condition of his hanger deck.
"Don't take too long, it will only take them minutes to be here." Spikes said.
The other clones all saluted, and he saluted back. Spikes turned then and ordered his helmsman to take them into hyperspace, and it was done in short order. Less than an hour later, he found himself in orbit around Rothana and its massive shipyard rings. Several other survivors of the battle had beaten him here, presumably having fled from the main battle before being taken apart. There were 25 ships there including his own. General Renphi's Flagship, the Honor Hound, was not present.
And the four other Venators and their crews and captains, never made the rendezvou. In fact, they were never heard from again.
Captain Spikes waited. He was called to Rothana to provide a report, but he waited. They had been right behind him. He had only gone before them because his hanger had been damaged. The Jedi arrived at Rothana from the retreat at Anaxes. They wanted to see him, to hear about how he had defeated twelve of the enemy's ships.
But Captain Spikes waited. He sat, legs over the edge of the crew pit stations. He gave no more orders, he had no more orders, but his men stayed with him. And they waited for their brothers who would never come. Eventually the Jedi came to him. Obi-Wan Kenobi, Mace Windu, and Anakin Skywalker. They were saying things, but he couldn't hear them, couldn't see them.
He felt a hard hand fall onto his shoulder, and he looked up, only then realizing the moisture that had gathered in his eyes. But even through that he could make out the face of Anakin Skywalker. The same Anakin who had rescued him from his doomed position at Jabiim.
"Spikes." He said, and Spikes knew the General remembered him.
"We are going to get them back for this." The Jedi told him, metal hand squeezing his shoulder.
Somehow, that cold metal hand conveyed something comforting to the Clone. Not compassion, not kindness, the Jedi always had plenty of that. It conveyed understanding. It Conveyed a promise. A cold, hard promise.
"We will get them for this." The General reasserted.
"But we need your help."
Spikes nodded, and wiped his eyes, transforming his grief, his failure, into rage, and conviction.
"Yes, General." He said simply, taking his leader's hand, and lifting himself.
"I'll do whatever it takes."
0000000000000000000000000000000000
Last Testament of a Devoted Space Marine, Force Commander of the Skyward Order of the Skywatch Chapter
I am prepared. I look at my brothers, and cannot see them. We are shrouded in darkness. We are prepared. Before us, behind a wall, the Mechanicus agents, operatives, and most importantly, leadership, who may become our fate.
They do not know we are here, for we were here before they were. We have been motionless for weeks, fed by the nutrient cycles within our muffled and cloaked suits. We have been briefed, silently, when conditions allowed, but always it is in cypher, and always it is only what we need to know. And it is enough.
I am waiting. We are waiting. We are prepared. And then the signal comes in. Dark Command. And I know now that the worst has come, though I know not the reason. I have been briefed, I know the names, the faces. I know that we cannot survive this, that we will be killed and taken. But I am at peace, for I am prepared.
Already I am listed as missing. If I had returned, it would have been marked as a clerical error, a fault of the data as a result of the hurried nature of the many evacuations I was made to facilitate. But now it will exonerate my chapter. Others will be able to return, after their duty is done. But not us. I know this as my auto-senses scan once more, confirming what I have known for weeks.
So many Skitarii, they would be impossible to overcome and escape, to say nothing of the combat servitors, the Kastelan-class anima, the Kataphrons. No, there would be no victory without sacrifice here, and if one of us falls, then we all will, it is the only way. I am a Space Marine. I am a Sergeant. And I am a member of Skyward.
As me and my brothers slowly move into position behind the walls, I remind myself of what it means to be a part of that most rigid, most stringent, most holy of orders. As my brothers come to me, removing their helmets, I retrieve the specialized syringe that is my responsibility to use, and remind myself that Glory, Honor, and History were not ours to have.
As I plunge the syringe into their necks, choosing different angles, and different places for each wounding, I know that I am murdering them. Not physically, nor mentally or spiritually, but in a way more shallow, and yet deeper than all. As I inject them each with the tainted concoction that we all know will see us wiped from history at best, or proclaimed failures and disgraces at worst, I feel nothing but pride.
We are giving, and have given more to the Emperor, to his cause, his peace, than most marines will ever be willing to stomach. These are my thoughts as I sink the oddly shaped needle into my own neck, and then strap it to the back of the melta charge we will soon use to perform the breach. We replace our helmets, strap the charge to the wall, and step back, silently.
We are Space Marines of the Skywatch, and Skyward knights of the Emperor. We know no fear but the fear of Failure. We know no sacrifice that is too great, nor any act too small or loathsome, that we would not Gladly perform for our Chapter. For our father. For our Emperor. We will die, but we will not fail. We will be taken, but we will not betray our Chapter Master's design. We wait, and we listen. And then we engage.
And as I detonate the Melta, as we break through the wall, into the sacred inner halls of this Voidborne temple to the Machine God, I see the half flesh faces of the leadership of the Martian priesthood. Despite their purported ascendance, fear, shook and horror reflect in the eyes that face my direction. I know just what to scream. In my most deranged affect, in my most frenzied tones, I cry out my final words.
"FOR THE PATRIARCH, AND THE VOID GODS! TAKE THEM. KIIIILL THEM! JOIN THE FATHER'S FLOCK OR DIE!"
Knowing my duty is done, and that I go to the Emperor, I hone my sights, and my specialty rounds do as they were intended, ripping the Arch Magos and several of his entourage into scrap. But as I do, I feel the searing pain of approaching volkite rays, and already my mind is blurring, my helm and face melting in the light of radiation fire.
By design my blood is tainted. And by this design our Chapter will remain pure. I know this, even as I shed my mortal coil, and depart this life of flesh to seek my enthroned father, to meet him as his most loyal son. His most ardent warrior. His most shameless martyr.
His most prepared and devoted Space Marine.