When the Cavalry Comes.

XXXIII

Fives flipped through reports while Cav sat on the floor by his desk, sharpening her knives. She sighed and let her head fall back against the side of his desk with a thunk.

"Ow." She grumbled, rubbing her head. Fives snickered.

"Yeah ow. Knocking your head against walls tends to hurt." He rubbed at his eyes tiredly. The previous silence resumed once more. Both of them were adamantly ignoring the elephant in the room.

The door opened and Jesse stuck his head in. "Am I interrupting anything?" He asked.

"No." Cav grunted.

"Yes." Fives said at the same time.

"Nothing important." Cav amended for both of them. Fives didn't say anything.

Jesse shrugged and passed Fives more datachips and a stack of paper. Fives groaned and began his therapy routine of banging his head against his desk.

"The Commander will be in here to talk to you two about the mission and the paperwork." Jesse informed them before giving Fives a lazy salute and leaving. Cav looked at Fives. 

"This a officer only briefing or what?"

"Jesse said the two of us. You should probably stay." He muttered into his desk. 

"Got it." Cav sighed. The door slid open, revealing the Commander standing in the doorway. She waved them off as they made to stand to attention. 

"No need for that right now. Just a couple updates on different efforts across the galaxy that mean almost nothing to us right now but you have to know anyways." Ahsoka sighed, looking at her own datapad. "Really you can just read it yourself, but I'm supposed to tell it all to you verbally as well. Pretend we did that 'cus I'm just going to skip to the important bits."

"There's the Festival of Light on Naboo happening, and the Chancellor himself will be attending." She said, a shadow passing over her face. "Then there's the matter of the 212th and the severely depleted 501st. We're being used as a trial battalion and merging the two together under Anakin, Cody, and Rex's command. Cody received an 'technical demotion' meaning that he no longer holds the rank of Marshal Commander on paper unless Anakin is incapacitated, upon which he will resume his old command and take charge of the battalion. Any other time him and Rex are on equal footing."

"How exactly is this gonna work with merging? Will we still have 212th companies and 501st companies or will we all be put together?" Fives asked, leaving on his forearms as he looked over the file on his own datapad. 

"It's up to Anakin. A little bit of both as far as I can tell. Some companies will be merged but most will stay the same I think." She rolled her eyes before looking back at her datapad. "There's a couple other things too, mostly around Kenobi's disappearance. There seems to be a mass gathering of bounty hunters from across the galaxy for something, and Kenobi's killer is there. Unfortunately, his case is listed as closed and we are forbidden from pursuing it until it becomes relevant again."

She sighed looking tired, then suddenly very alert as her wristcomm beeped. 

"He's awake, Commander."  Kix's voice crackled.

Jedi must have a hidden power of teleportation because as soon as her eyes widened she vanished. 

Fives snorted under his breath. "Those two are just a tragedy waiting to happen. Remind me to never fall in love."

"Will do." Cav muttered back, still staring at the spot the Commander had been. 

"We got some new people from the 212th it looks like. Might have to add some yellow streaks to our pretty blue." Fives said, scanning through the files. 

"Updates on the condition of allies, Umbaran technology to be implemented into republic design, senators to be pushing to let clones go out on the battlefield a year even earlier at age eight, the Cha'kaars." He scowled. "That'll be a fun one if it gets passed. Oh skrag."

Cav winced. "They'll only be a little bigger than I am." She muttered. "How can they be expected to fight in normal armor? It'll be nearly useless on them, even a hinderance." Fives made a sound of agreeance in his throat. He sat up when the holocomm on his desk beeped at him and answered it. 

Instead of a superior officer or a jedi though, it showed a live feed. Fives and Cav both watched it intensely as it played out. Fives was pale when it finished. He replayed it to be sure. 

The Festival of Light. 

Gunshots and explosions break out. Flashes of red through it.

The Chancellor on the ground, compromised.

More smoke and screams from bystanders as the Chancellor's personal guard rush in only to be brutally and efficiently slaughtered as Rako Hardeen emerged from the smoke, wielding a red bladed lightsaber. 

"Hardeen was a sith?" Cav gasped quietly. 

"Not Hardeen." Fives said. The video played out farther. Hardeen's face looked odd. Like it wasn't really there. 

Fives paused it and went back second by second through the frames until he found what he was looking for. 

A single frame where Hardeen's face was gone completely, revealing the person underneath who looked directly at the camera before the feed cut out.

Cavalry knew that face. Not well, but she definitely knew it. 

"We have to tell the Commander." She said, getting to her feet and starting towards the door at a sprint. Fives was right behind her, following her through corridors and down various hallways, until Cav burst into the intensive care unit in the medbay.

The Captain was shirtless, sitting up and beginning to peel off the electrodes and sensors across his chest. Ahsoka was sitting at his side, a hand on his arm while Kix stood a little while off, shouting at them but not attempting to stop the Captain from removing the medical tech. 

They all turned to look at her and Fives. 

"Cav?" Kix asked, concerned. 

"The Chancellor of the republic has been kidnapped." She said breathlessly, leaning slightly against the doorframe before continuing into the room.

"By High General Obi-Wan Kenobi."