Lily skids to a stop and instinctively ducks behind a pillar as she exits.

Oh fuck, now what?

Ellaita does the same.

The bomber freezes mid-flight, clearly fighting against some kind of tether - the bomb it had been trying to drop starts peeling apart - every blaster bolt stops mid-air, and the troopers' blasters begin crushing in their hands, their armor warping and locking. Rubble pulls off anyone pinned, injuries healing.

"Jacen," Anakin says, voice carrying, intense. "This isn't their fight."

"Then I must ask whose fight it is, grandmother."

Lord Inkil's voice is as smooth, menacing as ever. He - appears, almost, between a few stormtroopers, striding out into the courtyard. "I've been looking for you."

"You haven't been the only one."

"I'm done with empires and dark lords. Fuck off."

"Not even willing to chat?" He ignites his crimson blade. The stone around them begins to shake. The tether on the bomber weakens.

And everything he's doing stills. "Go back to your children. Raise them, like I couldn't raise mine. And stop chasing the ghosts of what should've been left to rest - before you make me kill you."

"Hm..."

"No."

He throws his lightsaber, still lit -

On a path tracking toward Ellaita's hiding place.

Oh fuck time to move-

It freezes, blade wavering, and flies toward Anakin - who's turned partly toward Ellaita, attention-wise and in her physical manifestation -

And Lord Inkil takes - something, it's not quite visible - out of a pocket, thumbing a catch on it -

A strange, discordant humming fills the air.

Anakin's form snaps back to blue, flickering. Inkil's lightsaber falls to the ground -

She throws a hand out to him - the bomber ship peels apart nearly entirely, just enough mechanisms left to force it to land - all the First Order's present weapons except the lightsaber begin destroying themselves - she tries to throw Inkil back -

She vanishes.

Lily's - head -

There's a screaming, a tearing echoing through her mind -

She's halfway across the courtyard, Elesse's lightsaber ignited, before she processes what she's doing.

He recalls his lightsaber to his hand, blade raised.

The amber blade slams into his block with enough force to push it back.

Lily's never held a lightsaber before. Doesn't stop her from almost seeing the flow of her next strike - blade slipping off Inkil's, slash for his stomach while twisting to the side -

Inkil blocks her again, tilting his head.

Ellaita starts shooting.

He's a significantly better duelist than an angry preteen holding a lightsaber for the first time, but Ellaita's bolts combined with a reluctance to kill Lily until he knows what's going on is - not quite giving them an edge, but stopping him from getting one, at least.

Still, his stormtroopers are recovering, trying to salvage what's left of their own backup weapons and advance on Ellaita and anyone else trying to shoot Inkil. They have vibroblades, if nothing else.

Well, they're fucked. Again.

There's a distant whistling - like approaching X-wings -

Before the stormtroopers even have time to about face, they're being fired on.

Whoever the hell's flying, they're damn good.

Nothing like a bit of close air support.

...She's never going to laugh at the groundpounders bitching about the noise again, though.

More X-wings follow, coordinating closely with the one on point.

The stormtroopers start trying to return fire. They're not very successful, especially since they'd been preparing for a ground assault with suppressing fire as backup - that Anakin Skywalker peeled apart like an onion.

Lord Inkil throws Lily across the courtyard and turns, cape snapping around him, apparently retreating toward a ship.

Lily tumbles. She doesn't seem very badly injured, though it's hard to tell over how upset she is.

Okay, well.

She'll check on the kid, firing as necessary to keep troopers off her.