Thanks so much for the support guys! I'm running out of ideas, and desperately need some!When Anakin woke up, he was restrained to a bed. He looked around groggily, uselessly tugging at the restraints.
He heard footsteps move towards him, and he struggled even more.
"Calm down… calm down…" It was The Doctor again. He tugged at Anakin's restraints, making sure they were tight, and pulled a chair over beside Anakin. Anakin fought even harder, frantically trying to pull his limbs out to freedom.
Anakin froze in terror when the doctor placed a hand on his forehead.
"No fever…" The Doctor muttered to himself as he wrote down the information on a form attached to a clipboard.
Anakin realised something was off about him. Normally, there was no pretence with The Doctor. He just got right on with his task: torture. Anakin thought about this, and remembered the earlier… incident. He decided that in order to solve this complex riddle, he would need to ask.
"Where… am I?" He whispered hoarsely. The Doctor… or whoever he was looked up in surprise, but answered simply.
" South-Side Coruscant Youth Mental Health Centre."
Anakin was dumbfounded. This wasn't at all how his visits to The Doctor went.
"What… how… why…" The Doctor leaned forward again.
"Do you know who I am, Anakin?" The Doctor's brow was furrowed, his face riddled with concern.
Close up, Anakin realised that this man looked nothing like The Doctor. There were no scars, no evil glare. He mutely shook his head.
"Why did you hurt me then?" Anakin looked away, studying a crack in the wall closely.
"Because I… I thought you were going to hurt me," He whispered.
"Why?" The man leaned forward, interested.
Anakin sighed, and shook his head.
"I… He… There…" he sighed. "Never mind."
The man leaned back, contemplating whether or not to try and push him.
" How about something simple then? Tell me your full name." Anakin looked at him, confused. Why didn't the man know the name of his patient?
"Why don't you know my name?" Anakin asked him.
"I know your name. I just want to hear you say it." Anakin gave him a wary look. "Just humour me. I'll tell you my name afterwards and we'll go from there."
Anakin sighed.
"Anakin James Skywalker."
"It's nice to meet you, Anakin. My name is Obi-Wan Kenobi. I'm 28, and I am a doctor here."
Anakin frowned slightly.
"If you work here, then why were you at the Lars'?" Obi-Wan smiled and spoke,
"My parents are close with Cliegg and Shmi. I grew up around them, and Owen and I used to chat about some things. They called me after you passed out in their hallway, saying you were having some sort of panic attack, and explained some other signs of mental distress. I came over as soon as I could. I had just called the Youth Mental Health Hospital for an ambulance when you woke up. Then all hell broke loose. After I sedated you, you were transported here, while another two ambulances from the general hospital were called for Owen and Cliegg."
Anakin felt a wave of guilt flood over him. Obi-Wan noticed this, and placed a hand on his shoulder.
"Don't worry. They're not hurt bad. Owen just has a minor concussion, and Cliegg just needed a few stitches."
Anakin quietly hissed to himself and pulled his sore shoulder away from Obi-Wan's touch.
Anakin looked away from Obi-Wan and at the ceiling, the full realisation of what he had done sinking in. He started to tremble as tears began rolling down his face.
"I… I thought they were trying to hurt me." He whispered around sobs.
Obi-Wan placed an arm on Anakin's shoulder (his good shoulder this time, thank heavens).
"I know. They know that too. I'm afraid that your outburst was necessary. Otherwise, we never would have known about this problem. The next step is to help you overcome whatever it is that has been troubling you."
Anakin's face changed from an open-but-wary look, to completely closed off.
"What problem?" Obi-Wan noticed that even Anakin's voice changed when he said it. It became deeper… and tight. He leaned forward slowly, reaching a hand towards Anakin.
Anakin began to struggle, still watching him closely, and tensed tightly as his hand got closer and closer to his body.
"Relax, I'm removing the restraints." He began to unbuckle the first one, then stopped as he thought better of it. "If I remove these, do you promise not to run or hit me?" Anakin glanced at him sullenly for a long moment before shaking his head mutely and shakily, as if he was scared Obi-Wan was going to hurt him if he said the wrong thing.
Obi-Wan laughed heartily and finished unbuckling the rest of the restraints.
"I like your honesty. Come with me." He took down the rail that was keeping Anakin from getting out of the bed, and offered his hand to Anakin.
Anakin stared at the hand and back at Obi-Wan for a long moment, not sure what he wanted. Obi-Wan patiently explained.
"I'm offering my hand to help you get up. I'm taking you to the general hospital on the other side so you can see the Lars'."
Anakin's face became a ghostly white, and he madly shook his head, tears brimming in his eyes.
"Come on, you'll need to face them sometime. Besides, pretty soon you'll be going home with them, so it'll be a little awkward if you haven't seen each other."
Anakin pulled his knees up to his chest on the bed and shook his head even harder. Obi-Wan, to Anakin's surprise and relief, did not get angry and yell and throw things, but instead smiled.
"Okay, we'll go see them another time." He walked out of the room, closing the door behind him, leaving Anakin with a strong feeling of isolation. He drew his knees even tighter into his chest, thinking about what he had done to the Lars', and sobbed until he fell asleep.
-
The first thing Anakin saw when he woke up was Owen's face. He was shaking his sore shoulder roughly, trying to wake him up. He felt something crack in his shoulder, and he screamed in agony, doubling over, holding his shoulder tightly.
He heard Shmi tell Owen to back off, and to get Obi-Wan. Hot tears streamed down Anakin's face, as the searing agony in his shoulder continued. He heard Obi-Wan rush in, shouting "what's wrong?", and felt gentle but firm hands take his hand off his shoulder. Anakin cried out, and tried to push the hands away without moving his shoulder.
"Anakin… Anakin… It's alright, Obi-Wan's trying to help you." That was Shmi's voice; soft, calm, reassuring. He decided that he had caused the family enough trouble, and let the hands return to his body.
Eyes shut tightly, Anakin bit his tongue each time he felt pain as they prepped him for an X-Ray. Before long, his tongue started bleeding badly. Blood was running out of his mouth and onto the pillow. Still, he continued to bite down. He had to stop crying. He was being a baby. That's what Dad always called him. A baby. Nothing but a useless baby.
An hour later, Anakin was back in his room, his arm in a sling, holding a roll of cotton to his tongue, and waiting for Obi-Wan to come back in with the X-Ray results.
He had already apologised profusely to Owen and Cliegg and Shmi, and they had all forgiven him.
"We didn't really ask you how you felt about all of the changes, so it would have been a little bit overwhelming." Shmi had told him, with a small smile.
Obi-Wan walked into the room, holding the X-Ray's. As he put them onto the light bars, Shmi asked him for the news.
"It's not good, I'll tell you that." Obi-Wan backed away from in front of the X-Rays, and let them all look at the shoulder. It would take a child to see that this was definitely not the way a shoulder should look.
"You must have had a displaced broken shoulder a few years ago which was left untreated. As you can see, the bones moved in downwards and have set back in place in completely the wrong order, leaving you with extreme pain and limited movement."
Anakin gazed at the X-Ray in shock. He hadn't thought it was that bad.
"It gets worse," Obi-Wan continued. "You know those panic attacks you were having? They were partly panic, and partly this bone here," he pointed to the small bone set lower than all the rest. "constricting one of the blood vessels to the heart, and then releasing it, causing your heart and breathing to go hay-wire at the slightest problem."
The room was silent for a bit, before Shmi spoke up.
"What can be done about it?"
Obi-Wan looked up.
"There's good and bad news. The good news is that there is a major surgery that could be done to re-position the bones, freeing you of pain, and giving you a normal shoulder…"
Obi-Wan hesitated.
"Go on." Shmi urged. "What's the bad news?"
Obi-Wan sighed.
"The bad news is that even after intense physical therapy, you may never have more than 40% use in your right shoulder and arm."