Will you look at that...it only took me months of work and rewrites to get this chapter ready for you all to enjoy.
(Which, by the way, I hope you do.)
Updates will still be slow, so a thousand apologies to anyone whose hopes got raised too high.
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Disclaimer: George Lucas owns Star Wars, not me. That's right, I am not the property of George Lucas! XD
Claimer: I own the plot and Silas Guum!
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Silas's invention was very unusual, even to look upon. If a stasis tube, a carbon-freezing unit, and a parachute had gotten together and had a child, Anakin imagined, the result would probably look something like this machine. Not that that bothered him.
What bothered Anakin the most was the simple fact that this medical monstrosity sat in plain sight in the hanger, and was in fact right next to Anakin's latest piece of repair work, a Skipray Blastboat. How he'd managed to miss this, Anakin would probably never know.
By all appearances, he and Silas were the only ones in the hanger. Anakin chose to ignore the fact that practically the entire ship's compliment was hiding near the hanger doors and watching.
"Silas Guum calls her the 'Re-Gen Tank'," Silas explained, "Very lovely, isn't she?"
"One-of-a-kind, for certain," Anakin replied, trying to avoid offending the Gand.
Certainly, Silas took it for a compliment. After some fiddling with the controls, the hatch to the stasis-tube part of the Re-Gen Tank yawned open.
"Friend Vader will need to do nothing but sleep through the procedure," Silas said, "It will take less than many hours, and Silas Guum has worked carefully to prevent Friend Vader from receiving damage to his armored suit."
For a moment, Anakin felt suspicious. How easy would it be to put his body in this machine, and then have it 'malfunction'? But it only took one glance at Silas Guum settled his worries. The Gand's eager willingness to help was such that you could almost see the waves of Light-Side energy pulsing off into the Force.
It was dark in the Tank when the door was closed. Anakin felt a slight prick, and felt his mind drift away, even as some sort of liquid started filling the chamber…
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Weird. It almost felt like he was in a different place now. And he certainly didn't seem to be in the tank anymore…so either this was a dream, or he was dead and 'One-with-the-Force' now. Anakin decided to stick with the 'dream' theory until proven otherwise. A filmstrip of events was passing through his mind.
He was watching Luke flying his X-wing in battle, switching off the computer and trusting his aim to the Force…
…Geonosis! His hearing was drowning in the roar that mixed blasterfire, lightsaber hums, and the screaming of all those caught up in the total free-for-all…
…Party in the trees. Little Ewoks and tall Rebels, all celebrating the explosion in the sky above…
…Watto. The Toydarian was screaming in Huttese, raging over the twisted hulk of metal that used to be a podracer. So what if the driver had survived the crash without so much as a scratch? Parts cost far more than did little slaves…
…A faint figure. Strange, in strange armor, and wielding a weapon that moved of its own accord…was it alive? Was it all alive? But where was the Force in this being?
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Anakin was jerked back to awareness when someone rapped on his helmet. Everything was still black, but when he hastily tripped the restart on his basic helmet systems Anakin was relieved to see everything worked fine.
"Many apologies, Friend Vader," came Silas Guum's voice, "Silas Guum was unable to finish certain repairs with Friend Vader's helmet was working. It is not damaged?"
Blinking behind the lenses, Anakin waited a moment before replying, "Unless Captain Vorn is NOT currently waving his hand in front of my face, I believe it is all in good working order."
Tallo Vorn had the decency to grin sheepishly, before offering Anakin a hand out of the tube. Outside, Anakin looked himself over carefully. Except for the fluid dripping on the deck - it was green and for some reason made Anakin think of chlorophyll - he looked very much the same.
Then he noticed the pulsing mass of Force centered in his chest.
"Re-Gen fluids remain within the damaged areas and assist in the fixing," Silas Guum explained as Vorn handed Anakin a large towel, "Already there will be improvements, but Friend Vader must unfortunately continue use of his suit for a while longer. Until all is corrected, some parts will be a little overly sensitive."
"Well, Guum," Vorn said, "I can't say much for the looks, but I think the Med Corps are going to be VERY happy to take a look at your little toy."
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Vorn was more accurate then he realized: a week later the Crusader had moved from Brentaal to the newly liberated Coruscant in order to transfer the Re-Gen Tank over for study. Anakin was also brought over for a quick study.
He didn't need any medical droids to explain things for him, though. He could easily feel how the dead material that once constituted as his lungs was coming back to life, cell by cell. He was pleasantly surprised to learn that the reason the rest of his old injuries felt better was that the mere presence of the Re-Gen fluid had neatly jump-started the rest of his body's healing abilities.
Eventually, Anakin wouldn't need the suit at all. That was a day he was definitely going to look forward to. As it stood for the moment, everything was going his way.
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Or so he thought.
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