The difficulties of childbirth, like many things, was based heavily on class. A mother on a planet in the Inner Ring could almost universally expect a nurse-droid, live imaging, and emergency bacta if needed. A slave on Tatooine would be lucky to receive one of those.
Shmi wasn't very lucky, so she got Bertha. Though if you had to do without a nurse-droid and all that other fancy technology, Bertha was about as close as you could get for a stand in. Bertha was an old woman who had been delivering the babies of other slaves since she was a teenager. Shmi would have felt much more comforted with the woman's knowledge if she didn't keep repeating the same two commands.
"Okay, breathe deep breaths." Shmi gave several panicked breaths, "Now push!"
Shmi let out a cry of pain as she pushed again, only this time, she didn't cry alone. A cry that filled her heart with more emotion than words could describe sounded out and Shmi leaned forward to try and catch a glimpse of her new baby, despite her body crying out to collapse back into the paper covered bed.
The bundle of blood and fluids was cradled into Bertha's arms, Shmi looked on in hesitation as the woman looked him over.
"Congratulations. It's a healthy baby boy." Bertha said as she wrapped him up.
A boy! Just like she expected! She held out her arms and her baby was placed in her arms. She marveled at him. She had made this life. With no one's help. Finally, her life had purpose.
"Hello Anakin." She whispered.
Then pain came again, and she let out another cry of pain.
The pain was so unexpected it made her lose track of her surroundings for a moment. She'd been told there could be contractions still afterwards, but she hadn't expected it to feel that intense!
"There's a second one on the way." Bertha stated and Shmi's eyes widened.
Two? That hadn't come up before. Nothing had prepared her for a second one to be on the way. Her mind raced as she thought of the ramifications. One child a master could deal with, but two? The future was uncertain and-
"Push!" Bertha yelled, and Shmi complied, all other thoughts disregarded as she focused on what was important. Making sure her second child was safe and sound. Everything else could come later.
The second birth was even tougher than the first, almost as if her very body rebelled fought against the birth, but Shmi's will was not to be denied. For hours she pushed, breathed, and chewed on ice cubes to fight the stifling heat of Tatooine's dual suns baking the house. Then, finally, just as the twin suns began to set, another cry came out and Shmi collapsed, spent of energy. Her mind a dull buzz as she cradled Anakin in one arm, thumb idly stroking the sleeping babe's leg.
"It's a beautiful baby girl." Bertha announced.
"A girl." Shmi breathed, dread and joy waring within her.
"Born just at sunset. An auspicious birth to be sure." Bertha said before handing over the second baby.
Shmi looked down at her unexpected gift. A daughter. When she was young she'd often talk of what she would do with her daughter if she ever had one, but not once did she ever think of a name for the little girl. Ever since she got pregnant she was only certain that she'd have a boy.
She gazed down at the little face of her daughter, bright blue eyes and blonde hair, just like Anakin.
"Sedka." She finally decided, an old word that she'd heard some Tatooine natives say for sunset, which on Tatooine was always considered a blessing. "Anakin and Sedka Skywalker."
As she clutched the little ones close to her. Her children had difficult lives ahead of them, both of them. But Sedka...well there were certain challenges that came with being a young girl on Tatooine, even before you considered being a slave as well.
"Don't worry." She said, unsure if it was to herself or to her children. "Mommy will take care of you."
Shmi had to believe that she could. For them.
Transferring damn near thirty years of memory into the head of a brand new batch of grey matter is not a quick process, nor a pleasant one. So for the first four years or so of my life I was a mostly normal child. At least not any stranger than Anakin, the goof.
It's just that my sudden jumps of wisdom wasn't due to Force Bullshit.
Then again, considering my very presence in Star Wars, force bullshit was absolutely involved in things. Though I'm not entirely certain that I am, in fact, the realtor from Florida reborn, it almost seemed more like I was just the receiver of her memories a small trickle at a time. The memories did seem just as real and vibrant as my own, but shouldn't any memory feel that way? Regardless, they came at such a slow trickle that it took me a while before I even realized it was unusual to remember doing things I had no way to have done. After all, no one who has never been off Tatooine would dream of having gone swimming in a pool. I only noticed a real differenced based on feelings in the memories versus now. My memories rarely possessed the raw awareness of my surroundings that I had now.
Anakin and I both were unquestionable force sensitive, I could already tell. We both would react to things before they happened, we had an odd insight into people at a glance, and we both could generally tell when the other was in distress. If I didn't have memories of NOT being able to do those things, I would have just thought myself very insightful and thought nothing of it.
But I knew better.
"Sedi! Come on! Mommy's looking for you!" Anakin called, already heading in my direction.
I could feel his smirk as he approached, he just caught me and he knew it. Not that it really mattered, he generally supported my rule breaking.
"Okay. Just a second." I responded as I tore off another piece of fetid meat and dropped it in front of my latest animal friend.
"So what did ya find this time?" Ani asked, leaning over behind me to look at the creature I was handfeeding. It was small, only coming up to my knee and I was only 5. It had long drooping ears, a short muzzle, rust and black fur, and an adorable little tail that wagged happily as I fed it. I had absolutely no idea what this animal was, but I loved it.
"It's a Taiwanese Tiger." I responded confidently.
Anakin looked at me suspiciously, but he could also feel how confident I was. I ignored his skepticism and reached out to pet my fuzzy friend one last time, doing my best to project out the same happiness I got from petting it to the creature. It rolled on its back and lightly pawed at my hand, claw retracted.
I'm not sure if my projected good vibes actually did anything or not, but I was often told that I really had a way with animals, so it could be that it was working. I didn't know for sure though.
"Bye Lady Clarisa, if I see you around again I'll try to sneak you some more treats." I chirped, before throwing one last piece of meat out and turned to walk away. Which was fine, the sun was sweltering and I could use the shade.
"What does mom need?" I asked as I skipped back towards the door. That was one of the best things about being a kid again. I could do stuff like skip and no one said a single thing.
The slavery was a bit of a downer though.
"Gardulla says she wants to see us, so she wants to make sure we're washed up." Anikin said.
My mood soured. A Hutt wanting to see you was generally not a good thing, though it was frequent for us. She owned us after all.
"Does she know what Gardulla wants?" I asked, biting my fingernails as we rounded the corner and walked inside.
"No. Probably just wants to make sure you aren't still saying bad words."
My stomach knots itself at the reminder, and Anakin winces in response.
"Sorry Sedi. I didn't mean-"
"It's fine." I cut him off.
I had once gotten used to my old curse words being considered childish nonsense. I could use shit, ass, damn, and other great words without impunity.
Turns out motherfucker was universally understood, and I made my Mom pay for it.
In short order we found our mother. It wasn't hard; she was in the slave bunk house. Gardulla ran a bar and casino, and housed all her slaves in various bunkbeds in the back. She wanted everyone close at hand should she need them.
Considering she was still running a casino though, we were till kept decently clean, fed, and clothed. Couldn't have us driving off customers from not looking nice after all.
"There you two are." Mom said as we came into sight. So quickly in fact that it seemed she knew we were coming. I'm actually decently sure that Shmi also was strong in the force, but I couldn't exactly prove it. I did manage to catch a glimpse of scars on her back peaking out of her shirt before she turned around.
"To the fresher, quick. We need you looking decent. You know how Gardulla hates dirt." Mom said as she bustled.
Actually, Gardulla hated children, it was just amplified by dirt. She seemed to think all children just oozed a thin layer of filth and despised being reminded of that fact.
I was smart enough to not saying anything about that though. I had learned some things about keeping my mouth shut after all.
Anakin and I were thrown into the sonic showers in short order, which was always an odd sensation, like a full body tickle that was over in seconds. Moments later we were put in our least bad outfit and we walked up towards Gardulla's chambers, where Thrisnys stood guard.
Aside from being Gardulla's lapdog, Thrisnys was a perpetually grumpy trandoshan with a wicked burn mark coving the entire right side of his face. He wore a dark yellow armor of a material that looked similar to what the clone troopers would eventually wear. He carried an large blaster rifle, letting it rest in his arm rather than put it away. He also carried no less than a dozen vibroknives on his person and seemed to relish any opportunity to use them.
"What do you want?" He hissed.
"Shmi Skywalker and children here. Mighty Lady Gardulla called for us." My mother said, bowing to the lizard-man, Anakin and I followed suit.
Thrisnys glared at us, looking for any reason to punish us. On finding none he opened the door. A tidal wave of hookah smoke and music poured out. I tried do breath through my mouth as Thrisnys walked in and waved for us to follow. The hookah smell was strong, but it couldn't overpower hutt stink.
Gardulla's room was the size of a small house, easily 700 square feet, it stayed dark while a window to the side looked out into the casino, where bright and colorful lights shown through. A group of musicians stood to the side playing their hearts out, as if playing to a massive audience and not a small handful of sentients. There were several sabacc tables scattered around with varying amounts of players.
"Lady Gardulla, the Skywalkers, as you summoned." Thrisnys stated as he gave an incline of his head. As Gardulla's right hand, he needn't bow and scrape to the hutt nearly as much. We bowed as deeply as we could without throwing ourselves off balance and stayed looking down.
"Skywalker." The hutt greeted, allowing us to raise our heads. Gardulla insisted all her slaves learn Huttese, but she generally spoke Basic unless there were other hutts about.
"What can we do to serve you, Mighty and Illustrious Gardulla?" Shmi said as we straightened up.
"I have been patient with you Shmi, because you are good in my kitchens and you are good with the machines, but your-" the hutt hesitated before speaking again, this time like one utter a curse-word, "children are dead weight. I need results from them, or I will sell them and be done with it."
My eyes widened. This was sudden. Gardulla certainly wasn't a fan of us, but she'd never acted like we were this big of a deal before. She also was cutting straight to the point, which wasn't her style. She liked to talk all around a point before jumping right into stuff like this. This didn't sound right at all.
I could feel Mom's panic too as she went so very still and waited for a few breaths before speaking.
"Mighty Gardulla, both of them are ready to pull their weight. Why, Anakin has been working with Sawdit in the repair room, he's showing great promise with hardware."
"And what of your daughter?" The overgrown slug cut in.
My mom could say nothing. I was five, just my size made it hard for me to find something to do to be helpful. I was too young to handle customer service, I was too small for manual labor, and I just didn't seem to get the machines here, they were a complete mystery to me.
"Your daughter is clumsy and foul mouthed. She can't help in the kitchen, can't help with the machines, and is too young to be a dancer. She's dead weight."
I was fucking five! Sorry that my stubby legs were uncoordinated and I didn't have tits to flash yet! I kept my face, mostly, schooled though. Gardulla stared at me for a moment, looking for a reaction. I didn't give her the satisfaction.
"Both your children have to pull their weight, or they are gone Skywalker." Were the last words, before we were given a wave and dismissed.
As soon as we left the room, Mom swept us into a hug and I hugged back fiercely. I might have all the knowledge of another life, but Shmi was the one that had raised me for five years. Who took care of me when I was sick. Who fed me. Who took a whipping for me. Who loved me, despite occasionally being a little shit. She was Mom, old life or not, and I couldn't stand the thought of being separated from her, Anakin more so.
"I'll take care of it." Mom said as she rubbed are backs, I could feel Anakin shaking beside me.
"You promise they aren't gonna have her, right mom?" He pleaded with a choked voice.
"I promise. They won't rip us apart."
"Don't worry Mom." I said, fully intending a double meaning as I spoke. "I'll be alright."
Anakin began crying in earnest. Damn telepathic bond!
Shmi would be fine without me. Anakin though, well, the kid might not recover from that. There was something special about twins, especially force sensitive ones that were raised together. The very fabric of reality tied them.
"I'll take care of it Mom. I'll make sure we aren't ever separated." I swore with conviction. It was true, even if I had to sneak away and find a transmission dampener to block our kill switch, have Anakin put the parts together, steal some credits, and barter passage off planet, I'd do it. We weren't going to be separated easily.
I just needed to figure out a skill, other than being force sensitive, that I could use that a ten foot-long slug would appreciate.
Like maybe the ability to eat salt?
I'd figure it out.