Day 8: Everything Hurts and I'm Dying | Back from the Dead

This can be read as a standalone, but it's intended to be a prequel to my Deception arc AU, halt by the headstone. So if you'd like to see Anakin and Obi-Wan hash it out, feel free to give that fic a read.

Ahsoka grinned. She couldn't help it. "Master! You're back!"

Anakin—and it was Anakin looking back at her, truly Anakin—was in bed, propped up by a mountain of pillows. It was almost comical to see him without his head of hair, but it was so recognizably him, wearing his own face and his own eyes and smiling that familiar crooked smile, that her heart felt fit to burst as she bounded across the room and settled into the chair at his bedside.

"Of course I am, Padawan," he said, and that was his voice, too. Soft and lilting, nothing like the low rasp of Rako Hardeen. "Did you ever doubt it?"

His bored tone was designed to reassure her, but it didn't work. In the mellow light of the Halls of Healing, Ahsoka could just make out the fine sprawling lines of his scars—remnants of his bouts with Dooku's Sith lightning. That, and the sight of her Master garbed in standard white healing robes—somehow more startling than his lack of hair—were proof enough of what a close call it had been. Too close. Ahsoka wanted to crawl onto the cot and tuck herself at his side, to feel the steady weight of him, to splay her palm over his heart to make sure it hadn't stopped.

But that was attachment talking, and they were Jedi. Hugging him was out of the question, with Obi-Wan lingering in the doorway.

"Of course not," she said. "I just—wasn't expecting to see you without all your hair. You're looking very . . . shiny."

Anakin grimaced and ran a self-conscious hand along the side of his head. "Not for long. Master Che said she had something that could make it grow back, by the time they let us back in the field."

Ahsoka smothered her grin, replacing it with a pleading, wide-eyed look. "Aww, but do you have to? We can match, you and me and Rex . . ."

Anakin gaped, staring at her in something akin to horror. "Er—I'm not really . . . I don't think . . . "

He stammered for a few more moments, grasping for words, before she could no longer contain her laughter.

"I'm kidding, Skyguy," Ahsoka snickered. "We'd have to put a camo net over you, with a polish like that. Pretty sure everyone can see you from orbit."

Anakin scowled, but his eyes were alight with amusement. "You know what needs polish? Your jokes."

"I try, Master."

"There is no try," he said, letting his voice slip in a terrible Yoda imitation. "There is only do."

Then, remembering they weren't alone, they glanced guiltily at Obi-Wan, who was still standing framed in the doorway. His expression was inscrutable, as it so often was, but his beard looked more ragged and unkempt than Ahsoka had ever seen it. From the bruise-like shadows under his eyes, she wondered if he had slept at all the night before.

Anakin cleared his throat and said, "So—how do I look? Truthfully?"

Ahsoka knew him well enough by now to know he wasn't asking for vanity's sake. She could tell the question wasn't entirely meant for her, and the answer she gave wasn't entirely meant for him.

"Like a shaved womp rat," she said.

Anakin snorted. "You have never seen a womp rat before in your life."

"Sure I have. I'm looking at one right now."

"Very funny," he said, with a breath of laughter. "I hope you didn't get used to being without me, Snips, because those jokes definitely need a lot of work."

He was teasing her, but the jab cut through her chest like a blade. She was used to having him around, because he was her Master and she was his Padawan, and she needed him—maybe she wasn't supposed to, but that was how it felt when he'd make a game of tearing through enemy droids to calm her shaking hands, and when he'd make her laugh until her ribs hurt to keep her eyes away from the sea of bodies around them. That was how it felt when he'd let her peer over his shoulder as he tinkered with his machines, so she wouldn't have to sleep through another night of bad dreams. That was how it felt, because he was always within arm's reach: the only bright constant in the confused blur of war, and the grief and pain that came with it.

Ahsoka needed him, and to be reminded that she shouldn't—to be reminded that he wouldn't always be there, that the bond that kept them tethered, kept her whole, would one day wither and rot away—it jolted her. It was a truth she couldn't bear to imagine. Maybe that was why Obi-Wan hovered close; maybe he didn't want to imagine it either.

"Well," she said, as easily as she could. "You can't teach me anything, can you, if you're out of commission. What's the damage?"

Anakin shrugged. "Barely anything. A bit bruised, that is all."

"A bit?"

"There may be a broken rib or two. Nothing serious."

Ahsoka frowned. "That sounds at least a little serious to me, Skyguy."

"We've had worse."

From the corner of her eye, she saw Obi-Wan stir. She caught the sharp flare of his anger in the Force, and an echo of—something else, so quickly contained that it might have never been there at all.

But Ahsoka knew her Master's Master well enough by now, too, and she remembered how it felt to watch Anakin fall in that dark alleyway—fall and not get back up. She remembered pulling Anakin close, her heart pounding in her ears as she listened to his garbled apologies, as she felt the thready pulse at his wrist slow and then abruptly stop.

"We've had better, too," Ahsoka said bracingly. "So that's why I know you're going to be all right."

A brief smile. Another shrug. "I already am. Always."

"You better be, or I'm telling the boys. They'd be furious, you know."

Anakin winced, all traces of amusement gone. "Rex and the others . . . how are they, Ahsoka?"

She hesitated, drumming her fingers against the metal railing of his cot. "I'm not sure. I haven't really had the chance to—I mean, I haven't seen much of them since . . ."

Since the funeral, Ahsoka didn't say, because knowing it had all been for show didn't make the grief any less real. It had felt like the only real thing in the world, that grief, when she'd been unable to do anything but wait for Anakin's return. She had spent those long stretch of days with Padmé—though she knew better than to ask why he had told the Senator at all—because as much as it shamed her to admit, it was easier than seeing their stricken faces and feeling the sorrow that flooded the Force. A part of her almost resented Anakin for telling her the truth against the Council's orders. A part of her resented the Council, too, for giving him such a stupid mission to begin with. But at the same time—despite it all—it warmed something in her to know he trusted her enough to keep his secret. That she mattered to him enough that he spared her the pain, as much as he could.

Anakin shifted uncomfortably, his fingers tugging at the sleeves of his white tunic. In the Force, a flash of guilt, like a brand being burned into his skin.

"Right," he said. "Right. Okay. First item on the agenda, then. Pay the boys a visit when I'm finally out of this place."

Ahsoka tried for a smile. "Before or after you stop looking like a signal light?"

"Before. Like you said, Snips—we match. Rex will have a laugh out of that one. Now we just have to get Master Che to—"

"I would be more concerned about your debriefing than anything else," Obi-Wan said suddenly. Ahsoka, startled, couldn't quite bring herself to look at him as he stepped inside the room. "The Council will want to speak with you sooner rather than later. That should be the first item on your agenda."

Anakin sat upright, spine straight, hands falling to his lap. "Of course. That is—that is what I meant. Council meeting and then the barracks. I haven't forgotten, Obi-Wan."

Obi-Wan folded his arms, his shoulders set in a taut line. "And you are sure you're fit to be discharged this afternoon?"

Anakin dipped his head. "Master Che said it herself."

"No internal injuries? No collapsed lung or anything of that sort?"

"No, Master."

"And you are not merely downplaying it for your Padawan?"

"No, Master."

"Good," Obi-Wan said, and something in the stiff set of his shoulders seemed to ease. "Try not to be late this time."

Then he turned and strode out of the room, the door sliding shut behind him. Anakin stared after him, and Ahsoka stared at her Master. She could feel his surprise and uncertainty—is that it, is that all?—drowning out the guilt and lingering exhaustion. It seemed he had been expecting a different kind of welcome.

For a moment, her own sleeping anger stirred—because what did it matter that she had known the truth from the start, when he had still died in her arms? What did it matter, when all the world had stopped, because her only constant had been snuffed out like a guttered candle? She had to watch Rex and their men mourn, had to watch Obi-Wan become little more than a shadow, all the while knowing she could do nothing to ease their pain.

What did you think was going to happen? she wanted to snarl at him. You died. We buried you. You were dead, and it was real. It was real for us.

But her temper wilted when Anakin let his head drop, his hands fisted at his sides. Through the Force, she sensed a despairing anger—a kind of resigned ache, draping over him like a well-worn cloak.

"Typical," he muttered, pulling a face. The effort it took to release his muddle of emotions was palpable—and in spite of herself, Ahsoka felt her anger slip away.

It was for the mission. For the war. We are Jedi, and the Republic always comes first.

Still, her fear gnawed at her. That persisting grief. Without thinking it, before she could talk herself out of it, she reached for Anakin's flesh hand.

"Don't do that again, Master," she said. The thump of his pulse under her fingers was steady and strong and so achingly real. "I'd hate to have to go to your funeral twice. It'd be terrible. Inconvenient, I mean."

At length, Anakin looked up, turning his hand over so it was holding hers.

"I would hate to inconvenience you, Snips," he said, gentle now, his temper abandoned. "I shall try my best. I am getting rather tired of these Halls, anyway."

"Do or do not, remember?" Ahsoka said, and her smile felt watery around the edges. "There is no try."