Warnings: Medical Procedures & Blood
Further notes at end of chapter.
Chapter 3
Anakin had been squeezed out from Padmè's bedside to the background. Not that she was aware of where he was.
She was so pale and lifeless on the medical table. Her pure white gown so stained with scarlet red. There was so much blood.
The patient was hovered towards an operating theater and she disappeared behind automatic doors.
She appeared as a slain angel being floated into oblivion.
Skywalker stared at her from a distance; he was told he could not follow her.
The medical team scrambled around her. They were doing everything they could to save Senator Amidala. Their medical expertise lay in war trauma, not with childbirth complications. The plan and hope was to preserve her until they reached the elite upper level Coruscant hospitals.
He choked out a broken sob once she disappeared from his sight. The crowd was gone, and the babies had been whisked away. Only Kenobi remained in the eerie halls. Not that Anakin cared.
His body was failing him and he stumbled back. He inhaled a sob.
Padmè was dying, he could sense it. Her life force was already so weak, so frail.
Despite all the battlefield gore he had witnessed, he never knew a human could bleed that much. Distantly in his mind he remembered his mother mentioned pregnant humans' blood volume increases fifty percent by the end of a standard pregnancy.
He could still smell it. The iron and copper of her crimson loss.
His robes felt sticky against his cold, clammy skin. He looked down at his numb body, and realized he was covered in her blood. The dark color hid it well, but he knew. Skywalker wanted to scream, but he just remained frozen, staring at himself horrified. Frantically, he started trying to brush off the oxidizing fluid.
His movements became more desperate and panicked, as if he was covered in thousands of venomous insects.
"Let's get you to your quarters so you can change," Kenobi urged. He had never seen Anakin like this; it frightened him. His friend's crazed eyes startled to his.
"No, no! I'm not leaving!" He protested, stumbling away. Nothing felt real to him; it was almost like he was watching everything happen from outside himself.
"Anakin, calm down," Obi-Wan said while trying to hold him still. His friend was in quite a distressing state.
The younger Jedi looked around wildly. A medical droid was approaching them. "Where are they?" he madly demanded.
"I'm sorry, I do not understand," the droid replied.
The voice the droid used agitated the deranged individual. So calm, even and supposedly soothing. It was all wrong. "Where are the twins?"
"The Senator's twins are in room E27 with medical droids and overseeing doctors, General Skywalker," they chirped. Their programming recognized the General's voice verification.
Anakin nearly stumbled in that direction, scanning his surroundings listlessly.
A scared Kenobi followed, unsure how to handle his friend's state. Did he need to be sedated or tranquilized?
Anakin made his way to a storage cabinet in one of the halls. Inside them were surgical scrubs, medical gowns, bedding and personal protective gear. Nearby was a medical laundry bin.
Quickly, he began tearing at his belt with stupefied fingers. He slung his belt carelessly on the shelf of bedding. His bloodied and sticky black sash, black leather tabard, black outer tunic, and black under tunic were all unwrapped and clawed off in one forcible yank.
He dumped them in the laundry bin; the heap made a sickly damp sound as it slid and stuck down the plastic lining.
Anakin donned a pale grayish-white shirt. It was sterile, overwashed and coarse in texture, but Skywalker could hardly feel it.
He haphazardly checked his pants, which were surprisingly not splattered with his beloved's blood. His journey continued to his newborns' room.
Kenobi grabbed his friend's discarded belt, the lightsaber still clipped. A Jedi never left their weapon.
Skywalker's senses are what he followed; Anakin could not make out the room's markings. He called upon the luminous rays his children radiated.
Venator-class star destroyers were not fitted with maternity wings.
The medical droids and overseeing clone doctor had made a makeshift one. For a bassinet, they used a traditional hover gurney with sides and padding.
Inside, there were hospital pillows and blankets softening the interior. A rolled up blanket was placed in the middle as a divider. Luke was on the left, and his twin on the right. They were swaddled, well more so wrapped by the infant inexperienced medical team to help them maintain body heat.
They faced each other. They were perfectly mirrored.
Just seeing them made Anakin feel less frantic.
"General Skywalker," the clone doctor, Greyhawk, was surprised by his presence. Jedi Master Kenobi stepped in not far behind. "Master Kenobi."
"How are they?" Anakin asked. His words were delicate, like he might break if something was wrong.
"They are doing quite well, from what I and the droids can tell," he informed. "My only concerns are their hydration and nutrients, sir."
Skywalker's face fell. Padmè could not nurse them, they had no infant formulas, and certainly no baby bottle. He raked his hand through his hair. His children did not even have clothing and diapers, just concocted absorbency pads cut smaller and wrapped around, secured by bandages with adhesives.
Greyhawk instantly caught his General's distressed demeanor. "Are you injured, sir?"
"No, no, I'm not," he approached the gurney. It emitted a quite mechanical whir. His children were restless and scared, he could sense it.
He needed to hold them; it felt like a sacred call luring him in. "Help me hold them," he ordered instead of asked.
The doctor's face furrowed with confusion. "Of… of course, General." He looked around the room. A medical station was embedded to each side. A sterile, electronic cave of healing. "How about you sit here, and we'll give them to you?"
Anakin went to the flat surface in a daze.
A droid lifted Luke, and Greyhawk his twin.
"Here's Baby A," he informed.
"Luke," the father corrected. "She named him Luke."
"Alright, Luke," he stiffly transferred the baby to the Jedi. His breath was held the whole time.
The medical droid gave the other newborn to the clone. "And this is?"
"She-" his voice caught and tears pooled in his eyes. "She was not able to name her, yet." The last word was a prayer. A prayer for more time, for her to live and be able to name her daughter. And… and everything else life promised.
Force, he was breaking. He could actually feel it, his body and soul dividing straight down the middle. A gruesome ripping to the cellular level.
"I see, 'Baby B' still," was all the clone could find to say. Again, the man transferred the infant efficiently though gawky.
The secret new parent held his children. They felt like his lifeline, the only sense of connection he could have. He could hold his children, keep their little souls, heartbeats and breaths close to him. Keep their glow next to him in this utter darkness.
Keep them safe in his embrace. It's all he felt he could do.
He kept shifting his eyes to see them, each tucked into the nooks of his arms. If he did not actively see them, surely they would disappear. "Your mother is going to be just fine. She's… She's…" his words faltered as it fully crumbled upon him.
She was dying. He could still feel it.
His spouse, best friend, and most important being. Or at least was the singular most important, now his children were hastily placed within the sacred tier.
His family was his universe, before today it was Padmè at the center. His former student Ahsoka Tano, and former Master Obi-Wan were in orbit. After today, it would always be the twin's and spouse being the exact center of his universe. And light, and gravity, and home.
And a vital member was dying.
Their mother, their entire existence and caretaker until only hours ago was dying.
Former Naboo Queen and Senator Padmè Amidala was dying.
And there was nothing he could do.
He could not take care of her to prevent it, and could not intervene now.
Fear clung to his tattered heart as he questioned his ability to hold and protect his children. His starlights.
He had failed their mother, so how long until he failed them?
She was dying, and, Force help him, if he could even care for his scared, dehydrated, hungry newborns?
He moved onto the medical slate further and lifted his legs up to the surface. He pressed into the wall and brought his knees up for his upper legs to prop and balance the twins on.
Delicately, he maneuvered their little bodies to be supported by his raised lap. If he curled in tighter, he could rest his forehead on his knees.
His upper body curled towards them; he became a cove for the newborns. He stared at their little faces, finding the million mimics and copies of Padmè's features.
He cried; he could not do this. Could not process it.
Padmè was dying and he was helpless with two new babies.
Greyhawk exchanged a concerned look with General Kenobi. None of his advanced medical training prepared him for something so broken.
On Anakin's march to this room, Obi-Wan had talked and called to him. He was completely unresponsive. A man possessed.
Kenobi stopped trying to talk to him and just stayed by his side.
He had never seen Anakin like this- never.
Not when Shmi died, not when he was a child and cried for her at the Temple, not after the countless battles, not when his Ahsoka left the order, not in the heinous carnage of war, and not in the fields of bodies and ruins of slain civilizations. Never.
His friend- no, his brother, was shattering.
Whatever urgent suspicions and conclusions that burned in Kenobi's mind were, they could not be spoken. No words could be spoken.
Were the twins Anakin's children? Probably. Was Padmè beyond an attachment and Anakin's lover? Probably. Did any of that matter right now?
No.
Kenobi, the great Galactic Republic's Negotiator, was at a complete loss for words.
Anakin had never looked so small.
Obi-Wan noticed he convulsed with sobs, curled into himself encasing the infants. Also he shivered. Was it shock?
Obi-Wan sat down the belt and weapon he held. He grabbed a blanket lying in the gurney and approached his friend. Tentatively and ambiguously he draped the thin and scratchy covering around his friend's shoulders.
He numbly sat next to him and placed a hand on Anakin's knees. "It will be alright, Anakin, it will be alright," he said.
When Anakin was a boy, he had so many nightmares. He would wake in the middle of the night completely panicked and incensed.
Obi-Wan would sense his distress or hear his screams and go into Anakin's room. While Anakin was his padawan, they shared a Master and Padawan quarters within the Jedi Temple.
The boy would cry and cling to Kenobi before his mind returned to him. Anakin would draw away.
The child would viciously wipe his tears away and insist he was alright. Being a "good" little Jedi.
Well, in those scary moments, Obi-Wan would utter the same words.
The man knew it was not very Jedi like to hold and sooth a padawan who should be uninfluenced by emotions.
Kenobi had never been held and soothed as a boy; he had never cried. But how could he deny this instinctual response to a frightened child?
They were there again, like all those years ago. Except Anakin could not wake up, he could not blink this away. The nightmare was reality, and there was nothing either could do.
"It will be alright, Anakin," he said again.
Skywalker's convulsions increased and his cries became audible.
He did not need to say anything, Kenobi could feel it through their bond. And all he could do was sit next to him and comfort him like all those years ago.
"It will all be alright," he repeated staring into the distance.
Force, let everything be alright; let Padmè survive this and return to these beings that so desperately needed her.
Time passed. It did so glacially, agonizingly. Seemed they had nothing but time dwindling down to an unknown ending.
"Generals?" Greyhawk called. He had left the room at sometime, but neither had actually noticed.
Their faces locked onto the clone's face, anxious and eager for any information they could gleam. Anakin's face glistened with tear streaks and he searched the man's face desperately.
"If you'll come with me, please," he said heavily. "When you're ready," Grayhawk hastily added.
Skywalker's spirit sank at the tone. He stood up laboriously, the weight of his heart weighing him down. He gently settled his children down in the gurney made cradle. Both of their downy heads he smoothed down. So much love was sent through the simple touch. "I'll be back soon, little ones," he said, wiping his wet face dry.
In an instant, he fortified himself. A concretely constructed mask of calm apathy braced for what was beyond bearable.
At least he prayed he was braced so he would not be completely destroyed.
The mournful group went outside the room and followed the doctor. Jedi Knight Skywalker wanted to stay silent, not utter anything to break the unknown. But Anakin could not take it anymore. "Is she alive?" he blurted out. He wanted to believe he would feel her death. But he was not sure.
Her bright presence was so dim, perhaps completely dark. Especially compared to the twins. They were blinding stars and Padmè was dying embers in the Force.
"Yes," Dr. Grayhawk said reservedly.
Skywalker felt like he would break all over again via relief.
Alive, she was alive!
"But… Well, we'll talk more with her doctor." Grayhawk led them there. They stayed outside the room, looking through a massive observation window.
In the sterile room, droids hovered around the senator's still, pale form. She seemed so small on the medical bed. Medical machines whirled and beeped monitoring her weak vitals.
She was on life support; not incubated, though she needed an oxygen mask over her nose and mouth. Half of her sunken face was hidden by it.
Another clone doctor, Cast, waited for them by her room. "Generals," he greeted. "We have her stable for now. We've had to put her in a medically induced coma, and are keeping her body temperature down. The bleeding- we could not stop it. We are hoping to keep her stable enough for the doctors on Coruscant to be able to treat her. They've been alerted to what has happened and talked us through a lot of the procedures."
"What do you mean, you could not stop the bleeding? What happened?" Skywalker barked.
"We don't know. It was not in any of the droids' memory banks. Some of our team worked on using the data networks and contacted Coruscant to see if they could find anything for a diagnosis and viable treatments. At first, we thought the issue was a retained placenta. Once the operation was fully underway, we found parts of the placenta and removed them. But- it was almost like parts of the placenta that were most connected to the uterus had… liquefied. As though the cells dissolved," the clone tried to reiterate. It was unlike anything Cast had ever seen; it was as though that organ had been disintegrated into a puree. And there was so. Much. Blood. "We could not remove the placenta cells still connected to the uterus, and she's lost a considerable amount of blood. We… We really thought she wasn't going to make it, but somehow she pulled through."
"Why didn't you remove the uterus?" Skywalker slowly bit out as though a threat. Of course he did not want to remove Padmè's organs, but to save her life- there was no question.
Organs could be regrown, and if she wanted future children surrogacy or artificial wombs were available.
Cast paled. "We did not want to perform a hysterectomy because of her declining condition. We were also worried the cellular deterioration would spread. It seemed to work almost like an acid. The uterine walls seem to keep it at back, but the placenta was vulnerable.
We are not sure what it is. Perhaps a microscopic lifeform she was exposed to that has not been recorded yet. The other doctors, our droids and records could not identify the invasive organisms we found. They don't seem to be able to spread to anything else but the Senator's DNA. It's quite baffling."
Skywalker balked. "So what you're telling me is that she's precariously stable and infected with some unknown microscopic cellular attacker? That if you try to remove or treat the hemorrhaging, it would spread to her entire body?"
"Exactly, sir," Cast confirmed.
Kenobi nervously covered his mouth. "Thank you, Cast," he told the obviously anxious doctor.
"Of course. She's being constantly monitored, and if you need anything else, a droid won't be far away," he said, anxious to make his leave.
Anakin's cold eyes stared through the glass. His and Kenobi reflecting in the pristine divider. Skywalker watched the droids' activities and Padmè's chest shallowly rise and fall with the aid of machines. He stared at his spouse fighting to keep the last thread of life.
Senator Padmè Amidala was dying, and not from a blaster fire, or an assasination, or planetary invasion, or battle.
She was dying from childbirth. The birth of their children… of his children.
She was dying because of his love for her, of their forbidden, and now obviously doomed, attachment.
He was killing her, and there was nothing he could do
~xXx~
Notes:
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