Kallus awoke with a gasp. For a moment he thought he was still stuck in that communication tower with Thrawn. The last feelings of sand lodged into his skin melted away as he took large gaping breathes to calm his beating heart down, something he'd been doing long before he'd ever even heard of the blue Chiss. The only feeling that hadn't gone however was the scorching pain blasting from his injured leg. It had never been the same since the ice moon, but it wasn't until his confrontation with Thrawn that it had gotten this bad.
He gingerly rolled up his trouser leg to look at the mottled mess that was his right leg. Calling it bruised seemed unfair to the artistry of different colours staining his knee and shin. Thrawn would have had a feild day describing all the different unnatural shades of purple and green. However, that was nothing compared to the smell. None of the rebels smelt particularly fresh due to their time divided between a humid forest planet and a battle ground. But the scent of rot coming from his leg rivalled that of a trash compactor. It almost didn't feel real anymore. It felt like a diseased animal that had attached its self to him and died.
Now, Kallus was far from an idiot. He would have died a long time ago if he was. He knew that whatever was wrong with his leg, it was bad. But he also knew that calling the rebels medical supplies limited would be a generous exaggeration. He'd already stolen so much from these people. He didn't deserve to take anything else.
Kallus reached for the cane beside his bed. Thanks to the vast forests that surrounded their base, he'd been able to make one from the nearby wood. All his weapons had been taken from him after his encounter with Thrawn, but even if they hadn't, he doubted the rebels would have let an armed ex-imperial walk round their base. Thankfully Garazeb-no Zeb, had lent him a hunting knife so he could carve a more suitable handle on the top of the cane. He wasn't sure if the commanders in charge knew that the lasat has let him use the knife, but he wasn't about to ask.
He placed his weight on the cane as he forced himself up. He tried to keep the focus in his eyes as the pain shooting from his leg threatened to blind him.
Slowly, he made his way out the door and into the base. Even for a man who had spent their entire life training to hide his emotions, the constant winces were impossible to keep off his face. As he limped along, he realised that it had been while since he'd been able to recognise sensations with his leg. He couldn't even feel the fabric of his trousers or the sole of his shoe against his skin. All he could feel was pain.
Kallus passed a few people on his way to command but they didn't take much notice of him. After being here for a few months, the glares of hatred and distrust has mostly stopped, and it wasn't as if he was the only person here who needed to use a cane. He hadn't been asked about it a lot, there weren't exactly a tone of people who wanted to have a conversation with the ex-imperial, but when he was he simply told them that it was an old war injury. It wasn't the entire truth, but people had enough of their own war injuries to know not to pry. After a while the cane had become a part of him, like how Kanan always wore his mask or with Sabine and her multicoloured hair or how everyone in the ghost seemed to always wear the same outfit.
Eventually Kallus made it to the command room where Mon Mothma and the ghost crew were standing around a holoprojector.
"Kal! Over here!" Zeb shouted.
He made his way over to where the lasat had left space for him. If a year ago someone had told him Zeb of all people had become his closest friend, he'd have called them crazy and had them sent to the imperial prisons for madness, literally.
Kallus hadn't defected for Zeb but, what he'd said and what he'd done on that ice moon had been the catalyst that made him truly look at the empire that he'd dedicated his entire life to. And made him realise that it wasn't what he'd been lead to believe. Kallus felt a great deal of gratitude towards him for that. But lately, that gratitude had started to develop into something more. And that something was a change Kallus was nowhere near to being ready to deal with.
He tried to pay attention as Mon Mothma and Hera explained the mission. The plan was the usual try to stop The Empire from doing this one thing and when that inevitably goes to hell, call Kanan and Ezra to do their Jedi thing to save the day at the last minute. But he found it hard to focus on anything that wasn't the burning pain searing up his leg.
"Ha! Shouldn't be a problem, right Kal?" Zeb joked with a gruff laugh, giving the ex-agent a playful punch on the arm. The punch was only light, it probably wouldn't even bruise, but it was enough to knock Kallus off balance.
"AAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!" He cried out, as the whole of his body weighed crashed upon his broken leg. What little of his bones remained immediately turned into mush under the pressure and the next thing Kallus knew he was curled up on the floor.
"Karabast!" He vaguely heard Zeb cry. He could barely register anything over the pain. It felt like his bones were swimming in a meat grinder.
"Kallus, what's wrong?" He heard somebody else ask. He thought it might have been General Syndulla -no Hera, but he wasn't sure.
"I... leg!" He managed to gasp. The pain was almost incomprehensible. It was somehow complete agony but at the same time blindingly numb. Even after his fight with Thrawn it hadn't hurt this bad.
People were crowded all around him and voices shouted from every direction, but he couldn't focus on anything, until he heard the familiar, warm gruff tone of a lasat.
"I'm sorry." Zeb said before hooking one arm around his shoulders and another under his legs. Somehow, he let out an even more anguished cry as his bones rioted inside his leg after being forced to move. In a different situation Kallus would probably be embarrassed or even elated by being carried bridal style by the lasat but right now, he couldn't feel anything but pain. He hissed and dug his nails into the thick purple fur. If it was anyone else, he would have been worried about hurting them, but he knew Zeb could handle it. He'd survived much worse.
Kallus didn't realise he'd been taken to the infirmary until he felt the soft surface of the beds beneath him and Zeb's arms disappearing from around him.
"No... not..." He protested. He tried to push himself off the bed. He'd barley lifted his chest when a familiar pair of strong hands pushed him back down.
"Woah! Where do you think you're going?" Zeb argued.
"Can't ...don't." Kallus said in between cries, desperately attempting to communicate that they shouldn't waste their precious supplies on him. Unfortunately, he didn't get the chance because the next thing he knew somebody had stuck a needle in his side and for the first time in months the pain disappeared as the world faded into black.
Kallus awoke with a gasp. As usual, for those first few waking moments he thought he was still being held in Thrawn's detention cell. Until he recognised the secluded brown walls and dirtied sheets that counted as a hospital on a rebel base.
That was when he realised that for the first time in months he couldn't feel any pain in his leg. It wasn't until a moment later that he realised this was because he couldn't feel his leg at all.
He yanked the flimsy sheet away in a haste to look at his leg. Only to find that it wasn't there. All that was there was a raw stump.
This...this... this couldn't be happening Kallus thought, his mind failing to process what he wasn't looking at. This had to be another nightmare.
His heart started ponding like the rapid firing of a blaster. His blood was moving at light speed. His breathes couldn't keep up. He couldn't tell the difference between the wailing of the machine by his head over the pounding of blood through his ears.
A Rodian doctor came rushing in with younger man -no boy behind her.
"Alexsandr Kallus. My name is Doctor Drera Kryew. You are having a panic attack. I need you to take deep breathes for me."
Breathe?...yes, he... he could do that. He needed to breathe to allow oxygen into his lungs so that his body could function efficiently.
Kallus closed his eyes. At first it felt like he was a fish swimming under water who had forgotten he could breathe in it. For a while his mouth did nothing but open and close without taking anything in or out. Until a trickle of air made its way into his gaping mouth which opened the flood gates to his lungs as air came rushing in so fast he almost choked. He pushed the air back out again, but another wave came back in. So, he pushed it out again, but it just kept repeating. It took him longer than it should to realise that this was what breathing was. When it was close to normal he reopened his eyes to find that Doctor Kryew was still beside him, but the boy had disappeared.
"Thank you." The Doctor said, her voice blunt and grounding like a rock. "Do you know where you are?"
"The infirmary. Yavin 4. Rebel base." His own voice sounded hollow as though it was devoid of anything.
Once again, he glanced down at his leg, checking despite already having seen it, that it truly was gone. Sure enough, he found a recently cut stump that was still leaking blood through the bandages. Unable to think of much else, Kallus was glad that at least now the Rebellion wouldn't have to use their medical sullies to heal his leg now that it was gone.
The doctor opened her mouth but before she could speak the boy from before cane speeding in, the Ghost crew hot on his tales.
They all started firing questions at him at the same time, each one feeling like a bullet to his brain making his head swim. However, a glare from Doctor Kryew silenced them immediately.
"Captain Kallus has just had a panic attack. If any of you cause him to have another one , then the only time I will ever examine your body will be when it's dead."
The six of them nodded silently as the woman left them alone with him.
"Are you alright?" Hera asked in her motherly tone.
"Yes." Kallus replied uncertainly, unsure as to why they were here. Maybe they still needed him to finish the briefing?
"We were worried about you." Kanan stated, answering his unasked question. Or maybe he had just read his mind? Kallus had never truly understood his or the Bridger boy's powers.
"Oh." Was all he could say in response. He couldn't remember the last time anyone had cared enough about him to be worried about him.
Not needed to be Jedi to sense this, the crew of the ghost gathered around him. Sabine and Ezra sat on the end of his bed like the children they still technically were. Hera and Kanan moved closer until they were right by his side. Chopper used one of his 'arms' to gently pet his remaining knee. Whilst Zeb wrapped a large comforting arm around his shoulders until he was firmly pressed against his warm chest.
Trapped in his new family's love, Kallus realised that he couldn't think of anywhere else he'd rather be.