Anakin's own injuries from his (rather stupid) fall healed with bacta, treatment, and his mentor buzzing around briefly, worriedly. Anakin could see the stormy gray eyes reflecting more than sorrow, more than pain, but almost...fear. Worry should not be the Jedi way.

Why? It wasn't like someone had died.

Anakin managed to convince himself that his Padawan lay in the body and wasn't that far off - that they were just preparing him for the worst because he was 'weak'. The Jedi Knight had a terrible time convincing him that he should just see her anyway - he could deal with blood, after all.

Once, Obi-Wan had uttered, "Anakin, it's not like they can put a bacta patch on this one."

Anakin had only staunchly thought that they were Med-droids - they could surely care his apprentice.

But when a reluctant agreement was met, Anakin was completely and entirely unprepared for when he walked into that room. There was no movement of her body at all, he could see even as he crossed the room in slow steps. She was like a corpse. Perhaps she was a corpse - or this body was. His Padawan was not there.

He fretted silently (he should have been there, for Force's sake)

No. She was not dead.

Her shields were demolished; anyone with any Force ability could have a field day walking around in her mind, poking at it. Even ordinary beings had a semblance - most rather good, actually, unless their intelligence was low - of shields, but this was completely...weird. But not only that, her mind was utterly blank. Except she was in there, somewhere.

Despite his numerous injuries, the panicky Master had been allowed an allotted time with the child. Her body lay straight, her arms resting lightly at her sides, and when Anakin had reached out to touch her to see that she wasn't dead - for he couldn't feel her life at all - and withdrew his hand quickly.

It wasn't cold, not hot, but there was a coolness to it. Touching the skin felt hostile and rude, so wrong. Venturing into the vast expanse of her mind felt wrong - for Anakin had long since agreed that some things were private. Obi-Wan had never delved into his own mind, but then their bond had been lacking.

The Master was horrified. How did this happen? Why? Why? He should have seen it, though.

Anakin knew that the grief and the war was consuming her. Ahsoka was still a child, a being stripped of her innocence far too early and thrown into battle without any sense of what it meant. People portrayed it as heroism, which it hardly was. It was a cruel and twisted chess game.

Timidly, Anakin reached out and gripped the limp hand in his own. A part of him longed to apologize to the lifeless body, but he felt that not right, either. Did she even know he was here? He poked at their bond and was startled to find it, but torn.

"Master Skywalker, I'm very sorry, sir, but Miss Tano needs her rest now."

Anakin glowered silently at the lack of intelligence in the droid.

Rest? Right. This was hell, not rest.

This is Ahsoka Tano's mind;

Dark. So very, very dark, except where she has run to. She had run from everywhere else, and one part of her mind functioned. That was where she was.

She was not cowering, not sobbing, not laughing, she was looking around frantically. She was lost. And she wasn't entirely sure she wanted to be found. What she really wanted to do was just to sleep - forever. Should she?

And she was sorry, frightened - hopeless. She could not recall any happier times, none, for she was sure that she had let Anakin die, and not only that - she would have to see him die eventually anyway. Everybody died - why should she live?

The child was torn apart.

Slowly she fell to her knees, her dull eyes searching the bleak light. There was nothing here for her, nothing at all but an endless and senseless darkness. Part of her that once screamed to fight it off was dead.

Was she dead? Was she finally dying? Did she even care? These questions may have presented themselves, but were so insignificant, Ahsoka felt nothing.

She let herself fall asleep. This was when she went into cardiac arrest, and she was kept alive artificially.

Anakin was shaken; Ahsoka could not have been that body, just couldn't have been - Obi-Wan was right, no bacta patch could or would ever fix this.

When a med-droid explained in a dim, emotionless voice that they could find no other problems and that she should've come around, Anakin had not dared explain that her injuries were not something a droid could uncover - for as much as he harbored a liking to them, most were inadept with emotions. Save 3PO - his wife's worry-bound droid that he himself had made.

But Med-Droids were the worst. Nothing fazed them; they were made that way, for if they felt sorry for everybody , nothing would get done.

So even when the Med-Droid's drone attempted to penetrate the Knight's mind, her knew something had changed that day he had fallen, when her shields had seemed to incinerate in the flames themselves, when he tried to send her away - and then she just had to get him out of there - and her lack of focus beforehand.

Her emotions had been on the rise, and probably had been for some time now.

But she would recover, Anakin said to himself senselessly - because she was his brave, young Padawan. Because she could survive anything and everything better than he could. She was Ahsoka Tano, she was his Snips...

Once he had not cared for her - he didn't know if she knew how much he loved her (not the way he loved Padme), and sometimes watching her, he wondered if she cared so much for him.

Anakin couldn't save her, not this time. Hopelessness ate at him - like the tides of the dark side waving in. Anger, fear, hatred...anger. Fear. No, not hatred.

She would not die, Ahsoka could not. She wouldn't, she had to be all right...

Anger flared. At himself.

He had to help her; he should've...but how? How did you break this?

A small tap of a stick on the cold durasteel floor brought Anakin out of his misery; he jolted suddenly as a small green troll shoved a gimer stick into his shins. "Dwell, do not. Come, you will." The wizened Master blinked up at the Jedi, and Anakin wondered what had brought Yoda here - his Padawan - hopefully, surely.

Anakin never found out - the Master spoke with Kenobi in long conversations, only giving Anakin advice that further put him on edge.

But something was going on.

"Come back, I will." was the promise.

Days were slow, terrible, and drawn-out. Each one had the members of the ship, save Ahsoka, tenser and tenser. Anakin himself was quiet, infuriated, and his rage was growing terribly in intensity. Because despite everything, he truly believed she'd come back...but he knew...

and so it happened. So they said to him that she wasn't coming back, not now and not ever, that she would be declared dead tomorrow, that her mind was hardly functioning...

and he screamed. He yelled, and did not even know what he yelled. He may have even cried...but he struck the stupid droid down and said that she couldn't be dead, and she wasn't...she'd be okay in that one single day...she was asleep, she was recovering.

She was Ahsoka Tano. She was his Padawan.

Hey everyone, so I'm back - again - and very sorry that this late. But the next chapter SHOULD be up soon - don't hold me to it, though - and then I'll post a short epilogue-ish thing. Anyway, I'm sorry for the OOCness of Anakin. Really, I don't think I wrote him too well this time.

REVIEW! (Please)

Thanks, everybody!

~HorseStar