In true Grey's Anatomy fashion, some absolutely horrible catastrophe must happen be it death by hiccups or a plane crash. In this case, a building collapses on Padme (I'm so sorry!). On the plus side, Anakin is back so there's that to look forward to!

Right now, I have so many ideas for how long this story is going to be and it ranges from 10- 20 more chapters maybe? So I am debating if I should split that up or not. Let me know what you think! Do you want a sequel? Or just one big story?

I am also outlining the prequel to this story too so there's that to look forward too as well.

Enjoy!

-DFD

Chapter 15

Anakin helped the paramedics load a patient into an ambulance before turning back to the scene. The number of patients was starting to finally die down as the rescue squad was pulling the last of the people out. The only ones who still needed medical help were the people still trapped inside the building that collapsed a few hours ago. Anakin scanned the scene hoping to see Padme. He needed to talk to her and fix things between them. Walking around, he quickly realized she wasn't there. Did she go back to the hospital? Glancing at the crowd around the building waiting to help, he made his way over there. Maybe she was there. Scanning the crowd, he didn't see her but he heard whispers of a doctor being trapped in the rubble. Without thinking he rushes forward, pushing past the rescue squad in his haste to find her.

The squad had already started to clear away a lot of debris but by trying to make sure the structure doesn't collapse further, they were moving too slowly. He ignores them as they try to get him to stay back. Ducking and stepping over rubble he moves deeper into the building until he can't move farther. He looks between two wood beams to try to make out anything that would help him find her. "Padme!" He shouts, hoping she hears him, "Padme!" He calls again and the building rattles as things shift again. He hears the faint sound of banging further in the wreackage. His eyes dart around the space frantically trying to find a way to keep moving forward. "Fuck it." He mutters as he backs up. Looking up at what the wood beams were supporting. Deciding that it wasn't supporting too much, but also concluding that his plan was very stupid, he runs straight at the beam, ramming his shoulder into it as hard as he could. The beam gives way and he's through the other side, tumbling onto the rubble on the other side. The debris above shifts and some metal and plaster falls where the beam once stood.

Coughing he gets to his feet, rubbing his sore shoulder before looking around the small space. "Padme!" He calls again as he hunches over to walk around the narrow pass he was in now. "Padme!" he stops in his tracks as he hears the faint tapping sound again. It sounds like a rock being hit on a metal pipe, "I heard you!" He called and the tapping continues, more frantic this time. Stumbling over his feet he follows the sound to a small hole low in the debris that peeks into a small air pocket. "Padme?"

He hears coughing on the other side, "Ani."

Getting down on his stomach he looks through it and reaches through the hole, letting his fingers brush against hers. Her hand is tightly gripping a rock and hovers over a metal pipe that is leaking. Her fingers drop the rock and squeeze his tightly, "I'm right here, Angel." He said, "I'm here. I'm not going anywhere."

"Ani." Her voice is faint, "I'm trapped." She sounds like she is fighting back tears. She's afraid.

"I know," He said, "But help is coming. They'll get you out." He is able to make out the top of her head through the hole and can see her head is turned to the side but the rest of her is clearly trapped under the rubble.

"It hurts to breathe," She said, "And there is something penetrating my abdomen and my chest. I'm bleeding out." She takes a breath and he hears how hard the task is, "Multiple crush injuries, internal bleeding, possibly a hemothorax. I don't think-"

"Don't." He says, "Don't tell me you're not going to make it." He squeezes her hand, "You're going to be fine." He says. Anakin glances around where he is lying down. She is within his reach and he feels powerless to do anything.

"Anakin." She calls, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry about everything." She is crying now. And he fights back his own tears. Her talk about dying is killing him. "Tell my parents… I love them."

He shakes his head, "Padme-"

"Anakin…" She squeezes his hand, "I love you."

He growls, "Stop!" He shouted, "Stop talking like you're dying; you're not going to die. Not while I'm here."

Padme takes a deep shaky breath, "The others are already dead." She said, "They were talking before… now it's just me…I'm next."

Bringing his other hand to his eyes, he wipes the tears away, "Padme… please." He begs, "I can't live without you."

Padme squeezes his hand, "Neither can I."

Looking up, he takes a deep breath, "Hurry up and get us out of here!" He shouts back in the direction he came. Looking down where his hand is through the hole, he debates trying to get her out himself, but he isn't sure if doing that would shift the rubble too much and crush her more. He also worried about the objects penetrating her. If he moved her the wrong way, she would bleed out in a matter of seconds.

"You should go." She said, "Go and help them. It's not helping anyone just staying here."

Anakin shakes his head, "I'm not going anywhere." He says. "I'm never leaving you. Never again." Padme takes a shaky breath and closes her eyes. Anakin squeezes her hand tightly, "Keep talking to me." He says, "Stay awake and keep talking. Tell me what you want to do this weekend. I'm back; we can do whatever you want. Just name it."

She smiles, "The lake house."

"Done." He said, "The moment we're done here, I'm taking you there."

"We can swim out to the island." Her breath shakes from the tears she is freely crying.

"Whatever you want," He said, "I will brave the sand, just for you." He smiles, remembering how he once ranted about how much he hates sand.

She lets out a pained groan as she tried to laugh, "Do you… remember the last time we were there?"

"Of course," He said with a smile, "Though I don't think we spent much time outside the bedroom."

She smiles and takes a breath, "We went to the market that one day," She said, "I remember… that one girl that kept flirting with you."

He smiled and rubbed his thumb across her knuckle "I don't remember that." He said, "I just remember the beautiful girl who sat across from me at that café."

Padme closed her eyes and her grip on his hand loosened, "Ani…" Her breath was short and weak.

"Hold on." He urged, "Just hold on. They're almost here." He said. He could hear the sound of the squad getting closer and he turned so his voice could travel towards them, "We're back here!" He shouted, "Hurry!"

"Ani… I love you." She didn't hear him respond. She lost the grip she had on his hand and felt the heavy darkness fall over her as she fell unconscious again and her breath gave out.

[][][][]

Anakin gripped her hand as tight as he possibly could, "Padme!" He tried to get her to respond but she didn't. Reaching for her wrist he felt for a pulse. It was there, but it was very faint. The rescue squad was close; he saw their flashlights peeking through the rubble, "Hurry!" He shouted at them. He couldn't focus on what they were saying; he was too worried for Padme to think of anyone or anything else. Only when the gripped him by the shoulders and pulled him back did he realize how close they were. He stood by as he waited for them to remove the rubble brick by brick. It was slow- too slow. By the time they reached her they had to bring in a saw to cut the three metal rods that pierced her so they could get her out. Once they had her on a stretcher he fell into step beside them as they got to work on her.

Following close behind, he listened to the paramedics as they went through their protocol. Her pulse was weak and she was having trouble breathing. All signs told him she was bleeding into her chest. They were quick to load her into an ambulance but he knew she needed surgery immediately. "Gloves." He ordered and the paramedics exchanged looks, "I need to insert a chest tube and perform a thoracotomy quickly. If I don't, she is going to bleed out and die so give me gloves and a damn scalpel." He gave them a look that dared them to challenge him and without delay they gave him what he asked for. Ordering them to maintain manual ventilation, he lifted her left arm and made a small cut in her side before placing a tube inside. Immediately it started to drain the fluid that collected in her chest but it didn't stop the bleeding. At the incision point, he widened the cut enough so his hand could fit before taking the rib spreaders and placing it so he could reach her heart. Wrapping his hand around her heart, he began to manually pump it, squeezing it just enough to circulate the blood. His fingers felt around the organ for the source of the bleeding. When he found it, he pressed his finger to it and kept it there as he continued to palpate the muscle.

It took ten minutes to reach the hospital. Ten minutes felt more like ten hours to him. His left hand shook nervously as his right hand seemed to be the only think keeping her alive at the moment. He's been shot at, performed open-heart surgery in the dark, amputated limbs without anesthesia; but none of that compared to what he was doing now. His hand was wrapped around Padme's heart. His hand was keeping her alive. His hand… The thought terrified him. If he let up even once, he would kill her. If his finger slipped from the hole he was covering he could kill her. If he squeezed too hard he would kill her. He couldn't think about that now. He had to stay focused on what he was doing, not who he was doing it to. He's done thoracotomies so many times before; he just has to think about that. Closing his eyes, he focuses on the sound of the heart monitor, using the steady beeps to help him keep the right pace.

When the doors to the ambulance opened, he saw Ben standing there ready to take her to the OR. He heaved a sigh of relief. Just a little longer. The paramedics slowly and carefully unloaded the gurney, being sure that their movements didn't jostle him. He took his place standing on the wheel rack, reaching across the bed to grip the handrail on the opposite side to keep his balance while Ben and the residents rushed them into an OR.

"Anakin-"

"She has a tear on the right ventricle but I have a good grip on it." He said.

"Anakin-"

"Ben." He interrupted, "Just get her into an OR." Anakin didn't even look up. His eyes were focused on the monitor watching the pulse carefully. He was scared. Ben had never known Anakin to be afraid of anything, but with what was at stake here, he understood. Wheeling them into an OR Ben scrubbed in.

"Lets get her on bypass." Ben said as he made his way to the other side of the table. Anakin kept massaging the heart until the bypass took full effect and he let go, pulling his hand out which started to shake just as bad as his left hand. "Anakin." Ben said, pulling his attention so Anakin would look up and meet his gaze, "We got it from here," He said.

Anakin let out a shaky breath and nodded his head, before looking down at Padme one last time before leaving the room quickly. He made his way to the nearest restroom he could find, bursting through the door and locking himself in one of the stalls he hunched over the toilet bowl and emptied the contents of his stomach with a violent heave. He groaned and coughed the last of it out before falling back to lean against the side of the stall, breathing deeply while his body shook. Closing his eyes, he tried to convince himself that she would be fine. He did everything right. He kept her heart beating all the way to the OR. And now she was on bypass. Ben would patch the hole; she would be all right. She had to be.

Looking down at himself he realized just how much blood he was covered in. He had not planned on getting involved in the sinkhole but when it happened, and he heard people screaming and no one had gotten there yet, he left his bike and went to at least get started for the paramedics. And even when they did arrive, he stuck around to help as much as he could. Getting to his feet, he left the restroom and made his way for the attendings lounge where he would take a quick shower to clean off the blood and change out of the bloody clothes.

Putting on scrubs, he goes to sit in the waiting room where everyone else waiting for news was sitting. He watched the nurses move from one family to another trying to make them more comfortable and to keep everyone calm. He moves to stand as close as he can to the doors Ben will come out of when he's done. Leaning against the wall, he closes his eyes. He should have come back sooner. He should have called sooner. Maybe this wouldn't have happened if he did. Or maybe she would have died by now. He bangs his head back hard against the wall. He can't think like that. She's going to be fine; she's strong- stronger than him in almost every way. She's fine.

The doors to the OR open and his eyes dart to them even though he knows it will be hours before Padme will come out. Ahsoka walks over to him pulling her scrub cap off her head, "Hey," She said, "Ben told me to wait with you."

Anakin sighs, "I don't need someone to watch me." He said.

She shrugs, "Maybe not, but you shouldn't be alone either. We both know what you're prone to do when that happens."

He rolls his shoulders awkwardly, knowing she is referring to how he suddenly left, "I'm sorry," He said.

"It's okay."

"No its not." He said, "Something terrible happened and I just… I was suppose to be your teacher, and I did a crappy job at that."

Ahsoka smiles, "Well, you're here now. That's what matters. And I think Padme would agree."

He shakes his head, "I screwed that up too."

"Let her decide that." She said, moving to lean against the wall with him, "Ben will fix this." She said with confidence.

"What if I messed up?" He asked suddenly, "What if I made it worse?"

She raised a brow at him, "I thought it was the resident's job to worry about things like that." She smiled, "You're an attending. You're supposed to be all confidence and cleverness."

He lets out a shaky breath and looks down at his trembling hands, "I had her heart in my hand." He said, "I had her heart. I could have-"

"You didn't." She assured him, "She's in there right now on bypass with Ben patching her up. Windu and Organa were on their way up there too to take care of everything else. She's in the best hands right now."

He clenches his fist and gives a dark laugh, "Yeah and the best hands clearly aren't mine."

Ahsoka furrows her brow, "You are the best. And the only reason its not you is because you're too close to her." She grips his wrist and says nothing, only trying to provide what little comfort she can.

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Anakin had lost track of time by the time Ben appeared. All he knew about time was that the sun was still up just before he went into the building to look for Padme and now the sun was gone. Ben made his way over to him and folded his hands across his chest; "She's out of surgery now." He said, "It went well, but recovery won't be easy. There was a small break in her pelvis, her right leg was dislocated, and her right arm was broken; but bed rest and some physical therapy will have her back on her feet in no time. Bail had to resect part of her liver and there was some damage to the spleen. I patched the tear in the ventricle and it is holding well." Ben smiled, "I see no reason why she won't make a full recovery." Anakin nodded his head and let out the breath he didn't realize he had been holding, "Would you like to see her?" Ben asked and he nodded once and followed him up to her room.

Ben and Ahsoka entered the room where Padme rested on the small hospital bed. Standing in the doorway, Anakin took a moment before stepping through and coming to stand at the end of the bed. Bruises marred her perfect face and casts covered her right arm and leg. Her left arm had some bandages covering the small scrapes on it and her chest and abdomen were heavily bandaged. "She should wake in a couple hours, or maybe a day or two." Ben said, "I'll have the nurses bring a cot up for you if you'd like." Anakin didn't respond and Ben could tell he wasn't going to. Without another word, he tapped Ahsoka on the arm, and had her follow him out the door to leave Anakin alone with Padme.

Moving over to the monitors beeping rhythmically next to her bed, Anakin reads through them, making sure they all read out normal before pulling up the chair to sit next to her. Taking her left hand in his, he weaves their fingers together, bringing her knuckle to his lips and pressing a soft kiss to them. He watches her peaceful face for an unknown amount of time- he didn't even notice when a nurse brought up the cot and some pillows- lulled by the beeping of the monitors in the room, he eventually falls asleep in the chair.