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Chapter 23 – Convalescence
"Vader, can you hear me?"
Flat on his back, Vader blinked groggily. The outline of Uli's face came in and out of focus every few seconds.
"Yes," his lips felt leaden.
"Good. And can you count my fingers?"
Three digits appeared above his nose, then four, then back to three. Vader squinted and decided to go with the average. "Three, but they're blurry."
"That's normal. It will take a few days to adjust to the cornea transplants," Uli entered notes on his datapad.
Sensing an itch on his left arm, Vader made to lift his other hand, but panicked when he couldn't. Not even a single finger would respond to his request.
"I can't move!"
"We temporarily immobilized you from the neck down. If you're healing well enough by tomorrow, we won't repeat the dose."
Force, I hope they don't. This is worse than being in that suit!
That suit… he had hazy, choppy memories of it being cut and disassembled into a black pile, but it seemed as real as a dream. He couldn't tilt his neck to see what covered his body. Something enveloped his head, but it didn't feel like a helmet.
"Show me," Vader commanded, pulse quickening. "With a mirror."
Uli didn't need clarification. With the click of a button, a lever descended from the ceiling, bringing a rectangular mirror down with it. Uli rotated it so the angle reflected most of Vader's torso. The young doctor said nothing as his patient beheld his handiwork.
Thin gauze lay draped across most of his skin, which was pink and shockingly smooth. Not a single scar, blister, or blemish remained. Of that Vader was certain, even with blurred vision. It shocked him to the point of having to remind himself to breathe.
The miraculous didn't end there. Beneath those bandages were two brand new forearms with five flesh fingers attached to the palm of each hand. Vader could feel the warm flow of blood coursing through his fingertips. How badly he wanted to curl them, to feel the subtle brush of fingerprints against his new skin. They were incomparably beautiful. He'd never been one to idolize or romanticize the human body, but he just might have to start.
Uli adjusted the mirror to follow Vader's gaze. The lower half of his body came into view, covered in gauze just like the upper half. Whole legs and intact feet were what he found. And between those legs, too heavily bandaged to see clearly, was what he hoped to be the best reconstruction of all.
Not to discount what he saw when the mirror moved back up to his face.
Vader decided then and there that Uli Divini was a magician. But instead of making people vanish, he made them reappear.
What he saw brought tears to both eyes. Eyes that peered at themselves without the interference of a visor. Eyes that winced at the light bombarding their pupils, constricting from yellow irises spotted with faint flecks of blue. Eyes without eyebrows to crown them yet, yet that detracted little from the sight of his face.
His face. Not the face he'd fused with his mask for five years. He had no words.
"As you can see, the operation was an enormous success," Uli said with well-controlled pride. "We used regenerated limbs made from the DNA you provided. Those are your arms and legs."
And they certainly felt like it.
Vader's eyes roamed the bald scalp under his bandages. Uli anticipated his next question.
"Your hair should start to grow back within a week. We revived over ninety percent of your follicles."
Vader responded by simply exhaling.
"We'll monitor you closely overnight, but I don't foresee any complications. You'll receive nutrients intravenously for the next forty-eight hours," Uli stood and dimmed the overhead lights to a comfortable level. "Just rest and let yourself heal."
Not that I have much of a choice, Vader pondered, feeling a mild sedative enter his system. A blissful, paralyzed slumber overtook him within minutes. He didn't see the lines worrying Uli's young brow. Nor did he hear the doctor whisper quietly into the twilight of the operating room.
"I once knew you, Anakin. I pray that what I've done won't drive you further into madness, but release you from its grip."
Shivering, the hair on Uli's arms stood up. The weight of what he'd done settled into his bones. He'd just restored Darth Vader to prime physical health. The second-most powerful man in the galaxy would walk out of here feeling a hundred times stronger. And that could easily make him the most powerful man – surpassing the Emperor himself.
Uli Divini prayed more that night than during the entire six years of his career.
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The second time Vader awoke after surgery was as disorienting as the first. His environment had changed. Instead of surgical apparatuses hanging overhead, recessed lights glowed softly through frosted bulbs. The color surrounding him in all directions was no longer slate gray, but teal blue. It felt like he was underwater gazing up at the sun.
To his relief and amazement, his neck muscles complied when he ordered them to move. Craning slowly to the left – the only direction he could currently go – Vader felt a dull ache throb in his shoulder, but ignored it when he discovered a window.
Horizontal blinds sat partially closed from top to bottom, obscuring a much of a view beyond the five-foot-square frame. But Vader could tell it was dark outside. Whether early morning or late evening, he couldn't tell.
Something shuffled on his right. A pair of anxious eyes came into view and then disappeared just as suddenly. Vader's babysitter soon returned with Uli, who shone a penlight into each of his eyes. Vader protested by clamping them shut.
"Take that away!" he tried to swat Uli's hand, but his nervous system only granted him weak thumb spasms.
"If you're going to be difficult and interfere with post-op care, we'll give you another paralytic dose," Uli said curtly. "We were about to let it run its course. Don't make us change our minds."
For once, Vader was in no position to rebuke the man. The joy of raw vulnerability had officially begun.
But that didn't mean he was oblivious to the silver lining. "I must be doing well, then."
"Indeed. All your systems are stable, and the grafts show no sign of infection," Uli held a sensor device a few inches above Vader's chest. "Your heart is slow but gaining strength. Brain waves are normal and there's no sign of imminent coma relapse."
Vader glanced back at the window. "How long have I been asleep?"
"Since this time last night."
Another twenty-four hours gone. Nothing compared to the recovery period that lay ahead, he realized.
"I'm hungry."
"You'll need to wait another twenty-four hours before starting solid foods," replied Uli. "Your stomach would reject anything you eat now."
Swallowing against the dryness lining his throat, Vader took the news in stride. He'd gone five years without normal food. One more day wouldn't be the end of him. Not the end at all. The beginning.
Vader soon became acutely aware of the tension in the recovery room. Sooner or later he and Uli would have to confront the obvious. May as well get it over with now. Let's see what he's really made of.
He craned his neck to stare Uli square in the eye. "I remember you, Uli. Do you remember me?"
Uli felt his extremities go numb. "Yes," he acknowledged.
"Now you understand why I swore you to secrecy earlier."
"You had good reason to," the doctor shifted uneasily. "Never in a million years would I have guessed it was you under that mask."
"And now that you know?" demanded Vader coldly.
"I will treat you as any other patient. The oath I took when I became a doctor is unconditional."
"You speak those words with false bravado. I can feel how tempted you are to violate your code of ethics," Vader gazed through Uli as he read his thoughts. "Two choices are eating away at you. You could kill me and forge the medical records to make it look like a post-op mortality. A credible outcome, given the complexity of the surgery. Or you could hold me ransom and get enough credits from Palpatine to live like a king the rest of your life."
Uli froze, shaken by Vader's assessment of motives he hadn't even admitted to himself yet. He broke eye contact with Vader, both ashamed and terrified of what the Sith would do with knowledge of these thoughts.
"I don't blame you. Anyone in your position would weigh the same options," Vader stunned him with empathy. "But I sense other things in you as well. You have enough integrity to withstand those temptations."
Uli couldn't believe his ears. Had Darth Vader actually complimented him? On something other than his surgical skills?
"I… I do?" he blinked in awkward disbelief.
"I'm not in the habit of giving false praise."
That's certainly true, Uli reasoned. "Does this mean you won't…"
Vader knew exactly what he was asking. "Destroy you? Not unless you drastically change your character, which I don't foresee happening."
Relief flooded Uli's veins. To his astonishment, he saw measured respect in Vader's ochre eyes.
"None of us foresaw you changing either," he said as evenly as possible.
"No one knew me," spat Vader defensively. "No one knew anything, especially Obi-Wan!"
Uli flinched at the Jedi's name. "He disappeared… did you kill him?"
"Not yet. But his day of reckoning is soon," Vader narrowed his eyes. "Very soon."
Uli's stomach churned. It's what I feared – I've strengthened and enabled him to commit even more heinous acts than before. Force, what have I done?
"Why?" Uli dared to ask. "What will killing him achieve?"
"Reparation for what he did to me! He trapped me in that suit, Uli! He's the reason I spent the last five years in constant pain and misery!" Vader coughed, irritating the new tissue in his lungs. He ignored the voice that said the suit was more Palpatine's doing than Obi-Wan's. Obi-Wan was a more accessible target, all things considered. Vader would seize convenient revenge first, less convenient later.
"His death won't make the last five years disappear. Having this surgery was the closest you'll ever get," remarked Uli.
"Your opinion is neither wanted nor valued," Vader warned. "Do not forget your job, Divini. Stick to overseeing my physical recovery, nothing more."
Biting his tongue, Uli stood brusquely and checked the fluid level in Vader's IV. He deliberately refused eye contact with his patient before heading out the door, dimming the lights behind him.
"The paralyzing drug will wear off slowly over the next several hours. I'll return when you're ready to sit up and walk." And Force help us all, especially Obi-Wan, when that happens.
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Shards and figments of dreams floated through Vader's mind, slowly congealing into a single landscape. Waves of green appeared first, forming meadows like those on Naboo. Yet no flowers bloomed here. Nor did the sky resemble the soft blue gauze he remembered. Instead it was a strange shade between pale pink and brown.
Cresting the horizon were two figures, one leading the other. As they drew near, Vader's heart leapt when he recognized Shmi in front. Her companion stood directly behind her, face hidden from every angle.
Beaming at her, Vader drew closer, reaching to embrace her in the loose folds of his tunic. What elation filled him at the thought of feeling her warmth against his own after so long.
Yet he stopped short when he saw the look on her face. She appeared to be in no mood for a joyful reunion.
"Son." She stood with feet planted wide and arms crossed.
Vader was baffled by her coldness. "Mom, look at me! I'm healed. I'm reborn!"
"I see your body is healed. That's all."
"Aren't you happy for me?" he implored.
"I would be if I knew the transformation went beneath your skin."
Her words weren't making sense through the fog of his dream. "What more do you need?"
"It's not what I need, but what he needs."
Shmi took one step to the side and revealed the man behind her. Vader found himself staring directly into the ice blue eyes of Obi-Wan Kenobi.
He didn't hesitate. Quick as lightning Vader reached for his lightsaber but found it missing. And then, raising both hands, his next instinct was lightning itself. Sith lightning.
It flared from his fingertips with violent, blinding voltage that almost threw him back. It sliced through Obi-Wan's clothes and singed him like toast. It engulfed Vader's soul with white-hot power, liquefying in his new veins and igniting his blood. The evil euphoria temporarily blinded him; when his vision returned, he saw Obi-Wan's lifeless form at Shmi's feet.
Her scream shattered his triumph in a single blast.
"ANAKIN!" she fell to the ground, cradling Obi-Wan's head. "How could you!"
Her behavior kept confusing him. "He was nothing to you, while I had a vendetta to settle."
"Nothing to me?" she wept over him for a long minute. Then, prying herself away with difficulty, she revealed the deceased's face and buried hers in her hands.
Vader stared in mute shock. Lying in Obi-Wan's place was Ainar.
Shmi's disconsolate sobbing was the last thing he heard, and it rang relentlessly after he woke. His new heart almost pounded out of his chest as he bolted upright, gasping for air.
Within seconds, Uli's team raced into the recovery bay, poorly controlled panic filling their eyes. Darth Vader was mobile and severely agitated. A bad combination before his surgery, and a lethal one now.
"Blood pressure is elevated!"
"Heart rate is over 120 beats per minute!"
"Emergency sedative, now!"
Uli's assistants scurried like ants in an upturned anthill, rushing around under Vader's furious aura. He was too distracted by afterimages of his dream to interfere with the sedative injection.
"Just lie back slowly," Uli coaxed, watching Vader's eyelids slowly droop. "You're safe here, nothing's wrong."
Vader kept breathing hoarsely even after lying down. His eyes, though drowsy, still looked haunted. "M-my father…"
"Just try to relax, you must have had a nightmare," Uli checked his patient's vitals again, relieved to see them stabilizing.
"I need him. Bring… him here," gasped Vader.
Uli passed a wary look among his assistants. "You can't have any visitors. I explained that earlier."
This did nothing to ease Vader's state of mind. Struggling against the sedative, his bare limbs writhed beneath the sheets. "Bring him… to me now!"
As his anger flared, so did Sith lightning. Uli and company jumped out of their skin when blue-white sparks shot from Vader's fingers, singing holes into his blanket. Uli couldn't move fast enough to inject another dose of sedative, the maximum allowed, into Vader's IV.
"I can't do that," the doctor's voice and hands shook. His knees felt like rubber, but somehow he stood standing as Vader finally lapsed into unconsciousness again. The three men breathed a collective sigh of relief, each having seen his life pass before his eyes.
No, I definitely can't do that, Uli mentally reaffirmed. And even if I could, the last person I'd want to track down and meet is Darth Vader's father! I can only imagine…
"That was close!" he wheezed. "Too close. I need both of you to keep watch while I do some research. There's got to be a better way to keep him under control. We can't keep paralyzing him, or he'll never rehabilitate."
"You say that like it's a bad thing!" a shaken assistant replied.
Uli closed his eyes, forcing himself to regain composure. This was just what he'd feared. But he'd chosen this, and he'd be damned if he backed out now. He was in too deep anyway. What could he do, keep Darth Vader sedated and paralyzed indefinitely? Not in Emperor Palpatine's own surgical center, that's for sure. Sooner or later he'd come snooping around, and Uli wanted to be as far away as possible when that happened.
"We can work through this… we have to," he said for himself as much as them. "I have an idea, but I have to check something first. I'll be back as soon as I can."
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Had one used an x-ray telescope to see within the surgical center's walls, strange sights would have met their eyes. Very strange. Stranger than, perhaps, even the Sith alchemy experiments inhabiting the west wing.
Seeing Darth Vader walking on bare human feet was odd enough. With each passing week, his steps grew less shaky and more confident as he learned to adjust his stride. The re-humanization of the galaxy's most feared monster was strange to behold. Yet Uli's team did their job as they would have with any other patient.
Which was made possible by the creature tethered to Vader's ankle.
Vader had woken to find the two-foot-long lizard napping on his stomach. He recognized it instantly. A ysalamir. The only creature known to repel the Force within a thirty-foot radius of itself. Uli paid quite the premium to get one delivered from the nearest intergalactic zoo.
And so it followed Vader wherever he went. If the Dark Lord so much as pinched its tail, it snapped at his fingers, threatening to pierce his new skin. The animal's temper was a perfect match for Vader's. And thanks to its presence, that temper was all Vader had at his disposal. No Force lightning. No telekinetic choking or mind manipulation. He was, for all intents and purposes, powerless. A normal, average human with his greatest strength in his biceps.
Six weeks passed. His hair grew. His limbs and joints began to function seamlessly. His eyes remained stubbornly yellow, but Uli swore he saw a few more flecks of blue by the time he finished rehabilitating.
Then again, that may have just been wishful thinking. Vader had been without his powers for so long that it was tempting to forget he ever had them. Working with him like this had shifted everyone's perception. By the end of the seventh week, Uli's staff no longer felt frightened to the point of nausea when they began each shift.
Curious things were happening within that surgical center. The galaxy was about to change dramatically, and only a handful knew it. Whether the universe was prepared for these changes remained to be seen.
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It's funny how the name Divini is similar to Houdini. I realized that only after comparing the former to a magician.