Chapter Text
Everything has gone rather hazy.
I try to watch the transports speeding away, dark shadows against the burning sands but before I am aware of it they are already gone, passing beyond my sight.
Something dark flutters before my vision and I blink; my eyes are gritty and dry as if I have been staring for some time. The dark shape before me resolves into a black glove. The glove is on a hand, the hand on an arm and the arm is attached to the shoulder of Doghouse, a medic in the 212th. He is currently yelling rather rudely into my face.
“General Kenobi!”
Turning my head away from the obnoxiously loud sound only leads to fingers grasping my face, holding it firm.
“Sir, please respond.”
I bat his hand away, irritably.
“There's no need to shout, Lieutenant,” I tell him.
“No, of course not,” he mutters, and glances up behind me to where another trooper is crouched. I can feel a faint pressure as if the trooper is holding onto my shoulders, supporting my back.
“General, we need to get you onto the stretcher,” Doghouse says. “Remember how this goes? Then you have to lie still.”
Stretcher? I glanced down and see the handles of an old-fashioned manual stretcher resting on the red dirt at his feet. With so many injured we must have used up every hover-stretcher available. Even more reason why I am not going to submit to these demands; I refuse to be carried to safety by my own men.
“I don't need it,” I insist, even though my voice sounds strange and distant in my ears. “Just help me up. I can walk, I can…”
“General Kenobi,” Doghouse interrupts. “That didn’t work last time, and it’s not working now. Besides, Cody left me under quite strict orders. You are not to walk anywhere until we've got med evac inbound. In the meantime all casualties are to be under cover. That's how it is.”
Oh really. That's how it is, is it? Cody is an excellent officer and Doghouse a competent medic who has saved my life too on more than one occasion, but I rather think I know my own limits better than they do. I am a Jedi. I'll quickly put an end to this. But before I can begin to formulate a suitably cutting response, Doghouse seems to have taken my silence for assent and, crouching by my feet, he has started to count down.
“Ready? On three...”
Now the trooper behind me, Sparker I think, has his hands jammed under my arms, Doghouse grips onto the armour plates at each of my knees and before I can prepare myself or make any objection, the troopers have lifted me bodily into the air and down on my back onto the hard plastoid of the stretcher. They are gentle, of course, in a way that belies the purpose of their creation, but the sudden pain of the movement still rips a horrible groan from my throat before I can hold it in. An intense cold sweeps through me, spiralling out from my core to my extremities like a wildfire formed of ice.
One of the troopers speaks, then the other, but I can no more answer them than I can fly. Lost in agony I am nonetheless aware that the floor beneath me starts to move and rock as I am hoisted into the air. Beyond my closed eyes, the world sways and pitches, and sharp bolts of cold lightning fire course up and down my spine and deep into my torso. It is all I can do to keep breathing through my gritted teeth and stuttering heartbeat.
After what feels like an age, I become aware of a murmur of voices above, a bright light shining into my eyes, and someone calling me, insistently. Then there are gentle hands on my shoulder and hip rolling me up onto my side, releasing the tormenting pressure off my back. I feel a scratch of a hypo-injector on my neck. The pain fades; a hand wipes tears of pain off my face and then there's nothing but a blissful encroaching dark.
I awake again a short while later hearing a voice crying out. Someone is in pain. I smell sweat and fear, fuel and smoke. Burnt plastoid and blood. Peeling open gritty eyes, I see a shadowed gloom, the curve of metal of a ship's hull, bodies scattered across the floor. The gunship crashed. My men are dead, they're all dead, and…
“Trapper?” I whisper. There aren't many left but someone is crying out in pain. Someone is still alive out there.
Nearby, a prone figure rolls its head in my direction.
“Hey, General,” the clone trooper says, words slow and slurred, but strong. “Looks like we made it after all, huh?”
My tattered memory throws together the tiny distinctions of the voice, the Force signature, the armour…
“Trapper,” I say again. He's alive. He's here talking and he's alive. But I'd heard someone crying out. And if it wasn't Trapper...
“Someone's in pain,” I tell him, in case he doesn't know. “I heard...I think it's Copper. We have to help him, I have to…”
“Take it easy, General,” Trapper says in the slow, imprecise tones of the heavily medicated. “It’s one of the Novas, picked up some shrapnel. Doghouse is with him.”
“Where’s Copper?" I insist. "He was here.”
“Copper's dead, sir,” Trapper says, voice stripped back to nothing, just a sound. “Digit too. And Grapeshot, Marney and all of them. But we got out, remember? Waxer and Boil came for us. We’re waiting on dustoff now, but we got out.”
I blink, trying to follow what Trapper is telling me, though my thoughts seem slow and disjointed, like they’re under a cold frost. I can see other bodies scattered around, on stretchers or on the floor and yes, I realise now that I can see them moving, breathing. They're just injured. Not dead, not yet. This isn't the crashed gunship. We got out. I'm not there anymore.
I seem to be lying on my own stretcher, propped up on my side with one hand tucked beneath my cheek. The IV fluid pump is back, strapped to my left arm. It might not be working properly though because my mouth is so dry. I'm cold, so cold my whole body is trembling right through to my fingertips and I can't seem to stop it.
“Are you…” I ask, hoping my voice is loud enough. “Are you all right?’
“I'm good, sir,” Trapper says. “Busted leg, few broken ribs. Folly stuck me with the good stuff when we arrived.” He rolls his head, grins conspiratorially. His first dose of painkillers must still working. In the same time I've gone through three or four shots. The downside of a Jedi metabolism.
“How 'bout you, General?” Trapper asks. “You don't look so great.”
The pained voice in the distance cries out again and my head jerk towards the awful sound. The Force feels muddy and begrimed, tumescent with suffering.
“General?”
“‘m fine,” I say, though it comes out as a whisper; my mouth and throat are parched and I can’t seem to get the breath to speak.
Across from me I can see Trapper is frowning. He turns his head away and shouts loudly.
“Lieutenant!”
I flinch a little at the sudden sound but it's lost in the tremors. I want to ask him what's wrong but I can't seem to form words.
”Doghouse!”
“Yeah?” Someone shouts back from far away in response to Trapper’s yell.
“It’s the general."
There's the sound of voices and movement and then Doghouse appears with another trooper in tow. I see him pat Trapper's shoulder on the way past and then he crouches before me.
“General—you're awake already.”
Doghouse starts taking my pulse, blood pressure and a host of other annoying tests. His assistant is inspecting the IV pump. “Hoped that jab would have knocked you out for a while yet. Are you in any pain?”
“I'm quite well,” I croak at him. “What's our situation?”
Doghouse makes some notes on a datapad, looking distracted.
“No sign of any enemy movement in the immediate area,” he says, still typing. “Commander Cody just reported in that the ground assault forces are in position to start the attack.”
Everything going to plan so far, then. Of course there was still plenty of time for things to go wrong and Anakin is still facing the most critical and dangerous part of the assault. But at least the medic's words mean I haven't been insensible for long. Thirty minutes at most.
“Very good,” I say. "I want to speak to the ranking officer." My voice seemed appropriately firm to my own ears but the medics don't seem to be listening to me. Instead Doghouse is looking over at his assistant.
“BP’s 95 over 60, and I don't like that core temp. 34.8. I've got tachypnea, tachycardia…How're those fluids looking?”
“Almost through the second pack,” the trooper is saying, and I hear a beep, probably the IV pump. I rest my eyes while the pair set about inspecting the bacta dressings on my abdomen and back. I probably ought to sit up to make their task easier but they haven't asked me to move yet for which I am exceedingly grateful.
“All right,” I hear a tired voice saying. Probably Doghouse, though he isn’t speaking to me. “Get a clotting fluid, three more bacta packs and one of the good blankets. We've gotta do something about the shock.”
Ah, of course. The internal bleeding. I was supposed to be suppressing that. I had forgotten, and now my grasp of the Force seems tremulous, uncertain. I reach out and draw the Force close, weaving myself gently into it...
“General. General Kenobi.” I open my eyes again. Doghouse is crouching beside me, tapping my face. “Stay awake, please.”
I don't bother to correct him that I had been meditating, not sleeping, but at least they are acknowledging my presence again. “How are the men?” I ask, my breaths coming strangely fast, like I have been running. I really could use a healing trance about now.
“Holding on,” Doghouse tells me, not committing much information.
“Numbers? Severity?”
He briefly looks as if he is considering not answering me at all, but my authority still has some influence, even over Doghouse. “Fourteen injured Cat-2 or Cat-3s in this ship, another 23 Cat-4s outside. Fully fit troopers are Nock, three sentries, and me. No more Cat-1s.”
That's good news. Category 1 is deceased, so no-one else has died since Doghouse took over. The most at risk are the Cat-2 group: injuries that are time critical. They will continue to rapidly deteriorate without surgery or bacta immersion. Cat-3 are other stable but non-mobile injuries and Cat-4 walking wounded.
Before I can ask more, the wounded man by the far wall starts groaning loudly once again. It sounds very bad.
“Go help him,” I instruct the medic. He looks around for a second, torn between his responsibilities, and then nods.
“Nock will be back in a moment,” Doghouse tells me. “Just lie still, General, and don’t move. I mean it,” he says and then he is gone.
As he leaves, winding his way amongst the stretchers, I realise how unfair it had been of me to leave this many wounded to the care of just one medic. I should have had Folly or Coric stay behind too. But it is too late for realising that mistake now. All I can do is hope no more of our men pay for it with their lives.
I feel more alert by the time the assistant medic returns, although the tremors have gotten worse, each shiver sending uncomfortable jolts up my damaged spine. The trooper sets about replacing the thin foil blanket over me with a self-warming one, lined with inbuilt heating elements.
I thank the trooper and ask him his name. He gives me a slightly strange look.
“It’s Nock, sir. CT-5761?”
Of course. I've known Nock for months. He's in Ghost Squadron. I'm becoming confused, forgetful. Another side effect of the hypovolemic shock, no doubt.
“Yes, yes. Nock; I remember. You'll have to forgive me. I'm not myself.”
“Of course, sir.”
At first I could barely feel the blanket he has laid over me but now the warmth is suffusing even the numbness of my limbs. It’s excellent. While I drowse in the warmth, Nock continues to connect up the next pack of fluids to the IV pump. Doghouse hasn't returned and in the distance another trooper starts coughing, painfully.
Something is wrong.
"How many injured men are there here?” I ask. Moving my head or neck to look around and count them seems like a bad idea. But didn’t Doghouse already tell me?
Nock answers anyway as he works. “Forty, maybe? No, it’s fewer. Thirty-seven.”
“And our supplies?”
“They're fine, sir,” says Nock, but this time there is the faintest hint of hesitation about the words.
“Trooper,” I warn.
“We’re...uh...running low,” Nock confesses.
“Low on what?”
“Pressure bandages, bacta shots, bacta packs and analgesics.”
“How low? I want the truth; that's an order."
“All but out, sir,” he admits. “We lost a lot of supplies.”
Damn. Relief ships will be able to reach us with supplies or for evac as soon as Anakin has the shield down. But who knows when that will be, or how many wounded he and his men might accrue in the doing.
On my right, Nock is reaching for one of the dressings on my torso, infusing bacta into what is probably my liver or some other unimportant organ. I catch his wrist.
"No,” I tell him. “Leave it.”
“I'm just changing the dressings over, sir,” Nock tells me, soothingly. “These ones are almost used up.”
“Yes, and you also just told me our supplies are low. Leave it be.”
Nock hesitates. “Sorry sir, but the lieutenant ordered me to…”
“And I am ordering you not to. We must ration what we have left. I am not letting you waste supplies.”
“Sir,” Nock is trying to sound stern, but he's no Cody, or Doghouse either for that matter. “I'm not a medic but both Doghouse and Folly said you needed constant bacta to keep your injuries stabilised.”
“And should they become unstable I'll be sure to let you know.”
Nock just stares at me, helplessly.
“Are we short on stims?” I ask.
“We’ve no shots left, sir, but I think there's plenty of capsules.”
I hold out my hand and the trooper starts disagreeing almost immediately.
“Lieutenant Doghouse said—”
“I'm not intending to take a whole pack,” I tell him. “But these painkillers aren't very effective and I need to be able to function if something happens. I promise I will inform the medics of everything I've taken as soon as we get evacced. Acceptable?”
I continue to hold out my hand and eventually Nock gives in. He digs a pack of stim capsules out of a medical kit, snaps the pack in two and drops one half of them into my palm.
“They're not pain relief, sir,” he points out again. “Just a temporary boost, and you're going to feel even worse when it wears off. And if you take too many—”
“I understand, Trooper; I am quite familiar with the side effects.”
I toss one of the pills into my mouth and bite down on the casing, breaking it open. Faster than letting them dissolve. The bitter fluid inside oozes out, the acidic taste coating my tongue, but I can feel it starting to work within seconds; my hands still their tremor, my vision clears and my confused thoughts start to crystallize into purposeful action.
“Now, tell me—who’s on comms?” I ask, as I stow the rest of the capsules into my pocket and start pulling my clothing back into place. My belt, armour, and ‘saber, I notice for the first time, have been stashed in a pile next to the stretcher.
“Sparker, sir,” Nock answers, glancing between the bag of medical supplies and the distant Doghouse like he's still hoping for tactical support.
“Very well. Now, I need to know how the assault is progressing, so if you wouldn't mind helping me up I shall go and find him.”
Nock, of course, starts instantly protesting my proposed course of action, and it is only after I start to sit up anyway that he finally stirs himself to assist me.
Movement certainly isn't comfortable but I've been through worse, so before long I am sitting up, leaning against the transport wall. From this position I can see the worst of the injured troopers around me; camo and white clad figures stacked inside the space like battery cells in a power converter. The portside hatch is open and beyond I can see nothing but harsh light.
“You really shouldn't try and move, sir,” pipes up Trapper from his stretcher, who it turns out isn't asleep at all.
Nock, desperation in his tone, adds; “He’s right. If you stay here, sir, I'll go and find out if any news has come in and report back. Only please stay here. If anything else happens to you Commander Cody will murder me.”
I hesitate and then take pity on the man. “Very well,” I tell him with a sigh “I won't move so long as I get an update.”
The trooper hurries off and I am left once more alone and yet at the same time surrounded by silent troopers, and with a sense of profound and uncomfortable deja vu . I retrieve my possessions and dress myself again, being slow and careful, and then once more the only sensible use of my time is to rebalance myself in the Force and to take back control of the bleed and fractures.
It is working rather successfully until a sense of uneasiness starts to grow in my mind, drawing me from my trance. Some time has passed, ten minutes at least, but Nock hasn't returned. None of the uninjured troopers have come back into the LAAT for some time, and now I have this creeping, pressing feeling of imminent danger.
Something is about to happen.