Chapter Text
Ahsoka tapped her fingers against the holotable. It was pretty predictable for Skyguy to be late for a planning session.
All the officers were standing around waiting, with the occasional snide comment suggesting they had better places to be. Ahsoka had already spammed Skyguy’s comm with five minutes warning , it’s starting right now , and where the kark are you . Wasn’t like anything could begin without the actual general here though, he was kinda the one in charge of this shitshow.
Anakin just happened to be a lot better at leading the charge saber-first into blaster fire, than being, y’know, punctual. He tended to get caught up in things and lose track of time, until someone dragged him out of a starfighter’s innards by the bootstraps. Judging by Rex’s slightly raised eyebrows and sharp signing under the table, it was gonna be her today. Better than placating the natborns at least. Ahsoka gave him a good luck shoulder bump on the way out. She’d probably owe him first dibs on the good ration flavours tomorrow.
Ahsoka tried Anakin’s comm again, just in case, then the engineers base in the fighter hanger. She was not going to walk all the way down there if she didn’t absolutely have to unless the Resolute was on fire.
Sparky picked up the call, a not-so-shiny shiny with a talent for rewiring anything electrical. Their bright yellow hair wasn’t visible in the blue tinted hologram, but the gelled up spikes were– another part of how they earned their name. She watched as Sparky gestured to the other mechanics, and considerately muted the audio before yelling across the hangar.
“No luck, sorry Commander.”
“Thanks for trying, though. You might wanna get back to it.” Ahsoka gestured behind the clone, where something looked to be arcing blue electricity and everyone was just watching like it was the latest holodrama instead of running for the fire extinguishers.
Sparky hung up with an expression that suggested more disappointment at not being involved, rather than actual panic.
Ahsoka decided that was well above her purely theoretical paygrade. She did not want to hear Kix’s “Things not to Attempt in a Star Destroyer,” lecture-slash-chewing out, when she was finally not involved.
She had a briefing to get to and a wild pelikki chase to continue.
Next stop was the training room, where she found Fives and Echo running a handstand competition that Ahsoka could’ve won with a spare second. Tup was laughing on the floor, with Dogma watching on worriedly. Jesse mouthed to her, “Don’t tell Rex.” It wasn’t that Rex would stop their fun, it’s just that he was competitive from being the adopted baby CT to a buch of commanders, and Ahsoka was one-hundred-percent willing to help him cheat.
The smaller secondary training room only had a group of shinies using it for very regulation hand-to-hand combat drills. She returned their salutes, then waved them off to go back to what they were doing. It always took a while for Kamino rookies to calm down with the protocol that had been conditioned into them. It was to be reserved for the stuck up admiralty officers that thought they were better than everyone else. Ahsoka had acquired Skyguy’s hate for standing on formalities.
Ahsoka had been holding out hope for the little training room. She’d found Anakin in there too many times to count, panting and dripping with sweat, beating something up at stupid-o’clock in the morning. She’d even joined him more than once when the nightmares got too bad, sparring until they both had to flop down on the mats in exaustion.
Ahsoka frowned and tapped a negative to Rex’s increasingly frantic comms. She was running out of usual Skyguy haunts. At this point she’d be looking for Master Obi-Wan in hopes that the Holonet and Temple and everywhere they went catchphase,’Where Kenobi goes Skywalker follows’ would ring true. But Obi-Wan was practically on the opposite side of the the front, the 212th called to beat the Seppies back there.
She’d have to find him on her own.
Next logical place would be his quarters. Not the general’s rooms Anakin had given up to Rex for an extra planning space-come-supply closet-come-rec room that was desperately needed on the crowded Venator, but the dingy closet-with-bunk covered in robot bits. Skyguy didn’t even hang out there much, but that was the literal last place Ahsoka had before she was off to start tearing up the engine room.
It was quiet. Not completely, the ever-present background hum of the hyperdrive remained, but the usual clanging, welding, Huttese swearing Skyguy noises were absent.
Ahsoka typed in the door code, the same one Anakin used for datapads, his comm and security number that Obi-Wan still had to threaten to write in perma-ink on his forehead. She’d caught him hacking into his own stuff more than once, too.
The lights flickered on automatically, those stupid ones that went off if you stayed too still. She nearly turned on her heel to walk out, when she heard a faint whimper.
Oh kark.
A dark-brown clad figure lay on the floor by the bunk, decidedly not moving. Ahsoka fell to her knees by Anakin, running though all her first aid lessons in her mind. She didn’t panic, she’d been here too many times before.
“Anakin, can you hear me?”
She squeezed his shoulders, getting a groan in response. She would’ve laughed at how he sounded like an unruly padawan not wanting to get up for morning classes, if he wasn’t pale as Hoth and kinda clammy.
She couldn’t see any blood; checking for blaster fire was automatic too.
She leant over to listen for his breathing, thankfully there, then tapped his cheek.
“Skyguy!”
This time she got blue eyes flickering open and a mumbled, “Snips?”
She’d thank the Force later.
“What happened, are you okay?” she questioned.
He was still lying there, curled on his side, arms around his chest and middle. He shifted slightly, tucking his legs closer to him, and gasped. Ahsoka felt the flash of pain through their bond.
“Hurts. I fell.”
“Yeah, I know, Skyguy. It’ll be okay though.” She really didn’t have enough information to tell that but it was always better to be a bit optimistic in her reassurances, though not her actions. She decisively clicked down the medical alert on her comm. “I’m calling Kix, can you tell me where though?”
Anakin just shook his head, eyes wide and pleading.
Ahsoka had a few minutes before the medics would arrive, but she was getting seriously worried by Anakin’s everything , right now. He was usually not so quick to admit pain instead of trying to jump up and pretend he was fine like certain other Jedi—cough, cough, her grandmaster—she knew.
Ahsoka wiped her sweaty palms on her leggings, because damn, now she was kinda scared. It obviously hurt like sith hells.
“Can you move your arms so I can check what’s wrong? Better not have broken anymore ribs.” She’d probably laugh if he had, it was a wonder there were any left by now, though that might be the stress induced hysteria talking.
Anakin gingerly lifted an arm out of the way so Ahsoka could untie his tunics. It hit her then just how much he trusted her, not only to have his back on a battlefield but to be here when he is vulnerable and can’t fight back.
She peeled away dark fabric to reveal a few bruises and not much else. Maybe a bit of swelling, but she wasn’t sure. Ahsoka went to trace Skyguy’s ribs, to see if she could tell if that was the problem, but he flinched away before she could touch skin.
Anakin whined, high and pained, and Ahsoka moved to reassure him because there was not much she could do with her duct-tape-and-prayers healing knowlege before the medics arrived.
“Hush, hush. It’s okay, help is coming. I’m here,” she soothed.
To her horror, Skyguy’s eyes filled up with tears. Like actual dripping down his face and starting to sob, tears.
Now Ahsoka was actually nearly panicking because what was she supposed to do with a crying Anakin who whimpered out, “Want Obi,” and “ Hurts .”
She flailed about for half a second before doing the first thing that popped into her head. She moved her hand to Skyguy’s hair, tangling her fingers in it. Ahsoka had seen Obi-Wan do this for Anakin when he was upset or hurt. It was how Anakin would try to comfort her, gently rubbing at her montrals until the pain faded away.
She carded through, doing her best to avoid knots, which was kinda difficult given it was all sweaty and stuck together. Skyguy’s eyes fluttered shut, though his face was still twisted up in agony.
The medics would be here soon, she just had to keep telling herself that.
Time stretched out like the expanse of space, so vast and featureless that it could have been minutes or hours or years.
Anakin was fragile. He was the strongest person Ahsoka knew.
He was a mess of contradictions and emotions, all careless, reckless, thoughtful protectiveness. How many times would Ahsoka have to see her master, her brother, her friend a half step away from death, never any further.
Kix and Coric tumbled though the door. Anakin was loaded onto the stretcher. Ahsoka could feel his Force signature flickering. It twisted in on itself, the light dimming, cowering in a corner like it had been beaten. She really wanted her bouncy, vibrant, overenthusicastic Skyguy back.
Ahsoka curled her Force signature around his, letting their light blend together and strengthen each other. She’d done it on the battle field a million times and she hoped it would work here too.
The medics pushed Anakin’s arms away to check him over. Ahsoka caught a grasping, flailing hand and held it. Skyguy gripped it like she was the last lifeline and he was drowning.
She stayed by his side the whole way back to the medbay, only barely registering Kix and Coric’s murmurs about blood pressure and volume and transfusions and internal bleeding .
Fuck, Anakin could never do things by halves, could he. It always was either miraculously escape without a scratch somehow, or swan-diving into the kriffing Rejoin the Force thing.
They made it, and Anakin was going where she could not follow. It didn’t matter that it was just in for emergency surgery. That Coric and Kix had this well and truly handled. She had to believe that, didn’t she. She was only wobbling from the adrenaline crash, legs giving out from underneath her from that and nothing else.
She slumped down against the wall. At least if she couldn’t move from the invisible weight of something, grief, pain, knowing that one day this could be it , she didn't have to go to the briefing.
She stared at the medbay doors, all white, sterile durasteel. She imagined blood streaking across them, left by dying hands.
Ahsoka screamed inside her head, inside her shields where no one could hear.
This is war,
this is war,
this war was killing them all.