Chapter Text
Obi-Wan slowly pulled his eyes open, resisting the urge to melt into the Alderannian shuttle’s plush, ultra-supportive seats as it landed in the Negotiator’s docking bay. Sighing to himself, he quickly removed the safety straps, then pushed himself to standing, ignoring how his joints and muscles protested.
The mission on Zigoola had been more brutal than he’d anticipated. Between the standard horrors of a Sith Temple, he’d had to fight through the thick, sweltering Zigoolan jungle to get there. His whole body was aching and sore, he was covered in mud and foliage from head to toe, and he was utterly exhausted. Even though he’d slept basically the whole ride back to the Venorator, it hadn’t really improved. He’d had half of a ration bar and an electrolyte drink, but that hadn’t made him feel any better either.
And, to make things worse, he’d been coughing intermittently the whole trip home. In theory, Zigoola’s atmosphere was breathable for humans, but maybe there’d been something in the air his body hadn’t liked. It wasn’t like that was exactly a rare occurrence for him. A cup of tea, a sonic, and a long nap would definitely do him some good.
Before he headed off the ship, he turned to Senator Bail Organa, nodding respectfully. “Thank you for having me along, senator.”
“Of course, Master Jedi,” Organa said as he extended his hand to firmly shake Kenobi’s. “I only wish we’d been able to save any of the artifacts.”
Obi-Wan smiled. “I’m sure many of our archivists would agree.” His tone turned serious. “However, I’m glad we were made aware of the temple.” They both knew the price Sith relics could fetch on the black market, especially if the vendor was trying to court Count Dooku. “Hopefully, it will be unable to cause harm to anyone else.”
“Very true, very true,” Organa nodded, watching as Kenobi stepped away, towards the now extended ramp of the shuttle. “I’ll be in contact if there are any more developments. Please feel free to reach out if you need anything.”
“Thank you, Senator. You’ll be my first call.” He nodded again, then exited the ship, heading quickly towards the lift. His priorities were in line. Room, sonic, tea, sleep. Easy enough.
***
Halfway to his quarters, his plans were disrupted by the sight of his commander walking down the hallway in his greys, datapad tucked under his arm. Obi-Wan sighed, wearily trying to wipe some of the mud off his face as Cody approached.
“You’re back early, General,” the commander said, pivoting so he could walk with his general.
“Am I?” he sighed, exhausted.
Cody paused, looking him up and down. “Not quite, General. Do you need me to comm the medics?”
He shook his head. “No, I’m alright. Nothing a sonic and some sleep can’t fix, commander.” And maybe, just maybe, he underlined it with a little bit of Force suggestion.
“You sure, general?” Cody hesitated, eyes narrowing.
Obi-wan opened his mouth to defend himself again, but no words came out. Instead, he fell into another sudden paroxysm of coughing, chest aching with the movement. “I’m fine,” he sputtered after it was over, pulling his elbow away from his mouth.
“General, I think you should go to the medbay,” Cody said again, worry creeping into his tone.
Obi-Wan quickly waved it off, shaking his head. “It’s alright, just some Zigoolan pollen.”
“Does Zigoolan pollen do that, general?” Cody said, pointing to his sleeve. He looked down, and saw a glob of red-tinged mucus staining his sleeve. Oh. That was probably not a good sign.
The commander nodded. “I think you should go to the medbay, General.”
***
Obi-Wan sighed as he leaned his head against the drab medbay wall, shifting in the hard seat of the chair. A shiver rolled through him, and he pulled his robe around himself tighter, attempting to roll out the stiffness in his shoulders.
He and Cody had been pointed to an empty room by the vod on triage duty, Sono, and they’d settled in while they waited for a medic to be free. It wasn’t exceptionally busy, but the scan Sono had run had put him more towards the end of the priority list.
“You know you don’t have to stay,” he said, looking over at Cody, who was scrolling his datapad.
Cody looked at him, eyebrow raising slightly, but he didn’t say anything.
He rolled his eyes. “I’m not going to sneak away. I promise.”
“Of course, general.” He didn’t move to stand up.
It was Obi-Wan’s turn to raise his eyebrows at Cody.
Cody sighed. “I’ll leave when the medics get here.”
“Fine.” Another shiver rolled through him.
A few more minutes passed, and then finally, there were several knocks on the door. Obi-Wan smiled, just a little bit.
“Come in,” he mumbled, staring over at Cody until he stood up.
The door slid open, and a medic stepped to the side to let Cody exit before he spoke. “Good afternoon, general.”
“Hello Stripes,” Obi-Wan hummed, refusing to follow Stripes’s gaze to the exam table that he wasn’t on. Instead he stayed fixed on the Lieutenant's facial tattoo. He’d gotten to know the medic pretty well over the years, but the tattoo always made him even easier to pick out.
“So, what’s going on today, general?” He asked, rubbing his hands with sanitizer gel.
Obi-Wan opened his mouth to speak, but he was interrupted by another paroxysm of coughing. He quickly covered his face with his sleeve, wincing at the slime on his robes. “Sorry, think I caught a bug while I was gone.”
Stripes nodded, reaching for a monitoring bracelet and securing it on his wrist. “Perils of travel. We’ll get you checked out, general.” He double tapped on his datapad. “Symptoms?”
Slowly, Obi-Wan began to recount his symptoms, fighting the tickle at the back of his throat. There was the cough, and… whatever red-tinged slime he’d coughed up along with it, along with the shivers and the body aches. Halfway through his description, the bracelet dinged with vitals, which Stripes dutifully recorded in his chart. Apparently, he was running a low grade fever. That explained at least some of his misery.
Once Stripes’s interrogation session was over, he moved on to a quick physical exam. He put up with the fingers prodding at his neck and jaw, and the lights and tubes that Stripes pushed into his ears, nose, and mouth. However, he couldn’t suppress a shiver as the stethoscope bell was pressed into his back.
Stripes softly mumbled something about being “sorry it was cold,” but continued to slide it down his back anyway. After a few beats, he finally pulled it away. “I’m going to get a scan real quick, alright, general?”
Obi-Wan hummed his assent, then did his best to hold still as the wide blue beam passed over his torso and up towards his head. The device beeped, and Stripes took a moment to parse through the readout before nodding.
He nodded, eyes raising to meet Obi-Wan’s. “You’ve picked up a chest infection, pneumonia,” he explained. “I’m going to prescribe you some antibiotics. It’ll be three a day for ten days, alright?”
Obi-Wan nodded, almost reaching for his datapad to set up reminders. Though, the medics would probably manage that on their own. “Unfortunately, I am going to have to confine you to quarters. Make sure that you eat well and drink plenty of water, and try to move around a bit every day. Being stagnant could make it harder for you to recover, alright?”
He grumbled slightly, but nodded. Confined to his quarters. Just what he needed. At least he would get out without too much prodding.
Stripes opened his mouth to speak, and Obi-Wan’s heart fell. “Before you go, I’m going to need to draw some blood and get a sputum sample, okay?”
Of course. With a quiet sigh, he rolled his sleeve up. Maybe one day he’d escape the medbay without having to be stuck with a needle, but that day was not today.
***
The exhaustion flowing through his veins seemed to double as he stepped over the threshold and into his quarters, slamming into him like a hovertrain. Any of the energy remaining in his body leached out of him, and the only thing that prevented him from falling straight into bed was the grating feeling of the grit and grime stinking into his skin.
Instead, he dragged himself to the ‘fresher, only remembering that he should probably have taken his mud-caked boots off when he was halfway there. It was mostly dried by now, though, so the tracks weren’t all that bad. He’d scrub them in the morning. It wasn’t like he was going to be doing much else, since he’d been confined to quarters.
Moving slowly so he didn’t upset his aching joints, he slowly started to remove his sweat soaked robes, the fabric having picked up so much of the distinct, very dark brown soil that it was a two whole shades darker.
Looking in the mirror, he could almost understand why Cody had insisted he go to medical. The dim, flat lighting of the refresher probably wasn’t doing him any favours, but he really didn’t look great. Under the layers of soil, his skin was pale and clammy. His eyes were red and bloodshot. He looked like he felt. Awful.
After a quick sonic and throwing back his first of the new antibiotics, he crashed into his bed, hitting the mattress like a bag full of rocks. The sleep couldn’t come fast enough.
***
Obi-Wan was surrounded by fire.
Below him was a river of red and orange lava, bubbling and oozing. It stretched on, smaller streams joining with the larger flow. He could practically smell heat in the air, and feel it radiating up from the ground onto his skin, even though he was standing stories above it. There was something noxious there too, the combined stench of charred flesh and rotten eggs.
Far in the distance, he could make out a cloaked figure, standing on one of the metal structures that surrounded the flow. Ash seemed to coalesce around him, forming a thick, dark cloud. Without explanation, fear struck him, seeming to squeeze painfully inside his chest against his will. Before he knew it, before he could question it, his lightsaber was in his hand, vibrating so violently it was hard to hold on.
“Who are you?” He called out, but his voice was lost to the sound of thunder. It was almost a roar, like the smoke filled sky was going to come crashing down with the noise.
The world lurched and shifted, and suddenly Obi-Wan found himself in the center of the ash cloud. His lightsaber was raised defensively, the pale blue glow from the plasma blade flickering against his face. It was the only light he could see.
“Who are you!” He yelled again, head and body whirling around as he searched for the figure he’d seen before.
There was another echoing thunderclap, and the figure appeared again, still desperately out of reach. Slowly, it raised its hooded head, a fiery red blade igniting in its hand.
“You should already know that,”
Obi-Wan's chest constricted painfully as he gasped.
“Master.”
Anakin.
***
Obi-Wan woke up coughing.
It just wouldn’t stop. He hacked and hawed again and again and again, unable to get a single breath in. It didn’t matter how much mucus he’d already spat out, more and more just kept coming. His chest burned, every cough only making it ache even more.
He didn’t even try to stop the tears from forming in his eyes when he felt his stomach squeeze and twist. Blood and mucus filled vomit spilled out of his mouth and onto his covers as he tried desperately to get any air in. After a moment of sitting in his bed, just trying to breathe normally and get his bearings, he got up and headed towards the ‘fresher.
He blinked the tears out of his eyes as he reached for his cup with a shaky hand, leaning against the counter to keep his balance. His heart was still pounding, and he tried to force himself to calm down, running a hand through his sweat-dampened hair.
A shiver rolled through him, and he gripped the countertop even harder, trying to keep steady. He was absolutely exhausted, but he’d have to change his sheets before he could go back to bed, and that seemed like an impossible task right now. It didn’t help that his heart was still pounding from the nightmare. He swore he could still smell the sulfur burning his nose.
Despite the fatigue tugging at his limbs and mind, he knew there wasn’t any way he was going to be getting any sleep after that. His mind felt muddled and frantic, too tired to process the tangled mess of the nightmare but terrified nonetheless.
Pushing the sweat drenched hair away from his face, he raised his eyes and saw his meditation cushion, shoved in his room’s far corner, reflected back at him in the mirror. He sighed softly to himself. It looked blissfully blood and vomit free.
He’d meditated on rough nights before, when he couldn’t sleep. First after Melida/Daan, and then again after the invasion of Naboo. Even if it wasn’t sleep, it was rest, and that was better than nothing. After sucking in a deep breath to gather his energy, he pushed off the sink and dragged himself to the meditation cushion.
His legs easily collapsed into the cushion without much effort on his part, and Obi-Wan slowly folded them up, hips protesting the furled up position. After a few seconds of shifting around to get situated, he let his eyes fall closed, and pulled in a deep breath, trying to center himself and clear his mind.
***
Over the next few hours, Obi-Wan tried to keep his focus solely on his breathing. He could practically hear the words of his crèche-masters echoing in his head, repeating over and over again.
“Clear your mind.”
“Find your center.”
“Breathe.”
No matter how far he got in his mind, though, the characteristic burn in his chest would not go away. Relaxing into the Force helped some, but he was unable to get any deeper than focusing on the dull hum of life signatures through the ship. It was like a wall had been built up between him and the typical full, trance-like state of meditation.
This may have had something to do with the fact that he could feel every inhale getting a little harder, like the air in his room was thinning continuously. His attempts at meditation had forced a deeper connection to his body than he usually prefered, and it was impossible to ignore the deep sensation of doom building inside his chest.
Normally, meditation helped calm his anxious feelings, but this one only seemed to fan the flames. He shifted again, trying to reposition himself into a more comfortable configuration, but it was a wasted effort. This wasn’t helping.
He pulled his eyes open as he slouched back against the wall, unable to take a real deep breath to try and calm himself. His mind was swimming, thoughts mushy and scrambled with an anxiety that was rapidly becoming panic.
He couldn’t get enough air in. Every inhale seemed harder and harder and less and less productive. He couldn’t breathe, Force, he couldn’t breathe.
Normally, Obi-Wan would’ve been more hesitant to call the medbay. He hated them fussing over him, and he hated the poking and prodding, but this was different. Every neuron in his body was screaming at him that he needed help, and that he needed it now.
His eyes fell on his comm, across the room and charging up the small table that he used as both a desk and an improvised kitchen counter. He attempted to stand, but that made his head swim, a dark wall rising in his vision as he fell into another painful, violent coughing fit. There was no way he’d be able to stand up, walk across the room, and pick it up. No way.
Tears beading in his eyes, he dropped his head back against the wall, reaching his hand out instead. He hadn’t been able to meditate properly, but the Force had still been there. He could do this.
Heart pounding, he did his best to summon the Force, pulling the object towards him. It was difficult to stay focused, since he was unable to use a breathing pattern, but it was moving, however ungracefully. The comm wobbled back and forth in the air, unstable, but it eventually found its way to his hand.
He slumped down with exhaustion, trying and failing to catch his breath as he dialed the emergency code and raised it in front of his mouth.
“I’m… I’m in my quarters…” he gasped, voice quiet as he fought for air. “I can’t… I can’t breathe…”
***
Nye rolled over again, unable to find a comfortable position as she tried to sleep. The beds in the barracks emergency response room were okay, but they were required to sleep in almost their full kit, and that made it difficult to get comfy. On the top bunk, she could hear Sym snoring softly, probably out cold. She sighed, repositioning herself again. How Sym managed to sleep like a freshly decanted vod in her full armor would always be a mystery to her.
Looking over towards the table, she stared at her datapad loaded with her advanced medic assignments, pondering if she should give up on sleep and work on that instead. It wasn’t like the endless barrage of work ever stopped, not while they weren’t actively deployed. Before she could act on that thought, the telltale sound of their tones dropped.
All thoughts were forgotten as she sprung up out of bed, quickly clicking her boots on, while Sym practically threw herself down from the second bunk. They moved quickly but silently as the droid dispatcher’s voice recited the details.
“Emergency Medical three-seven, copy an ill person on level two, hallway three-six-echo, room number two-three-seven.”
Nye narrowed her eyes as she looked at Sym. Those were natborn quarters. Both medics quickly pulled on their buckets so they could respond.
“Emergency Medical three-seven, copying,” Sym said, pulling the hover stretcher off its charger on the wall and activating it.
There was a pause, and then the dispatch droid’s modulated voice returned, repeating the information they’d already been given before continuing on. “Thirty-five year old male, conscious but having difficulty breathing.”
Sym acknowledged the droid while Nye reached over the litter, pulling the heavy green ALS bag and then the somehow even heavier blue respiratory and oxygen backpack over onto it. Both of the medic’s minds started working.
They shared a look. There was only really one male of that age who would’ve been residing in natborn quarters: General Kenobi. They both knew it.
Still, Nye raised an eyebrow as she watched Sym pull the trauma kit, as well as the case that contained the CPAP machine, onto the stretcher.
“It’s Kenobi,” she said, by way of explanation.
Nye sighed. “Fair enough. Wouldn’t trust him either.”
“Glad we’re in agreement,” Sym said cheerfully as passed the defibrillator over to her, then started to pull the stretcher towards the door. The narrow bed was too full to carry the defibrillator and everything else safely.
Nye grunted as she heaved it up, feet moving quickly to catch up to Sym. She’d made her carry it last time too. “Ni ven eyayahi gar narise, ner shab!”
***
Sym quickly bypassed the lock on the door to Kenobi’s quarters, bumping her gauntlet with her emergency medic credentials in them against the door as she updated the droid that they were on scene.
As she stepped into the darkened room, she announced, “Emergency response team, was there a call for a sick person?”
Her head snapped to the source of a low, nearly imperceptible groan, not even waiting for her helmet’s night vision to fully resolve as she reached for the lights. “General?” She called, waiting for her vision to even out again. Sure enough, there he was, crumpled against the wall of his quarters, his meditation cushion askew underneath him.
Kenobi looked awful. His skin was flushed and washed out, half-lidded eyes opening to follow her as she lowered the stretcher and squatted down next to him, Nye close behind. “Hey, General, I’m Sym, and this is Nye, we’re gonna help you, okay?”
He tried to respond, but the words were replaced with a painful-sounding coughing fit. His breaths were fast but shallow, chest moving rapidly, lips tinged blue and his vitals flashing red on her HUD. He was barely satting in the low eighties. Kark. “Nye, get him on O2,” she ordered, mentally paging through potential causes of his respiratory distress.
Nye tore open the blue backpack, softly explaining to Kenobi what was happening while she opened the oxygen tank and then looped the mask over his face. “This should help you breathe a little better, okay?” She explained.
“There's gonna be some touching while I examine you, okay?” Sym started to pat him down, mainly checking for any bleeding. His jugular veins weren’t distended and his trachea seemed to be in the right place, but that wasn’t enough to reduce her suspicion of a pneumothorax on its own. He’d need a scan before she felt comfortable really ruling it out, and that was above her head.
When she checked her gloves after the pat down, they were still entirely blue. “Sweep’s clean,” she announced. His mental status was concerning too. That could’ve been the hypoxia, but it also could've been something else. “Can you grab me a BGL?” She asked, pulling open the ALS bag. “I’m gonna get a line in real quick.”
Kenobi shook his head slowly, any attempt at words replaced with a desperate gasp for air. “I know you don’t like needles, General. It’ll be quick, and it’ll help take good care of you, okay?”
He let out a quiet whine at that, but he didn’t pull away as Nye sunk the glycotest needle into his finger and Sym snapped the tourniquet around his arm. The bright red glow of his blood pressure on her HUD meant he wasn’t expecting it to be easy, but it still ended up taking longer than she would’ve liked. She wasn’t the kind of medic who normally had to dig.
While she worked at that, Nye started to get his vitals, slapping the pulse sticker onto his chest before clicking a monitoring bracelet around his wrist. She shook her head at Sym. “He’s running a fever at 39.1, resps thirty two, heart rate one-twenty-six, blood pressure eighty six over fifty eight. He’s still satting at eighty one. The oxygen isn’t helping.”
Sym nodded as she secured the IV in place. “Go ahead and get him on CPAP.” She pondered starting fluids, but decided against it. She didn’t want to overload his lungs, especially since she didn’t really know what was wrong yet. Hopefully they wouldn’t need to intubate him.
Nye reached back for the device. “We’re going to put you on a different mask to help you breathe better, okay?” Kenobi nodded slowly, tracking her movements with his eyes even though he couldn’t talk.
While she secured the CPAP mask to his face, Sym pulled out a stethoscope, parting his robes to expose his chest before pressing the bell skill. He flinched away from the cold metal, hands twitching. His chest rattled with every breath, crackling down both sides. She looked up to Kenobi. “Have you been sick?”
He nodded slowly again, falling into another coughing fit, staining the mask with more red-tinged sputum. She patted his shoulder. “Nye’s gonna get a scan of your chest, okay?”
The CPAP was helping a little bit, but his sats were still refusing to break into the higher eighties. After this scan, they’d be transporting, moving as fast as they possibly could. This was some nasty pneumonia.
Nye passed the scanner's blue beam over his chest and neck, passing it over to Sym when it beeped. “It’s showing some bilateral lung inflammation, but nothing very specific.” Internally, she sighed. Why couldn’t it have just been trauma?
She shared another look with Nye, who had already started positioning the hover stretcher next to him. “We’re going to get you onto the stretcher now, so we can take you to the medbay, okay?”
He nodded slowly, eyes drifting. She tapped his shoulder again. “Is it better sitting up?” Another nod.
Nye moved the head of the stretcher up. “Go ahead and scoot over.” Both of the medics helped him move over, careful of the tubes and monitors. She covered him with a sheet, cuffing it under his chin, then started to pull the straps over his body, making sure he wouldn’t fall off the stretcher. She positioned the CPAP in a safe spot.
She pushed the button, and the repulsorlifts engaged, slowly raising the stretcher off the ground. The mask hissed, helping force air into his lungs, as they grabbed their bags and moved towards the door.
His saturation was still colored red on her bucket’s HUD, even with the CPAP. The doors to hissed closed behind them. At least the aft medbay was close.