Chapter Text
There was a message from an unknown sender waiting on Anakin’s com channel when he finally stumbled into his bunk after three straight days of fighting on Muunilinst. According to the time stamp, it had been there for awhile, but he must have missed it under the constant barrage of orders and battle updates of the last few days. Anakin could barely keep his eyes open, but his heart raced at the sight of the blinking notification. Padmé. It must be from Padmé. Who else would be writing him from an unlisted com frequency?
It wasn’t from Padmé. Anakin, it read, you hardly know me, but your mother would have wanted us to look after each other. I know the Jedi are involved in the fighting. Are you alright? Please, don’t be a stranger. Cliegg Lars.
Cliegg Lars? Cliegg Lars?! How did he even have Anakin’s com frequency? Anakin certainly didn’t remember giving it to him. But then, he didn’t remember much about that last trip to Tatooine. Just the rattle of his mother’s dying breath, the weight of her body, and the stench of burning flesh as he cut down Tusken after Tusken. The rest of it was lost in a haze of rage and grief and sand.
For a moment, Anakin wanted to ignore it, delete it, smash the comlink on the floor. He didn’t need this reminder of his failure as a Jedi and a son, not when he’d just spent the last three days failing over and over again to protect his men. No, Anakin didn’t need this, but maybe Lars did. His mom always said that the biggest problem in the galaxy was that no one helped each other. She would want him to look after her widower.
Yawning hugely and struggling to focus his eyes, Anakin sent out a quick reply and feel asleep with his boots on.
Cliegg woke alone to the smell of caf and frying eggs. Lying with his eyes closed, he imagined Shmi must have gotten up before him and started making breakfast. But when he reached across, her side of the bed was cold. A few of her dark hairs still clung to her pillow, but it had lost the shape of her head. His wife slept in sand now and Cleigg would sleep alone until he joined her. He let his grief wash over him, then pushed it aside and started his day.
In the kitchen, Beru puttered around the stove while Owen methodically shoveled forkfuls of egg into his mouth. He grunted a greeting as Cliegg floated to the table on his power chair. Since Cliegg’s injury, Owen had taken over more and more of the farm work. He needed to eat fast if he had any hope of staying on top of it.
“Good morning,” Beru said as she set a plate and steaming mug of caf down in front of him. Cliegg took a sip of the caf before digging in. The eggs weren’t quite like Shmi’s, but the caf had just the right about of blue milk mixed in. Beru joined them with her own breakfast a moment later. “There’s a message for you on the comm channel,” she said as she settled down on the bench next to Owen.
“Really? Who from?”
“Anakin,” Owen grumbled between mouthfuls. “Days late and a few hundred credits short as always.”
Beru frowned at her husband, but Cliegg just sighed. After years of Shmi’s stories about her sweet, talented boy, the strange young man who had walked off into the desert and came back with her corpse had been something of a disappointment. He’d fixed every broken thing on the farm, but had barely spoken to any of them. What Cliegg chalked up to grief and shock, Owen put down to Jedi pride and standoffishness, and no amount of tutting on Beru’s part would change that. Cliegg had hoped that maybe getting to know Anakin would. It had been a disappointment that, when Cliegg reached out, the boy never reached back.
“What does it say?” Beru asked, leaning forward to get a glimpse as Cliegg pulled the message up on a data pad. He read it over, then read it again, and a third time just to make sure. Weren’t the Jedi supposed to have educated the boy? Shmi had been a slave her whole life and she wrote better than this.
“Well?” Owen put his fork down and joined his wife in trying to sneak a peek. He had a man’s shape and bore a man’s burden, but, by the suns, he looked just like a boy at that moment.
Cliegg chuckled and read Anakin’s message aloud, word for word as he’d written it. “Sorry. Tired. Three days fighting Muunilinst. Lost rt arm Geonosis. Hop u r well. Anakin.”
Owen and Beru blinked at him as they tried to process Anakin’s incoherent jumble of a message. Owen took a long gulp of his caf to help and shook his head.
Beru’s fork clattered on the table as it slipped from her fingers. “He lost his arm?!” Beru exclaimed. She pulled the data pad from Cleigg’s hand to read it over herself. “He lost his arm and they sent him to fight?” She slapped it down on the table with a bit more force than necessary.
What? Cliegg pulled the pad around read the message again. Lost rt arm Geonosis. The fighting there had happened just after Anakin and his woman had left, a little over a standard month ago. Even with all the medicine a Hutt could afford, there was no way he’d be well enough to tie his own boots, let alone fight in a war. Yet, from the sound of it, that’s just what he was doing. The Jedi had promised Shmi that they would take care her son and provide him with an education. Based on Anakin’s message, they’d done neither. Well, someone needed to look after this boy and it might as well be his family. Cliegg Lars set aside his breakfast and began to write.