The Secret Apprentice | Vader x OC

Grief

Aurin looked at Vader, having no choice but to at this point. Her eyes trailed along his chest, abdomen, and biceps. I have to give her credit though since she never made her observations obvious. Vader had preemptively kept his Force telepathy out of her head, neither of us wanting to bother with her thoughts right now.

Ciera spoke up while removing and powering down his breath mask to replace it with the mask of a much more advanced ventilator, "painkillers? Or no. Anesthesia is also—"

"No." He cut her off, making it clear that he was already annoyed and impatient.

"As you wish, Lord Vader..." Powering the ventilator on, the air pumping into the mask was so clean and pristine that it felt pleasant enough for him to close his eyes.

The med droid initiated the surgery by creating a single incision at the closest point to the first wire, this one being the less complicated out of the two for them to access. Vader didn't even flinch at his skin being cut open, both Ciera and Aurin eyeing the operation table's display that provided them with a detailed, scanned image of the specific wire and its location. Blip was curious, studying the process from over my shoulder.

Ciera spoke to Aurin while I approached the table, "Alright. This first wire is directly behind this one in the front." She pointed it out to her, and she nodded, "sounds good."

Ciera looked at the incision, her gloved hand slipping her index finger and thumb into the split sections of skin. Vader just barely scrunched his eyebrows together in discomfort, feeling her fingers shifting around within his abdomen. Ciera looked to the display again, pushing her entire fist into his abdominal cavity to slip her arm in to hug it between his rib cage and intestines. The instant her arm got to mid-forearm, a cringe sprang onto his lips and his eyes flew open. He abruptly raised a tightly enclosed fist to then slam it back down onto the table with a loud crash, his teeth clenched together as he let out a deep, loud growly groan in discomfort.

The slam of his fist led both Auren and I to jump, neither of us expecting it. Ciera stressed, "I know. Unfortunately this must be done by hand, there is no tool sophisticated enough to make this easier for either of us."

Vader snapped, "Shut your mouth and get it done before I rip out your tongue!" His eyes were almost frightening.

Aurin and I were shocked as Ciera went on as though she hadn't heard his threat and hadn't even been phased by it, "alright, I've got it. Tightening the wire...now."

The motion of her fingers caused him to bend his legs, every sensation nearly unbearable with how uncomfortable it was for him. It began to send him back to the day the droids installed those wires inside of him. Everything that happened within those months of surgery had left him with mental trauma that periodically led him to suffer phantom sensations of unbearable pain. Thankfully for now, he was able to avoid falling into that pit of hellish recollection by locking his eyes on me. His eyes were nearly boiling with a color matching that of magma, the look of discomfort in his face and distress in his eyes led me to move a hand into his hair.

"It's going to be okay. You're strong—"

Vader cut me off, turning his head away from my hand to roll it around a little as though trying to shake off his discomfort, "for kriff's sake, Reina. Just stop."

His words left me feeling discouraged, Blip emitted a quiet boop at my emotional shift. Ciera chimed, "First wire, done." She steadily withdrew her arm, Vader cringing mildly the entire way. 

With that wire tightened, the droid began to seal his skin while Ciera removed her glove, "once the droid has finished cauterizing your incision, I want you to turn onto your stomach."