Snippets of Ahch-To (AU) (discontinued)

#4: The Past (Progressive Deterioration)

An ancient man and his young granddaughter were onlooking the sea, watching the waves roll and descend back into the ocean. In the warm sunlight, the elder rested, confined in his hoverchair, while the young lady - the former scavenger - found herself a spot on a mossy rock.

A breeze washed past Anakin's hunched form. The colder air stung his lungs when he breathed in, and soon the ailing Anakin Skywalker was struck with a coughing fit. His eyes squeezed shut as his body convulsed; he winced at the pain in his chest. His already trembling right hand shook a little more.

Rey drew the hoverchair close and gently kissed the wizened, scarred, colorless cheeks, too afraid to place a hand over his collapsing, fragile lungs for it might suffocate him. She held his clattering metal hand tight as she pulled his large blanket up to his neck.

"Thank-..." Anakin was too weak to finish his words of gratitude. His practically grey and rather crinkled eyelids fluttered down to cover nearly blind eyes as he feebly leaned into Rey's chest, gasping for air.

The former scavenger wished Ahch-To to have the luxury of advanced medicines, to quell his sicknesses, to repel his ailments. She could not refute that she was rather concerned with the decline in his health, which was worse than the galactic standard for his age.

Rey knew her grandfather's health was rapidly deteriorating (for example, he had suspected the sight of his severely impaired left eye to be completely gone once he reaches 77 standard years old), but today was an especially bad. Yet despite being bedridden from illness and fatigue, Anakin had stubbornly insisted Rey to wheel him outside the hut, so he could bask under the sun as he fell asleep and drifted a little closer to his ultimate death. He had requested his granddaughter to stay with him, wishing to spend more time with her before he became one with the Force.

Rey didn't want her grandfather to die. She loved him, and she knew the feeling was mutual.

Rey gently lifted her grandfather - essentially a lump of deteriorating flesh that had cybernetics attached to it and a warm blanket on top - into her lap. She could feel Ani's rapid, feeble, unsteady, quivering breaths against her chest. With effort, the trembling hand withdrew from Rey's touch, and the metal thumb did the best it could to brush against her calloused skin.

"Would you like to return to your bed, Grandpa?" Rey murmured next to his ear-sub, her voice soft and soothing.

"Hmm?" The old man struggled to rasp. His voice had simply disintegrated, quite like what most of his senses are currently doing. Anakin's taste buds and nostrils were becoming less sensitive. Each day he lost more hearing and sight, and without his cane, he couldn't even stand up by himself. Time was not treating his battered body well.

His breath shook a little more, and Rey let his head loll into a comfortable position in her arms. A rough hand touched his arm, making the decrepit man's nearly blind eyes crinkle in joy.

"Grandpa... Loves... Rey..." He forced out with his waning strength, hoping his voice was audible to his precious little desert jewel. Both hands violently shaking, he somehow managed to caress her face for a few moments before they sank into her lap from tremendous exhaustion.

"Sun... Rey... Lovely..."

Rey knew her grandfather would refuse to be moved until he requested so. She readjusted the blanket, so her grandfather could feel more comfortable as he drifted towards his daily dozes.

But before he slept, she wanted to ask a question that had been nagging her at the back of her mind. She brushed her grandfather's tiny, melted and deformed ear stubs, getting his attention. Two bleary eyes gradually shifted their unfocused gaze upward, and a toothless smile rose upon Anakin's pallid face as he gave a very slow and slight nod. Groaning, he managed to rest a twitching hand onto her shoulder.