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His Master's voice grated out, completely unmoved, his close presence looming, blurred both in Luke's vision and in the Force. "There was a bomb. You were injured. Can you remember this?"

Luke closed his eyes, made the slightest movement of acknowledgement with his head, even this lighting fireworks down his spine and across his chest. "Where?" It was barely a whisper and it cut down his throat like a blade, but he knew Palpatine would hear it and understand.

"You are on Coruscant. You were badly injured - the assassination attempt was almost successful."

There was the slightest hint of amusement in his Master's voice, mixed in with his outrage at having something which belonged to him damaged. No pity, no empathy; the only concern that his possession would be taken away. But then Luke expected no more. A word slowly percolated through the haze, making him frown. "Assassination?"

"They wanted you, my friend; you were the target." Palpatine's tone did not invite debate. "The bombs were not time-triggered, someone waited to activate them remotely. Waited for their target to arrive. They were too small and too few and badly placed to do any lasting damage to a Super Star Destroyer - they had a very different target."

"How many?" Luke whispered, making Palpatine frown. "How many...died?" he was faltering now, even this small exertion draining him.

Palpatine looked askance, clearly unsure why his Jedi would care, but Mara spoke up, her eyes on the Emperor. "Forty-seven dead; mostly troopers from the 701st. Another sixty-odd wounded. The count would have been much higher, but we were already on alert and the bays had begun to evacuate."

Luke sighed, disturbed; incensed, as the facts sank in. Forty-seven dead. Sixty wounded. For what? To get to one man.

His Master's voice cut through this thoughts. "We will find out who did this."

"I want them." he whispered, putting all of his remaining strength into the breathless words so that his Master would remember, "Alive- I want them alive."

His Master set his head on one side, voice half-curiosity, half-challenge, "For what?"

Words were beyond him now, no energy left to even whisper, but he reached out through the Force to Palpatine, passing through that link all of his growing outrage and anger. His desire to deal with this personally - to look his attackers in the eye before he killed them, so that they would know that it was he who did this. Himself, face to face- not hiding behind the anonymity of impersonal weapons which killed and maimed indiscriminately, but he and his enemy, face to face. Retribution.

Palpatine smiled indulgently- this he understood. "I will give them to you, my friend." His quiet cackle pulled pale lips to a thin line as he watched his wounded, aggrieved Wolf's eyelids flutter closed, exhaustion and injury quickly overtaking that burst of dark emotion. "I will give you your revenge."

.

.

.

"There's probably something you should know, now that he seems to be more aware." Hallin said ominously as Mara stood by the high medical bed, studying Luke's sleeping face. She'd remained when everyone else had left, attentive as ever, and considering what he now suspected about she and Luke, Hallin felt it only fair that Mara should know.

She turned immediately, and Nathan rushed to reassure, "Don't worry, it's nothing terrible- just something that we may have to deal with in the coming weeks... and beyond."

"What kind of something?" Mara asked warily.

"Typically with this kind of condition resulting from deep coma following traumatic brain injury or hypovolemia, the patient may exhibit a range of resultant secondary effects collectively called postconcussion syndrome..."

"Basic please?" Mara prompted tersely, hearing Hallin drop into his professional medic mode. The medic paused a few seconds, searching for the right words.

"You may find him a little... different. Unpredictable perhaps. People recovering from comas following head injuries - brain trauma - will often exhibit new character traits, though they're generally temporary. They often complain of racing thoughts, they're unable to sleep, you may notice that they've lost some social function... interpersonal and social judgement may be impaired so they may act inappropriately or out of character. They may exhibit a tendency towards violent episodes, become more mercurial with inconsistent, often contradictory mood swings."

"Fantastic." Mara deadpanned, a thousand scenarios involving Luke and Palpatine coming horrendously to mind. "But this is temporary?"

"Probably."

"Probably isn't yes."

Hallin shrugged, unable to answer, "There may be some permanent changes, it's too early to say. There may be few or practically none of these symptoms; he may suffer no more than temporary memory loss and headaches. If he does evidence further symptoms, recovery of cognitive deficits is greatest in the first six months, but it may be total or minimal."

"Don't feel you have to commit to anything substantial, Hallin." Mara said sardonically.

"Postconcussion syndrome is notoriously unpredictable." Hallin defended, "The mind is a complex organ and personal consciousness and cognitive ability is subjective at best. There's no data as to how it may effect a Force-sensitive. If it reassures you any, his coma was mid-level and relatively short, and the speed with which he received treatment for hypervolaemia and hypoxia was favourable, plus there's been no indication of post-traumatic epilepsy golloeing surgery, therefore all indications point to a positive prognosis. In the meantime you should know that his short-term memory will be affected. It's not obvious yet because he's not entirely coherent, but he presently has no ability to lay down new memories. It's perfectly normal- nothing to worry about. Remember he's still recovering, his brain simply doesn't have the resources to both repair injuries and create new synapses at present."

Mara frowned; "But he still remembers everything?"

"Chances are he's lost nothing from his past save perhaps the last few minutes or hours leading up to the explosion- he's just not going to recall from waking session to waking session for a short while. It's perfectly normal. Remember that the actual blow to the head isn't the problem; it's the resultant swelling, internal haemorrhaging and hypoxia - oxygen deficiency - which means that the brain suffers cross-the-board damage. It basically closed down for a while and in doing so may have lost certain parameters. He'll improve every day now but for the time being, a good amount of your talks with him will be spent going over the same few facts."

And they were, the same few facts over and over. It became something of a rote, Mara learning to recite all relevant points in a rush of information when he woke, Hallin far more patient; more willing to indulge.

She hadn't really noticed before how committed he was to Luke - how protective - but then Luke had never really needed it before, Mara supposed. She'd always scorned Hallin, believing him little more than an opportunistic hanger-on, but everything she'd seen in the last few weeks had put that into question; he'd helped Mara when he hadn't needed to, had remained always in the medicentre, attentive and dedicated. Everything about his actions, his casual, cordial manner and open, informal demeanour around Skywalker- and more importantly, Skywalker's comparable, comfortable reaction- all suggested a long-standing connection. As much as she hated to admit she'd had him wrong, it seemed the medic sincerely cared about Skywalker. They had after all, arrived in the Palace together and now had three years of shared chaos and confusion as they'd found their way; that was a lot of history - the kind of thing which built a genuine friendship.

And all she could think in the face of that realisation was one thing; at what point, she wondered, would Palpatine decide to use it against Luke?