Anakin groaned, breaking the deafening silence around him, his body aching. He was sure he was cut all over and bleeding rather profoundly, but his brain didn't seem to care much about that. Dust and other microscopic dirt particles clouded the air around him and he coughed, attempting to open his eyes. That was when he discovered that his eyes were open and that it was dark all around him. He was having some trouble breathing, and he realized he was buried deep under layers of rock and rubble. Somehow—out of sheer dumb luck he decided—the rocks had fallen so that they weren't crushing him, though they were still trapping him in place.

Coughing and groaning again, Anakin reached out with the Force to see if he could sense his friend. "Obi-Wan?" he called out into the darkness, carefully shifting in the rubble and trying his hardest not to disrupt the rocks above into collapsing on him. He winced at the pain he could feel all over his body, but pushed the nuisances aside and focused on finding Obi-Wan in all the rubble. "Obi-Wan."

His heart clenched, fear washing through him; had his actions cost his friend his life?

No, it didn't! He realized with a rush of relief as he finally found his friend's Force Signature somewhere in the rubble nearby him. It seemed, however, that Obi-Wan hadn't regained consciousness as Anakin had.

Anakin continued to stretch out his senses, silently assessing their situation. It seemed he was buried far below meters of rubble; not a good situation at all. Obi-Wan was in a similar position, though Anakin sensed that Obi-Wan actually had a leg and arm pinned by the rubble; he didn't know if the rubble had caused an injury, but he could wait until Obi-Wan woke up for that. He winced in sympathy for the elder Jedi and was just starting to try and figure out a way out of the mess of rubble when he remembered the third member of their party.

Feeling sick to his stomach, Anakin slowly and carefully brought his arm up to his face. He turned on his comlink and winced when he saw the rubble mere inches from his face, finally seeing the precarious prison of rubble he was in with his own eyes from the weak blue light cast from his comlink. He hardly had any room to move. Finding the right connection for the comlink that Jedi pair had let Luke borrow, Anakin tried to get ahold of their inexperienced Jedi companion.

"Luke...Luke..." he paused to cough from the dust again. "Luke, are you there? Can you hear me? Luke."

He didn't get an answer, and he felt fear grip him once again—this time for the young man's life. Please, oh please, don't let my actions have killed him. Oh Force, please let him be alive, Anakin found himself thinking fiercely as he tried again. "Luke, are you there? Luke!"

He heard his friend's weak voice call out in the rubble, somewhere above and off to his left. "Anakin?" he heard Obi-Wan groan quietly.

Anakin stopped calling for Luke for a moment. "Master? I'm here. Are you alright?" he called back to Obi-Wan.

Obi-Wan gave a cry of pain which was quickly stifled. "I'm pinned under this rubble, it's my arm and leg..." he told Anakin.

"I know; I'm trying to think of a way out..."

"Should I try Rex and Cody?"

"Is your comlink pinned?"

"No, it's the other arm that's pinned."

Anakin grimaced. "I'm sorry Master...for all of this."

"I'll scold you if we make it out of this alive, Anakin; right now focus on getting us out."

Anakin sighed. "Alright, you go ahead and call Rex and Cody."

He heard Obi-Wan proceed to contact the two and explain their dangerous situation to them while Anakin tried Luke once again. "Luke, are you there? Can you hear me? Luke, answer me," he called into the comlink, his voice growing steadily more desperate.

Obi-Wan paused upon hearing Anakin's attempts and mumbled something to whoever he was talking to before he called out to Anakin. "Have you been able to get ahold of him?"

"Nothing," Anakin replied, his voice strained.

"Keep trying, he might just be unconscious," Obi-Wan said firmly, trying to give Anakin some hope to hold onto.

Anakin made an exasperated sound that caused him to cough, clearing his throat again before he continued his attempts to reach the youthful Jedi. "Luke? Luke? Luke, come on, answer me. Luke!"

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Luke sluggishly started to come back to himself, though as his senses started to return, he scrambled to hold onto the blackness he'd been in prior. This new darkness was so full of pain, and he didn't want that. However, he eventually came to despite his valiant efforts to stay unconscious.

His body hurt, his head throbbed in pain, and his neck was painfully tilted too far backwards. The edge of the vent was biting into his back, and had started to cut rather deeply into his back. One arm was pinned against the outside of the front edge of the vent between the vent and a large rock, and the other arm was encased completely by rocks as well, though it was higher up then the first arm. He tried to move his head, but he hit it on a rock above him and instantly froze. His head was stuck in this tiny space in the rocks and his back was bent at a bad angle half out of the vent; he was completely trapped. He couldn't move at all.

Panic was rising fast, his head throbbed, and his breathing was shallow, but he clung to his limited training and used what he knew to calm himself down the best he could. He stretched out his senses, ears ringing as he continued to slowly come back to his usual calm self. He could tell that he was buried far, far, far below the rubble, and his heart sank. He didn't think he had any way out; no one knew where he'd been and he'd been so far below ground before the building caved. On top of that, he doubted there was enough oxygen for him to last until a rescue.

As Luke's hearing came back to him, he realized his comlink was still working...somewhat.

"L...e...ca..." The static was horrible, and the comlink was probably damaged beyond repair, but he could hear someone trying to get through.

"Lu...e!"

Recognizing the voice as his father's, Luke slowly and cautiously rotated his wrist until he felt a rock press against the button he knew would let him reply.

"I'm here!" he called out. His voice was cracked and raspy, but apparently it was loud enough for the Anakin to hear; good, Luke was worried speaking much louder would bring the remaining rubble down on him.

More static came through.

"W...ah...e," his father's voice came, his words broken up and distorted.

Did he ask where Luke was? "I'm trapped; I can't move at all! I was in the ventilation shafts when the collapse happened! I can't even move my head and I'm really far below the surface. I was nearing the basement when the place caved," Luke told him sorrowfully.

There was silence on the other end for a while and Luke briefly wondered if his comlink had finally broken. However, his father's voice came through again in the next moment.

"L...e...m...s...r...e...I...pd...It...aul..."

Luke shook his head. "My comlink is too damaged, I can't make sense—" Luke paused to cough. "I can't make sense of what you're saying."

Through the Force Bond he'd realized existed even in this time before Luke had been born, although it was rather weak and needed some strengthening, Luke felt a twinge of his father's exasperation. Luke clung to that small Force Bond, reaching out for his father as his father's feelings became clearer for Luke to sense.

Luke felt pain, exasperation, fear, and desperation from his father, though it seemed he was also trying to keep a level head.

"I...m...go...ing...to...tr...y...ta...lk...in...like...this...so...y...ou...ca...n...h...ear...m...e," came his father's voice as Anakin spoke extra slowly.

Luke smiled a little. "Alright. So do you have a plan on how to get out of this?"

"We...re...wo...rki...ng...o...n...it."

"Oka—" Luke was cut off by the sound of groaning metal and suddenly everything around him shifted. Apparently part of the vent finally caved under the weight of the rocks. The edge of the vent raked violently up his back, digging in deep enough to elicit a unwarranted scream of pain as he moved, his arm that was trapped in the rubble yanked sharply upwards, probably breaking the comlink entirely, and he hit his head hard on the rock again as he was dropped down. He had to hurriedly use the Force to keep the rocks from falling on his head and crushing it, slowly setting them strategically so that he wouldn't have to keep holding the rocks.

Luke choked off his pain, suffering his agony in silence. He could sense panic run through his father, though considering he didn't even hear static from the comlink he was sure it had been entirely broken. He felt his back bleeding steadily, hearing the sound of it drip steadily onto the vent. Luke closed his eyes, letting out a slow and shaky breath.

I'm going to die down here, he thought, feeling emotionally numb while his physical pain was all too real.

********************************************************************************************

Anakin heard the groan of the metal and Luke's shout of agony, and then the comlink went dead.

"Luke! Luke! Luke!" he called desperately into the comlink with no success. Dread and panic washed through him and he clung to the presence he'd eventually identified as Luke a little while back, needing the reassurance that he was still alive.

"What happened?" Obi-Wan called to Anakin.

"I don't know; I was talking to Luke and...I think more rubble caved in on him," Anakin said, his voice sounding strained once again. He could sense the youthful Jedi's immense pain, and realized Luke was even starting to slip towards resignation. He made an exasperated sound deep in his throat. "Come on Luke, don't give up on me!"

"Can you sense him?" Obi-Wan asked incredulously.

"Yeah, and I think he's giving up."

"Don't let him," Obi-Wan replied sharply.

Anakin nodded, clinging to that Force Bond he had with the Jedi and trying to give him reassuring and hopeful feelings. It was a rather trying task since Anakin was panicked and fearful himself.

"Are they coming?" he abruptly asked Obi-Wan.

"They're trying," Obi-Wan said.

"Well they have to hurry. Luke's deep underground and only has so much oxygen..."

"So are we, Anakin. We're all in a precarious situation. They'll do what they can, but...nothing's sure," Obi-Wan said quietly.

Anakin gave a growl of frustration, feeling around with the Force until he found the top. Focusing the best he could, he slowly began to move the rock at the top. Every movement had to be done carefully or he could accidentally bury the two of them, and it would be the swift end of that idea. It was painstakingly slow progress, but if he did nothing it might be too late by the time that Cody and Rex's team arrived to help dig them out.

Eventually, Anakin could feel the clones up above them and he heard Obi-Wan contact Cody on the comlink, giving Cody rushed instructions with his labored breathing. Their oxygen was running out, though Anakin had been too distracted by his efforts while also keeping track of the fading Luke to really care. He could feel the rubble become lighter and lighter and helped the soldiers to move the rubble with the Force in an effort to speed the rescue up. He felt relief rush through him for a moment as light broke through the cracks of the rocks that had caved in on him, though he held the remaining rocks up with the Force as they were moved out of the way. He moved painfully to free himself, secretly grateful when some of the clones, one of them being Rex, dropped down to help him up. Anakin squeezed his eyes shut at the harshness of the light after being in the dark so long as the clones helped him up out of the ginormous pile of rubble. He sensed Obi-Wan reaching the point of freedom next to him as well. As they moved the rubble off of Obi-Wan's arm and leg, he cried out in pain, and they had to support him as they pulled him out of the rubble. They got them to the top, and Anakin distantly heard Rex say something about getting them out of there for medical attention. Anakin stopped him before he could even finish the sentence.

"Luke," he said, surprised at how raspy his voice was. "We need to get Luke out from under this. I know where he is; follow me."

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Luke was painfully awake; he didn't really have it in him anymore, but for some reason he was still alive. Air trickled in and out of his lungs at a very slow, labored rate, and he knew he was quickly running out of oxygen. His head swam feverishly, his body was in agony, he could still hear the rhythmic drip, drip, drip of his blood, and he felt as if he was partially detached from his body; as if all the pain was there, but at the same time it wasn't.

With time being an indiscernible concept under the rubble, Luke simply knew that at some point his breathing became forced, his chest burning as his lungs tried to live off of a tiny, nearly non-existent amount of oxygen. When unconsciousness came to claim him once again, he welcomed it happily, the feeling of the empty blackness so much better than the never-ending agony he was in now.

********************************************************************************************

Anakin, although bleeding and weak, helped the clones dig through the rubble he could sense Luke under with a frantic, speedy pace. With every passing moment, Luke's Force Signature dimmed, and Anakin's panic level rose.

Force, don't let him die because of me, please don't...

Steadily they grew closer to Luke, and Anakin had to step back and let the clones dig, using the Force to keep the rocks from crushing the youthful man any further then they might already be. Finally, he saw the Jedi's limp hand appear in the rubble, and he instantly leaped down, throwing the rocks aside in a haze as he uncovered the arm, quickly finding his head. Luke's Force Signature was so weak Anakin feared the worst as the dirt-covered blonde head appeared. Anakin felt a sudden rush of strong, fierce protectiveness as he looked down at the Jedi, moving more of the rocks and slowly uncovering the ventilation shaft Luke was halfway hanging out of. He placed his hands on the Jedi's back to lift him up, and almost dropped him in the same moment. Anakin pulled one hand away, realizing it was slick with Luke's blood. Grimacing, with his fear growing with every moment, he finally managed to completely uncover Luke, carrying Luke out of the rubble and to the surface himself.

"Get a medical capsule here, right now!" he demanded in a loud but still throaty voice, getting down on one knee and holding Luke up as he looked the young man over. "Force, Luke, don't die on me. Especially not like this."