The Unchronicled Adventures of Ahsoka Tano, Book Eight

Chapter Seventy-Three: Parents

AHSOKA TANO 

Ahsoka was breathing what felt like a mile a minute. She could hardly focus on anything now; her vision and hearing were beginning to go. Somewhere in the middle of all of the white-hot agony, she had grabbed onto Lux's hand, who murmured comforting words to her and gripped her fingers back just as hard.

Amni, meanwhile, had been fussing with a tray of medical supplies, making some last-minute preparations for the birth. Halting her work for a moment, the young Twi'lek woman looked into her eyes, her expression severe and maybe even a little frightened. "Master Tano, I need you to get ready to push, really, really hard. Okay? Otherwise this will take a lot longer."

She nodded, biting her lip. Spots began to dance in front of her eyes, but she clung to consciousness with every available fiber of her being. The majority of the unable fibers were occupied with dealing with the pain.

"Master Tano! Get ready, now! One," she said.

"Two!" Ahsoka tried to fight it away, but the darkness was threatening to overwhelm her.

"Three! Push!"

One final heave, and it was over. Dimly, as if from the other end of a long tunnel, she could hear a baby's cries.

"It's a girl!" yelled Lux.

And then black. Nothing but kind, merciful black.

A few minutes later, Ahsoka opened her eyes again. "Lux..." she whispered, almost inaudibly. Her voice was finally starting to go from all that screaming.

"You did it, Ahsoka! You did it!" His smile on his face could have powered the whole of Coruscant for a decade.

"I need to see my daughter," she said, her sore throat making her cough.

Amni and Lux helped her sit up, and she placed a crying, squirming bundle wrapped in a blanket into her arms. She breathed a sigh of relief. The baby was perfectly healthy, but didn't look anything like what she had expected.

The little girl had Togruta markings on her face, and her skin was a tone in between Lux's light skin and Ahsoka's more tanned color. There were tiny wisps of hair on her head, and hints of montrals at the tops of her skull.

But what was strange about her was that, although her wispy hair was brown like her father's at the roots, the stands got thicker at the ends. It as almost as if they would turn into lekku at the bottom when she got older...

But Ahsoka wouldn't think about that now. She refused to. "You're beautiful," she said, kissing the top of the baby's head. The little one stopped crying, instead gurgling contentedly, as if understanding that she was with her mother now.

Lux leaned over towards her, making a move to sit down next to her on the bed, but Amni slapped him away. "What are we going to call her?"

Ahsoka pondered this for a moment. She had spent many hours thinking long and hard about what to call her baby. But, now that she was holding her child in her arms, none of the names she had come up with really seemed to fit.

"I like 'Aeja'," she said. "I think suits her. The Jedi records told me it was my mother's name."

He smiled gently. "It's perfect."

"Well, Lux, we're parents now," she said in a tired whisper. He planted a kiss on her cheek. "And since she's ours... What are we going to do about a last name?"

"I guess we'll call her Bonteri for now, but we'll come up with something. We always do," he replied.

"We always do..." she echoed. She pulled her baby closer.

Again, Lux tried to sit down next to her. And this time, Amni let him.

*Ahsoka and Lux's child has been born safely. But will their state of happiness be shattered by coming events? What have the Emperor and Darth Vader been planning in their apparent absence? And will the Onderonian Rebels emerge victorious from their current battle against the Empire? You'll find out in the next thrilling chapter of The Unchronicled Adventures Of Ahsoka Tano!

Sooooo.... LUXSOKA EVERYBODY!!!! How'd you like the chapter? And for those of you who had burning questions about the baby's name and gender, I hope they have finally been satisfied!

And btw, the name 'Aeja' stems from two Luxsoka daughter names that I found online that I liked, 'Aeris' and 'Shia'. Her name in my story was originally going to be spelled 'Aesha', but I liked the 'Aeja' spelling better.

So, I'll try to update again tonight. I'm going away for a week and a half in two days, so I'm going to be writing like a maniac trying to wrap this book up before then! Bye!

Realize that your actions contributed to your wife dying in childbirth and may the Force be with you,

Sharron