S T A N D I N G
The world swam in fragments of color and light.
A crimson pulse against sterile white. The sound of a ventilator, low and rhythmic, like a sleeping beast in the corner of the room. Then came the hiss, sharp, mechanical, bacta nozzles priming as the droids worked in calm precision. Somewhere between those sounds was the faint hum of a repulsorlift bed, the kind reserved for those who were too broken to stand but too stubborn to die. Renn Vizsla fit neatly into that category.
He didn’t remember how much he took, only the feeling of each one leaving a piece of its echo behind. The armor had held through most of it; Beskar was stubborn that way, but even Beskar couldn’t stop everything. There were gaps, joints, seams meant for mobility. He’d bled through all of them.
The light above him was too bright when his eyes first cracked open. His throat was sandpaper, his chest heavy. It took him a few sluggish breaths to realize the weight across his torso wasn’t armor anymore, it was a med-compress, cinched tight to keep the bacta from spilling as the gel pumped into the deeper wounds. His gauntlets were gone, too. The hands beneath were raw and swollen, fingers flexing weakly against the restraint field to test if he was still whole.
He wasn’t sure he liked the answer.
“Vitals stable,” a droid’s monotone voice cut through the haze. “Bacta saturation approaching optimal levels. Initiating nerve-mesh reconstruction cycle three.”
A faint, electric tingle spread across his ribs and side, then down into his leg. The sensation made him grimace, though the sound came out more as a growl. Pain was pain; it didn’t matter if it was synthetic or earned. Still, he forced himself to stay silent, breathing through it like he had through every blade, blast, and flame before. Mandalorians didn’t cry out in infirmaries. Not if they could help it.
The droid pivoted on its repulsorlift, hovering close to adjust one of the dermal sealers along his abdomen. “You suffered multiple lacerations to the sub-thoracic cavity,” it continued clinically. “Two punctures to the right lung. One major arterial severance. Fractures in the ulna, tibia, and fourth rib. You should be deceased.”
Renn gave a dry, humorless chuckle. “You sound disappointed.”
“Statement: Merely surprised, Warden Vizsla. Statistical survival rate: 2.4 percent.”
“Guess I’m not much for statistics.”
His voice came out low, strained, like gravel scraped against metal. The mask of his helmet wasn’t there to hide behind, and he hated that. The room felt too open without it. Exposed. His hair, dark hair was matted to his temple, and the sharp scent of bacta and cauterized flesh clung to him like a shadow. He wanted to tear the monitors off, stand up, and prove he could still fight. But when he tried, the world tilted. Pain roared in from the edges, dragging him back down.
The med-droid responded by adjusting his dosage, a faint hiss through the IV line. “Recommendation: Remain still. Regeneration cycle incomplete.”
“Noted,” Renn muttered, though the words tasted like defeat.
Hours passed, or maybe minutes. Time bent oddly when half-conscious.
He drifted between memory and now: flashes of the fight that brought him here. The sound of durasteel walls ringing with blasterfire. The way the knife slid beneath his plate and found the soft space near his ribs. The look on his enemy’s face when Renn didn’t fall, not yet. Mandalorians were bred for war, but even war had moments that clung like ghosts. Thoughts brought him back to the fight on the Death Star III and the Death Trooper (Maera Dren) that had aided in leaving him in such a torn state.
His eyes opened again to the faint shimmer of bacta vapor curling in the air. The infirmary had dimmed, night cycle, probably. The hum of droids was quieter now, routine maintenance more than emergency triage. He exhaled slowly, feeling the ache in his chest like a slow fire receding to embers.
A voice broke the silence. Not a droid this time, something with cadence, tone. Human.
“You’re lucky, Vizsla.”
Renn turned his head slightly, vision still blurry, but the outline was unmistakable: Mandalorian armor in deep cobalt, helm under one arm. One of the citadel’s guards, maybe a subordinate, though Renn couldn’t recall the name. “That so?” he rasped.
“Lucky the med-droids found you before the blood loss took you. Half the squad thought you were done.”
He forced a faint smirk. “Half the squad doesn’t know me well enough.”
The soldier gave a short nod, something between respect and disbelief. “You should rest, Warmaster. The Mand’alor’s been informed. He said you’d curse him if he visited before you were conscious.”
“He’s not wrong,” Renn said. His eyes drifted toward the ceiling again. “Tell him I’m not dead yet. That’ll do.”
The soldier hesitated before stepping closer. “You were out there for hours, sir. Alone. What the hell happened?”
Renn’s jaw tightened. The question stirred fragments he wasn’t ready to face. “Doesn’t matter. The job’s done.”
“Whatever it was, it nearly killed you.”
He didn’t respond. The silence that followed said enough.
When the guard left, Renn finally managed to sit up, barely. Every movement felt like dragging lead through his veins. His side screamed, the bacta hissed in protest, and the monitors spiked warnings in angry crimson. The droid was back within seconds.
“Patient movement unauthorized. Stabilization incomplete.”
“I’m done lying down,” he growled, teeth clenched. “Get me the armor.”
“Denial: You are not fit for combat or deployment.”
“Didn’t say I was.” His voice was ice. “Just bring it.”
The droid paused, logic circuits spinning. Then, perhaps recognizing the futility of arguing with a Mandalorian, it complied. The armor was stacked neatly in the corner, a testament to the techs who’d cleaned it. Or tried to. The plates were scarred and burnt, streaked with black carbon scoring. A few were missing entirely, likely cut away to reach his wounds. The sight made Renn’s chest tighten more than the pain ever had.
He ran his fingertips across the breastplate when the droid brought it over. A dent, roughly the size of a blade hilt, marred the surface. “You held up,” he murmured under his breath, as if speaking to an old comrade. “Better than I did.”
For a long time, he just stared at it, at the burn marks, the scars, the faint smears of dried blood that even bacta couldn’t wash out. The armor was memory. Each mark told a story, each story a lesson. Survival wasn’t just about enduring. It was about remembering why you did.
He lost count of the hours again. Sleep came and went in uneasy waves, broken by flashes of light and sound that weren’t real. Sometimes it was the clash of blades, sometimes a voice, Aether Verd's, calm and commanding, calling him back to purpose. Sometimes it was the quiet hum of a ship over Roon’s clouds, taking him back to that first time he’d been named Warmaster. The weight of that title pressed heavier now than the bandages.
When he next woke, the bacta tanks along the wall glowed faint blue in the early hours. A few patients occupied them, soldiers who hadn’t been as lucky as he had. Renn’s eyes lingered on them a while. Mandalorians didn’t mourn in the open, but they didn’t forget, either.
He flexed his hand again, stronger this time. The pain was still there, dulled but steady. Proof he was alive. He reached for the edge of the bed, letting his boots find the cold durasteel floor. The world tilted again, but he stayed upright.
“Unauthorized movement detected,” the droid warned from across the room.
“Yeah,” he muttered, taking another step. “So what else is new?”
He crossed the room slowly, each breath like fire in his ribs. The small viewport near the far wall overlooked Roon’s southern foothold, the jungles stretching into fog, the citadel’s banners visible even through the mist. Dawn was coming, bleeding orange into the gray sky. The sight steadied him more than the bacta ever could.
He pressed a hand to the glass. “Still standing,” he whispered.
