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“Are you Reath Silas?”
Reath looked up from the tiled floor of the Halls of Healing which had been holding his attention in an almost a trance-like state. He hadn’t heard the door open. Instead, a young human woman dressed in the robes of a Jedi healer entered, fiddling with a datapad. She looked a little young to be a medic, but then again, Reath felt a little young to be a Jedi Knight.
He tried his best to clear his throat of the lump still there.
“That’s me.”
“Great,” the woman smiled brightly, forming dimples in her soft, heart-shaped face—a face that seemed out of place in the serene, reverent halls of the temple. “I’m Citara Cirris. I’ve been assigned for your physical therapy.”
Reath nodded. He knew that’s why he was here, but it still didn’t seem quite real. He had felt ready for his first solo mission as a Jedi Knight, but now…now he couldn’t help but wonder if it had all been a mistake—if his actions on Corellia had been a fluke.
“Let’s take a look.”
He wasn’t sure what to do as she motioned for him to extend a limb that wasn’t there anymore. Well, most of it anyway. His right arm, his dominant one, had been cleanly severed by his lightsaber at the elbow. An advanced prosthetic had been surgically grafted onto Reath’s arm but not yet activated.
“A baby Jedi…how sweet. Well, how about we say a hand for a hand and call it even?”
The sudden flash of remembrance made Reath feel woozy, so he closed his eyes and steadied his breathing. Citara noticed, and Reath could feel her slowing down to match his breaths. Finally, her gloved hand came to rest on Reath’s chest as the two descended into a deep meditative state.
“Come back to me whenever you’re ready.” Her voice was soft but commanding.
Reath blinked, sufficiently calmed, to find Citara inches from his face, her violet eyes staring intensely into his own.
Oh, this won’t be a problem, Reath thought sarcastically, getting his first real look at Citara Cirris. She’s just the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen.
“I’m sorry, Knight Silas. I should have been more considerate. Are you feeling well enough to continue?”
Reath gulped and nodded, and mercifully, Citara took a step back to examine his arm. She rolled up the sleeve of his loose medical tunic, holding his arm carefully, carefully examining the connection between the prosthetic and the rest of his arm.
“You’ve healed nicely, practically no redness or scarring. Thank the Force for bacta.”
“It’s saved my life a few times recently,” Reath added soberly. “Without it, I wouldn’t have even gotten the chance to lose my hand..” Reath cracked a tiny smile.
Citara shook her head in mock displeasure, laughing softly. “That is one way of looking at it, I guess. But I think it’s high time we turn this thing on and see what it can do. Are you ready?”
“Are you ready?” could have been the past few months of Reath’s life. He wasn’t ready to lose Starlight, to lose so many friends, to lose his home. He hadn’t been prepared to become a Knight, and he certainly hadn’t been ready to lose his second master in less than a year. Part of him was always going to be small and scared, but It didn’t matter. What he felt was second to what he knew to be true.
He was a Jedi.
“I’m ready.”
The following days and weeks fell into a comfortable pattern. Reath woke, mediated, ate a small first meal, then traveled to the Halls of Healing to see Citara, trying to ignore the flutter in his stomach that bubbled up every time he approached the medical wing.
“Increasing the strength in your upper arm will be critical. It will help you better control the prosthetic.” Citara reminded him, guiding him through exercises to do just that. “And we’ll continue to strengthen your left as well. Or else you’ll get lopsided and fall over.”
Reath carefully lifted the weights over his head, meeting Citara’s upside-down gaze.
“My right arm suddenly weighs 10 pounds more than it used to. I’m already falling over.”
“Well, we’ll just have to work on balance, too.”
And they did. Citara was nothing if not thorough: working Reath through exercises for strength, balance, dexterity, as well as a daily meditation to help him accept the new addition to his body.
As helpful as it was to regain the strength and confidence in his hand, to feel okay grasping a lightsaber again, it was the meditations that were making the most difference. Every day, he sat down with Citara Cirris and disappeared into a deep meditative state, and returned feeling more connected to the Living Force than he ever had in his entire life.
Their conversations only took a week to switch from Reath’s arm or the Jedi or the Nihil threat to other things to themselves. Citara was a year older than Reath, a knight herself, and her own master had been a healer. She had grown up at the Jedi Temple on Valo, but she hadn’t been present for the Republic Fair and the resulting attack. Telling her story, Citara's face revealed the kind of commingled relief and regret Reath could understand after losing his home on Starlight.
Once he realized she enjoyed listening to him talk about his studies, Reath enthusiastically told her about his current mission as much as he could. When he mentioned an ancient Sith artifact, Citara asked what he knew about it, where it was, what it could do. It was easy, their conversations taking on a natural back-and-forth Reath had never experienced before.
“Did you ever want to pursue something else? Other than healing, I mean?” Reath asked about a week and a half into his therapy as he observed Citara poking at his prosthetic after a series of more involved exercises had reduced its functionality.
The medic glanced up from the arm, smirking. “Did you ever consider not being a scholar?”
Reath laughed. “Point taken.”
“That reminds me,” Citara said suddenly, standing up to rummage through her cloak hanging on the back of the exam room door. “Ah! Here it is.”
From the pockets of her white temple robes, Citara Cirris produced an ancient-looking holocron.
“For you,” she said, setting the holocron down on the table in front of Reath.
Reath felt flush. Was it a gift? If it weren’t a gift, his blushing would be even more noticeable. That just made him blush even more.
“What is it?”
Citara rolled her eyes and took her seat on the other side of the table, getting back to work on the exposed wiring of Reath’s arm. “If only there were a way to find out….”
“Okay, okay,” Reath laughed. He reached out with the Force, and the holocron clicked open, revealing the figure of a wizened Ithorian Jedi.
“The seeming defeat of the Sith Empire,” the recording began, “Should not lead us to complacency, as these artifacts show—”
Reath paused the recording and reached out to stop Citara’s work, practically buzzing with excitement, her hands still busy poking at his arm.
“Is this—how did you….” Reath exclaimed, only then realizing he was holding Citara’s hand. Her skin was soft and warm against his, and he was suddenly very aware of how sweaty his palms or palm Reath corrected was.
Sweaty or not, instead of pulling away, Citara gave Reath’s hand a gentle squeeze. Then, instinctively, Reath leaned forward, and Citara brushed her thumb across his. Reath felt like he’d been prodded with an electro staff, hurriedly pulling his hand away and running it through his hair to give it something to do.
Citara glanced away, her hands disappearing under the table.
“You said you were looking for it, and I just so happened to know where it was. Of course, I could have told you where to find it yourself, but then I would have missed seeing the look on your face right now.”
“I, well….” Reath tried to calm himself, to tell his body to get in line with his mind, but it was as if a switch had been turned on, and he was having a hard time getting it to turn off again. Knowing exactly what was happening, why, and how, and that it was totally normal, especially for a 19-year-old human male, didn’t help Reath feel any less mortified. “Thank you.”
Citara set down her tools and closed up the paneling on Reath’s prosthetic. “That’s all for today,” she said, avoiding direct eye contact. “Get some rest.”
Mercifully, Citara quickly gathered her things and left, throwing on her cloak in a whirlwind of white before Reath even had a chance to stand up from the table.
Reath avoided therapy for three days before someone got on his case about it. But, of course, he wasn’t expecting that someone to be Ram Jomoram.
“Citara told me to tell you that you need to come back.”
Ram sat on Reath’s bed in his small personal quarters in the Jedi Temple on Coruscant, swinging his legs over the side, eating a packet of some snack he’d picked up at the nearest spaceport.
“You should listen to her. She’s really smart, and nice, and one time when I sliced my hand open, she saved my life.”
Reath groaned. “I know. Also, I don’t think a slice on your hand would be life threatening.”
Ram shrugged. “It was a pretty rusty knife.”
“Why were you using a rusty knife?” Reath exclaimed.
“I was testing a bunch of different ways different types of damage effects tools. Like, we know clean, new tools are best but I was curious just how it all worked. So I was experimenting.”
Reath rolled his eyes and collapsed into his chair. “Did she really say I needed to come back?”
Ram nodded, munching on his very loud snack. “Yeah, she said she didn’t want to have to get any other healers involved and since we were friends I could just tell you myself.”
“Was she…upset?”
“Why would she be upset?” Ram dumped the rest of the snack packet into his mouth. “She’s just telling you to finish your treatment.”
“Did she say anything else?” Reath continued to prod. “Or, did she seem…nervous at all?”
Ram’s brow furrowed in confusion. “I’m going to be honest with you Reath, I think this is one of those things I’m just not good at seeing.”
Reath sighed. “Well, I suppose there’s only one way to find out.”
It was the longest journey to the Halls of Healing Reath had ever experienced, his boots practically dragging along the floor. But he had to go. At the very least, he didn’t want Citara to get in trouble for not doing her job. That and the two of them should be willing and able to move on from this and work together as Jedi.
Reath stopped by the front desk to get Citara’s location, half hoping she was busy in another appointment, but no such luck.
“Medic Citara Cirris,” said the droid currently on duty. “Is currently in Examination Room 12 waiting for your appointment to begin.”
Logically, Reath knew he could list at least twelve separate incidents that were more nerve-racking and more dangerous than his current goal, but that didn’t seem to matter to his racing heart. Still, there was no point in prolonging the inevitable awkwardness. The sooner Reath had a clean bill of health, the sooner he could be back out on the trail of the ancient Sith artifacts Master Yoda had instructed him to find.
Citara’s back was turned when Reath entered, entering some data into a computer.
“Uh, Medic Cirris? Citara? I just wanted to apologize for not showing up for three days. And for not explaining why.”
With that, Citara turned around, hands clasped in front of her. “Thanks, Reath. I’m glad you came back. It was nice to see Ram again. I missed that funky little guy.” Citara smiled and put her hands in her medic’s overcoat pockets. “Come take a seat.”
Reath hopped up onto the exam table while Citara examined his arm. “Any issues in the past three days? That delay still bothering you?”
“No, no issues,” Reath shook his head. “Although Ram can’t keep his hands off of it. I’m afraid I’m going to wake up in the middle of the night to find he’s removed it for his experiments.”
Citara laughed warmly, rolling Reath’s sleeve back down over the gray metal. “And the holocron? Have you had a chance to study it further?”
“Uh, no, I haven’t. To be honest….” Reath forced himself to look Citara straight in her violet eyes. “I know it might be best to not mention it, but I’m not very good at keeping secrets. I don’t know how much longer you think I need, but I think I should be assigned to someone else. I know I should be able to not let my feelings get in the way but, I’m not quite there yet, and that’s not your problem.” The words spilled out as Reath realized how much of a burden it had been, holding in his feelings.
Citara’s eyes softened sadly. “Not my problem? Reath, do you think you’re the only one here who is worried about their feelings?”
It took a while for Reath to process what Citara was saying, and when he did, he felt that same jolt of electricity from when they had held hands. Reath had gotten so used to having crushes on every girl he met he had completely stopped thinking about what would happen if one of them liked him back.
“I…I guess I am really in my own head, huh? I’m sorry, I wasn’t even thinking—” Reath sighed, and Citara gently took Reath’s flesh hand in her own.
“It’s okay, you’ve got nothing to apologize for. It’s not like you’ve had a lot to think about lately or anything.” Citara smirked.
“I only ever talk about myself,” Reath pleaded. “And you gave me that Holocron—”
“Reath,” Citara interrupted. “Patients don’t usually get entire biographies from their doctors.”
“And you’re my doctor.” Reath groaned, dropping his head in embarrassment.
“Reath,” Citara interrupted again, lifting his chin. “It’s okay. We both know how…complicated this is.”
They sat there for what seemed like an eternity, Citara’s hand under Reath’s chin. Reath hadn’t realized she was so tall. He was still seated on the exam table, and Citara looked right into his eyes.
“Citara, I…” Reath had come into this exam room to apologize and to move on, but now the room had shifted on its axis as he felt pulled like a magnet towards the woman in front of him. “I know I shouldn’t ask this, but—”
“Reath Silas if you don’t kiss me I’m going to take your arm off.”
There was no fear.
Reath leaned forward, and Citara met him in the middle, their lips brushing tentatively at first, then pressing together more urgently as the two felt the other’s desire. Citara moved in closer, standing between Reath’s knees, lacing her hands behind his head, running her fingers through his slightly longer-than-usual warm brown hair.
He had always assumed or imagined his first kiss would be something romantic and chaste, not the increasingly intense full-on makeout session that was currently pulling Reath off of the table. Once standing, Reath pulled away, breathing heavily, tentatively placing his hands on Citara’s hips.
“Is this okay?” He said softly, almost a whisper.
Citara nodded and leaned back in, lips parring slightly to slip a tongue inside.
This is not supposed to be happening right now, Reath thought matter-of-factly, finding it difficult to care about the potential consequences at the moment.
The two were lost in their passionate haze, not sure how much time had passed when Reath realized they weren’t alone.
“Oh,” Ram said, standing in the open doorway to the exam room. “That’s what you meant by nervous.”