–from the next, yet-unpublished chapter of Blackbirds: Year One.
(Yes, I know it’s been a long time. And I can make no promises. But I’m feelin’ it again for the first time in two years, so here’s this.)
“It’s coming along well; you shouldn’t need a dressing much longer,” Yant said, gently bending Maul’s arm out straight at the elbow, inspecting the deep burns that he had gotten on Felucia with careful scrutiny. “Just some healing left for the dermis and epidermis. If you want, I’ll give you some exercises you can start doing with it now.”
The zabrak doctor was a mystery that Maul didn’t really have the mental capacity to sort out. He had been drifting around the periphery of the group of them for days – Maul had seen him at a distance a few times – but he hadn’t made an introduction until now. Maul had come down to the medical wing for his once-daily check up, expecting Frayus, and instead met Zan Yant.
Maul had surprisingly little experience with other zabraks; there had been a few training at Orsis (and he hadn’t been friends with them in any capacity), but that had been his only prolonged proximity to the species he was half of. Despite considering himself zabrak, most of his interaction since adulthood had been with humans. Even then, something about the softness with which Yant carried himself seemed almost uncharacteristic. Not bad, but unexpected.
Yant also had a vague Corellian drawl that it sounded like he had tried to school himself out of, in favor of a Core accent like Maul’s.
“Lieutenant?” Yant asked, frowning a little in what looked like worry, which was when Maul realized he had probably been asked something and missed it.
“Maul is fine,” he answered, blinking himself back to something that approximated focused and alert. “Did you ask something?”
“I wanted to know if you wanted some exercises you could do with this arm while it finished healing.” Yant set said arm down on the arm-rest of the chair Maul was in, then moved to get a lighter synthskin dressing from the cart to the side. There was still concern on his face when he came back and started redressing the arm he had been checking over. "And is there anything else I can do to help you?“
Maul looked at him, taking in that expression, though the question just echoed in the somewhat empty space of his own skull. He couldn’t really fathom how anyone could help with any of this. "Exercises would be good,” he ventured, after a couple more moments.
Yant nodded back, mouth pressed into a line; once Maul’s arm was redressed and his shirt back on, and once the datapad was loaded with exercises, Yant reached out and gave a rub between his shoulder blades. An offer of comfort, if of a silent sort.
Maul didn’t really know what to do with that, either; he stood and picked up the datapad. “Thank you,” he said, whether it was necessary or not; even then, he didn’t know if it was for the doctoring or the attempt to make him feel better. Both were appreciated, and both were very far away.
“You’re very welcome,” Zan Yant said back, all but radiating quiet sympathy, and since Maul couldn’t really take any more of that, he just walked out.
Back out into a world forsaken.
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