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And there was Drake, the bells in his hair chiming softly as he came to a stop and bowed his head. "Luke, I think you said your name was? I don't think I properly introduced myself; I'm Amberdrake."

"Luke Skywalker, yes," he smiled, dipping his own head in greeting, gaze briefly drawn to the bells simply because the sound was impossible to miss.

"Thanks for this, by the way. I hadn't thought I'd get much of a response, even less about the... other effects to this." He gestured loosely with his right hand as he spoke, partly as a gesture in general and specifically intending his right hand.

Luke had to admit that so far, it hadn't been so bad - it'd been worst the first few days, really. But the fact that the intermittent sensation of pain in a hand that wasn't actually there had then gone away for a few days just to randomly come back every now and then had been pretty startling.

"Of course," Amberdrake glanced at the hand with the gesture, and tipped his head to one side. Curious, how advanced these things were on other worlds. On his own, Luke would have had to make do with something simple, and most likely it would have had to be carved from wood. "I'm afraid I don't have an office, yet, to lead you to," he said, apologetically. He gestured along in one direction or another that seemed likely. "Perhaps we can find a quiet bench, somewhere?"

"That's fine, I don't mind sitting outside," Luke smiled, casting a glance around, "there's nothing wrong with the weather, and it's green, here."

Of course, they weren't standing in the middle of a forest or a park or anything, but neither was it a barren wasteland or a solid metal construction like Smuggler's Moon... or like the ships on the fleet, when they couldn't afford to hide on a planet.

"And really, even if it was raining, I might not have minded, much." Which was both true and not - he couldn't help still being fascinated by rain and not minding getting wet, but dealing with wet clothes and being cold after getting out of it was less pleasant.

Drake inclined his head again, a little, this time with a faint smile. "There's orchards and the like outside of the city," he noted, "and some of the city itself is rather green. I admit I haven't scoured the whole place, though. Or even strayed very far from my current haunts."

The kestra'chern led the way toward a bench he'd spied on the way here. Tucked out of the way, but still outside and under the sky. "You may find yourself minding cold rain more, as the years go on. It really depends on what sort of pain develops."

"Oh," it slipped out of Luke with a smile, and clearly he'd have to go exploring, both around the city and outside of it. There was never enough time for that even when they did have a base on a planet.

"I'll have to go exploring," he added belatedly, then glanced down at his hand and up at Amberdrake, "the weather could end up affecting it?"

Maybe he shouldn't be surprised. The Two-Onebee had mentioning something briefly during the check up last week, but hadn't gone into deeper detail at the time.

"It could," Amberdrake agreed, and sat down on one side of the bench he'd found. "Only time will tell, however."

He looked at Luke for a moment, remembering a different scruffy, brown-haired guy. Younger than Luke, yes, but so enthusiastic about everything.

"I have a dear friend who could use someone to go exploring with," he mentioned, slowly, "if you wouldn't mind some company? He can be a little... acerbic, I admit, but his heart is good. He just doesn't know how to handle people very well."

Edited 2016-05-06 08:32 (UTC)

"Well, maybe I'll be lucky," he muttered, eyeing his hand and feeling resignedly upset about the whole thing again. Pushing it away, he let out a breath and straightened up when Amberdrake started talking again.

"I wouldn't mind," he said, a slow grin appearing on his face, "if he would want to. I have a friend who pretends to care a lot less than he does... less so now than when I first met him. He's not bad at people as such, but I think I'd be able to survive it."

He probably would even if he hadn't been forewarned; Luke at least tolerated quite a few sorts of people. The expression on his face at the moment was just an amused smile, however.

"Don't think of it as a sentence," Amberdrake responded to that first bit, and to what Luke pushed away. "This is simply your new normal. And like I said, I can teach you ways to help it, as it develops. If it doesn't, so much the better;" the Healer smiled, "I'll still teach you those things in case it hurts in the rain when you're an old man."

He chuckled about Sanzo, and nodded, "I think you'll handle him fine, then. I'll tell him it's to keep an eye on you, but honestly, I know he's restless, and bored, and he needs the excuse to go out and do something besides gamble and smoke."

"It'll be fine, I know," Luke shook his head, smiling faintly even if there wasn't much true humour in it, "I'm getting used to it, and it's not so bad. It just happened two weeks ago, that's all."

And under pretty traumatic circumstances, which was usually what upset him more than the loss of his hand, really.

"But I'll definitely not say no to any of that help," he added, the smile warming up again before he chuckled as well, "and well, you wouldn't even be wrong. All of my friends would insist I need someone to look after me."

Luke didn't mind at all saying that, waving a hand lazily in the air and amusement clear in his voice and tone. Fondness also crept in as he thought about said friends - and avoided thinking about where Han was currently.

"I don't mind being the excuse if he needs it, and like I said, I'd like the company.

"Good," Amberdrake's smile turned briefly into a grin; a conspiratorial flash of teeth. "It's so refreshing to have someone to team up on him with. He definitely needs it."

That almost mischievous streak was set aside as quickly as it came, but only because there was business at hand. Well, kind of literally at hand.

"Now," Drake sobered, but he remained pleasant as he hand out a hand, "may I see what I can of your arm?"

"I'll do my best," Luke promises with an answering smile, both amused at the request and curious to meet him, now.

Nodding at the request, Luke held out his right hand, which really did look almost indistinguishable to his left. The biggest clue that something was off was that there was no hair at all from a little below the middle of the lower arm all the way out to the fingertips, and there was a faint line in the fake flesh in the underside of the arm, where the access panel was.

"I can open it up if that helps, but I don't think you need to see that, the way you work?"

Amberdrake wasn't, after all, going to work on the mechanical parts, and Luke leaned forward a little, just as intent as if he had been (perhaps even a little more so, given that this was very different to what he was used to).

Drake took the offered hand, marveling for a moment at how good the prosthetic was. "On my world, everyone still has to make do with pegs, or hooks, or whatever else can be fashioned. This is remarkable."

His attention quickly went to the seam, however, and he shook his head, "I don't need you to open it, no. Do you want to see it as I do?" Not that he was, yet, but he would. "I can project imagery with my Empathy." Luke seemed like the kind of patient who would be curious, but, "It may be very disconcerting, since it's such a recent loss. Up to you."

"That must be hard," Luke frowned, feeling unhappy on the behalf of everyone having to make do with what they could, "around thirty-twenty years ago, the synth skin was still in development, so usually you'd get bare metal limbs. I know you can do some pretty clever things even with more simple resources, but I don't even have to think about it to use mine like a normal hand."

It wasn't that usual to see less complicated replacements on Tatooine sometimes, especially if they happened to belong to a slave, so Luke knew about simpler set-ups and knew they could be serviceable enough.

"... And yeah, I do." There was no hesitation as Luke glanced from his hand up at Amberdrake, curiosity and something a little more somber in his expression.

"It might help me later, and I'm curious," a pause as Luke let out a soft breath, "and, anyway, I'm... well aware it's gone. I'm still having to work around the Force insisting there's nothing there even with my replacement very clearly being attached to me."

It just didn't register the prosthetic as a part of Luke, but he hoped that would change in time.

Amberdrake nodded, and set his other hand against Luke's actual arm, below the stump. "You should shut your eyes, so you don't get completely disoriented," he cautioned, even as his own bright blue eyes went unfocused.

He gave Luke a moment and then lowered his shields enough to project the image of his second vision in real-time. Luke's stump was bright with energy and the pulse of his blood was visible. Drake sifted through layers of information, parts of the arm being obscured or revealed as he went. Blood-stream, nervous system, muscle tissue, tendons, bones, pure life energy. That last one was probably what Luke called the Force, he knew.

The prosthetic wasn't even visible to this second sight; probably for the same reason the Force denied its existence.

Nodding, Luke did so - would've done so even if Amberdrake hadn't suggested it, because it was something he was so very used to doing in regards to working with the Force.

Even if this was probably not the Force, or maybe just vaguely related to it, somehow.

"Oh..."

Luke's breath caught a little when the images started to flicker past, and he smiled unconsciously, simply following along. The last was indeed what Luke could called the Force - at least as he interpreted and felt it.

"This is amazing."

Drake sifted through the information expertly, letting Luke watch as he nudged a single singed nerve-ending into re-growth; shooed the tiniest bit of inflammation away from an important vein... tiny little things, done with absolute surgical precision. May as well, while he was looking, right?

"Thank you," he chuckled, once he deemed it well enough to withdraw. He withdrew the projections, too, before his eyes sharpened again into normal vision. "I've been at it a while... I am a fully-trained chirurgeon as well as Healer -- that is, I've been trained with and without the Healing Gift."

Being trained in purely mundane means first gave him what was, among most Healers on his world, a unique level of understanding the anatomy he worked on. The Gift was so detailed; required so much finesse; no knowledge was wasted. His Healing ability was certainly not casting a spell and walking away!

"Your arm looks to be in fine health," he added, "I can see it possibly cramping here in the near future as the musculature adjusts," Amberdrake traced one specific spot with a fingertip to illustrate. "The best way to get it to calm down, if it does, is pressure right here," and he demonstrated with that same fingertip, "at this angle; up toward the elbow. Not enough to hurt, you see? It should calm that twinge after you hold this for a few seconds."

Luke followed what Amberdrake was doing as closely and attentively as he could; while he wasn't sure he'd be able to recreate this, on the off-chance that he could, even if it took a while...

And even if not, it was utterly fascinating to watch (and feel) the process as well as the layers of his body being gently prodded.

"That must help, being both. Which did you learn first?" Luke commented, shivering a little in reaction when they were both properly here and now instead of... elsewhere.

"I think I get it," nodding, Luke repeated what he'd been shown, adjusting the strength until it matched the pressure Amberdrake had been using.

"Like that?"

"I was trained as a chirurgeon, first," was Drake's reply to his question. "That's the type without magic, without the Gift. Purely scalpels and logic and training."

He watched Luke demonstrate what he'd just done, and nodded.

"Yes, just like that," Amberdrake smiled, and folded his hands together on his lap now that they weren't full of Luke's arm -- both real and fake. "If it persists or something else comes up, you can of course contact me. As long as we're both still here, at least, I'll be able to help."

Edited 2016-06-01 08:54 (UTC)

"That's the only form of it that exists where I come from... though, we've got some things that make sure you can heal nearly from anything." Luke turned his cybernetic around, twisting his hand around the wrist.

"Of course, not everything. Organs are easier to heal or regrow on a small scale than whole limbs, for example."

Nodding thoughtfully, Luke repeated it, though without any pressure at all, just to make sure he had got it.

"Hopefully it won't, but I'll definitely come to you if I need it."

"Ah, I can't regrow limbs," much as he wished it was possible for the Healing Gift. After a decade of war, he knew plenty of people who could use such a talent.

"I can reattach freshly-removed limbs... I've done that before," Amberdrake added, "although I was down for weeks after, and it was a hand. I'm not sure I could do it for something larger, not without some kind of external energy source channeling into me."

And even then, if it was a leg or a wing? He'd probably be down for a month. And he'd be lucky if he avoided going into shock!

Edited 2016-06-01 14:45 (UTC)

"Not something that we've been able to figure out either, even with people trying, and trying a lot. Hence this," Luke said, smiling a little wryly as he wriggled his right hand.

"If only I'd come here with my hand and immediately after it happened, then," there was light teasing amusement in Luke's voice before he sobered, shaking his head, "but that sounds like it's something of a feat and takes way too much energy from you, so just for the best I didn't."

It wasn't like he was particularly upset at having a prosthetic anyway - having lost the hand, and being upset at who did it? Yes, of course. But he didn't mind the cybernetic itself.

"I could do it, in theory, but the sheer amount of power it would take..." Amberdrake shook his head, and then chuckled at Luke's concern. "If you'd come here with your hand in tow, I would have re-attached it for you. Sanzo would take care of me after, I'm sure; grumbling all the while. I gave him instructions early on in what to do if such a thing occurred."

Again, anyway. There was a particularly perfect, thin little scar that looped Sanzo's right wrist. Though the priest didn't remember the incident, that in itself was a testament to how thorough Amberdrake had been about the reattachment. Nothing seemed amiss; like every nerve ending and vein and bit of bone and tendon and muscle fiber hadn't needed to be painstakingly pieced back together again.

Drake was a very good Healer! Among many other things.

"Well, just as well that you didn't need to, but... thank you," Luke said with a smile, then shook his head, "and if I'd come here with my hand, I'd have been more worried how it could've come with me."

Chuckling, he shook his head. He'd also, obviously, have been pretty traumatized (the memories of everything past falling out the bottom end of Cloud City were a bit jumbled and hazy, even now), but, well..

"My hand, with my weapon, fell into a shaft where I was fighting and would've been dumped further over an abyss." Taking a breath and letting out a sigh, feeling tension in his chest from thinking about it again, Luke snorted.

It was basically correct, though easier, he was sure, to not be talking about gas giants and their endless atmosphere and thickening layers of gas.

"Ah," Amberdrake tilted his head a little to one side, watching the young man intently for a moment. Then he smiled, again, at the snort. "If you ever wish to talk about it to someone, I'll offer my ear. That's what I actually do for a living; I am a... therapist, of sorts."

Yes, of sorts. Gods, but he needed a better way to describe what he was!

"...Though that word grossly over-simplifies what I do. Kestra'chern just doesn't translate very well, no matter how I try it."

Freezing for a moment, Luke stared at nothing and then scrubbed his face, dropping his hands to give Amberdrake a tiny, quirked smile.

"I... maybe. I haven't exactly... been able to tell anyone." He looked away, shrugging. More like, hadn't thought it was the right time or that he should. Leia was the only one he might be willing to tell, but therein lay the problem.

Actually being able to talk about some of it, at least, with someone who had no vested interest in it either way... might be nice. Wasn't like there hadn't been questions if he needed to talk, but what he needed to talk about... wasn't something he was going to tell to anyone in the Alliance. Yet, anyway.

"Sort of like a healer for mind and body both?" Luke ventured after a moment, when he didn't feel quite as tense any longer.

"Something like that," Amberdrake had waited during that tension, radiating a low-level calm as he often did in such situations. "Most kestra'chern are not Healers, though we all know the basics, and things like massage therapy and injury recovery therapy. That I also happen to be a fully-trained Healer... I make use of it as a kestra'chern. It's a bonus to my skill-set. I can't be a full-time Healer, though I was an emergency Healer during the War... and thus I did more Healing than anyone preferred."

It was always better to not have to use your emergency Healers! And the capital W in War was pretty much audible in his voice... most of Urtho's army referred to it as such, and had for decades. It was its own entity; an eternal, dark monster with its own whims and hungers.

Luke was definitely grateful (and a bit startled) for the sense of peace coming from Amberdrake - it made it far easier to recenter himself and draw in a breath and let go, for now, of the worst of the tension.

"War always need people who can patch up injuries, and they end up having to do it more than anyone likes," Luke said with a nod, grimacing a little. They'd lost so many, just between the time Luke had joined the Alliance and right before he ended up here.

Hoth had been a big one, but it was hardly the only large battle with many rebel losses. Vrogas Vas stood out...

"What was it about? The war you mentioned?"

Amberdrake looked down for a moment, gathering his thoughts.

"Power, of course," he chuckled, a touch wry. "The rallying point Ma'ar built his army around was superior breed theory... that people like me, with my brown skin, were decadent foreigners who needed to be taught a lesson. 'Taught a lesson' devolved quickly into 'wiped out', of course. That was the start of the war, anyway.

"It lasted over a decade... Ma'ar's real goal was world domination, but his grudge against my kind for not simply laying down and dying for the cause was palpable. He had similar hatred for gryphons, and tervardi, hertasi, dyheli, kyree... anything that didn't look like him or was created by him, honestly. And even that latter... he didn't treat the makaar very kindly, either. They were just his attempt at countering Urtho's gryphons.

"It was a war ultimately between two Adept Mages of such power that they could create entire races from scratch. Urtho stood against him, and we rallied behind him. But the world will never be the same, not in so very many ways."

"I guess that is a usual starting point," Luke agreed dryly, but fell quiet, frowning, as Amberdrake continued. Most of that sounded familiar, if in slightly different form and shape, as the galaxy stood now. Luke shook his head, grimacing.

"Entire races? That's..." a sigh, and nodded, "the Emperor, who controls a large part of the whole galaxy where I'm from, doesn't have much over for anyone who's not human either, so he's created policies that oppress them... Or they end up as slaves a lot."

Shaking his head, Luke turned around in his seat to be able to reach out and squeeze Amberdrake's shoulder.

"Hopefully it'll heal as much as possible, at least? And you have helped both yourself and all those other races."