"Reunion"

A tight band of emotion formed around Mirax's chest -- she'd never heard so much fear in his voice. Never. Reaching out with one hand, she flipped the room lights on to their lowest setting.

"Corran, it's me. Mirax."

The band tightened when she finally saw him. He sat facing her, his blaster held in a slightly shaky two-handed grip. The bedsheet had fallen to his waist, revealing a chest covered in bruises, welts, and barely healed scars.

Her hand flew to her mouth. "Oh, gods, what did they do to you?"

The blaster lowered. "Mirax? Is it really you?"

The tremor in his voice drew her to him and she quickly covered the distance between them, her boot-heels clicking quietly on the polished floor. She stopped suddenly. For the first time in her life she didn't know what to say.

"I ... I'm sorry for waking you, but I just got in and I had to see you..." The lump that had formed in her throat silenced her and she sat down carefully on the edge of the bed.

The subdued lighting couldn't quite disguise the pallor of his skin or the pain that she could see in his hooded eyes. Her gaze drifted, cataloguing injuries that could only hint at what he'd been through. Darkened bruises fought for space with barely healed cuts and abrasions. Needle traces and puncture marks speckled his chest and arms. Mirax felt sick to the pit of her stomach, not at the wounds themselves for she had never been squeamish, but at the thought that anyone could do that to another person. To him.

"Sith, Corran. Shouldn't you be in the medcenter?"

Resetting the safety, he placed the blaster on a side table and ran a hand through disheveled hair. "I've been there for the past two days. It looks a lot worse than it feels, and the marks are already starting to fade."

His brow furrowed as he reached out to touch her arm. "Everyone thought you were dead. Cracken only told me yesterday that you hadn't been on that bacta run at Alderaan after all..."

"Welcome to my world." The grief and desolation she'd felt since his `death' inexplicably threatened to overwhelm her once more,

"A friend?" His voice had steadied, and Mirax could even detect a note of teasing. "Just a friend? I seem to remember being promised a date, Ms. Terrik. I was hoping we'd be more than friends."

She smiled and a solitary tear trickled down one cheek. "Typical Corsec. Always reading more into a situation than is really there."

"I have evidence to back it up," he whispered, his hand trailing up her arm, his green eyes never leaving her face.

"What evidence?" She could lose herself in those eyes. Forever. If only her tears would stop blurring her vision.

"You agreed to a date. You kissed me before that last flight." His hand trailed slowly up her neck and caught a tear on one finger. "And I would say this is pretty damning evidence."

"Oh, Corran," she sobbed, flinging herself forward into his arms, burying her face in his neck as the tears flowed freely. "You were dead. I thought you were dead."

His arms slipped round her shoulders, pulling her more tightly to him, squeezing away the lingering pain. "I'm not. I'm here. Shhh, Mirax. It's okay."

Her sobs quickly subsided as she clung to him, reveling in the tight embrace she thought would never happen. Finally she looked up at him, swiping away the last few tears with the heel of her hand. "Don't you ever do that to me again, Corran Horn."

A wry smile tilted his lips. "I'll try not to." His eyes drifted closed as he leaned in to kiss her.

She had never had a kiss so sweet, Mirax later decided, as that first kiss from a resurrected Corran.

Her hand drifted up to the back of his neck, holding him gently in place as she parted her lips and deepened their kiss. Her insides melted when his tongue caressed hers and she tasted him for the first time. The warmth of his mouth comforted her yet left her wanting more, and she struggled to suppress the desire that gripped her body. He was tired and injured -- now was not the time or the place. When they finally parted for much-needed oxygen, she touched her forehead to his, frantically trying to quell her roiling emotions. "Corran, I..."

His fingers pressed to her lips, halting her words. "I missed you, Mirax. And I thought about you. A lot." He looked at her through long lashes. "My memories of you kept me sane, kept me fighting."

Pulling away from him a little, she could still feel his breath tickling her lips. "You're not going to try the `I'm just out of prison, so please sleep with me' line, are you?"

"Would it work?"

"Not with me, flyboy," she replied with a smirk.

"How about the `I think I'm in love with you' line?"

"Depends."

Cupping her face in his hands, Corran pressed a delicate kiss to her nose. "Depends on what?"

"On whether you mean it or not."

His voice was low and sensual. "I never say anything I don't mean."

A whimper escaped her lips as she leaned in for another kiss, her hands drifting to his shoulders and pressing him back down to the bed as she lay alongside him. Her hand trailed over his chest, recoiling instantly when he flinched. "I'm sorry."

"It's okay," he whispered, catching her hand and kissing it. "It just proves I'm alive."

Very gently, her hand came to rest in the center of his chest and she watched it rise and fall. "Yes, you're still very much alive, Lieutenant." Her lips replaced her hand as she brushed bruised and blemished skin with feather-light kisses. Abdominal muscles contracted under her touch as she crept lower...

She stopped suddenly and glanced at the unoccupied bed on the other side of the room. "Where's your roomie?"

Eyes full of lust met hers over a heaving chest. "Ooryl? Rec Room, probably. Gands don't sleep much."

Mirax watched his face for a long moment, contemplating scenarios and outcomes, deciding on words. Finally she smiled. "Tomorrow you pack your bags. You're moving in with me."

"Hey, don't I get any say in the matter? Maybe I like my independence. You can't go around telling me what to ... oh, sith!"

She sucked him in deep and hard, silencing his protests, holding his hips firmly to the bed as she drove him higher and higher. His hands tangled through her hair -- she groaned, he shuddered. Root to tip, she touched and tasted every centimeter, lips and hands working him, her eyes squeezed shut as she allowed her other senses to take over. The warmth in her belly grew in intensity as she felt him convulse beneath her...

His hands suddenly grabbed her arms, pulling her up and twisting to lay her beside him. "Enough. I need you and I want you, but you have way too many clothes on."

Mirax kissed him briefly and passionately, sat up to pull off her boots, then stood to strip off her jumpsuit and underwear. In no time at all she was back on the bed, straddling his stomach carefully as she looked down on him with dark eyes. He lay beneath her, hurt yet still strong, his eyes blazing with a fire she'd never seen before. Leaning forward, she placed a hand on either side of his head, locking his gaze with her own. "I thought you were dead," she growled. "I need to know you're alive." She reached down and stroked him -- once, twice -- then sank onto him with a loud gasp.

"Hell, yes, I'm alive," replied Corran through gritted teeth. His hands skimmed over her thighs and waist before settling on her breasts as she slowly rocked. "Either that, or I'm having one helluva dream."

"This is no dream, flyboy."

Delicately, she kissed his injured skin, pausing only to suck at sensitive nipples. Suddenly she found herself echoing his moans as he slipped a hand between them to caress her clit.

Muscles tightened, movements intensified and hastened, and breathing became difficult as they pushed their way towards fulfillment. Long, slow lovemaking could wait -- what Mirax wanted right at that moment was hard, fast, vitalizing sex. And from Corran's reaction, that was what he wanted too. His hands roamed all over her body, electrifying her skin and the muscles beneath, and he thrust as much as he could in the limited space she allowed him.

She watched his face as she made love to him, smiling as he gasped in pleasure when she tightened her inner muscles around him. Leaning down, she kissed him once more, completely immersing herself in the feelings her body was generating. To have him alive in her arms, inside her body, was almost too much to bear. She hardly noticed when his arms wrapped around her and he gave one, final thrust, his back arching off the bed as he climaxed.

Mirax shuddered in his arms, unable to stop herself biting his neck as her orgasm hit. A solitary, hot tear trickled down one as she finally propped herself up off his torso on shaky arms. "I guess that proves it, then. You're alive," she said hoarsely.

Corran grinned in reply, green eyes sparkling. "Are you sure? Evidence can be faked -- maybe I should prove it again..."

Rolling to one side, she ran a gentle hand over his sweat-slicked chest. "Maybe tomorrow, Corsec. You look like you need some rest."

"I was resting, until some mad, insatiable woman broke into my room and had her wicked way with me." He kissed the indignant frown that was forming on her forehead. "Mirax, about me moving in with you..."

"What about it?" she asked nervously, suddenly wondering if she'd gone too far. Perhaps he did need his independence -- after all, they hadn't known each other that long, and yet, here she was, insisting they should live together. "I only wanted you where I could keep an eye on you..."

"Oh, I understand that," replied Corran, a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth as he stroked her hair. "It's just ... can I bring my droid?"