[Gundam 00] The Subtle Grace of Gravity (Arc 6)
Title: The Subtle Grace of Gravity
→ Arc 1: Waking
→ Arc 2: Return
→ Arc 3: Learning
→ Arc 4: Surprise
→ Arc 5: Intimacy
→ Arc 6: Sentiment
Fandom: Gundam 00
Characters/Pairing: Lockon (Neil)/Tieria.
Rating: NC-17.
Wordcount: 6,256 (sixth part)
Notes: Part six of nine. Mostly somewhat weird fluff and setup for future chapters.
Summary: Lockon and Tieria start learning to deal with a relationship. Awkwardness ensues.
The way Tieria snuggled up to him was strange to Lockon. He'd shared a bed with cuddlers before--that was the sort of woman he tended to attract--but they'd kept at least a little distance from him. After all, no matter how affectionate they were, it had been only a one-night stand. That was how he worked. It had never been a good idea to get attached to people. There'd been that one woman at the Celestial Being safehouse who he'd slept with a few times over the years, but she had grown more distant from him as time went on, not less.
There'd been that one young man who'd been so very straightforward, but hiding need under his bluntness, and he'd clung, but he hadn't snuggled like Tieria did. Lockon had agreed to a night with him so long as he didn't mind humoring an inexperienced straight boy; he hadn't minded. Lockon was glad, now, that he'd had at least that much experience with men, because it had made it easier to know what to do with Tieria.
But what Tieria was doing was new. He left barely any space for Lockon to breathe. His chin rested up against Lockon's collarbone, his mouth pressed into the crook of his neck, one hand curled around Lockon's shoulder. He was asleep by now, and he still clung like that. It wasn't exactly objectionable. Lockon realized that the last time he'd had sex with someone he actually cared about had been as a teenager, and even then, he'd lost touch with her soon after and been relieved about it. He should have been worried about what was to come of what he'd done, what he'd now continue doing with Tieria. But he was oddly content. It felt right somehow, to be held onto like this. To know that he was filling a need that ran beyond the physical.
Tieria continued to cling in his sleep, but Lockon did not sleep himself. After a while, he realized that he needed to get up to go to the bathroom. This was going to be a problem.
He waited for a while, but Tieria didn't move. Finally, Lockon gave up on the hope that Tieria would let go of him and began to slowly ease himself away. In his sleep, Tieria made an incoherent little noise of dismay, and Lockon quickly reached up to stroke his hair some more--the gesture seemed to relax him enough while he was awake. It worked this time, too. Tieria sighed a little in his sleep and loosened his hold, and Lockon managed to roll out of his grasp and rise to his feet.
But then he looked back at Tieria, sprawled so awkwardly on the bed, and he stopped. For a moment, he forgot what he was going to do. He could only think about how charming it was to see Tieria so open but at the same time still hesitant, curled in on himself even in his sleep. At Lockon's departure from the bed, Tieria had folded his arms over his chest as if to protect his heart. It was adorable--and that was a strange word to apply to Tieria, but also a perfect one.
There was something else, too. With Tieria all around him in the systems of the lunar base, it was easy to forget that he was still vulnerable. In some ways, he still needed protection. Looking at him now, it was impossible to forget that. Lockon couldn't quite stop the sudden wash of relief that passed over him at the realization. Relief, and something else--but what was it? It was the same thing he'd felt when he'd first noticed Tieria softening on that island years ago (though he still had trouble accepting that it was years ago), the same thing he'd felt when he'd woken up wounded after taking that blow for Tieria. It felt right to be protecting Tieria, but he couldn't say just how or why.
Lockon still needed to use the bathroom. That was why he'd gotten up in the first place. He made his way around their discarded clothes (thinking that he might as well leave them that way, so that Tieria had something simple to focus his attention on in the morning), pausing only to first peel off his gloves and toss them into the laundry chute, then to take off his eyepatch and drop it on the dresser. He went through the motions while doing his best not to think too much, but it was difficult: his mind kept returning, with some bafflement, to that image of Tieria half-sprawled, half-curled on the bed like a puzzle piece that Lockon couldn't find a place for.
He was washing his hands when something strange occurred to him. Most of the people he'd slept with before, he'd used a false name with--not even his codename, just a false one. They'd been quiet, or they'd cried out that name during sex. There had been a couple of girls before Celestial Being who'd been all too happy to call out his real name, but even then he hadn't entirely been comfortable with that. Then there was that one woman who'd maintained a safe house--he'd introduced himself to her as Lockon, but when they'd tumbled into bed together she'd informed him in no uncertain tones that she wouldn't be calling out that name in the throes of passion. He hadn't really understood why, but he'd accepted her decision.
Tieria was the first person to call that name out like that. The thought made Lockon smile, although he couldn't say why. He stepped out of the bathroom and looked over to the bed again. Tieria had barely moved--he'd just shifted his head so that it was where Lockon's had been on the pillows. There was a little smile on his face. With some bemusement, Lockon realized that he could keep looking at that little smile. He could think, I made that smile, again if he wanted, but whether or not he did, he could keep looking. It was some strange sentimental thing.
He only looked away when he noticed that the laundry chute was only half-closed; it had gotten stuck again. He reached out and nudged it shut. That was one of the bugs that had yet to be worked out about the moonbase. Some of the pneumatic tubing systems stuck more often than was expected, Tieria had told him. This would need to be fixed before more people could settle into the base and begin sorting the data from Veda and the new information that would come back from Jupiter.
Lockon took out a clean pair of gloves from a drawer and pulled them on. He looked back at the now-closed laundry chute, then at Tieria on the bed, and he thought that he didn't mind waiting a while longer for those things to be fixed. Until then, he had a purpose here with Tieria.
* * *
Tieria woke up with a start. He hadn't slept much lately--most of the time his body needed to rest, he spent in Veda--and the sensation of waking itself was strange. What was stranger than that was that he was naked. When he had slept, he'd always worn a pair of pajamas modeled after his uniform. Waking up with nothing but the thin blankets on his body was a sensation he hadn't experienced before.
He knew why he was experiencing it now, of course--the memories of the previous night refused to leave his thoughts. He didn't mind. They were good memories. But there was a problem now that dragged him out of his half-waking, half-dreaming state of reminiscence back to full wakefulness. It was this: the other half of the bed was empty. It was barely even warm--Lockon had been away for several minutes now. Tieria sat upright immediately, quite alert despite his naked state, sweeping his gaze across the room for Lockon.
He relaxed only when he caught sight of Lockon standing before the mirror in the alcove that led to the bathroom. He was still naked too, save for the towel slung across his hips. As Tieria watched, he absently discarded the towel on the counter with one hand and raked his other hand through his wet hair. That was the only reason he'd left the bed: to shower. Tieria relaxed a little more.
But he could only relax so much. Lockon had his back to Tieria, and that exposed a series of scars that Tieria had thoroughly observed only through cameras before, never in person. A long and nasty burn scar, punctuated here and there with the remains of old puncture wounds, ran all the way across Lockon's back diagonally. Tieria clutched at his restraint, forcing himself to resist the urge to let his eyes blur with tears. There was no need. After a moment, the urge passed. Instead, Tieria found himself simply staring at the shape of Lockon's bare form seen from behind, the lines and curves of muscle. Even with those scars, it was the body underneath them that kept his attention. Tieria had no idea why. His own body was merely a shell, and Lockon's body was just a battered housing that had mercifully held together against all odds. It was the man woven into the fabric of that body that was important, and yet Tieria continued to stare.
Finally, Tieria managed to tear his eyes away in order to sit up and look around. He frowned slightly at the sight of the clothes the two of them had been wearing the previous night still scattered across the floor. Still holding himself a little strangely in his unfamiliar nakedness, he got up and began to gather the clothes.
"You know," Lockon said from over by the mirror, "you can keep looking if you want."
Tieria frowned down at Lockon's pants as he folded them. "What?"
"You were staring at my butt," Lockon said. Even though Tieria still wasn't good at reading the tones of voices, he could hear the grin in Lockon's words. "I don't mind, you know! Did you have a good time?"
Embarrassment, Tieria knew, was a strange and useless emotion. All the same, he wasn't sure which to be more embarrassed about: the blood that rushed to his face or the blood that began to gather lower in his body. He stood up, setting the folded pants down on top of the nearby dresser. "There was no reason for me to be looking in the first place."
Lockon laughed, and Tieria felt himself heat up further. He opened his mouth to speak, but he couldn't think of what he should say in response to that laughter. "Lockon..." He'd been saying that so much, lately. Sometimes it seemed like the only thing he could say.
"It's all right." Then Lockon's hand was on his shoulder; Lockon had made his way over from the alcove. Tieria held back a gasp. It was such a normal gesture for Lockon to make, and he'd done it plenty of times before, but somehow it was different when they were both naked. Tieria wasn't entirely sure why, but he knew it felt good. Acting on an instinct he hadn't known he had, he leaned back into Lockon, pressing the side of his face against Lockon's throat.
Lockon slid his other hand around to rest on Tieria's belly, right below this body's purely decorative navel. He had his gloves back on. Tieria couldn't see, but he hoped Lockon had his eyepatch back on, too. "I forgot to say good morning," Lockon said. "I guess I'm still a little out of sorts after last night."
"Did I do something wrong?" Tieria asked, struggling to keep a sudden note of alarm out of his voice and probably failing.
"No." Lockon laughed a little, more quietly this time, and Tieria felt more of those startling physical feelings rise in him at the tremors of Lockon's body behind him. He still wasn't used to this, and he still reacted intensely to everything Lockon did to him. "You were fine, Tieria. Besides, you're just starting at this sort of thing, so you shouldn't worry so much about how good you are at it."
"It's only natural," Tieria said, "that I should want to improve my skill."
"I'd rather you just enjoyed yourself," Lockon said. "Nobody's perfect at this, after all, so don't try so hard."
"You are," Tieria said quietly, shifting so that he could feel Lockon's pulse against his temple.
"What?"
"You are perfect during sexual activity," Tieria said. "There's nothing more I could ask for from you."
"Ah," Lockon said. "That's not really true." He sounded a little subdued; Tieria wondered what troubled him. "I'm glad you like it, though."
Tieria gave a slight start as Lockon lifted his hand from Tieria's shoulder to stroke his hair. Did Lockon not realize what a response his every touch drew from Tieria, or was he doing it intentionally? "Lockon, if you keep touching me like this, I'll soon be fully erect."
"You don't have to say it like that!" Lockon said.
"Nevertheless," Tieria said. "It's true."
"I know," Lockon said. "I owe you something."
"Lockon, you don't--ah!" Tieria tumbled; Lockon had pushed him. He landed on the bed, flailing. He sat up just in time to see Lockon kneel next to him on the edge of the bed--he did have his eyepatch back on, Tieria noted with some relief. "What was that for?" Tieria demanded.
Lockon grinned at him, and Tieria felt another of those peculiar emotions he'd been experiencing lately: a sensation as if something were melting inside him. "I do owe you something. You never gave me a chance to do this for you!" Before Tieria could say anything else, Lockon ducked his head and planted a kiss at the top of each of Tieria's thighs.
Tieria gave a shameful little squeak. Then he couldn't even think of making any more noise, because Lockon had lowered his head to Tieria's lap and pulled the head of his cock into his mouth. In the sudden silence, as Lockon gently licked at him, Tieria realized there were tears at the corners of his eyes. The contact had been too sudden, and he hadn't had the chance to prepare himself this time. There had only been Lockon's grin, and then Lockon's mouth wet around him. And now there was more of it; Lockon drew him in deeper in slow and measured motions.
By the time Tieria managed to find a few scraps of his voice, Lockon had taken just over half of his length into his mouth and was sucking at him in long, lingering pulls, his tongue moving at the head. "Ah--" Tieria fumbled for something to say. Only one thing came to mind. "I'm sorry..."
Lockon stopped; Tieria could just make out his frown. Then he pulled away, slowly, releasing Tieria in increments. Tieria felt suddenly cold; he wanted Lockon's mouth back on him. "What do you mean, Tieria? You don't have anything to be sorry about."
"I didn't realize," Tieria said. "Until you began to do this to me. I was unaware of how poorly I performed when I did it to you."
Lockon stared at him.
"I apologize," Tieria said. "I'll practice more before I try--"
Lockon cut him off, putting an arm around him and pulling him close. He nuzzled against Tieria's shoulder. "Don't say that. Don't say anything like that! I liked the way you did it, Tieria."
"I don't understand," Tieria murmured.
"It's all right," Lockon said. "You don't have to. Just relax and don't worry about skill too much. You'll get better with time, and I'll like all your efforts. I promise."
Lockon promised, so Tieria accepted that promise without hesitation. "All right," he said.
"Good," Lockon said. He let go of Tieria and kissed him lower on his chest now, then lower, then on his stomach, and then he had his mouth poised between Tieria's legs again. He licked little circles all around Tieria's shaft, and Tieria made little moans, getting higher in pitch until finally, when Tieria thought he couldn't make any more sound, Lockon took Tieria's length back into his mouth and drew on it again. This time, Tieria managed only to gasp.
He regained enough control of his own body to lift a hand and hesitantly lay it on Lockon's head. As strange as this scene was, it was also perfect. Lockon's head was on Tieria's lap, and Tieria's fingers ran through his hair, stroking him, petting him, holding him close. Tieria closed his eyes to force the tears away, then opened them again. Lockon still knelt at his side, head still on his lap. It was still perfect.
Now that he'd had the experience, Tieria recognized the signals as climax approached. Certain circuits in his brain began to disconnect; certain connections in his spine prepared to uncouple to protect him from the flood of sensation. The room around him blurred faintly as his brain struggled to decide how to perceive it. Tieria fought those urges and clutched more tightly at Lockon, one hand on his head and the other on his shoulder.
Lockon pulled back from him until his lips were just resting against Tieria's cock. "Hey," he said softly. "Don't take it so seriously. Relax, all right?" He pressed both hands, still gloved, to Tieria's hips, pinning him gently against the pillows. Then he sucked Tieria's length back into his mouth and drew at him hard.
Relax--
Lockon had told him to, so Tieria did. He fell back against the pillows, giving in to the guidance of Lockon's hands on his hips. His brain stopped trying to disengage, and this time, though his surroundings flickered a little, his mind stayed put. Even so, he couldn't begin to describe the feeling. All he knew was that he didn't try to stop the tears from stinging at the corners of his eyes this time. "Lockon," he finally said, because yet again, it was the only thing he could say.
After a few moments, Lockon leaned over him. "I hope you're not still worried about who's good at what," he said.
Tieria reached up to touch his hair again. "Somewhat," he admitted. "But I will learn."
* * *
After a while, Lockon got up and left the room to make breakfast. It seemed like the natural thing to do. Tieria was dozing again, although Lockon had needed to encourage him to relax a few times first. Even so, Lockon wanted some space to himself for a while. They were out of prepared breakfasts, so the kitchen was the obvious choice. It still showed some signs of its origin as two small personal quarters--a mirror in an odd place here, two doors where only one might have been needed there--but that gave it character, and in a place like this, that was important.
"A place like this" meant a lot of things, Lockon had come to learn. It wasn't just that the laundry chutes stuck sometimes, or that every so often Tieria would inform him of an entirely new layer to the base that now needed restoring. It also meant something more relevant to breakfast: they had to be careful about food. Tieria had told him recently that they would soon be able to increase the space dedicated to hydroponics, but even that could only grow so many things. They had to choose carefully what to import from Earth and how to preserve it. Some of the networks Celestial Being had used to acquire food and supplies remained available to them, but that didn't solve everything.
Lockon usually found himself resorting to rations made from nutrients produced in the lunar complex, rather than dipping into their stores of imports from Earth, save for during the meals he'd been taking with Tieria lately. But he'd mentioned recently that he wouldn't mind cooking for the two of them. He thought now was the time to make good on that implicit promise. That was another thing he could teach Tieria: making sure your partner had breakfast ready for them after a night in bed together.
And if he let himself idle for too long, he'd start thinking too much about just what that meant.
Lockon got out the frying pan, the partially blunted safety knives, and some of the synthetic cooking oil produced on the base. Then he rummaged around in the food storage until he'd found what he was looking for and pulled it out. Then he stopped, one potato in each hand. Something was wrong. It took him a moment to figure out what it was.
These were real potatoes, grown in real dirt, not whatever could have been made in the hydroponics level of the moonbase. Tieria had had them imported from Earth. Why would he waste some of their precious import quota on potatoes when they could be grown right here? True, the ones grown in the hydroponics level would look a little funny, and they wouldn't be as good, but...they'd be adequate.
A worrying thought occurred to him. Lockon tried to remember if he'd told Tieria that he liked to cook with potatoes. Had Tieria taken one little comment like that as a reason to have potatoes shipped to them all the way from Earth? As a matter of fact, he didn't think he'd even told Tieria anything like that. He cast back in his memory--
Ah. Back in Celestial Being, he'd sometimes gotten the chance to cook for the rest of the crew during their stays on Earth. He'd usually preferred something with potatoes. But that didn't make things better, because it meant that Tieria had held such a trivial detail in his memory for six years and then used it now. It meant that a long-ago habit was enough to make Tieria go out of his way to arrange things in Lockon's favor.
It meant that Tieria was looking out for him far too much. That wasn't right. It wasn't right for Tieria to be so attached. Lockon was supposed to be the one who looked out for people; he was supposed to recall habits and quirks and use them as best he could to make someone a better member of the team. That was what he'd done, with Tieria. It was just what he did. That had been his contribution to the team, back when he was part of the team. Why was Tieria now doing so much for him? It wasn't the way things should be.
Lockon put the potatoes down on the counter.
Tieria feeling so much for him wasn't the way things should be, either. The idea was completely bizarre to Lockon. He wasn't someone that people fell for in that way: he was just a guide who helped them along. Lockon let out a shaky breath and glanced around him to make sure that Tieria hadn't arrived yet. Then he propped his elbows on the counter and buried his head in his hands, trying to find some stability. Trying to find a place in all of this that made sense, a place he could properly guide Tieria from, because what else could he do now?
He wasn't given much time to search for it before he heard a voice behind him. "Lockon, are you all right?"
With a small start, he turned to see that a screen had formed on the wall, from which Tieria looked out at him, openly concerned; he was still naked, at least from the waist up, but his hair was wet now. Lockon blinked once, then realized where he'd gone wrong. He'd thought he was in private, but there was nowhere in the moonbase that Tieria couldn't see with a thought.
"I'm fine, Tieria," he said. The sudden panic of facing Tieria's feelings for him and whatever they might signify was gone now that he was actually talking to Tieria. It would come back later, he thought, although probably not for a while, now that he remembered how often Tieria was watching him. "I'm going to make something called hash browns for breakfast. It looks like we've got all the ingredients for it. You know, we almost have too many ingredients for it. You didn't need to have potatoes imported up here--we can grow them ourselves."
"Need is not my only motivator in regards to you, Lockon," Tieria said. He hesitated; his expression softened. "I want you to be comfortable here."
Lockon resisted the urge to smile gently at that, even though it was his first impulse. He really was glad to see Tieria making that expression and even more glad to see him caring about someone that way. The fact that it was Lockon he cared about so much, though, still felt hollow. Lockon picked up a spatula and tapped it warningly on the wall. "Don't go too far out of your way to make people comfortable just yet! We still have a lot to cover. When the tubing systems don't stick anymore, we can talk about what food makes people comfortable." People. Not him. He had to make sure Tieria knew that there would be other people on the moonbase eventually.
Tieria took a moment to reply, looking startled--but not, Lockon noted with some relief, hurt. Then he said, "Of course. I'll be in for breakfast shortly." The screen faded from the wall.
Lockon turned his attention to dicing, pressing, and frying the potatoes with yet more relief. He'd rather be talking to Tieria about easy, comfortable things, such as how he could learn to appreciate movies or music, but until he could get back to that point, preparing food was another way to distract himself, even if it wasn't as effective. Besides, it gave him time to think about how he could teach Tieria how to appreciate food. That was something he hadn't learned in all the years Lockon had been...gone (asleep? Unaware? Dead? No, gone was the best way to describe it): that food could be fun as well as nourishing. Nobody had thought to teach him, and he'd been too busy learning what to do with his new emotions to consider little things like his sense of taste. It was time to fix that.
Tieria arrived only minutes later; he must have spared no time for anything but drying his hair and putting on clothes. Lockon was still frying the hash browns. Tieria announced his presence with slow, uncertain footfalls: the approach of someone still assimulating just what had happened last night. Lockon smiled at the frying pan, then turned to gesture at Tieria. "Why don't you go get the common area ready? We can eat in there."
"I'll do that," Tieria said. Then he paused, coming closer to peer over Lockon's shoulder. "Lockon...do you want me to get more materials for you? I believe we have some wheat flour in another storage space. There is a more native dish called a 'boxty'--"
Lockon lifted a hand to touch Tieria's shoulder. "I know. But I can survive on food other than what gets served at pubs in my home country. I did all right on the Ptolemy for years, didn't I? I'll be fine. Besides, these are good too." He finished the last hash brown and flipped it onto a plate with the others. "Here, Tieria. Why don't you take this into the lounge and get it set up there while I clean up in here?"
Tieria looked at him for a long moment, his eyes very wide and serious. Then he nodded quietly, took the plate, and left. Lockon stifled a sigh as Tieria walked out the door; there was too much chance Tieria would see it anyway. But with Tieria out of the kitchen, Lockon couldn't avoid thinking about what he'd said. Had he really been researching traditional Irish foods for Lockon's sake? Fortunately, it was impossible to take that seriously enough to worry about it. Lockon grinned as he finished cleaning, then headed out and made for the common area.
He stopped in the entrance as he got there.
Tieria was sitting at one of the tables, busily cutting up a plate of hash browns. That wasn't the problem. If Tieria wanted to cut his meal into very small pieces, that was fine with Lockon, although of course he'd explain to Tieria that you didn't need to cut hash browns up so much. In this case, though, Tieria had already cut up one plate. He was working on the other one now.
He was cutting up Lockon's food for him.
"Tieria," Lockon said, finally finding it in him to walk forward toward the table. "You don't have to do that. Really!"
Tieria didn't even look up. He continued cutting. "You cooked the meal. I will finish the preparations."
"I can eat it without you cutting it up first," Lockon said. "It's not that hard."
Tieria hesitated. "You're sure? Lockon, I wish to make things as convenient and safe as possible for you."
"I'm sure," Lockon said. He knew he had something more to say, but at that moment, all words deserted him. Instead, he found himself looking down at Tieria, looking into his earnest eyes, struggling to deal with what he saw in them. This was wrong, he knew then. It wasn't right for him to be this close to Tieria. Here was someone who felt for him things that Lockon could never feel in return. He shouldn't be encouraging that.
"Lockon?" Tieria asked tentatively. "Are you all right?"
But he couldn't walk away from it, either. Lockon sat down. "I'm fine," he said. "Let's eat."
* * *
It seemed impossible to Tieria that he would find a routine again, that things would return to normal. The ways he had touched Lockon, the places Lockon had touched him, all of that meant that nothing could be the same again. He no longer had a baseline from which to draw his future behavior. True, he had accepted that he must change to meet the future, and he had been glad to do so, but this wasn't a future he'd expected at all.
It was better.
Tieria had no way to describe how good it felt to be at Lockon's side. And he was at Lockon's side--he had his duties in Veda, but he found that it wasn't so hard to accomplish them anymore, knowing that Lockon would be waiting for him when he emerged. It did not occur to him, at first, to arrange Lockon's duties so that their free time coincided. Initially, it had seemed more sensible to have one of them working while the other was resting (although Tieria needed far less rest than a normal human). But Lockon began quietly rearranging his own schedule so that it matched with Tieria's, and somehow, this pleased Tieria. Not just the knowledge that he'd see Lockon more, but the clean digital sight of their time matching up, like a signature of their togetherness. Lockon was with him. Why this gave him such joy, Tieria didn't know. All he really wanted, after all, was to learn what Lockon could teach him about humanity--things like this proved he still had much to learn--and to make sure that Lockon was safe--and preferably happy, although Tieria had no idea how to do that at all. Why did it matter, whether or not he was close to Lockon?
But it did. The closer Tieria was to Lockon, the more full of warmth and light he felt. He accepted these feelings happily, even if he didn't entirely understand them.
Tieria didn't ask for sex again, not yet. He wasn't sure he could handle the feeling again so soon. As contemptible as the other things he'd said had been, on one matter Regene had been right: Tieria's body was not yet optimized for sexual activity. That wasn't the whole reason he didn't pursue it further just yet, though. There was something else: with Lockon, he didn't need it. Just touching him was enough.
So when Tieria next began coming to Lockon's quarters at the moonbase's assigned night time, he came in his nightwear, a simple sleeping gown. Lockon laughed at it; he didn't see the point of such garments here with no one but them. It wasn't surprising; he still only wore underwear to sleep.
Tieria flushed at the question, then steadied himself. "It's only proper."
"Proper?" Lockon wondered--he was pushing Tieria to explain himself, Tieria realized.
It was all right, though. He was beginning to realize that he could do that. "It makes me more comfortable," he said.
Lockon accepted that answer with one of those impossibly warm smiles, and once again, Tieria felt that strange sensation of warmth tight around his stomach.
Tieria didn't need to sleep at all. In fact, he should have been spending that time in Veda while his physical body rested. But there was something irresistible in the notion of spending it dozing off at Lockon's side. He still tried to set aside most nights for his duties in Veda, while allowing himself to spend them in Lockon's bed as a special reward. It grew more difficult as he went on.
He also found himself drifting closer to Lockon. On the first night he came to Lockon's bed in his nightwear, he rested his head against Lockon's shoulder and breathed in the unexpectedly comforting scent of him, but didn't let himself draw too much closer than that. He was relieved, then, that he'd seen to it Lockon had a large bed in the first place, firmly believing that he should have at least some luxuries in the then-austere environment of the lunar complex.
But the second time Tieria slept there, when he opened his eyes in the morning to find Lockon stirring next to him, he realized he'd unconsciously nestled up to Lockon's side, both hands clutching at one of his arms, his face in the crook of Lockon's neck. He'd pulled back in alarm, but Lockon had only laughed and touched his cheek.
The third time--
Tieria had gone to sleep next to Lockon, the same as the previous two times. In the middle of the night, he woke up with a start. It took him a moment to realize why: Lockon had moved slightly in his sleep. At that point, Tieria had been close enough to him, wrapped up against him with his hands pressed to his bare belly and his head nestled against his chest, that the small gesture had awoken him.
He sat up, blinking. A part of him resisted the separation from Lockon, the sudden absence of his warmth. But he was still right there, so it wasn't so bad after all.
Lockon did not turn off the lights completely in his room when he slept; he merely dimmed them, leaving a faint glow at the edge of the room. Tieria hadn't understood why, at first, but now, looking at Lockon sprawled out there, he knew. Lockon looked amazing in the soft greys of human night vision, as he always did, no matter what color Tieria saw him in. But it was the motion of his chest that captivated Tieria. Even as the faint light gleamed off painful old scars that made something twinge unpleasantly in Tieria's heart, something about that rise and fall of Lockon's breathing made Tieria indescribably happy. Just looking at him there in the dim light made Tieria smile. He couldn't quite help himself--he reached out to stroke Lockon's face. He was tentative at first, but then his fingers slipped to Lockon's pulse, then to his shoulders, shying away from the scars to finally rest gently on his heart.
Tieria could feel it beating. Before he knew what was happening, he was sighing with the joy of it. "Lockon," he said quietly, even though he knew he should stay mute and let Lockon sleep. It just felt right to say his name.
But he jumped a little with guilt when Lockon stirred beneath his hand, blinked, and opened his good eye. He wasn't wearing his eyepatch, but somehow, with the beat of his heart beneath Tieria's fingers, that didn't seem so bad for once. "Something wrong, Tieria?"
"No," Tieria said. "Nothing is wrong. Everything's right." He couldn't bring himself to say anything more. All he could do was sit there with his hand over Lockon's heart.
Lockon looked up at him for a long moment, a distant, puzzled expression on his face. Tieria didn't know what to say in response to it, so he was glad when Lockon spoke first, with a grin suddenly overtaking that strange lost expression. "If you're turned on, I can do something about that."
"That's not it," Tieria said. If he let himself touch Lockon in just the right way, of course, he knew it wouldn't take long for him to be crying out with need. But he didn't want that, right now. He just wanted to look at Lockon there and feel how warm he was.
"If you're sure," Lockon said.
"I am," Tieria said. After a reluctant moment, he lay back down at Lockon's side. This time, he rested his head over Lockon's heart. It would be easy to fall asleep again, like this. "Let's go back to sleep."
→ Arc 1: Waking
→ Arc 2: Return
→ Arc 3: Learning
→ Arc 4: Surprise
→ Arc 5: Intimacy
→ Arc 6: Sentiment
Fandom: Gundam 00
Characters/Pairing: Lockon (Neil)/Tieria.
Rating: NC-17.
Wordcount: 6,256 (sixth part)
Notes: Part six of nine. Mostly somewhat weird fluff and setup for future chapters.
Summary: Lockon and Tieria start learning to deal with a relationship. Awkwardness ensues.
The way Tieria snuggled up to him was strange to Lockon. He'd shared a bed with cuddlers before--that was the sort of woman he tended to attract--but they'd kept at least a little distance from him. After all, no matter how affectionate they were, it had been only a one-night stand. That was how he worked. It had never been a good idea to get attached to people. There'd been that one woman at the Celestial Being safehouse who he'd slept with a few times over the years, but she had grown more distant from him as time went on, not less.
There'd been that one young man who'd been so very straightforward, but hiding need under his bluntness, and he'd clung, but he hadn't snuggled like Tieria did. Lockon had agreed to a night with him so long as he didn't mind humoring an inexperienced straight boy; he hadn't minded. Lockon was glad, now, that he'd had at least that much experience with men, because it had made it easier to know what to do with Tieria.
But what Tieria was doing was new. He left barely any space for Lockon to breathe. His chin rested up against Lockon's collarbone, his mouth pressed into the crook of his neck, one hand curled around Lockon's shoulder. He was asleep by now, and he still clung like that. It wasn't exactly objectionable. Lockon realized that the last time he'd had sex with someone he actually cared about had been as a teenager, and even then, he'd lost touch with her soon after and been relieved about it. He should have been worried about what was to come of what he'd done, what he'd now continue doing with Tieria. But he was oddly content. It felt right somehow, to be held onto like this. To know that he was filling a need that ran beyond the physical.
Tieria continued to cling in his sleep, but Lockon did not sleep himself. After a while, he realized that he needed to get up to go to the bathroom. This was going to be a problem.
He waited for a while, but Tieria didn't move. Finally, Lockon gave up on the hope that Tieria would let go of him and began to slowly ease himself away. In his sleep, Tieria made an incoherent little noise of dismay, and Lockon quickly reached up to stroke his hair some more--the gesture seemed to relax him enough while he was awake. It worked this time, too. Tieria sighed a little in his sleep and loosened his hold, and Lockon managed to roll out of his grasp and rise to his feet.
But then he looked back at Tieria, sprawled so awkwardly on the bed, and he stopped. For a moment, he forgot what he was going to do. He could only think about how charming it was to see Tieria so open but at the same time still hesitant, curled in on himself even in his sleep. At Lockon's departure from the bed, Tieria had folded his arms over his chest as if to protect his heart. It was adorable--and that was a strange word to apply to Tieria, but also a perfect one.
There was something else, too. With Tieria all around him in the systems of the lunar base, it was easy to forget that he was still vulnerable. In some ways, he still needed protection. Looking at him now, it was impossible to forget that. Lockon couldn't quite stop the sudden wash of relief that passed over him at the realization. Relief, and something else--but what was it? It was the same thing he'd felt when he'd first noticed Tieria softening on that island years ago (though he still had trouble accepting that it was years ago), the same thing he'd felt when he'd woken up wounded after taking that blow for Tieria. It felt right to be protecting Tieria, but he couldn't say just how or why.
Lockon still needed to use the bathroom. That was why he'd gotten up in the first place. He made his way around their discarded clothes (thinking that he might as well leave them that way, so that Tieria had something simple to focus his attention on in the morning), pausing only to first peel off his gloves and toss them into the laundry chute, then to take off his eyepatch and drop it on the dresser. He went through the motions while doing his best not to think too much, but it was difficult: his mind kept returning, with some bafflement, to that image of Tieria half-sprawled, half-curled on the bed like a puzzle piece that Lockon couldn't find a place for.
He was washing his hands when something strange occurred to him. Most of the people he'd slept with before, he'd used a false name with--not even his codename, just a false one. They'd been quiet, or they'd cried out that name during sex. There had been a couple of girls before Celestial Being who'd been all too happy to call out his real name, but even then he hadn't entirely been comfortable with that. Then there was that one woman who'd maintained a safe house--he'd introduced himself to her as Lockon, but when they'd tumbled into bed together she'd informed him in no uncertain tones that she wouldn't be calling out that name in the throes of passion. He hadn't really understood why, but he'd accepted her decision.
Tieria was the first person to call that name out like that. The thought made Lockon smile, although he couldn't say why. He stepped out of the bathroom and looked over to the bed again. Tieria had barely moved--he'd just shifted his head so that it was where Lockon's had been on the pillows. There was a little smile on his face. With some bemusement, Lockon realized that he could keep looking at that little smile. He could think, I made that smile, again if he wanted, but whether or not he did, he could keep looking. It was some strange sentimental thing.
He only looked away when he noticed that the laundry chute was only half-closed; it had gotten stuck again. He reached out and nudged it shut. That was one of the bugs that had yet to be worked out about the moonbase. Some of the pneumatic tubing systems stuck more often than was expected, Tieria had told him. This would need to be fixed before more people could settle into the base and begin sorting the data from Veda and the new information that would come back from Jupiter.
Lockon took out a clean pair of gloves from a drawer and pulled them on. He looked back at the now-closed laundry chute, then at Tieria on the bed, and he thought that he didn't mind waiting a while longer for those things to be fixed. Until then, he had a purpose here with Tieria.
* * *
Tieria woke up with a start. He hadn't slept much lately--most of the time his body needed to rest, he spent in Veda--and the sensation of waking itself was strange. What was stranger than that was that he was naked. When he had slept, he'd always worn a pair of pajamas modeled after his uniform. Waking up with nothing but the thin blankets on his body was a sensation he hadn't experienced before.
He knew why he was experiencing it now, of course--the memories of the previous night refused to leave his thoughts. He didn't mind. They were good memories. But there was a problem now that dragged him out of his half-waking, half-dreaming state of reminiscence back to full wakefulness. It was this: the other half of the bed was empty. It was barely even warm--Lockon had been away for several minutes now. Tieria sat upright immediately, quite alert despite his naked state, sweeping his gaze across the room for Lockon.
He relaxed only when he caught sight of Lockon standing before the mirror in the alcove that led to the bathroom. He was still naked too, save for the towel slung across his hips. As Tieria watched, he absently discarded the towel on the counter with one hand and raked his other hand through his wet hair. That was the only reason he'd left the bed: to shower. Tieria relaxed a little more.
But he could only relax so much. Lockon had his back to Tieria, and that exposed a series of scars that Tieria had thoroughly observed only through cameras before, never in person. A long and nasty burn scar, punctuated here and there with the remains of old puncture wounds, ran all the way across Lockon's back diagonally. Tieria clutched at his restraint, forcing himself to resist the urge to let his eyes blur with tears. There was no need. After a moment, the urge passed. Instead, Tieria found himself simply staring at the shape of Lockon's bare form seen from behind, the lines and curves of muscle. Even with those scars, it was the body underneath them that kept his attention. Tieria had no idea why. His own body was merely a shell, and Lockon's body was just a battered housing that had mercifully held together against all odds. It was the man woven into the fabric of that body that was important, and yet Tieria continued to stare.
Finally, Tieria managed to tear his eyes away in order to sit up and look around. He frowned slightly at the sight of the clothes the two of them had been wearing the previous night still scattered across the floor. Still holding himself a little strangely in his unfamiliar nakedness, he got up and began to gather the clothes.
"You know," Lockon said from over by the mirror, "you can keep looking if you want."
Tieria frowned down at Lockon's pants as he folded them. "What?"
"You were staring at my butt," Lockon said. Even though Tieria still wasn't good at reading the tones of voices, he could hear the grin in Lockon's words. "I don't mind, you know! Did you have a good time?"
Embarrassment, Tieria knew, was a strange and useless emotion. All the same, he wasn't sure which to be more embarrassed about: the blood that rushed to his face or the blood that began to gather lower in his body. He stood up, setting the folded pants down on top of the nearby dresser. "There was no reason for me to be looking in the first place."
Lockon laughed, and Tieria felt himself heat up further. He opened his mouth to speak, but he couldn't think of what he should say in response to that laughter. "Lockon..." He'd been saying that so much, lately. Sometimes it seemed like the only thing he could say.
"It's all right." Then Lockon's hand was on his shoulder; Lockon had made his way over from the alcove. Tieria held back a gasp. It was such a normal gesture for Lockon to make, and he'd done it plenty of times before, but somehow it was different when they were both naked. Tieria wasn't entirely sure why, but he knew it felt good. Acting on an instinct he hadn't known he had, he leaned back into Lockon, pressing the side of his face against Lockon's throat.
Lockon slid his other hand around to rest on Tieria's belly, right below this body's purely decorative navel. He had his gloves back on. Tieria couldn't see, but he hoped Lockon had his eyepatch back on, too. "I forgot to say good morning," Lockon said. "I guess I'm still a little out of sorts after last night."
"Did I do something wrong?" Tieria asked, struggling to keep a sudden note of alarm out of his voice and probably failing.
"No." Lockon laughed a little, more quietly this time, and Tieria felt more of those startling physical feelings rise in him at the tremors of Lockon's body behind him. He still wasn't used to this, and he still reacted intensely to everything Lockon did to him. "You were fine, Tieria. Besides, you're just starting at this sort of thing, so you shouldn't worry so much about how good you are at it."
"It's only natural," Tieria said, "that I should want to improve my skill."
"I'd rather you just enjoyed yourself," Lockon said. "Nobody's perfect at this, after all, so don't try so hard."
"You are," Tieria said quietly, shifting so that he could feel Lockon's pulse against his temple.
"What?"
"You are perfect during sexual activity," Tieria said. "There's nothing more I could ask for from you."
"Ah," Lockon said. "That's not really true." He sounded a little subdued; Tieria wondered what troubled him. "I'm glad you like it, though."
Tieria gave a slight start as Lockon lifted his hand from Tieria's shoulder to stroke his hair. Did Lockon not realize what a response his every touch drew from Tieria, or was he doing it intentionally? "Lockon, if you keep touching me like this, I'll soon be fully erect."
"You don't have to say it like that!" Lockon said.
"Nevertheless," Tieria said. "It's true."
"I know," Lockon said. "I owe you something."
"Lockon, you don't--ah!" Tieria tumbled; Lockon had pushed him. He landed on the bed, flailing. He sat up just in time to see Lockon kneel next to him on the edge of the bed--he did have his eyepatch back on, Tieria noted with some relief. "What was that for?" Tieria demanded.
Lockon grinned at him, and Tieria felt another of those peculiar emotions he'd been experiencing lately: a sensation as if something were melting inside him. "I do owe you something. You never gave me a chance to do this for you!" Before Tieria could say anything else, Lockon ducked his head and planted a kiss at the top of each of Tieria's thighs.
Tieria gave a shameful little squeak. Then he couldn't even think of making any more noise, because Lockon had lowered his head to Tieria's lap and pulled the head of his cock into his mouth. In the sudden silence, as Lockon gently licked at him, Tieria realized there were tears at the corners of his eyes. The contact had been too sudden, and he hadn't had the chance to prepare himself this time. There had only been Lockon's grin, and then Lockon's mouth wet around him. And now there was more of it; Lockon drew him in deeper in slow and measured motions.
By the time Tieria managed to find a few scraps of his voice, Lockon had taken just over half of his length into his mouth and was sucking at him in long, lingering pulls, his tongue moving at the head. "Ah--" Tieria fumbled for something to say. Only one thing came to mind. "I'm sorry..."
Lockon stopped; Tieria could just make out his frown. Then he pulled away, slowly, releasing Tieria in increments. Tieria felt suddenly cold; he wanted Lockon's mouth back on him. "What do you mean, Tieria? You don't have anything to be sorry about."
"I didn't realize," Tieria said. "Until you began to do this to me. I was unaware of how poorly I performed when I did it to you."
Lockon stared at him.
"I apologize," Tieria said. "I'll practice more before I try--"
Lockon cut him off, putting an arm around him and pulling him close. He nuzzled against Tieria's shoulder. "Don't say that. Don't say anything like that! I liked the way you did it, Tieria."
"I don't understand," Tieria murmured.
"It's all right," Lockon said. "You don't have to. Just relax and don't worry about skill too much. You'll get better with time, and I'll like all your efforts. I promise."
Lockon promised, so Tieria accepted that promise without hesitation. "All right," he said.
"Good," Lockon said. He let go of Tieria and kissed him lower on his chest now, then lower, then on his stomach, and then he had his mouth poised between Tieria's legs again. He licked little circles all around Tieria's shaft, and Tieria made little moans, getting higher in pitch until finally, when Tieria thought he couldn't make any more sound, Lockon took Tieria's length back into his mouth and drew on it again. This time, Tieria managed only to gasp.
He regained enough control of his own body to lift a hand and hesitantly lay it on Lockon's head. As strange as this scene was, it was also perfect. Lockon's head was on Tieria's lap, and Tieria's fingers ran through his hair, stroking him, petting him, holding him close. Tieria closed his eyes to force the tears away, then opened them again. Lockon still knelt at his side, head still on his lap. It was still perfect.
Now that he'd had the experience, Tieria recognized the signals as climax approached. Certain circuits in his brain began to disconnect; certain connections in his spine prepared to uncouple to protect him from the flood of sensation. The room around him blurred faintly as his brain struggled to decide how to perceive it. Tieria fought those urges and clutched more tightly at Lockon, one hand on his head and the other on his shoulder.
Lockon pulled back from him until his lips were just resting against Tieria's cock. "Hey," he said softly. "Don't take it so seriously. Relax, all right?" He pressed both hands, still gloved, to Tieria's hips, pinning him gently against the pillows. Then he sucked Tieria's length back into his mouth and drew at him hard.
Relax--
Lockon had told him to, so Tieria did. He fell back against the pillows, giving in to the guidance of Lockon's hands on his hips. His brain stopped trying to disengage, and this time, though his surroundings flickered a little, his mind stayed put. Even so, he couldn't begin to describe the feeling. All he knew was that he didn't try to stop the tears from stinging at the corners of his eyes this time. "Lockon," he finally said, because yet again, it was the only thing he could say.
After a few moments, Lockon leaned over him. "I hope you're not still worried about who's good at what," he said.
Tieria reached up to touch his hair again. "Somewhat," he admitted. "But I will learn."
* * *
After a while, Lockon got up and left the room to make breakfast. It seemed like the natural thing to do. Tieria was dozing again, although Lockon had needed to encourage him to relax a few times first. Even so, Lockon wanted some space to himself for a while. They were out of prepared breakfasts, so the kitchen was the obvious choice. It still showed some signs of its origin as two small personal quarters--a mirror in an odd place here, two doors where only one might have been needed there--but that gave it character, and in a place like this, that was important.
"A place like this" meant a lot of things, Lockon had come to learn. It wasn't just that the laundry chutes stuck sometimes, or that every so often Tieria would inform him of an entirely new layer to the base that now needed restoring. It also meant something more relevant to breakfast: they had to be careful about food. Tieria had told him recently that they would soon be able to increase the space dedicated to hydroponics, but even that could only grow so many things. They had to choose carefully what to import from Earth and how to preserve it. Some of the networks Celestial Being had used to acquire food and supplies remained available to them, but that didn't solve everything.
Lockon usually found himself resorting to rations made from nutrients produced in the lunar complex, rather than dipping into their stores of imports from Earth, save for during the meals he'd been taking with Tieria lately. But he'd mentioned recently that he wouldn't mind cooking for the two of them. He thought now was the time to make good on that implicit promise. That was another thing he could teach Tieria: making sure your partner had breakfast ready for them after a night in bed together.
And if he let himself idle for too long, he'd start thinking too much about just what that meant.
Lockon got out the frying pan, the partially blunted safety knives, and some of the synthetic cooking oil produced on the base. Then he rummaged around in the food storage until he'd found what he was looking for and pulled it out. Then he stopped, one potato in each hand. Something was wrong. It took him a moment to figure out what it was.
These were real potatoes, grown in real dirt, not whatever could have been made in the hydroponics level of the moonbase. Tieria had had them imported from Earth. Why would he waste some of their precious import quota on potatoes when they could be grown right here? True, the ones grown in the hydroponics level would look a little funny, and they wouldn't be as good, but...they'd be adequate.
A worrying thought occurred to him. Lockon tried to remember if he'd told Tieria that he liked to cook with potatoes. Had Tieria taken one little comment like that as a reason to have potatoes shipped to them all the way from Earth? As a matter of fact, he didn't think he'd even told Tieria anything like that. He cast back in his memory--
Ah. Back in Celestial Being, he'd sometimes gotten the chance to cook for the rest of the crew during their stays on Earth. He'd usually preferred something with potatoes. But that didn't make things better, because it meant that Tieria had held such a trivial detail in his memory for six years and then used it now. It meant that a long-ago habit was enough to make Tieria go out of his way to arrange things in Lockon's favor.
It meant that Tieria was looking out for him far too much. That wasn't right. It wasn't right for Tieria to be so attached. Lockon was supposed to be the one who looked out for people; he was supposed to recall habits and quirks and use them as best he could to make someone a better member of the team. That was what he'd done, with Tieria. It was just what he did. That had been his contribution to the team, back when he was part of the team. Why was Tieria now doing so much for him? It wasn't the way things should be.
Lockon put the potatoes down on the counter.
Tieria feeling so much for him wasn't the way things should be, either. The idea was completely bizarre to Lockon. He wasn't someone that people fell for in that way: he was just a guide who helped them along. Lockon let out a shaky breath and glanced around him to make sure that Tieria hadn't arrived yet. Then he propped his elbows on the counter and buried his head in his hands, trying to find some stability. Trying to find a place in all of this that made sense, a place he could properly guide Tieria from, because what else could he do now?
He wasn't given much time to search for it before he heard a voice behind him. "Lockon, are you all right?"
With a small start, he turned to see that a screen had formed on the wall, from which Tieria looked out at him, openly concerned; he was still naked, at least from the waist up, but his hair was wet now. Lockon blinked once, then realized where he'd gone wrong. He'd thought he was in private, but there was nowhere in the moonbase that Tieria couldn't see with a thought.
"I'm fine, Tieria," he said. The sudden panic of facing Tieria's feelings for him and whatever they might signify was gone now that he was actually talking to Tieria. It would come back later, he thought, although probably not for a while, now that he remembered how often Tieria was watching him. "I'm going to make something called hash browns for breakfast. It looks like we've got all the ingredients for it. You know, we almost have too many ingredients for it. You didn't need to have potatoes imported up here--we can grow them ourselves."
"Need is not my only motivator in regards to you, Lockon," Tieria said. He hesitated; his expression softened. "I want you to be comfortable here."
Lockon resisted the urge to smile gently at that, even though it was his first impulse. He really was glad to see Tieria making that expression and even more glad to see him caring about someone that way. The fact that it was Lockon he cared about so much, though, still felt hollow. Lockon picked up a spatula and tapped it warningly on the wall. "Don't go too far out of your way to make people comfortable just yet! We still have a lot to cover. When the tubing systems don't stick anymore, we can talk about what food makes people comfortable." People. Not him. He had to make sure Tieria knew that there would be other people on the moonbase eventually.
Tieria took a moment to reply, looking startled--but not, Lockon noted with some relief, hurt. Then he said, "Of course. I'll be in for breakfast shortly." The screen faded from the wall.
Lockon turned his attention to dicing, pressing, and frying the potatoes with yet more relief. He'd rather be talking to Tieria about easy, comfortable things, such as how he could learn to appreciate movies or music, but until he could get back to that point, preparing food was another way to distract himself, even if it wasn't as effective. Besides, it gave him time to think about how he could teach Tieria how to appreciate food. That was something he hadn't learned in all the years Lockon had been...gone (asleep? Unaware? Dead? No, gone was the best way to describe it): that food could be fun as well as nourishing. Nobody had thought to teach him, and he'd been too busy learning what to do with his new emotions to consider little things like his sense of taste. It was time to fix that.
Tieria arrived only minutes later; he must have spared no time for anything but drying his hair and putting on clothes. Lockon was still frying the hash browns. Tieria announced his presence with slow, uncertain footfalls: the approach of someone still assimulating just what had happened last night. Lockon smiled at the frying pan, then turned to gesture at Tieria. "Why don't you go get the common area ready? We can eat in there."
"I'll do that," Tieria said. Then he paused, coming closer to peer over Lockon's shoulder. "Lockon...do you want me to get more materials for you? I believe we have some wheat flour in another storage space. There is a more native dish called a 'boxty'--"
Lockon lifted a hand to touch Tieria's shoulder. "I know. But I can survive on food other than what gets served at pubs in my home country. I did all right on the Ptolemy for years, didn't I? I'll be fine. Besides, these are good too." He finished the last hash brown and flipped it onto a plate with the others. "Here, Tieria. Why don't you take this into the lounge and get it set up there while I clean up in here?"
Tieria looked at him for a long moment, his eyes very wide and serious. Then he nodded quietly, took the plate, and left. Lockon stifled a sigh as Tieria walked out the door; there was too much chance Tieria would see it anyway. But with Tieria out of the kitchen, Lockon couldn't avoid thinking about what he'd said. Had he really been researching traditional Irish foods for Lockon's sake? Fortunately, it was impossible to take that seriously enough to worry about it. Lockon grinned as he finished cleaning, then headed out and made for the common area.
He stopped in the entrance as he got there.
Tieria was sitting at one of the tables, busily cutting up a plate of hash browns. That wasn't the problem. If Tieria wanted to cut his meal into very small pieces, that was fine with Lockon, although of course he'd explain to Tieria that you didn't need to cut hash browns up so much. In this case, though, Tieria had already cut up one plate. He was working on the other one now.
He was cutting up Lockon's food for him.
"Tieria," Lockon said, finally finding it in him to walk forward toward the table. "You don't have to do that. Really!"
Tieria didn't even look up. He continued cutting. "You cooked the meal. I will finish the preparations."
"I can eat it without you cutting it up first," Lockon said. "It's not that hard."
Tieria hesitated. "You're sure? Lockon, I wish to make things as convenient and safe as possible for you."
"I'm sure," Lockon said. He knew he had something more to say, but at that moment, all words deserted him. Instead, he found himself looking down at Tieria, looking into his earnest eyes, struggling to deal with what he saw in them. This was wrong, he knew then. It wasn't right for him to be this close to Tieria. Here was someone who felt for him things that Lockon could never feel in return. He shouldn't be encouraging that.
"Lockon?" Tieria asked tentatively. "Are you all right?"
But he couldn't walk away from it, either. Lockon sat down. "I'm fine," he said. "Let's eat."
* * *
It seemed impossible to Tieria that he would find a routine again, that things would return to normal. The ways he had touched Lockon, the places Lockon had touched him, all of that meant that nothing could be the same again. He no longer had a baseline from which to draw his future behavior. True, he had accepted that he must change to meet the future, and he had been glad to do so, but this wasn't a future he'd expected at all.
It was better.
Tieria had no way to describe how good it felt to be at Lockon's side. And he was at Lockon's side--he had his duties in Veda, but he found that it wasn't so hard to accomplish them anymore, knowing that Lockon would be waiting for him when he emerged. It did not occur to him, at first, to arrange Lockon's duties so that their free time coincided. Initially, it had seemed more sensible to have one of them working while the other was resting (although Tieria needed far less rest than a normal human). But Lockon began quietly rearranging his own schedule so that it matched with Tieria's, and somehow, this pleased Tieria. Not just the knowledge that he'd see Lockon more, but the clean digital sight of their time matching up, like a signature of their togetherness. Lockon was with him. Why this gave him such joy, Tieria didn't know. All he really wanted, after all, was to learn what Lockon could teach him about humanity--things like this proved he still had much to learn--and to make sure that Lockon was safe--and preferably happy, although Tieria had no idea how to do that at all. Why did it matter, whether or not he was close to Lockon?
But it did. The closer Tieria was to Lockon, the more full of warmth and light he felt. He accepted these feelings happily, even if he didn't entirely understand them.
Tieria didn't ask for sex again, not yet. He wasn't sure he could handle the feeling again so soon. As contemptible as the other things he'd said had been, on one matter Regene had been right: Tieria's body was not yet optimized for sexual activity. That wasn't the whole reason he didn't pursue it further just yet, though. There was something else: with Lockon, he didn't need it. Just touching him was enough.
So when Tieria next began coming to Lockon's quarters at the moonbase's assigned night time, he came in his nightwear, a simple sleeping gown. Lockon laughed at it; he didn't see the point of such garments here with no one but them. It wasn't surprising; he still only wore underwear to sleep.
Tieria flushed at the question, then steadied himself. "It's only proper."
"Proper?" Lockon wondered--he was pushing Tieria to explain himself, Tieria realized.
It was all right, though. He was beginning to realize that he could do that. "It makes me more comfortable," he said.
Lockon accepted that answer with one of those impossibly warm smiles, and once again, Tieria felt that strange sensation of warmth tight around his stomach.
Tieria didn't need to sleep at all. In fact, he should have been spending that time in Veda while his physical body rested. But there was something irresistible in the notion of spending it dozing off at Lockon's side. He still tried to set aside most nights for his duties in Veda, while allowing himself to spend them in Lockon's bed as a special reward. It grew more difficult as he went on.
He also found himself drifting closer to Lockon. On the first night he came to Lockon's bed in his nightwear, he rested his head against Lockon's shoulder and breathed in the unexpectedly comforting scent of him, but didn't let himself draw too much closer than that. He was relieved, then, that he'd seen to it Lockon had a large bed in the first place, firmly believing that he should have at least some luxuries in the then-austere environment of the lunar complex.
But the second time Tieria slept there, when he opened his eyes in the morning to find Lockon stirring next to him, he realized he'd unconsciously nestled up to Lockon's side, both hands clutching at one of his arms, his face in the crook of Lockon's neck. He'd pulled back in alarm, but Lockon had only laughed and touched his cheek.
The third time--
Tieria had gone to sleep next to Lockon, the same as the previous two times. In the middle of the night, he woke up with a start. It took him a moment to realize why: Lockon had moved slightly in his sleep. At that point, Tieria had been close enough to him, wrapped up against him with his hands pressed to his bare belly and his head nestled against his chest, that the small gesture had awoken him.
He sat up, blinking. A part of him resisted the separation from Lockon, the sudden absence of his warmth. But he was still right there, so it wasn't so bad after all.
Lockon did not turn off the lights completely in his room when he slept; he merely dimmed them, leaving a faint glow at the edge of the room. Tieria hadn't understood why, at first, but now, looking at Lockon sprawled out there, he knew. Lockon looked amazing in the soft greys of human night vision, as he always did, no matter what color Tieria saw him in. But it was the motion of his chest that captivated Tieria. Even as the faint light gleamed off painful old scars that made something twinge unpleasantly in Tieria's heart, something about that rise and fall of Lockon's breathing made Tieria indescribably happy. Just looking at him there in the dim light made Tieria smile. He couldn't quite help himself--he reached out to stroke Lockon's face. He was tentative at first, but then his fingers slipped to Lockon's pulse, then to his shoulders, shying away from the scars to finally rest gently on his heart.
Tieria could feel it beating. Before he knew what was happening, he was sighing with the joy of it. "Lockon," he said quietly, even though he knew he should stay mute and let Lockon sleep. It just felt right to say his name.
But he jumped a little with guilt when Lockon stirred beneath his hand, blinked, and opened his good eye. He wasn't wearing his eyepatch, but somehow, with the beat of his heart beneath Tieria's fingers, that didn't seem so bad for once. "Something wrong, Tieria?"
"No," Tieria said. "Nothing is wrong. Everything's right." He couldn't bring himself to say anything more. All he could do was sit there with his hand over Lockon's heart.
Lockon looked up at him for a long moment, a distant, puzzled expression on his face. Tieria didn't know what to say in response to it, so he was glad when Lockon spoke first, with a grin suddenly overtaking that strange lost expression. "If you're turned on, I can do something about that."
"That's not it," Tieria said. If he let himself touch Lockon in just the right way, of course, he knew it wouldn't take long for him to be crying out with need. But he didn't want that, right now. He just wanted to look at Lockon there and feel how warm he was.
"If you're sure," Lockon said.
"I am," Tieria said. After a reluctant moment, he lay back down at Lockon's side. This time, he rested his head over Lockon's heart. It would be easy to fall asleep again, like this. "Let's go back to sleep."