FFVII / ZackxAeris / Behind the Blue
Title: Behind the Blue
Author: mirroredsakura
Fandom: Final Fantasy VII
Rating: NC-17
Pairing/Characters: Zack / Aeris
Warnings: Fluff. Squishy Aeris thoughts. Out-of-body experiences. Implied demonsex. Het. Sex.
Summary: Aeris was given an ultimatum: join the Turks or run. When she meets a merc with SOLDIER eyes, it doesn't ever occur to her that maybe all he wants is... her.
Disclaimers: None of the characters belong to me.
Notes: Written many years ago for mercverse AU, the world-bunny of icedark_elf which included, among other things, Zack as a human with demon blood, Cloud as an immortal, Sephiroth as a mage adept, and Vincent and Chaos as demon twins. As mercenaries. Mercverse.
I rewrote Armed Escort last month after it'd been niggling at me for years. And since I did that, I couldn't help but really really want to keep on filling in those silly plotholes my teenage self though gee, it's totally okay to just leave in there. And Aeris sat up and informed me Zack is a wonderful person and all, but there was so much more. Lo and behold... there was!
Sequel to Armed Escort: Redux. I highly recommend you start there! :)
~+~+~+~
There is not much out there hotter than a girl in slinky black leathers.
Aeris would know - she had to wear them. And during those last few awful hours before the sun set and the dank heat of industrial under-Plate Midgar really started to dissipate, it was beyond mortal endurance to be outside while in them.
Even in the bar she’d finally taken refuge in, where the churning of ancient machinery freely advertised the liberal use of air conditioning, the press of too many people packed into a single room meant the old generator could barely keep up. If she’d had her materia - the bracer, not her mother’s - she might even have been tempted to self-medicate with a swift shot of an Ice1.
Instead she sat as quietly and unobtrusively as possible, toying with a glass of something strong and cheap that she had no intention of drinking, waiting for the day to die.
Not long now, her mother’s voice whispered at the back of her mind. It was quiet and encouraging, and Aeris knew Ifalna understood.
Not about the heat, necessarily, but that Aeris was dawdling, delaying the inevitable. She just… she didn’t want to leave.
For all that Midgar was filthy, crime-ridden, and at the mercy of self-absorbed royal oversight, it was home. But not even having a foster mother like Elmyra (strong, hard-headed, teeth like a dragon when roused) was enough to keep the Turks off her tail.
Attunements came and went in the city - while anyone could learn sooner or later how to harness a battery of different materia, Ifalna’s line had been known for an unshakeable bond with the Planet… and the capacity to seek out the Promised Land. It was the sort of power royals hungered for, with very little idea how to harness.
Things had come to a head that morning when a stone-faced Tseng had appeared at Elmyra’s door with a sheaf of official-looking papers, stamped and signed by Shinra himself - requisitioning her as a free agent legally domiciled in his city.
Mercenaries weren’t exactly known for delicacy when it came to inducting new members, even ones they really wanted. For what they were, the Turks had been kind… had in fact done very well by her until now, playing a deeply-orchestrated cat-and-mouse game as they had juggled her wishes with those of Shinra.
Someone had forced their hand.
“What can I do?” she’d asked him, grasping at his hand.
Tseng’s face hadn’t changed - a solemn, almost cruel expression with a grim set to his jaw - but his eyes had been a different story.
“You can run,” he’d told her bluntly, his fingers curling around hers, “we return in the morning, in a more… official capacity. If you left the city tonight, it could be a long time until we found you. The army won’t mobilize outside the city limits just for you.”
She could be free... if she just kept running.
Not… not fair.
A hard, hot little coal of anger lit inside of her. She felt her chest tighten, felt the hand hanging limply at her side ball into a fist… and then forcibly relax as that spark was snuffed out by an icy fist of despair and the raw wellspring of determination.
It wouldn't help to be angry. If she ignored it… then it was like it wasn’t there.
She didn’t cry. When she stiffened her spine and pinned him right in the eyes with her own, she was smiling again. If it was a little wooden around the edges, if her handshake was stiff and formal… she also knew Tseng understood - even approved - of her stiff upper lip.
“You would make a good ally,” he said at last, “if you chose to stay, it would be my pleasure to have you on my team.”
He didn’t say that she would make a good Turk - that would be skirting too close to a lie.
Elmyra had roared a great deal... but she had done it as she'd blazed through the cooking, and had promptly started ransacking the house the minute she'd watched Aeris scrape the last bite off her plate.
Aeris hadn't had much of an appetite after that morning, but Elmyra was not going to let her baby girl skip a meal today of all days, not when... why, who knows when the next time Aeris would be able to sit down for a good home-cooked--...
Elmyra didn't cry either. But she channelled her impotent anger into a whirlwind of activity as she packed and repacked a bag small enough to carry but large enough to live out of. And while Aeris ached to see the hollow look in her mom's eyes and the tight set of her lips, Elmyra only leaned into her hug for the briefest of moments before she was the straight-backed martinet again.
Tseng had oh-so-carelessly left his motorcycle outside their door with keys still in the ignition. The first thing Elmyra did was bundle her foster daughter into an old set of motorcycle leathers and out of the house, so glad now that Aeris had gotten it into her head to start learning how to ride months ago…
“This isn’t goodbye yet,” she’d said, grasping her daughter’s hands as though they were a lifeline, her voice unwontedly gruff, “but you’ve got to get somewhere safe-- safer-- away from here.”
“But Tseng--”
“Tseng isn’t the only Turk who knows about you,” Elmyra insisted, implacable. “And he’s not the only one who’ll know about a deadline on your head. I want you in a different sector quick as possible, dear. Find someplace crowded, where you can’t disappear without a fuss. I’ll… I’ll meet you at the 7th Heaven at 10 o’clock sharp with all your things. The bartender there is a good girl, she can take any messages you might--”
Elmyra’s voice had broken then, and her hands had clamped down hard enough to hurt, but Aeris didn’t care. “I love you, Mom.”
And even though Elmyra couldn’t hear Ifalna, Aeris could hear her mother whispering her own thanks to this woman who had taken her daughter in, who had taken care of her when no one else would.
xx
Swirling her glass so that the ice clinked, Aeris’s thoughts were anything but idle as she pieced together the bare rudiments of a plan. With the bike she could get through the narrow streets of lower-Plate Midgar easily enough - and fast, which was even more important. She could get out of the city that way too, and on a good road, she could make it to Kalm before they set Midgar’s various merc companies on her trail.
From there… there was an old chocobo farm off to the east, she was certain she could make it out there and hopefully swap the bike for a good bird. That would make it easier to disappear off the roads for a while--
She bit her lip to keep it from trembling as she felt the tears gather. She wouldn’t be scared. So there were monsters. She had a staff for a reason and she could fight if she needed to.
“Hey-- think I could get you something better?”
Her head came up with a jerk - she’d been so lost in her thoughts she hadn’t seen the boy approach.
She’d seen him when he came in. Of course she had. It wasn’t just the cocky way he walked - there was an entire city’s worth of men who swaggered more than this man. It was the eyes… SOLDIER eyes weren’t common, especially now that the old legions had been almost completely obliterated. And he’d been so… well. He’d had such a nice smile.
If you were okay with teeth like a dragon’s. Not as pointy as Elmyra’s when she really fanned the fire, but sharp.
And he was turning the full 50 gigawatts of those pearly whites on her as he leaned his weight over her table. He had lashes like a girl and he knew how to use them, his eyes half-lidded and lazy as he gestured at her glass. “You don’t look like you’re enjoying yourself much… and you know, not everyone knows their way around a good Belhemel tequila like I do.”
SOLDIER eyes… hair wilder than Reno’s though not nearly as long… He wore his suit like Reno too, as though ties were a suggestion, not a rule.
--If this guy was some no-name middle management schlub, she’d eat her hat. Elmyra was right, she couldn’t trust the Turks just because she did their leader.
She popped to her feet, and sped straight for the ladies room in the back. The windows in there were grimy, but they were unlocked and they were large enough to climb out of in a pinch. It wouldn’t be the first time she’d had to take to the rooftops, and at least the leather would hold up better than one of her dresses.
Aeris glanced back once to see whether or not the brush-off would do the trick. Sometimes the Turks were polite. And there was always the possibility that the ex-SOLDIER didn’t know her, really had just been trying to be friendly.
--No such luck it seemed. He was watching her with those unsettlingly blue eyes. And he was coming after her.
She whirled around and pushed through the swinging door of the ladies room, her mouth set. It looked like she’d be fighting after all.
Well. Her staff leaning against Tseng’s bike outside hadn’t been her only weapon.
xx
“Listen, maybe we got off on the wrong foot--”
She grabbed him and yanked, pulling him through the door and past her, tossing him into the opposite wall.
Aeris could get scrappy with the best of them in the slums, but she was not a born fighter, and she had never seen the way a man like this could move. He coiled like a cat, twisting in the air and skidding to a stop on his feet, bracing himself with a fist against the wall. She closed in with the straps of her bag twisted in her fist, whipping it into the back of his head with a dull thump.
It was like he barely felt it - he just ducked with the blow, hooked an arm around her waist and heaved her to the floor. That, at least, she was ready for - she was used to being the smaller one, the lighter one, even if none of the other boys had ever been this fast. She used that, used her weight and her momentum to pull him off-balance with her - but maybe he was already intending on it because he never really lost his footing, and he fell like he was made of springs.
She only succeeded in getting stuck in a terrifying tangle of bodies as they rolled together in the tiny confines - he was heavy, all lean, hard muscle… he could pick her up and snap her in two if he really wanted.
Then his arm closed tight around her neck, and she heard his frustrated grunt, felt his hot breath against the back of her neck - and then she remembered the teeth.
He couldn’t make her cry, but she screamed, hoping against hope that someone out there would hear her and come running.
--No one came of course, the cowards. The entire city knew a merc when they saw one, and no one was getting involved even if he ate her and came out wearing her ribcage for a hat.
That little coal of anger that had been glowing inside her all day reared, flared up into a glowing ball of heat that electrified her enough to struggle, all pointy elbows and teeth. It was futile, useless stuff, and she knew it as the tears burned in her eyes, but he was not taking her anywhere without her fighting it every inch of the way--...?
His hands fell away from her. His entire body simply collapsed, half slumped over her, and she screamed again, struggling hard to scrabble out from under his dead weight. Her hands closed around her purse, icy fingers frantic as she dug her hand in and yanked out the gun.
The anger was back, fire-hot and burning like a physical pain behind her eyes. She should have just taken her chances and shot him the minute he tried to follow her into the bathroom. She shouldn’t have tried to just fight him off, or slip away, she should have just--
Aeris!
She froze as though she’d been hit with a Stop spell. Her mother’s voice had been with her for years, and while it wasn’t always there, and while it didn’t always approve, she had never heard or felt such shocked chagrin.
Look, girl. Look with more than just your eyes.
Slowly she lowered the gun barrel and did as she was told… she looked down at the man properly for the first time. His eyes were open and he was certainly breathing, but he was just... lying there like a large sack of bricks.
What had she...? That couldn't have been her doing could it? She simply didn't have that kind of power.
Cautiously she crouched down next to him, gripped his shoulder and with some awkward juggling, managed to roll him on his back. His mouth flopped open almost comically, and though his eyes followed her, the pupils were dilated and he looked… drunk?
She never let go of the gun, but she did leave the safety on as she crept forward. She straddled his waist, her legs hugging his arms under her so that if he moved, she would have ample warning.
Aeris had always been leery of her own powers… the fuzzy flashes of empathy that she’d inherited from Ifalna had never sat well with Aeris because they often told her too much and yet too little.
But she had… she’d been scared and angry, and-- that wasn’t really the best excuse. Not when she’d nearly hurt this man, irrevocably even. She should… she needed to be sure.
She touched the very tip of her finger to his forehead and reached for that space inside her, that other that she kept hidden so deep. It wasn’t painful - it was quite like relaxing a fist or letting out a breath you’d held onto for just a touch too long.
As easy as breathing, she was inside a room: a dark-walled room with plain wood flooring and lit with a hundred windows. She shaded her eyes as she peeked through one, and saw a little boy on all fours, roaring at a materia-green lizard. Tiny, needle-like teeth glittered in his wide-open mouth as the lizard stared right back at him, utterly unperturbed. A woman in the background watched him with a tight, uncomfortable smile.
In another she saw the SOLDIER fight, really fight, the oily water of the fens churning underfoot as his entire body was haloed in a nimbus of blue-white light, the sheer force of his attacks gouging deep furrows in the earth.
He was fighting snakes, she realized. Zoloms like the ones not too far from the farm she’d intended to find. There were other shapes around him in this one, lightning-fast bodies blued with Haste that flashed through the greenish-yellow coils, and brought a fierce smile to his lips.
One more and she saw him throwing his head back and laughing, knocking back beers and fist-bumping an all-too-familiar redhead. She’d know hair like Reno’s anywhere.
So… she’d been right, hadn’t she?
“You know, that’s called snooping…”
The words were a drawl, nearly startling her out of her skin. She whirled to face… nothing?
No, no there was someone there. There, next to another window, shining with sunlight, so that he was nearly hidden in the contrast but for his eyes.
“How did you know--?”
She was rewarded with a snort. “Cetra. You’re all the same. The power to crush mountains and you use it to love~”
The figure stepped forward and… he was no clearer now than he’d been. He had the SOLDIER’s mass of wild hair, the same lean, muscled grace… but he was coal black, not black like skin was, but black, from head to toe, as though he were spun of night and shadow.
Except for his eyes: bright as sapphires, and filled with a wary curiosity.
“That wasn’t what I was trying to--”
“No,” he agreed, his lips curling in a smile - his jaw was exaggeratedly large compared to a human’s, all the better to cram in all those teeth, as pointy as his hair and twice as shiny. “You just wanted to be sure. I'd have killed you otherwise, you know. I don’t like when others mess with me and mine.”
She didn’t cower against a wall, but there was a deep flutter of fear beating hard inside her chest.
The figure cocked his head, birdlike, in slit-eyed contemplation. He approached like a stalking cat, careful footsteps soundless, nostrils flaring as he sniffed. She realized he had a tail, whip-thin with a wedged tip that flick-flicked in the air behind him.
“You smell good enough to eat,” he informed her, that rictus grin widening, “fear and unfiltered power. Yummy.”
Somewhere out there, she heard the SOLDIER’s voice - a nice voice, earnest and well-meaning. You know I wasn’t going to hurt you, right?
He looked up like he was listening too, and he rolled those beautiful blue eyes. “You see what I have to deal with.”
But the SOLDIER’s voice had given her a lifeline out, a shining strand that led back to her own body, back into her right mind. She groped for it, felt it coil around her wrist and yank her up, out--
“Now that’s just rude…”
She was back in her own body, right where she’d been, swaying over the SOLDIER’s handsome, bewildered face. And yet… no she wasn’t, she had a hard band of iron wrapped around her other wrist and she…
She was still there in that room with the windows, that dark face right in hers, holding onto her arm, hard. He blew a plume of faint green smoke at her with a grin. “You should watch where you bestow your gifts, little girl,” he told her conversationally, as though wicked talons weren’t just a hair’s breadth from her skin. “you never know what kind of evil hellbeast will just up and accept.”
He nuzzled into her neck, snuffling deeply as he breathed her in. Outside she peered down into the SOLDIER’s eyes, sifting through the materia blue to see if sapphire lurked underneath.
“What are you?” she whispered.
The bright eyes laughed at her. “Haven’t you guessed yet?”
It was the oddest, most confusing sensation in the world to be two places at once… and yet, Aeris had always known something like this hadn’t she? She’d had so much trouble staying firmly planted in the here and the now - this was only one step further in the other direction.
She also got the sense, past her pounding heart, that he… whatever he was… wasn’t so much evil as… different. Dangerous.
She reached up slowly so as not to startle, and gently touched her fingers to his face. That empathy flared up between them - not as a room with windows anymore, but fuzzy glimpses into this strange, inhuman mind.
She saw a cage of blood and bone that this dark figure stalked in tiny, cramped circles. She saw his boredom, his ennui, but also a keen intelligence that kept the berserk rage at bay. She felt more than saw the presence of others, of home and safety and pack, after too many years alone. She felt that hot, jealous love that tied him up, and the firm hand that kept him tame--
She was thrown out of her reverie by a sharp pain - he’d wrapped that lithe body around her, torn open the seams of her sleeve, and closed his needle-like teeth into her shoulder. He released her immediately, his tongue swiping greedily at his own teeth and she realized he hadn’t bit deep, but fat drops of blood were welling up and starting to run down.
"Ah ah ah," he tsked, those blue eyes wintry beneath the teasing voice, "some things aren't meant for you."
But he was distracted, his eyes locked on the tiny red rivers flowing down her arm. As she looked down on the outside, she knew that even though her clothes went untouched, if she peeled the leathers off she'd find a ring of teeth marks to match.
She wondered if she was bleeding out there too, and whether the SOLDIER could smell the sharp scent of copper like she could.
As if to forcibly distract her back into that room of many windows, an incredibly, inhumanly long tongue slipped out from between those dark lips - a dark fleshy pink that stood out sharply against the black cavern of his mouth - and lapped languorously at her skin until she was clean.
A sharp shudder ran like visible prickles along his skin, and she could barely see the flutter of inky lashes as his throat thrummed in a deep bass purr.
“What am I ever going to do with you,” he murmured, his voice low and musing, “when you taste so good?”
Aeris blinked, pulling away from him completely for the first time. He let her, and though his heavy-lidded eyes never left her, he simply stood there, his tail flicking like a metronome from side to side, waiting to see what she would do.
It was odd. She could still feel the small pulsing pain of his teeth where he'd hurt her... but she was strangely less frightened than she’d been before.
“Are you going to hurt me?”
He cocked his head again. "Is that a request?"
"A question."
He cocked his head in the other direction. "If you like it.” His grin stretched, “If you deserve it."
He said it like a threat, but Aeris didn’t need to be touching him to understand there was a promise of safety in there too. This wasn’t a beast she was dealing with.
Still… people lied.
“Why did you keep me here?”
He grinned, flashing all his teeth at once, sidling around her with a grace that was more balletic than large stalking cat. “To see if I could, naturally.”
That tasted like truth. But… “Is that all?”
He paused in his circling, those beautiful eyes thoughtful, “I suppose it’s nice to be seen.”
That felt much closer to the truth. When she reached out to touch him again, he didn’t push her away. No visions this time - as she cupped his face with her hand, she simply got the sense of realization that they were in a room with many windows… but no doors.
No way out, not for him.
Aeris the child had been a chatterbug. Aeris the teenager had been headstrong bordering on reckless. Aeris the adult was a little wiser, a little more patient, a little more graceful at accepting what her life threw at her. But she had never been alone.
More than other children, her head filled with the voices of the dead, she had never really known real solitude. Did the SOLDIER know his inner demon was awake and aware and so patiently alone?
Demon?
...That’s what he was, wasn’t he?
“You’re crying.” There was dry curiosity in the demon’s voice as he leaned in close to peer at her, his tongue snaking out to lap at the single drop that had managed to slide down her cheek. “Why are you crying?”
He sounded so distant, so downright bored.
So. Demons lied too.
“Because you can’t, can you?” She reached up, carding her fingers through his inky black hair. The wild array of spikes felt strangely solid, as if they weren’t actually made of of individual hairs, but they were soft to the touch all the same. They rippled beneath her fingers, as though shivering at her touch.
He was standing so still, so upright and controlled. Only his tail… it lashed against her leg, then finding purchase, wrapped around it like a clinging vine. She could feel the tension.
Aeris kissed him. She navigated carefully away from the razor edges of his teeth, found his shockingly soft lips. And outside she was suddenly supremely aware that the SOLDIER had reared up and kissed her back - as hard, and hot, and wanting, as this demon’s face was so guarded and still.
As if he could truly ignore the electricity that crackled between them at a touch, or the way her power rose up in her like a cresting wave and collided with the blue-white flare of his. Desire rose in her at the kiss of his power, a heat that lit a fire deep in her belly.
He shuddered against her and then yanked himself away with a snarl. For the second time that day, she found herself flung onto the floor, skidding this time on the waxed wood, with a man - the same man, really - pounced on top of her, pinning her down.
The straining features and the bright flare of anger was terrifying - and yet… it was almost a relief after so much false calm.
"Did you think I was in need of your pity, little Ancient?” He lifted one of his hands to her face, the dark claws shining in the light. “You would taste just as good without those pretty eyes.”
Her pulse jumped, but it wasn’t just fear. The SOLDIER’s kiss was a burn on her lips, a heat she couldn’t ignore as she felt her mouth slip open and his tongue slide inside. Her breath came out in a gasp - and it wasn’t from pain.
With an inarticulate shout, the demon tore away from her - a dark blur in her vision, he ended crouched like an animal at her feet. All she could properly see of him were those wide, suspicious eyes, torn between anger and desire.
It wasn’t easy to tamp down the sheer want that flooded her as she watched the materia glow of the SOLDIER’s eyes bleed into witchlight, swallowing the pupils… but when she spoke to the demon, her voice was gentle. “You shouldn’t mistake compassion for pity, you know?” she told him, sitting up carefully and holding out a hand to him.
He didn’t say a word, but she noticed when his tail stopped whipping around quite so violently.
Aeris was a creature of intuition - the voices were not always coherent enough to be guided by - and she knew somehow that she had bitten into his pride. And that wasn’t right… she needed him to understand.
“And… you shouldn’t mistake desire for a trap, either.”
He stopped and cocked his head. Even though she couldn’t see it, she felt his eyebrows rise. Leaning forward only slightly, she saw the wicked glint of his smile curl upwards.
“Is... that... right?”
Her face colored sharply, but she didn’t take anything back.
--And then if she’d thought she was red before, it was nothing compared to the distinct blotch of tomato that heated her face when he took a deep, assessing sniff of her… of her…
“H-hey!”
This wasn’t fair. There were… there were the both of them, and it was so hard to concentrate on any one thing. The demon’s tail had slowed down to a mesmerizing flick-swish-flick as he watched her squirm, and she didn’t have to be fully in her own body to know that the SOLDIER’s kiss was making her stomach do flip-flops in appreciation.
A deep, almost reluctant chuckle drew her attention back to the demon as he rubbed the side of his cheek against the inside of her knee - as if he could feel her skin through the leather. “You make me feel young,” he told her with a wry twist of his lip. “The power to crush mountains…” he shook his head.
“What better use for it?” she asked softly, and for the first time, her sense of humor leapt to the fore. The smile she shot him at her own little joke was cheeky and fiendishly wide.
Elmyra had once given her a lecture on the dangers of flirting, but Aeris had to admit the gravity of her foster mother's concern had never weighed as heavily on her shoulders as it probably should have. And while this was probably exactly the kind of trouble - if perhaps not the exact circumstance - Elmyra had been so concerned about her getting into, Aeris got the distinct impression that if anyone was driving the bus, it was her. And that wasn’t the worst feeling.
The demon shook his head, the dark spikes flying in a way that real hair didn’t. She hadn’t managed to bait him into laughing outright, but she could detect a smile in his voice if she listened hard enough. “And to think all we wanted to do was buy you a drink.”
Wait. Didn’t he… didn’t he know?
--Then the SOLDIER cracked his head against the floor and she heard the distinct sound of a tile splinter beneath it.
That jerked Aeris back into her body faster than anything - and this time the demon let her, equally concerned about his other half’s idiotic sense of self-preservation. She swayed above him, the demon’s muttered curses (none of which, thankfully, were directed at her) still sounding in her ears.
--Complicated-- was all the voices of the dead had to say about him. Her mother, thankfully, was noticeably missing from the cacophony. That would have been… too odd, even for Aeris to handle.
She flexed her fingers, feeling the intoxicating rightness of being back in her own self, in actually feeling, not just aware of everything that happened to her - the heavy weight of the gun in her hand, the fluttering beat of her own heart… and the sharp scent of blood.
Was it his or hers?
The SOLDIER’s eyes were still glowing - so blue they drowned the pupils and nearly got lost in the whites - and they cast strange shadows on the walls, on her skin. She wondered what she must look like... his eyes were fixated on hers in rapt fascination.
And he had… the nicest smile. A little shy, a little rueful, and there was still that wrinkle of worry between his brows because-- well, she was still holding a gun to him.
Her anger though - that unending pit of frustration and disappointment and fear that she’d been wrestling with since that morning… had in fact known in no small amount all her life…
That was… gone?
And it was delicious, I hasten to add.
The demon’s voice was there, low and teasing again. She might have escaped the room, but once heard, she couldn’t close him off quite so easily. He’d… eaten it? But that was…
Demonic?
Cheating. She had never felt so light.
I could always give it back, I suppose.
But she didn’t want it back. It had made her stupid - and while she was naturally impulsive, there was a far cry between kissing other people’s demons, and picking fights with a SOLDIER just because she didn’t want to leave home.
Such a compelling reason to keep me, indeed.
His voice was the driest, most blasé thing she had ever heard. And oh, she wanted to wrap her arms around that solemn, poised thing and squish him in the biggest, cuddliest hug she could muster.
Because sometimes the lie wasn't in the words.
“What are you?” the SOLDIER’s voice was a whisper, and his face was still open, honest… full of an almost childlike wonder. Why?
You have the eyes of goddess, the demon replied for him, faint surprise wrinkling the unconcerned tones of his voice. ...Of deity. I would venture to say it seems you aren’t just… any Ancient.
No… she was the last. The last of all of them. But that didn’t change anything… first or last, she just didn’t have that kind of power.
So young… Power sleeps, you know. It takes age and impetus to waken it. What such conflict have you known in your short life?
She looked down, flexing the pads of her fingers against all that taut skin, that hard muscle. He made a soft sound at her touch, his breath hitching as he tried, visibly, to be very, very good. Impetus… Was it him-- them?
That would be all too convenient for your sensibilities, wouldn’t it? the demon replied dryly, a dark bubble of laughter hovering behind the solemnity. Behold the sting that is humanity. It must be so hard to be ~good~
That made her smile back at the SOLDIER for the first time, her smile small and hesitant, but there.
It was very human, wasn’t it? To hide behind an excuse when she simply… wanted. And while she wasn’t goddess, Aeris was not a coward.
With her free hand, she reached for his. It was large and callused and he had the wide wrists of a swordsman. She knew she was blushing again, but embarrassment had never been a deterrent to her for long - she tugged his hand up to the ring at her neck, an open invitation… if he wanted it.
There was another puff of laughter in her head. Oh, we’ve wanted. And this time he did nothing to hide the heat, his laughter so low, so male.
Part 2 here.
~+~+~+~
Author: mirroredsakura
Fandom: Final Fantasy VII
Rating: NC-17
Pairing/Characters: Zack / Aeris
Warnings: Fluff. Squishy Aeris thoughts. Out-of-body experiences. Implied demonsex. Het. Sex.
Summary: Aeris was given an ultimatum: join the Turks or run. When she meets a merc with SOLDIER eyes, it doesn't ever occur to her that maybe all he wants is... her.
Disclaimers: None of the characters belong to me.
Notes: Written many years ago for mercverse AU, the world-bunny of icedark_elf which included, among other things, Zack as a human with demon blood, Cloud as an immortal, Sephiroth as a mage adept, and Vincent and Chaos as demon twins. As mercenaries. Mercverse.
I rewrote Armed Escort last month after it'd been niggling at me for years. And since I did that, I couldn't help but really really want to keep on filling in those silly plotholes my teenage self though gee, it's totally okay to just leave in there. And Aeris sat up and informed me Zack is a wonderful person and all, but there was so much more. Lo and behold... there was!
Sequel to Armed Escort: Redux. I highly recommend you start there! :)
~+~+~+~
There is not much out there hotter than a girl in slinky black leathers.
Aeris would know - she had to wear them. And during those last few awful hours before the sun set and the dank heat of industrial under-Plate Midgar really started to dissipate, it was beyond mortal endurance to be outside while in them.
Even in the bar she’d finally taken refuge in, where the churning of ancient machinery freely advertised the liberal use of air conditioning, the press of too many people packed into a single room meant the old generator could barely keep up. If she’d had her materia - the bracer, not her mother’s - she might even have been tempted to self-medicate with a swift shot of an Ice1.
Instead she sat as quietly and unobtrusively as possible, toying with a glass of something strong and cheap that she had no intention of drinking, waiting for the day to die.
Not long now, her mother’s voice whispered at the back of her mind. It was quiet and encouraging, and Aeris knew Ifalna understood.
Not about the heat, necessarily, but that Aeris was dawdling, delaying the inevitable. She just… she didn’t want to leave.
For all that Midgar was filthy, crime-ridden, and at the mercy of self-absorbed royal oversight, it was home. But not even having a foster mother like Elmyra (strong, hard-headed, teeth like a dragon when roused) was enough to keep the Turks off her tail.
Attunements came and went in the city - while anyone could learn sooner or later how to harness a battery of different materia, Ifalna’s line had been known for an unshakeable bond with the Planet… and the capacity to seek out the Promised Land. It was the sort of power royals hungered for, with very little idea how to harness.
Things had come to a head that morning when a stone-faced Tseng had appeared at Elmyra’s door with a sheaf of official-looking papers, stamped and signed by Shinra himself - requisitioning her as a free agent legally domiciled in his city.
Mercenaries weren’t exactly known for delicacy when it came to inducting new members, even ones they really wanted. For what they were, the Turks had been kind… had in fact done very well by her until now, playing a deeply-orchestrated cat-and-mouse game as they had juggled her wishes with those of Shinra.
Someone had forced their hand.
“What can I do?” she’d asked him, grasping at his hand.
Tseng’s face hadn’t changed - a solemn, almost cruel expression with a grim set to his jaw - but his eyes had been a different story.
“You can run,” he’d told her bluntly, his fingers curling around hers, “we return in the morning, in a more… official capacity. If you left the city tonight, it could be a long time until we found you. The army won’t mobilize outside the city limits just for you.”
She could be free... if she just kept running.
Not… not fair.
A hard, hot little coal of anger lit inside of her. She felt her chest tighten, felt the hand hanging limply at her side ball into a fist… and then forcibly relax as that spark was snuffed out by an icy fist of despair and the raw wellspring of determination.
It wouldn't help to be angry. If she ignored it… then it was like it wasn’t there.
She didn’t cry. When she stiffened her spine and pinned him right in the eyes with her own, she was smiling again. If it was a little wooden around the edges, if her handshake was stiff and formal… she also knew Tseng understood - even approved - of her stiff upper lip.
“You would make a good ally,” he said at last, “if you chose to stay, it would be my pleasure to have you on my team.”
He didn’t say that she would make a good Turk - that would be skirting too close to a lie.
Elmyra had roared a great deal... but she had done it as she'd blazed through the cooking, and had promptly started ransacking the house the minute she'd watched Aeris scrape the last bite off her plate.
Aeris hadn't had much of an appetite after that morning, but Elmyra was not going to let her baby girl skip a meal today of all days, not when... why, who knows when the next time Aeris would be able to sit down for a good home-cooked--...
Elmyra didn't cry either. But she channelled her impotent anger into a whirlwind of activity as she packed and repacked a bag small enough to carry but large enough to live out of. And while Aeris ached to see the hollow look in her mom's eyes and the tight set of her lips, Elmyra only leaned into her hug for the briefest of moments before she was the straight-backed martinet again.
Tseng had oh-so-carelessly left his motorcycle outside their door with keys still in the ignition. The first thing Elmyra did was bundle her foster daughter into an old set of motorcycle leathers and out of the house, so glad now that Aeris had gotten it into her head to start learning how to ride months ago…
“This isn’t goodbye yet,” she’d said, grasping her daughter’s hands as though they were a lifeline, her voice unwontedly gruff, “but you’ve got to get somewhere safe-- safer-- away from here.”
“But Tseng--”
“Tseng isn’t the only Turk who knows about you,” Elmyra insisted, implacable. “And he’s not the only one who’ll know about a deadline on your head. I want you in a different sector quick as possible, dear. Find someplace crowded, where you can’t disappear without a fuss. I’ll… I’ll meet you at the 7th Heaven at 10 o’clock sharp with all your things. The bartender there is a good girl, she can take any messages you might--”
Elmyra’s voice had broken then, and her hands had clamped down hard enough to hurt, but Aeris didn’t care. “I love you, Mom.”
And even though Elmyra couldn’t hear Ifalna, Aeris could hear her mother whispering her own thanks to this woman who had taken her daughter in, who had taken care of her when no one else would.
xx
Swirling her glass so that the ice clinked, Aeris’s thoughts were anything but idle as she pieced together the bare rudiments of a plan. With the bike she could get through the narrow streets of lower-Plate Midgar easily enough - and fast, which was even more important. She could get out of the city that way too, and on a good road, she could make it to Kalm before they set Midgar’s various merc companies on her trail.
From there… there was an old chocobo farm off to the east, she was certain she could make it out there and hopefully swap the bike for a good bird. That would make it easier to disappear off the roads for a while--
She bit her lip to keep it from trembling as she felt the tears gather. She wouldn’t be scared. So there were monsters. She had a staff for a reason and she could fight if she needed to.
“Hey-- think I could get you something better?”
Her head came up with a jerk - she’d been so lost in her thoughts she hadn’t seen the boy approach.
She’d seen him when he came in. Of course she had. It wasn’t just the cocky way he walked - there was an entire city’s worth of men who swaggered more than this man. It was the eyes… SOLDIER eyes weren’t common, especially now that the old legions had been almost completely obliterated. And he’d been so… well. He’d had such a nice smile.
If you were okay with teeth like a dragon’s. Not as pointy as Elmyra’s when she really fanned the fire, but sharp.
And he was turning the full 50 gigawatts of those pearly whites on her as he leaned his weight over her table. He had lashes like a girl and he knew how to use them, his eyes half-lidded and lazy as he gestured at her glass. “You don’t look like you’re enjoying yourself much… and you know, not everyone knows their way around a good Belhemel tequila like I do.”
SOLDIER eyes… hair wilder than Reno’s though not nearly as long… He wore his suit like Reno too, as though ties were a suggestion, not a rule.
--If this guy was some no-name middle management schlub, she’d eat her hat. Elmyra was right, she couldn’t trust the Turks just because she did their leader.
She popped to her feet, and sped straight for the ladies room in the back. The windows in there were grimy, but they were unlocked and they were large enough to climb out of in a pinch. It wouldn’t be the first time she’d had to take to the rooftops, and at least the leather would hold up better than one of her dresses.
Aeris glanced back once to see whether or not the brush-off would do the trick. Sometimes the Turks were polite. And there was always the possibility that the ex-SOLDIER didn’t know her, really had just been trying to be friendly.
--No such luck it seemed. He was watching her with those unsettlingly blue eyes. And he was coming after her.
She whirled around and pushed through the swinging door of the ladies room, her mouth set. It looked like she’d be fighting after all.
Well. Her staff leaning against Tseng’s bike outside hadn’t been her only weapon.
xx
“Listen, maybe we got off on the wrong foot--”
She grabbed him and yanked, pulling him through the door and past her, tossing him into the opposite wall.
Aeris could get scrappy with the best of them in the slums, but she was not a born fighter, and she had never seen the way a man like this could move. He coiled like a cat, twisting in the air and skidding to a stop on his feet, bracing himself with a fist against the wall. She closed in with the straps of her bag twisted in her fist, whipping it into the back of his head with a dull thump.
It was like he barely felt it - he just ducked with the blow, hooked an arm around her waist and heaved her to the floor. That, at least, she was ready for - she was used to being the smaller one, the lighter one, even if none of the other boys had ever been this fast. She used that, used her weight and her momentum to pull him off-balance with her - but maybe he was already intending on it because he never really lost his footing, and he fell like he was made of springs.
She only succeeded in getting stuck in a terrifying tangle of bodies as they rolled together in the tiny confines - he was heavy, all lean, hard muscle… he could pick her up and snap her in two if he really wanted.
Then his arm closed tight around her neck, and she heard his frustrated grunt, felt his hot breath against the back of her neck - and then she remembered the teeth.
He couldn’t make her cry, but she screamed, hoping against hope that someone out there would hear her and come running.
--No one came of course, the cowards. The entire city knew a merc when they saw one, and no one was getting involved even if he ate her and came out wearing her ribcage for a hat.
That little coal of anger that had been glowing inside her all day reared, flared up into a glowing ball of heat that electrified her enough to struggle, all pointy elbows and teeth. It was futile, useless stuff, and she knew it as the tears burned in her eyes, but he was not taking her anywhere without her fighting it every inch of the way--...?
His hands fell away from her. His entire body simply collapsed, half slumped over her, and she screamed again, struggling hard to scrabble out from under his dead weight. Her hands closed around her purse, icy fingers frantic as she dug her hand in and yanked out the gun.
The anger was back, fire-hot and burning like a physical pain behind her eyes. She should have just taken her chances and shot him the minute he tried to follow her into the bathroom. She shouldn’t have tried to just fight him off, or slip away, she should have just--
Aeris!
She froze as though she’d been hit with a Stop spell. Her mother’s voice had been with her for years, and while it wasn’t always there, and while it didn’t always approve, she had never heard or felt such shocked chagrin.
Look, girl. Look with more than just your eyes.
Slowly she lowered the gun barrel and did as she was told… she looked down at the man properly for the first time. His eyes were open and he was certainly breathing, but he was just... lying there like a large sack of bricks.
What had she...? That couldn't have been her doing could it? She simply didn't have that kind of power.
Cautiously she crouched down next to him, gripped his shoulder and with some awkward juggling, managed to roll him on his back. His mouth flopped open almost comically, and though his eyes followed her, the pupils were dilated and he looked… drunk?
She never let go of the gun, but she did leave the safety on as she crept forward. She straddled his waist, her legs hugging his arms under her so that if he moved, she would have ample warning.
Aeris had always been leery of her own powers… the fuzzy flashes of empathy that she’d inherited from Ifalna had never sat well with Aeris because they often told her too much and yet too little.
But she had… she’d been scared and angry, and-- that wasn’t really the best excuse. Not when she’d nearly hurt this man, irrevocably even. She should… she needed to be sure.
She touched the very tip of her finger to his forehead and reached for that space inside her, that other that she kept hidden so deep. It wasn’t painful - it was quite like relaxing a fist or letting out a breath you’d held onto for just a touch too long.
As easy as breathing, she was inside a room: a dark-walled room with plain wood flooring and lit with a hundred windows. She shaded her eyes as she peeked through one, and saw a little boy on all fours, roaring at a materia-green lizard. Tiny, needle-like teeth glittered in his wide-open mouth as the lizard stared right back at him, utterly unperturbed. A woman in the background watched him with a tight, uncomfortable smile.
In another she saw the SOLDIER fight, really fight, the oily water of the fens churning underfoot as his entire body was haloed in a nimbus of blue-white light, the sheer force of his attacks gouging deep furrows in the earth.
He was fighting snakes, she realized. Zoloms like the ones not too far from the farm she’d intended to find. There were other shapes around him in this one, lightning-fast bodies blued with Haste that flashed through the greenish-yellow coils, and brought a fierce smile to his lips.
One more and she saw him throwing his head back and laughing, knocking back beers and fist-bumping an all-too-familiar redhead. She’d know hair like Reno’s anywhere.
So… she’d been right, hadn’t she?
“You know, that’s called snooping…”
The words were a drawl, nearly startling her out of her skin. She whirled to face… nothing?
No, no there was someone there. There, next to another window, shining with sunlight, so that he was nearly hidden in the contrast but for his eyes.
“How did you know--?”
She was rewarded with a snort. “Cetra. You’re all the same. The power to crush mountains and you use it to love~”
The figure stepped forward and… he was no clearer now than he’d been. He had the SOLDIER’s mass of wild hair, the same lean, muscled grace… but he was coal black, not black like skin was, but black, from head to toe, as though he were spun of night and shadow.
Except for his eyes: bright as sapphires, and filled with a wary curiosity.
“That wasn’t what I was trying to--”
“No,” he agreed, his lips curling in a smile - his jaw was exaggeratedly large compared to a human’s, all the better to cram in all those teeth, as pointy as his hair and twice as shiny. “You just wanted to be sure. I'd have killed you otherwise, you know. I don’t like when others mess with me and mine.”
She didn’t cower against a wall, but there was a deep flutter of fear beating hard inside her chest.
The figure cocked his head, birdlike, in slit-eyed contemplation. He approached like a stalking cat, careful footsteps soundless, nostrils flaring as he sniffed. She realized he had a tail, whip-thin with a wedged tip that flick-flicked in the air behind him.
“You smell good enough to eat,” he informed her, that rictus grin widening, “fear and unfiltered power. Yummy.”
Somewhere out there, she heard the SOLDIER’s voice - a nice voice, earnest and well-meaning. You know I wasn’t going to hurt you, right?
He looked up like he was listening too, and he rolled those beautiful blue eyes. “You see what I have to deal with.”
But the SOLDIER’s voice had given her a lifeline out, a shining strand that led back to her own body, back into her right mind. She groped for it, felt it coil around her wrist and yank her up, out--
“Now that’s just rude…”
She was back in her own body, right where she’d been, swaying over the SOLDIER’s handsome, bewildered face. And yet… no she wasn’t, she had a hard band of iron wrapped around her other wrist and she…
She was still there in that room with the windows, that dark face right in hers, holding onto her arm, hard. He blew a plume of faint green smoke at her with a grin. “You should watch where you bestow your gifts, little girl,” he told her conversationally, as though wicked talons weren’t just a hair’s breadth from her skin. “you never know what kind of evil hellbeast will just up and accept.”
He nuzzled into her neck, snuffling deeply as he breathed her in. Outside she peered down into the SOLDIER’s eyes, sifting through the materia blue to see if sapphire lurked underneath.
“What are you?” she whispered.
The bright eyes laughed at her. “Haven’t you guessed yet?”
It was the oddest, most confusing sensation in the world to be two places at once… and yet, Aeris had always known something like this hadn’t she? She’d had so much trouble staying firmly planted in the here and the now - this was only one step further in the other direction.
She also got the sense, past her pounding heart, that he… whatever he was… wasn’t so much evil as… different. Dangerous.
She reached up slowly so as not to startle, and gently touched her fingers to his face. That empathy flared up between them - not as a room with windows anymore, but fuzzy glimpses into this strange, inhuman mind.
She saw a cage of blood and bone that this dark figure stalked in tiny, cramped circles. She saw his boredom, his ennui, but also a keen intelligence that kept the berserk rage at bay. She felt more than saw the presence of others, of home and safety and pack, after too many years alone. She felt that hot, jealous love that tied him up, and the firm hand that kept him tame--
She was thrown out of her reverie by a sharp pain - he’d wrapped that lithe body around her, torn open the seams of her sleeve, and closed his needle-like teeth into her shoulder. He released her immediately, his tongue swiping greedily at his own teeth and she realized he hadn’t bit deep, but fat drops of blood were welling up and starting to run down.
"Ah ah ah," he tsked, those blue eyes wintry beneath the teasing voice, "some things aren't meant for you."
But he was distracted, his eyes locked on the tiny red rivers flowing down her arm. As she looked down on the outside, she knew that even though her clothes went untouched, if she peeled the leathers off she'd find a ring of teeth marks to match.
She wondered if she was bleeding out there too, and whether the SOLDIER could smell the sharp scent of copper like she could.
As if to forcibly distract her back into that room of many windows, an incredibly, inhumanly long tongue slipped out from between those dark lips - a dark fleshy pink that stood out sharply against the black cavern of his mouth - and lapped languorously at her skin until she was clean.
A sharp shudder ran like visible prickles along his skin, and she could barely see the flutter of inky lashes as his throat thrummed in a deep bass purr.
“What am I ever going to do with you,” he murmured, his voice low and musing, “when you taste so good?”
Aeris blinked, pulling away from him completely for the first time. He let her, and though his heavy-lidded eyes never left her, he simply stood there, his tail flicking like a metronome from side to side, waiting to see what she would do.
It was odd. She could still feel the small pulsing pain of his teeth where he'd hurt her... but she was strangely less frightened than she’d been before.
“Are you going to hurt me?”
He cocked his head again. "Is that a request?"
"A question."
He cocked his head in the other direction. "If you like it.” His grin stretched, “If you deserve it."
He said it like a threat, but Aeris didn’t need to be touching him to understand there was a promise of safety in there too. This wasn’t a beast she was dealing with.
Still… people lied.
“Why did you keep me here?”
He grinned, flashing all his teeth at once, sidling around her with a grace that was more balletic than large stalking cat. “To see if I could, naturally.”
That tasted like truth. But… “Is that all?”
He paused in his circling, those beautiful eyes thoughtful, “I suppose it’s nice to be seen.”
That felt much closer to the truth. When she reached out to touch him again, he didn’t push her away. No visions this time - as she cupped his face with her hand, she simply got the sense of realization that they were in a room with many windows… but no doors.
No way out, not for him.
Aeris the child had been a chatterbug. Aeris the teenager had been headstrong bordering on reckless. Aeris the adult was a little wiser, a little more patient, a little more graceful at accepting what her life threw at her. But she had never been alone.
More than other children, her head filled with the voices of the dead, she had never really known real solitude. Did the SOLDIER know his inner demon was awake and aware and so patiently alone?
Demon?
...That’s what he was, wasn’t he?
“You’re crying.” There was dry curiosity in the demon’s voice as he leaned in close to peer at her, his tongue snaking out to lap at the single drop that had managed to slide down her cheek. “Why are you crying?”
He sounded so distant, so downright bored.
So. Demons lied too.
“Because you can’t, can you?” She reached up, carding her fingers through his inky black hair. The wild array of spikes felt strangely solid, as if they weren’t actually made of of individual hairs, but they were soft to the touch all the same. They rippled beneath her fingers, as though shivering at her touch.
He was standing so still, so upright and controlled. Only his tail… it lashed against her leg, then finding purchase, wrapped around it like a clinging vine. She could feel the tension.
Aeris kissed him. She navigated carefully away from the razor edges of his teeth, found his shockingly soft lips. And outside she was suddenly supremely aware that the SOLDIER had reared up and kissed her back - as hard, and hot, and wanting, as this demon’s face was so guarded and still.
As if he could truly ignore the electricity that crackled between them at a touch, or the way her power rose up in her like a cresting wave and collided with the blue-white flare of his. Desire rose in her at the kiss of his power, a heat that lit a fire deep in her belly.
He shuddered against her and then yanked himself away with a snarl. For the second time that day, she found herself flung onto the floor, skidding this time on the waxed wood, with a man - the same man, really - pounced on top of her, pinning her down.
The straining features and the bright flare of anger was terrifying - and yet… it was almost a relief after so much false calm.
"Did you think I was in need of your pity, little Ancient?” He lifted one of his hands to her face, the dark claws shining in the light. “You would taste just as good without those pretty eyes.”
Her pulse jumped, but it wasn’t just fear. The SOLDIER’s kiss was a burn on her lips, a heat she couldn’t ignore as she felt her mouth slip open and his tongue slide inside. Her breath came out in a gasp - and it wasn’t from pain.
With an inarticulate shout, the demon tore away from her - a dark blur in her vision, he ended crouched like an animal at her feet. All she could properly see of him were those wide, suspicious eyes, torn between anger and desire.
It wasn’t easy to tamp down the sheer want that flooded her as she watched the materia glow of the SOLDIER’s eyes bleed into witchlight, swallowing the pupils… but when she spoke to the demon, her voice was gentle. “You shouldn’t mistake compassion for pity, you know?” she told him, sitting up carefully and holding out a hand to him.
He didn’t say a word, but she noticed when his tail stopped whipping around quite so violently.
Aeris was a creature of intuition - the voices were not always coherent enough to be guided by - and she knew somehow that she had bitten into his pride. And that wasn’t right… she needed him to understand.
“And… you shouldn’t mistake desire for a trap, either.”
He stopped and cocked his head. Even though she couldn’t see it, she felt his eyebrows rise. Leaning forward only slightly, she saw the wicked glint of his smile curl upwards.
“Is... that... right?”
Her face colored sharply, but she didn’t take anything back.
--And then if she’d thought she was red before, it was nothing compared to the distinct blotch of tomato that heated her face when he took a deep, assessing sniff of her… of her…
“H-hey!”
This wasn’t fair. There were… there were the both of them, and it was so hard to concentrate on any one thing. The demon’s tail had slowed down to a mesmerizing flick-swish-flick as he watched her squirm, and she didn’t have to be fully in her own body to know that the SOLDIER’s kiss was making her stomach do flip-flops in appreciation.
A deep, almost reluctant chuckle drew her attention back to the demon as he rubbed the side of his cheek against the inside of her knee - as if he could feel her skin through the leather. “You make me feel young,” he told her with a wry twist of his lip. “The power to crush mountains…” he shook his head.
“What better use for it?” she asked softly, and for the first time, her sense of humor leapt to the fore. The smile she shot him at her own little joke was cheeky and fiendishly wide.
Elmyra had once given her a lecture on the dangers of flirting, but Aeris had to admit the gravity of her foster mother's concern had never weighed as heavily on her shoulders as it probably should have. And while this was probably exactly the kind of trouble - if perhaps not the exact circumstance - Elmyra had been so concerned about her getting into, Aeris got the distinct impression that if anyone was driving the bus, it was her. And that wasn’t the worst feeling.
The demon shook his head, the dark spikes flying in a way that real hair didn’t. She hadn’t managed to bait him into laughing outright, but she could detect a smile in his voice if she listened hard enough. “And to think all we wanted to do was buy you a drink.”
Wait. Didn’t he… didn’t he know?
--Then the SOLDIER cracked his head against the floor and she heard the distinct sound of a tile splinter beneath it.
That jerked Aeris back into her body faster than anything - and this time the demon let her, equally concerned about his other half’s idiotic sense of self-preservation. She swayed above him, the demon’s muttered curses (none of which, thankfully, were directed at her) still sounding in her ears.
--Complicated-- was all the voices of the dead had to say about him. Her mother, thankfully, was noticeably missing from the cacophony. That would have been… too odd, even for Aeris to handle.
She flexed her fingers, feeling the intoxicating rightness of being back in her own self, in actually feeling, not just aware of everything that happened to her - the heavy weight of the gun in her hand, the fluttering beat of her own heart… and the sharp scent of blood.
Was it his or hers?
The SOLDIER’s eyes were still glowing - so blue they drowned the pupils and nearly got lost in the whites - and they cast strange shadows on the walls, on her skin. She wondered what she must look like... his eyes were fixated on hers in rapt fascination.
And he had… the nicest smile. A little shy, a little rueful, and there was still that wrinkle of worry between his brows because-- well, she was still holding a gun to him.
Her anger though - that unending pit of frustration and disappointment and fear that she’d been wrestling with since that morning… had in fact known in no small amount all her life…
That was… gone?
And it was delicious, I hasten to add.
The demon’s voice was there, low and teasing again. She might have escaped the room, but once heard, she couldn’t close him off quite so easily. He’d… eaten it? But that was…
Demonic?
Cheating. She had never felt so light.
I could always give it back, I suppose.
But she didn’t want it back. It had made her stupid - and while she was naturally impulsive, there was a far cry between kissing other people’s demons, and picking fights with a SOLDIER just because she didn’t want to leave home.
Such a compelling reason to keep me, indeed.
His voice was the driest, most blasé thing she had ever heard. And oh, she wanted to wrap her arms around that solemn, poised thing and squish him in the biggest, cuddliest hug she could muster.
Because sometimes the lie wasn't in the words.
“What are you?” the SOLDIER’s voice was a whisper, and his face was still open, honest… full of an almost childlike wonder. Why?
You have the eyes of goddess, the demon replied for him, faint surprise wrinkling the unconcerned tones of his voice. ...Of deity. I would venture to say it seems you aren’t just… any Ancient.
No… she was the last. The last of all of them. But that didn’t change anything… first or last, she just didn’t have that kind of power.
So young… Power sleeps, you know. It takes age and impetus to waken it. What such conflict have you known in your short life?
She looked down, flexing the pads of her fingers against all that taut skin, that hard muscle. He made a soft sound at her touch, his breath hitching as he tried, visibly, to be very, very good. Impetus… Was it him-- them?
That would be all too convenient for your sensibilities, wouldn’t it? the demon replied dryly, a dark bubble of laughter hovering behind the solemnity. Behold the sting that is humanity. It must be so hard to be ~good~
That made her smile back at the SOLDIER for the first time, her smile small and hesitant, but there.
It was very human, wasn’t it? To hide behind an excuse when she simply… wanted. And while she wasn’t goddess, Aeris was not a coward.
With her free hand, she reached for his. It was large and callused and he had the wide wrists of a swordsman. She knew she was blushing again, but embarrassment had never been a deterrent to her for long - she tugged his hand up to the ring at her neck, an open invitation… if he wanted it.
There was another puff of laughter in her head. Oh, we’ve wanted. And this time he did nothing to hide the heat, his laughter so low, so male.
Part 2 here.
~+~+~+~