fic: Bionic Woman 2007, Not Everyone's Got Lambs (to Slaughter), Jaime/Sarah
disclaimer: not mine
fandom: Bionic Woman 2007
pairing: Jaime Sommers/Sarah Corvus, vague reference to Jaime's fiance. whose name I had to look up, he was so memorable, er, random guy/Jaime
genre: angst, AU, femslash, smut?, violence (ok, so the last two aren't genres?)
rating: ...soft R. non-explicit sex, violence, death and destruction.
length: 3000+
notes: I tried to get this done for International Day of Femslash and pretty much failed. I opened it at random tonight, and realized it was mostly finished, so did some polishing. title stolen from the Scissor Sisters' 'Intermission'
Not Everyone's Got Lambs (to Slaughter)
by ALC Punk!
Jaime Sommers sat on an empty crate in front of a window, knees to her chest. There was nothing to see out there, but she looked anyway, her eye detecting enough light to turn brick into something visible. In the darkness, in the middle of nowhere, with the street light broken, all she had was starlight. The moon had set hours before.
Not that it mattered.
She felt empty and used up, broken or lost. She wasn't really sure. This wasn't fun anymore. Not that it ever had been. Lab rat. Experiment. Half a billion dollars. She was wired for sound and visual and too many other things all at once.
There had been, maybe, moments where it didn't suck.
But now? With all the things she'd done, tiny machines crawling under her skin, changing her, making her a freak of nature--but that brought the memories back and Jaime flinched, trying to focus on dark-red brick and the taste of iron at the back of her throat.
Pizza. Not blood. Iron was blood, the sweet smell coating the insides of her nostrils until she lashed out, breaking her hand against the plaster wall.
For a time, the pain worked.
-=-
Jaime remembered tasting his fear... could almost smell it, even now. She'd laughed a little, knowing the sudden acrid stench meant he'd wet his pants.
He was nothing, a nobody, a pawn of Berkut, out of his league and lost without backup.
"They sent you to watch me." She licked his cheek, laughing when he moaned, eyes rolling wildly.
It wasn't a surprise he wanted to get away. She'd broken two fingers and wrenched his ankle all the way around (he'd passed out for a good twenty minutes from the pain and she'd had to wait for him to wake up, picking her nails with a sliver of wood and thinking about fuschia polish for her next manicure).
She'd actually tied him a little tighter, listening with her head tilted, to the way his muscles strained against the rope. Bone and sinew would give way eventually, but for now he was just uncomfortable.
"I don't mind men looking." She cooed, her hand dropping down his chest, stroking, then brushing over his crotch. The pain didn't stop his blood from flowing, and she laughed. "You'd like that," she guessed, leaning in and kissing his cheek gently.
He swallowed, maybe working up the courage to beg; maybe wondering if she'd let him go. Thinking he could get out alive--all he would have to do would be swallow his pride. Do what she wanted, let her touch him... She's a hot chick, after all, banging her, letting her use him, wouldn't be all bad. Even if his ankle was still on fire.
Jaime could practically hear his thoughts as though he'd voiced them, "How much of the bet do you think you'll win?" she asked, as though idle and bored. "Is it up to a cool grand yet?"
"Uh, bet?"
"Mhmm." She leaned closer, mouth tickling the hairs around his ears, "Who bangs Jaime Sommers first. There is one, isn't there? You boys can't think of anything else while you're watching me. In the shower. Making breakfast. Falling asleep, the sheet slipping off just a little--"
He made a sound, and her hand on his throat choked him off.
"I don't like being watched."
The sound of his neck snapping had echoed for so long, her enhanced hearing making it louder than a sonic boom, and Jaime shivered a little, realigning her broken fingers, using the pain to push the memory away.
What the hell was she? What had she become? She remembered Sarah Corvus mockingly telling her she'd outlive her usefulness to Berkut. Like Sarah had.
Except that Sarah had murdered so many people and killed more once she was alive again. Jaime's fiance, others--Berkut had never told her who the others were, but she'd been so sure they were real, that Sarah was a monster to be put down only you can save me-- and then there'd been Becca.
But Becca wasn't a topic for her. Not now.
Refocusing on the red bricks through the window of the warehouse she'd wandered into, Jaime fought down the urge to press forward. One good punch and the window would shatter--there would be so much glass...
That heady rush of breaking a man's neck came back and she wanted to be sick.
-=-
No one had told her that going rogue would mean cheap sex in dirty motels, and an accent she couldn't get rid of.
Jaime didn't remember why it had started, she just remembered being undercover, and pain at the back of her head and then... and then she'd woken up, her accent British and anger filling her.
Berkut had tried to contact her and she'd ignored them, running until she couldn't breathe anymore. Bent forward over her knees, she'd listened to the sounds of the empty countryside and found some measure of peace. A persistent whining in her ears had finally identified itself as the tracking device they'd installed along with her bionics.
The anger crashed outwards and she was bleeding from her nose again when it broke inside, useless and dead.
The cheap sex came after, six hours later and twenty drinks under the table.
She didn't know his name and she didn't care, and she could tell he was going to get off before she did--but maybe that didn't matter anyway. Jaime scraped her nails down his chest, watching the pressure, knowing she could plunge them deep, scrape her knuckles on his ribs--
It wasn't until after that she could be sick about that sending her over the edge, the orgasm sharp and violent.
He'd cried out beneath her, and she'd ignored him, shaking free and standing, scrambling back into her underwear and pants.
Out the door before he could recover, halfway down the block before she realized it wasn't sweat that coated her fingertips red.
She puked up a bottle of whiskey in an alley.
-=-
Jaime wasn't sure anymore what had happened first, the neck, the accent, the thing she was avoiding, or the sex. She would have laughed, but her memories were rushing in circles and she just wanted it all to stop.
The smell of cigarette smoke cut across her mind and she didn't turn as a hand appeared to her right, a lighted cigarette in it.
"You'll need a good fuck after you smoke this."
Jaime wondered if Sarah were being deliberately crude, or if there was a tone of smug superiority in her voice. Grabbing the thing, she took a long drag on it, ignoring the urge to cough.
Almost, she could feel cells dying and being replicated, healed. Changed. Like all of her would be, one day.
"How d'you figure that?" Jaime finally asked, her voice thick with derision.
Sarah leaned in, tilting her head slightly, then pulled back, "Love the accent--that a new thing, or are you just trying to be exotic?"
Taking another long drag, Jaime let her eyes drift back to the bricks outside the window. There was no point in answering Sarah, no point in anything, really. Not now, not ever again.
"New glitch, old you--" Sarah yanked the cigarette from her and dropped down onto the dusty floor, legs crossing before she took a drag of her own.
Old you-- for a moment, Jaime wanted to be her old self, wanted to be arguing with Becca over something stupid. Boys, dating, computers, school--anything, but what she was in reality. Anything but the memory of blood and the sound of broken bones.
"Been listening to the news," there was a dreamy quality to Sarah's voice that was at odds with the sharp edges of her broken mind. "Heard a little story about a little girl..."
Jaime didn't answer, couldn't answer, and the taste of blood filled her mouth when she bit down on her lip, shearing through the skin too-fast to stop.
"Something about an argument, and a little girl--well, teenager, really," Sarah continued in her strange little sing-song. "Put through a plate glass window, they said."
With her eyes closed, Jaime could suddenly hear Becca and her stupid little argument, and the whine in her voice about how Jaime, you never give me anything and you lie so much and why can't you be like dad except that Jaime couldn't be any of that, and she always had to lie and Becca, you wouldn't understand and give me a chance! and her answer hadn't come in words--
Red brick through the window again and Jaime was panting. She turned and lunged, falling off the crate and grabbing the cigarette from Sarah. She took another long drag, ignoring the shaking of her hands.
"So," she said, staying right there on the floor, almost pressed up against Sarah. So close. So easy to kill her... "You think we're alike now, you and I?"
A hand touched Jaime's cheek, delicate and careful, "Well, we do share quite a lot."
Jaime blew out a cloud of smoke and laughed. "Not hardly--after all, you didn't kill your sister with your bare hands. Circumstances did."
A shiver went through Sarah, Jaime could feel it, and she wondered at it even as she wondered why she was still there, in Sarah's personal space. To kill her? Jaime was hoping she was over that.
"You were hacked."
"Was I?"
Sarah's eyes widened in the dim light, as though she could see into Jaime's soul that way. And perhaps there was a sort of real emotion there. Perhaps not. "You were--"
A laugh and Jaime kissed Sarah's cheek, sliding her mouth to her ear, "You have to ask yourself: which of us has more to lose? The woman who's lost everything or the woman trying desperately to get it all back?"
"Both," Sarah whispered. Another shiver went through her.
Jaime smiled. "Wrong answer."
"Wrong question," objected Sarah, her head turning and her hand coming up to pull Jaime in for a kiss.
The brush of lips made Jaime's brain hiccup for a moment.
Sarah Corvus tried to kill my sister. The thought jerked her away and she punched out before thinking further, knocking Sarah backwards.
In a flash, Sarah was back, laughing a little as she tackled Jaime. It was so easy to twist, to throw Sarah off of her as they landed. Jaime realized the thrill of it all was making her skin ache and sing, and she punched Sarah, then dove in, licking the blood from the side of her mouth without a thought.
"Kinky," Sarah whispered before turning just enough to capture Jaime's lips again.
The kiss was rough, demanding, and Jaime answered it, fist shoving into Sarah's rib cage and making their teeth click together.
"Fuck."
Jaime slammed into the wall, feeling the plaster crack and coughing as the dust billowed out of the material. More dust swirled up from the floor when she rolled and climbed back to her feet.
Across the room from her, Sarah smiled, "You can feel it, can't you. That edge that makes everything move to fast. Like you can close your eyes and time would--"
The blink was a fraction of a second, but Sarah was slamming into her even as she swept her eyelids back up.
"--stop."
They both crashed into the wall and Jaime kicked out, hearing something crack. Part of the floor maybe.
Her mouth found Sarah's and the energy pulsed down her skin, making her gasp and moan when Sarah's hands slid up under her shirt.
"Burket would love to watch this," Sarah said.
Seeing red again, Jaime could see the past as well as Sarah, ducking away from her and laughing.
Becca was always whining, always loud, it was so easy--
Jaime put Sarah through a wall and followed her, coughing in the dust and cobwebs that clogged the air, feeling the skin on her hands lacerate from the jagged edges. They were already healing, though. She didn't care.
"Good, yes--" Sarah punched her in the face and then ducked.
They both went through the next wall, Sarah on top. This time, she got her hands under Jaime's shirt, yanking it up.
Fuck. Sarah's mouth on her breast slammed her into reality, and she arched up, fingers tangling in the too-short hair and moaning before Sarah bit down and Jaime swore out loud.
The warehouse was ripped away and they were somewhere, nowhere, everywhere. We're special, Jaime.
What the--
"Our nanites are linked," Sarah said, mouth brushing along Jaime's cheek, lips gentle. "There are things... things we can do because of that."
Jaime punched her again, bucking and rolling them, pinning Sarah to the dirt-covered floor. "You'll have to tell me more."
It would be so easy. Ten pounds of pressure, just a flick of her wrist, a flexing of her muscles. Sarah's hand closed around her wrist and Jaime smiled before she reared back and pulled her shirt off.
There was so much wrong in what they were doing, in what they had done and could do--
But Jaime needed it, needed to feel like her skin fit correctly, needed Sarah's hands stroking her sides, her waist, her breasts as she murmured softly about the nanites and how the bionics made her better.
"We're different," Sarah said, kissing Jaime's belly, then licking a line back up to her breasts and biting the other nipple. "Better. Special."
"Freaks." Corrected Jaime, even as she whimpered and grabbed Sarah's hands, pushing them down, undoing her own pants.
"That, too."
Sarah's fingers were rough and soft at the same time and Jaime couldn't do anything but feel the heat and the sting and the edge until she was crying out, coughing an instant later on the dust still in the air and Sarah was giggling as she pulled her hand free, then licked Jaime's belly again.
"This is wrong--" Mood changing, Jaime was on her feet, buttoning her pants before reaching down for Sarah while the other woman blinked.
They crashed through another wall, this time landing amongst dusty, rotten boxes and coughing even while they swung. Jaime was bleeding from cuts on her shoulders, but she ignored the blood until she had Sarah pinned against the wall (outer wall, brick underneath the sheet of plasterboard and wires, and Jaime could hear the distant rattle of traffic from five streets away).
"What does killing me accomplish?"
Killing... Becca, her eyes wide with surprise and the sound of glass breaking and the sweet, sickly smell of blood--
Jaime sagged into Sarah, gasping for breath. "Why?"
"Why what?" I need you, you know that-- the words were a thread, a whisper under the spoken, and Sarah didn't try to break free.
Ducking her head, Jaime tucked in under Sarah's chin for a moment before she licked her neck, tasting plaster dust and dirt. "Mmm. Sexy." Changeable moods. Hot, cold, angry, sad, lust--she was beginning to sense the rhythm. Or maybe there was no rhythm and she was lying to herself.
"How'd'you like it, Sarah? Fast and hard?" She released her, but didn't step back, letting her hands drag down Sarah's shirt, then back up and underneath the fabric.
The cuts in Jaime's shoulders pulled as she shifted and pushed, learning what made Sarah Corvus gasp and moan.
When Sarah was done, shaking and sliding slowly down the wall, Jaime pulled away and left her there. She had a shirt (she had a sister), and a bra. They were a bit mangled, but still usable. Dressing again meant tucking in her shirt before she smoothed a hand down one leg, stretching, feeling her shoulders pull at her skin. The cuts were gone already.
"They're getting more efficient," she said without bothering to turn.
"Good." Sarah was right behind her, but she didn't seem to want to kill her or fuck her again.
Jaime closed her eyes, "How do you deal with the memories?"
Once upon a lifetime, she would have laughed about asking Sarah Corvus for advice on how to forget. But the desolation, and the sense that reality was spinning faster out of her control were more than enough to wake her up to the truth: Sarah had already been where she was, and might be the only one who would understand.
Until she was fixed.
Until they were fixed.
"They'll be looking for us," Sarah said without replying to Jaime's question. Her hand brushed Jaime's, then she moved away, picking her path back across the destroyed warehouse.
"Looking for me. I'm the one who--" there was no way to finish the question without her throat closing and Jaime didn't.
"So we run. And we find Anthros."
"And he fixes us." There was something darkly humorous in the situation, and Jaime added, "You sure you don't have any doctors to kill?"
"I live in the moment, Jaime. That's how I deal with it. The question is, can you accept that?"
Jaime finished picking her jacket out of a pile of debris. "What if Anthros can't help us?"
"We let Burket find us and kill us."
For a moment, Jaime stared at her, eyes wide in shock. Then Sarah snorted, "I'm sorry, that would be your solution. Mine would be to continue living. I'll die soon, anyway, remember? And you've got, what, four years and six months?"
"Yeah. Something like that."
Sarah leaned in and kissed Jaime's cheek, "It was nice knowing you, babe."
They left, taking care to stay out of sight until they were lost in the crowds of humanity. Jaime could feel the urges, could see the tactical advantages, the deaths she could cause. But she didn't act on them--she could do this, she could be in control of herself. Like Sarah. She didn't know what would happen next, but it didn't matter, as long as she stayed in control.
-f-
fandom: Bionic Woman 2007
pairing: Jaime Sommers/Sarah Corvus, vague reference to Jaime's fiance. whose name I had to look up, he was so memorable, er, random guy/Jaime
genre: angst, AU, femslash, smut?, violence (ok, so the last two aren't genres?)
rating: ...soft R. non-explicit sex, violence, death and destruction.
length: 3000+
notes: I tried to get this done for International Day of Femslash and pretty much failed. I opened it at random tonight, and realized it was mostly finished, so did some polishing. title stolen from the Scissor Sisters' 'Intermission'
Not Everyone's Got Lambs (to Slaughter)
by ALC Punk!
Jaime Sommers sat on an empty crate in front of a window, knees to her chest. There was nothing to see out there, but she looked anyway, her eye detecting enough light to turn brick into something visible. In the darkness, in the middle of nowhere, with the street light broken, all she had was starlight. The moon had set hours before.
Not that it mattered.
She felt empty and used up, broken or lost. She wasn't really sure. This wasn't fun anymore. Not that it ever had been. Lab rat. Experiment. Half a billion dollars. She was wired for sound and visual and too many other things all at once.
There had been, maybe, moments where it didn't suck.
But now? With all the things she'd done, tiny machines crawling under her skin, changing her, making her a freak of nature--but that brought the memories back and Jaime flinched, trying to focus on dark-red brick and the taste of iron at the back of her throat.
Pizza. Not blood. Iron was blood, the sweet smell coating the insides of her nostrils until she lashed out, breaking her hand against the plaster wall.
For a time, the pain worked.
-=-
Jaime remembered tasting his fear... could almost smell it, even now. She'd laughed a little, knowing the sudden acrid stench meant he'd wet his pants.
He was nothing, a nobody, a pawn of Berkut, out of his league and lost without backup.
"They sent you to watch me." She licked his cheek, laughing when he moaned, eyes rolling wildly.
It wasn't a surprise he wanted to get away. She'd broken two fingers and wrenched his ankle all the way around (he'd passed out for a good twenty minutes from the pain and she'd had to wait for him to wake up, picking her nails with a sliver of wood and thinking about fuschia polish for her next manicure).
She'd actually tied him a little tighter, listening with her head tilted, to the way his muscles strained against the rope. Bone and sinew would give way eventually, but for now he was just uncomfortable.
"I don't mind men looking." She cooed, her hand dropping down his chest, stroking, then brushing over his crotch. The pain didn't stop his blood from flowing, and she laughed. "You'd like that," she guessed, leaning in and kissing his cheek gently.
He swallowed, maybe working up the courage to beg; maybe wondering if she'd let him go. Thinking he could get out alive--all he would have to do would be swallow his pride. Do what she wanted, let her touch him... She's a hot chick, after all, banging her, letting her use him, wouldn't be all bad. Even if his ankle was still on fire.
Jaime could practically hear his thoughts as though he'd voiced them, "How much of the bet do you think you'll win?" she asked, as though idle and bored. "Is it up to a cool grand yet?"
"Uh, bet?"
"Mhmm." She leaned closer, mouth tickling the hairs around his ears, "Who bangs Jaime Sommers first. There is one, isn't there? You boys can't think of anything else while you're watching me. In the shower. Making breakfast. Falling asleep, the sheet slipping off just a little--"
He made a sound, and her hand on his throat choked him off.
"I don't like being watched."
The sound of his neck snapping had echoed for so long, her enhanced hearing making it louder than a sonic boom, and Jaime shivered a little, realigning her broken fingers, using the pain to push the memory away.
What the hell was she? What had she become? She remembered Sarah Corvus mockingly telling her she'd outlive her usefulness to Berkut. Like Sarah had.
Except that Sarah had murdered so many people and killed more once she was alive again. Jaime's fiance, others--Berkut had never told her who the others were, but she'd been so sure they were real, that Sarah was a monster to be put down only you can save me-- and then there'd been Becca.
But Becca wasn't a topic for her. Not now.
Refocusing on the red bricks through the window of the warehouse she'd wandered into, Jaime fought down the urge to press forward. One good punch and the window would shatter--there would be so much glass...
That heady rush of breaking a man's neck came back and she wanted to be sick.
-=-
No one had told her that going rogue would mean cheap sex in dirty motels, and an accent she couldn't get rid of.
Jaime didn't remember why it had started, she just remembered being undercover, and pain at the back of her head and then... and then she'd woken up, her accent British and anger filling her.
Berkut had tried to contact her and she'd ignored them, running until she couldn't breathe anymore. Bent forward over her knees, she'd listened to the sounds of the empty countryside and found some measure of peace. A persistent whining in her ears had finally identified itself as the tracking device they'd installed along with her bionics.
The anger crashed outwards and she was bleeding from her nose again when it broke inside, useless and dead.
The cheap sex came after, six hours later and twenty drinks under the table.
She didn't know his name and she didn't care, and she could tell he was going to get off before she did--but maybe that didn't matter anyway. Jaime scraped her nails down his chest, watching the pressure, knowing she could plunge them deep, scrape her knuckles on his ribs--
It wasn't until after that she could be sick about that sending her over the edge, the orgasm sharp and violent.
He'd cried out beneath her, and she'd ignored him, shaking free and standing, scrambling back into her underwear and pants.
Out the door before he could recover, halfway down the block before she realized it wasn't sweat that coated her fingertips red.
She puked up a bottle of whiskey in an alley.
-=-
Jaime wasn't sure anymore what had happened first, the neck, the accent, the thing she was avoiding, or the sex. She would have laughed, but her memories were rushing in circles and she just wanted it all to stop.
The smell of cigarette smoke cut across her mind and she didn't turn as a hand appeared to her right, a lighted cigarette in it.
"You'll need a good fuck after you smoke this."
Jaime wondered if Sarah were being deliberately crude, or if there was a tone of smug superiority in her voice. Grabbing the thing, she took a long drag on it, ignoring the urge to cough.
Almost, she could feel cells dying and being replicated, healed. Changed. Like all of her would be, one day.
"How d'you figure that?" Jaime finally asked, her voice thick with derision.
Sarah leaned in, tilting her head slightly, then pulled back, "Love the accent--that a new thing, or are you just trying to be exotic?"
Taking another long drag, Jaime let her eyes drift back to the bricks outside the window. There was no point in answering Sarah, no point in anything, really. Not now, not ever again.
"New glitch, old you--" Sarah yanked the cigarette from her and dropped down onto the dusty floor, legs crossing before she took a drag of her own.
Old you-- for a moment, Jaime wanted to be her old self, wanted to be arguing with Becca over something stupid. Boys, dating, computers, school--anything, but what she was in reality. Anything but the memory of blood and the sound of broken bones.
"Been listening to the news," there was a dreamy quality to Sarah's voice that was at odds with the sharp edges of her broken mind. "Heard a little story about a little girl..."
Jaime didn't answer, couldn't answer, and the taste of blood filled her mouth when she bit down on her lip, shearing through the skin too-fast to stop.
"Something about an argument, and a little girl--well, teenager, really," Sarah continued in her strange little sing-song. "Put through a plate glass window, they said."
With her eyes closed, Jaime could suddenly hear Becca and her stupid little argument, and the whine in her voice about how Jaime, you never give me anything and you lie so much and why can't you be like dad except that Jaime couldn't be any of that, and she always had to lie and Becca, you wouldn't understand and give me a chance! and her answer hadn't come in words--
Red brick through the window again and Jaime was panting. She turned and lunged, falling off the crate and grabbing the cigarette from Sarah. She took another long drag, ignoring the shaking of her hands.
"So," she said, staying right there on the floor, almost pressed up against Sarah. So close. So easy to kill her... "You think we're alike now, you and I?"
A hand touched Jaime's cheek, delicate and careful, "Well, we do share quite a lot."
Jaime blew out a cloud of smoke and laughed. "Not hardly--after all, you didn't kill your sister with your bare hands. Circumstances did."
A shiver went through Sarah, Jaime could feel it, and she wondered at it even as she wondered why she was still there, in Sarah's personal space. To kill her? Jaime was hoping she was over that.
"You were hacked."
"Was I?"
Sarah's eyes widened in the dim light, as though she could see into Jaime's soul that way. And perhaps there was a sort of real emotion there. Perhaps not. "You were--"
A laugh and Jaime kissed Sarah's cheek, sliding her mouth to her ear, "You have to ask yourself: which of us has more to lose? The woman who's lost everything or the woman trying desperately to get it all back?"
"Both," Sarah whispered. Another shiver went through her.
Jaime smiled. "Wrong answer."
"Wrong question," objected Sarah, her head turning and her hand coming up to pull Jaime in for a kiss.
The brush of lips made Jaime's brain hiccup for a moment.
Sarah Corvus tried to kill my sister. The thought jerked her away and she punched out before thinking further, knocking Sarah backwards.
In a flash, Sarah was back, laughing a little as she tackled Jaime. It was so easy to twist, to throw Sarah off of her as they landed. Jaime realized the thrill of it all was making her skin ache and sing, and she punched Sarah, then dove in, licking the blood from the side of her mouth without a thought.
"Kinky," Sarah whispered before turning just enough to capture Jaime's lips again.
The kiss was rough, demanding, and Jaime answered it, fist shoving into Sarah's rib cage and making their teeth click together.
"Fuck."
Jaime slammed into the wall, feeling the plaster crack and coughing as the dust billowed out of the material. More dust swirled up from the floor when she rolled and climbed back to her feet.
Across the room from her, Sarah smiled, "You can feel it, can't you. That edge that makes everything move to fast. Like you can close your eyes and time would--"
The blink was a fraction of a second, but Sarah was slamming into her even as she swept her eyelids back up.
"--stop."
They both crashed into the wall and Jaime kicked out, hearing something crack. Part of the floor maybe.
Her mouth found Sarah's and the energy pulsed down her skin, making her gasp and moan when Sarah's hands slid up under her shirt.
"Burket would love to watch this," Sarah said.
Seeing red again, Jaime could see the past as well as Sarah, ducking away from her and laughing.
Becca was always whining, always loud, it was so easy--
Jaime put Sarah through a wall and followed her, coughing in the dust and cobwebs that clogged the air, feeling the skin on her hands lacerate from the jagged edges. They were already healing, though. She didn't care.
"Good, yes--" Sarah punched her in the face and then ducked.
They both went through the next wall, Sarah on top. This time, she got her hands under Jaime's shirt, yanking it up.
Fuck. Sarah's mouth on her breast slammed her into reality, and she arched up, fingers tangling in the too-short hair and moaning before Sarah bit down and Jaime swore out loud.
The warehouse was ripped away and they were somewhere, nowhere, everywhere. We're special, Jaime.
What the--
"Our nanites are linked," Sarah said, mouth brushing along Jaime's cheek, lips gentle. "There are things... things we can do because of that."
Jaime punched her again, bucking and rolling them, pinning Sarah to the dirt-covered floor. "You'll have to tell me more."
It would be so easy. Ten pounds of pressure, just a flick of her wrist, a flexing of her muscles. Sarah's hand closed around her wrist and Jaime smiled before she reared back and pulled her shirt off.
There was so much wrong in what they were doing, in what they had done and could do--
But Jaime needed it, needed to feel like her skin fit correctly, needed Sarah's hands stroking her sides, her waist, her breasts as she murmured softly about the nanites and how the bionics made her better.
"We're different," Sarah said, kissing Jaime's belly, then licking a line back up to her breasts and biting the other nipple. "Better. Special."
"Freaks." Corrected Jaime, even as she whimpered and grabbed Sarah's hands, pushing them down, undoing her own pants.
"That, too."
Sarah's fingers were rough and soft at the same time and Jaime couldn't do anything but feel the heat and the sting and the edge until she was crying out, coughing an instant later on the dust still in the air and Sarah was giggling as she pulled her hand free, then licked Jaime's belly again.
"This is wrong--" Mood changing, Jaime was on her feet, buttoning her pants before reaching down for Sarah while the other woman blinked.
They crashed through another wall, this time landing amongst dusty, rotten boxes and coughing even while they swung. Jaime was bleeding from cuts on her shoulders, but she ignored the blood until she had Sarah pinned against the wall (outer wall, brick underneath the sheet of plasterboard and wires, and Jaime could hear the distant rattle of traffic from five streets away).
"What does killing me accomplish?"
Killing... Becca, her eyes wide with surprise and the sound of glass breaking and the sweet, sickly smell of blood--
Jaime sagged into Sarah, gasping for breath. "Why?"
"Why what?" I need you, you know that-- the words were a thread, a whisper under the spoken, and Sarah didn't try to break free.
Ducking her head, Jaime tucked in under Sarah's chin for a moment before she licked her neck, tasting plaster dust and dirt. "Mmm. Sexy." Changeable moods. Hot, cold, angry, sad, lust--she was beginning to sense the rhythm. Or maybe there was no rhythm and she was lying to herself.
"How'd'you like it, Sarah? Fast and hard?" She released her, but didn't step back, letting her hands drag down Sarah's shirt, then back up and underneath the fabric.
The cuts in Jaime's shoulders pulled as she shifted and pushed, learning what made Sarah Corvus gasp and moan.
When Sarah was done, shaking and sliding slowly down the wall, Jaime pulled away and left her there. She had a shirt (she had a sister), and a bra. They were a bit mangled, but still usable. Dressing again meant tucking in her shirt before she smoothed a hand down one leg, stretching, feeling her shoulders pull at her skin. The cuts were gone already.
"They're getting more efficient," she said without bothering to turn.
"Good." Sarah was right behind her, but she didn't seem to want to kill her or fuck her again.
Jaime closed her eyes, "How do you deal with the memories?"
Once upon a lifetime, she would have laughed about asking Sarah Corvus for advice on how to forget. But the desolation, and the sense that reality was spinning faster out of her control were more than enough to wake her up to the truth: Sarah had already been where she was, and might be the only one who would understand.
Until she was fixed.
Until they were fixed.
"They'll be looking for us," Sarah said without replying to Jaime's question. Her hand brushed Jaime's, then she moved away, picking her path back across the destroyed warehouse.
"Looking for me. I'm the one who--" there was no way to finish the question without her throat closing and Jaime didn't.
"So we run. And we find Anthros."
"And he fixes us." There was something darkly humorous in the situation, and Jaime added, "You sure you don't have any doctors to kill?"
"I live in the moment, Jaime. That's how I deal with it. The question is, can you accept that?"
Jaime finished picking her jacket out of a pile of debris. "What if Anthros can't help us?"
"We let Burket find us and kill us."
For a moment, Jaime stared at her, eyes wide in shock. Then Sarah snorted, "I'm sorry, that would be your solution. Mine would be to continue living. I'll die soon, anyway, remember? And you've got, what, four years and six months?"
"Yeah. Something like that."
Sarah leaned in and kissed Jaime's cheek, "It was nice knowing you, babe."
They left, taking care to stay out of sight until they were lost in the crowds of humanity. Jaime could feel the urges, could see the tactical advantages, the deaths she could cause. But she didn't act on them--she could do this, she could be in control of herself. Like Sarah. She didn't know what would happen next, but it didn't matter, as long as she stayed in control.
-f-