...And the continuation,
in which there is speculation as to whether the burning spinal columns are emblematic of arousal or orgasm. I say arousal.
More BSG ficcing, a deliberate continuation of Downloaded: Deleted Scene, in which said Leoben and the Kara in his head discuss the nature of the beast. R, again, though twice as long and twice as graphic.
I seem to have found my font of inspiration.
--
Spitshine
Same complex as her place. He’s done his research-electric bills-and she’ll maybe stop by, when she comes back to get the arrow. He saw it. And the building’s still standing, worth its salt, so he moves in across the hall and two floors down. His place is cleaner, sparer, and his walls are nearly white at least for now. Maybe he’ll understand why she paints them. Maybe he’ll do it himself. The poetry on her wall is about herself, by way of Zak Adama. Maybe he’ll write some about her on his.
Like about how she can look so perfect and so out of place at the same time, in this room with blank walls. How she’s part of her flightsuit, how her eyes do the same thing as the clasps and the vinyl and the tags that hang outside it. Two tags. Two is the perfect number.
He says it aloud, to her, honestly. “This is perfect.”
“Except that I’m not actually here. I’m a virus in your system.”
“Doesn’t make you not real.”
“I think it does.” But it doesn’t, he thinks, you’re real, you’re here, you’re Kara even if you’re not Kara, the same way I’m Leoben even if I’m not Leoben. She evidently disagrees, tosses her hair, crosses her arms, casts a thicker shadow on the wall. (He doesn’t have electricity either.) “All your destiny talk doesn’t apply if you’re just making me up.”
“You’re going to help me guide the other you. You are patterns, collecting into one form. This is perfect. This is right.” It is.
She snaps, “I’m a voice in your head.”
“I listen to those.”
“We’ve established that you’re frakkin’ nuts.” She uncrossed her arms some time ago, but hasn’t left the wall, keeps her back arched. He doesn’t have a carpet, so her boots are braced, black and spitshine gleaming, perpendicular to the grain. All of her is perpendicular to the grain.
He feels himself smiling, opening, letting go of the rail. He takes the stairs by one, and not all of them, but enough.
“I can leave,” she says when he gets too close (for her-he could be even closer).
“You stay because you don’t want to go,” he tells her.
“I stay because you don’t want me to go and I’m a voice in your head.”
“You stay.” She does.
He wants this expression to stay on her, same time he doesn’t; hints of dejection, anger (but there’s always anger), that wetness in her eyes that means belief, the crease in her skin that hasn’t accepted yet. Her hair, between short and long, sticks that much closer to her face, and that means something too.
He could smile forever. He could, actually.
There hadn’t been challenge in her face for a few moments. There is now. “You don’t actually care why, do you.” It’s not a question.
He answers anyway, she wants it, she deserves it. “I know why.” He takes another stair down, hovers between them, both knees bent. “All of this has happened before.”
“It’s not happening right now because I’m not real.” She says it too quickly. She’s on the defensive. He’s been here before. “I could hold you in my arms and tell you I frakkin’ love you and it wouldn’t mean shit.”
was it everything you thought it would be?
that and more
“It would mean something to me,” he says even though he means will, not would. “And it would mean something to you, which is why you remembered that at all.” He means will there too.
“Remembered?” Her fingertips stutter on the wall.
“You will.” His heel settles into the stair, and then he leaves it for the next, and the next, and he can’t stop smiling even though it’s not a pure smile (when is it ever a pure smile?), wistful and far reaching. “You will do this, and then you will do this.”
This expression he likes on her too, plain disgust, and he’s close enough to see her grimace. Her teeth aren’t straight, just like his. She winces into forced symmetry, leaning her head so that the part of her hair, perpendicular to the grain, like everything.
that and more
“You see it too.” He knows. “You’re seeing it right now.”
She is. “Yeah, because you’re telling me what to see.”
“Do you like it?” Sound young, he tells himself, sound honest. Be honest.
She does, and he remembers it, wants more of it. “Does my answer actually matter?”
“Your reactions matter.” Half a step, “Your emotions matter,” and then the rest. “You don’t always mean what you say.” He takes the railing again, knows he’ll have to.
Her arms come up again, crossing, crinkling the black panels of her suit, making the buckles click. The click makes sense. “But it’ll mean something when I fulfill some fantasy, prophecy, whatever, in your head.” She’s taunting, sarcastic. She half-believes it.
Yes, he did have to. It’s slick under his palm. “I can tell when you mean what you say. I’ll know.” He knows it now.
She scoffs, puffs out her chest, holds still. “All right, I love you.”
“You don’t mean it yet.” He can say it and smile.
“Damn right.”
“But you will.”
Her voice is low, rasping. Expected. “And what’s the rest?”
He knows this, knows this, and his heart is racing but he doesn’t take the steps by twos. She doesn’t retreat, there between him and the wall, looking up into his eyes, and there’s fear, real fear, but not gunpoint fear, and he’s shivering and sweating at the same time before he leans in even closer. Breathes her. Watches her. Kisses her. Or she kisses him, he really can’t tell, and doesn’t want to.
And this is God, and not the same way everything is God.
She makes him want it more, more of his body against hers, and he takes that, lifts her, holds her up with his hip, his thigh between hers. Her boots scrape, catch in the panels of wood. She’s off the floor and kissing him, making such sounds, child sounds, pain sounds, dripping rushing sounds that he feels in his mouth and through her flightsuit, and he knows he’d feel them more if she wasn’t wearing it. He wants that.
“Your reactions matter,” he tells her, tells her shivering tongue, tells her slick teeth.
“What, I’m-“ she’s panting, pulling him in, “-not loud enough?”
“No.” She will be. “Just right.” Once he gets past that buckle. “Perfect.”
He snaps it, and then the other, right where her legs are clenching on his (oh, God) and there’s the zipper, too, right at her neck. He tears it down, and her breath is louder than it, because it’s in his ear. And then in his mouth. Louder. Under his hands, because his hands are on her skin, under her tanks, he can feel her chest expanding, can hear her pulse with her hands in his hair.
“Maybe that’s why you’re not resisting.” He doesn’t know if he actually says it, her mouth never leaves his. “Maybe you’ve seen it too.”
Her breasts heave, crush his hands between their chests. “I’m not really here.”
“You don’t mean it.”
She pries down his outer shirts. He burns, knows his back is glowing through his undershirt, sweatsoaked and steaming faintly. He hears the steam, rushing, dripping. As loud as her.
“Machines shouldn’t sweat,” she says.
He kisses hard, strokes soft. “Machines don’t.” His knee aches between her legs, from holding her up this way, he knows. He doesn’t care. Not even when she weighs down into it deliberately.
“You’re gonna have to let me down if you want to do this,” she says, her hands, nails, sliding down his face, his arms, to the waist of his pants. She knows his back. She knows scars and heat and wet.
Eyes open-like hers, and hers gleam-he kisses her, a lot, more, touches her, lets his nails spike in, lets his hip arch her higher. “This is what’s supposed to be. This is what I want.”
Kara laughs. “You’re definitely not a man.”
-Five. At least he knocks.
Kara’s gone. Leoben’s still here.
“The broadcast came through,” says the Five, back up the stairs, where the door is.
Leoben leans his brow into the wall. “I’ve seen it.” It’s white.
It won’t be for long.
--
.
More BSG ficcing, a deliberate continuation of Downloaded: Deleted Scene, in which said Leoben and the Kara in his head discuss the nature of the beast. R, again, though twice as long and twice as graphic.
I seem to have found my font of inspiration.
--
Spitshine
Same complex as her place. He’s done his research-electric bills-and she’ll maybe stop by, when she comes back to get the arrow. He saw it. And the building’s still standing, worth its salt, so he moves in across the hall and two floors down. His place is cleaner, sparer, and his walls are nearly white at least for now. Maybe he’ll understand why she paints them. Maybe he’ll do it himself. The poetry on her wall is about herself, by way of Zak Adama. Maybe he’ll write some about her on his.
Like about how she can look so perfect and so out of place at the same time, in this room with blank walls. How she’s part of her flightsuit, how her eyes do the same thing as the clasps and the vinyl and the tags that hang outside it. Two tags. Two is the perfect number.
He says it aloud, to her, honestly. “This is perfect.”
“Except that I’m not actually here. I’m a virus in your system.”
“Doesn’t make you not real.”
“I think it does.” But it doesn’t, he thinks, you’re real, you’re here, you’re Kara even if you’re not Kara, the same way I’m Leoben even if I’m not Leoben. She evidently disagrees, tosses her hair, crosses her arms, casts a thicker shadow on the wall. (He doesn’t have electricity either.) “All your destiny talk doesn’t apply if you’re just making me up.”
“You’re going to help me guide the other you. You are patterns, collecting into one form. This is perfect. This is right.” It is.
She snaps, “I’m a voice in your head.”
“I listen to those.”
“We’ve established that you’re frakkin’ nuts.” She uncrossed her arms some time ago, but hasn’t left the wall, keeps her back arched. He doesn’t have a carpet, so her boots are braced, black and spitshine gleaming, perpendicular to the grain. All of her is perpendicular to the grain.
He feels himself smiling, opening, letting go of the rail. He takes the stairs by one, and not all of them, but enough.
“I can leave,” she says when he gets too close (for her-he could be even closer).
“You stay because you don’t want to go,” he tells her.
“I stay because you don’t want me to go and I’m a voice in your head.”
“You stay.” She does.
He wants this expression to stay on her, same time he doesn’t; hints of dejection, anger (but there’s always anger), that wetness in her eyes that means belief, the crease in her skin that hasn’t accepted yet. Her hair, between short and long, sticks that much closer to her face, and that means something too.
He could smile forever. He could, actually.
There hadn’t been challenge in her face for a few moments. There is now. “You don’t actually care why, do you.” It’s not a question.
He answers anyway, she wants it, she deserves it. “I know why.” He takes another stair down, hovers between them, both knees bent. “All of this has happened before.”
“It’s not happening right now because I’m not real.” She says it too quickly. She’s on the defensive. He’s been here before. “I could hold you in my arms and tell you I frakkin’ love you and it wouldn’t mean shit.”
was it everything you thought it would be?
that and more
“It would mean something to me,” he says even though he means will, not would. “And it would mean something to you, which is why you remembered that at all.” He means will there too.
“Remembered?” Her fingertips stutter on the wall.
“You will.” His heel settles into the stair, and then he leaves it for the next, and the next, and he can’t stop smiling even though it’s not a pure smile (when is it ever a pure smile?), wistful and far reaching. “You will do this, and then you will do this.”
This expression he likes on her too, plain disgust, and he’s close enough to see her grimace. Her teeth aren’t straight, just like his. She winces into forced symmetry, leaning her head so that the part of her hair, perpendicular to the grain, like everything.
that and more
“You see it too.” He knows. “You’re seeing it right now.”
She is. “Yeah, because you’re telling me what to see.”
“Do you like it?” Sound young, he tells himself, sound honest. Be honest.
She does, and he remembers it, wants more of it. “Does my answer actually matter?”
“Your reactions matter.” Half a step, “Your emotions matter,” and then the rest. “You don’t always mean what you say.” He takes the railing again, knows he’ll have to.
Her arms come up again, crossing, crinkling the black panels of her suit, making the buckles click. The click makes sense. “But it’ll mean something when I fulfill some fantasy, prophecy, whatever, in your head.” She’s taunting, sarcastic. She half-believes it.
Yes, he did have to. It’s slick under his palm. “I can tell when you mean what you say. I’ll know.” He knows it now.
She scoffs, puffs out her chest, holds still. “All right, I love you.”
“You don’t mean it yet.” He can say it and smile.
“Damn right.”
“But you will.”
Her voice is low, rasping. Expected. “And what’s the rest?”
He knows this, knows this, and his heart is racing but he doesn’t take the steps by twos. She doesn’t retreat, there between him and the wall, looking up into his eyes, and there’s fear, real fear, but not gunpoint fear, and he’s shivering and sweating at the same time before he leans in even closer. Breathes her. Watches her. Kisses her. Or she kisses him, he really can’t tell, and doesn’t want to.
And this is God, and not the same way everything is God.
She makes him want it more, more of his body against hers, and he takes that, lifts her, holds her up with his hip, his thigh between hers. Her boots scrape, catch in the panels of wood. She’s off the floor and kissing him, making such sounds, child sounds, pain sounds, dripping rushing sounds that he feels in his mouth and through her flightsuit, and he knows he’d feel them more if she wasn’t wearing it. He wants that.
“Your reactions matter,” he tells her, tells her shivering tongue, tells her slick teeth.
“What, I’m-“ she’s panting, pulling him in, “-not loud enough?”
“No.” She will be. “Just right.” Once he gets past that buckle. “Perfect.”
He snaps it, and then the other, right where her legs are clenching on his (oh, God) and there’s the zipper, too, right at her neck. He tears it down, and her breath is louder than it, because it’s in his ear. And then in his mouth. Louder. Under his hands, because his hands are on her skin, under her tanks, he can feel her chest expanding, can hear her pulse with her hands in his hair.
“Maybe that’s why you’re not resisting.” He doesn’t know if he actually says it, her mouth never leaves his. “Maybe you’ve seen it too.”
Her breasts heave, crush his hands between their chests. “I’m not really here.”
“You don’t mean it.”
She pries down his outer shirts. He burns, knows his back is glowing through his undershirt, sweatsoaked and steaming faintly. He hears the steam, rushing, dripping. As loud as her.
“Machines shouldn’t sweat,” she says.
He kisses hard, strokes soft. “Machines don’t.” His knee aches between her legs, from holding her up this way, he knows. He doesn’t care. Not even when she weighs down into it deliberately.
“You’re gonna have to let me down if you want to do this,” she says, her hands, nails, sliding down his face, his arms, to the waist of his pants. She knows his back. She knows scars and heat and wet.
Eyes open-like hers, and hers gleam-he kisses her, a lot, more, touches her, lets his nails spike in, lets his hip arch her higher. “This is what’s supposed to be. This is what I want.”
Kara laughs. “You’re definitely not a man.”
-Five. At least he knocks.
Kara’s gone. Leoben’s still here.
“The broadcast came through,” says the Five, back up the stairs, where the door is.
Leoben leans his brow into the wall. “I’ve seen it.” It’s white.
It won’t be for long.
--
.