Light of Day (1/1)
Title: Light of Day
Author: Esmeralda
Rating: NC-17
Pairing(s): Kaylee/River; Mal/Simon; Simon/River
Disclaimer: Currently unbeta'd. This is a work of impure fiction. It contains sibtext, a term that I must credit to Capella.
Warnings: F/F and M/M Slash, some limited het
Summary: Simon has some complex desires; Mal is one.
Feedback: Constructive criticism is always welcome.
Timeline: between the last episode of Firefly and Serenity
___________________________________________________________
Mal leaned his head against the cool of the cockpit doorjamb. The dark metal had relieved many an ache borne of leadership. He did not sigh; the captain wasn't a man prone to sighing. But in the sanctuary of his mind, he let a long, slow breath escape.
Mere moments later, River silently appeared at his elbow. "Tangent's gone to ground," she said, solemnly, patting his arm.
For once, Mal understood her perfectly. "Reckon so," he replied with a halfhearted shrug.
"Cold night," she pronounced, nodding once, firmly. And then, slippery as she'd arrived, Little Sister was gone.
His back hurt, his stitches strained. Bullet holes were not a new sensation, but schooling himself to the wounds didn't eliminate the burn. Mal shifted to let the ship take his weight. The pain eased. "That's my girl," he said out-loud, in a whisper. Inara always said she didn't know if he spoke to her or the ship when they were together. Mal preferred not to elaborate.
"Perhaps I should check those," a mild voice opined, startling the captain.
"Perhaps you should mind sneaking up on folks," Mal replied, chagrined now that he did not hear footsteps, breath, or intent coming down the corridor. Either time.
Without permission, Simon slipped a suspender down and lifted the captain's shirt. He poked at the bandages with sure hands. Nevertheless, Mal found himself standing straighter with the pain in the small of his back.
"I could still give you a shot for it."
"Got to stay alert."
"River tells me your quarry won't be found tonight. You should rest."
Mal felt a jolt of annoyance. "Baby Girl doesn't know when to keep silence," he said.
"She means well," Simon replied, letting the fabric fall and stretching the suspender back over Mal's shoulder. "I'll leave you to your misery, then."
It was the doc's hesitation, the fact that he did not immediately turn heel, that brought a smile to the captain's grim face. "So go," Mal said, unable to resist.
"You're a right bastard, you know that?"
"Been said," Mal replied, "by more righteous than you."
Simon turned to him, the light of the planet cool on the left side of his face. "Why do I always have to come to you?"
Mal regarded the sparkling world below him for a long moment, toyed with saying there was no have to about it. "I daresay it's the way us captains are built. Living ones, anyhow."
Simon stepped closer. "What is the point of living, if you don't love?"
Mal grinned, bright in the dark. "I don't answer questions of philosophy, but it's a cold night," he murmured, his lips and tongue passing on River's wisdom.
*****
Bewildered and no less angry for it, Simon strode back through the ship toward the infirmary. He passed a shaking hand over his mouth and cursed under his breath. He had yet to be allowed any liberty beyond a few searing kisses that Mal ended too soon; the man took stoicism an astonishing long way. The brief press of Mal's body, hot and resistant, was enough to extinguish Simon's patience, but the hands on his shoulders had insisted that he back away.
Out of sight of the bridge, Simon paused and adjusted himself with a painful sigh. He knew with a certainty of long observation that after everyone else had quieted, Mal would go at last to his bunk, lie there awake thinking of what he wouldn't take in the offering, and convince himself that refusing had been the right thing to do. Simon wondered if Mal would even allow himself enough human weakness to waste his pleasure in the sheets.
The doctor ran a hand through his hair and attempted to compose himself. Might as well check on River.
River was not in her bunk. Simon went on high alert.
He didn't feel that anything was wrong, but he went looking anyway. He was wholly unprepared for what he saw in the mess hall, and he froze in horror.
River had Kaylee pinned to the wall by her throat, one-handed. Kaylee's eyes flicked to his, and she did the oddest thing, she clutched the front of her own shirt to her. Only then did Simon register that it had been open.
"It's okay, Doc, she just got a little out of hand. Bad moment. Wouldn't do me no harm." The engineer's voice came out thinner than usual from her constricted voicebox.
River swayed back and forth to her own music. Releasing Kaylee's throat, she slid her hand into the wavy brown hair, stroking. The bright red hand mark on white skin contradicted Kaylee's confidence in her own safety.
Simon stepped into the room. "What is going on?" The adrenaline kick sharpened his voice.
Kaylee didn't answer. Instead, she looked to River's face.
"Wanting," River replied after an unnatural pause. "Everybody's wanting tonight." Her dark eyes slid to Simon. She smiled, a sad little smile. "Else times maybe one or two, sometimes this one, sometimes that one. Not everybody."
Simon nodded, curtly. "You want the other medicine?"
"I don't understand," whispered Kaylee. She hadn't moved, arms still crossed tightly before her.
"Apparently, we have a libido overload on board tonight," Simon replied.
Kaylee snorted softly. "And that's a novelty?"
"What River means is that right now, everyone's in a froth and no one's doing anything. It's too much for her to shut it out."
"Oh." Kaylee sounded disappointed. Then, she giggled. "Not even Jayne? His gun-hand injured or something? Can't switch left?"
Simon squeezed his eyes shut at that image. "Jayne made a bet with Zoe he doesn't want to lose. Never mind."
River continued to stroke Kaylee's hair. Simon stepped forward to grasp his sister's shoulders, preparing to coax her away. "I'm sorry, Kaylee, that she did that to you." He nodded at the shirt.
"She didn't..." Kaylee looked from brother to sister. "Doc, I think you got the wrong idea. Up until she got a little spirited with her grip, I was on with her flight plan. Fact, I thought I might have started the engines," she said, a bit sheepishly.
Simon couldn't conceal his surprise. River had said, Everybody.
"I didn't know, though, that it wasn't me she was on about." Kaylee looked at the floor. "So I'm sorry for..."
River shook her head, hair tossing. "Wrong," she said a little too loudly, stamping her foot. "Everybody." She looked at Simon over her shoulder in frustration, begging him to take her meaning.
His feelings were mirrored in her dark eyes. He flinched. "It's dangerous," he said, trying to gentle her with his hands. "Not a good idea."
"You can protect her," she said. "Please."
"Look, I'm really sorry..." Kaylee moved at last, trying to brush past them. River reached for her and swung her into a tight embrace, silencing her with her lips.
Simon was fairly certain he wasn't supposed to feel such a jolt of pleasure but it was beyond his command. He took a step back.
Kaylee's hands came up to grasp at River, but she wasn't pushing away. His sister made a hungry noise that he would rather not have heard, to have to remember it now for all time. Of course, he had heard all her screams and nightmare noises, why not this? "I... I need to go," Simon said, backing for the door. He couldn't bring himself to actually turn away from the sight.
River ended the breathless kiss and began a series of small ones all over Kaylee's face. "You can't," she whispered, and Simon knew she spoke to him. "Might need the word." Her fingers outlined the marks on Kaylee's throat for him. "Should have asked you before. I didn't know she wanted."
The word. No one knew about it yet. One day, if he didn't find a cure, the right cocktail, they would hear it. Unless it was one of those times Mal ignored his pleas and took River ashore without him.
Simon wavered. If he left, Kaylee or River or both could be hurt. If he stayed... he flushed, refusing to pursue the thought. Instead, he should end it, go get the medicine, sedate her. The moment the thought occurred to him, River moved on him faster than he could react, sweeping past and catching his wrist behind him in a tight loop of something long and silky: Kaylee's fallen scarf. River tied him to the mess door and dragged it shut.
He grabbed at her as she spun away again and she laughed at him. "River," he said through gritted teeth, turning his attention to the knot. She had left his other hand free. One glance told him not a chance. "Untie me."
She shook her head. "Simon. Feel good, not bad. It isn't your fault." Walking away from him, River reached underneath her own hair and untied her dress.
"He staying, then?" Kaylee asked, not looking at Simon.
"No choice," River answered.
"Don't know as I can do it with somebody watching."
River moved closer, speaking softly in Kaylee's ear. Simon caught, "...likes you too." She said something else that he couldn't hear. Outspokenly frank Kaylee blushed brightly.
"I'll close my eyes," Simon said, suddenly defeated, sliding down the door to sit. Resolutely, he did so, just as River's dress whispered down and off her hips.
He had seen her naked countless times. Sometimes he'd find her standing, staring down at her clothes like a shed skin. He'd cared for her broken and sick. She'd crawl into bed with him, five years old in her head.
It wasn't as though his body had never responded, or that she didn't know that it did, and sometimes she forgot who he was altogether, but his role, crystal clear in his own head, always overrode fleeting impulses. Suddenly, he understood exactly why the captain sent him packing.
A soft moan caught him unawares. It sounded like Kaylee. It sounded good. He took a deep breath.
Another moan, this time, River. He could hear them kissing.
His cock hardened. He shifted positions to conceal it. This night had come to no good so far, just risk and frustration and more boundaries crossed than he cared to count. He couldn't imagine any improvement going his way.
"Kaylee," River said, breathless.
"Yeah, Girl, just that," Kaylee replied, the timber of her voice stroking up Simon's spine. He had wondered how she'd be with her odd combination of giddy and bold. Once, watching her heave a wrench half her size, he had imagined that her wiry thighs would be soft, and that she'd gasp out all surprised when his tongue on her outside worked together with his fingers inside in that particular way he knew. He'd put the thought firmly aside. She wasn't for him.
"Oh, where'd you learn... Oh!" Kaylee gasped and Simon's eyes flew open. River had the other woman laid out on her back in the nest of discarded clothing.
Plagiarist, he thought. River giggled against Kaylee's wetness. Yeah, I know you can hear me.
Well, his eyes were open now. Kaylee's were shut, her face blissful, arms over her head. So thin that her ribcage and hipbones jutted up fiercely from the plane of her stomach, she was, nevertheless, worth seeing. Especially with her hips rocking gently in time with River's movements, her shoulders and small breasts quivering.
Steady, mei-mei, he thought earnestly, don't change up on her now.
Without much warning at all, Kaylee climaxed. She came almost silently, with just a plaintive whine, as her whole body shuddered. Just at the end, she went full-voice, "Ta ma de!"
Simon wondered, unphysician-like, if a man could die from a hard on. He slumped against the door.
River rose from her crouch and paced toward him purposefully. He put a hand up to ward her off, willing himself to watch her face and not to follow the tousled black hair floating around her down to her white breasts and long waist. She ignored the gesture and stood before him, unselfconscious. He had to remind himself that River had not known privacy in enough dark years, her whole adolescence, that she doubtless couldn't recall it. He wanted to shut his eyes again, but it wouldn't matter, he could still smell her; if she took the last step, her belly would brush his face.
She knelt by him, touched his cheek sweetly. And then, she kissed him. The taste of Kaylee burst across his tongue, scent filling his nose, and felt the agony of opportunities foregone. River pulled away. "She's worth it," she said, and stood. Walking back to the still prostrate Kaylee, River missed her brother's expression, and if she could hear him in her mind, she gave no sign of it.
His eyes fixed on the swaying backside, Simon had broken into a full sweat. Sister, sister, sister, he reminded himself, a mantra. The prayer beads against his skin burned. He never used them, he didn't pray, he only wore them because she had given them to him.
Kaylee put up her hand, like a flag of surrender, and then it found its own life and caught River's calf. "Hey, conjure you could come back down here for a time, Lovely?"
River half-smiled, a display of more happiness than Simon saw in her a week at a time. She slipped back down to her knees, but Kaylee wasn't having any halfway attempts and pulled River down beside her. For a couple of minutes, all he could see was arms and hands entwining, and feet stroking legs. Little bursts of laughter punctuated the whispering.
He began to ease, his thoughts wandering back to Mal. There weren't many men that made him feel like Mal did. Maybe one a half-decade. Conversely, lots of men made known their desire for Simon. If the coldness of his demeanor didn't work, he got his point across with sufficient force, not interested. But Mal....
When Simon was busy delivering the whorehouse baby, he had overheard Mal's unstudied and undefensive reply to the Madam's most intrusive question as to why he wasn't trading protection for girls. "You ain't looked at one of 'em as long or as lovin' as you looked at those pistols," she had said, testing. "You're not sly, are you? 'cause I got my boys...."
"Sly? No. I lean towards womenfolk. Just one thing at a time. Never like complications."
More than one way to read his meaning, but she and Mal had ended up fucking all night. She died the next day in the raid.
And then, Inara left them. All her studied interactions with Mal, her companion's code, and her declarations before and after that night that she didn't care what he did were for naught. She was as burning jealous as Simon had been. It didn't matter that neither of them had graced Mal's bed, or that no one had in some time before that night. They had each imagined having a possessory interest.
Simon sighed, out loud, forgetting where he was.
"Deng yi miao!" Kaylee exclaimed from across the room, her back and surprisingly curvaceous backside now to Simon. "I plumb forgot you was here. You ain't looking, are you?"
"Indeed, I am," Simon replied, dryly. He rested his chin on his folded arms. "I don't mind telling you it's a fine sight, twisted up as this whole scene might be overall."
Her back was stiff. "I can't..."
"...leave River frustrated is what you can't do after all this trouble." In for a penny. "I've already seen the most of you in this."
Silence. Then, "Well, what does she like?"
Simon was startled. "Hell if I know. Ask her."
"Okay," Kaylee replied, timidly, "what I really mean is, what doesn't she like? Generally speaking, how do I avoid getting us all into even more trouble. I'm not sure you know yourself, do you now, River Girl," she added, softly.
Oh. Good point."Don't touch the middle of her forehead. Don't restrain her. No sudden aggressive moves."
"Not really my style," Kaylee giggled.
Simon smiled at that. "I guess not." He could see River stroking Kaylee's side, long, slow sweeps of her hand, and he could hear her humming. He took the sound as hopeful; she wasn't verbal at her most contented. "Beyond that, I'm not much help." This is probably illegal on most planets.
River burst out laughing. "Silly boy," she said. Abruptly, she rolled Kaylee over on her back and straddled her hips. She leaned forward onto her hands, tall enough that her breasts brushed Kaylee's face. Kaylee cupped them from the sides inward and kissed, circling one, then the other, as River shifted her weight to guide Kaylee back and forth.
Simon's face and thighs flushed hot again and he decided to concentrate on the refrigerator for a moment or two. He noted that for his next rotation on kitchen duty, he should most likely work on getting Jayne's gun-greased fingerprints off the so-called stainless.
A moan, another moan, and a couldn't-resist-glance later, Simon knew that Kaylee was licking, and that this might be River's favorite thing ever in life so far. But then, Kaylee moved the hand closest to him from breast down to slip between their bodies, and he learned that River had much higher limits than previously realized. Her hips flexed as she ground against the busy fingers, her back arched, and the sound coming from her made his hair stand on end. He had no idea what stream of abject nonsense Kaylee was crooning in return, but it added to the otherworldly mix, and he suddenly wasn't River's brother at all, just an exhausted but electrified man watching something so gorram gorgeous he could hardly stand his own skin.
The Simon who couldn't possibly be related to this wild animal, the version of himself who wasn't tied to a half-ton door, got up, strode over and knelt down to run his tongue over her beautiful, stark-white ass. His thumb slipped inside her alongside two of Kaylee's fingers, and when River came about three seconds later, he worshipped that orgasm like a holy event, holding himself back, determined not to sully the sacred moments with any distraction of his own.
The sound of River crying, softly, afterwards brought him up tight on his leash and back to his senses. Realizing he had bitten his own arm, was still safely tied ten feet or so from his sister, and had not in fact, committed any physical incest, did not ease his panic. River had sunk down along Kaylee and was being cradled as the tears flowed.
"Oh, mei-mei, forgive me," he groaned.
"What the hell you on about?" asked Kaylee. "Ain't you never made a woman cry with being sexed? The girl is blissed," she added, winking at him and blushing at the same time.
Of course, she didn't know. He stayed perfectly motionless, terrified, his still-hard cock an indictment. Minutes passed. River quieted. She slid off to the side of Kaylee and he could see the openness of her face, tearstained, but calm. He made no sound, tried to keep his mind blank.
"I don't mind saying that was the best hour I've spent since... I can't last remember," Kaylee sighed to River, brushing hair from her face. "Thank you."
River smiled, her eyes dreamy and faraway. She said nothing but kissed the end of Kaylee's nose. Then, her eyes focused on Simon, cutting the distance between them to nothing. She pushed up off the floor and he shut his eyes, huddling tighter to himself. He heard the fabric of her dress as it reclaimed her skin, and the brush of her bare feet on the floor as she approached. Then, she was stroking his hair and his neck as if he needed soothing.
"I'm sorry I called you," she said, contritely. "I scared you bad. Didn't mean too, just wanted you close. To touch me." He had no idea what she meant, and he was shaking. She slipped to the floor beside him and wrapped her arms around him. "I lost control, I called you."
"River," he said, as calmly as possible, "it doesn't work that way. I don't hear you in my head like you hear me. I can't." She often forgot things. Important things.
"Bao bei," she sighed. "You don't hear me, you feel me. How do you always know when I'm hurt, how to find me when I'm hiding?"
He didn't know. Honestly. He just did it. But that hadn't anything to do wit this. "I... I shouldn't have thought... that." She was so lucid all of a sudden and he was the crazy one who couldn't say what he meant.
Her fingers worked at the knots, nimbly, and he was free. His wrist burned where he had pulled the scarf tight enough to mark his skin. "Look at me, Simon." He forced himself to comply. "I wanted you to," she said. "But it makes you unhappy. I'll try never to do it again." She held her palm under his chin, searching his eyes. "I'm broken enough that I can't promise, but I'll try. It's not your fault." She shrugged. "I love you more than anyone in the world. I get confused." River pressed her forehead to his.
Tears filled Simon's eyes. He blinked them away. River was practically in his head, she knew the complexity of his thoughts. No point in talking.
A moment later, Kaylee stood before them, mostly dressed and innocent of the added layer of upset. She offered out her hand to Simon, looking a little sheepish. "You look a mite shaky there, Doc." He accepted and hauled himself to his feet.
"I'd like to sleep in your bunk," River said, matter-of-factly to Kaylee, and then squared her shoulders resolutely. "But it's dangerous. Maybe not a good idea yet."
Kaylee smiled at her, a little sadly, and nodded. "I'd like it too, but I do understand." She touched River's cheek. "'Night." She moved past them and dragged the door open, disappearing into the darkness.
"Two less wanting," River said, impishly. She tilted her head and her eyes lit up. "Ooh, four. Zoe and Wash made up. Jayne's asleep but he's dreaming nasty dreams," she said, confidentially. "I'm turning in," she yawned and stepped to the door. "You see to the last two of you, I might sleep all through the night." She paused in the doorway, her head lowered. "I love you."
"I love you too, River."
She nodded and left. He felt boneless with exhaustion, hardly in any condition for courting, let alone pursuing futility. His eyes fell to the floor and Kaylee's discarded scarf.
*******
Mal was fighting back, wrestling, before he was quite awake. He would swear he had just managed to find peace and whomever this fucker was would pay dearly for its interruption. A chill lodged in the pit of his stomach when he realized his hands were tied. Above his head. He struggled to orient. Dim red lights, his bunk. No smell of Reavers. He murmured words of heartfelt thanks for that.
The shape in the darkness seemed familiar. In a moment more, it registered. "Gorram it, Simon, you'd best have a horse tranquilizer there, a fine explanation after, and Jayne with Vera for backup, else you're dead." The sudden sweat began to cool across his skin.
"I learned the oddest thing tonight," Simon replied, ignoring the threats. His voice was more than usually cool, clinical.
"You've been the ruin of the better part of this night already," Mal said, reflexively testing the knots and then pushing toward the wall anchor to see if whatever it was would loosen. "I don't much care to be educated on any subject by a sleep thief." He must be dreaming. The uptight, ethics-touting doctor would never pick his lock, invade his privacy, and insult to injury, tie him to his bed. Not for any reason, least of all to force him to regard a lecture.
Simon moved to sit on the bed next to his chest, well out of range of a kick or leg-lock. "You and I worry about the same things."
"Oh really. You've just mutinied. I'd say you got a sight more to worry about than I do."
Simon's voice warmed. "I don't have any patience for games, tonight, Mal. I hardly have any strength left at all, in fact, but I'm here." With that, he leaned down and Mal found himself tasting the sinfully good inside of the doc's mouth. It did not occur to him, cagy sort that he was, that simply biting down would end any further invasions.
The just recently quieted blood surged back up in him and his head lifted to meet the kiss harder. A strong hand slipped under his neck and Simon slid a leg over, shifting on top of him. Naked under the sheet--a rare indulgence to begin with--Mal almost lost his composure but caught himself before he could arch up against Simon and provide any encouragement. Breaking his mouth free, he commanded, "Stop." Never mind that he knew Simon could feel with every inch of his body that the word was not heartfelt, it was the Captain's voice.
Simon froze. "Please." He buried his nose in Mal's exposed armpit and Mal suppressed a groan. "I understand why you wait for me to ask, why you test us and then push me away. You've been disciplined for long enough. You know this isn't a whim. I won't regret it. You know that I know I don't have to. River came to you tonight. She wouldn't if I didn't want you. Just for you."
"It's a complication," Mal replied, wishing the doc lacked a way with words.
Simon nodded. "You have a boat full of constant complications, Captain, like it or not. I am by far, not the worst one."
That produced a crooked smile that started somewhere in Mal's hardened groin. Simon smelled, bemusingly, like several kinds of sexing all at once. His fine trousers and silk shirt were rumpled, the heat of him coming through like he had nothing on at all. He risked an admission. "You're trying to off me with sheer want so that you can run this crew. I just know it."
"Yeah, because that would be my heart's desire," Simon replied, drolly. He sat up a little and unbuttoned his shirt.
Mal watched the fabric open to an expanse of skin he had been wondering about for some time, and reached for a defense. "I don't forgive you tying me." The shirt disregarded him and jumped to the floor.
"You are in charge of this ship, of me as its doctor, of where we go, and I never question that--well, mostly not. Treating a patient, even you, I'm in charge." Flexing his hips once, driving himself against Mal for emphasis, Simon said, "In a long overdue bedding, neither one of us would be in charge. I needed you to hold still long enough for me to make the point, instead of you getting all responsible and putting me out the door in a huff."
That sobered Mal a little. "On occasion, times are such for me that doing the right thing comes after surviving. This isn't one of those times."
"I submit that, in this instance, it isn't a choice of one over the other," Simon replied, unbuttoning his trousers. He managed out of them without removing his weight from Mal.
"You intend on taking anything without my express permission?" Mal was genuinely surprised. His heart pounded harder. You think you know a person, but things change.
Simon snorted. "I'm going to untie you now, knowing full well that you'll likely kick my ass and put me in my own infirmary with only Zoe's iron touch to minister to me."
Wearing just his short clothes, Simon had a sort of allover gleam to his flesh, and Mal argued with his hands wanting to touch. His brain won. "Best get on with it then. Longer you leave me this way, the worse the temper." Mal lay quietly while Simon undid the apparently ingenious knots. He couldn't help but notice that Simon flinched when Mal's second hand slipped free. Mal moved swiftly, as could only be expected, and he enjoyed Simon's shock when instead of hitting or pushing, he grasped. One hand closed on Simon's cock through the thin cloth, the other wrapped tight around his back. Mal rolled, taking Simon under him despite the tangle of sheets.
He was sure now, and the certainty broke his resolve. He had stood his ground in gentlemanly fashion with Inara, trying to spare them both complications. She was gone, and that was quite a complication in itself.
He'd been pretty well ignoring the doc's sundry charms throughout until Simon had made his own move a few months ago. That had been a surprise too.
Mal didn't mean to be ungentle and Simon, hothouse variety that Mal teased him for, didn't seem to mind his roughness. The slight man seemed somehow plenty strong now.
The fine, rich-boy shortclothes went and ripped themselves accidentally, Mal's fingers hooked in the waistband. He paused, stymied. Simon made a short, impatient noise and tore them the rest of the way off. That cleared things up considerable and Mal went back to the kissing. Some men wouldn't kiss, a damn shame; this one was exceeding good at it. Mal could taste a little blood, wondered briefly whose. It turned out Simon was possessed of some sharp teeth.
Half trapped, Simon still managed to twist his toes in the sheet and work it down off Mal's hips. Once he got his hands on Mal's bare ass, he stopped being quiet. Mal was startled, he knew Simon more by his silences than his talk or his sounds, being was one of the stiller, more deliberate people Mal had ever met. Simon's panting broke into moaning and then dear lord a soul-stealing, begging chant.
Mal latched his mouth onto Simon's neck, taking the sound down in pitch just a little, feeling it rumble through him, and fucked against him hard. He wanted everything this first time, registered briefly that the word first was involved in the thought, and knew they were altogether too hot to last long enough to even scratch the surface of want. He stopped thinking in words, just sensations of hard-slick-cockburning goodness. Simon moved against him as if he knew Mal's secrets, and there wasn't any hope of control. Mal turned his face into the pillow as the pleasure shuddered through him so as not to really bite. A couple of glorious long shocks into it, he distantly heard Simon yelp and felt the counterpoint to his own pulsing. Despite himself, he moaned into the pillow. It seemed to go on for hours, like that best-tasting meal of rice after starving.
Feeling his breathing ease, Mal was inclined to make a statement about how he usually took some care, and to apologize for running headlong this time, but hell if he didn't fall asleep mid-thought, right on top of Simon.
*******
Mal stood at the infirmary door, waiting for permission to enter, suspecting that Simon knew he was there. The doc finished wiping some instruments and closed the case. Mal allowed himself the notice of how Simon's shoulders moved, he hadn't known they were powerful before last night. He didn't like the nervous feeling in his stomach, the hope that he hadn't done anything reproachful.
Simon turned to him, inscrutable, his usual self. "Need something, Captain?" he asked, kindly but neutrally.
Mal glanced over his shoulder. "Mind if I come in?"
"Please."
Mal slid the door shut. He hated that he couldn't find the words he wanted. "You okay?"
"Fine." Simon said, his posture perfect as always, giving nothing away.
"Good. Doc, I wanted to say... What I mean..."
"Fang xin," replied Simon, his face softening. "No need to talk about it; I have no expectations. In fact, I assume that you're trying to tell me that was that. A cold night."
Mal rubbed a hand across his face. "Stop trying to speak for me," he said gently. "This is hard enough." It occurred to Mal, just at that moment, that words were not what he needed to say. He took two broad steps and pulled Simon's mouth to his. A minute or so later, he felt confident he had conveyed his meaning, particularly so from the feel of Simon hard against his thigh. "I was disappointed you were gone when I woke up," Mal murmured. Surprise registered in normally guarded eyes. He figured he was on the right track. "Sorry I fell off to sleep like that... wasn't exactly top form."
"I didn't mind," Simon replied, not moving away from the hand clasping the back of his neck. "You aren't that heavy." He slid his cheek against Mal's and spoke close to his ear. "Besides, it kept you safe from me fucking you awake."
"Shame," Mal said, enjoying the renewed surprise on Simon's face as they drew back to regard one another. "What are you doing after shift?"
Simon nodded. "I thought, in the light of day, you'd have second thoughts."
"Haven't you noticed?" Mal said, backing away with a smile and heading for the door, "There isn't any light of day on Serenity."
*******
ta ma de--holy shit
bao bei--precious
mei mei--little sister
deng yi miao--hold on a second
fang xin--don't worry, be at ease
Author: Esmeralda
Rating: NC-17
Pairing(s): Kaylee/River; Mal/Simon; Simon/River
Disclaimer: Currently unbeta'd. This is a work of impure fiction. It contains sibtext, a term that I must credit to Capella.
Warnings: F/F and M/M Slash, some limited het
Summary: Simon has some complex desires; Mal is one.
Feedback: Constructive criticism is always welcome.
Timeline: between the last episode of Firefly and Serenity
___________________________________________________________
Mal leaned his head against the cool of the cockpit doorjamb. The dark metal had relieved many an ache borne of leadership. He did not sigh; the captain wasn't a man prone to sighing. But in the sanctuary of his mind, he let a long, slow breath escape.
Mere moments later, River silently appeared at his elbow. "Tangent's gone to ground," she said, solemnly, patting his arm.
For once, Mal understood her perfectly. "Reckon so," he replied with a halfhearted shrug.
"Cold night," she pronounced, nodding once, firmly. And then, slippery as she'd arrived, Little Sister was gone.
His back hurt, his stitches strained. Bullet holes were not a new sensation, but schooling himself to the wounds didn't eliminate the burn. Mal shifted to let the ship take his weight. The pain eased. "That's my girl," he said out-loud, in a whisper. Inara always said she didn't know if he spoke to her or the ship when they were together. Mal preferred not to elaborate.
"Perhaps I should check those," a mild voice opined, startling the captain.
"Perhaps you should mind sneaking up on folks," Mal replied, chagrined now that he did not hear footsteps, breath, or intent coming down the corridor. Either time.
Without permission, Simon slipped a suspender down and lifted the captain's shirt. He poked at the bandages with sure hands. Nevertheless, Mal found himself standing straighter with the pain in the small of his back.
"I could still give you a shot for it."
"Got to stay alert."
"River tells me your quarry won't be found tonight. You should rest."
Mal felt a jolt of annoyance. "Baby Girl doesn't know when to keep silence," he said.
"She means well," Simon replied, letting the fabric fall and stretching the suspender back over Mal's shoulder. "I'll leave you to your misery, then."
It was the doc's hesitation, the fact that he did not immediately turn heel, that brought a smile to the captain's grim face. "So go," Mal said, unable to resist.
"You're a right bastard, you know that?"
"Been said," Mal replied, "by more righteous than you."
Simon turned to him, the light of the planet cool on the left side of his face. "Why do I always have to come to you?"
Mal regarded the sparkling world below him for a long moment, toyed with saying there was no have to about it. "I daresay it's the way us captains are built. Living ones, anyhow."
Simon stepped closer. "What is the point of living, if you don't love?"
Mal grinned, bright in the dark. "I don't answer questions of philosophy, but it's a cold night," he murmured, his lips and tongue passing on River's wisdom.
*****
Bewildered and no less angry for it, Simon strode back through the ship toward the infirmary. He passed a shaking hand over his mouth and cursed under his breath. He had yet to be allowed any liberty beyond a few searing kisses that Mal ended too soon; the man took stoicism an astonishing long way. The brief press of Mal's body, hot and resistant, was enough to extinguish Simon's patience, but the hands on his shoulders had insisted that he back away.
Out of sight of the bridge, Simon paused and adjusted himself with a painful sigh. He knew with a certainty of long observation that after everyone else had quieted, Mal would go at last to his bunk, lie there awake thinking of what he wouldn't take in the offering, and convince himself that refusing had been the right thing to do. Simon wondered if Mal would even allow himself enough human weakness to waste his pleasure in the sheets.
The doctor ran a hand through his hair and attempted to compose himself. Might as well check on River.
River was not in her bunk. Simon went on high alert.
He didn't feel that anything was wrong, but he went looking anyway. He was wholly unprepared for what he saw in the mess hall, and he froze in horror.
River had Kaylee pinned to the wall by her throat, one-handed. Kaylee's eyes flicked to his, and she did the oddest thing, she clutched the front of her own shirt to her. Only then did Simon register that it had been open.
"It's okay, Doc, she just got a little out of hand. Bad moment. Wouldn't do me no harm." The engineer's voice came out thinner than usual from her constricted voicebox.
River swayed back and forth to her own music. Releasing Kaylee's throat, she slid her hand into the wavy brown hair, stroking. The bright red hand mark on white skin contradicted Kaylee's confidence in her own safety.
Simon stepped into the room. "What is going on?" The adrenaline kick sharpened his voice.
Kaylee didn't answer. Instead, she looked to River's face.
"Wanting," River replied after an unnatural pause. "Everybody's wanting tonight." Her dark eyes slid to Simon. She smiled, a sad little smile. "Else times maybe one or two, sometimes this one, sometimes that one. Not everybody."
Simon nodded, curtly. "You want the other medicine?"
"I don't understand," whispered Kaylee. She hadn't moved, arms still crossed tightly before her.
"Apparently, we have a libido overload on board tonight," Simon replied.
Kaylee snorted softly. "And that's a novelty?"
"What River means is that right now, everyone's in a froth and no one's doing anything. It's too much for her to shut it out."
"Oh." Kaylee sounded disappointed. Then, she giggled. "Not even Jayne? His gun-hand injured or something? Can't switch left?"
Simon squeezed his eyes shut at that image. "Jayne made a bet with Zoe he doesn't want to lose. Never mind."
River continued to stroke Kaylee's hair. Simon stepped forward to grasp his sister's shoulders, preparing to coax her away. "I'm sorry, Kaylee, that she did that to you." He nodded at the shirt.
"She didn't..." Kaylee looked from brother to sister. "Doc, I think you got the wrong idea. Up until she got a little spirited with her grip, I was on with her flight plan. Fact, I thought I might have started the engines," she said, a bit sheepishly.
Simon couldn't conceal his surprise. River had said, Everybody.
"I didn't know, though, that it wasn't me she was on about." Kaylee looked at the floor. "So I'm sorry for..."
River shook her head, hair tossing. "Wrong," she said a little too loudly, stamping her foot. "Everybody." She looked at Simon over her shoulder in frustration, begging him to take her meaning.
His feelings were mirrored in her dark eyes. He flinched. "It's dangerous," he said, trying to gentle her with his hands. "Not a good idea."
"You can protect her," she said. "Please."
"Look, I'm really sorry..." Kaylee moved at last, trying to brush past them. River reached for her and swung her into a tight embrace, silencing her with her lips.
Simon was fairly certain he wasn't supposed to feel such a jolt of pleasure but it was beyond his command. He took a step back.
Kaylee's hands came up to grasp at River, but she wasn't pushing away. His sister made a hungry noise that he would rather not have heard, to have to remember it now for all time. Of course, he had heard all her screams and nightmare noises, why not this? "I... I need to go," Simon said, backing for the door. He couldn't bring himself to actually turn away from the sight.
River ended the breathless kiss and began a series of small ones all over Kaylee's face. "You can't," she whispered, and Simon knew she spoke to him. "Might need the word." Her fingers outlined the marks on Kaylee's throat for him. "Should have asked you before. I didn't know she wanted."
The word. No one knew about it yet. One day, if he didn't find a cure, the right cocktail, they would hear it. Unless it was one of those times Mal ignored his pleas and took River ashore without him.
Simon wavered. If he left, Kaylee or River or both could be hurt. If he stayed... he flushed, refusing to pursue the thought. Instead, he should end it, go get the medicine, sedate her. The moment the thought occurred to him, River moved on him faster than he could react, sweeping past and catching his wrist behind him in a tight loop of something long and silky: Kaylee's fallen scarf. River tied him to the mess door and dragged it shut.
He grabbed at her as she spun away again and she laughed at him. "River," he said through gritted teeth, turning his attention to the knot. She had left his other hand free. One glance told him not a chance. "Untie me."
She shook her head. "Simon. Feel good, not bad. It isn't your fault." Walking away from him, River reached underneath her own hair and untied her dress.
"He staying, then?" Kaylee asked, not looking at Simon.
"No choice," River answered.
"Don't know as I can do it with somebody watching."
River moved closer, speaking softly in Kaylee's ear. Simon caught, "...likes you too." She said something else that he couldn't hear. Outspokenly frank Kaylee blushed brightly.
"I'll close my eyes," Simon said, suddenly defeated, sliding down the door to sit. Resolutely, he did so, just as River's dress whispered down and off her hips.
He had seen her naked countless times. Sometimes he'd find her standing, staring down at her clothes like a shed skin. He'd cared for her broken and sick. She'd crawl into bed with him, five years old in her head.
It wasn't as though his body had never responded, or that she didn't know that it did, and sometimes she forgot who he was altogether, but his role, crystal clear in his own head, always overrode fleeting impulses. Suddenly, he understood exactly why the captain sent him packing.
A soft moan caught him unawares. It sounded like Kaylee. It sounded good. He took a deep breath.
Another moan, this time, River. He could hear them kissing.
His cock hardened. He shifted positions to conceal it. This night had come to no good so far, just risk and frustration and more boundaries crossed than he cared to count. He couldn't imagine any improvement going his way.
"Kaylee," River said, breathless.
"Yeah, Girl, just that," Kaylee replied, the timber of her voice stroking up Simon's spine. He had wondered how she'd be with her odd combination of giddy and bold. Once, watching her heave a wrench half her size, he had imagined that her wiry thighs would be soft, and that she'd gasp out all surprised when his tongue on her outside worked together with his fingers inside in that particular way he knew. He'd put the thought firmly aside. She wasn't for him.
"Oh, where'd you learn... Oh!" Kaylee gasped and Simon's eyes flew open. River had the other woman laid out on her back in the nest of discarded clothing.
Plagiarist, he thought. River giggled against Kaylee's wetness. Yeah, I know you can hear me.
Well, his eyes were open now. Kaylee's were shut, her face blissful, arms over her head. So thin that her ribcage and hipbones jutted up fiercely from the plane of her stomach, she was, nevertheless, worth seeing. Especially with her hips rocking gently in time with River's movements, her shoulders and small breasts quivering.
Steady, mei-mei, he thought earnestly, don't change up on her now.
Without much warning at all, Kaylee climaxed. She came almost silently, with just a plaintive whine, as her whole body shuddered. Just at the end, she went full-voice, "Ta ma de!"
Simon wondered, unphysician-like, if a man could die from a hard on. He slumped against the door.
River rose from her crouch and paced toward him purposefully. He put a hand up to ward her off, willing himself to watch her face and not to follow the tousled black hair floating around her down to her white breasts and long waist. She ignored the gesture and stood before him, unselfconscious. He had to remind himself that River had not known privacy in enough dark years, her whole adolescence, that she doubtless couldn't recall it. He wanted to shut his eyes again, but it wouldn't matter, he could still smell her; if she took the last step, her belly would brush his face.
She knelt by him, touched his cheek sweetly. And then, she kissed him. The taste of Kaylee burst across his tongue, scent filling his nose, and felt the agony of opportunities foregone. River pulled away. "She's worth it," she said, and stood. Walking back to the still prostrate Kaylee, River missed her brother's expression, and if she could hear him in her mind, she gave no sign of it.
His eyes fixed on the swaying backside, Simon had broken into a full sweat. Sister, sister, sister, he reminded himself, a mantra. The prayer beads against his skin burned. He never used them, he didn't pray, he only wore them because she had given them to him.
Kaylee put up her hand, like a flag of surrender, and then it found its own life and caught River's calf. "Hey, conjure you could come back down here for a time, Lovely?"
River half-smiled, a display of more happiness than Simon saw in her a week at a time. She slipped back down to her knees, but Kaylee wasn't having any halfway attempts and pulled River down beside her. For a couple of minutes, all he could see was arms and hands entwining, and feet stroking legs. Little bursts of laughter punctuated the whispering.
He began to ease, his thoughts wandering back to Mal. There weren't many men that made him feel like Mal did. Maybe one a half-decade. Conversely, lots of men made known their desire for Simon. If the coldness of his demeanor didn't work, he got his point across with sufficient force, not interested. But Mal....
When Simon was busy delivering the whorehouse baby, he had overheard Mal's unstudied and undefensive reply to the Madam's most intrusive question as to why he wasn't trading protection for girls. "You ain't looked at one of 'em as long or as lovin' as you looked at those pistols," she had said, testing. "You're not sly, are you? 'cause I got my boys...."
"Sly? No. I lean towards womenfolk. Just one thing at a time. Never like complications."
More than one way to read his meaning, but she and Mal had ended up fucking all night. She died the next day in the raid.
And then, Inara left them. All her studied interactions with Mal, her companion's code, and her declarations before and after that night that she didn't care what he did were for naught. She was as burning jealous as Simon had been. It didn't matter that neither of them had graced Mal's bed, or that no one had in some time before that night. They had each imagined having a possessory interest.
Simon sighed, out loud, forgetting where he was.
"Deng yi miao!" Kaylee exclaimed from across the room, her back and surprisingly curvaceous backside now to Simon. "I plumb forgot you was here. You ain't looking, are you?"
"Indeed, I am," Simon replied, dryly. He rested his chin on his folded arms. "I don't mind telling you it's a fine sight, twisted up as this whole scene might be overall."
Her back was stiff. "I can't..."
"...leave River frustrated is what you can't do after all this trouble." In for a penny. "I've already seen the most of you in this."
Silence. Then, "Well, what does she like?"
Simon was startled. "Hell if I know. Ask her."
"Okay," Kaylee replied, timidly, "what I really mean is, what doesn't she like? Generally speaking, how do I avoid getting us all into even more trouble. I'm not sure you know yourself, do you now, River Girl," she added, softly.
Oh. Good point."Don't touch the middle of her forehead. Don't restrain her. No sudden aggressive moves."
"Not really my style," Kaylee giggled.
Simon smiled at that. "I guess not." He could see River stroking Kaylee's side, long, slow sweeps of her hand, and he could hear her humming. He took the sound as hopeful; she wasn't verbal at her most contented. "Beyond that, I'm not much help." This is probably illegal on most planets.
River burst out laughing. "Silly boy," she said. Abruptly, she rolled Kaylee over on her back and straddled her hips. She leaned forward onto her hands, tall enough that her breasts brushed Kaylee's face. Kaylee cupped them from the sides inward and kissed, circling one, then the other, as River shifted her weight to guide Kaylee back and forth.
Simon's face and thighs flushed hot again and he decided to concentrate on the refrigerator for a moment or two. He noted that for his next rotation on kitchen duty, he should most likely work on getting Jayne's gun-greased fingerprints off the so-called stainless.
A moan, another moan, and a couldn't-resist-glance later, Simon knew that Kaylee was licking, and that this might be River's favorite thing ever in life so far. But then, Kaylee moved the hand closest to him from breast down to slip between their bodies, and he learned that River had much higher limits than previously realized. Her hips flexed as she ground against the busy fingers, her back arched, and the sound coming from her made his hair stand on end. He had no idea what stream of abject nonsense Kaylee was crooning in return, but it added to the otherworldly mix, and he suddenly wasn't River's brother at all, just an exhausted but electrified man watching something so gorram gorgeous he could hardly stand his own skin.
The Simon who couldn't possibly be related to this wild animal, the version of himself who wasn't tied to a half-ton door, got up, strode over and knelt down to run his tongue over her beautiful, stark-white ass. His thumb slipped inside her alongside two of Kaylee's fingers, and when River came about three seconds later, he worshipped that orgasm like a holy event, holding himself back, determined not to sully the sacred moments with any distraction of his own.
The sound of River crying, softly, afterwards brought him up tight on his leash and back to his senses. Realizing he had bitten his own arm, was still safely tied ten feet or so from his sister, and had not in fact, committed any physical incest, did not ease his panic. River had sunk down along Kaylee and was being cradled as the tears flowed.
"Oh, mei-mei, forgive me," he groaned.
"What the hell you on about?" asked Kaylee. "Ain't you never made a woman cry with being sexed? The girl is blissed," she added, winking at him and blushing at the same time.
Of course, she didn't know. He stayed perfectly motionless, terrified, his still-hard cock an indictment. Minutes passed. River quieted. She slid off to the side of Kaylee and he could see the openness of her face, tearstained, but calm. He made no sound, tried to keep his mind blank.
"I don't mind saying that was the best hour I've spent since... I can't last remember," Kaylee sighed to River, brushing hair from her face. "Thank you."
River smiled, her eyes dreamy and faraway. She said nothing but kissed the end of Kaylee's nose. Then, her eyes focused on Simon, cutting the distance between them to nothing. She pushed up off the floor and he shut his eyes, huddling tighter to himself. He heard the fabric of her dress as it reclaimed her skin, and the brush of her bare feet on the floor as she approached. Then, she was stroking his hair and his neck as if he needed soothing.
"I'm sorry I called you," she said, contritely. "I scared you bad. Didn't mean too, just wanted you close. To touch me." He had no idea what she meant, and he was shaking. She slipped to the floor beside him and wrapped her arms around him. "I lost control, I called you."
"River," he said, as calmly as possible, "it doesn't work that way. I don't hear you in my head like you hear me. I can't." She often forgot things. Important things.
"Bao bei," she sighed. "You don't hear me, you feel me. How do you always know when I'm hurt, how to find me when I'm hiding?"
He didn't know. Honestly. He just did it. But that hadn't anything to do wit this. "I... I shouldn't have thought... that." She was so lucid all of a sudden and he was the crazy one who couldn't say what he meant.
Her fingers worked at the knots, nimbly, and he was free. His wrist burned where he had pulled the scarf tight enough to mark his skin. "Look at me, Simon." He forced himself to comply. "I wanted you to," she said. "But it makes you unhappy. I'll try never to do it again." She held her palm under his chin, searching his eyes. "I'm broken enough that I can't promise, but I'll try. It's not your fault." She shrugged. "I love you more than anyone in the world. I get confused." River pressed her forehead to his.
Tears filled Simon's eyes. He blinked them away. River was practically in his head, she knew the complexity of his thoughts. No point in talking.
A moment later, Kaylee stood before them, mostly dressed and innocent of the added layer of upset. She offered out her hand to Simon, looking a little sheepish. "You look a mite shaky there, Doc." He accepted and hauled himself to his feet.
"I'd like to sleep in your bunk," River said, matter-of-factly to Kaylee, and then squared her shoulders resolutely. "But it's dangerous. Maybe not a good idea yet."
Kaylee smiled at her, a little sadly, and nodded. "I'd like it too, but I do understand." She touched River's cheek. "'Night." She moved past them and dragged the door open, disappearing into the darkness.
"Two less wanting," River said, impishly. She tilted her head and her eyes lit up. "Ooh, four. Zoe and Wash made up. Jayne's asleep but he's dreaming nasty dreams," she said, confidentially. "I'm turning in," she yawned and stepped to the door. "You see to the last two of you, I might sleep all through the night." She paused in the doorway, her head lowered. "I love you."
"I love you too, River."
She nodded and left. He felt boneless with exhaustion, hardly in any condition for courting, let alone pursuing futility. His eyes fell to the floor and Kaylee's discarded scarf.
*******
Mal was fighting back, wrestling, before he was quite awake. He would swear he had just managed to find peace and whomever this fucker was would pay dearly for its interruption. A chill lodged in the pit of his stomach when he realized his hands were tied. Above his head. He struggled to orient. Dim red lights, his bunk. No smell of Reavers. He murmured words of heartfelt thanks for that.
The shape in the darkness seemed familiar. In a moment more, it registered. "Gorram it, Simon, you'd best have a horse tranquilizer there, a fine explanation after, and Jayne with Vera for backup, else you're dead." The sudden sweat began to cool across his skin.
"I learned the oddest thing tonight," Simon replied, ignoring the threats. His voice was more than usually cool, clinical.
"You've been the ruin of the better part of this night already," Mal said, reflexively testing the knots and then pushing toward the wall anchor to see if whatever it was would loosen. "I don't much care to be educated on any subject by a sleep thief." He must be dreaming. The uptight, ethics-touting doctor would never pick his lock, invade his privacy, and insult to injury, tie him to his bed. Not for any reason, least of all to force him to regard a lecture.
Simon moved to sit on the bed next to his chest, well out of range of a kick or leg-lock. "You and I worry about the same things."
"Oh really. You've just mutinied. I'd say you got a sight more to worry about than I do."
Simon's voice warmed. "I don't have any patience for games, tonight, Mal. I hardly have any strength left at all, in fact, but I'm here." With that, he leaned down and Mal found himself tasting the sinfully good inside of the doc's mouth. It did not occur to him, cagy sort that he was, that simply biting down would end any further invasions.
The just recently quieted blood surged back up in him and his head lifted to meet the kiss harder. A strong hand slipped under his neck and Simon slid a leg over, shifting on top of him. Naked under the sheet--a rare indulgence to begin with--Mal almost lost his composure but caught himself before he could arch up against Simon and provide any encouragement. Breaking his mouth free, he commanded, "Stop." Never mind that he knew Simon could feel with every inch of his body that the word was not heartfelt, it was the Captain's voice.
Simon froze. "Please." He buried his nose in Mal's exposed armpit and Mal suppressed a groan. "I understand why you wait for me to ask, why you test us and then push me away. You've been disciplined for long enough. You know this isn't a whim. I won't regret it. You know that I know I don't have to. River came to you tonight. She wouldn't if I didn't want you. Just for you."
"It's a complication," Mal replied, wishing the doc lacked a way with words.
Simon nodded. "You have a boat full of constant complications, Captain, like it or not. I am by far, not the worst one."
That produced a crooked smile that started somewhere in Mal's hardened groin. Simon smelled, bemusingly, like several kinds of sexing all at once. His fine trousers and silk shirt were rumpled, the heat of him coming through like he had nothing on at all. He risked an admission. "You're trying to off me with sheer want so that you can run this crew. I just know it."
"Yeah, because that would be my heart's desire," Simon replied, drolly. He sat up a little and unbuttoned his shirt.
Mal watched the fabric open to an expanse of skin he had been wondering about for some time, and reached for a defense. "I don't forgive you tying me." The shirt disregarded him and jumped to the floor.
"You are in charge of this ship, of me as its doctor, of where we go, and I never question that--well, mostly not. Treating a patient, even you, I'm in charge." Flexing his hips once, driving himself against Mal for emphasis, Simon said, "In a long overdue bedding, neither one of us would be in charge. I needed you to hold still long enough for me to make the point, instead of you getting all responsible and putting me out the door in a huff."
That sobered Mal a little. "On occasion, times are such for me that doing the right thing comes after surviving. This isn't one of those times."
"I submit that, in this instance, it isn't a choice of one over the other," Simon replied, unbuttoning his trousers. He managed out of them without removing his weight from Mal.
"You intend on taking anything without my express permission?" Mal was genuinely surprised. His heart pounded harder. You think you know a person, but things change.
Simon snorted. "I'm going to untie you now, knowing full well that you'll likely kick my ass and put me in my own infirmary with only Zoe's iron touch to minister to me."
Wearing just his short clothes, Simon had a sort of allover gleam to his flesh, and Mal argued with his hands wanting to touch. His brain won. "Best get on with it then. Longer you leave me this way, the worse the temper." Mal lay quietly while Simon undid the apparently ingenious knots. He couldn't help but notice that Simon flinched when Mal's second hand slipped free. Mal moved swiftly, as could only be expected, and he enjoyed Simon's shock when instead of hitting or pushing, he grasped. One hand closed on Simon's cock through the thin cloth, the other wrapped tight around his back. Mal rolled, taking Simon under him despite the tangle of sheets.
He was sure now, and the certainty broke his resolve. He had stood his ground in gentlemanly fashion with Inara, trying to spare them both complications. She was gone, and that was quite a complication in itself.
He'd been pretty well ignoring the doc's sundry charms throughout until Simon had made his own move a few months ago. That had been a surprise too.
Mal didn't mean to be ungentle and Simon, hothouse variety that Mal teased him for, didn't seem to mind his roughness. The slight man seemed somehow plenty strong now.
The fine, rich-boy shortclothes went and ripped themselves accidentally, Mal's fingers hooked in the waistband. He paused, stymied. Simon made a short, impatient noise and tore them the rest of the way off. That cleared things up considerable and Mal went back to the kissing. Some men wouldn't kiss, a damn shame; this one was exceeding good at it. Mal could taste a little blood, wondered briefly whose. It turned out Simon was possessed of some sharp teeth.
Half trapped, Simon still managed to twist his toes in the sheet and work it down off Mal's hips. Once he got his hands on Mal's bare ass, he stopped being quiet. Mal was startled, he knew Simon more by his silences than his talk or his sounds, being was one of the stiller, more deliberate people Mal had ever met. Simon's panting broke into moaning and then dear lord a soul-stealing, begging chant.
Mal latched his mouth onto Simon's neck, taking the sound down in pitch just a little, feeling it rumble through him, and fucked against him hard. He wanted everything this first time, registered briefly that the word first was involved in the thought, and knew they were altogether too hot to last long enough to even scratch the surface of want. He stopped thinking in words, just sensations of hard-slick-cockburning goodness. Simon moved against him as if he knew Mal's secrets, and there wasn't any hope of control. Mal turned his face into the pillow as the pleasure shuddered through him so as not to really bite. A couple of glorious long shocks into it, he distantly heard Simon yelp and felt the counterpoint to his own pulsing. Despite himself, he moaned into the pillow. It seemed to go on for hours, like that best-tasting meal of rice after starving.
Feeling his breathing ease, Mal was inclined to make a statement about how he usually took some care, and to apologize for running headlong this time, but hell if he didn't fall asleep mid-thought, right on top of Simon.
*******
Mal stood at the infirmary door, waiting for permission to enter, suspecting that Simon knew he was there. The doc finished wiping some instruments and closed the case. Mal allowed himself the notice of how Simon's shoulders moved, he hadn't known they were powerful before last night. He didn't like the nervous feeling in his stomach, the hope that he hadn't done anything reproachful.
Simon turned to him, inscrutable, his usual self. "Need something, Captain?" he asked, kindly but neutrally.
Mal glanced over his shoulder. "Mind if I come in?"
"Please."
Mal slid the door shut. He hated that he couldn't find the words he wanted. "You okay?"
"Fine." Simon said, his posture perfect as always, giving nothing away.
"Good. Doc, I wanted to say... What I mean..."
"Fang xin," replied Simon, his face softening. "No need to talk about it; I have no expectations. In fact, I assume that you're trying to tell me that was that. A cold night."
Mal rubbed a hand across his face. "Stop trying to speak for me," he said gently. "This is hard enough." It occurred to Mal, just at that moment, that words were not what he needed to say. He took two broad steps and pulled Simon's mouth to his. A minute or so later, he felt confident he had conveyed his meaning, particularly so from the feel of Simon hard against his thigh. "I was disappointed you were gone when I woke up," Mal murmured. Surprise registered in normally guarded eyes. He figured he was on the right track. "Sorry I fell off to sleep like that... wasn't exactly top form."
"I didn't mind," Simon replied, not moving away from the hand clasping the back of his neck. "You aren't that heavy." He slid his cheek against Mal's and spoke close to his ear. "Besides, it kept you safe from me fucking you awake."
"Shame," Mal said, enjoying the renewed surprise on Simon's face as they drew back to regard one another. "What are you doing after shift?"
Simon nodded. "I thought, in the light of day, you'd have second thoughts."
"Haven't you noticed?" Mal said, backing away with a smile and heading for the door, "There isn't any light of day on Serenity."
*******
ta ma de--holy shit
bao bei--precious
mei mei--little sister
deng yi miao--hold on a second
fang xin--don't worry, be at ease