Return to Challenges etc.
“Oh just pick something.”
Aeryn Sun thought to herself sourly. She had been standing at the closet for almost a quarter arn, picking up one piece of the unfamiliar clothing after another, turning it over in her hands and then placing it back again. What did females on this frelling backward little planet wear anyway?
She shivered, the early morning chill exacerbated by the fact that she was, at the moment, completely naked. In frustration Aeryn closed her eyes reached into the closet and snatched the first piece of material her hand touched. She looked down and breathed a sigh of relief. Blue shirt, long sleeved with a closure she actually recognized. “Button Fly,” the same type that the pants of his flight uniform were. She pulled it on and closed it, being careful to make sure the little round things were matched up with the correct holes and marveled again at how archaic this place was. Clasps would have been stronger and the fuzzy material he called “Velcro” would have been more efficient but when she had asked him once why they only used those on military clothing, he had just laughed and said, “they don’t look cool.”
She reached down and pulled on her exercise leggings, and thought sardonically that it was good that she had wearing those instead of her uniform when she had momentarily lost her mind and come looking for the human. At least they wouldn’t brand her as different; if what could be judged from the few people they had encountered were any clue, different here would get you killed. Just ask Rygel.
She added some sort of black cloth jacket and now properly attired went back to the low table and sat down on the floor. She spread out the picture schematics that John had purchased yesterday from something called a “Newsagents” and regarded them rather suspiciously. He had said that after they purchased a few needed items, bedrolls, extra clothing, canteens, a bottle of something called ‘Bourbon” which he said was like Raslac, a training exercise called “deck of cards” and some type of field ration called “chocolate” they would head for a sparsely populated area called simply “The Outback”. He had said they would have to be careful how far they went in though, parts of the place were evidently hot and he worried about her getting heat sickness.
Aeryn frowned trying to make sense out of the colors and unfamiliar symbols of his language. He would have to teach her some of them, if they were to survive here long enough to find D’Argo and a way to contact Moya, if such a thing were possible, just enough so that she would know which ones were dangerous.
“Ummmh”
The sound made her jump and she turned around just in time to see him shift position on the bed. His hand reached out snaking along the space she had so recently occupied as though searching for something and for a moment she was afraid he would wake. But he merely grabbed a pillow and hugging it to his chest rolled back to the other side. She watched his breath settle back into a quiet rhythm and released her own, not realizing for a microt that she had been holding it.
He had flipped her, when she had pushed him down after that first kiss. With an ease and speed that had surprised her. He was a cerebral being, the human, given to talking and reason and it was easy to forget how physically strong he actually was.
“Tell me what you want” he had whispered into her ear. “Tell me.”
She had stared up at him uncomprehendingly her hands flexing where he held them pinned shoulder high by the wrists. What was there to tell? What was there to want? This was recreation. There was need and release, nothing more.
He had laughed at her confusion and coaxed her into another kiss.
“We’ll make it an adventure then.”
And then he’d touched her. Starting with her face and working his way down, he had mapped her entire body as though he were committing the feel of her to memory. He’d stop only when his fingers hit an area that illicited a response from her and then he’d kiss the skin as though marking it for future reference. The sensation had awakened something in her, something more than need and when he...
Aeryn shook her head abruptly forcing the memory from her mind. All of a sudden the room seemed to small, too confined, and she stood quickly, grabbed a blanket from the foot of the bed and went out on the Terrace.
There was no chair so she wrapped herself in the blanket and sat on the cold stone floor. She closed her eyes and lifted her face, hoping the cool morning air would wash the foreign thoughts from her head. They didn’t need thoughts right now, they needed a plan, and sentimental drivel wasn’t going to help them any.
They had talked afterwards, lying side by side and almost nose to nose. Whispering although there was no need. He had told her that this place was not the place he had told her stories about, not the place where he had grown up with his parents and sisters and the boy called DK. That if worse came to worse and they could find no way off of the planet for awhile then he would take her there somehow, he had friends there and they would help them.
When she had asked him how they would get there, how they would evade detection while they traveled, how they would find D’Argo and protect him from Rygel’s fate, the joy had faded out of his eye’s and he had shaken his head slightly.
“One step at a time, Aeryn,” he’d said. “One step at a time.” Then his fingertips had traced the curve of her hip and there had been no more talking for awhile.
She opened her eyes and took in the surroundings. Scanning the horizon for potential threats and looking for anything that might be of use to them in their current situation. She could just see the water of the harbor past the trees, the sun glinting off of the big bridge turning it golden in the weak light. She heard the engines of whatever their vehicles were called groaning in the street and the faint voices of people talking.
Something caught her eye and she looked down. A woman walked out of one of the dwellings across the street. She stopped and stretched and ran her fingers through her hair. She was wearing loose fitting pants a large shirt with no closures and her feet were bare.
The shirt had lettering on it.
BAMAGIRL
Aeryn wondered if the symbols were her name, or the name of her training facility the way John had IASA all over his. She had always thought that it was a silly custom. Why would you want to advertise who you were or where you were from? And enemy would be able to spot you from metra’s away and you made yourself a sitting target for local prejudices.
She shaded her eyes and looked to the west. She thought she saw what appeared to be some sort of small commerce center a few metra’s off. That was good, it looked big enough to carry the supplies they might need and populated enough that two strangers would not draw any undue attention, but small enough that there probably wouldn’t be a large security force guarding it. She wondered idly if there would be a weapons dealer there. All they had was the one gun John had stolen from the guards and she didn’t really know its range or firing capability. .
“MOM, WHERE’S MY LUNCH???”
Aeryn looked back across the street to see a male child, young perhaps 8 cycles old, come banging out of the front door and stand squirming in front of the woman who looked at him with a mixture of annoyance and affection. She couldn’t hear her response, but whatever it was seemed to cause the child more anxiety because he began bouncing up and down on the balls of his feet and gesturing wildly.
The woman spun the boy around and began digging through what suspiciously looked like a field pack that was strapped to his back. She took one thing after another carefully out and placed it on the ground beside them.
For some reason Aeryn found herself leaning closer. Resting her head on the bars of the Terrace so she could both see and hear more clearly. Yes, it was a field pack; she could recognize some of the contents. Regulation/strategy manuals, extra foot gear and clothing, communication device and.... there it was, a ration box. She smiled slightly; maybe this place wasn’t so different after all.
Evidently it was the ration box that the boy had been seeking because when the woman, his mother, waved it under his nose with a frown, he stopped jumping about so much. He stood somewhat calmly as she repacked the kit and then ran off before the woman could do no more than brush her lips lightly against his hair. He hurried off up the street to where three more males who seemed to be about the same age were waiting. Members of his unit, Aeryn guessed. Her smile widened. She remembered leaving her barracks and rushing off much the same way when she was a child.
A vehicle pulled up to the dwelling just then, puffing smoke into the air. Aeryn idly remembered Crichten telling her that they still used a liquid as the major source of their fuel because they had not fully harnessed the energy of their sun. A woman got out of the vehicle and waved to the woman standing on the front porch. She was the same race as the people who had worshiped Rygel on that planet where Crichten had gotten lost a quarter cycle ago.
“Hey Atana”
“Hey Shar,”
The woman on the porch called to someone in the house and a few microts later a small girl came out of the door. She was younger than the boy was, perhaps only 5 cycles. She too had a field pack although it was a ridiculous pink color and Aeryn wondered what type of instruction she was having that day that she could perform in the short skirt and black flat shoes. The woman stooped down and spoke gently to the child who nodded in response. She then put her arms around her, pulled her close and kissed her several times.
She remembered a dark room, quiet except for the hum of the engines. A hand across her mouth smelling of Chakan oil and leather. A woman’s face the beauty somehow enhanced by the twisted scar winding around one side. Gray eyes like hers and a smile.
The child returned the embrace twinning her arms around her mother’s neck as the stood and carried her down to meet the other woman. With a final kiss the let the girl down and she ran to join the other two children in the back seat of the vehicle.
“Are you picking up or am I?” the one called Atana asked.
“Nope, Lee offered to get them, she’s got to take her son to the airport and it’s on the way. She’s going to drop them off over the Shipscat’s and we can pick them up there.”
“That was nice of them, I’ll have to remember to thank T.”
“Yeah I know, me too”
“Well, I’ll see you later”
“See ya.”
After they left, the woman stood in her front yard digging her toes in the grass lost in thought. Aeryn wondered what she was thinking. She wondered what it must be like to stay with your mother instead of being raised by nursery guards and battalion leaders. She wondered if she would have turned out any differently if she had.
She was about to get up and leave when a man came out of the house. He too seemed to be in a hurry and the woman had to grab his arm to keep him from rushing past her. She gave him a piece of paper she had in her pocket and looked hurt when he took it and pulled away leaving her upturned face busing nothing but air. He stopped before he reached the street though and turned around and trotted back to the woman grabbing her from behind and spinning her around to kiss him. She resisted at first but he persisted, slapping at her butt and nuzzling her neck until she began to giggle with delight. He released her then with a final pat to her backside and headed back down the walk again.
The woman watched him with amusement, “Don’t forget the milk player, player can’t make Mac and Cheese without it”
The man turned around his face contorted with embarrassment.
“Sharon how many times have I told you NOT to call me that in public?”
The woman merely laughed and waved him on.
She had gasped when he grabbed her, she thought they were done for the night. She at least didn’t have the stamina for any more. But he had only pulled her close to him, cupping his body to hers and twining the fingers of his free hand in her hair.
“Go to sleep Aeryn” he’d whispered.
She had tensed against him. And he hesitated for a microt. But then the arm draped across her stomach had tightened and he had pushed against the back of her knees with his pulling their combined bodies into almost a fetal position.
“Go to sleep or I’ll sing to you.”
She hadn’t moved. Concentrating instead on the rain beating its uneven tattoo on the roof.
“O.K. I warned you. 100 bottles of beer on the wall, 100 bottles of beer, take one down and pass it around...”
That had done it she had begun to laugh.
He chuckled when he felt her body relax. “That’s better.”
He pulled her hair back and kissed the top of her ear.
“Everything will look different in the morning.”
Aeryn watched the man hustle down the walk toward the end of the street. The woman watched him for a few microts and then bent down to pick up some sort of papers wrapped in a bag on the ground. She stood up and looked around and this time her eyes turned up and saw the woman sitting on the balcony of the small motel across the street.
Aeryn pulled back when she realized that she had caught the woman’s attention. But she only smiled and waved at her and went back into the house.
Aeryn got up and returned quickly to the room. The sun was well over the treetops now and they were, as Crichten was so fond of saying “wasting daylight.”
She headed for the small table where she had left the picture schematics but paused before she got there and regarded the man sleeping across the room from her.
Her breath caught, and for a microt she was filled with an overwhelming urge to crawl back in the bed, fit her body to his and pull the covers over them both. And maybe, just maybe if she closed her eyes tight enough, when she opened them...
“STOP IT”
She plunked herself down on the floor hard. What was the matter with her? The whole thing had been a mistake anyway. Aeryn grabbed the pictures and began to arrange them on the table her hands shaking with anger. She had been a fool to follow him here in the first place, and now she was paying for her weakness. She had been a fool to trust him and come here to this place, his father had suggested it and soldiers were likely to show up at any microt. And last night had been..... last night had been recreation that’s all. A needed tension reliever, pleasant and necessary if they were to work together and think clearly enough to stay alive. Nothing more. NEVER anything more.
She heard him shift behind her and she took a deep breath.
“Wake up John. Get out of bed.”
