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Aries fell into the cachement pool at the bottom of the waterfall and came up spluttering, soaked, bellowing her indignation and her surprise as she bobbed to the surface -- looked up, the air suddenly balmy and the trees a thick green net all around this unknown winding river -- bright red with PURE INDIGNATION. "JUDE!" she bellowed again. You did not push your captain into a waterfall. You did not push your captain into anything. Even in full armour she was making her way to the bank, pulling herself up, completely sodden -- "JUDE!" And then she called him something very coarse.

At least it wasn't like being dunked in the middle of a Destiny City winter, but Sagittarius' own personal jungle belonged to one person: Sagittarius. Loved one person: Sagittarius. The sand was crunching into her sandals as she swore again, taking her cape and squeezing it out, pulling it over her head -- oh, damnit, her brooch had come off. You did not leave without your doublestar brooch. Aries primly yanked off her chestguard, plain brown undershirt beneath, and waded in once more to dive for the symbol of her guardianship.

When she came up for air, she yelled:

"You're on the worst punishment detail I can think of, Jovian!"

(This sounded really familiar.)

She looked at him, her red-orange hair slicked down around her helmet, blinking water away from her eyelashes. Abruptly she ducked down into the water again, down to the bottom of the pool with the sound of the pounding waterfall all around them. Jude Lawson had, in order: object one, a bedroom voice, object two, bedroom eyes. Object three, a collection of teehee girls. Aries was under for what looked to be quite a long time, not appearing on top of the churning waters --

-- when from the side, next to the water-weeds, a hand shot out and grabbed at Sagittarius' ankle. At least he'd already taken his glove and his cape off, because he was jerked directly into the shallow waters. His captain sat at the water near the shoreline and started jerking off her handguards and twin horn-knives, ignoring his plight completely. They required some effort with her teeth: they were good weapons, but stopped her fine motor skills a little. One came off. The other was unstrapped much more quickly.

Then she watched Sagittarius flounder in the thigh-deep water.

"You should have learned to swim," she said.

Jude Lawson had a terrible secret: the secret was that he had a deep, sexy Southern accent. A terrible sexy Southern accent. Hero had a clipped New England accent, though she had beautiful vowels (years of elocution) and her own deep voice to contend with -- but Jude drawled. He had a cowboy drawl. He had a Southern man drawl. He had a drawl which sold cigarettes and bespoke the South rising again. And he was waist-naked, waist-deep in water, and she was simply taking off her helmet and scrubbing at it with her cape in irritation -- lifting up her legs, unbuckling her greaves. Greaves, sandals, on the bank. That stuff rusted.

Her belt followed, clinking with gold -- she stood up, ankle-deep in the water now, unbuckling her shoulder guard. She had a lot of armour. She was Captain Aries.

"I'm drying out my clothing."

She was untucking her scarlet kilt, squeezing that out too, leaning over to lay it out on the scrubby grass. Water was still streaming in rivulets underneath her chin. She was left in her brown undershirt and her shorts; annoyingly more obsessed with her weapons trying out -- brushing off the bone -- than she was with Jude, standing in the water looking like a Playgirl centerfold. A Playgirl centerfold with an ugly, wicked scar.

"Was there something you wanted, brother?"

Oh, she was ******** with him, she had to be.

He had sloshed back into the water, walking towards her. Aries out of her Barren Pines outfit was trim and boyish, slim hips, small-busted. He'd seen the hint of sinew and muscle in her arms, and it was more apparent now that she was wearing completely soaked clothing and sitting on the sandbank beside the waterfall: his waterfall. She was good-looking, boyish. This said a lot about Jude. To Jude. From Jude. "Do you now," she said. It wasn't a question. "Sagittarius."

That wasn't what he wanted and they both knew it. His thumb was over her mouth, her jawline. "I want things that are complicated," she said. "I am a complicated man." She was openly slipping up with the gender terms now, too. She reached out with her hand and tangled it into his sopping hair again, her fingers brushing against the piercing at his eyebrow, slicking his hair behind his ear. "What do I want? You couldn't imagine what I want, you couldn't fathom what I want -- "

He was looking at her. "Or maybe you could."

She reached forward again, her cheek next to his, her mouth at his ear. "'And there went out unto him all the land of Judaea,'" she said. "Jude." Her hand was at his other shoulder, and suddenly she was pressing him back into the sand. She was looking down over him; she was also dripping, but this was arguably his fault. "Jude." Her hands were on his shoulders now, pinning him down. "Jude. Jude, Jude." One hand slid up his wet skin, cupping his jaw. "His left hand is under my head, and his right hand doth embrace me. Jude."

She gave him a look that said: you always had the most egregious ego. Hero kept stroking back the wet locks of navy hair, just about black with wet, a deep cobalt blue underneath her calloused fingers. She was lying half-into him, one hand on his shoulder, not straddling his hips -- lying over him, leaning into him, pinning him down. Red-orange strands of hair were pasted to her forehead, just above her ears, damp. And this close he could see that she was not redhead pale -- he was a measure or two more pale than she was, she was that terrible novel term: sunkissed.

Aries was fire, what did he expect.

"I am your Captain," she told him. And then, to match his own grin, she finally gave him one of her own: it was a slow and amazing miracle across her face, staring directly into his eyes. His eyes were startling, she thought. Cerise. And her grin was more egregiously filled with ego than anything he'd ever seen. "If you don't love me, I'll make it so that you do fairly soon. I'm sure."

Her hand had gone down to the pinkish, puckered outline of his scar, the one that Obsidian left, an unwelcome reminder of both his death and the Negaverse Lieutenant. But he was with Hero, he was with her, her and her messed-up Biblical obsession of -- "Behold, thou art fair, my love; behold, thou art fair," and her mouth was at his neck where it met his shoulder, and Hero Barrett (???) was giving him an excruciatingly large lovebite.

Their things had been serviceably dry, uncomfortably covered in sand. Aries had been busy strapping back on her greaves, squeezing her feet into her (slightly squishy still) sandals. All professional. The last to go on was her helmet, adjusted in her hair -- all professional. All military. Sagittarius was incandescent; he was more than good-looking when he looked like that, seized out of his depression -- he was glowing, he was too bright to look at. Inside her head she said: for, lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone; and that wasn't true, winter had just begun. But in his smile was summer.

"How have I been," she said, more than a trifle sardonically. "How have I been. I'm wedged back in the schooling system, you're off God knows where, I find a Destiny City covered in senshi who have no idea what they're doing, and I don't have enough access to Zue or Topher. It's not even a little bit adequate."

She was brushing sand off her shorts, onto the chilly frozen ground of Destiny City. And for a moment she looked incredibly awkward.

"You have a place to stay? Don't lie to me."

Place could mean anything. Place could mean living in a box by the petrol station. Place could mean living with a sugar momma -- or a sugar daddy -- in some condo. Place could mean a storm drain. For once she decided not to push it: she had just spent a lot of time pushing it. Pushing it very far. Pushing it further than -- well, things had been pushed.

This was Jude Lawson; wannabe den daddy, overprotective alpha male, enjoyer of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Brave warrior. Expert slitherer-outerer.

"You're not on a man hunt. You're on a suicide mission."

It was useless telling him not to do it; ordering him, even -- why set yourself up for an order that would be immediately broken, leaving oneself with how to punish the man? He was talking, talking, talking. All words. They were both in love with words. It was something they had in common -- otherwise they were brutal, stark opposites; always were, always had been --

"I warn you," she said. "I'm not leaving him as your quarry. If I see him he's dead." She re-adjusted her horn-knife, vehemently. "If I see him he's mine."

She looked at him.

"I am also entitled to..."

...

...

She rubbed her temples, and said with dignity: "Be revengey."