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 Posted: Mon Nov 01, 2021 10:05 am
Jet was not on the usual bench when Aquamarine teleported to the park.
Twilight streaked the darkening sky with pinks and oranges, as the sun sank lower and the moon gained prominence. Someone less single-minded might have stopped to admire it, but Aquamarine cared for Jet and nothing else. The park itself was emptying. An evening jogger ambled down a nearby trail; in the distance, Aquamarine heard the chattering of children, but their voices were drifting away, no doubt called home by their parents.
The aura of a General touched at Aquamarine’s senses; once, he might not have been able to identify it as Jet, but years of close contact — working in tandem, dispatching their enemies side by side, living in close quarters, sharing a bed — allowed him a certain degree of familiarity. Though any other General would have felt no different from another, Jet stood out from among them.
Aquamarine followed the aura to the west. He passed some flowerbeds, crossed a trail, and snaked through a cluster of trees, to a dark corner of the park where a creek trickled and rocks tripped unsteady feet.
He found Jet standing over a body.
“You couldn’t wait for me?” Aquamarine said, folding his arms over his chest. Jet didn’t often go out on his own now, not without warning him ahead of time.
Aquamarine eyed the body with a dispassionate stare, until he noted the jeans and t-shirt in the place of ruffles and bows or furs and planetary symbols.
“You didn’t tell me you found another traitor.”
Why else would Jet go after a civilian?
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Posted: Mon Nov 01, 2021 10:08 am
Jet was breathing heavily, even though it had clearly been several minutes since the body was left to crumple to the ground, lifeless. He could feel Aquamarine’s approaching aura, and yet he couldn’t seem to move from the spot. Instead, he clutched the starseed in his hand with such a force it was making an impression in his skin.
“We’re supposed to collect starseeds and energy,” he made himself shrug, and he turned to look at Aquamarine, although he couldn’t quite control the expression on his face. There was obviously anger, but there was something more than that. Hurt. Loss. Things he didn’t feel for the dead civilian, but things he felt regardless.
“We don’t know what to expect, so might as well keep our supplies as high as possible,” he said and pulled open his subspace pocket so he could place the starseed inside.
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Posted: Mon Nov 01, 2021 10:12 am
“We’re always supposed to collect starseeds and energy,” Aquamarine countered.
He stared at Jet’s face, noted the tension around his eyes, how his expression seemed stuck between several different emotions at once. His gaze dropped to Jet’s fist, watched him store the starseed away. Even with it gone, there was a stiffness to Jet’s fingers. He looked wound up, like one wrong move or careless word might make him snap — either to punch something or cry, Aquamarine couldn’t decide which.
Unfolding his arms, Aquamarine let them hang by his sides, angling for less aggression and antagonism.
“So was this another traitor, or…?” he asked.
Aquamarine looked at the body again. Nothing was familiar about the face. No details stood out to match any descriptions in the database. It might as well have been some random civilian.
“I thought we didn’t target civilians.”
Nevermind that he’d snagged a starseed from one himself. That circumstance was… unusual, to say the least. Personal.
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Posted: Mon Nov 01, 2021 10:14 am
“We don’t target civilians,” Jet agreed with Aquamarine, even as he still didn’t look up at him. He glanced at the body again, his expression twisting into something of a sneer. “The city doesn’t need people like him,” he explained, because while Jet did everything he could to avoid the loss of civilian life, he didn’t want people like him in the city. Or anywhere else in the world.
“Let’s just go,” he said after a moment, but paused as he almost tripped over a shoe that had been left behind. A woman’s shoe. He didn’t dare pick it up, and he doubted that the woman would be coming back for it. “We shouldn’t be around here.”
Not that they couldn’t just teleport away if they needed to, but he didn’t want the Negaverse to get more of a bad public reputation, especially since he was certain others of the lucky thirteen were probably out grabbing starseeds from just about anyone they could find. Or at least a few of them were.
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Posted: Mon Nov 01, 2021 5:14 pm
“Okay,” Aquamarine said, because arguing about it wasn’t going to do either of them any good, and he didn’t care to stick around anyway.
They had a job to do.
His gaze caught on the shoe — a pretty pink flat, dressy enough to imply there might have been effort put into the owner’s appearance, but casual enough not to seem completely out of place in a park. Maybe she’d been on a walk after class, or meeting someone for what was supposed to be a laid-back date.
“We can talk about it if you want to,” Aquamarine offered, lifting his gaze back to Jet. As was usually the case, Aquamarine’s voice wasn’t particularly soft or comforting, but he kept it low and quiet enough to pass for it.
“If you don’t…” Aquamarine shrugged. There was a lot Jet didn’t talk about; at this point, Aquamarine was used to it. “We should do something about the body, at least. Or the shoe. Someone’ll find it. Might make a connection. If the girl reports it and the authorities find him like that, she might run into some trouble. You know how s**t gets twisted around.”
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Posted: Mon Nov 01, 2021 5:30 pm
“There’s not much to talk about,” Jet shrugged, but he paused to look back at the body and at the shoe. “I don’t want people like him in the city. I don’t care if he was an agent. He wasn’t, but I wouldn’t have cared if he was,” he said, making a face as he looked down at him.
“Most of them look like normal people, don’t they? The ones who decide to prey on others. I’ve never understood it. I don’t care about the White Moon or these aliens-- whatever they are. They know they’re fighting a war, and sometimes soldiers die,” he said, briefly recalling what Axinite had told him once. Their goal wasn’t to slaughter the innocent.
And if the White Moon was going to allow creatures like that man crumpled at his feet to live in the city -- in the world Jet wanted to protect? Then they all deserved the same fate.
“Arles,” he called then, and watched as the shadows shifted and teeth shone out from the darkness in a wide grin. “Get rid of this body, will you?”
The smile turned into more of a sneer.
Am I to be your scavenger? Disposing of things you can’t deal with? This isn’t the first time I’ve disposed of similar vermin, Arles thought into both Jet’s and Aquamarine’s minds.
Jet frowned, because he knew what the mutt was talking about, but he definitely didn’t want to bring up what Aquamarine had done for him before.
“If I give you a starseed, will you shut up and do it?”
Arles let out a noise that was likely supposed to be a laugh, but it was too gravely, like a snarl. But it seemed as though he was willing to accept his payment.
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Posted: Mon Nov 01, 2021 5:53 pm
Aquamarine was sure there was plenty to talk about, but he could never decide how much he wanted to press. How much was too much, and how much was nothing at all? Did he even want to know?
Yes, sometimes. Other times, no; he wasn’t sure he could stomach it, wouldn’t know how to channel the rage it would likely invoke when the target was already neutralized. One time and one time only, Aquamarine dipped his hand into a civilian’s chest, took a starseed he wouldn’t normally touch, left the body there in the woods at the very edge of the city. He never wondered what happened to it. The deed was done.
Arles appeared, but Aquamarine had eyes only for Jet. He listened to the dog talk, listened to Jet respond, watched him frown, watched him shift, watched the emotions play over his face. The feeling that crawled up Aquamarine’s chest into his throat was not quite pity, not quite sympathy, not quite anything he was used to feeling (not that he was used to either of those).
He stepped closer. Tentatively, Aquamarine reached out a hand, placed it against Jet’s arm. Part of him expected Jet might pull away, but another part of him thought maybe Jet might respond to it, maybe Jet might like the contact to ground him again.
Funny how something as simple as touch could do that.
“You don’t have to convince me of anything,” Aquamarine told him, still quiet, edging as close to gentle as he would ever be. “I’m not here to judge you or give you a hard time, I’m just… here.”
Sometimes he didn’t know if that was enough, but it was all he knew to do.
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Posted: Mon Nov 01, 2021 5:56 pm
He didn’t pull away when Aquamarine placed a hand on his arm. Instead, Jet stilled a little more. He closed his eyes and breathed. He wasn’t sure how Aquamarine always seemed to know exactly what he needed at any moment, but here he was, being supportive and attentive and giving him the space he needed to process things.
“I know,” he said just as softly, and watched as Arles got to work digging his fangs into the body of the civilian so he could drag him off and into the depths of the Rift.
“Maybe it would be better if we left the body, I don’t know,” he said as he watched the youma. “Maybe it would be better if they find him and… people can know they don’t have to worry about being hurt,” he said with an awkward shrug. “I don’t want anyone to have to keep looking over their shoulder in case—”
Another shrug, because he didn’t know what he was trying to say, but he felt it deep inside the anguish that others must surely feel when faced with that situation. He glanced up at Aquamarine then, his eyes almost pleading, as if needing help for an answer he didn’t feel like he could reach on his own.
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Posted: Mon Nov 01, 2021 7:21 pm
Aquamarine had no answers for him.
It was not his rage that brought them here, not his pain. He had no experience in this, no way to know what the right decision was. He could offer nothing but suggestions and support, but by the look in Jet’s eyes, Aquamarine had to wonder if that really was enough.
He took his hand from Jet’s arm, brought it to Jet’s face, stared into Jet’s eyes as his fingers played along Jet’s jaw, sliding up, up, up into his curls, pulling thick locks of hair off of Jet’s forehead.
“I don’t know what to tell you,” he said.
Honesty seemed better than thoughtless decision making.
Aquamarine tucked a curl behind Jet’s ear, touched the dark freckle near Jet’s eye with the pad of his thumb.
“Maybe we should call it a night,” he suggested, voice almost a whisper, like talking any louder might provoke Jet, make him defensive, make him weep. “We can go home, get some rest. You’ve barely slept these last few days. We can make up the time tomorrow. The Queen wouldn’t want you running yourself ragged, even for a mission like this.”
Not that he could speak for the Queen, couldn’t guess what she was thinking, what she desired beyond the mission she gave them, but she seemed practical enough that Aquamarine felt certain she didn’t intend for them to wear themselves out before the finish line.
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Posted: Mon Nov 01, 2021 7:21 pm
He swallowed thickly as Aquamarine touched his face, and then felt the familiar feel of fingers in his hair. Jet let himself close his eyes for a few moments and just breathe. He knew he was getting worked up over nothing. Well, it wasn’t nothing, but it was nothing that had to do with him at this current moment.
“Okay,” he agreed when Aquamarine offered to just call it a night and rest. He knew they needed to prepare for whatever was coming with these aliens, but Aquamarine was right in that they needed to rest as well. If there was going to be some kind of fight that broke out, they would need to be at their best.
He kept his eyes closed as Aquamarine tucked his hair behind his ear, and tried to ignore the sound of Arles dragging the body away. He knew he wouldn’t be likely to talk about things with Aquamarine, but he also never seemed to push for that conversation, and Jet was grateful for it. Even if he didn’t know what to tell him, Jet at least had someone with him to ground him and remind him that he was still there and alive and working towards something greater, so to speak.
When Jet opened his eyes again he was met by Aquamarine’s, still looking at him and offering him the support he didn’t think he deserved, or should need.
“Thank you, Aqua,” he said softly, and leaned close to briefly press his forehead to his partner’s. “I’m okay,” he tried to assure him, and then pulled back so they could prepare to teleport close to home.
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Posted: Mon Nov 01, 2021 7:29 pm
Displays of affection were rarer in their powered lives than in their civilian ones, where affection was already rare enough, but sometimes, when the moment was right, when the mood seemed to inspire it, Aquamarine didn’t mind. Jet’s forehead touched his, and it felt right.
With his arms around Jet, Aquamarine closed the remaining distance, catching Jet’s mouth with his own.
Then they vanished, and the shadows were empty.
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