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Futatsu would not get out of my head. You must imagine a short, long-haired man with big green eyes, illustrating everything with his hands as he talks at you. Because that is the mental image I had the entire time this was being written.
Futatsu/SingKueh, about 4000 words, R for violence, language and sexual situations (lucky Futa).
It was a pretty intense kind of day, and I’d been through a lot of shit. Not that I haven’t always, but, y’know, more so. So it was all kinds of out of character when I… well, stop. Back up. Lemme tell you the backstory or you’ll never respect me again.
So there I was, just me and my gun set to ‘maim horribly’, and I was gonna off this guy. Well, not so much a guy as a lady, I found out later. But then she was a lady wearin’ an EarthSphere Corps hat an’ a military-issue trench coat, so what the hell, she’s pretty much just prey.
I’m sitting there, and I’m aiming so that I get her from the front – try never to shoot a guy from behind if I can help it, it’s just a thing, okay? – and I’m waiting until she turns, like, thirty-four degrees to her left so I can make sure the shot hits her in the throat. Those trench coats, lemme tell you, they’re shit for stealth or marching but they’re great for making sure no one gets a chance to blow big messy holes in you, so I had to wait ‘til she gave me an opening.
And then she turns – more like forty degrees than thirty-four but who’s counting, and I pull the trigger.
Yeah, it went off perfectly. What, you think I’m some kinda noob? Her head flew off like a frikkin’ firework, it was pretty cool. ‘Specially when the bullet exploded and spattered blood all over the place.
Yeah, I’m a cold-blooded murderer, so sue me. Wait, I don’t exist, least not officially, so good luck there. EarthSphere Corps’s the ones trained me this way, they shouldn’t get too pissed off when I start usin’ it on them.
I got outta there like a bat outta hell, or like greased lightning, or like wildfire, or pick your colorful dead metaphor, doesn’t matter, I was bloody fast. See, if I get caught I’m worse than dead, ‘cause of what I said before, I don’t exist. So I’ll be lucky to get spaced if they do catch me. I got a lot of guys used to be my buddies thinkin’ I need some retraining, if you know what I mean and I think you do if you’re thinking somethin’ involving the biggest damn knives you ever met and maybe some stripped wires.
So I’ve learned to run really, really fucking fast, ‘cause I’m not suicidal, unlike some guys I could mention, like the one I was on this mission with and where the hell was he, anyway? My comm unit crackled static and I went to pick it up when I realized it was code.
We’ve got a lot of codes, verbal and nonverbal, line-of-sight and not, and that one I just heard meant that something really freaking huge was about to happen, and it’d be bad. So I stopped and looked around for somethin’ to hide behind, which you would too if you were a former bomber pilot spent all his time runnin’ from other bomber pilots. Big chunk of concrete looked promising, so I vaulted that, dropped behind it, waited for the big bang, then it went off again.
Only time that signal gets used twice is when someone’s in some serious shit, and ‘round here serious shit is usually the kind of shit that leaves you dead ‘steada bleeding. So I jumped right back over the concrete, and headed for the noise.
Now before you get all on me for getting myself in trouble, lemme tell ya, I don’t do this for just anyone. That little pattern is specific to me ‘n about three other guys, and one of ‘em is, like I said, this guy with a death-wish, ‘cept I made him swear on his mother’s grave that he’d whistle for help if he needed it next time. Didn’t think he’d actually do it but I guessed either he wanted to live or he actually honored his promises. Know it’s both, now, but we only got there after… yeah, okay, I’ll keep to the timeline.
I jumped yet another big chunk of metal and concrete – damn, ya know, I do not envy the guy with the job of cleaning up this city once all this shit is over, if it ever is – just to find this guy I know with a chokehold on the guy who’d whistled.
Yeah, you guessed it, another fucking EarthSphere Corps jackoff. So I aimed at him, ‘cause it’s more or less instinct, even though I was scared enough I just about shit myself, pardon my Pacem. He’s this guy, see, who I was – ah, never mind that, he wasn’t gonna be happy to see me, we’ll leave it at that.
‘Course, I’ve grown like half a foot since then and my hair’s a lot longer, so I guess I don’t look much like I used to, ‘cause he didn’t recognize me at first. Seriously, nothing. I still don’t know if I’m relieved or freaked out about that, thought I was more memorable than that. But, y’know, recognition or not, I still didn’t wanna shoot him. Not seriously, at least.
Again, though, recognition or not, he knew a gun when he saw it and he brought the guy with the death-wish – you know, my buddy now, he’s this half-Chinese guy with a nasty stare, call ‘im ‘Kueh – around as a human shield. Fucking coward, he’s in a freaking Kevlar trench and he needs a hostage?
So I, being me, open my big mouth and tell him to drop the hostage, and that’s when he recognizes me.
“Holy shit, Futatsu,” is pretty much what he said. Yeah, okay, so they thought I was dead and I liked it that way, and since he’s seen me it’s pretty obvious that I’m not so he has to die, so I’m about ready to shoot him, shield or no shield.
Right here, I want you to imagine: me, on one side of this little courtyard between two buildings, one of which is still in good shape minus a few windows, one of which is just scrap metal and dust, facing this EarthSphere cannon-fodder holding this short guy in a really harsh arm-lock, and all three of us totally still ‘cept for the wind. Yeah, it was a real Hollywood moment.
“Just drop ‘im, Tien,” was all I said. Didn’t wanna talk too much, ‘cause, you know, things get awkward when you’re holding a guy at gunpoint.
‘Kueh looked up at me then, glaring like mad. I swear the guy has a whole arsenal of lethal glares and all of ‘em could bore a hole through titanium. He wasn’t mad at me though, he was mad at himself. Don’t ask, I just know, okay? He was probably pissed off that he’d let himself get rescued, again.
Then Tien twisted his arm and he dropped to his knees, and holy fuck that was wrong, ‘cause ‘Kueh takes pain better than anyone I’ve ever known. Then I realized his arm was bent all out of whack. Broken. Tien was still holdin’ him, so he didn’t try to get away, but his face went totally ash white.
“Fuck, Tien, you picked up some bad habits since I been gone?” I asked him. Our unit’d never been into torture, one of the reasons I stayed as long as I did. If we’d got up to some of the shit I saw goin’ down in, like, the fifteenth unit? I’d’ve been outta there in three days.
“It’s been two years, Futatsu, things happen,” he said. Well, yeah, no shit Sherlock, otherwise I wouldn’t be standing here pointing a homemade assault rifle at you, but I wasn’t gonna argue the point, I had more important things to worry about, like whether my buddy’s arm was permanently fucked up and if I would survive long enough to find out.
“Get out of here,” I told him. “Three seconds. You don’t drop him, you die,” I said, and you know what, my voice wasn’t even shakin’. Sure as Hell my gun hand wasn’t. Guess I’m a little more cold-blooded than I give myself credit for, ‘cause I really was gonna shoot him.
That’s when ‘Kueh took the moment of distraction to do this completely impressive thing where he – ah, I don’t even know how to describe it, it was like a disarming grab and a back flip and a high kick all at once, and the moment ended with his foot smack on Tien’s throat, a broken knee on Tien’s part and ‘Kueh completely in control of the situation.
I just about dropped my gun, I was that surprised. I mean I know ‘Kueh’s tough, I see him in action all the time, but fuck, that was something else, and he didn’t even look like he was in pain, though he was doing his damnedest to keep that arm still.
“Futa…” he started, then stopped. I didn’t know if he was gonna pass out on me or what, so I headed up for him. I was still ready to shoot Tien if he tried anything, which didn’t look likely, but I don’t trust odds.
He was still breathin’, and he looked up at me and glared, and it sucked, let me tell you. I might’a shot him right then, if he’d said anything, so it’s a damn good thing he didn’t, and an even better thing that ‘Kueh grabbed me right then and dragged me out of there.
We got into an alley and he let me go, still starin’ at me, totally blank – still in fighting mode, trying not to feel the pain. I know that look, I do it myself, but his is scarier’n mine. I just grin like a maniac, he looks like he’s gonna cut someone.
I went over all shaky, which was really stupid given we’d barely come close to dieing, and I don’t usually freak out, but I think I would’a passed out right then and there if ‘Kueh hadn’t been standing there lookin’ like about ten miles of bad road – and I know bad road, trust me, Colony brat here. Anyway, I figured if I shut down right then we’d both still be here passed out on each other when Tien’s buddies – my former buddies – showed up to figure out why he hadn’t come back from Earthside duty. It’s always the same damn reason, and it was gonna be the same reason when their buddies came to figure out their fates, so I don’t know why they keep sending guys down here, but they do, so we had to get lost.
I got over myself long enough to grab ‘Kueh by the arm that didn’t look like a truck’d run over it and bolted. Got us about a mile away, away from the base too, before I let him stop. By then we were both dead tired, the sun was goin’ down, it was looking like we were stuck here – not a good time, let me tell you.
He’s the one pointed out the room with the bombed-out window – we were in a pretty much deserted part of the city, I just hope to Heaven it wasn’t full of radiation, nothin’s shown up yet but you never can tell – and he’s the one got us in there, ‘cause at that point I was pretty much useless, I don’t mind saying. I mean, I shouldn’t’a been, but seriously, someone that close to you’s ready to kill – one of your friends, it’s not good for the old neurons, y’know?
So once we got in there, and I managed to calm down enough to remember that, hey, ‘Kueh has a broken arm, let’s fix it, I sat him down on the bed and started tearin’ up a sheet to wrap the thing with. Had to MacGyver a splint – there was nothin’ wrong with ‘Kueh’s legs, so he just kicked a bedpost down, they were pretty cheap, and I used that – but it was a pretty good job. Only the one bone broken, that was lucky, and ‘Kueh knows how to hold still.
“So how the hell’d you run in with that guy?” I asked him, just idle curiosity, you know.
“He was displeased when I planted the C4,” he told me. I chuckled. Yeah, I could just imagine.
“How’d he get you, though?” I had to know. Wasn’t like I hadn’t seen ‘Kueh take down like ten guys with his bare hands. Not to mention that he must’a gotten disarmed, ‘cause his sword was nowhere I could see.
‘Kueh grimaced, looking disgusted. “I was careless. One of them disarmed me - while I was dealing with him, that one came up and snapped my arm.” He glared at the wrapping like it offended him, but that was probably his self-loathing going again. Told you the man has a deathwish.
“Guess it was a good thing I was there, huh?” I asked. I’d just finished wrapping the splint on, just at that tricky part where you have to tuck the end under and the whole frikkin’ thing tries to unwrap itself, you know? So I wasn’t paying too much attention to the whole conversational thing, which was why I didn’t have a chance to prepare for ‘Kueh’s question.
“Yes, I suppose it was. Tell me, how did that man know you?” I guess it was the logical thing to ask, but man, talk about out of left field. I didn’t really wanna answer, but ‘Kueh’s my… friend, he deserved one.
“We were in the Corps together,” was the start of it. Should I go on? Sense told me no, so I stopped – yeah, I am capable of having common sense, when I need it. Just every once in a while.
“That wasn’t the reaction of men who’d merely studied together,” he said, and yeah, he was right, the tension had been pretty damn thick. Not to mention that I’d been going all to pieces for the last half hour. No, ‘Kueh knows me too well not to press something like that, damn him.
“Yeah, we had each other’s backs,” I said. Tried to keep it light, but that sentiment, y’know, those are pretty heavy words for guys like us. I was more or less saying that I’d used to trust Tien with my life, and that was the truth. I don’t lie.
“I’m sorry,” he said, and like he always does when he apologizes, he stood up and bowed. Now that’s always gotten me, I don’t bow for nothin’ and I don’t think anyone else should either, so I grabbed his shoulder and sat him down on the bed again.
“Don’t be. I would’a done it myself,” I told him. Now ‘Kueh knows I don’t lie, but it even took him a minute to register that, figure out exactly what I was at that moment. Yeah, here, look at ‘Tatsu, famously psychotic murderer. See ‘Tatsu shoot things, shoot, ‘Tatsu, shoot.
He looked straight at me – I mentioned he’s got a hell of a glare on him, but I didn’t mention why, and part of it’s ‘cause his eyes are pretty much black. Look like holes into space, I tell you, they’re scary. So having him hold eye contact for more than a few seconds was kind of unnerving.
“You would have killed him. Someone you trusted. For me,” he said. Don’t think he was accusing me of anything, though, he was just tryin’ to understand. Don’t see what’s so hard about it, ‘Kueh’s the one I trust now, and I told him so.
He said absolutely nothing for a minute and I was startin’ to wonder if I’d broken him, then he comes out with, “Thank you. That means a lot to me.”
What the shit. It’s the truth, isn’t it? I mean, to explain my reaction you’d probably have to have been there, but he sounded like he’d just been given the fucking question whose answer is forty-two and the entire universe had opened for him like a chrysanthemum, or whatever that thing is. I mean, this was I-am-stoned-in-a-cathedral level of wonder and awe.
Oh, by the way, turns out his eyes are really, really dark gold. How do I know? He’d been staring at me for the last ten minutes. Now I was staring at him. It’s hard not to do, when someone gives you that look.
When I realized I now knew exactly what shade his eyes were I knew we were reaching batshit levels of crazy, so I broke eye contact and flopped on the bed. And when I say flopped I do mean it. That thing bounced like a fighter jet on reentry. ‘Kueh wound up giving in and dropping on his back, too.
Yeah, there was only the one bed. It wasn’t like we had all that much choice. I guess I could’a slept on the floor, but, y’know, there was glass in it from the windows and there’re some nights when – okay, upshot was I was gonna be in the bed, and so was ‘Kueh, ‘cause he didn’t need any more injuries.
So when he looked like he was gonna get up and leave I grabbed his hand. Hey, was the nearest bit of him. Could’a grabbed his shoulder, I guess, but the hand was what I went for. It wouldn’t’a been a problem, ‘cept that he, well, grabbed back, I guess.
He’s got really nice hands. Kinda long, graceful-looking, got calluses – all that sword work, I guess. Nice fingers. Really, really talented fingers, which I found out, ‘cause at that point he was pretty much petting my hand. Not consciously, I don’t think, ‘cause if it were conscious he wouldn’t’a been so surprised when I rolled over so we were like three inches apart.
Let me outline the situation for you a bit: I was coming down off an adrenaline high, and I was kinda panicked still, and ‘Kueh is damn reassuring, weirdnesses aside, and did I mention he is really, really pretty? I’m not even gonna say handsome, ‘cause he isn’t. He’s gorgeous. I mean, he has better hair than me, and he’s got all that muscle tone, and he’s got the exotic, mysterious thing going, and for fuck’s sake, don’t blame me, it was all the hormones’ fault.
I kissed him. I think he was surprised. I mean, I would’a been, had our positions been reversed.
He tensed up first, and I was about to pull back ‘cause I figured he was gonna sock me one trust or no trust, but then his hand tightened, so I kept going.
It was really, you know, innocent, that first one. No tongue or anything. We didn’t break off for a while, and when we did, I found out that he’d grabbed my hair so I couldn’t go very far.
“Why did you do that?” he asked. Looked kinda dazed, but I sorta figured he would be.
I wasn’t about to start babbling all that I just said, so I shrugged. “Seemed like a good idea?”
He didn’t disagree. I took that as a cue to try it again. This time, he opened his mouth, just a bit, and then he did something that involved just a little brush of tongue, and his free hand found its way to the small of my back, and I swear to God I just about combusted.
‘Kueh is a damn good kisser. I found that out over the course of the next hour or so. We didn’t get any farther than that, he’s kinda too nervous for that, but y’know, it’s a great feeling, to just lay on a bed and kiss the hell out of somebody.
We wound up with him on top, just kind of draped over me, which was nice since at some point my coat and my shirt had gotten thrown halfway across the room and it was getting cold. He was really relaxed. So was I, actually, but the difference is that I’d been known to relax before. I’d never seen him like that. It was pretty ego-boosting, ‘cause I caused that, I made him go all boneless and shivery like that.
He glanced up at me, and God strike me down if he wasn’t the sexiest thing in the entire multiverse at that moment. Eyes half-closed, this little self-satisfied smirk, hair all coming loose, no shirt on and his belts unbuckled – yeah, okay, that mental image is mine, you stop having it.
Ah, what the hell, I’ll let you have your fun, I got to see the real thing.
“That’s trust, then?” he asked, and it could’a been a nasty question, but it wasn’t. More sarcastic, ‘specially with that smirk. Nearly melted right then, only thing stopping me was that I already had.
“Not quite, few less letters, but you were close…” I muttered. He laughed, and I could feel it through my skin where we were touching. How long had it been since…
Right, I knew there was something I’d been avoiding thinking of. I closed my eyes and must’a tensed up, ‘cause he knew right away that something was wrong.
Being him, he couldn’t just drop it. “Futatsu, what…?”
I so didn’t want to explain that the last time I’d been with a guy like this was two years ago just before I’d crashed my plane into the plains and left the Corps. So, so didn’t want to explain that the last guy I’d been with like this was…
“Tien.” He said it, not me, and in a seriously flat tone, matter-of-fact. “That’s who you’re thinking of, isn’t it.” Not a question, but I nodded anyway. Hey, I wasn’t gonna lie, and refusing to answer, well, ‘Kueh deserves better.
He didn’t know where to go from there, and I obviously wasn’t in a better mental place, so we kind of sat there for a while, drowning in our angsts. It sucked, and not in a good way.
“Futatsu…” he said after a while, “I know why you’re here, you told us that, but… why do you hate them so much?” he asked.
Of course I thought I knew what them he was talking about, there’s only one them for us, so my answer was pretty straight. “They’re sick fucks and they’re all out to make life hell for Earthsiders. I’m not gonna side with anyone thinks a nuke’s the best way to deal with some dissent,” I said. That was pretty much my stock explanation.
“Not the EarthSphere leaders. Your old unit. You…. That was hatred, back there,” he said. If I’d combusted before, now I was ice. Seriously. Blood, no, sorry, no blood, just got ice water. Ice water with salt in it, so the temperature’s lower.
It was ‘cause he’d been – no, that’s stupid, can’t say that. But it was, I’d hated Tien so much ‘cause he’d hurt ‘Kueh. How the fuck do you say that without sounding like a total girl? You don’t, so I kept my mouth shut, but he must’a figured something out from my expression. I swear the man’s just about psychic.
He didn’t say anything though, just curled up a bit more so his head was right on my shoulder. Like I said, he’s damn reassuring. Very solid, very real, and I always know I can count on him not to get himself fucked up too bad.
We were both about to fall asleep, so I let it happen, and I think he said something else but I don’t remember what it was.
And that’s it. Don’t know where we’re gonna go from here, but that’s what happened.
Futatsu/SingKueh, about 4000 words, R for violence, language and sexual situations (lucky Futa).
It was a pretty intense kind of day, and I’d been through a lot of shit. Not that I haven’t always, but, y’know, more so. So it was all kinds of out of character when I… well, stop. Back up. Lemme tell you the backstory or you’ll never respect me again.
So there I was, just me and my gun set to ‘maim horribly’, and I was gonna off this guy. Well, not so much a guy as a lady, I found out later. But then she was a lady wearin’ an EarthSphere Corps hat an’ a military-issue trench coat, so what the hell, she’s pretty much just prey.
I’m sitting there, and I’m aiming so that I get her from the front – try never to shoot a guy from behind if I can help it, it’s just a thing, okay? – and I’m waiting until she turns, like, thirty-four degrees to her left so I can make sure the shot hits her in the throat. Those trench coats, lemme tell you, they’re shit for stealth or marching but they’re great for making sure no one gets a chance to blow big messy holes in you, so I had to wait ‘til she gave me an opening.
And then she turns – more like forty degrees than thirty-four but who’s counting, and I pull the trigger.
Yeah, it went off perfectly. What, you think I’m some kinda noob? Her head flew off like a frikkin’ firework, it was pretty cool. ‘Specially when the bullet exploded and spattered blood all over the place.
Yeah, I’m a cold-blooded murderer, so sue me. Wait, I don’t exist, least not officially, so good luck there. EarthSphere Corps’s the ones trained me this way, they shouldn’t get too pissed off when I start usin’ it on them.
I got outta there like a bat outta hell, or like greased lightning, or like wildfire, or pick your colorful dead metaphor, doesn’t matter, I was bloody fast. See, if I get caught I’m worse than dead, ‘cause of what I said before, I don’t exist. So I’ll be lucky to get spaced if they do catch me. I got a lot of guys used to be my buddies thinkin’ I need some retraining, if you know what I mean and I think you do if you’re thinking somethin’ involving the biggest damn knives you ever met and maybe some stripped wires.
So I’ve learned to run really, really fucking fast, ‘cause I’m not suicidal, unlike some guys I could mention, like the one I was on this mission with and where the hell was he, anyway? My comm unit crackled static and I went to pick it up when I realized it was code.
We’ve got a lot of codes, verbal and nonverbal, line-of-sight and not, and that one I just heard meant that something really freaking huge was about to happen, and it’d be bad. So I stopped and looked around for somethin’ to hide behind, which you would too if you were a former bomber pilot spent all his time runnin’ from other bomber pilots. Big chunk of concrete looked promising, so I vaulted that, dropped behind it, waited for the big bang, then it went off again.
Only time that signal gets used twice is when someone’s in some serious shit, and ‘round here serious shit is usually the kind of shit that leaves you dead ‘steada bleeding. So I jumped right back over the concrete, and headed for the noise.
Now before you get all on me for getting myself in trouble, lemme tell ya, I don’t do this for just anyone. That little pattern is specific to me ‘n about three other guys, and one of ‘em is, like I said, this guy with a death-wish, ‘cept I made him swear on his mother’s grave that he’d whistle for help if he needed it next time. Didn’t think he’d actually do it but I guessed either he wanted to live or he actually honored his promises. Know it’s both, now, but we only got there after… yeah, okay, I’ll keep to the timeline.
I jumped yet another big chunk of metal and concrete – damn, ya know, I do not envy the guy with the job of cleaning up this city once all this shit is over, if it ever is – just to find this guy I know with a chokehold on the guy who’d whistled.
Yeah, you guessed it, another fucking EarthSphere Corps jackoff. So I aimed at him, ‘cause it’s more or less instinct, even though I was scared enough I just about shit myself, pardon my Pacem. He’s this guy, see, who I was – ah, never mind that, he wasn’t gonna be happy to see me, we’ll leave it at that.
‘Course, I’ve grown like half a foot since then and my hair’s a lot longer, so I guess I don’t look much like I used to, ‘cause he didn’t recognize me at first. Seriously, nothing. I still don’t know if I’m relieved or freaked out about that, thought I was more memorable than that. But, y’know, recognition or not, I still didn’t wanna shoot him. Not seriously, at least.
Again, though, recognition or not, he knew a gun when he saw it and he brought the guy with the death-wish – you know, my buddy now, he’s this half-Chinese guy with a nasty stare, call ‘im ‘Kueh – around as a human shield. Fucking coward, he’s in a freaking Kevlar trench and he needs a hostage?
So I, being me, open my big mouth and tell him to drop the hostage, and that’s when he recognizes me.
“Holy shit, Futatsu,” is pretty much what he said. Yeah, okay, so they thought I was dead and I liked it that way, and since he’s seen me it’s pretty obvious that I’m not so he has to die, so I’m about ready to shoot him, shield or no shield.
Right here, I want you to imagine: me, on one side of this little courtyard between two buildings, one of which is still in good shape minus a few windows, one of which is just scrap metal and dust, facing this EarthSphere cannon-fodder holding this short guy in a really harsh arm-lock, and all three of us totally still ‘cept for the wind. Yeah, it was a real Hollywood moment.
“Just drop ‘im, Tien,” was all I said. Didn’t wanna talk too much, ‘cause, you know, things get awkward when you’re holding a guy at gunpoint.
‘Kueh looked up at me then, glaring like mad. I swear the guy has a whole arsenal of lethal glares and all of ‘em could bore a hole through titanium. He wasn’t mad at me though, he was mad at himself. Don’t ask, I just know, okay? He was probably pissed off that he’d let himself get rescued, again.
Then Tien twisted his arm and he dropped to his knees, and holy fuck that was wrong, ‘cause ‘Kueh takes pain better than anyone I’ve ever known. Then I realized his arm was bent all out of whack. Broken. Tien was still holdin’ him, so he didn’t try to get away, but his face went totally ash white.
“Fuck, Tien, you picked up some bad habits since I been gone?” I asked him. Our unit’d never been into torture, one of the reasons I stayed as long as I did. If we’d got up to some of the shit I saw goin’ down in, like, the fifteenth unit? I’d’ve been outta there in three days.
“It’s been two years, Futatsu, things happen,” he said. Well, yeah, no shit Sherlock, otherwise I wouldn’t be standing here pointing a homemade assault rifle at you, but I wasn’t gonna argue the point, I had more important things to worry about, like whether my buddy’s arm was permanently fucked up and if I would survive long enough to find out.
“Get out of here,” I told him. “Three seconds. You don’t drop him, you die,” I said, and you know what, my voice wasn’t even shakin’. Sure as Hell my gun hand wasn’t. Guess I’m a little more cold-blooded than I give myself credit for, ‘cause I really was gonna shoot him.
That’s when ‘Kueh took the moment of distraction to do this completely impressive thing where he – ah, I don’t even know how to describe it, it was like a disarming grab and a back flip and a high kick all at once, and the moment ended with his foot smack on Tien’s throat, a broken knee on Tien’s part and ‘Kueh completely in control of the situation.
I just about dropped my gun, I was that surprised. I mean I know ‘Kueh’s tough, I see him in action all the time, but fuck, that was something else, and he didn’t even look like he was in pain, though he was doing his damnedest to keep that arm still.
“Futa…” he started, then stopped. I didn’t know if he was gonna pass out on me or what, so I headed up for him. I was still ready to shoot Tien if he tried anything, which didn’t look likely, but I don’t trust odds.
He was still breathin’, and he looked up at me and glared, and it sucked, let me tell you. I might’a shot him right then, if he’d said anything, so it’s a damn good thing he didn’t, and an even better thing that ‘Kueh grabbed me right then and dragged me out of there.
We got into an alley and he let me go, still starin’ at me, totally blank – still in fighting mode, trying not to feel the pain. I know that look, I do it myself, but his is scarier’n mine. I just grin like a maniac, he looks like he’s gonna cut someone.
I went over all shaky, which was really stupid given we’d barely come close to dieing, and I don’t usually freak out, but I think I would’a passed out right then and there if ‘Kueh hadn’t been standing there lookin’ like about ten miles of bad road – and I know bad road, trust me, Colony brat here. Anyway, I figured if I shut down right then we’d both still be here passed out on each other when Tien’s buddies – my former buddies – showed up to figure out why he hadn’t come back from Earthside duty. It’s always the same damn reason, and it was gonna be the same reason when their buddies came to figure out their fates, so I don’t know why they keep sending guys down here, but they do, so we had to get lost.
I got over myself long enough to grab ‘Kueh by the arm that didn’t look like a truck’d run over it and bolted. Got us about a mile away, away from the base too, before I let him stop. By then we were both dead tired, the sun was goin’ down, it was looking like we were stuck here – not a good time, let me tell you.
He’s the one pointed out the room with the bombed-out window – we were in a pretty much deserted part of the city, I just hope to Heaven it wasn’t full of radiation, nothin’s shown up yet but you never can tell – and he’s the one got us in there, ‘cause at that point I was pretty much useless, I don’t mind saying. I mean, I shouldn’t’a been, but seriously, someone that close to you’s ready to kill – one of your friends, it’s not good for the old neurons, y’know?
So once we got in there, and I managed to calm down enough to remember that, hey, ‘Kueh has a broken arm, let’s fix it, I sat him down on the bed and started tearin’ up a sheet to wrap the thing with. Had to MacGyver a splint – there was nothin’ wrong with ‘Kueh’s legs, so he just kicked a bedpost down, they were pretty cheap, and I used that – but it was a pretty good job. Only the one bone broken, that was lucky, and ‘Kueh knows how to hold still.
“So how the hell’d you run in with that guy?” I asked him, just idle curiosity, you know.
“He was displeased when I planted the C4,” he told me. I chuckled. Yeah, I could just imagine.
“How’d he get you, though?” I had to know. Wasn’t like I hadn’t seen ‘Kueh take down like ten guys with his bare hands. Not to mention that he must’a gotten disarmed, ‘cause his sword was nowhere I could see.
‘Kueh grimaced, looking disgusted. “I was careless. One of them disarmed me - while I was dealing with him, that one came up and snapped my arm.” He glared at the wrapping like it offended him, but that was probably his self-loathing going again. Told you the man has a deathwish.
“Guess it was a good thing I was there, huh?” I asked. I’d just finished wrapping the splint on, just at that tricky part where you have to tuck the end under and the whole frikkin’ thing tries to unwrap itself, you know? So I wasn’t paying too much attention to the whole conversational thing, which was why I didn’t have a chance to prepare for ‘Kueh’s question.
“Yes, I suppose it was. Tell me, how did that man know you?” I guess it was the logical thing to ask, but man, talk about out of left field. I didn’t really wanna answer, but ‘Kueh’s my… friend, he deserved one.
“We were in the Corps together,” was the start of it. Should I go on? Sense told me no, so I stopped – yeah, I am capable of having common sense, when I need it. Just every once in a while.
“That wasn’t the reaction of men who’d merely studied together,” he said, and yeah, he was right, the tension had been pretty damn thick. Not to mention that I’d been going all to pieces for the last half hour. No, ‘Kueh knows me too well not to press something like that, damn him.
“Yeah, we had each other’s backs,” I said. Tried to keep it light, but that sentiment, y’know, those are pretty heavy words for guys like us. I was more or less saying that I’d used to trust Tien with my life, and that was the truth. I don’t lie.
“I’m sorry,” he said, and like he always does when he apologizes, he stood up and bowed. Now that’s always gotten me, I don’t bow for nothin’ and I don’t think anyone else should either, so I grabbed his shoulder and sat him down on the bed again.
“Don’t be. I would’a done it myself,” I told him. Now ‘Kueh knows I don’t lie, but it even took him a minute to register that, figure out exactly what I was at that moment. Yeah, here, look at ‘Tatsu, famously psychotic murderer. See ‘Tatsu shoot things, shoot, ‘Tatsu, shoot.
He looked straight at me – I mentioned he’s got a hell of a glare on him, but I didn’t mention why, and part of it’s ‘cause his eyes are pretty much black. Look like holes into space, I tell you, they’re scary. So having him hold eye contact for more than a few seconds was kind of unnerving.
“You would have killed him. Someone you trusted. For me,” he said. Don’t think he was accusing me of anything, though, he was just tryin’ to understand. Don’t see what’s so hard about it, ‘Kueh’s the one I trust now, and I told him so.
He said absolutely nothing for a minute and I was startin’ to wonder if I’d broken him, then he comes out with, “Thank you. That means a lot to me.”
What the shit. It’s the truth, isn’t it? I mean, to explain my reaction you’d probably have to have been there, but he sounded like he’d just been given the fucking question whose answer is forty-two and the entire universe had opened for him like a chrysanthemum, or whatever that thing is. I mean, this was I-am-stoned-in-a-cathedral level of wonder and awe.
Oh, by the way, turns out his eyes are really, really dark gold. How do I know? He’d been staring at me for the last ten minutes. Now I was staring at him. It’s hard not to do, when someone gives you that look.
When I realized I now knew exactly what shade his eyes were I knew we were reaching batshit levels of crazy, so I broke eye contact and flopped on the bed. And when I say flopped I do mean it. That thing bounced like a fighter jet on reentry. ‘Kueh wound up giving in and dropping on his back, too.
Yeah, there was only the one bed. It wasn’t like we had all that much choice. I guess I could’a slept on the floor, but, y’know, there was glass in it from the windows and there’re some nights when – okay, upshot was I was gonna be in the bed, and so was ‘Kueh, ‘cause he didn’t need any more injuries.
So when he looked like he was gonna get up and leave I grabbed his hand. Hey, was the nearest bit of him. Could’a grabbed his shoulder, I guess, but the hand was what I went for. It wouldn’t’a been a problem, ‘cept that he, well, grabbed back, I guess.
He’s got really nice hands. Kinda long, graceful-looking, got calluses – all that sword work, I guess. Nice fingers. Really, really talented fingers, which I found out, ‘cause at that point he was pretty much petting my hand. Not consciously, I don’t think, ‘cause if it were conscious he wouldn’t’a been so surprised when I rolled over so we were like three inches apart.
Let me outline the situation for you a bit: I was coming down off an adrenaline high, and I was kinda panicked still, and ‘Kueh is damn reassuring, weirdnesses aside, and did I mention he is really, really pretty? I’m not even gonna say handsome, ‘cause he isn’t. He’s gorgeous. I mean, he has better hair than me, and he’s got all that muscle tone, and he’s got the exotic, mysterious thing going, and for fuck’s sake, don’t blame me, it was all the hormones’ fault.
I kissed him. I think he was surprised. I mean, I would’a been, had our positions been reversed.
He tensed up first, and I was about to pull back ‘cause I figured he was gonna sock me one trust or no trust, but then his hand tightened, so I kept going.
It was really, you know, innocent, that first one. No tongue or anything. We didn’t break off for a while, and when we did, I found out that he’d grabbed my hair so I couldn’t go very far.
“Why did you do that?” he asked. Looked kinda dazed, but I sorta figured he would be.
I wasn’t about to start babbling all that I just said, so I shrugged. “Seemed like a good idea?”
He didn’t disagree. I took that as a cue to try it again. This time, he opened his mouth, just a bit, and then he did something that involved just a little brush of tongue, and his free hand found its way to the small of my back, and I swear to God I just about combusted.
‘Kueh is a damn good kisser. I found that out over the course of the next hour or so. We didn’t get any farther than that, he’s kinda too nervous for that, but y’know, it’s a great feeling, to just lay on a bed and kiss the hell out of somebody.
We wound up with him on top, just kind of draped over me, which was nice since at some point my coat and my shirt had gotten thrown halfway across the room and it was getting cold. He was really relaxed. So was I, actually, but the difference is that I’d been known to relax before. I’d never seen him like that. It was pretty ego-boosting, ‘cause I caused that, I made him go all boneless and shivery like that.
He glanced up at me, and God strike me down if he wasn’t the sexiest thing in the entire multiverse at that moment. Eyes half-closed, this little self-satisfied smirk, hair all coming loose, no shirt on and his belts unbuckled – yeah, okay, that mental image is mine, you stop having it.
Ah, what the hell, I’ll let you have your fun, I got to see the real thing.
“That’s trust, then?” he asked, and it could’a been a nasty question, but it wasn’t. More sarcastic, ‘specially with that smirk. Nearly melted right then, only thing stopping me was that I already had.
“Not quite, few less letters, but you were close…” I muttered. He laughed, and I could feel it through my skin where we were touching. How long had it been since…
Right, I knew there was something I’d been avoiding thinking of. I closed my eyes and must’a tensed up, ‘cause he knew right away that something was wrong.
Being him, he couldn’t just drop it. “Futatsu, what…?”
I so didn’t want to explain that the last time I’d been with a guy like this was two years ago just before I’d crashed my plane into the plains and left the Corps. So, so didn’t want to explain that the last guy I’d been with like this was…
“Tien.” He said it, not me, and in a seriously flat tone, matter-of-fact. “That’s who you’re thinking of, isn’t it.” Not a question, but I nodded anyway. Hey, I wasn’t gonna lie, and refusing to answer, well, ‘Kueh deserves better.
He didn’t know where to go from there, and I obviously wasn’t in a better mental place, so we kind of sat there for a while, drowning in our angsts. It sucked, and not in a good way.
“Futatsu…” he said after a while, “I know why you’re here, you told us that, but… why do you hate them so much?” he asked.
Of course I thought I knew what them he was talking about, there’s only one them for us, so my answer was pretty straight. “They’re sick fucks and they’re all out to make life hell for Earthsiders. I’m not gonna side with anyone thinks a nuke’s the best way to deal with some dissent,” I said. That was pretty much my stock explanation.
“Not the EarthSphere leaders. Your old unit. You…. That was hatred, back there,” he said. If I’d combusted before, now I was ice. Seriously. Blood, no, sorry, no blood, just got ice water. Ice water with salt in it, so the temperature’s lower.
It was ‘cause he’d been – no, that’s stupid, can’t say that. But it was, I’d hated Tien so much ‘cause he’d hurt ‘Kueh. How the fuck do you say that without sounding like a total girl? You don’t, so I kept my mouth shut, but he must’a figured something out from my expression. I swear the man’s just about psychic.
He didn’t say anything though, just curled up a bit more so his head was right on my shoulder. Like I said, he’s damn reassuring. Very solid, very real, and I always know I can count on him not to get himself fucked up too bad.
We were both about to fall asleep, so I let it happen, and I think he said something else but I don’t remember what it was.
And that’s it. Don’t know where we’re gonna go from here, but that’s what happened.