REBELS AND SAVIORS

Maelstrom

“Sickbay.”

“Kyle? What are you still doing there?” Maria asked.

“Too many patients to take time off. Maria? Are you sick, hurt?” And before Maria could answer, “Or just wanting to check on Sean?”

“Yes...I mean no. Well, yes.” Maria swore under her breath. “I want to know about Sean, but no, I’m calling about Michael. He’s sick.”

“Sick? Just wait. I’ll come to you.” Kyle signed off and Maria turned back to Michael.

Holding his body close to her, she gently wiped his face with a cool cloth. Even his lips were slightly red, and she couldn’t tell what his temperature was, but to her it was high.

“Maria?” Kyle eased himself between the half-open door, and entered the cold dark room. He followed Maria’s voice when she called out.

Walking in their bedroom, Kyle paused in the dim light to look at the two in the bed. Maria was holding Michael, wiping his face and talking to him softly. Tears were slowly inching down her face, but she didn’t seem to notice it.

“Kyle! Thank god! He’s so sick!”

Kyle quickly scanned Michael and whistled under his breath at the temperature.

“How long has he been like this?”

Maria’s hands kept wandering over Michael's face, and she bent down and kissed him softly. Kyle gazed at her in wonder as a full range of emotions hit him in full force. Backing off, he tried to watch them dispassionately.

“I don’t know. We took a bath - a cold one - before going to sleep. I remember being cold, and he was the only thing warm in the room. I woke up about ten minutes ago because I felt hot...very hot.”

“He’s got a raging infection. I can fix it with antibiotics and give him something to help the fever.”

“Infection? From what?”

“I don’t know. I thought we treated all his injuries. Let’s take a look and see if we missed anything, and if it isn’t an obvious surface injury...” Kyle watched as Maria quickly started searching Michael’s body, hardly paying any attention to him. “Then I’ll need him in Sickbay for a full body scan.”

Maria was gently moving him around when Kyle whistled at her and tossed her one of Michael’s shirts from a nearby chair. Maria looked down and noticed that she had been naked the entire time. Quickly putting on the shirt, she watched Kyle turning Michael over while she buttoned it.

It was on his back, low, and near the left kidney. A small injury that looked too small to cause problems, but deep enough. Kyle scanned the area.

“There is still a piece of metal embedded in his back. Michael must have pulled out the shrapnel, but missed a piece.”

“Should we take him to Sickbay?”

Kyle just shook his head no. “I can do it here easily enough. Truth be told, I’d rather have one of my hearts removed before admitting another patient to my Sickbay.”

Maria held Michael across her lap while Kyle quickly removed the remaining shrapnel and sterilized the wound. Maria’s hand kept slowly stroking his hair as Kyle gave Michael his first round of antibiotics.

“He’ll sleep for a good ten to eighteen hours. Call me when he wakes up. He’s confined to bed rest for two days, and longer if his fever remains. I’ll be back in the morning to check on him.”

“Thank you, Kyle.” Maria and Kyle pushed Michael on his back and covered him up. “This is all my fault.”

“How? Did you put the shrapnel in his back?”

“No, but if I had gotten there sooner Vishnu might not have gone down.” Maria covered Michael up, checking the covers and then rechecking again. “I ran a scan on him and I missed it.”

Kyle remained sitting on the edge of the bed. “Then it must be my fault as well. I ran a scan too and didn’t find the injury. But the real culprit here is a certain Commander who could’ve mentioned it.”

“He could have. That's true. But I don’t see Michael as the type of man who wants to be babied in Sickbay.”

Kyle laughed at that. Understatement. “Of course, you’re right.” Kyle reached over and grabbed Maria’s hand that was stroking Michael’s face forcing her to look at him. “You going to tell him?”

“Tell him what? That it’s his own fault that he...”

“No. Are you going to tell him how you feel about him?”

Kyle was serious, and Maria’s eyes narrowed. “You know too much...Reading me, doctor?”

“Normally, no, but you’re pretty open right now.”

Maria just shrugged as her hand went back to soothing Michael. “What good would telling him do? We don’t have a similar concept or word for what I feel for him. And soon it will be over.”

“Maybe he has a right to know? Maybe he needs to know.”

“Why? So he can be like Max? Stuck in a 'sort of' marriage with no partner? Or so that when I go...and I will go, he feels my end more than he should?” Maria bent down and kissed his head. “He doesn’t need the extra pain.”

Kyle just shook his  head, and stood up to leave. “Think about it. It’s not just for you, Maria. He might not have a word for it or even understand it, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t feeling it. His world walked away from a lot when they made their primary goal to repopulate their world. But of all the matches I’ve heard of or seen...few were happy. The Attilaans are bonded by similar chemistry in their brains. Perhaps there's something wrong with being bonded to someone so similar.”

“It seems to have worked for them. They survived...pulled themselves back from the brink of destruction.” Maria watched him sleep. “I know they feel things that they have no name for, or even want to name. I’d never fault his loyalty and devotion to Max and Sean - or even you. All the people on this ship mean so much to him.”

“He was a freak on his own world. The only way to make a place in their society was to produce children. It was a statusmaker. Michael had the added stigma of being unbonded, but Sean and Max are now equally outcast. Now none of them have mates, and none of them will ever mate with an Attilaan. That time is over.” Kyle looked at his sleeping friend. “He made this ship and its people his own. It’s all he has...all he’s known since he was seventeen. Half a lifetime is a long time.”

Maria just shrugged, a frown between her pretty brows. “It doesn’t make the desire any less. He wants what he could never have, and understands little about what he can...”

“Dreams change, Maria. He couldn’t want something else when it was all he knew...all he ever wanted.” Kyle reached across Michael’s body and framed Maria’s face with his hands and forced her to see him. “Tell him because he needs to hear it, even if it's for only a moments, a day or even a few months. Tell him.”

“He’s been so alone,” she said softly, “as have I.”

“He needs something to save him when you’re gone. Something that tells him that there's hope, and that for a short time in his life he had something indescribable...something righteous.”

“Promise me something?” Kyle just nodded. “When I go...make sure he’s not alone...that he’s okay...for me?”

Kyle didn’t know what to say. How could Michael be okay? Kyle simply agreed because he had no other option.

Maria smiled slightly and casually removed Michael’s shirt. Snuggling under the covers with Michael, she whispered her thanks to Kyle.

“Goodnight.” And Kyle watched as she closed her eyes. Taking that as his cue, he stood up and left them to sleep.

Maria listened to the door shut behind Kyle, and then rolled over on her back bringing a sleeping Michael with her. He was so tired, and it was as if his entire body was concentrating on nothing but rest. She gently held him while he slept, stroking his back and running her fingers through his hair.

Reaching down, she gently kissed his head, and whispered an “I love you,” at his sleeping form.

~~~

“Sam, report on the current repairs?”

Sam moved in his chair to face Max, and frowned. “It doesn’t look good. With Sean down, and almost half of his repair crews still offship serving time for bad behavior...estimation can’t be made.”

“Do you need some help?” Max turned at the sound of Maria’s voice.

“Maria, how is Michael? I heard...”

“He’s better. Still sleeping.” Max's eyes narrowed to slits as Maria crossed to his command chair, watching her carefully in case she felt the need to push a button or something. “What’s the problem?”

“We need to do repairs, not only on Shiva, but on the recovery craft that engaged in battle, along with almost all of our small fighters.” Maria just waited for him to continue. “We can’t run and hide from Khivar long enough to get repairs underway, we are understaffed - plus Sean is out of commission, as is Michael.”

Maria nodded. “Will a safe haven help you?”

“What did you have in mind?”

“The Thorns.”  That got everyone’s attention.

Max just laughed, half in amusement, and the other half because the closest thing he would ever have to a sister-in-law was certifiably insane.

“The Thorns? No one goes there. It’s not even mapped by Khivar or his sensor arrays.”

The Thorns - a special space anomaly of spatial rifts, energy fields and tackion radiation. The area was considered a trap where few were able to navigate; therefore no one went there. The negative energy sinkholes pulled ships into their fields and drained them, thus rendering the ship ensnared and unable to break free.

“I can take you through it. I’ve navigated it many times.”

Max just stared at the woman. Michael was right. She was incapable of watching over herself, and taking unnecessary risks was almost her mainstay.

“Maria...”

“There is a place in the middle, a haven where we can stay until repairs are made. The trick is to avoid the sinkholes and rifts, and ride the energy and radiation waves.” Maria knew they thought she was crazy. “Khivar will never come there to look for us, and we can take the time to actually get our systems online.”

Max thought about it. Khivar had his arrays everywhere. He would be actively searching for them. They had too many systems down, too many injured crewmen and no time to repair any of it.

“How often have you been through the Thorns?”

Maria laughed. “My people used it as a training field for flight instruction. I’ve been running it since I was a young adult. It's mapped by my ship. I can lead you in. It's just a maze. In the center is a place that is safe. Rather like the eye of a hurricane.”

Max thought for a moment. It was insane, but if they could find a place to effect repairs...Khivar and his people would be searching all the usual places to hide. Pierce would help them narrow the field.

“Okay. Let’s do it.” Max ignored Sam’s look of disbelief. “Do you need to take Helm?”

Maria went to Michael’s security station. “No. I can access the Zephyr’s navigational computer from here. I’ll tie the information into the Shiva’s computer, and plot the course. Sam can do the actual journey to the center.”

The operations officer watched Maria as she quickly worked. Suddenly his computer and system were alive. The main computer bank was receiving an active download from Maria’s ship’s mainframe. It was sending navigational information at an alarming rate.

“Course is plotted in, Max. Any time you’re ready.”

Max looked at Sam and nodded. “Take us in, Sam.”

Sam looked uncertain, but he took them to the Thorns gateway in almost no time at all and using navigational control, entered the labyrinth.

The Bridge crew was mesmerized by the open field of energy ribbons as they entered a lightning landscape only heard of, but never seen. It was shockingly beautiful and intense.

“Cap, I’m reading rising radiation along the hull. In areas where our shields are weakened...”

Maria quickly made adjustments in the computer.

The man just frowned and reread his scans.

“Gar? You were saying?” Max asked, quietly waiting.

“Nothing. The radiation is running symmetrically to our hull. It isn’t penetrating. I don’t understand it.”

Max turned in his seat and looked at Maria. “What did you do?”

“Energy flows from systems of high energy to low. I sweetened the pot, as it were. I changed the polarity of your warp field to emit outward. You aren’t needing to create a warp field at this time, so I pushed the field outward, allowing us to run at impulse within a warp field bubble. That will keep the radiation from moving through the shields as it seeks balance by filling a lower radiation and energy field.”

Max watched as Maria took the helm seat next to Sam, and they navigated through the Thorns without a problem. The two sat conversing the entire time, and even Max had to acknowledge that Maria was right. The Thorns weren’t that difficult to get through. By the time they reached the center, the area was clear in a nice quiet space.

“Maria, why is there no activity here?”

Maria smiled at Sam and turned in her seat to answer Max.

“It’s the same principle that created the corridors we navigated through. The rush of energy enters the Thorns through subspace rifts and ribbons brought from other systems. Because of the energy sinkholes, the incoming energy seeks a balance within the system and rushes to the sinkholes to fill its void. That is the rush of lighting displayed. But what happens is, there are thousands to millions of these microbursts occurring at once, and when one energy field encounters another, they cancel each other out. They balance. It creates a vacuum or a cancelled field.”

“So we travel in the cancelled area?”

“Yes. It is like a neutralized space corridor or conduit. In the center where all these energy fields come together it creates a larger neutralized area...a sort of hub. Here we can stay indefinitely until our repairs are made and the engines and system can be made ready.”

Max quickly sent orders for all stations to report on repairs as the engines came to a full stop in the center of the Thorns. With their sensors on full sweep, they  were able to read any approaching ships. For a short while, they had a hiding place safe from Khivar and his searchers.

“Captain, the sensors are reading nothing.”

“Understood.”

Maria got up to leave, when Max stopped her. “Where are you off to?”

“Engineering. I was going to go work on getting the heat and power re-established to C Deck. And to fix your shields.”

“I wasn’t aware that shields were down except in areas of the ship with hull breaches.”

Maria just laughed. “Well, there are shields, and then there are shields.”

Max stood and walked Maria off his Bridge.

“Making sure I get off the Bridge without touching anything?”

Max just smirked, but then stopped her beside the door.

“Okay, what are you planning?”

Maria just shrugged. “Nothing special. Just replacing your current shields with ones like mine.”

“The reflective ones?” Max’s interest was suddenly piqued. Her shields. He wanted those...bad. Having them would make the Shiva invisible to Khivar’s sensor net, and her shields would be able to transverse other shield technology by emulation.

“How much time will it take?”

“Some work. The new system will need emitters placed over the entire hull. Repairs of damaged areas will need to be first. And it comes with a price.”

“Explain.”

“You can’t be scanned, but that also means that your own smaller support ships, recovery ships and fighters won’t be able to lock onto the Shiva. Your options will be to set established rendezvous coordinates, or to break communication silence.” Maria stretched. “If we also establish these shields on your other smaller ships, that means you’ll be equally blind to them.”

Max nodded. “Okay. So can’t you find a way for the ships to detect each other?”

Maria actually looked embarrassed. “I really wish I could, but currently there is no way. I understand the shielding and how my technology works. But, I’m not a real engineer. I can’t necessarily create new technology.”

“But, you understand our systems enough to fix them, or even improve them?”

“Sure I do, but they’re less evolved than my own systems. I understand almost anything below my own technology. I just doubt that I have the expertise to expand beyond it. That would take an engineer - a real one. There are limits to my knowledge.”

“Okay, then do what you can. Sean will be out of regeneration in about six days. Michael is off duty for another two, which I’m sure he isn’t happy about...”

“Why do you think I’m out and about helping people? He hasn’t woken up yet to hear the good news because Kyle gave him something to keep him asleep for at least eighteen hours of blissful bitch-free whining...but,” Maria just shrugged delicately, “he’ll be awake soon enough.”

“Let’s let Kyle take care of it.”

“Agreed.”

With that said, Maria took off to engineering. She had hours before she would need to go check on Michael again. Looking at the engineer board and all the down systems, Maria went to round up extra help.

~~~

Max frowned at the temperature of the C Deck. Maria was correct. It was cold. Entering Michael and Maria’s quarters, Max knew almost immediately that Michael had awakened. And he was unhappy.

“Dammit, Kyle, let me up from here!”

Max entered and quickly swallowed a smile. “What’s going on, little brother?”

Michael’s eyes narrowed as he suspected that Max was amused. Rattling a restraint on his left hand connecting him to the bed, Michael looked highly pissed.

“Tell this jackin’ jay, two-hearted Nellian worm to release me!”

Kyle just shook his head no. “Absolutely not.” He pointed a finger at Michael. “Your history of following medical advice is for crap. So until I say you’re ready for active duty, this is were you stay.”

“Maxwell...”

Max put up his hands. “Sorry, Michael. You know that the Medical Officer’s orders supercede the Captain’s in all things regarding the welfare of a crew member.”

“I’m fine! Great. I don’t feel tired, and there is too much to do to be tied up to a bed.”

“You’re hardly fine. Maria called me here in the middle of the night because you had a raging fever, you were unresponsive, and...when the hell were you going to mention the hit you took to your back?”

“I pulled out the shrapnel. It was nothing.”

“Nothing? You missed a piece. You know it poisons the blood. Your fever was the first step in many towards your death. You got lucky that Maria was with you and called me.”

Michael suddenly seemed to realize that something, or specifically someone was missing. “Where is she?”

“Working, like everyone else.” Max answered easily, smiling at his brother in spite.

“You? You’re letting her touch the ship unsupervised? Are you insane? She takes unnecessary risks, and...” Michael looked at his bound hand and groaned. Of course. “This is her fault.”

“What is?” Maria asked at the door. “What are you blaming me for now?” Michael rattled his bound arm at her. Maria just shrugged. “I didn’t do that...though it’s a great idea.”

“You called Kyle. You set him on me. And now look.”

Max ignored him, and studied Maria. She was filthy. Her hands were bleeding in a few places, and she looked tired. It had been almost six hours since they entered the Thorns and she took herself off to do repairs.

“How’re repairs going?”

“Not good. We’ve got over twenty hull breaches and internal sensors are offline. Sixteen subdeck corridors are blown in, injectors are also offline, the crystalline matrix is showing a full scale fracturing, inertial dampers are...”

“I think I’ve got the picture. I spent this morning helping to reroute blown paneling on the Bridge.” Max rubbed his scarred cheek. “How long?”

“Two weeks. Things will be better when Sean is able to work. His main assistant was killed, and half his repair staff is off the ship. This is the worst time to be understaffed.”

“Who is taking control?”

“Keller and Jonesy. They’re coordinating all important and essential systems first including all hull breaches and environmental systems. We lost all power to hydroponics and had to set up temporary heaters and oxygen-carbon dioxide mixed generators. It’s still down, and that system is essential or all the food banks will be gone.”

“I’m going to go check on it now. Internal communications are down again so wear a com badge, Maria.”

Max started to leave, as was Kyle, when Michael called to him. “You need me, Maxwell. Tell Kyle to release me.”

Maria just rolled her eyes and took herself off for an extra special cold shower. She had repaired the environmentals for this deck, but she wasn’t sure when the systems would come online.

Max stopped angrily. “What I need is for you to use your head! I’m sick of watching you try to get yourself killed. So shut up and rest! You’re off duty until I say so, and that will be when Kyle okays it. Are we clear?” Max looked at his brother hard. “I said, Are. We. Clear?”

“Yeah, we’re clear.”

“Good. Now be a good boy and let Maria feed you. I’ll check back on you later.”

Max and Kyle left the room. Both men headed for the lift until they remembered it was still offline. Taking access tubes, they both climbed the deck.

“Well that went better than I expected. Luckily I went to check on him just before he woke up or I’d have never got the restraint on him. I give him five more hours and he’ll be climbing the walls in boredom.”

“I give it less. Michael doesn’t do inactivity well.” Max started to head away from Kyle to return back to work. “What’s the final count, Kyle?”

“Eighty-seven dead, thirteen still critical and twenty in regeneration. Sickbay is swelling with the injured.”

Max nodded his jaw clenching. “I should’ve destroyed that system before I left.”

Kyle touched Max’s shoulder. “I know, but doing such a thing is beyond us. Beyond you. That's a tribute to you personally, Max. Your people would have exacted revenge and rained destruction on them until all of them were annihilated. You didn’t. You've evolved.”

“The hell I have. I wanted to, and I would have if Michael and Maria had died. What I left them was the horror that Khivar will settle on them.”

“His hands...not yours.”

Max rubbed his face. “Khivar? Does he even have hands anymore? He’s like a scary story you tell your children to keep them behaved and honest.”

“I have an order for you, Captain. Forget getting back to work, and go take some down time. We’re in Maria’s playground, safe for now. Let's rest so we can fight stronger tomorrow.”

Max thought about it and nodded. Heading back to the access tube he had just vacated he waved Kyle goodbye on his way back to his quarters.

“Bridge?”

“Aye, Captain?”

“Tell operations to order a full ship step down. I want only skeleton crews on for the next twelve hours. Repair crews are to fix only what is utterly essential and the rest can wait for the step down to end. No cooking tonight. Order replicator use for all personnel.” Max paused. “Are replicators working?”

“Not all of them, Cap. I’ll reroute them to the ones that are. Anything else?”

“No. Just goodnight.” Max turned off his com badge and laid back in his bed. Waiting. He knew she would come. She always did when he was tired, too tired to fight it. Serena.

~~~

“Maria. Come on, just look at it!”

“No! I’m making us some food.”

“The damn replicator is down.” Michael said with a bite to his voice.

“No, it's not. I fixed them on this unit, and in the dining area. You might notice how much warmer it is? I fixed that too.”

“Okay, you’re the Wiz. Just look at it.”

Maria set their food down at the bedside and looked at his wrist in the restraint.

“Yeah. It looks like I suspected. A restraint.”

“Well?” Michael waited. Maria calmly picked up the plate of food and started eating, shoving food at Michael as well.

“Well what?”

“Can you disarm it? Get me the hell out of it?”

Maria just shrugged forcing more food on him. “Sure I can. It’s a simple harmonic thirteen tumble restraint. It's tricky, being so many tumbles, but would probably be under a minute's work.”

“Good.” Michael smiled and waited, but Maria just kept eating and feeding him. “Maria?”

“What? You want something else?”

“Get me the hell out of this restraint!” Maria just shook her head no. “Maria,” he threatened. “Is this about Jonesy tying and gagging you up?”

“Nope, but now that you reminded me...”

“Maria!”

“What?” The exasperation was clear in her voice.

“Undo the blasted thing!”

“No!”

“No?” Michael looked at his bedmate. “Why the frickin’ hell not?”

“Because you told me to mind direct orders, correct?” Michael just nodded. “Well Max gave you a direct order and that didn’t include getting out of the restraints. He said you were to rest. I can’t release you without breaking the direct order...so no.”

“Dammit! Maria...”

“Don’t swear at me. I’m just following your instructions...to the letter.” Maria put the plate away, and pulled off his shirt she had been wearing. Snuggling down close to his body against his raised left arm, she settled to nap.

“What are you doing?”

“Napping.” Maria looked up at him, and then lifting herself upward, she kissed him lightly on the lips. And then again, and then not so gently. “Sleep with me.”

“Maria...”

She just snuggled in and was soon asleep. Michael ran his free hand down over her skin and looked up at his bound one. Great.

~~~

Michael moaned as her hand moved over his body and found his hardness in a nice grip. She was asleep, but once again her body was moving against him. Holding his breath, he waited to see where or how far she would go this time. He learnt his lesson not to not wake her long ago, but the forced moans from his throat were his undoing.

“What?” Maria startled awake, confused. “Are you okay?”

“I will be soon.” Suddenly her hand stilled on him as she came aware of where her hand was and what she was doing.

“Oh! I’m so sorry!” Maria sounded embarrassed. “I haven’t done that in awhile.”

That was correct. Her hands always moved over his body in her sleep, but since the first night she hadn’t actually taken him in hand.

“It’s okay. But you’re really going to have to release me from the restraint now. I really need to go finish this.”

Maria looked at him and nodded. She knew that she was going to release him eventually. Sooner or later, he was going to need to use the bathroom, and suddenly it looked like he needed to go now.

“I’m so sorry.” She stopped apologizing at his look. “It’s just you scared me over the last few days, and I think I needed to feel you, know you were there.”

Michael laughed ruefully. “Oh, I’m very here.”

“I know. It’s hard to miss.” Michael was surprised that Maria’s hand remained on his lower stomach stroking the soft hair there.

“I should take care of this...soon. I guess you could let me out of this restraint, and I could finish it in the bathroom.”

Maria just made a protesting sound in her throat.

“No, that wouldn’t work, because when I came back to bed we’d both be cold. I guess I could...”

Michael stopped talking when her hand moved down his body and took him in hand.

“You could let me finish what I started.”

Michael smiled in the dark. Door number two. Definitely was his choice as well.

“I could.”

Maria leaned up over him. “You don’t seem to mind this at all.” He smiled at the suspicion in her voice.

“Has anyone ever mentioned that you talk too much?”

“No.” Maria looked down his body, and almost against her will she moved the covers away so she could look at him. He was...big. “Um, how do we do this exactly?”

“What you were doing was more than fine.”

“I was asleep!”

Michael brought her closer and wrapped a hand around her neck to bring her mouth to his. Moving his lips over hers, he quickly sucked her tongue into his mouth to taste her as his freed hand moved down his own body to join her smaller one. Wrapping his hand around hers, he showed her the quickest method to finishing him off while his mouth kept exploring hers. If he left it up to her, he wouldn't get any satisfaction. She would just slow torture him the entire time and talk all the while.

“Maybe you should do this alone.”

“Shhhh, no this is better.” Michael laughed at her expression as it raced across her face. It wasn’t quite what he had in mind, but it would do in a pinch. He was already so close it was almost a done deal.

Her surprised look at his reaction when he came was priceless. Michael felt a suspicion that she wasn’t nearly as experienced he was, and that wasn’t much. She seemed fascinated by his body. Her hands still roaming and feeling him up.

“Maria, not that I’m complaining or anything, but if you keep touching me, we’ll have the same problem again.”

Her hand pulled away immediately. “Oh! Sorry.”  Michael just nodded and covered her up in the bedding and plastered her to his body under his arm. Closing his eyes, he finally felt relaxed enough to sleep. Maria was having the opposite results. She was suddenly awake.

“Um, Michael?”

“Hmmm?”

“What about the sheets? Maybe we should change them or clean up or something?”

“Shhhh.”

~~~

“Is everything okay?”

“Hmm, now it is. How long will you stay?”

She smiled and kissed him, gently and then with increasing passion. “As long as you need me.”

Alex ran his hand down her smooth back. “You are always gone when I wake. I hate it.”

“I know. It is how it must be. Time, my love. It draws near.”

“I feel it.”

Her hand moved down his body to rest on his stomach. “The baby?”

“Protected in a surrogate.” Kathleen just nodded. “Leena, you feel so real to me.”

“I wish he were still here. What should we name him?” She smiled at him, pushing him to his back, straddling his hips. “I should feel real. But no distractions this time. Our son. His name? I am thinking after my father.”

“Horace?” Alex just laughed. “The boy is going to have enough problems. Horace!”

She slapped him lightly on the chest, laughing. Suddenly her blue eyes became serious, and she moved on him taking him inside her, joining their bodies. Watching him through lowered lids, she saw his eyes closed and he moaned her name.

“Horace is a good name, Leena.” She laughed.

He brushed the hair back from her head and lifted his lips to her collarbone. Instead of the light kiss she was expecting, he sucked her skin, nipping at her gently. The combined pain and pleasure sent a jolt through both of them. It is the most erotic thing they had ever felt. His energy seeking out hers. Leena let out a ragged gasp, and he intensified the pressure, leaving a red welt when he finally raised his head.

His eyes are liquid, aroused, somewhere between fury and desire.

“You are still angry?”

“You left me before you needed to, and with an unborn baby. Dammit, Leena, how am I supposed to do this alone?”

She leaned down into him, looked him in the eyes with a sadness. “You are not alone, never alone. I promise. I know I have no real corporeal body, but my essence is linked to you, and that will never change.”

“Leena...”

“Shh. It is all right. It will be all right. Your journey is only just beginning. There is so much out there.”

“You exist in my dreams only. What kind of life is this one?”

Leena kissed him. “The only one we can have, but it is more than most have.”

~~~

Max rolled off his bed to sit on its side. Rubbing his hands over his face, he felt the sweat still pouring off his body. Michael. Michael was gone, and in the past Michael would have woke and asked him about his nightmare. Fingering his scar and closing his eyes, he tried to erase the memory of her, of Serena.

All he ever saw any longer was that one last kiss, that smile, and then her turning and the back of her head being blown away. She haunted him. Body and soul. There was no peace, no escape.

Serena, his dark-eyed bitch of a wife who was like living fire in his veins. They hadn’t been bonded in love, but they were more compatible than most bonded pairs. Passion - it burned hot between them from the moment they first met and over the ten years until they married. She knew him, knew things he didn’t even understand, and she used that knowledge to control him. Since she died he dreamt of her, still slept with her, but when he was tired it wasn’t sex he dreamt about, but the nightmare of her death.

This was Michael’s fault. Love. Max just shook his head trying to clear it. Was that destructive feeling he had, that he associated with Serena really ‘love’? Cursed was more like it.

Isabel. It was different with her. She, like Serena, didn’t give in to him. She stood her ground. But where Serena had made him want to do violence and find freedom from her, Isabel made him want to stay, to find peace.

“I don’t have time for this shit!” Max stood up and left the room.

As he passed Michael and Maria’s rooms, he staggered. Michael had left their twin bond fully open, and Max was experiencing...afterglow? Dammit! He quickly slammed the mental door and promised himself to thrash his brother at the next available opportunity.

On his way to the Bridge, Max couldn’t be more surprised to find himself standing in Sickbay. Quickly checking on Sean, he then went to Isabel, his real reason for the detour. Taking a seat at her bedside, he watched her sleep. Max never knew when tiredness overtook him, but there at her bedside he finally found rest. Kyle found him sleeping there hours later, and just let him be.

~~~

“What are you doing here?” Maria asked absentmindedly.

“I’m helping with repairs.”

Maria just snorted at Michael. Right. In the last ten days, that was a standard joke between them, because together they never worked. Other things distracted them.

“Let me see your list.” Michael just scowled at her. “Hand it over.” Reluctantly, he gave her his assignment list. “You’re supposed to be working on the manifold and shovels. What are you doing here?”

“Helping you?” Michael said.

She laughed at that. Right. No help there. He was good, real good. They were going to get caught again. Like the day before, and the day before that, and in the lift, and in the docking bay, and in hydroponics...

“I think Sean split us up for a reason.” Michael just made a face.

“Sean is a bitch. He ruined dinner last night. I told him not to put all that pepper in, but he refused to listen.”

Maria just shrugged. “The pepper wasn’t that bad...just peppery. I think the Argillian Port ale was a huge mistake. It tasted like dirty socks.”

Michael scratched his brow. “Yeah, I told Sean not to do it,” Michael shrugged, “but what can you do?” He ignored the fact that he was the one doing the pouring of the offensive Port.

“The point is, Michael. You’re not where you’re supposed to be. Sean is going to blow a injector relay if he catches you again.”

Michael was sick of it. Ever since he and Maria had stepped up their relationship they’d been working non-stop on repairs. Morning, noon, night and all frickin’ times between. Last few nights she was so tired, he put her to bed and she didn’t move or even make a sound. So he took to waylaying her in non-essential areas, but Sean was being a pain.

“I don’t see why we can’t work together.”

Maria put down her tools and looked at him. Her look of exasperation quickly turned to one of amusement. He was pouting. A pouting Attilaan. Maria couldn’t help her response. Bastard. She kissed him.

"Because when we’re together, we don’t work."

"I wasn't planning on distracting you." Michael lied.

He lowered his head to hers, his lips a hairsbreadth from her fuller lips.

"Tell me what the hell Sean needs with both of us working to exhaustion?" Michael softly rubbed his mouth against her and talked in a low tone. “I’m getting suspicious that you’re trying to avoid me. That you’ve got Sean running interference because we were heading somewhere very intimate since that day I was tied up to our bed.”

Her voice was breathy, almost inaudible. "I don't know what you're talking about."

He lowered his lips to hers, his intent clear, and she frantically tried to twist her head to the side. His fingers, twined in her hair, held her immobile. His lips descended and he nibbled at the edge of her mouth, skillfully teasing her and sending shivers down her spine. The kiss deepened, as he forced first acquiescence, and then desire. Maria was trembling, and making a barely audible animal sound as he finally ended the kiss and raised his face from hers with cool satisfaction.

"Tell me." They both looked up in guilt at the sound of Sean’s voice. “What does it take to keep you two working and off each other?”

“Aw, Sean...”

“Don’t, ‘Aw Sean’ me. I’ve got the two of you mating like monkeys in almost every corridor, and then some. My landing crew is still talking about the two of you in the landing bay. They’ve got bets all over the place when and where we’ll find you both naked and going at it. I think the forward array, and the observation deck are the most bet upon. My crew is distracted trying to keep an eye on the two of you. One of my workers took a spill from a ladder trying to twist himself into a knot to watch you.”

“We’re not that bad.”

“Worse. Michael, go back to work.” Michael slowly went off to return to the forward manifolds.

Maria watched him leave with a look on exasperation on her pretty face. “Whew, that man is more lethal than a drink of hundred proof whiskey.”

“Getting hard to avoid?”

Maria laughed and picked up her tool. “You have no idea. This last week has been...difficult.”

Sean had been out of regeneration for only six days. He still looked weak, but he was almost back to normal.

“I'm sure it has been, given that the rest of us are hard and randy.”

“Sorry about that. We mean no harm.”

Sean helped her reconnect a power grid. “So how much longer?”

Maria quickly reran a diagnostic and then reestablished the power flow.

“Just two more days.”

Maria gathered up her tools to move to the next assignment, but Sean stopped her.

“You could try just telling him the truth.”

“I’d rather not.” Sean gave her a deep look. “I know, but it’s difficult. Who knew so many birth control methods would be worthless with Attilaans? Michael is determined to wreck the most effective one...abstinence.”

“We’re a fertile people.”

Maria just snorted. “I thought the word was ‘horny’. Well Kyle says this is guaranteed, and it becomes effective in my body in two days. Then I’ll stop avoiding him.”

“You don’t want his baby?” Sean asked softly.

Maria paused and looked at Sean, her anguish apparent in her eyes. “No. I can’t afford to take the chance, Sean. If I become pregnant, how can I do my duty, walk into the Granilith and willfully take my own life, thus destroying his child at the same time?”

Sean just nodded. He understood it the first time she explained her need for help. Maria knew the course of her life was set. The fates had already woven it, and the second was drawing out the length...then that only left it to be cut. They already knew how, just not necessarily when.

“Maria,” he stopped her again. “If things were different, would you...I mean, would you want his baby?”

Maria stopped and looked at the man, a small smile on her face. “Perhaps. Not right now or right away, but perhaps someday. When I think of staying with him, I think of running around the universe chasing dreams, getting into more trouble than either of us deserve to be in, and being just the two of us.”

“So, no children?”

“Oh, there’d be children. Just not right away. And when we had them...they would be beautiful, opinionated, tough and hard to keep under control. They would wake us early, and keep us up late. And we’d wonder how we lived all our lives empty until they came.” Maria suddenly looked very upset as her eyes shone with tears. “That was just a dream I have...but it belongs in dreams. It can’t be.”

Sean swore under his breath. He hadn’t meant to make her sad, or hurt her. “Maria, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean...”

“It’s okay.” She tried to pull away. “I just never had a reason to dream this dream before, and now I do. It makes it difficult.”

“I just don’t want to see him hurt, and right now, I can’t see how we’ll ever avoid that. Your leaving...it’s going to hurt.”

Maria put her hand on Sean’s face and leaned forward to rest against him. “I know. That’s why I can’t afford to make a mistake, become pregnant. Watching me go will be bad enough, but I couldn’t destroy his child too, or ask him to let us both go.”

Sean just nodded. “Yeah. Off to work with you. I’ve got ten credits that says he finds you within the next half an hour.”

“Keep your money.” Maria went to the ladder preparing to climb up three floors to her next assignment. “Oh Sean, dinner was lovely last night!”

Sean laughed as she quickly went up the ladder out of sight. Cheeky little bit.

“Brat!”

~~~

Michael and Maria were resting in the bath, both too tired to move. They had finished all primary repairs that day. All that was left were non-essential areas. Maria was almost asleep in the warm water, when Michael tried to rouse her.

“We should go to bed.”

“Hungry...”

Michael just sighed. “There is no way I’m going to the galley.” Michael’s eyes narrowed at her latest delay tactic. “Want to tell me what the hell is going on?”

Maria avoided his eyes and got out of the bath. “Don’t know what you’re talking about, Commander.”

“Maria...”

“So guess I’ve got to add suspicious to the list of Attilaan traits?”

“Bullshit. I know when a woman is avoiding me.”

Maria smiled at that and laughed. “Lots of experience, huh?”

“Maria.”

“I’ll go make dinner from the replicators.” Maria fled before he trapped her again.

Michael followed to find her ordering enough food for an army while yawning. She really looked almost down for the count. Maria was eating and reading her manuscript.

“You really should be working on your manuscript and not letting Sean use you as slave labor.” Michael just realized something. “Where is your scurrying mouse-like Immaculate?”

“Liz? She’s around.” Maria rubbed her eyes, and tried to suppress a yawn. Kyle’s magic sleeping potion was already working. “You might not have noticed her, but she been doing repairs with the rest of us.”

Michael’s eyebrow went up at that. “She knows engines?”

“Better than I do. Not the same technology, but she knows your technology.”

“I thought she was a nun?”

Maria ate another bite, and then helped herself to some food from Michael’s plate. “She sort of is, but not really. Not if we can complete the task. Once that’s done her life is her own.”

“And yours is...” Maria failed to meet his eyes. There was no reason to rehash old territory.

“Anyway. Liz was pressed into service at an early age - practically from birth, when it was apparent that she would be able to handle the yellow gem. All those years in solitude and contemplation at Temple, she was allowed to pursue any education she desired.”

“Engineering?”

“Engineering. Not my people’s technology, but almost everyone else’s. She's much better than I am. A natural. My knowledge was required for learning to build and operate my ship, but Liz’s is a lesson in love. She likes it.”

Michael stopped eating and contemplated what she was saying. “What do you mean Liz isn’t one of your people?”

“Not really. Centuries ago, so many centuries that we lost count, the gems were removed from Anterra. They were entrusted to three holy women, special women who could touch them. That was when the location of each was written in the manuscripts.” Maria got up and ordered some dessert. “Anyway, these special women searched out and tested people on their new worlds with the same ‘resonance’ ability to hold their crystals. So each generation at all female births, the newborn are tested.”

“So she was...”

“Native to the world we took her from. She was sent to Temple practically from birth, and taught how to hold the gem, how to protect it, and what her duty would be.”

Michael took away the dishes, and helped Maria up. She was falling asleep again. Taking her into the bedroom, he helped her get ready for bed.

“So what did these worlds get from your people that would be worth this amount of devotion and dedication over all these years. Abydos is a sludge pit, hardly worth fighting for.”

“We gave them technology when they had none. But for Liz? She gained everything. Women on her world are treated poorly. Used as slaves, sold into bondage as sexual slaves, beaten, and used at times as livestock. Education? A female? Not really heard of or sanctioned.”

“No offense, Maria. But it hardly seems like your people helped them at all.”

Maria moaned in appreciation as he covered her, and she nestled up to his warmer body. “Not now, but in the past Abydos was a thriving world. Khivar had destroyed so many star systems close to Abydos that it threw that system into turmoil. Abydos was one of the planets pulled from its original orbit to another. It devastated the ecosystem, and literally turned the world into a desert.”

“Khivar...such a great guy. He wrote the book on how to make friends and influence people. Rat bastard.”

Maria was already drifting off on him. Determined to keep her awake, Michael continued to ask her questions.

“So Liz is working with Sean? The Immaculate and the ‘Not so Immaculate’?”

Maria chuckled softly. “Indeed! It’s so funny. Sean seems to really respect her, and he’s careful to keep his hands to himself.”

Michael could hear the pause in her voice. “But?”

“But, they make a strange pair. Sean talking non-stop, and Liz not even making a noise. He tried to corrupt her to the ways of gambling.”

Only Sean would try to tempt a nun from her devotional calling. “And?”

“She ignored him for an entire eight hours.” Maria laughed remembering the battle of wills. Sean trying to get her to break silence, and Liz determined to ignore the infidel.

“So once again...shouldn’t you and Liz be working on the location of your second gem?”

Michael almost bit his tongue. He didn’t want her to find it too fast or too soon. But her working on the translation might remove her from Sean’s slave taskmaster hands, and get him some quality time that didn’t involve her falling asleep on him.

“No need. I finished the translation by the second day with Liz’s translation key. I already know the next location.”

Michael swallowed a curse and tried to remain calm and reasonable. “It took you weeks with the first manuscript.”

“Well the first was encoded with a riddle of sorts to make it hard, but the following manuscripts are easy because if you find the first translator key, then everything is downhill.”

“Where is it?” Michael asked quietly.

“Kheb, on the world of Imohep in the Upper Kingdom. There in the Temple of the Immaculate we’ll find the next gem.” Maria voice was getting quieter as sleep was catching up with her. “The red gem, the one that determines the length of life...she, that is patient.”

Michael held her as she finally succumbed to sleep. Kheb. It took her only two days before she knew it was Kheb. And from Kheb, she would soon discover the last gem. After that it was just finding Khivar and activating the Granilith. Too soon. It was happening too fast. Holding her close and tightly, Michael wondered if he could sabotage a few systems to keep them in the Thorns indefinitely.

~~~

Max was hidden beneath a control panel, trying to rewire the fried system. Most of the Bridge systems were back online, and Michael had spent the day testing new weapons with the special shields that Maria had helped him install.

“You want to talk about it?”

“Nothing to say.” Michael said curtly. Max just shrugged and then frowned.

“I got a nice present from you the other day.”

“Really? I can’t remember giving you a present since our eighth birthday when it was determined you were bonded to Serena, and I was a freak.”

Max pulled out from under the console and looked up at his brother’s unsmiling face. Michael, over the last few days, had taken on a wickedly nasty disposition, and the only person able to break his mood was Maria. But even Maria was still avoiding the man. Smart girl.

“I remember.” Max smiled slightly. “It was a poisonous snake. You left it in my bed. Mother boxed you about the ears if I remember.”

“I know. Hated it. She always hit harder than Father. I was hoping for punishment from Dad. He was so absentminded, he’d tell you to go wait for a beating then he’d forget he was supposed to do it.”

Max laughed in glee. “The phrase, ‘You already beat me bloody, Pa’ was such a tool of survival.”

“I always appreciated his, ‘Good then, don’t make me take you to task again...um what was it you did?’ Only a fool would remind him.” Michael’s dour countenance lightened at the memory. “So what was this alleged present, and do I want it back?”

“Aw, well there is the point in fact. I think you owed me a few.” Michael’s look of confusion made Max smile even more. “Remember when Serena and I first became sexually active?”

“Hard to forget. A person couldn’t sleep, or take a chance entering our room without you two rutting.”

“That’s not what I wanted you to remember.” Max smiled.

It was true. He and Serena didn’t bother to wait until their joining ceremony. They were sneaking around and going strong at fifteen. Their parents figured it out finally, and their marriage occurred at seventeen instead of the usual eighteenth birth mark. They were afraid of out of wedlock pregnancy, but none of them questioned why in all that time Serena had never once conceived. It took them months after the wedding to realize that Max was bonded to a sterile woman.

“What? All the monkey-screeching?”

“No, what happened to you the first time I did it with Serena?”

Michael thought about it. He had been swimming down at the old quarry. The third sun was high in the sky and the second was slowly moving to its zenith. He was lying nude on the grass giving the local maidens, curious about the unbonded Attilaan, a peep show when...

Michael looked down at Max and laughed a hearty laugh. “Oh my god! I remember.” Rubbing his face in mirth, he squatted down next to his twin. “The most embarrassing moment of my life! There I was trying to pretend I didn’t know the ‘girls’ were watching me, checking me out...when bam! Out of nowhere I orgasmed. Made a mess of myself, spurting like a damn fountain! The ‘girls’ ran off screaming in fright thinking I was some kind of monster popping my load without even touching myself!”

Max laughed in delight. He remembered how humiliated Michael felt and how pissed. They fought the entire next day...almost killed each other.

“It was hardly my fault. I didn’t know that it would happen. At fifteen neither of us could control our mental connection.”

“Or the next year either.” Michael smiled in chagrin. Best frickin’ year of his youth playing recipient mental voyeur because of his brother’s out of control hormones. “Yeah, that’s why I used to bang my finger with a hammer on purpose.”

“Sadist.”

“I got even.” Michael said evilly.

Max had to agree. Michael used to wait until inconvenient times, usually when Serena and he were into it, and then make Max orgasm early. He spent months trying to convince Serena that he wasn’t a premature ejaculator, and that it was Michael’s fault.

“I think I still owe you for that, little brother.”

Michael just waved a finger at his brother, and rechecked his panels. One was still out. Max had missed something.

“I’m still getting a busy light. Recheck circuits 3A to 13B. Something must have shorted again.” Max nodded and went back under the console. “So... this present?”

Suddenly, Michael had power to his station restored. And Max climbed out from under it, slowly rising to his feet.

“Oh yeah. The present.” Max wiped his hands on a rag and rearranged the tools. “The other morning, early...I couldn’t sleep, so I was heading to the Bridge when I caught the tail end of you and Maria...”

“Oh shit!” Max trailed off as Michael actually looked uncomfortable. “Sorry about that, Max. I forgot. It was late, and I was tired.”

Max just shrugged. “No problem. I figured I deserved to be on the receiving end for a change.”

Michael wanted to agree, but he couldn’t. He and Maria. They were private. Not something he wanted to share, not even by mental accident with his twin.

“Still...I’ll try to keep a cap on it.”

Max just shrugged. “So you’re in an established relationship, lasting a hell of a lot longer than I thought it would. So what’s got you biting the heads off everyone in sight?”

Michael looked around to make sure no one was eavesdropping. “Maria. She knows the next gem's location.”

Wasn’t that her purpose? Max was confused. “Okay, so what’s wrong?”

“She figured it out in two days, not two weeks this time.”

Max just shook his head. Then suddenly it hit him. “And once she finds the next one, it will be a quick translation...”

“To the last one, and finally Khivar. And then...”

Michael couldn’t say it. He just looked away, his jaw clenching. Max felt his emotions, and suddenly understood everything. And then Maria would die, and Michael would be alone again.

Max slapped his brother on his back. “Come on.”

“Where we going?”

“To get drunk.”

~~~

“So why are we drinking again?” Sean asked in a slurred voice and trying to focus his bleary eyes.

“To feel good.” Max’s voice floated up from under a table where he was lying.

Michael smacked the table hard. “Right! To feel...good!” He took the drink that Sean poured and downed it.

“Why are we feeling bad?” Sean asked again for the thousandth time.

Michael just snorted. “Why do we invite him? He’s too slow.”

“Because Alex was busy sleeping which is all he does now, and Kyle was doing something doctory, like saving lives, or something...maybe a physical?” Max’s hand wandered up from below the table and nabbed the bottle. “That just left Sean. Poor us.”

Michael just echoed his brother. “Yeah, poor us.”

Sean noticed the bottle disappearing. “Dammit, Michael. I told you not to let him get the bottle. Now we'll have to get under the damn table too.” Sean looked down at Max. “What the frickin’ hell are ya doing down there anyway?”

Michael made a rude noise. “He has to. He always ends up on the floor sooner or later, this way he doesn’t bump his head on the way down.”

“Oh. Wuss.” Max’s hand came over the table’s edge to wave a finger at Sean. Sean just laughed it off. “So why are we drinking again?” Sean asked.

The twins just groaned. Again. Sean waited until Max was off on a rant, and took back the bottle. They were on the third one from contraband gained from an Outworld command post. It was illegal in Imperial territories.

Sean, ever the talker, ignored the surly twins and went off on his own rampage.

“At least you don’t have a frickin’...immulant watching you twenty-four hours a day.” Sean belched making Michael gag. “She has bug-eyes.”

“Immaculate.” Max said from under the table.

“Huh?”

Max finally sat up and pulled himself up from under the table. “She’s an Immaculate, not an Immulant.”

Michael was having a hard time focusing on the conversation. “What the hell is an Immulant? Is that like some ugly babble thing women wear around their neck?”

“No!” Both Max and Sean said in unison.

Michael wasn’t paying attention. “Maybe I need to buy Maria her own Immulant. Think she’s avoiding me because I haven’t got her one?”

“Nope. She’s already got the one Immulant person who is scurrying around my engineering bays.” Sean took another drink. “She’s good. Real good, but damn, I hate her! She refuses to have fun.”

Michael’s face clouded suddenly. “Hate her! You hate my Maria? What the hell do you mean she’s no fun?” Michael tried to struggle to his feet, but Max pushed him back down.

“Maria? No. Not Maria. She’s a real sport.” Sean took another drink. “I was talking about the Imm...Imm...the scurry one with the buggy eyes.”

“Huh?” Michael was lost.

Max hit him upside the head. “Liz.”

“Oh, her. How can you hate someone that doesn’t talk?” Michael calmed down.

“Oh, she talks. In this low whispery voice. She is so damn quiet. I tried to draw her out, but no! No! She wants no help. I invite her to play poker with the boys, and she just ignored me. Not even a word to say no. Like I’m trying to corrupt her Immulant self...no sir, she is no sport.”

“Maria plays poker.” Michael informed the others. Max just rolled his eyes. Four hours of Michael conversation all revolving around Maria was making him need another drink.

“She’s not invited.”

“Why the hell not!?” Michael struggled to stand up again to take out Sean when Max pushed him back in his seat again.

Sean just poked Michael in the chest. “Because you banned her from the game last time. She took us all for all our credits, and when you accused her of cheating, she said, ‘Yeah, so?’ and then she walked with all our money.”

“Maria cheats really well.” Michael said with pride with a shit-eating grin on his face. “Did I tell you that she can pick harmonic restraints with thirteen tumbles in under a minute?”

Max slapped his brother lightly and pointed to a new drink. “Ad nauseum.  Shut up and have another drink.”

Michael looked in his drink and practically pouted. “I don’t know why she’s avoiding me.” He downed the drink.

“I do.” Sean said licking the inside of his empty glass.

Sean looked up at the two quiet brothers. Frowning he looked at them confused.

“Just fucking tell us!” Michael’s patience was on a thin thread.

“Oh sure. She wants your babies, and something about it not being safe until...” Sean looked confused, trying to concentrate, “...tonight? And she wants to fight with you across the galaxy, and you’re her dream...and she can’t have you, but she wants you, and I think she’s cursed with the evil love bug.” Sean scratched his head. He might have got some of that wrong.

“I feel good!” Michael’s attitude suddenly lightened. Grabbing the bottle he sloshed more into the glasses pouring more on the table than the glasses. Max took a sniff and realized that his rooms were going to smell bad for a long time. And once Sean tossed his guts, Max was going to blow up the place.

Sean joined in the celebration. “I feel per…, um, per..., um, good!”

Max wasn’t a talky drunk, so he just took his glass and tossed it back. But as he went through the motion, he didn’t stop. He kept on going, and both Michael and Sean laughed as he fell from his new chair back on the floor.

“Wuss!” Michael spit some whiskey on his brother who took up his previous position under the table.

“Guess what? Guess!” Michael looked at the drunk Sean and just shrugged.

“Just tell me, or I’ll kull ya.”

Sean didn’t know what kull was, but it sounded painful. “Max is in luvvvvv.”

“Not.” They ignored Max’s voice once again from under that table.

“With Lay-de Is-a-bel.”

“Shut up, Sean.” Max’s voice once again rose from under the table.

“An Imminent twin? Or is she an Immulant, too? Oh god! Where do all these babble women come from, and why do they smell nicer than men?” Michael smelt himself and grimaced. It didn’t take much to smell better than he did at that moment, and then looking down at his brother under the table. “Is it true? Are you a victim of the love blight?”

Max just closed his eyes and refused to comment. Michael swore. Sitting up, he banged his hand on the table hard.

“It’s official. This luv crap is a disease.”

“Told ya,” said Sean morosely. “Hope I don’t catch the luvvvvv bug.”

Michael just snorted. “Yeah, like when was the last time a woman let you near her?”

Sean thought about it for a second. “There were the bearded twins...”

Max’s voice floated upward in response to that. “I’m going to vomit.”

“From the look of things, I think that might be the best idea.” The men looked up to see Maria standing in Max’s door.

Michael whole face broke into a smile. “Maria! Maria!” She quickly went to his side as he was on the verge of sliding off his chair. “Sean said you were finally going to have sex with me.”

“Really? Sean knows that, does he?” Maria looked under the table at the relaxing Max. “What’s Max doing under the table?”

Sean looked at Maria with watery blood shot eyes. “The floor kept sneaking up on him and hitting him in the face. So he decided to stay there.”

“Good plan.”

Max voiced piped up from below. “Thanks.” Max passed out.

“How long have you been drinking?”

Michael feigned innocence. “Drinking? We haven't been drinking.”

“Uh huh. How long?’

“Over four hours. Just a quick one. Max’s idea. He was all depressed over catching the cursed disease.” Maria didn’t even bother to ask. Michael looked at Maria. “What are you doing here?”

“Came to find you and take you home. I was cold and alone, and missed you.” Maria leaned down and kissed his lips, but quickly straightened away from him. “First order of business is to dump you in a shower and do something about the taste of your mouth.”

Michael rubbed his head into her. “You’re all I can taste.”

Sean was watching them with a watery expression. “Awww!”

Maria looked at the crying, emotional engineer. “What’s with him?”

Michael just shrugged. “Nothing. Ignore him. Sean gets all emotional when he drinks. He once cried buckets over a squashed bug with all its greasy guts everywhere.”

Sean tipped over, and landed hard on the floor passed out as well.

Maria looked at the sleeping man. “Well, that’s just disturbing.”

“Tell me about it.” Michael looked at his drinking buddies and tsked in disgust. He could always drink them under the table - literally. Turning to Maria he smiled his most charming of smiles, which actually looked anything but charming, but more predatory. “So I’ll let you take me to bed and abuse my body.”

“Tempting offer, but no.”

“Why the hell not?” Michael swore. “Dammit, Maria. I’ve been more patient than a saint, which I’m not...”

“Damn straight, you're not.” Maria took his weight as she went under his arm to help transport him back to their room. “But, I'll make you a deal.”

“A deal?”

“Uh huh. If you take the shower, and do something about your mouth, I'll meet you in bed. And if you’re willing and in any way able, we’ll see what we can do about relieving some of your...tension.”

“Deal. I’m always ready for you, Maria.” Michael said smugly.

“I noticed.” Maria carted him through the door, and dumped him in a bath. It took some doing, but she finally had him in bed, and surprise, surprise...he was instantly dead to the world the moment his head hit the pillow.

~~~

Michael rolled over in pain, and almost lost it when Maria shoved a glass under his nose.

“Wake up, Commander.”

Michael didn’t even bother to open an eye. Opening his eyes would be a bad thing. A real bad thing.

“Go away. Leave me to die in peace.”

“That bad, huh?” Maria sat next to him on the bed. “Anything I can do for you?”

Michael tried to open an eye to look at her, but the light was too bright and sheering in pain. “Got your weapon handy?”

“Yes.”

“Good. Shoot me. Mercy. I beg for mercy.”

Maria laughed at him and made a soothing noise. “Just drink this.”

Michael finally succeeded in opening his eyes, and the vile, putrid liquid in the glass turned his stomach. Maria’s brow went up as his coloring took on a sallow grayish tinge.

“Oh! Maybe I should help you...” He was already gone. Maria sighed and put the glass on the bedside. Kyle didn’t say that it worked without drinking. Apparently all it took was looking at the disgusting liquid. Good thing she didn’t have him smell it.

Maria went to the bathroom door, and grimaced as he became sick. Running a quick bath, she helped him into the water. Rinsing out a cloth, she wiped down his face which was covered in a clammy sweat.

“Where the hell did you get that crap?”

“Kyle. He came by and gave it to me earlier. I guess he was busy rousing both Sean and Max.”

Michael just laid back with a moan. “Son-of-a-bitch. Knew I recognized that stuff. Kyle’s always is pouring it down my throat after I get dru...” Michael peeked at Maria, “...have a few.”

“A few?” Maria looked at him as if he were insane. “A few what? Liters, buckets or cases? What were you celebrating?”

“Not a damn thing. I was drowning my sorrows.”

Maria went quiet. Sitting on the side of the bath she looked down at him. “Are you sad? Because of me?”

Her voice registered, and he looked at her. Neither spoke as they shared a common look full of pain and regret. Michael just sighed.

“It hasn’t even happened, and already...” He stopped talking.

Talk was never his strong point, and emotions were even bigger strangers. Even in the company of even his closest friends and brother he was often stingy with information and taciturn.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” Maria looked away from him, but his hand came up and refused to let her turn from him.

“That you won’t have sex with me, or that you have to hide?”

“Neither. I’d make love with you, Commander. In a heartbeat. It’s all I've thought about in forever. That’s not the problem.”

“What is?”

“You.” Maria moved her hand to his hair, pushing her fingers through its long unruly length, moving it off his face. “It’s already impossible. If...when...we get really physical, actually make love...how much will you have to pay?”

Michael just closed his eyes. She was right. It was unbearable now. Knowing that her time was limited, that they were limited. Every day, they stepped closer to the end, but if they were lovers...

“I’m hurting you.” Maria said sadly.

“No, you’re not. The situation is.” Michael brushed his thumb across her cheekbone. “I don’t understand it. But...I feel you. I feel bonded to you, and that, to me, is not only strange but impossible.”

“I feel you too. I have for a long time.”

Michael met her eyes. Wrong. It was hurting them both.

“I didn’t know. No one told me. There was never a warning that I’d find you, and someday doing my duty would cost me so much. Before, it was all I knew, and somehow that was easy. But now...”

Michael understood too well. “So what are you saying?”

Maria took his hand still framing her face and pulled one of his digits in her mouth and sucked it hard watching his eyes narrow and grow heavy. She leaned forward and removed his finger to his regret, but quickly replaced it with his mouth.

“I’m saying that I want to make love with you...be with you. I know it’s only for a short span of time, but I’m too weak to walk away and never know.” Maria leaned her forehead to his. “But I can’t be the one making this decision. It has to be yours.”

Michael laughed. “You’re kidding me, right? You know...I think I’ve been everything except subtle about how much I want to get you under me. I think the decision was made long ago.”

“You’re talking about sex. I’m not.”

“Okay, put me on the same page. What are we talking about?”

Maria looked at him seriously. “We’re talking about making love, and there is a difference. I don’t know much, but I know that. We’re talking about how hard my leaving is going to be if we take this last step together. I’m talking about not wanting to hurt you, and I’m saying that you need to stop thinking with your penis and think with your head...your real head.”

“Maria...”

“No. I need to go work on the stabilizers. If I leave you here in the bath, will you just think about it? And don’t fall asleep and drown yourself. That’s a coward's way out. Really think about it. Not what you’ll get out of it, but what it will mean when in a couple of weeks I'm gone.”

“And if I decide I can handle it?”

Maria reached down and kissed him again. “Then we see how it goes. We don’t change the formula. We were doing fine all this time. The only difference is, we don’t stop if we don’t want to.”

Michael looked at her serious green eyes. So much life and energy shone in their brilliant depth, and suddenly the implication hit him. This brilliance would soon be gone, snuffed out for all eternity. It hit him hard, and Maria saw that.

“The decision has to be yours, because you’ll be all that survives. The burden will be yours to bear.” Maria kissed him quickly and left the room.

Max. He was going to be like Max. Living the rest of his life with the memory of her, her ghost reminding him what he could never have...having only been there long enough to give him a glimpse. It was cruel.

Rubbing his face hard, Michael leaned back and shut his eyes against the searing pain of it all.

~~~

“Sleeping in the bath can be lethal, especially when you tied one on last night.”

“Shut up, Kyle. How could you give that shit to Maria for me to drink?”

Kyle just laughed. “I noticed it was still beside the bed, so I take it you never bothered to drink it.”

Michael just grimaced. “What the hell are you doing here? Come to gloat?”

“Nope.” Kyle reached over and injected Michael. “Came to give you a vitamin shot to get you back on your feet. Sean is singing happily in engineering, terrorizing that little girl Liz, and Max insisted on going to the Bridge. He’s fallen asleep in his chair three times. So finally I was forced to concoct a ‘pick-me up’ vitamin mix.”

Michael just swore. Fucking Sean. Pansy ass bastard. Couldn’t hold his drink to save his life, but woke up feeling all fresh-like.

“How many times did Sean lose it last night in Max’s room?”

“Don’t ask. And save yourself some heartache and don’t go in there.” Michael just swore.

“So you feel better after your little brush with drunken behavior?”

“I feel like shit.”

“That’s not what I was asking, Michael. Did the drunk help?”

Michael nodded for Kyle to hand him a towel. “Nothing is going to help, is it?”

“Don’t think so.” Kyle followed Michael out of the bath. Taking a seat in a chair as Michael dressed, Kyle decided to just tell him. “Max ordered us out of the Thorns today. We laid in a course for Kheb.”

Michael took a seat on the side of the bed and rested his head in his hands. “I thought we’d take longer making repairs.”

“The new shielding makes it easier to avoid Khivar and his goons. The Imperials can only see us by actual view, but sensors are now worthless.”

Michael laid back down on the bed. “Maria and her damn shields. She’s too helpful by far.”

“So we’re back on the journey.”

“Fuck the journey. I want it over. Finished. I want her journey to fail, and to just live with Khivar’s reign, and Maria stays with us. With me,” he whispered.

“Michael...”

Michael looked at Kyle. “This love thing. Does it make you selfish?”

“Unfortunately, yes.”

“Then I’m in trouble because by nature, I already was selfish.” Michael rubbed his stomach which still hurt. “She wants me to be careful about deciding to finally join with her. She’s afraid that it will only make things harder for me later.”

“And you think...?”

“I think it can’t get any harder.” Michael sat up and looked at Kyle. “You said it usually feels good, this love thing?”

“Usually.”

“Then why do I feel like someone is ripping out my heart? Why do I want to kidnap her and refuse to let her go? Why the hell am I willing to let the universe live in slavery just to keep her with me? Half the time I feel like there’s a stranger in my body.”

“Is it really bothering you?”

Michael shrugged. “I feel...alive.”

Kyle just shook his head. Love. Great big, unsolved mystery.

“If I could take it away, Michael...if I could give that magical injection you wanted before as a cure, would you take it?”

Michael laid back down with his eyes closed.

“No.” He said quietly. “I would not give up a single moment of knowing her. She’s the first female I’ve ever talked to for more than a moment. First one that wasn’t just about sex. Maybe at the beginning, but that changed. I like the way she pets me in her sleep. The way she leans up and whispers her observations about something Sean is saying in my ear. It’s like a private joke between...”

“...the two of you?”

Michael nodded. “Yeah. I like the way she eats off my plate, or discreetly puts her food on it when she doesn’t want to eat something. I like arguing with her, because she lets me win at times even when I’m wrong. I like how she...” Michael stopped and looked at Kyle. “I’ve got to stop doing this, don’t I? But God help me, Kyle, when did she become my best friend?”

“It only makes it harder.”

Michael just groaned. “Tell me what to do.”

“What does Maria suggest?”

“That I think about it - really think about it - and then just let us go on as before, and if it leads us to something more, then it does. And if it doesn’t, then that’s okay too.”

“Can you live with that?”

Michael’s voice was tired and weary. “I don’t know.”

Kyle watched him sleep for a short while, and then left the room. He shouldn’t be surprised that Maria was there.

“How is he?”

“He’ll be better after some more sleep.” Kyle for the first time didn’t know what to say to the young woman who had become so much more than just a client. Maria was a real friend.

“I need you to do something for me.” Maria said softly.

“Take care of him when you’re gone?”

“That, yes. And this.” Maria handed him a vial of clear liquid.

“What is this, Maria?” Kyle looked at the drug, and then her.

“It’s a drug that will help if things get bad with him after I’m gone. It will effectively wipe out about a year of his memories, which will include everything involving me.”

Kyle handed it back. “No. I won’t.”

“Kyle, I can’t stand to worry about him being in pain.”

Kyle knew what she was saying, what she was trying to do. But she had no right.

“No. I’ll keep the drug, but I won’t use it unless Michael asks me to.” Maria frowned at that. Stubborn Attilaan. He wouldn’t. He’d see it as a sign of weakness.

“Kyle, please.”

“No. This was a gift, Maria. You might not think so because it is a painful lesson. But it is a gift. He’s evolved. Max is evolving in his own right, and even Sean is watching it happen and he wonders if he’ll ever get so lucky.”

“Kyle, he’s not used to this! It’s too much!”

“It’s everything. His people turned away from these types of emotions, but there has to be a reason that an unbonded Attilaan male would suddenly find himself bonded to woman who is outside his own species.” Kyle took the drug, and put it in his pocket. “Maybe it's time for them to stop interbreeding. Maybe their gene pools need new blood, and this is just the beginning. I just know that knowing you has given him something he never had.”

“What?”

“A sense of belonging, of feeling right inside his own body. Don’t ask me to take it away - not even to spare him the pain.”

~~~

Max knew the moment Michael entered the Bridge. The temperature dropped quite a few degrees. The cold fury rolled off his twin, and Max didn’t need an open link to his twin to feel it.

“Why?” Michael asked coldly.

“Repairs were over eighty-nine percent done, and with the new shielding...”

“You knew how I felt...what I feel. What were a few extra days?”

Max turned in his seat, and looked at Michael. “We’ve got a contract with her, Michael. Repairs were almost complete, and close enough to finish over the next few days. She gave us new shield technology.” Max didn’t feel so great, and Michael looked just as bad. “She asked me to plot a course, and I had no reason to refuse.”

“You could’ve stalled. For me.” Max swore at the look of betrayal in Michael’s eyes as his twin turned on his heels and stalked off the Bridge.

“Sam, take over. You’re in command.” Max quickly followed. Catching up to Michael he pulled him around to face him as Michael jerked his arm out of Max’s grip.

“Dammit, Max! Was that what last night was about? You knew! You knew we were getting underway, and last night was a pity party.”

Max sighed and looked at Michael. How the hell did they get so far from themselves? From their people? They were navigating foreign waters.

“Yeah, I knew three days before. I told her it would be three days before repairs were far along enough to get underway.”

“You could’ve told me.”

Max pushed his hands in his pocket, but caught himself in the defensive gesture. Keeping his hands on his hips he stared his brother down.

“I could have, but I thought you needed a day off from the worry.” Max clenched his jaw. “I didn’t know that she had translated it in two days, Michael. That, I didn’t know. She kept the location to herself through the battle, the Thorns and all the repairs. How was I to know that it didn't take her that long to translate?”

Michael refused to relinquish his anger. “You could’ve given me a few more days!”

“I wish I could. But this isn’t just about you!”

Michael ran a hand over his neck. His bitterness apparent in his tone. “Right, the fate of the universe, blah, blah, and blah. Heard it.”

Max grabbed his brother hard and shook him. “Not that either! Maria! This is about Maria. Stop being a selfish prick for a second and think of this from her side.”

Michael calmed down for a moment, and waited for Max to finish it, to tell him.

“You think this is easy for her? Before she met you, this journey was her entire life, her entire life...all the life she was ever going to have! And somehow she learned to accept that. She was okay with it because all she had in the world was this mission. Her people, gone. Her world and home, gone. She spent over ten years shifted in time with ‘monks’, not touching or being touched. That world is nothing but a pile of ruins in the here and now.”

“I know, she told me.”

“Then try feeling it. She was prepared to die for the cause because there was nothing tying her here anyway. The journey’s end would’ve released her. Why do you think she was so insane? So uncaring of the cost? So much so that she swam in sub-artic waters despite being unable to regulate her own body temperature? Risk being killed by sea creatures?”

“Single-minded. She sees nothing but the task at hand, and it's do or die at all cost.”

“Then she met us. All of us, but especially you. She has ties now, desires and dreams. Suddenly there is a reason to not die. Every step she took with you has clouded her journey, made it more difficult for her. You’ve anchored her to this life, and every day that this journey is extended or is dragged out, she is further sucked in, and it makes it even more difficult.”

“Max...”

“I complied with her wishes because she’s in pain. She can’t fail and give up because it’s all she knows, all she’s ever trained to do...but you...you make her want to fail, to walk away.” Max pushed his brother away, “I put us underway as an act of mercy, to decrease the length of her suffering. You want to do something...lighten her load, and just make these last few days happy ones for her? Go build some good memories, because soon that’s all you'll have.”

Michael rubbed his face hard and looked at his brother. He was right, and Michael hated him for it. Selfish. He was thinking only of himself and what it meant to him. God help him. Michael cleared his throat. He had never cried in his life, and he refused to start now.

Cussing and feeling his own bad humor, Michael conceded to Max.

“I hate this shit! I hate this fucking love crap. Who was the sadistic bastard that thought this up? No wonder our people got rid of it. It makes you selfish, and at the same time caring, and...giving. Dammit!”

Michael turned to leave, but he looked back at his quiet brother. “Don’t think I still don’t hate you for this.”

Max nodded. In the same position, he’d feel the same.

~~~

Michael found Maria working on a trans-warp conduit. It was out of phase. As she replaced the iso-linear chips, she ran a quick diagnostic, trying to put it back into place, but the locking mechanism was jammed. Coming up behind her, Michael reached around her, trapping her against his body as he used brute force to slam the conduit back into place.

"Maria..." Michael smiled at her, but there was no humor in his eyes. “Need some help? This job looks a little too much for you. Taking on more than you can handle again?”

This implication was clear. She was over her head in trouble, but this time she could feel the trouble was him.

"No." She held up a forestalling hand, "I can cover my own ass, and you will be there if I need help...which I don’t."

"I’m going to be too busy to play babysitter to you..." Michael was picking a fight with her, and he knew it. But somehow he was more comfortable with that approach.

"Hold it right there!" She poked him in the chest. "I can work just as well as you can. I'm even better at it most of the time.  And before you start poking holes in what I was doing, please notice it was fixed! I would’ve gotten it back in place myself, thank you very much." Each point was accompanied by a sharp, furious jab of her finger.

"Do I get to talk now?" He bit out his words. "I was just asking if you need help. Nothing else. I wasn’t trying to start something.” Bullshit. Michael spit out the lie easily.

"Why don't you get it? This is about me! None of you would be here if it weren't for me. I can't just sit back and let everyone else go down because of my fate. Not you and not my newfound friends. It's my future in the balance here. I can’t stand that so many have already died." She would not cry, she told herself. Weakness was not allowed in front of this man.

"You're right," he nodded briefly. "We wouldn't be here if it weren't for you. You came running to us for help. You sought out the protection we offered. Now you want to cut loose because you're suddenly uncomfortable with it. Well, tough. Live with it. You're under my protection now. And that means I will protect you from yourself if I have to." Michael sighed. He was being nasty. “What happened to the Vishnu had nothing to do with you, Maria. Nothing. It was about Khivar looking for Alex and his sisters. You’re not responsible for the damage or the loss. In fact, you saved our asses. Without you...”

"I don’t need thanks. It was you out there. I knew better than to let you run off all alone, like the big bad lone wolf you think you are. I can’t believe how much trouble you get into." Maria clamped her hands on her hips. "Face it, you need me."

"You're a bigger liability. If Khivar learns of your existence, or what your intent is, there will be hell to pay." His eyes belied his anger.

Maria felt a thrill of triumph. She was getting through, maybe not the way she wanted, but she was getting a reaction. They should be partners like he promised, but he couldn’t get past his protective male response.

"I trust you to protect me. Any excuse you can come up with for leaving me behind, I can throw back in your face." She looked smug but her eyes flashed with fire, daring him to try.

"Oh?" Something dangerous glinted in his eyes. She would find a way to follow him, just as he would have followed her if the positions were reversed.

"Oh!" she answered back, sidestepping him and seeking to leave.

She had to admit that she never saw it coming. Not now. Not here. Not in the middle of a pulse-pounding argument. Before she could blink, one of his hands had cupped the base of her skull the other was at her waist pulling her into a kiss.

His lips were hard and unyielding, like the man himself. The moment they sealed her mouth, her chest tightened painfully and a shock of candescence centered low in her stomach. Michael moaned. This was what he wanted, but with them there never seemed a direct approach.

She moaned into his mouth and immediately felt him push his advantage.

His tongue swept inside her, hot and demanding.

Maria melted, wrapping her arms around his neck. She clung to him as the last sane and rational thing in this world. He was her anchor. Unwilling to let it be said that she couldn't give as good as she got, she found herself pushing back. Her tongue tangling with his. He tasted of strength and power and danger. He was getting to damn good at this distraction thing.

His mouth left hers and she heard a small, whimpering noise just beyond the pounding in her ears. Was that her? She opened her eyes and looked at him. He was staring at her. Hunger and uncertainty warred with each other in his eyes. She didn’t need to see them, she could feel it, sense it. His emotions were rolling off him in waves hitting her hard and fast. Furious. He was furious with his own impotence, his inability to ultimately keep her safe.

She licked her lips, savoring the lingering taste of his kiss. His gaze was drawn to the gesture. She reached up to touch his cheek, her fingertips tracing the ridge of bone there. His skin was hot to her touch. He closed his eyes and drew in a deep breath expanding his chest where he held her trapped against him. She felt his hold begin to loosen. His uncertainty and fear hastily building a wall between them.

"Michael." Was that her voice, so thick and ragged? She didn’t want him to block her out, build an impenetrable wall to keep himself from her. So little time left to spend fighting.

His eyes snapped open and he started to move away, apology already in his eyes, on his lips.

She stopped his lips with her own before he could utter the damning words. Gently, aware of his fears, her needs. A soft press of swollen lips to heated ones; a light stroking of her long fingers against his tense throat; a yielding push of her slender body against his own. His grip tightened and there was a rumbling vibration in his chest. She felt it move through her. She pressed on, tenderly suckling on his lips, first the top, then the bottom. He opened to her and she slipped inside. Delicate touches against his pallet, his teeth. Silken glide against his tongue.

She broke the contact to allow them both some space for breath. The air entered and left their lungs in short little gasps. She had never been so drawn to anyone in her life. She'd never been in love and felt the blood-tinged bitterness of one-sided adoration, or even the pain of knowing it would end. Yet no man had ever stirred her soul as this one.

None had ever challenged her, pushed her and demanded more of her than this man. He was constantly demanding and biting, arrogant, and rude. And she had never wanted to brand herself on another's soul as she did with this man.

His forehead pressed against hers, his eyes level with her own.

"You don't want this." His voice was a rough rumble that sent shivers across her nerves. He hadn't released her, though.

Maria nuzzled his jawline determinedly as she spoke. "Don't tell me what I want or don't want. I've already made up my mind. It’s you that needs to decide how far to go."

"You're stubborn, sarcastic and infuriating." His tangent ceased when her teeth closed over his ear lobe, tugging gently.

She flicked the edge with her tongue and released him. Her lips touched his ear as she murmured, "Exactly. You wouldn't have me any other way."

He claimed her mouth again, effectively silencing her.

Maria felt the turmoil of his yearning just below surface. She knew he didn't lose control often. She wanted to see him shed his reserve of restraint and just be with her.

It was part of the reason she pushed him. To see the man he was inside brought to the surface. If anger was all she could stir, she'd settle for it. But given this glimpse of vehement desire, she no longer wished to settle at all.

This is what she wanted. This is what she had to have. 

His hand stroked up and down her spine, alternately crumpling and smoothing her leather top, the other hand wound through the soft strands of her silky blond hair. Winding there and binding them together. He gently drew her head back then, and pressed his hot mouth to her silken throat, his tongue and teeth gliding over her skin, wringing another breathy moan from her. His touch was gentle, his caress almost hesitant. He was an enigma in that such a hard, demanding man could be such a shatteringly gentle lover.

She smoothed her palms down his sides, firm muscle and raw power rippling under her touch. Frantically tugging his clothes she pressed against him, feeling flesh and muscle and bone and the hardening length of him through the layers of leather.

"This is in my way," she plucked at front ties of his shirt.

He released her and his mouth left her throat. He took a step back and then pulled the shirt over his head. There was no hesitation now. Maria found herself looking at his chest, and the rest of him. There was nothing soft about his body. He was so completely different from the man she'd expected him to be.

She itched to touch him. Her finger's twitched and she reached forward to brush her fingertips along one of the more jagged scars on his torso. It was faded, barely visible. An old scar that ran from his sternum to his shoulder, over his left pectoral. Her hand shook. What had done that? He told her once, but she could hardly remember her own name at that moment.

She leaned forward to press her lips against it, feeling the coarse skin against her lips, and the jump of muscle under skin at the contact.

She felt his pulse quicken. She wanted him. She wanted to feel him moving over her. She wanted to taste the sweat on his skin.

She felt his hands frame her face and she looked up at him. This kiss was soft, sweet, a gentle play of lips on lips. Their tongues dancing a slow waltz. They fought so hard, pulling back to protect themselves, but it always came back to this.

His hands slid from the side of her face, down her neck, her shoulders, unbuttoning and pushing open her snug leather top, sliding it off her arms to flutter to the floor. With a deft twist he unhooked the front of her bra and it was tossed aside to follow the shirt.

His palms swept up her sides, over her breasts, the thrilling shock of his calloused hands teasing over her nipples made her tremble.

Her own hands traced the definition of his shoulders, his biceps, feeling the strength there, the calm safety and sheltering comfort. No matter how she infuriated him, how she pushed or prodded, this strength was never used against her. Only for her. Only to protect her.

He broke the kiss to look at her, taking her in. She felt vulnerable and exposed beyond simple nudity. Neither of them had many hang ups regarding their bodies. It was as if he were the one who could see beyond the mortal body and into the secret heart of a person and not her. Did she unbalance him this much when she read him beyond words and actions, beyond what he tried to project? The bond they had forged unwillingly had left them both exposed.

His fingers hooked into the front ties of her leather pants and undid the fastenings. Once there his hands rested on her waist, just above the open waistband, his fingers curling around her sides, his thumbs making sweeping circles against her stomach. His hands were huge and warm. She was lost in a sensual haze as his thumbs stroked her skin into a fire. Her eyes slid shut and her head fell back. Her own hands drew designs against his shoulders, his chest. They were both caught in the emotions between them, one of seduction and need.

Slowly, she unwound her protections and allowed her emotions to slip silently through the contact, taking in his in return. Desire, thick and rich, swam through the connection. Anxiety? She frowned. That he wanted her was irrefutable. That he cared about her was undeniable. He was worried that without her, he would cease to care enough to survive.

The stroking of his thumbs stopped and she felt suspicion, a hint of anger.

"What are you doing?" His tone was accusatory.

"Feeling you. Letting you feel what I feel." Her mouth turned down slightly, "Don't you like it?"

"It's... strange," he lied. It was unsettling. This very connection was what he had wanted all his life, but now...it hurt. It was too much all at once, knowing that long after she was gone, he would still feel her.

"Touch me." Her hand covered his, guided it up her side, over her breast. They both stiffened at the touch. She felt herself coiling as he touched her, the sensation of his warm hand on her breast pulled a thread within her body tight, the reaction shooting straight to her center.

He felt it, too. He felt what she felt, and she felt his reaction to it echo back. Everything was heightened in this state. Everything shared. She was aware of the softness of her own skin against his fingers, of the slight weight of her breast and firm resistance. He brushed his thumb over the aching peak and she gasped. The sensation was raw and almost painful in its intensity.