Until We Have Faces

[ninefox]

Krell had to pin him with the Force to get him on the altar, and not gently. The back of his head might be bleeding, but it's hard to tell: the antechamber already smells of iron. The whole station is a bristling-black hulk of ancient ore, nickel and iron and ice and stone. The lack of anything resembling alloys or right angles makes it feel horribly unreliable, not a machine guaranteed to keep the air in, but an ancient brooding piece of debris untouched by the steadiness of engineers. It did have an airlock, that Krell and a few shame-faced clone guards shuffled him through, and iced-over doors somewhere in the dimness of their crisscrossed headlamps that must lead back into the warren of Ninefox Point.

The benighted promontory did not orbit so much as a brown dwarf or black hole: it was a rogue planetoid, drifting through the ragged stretches of starless, lifeless space. Here, old Strife, the Dark Side of War, had been confined ever since the ascendancy of the Jedi, noble Combat, and the rest of the Light pantheon. But even reviled and relegated Gods were due certain honors, and retained certain powers - and certain appetites. And Krell - who had his own suspicions about the future of that ascendancy - had come to give Strife his due and be rid of his most vexing problem in one blow.

It's pitch-black with him and the others gone. The heavy magnetic manacles embedded in the alter are utterly immovable; the stone beneath him is pitted and rough and cold, almost untouched since the creation of the universe - except, of course, for all the sacrifices that have come before.

Comments

[callmefives]

He shivers as the monster presses itself to his back, keeps his legs tight together though he doesn't have the energy to curse himself for putting himself in this position. "Ruined now," he whispers, and barely has the energy for that. He's ruined, his service is ruined, what love his brothers might ever have had for him is lost.

"Ruined and done... just want it over." He wishes he'd died with Hardcase, he's the only one who came out of this debacle with his honor intact.

[ninefox]

"Yes, but it's not."

It's never over. It's never, ever -

"We're just ruined together. It's not as nice as death, but it's better than being ruined alone, isn't it?"

[callmefives]

"No," he whispers, voice so weak it's barely audible. He doesn't know how much time has passed, how long he spent in the blackness of the thing's belly, how long it's been since he ate or drank, but he feels like he's barely clinging to consciousness, and it's only fear of the beast curled close against him that's keeping him from succumbing to the darkness. "If I was alone... I could die."

[ninefox]

"Well, you can't," Jedao snaps at him, and sticks a few fingers in his mouth, because he's tired of hearing the same thing for a bit.

[callmefives]

Fives bites down with reflexive viciousness, even knowing it'll do no good. Hell, he's weak enough now it wouldn't have done much good anyway. But it's all he can do in response, and it's better than simply taking the assault. It's all the defiance he has the strength to muster right now.

[ninefox]

Instead of tasting like ash or iron or even like flesh, this time biting makes his fingers taste like something cool and clear and almost sweet: fresh water gently trickling into Fives' mouth.

[callmefives]

He swallows almost as reflexively as he'd bitten at the first taste of water. He's so dehydrated, so dry, but then he spits snarls and tries to jerk his head away, to escape this latest trick.

[ninefox]

Jedao laughs and nuzzles Fives' neck, trailing his wet hand down Fives' chest, rubbing gently over a nipple.

"No matter how despairing you are, you're so fierce," Jedao murmurs, obviously pleased with it.

[callmefives]

Fives snarls at what he's sure is mockery, though the sound is weak and pathetic even to his own ears, and when he lifts a hand to try and push the monster's away a kitten might have brought more strength to the effort. It's humiliating as much as it's terrifying, and he tries to at least curl his arms over his chest and arch himself away.

[ninefox]

He lets Fives push his hand a little, stroking his flat stomach as he licks the back of Fives' neck. He rubs the notch of Fives' hipbone, and trails elegant fingers down his thigh.

[callmefives]

"Stop," he rasps, whisper soft and strained, and turns his head as he reaches to try and push the hand away from his thigh now.

[ninefox]

"Why?" Jedao asks, although he laces his fingers with Fives, brings both their hands back up toward Fives' chest again. "It's the only thing I've done so far you liked."

[callmefives]

"Don't want it," he whispers, and tries weakly to tug his hand away. He's fortunate that he's worn down enough right now that his body isn't giving his words the lie. "Don't... I wanna be clean." Even if he'll never be pure again, he can at least avoid repeating his sacrilege.

[ninefox]

"You don't have to be pure to be good," Jedao tells him, nuzzling his neck a little. "Go to sleep, wildling. I promise I won't fuck you while you're asleep. No matter how much I'd like to," he adds, in a sultry rumble that almost feels like soft fur rubbing against Fives' skin all by itself.

[callmefives]

"Never," he mumbles as he tries to fight off sleep. But his eyes haven't been open for a long time now, no matter how he's struggled, and he feels warm and lax and utterly wrung out, in ways not even the hardest training sequence or the most brutal battle has ever equaled. He knows part of it's his refusal to eat or drink, that it's just making him too weak to fight, but he also knows it doesn't matter; even at his best he could never hold his own against these beings and their dark magic. "Promise. Never."

[ninefox]

"I definitely don't promise that," Jedao purrs, sounding amused, kissing the hinge of Fives' jaw sofly.

[callmefives]

"Rot in hell," he slurs, the words barely a breath of air as he loses the battle to stay awake and drifts into fitful, uneasy sleep.

[ninefox]

"Sweet dreams, my darling," Jedao breathes. And Fives does dream. He dreams of crawling through a desert littered with eggshells, dusty and cool and unbearably dry, until he finds a vine curling up the face of a rock, with gleaming drops of water on its leaves.

[callmefives]

Even in the dream he feels like he shouldn't drink, but he can't remember why. And he's stranded in a desert, if he doesn't drink he'll die. He still hesitates, but eventually he laps a few drops from one of the leaves, and then another and another.

[ninefox]

The water is wonderful, refreshing and sweet and a little tangy, maybe mingled with some kind of juice from the plant; and somehow there's always a little bit more, until Fives has drunk his fill.

[callmefives]

He sleeps less restlessly after that, his body and mind less desperate but both still drained enough to stay mired in sleep.

[ninefox]

There's no day or night in the starless reaches, but Jedao doesn't care; he stays wrapped around Fives, warm and chirring softly, for as long as he sleeps.

[callmefives]

When he finally wakes it's abrupt and almost violent. He feels a strange body pressed to him, strange arms wrapped around him, and he jerks and twists, trying to get free before he even remembers where he is or what's going on.

[ninefox]

"You're awake!" Jedao announces happily, uncoiling enough that Fives isn't so engulfed, pressing up against his front instead, and kissing him.

[callmefives]

Memory just makes him fight harder, and he jerks his head away, or tries to, as he pushes at Jedao's chest and tries to knee him where there'd be tender bits on a human man.

"Let me go!" he croaks, not noticing his mouth and throat aren't so dry anymore. Not yet.