#swimmingbird

1.  When she was eight her mother had bought her a practice suture kit. She’d had to practice at it, and practice at it. Proof that one day she’d be the doctor her mother always wanted. When she was twelve, she’d performed her first sutures herself. A terrible cut on a man’s leg. The blood, and the screaming hadn’t frightened her. By this point she was used to it. When she was fourteen, she was good enough at stitches to perform them without her mother. She may not be the doctor her parents had hoped for, but she made a fine medic in a pinch. When Spike had collapsed outside her door it was the first time she was grateful to be so well trained in medicine.

Sing for me. 

He’d almost died, out there on her sidewalk. She had almost lost him, and it was when she had realized she couldn’t loose him. Live without him. She had grown so attached to his easy lopsided grins, his warm eyes, to lending him Whitman, and Hemingway, and Plath.

Just like that. Sing for me. 

Everything was changing between them. Had changed.

She took his sutures out, his injuries were healing, open flesh turning to shiny pink scars.

“Looks like you survived this one, lucky I was home,” she said, her fingers brushing over one of the scars, tracing the raised edges, leaning over she brushed her lips against the fresh scar. “I’m glad I was.”

2. It was pouring outside, her hair was wet, the golden waves wild as the humidity caused her hair to curl tighter. This time she had sought him out. Coming across the city to his apartment, she felt like it must be safer here, he would be less like to find them here. Her arms wrapped around his neck, her body close to his as her heart thundered in her chest. She felt warm, as her lips were on his, hungry, ready to consume. She felt like some burning thing. 

Had she ever known passion like this? Hunger like this? Every night with Spike it felt as if she might die from the want of him. So she sought him out. Came to him. As soon as the door closed behind them she stepped into his arms. Into the fire. Her lips are on his, and all she wants to do is burn. 

3. No one could desire that which they already had. For as long as she could remember she wanted freedom. Because she never had it. Her prison was too comfortable, too gilded for her to complain about it, but she couldn’t ever help feeling like she had been born into a trap. Into a cage. She wanted to be free. She felt free with him. 

The first choice she had ever made for herself, and herself alone. No other reason than she wanted him. Wanted to be with him. Julia watched him for a moment, the light of the room low. The two moons, and the city lights filtered in from outside. Leaning in she pressed her lips to his shoulder, a grin pulling at her lips. “You know, I think you might be the most beautiful person I’ve ever seen,” she said, her smile soft. “You even look good with the neon lights pouring in from outside, it’s really impressive,” she murmured, before she leaned in, and brushed her lips against his. The same spot Phobos (or was it Deimos shining in her bedroom window?) had been kissing before. She plucked the light of the moons of mars right from his lips and swallowed it whole. 

4. It was too sudden. It was all rushing by her so fast she couldn’t keep track of it. Couldn’t see it. It was the wind in her face, in her eyes, she couldn’t catch her breath. They were going to leave. Going to make a run for it. He was all easy smiles, and deep promises, and she was ... scared. Scared of what could happen to him. Scared of the syndicate finding out. But fear didn’t make her choices for her. They’d leave, and then ... and then they’d be together, and they’d live. She had to believe that. Had to believe him. 

Reaching forward she caught his hand, lifting the back of it to her lips, as she pressed a kiss there, before she leaned in and kissed him. Kissed him before he could walk out of the apartment. A kiss at the threshold. A kiss for luck. A kiss goodbye she didn’t know which. 

She wouldn’t find out until later which it had been. 

5. Ceramic scrapped against the little table in what accounted for the ship’s living room. A casserole made of eggplant, and tomatoes and zucchini occupied half the plate. A seared chicken breast sat next to it. Savory and sweet, the smells of roasting vegetables and frying oil still hung in the air. Warm in ways that the smell of cooking could only be. 

Leaning over she pressed her lips against his cheek, a soft, brief kiss before she sat down next to him to have her own dinner. How easy it could be to take this moment for granted. It wasn’t a kiss unlike the one she had given him that morning as she passed off a cup of coffee so black it looked like color could get lost in it. Or the other day when he’d gone off to look for information on a bounty. Or last week before she had gone to take a bath. 

https://swimmingbird.tumblr.com/post/637716164155408384/the-smirking-fox-sent-this-might-have-passed

The armored bounty hunter took cover behind a part of the alley wall that stuck out just enough to provide temporary shelter from what would no doubt be a hailstorm of bullets, then motioned for Spike to do the same behind a dumpster on the opposite side. Sure enough, four men dressed in some kind of religiously-based robes came into sight. Their faces—presumably entire bodies—had undergone extensive modifications via cybernetic prosthesis.

“Eh, some obscure cult or whatever that subscribes to transhumanism. Said that humankind is destined to outgrow their biological functions and become one with the machine, or something like that.“ He was briefly interrupted by a bullet ricocheting just near his head. “I’ll just give you the pamphlet once we’re done here, but long story short: there may or may not have been a kill order put out on prominent members of the cult, and I may or may not have taken it, and they may or may not want my head on a stick. I just don’t know how they tracked both of us, though. I mean, they can track people with cybernetic implants, prosthetics, etc. Even something as simple as an eye. But neither of us has those, or I don’t, anyway.”

Dark eyes glance over at their current company, evaluating him with a cool wonder about them.

“You’re not decent, hm?“ Atieno’s expression is fairly open, almost accepting of the lack of decency that this man seems to have about him.  It doesn’t make him any less curious, in ways that they are still trying to work out.

“Guess you wouldn’t have to be decent for the things that you do. Decency isn’t exactly require for survival. Not in this part of the universe.. or any part really.“ Decency.. it’s appreciated but not required and Ati is far too used to those whose sheer cruelty still makes them repulsed.

“For someone who protests so much.. “ their fingers drum against the table as they think through it. “Maybe you’re not decent, I’ll take you on the word for it. But how would you describe yourself then?“