Written for comment_fic on livejournal

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Riley knew every inch of Jessie. And every inch was perfect. Jessie was beautiful and brave. And she had saved Riley, making her feel like a human being for the first time ever. Brought her to paradise, where there were warm showers and soft blankets and apples and sex-on-beds and people. People everywhere, most of them hardly afraid at all. Jessie made Riley understand what it is to want to live, not just to fear dying. In the muck, where Riley had lived for so long, Riley hated her own body - it was utterly human, soft, weak, breakable. But then Jessie had taught to think of her body as a package to be opened, as a hiding spot for pleasures that could be coaxed out. And Jessie's body -- paradise within paradise. And like magic, Riley learned to savor being human.

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Jessie knew Cameron's body well. She had helped John fix a glitch once. Since then, Cameron had acted like they were friends, acting surprised every time Jessie rejected her. There were a few lonely nights, though, when Jessie didn't reject her. And Jessie would always hesitate, always get close to orgasm and try to stop, to refuse to allow herself to find comfort or pleasure in metal. But Cameron would always say, "Don't worry. I won't tell anyone. I swear." This simple reassurance, this basic manipulation of the most foolish of needs, would let Jessie finish in a blur of pleasure and shame. It always bothered her, that Cameron could calculate exactly what to say, as if by magic. It made Jessie ashamed to be so easily taken in by metal, by the appearance of humanity. Later, after everything, she would wonder if this blind affection for metal had led to what happened on the sub. And whenever she doubted her actions, doubted her own methods, she would remind herself that Cameron was too seductive to let live.

******

Cameron observed everything about Sarah. More carefully than John, even. But then she knew John, or a later version. Sarah was more like a myth until she went back through time to find them. Then she got to see Sarah, see her mind work. Cameron hadn't looked at anyone this closely since she met Allison, hadn't learned so much from anyone about who she might become.

When she noticed that Sarah was jealous of her, of her bond with John, she did her best to be jealous of her back. When Sarah was distrustful of her, she showed distrust back. She tried to make wry comments the way Sarah did. She even tried her best to be kind to animals. She would learn to be John's protector by watching Sarah -- after all, she was the best fighter she knew.

Sarah had seen victory over far more powerful opponents far too many times. When Sarah was in a fight, things never went the way logic would predict. She would always think of something, some surprise, some way of crossing against the light. It was clear: Sarah was a statistical anomaly. And humans are better than machines at being anomalies.

There was a mystery there, more than a mere puzzle, in Sarah, in her eyes, in her words, in the way she ran and shot and kicked, in the way she did one thing when all available information said she should do the other. There was something in Sarah that might transform Cameron, reconfigure her somehow, if only she watched closely enough. If only she could find a way to unravel Sarah's moods and glances like a skeptic figures out a magic trick. Then Sarah might turn her into something entirely new.