He woke with a start, sticky with sweat and with panic kicking hard within in his chest. He sucked at the air panting loudly, before checking himself.
He mustn't wake her. She had had a long run of it this week too.
"That damn dream again", he muttered.
Reaching out to the sleeping woman beside him, he tenderly pushed a lock of blonde hair from her temple.
"So beautiful ", he thought. So much horror in her past, and yet she had kept a bright flame within her. She had given it out with a smile and so freely. A soft word here, a touch of a forearm there. A tale of Charleston and fresh strawberries for the children. It dropped from her like a scattering of diamonds as she had walked through their temporary camp. "Hope", it would be called, if he believed in such things.
For the longest time he hadn't known what to believe anymore. He had a hard, blank surface, all set for speechifying on such things as hope and the fight eternal. To keep the troops marching, to keep the civilians clinging to something to walk for. All the while his own heart was sputtering out and his veneer of tough indefatigable soldier-warrior wearing thin... All the damned way to Charleston. It was doubtful to Dan in those small hours that he would have pulled the Death March off, if not for Tom's faith and encouragement, taking the weight...taking so much of the weight from him...and maybe just maybe, somewhere hidden inside, even from himself, he had hoped to see her here again too and that that nascent idea of something other than relentless killing, running, had sustained him.
Maybe he could believe in this? He sat for a moment on the side of the too-small cot and watched her breathe. She had insisted the cot would do for them both, even when he had gallantly offered to move to the floor and sleep in his bed-roll. She had pulled him back down to her, laughing, and wrapped her naked, unshaved legs around him once more and held his tired head to her own. He had felt the rise and fall of her breast against his. He could have cried for the comfort and heartbreak of it, but instead he slept.
His dream swam in front of his eyes, snapping him out of his musing. Every night the same thing. Blood on snow, fresh skitter meat strewn among the frozen carcasses of men and women he has known. Stumbling and cold, fingers blackened and snapping to frost bite, he searches frantically for them with a drum beating in his chest, and he thinks his heart might give out if he can't find them, but it will burst if he does find them among the carnage, and it's beating so hard and he can't breathe because when he sucks at the air he only gets ice. But he does find them. Every night, lying in the red stained snow, their faces cold and blue. Their open eyes staring at him accusingly.
His wife and his beautiful daughters.
Tom.
Anne.
Little Matt.
Jimmy.
All of them.
And every night it is mostly the same faces he finds but tonight she was there too.
He dropped his head into his hands and groaned lowly.
He had to talk to Anne about this - maybe she could prescribe something from her travelling dispensary of soon-to-expire medications. They would need someone versed in herb-lore soon….he pushed that thought to the back of his mind.
"Can't do anything about it at this time of the morning you damned fool, and even if you could, is it even any of your concern anymore? Manchester's got that. That and all else."
The fluorescent light from the hallway of the former mall outside was throwing narrow beams through the grills above the door into the unfinished storage room he called his quarters. He stood and dressed quietly, bathed by shadows and light, and then when he at last pulled on his cap, he stepped out into the hall, drawing the door softly behind him so as not to wake the sleeping woman within.
The jolt of the cot wakes her. She can hear him breathing and muttering to himself. "He has been doing that a lot lately", she thought. She wants to raise her hand to his back to comfort him. But she's still unsure of how to show him that she knows. She wants to touch him, to tell him that he is not alone, but she is afraid to. He's so very brittle, he might just break. And they can't afford for him to break.
This will kill her. She curls her hand back to her chest and pretends to sleep. She doesn't even move when his thumb pushes her hair from her eyes and then tenderly traces down her cheek to her jawline. At his touch, she desperately wants to breathe out a sigh as her heart flutters within and her groin stirs again.
He's so outwardly tough and yet capable of such gentleness and kindness. She thinks he doesn't even see that in himself. He's locked it up for so long now he doesn't know what's inside him anymore. He is so busy being what they need him to be that he can't even remember that he used to be someone's son, someone's brother, husband, lover, someone's father. It's only now, in the darkness of this room, when he thinks he's alone, that he drops his mask and breathes for a while. "Breathe with me", she thinks. But he can't sleep.
He's dressing now. She can see silver flashes of his skin through the shadows; an arm, his chest stretching tight across as he pulls his uniform on. He hates that uniform, but she's grateful for it. It doesn't smell. He leaves his shirt open as he pulls his trousers and boots on. He has a good body for a man of his years. She doesn't know his age and she hasn't asked. His arms are strong, his belly is tight, his chest broad, and there's warmth, and toughness, and safety and life when she is encircled by them. And sex. Such good sex. She had missed that.
The first time they slept together was the night that the 2nd Mass arrived in Charleston. He and Tom Mason were drunk as lords and telling very bawdy stories from the before-time. It was good to see them laugh. There hadn't been much laughter to witness when she had visited them on their trail. She had suspected this was the first time the two men had shared a joke together. There was a warmth between them that was tangible, and infectious, so
as the 2nd Mass began to dwindle away into the night , and drunk civilians from their party paired off with their better fed counterparts in Charleston, she had stayed on talking, laughing and drinking with Tom, Anne and Weaver. She didn't know him as "Dan". Not yet.
The morning after, she actually called him "Captain". She smiled as she remembered the awkwardness.
"That's a weird thing to call someone who has had their hands on your naked ass", he'd joked.
Remembering that first night is causing her to ache between her legs again. "Wherever he's gone, he'd better come back here before he's on duty", she says aloud.
"And why's that?", from the doorway. She hadn't heard him return.
"Where did you go?"
"I asked you first", teasing in his voice.
He settles on the side of the cot, leaning over her, smiling. Waiting for her reply, and screwing his eyes in mock interrogation. She remains silent, goading him.
At last he stands and sighs, "Ok I can see you are not going to tell me so I'll tell you. I went to visit our ugly new friend. Ever since we put him in lock up I have been having this recurring dream. It's every night. I don't believe it is a co-incidence"
"And?"
"And nothing. He's under total lockdown. Order from Manchester... That is if it is a "he". Maybe they have no "hes" or "shes". Who knows"
"Tell me about the dream", she asks. "I want to understand."
"It's ah….it's death….you know... Avery? Everywhere. But not the same as before. And I am alive in it. The only one. In the cold... somewhere in the mountains I guess. There's snow on the ground and so many bodies…all cut up and ...frozen...they're frozen." His throat catches.
Avery sits upright on the edge of the cot and this time she does reach for him.
She touches his arm, tugs at his sleeve and pulls him to her, giving in to the need to let him know that she can listen to this. She can take some of this on her shoulders.
Responding to her tug, he kneels in front of her, between her legs and his arms go around her. They stay like that, for a moment, silently holding each other. She can feel the tension pulled tight in his strong back as she rolls her hand down his shoulders to give comfort.
Breathing a heavy sigh, he pulls back and presses his chin against her forehead.
"You don't need to hear this, any more than I need to live it", he whispers.
"Yes I do. I need to understand, Dan. I want to….I want you to...let me inside."
A pause. "Please."
"You don't want to understand. The people...the dead ones...they're you. They're Tom & Anne. They're my Jeannie. All I have. But other people, too, who have died already, like Jimmy. But this dream feels real. Like it's some kind of warning or a whadda ya call 'em….premonition. Something like that."
It's coming out of him in a rush now.
"And I think our friend downstairs has something to do with it. And I don't know what it means other than that I don't want to lose you. Any of you. Anymore. I can't do it again…."
She puts her hands on his face.
"I'm so tired. I can't do it again", he repeats, barely audible.
Letting her go and kneeling back on his heels, Captain Daniel Weaver of the 2nd Massachusetts shakes his head and casts his eyes to the floor, doing his best to hold back a sob from rising and breaking in a tide of remorse and grief and guilt. He knows that if he cries he may never be able to stop.
She knows he can't cry. She doesn't want him to. Not yet and not here in this dingy room. She knows now that more than the grief, it is the guilt that is killing him. They made him responsible for all of them. They made this broken man bear the weight of their lives and deaths. For a moment she hates the 2nd and all it stands for. But she knows too, that he chose it. By becoming their soldier-warrior he could hide from all that the falling skies did to him.
Sliding down from the cot and kneeling with him on the floor, Avery again takes his face between her hands, raising his blue eyes to look at hers. There are no useful words now.
She reaches to him with her mouth and for the longest time covers his lips and chin in long, gentle kisses. She kisses each of his eyes closed. She kisses his nose. She kisses him on the mouth once more. Pressing his face to her. After some time, he opens his eyes, and what she sees there is not guilt, or grief, or pain. She knows the look, and feels the tight twitch of anticipation between her legs. She removes his cap and throws it into the shadows.
His hands move to encircle her waist, and they slip around her back, pulling her closer, tighter and tighter until she is kneeling nearly on top of him, he kneeling beneath her, between her legs. She kisses him on the mouth once more, this time parting her lips. His mouth is hot on hers, and his tongue flicks across her teeth. He is teasing her tongue with his, biting her lip. On his beard lingers the smell of her, from their lovemaking last night, and she groans a little as she remembers what his tongue can do. What it might do now….
His hands are on her hips, holding her, pulling her into him. She can feel that he is hard. Very hard. She can't help herself as she moves to grind slowly against him, feeling herself getting wetter with that exquisite length of pressure against her core.
He is nuzzling at her neck, his beard scratching, and it is sending flutters down to her stomach. She can't breathe. She can't get enough air. She is in the air. Her legs are wrapped around his waist and he is standing with her pushed against the old, broken storage cabinet at the wall, pressing into her, his hands under her ass.
"My legs were dying in that position", gruffly in her ear. "And I can't get your clothes off from there." He nips at her chin with his teeth and she can feel he is smiling against her throat. Good.
He lifts her onto the cabinet and she can smell his hair; smoke from the compound open fires at which he likes to sit at night. She wants his mouth on hers again, but with his hands now gloriously free he's busy pulling her old grey vest-top over her head. "God I hope he tears it", she thinks, "it will give me an excuse to requisition a fresh one from Stores."
She giggles aloud as she gets a flash of what reason to put on her clothing request form. "Reason for request: Replacement required as old one ripped while being removed by Captain Daniel Weaver, Commanding Officer, 2nd Massachusetts, for purposes of engaging in Immediate and Desperate Carnal Knowledge." That would give that hard-faced bitch of a Requisitions Officer something to think about while she fingers herself at night.
He doesn't rip it.
His thumbs flit over her now exposed nipples, sending another shiver to her centre. His mouth moves to where his thumb was, the fingers of his right hand sliding into the top of her panties. He needs to lift her again to remove them, and as he takes a step back, tugging them down them gently, she can feel the calluses on his hands scrape her hips and thighs , trail past her knee and down her calves, as he takes her feet gently, holding them for a moment.
She closes her eyes to the sensation.
"You're smiling you know?" he whispers.
She opens her eyes and as he rushes to her again she wraps her legs around his waist once more. His mouth is on hers again before she can answer. He is urgent with his tongue. Licking and nipping at her, his hands roam desperately from her back to her breasts, his breathing is ragged. His fingers find her between her legs and he lets a low moan when he feels her wetness, slick on his hand. He rubs her hard nub with two fingers all the while his tongue explores her mouth and her neck. Her hips begin to buck in response to his teasing. Not wanting to come so soon, she pushes his hand away and slides down from the cabinet.
"I'm naked and you're completely overdressed", she states baldly, placing her hands on his ACU jacket and feeling through the rough material the solid planes of his chest. She begins the slow, pleasurable task of peeling him out of his uniform, taking her time. She slides the camouflage from his shoulders and down his thick arms. She flings it to the back of the room where it joins his discarded cap in in the darkness.
Rubbing her hands now down his chest she can feel his hard, notched ribs shudder under her touch.
"He's too thin", the thought hits her and suddenly she is saddened.
His tight belly, and ribs are tickled with a down of red hair and she rubs her fingers through it, tugging it playfully between her fingers. All the while her mouth and her tongue trace a line from his neck to his chest, where she rests a bit and bites at one nipple gently with her teeth. His arms reach for her and he's pulling her to him again, encircling her. She can feel his heart thumping in his chest. She can hear it.
Her hands continue downwards until they find the top of the army issue camo trousers. They're second hand, and belonged to a now dead soldier. They've been washed too many times. "They're cleaner than his own gear", she realises, "but at least his own clothes smell of him." The thought drives her to bury her face in his neck and breathe deep. His sweat, mixed with the smell of her on him, tobacco, whiskey, gunpowder and wood-smoke. Definitely better. Whatever had happened on his long road, Charleston's showers had failed to dilute it and it seeped through his very pores. No French perfumer was ever going to distil it but in this wasteland she couldn't think of anything she would rather breathe.
"I know you hate wearing these."
She gently grasps him through the rough, fading material, feeling the length and thickness of him, enjoying the twinge it elicits in her and the groan in him.
She moves to pop the button and draw his fly down, tugging him out of his army issue underwear to expose his hardness to the air, and he feels hot in her hand.
He can't wait any longer and Dan knows that from the sounds of her breathing neither can she.
He moves them towards the cot - she's encircled in his arms and she's holding his cock, stroking him gently, his mouth on hers, as he lowers himself down on top of her. She pushes his camos further down; just enough to allow his full length reach her. She raises her hips to him in invitation and he growls with pleasure as he pushes into her, feeling her close tight, wet around him. Her legs are wrapped around his back. She's kisses him deeply and whimpers a little into his mouth as he pushes home. God, he loves that sound. He takes himself out again to a moan of annoyance from her. She reaches to pull him into her, but he flexes his hip and drives fast and hard and deep into her again before she can wrap her fingers around him. There's that sound again. He needs to move. He has to. Like he has to breathe. He begins to thrust, slowly at first, but her whimpering turns to moans and her ragged breath is hot against his neck, she's bucking against him and he begins to push into her faster. If the Skitters don't kill him, this might just. His heart feels so full. He feels so full he needs to let go. He can feel her clenching on him deep within. She's close.
"Oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck. I am alive", she screams inside.
She's full with him. That ache is growing. The tightness and hardness and size of him moving inside her. She moves in rhythm with him, needing the full stroke and as his cock thrusts down into her she's clawing at his back and pulling at his pony-tail. His heart is thumping against her breasts , and her nipples are irritated by the hair on his chest but she just does-not-care…
The rhythm breaks suddenly and he is moving in her with uncontrolled jerks and it feels glorious and she is going over. She doesn't care if tomorrow she is Skitter food; she clenches around his exquisite hardness and that wonderful heat radiates outward from her nub and her core through to every muscle in her body until even her toes are in spasm and curled under her feet.
He comes in a torrent deep inside her, sweating, panting and groaning her name.
"Avery", he growls.
All her muscles flex at once and she slumps, spent, beneath his comforting weight. This is the only thing that matters any more.
Panting and slickened with sweat, he flips her onto him, still connected to each other.
"That's an impressive move, Captain."
"Not half as impressive as some of yours."
He is softening now and moving to leave her, but she stops him, drawing him back, tightening her hips on him she nestles her head onto his neck.
"Let's stay a while like this."
"Duty calls."
"Ignore it."
"I can't."
"I know. And I am glad you can't. That makes you who you are."
"Who am I?"
"Mine. You're on loan to the2nd Mass but I'll be wanting you back in one piece."
"I believe you."