This is a prequel to my What's In a Name. Enjoy (imagine scary Black Manta voice now) or die.
Guilt. Lots of guilt. And shame. Both were as cold as ice and running through her from head to toe.
It's October, just over a month after the Invasion. After the final battle, during which Tigress and Kaldur'ahm died. At least as far as the Light knows.
Anyway, why does Artemis feel ashamed and guilty? Because she's lying in bed with Wally, who's draped over her like a blanket. Wally, who's supposed to be the love of her life, the one she cannot live without. But he's not. Not anymore anyway. That honor belongs to someone else, to her everlasting shame.
Someone she spent months with, working to bring down the evil known as the Light from the inside. Someone who just understood her in a way she didn't even think possible. Someone who, at this very minute, she's lying awake thinking about. And she knows, she knows how stupid and pathetic that sounds, to say you've fallen in love with one of your boyfriends best friends. But she did.
And it's not like she meant for it to happen. She can't say she's proud that now that she's back, she and Wally barely touch each other like they used to before, and when they do Artemis can't help but imagine she's making love to a man who's Wally's total opposite, like they did that one night on the sub when their feelings overloaded and they just couldn't help themselves.
Of course she can't say that she's not happy that Kaldur reciprocates her feelings. Just that he naturally reciprocates the feelings of guilt and shame tenfold.
And Wally, God, Wally. He doesn't deserve this. Doesn't deserve some tramp who threw away what they had.
But that's just it, the selfish part of her brain says. If you can feel like this over someone else, than just what did you have? "Shut up," she fiercely whispers. She closes her eyes, hoping that the blissful oblivion that is sleep will ease her feelings. For the time being anyway.
Meanwhile, miles away under the surface of the ocean, the object of Artemis' affections is doing the same thing. Lying awake in one of those pod things, thinking about the one he can't have.
Thinking about everything about her, despite his efforts not to. Her eyes (going from dark grey to ice blue in certain lights), her hair (pure gold), her body (the perfection of which is permanently burned into his brain from their night on the Manta sub, and has gotten him through a lot of lonely nights afterwards).
They've pretty much avoided each other ever since they got back. It's just an unspoken agreement between them. Of course it hasn't been that hard, since Artemis decided to go back into retirement. With Wally.
And when they do see each other, they make it a point to stay as far away from each other as they can, or that their not alone in the room, though anyone who caught the longing looks they shared would know in a minute.
And Kaldur didn't plan for this to happen. He had been very happy when he realized he was moving on from Tula and her death. Not so much when he realized he was moving on to Artemis.
He shouldn't, he really shouldn't, he knows fully well that he shouldn't, but he lets his memories of his time with Artemis lull him to sleep, in place of the real thing.
Another month of this goes by. Longing looks shared when they let themselves be in the same room with each other, with plenty of people around to make sure they don't let themselves do anything they'll regret later.
And Artemis and Wally barely talk to each other anymore, though it's not from lack of effort on Artemis' part. She just can't find it in her to fake her feelings for him when she knows that he doesn't have to.
Today Wally asked her to meet him for lunch, telling her he had something important he wanted to talk to her about. And she is terrified at what that might be. Like little-kid-thinks-there's-a-monster-under-the-bed terrified.
And when she gets to the resteraunt, this little seafood place they found by accident a lifetime ago, about ten minutes after he does, he's waiting at one of the tables outside. With no food whatsoever sitting in front of him. Nothing. At all.
Now if Wally was a regular person, this would mean absolutely nothing. But to Artemis, this is a bad sign.
"Hey, Artemis. Sit down." She does, across from him, hoping that the fear she's feeling isn't showing on her face.
It's, like, five minutes before Wally speaks again, like he's trying to get his nerve up.
"Artemis... I know."
Now she doesn't have to fake a blank look.
"Know...?"
"That you ... have feelings, for Kaldur. And that he feels the same for you."
Now there's utter horror on her face, and her voice disappears into thin air.
"I can't blame him. Who'd be stupid not to?" Now he's kind of rambling. "And... I don't blame you, either."
She finally finds her voice. "I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry. I never meant to-"
He covers her hand with his. "I know you didn't. You and me, I guess, we're just not supposed to be a permanent thing."
She is honestly shocked by how calm he is. All she feels right now is guilt and shame and, admittedly, a little happiness.
It's a quiet car ride back to the house they share. Artemis stopped calling it home about two months ago. She packs everything of her's that will fit into a duffel bag quick as she can, gives Nelson, who doesn't even wake up, one large hug and tells Wally she expects joint custody. He gives her a sad little smile, and she returns it. Before she walks out the door, she turns back to him. She knows it pointless, but she just has to say it.
"I really, really don't want to say 'it's not you it's me'. But it is. And I am so, so sorry for it Wally". He just accepts it with a nod of his head. After the door closes behind her, and he hears her car pull out of the driveway, he lets himself cry. Just a little.
It's only when Artemis has checked herself into a room in a small hotel just off the highway going out of Palo Alto that she really lets herself think about the events that just transpired.
She can't go to her mother in Gotham. She just can't. Not yet at least. And she doesn't want to talk to anyone on the team yet either.
Well, maybe someone in particular. Hello, selfish part of the brain. But then the rest of her brain says, Really? It hasn't even been a day yet and you want to make a booty call for the guy you just left your boyfriend for? Really?
Harsh but true. Very, very true. So she waits a week. And that's as long as she can take.
Right now, Kaldur is in civilian clothes, driving a car to the address Artemis gave him over the phone. For the last two plus months he has been in retirement. Aside from his friends on the team, the surface world knows him as Jackson Hyde, while the world of Atlantis still treated him with disdain bordering on outright hatred.
Not that he could blame them.
Anyway, he's going over the phone call he received from Artemis, asking him to meet her so that they could talk, followed with this address and a room number. And he's a little surprised that he's at this motel a mile or two outside of Palo Alto. Right now his greatest hope is that Artemis is safe.
He knocks on the door, and when Artemis opens the door his eyes do a quick once-over for any injuries. None. Although from the looks of it, Artemis isn't wearing a bra.
"Hey, Kaldur. Please come in." Artemis is nervous, wondering if it's obvious that she's spent the last hour between calling him and his arriving that she considered meeting him at the door fully dressed or in her underwear, finally compromising with clothes and no underwear.
He does. Then he just stands, waiting for Artemis to speak.
"Wally and I broke up. Last week." Then she's quiet, waiting for his reaction.
Um, heart, if you would stop jumping for joy.
They both just stand, quiet, waiting for the other to do or say something.
It's Artemis who makes the first move of course. She kisses him. Actually, it's not so much a kiss as it is her lips performing an all out assault on his mouth. She pulls back, to better gauge his reaction. Well she tries anyway.
When Kaldur felt the pressure on his lips decrease, he pulled her back, and met her with equal force. Artemis hears fabric ripping, and realizes it was her shirt when she feels Kaldur's hands on her breasts, and hears his grunts of approval. She unzips his civie jacket and sends it flying across the room, wraps her arms around his neck and pulls him even closer to her body.
They never make it to the bed. Clothes fly across the room, Artemis' ripped in half due to Kaldur's superior strength and impatience. Normally, Kaldur would go a lot slower, so that Artemis may enjoy the experience as much as him. But hey, he's had to make due with a memory for the last five months. There are no words or thoughts other than moans and grunts of approval.
At first all they do is kiss and neck, running their hands up and down each other's bodies as far as they can reach without breaking their kiss, wondering if the other's is as fantastic as they remember and discovering it's even better.
His mouth eventually leaves her's and travels down her throat to her breasts. He sucks on one nipple while his hand pinches and twists the other, to her breathless approval, and his erection occasionally prods into her entrance. His free hand ghosts down her body to said entrance and his fingers slip in as far in as he can, then back out, then in again occasionally stopping to rub her clit.
Artemis is to busy enjoying the sensation to realize that Kaldur's mouth left her breasts until he's licking her clit, which he latches onto like a starved man, pushing his tongue deep and hard into her. It's with a cry that she finally comes, and Kaldur continues to lap her folds before he moves to position himself at her entrance.
But Artemis has remembering him for the last five months too. She rolls them so that she's straddling him, with one hand gripping his member. It's slowly that she moves it up and down, to Kaldur's frustration. He's ridiculously happy when she moves down his body, kissing it along the way, until he feels her mouth close around his length. She sucks and swirls him like her life depends on it, first slow as both can stand, then harder and faster as Kaldur enters a state of bliss, until he comes just as hard as she did.
Even after that, Kaldur takes her wrists and flips them so that he's on top again. He looks at her for approval, which she gives with a nod of her head, before he enters, slowly because of his strength, until a frustrated Artemis wraps her legs around his back and pulls him in deep. He frees her wrists and her hands move to hold onto his hips.
And then it's him thrusting into her, which felt unbelievably amazing, and her occasionally begging "harder", or "faster", and he's only to happy to comply. Soon he hits her spot, and she nearly comes again then. It's only when he hits this spot again and again that she lets herself come, which almost immediately causes Kaldur to come.
Their minds blank, their bodies trembling from sheer pleasure, Kaldur nearly collapses on her, but makes it a point to pull free from her (to her annoyance) to move the both of them so that their lying on their sides. Covered in sweat, and in Artemis' case rug-burn, they stare at each other until their breathing slows enough for them to talk. It's Kaldur who does first.
"Perhaps we should wait to tell the team."
"Agreed. They're our friends, our family, but, still."
Kaldur looks her in the eye before saying "I love you." Whatever bones that weren't melted already just did. "I love you to."
He pulls her closer to kiss her forehead, which Artemis finds very demure after what they just did, then just holds her to him, stroking her hair. She's half asleep when she hears him ask "If I may be so bold as to ask to do that again?"
She laughs. Then she pushes him so that he's lying on his back with her on top of course.
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