Uh, this turned out to be a long chapter. But that's good, right?
Warnings: A little lime-ish, Coop x Kiva
Disclaimer: I do not own Megas XLR, but I call dibs on the fat guy.
And with that, on to Coop's POV!
Kiva and Jamie had been gone for hours. Maybe they'd gone to see a movie or something. Or maybe they'd been attacked by the Glorft. Or maybe they were parked somewhere…
Coop leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees. The frantic colors on the TV screen couldn't block out the scene his mind was playing. Why did that bother him so much? As if it wasn't bad enough that Jamie always got the girls. Coop couldn't take it any more and got up to go outside. As he stepped through the door, he paused and looked around. Times like this were very rare for Coop. Tonight he noticed how cold it was getting, and how strange the neighborhood looked under the weird color of the streetlights. He looked up at the sky and felt that he was trapped under a plastic dome. There were none of the stars he was used to seeing when he was training in Megas, out beyond atmosphere of Earth. Everything here seemed so artificial…
He wondered why that had never bothered him before.
He wondered what Kiva's Earth was like. Judging from her suit and from Megas, it was just like most people thought it would be—hard, metal, machine-like. Was Earth really in that much trouble? He couldn't imagine his race so scared and dominated. Poor Kiva.
Coop stepped onto the sidewalk in front of his house and started down the street. He wasn't really sure where he was going. It didn't really matter. He just needed to get away, from all those stupid thoughts, from…
Keeping away from the main streets, he ended up walking his old route to school. There was a park nearby. It was empty. Coop considered taking a seat on one of the swings, but decided against it. Even in grade school he had been wary of the swings. Partly because of the jokes he knew he would be the subject of if he went near them. Being conscious of the effort it would require, he also decided against sitting on top of the monkey bars. He settled for sitting on some steps. Now what? he thought. He wasn't used to being alone like this. When you went off to think by yourself, how did you start? What did you think about?
Kiva. It was Kiva. If only that damned girl hadn't come here. Two buddies didn't need any girls to come around and mess things up. 'Cause that's what girls did. He'd never known them to behave otherwise than, well, girly. Except for moms. Moms were okay. But the moms had to be girls first (cue John Mayer), and somebody had to fall in love with them. He tried to picture Kiva as a mom. There she would be, in the kitchen, in an apron, little Kivas running everywhere. The smoke alarm would go off, the microwave would beep, something, somewhere, would explode, and Kiva would start to cry…The image was so touching that Coop wished she were there so he could comfort her.
And there it was. All he wanted to do, was put his arms around her, and find out about her. He wanted her to feel like she was home.
By the time Coop got back, Jamie was asleep on the basement couch, and Kiva was, presumably, upstairs. Coop was careful to be quiet. He didn't want to wake anyone up. He knew that the first chance Jamie got, he would be bragging about all the details.
But wait! They had promised him their left-overs, hadn't they? Coop found the Styrofoam boxes in the fridge and set to work. When he was finished, he looked at the fortune cookie on the kitchen table. He believed in fortune cookies, and he was a little afraid of this one. For some reason, he felt like he was at a very important time in his life. Like there was some big decision, or some great occurrence, bound to befall him in the coming days.
Well, if that was true, it couldn't be stopped by refusing to eat a cookie. He took it out of the wrapper and broke it open.
"Lucky numbers 15, 5, 23," it said.
Wrong side.
"A long journey begins with a single step."
"In bed," Coop added, out of habit. Not having a whole lot of experience—in bed—he wasn't quite sure what to make of that analogy, but he could figure out the intended message. Take things one day at a time.
"I can do that, no problem!" he said, smiling. Feeling much better, he went to bed.
When Coop and Jamie awoke the next day, they got straight to the video games. After all, the safety of the planet depended on their skillz. Jamie didn't say anything, but Coop thought he looked more smug than usual. Jamie kept on saying nothing, until Coop couldn't stand it anymore.
"How did it go?" he asked.
"How did what go?"
"The date. With Kiva." Coop's character died at an unusually early stage. Neither of them commented on it.
"Oh, it was cool. You know."
"Not really."
"Just trust me, big guy. It was cool." Jamie slouched back into the couch cushions.
"Huh." Coop wanted to ask so much more, but he couldn't. He wanted to know, he had to know, did you kiss her? But he couldn't.
It was a very solemn game after that.
Later that day, all three of them visited Goat in the junk yard. Megas wasn't in particularly bad shape, but a tune-up couldn't hurt. Jamie and Goat lazed in some lounge chairs, talking about babes, probably, while Coop lovingly went over every inch of Megas. Kiva was busy repairing something he didn't understand, or care to, for that matter. He knew how to work all the essential fighting parts, so why worry?
He was shining the left shoulder when Kiva came out and sat down next to him.
"Hey," she said.
"Hey," he said.
"How's it going?"
"All right. We're ready to get fighting, though. I don't like this sitting around. Megas is a mech that needs to be in action."
"You're right about that. I remember the first time we were introduced, and they told me I would be the pilot. I hated that we even needed such a machine, but I was thrilled…" She traced her finger along the smooth, bright surface, and it was all Coop could do to keep from grabbing her and kissing her, but he realized that such an action would probably squish her. He hadn't really thought of that before. He hadn't been conscious of really wanting to kiss her before, much less had he considered the logistics of the situation. Kissing required delicacy, and delicacy was not his strong suit. His strong suit was smashing things.
"I just hope there's still an Earth to defend when I get back." She looked out over the junk yard, but Coop doubted she was seeing the piles of trash and scrap metal.
"What's it like?" he asked.
"Hm?" Kiva turned to him.
"Your Earth. What's it like?"
"Well…" She pulled her knees up to her chest and hugged them close. "Most of the population lives in big cities. We don't have much contact with other cities, and I really don't know anyone who lives outside the boundaries. I'm sure there are some, but they don't have much to do with us. We were worried about overpopulation, but then the Glorft came…" She laughed without humor. "There are a lot fewer people now, but we've lost so many resources I don't know how we'll survive even if we do escape from the Glorft."
"Kiva," said Coop, "you'll get home, and you sure won't have any Glorft to worry about, if I have anything to say about it. You can take some of our food with you too, when you go."
She smiled at him. "Thanks, Coop. I know you're trying." She turned back to watch the sun setting over the hills of waste. She took a deep breath, and put her face down on her knees. It was a few minutes before Coop noticed she was crying.
He reached out his hand, and drew it back. What would she do? Would she think he liked her, and would that scare her? His hand was sweaty, and nobody wanted to be comforted by a sweaty hand. She looked so fragile.
But he couldn't think of anything else to do, and he had to do something. He put his hand on her shoulder.
Neither of them mentioned the moment on the shoulder of Megas. Coop wasn't sure if it would have been within social norms to mention it or not, but he could never find a reason to bring it up. It seemed to him, when they were training the next day, that Kiva leaned closer to him than she normally did, but nobody said anything about it, so he didn't either.
Dinner that night involved all three of them at the local pizzeria. Coop wondered if this had any significance. Jamie still hadn't said anything about the date from the other night. At one point during dinner, Kiva was laughing and playfully pushing Coop on the arm. Coop was surprised, but pleased. It felt so natural. As they walked home, he caught himself almost putting his hand on her shoulder, but Jamie was right there and that couldn't end up good.
It was too much to think about. He and Jamie sat down to play a game of Halo 2, and Kiva went upstairs.
"Jamie?"
"Yeah?"
"Hey, you and Kiva—" Coop cleared his throat. "You and Kiva, are you a thing?"
"A thing?"
"Yeah, like, are you guys…a couple?"
"Ah, naw. I don't think so. It was a date, sure, but she acted kindof weird. I don't think we're meant to be together. The chemistry's just not there."
"Oh. Okay." They played for a while more. "So you're okay with that?"
"Me? Oh, sure. I mean, we're gonna run into so many space chicks, and I'm not gonna want to be tied down to any one girl. Jamie cannot be selfish in his love."
"So you wouldn't mind if, I mean…"
"Wouldn't mind if what?"
"Never mind"
It was late, and dark, when Coop went out to sit with Megas. He didn't have anything he particularly wanted to think about, but he felt better in the driver's seat of the beautiful machine. He knew almost every part of it, and it was more an extension of himself than an inanimate object to be controlled by whoever grabbed the wheel. He felt more at home in Megas than he did anywhere else, and lately he had been coming up to spend time with it whenever things got crazy.
He hadn't been sitting there very long when the door opened and Kiva ducked in.
"I thought I'd find you here," she said. She sat down in the seat next to him, instead of in her customary seat in the back.
"Yup. It's a good place to be," said Coop.
"Megas is beautiful. I want to tell you that I think you've done a good job, no matter how ticked off I seem sometimes."
"No, really, I understand. I can't imagine…I can't imagine coming from what you come from."
"Coop…" She looked at him and laughed a little.
"Kiva." It seemed that no word had ever been harder for him to say. No word had ever meant so much to him, and never had so much depended on saying just one word.
She leaned closer to him. "Well," she said.
"Yeah?"
"Are you…Do you...Nevermind." She sat back in her seat.
Coop tried to think of something witty to say, but all he could think of was getting closer to her, and touching those lips, and holding that slight frame in his arms. How could a guy be expected to think of anything else?
"You know," she began, "I thought Jamie and I would start something. It seemed natural. Two people like us, trapped here together. I thought maybe something would happen." She laughed. "I was almost sure of it, actually. I guess I've just seen too many holovids. Because that whole time I was on that date with Jamie, I kept thinking of you."
His heart beat quicker, and he couldn't say anything.
Kiva continued. "I kept thinking, 'I should be with Coop.'" She looked at him. "It's weird, isn't it? I'm sorry if I shouldn't have said that."
"No, um. I've been kindof thinking that same sort of thing, lately."
"Oh." Now that all that had been said, she didn't seem to know what came next. "Well, that's good, I guess."
"Uh, yeah." Coop's hands suddenly became even sweatier. Every pore in his body was not just oozing, it was flooding. Was this supposed to happen? How was he supposed to cope with things like this? This wasn't supposed to happen. She was going to change her mind any minute now. She'd say, "Oh, I gotcha! You thought I was serious?"
"Kiva?" He had to fight to control his voice.
"Yeah, Coop?" She cleared her throat and put her a stray piece of hair behind her ear. She tried to look at him, but looked away.
He decided to go for it. What the hell, he couldn't feel any more stupid than he did right now.
Her hands were between her legs, so he leaned over and put his hand on her knee.
"Kiva…" he whispered.
"Yeah?"
"Uh, um, well…"
"Coop?" She was finally looking at him. Good Lord, her eyes were green. "Coop, do you want to kiss me?" she said.
"Uh, yeah, I do."
"I want to kiss you too."
Holy hell. It was like hearing an announcement for an all-you-can-eat buffet at a monster truck rally. Coop took a moment to let that sink in.
"Oh, all right!" Kiva leaned closer, put her hand on his cheek, and kissed him. They looked at each other, and Kiva smiled and Coop grinned. He pulled her over onto his lap, and they kissed again.
"How's that?" he asked.
She couldn't keep the smile off her face. "Nice."