John and Kaidan fight for the right
to someday be able to sit down, look at the night
sky and finally breathe easy.
OUR SONG WILL DROWN OUT THE SILENCE
by TALKSCHEAP
We stood at the precipice of something great, a feat indescribable in it's immensity and scale.
But there were two figures-In comparisson to what was before them.-the end of all, the slow and steady death of all things. Beauty, sadness, grief and all hope disappearing in the amount of time it took to cultivate the skill and grace to learn the words to describe them...Oh, how they two, standing side by side seemed so insignificant.
Two figures traversing space in a ship made through an alliance of two species once compelled into an interstellar war so horrid it was dubbed the "Contact War". The ticking of machinery, the gentle hum of engines invaded their ears.
They looked on at the array of stars on the mighty vessel the human alliance called The "Normandy" aloft the ship observations deck. Before them the whole galaxy, two specks of stardust,...they stared straight into the abyss and the abyss looked back, gnarling, screaming a horendous note. The one with the blue eyes, dark circles encircling them, they are filled with dreams haunted by blackened trees ensnaring a field charred by a war long fought in the bowels of a time immemorial. His comrade in arms, his reluctant soldier wraps his arms around his torso hoping to somehow ease the heavy burden put upon his long hidden love, so newly sown was the seed only to be pelted with the acrid rain of war.
"John.", a gentle hand against a rough cheek. "Hey, you there? It's me Kaidan. Remember me Shepard?"
The man with the black pompadoured hair says jokingly. He is the lighter natured of the two, usually it is he who would berate his commander and call him names like idiot, stupid or crazy when the other would go into one of his childish moods. The one called John blinks slowly and cranes his neck to kiss the side of the man Kaidan's cheek. He puts his arm around his dearest friend and leans into him. He nuzzles his nose against his neck.
"Yeah, sorry Kay, mind's just wandering again. Lots to think about you know.", John sighs again, tickling the hairs on the back of his lover's neck. "The fate of the galaxy and all that."
"Yeah John, I figured.", he shivers at the intimate touch, he closes his eyes and leans onto Kaidan's cheek.
Commander John Sheppard of the Alliance Military, First Human Spectre, a usually boisterous, scrappy Earth-born orphaned street rat, with horrible driving skills and a lackluster sense of direction, not to mention a terrible personage born with innate verbal diareah is reduced now to a beacon of silence.
"John...", Kaidan starts but stops himself sighing deeply. Kaidan almost misses the practical jokes involving shrinking all his alliance issued casual PTE wear so he had to walk around in short shorts and his salmon pink cut-off shirt with the holes in the armpits throughout the deck for the last week of the fight against Saren. John Sheppard was always jokes...dirty ones. Really bad ones that only he and Wrex would laugh about and ultimately Joker would appreciate. At this moment however, there was a part of John he had not seen before. Maybe he had, but it was always hidden underneath off-color quips about Salarians topping on a Turian and how funny it would be if the Salarian were somehow squished to death or poked and stabbed by Turian elbows. The man infront of him now does not smile, does not poke fun at his hair that he would say reminded him of a Turian's fringe. He has not heard his lover's laughter in so long and it breaks him.
Between the rampant arguing and ensuing angry make-up sex, Kaidan had not realised until now how the saviour of the citadel was all but the most delicate of things. The commander had heard the voices of the lost, heeded their every need for vengence so much so that he himself had turned into one of them. What disturbed him the most of all things, was the silence. He had not wished so hard for Shepard to say something stupid, do something volatile and display his many acts of thoughtless bravery. He missed flinging his hands in the air in exhaustion at his lovers stupid antics and the way John would kiss him, dip his toungue into his mouth and ruffle his hair and tell him that he knew that Kaidan still loved him no matter what because his scars were sexy and anyway Shepard was good in bed and Kaidan wouldn't be able to find someone to replace him.
Kaidan Alenko was at a loss. He had no way of knowing how his love would react most times, being unpredictable. But, now it had seemed to be steady pace of nods and knowing but painful looks.
He was afraid, scared and frightened for his John.
His loving, careful and playful John.
His generous, kind and sarcastic John.
His sweet John who was now sighing into his hair.
Kaidan was the taller of the two and he'd like to hope and pray to be the stronger. But, oh how his faith dipped and curved. The odds were against them, indefinitely. But, the galaxy had John.
His John, who he'd had to hold back because he had lashed out in a fury at an ensign when he'd found the kid had been stealing some of his Blast-Os as John was pointing his light-up special edition Blast-O Electric Tentacle for-cereal-use-only-spoon at the cowering recruit, swearing at the top his lungs for even looking at his cereal in the first place.
His John, who bet James he could jam a whole Tungsten 20mm bullet up his nose and projectile snort it out at one of the thermal canisters, which he suprisingly did so. But not without gaining a face full of snot and a slight sneering mixed look of acomplishment and absoloute pain.
His John, who cried while they were watching Fleet and Floatila on his Commander's bed in his quarters and proceded to dry his tears on Kaidan's shirt as they watched the film over Kaidan's omni-tool.
His John, who accidentally killed all his fishes after not feeding them for a mission or two, packed them solemly into an empty MRE ration packet and had a funeral for them on Tuchanka complete with a two page eulogy about how he missed them staring at him all day especially his favorite fish named Bubbles who would fart in the tank from time to time sending well,...bubbles bursting out of him.
His John, who made the horrible decision to leave Ash at Virmire when the mission went awry as Saren devestated their squad.
His John, whose heavy heart carried the burden of having to hurtle an asteroid towards a Mass Relay killing 800,000 Batarian Colonists for the sake of a billion more.
His John, who had to leave his homeworld burning and dying to follow orders and help gain Earth a fleet through an alliance with the other citadel species.
His John, who ran after Kaidan on Horizon, pulling Kaidan close, begging him to please listen to him and he loved him please, listen to him when he says he was dead and he still loved him.
His John, who watched with sad eyes as Kaidan walked away in silence after they'd just had fast sex on that regretful day on Horizon. Kaidan draping him over a medical crate and fucking him hard, tears welling up in both their eyes as he felt the stickyness of his own seed as it dripped down John's abused hole drying on his prick as it touched the air.
"John.", Kaidan whispered finally.
"Yeah?", came the tired and muffled reply of John, the man, the one thing in the galaxy standing between the Reapers and the end.
"We'll make it through", once the words came out of his mouth he found it easy to believe. "I'll be here John. I'm not leaving."
That night they made love. Their breaths emptying into eachother's lungs. John sighed and greeted Kaidan's prick tersely as his inner walls wrapped around Kaidan with a tight grip that only served to spur Kaidan ever onwards. Their mouthes wet with eachother's saliva, John's toes curling with each thrust, his muscled thighs hefted over Kaidan's shoulders in an embrace that signified his abandoning all control to his older lover.
Soon Kaidan had emptied himself into him and tired and boneless he reached for John and pulled him closer.
"I love you John."
"I know Kaidan.", another sigh. "I know."
Kaidan cupped John's cheek and brought his lips down for a gentle and reassuring kiss. John had not smiled that day or the days after that. But Kaidan knew that one day he'd see it again. Someday after this was all over.
John snuggled close and began to hum softly. The melody was soft and Kaidan tried to think but, could not recognise the song until suddenly he felt John's warm tears staining his chest.
His John.
His John, who would kiss his forehead and lay down next to him when he was suffering from one of his many migranes and hummed him a lullabye to sleep.
His John, who while CO of the Normandy SR1, sang surprisingly well when they were both together, laughing, teasing and kissing in the shower.
John's voice crackled as he sobbed quietly, humming the rest of the notes. Kaidan hummed a long with him, still not knowing the song, tears began shining down his own cheeks as they huddled close.
He was John's Kaidan, and he would do well by him and see to it that John would survive this mission.
A strangled cry and a few short verses drifted into the quiet spaces between.
We stood at the precipice of something great, a feat indescribable in it's immensity and scale.
Two lone figures melding softly into one, nothing before them save the humming of heartbeats and an indescribable hope.