Every time I think I'm done with this fandom...
A Night Out
"This has been fun, but I've got an early morning tomorrow." The other elf slid off her barstool, pulling on her jacket as she went. She was cute, bobbed purple hair, big green eyes and a crop top that showed off the soft curves of her waist. But her hair was possibly the most interesting thing about her.
Holly smiled, nodded. "Yeah, me too. Great to meet you."
Neither of them bothered to suggest getting together again.
Tipping back her beer, Holly sucked up the dregs. The bartender knew a failed attempt when she saw one, and slid her another without being asked. Fingers closing around the cool glass, Holly raised it to her in a toast.
"Date not go well?"
The beer caught halfway down Holly's throat. "Lili?" she choked out.
Perched on the date's newly vacant stool, Lili Frond flipped her blond hair over one shoulder and surveyed the crowd of dancers behind them. She was wearing something very brief and very blue that made her shoulders look like works of art, and her legs look endless. "You know, I always thought you were straight."
"Me?" Holly choked again. "Why?"
Lili slid her enormous eyes in Holly's direction. She'd done something to them to make them look even larger than usual. "Well, you did go on those few dates with Trouble."
"Everyone's gone on a few dates with Trouble," Holly replied, putting her beer down for safety's sake. "You included, if I remember correctly."
Lili propped her elbows on the bar and leaned back, still looking out at the crowd. "I suppose I did. Ah, my misspent youth." Tilting her head, she looked at Holly from under her lashes. Holly felt something flip in her stomach. She told herself it was all the beer. "But you never answered my question. Date not go well?"
"What makes you think I had a date?"
"I saw her leave," Lili admitted, wrinkling her nose adorably. "She was cute."
"Mm," Holly shrugged one shoulder. "Too cute," she added, before she could stop herself.
"Too cute?" Lili echoed disbelievingly. "Too cute for the great Holly Short. What would you prefer? Someone a little more…vampiric?"
Holly rolled her eyes. As Artemis edged ever closer to thirty, this had become a popular theory in the LEP headquarters. "It's not like that," she replied.
"I know," said Lili. "I just wanted to rile you up."
"What did I ever do to you?" Holly's hackles rose.
"You can be a real prick sometimes." The other elf didn't hesitate.
Holly blinked.
Lili made a face. "This isn't going how I meant for it to go."
"You mean you didn't come over here for the express purpose of insulting me?" Holly raised an eyebrow. The night had been disappointing enough already. She didn't need Lili bleeding Frond adding to it.
"No," Lili answered with unintended vigour.
When she didn't say anything else, Holly waved a hand for her to continue. "Then why did you? Because so far that's all you've accomplished."
"Yeah, that's me. Bloody useless."
"Your words, not mine."
"Oh, d'arvit yourself, Holly Short. You think you're so much bloody better than the rest of us."
Holly couldn't hold back a bitter snort of laughter. But she didn't feel inclined to correct Lili by explaining that, actually, she spent most of her life feeling like she was being scraped out of the bottom of the barrel of existence, thanks all the same. "Look, Frond, could you not just—"
"And it wasn't because you went on a couple of dates with Trouble," Lili interrupted, jaw tensing as if for a fight.
"What?" Holly paused in the act of drinking. "What wasn't?"
"Wasn't why I thought you were straight."
"Okay," said Holly, who, frankly, could not care less.
"It was because I hit on you shamelessly all through first year training, and you never gave me anything but the cold shoulder." Lili said all this very quickly, as if afraid she wouldn't get the chance to finish. "Actually, to be honest, the cold shoulder was the nicest thing you gave me. You laughed outright when I failed my first marksmanship exam."
Holly blinked. For good measure, she blinked again, but it didn't make anything clearer. To be honest, she remembered Lili failing the test, and the rush of triumph she'd felt at the time. Not that it had mattered. Lili still got accepted, and Holly, who'd worked her fingers bloody and aced every test they'd ever thrown at her, was still made to feel like she was lucky they even let her through the door.
"Seriously?" Holly shook herself free of the memories.
"Don't tell me you didn't notice. Like I said. It was shameless."
"Yeah, no, I noticed, I just—you were—" Holly licked her lips. She felt like the night had gotten away from her. She'd been having a perfectly normal boring first-slash-last date and now suddenly she seemed to be having a heart-to-heart with Lili Frond, who may or may not have been into her. "I thought you were just doing it to get the guys' attention."
Lili didn't look at her when she said, "Yeah, everyone always thinks that about me."
Holly didn't like being lumped into that everyone, especially when everyone so clearly meant dickheads. She made a face. "Well, you only ever did it when they were around."
"And when was I supposed to do it, exactly?" This time, Lili did turn to face her. "Maybe if you'd have given me five seconds of your time, I'd—" She broke off, teeth dragging at her lower lip. She looked at Holly for a long moment, the changing lights slipping across her perfectly made-up face. Abruptly, she shrugged one shoulder, tossed her hair again, and turned back to the crowd.
Holly was not immune to any of these actions. A little desperately, she reached for her beer. "I suppose we didn't get much time alone."
"We didn't get any time alone. You made sure of that."
"Look, training wasn't exactly easy for me either, you know." But the excuse sounded cowardly even to her.
"And did belittling me make it any better?" Lili looked her straight in the eye.
It had not, and Holly was surprised to feel a stab of guilt. She swallowed, shook her head. "Look, can I—can I buy you a drink?"
Lili snorted. "I don't need your pity, Short."
"No," Holly agreed. "I was thinking more as an apology."
This made Lili chuckle. "You owe me way more than a cocktail."
Holly thought back to her time in the academy, examining it in the unflattering light of this new information. "Yeah," she finally conceded. "Yeah, I might just. Got to start somewhere though."
They were several drinks in before Holly worked up the nerve to ask: "But why me? I mean, as stated, I wasn't very nice to you, and you had everyone else in the academy falling at your feet. So why me?"
Lili smiled in tragic self-deprecation. "Because I have terrible taste?"
"All right, well, first of all, ow, but also…fair." Holly wasn't used to being the asshole. Generally speaking, Artemis graciously filled that role for her.
"Nah," Lili shook her head. "Come on, Short. How can you even ask that? You were the smartest, the fastest, the toughest. The best shot. The best pilot. The best everything. All I wanted in life was to fuck you senseless and then marry you. I mean, how could I not?"
By this point, Holly had lost count of how many times she'd choked on her beer.
"Is it any wonder," Lili ran one manicured nail around the rim of her glass, "that I bombed all my tests first year? All that sexual frustration. I was a mess."
Holly choked again, this time on air.
"You're blushing," said Lili, toying with the spear of olives in her drink.
"No, I'm not," Holly replied a little too quickly.
Lili smirked and sipped her martini.
"Usually…" Holly cleared her throat. "Usually, people find those things drawbacks."
"Yes, well, people are idiots." Lili put down her glass and pushed away from the bar. "I've had enough apology drinks. How about an apology dance?"
Holly licked her lips. They were dry. "All right."
It was a Friday night. The dance floor was crowded. It was always crowded, but Holly could swear tonight it was more crowded than usual. It certainly felt more crowded than usual as Lili was jostled against her, breasts soft on her arm, hip hard on her thigh. Still, when the press threatened to sweep Lili away, Holly reached out without thinking, hand sliding around Lili's waist to draw her back. Obediently, Lili came closer. Very close. Possibly too close. This was probably the reason Holly forgot to take her hand back: too distracted by Lili's proximity; by the way the lights played across Lili's cheeks, her lips; by the way Lili watched her, eyes half-closed.
They drank too much. At some point, they went back to the bar and Lili started buying shots, Holly remembered that. That and how, once, Lili put her hand on Holly's leg, just a little too high. She remembered the sheen of sweat on Lili's throat, and the way Lili worried her lower lip until it was swollen. She remembered Lili leaning in to ask, "Will you walk me home?"
Apparently, she'd said yes, because suddenly they were outside on the pavement, their ears ringing in the sudden, deafening silence of the sleeping city.
Despite Haven's climate control, it was cold after the sweaty closeness of the club, and Lili shivered. Holly shrugged off her jacket and slung it across Lili's shoulders.
"That's why we do it, you know," said Lili, teetering just a little in her heels.
"Do what?" Holly smiled, putting a hand on Lili's elbow. Her fingers caught the soft inner skin of her arm.
"Wear such tiny dresses." Lili's head lolled on her slender neck. "So that you'll give us your jackets. They always smell so good."
Holly chuckled. "I don't know that that one does."
"Of course it does," Lili let Holly lead her, even though Holly had no idea where they were going. "It smells like you."
Holly squinted at the pavement.
"You're blushing again."
"No, I'm not."
"I had no idea it was so easy to make you blush, Major. So many wasted opportunities!"
Looking back at Lili, cheeks pink with cold and drink, Holly couldn't help but agree. She tugged at the jacket just a little, and smiled when Lili let the movement pull her closer.
Lili's mouth was soft, and she tasted like gin and olives. Holly had always thought she'd taste sweet (because of course she had thought about it. Once in a while. For Frond's sake, she wasn't blind), but found she preferred the sharpness. When she tipped Lili's head back, fingers in her golden hair, the other elf whimpered in a way that made Holly weak in the knees. Her hands moved, lower, until she found the edge of Lili's dress. She slid her fingers around Lili's thigh, then up, between them. There was some silky, slip of fabric, the warmth and wet—
"Oh, we are in the street," said Holly, breaking away from Lili with her hands up, as if facing a gunman.
It took Lili a moment to catch her breath. "Holly—"
But Holly was having a crisis, so she dodged. "I thought it was to make your legs look longer, to be honest."
"What?"
"The reason you wore such short dresses."
"The reason we—" Realising what was happening, Lili shook her head. "Well, obviously that too. I mean, I do look fronding incredible in this." When Holly said nothing, she added, "You were supposed to agree with me there."
"Sorry," Holly smiled, but shakily. "You look fronding incredible." She frowned. "Are you allowed to take your family name in vain like that?"
"Don't change the subject," Lili sniffed. Then, more quietly, "Do you really think so?"
"That you shouldn't take your family name in vain?"
"No, you idiot. That I look incredible."
"You always look incredible, Lili, and you know it."
"Yeah, sure, I know it. But I want to know if you know it."
Holly rolled her eyes. "Everyone knows it."
Lili was struck with sudden inspiration. "Is that why you weren't interested in me? Because I look incredible? Do I look too incredible, Holly?" She stepped very close, looking up at Holly through her lashes, and purred, "Like that other girl who was too cute?"
The combined force of the truth and Lili's play-acting threw Holly off centre. "I—" she started, then stopped. "I—yeah, actually, I suppose…kind of. You are too pretty. For me, I mean."
Lili abruptly dropped the act. "That has got to be the stupidest reason anyone's ever given for turning me down."
"I'm not—" Holly broke off and crossed her arms over her chest. "When has anyone ever turned you down?"
"Other than you? Never. But that's not the point. The point is there's no such thing as too pretty."
"There is for me." Holly shrugged, trying to ignore how warm Lili was, and how soft. "It's…it's intimidating."
"Intimidating? You're Holly d'arvitting Short. You face down literal death, like…I dunno, at least once a week."
"Only once a month, surely," Holly murmured. "And death isn't as scary as…as…"
"As me?" Lili whispered. Her voice cracked a little. She sounded almost sad, but Holly was sure it was just the cocktails.
"No, not you. Not you personally. Just…the way you are. The clothes and the makeup and the flirting. I don't—I can't do any of that. I've never wanted to know how to do any of that because I want to be taken seriously. And no one takes girly women seriously."
"I take girly women seriously," said Lili.
"Yes, well…" But Holly didn't know what to say, so she let the sentence drift.
"No, I mean it. Just because I like to look good, doesn't mean I can't think. It doesn't mean I don't have feelings." Lili pulled herself away from Holly, tottering dangerously. But she pushed the other elf's hand away, when Holly made to grab her. "Then again, you always did think you were better than me."
Holly was silent.
"Go on, we both know you do. You think I'm a vapid cow."
"Lili, I—"
"But you don't even know me." Lili's beautiful mouth drooped.
"You're right," said Holly, shoving her hands in her jeans' pockets. "I don't. And I did think you were an idiot. But only because I—I—"
"Because you what?"
"Because I was jealous."
"Of what?" Lili stared. "My tits? Because that is true. You don't have a lot going on there."
Holly snorted. "No, jerk. Of how easily things came to you. You're rich, you're beautiful, everybody loves you. You were no good at anything we did in training, but you still got hired. You didn't need to prove yourself. Nobody's ever made you feel like…like a freak. Because you're exactly what everyone wants us to be, aren't you? You're cute and pretty and funny and know what colours suit you and your hair is always perfect and—"
"Do you really think I'm funny?"
"And—what?"
"Do you think I'm funny?" Lili stepped closer.
"Yes," said Holly. "Yes, I think you're funny."
Lili dragged her teeth across her lower lip. This was the second time she'd done that tonight. This was not enough for Holly to have built up an immunity. "Who's made you feel like a freak?"
But Holly was still too focussed on Lili's mouth to respond.
"Holly," Lili put her hand on Holly's arm and shook it gently. "Tell me. I can't beat them up, but I shall be very demeaning next time I see them. I have a gift, you know."
Holly did look up then, her mouth crooking into a smile despite herself. "Yeah, don't worry. I haven't forgotten the time you made Corporal Shade cry in the locker room."
"Frond, the locker room," Lili groaned, swaying dramatically in her heels. "Don't remind me. You've no idea, Holly. I used to live for the day they'd give us gendered locker rooms. Then I'd have had you all to myself. But of course they never did, so you kept changing in that stall and all I got to see was your ankles. And, meanwhile, I had to smell Grub Kelp's horrific socks the entire time."
"I'd forgotten about those," Holly snorted. "They really were terrible."
"Please, let's not talk about them. I regret mentioning them. Just thinking about them is making me want to retch."
They swayed together for a moment, drunken minds too busy thinking to keep a hold on their bodies.
"I'm sorry I was a dickhead to you," said Holly, mouth very close to Lili's jaw.
"I wish things had been easier for you." Lili tilted her head so their cheeks brushed. "I used to wish—I used to wish being a shit to me actually would make you feel better. I'm not blind, Holly. I saw how they treated you. How all those guys thought you ought to be made to pay for being better than they were."
Lili swallowed, pressing her temple to Holly's. "You were fucked either way, though, weren't you? If you hadn't been absolutely fantastic, they'd not have let you in. You don't have the name like I do—or the tits," she chuckled.
"But you are absolutely fantastic, so they hated you for it. There was never going to be any way for you to win. I knew that back then too. And all I wanted—Frond, all I really wanted—was to help you. But you wouldn't give me the chance."
"Lili—" Holly closed her eyes.
"Come home with me." She put her arms around Holly's neck.
"Lili, I—"
Lili cut her off, hungry-mouthed and eager. When they broke apart, they were panting.
"Come home with me."
"Okay," said Holly, as if she had a choice, as if Lili's lips weren't already on hers again, fingers plucking at her shirt hem.
How they got there, Holly had no idea. The next day, she'd remember Lili's warmth, the dark, fumbling for keycards, tripping on the stairs, falling through a door. She'd remember blue light coming in enormous windows as she lowered herself between Lili's legs, and the taste of salt and the way Lili's thighs quivered against her.
At some point, Holly woke up in a bed she did not remember getting into. It was enormous and white, like sleeping in a meringue. Next to her, Lili was sound asleep.
As quietly as possible, Holly got up, feeling her way through the dim apartment. It was enormous. She went into three separate closets before she found the bathroom, and she got so lost trying to find the kitchen that she gave up and gulped water from a different bathroom's tap. She couldn't find the one she'd gone pee in. It seemed like a miracle she managed to find her way back to the bedroom.
"You all right?" Lili's head emerged from the nebulous duvet.
"Yeah…just got lost." Holly shivered happily as she slid back into the warmth of the bed. Lili immediately hooked a leg across Holly's hips. "This place is huge."
"Mm," Lili murmured, busy with Holly's shoulder, her neck, her ear.
Later, playing with Lili's tangled hair, she asked, "Why did you join the LEP? I mean, look at this place. It's not like you need the money."
"That's certainly true." Shrugging, Lili turned so she could look up at Holly. "But I wanted to be like you. Strong and brave and terrifyingly violent. I thought I could learn all that in basic training. That there'd be some class that would turn me into a completely different person." Shifting again, she pressed her open mouth to Holly's ribs. "But I'm no good at any of that. And I never will be, no matter how many drills they put me through. Not like you are."
"I'm not—"
"Shut up," she cut her off, smiling into Holly's skin. "Anyway, by the end of it all, I realised that I actually just liked being useful. Growing up, I didn't get to be useful very often. Everything was done for us. I just had to look pretty. I mean, I still do that for the LEP. They love to trot me out when they need a pretty face to appease the journalists. Other than that, though, I get to be useful. Not essential. Not like you. But quietly useful. And I like that."
Over the course of the night, Lili had probably said more nice things about Holly than all the nice things everyone had ever said about her all combined, and Holly didn't know how to handle it.
"Lili, I'm…I'm glad you came to talk to me tonight," she said, then grimaced. What a hackneyed thing to say.
Lili didn't seem to notice. She was tracing patterns on Holly's skin with one finger. "I didn't just say it because you can be such a prick sometimes, you know."
"Pardon me?"
"At the bar, when I made that joke about you and Artemis. It wasn't just to rile you up." Lili didn't give her time to respond. "I mean. It was. It was to rile you up, but it wasn't to get even, it was because he riles you up all the time, and, even if it's not like that, you still like him better than anyone else."
"Lili—"
"And I don't know. I suppose I thought if I could rile you up then maybe you would-you would-"
"I would what?"
Lili turned away, looking at the far wall. "Then maybe you would like me too."
Gently, Holly took the other woman's chin and turned her back. "I do like you, Lili."
"Even though I'm so pretty?" Lili aimed for jocular, but her eyes were too wide and too serious.
"For you," Holly ran her thumb along Lili's mouth, "I'll make an exception."
Lili bit her lip, and Holly drew her up to kiss the marks her teeth left.
"Excuse me?"
"There's no need for that tone."
"I beg your pardon, you just told me you spent the night with Lili Frond. There is absolutely a need for this tone."
"For the love of—keep your voice down, would you?"
"You're hungover."
"Yes."
"Well if you'd do the ritual on time—"
"Frond, what are you? My mother?"
"Unfortunately, the adults in my life do tend to need parenting."
"You've never had to parent Butler a day in your life, Artemis."
She heard him chuckle on the other end.
"Where are you now?"
"On my way home."
"At this hour?" Butler's voice filled her ear. "It's past dinner time. Just how long did you spend with her?"
"What is this? Have I been on speaker this whole time?" Holly dodged.
"I think Butler makes an excellent point," Artemis dodged right back. "Besides, I thought you disliked Lili in the extreme."
"Well, opposites will attract," said Butler.
"Mm," replied his charge, though he didn't sound convinced.
"Though you're going to be a wreck for work tomorrow, Holly."
"Frond, the pair of you. Seriously. I'm fine."
"Are you?" She could hear Artemis' raised eyebrow. "You just spent the night with Lili Frond."
"Technically, the night and the day. We spent the night dancing."
"Dancing. And then—Oh, to be young."
"She's not young, she just does regular cardio workouts, unlike someo—"
"Was this planned, then?" Artemis hurried to change the subject.
"No, not at all. I was on a date with some elf I met at a gallery opening, but she left early because we had no chemistry and then, suddenly, there was Lili."
"With whom you had notably more chemistry."
"...yeah."
"Well, I have to say, Major. You always keep us on our toes. I answered your call expecting some imminent crisis, not this."
"I don't know. It feels pretty crisis-y to me."
"Why?" asked Butler. "You had a great time with a beautiful woman. I'm failing to see the crisis here."
"A beautiful woman I work with," Holly pointed out. There were other reasons, but that was the most obvious one.
"Yes, well. It'll hardly be your first office romance." Artemis pointed out. "You dated Trouble for a while, didn't you?"
Holly grimaced. "I wish everyone would stop bringing that up. I'm trying to forget it ever happened."
"And yet you went on three dates, if I recall. If it was so bad, why go back for more?"
"Does this mean we can look forward to at least two more morning-after calls from you? I'm only sorry I'm not there. I have an excellent hangover cure."
Holly smiled fondly. "Of course you do, Butler. And because I'm a glutton for punishment, Artemis, obviously."
"After all," the bodyguard added,"why do you think she's still friends with you?"
"Uncalled for," Artemis sniffed.
Holly's smile grew.
"Honestly, Holly. Why are you worried?"
"I don't know…we're very different people. It…I can't see how it would work."
"That makes it sound as if you were imagining something rather more sustained than a casual fling."
"No," Holly replied immediately. "What? No. Of course I'm not."
"Mmmm."
"Don't mmm me, Artemis."
"I'm simply saying that—"
"Oh, don't antagonise her, Artemis. She's hungover."
"Well, if she'd do the ritual—"
Holly slid lower into the backseat of the cab, only half listening to Butler and Artemis squabble.
"Don't you agree, Holly?"
"Holly?"
"Major Short."
"Shh, I think she's asleep."
"...yes, I believe you're right."
