Title: And Between the Wasteland and Sky Yes, the title comes from a Trigun episode
Author: Nagia
Disclaimer: K'val, Syl, and the world of Learning to Fly belong to Peal Fatima. She is awesome. She should get Blood and Thunder out VERY, VERY soon!
Pairing: K'val/Maria, with references to K'val/Syl
Notes: When I noticed the tension between K'val and Syl (and the reason for the tension) I knew I'd have to explore it. Here, then, is my exploration, though it focuses more on K'val and Maria than K'val and Syl. I may be wrong about this, but from what I could gather from the books, Maria was some sort of physical and social therapist for patients whose need for therapy was so extreme that they had to be re-integrated into normal society by constant attention outside of a hospital setting.
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1
The Bors Compound, Scottish Highlands, ABM 525, early AprilMaria stared at the young Keedrow Mreetsai. From the braid plaited into the locks on the right side of his head, he was a Knight, but his Allieged was nowhere to be seen. He sat dejectedly on a bench outside the Bullet Plane terminals, his eyes fixated on his feet.
He had to be K'val O'Morgain Mac-An Bors, Mac-Der Ryan. There was simply no other explanation for a Knight with neither Arc nor Allieged and a broken, anguished look to him.
My, she thought to herself with her first feeling of vicious glee for the year, how low has the mighty one fallen. She promptly felt more than a little guilty at the ironic pleasure she took in seeing him the way he was.
She'd known him before he'd left for Academy Aroyali, disdaining the humble Mreetsai academies of Great Britain for the official, Mreetsai-affiliated Academy.
He'd been among the most popular of the males in the Highland clan. Well-adjusted, friendly, outgoing, handsome… K'val's life would have been easy, if he'd stayed in the Morgain Territories.
He hadn't. He'd taken the traditional path— the TRULY traditional path, not the somewhat-modernized path even the Highland males (famous for being traditionalists) took. He trained as a Druidic Bard, spoke the oldest version of Scots Gaelic one could speak and not be speaking Irish Gaelic, and followed exactly three steps behind his Allieged.
To stay three steps behind her, he'd had to follow her to America.
In America, the popular, friendly K'val had died birthing the K'val before her. Rumor had it that a woman had been his downfall.
"Are you… are you K'val?" She asked, accidentally inflecting it wrong.
He looked up, a traumatized, haunted cast to his face. "Yes."
"I'm Maria. You'll be staying with me for a while."
He stood. "Thank you for lending me a place to stay," he said, his voice the perfect monotone of an early-model android.
"So… shall we go get your luggage?"
He pulled a very, very small duffel bag out from under the bench. "I already have it."
"Most people would have brought more luggage than that." She stared at the small duffel. It couldn't possibly hold all the random personal items one needed! It appeared to barely have room for three days worth of clothing, much less clothing AND chewing cylinders (to keeps one's fangs from growing too long) AND ear-flossing brushes (to keep one's ears free of all the random accumulations of body-gunk one's ears accumulated) AND shredding blocks (to keep one's claws manageable) AND all the other sorts of personal items males needed.
"I figured I could buy what I needed when I got here."
"But… your pension's been frozen!"
He looked at her as if she were stupid. "Do you think I don't know that? I have other sources of income, you know."
"Oh? From what, moonlighting as a gigolo?"
He bared his fangs. "Very funny. No, I did work, when last I was here. I should still have a good deal of credit in my bank account. …Speaking of that, I should go check." And with that, he headed over to one of the few banks still open. There weren't many people in the station, and those who were around were mostly off-worlders, so it didn't matter. There wasn't a line in front of the bank station, and she watched him smoothly and efficiently switch from Bin-Ta to Bin-Gaeli, the standardized language in the Morgain territories.
He returned with a few bills, and she felt her left ear begin to spasm as she noticed that one of them was a very high number.
"What's that for?" She asked, pointing at the high bill.
"For getting my car out of the Terminal parking."
"How long did you have it reserved for?"
"I had it reserved for about nine months."
"Don't you have to pay before you reserve long-term parking?"
"That's a down-payment."
They entered Terminal parking. There was an array of cars parked, none of which could possibly be his (they were all too expensive).
And of course, he headed straight over to one of the most expensive parking spots (one of the year-new ones, that suspended the cars in a force-field, so no one disturbed the cars) and promptly began to fiddle with the view screen, oohing and ahing.
"Uh, you know that if you don't enter a password, you're costing the renter of the space some serious money."
He waved off her concern. "The car's mine."
Yeah, right, she thought, looking at the car (a VERY yellow, VERY expensive Stal— the deluxe Keedrow version of a human Corvette). And my father was an Englishman.
"You don't believe me, do you?" He asked her, turning.
"No."
He tapped the console a few times, and a payment android walked over. The android quietly accepted his money, asked for proof of ownership, which K'val gave, and then the force-field descended back into the platform and the android produced the keys.
"Thank you very much," K'val said to the android, then dangled the keys in front of her face, smirking all the while. "Believe me now?"
"How could you afford to buy that?" His parents, like the usual Morgain couple, had a LOT of children (K'val had twelve younger siblings, and his family wasn't the largest by any means), and money was pretty slim.
"I worked a lot."
Well, he always was industrious. When the boys who lived in and around the compound had first learned that girls could occasionally be fun, K'val was busy learning how cute people thought young, miniature Druid bards were, and how likely they were to throw bills in said miniature Druid's hat if he left it upturned on the ground. Even humans had done it, though they didn't understand what they paying. As he'd gotten older, taller, and prettier, the numbers on the bills had gotten higher and higher. There had been more than a few names and videophone numbers scrawled on them.
"You were always working, if I recall. Working and saving to pay for the Marionette's surgery."
The Marionette… ah, K'val's third younger sister, who had been scarred in a fire K'val felt to this day was his fault. He understood that the fire had been out of his control, but he felt that he might have been able to prevent her from being injured and burned.
"Has she… has she undergone it, yet?"
"No, she's going under the knife a week from now."
He nodded. "So… if you want to go back to your house, I could just follow you."
"Alright."
.
.
.
Maria turned left where one usually turned right to get to the Bors Compound, then hit the button on her dashboard console that connected her to K'val's car. "You ready for a little offroading?" She asked. "Does your Stal do that?"
He grinned. "This isn't a Stal."
"It's not? It looks like one…"
"You really thought I was rich enough to reserve the most expensive parking space for nine months— hell, you thought I was rich enough to get my hands on a Stal? No, I had my car shipped over and then stored."
"Uh… then why does your car look like a Stal?"
"Because I programmed a hologram projector to make it look like a Stal so… people… would leave it alone, not knowing it was my car."
"Then what is it?"
"He's a souped-up mechavehicle, and his name is Bitgangangerheim."
"How did you get your hands on a mechavehicle?!" Mechavehicles were the Mreetsai equivalent of human Tanks, and they were… large, cumbersome, destructive, and nigh unstoppable. They were also Mreetsai-only.
"And it's only a year old! But they were having all sorts of problems with it, so I made a wager with the fourth Yadda's Second-in-Command, that if I could fix it, then I should keep it. He agreed. And I fixed it, so now I have it."
And suddenly the image on her monitor that displayed the other vehicles wavered. It changed into a monstrous, hulking box of yellow metal with black flames streaking across it, nearly as big as a tank and very battered, its rear covered in bumper stickers (featuring slogans such as "Free all bagels," "The Mirar is the widow of your soul," "Aurelius Aylu for All," "Human = fish legs. Yum, dinner!" And "If it ain't Bear, it's bull-you-know-what!"). There was a hole in the top of it, with a monstrous energy cannon poking out. What she could see of the inside was covered in weapon racks, gun racks, ammo chains, and energy canisters, with a few firing stations.
The thing looked like they'd designed it with "SUPER MEGA DESTRUCTION (TM)" in mind.
"Alright then, get ready to swerve off onto an unpaved road in those woods," she said, then closed the connection.
Less than sixty seconds later, a Mirar's face appeared in her console.
"This is Cieli Aylu Mirar, De Luisane, Allieged to K'val," said the Mirar, warily.
"Ah, you're K'val's Allieged."
"I am. Have you picked him up?"
"Yes— tell me, what, exactly, is wrong with him?"
"He was involved with a sadist. She beat him badly, but he kept going back. Eventually… she broke him. I'm not sure what's wrong with him, but she kept him in a cell for seven days and starved him. He… he asked her to hit him…"
Hmm… sounded like a case of touch starvation. And sadism… well, being involved with a woman who thought beating you up was fun could do all sorts of things to your head.
"Can you— can you help him?" The Mirar paused before help, as though she'd been thinking of another word. The word she'd been thinking of was probably fix.
"Yes, I can patch just about anybody back together." I'll find a way, she promised herself. This case looks tough, but it's probably not as hard as it looks.
"She broke his tail in six different places, did something to his spine, and cut him so deeply on his sides that he nearly bled out. He couldn't even walk, when she told us to come and get him."
On the other hand…"He isn't one of the mutations, is he?" 'Mutation' was a slang term for a Keedrow who had multiple nipples on the sides of his or her torso. Long ago, the Keedrow had been a species that produced litters rather than single offspring, and they'd had multiple nipples. Six thousand years ago, the DNA modifications had removed those chromosomes, but in areas with small (and very, very, very, very lightly inbred) populations, such as the Morgain territories or northern China, the gene sometimes resurfaced. Half-breeds whose Keedrow heritage was northern Chinese were known to carry it.
If K'val was a mutation, then the cuts might have permanently damaged some rather important nerve endings.
"No… I don't think so. His nipples are on his chest— I think I saw them through his shirt, once. And usually with mutations, they're only the sides, right?"
"Not necessarily with all mutations, but with Morgain mutations, yes."
"Then no."
Well, that was a start, at least. But she'd shattered his tail, and he'd begged to be hit? Definitely touch starvation, and he probably had an inferiority complex to boot.
Well, she'd have to see just what the woman had drilled into him, first.
"What was the woman's name?" Maria asked.
Cieli hissed at the mere mention of the girl. "Syl," spat the angry female.
.
.
.
She led K'val to her cabin (a hunting lodge she'd inherited from her Great-Uncle, the Laird). He parked the Bitgangangerheim and followed her into the house with his duffel.
It felt odd, to have a patient in the house again.
He took the measure of her foyer in an instant, and had some measure of the living room in another instant.
"Where will I be staying?" He asked. Usually patients who underwent such extreme physical therapy as to actually become live-in patients stayed in a room built for them, so that they could be constantly monitored.
"It's a two-room lodge," she said quietly, "but the loft is large enough to hold you and three others, and has a bedroom, so it shouldn't be a problem."
"I'm staying in the loft, then?"
She pointed to the upstairs area. It was all one big loft, with a balcony that had a table and chairs and a railing. She would be able to monitor him closely from where she slept on the couch.
She only came to the lodge when she was 'open for business,' which was during autumn and spring. She didn't stay in the lodge during winter (though she did work), because of the possibility of being snowed in with an unstable patient, and she didn't see patients in the summer, because of estrus.
He nodded and made to go upstairs, not at all disturbed at the fact that he would be in her sight and senses at almost all times.
"Wait, please," Maria said. She touched him lightly on the elbow.
He jerked, then whipped around. "Yes?"
"I need to weigh you, and see all your injuries for myself."
"A physical," he sneered. "Want a urine sample, too?"
"Oh, stop! It's not at all an invasive procedure!"
"The procedure isn't, no. But you're going to sit back and wonder to yourself the details of how I got my injuries, considering the general facts— and that is invasive."
He had a point. "K'val, how about this? If an injury strikes me as odd, even taking into account of how you received most of your injuries, I'll mention it. If you decide to tell me, fine. If you decide it's too personal, also fine. And I'll put it out of my head."
"You promise?" He narrowed his eyes, giving her the distinct feeling that her promise would be taken seriously.
"I promise."
With that, he followed her into the kitchen. He blanched when she told him to strip, backing away.
"K'val," she tried to put it gently, "I'm not like that. I don't want you take all your clothes off… just most of them. I need to see every single one of your injuries, AND get an accurate weight."
He sighed. The shirt came off… then the kilt… then the pants… until he was standing in front of her in his underwear, with his shoes and socks in hand, and his clothes neatly folded under the other arm.
His lack of clothing yielded an impressive view. He was tall for a Morgain man B(Morgain men were notoriously short and furry, to conserve heat), with a broad chest, washboard abs and what looked to be the beginnings of an excellent waist (and probably something at his waist was /equally/ excellent). His legs… well, she would have killed to have his legs, and she would have died if he could switch tail-bases with her boyfriend.
"Put your clothes on a counter and step on the scale," she said.
K'val obeyed without comment.
The scale read 210— not NEAR enough for a Mreetsai male. She wrote that down on a glass notepad and then motioned for him to step off the scale. She dragged a kitchen stool over with her foot and then stood on it, to get a better view of his head and face. There was a tiny scar on his right ear (which had begun to twitch madly the instant she touched it).
He'd gotten it when Syl bit him, one night, and she winced in sympathy. Bad enough to be bitten in the ear, but then to have to admit it?
There were still bite imprints on the back of his neck, but she skimmed over that. A Dominatrix frequently bit her partners on the back of the neck, an "obey me" pressure point.
There was a slice mark on his left nipple, improperly tended.
"I… wanted to tend that myself," he said.
"You didn't do a good job of it. It's still partly open." She swabbed it with alcohol, making his breath hiss through his teeth.
And then her nose noticed something embarrassing— the pain had aroused him. Maria took a step back, reddening. A stripe of pink appeared on the bridge of K'val's nose.
"That must be… uncomfortable," she said.
"Uncomfortable. Yeah, that's a good word." He said bitterly, and she couldn't tell if he was being sarcastic or just hateful.
"I'm sorry… I didn't mean to hurt you." Or give you a stiff one.
He sighed. "Just get on with it."
So she canvassed the front of him, down to his ankles, and then made him turn around.
"My god…" the words came out breathy. His back was a maze of welts and scratches and red marks, and more than a few half-healed cuts.
Deep cuts.
"It must hurt like hell…"
"That's why I wear flannel undershirts," he replied, acidic.
"Will you stop being hateful? I didn't do this to you!"
He turned around, his fangs bared. His hand lashed out too fast for her to see, and suddenly she was pressed up against the wall, pinned beneath him.
"No, you didn't." The words were more growls than words. "But you're enjoying it."
She found herself stammering, instinct keeping her from meeting his eyes. "I'm— I'm— I'm not!"
"Don't lie."
Maria squirmed. "I'm not!" She stopped squirming when she realized that K'val was just taking his anger at Syl (what anger he was capable of feeling at her) on her. He was doing this to reaffirm that he could take care of himself, that he hadn't been broken. He was still a man. She raised her chin, used her understanding like a weapon.
"K'val, I am not Syl. I am not remotely like her. Your back and ass would be very, very nice if they weren't covered in welts and scratches. But they are, and if they weren't, you wouldn't be here." She spoke slowly, defiantly. She met his eyes directly. "I am not enjoying this. It hurts me to see a Knight so wounded— you're one of our own, K'val, and she should never have been able to touch you."
The last sentence nearly sent him into a rage. The anger lasted until she calmly removed the tiny tranq gun from its equally small holster and shot him with it.
The snarling continued until about four minutes later, when he began to blink heavily and his ears began to droop. Within another two minutes, he was slumping against her. She cradled him as he sank to the floor.
End part one