Anna waited for John to sit up, frowning, "What's wrong?"
"I don't want to let what Mrs. Patmore just said lie."
"Why not?" John waved a hand at the closed door, "She doesn't know us or what we're doing. It's all stuff and nonsense from someone with no perspective."
"I think she's got a perspective we need to consider." Anna held up a hand to stop John's argument. "Please let me finish before you speak."
John nodded, "Alright. What's troubling you about what she said?"
"If I said everything would you blow a gasket?"
"Anna," John leaned forward enough to cover her hands where they clasped around her knees. "You're my wife. We're partners in all things. That means that your opinions should be as expressed as mine and I want to hear every one of them."
"Even if you don't agree?"
"Especially if I don't agree." John kissed her knuckles, "Now what's bothering you?"
"We almost died, in that cockpit, and we didn't spare a thought for ourselves."
"I don't follow."
Anna rotated enough to face John. "We've got a little boy who'd spend the rest of his life wondering what happened to his parents. He'd be raised by good people but not by us. He'd hear stories about us but never know us." She sniffed, wiping at the unexpected tears in her eyes. "We almost left our son as an orphan because we were so caught up in revenge and destruction we didn't think."
"And that's what you think is happening here?" John motioned between the two of them, "We're forgetting where our obligations lie?"
"I think we're forgetting a great many things, John." Anna took his hands in hers. "We're married and we don't even live together. We've a son but we're not raising him. We're always looking over our shoulders, waiting for the government or the RA or someone with a grudge to strike us down."
"I've made enemies, Anna, and I know it's not the best of situations but there's nothing I can do about that now but try and correct the mistake."
"No, John," Anna shook her head, "I'm not being clear because that's not what I'm saying."
"Then please," John's eyes pleaded with her, "Explain it so I understand. I want to understand so desperately and I don't."
"What I'm saying is maybe Mrs. Patmore's right. Maybe it's time we left this battle to someone else." Anna put a hand to his face, running her fingers over his face. "The Brothers seem to have the government well in hand, your work is already sparking the right kind of uprisings to finally throw the government over, and with the RA weakened they'll crumble into dust or blow away."
"You think we can safely go back home? Return to our lives and be finished with all this?"
Anna nodded, "We can go back and be parents to a little boy who wants so desperately just to learn how to walk." She cupped his face in both her hands, shifting so she sat between his legs, the comforting whir of the gears and gyros in his cybernetic one reminding her of why they first met. "He needs us more than the nameless millions who have others to watch over them. We can't leave him anymore."
John nodded, "You're right."
"John I don't want you to feel that you're giving up on your dreams." She smiled, "It's why I fell in love with you in the first place."
"We just need a new dream." John brushed some of her hair out of her face. "It's time for us to make a new dream together."
"I'd like that."
"Me too." John leaned forward then stopped, sniffing. "First I think we should clean ourselves up. We're not exactly in the best of states."
Anna laughed, "No, we're not."
They dug through the cabin to find a place to clean their clothes before John pulled the components for the shower together. He knocked on the wall of it, shaking his head. "It won't have very much hot water unless they're running it past the radiation drive."
"Then we'll just have to share." Anna teased, pushing John toward the stall. "No time to waste Mr. Bates. Our clothes will be done soon and I'd hate to have them clean before I can wear them."
John grinned, stepping in the stall and turning on the spray just as Anna joined him. The spurt of cold water hit her back, sending her into him. She swatted at his shoulder, grabbing him around the waist to turn them around and expose his back to the cold water. He yelped, struggling to adjust the knobs as they both shivered a moment.
When he finally managed to get control enough to give them a steam stream Anna already had her hair lathered with soap before scrubbing over herself. She ducked his arm to rinse off, sighing at the feel of the water washing away the days of grime and sweat from her. Closing her eyes she lost herself a moment in the feel of the water over her.
Her eyes opened immediately when she felt hands in her hair, massaging her scalp until she groaned. Anna's body slumped back, sending her forehead to rest on the stall wall, and John continued to ease the soap from her hair. Instead of stepping away he moved closer, kissing over her neck while blocking her from the spray, and shifted her drenched locks out of the way while he continued his attentions on her neck.
Anna flailed her hand to the side, shutting off the water as a jet of cold water hit her through the small gap between she and John. When she went to turn John leaned back enough to give her room but surprised her by sinking to his knees in front of her. Her hands went to his shoulders, trying to pull him to stand again, but John shook his head while sculpting his hands up her thighs.
"I'd like to show my wife how much she means to me, if you don't mind."
Anna grabbed a handhold on the wall and sucked air into her lungs when John's mouth moved over the skin of her stomach. His tongue licked at the drops of water dribbling their way down her abdomen, following their progress before leaving a trail of his own. She clenched her hand around the bar when his teeth scraped just under her navel before giving in to a stuttering moan at the feel of his fingers brushing over her folds.
He eased her legs apart, kissing his way to the bundle of nerves there while he slipped his fingers carefully over her wet skin. When his tongue ventured to taste at her Anna clawed her other hand for purchase in his hair. And when his palm worked against her to give his fingers better leverage inside her Anna tugged him closer.
Given the slipperiness of the wall she tried to keep her feet planted, relying almost entirely on the grip her right hand had on the handhold of the shower to prevent them both tumbling to the slick floor. But John risked a hand to her hip, pressing her back into the wall, as his other hand labored tirelessly with his tongue to send sparking sensations rippling through her whole body. Her sob drove her eyes shut and her hips rocking against his mouth.
Teeth and tongue worked in tandem to lick and suck at her, driving Anna to writhe in his grasp. When his fingers scraped along the inside of her, rasping where her voice screeched before she could contain herself, her body surrendered to the sensations. All sense was long gone and she submitted to the pleasure overriding her system that warned of propriety on a strange ship with strange people as Anna let herself climax with a high-pitched cry.
Her chest rose and fell in time with the trotting thump of her heart, leaving Anna limp in John's steady grip. His mouth nipped up her body, hands gliding over her skin now sticky with her sweat and slippery where any remaining water lingered, to take her mouth. Anna pulled him closer, her hand forming a claw at the back of his head while she controlled his movements over her lips.
She risked releasing her handhold to take another. John groaned into their kiss as she wrapped over his erection. Her wrists stuttered, energy still flagging as she tried to return from her orgasm, but Anna maneuvered her leg over John's hip to pull him closer to her.
He responded immediately, grinding into her hold. Anna broke their kiss, moving her lips down his chest while the fingers of her other hand left their hold at his neck to run through the wet hair there. John's grip tightened on her hips to hold her closer to him.
In a moment Anna surprised him, and herself, by turning in his hold. Her hand covered his at her hip, pulling him closer until her chest touched the wall. She shivered slightly, forcing her eyes to stay open when John covered her smaller frame with him figure, and sighed when he repeated his earlier action of leaving kisses over her neck and shoulders.
John moved a leg between hers, spreading her enough to slot himself right behind her, and bit down on his own groan when Anna rocked against him. His hand at her hip held steady while the other distracted her with an upward path toward her breasts. She whimpered at his cold fingers kneading over her skin.
"Are you ready Anna?"
"Yes." She managed, nails digging into the skin of his thigh as he entered her.
They paused a moment. Anna knew their latest encounter was different. They had been dying… or about to die, in the middle of nowhere. They had been celebrating the final moments of life. They had no time to anything but drown themselves in the moment.
But this time, with John rocking slowly in and out of her, was very different. The control of his motions, with gentle adjustments of her body to meet him at the right moments, was not just gratitude at their survival. It was not even the nervous release due to their change of fortune or their odd circumstances.
This was the unity they always had. Anna leaning back to his chest, moaning at the feel of his hands still playing at her breasts, needed no words for direction. The increase in his speed at the catch in her breath when her keens struck higher chords spoke not just of instinct but learned behavior.
Anna pulled John's mouth to hers, sharing a deep kiss when he struck inside her just as the hand at her hip slipped to her nerves to stroke her to her second climax. The final stutter of her hips, in response to the last plunges of his body, had Anna sighing to finish their kiss. John held her close, pulling free while staring down at her.
"Are you alright?"
"How could I not be alright?" Anna traced the line of his jaw. "I love you and I'm here with you. I couldn't be happier."
"That's not true." Anna frowned and John smiled, kissing below her jaw. "If Jack was here it'd be perfect."
"If we're splitting hairs about this, Mr. Bates." Anna chided, risking a rinse in frigid water to clean them both off before they stepped into the welcoming embrace of fresh towels and then their own clothes. "I'd be perfectly happy if we were in our flat, Jack nearby, and we could then curl up in our bed with our son between us."
"He kicks you know."
"But it's worth any bruise just to have him close." Anna held her hair up, allowing John to tighten her corset before securing her hair on her head. "One day he won't want anything to do with us because we'll be parents and old and not cool enough for him."
"Don't say things like that." John lay on the bed, Anna crawling next to him. "I'm a cyborg so I'll always be cool."
"And I won't be?"
"Well?" John shrugged, then lifted his arms to defend himself from Anna's playful swats. "I'm just having you on."
"I hope so." Anna settled her head on his shoulder, smiling when his hand held hers on his chest.
They lay in silence a moment before Anna spoke again. "Why'd you start writing against the government?"
"I thought I told you that."
"Yes," Anna pushed herself to rest her chin on her hands, folded over his chest so they could look in one another's eyes. "You said you wanted to stop injustice but how'd you know it was coming."
"I recognized the signs."
"How? No one else did." Anna shrugged, "Or, if they did, they didn't react."
"I'm a student of history," John pulled one of Anna's hands free, playing with it. "When I was younger I was fascinated with the First Great War."
"That was ages ago."
"But it was important." John ran his fingers over her, tracing with such precision Anna was sure he wanted to commit every cell of her skin to memory. "Back then the Germans struggled to find energy sources to fuel their empire. People died and there was nothing to be done."
"What happened?"
"They discovered how to make nitrogen. How to literally pull it from the air."
"So?"
John managed a half smile, kissing her hand before returning it, "They used that to power their weapons, to make better weapons, and to kill. They took a tool that helped save thousands and used it as a tool to slaughter millions."
"That's the risk of development anywhere."
"But that's how I knew." John sighed, "Every government that feels weak, that feels they need to prove something, that feels they deserve more than they have will take their innovations for the betterment of man and turn them into weapons to destroy their neighbors. They'll show their power not through technological advancement for the gain of all mankind but to crush those opposed to them."
"And you saw it coming?"
John nodded, "I watched the decisions take the path history proved time and again leads only to death and destruction on a grand scale."
"John Bates just couldn't stand by." Anna moved a bit of hair back from his forehead, "Because you're too loyal and noble and all those things that should leave me shaking my head at you."
"But?"
"Instead they just make me love you more." Anna kissed his cheek, returning her head to his shoulder. "You couldn't let lie could you?"
"I watched too many places burn to the ground, sacrifices on the altars of man's pride and arrogance. I wouldn't let another burn without saying something about it."
"And now?"
"Now we're seeing the people who've finally woken up see it." Anna could feel John's smile as his chest expanded. "History turns to this point too. The wheel adjusts for people to gain control of their lives again and seize back what they've lost."
Anna stayed silent a moment, "I'm glad you helped me see it."
"I'm glad you wanted to see it with me." Their hands intertwined, "There's no one I'd rather share this with than you."
"I'm glad." Anna closed her eyes, "I'm so glad John."
