She has never been more relieved in her life to finally walk through her front door. It was easier in the beginning, but as the day went on things became much more difficult. Bruises began to flower upon her pale skin: the shape of fingers around her wrists, half-moons of dried blood, the shadow of fingers on her jaw. The injuries his mouth had left behind, the bruises on her ribs, they remained thankfully beneath her clothing, but by the time the clock finally rolled around to 5 PM, she was certain that people were beginning to be suspicious and she fled the building without a single look back.

The heat of her shower pulls more blood to the surface and as she stands before the mirror now she is transfixed. When she had woken this Monday morning, she had no inkling of the way the day was going to go. There is no going back now, is there? She has stood upon the edge of the precipice and she has made her choice. She fell, didn't she?

She tries to think whether the decision was foolish or well-thought out, whether it was sudden or simply a long, slow, secret time in coming. She wraps her fingers lightly around her wrist, watching as the slender digits do not cover the whole of the bruises. He makes her feel small and delicate; when she is around him she feels self-destructive, a tiny porcelain ballerina flung from the top shelf of her own volition and shattered upon the ground, smiling all the while.

She closes her eyes and relives the moments that they have had together, those few swift moments. They weren't enough. She wants more. She wants hours to explore every dip and hollow of his body, wants to know what every exposed inch of his form tastes like within her mouth, and yes, yes, she wants that, too. She wants to pull him inside, feel the rhythm of his pounding pulse against her tongue, she wants to hear him moan, she wants to make him shatter the way she did, torn apart and screaming, and she wants to swallow every drop when he does.

There is still distance between them, he doesn't love her now, but he will, oh he will, she'll make sure of that. She will claw her way to the very heart of him, until she is deep within him, in his blood and his skin, his bone and his breath, until he could never dream of a second without her, until he will cry and scream and beg for her the way she wants to beg for him. He needs someone to take care of him, she thinks, his mind is occupied by far more important things, she will think of the small things for him, the things that are beneath his notice; she will become indispensable, as deeply a part of him as… as the scars on his face.

She thinks of how they felt beneath her tongue, how the corners of his mouth taste salty as though the flesh there is still raw. She imagines him bleeding, and imagines drinking that in, too. She wants all of him, all of him always… yes, yes, she has to get him out. She will live, her heart will continue beating and she will continue breathing without him, but she does not want to. Destined, he had said, and he was right, he was always right! Why hadn't she listened to him before? Those few moments could have been hours, perhaps she might have already had a hold upon his heart by now. She has wasted time, it makes her actions now all the more important.

When they leave, they must leave together. They will have to flee the city. She will be breaking more than one rule, more than one law by assisting him in this. If she is to help him… if she is to help him, it will mean a complete change. She knows that. She will have to leave with him; she will be in as much trouble as he will, perhaps more. Fraternizing with a superior officer, disobeying a direct order, going UA, oh, that only just showed the tip of the iceberg, didn't it? It was… it was treason, what she was planning.

If she does this… it will mean a new life. A new life together. Is she ready to do this? She has known him only a few months, spoken with him only a few weeks… is she ready to give up everything for this man? Could she really become a fugitive, a… a criminal? She has imagined what life at his side will be like (pure bliss) but what would life be without him? She thinks very hard on that, holds the image in her mind, sees herself growing older, earning further credentials the way she always imagined, earning the respect and the renown that she deserves. The images seem flat, empty, devoid of life. She sees the future through a haze of misery, a life without life, gray and empty, no love and no laughter. How could she ever feel for another the way she feels for him? How could anyone deserve her love and devotion more than him?

There was no getting around it… the decision had been made for her, hadn't it? Long ago. He had already seen and understood what she was only beginning to reveal, to admit to herself. She had felt the pull between them but he, oh, he was the one that knew what it meant, what it was meant to grow into. There is no going back, not now.

She is sure of that, and as the sun finally begins to sink past the horizon, the day drawing to a close, she tries desperately to think of something else. For hours her mind cannot focus on a single thing (save him), spinning ceaselessly. It has been hours since she has seen his face, hours since she has touched him. She gives in to the distraction and soothes herself by imagining a day when she will be at his side always, when she will never again sleep alone. It fills her with warmth until it bubbles up in peals of ecstatic laughter and she gives in again, leaping and dancing about the room in glee. If only she can last until that day.

She takes another sip of wine, feeling pleased, fuzzy, content; she cups her face in her hands and feels the tenderness of the bruises against her palms. Oh, she is in love! What a blissful, happy day! Oh, if only she could look upon that face again. It was the face of a god, the face of a… of a king, the face of an angel. To look upon him, to touch him, it was an honor, a privilege, one he had bestowed upon so few, and now her alone and she feels treasured. He will take the shattered pieces of the figurine, and he will reform them, make them into something better than the first, better because it was made by his hands, she can feel that, feel it in her bones. She clutches her hands to her heart and spins in drunken, dizzy circles. If she could only see him!

She stops in her tracks, face frozen open-mouthed as she comes to the realization. The photo albums! She need only look there to satisfy her craving for him, doesn't she?

She nearly trips in her haste to leave the living room; she weaves her way to her bedroom and scatters rings, bracelets, necklaces across the top of her bureau, tossing them aside thoughtlessly as she digs to the bottom of her jewelry box.

"Ahah!" she says when she discovers her target. On the top shelf of her closet, there is a fireproof safe where she keeps all of her important papers. The apartment was built with taller people in mind: she could never reach it without retrieving a stool to stand upon. She always felt like a little girl rummaging around in her Daddy's closet when she looked in here, and she giggles quietly now as she inserts the key and turns the lock. She shoves the container of files to the side and reaches into the very back of the safe where the photo albums are stacked, one atop the other.

She grabs each one and tosses it carefully onto her bed. She locks the safe, hops down from the ottoman, shoving it aside and closing the door. The key she stashes again in the bottom of her jewelry box, piling her things haphazardly atop it (she will sort through them in the morning). As she crawls onto the center of her bed, she knows which album she will look into tonight. The last, the fourth. There are pictures inside that tell a story, moments of great change and happening, but those are not her favorites. There are others, ones less polished, more spontaneous. What they lack in composition, they make up for in captured life.

These are the tiny moments that she will now treasure: parts of him that will never exist again, she thinks. There are pieces of the puzzle that are lost forever, shattered and irretrievable: to give his heart, his love, only to have that person taken away from him again. They were afraid of him, thought of him as a monster, something inhuman, but how could a monster love? Monsters did not crave companionship and what had he told her?

"How strange to all your life be told that you are different, abnormal, subhuman… only to one day find yourself surrounded by your own kind."

Monsters did not remember with that small, sad smile the things he would never again experience; monsters did not miss the things that had once been his alone, the things that had been taken from him. What a sad, solitary life he has led. Everyone he had ever loved had left him in the end; death had taken them in one form or another. All of his life he had been separated, ridiculed, feared, how could they have expected him to turn out any differently? How could he be expected to value human life when humans had never even demonstrated themselves worthy of those lives?

She opens the album cover slowly, handling it with the utmost care. She flips slowly through the pages and finds the image that she wants. The Captain is seated upon a bed. He is the only one in the photo. There is a slight bluish cast to his face, the reflection of a TV screen. In his hands is a black controller, he is staring at it in obvious bewilderment. She closes her eyes, imagines herself riffling through files in her mind. Again she finds the one that she wants. Her eyes open again.

She imagines the picture darkening, gaining depth, she watches the still form come to life in her mind, and soon she hears a voice that is made for laughter, just as Jack said it had been.

OOO

"You're trying to tell me you've never seen a video game system before? How is that even possible? I mean… nothing? Not a Nintendo, not even an Atari?"

The brunette received only a blank expression in return.

"You've got to be kidding me."

Jack shrugged finally, giving the buttons a few cursory taps.

"We got by," he said quietly, "Not a whole lot of room for… extras," he finished disdainfully, and Benny rolled his eyes.

"Well, come on, what's your excuse now? Your pockets ain't empty, and you're not blowing your pay on pussy, so where's it goin'?"

Jack laughed, shrugged again.

"I don't… buy anything… I mean… what would I buy? I'm a simple guy. They give me everything I need, don't they?"

"A man does not live by uniforms alone! Where in the hell are your toys? What do you do with all your money?"

"Nothing… It's bound up here and there… savings accounts… CD's… I don't have any real use for it."

Benny shook his head, mystified.

"Yanno, when we get home? That first round of drinks? That'll be your round, money bags."

"Whatever you say, blue eyes…"

OOO

The picture goes still again and she is surprised to find tears in her eyes. He had loved him dearly, she can tell, and didn't that alone prove them wrong? How could a monster inspire such devotion, such adoration in others?

She knows him now, she feels as though all his life has been lived and recorded inside of her. She turns the page and gazes upon them playing, bodies knotted into a ball, wallowing, wrestling in the midst of a cloud of dust. It ends with Ben on top ("Guess they forgot to tell you I won State.") only to have his victory rewarded with a forehead to the face. The next photo has him grinning and bloody, and she thinks of how they belonged together, how different his world might have been if he had survived, if they had lived to see each other home.

Harley wipes her eyes, and promises to herself that he will never again need to know the loss of a loved one. He is gone, but she is here now, she will take care of him. She traces a fingernail along the photo again and wonders if he is looking down, if he still watches his beloved, if he approves of her, if he knows that she will cherish every moment in his presence, every moment she spends in his arms.

"I love you," she says to no one, and blushes furiously. She hugs the album to her chest and lets her eyes slip shut again. How could they not all know? How could they not recognize his greatness? His genius? Eccentric, yes, perhaps a bit antisocial, but weren't all of the great minds just so? Did not the lion look down upon the mouse? They hated him for being different. He was different because he was better. Why was she the only one to see that? He would never again have to live in a world that did not appreciate his brilliance: she is here now, all that will change.

Her eyes snap open.

Why should she have to search to find his face? These belonged to her now… why, she could do anything she wanted with them!

Her eyes widen, she licks her lips expectantly, she lowers the book suddenly and her fingers fly through the pages, heading to the front of the album again. There, there it is.

He looks so very young, so strong. She knows that he is barely 20, at the peak of his physical condition, only a few days before his ceremony. She knows there is nothing special about this picture, that every graduating cadet has one, but she stares at it with awe, feels so honored to possess it. She parts the plastic film carefully, slowly separating the picture from the page's glue.

She blushes again, looks around though there is no one to see her. She feels silly, like some love struck-teenager, and later she will have to hide it so no one will see but here, now, alone, she can press it to her heart and pretend it is him in her arms instead. Oh, how she wants him near again, how she wants to feel his chest rise and fall against hers, to taste his breath within her mouth.

She dreams of a day when she will be able to wake beside him, a night when she can reach into the darkness and let her hands wander as they please. She shivers in pleasure, closing her eyes, opening them again, and she pulls the picture away, gazing upon the strong jaw, the smooth unlined face. The ordeal he has endured has placed years upon his face, she can see that now: furrows in his brow, lines deep around his eyes and mouth.

Someone so young should not be so old, she thinks, and touches the picture as though she can smooth away the future lines with her fingertips. She wants to take them away forever, to remove the creases of sorrow, of defeat, of agonies both present and past, and replace them all with lines of laughter. She wants to soothe the tension from his shoulders, bring them up so that she can see him stand tall and proud and straight again.

Her knees feel weak, her fingertips tingle, and she stares at him hungrily. This portrait must stay where she can see it, where he will never be far from her thoughts, where she can stop and look upon him whenever she wants, until she can replace it with the real thing.

Her eyes stop again on her bureau. Yes, the mirror. There is a small space between the frame and the glass, she put a postcard there once; she will place the portrait there now. She slips the bottom edge in carefully, prepares to slide it to the side. The flat white backing shines in the mirror and what she sees there stops her dead in her tracks. Reflected back to her in a blue, hurried, scrawling, familiar hand are the letters: .regnad ni ydaerla era uoy ,siht gnidaer era uoy fI .trohs si emit ruO

Our time is short. If you are reading this, you are already in danger.