[Kites]
Kites wasn't sure if he should be impressed or horrified at how quickly Gen vacuumed up all the food.? Every single plate was emptied down to the bare crumbs, the carton of juice completely sucked dry.? Considering her abilities though, maybe that is normal after the androgyne exhausted all their energy reserves.? Maybe it was the stress.? The last week didn't exactly end on a positive note.? It was followed by even worse news.? Chord, Harrison, AND Ireland were dead.? Somehow it didn't seem to compute.? How could the three most important people of this company just disappear like that?? Something didn't smell right about this.? What are the odds of something like this just occuring?
"That's okay, Gen.? Just sleep.? I'll be right here," Kites said, bending over to give her a kiss on the cheek, wrapping his wing around her.? His heart wouldn't stop hammering against his ribs though.? Something inside him pulled him towards contacting Raine, but he wondered if that would be allowed.? Surely the company would know about the news of their boss's deaths.? He wouldn't get in trouble for doing that, right?? Biting his lower lip, Kites turned to look at Gen peacefully sleeping by his side.? He promised her that he would be by her side, so he couldn't just leave and make a call through his watch.? Nor could he or would he make one when she was resting, wanting nothing more than to be within the safety and comfort of his being.
So he did the only thing he could.? Tapping on the face of his watch, Kites scrolled through to his contacts, then chose Raine's name and tapped on it, opening up an SMS window.? He began to quiet type on it, fingers gliding over the glossy screen.? "Raine, I don't know if you heard the news.? Chord is dead.? So are Harrison and Ireland.? Investigation underway.? Do you have some time to meet up?? Feeling very conflicted."? Then he hit send and laid back down.? He laid there for a while, just listening to Gen's breathing, all the little minute twitches that she made.? Perhaps she was replaying that day's events, feeling like all of it was her fault.? At time she moaned out, breathing heavily, pained.? So Kites turned to his side, pulling her into his arms he pressed her against his chest, keeping her close.? That seemed to provide some comfort as she seemed to quiet down.? Eventually he felt his eyelids getting heavy himself, drifting off.
(Gen)
Gen was dreaming.? Or was she really just remembering while asleep?? It was hard to know.? It was as if she was in a memory but had the freedom to move around within that memory, and to focus in on details.? And to block out anything threatening to overwhelm her, like the sudden and simultaneous deaths of three people she'd known.? Right now, there was something she was looking for, something she needed to find.? But what?
Following her instincts, the androgyne began moving from memory to memory, starting with the phone call.? Hearing the helicopter approach.? Sighting it through the window.? Voices and sounds from the phone and from outside.? The explosion.? Pieces falling into the harbor.? Her leaping out and down, into the water.? Searching... searching... finding nothing but death.? Her coming back to the surface, onto the island.
She stopped, frowning in her sleep.? She'd missed something.? Something she'd noticed before, when it was all happening.? She moved backwards, rewinding until she was back in the water.? In the water.? Something in the water.? Something she'd seen?? No.? Not seen.? Tasted.? Not with her tongue though.? With her gills.
Something chemical then.? Something that wasn't supposed to be there. Her body was designed to remember traces of everything she ingested, through eating, drinking or breathing.? She began sorting through what she had detected, dismissing the obvious things like the harbor water's normal pollutants, biological detritus, chemicals that connected to the expected debris from a helicopter.
Finally she had it.? She didn't know what it was - only that it wasn't something she could put into a dismissible?category.? And that it wasn't supposed to be there.? She tucked it into a bit of memory that she could access when she was fully awake again.
In the meantime, her body was making use of all the calories and nutrients she'd consumed, causing her temperature to rise slightly as she finished repairing and replenishing herself.? Her skin became warm all over, particularly where she was nestled against Kites.? Remembering how nice skin on skin had felt before, the androgyne began slipping out of her clothes until she was? snuggled up naked against the winged youth.? The familiar male scent Kites was giving off triggered her body to shift into what it remembered, and soon Gen was in full male mode once again.
Still half-asleep, Gen wondered what was happening to him.? It seemed inappropriate from what he'd been told in his lessons on human behavior back in the lab.? But at the same time he wondered if this was just more of his body trying to recover from the traumas he'd been through.? He'd read in some books where desire for physical closeness was a natural reaction in many cases.? At any rate, it felt too nice to pull away, so he just rested his head against the other boy's shoulder and let himself drift off once again.??
Tag - Kites
