SAY THAT AGAIN

Timeline: post-Fractures

Disclaimers: yadda, yadda, yadda…

Betareading provided by Atana_Mirtai Corp, renowned expert on the J/A relationship. J

Thanks Atana.

*****

This was endangering their mission unnecessarily. Their chances of success were already microscopically thin and any additional strain factor could cause total failure and death. Something had to be done. Now.

She had briefly considered Crais at first but thought better of it, especially since his sight alone made her skin crawl away. D’Argo had become more than a crewmate over the last cycles but his friendship went to Crichton first, especially since the crews had been split, and after what had happened between Jothee and Chiana, she knew he would refuse flat out. As for Rygel, her imagination could never be that stretched.

There was only one way to go about it. Besides, he needed it too. His hungry eyes said so every time she walked past him, their bodies executing an elaborated choreography of careful avoidance that was slowly but surely racking their nerves. The whole thing could be over in less than 500 microts as long as she kept it under her control. And she would.

At first, he was too stunned to react. He had been working on a conduit in a deserted corridor on Tier 5, way off from the rest of the crew, too concentrated on his task to hear her stealthy approach. His welder went crashing on the floor as she spun him around and pinned him against the wall, his arms kept in a tight grip behind him. She crushed his mouth with hers before he had time to realize what was going on. He responded automatically to her kiss, starvation dimming his better judgment but soon, he started squirming under her overall brutal attitude, trying to free himself from her painful grip.

“Aeryn! What… are you doing?” John finally managed to utter, tearing his mouth away.

She slid her thigh between his legs, eliciting a garbled moan through his trembling lips. Good. This would be over fast just like she had planned.

“Just reducing fluid levels,” she breathed against his mouth before kissing him again to prevent him from talking. Her hands tightened on his wrists.

He turned his head sharply, his cheekbone connecting painfully with the wall.

“Don’t… play with me!” His words came out somewhere between an order and a plea.

Cold anger suddenly replaced his desire and powered a physical strength she had not expected. He twisted his arms free and pushed her away brutally.

“After all that time on Talyn, you didn’t even get to know me better,” he spat, his bitterness heightened by his crushing disappointment.

“It wasn’t you on Talyn!” She snapped back, her body still trying to process the sudden change of mood.

“YES IT WAS!” He shouted, losing his control.

“You will never understand,” she mumbled, turning away to flee a situation getting out of hand, “You’re just jealous…”

“And I have every right to be!” He interrupted her, catching her arm in a strong grip to stop her. She wouldn’t get away with it so easily.

She glared at him, her lips tightening in a fine line.

“You’re jealous because he was there when I needed John Crichton,” she said in a deliberately slow way, “and you only think of yourself, wishing it had been you instead of him.”

John released her arm with a disgusted gesture.

“You know what? I hope you two had the best of times forgetting about me.”

She couldn’t help feeling a surge of guilt at his words and stared hard at the floor, letting her feet take her away as fast as possible only to realize after a few steps, that they had led her in the wrong direction and she was stuck in a dead-end part of the corridor.

John sank on the floor, his back along the wall, his knees propped up tight against his chest.

“You’re right, I’m jealous,” he murmured as she passed him by, retracing her steps. The earnestness in his voice made her stop. “But I don’t know what I envy him most for, his life with you or his life without Harvey and he got to live them both at the same time.”

“Not for long,” she whispered, fighting back tears as memories flooded in.

“I never had either. Only glimpses and short-lived promises. Nothing real.”

His words stung deeper than he realized.

“I meant every word I said when I said them.”

“Oh, so now you remember!”

He stared at her and bit his lip, regretting his sarcastic tone. Sharing pain was fine, causing more was unnecessary.

She leaned against the wall, finding comfort and confidence in its solidity. She should have known better, nothing ever went as planned where he was concerned. Her back slowly slid against the wall until she sat cross-legged on the floor, opposite to him. She let out a deep breath.

“I’m not sorry about what happened on Talyn,” she said softly and looked straight at him.

“Aeryn…” John shook his head.

“Don’t interrupt me.”

He immediately closed his mouth.

“But I’m sorry that I hurt you.”

He got up and went to sit cross-legged in front of her, his knees a feather-light touch against hers. She did not flinch or move away. He silently sighed in relief.

“I’m sorry that I put us in this situation.”

“It wasn’t your fault…”

“Yes it was. It always is. I didn’t have to go inside that dead Leviathan where some nutcase grew food through cloning people. D’Argo got a double and Chiana too, but they didn’t get to bring those back, I did. Why? Because trouble has been my best buddy ever since I set foot in the Uncharted Territories and if not for you watching my back, I would never have seen the end of my first day here.”

He saw the tears form in her eyes and realized his blunder.

“Baby, I’m sorry.”

His use of the term baby opened the gates even more.

“Please don’t cry. You did your best. No one could have done better with a hopeless case like me.”

He slowly reached up to brush away the tears on her cheeks, afraid that she’d recoil before a more daring gesture of affection. He removed his hand as she wiped away the tears with the back of her hand and rested her head against the wall, looking at him absently.

“What would you have done if the situation had been reversed?”

“Me with you on Talyn and him alone on Moya?”

“No. One of you and two of me.”

His thumb slowly brushed his lower lip as a sadly ironic smile began to form.

“I would have gone back to Earth with you two and become an instant living God, embodying the most secret fantasy of every human male.”

His ironic smile faltered before her quizzical expression.

“I have no idea,” he relented, growing serious again.

“Neither did I.”

They held each other’s gaze in silence.

“Aeryn, what happened happened, there’s no changing or forgetting that.” He bit his lip, hoping he would not ruin the moment within the next microt, “Now, there’s just one of me who loves you and one of you… who loves me…” He let his voice trail away on the last words then continued, emboldened by her silent assent. “Maybe we can start over at some point…?”

Her eyes bore into his and she saw her fears and hopes mirrored in his gaze.

“All right,” she finally said after what felt like an excruciatingly long time to him. She heaved a deep sigh and leaned over to him. He held on his breath, unsure of what she expected him to do. She pressed a gentle finger on his mouth to keep him from interrupting and smiled softly.

“You are like a plague, John Crichton…”

THE END

Green Eyed Monster: “You are like a plague, John Crichton, and you have ruined my life. And yet I just… keep coming back.”