Cloverleaf Station: Chapter Fourteen, Part One

 Notes: Okay, so a conversation derailed the smut, but it's an important conversation! Smut next time, I promise.

Title: Cloverleaf Station: Chapter Fourteen, Part One

***

Chapter Fourteen, Part One

 

The chair got stuck in the door of Kieron’s room. Luckily by then, it didn’t matter, because Elanus didn’t waste any time taking matters into his own hands and bodily lifting Kieron out of the chair and onto the bed, laying him on his back and smothering him with his weight a moment later as he kissed the breath out of his lungs. It felt like he was being crushed with the force of the other man’s desire, drowned in his emotions. It was so much. It was too much. It was perfect.

Too much sensation was what he needed to force his mind to stay in the moment. More time to think meant he started thinking other things that came up for him in close proximity to another person’s body. Things like how easy it would be to twist their neck to the point of breaking, how long it would take to dislocate the fingers that were tenderly stroking down the side of his face right now, how simple it would be to grab the shiv that he’d stashed in the wall just behind his pillow and use it to kill the person on top of him in five different ways that would send all the blood flying in the opposite direction.

That was probably the sort of thing that Kieron should discuss with Elanus before they got too deep into this, but…he didn’t want to stop right now. Things were so good, the warmth and pressure against his body reminding him that he was alive, he was real, he was right here, sharing this moment with this man, so different from him but wanting the same thing, for once. Kieron reached up and let himself touch, ran his own fingertips over the scruffy edges of Elanus’s decorative beard, gave in to the impulse to lick over the pounding pulse point in his neck, to nip ever so gently at his earlobe and listen to his sharp inhale and know that it was because of him.

Kieron had never wanted someone like this before. It felt like intoxication, like the one time he’d let himself become drunk in the presence of someone he trusted. It felt beautiful, like the chance for a release that he couldn’t even imagine because he didn’t know how to.

A sudden spike of fear—not fear of being hurt, or of hurting Elanus, but of his own deep ignorance, finally drew Kieron out of  his daze of desire. He put his hands on Elanus’s chest and pushed back.

To his surprise, Elanus went instantly, no lingering or trying to reposition himself. He just sat back on his knees, eyes closed, and took a deep breath, running one hand through his wild brown hair before finally looking down at Kieron with a wry smile. “Too much?”

“It—it’s not that,” Kieron said, but the truth was it was too much, in a way he couldn’t articulate. “It’s not—I’m not—you haven’t done anything wrong.”

“I’m glad to know that, but that doesn’t tell me a lot,” Elanus replied, and held up a hand to forestall Kieron’s urge to get off a quick response. “Which is fine. I don’t want to lay down any sort of law or give you an ultimatum. I just want to be with you, in a way that’s good for both of us. If that means we fuck, or I suck you off right now, or we settle back on your bed and watch a holovid for a few hours without Catalina asking us to make Tyrannosaurus Pirate sounds. That’s all fine with me.”

If it had been anyone else, Kieron would have immediately assumed they were lying. Sex could be complicated but it was also primal, a matter of instinct. Instincts, however, weren’t created equal. There was no way sitting there and watching a movie in close contact would be as good to Elanus as fucking.

Besides, Kieron wanted to fuck. He just didn’t want to screw things up at the same time by not knowing how to express his enjoyment, how to let Elanus know that it was good and not something he was bearing, where to draw the line between pleasure and something he would bear, for the right person.

And Elanus was the right person. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have gotten this far. Not with Kieron still recovering. He couldn’t imagine making himself vulnerable to someone he didn’t completely trust.

Actually, that thought helped quite a bit. He trusted Elanus. He trusted that whatever happened between them, they could be honest with each other. “I’m not sure what I like,” Kieron settled on at last.

“Okay.” Elanus nodded. “That’s good to know. Do you have any opinions on what you’d like to try?”

“I already told you.”

“Yeah, fucking, but it doesn’t sound like you know that you’re going to like that.”

Kieron sighed. “I mean, I know I like it. I’ve liked it before, but it’s been a long time and I’m different, now, than I used to be.”

Elanus tilted his head a bit. “Out of curiosity, who was doing the penetrating before? You or your partner?”

“They were. To me.”

“Huh. I’m a little surprised you allowed that.”

Kieron rolled his eyes. “Why, because it put me on the bottom? Like I couldn’t have killed either of them at any time.” Whoops, not the thing to bring up with the guy you were trying to talk into having sex with you. “I mean…”

“I think you mean exactly what you said.” Elanus arched an eyebrow. “And, okay, I definitely don’t want to be killed tonight, so that makes me think we ought to come down on the ‘movie and cuddle’ side of things. Blowjobs are great too, I’d never knock ‘em. Fingering is amazing. Toys are the best—shit, I didn’t bring any of mine with me, I left in too much of a hurry, but maybe we could have Catalina fabricate some—”

“Absolutely not!” Kieron couldn’t have been more horrified if Elanus had asked to invite Deysan into bed with them. “You don’t avoid having the sex and baby talk with your child by asking her to fabricate sex toys. Fuck no, we’re not doing that.”

Elanus nodded. “That’s a very fair point. Okay, then, what about you fucking me?”

“Me fucking…you.” Kieron looked the lean, very long man over for a second. “Where the hell would I even put your legs?”

“Over your shoulders, around your waist, spread beneath you on the bed, or on the floor for starters,” Elanus replied with a smirk. “There are so many places to put them. I know some positions are hard for short people like you to handle, but really, you don’t have to be as glorious as me to show me a good—”

The pillow Kieron threw hit him squarely in the face. When it fell, Elanus was laughing. After a second, Kieron joined him.

“Look, we’ll work it out,” Elanus promised. “We’ll go slow, all right? Make sure it’s all good, but I know I would really love to be fucked by you, so if you’re into that, I’m game.”

Kieron looked this tall, handsome, ridiculous man over one last time. “Yeah, I think I’m into that.”

PS on comments!!!

 Hi darlins!

To my commenters--all one of you right now, lol--blogger isn't letting me reply to you for some reason at the moment, but I'll figure this out and I love you! Thank you for commenting! You're not alone, I'm still reading and appreciating you!

Back to our regularly scheduled programming ;) More Cloverleaf Station soon!

Cloverleaf Station: Chapter Thirteen, Part Two

 Notes: Oh my god, is it finally...are we really...has the slow burn, practically nonexistent burn, become an actual BURN!? I think it has! WHaaaaaat? And there are DINOSAURS? Get outta town.

Title: Cloverleaf Station: Chapter Thirteen, Part Two

***

Chapter Thirteen, Part Two

 

It turned out that children everywhere, whether they were human or not, were fascinated by dinosaurs. Kieron was sure even he would have been, if he hadn’t first learned about them in his twenties. Zakari’s kids had gone crazy for them—one of their favorite games had been to play “dinosaur pirate ship captain,” which was pretty self-explanatory. It had led Zak down the rabbit hole of finding books that featured dinosaurs who were also the captains of space ships. One of those dinosaurs was also a pirate, and that was the book Kieron read to Catalina.

She loved it. By the end of it, she was making “dinosaur” noises and pretending to be the ship that carried the dinosaur pirates across the galaxy. It was stupidly cute, and Kieron got a surprise when Catalina suddenly made holograms of the dinosaur pictures from the book appear inside of her, moving around like they were live action instead of stills.

“That’s incredible,” he said, impressed despite knowing just how impressive Catalina was already.

Elanus was smiling so hard the designs in his beard were almost impossible to make out. “She’s never been this into a story before. I’ve read her plenty of books about ships and explorers and daring adventures, but I never once thought to add dinosaurs to the mix.”

“Zak always said you could never go wrong with them.” A little bit of Kieron’s good humor melted away as he realized just what he was doing here. He was laughing, playing, having a lovely morning with two people he was growing closer to despite himself, and he was not thinking about his friend. His best friend. The friend who was still floating out there in the black, waiting to be taken back to his family’s mausoleum so he could be remembered properly.

“What? What’s that face for? And don’t say ‘nothing,’” Elanus cautioned him. “Nothing would be bullshit, I know your looks by now. What’s wrong?”

Kieron sighed and stared at him. He actually did want to talk about it, was the thing, which was ridiculous. He didn’t share things. He didn’t make himself vulnerable like that, didn’t reveal the soft parts of himself and make it easier for others to stab him there. But…this was the guy who’d saved his life. If he couldn’t open up with him, then he’d never be able to with anyone.

Despite his resolve, he still couldn’t do it directly. “Have you ever felt like you’re betraying someone simply for living your life?”

“No,” Elanus said promptly, and Kieron’s heart seemed to shrink a little. “But I can see where you might get that feeling from. I have probably never met anyone as determined to resist any and all comforts for himself as you, and I’ve known literal ascetics, people who make their livings through self-denial, so that’s saying something.” He paused. “It’s the fun, isn’t it? You don’t feel like you deserve to have any.”

Kieron nodded. The words he wanted to say were stuck in his throat, but Elanus didn’t seem to require them to understand him. It was an incredible relief.

“I don’t know much about your friend, but I know a bit about you now, and I don’t think you’d devote so much of yourself to someone who didn’t really deserve it. Someone good, in a way you don’t see yourself as able to be good. Someone kind, because you crave kindness even though you can’t ask for it. Someone willing to reach out to you and bridge the distances that you don’t feel you can get over on your own.” Elanus spoke softly, gently, and his dark brown eyes were full of compassion. It hurt to look at them. “Would a person like that begrudge you any sort of happiness you could scrape together? Would he?”

Kieron shook his head, still mute.

“Then let yourself have these moments. Times like this are what make all the pain and suffering that comes along with life worth enduring.” He ran a hand through his hair and sighed. “You can let yourself have things. Big things, little things, things that make you happy. There’s an argument to be made that some people have too much, and believe me, I get that, but you’re not one of those people. You hardly take anything for yourself, even time, even a chance to rest. Would it be so bad to just—just seize one of those things that you want? Would it be so intolerable to let yourself enjoy something you crave? Honestly, I think that—”

Whatever else he was going to say was lost as Kieron abruptly grabbed the front of his shirt, hauled him in close to his chair, and pressed their mouths together.

It wasn’t much of a kiss—way too sudden, teeth clacking and an exhale so loud it sounded almost like a honk coming out of Elanus’s nose. Kieron’s heart beat too fast in his chest, something he ought to be able to control, where was his control? He was too full of wants now, too full of desires and maybes and “what-ifs.” He was also ready to let go at the first sign that he’d read thing totally wrong.

Instead, he got Elanus grinning against his mouth as he slid his knees along the outer edges of Kieron’s thighs, slotting himself into place against him. “Good thing you have a long torse,” he murmured as he wrapped his arms around Kieron’s neck, anchoring himself on his lap. “This would be awkward otherwise.”

“It’s already plenty awkward,” Kieron replied. He knew his face was bright red, but he didn’t want to let go of Elanus. He flattened his hands on the other man’s back and stroked up his spine. “You’re too tall.”

“You’re just jealous. Come here.” He leaned in for another kiss, and this one wasn’t awkward. This one was hot, flavored with mutual need and satisfaction and the latent heat of desire. “Gods, I was starting to think you were a lost cause,” he muttered between kisses. “How many hints do you need, huh?”

“A lot,” Kieron confessed. “I’m not good at knowing when people are interested in me.”

“No?” Elanus pulled back for a second. “Have you…tell me you’ve…”

“I’ve had sex, if that what you’re asking.” A grand total of two times, but he didn’t need to know that.

“And did you…like it?”

“I liked it.”

Elanus huffed with a mixture of exasperation and reluctant charm. “C’mon, work with me here, Kieron. Tell me what you want right now. Kisses? Sitting together holding hands? Another story? Fucking in your bed? I’m good with anything, but—”

“Fucking.” He cleared his throat. “That sounds good. Let’s do that, if…you’re okay leaving Catalina right now?”

“Well, I’m not going to have sex in front of her,” Elanus deadpanned. “So yeah, I’m fine with it. She’ll be all right.” He glanced over his shoulder with a smile on his face. “Look, she’s making the dinosaurs shoot down the rival crew of pleisiosaurs. So cute.”

Kieron grinned. It was cute. “Shall we?”

“Let’s.” Elanus stayed right where he was. “You can drive,” he purred. “I’ve got plans for my hands.” They slid down Kieron’s body until his right hand pressed against his groin, and—

Yeah, it was time to go.

Cloverleaf Station: Chapter Thirteen: Part One

 Notes: More tooth-rotting sweetness headed your way! It's going to be this way for a while, friends, prepare yourselves for...schmoop.

Title: Cloverleaf Station: Chapter Thirteen, Part One

***

Chapter Thirteen, Part One

 

Doing nothing for days was painful. Or, well, it should have been painful. Every time in the past when Kieron had been obliged to put aside his goals because of his body, he’d been filled with shame and anger. Bodies weren’t supposed to give out when you needed them. They were supposed to be strong, and if they failed, that meant you needed to focus more on your mental control so you could force them to do what they needed to do.

Kieron had learned from a very early age the necessity of being able to push himself to, and past, his self-imposed limits. He’d also nearly died from doing that more than once, so when he realized that he wasn’t going to be able to do much as read a book for the next few days thanks to the blurriness of his new eyes as they adjusted, he was prepared to put up with it. Badly.

It was different this time around, though. Kieron wasn’t alone, or surrounded by people he loathed or, at the best, preferred to avoid. This time it was just Elanus and Catalina, and as much as he’d disliked Elanus plenty when they first met, the man was…growing on him. Partly because, now that he had what he’d come for, Elanus had relaxed enough to bring out the charm, effortlessly cheerful, easily conversational, and slightly flirtatious.

If Kieron had met him like this first, he knew he would have hated the man. No one put that much effort into being perfect without having something to hide.

But the Elanus that Kieron had met first had been a complete asshole. A raging dictator, a threat-slinging jackoff, a force to be reckoned with. That was his real face—or at least, that plus the charm was his whole face. Kieron could trust that.

He could argue with it, too. It was easy to get in the mood for a good fight after he found he still needed help to get up out of bed the next morning. Help getting to and from the bathroom was one thing, but accepting help doing something as simple as getting dressed was…hard. Especially when Elanus kept tisking about the state of his clothes. Jerk.

“It wouldn’t be too hard to go and get the Lizzie, I could—”

“Mmm, no.” Elanus angled the shirt so that Kieron could get his arm through the hole without straining himself. “Neither of us are in shape for that and I’m not about to send Catalina out by herself.” He straightened Kieron’s collar, then grabbed a pair of socks. “Let’s see your foot.”

Kieron complied with ill grace. “I really ought to be running more simulations to find—”

“Zakari’s ship, it’s being done, Catalina is backing up the station’s computers as we speak, and there are literally thousands of algorithms taking in new data to support that, so no.”

“I could at least make sure Moritz is—”

“No.” That was where Elanus’s new charm fell away. His voice went cold, his warm eyes became harsh, his expression turned feral. “No, that fucker stays down in the cold unit where I put him. No checking on him, no giving him attention, no attending to his needs. He’s got the basics for survival and he can fucking deal, or I can jettison him out an airlock and call it an accident. Which, I’ve got to say, would make me feel good.” He leaned a little closer. “He tried to ruin my company. He stole my child and try to sell her into slavery. He nearly killed you. Deysan can go straight to the center of a black hole, as far as I’m concerned. I’m only keeping him alive right now because a trial will make it all the easier for me to seize his assets once he’s convicted.”

Kieron didn’t shrink away. Backing up had been bred out of him. “Which you’re sure he will be.”

“Sure enough to bet the satisfaction of my heart on it, yes. As soon as the season here is over, a prison ship from Gania will arrive to take him home.”

Kieron raised an eyebrow. “You trust him to a prison ship?”

“I’m sure as fuck not going to let him fly around with Catalina and I.”

That begged the question of how Elanus was going to get both his ships back to Gania, but that was probably a matter best saved for another day. “So what do I do?” Kieron finally asked.

Elanus shrugged. “Whatever you like to do with your free time. Find cute catterpet vids, watch porn, hang out with me and Catalina. Not all at the same time, she’s at that stage right now where she’s curious about everything and I might be prepared to tell her how a ship is made, but I don’t think I can take a question about where babies come from.”

Kieron sighed. “I usually read, but looking at a screen for too long makes my head hurt.”

“That does suck. What kind of books do you like?”

“Anything adventurous.” Aaand cozy domestic comfort reads too, but Kieron wasn’t ready to reveal that illicit desire to Elanus’s too-keen eyes yet. He still felt embarrassed about having such a strong reaction to books that were nothing but descriptions of people living calm, enjoyable lives with no drama, but it was so miraculous. The only time he’d cried since Zak’s death had been when reading a description of an Old Earth woman in Japan making red bean cakes, of all things. The memory of his miniature breakdown still threatened his cheeks with heat.

Elanus suddenly smiled. “How about a foray into amateur theater?”

“If you’re expecting me to act anything out, the answer is no.”

“No, no, not you acting something out. I’d like to get Catalina more exposure to literature and the arts and give her a more practice expressing emotions through words, and reading out loud to you could be just the thing for her. Here.” He grabbed Kieron’s tab off his bedside table and handed it over to him. “Pick one of the least violent books you like.”

“Any other parameters you want to throw my way?” Kieron asked, not as sourly as he would have liked. He was already intrigued by the prospect of being read to. He’d never been read to before—not fiction, not a story meant for pleasure instead of instruction.

“Hmm, nothing that involved kidnapping. Let’s not remind her of that if we can help it.”

“Do you really think it would bother her?”

Elanus sighed. “Look. I know you’re doing your best to think of her as an actual person, but I can tell that you haven’t quite managed it yet. When you’re with her, it’s plain, but when you can’t see her it’s easy to think of Catalina as advanced machinery again.

“But I’m telling you, she’s a living being. She has a biological cycle that includes a desire for rest and play, a need for sustenance, and a love for family. She had a nightmare last night, Kieron.” He sounded pained. “Have you ever had to wake a child up out of a nightmare? It’s a lot harder when your child is a ship. I couldn’t hold her. I couldn’t cradle her in my arms and stroke her back and soothe her. All I could do was talk her out of it. Eventually.”

Kieron stared at Elanus for a moment, took in the dark circles under his eyes and the way his hands shook a little. He was still recovering from his own injuries, and he’d been keeping Kieron alive in the Regen tank for days, and his daughter still needed him desperately. “I think I can find a book she’ll like,” Kieron said at last.

It was the least he could do.