They say it’s blind they say it waits, but every time it seals your fate

[mortemscintilla]

WHO: Korra and Hei

WHAT: Korra gets a front-row seat into Hei's dreams. Specifically his relationship with Amber.

[ Anger burning under the surface of his skin, clouding everything around him, Hei had stormed off after wrenching his photos away from Korra. He hadn't stopped to consider if the photos were loaded with a special brand of City-magic. Hadn't realized that after she'd touched them, memory-fragments had clung to her fingertips like ragweed pollen. Seeping into her pores, germinating day by day. ]

[ And of course he had no way of knowing what she'd dream of, several nights later. Or that the dreams wouldn't be hers. ]

[ Like most of his dreams, it's a vivid one. A forest unfurling like a dark green sea. Autofire and muzzle flash color the night. Tree stalks and bones shatter with hot plashes of fluid. The air is heavy with a shrill sound and scent that is somehow primal, hostile, terrified. It is like being enveloped in blood. ]

[ Everywhere, there are bodies. Acres upon acres of them, piled atop one another like split logs. Armless, legless, headless corpses, fields of little rag dolls pulled apart, liquid, stuffed with streaming redness, flowing out and away. Hei's, Pai's, and Carmine's handiwork. The result of a successful night-raid. From the corner of his eye, Hei glimpses a Contractor, one of Amber's squad, drifting through the blazing camp with the flayed corpse of a girl draped around his shoulders. The girl’s skinless body shimmers, blood-glazed tissue reflecting firelight the way moon rays reflect off a placid lake's surface. The Contractor is whistling, dreamy-eyed. ]

[ Hei isn't sure if that's his Obeisance -- or if the man is insane. He doesn't care. The war is like that: it gets inside you, under your skin and into your bloodstream, plants roots in your heart and mind and soul. You surrender to its cruelty as a matter of survival. ]

[ A starburst of light. Another memory -- one that makes his nerves jump. Pale skin and a curl of parted lips. Green hair tangled across a red uniform. He feels the humidity of the Brazilian forest, hears buzzing mosquitoes, sees gossamer netting. It's nothing compared to the global warming between Amber's thighs, the clamor in his head, his thoughts tissuey, friable, as he arches over her. Wait… hold on, Hei. Scrambling around in her pockets. Taking out a swiss army knife, extending the nail clippers. She giggles, Your fingernails are like knives. He gives her his hand and she trims his nails. Then files them down smooth. Her voice, singy-songy, Don't need a female circumcision. When she finishes the strange manicure, she eases his hand back between her legs. ]

[ Ohhhh. Her soft cry tastes like butterscotch against his hungry mouth. ]

[ Little details pinwheel through Hei's brain. The way her pulse flutters when he curls his fingers around her throat. How her hair feels like a wash of green seafoam as she bends her head, taking him with such gorgeous smoothness into the cool-hot vacuum of her mouth. The taste of her on his tongue, tart and rimey yet somewhow sweet, like biting into a dripping peach. How, each time, he has to fuck her with his eyes closed -- because the way she looks, lying beneath him, flushed and gasping, wisps of that pale hair sweat-plastered to her body, she is hypnotic, and he knows he can lose himself in gazing at her, lose the urgent rhythm of his cock in her slick wet sex. ]

[ Burying his face in the hollow of her neck, inhaling her cordite-and-mint scent, Hei drifts -- in the cradle of his dream-body, yet outside of himself, watching from a great distance of space and time. 

It was always a struggle, he remembers, to control himself with Amber. But she'd sense that; brace her hands on his shoulders and ease the shakes out of him, coaxing him with her voice and body and kisses to take it slow. He only had to listen to her and obey. He'd sometimes 

wonder what she was thinking in those moments. Part of her, maybe the deepest part, was always locked off -- even when they were that close. Maybe it was because she knew things about the future that he'd never be able to grasp. She had purposes -- for him, for Pai, for herself -- that Hei couldn't even imagine. ]

[ He remembers other things too -- less important, yet somehow more precious to him. The way Amber could be so hard to please, a kakuru puzzle in equal parts tantalizing and mystifying -- but when he got it right, it was like cracking the vault to something blissful: her skin filming like melted butter under his lips as if she were running a fever or a marathon, her wordless mewling cry as she came apart, a wavering song that melted into a scream. ]

[ Nights in the jungle, blackness so absolute it becomes a living entity, Hei remembers those stolen moments with her as a respite from everything. Being with Amber made the brutal truths of the war bearable. When she held him, he believed, however briefly, that there were no such things as hatred, or cruelty, or pain. And when she kissed him, he thought he'd never want to kiss anyone else again, ever. ]

[ Except he should've known -- even then (especially then) -- that Amber was mapping out the starchart of a different future for him.  Everything they'd shared -- at a depth and breadth both thrilling and terrifying. But it was never enough. Especially in the wake of war and politics, carnage and tragedy. Two people could never share the same psyche. ]

[ Afterwards, he remembers, Amber would always let out a jittery sigh -- satisfied, yet somehow wistful. That was nice. You're always such a quick study, Hei. A girl appreciates that. ]

[ A girl appreciates that. It was as if she was giving him advice for down the line, when he'd find himself years and miles away from her, in bed with someone else. Knowing Amber, she probably was. ]

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[mortemscintilla]

[ As far as he's concerned, she knew what she was getting into the moment she asked to be choked. It's her own naivete that prevented her from grasping the broader consequences. She knows he's untrustworthy. She knows he's a liar. She knows he has a malicious streak a mile wide. Yet she wanted, despite all the red flags, to gamble with her safety, in the guise of frivolous experimentation. ]

[ Had she forgotten whom she was dealing with? Forgotten what he was -- is -- dealing with? ]

[ Fuckheaded girl. Hei can taste his rage, bubbling in a cold effervescence in his veins. It really is true: the only people to seek out their endangerment are those who can afford to do so. It reminds him of those BDSM clubs he's seen in the West: watching all those white, upper-middle class twats from so-called developed nations beat, whip, and sexually objectify each other in a supposedly civilized fashion. Were they true aficionados of human degradation, they could have paid for a visit to a local prison, or walked through a slum. But no -- you can't brag about that in private chatrooms or public bars. ]

[ When he speaks, his voice is a hooked barb, ]

You've always had choices. Not my problem you're too stupid to make the smart ones.

[ (She had the choice to say Stop. At any time. But she didn't. She just expected him to handle her with kid-gloves, to treat her with the same regard he'd lavished on Amber, even though she's not Amber in any sense, and has done little to deserve such affection. Special treatment is earned, not bestowed for free.) ]

[ He doesn't say that. It's been a long night; all he wants is an icy-cold drink, a hot bath, and sleep. He's tired of dealing with pampered princesses, their moonbrained moods, and all the headaches they bring. When Korra moves, he steps past her and out the door. Not through it, and that is something -- but it slams into the wall, probably kicked, the crash echoing all the way down the corridor. ]