fuse_box | across time & space

Entry tags:

universe: after the city

across time & space

WHO: Hei & Korra
WHAT: Hei’s been missing for years.

[Are you sure you don’t want me to stay? As Korra watches Mako walk down the beach path, she kind of regrets telling him she was fine. The air feels a lot chillier without his companionable warmth. But he's no better at comfort sex than Bolin is; they're both too romantic. Of all her friends, Asami's the only one who really understands the occasional need for intimacy without its attendant baggage. Too bad Asami's out of town.

Korra smiles and shakes her head as she opens the front door. It doesn't matter. Nights like this are why she remodeled the house so Naga could come inside. The polar bear dog's warm, solid presence is like a campfire, a soft blanket, and hot tea all in one affectionate package.

Speaking of — Naga pokes her head out of the bedroom door and whines a question.]

I'm sorry, girl. She didn't make it. [Even with Korra to stabilize her wounds and the best vet in Republic City, Cat's injuries from the hit & run accident were too severe.

One by one, everything that connects her to Hei is vanishing. A few months after he was officially declared dead, Yin went missing. Her black cat died, and some guy with a poodlebird from Future Industries took all the computer equipment. She's had to renovate the house a few times, due to storms and other emergencies. And now Cat.

It makes Korra feel sad, but mostly it makes her feel old. The normal bumps and pains that occur over a lifetime have been crammed into less than a decade; she's still a few years shy of thirty, but she feels like she's her mother's age sometimes.

Naga nuzzles her shoulder comfortingly, and Korra takes the invitation to wrap her arms around her and bury her face in the polar bear dog's fur.]

I'm tired of losing people.

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[He doesn't seem offended by her permission to use his own home, which is good. Korra forces herself to relax.]

Yeah, of course. Your clothes are in a box in the basement. [She's not a sentimental person, but like when her friends vanished in the City, she couldn't get rid of his clothes. It's not like he had a lot of stuff...it was easier to keep it in the basement than get rid of it.]

[ She could have gotten rid of it, if she'd wanted to. Hei isn't sure what to make of the fact that she hadn't. He doesn't let his surprise show. Just offers a nod, terse yet somehow stilted, and murmurs, ] I'll find them, [ before edging carefully past her, deeper into the house, feeling strangely like a prisoner who's been given permission to roam around unaccompanied. ]

[ This is my house. Was my house. Where I used to live with Korra. With a cat that I somehow managed not to starve, or break, or ... my house. The words mean nothing. In the basement, he finds the locked box of his clothes. The fabric inside gives off such a familiar smell, of staleness but also of himself, that he is disoriented. None of this feels real, but that's besides the point. It is real, as real as his life with Korra in this house once was, as real as his days floating in space with Chekov, undoubtedly were. ]

[ In the shower, he takes his time on purpose. There's lot to digest, so giving Korra a moment of quiet, staying out of her way, is no great effort. He focuses on the feeling of hot water on his skin, the smell of soap and shampoo, the icy breath after a good scrubbing with an extra toothbrush. The robes on the back of the bathroom door, the towels, the items on the shelves -- everything is Korra's. No shaving tackle or extra shampoo or unfamiliar products in sight. ]

[ Could she have spent all this time living alone? It seems impossible. ]

[ He comes back out in his new (old) clothes, oddly young-looking with his wet hair smoothed down around his skull. At the kitchen, coaxed by the breakfasty sounds and smells, he hovers uncertainly, blinking in the yellow stripes of sunlight that cut through the blinds. ]

[If she doesn't let herself think hard about it, it feels really good to have someone in the house again. Korra loves solitude, but living alone has been really lonely. The house feels warmer, more like a home. She even finds herself humming a little as she cooks... and then realizes she hasn't prepared enough. She hasn't cooked for two in awhile. She sets what she's prepared on the table as he gets out of the shower and starts up on the next batch.]

Breakfast is on the table. [Does her voice shake a little? It's hard to tell. The sight of him makes her heart pound.]

[ The look Hei gives Korra is not easily readable. He's still rocked by all the changes in this world, big and small. But none of them effect him like this one. Korra's got that whole barefoot, rumple-haired, housewifely vibe going on; the sun carving a bright slice across the line of her cheek, the tip of her nose, the spiky edges of her eyelashes, her clothes a teasing drape over smooth curves and muscles, and her hips jolt smoothly side to side with that lazy animal swiftness as she floats around the sunlit space. It still makes Hei's mouth go dry, makes him want to sink his teeth deep into her and not let go. She looks so fucking good even from the back -- Jesus, especially from the back -- and she's -- ]

[ Making stir fry. ]

[ It's almost funny. All the years that he'd encouraged her to learn, and it seems she'd bitten the bullet at last. He'd never know if mastering the recipes and utensils had come easily to her. She works mechanically and without undue concern, like all experienced cooks. He finds this oddly becoming. ]

[ Drawing out a chair, he slips into it warily. Scrubs the dangling out of his face as he surveys the food, picking up the lacquered chopsticks. Taking his first bite, Hei blinks. It's ... good. The fish is white and fluffy, the kelp crisp, everything rashed with those toasty brown patches. His stomach, in full approval, gurgles. ]

Someone's turned into a little domestic goddess.

[ It's a dry tone that slides somewhere between amused and incredulous. ]

[Why bother learning when he always did it faster and better? Also, let's be real, he wasn't the best teacher. Necessity is the best teacher of all.]

Well, I couldn't stop eating just because you were gone. [That sounded accusatory. She didn't mean to sound accusatory.]

I can't do a lot of dishes. But it's kind of relaxing sometimes.

[ No, teaching had never been his metier; he'd lacked the right patience for it. But watching Korra futz around the bright kitchen -- Korra who'd once regarded the utensils as just a collection of nameless things, who'd once moved through the house like a whirlwind, leaving stacks of unread books on the coffee table, and coats over the couch back, balled socks in the middle of the room, and lightly crusted tea mugs that could stagnate on the table for days -- he feels like he's sitting with a stranger. ]

[ In many ways, he is. She's clearly moved past that youthful clutter and upheaval that once defined her life: her energy is bright and fierce as ever, but it's no longer that hair-trigger of a lightning flash. It burns quiet and steady now, like a well-lit fire that will still be simmering in the morning. It makes Hei feel self-conscious. He knows damn well he might not be welcome, that he has come back to life at much too short a notice for her. ]

[ But there's no point in apologizing now. ]

[ He doesn't flinch at her words. But there is a tiny wrenching sensation in his chest. Keeping his dipped, he focuses on clearing his plate, quick but neat, like someone pressed for time but who nonetheless wants to savor every bite. ]

[ Quietly, between a lull, ]

I ... thought of you like that. When I was away. Relaxing, for a change.

[ Sometimes, watching the stars, he'd hoped that she wasn't grieving, that she was instead keeping her hopes up for his return. Other times he'd found himself wondering if she'd find comfort elsewhere -- maybe with her friends and family, or with someone new. Someone worthy of her, whom she could enjoy a happy life with. ]

["Relaxing" and "grieving" aren't mutually exclusive, but they're usually pretty well at odds. Korra shakes her head almost imperceptibly, and finishes cooking up her portion of breakfast. She settles down at the table, her pounding as her knee brushes against his. Has the table always been this small, or is he taller than she remembers?]

So...did they make you join Starfleet while you were up there? [Another way of asking Are you going to leave again?]

[ Not as completely at odds as she thinks. At least not in Hei's world. Always on the run, always caught up in battles, in a violent struggle for survival, has limited his scope for grieving. In many ways, it's impossible. In his career, there were no funerals for fallen comrades, no burials, no eulogies, no opportunities to sit by himself and reminisce. Just an emptiness that sprung up in the midst of his unstoppable momentum, a void so terrifying and hungry it swallowed him whole. ]

[ The only thing that saved him from being paralyzed by it, being killed, was his rage. A rage that became the superstructure of his entire life, so icy-hot and steely that the sane could barely begin to imagine it. And that rage was only the first step. Then something even harder came, something that could live with the grief, the fury, the limitations. ]

[ Grieving -- uninterrupted, profound -- is a relaxation. A luxury that not every warrior in the field can afford. ]

[ She settles in close, their knees kissing, and Hei can feel the indelible imprint of her warmth, even through the layers of clothes. He shifts, as if he's sliding off his chair, even though he isn't. ]

They wanted to jettison me, actually. [ He was regarded -- at least at first -- as a dangerous barnacle clinging to the ship. The crew were slow to warm up to him, and he to them; mostly he'd stayed out of the way, keeping company with Chekov when the boy was off-duty. ] Their Captain was convinced I was a spy.

A spy for who?

[ Hei tips a shoulder in a shrug, before sloshing cream into his teacup. He takes a slow sip, his face lit with a softer light than a moment ago. (It's amazing; she's learnt how to brew a proper cup of tea, too.) ]

Starfleet has enemies. Then there's factions within the organization. Lots of inter-politics and rivalries.

[ He wasn't particularly surprised. Trade and private property still existed within the Federation, despite its post-capitalistic facade -- which in turn led to the usual privateers and criminal networks. The world was technocratic in many ways, a socialist utopia in others -- but with the demerits of both. For Hei, in particular, it embodied the exact coercions and corruptions that were so prevalent in the Syndicate. ]

You can't even say there's two main sides, because it isn't that simple. There's more sides than a diamond, and they all want to surpass each other. Spies and undercover ops? Not a surprise.

And of course they wouldn't believe Chekov. [MASSIVE. EYEROLL. But at the same time, she can't be too annoyed, because it means Hei came back here.]

So... you're back for good now?

[ Hei isn't sure what to make of the question. Maybe she expects he'd only dropped in for a visit. That he's comfortably situated with Stafleet now, an unexpected guest dropped into her world --but soon to be gone, because the frames of reference between them have shrunk so completely in three years, because she can't imagine their lives juxtaposed anymore. ]

[ Except her gaze is so blindingly bright. So hopeful. It is the first time since his arrival that it imparts a frission of homecoming, makes Hei feel like she's really welcoming him. Like she wants him to stay. ]

[ He could be wrong. If he is, it'll hurt but -- that's how life goes. ]

[ He wants to reach out for her. But she looks so fucking beautiful, here in the sunlight pouring into the room like melting butter, so close and redolent of thousands of those salty, sweet, soupy scents that twine his attention into a hard ball of want, that he can't trust himself. ]

[ So he swallows, his fingers deceptively light as they curl around his cup. Murmurs, without quite looking at her, ]

Starfleet ... was never where I wanted to be.

[ It was here, with you. The stars in space were never a temptation to stay away. Never the centerpiece of his desires. During his travels, they were just a palliative. A glittering compensation. Maybe as a boy, he'd have given anything to be where Chekov is. But he hasn't been that boy in years. ]

[It's really not fair what he can do to her heart. Korra takes a deep breath and reaches out to squeeze his arm.]

I'm really glad you're back. [She still doesn't know how to bridge that three year gap between them, but baby steps.]

[ He wishes that time would drip into stillness. Wishes everything that's pincering him in different directions would narrow down to one thing. Just this.The warm weight of her hand on his arm, as if nothing exists between them or around them, but those thrumming cells leaping off his skin beneath her palm. ]

[ Because if he focuses on anything else, it is difficult to imagine how, after three years, they'll relate. What they'll say to each other. Whereas most of their relationship the actions and emotions have pounded themselves out, sometimes spectacularly, sometimes messily, the intimacy and sex piling up as fast or faster than life can offload them, like planes at a terminal lined up for take-off. This is challenging, to have been separated for such an enormous chunk of time, the distance wringing such emotional exhaustion out of them both that he is at a loss how to move them forward. ]

[ Especially because he is mindful of not wanting to succumb to the old bad habits of fast sex and stunted talks, the easy immediate choices of physicality with no subtext. ]

[ Maybe a reconciliation will happen in clumsy little steps. Or maybe in terrible lurches. He doesn't know -- but he's careful not to push or presume. He just wants to be honest, for them to have a conversation the way normal people do instead of him always carefully constructing the most suitable sentence for the moment. ]

[ He waits a beat, then two, before his hand closes on hers, lifting it to press her warm little fingers to his lips. ]

[ In a half-whisper, ]

All the while I was trying to get back, sometimes it made it easier. Thinking you were waiting. Other times I'd catch myself thinking that you couldn't be expecting me, and it didn't matter if I floated off to nowhere. [ His lips twitch, a dry self-deprecation. ] Lucky for you I'm not the float-off-to-nowhere type.

[She kicks his ankle.] Of course it would. [Even if he's not the float off to nowhere type, she doesn't like the idea of him even thinking about it.]

So, if I ask you to tell me what space is like, would you try to give a real answer? [He's always been terrible at telling travel stories.]

[ That kick, her childlike curiosity, suffuses him with such a sense of bittersweet excitement. He doesn't want to shift an iota, lest it dissipate or be withdrawn. But she's asking him about space, a little girl expecting to hear a marvelous story, and he has no idea what to tell her. His travels resist the translation into speech; mostly they're tactile. ]

[ He's been places where the thin little tissue of his psyche, of a human consciousness, had no meaning. Would be smashed like an egg yolk, spilling goo and insanity everywhere. The universe was such a weird place -- like a dark wasteland that had been abandoned forever, but there were still lights glittering inside, and so much gorgeous overspilling garbage, discarded fragments of impossible dreams, cogs and gaskets from the innards of infinity. On board the enterprise, constantly surrounded by other people, beset by responsibilities, driven by their mission, he would always crave solitude. But gazing at the soundless belly of space, all that freedom and possibility everywhere, hadn't afforded him a sense of peace. Perversely, he'd wished he was tethered to something solid -- real gravity, real ground, a promise that he was where he should be -- not floating in the ether, his center misaligned. ]

[ He's always stayed on the move, always been a creature of swift momentum and deep restless energy. But space travel isn't for him. Skating along on something that touches him, but that he can't touch. It's no better than Nietzsche's goddamned abyss. ]

[ Finally, in a gentle deflection, ]

You want to give it a shot? You'd look good in a spacesuit.

I'll pass, thanks. [A tinge of annoyance in her voice. She knows a deflection when she sees it.] I just want you to tell me about it. You've been gone for three years. I want to fill the gap.

[ Hei lets off a slow exhale, wondering how much of this distance between them is hers, how much is his. She'd thought he was dead, mourned him, lived for months and months devoid of anticipation or hope that he'd return. And now he's come back, unlooked-for, and of course she wants to know about his life, so she doesn't feel so confused and uninformed and out of her depth. ]

[ But he senses the fear in his own reticence. He doesn't want, he realizes, to talk about the Enterprise. Wants that time to be as unrecalled and blurry as his days in kindergarten. It hadn't been unpleasant, with Chekov there. But he'd felt, as days passed, like his sanity was bleeding out of him. He hadn't liked the tepid surfaces, the imperfect stillness, the mechanical rumblings, the way the bridge would sing dissonantly around him. Everything seemed the wrong color, warped and glowing, and the odors of the place were sanitized and hellish. He'd felt that way a few times, in hospitals; he'd forgotten just how bad it could get, the cabin-fever that was like an internalized madness. The crew gave him cards for meals, fresh from the food synthesizer, four or fives times a day -- but nothing tastedreal. His stomach snatched at nourishment and always keened for more. Even when gorging on ice creams and bowls brimming with noodles, plump slabs of steak and dripping dumplings, he'd felt like something was missing. Had fantasized in weaker moments about thick breads piled with cheese and beef and fried onions. A stir-fry with everything. ]

[ He rubs her palm slowly with his thumb, before placing it down. The effort is palpable, to be firm but not cruel. ]

It ... didn't suit me as much as being here does. That's all I'll say.

[Wow, she really hadn't missed this. Korra doesn't scowl, not like she used to, with all the petulance and anger clearly tattooed on her features. But she doesn't try to hide her annoyance either as she takes their empty dishes over to the sink.] Okay, so we're sweeping the three years I thought you were dead under the rug. Is there anything you can talk about?

[ Fuck. He's going about this all wrong. As usual. ]

[ She sets the dishes with a clatter in the sink, and the sound feeds a spark through his always-wired nerves. She's changed so much since his absence. She used to radiate the innocence of a moody little girl, all big-eyed and pouty-lipped as if she was being excluded from Grown Up Mysteries. That's gone now. In its place is a very adult anger, three parts stone to one part slow-burn, with all its awful, decisive, womanly grace. Such intelligence shining out of her eyes, and the competent curve of her lips and cheek. A strong woman, determined and resourceful. But soft too, like her own mother.]

[ It makes Hei want to smile, at once proud and awkward. But now is not the time to tempt Korra's readiness to cuff him. ]

[ Rising, he sidles close to lean over the stove, which he'd set into the countertop kitchen-island when moving in, years ago, to reduce his likelihood of having his back to a door when cooking. That was how his mind worked -- tactically. Still does. ]

[ Except where Korra is concerned. ]

[ Softly, his gaze vague with something like contrition, ]

I'd rather hear about you. How you've been getting on. What you've been upto. [ A beat, then, ] If you know where Yin is.

[She is, perhaps, a little more sympathetic to his reticence as she tries to figure out where to start the story of three years. Three years blessedly unmarked by world-ending chaos. But at least world-ending chaos would be something to talk about.

She's not sure whether she's relieved or distressed when he brings up Yin.]

I don't. I looked for her after she disappeared, but I couldn't find any sign of her. There wasn't any sign that she was taken against her will or hurt. I thought maybe she just needed some space to grieve. [Like I did. Though Korra didn't have the luxury of vanishing to nurse her ache in solitude. She'd already done that once, and Kuvira had almost taken over the entire Earth Kingdom.]

[ Hei's breath feels stuck in his chest. Korra's answer is what he'd expected. But that doesn't make the disappointment and guilt any less crushing. While Hei was here, he'd kept an unwavering focus on his network, his allies, his affairs. The closest to an omniscient Argus that any normal person could achieve. He'd made it his priority to be keenly aware of all things that concerned him -- and Yin most assuredly concerned him. ]

[ Where could she be? The idea of her slipping into the gaps of the city, seeping like water between the dirty cracks, makes him feel as though the eggshell of his self-restraint will at any moment smash to pieces, allowing the offensive stink of human depravity to invade his nostrils. Except it's a luxury -- like grieving -- to allow himself to conjure ugly scenarios, to be sick with fear. Right now he's just exhausted, light-headed, distant from everything. ]

[ Everything except Korra. ]

[ He doesn't meet her eyes. Instead he studies his hands, splayed out across the polished countertop. They're paler than they used to be; all of him is, from his year spent in the perpetual dark of space. For a moment, planted in this sunlit kitchen, it's difficult to recognize himself: too many timelines converging and melding together, disorienting him. ]

[ In the next breath, he shakes it off. ]

I'll have to find her.

[ Coded ads placed in newspapers and the radio. Messages secreted in that empty office where the missive had led him. Jinora's assistance in determining spiritual signatures. Whatever it takes, until he's sure she's safe. ]

[When Korra was younger, more insecure & selfish, she would've felt a little jealous at how quickly his thoughts turned to Yin — a young woman who's known him longer, better, and who loves him completely. But she's not so petty now. Yin is her friend too, even if they've spent little time together since coming to this world.

She reaches out & squeezes his hand.]

Anything I can do to help.

[ He doesn't smile, but there's a softening in his expression, something flickering across his eyes, the line of his mouth. Gratitude, maybe. Everything's crumbled around him, in the three years he's been away, but Korra is still here, steadily shining as the moon the caught in a net, warm and solid to the touch. ]

[ He lets his fingers lace with hers, squeezing them gently. ]

Maybe you can use the vines. Narrow out her energy.

[ He hopes Yin is somewhere safe. Hopes the cat is with her, keeping an eye out for her. The alternative is something that he can't bear imagining. He doesn't meet Korra's gaze. But he edges closer, putting no care or ceremony into it. Just closing the gap between them, his hand still knitted with hers, the other coming up to trace its fingertips along her jawline, before palming her face, a slow cradle, letting her decide if the touch is okay. (Maybe telling her I'm sorry but also Thank you, because he can't trust his voice not to betray him on either counts.) ]

I can try. I'm still not really good at it, unless she's in the swamp or somewhere in the spirit world. You'd have more luck with Jinora... [Her voice stutters slowly to a halt as he cups her face. She's missed him so much... She can feel the ache of it deep in her belly. Missed his smell, missed the way his touch could tell her so much. Missed having sex with him and feeling like they were building something.

She hasn't spent three years celibate. In the first few months after she thought he was dead, she made some really stupid sexual choices with people who, fortunately, nobody would ever believe got to fuck the Avatar. After that, she became a bit more discerning, occasionally releasing the tension with an attractive, well-behaved stranger, and — more frequently — Asami, after a late night discussion about Future Industry's foray into sex toys led to a mutual admission of sexual frustration and a mutual willingness to help the other work it off. But that's all it was — good friends helping each other let off steam, like maintenance on a satomobile. They weren't making anything together.

She doesn't want to rush this. She doesn't want to pretend that this three-year wound can be healed with one good fuck. But oh man, does she want to fuck him. Just yank her pants down and pull him inside so she can feel that he's back in her deepest places. She manages not to do that, instead leaning forward to hesitantly kiss him.]

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