Who cares what picture you see?

[mortemscintilla]

WHO: Korra and Hei
WHAT: Two crazy kids catch a movie. This thread is about a millimeter deep.

[ A new Mover. Faster Nuktuk! Kill! Kill! The title alone doesn't bear thinking of. Scorpions crawling around in his boxers sound more fun. Hei has no idea why he agreed to go. But Korra assured him it wasn't a four-hour epic, and that if he got too bored they could slip away. With reluctance, but aware of certain unpaid debts of boyfriendly attention, he agreed. ]

[ Since Yin's return, he knows he hasn't been spending as much time with her as he ought to. Too busy setting up living arrangements for his friend, trying without words to bridge the gap of three inexplicable years, to make sure she's safe and -- yes, happy. Because she's wasted eerily away since they've been apart, a dull-eyed washed-out husk of herself. Too Doll-like to fill him with anything but dread. ]

[ The past few weeks, he's compensated by paying her steady attention. Until she understands that he's not going anywhere, until she feels entitled to his time as a friend should. He encourages her to listen to radio broadcasts for events, so she'll be prepared with suggestions about what they might do. He gets her audio books in cassettes, a small, ornately-carved zither to play tunes on, practices his increasingly-spotty German on her, gently coaxes her out to eat all sorts of unthinkable things: arctic hen testicles, jelly of turtleduck, thousand year old eggs. He's not sure the outings make a lick of a difference. But last week, Yin was actually the one to initiate their always-brief, one-sentence conversations, rather than the other way around. Hei takes that as a good sign. ]

[ Tonight, the air carries a chill, and Korra is sunshine temperature, a little waft of summer walking at his side. Hei lets his hand curl around hers, tucking them both with a habitual air into his coat pocket. Also with a habitual air, he scans the street as they drift through the crowd, checking ambush positions, logging exits and hideaways, with the practiced nonchalance of an ex-Syndicate op. Everything looks fine. ]

[ By degrees, he allows his tension to thaw, until it is no more than a small shard lodged in his guts. The theater lies ahead, its marquee of lights boxing in the words Nuktuk like the moral of a Sunday sermon on a church sign. A knot of people wait outside; families jawing amiably, children squealing, teenagers boiling over with hormone-driven energy, giggling and jostling one another. Surrounded on all sides by normal, Hei feels wariness tugging his brows like needle with a thread. But Korra's scent is a sweet tickle in his nose, her fingers delicate, yet comfortingly strong in his, and her soft prattle laps richly at his ear, grounding his scattershot senses. ]

[ Squeezing her hand, he edges in closer. His voice is wary, interest hidden under a hard shell. ]

Is this the theater where they use real butter for the popcorn?

Comments

[mortemscintilla]

[ Hei tips a shoulder, a noncommittal Suit yourself, but there is a quiet gratitude tucked away behind his smile. She's being indulgent of his idiotic fancy -- and while it should make him uncomfortable, like a spoiled child allowed to enjoy one last carnival ride, all he feels is thankful. He doesn't know how to explain to her -- the little gestures and commonplace risks that act as his bridge between a world of perfect spycraft and the messy, spontaneous, open-ended world everyone else inhabits. He doesn't have to explain it. ]

[ Body angled, he makes an arrow of himself. Night breeze ruffles his hair to bring up goose pimples and the darkness is such that the water can't be seen, only heard, a throaty rush that his bare skin feels in an acute contact high. Perched on the verge of a blackness so deep it should be like leaping into everlasting night or into death itself. ]

[ It isn't. But wouldn't it be interesting if it was? ]

[ When he leaps, it's legs-first, arms crossed over his chest so he falls as if tipped dead from a coffin. Such a short fall for such a yawning distance, yet it's a shot of pure adrenaline. Then he's underwater, bitingly cold and dark, and everything disappears -- sky, stars, city, self. On the surface, barely a ripple spreads where he's dropped in. It's a given that generally you surface forty yards from where you've dropped in. He doesn't, though. The water's shimmering surface stays unbroken. ]

[ (Try not to worry, Korra. He can hold his breath an admirably long time.) ]

[anatural]

[Korra's heart clenches, just a little, as he goes plummeting over the edge, even as she knows he's going to be okay. She's seen him do crazy shit before — swinging from building to building, taking risks that seem insane as easily as you walk out the front door of your house.

She strolls to the edge, peering down to make sure she doesn't need to bend the water before he breaks the surface. She barely sees him slide in, he makes so little impact on the water. She watches and waits for him to come up.

And waits.

And...waits. He's fine. She knows he's fine. But that's still a really long time in the water.]

Shoot.

[She shrugs off her coat and dives after him. Just in case.]

[mortemscintilla]

[ Upon impact, the icy water had sent a rolling tide of gooseflesh up Hei's body. But the chill is gone now, water warm, the temperature of blood. He lets himself go, not diving but merely sinking. His nose is filled with the taste of stirred silt and algae and salt; the weight of water forces the air from his lungs. He knows you're supposed to surface quick, to tread ashore with the strong slice of a shark's fin. If you cramp up or get licked by a ripcurl you'll be sucked into the break where bay meets sea. That far out, only the sky and water, a body gets to feeling it's filled with rocks. People drown all the time. ]

[ He doesn't want to drown. He's never been interested in going out so easy. Life never offers you free handouts. Why make it any easier for death? ]

[ Still, he stays where he is, buffeted by undercurrents, pulled deeper. Strands of hair sweep in soft arcs across his face. He floats through perfect blackness, uncertain gravity. Feeling so sweetly serene, so close to death. Close enough to taste, if death has a taste. ]

[ Then he becomes aware of body plunging near his, a blur of flailing little arms and legs distorted by motion and diffusion. Blinking, the illusion of peace dissolved, he arrows his body. Kicking with powerful strokes to the surface, hurtling up into the frigid air, the hot white stars above aligned in orbit, the distant screeching of gulls, the syncopated beat of music from one of the bayside dance-halls -- and the shape of Korra's lovely bedraggled head, the sight hitting him like a waft of pure oxygen. ]

[ He blinks a moment, confused. Then smiles an odd, inscrutable half-smile. ]

I thought you were just watching.

[anatural]

[Korra comes up with a gasp that's more relief than a need for air. Knowing that he's okay, she feels rather silly for jumping in after him. It was fun, though - the adrenaline thrill of the fall, everything disappearing until it was just her and the water rushing toward her. She grins aft him.]

I changed my mind. Couldn't let you have all the fun.

[She swims closer and wraps her arms around his neck. His skin is far too cold... That can't be good. She presses herself closer to warm them both up.]

[mortemscintilla]

[ It wasn't for fun, Hei wants to tell her. Shivering, he struggles to frame an appropriate response. He wishes he could explain he's trying to see his way clear of it -- whatever It is. But each day it grows harder. Like, the things he thought possible aren't truly possible anymore, and they’ll never be again. Life doesn't speak to him the way it seems to do to Korra -- everything seeps down to a certain sublevel, then stops, frozen, as if separated by a glaze of ennui. He's struggled with it before. He's struggling now. When he does stupid things, takes crazy risks, it's because he has to jolt himself out of it. ]

[ And he still doesn't know what he's doing with her. He's afraid he'll never know it -- or understand why she keeps him around. ]

[ Except he can't say anything. Disconnected words flee through his mind. Then Korra is swimming closer, hair plastered wetly to the curve of her skull, pearlescent drops clinging to her eyelashes and rolling down her cheeks. Beautiful as a mermaid and eerie as a drowned ghost. He gathers her close, taking in slow lungfuls of the salty air, nuzzling her cheek, clammy then warm with radiant pulse. ]

[ Quietly, the lines of his face melting into a childlike smile, ]

It was fun.

[ He's not sure if he means it or not. But the movie, the popcorn, the messy quickie, the stroll for ice-cream culminating into this icier plunge ... It was definitely nice. Nice to lose track of everything except this delicious armful of girl hugged up against him. He may be bereft of a lot of things. But in this aspect, he is ridiculously lucky. ]

[anatural]

[She knows it wasn't for fun. But as close as they are, as many intimacies as they've learned to share, they both still shy away from pure expressions of sentiment. She doesn't quite want to say "you scared me" over something so trivial. But as much as she's made her peace with the wounds of the past, he's vanished too often, in too many different ways, for these things not to frighten her at least a little.

He's here now, and that's what matters. She nuzzles his shoulder.]

Want another go?

[She may or may not mean the jump.]

[mortemscintilla]

[ He always finds it ironic, that though he's half-convinced that something may wrench her from him, or that he might drive her off himself, by getting everything wrong in a million explicit or undefined ways, he is the one who constantly floats away, sometimes figuratively, sometimes literally. He sees the effects of it in Korra's anxiety, stronger sometimes than others, and tries his best to allay it. Because he understands how terrible it is, fearing that everything you've gotten used to might be taken away with the snap of fate's fickle fingers; the classic fear of anyone mortal and vulnerable and powerless -- but the pain is so uniquely his and Korra's. ]

[ Plumes of steam rise off his shoulders and braid from the crown of his skull. Chill wind pours across his skin, but inside there's a flicker of heat, brightening and burgeoning, at the touch of Korra's body, buoyant in the water, at the innocent delicacy of her question. ]

No. [ To the jump, at least. A beat, before he wrinkles his nose, faintly wry, almost playful. ] But somewhere dry and toasty would be nice.

[anatural]

I think that can be arranged. [She starts swimming back to the shore, without letting go of him. It should be awkward, and it kind of is, but it's also fun, moving as one tangled mass. She only lets go, reluctantly, when her feet touch sand. The night air isn't particularly cold, though it certainly feels that way with the water weighing down her clothes and skin.

Easy enough to take care of — she draws all the water off herself and Hei with her bending and returns it to the bay as a little orb that almost glows.]

[mortemscintilla]

[ Hei watches the orb spin across the waters, absorbing the glow of starlight and casting it back brilliantly, like the glints of Korra's teeth and eyewhites, as if she's something ethereal and enchanting that has arisen to work magic from the sea-depths. Dry now, his skin and hair crisped with leftover salt, he wants a shower. But the walk back to the statue to gather his clothes and shoes seems tedious. Korra is right here, seeping warmth, close enough to touch, and a row of crusty fishing boats float near the shoreline, the starlight breaking through each ship's geometric angles, glinting off the gangplanks, and offering its own mix of illumination and concealment. ]

[ He knows it's a bad idea. There are patrolmen who take rounds of the shoreline. But the rimey sea air knocks something loose inside him, makes him feel light, giddy, almost young. Slowly, he edges closer to Korra, his movements gentle and insinuating. Presses her back against the nearest sand-crusted tree, his leg threaded between hers, and lets their mouths nudge and connect in the imperfect darkness. A seduction, but also a question. ]

[anatural]

[Once she had balked at the idea of getting intimate under the statue of her past life. Now she's a little less caught up in image and propriety and what she "should" do and how she "should" behave. And she thinks Aang would understand. This is an expression of love — raunchy, inappropriate, a little shock, but still love.

Besides, they've done a dozen other crazy things tonight. What's one more? She runs her hands up his back, lightly tracing the network of scars with her nails, and grinds against his leg. Her kiss is an enthusiastic yes to whatever he wants to suggest.]

[mortemscintilla]

[ Hei smiles into the hot press of their mouths, his eyes glinting dryly at her from under the shadowy crowns of lashes. The tree is squat and stumpy, but with a gnarled abundance of branches pluming dense leaves overhead. Gently, he snatches at Korra's wrists, coaxing her skittering nails away from his skin before they grow too distracting. Tipping her arms overhead, he folds her fingers around the sturdiest crisscrossing branches, until she's all but balanced on her tiptoes. The position arches her body, forces her breasts out, and he smoothes the tangles of hair from her cheeks, tucking them behind her ears, until her face is a soft-blooming cipher in the wan starlight. ]

Don't move.

[ His tone is bossy and indulgent in equal parts. He stays close, his thigh still wedged between hers, offering pressure but no friction. With his fingertips, he touches her, lightly, unhurriedly, in the places that he wants to touch, which are not necessarily where she may want to be touched: the slope of belly and curving waist, the long muscles of her thighs, the sturdy calves, thumbs skimming the undersides of her buttocks, tracing the hard ridge of spine, the span of shoulderblades, all through the warm fabric of her clothes. ]

[anatural]

Heeeei... [She whines, frustrated, but obeys. The tree bark digs into her palms, encouraging her to stand even more on tiptoe to put less pressure on her hands. He's not touching her in the really good places, but she's not yet turned on enough for that to be torture.]

Explain again why you like it when I don't touch you.

[mortemscintilla]

[ He tips her a crooked little smile, but doesn't answer her. He doesn't need to. For him, it's all about maintaining the upper hand. Even as he's learnt a great deal about slackening his controlling streak, about letting go, there are times he needs to flex it. To remind them both that he's not going to hurt her. To show her, almost, that he won't (again? anymore?) abuse that fragile trust spinning skein-fine between them. ]

[ She's balanced on her tip-toes, and he can't help but admire the sight of her, tongue-tip skimming his upper-lip at the dappled fall of light and shadow, her breasts and buttocks high, her calf muscles lifted, the fabric straining across her blouse. Immobile Avatar, by goddamn Michelangelo, but with radiantly alive skin. Edging closer, he coasts his palms along her sides and behind her, pulling her against him, her breasts a soft delicious pillow-weight against his chest. Drops both hands to her ass so her hips are dragged in tight, his thigh fitted neatly between her legs. ]

[ Inhaling, Hei lets his eyelids slip half-shut and his lips open, wet and biting against her throat. She smells of sea-water and adrenaline, a musk that is deeply saltine, yet far from foul. Entrancing and bittersweet. Gnawing the curve of her neck, he dips his head. Nuzzles her breasts, then sucks wet spots at her nipples through the fabric, a sharp ring of teeth and damp friction of tongue coaxing them into a state of puckered hardness. As he works, he rocks his thigh between hers, hard long muscles against the softness of her groin, teasing out that sweet kindling heat. ]

[anatural]

[Korra draws in a long, ragged breath and lets her eyes flutter shut. She'll never understand his need for control, not really, though she's played her own control games every once in awhile. So she doesn't get the reminder or the reassurance he intends. The only message she receives from it is that he wants to run the game.

She's okay with that, though. She may not enjoy helplessness itself, but she enjoys the pleasure he gets out of it. That's the best part of sex — not just receiving physical pleasure, but enjoying his.

The bark digs into her palms, and she flexes her fingers, trying to give her hands a break, even as she arches into his touch, making soft sounds of enjoyment.]

[mortemscintilla]

[ He knows the tree-bark isn't a forgiving texture. He could tie her hands with his belt, but she's never gone for that type of play, and it's not her immobility he's interested in. Just her acquiescence, her trust. Slinging one arm around her, he keeps her close, so her weight is distributed more comfortably, pressure concentrated on that hot point of contact where his thigh nudges between her legs. Coasting a palm along the hem of her blouse, he peels it up until it's bunched above her breasts. Loving the sight she makes, throat a taut thrilling line down to the bandages of her sarashi, and that gorgeous bounty it restrains. ]

[ Still, he doesn't rush right into things they way he used to. He's learnt that a slow burn generates just as much heat as a flash-fire -- more, if you stoke it right. He strokes her swathed breasts, pinching them firmly now and then, and kisses her until he can feel the jitteriness in her gusting breaths, feel her nipples growing harder. Nuzzling her ribs, her belly, he descends to his knees, cradling her body with widespread palms. Fits himself at the juncture of her thighs, rubbing his face against her crotch. His hard forehead presses her zipper into her slit, before he mouths her through the thick material, scraping his teeth along it so the thick seam is pressed against her clit. ]

[anatural]

Mmmm! [He's such a tease. Korra squirms and wishes she could grab onto him. Or wrap her legs around him. Do something. Or at the very least, let her arms down. She's strong enough to maintain this position for as long as she has to, but that doesn't make it comfortable. This is essentially a torture position, after all.]

I know you told me not to move... but could I put my arms down?

[She wriggles enticingly, offering him an incentive to be merciful.]

[mortemscintilla]

[ He's tempted to say No. But he isn't interested in adding to her discomfort. Especially not with the delicious way she squirms, that pleading-kitten expression of hers feeding a wash of quiet, ridiculous tenderness through him. Threading his arms around her, he hitches her up until she's got her arms and legs looped around his torso. ]

[ The sand is a glittery powder, damp and fine, and he melts to his knees so Korra is settled into his lap. This close, her body-heat affects him like swallowing a mouthful of vodka, its temperature pooling pleasantly in his stomach while a different breed of warmth sparks deep within his bones. Drawing her face close in his two hands, he smoothes the wind-tumbled hair away from her mouth. Kisses her there, soft and full, before exploring the point of her chin, the delicate fold of her ear, the sweet spot at the angle of her jaw which, teased just so, makes her ripple like a playful cat. Trancy, absorbed, but strangely innocent, as if his initial intent was to torment her, but now he's gotten side-tracked with the little whimsies. ]

[ It's funny. He's been with her for ages, yet each time he's greedy for all the secrets of her, remapped, resampled, the way he imagines a starving user wanting junk, thrumming sickly for that sweet, spinning, ecstasy, its sheen refusing to fade. ]

[anatural]

[He's gotten so easy to distract — not relentless the way he used to be. Korra likes it better that way. At this point in her life, she prefers sweetness and whimsy to pushing boundaries. She doesn't have anything to prove to him or to herself anymore, and that had always been the thrill of controlplay for her. All she really wants is to be close to him. She smiles and wraps her arms around him, moves her body to encourage and reward him.]

[mortemscintilla]

[ It is all in the framing. The frames you build for your life and the habits your subconscious starts accumulating, whether you are paying attention or not. After such-and-such number of years with Korra (he'll never figure out which anniversary, if any, to privilege), the sweetness and whimsy don't feel forced or unnatural, or even some milestone of personal progression -- ( A relationship that you haven't fucked up yet with lies or violence. Go you) -- but just a thing that's real and true. ]

[ She stirs against him, her arms two delicious bars of heat in the coolish air, and he takes careful hold of her waist. Touches his lips to hers again, delicately, coaxing her lower-lip between his teeth with gentle tugs, then letting his tongue push in, licking and twining in a slow, dreamily unforced exploration. It's not all innocent, though; in his trousers, he's hard, achy. Every inch of skin thrums with the eagerness to push her back, strip her and sink inside, to leave her with gasping lungs, flung limbs and scorch-mouthed bites and kisses. It suits him better. And her. ]

[anatural]

[Korra can feel his eagerness throbbing between her legs. She slides her hands down his chest, down to his pants. She runs her thumb along the zipper, pressing it lightly, just enough to give him a little friction.]

Tell me what you want.

[If he wants the control game back, she'll let him do it. And if he wants to rip her pants off and sink right in, well, that's even better. (It always confused Asami, how little foreplay needs before Korra was ready to get stuffed. Different strokes, different folks.)]

[mortemscintilla]

[ He shudders as she palms the hard slope of his chest, twitches as she thumbs the cold line of his zipper, the metal teeth pressing into his erection as if he's been given a shock. Tell me what you want, she says, and he almost smiles, because isn't it obvious? None of the games, the frippery, dispels his focus from the target. This girl. Her body and mine. Yes. She makes him so rawly hungry, a terrifying exposure of emotion that always makes him want to reach for her to cover that impulse, deny and distract. ]

[ For once, he doesn't. Instead, dropping a hand between them, he tries to get at his fly without discouraging her hand. Dragging his dick out with an aimless efficiency from the swelter of his jeans, he tugs at her waistband with the other hand, skinning her pants down, all short fingernails and rough haste, until the material is jammed against her boots. Of course it isn't as simple as all that. It's clumsy and juvenile and cramped, and he's sure they're going to end up with bodyparts full of grit, and sand between their fingers and under their nails and in their hair. ]

[ It doesn't matter. The wind is chilly, but blood is zinging through him, nerves firing brightly like the coils and bells on a pinball machine, core temperature boiling -- and when he tugs Korra's boots off, dragging her pants free and settles her astride him, the saddle of her thighs is buttery-hot and heavy, perfect, her splayed sex a wet smear across the taut smoothness of his cock: heat against heat. ]

[anatural]

[As long as Korra doesn't get sand up her vag, she's happy. She laughs as she helps him wriggle her out of her pants.]

This would go a lot smoother if you'd let me undress myself. [It's a longstanding joke, his tendency to strip her instead of letting her undress herself. But awkward or not, the pants do come off and he's there between her legs, an electric shock given form. Before he can do anything more, she reaches down and places him at her entrance herself.

She kisses him, takes a deep breath, and sinks straight down.]

[mortemscintilla]

I'm just --

[ He can't finish. His breath stutters to a halt, before unsnapping with a wet, wheezy moan. Korra's fingers are chilly, but the rest of her pulses heat, her sex a fluid mind-melting swallow that cuts off higher brain-function like a film reel, a useless dark flapping. His breath gusts hotly against the seam of her lips; he's got one arm cinched around her waist, palm splayed between her shoulderblades while the other hand finds a brutal grip on her ass and kneads. ]

[ Beyond them, in a slice of peripheral vision, there is the edge of the water, waves breaking into lacy foam and the sky speckled with bright stars above. He scarcely notices. This has nothing to do with romance or ambiance; his whole body begs to rut, and will do so in the most convenient place. But it's not so black-and-white as the selfish mess of Want Take Have, either. ]

[ Gathering Korra closer, he circles his hips, deep and fluid. Licks the glitter of salt from the hollow of her collarbones, before he kisses her mouth again, a curl of tongue that is both tender and lewd, somehow matching the glint of his half-lidded eyes. Wanting to focus, for the moment, on nothing but this: the most drag of skin on skin, the smooth, slick fit of their bodies and the soft fluttering of both their pulse. ]

[anatural]

[Ambiance is overrated, but romance? This is plenty romantic. This intimacy, this ache, it's unique to them. It's different from the ache she feels with Asami, that she felt with Bolin back when they were intimate. Flowers and moonlight and music don't hold a candle to that.

She wraps her arms around him and rolls her hips, taking a sinful delight in the feel of skin-on-skin. She doesn't mind condoms — she understands their importance — but those first few weeks after his return gave her a real taste for bareback. But he's so paranoid, they never do it as much as she'd like.]

[mortemscintilla]

[ As far as Hei's concerned, they risk bareback entirely too much. It's a point of outright tension between them. Each morning, he badgers her about mindfully taking the herbs in her special sachet. He's even suggested she try the new oral contraceptives that are trickling into the market, if she wants unprotected sex without the threat of pregnancy. He can't deal with the idea of a baby. The memory of Korra's first pregnancy, the bloody wash of the miscarriage, the dismal era is presaged -- it is still raw. He's barely gotten settled into the wreckage of his life. He's slowly coming back to himself, to his routines; a baby has no place in that wobbly framework. ]

[ He's content with Korra. More than content -- happy. It's so hard-won and precarious, and he refuses to allow a volatile element into that mix. Even sharing her with Asami is more teeth-gritted effort than generous lenience. ]

[ He can't say any of that, though. Or think of anything at all, beyond the taffy-pull of Korra's heat and softness, the way it stirs him from brainstem to spine. The fabric of her sarashi is an abrasive scratch across his bare chest; tugging it undone with an aimless skill, Hei lets her breasts overspill into his hands. Hot, heavy, a slow pulse against his palms. He buries his nose between them, takes a deep appreciative whiff of her saltysweet scent, at the same time thumbing her nipples, matching it to the soft jerk of his hips, his cock a tight, slippery nudging against her sweetspot. ]