Post by Admin on Aug 6, 2009 2:06:12 GMT -5
Luce:
Luce drifted somewhere in a place between true sleep and true wakefulness. Her breathing was still even, her heartbeat slow. The sounds that came to her ears didn't really get processed by her mind just yet but their presence was marked. They were like boats drifting by on calm seas and Luce was standing on a shore. They came and they went, and she didn't particularly notice except to think they were nice to look at, nice to hear.
On any other morning she would be up by now, already half way through her self imposed training regiment. Mornings were the best time to be up and about in Vegas, before the sun had truly risen and baked the earth and the people doomed to wander beneath its baleful, desert gaze.
But this morning she avoided consciousness instead of jumping into it. She was safe here, comfortable, warm, and she didn't want to leave. Like generations before her, Luce had learned that their were many things possible in the darkness that didn't hold in the dawn's light. So waking would mean facing the world and its realities, something that she wanted to hold off for just a bit longer.
She felt someone else's heartbeat between her shoulders and someone else's body breathed against her own. There wasn't a name attached to the person yet, that was another bit of information that she let float by out of her reach, but everything that a name invoked; feelings, memories, a presence, all of that was there. That was unusual, having someone else there. But the knowledge didn't cause her to feel alarmed. Just the opposite.
She moved a bit to get more comfortable and felt the softness of the pillow under her cheek and the sheets against her skin. Even in the hotel they did not have bedding this comfortable and the unfamiliar luxury just drove her closer to wakefulness.
So after a couple of more minutes of blissful, imposed ignorance, she opened her eyes. Golden sunlight flooded the room coming in through the white curtains and bouncing off the warm tones of the wood that could be found all throughout Sedra's house.
Luce blinked for a moment, letting her eyes adjust to being open and letting her mind wake up on its own. She didn't try to sit up, it would have involved moving Sedra's arm and she didn't want to wake her yet, but her breathing began to speed up and tagging along with consciousness, came responsibility and Luce couldn't stop thinking of all the places she should be and all the things she should be doing.
She sighed but accepted them and turned her head slightly. "Sedra."
Sedra:
"Sedra."
"Mm." The quiet sound of Luce's voice rouse Sedra slowly from her sleep. Her sleep had been full of dreams--her own as well as Catherine's. It was not unusual for her host's dreams to become tangled with her own while they slept. Most of them felt thin, distant. Sedra could sense them, could feel the fuzzy traces of them touching her own mind, but couldn't quite grasp them at times.
Other times they were vivid, sometimes full of pain, sometimes full of lost hope. Sometimes they were her host's old memories, tainted by the violence and despair of her present life. It was one of these dreams that Luce's voice stirred the both of them from. The sunlight from one of the windows spilled into the room, warming the carpet and falling across her face, scattering the night's dreams.
Sedra awoke sleepily, her arm curling snugly around Luce's form lying next to her. The bare flesh of her shoulder had a pink scar running along it, a mark from one of the Animorph's attacks. She nuzzled her face against the nape of Luce's neck, breathing in the faded scent of rain mingled within her dark, curly hair. Still lost in the fog of early morning, half-awake, Sedra murmured something like 'Jals' against Luce's skin, barely audible. Then she shifted slightly, sighing.
Everywhere it was warm, cozy. Comfortable. The plush, silk sheets of the bed grazed her flesh, enveloping her body. Morning was Sedra's favorite part of the day--when her host wasn't quite awake and aware, when for a brief moment everything was silent and the day was full of opportunity. But it also meant dealing with the reality of things again. Dealing with Yeerk ranks, dealing with the crabby scientists she worked with, dealing with the Animorphs. Every day as usual.
This morning was a pleasant, quiet morning. Surreal almost. Outside, Sedra's ears could pick up the gentle chirp of sparrows nesting in the backyard trees. The sound buzzed in her ears for awhile, before finally helping her wake up more. Sedra's eyes slid open, focusing on Luce next to her. Not Jals, Luce.
Suddenly, the events of their stolen night rose up to her memory. Deep down Sedra felt her host rousing as well, realizing, remembering. The slow emotions from her host filtered through: anger, betrayal, confusion. Mixed with a strange sense of something else. Sedra didn't want to deal with it, to watch the thoughts that were surfacing from her host and have the emotions needle her good mood. Stuffing a mental barrier between them, she ignored Catherine for now. Despite that, came the realities of what had happened at the dam. All the pain and terror, the frustration. The things she would have to deal with today. It was unpleasant, and not something she wanted to dwell over right now.
A small smile tugged on her lips, and she shifted again until she had one arm free, propped against one of the fluffy pillows. After rubbing her eyes, she rested her cheek in the open palm of her hand. Her other hand moved to touch lightly across Luce's cheek, pulling back a strand of the woman's dark hair behind her ear. "Hey."
Luce:
Luce turned so that she was facing Sedra and one arm went around her waist. "Hey yourself," she said with a small smile before closing her eyes again briefly. It was so easy, surprisingly easy to love her and to be here with her. And Luce just wanted to forget about the rest of the world and stay here with her, go back to just a couple of minutes ago when she wasn't aware of her duties and responsibilities. But if there were people out there who could ignore their conscience indefinitely Luce wasn't one of them. Some days she wished she was, it would make life easier.
She opened her eyes again and they found the scar that was Sedra's permanent reminder of her second run in with the animorphs. Except it wasn't her scar. It was Catherine's. Catherine would forever bear that scar for decisions she had no part in making. And even now, she was here.
Luce looked into Sedra's, into Catherine's eyes but she wasn't sure what she was looking for exactly, or who. She should have said something to Catherine then but she didn't. She didn't want to face her just yet. She knew it made her a coward and yet she stayed silent anyway. She couldn't silence her conscience forever, but she could silence it for a little while.
"I want to stay but I should go," she said quietly but made no move to leave or even get up.
Sedra:
Sedra rubbed her eyes again, trying to wake up more. Outside the birds were still chirping, their shadows flitting back and forth across the window panes. It was the kind of morning where it was easy to sleep in, especially with Luce here. There was a wistful look on Sedra's face, almost. Wanting. Sedra met Luce's gaze as she spoke, a quiet smile reflected in her blue eyes.
"I understand." She wasn't surprised that Luce had to leave. Even if this was one of her days off, she would have to leave soon too. There were things to be done today, Yeerks to face and issues to be resolved. Still, maybe she could steal some more time. After a playful hesitation, Sedra placed a light kiss on Luce's lips. Then, reluctantly, she drew herself away from Luce's arms and pulled herself upright on the bed. Black curls of hair fell across her shoulders, dark against the creamy beige of her skin. As she moved, the sheets slid off her, pooling around her waist.
The room was pleasantly warm. Sedra had found that in some places the sun didn't start warming the earth until near the afternoon or later. In Las Vegas, it began early and lingered. Sometimes even the evenings could get hot. It was something Sedra knew her host enjoyed. There were memories she had gone through when she first infested her host, memories of Catherine's childhood--warm, carefree Saturday mornings, waiting for her favorite cartoons to come on. Small, sitting against the window panes, feeling the sun hit her back. After awhile, it was something that Sedra had grown to like as well.
Bending her head forward a little, Sedra ran the palms of her hands against her face, then brushed her fingers through her tangled hair. Catherine's thoughts were still there, in the back of her mind, no matter how much distance Sedra tried placing between them. They weren't as scattered, or terrible as they had been earlier. After the initial shock of waking, her host had withdrawn more.
The absence of abuse from her host didn't help to ease Sedra's confusion, or make her feel any more clear about this whole situation. She was messing around with a supposed sworn enemy, an Animorph, a human, a free human. She expected some sort of cut-and-dry reaction from her host; Something she could expect from a host, some quip about being evil or some snarky comment that was supposed to taunt her into anger or make her feel more detached. Instead there was just here, and now. And there was Luce.
Turning her head a little, she lifted an eyebrow. "Could I make you some food, before you leave?" Sedra had never known how to cook, but Catherine had learned the skill from her mother back when she had been younger. The skill came in handy. "Some breakfast?"
Luce:
Luce reluctantly opened her arms so that Sedra could sit up. She did have to go but Sedra had been the first to make a move to get out of bed. Luce lifted her head off the pillow just enough to rest it in a right hand, her elbow resting on the pillow where her cheek had been a moment before. She buried her fingers in her hair and looked down at the covers that still held the impression of Sedra's body (Catherine's) in them. Her left hand swept over it, smoothing some of the wrinkles in the sheets. Her posture looked a bit like a child who had been told she had to get up and go to school except that she wore a look of quiet contemplation instead of thwarted indulgence.
She looked up to meet Sedra's eyes when she heard the offer of breakfast. A small smile replaced the slight, thoughtful frown she'd been wearing. She pushed herself up slowly, her weight resting on her right arm. She ended up half sitting, half reclining. She used her other hand to try to rub the remainders of sleep from her eyes. "I supposed I could stay for a while," she said knowing very well that doing so was an unnecessary risk.
Her hand dropped back down to the sheets around her waist and she looked past Sedra to where bars of light fell on the carpet where they were coming in from the blinds. Small pieces of dust floated serenely through the air but Luce didn't really see them. She was trying to figure out what time it was by the angle of the light but then she decided she didn't care. How much more trouble could she possible get into for staying just a little longer?
She looked back up at Seda after making the decision to stay. "Yeah, I could probably stay for a while but," her free hand crossed the short distance between them and she ran her fingers lightly over Sedra's skin. "I'm not really hungry," she said and looked up. "Are you?" she asked hoping the answer was no.
Sedra:
"Alright." The tone of her voice hinted that she seemed content with Luce's answer. In the least, she'd accomplished getting Luce to stay longer. Some part of Sedra wanted to ask where she had to leave off to so early in the morning. Another part of her didn't want to know. It felt like too much to deal with, too much to care about right now. The question was close on her lips, almost, but was left unasked.
Clenching her eyes closed, Sedra attempted to stifle a yawn against the back of her hand. Even if she had been plagued by the fragments of her host's bad dreams, the sleep had been better than usual. It had been so long since Sedra had felt some sort of peace akin to what she had felt with Jals. Even though she was used to it by now, it was strange. Even moreso that she felt it with Luce. With a human.
Sedra's eyes slid open, her dark blue gaze coming to rest on Luce. Her eyes were warm, if not still misted with a little sleepiness, and her voice was smooth. "I'm not, no." She paused. "Maybe later, then. If you get hungry." Food could sometimes be hard enough to get, even being a Yeerk. Most stores were run down or partially destroyed and food had been left out to rot by the ones in charge, too busy dealing with everything else. Now they were back-tracking, trying to get things back together and start processing food for their hosts again. A conquered world was useless if all their hosts died from starvation. And so, Sedra offering food was not usual.
Now that Luce was staying--if only for a bit--Sedra didn't feel as motivated to get up. At Luce's touch, the corners of her lips turned upwards a little. Truthfully, she had suggested the food as a way to keep her here longer. To prolong the fact that the both of them had to get back to their respective worlds at some point.
Shifting, Sedra slipped one arm around Luce's waist and pulled her closer. Her fingertips traced along Luce's back, light along her spine. "Not sure how willing I am to get up, anyways."
Luce:
She let Sedra pull her over and Luce slipped her free arm around Sedra's waist pulling her closer at the same time. She shivered slightly as Sedra's fingertips ran up her spine.
Whatever else might happen in the future, or even just later today, she was glad she was here and she was glad this moment existed. There would come a time, there always came a time, when she would be hurt, or scared, or fighting, or dying, and everything would seem wrong. But she'd be able to remember this morning and Luce was beginning to think that the only point of living was to gather moments like this.
A contented smile slowly spread across her face. "Hmmm, I was hoping you'd say that."
Sedra:
**Later**
The kitchen was slowly being filled with the enticing aromas of breakfast being made; Sedra had decided to make some french toast topped with some powdered sugar, along with a side of some fruit. The cooking hadn't started out well at first--Sedra had attempted to do it without going through her host's memories. Along with that, her host had slipped into a withdrawn silence.
Making breakfast with her host was part of a morning routine usually; Sedra would do her morning stretch--a habit leftover from Catherine's past--and her host would help her make breakfast. It would be easy enough to dig through her host's memories and do it herself, of course. But in the privacy of the house, where it was only her and her host in the mornings, she left Catherine alone. So, after some prolonged silence, Catherine had started giving her small bits of advice off and on. Once finished, Sedra had cut the toast into slices and placed the food on a couple plates along with the fruit.
Reaching forward, Sedra switched the stove off and picked the plates up in both hands. Luce had been seated at the table, where a couple misty glasses of orange juice were sitting. In the middle was a syrup bottle, one of the old brands from when human products were still being produced. It was partially empty, with some syrup stuck in the cap.
Immediately to the side of the table was a large window, its blinds thrown all the way open to let the sunlight spill into the room. The cat from the night before was perched on the window's ledge, his pink nose pressed against the warm pane of glass and jaw moving ever-so-slightly with tiny meows. His tail, fluffy with black rings, flicked back and forth expectantly. He was watching some birds outside--pigeons hobbling around the grass looking for scraps of food and small sparrows hopping around. The cat had slept on one of Sedra's couches for the night, and eaten his cat-breakfast in quick gulps when Sedra had come downstairs and fed him.
Setting one plate in front of Luce, Sedra settled down in her own seat. She'd slipped into a cotton sundress and stockings, something that probably looked more relaxed than Luce had seen her wear before. Fiddling with one of the forks near the plate, her blue eyes lifted to Luce's face. "What do you think?"
Luce:
Luce sat at the table feeling just a little useless. She didn't know how to cook and normally her breakfast consisted of too many bowls of cereal. And not even the good kind but the ones with fiber and vitamins and all the other things bodies supposedly needed. If she was indulging herself she put fruit on it. Not to say she never ate junk food, she just ate it sparingly and late at night.
She spent her time looking around the kitchen and readjusting her forks and spoons. Multiple forks, multiple spoons. Why did you ever need more than one? You didn't, not really. And the chopsticks were just going overboard and when she found herself starting to use them as drumsticks she put them back down and pushed them away so her nervous hands couldn't reach them without her mind noticing.
She watched Sedra move through the kitchen from cupboard to stove to sink to drawer. All the movements were carried out with such unconscious surety that it almost seemed like a dance. She had seemed a little unsure at first but had quickly settled into the pace that Luce was now admiring telling Luce that she'd done this before and she did it often. Luce thought about commenting but she didn't want to distract Sedra and she was enjoying just watching.
Luce heard a tiny click sound as Sedra turned some dial on the stove. The whole time Luce had been passively observing and hadn't really kept track of how close Sedra was to being done so when she picked up the plates and turned towards the table Luce found herself in the uncomfortable situation that occurs when someone catches you staring at them. She looked away quickly, looking at the glass of orange juice she hadn't really touched yet.
A plate of french toast and fruit got put into the spot on the table Luce was looking at and she looked up in time to see Sedra sitting down across from her with a similar plate.
For a moment she didn't say anything and Luce noticed that her hands weren't the only ones that fiddled with cutlery when they were not being paid attention to. "What do you think?" she asked and Luce looked back down at her plate.
"I think it looks too pretty to eat," she answered, voicing the first thing that came to her mind. The breakfast looked like it should be photographed for a food magazine. The fruit was all in vibrant colors and neatly sliced next to the pieces of french toast fried to a golden brown and covered in powdered sugar.
She picked up a fork but didn't use it. This scene was surreal. Luce felt like they were in a bubble and the real world was on the outside of it but it wouldn't get held there for long and already the reality of this world seemed to be fraying. She became hyper aware of small the inconsistencies in this scene of domestic normalcy and happiness. The feeling of the morphing suit under her clothing pulling against her movements. The sounds of birds chirping and the knowledge that she could become one of them. The dracon beam on the kitchen counter, a piece of alien technology sitting right next to a bowl of house hold nick knacks that never seemed to have a proper place except for the bowl or box or drawer in every house always put aside for their use. And then of course the biggest unspoken truth looming over this scene, the fact that there were not two players, but three.
She looked up at Sedra and saw Catherine sitting there. The woman who had gotten her through the worst years of her life, who had sat with her in the cages and had been the one to tell Luce to keep hoping for freedom. They had suffered together. And now Luce was one of her jailers. As responsible for her slavery as Sedra was because she was sitting here and didn't try to do anything to stop it.
Luce put her fork down and pushed her chair away from the table. "I...I have to go, to get back," she said quietly and she hated herself for saying it. She was hurting Sedra by doing so and that hurt her. But she wasn't even hurting Sedra for a reason, she wasn't asking her to free Catherine or even mentioning that she thought it was wrong. She was just running away so that she didn't have to deal with either woman and the moral problem they represented. "I'm, I'm sorry. It...thank you for breakfast, for cooking...I just have to go."
Sedra:
A smirk twitched on her face at Luce's comment about the food. She didn't make french toast often, but it had felt like she should make something more substantial then just some cereal and milk. Looking up from her food, her blue eyes rested on Luce. She had noticed the thoughtful look on Luce's face, and in her eyes when they lifted to meet her own. The food smelled delicious, but Sedra wasn't feeling particularly hungry. As it was, neither of them were touching their food.
Sedra didn't move when Luce put the fork down and pushed away from the table. Her only reaction was a small blink, as if she'd been hit. There were no traces of the smile on her face anymore. It had been replaced by a more distant expression, something more usual of her. Perhaps it shouldn't have come as a surprise, but it had nonetheless. Luce's words had broken the almost dreamy atmosphere that had shrouded the two of them since the night before. Had widened the crack, let reality start to slip further through its fissures.
"Ahh, I see." Withdrawing her fingers from the fork, she looked over to the window. The cat was still perched on its ledge, his tail flicking back and forth. "You're welcome. I enjoyed cooking." She was taking great pains to cut out the hurt from her voice--so much so that it would be hard to detect. No matter how much they were pretending, there was always the solemn fact of the war hanging over their heads. Even if Sedra wanted to believe that she could recover what she had lost with Jals, it didn't make this situation any different then what it truly was. They weren't on the same side of the war. The next time they might find themselves staring across the different sides of a battlefield.
A false smile found its way onto her lips. One hand slipped underneath the plate in front of her, lifting it up as she stood up from her chair. Then she leaned across the table to take Luce's plate. The movement caught the cat's attention, and his head swiveled around to watch as Sedra piled the plates atop each other. The tiled floor was warm underneath her stockinged feet as she moved to the sink and laid the plates carefully in it.
Turning back, she glanced to the nearby glass sliding door. The sun was pouring through the glass panes, outlining a warm patch of sunlight across the floor. After a moment Sedra returned back near the table, hands resting atop her chair's back. There was a goodbye on her lips, but it didn't make it past them. Instead she ended up saying, "Leave the door open when you go."
Luce:
A slight increase in the pace of her breathing was the only sign of how much Sedra's last words and the cold tone it was said in had hurt. For a moment she couldn't speak. Her face was expressionless but she was struggling to control her breathing so that her voice, when she spoke, wouldn't come out choked or hurt.
In the end she failed a little. When she spoke her voice was stilted. "Ok. I...I want," she stopped. Normally she could choose to let the traces of her english accent, a hold over from the first six years of her life, slip into her speech or she could suppress it, though suppressing it gave her voice a dead quality. She didn't mind, it helped her keep the emotion she didn't want to show out of her speech. But she was having trouble suppressing it now.
She closed her eyes for a moment and composed herself. When she spoke her normal reserved tone was back, so different from how she had been speaking even ten minutes before. "Let's try not to meet at the point of dracon beams again." She tried to smile, to inject some humor into the statement but since it was a very real possibility that they might once again be put in a situation where they were enemies there wasn't much that could lighten it.
She pulled the white t-shirt Sedra had loaned her over her head, revealing the morphing suit beneath it. She looked down at it and then draped it on the back of the chair she'd been sitting in a moment before.
She walked towards the glass doors and the sunny, peaceful morning outside them. She slid the door open but instead of walking out and morphing she turned back to Sedra. "I don't regret coming," she said quietly in her genuine voice before she turned away and stepped out.
She ducked out of sight of the door and morphed the nighthawk as quickly as she could. When she had wings she lifted off and sought the freedom of the sky and the new day but the farther she got away the more she just wanted to go back.
Sedra:
The air in the kitchen felt still and warm around her. Sedra watched Luce struggling for what to say, her fingertips curling absently against the wood grain of the chair. Her lips were pressed together, biting back the words she wanted to say. She didn't want Luce to leave. Yet it was foolish to imagine that this would turn out any different.
Luce's attempt to brighten the mood brought a sad, quiet smile to Sedra's face. Truthfully, she didn't know what would happen in the future. If they met under the wrong circumstances, there wasn't any telling if things could play out like they had last time. This situation in itself was beyond dangerous for the both of them.
Silently, she watched Luce leave the white shirt on the chair and turn to leave. There was a small movement--a small shift in her weight--as if she was going to move forward. She didn't. When Luce turned back, Sedra would be still standing motionless next to the chair.
"I don't regret coming."
Then she was gone. Sedra slipped around the table, stopping short of the sliding door's frame. With her hip and shoulder leaning against the frame she gazed out at the clear, sunny sky where Luce had disappeared. The fact she could do that was another reminder of what Luce truly was--an Animorph, able to take on wings and claws and fur whenever she cared to. Part of the group of humans that were the supposed saviors of the human race, boiling Yeerks alive and leaving the mangled corpses of hosts in their wake. Just as haughty and self-righteous in their cause as the Andalites.
And in all of this, Luce. The person she had expected most to come knocking on her door, ready to kill her. Sedra felt her heart twist a little. Different. She hadn't come to kill. She'd treated Sedra like another living being--something that breathed and thought and felt. Sedra hadn't expected that, not out of an Animorph or human.
In the back of Sedra's shared mind, Catherine was there. An ever-present and constant reminder of the fact that she had no real 'body' of her own. Catherine's thoughts were still full of despair--deep-rooted and hateful thoughts. She thought Luce had forgotten her, was leaving her to rot away within the prison of her own mind, her own body. Accepting the fact that Luce had not come to save her was hard enough before, but for some reason it felt worse now. Even if Catherine was entertaining some crazy hopes, it still hurt to know that when Luce looked at her she saw Sedra, not Catherine. If Luce wasn't here for her anymore, who was?
Sedra observed these thoughts quietly. Catherine wanted to hate them both. The thoughts were the type of dark, spiraling thoughts that led a host into resignation. Sedra had seen it before, in much simpler ways with her past hosts. She wanted to feel superior at this, she wanted to feel like crushing her host and sweeping her resistance away was an accomplishment. Instead, she felt strangely empty and hollow. The feeling was uncomfortable and she distanced herself from it immediately.
A ringing sounded from within the house. Turning her head, she glanced over at the phone sitting on the counter. It rang again, sounding more urgent. Reality, catching back up with her; It had to be one the higher-ups, requesting her to come in and debrief about the Dam issue. Sedra's hand dropped from the door frame, and she began to move inside when she felt something brush her leg. The cat was up against her leg, his back arched and tail straight up. There was a purr vibrating in his throat. She stared down at him, silent, hearing the phone ring a third time.
"Go, go. Outside."
He looked up at her with open, green eyes and ignored her words encouraging him to go outside. Moving her leg a little, she nudged his side to encourage him to leave. He took a few wobbling steps on his tip-toes, back still arched, and then bumped her leg with his hip again. The phone rang a fourth time. Sedra nudged at him again. The cat stretched slowly out, still purring, then trotted out from under her. He took a few steps into the grass, paws digging into the moist earth with each step.
Sedra watched him for a few seconds, then looked up into the sky. The clouds from yesterday were completely gone, replaced with wisps of white, streaked across the large expanse of sky. Luce was gone. "Goodbye." The word was said in a voice she herself almost couldn't hear.
Turning away from the backyard, she slid the door closed. The house was silent for a moment, before another ring filled the room. Running her fingers through her dark hair, Sedra headed over to the phone. She paused, letting it ring another time before picking it up and settling it against her ear.
"Hello?"
Luce drifted somewhere in a place between true sleep and true wakefulness. Her breathing was still even, her heartbeat slow. The sounds that came to her ears didn't really get processed by her mind just yet but their presence was marked. They were like boats drifting by on calm seas and Luce was standing on a shore. They came and they went, and she didn't particularly notice except to think they were nice to look at, nice to hear.
On any other morning she would be up by now, already half way through her self imposed training regiment. Mornings were the best time to be up and about in Vegas, before the sun had truly risen and baked the earth and the people doomed to wander beneath its baleful, desert gaze.
But this morning she avoided consciousness instead of jumping into it. She was safe here, comfortable, warm, and she didn't want to leave. Like generations before her, Luce had learned that their were many things possible in the darkness that didn't hold in the dawn's light. So waking would mean facing the world and its realities, something that she wanted to hold off for just a bit longer.
She felt someone else's heartbeat between her shoulders and someone else's body breathed against her own. There wasn't a name attached to the person yet, that was another bit of information that she let float by out of her reach, but everything that a name invoked; feelings, memories, a presence, all of that was there. That was unusual, having someone else there. But the knowledge didn't cause her to feel alarmed. Just the opposite.
She moved a bit to get more comfortable and felt the softness of the pillow under her cheek and the sheets against her skin. Even in the hotel they did not have bedding this comfortable and the unfamiliar luxury just drove her closer to wakefulness.
So after a couple of more minutes of blissful, imposed ignorance, she opened her eyes. Golden sunlight flooded the room coming in through the white curtains and bouncing off the warm tones of the wood that could be found all throughout Sedra's house.
Luce blinked for a moment, letting her eyes adjust to being open and letting her mind wake up on its own. She didn't try to sit up, it would have involved moving Sedra's arm and she didn't want to wake her yet, but her breathing began to speed up and tagging along with consciousness, came responsibility and Luce couldn't stop thinking of all the places she should be and all the things she should be doing.
She sighed but accepted them and turned her head slightly. "Sedra."
Sedra:
"Sedra."
"Mm." The quiet sound of Luce's voice rouse Sedra slowly from her sleep. Her sleep had been full of dreams--her own as well as Catherine's. It was not unusual for her host's dreams to become tangled with her own while they slept. Most of them felt thin, distant. Sedra could sense them, could feel the fuzzy traces of them touching her own mind, but couldn't quite grasp them at times.
Other times they were vivid, sometimes full of pain, sometimes full of lost hope. Sometimes they were her host's old memories, tainted by the violence and despair of her present life. It was one of these dreams that Luce's voice stirred the both of them from. The sunlight from one of the windows spilled into the room, warming the carpet and falling across her face, scattering the night's dreams.
Sedra awoke sleepily, her arm curling snugly around Luce's form lying next to her. The bare flesh of her shoulder had a pink scar running along it, a mark from one of the Animorph's attacks. She nuzzled her face against the nape of Luce's neck, breathing in the faded scent of rain mingled within her dark, curly hair. Still lost in the fog of early morning, half-awake, Sedra murmured something like 'Jals' against Luce's skin, barely audible. Then she shifted slightly, sighing.
Everywhere it was warm, cozy. Comfortable. The plush, silk sheets of the bed grazed her flesh, enveloping her body. Morning was Sedra's favorite part of the day--when her host wasn't quite awake and aware, when for a brief moment everything was silent and the day was full of opportunity. But it also meant dealing with the reality of things again. Dealing with Yeerk ranks, dealing with the crabby scientists she worked with, dealing with the Animorphs. Every day as usual.
This morning was a pleasant, quiet morning. Surreal almost. Outside, Sedra's ears could pick up the gentle chirp of sparrows nesting in the backyard trees. The sound buzzed in her ears for awhile, before finally helping her wake up more. Sedra's eyes slid open, focusing on Luce next to her. Not Jals, Luce.
Suddenly, the events of their stolen night rose up to her memory. Deep down Sedra felt her host rousing as well, realizing, remembering. The slow emotions from her host filtered through: anger, betrayal, confusion. Mixed with a strange sense of something else. Sedra didn't want to deal with it, to watch the thoughts that were surfacing from her host and have the emotions needle her good mood. Stuffing a mental barrier between them, she ignored Catherine for now. Despite that, came the realities of what had happened at the dam. All the pain and terror, the frustration. The things she would have to deal with today. It was unpleasant, and not something she wanted to dwell over right now.
A small smile tugged on her lips, and she shifted again until she had one arm free, propped against one of the fluffy pillows. After rubbing her eyes, she rested her cheek in the open palm of her hand. Her other hand moved to touch lightly across Luce's cheek, pulling back a strand of the woman's dark hair behind her ear. "Hey."
Luce:
Luce turned so that she was facing Sedra and one arm went around her waist. "Hey yourself," she said with a small smile before closing her eyes again briefly. It was so easy, surprisingly easy to love her and to be here with her. And Luce just wanted to forget about the rest of the world and stay here with her, go back to just a couple of minutes ago when she wasn't aware of her duties and responsibilities. But if there were people out there who could ignore their conscience indefinitely Luce wasn't one of them. Some days she wished she was, it would make life easier.
She opened her eyes again and they found the scar that was Sedra's permanent reminder of her second run in with the animorphs. Except it wasn't her scar. It was Catherine's. Catherine would forever bear that scar for decisions she had no part in making. And even now, she was here.
Luce looked into Sedra's, into Catherine's eyes but she wasn't sure what she was looking for exactly, or who. She should have said something to Catherine then but she didn't. She didn't want to face her just yet. She knew it made her a coward and yet she stayed silent anyway. She couldn't silence her conscience forever, but she could silence it for a little while.
"I want to stay but I should go," she said quietly but made no move to leave or even get up.
Sedra:
Sedra rubbed her eyes again, trying to wake up more. Outside the birds were still chirping, their shadows flitting back and forth across the window panes. It was the kind of morning where it was easy to sleep in, especially with Luce here. There was a wistful look on Sedra's face, almost. Wanting. Sedra met Luce's gaze as she spoke, a quiet smile reflected in her blue eyes.
"I understand." She wasn't surprised that Luce had to leave. Even if this was one of her days off, she would have to leave soon too. There were things to be done today, Yeerks to face and issues to be resolved. Still, maybe she could steal some more time. After a playful hesitation, Sedra placed a light kiss on Luce's lips. Then, reluctantly, she drew herself away from Luce's arms and pulled herself upright on the bed. Black curls of hair fell across her shoulders, dark against the creamy beige of her skin. As she moved, the sheets slid off her, pooling around her waist.
The room was pleasantly warm. Sedra had found that in some places the sun didn't start warming the earth until near the afternoon or later. In Las Vegas, it began early and lingered. Sometimes even the evenings could get hot. It was something Sedra knew her host enjoyed. There were memories she had gone through when she first infested her host, memories of Catherine's childhood--warm, carefree Saturday mornings, waiting for her favorite cartoons to come on. Small, sitting against the window panes, feeling the sun hit her back. After awhile, it was something that Sedra had grown to like as well.
Bending her head forward a little, Sedra ran the palms of her hands against her face, then brushed her fingers through her tangled hair. Catherine's thoughts were still there, in the back of her mind, no matter how much distance Sedra tried placing between them. They weren't as scattered, or terrible as they had been earlier. After the initial shock of waking, her host had withdrawn more.
The absence of abuse from her host didn't help to ease Sedra's confusion, or make her feel any more clear about this whole situation. She was messing around with a supposed sworn enemy, an Animorph, a human, a free human. She expected some sort of cut-and-dry reaction from her host; Something she could expect from a host, some quip about being evil or some snarky comment that was supposed to taunt her into anger or make her feel more detached. Instead there was just here, and now. And there was Luce.
Turning her head a little, she lifted an eyebrow. "Could I make you some food, before you leave?" Sedra had never known how to cook, but Catherine had learned the skill from her mother back when she had been younger. The skill came in handy. "Some breakfast?"
Luce:
Luce reluctantly opened her arms so that Sedra could sit up. She did have to go but Sedra had been the first to make a move to get out of bed. Luce lifted her head off the pillow just enough to rest it in a right hand, her elbow resting on the pillow where her cheek had been a moment before. She buried her fingers in her hair and looked down at the covers that still held the impression of Sedra's body (Catherine's) in them. Her left hand swept over it, smoothing some of the wrinkles in the sheets. Her posture looked a bit like a child who had been told she had to get up and go to school except that she wore a look of quiet contemplation instead of thwarted indulgence.
She looked up to meet Sedra's eyes when she heard the offer of breakfast. A small smile replaced the slight, thoughtful frown she'd been wearing. She pushed herself up slowly, her weight resting on her right arm. She ended up half sitting, half reclining. She used her other hand to try to rub the remainders of sleep from her eyes. "I supposed I could stay for a while," she said knowing very well that doing so was an unnecessary risk.
Her hand dropped back down to the sheets around her waist and she looked past Sedra to where bars of light fell on the carpet where they were coming in from the blinds. Small pieces of dust floated serenely through the air but Luce didn't really see them. She was trying to figure out what time it was by the angle of the light but then she decided she didn't care. How much more trouble could she possible get into for staying just a little longer?
She looked back up at Seda after making the decision to stay. "Yeah, I could probably stay for a while but," her free hand crossed the short distance between them and she ran her fingers lightly over Sedra's skin. "I'm not really hungry," she said and looked up. "Are you?" she asked hoping the answer was no.
Sedra:
"Alright." The tone of her voice hinted that she seemed content with Luce's answer. In the least, she'd accomplished getting Luce to stay longer. Some part of Sedra wanted to ask where she had to leave off to so early in the morning. Another part of her didn't want to know. It felt like too much to deal with, too much to care about right now. The question was close on her lips, almost, but was left unasked.
Clenching her eyes closed, Sedra attempted to stifle a yawn against the back of her hand. Even if she had been plagued by the fragments of her host's bad dreams, the sleep had been better than usual. It had been so long since Sedra had felt some sort of peace akin to what she had felt with Jals. Even though she was used to it by now, it was strange. Even moreso that she felt it with Luce. With a human.
Sedra's eyes slid open, her dark blue gaze coming to rest on Luce. Her eyes were warm, if not still misted with a little sleepiness, and her voice was smooth. "I'm not, no." She paused. "Maybe later, then. If you get hungry." Food could sometimes be hard enough to get, even being a Yeerk. Most stores were run down or partially destroyed and food had been left out to rot by the ones in charge, too busy dealing with everything else. Now they were back-tracking, trying to get things back together and start processing food for their hosts again. A conquered world was useless if all their hosts died from starvation. And so, Sedra offering food was not usual.
Now that Luce was staying--if only for a bit--Sedra didn't feel as motivated to get up. At Luce's touch, the corners of her lips turned upwards a little. Truthfully, she had suggested the food as a way to keep her here longer. To prolong the fact that the both of them had to get back to their respective worlds at some point.
Shifting, Sedra slipped one arm around Luce's waist and pulled her closer. Her fingertips traced along Luce's back, light along her spine. "Not sure how willing I am to get up, anyways."
Luce:
She let Sedra pull her over and Luce slipped her free arm around Sedra's waist pulling her closer at the same time. She shivered slightly as Sedra's fingertips ran up her spine.
Whatever else might happen in the future, or even just later today, she was glad she was here and she was glad this moment existed. There would come a time, there always came a time, when she would be hurt, or scared, or fighting, or dying, and everything would seem wrong. But she'd be able to remember this morning and Luce was beginning to think that the only point of living was to gather moments like this.
A contented smile slowly spread across her face. "Hmmm, I was hoping you'd say that."
Sedra:
**Later**
The kitchen was slowly being filled with the enticing aromas of breakfast being made; Sedra had decided to make some french toast topped with some powdered sugar, along with a side of some fruit. The cooking hadn't started out well at first--Sedra had attempted to do it without going through her host's memories. Along with that, her host had slipped into a withdrawn silence.
Making breakfast with her host was part of a morning routine usually; Sedra would do her morning stretch--a habit leftover from Catherine's past--and her host would help her make breakfast. It would be easy enough to dig through her host's memories and do it herself, of course. But in the privacy of the house, where it was only her and her host in the mornings, she left Catherine alone. So, after some prolonged silence, Catherine had started giving her small bits of advice off and on. Once finished, Sedra had cut the toast into slices and placed the food on a couple plates along with the fruit.
Reaching forward, Sedra switched the stove off and picked the plates up in both hands. Luce had been seated at the table, where a couple misty glasses of orange juice were sitting. In the middle was a syrup bottle, one of the old brands from when human products were still being produced. It was partially empty, with some syrup stuck in the cap.
Immediately to the side of the table was a large window, its blinds thrown all the way open to let the sunlight spill into the room. The cat from the night before was perched on the window's ledge, his pink nose pressed against the warm pane of glass and jaw moving ever-so-slightly with tiny meows. His tail, fluffy with black rings, flicked back and forth expectantly. He was watching some birds outside--pigeons hobbling around the grass looking for scraps of food and small sparrows hopping around. The cat had slept on one of Sedra's couches for the night, and eaten his cat-breakfast in quick gulps when Sedra had come downstairs and fed him.
Setting one plate in front of Luce, Sedra settled down in her own seat. She'd slipped into a cotton sundress and stockings, something that probably looked more relaxed than Luce had seen her wear before. Fiddling with one of the forks near the plate, her blue eyes lifted to Luce's face. "What do you think?"
Luce:
Luce sat at the table feeling just a little useless. She didn't know how to cook and normally her breakfast consisted of too many bowls of cereal. And not even the good kind but the ones with fiber and vitamins and all the other things bodies supposedly needed. If she was indulging herself she put fruit on it. Not to say she never ate junk food, she just ate it sparingly and late at night.
She spent her time looking around the kitchen and readjusting her forks and spoons. Multiple forks, multiple spoons. Why did you ever need more than one? You didn't, not really. And the chopsticks were just going overboard and when she found herself starting to use them as drumsticks she put them back down and pushed them away so her nervous hands couldn't reach them without her mind noticing.
She watched Sedra move through the kitchen from cupboard to stove to sink to drawer. All the movements were carried out with such unconscious surety that it almost seemed like a dance. She had seemed a little unsure at first but had quickly settled into the pace that Luce was now admiring telling Luce that she'd done this before and she did it often. Luce thought about commenting but she didn't want to distract Sedra and she was enjoying just watching.
Luce heard a tiny click sound as Sedra turned some dial on the stove. The whole time Luce had been passively observing and hadn't really kept track of how close Sedra was to being done so when she picked up the plates and turned towards the table Luce found herself in the uncomfortable situation that occurs when someone catches you staring at them. She looked away quickly, looking at the glass of orange juice she hadn't really touched yet.
A plate of french toast and fruit got put into the spot on the table Luce was looking at and she looked up in time to see Sedra sitting down across from her with a similar plate.
For a moment she didn't say anything and Luce noticed that her hands weren't the only ones that fiddled with cutlery when they were not being paid attention to. "What do you think?" she asked and Luce looked back down at her plate.
"I think it looks too pretty to eat," she answered, voicing the first thing that came to her mind. The breakfast looked like it should be photographed for a food magazine. The fruit was all in vibrant colors and neatly sliced next to the pieces of french toast fried to a golden brown and covered in powdered sugar.
She picked up a fork but didn't use it. This scene was surreal. Luce felt like they were in a bubble and the real world was on the outside of it but it wouldn't get held there for long and already the reality of this world seemed to be fraying. She became hyper aware of small the inconsistencies in this scene of domestic normalcy and happiness. The feeling of the morphing suit under her clothing pulling against her movements. The sounds of birds chirping and the knowledge that she could become one of them. The dracon beam on the kitchen counter, a piece of alien technology sitting right next to a bowl of house hold nick knacks that never seemed to have a proper place except for the bowl or box or drawer in every house always put aside for their use. And then of course the biggest unspoken truth looming over this scene, the fact that there were not two players, but three.
She looked up at Sedra and saw Catherine sitting there. The woman who had gotten her through the worst years of her life, who had sat with her in the cages and had been the one to tell Luce to keep hoping for freedom. They had suffered together. And now Luce was one of her jailers. As responsible for her slavery as Sedra was because she was sitting here and didn't try to do anything to stop it.
Luce put her fork down and pushed her chair away from the table. "I...I have to go, to get back," she said quietly and she hated herself for saying it. She was hurting Sedra by doing so and that hurt her. But she wasn't even hurting Sedra for a reason, she wasn't asking her to free Catherine or even mentioning that she thought it was wrong. She was just running away so that she didn't have to deal with either woman and the moral problem they represented. "I'm, I'm sorry. It...thank you for breakfast, for cooking...I just have to go."
Sedra:
A smirk twitched on her face at Luce's comment about the food. She didn't make french toast often, but it had felt like she should make something more substantial then just some cereal and milk. Looking up from her food, her blue eyes rested on Luce. She had noticed the thoughtful look on Luce's face, and in her eyes when they lifted to meet her own. The food smelled delicious, but Sedra wasn't feeling particularly hungry. As it was, neither of them were touching their food.
Sedra didn't move when Luce put the fork down and pushed away from the table. Her only reaction was a small blink, as if she'd been hit. There were no traces of the smile on her face anymore. It had been replaced by a more distant expression, something more usual of her. Perhaps it shouldn't have come as a surprise, but it had nonetheless. Luce's words had broken the almost dreamy atmosphere that had shrouded the two of them since the night before. Had widened the crack, let reality start to slip further through its fissures.
"Ahh, I see." Withdrawing her fingers from the fork, she looked over to the window. The cat was still perched on its ledge, his tail flicking back and forth. "You're welcome. I enjoyed cooking." She was taking great pains to cut out the hurt from her voice--so much so that it would be hard to detect. No matter how much they were pretending, there was always the solemn fact of the war hanging over their heads. Even if Sedra wanted to believe that she could recover what she had lost with Jals, it didn't make this situation any different then what it truly was. They weren't on the same side of the war. The next time they might find themselves staring across the different sides of a battlefield.
A false smile found its way onto her lips. One hand slipped underneath the plate in front of her, lifting it up as she stood up from her chair. Then she leaned across the table to take Luce's plate. The movement caught the cat's attention, and his head swiveled around to watch as Sedra piled the plates atop each other. The tiled floor was warm underneath her stockinged feet as she moved to the sink and laid the plates carefully in it.
Turning back, she glanced to the nearby glass sliding door. The sun was pouring through the glass panes, outlining a warm patch of sunlight across the floor. After a moment Sedra returned back near the table, hands resting atop her chair's back. There was a goodbye on her lips, but it didn't make it past them. Instead she ended up saying, "Leave the door open when you go."
Luce:
A slight increase in the pace of her breathing was the only sign of how much Sedra's last words and the cold tone it was said in had hurt. For a moment she couldn't speak. Her face was expressionless but she was struggling to control her breathing so that her voice, when she spoke, wouldn't come out choked or hurt.
In the end she failed a little. When she spoke her voice was stilted. "Ok. I...I want," she stopped. Normally she could choose to let the traces of her english accent, a hold over from the first six years of her life, slip into her speech or she could suppress it, though suppressing it gave her voice a dead quality. She didn't mind, it helped her keep the emotion she didn't want to show out of her speech. But she was having trouble suppressing it now.
She closed her eyes for a moment and composed herself. When she spoke her normal reserved tone was back, so different from how she had been speaking even ten minutes before. "Let's try not to meet at the point of dracon beams again." She tried to smile, to inject some humor into the statement but since it was a very real possibility that they might once again be put in a situation where they were enemies there wasn't much that could lighten it.
She pulled the white t-shirt Sedra had loaned her over her head, revealing the morphing suit beneath it. She looked down at it and then draped it on the back of the chair she'd been sitting in a moment before.
She walked towards the glass doors and the sunny, peaceful morning outside them. She slid the door open but instead of walking out and morphing she turned back to Sedra. "I don't regret coming," she said quietly in her genuine voice before she turned away and stepped out.
She ducked out of sight of the door and morphed the nighthawk as quickly as she could. When she had wings she lifted off and sought the freedom of the sky and the new day but the farther she got away the more she just wanted to go back.
Sedra:
The air in the kitchen felt still and warm around her. Sedra watched Luce struggling for what to say, her fingertips curling absently against the wood grain of the chair. Her lips were pressed together, biting back the words she wanted to say. She didn't want Luce to leave. Yet it was foolish to imagine that this would turn out any different.
Luce's attempt to brighten the mood brought a sad, quiet smile to Sedra's face. Truthfully, she didn't know what would happen in the future. If they met under the wrong circumstances, there wasn't any telling if things could play out like they had last time. This situation in itself was beyond dangerous for the both of them.
Silently, she watched Luce leave the white shirt on the chair and turn to leave. There was a small movement--a small shift in her weight--as if she was going to move forward. She didn't. When Luce turned back, Sedra would be still standing motionless next to the chair.
"I don't regret coming."
Then she was gone. Sedra slipped around the table, stopping short of the sliding door's frame. With her hip and shoulder leaning against the frame she gazed out at the clear, sunny sky where Luce had disappeared. The fact she could do that was another reminder of what Luce truly was--an Animorph, able to take on wings and claws and fur whenever she cared to. Part of the group of humans that were the supposed saviors of the human race, boiling Yeerks alive and leaving the mangled corpses of hosts in their wake. Just as haughty and self-righteous in their cause as the Andalites.
And in all of this, Luce. The person she had expected most to come knocking on her door, ready to kill her. Sedra felt her heart twist a little. Different. She hadn't come to kill. She'd treated Sedra like another living being--something that breathed and thought and felt. Sedra hadn't expected that, not out of an Animorph or human.
In the back of Sedra's shared mind, Catherine was there. An ever-present and constant reminder of the fact that she had no real 'body' of her own. Catherine's thoughts were still full of despair--deep-rooted and hateful thoughts. She thought Luce had forgotten her, was leaving her to rot away within the prison of her own mind, her own body. Accepting the fact that Luce had not come to save her was hard enough before, but for some reason it felt worse now. Even if Catherine was entertaining some crazy hopes, it still hurt to know that when Luce looked at her she saw Sedra, not Catherine. If Luce wasn't here for her anymore, who was?
Sedra observed these thoughts quietly. Catherine wanted to hate them both. The thoughts were the type of dark, spiraling thoughts that led a host into resignation. Sedra had seen it before, in much simpler ways with her past hosts. She wanted to feel superior at this, she wanted to feel like crushing her host and sweeping her resistance away was an accomplishment. Instead, she felt strangely empty and hollow. The feeling was uncomfortable and she distanced herself from it immediately.
A ringing sounded from within the house. Turning her head, she glanced over at the phone sitting on the counter. It rang again, sounding more urgent. Reality, catching back up with her; It had to be one the higher-ups, requesting her to come in and debrief about the Dam issue. Sedra's hand dropped from the door frame, and she began to move inside when she felt something brush her leg. The cat was up against her leg, his back arched and tail straight up. There was a purr vibrating in his throat. She stared down at him, silent, hearing the phone ring a third time.
"Go, go. Outside."
He looked up at her with open, green eyes and ignored her words encouraging him to go outside. Moving her leg a little, she nudged his side to encourage him to leave. He took a few wobbling steps on his tip-toes, back still arched, and then bumped her leg with his hip again. The phone rang a fourth time. Sedra nudged at him again. The cat stretched slowly out, still purring, then trotted out from under her. He took a few steps into the grass, paws digging into the moist earth with each step.
Sedra watched him for a few seconds, then looked up into the sky. The clouds from yesterday were completely gone, replaced with wisps of white, streaked across the large expanse of sky. Luce was gone. "Goodbye." The word was said in a voice she herself almost couldn't hear.
Turning away from the backyard, she slid the door closed. The house was silent for a moment, before another ring filled the room. Running her fingers through her dark hair, Sedra headed over to the phone. She paused, letting it ring another time before picking it up and settling it against her ear.
"Hello?"