auguris: ([UL] Tothos)
Gabe ([personal profile] auguris) wrote in [community profile] rainbowfic2013-01-26 08:03 pm

Bone Black 12, Fire Opal 3

Name: [personal profile] auguris
'verse: Universe Lost
Story: Lighthouse
Colors: Bone Black 12. Memorial; Fire Opal 3. Impassioned
Supplies and Styles: Canvas
Word Count: 550
Rating: R
Warnings: None
Summary: Tothos leaves home.

Tothos stood at parade rest, gaze firm on the horizon. Should she glance right, she would sight the massive blue and white lighthouse, still abandoned; left, the small memorial stand emblazoned with their names.

"This is unhealthy."

Roj stopped in front of the memorial. The holo played and her stomach clenched; voices of her comrades, laughing, jeering, alive and whole.

"Psych says I check." She saw herself reaching back and wrenching the mechanism off the memorial, smashing it under her boot, tossing Roj onto the fledgling grass and choking his life out--

"Told me the same," Roj said. Tothos slid her eyes shut. "I don't feel checked. I feel..."

"Close up," she muttered. Of course he felt. They both felt. No reason to bring it up every fucking time they spoke.

He stood beside her and slid his hand down her wrist, trying to take her hand. After a moment she let him. She didn't have much to give, but she could give him this.

"I'm leaving Nobis," she said. Silence followed his sharp intake of breath. He clenched the hand holding hers.

"Can I say anything?" She shook her head. "Nic, please."

She opened her eyes. "I hate that."

"Danica," he said. "Where will you go?"

"I'm going to find my father." She turned her head just enough to meet his eyes. "I know he left, somehow, before the Alliance came. I'm going after him."

Roj laughed breathlessly. "You're chasing conspiracy theories now? The Alliance reestablished the Jump eight months ago. Your father didn't leave Nobis. He..." Roj shrugged. "Fuck, Nic, we were at war. Don't make me say it."

She had tenuous proof. It wasn't worth arguing about: it was something. It was all she had. "I'm heading to Cross."

"What a wonderful choice! Half uncolonized wilderness, half murderous colonials!"

"You've been?" she snapped.

He stumbled over several starts and stops before finally withdrawing his hand. She closed her fist around the memory of warmth. "Why am I here?"

"To say goodbye." She returned her gaze to the horizon. "The next jump is in two days. I'm already packed."

He grabbed her and pulled her mouth to his, clumsy and messy, his teeth scraping her lip. She fisted his jacket and gave back everything he offered, pressed lips and tongue and breath back into him.

She had never been good at kissing.

He pulled away, lips flush and eyes wet. "Do you love me?"

She had expected this, but hadn't decided how to answer; which was easier? Did the truth matter?

All she had was a half answer: "I did."

He pushed her or pushed himself away and shook his head and gripped his hair and rushed towards the main path; it would take him back to the new metro stop, and in fifteen minutes the rail would raise and he would enter the car and return to Kepler and his apartment and then cry or scream or curse some version of her name.

She kept her eyes on the ground until she could no longer hear his footsteps, raised her gaze once more to the sky, glaring beyond for that fifteen minutes before she let herself look in his direction, half expecting him to still be there, waiting for her to change her mind.
bookblather: A picture of Yomiko Readman looking at books with the text "bookgasm." (Default)

[personal profile] bookblather 2013-01-28 09:00 am (UTC)(link)
Ugh, this hurts like a punch to the heart, and is perfect. Don't change a word.
kay_brooke: Snowy landscape with a fence, an evergreen forest, and a pink sky (winter)

[personal profile] kay_brooke 2013-01-28 06:42 pm (UTC)(link)
The emotions in this are so real: the anger, the sense of a once-love that's curdled after time and bad experiences. Great job.
shipwreck_light: (Default)

[personal profile] shipwreck_light 2013-01-30 04:07 am (UTC)(link)
Your gut punches.

Are the best gut punches.

"She had never been good at kissing." and then that END when fifteen minutes are everything and nothing.

Really fine work. Thank you! Ows and all.
settecorvi: (Default)

[personal profile] settecorvi 2013-02-03 11:21 pm (UTC)(link)
Ow. This hurts, and I mean that as the most sincere of compliments.

She closed her fist around the memory of warmth - this line caught me, in particular, but there are so many phrases in this that punch you right in the gut.
clare_dragonfly: woman with green feathery wings, text: stories last longer: but only by becoming only stories (Default)

[personal profile] clare_dragonfly 2013-02-16 02:39 am (UTC)(link)
Ouch. I really love the dialogue in this--it's like bam, bam, bam, both really fast and punching.