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padmeonpaper2009-05-02 12:02 am
padme_kenobi) wrote in padmeonpaper2009-05-02 12:02 am
Entry tags:
Fic: "The Sound of One Hand Clapping" (Battlestar Galactica, Lee/Kara, 10/11)
Title: The Sound of One Hand Clapping
Author:padme_kenobi
Previous Chapters: Can be read here.
Characters/Pairings: Lee/Kara with mentions of Lee/Dee, Sam/Kara and Zak/Kara
Status: Complete. One chapter will be posted per day.
Word Count: 2,676 this chapter
Rating: NC-17 this chapter - smut, and I do mean SMUT
Spoilers: Through S3's "Crossroads, Part 2"
Summary: They have been her lifeline. For a month she would not have eaten, drunk, dressed, used the head, washed, existed without those hands.
Author's Notes: There is most definitely smut in this chapter, so if that's what you're looking for, you've come to the right place. ;) I would almost go so far as to call it PWP, or at least as close to PWP as this fic will come (because it does have an overall plot, heh). Not for the small fry or the easily offended. As always, more extensive author's notes can be found here.
She sleeps entwined with him as before, smiling as she feels his fingers combing through her hair. Kara’s deeply asleep by the time Lee leaves for his shift, and she doesn’t wake until two hours after he returns.
“Welcome back,” Lee breathes in her ear.
Kara stretches languidly, shifting her hands so they’re more comfortable. “That was old the first five hundred times you said it.”
“Well, what do you want me to say?”
“I dunno.” She turns to face him. “Don’t you have patrol, Mr. CAG?”
Lee trails a hand from her breast down to her stomach. “You didn’t notice me getting up and going?”
“Nope,” Kara yawns. “You must’ve knocked me out good.”
“Good,” he echoes with a smile. His fingers are still moving, making the circuit from her navel, up her belly, around one breast and over the other. She follows them with a smile slowly beginning to form on her face.
“Someone’s in a mood.”
“Maybe.” Lee presses a kiss to her neck. “I seem to recall we had a bargain, after all.”
“Lee, I’m sorry.”
The words tumble out of her mouth before she can stop them, before she can even begin to contemplate why she’s saying them or what effect they will have. Even more, she finds herself continuing.
“It’s just … that’s what I do. I’m a frakking screw-up. You ought to know that by now. My whole godsdamned life is about waiting for the next time when the gods are gonna frak with me. And they always do. So sometimes I think I can’t wait, I’ve got to do it before they start screwing around with me. Or with the people I love. There’s maybe a few minutes where I think I’ve got it made and then reality comes right back, and then forget it. And you were right.” She bites her lip. “You were right when you said you shouldn’t have to go through that. You were right when you said you should walk away. Because you should. There is no reason for you to keep doing this, because lords know I’ll probably find some creative way of frakking it up too. I almost did, right? I mean, you were ready to walk out that godsdamned door. You should have. You should have.”
“Hold on.” His eyes are wide as saucers, and Kara thinks there’s the beginning of a smile at the sides of his lips. “You’re actually saying I was right about something? You are admitting I was right?”
“Lee, this is serious.” But she can feel a grin spreading unwillingly across her own face.
“Okay, wait. Wait, let me just record this for posterity.” Lee slaps his pockets and comes up with a pad of notepaper. He jots the date and time and then narrates, tongue poking between his teeth: “Starbuck … said … Apollo … was …”
“All right, all right, all right. Ha ha. You got what you wanted, hotshot. Now can we talk?” Kara nudges him in the ribs.
“Hey, you messed up my evidence!” he complains as his hand jerks over the page, leaving a pencil trail.
She sighs in mock frustration. “Just for that you’re not getting laid, you frakker.”
“Frak you,” Lee snickers.
“Not today, buster.” Kara turns away, willing herself not to burst out laughing.
“Godsdamnit, you’re serious.” There’s the sound of paper tearing, and then Lee’s pleading voice in her ear. “I take it back. I’ll be serious now, I promise.”
“No takebacks, Lee.”
“Come on, Kara, a guy has needs.” He molds himself to her in demonstration, and she can indeed feel a bulge pressing her back.
“I said no takebacks.” She turns just long enough to poke the tip of her tongue out at him, then whips her head back.
“Brat.”
That does it. Suddenly Kara’s cracking up, trying to be silent because she’s not sure how many people are in the bunks around her, but her shoulders are shaking with laughter and that sets Lee off, and suddenly it is like old times. Suddenly, crazily, she has her wish, and they’re in each other’s arms laughing. Starbuck and Apollo. Kara and Lee.
Again.
“I know you were serious before,” Lee says when they’re finally able to stop. “And I’m sorry too. I shouldn’t have made fun. And I shouldn’t have gotten angry earlier. I spent most of CAP upset at myself, when I wasn’t watching out for Cylons.”
“Well, that’s sort of our thing, isn’t it?” Awkwardly she flips onto her back and turns to regard him. “It’s always been our thing. Calling each other on our collective bullshit.”
“I guess so.” He contemplates the bunk’s roof for a few moments, brow crinkled. “But it’s different now. Now we’re … well, us.”
Kara leans in closer. “Yeah. Now we’re us.” She tries not to feel frightened at the prospect, and discovers that restraining her fear seems to require no effort at all.
Lee meets her halfway, kissing her forehead slowly and sensually. “I’m sorry all the same.”
“So am I, Lee. Really.” She discovers that she means it, and means it for everything. Her behaviour of hours previous, running until she had no choice but to surrender to him three weeks before the crash, the dance, New Caprica, Sam, all the times she’d led him on and then run, the thing with Baltar …
Gaius frakkin’ Baltar. Kara shivers involuntarily and Lee presses closer, his fingers threading through her hair and gentle breath ghosting across her skin. It soothes her somehow, as does his subsequent touch on her cheek.
“We had a bargain, Kara,” he rumbles directly in her ear.
That draws a real smile, and a laugh. “We did, didn’t we.” She pretends to hold out one of her hands. “Pills first, pervert. I’m more fun when I’m high.”
Lee rises without another word, opens the curtain and clambers over her. She gets a brief view of the empty bunkroom as he stands unscrewing the pill bottles, and Kara smiles more widely. Better they have privacy for what she’s about to suggest. Otherwise he’ll never go for it.
“Dog the hatch, Lee,” she grins.
He snickers. “I never pegged you for shy.”
“No, you’re the one who’s shy. Or you will be anyway.”
“Forget shy, I’m frakking intrigued.”
Kara waits until he’s back in the rack with her, until the pills and water are swallowed and Lee’s removing her bra and pushing his fingers underneath her sweatpants. She smiles and turns towards him.
“You’re still not getting laid, Apollo. Hope you realize that.”
The surprise on his face is almost comical.
“Go ahead. Get off,” she continues, her eyes finding his crotch. “I’d help you out, but …” Kara waves her bandaged hands in his face. “Besides, the rest of me is at your disposal. You just can’t come inside.” The double meaning pleases her.
Lee looks as if he can’t decide whether to kiss her or smack her. There’s something simmering in his eyes, something close to arousal. “I tore it up,” he whispers, voice low and husky. That’s when she knows she’s got him. “The evidence. I tore it up. I swear, Kara.”
“But you still wrote it,” she says smugly.
“Yeah. I still wrote it.”
There’s that flicker again, his irises darkening perceptibly this time. Kara watches as he shrugs out of his tanks and lies back down. His gaze fixes on her and travels downwards until he’s staring at her chest, fully and unabashedly. For a moment she feels embarrassed, but it’s only a moment, for next second he reaches out and cups a breast gently, hesitantly. She smiles and briefly closes her eyes, delighting in the heat spreading from his touch.
When she opens them again Lee is tracing light concentric circles around her nipple with his thumb, apparently fascinated. It’s the action of his other hand that interests her more, however. He’s moving in a trail down his belly, past his navel, following the dark line of hair that disappears into his pants. He dips his hand into the tent at his crotch and a long shuddery sigh slips from his lips as he frees himself.
Worth the price of admission just to see this, Kara thinks to herself. Yes, she’ll regret not feeling his climax, not being able to delight in the warmth and the wet as he spills inside her. But there will be other times. And the sight of Lee stroking himself, fingers working up and down his shaft while his other hand explores her breast, is more than enough to spread liquid heat between her legs.
She presses her chest into his touch and is rewarded with a solid groan as he squeezes himself, hard. He moves from one nipple to the other, massaging, pinching, holding until both are pebbly peaks and Kara’s moaning too. Both dart forward and Lee captures her lips in a desperate kiss. Against him now she can feel the slow, steady motion of his hand. She opens her mouth slightly and nibbles along his bottom lip, licking to soothe the bite marks. He pinches her nipple each time she bites, setting up a delicious bite-pinch bite-pinch rhythm that has them both on edge. Kara thinks if he doesn’t move his hand, if he doesn’t start touching her where she’s well and truly wet and ready, she might die.
‘Kara,” Lee whispers, and again, and he’s speeding up now and the tiniest part of her is beginning to regret this experiment, but next moment his hand is indeed trailing down, down to her navel and all is forgotten as he dips beneath her pants, finds her clit. And then she’s not sure if he or she is panting, “Godsgodsgodsgods …”
Maybe neither. Perhaps both.
She looks at the interplay of his hands, one down her pants, one fisted around his cock. Squeezing, prodding, massaging, both of them in their own universes and yet inextricably linked. She feels like she’s not doing anything, like she doesn’t have a point, but the look in his eyes tells her otherwise. They are an entirely new shade of blue, one she was not aware existed. Focused entirely on her. They flick down and around, beating a staccato cycle – face-breasts-sweatpants-face – but always coming to rest on her face, on her eyes, and she is transparent before him. She can’t decide if it’s the fulfillment of her every dream or the realization of all her nightmares to be naked like this.
Perhaps it’s neither. Maybe it’s both.
Kara has been naked in front of Lee Adama since the crash.
So, possibly, none of this even matters.
His thumb seeks her clit once more, presses, and abruptly she decides she should stop overthinking things so frakking much.
They are both close. The air is thick between them with sweat and sex and rapid breathing. Lee’s exhaling like he did when they used to run together, slow and deep, but now there’s a desperate and shaky quality to it. Her eyes find his cock and take in the tiny drop of pre-come blotting the head, quickly disappearing into the accelerating rhythm of his strokes. He catches her watching and the look he shoots her is almost enough to make her arrive right there. Almost, but not quite.
And then he slips a finger inside her and it’s over.
Instantly the word springs to her lips, the word that’s always there whenever a climax is about to arrive. It’s become as reliable an indicator to Kara as DRADIS contacts of Cylon attacks. Whether she says the word or not, it’s always there. On the fringes. Like the heat in her belly.
She knows he wants to hear it.
So she whispers it, whispers it as she arches and slides down on his finger and clenches around him.
“Lee …”
The word comes out in a gasp but she knows he understands.
She knows because he closes his eyes and bites his lip and squeezes and expedites the pace, and when he opens up again the look he gives her could burn a hole through steel. Lucky for the wall he’s not turned the other way.
Kara leans in close to his ear as her climax winds down. “Come on, Lee.” One hand, brought hesitantly up to his cheek, a light touch, firmer when the pain doesn’t overwhelm her. Elation because, frak, she’s touching him. “Come for me.”
Lee presses his forehead to hers, momentarily trapping her hand, but she doesn’t care because his breath catches and he groans and groans again, and something a little warm and slippery flows onto her stomach. They close their eyes together. Melded against each other.
Seconds pass. Or maybe it’s hours, or it might be minutes.
Finally he kisses her, and she smiles against his lips, and he says, “I see why you wanted me to dog the hatch.”
His voice is still low, but there’s a layer of contentment she’s not sure has ever been present before.
“Yeah. I knew you’d be too much of a prude otherwise.”
“Frak you.”
“Hello, CIC paging Captain Obvious.” She gestures to her belly, spattered with liquid. “I believe this is yours.”
“Yeah. Sorry.” Lee trails his hand over the spot, only succeeding in making a bigger mess. “But I’m not a prude, Kara.”
“Says he who wouldn’t even think of this until the hatch was triple-dogged.”
“You didn’t tell me what we were going to do, just said I should dog the hatch!”
“Yes, but I know you, Lee.” Pertly Kara kisses his nose and trails her tongue down to his lips. “You were the one who was worried I’d announce to the whole ship we were frakking.”
“There’s something called privacy, Kara,” Lee says witheringly, though he returns her lick. “Maybe you’ve heard of it.”
She snorts, loudly and indelicately. “On a battlestar? Gods, give me that Picon weed you’re smoking, Apollo. I want some.”
“Okay, you know what, never mind.” He surrenders to a chuckle. “I think I’ll just give up arguing with you. I can never win.”
“You catch on pretty quick for someone stoned off his ass.”
He smacks her, and she supposes she deserved that, so she says nothing. Just laughs, and enjoys the morpha seeping into her system and the freedom from pain allowing her to caress his cheek. This time Lee notices.
“You’re touching again,” he whispers, and there’s something like awe in his voice.
“The pills help,” Kara says, and it’s not exactly a lie.
“Before you couldn’t stand it even with the meds,” Lee points out.
She can’t do anything but nod as his hand comes up and carefully closes around hers, his eyes watching her for any signal or hint of discomfort. The rehab bandages are less bulky and she watches her hand disappear in his. Watches as he squeezes lightly, and although the friction of bandage against palm is a little too much just yet, she doesn’t wince when pain knifes up her arm.
He has beautiful hands. She remembers thinking that but being too angry and in too much pain to further reflect on the point.
They are pale. Lightly freckled. But they have a kind of quiet dignity. A musician’s grace, her father would have said. These hands have caressed her. They have hit her. They have gestured incredulously in her direction. The thumbs have massaged her nipples and her clit. The fingers have been smashed, bruised, cut by combat landings. They have been drenched in the blood of the man who fathered him. They have aimed guns, pulled triggers, killed Cylon and human alike.
They have been her lifeline. For a month she would not have eaten, drunk, dressed, used the head, washed, existed without those hands. They have touched her in the most intimate of places for the least intimate of reasons. He has given them to her, given them out of love.
Lee holds her bandaged digits. Kisses them.
The sound of one hand clapping becomes two.
Author:
padme_kenobiPrevious Chapters: Can be read here.
Characters/Pairings: Lee/Kara with mentions of Lee/Dee, Sam/Kara and Zak/Kara
Status: Complete. One chapter will be posted per day.
Word Count: 2,676 this chapter
Rating: NC-17 this chapter - smut, and I do mean SMUT
Spoilers: Through S3's "Crossroads, Part 2"
Summary: They have been her lifeline. For a month she would not have eaten, drunk, dressed, used the head, washed, existed without those hands.
Author's Notes: There is most definitely smut in this chapter, so if that's what you're looking for, you've come to the right place. ;) I would almost go so far as to call it PWP, or at least as close to PWP as this fic will come (because it does have an overall plot, heh). Not for the small fry or the easily offended. As always, more extensive author's notes can be found here.
She sleeps entwined with him as before, smiling as she feels his fingers combing through her hair. Kara’s deeply asleep by the time Lee leaves for his shift, and she doesn’t wake until two hours after he returns.
“Welcome back,” Lee breathes in her ear.
Kara stretches languidly, shifting her hands so they’re more comfortable. “That was old the first five hundred times you said it.”
“Well, what do you want me to say?”
“I dunno.” She turns to face him. “Don’t you have patrol, Mr. CAG?”
Lee trails a hand from her breast down to her stomach. “You didn’t notice me getting up and going?”
“Nope,” Kara yawns. “You must’ve knocked me out good.”
“Good,” he echoes with a smile. His fingers are still moving, making the circuit from her navel, up her belly, around one breast and over the other. She follows them with a smile slowly beginning to form on her face.
“Someone’s in a mood.”
“Maybe.” Lee presses a kiss to her neck. “I seem to recall we had a bargain, after all.”
“Lee, I’m sorry.”
The words tumble out of her mouth before she can stop them, before she can even begin to contemplate why she’s saying them or what effect they will have. Even more, she finds herself continuing.
“It’s just … that’s what I do. I’m a frakking screw-up. You ought to know that by now. My whole godsdamned life is about waiting for the next time when the gods are gonna frak with me. And they always do. So sometimes I think I can’t wait, I’ve got to do it before they start screwing around with me. Or with the people I love. There’s maybe a few minutes where I think I’ve got it made and then reality comes right back, and then forget it. And you were right.” She bites her lip. “You were right when you said you shouldn’t have to go through that. You were right when you said you should walk away. Because you should. There is no reason for you to keep doing this, because lords know I’ll probably find some creative way of frakking it up too. I almost did, right? I mean, you were ready to walk out that godsdamned door. You should have. You should have.”
“Hold on.” His eyes are wide as saucers, and Kara thinks there’s the beginning of a smile at the sides of his lips. “You’re actually saying I was right about something? You are admitting I was right?”
“Lee, this is serious.” But she can feel a grin spreading unwillingly across her own face.
“Okay, wait. Wait, let me just record this for posterity.” Lee slaps his pockets and comes up with a pad of notepaper. He jots the date and time and then narrates, tongue poking between his teeth: “Starbuck … said … Apollo … was …”
“All right, all right, all right. Ha ha. You got what you wanted, hotshot. Now can we talk?” Kara nudges him in the ribs.
“Hey, you messed up my evidence!” he complains as his hand jerks over the page, leaving a pencil trail.
She sighs in mock frustration. “Just for that you’re not getting laid, you frakker.”
“Frak you,” Lee snickers.
“Not today, buster.” Kara turns away, willing herself not to burst out laughing.
“Godsdamnit, you’re serious.” There’s the sound of paper tearing, and then Lee’s pleading voice in her ear. “I take it back. I’ll be serious now, I promise.”
“No takebacks, Lee.”
“Come on, Kara, a guy has needs.” He molds himself to her in demonstration, and she can indeed feel a bulge pressing her back.
“I said no takebacks.” She turns just long enough to poke the tip of her tongue out at him, then whips her head back.
“Brat.”
That does it. Suddenly Kara’s cracking up, trying to be silent because she’s not sure how many people are in the bunks around her, but her shoulders are shaking with laughter and that sets Lee off, and suddenly it is like old times. Suddenly, crazily, she has her wish, and they’re in each other’s arms laughing. Starbuck and Apollo. Kara and Lee.
Again.
“I know you were serious before,” Lee says when they’re finally able to stop. “And I’m sorry too. I shouldn’t have made fun. And I shouldn’t have gotten angry earlier. I spent most of CAP upset at myself, when I wasn’t watching out for Cylons.”
“Well, that’s sort of our thing, isn’t it?” Awkwardly she flips onto her back and turns to regard him. “It’s always been our thing. Calling each other on our collective bullshit.”
“I guess so.” He contemplates the bunk’s roof for a few moments, brow crinkled. “But it’s different now. Now we’re … well, us.”
Kara leans in closer. “Yeah. Now we’re us.” She tries not to feel frightened at the prospect, and discovers that restraining her fear seems to require no effort at all.
Lee meets her halfway, kissing her forehead slowly and sensually. “I’m sorry all the same.”
“So am I, Lee. Really.” She discovers that she means it, and means it for everything. Her behaviour of hours previous, running until she had no choice but to surrender to him three weeks before the crash, the dance, New Caprica, Sam, all the times she’d led him on and then run, the thing with Baltar …
Gaius frakkin’ Baltar. Kara shivers involuntarily and Lee presses closer, his fingers threading through her hair and gentle breath ghosting across her skin. It soothes her somehow, as does his subsequent touch on her cheek.
“We had a bargain, Kara,” he rumbles directly in her ear.
That draws a real smile, and a laugh. “We did, didn’t we.” She pretends to hold out one of her hands. “Pills first, pervert. I’m more fun when I’m high.”
Lee rises without another word, opens the curtain and clambers over her. She gets a brief view of the empty bunkroom as he stands unscrewing the pill bottles, and Kara smiles more widely. Better they have privacy for what she’s about to suggest. Otherwise he’ll never go for it.
“Dog the hatch, Lee,” she grins.
He snickers. “I never pegged you for shy.”
“No, you’re the one who’s shy. Or you will be anyway.”
“Forget shy, I’m frakking intrigued.”
Kara waits until he’s back in the rack with her, until the pills and water are swallowed and Lee’s removing her bra and pushing his fingers underneath her sweatpants. She smiles and turns towards him.
“You’re still not getting laid, Apollo. Hope you realize that.”
The surprise on his face is almost comical.
“Go ahead. Get off,” she continues, her eyes finding his crotch. “I’d help you out, but …” Kara waves her bandaged hands in his face. “Besides, the rest of me is at your disposal. You just can’t come inside.” The double meaning pleases her.
Lee looks as if he can’t decide whether to kiss her or smack her. There’s something simmering in his eyes, something close to arousal. “I tore it up,” he whispers, voice low and husky. That’s when she knows she’s got him. “The evidence. I tore it up. I swear, Kara.”
“But you still wrote it,” she says smugly.
“Yeah. I still wrote it.”
There’s that flicker again, his irises darkening perceptibly this time. Kara watches as he shrugs out of his tanks and lies back down. His gaze fixes on her and travels downwards until he’s staring at her chest, fully and unabashedly. For a moment she feels embarrassed, but it’s only a moment, for next second he reaches out and cups a breast gently, hesitantly. She smiles and briefly closes her eyes, delighting in the heat spreading from his touch.
When she opens them again Lee is tracing light concentric circles around her nipple with his thumb, apparently fascinated. It’s the action of his other hand that interests her more, however. He’s moving in a trail down his belly, past his navel, following the dark line of hair that disappears into his pants. He dips his hand into the tent at his crotch and a long shuddery sigh slips from his lips as he frees himself.
Worth the price of admission just to see this, Kara thinks to herself. Yes, she’ll regret not feeling his climax, not being able to delight in the warmth and the wet as he spills inside her. But there will be other times. And the sight of Lee stroking himself, fingers working up and down his shaft while his other hand explores her breast, is more than enough to spread liquid heat between her legs.
She presses her chest into his touch and is rewarded with a solid groan as he squeezes himself, hard. He moves from one nipple to the other, massaging, pinching, holding until both are pebbly peaks and Kara’s moaning too. Both dart forward and Lee captures her lips in a desperate kiss. Against him now she can feel the slow, steady motion of his hand. She opens her mouth slightly and nibbles along his bottom lip, licking to soothe the bite marks. He pinches her nipple each time she bites, setting up a delicious bite-pinch bite-pinch rhythm that has them both on edge. Kara thinks if he doesn’t move his hand, if he doesn’t start touching her where she’s well and truly wet and ready, she might die.
‘Kara,” Lee whispers, and again, and he’s speeding up now and the tiniest part of her is beginning to regret this experiment, but next moment his hand is indeed trailing down, down to her navel and all is forgotten as he dips beneath her pants, finds her clit. And then she’s not sure if he or she is panting, “Godsgodsgodsgods …”
Maybe neither. Perhaps both.
She looks at the interplay of his hands, one down her pants, one fisted around his cock. Squeezing, prodding, massaging, both of them in their own universes and yet inextricably linked. She feels like she’s not doing anything, like she doesn’t have a point, but the look in his eyes tells her otherwise. They are an entirely new shade of blue, one she was not aware existed. Focused entirely on her. They flick down and around, beating a staccato cycle – face-breasts-sweatpants-face – but always coming to rest on her face, on her eyes, and she is transparent before him. She can’t decide if it’s the fulfillment of her every dream or the realization of all her nightmares to be naked like this.
Perhaps it’s neither. Maybe it’s both.
Kara has been naked in front of Lee Adama since the crash.
So, possibly, none of this even matters.
His thumb seeks her clit once more, presses, and abruptly she decides she should stop overthinking things so frakking much.
They are both close. The air is thick between them with sweat and sex and rapid breathing. Lee’s exhaling like he did when they used to run together, slow and deep, but now there’s a desperate and shaky quality to it. Her eyes find his cock and take in the tiny drop of pre-come blotting the head, quickly disappearing into the accelerating rhythm of his strokes. He catches her watching and the look he shoots her is almost enough to make her arrive right there. Almost, but not quite.
And then he slips a finger inside her and it’s over.
Instantly the word springs to her lips, the word that’s always there whenever a climax is about to arrive. It’s become as reliable an indicator to Kara as DRADIS contacts of Cylon attacks. Whether she says the word or not, it’s always there. On the fringes. Like the heat in her belly.
She knows he wants to hear it.
So she whispers it, whispers it as she arches and slides down on his finger and clenches around him.
“Lee …”
The word comes out in a gasp but she knows he understands.
She knows because he closes his eyes and bites his lip and squeezes and expedites the pace, and when he opens up again the look he gives her could burn a hole through steel. Lucky for the wall he’s not turned the other way.
Kara leans in close to his ear as her climax winds down. “Come on, Lee.” One hand, brought hesitantly up to his cheek, a light touch, firmer when the pain doesn’t overwhelm her. Elation because, frak, she’s touching him. “Come for me.”
Lee presses his forehead to hers, momentarily trapping her hand, but she doesn’t care because his breath catches and he groans and groans again, and something a little warm and slippery flows onto her stomach. They close their eyes together. Melded against each other.
Seconds pass. Or maybe it’s hours, or it might be minutes.
Finally he kisses her, and she smiles against his lips, and he says, “I see why you wanted me to dog the hatch.”
His voice is still low, but there’s a layer of contentment she’s not sure has ever been present before.
“Yeah. I knew you’d be too much of a prude otherwise.”
“Frak you.”
“Hello, CIC paging Captain Obvious.” She gestures to her belly, spattered with liquid. “I believe this is yours.”
“Yeah. Sorry.” Lee trails his hand over the spot, only succeeding in making a bigger mess. “But I’m not a prude, Kara.”
“Says he who wouldn’t even think of this until the hatch was triple-dogged.”
“You didn’t tell me what we were going to do, just said I should dog the hatch!”
“Yes, but I know you, Lee.” Pertly Kara kisses his nose and trails her tongue down to his lips. “You were the one who was worried I’d announce to the whole ship we were frakking.”
“There’s something called privacy, Kara,” Lee says witheringly, though he returns her lick. “Maybe you’ve heard of it.”
She snorts, loudly and indelicately. “On a battlestar? Gods, give me that Picon weed you’re smoking, Apollo. I want some.”
“Okay, you know what, never mind.” He surrenders to a chuckle. “I think I’ll just give up arguing with you. I can never win.”
“You catch on pretty quick for someone stoned off his ass.”
He smacks her, and she supposes she deserved that, so she says nothing. Just laughs, and enjoys the morpha seeping into her system and the freedom from pain allowing her to caress his cheek. This time Lee notices.
“You’re touching again,” he whispers, and there’s something like awe in his voice.
“The pills help,” Kara says, and it’s not exactly a lie.
“Before you couldn’t stand it even with the meds,” Lee points out.
She can’t do anything but nod as his hand comes up and carefully closes around hers, his eyes watching her for any signal or hint of discomfort. The rehab bandages are less bulky and she watches her hand disappear in his. Watches as he squeezes lightly, and although the friction of bandage against palm is a little too much just yet, she doesn’t wince when pain knifes up her arm.
He has beautiful hands. She remembers thinking that but being too angry and in too much pain to further reflect on the point.
They are pale. Lightly freckled. But they have a kind of quiet dignity. A musician’s grace, her father would have said. These hands have caressed her. They have hit her. They have gestured incredulously in her direction. The thumbs have massaged her nipples and her clit. The fingers have been smashed, bruised, cut by combat landings. They have been drenched in the blood of the man who fathered him. They have aimed guns, pulled triggers, killed Cylon and human alike.
They have been her lifeline. For a month she would not have eaten, drunk, dressed, used the head, washed, existed without those hands. They have touched her in the most intimate of places for the least intimate of reasons. He has given them to her, given them out of love.
Lee holds her bandaged digits. Kisses them.
The sound of one hand clapping becomes two.