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This RP came about the way ours tend to happen--we just kinda fell into it during a chat. Thanks, Andy!--Maer
Sihnon, White Sun (Bai Hu) system
Dmitri and I worked well past midnight finicking with the decorative metalwork we'd made for the box. With the ingenuity born of necessity, we'd jerry rigged the tools we needed to machine the metal and polish it to a mirror finish. As for the metal itself, Svetlana gave up her heirloom silver serving tray for the project. It hurt me to take it from her because I knew how much she loved it, but she put it in my hands and folded my fingers around it. For her children's freedom, she said. Blinking back tears, I thanked her and Dmitri and I cut it up. That had been two days ago at the very beginning of the construction process and now Dmitri and I were installing the last corner piece to the box.
He'd truly outdone himself and I could see that Dmitri had missed making something beautiful with his hands. Intricate fretwork pierced the metal. Oriental and Arabesque in design, it gleamed under our polishing rags. It matched the design of the medallions we'd screwed to the lid and the sides. As for the box itself, the trick bottom panel was already in place and Dmitri and I had tested it. It would pop open when we needed it to. Until then, we left it secured, just another pretty wooden box with silver accents.
"Let it go, devushka. Get some sleep." Dmitri pulled the rag from my hand and swatted me with it. "Joshua is no doubt waiting."
"Ten more minutes won't make any difference," I said and tried to get my rag back. As usual, my brother was an ass and held it beyond my reach. Just like when we were kids, to prove he'd always be older, smarter, better than me. Odd how quickly we'd fallen into our old patterns, once the shock of our reunion had worn off. I'd dreamt up countless of homecoming scenarios over the years, but this was an outcome I had failed to anticipate.
"No. I've seen the way he looks at you." Dmitri snapped the rag and the tip hit my shoulder, stinging, just like his humor. "Gde glaza idti, ruki idut, ne tak li?"
Where his eyes go, his hands go, right?
"Oh, really?" Incensed by the innuendo, I gave up on the rag and snarled, "You don't know a damn thing about it, Mitya, so shut the fuck up."
We were in Svetlana's tiny kitchen and my crew was sleeping on the floor just outside. I had to keep my voice down and it robbed my words of their heat. Dmitri laughed softly and mussed my hair in that condescending way I loathed.
"Stop hissing, malenk'aya kiska. Go curl up with your man. I won't watch." He pulled his hand away before I could break his fingers. "Much."
I got out of there before I gave in to the urge to pound that smirk off his face. Damn his dirty mind. Crossing the crowded floor carefully, I grabbed my bag off the dining room table and made my way to the apartment door. Once outside, I turned for the communal bath down the hall. I'd put in a full day's work on that box and the day's grime and sweat still clung to me. To hell with my brother's puerile fantasies, I wasn't about to doss down with Joshua dirty. The cold water from the shower was excruciating but it was all the apartment block had. I was shivering by the time I'd rinsed the last of the soap off. Pulling on a clean change and stowing my gear in my bag warmed me up a little, but not enough, and Dmitri's suggestion I curl up with Joshua was looking better by the minute.
We'd drawn straws for the couch and tonight Arden had won. Joshua and I had the floor but it didn't bother me. We had enough blankets and we'd slept in rougher conditions. The rest of the crew carpeted the living room floor, the only room with enough space to hold all of us. Even so, everyone was packed close enough that stepping around them was a tricky business, made more so by the dark. The room was warm, thanks to the number of people in it, and that perversely made me shiver more. I was shaking hard when I finally reached Joshua and I slid between the blankets trying not to wake him. I put my back to him and curled up and waited for the shakes to pass. No matter what Dmitri said, I wasn't about to engage in any activity I didn't want his children to see. Not while I was still a guest under their roof.
She was quiet, but Joshua always knew when Rina crawled in and out of bed. Even when they weren't in their bed. Or even if it actually wasn't a bed. He pressed himself tight up against her, trying to transfer some of the warmth gained from the blankets to her. "How did the box go?" he asked, not really opening his eyes as he let himself conform to her.
"Beautifully," I whispered and selfishly pulled his arm around me, hugging him closer as I breathed in the scent of him. "Dmitri does exquisite work. Makes me look like a rank amateur." No wounded pride or resentment in that statement. Just unvarnished truth. "You'll understand when you see it tomorrow."
"I'm sure, I will." He found that comfortable spot with his arm on her where it felt like they were just one person. "The box is fine...how is Dmitri?" Joshua wondered how her family was adjusting to not only an influx of people, but to a family member long since thought dead.
As Joshua's weight settled against me, Dmitri's words whispered from memory. Where is his eyes go, his hands go ... little pussy. God, how could I have forgotten how cutting his humor could be? I, who had grown up on the receiving end of his sharp tongue when I annoyed him. The comfort I'd gained from Joshua's embrace retreated a bit as I steeled myself to keep what I felt from my tone. "He's fine. It's like I never left."
More than that I didn't dare say. Already I could feel my mood evaporating and damned if I would give Dmitri any more of my time with Joshua than he'd stolen already.
Joshua wasn't blind nor deaf. He had seen how Rina interacted with Dmitri and it was clearly not all rainbows and sunshine, but he didn't say anything. No point in pushing. If biological families were anything like his adopted family of the Equinox, then every family would have their own byplay, their own strengths and weaknesses. Rina would handle it.
"So, we're all good for the wedding then, after we rescue your family?" He squeezed her softly in reassurance.
"God, yes," I breathed and turned around in his arms to hug him. The coming op on the morrow had me wound up tight. There was so much we needed that we didn't have—no floorplans, no guard schedules, nothing in the way of hard intel. Just hearsay and limited knowledge gleaned from my brothers. Hell of a way to pull off an extraction. I didn't dare mention what I thought of the odds to Joshua, but I had already thought through some of the likely scenarios, braced myself for their logical outcomes. I'd had plenty of time to work them out as I'd labored over the box. Several of them had us failing. A few were even worse. I knew what we had in Equinox's arms locker. I knew down to the millimeter how much room the box had for our weapons. I knew that chances were good we would be separated from the box before the time came to use it. So many variables were beyond our control, so many things could go wrong.
I had come home to honor a promise I'd made to Joshua, but I had also come home to balance the scales, to face a reckoning seventeen years overdue. If I was destined to buy my family's freedom with my life, so be it. My only regret would be the man I would leave behind to mourn me. I worried how it would hit him. I knew intimately how much pain it would cause. Tomorrow would settle the matter one way or the other and until then, I had to make the most of the time I had, if tomorrow was all the time I had left. So I hugged him tight and said into his chest, "We're good."
"Good. I'm kind of looking forward to it," Joshua said with wry understatement. "Op is going to go smooth as silk, we'll get your family out and we're going to have one hell of a wedding." He rubbed her belly softly with his hand as he thought for a minute. "Just as a warning, I have no idea what happens after the 'I do'. All my imaginary scenarios end with the wedding part."
"Well, sir, I suspect what happens after is something like this," I said, giving him a squeeze. "Only with more mattress and less clothes."
Poshel na khuĭ , Dmitriĭ.
Joshua gasped softly in surprise and then chuckled. "Hey now, no fair. Don't get me all riled in your family's living room." But he ran his hands up and down her body briefly, letting her know she was appreciated, even if they couldn't take advantage. But he reigned himself in shortly and said, "But yes, I hope some of that happens on our wedding night. But then back to the Black again for us..."
I moved with his hands, trying to get as much contact through our clothing as possible and sighed when he withdrew. Kindled lust made my voice throaty as I murmured, "And after that comes the honeymoon. Have you any ideas as to where?"
"We get a honeymoon?"
"Well, yeah." I gave him a playful swat. "It's the reward for going through the nightmare of wedding planning and the interminable speeches to the happy couple during the reception and all the rest of it. Didn't you know that?"
"I guess I just never thought we'd get one."
It was too close to my thoughts of the past few days that I couldn't suppress the grue that ran down my spine. God willing, I'd survive to give him that honeymoon. Even if I had to climb out of hell itself.
"Since we're going for a simple affair, our honeymoon should also be simple." I snuggled closer to him. "If all we get is the ship to ourselves for one night alone, it would be enough."
"I'm happy to go wherever, as long as you're with me. Although admittedly I'd like to find something with a rush that doesn't involve combat."
"We could hang glide off the crater's edge. It's a mile across and about half that deep. It should make for some pretty thrilling thermals."
"What? You didn't immediately think that when I took you out back of Muleskinner's?" I laughed softly as he considered the idea. Joshua's joyful innocence when it came to life's pleasures was something I'd lost a long time ago and it never failed to make my heart ache with tenderness. "I'm sure he's got enough scrap lying around to make a decent frame."
"Well yes, but you deserve a real honeymoon. What kind of lousy husband doesn't take his wife somewhere nice?"
Dear God, what did I do right to deserve you, Joshua?
"Anywhere with you is somewhere nice." I cupped his face and looked into his eyes. They were nothing but a darker blur in a deeply shadowed face but I knew where they were regardless. "Everything we need for a real honeymoon is right here in this room. Because you're in it. I don't want or need anything else."
"Don't know how I got so damn lucky."
"Reading my mind again, love?"
Chuckling deep in my throat, my heart brimming over, I drew him down for a kiss.
It was a long, deep kiss that was both a reminder of everything she had been for him and everything that was yet to come. When he finally came up for air, he said, "Okay, I think I'm on board with this honeymoon right here plan."
I said nothing but simply smiled my secret smile and kissed him again.
HOW TO SPEAK RUSSIAN[edit]
devushka = дeByшka = dyeh-voosh-kah = girl Sound clip
Gde glaza idti, ruki idut, ne tak li? = Гдe rлaзa идTи, pykи идyT, He Tak ли? = g’dee glah-zah it-zee, roo-kee doot, nee tahk lee? = Where his eyes go, his hands go, right? Sound clip
For a better sound clip, select the Russian setting and paste the Cyrillic text above here.
malenʹkaya kiska = MaлeHbkaя kиcka = mah-leen-kyah kiss-kah = little pussy Sound clip
For a better sound clip, select the Russian setting and paste the Cyrillic text above here.
Poshel na khuĭ , Dmitriĭ. = пoшeл Ha xyй, ДMиTpий = poh-shell nah hoy, Dee-mee-tree. = Fuck you, Dmitri.Sound clip