By Viridian5
12/6/03
Tyr had a great hoard of wealth and women and a sweet tent with all the luxuries, but.... "Leopard print sheets and tiger print pillows?" Harper asked. "Cheesetastic, Tyr. This is worse than Dylan's black satin."
"How would you know what sheets he has on his bed?"
Like Tyr didn't know. "Nobody can keep me out of somewhere I want to go to."
"Again I ask--"
"Ancient history, and you know it." Way ancient, since a "Greek God or something" physique had carried Dylan only so far. "Yeah, ancient history, like whatever loyalty we ever had to each other. Your minions won't be bothered by the kludges you keep inviting in?"
"The minions here are highly obedient. It can be quite boring at times."
Yeah, Tyr had an over-the-top version of a Harper paradise, with a pretty Earth-like setting, scantily-clad harem girls all his own, and silk hangings. "How tragic."
The familiarity--the light voices, the rapid-fire insults--hit Harper hard. Of all people, he should have been the most ready for Tyr's betrayal, yet it had hurt him the worst anyway. Even if Tyr had kind of admitted to liking him before leaving. If Tyr hadn't cut off all that hair Harper used to pull on, Harper might start to get embarrassing thoughts from all the nostalgia.
Tyr smiled a little. Maybe he felt it too. "Do you trust me, Harper?"
"No." Wait. "Yeah, in the way that I trust you to always do what you think is best for Tyr. I don't know what difference it makes, since I doubt you trust me."
"That doesn't bother you?"
"I had some different expectations of you once, guy, but then you fucked with my ships and my head. I don't care what you think of me anymore." Liar. Why did he have to be so damned sentimental? "I know better now. A snake is a snake, and a Nietzschean is... a really big snake."
"How are you dealing with Rhade?" Tyr asked, his vowels going longer and his consonants getting crisper and sharper in his disdain.
Aside from getting the odd urge to call Rhade "boss" and the feeling that he knew him already? "He has enough of a Spock vibe to him that I can ignore the Nietzschean thing most of the time." At Tyr's blank look, Harper said, "Let it go. I'm the only person in this part of space who knows what I'm talking about."
"As ever." In a softer tone, he said, "If only I could trust you to always do what's best for Harper."
"Morals can be so inconvenient."
"So I've heard. How are you aware of that?"
"Funny guy." Harper had kind of missed this sparring.
"If I'd asked you to destroy the Drago-Kazov homeworld instead of Dylan, I suspect that you would have."
"You know it."
Tyr looked at him with an unreadable expression. "I may have sent a message to the wrong blond."
"Maybe not. I can't call how Beka will jump on this."
"You can't think she'll actually abandon Dylan and the Andromeda."
So Tyr didn't trust her as far as Harper could pick her up. Not much of a surprise. Too bad that Tyr had more faith in her loyalties than Harper did.
Or this might be a Beka scam in motion, and he didn't want to screw that up for her. Either way supplied the same answer. "I learned long ago not to be surprised about anything she does where buff guys who are no good for her are concerned."
"However did Dylan dissuade you?"
"Hunh?"
"Regarding the Dragan homeworld."
"He mentioned the human slaves who'd die too." As if Dylan really cared about humans enslaved by Nietzscheans.
"He retains his talent for manipulation."
"Yeah, but your backup plan nailed them anyway."
"Did you find it satisfying? Aside from the slaves."
"Yeah. Until I found out that Earth is now the unofficial Dragan homeworld, so thanks ever so."
Tyr actually looked disgruntled. "They're vermin. They have no place in my united Prides."
"They have no place being alive."
They shared a heartwarming moment of mutual hatred of the bastard Pride that had destroyed their families and homes, then Harper remembered that he should be ticked off at Tyr.
Maybe Tyr sensed Harper's change of mood, because he said, "I have as much intention of allying with the Abyss or the Magog as I might with the Drago-Kazov. The Route of Ages is a means to my end, an end that would benefit you as well."
Right. Whatever. Harper replied, "You're buddies with the Collectors, and they're buddies with the Abyss."
"They serve a purpose for now. As for the blind prophet everyone is using as evidence of my evil nature, she wouldn't be dead if she hadn't leapt in front of Dylan."
"And that makes it all better."
"Frankly, yes."
"Why do you care what I think?"
When Tyr reached out, Harper didn't dodge, so Tyr's fingers successfully stroked down the back of his head and made him quiver. Despite his cock having straightened to full attention, Harper said, "I'm not gonna join you or anything. Even if Beka and the Maru connect up with you," which they might not, "I'm not giving up the Andromeda." Beka could just deal, especially since she hadn't told him jack about whatever game she had going here or invited him along or anything.
Besides, the thought of an Earth kludge like himself being sextoy and companion to the head of the united Prides made him feel a bit ill. His parents would roll over in their shallow graves.
"I know."
"You're gonna waste yourself on a kludge you can't even procreate with when you're surrounded by willing Uber chicks?"
"I'm more than virile enough to satisfy them even after finishing you off."
"You're that tired of obedient harem girls? You must be nuts."
Tyr shut him up with a kiss, which worked. As Harper kissed back, he wondered if he were really going to do this with Tyr. Tyr had one hand tilting his head up and the other on his back under his jacket and shirt, tracing familiar erotic patterns on his skin. Okay, he was doing this. If he gave up on everyone who'd ever pissed him off and betrayed him he'd be a hermit now. Besides, even without the long locks Tyr was fucking hot.
Tyr had a great talent for undoing clothing, with Harper's gear, even the toolbelt and boots, flying off. Sometimes Harper got the feeling that Tyr didn't like his fashion sense. If only Harper could claim the same success with removing Tyr's. Why did Tyr have to wear outfits that fastened in such weird ways? Getting the damned things off were always a chore and a half. Took too long. Fuck it. Harper jumped up, wrapped his legs around Tyr, and did a twisting motion that knocked them down onto the tacky, tacky bed, with him on top. Obviously amused, Tyr asked, "So impatient?"
"Do you know me at all?"
"I could ask the same."
Harper would have answered, "I thought I did," if Tyr hadn't chosen that moment to roll them around to put Harper on the bottom and started to pet him so thoroughly. Harper melted into his big hands and purred. Maybe Tyr did still know him. Tyr had claimed once that he could tell whether Harper wanted to top or bottom solely from his posture, and he hadn't been wrong yet, not that Harper always admitted it to him.
Sanity intervened for a moment as Harper wondered something. "Hey, when I make you come so hard you scream like a girl, do I have to worry about a bunch of armed Nietzschean minions bursting in here?"
"You'll be the one screaming like a woman. But would such an interlude excite you?"
Harper imagined a small army of armed, scared Ubers running in on him while he was half-naked and moaning. "No."
Tyr reached for a small device and pressed a button. "Then worry no longer. They won't hear anything."
"Good. You know how loud I get."
"Beyond a doubt. You live your whole life loudly."
Living life loudly was a luxury Harper hadn't experienced until leaving Earth, so.... "You know it."
More kissing, stroking, writhing, and undressing, good. Tacky sheets, bad and don't think of them. At least he wouldn't slide right off them the way he had off of black satin. That had been embarrassing. Dylan had a weird sadomasochistic streak. Don't think of Dylan either. He had no place here.
Tyr felt and smelled very good, very Tyr-like, and the familiarity helped melt Harper. Here he had a missing part of his family and life back, even if it wouldn't last long.
When Tyr tried to roll Harper over onto his stomach, Harper said, "Hell no. On my back. I don't want to have to see these sheets while you're doing me."
Tyr lightly swatted his head. "Since when have you become so fastidious?"
"Since I saw these sheets." Harper lessened the sting by unwrapping himself from Tyr and spreading his legs in invitation. He could swear he'd heard the sound Tyr made as an answer in a documentary about old Earth jungle cats. The sound did things to him, pinning him between a flight or fuck reaction. Fuck easily won out.
This hot to go, Harper didn't need Tyr wasting precious time fucking him with those capable fingers, not when the real thing was right there, so he started squirming and growled, "Enough, Tyr. I'm ready already. Fuck me."
"Are you sure?"
"Yes!"
Tyr smirked, no doubt seeing it as a compliment to his skills. Whatever, just as long as Tyr gave him the good stuff already. The first slow, steady push in hurt a bit, since it had been a while, but it hit the spot nicely.
"You look uncomfortable," Tyr said, smirking again. "Am I so large?"
Too large? Pshaw. No such thing. Being twisted into a pretzel with a big, hot body on top of him and a big, hot cock inside him provided excuse enough for a little discomfort. "Fishing, Tyr? What, are you just average-sized among Nietzscheans?"
"Does this feel average to you, little man?"
"It feels--" Harper groaned on the next thrust. "Really good, actually."
Tyr looked smug. Good. Tyr tended to put more panache and effort into his fucking when he felt smug. Unfortunately, he was also in a mood to prove his endurance, taking it slow and excruciating, which left Harper whining, rocking, and pushing down for more and faster.
"C'mon, Tyr, fuck me already. I know you can go all day long, so you don't have to fucking prove it, okay?"
"Beg me."
"Fuck you."
"Maybe, but we'll never get to that the way we're going now, not with me riding you for the next few hours."
Harper moaned when Tyr thrust a little harder just to show he could, then went back to slow and shallow. "You are such a bastard. I didn't miss you at all."
"I can tell. Since you can't endure any more, I'll be kind."
"'Kind'? I'll show you--" But Tyr sped up then, which left Harper too involved in enjoying the ride to keep complaining. His hands scrabbled all over Tyr's hard body as they moved together in rhythm, but he couldn't find anything he could hold on to. By contrast, Tyr had Harper's cock in hand, not that Harper was complaining.
"I did miss you," Harper gasped after one particularly good thrust, and Tyr came hard, which led to two more really good thrusts and a bite on the neck because Tyr always bit his neck. To Harper's perpetual disappointment, Tyr never made any silly sounds during orgasm. Harper made up for that when Tyr jerked him off, because something that good had to be celebrated in song. Okay, moaning and grunting, but musical moaning and grunting.
Deep in the afterglow, Harper felt like one big smile. He'd definitely missed this.
"Did I exhaust you?" Tyr asked. So smug.
"Nah, I'm just basking. Besides, with my eyes closed I don't have to see--"
"I don't want to hear another word about the sheets."
Harper opened his eyes. "They're so there."
"Have you been with anyone else?" After everything Tyr had done, he had the nerve to be possessive?
"Do I look like I have 'Exclusive property of Tyr Anasazi' tattooed on me anywhere?"
"Ah. You haven't." As if in apology, Tyr said, "I missed our arguments."
Harper did too. "That's what the kids are calling it these days? I must be getting old."
Tyr kept trying to pet Harper's hair flat. "Getting old is no bad thing."
It was a luxury. "That's for sure. Stop messing with the hair! Or at least pet it up." Which Tyr did, so Harper sighed happily and said, "Better. Hey, how long do you think we have until Beka comes back?"
"My people will let me know when the Eureka Maru enters the atmosphere."
Thinking of the picture he'd present sprawled out naked and funky on the Second Coming's leopard print sheets, Harper asked, "In person?"
"No. I have my ways." And Tyr was hard again.
Nietzscheans. They only had bodies at all as a way to carry their sex organs around. Not that Harper always had a problem with that. "Are you gonna do something useful with that fully loaded cock?"
"Useful to whom?" Tyr's hand slid possessively up Harper's thigh.
"Useful to me. It's all about me, ya know." History had taught Harper that it would take him about another ten minutes to get hard again and that Tyr would keep him entertained in the meantime. It sure beat the hell out of anything his life had offered him in the last few months.
He hoped Beka would have a long talk and staring match with Dylan.
-----------------
"She's returning," Tyr said.
So Beka's powwow with Dylan had lasted long enough for Harper to get fucked once more and blown. Good going, Beka. Given his recent track record, this sex might have to tide him over for quite a while. In an ideal world, Harper, greedy bastard that he was, would have asked for even more time, but he hadn't done badly.
Hot scented washcloths and towels to freshen up with? Yeah, Tyr was really roughing it.
Tyr had an inscrutable expression on his face as he watched Harper dress, but Tyr did that. "Don't be a stranger," Harper said half-flippantly as he put his boots on, then he hugged Tyr tightly. Who knew when they'd meet again?
"I'll see what I can do." Tyr stroked the back of his head, then sent him out to the waiting Uber escort that would follow him to his slipfighter.
Tyr had even planned it so Harper only had the opportunity to give Beka a brisk wave from a distance before her Uber escorts motioned her to go to Tyr. Since Beka had the ability to stare him down into babbling idiocy when she knew he'd gotten some, he appreciated not having to face her. Especially on this occasion.
----------
On the Andromeda, Dylan waited for him at the airlock. "Mr. Harper, I want a debriefing from you in my office." Of course. Dylan had only needed half a second to decide which crewmember to send to Tyr.
If they hadn't had some ancient history between them, Harper might have said something dirty about debriefing, but with the ancient history it might not be taken as a joke. "Yeah, boss."
Once they reached Dylan's office, Dylan offered him a seat but Harper declined, which Dylan must have interpreted correctly but wanted his report too badly to get into, because instead of asking about it Dylan just raised an eyebrow and asked, "Do you have any information for me?"
Harper wondered whether Dylan really understood his thing with Tyr. Probably not, since Harper didn't always understand it. But if he said something like "I don't fuck around with Tyr just to get data for you," he worried that Dylan would just give him a weird look, so why bother?
"He wants to use the Route of Ages to defeat the Abyss."
"He says."
"He says. He might be telling the truth. Tyr's always been interested in the quality of his own life, and he has to see that there would be no quality in life under the Abyss."
"Nothing else?"
From past experience, Dylan had to know that Tyr would only tell Harper what he wouldn't mind Dylan knowing, but Dylan seemed to have this odd idea that Harper could coax more out of him somehow. It left Harper uncertain whether he should feel complimented by that or not.
It hadn't just been how badly Dylan had screwed up Brendan's rebellion on Earth that had ended Harper's thing with Dylan. The main problem had been that Harper knew that Dylan could be a ruthless sociopath... but Dylan didn't realize that about himself and had the nerve to reprimand Harper for showing the same behavior.
"I didn't loosen his tongue that much." Let Dylan chew on that.
From the look on his face, Dylan didn't like the taste of it. Yeah, Harper thought, you go wonder if you're whoring out your crew, Captain Terrific. Not that Dylan wouldn't whore out his crew anyway, but he might feel a little bad about it.
Feeling merciful, Harper spared him from having to answer by asking, "Did Beka tell you which way she'd jump?"
"No." Dylan looked a little worried. Well, he didn't have dick--especially not Uber dick--to offer her, so maybe he should be concerned.
"She might be playing him." Harper hated it that Beka stopped talking to him whenever some hunk of something crossed her path. She could get so stupid over the manmeat du jour sometimes that Harper became the voice of reason by default, and she never wanted to hear reason at those times.
"She might not be. That's really all you have?"
"He knows me well enough not to tell me too much." Harper smiled as Dylan looked like that didn't taste too good either.
"Thank you." Dylan looked down at the desk, then said, "Maybe you should shower before you go to the bridge."
Harper didn't reek of sex--he could tell--but he didn't have to, not with their new playmate around. "You think Rhade won't know anyway?"
Again with the bad taste face. "You might be right, but we don't have to rub his nose in it."
"Sure. See ya." So he went to his quarters and showered. If something ever happened with Rhade, it would be because Harper made a real move, not because he waltzed in front of the guy smelling like a Nietzschean catamite and Rhade took it as an invitation. Still, it made him feel sad to wash Tyr off of him. So many things gone down the drain....
Rhade gave him a funny look when he showed up on the bridge anyway, which Harper had expected, but putting in the effort to be discreet made a difference with Nietzscheans. Harper had found that out the hard way years ago.
--------------------
"Beka, enough with the 'funny' electrocution, okay?" Maybe she'd come back from the Abyss wrong or maybe this was just the electrical version of the hardcore Harper discipline she engaged in sometimes, but either way he was tired of it. "Don't tell me that you weren't wheeling and dealing with Tyr, because it would disappoint the hell out of me. If you didn't try to make a deal with him, he wouldn't have believed you for even a second."
"He didn't anyway." She looked annoyed.
Had Dylan or anyone else been telling her that she had to whore herself out to Tyr for the Commonwealth? No. Was Harper supposed to believe that she'd hated the sex? Get real. Or that Tyr had been the great love of her life? Not even.
Tyr had apparently offered her in trade to the Abyss for his own life. Well, Nietzscheans did that. Anything that got between them and their own survival didn't stay there long. Still, Harper felt disappointed in him, even though he knew better, because nobody got to try to feed Beka to the embodiment of all evil and get away with it. Still again, he was glad that he couldn't tell whether his shot, Dylan's, or Rhade's had hit Tyr in the back and knocked him over the edge into the chasm.
"You know how I am: insensitive and with the dry wit. Why the hell did you have to tell me that you'd slept with him, anyway?"
"He didn't seem as interested as he should have been." Beka shot him a very significant look.
"What? You think I know whether he's been neutered or not?" But Harper saw where she was heading.
"What did you do with him while I'd gone to talk to Dylan?"
Oh, definite hurt Beka pride looking for a guilty party. "I was supposed to know that you'd toss yourself into his lap after I left? You should have done it before that!"
Her mouth twitched. "Those sheets scared me. Leopard print?"
Did Tyr have more than one set? Scary. "Definitely the sign of a taste-impaired mind, and I should know."
Beka shook her head. "With the tiger-striped pillows."
Watching her carefully, Harper started to relax at what he saw. Now that she knew that Harper had taken Tyr's edge off before she'd done him, she wasn't so mad that Tyr hadn't been as needy as she would have preferred. At least that was the impression Harper got.
"Do you think he's really dead?" Beka asked suddenly.
"Did we see a body?"
"No. Good point." Being Beka, she understood.
At least, most of the time.
Tyr had been declared dead so many times that one more death didn't faze Harper. They would argue again.
col·lat·er·al
adj. 1. Situated or running side by side; parallel.
2. Coinciding in tendency or effect; concomitant or
accompanying. 3. Serving to support or corroborate.
4. Of a secondary nature; subordinate: collateral
target damage from a bombing run. 5. Of, relating
to, or guaranteed by a security pledged against the
performance of an obligation: a collateral loan.
6. Having an ancestor in common but descended
from a different line.
n. 1. Property acceptable as security for a loan or
other obligation.
-- The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language,
Fourth Edition. Copyright © 2000