Work Text:
Butterfly Reflections On Raspberry Kisses
By Margaret Brown, aka Andromeda Valentine
"Demons' day in madness kissed.
I swear I never had it like this.
Forbidden, yet I cannot resist..."
Dylan's POV
Melissa Etheridge, 'Resist,' Yes, I Am
"Dylan... If we don't make it, I want you to know - "
I knew what she was going to say as soon as I saw that look.
I froze for a second then, caught between wanting desperately to hear those words and wanting desperately to avoid all the changes hearing them would bring.
"*Don't* say it, Rommie."
The words came out harsher than I had intended, and she looked hurt for a second before her stubbornness took over.
"If we're going to die..."
There was obviously only one answer to that.
"We are *not* going to die. Captain's orders."
Ah, good, Dylan - nothing like a joke fallen flat to *not* diffuse tension...
She just looked at me a long moment, still a little hurt, and I swear I saw her chin jut out ever so slightly the way it does when she's set on something and still being challenged.
"This isn't about living or dying, Dylan. It's about saying what I need to while I still have the courage."
I started to say that this wasn't the time - not surrounded by a worldship full of very hostile, very *hungry* Magog - but as I did I heard Warrick's voice echo in my head. Those same words from him had wounded Jill - Pax - past healing, and I was verging on making the same mistake.
"Rommie..."
"No, Dylan. You can't tell me it's all right to have feelings and then allow me only the emotions you're comfortable with me having."
The snap and fire in that statement caught me off guard, but then I often find myself taking Rommie's seeming placidness for granted. Still waters run deep, Hunt, don't forget that...
"That isn't it, Rommie. I just don't want you to say anything you'll end wishing you hadn't. That would be... worse than not saying anything at all."
That got a me a vaguely amused critical look from Rommie, and I almost kicked myself for not watching what I said more closely. That statement had come perilously close to saying a lot more than I'd intended, and if anyone could see that, it would be her...
"So... you don't want me to say something I'll regret later?"
Or something you don't really mean...
I just nodded, glad she'd seen my point of view here. "Exactly."
But she inched closer to me, not further away, and I got the sudden feeling that she wasn't seeing things my way after all...
"Then I won't say anything at all."
Before that could sink in, her lips were on mine. I had a brief thought about what it was with the women I knew doing this to me, followed by the random thought that Rommie tasted like raspberries. After that, I couldn't think anymore...
Reality finally returned when Rommie suddenly pulled away and whirled around to start firing at the several Magog who'd just shown up. I sat there stunned for a second or two, then jumped into the fray beside her.
The quasi-confused look I got from some of the Magog during the firefight puzzled me until Rommie turned to me afterwards and brushed her fingers over my mouth. I looked at her blankly a second before she held up her hand to show me.
"Lipstick" she said simply, before turning to continue our search for Tyr and Harper.
I half-consciously passed my tongue over my lips to remove any lingering traces of Rommie's lipstick, and caught the faintest taste of raspberries...
END