Work Text:
THE LAST SEDUCTION
(c) 2004 Jungle Kitty
Kirk remembered resting his cheek against Antonia's thigh as she stretched. Mmmmm, that was so good, she'd moaned, it was like dying.
I'll take that as a compliment, he'd replied.
She'd laughed, that gorgeous low chortle that always sounded like the response to a dirty joke.
He wished she was with him now. For her warmth, her smile, her passion, for a thousand reasons, none of which loomed more importantly than telling her that dying didn't feel good at all.
It was happening slowly and it hurt like hell. Sharp knives were stabbing him all over, sharp *hot* knives that turned him cold, worse than cold. Alone.
It didn't matter that Picard was there, hovering over him. He was alone with the pain as the knives cut away everything else, everything he was, everything he'd planned, everything that was just over the next hill. Alone with the approaching nothingness.
Picard seemed to be moving away, slowly drawing back but that was an illusion. Whatever was behind Picard--a darkness beyond black--brushed Picard aside as it rolled forward. The sun disappeared behind it, then the sky, the hills, the bridge he'd fallen from.
And when there was nothing left except the hot-cold pain, the darkness began dismantling that.
But he needed it, he needed his pain, pain meant he was still alive, he could still go on, could still make a difference, he couldn't die, he was James T. Kirk!
James T. Kirk? What did that mean? He'd known once, he was sure of it, it had been *important.* He grasped at the ghost of a memory. James T--
Too late. The words dissolved into senseless sounds and vanished. Then he felt the years falling away, so few, too few. He wanted more, he *demanded* more! More time! Time for friends, lovers, journeys, sorrows, promises, regrets, life life LIFE!
*No. No more time.*
The darkness took on a color, deepest red, and red meant fight, there was something inside him that still knew that. He wasn't going to take no for an answer, was he? But his unvoiced protest was swept aside by a sudden onslaught of motion, a turbulence of reds and purples. Like a swift-moving river, it tumbled him over as if he were no more than a twig fallen into the current.
Laughter. There was something like laughter. It rippled softly, a come-on, a dare, a beckoning glance...
*You're not going to turn back now, are you?*
He felt no fear and had no thought of resistance, not anymore. This was seduction on a cosmic level--it smiled, flirted, drew him in, he felt it wanting him to go deeper, deeper, to its very heart. There was no question of consent, consent had been given in the first moment of life. How could he have forgotten?
He wasn't broken or alone, loneliness and pain couldn't co-exist with the roaring elation that swooped him up and carried him onward.
Then he saw it.
Life and more-than-life, bursting with possibilities, fresh and new, unfolding before him like a
"...rosebud..."
Something tugged at him like--like--an eager horse pulling the reins, a ship straining against its moorings, a lover kept waiting too long--he was flooded by half-remembered sensations, the last sweet tokens of what had come before.
Or perhaps the first taste of what lay ahead?
There was only one way to find out.
[End]