I recently watched V for Vendetta for the first time ever. Then, the next day, I watched it again. Then, three days after that, this story appeared in my head, and we all know how that goes. Probably just a one-shot unless some more inspiration hits me.
Rated for sex, but not particularly graphic. Oh yeah, and it only really works if you read V's lines in Hugo Weaving's voice. God, I love his voice.
It was the jukebox which had brought about the change. She loved that jukebox. When he wasn't around, she would turn it on and dance, alone in the room, eyes closed and just losing herself. It was an exhilarating escape. Then one day everything changed. It all changed because he saw her, and rather than leaving her that escape, he joined her, took her in his arms and danced with her, and suddenly everything changed. How she saw him changed. She was somehow suddenly acutely aware of the man V was.
The mask, the gloves, the black, they weren't just to hide the scars. They were to hide his humanity. Was he ashamed of it, she wondered, or afraid of it? So many questions. His whole existence was one big question. She knew that he intended for the mystery of his identity to instill fear in his enemies. And to the rest of the country, he wanted to be more than a man. He wanted to be a symbol. An idea. Abstract, formless, faceless. Make people think, make them wonder, make them question. And until this moment, it had all worked. Every time Evey spoke to him, she felt she was speaking, not to another human being, but to some projection of some part of herself. He could easily have been a figment of her imagination, the voice in the back of her mind which had always whispered, something here is wrong. He was a ghost.
But now. Now, beneath the cloth on his shoulder, she could feel skin and muscle. Now she was close enough to him that she could feel his warmth, hear each breath as it escaped the lips she now realized must be under that mask. And for the first time in a long time, Evey felt a flash of desire. It was an emotion so base, so raw, that it shocked her. She had been living in such a dull state of mind for so long. Fear had sedated her, and now suddenly it was like she was awake again. She pulled away from him.
"Make love to me, V," she said abruptly.
"What?" He retracted his hands. For the first time in their months of interaction, she had startled him. The question hung in the air for a moment.
"Please." It was explanation enough. It was not strictly him that she wanted, it was the thrill, and the feeling. He wondered briefly if she had ever read 1984.
"Evey," he said softly, stepping away from her. "Evey, you are one of the most beautiful creatures I have ever seen. Were I any other man, I would not hesitate to sweep you into my bed and take my pleasure in your body. But I cannot. You ask me to make love to you, but there is no part of me in which love still resides. I know no passion that is not fueled by revenge. I am too full of hate to create love."
"Fine," she said, and in one deft movement she ripped off her shirt. "Then fuck me." She was surprising herself now. She never cursed, never came on to men.
V stared at Evey, her small breasts and smooth skin. Wryly, he thought that whatever the reason he had initially been sent to Larkhill, it had not been homosexuality. But when he thought of her smooth skin mingling with his own, scarred and repulsive, he felt nothing but horror. He raised his gloved hands. "These hands, they have taken too many lives and caused too much pain to be worthy to touch one such as you."
"I don't care," she said. She was struck with the cliché of it all. What a wonderful romance it would make. The man honorable and self-deprecating, the woman magnanimous. Except that he was not denying her for her sake, but for his own. And she was not forgiving him for his sake, but for her own. She approached him, took his outstretched hands, and placed them on her breasts. He contemplated them for a moment, smooth leather moving slowly over her nipples. Then, in an instant, he made his decision.
"Very well," he murmured. And suddenly the hesitation was over. Before she had a chance to realize what had happened, his hands had moved to grip her wrists. He pulled them above her head, taking them in one hand, and at the same time he backed her up against a wall. The cold metal of his mask touched her forehead, and she could feel his sharp, warm exhalation. She closed her eyes, and suddenly his other hand was between her legs. He had not taken off his gloves, touching her instead with soft leather, which quickly grew slick as he worked his fingers inside of her.
She kept her eyes closed, unwilling to face the reality of what she would see if she opened them. Unable to stare into the black voids, unable to face the reality that she would never meet the eyes of the man giving her such pleasure now. He remained a ghost. A wish. A question.
V, on the other hand, stared at her face like it was an answer. He treasured every sound she made, every breath, every contraction of every muscle in her body as she felt. Evey's pleasure brought him pleasure like no joining of the flesh ever could. When she reached her climax, he looked her in the eyes and, like Evey, he too felt something new. Not passion, he had known enough of that to last a lifetime. No, for one shining moment he felt… good. For a moment, he had created, rather than destroyed. Within the pure wonder on Evey's face, he forgot that he was a monster for the briefest, most glorious second.
Evey collapsed against the wall, gasping and sweaty. The glory was over, and now what was there? He could not kiss her, she could not touch him. He released her wrists and, with that hand, touched her cheek briefly. Then he turned and walked away and she let him go. What could either of them say? The next morning he would make her breakfast, they would discuss more politics and everything would go on the way it had.
She had answered his question and the answer was wrong.