Language of the Dark

With them, words aren't necessary.

They speak the language of the dark, of the fight, of desperate touches and parting looks. Her hands are slow to move, her lips responding first. The thin, dangerous lines of her teeth still feel alien as his tongue slides against them. He has yet to adapt to their shape, even in his own mouth. Michael closes his eyes and tastes salt, and he cannot be sure whether it is the tears that are now slipping elegantly down Selene's high cheekbones, or the grime of his own battle-weary sweat.

With them, instincts don't apply.

After a very long time, she slowly turns under the light grasp of his fingers, closing her lips to him and tangling her fingers with his. Selene tugs lightly, and Michael forgets the incredible strength he's learned to possess and follows her off of the narrow, shattered bridge.

With them, the simple things don't matter.

Michael has lost his shirt somewhere back in the helicopter, and Selene is soaked to the bone. By all natural rights they should both be freezing, but suddenly a thing so banal as temperature is no matter. As soon as their feet are back on firm ground, her fingers disengage from his. Michael starts protest, gropes to find them again in the eerie half-light of dawn, then goes still as her hand lands against the hair that is plastered to his cheek.

With them, it is not rational.

His lips possessing hers once more, Michael steps forward until Selene's shoulder-blades graze the stone of the staircase. She gives him one of her looks, the kind that says more than he can ever imagine being able to express in mere words. Michael pulls away for a moment and works his hands around her waist until his fingers find the zipper on her corset and work it free. It falls to the wet ground, and when he brings his hands around to remove the rest of the wet leather from her skin, his hands are red with her blood. He keeps going anyway, pressing his lips to the still-healing wound marking the spear's entry just off-center between her breasts. They have not checked to see that they are alone, in the middle of their war-zone. The unearthly blue of Selene's eyes says she doesn't care.

With them, abandonment is a fantasy never to be realized.

The fabric of Michael's pants is hopelessly ripped, and it falls away in shreds as her hands struggle to find a belt, a clasp, a zipper. He has a sudden thought that this will make for a slightly awkward exit, but the purely animal side of him brushes it aside as he pushes up into her and skin meets skin with their hip-bones barely touching. The tears on her cheeks have dried now, jagged lines in the grime darkening the paleness of Selene's skin. She pulls his hand, still coated with blood, to her mouth and sucks his fingers dry. He gives a sudden, catlike hiss and replaces his hand with his lips against her mouth, tasting the residual tang of copper on her tongue. He keeps his eyes open as he moves, glued to the radiant blue of hers, ever-vigilant, even now.

For them, change is the only certainty.

"Michael," says Selene at last, the first word she has spoken since the fight's end. He wraps his arms protectively around her in an exceedingly human gesture, pressing every inch of her naked body to his. Somehow, even in the cold first light of day, her skin is suddenly warm.