Amaranthine

“So, you have a wizard for us?” Cait asked a distinctly pallid Chairman Zebrowski, who was currently looking over the photos of the aftermath of their clash at South Works. “Because unless they know ‘Protection from Supersonic Impact’, I gotta say, I think that’ll be a pretty easy match up for us.”

“Hmm?” The Chairman gulped, eyes flicking between Cait and a pile of gore she thought might be the many-armed malevolent she’d fought in the main factory building. He coughed, collecting himself. “Uh, yes, well, yes, we do believe one of the factions that vied for control of the city in the early days of the Waves is making moves. However, The Coven of the Fall are not so centralized as Anarky is… was. It was only Gwyn and Lira working in tandem that illuminated us to much of our surveillance data and raw info streams not matching up. Miss Stine made it clear with some very colorful language she suspected magic to be the culprit, and where there is magic in Technocago, there is The Fall.”

“Okay,” Kennedy said, picking up the conversational thread, “so, what do you think the chances are you would have had a cult of psychotic Altereds drinking the blood of a demigod in your city if this Coven was in charge of things?”

Her threat wasn’t exactly subtle. While The Chairman had impressed her that morning, the fact that Anarky had been allowed to grow to the size it had in their backyard took away much of that goodwill. Again, his eyes went hard.

“Very high, I would imagine Miss Swan. I’m certain Willow can tell you more of their history than I can given her area of expertise, but The Fall was primarily interested in the power gained through large scale sacrifice,” he explained, and Kennedy looked appropriately cowed.

“Damn,” Cait said, “so not the chill kind of witch that will do surprise sex at you in a sewer, huh?”

She felt Willow’s eyes burning into the back of her skull with near-physical force as Kennedy went from chagrined to chortling.

“What?” The Chairman asked, air of control cracking once more as he tried to put together where that had come from. “I… don’t know, honestly, explorations of carnal casting were actually a large aspect of their recruitment campaigns in the early days. They tended to leave out the high occurrence of sacrifice during or after the act itself, however, even when that was leaked, a certain subset of the population became almost more eager.”

‘I’lm have to remember that, next time I ‘do surprise sex at someone’, Willow’s voice whispered absently into both of Cait’s ears at once. She assumed no-one else could hear that, so she didn’t react, despite the confused shiver it sent down her spine.

“Regardless,” The Chairman continued, “dealing with them won’t be quite as simple as raiding a factory and handing out summary executions like candy.” He said those last words like an accusation, but that slid right off the Dawn Posse. What the fuck were they supposed to do? You couldn’t capture someone like Goliath.

“I’d like your team to cool your heels, for a day or two,” he said, meeting the group’s scowls unflinchingly. “Our citizens are not used to this level of violence occurring within the city, and I would hate for public opinion to turn against you so soon after your arrival.”

“Really? Kennedy countered, “Because it kind of feels like you don’t want us to fix any more problems in days when you’ve been doing nothing to deal with them for months.”

The slightest flash of heat entered Zebrowski’s eyes at that, but he let it pass from them without allowing it to color his next words.

“Your approach is undeniably effective,” Kennedy, he granted, with a tight smile and inclination of the head, “but you must admit it is brutal. The city has begun to stabilize enough under the efforts of the Guardian corps. your mother sent that some of the nightlife and daytime normality is returning. Please, make a few appearances around the city not covered in the blood and gore of a recent kill. Not only will it help your image, but you deserve it.”

He’d managed to work his face into a warm, bright smile by the end of his plea, and it worked on Cait, at least. They did deserve it, and her parents had always talked about Chicago as someplace they wished they could have gone more before the Waves. Still, she kept her face hard and body language tough until Kennedy sighed, nodding her assent.

“Fine,” Kennedy agreed, “We’ll take it easy.” She turned to the team’s two attaché’s eyebrow quirked. “You two hitting the town with us, or sticking with the nerds?”

Gwyn looked conflicted, eyes shifting from Breastman to Roman. It was clear she’d actually been having the time of her life directing the technological rebuilding effort of an entire city.

-IT’S OKAY HONEY- Breastman said over the team channel. -NEED SOME DOWN TIME WITH EVERYONE ELSE TOO. YOU STILL HAVE ME WHEN THE DOORS ARE CLOSED-

Gwyn blushed, but immediately spoke up; “I’ll be sticking around. I’ve made my tech too integral to our efforts thus far to duck out without things getting cocked up.”

“Suit yourself,” Lira said with a shrug, prowling over to wrap either arm around both Cait and Kennedy’s waists. “I’m having a night with my girlies.”

“Was hoping you would,” Cait said, leaning over to whisper the words right in her ear, drawing out an adorable little giggle.

“Good enough, I suppose,” sighed The Chairman, “In the meantime Impish and I will devote more resources to identifying loci of Coven activity. Kennedy, perhaps you and Willow could keep an ear to the ground as well, given your arcane proclivities.”

“Always do,” Kennedy said, already turning to enter the opening elevator. For her part, Willow just left a laugh, one that hung in the room far longer than she did.

Cait looked around at the inhabitants of the elevator, all covered to various degrees in gore and viscera.

Honestly, if someone walked into my office looking like this, I’d look at them like Zebrowski did too.

“I call the steam shower,” she said absently, to a chorus of groans, and one giggle.

To be honest, after a good 10 minutes of scrubbing, it had become clear Cait had needed the help. She had bits of boy in places that seemed impossible, proven when Kennedy pulled a tooth out of the cleft of her asscheeks.

“Jesus Cait, did you face-sit someone to death?” she asked, laughing as she flicked it towards the drain. Kennedy’s indifference to death and gore, Cait understood. She’d killed her first man at 15, and proceeded to kill a whole lot more members of her abusive family that same day. If she’d had guilt related to that, her new mother had helped her work through it. Now, she was pulling people parts off of her girlfriend in the shower, and from the way her hands were roaming, it was doing nothing to dissuade her from her initial goal.

Then they roamed a little further, and the part of Cait’s brain that cared about the reasons for things shut off.

Cait let a low groan build in her chest as Kennedy’s soft, nimble fingers stroked along the underside of her quickly waking shaft. She’d finally let her link with Qi drop, and her features were entirely human once more, if made slightly harder by the muscle and definition she gained from Cait.

She kissed Cait’s back, rounded as she braced herself against the shower wall. The big girl shifted, pushing greedily into Kennedy’s hand, a soft moan Kennedy knew Cait would find embarrassing escaping her throat as she followed through on one stroke, tracing black-painted fingernails down the taut skin of her balls. She worked at Cait’s shaft until she couldn’t close her fingers around it, feeling her own arousal, and a little fear, build as she imagined where it was going next.

As if Cait could feel that, and their link was so natural at this point Kennedy sometimes had to remind herself that Cait could, she pushed off the wall, tuning to face her. She pulled Kennedy’s hand off of her cock, placing it on her shoulder, then making Kennedy gasp when she lifted her, easy as a toy, into a position that made coupling almost inevitable, Cait’s entry into her a matter of the slightest surrender to gravity.

Kennedy giggled, wrapping her arms around Cait’s neck at the same time her legs wrapped around her hips. That motion brought them into contact, ruining the beginning of their kiss when Cait breathed a sigh of pleasure, and Kennedy let out a ‘mmh!’ through Cait’s lip, bit between her teeth when Cait’s cock slid along her clit, in-between her labia.

She felt Cait’s fingers dig into the soft flesh of her asscheeks, felt the big girl’s new-found and precarious self-control struggling against the urge to slam up into her. It was understandable, Kennedy fought the same urge.

Of all the women Cait found herself involved with, Kennedy was the tightest. That wasn’t a comment on her anatomy, that wasn’t really how vaginas worked, and it also wasn’t necessarily a good thing. Yeah, technically, it felt amazing if they lost control and Cait went in before she was ready, but Cait was well aware that was a one-way street. This girl had been all but unable to handle touch two months ago. Even as close as they were, with the certainty of actual love between them, Kennedy still took time, a lot of time, to warm up, to be ready.

It was hardly a sacrifice. The softness of Kennedy’s skin, the beauty of her body, the sweet licorice taste of her lips, all on top of the silky heat of her other lips sliding along Cait’s shaft, these feelings were a heaven all their own. They stayed like that, kissing and caressing in the gentle drizzle of water and hot steam, letting Kennedy’s body prepare itself.

Cait’s only warning was a burst of resolve. Kennedy adjusted the angle of her hips, just a few degrees, but enough that when she next moved, the first few inches of Cait slid into her entrance, rather than past it. Like always, Cait watched Kennedy’s face, making sure she wasn’t biting off more than she could chew. That had happened less and less lately, and this time golden eyes lidded heavy with lust, white teeth over black lip, her face showed no pain, only bliss and need.

Cait knew Kennedy well enough by now to know it was useless kissing her until she got used to having Cait inside her so instead she moved one hand up to her back, pulling her close to bite and suck at her neck. Each soft, delighted gasp of surprise was echoed by a twitch downstairs, enhancing the journey of being fully accepted by Kennedy even further.

“I can’t wait until you can just fuck me,” Kennedy breathed into her hear, voice a heavy purr. The combination of sensations and words sent frisson like a religious experience down Cait’s spine to her hips, and Kennedy almost got what she wanted. But this was the point they’d fucked up at a couple of times; the hornier Kennedy got, the less her actual ability to handle Cait lined up with her confidence in that ability. Cait laughed, bringing the hand on Kennedy’s back up to squeeze tight around the back of her neck, pressing her into the hollow of Cait’s.

“Yeah?” Cait asked, letting a hint of cruelty invade her voice as she controlled Kennedy’s body, keeping their slow pace exactly the same. “then why don’t you practice more?”

“Cait, I fuck you almost every day,” she begged, trying to force her hips down against Cait’s inexorable grip.

“Not enough,” Cait chided, forcing back the urge to bottom out in Kennedy herself, “that should be every hour, every fucking minute.”

She dropped Kennedy’s ass just long enough to spank it, having the side effect of letting a couple extra inches quickly slide in before she caught her again, pulling her back up to a comfortable, teasing at this point, depth..

“I caaaan’t… we’re shuperherows…” Kennedy slurred, starting to melt into Cait the way she did when Cait was playing things exactly right.

“We don’t have to be,” Cait whispered into her ear, letting her slide down deeper once more, and keeping her strokes at that level. “We could just be this. I can be this for you, and you for me, every second of every day.”

Cait had to be careful with dirty talk for Kennedy. You didn’t go through the kind of trauma she had without a few landmines buried in your head, ones that could go off a hell of a lot more than once. Cait had learned the hard way that Kennedy loathed the kind of objectification Lira loved, but when it was presented as a two-way street? Well, that was how you turned the strong, proud goth into the mewling mess currently shuddering on Cait’s cock.

It wasn’t even like Cait was lying, at least not in the moment. Right now, she couldn’t imagine ever wanting to spend another moment doing anything other than what she was doing right now.

“We were made for this,” she whispered, luxuriating in the feel of every part of Kennedy, of how she herself felt to the girl, one of the major upsides to an empathic link with her lover. “To be together, to be one.” Kennedy pulled herself tighter to Cait’s torso, breathing quick, high, and uncontrolled, just like her hips would be moving, were it not for the iron-handed guidance Cait provided.

Close like this, emotionally inseparable, physically intertwined, Cait felt the words she’d said were the only true words, really true, that she’d ever spoken. As her dam of control burst, and she let Kennedy move as she wanted, joining her in abandon in the precious few moments before they each reached their peaks, everything but that truth, represented in form and feeling by the girl wrapped around her, melted away.