Amaranthine

It was a good thing Cait wasn’t leading, or she would have bowled the woman at the door straight over.

Fiona Impish was simply a pretty missable woman. Cait was in the abhorrent habit of commenting to anyone who would listen on basically any attractive woman she saw, and Fiona simply hadn’t moved that needle in the Council Chamber.

Still, if you put the right kind of smile on someone, it could turn anyone into a 10, and that was what Fiona wore as Lira squeed, doing a stuttering little dance up to throw her arms around the woman.

“Oh my god, FiFi, you look fucking tasty girl!” Lira exclaimed, remaining in the woman’s personal space to play with one of her dangly gold earrings. “I love these, really emphasize that elegant neck, I’m so glad you actually decided to come out!”

Admittedly, on another night, Cait would’ve been glad too. Fiona looked good out of public servant chic. Plus, her general mousy vibe mixed with her obvious self consciousness wearing what was probably the sluttiest dress she owned (which again, didn’t even move the needle in this group, but that was hardly a fair comparison), all combined to set off a sort of prey reaction in the fuckboi side of Cait’s brain she’d normally love to explore.

So, she simply waved a polite little hello, and did nothing to interfere as Lira swept the woman away, holding close to her side as she led the group to the elevators. Once inside, she pulled Kennedy into that convo as well, leaving Cait walking behind with Qi when they reached the street.

For a moment, the companionable silence was nice, actually. Kennedy and Lira provided quite the view to follow behind, and even just being near Qi, you felt a little of her fire, like the glow of an evening hearth. But that would be a waste. Passively enjoying Qi is what Cait had been doing for months, and while Lira wasn’t the type to treat other women as party favors, Cait doubted the addition of a distraction like Fiona was an accident.

Cait leaned over, bumping her shoulder into Qi’s elbow.

“You look so fucking cool in that outfit,” she said, running her eyes from Qi’s belt, up her toned tummy to her eyes. Qi’s smile was much softer than her fangs.

“Yeah? Thanks,” she chuckled. “Lira said it had ‘big Tekken vibes’, and implied that was a good thing.”

“Hah! I totally see it,” Cait laughed. “Wouldn’t matter though. You’re the kinda girl that would look good in a cardboard box, so long as we could see your face.”

Qi blushed a little, a hint of the girl peeking out from the dragon before her lip curled up, grin turning from soft to lewd.

“Not so bad yourself,” she growled, “though I don’t see why you bother with clothes at all. I’m just gonna get you out of them.”

That almost made Cait miss a step. Not because the advance was unwelcome. But because it was so familiar. If she hadn’t said that exact line herself, she’d said things so similar as to be indistinguishable. It was like looking into a mirror, and she found she didn’t really like it.

Gotta see if that’s really her. It doesn’t feel like it is. Also gotta reevaluate my approach, that felt a little gross.

She channeled Kennedy, rolling her eyes and smiling up at the towering dragon-girl like it had been a joke. It did make her wonder how often Kennedy had been pretending to be annoyed-but-charmed, but really had just been annoyed.

“Easy there, Qi, the night just started,” Cait said, trying to modify her voice to be mollifying but enticing, like Kennedy did so often. It was at that point she realized she was taking the traditionally female role in this flirtation, and despite ostensibly being female, wished she were better at it.

She didn’t nail it. Cait watched Qi’s face shift, a flash of insecurity and worry running across it before it was replaced with a kind of arrogance, in turn quickly hidden back behind that lewd grin.

“Never stopped you before,” Qi said, entirely fairly if Cait was being honest.

“Point to you,” Cait said, letting it pull a genuine laugh from her, “but get a few drinks in me first. I don’t care if they’re actually helping me rehydrate, but my body needs to think I am after last night.”

“Hit you pretty hard huh?” Qi asked, looking a little more smug than Cait thought she deserved given that her role for most of that had been laying there from the flashes she remembered, but still, she was less worn out.

“Harder than anything since I was Altered,” Cait admitted. “Besides Willow yanking my soul out of my skin, and that only hurt, didn’t slow me down.

“Gotta say, pretty proud of that,” Qi preened, and Cait punched her gently in the side.

“Don’t get too cocky,” she laughed, following the punch in, then pulling Qi’s arm around her shoulders. “Can’t be two arrogant bastards on the team.”

Qi hesitated at Cait’s tender gesture, unused to it from her. But after a moment, her talons curled around Cait’s delt, keeping her close for the rest of the walk.

“How many of these people do you think we saved?” Qi asked, voice suddenly softer. Cait took in the street. It was clear that, even without Amaranthine and Draconic in the mix, recovery in the city had continued. People were out in droves, and cars honked at each other as they jockeyed for position on repaired streets.

“Holy shit,” Cait said, “when did this happen?”

“Lira filled me in while we were playing dress-up,” Qi explained, talons gently stroking over Cait’s shoulder. “Gwyn and Roman got a lot of logistics drones back online, and the extra Guardians in the city cleared out the Altered Beasts fast. Turns out they were moving nests, more than our little group could cover. With more heroes, there less places to run.”

“Makes sense,” Cait said, raising her left hand to rest on top of Qi’s. The dragon did her best to lace their fingers, but those claws were bulky. “Shit Qi, we probably saved all of them. Saved everything, last night.”

“Yeah,” Qi whispered, only audible over the sounds of the city due to their closeness. “Fucked up right? If those monsters had gotten out, or Gwyn’s bots….”

“Bye-bye everything,” Cait finished, feeling a chill down her spine Qi’s warmth did nothing to combat.

Everything but me, floating in the infinite.

“Heh,” Cait forced a chuckle out against the existential dread, pulling closer to Qi and looking up up up to her ruby reds. “How many of the stares you receive do you think are cause you’re a superhero, or just cause you’re so fuckin’ beeg?”

“I’ve learned not to wonder,” Qi laughed, “everytime I think it’s one, it’s the other, and I look like an idiot. I try to just tell myself while it might be 50/50 that, it’s always cause I’m hot.”

Cait licked her finger, pressing it to Qi’s abs, making the pssshh sound of imaginary steam. Admittedly, if they were any hotter, she wouldn’t have to.

“You get it,” Qi chuckled.

“Well yeah, that’s one lived experience we definitely share,” Cait responded. At some point, the walk had shifted. Qi’s hand felt comforting, not possessive, and Cait’s mind had stopped rebelling at the thought of being arm candy. It… kinda felt like a nice date, actually.

Relaxing into the conversation, Cait noticed how well Lira had pulled Kennedy into their own ahead of them. It was rare, that Cait saw Kennedy interact with anyone not directly on the team, at least in an unofficial capacity. The bright smile she wore as she laughed at a joke Impish was clearly not certain would land was infectious. In fact, Cait wondered if she’d caught it from Lira who wore the same.

“Ya know,” Qi said, eyes fixed on the women ahead of them as well, “I’ve been on campus for years. Everyone knew of Kennedy, but besides Lira and Warhawk, I don’t think I ever saw anyone else even talk to her. Apparently people had tried, but she had a reputation for being kind of a bitch. Totally understandable, in hindsight, but hard to believe that’s the same girl.”

“Yeah, cause she’s sooooo nice to you,” Cait laughed, leaning into Qi enough to make her take a playful stumble.

“I was moving in on the only woman she’d ever shown sexual interest in,” Qi laughed. Her hand fell to Cait’s ribs, voice growing deeper, breathier as she continued; “Still am, actually.”

“Takes some of the pressure off when you’ve all boned though, doesn’t it?” Cait responded, smiling bright and trying to pull Qi out of the baser instincts. She’d spent a whoooole lotta time with the Dragon recently, she wanted to get to know the Woman. Unfortunately, Cait was not a master at actually caring about people, and Qi noticed that Cait had been dodging the kind of advances she usually caught with both hands. Her face fell a bit, a little hurt entering those ruby reds.

“Cait, are you, like, mad at me?” she asked, “I just… normally you, you like that, right?”

Cait felt her stomach drop. Both at the implication, that at least some of the Alpha Dragon thing was an act specifically for her, and the fact that she was fucking this up. This would have been the part of any pervious relationship where she was on to the next, the second any kind of resistance was shown. She’d fooled herself into thinking she’d gotten better, but when things were as easy as they were with Lira and Kennedy, she hadn’t needed to be better.

“No, of course not,” Cait said, leaning in to Qi again, this time just to show affection. “I just want to get to know you, and it feels kinda like you just confirmed my suspicion that… that isn’t it.”

“It’s not not it,” Qi protested weakly, but didn’t have time to explain herself further.

As they’d walked, the glowing blue of PlazLoad’s lines had become more intense, not individually, but as a function of number. For whatever reason, this spot in the city served as a conflux of dozens. Specifically, one building, criss-crossed with pulsing blue power and with a line of people that curved down the block.

“Okay, feel kinda silly for asking, but this is it, right FiFi?” Lira asked, bouncing excitedly on Fiona’s arm.

“That it is!” the woman responded, clearly much more at ease after the walk. “Welcome to the PowerStation, Technocago’s nightlife mecca.”