Requested by LuaKitsune :3
It's my first attempt at MXM content, although I am unable to quite understand such pairing I am giving it my best shot. I hope you like it.
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'You're quite soft for that.'
Sometimes, it didn't matter if it was a compliment. The other times, it wouldn't even matter at all. For sure what doesn't mean to sting could be the sharpest of all words. But even in times when this was what attracted most to you, your kindness, you couldn't help but inwardly jeer at the words as if they were those obnoxious entities at the back of your head, in that dark corner, cringing at your very essence and reminding you of your failures.
Your kindness...
"Am I?" You mumbled half-heartedly at the petite Asian who fumbled with her flashlight right beside you, the quiver of her hands not going unnoticed as she shifted in her position, moving a little closer to you as she held the flashlight up for a better view of an excuse, "I appreciate that, not to mention that the times are hard here. I was starting to believe that I was getting a little too cold in here, literally and figuratively."
The lady giggled, her sheepish childlike chuckle a cherry on the top. You didn't mind her snuggling a little closer, you knew it was common among people to seek affection at times, especially in darker times when one couldn't find even a cold shoulder. You were aware of attentions. Mother always told you that when you were to grow up into a young gentleman, women would flock around you. Spring had to be in the air probably, for it turned out to be true. You felt proud when mother showered you with love and praises, you felt proud when her prophetic visions started to show their solid hues. You were shy, but you loved attention.
You wanted attention...from him. Especially when he gave none.
By the time your cogitating had ended, the makeshift spear was done. Min clapped her hands vigorously in elated exuberance as she admired your handwork, which was whatever you could do at best at the moment. Earlier, Chris had managed to set the girl free from the deadly clutches of the extra-terrestrial creature, and in doing so had acquired the tail for a trophy.
So often, when you stared at that scar-ridden body, your heart would thud rigorously against your chest at the mere cognizance of his raw strength. You could only admire the big bruiser of a man he was from far away, only longingly staring at him and swoon. You could count on one hand how many times you had looked him in the eye. And the handful of times you had, your sight had dropped to the ground in sheer embarrassment of it.
Maybe it was that this man was always enveloped by that aura of morale you never possessed that made your blood boil, or maybe the worst, you coveted him. It was the epitome of masculinity that you could never achieve and was so out of your reach, that such perfection to exist shook the foundation of your existence. Even your appearance softened your presence; tall and lithe, warm and genial. Nothing about you, as you wished, was rough, or sharp. Your loveliness was a gift from your mother, and even though you wished what your nature as a man couldn't bestow you with, you couldn't help but sympathize with your befuddling state.
"You're just godsent!" Min exclaimed, hugging your arm like a jovial child, but the gesture took a whole different meaning when you considered how her longing sight had ensnared you like most from far away, and how so often she flitted around you meretriciously when you told a tale or two of your past to others, "I wish there was a better way to say so. No one wants to be sent here by gods."
"It is just fine. Your gesture means no harm, Min. Here, use it carefully, it is very dangerous." Your own hands shivered as you picked up the spear, the wooden shaft taken from the scraps scattered across the barren realm and attached to the tip of the tale with thickly woven ropes. It was tight enough, but you made sure it wouldn't loosen up or get torn.
"Lets go! I wanna show this to everyone. I bet my ass the cavemen would spit at us in jealousy! We're making it out alive with this one." She gave out a loud sassy laugh and then led you through the fog towards the smoke in the darkened skies, "Chris would be the proudest, but I ain't giving it out for free."
"He would surely be glad to see it." You hoped he would be.
Maybe he would give you a word or two of encouragement. Or even better, if he is truly happy, he might pat your back and tell you that you had finally done it...like your father should have.
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"Why do you always have to be hard on him?" She asked with the same strained eyes, "He's but a boy. A boy, can't you see?! What do you expect from him, a child? You're a man!"
"And so he should be when he grows up!" Each time his tone was raised, at anyone, at anything, you saw a little of you disintegrate in the dark where you always stood, hoping that he couldn't see you. Or maybe just a silhouette, a shape of something that was one with that dark, that was maybe everywhere and so he couldn't define it in its entirety.
And each time he spoke with that sharp voice, it made you think of that feeling which could mostly resonate with a bitter taste of rusted iron rod, or the pungent scent of it in a rotten room. Why you had to draw parallels between them when there wasn't any? You had thought about it, but that little learned brain of yours looked more for resemblances than it could conjure independent thoughts. It was sharp, and it was rotting.
It was rotting like you in the dark that had become your home, a safe home from which you didn't dare to run. The dark that concealed you for you were scared. You were scared of what you were to the man you loved, but you feared so much that the love had been dissolved into that repulsive solution you had no name for, eroding into nothingness.
"The boy needs love, and you're giving him none of it."
"What do you want me to do?" He lashed out again, those massive big calloused hands clenched into a fist so hard you feared it might break itself, "Coddle him?! Take him into my arms like an infant and shush him as he cries?!"
"Listen to yourself!"
"No!" He raised his fists, and you doubled up. This is it, you told yourself, your mother won't have to bear no more of this and you will man-up.
You will...man-up.
The fists however never came down on that frail form. It remained in the air, but the damage was done. She was hit...she had seen it, she was told her place once again. Their place. Beneath him. Beneath those fists so high in the air no eyes dared to raise to that level.
And he remained in the dark. Cowering away in terror, head held down with invisible weight.
"He ain't no boy, no infant! He has to stand up, not cry and whimper among others like a girl. He's a fucking boy. Tell him to stop being a fucking pansy!"
"Watch your words, he's here!"
Your mother was always so kind. She never told you what to be. She let you prosper in your safe space. And she always shielded you. You admired her for her silent affirmations, which were stronger than your father's fists. They did what he couldn't, they made a difference. They seeped within your veins and nurtured you, strengthened you from inside.
After all, it made sense to you. What could you do against three boys twice your size? Curl up in a ball, indeed. That's what a pup does in a pack of wolves growling at him. You knew you were powerless, and you accepted it. At least the scared pup in your arms got to live instead of watching its tail shredded to pieces, or whatever the rowdy coke-addict boys in the dirty alleys of your neighborhood chose to do to it afterwards if it was unfortunate enough to live.
Or it could be you? The other scared pup.
But when you looked up at your brutish father, whose strength you could never fail to notice, whose vigour of which the essence in itself was intoxicating...your father...
Why he never saw you?
Why he never noticed your unbreakable spirit?
He was a man. In body. In spirit. You were as well.
He was on his path to conquer fear...children were afraid of dark but he slept soundly in it. You did as well.
Wasn't this already enough to man-up?
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"That's bloody brilliant!" A loud uproar from the campfire brought you back to the reality, "This one takes the cake for sure."
You looked up to find the source of the voice so sturdy, only to have it drop to the badge onto the pocket of the man's vest. You indeed made sure a faint smile acknowledged the man's enthusiasm, hoping that your hair succeeded in hiding your flushed, heated face. The little pride bubbling in your chest was too voracious to calm down, emotion daring to ripple at your throat at the mere mention and purge itself out to experience its freedom.
They were impressed. He was impressed.
"It feels good to know your effort didn't go to waste." Claire said, all too happy as she patted Chris's arm, "Damn right, I'll be throwing hands with that fucker up there if it took this from us."
"I'll make sure of that, it is keeping its damn hands or whatever it is to itself if it wishes to keep it all clean."
Chris was a big guy, with a gruff attitude that kept men at bay and thinking thrice before approaching his sister for even the most common favor such as asking for her precious knife, or a hand at loading stuff into the barn. So it was so often surprising how the man cracked some light-hearted jokes that kept the tensions at the campfire low.
And above all, he was always more than willing to help. He was that steely knife whose edges had always been getting sharpened by his rough times, and he was letting it cut through it, enduring it without a single flinch. His spirit, nonetheless, was humbled by the sufferings. Never looking down on others, never discouraged, and always so welcoming with a warm sense of camaraderie.
Such a man he was...something you sought to find among other men.
Something you wished your father knew of.
"Like what you see?" Claire gave you a gentle tap on the head as she ruffled through your locks. It had been a long time since you had gotten to wash them, but they were still cleaner than you feared. Your hair had grown a little longer, and so often posed as an obstacle to your sight and senses.
You were just caught staring in the void out of blues, but your line of sight, unbeknownst to you, was tracing the scars on Chris' arms. Apparently, you nodded your head in unpresuming embarrassment, earning you both Claire and Jill's hearty laugh.
"Not your fault, pretty one. Chris is an eye candy, no?" Chris snickered at Jill's sassing about it, only to shake his head in defeat as she coyly nudged him.
Pretty One, the name most had given you because so often in the hordes of many faces, they forgot your name, if not your face.
"Blood." You interjected calmly, "Xenomorph's blood is acidic. Miss Ripley had demonstrated earlier. Its corrosive properties are lethal, destroying whatever surface they make contact with at a fast pace. Injury to spine and tail is risky, it will be spreading the blood everywhere. A little to the side and it was about to make a contact with his face."
Something about it caused the laughter to die down. But Leon was quick to pick up on the matter.
"We got lucky there then." He chuckled, "Next time, I'll call the shots."
They were so very trivial about many things which allowed majority of people to become easily acquainted with them. However, they found you difficult, as you had heard from Claudette. The comment baffled you, and while you had feared that you had offended them, it was relieving to know that the comment was made at your obsequies meekness rather than your unwillingness to form any relationship.
You were someone who kept your hands to yourself, offering rather shoulders to other to cry upon. You didn't mind to be a cuddly person, but a long time of isolation had affected your sense of relationships. You found it easier to hold pups and cats. They were always very soft and welcoming, and their silent gestures were easier to read.
The interpretations of touch varied so vastly in people that you had started to fear miscalculations on both theirs and your side.
When you showed no sign of motivation, Claire blithely wrapped one arm around your neck as she conversed with Chris. You weren't entirely shrunken in your place, but you feared discomfort. So you nodded once or twice as she fervently talked about motorcycles and rifles, even when the words got over your head.
Maybe Chris picked up the confusion on your face. And he did so quickly.
"You never held a gun?" he asked so genuinely that it made your heart sink to your stomach. You loved the craftsmanship of guns. You loved the sport, but not the thrill of hunt.
"My father was a cop. Old Man was very fond of his rifles. Said it was passed on to him by his father as a family heirloom. He taught me basics. I just never used them much."
"How come? Never thought of getting into the family business?" He asked as Claire left to join Jill and walk back to the shacks.
"You can say...I wasn't the guy for that." You mumbled in a low voice, a little too judgemental by yourself than fearing it from the other side before you cleared your throat and looked at the dying flames before you, "I tried picking up my father's profession. Wanted to put myself into his shoes wondering what made him so thick-skinned. Watching him spiral out of control made me finally change my mind. It took me a lot of courage to put it in front of that man that I was in favor of art over politics."
"And?" he pressed deliberately.
You dared to look up, watching him eyeing you down all too intensely. Your nerves lost their hold on the mind, he was invested in the conversation. Your throat felt dry at the response so you merely shrugged your shoulders.
"So often, Fathers expect a little too much from their sons. And that's a sad thing about it. We look at women," you looked at Claudette savoring her light nap by the fire, "and we find them trapped in a gilded cage even after all this time. We wonder about their lives, their sufferings and rebellion, and we think that maybe this world driven by men is still harsh on them. But then, I look at us, as one of us, and I realize none of us are free at all. We have made a cage for ourselves in the end, and we are too used to it by now."
"It's weird that you put it like that now, (Y/N)." he said, heaving a sigh of relief, "It is said, no doubt, but you just can't sit there and cry about it. Because if we were to do it all the time, the world would just...drown? Maybe?"
"Not wrong...it's just my way of perceiving it." you huff, a little exhausted by your time staying up and running around.
As Chris began to fumble with his leather glove you stood up to take a leave. His gloves were worn out, another artifact of time. The repetition of pain and agony had suddenly halted the time in your presence, and still from time after time, as you thought more and more, made more delirious attempts at changing something, anything, it reminded you that time was indeed a force to reckon with. Even in the face of rebellion, it was standing firm in its duty.
It was always changing something, moving ahead.
"Where you off to now?" Chris came to a halt as he sat there still, eyeing you suspiciously. Maybe it was the weight of that gruff voice that revibrated through your spine in an intense affect which made you stop, but you chose to challenge it, your fidgety hands shuddering as they made their way into your coat's pockets.
"Off to find the glowing flowers." You excused yourself sheepishly, "Detty told me earlier that she needs some of them for more medicines. I was out for a walk, thought I might do it as well. She do be working restlessly on the antidotes."
"With the chance of you being jumped by those assholes?" He pointed at the woods with a precariously expression that fluctuated between care as well as vigilance.
"I do it most of the time. The boundaries are marked, it is only a stone's throw away."
He gave you a long, heated look which made you jittery in my place. You had to admit he made you experience flutters in the stomach like a little jovial girl. Doomed be you if father learned of that! You chastised yourself. Or if it was something different entirely, then you were fearing for life. As his gaze lingered on your face, your forehead began to get laced by sweat beading around the corners.
"As you wish," He mused, "Watch your back, though."
You gave a swift nod and jogged on your way to the woods. As your feet touched the darkening land, you picked up your pace, and you kept on picking it up, until you had broken into an urgent sprint. This one however lasted longer. You were too eager to leave that warm homely place, a little too perplexing that you were receiving what you were craving all this time. Attention...and now you were running away with the little of what had remained of it.
Now it was you, and that ominously dark woods. How you wished it was just that for the rest of the wretched life! When you had learned enough of life, pretending becomes sickening. But it is hard when the most judgemental of all is solely you. It sickened you how you relied on the mere plays of resemblances, how you sought the ability to turn back the time and confront your so very traditional father. But it was that meek understanding of your weakness that reminded you that you were to eventually break down and fall into his strong arms and hope that they might give you the comfort you were so starved of.
The moment your eyes met the faint glow in the distance, you footing slowed down. You were distracted, and the humming of the land and the air provided you with strange comfort. For long you stood in the dark, grasping the emotion in the air that breathed life in the place. Every corner of this realm was sentient, at least to you. In isolation you could tell that it talked to you, albeit without words. Sometimes it was just an acknowledgement of your life, your sufferings. Sometimes it pricked at your skin like taunts. And oftentimes, it brought you solace with distractions, with illusions of what it could be.
Your response to it would be you patting the woods, and often the land. Sitting in reclusion and thinking was something that allowed you to be in peace, and thank the very realm for its wonders. Yes of course you wouldn't live in such a state of dilemma and paranoia, of constant suffering. But you couldn't depart from such a placed without a memory of it. It had brough its own anecdote of comfort to you; an exotic wisdom.
And you willingly revelled in its ethos.
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Your coat had big pockets, but the flowers weren't miniature in size either. You didn't pick flowers from plants most of the time. Temptations were hard to fight, they smelt sweet, they even tasted sweet. Pustula plants were a sight to behold. The closer one got the brighter and warmer it got. The flower had a life in it, it hummed in response. It hummed a strange, faint and lulling melody. How could you kill it?
You would often gather fallen plants and leaves. They had plenty of serum to give, and were edible to consume. One could eat them raw, or could cook it and use it in curries for fishes, making for an exotic cuisine. You had provided the recipes to Kate and Haddie; they hadn't moved past them so far.
However, there seemed to be a buffet before you. Lots of flowers had fallen down, and the buds were in the final stages of blooming. Your pockets couldn't hold more than three. Even three was a generous attempt, and you couldn't just leave a hefty catch there. Your pockets were brimming, the contents close to falling out at each step.
Your were already struggling.
"I should've taken my satchel with me. Why do I have to be so stupid?"
"Indeed, you should've." A sleek sharp voice spoke from beside you. It was so sudden and unexpected that you flinched and fell backward, even when you were crouched beside a brightly glowing plant, "The latter part, I can't tell."
It wasn't so easy to figure out his shape. The glow of the plant was intense in the face, blinding you for a brief moment that it took you seconds to focus on the equally bright blonde head that stood at a considerable distance form the flower. The paleness of his skin was dissolved into the light as well. Maybe it could've been easier to find his hulking form before you if he was wearing his shades, which were absent at the moment.
Now his eyes were bare, and equally impressive golden gaze with slits akin to that of snake and cats; equally sleek and captivating. But it was the knowledge of that being before you that caused your blood to run hotly. One fears the chill of cold, but it was the dread in the air that felt so inhumanly calm that you could only feel the rush of blood at a pace that could cause sparks.
You needed the cold in the skin for serenity in the face of danger, not heat in the head and face, if not for those eyes.
Not the eyes that burn like embers.
It was the sturdy composed body of a man with a calculating sense of deception, but he walked with a feline grace accentuated by the leathery black attire that embraced his form lovingly, emerging from the dark as if he was but a shadow manifesting into that comprehensible shape. No need to look at the ground, no fear of the space, no care how many eyes fell on him from the abyss. Just the confidence of a singular sentient mind that knew it could conquer every fear known to man and own it. In him you saw it; the devastating need to wreck havoc, and it fueled that fire in him which compelled you from time to time to single him out from the horde of other hunters.
So fierce in his anonymous pursuit. You would have been enthralled, if not for his status as a feral force of genius of a man.
Maybe it were you being crouched before him, but the more you looked at him, the smaller you felt. It was that disastrous curse of you cogitation, the need to think, and think and create a fable in the mind that everything looked so massive when looking through those looking glasses. Your vision of him had already made him a bigger entity than he was, and the fearsome edge to that was that it wasn't probably sufficient enough even after all the efforts.
So when he stood only a good six feet away from you, looking all serene and ready, you could only hope that the hunter wasn't aiming for your neck which you couldn't hide at all.
"I wasn't expecting to meet you so soon, (Y/N)." He chuckled ominously, tilting his head sideways curiously, "Look what fate has brought you to."
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Happy New Year to all of you! I decided to start the new year with a new attempt, hope you love it.