Drifting...
He felt cold claws scraping along the back of his leg, thin strong fingers forcing his legs apart, the well-known, infinitely-hateful rough, ridged, broad hardness being shoved into position between his thighs...
"Zaabon! Zaabon!!"
Gasping, he struggled awake to find Benten, wide-eyed with fright, grasping his arms.
"...what...?"
The crimson eyes stared for a moment, then the little alien wrapped slender arms around his shoulders and buried his face against the strong blue neck with a sob.
"Oh gods... Are you OK now?"
He stroked the soft white hair gently.
"...I think so... What happened?"
Benten pulled himself a little upright and gazed down at his lover.
"It must have been a nightmare. You were thrashing about, then you went completely rigid. I couldn't wake you."
Zaabon sat up, pulling Benten with him, and hugged him close.
"I'm sorry I frightened you."
"Please will you tell me about it? Who's Vejiita? And who's Furiizaa? What did they do to you that makes such a horror of your sleep?"
Zaabon froze.
"I said those names?"
Benten nodded.
"Whispered them, as though they choked you to speak them."
Shoving his hair back from his forehead, Zaabon tried to smile.
"Just - old enemies, little one. Nothing for you to worry about."
Benten glared at his lover.
"Will you stop saying that! Of course I'm going to worry about them! Even when you're not driving me frantic with your nightmares your sleep is uneasy. You whimper those names, and others. I can't sleep when you're in such pain!"
Zaabon lowered his eyes.
"I can make up a couch for myself in the hold..."
Benten slapped him. It wasn't hard, but it stung, and Zaabon stared at him, wide-eyed with startlement. There were tears in the big red eyes.
"Don't do this to me!"
"Benten..."
He reached for the younger male, but Benten pulled away.
"No, Zaabon. You have to tell me. I... I can't keep going like this. I can't bear to see you like this."
Zaabon shook his head slightly, unable to speak, and Benten flung himself off the bed, pacing tightly, his arms wrapped around himself.
"Little one, please..."
Benten paused, looking over his shoulder.
"You don't trust me."
"Yes, I do, but..."
"Then trust in me. You can't say anything that will change things between us."
I wouldn't bet on it...
"Benten, please, trust me, it's not anything you want to hear..."
The little alien jumped lithely onto the bed, crouching over his lover and sinking long crimson nails into his shoulders. Zaabon winced as one partly reopened a recently healed, Grymm-inflicted gash. Benten ignored his reaction.
"I will be the judge of that. Just tell me!"
Suddenly miserably angry with Benten for insisting, desperately tired of trying to dissemble, and already sure of his lover's rejection, Zaabon bit his lip, gazing at Benten, trying to blink back tears.
"Very well. But don't say I didn't warn you..."
It may have had something to do with Benten's presence, or some strange, subtle mental power he owned, but Zaabon relived the memories, completely, fully, as he told them. His eyes were closed - to start with so that he couldn't see the revulsion in his lover's face, the disgust in his eyes, but then, after a while, he found he couldn't open them even if he tried. Wrapped up in the nightmare that had been his life, he felt every rape, every violation, every humiliation anew, curled into a foetal ball, his arms wrapped around his head, voice harsh and grating, tears drenching the covers beneath him. Lost somewhere back in his own history, he'd forgotten Benten was there...
Furiizaa was in one of his all-too-frequent 'let's humiliate Zaabon' moods, and the alien realised, with sinking heart, that it would lead up to yet another degrading sex and torture session. He wondered, vaguely, if there was any way he could mitigate the forthcoming pain - but it was almost impossible to predict what Furiizaa wanted, or what he would do. It usually didn't make any difference anyway: the little lizard revelled in his power over his beautiful slave, and Zaabon had long ago given up trying to work out why he behaved so. Why he had an almost psychotic urge to possess, and then destroy, beautiful things...
Zaabon had been summoned on many occasions to watch as Furiizaa had supervised the careful unloading of a world's priceless, exquisite treasures into his quarters - then spent several happy hours smashing them to tiny pieces. Zaabon particularly dreaded these occasions. At the end of his orgy of destruction, Furiizaa always turned to him, eyes alight with a dark glee, ripped the bodysuit from him and threw him face down onto the floor, leaping heavily onto his back and pressing the cool blue skin into the shards on the ground before ramming himself into the suffering body. These sessions never lasted less than a shift, and often more, and Furiizaa frequently invited favoured companions to join in...
Without realising it, Zaabon had screamed aloud at the memory of lying in his own blood on shattered glass, above him the two leather-skinned Ngargs who had insisted on fucking him at the same time, two thick, barbed clubs of semi-organic flesh ripping him apart as Furiizaa sat over his face, forcing his own erection down Zaabon's throat as he chuckled, watching the aliens thrusting negligently in and out as they argued over the best rhythm for them to climax simultaneously... It had taken longer than usual in the tank for him to recover from that little episode, and Furiizaa had not been happy. He'd grabbed Zaabon's plait as the alien emerged from the tank, weak and still hurting as usual, and yanked his slave's face down to within inches of his own.
"My quarters, whore. Now."
And Zaabon, naked and still dripping from the tank's fluids, had followed his master, too disorientated - too crushed - to care about the groping hands along the way...
So many years in the Ice Lord's power. So many years under him, literally. Unending pain. Why hadn't he ended it?
You could have.
Because I'm a coward.
Which is the more cowardly - to live, or to take one's own life?
... I don't know any more...
He'd been fresh out of the tank, yet again, when Furiizaa had landed on Namek, the memory of his master's latest atrocity fresh in his mind and searing his nerve-endings. He did not want to go through that again, ever.
And then... Unknowingly, the Saiyan prince had given him a way out...
The sound of sobbing called him back to himself. Benten...?
Then he realised the sounds came from his own throat.
Something was covering his eyes. It was several minutes before he realised it was his own hand. Slowly, hesitantly, he pulled it away.
Everything was blurred. He rubbed tiredly at his face. Where the hell was he?
Then he made out Benten, sitting quietly at his side, crimson eyes glowing. Warmly. Like a comforting fire, not the cold, angry red of Furiizaa's eyes...
Zaabon's own opened wide, disbelievingly - then he frowned. Carefully feeling around the thought of the Ice Lord. Almost panicking when he realised his overpowering fear - was gone.
His gaze was pulled, irresistibly, to Benten.
"Do you feel better now?"
"...what...?"
The little alien sighed and lay down, nestling into the larger male's side. Closer to, Zaabon could see the fatigue in the delicate face. He touched a high cheekbone gently, suddenly overwhelmed by a desire he'd never felt before. But still too afraid to put it into words.
"Benten...?"
Benten kissed him.
"Yes. Of course."
Unable to believe what he was doing, Zaabon rolled onto his stomach, spread his own thighs and waited, trembling slightly, as Benten slid onto his back, kissing his shoulders and very slowly pressing into him.
It should have hurt. He expected it to hurt. It had always hurt before.
Only -
Benten sank into him with a sigh, arms wrapped around the broad, blue chest from behind, and all Zaabon could feel was warmth, a slight, somehow comforting weight, and a tantalising, teasing motion, so gentle, so soft, he could hardly believe it was happening.
It... was... delicious...
This is what I should have known, all these years? This... this beautiful, powerful sweetness? This is sex?...
And then Benten wormed slender hands under them both and wrapped long fingers gently around Zaabon's stirring erection, and he was lost...
He drifted slowly back to reality, conscious of Benten's slight weight on his back, the soft white hair drifting around his neck and shoulders, warm, languorous, replete. Happy.
His eyes flashed open. Happy?
The last time he'd felt happy was back before the Ice Lords had 'visited' his homeworld...
Benten felt him stir, and pulled very gently out of his body, kissing his shoulder and nestling against his side.
"How do you feel?"
Zaabon stared at him, then rolled onto his back and pulled the little alien on top of his body. Benten rested his forearms on the broad strong chest and smiled into wide, startled, suddenly somehow innocent golden eyes.
"What are you, that you can heal so... so... surely and swiftly?"
Benten sat back, his slight weight comforting on his lover's groin.
"What am I? I don't know. I don't know what I am, or who I am, or who my people are." He bit his lip, suddenly anxious. "Does it matter?"
The memories were still there - they'd never disappear. They were part of who and what he was. But they no longer had the power to reduce him to a quaking, terrified wreck.
His eyes wide and wondering, Zaabon gently, delicately pulled his own personal miracle into his arms, lightly kissing the smooth white brow.
"No. Not unless you want it to matter. Thank you..."
Benten kissed him, lightly at first, then more forcefully, slender pale body melting against his lover as he sighed into the warm, fainne-tasting mouth. Zaabon felt his lips curve into a smile, then the little alien pulled slightly away, his eyes sparkling.
"Zaabon... I'd like to know what it feels like."
Zaabon gazed up into the beautiful crimson eyes.
"Like what feels like, little one?"
Benten chuckled, tickling his lover's ribs.
"You inside me, of course."
Zaabon smiled. For the first time in years able to think about the possibility without fear, without panic gripping his heart and freezing his body.
Could he?...
He shook his head slightly.
"It's still a little too soon, sweetheart. Can you wait?"
Benten sighed, his eyes full of something Zaabon didn't recognise.
"I'd wait forever, for you."
