Time Enough (Lady Nightshade and Mr. M)

Joe raised his hands when Nurse took over, and smiled at Athena as she was taken under the older woman's metaphorical wing. He then left to get their gear, including the things future-Athena had left behind.

He came back wearing lightweight, flexible leather armor, with a sword strapped to his waist. He carried a riding dress, something tough but light. Unfortunately, it was still a dress. "Hey, it's period-appropriate," he murmured, apologetically. "You never did like dresses, but there's not much choice around here, unless you play male, and you weren't willing to do that." He smiled, and winked. "I wonder why."

He relieved her of the food basket, and promised to come back to get her, then left the kitchens for the stables. Nurse showed her to a private chamber where she could get changed into the riding clothes, and Joe was back by the time she was ready. When no one else was looking, he pressed a long sheathed knife into her hands. "Put that in your bodice or something. Just in case." Then, offering her his arm, he led her to her horse.

Well at least she had a weapon to use. That much she could do with it as she placed it where Joe suggested. Considering what was proper, most wouldn't like her being armed. Joe's teasing only made her flush a deeper shade of crimson as they approached the horses. Michael was there and in his armor once more.

"If we're traveling, wouldn't you be obvious as a Knight and draw attention?"

Athena replied as she walked up to a black stallion. The horse neighed gently and took a step forward to her. The poor stable hand coldn't hold him still.

"No M'lady, you don't want to."

The young man was trying to warn her that the horse was unpredictable. With lack of horses they had little option. Ignoring the warning she reached out and patted the horse against the snout. The men looked stun then as she moved closer and the horse calmed down and started to nuzzle against her chest. Laughing she reached out and snagged a carrot that was hanging out from cooks basket of food.

"What's his name?"

She asked and fed the carrot to the Horse who took the tasty treat.

"It's Thunder M'Lady."

"Thunder. He'll do."

Michael bowed his head as they approached, smiling and helping the stablehands lead the horses out. His men were also armed and armored; they were taking a small group, because they didn't know what they would be facing when they arrived.

"If we're traveling, wouldn't you be obvious as a Knight and draw attention?"

"Why, yes, Lady Athena. As that village is within my father's purview, I would have to officially investigate it anyway. My armor is my badge of office, in that case."

Both Michael and Joe smiled as Athena made friends with the horse, but it was Joe who stepped up when Thunder was saddled with a lady's saddle and took hold of Athena's waist, hoisting her up to sit side-saddle on Thunder's back. The powerful mount whinnied in complaint and shifted a bit, but stayed largely put. Joe helped her get settled, and put her right foot, the leading foot, in the stirrup. "Yeah, they didn't let women ride like normal people," he muttered softly to her as they adjusted her seating. "But you'll be secure enough."

"You've got the reins, and Thunder is neck-trained; you want him to turn, you tug the reins in that direction, he feels the pull of them against his neck and turns away from it. You shouldn't have to actually pull so hard that it tugs at the bit in his mouth to force his head to turn; that would be some pretty serious riding, and I'd have you dismount before we got into such a situation." He looked around, then leaned in a bit closer. "Sir Mike and his boys are good, no mistake, but if the shit goes down, stick close to me. I have physical enhancements and combat subroutines from the whole of human history, and my primary job in this mission involves keeping you safe." He winked again and patted her knee reassuringly, then moved off to his own horse.

"You know I think I am going to break this rule later on."

Athena hissed to Joe before he winked again and was helped onto his own stead. With Michael at her side they started off at a gentle trot. Athena keeping her hands balled into tight fists around the reigns. It was mildly annoying to her as the up and down trot bounced her chest with it. Not that the men seemd to mind as she had caught them looking at her every now and then.

They rode for the rest of the day, taking occasional breaks to rest the horses (not that Thunder needed it, seemingly), but not really having much time to talk, what with horse care and such. Michael was quite happy to show her how to tend to a resting horse, and found it an easy conversation starter. But soon they were back on the trail.

Finally, at sundown, they made camp not far from a stream. With everyone splitting the tasks, the animals were soon tended to, the fire was built, and a place for Athena to sleep was established a distance from where the others were laying out their bedrolls. Only Joe, as her personal manservant, was set up close to her.

As the sky grew dark, and the brilliant, clear stars came out. The men-at-arms mostly kept to themselves, cooking sausages on sticks in the campfire, but Michael sat close and smiled at her. "Tell me about your youth, Athena. I've never heard of Maytag; what's it llike?"

Athena didn't expect that question to come from Michael. Instantly she blushed and took deep breaths. Remaining calm was the most important thing to do. Not knowing herself what to say about Maytag. With the fire crackeling and the light flickering against her hazel eyes she opened her mouth to speak.

"Well, It's a pretty place."

She begain and looked over to Joe with pleading eyes. Not knowing anything about her cover was going to ruin everything. Perhaps even with the Knight and she didn't want that. The simple thought made her blush and she heard some shifting and felt a comforting arm over her shoulder. Michael was by her side and gave her a caring look that told her to take her time.

Joe, preparing the evening meal for the two of them, gave Athena a look and then smiled at Michael as he brought her bowl over to her. "Maytag is much like all of England. Deep woods, fertile fields, goodhearted and stalwart citizenry. Her parents are good rulers, too. Fair, merciful, and just. Her father, the Earl, is as you would expect a powerful noble to be. Perhaps Lady Athena could share an anecdote of her early youth?" His eyes met hers, and his eyebrow quirked up on the side Michael could not see. "Perhaps something adapted for the current gathering that might shed some light on the kind of people her parents are?" His voice was gentle, encouraging, but there was only so much he could create for her; Michael was looking to her for some sort of response to his, what he considered, relatively simple question. If only he could understand what sort of complications were inherent in that question!

Great, Joe wanted her to talk about her parents. If only he knew the difficulty in that task. how could she talk about her father? He was an abusive drunk and when he was sober, he hardly was there in her life. Her mother had died when she was about twelve. It was getting harder to even see her smiling good-natured face in her mind. The only real 'Dad' she even knew was her closest girlfriend's father. He was the one that met the boys she brought home. Go to school confrences, and take her out for her birthdays.

"Well, I can't say much about my mother. She died when I was a young child."

Athena spoke softly. It was hard to speak of this for her and she had to fight hard not to shed a tear. Memories, both good and bad rushed up from the cage she had them locked in.

"My father, well, he is a good man. Fair, and always caring. Much like a father would be to his headstrong daughter."

Michael's face was serious. "I'm sorry for your loss," he said quietly. "I, too, lost my mother at an early age. It's a difficult thing, sometimes." He yawned heavily. Across the fire, the men at arms all appeared to be napping. Michael yawned again, widely, and leaned heavily against her shoulder. In mere moments, he was fast asleep.

"I'm sorry I sprung that on you," Joe said, dusting something off his hands into the fire. It was only then that Athena detected the scent of something in the smoke, something chemical. "We had to tell him something, and I didn't have time to prep you for anything like that. If it helps, you did well."

He glanced at the other men. "They'll sleep solidly. I'll have to put them to bed, but they won't think too much about it in the morning; the compound makes sure of that. But this way we can have a private conversation." He sighed. "So, this village. It's an unusual pattern of infection. I think it's engineered. I suspect it might be the Snag, or a clue to it, at least. What's your thought?"

" I don't know. Your the more in depth person here. How should I know if it is or isn't?"

Athena stated with bordem in her voice. She was more comfertable with Michael laying on her shoulder then anything at the moment. For all she knew the plague coul dbe starting out where they were going.

"How come it's not working on us?"

He chuckled. "The same things that are fighting off infections also keep us immune to poisons and most drugs. Medicines are selectively permissible, but the vaccine is smart, and it's got every drug from the beginning of history to the end of time programmed into it. Once you get a display interface, it can even tell you what symptoms you're supposed to be experiencing. So if you get drugged, you won't actually get drugged, but you can accurately pretend you are, if you need to. It's all about the acting."

He busied himself settling the men-at-arms into their bedrolls."As for the plague... see, one of your abilities, now that you're here, is you ought to be able to sense things that are out of their time. Like, take a moment right now. Close your eyes, and breathe gently. It was described to me as kind of a mental tickle, the same kind of sensation you got when you were surfing the timestream, but more localized, and more... nibbly? It's hard to describe a sense that doesn't have a regular comparison. I mean, all my extra sensors are wired into existing parts of my brain, so I interpret them as regular senses, but the time-stream thing... that's entirely new. You've got it in you, you can sense it. You can sense me, if you try; I'm out of my place in time, as are you, but you can't very well sense yourself. So practice a bit with me."

He looked at her, and smiled. "Yes, you ought to be able to do it with lover-boy leaning on you." His voice was light, but his expression... there was something wistful there, actually. Something warmer than she would have expected from just a partner.

"Do I hear a little bit of the green-eyed-monster in there?"

Athena poked at him as Michael slepted soundly. She shifted only slighty, but it made him react as an arm went from her side to wrapping around her waist with a possive hug. It couldn't have been a more perfect time for that to happen. Tilting her head in Joe's direction as the flames flickered and bit into the air like a snakes tongue.

It was short lived, as she rolled her eyes. Trying to feel something that she didn't know how to start. Well, that was something that she probably had to try. Closing her eyes, athena started to concentrate. All she could hear was the crackling of the flames before feeling really silly.

"Your Jedi Mind tricks will not work on me!"

She couldnt help but break the little concentraion she had. It was silly to her.

"Do I hear a little bit of the green-eyed-monster in there?"

He chuckled and looked away. "Nah, I don't get jealous. Besides, two things. One, I already knew you had a thing for this guy because of how you reacted to him when we got here. And I think you went to visit him without me at least one time before that, now that I think about it. So I know he's important to you."

"And two... I already know I get to love you," he said softly, and simply, not looking at her. He paused a moment after that, and then busied himself with undressing and prepping the men-at-arms, giving her some time to try and relax and focus.

~~~

"Your Jedi Mind tricks will not work on me!"

When she pulled out the quote, he grinned, and dropped his voice to imitate a Jabba the Hutt laugh. "Huhh huhh huhh! Well, it was worth a try. Maybe you've been around me long enough since you arrived, your senses don't actually pick up on me anymore. Kind of like when you hang around a smell for a while, you get used to it. Except... not a smell."

"Tell you what, when we get to the place, just be alert for any odd sensations, any instincts you might have. Inexplicable tickles in your backbrain... you know how they always portray psychics in the movies? Kind of like that, except, you know, real."

He finished up with the soldiers, and moved over to the fire again, sitting on the far side and gazing at her. "Do... do you want to sit like that for a while, or should I help you move him to his bunk?"

His comment back to her star wars quote only made her smile a little more. It didn't last long though as a comment that Joe had said before the lesson sprung back up onto her.

I already know I get to love you


Athena didn't know what to make of his comment. It surly made her face blush to a deep crimson red. Why she was even blushing? It didn't make any sense to her. What did Joe mean exactly by loving her? Like a sister? Or was it what she really thought? Shaking her head, her eyes turned up when Michael moved and held her close again. Her stomach flipped and tightened, feeling the tickle of butterflys in her stomach. Was the feeling for her Knight? Joe? Perhaps...both? Athena wasn't sure and couldn't think of it as Joe intruppted her thoughts.


"Do... do you want to sit like that for a while, or should I help you move him to his bunk?"


Another deep blush.

"Uh, I.. Yes. I think he should be in his bunk."

If Joe saw her blush, he didn't say anything as he helped her move him to his bedroll and left him in what he was wearing for the night. When they had finished, there was a silence as the pair moved back to the fire and sat next to each other. After only a moment she took her right hand to her left arm and rubbed it up and down abesentmindly. As if she were getting cold and wasn't saying anything.

He didn't seem to be looking at her, but almost as soon as she started rubbing her arm, he whipped off his cloak smoothly and settled it over her shoulders. His arm lingered over her shoulder, seeming hesitant, but also a little bit familiar. He let his arm slide off of her back slowly, and then just kind of unnecessarily rubbed his hands together and warmed them by the fire. He seemed more nervous than she'd ever seen him over the past couple of days.

Finally, he cleared his throat. "Okay, well... you've got lots of questions, still. Maybe not about what's going on, but surely you want to know about something. Maybe the lifestyle? The mechanics? What you have to look forward to? I don't know; anything." He gave her a sidelong glance, and smiled gently, as if quietly daring her to ask a personal question.

Her body shivered as Joe had given her his cloak. Not that she was that cold. More that she was still trying to decipher what he had said, and the fact that Joe was nervous. Athena did have questions still, and that was enough to distract her for the moment.

"Well, what about aging? Won't that effect this...job? Having a family?"



The last made her blush again as the question had just came out. Why was she even feeling like this? It was enough to think she was still dreaming, but she knew she wasn't. As she drifted her her eyes over Joe, she then noticed that he was rubbing his palms together to keep warm by the fire. Absentmindly, Athena scooted closer against him and reached out to grab his hands.

He was surprised when she took his hands, but he gripped hers firmly and turned to her. "We get aging treatments from the 43rd Century. That's about when they perfected the biological age freeze. After that, it all gets post-human, anyway."

He looked down at her hands in his. "We get to have families, when we want to. When we have all the time in the world, and all the health care that will ever exist, then we can just choose better when we want to handle it."

His thumbs stroked across the backs of her hands, in that way that she liked, as if he knew exactly what to do, as if he'd done it for years, but he didn't meet her gaze, just looked at her hands and smiled gently, almost to himself.

"I...see."


Two little words. The only thing she could think to say as she sucked in a silent breath of air when Joe started to strok her hands. It sent a tingeling sensation down her spine and a shot of lightening to her stomach. Why was this now happening to her? That Joe was sending her mixed signals at a time like this? It made her head spin. Normaly she didn't have guy problems. Hell, she never even had a guy, much less two intrested in her. Or have her feelings twisted and split two ways. There was even the little voice reminding her that she had yet to really be with a man.
Yet, that first day with Michael. He lead on that we had...But, that wasn't the me now. That was the most embarressing secret there. Athena didn't know if Joe even knew that. Though he seemd to know more about her then even she did. Yea, she had some experience. Dating when she was in highschool, but nothing went too serious.


"Joe...I.."


Athena paused, closed her eyes and counted to three. Opening her eyes, she turned her head to lock eye contact; only to clunk their forheads against each other.


"Ow!"


She hissed and took a free hand to her forhead. Nearly falling back as Joe caught her halfway off their seating. There was a look of concern in his eyes. Searching, as if to make sure he really didn't hurt her. Both were about to say something when she tried to move herself and managed to pull the weight of gravity back as the two fell back and to the ground. Joe half on top of her as their faces pressed close. There was a shock to her system, and it was almost funny if not for the way each was looking at the other.

He fell with his arm under her back, and as they settled, she found his strong hand had come to cup the back of her head, his fingers having slid gently through her hair, to perfectly protect her skull from hitting the ground. It also was a perfect way to tilt her face upward for a kiss.

But he didn't go for one -- not right away. Joe's body was heavy against hers, but not uncomfortably so. Far from it, in fact. His arms were solid and deceptively strong around her. And his breath was warm and sweet against her lips. But he brought his face no closer as he gazed into her eyes. "You know," he said softly, "when you recruited me, you told me we'd met before, back in your personal timeline. But you never told me how, or why. I think it was to keep from changing how I'd react to you. So I don't know if this is how it starts, but..."

And he leaned in, deliberately slowly, giving her a chance to stop him as he angled his head and brought his lips down to hers...

What? They had met before? Athena didnt think they did. She was sure she would remember meeting someone like him. The thought was soon intruppted when his head lowered and their lips touched for the first time. The feeling was eletric as the touch seemed almost innocent. It felt right, oh so right as she found herself responding to his kiss. Managing to free her arms, Athena wrapped them around his shoulders and held him there. Her fingers teasing the back of his neck.


"Joe I -"


Athena had tried to say something when the kiss broke for only but a moment. There was no one around, save for the sleeping guards and Knight that were practicaly dead to the world. Their lips pressed again, only this time much more passionatly. Her body tingled with excitment as her hands rolled down his back to the hem of his shirt. Gently she pulled the shirt up and grazed his back witht he soft touch of her finger tips. Encouraging Joe not to stop.

He broke away to help her lift his shirt off; he'd taken off his leather armor jerkin when they made camp. Now he was shirtless, his broad chest with just a little hair looking very buff as he returned to kissing her, holding her tight. His lips parted against hers, and his tongue gently brushed, seeking entry. His hands were warm against her as he encircled her with his strong arms.

It was strange; he had proven to her that he was partly artificial, that he had at least a cyber-arm, and implants in his eyes, and probably much more besides. But his skin felt perfect, soft with an underlying hard layer of muscle. She could swear she could feel his pulse through her fingertips, though perhaps that was her own heart beating so fast...

TO her, Joe was perfect despit his artificial limb and those in his eyes. His warmth captured her, warming her to the very core as her lips parted to allow him entry. Joe seemed to go slpw, letting her know he wouldn't push her if she didnt want to. Mentally smiling, she pressed harder to him, letting her own tongue search for his end. When the kiss broke, each looked into the others eyes. Eyes filled with promise and need as Athena's heart skipped a beat for him.

"Don't you dare stop!"


The words squeaked out, followed by the reddening of her cheeks. He only smiled, making her wonder what he was thinking right then. This time, she made the move and brough his head down to kiss him again. Each time, the tension and passion growing as her hands slipped back down his back. her nails teased and pressed against his backside. Bringing out goosebumps over his shoulders as she swore he had let out a small suprise gasp himself.

She dug the nails in harder and this time knew he liked from the reaction he was giving her. Yet, before she could try anything else, the world and ground moved and she was up in his arms and being carried. Witht he kiss broke, Athena could feel her body shiver. Not fromt he cold, but for anticapation. Closing her eyes, she would let him suprise her where they were going and leaned her head up to kiss him down his neck and shoulder area. Adding little nips for suprises.

At her gasped words, he grinned. "I wasn't planning to." He sighed as her nails stroked down his skin, though they weren't able to do more than leave red pressure lines on his flesh. And then he lifted her, effortlessly, and strode toward the woods. He snagged a blanket as they passed his bunk site, but he didn't pause as he strode into the woods, making no sound but rustling as he pushed them through foliage and little gasps and tiny moans at the work of her mouth on his flesh.

Finally, in the dimness of the forest, they broke into a broad, grassy hillside meadow. The stars were brilliant above, making the half moon that was just coming up over the horizon almost unnecessary. He paused a moment, looking down the gentle slope that seemed almost crystalline in the starlight, and murmured in her ear, "This is the best we can do for privacy, I'm afraid..."

"It's perfect." Athena whispered to him. Feeling goosebumps running down her own body as her head turned to look around. It was beautifull, perfect as her eyes gazed up towards the heavens. Each star twinkled down, while she knew that a couple were planets that yet had to be discovered in this time.

"Joe.."


Her gaze turned back to his as she kissed him once more. How and why he made her feel like this was irrevelent. Joe was safty, and so much more as her chest pressed tighter against his chest.

As they melted into each other's kiss, Joe let her down, so her feet could support her – when her knees ceased to be so weak at his touch, at least. Eventually, he broke away, and with a swift turn he flicked the blanked out on a spare space on the hillside, spreading it almost perfectly on the soft grass. Then he swept her up again, and this time he veritably spun with her, like a ballet dancer, and just as adroitly laid them both down on the blanket, side by side.

His kiss grew more passionate, his soft lips flexing against hers, his tongue sliding erotically against her own, while his hands, his hands weren't being too entirely forward, but the way they stroked her back, her hip, brushed the hair back from her face, it was like he knew just how to do it, how she'd dreamed of it, like he was chancing upon exactly the ways to most please her.

A part of her mind, the part still trying to figure out all the time-travel nonsense, even as the rest of her was consumed with this experience, that small, dwindling part wondered if he touched her so well because he'd learned to do so at some point in his personal past, which would be some point in her personal future. But soon even that part of her was focused on the feel of him against her, and her against him.