It wasn’t supposed to happen like this, Caitlyn had wished she could’ve carried herself with more grace. More understanding. More love. Like she always believed herself to be capable of in moments like this.
But it didn’t happen like that, when it came down to it, any scrap of understanding for Vi couldn’t be found without sacrificing what felt like herself. The only thing keeping her going, allowing her to move within her grief.
Losing her mother, changed her, hardened her in a way that she didn’t completely unwelcome. And as much as Vi has gone through, Caitlyn couldn’t stand to see anything outside of her own reasons for doing this.
She hit her. Not with the same force she would’ve used in an actual fight. Not even a quarter of the force she would employ on Jinx when she got her hands on her. But still more force than she ever considered having in herself for Vi. The animosity that came out in that moment, couldn’t be choked down quickly enough. Like an injured animal lashing out at anyone trying to help.
And her fear of being swayed, of being touched, of having to see her, of having to understand and consider. Overwhelmed. And she issued the blow to her, maybe not with her hand, but the butt of her rifle wasn’t any consolation. The intent was all the same.
She didn’t look back, she felt like she hadn’t been looking at the people around her anyways since the explosion. But especially now. She couldn’t face her after doing what she just did, didn’t want to. So she steeled herself in her position.
Caitlyn climbed her way up the ladder, but the grip this city had on her didn’t loosen. Didn’t falter. Her own began to tighten on every rung that would follow.
What had initially taken hours to do, with breaks in between, Caitlyn found herself unwilling to stop. She couldn’t stop, and think about what she just did. She couldn’t stop and listen to the cries that have grown faint the higher she would get.
She just kept moving up.
As soon as she was out, she took a deep breath that offered her nothing. The clean air felt constricting on her own throat after what she just pulled in the undercity.
She acted out of movement, out of duty and fact. The words that followed of her failed attempt felt unlike her. But she wore it well, because it’s who she now decided she had to be.
And the moment she could be alone, step away from everyone looking to her as to what to do next. Because she had no clue. She found herself sick, the disgust manifesting itself in her as she threw up what felt like her insides. And they burned all the way out.
Her throat now stung but she welcomed the hum of it, the distraction, the constant.
The news of the explosions of colorful disarray all over the city, fueled her. Another nail in the coffin she helped put herself to bed in.
All she had left was her name, the name given to her by her mother, by her lineage. And Jinx had severed that.
Caitlyn sent Vi to the back of her mind buried away with her grief.
She didn’t have time to feel anything more than her anger, her hatred. Work was to be done.
The days began to move and things felt less and less like herself, but she was in it every step of the way.
Caitlyn had turned cold, perhaps she always had this element about her, because of her family, but now she had possessed the ability to be unkind.
Days would continue, and she didn’t waver under the weight of them. Caitlyn didn’t sleep most nights. She didn’t enjoy her dreams, or the quiet she would have to suffer through before them.
When she did sleep she couldn’t sleep in her bed, it felt too suffocating. Too familiar. Too reminiscent.
So she would settle on two chairs pushed together to form a makeshift bed.
Some nights she craved the hardness of the floor, and would lay flat on her back. To settle in an uncomfortable position, because she didn’t want to be at peace.
Not after what had happened, what she had lost, what her motivations had cost her. Not until she could get her hands on the monster that had taken everything from her. Including herself.
Most nights though, she would spend at her desk.
She had welcomed the aloneness she often found herself in, but the General, had planted the idea of needing to form some sort of closeness with someone she trusted.
To remedy the loss left by Vi’s betrayal.
That what it came down to in times like this were those who were alike ourselves.
To be alone is to be left vulnerable.
Caitlyn didn’t believe her words, they didn’t seem like a truth the General would follow, let alone believe.
And then she considered maybe it was said to her, because it would ring true for someone like herself.
Left to her own devices too long, and Caitlyn wouldn’t know what to make of anything.
Begrudgingly, she found herself welcoming the presence of another.
It started out as silence that would occasionally be filled by Caitlyn saying something and the offering of another’s thoughts. Mainly in agreement.
But not so much so that Caitlyn would quickly grow tired of it. Of her newfound company.
Then they would begin to talk about strategies, on how to work the undercity into giving up Jinx, and the sanctions that should be put in place at the bridge.
Caitlyn found herself alone at her desk, the papers around her only angered her, as the solutions on them didn’t help, and the news only worked to piss her off. As for the rest, she couldn’t answer what was being asked.
Copycats.
The only people who are able to have others want to follow them are those who are able to inspire.
And Caitlyn hated this fact.
Denied it to her core, that the undercity, the lot of them aren’t inspired by Jinx, they are just the same as her.
It didn’t ease her mind much, but it helped to quench the idea of how one could incite such action from an entire city.
Unless the city itself is spoilt.
Caitlyn hadn’t dared to go here in her thoughts before, but as of late they crept more and more in this direction.
She would always stop them, but they would still make some distance.
The sound of a familiar knocking pattern brings her back.
She internally sighs. Maybe out of annoyance, or out of some sort of satisfaction.
Caitlyn doesn’t work to straighten or compose herself.
This sight of her wouldn’t be new.
“Come in” she says, not loudly or even with a sense of warmth. But it wouldn’t have mattered how she welcomed the girl, she would still without fault, enter.
The door opens, and Caitlyn sees the mannerisms in the way it’s opened before she sees the girl herself.
The attention she has left she splits in half and pays it forward to the girl walking towards her
“Officer Nolen” she regards her professionally.
Caitlyn doesn’t need to do this, she refers to the girl as ‘Maddie’ most of the time anyways, but it’s her way of reminding the girl where they stand.
Still feeling the need to assert herself to some degree within their dynamic.
More so for her own sake than the girl’s.
The girl as expected, doesn’t falter, doesn’t ease up either though.
“Commander” the girl says matching her.
This does manage to draw a reaction from Caitlyn.
A wry barely there smile overtakes her features.
And a bubbly bright one overtakes the girl across from her.
“Are we done with the formalities?” the girl asks carefully, toeing the line between subordinate and companion.
That limbo that Caitlyn leaves her in most of the time, not really caring to define her as either.
“For now” is all Caitlyn says
There’s no room left in her words to actually keep the conversation going.
But Maddie persists, and Caitlyn actually admires that about her, about as much as she hates to see it.
“Why are you here Maddie?” she asks as she meets the girl’s eyes.
She takes her time to look over the girl, from the ginger hair, to the uniform, to the face, to how she acts. To the very way in which this girl carries herself. Everything about the girl screams in Caitlyn’s face that she is someone her mother would approve of.
And she hates to hear it, it rattles her to know this truth.
To also know that whatever she’s doing with this girl that her mother would like, is not a side of herself she ever wants to even think about in relation to her mother.
“I’m not imposing am I? I usually come around this time of night” Maddie says easily but not quite comfortably.
She still presents herself with an air of submission around her, and regards Caitlyn with a tone of respect. As she always does.
Caitlyn knows what she says is true, and yet she wants to directly deny it.
Deny that the girl should even think to come in without being ordered.
But then Caitlyn has to come down from whatever ledge she’s on.
She can’t exactly be cruel to Maddie, she can get away with shortness and even being cold.
But cruel is not a line she’s willing to cross, not when she still expects something from Maddie.
So Caitlyn forces herself to calm, practically beating the idea into her head.
And looks up at Maddie with an ease she doesn’t wear unless she wants something.
And despite not asking her here Caitlyn is not exactly dissatisfied with her presence.
“No, not imposing” she says shortly as she stands up.
It’s a wordless action, but it’s a familiar movement, a cog in a machine that Maddie has been conditioned to know to keep moving, from Caitlyn merely standing up.
She tells herself it’s transactional, and she fears the girl sees it as love.
But she doesn’t care enough to stop, her efforts are fruitless when it comes to going back to being alone.
It’s a mere, at most affection. An exercise of human need.
Caitlyn warms up on the short distance through the halls as she walks to the unclaimed room with a bed she’s come to familiarize herself with. For occasions like this.
Maddie falls into line behind her.
Already disarmed with her gun left propped up against the corner of the room.
As well as her beret discarded on a nearby table.
This room is empty and emotionless and somehow decorated just enough to make her feel less like shit for even doing what she’s about to do with the girl in here.
Caitlyn moves to the bed and sits, straight as a pin, still having a superior sense about her.
Perhaps it’s her properness she’s grasping onto in this moment, because it’s all she has left, that she even recognizes.
The next step is simple and Caitlyn watches it take place.
Enjoying the time it takes to complete.
The tenderness she tells herself the act is filled with.
Maddie walks in front of where Caitlyn is seated on the edge of the bed and begins to kneel down like she has before.
Caitlyn would usually find the idea of someone kneeling appealing, but she can’t ever muster it with the girl.
She holds Caitlyn’s eyes for a second, and Caitlyn hopes to find a part of girl that doesn’t want this.
Maybe then she’d feel guilty enough to stop.
But just like every time leading back to their first, her eyes tell Caitlyn she wants to be here.
And Caitlyn can’t imagine why.
She then takes Caitlyn’s left foot in her hands and slowly undoes the laces, as she follows up with sliding off the boot.
It’s not a sexual act, or even gratifying, but it feels warm to Caitlyn.
It feels gentle and soft and exactly what Caitlyn wants before what comes next.
She allows herself to close her eyes and lean her head back slightly as Maddie continues on to her right foot.
Once both of her shoes are off Maddie then moves to take off her own.
Caitlyn watches, examines her movements, they’re organized and precise in the way that they’re clumsy and nervous.
She doesn’t linger on that thought, doesn’t feel the need to, and simply doesn’t want to really think at all.
Once Maddie’s shoes are off Caitlyn begins to undress herself.
Maddie has asked since their first night, to help undress her, but Caitlyn doesn’t concede in this.
She continues to do it herself.
She doesn’t need the girl close enough to be felt in such an intimate act that isn’t something she can lose herself in.
Maddie does the same, and they both begin to undress themselves in absolute silence.
Before Maddie moves to get on the bed she walks around the room fulfilling the last act of blowing out the candles.
Leaving them in complete darkness.
Caitlyn prefers the concept this feeds her brain of her and a shadow. Or maybe both girls are shadows in this instance. Under the shield of darkness, no eyes can lay upon them. No eyes can know what they do.
Like they don’t exist.
Like it never happened.
And then Maddie touches her reverently.
With an eagerness.
For the seconds she’s allowed before she’s not.
Before Caitlyn takes over, and pushes her back onto the bed.
Before Caitlyn loses herself in the act, and the sounds she is able to elicit from the girl beneath her.
Before then, Maddie soaks in the feeling of being able to touch Caitlyn.
And Caitlyn suffocates under the touch, like an internal itch is getting at her.
Caitlyn allows the few touches before she can’t anymore, and then she’s the one touching the girl.
She doesn’t want to be felt.
She wants to feel.