Can You Use Companion As A Verb?

Posted on Sun May 8th, 2022 @ 1:02am by Kindra Graham & Alden Loxley

Mission: Twas The Twelve Days of Travel
Location: Port Shuttle
Timeline: November 8th

It had taken a little time for Alden to feel comfortable enough to seek alone time with Kindra, on account of he'd been feeling guilty, a little ashamed and definitely somewhat confused about recent events. Not just the lack of any real money gained by legal or illegal means, some discomfort gleaned from the conflict of interest between himself and Alison (and the rest of the crew to boot in a - mostly - silent majority) alongside an overriding and deeply felt concern for the predicament he found himself in.

A Catch 22. Save the broken girl. Risk the family and friends' lives. Make enough money to keep Fortune's Echo flying while ensuring everyone he wanted to share his (and Alison's) Firefly with kept breathing and all their fine blood on the inside where it belonged.

So while they'd shared meals (along with the rest of the crew), conversations (though rarely just the two of them and certainly not in each other's private quarters), Alden had so far avoided any naked alone time.

Now, with the Li-Shen's headache subsided, a half bottle of Apple Pie Moonshine in his belly and rolling happily round his brain, his boots had found their own damn way to the port shuttle where Alden had quietly overridden the locks and snuck on in. He wasn't drunk enough to be excused the bad manners, nor sober enough to care about propriety or inhibitions.

"Can I have a cuddle?" Alden asked, standing in the veil-strewn doorway to the inner sanctum of his favourite Companion. "I miss cuddles...."

Kindra lay curled up in bed with the poetry book she'd acquired at Li Shen's illuminated by a small bedside lamp, although she'd been staring at the ceiling for some time when the curtain stirred, and Alden appeared. "Alden?"

It had been six days since their encounter on the bridge, and she had begun to anticipate the worst – that Alden had changed his mind and just didn't want to tell her. Despite all her training, Kindra had so little personal experience with romantic relationships, she didn't know how to handle her own situation. Besides, Alden'd had a serious injury, and so many responsibilities weighing on him, adding to his stress. She didn't want to be one more burden.

Kindra slipped from the warmth of her blankets into the cool dim light of her shuttle wearing only a thigh-length sleeveless silk nightgown. She rushed to Alden and wrapped her arms around his neck, pulling him into an embrace. So overjoyed by his arrival, she didn't pause to consider the strong scent of fruity alcohol on his breath. Kindra held him tightly and whispered next to his ear, "I miss cuddling with you too."

She looked so peaceful, he thought. No sign of mussed up covers, blanket thrown to the side... just serenity personified. He missed that. The peace in the madness and confusion of current (and recent) times had unfortunately been fleeting, stolen moments and at every hard jink in their trail, Alden had wondered if she'd leave. Not really anywhere to go to on Ghost, but Li Shen's had definitely been a concern. Here Kindra still was. And Alison hadn't abandoned his stubborn, dumb ass yet either. Big details in a crazy Verse.

And daaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaamn, but her slender, warmly supple curves were divine in all the right ways, stirring up old feelings that had more to do with primal desires than comfy people blankets. Moonshine mind didn't overthink or complicate, it just told him to kick off his boots and go with the flow he'd become caught up with. Companion Riptide. Welcome. Wanted.

Long arms wrapped about Kindra's slim form as Alden turned and ditched his boots to the side, one expertly driven heel to the next. Socked feet padded the soft furnishings on the shuttle floor even as he lifted her up off of it. Then with a soporific pirouette, the Echo's captain lazily launched them both back across the short distance to jointly fall down upon the recently abandoned bunk. It carried both the young woman's scent and warmth still. An incentive for more and the catalyst for a slow, dumb smile against the crook of Kindra's neck as they fell into the bedding.

"I feel like I'm on a roll of bad decisions and unwanted steps," Alden noted without any overt remorse. He couldn't change the past. "You always feel like a good one." A pause as his brain tried to worry then overwrote itself with action. Companions and relationships. Complicated. Pleading eyes coloured his words as he pushed back slightly in order to regard those perfect features. "Cuddles now. Tell me the rules later?"

They fit together so well, in all the right ways. She gasped with pleasure when he picked her up then fell into bed with her. By all the gods, with Alden pressed against her like this it was hard to think about anything except eliminating the barrier of clothing between their bodies as fast as possible... except for the strong smell of alcohol on Alden's breath. Dammit.

Kindra looked into his dark blue eyes and murmured, "You already know my first rule. Consent. How much have you had to drink?" Finally he'd come to her, and he'd arrived drunk. Consent required a sober state of mind. Whatever it was that made Alden refrain from her company, it seemed he needed to be drunk to get past it. She simply could not risk enabling anything Alden might regret later.

She stroked the side of Alden's face tenderly, and kept her tone light and playful. "Cuddles yes, absolutely. But only cuddles. After some sleep, when you're sober and if you choose, I'd like to indulge in much more. Whatever rules we may need between us, we can figure them out together."

His smile was pure happiness, backed but not fuelled by his current state of slightly artificial calm. Alden was comfortably determined, enthusiastically interested and definitely not inebriated enough to be okay with pushback from a place where rules were required.

"I had a drink," he admitted openly. "I'm not drunk." There was a difference, right? Yeah. He could still function in the thinking-game, form real words, no slurring, and he knew what he wanted. Honesty was needed, though.

"I screwed up. I was selfish. I didn't think it through," Alden continued before Kindra could complain, protest or talk at him. "You know it, Alison knows it. And we can talk it out right now or we can...." he reached a hand out, intending to slip long fingers under that pesky nightgown if Kindra would allow such a trespass. "Do something else?"

Kindra wasn't sure what he'd meant by bad decisions and unwanted steps or what exactly Alden had done to confess he'd screwed up, was selfish, or hadn't thought it through. She knew there was tension – so palpable she didn't need to be a Companion to pick up on it - between Alden and Alison, and it had to do with Daiyu, Whit, and what happened on Li Shen's. Kindra had refrained from pressing Alden for particulars or going to Alison to ask. She trusted Alden implicitly – trust was one of his core values after all. He'd tell her when he was ready, or when she needed to know.

"One drink?" So, he wasn't drunk, and he could consent. "Well, then. We can talk later, when you're ready. But right now-" She kissed him eagerly, all restraint gone, and pulled the tail of his shirt loose from his trousers, hands groping for skin. "Let's do all of the something else."

A long slow pull from a small jar of moonshine counted as 'one drink', right? Alden considered this statement for factualness for a brief millisecond before Kindra made that judgement call on both their behalf and occupied his lips for something far better than talking. Hell, he didn't need to talk about anything either - Echo-business was his and Alison's - and there wasn't enough willpower in the Verse to prevent Alden kissing Kindra right back. Meanwhile he pulled his shirt up over his own head, hurled it to the side and focused his full attention on mustering up a naked Companion from outside of that pesky silk nightie.

Running her hands over his back hot against her fingers, Kindra wrapped her legs around his hips, leaving her lower half bare. She pulled him close, inhaling his intoxicating masculine scent, and claimed his lips again hungrily. For long moments she reveled in the delightful erotic frustration of his body pressed against hers, and yet fabric still separating his naked skin from hers. Unable to wait any longer, she rolled Alden over on his back, and straddled his thighs, the nightgown's hem now hiked up above her hips. Panting, her whole body trembling with desire and anticipation, she unclasped his belt buckle and tugged open his trousers.

All of the something else. Hell, yeah! That was about as far as Alden's conscious brain needed to go right now. Conjuring up words and eloquence was far less interesting at this moment in time than getting literally physical. Her hands. His skin. Her closeness. His need....

Alden resisted not even a little bit as Kindra took control of their position, thoroughly caught up in the wondrous adventure that was a Companion's raison d'etre. This particular one wasn't like the others though, and there was a reason he didn't usually partake in paid indulgence - not just a lack of credits, but a need for more than a simple business transaction. He wanted to be loved again, really loved, and he needed to let go of the past. Reason wasn't entering his mind now though, and as warm skin collided in a mutual desire for escape and pure pleasure, Alden willingly lost himself in the wonders of a world in which he could be Kindra's sole desire.

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