Two

A voice was calling his name. Even in sleep there was no peace. He could see how vividly things exploded before his eyes: that one time before you die when everything paused, slowly, slowly reeling and then allowing you to literally review what you had done with your life. Though perhaps it's absurd that an android could have a similar experience. It happened.

He saw Jupiter scream, but heard none of it. He saw the super being melt, demolish, collapse upon itself. Then die. He witnessed the god who controlled Tanagura vanish, in pain, in shards shattering until there was nothing left but the very core that was so warm, so destructively intense the glare made him wince, made his skin ache terribly.

He had long lost his limbs. He would next lose his life as the said core was enveloping him, swallowing him, attempting to strip him slowly from clothes to artificial skin to flesh to bone to the very marrow where he once had pounded into his Pet the fact of his ownership. He thought he himself would die soon. But just when he did think so, just then...he didn't.

The core offered itself to him in the resounding voice of Jupiter: ' One wish my dearest. One wish I shall grant of you in my death... '

A wish? He immediately saw Riki's face, his unmistakable smile. What a lovely smile. It reminded him that despite having everything in the world as an elite, the position was nothing more but a superficial fate. That after seeing it all, doing it all, the only thing that could make him really truly happy was a mongrel's smile, the challenge of his eyes, to be able to touch him, possess him, to be his everything.

"I think I love you," he heard Riki say, before the blast eclipsed that smile for all eternity. He then thought to himself how he could have wanted more to stay only in the presence of that single smile. But then it was over. He fought, despite confusion and near desperation. He lost. And still lost Riki in the end...

Jupiter read his thoughts, his longing. He had no need to conceal it. He never really wanted to if not for the threat of his former situation. No longer relevant at this point. For that the core glowed red, menacing, burning him through, except somehow, he had already accepted this judgement. He had accepted it the moment he had attached himself to a mongrel of the Slums.

"I suffer only for him," Iason closed his eyes.

' Would you really chose a mongrel over me? I who had taken such care of you? '

"Yes," it was the truth. "I would choose Riki over everything. Neither status nor grandeur nor position in the end could compare to the happiness he presents to me..." he had never been so sure... "He is the soul I've never had."

With that he wanted death, prayed as if he could that it came swiftly. He wanted to meet his beloved wherever he was. He wanted to be with the human he loved.

' You are stubborn. Such madness. Throwing your life away for- '

"-I never had a life," Iason gently argued. "Riki was my only freedom. He was my only escape..."

He felt this statement shake Jupiter to its very centre. It fell to silence, hearing those words coming from the very mouth of what was once his most heralded Blondie. Yet the latter was already dying, as Jupiter was dying, so whatever triumph Iason might take from this would be a hollow victory still. Riki was already dead.

Jupiter suddenly went cold. His presence slowly diminished itself into an insignificant spec, seemingly assessing, calculating, before gathering enough power to once more grow. The Blondie opened his eyes and wondered, "Why?"

' Very well, ' said the core. ' You have won my arrogant creation. '

This jolted Iason.

"Won?"

' Allow me to grant you my final gift. Something which you have been desperately fighting for, as you imply, all your life... '

' ...all your life... '

"Riki..."

Sapphire eyes slowly opened, blinded by a sudden glaring light his mind belatedly processed to be some lamp left open overhead. But then there were no lights where he had slept, there was only darkness, and a subtle feeling of cold that assaulted his senses rather immediately. He heard a hiss and something popping open around him, head to foot.

He could feel the sheets, smell the scent of freshly pressed, freshly changed satin, feel the texture slip through his fingers as he tried to move idle muscles, muscles that he hadn't used for so long. He started. That startled him.

He almost shot up, if not for noticing he was encapsulated then he definitely had to reach and open that lid himself. It eased up and off quietly, even as his shaky hand afforded little strength. Where was his strength? And where was he? The last time he recalled, they were being devoured by catastrophe in all four sides. Right now he was simply in a pod, made to be a chambered bed which monitored his health. He wasn't in his room.

Disoriented, Iason tried to make sense of things and peel through his memories but could supply no answers to his own questions. He remembered losing his legs. As he stared down onto the blanket which covered his sinews he wondered if the shape they formed was his or had another pair taken their place?

With a second, two of hesitation, he drew back the sheets where beneath he was but splendidly nude, surprisingly able to feel his legs as he moved unaccustomed toes. He hesitantly reached to touch his knees. These were his knees! But how can that be, when he could recall so clearly how he'd been dismembered during the incident.

"Riki..."

Iason frantically, most panickingly jumped out of the pod and almost lost his balance, a sudden flash of dark hair, dark eyes swimming into memory. Yes, definitely his body. Nothing was removed. Nothing was replaced. He was shockingly whole; his heart and head throbbed, his spine stung, his innards twisted as he heaved for necessary breath. Grasping the nearest support, he glanced around aiming to regain control over his facilities now...he just had to.

"Riki..."

He had to find him. He must. But his body was in disagreement.

"Damn," Iason stumbled onto the carpeting, cursing the inability to possess the strength now when he needed it to find his beloved. Why the superior mechanisms built into his body fail him now?

His legs wobbled. His feet were so uncertain for the first time since he could recall that every step was like teaching himself to walk again. Everything was a struggle. He fell.

"Riki..."

Then he heard it, a low groan or grunt that was almost inaudible. Desperately, he tried to focus beyond his panic, searching for calm, searching for the source of that sound which somehow reverberated in the dark the way Riki's voice did. Only then was he able to notice his pod wasn't the only pod in the room. There was another.

With difficulty, Iason slowly stumbled to his feet, managing his weight and balance so as to be able to make it to the side of that other bed. There was a sudden spasm that crept up his back and stung his shoulders as if he had been miserably drilled, but he ignored it. Then there, for what seemed like eternity, he looked down, reverently and almost not believing, at the occupant. Such great happiness threatened his heart. His Riki was there. Those dark, raven locks had grown to a stunning sea of black now rippling on either side of his head.

Iason was almost scared to touch, beyond frightened in fact to open that capsule as if the being there lain was the most fragile of treasures and he could so easily shatter it. He hadn't valued it enough before...those nights spent tearing carnally for the very last drop of his nectar from that body even as Riki screamed no more.

As if to awaken the youth would mean transgression. But he had to do it. He had to touch his face, his entirety. He had to be certain the other was as he is, not incomplete. He needed the assurance of him terribly. He needed to simply know he was all right.

"Riki..." he couldn't stop calling his name. It was like a string that anchored him to existence. Had he not aged, his Pet? Had he not changed except for that longer sport of hair?

With trembling hands, Iason reached, carefully drawing the sheet that covered the younger of them. He trailed his eyes over his naked body, noting every crevice, every corner, every muscle visible, the glowing skin and hair, his sleeping sex. Only then was the Blondie able to breathe. Riki was undamaged. He was whole...

' This is the mongrel...you chose him over me...I return him to you, perfected... '

Iason felt relief wash over his form. He felt exhaustion. He fell to embracing the unconscious youth, an anomaly of tears easing their way down his cheeks. His mind remembered Jupiter.

"But why?" he'd asked the super-being, witnessing how the core slowly re-constructed Riki before his very eyes, adding a few considerable touches...what were those touches?

' Because I miscalculated. Achilles was never meant to be a weakness...because he is your strength. He has always been your strength... '

Iason opened his eyes. He slowly lifted his naked hand and saw the glittering dark ring. He trailed his sights to what lay limply between Riki's legs and saw the equal of it. Would this still need to define them?

Jupiter was the one who returned him Riki, and before its demise, had blessed them both. Why must they be unequal still then? The Blondie swallowed, lifting his face from where he buried it on the other's chest, leaving a kiss on the skin as his lips passed it, moving to finally kiss those unmoving lips. Supple. Alive.

Iason cupped that cheek, softly, still much too overwhelmed. He was here, yes, breathing. They were both existing. That fact made him look at his dear Pet's face, and with his fingers, just tried to memorize this moment, tried to trace the lines he'd come to love so well on that face.

But the knowledge that this could no longer entirely be Riki dampened the happiness, recalling Jupiter's horrid reconstruction which instead, slowly brought silent tears. When had he found this heart?

"I'm sorry...my love..."