and fall to you and fall to you / and fall
Okay, the backstory on this little ditty is
possibly_thrice recc'd the Rough-and-Tumble series on the Kink Meme discussion thread without my knowledge. So when I went looking for hot fics to read and clicked on her link, it took me to my series. I wanted to die of flattery and squealy, flaily joy. I then proceeded to lose my cool all over her and promised her anything, ANYTHING she wanted written. She graciously requested Pike/Number One "shenanigans," and I quote. I can only hope this is shenanigan-y enough for you, m'dear!
See? This is what happens when you give me an inch on the Internet. I forcibly make you prompt me and then shove my ficiton under your nose and be all, "READ THIS AND DESPAIR!" I'm a horrible person, but there are worse things I could be doing with my free time.
The School of Sensualist Thought
by JJPH
for
(see profile page for disclaimer)
The first time Christopher Pike heard his philosophy professor lecture about sensualism, he knew he had found a school of thought worth following. While never a popular theory, even at its origin in the ancient world, it makes an immense amount of sense to a young Pike. He’s always been a practical man and he feels comfortable with a world where the only truth comes through the senses. He’s never been one for all-seeing men in the sky or the idea that everything is connected by feel-good invisible energy. That being said, Christopher Pike finds his deeply ingrained belief in sensualism tested when against all odds, a handful of unseasoned cadets manages to save his ship, his life, and his planet without losing more than a scattering of casualties. Pike may not be able to smell, touch, or taste luck, but it sure feels like someone up there is looking out for him.
The Academy is eerily silent when the Enterprise limps back to spacedock on impulse power. It’ll be weeks before his ship, no not his ship any more, before Kirk’s ship is ready to head out again. She’s been slated for deep-space science exploration. That ought to be quiet, if nothing else. He wishes he could be part of it, but until the nerve reparatives knit themselves into the holes where that damn slug bit its way through his spine, he’s no good to anyone.
“Your self-pity is irrational,” says Number One. They’re sitting in his living room. A pillow and assorted blankets are draped over his couch. He can’t handle the stairs with the chair, so he’s been sleeping there since the hospital discharged him. “According to your medical files, the reparatives are functioning optimally. You should make a full recovery.” She’s perched on the edge of the couch, her back ramrod-straight, posture perfect, her ankles neatly crossed. Pike smirks to himself. This is probably the closest thing to getting her in his bed that will ever happen. Not that he thought about that. Well, not often, anyway. “Admiral Pike,” Number One says and the memory of how he got his promotion, strapped to an interrogation table spewing out access codes, brings his mind crashing back to reality.
“I’m not much of an admiral relieved of duty and planet-bound,” he grumbles. He wheels himself around the glass coffee table and into the kitchen. “You want something?” he calls over his shoulder.
“Define something,” she responds and draws a laugh from deep in his chest. Good old Number One. She’s got a calculator for a brain and a sense of logic that would make a Vulcan proud, or whatever the logical equivalent of pride would be. “If you’re referring to a drink, you know what I like.” Pike pours two glasses of scotch, and balancing them in one hand, awkwardly rolls back to where she’s waiting impassively. She nods her thanks and sips at the liquor daintily, if that’s a word Pike can apply to a woman he’s seen handle situations that would make most first officers cry.
Pike scrubs a hand through his hair, which he’s sad to say is more salt than pepper after the Narada. “I’m sorry if I’m bringing you down,” he says. Number One tips her head to the side and blinks at him. She’s out of uniform today, having left her Starfleet uniform at home for this social call. The cowl-necked sweater is out of season for the warm weather, but she’s not sweating. Pike’s not sure if he’s ever seen her sweat. He continues. “I hate this.” He gestures at the wheelchair. “I’m used to sitting in a captain’s chair.”
Number One frowns. “If I were to attach photon torpedoes to the wheelchair, would that make you feel more comfortable?” Pike snorts, then pauses. They’d served together so long, he can’t remember the first time he met her. She’s saved his life more times than he’s saved hers, though it’s a close count, and he has no doubt that if he said yes, photon torpedoes would make him feel better, she’d find a way to get them to him. Pike leans forward and grasps her hand. She smiles perfunctorily back at him and pats his hand absently until he releases his hold. He sits back in the chair and shakes his head at himself. Cool as ice, this one. Pike takes a sip of his scotch.
“Is this about your perceived lessening of virility?” Pike inhales the aged amber liquor when his throat spontaneously rejects the idea of swallowing. When his vision clears, Number One is calmly gazing at him, no sign of sarcasm or mocking in her expression. “You do understand, of course, that such a viewpoint is both out-dated and unfounded. Given that your nervous systems sustained no permanent damage, there is no reason to believe that you will experience any loss of response to erotic stimuli.”
In times of crisis, Pike, as a consummate Starfleet officer, falls back on his core belief system. In any other situation, the words he chose to fire back at his first officer and closest confidant would have easily diffused the tension. Unfortunately, those words have a somewhat opposite effect in the moment. “I’ll believe it when I feel it.”
Pike squeezes his eyes shut, aware of how blatant that sounded. Every regulation regarding fraternization between crew members, sexual harassment, abuse of rank flashes through his mind. He’s so preoccupied with formulating a satisfactory apology, he doesn’t see Number One stand and straddle his lap. The sudden, warm weight of a woman settling herself over him snaps his eyes open. “What-”
Number One wiggles into place and Pike loses his train of thought. “What I am doing, as I believe you were about to ask, should be perfectly apparent. As you have ascribed for a long time to the school of sensualist thought, a physical demonstration is necessary in order to convince you.” She takes a deep breath and loops her arms around his neck. Her breasts shift under her sweater and Pike starts to sweat. “As your first officer, it is my duty to provide my admiral with accurate reports on current situations.” Pike can feel his hands spreading wide around her hips, across her lower back. He tells himself he’s getting ready to push her off in a minute. Any minute now.
“You’re not on duty, Number One,” Pike says, his voice gone gravel-rough and heated. “You’re here as a friend.” The last word is loaded with years of working together without the mess of sex and feelings and bullshit that comes with enlisted relationships. Years of them just being them, Captain Pike and his Number One, the two of them against the wilds of uncharted space. It’s an out and she knows it, of course she knows, she knows everything he doesn’t say, but she grips the hem of her sweater and tugs it over her head in one liquid movement. And the galaxies they’ve explored together, the stars they’ve charted, the nebulas and comets and planets all compress down into the silken feeling of her mouth on his.
And it’s simple, it’s so simple, it’s been staring him in the face for years, and why didn’t he ever think to push his hands into her hair or let her run her fingertips over his jaw? Between them, his shirt joins hers on the hardwood floor and her soft trousers get shoved off. His are harder to undo because his hands are shaking, and while Pike wishes he could say it was only lust making them tremble, it's more than that. Number One’s making small circles in the hair at his nape and Pike twists under her hands like a teenager. He thinks to reach down and flick on the brakes before she finds his cock with one small hand and he stops thinking all together.
“Can you feel this?” she whispers, throaty and low, as she works him. Her touch is steady, methodical, relentless, and Pike thinks he might die, but hell, if you’ve got to go, there are worse ways. He nods and grits his teeth. Number One looks smug. “Obviously you can. Without properly functioning nerves, my touch would have no effect.” Pike moans heavily. He is not, repeat, not getting off on her science talk. “To further illustrate my point-” she says and increases her speed. “Notice the marked increase in your respiration. In addition, I believe your heart rate is sufficiently elevated to indicate arousal.” Okay, he’s kind of getting off on her science talk. Okay, really getting off, but he’ll never tell.
She stops and pulls back, and Pike thinks in a blind panic that that was it, experiment over, and now she’ll snap off a salute and leave him parked in his living room, stiff and aching for her. But she doesn’t salute or leave. She takes a firm hold of the arm rests and levers herself up and then down, down, oh God damn down onto him. Pike wraps his arms around her, clutching her as close to him as possible. He can feel her heart beating back against his and fuck if he’s not the only one experiencing arousal here. She sighs, a high, hungry sound and if he were out of this goddamn chair, he’d flip her over and do whatever it took to get her to make the sound over and over again. But all he can do is sit perfectly still while she slides up and then down again, rolling her hips like she’s in no rush, like she’s assessing the tactical advantage of the situation and maybe she is, because Pike feels like surrendering everything he is to this woman right about now.
He cups her hips and guides her into smaller circles, quick motions, watching her all the while. The sharp angles of her face have softened with age and wear, but she will never be more than twenty-five to him, dark-haired and skeptical the first day she set foot on his bridge. “Captain,” she breathes, and it’s closer to a gasp than a statement. He wonders idly if it’s the same for her, if she sees that young brash captain when she looks at him instead of an old man in a wheelchair.
“Admiral.” He grins up at her and that one eyebrow lifts, perfectly, and he comes in hot, sharp bursts of pleasure that ripple up through him. She’s still moving, a little faster now, a little less finesse, and Pike realizes that it won’t be real, it won’t be exactly what he wants until he makes her come, too. He works one hand between them and finds her, hot and damp against his blunt fingers. “You wanna?” he asks, fighting the drowsiness tugging at his thoughts.
She nods, too quickly to be casual. “Yes.” Her response is bitten-off and tense, and his cock gives a strong twitch inside her. He rubs at her clit with sloppy, unfocused strokes. She whines and lets her head drop back. Pike pulls her face to him and kisses her mouth, her chin, her throat. Gentle and soft, at odds with the frantic, insistent motion making her breath hitch. “Oh,” she sighs. She sounds genuinely surprised and Pike is tempted to ask her what about. “Oh,” she says again and screws up her mouth. “Oh!” And she’s tightening down on him, his half-soft cock going hard again as she pulses around him. There, thinks Pike as he gathers up to him, her ragged breath hot on his shoulder. That right there was truth, the only truth Pike would fight and kill for. His Number One, lost and safe in his arms.
The untangling of limbs and hands is more awkward with the chair involved, but Pike finds he doesn’t mind as much. She dresses quickly and efficiency, seduction not at the forefront of her mind. It turns him on away. “Number One,” he says in his best bridge voice. She straightens immediately, no thought involved. That turns him on, too, but he tucks that away for another day. “My compliments on a most thorough report.”
The corners of her mouth twitch, her version of a grin, and she lifts that eyebrow again and damn if maybe today isn’t that day. “Just doing my job, Admiral.”
“You know,” he says and wonders just how many times they can do that before the chair’s brake gives. “I think I prefer ‘Captain.’”