Fic: Army Brat (Cara/Kahlan, prompt: military AU)
Title: Army Brat
Prompt: military AU (modern or not), by endgirl
Length: 1987
Warnings: just a tiny bit of (not-so-military) discipline
Author's Notes: Nothing was mine but the fun.
“Ensign, your boots are soiled.”
“The captain kept me up all night fucking, ma'm. I'm sorry. It'll never happen again.”
The Mason kid stared at her commander, the Holy Goddess of Hell, sometimes known as lt. Amnell, her eyes as innocent as they ever could be. Well, as innocent as she could make them. The bitch was incredibly hard to please, not at all common in the training facility. Somehow they all seemed to fall for Mason's well-trained charms - at least the ones she wanted to - but that darn lieutenant had somehow managed to avoid her well-placed suggestions since the very start. The last days of Mason's final year at the Academy were rapidly growing short, and she still hadn't scored with the hottest instructor in the whole damn campus - although none of the trainees would ever dare admit that to the lieutenant's face.
Mason had no such issues. She'd already done it all before, over and over again. Hitting on a superior officer? Check. Hitting on a female instructor? Check. Hitting on Kahlan Amnell? If the bitch weren't so incredibly clueless, she would have already gotten her hints...
There had to be more to her ignorance than just plain stupidity. She was no child in the games of adults. Mason had seen the way the lieutenant was among the older staff; she knew her ways, she sure did. Rumours of her relationship with major Denna - which, according to the trainees' gossip, lasted for several months during one incredibly chill winter on the campus - had reached Mason's ears as soon as she set foot on the grounds, four years back. And the glances that the lieutenant and captain Nicci exchanged during mealtime told the story for themselves. Mason had been furious for days after she'd first seen the way they looked at each other. She also banished the captain from her thoughts for a few days - although she had been a recurring guest in some of Mason's favorite fantasies - as she eased her loneliness during the cold nights in the dorm. If you were quiet enough, you could get away with almost anything, as long as you kept your hands under the blanket.
That hadn't stopped her from attending their regular encounters in the gym storage, every last Saturday of the month, which had been going on for almost a year. The captain had approached Mason during her third year at the Academy, proposing an arrangement that would certainly suit them both, and the ensign had found it most satisfying, if only just a bit entertaining. After all, she always had preferred brunettes to blondes.
Nothing she had ever done with the captain could compare to what she wanted to do to the lieutenant.
The chill morning wind scraped the plain around the two of them, leaving Mason shivering just a bit. Saying such a thing to her instructor - carefully chosen words, at least this time - was no problem to her; showing weakness in front of a commanding officer... was unacceptable.
Lieutenant Amnell had chosen the spot for the morning part of their exercise. Mason's top marks had some use after all, if only in the form of personal instructions from one of the best field officers versed in land warfare that were ever appointed to the Academy. They were standing atop a hill a safe two miles away from the school grounds, alone at the edge of the forest, waiting for the sun to rise higher above the mists.
The fact that they were alone gave Mason even greater liberty with her words, but her experience with a few of the more sensitive - and strict - instructors told her to shut up when she saw the disapproving look in lt. Amnell's eyes.
“It's no excuse for not keeping your equipment in order, ensign.”
The chill in the air was no match for the ice in her voice. Mason stopped shivering, not from her words, but from the unspeakable arousal her tone awakened in her.
“I'm sorry, ma'm”, she said, and this time there was true respect in her words. Had she approached any of the other instructors with that sort of an excuse for ill discipline, she would have gotten blank looks, angry glares, occasionally even blushes. It took a strength of character to match her cockiness with nothing more than a muscle's twitch in the instructors' faces, and, judging by her reactions, lt. Amnell was one of the better players.
Had it been a game.
“Some questions have arisen regarding your graduation, ensign Mason”, lt. Amnell continued coolly. The ensign looked up. “A few of my fellow instructors have expressed their concern about your ability to serve in the Army.”
Mason feared her face was as pink as her pride, but there was no way for her to check, not with the chilly wind meandering about her, nor with the lieutenant's solemn expression. “You cannot believe everything captain Cypher has to say, ma'm,” was all she managed.
“Oh? Even though you've just proved, once again, that your obedience towards your superior officers is no better than your personal hygiene?”
This time Mason took the blow with nothing more than a slight stiffening in her jaw. You've trained for this, kid. Remember, she's just an army brat, same as you, same as everyone in this godforsaken place.
“If you doubt my obedience, ma'm, all you have to do is ask.” She smiled just a bit, but it was enough to shatter the cool look in the lieutenant's bright eyes.
The look she got after that was not nearly as accomodating. “Kneel.”
She considered it for just a moment.
It was really a short moment.
Her knees in the freezing dirt forced Mason to concentrate on the now. Staring up at the lieutenant from such short a distance, admittedly, not so unpleasant as a sight, but the solemnity of Amnell's expression was something she had never seen before, not in any of her other commanding officers, not in any of her colleagues, not even in her own reflection.
This was something completely, shockingly new.
For a moment, as the lieutenant stared back at her, her expression balancing on the verge of a smirk, not really going there, Mason could do nothing but accept the fear that was slowly rising inside of her. Shortly after the fear came the lust, but the resolve in her commander's eyes and the quickening of her heart in anticipation of her well deserved punishment forced to concentrate.
The lieutenant's gaze remained firmly locked upon hers as Amnell reached the buckle and released her belt. Stepping with her feet a hand's length apart, she undid the pants of her uniform and let them fall loose around her legs, resting just above her knees.
Mason didn't even dare shift her eyes from the officer's face. “What would you like me to do, ma'm?” she asked, hoping for her voice to remain calm, succeeding just until the very end.
“Fuck me”, Amnell said.
Only a moment's pause; then, shivering although she couldn't feel the cold anymore, Mason lifted her hand, tracing the curve of the lieutenant's leg up to her hip, desperately trying to focus, desperately wanting to feel more.
“I said 'fuck me', not 'waste my time', ensign”, Amnell growled down upon her, crossing her hands on her chest.
“Sorry, ma'm”, Mason whispered and let her hand slide over to the lieutenant's inner thigh. The woman's skin was pale in the dawnlight, the soft hairs just a bit aroused in the chill. Mason touched the outer curves of her sex, and then the inner; as soon as her hand reached what she was looking for, she felt soft drops on her fingers.
Lt. Amnell showed no signs of feeling anything the ensign's hand did to her, except for her body's moist betrayal. As the ensign explored the inside of her warmth, she stood calm and stared somewhere across Mason's head, her face solemn when the ensign looked up for a moment.
Mason soon found it hard to keep her breath calm, as she felt all that she had been denied for years. Feeling the melting insides of the lieutenant's body was akin to coming, she soon realized, because there was nothing in the whole wide world around her that could keep her attention even for a bit of a second, once she got in.
A warm thumb found the lieutenant's centre, and a soft sigh finally escaped her lips, vanishing into the morning light. Mason couldn't even ponder stopping, as all she was, all she's ever been, was firmly locked inside the rupture point of her commander's body.
A gasp joined the first sigh, and Amnell's body shivered just a little; it was enough for Mason to know she had hit something good inside her, something special. She breathed harder herself, her cold cheek barely touching the officer's tigh where she came close to her body.
The lieutenant's breath quickened, as did the ensign's fingers; a few heartbeats was all it took for them to dive into the moment, not thinking, barely breathing, sharing nothing more than a touch, a single, gentle...
“Now.” A coarse whisper, an order and a plea.
Mason dug deeper, letting her fingers go all the way, letting herself become one with the twitches and the shivers and the warm, soft release growing stronger inside the officer's body, coming closer, enveloping her hand and her thoughts and all her senses as she became lost in the feeling, one with the touch. Nothing was ever closer to perfection, nothing will ever be. One moment. An eternity.
The lieutenant quickly jerked back just a step, enough to get free of Mason's touch, enough to leave her all alone in the world once more. Turning away, Amnell pulled up her uniform in one smooth move. It was almost more than the ensign could stand, her hand suddenly removed from its shelter, stripped bare of the warmth of the lieutenant's inner body.
The buckle snapped into place before she took hold of herself, and lt. Amnell turned back to face her. “At ease, ensign.”
Mason slowly rose to her feet and joined her hands at her back, silently feeling her right with her left. There was something left there, something of Amnell's warm secrets, something of her. She stopped her smile before it become apparent, and shifted her attention to the other officer's face. Not so calm now, are we? Still, the lieutenant kept her expression under control. It took a special kind of perception to notice the tiny changes, the slightly relaxed muscles close to her lips, the somewhat misty feeling one got from looking into her eyes.
“Lesson over, ensign”, the commander's voice was even cooler than before. “I trust you can find your way back by yourself? Or should I ring the captain?”
Her face blushed before she could manage to control herself. Still, her words couldn't betray her. They never did. “Oh, I can manage, lieutenant,” she said, crossing the line and knowing it. An officer - especially one in training - was never allowed to address her superior only by her rank. The punishment for that sort of disobedience varied. But one could always count on the officers to devise a creative one.
Amnell only smiled, both shocking and amusing the younger woman. “Next time you show up with your uniform not in order, I will have you expelled.”
“Yes, ma'm,” Mason respectfully ducked her head. Stealing a glance at the lieutenant, just a glance, she slowly turned and walked away, hiding her smile.
She didn't need to turn back to know that the lieutenant was watching in the other direction, any other direction, determined not to show her inferior that anything had changed.
Mason knew better. And it was enough for one morning.
It was more than enough.