Archive of Our Own ^beta

Kori reached her hands up to touch the clouds as she flew through the early morning sky, the first patches of blue creeping out from the glorious sunrise she had woken up to.

She had moved away from the warmth of the two bodies beside her and crawled carefully over flailing limbs and awkwardly positioned bodies with arms and legs and hands that will surely be devoid of feeling when they wake up. She had to leave the bed scented of cinnamon and metal and motor-oil and trotted slowly, still half asleep, to the edge of the bed where she picked up whatever garments she grabbed first, hoping they would make a full outfit for her to brave the early morning chill, the biting wind.

Looking in the mirror, Kori had realised that she couldn’t remember who had brought the crop top she was wearing, the light purple fabric slightly singed and dotted with black stains, yet in her size and favourite colour. Deciding she didn’t really care, she re-adjusted the drawstring on the pants that defiantly did not belong to her, and grabbed a jacket that strangely matched. It was baggy, a few sizes too big and Kori smiled to herself as she picked raven and the odd white hairs out from the hood. The scent of gunpowder stung her nose, but she ignored it. She would put them in the wash once she got back and changed.

The kitchen itself had been tidy, but she stacked the dishwasher nonetheless on her way to the fridge, taking stock of the food they had and writing it on a sticky-note while she drank a glass of orange juice, so her love would know what he would be able to cook for breakfast. Glass emptied, she quietly closed the fridge door with her hip, the contents clanging together and jingling slightly, and made her way towards the front door, picking up the scattered arrows and screws that always seemed to litter their home.

On her way through the sand, she watched her feet leave indents and sink into the grains, the grit slithering between her toes. She had stood on the water’s edge for a moment, the cool sea flowing over her skin to pool around her bare feet and then receded, only to repeat. She closed her eyes and faced the sunrise, the early morning light calming her and making her feel alive. When she took off towards those shinning pinks and purples and oranges, the sand parted beneath her in a circle, the force behind her leap marking the earth.

Now, she smiled as she spun in torpedo circles, free in the quiet emptiness of the early morning sky. “Hello birds!” She welcomed the flock she flew by every morning, the grey-white peregrines turning their heads in greeting. “How are you? It’s so nice to be free in the wide open sky, isn’t it?” 

Kori’s hair whipped behind her as she flew high enough to poke her head out of the clouds, could see the glint of the sea far below. She smiled and waved to the sun, with only a quarter sticking up from the horizon. “Hello sun! How are you today? Did you have a nice rest?”

Flicking her feet into the air and flipping around, Kori dived down to the ocean floor like an arrow from a bow, laughing at her metaphor. Pulling up and levelling out just before she sunk into the water, she spun lightly, placing her hands in the water and watching the sea spray float and dissipate into the air. A school of blue fish swam just below her, making her gasp. “Hello there fish! I haven’t seen you before. Are you enjoying the morning?”

After watching them for a moment, Kori flew back up to normal level, slowing to a pause. Turning around, she saw her home, and her loves inside it. She watched as a light turned on in the lounge, knowing who would be up at this time, knowing that the only reason he would wake up was for the smell of breakfast wafting into the room. 

Kori threaded her fingers through her hair, the wind brushing it away from her hands and making them fly in un-connected patterns.

Kori had never pitied the human race, never thought about the lives of her loves in such an unfortunate way. She never had the need to, these humans with such a sense of familial ties and justice, the power and beauty they hold in their mortal bodies. But as she thinks about it now, her loves can never fly as she is now, never feel the wind against their skin and the sea-spray against their face.

So destructible, her loves. So fragile. So easily damaged. Anything could happen, if she wasn’t careful. Even with arrows soaring from behind them, led fired from the front like shields of death and destruction, Kori still needed to be careful with their squishy flesh and flimsy bones.

Although their bed is always warm, full of love and energy and lust, sometimes she gets carried away, leaves bruises on necks, handprints burned into the flesh of their arms, their backs, their ribs- the evidence of her passion stained on their flesh like red wine on white carpet, the bed sheets singed and damp. Stretching of necks and bones cracking, the roughness that is their lives and their love- yet Kori had never thought of them as… broken. Fragile yes, but never broken. Not the broken she sees written on their faces after too-rough nights of too-long patrol with anxiety and death sunken into their features, the weight of past experiences pulling them down. Kori’s only job is to fix them on those nights, make them feel whole and full of love again.

Kori closed her eyes, the taste of warming metal and shampoo embedded into her tongue. Old Spice cologne and gunpowder in her nose.

When they fall asleep, heads on her lap and her fingers through their hair, she can’t help but feel how lucky she is to have them, the two men by her side. Hair in her lap, one set shorter than usual, the black hardly flowing through her fingers for her to tug on, the red too long and with split ends that snapped too easily, yet she loved them both. Loved their warmth, their humour, their hearts. Loved every part of them.

Loved the banging of pots and pans in the too-early hours of the morning, sometimes afternoon if they were lucky, and the grumbling that always followed the abrupt wake-up. The smell of bacon or waffles or pancakes wafting through the house and soaking into the very walls, cheering everyone up.

Loved the cleaning sessions, the moments of a calculated chaos of the mops and vacuums and dusters sweeping around the house like an orchestra, caking them in dust and grime but the smiles plastered on their faces with their red cheeks outweighed their black fingers and the dirt-caked nails from cleaning weapons and furniture.

Kori sighed, turning over and over in the sky like laundry in the washing machine. Hearing the shouts and choruses of laughter and joy in the direction of her ship, their home, had her looking back again at their little island paradise, searching out the trucker hats among tangled red, the black and white among the tan, the love above the bickering.

When Kori had first escaped from her planet, escaped from her father and his shackles and his throne, she never expected to crash land into the comforting and waiting arms of the two men who loved her and cared for her most. The reds fitted perfectly into her life, the perfect size to fit against her form.

Remembering the first human she came across, her first introduction to English, she smiled, the ocean seeming larger than it had. What if she had stayed with him, the man who promised protection and loving servitude, in return for a life of love? The acrobatic arrogance with which he carried himself and their team, she fell for it. Yes, she had loved him.  She had devoted her whole heart to the first kind human she had met. Sometimes, she thought about him, in the lonely hours between waking up and falling asleep.

She could have made a home with that man, a family. Out on the sea, the waves carrying them closer together. If she had stayed with him, had taken his hand instead of joining his brother and his deranged friend on their crime eradication mission, would she have ended up in the net they had all fallen into without realising it?

With a single, final look out towards the open ocean, out to what could have been, Kori turned and flew in the direction of home, and the building they all lived in, together.