cerhadivision | Isla Sorna

Isla Sorna

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bluebetabitch

When you spend a long time building something with your own two hands, it becomes difficult to wrap your mind around the idea of the work being done. Owen grew up around that kind of mindset, and knows very well how it feels to be in the same grip. But he doesn't mind. That's the thing about having a family: it expands, and the world around it needs to expand with it. Little by little, the house came up around them, and they settled into it, and he's never really stopped working this little world of his over like an ever-evolving project that he loves with his whole heart.

They're settled here. Officially. No one can deny it, and even though Owen still has dreams sometimes about InGen -- or anyone -- hunting them down to rip the girls, or even the boys, out of his hands, those fears evaporate every morning. The girls get along as well as any sisters do, and even the squabbling has died down in recent months; the boys have adapted beautifully, and although Chi and Psi still exhibit behavior that looks odd alongside the girls from time to time, they no longer struggle to meet expectations that were completely alien to them for most of their lives.

And then there's Blue and Omega.

The difference in Blue between her youth on Isla Nublar, and the young womanhood that quite clearly blossomed in the Santa Lucia Mountains of central California, is not only noticeable, but striking. Always the one he could rely on over the others, Blue has managed to develop into a creature that is both an extension of his right arm and yet still a highly independent person who no longer looks to him quite so often for cues; she still values her space and her privacy, but those withdrawals from the pack just to brood and sulk have all but disappeared. And while Blue's temper will always strike fear into the hearts of her siblings -- adopted or otherwise -- she's learned to balance it with patience, a trait that would always thwart her more than any other. Until now. Owen always wanted Blue to learn that balance between animal instinct and human rationality, and he knew she'd get there in her own way sooner or later. Now, it seems she has, and it's a beautiful thing to see.

Then, as if her own transformation wasn't enough, she'd somehow managed to turn her mate into an entirely different person.

If Blue's maturation is impressive, Omega's has been nothing short of miraculous. All right... Owen is a professional behaviorist; he knows there's no such thing as miracles, only hard work and dedication. Only this time it wasn't his. It was Blue's time, effort, and uncharacteristic affection that turned a furious, hateful killing machine into something that could be now what he might have been then, before InGen had their way. Omega lives in the house now. He eats when they do. He joins the family in their gatherings, as long as Blue is with him, and although his temper is still zero to 60 when roused, these days it's much harder to set him off than it used to be, even if that wouldn't be saying much. He prefers his mate and solitude over anything else, but his violently aggressive tendencies have been all but curbed for the sake of keeping Blue happy.

For obvious reasons, Owen has kept a close eye on them both from day one, and even from the very beginning Omega has treated Blue like the center of the universe. Owen himself has salvaged his share of abused, wild animals -- it's literally part of the job -- but he knows without question that no one could have done this but her. And her success is absolutely indisputable.

Case in point: today, Omega's dislike for interacting with unfamiliar people had outweighed his desire to be with Blue as often as possible, and instead of throwing a tantrum he simply hadn't gone with her down the mountain.

For Barry, it was supplies; Echo wanted clothes; Blue was only interested in procuring necessary parts for her nearly-restored 1979 Pontiac Phoenix Firebird, a task built upon very specific requirements and one which she would never entrust to any of her siblings. The day is very nice for a sojourn into the city, considering the length of the drive: blue skies and a mild breeze, not quite so far into spring that the air is anything more than comfortably warm. Psi is helping Delta collect chili peppers and the new experimental plums. Chi fell asleep in the grass up the hill. Charlie is giving Owen a hand with replacing some worn poles along the stone steps leading down to the boys' den, when they hear the familiar sound of the Jeep rolling up the long hill that serves as their driveway.

Only, it sounds like it's coming up fast.

Owen and Charlie look at each other, and immediately drop what they're doing to meet the car just as Barry rolls up, screeching to a stop and diving out of the driver's side to rush around to the passenger door. He looks frantic. And he's helping Echo out of the car. She looks like she's about to pitch right off her feet.

"Owen!" Barry calls out urgently, eyes widening immediately as Owen rushes to them. "Owen!" He has to wrap an arm around Echo's back to keep her standing. And then, to Owen's surprise and dread, Barry yells again. "Omega!"

Owen doesn't actually know where Omega has been this whole time. But suddenly he's there next to him, clearly as alarmed at being summoned as Owen was to hear it, and Owen can practically feel the tension in the male raptor's body triple because they both realized the same thing: that Blue is not with them.

"They took her," Barry says, breathless, and the bottom falls out of Owen's stomach.

Echo tries to rouse herself, flopping a little, mumbling in groggy frustration as she tries to shake off whatever is wrong with her and help explain. But Barry keeps his hold on her and barrels right through it.

"It was InGen. They had an entire strike force, Owen, the streets are chaos now. They used non-lethals. Tranquilizers. Echo took a direct hit, but they left her behind. All of them were focused on Blue." He looks at both of them, Owen and then Omega, panicked and desperate. "They came for her."

The weather was gorgeous a minute ago. Now the entire world is ice. Owen's heart has stopped, his breath is gone. Delta and the boys come running up, but he barely notices them. Beside him is Omega, frozen; then suddenly the raptor whirls to him, eyes wide, and the fury -- the fear -- in them is apocalyptic.

Omega doesn't say a word, but Owen immediately finds his voice. "Go get her."

The male raptor is gone like a bolt of lightning. Owen turns and strides quickly to a hidden cache beneath the porch. He pulls out two assault rifles and a hell of a lot of ammo as Charlie shrieks behind him, "Why aren't we going with him?!"

"Because we're going to follow him." Owen tosses a rifle to Barry, and gestures sharply for everyone to get into the car, including the still-dizzy Echo. "After Isla Nublar, Omega found us in less than a week on nothing but Blue's scent and pure instinct. This time he knows where he's going. We'd only slow him down." The motor is still running. Almost before every door is shut, Owen jerks the Jeep into gear. His last words are almost a growl to himself. "With any luck, all we'll have to do is clean up."

The Jeep screeches in reverse, turns, and roars off down the mountain.

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"Well," she murmured back, "even if we manage to eat all of it, we'll still have to be careful." Owen and Dr. Gwen had managed to convince the Park Wardens of their mountain to just...stay away from it, and let Nature take its own course in those rolling hills, but Montana was a different sort of country. Although, if it was as wide and big as Owen intimated, there might not be much human interference, at that.

Omega's answering purr made her warm inside, and Blue bit her lip, knowing that it was extremely unfair to begin something without being able to finish it. Her mate deserved better than that. He didn't deserve her hesitance, her irrational fear. And he definitely didn't deserve to have Vic-fucking-Hoskins still, even now, haunting them with his damned ghost.

Blue abruptly put the phone aside and clasped her fingers together, staring unseeing at her hands. "Omega," she began without preamble, although her voice was quiet, unsure, "--I need--I have to tell you something." Her knuckles began to whiten. "And you have to promise that you won't--wreck anything when I do..." Blue turned her head just enough to gaze up at him around the fall of dark hair. "--please."

While not exactly certain he could eat all of it -- especially without having much interest in trying -- Omega is at least quite positive that he could get away with it, one way or the other. And not necessarily through violent means, actually, considering he is a better person now or some fucking thing. If Blue is helping him bring it down -- although he might insist otherwise, for the sake of competition against himself -- he knows he'll behave better should any incident occur.

He's still musing on the vision of tackling a buffalo on the plains of Montana when he feels tension begin to seep into his mate's body, bringing his attention swiftly back to the moment, back to her. She doesn't withdraw from him, which is great, but it's obvious that something is wrong. That much is ominously confirmed the second she tells him not to lose his temper.

Considering how much better he's gotten at not doing exactly that, Omega knows this is gonna be bad. As his brow furrows, he answers with a slow nod.

Well, that was probably as much acquiescence as she was going to get, but Blue didn't immediately speak again. She looked back at her tangled fingers, trying to sort the words out in her mind so that she didn't just...throw everything out all at once.

When she did finally speak, it was hesitant, quiet. Almost imperceptible. "...InGen...didn't want us back because we left. They dropped Echo first, but didn't take her. Just me. I was their target all along." Blue ducked her head, hair hiding her face.

"Hoskins put me in your old cell, for the psychological shock value, probably, but then they...took me to the medical center and..." she had to clear her throat before continuing, "...injected me with your DNA, trying to create his 'next-generation' of hybrids." Her fists clenched. "Like he'd planned all along."

Blue took several deep breaths, then went on, voice falling flat, emotionless. "Don't know how long after that, they kept me under with those tranquilizers, but Hoskins started coming into the cell and-and staring at me. Finally he got too close, and I was able to cut him." A brief fierce gout of satisfaction heated the words, before fading. "--that pissed him off, then he--he..." Blue choked back a sob, biting it off before it escaped.

"--he raped me." There. She blurted it out, drawing up her legs and wrapping arms around her knees. Saying the words made it real again; she could even smell Hoskins' fetid stench: sweat, grease, liquor and that shitty cologne that always filled her nostrils like cotton. "--said he was going to get his hybrids one way, or another."

As soon as she starts talking, he wants to stop listening. This is the opposite of the magic she used to work on him, when he'd work himself into a rage and her soothing voice and unwavering affection would put out the flames whether he was done feeding them or not. Now, she's taking the cautious peacefulness surrounding them and turning it cold and sharp and ugly--

No, not her. She's only saying it, but she didn't make it real. InGen took her, and InGen imprisoned her, and InGen poisoned her... and Vic fucking Hoskins wasn't satisfied in trying to grind Omega down under his boot. No. He stole his mate away from him and did worse. Omega exists in a frozen moment where he can hear her but no part of him moves, remembering when he found her in his cell, found Hoskins with her, a look of horror on his face and his pants open...

The instant that the last word leaves her lips, Omega is off the bed and on his feet, propelled by... nothing, just the need to move, volcanic hatred boiling up inside him after going so long without an eruption, and he wants so badly to throw something right through the goddamn wall but he promised her that he wouldn't and even if he did there is no one around who would deserve it, no one to crush or tear apart, no one left who should die horribly for this--!

He drags his fingers over his face and then -- Blue. Omega whirls back to her, swallowing fire, and quickly he's on his knees on the bed in front of her, taking her face in his hands; the only thing remotely gentle about him now is the way he touches her. Every other part of him is lethal.

"I should have killed him for you. I'm so fucking sorry I didn't." Sharp canines gleam as he bites out the words, almost gags on them. "If I could do it over again, he'd still be dying in pieces."

He had the chance. But it would have been too fast... and she needed him. That was more important than anything else, and Omega would have let Hoskins rot away untouched if it meant doing more to save his mate. But apparently that unholy bastard left a wound in her that still hasn't healed. It's festered this whole time and Omega never realized how deep it went.

"What do I do, Blue?" It's a urgent question, almost desperate. She is the one person who makes everything clear to him, always, the one who teaches him the right way. "Tell me what it is and I'll do it. Anything."

She'd flinched away from his immediate violence, fearing that she'd pushed him too far--he was going to unleash all that wrath on some poor undeserving soul and she wasn't going to be able to stop him-- But even though he paced, back and forth, and Blue could feel the waves of boiling hate rolling off of his very skin, she saw him abruptly swallow it, and followed him with wide eyes when he came to kneel beside her, stricken, desperate.

She didn't hold it against him that he hadn't decapitated Hoskins for her. Never. Owen had taken care of that. Dr. Gwen had told her that Omega hadn't left her side since he'd brought her out of the containment compound. Had remained with her day and night, only letting Dr. Gwen and her assistants, along with Owen, near her.

Her fingers curled around his wrists as he held her face in his hands, and Blue had to close her eyes from the intensity burning out of his. He needed her. Needed her to tell him what to do, how to fix this, how go to on. But the hell if it was--

"--I don't know." It was a whisper, followed by another strangled whimper. Blue opened her eyes, glassy and sad. "I wish I could just burn him out of me...somehow."

He shouldn't put this pressure on her. She's been through enough, and he's not a child, nor is he helpless, but Omega doesn't know any other way. He doesn't know this, and if she just tells him what she needs from him then he can be what she needs him to be again. That's the most important thing in his life: keeping her in it.

But she's at a loss, just as he is. If she had woken up on Isla Sorna, they would have decided on the best way to dispatch her tormentor, and Hoskins would have died in screaming agony. Instead, she has to settle for the knowledge that her Alpha ended the man himself, and Omega will never entirely forgive himself for missing the chance when he had it. Not that it truly matters... it won't erase what was done to her. Omega doesn't know what to do instead.

He doesn't let her go. He just leans forward and touches his forehead to hers, shutting his eyes and gritting his teeth tightly. It's the only way he can choke back the shrieking fury within him that was just waiting for the chance to be released.

"You're still mine," he hisses, low and dark, to the ghost of Hoskins in whatever layer of Hell took him. "All of you. And when you'll have me again, I'll prove it, and we'll burn him out of you together."

The predatory growl in her mate's voice struck a low, primal chord down in Blue's stomach; for the first time in a long time, one not associated with fear. She inhaled a sharp, small breath, her forehead pressed tight to Omega's, and slid her fingers from around his wrists to around his neck, urging him nearer with a little muted whine.

I love you, I'm always yours, her tiny nuzzle reaffirmed. "...touch me," she entreated, the words breathed against his lips. "I want to feel you...and not him...ever again." A shudder of remembered revulsion shook her, but Blue simply threw her shivering body into Omega's arms, biting her lips with the effort not to give in. Not again.

He comes as close as she pulls him -- always -- but at her whispered words, he wonders if she's certain of what she's asking him. What she wants and what she can take are often at odds with each other now, and if he triggers that agony in her after this, it would make him a monster.

But actually refusing her is a talent that continues to elude him, and he doesn't want to. He wants her. That's what he always wants. Whatever she'll let him have of her, he'll hoard like a dragon protecting its priceless treasure.

Omega's hands slide from her face into her hair, and his lips part against hers for a long moment before he kisses her, deepening it if she'll let him, a claiming kiss that he's given countless times and yet never means any less. His hand settles at the back of her neck and his arm drops to her waist, palm open and fingers spread to stroke her, wanting to kiss her until she needs him to stop.

Blue flinched from his initial touch, a completely involuntary reflex that eased moments afterwards, allowing her to gently relax into his hands. She held still when he kissed her, but slowly parted her mouth to let him have a little more, shivering lightly at the remembered taste of him on her lips. Blue whimpered into his mouth, clutching at his arms for more than just balance, feeling her body beginning to rise into his hands.

A sniggering laugh echoed in her ears and she jerked her head away, panting, and not out of desire, but firmly shook her head and turned back to Omega, claws fisting in the fabric of his shirt. "No," she demanded, but not to him. To her mate, she insisted, "--don't stop. Please. Don't stop."

She couldn't survive being this pathetic, fragmented thing any longer!

Her abrupt disconnect startles him; somehow the mere chance to kiss her again had temporarily wiped the past from his mind, and he'd let his guard down. If she tried to hurt him just then, it would have been a perfect chance. But she clings to him still, and he can feel the tension in her body as she physically refuses to withdraw from his arms.

"Blue." He calls her to ground her, and nuzzles her back to him. No one else can interfere with this, not when he's finally holding her again, catching her gorgeous full lips with his own and reviving an addiction that he could never bury in the first place.

"...do you remember when we first met?"

Omega strokes the back of her neck, and eases her slowly down to the bed with the weight of his body pressing into hers. He doesn't settle fully on top of her, but he stays close enough to kiss her again between words, and speaks to her so the sound of his voice will scare away anything else.

"I didn't know how to take the feelings you provoked in me." His open mouth ghosts down her throat, whisper-soft, and runs a hand back and forth over her side. "All I knew is that I'd spent my whole life trying to be better than you, and I couldn't let you win. But you did. So easily." The flutter of her pulse receives a slow, worshipful kiss. "I opened up the scars you left in my chest again, to be sure they wouldn't fade."

He called her name and Blue focused on him again, but went tense and stiff when he oh-so-carefully maneuvered her back across the bed, her breath coming faster and harder. Her talons gripped tight, uncaring if she pierced flesh this time, but Omega kept kissing her, pulling her out of her own head and giving her a tangible anchor to cling to.

His voice washed over her, beginning to soothe the instinctive panic which had leapt up in place of unslaked desire, but still she remained rigid, unable to ease the tightness of muscle primed to kick away should danger threaten. And yet the touch of his hands was gentle, soft, reverent.

The warmth of his mouth left gooseflesh rippling over her skin, and a shiver ghosted over her from crown to heel. Blue whimpered, unable to help recalling those memories: heat, earth, green, rain, blood, mate... The memory of the jungle where they'd been born washed over her, filling her nostrils with the smell of steamy leaves after a cooling rain, coupled with Omega's distinctive scent, and she mewled, finally disengaging her nails to slide her hands up to cradle his head, bringing him back to her for a slow, smoldering kiss.

Omega knows not to expect her to simply melt beneath him, not so easily. It may not fully happen at all, but she begged him not to stop and he won't, not unless she exiles him from her side all over again. The sting of her claws digging into him almost makes him pause, but he doesn't make a sound for that. He can take that.

These are better memories. Half of it was pure humiliation for him at the time, but now he knows how lucky he was: if she had kept fighting him, or rejected him, he might never have won her in the end. Or maybe she won him, without either one of them realizing that such a thing could happen... Omega remembers the first clumsy, wild mating just as well as he remembers her curling up against him in a cool furrow in the earth beside the stream.

And now Blue is the one who pulls him in for a kiss that makes his heart race. Now Omega sinks down into her, carefully letting her decide how much of him she wants when she's possessed every part of him from the beginning. Still testing, conscious of any desire to push him away, he eases himself to fit between her legs so she can cradle him there. Nothing more than that.

His weight was distantly familiar--solid, warm and vibrant in her arms; Blue held on to him tightly, never wanting to let go. Each time the ghost of unwelcome fingers tickled over her skin, Omega's hands were there, smoothing down the length of her body, chasing away the imagined slight.

Of their own volition, her knees parted--but the rasp of denim against her bare thighs had her screaming, shoving hard at a leering Hoskins above her and she kicked away, shaking with silent sobs as she huddled against the head of the bed, a pillow clutched in her arms, a pathetic shield.

Dark hair stained her face; Blue hid behind it, ashamed and terrified. She hiccuped and sniffled, muttering a broken litany of, "'m sorry--'m so sorry--" over and over again.

Omega jerks back instantly to free her as she scrambles away from him, something that hurts more than if she'd kicked him square in the chest. But he shouldn't have done that. That was too much, too fast and he should have known better, shouldn't have gotten ahead of himself just because he craves her touch that much.

Her reaction brings him right to his senses, however. He gives her a chance to catch her breath, trying to separate how much her fear twists in his gut like a knife from the need to protect her from it, but as soon as she starts apologizing to him he can't sit still any longer. Apparently he's still reckless enough to try and pry the pillow out of her grip, running a hand up her arm and brushing her hair back from her face.

"Don't," he tells her swiftly, fingers on her cheek, his head once again touching hers. "I'm still right here. We'll stop. But I'm not leaving you."

She couldn't stop shaking. Blue gripped the pillow like grim death, piercing the thin white fabric with sharp nails. Darkness swam in her hazy vision; she felt Omega draw near again but she held still--there was nowhere else to run, really. But then he was there, touching her gently, purring soothing words in her ears, and she was able to catch a swift breath, inhaling shakily.

Tears still coursed down her cheeks as Blue leaned her head against his, wanting to nuzzle into him but knowing that was so unfair, to offer what she couldn't really give. That didn't stop her from carefully unclenching one hand from the pillow and bringing it to stroke his cheek with trembling fingers, letting them drift down to curl in the fabric of his shirt.

Was she always going to feel this way? Would she never be able to have her mate ever again? A fresh wave of misery rolled over her and Blue dropped her head to Omega's shoulder, unable to stop her sobs this time. She cried like a brokenhearted child, sadness breaking her all the way down.

He turns into her hand when she touches him, and then he's embracing her all over again, folding her against his chest while she fractures his heart with her sobs.

She tried, he wants to tell her; it was too much, or he did it wrong, but she still tried. That's more than she's been able to do for weeks -- far more -- and even what they're doing right now, just holding each other, is something she couldn't have managed then. Blue is coming back to him, he's sure of it. But he himself knows how easy it is to get lost in the dark along the way.

Omega tucks her against his shoulder and rests his cheek against her hair. If she wasn't with him, the hatred he feels would be too great to withstand; there has to be something on this earth against which he can vent his rage, and by god he would find it, if not for her. He won't go anywhere unless she's beside him, and even without trying, she keeps the animal in him at bay, tethered to her as guardian and protector instead of a beast of pure destruction.

He strokes her hair down her back, the black waterfall cool to the touch as it dries. There's nothing he can do but let her cry.

When Blue abruptly woke up, it was now full dark. The city lights gleamed a dull orange through the open window, and the stars were obscured by their half-light. She yawned in reflex, starting a little when she realized just where she was. In the middle of a hotel bed, tangled with her mate.

She moved a little to look up at Omega, still asleep and curled protectively over and around her, still fully dressed. Blue felt a pang of heartache; he had to be exhausted, and miserable, suffering over her all hours of the day. She gently stroked his face, wishing she could reward such unswerving devotion.

And although she knew it was foolhardy, and so unfair, she eased up to press a soft kiss to his lips, mouthing I love you silently, and resting her cheek against his.

Being able to sleep beside her is a victory that could sustain him on its own well into the future, but Omega doesn't need a reward to protect her. She's his mate. She's his entire world. He will never be too exhausted to fight for her, or to curl around her in darkness -- whatever she needs from him. Holding her in his arms means more to him that eating or sleeping.

But they'd slept anyway, without intrusion, and Omega drifted off to the scent of her hair and her face pressed into his shirt, and as darkness descended he'd instinctively taken up a stronger position to surround her with his own body, the best defense he has. That she was able to fall asleep is the only reason he could... but her tears will echo in his dreams for a long time.

Being easily woken and utterly attuned to her has him stirring slightly when those beloved lips touch his, and she moves to be closer to him; Omega breathes a slow, heavy sigh, and opens his eyes slowly. Nothing's wrong? Good. His fingers spread gently on her back, and his cheek rubs hers the slightest bit.

Soft in the dark, Blur purred gently, relishing the gentle touches and affection shared between them. She wanted so much to kiss him, to taste his lips and tongue again, but doing so would only take her down a road she wasn't yet ready to travel. No matter how she yearned to do so.

So instead she kissed his cheek, his nose, his chin, the hollow beneath his jaw, the beating pulse in his neck, and finally brought her lips back to his, breathing his breath with greedy abandon. An idea struck, lightening her eyes with interest.

"Let's go for a run," she whispered, "out away from the city." Their lodgings were on the far north side of the town anyway; Blue had spied thick forests not a mile away from the main highway. "Who knows what we'll find out there tonight." She blinked up at him, the ghost of a smile curving her lips. "Want to?"

His eyes fall shut again as her lips move across his skin, and he swallows carefully, telling himself to feel it without giving in the way his body tells him to. How can she be so alluring when he knows full well how she'd react if he tried to answer her too strongly? She can't realize how badly she's teasing him, and it's still nearly impossible to resist.

Somehow, he manages to hold himself still, but for the way he nuzzles her when her warm mouth returns. And just when he starts to fear that this will be the thing to break him -- she draws back, and he meets her eyes to find a glow in them that he hasn't seen in a while.

A run, with her, away from the lights and buildings and cars. Omega stares at her in disbelief. "Hell yes."

Blue at least had the foresight to leave a note, just in case, slipping it beneath Owen's door on their way out. She'd pulled on a dark t-shirt and darker jeans, all the better to blend with the night. Once outside, her mate's hand firm in hers, Blue inhaled a greedy lungful of evening, then set off down the side of the road, northward away from the lights and brightness of the city.

They hadn't gone half a mile when Blue abruptly veered to the left, leapt over a barbed-wire fence and began flying across a wide expanse of open ground, a local's livestock pasture, no doubt. Proven when she abruptly halted, staring wide eyed at the...bovine that eyed them back, more than a little nonplussed to find two such...creatures in its patch.

Blue suddenly bared her teeth and screeched, sending the herd galloping in all directions, making an awful mooooooing racket. Laughing with delight, the Beta hybrid took off after them, swerving this way and that, causing the quadrupeds to veer away from her and head in the opposite direction. She briefly considered catching one, but no doubt it would be missed; she spied tags in floppy ears and the herd was small, besides.

The cows galloped towards their barn, situated behind the dark house, a human dwelling, and Blue let them go, laughing with unmitigated delight. She flashed her mate a coquettish grin, flounced a bit flirtatiously, then gave a toss of her unbound hair and dashed for the trees, not a hundred yards away.

He lets her lead the way, mystified by this mood that's taken her. Which is miserable, really, because this is who his mate used to be before Isla Sorna. Omega never would have thought twice about her pulling him out under the night sky to run god knows where. This time he is alert and attentive from the first step, paying much closer attention to her than to the unfamiliar world around them.

But it's... exhilarating. He follows her over the fence, and the second her raptor blood sends the herd thundering in their swift escape, the feral wind catches him and carries him off in a mad, wonderful whirl. Every predatory instinct demands that he bring one of these animals down for its foolishness, trying to run from him when it has no chance of getting away -- but Blue doesn't attack them, and so he doesn't either, but races her through the stampede with a savage hiss to spur them on.

He catches her eye, and excitement flares in his chest; in an instant, he follows, her own shadow chasing her into the black forest. He is in awe of her now, of her sudden high spirits when only hours ago she was dissolving in his arms, of the strength she has even though he's never forgotten it. And he won't stop until he catches her.

The trees were pines, spindly conifers amid their larger cousins, but Blue navigated through them with the ease of a natural predator. She heard familiar sounds: squirrels up in the branches, owls flitting through the needles, rabbits rustling in the low vegetation. She scented fresh water, not too far ahead; a stream or river, gurgling its way to a larger body of water somewhere.

The air was clear, thick with the scents of summer and alive with the chorus of frogs and night insects. She both heard and felt Omega close behind her, following her every move and the knowledge pleased her, made her run all the faster, whipping through the foliage with careless abandon.

She finally emerged on the bank of the stream--which could be labeled a river, really, the water shimmering in the moon's light. Blue peered over the bank's sandy edge, then dropped a fist-sized rock, laughing softly when she heard the splashy ca-chunk! Without any other hesitation, she immediately began peeling off her clothes, unlacing her boots and pulling them off, as well.

He considers leaping into the trees, but he can follow her more closely on the ground; besides, it's always been a trademark of hers to climb into the branches before he does, as though her feet ought to touch better than the earth. She's not wrong. Sand and dirt aren't good enough for her; even the trees aren't really close enough to the sky.

In the back of his breathless mind, Omega still waits anxiously for the instant when his mate's energy runs out; at the front of it, he hopes they never stop running. However she soon brings them across something new and interesting, to the sound of rushing water, pouring like molten silver through the woods. His gaze flies to her, and his heart grips itself tight in his chest. God, she is so beautiful, a haunting vision wearing nothing but moonlight.

And it makes him pause, not knowing whether he can trust himself. But he has to, for her sake -- he's not going to drop anchor on her momentum, not even if it carries them both all the way from one ocean to another... or naked into a river deep in the unfamiliar forest. Snarling at himself on the inside, Omega swiftly drags his shirt over his head and strips down after her so he can follow her straight in.

Blue dipped a cautious toe into the swirling water, withdrew her foot, then simply hopped over the bank, landing shoulder deep in the dark depths with a sparkling little laugh. Then she was gone, darting beneath the surface and cutting a swift line towards the other shore, some twenty or so yards away. She didn't come up for air until she reached it, blowing out her breath and throwing back her dripping hair.

The current in their swimming pool was flowing, but not too strongly; very little silt was present in the mostly clear water. There were several very surprised perch and bream in the pool, skitting away from the new threat to hide beneath submerged rocks and fallen trees. Blue spied two or three turtles, also disappearing into crags along the shore here and there.

But that didn't bother her in the slightest; she simply swam and cavorted as she liked, splishing and splashing with almost childlike abandon. The moon was half-full, shedding more than enough light for raptor eyes to see by, and the entire world was filled with silver light and the sounds of the night and the river, rolling on past.

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