Evaporating Empathy (Closed)

Private Dougall was checking on their survival supplies. He'd done it this morning, but it was abruptly a hell of a lot more important since their stay was going to be prolonged now, and wild animals would ransack the supply boxes without a second thought. If that happened, they were all in deep shit. Private Raymond he'd sent to set up the tents and moisture traps. More busy work, this time nothing but. There'd been no choice. It had been everything he could do to stop the fight in the first place.

Sergeant Moray stares down at the shattered pieces of their radio and tries to will them back together. It doesn't work, and it's beneath him, so he squeezes his eyes shut instead, takes a fortifying breath, and looks back up. His eyes are flat and green and empty as porcelain.

"How did it happen?" he says, and kneels beside the wreckage as he tries to make sense of the pieces. The battery is fine, but it looks like the antenna has completely shattered. The top part has broken open entirely, and capacitors glimmer within the faint shade. He doesn't have enough mechanical know-how to fix this. Maybe jury-rigging an antenna, but not this. "Please at least tell me it was an accident."

Private Dana isn't completely incompetent, which is what makes this confusing. She had fire, a drive to improve herself, and volunteering for this survival exercise out the way out in the fucking Outback, over a twelve-hour flight for two weeks out in the sticks learning how to not die from exposure - that took grit. Grit doesn't fix stupid or the radio, though.

Two weeks, and their only radio is in pieces on the first day. If the manifests they'd been sent out with were right, they had maybe five days of supplies to get settled in with before they had to start hunting, and that was without activity. They'd have to get more and soon.

Two weeks, and probably a couple days before they even started to send out the search parties after that.

The more he thinks about it, the more the entire concept pisses Moray off. His jaw clenches and he glances aside, sharp, and tries to estimate the position of the sun. It's probably ten A.M., which means the dead heat of the afternoon has yet to come. They needed shelter before they started losing water to the burning heat of the noon sun. Water was going to be their main struggle.

He scrubs a hand through his hair, and can already feel the first faint moisture of sweat beading on his brow. He'd gotten a haircut fresh before packing for this trip, so he was down to the military-standard buzz, just a thin layer of black over his skull. That's good, since as the biggest man present (standing seventy-six inches) he'd have to do the heaviest share of labor. The other two men were Aussie natives, less than six feet apiece, and Dana was shorter than that.

He grimaces, and carefully doesn't think about all the fun digging out foxholes for shelter is going to be.

Katherine Dana, or "KD" as her friends called her, was in deep shit. She watched her boss process the implications of the broken radio with growing dread, the same dread she herself was feeling. Suddenly volunteering for this survival exercise didn't seem like the adventure she thought it would be; shit just got serious.

"I missed, Sir," she said quietly as she watched him take measure of the sun and its distance in the sky. Sergeant Moray looked at her askance.

She cleared her throat and tightened her jaw but refused to look away from his intimidating stare. "Raymond tossed it to me and I missed," she explained. "I fumbled it, it ricocheted off a rock and landed... well, you see how it landed," she concluded while gesturing at the radio in his hands. Her heart raced. She wanted this training exercise to prove to herself that she could do it; she wanted -no, needed, to prove to herself that she was strong and capable because she was only 20 years old and had a whole lot of life left to live. She didn't want to do it timidly.

"I'm sorry, Sir," she said sincerely, with a very slight tremble in her voice. She shook her head, her expression crestfallen, before she quickly drew in a deep breath and righted herself. She stared at a point slightly to the left of the Sergeant's eyes. "Tell me what I can do to fix this."

The story actually makes Moray angrier, though now his spite has broadened his focus. He closes his eyes, and when all he can see in the blackness is the phantom image of two of his troopers tossing their only fucking radio around like a baseball his teeth grit and they snap back open. His face flushes and his eyes dilate with unfettered frustration as he steps right up into Private Dana's personal space, chest to chest with her.

At this distance the Sergeant's size is intimidating; he's tall, but also broad of shoulder, a craggy mass of hard angles, clenched jaw, and obstreperous temper. More than that is the absolute focus of his impressive temper; his eyes zero in on Dana like she's the only thing that exists, dismissing the rest of the universe as they lock on and try to burn her out of reality with sheer ire. In contrast, when he raises a single finger and turns Private Dana's head back so that her gaze matches his, Moray's touch is perfectly controlled.

"While I don't doubt that Raymond is a fucking idiot," he says, soft, "I equally doubt that he just tossed the damn thing at you apropos of nothing. You egg each other on, and I know it. He's mad you got tits, and you're mad he noticed, or whatever the fuck issue you two can't solve."

Moray's head inclines. Staring him dead in the eye feels like making eye contact with a raptor, something designed to eat humans for breakfast. He doesn't blink. "The issue is solved now. I am involved now. Raymond is going to regret every single fucking moment of his life that lead up to this moment, and so are you. Report back to my tent and stand at attention until I feel like I can talk to you without wanting to strangle you. We'll discuss this further then. Is that understood, Private?"

His hands flex idly, once, and Moray crosses them behind his back in parade rest rather than reach for Dana's throat or shirt or - he doesn't even know. His blood is pumping and anger has always made him crazy, the reason he's still a Sergeant and not a noncom. Even the passing thought of that makes his blood pressure rise a little more.

It took every ounce of fortitude KD felt not to take a step back when Sarge got into her personal space. He was livid. Absolutely fucking livid. The air around him crackled and sparked with its intensity.

"While I don't doubt that Raymond is a fucking idiot," he says, soft, "I equally doubt that he just tossed the damn thing at you apropos of nothing. You egg each other on, and I know it. He's mad you got tits, and you're mad he noticed, or whatever the fuck issue you two can't solve."

KD resisted the urge to lick her dry lips as she concentrated on maintaining eye contact with Moray; it was no easy task. His eyes were a unique color of green which made her uncomfortable and fascinated all at the same time. She often found it difficult to look at him, thus her trick of looking slightly to the left, but at this proximity she couldn't avoid his gaze. She blinked dusky lashes over her deep blue eyes. She, herself, had unique-colored eyes, though hers were deeper blue with flecks of gold and paler blue. The color stood out more when she wasn't in uniform; her hair tucked up under her cap was dark brown: a perfect foil for her eyes, pale complexion, and pink lips.

"...back to my tent and stand at attention until I feel like I can talk to you without wanting to strangle you. We'll discuss this further then. Is that understood, Private?"

KD focused on the tail end of Sarge's tirade. She'd earned it. She'd take her lumps, though part of her wondered why Raymond wasn't also waiting at attention in Moray's tent. For a split second she thought to ask, but the moment passed quickly as she watched Moray flex his hands, and then stand at parade rest. That was her cue. Move.

Move! she willed herself silently, and realized with mounting fear she was paralyzed to the spot. What the ever living hell?! she thought to herself.

Truth was, Raymond was more to blame than KD, but KD was no snitch. Raymond didn't waste any time in letting KD know he thought she had no business being on such an expedition. "No place for a woman," he said, then scoffed to himself as he adjusted his growing erection while staring at her tits. He'd made her existence hell from that moment on. Any chance he could take to trip her up or make her look like a fool, he took it. For the most part she was able to keep that from Sergeant Moray, but the radio incident was too big a break.

KD raised stormy blue eyes to Moray's green. She saw the incredulity in his eyes at her hesitation to obey his order and thought better of addressing her concerns with him now. "Yes, Sir!" she said instead, and stiffly snapped to attention before taking her leave.

Raymond saw her coming as he sorted moisture traps. "Ready to give up yet, love?" he snickered.

"Fuck you," KD replied as she stormed towards Moray's tent. Why were some guys just pricks from the get-go? Was it her tits, truly?! The thought pissed her off enough she thrust out her chest in defiance. "See these, Raymond?" she called softly, so Moray wouldn't overhear, "You're just pissed you're never gonna get. with. these.," she said as she gestured suggestively toward her full, plump breasts. She did her best impression of a stripper showing her wares as her hands cupped and gently shook her tits for her captive audience.

KD was a firecracker, a short little ball of boom. What she lacked in stature she made up for with curves. Hers was most-definitely a female body: no waif here, but that made her all the more enticing. She was built like a gymnast, but with boobs. And generous, beautifully-formed ones at that.

"Just remember that when you pitch a tent in your pants tonight," she said, then ducked quickly into Moray's tent.

Inside, KD took a deep breath and closed her eyes, grounding herself and bringing her awareness back to the present. It was a technique she'd picked up in the yoga class she took the last semester of her failed attempt at college. She let her anger at Raymond and fear of Moray war inside while outwardly she assumed parade rest position, squared her shoulders, and hunkered down for the long haul.

Moray closes his eyes for a long moment and breathes - lets the blood surging in his veins settle to something approaching normality, and his sulfurous temper cool. Then he turns and heads for where Dougall was sorting through the last crate of supplies.

Corn-fed is a description written for the Iowan farmboy; bigger even than Moray, with the same short-cropped hair and square jaw, but without the stress lines and shadows that the older sergeant's constant stress has inflicted across his face. Dougall is a deep thinker of shallow things: not smart, and not quick to lead. He'll work himself to the bone, though, and he has a certain kind of old-fashioned manners, though no doubt they piss off Dana in an entirely different way than Raymond's bullshit.

"Things alright?" he asks without looking up, as he counts off the MREs in the container. Moray already knows its thirty-two a container, and they only have the one, so they have little more than a week at three a person, four persons to a fireteam. It's good to keep the boy occupied though.

"I'll settle it out," Moray replies by way of an answer, which the private accepts without complaint. "Take your pick of tents. I'm going to knock heads together all week. Keep your head out of it and you'll be fine. You haven't got issues."

"Sir," Dougall says with a nod. He probably didn't even register the terse-ass compliment for what it was. Moray can't help but like the kid sometimes. There are worse things to be than simple.

Moray turns and heads for the prime troublemaker now. Raymond is still sneering in the direction that Dana went, his hands making little grabbing motions that he probably isn't conscious of, and he definitely isn't aware of the half-chub he's popping in his pants. Moray can guess what's happened again. The private'll never have the balls to make a move, though, and Dana hates his guts anyways. "Private Raymond?"

"Yeah?" he replies, without turning around. First mistake.

"I didn't hear a sir," Moray says, tone mild.

Raymond's spine stiffens involuntarily as he recognizes the danger signs, beaten into him viciously over the preceding weeks. "Yes, sir!"

Sergeant Moray nods, strides past Raymond, and comes back with a pair of mirrored signal panels, about a foot wide apiece, probably about twenty pounds. "Take these about a mile out either way and plant them face-up. Reflective signaling is going to be our best shot at getting help now."

The words make sense, but Raymond glances back between Moray and the panels with a confused look. A mile round-trip for two trips: four miles is a pretty decent jog in itself, but carrying twenty pounds of added gear plus kit is going to make that a grueling exercise.

Sergeant Moray's expression remains perfectly still. "Now, private."

Raymond's face darkens, and he snaps to and picks up one panel, then begins the long jog out of sight down a gentle incline. He'll regret that when he has to go uphill in the dark instead on the return trip. Meanwhile, Moray makes his way to the last member of his fireteam, and parts the flap of his tent and steps inside, past Private Dana. He seats himself and pulls out a logistics book and marks out their location and the date, then scans it for anything nearby they can use to survive.

"Dana," he says, eventually. "I realize that Raymond is a fuckhead. He's an instigator. He is also nothing you aren't going to have to deal with anywhere else in the Force, and when you cocktease every asshole you run into, you're eventually going to get into more trouble than you're worth, which is already a problem I'm faced with when I have to think about you."

The problem is that Dana (or KD, as she prefers) is a fucking bombshell, and is perfectly aware of it. Short, stacked, and curvy, confident and brash, a lifestyle of taunting people with the perfect ass they can't have is inviting a boatload of problems her way in the machine of the army.

Moray glances up and meets her eyes again, the sizzling rage from earlier muted into the general annoyance he associates with other humans in general. "If you get pissed when he treats you like a pair of tits, and then shake them in his face, you're crossing your fucking wires. Be professional, or get used to being treated like a skank. A woman like you doesn't have a whole lot of other choices. It sucks, but it's true."

KD sucked in a wary breath as Moray entered the tent. She waited for him to make eye contact, but he was too engrossed in his logistics book. "I realize that Raymond is a fuckhead. He's an instigator. He is also nothing you aren't going to have to deal with anywhere else in the Force, and when you cocktease every asshole you run into, you're eventually going to get into more trouble than you're worth, which is already a problem I'm faced with when I have to think about you."

Heat flooded KD's body; it wasn't just her cheeks that turned red, it was her neck and chest, too. Sarge didn't sugar-coat shit. She avoided his gaze and concentrated instead on maintaining perfect posture as embarrassment washed over her in waves. KD didn't think it could get worse, but it did:

"If you get pissed when he treats you like a pair of tits, and then shake them in his face, you're crossing your fucking wires. Be professional, or get used to being treated like a skank. A woman like you doesn't have a whole lot of other choices. It sucks, but it's true."

He'd seen. Moray had seen how she'd taunted Raymond. Suddenly KD felt like a pre-pubescent teen again, about the age she was when she started developing breasts, when the body she'd been so used to and comfortable with started changing and attracting attention she didn't know how to deal with; she'd learned, though. For KD, the sexual 'taunting', as Moray put it, was a way for KD to take charge of her sexuality. She didn't like the way men looked at her necessarily, but she'd learned to own it and throw it back in their faces as a weapon: "here is your lust and lasciviousness, look at it, own it, revel in it" type of thing. She liked to watch them wind themselves up over her body, and then watch their reactions as they realized they were drowning in their own lust and she wasn't about to be the lifesaver. Changing the world, one testosterone-fueled male at a time, or so KD told herself to justify her actions.

But Moray, Moray just called her on it. Oh, he might not know all the whys and wherefores, but he called her on her behavior and pointed out how it affects her life. He put into words what she'd not yet been able to decipher from the mess of emotions that had been at war inside her throughout her teens. She hated him for being right.

"Be professional?!" It erupted from KDs lips without thought. "Be professional," she repeated, this time with more sarcasm and incredulity. "Sure thing, Boss. Because every asshole out there with a dick -and a few with tits, I might add- can only seem to think with their genitals, and that's okay, but when I fight fire with fire it's not?!" A slight pause while KD drew a reinforcing breath, "Here's a thought, how about you and Raymond and every other wanker in the service with too much testosterone and too little intelligence learn to control your baser instincts instead of punishing me for having tits?!"

Silence descended like a heavy blanket in the tent.

Moray nods twice, and finishes writing the sentence he's jotting down; folds the logbook closed around his pen, sets it aside, dusts off his hand on his pants, even as a steady red flush runs up his collar and neck, turning him a dull brick red throughout. Then he comes up off the ground like his namesake in a single, sinuous muscular contraction that surges point-blank into her face, staring eye to eye with the younger girl, green and staring and mad as his fingers sink into her hair and jerk her head against his. Their noses and cheeks brush, but whatever intimacy there would be is subsumed into the realization that Dana is less than an inch away from something that solves its problems by killing them.

"When you fight fire with fire you are just fucking waiting for someone willing to watch it burn to come along and bend you over in your own ashes," Moray whispers, elevated by rage into that cyclopean intensity that will not look away. The susurrus of his breath on her neck as he speaks slithers down her neck like a chill. "You will still be out of the Force, you will still have those tits, and the only difference you will have made is that you have motivated someone to see how fucking much they can take from you before you crumble. You can tease and taunt assholes, but there are things out here that will eat you whole, Dana. Try not to look so fucking appetizing."

His hand uncurls from the back of Dana's neck one finger at a time, and he doesn't so much back up as coil away, still staring at her with animalistic intensity. The electricity of their contact still sizzles on the skin and Moray's breath comes short and almost inaudible as he waits. "Get out of my tent."

He doesn't deal well with challenges. He's still a Sergeant because his response to challenges of his authority are brutal and swift, and that doesn't fly as an NCO. In a squad it makes him terrible and effective, but over a wider variety of men and others used to command it just makes him a tyrant.

Moray concentrates on his breathing, tries to steady it, and tries not to think about pinning Dana against the ground and tearing all that arrogance from her along with her clothes.

The heat was coming. KD could tell the difference in the air as soon as she exited Moray's tent. It wasn't here yet and wouldn't be until later, but the temperature difference was palpable on skin that felt suddenly cool to the touch. That happens when all the blood built up in rage once pooled in your head suddenly rushes to your toes.

She walked briskly across the ground about forty paces and stopped, suddenly. Where exactly did she have to go? She saw Dougall lounging by the supplies, his hat tucked over his eyes. If he'd noticed her departure or heard any of the heated words between her and Moray, his relaxed, lupine position indicated nothing.

KD closed her eyes, her pale features marred in confusion. What the hell? she thought, her mind rapidly processing the feelings and emotions the last few minutes brought. She could still feel Moray's fist in her hair, feel his skull and flesh firm against her own as every inch of his body stiffly, and irrevocably, claimed physical superiority over her own. She felt very small, and yet too large all at once. She wanted to shrink away from the intensity of the man, but her body reacted to him physically in ways she wasn't quite prepared to handle. She was aroused. She could feel the tell-tale wetness between her legs that had nothing to do with the heat. She was so damned angry, how could she be aroused?! But she was, and she didn't quite know what to do with it.

She exhaled a deep sigh and ran her fingers through her dark hair. It tingled where Moray has pulled it. He had been so very close... it terrified her that the thought both frightened and aroused her. What the hell is wrong with me?! she thought as she put on her hat, squared her shoulders, and went in search of shade.

Moray counts sets of breaths until the maniacal rage ebbs to low tide, the omnipresent, sullen burn he can feel throbbing in the back of his head like a low headache at all times. He's never not been angry: he exists on stress and intensity, perpetually burning. There are a few habits and hobbies he can distract himself with, and repetitive labor soothes his mind out with physical activity, but it never blows out.

This is all old hat, now. He's used to the sneering burn. The job is just to sublimate it in irritation and then ignore it. It'd be easy if Dana wasn't so god-damned in his face with her sexuality all the time, and he'd bet money she really had been completely unaware of it up to this point - she meets challenges and antipathy with her own sneering sexuality, dominant in her own body and dismissing people on the most primal of levels, unworthy of mating. The heat of her contempt is impossible to ignore for someone so in touch with their own savage disdain.

Moray dismisses others the same way, but until now had never associated sexuality with it - merely ignored everything as moving bits of meat he could break if he decided to. Dana's meat too, in that sense, but he also wants to bend her over the nearest crate and fuck her wild first, pants around her knees and tits hanging out under her shirt, panting for breath. The collision in instincts is maddening. The sergeant hisses in frustration as he feels himself stir at the image that conjures, and does another set of breath counts before he steadies.

Waiting won't help. His mind is baiting itself. Go forward, keep busy. Hope she isn't stupid enough to provoke him again. There are too few witnesses and the violence stirring too profound.

Moray ditches the logbook and heads outside.

~*~

He spots Dougall almost instantly, at ease on top of the crates he'd counted. The sight soothes him a little. The big boy knows animals, worked with them all his life, and suits his body language in a way that makes it easier to deal with the other humans. Moray grants him a nod then spots Dana in the shadow of one of the tents. He barely looks at her.

"Listen up, sit-rep time," Moray booms. He doesn't shout, precisely, but he's capable of raising even his conversational voice to impressive volumes that echo and blast out over other people talking.

"We're out a radio, and we're far from contact. I'd have you running and doing exercises, but I don't know how much water we're going to have for the long run and we're not wasting it with sweat until we find a steady source. We're in the Gibson Desert, and there is no rain forecasted. Lake McKay is about eighty-five klicks east, and we're heading that direction - we make that, we're fine, but that's a hell of a hike in this kind of weather. I'm teaching Dougall to make solar stills and we'll only camp near plants we can tap for water. Once we reach Mackay, we can purify its water for drinking, but do not put water from there in your mouth directly; it's a salt lake and metallic elements build up in it."

Moray nods out in the direction Raymond had taken off in. "I'm making Raymond leave a trail of reflective signal panels. They'll tip off S&R where we're headed and with any luck once we hit MacKay we'll be easy to find. We'll be out in about two and a half weeks, probably. The trick is going to be lasting the hike and then finding enough food for four of us."

He claps his hands and points upwards. "Noon heat is coming on, and I'm not having anyone out in the sun for it. We're hiding out until the heat passes and then hiking in the evenings and the first part of night. Full dark we're camping out and sealing the tents - there's a hell of a lot of crawlies out in the starlight that we can't afford to have someone step on by accident, because if you're snakebit or stung by a scorpion you're fucked, I've got no antivenom and we probably can't carry you."

"In general, Dougall, I'll be setting up the stills and showing you how they're done. Dana, you're setting up the tree bags to collect the water they transpire along with the dew sheets. Between the two we should get enough water. Raymond is in charge of hunting and setting up the campsite, he's our best shot."

The businesslike discussion soothes Moray. Survival is simple, uncomplicated. Do not die. None of this conflicting bullshit.

KD listened to Moray dish out orders in that controlled and cryptic manner she was beginning associate with him. She wondered briefly if he felt the sexual attraction too, or if he just talked shit to scare her and teach her a lesson. She decided not to spend too much time thinking about it, however, and instead concentrated on her assigned task.

Methodically she placed dew sheets, plugging her mind into the task to channel the energy and frustration she felt. She wished it were more physical, but she knew that later today she'd wish for the idleness of this moment, and then she'd be wishing she could just do something simple like set dew traps.

Sweat trickled between her breasts as she worked, but she paid it no mind. She'd be a lot sweatier before the trip was done, and a lot dirtier too. She smiled. Maybe two weeks of dirt and grunge would put an end to Raymond's tormenting her.

The noon heat passes drearily. It's about four hours of dead time and there's not much to do in it besides stew and aggravate each other - which is what Raymond would presumably do, but he came back about an hour into the heatwave and passed out almost immediately in his tent for a nap, exhausted by the brutal round trip he'd been ordered onto. Meanwhile, Moray - itches.

He wishes there's a better word for it. His irritation tics and pulses without discernable source, and he can't stop thinking about Dana barking back at him, provoked and fierce. He's very certain this is precisely what goes through Raymond's head, and that comparison pisses him off, because he doesn't like the douchebag either. Everything, all of it, is pulling at his temper, and sitting here in the raw heat doing nothing isn't helping him with it. His lips pull back from his teeth.

Without quite thinking about it, or realizing what he's doing, Moray is back on his feet and headed outside, to where Dana is finishing up the last of the traps, sealing the plastic bags around the tree branches closest to where their camp is. He uses a pocket airbrush to test the seal integrity (a useful tool for desert survival) and nods when the air pressure fails to be noticeable through the plastic. "That'll work. It's not a lot of water - maybe two cups when you count it all up - but that's still enough water to keep someone alive. Water loss is our biggest enemy out here."

He's standing beside her, and the heat of his body, the feel of it displacing the air, is faintly electric: a dire, mutual awareness. Moray inhales, then settles himself with a harsh exhalation. "I'll handle Raymond. He'll say stupid shit, and I don't doubt that, but this isn't the kind of situation he can fuck around in anymore. You've got my word on that."

It's not an apology, but then Moray doesn't really believe one is necessary. More - an acknowledgement that her concerns are valid, even after the argument. Equally, a warning to keep her cool at whatever comes on the days to follow.

The big sergeant isn't watching her, or staring at her, but there is a laser-fine awareness of Dana that is almost worse; instead of just leering, he's watching her like something dangerous, preternaturally aware of where she is and what she's doing, like a wild dog or something. He's aware, in his bones, that somehow Dana is a threat to him, but just not clear on how exactly.

His self-control, maybe.

Those empty green eyes cut over to Dana's, and Moray makes a brief, curt gesture. "You should get to your tent. Heat's coming."

It comes off as dismissive.