[main] - [updates] - [my fanfiction] - [recommendations] - [livejournal] - [about me] - [miscellaneous] - [guestbook] - [webrings]

It had been four days since Bester had left Babylon 5, without Kelsey, and Garibaldi had been left with the reminder of what had been done to him.

He woke in the night, gulping for breath, aroused, desperate, choking down sounds of strangled desire and terror and awe from dreams of the psi cop. Half the terror was from not knowing if they were dreams out of his own mind... or if Bester had returned to the station and intruded on his thoughts again, bringing to the surface all the hidden, secret wants that haunted him.

And his shoulder hurt. Bester had bitten him at the conclusion of their sweet, vicious fuck. "So you will remember... and know it was real" Bester had told him in that coarse, velvet voice. The bite throbbed now as he sat up in bed for the fourth night in a row, drenched in sweat, not sure whether to scream or cry with the wanting that surged in him so brightly. He missed it... missed the sweetness Bester had been in his body, the magnificence the telepath had been in his mind. He thought sometimes, deep in the night, he would trade his soul for it.

And if that, what else would he trade to have it again?

He knew what beckoned. The darkness of seduction, of obsession, the path he could travel that would spiral down on itself leaving destruction in its wake, death on its edges until nothing was left but corruption, rage and emptiness. He knew it from his drinking bouts, when alcohol had controlled his life. And the more he thought about that, the more he arrived at a terrifying, horrific understanding.

It was this revelation that forced him to decide he could not keep this to himself, whatever the consequences. Even if... even if Bester punished him by withholding that sweetness...

He fought down a whimper. He was stronger than this. But... the alcohol hadn't been the foundation of his problems with obsession.

There was only one person he could go to with this.

Sinclair had not been totally insensible of Garibaldi's mood. He knew when Michael was upset about something, and knew full well also the introverted, destructive tendencies Michael had in his personality. So much work... the man had done so much work toward making his life more constructive, achieving personal happiness and doing something with himself and his talents. But both of them were ever vigilant. It had been Sinclair who had gotten Garibaldi to come to grips with his alcoholism and do something about it, and out of it had come a powerful and intense friendship that followed them throughout their careers. They had separated, and now were back together again in service to Earth. It was, in many ways, a service to each other, too. A personal bond of loyalty and respect.

He had started to become concerned when the days went by and Michael didn't approach him. They often talked of private matters, trusted each other to hear the fear and doubt and isolation that each man carried around with him. They had each other and little else. And if Michael couldn't talk to him...

Finally, on the fourth night, late into the evening, the door signal stirred Sinclair out of a meditative doze. He had been listening to Beethoven... piano sonatas. It made him think of other times, other places that were safe and passionate. But the door...

"Computer, stop playback." The music ceased. He stood up to approach the door, certain who he would find on the other side. "Come."

Michael looked intense and tight-lipped, clothed casually but with an air of complete unconcern, as though the clothes were only there to let him go through the world unremarked.

"I'm glad you came," Sinclair said. "I don't like to think there's something you felt you had to hide from me."

Garibaldi dropped his eyes to the carpet and Sinclair felt compassion flood him in a wave of warmth. He hated seeing such agony, especially in Michael. /My God, what can it be? He's got his share of personal demons but this looks like shame -- and I don't know if I want to think about that./ Sinclair moved out of the way and Garibaldi entered his quarters, understanding the silent nature of the invitation. He sat down uneasily.

Sinclair sat down in a chair across from him, also silent. Something heavy had followed Michael in and held him down, impossibly weary, yet with a nervous tension that Sinclair could sense below the surface, wound up like a man who needed to move or it would kill him not to. Michael swallowed.

"Jeff, there's something I have to tell you about, and I don't know what you're gonna say but this is driving me over the edge and I'm scared." It all came out in one unbroken tangle of fear and pain. "You have to know as the commander of the station -- I don't want to become a liability. I thought I could handle it but now I'm not sure. I'm afraid of what I could do... who I could compromise."

/Jesus,/ Sinclair thought. /He's started drinking again. Damn. Damn damn damn -- /

"Michael," Sinclair said gently. "Whatever it is, we can handle it. I'm glad you want to tell me if it's as bad as it sounds. Please -- let me worry about the consequences. That's my job."

It was supposed to be a light remark, meant to ease the mood, but Garibaldi looked away from him. There was a dark pause, and then Garibaldi stood up.

"I can't think of a way to say it, so I guess I'd better show you." He unfastened his dark bronze shirt and shrugged out of it slowly. Sinclair saw the flinch of pain and frowned, half confused and half disquieted. As Garibaldi let the shirt slide down to his elbows, he turned around, offering his body as the explanation he couldn't make his mouth provide. Sinclair was on his feet without realizing it.

"Good Lord," Sinclair said. He thought for a moment that shadows were obscuring part of Garibaldi's shoulder, but as he moved closer he realized that the light in the room was perfectly adequate -- the darkness was in Michael's flesh. A savage, purple and black bruise covered one of his shoulder blades. It was a bite, deep into the muscle. Sinclair reached out to touch it empathetically, laying his hand on Garibaldi's skin.

"How did you get this?" Sinclair asked. This was no love bite -- this was a wound, a marking, violent and cruel. Thoughts of alcoholism relapses were gone. This was obviously not about that. He probed softly at the edge of it and Garibaldi winced. "Why didn't you go to medlab?" Sinclair could practically feel his own shoulder ache just looking at Garibaldi's body.

"I didn't want to answer questions about who did it," Garibaldi said plainly. "I know how bad it looks, and somebody would have gotten nosy. But it didn't break the skin... I think he was careful about that."

"He? Michael, who -- "

"Bester," Garibaldi said. "Bester did it."

"The psi cop?" Sinclair said. Everything clicked into place, and Sinclair felt rage well up out of his soul, white-hot and deadly. "That son of a -- "

"Jeff." Garibaldi's voice, hard and low, stopped Sinclair cold. It was the sound of a rebuke, even of anger. Anger at whom, he couldn't tell. "You don't understand. Bester didn't rape me. I wanted him to do it. I needed it and he knew and I begged for it..." He stopped before his voice gave out, trembling with desperation, with longing and fury and pain. He pulled away from Sinclair's hand, jerking his shirt back on as if against a chill. He stood there, silent.

"Michael," Sinclair said finally, softly. His belly had gone cold, and he knew he didn't have the right words for this. He knew how he sounded, how he looked, and wondered if he dared to consciously admit the truth that his astonishment was hiding. "Michael, I..."

"I didn't think you would understand," Garibaldi said. "That's okay. I expected I'd have to explain. I just don't know how... or if I can. Just... try to hear me, okay?"

"All right," Sinclair said sincerely. "You know you can tell me anything." Garibaldi nodded, still facing away from him.

"Ever since I found out about psi cops... when I was little... I was fascinated by them. Telepathic law enforcement. Like Earthforce and...and magic put together in one person. To be sensitive to something that we can't perceive. Can you imagine? Do you ever really think about that? My God... like seeing or hearing but we can't conceive it..." He shivered. "There's so much power in them, Jeff. Power like you don't know. I didn't know until...until Bester..." His voice trailed off again and Sinclair heard him curse violently under his breath. "God, I gotta sit down."

Sinclair followed him back to the couch. Michael sat in the middle, and didn't seem to object when Sinclair took up one end close to him. Maybe that was a good sign. Michael sat with his head in both hands, bowed over as if weeping but he was unnaturally silent. Then he drew a ragged breath. "It feels so stupid to try to explain it," he murmured. "To try to explain what I feel when I see a psi cop. Why I have to avoid them because I know they can feel it in me. The power of what they are. The threat, the force. Domination. Being dominated. It doesn't get any more intense than a psi cop, Jeff. And I need that. I need to be controlled. I live on the edge, damn it... the more I try to control my life, the more I screw it up. If I let go... same thing. But Bester didn't ask me to make choices. Didn't ask me to make decisions. He made them. Told me what to do. Took what he wanted... what I wanted. And I didn't have to ask for it. He knew."

Sinclair swallowed this time. What he heard made him wild inside -- hunger, fear, agony. He felt pain of his own for Michael's pain, but hearing the desire, the lust, made his cock tremble and stiffen. Michael needed power. Needed domination. Sinclair's hand clenched. "Do you know what it feels like to have your most powerful, secret needs met?" Michael asked. "To have someone know what they are without any words being spoken and just...just do it? Oh, God, Jeff--" Garibaldi leapt to his feet and paced across the room nervously, hands together. "God, oh God..." He stopped at the wall, putting both hands on it. "Things even I didn't know I wanted... and he did them."

"How did it start?" Sinclair asked softly. He knew Michael needed to talk about everything, to bare his soul. Sinclair knew that Michael needed his witness, and secretly he wanted to hear it, to learn the things about Michael that would never have come up except for this. "When Bester came aboard four days ago? Was that the first time?"

"Yes. The only time, too. Before that it was just...just wanting... all my life. Oh, God, all my life..." His voice shook. "I don't know when it turned sexual. I never felt the change. But it's all I can remember, wanting to be taken, to be fucked by a psi cop. I'd been around psi cops before. Maybe they knew and didn't care. Maybe they couldn't tell. But Bester knew and he...he did something about it. He came into my dreams while he was on the station, Jeff. Put himself in my dreams and I woke up screaming." Sinclair heard the truth in his voice -- screaming not with fear, but desire and need. "First I got mad. That bastard violating my head like that. I didn't think... I went down to his quarters to chew him out. Can you believe that? Can you believe how fucking stupid..."

"Maybe you wanted him to know," Sinclair said quietly. "Secretly wanted him to do something."

"Yeah, I... maybe I did," Michael swallowed. "He played dumb at first... testing me, I think. But I didn't back off, and he burned me. That's the only way I can describe how it felt when he spoke. It was like being seared to the soul. The sound of his voice. I panicked and started to leave... and that's when I heard his voice in my head. He told me what I was giving up by leaving... what I would never have if I backed away from it. But it wasn't the words... not that they were really words. It was like...like whole concepts... emotions that my brain translated into words. Damn, I can't explain. But I felt what he was saying to me. Felt his own emotions, felt the obscenity of what he wanted to do to me, the brutality of it. Jeff, it felt so good, oh Jesus."

Sinclair had seen Michael do a lot of things. Cry, among them. But he'd never heard such rawness, such naked urges in Michael's heart. It wrenched him, the pure needs that Michael must have felt, must still be feeling to be so tormented by desire.

"And you let him do what he wanted," Sinclair murmured. He saw Michael's head nod tiredly from across the room. Sinclair felt something hot ripple up his back in response to it. Pure submission...

"That's just it, Jeff," he said quietly. "It wasn't just what he wanted. He was reflecting my wants, giving me the things that provoked me the most. He...he told me to go back to my quarters and wait for him. And I did. I can't describe what that was like -- waiting for him. Shaking so hard I thought I was going to be sick, still able to feel an echo of him in my mind, like a taste or a smell. I know what his mind tastes like, Jeff!"

"So he came to your quarters," Sinclair said gently.

"Yeah... and everything just... happened. I know what people would think. Even while it was happening I could practically hear your reaction to finding out. That I would want what he did. That I'd want him. That's the really creepy part, Jeff. I know how you see him, how everybody else sees him. But I remember what his mouth tastes like, what his cock tastes like, how he sounds when he comes. How he fucks... with his thoughts wound up inside my head... way beyond the most obscene, sexual thing you can imagine. Christ, Jeff, when I was close to coming he held it back from inside my own mind! Held onto my climax like claws holding onto something real -- I could feel it -- " He shuddered and rubbed his arms. "I could feel it. Then he let go and...and... we both..." Sinclair heard him swallow and realized it was a sob. "God damn it, Jeff. God damn it." It was a whisper. "I think he's beautiful. There isn't anything more beautiful than what he did, how he made me feel. And I want it again. I want to get in a Starfury, go to Earth and find him so he can do it again. I know how nuts that is, but Jeff...I want him. I want to be fucked like that again. And I don't know what I would do to get it."

He went silent and Sinclair knew what he was dealing with. He had known his own varieties of obsession, had experienced how much his sense of reality could change while he was fixated on something. But to see sexual magnificence in psi cops, for Michael's experience to be so overwhelming that it would override everything else...

"You're afraid you could betray us if he asked you to," Sinclair said. "Not that he could blackmail you... but that he could just ask... demand it... and you'd obey. You're afraid because you think you really would if he tried it."

Michael nodded violently.

"Fuck, Jeff, I think I would. If he asked me, today, to betray you, the station, the Earth Alliance, in exchange for that. I think I would." He swallowed hard again, and finally turned around to look Sinclair in the eye. Sinclair could feel what it cost him to do it -- the tight muscles in Michael's jaw and neck, his clenched fists. "You know why I started drinking, Jeff? You know what I was trying to escape? This. I was trying to block out this. I realized that yesterday. That the hell I put myself through, the hole I climbed into when I took a drink, was better than living with the razor edge of what I felt when I thought about psi cops. What I wanted from them. Because I knew what it would cost me to pursue that want and becoming a raging, pathetic, useless drunk of a pilot was better than facing that." Sinclair stared at him. "And here I am, stone cold sober and about to go insane because a psi cop came to me four days ago and showed an agnostic what Heaven felt like."

"My God, Michael," Sinclair said.

"Yeah," Garibaldi said quietly. "That's what I thought when Bester touched my mind." His eyes dropped again into the darkness of the shadows in the corner and he turned away. "So what do I do, Jeff? How do I put something like that behind me? I've lived tortured by it all my life, and now I've got a taste of it. And it's better than I imagined it could be. How do I say no to that and get on with my life without going mad?"

Garibaldi heard Sinclair get up from the couch. Bare footsteps came across the carpeted floor toward him slowly, hesitant. A large, strong hand slid up the back of his good shoulder and squeezed gently. Then a second hand, carefully on the other side. Michael shivered at the warmth and sensuality of it.

"Jeff..?"

"It's all right, Michael," Sinclair said quietly. "You aren't alone. I don't want you to feel like you have to deal with this by yourself." Garibaldi turned around, intrigued, comforted, a little frightened. The look on Sinclair's face mystified him, so he guessed.

"You look disgusted and I guess I don't blame you," Garibaldi said. "Sometimes I think it is, too."

"I'm not disgusted," Sinclair said in a low voice. His amber eyes were dark like coal buried deep in the earth. "I'm jealous." Garibaldi's throat went dry and he opened his mouth to say something, but Sinclair's hands came up to hold his face. It was a sensuous, possessive act, palms on his cheeks, fingers resting on the pulse behind his jaw. "Michael." Garibaldi's stomach quivered at the tone of voice. "I'm sorry it had to be Bester. If I'd known I wouldn't have let him get to you first."

"If you'd known..?" Garibaldi said in a hoarse whisper. He didn't dare assume. His heart and groin ached with the intensity in Sinclair's eyes. Sinclair took a deep breath.

"If I'd known you wanted to be held down like that... taken..." His voice trembled. Something burned in his eyes, like oil fire on a calm, still lake. One of his hands left Garibaldi's face, sliding down over his neck and leaving sharp trails behind. Garibaldi inhaled shakily as the clawing went over his collarbone, down the front of his chest where his open shirt left him bare. "Michaelll..."

Michael didn't stop him, stomach flinching as his fingers drew across Michael's navel. Sinclair held his eyes, seeing amazement, nervousness, something else gently painful. He touched Michael's belt and Michael sucked in a sharp breath, unable to look away from the smoldering purpose in Sinclair's jasper stare. Sinclair lunged forward, pushing Michael back against the wall and closing strong fingers around the hard cock in his trousers. Michael gasped harshly, raising his hands to clench them into Sinclair's biceps. He writhed involuntarily, pushing his pelvis into Sinclair's hand. Sinclair smiled at him, mouth only centimeters from his own, and it was not the kind of smile Garibaldi was used to seeing. It made heat crawl up his back.

"I can give you power," Sinclair said in his quiet, leonine voice. "I can hold you down and take you, make you scream. That's what you want, isn't it? To yell, to beg. To be so far gone that you do it without intending to?" Sinclair's heat was oppressive, magnificent. Sinclair's hand was slowly, firmly kneading his stiff cock through his pants. Garibaldi swallowed hard. "Bester doesn't deserve you," Sinclair whispered. "I want to take you myself. Show you how it should be done."

"Jeff, oh God..." The words were strangled by the sudden flood of pleasure when Jeff squeezed again, finding the delicious places to touch his cock that made him desperate.

"Do you want me, Michael? Do you want me to do it right? Hell if I can't make you forget you ever wanted that bastard psi cop." The voice was savage and low. "I want to hear you yell my name. You yelled his, didn't you? So I can't have that. I can't think he would hold you like that. I can't stand that, Michael, not when you don't even know what I could do to you. So let me show you."

Michael reached for his mouth suddenly, needing, hungry, and Jeff stopped him with a hand on his chest. The strength behind it was unopposable, solid, and Jeff pushed him back into the wall with a thud. Jeff leaned forward slowly, as if to drown him in ecstasy, and Michael whimpered softly as Jeff's mouth found his, kissing luxuriously, tasting, biting him.

Michael panted hard when Jeff let him go, leaning against the wall for support, and the tawny golden stare held him -- a lion's appetite. Jeff was so beautiful. My God, how could such a man want him? It was chilling... the idea that a powerful, strong and composed man like Sinclair would want him so much. The kiss still burned. He tasted blood.

"Fuck, do it, Jeff," Michael whispered, gulping to breathe. "Fuck me. Do anything you want -- everything. Please, oh, Jesus...Jesus, you want me to beg, Jeff? Yeah, I'll beg for you. Like I wouldn't for that psi cop. He could hear it in my head but for you I'll say it."

Sinclair pulled him away from the wall roughly and kissed him hard, sliding large hands beneath his shirt to hold him. In another breath, Sinclair was pulling at his belt, unfastening it, shoving trousers and boxers down past his knees. The demand was clear, and Michael kicked his shoes off to help.

"All of it," Jeff growled. "Take everything off. Socks, too." His bronze shirt was torn from his shoulders and tossed across the floor. His boxers had just left his toe when big hands grabbed his ass, dragging him up against Sinclair's hard body. A hot mouth engulfed his neck, kissing, licking, while those greedy hands fondled his muscled rump and back, sliding up his flanks and sides to caress and stroke. "I dream about you," Jeff said against his throat. He bit softly, then kissed his way down to the shoulder. "About fucking you. Having you suck me, hearing you beg. In my dreams you're so hot for me, needing me to do it hard, to ram my cock into you. Christ, Michael, if I'd thought it was true I wouldn't have let that bastard psi cop into you. Uuuhhhrrrrr, Michael -- " He pulled back to look into Michael's eyes. "Into the bedroom. Come on."

Flaming, honey colored eyes seduced him, pulled him even if Jeff's hand hadn't. The hand was on his cock, leading him. A shudder struck him in the chest and tore out through his belly and thighs, and Jeff put him down on the bed. "Stay there," Jeff admonished softly, eyes like iron tearing through stone. He gestured as he said it, and Michael saw his hand trembling. Jeff disappeared into the lavatory, and came out with a cool, green bottle of lubricant in his hand. "On your back," Jeff said. The voice was the sweetest caress, warm and commanding. It would have physically hurt to refuse.

Sinclair reached back and pulled his anthracite gray shirt over his head, something intent and determined in his manner, his lips pressed together. Strong muscles moved under smooth flesh, dark hair on his chest, brushstroking down to his waist. He was wearing loose trousers, and those dropped down to the floor easily, rendering him gloriously naked. Michael felt his throat close up in pure admiration of what Jeff was, physically and emotionally. Compassion over a core of granite resolve, unyielding and unbreakable. And when it moved it was unstoppable. Jeff came toward him.

He felt the bed shift, mattress dipping with Jeff's weight, had some distant sensation of being pushed gently down to lay on his back. But it was that green bottle that he thought about. He saw Jeff cover his fingers with the slick oil, and Jeff laid on his side, looked down into Michael's eyes. One of those magnificent hands found his anus, a large finger pushed, and he cried out wildly.

"Jeff! JEFF OH GOD!" He clutched blindly at Jeff's shoulders. When he opened his eyes again, gold flint gazed back at him, intense and thirsty. A second finger. He howled.

"You want my cock, Michael?" Jeff crooned. "Hmm? Does that make you want it more? Yes, I know. I guess you saw that I'm big. I should have warned you. Oho, you like that, do you? Want a big cock, Michael? Hmm?"

"Fuck, Jeff, you know I do," Michael gasped viciously. "Yeah, I want your big cock. God, I want it. Please. Jeff, please. Fuck me. Come on, stop teasing. Damn you, Jeff. Please, oh, Christ, please please please..."

The two fingers pulled out, leaving an aching emptiness. He moaned longingly, and whimpered again when Jeff got up and knelt between his legs.

"Hope you like it rough, Michael," Jeff purred, leaning down over him to nudge his cock against the slick opening to Michael's rectum. "Because I'm not in the mood to be gentle."

"Hard, Jeff," Michael growled, digging his fingers into Jeff's arms. "Please, I want you -- " He cried out as Jeff plunged into him, ensheathing himself completely in that one thrust. Michael arched back, breathless. His hands held Jeff's arms in a death grip, and Jeff licked his mouth in anticipation of bruises there later. Proof of many things, among them Michael's intense response to him. He drew a deep breath and bucked, and Michael yelled. Oh, what a fantastic sound. "Jeff," Michael howled. "Yeah... oh yeah oh yeah Christ fuck me, DAMN YOU JEFF FUCK ME -- "

Sinclair answered the scream with his body, quivering with domination lust, inflamed by Michael's full-throated yells of pleasure and hunger. No psi cop would ever have this. No one would ever take Michael like this. Sinclair was keeping it for himself, greedily and jealously guarding it from all seekers. And Michael screaming his name when he climaxed was the only reward he wanted, the wet heat of his ejaculation the proof of the bond that had finally gone beyond friendship.

The scream sent him over the edge, and Sinclair let go with a roar of ownership, of mastery and triumph. Michael gasped his name again; "Jeff" in amazement and wonder. /Does he see my delight?/ Sinclair wondered. /We understand each other here, and I think he'll see the truth eventually. He'll never want Bester as much because there's no trust there. No love, no compassion. Ironically it's in love and trust that I'll give Michael the violence we both want. I respect him too much to do anything else. I can't hold back... can't.../

"Michael," he groaned, and the orgasm faded like a flood receding, distant and warm, making him shiver. "Bester can't have you. He can't. Whenever you want him, come to me and I'll remind you why he's no good for you."

"Bester who?" Michael murmured sleepily, grinning. Sinclair chuckled softly.

"Nobody. Nobody important." He curled around Michael protectively and the warm bed held them as they slept quietly.

<<<< back to the "Babylon 5" recommendations	back to the main index >>>>
<<<< back to the main recommendations page	back to Storyteller's Campsite >>>>