Pirate and Companion
by Mab
Yonks ago, Elaine wrote a sadly so far undeveloped AU snippet set in the Firefly universe, where Blair is a companion - a highly paid and usually respected prostitute. I read it and enjoyed it as a curiosity, and then thought no more of it until I started watching the Firefly DVDs I received for Christmas. And then I perpetrated this...
His feet hurt. It was the sum of Jim's universe right now, but he wasn't going to say anything. The rest of the crew had pounded over unforgiving grit and rocks the same as he had, and he wasn't going to betray that the gorram senses were messing with him again. Again, and again. His fist clenched in frustration.
“Something wrong? Blair enquired. He looked fresh and serene, and there was a subtle scent rising from his hair. The pleasant spice of it would sometimes break into Jim's distraction, and then the comfort would flee with yet another throb of pain.
“Aside from almost getting my crew and myself killed? No, everything's absolutely shiny.”
That penetrating stare looked into him. He'd felt less naked in the assembly line nudity of military camp. “I think you're in pain. I know the look. Is there anything Paul should know?”
“Paul knows everything he needs to. Now, if you'll excuse me.”
Jim stood, and walked on what felt like knives to his cabin. Once there, he lay on the bunk and stared at the panels on the ceiling. They were dingy, the cream plastic discoloured with age, and cracked in two places. He tracked the lines, related their placement to the structure that lay underneath, speculated as what type of manoeuvre might have caused the damage. But none of it did any good. His feet burned and then ached. With a curse, he frantically tore off his boots and socks, to stare at feet that were, yes, a little blistered in places, maybe a touch bruised on one point on his sole. He sighed. Whatever this pathetic damage, there was nothing to suggest that he could have happily cut the damn things off and stumped as a cripple the rest of his days.
With a groan he lay back again and covered his face with a forearm. He drifted in pain a while, before a voice brought him back with a start.
“What!” he roared. He sat up, to see Blair leaning over him. He had changed from what he wore in the canteen. Now he wore a loose, thin tunic and pants, and his eyes were outlined in kohl. His face was not seductive, however, but concerned.
“You didn't hear me. I've been talking to you and you didn't answer.”
“I'm talking to you now. And what the hell are you doing here anyway?” He gestured at Blair, at the incongruous but fascinating clothes. “I thought we'd already established that you're way too expensive for the likes of anyone on this junker.” A shadow passed across Blair's professional tranquillity and Jim was pleased. The man was supposed to be a hostage – a well-treated one, yes – but that did not mean that he had the run of the ship, or the run of the captain's cabin. Especially not that.
“You were out of it. Miley was worried. He fetched me”
“Gosa!”
Blair smiled. “He's reliable.”
“You mean he's more scared of me than of anyone else.”
“However it comes about, he won't betray you.”
Jim shifted, swung his legs around to stand, and winced.
“You are hurt.”
Frustration and pain exploded into rage, because Jim wasn't hurt, but he was hurting, and he wanted it to stop.
“There is nothing wrong with me! My gorram feet hurt, but nobody ever died of that! Now why don't you take your lawn pyjamas and your made-up face back to your cabin, instead of swanning around my ship giving my crew ideas that are going to lower your gorram value!” Because Jim had never thought of sampling the goods for free, taking out a few of his costs in trade, had he now?
They stood face to face for a frozen moment that passed by in only a few beats of Jim's heart, but seemed to last much longer. Blair stepped back, his gaze flicking over Jim from head to toes, and then he was gone. Jim flopped back onto his bunk, head in his hands. He didn't move even when he heard the faint sound of bare feet, the barely there flutter of fine material. The spicy scent of Blair's hair rode with these sounds, and Jim tracked it all until he knew that the companion stood once more at his door.
“What, Chief? Getting bored with all that professionalism? Want to be able to say the nasty bad pirate raped you? Come back tomorrow, and I'll see what I can do for you then.”
“What I want, idiot, is to help you. Sit up properly.”
Blair's asperity shocked Jim into compliance. He looked up, and then down as Blair flowed into a cross-legged sit on the floor, and took Jim's feet gently into his lap.
“What are you doing?”
“There's no major damage to your feet, they're just reacting badly to a stimulus that's gone. So perhaps if I apply another stimulus, they may improve.” Quick, nimble hands unpacked a small bag that lay on the floor, took out a towel and laid it with elegant surety under Jim's feet and across Blair's lap. Then they reached into a pouch and extracted two more towels. “In an ideal world, we would have a basin of hot water for this.” Blair smiled up at a stunned and silent Jim. “But the world is seldom ideal so I've had to improvise.” He wiped the towels gently across Jim's feet. Moist heat embraced his skin, and he flinched at first, before he realised that it was soothing. “There now,” Blair's voice murmured, and Jim felt something in his gut uncoil, even though the ache in his feet continued.
The dry towel was wrapped around his feet with exquisite care, and with barely a jostling move, Blair twisted to take a small bottle out of his bag. “I wondered if perhaps I shouldn't have used a light tincture of eucalyptus, but that might irritate,” he said. “So I thought a touch of lavender, based in almond oil.”
“And what's next? A touch of eyeliner?” Jim's voice was gruff. The scent rose into the air, rich and sweet, touched with a tang that wove itself into the skin of the man rubbing it against his palms.
“Let me know if anything's not comfortable.” With that, Blair rubbed his hands in a long slow swathe up and across Jim's left foot. His attention was wholly on his work, and Jim's attention was wholly on the bliss of relief as his body realised that there were other feelings than pain. Then Blair looked up, and with a small smile, remarked, “It's becoming fashionable in some circles for men to wear a little make-up. And there are always a few clients who find that it adds an interesting frisson.” He shrugged. “I was bored, and decided to experiment. And when Miley came, he seemed to think it was urgent, so I didn't delay.” He carried out a firm, careful caress of each individual toe, before flexing the foot to a point of almost pain across the arch, but only almost. It was a good feeling compared to what had been before, and Jim said nothing.
Blair lifted his head again and gravity once more unveiled his face from its curtain of hair. The kohl swept around his eyes in a thick line. He looked wild, and not at all effeminate. “Is this helping?” Jim nodded. “Right foot, now.” Blair began with the long strokes that had graced the other foot. “Do you know the original purpose of kohl?”
“I'm not that educated a man.”
“Before humanity invented tinted lenses, along with all the other wonders of civilisation, it was a way to reduce the sun's glare against the eyes.” Blair looked up, his face mischievous. “Refined in purpose and technique since then, of course.”
“Oh, of course.” It was hard to sound as sardonic as Jim would have liked. He was aglow with the passive ecstasy of the end of pain. He made an effort. “Thank you.”
Blair rose to his feet with an economical grace that Jim knew spoke of strength and trained muscle memory. “It's surely to my advantage to keep you in good health. Not all your crew appreciate my - monetary – value as you do.” Blair's look was direct, and angry. Then his face cleared. “Besides, I don't like to see people in pain. If I didn't think that good touch, pleasurable touch, was a rightful experience I wouldn't be what I am or do what I do.”
He left, and Jim wondered why that second brief loss of Blair's composure hadn't been as enjoyable as the first, before he sank into sleep.
Return to Story Index