Unity and Destiny Pt. 08

They met Selena on the way back. The older woman was dressed, and she looked uncomfortable now in a way she hadn't before.

"Thank you for joining us," Esther said with a smile.

Selena nodded, eyes flicking nervously to Javier's nakedness.

"I still feel strange about it," she said. "And I think I'm done. But thank you for letting me be there. It was beautiful."

When they went back inside, Grace and Kat were lying side by side in a half embrace. Kat was still masturbating slowly, but when she saw them she squeezed towards the edge of the bed, pulling Grace along. And so Javier and Esther squeezed on the other side. And just like that, Javier was lying naked alongside Grace.

"Hey," he said. She turned her head and smiled slightly, running her hand through his hair.

"That was the hottest fucking thing I've ever watched," she said. "I didn't even know what to look at."

"Yeah," Javier agreed.

A cool hand settled on his mostly-soft dick, and he sighed, looking back at Esther. But she just smiled slightly at him.

It was Grace's hand. And she was starting to rub his cock, ever so slowly.

"Just this, if it's OK," she said. "What can I say? I'm curious, Javier. And I like you."

"That's a good thing to make sure of, before you give a hand job," said Kat. Grace gave her a dirty look.

He had to give her directions on everything, and she bit her lip in nervousness.

"He's loving this, Grace," said Kat softly. "Don't be so nervous."

Javier was starting to get really into it when he heard a noise. It was Nicola and Mark, stark naked in the doorway.

"Is there room for us?" Nicola asked. She sounded casual, but her hand was gripping Mark's tightly. Mark didn't even pretend not to be scared as hell.

"More than enough," Kat said easily, sitting up and scooting back.

Mark was staring at Grace. Maybe he found her as attractive as Javier did, or maybe he was trying to square up what she was doing with what he knew about her. But whatever the case, Javier could see how useful the distraction was for him. And maybe Esther did as well, because she reached out her arms to the couple. And when Nicola took her hand, she stiffened suddenly.

"Oh, Christ, Esther," she said. "Can we, please?"

"Both of you, if you want," said Esther. And something kindled in Mark's face as he stared at Esther, naked and inviting. He nodded slowly, and when he took her hand, he grunted, eyes closed.

"That's quite a fucking trick," Kat said with a laugh, staring at Mark's sudden erection. "You think Esther could teach me?"

"You do well enough as it is, you maniac," said Grace, pulling closer to Kat, momentarily releasing Javier. She looked back quickly, apologetically, but Javier just started masturbating.

"Why don't you do what you're going to do," he said. "That's way more than enough for me."

It wasn't, really. He wanted to press inside Grace, the way they'd probably never do again. Or join in the complicated pile with the other two women and Mark. Though right now they were mostly off somewhere in their senses, a place he'd never be able to join them. He carefully quashed that old bit of jealously. And instead he watched them, and the expressions of joy on their face. The way Esther rolled over, kissing Nicola full on the lips while Mark cautiously began rubbing her back. Just as she liked.

Javier swallowed and looked back to the two women, who were entwined now, lips together, fingers between each other's legs. And he decided he'd rather watch that for a while. Sometimes Kat or Grace would catch his eye and smile, and he moved closer to both of them. Close enough to fuck, if that was what Kat wanted. But right now she mostly had eyes for Grace alone.

* * *

Esther had never felt anything like this.

She hadn't shared senses with Nicola for over two months, and even longer with Mark. But they'd all grown in their own ways since then. And despite the horrors, or because of them, they'd grown closer than ever.

She felt the bead of sweat on Nicola's chest, just below her left breast. She could taste it, and she could feel every water molecule, every stray ion, its deepest vibrations. Nicola's fine perception was unbelievable, and Esther reveled in it, even while feeling Nicola's own wonder as she explored the shallow reaches of otherspace.

Her connection with Mark was weaker, but there was still so much there. Suffusing it all, a shockingly erotic sense of his body, of every little pathway. The kind of self-knowledge he'd had to painfully reconstruct after his near-death. After she and Nicola and Javier had brought him from beyond death.

She understood now the mistakes that she and Nicola had made, in that desperate rush to save him. She saw the scarring and the damaged nerves, and she ached to make it right. But that was beyond her ability or Nicola's. It was all part of Mark, and his body was itself finding new pathways. Just as it had after the terrible event that had resulting in the great scar along his scalp, something she wouldn't even think about now, lest Mark feel the direction of her sight.

He was touching her so gently, but her body responded with astonishing speed. And whatever pain there was between him and Nicola, he wanted Esther right now. It was something she could feel down to his toes, a need even more immediate than the yearning Nicola had, which owed as much to her joy in borrowing Esther's senses as to anything sexual. Esther's hand found Mark's erection, and she stroked it, feeling the echoes of his joy in a beautiful after-image. The heavy weight of his maleness, almost as though it was hers. A strange, intoxicating sensation. She kissed Nicola again, and she felt another rush of satisfaction from her friend, along with the guilt, the desire for Mark, the worry.

But their senses were bleeding into each other as well, across Esther's bridge, or from their own abilities. Even as Esther kissed Nicola, even as she traced the pattern extending down around Mark's shaft, the other pair was talking in their own way, without words. Mark would never have gone to find the lubrication on his own, surely. He wouldn't have waited, touching her so gently that she wanted to scream, while Nicola reached for Javier, breaking her kiss just long enough to climb on top of him, settling herself just so, waiting for Javier to turn and find Esther's lips, for Nicola's tongue to find her breast.

Mark entered her from behind, sighing in pleasure. And at the same time, Nicola settled onto Javier's penis, and through her friend's senses Esther felt her own hips driving down, through the bed, burying herself on her love's penis even as a second man filled her from behind. She gasped and pressed harder onto Javier, feeling Nicola's pussy, her pussy, clasping so tightly, but he fit perfectly. Both of them did, and Esther was crying into Javier's mouth, because she'd never felt so overwhelmingly *filled*. She would take all of them inside her, if she could, to hold them so close to her that they could never come to harm. She almost didn't notice when Nicola began to shake and quietly sing, the way she did during her best orgasms. The feelings washed through her, and when they were all finally through she wasn't even sure if her own body had ever climaxed. Compared to the sensation of fullness, it hardly mattered. She thought Javier had even joined them a little way. He was looking into her eyes, and he hardly reacted when Nicola finally rolled off him with a groan to follow Mark and wash up.

Finally Javier sat up as well, running his fingers along her torso, tracing her Changes until her nipples hardened and her body began to consider—but no. This evening was already exactly as she wanted to remember, whatever came next. She kissed Javier, finding his hand and twining her fingers in his.

"Goddamn," Kat said, looking at the two of them. "Do you think there's some way we could get in on that action, next time? If there's a next time, of course. I shouldn't be presumptuous."

"That's all you ever are, Kat," said Grace, kissing her lover's breast again. "And we still love you."

The other coupled returned, and Esther smiled through the wall at Selena in the living room, receiving a hesitant smile in return. The older woman had watched everything, this time from a slightly safer distance.

"Benjamin didn't understand anything," Esther said slowly. "He was a sad, twisted young man who never grew up properly."

"Amen," said Nicola. "The less said about him, the better. So, until tomorrow?"

Nicola and Mark made their way back to their own bedroom, but Grace and Kat asked to sleep over with them. Javier just threw another sheet on the sweaty, wrinkled one, and the four of them called it a night.

She couldn't hold all of them inside her forever. No one wanted that, not even her. But she could have these perfect moments. Nothing at all like Unity, and everything Esther needed.

* * *

Early the next morning they all gathered in Jacob's cramped living room. Raj had spent the night with Jacob and Tomiko, perhaps hoping to craft a last-ditch argument to persuade Esther. But the others could tell the argument was lost as soon as she walked in.

"Esther," Raj finally said. "I understand all of your reasons as you've explained them. But I need to hear you talk about the things you aren't saying. Lukas has always been careful with how he phrases things, and Nicola saw how he was trying to manipulate you. For a minute I thought we'd lost you, the same way we did after the declaration of war. So convince me your weighing of risks is as rational as you can manage with limited information, and not being influenced by any sense of making right a situation you think is your fault."

Javier watched Esther. It was exactly the right question, and she thought seriously about it.

"I won't pretend I'm not still struggling with guilt," she said, "But I have to rely on the same argument I told you. Lukas's logic is sound. His facts match with my privileged knowledge from sources he doesn't know. None of us can come up with a reason he would be deceiving us, and in a practical sense we already knew most of what he told us."

"Why did you bring up Herod's name?" Javier asked.

She looked at him with surprise and discomfort.

"I didn't realize I'd said that. It was Lukas's reasonable theory about the Mexican's motivations, of course. The idea that all this had been set in place because of my actions, his fear that I would overthrow him."

"No," Javier said. "It's more specific than that. You're thinking about the visions in Unity, from around your birth, and then again those that provoked Benjamin's actions."

"Birth visions?" Jacob asked, looking concerned. "Esther, you never mentioned those."

Nor had she told any of the others, it seemed. Miserably Esther went through what little she knew. The prophecy that Benjamin's sister seemed to know of, that she had a future destiny of grand importance. The clear vision from Diana, of her being stolen from some unpleasant fate.

"I can't imagine those were just messages the Mexican sent through Unity," she said. "That wouldn't make sense. They seem more like true prophecies. Like the earthquake."

"Hold on, Esther," Jacob said. "Have you been worrying that your whole life has been prophesied somehow, on such a thin basis?"

"No," Esther said. "Well, not most of the time. But when Lukas implied that the Mexican was worried about me specifically, or one like me, I couldn't help but think of Herod. Surely the Mexican knows more about Unity than virtually anyone else. I assume he had seen exactly these same visions, and it was that fear that drove him suddenly to desperation when he suspected the prophecies were coming true."

"But Herod's fear of Jesus, that's just a story," said Grace. "No offense, Jacob. What I mean is, it's a common story. Like you said, the rescued child myth was already there with Moses. But also earlier, with Karna in the Mahabharata. And the prophetic doom which is unavoidable, or even self-fulfilling? That's everywhere. Oedipus, Cronus, even Macbeth. If these visions from Unity are interpreted by humans, which they are, they will be influenced by the stories we all know. And if Unity visions are sometimes self-fulfilling prophecies of their own, a communal idea that crystallizes from the dreams and fears of the Chosen, then this sort of prophecy is exactly what you would expect. Plus, it would hardly take a prophecy for the Mexican to worry about someone stronger replacing him. That's the worry of every despot through history."

Jacob nodded. "I couldn't have said it better. The Mexican has made his own choices, and you have no responsibility for them. Esther, don't put much weight on any of these apparent scraps of prophecy. We all search for meaning, even when it isn't there. And it's obviously not helping with, ahh, how shall I put this. Your messiah complex?"

Esther looked shocked for a moment, and then she sighed.

"Of course you're right," she said. "I keep trying to hold my arrogance at bay, and it keeps creeping into the way I see the world. I have unusual powers, but it doesn't make me a special person. No better or worse than anyone else."

"True," said Nicola. "It's not your powers that make you a special person. That's what we keep trying to tell you. So go through your thoughts again, in that brilliant mind, and then tell us if you've miscalculated something. Because in the end, you're the best judge we have."

They waited, and finally Esther shook her head.

"No," she said. "I'm afraid it all comes out the same. I'm going to go with him."

"Then I am as well," said Javier, and the others chimed in immediately. Even Raj.

"Esther said this was everyone's responsibility," he said. "And she's right, I'm sorry to say. Even mine, though I'm worse than useless when it comes to fighting. I'll help with communication, logistics, whatever needs another person you can trust."

When they left to meet Lukas, Jacob looked stricken, Tomiko was crying, and Javier hoped to God this wasn't the last time they'd see each other.