Title: Hearing Distance
Author: moribound
Rating: AO
Pairing: Tosh/Mary
Summary: Set during "Greeks Bearing Gifts": a character study of Toshiko's reactions to Mary and the pendant. Begins when Tosh returns home to find Mary waiting for her on the wall outside her flat. Includes the missing scene after Tosh kisses Mary.

***

I know she's waiting for me even before I see her. She's sitting on the wall, smoking. The way she exhales the plumes of grey that float upwards and into the ether; she looks like she hasn't a care in the world. As though she's the one holding the cards and this, her stance, her hand carelessly waving that dreadful cigarette around is her poker face. Inscrutable. Like a sleeping dragon. And I know I'm her prey. The way she smiles at me; her teeth sharp and white, hidden beneath scarlet lips. I know that I should be apprehensive but I'm not. I know that I should be scared but I'm not. I should be a hundred different things but I'm not. I'm not. I'm Toshiko Sato. Dutiful daughter. A credit to her country. Unknown saviour of the people. Protector of the world. I have my duty and I accept it; I relish it. It's what makes me who I am. I cling to it, like a drowning man. It's my last bastion of self.

And I can't tell a single soul.

So who am I? Who does Mary see?

Toshiko Sato. Lonely. Alone. So desperate for someone to love. For someone to love her. I hate my own melancholy like I hate the miscreant thoughts I stole today. It's something I didn't want and yet something I'm fated to have. And it hangs about me with the stench of remorse, turning things to grey. I know Mary sees it. I know she sees me, who I am. I hate that, too.

Oh yes. I know that I'm her prey even before she turns and fixes me with that self-satisfied grin, her neatly lined teeth hidden beneath scarlet lips. It's a weird thing of mine you know, teeth. I always notice them. Jack has perfect teeth. But then, Jack has perfect everything, doesn't he? And Owen has teeth like a hunter, tiny sharp teeth that he hides like everything else in his life. I'm not sure I've ever seen Ianto's teeth. Perhaps that's because he never smiles ... at least, not any more. And Gwen... Gwen is all teeth. All smiles. All reassurances. But beneath it I know she pities me. She thinks I try too hard. I would never admit it to anyone, but she's right; I do try too hard. I don't know any other way to be. It had been a huge part of my childhood: perhaps the only part I can honestly remember with clarity. Father used to hoist me onto his shoulders and tell me I was his little genius. Trying too hard was a habit before it became a way of life.

"Might have known you'd have my address as well." My voice sounds bitter; resentful. Not like me at all. I never used to let my emotions colour my language. I can feel her eyes on me even though I force myself not to look at her, not to think about her thoughts in my head.

You're thinking...

...that I want to kiss you.

But I had pulled away. Her honesty terrified me. What if I'd let her kiss me? What if I'd allowed her to pull me against those lips that spoke to me without even moving? In that moment, I was scared. Because after all, didn't I long for someone to want to kiss me?

"Did you tell them?" she asks outright, blithely ignoring my attempts to make her feel guilty. To make her feel anything about the secretive and underhand ways in which she has burrowed into my life so far.

I want to lie to her and tell her that everyone at The Hub knows about the pendant. I want to be the hunter and let her be the prey. But I can't look at her and instead gaze across the road towards my front door, hoping that she will ask me something else. Anything else. She doesn't. She sits there, her eyes boring into the back of my head as I press my house keys against the palm of my hand, feeling the coolness of steel and the scraping edge of that stupid plastic key ring I keep meaning to throw away.

"No," I finally blurt out. "I didn't."

Now I'm ashamed of myself for telling the truth. It's a strange feeling for me; I've been so delicately and deliberately programmed ... yes, programmed ... for honesty and justice and nobility. That's why I work at Torchwood. That's why I strive to be the best at what I do. I suppose I'd comforted myself with that for a long, long time. But honour isn't a substitute, is it? The aching of my chest answers the question for me.

As I run across the road towards my front door, I tell myself that I don't care if she follows me or not. It's only when I put the key into the lock and wrench the door open that I realise I want her to follow me. I hate myself for thinking that. I can feel how my face twists with the anger and the shame and the violation of people whom I thought were my friends. And the things I heard...I wonder if I'll ever be able to wash that away; that feeling of voyeurism that rumbles around my stomach and tangles nausea up into my chest.

I throw my keys and bag onto the kitchen counter and make for the relative safety of my bedroom because at least in there I can hide away from everything my mind knows, from everything it heard and won't let go. Their voices taunt me as I grasp at my coat, tugging it from my shoulders. Owen's dismissal of me and Gwen's condescension burns at the back of my throat.

The front door slams shut and I turn to see her there, standing in my hallway, a bemused look on her face. She's sort of smiling at me. Her eyes have light dancing through them and I know she wants to laugh at me like they do. I hate her for that; for being confident enough to feel that way. But I'm madly jealous of her, too, because she's the person I always wanted to be and it contorts my face as I throw my coat down carelessly. That's not like me. A part of my brain tells me to hang it up or lay it across the back of the chair ... anything rather than leave it there. But I ignore the voice. Voices. Ignore anything and everything that my brain throws at me because only then can I take back control.

"What made you change your mind?" she asks, wandering through the living room towards me. I ignore her and reach up for my cup on the shelf, washed and clean, where I'd left it this morning. As always. Routine, my father used to tell me, is the lynch-pin of order. And nobody follows a routine like I do. To the letter. To the absolute. And I think that I've never felt more out of control than I do this very second, with Mary's questioning gaze on my face and a white-hot rage behind my eyes, blinding me.

"You listened to them, didn't you?" she crows triumphantly. "See I told you! Isn't it incredible?" She leans over the counter as I whirl around, focusing on routine. Put the cup down. Fill the kettle. Make the tea. Get the spoon. Order. Control.

"Some of the stuff you hear!" Mary's mouth widens into a smile of connection. She thinks that I'll delight in it like her; she thinks I'll see it as a blessing. My hand hovers over the mug for a split second before I march to my bag, plunging my hand inside it to search for and pull out that damned pendant. Holding it up in front of me like a weapon, I finally lose control. Lose order. Lose routine.

"What is this...thing?" I gasp over the last word and throw it down onto the counter, my hand trembling as I retreat a safe distance from the fused lines of green stone and silver metal. "Why did you give it to me?" I hate the way my voice sounds, so weak and scared. My throat thickens over tears and I take another step backwards, away from her.

"I told you," she says patiently, like a mother to a fractious child, explanations forming on her lips already, the unspoken words meaningless to my mangled emotions.

"The things I heard..." I shake my head, unable to hear anything but the hurtful tone of Gwen and Owen's words; the way they looked down on me. They way they always had. "What they thought of me...what they really thought...God! These are people that are supposed to like me!" I slam my hand hard against the counter top behind me, bringing disorder to the surface as my pain roils and tangles my insides together. Put the cup down. I feel the tears sting my eyes and blur my vision. Fill the kettle. My breath coming in sharp burning sobs. Make the tea. Get the spoon. Gone. Disorder. Restlessness and change. It frightens me.

"They do like you," her voice is soothing, calming. She leans over the counter and tries to offer an explanation but I know nothing will help. "People are complicated, they..." she pauses and lets out a laughing breath before dropping her head and shaking it a little. Her serenity unsettles me. She knows I'm weak and alone and scared. Her lips part and pull back over her perfect teeth for a second and I believe for a second that they are pointed and sharp. Just like she is.

"Okay," she says, changing tack. "I should have warned you about this. It isn't like reading someone's diary." She watches me carefully as I march over to the fridge and pull out the milk, slamming the door so that the jars inside rattle in protest.

She turns to me as I run back to the relative sanity of my routine. Fill the kettle. Make the tea. Get a spoon. No. Something was missing. Fill the kettle...make the tea... I lean over the sink and try not to cry so obviously but the tears are filling up my chest, filling up my eyes, filling up my life. How long have I been waiting to cry like this? How long have I felt so sorry for myself? How long have I felt so lonely? Just having her here is something, isn't it? Having anyone rather than the cold rush of emptiness that devours me from the moment I open the front door.

"The stuff you've been hearing it's so...deep, so personal. Stuff they're not even aware they're thinking."

She makes it sound like a mistake. Like they didn't mean what they thought. But I know different. If you could be inside someone's head; really inside their head, in the secret recesses of their mind then why wouldn't they be honest? Owen never thought to censor himself because he didn't need to. His thoughts were his own. Until they were mine, too. And I feel filthy; covered in stolen moments and ideas and words that only exist to hurt me. I'm drowning in them.

"You think you know someone and suddenly you see them for real and they're..." I press my lips together to stem the flow of tears but they come anyway, splashing hot and angry and treacherously down my cheeks, "bastard little kids!" My hand slams against the counter again, punctuating my staccato speech as I finally give vent to the white-hot rage that had been tumbling in my gut all day.

Mary is smiling. I know she's smiling because I can feel it. Just like I can feel her eyes on me, I can feel the smile that curves those lips and tugs at the corners of her beautiful eyes. She seems pleased, somehow, as though getting me to lose control in some way gives her what she wanted. What I wanted, too, perhaps.

"Not everything," she says and her voice is soft.

"Not everyone," she adds, taking off her coat.

She looks at me and my eyes meet hers for a split second. But it's enough for me to know that she feels; that she has felt what I feel right now. The ache in my throat subsides a little and I realise that I'm craving the intimate tone of her voice once more. There is something of a connection between us, however distant, however tenuous. But it's there nonetheless, confusing and ambiguous and enigmatic. I want to work it out; I want to work her out. I want her to stay so I can find the sameness that binds us together right here, standing in my kitchen, just looking at one another.

...even across these unimaginable distances there are fundamentals that stay exactly the same...

She picks up the pendant from where I threw it unceremoniously onto the counter. Moving slowly, she takes a few steps towards me and holds it out, her delicate fingers grasping each end of the chain. My heart starts to beat faster, the frantic thumping of the prey before it is captured and slain. But I don't move away. Not this time.

Closer, she is almost standing against me and I can feel her breath on my cheek as she leans in, fastening the clasp of the chain around my neck. It's hard not to stagger when the emotions come flooding in as they do every time the pendant lies against my breastbone. I wonder if Mary can see my heart fluttering against my chest as she cups my face in her hands, lifting my chin slightly so that I am looking directly into her eyes.

A white flash. A moment. A rush of emotion flooding my senses. Fragments of something intangible and distant.

Lips. Limbs. Fingertips brushing over olive skin. A momentary rush of blood and lust and heat. Her head thrown back. My mouth on hers. Her hands on my body.

"I wouldn't say your thoughts were exactly pure," I whisper. My voice sounds strange, falling from between my lips like that. Low and with hidden meaning; a muted far-off thunder that promises something cacophonous. Different. As though wearing the pendant and being so close to her makes me that way. She's looking into my eyes now, smiling again. I feel her fingertips curve up under my hair to press with gentle insistence on my skull, her palms on my cheeks, making me see her. And I know that she sees me too.

She leans in towards me for a moment before pulling back. "At least they're consistent," she raises her eyebrows as though asking me a question. "No agenda; no resentment." She steps further away from me and I want, for a second, to reach out and pull her back against me once more. I want to believe her, to fall into her eyes and her arms and be wanted and loved the way it should have happened years ago. I want it so much that the distance between us is almost overwhelming.

My head drops as I glance down at the pendant, lying against my skin. I feel its warmth and its chill at the same time, like the worrying emotions flitting dangerously through my head. Want and hate. Hate and want. Routine lost and discovery found.

And then it becomes clear to me; the echoes of the pendant burrowing deep inside my head to boom through the open spaces. The storm is coming and I'm out in the open, unsheltered, entirely defenceless.

"They pity me," I manage to say before the tears come once more. I despise myself for the weakness they betray to her, standing before me, knowing more than I do or ever will at this precise moment in time. I look up at her. "You don't pity me." The truth gazes at me with clear blue eyes, head tilted to one side. When I look at her, I feel a tightness in my chest. She lowers her lids and the feeling surges up into the base of my throat; clutching at my heart along the way. I haven't had many lovers but I know what passion feels like. And a thrill of secret pleasure trickles its way into my veins and begins to flood round my whole body.

"Why would I?" she shakes her head as though I'm some kind of idiot and I hate the way it makes me feel. The way she looks at me; the way she's looking at me right now makes me want to defend myself. But my traitorous heart knows that I never will.

...the curve of her body as it bends against mine...the sweet taste of her skin like cherries...the rise and fall of her breasts as I touch her and savour her and explore her...her lips on mine...her mouth following secretive whispers of flesh on flesh...

"What you're thinking now," I start to say and find that my mouth is dry; my throat hoarse. I swallow and try again. "That's pretty graphic."

She almost shrugs off my words. That self-satisfied smile returns to her face again and her eyes narrow almost to slits. Yes, she's the hunter, prowling, stalking. I know this. Just like I know that the pictures and emotions in my head are fatefully entwined with my darkest needs and wants. It seems so quiet all of a sudden; the only sound is my own breath, filling my head, filling my senses. And the beat of my heart, pounding faster as I run towards the images floating through my brain.

"That wasn't my thought," Mary finally says, her face rounded and smug with contentment.

I frown and try to re-examine the images, the emotions, but this time they are gone before I can even begin to form them. It's confusing, this constant battering of ideas. Are they mine? Hers? The fabrication of desire is the only thing that I can't trust and yet...and yet when I look into her face all I see is how much she wants me.

"What?" I ask, confusion colouring the patterned shapes and feelings that are flooding through my body, trembling their way down to my fingertips and back again.

"I wasn't thinking anything," Mary laughs. "That wasn't my thought." She looks at me, parting her lips so I can see her teeth. Perfect. White. And she goes in for the kill. "Must have been yours."

I know she's right. I know that my desperation has tumbled headlong into desire for her. For a woman. For everything that I thought I wasn't ready for, or everything I was too scared to want. Toshiko Sato. Alone. Lonely. No more. Because if I allow myself to want, to truly want, then I allow myself to dream and to think and to -

...her hands grip my arms and her body looms over me...skin on skin and lips on lips...fingertips moving down my body, over my stomach, down to the cleft between my legs and...she's inside me and I'm losing my sense of self...she's all over me ... I can smell her scent on every inch of my body and still it's not enough...

"That one ... there. That's yours." I blurt out, my tongue finally finding the right words.

"Yeah," she nods, her mouth widening to a dragon's grin. "That was mine." She's proud! She can see me, naked and hungry for her, just as she is hungry for me. Desire painted in bright colours across her face and, I suspect, across mine, too. Lifting her chin slightly, she nods again silently, her smile belying how proud she is of her successful hunt.

I want to close my eyes to savour the images, to feel the emotions but I can't stop looking at her. I'm trembling now; I can feel my fingertips twitching of their own accord and soon I know my knees will follow suit. But I can't look away. She's got me. She knows she's got me.

"I certainly seem to be enjoying myself," I whisper, my throat swelling in anticipation of her touch, her kiss, her caress. I can't remember when I've ever wanted anything - anyone ... more than her right now. I feel like my body is vibrating with desire and yet she's still making me wait. I am the prey, wanting to be hunted.

"You would," she nods, taking a step towards me. "You will," she corrects herself. For a moment she holds her head up, looking down at me through lowered lids, almost a dare, almost a promise. I can feel her body move against me even though she is inches away. And I know what to do.

This time I'm strong. I'm forceful. I break the routine that has held me in its clutches for so long...too long. My hands slide up around her face and I pull her roughly against me, my lips pressing against hers; flesh bruising flesh. I can barely acknowledge, much less comprehend the feelings that rip through my body as our mouths meet.

Her hands come up to grip me, fingers hardened by desire against my neck. I hear a moan from the base of her throat and it thrills me that I'm doing that; I'm the one making her feel that way. She opens her mouth and I feel her tongue pushing against my lips, parting them gently. Acquiescing to her touch, I feel the tip of her tongue run across my lower lip, just brushing against my teeth.

I fall against her, my knees almost buckling at the sensation rippling up and down my spine, my legs, my abdomen. Heightened by the pendant, I know I'm feeling what she feels, too. I know that my body is being filled to the brim with both our emotions and I can hardly bear it, my heart beating out a staccato rhythm that echoes and pounds in my ears with the swirling rush of an incoming storm.

Mary puts her arms around me now and holds me against her. Her mouth leaves mine and traces a line of kisses down my jaw to the hollow just beneath my ear. I feel her breath, hot and moist, full of longing on my skin. Her hands smooth up and down my back, fingers questing as though looking for something. Their touch burns like wildfire and I can't help letting out a whimper of want as her lips push past my hair and her tongue buries itself in the dip of my neck. This feeling...so alien to me and yet so welcome. I can barely remember to breathe as her mouth works its way to where my clothing begins.

She chuckles as one hand moves from behind my back to the hem of my shirt. Her breath tickles my neck and I can't help smiling in return and tilting my head to one side. Pulling her head back, she looks into my eyes and I can see myself reflected in clear blue. I'm smiling. I look different. I look happy. I honestly can't remember the last time I looked or felt like this. Part of me wonders if it's the way she makes me feel or whether it's the pendant doing this. Whether this is all make-believe and I'm fooling myself that she wants me so much ...

Mary puts a finger over my lips and shakes her head, half-closing her eyes. Her beautiful lips curve up into a smile and her hand slips around to cup my cheek, her thumb gently stroking my mouth.

"Silly," she says in a low intimate voice. I almost look away in embarrassment but her insistent touch tells me that there'll be none of that, not any more. And I feel the confidence surging through me again ... her confidence, or is it mine? It makes me look her in the eye; it makes me put my arms around her and feel her curves beneath my fingers. And I know that I want her and that it's real.

You don't need the pendant to know how I feel.

I don't, I know that now. My senses are alive for what feels like the first time. My body is tingling with awareness, with her closeness, with our desire. I close my eyes and breathe in her scent, exotic and seductive all at the same time. Her fingers flutter over my throat before plucking at the collar of my shirt.

"This needs to come off," she says simply, taking a step back.

My hands trail to her waist and I instantly feel the distance between us. I look over her shoulder and nod towards my bedroom, the overwhelming need to kiss her again burgeoning in my chest and making me bold. She follows my gaze and turns back to look at me, a grin creeping over those scarlet lips. A grin that I share, blushing so madly that I feel the heat emanating from my cheeks.

"In there," I tell her, trying to ignore the flood of images that flow from her head to mine...Lips...hands...thighs...her torso, so flat and perfect...her breasts, rounded and full, rosy tipped...

The onslaught of pictures and feelings in my head throw me; I put a hand against my brow and close my eyes but that makes it worse. I can't separate the images now and they all blend into one long erotic blur that fills my whole head, spreading down throughout my chest into my loins where it hums and stirs long- forgotten sensations.

Hardly able to help myself, I grab at her, my fingers curling around her upper arms, digging in hard. I pull her against me, feeling her hips bump up against mine and reach for her lips with my own. This kiss isn't like the last one. It's not desperate or filled with adolescent yearning. It's hard and vital; hungry. I feel and hear her surprise but it doesn't matter; I want her. I run my hands up into her hair and pull her mouth closer, harder onto mine. This time I'm the one who quests; I'm the one who searches. I thrust my tongue into her mouth and feel her respond with alacrity, the pleasure echoing up into her mind and mine at the same time.

I don't know how I'm doing this. I don't know why I'm doing this. Rational thought surely isn't a part of this. I wonder if it ever is. Gwen and Owen...that isn't rational, is it? I can't help wondering if it feels this good for them. The burning urgency in the pit of my stomach and the swaying betraying of my hips as I move them against hers. No wonder they couldn't ... wouldn't stop. In as much as I know it to be wrong, I also know that I've never felt so liberated in my whole life.

Mary pulls her mouth away from mine, her lips swollen and red from my kisses. I like the way she looks. I like that I've made her look that way. It's an odd feeling, that sensation of power over someone else. Her mouth open, lower lip moistened by my kisses and the tip of her tongue, she walks backwards into my bedroom, looking at me all the while and pulling at her clothes like a wanton. Watching her, I know I'm smiling and I catch my breath in anticipation. Toshiko Santo has someone to love. Someone to love her back. I can barely believe it.

Believe it.

The kitchen is a mess. My bag, the cup, the spoon...all lying on the counter, cluttering up the smooth surface. I should tidy up. I should restore order. I should return to the routine.

But I don't. I follow the lewd, uncensored thoughts in my head to their place of inception and turn the corner of my doorway to see Mary with her back to me. She's half undressed, her skirt and tights looking odd in contrast to the nakedness of her upper body. She slips a bracelet off her wrist and places it next to the two rings already on the bedside table. The clatter of metal on wood is the only sound she makes, but I can hear her thoughts from across the room. Loud; constant; graphic and enough to make me blush, surely.

It's only when I follow her into the room that I realise I'm calm. I'm moving with absolute certainty towards something. All my life I think I was running away from this ... the intimacy, the closeness, the sheer being with someone. Strange then, to be moving towards the one thing my family always insisted was a distraction.

Mary removes her skirt and tights and then turns to face me, unashamedly displaying her naked body; flaunting it, her hands on her hips and a smile slashing her face once more. The hunter, out in the open, one last time.

But this time I'm ready. I hear her in my head; I feel her in my body, moving around, inciting passion and lust and desire and all those feelings I had been taught were secondary to anything and everything else in life. But not now. Not in this moment and not, I want to believe, again. I look at her and feel an odd mixture of appraisal and want. She's perfect. And she knows it.

Do you think I'm beautiful, Toshiko? Her question is in my mind instantly as she moves towards the bed. On all fours she creeps across it towards me. The hunter. Her sinewy frame belies the softness of the curves I can see undulating her frame. Oh yes, she's beautiful. The pale texture of her skin, the sea-blue of her eyes, the scarlet fingertips outstretched like claws on the pale material of my duvet. God, she's beautiful. Do you? Do you think I'm beautiful, my Toshiko?

"You know I do," I whisper, my heart beating a tattoo at the base of my neck. Her eyes flicker to it and she smiles before turning her eyes back to me.

"Yes," she says, inclining her head as she reaches my side of the bed and swings her legs over so she's sitting in front of me. "And you are too."

I don't take compliments well. Generally I don't take them at all. I store them away and savour them at a later date, pour over them with the abject regret of a lonely person. But tonight ... now, I drink it in. I'm willing to believe anything and everything she says from now on because I can hear her in my head and my heart. And I want to lose myself in it, to surrender entirely to whatever she wants and wishes and dreams for.

"Thank you," I say, my voice thickened by the desire plunging rollercoaster waves of delight through my entire body. I feel like my knees are trembling as I look down on her, on that naked skin that aches for my touch.

My beautiful Toshiko. I know you want me. But not as much as I want you.

She reaches up and her fingers curl over the waistband of my jeans, pulling me closer to where she sits on the bed. Deftly, she unbuttons and unzips and has them halfway down my legs before I can even comprehend what she's doing.

...kisses on my hip bone, her breath warm against my inner thigh...hot, wet contact with my belly and lower...always moving lower until she's almost inside me...

It's almost orchestral, the noise in my head that pounds down to my heart and sings a vibrato further down, to the dull aching in my loins that moves me closer to her. I step out of my jeans and let her remove my underwear as well. I slip out of my shirt and unclasp my bra, throwing it carelessly to one side. It feels deliciously wicked to be so lewd and improper. I throw my head back for a second and delight in the forbidden, the frowned upon, the deliriously seductive.

"Toshiko..." Mary whispers and I look at her. She smiles and places her hands onto my hips, pulling me towards her on the bed. I'm naked and I should be ashamed, I should be conscious of my modesty and my reputation and all the chaste inhibitions instilled in me since birth. But I lean down and fall over her, one of my legs sliding naturally between hers, her lean limb hooking over mine. She reaches up behind me and pulls at the clasp on my hair, throwing it across the room where it lands with a clink against the wardrobe. We giggle and she pulls her fingers through my hair, watching the jet black strands slip through her grasp.

Touch me. Please touch me, my beautiful Toshiko.

I'm lying over her, my stomach pressed against hers. I can feel the insistent press of her breast on my own, her breath on my shoulder as she drops kisses onto it. My hand moves to rest on her hip, curving up and away from her thigh and rolling gently down towards her waist. I smooth my hand over it, daring myself and smiling when I feel the silken contact on my palm. Mary's eyes half close like a cat's and she lays her head down on the duvet, rolling over so that her body is exposed to me.

Please...please touch me, Toshiko. Make love to me. Give me your love.

My fingers look so strange on her body, as though they aren't meant to be there and yet I know that this is right, for now. Spreading out my hand I splay them across her skin, trailing them down her outer thigh and then back up towards her waist. She murmurs something that I can't quite catch and I realise I've been listening to my own thoughts, resounding in my head like thunder.

She grabs my wrist and pushes my hand downwards, down over her belly to where the stray wiry hairs begin. I should be afraid; I should be hesitant and yet I'm not. I hear her whisper my name as I dip my head to her skin, tasting it just above her breast. She sighs and shifts beneath me as I gather flesh between my lips and taste it with the tip of my tongue. When I use my teeth it elicits a groan that spirals up my spine and flutters around my groin. She pushes her hips up beneath me and my hand slips lower...always lower...

...so good...so good...

I'm not sure if those are her thoughts or mine. It's funny really; I don't even care anymore. Things like that don't matter now. The only thing that really matters is my hand sliding over her skin, her body thrusting up to meet my touch, her legs parting and her breath against my shoulder. Hot. Quick. Her tongue on my flesh and her teeth following, scraping, biting. They'll leave marks and I want them to. I want her to mark me, to leave a reminder of how we are right now. Something to let me know that this is really happening.

...it is happening...it's happening now...

Without even thinking, a chuckle escapes from my throat as I savour her skin and she moans in response. I move sideways, shifting my weight so that I'm leaning over her a little more assertively. This feels good; this alien power flooding my body. I never knew that sexual thrill: sure, I'd read about it and craved it but never found it. Until now, that is. Until I let my tongue drift up the length of her neck and my fingers wander into the patch of softly curling sandy brown hair. I can't help laughing again, the sound muffled against her neck, the pulse in it clattering madly underneath my lips. Toshiko Sato would never be so bold!

...but she would...she is...

I take the initiative ... I'm good at that, so Jack tells me ... and nudge her legs further apart. She moans again, her breath fluttering past my hair. I love the way it sounds. I love that I'm the one making her groan and writhe underneath me. I can feel the searing heat emanating from between her legs, from that part of her that sends a blistering chill of passion down my spine to throb tantalisingly in my own loins. She gasps as I tentatively trail my forefinger down the puffy pink lips, feeling how velvety soft they are. There's a part of me that remembers those clinical anatomy lectures at university; the drone of my professor and the stupid diagrams that made the idiot boys at the back of the lecture theatre snigger and make asinine comments. And as I touch her, my brain throws terminology at me whilst my fingers betray that disengagement and I can't help closing my eyes, sparks of yellow and white exploding behind my lids.

Her leg bends, her knee pushing up and into the maddening pulsating between my thighs. Now she laughs; scrapes her scarlet nails down my back and I arch into them, hearing a long hiss of desire escape my throat. The pendant falls onto her chest, snaking a blur of green down between her breasts as I lift my head up and away from her. Now she looks into my eyes and I can see...I can see...I see everything. Everything I should be and everything I am.

"Touch me," she says, her voice no more than a murmur, an afterthought, a promise. "Touch me." Her leg pushes up again and I feel myself squirm against it whilst her hand splays across my lower back, warm fingers outstretched to force me against her. My hips begin to rock back and forth involuntarily as though dancing to a primal rhythm. God, she feels amazing underneath me; she feels so supple and pliant and yet the muscles in her leg are tensing and relaxing with every movement she makes.

My head hangs down and I can feel her nails digging into my wrist, sharp tiny knife edges of want as she tugs at me. Her eyes deepen to azure as they hold mine, my face a tiny reflection in dilated pupils. My fingers graze against her and she sucks in air through her teeth, closing her eyes. When she opens them again they look almost violet, darkening to black as she thrusts up again with her hips and my fingertips slip inside her.

...yes...

Her hand reaches up to cup my face. There's an odd expression in her eyes, on her face. I try to read her thoughts, but there's nothing there, just the echo of my question rattling around my own mind. For a second I'm scared; I feel lost without that connection, without that link to her that's so much more than the physical. But she smooths her palm down my cheek and shakes her head almost imperceptibly, her mouth curving to a soft smile.

"We don't need this," she says, her fingers reaching for the pendant.

"You don't need this," she adds, tugging so that it comes free from my neck and reality comes flooding in to fill the void in my head.

"No," my voice croaks. I haven't spoken for so long that words seem ineffectual and a poor line of defence against her. "I need to ... "

"You don't," she drops the pendant onto the bed. "You know how I feel." She punctuates her words with a thrust of her leg and I feel a wave of weakness palpitate my hips. I fall against her momentarily, my ears buzzing.

...touch me...

And she's moving underneath me, writing patterns on my back with her fingertips, swirling circles of desire over my skin, echoed in the slow languorous sway of my hips. How they betray me. How honest they are.

...please...touch me...

So I do. I do. The sound that emanates from her mouth when I slide my fingers inside her wrenches inside my chest. She squirms under me, her eyes widening at my temerity. I'm grinning as I taste her; I can feel my lips stretch as I press them to her neck, her clavicle, her pectorals. The names flit into my head and out of them just as quickly as she clutches at me, her hands on me; all over me.

I can feel beads of sweat lower down between my breasts as they are crushed against hers, pale pink nipples incongruous with my own darker ones. We move together now, friction and passion and motion becoming damp with sweat and lust. Her knee is hard and I bear down on it, a glorious rocking back and forth that brings a thankful groan from my throat. And I'm gasping, sucking in oxygen that dizzies me as I plunge into her. It feels welcome and familiar although I know there's a part of me that is horrified at my desire; ashamed at my sensual celebration of this moment, this passion.

Her chest rises and falls more quickly as her sinful limbs wrap around me. She whispers my name and I feel her clench around my fingers and shiver. My hair is sticking to the back of my neck and my forehead and I can hardly focus as she slides her arm around my waist and pulls me down onto her. It's too much. Her caress, her blistering wetness clinging to my touch, the way her breath husks against my shoulder. For the first time in what seems like forever, I'm not alone. I'm with her in every whimper, in every bead of sweat that rolls from my throbbing body, in the fingers that press against my skin.

There's a sharpness at the back of my neck; a tension that is taut and stretched in a fine line of sensation down throughout my whole body. She throws her head back, arches her back. I feel like I'm falling and throw out my arm to brace myself. It's hard to rationalise the emotions ripping through me. I like to name things, to know what they are. I like to compartmentalise and organise and do all those things that Torchwood teased out of me back in the beginning. And yet, here in the moment, with Mary poised in my embrace, on the crest of this...this thing, I find that I am unable to name or label or classify anything about what we are. What we're doing. What we're feeling.

But I know it's perfect. It's consuming. It's an emancipation of someone I had incarcerated in routine and order.

...Toshiko...my Toshiko...

Her lips part, inches from my own. I can't help but crush my mouth against hers, abandoning myself to it. Harder, faster, flesh against flesh. God, I can't stand it. I can't do without this feeling. But I can't stop the inevitable surge through my veins as the taste of her tongue ignites me. As the light explodes from my loins to my chest I pull away from her and see her smile at me, her mind calling my name, keening into sound as she pushes against me, twitching, rising, aching, falling.

For the first time, there is silence. A nothingness of fulfilment. A blackness of peace.

And I smile as she smooths the hair back from my face. I smile as she trails her fingers down my cheek. I smile as I close my eyes and lean down against her. And when she embraces me, there are no voices, no whispers, no sound except the whistle of my pulse as my blood sings around my body.

This moment contains me; I feel the precarious freedom in her arms and I cling to it and let it cover me in a sheen of parity with everyone else I had always envied so much. And for the first time in my life, I'm within hearing distance of myself.

***