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Ntaro Challenge: A House L'u-cif-er Story (ch. 2) by Acton Bell


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Viir woke with a start. Beside him, Genji lay sleeping on his stomach, his hair haloed around him. He stirred as Viir sat up, but didn't wake.
Viir smiled as he trailed his fingers lightly over his lover's shoulder, enjoying the feel of the warm, moist flesh. They had met in a hot, stuffy practice room when they were seventeen. Captured by a pair of golden eyes, Viir had known instantly that he had met the other part of himself. Being the off-spring of a Byshen and a gengineered Elysium he had been treated like an outsider by both cultures. As a Wild Psi he had feared himself and what he was capable of. He'd felt his Talents eating away at him, known he was going to die before he'd ever really lived. Then he met Genji. From the other man he received total acceptance and understanding and he'd known he filled the void in Genji's life also. Against all odds he had celebrated his twentieth birthday and more. He and Genji had made a life together, gengineered a son together. They were blessed.
Viir stiffened. There it was again. The faintest brush of a mind against his own, a feeling of cold calculation and anger. Mentally he reached out, trying to find who and where it was. There was nothing.
"Fjandinn!" Viir cursed softly. His Talents were strong, but they were unpredictable. All his life he'd found himself unable to perform the simplest of acts with his Talent.
"What is it?" said Genji, sitting up and pressing Viir's hand. "What's wrong?"
Viir was flooded with a cascade of emotions belonging neither to himself nor Genji. Anger, pain, fear, self-righteousness. Half-formed thoughts and images surged into his mind. Fire. A young Ntaro catching a ball. Their fault. The Ntaro, one among others, gathered at a table.
Tears rolled down Viir's face at the depth of the anguish he was sensing.
More disconnected images. Always the same Ntaro at different ages and places. Older, younger. No pattern. Just the Ntaro and pain, anger. Hurt. Fire. Pain. Die!
He couldn't breathe. He was drowning in psychic agony. Genji was yelling. He couldn't hear the words above the crackling of the flames. The smoke was filling his lungs. There was so much pain.
The connection broke.
Viir gasped for breath, the air burning in his lungs as if he had run a race. His muscles were trembling. He couldn't control the shaking. He had never experienced that intense of a connection outside Elska before. And his bond with Genji had been one of completion; this had been one of submersion. He had ceased being Viir and become someone else.
The trembling subsiding, he lifted his head to look at Genji. Even in the dim light Viir could see the other's face was white beneath the tawny shaded skin.
"Minn ástvinur hjarta," Genji said. His voice was rough and ragged, even as the brush of his mind against Viir's was hesitant and gentle, seeking to heal if it could.
Viir winced as he tried to smile and gingerly touched the cheek that still burned from the slap Genji had administered to break the connection.



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