playinginsand | [AU: Kaylee in Eden]

"Shiny!" Kaylee exclaims, apparently not all that hungry after all.

"She's a real beauty!"

"Thanks." Now he's filled with pride, standing off to the side to let her get as close as she likes, but his eyes are on the machine as he grins. "I check it at least once a day, but I've only really had to do upkeep twice in six years."

"Well, they like to be cared for," Kaylee says, "once she's responding to you, it's just a matter of listening to her... oh listen to me. You know all about this anyway, right?"

She turns and grins at him; a real bright smile.

"You ever been in the black?"

He blinks at the brightness of that smile. It seems familiar somehow, that particular light in her eyes, and Sokka just slowly smiles back at her, nodding slowly. "Yeah, but it's been a while since someone passed through I could babble with, so don't worry about that."

As for the black, he's rubbing his neck again, letting his eyes move back to the generator as he shrugs. "Nope. Just in the, uh-- atmo, now and again."

"Shame," she says. "Somethin' special about a good responsive boat. It's more than just a few machines, not that machines ain't special."

But she's back looking at the generator again, peering around the back, where she finds blankets.

"See you camp our down here when she's sick, though," she remarks. You ever have sex down here?"

He smiles and ducks his head, nodding when she waxes poetic on her ship. "Yeah, I've heard that," is all he says, quiet.

Sokka looks up when she notes the blankets, opening his mouth to offer an explanation. The problem comes when he chokes on air a second later.

"Do-- I-- what?"

Kaylee's eyes go wide. "Have I said too much?" she asks with a nervous laugh. "You much think I'm some sort of guàipĭ de rén. I'm just stuck on my own in the engine room all day, and you must get girls passing through all the time, right?"

There is a fifteen year old in Sokka's brain right now squeeing. Fortunately, the twenty-three year old is quashing him under eight years of confusing sexual exploits.

"Uh," he begins, and figures it's probably a good thing he doesn't understand the Chinese. "No- no, I don't think you're a... it's just... uhm..."

He clears his throat and prays he's not blushing as hard as he thinks he is, blinking at her. "It's been... a long time." A beat and he grins a little, sheepish. "...most girls that pass through want to know me longer than twenty minutes. And that's just-- assuming they haven't gotten totally sick of me talking machines yet."

"Well, just forget I asked, then," Kaylee says easily. "It's been a long time for me too, is all. Hey, you know you've got a loose connection here, right?"

He doesn't come forward right away, brows drawing together with worry as he looks at her. This hadn't been on his mind when he saw her from the roof, nothing like it had been on his mind since he first met her. But that doesn't mean he isn't...

Intrigued. Intrigued is a good word. Besides, he doesn't want to insult her.

Taking slow steps to join her, Sokka frowns as he crouches beside her, trying to peer where she's pointing. "Where? I've got some tools up on the roof I can go get."

You know, if he turned his head to the side, he'd be very, very close to her face.

He would, wouldn't he?

"Here," Kaylee says, pointing directly at it. Then

she

turns

her

face to explain, and it treated to a close up of one of those scars.

"It's not urgent, but if one of the magnets slips, the whole thing'll go down in seconds."

You know, if she hadn't said anything, Sokka would not be nearly as aware of her breath against his cheek as he is right now. As it is, it takes him a moment before he dips to look right where she's pointing. "Oh yeah, you're right. I'll have to tighten that later. Damn it, why didn't I notice that last time..."

Leaning forward as he is, Sokka puts his hand down against the ground to balance. There's something warm under a couple of his fingers and, for whatever reason, he doesn't look down to see if it's her hand.

It is her hand, as it happens, but Kaylee, shot down as she sees herself, isn't really worried about it.

"You miss things," she says. "You see something everyday and you miss things. Sometimes it takes someone new to point out what's been starin' you in the face all along."

She laughs. "Like this time Serenity's fugeshaft was almost completely worn through. If Wash hadn't found it, I'd have left us spinning into the black"

He grins at her - for the story and for the excuse not to call it his fault. "Well, if you hadn't found this, I'd've had about thirty people pissed off and screaming at me until I got it fixed again. So thank you."

"Maybe thirty people is worse'n the five yellin' at me we start driftin'," Kaylee allows. "But you ain't met my cap'n."

And having Mel Reynolds yell at you is worse than anything

Sokka just smirks and leans back to sit cross-legged on the floor. "That's all right. You haven't met Minerva. She's new but she bitches like a pro."

She didn't react to his words or to the hand. He's not sure if he should be disappointed by this or not.

He just knows that a part of him is.

She might not have reacted when it was there, but when his hand comes up, hers lifts, fingers grabbing slightly in mid-air.

Then she sits up, facing him.

"Well, I'm glad I saved you from that, then."

Well, then.

His hand pauses, in case her fingers want to grab at things other than air.

"...I really appreciate it," he replies, grinning a little as he twists to face her, too.

It's possible that he's even in her debt.

Kaylee wouldn't exactly say that. And she certainly wouldn't want to exchange things.

Maybe not that, anyway. But her fingers brush his, and that couldn't be an accident, right? And he's... is he looking at her funny?

She grins that bright smile again.

"What is it?"

Is he? He blinks with the question, smile dropping a little. Did he look at her strangely, say something strange, freak her out with the smile?

Or overthink every little thing terribly?

The hand that brushed her fingers lifts and he rubs the back of his neck, sheepish with his eyes on the machine. "Nothing. Sorry. Seriously, we don't get a lot of mechanics here, so I guess I kind of freak out when there's someone to talk to about any of this."

Kaylee laughs again.

"No need to freak out," she says. "She's beautiful. You should be proud of her."

"I am," Sokka replies, grinning when he glances to Kaylee and then puts his eyes back on the generator, and the pride is there, obvious in his gaze. It wasn't his first invention and certainly not his biggest; he'd been more proud of the light and alarm system in Apocalyptica, his proudest had been the zeppelin.

But the generator... that was the first thing he built alone.

A pause and his grin is sheepish, laughing quietly at himself. "Even if my nephew was the genius behind the machine that'll take everyone home."

"Then it clearly runs in the family," Kaylee says with a laugh.

"Where is he now, your nephew?"

Grinning when she laughs, Sokka makes a face anyway, sitting back on his but with a knee up to rest his arm on. "He and his sisters used the machine to go back to the world my nieces were born on. He's got the plans he needs to make another machine and he was born here, so they'll come back when they're ready."

Though it wasn't-- supposed to take quite this long.

"Oh well, ain't that just shiny," Kaylee says. "Dimension hopping 'stead of planet hopping. Bet they get to meet all sorts of people."

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