She caught sight of the dark, damp pink of Cafas' hair only once it was far too late.

Maya started with an ACK! and moved right on into squealing and wriggling as they both disappeared into the white abyss.

"Ca-!" She was still wheezing from her fall, her ribs already sore. "Cafas!" She tried to get his attention between noms. His hair tickled along her collar bone as he mimed his actions. It tickled and she meant to retaliate.

Maya found his face and latched onto it with both hands.

"Leviathan, meet Kraken!" She snaked her arms past his face and reached down and around to surrounded his torso and crush his face to her collar bone. She wrapped her legs around one of Cafas' as any proper Kraken would. Their foamy sea battle waged beneath the milky depths.

A challenger has appeared! A mighty tentacled Kraken, sworn enemy and competition for tasty food! It's fiendish tentacles covered the leviathan's face momentarily, blinding it, before wrapping in to crush the Leviathan to death! The Leviathan tried to escape but tentacles had trapped its leg-appendage.

Hope we don't get stepped on or kicked

"Tonight I shall feast on calamari!" Came a muffled shout from Maya's collar bone. The leviathan thrashed (gently) trying to free itself from the squidy clutches! It's leg and face were trapped! It pulled mightily (and cheated by tickling the Kraken's sides) pulling his face free.

Leviathan's don't survive by playing fair!

Truly a mighty struggle to behold on the depths of the Foamcean, Leviathan tried mightily (carefully) to gain the top position, finding purchase with it's free legpendage. It flipped itself atop the Kraken, tickling still more. "You are mine Kraken!"

A mouthful of foam briefly stunned the Leviathan, it's rage turned to confusion as it choked and tried to get the flavour out if its mouth. "Ew, yuck, so gross." Truly a battle-cry to inspire dread!

She held him tight, tight, tighter! But eventually had to let his face go when the dexterous Leviathan cheated. She slapped her mighty tentacle hands ineffectively along his sides as a defense. They rolled across and over and back and forth in their battle as both creatures battled for dominance. No doubt Maya's hair would not be white after this kind of battle.

> "You are mine, Kraken!"

In the end, it was the Leviathan that came out on top. Kraken Maya gasped and giggled trying her damnedest to tickle him back from where her hands had slipped under his shirt. The soap made it easy to slide her arms up his slick skin and the foamcean sprayed at him with maybe a little help from a passing breeze.

He sputtered as the unintended consequence of both tickling someone and throwing foam at their face came to fruiting. Soapy mouth. Yeah. She'd had a little bit of that earlier.

"Wait!" Maya stopped her assault and laid her hands flat on his ribs, panting from their epic battle. She was a mess. Her hair was a limp tentacle all on its own. Her shirt rode up to expose the silvery scars at her belly. Her skirt. She didn't even want to look.

And now that they'd stopped, she was feeling Cafas panting under her hands. He was right there. She wanted to hug him again. Have him hold her. Was that... wrong?

She smoothed her hands up and around to his back and then pulled herself up, an inverted pull up. She couldn't hold it for long. Her arms were already shaking. Physical strength was not her forte. Her lips pursed on the way up to him, she meant to whisper in his ear. Truce. That was what she wanted to say. That was why her lips were puckered. Honest.

The Leviathan didn't know how long it could hold out to revenge tickling. Its weaknesses would be exposed. It fought back the urge to giggle under mounting tension.

"Wait!"

Oh thank God

His nemesis wished to parlay? He would hear her out. Cafas held himself up, one leg still trapped, Maya's hands against his chest. Was she hurt? As best he could Cafas looked Maya up and down, pausing momentarily at the scarring he'd never seen before.

I wonder...

Her hands slipped around him, far too gently to be a renewed attack. Cafas looked up as his body took her weight. Her arms were shaking. He slipped an arm around to support her. His eyes moved up her face, pursed lips to soft, honey eyes. Could any man have resisted?

He pulled her tight.

Their lips met.

Later he'd convince himself he was drunk, if he'd just had a moment to think, if he'd not been away so long. He'd forget the moment, and how badly he'd wanted it. There, buried in foam, half undressed and panting, he'd wanted her.

She'd been aiming for his ear, but when Cafas helped support her weight he did it a little too well. Her body lined up with his, mouth to mouth, belly to belly, leg to leg. The most important and surprising of those being the mouth to mouth part. He swallowed the word she'd meant to speak, her lips parted in surprise. Then almost of their own accord, they molded themselves to match Cafas' lips.

Her body sang with tension. Didn't he not even like girls? She thought that she'd been safe and so she hadn't considered his feelings as they played. She hadn't considered her own, either.

She craved this and even wanted closer. But they were already there. Hands, lips, teeth. Every time she tried to form a coherent thought something distracted her. Like his stubble. It'd been a long time since she'd felt stubble.

They'd been silly. If she'd been thinking, she wouldn't have let herself get into this situation. Even now, it wasn't her brain that was in the driver's seat. At least, it wasn't the word-forming part of the brain.

Someone tripped over their legs and it was enough to break the spell.

Maya was kissing Cafas.

The thought scared her enough that she gasped into incorporeality. The girl he'd been holding simply went poof. Right into thin air.

How long had the kiss lasted? He would never know. To him it was an instant and an eternity. Her lips against his, his hand on her back, pulling her still closer, feeling the contours of her shoulder blade in exquisite detail.

And it was gone.

The moment, and the shoulder blade.

Cafas' arm gave out, not from exertion but from the wave of emotion that broke against him. He had no time to respond or brace, he hit the floor hard and with a crunch.

He could feel the blood dripping from his nose already.

He could feel that his nose was broken.

It wasn't what hurt the most.

Idiot.

He pushed himself to his knees, standing, staring blankly at the floor.

Bastard.

He could feel the burning in his eyes, he fought with it and barely won.

Traitor.

The word struck him like a meteor strikes a planet. It left a scar on his mental landscape he would never be rid of. Loyalty. It was all he had. The one thing he had never questioned. Now it had failed.

Anger and self loathing boiled within him, even as blood fell from his chin. He wanted to release it, wanted an escape, but there was none. His arm drifted to his face, wiping the blood away. He barely noticed he'd moved.

****

He shook his head. Released himself from his own clutches. He wasn't done with himself, but there was something far more important at that moment.

"Maya?"

He spun, looking for her, a quiet desperation in his voice.

I'll never forgive you if you hurt her.

For Maya, it was easy to let herself spread through the bubbles, a low-lying fog that people kicked through just as easily as they kicked through the now grimy foam on the floor.

She had-

That was-

How could she? The whole thing replayed in her mind. She could see it now, how they'd ended up there in that moment. She'd jumped him and teased him all night. It hadn't been fair to him. Even if he didn't like girls, it wouldn't have been fair to him.

> "Maya?"

Now she was being a big ol' chicken about it. She'd taken advantage of him and his loneliness. The worst part was that she wanted to do it again: she just wanted to be held. Except, what she really wanted, if she was going to be honest with herself, was something that was never, ever in a million years going to happen.

"I'm okay." Her small voice came from nowhere in particular, but she did start to construct one of her fragile silence barriers. If someone walked through it, the dang thing would pop. But she didn't want to have this conversation over the thumping music. And she didn't dare face him just now. She stayed close... and far... and all around. "I'm sorry. I was unfair and I, I just took it too far. I apologize. Really." She wanted to ask him to forget it, but... well, could she?

"I'm okay. I'm sorry. I was unfair and I, I just took it too far. I apologize. Really."

The music died and now Maya was speaking to him out of thin air. Cafas seemed to recall her being able to do that, but the years had dulled his memory. Still, what surprised him more were her apologies.

"You... You really shouldn't be the one apologising here. I kissed you. Look, I'm sorry if I upset you, I just... It was.. I dunno." He held his face in his hands, trying to rub some sense into his head. It hurt a lot and he let go with an angry gasp. "I really have no excuse. I'm sorry, I'm sorry to you and I'm sorry to Calley. God... F***! Weak sonofab****!".

Despite the foamy fun to be had people were staring at the guy talking silently to himself now. Just casually standing in the middle of the club, nose streaming blood, talking to himself. Cafas noticed them for the first time since the kiss. He really didn't want the world thinking he'd had some episode

"Hey can... Can we talk about this outside? You don't have to form up if you don't want to."

"Please don't be mad." Even if he was directing his anger at himself, Maya felt it wasn't that far a leap to be mad at her, especially since she deserved it.

Outside. Maya imagined hugging herself around the middle. She could trust herself to go outside. And there was no alcohol outside. Yes. Outside was good. "Yeah. No. Outside's great." Or down a deep, deep, dark hole. That might be even better.

She let the barrier drop and with a rush the sound came back. Just like flipping a switch.

Maya "formed up" outside of the perimeter of bubbles. She was still sopping wet. Chilly now, she guessed, from the goosebumps she felt on her own arms when she hugged herself. And her shoes were somewhere in that bubble mess. Probably a lost cause.

The elemental waited for Cafas, considered and discarded the offer of her hand. She instead opted to hug herself tighter.

Maya formed out of thin air in front of Cafas,as his ears were once again assaulted by the driving music. She looked... Cold and upset. If he'd thought to bring a jacket he'd have given it to her. He really wanted to hug her, but he was sure she wanted to keep further from him than that.

~~~

Outside wasn't what Cafas would term warm. He shivered slightly in his wet clothes before finding an out of the way nook to stand in, leaning against the wall. He tried to calm down, at the very least for Maya.

He sighed, sliding his back down the wall until he was sitting, knees pulled in.

"I'm sorry Maya, I shouldn't have done that. Even if I was single I should've made sure it's what you wanted too... I just... I guess I saw what I wanted to see. In the moment I can't express how much I wanted that. More even. I just... God what's wrong with me?"

Cafas' shirt was soaked with water, slowly turning red. His nosebleed was finally slowing down. He knew he must have looked a mess but all he could think about was how he'd seemingly just hurt Maya, and very seriously considered cheating on Calley should it have gone there.

"Are you okay? Really, I know you said you are in there, but I dunno."

Maya grabbed a small stack of bar napkins as they passed. They were flimsy, but it was better than nothing. She was jarred by the amount of blood there was. She'd perceived him hitting the ground, but hadn't quite registered what that would look like once they were face to face. He'd even talked about his poor nose earlier.

She stepped out into the night after Cafas, barefoot.

"Hush." She knelt next to him and offered her paltry consolation prize: yay bar napkins! Was this something you dabbed at or pinched and held up? Cafas would know. She would have to trust that he would be taking care of himself here. "There's nothing wrong with you except your nose. It takes two to tango, Cafas." She flushed red, the tips of her ears and her knees burning just as red as her cheeks.

"If it were anyone but Calley, I'd make the argument that we're both consenting adults." Maya plopped down onto her backside and rubbed her eyes. She wasn't crying. That was just... soap. And this was a crummy situation all around.

Was she okay? "Guh. Don't ask that. That only makes it worse." Because she wasn't. And he wasn't. The more she thought about not being okay, the less okay she was going to be.

"I stopped wearing my ring a long time ago. Sebastian's not coming b-" she couldn't even finish that sentence before the soap made her choke up.

"Hush."

Cafas accepted the napkins gratefully. He tilted his head forward a little, pinching his nose. The napkins he used to clean his face up a bit, though without a mirror he may have just smudged it. He was also very glad she didn't appear to be angry with him.

"There's nothing wrong with you except your nose. It takes two to tango, Cafas."

That was something of a relief. Taking two to tango helped him feel a little less like he'd been the only one wanting that. He'd have nodded, had he not been pinching his nose. "I guess so, but I still shouldn't have done that to Calley." He was never going to forgive himself for that.

"If it were anyone but Calley, I'd make the argument that we're both consenting adults."

Cafas gave Maya an odd look at that. Some people you expect to say things like that, Sam for instance, Maya wasn't one of them. "Thanks, I think. If I were unattached, well I can't say I've never thought about it."

Maybe I should add "if we were both single"?

"Guh. Don't ask that. That only makes it worse."

"I stopped wearing my ring a long time ago. Sebastian's not coming b-"

Cafas, to his shame, couldn't recall even considering that all night. He shuffled closer to Maya and wrapped an arm around her. Earlier impertinence or not hugs were all he had on the comforting front. "I'm so sorry Maya..." Seriously, all he had.

Cafas sat, a cold, wet, and lonely idiot, holding his cold, wet and lonely friend.

Looks like we were both trying to replace something irreplaceable... What with trying to fix an unfixable world, seems we're making a theme of trying the impossible.

If he hadn't asked, she could have kept pretending. If he hadn't shown her kindness about it, she could have kept the tears to soap-in-the-eyes levels. But now he acknowledged that raw piece inside of her. He opened the floodgates.

She threw her arms around his neck and ugly cried into his shirt.

Sebastian wasn't coming back.

Maya'd trusted him and given him unreserved pieces of herself. That unicorn left and with him went those pieces. For four years she'd been pretending that was fine. Maybe they'd come back all on their own. Maybe he'd even bring them back?

But she couldn't hide from that now. Her loneliness was mirrored in Cafas here and now. Seeing the same kind of hurt developing in him made it impossible to avoid her own.

She cried for herself and how she'd been duped. She cried for Rowan, who had never even met his daddy. She cried for Cafas, who deserved better.

By the time she was down to hiccuping sobs, Maya realized something. "You probably shouldn't hang around me." Not that she made any movement to leave. "I tend to turn people into bad guys."

Cafas wrapped his arms around Maya fully, holding her gently as she cried. Blood sweat and tears mingled in his shirt, and he had a feeling the soap wasn't doing much. He held her in silence while she cried, stroking her back and wondering how he'd cope if Calley never came back.

If someone kills him, they'll die...

It was something he spent days worrying about. Every time the phone rang, every New York area code, every knock at his door on the rare occasion he was home. He wondered if Calley felt the same, every time the communicator rang. Cafas became aware of it's weight as he thought about it. There was no way it had survived the water.

"You probably shouldn't hang around me. I tend to turn people into bad guys."

Way too late for that...

Not that he felt like saying that to Maya. Deep down he felt a lot like a bad guy in masquerade. Things he'd done... Lives he'd ended. Could he ever truly consider himself good, even if the cause was? How bad did someone have to be for killing them to be good? To make it not evil?

"I've done my fair share of bad things Maya. I carry a sword on missions and it's hardly decorative. I've shot people, I've beaten people, I've..."

Killed people out of anger, out of a sense that I am the final arbiter of what constitutes justice.

He let his sentence trail off. There was a moment of silence and he picked back up. "Point is, you wont make me a bad guy. You'll keep me a good one." He gave her a squeeze. It was often the thought of his friends, of the X-men, of how disappointed they'd be, how much it could hurt them, that kept him from following through on darker impulses.

And Sebastian stands as a perfect example of what I can't let myself become...

She felt… puffy. Puffy and empty. Even though she was situated mostly on Cafas’ lap with her head on his shoulder, the tension they’d shared earlier that night just wasn’t there. Maybe it was the uncontrollable sobbing and the shivering. It just wasn’t sexy.

Cafas didn’t seem to hold a very high opinion of himself. She would have stopped him if he hadn’t stopped himself.

”I don’t want to sound biased,” though at this point she clearly was, ”But if you’re unhappy… you don’t have to be.” She addressed his bloody shirt where her hand gripped it. Not that Maya was a better alternative. Maya was damaged goods and came with a hell of a lot of baggage. And not that quitting the X-men was something that you could just do. She’d tried that. Now here she was, right back on the vigilante bandwagon.

And Maya wasn’t a long term solution either. ”You deserve to be happy too.” Because, clearly, she was the spitting image of happiness right now.