Written Wonderland

Oh, some part of Evan's mind screamed at the rest of him, exasperated about why the fuck no part of his entire body was in contact with the luscious, radiant, beckoning goddess before him. But he was sharp and determined now, his expression somehow holding steady despite the whirlwind of fantasies and impulses his lust kept throwing at him in hopes of sparking more play.

He felt the goddess' gaze on him--obviously saw it, too, but he could swear a strange, caressing tingle roamed along his skin in sync with the movements of her eyes. It took some effort to dig past the fantasies--the (seemingly?) easy, sumptuous, straightforward sex; the exciting, thrilling, agonizingly imbalanced jostling for control; the painful, harrowing, enraging humiliations--but the captain held tight to the sensation of the goddess' gaze to pull out memories of confidence: his fingers running over his collar bone at her summoning; his torso dancing confidently as he pulled off his shirt the previous night; the look in the goddess' eyes when he managed to push her down with his fingers around her throat.

He managed to bolster himself with those memories, and feel more in his head or even above it rather than stuck in his dick. He still felt the ache and the yearning, but he had it tamed for the time being. He watched the goddess' expression shift subtly through the silence with a still unfaltering gaze and a powerfully confident posture. For once he felt utterly in control of himself, even if he still had no idea how to get what he wanted from here.

He had mixed feelings about her asking if he was disappointed. Obviously, it wasn't a genuine inquiry, but nor was it as biting as he was, apparently, anticipating. His expression did finally falter--just to let show a brief, fleeting flicker of a smirk before returning to that steely inscrutable gaze.

Before he could think of a reply, though, the goddess carried on, and asked him another question that raised so fucking many mixed feelings. What was it he desired? Fuck if that wasn't just about the most complicated question he could have possibly conceived of.

He desired his dick inside of her.
He desired Xavier's safety, and--fuck--to be back with him.
He desired the goddess in agonizing pain, or insufferably humiliated--or better yet, both.
He desired Mizu's trust and respect, which he resented deeply was on the line right now.
He desired to feel the goddess sinking beneath his touch and to ride that power trip all the way up as far as he could go.
He desired the goddess' touch--to sink beneath her and lose himself completely in her power and potency.
He desired to serve the goddess--to free her and see her revenge exacted and her status in the world repaired.

The captain sighed, in a way he tried to play off as bored but that let show a hint of sorrow--both in the sound and in his subtly softened expression--and he crossed his arms as he leaned his shoulder against the wall by the bed.

"What's it say if not even the goddess of desire knows what you want?"

The goddess held her breath for a moment as she watched her question settled over Evan. Though his newfound composure irritated her, she desperately awaited the opportunity to sink into the fantasies that were surely about to flood his mind, and she closed her eyes in anticipation, a wide smile appearing over her lips.

She watched behind her eyes eagerly as he imagined himself deeply buried in her and utterly consumed by the intoxicating nature of her body, watched him imagine falling under her command at her very touch, watched him imagine turning the tables on her yet again so he raise himself practically to godhood by owning her. Her body shivered at the thought, and her lips pursed, but the fantasies were coming quickly, and she didn't have time to collect herself. She watched him consider causing her pain or even humiliating her the way she did to him and watched him yearn for his beloved lieutenant. The goddess smirked, grateful she had interrupted their tryst at exactly the right time. She watched Evan imagine the possible scenarios of both losing or gaining Mizu's favor, and she was amused that she couldn't sort out which of those he wanted more, but she was utterly struck by the potency of his desire when he came to imagine serving the goddess Dehaljadrun herself, not as a thrall but as a free agent bent on releasing her and restoring her to her power, both with the human realm and the gods. And then she saw Evan imagine Dehaljadrun exacting revenge on the king, and her smile erupted into a terrifying grin at the satisfaction of that thought with all its gruesome and heartless detail.

As the images behind her eyes faded and gave away to a somewhat surprising sensation of melancholy shyly radiating off Evan's mind, the goddess opened her eyes and raised an eyebrow both at Evan's sigh and his retort.

Rolling her eyes momentarily, she bit back the easy answer--that she absolutely fucking did know what he desired--and rolled casually off the bed, her tall form taking on its full height as she closed the distance between them one agonizing set of inches at a time. When she was finally close enough, she leaned one hand against the wall to brace herself while she let one finger trace the edge of Evan's jaw, holding the rest of her body stubbornly away from his naked skin. As she did so, she leaned in toward Evan's ear, her hair falling over one side of her face and shoulders, and whispered with the subtlest breath, "It means you're one hell of a playing field."

Evan's melancholy shifted to indignation the instant the goddess rolled her eyes. He supposed she probably thought she did know what he desired, but he couldn't see how she possibly could if he couldn't even figure it out himself. Maybe she just sensed all his mixed feelings, and felt content with that, despite the fact that it left him fucking paralyzed with confused, agonizing indecision.

Or--the thought crossed his mind with flashes of both terror and wonder--maybe she knew more about his own desires than he did. She was a fucking god, after all. That thought tugged poignantly at his chest, pulling up that sense of purpose that had been ignited at her summoning--that for once in his life, maybe he really was finally where he was supposed to be.

The captain stubbornly narrowed his eyes, both disinterest and melancholy now firmly replaced with irritation. His eyes might've widened a touch at his previous thought, but he clamped down on his expression quickly and determinedly, no matter how heavily his attention was currently being pulled into his chest.

The goddess had moved up from the bed and was making a melodramatically slow approach. Evan uncrossed his arms and let them fall lazily to his sides as he shifted to lean more on his shoulder blades so he could face the goddess squarely while still casually leaning back. He was confident as she approached, but his godsdamned lips couldn't fucking help parting, albeit subtly, as the goddess placed her finger against his jaw and drew out a silent breath from his tender chest. He could feel his cock throb, the screams of the part of him aching to touch her growing louder in his mind, and fighting to pull his attention even further back down into his body, to give in to the way his skin felt utterly magnetized towards hers.

Evan clamped his lips and his jaw shut in response, his temples momentarily swelling with tension.

Then the goddess whispered in his ear, sending a shiver down the back of his neck and a jittery excitement into his chest. It seemed like a good thing to hear--one hell of a playing field--but he wasn't entirely sure. But rather than stand there stiffly and ponder over her reply, he finally decided to just take a fucking action, and in order to bypass his current paralysis about what action to take, he decided to just let the fuck go and let his intuition drive.

"I want a new memory of you in my body."

Oh, not action? Well, not how he'd expected, anyway. He surprised himself by going this direction--just staying the fuck still and talking--and he still had some pretty fucking mixed feelings about this idea he was proposing, but, well, no turning back now.

"Not just taking pity on me and calling off a thrall."

His cheeks had faded after he'd stood and paced along the bed, but they gained back some color again at that comment, his eyes shifting uncomfortably to the side away from the goddess's face. He brought them back again quickly, despite the fact that his expression was starting to admit that he did not, in fact, entirely like this idea. Rather, he kind of fucking hated it.

"And my commander wants to speak with you, anyway. Think we could come to an arrangement? I'm sure you'd have a fucking heyday with it."

Dehaljadrun thoroughly enjoyed how close her body was to Evan's even if it is was excruciating to continue keeping more of herself from touching him. She was so immersed in the sensation of his skin against her finger that that it took her a few moments to register what Evan was saying.

Something about his body, a thrall, his commander... how did any of that make sense? Dehaljadrun pulled away in an attempt to clear her head, her eyebrows furrowed at the direction the situation had taken. And here she thought he was going to pounce her again; she'd said exactly the right thing, hadn't she? Of course she had.

The goddess looked Evan up and down again, mostly out of confusion and frustration than admiring his body--though that definitely threatened to distract her again. Finally dipping into his mind to understand what the fuck he was actually asking for here, she saw Evan's memory of her possessing his body only long enough for her tell Philip to stop what he was doing to Evan, and her heart sank, an immense wave of regret passing over her again. She turned away from Evan, uncaring that her back was to him, and walked over to the table, placing her hands onto it in the place where Evan's body had been just moments before. Fuck, why did they have to double back to this shit again?

But there was more. If the goddess understood what Evan was asking for... He wanted her to possess him to talk to his commander? Her eyebrows furrowed more deeply, and she grew uncomfortable knowing that Evan was surely watching her reactions, but she needed to think, gods damnit, and facing him was not about to help her with that.

"I don't know if I can do that," the goddess finally said, after which she did turn to face Evan, her expression somewhat worried and possibly even remorseful. But then again, maybe she could. It's one thing to try to possess men through dreams and another thing entirely to ride back in Evan's body when he used the talisman. Surely she could manage for longer than she had with the others before... before...

"It's one thing to release a thrall I came to in a dream," the goddess said, her expression evening out into a uncharacteristic stoicism so far from where her desire had been just moments before. "It's another thing altogether to release a man who falls under while I'm more physically in his body." The goddess looked toward the curtain, aware of the presences just outside the room. Gods, it would be glorious to meet with Evan's commander in Evan's body, though, especially given what she had just learned about their relationship, and didn't she need him prepared for the underworld? If he couldn't survive a possession now... It was risky, though, incredibly risky, and she was horrified at the idea of failing at this... again. Not to mention losing... this one. Fuck.

Evan felt a sort of grim panic grip at his chest when the goddess turned away. He'd been braced for her to gloat over him proposing the idea, or maybe just outright refuse as a power trip, but he could swear she'd looked sad before turning away, and her body language seemed deflated. He searched in his mind for what could have been wrong about his proposal, and why the goddess was having such a different reaction to it than he'd anticipated. He supposed he'd been a bit obtuse about what exactly he meant; had she misunderstood him? Or maybe it was just bringing up the incident with Philip earlier...

Evan pushed himself lightly away from the wall, half a mind to go walk up next to her, but a hesitation stalled him out. Which, in a way, he was glad for, when the goddess did turn back to face him. He looked confused and worried and kind of irritated, and expectantly still. What the fuck did she mean, she didn't think she could?

Luckily she elaborated, and at least gave him one thing he could respond to.

"I won't fall under," the captain growled, his eyes narrowing to convey his indignation at the idea.

Maybe it was hubris for him to say so so confidently, but he was entirely too fucking determined right now to even conceive of the idea. Besides, here he'd already been pissed at the thought that the goddess had just been having a bit of fun with Xavier before; Evan clenched his fists and gritted his teeth angrily at the thought that she'd knowingly risked Xavier's sanity in the process. He had half a mind to lay into her about that, but--with a great deal of effort--held himself back and waited stiffly for her reply.

The goddess let out a short laugh, unfazed by Evan's indignant expression. Did he really think that? She had seriously underestimated Evan's pride, although... maybe that meant he was underestimating her. That was going to get them both into trouble.

Once she had composed herself, she looked toward the curtain again, and nodded once, mentally giving the shadow beings permission to enter the room. They had blackened, almost burned and cracked skin over most of their unclothed bodies, and the veins of bright, glowing purple running through their flesh made them look exceptionally unhuman, though they had four limbs and a head and walked upright. Smoke or mist appeared to waft off their bodies, making it look as though they were shifting in and out of focus in a way that made it difficult to look at them directly. Four of them entered the room, some tall, some shorter, all of them aware that they were in the goddess' space and therefore subject to her demands.

"Let me give you a taste of what you're dealing with," the goddess said bitingly, her mouth and eyebrows now hard lines across her face. She nodded toward Evan, and the nearest shadow being to him--a stalky, short one about the same height as Evan with purple veins of glowing ore traveling through one eye--grabbed onto Evan's wrist. If Evan were to attempt escape, the smoky demon being would only allow its hand to become fully smoke only to reappear in a more convenient location. The other beings began to close in on Evan, the smoke coming off their bodies making breathing uncomfortable if not outright difficult. The goddess stared on unflinchingly, though she recognized the similarities to the situation with Philip, obviously still fresh on her mind. But, she had different intentions this time, and she needed Evan to know exactly what he should be prepared for if she was truly going to enter his body.

With smoky, phase-shifting hands on multiple parts of Evan's naked body--his wrists, his arms, his thighs, his hips, his ankles--the shadow beings lifted Evan effortlessly and put him in the center of the bed. Eight smoking, burned hands held Evan down face up--disappearing and reappearing as necessary--and the goddess took a deep breath. It had been a long time since she had entered someone so completely, and she'd be lying to herself if some part of her wasn't absolutely thrilled at the idea. To be so completely intertwined as to practically be the same being... Still, the rational voice in her mind piped up and reminded her, You said it would only be taste. He surely can't survive much more., and she shrugged it off, determined to summon up all the power of her godhood and send it deep into the center of this man's very soul.

As the goddess rounded the edge of the bed and stared at Evan and his open legs, she felt his inevitable fear--too late, some voice within her said--and his excitement. The purple fur of the blanket on which the shadow beings held Evan down singed at the edge where their legs and bodies were touching it, and the room was filled with a smoky, almost suffocating haze.

Dehaljadrun looked down at her hands as they caught fire, electricity sparking from the tips of the crackling flames, and moved between Evan's legs.

"You have no idea what you're asking for," she said with a somber expression before she pressed her burning hands down onto the area just above his hipbones, fully aware that the flames were coming down over his scar. The shadow beings held tighter, prepared for Evan's thrashing at the severe pain of his skin being seared, but the flames died down once the goddess' hands were fully against Evan's hips, the skin quickly turning an angry red with black at the edges. Once the flames died down completely, Dehaljadrun searched out the flow of Evan's body, the way it would seek immediately to begin repairing itself, rushing toward the areas she had desecrated. With her eyes closed, she followed this river, aligning her own energies in that direction, only one step left in the process of creating and closing the circle of energetic flow between them.

Pressing down on the burned areas of Evan's skin, the goddess braced herself as she thrust into Evan's ass, hard and unyieldingly, reaching as far into him as she could physically go in her current body, simultaneously aligning her consciousness with Evan's, her endorphins with Evan's, her emotions with Evan's, her power with Evan's as her soul physically transferred into his body.

((OOC: I've been going back and forth about the logistics of how getting into bodies works for Dehaljadrun, and I think having the person in pain (or forcing the body to try to repair itself) does help and is definitely a good way to get a stable connection. From what I'm gathering, when comes to people in dreams, it's only a halfway connection, and she's rarely able to control the body. She's mostly just present in their mind, and the connection is extremely difficult to sustain. Apparently, for a conversation with Mizu, she wants to be confident that a) Evan's not going to turn into a thrall in the meantime, b) she can stay in his body and use his voice long enough to actually have a reasonable conversation with her, and c) has at least some of her power with her so that she can make a show of force if she needs to. She's not entirely sure that, even if she were to create a stable connection with Evan that the talisman would work for her because she's not entirely sure how the bindings work (although them trying and having her soul be pulled away from Evan's in the process sounds angsty and hot as fuck). Anyway, basically this is a huge question mark for her, and though we were going back and forth about whether to just have her enter Evan's mind again, she's pissed that he thinks he can withstand her. Like, she doesn't want to make it seem easy, so she's definitely taking the more involved, more painful route. I'm willing to negotiating on these logistics or rewriting this post, but mostly it was hot and I wanted you to at least get the chance to read it if I was going to change it.))

Ughhh, Evan fucking hated that the goddess laughed in response. On the one hand, of course she did, but that didn't really make it better. The captain rolled his eyes and clenched his fists a little tighter.

He was further irritated when she looked to the curtain like she was distracted by something else. He absolutely felt like he wasn't being taken seriously, and he fucking hated it. Honestly, it felt a lot like Mizu not trusting him about the goddess in the first place had felt, but with an added infuriating layer of outright mockery to boot.

He was surprised when people--creatures?--entered the room, and admittedly stepped back against the wall again as he took in the sight of them. He thought they were probably whatever creatures had been around the clearing the other night, but seeing them up close was certainly something. And they'd kept their distance the other night, but there wasn't much distance to keep here in this room.

Evan's gaze returned sharply to the goddess when she spoke, and then again back to the smoky, blackened, veiny figures as they started to approach him. His heart was starting to race and pound against his already aching chest, and for a very brief moment, his eyes couldn't help scoping out the layout of the room in the context of how the strange beings were traversing it while his body took up a defensive stance.

No conscious part of his brain thought he was going to manage to fight his way out of the room, but the instinct to prepare for the possibility was impossible to suppress. When the first being grabbed a hold of his wrist he yanked it away without thinking, and a flush of confusion and surprise and fear chilled him when the very substance of the thing shifted to effortlessly grab hold of him again.

It was tempting to sink into an animalistic part of himself, alive and vivid with fear and adrenalin and determination to fight no matter the odds, but he didn't want to give the goddess the satisfaction. Instead he wrestled that part of him down internally while he gritted his teeth through the unnerving sensations of burnt hands grabbing at him and moving him onto the bed. The juxtaposition of them holding him down against the soft fur of the bed was very strange, and made all the stranger by the smoke wafting off the creatures and muddying Evan's brain. Some part of him wondered almost idly whether he might suffocate in it, but that seemed too absurd a fate to even contemplate.

Besides... the goddess seemed unconcerned, and she still needed him. He couldn't help using that data as a grounding point.

The captain's eyes watched the goddess finally move towards the bed once the creatures had Evan in place. He couldn't help thinking how the situation was similar to the way the thralls had gotten him on the metal table earlier, and he broke a wicked smirk thinking about the comment he'd made about the king. He wasn't interested in pissing her off that badly now, but it was frankly gratifying to think back on, and his expression broadcasted that loud and clear.

Another shot of fear burned through Evan's body when the goddess' hands literally caught fucking fire, but he managed to keep up his smirk if with gritted teeth. He even chuckled deeply at her comment--hadn't she said something similar to him the night before?--but of course that shifted quickly into a loud, drawn-out groan when her hands brought the fire to his skin and forced his body to frantically try to escape the searing pain they carried with them. He put it off as long as he could, but the build-up of the burn forced his groan into a scream soon enough, his body still thrashing and his mind starting to go blank from the sensation.

He got just a brief reprieve, the flames having died down and the immediate sense of danger having faded. The captain blinked hazy tears from his eyes as he tried to catch his breath between groans and to regather his thoughts amidst the smoke and the lingering biting aches in his skin. But, barely a moment later the goddess was pressing down on the raw, agonizing burns she'd created, and then altogether ramming her cock into his still tender and utterly unprepared ass.

The captain let out another scream, a searing hot white everything flashing across his body and his vision and his thoughts. As he started to come back from the initial shock, his mind couldn't help swirling in that moment when he'd nearly gotten to breaking beneath Philip, but felt that wave of warm melancholy harold the goddess' possession of him, however brief. His eyes opened and searched for the goddess', showing her an expression that was absolutely in pain, absolutely both angry and tearful, and absolutely resolved: yes, he wanted this.

Please.

Evan's screams fell upon the goddess' ears, and some part of her yearned to stop, but a much greater part of her was in control now, determined to show this smirking, arrogant, know-it-all captain just exactly what she was: what made her a god. Although, even that had to largely fade away for what she was about to do to work, giving up her attachment to her own body--and her self--temporarily.

One last, lingering doubt about this--this thing she had tried to do and failed time after time after time over the past 10 years--made her open her eyes and refocus on Evan's expression--pleading and begging for this moment even after all the searing, blinding pain she was causing him--and what she found there gave her the last nudge she needed to let go and release herself from her corporeal form.

It happened slowly at first then all at once as the being known as Dehaljadrun became nothing more than microscopic droplets of water and jolts of electricity seeping into Evan's body, making it seize and shiver. If Evan had enough awareness to watch, he would have seen her body exchanged for a cloud of mist, the purple, glittering halo of her starkly contrasting the smoky haze lingering heavily in the room. She became a river herself, flowing into Evan's body, finding any opening--orifices, pores, seared skin--and pouring in one tiny droplet and jolt of electricity after another. The sensation was immense for the body they now actively shared as the goddess flooded Evan's every cell. It was simultaneously beyond pain and beyond pleasure, some sustained orgasmic state of unity that obliterated any possible doubts that there was anything more pure and perfect than this moment.

Within Evan's body, all the glittering, electric mist now absorbed into Evan's skin, the river of flow, of energy, of pure existence that was the goddess began to reassemble slowly within Evan, careful not to push the non-corporeal part of him away but rather to envelop him in the wonder of it all. She collected the pieces of herself as well as the pieces of him, however his consciousness had broken apart to withstand this. But, he had invited her in. He had begged her with his eyes and his being, and not even because of her direct influence.

As the goddess became more and more whole within Evan, some separation was necessary, a slow process that allowed both of them to emerge from the combined river of flow as two separate personalities within a shared body but left each of them with a desperate yearning for the more united state, to fall back into the river of sensation and be nothing but energy merged into a single state of flow. The goddess was familiar with the river, the light, the flow, and the sensation of leaving it such that she regathered herself, her ego, and her conscious thought quicker than Evan could ever have, dazzled and pulled and awash with the experience of--dare she say it--divine presence.

The goddess knew that no human body could withstand this state indefinitely--the river would always pull and claim it eventually--but she had no idea what the time limit on the state of being was. Though she was fairly confident she could now autonomously move Evan's body and speak if she wanted to, she simply waited in terrified silence for moment after moment, willing Evan to make it back together. She felt that he was strong enough not to get lost at least in this first stage of flow, though she knew that it would require immense sustained effort not to fall back in, to give in entirely to the pull of the goddess' energy, to lose himself down in whatever lay at the end of this river of light and electricity and mist and water and flow.

Come on. Come on, she willed, already worrying that she had fucked this all up, that, in her haste and the pain she had given Evan, she had already lost him but was unable to stop willing him across nonetheless.

A strange sort of sadness tugged at Evan's chest at the sight of the goddess dissipating. He wasn't sure what he'd been expecting, but it certainly wasn't that--and, apparently, he'd been enjoying looking upon her face in that state, and he suddenly missed the sight--the feeling of her gaze--though the shimmering halo she left behind was at least something to behold.

His attention was quickly drawn back into his body, though, as uncountably many tiny shocks pricked their way inside of him, lighting up every last godsdamned cell and stacking up to quite the fucking ride. He closed his eyes and let his body shiver and jolt however it needed to. It was a lot to endure, but he wanted to welcome it, even if some part of his brain was fully in panic. He'd expected the possession to be just another kind of loss of control, but this process consumed every last drop of him, pulling both body and soul into this intense, entrancing flow the goddess was somehow creating within him--within them?

Gods, it was magnificent.

He felt deeply the impulse to cry--ecstatically--but the concept of crying also made absolutely no fucking sense anymore. He was completely enraptured in this flow, this river, this divine state of awe. If Evan had thought he'd found purpose with the goddess before, it had nothing on this, though frankly he could hardly remember before now, this moment. He had never been so present in a single moment, nor so disinterested in the previous moment or the next.

The only sensation stringing moments together was a vague sense of movement, hinting at the context of time and space, and slowly, he felt more and more called to pay attention to that sensation. To remember that there were moments before this one, and that there were moments in the future which he wanted to get to. As absolutely fucking glorious as this moment was, he couldn't stay there forever. He didn't want to, as absolutely fucking insane as that sounded. With agonizing determination, Evan pushed against the current that pulled him, to find the concept of himself and his body again; of his cause; of his goddess.

He focused back in on the stinging of the burns; the soft fur beneath him; the rough hands holding him down. It was strange and kind of devastating to be aware of his body again, but he knew it was important. It was his anchor against the current, keeping him grounded while he tried to dip back into his head and figure out if the goddess was really there with him like he so desperately hoped that she was.

"Well?"

((OOC: He's aiming to use the body's mouth there, but I suppose it could just ring out as a thought in his head depending on what his access to control is right now. And uh, let us know if body sensation is not actually something he has (as much?) access to while the goddess is sharing it with him. We weren't totally sure how that would shake out and just took a guess lol. Or if anything else seems off to how this would work/be experienced.))

The goddess could hardly stand the relief that flooded through her when she heard and felt Evan's response, and she cringed at knowing his body, at least, felt it. While she had been completely open while searching for Evan's consciousness within his mind, she attempted to distance herself and her emotions as much as possible from him now that she was confident he had made it through.

His sarcastic comment didn't make anything better. Really? Well? Rage bubbled up within her--was that not the most intensity he had experienced in his life?--and she took control of Evan's left arm, shaking the shadow beings from it enough to slide his hand over to one of the burned, raw, and bleeding patches of skin she had flayed above his hips and drug his fingers mercilessly across it, putting more pressure on it as she moved before releasing his arm. The goddess winced internally at the pain, excruciatingly aware of what Evan's body was experiencing, but she wanted him to know that what she had attempted had worked.

The motion was enough for the shadow beings to realize that the goddess had successfully claimed the body such that the group of them backed off, moving toward the walls of the room and staring at Evan in some kind of awe and reverence, though their faces were obscured by both their burns and the veins of glowing purple running through their skin.

((OOC: From what I gather, if Evan wants to move the body, he can, but if an action is in direct conflict with something she's doing, she would win out. She could also theoretically take complete control, but I think it's more fun for her to struggle with it for a moment at least. Also, they can hear each other's thoughts right now if they tried, and any emotional reactions that the body would experience viscerally are painfully obvious to both of them.))