Lark, who really is more accustomed to this, is still dressed in a black button-down shirt and jeans, sunglasses against the brightness, and his own leather jacket for protection against the sand just in case. (To be fair he doesn't own much else on the Barge.)
Despite the heat, he is quite plainly excited for this, has been gleefully forcing himself to be patient all day. The amount of energy that takes has him euphoric even before the familiar rush of feline pheromones hits him.
"I say we get moving," he says, "Ninety miles an hour should give us enough air to cool off in."
Alec's expression is less than gleeful as he pulls his own sunglasses out of his pocket and puts them on, scanning the surroundings. He's been in some similar environments, of course, stress testing and a single field operation, but that doesn't mean he's any more excited about it.
It's when he looks at Lark that he lets the long suffering sigh escape, and smirks at him, swinging aboard the bike.
"Fantastic. Let's see if you can even keep ninety," he throws out as the kind of challenge they both live and breathe on, more than whatever brought him here anyway. He kicks his bike's engine to life.
"Don't worry, if I can't, I can always hitch a ride with someone who can." Smirking at him as he starts his own, and tears out ahead of him. He knows from experience where the soft sand is--but there isn't a lot of it, not on the flat he's taking them out on. Most of it is packed hard and only the top layer crumbles, which can make for slick riding when conditions are right.
Alec isn't afraid, even though his bike is more readily made for concrete surfaces and much higher speeds than this. He doesn't feel the need to admit to how easy it would be for the tires he has on this to fail to grip the dry dirt and sand, for a lot of reasons, the primary of which being it hardly matters at all. He'd still be here.
Which is weird.
He rolls his eyes hard enough to be seen even past his sunglasses and even though Lark has already pulled ahead of him by the time he does, and takes off after him - for once eschewing his characteristic fancy peel outs or wheelies in favor of just catching up.
Lark works to keep a lead, because he knows the safest trails, he knows where to weave and where to race flat out, and he's keeping in mind his inexperience and Alec's tires.
Even at these speeds, the air is not cool. It's thick enough to chew, it ripples the air into watery mirages ahead of them, but it does manage to cool them off even through their jackets.
After the January chill outside, Alec had been particularly miserable the second he walked in the door; he prefers the cold, if he has to pick one, which he'd rather not. He unzips the jacket several minutes into the ride but leaves it on: he's more concerned about the sun than the heat, and anyway. He's not losing it in here.
But he adjusts, drops his mouth open just enough to pant against the flow of air and dust, and lets himself focus on the hum of the engines, Lark ahead of him - glaring blue and light-sinking black out in the bright, warm landscape - the sound of the wind past his ears. And true to form, he loses patience eventually, even knowing how reckless it would be. Even knowing how dangerous.
He twists the throttle and moves up to challenge Lark's lead, swinging out wide enough that the rooster tail of sand behind him falls back to the ground several feet in their wake, grinning with a small, mocking salute as he draws even, speeds ahead.
Lark had hoped for this, even if it's hard to shut out the part of him that spends so much time out here, that knows how easy it is to die from the heat. How easy it is to get hurt.
He guns it anyway and tears after Alec, determined to overtake him again.
Maybe his bike is better suited to the city, but Alec himself is adaptable if he is nothing else, and Lark brings out the part of him that plays hard enough to draw blood. Lark always steps up when others would fall behind.
Alec sets them on a course for the distant towering, flat rocks and the uneven spaces between them, and only glances back to make sure the teasing of speeding up and dropping back, speeding up and dropping back is keeping Lark hot on his heels.
He is, and so far he hasn't tried to pull ahead. He had thought to, at first, but now it's just a hot chase, and the real fun, the real instinct at work, is one that always wins by dogging from the heels.
It's hot in the shade, too, but it's noticeably cooler, and when they rush under some of the taller rock formations it's a relief.
Alec breathes out when they flash through the shade, settles closer to the hot metal of his bike and ignores all but the telltale whine of the belts. The natural walls bounce the sound back and forth around them, and Alec stops checking for Lark.
He also speeds up, cutting into the bone dry bed of a creek, his bike leaving deep gouges in the sand drifts behind him.
Lark almost wants to call out, to warn Alec how dangerous the sand can be here. He and the pack are fine on their four legs but the dry upper crust breaks into loose grit easily. A wolf can navigate it; a bike, though....
But he grits his teeth and follows, takes a deep breath to calm himself, to push the thought of a sliding crash away, and follows faster.
Warning or no, Alec is forced to slow down again a few yards later when his bike fishtails through a turn, almost upsets him right out of his seat. He recovers though, his expression never shifting despite the near miss and accelerates again the next patch of solid, open ground he hits.
Lark spoke to him of losing himself in the heat and the speed of running through thus land. Alec has a different sweet spot to aim for, and he doesn't honestly know if he can hit it without losing Lark behind him, but this is how he knows to learn best. This is how he knows to teach. He just goes.
Something Lark won't say, even with their newfound ability to talk to each other: Newborn wolves have a wonderful and naive sense about things. It's all about the pack, about mutual safety. If you die, I will die, too--sometimes from grief but more often from the dangers that haunt their kind.
And Lark has shut that off. He kills his own kind without any passion, without any instinct to drive it. He pushes his own packs into harm's way and doesn't offer them any warning. He's in as much danger from the world as they are, but for the sake of success he has become a bigger threat than any military unit or drug ring or enraged mob boss.
When he hunts with the pack and one of them stumbles, he watches to see if they can be saved or if they need to be torn apart.
He's watching Alec with that same intensity, and it's allowing him to keep pace, to ride faster than he ever has before. But when Alec fishtails there's too much of him that knows they're not really in danger here for any wolf instincts to kick in.
Or so he would have thought. Most of him knows this is not the real Death Valley. The rest of him sees those tires swerve and he thinks immediately of the dangers he'll be fending off for the two of them if Alec is seriously hurt.
Moot point, of course. Especially with Alec--that's one reason Lark likes him so much, he doesn't need to protect him. But it was still there, a white-hot flash of the newborn wolf Lark has long since smothered.
He pushes his bike harder, until the hot air he's gulping in each breath begins to make him lose himself just the way he likes.
Alec is not now, nor will he ever be, a wolf; transgenics speak among them a different language of loyalty and respect, of love. It's a delicate balance, and no one outside of it can understand it of course, but he would rail against the idea of needing protected. He would not protect any of his own kind out here, at least not that he'd admit outright. On your own two feet or not at all.
In practice, there ways around this, and extenuating circumstances; but overall this is the stance Alec and every X5 that made it to his age took. This is what he would throw in Lark's face if he crashed and burned and went over out here in the sand and the heat, which ultimately, he doesn't.
It's the bike that's in danger of overheating first, that makes Alec finally slow down and pull over in the shade of a wall of rock several stories high; he's panting, a line of dirt streaked in the sweat around his eyes, his hair wind-tousled and dark. He immediately strips his jacket off and fans the sweat-darkened t-shirt underneath as he sits up and twists to find Lark, grinning.
"I can't believe it either," he teases, panting and ecstatic. He grabs two bottles from the small bag he'd carried in, and hands one to Alec. In this heat they've already started to go lukewarm.
This is the dirtiest he's seen Alec, minus the times he's seen him bloodied. Lark likes things clean and neat but he isn't going to pretend there's no allure in Alec sweaty and sandy and grinning at him.
If there were some way to change that, a source of water nearby that they didn't bring with them, Alec would be for sure; as it stands, he doesn't seem to notice or mind as Mich ad his constant disapproval would suggest he should. He's not comfortable, this isn't his preference, but it's not the worst off he's ever been, either.
He takes the water, drains half of it, then sips the rest more slowly while shaking his head. "You make it sound as if being out here on foot was an option and I promise you: it wasn't."
He's certain a transgenic would do just as well in the desert as one of the heavier-furred lycanthropes, but part of being out here is enjoying being out here. If Alec can't love it like Lark does (and who can? Even other wolves don't) then he at least wants him to not hate it.
"Yeah?" He grins, looks around them. "There's incentive to do well out here." Which is, if you know him, a 'thank you'.
"But this all reminds me, I want to find a way to get a bath in my cabin. I'll have someone haul water to it from the showers if I have to."
Hating something has never really stopped Alec from doing something if it becomes necessary; however, this is not necessary. If he hated it, he wouldn't be out here.
He raises an eyebrow at the segue though. "Is that your way of rubbing my face in where we're not right now? Because I will leave your ass out here," is his reply, only half serious.
He laughs by way of answer and sips his water. "I want a bath because if I get into a fight and don't necessarily want to face the wardens with blood all over me, I can soak. Even if I have to siphon water from my kitchen sink through a garden hose. I want one because it's only a matter of time before some inmate panics and destroys the showers again, and sponge- or tongue-bathing only goes so far. I want one because there are things we can do in the bath that I've only been able to do once or twice in my life."
Another sip. "And if I ever decide to start a black market organ harvest, I'll need a lot of ice and a good tub." Okay, yes, this one might just be playfully testing to see how far Alec's read in the book Lark gave him.
The joke is on Lark: Alec already understood that reference before he even knew the lycanthrope he's currently wrinkling his nose at.
"You civvies are so spoiled," he teases, even though he would absolutely spend a lot of time in a bathtub if he had access to one. And: "And I guarantee you anything we did in a bathtub would be a first. You should've told me before the Christmas lists went out. I could've snuck one in under the radar for you."
"I would have if I'd thought of it then." He'd been preoccupied with T'Pol, with his dozen other ideas. "But maybe it's better this way. Chris can ask for one for me. And if he won't, I'll just get creative; it'll give me a chance to see what I can get away with that won't involve risking Zero or whatever they do as punishment this month."
"I could, sure. I went to law school because I love getting splinters and nails driven through my hands," Lark retorts, and then follows Alec's line of sight.
Prissy lawyer facade is gone, and in its place the werewolf who would absolutely scale a sandstone cliff. "No. But I know it won't kill us."
"You lost the right to complain about your delicate hands when you told me you like burning the skin off your paws," he offers back blithely, smirking when he catches sight of Lark's expression from the corner of his eye. He's still casually sipping on the last of his water, drawing it out.
"It would be more effective if they'd actually treat it like solitary," he muses, thoughtful. "Take away the communicators, don't allow visitors. That's the main problem: no one here has the stomach to actually enforce punishment. It's cruel."
"I know." Lark says and sounds resigned until he starts laughing. "And they can't figure out why people keep dying. They call it a phase and put their heads in the sand and hope we learn from their example."
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Despite the heat, he is quite plainly excited for this, has been gleefully forcing himself to be patient all day. The amount of energy that takes has him euphoric even before the familiar rush of feline pheromones hits him.
"I say we get moving," he says, "Ninety miles an hour should give us enough air to cool off in."
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It's when he looks at Lark that he lets the long suffering sigh escape, and smirks at him, swinging aboard the bike.
"Fantastic. Let's see if you can even keep ninety," he throws out as the kind of challenge they both live and breathe on, more than whatever brought him here anyway. He kicks his bike's engine to life.
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Which is weird.
He rolls his eyes hard enough to be seen even past his sunglasses and even though Lark has already pulled ahead of him by the time he does, and takes off after him - for once eschewing his characteristic fancy peel outs or wheelies in favor of just catching up.
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Even at these speeds, the air is not cool. It's thick enough to chew, it ripples the air into watery mirages ahead of them, but it does manage to cool them off even through their jackets.
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But he adjusts, drops his mouth open just enough to pant against the flow of air and dust, and lets himself focus on the hum of the engines, Lark ahead of him - glaring blue and light-sinking black out in the bright, warm landscape - the sound of the wind past his ears. And true to form, he loses patience eventually, even knowing how reckless it would be. Even knowing how dangerous.
He twists the throttle and moves up to challenge Lark's lead, swinging out wide enough that the rooster tail of sand behind him falls back to the ground several feet in their wake, grinning with a small, mocking salute as he draws even, speeds ahead.
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He guns it anyway and tears after Alec, determined to overtake him again.
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Alec sets them on a course for the distant towering, flat rocks and the uneven spaces between them, and only glances back to make sure the teasing of speeding up and dropping back, speeding up and dropping back is keeping Lark hot on his heels.
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It's hot in the shade, too, but it's noticeably cooler, and when they rush under some of the taller rock formations it's a relief.
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He also speeds up, cutting into the bone dry bed of a creek, his bike leaving deep gouges in the sand drifts behind him.
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But he grits his teeth and follows, takes a deep breath to calm himself, to push the thought of a sliding crash away, and follows faster.
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Lark spoke to him of losing himself in the heat and the speed of running through thus land. Alec has a different sweet spot to aim for, and he doesn't honestly know if he can hit it without losing Lark behind him, but this is how he knows to learn best. This is how he knows to teach. He just goes.
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And Lark has shut that off. He kills his own kind without any passion, without any instinct to drive it. He pushes his own packs into harm's way and doesn't offer them any warning. He's in as much danger from the world as they are, but for the sake of success he has become a bigger threat than any military unit or drug ring or enraged mob boss.
When he hunts with the pack and one of them stumbles, he watches to see if they can be saved or if they need to be torn apart.
He's watching Alec with that same intensity, and it's allowing him to keep pace, to ride faster than he ever has before. But when Alec fishtails there's too much of him that knows they're not really in danger here for any wolf instincts to kick in.
Or so he would have thought. Most of him knows this is not the real Death Valley. The rest of him sees those tires swerve and he thinks immediately of the dangers he'll be fending off for the two of them if Alec is seriously hurt.
Moot point, of course. Especially with Alec--that's one reason Lark likes him so much, he doesn't need to protect him. But it was still there, a white-hot flash of the newborn wolf Lark has long since smothered.
He pushes his bike harder, until the hot air he's gulping in each breath begins to make him lose himself just the way he likes.
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In practice, there ways around this, and extenuating circumstances; but overall this is the stance Alec and every X5 that made it to his age took. This is what he would throw in Lark's face if he crashed and burned and went over out here in the sand and the heat, which ultimately, he doesn't.
It's the bike that's in danger of overheating first, that makes Alec finally slow down and pull over in the shade of a wall of rock several stories high; he's panting, a line of dirt streaked in the sweat around his eyes, his hair wind-tousled and dark. He immediately strips his jacket off and fans the sweat-darkened t-shirt underneath as he sits up and twists to find Lark, grinning.
"We didn't die."
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This is the dirtiest he's seen Alec, minus the times he's seen him bloodied. Lark likes things clean and neat but he isn't going to pretend there's no allure in Alec sweaty and sandy and grinning at him.
"Aren't you glad we're on bikes and not on foot?"
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He takes the water, drains half of it, then sips the rest more slowly while shaking his head. "You make it sound as if being out here on foot was an option and I promise you: it wasn't."
Still. "You're getting much better."
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"Yeah?" He grins, looks around them. "There's incentive to do well out here." Which is, if you know him, a 'thank you'.
"But this all reminds me, I want to find a way to get a bath in my cabin. I'll have someone haul water to it from the showers if I have to."
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He raises an eyebrow at the segue though. "Is that your way of rubbing my face in where we're not right now? Because I will leave your ass out here," is his reply, only half serious.
"Seriously? A bath? Why?"
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Another sip. "And if I ever decide to start a black market organ harvest, I'll need a lot of ice and a good tub." Okay, yes, this one might just be playfully testing to see how far Alec's read in the book Lark gave him.
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"You civvies are so spoiled," he teases, even though he would absolutely spend a lot of time in a bathtub if he had access to one. And: "And I guarantee you anything we did in a bathtub would be a first. You should've told me before the Christmas lists went out. I could've snuck one in under the radar for you."
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"You can just build one, you know," he offers idly. Then: "Have you ever landed in Zero?"
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Prissy lawyer facade is gone, and in its place the werewolf who would absolutely scale a sandstone cliff. "No. But I know it won't kill us."
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"You lost the right to complain about your delicate hands when you told me you like burning the skin off your paws," he offers back blithely, smirking when he catches sight of Lark's expression from the corner of his eye. He's still casually sipping on the last of his water, drawing it out.
"It would be more effective if they'd actually treat it like solitary," he muses, thoughtful. "Take away the communicators, don't allow visitors. That's the main problem: no one here has the stomach to actually enforce punishment. It's cruel."
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