Lexx: Fanfic

Xev traversed the entrance to the cryochamber in two short steps, stopping in front of her dead love's glass-and-ice coffin. The cold air assaulted her senses, but coldness was something she had long since adapted to.

It was late night aboard the Lexx, although there was no sun, or moon, or stars to say so. Xev had been restlessly fidgeting in her bed; she had been for several nights now.

Lately, her thoughts seemed to drift towards Kai, the frozen beauty before her. Her thoughts were always on Kai, but for the past few days, they had been different. She was no longer dreaming of his love, or wistfully sighing as her mind was filled with deliciously erotic images, bodies aroused and fused in the heat of passion.

But not anymore. The heat had turned to cold and as a dreadful feeling settled in the pit of her stomach, she finally understood what others had meant when they spoke of heartbreak.

She stared sadly at the lovely man who had both stolen her heart and then shattered it, completely oblivious as to having done anything at all.

Raising her hand, she slipped it on the dewey surface of the pod, over Kai's face, caressing it over the distance separating them. Her fingers traced his face, still beautiful in death, leaving a trail in the condensation. She 'caressed' his hair, following the gleaming black forelock down his face and shoulder. She stopped at his chest.

Xev's hand hovered over the pod for an instant, until finally her fingers traced a small heart, over Kai's chest.

Tears soon blurred the sight. She dabbed at her eyes, and with the moisture drew a broken line across the heart.

She sighed, and made no effort to hide or stop her tears. She was alone, after all-- so completely alone.

She wondered how people who had loved for years dealt with such heartbreak. The pain was almost unbearable; she felt empty inside, and yet also filled with a bizarre tapestry of emotions. Emotions she couldn't identify or even explain. She had never been taught to, after all. As a love slave, she had been trained to serve and please, not to love.

She had never expected to fall in love, so she had never expected heartbreak. It was a terrible thing to discover; that something as beautiful as love could cause the worst kind of pain she could imagine. It hurt-- much more than a broken arm or a knife to the stomach could.

She felt utterly abandonned. Xev knew he never meant to hurt her. But, as unknown as it was to him, he had done so.

Little droplets had begun to fall from the heart drawing. The sight brought more tears to Xev's eyes; her own heart felt the same way, broken, crying.

She wasn't quite sure why she had wanted to come to the cryochamber tonight. She often came, to watch Kai and then dream, but tonight was different. She was here to look at him, to watch him one last time... and to remember. To remember him as the lover she had lost, as the lover she never quite had in the first place. As the lover she would never have.

Hope had kept her going, kept her dreaming and wishing. But after a while, even hope had to accept the inevitable. Kai was dead. Kai was incapable of emotion. Kai was incapable of... love. It had taken a long time, but finally Xev was willing to see it as the truth.

She wasn't sorry for loving him, though. Even without a happy ending, love could still do great things.

Xev's eyes were to Kai's own closed lids. Defeat was not something she liked to admit, but she couldn't deny the pain in her heart any longer.

She would still love him-- but it would be a different kind of love. A love based on friendship and loyalty, not a love based on agonizing longing and waiting.

It took a while before the last tears of unrequited love fell from her eyes. Then, she moved forward and pressed hers lips to the pod's cold casing. When she backed away, she could see the outline of her lips. A frozen kiss for a frozen love; the thought almost made her smile.

She swiped her hand over the kiss and the heart, knowing they would have left marks in the condensation of the pod. She preferred to erase all traces of her presence.

And then Xev stepped away, her eyes taking in Kai for the last time in this light.

"I love you, Kai..." she whispered. "And I'm glad I did."

And with those words, she left him, to return to sleep... and to dream.