Who: Dieter and Yelena What: They wake up together in their room When: Backdated to day 1 Where: Their Room Rating: low
Yelena usually slept pretty light as she was conditioned to by the Red Room. You werenât safe when you slept and so you needed to be able to wake up and fight at a momentâs notice. With that being said, somehow she had been transported to a whole ass other part of the world. She was only aware of this when she started to wake up and realized her bed felt different. Then as she moved, her hand landed on another personâs torso and Yelena was awake immediately.
Sitting up, she was ready to fight until she saw that telltale bundle of blonde curls and that stupidly adorable face. âDieter?â She looked around - this was not her room. She was pretty sure this wasnât his room either. What the hell?
Then Yelena realized she was naked. What? It had been hot last night. Sue her. While she wasnât a prude or had a lot of humility when it came to being naked, she knew Dieter might have a heart attack so she stood and walked toward the closet. Yes, she could have dragged one of the blankets with her or something, but whatever - sheâd hopefully find clothes in the closet and in the meantime Dieter would just have to deal with her naked backside.
â
Fortunately, Dieter was one to dress for the occasion, and bedtime was no exception. He was the sort of man to wear a matching pajama set (of course the pants were in fact shorts) most of the year. When he had tucked in the previous evening, Dieter had had no inkling of an idea that the Dome would be up to its old tricks again and this time perform a sort of kidnapping.
Somewhere in his dreams, Yelenaâs voice floated in, saying his name (of course!) and Dieter shifted slightly, sighing in his sleep. But, the bed was moving? Ever so slightly? Blindly, fingers curled into the sheets beside him and his eyes cracked open, looking first at the unfamiliar sheets and then over at the naked Yelena.
Yelping, he sat right up and clutched the blankets to his chest, blue eyes wide as he tore his gaze from her to focus almost over-exaggeratedly on the rest of the very unfamiliar room. âUm, what is going on, please?â
â
Yelena kind of wished he had been naked, but the outfit was so very Dieter that she couldnât fault him at all. She had no idea he had shorts on under the covers, but really it would ultimately make the outfit rather than break it. For him, anyway..
She rummaged around the closet unphased as he spoke, though she did glance back briefly and smiled to herself when it was obvious he was trying not to look at her. Well at least he wants to.
Yelena found a light summer dress. While it wasnât normally her sort of thing, she slipped it on so sheâd be clothed for the moment. Sheâd need to get a bra and underwear and all that kind of thing, but she was pretty sure Dieter would be able to breathe now.
âNot sure what, exactly, but weâre on a boat. A cruise, probably, since this room is too nice for a container ship and itâs not the military.â Sheâd been on enough boats to know how a boat felt though.
She turned around as she pulled her hair from behind the fabric of her dress. Her blonde hair fell over her shoulders. Her hair wasnât up as it usually was. âUnless we both got really drunk last night and blacked out so much we donât remember going on vacation.â
â
âA.. cruise?â Dieter repeated the word stupidly, still catching everything Yelena out of the corner of his eye as he busied himself with looking at the roomâs ceiling fan. How lovely, five blades and what a nice hue of eggshell.. But then soon as the summer dress was on, Dieter found himself wrestling with feelings of disappointment. The woman was truly stunning, both inside and out.
Blinking owlishly, he moved to stand up from the bed, shuffling over to the window of their room to look outside. âHeilige ScheiĂeâ he muttered under his breath, turning to her. âWhere do you think weâre headed?â
â
âIâm not sure. Weâre docked at the moment, but since we have clothes and our phones and stuff, this is probably where weâre meant to be right now⌠I think itâs a good sign youâre still you and Iâm still me. My sister told me once there was a time where the town turned back to the 1980s and everyone thought they were someone else.â Natasha had been a Russian spy so that wasnât entirely different, but Natasha hadnât been Natasha.
Yelena saw the tv in their room and tilted her head. âHave you ever heard of the Princess Cruise?â Maybe that would hint at it. But instead of waiting, she found the remote and pressed a button. Immediately the cruiseâs intro page came up and in a very hotel/cruise way talked about âdiscover the beauty of Alaskaâ.
âOh good. Alaska.â She deadpanned.
â
Wide eyed, Dieter looked at the large TV screen, listening as the voiceover waxed poetic about Alaska. âI.. Iâve never traveled to the Alaska.â Dieter replied stupidly, moving to the closet to find some clothes for himself.
He wasnât, couldnât be as brave and fearless as Yelena had been, dressing in front of someone, even if he wasnât a complete stranger.. No, poor Dieter would resign himself to dressing in the bathroom for the foreseeable future.
âDoes the ship woman on the TV say what we are supposed to be doing?â Cruises had itineraries didnât they? Things to do, tours to take or whichever.
â
Yelena watched him and had a suspicion that Dieter wouldn't get dressed in front of her much to Yelena's disappointment. Was Dieter conventionally the sort of man women wanted to see naked? No, but that didn't mean that Yelena didn't. She wasn't going to push though, as much as a part of her screamed at her to pull him back into bed with her.
To ignore herself, Yelena focused on the TV. "Looks like Vancouver first⌠then we go North. A few stops. Stagway isn't so bad." Probably better this time around where she wasn't going to assassinate three businessmen hiding out in the middle of nowhere. "They have a pool here and hot tubsâŚ. Looks like a formal dance." Yelena wasn't big on formal dances in general and yet the next thing she said was, "Want to be my date?" Would that be romantic enough for Dieter to take her to bed later that evening?
She rolled her eyes at herself and went to open the door and head into the little deck they had. You are not a teenager anymore. Stop acting so stupid. She leaned on the railing. Outside it was Vancouver cool rather than Alaska cold and she could see the city if she leaned forward a little and turned her head.
â
Balking at the question, Dieter stammered out a reply. âI.. I would like that very much.â He admitted. Thankfully she was already heading out onto the balcony so hopefully she didnât catch the red on his face. Using the precious time she was on the balcony, back towards the room, Dieter started the arduous process of changing into that day's clothes..
Glancing over his shoulder at her as she focused on the city outside and beyond the balcony, Dieter quickly discarded his sleep shorts and underwear for that of a fresh pair and his pants, zipping them up as he unbuttoned his pajama shirt and took it off, folding it and placing it on his pillow (old habits died hard) along with the folded sleep shorts. Keeping one eye trained on the balcony, Dieter moved across the room to the dresser and started to dig around for a shirt. âWhat do you suppose is the catch for this amazing trip? Not that Iâm not very much thankful, but it is only a matter of time before the second shoe does its falling.â
Other shoe drops. Sigh. Englishisms and Dieter had never gotten along.
â
âMaybe they plan to royally screw with us in the next couple months so theyâre trying to be nice to us now so we donât revolt somehow.â There wasnât a specific pattern that Yelena could see with the Dome, but it did seem like trouble wasnât all the time. It was like there were rest periods. Whether that was strategic or simply necessary like there needed to be a recharged, she couldnât say.
Yelena really wanted to look behind her at Dieter. As an agent of the Red Room, she wasnât really accustomed to giving people their privacy or delaying what she wanted and yet, with Dieter, she didnât want to push him. The fact he looked happy to go to the formal dance thing with her made her happy enough. Even if she kept thinking about the time she pushed him up against the wall and made out with him, as brief as it was.
Her grip on the balcony railing a little. She could hear her sisterâs advice in her head. Yelena turned and, unlike her, had her eyes closed. It was such a bad thing to do tactically and her body was screaming at her that she was on a balcony high up with her eyes closed and she would have a harder time defending herself. And yet, she was doing it so that sheâd respect Dieterâs privacy.
She stood there with her eyes closed and took a deep breath. âWhen youâre ready. Whenever that is. Which doesnât have to be now or anything. But when youâre ready, I want to kiss you again. And a lot. Just⌠so you know.â Now she was standing there, eyes closed, feeling exposed and like an idiot.
â
Turning from finding a shirt (which was being elusive in the depths of the dresser drawer) Dieter saw Yelena turn around to face the room again, her eyes squeezed shut⌠and found the action to be sweet of her. Granted, he didnât know the extent of what she had gone through in her life before Madison, but he could guess and glean bits and pieces here and there, and one thing was for sure: closing your eyes with your back turned on the world took a lot of willpower.
Finally finding a shirt, Dieter tugged it on and moved across the small room to the balcony and Yelena.. Standing in front of her, he watched her face, the twitching, the way her nose scrunched and chin jutted out in a defiance that she probably wasnât fully aware of. Placing a hand on her arm, he spoke up, accented voice soft. âYou can open your eyes now..â And only when she had complied, when he saw those green eyes looking up at him, did he lean in and kiss her softly.
â
She sensed him coming closer and she felt goosebumps rise on her arms which was a sensation that rarely happened to her. Opening her eyes, she found him standing in front of her and it made her smile only for her to continue smiling against his lips for a moment before she kissed him back.
Yelenaâs hand went to the back of his neck and her other palm pressed against his chest as she kissed him. She wasnât sure for how long she kissed him or how she managed to keep the kiss soft and slow instead of rising in need like her body craved, but she did. This was the sort of kiss she had never had before. When she pulled back, she had to gasp for air.
Cheeks slightly pink in colour, she smiled again, this time a little more dopey than was her usual sort of smile. âA girl could get used to being kissed like that, you know.â
â
He had been wanting to do that for quite some time now. Dieter was by far not a brave man, either with adversaries or throwing himself out there. But he had done things in his lifetime that people could only dream about, had had adventures and even if he hadnât lived to tell the tale, he had jumped right into it⌠and he would do it again if it meant ending up where he was right now.
Drawing in a shaky half a breath, he opened his eyes to look at her, taking in the pink color of her cheeks and the dopey smile: all different parts of the beautiful wonderfulness of her. âMy only qualm was that I didnât do it sooner.â Dieter admitted as he lifted a hand to cup the side of her face, his thumb smoothing along her cheekbone almost reverently. âDid you want to eat something? Maybe go see the rest of the big boat?â
â
What she wanted to do was to order room service and not leave the cabin for several days, but Yelena suddenly realized that maybe doing it the ânormalâ way that people did this kind of thing would make things feel like the kiss had felt. She didnât need to seduce him or manipulate him. He wasnât a mark. The way she felt the butterflies of adrenaline was new and she liked it. Even the way Dieter touched her face was a new experience for her and she realized how messed up that actually was.
She let out a soft breath and then nodded. âEating something and knowing where we are sounds good.â She paused, then added belatedly. âI should probably make sure my sister is okay.â Hey, she had gotten distracted. âAnd⌠figure out if Fanny is here somewhere.â
â
âAll very good points,â Dieter gave her a soft smile, hand drifting from her face to her hand, giving it a gentle squeeze. He didnât want to mention it, but the fact that Fanny wasnât in the room didnât bode well for the canine. However, he didnât think the Dome would be so heartless as to get rid of her â maybe it was another âfrozen in timeâ situation and sheâd be waiting back in Madison when they got back, none the wiser.
At the mention of Natasha, however, Dieter spoke up rather candidly. âI believe that out of everyone here, you and your sister are two who can very much take care of yourselves.â Maybe it was Yelenaâs sisterâs roommate they should be worried about? Dieter didnât know if Natasha was involved with anyone, and truthfully she intimidated Dieter just a little.
âPancakes⌠Pancakes are decent cruise food, yes? With the little blueberries?â It was a rhetorical question, because obviously pancakes were a decent food on land or on the ocean.