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| ===Chapter 11 - Not My Choice===
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| Pascal smiled stiffly at the mirror as he adjusted the Knight's Cross he wore just under the collar, now set atop a four-pointed starburst in white gold. Brand new rank insignias also adorned the crimson highlights on his shoulders -- a silver star laid between two stripes, identifying him as the youngest Major in the Weichsel army.
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| Staring at his own reflection, he raised his hand in a solemn military salute.
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| ''Father if you could only see me now...''
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| Pascal sighed after his hand came back down. Honors and promotions simply didn't feel as meaningful as before, not even when von Manteuffel -- stone-faced as always -- had pin it onto him in person. In fact, Pascal stood through the entire evening ceremony feeling as though something was just... missing.
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| It was as though a hole in space had drained its colors away, and not even Sylviane's proud smile could patch it up.
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| Still staring at his image, Pascal began undoing the buttons to his uniform shirt as he prepared for bed.
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| His eyes then fell upon a small box. Kaede had passed out from fatigue by the time of the evening ceremony, so Pascal had received its contents in her stead. After everything that happened, he didn't have the heart to drag her to an event that she strongly resented.
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| Which was kind of a shame...
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| Down to just his trunks, Pascal hanged his uniform neatly over a chair before doing the same to Kaede's. The girl had a tendency to just leave her clothing strewn over the bedcovers. Thankfully her undergarments were self-cleaning, otherwise he'd probably have to remove them from his pillow on a daily basis.
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| ''Why do I feel like the servant here...?''
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| But any desire to sigh again was immediately forgotten as Kaede muttered in her sleep:
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| "No... don't..."
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| Her wispy words almost trembled despite their softness. The small girl was curled up under the comforter again with only her face exposed. Meanwhile Pascal could see the faint perspiration rolling down her pale forehead as she turned about in her sleep with hastened breaths.
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| ''Another nightmare...'' he thought in sympathy.
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| Pulling open the comforter, Pascal laid down next to her in the double bed. He then draped one arm over her side as he brushed the silky hair at the back of her head with gentle strokes.
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| "It is just a dream, you are safe here..." he whispered slowly, again and again.
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| It took only three brushes before her faint shivering stopped.
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| Another minute, and her breath calmed back to a tranquil waft as well.
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| Her expression grew peaceful again, except for the worsening shadow under her eyes.
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| ''Really has been hard on you...'' Pascal exhaled as he gestured the lights off.
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| He kept stroking her head for as long as he remembered. For a mere history student he had forced into military life, helping her get some sleep was the least he could do.
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| ...
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| "Uhnnnnng..."
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| Kaede groaned as she turned in the bedcovers, away from the rays of light pouring in the small window. It was the best she had slept all week, through the whole night no less. Why couldn't the sun be a little more understanding?
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| ...Then her small nose came across something smooth but firm -- certainly not a pillow.
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| Her hand crawled upwards under the covers, feeling the extra weight over her shoulder but ignoring it, until she felt the bottom of what seemed like a rough palm.
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| ''Huh--''
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| Kaede's eyes finally opened. Sure enough, Pascal's left hand was right in front of her face, palm down and thumbnail just under her nose.
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| ...Which meant the weight on her shoulders was the rest of his arm.
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| ''Why is... you said you wouldn't touch me without asking...''
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| She wasn't really alarmed, just... startled. His hand was ''wayyyy'' too close for comfort, even putting aside the conservative nature of her Russian and Japanese cultural upbringing. Sure, Pascal had also done this once before, but that was ''one time'' and he had asked with special circumstances!
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| Kaede shifted back almost in reflex, right into the rest of Pascal's body.
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| That only made it worse, far worse. She was certain he was now spooning her, judging from the heat across her back. But that wasn't even the part that shocked her eyes wide open...
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| ...Something hard had pressed into her butt. More like jabbed, since it felt more like a stiff baton.
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| Kaede froze on the spot as her breath halted. She could feel her cheeks catching on fire.
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| Unlike proper girls who at least had some naivety to shield them from the surprise, she knew ''exactly'' what that was.
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| ''Getoffitgetoffitgetoffitgetoffit...''
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| She rolled back the other way and flipped his arm off of her at the same time.
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| "Wake up!" she called out as soon as Pascal's golden soft curls came into sight.
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| The lazy eyes that lifted were rather grumpy. Meanwhile Pascal was flexing his left arm and shrugging its shoulder joint before focusing upon her.
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| "What did I do to deserve abuse this early in the day?"
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| "W-what were you doing in my sleep!?" Kaede cried back.
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| Pascal paused for a moment to think, but his stare never left her gaze.
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| "You were having a nightmare," he stated simply.
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| "That doesn't--!" her somewhat incensed momentum carried on a bit further before deflating into the air like a runaway balloon. "...Oh..."
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| Kaede's cheeks grew a shade darker as her eyes shifted away towards the ceiling.
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| ''I didn't ask for that...''
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| She managed to keep that in. Ungrateful prickliness rated atop the list of things people hated when they only tried to help. And while it was embarrassing to think about, it was certainly true that she slept unusually well last night.
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| ''Nonono. I was just ''really'' darn tired. Nothing to do with...''
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| Kaede sighed. Ignoring what she didn't want to think about was one thing. But being fictitious towards herself when she did ponder over it? Not her forte at all.
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| ''Okay he did help with the nightmare, probably... definitely...''
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| She snuck a peek at Pascal's lazy turquoise eyes before glancing away again, her face still burning.
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| "T-thank you... I guess," she muttered. "You might want to do something about that down there."
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| "Kind of hard when you are in the bed. Taking care of it hardly seems appropriate," Pascal sighed as he began to sit up in the bed, dragging a lightly propped tent across the bedcovers as he did.
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| Kaede almost snorted at that response. Her countenance was still flushed, but she couldn't resist the temptation to return a little cheek this time:
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| "So... you haven't been able to masturbate at all since I came here?"
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| She actually felt really sorry for him. It was one of those common urges that she welcomed not having a ton of in her current body. Back then as a young man, ''he'' had always felt bad after getting it out of the way. It supposedly had something to do with the decrease in testosterone levels...
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| Pascal raised one eyebrow in mild surprise as he turned towards her:
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| "Sometimes I forget that you were male once also..." Then, with a faint smirk: "do you ''want'' me to do it while watching your cute little sleeping face? Or perhaps you would like to help? You do have the equipment now."
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| The first question sent a shiver back up her spine, while the second reignited her embarrassment altogether into a wildfire.
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| Kaede pulled up the bedcovers and buried her entire face under it this time, all the while retorting:
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| "Pedophile! you total pervert!"
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| "Only two years difference between us," came the matter-of-fact answer. "And if you were a boy once, you know exactly how our urges work. Only thing that keeps us from being feral like animals in heat is a brain and self-control."
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| Kaede was more thinking of the twenty-four centimeters (9") height difference between them and the fact she ''looked'' mid-teen. Meanwhile Pascal was almost twenty and appeared even older with his mature expressions and ever-composed demeanor.
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| ''Thank heavens for his self-control though,'' she thought. Somewhat impressed even, if she was frank about it, since he had been sleeping with a girl in the same bed for weeks and never once touched inappropriately.
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| "Have you ever done it? As a man?" she heard him ask nonchalantly, as though talking about the weather.
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| "W-what? Uh... no?" she peeked back out from the comforter. ''And if I don't ever, it'll be your fault.''
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| "Have you ever courted a girl then?" Pascal turned towards her with an amused, lopsided smile.
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| ''What kind of weird pillow talk is this?'' Kaede thought. Was he trying to discuss as though between two men? Despite the body she inhabited now and the fact he ''still'' had a hard on while sharing the same bed? With anyone normal this would be an extremely awkward conversation, but Pascal himself hardly even seemed to care.
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| "Once," she replied. It wasn't really an experience she really wanted to talk about. "What about you? Have you ever done it?"
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| She mostly just wanted to change the topic, but part of her was curious.
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| "Father made sure I had a chance when I hit puberty," Pascal half-chuckled. "He just came back with a prostitute one day and said that if I did not experience it early, youthful fantasies will just blow it out of proportions. Then, being a highborn, I would be in danger of far worse sins than sex without matrimony..."
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| ''Wouldn't be the first noble brat to force a maidservant down...''
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| "--He also taught me how to cast a conception spell around then, just so you know," his eyebrows shot up suggestively, "if you were ever in the mood badly enough."
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| "Get on with it before I hit you again," Kaede retorted sharply. She ''hated'' it when he was being a smartass about her state of being.
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| For a moment Pascal looked like he was about to snicker. Then:
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| "What can I say? It was not as hyped up to be..." he shrugged. "The act itself was pleasurable, sure. But that woman was dumb as a cow. Felt like my brain cells were dying just by laying next to her."
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| By itself, sexual activity satisfied only a physical urge. The endorphins it produced did help emotional needs, but that really needed an established relationship for it to be more than short-lived. However, for Pascal who coveted intellectual companionship above all else, mere acts of lust simply weren't enough.
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| ''Your father knew you too well.''
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| Kaede was actually quite impressed. Not many parents knew how to deal with their kids' puberty. In fact, most of them lost touch with their own past and began idealizing... as though youth and hormones had anything to do with wisdom and logic.
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