I should disclaim that I have about fifty-seven Claire Temple ships, including Luke Cage, Matt Murdock, Misty Knight, and Jessica Jones. I actually really want to work on a Luke/Claire fic (and a JJ/Claire fic, and a MK/Claire fic), but we'll get there. For now, shadukiam has me on kind of a Bucky tip, and Luke Cage has me on a big ole Claire tip, so here we are.

Story title from "Flat of the Blade" by Massive Attack

Chapter title from "Small Time Shot Away" by Massive Attack

"Get down!"

It wasn't until Claire was back at her mother's place, in her room, still shaking slightly from the impact of the explosions, that she looked down at the side of her upper thigh, almost her hip, and saw the same words written there in cursive that looked like it had been forced to be neat at gunpoint.

It had been there, of course, for as long as she could remember, and the words had once been a source of curiosity to her, the context of that statement a mystery. Would they meet at the gym? Playing ball? A club, where he was singing along to some James Brown remix?

That early on, Claire never imagined the world would explode into super-powered human-slash-malicious alien warfare on top of the crime and poverty that already burdened it. This seemed especially true i

n New York, particularly Manhattan, which had seen more than its fair share of time as the staging ground for these battles.

She probably should have guessed by now that there'd be some threat involved with those words, but as time had gone on, Claire hadn't spent as much time thinking about her soulmate – in fact, she barely thought about it at all. In a world so connected, it seemed like one was at once more and less likely than ever to meet the author of the words on their skin.

And then there were the actual words. Given her former job and still technically current occupation, she'd never taken well to men barking orders at her, particularly when she already had her hands full, though experience had taught her that taking cues like "get down" was usually more a matter of survival than compliance.

Still, though.

She didn't like his style, his demeanor. He'd been cold-eyed, stiff; military, obviously, but more, like some kind of automaton. And now, in the relative safety of her bedroom, she remembered her retort and the curl of her lip that had gone with it:

"Give me a goddamn minute!"

To be fair, she'd been in the middle of finishing up a stitch, and it was only luck that had let her tie the knot before he'd practically tackled her to the ground – which, given his metal arm and hard-trained physique (did all of these super-humans get some kind of group discount at Crossfit or something?), ended with more than a little bruising and the soreness that she was dealing with now.

Really, it wasn't that likely that it was even him. It hadn't been the first time she'd heard those words – though granted, it had been the first time that they'd been someone's first words to her. Even so, with the way things were going, it probably wouldn't be the last.

Wetting her lips, she took a breath, looking out the window, brushing her hair away from her face with fingers that shook slightly. But just slightly.

As always, come see me on tumblr at something-pithy!