thedeadparrot (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
thedeadparrot) wrote2012-05-30 10:16 pm
thedeadparrot) wrote2012-05-30 10:16 pm
Entry tags:
abandoned fic
I was bored and figured that I would randomly post a bunch of stuff that's been left unfinished on my hard drive (or Google Drive, whatever). Some of it is finished fic that just didn't feel good enough or substantial enough to post properly. So it ended up here.
I mostly wrote these things as gifts formerisunshine36, and I don't entirely consider them "canon" which is why they haven't been formally posted. Also, the Vegas one was sort of setting up something larger but I ended up working on Sheppard's Eleven instead and that's where all my Vegas feelings went.
Dustin and Eduardo have a quiet moment
"'Sup, Wardo?" Dustin says. He's focused on his video game, fingers jamming down hard on the buttons of his controller. It's some sort of fighting game that Eduardo doesn't understand, with characters that look like cartoons. A pink blob floats across the television screen and then kicks a guy with a sword and shield in the face.
Eduardo rubs at his eyes. He's still sleepy from staying up late, waiting for Mark to get home. Of course, Mark never did make it home. If Dustin was looking any less relaxed, Eduardo would be getting worried, but Dustin is just grinning to himself, executing weirdly complicated moves. His pink blob hits an anthropomorphised fox with a baseball bat. Everything must be right in the world, then. Mark certainly isn't bleeding to death in a back alley somewhere. He probably just made an extra stop to visit his family after wrapping up his business in New York. "Morning," Eduardo says. It's hard to be coherent on Saturday mornings.
"Wanna play?" Dustin asks without turning around.
Eduardo stares blankly at him. "What?" He has no idea if Dustin is talking about the video game or if he's referring to some sort of obscure mob lingo Eduardo's never heard of.
Dustin pauses the game so that he can face Eduardo. He holds up the extra controller. "We can team up against the computer if you want."
Eduardo doesn't even know what that means, but he takes the controller. It's Saturday morning, and Eduardo can either do this, or he can go back upstairs and work out what he wants his portfolio to look like Monday morning when the markets reopen. He settles down on the couch, takes the controller from Dustin's hand. Dustin grin at him, but he doesn't say anything else, just starts the next round. Eduardo has some idea of how Dustin fits into Mark's work life, but it's easier to think of him as Mark's college (and current) roommate, the fun and unassuming guy who seems good at balancing out some of Mark's worse instincts.
Eduardo honestly doesn't know what he's doing, and Dustin doesn't seem inclined to explain it to him, so he ends up mashing buttons at random. The yellow creature he's controlling manages to electrocute the giant turtle monster, so Eduardo considers that a success.
He's still not sure what the point of all this is, but it is a little soothing to participate in some cartoon mayhem. He figures out which buttons are for performing attacks and which buttons are for jumping, even though that takes a little bit of time.
"Mark said that he's going to be busy all morning," Dustin says after their fifth round. He half-smiles, almost an apology.
Eduardo sighs. He knows Mark can take care of himself. Usually. There are other shades of meaning in Dustin's words, and Eduardo-- Eduardo doesn't want to understand what they are. Really. He's better off not knowing.
They play for a another few minutes in silence.
"It's okay," Eduardo says, eventually. "I'm okay with waiting." It feels weird to say it out loud, like a confession, even though it's not one; it shouldn't be.
Mark will be back in time for lunch, probably, and then they can spend the afternoon watching bad movies while Mark keeps up his running commentary about how stupid everyone else is. It'll be a good way to end a week. It should be.
Dustin gives him an odd look, but it only lasts for a moment. "Sure," he says, an undercurrent of skepticism in his voice, and then he turns back to his game.
Mark and Sean have a convo post-election
Peter tells Sean that he's become complacent since he moved back to California, that he's gotten soft. Okay, so maybe Sean has gained a few pounds here and there and maybe he's stopped looking over his shoulder every waking moment, but that's hardly complacency. He's just gotten a little settled, that's all. He works for Mark, and anyone who has a problem with Sean can bring it to Mark.
As far as Sean knows, no one wants to have a problem with Mark.
So maybe Sean isn't as guarded as he used to be. Maybe that's why he freaks out when he's about to get out of his pool after his morning swim and finds Mark standing on his deck, hands shoved into the pockets of his shorts. Sean jerks backwards as soon as he sees him, falling back into the pool with an awkward splash. "Holy shit, Mark," Sean says, pushing his hair out of his eyes. "Don't do that to me."
Mark shrugs. He's dressed more casually than Sean has seen him dress in years, a t-shirt and flip-flops and khaki cargo shorts. He doesn't look like Mark Zuckerberg, kid in the too-big suits and the scariest mob boss east of the Mississippi. He looks like Mark Zuckerberg, kid. Period. "You looked busy," Mark says. It's not really an answer. He steps closer and sits at the edge of the pool, cross-legged and unwilling to touch the water.
Sean decides that he doesn't want to bother getting out. Mark will do what he wants, same as he always does. He treads water near the edge and takes a good look at Mark. Mark is pale, paler than almost anyone else Sean sees, and Sean sells coke to bored Silicon Valley types who sunbathe in the glow of their computer screens. Mark's face has shed some of its boyishness. Not enough to make him look like an actual adult, but enough that he doesn't really look eighteen anymore. He's skinnier, too. Maybe Eduardo hasn't been feeding him right, what with his mayoral duties getting in the way of all of that.
"So," Sean says. "To what do I owe this dubious honor?" He pushes off the nearest wall and does a few backstrokes.
Mark squints with the sun in his eyes. "Thought I'd check in," he says.
Sean glances around for any sign of Dustin or Chris or anyone else in his little entourage who might be here to make sure Sean isn't skimming more than his share off the top. Sean thinks he might be a little insulted that Mark felt the need to come out here personally. (Okay, so maybe there was that one time, but Mark rolled his eyes and forgave him with just a warning. Sean doesn't think that counts.) "Celuzza mentioned that you might be having some trouble with Providence," Sean says off-hand. "That's nothing to do with me."
Mark's shoulders tense at the mention, mouth twisting into a frown. "Chris said I should let it be for a while," Mark says. "Get out of town before I do something rash."
Sean lets out a sharp bark of laughter. "You're joking, right?" he says. "You came all the way out here to get some vacation time?"
Mark's frown gets deeper, broadcasting annoyance, and while Sean knows that this is when some people might start getting nervous, Sean has seen Mark so drunk that every other word out of his mouth was a curse, and he's seen Mark wince at the sight of blood, and he's tasted the inside of Mark's mouth. It doesn't matter that Eduardo's just waiting for Mark to make an honest man out him -- it's still legal in Massachusetts these days, after all -- Sean will always have been there first, and he'll always know Mark better than Eduardo ever will. "Maybe. I guess," Mark mutters. "Eduardo had some sort of political thing he had to do."
Sean climbs out of the pool and slaps Mark on the back. His hand leaves a wet print on Mark's t-shirt. "Well, " Sean says, grinning widely. "If you're looking to loosen up, you've come to the right place." There's this club in San Francisco that Sean loves that he thinks Mark would like too. They could get sushi beforehand, and Sean is relishing this chance to show off the West Coast in style. This is going to be a blast
"I knew you'd say that," Mark says with a quick roll of his eyes, but the corner of his lips quirks upwards, almost a smile.
Dustin and Mark and Eduardo have a vacation in Vegas or something idk
They're in Vegas this weekend, which Dustin likes, because it's a change of pace from the miserable Boston winter they've been having this year: icy sidewalks and cars covered in snow. Mark has been extra grumpy lately, something to do with stuff on Chris's side. The State Troopers are not happy with the close, personal relationship that the mayor of Boston shares with an alleged criminal kingpin, and they've been trying (unsuccessfully) to get something to stick to Mark (though that's never going to happen under Marilyn's watch).
The Vegas air is dry and warm (relatively), and the Strip is alive with neon in a way that Boston simply isn't, this time of year. Dustin is mostly here for a little R&R between assignments, and Mark is here to-- pretend to understand how to go on vacation? It's a little unclear, like most of the joint decisions that get made between Mark and Eduardo. Eduardo seems a little bit happier about the chance to go out and pretend to be a normal couple doing normal couple-y things. Mark seems content to find things to occupy himself with, which is more of Dustin's problem than Eduardo's, but Dustin is pretty sure Eduardo is going to be in the blast radius if anything happens to go nuclear.
And let's be honest here. With Mark around, there's always the potential for things to go nuclear.
Tonight, they're in the casino of the MGM Grand, surrounded by a truly garish amount of gold-colored wall paint, blinking multi-colored lights, the sounds of spinning slot machines and the hum of people. Mark is playing blackjack, every ounce of concentration on the cards in front of him, lips turned down into the slightest frown. Eduardo is hovering, eyes wide and concerned, leaning over Mark's shoulder in a way that only he can get away with. Anyone else would have lost their nose for sticking it where it doesn't belong.
"Mark," Eduardo says, voice low enough that only Mark and Dustin can hear him. "I don't think you need to--"
Mark doesn't even look up. He's too busy counting the cards, +2, -1, the way he and Dustin used to practice in front of Chris in their old suite. It was the first thing they ever tried together as a team of college-aged delinquents, before they pulled off their first Ponzi scheme, before they even knew Sean's name. They even took their show to Foxwoods with their fake ids and came out of it a couple hundred dollars ahead. That was big money for them in those days. These days, they wouldn't even think twice about wiping their ass with that kind of cash.
"The shrimp looks pretty good tonight," Dustin says, which gets a half-confused, half-horrified look from Eduardo, and it breaks Mark's concentration just enough that he refocuses his attention on Dustin. 'Shrimp' used to be one of their code words for 'slow the fuck down, you're being obvious,' and it probably pisses Mark off because he's only played two hands, and he lost one of them. It's hardly enough to make anyone suspicious. .
"I'm not hungry yet," Mark says, petulant. His leg twitches, giving a way his restlessness
Eduardo chooses that moment to strike. "C'mon," he says. "My stomach is starting to rumble." He grabs Mark's arm and physically pulls him out of the chair, and Mark only makes one annoyed sound before letting him, which is kind of amazing in and of itself.
Eduardo is shivering with his back against a wall, his eyes closed, mouth slack. Mark's seen Eduardo in a lot of compromising positions, like that time his roommate decided to give him a sharpie mustache when he was crashing after a project or that time he got really wasted and accidentally walked into a closed door. But this one, this one is different. This one is voluntary, or as close as involuntary biological processes get to voluntary.
Mark touches Eduardo's bare shoulder, listens as Eduardo sucks in a quick breath. "Mark," Eduardo says, and his voice sounds like sandpaper.
"Yeah," Mark says. He leans in closer, presses his mouth against Eduardo's. It's a clumsy kiss, strange and unfamiliar. Eduardo's usually clean-shaven, but he must be too out of it to shave. His stubble scratches Mark's face.
There's an erection pressing against Mark's stomach, hard and insistent, which should freak Mark out more than it does. Guys are straightforward, easy. Mark knows exactly how these body parts work.
Except maybe not entirely, because Eduardo shudders through an orgasm as soon as Mark gives his cock a squeeze, coating Mark's hand in semen.
"Fuck," Mark says. Yeah, he'd done enough research to know some of what to expect, but hadn't been ready for the way Eduardo looked, his skin flushed and his back arched. Mark licks a wet stripe across Eduardo's collar bone. Eduardo's cock is still hard in Mark's hand.
"Mark," Eduardo says again. One of his hands tightens in the fabric of Mark's t-shirt, and Mark needs more skin, all of it. He yanks off his t-shirt and shoves his boxers down his legs.
He drags Eduardo's head down so he can kiss Eduardo again, fast and hard. Eduardo makes a soft noise into Mark's mouth. His fingers dig into Mark's arm, but his whole body seems to relax, like he's just riding out the arousal.
Mark still isn't sure how to process any of this, the way Eduardo sounds, breathy and strung out, the flush that chases its way across Eduardo's chest and neck. Mark wants to touch him some more, but he doesn't know where to start, the angles of Eduardo's collarbones or the curve of Eduardo's wrist or the knobs of Eduardo's hips.
Eduardo gets impatient, it seems, because then he has his hands on Mark's shoulders, turning him, so he's the one pushed against the wall, and Mark lets him. He's here because this is what Eduardo needs, and yeah, okay, Mark likes the thought of getting laid, too. His hands are warm, warmer than usual, and his cock is wedged up against Mark's hip, hard, still a little slick with come.
He kisses Mark, sloppy and eager, hips snapping forward like he can't stop himself from rutting up against Mark's body. He hisses when Mark bites at his lips, gasping and coming as soon as Mark digs his fingers into Eduardo's arms. "Fuck," Eduardo says. Mark's always thought that orgasm faces are kind of ridiculous, at least as far as he can tell from porn, but with Eduardo, with Eduardo like this, it's something else entirely.
"Bed?" Mark says. His own cock is leaking and getting a little uncomfortable, but Mark's an expert at dealing with annoying bodily functions at this point.
"Yes," Eduardo says, sounding out of breath, "please." They manage to stumble onto the tiny dorm room bed without breaking anything, which is a minor miracle in and of itself.
Mark ends up on top, straddling Eduardo's hips, looking down at the tan skin of Eduardo's chest. Mark's never understood the fixation on nipples, but Eduardo makes this sound when Mark touches his, a little like he's dying, except probably not quite as unpleasant.
"Good?" Mark asks.
"Yes," Eduardo says. "Don't--" He almost sounds the way he does when he's drunk. He rolls his hips up in an attempt to get more friction, and Mark thinks he could get used to this, the way Eduardo is strung out and needy, and the way Mark can do whatever he wants. The craziest thing about it is how much Eduardo likes it, how lightest touch can set him off. It's not like Mark knows what the hell he's doing, doesn't know if Eduardo's reactions are due to the fact that Eduardo likes everything at the moment or because Mark is doing something right.
In all likelihood, it's the former rather than the latter, but Mark can't bring himself to give a shit. Eduardo pulls him down into a messy kiss, sloppy and rough, and Mark loses his balance, their teeth clicking together as his hands slip from underneath him, their noses mashed together, and Eduardo makes another sounds as their cocks rub against one another. The friction is so good, Mark does it again.
Eduardo makes that sound one more time, and his hands slide between their bodies, wrapping around Mark's cock. Mark comes really quickly, just one-two-three jerks, and Mark's eyes are squeezed shut and he's biting his lip hard enough to draw blood.
When he opens his eyes again, Eduardo is staring at him, eyes dark and liquid and open. "That was--" he says, and then one of his hands is travelling up Mark's thigh's to his ass. "Can I-- ?" he asks, just a fingertip pressed up against Mark's asshole. He's still feeling weird and sensitive from his orgasm, even the lightest touch makes him shivery, almost too much. Mark's not a moron, so he knows what this means. He's studied it, figured out the mechanics, because he's been curious about them as any other teenage boy with a preoccupation with asses.
Mark nods. "Okay. Condoms and lube?" he asks.
Eduardo fumbles underneath his pillow, producing a small tube and a foil packet. His hands are a little shaky. Mark's hands aren't exactly steady themselves, but he manages to get all arranged. Everything is a sticky, gross mess right now, but they can worry about that later, when Eduardo isn't undergoing, well, whatever the hell this is.
Man, Sherlock fandom feels so long ago that I found stuff that I totally forgot that I wrote.
I think this prompt was something about Sherlock provoking John into hurting him
There are ten perfect bruises on Sherlock's hips right now. Unfortunately, they will fade in a few days, and Sherlock rather likes them, likes the way that ache ever so slightly when he touches them.
"Haven't I told you enough times to properly label things when you put your experiments near the food?" John snaps from inside the kitchen. Sherlock hasn't quite managed to set off John's temper yet, but he's close. It'll only take a bit more to push him over.
Sherlock decides to ignore John and focus on the inane chatter on his forums, curled up in John's favorite armchair with his laptop on his knees. He has waited out John's patience before, and he expects this to be a very effective strategy since people get so very touchy when he doesn't pay any attention to them and the idiotic things that come out of their mouths. Sherlock tries not to lick his lips in anticipation.
"You're not even listening, are you?" John says, shaking his head. "Unbelievable."
Sherlock continues to ignore him, waiting until John is close enough for Sherlock to smell his skin. Then he turns at looks at John, at his drawn eyebrows, at the downward twist of his mouth. Sherlock's breath catches in his throat one moment before John reaches for him. Sherlock's laptop crashes to the floor as John pulls him forward.
John's hands are quick, efficient, as they strip the clothes from Sherlock's body. His mouth is sharp and forceful against Sherlock's own. His teeth dig into Sherlock's lower lip, and Sherlock makes a sound that is definitely not a whimper. "You do this on purpose, don't you?" John asks, even though he already knows the answer.
"Of course," Sherlock says, forcing out the words between rough breaths. "Your reaction is identical each time."
John snorts, almost a laugh, and some of the anger bleeds out of him. "That it is," he says. He flips Sherlock over, so that he's bent over the arm of the chair, Sherlock's face pressed against the old, worn fabric, and then he places his hands on Sherlock's hips. His fingers dig hard into the bruises there, an explosion of old aches and new pain, and Sherlock shivers at the sensation.
It's perfect.
that female!Watson one I never did finish
I think it was a combo of Yuletide hitting and a general ambivalence towards the fact that it felt like I was recycling too much of If I Fell. Whoops.
One thing Sherlock has always appreciated about Joan is that she is incredibly forthright when it comes to sex. Women can be so inconsistently touchy about such things -- Sherlock assumes it's societal programming of some sort -- which is why he can't talk to Molly about a corpse's penis without her blushing or mention Donovan's truly unfortunate affair with Anderson without getting called a freak. Joan doesn't seem all that bothered about it, though.
"I'm used to your casual disregard for my privacy," Joan says, gesturing with her fork, "and the army tends to remove any squeamishness about sex in general."
Sherlock says, "I don't understand why there's any squeamishness about sex at all."
Joan just laughs at him and shakes her head. "Men," she says, and there's something in her smile that indicates that she thinks she knows something that Sherlock doesn't know. Not impossible. Sherlock routinely does garbage collection on his mind and that means there are gaps in his knowledge. Still, the expression irks him for some reason, and he doesn't quite understand why.
---
On a whim, Sherlock tries to make a spreadsheet of all of Joan's past lovers, male and female, and exactly what sort of sexual acts she performed with them. Though he has a reasonably good set of anecdotes to work with, Joan is fairly stingy on other personal details when she doles out anecdotes. She'll talk about proper blowjob technique or various kinds of vibrators without even so much as batting an eyelid, but she won't say anything exactly which university girlfriend she'd snogged for two hours straight in the library or which of her boyfriends was the first to perform cunnilingus on her.
"That's not really really relevant, is it?" she says the first time Sherlock asks, and Sherlock decides she wouldn't take kindly to his spreadsheet so he doesn't inquire further.
Still, he can keep meticulous notes when he needs to, and he doesn't let any hints of the spreadsheet's existence slip until he mentions her relationship with David Howard during one of their arguments about Sherlock's treatment of Molly.
"Wait," Joan says, her face twisted up in confusion, "who?"
"From your communication with him on Facebook, it seemed like you and he had a sexual relationship at one point," Sherlock says, though from her expression, he suspects that was a miscalculation.
Joan snorts. "If by 'sexual relationship,' you mean 'He tried to stick his hands down my trousers during a party while plastered, and I broke his wrist for it' then yes. It lasted for about thirty seconds." Sherlock knows that he should not be this fascinated by Joan's infrequent but intense acts of violence, but he can imagine the dark annoyance on Joan's face, the clear snap of the bone breaking, the smooth, practiced motions of Joan's hands. A pleasant shiver runs down Sherlock's spine at the mental image. It's a pity that he didn't meet her before that incident. He would have liked to see it happen in person.
---
Joan is not a particularly stunning woman. Her hair is straight and chopped short, not as short as some of the military personnel that Sherlock knows, but shorter than most women wear theirs. There are deep bags underneath her eyes. She does not wear makeup. Her hair is not quite brown and not quite blond, and her cheekbones are not particularly pronounced. Sherlock has seen the way people's eyes slide past her, writing her off like the idiots they are.
What they don't see is that there is something pleasing about the particular arrangement of features on her face. Her body is still in reasonably good shape, despite the psychosomatic limp, and she has eyes that Sherlock has heard others describe as 'kind.' Every part of Joan is kind as well, kind around her lips and near her ears and underneath her feet. Sherlock cannot stop himself from watching her, when she is in motion, when she is still, when she's laughing or frowning or cursing at him.
Sherlock is an addict. He knows what addiction feels like.
When Joan greets him every morning, half-lidded and grumpy and running a hand through her hair, Sherlock sits at the kitchen table and stares at the curve of her neck.
---
"You know," Joan says as Sherlock slides her jacket onto her shoulders, "there's a reason why everyone thinks we're fucking."
Sherlock has never cared about such things, and he is not planning on starting just for Joan's sake. "I don't see why that's relevant."
Now that Joan has begun to let her hair grow out, the number of people who assume they're in in a relationship has doubled. They've probably stopped assuming that she's a lesbian. Joan just shrugs. "I just wanted to let you know why everyone stands at least a foot away from me while you're hovering."
"That was obvious," Sherlock says, chiding. He has also noticed that Joan has a tendency to hover herself, especially when they're interviewing particularly clingy female suspects. She's not blatant about it, but she'll stand a tick closer than normal or she'll interrupt the conversation to make sure they haven't forgotten that she's there (like Sherlock would ever forget). Sherlock finds that he enjoys those moments, those tiny claims she makes on him. In his mind, they look like marks on his skin, visible only to him. He sometimes imagines her hand on the small of his back, on the curve of his hip, on the bend of his elbow.
Joan doesn't touch him, though. She'll hold out a hand or kick his shoes, but she won't touch in any way that actually means something. She won't stake her claim in a way that's visible to anyone other than Sherlock, and Sherlock doesn't understand why that bothers him so much.
---
Sherlock can usually tell when a suspect won't speak to him right out, first glance. It's annoying, really; all those petty human emotions getting in the way of a case.
Today, it's the man behind the counter of a pawn shop who looks like he's trying to be tough (from the dark-eyed glowers he shoots towards his customers), but may be a bit of a soft touch underneath (by the worn DVD case of Love Actually sitting on the DVD player next to the television set). The plan to find out whether or not this pawn shop has the stolen ring they're looking for is really quite simple, then.
Sherlock grabs Joan's hand, lacing their fingers together before she can object. Her skin is warm, slightly dry. There are a few callouses from where her cane rubs against her palm. Sherlock drags her along, up to the counter. "Hi," he says, putting on his friendliest and most hapless smile. "My girlfriend and I are looking to get engaged, but she's very particular about what sort of ring she wants." He glances at Joan with the most simperingly adoring look he can muster, which to tell the truth, isn't as hard as it could be.
Joan has managed to plaster a very large, very fake smile onto her face. "Yup," she says. "I was very specific about what it has to look like. Because I'm very specific about things. Um, my mum had a really beautiful one that she wanted to give to me when I got the right age, but then she lost it, and I've been trying to find one like it ever since." It's not the most convincing Joan has ever been, but Sherlock is sure the pawn broker won't notice. Most people can't read Joan very well.
The pawn broker glances between them, at Sherlock's smile, at Joan's honest hesitance, and Sherlock can see the exact moment the man melts for them. "All right, luv. Tell me what you're looking for."
Joan rattles off enough of a description to get the man to show them the stolen ring, and Sherlock squeezes her hand in triumph before he drops the act.
Afterwards, when the police have gently prodded the name of the thief who sold the ring out of the pawn broker, Joan says, "You should warn me next time you pull something like that." She's angry, genuinely angry, and Sherlock cannot fathom why that is.
"Your performance was more than adequate," he says. Reassurances are useful and important to most people, or so Sherlock has deduced. They have a lot more work to do hunting down Tyler Blake before they can rest tonight, and Sherlock starts striding away and holds up a hand to signal the first cab that comes along. They're so close. Sherlock can feel it.
That doesn't seem to do the trick, because Joan grabs a fistful of his jacket and yanks him back. "Sometimes, I cannot believe the things that come out of your mouth," she says. "Just, next time, warn a girl before you set her up as your fake fiancée, all right?"
It's a reasonable enough request, as far as they go, if also a bit of an annoyance. Sherlock should clarify at some later point whether she means all situations where he would like to use her as part of his cover story or just situations where he needs her to pretend to be in a relationship with him. "All right," he says.
---
"Don't be an idiot," Sherlock says to their suspect. "She really is an excellent shot."
The knife presses harder against Sherlock's throat. It draws a thin line of blood; Sherlock can feel the sticky fluid sliding down his neck. Thankfully, the suspect's hand is still steady. He's uncertain enough to be threatening but not terrified enough to kill Sherlock without meaning to. This man is a career criminal. A spot of violence won't even faze him.
Joan's hands don't shake either as she points the gun at the two of them. "Let him go," she says in the same tone of voice she tries on screaming children and uncooperative patients. "You don't want to add murder to your charges." Her voice almost seems to echo in the empty car park, the sound of it ricocheting off the concrete.
The arm wrapped around Sherlock's chest tightens. He wants to roll his eyes, because even a moron should see the skill with which Joan handles the gun, the minute shifts in her eyes and hands to compensate for every movement the man makes.
"What the hell would you know, you slag?" the suspect sneers. "Don't come any closer or I'll really slit your boyfriend's throat."
That was the wrong thing to say. Joan's eyes flick to the left, where Sherlock knows there isn't anything. The suspect's gaze follows hers for the split second it counts, turning his head, distracted. That's the moment that Joan makes her move.
A single gunshot echoes in the air. Sherlock feels the body slump behind him, and he manages to shove away the arm holding the knife before it manages to slice his throat by accident as it falls. Sherlock's breath comes out too fast, a bit from the wound, a bit from the adrenaline. His legs are surprisingly shaky, and he drops to the ground, landing hard on his knees.
Joan lowers the gun and scrambles over. "You all right? Let me take a look," she says. Her fingers are light and careful on his chin, tilting it up so she can inspect the shallow cut. She reaches into her jacket for the roll of medical gauze she's kept there since the incident with the butcher and the meat packing plant, and she bandages the wound with her usual efficiency. Her hands are still steady. He can imagine her like this in the middle of a battlefield, in the middle of surgery, quiet and unflinching and focused.
"You could have let him kill me," Sherlock says. Not that he thinks she ever would have, but he needs to hear her say the words the same way he needs her to tell him he's brilliant. They're words he wants to make her say over and over again until he can feel them underneath his eyelids, until she won't anymore.
"No, I couldn't have," Joan says, and the heat that passes through him as she speaks is almost as perfect as the slide of a needle into his veins.
---
"You told me to warn you the next time," Sherlock says. "Now I'm warning you."
Joan just glares at him with the same expression she wears when she finds one of his experiments in the kitchen sink. "Well, I guess that's true," she says. "I'm going to have to be a lot more drunk than I currently am before I'm going to be wearing this of my own volition."
"That can be arranged," Sherlock says, "if you would like." Mycroft left some wine in one of the cupboards a few months ago, and Joan keeps a bottle of whiskey in her room and likes to pretend that Sherlock doesn't know about it. She only drinks from it when the nightmares get bad.
"Remind me why I haven't shoved you out of one of the windows yet," Joan says. She's holding the corset with her thumb and forefinger, as if it's a particularly disgusting body part, as if she can't believe she's holding it at all.
"This club is the only lead we have," Sherlock says, "and the police don't have the resources to put anyone else under. Besides, you understand the culture as well as anyone." One of her boyfriends during her residency was a masochist, even more intensely than Sherlock is, and while they may never have taken it public, he knows Joan understand the culture, the terminology as well as Sherlock does. "It isn't like I'm asking you to be the submissive, but we'll still need to look like we belong there."
Joan huffs out a breath. "Fine, I'll do the makeup and corset, but nothing goes into my hair, all right?"
Compromise again. It frustrates Sherlock that the subject comes up so often. If she just outright refused, Sherlock could argue until she came around to his (clearly correct) point of view, but she always gives up ground and forces him to do the same. "Fine," he says.
Joan disappears for a while and then she comes out with the corset on, but the back isn't laced up. "It's you or Mrs. Hudson, and I'd rather not have to explain this to her," she says over her shoulder.
"I doubt it would shock her," Sherlock says, but his hands are already at the laces, and he's distinctly aware of how close he is to touching her skin.
They don't speak, but Joan makes a soft huff of breath when Sherlock yanks a bit too tightly. The corset looks good on her, flattering her curves, but she won't stand out, not at a place like this. Joan is really quite good at making herself invisible when she wants to be, and in this outfit, she'll very much be wanting to be invisible. And besides, Sherlock's the one meant to be the bait. They want everyone's eyes on him. Still, the scar left behind by the gunshot wound is very much visible on her shoulder, paler than the skin around it, and while it won't be as obvious in the dim light of this particular club, Sherlock is certain he'll find it personally... distracting. But not enough that he wants to convince her to cover it up.
When he's done, Joan twists her body, experimentally, testing the give of the garment. "I really hope you're not expecting me to do any sort of running in this," she says.
"If we play this right, we won't have to," Sherlock says. He hands Joan the collar he's planning on wearing for tonight. She holds it in her hand for a long moment, running her thumb along the black leather, along the name plate engraved with the initials SH.
"You've had this for a while," Joan says, inspecting the cracks in the leather and the wear near the buckle, her expression pulled into a thoughtful frown.
"I have," Sherlock says. He tilts his head up, an unspoken invitation.
Joan isn't careful about not-touching him, not while she does this. Her knuckles press against the back of Sherlock's neck, and her thumb brushes against his pulse point. When she's done putting it on, she hooks a finger underneath the leather to test the slack. Sherlock's mouth goes dry at the pressure. "All right?" she asks.
Sherlock nods. The collar around his throat is comfortable, familiar, and the fact that it was Joan that put it on him makes his head spin.
"Good," she says. Her smile is half-hearted at best. She isn't committed yet, and Sherlock knows why.
"You don't like public displays," Sherlock says, because he sometimes has to say things out loud before she'll explain things to him.
Joan snorts. "Not as such, no." She folds her arms across her chest, shoulders hunched, clearly uncomfortable with herself. Sherlock likes public displays very much. Most people are too stupid to pick up the subtle clues, after all. They need it shoved in their face. Sherlock enjoys shoving it in their faces, enjoys watching the way understanding blooms in their eyes. "But you do," she continues. Then she picks up the leash off the kitchen table and hooks it to Sherlock's collar.
She gives the leash a slight tug, just enough so that Sherlock can feel the press of the leather against the front of his throat.
---
Inside the club, Joan is tense, nervous, not quite settled into her character. Or what's supposed to be her character. Sherlock can disappear into other people, even enjoys the challenge of it, but Joan's not good at being anyone but herself. Sherlock likes that about her, the way she seems to live so comfortably inside her own body. Sherlock has never been a big fan of the limitations of his own flesh and bones.
Joan's left hand is clenched tight around the leash, her knuckles going white from the tension in her fingers. "I am never forgiving you for this, you know," she mutters into Sherlock's ear, the warmth of her breath raising goosebumps on his skin. She's just as careful as always about not-touching as always, keeping a few inches between them. Sherlock isn't wearing a shirt, and he can feel the way her body gives off heat, can smell the shampoo she uses in her hair. The club is dark enough that all of Sherlock's other senses feel heightened, every moment even more agonizing than the last.
"You haven't even had to do anything particularly objectionable yet," Sherlock says.
Joan's jaw tightens. Sherlock can imagine the way her teeth must be grinding right now, but the music is too loud, and he can't hear it. "I wasn't aware that I was expected to do anything objectionable," she hisses. Sherlock has to read her lips to understand what she's saying, but her anger is clearly written across her face. He's torn between provoking a stronger reaction, one that will most likely cause her to take her frustrations out on the nearest person, and bowing his head so that she can press a hand to the back of his neck and tell him how good he's been.
As much as he enjoys this, Sherlock has never been all that amenable to easy obedience. He likes to draw out a bit of cruelty in his tops, make them fight him down, but Joan is just as likely to walk away as she is to take him by the collar and force him to his knees. Sherlock needs to handle this delicately. She'd see through an act if he tried one. "Surely you must have realized that it might become necessary to take action if there are times our cover is in danger of being compromised," he says.
Joan gives him a look that says that she isn't convinced, but she seems calmer once she gets her bearings. She straightens her back, and her strides become more confident and assured. Sherlock almost regrets his decision to suggest this, because he finds it distracting to have her here. His mind wants to go down to the place where it doesn't have to think for itself, where he can take his lead from the pull of a leash or the push of a hand, where he can be forced to remain still. He bites his lip to keep himself sharp and aware, but he stores this moment to his hard drive, the feel of the collar, the scent of the leather, and the downturned corner of Joan's mouth.
He'll have time to enjoy the memory later. Right now he needs to focus on the case.
---
"Don't touch him," Joan snaps.
Sherlock pulls away instinctively from the outstretched hand, and then Joan is there, an arm wrapped possessively around Sherlock's waist. Sherlock wants to curl into her, wants to tuck his nose underneath her chin. He's not used to so much skin-to-skin contact, and it's almost too much for him to process. Their killer -- and it's most assuredly their killer by the way he was so careful to wear new shoes but not careful enough to remove his incriminating rings -- holds his hands up in mock surrender. "I didn't mean to intrude," he says smoothly. "But I do think his cheekbones are quite lovely."
The look Joan shoots the man is downright poisonous, and Sherlock wants more of it, wants more evidence that she owns him, that he's hers. "Well, it's not very polite to touch other people's belongings without their permission, now is it?" she asks. Sherlock ducks his head into her hair, because this is brilliant, because he can feel her bare palm, warm and slightly sweaty, pressed against his skin.
"Of course not," the man says. "But I'd love to see a demonstration." He's leering now, eyes roaming over Sherlock's neck and Sherlock's torso and Sherlock's crotch. Sherlock usually finds the evidence collection stage of his cases somewhat tedious once he's solved the puzzle, but he feels a quick thrill right now at the possibility of danger, of staring down their murderer and walking away undetected.
"I don't think--" Joan starts. She knows what's going on, she's on her guard today, and she's picking up on the tension in Sherlock's body.
"I'd like to," Sherlock says, softening his voice so it almost sounds as if he's deferring to her wishes.
Joan's dark, angry look shifts to him. The danger of it just pricks Sherlock's attention and he feels a quick rush of adrenaline. "Are you sure?" she asks, and Sherlock can hear what she's really asking, do you know what the hell you're doing? Sherlock does want to see how she'll react, if she'll follow his lead in even this.
"Yes," he says, meeting her eyes. She holds his gaze for a long moment before she turns her head away.
"No," she says. She slides two fingers underneath Sherlock's collar and gives it a rough tug, bypassing the leash entirely, and storms off. Sherlock can't do anything but follow her.
---
"He's our killer," Sherlock says when they find a corner where they won't be overheard. Sherlock lets himself loom over her just enough so that no one can see the movements of their mouths. Irritation rushes through him, because they may not get another chance to befriend the killer and collect the necessary evidence. And for what? Some squeamishness about performing in public.
"Fine," Joan snarls. She holds her body still, as if there's something thrumming underneath her skin. Sherlock wants to press a tongue against her neck and taste it. She says, "Do whatever you need to do, but don't pull me into it." She grabs hold of Sherlock's collar and tugs on it. Sherlock bends into her, enjoying the awkward crick it puts in his back. "I'm heading back to the flat. You can go back to whatever fucked up game you're playing." She lets go and shoves him out of the way.
Sherlock feels like he's just been hit in the solar plexus, a good solid punch that leaves him breathless and disoriented. What did she-- But then she's already gone, disappearing into the crowd.
---
It doesn't take more than a couple hours for Sherlock to seduce the proper evidence from their killer. The man is an idiot, which comes as no surprise to Sherlock. The killer would be much more effective at hunting his prey if he didn't immediately assume that every sub he stumbles across is stupider than he is. Sherlock hopes that he has put that assumption to rest after meeting and having been thoroughly humiliated by Sherlock, but Sherlock doesn't expect much from the criminally insane.
When he gets back to his flat, Joan has already changed back into her comfortable sweats and her favorite jumper. it is hardly the most aesthetically pleasing ensemble he has seen her in, but it tells him everything he needs to know about her state of mind at the moment. She's upset and agitated and reaching for the familiar, settling into comfortable patterns. Sherlock is still in the clothes he worse to the club, and the collar is still in place around his neck. He hasn't wanted to take it off just yet, and besides, he had loved seeing the rise it had gotten out of Anderson when the police had shown up to arrest the man and take Sherlock's witness statement. Joan is sitting at the desk in their sitting room, typing furiously into her laptop. Sherlock might even think she was composing a blog post if she didn't have her email client open, words filling up the text box at an alarming rate. Harry, maybe? But Joan has not been on good enough terms with Harry for her to consider Harry a confidante.
"I think you'll be relieved to hear that our killer has been arrested," Sherlock says.
Joan ignores him.
Sherlock continues. "I realize that I must have done something to upset you--"
"Yes," Joan says. "Very good observation right there, Sherlock." She smacks her enter key particularly hard on the last sentence she writes.
Most days, Joan is easy to read. She claims it's not worth trying to hide anything from someone like Sherlock, and so she leaves her self open as a book, letting Sherlock see into her to his heart's content. Right now, Sherlock can't pick up on anything besides the fact that Joan is furious with him. He tries to retrace it all to the exact moment it all fell apart. "I wasn't expecting you to do anything you didn't already enjoy," Sherlock says. "You were allowed to pick the parameters of the scene. And--"
Joan slams the lid of her computer shut. "What part of 'I don't like public displays' did you not understand, Sherlock?" she asks. "You were the one who deduced it in the first place."
"It was for the case," Sherlock says. "I thought you might be willing to expand your limits given the situation."
There is a furrow in Joan's brow that has only deepened as the conversation has gone on. She shakes her head. "Would it have killed you to ask before you tried to bully me into having sex with you in front of a complete stranger?"
"I didn't have the time," Sherlock says.
"That's complete bullocks," Joan says. "It's obvious that we didn't need to go through that, seeing as you caught him anyway without my help. What are you actually playing at here, Sherlock?"
Sherlock blinks. "It was simply the plan that made the most sense at the time," he explains.
"Most sense at the-- Sherlock, do you ever even hear the things that come out of your mouth?" She's gaping at him now as if Sherlock has managed to grow another head.
This conversation is simply going around in circles, which Sherlock finds very aggravating, "Of course I do."
Joan sighs and rubs the bridge of her nose. She waits a moment, as if she's composing her next question "Was it about me?" she finally asks. "Or was it about the situation?"
Sherlock feels his mouth go dry, which is frankly absurd because he's never had any problems with telling the truth before. "Both," he says. He studies her face, trying to pick up on where this conversation is going. At this point, she could take it anywhere, and Sherlock would have to let her. Sherlock would have to follow her wherever she leads.
"All right," she says, standing up. She curls her fingers underneath his collar once again, and Sherlock will never get bored with the way it feels, like she could take him apart in a moment's notice. She yanks on the collar, forcing him to his knees. Sherlock has felt the low thrum of arousal all night, and now it's rising to the surface. "If you tell me to stop, I'll stop," she says. "If you want me to slow down, I'll slow down. But if you ever try to manipulate me like that again, this -- all of this -- ends. Do you understand?"
"Yes," Sherlock says. He looks right into her eyes, and he doesn't look away. He understands, of course, and he's wanted this so badly he's felt stupid with it. This must be what it's like to have all your emotions spun inside out and backwards, to have logic not count for anything at all.
Joan kisses him then, hard and a little vicious, her teeth digging into Sherlock's bottom lip. "I almost went along with it," she murmurs against Sherlock's mouth. "You looked so perfect offering yourself up like that, offering yourself up to me."
Sherlock would say something, but she hasn't given him the permission, and he wants to be good. He wants to be good because otherwise she'll leave, and Sherlock won't have this any longer. His lip still stings, and the collar is still pressed tight against his throat. He wants Joan to leave marks on his neck, the larger the better, so he can flaunt them in front of Donovan tomorrow. He wants Joan to shove his head to the floor so that he can't see what she's doing to him, so that he has to deduce her next moves from sound and smell and touch.
Her free hand is undoing the zip of Sherlock's trousers, and her teeth are digging into Sherlock's collarbone, sending a bright spark of pain across Sherlock's nerves. Sherlock almost can't breathe from the onslaught of sensation, and all he wants is more. More skin, more pain, more sex, more everything. He whimpers when she frees his cock, the cool air brushing up against his heated skin. "Fuck," Joan mutters. "You're so--" She pulls back to pull the jumper over her head and to push her sweats to the floor.
Sherlock watches her, committing every new patch of skin she reveals to memory. He's still hungry for new details of her, for new things to learn and understand. There's a faint scar on her ribs, right beneath her left breast, and a mole on her right thigh. There are long red scratches from her wrist to her elbow from where she scraped her arm two days ago on the pavement while chasing down a suspect. She straddles Sherlock's lap, balancing herself with a hand pressed against Sherlock's shoulder.
Sherlock remains as still as possible, trying so very hard to be good. He believes her when she says that she'll walk away. She's waiting for something, a sign of some sort from Sherlock, a nod of his head or a slump of his shoulders. She isn't giving any indication of what that is, since her expression is calm and . Joan says, "You need to stop thinking so fucking much. The world isn't going to end if you switch your mind off for an hour."
It doesn't work that way in Sherlock's head, and it annoys him to think that Joan doesn't understand that. She's smarter than this. "That's not--"
Joan says, her voice soft and low and careful, "Sherlock, stop."
I originally wrote this as part of picfor1000 as an attempt to try to get back into writing Sheppard's Eleven. It didn't really help the way I'd hoped. It sort of meanders and doesn't go anywhere.
John's never really been fond of airports, but they're a necessary evil of the job. Trains have less security, but they're also slow and not all good for getting to foreign destinations. Boats, well, boats can be a good exist strategy, but they're so limited in scope. Cars can be useful, but they're even slower than trains, and timing is key in their line of work.
So, airports it is.
But then you have the problem of waiting. Air travel is basically frantic periods of waiting followed by much calmer periods of waiting. Waiting has never been one of John's strong suits.
McKay isn't entirely bad company, John does have to admit. He wasn't sure what to make of McKay at first, but Elizabeth had vouched for him, and Elizabeth was rarely wrong about things like that. Still, their first meeting had not gone as well as John had hoped, what with McKay getting annoyed about John's choice for a restaurant (too many menu items with citrus ingredients) and the way John really gets itchy around high strung people. They're heading west together to Phoenix, Arizona, and John is somewhat amazed that he hasn't killed McKay yet from over-exposure. It's their first job together, a fairly easy one. A chance for them to feel each other out, get a sense of how well they'll work together, each other's strengths and weaknesses.
One weakness John can see is that McKay hardly does airports better than John does. He pops a brown jelly bean in his mouth. Chocolate-flavored. The texture is strange with the flavor, but it's still good. John likes that about jelly beans, the way you never know what you're going to get next. You can guess from the coloring, sure, but it's impossible to know exactly what you're getting yourself into.
"We just have to get through the door, right?" John says. They've been discussing the job to pass their time. It's been helping a bit, though McKay feels the need to pace back and forth, back and forth. It's making John feel a little dizzy just watching him.
McKay's hands are twitching constantly, the corner of his mouth pulled down into a frown. "No, no, no, no. It's not just a door," McKay says. "It's a titanium-plated, timer-locked, pressure-sensitive entrance barrier." From John's vantage point, he's more of a silhouette than a person in front of the floor-to-ceiling windows as the evening sun pours in over his feet.
"Like I said," John says. "A door."
That bulging vein on McKay's forehead is not the most attractive look on him, but John is somewhat charmed by it, anyway. "I don't even know why I'm bothering," McKay mutters. "It's like talking to a brick wall."
"Hey," John says. "I'm sure you'll come up with something." He puts another jelly bean in his mouth. Apple this time, just the tiniest bit of sour with the sweet. Despite their weird antagonism, McKay has displayed a striking amount of competence at his job, and John is a lot happier to just let McKay do his thing. Elizabeth did have some good stories to tell about some of McKay's old exploits. John had really liked the one about some clever on-the-fly engineering McKay had done with a cell phone, a children's toy, and a small portion of the Bank of London's sever farm.
McKay throws his hands up in the air. "Yes, fine. I realize that no one else involved in this little operation has half my intelligence or experience, which means that I have to do all the work, but I will do my best to pull a rabbit out of my-- wait, please don't tell me you bought those jelly beans here."
"Fine," John says, placing a yellow jelly bean in his mouth. Lemon, McKay's favorite. "I won't tell you."
"Did no one teach you anything about how airport pricing works?" McKay asks, his face turning a little red. "That bag of jelly beans probably costs twice as much that exact same bag would cost at the nearest CVS. It's absurd. Price gouging of the worst kind. And you're--"
"Eating them," John says, raising his eyebrows. "You have some sort of problem with that, McKay?"
"Haven't you been paying attention? The last two minutes of our conversation were about how I do have a problem with the way you're eating overpriced airport food, when you could have bought the bag before arriving at the airport instead of now, when everything is ridiculous expensive." McKay says this as though John's jelly beans are some kind of personal affront to him.
John shrugs. "It was there, and I wanted some, so I bought it." He can spare the few extra dollars in price, and McKay probably can too, despite all his complaining. Besides, he hadn't realized wanted them until he'd seen them.
McKay opens his mouth to respond, but the loudspeaker comes on and a female voice booms. "American flight 762 to Phoenix is boarding at gate K12."
"That's us," John says, before McKay can really work up himself into a too much of a froth. He stands up and gently nudges McKay in the direction of the gate.
McKay, surprisingly enough, lets John do this without resistance, though he does mutter a little under his breath. It's entirely possible that Rodney McKay is the most obsessive, paranoid, and anal person that John has ever met, but then again, McKay's a details man. And John's needed a good details man for a while now.
John's not one to over-analyze things, so he won't make grand predictions about the future. They'll go to Phoenix, and they'll do the job. If it works out, it works out. And if it doesn't, it doesn't. He can worry about that later.
He smiles at the gate attendant as she scans his boarding pass, and as he steps onto the plane, he tosses one last jelly bean into his mouth (without peeking at the color) for good luck.
This one was the first fic I wrote in this fandom. It's not particularly good, but it helped me find a groove with these characters, so there's that. I still think there's some good moments in there.
The window that leads to Charles' room is open, letting the mid-autumn air in. Erik shakes his head when he sees it as he approaches the mansion. It's the only room with the lights still on this late, a warm yellow-orange amongst the forbidding darkness of the building. Charles always did have a fondness for meaningless gestures. It seems that time has not cured him of it.
It is child's play for Erik to slip inside, to find Charles awake, restless in his chair, waiting. The chess set has been set up, neat rows of black and white. Charles has decided to take white, it seems. Erik closes the window behind him using the metal clasp on the old wooden window sill and closes it with a flick of his wrist. The room is much the same as it was when Erik lived here. It's still too big, too cold, the lamps more orange than yellow. The large, wooden four-poster bed is still ridiculous for one man. Erik catalogs the minor changes. There are new hangers in the closet. There are a few more knick-knacks on the dresser. One of the couches has been shifted against the far wall. It is still the ugliest piece of furniture Erik has ever seen. If Erik squints his eyes, he can almost breathe 1962 all over again.
"I was beginning to wonder if you were going to show," Charles says. "My tea has gotten cold." He says the words so mildly they could be mistaken for a rebuke, but Charles lost the right to rebuke Erik decades ago. Not that Charles seems to have realized that.
"I was delayed," Erik says. He re-adjusts the helmet to make sure none of his thoughts slip out. There are are things that Charles does not need to know.
Charles arches an eyebrow. "Of course," he says. He doesn't say more, though Erik can hear the irritation simmering underneath his words. There's a lecture on the tip of his tongue.
Erik sits down in the chair across from Charles and waits. They've had this argument before. They've had every argument before, each one more boring than the last. Charles hands him a tumbler of scotch without comment. They've been working through the same bottle for years.
Charles moves out his first pawn, his hands steady and sure. There's a chip in the wood of one of his knights that wasn't here the last time. Erik wonders who else Charles has been playing against, maybe one of the new ones, that serious boy with the awkward sunglasses or that dark skinned girl with the white hair. It would be easy to say that they haven't changed. It would be easy to pretend that the years haven't touched them, but they wear too much of their age. Charles' hair has begun to thin, and Erik's has begun to gray. Erik wears his new scars proudly, and Charles hides them away.
And yet Charles still refuses to see the truth, still actively fighting him every step of the way, and Erik still refuses to back down, still ever more certain that this is the best way, the only way.
Erik matches Charles' move with his own pawn, their customary opening gambit. Charles' forehead creases in thought. Right here, right now, it's just the two of them and some scotch and a chess board. Perhaps they are at the CIA between recruiting missions restlessly waiting for the next name, next coordinates, or in the study after a long day of training, their bodies and minds worn out and exhausted and content.
The old, sweet, familiar ache rises up inside of him. It's not enough to shatter him, but enough to make him hurt.
"You're woolgathering, my friend," Charles says. There is a smile at the corner of his lips, amused, though he's trying to hide it.
"You're still hiding," Erik says, "after all these years." He's seen things that Charles couldn't even imagine out there. A boy trapped in a sunless room, his body stick-thin from starvation, his gills flapping in panic as Mystique approached him, his green scales wan and pale. A girl with cat eyes with her face torn to pieces after she'd been tossed to the lions. The man bleeding all over the side of the road because a mob had torn out his fangs, unable to talk, with real fear in his eyes when he saw Azazel's red skin and tail. There is a real war out there, and Charles has been sitting here, his life so easy and comfortable, his telepathy ensuring that there's no danger of discovery.
Charles' hands still on the knight he was about to move. "They're still children. They shouldn't have to endure the world until they're ready for it," he says. His voice is quiet enough to feel like a slap in the face.
"Always the dreamer," Erik snorts. "The world will be coming for them whether they're ready or not." They've had this argument before, too. Many more times than Erik cares to count.
In the months since Erik had last seen Charles, mutants have gone fully public. A little girl manifested in a crowded bus station in Montreal, her natural bioluminescence blinding three people in the process. More people have outed mutants they know since the incident, forced them into the public spotlight. The US government can't hide it any longer any longer, though even now there are half-hearted attempts to obfuscate the truth.
Erik is glad. Secrecy had always been Charles' game. Erik has no desire to play it himself. Erik would love nothing more than for the humans to see them for what they are, for what they are capable of.
"You know as well as I do, that publicizing the true nature of the school would put the lives of every student here in danger. I can't risk that." Charles moves out one of his rooks.
"Don't give me that," Erik sneers, bitterness soaking through every word. "You put the lives of your students in danger every day. Or have you forgotten who put a stop to my plans last summer?"
"They are old enough to know the dangers, and they are old enough to choose it. I can't ask that of all my students. Surely, you must understand--"
Charles' lips are still as red as Erik remembers, and it's far more pleasant to watch the familiar lecture roll off Charles' tongue than to actually listen to it. He occasionally has idle fantasies when he visits, about what it would be like to kiss Charles again, to roll him onto the bed and blanket his body with his own. The fantasies are not always idle; Erik once got so frustrated with Charles' usual prattle during one of these meetings that he attempted to fuck the stubbornness out of him in a dingy hotel room in Berlin. It had been strange and new and difficult with Charles' injury, but even then, it had been easy to indulge himself in the thrill of being able to touch Charles again, the chance to relearn Charles' body.
"-- you're not even listening to me, are you?" Charles smirks as if he doesn't need his telepathy to know what Erik's thinking right now. He's probably right.
"Of course not," Erik says. "I've heard it all before." There are times when he wonders why he comes back, year after year. It feels as though they've said everything that can be said to one another, made every broken promise, told every lie. By now, he should know that Charles will never learn to see reason. Charles won't ever join the Brotherhood, and Erik will never leave it. So then, why can't Erik stay away?
"You've listened," Charles says, his voice soaked in perfectly modulated Oxford-bred arrogance, "but I doubt you've ever heard a word I've said."
Erik bares his teeth. So Charles intends to play it this way, does he? They've managed to perfect the ways in which they can hurt each other, how they can tear each other apart with just words. It's an old ache. "And I doubt you've ever bothered to look up from your books and your nice, cozy little life here to see how the world really works. You're as afraid as the rest of us, and you're too stubborn to admit it to anyone."
Charles doesn't flinch. There was a time when he would, when the force of Erik's anger would send him reeling. "Not all of us choose to be ruled by fear, Erik," he says. His eyes flick towards Erik's helmet, a pointed reminder of the many precautions Erik chooses to take.
It's a cheap bullying tactic, but Erik refuses to back down when Charles throws out a challenge like that. He lifts the helmet off his head and stares Charles down, just daring him to do something about it. It's a relief in more ways than one. The weight of it is no longer pressing against his skull. He can hear without the helmet muffling the sounds. Charles is radiating his usual calm warmth and amusement, and Erik can't help but relax into it, can't help but feel greedy for it once again. Charles probably doesn't even realize he does it, letting those emotions leak out of him, a high that can't be synthesized or replicated. "Better?" Erik asks. He waits for Charles to start rifling through his head. The helmet was but one precaution. He only visits when he has nothing to give up that Charles doesn't already know, leaving Mystique to do most of the planning in his absence.
"Yes," Charles says, closing his eyes, and there it is again, the soft touch of Charles' mind against Erik's own. It's almost too delicate -- Charles' abilities are heartbreaking in their sheer power -- and Erik's never had a defence against this, the gentle press of their minds, the way they have always seemed to fit together, opposites snapping together, instantly attracting. In the end, it will always come down to this. Erik will always want Charles at his side.
Charles says, "You know I can't." His voice has gone rough and quiet, his eyes liquid and dark. He reaches over the chess board to rest his hand on Erik's own. The wheelchair rolls forward, and Erik can feel the metal parts turn. Perhaps, there was a time when this would have been enough to convince him, just Charles holding out an open hand, a faint smile lingering. It was more than anyone else had offered him before. And it was Charles, Charles with the sly smile and the too-bright eyes, Charles who had never known real suffering and who loved so openly and so freely. Charles with his dreams and his school and his students, who is still, as ever, a light in the darkness. How easy would it be to stay with him now?
The bottom of Erik's stomach drops out. The temptation to take Charles' unspoken offer is so strong he can almost taste it. This is why he keeps coming back. This is why he would be better off if he stayed away.
"I know," Erik says, yanking himself away. He stands up, the game forgotten between them. It was never more than an excuse to be in the same room at the same time. But now the wooden paneling feels oppressive, and Erik longs for the comforting metal walls of his home base. His skin itches all over, too tight. This was a mistake. He should know better by now.
Charles pulls back mentally, leaving behind a cool emptiness inside Erik's mind. "Of course," he says, a response to a statement that Erik hasn't said out loud. "Tell Raven that I hope she's doing well." He sounds tired, resigned, and yet his expression is filled with such understanding that Erik want to retch. It will take months before Erik will be able to even hear Charles' name without it feeling like blow to the chest. He puts the helmet back on. Its weight is comforting now. It does nothing to ease the longing.
"I will," Erik says. He opens the window -- with his hands this time -- and the fresh, chilly air from outside soaks into his skin. It clears his head, gives him the strength to do what he must. "Good night, Charles."
Charles doesn't move. Erik can feel the way his wheelchair is absolutely still in the quiet room. "Good night, Erik," he says. "Until next time."
There will be a next time. Erik doesn't doubt that. He has yet to cast off all of his human weaknesses, and Charles knows it. "Until then," Erik says, and then he disappears once again into the night.
FIN.
Mafia AU ficbits
I mostly wrote these things as gifts for
merisunshine36, and I don't entirely consider them "canon" which is why they haven't been formally posted. Also, the Vegas one was sort of setting up something larger but I ended up working on Sheppard's Eleven instead and that's where all my Vegas feelings went.Dustin and Eduardo have a quiet moment
"'Sup, Wardo?" Dustin says. He's focused on his video game, fingers jamming down hard on the buttons of his controller. It's some sort of fighting game that Eduardo doesn't understand, with characters that look like cartoons. A pink blob floats across the television screen and then kicks a guy with a sword and shield in the face.
Eduardo rubs at his eyes. He's still sleepy from staying up late, waiting for Mark to get home. Of course, Mark never did make it home. If Dustin was looking any less relaxed, Eduardo would be getting worried, but Dustin is just grinning to himself, executing weirdly complicated moves. His pink blob hits an anthropomorphised fox with a baseball bat. Everything must be right in the world, then. Mark certainly isn't bleeding to death in a back alley somewhere. He probably just made an extra stop to visit his family after wrapping up his business in New York. "Morning," Eduardo says. It's hard to be coherent on Saturday mornings.
"Wanna play?" Dustin asks without turning around.
Eduardo stares blankly at him. "What?" He has no idea if Dustin is talking about the video game or if he's referring to some sort of obscure mob lingo Eduardo's never heard of.
Dustin pauses the game so that he can face Eduardo. He holds up the extra controller. "We can team up against the computer if you want."
Eduardo doesn't even know what that means, but he takes the controller. It's Saturday morning, and Eduardo can either do this, or he can go back upstairs and work out what he wants his portfolio to look like Monday morning when the markets reopen. He settles down on the couch, takes the controller from Dustin's hand. Dustin grin at him, but he doesn't say anything else, just starts the next round. Eduardo has some idea of how Dustin fits into Mark's work life, but it's easier to think of him as Mark's college (and current) roommate, the fun and unassuming guy who seems good at balancing out some of Mark's worse instincts.
Eduardo honestly doesn't know what he's doing, and Dustin doesn't seem inclined to explain it to him, so he ends up mashing buttons at random. The yellow creature he's controlling manages to electrocute the giant turtle monster, so Eduardo considers that a success.
He's still not sure what the point of all this is, but it is a little soothing to participate in some cartoon mayhem. He figures out which buttons are for performing attacks and which buttons are for jumping, even though that takes a little bit of time.
"Mark said that he's going to be busy all morning," Dustin says after their fifth round. He half-smiles, almost an apology.
Eduardo sighs. He knows Mark can take care of himself. Usually. There are other shades of meaning in Dustin's words, and Eduardo-- Eduardo doesn't want to understand what they are. Really. He's better off not knowing.
They play for a another few minutes in silence.
"It's okay," Eduardo says, eventually. "I'm okay with waiting." It feels weird to say it out loud, like a confession, even though it's not one; it shouldn't be.
Mark will be back in time for lunch, probably, and then they can spend the afternoon watching bad movies while Mark keeps up his running commentary about how stupid everyone else is. It'll be a good way to end a week. It should be.
Dustin gives him an odd look, but it only lasts for a moment. "Sure," he says, an undercurrent of skepticism in his voice, and then he turns back to his game.
Mark and Sean have a convo post-election
Peter tells Sean that he's become complacent since he moved back to California, that he's gotten soft. Okay, so maybe Sean has gained a few pounds here and there and maybe he's stopped looking over his shoulder every waking moment, but that's hardly complacency. He's just gotten a little settled, that's all. He works for Mark, and anyone who has a problem with Sean can bring it to Mark.
As far as Sean knows, no one wants to have a problem with Mark.
So maybe Sean isn't as guarded as he used to be. Maybe that's why he freaks out when he's about to get out of his pool after his morning swim and finds Mark standing on his deck, hands shoved into the pockets of his shorts. Sean jerks backwards as soon as he sees him, falling back into the pool with an awkward splash. "Holy shit, Mark," Sean says, pushing his hair out of his eyes. "Don't do that to me."
Mark shrugs. He's dressed more casually than Sean has seen him dress in years, a t-shirt and flip-flops and khaki cargo shorts. He doesn't look like Mark Zuckerberg, kid in the too-big suits and the scariest mob boss east of the Mississippi. He looks like Mark Zuckerberg, kid. Period. "You looked busy," Mark says. It's not really an answer. He steps closer and sits at the edge of the pool, cross-legged and unwilling to touch the water.
Sean decides that he doesn't want to bother getting out. Mark will do what he wants, same as he always does. He treads water near the edge and takes a good look at Mark. Mark is pale, paler than almost anyone else Sean sees, and Sean sells coke to bored Silicon Valley types who sunbathe in the glow of their computer screens. Mark's face has shed some of its boyishness. Not enough to make him look like an actual adult, but enough that he doesn't really look eighteen anymore. He's skinnier, too. Maybe Eduardo hasn't been feeding him right, what with his mayoral duties getting in the way of all of that.
"So," Sean says. "To what do I owe this dubious honor?" He pushes off the nearest wall and does a few backstrokes.
Mark squints with the sun in his eyes. "Thought I'd check in," he says.
Sean glances around for any sign of Dustin or Chris or anyone else in his little entourage who might be here to make sure Sean isn't skimming more than his share off the top. Sean thinks he might be a little insulted that Mark felt the need to come out here personally. (Okay, so maybe there was that one time, but Mark rolled his eyes and forgave him with just a warning. Sean doesn't think that counts.) "Celuzza mentioned that you might be having some trouble with Providence," Sean says off-hand. "That's nothing to do with me."
Mark's shoulders tense at the mention, mouth twisting into a frown. "Chris said I should let it be for a while," Mark says. "Get out of town before I do something rash."
Sean lets out a sharp bark of laughter. "You're joking, right?" he says. "You came all the way out here to get some vacation time?"
Mark's frown gets deeper, broadcasting annoyance, and while Sean knows that this is when some people might start getting nervous, Sean has seen Mark so drunk that every other word out of his mouth was a curse, and he's seen Mark wince at the sight of blood, and he's tasted the inside of Mark's mouth. It doesn't matter that Eduardo's just waiting for Mark to make an honest man out him -- it's still legal in Massachusetts these days, after all -- Sean will always have been there first, and he'll always know Mark better than Eduardo ever will. "Maybe. I guess," Mark mutters. "Eduardo had some sort of political thing he had to do."
Sean climbs out of the pool and slaps Mark on the back. His hand leaves a wet print on Mark's t-shirt. "Well, " Sean says, grinning widely. "If you're looking to loosen up, you've come to the right place." There's this club in San Francisco that Sean loves that he thinks Mark would like too. They could get sushi beforehand, and Sean is relishing this chance to show off the West Coast in style. This is going to be a blast
"I knew you'd say that," Mark says with a quick roll of his eyes, but the corner of his lips quirks upwards, almost a smile.
Dustin and Mark and Eduardo have a vacation in Vegas or something idk
They're in Vegas this weekend, which Dustin likes, because it's a change of pace from the miserable Boston winter they've been having this year: icy sidewalks and cars covered in snow. Mark has been extra grumpy lately, something to do with stuff on Chris's side. The State Troopers are not happy with the close, personal relationship that the mayor of Boston shares with an alleged criminal kingpin, and they've been trying (unsuccessfully) to get something to stick to Mark (though that's never going to happen under Marilyn's watch).
The Vegas air is dry and warm (relatively), and the Strip is alive with neon in a way that Boston simply isn't, this time of year. Dustin is mostly here for a little R&R between assignments, and Mark is here to-- pretend to understand how to go on vacation? It's a little unclear, like most of the joint decisions that get made between Mark and Eduardo. Eduardo seems a little bit happier about the chance to go out and pretend to be a normal couple doing normal couple-y things. Mark seems content to find things to occupy himself with, which is more of Dustin's problem than Eduardo's, but Dustin is pretty sure Eduardo is going to be in the blast radius if anything happens to go nuclear.
And let's be honest here. With Mark around, there's always the potential for things to go nuclear.
Tonight, they're in the casino of the MGM Grand, surrounded by a truly garish amount of gold-colored wall paint, blinking multi-colored lights, the sounds of spinning slot machines and the hum of people. Mark is playing blackjack, every ounce of concentration on the cards in front of him, lips turned down into the slightest frown. Eduardo is hovering, eyes wide and concerned, leaning over Mark's shoulder in a way that only he can get away with. Anyone else would have lost their nose for sticking it where it doesn't belong.
"Mark," Eduardo says, voice low enough that only Mark and Dustin can hear him. "I don't think you need to--"
Mark doesn't even look up. He's too busy counting the cards, +2, -1, the way he and Dustin used to practice in front of Chris in their old suite. It was the first thing they ever tried together as a team of college-aged delinquents, before they pulled off their first Ponzi scheme, before they even knew Sean's name. They even took their show to Foxwoods with their fake ids and came out of it a couple hundred dollars ahead. That was big money for them in those days. These days, they wouldn't even think twice about wiping their ass with that kind of cash.
"The shrimp looks pretty good tonight," Dustin says, which gets a half-confused, half-horrified look from Eduardo, and it breaks Mark's concentration just enough that he refocuses his attention on Dustin. 'Shrimp' used to be one of their code words for 'slow the fuck down, you're being obvious,' and it probably pisses Mark off because he's only played two hands, and he lost one of them. It's hardly enough to make anyone suspicious. .
"I'm not hungry yet," Mark says, petulant. His leg twitches, giving a way his restlessness
Eduardo chooses that moment to strike. "C'mon," he says. "My stomach is starting to rumble." He grabs Mark's arm and physically pulls him out of the chair, and Mark only makes one annoyed sound before letting him, which is kind of amazing in and of itself.
Eduardo is shivering with his back against a wall, his eyes closed, mouth slack. Mark's seen Eduardo in a lot of compromising positions, like that time his roommate decided to give him a sharpie mustache when he was crashing after a project or that time he got really wasted and accidentally walked into a closed door. But this one, this one is different. This one is voluntary, or as close as involuntary biological processes get to voluntary.
Mark touches Eduardo's bare shoulder, listens as Eduardo sucks in a quick breath. "Mark," Eduardo says, and his voice sounds like sandpaper.
"Yeah," Mark says. He leans in closer, presses his mouth against Eduardo's. It's a clumsy kiss, strange and unfamiliar. Eduardo's usually clean-shaven, but he must be too out of it to shave. His stubble scratches Mark's face.
There's an erection pressing against Mark's stomach, hard and insistent, which should freak Mark out more than it does. Guys are straightforward, easy. Mark knows exactly how these body parts work.
Except maybe not entirely, because Eduardo shudders through an orgasm as soon as Mark gives his cock a squeeze, coating Mark's hand in semen.
"Fuck," Mark says. Yeah, he'd done enough research to know some of what to expect, but hadn't been ready for the way Eduardo looked, his skin flushed and his back arched. Mark licks a wet stripe across Eduardo's collar bone. Eduardo's cock is still hard in Mark's hand.
"Mark," Eduardo says again. One of his hands tightens in the fabric of Mark's t-shirt, and Mark needs more skin, all of it. He yanks off his t-shirt and shoves his boxers down his legs.
He drags Eduardo's head down so he can kiss Eduardo again, fast and hard. Eduardo makes a soft noise into Mark's mouth. His fingers dig into Mark's arm, but his whole body seems to relax, like he's just riding out the arousal.
Mark still isn't sure how to process any of this, the way Eduardo sounds, breathy and strung out, the flush that chases its way across Eduardo's chest and neck. Mark wants to touch him some more, but he doesn't know where to start, the angles of Eduardo's collarbones or the curve of Eduardo's wrist or the knobs of Eduardo's hips.
Eduardo gets impatient, it seems, because then he has his hands on Mark's shoulders, turning him, so he's the one pushed against the wall, and Mark lets him. He's here because this is what Eduardo needs, and yeah, okay, Mark likes the thought of getting laid, too. His hands are warm, warmer than usual, and his cock is wedged up against Mark's hip, hard, still a little slick with come.
He kisses Mark, sloppy and eager, hips snapping forward like he can't stop himself from rutting up against Mark's body. He hisses when Mark bites at his lips, gasping and coming as soon as Mark digs his fingers into Eduardo's arms. "Fuck," Eduardo says. Mark's always thought that orgasm faces are kind of ridiculous, at least as far as he can tell from porn, but with Eduardo, with Eduardo like this, it's something else entirely.
"Bed?" Mark says. His own cock is leaking and getting a little uncomfortable, but Mark's an expert at dealing with annoying bodily functions at this point.
"Yes," Eduardo says, sounding out of breath, "please." They manage to stumble onto the tiny dorm room bed without breaking anything, which is a minor miracle in and of itself.
Mark ends up on top, straddling Eduardo's hips, looking down at the tan skin of Eduardo's chest. Mark's never understood the fixation on nipples, but Eduardo makes this sound when Mark touches his, a little like he's dying, except probably not quite as unpleasant.
"Good?" Mark asks.
"Yes," Eduardo says. "Don't--" He almost sounds the way he does when he's drunk. He rolls his hips up in an attempt to get more friction, and Mark thinks he could get used to this, the way Eduardo is strung out and needy, and the way Mark can do whatever he wants. The craziest thing about it is how much Eduardo likes it, how lightest touch can set him off. It's not like Mark knows what the hell he's doing, doesn't know if Eduardo's reactions are due to the fact that Eduardo likes everything at the moment or because Mark is doing something right.
In all likelihood, it's the former rather than the latter, but Mark can't bring himself to give a shit. Eduardo pulls him down into a messy kiss, sloppy and rough, and Mark loses his balance, their teeth clicking together as his hands slip from underneath him, their noses mashed together, and Eduardo makes another sounds as their cocks rub against one another. The friction is so good, Mark does it again.
Eduardo makes that sound one more time, and his hands slide between their bodies, wrapping around Mark's cock. Mark comes really quickly, just one-two-three jerks, and Mark's eyes are squeezed shut and he's biting his lip hard enough to draw blood.
When he opens his eyes again, Eduardo is staring at him, eyes dark and liquid and open. "That was--" he says, and then one of his hands is travelling up Mark's thigh's to his ass. "Can I-- ?" he asks, just a fingertip pressed up against Mark's asshole. He's still feeling weird and sensitive from his orgasm, even the lightest touch makes him shivery, almost too much. Mark's not a moron, so he knows what this means. He's studied it, figured out the mechanics, because he's been curious about them as any other teenage boy with a preoccupation with asses.
Mark nods. "Okay. Condoms and lube?" he asks.
Eduardo fumbles underneath his pillow, producing a small tube and a foil packet. His hands are a little shaky. Mark's hands aren't exactly steady themselves, but he manages to get all arranged. Everything is a sticky, gross mess right now, but they can worry about that later, when Eduardo isn't undergoing, well, whatever the hell this is.
Porny Sherlock kinkmeme fills
Man, Sherlock fandom feels so long ago that I found stuff that I totally forgot that I wrote.
I think this prompt was something about Sherlock provoking John into hurting him
There are ten perfect bruises on Sherlock's hips right now. Unfortunately, they will fade in a few days, and Sherlock rather likes them, likes the way that ache ever so slightly when he touches them.
"Haven't I told you enough times to properly label things when you put your experiments near the food?" John snaps from inside the kitchen. Sherlock hasn't quite managed to set off John's temper yet, but he's close. It'll only take a bit more to push him over.
Sherlock decides to ignore John and focus on the inane chatter on his forums, curled up in John's favorite armchair with his laptop on his knees. He has waited out John's patience before, and he expects this to be a very effective strategy since people get so very touchy when he doesn't pay any attention to them and the idiotic things that come out of their mouths. Sherlock tries not to lick his lips in anticipation.
"You're not even listening, are you?" John says, shaking his head. "Unbelievable."
Sherlock continues to ignore him, waiting until John is close enough for Sherlock to smell his skin. Then he turns at looks at John, at his drawn eyebrows, at the downward twist of his mouth. Sherlock's breath catches in his throat one moment before John reaches for him. Sherlock's laptop crashes to the floor as John pulls him forward.
John's hands are quick, efficient, as they strip the clothes from Sherlock's body. His mouth is sharp and forceful against Sherlock's own. His teeth dig into Sherlock's lower lip, and Sherlock makes a sound that is definitely not a whimper. "You do this on purpose, don't you?" John asks, even though he already knows the answer.
"Of course," Sherlock says, forcing out the words between rough breaths. "Your reaction is identical each time."
John snorts, almost a laugh, and some of the anger bleeds out of him. "That it is," he says. He flips Sherlock over, so that he's bent over the arm of the chair, Sherlock's face pressed against the old, worn fabric, and then he places his hands on Sherlock's hips. His fingers dig hard into the bruises there, an explosion of old aches and new pain, and Sherlock shivers at the sensation.
It's perfect.
that female!Watson one I never did finish
I think it was a combo of Yuletide hitting and a general ambivalence towards the fact that it felt like I was recycling too much of If I Fell. Whoops.
One thing Sherlock has always appreciated about Joan is that she is incredibly forthright when it comes to sex. Women can be so inconsistently touchy about such things -- Sherlock assumes it's societal programming of some sort -- which is why he can't talk to Molly about a corpse's penis without her blushing or mention Donovan's truly unfortunate affair with Anderson without getting called a freak. Joan doesn't seem all that bothered about it, though.
"I'm used to your casual disregard for my privacy," Joan says, gesturing with her fork, "and the army tends to remove any squeamishness about sex in general."
Sherlock says, "I don't understand why there's any squeamishness about sex at all."
Joan just laughs at him and shakes her head. "Men," she says, and there's something in her smile that indicates that she thinks she knows something that Sherlock doesn't know. Not impossible. Sherlock routinely does garbage collection on his mind and that means there are gaps in his knowledge. Still, the expression irks him for some reason, and he doesn't quite understand why.
---
On a whim, Sherlock tries to make a spreadsheet of all of Joan's past lovers, male and female, and exactly what sort of sexual acts she performed with them. Though he has a reasonably good set of anecdotes to work with, Joan is fairly stingy on other personal details when she doles out anecdotes. She'll talk about proper blowjob technique or various kinds of vibrators without even so much as batting an eyelid, but she won't say anything exactly which university girlfriend she'd snogged for two hours straight in the library or which of her boyfriends was the first to perform cunnilingus on her.
"That's not really really relevant, is it?" she says the first time Sherlock asks, and Sherlock decides she wouldn't take kindly to his spreadsheet so he doesn't inquire further.
Still, he can keep meticulous notes when he needs to, and he doesn't let any hints of the spreadsheet's existence slip until he mentions her relationship with David Howard during one of their arguments about Sherlock's treatment of Molly.
"Wait," Joan says, her face twisted up in confusion, "who?"
"From your communication with him on Facebook, it seemed like you and he had a sexual relationship at one point," Sherlock says, though from her expression, he suspects that was a miscalculation.
Joan snorts. "If by 'sexual relationship,' you mean 'He tried to stick his hands down my trousers during a party while plastered, and I broke his wrist for it' then yes. It lasted for about thirty seconds." Sherlock knows that he should not be this fascinated by Joan's infrequent but intense acts of violence, but he can imagine the dark annoyance on Joan's face, the clear snap of the bone breaking, the smooth, practiced motions of Joan's hands. A pleasant shiver runs down Sherlock's spine at the mental image. It's a pity that he didn't meet her before that incident. He would have liked to see it happen in person.
---
Joan is not a particularly stunning woman. Her hair is straight and chopped short, not as short as some of the military personnel that Sherlock knows, but shorter than most women wear theirs. There are deep bags underneath her eyes. She does not wear makeup. Her hair is not quite brown and not quite blond, and her cheekbones are not particularly pronounced. Sherlock has seen the way people's eyes slide past her, writing her off like the idiots they are.
What they don't see is that there is something pleasing about the particular arrangement of features on her face. Her body is still in reasonably good shape, despite the psychosomatic limp, and she has eyes that Sherlock has heard others describe as 'kind.' Every part of Joan is kind as well, kind around her lips and near her ears and underneath her feet. Sherlock cannot stop himself from watching her, when she is in motion, when she is still, when she's laughing or frowning or cursing at him.
Sherlock is an addict. He knows what addiction feels like.
When Joan greets him every morning, half-lidded and grumpy and running a hand through her hair, Sherlock sits at the kitchen table and stares at the curve of her neck.
---
"You know," Joan says as Sherlock slides her jacket onto her shoulders, "there's a reason why everyone thinks we're fucking."
Sherlock has never cared about such things, and he is not planning on starting just for Joan's sake. "I don't see why that's relevant."
Now that Joan has begun to let her hair grow out, the number of people who assume they're in in a relationship has doubled. They've probably stopped assuming that she's a lesbian. Joan just shrugs. "I just wanted to let you know why everyone stands at least a foot away from me while you're hovering."
"That was obvious," Sherlock says, chiding. He has also noticed that Joan has a tendency to hover herself, especially when they're interviewing particularly clingy female suspects. She's not blatant about it, but she'll stand a tick closer than normal or she'll interrupt the conversation to make sure they haven't forgotten that she's there (like Sherlock would ever forget). Sherlock finds that he enjoys those moments, those tiny claims she makes on him. In his mind, they look like marks on his skin, visible only to him. He sometimes imagines her hand on the small of his back, on the curve of his hip, on the bend of his elbow.
Joan doesn't touch him, though. She'll hold out a hand or kick his shoes, but she won't touch in any way that actually means something. She won't stake her claim in a way that's visible to anyone other than Sherlock, and Sherlock doesn't understand why that bothers him so much.
---
Sherlock can usually tell when a suspect won't speak to him right out, first glance. It's annoying, really; all those petty human emotions getting in the way of a case.
Today, it's the man behind the counter of a pawn shop who looks like he's trying to be tough (from the dark-eyed glowers he shoots towards his customers), but may be a bit of a soft touch underneath (by the worn DVD case of Love Actually sitting on the DVD player next to the television set). The plan to find out whether or not this pawn shop has the stolen ring they're looking for is really quite simple, then.
Sherlock grabs Joan's hand, lacing their fingers together before she can object. Her skin is warm, slightly dry. There are a few callouses from where her cane rubs against her palm. Sherlock drags her along, up to the counter. "Hi," he says, putting on his friendliest and most hapless smile. "My girlfriend and I are looking to get engaged, but she's very particular about what sort of ring she wants." He glances at Joan with the most simperingly adoring look he can muster, which to tell the truth, isn't as hard as it could be.
Joan has managed to plaster a very large, very fake smile onto her face. "Yup," she says. "I was very specific about what it has to look like. Because I'm very specific about things. Um, my mum had a really beautiful one that she wanted to give to me when I got the right age, but then she lost it, and I've been trying to find one like it ever since." It's not the most convincing Joan has ever been, but Sherlock is sure the pawn broker won't notice. Most people can't read Joan very well.
The pawn broker glances between them, at Sherlock's smile, at Joan's honest hesitance, and Sherlock can see the exact moment the man melts for them. "All right, luv. Tell me what you're looking for."
Joan rattles off enough of a description to get the man to show them the stolen ring, and Sherlock squeezes her hand in triumph before he drops the act.
Afterwards, when the police have gently prodded the name of the thief who sold the ring out of the pawn broker, Joan says, "You should warn me next time you pull something like that." She's angry, genuinely angry, and Sherlock cannot fathom why that is.
"Your performance was more than adequate," he says. Reassurances are useful and important to most people, or so Sherlock has deduced. They have a lot more work to do hunting down Tyler Blake before they can rest tonight, and Sherlock starts striding away and holds up a hand to signal the first cab that comes along. They're so close. Sherlock can feel it.
That doesn't seem to do the trick, because Joan grabs a fistful of his jacket and yanks him back. "Sometimes, I cannot believe the things that come out of your mouth," she says. "Just, next time, warn a girl before you set her up as your fake fiancée, all right?"
It's a reasonable enough request, as far as they go, if also a bit of an annoyance. Sherlock should clarify at some later point whether she means all situations where he would like to use her as part of his cover story or just situations where he needs her to pretend to be in a relationship with him. "All right," he says.
---
"Don't be an idiot," Sherlock says to their suspect. "She really is an excellent shot."
The knife presses harder against Sherlock's throat. It draws a thin line of blood; Sherlock can feel the sticky fluid sliding down his neck. Thankfully, the suspect's hand is still steady. He's uncertain enough to be threatening but not terrified enough to kill Sherlock without meaning to. This man is a career criminal. A spot of violence won't even faze him.
Joan's hands don't shake either as she points the gun at the two of them. "Let him go," she says in the same tone of voice she tries on screaming children and uncooperative patients. "You don't want to add murder to your charges." Her voice almost seems to echo in the empty car park, the sound of it ricocheting off the concrete.
The arm wrapped around Sherlock's chest tightens. He wants to roll his eyes, because even a moron should see the skill with which Joan handles the gun, the minute shifts in her eyes and hands to compensate for every movement the man makes.
"What the hell would you know, you slag?" the suspect sneers. "Don't come any closer or I'll really slit your boyfriend's throat."
That was the wrong thing to say. Joan's eyes flick to the left, where Sherlock knows there isn't anything. The suspect's gaze follows hers for the split second it counts, turning his head, distracted. That's the moment that Joan makes her move.
A single gunshot echoes in the air. Sherlock feels the body slump behind him, and he manages to shove away the arm holding the knife before it manages to slice his throat by accident as it falls. Sherlock's breath comes out too fast, a bit from the wound, a bit from the adrenaline. His legs are surprisingly shaky, and he drops to the ground, landing hard on his knees.
Joan lowers the gun and scrambles over. "You all right? Let me take a look," she says. Her fingers are light and careful on his chin, tilting it up so she can inspect the shallow cut. She reaches into her jacket for the roll of medical gauze she's kept there since the incident with the butcher and the meat packing plant, and she bandages the wound with her usual efficiency. Her hands are still steady. He can imagine her like this in the middle of a battlefield, in the middle of surgery, quiet and unflinching and focused.
"You could have let him kill me," Sherlock says. Not that he thinks she ever would have, but he needs to hear her say the words the same way he needs her to tell him he's brilliant. They're words he wants to make her say over and over again until he can feel them underneath his eyelids, until she won't anymore.
"No, I couldn't have," Joan says, and the heat that passes through him as she speaks is almost as perfect as the slide of a needle into his veins.
---
"You told me to warn you the next time," Sherlock says. "Now I'm warning you."
Joan just glares at him with the same expression she wears when she finds one of his experiments in the kitchen sink. "Well, I guess that's true," she says. "I'm going to have to be a lot more drunk than I currently am before I'm going to be wearing this of my own volition."
"That can be arranged," Sherlock says, "if you would like." Mycroft left some wine in one of the cupboards a few months ago, and Joan keeps a bottle of whiskey in her room and likes to pretend that Sherlock doesn't know about it. She only drinks from it when the nightmares get bad.
"Remind me why I haven't shoved you out of one of the windows yet," Joan says. She's holding the corset with her thumb and forefinger, as if it's a particularly disgusting body part, as if she can't believe she's holding it at all.
"This club is the only lead we have," Sherlock says, "and the police don't have the resources to put anyone else under. Besides, you understand the culture as well as anyone." One of her boyfriends during her residency was a masochist, even more intensely than Sherlock is, and while they may never have taken it public, he knows Joan understand the culture, the terminology as well as Sherlock does. "It isn't like I'm asking you to be the submissive, but we'll still need to look like we belong there."
Joan huffs out a breath. "Fine, I'll do the makeup and corset, but nothing goes into my hair, all right?"
Compromise again. It frustrates Sherlock that the subject comes up so often. If she just outright refused, Sherlock could argue until she came around to his (clearly correct) point of view, but she always gives up ground and forces him to do the same. "Fine," he says.
Joan disappears for a while and then she comes out with the corset on, but the back isn't laced up. "It's you or Mrs. Hudson, and I'd rather not have to explain this to her," she says over her shoulder.
"I doubt it would shock her," Sherlock says, but his hands are already at the laces, and he's distinctly aware of how close he is to touching her skin.
They don't speak, but Joan makes a soft huff of breath when Sherlock yanks a bit too tightly. The corset looks good on her, flattering her curves, but she won't stand out, not at a place like this. Joan is really quite good at making herself invisible when she wants to be, and in this outfit, she'll very much be wanting to be invisible. And besides, Sherlock's the one meant to be the bait. They want everyone's eyes on him. Still, the scar left behind by the gunshot wound is very much visible on her shoulder, paler than the skin around it, and while it won't be as obvious in the dim light of this particular club, Sherlock is certain he'll find it personally... distracting. But not enough that he wants to convince her to cover it up.
When he's done, Joan twists her body, experimentally, testing the give of the garment. "I really hope you're not expecting me to do any sort of running in this," she says.
"If we play this right, we won't have to," Sherlock says. He hands Joan the collar he's planning on wearing for tonight. She holds it in her hand for a long moment, running her thumb along the black leather, along the name plate engraved with the initials SH.
"You've had this for a while," Joan says, inspecting the cracks in the leather and the wear near the buckle, her expression pulled into a thoughtful frown.
"I have," Sherlock says. He tilts his head up, an unspoken invitation.
Joan isn't careful about not-touching him, not while she does this. Her knuckles press against the back of Sherlock's neck, and her thumb brushes against his pulse point. When she's done putting it on, she hooks a finger underneath the leather to test the slack. Sherlock's mouth goes dry at the pressure. "All right?" she asks.
Sherlock nods. The collar around his throat is comfortable, familiar, and the fact that it was Joan that put it on him makes his head spin.
"Good," she says. Her smile is half-hearted at best. She isn't committed yet, and Sherlock knows why.
"You don't like public displays," Sherlock says, because he sometimes has to say things out loud before she'll explain things to him.
Joan snorts. "Not as such, no." She folds her arms across her chest, shoulders hunched, clearly uncomfortable with herself. Sherlock likes public displays very much. Most people are too stupid to pick up the subtle clues, after all. They need it shoved in their face. Sherlock enjoys shoving it in their faces, enjoys watching the way understanding blooms in their eyes. "But you do," she continues. Then she picks up the leash off the kitchen table and hooks it to Sherlock's collar.
She gives the leash a slight tug, just enough so that Sherlock can feel the press of the leather against the front of his throat.
---
Inside the club, Joan is tense, nervous, not quite settled into her character. Or what's supposed to be her character. Sherlock can disappear into other people, even enjoys the challenge of it, but Joan's not good at being anyone but herself. Sherlock likes that about her, the way she seems to live so comfortably inside her own body. Sherlock has never been a big fan of the limitations of his own flesh and bones.
Joan's left hand is clenched tight around the leash, her knuckles going white from the tension in her fingers. "I am never forgiving you for this, you know," she mutters into Sherlock's ear, the warmth of her breath raising goosebumps on his skin. She's just as careful as always about not-touching as always, keeping a few inches between them. Sherlock isn't wearing a shirt, and he can feel the way her body gives off heat, can smell the shampoo she uses in her hair. The club is dark enough that all of Sherlock's other senses feel heightened, every moment even more agonizing than the last.
"You haven't even had to do anything particularly objectionable yet," Sherlock says.
Joan's jaw tightens. Sherlock can imagine the way her teeth must be grinding right now, but the music is too loud, and he can't hear it. "I wasn't aware that I was expected to do anything objectionable," she hisses. Sherlock has to read her lips to understand what she's saying, but her anger is clearly written across her face. He's torn between provoking a stronger reaction, one that will most likely cause her to take her frustrations out on the nearest person, and bowing his head so that she can press a hand to the back of his neck and tell him how good he's been.
As much as he enjoys this, Sherlock has never been all that amenable to easy obedience. He likes to draw out a bit of cruelty in his tops, make them fight him down, but Joan is just as likely to walk away as she is to take him by the collar and force him to his knees. Sherlock needs to handle this delicately. She'd see through an act if he tried one. "Surely you must have realized that it might become necessary to take action if there are times our cover is in danger of being compromised," he says.
Joan gives him a look that says that she isn't convinced, but she seems calmer once she gets her bearings. She straightens her back, and her strides become more confident and assured. Sherlock almost regrets his decision to suggest this, because he finds it distracting to have her here. His mind wants to go down to the place where it doesn't have to think for itself, where he can take his lead from the pull of a leash or the push of a hand, where he can be forced to remain still. He bites his lip to keep himself sharp and aware, but he stores this moment to his hard drive, the feel of the collar, the scent of the leather, and the downturned corner of Joan's mouth.
He'll have time to enjoy the memory later. Right now he needs to focus on the case.
---
"Don't touch him," Joan snaps.
Sherlock pulls away instinctively from the outstretched hand, and then Joan is there, an arm wrapped possessively around Sherlock's waist. Sherlock wants to curl into her, wants to tuck his nose underneath her chin. He's not used to so much skin-to-skin contact, and it's almost too much for him to process. Their killer -- and it's most assuredly their killer by the way he was so careful to wear new shoes but not careful enough to remove his incriminating rings -- holds his hands up in mock surrender. "I didn't mean to intrude," he says smoothly. "But I do think his cheekbones are quite lovely."
The look Joan shoots the man is downright poisonous, and Sherlock wants more of it, wants more evidence that she owns him, that he's hers. "Well, it's not very polite to touch other people's belongings without their permission, now is it?" she asks. Sherlock ducks his head into her hair, because this is brilliant, because he can feel her bare palm, warm and slightly sweaty, pressed against his skin.
"Of course not," the man says. "But I'd love to see a demonstration." He's leering now, eyes roaming over Sherlock's neck and Sherlock's torso and Sherlock's crotch. Sherlock usually finds the evidence collection stage of his cases somewhat tedious once he's solved the puzzle, but he feels a quick thrill right now at the possibility of danger, of staring down their murderer and walking away undetected.
"I don't think--" Joan starts. She knows what's going on, she's on her guard today, and she's picking up on the tension in Sherlock's body.
"I'd like to," Sherlock says, softening his voice so it almost sounds as if he's deferring to her wishes.
Joan's dark, angry look shifts to him. The danger of it just pricks Sherlock's attention and he feels a quick rush of adrenaline. "Are you sure?" she asks, and Sherlock can hear what she's really asking, do you know what the hell you're doing? Sherlock does want to see how she'll react, if she'll follow his lead in even this.
"Yes," he says, meeting her eyes. She holds his gaze for a long moment before she turns her head away.
"No," she says. She slides two fingers underneath Sherlock's collar and gives it a rough tug, bypassing the leash entirely, and storms off. Sherlock can't do anything but follow her.
---
"He's our killer," Sherlock says when they find a corner where they won't be overheard. Sherlock lets himself loom over her just enough so that no one can see the movements of their mouths. Irritation rushes through him, because they may not get another chance to befriend the killer and collect the necessary evidence. And for what? Some squeamishness about performing in public.
"Fine," Joan snarls. She holds her body still, as if there's something thrumming underneath her skin. Sherlock wants to press a tongue against her neck and taste it. She says, "Do whatever you need to do, but don't pull me into it." She grabs hold of Sherlock's collar and tugs on it. Sherlock bends into her, enjoying the awkward crick it puts in his back. "I'm heading back to the flat. You can go back to whatever fucked up game you're playing." She lets go and shoves him out of the way.
Sherlock feels like he's just been hit in the solar plexus, a good solid punch that leaves him breathless and disoriented. What did she-- But then she's already gone, disappearing into the crowd.
---
It doesn't take more than a couple hours for Sherlock to seduce the proper evidence from their killer. The man is an idiot, which comes as no surprise to Sherlock. The killer would be much more effective at hunting his prey if he didn't immediately assume that every sub he stumbles across is stupider than he is. Sherlock hopes that he has put that assumption to rest after meeting and having been thoroughly humiliated by Sherlock, but Sherlock doesn't expect much from the criminally insane.
When he gets back to his flat, Joan has already changed back into her comfortable sweats and her favorite jumper. it is hardly the most aesthetically pleasing ensemble he has seen her in, but it tells him everything he needs to know about her state of mind at the moment. She's upset and agitated and reaching for the familiar, settling into comfortable patterns. Sherlock is still in the clothes he worse to the club, and the collar is still in place around his neck. He hasn't wanted to take it off just yet, and besides, he had loved seeing the rise it had gotten out of Anderson when the police had shown up to arrest the man and take Sherlock's witness statement. Joan is sitting at the desk in their sitting room, typing furiously into her laptop. Sherlock might even think she was composing a blog post if she didn't have her email client open, words filling up the text box at an alarming rate. Harry, maybe? But Joan has not been on good enough terms with Harry for her to consider Harry a confidante.
"I think you'll be relieved to hear that our killer has been arrested," Sherlock says.
Joan ignores him.
Sherlock continues. "I realize that I must have done something to upset you--"
"Yes," Joan says. "Very good observation right there, Sherlock." She smacks her enter key particularly hard on the last sentence she writes.
Most days, Joan is easy to read. She claims it's not worth trying to hide anything from someone like Sherlock, and so she leaves her self open as a book, letting Sherlock see into her to his heart's content. Right now, Sherlock can't pick up on anything besides the fact that Joan is furious with him. He tries to retrace it all to the exact moment it all fell apart. "I wasn't expecting you to do anything you didn't already enjoy," Sherlock says. "You were allowed to pick the parameters of the scene. And--"
Joan slams the lid of her computer shut. "What part of 'I don't like public displays' did you not understand, Sherlock?" she asks. "You were the one who deduced it in the first place."
"It was for the case," Sherlock says. "I thought you might be willing to expand your limits given the situation."
There is a furrow in Joan's brow that has only deepened as the conversation has gone on. She shakes her head. "Would it have killed you to ask before you tried to bully me into having sex with you in front of a complete stranger?"
"I didn't have the time," Sherlock says.
"That's complete bullocks," Joan says. "It's obvious that we didn't need to go through that, seeing as you caught him anyway without my help. What are you actually playing at here, Sherlock?"
Sherlock blinks. "It was simply the plan that made the most sense at the time," he explains.
"Most sense at the-- Sherlock, do you ever even hear the things that come out of your mouth?" She's gaping at him now as if Sherlock has managed to grow another head.
This conversation is simply going around in circles, which Sherlock finds very aggravating, "Of course I do."
Joan sighs and rubs the bridge of her nose. She waits a moment, as if she's composing her next question "Was it about me?" she finally asks. "Or was it about the situation?"
Sherlock feels his mouth go dry, which is frankly absurd because he's never had any problems with telling the truth before. "Both," he says. He studies her face, trying to pick up on where this conversation is going. At this point, she could take it anywhere, and Sherlock would have to let her. Sherlock would have to follow her wherever she leads.
"All right," she says, standing up. She curls her fingers underneath his collar once again, and Sherlock will never get bored with the way it feels, like she could take him apart in a moment's notice. She yanks on the collar, forcing him to his knees. Sherlock has felt the low thrum of arousal all night, and now it's rising to the surface. "If you tell me to stop, I'll stop," she says. "If you want me to slow down, I'll slow down. But if you ever try to manipulate me like that again, this -- all of this -- ends. Do you understand?"
"Yes," Sherlock says. He looks right into her eyes, and he doesn't look away. He understands, of course, and he's wanted this so badly he's felt stupid with it. This must be what it's like to have all your emotions spun inside out and backwards, to have logic not count for anything at all.
Joan kisses him then, hard and a little vicious, her teeth digging into Sherlock's bottom lip. "I almost went along with it," she murmurs against Sherlock's mouth. "You looked so perfect offering yourself up like that, offering yourself up to me."
Sherlock would say something, but she hasn't given him the permission, and he wants to be good. He wants to be good because otherwise she'll leave, and Sherlock won't have this any longer. His lip still stings, and the collar is still pressed tight against his throat. He wants Joan to leave marks on his neck, the larger the better, so he can flaunt them in front of Donovan tomorrow. He wants Joan to shove his head to the floor so that he can't see what she's doing to him, so that he has to deduce her next moves from sound and smell and touch.
Her free hand is undoing the zip of Sherlock's trousers, and her teeth are digging into Sherlock's collarbone, sending a bright spark of pain across Sherlock's nerves. Sherlock almost can't breathe from the onslaught of sensation, and all he wants is more. More skin, more pain, more sex, more everything. He whimpers when she frees his cock, the cool air brushing up against his heated skin. "Fuck," Joan mutters. "You're so--" She pulls back to pull the jumper over her head and to push her sweats to the floor.
Sherlock watches her, committing every new patch of skin she reveals to memory. He's still hungry for new details of her, for new things to learn and understand. There's a faint scar on her ribs, right beneath her left breast, and a mole on her right thigh. There are long red scratches from her wrist to her elbow from where she scraped her arm two days ago on the pavement while chasing down a suspect. She straddles Sherlock's lap, balancing herself with a hand pressed against Sherlock's shoulder.
Sherlock remains as still as possible, trying so very hard to be good. He believes her when she says that she'll walk away. She's waiting for something, a sign of some sort from Sherlock, a nod of his head or a slump of his shoulders. She isn't giving any indication of what that is, since her expression is calm and . Joan says, "You need to stop thinking so fucking much. The world isn't going to end if you switch your mind off for an hour."
It doesn't work that way in Sherlock's head, and it annoys him to think that Joan doesn't understand that. She's smarter than this. "That's not--"
Joan says, her voice soft and low and careful, "Sherlock, stop."
Sheppard's Eleven-verse
I originally wrote this as part of picfor1000 as an attempt to try to get back into writing Sheppard's Eleven. It didn't really help the way I'd hoped. It sort of meanders and doesn't go anywhere.
John's never really been fond of airports, but they're a necessary evil of the job. Trains have less security, but they're also slow and not all good for getting to foreign destinations. Boats, well, boats can be a good exist strategy, but they're so limited in scope. Cars can be useful, but they're even slower than trains, and timing is key in their line of work.
So, airports it is.
But then you have the problem of waiting. Air travel is basically frantic periods of waiting followed by much calmer periods of waiting. Waiting has never been one of John's strong suits.
McKay isn't entirely bad company, John does have to admit. He wasn't sure what to make of McKay at first, but Elizabeth had vouched for him, and Elizabeth was rarely wrong about things like that. Still, their first meeting had not gone as well as John had hoped, what with McKay getting annoyed about John's choice for a restaurant (too many menu items with citrus ingredients) and the way John really gets itchy around high strung people. They're heading west together to Phoenix, Arizona, and John is somewhat amazed that he hasn't killed McKay yet from over-exposure. It's their first job together, a fairly easy one. A chance for them to feel each other out, get a sense of how well they'll work together, each other's strengths and weaknesses.
One weakness John can see is that McKay hardly does airports better than John does. He pops a brown jelly bean in his mouth. Chocolate-flavored. The texture is strange with the flavor, but it's still good. John likes that about jelly beans, the way you never know what you're going to get next. You can guess from the coloring, sure, but it's impossible to know exactly what you're getting yourself into.
"We just have to get through the door, right?" John says. They've been discussing the job to pass their time. It's been helping a bit, though McKay feels the need to pace back and forth, back and forth. It's making John feel a little dizzy just watching him.
McKay's hands are twitching constantly, the corner of his mouth pulled down into a frown. "No, no, no, no. It's not just a door," McKay says. "It's a titanium-plated, timer-locked, pressure-sensitive entrance barrier." From John's vantage point, he's more of a silhouette than a person in front of the floor-to-ceiling windows as the evening sun pours in over his feet.
"Like I said," John says. "A door."
That bulging vein on McKay's forehead is not the most attractive look on him, but John is somewhat charmed by it, anyway. "I don't even know why I'm bothering," McKay mutters. "It's like talking to a brick wall."
"Hey," John says. "I'm sure you'll come up with something." He puts another jelly bean in his mouth. Apple this time, just the tiniest bit of sour with the sweet. Despite their weird antagonism, McKay has displayed a striking amount of competence at his job, and John is a lot happier to just let McKay do his thing. Elizabeth did have some good stories to tell about some of McKay's old exploits. John had really liked the one about some clever on-the-fly engineering McKay had done with a cell phone, a children's toy, and a small portion of the Bank of London's sever farm.
McKay throws his hands up in the air. "Yes, fine. I realize that no one else involved in this little operation has half my intelligence or experience, which means that I have to do all the work, but I will do my best to pull a rabbit out of my-- wait, please don't tell me you bought those jelly beans here."
"Fine," John says, placing a yellow jelly bean in his mouth. Lemon, McKay's favorite. "I won't tell you."
"Did no one teach you anything about how airport pricing works?" McKay asks, his face turning a little red. "That bag of jelly beans probably costs twice as much that exact same bag would cost at the nearest CVS. It's absurd. Price gouging of the worst kind. And you're--"
"Eating them," John says, raising his eyebrows. "You have some sort of problem with that, McKay?"
"Haven't you been paying attention? The last two minutes of our conversation were about how I do have a problem with the way you're eating overpriced airport food, when you could have bought the bag before arriving at the airport instead of now, when everything is ridiculous expensive." McKay says this as though John's jelly beans are some kind of personal affront to him.
John shrugs. "It was there, and I wanted some, so I bought it." He can spare the few extra dollars in price, and McKay probably can too, despite all his complaining. Besides, he hadn't realized wanted them until he'd seen them.
McKay opens his mouth to respond, but the loudspeaker comes on and a female voice booms. "American flight 762 to Phoenix is boarding at gate K12."
"That's us," John says, before McKay can really work up himself into a too much of a froth. He stands up and gently nudges McKay in the direction of the gate.
McKay, surprisingly enough, lets John do this without resistance, though he does mutter a little under his breath. It's entirely possible that Rodney McKay is the most obsessive, paranoid, and anal person that John has ever met, but then again, McKay's a details man. And John's needed a good details man for a while now.
John's not one to over-analyze things, so he won't make grand predictions about the future. They'll go to Phoenix, and they'll do the job. If it works out, it works out. And if it doesn't, it doesn't. He can worry about that later.
He smiles at the gate attendant as she scans his boarding pass, and as he steps onto the plane, he tosses one last jelly bean into his mouth (without peeking at the color) for good luck.
XMFC fic
This one was the first fic I wrote in this fandom. It's not particularly good, but it helped me find a groove with these characters, so there's that. I still think there's some good moments in there.
The window that leads to Charles' room is open, letting the mid-autumn air in. Erik shakes his head when he sees it as he approaches the mansion. It's the only room with the lights still on this late, a warm yellow-orange amongst the forbidding darkness of the building. Charles always did have a fondness for meaningless gestures. It seems that time has not cured him of it.
It is child's play for Erik to slip inside, to find Charles awake, restless in his chair, waiting. The chess set has been set up, neat rows of black and white. Charles has decided to take white, it seems. Erik closes the window behind him using the metal clasp on the old wooden window sill and closes it with a flick of his wrist. The room is much the same as it was when Erik lived here. It's still too big, too cold, the lamps more orange than yellow. The large, wooden four-poster bed is still ridiculous for one man. Erik catalogs the minor changes. There are new hangers in the closet. There are a few more knick-knacks on the dresser. One of the couches has been shifted against the far wall. It is still the ugliest piece of furniture Erik has ever seen. If Erik squints his eyes, he can almost breathe 1962 all over again.
"I was beginning to wonder if you were going to show," Charles says. "My tea has gotten cold." He says the words so mildly they could be mistaken for a rebuke, but Charles lost the right to rebuke Erik decades ago. Not that Charles seems to have realized that.
"I was delayed," Erik says. He re-adjusts the helmet to make sure none of his thoughts slip out. There are are things that Charles does not need to know.
Charles arches an eyebrow. "Of course," he says. He doesn't say more, though Erik can hear the irritation simmering underneath his words. There's a lecture on the tip of his tongue.
Erik sits down in the chair across from Charles and waits. They've had this argument before. They've had every argument before, each one more boring than the last. Charles hands him a tumbler of scotch without comment. They've been working through the same bottle for years.
Charles moves out his first pawn, his hands steady and sure. There's a chip in the wood of one of his knights that wasn't here the last time. Erik wonders who else Charles has been playing against, maybe one of the new ones, that serious boy with the awkward sunglasses or that dark skinned girl with the white hair. It would be easy to say that they haven't changed. It would be easy to pretend that the years haven't touched them, but they wear too much of their age. Charles' hair has begun to thin, and Erik's has begun to gray. Erik wears his new scars proudly, and Charles hides them away.
And yet Charles still refuses to see the truth, still actively fighting him every step of the way, and Erik still refuses to back down, still ever more certain that this is the best way, the only way.
Erik matches Charles' move with his own pawn, their customary opening gambit. Charles' forehead creases in thought. Right here, right now, it's just the two of them and some scotch and a chess board. Perhaps they are at the CIA between recruiting missions restlessly waiting for the next name, next coordinates, or in the study after a long day of training, their bodies and minds worn out and exhausted and content.
The old, sweet, familiar ache rises up inside of him. It's not enough to shatter him, but enough to make him hurt.
"You're woolgathering, my friend," Charles says. There is a smile at the corner of his lips, amused, though he's trying to hide it.
"You're still hiding," Erik says, "after all these years." He's seen things that Charles couldn't even imagine out there. A boy trapped in a sunless room, his body stick-thin from starvation, his gills flapping in panic as Mystique approached him, his green scales wan and pale. A girl with cat eyes with her face torn to pieces after she'd been tossed to the lions. The man bleeding all over the side of the road because a mob had torn out his fangs, unable to talk, with real fear in his eyes when he saw Azazel's red skin and tail. There is a real war out there, and Charles has been sitting here, his life so easy and comfortable, his telepathy ensuring that there's no danger of discovery.
Charles' hands still on the knight he was about to move. "They're still children. They shouldn't have to endure the world until they're ready for it," he says. His voice is quiet enough to feel like a slap in the face.
"Always the dreamer," Erik snorts. "The world will be coming for them whether they're ready or not." They've had this argument before, too. Many more times than Erik cares to count.
In the months since Erik had last seen Charles, mutants have gone fully public. A little girl manifested in a crowded bus station in Montreal, her natural bioluminescence blinding three people in the process. More people have outed mutants they know since the incident, forced them into the public spotlight. The US government can't hide it any longer any longer, though even now there are half-hearted attempts to obfuscate the truth.
Erik is glad. Secrecy had always been Charles' game. Erik has no desire to play it himself. Erik would love nothing more than for the humans to see them for what they are, for what they are capable of.
"You know as well as I do, that publicizing the true nature of the school would put the lives of every student here in danger. I can't risk that." Charles moves out one of his rooks.
"Don't give me that," Erik sneers, bitterness soaking through every word. "You put the lives of your students in danger every day. Or have you forgotten who put a stop to my plans last summer?"
"They are old enough to know the dangers, and they are old enough to choose it. I can't ask that of all my students. Surely, you must understand--"
Charles' lips are still as red as Erik remembers, and it's far more pleasant to watch the familiar lecture roll off Charles' tongue than to actually listen to it. He occasionally has idle fantasies when he visits, about what it would be like to kiss Charles again, to roll him onto the bed and blanket his body with his own. The fantasies are not always idle; Erik once got so frustrated with Charles' usual prattle during one of these meetings that he attempted to fuck the stubbornness out of him in a dingy hotel room in Berlin. It had been strange and new and difficult with Charles' injury, but even then, it had been easy to indulge himself in the thrill of being able to touch Charles again, the chance to relearn Charles' body.
"-- you're not even listening to me, are you?" Charles smirks as if he doesn't need his telepathy to know what Erik's thinking right now. He's probably right.
"Of course not," Erik says. "I've heard it all before." There are times when he wonders why he comes back, year after year. It feels as though they've said everything that can be said to one another, made every broken promise, told every lie. By now, he should know that Charles will never learn to see reason. Charles won't ever join the Brotherhood, and Erik will never leave it. So then, why can't Erik stay away?
"You've listened," Charles says, his voice soaked in perfectly modulated Oxford-bred arrogance, "but I doubt you've ever heard a word I've said."
Erik bares his teeth. So Charles intends to play it this way, does he? They've managed to perfect the ways in which they can hurt each other, how they can tear each other apart with just words. It's an old ache. "And I doubt you've ever bothered to look up from your books and your nice, cozy little life here to see how the world really works. You're as afraid as the rest of us, and you're too stubborn to admit it to anyone."
Charles doesn't flinch. There was a time when he would, when the force of Erik's anger would send him reeling. "Not all of us choose to be ruled by fear, Erik," he says. His eyes flick towards Erik's helmet, a pointed reminder of the many precautions Erik chooses to take.
It's a cheap bullying tactic, but Erik refuses to back down when Charles throws out a challenge like that. He lifts the helmet off his head and stares Charles down, just daring him to do something about it. It's a relief in more ways than one. The weight of it is no longer pressing against his skull. He can hear without the helmet muffling the sounds. Charles is radiating his usual calm warmth and amusement, and Erik can't help but relax into it, can't help but feel greedy for it once again. Charles probably doesn't even realize he does it, letting those emotions leak out of him, a high that can't be synthesized or replicated. "Better?" Erik asks. He waits for Charles to start rifling through his head. The helmet was but one precaution. He only visits when he has nothing to give up that Charles doesn't already know, leaving Mystique to do most of the planning in his absence.
"Yes," Charles says, closing his eyes, and there it is again, the soft touch of Charles' mind against Erik's own. It's almost too delicate -- Charles' abilities are heartbreaking in their sheer power -- and Erik's never had a defence against this, the gentle press of their minds, the way they have always seemed to fit together, opposites snapping together, instantly attracting. In the end, it will always come down to this. Erik will always want Charles at his side.
Charles says, "You know I can't." His voice has gone rough and quiet, his eyes liquid and dark. He reaches over the chess board to rest his hand on Erik's own. The wheelchair rolls forward, and Erik can feel the metal parts turn. Perhaps, there was a time when this would have been enough to convince him, just Charles holding out an open hand, a faint smile lingering. It was more than anyone else had offered him before. And it was Charles, Charles with the sly smile and the too-bright eyes, Charles who had never known real suffering and who loved so openly and so freely. Charles with his dreams and his school and his students, who is still, as ever, a light in the darkness. How easy would it be to stay with him now?
The bottom of Erik's stomach drops out. The temptation to take Charles' unspoken offer is so strong he can almost taste it. This is why he keeps coming back. This is why he would be better off if he stayed away.
"I know," Erik says, yanking himself away. He stands up, the game forgotten between them. It was never more than an excuse to be in the same room at the same time. But now the wooden paneling feels oppressive, and Erik longs for the comforting metal walls of his home base. His skin itches all over, too tight. This was a mistake. He should know better by now.
Charles pulls back mentally, leaving behind a cool emptiness inside Erik's mind. "Of course," he says, a response to a statement that Erik hasn't said out loud. "Tell Raven that I hope she's doing well." He sounds tired, resigned, and yet his expression is filled with such understanding that Erik want to retch. It will take months before Erik will be able to even hear Charles' name without it feeling like blow to the chest. He puts the helmet back on. Its weight is comforting now. It does nothing to ease the longing.
"I will," Erik says. He opens the window -- with his hands this time -- and the fresh, chilly air from outside soaks into his skin. It clears his head, gives him the strength to do what he must. "Good night, Charles."
Charles doesn't move. Erik can feel the way his wheelchair is absolutely still in the quiet room. "Good night, Erik," he says. "Until next time."
There will be a next time. Erik doesn't doubt that. He has yet to cast off all of his human weaknesses, and Charles knows it. "Until then," Erik says, and then he disappears once again into the night.
FIN.
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