Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“Keys….where are you….where the hell are you…?” Benji muttered to himself as he shuffled to his apartment door, attempting to juggle four over-full bags of groceries and search his pockets at the same time. It wasn’t going well.

The bag stuffed full of chips started to topple dangerously from its perch atop a stack of enough microwavable dinners to last a family of four through a nuclear winter, and Benji just froze, hoping gravity would take mercy on him and his bad decisions.

“Whoa, there,” a voice sounded from somewhere east of Benji’s left elbow, and the weight of at least half his groceries disappeared. “You look like you could use some help.”

Benji peered around a frozen pizza box to find his precious foodstuffs cradled safely in the tanned, muscular arms of one of the most attractive men Benji had ever laid eyes on.

Fuck, fuck, fuck, this guy was hot. He was so hot. He was temperature-of-the-sun’s-core hot, and that kind of weapons-grade hotness usually had a debilitating effect on Benji’s ability to act like a normal human being.

“Uhhhh….” Benji replied, as intelligently as he could. At least he wasn’t spewing his internal monologue of god he’s so hot how’s he so hot that can’t be legal out loud.

“Keys?” the man suggested, not unkindly.

“Pocket,” was all Benji could say in return, his powers of speech slow to return. He glanced helplessly down towards his jeans, the case of Red Bull stuffed under his arm creaking warningly when he tried to reach for the keys himself.

The stranger reached out and slipped nimble fingers into Benji’s jeans pocket, retrieving with ease the damnable keys that had eluded Benji. “Got it,” he smiled, somehow managing to shift the bags he was carrying to one arm and open the apartment door effortlessly.

“Hmmphrgh,” was Benji’s response, and frankly, he thought it was pretty coherent considering his heart was on the verge of flatlining.

He focused all his brain power on walking into his apartment and making a beeline for the kitchen, letting the groceries drop with a clatter onto the counter. His companion followed suit, though with considerably more grace.

“I’m Ethan, by the way,” the man introduced himself, holding out his hand, “Ethan Scott. I just moved in next door.”

“Oh! Right, yeah, good to meet you,” Benji said, shaking the proffered hand, “I’m Benji, Benji Dunn.” Alright, doing good, very normal, he coached himself. “Thanks for the rescue, it’s not every day I get a handsome stranger’s hands in my pants.” Well, there went normal, out the window.

Benji was positive his face was on fire, but at least the gorgeous stranger was too polite to say anything about it. Ethan just smiled at him, showing off his perfect white teeth.

“Seriously, thank you for your help,” Benji steamrollered on, “it would have been terrible to have been crushed to death by my own groceries, I mean, what a way to go. Always fancied it’d be a lark to take a flying leap off the Empire State, if I had to choose, though, obviously, I wouldn’t actually do that since I could hit a pedestrian, and the whole murder-suicide thing would be dreadful—” What the fuck was he talking about, Jesus, apparently he’d cycled around from speechless to nonstop blather.

Ethan didn’t look like he wanted to head for the hills, however, he was just watching Benji with a benign expression, like saving a lazy fool from his own groceries and then rummaging around in his pockets and having him rant at him about death was just an average Tuesday.

“I’ve heard drowning isn’t bad,” Ethan said, shocking Benji’s runaway mouth to a halt, “Just like falling asleep.”

Benji blinked. No one had ever just…stepped smoothly into one of his panic-babbles before.

“Are you real?” he asked, before he could think better of it.

Ethan tilted his head, like he was considering it. “As far as I know.”

Benji resisted the urge to grab the nearby teapot and beat himself to death with it. “I’m…sorry, for being so very, very strange,” he apologized, pressing a hand against his face, as if that would keep the weird contained. “I work from home and spend too much time alone, and that lack of human interaction has made me even more of an anti-social disaster than I was before, and let me tell you, I was no peach in college either.”

“I don’t know about that,” Ethan demurred, “You seem like more of a minor debacle, than a complete disaster.”

“Thanks for that,” Benji laughed, decompressing slightly, “I can deal with minor-debacle-status, I think.”

“Glad to be of assistance. And I get it, really, I work from home a lot too.”

“Yeah?”

“I’m an architect. Spend most of my time at a drafting table or answering email.”

“Uh-huh…” Benji took another look at Ethan’s obviously toned physique and raised an eyebrow.

“And I do some personal training work on the side,” Ethan added.

“There we go, knew there was a missing piece connecting to the…biceps,” Benji finished with a cough. “Anyway, really am grateful for the help—I’d invite you over for dinner to say thank you, but, uh, it’s probably clear that I can’t cook.”

“I’ve been known to spend time in the kitchen,” Ethan said, “Maybe you could come over to my place sometime. After I’ve settled in, of course.”

Was this guy seriously inviting him over? Benji wondered, more than a little surprised. Actually trying to spend more time with him?

“Yeah, that sounds great. I, uh, I look forward to it.”

“Good. I’ll let you get back to your…” Ethan gestured to the mounds of groceries that had begun their whole encounter.

“Oh, yes, I should…get to that…” Benji rubbed his palms against the sides of his jeans, not able to come up with anything interesting to say that might get Ethan to stay. Then, he was wondering: why the hell am I concerned with getting this random guy to stay? Then: he’s hot as all fuck, and not immediately repulsed by my awkwardness, I should be asking him to marry me, honestly.

“I’ll see you around,” Ethan gave a little salute that should have looked silly, but which he made seem suave.

“See ya!” Benji replied, cringing at his over-eager tone. He managed to wait until the door swung shut before collapsing face first onto the kitchen counter and muttering to himself, “I am so, so screwed.”

Chapter Text

It was a couple of days later that Benji found a note slid under his door. It read: “Free for dinner tonight, around 6? Let me know.” Beneath the message was a cursive letter ‘E’ and a phone number.

Benji managed to wait almost an entire minute before loading the number into a new contact in his phone and typing out, “Absolutely! I am so free.”

He cursed himself as soon as he’d sent it, quickly tapping out an addition: “That is, I am the normal amount of free. I’ll have to check my schedule.”

Fuck, that just made it so much worse. He finally sent a third message: “This is Benji by the way, if the intense foot-in-mouth-syndrome didn’t already give that away.”

There was about a minute of miserable radio silence, and then another thirty seconds of Benji anxiously watching the little gray typing bubbles bounce on the screen before Ethan’s reply materialized: “Great, I’ll see you then.”

Well. It appeared Benji’s new neighbor was still upholding a policy of gently ignoring his many social missteps. That was a relief, and boded well for the possibility that Benji might get through the night without feeling the urge to commit hari-kari with a butter knife.

When the hour came, Benji found himself standing nervously outside Ethan’s door, chanting under his breath, “you can do this, it’s just dinner, you eat that every day, you’ve got this,” before lifting his fist and knocking on the door.

Ethan answered after a brief pause, smiling when he saw Benji.

Ethan was dressed in sharply pressed slacks and a rich red button-down, the color bringing out his eyes and contrasting perfectly with his dark hair. Benji could identify the exact shade as ‘wineberry’ because he had a bad habit of watching HGTV at three am when he couldn’t sleep. The rolled-up sleeves showed off those forearms that Benji had admired since the moment they met and gave him an elegant-but-still-casual look that Benji couldn’t even hope to attain. Benji was himself dressed in a T-shirt with a glow-in-the-dark racoon face on it, and was feeling suddenly and desperately underdressed.

“I am feeling suddenly and desperately underdressed,” Benji said out loud, because apparently his past few hours spent practicing not spouting out every thought that came to mind had been in vain.

“Not at all,” Ethan assured him, “I just got back from a meeting with a client, I’m not normally much of a suit-and-tie guy.”

“Really? That’s good, though I suspect you’d still look brutally good in a burlap sack.” Benji grimaced and clenched a fist, as if it could recapture the words after they’d escaped. “Uh…let’s just forget I said that, shall we?”

“Or not,” Ethan suggested, “Since my suggestions at that work meeting I mentioned were shot down…I could use a confidence boost.”

“Consider me your personal booster, then.” Benji closed his eyes, “Or perhaps I should stop speaking for the evening.”

“That would be a shame, since I invited you over here specifically to talk with.”

When Benji dared to open his eyes again, Ethan was looking at him with that same distant amusement that had characterized their last interaction.

“Alright,” Benji said, “But fair warning, I’m sure I’ve got lots of inappropriate comments, just waiting to get fired out.”

Ethan huffed a laugh. “I look forward to hearing them. Feel free to look around,” he waved at the living room, “I’m just going to check on dinner.”

Benji puttered into the living room, peering at the generic knick-knacks and minimalist furniture. The space was nice, if a bit sparsely decorated. Almost impersonal actually, like sitting in an Ikea showroom. Maybe it was just because Ethan was freshly moved in, but still, Benji wondered why there wasn’t a little bit more of the man in the surroundings, especially considering how much time he spent at home.

The first real bit of personality he discovered came from a stack of records tucked next to a weather-beaten old record player that looked like it was from vinyl’s first round of popularity.

Because Ethan was the type of guy to have vinyl, but not on display to prove how hipster and cool he was, just casually there because he actually listened to it. Benji sighed, and wished he’d find something horrible hidden behind the Beastie Boys and Radiohead albums, like a secret drug stash, or a severed hand, then he’d have a good reason to stop falling head over heels for this guy who was so painfully out of his league. Instead, he found a pristine copy of Exile on Main St., the greatest hits of which he’d been listening to religiously since he was a kid.

“Hey, Rolling Stones fan!” He picked up the album and waved it cheerily at Ethan, “I mean, I know everyone is sort of a fan just by osmosis at this point, but still. They’re a personal favorite, I know the lyrics to every song on this thing by heart.”

“I know,” Ethan said idly, still preoccupied with whatever he was roasting on the stove.

“Pardon?”

“Uh…” Ethan looked caught off guard, which wasn’t something Benji’d even imagined was possible for someone as with-it as Ethan. “Our, um, our showers share a wall?” Ethan explained with a slight wince, “I may have…heard you singing. A couple of times.”

“Oh, god.”

“If it’s any consolation, you actually have a very nice voice.”

“No, no, I’m just….I’m just gonna crawl under your couch and die, thank you…” Benji mumbled, sinking towards the ground.

“Hey, what about that plan to swan dive off the Empire State, that you told me about when we met?”

“You remember that? Jesus, yes, let’s just do a rerun of all my most embarrassing moments.”

“Not embarrassing,” Ethan said stubbornly, “More like…adorable?”

“I think that’s worse than embarrassing.”

“Well, I think it’s too bad I don’t play guitar or something, then I could accompany you.”

“You seem like the kind of guy who could pick one up and learn to play in five minutes,” Benji grumbled from where he was hunched on the sofa, knees brought up to his chest, “And I’m the kind of guy who could take lessons for a year and still not be able to pluck out a tune.”

Ethan frowned and abandoned his cooking, coming over to sit beside Benji. “You’re being unfair with yourself.”

“Maybe. But, the thing is…god, this is going to sound like I’ve got the worst kind of self-esteem issues—probably because I do—but I haven’t been able to stop wondering since you invited me over here: why the hell is someone like you hanging out with someone like me? Like, on purpose?”

Ethan half-shook his head, like he couldn’t quite wrap his mind around Benji’s words. “Listen, Benji…I don’t know what you think of me, so I don’t know what you’re comparing yourself to, but… My first impressions of you are that you’re smart, funny, and capable.”

Benji’s eyebrows ratcheted upwards, disbelieving, but Ethan wasn’t deterred. “We hardly know each other at all, but I already feel like I can relax around you, which I rarely feel with anyone. So, if you’re really wondering why you’re here…it’s because I want you to be.”

Benji held his breath until he was pretty sure he wasn’t going to say something mind-bogglingly stupid. “Well, you’re one hell of a smooth talker, aren’t you.”

Ethan broke into a smile, and Benji relaxed fractionally.

“Seriously, lines like that must get you all the ladies…” Benji hesitated for a moment before deciding what the hell, he’s stuck with me through this much nonsense and added, “and gents, if that’s the case.”

The corner of Ethan’s mouth turned up slowly into a smile. “It’s occasionally the case.”

“Good, yeah. Good to know. Good, good, good…” Stop saying good, he berated himself internally, having to physically bite his lip to shut himself up.

“And you?” Ethan inquired, as if they were discussing the weather. “Since we’re on the topic…”

“Right, um…gents, mostly, though not exclusively. And not much at all, if we’re being honest, since I’m a stone’s throw from being a shut-in, and meeting people online is basically asking to shack up with an axe murderer and—is something burning?” Benji sniffed and turned around, relived to see a glimmer of smoke in the kitchen, confirming that he wasn’t just spontaneously combusting with the awkwardness of the moment.

Ethan hmmed and headed for the source of the smoke, not looking particularly worried. He swirled the contents of the pot around a few times as Benji approached, spotting some fairly burnt looking vegetables inside.

“It’s Cajun,” Ethan said, without a trace of irony.

“Right.”

“No, really, it is.”

“You know, because you give off this vibe of being in complete control, all the time, I almost believe you.”

Ethan plated up the contents of the still slightly smoking pot with a pile of rice and handed it to Benji. Benji took a bite and had to laugh, because it really was delicious.

“Do your skills have no limit?” he asked, shoveling another forkful in his mouth.

“I already told you, I can’t play guitar. I also can’t keep houseplants alive, I get Expressionism and Impressionism mixed up, and I’m pretty mediocre at embroidery.”

“Ha! I’ve got you beat there. My mum taught me all about the sewing arts, I could darn socks for days, and you’d better believe I could embroider the shit out of a dishtowel.”

Ethan laughed, ducking his head and scrunching his eyes, and Benji got the feeling not many people could elicit that particular, honest laugh.

Silently, Benji tucked that away as a newfound skill to be proud of.

“So…” Ethan began as they sat down at his dining table, which he had and used and didn’t just cover with junk mail and receipts, because he was a real adult, apparently. “I saw a bunch of computers at your place, I assume that’s for your work?”

“Yeah,” Benji brightened up, his Project (he capitalized it in his head, since it was so important) being one of his favorite topics of conversation, “I used to be more of your average programmer, coder, generic tech monkey, but then I hit on the idea for a bit of software that could really revolutionize things, and now I like to think of myself as more of an inventor, if that doesn’t sound too weird and arrogant.”

“Not at all. May I ask what you’re inventing?”

“Ha, well, the idea’s actually pretty simple. It’s like a one-size-fits-all translator. Let me back up: you know how, in our big digital capitalist-nightmare world, we have all kinds of highly complex technical systems that can do just about anything in the world…except talk to each other? Like, how even a simple video file made on a Mac might not play on a Windows machine?”

Ethan nodded, looking genuinely interested, which was a good sign. Usually people who didn’t really care started tuning out at this point.

“So, what I’m working on would make pretty much any system compatible with any other. More than just different operating systems; I’m talking about your phone talking to your smart fridge, the international space station interfacing with an archive in Michigan, everything from floppy discs to top-of-the-line servers, it would all be accessible, from a technical standpoint anyway. Security and encryption would still exist, though they’d likely have to be modified if the technology becomes widespread.”

“That sounds amazing…and dangerous,” Ethan concluded.

“Possibly,” Benji allowed, “I mean, there are certainly corporations out there who thrive on exactly that sort of incompatibility…I don’t want to name names, but, uh, a certain fruity company wouldn’t much like it if people didn’t have to keep buying new devices and software just to keep doing basic tasks.”

“I’ll bet.”

“Actually, the government even sent people to try and buy it off me, do you believe that?”

Ethan raised his eyebrows, looking appropriately intrigued.

“They did, but I said no, this is going public. Everyone deserves the right to information.” Benji tapped the table to emphasize his point.

Ethan stroked his chin, thoughtful. “In principle, I agree. But what about sensitive information? The kind that could get people killed?”

“Isn’t that the most important kind to have, at the end of the day? I mean, secrets are what rot away at the core of our democracy, those dirty little secrets of power that let us keep thinking we’re the good guys. It’s all just an illusion.”

“Maybe it’s an illusion worth protecting.”

“And maybe it’s one that needs banishing. So we can figure out how to take care of each other, and do the right thing.”

Ethan’s eyes went wide, and Benji wondered if he’d pushed too hard. “But, don’t listen to me, half a beer in me,” Benji sloshed the definitely still full bottle around, “and I start talking bollocks about stuff I haven’t the foggiest clue about.”

“Seems to me you know a hell of a lot more than most people do,” Ethan said, and he sounded…impressed? That couldn’t be right, Benji concluded, I’ve just been sequestered from other human beings too long, and don’t remember social cues.

“Ha, well, that’s, uh…nice of you to say.” He cleared his throat and tried to steer the conversation towards less intense topics, “Anyway, enough about me. Are you, uh, from around here?”

“No, but I always had a fondness for New York,” Ethan replied. “Too expensive to actually live in the city though, and since I’m not tied down to a workplace, I ended up looking further out. Found this place—good neighborhood, right price. Not much else to it,” Ethan twirled his fork absentmindedly, “You?”

“Same. Also, it’s close to my sister—but not too close, you know, far enough that she can’t drag me to every godforsaken experimental theater piece she hears about.”

“Not a theater buff, huh?”

“Oh, I like the classics fine, and I’m down with a bit of mixing-it-up but…I just don’t need to sit and watch three hours of a bunch of college dropouts rolling around on the ground, expressing their deep-seated ennui and discontent with the state of the modern world, or whatever. Not my thing.”

“I’m more of a movies kind of guy, myself.”

“Yeah? Any favorites?”

They talked about films and where they went to college and what sports they were following (Benji bravely listened to several minutes about recent football happenings, before admitting that the only football he cared about was generally called soccer in this part of the world), and Benji warned Ethan about the woman down the hall who kept a bad-tempered parakeet that occasionally got raucous around midnight, and Ethan promised to come over and look at the leaky tap Benji’d put in three work orders for and gotten no response on.

“You don’t really have to come over and deal with my plumbing,” Benji said as he made to leave, “If anything, I should be helping you out, you’re the newbie after all.”

“It’s no problem,” Ethan stuck his hands in his pockets, “The truth is, I’d like the company. My work took me far away for a long time, and now that I’m settling down…well, making friends isn’t easy.”

Part of Benji wanted to scoff at the idea that someone as cool, confident, and ridiculously good-looking as Ethan would have any trouble making friends. But, then again, if he had his pick of companions, why would he be hanging out with Benji?

That didn’t exactly raise his spirits, so Benji covered with humor. “Don’t feel like joining a book club? Maybe a wine tasting group? Start hanging out with those guys who juggle knives in the park?”

“Not exactly my speed,” Ethan laughed.

“Hmm, yeah, I imagine you more as the free-climbing Breakneck Ridge in your spare time type. Waterskiing, hiking–anything where you get to be outside and sweaty.”

“Sounds like you’ve got me all figured out.”

“Nah, I’m sure there’s more to you than a good tan and a mysterious smile.”

“Mysterious?”

Damn, and Benji had been doing so well at pretending to be both normal and not overcome with attraction for his new neighbor. “You’ve got to admit…you’ve always got this look like you’re the guy at the poker table who’s got two pairs, but is about to bluff a win against someone else’s full house.”

“That’s…very specific.”

Benji shuffled his feet, rubbing the back of his neck. “Yeah, I’ve got a bit of a colorful imagination.”

“I like it,” Ethan said, smiling that exact mysterious smile Benji had been talking about, probably on purpose.

Benji managed not to say anything, which was probably the best response considering all his brain was offering him was “!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

“I guess I’ll see you tomorrow, then, to deal with that sink.”

“Yep,” Benji squeaked out, backing out the door. “Bye!”

“Goodbye,” Ethan returned the farewell, before closing his door.

Benji went back to his apartment as quickly as possible, heading directly for the couch and throwing himself on it, shoving his face into a pillow.

It was one thing to have an interest in his hot neighbor. It was another for said neighbor to turn out to be smart and kind and a good listener and all-in-all a fucking dreamboat of a man. And, worst of all, he seemed to genuinely like Benji too.

This really was too good to be true.

Chapter Text

The thing about Benji’s leaky sink was, if he wasn’t such a lazy bum, he probably could’ve fixed it himself. He had a toolkit in his closet and access to Google, if anything went awry, and he definitely didn’t need a strong, handsome man with clever hands to come over and mess about with it – but he really, really wanted this particular strong, handsome man with clever hands to come over and mess about with anything he was willing to.

Now that sounded like exactly the kind of double-entendre he was really hoping to avoid blurting out while Ethan was over. He’d been practicing more studiously this time, re-running their previous encounters through his mind and pinpointing the places where he should’ve just shut up for his own sake. The trick now was actually shutting up.

He’d just barely finished panic-cleaning his apartment, hoping it was now suitable for human habitation, when a knock sounded at his door.

He gulped down a breath, straightening the shirt he’d taken almost an hour to pick out that morning. “Just a couple of guys, dudes, whatever, hanging out, fixing broken appliances like normal people, mmhmm, this is gonna be fine…” he muttered under his breath. He wasn’t encouraged.

“Hey,” Ethan greeted him when he finally swung open the door.

“Hi,” Benji said, though the word barely escaped his throat.

Part of Benji had been hoping for some sort of overnight-metamorphosis to take effect and render Ethan a little less jaw-droppingly handsome, just to even the odds a little. Alas, no such change had occurred, and Benji could already feel his pulse rate skyrocketing.

A t-shirt clung tightly to Ethan’s sculpted chest, and a box of tools swung casually at his side.

“You know, I’m pretty sure there’s–” Nope. Benji dug his nails into his palm, hard, and managed to cut himself off before completing the sentence with “a porno out there that starts exactly like this.”

“Pretty sure there’s what?” Ethan asked innocently.

“Ah, no, nothing…” Benji cleared his throat and stepped aside, waving for Ethan to come inside.

Ethan seemed to pick up on the nature of that ‘nothing,’ raising an eyebrow at Benji and saying, “I was promised more inappropriate comments, and I’m pretty sure there’s a lot of material to work with here. Tools, plumbing, etcetera…”

“I have been practicing keeping things PG, thank you very much. I hope to get through this whole encounter without being more than lightly chagrined.”

“Honestly, that sounded a little suggestive.”

“No, nope, that’s all on you.”

Ethan shrugged, “Maybe you’re rubbing off on me.”

“Okay, now that was suggestive.”

Ethan laughed and Benji joined him, starting to settle into that same friendly comfort he’d felt yesterday evening after the initial road bumps smoothed out.

“So, where’s that sink?” Ethan twirled a wrench leisurely in his right hand, and Benji was positive he knew exactly how good he looked doing it.

“Right, the sink,” Benji made an ‘aha!’ motion with his hands, like he was just remembering the purpose of the visit, which he was. “This way.”

He led Ethan to the cramped kitchen and gestured grandly to the space under the sink where water dripped slowly off of a pipe and into an empty yogurt container Benji had stuck there to contain the damage.

“Alright, let’s see what we’ve got,” Ethan said, before flipping over to look under the sink in an effortless, catlike motion that had Benji weak at the knees.

Benji grabbed onto a nearby counter for support and tried not to stare too obviously at the flexing muscles of Ethan’s abdomen.

“Pliers?” Ethan called out from under the sink.

“Uh, here…” Benji fumbled for the requested tool and handed it to Ethan.

“Yep, I thought so,” Ethan determined after another moment, “bad seal around the sink strainer. Easy enough to fix, but I’ll need a third hand…” One of his arms reappeared, gesturing for Benji to come closer.

Benji held his breath and scooted down next to Ethan, meeting his gaze in the darkened cupboard and trying not to think how intimate this felt, because there was nothing intimate about basic home repair, dammit. Except maybe there was, when the repairman in question looked like that.

“Hold this,” Ethan took Benji’s hand and wrapped it around the pliers, which were holding some piece of the under-sink piping in place.

Benji nodded, hyper-focused on the feeling of Ethan’s slightly calloused hands on his.

Ethan let go, moving on to disassembling a complicated-looking series of nuts and bolts and washers, setting them carefully aside. “Okay,” Ethan took the pliers back, “putty knife, please?”

Benji scooted out from under the sink, breathing deep in the fresh air and trying to get his head back on straight.

“Uh….” He blinked at the many tools in front of him, almost any one of which could’ve been a ‘putty knife,' as far as he was concerned.

“The yellow plastic scraper,” Ethan clarified.

“Right, thanks.”

Ethan worked in silence after that, punctuated only by the occasional metallic clunk or drip of water.

It was a comfortable quiet, after Benji stopped vividly reliving the closeness under the sink and wondering if he was just desperate and lonely, or if Ethan actually had looked at him with warmth in his eyes. It also served as a rather stark reminder of how isolated Benji was. He’d been working alone for months, living off grants from various nonprofits and institutions, and interacting almost exclusively with delivery people and the occasional barista.

He’d forgotten how nice it was to have another human being in the same room, another living, breathing person to talk to, or ask for help, or just acknowledge your existence.

“You look thoughtful,” Ethan noted as he slid out from under the sink and stood to fiddle with the drain from above.

“Just appreciating that if I dropped dead, it wouldn’t take weeks and the smell of my corpse leaking out to the hallway for someone to notice.”

Ethan opened his mouth as if to respond but seemed to think better of it.

“God, sorry,” Benji squeezed his eyes shut, “That was probably the most alarming possible way to say ‘it’s nice not to be alone.’ Apparently I can’t stop sounding like a creepy old hermit.” He put on an exaggerated leer and raised his voice an octave, “Would you like to see my collection of human pelts now, young man?”

Ethan snorted a laugh, covering his mouth. “If I say no, do I join the collection?”

“Probably,” Benji replied in his normal voice, “I haven’t developed the character that far.”

Ethan laughed again, “Well, you’ll have to let me know when you decide.” He tapped a wrench against the faucet, “I think we’re done here.” He turned on the tap, and they peered down under the sink together, to find no drips in sight.

“You’ve fixed it!” Benji exclaimed, “My hero!”

“All in a day’s work,” Ethan said, packing up his tools.

“All in a day’s helping your strange new neighbor out for free, you mean. I really do owe you now…”

“Well,” Ethan began, washing his hands in the newly repaired sink, “I was actually thinking of asking you for a little computer help… I’ve been having trouble with this 3D modeling software I use in my work, it keeps freezing and crashing on me. I know you’re not just some IT guy, but—”

“No, I can definitely help!” Benji enthused, “That’s right up my alley. If you’ve got the time, you could bring your computer over now and we could see what the problem is pretty quickly.”

“Great,” Ethan flashed Benji a smile so bright it just about knocked him over. “I’ll be back in a sec.”

Ethan returned with his laptop quickly, and Benji cracked his knuckles and got to work.

He was so wrapped up in his element that almost twenty minutes slipped by before Ethan politely cleared his throat.

“How’s it going?” he asked from where he was lounging against a stack of Benji’s external drives, the ones holding backups of every stage of his Project.

“Oh!” Benji scratched his beard, distracted, “Sorry, yeah, fixed that software problem up a while ago. Just had to trash the preferences and scoot your plug-ins folder somewhere out of the way. Doing a little much-needed maintenance, now. Your BIOS needed some tweaking…” Benji frowned at the screen, tapping out a few commands, “Cleaned up some unnecessary start-up programs that were slowing you down…” He gave Ethan a pointed look, “When’s the last time you shut this poor bugger down?”

“Um…” Ethan trailed off guiltily.

“Yeah, try to turn it off—all the way off—every night, and that’ll help out a lot. It’s like a person needs their eight hours, computers need to rest too,” Benji lectured.

“Noted. I’ll take better care of it in the future,” Ethan said, appropriately repentant.

“Yeah, I may not care about my own human health, but I’ll be damned if I let a poor computer suffer,” Benji grinned up at Ethan.

“As a part-time personal trainer, I feel morally obligated to tell you that you probably should care at least a little about your own health.”

“Eh,” Benji shrugged, “Who needs muscles of your own, when you can enjoy looking at someone elses.” Benji froze, “Not yours, though, definitely not looking at your muscles. Also not not looking, like, I mean, I’m not ignoring—”

Ethan laid a gentle hand on Benji’s shoulder. “Benji?”

“Mmhmm,” Benji replied, hunched over in a cringe.

“You seemed like you wanted to stop talking, but couldn’t.”

“Yep. That happens. Sorry.”

“Don’t be, it’s fine. I just thought I’d help out.”

“Appreciate it, mate,” Benji said, letting his breath out in a rush.

“Anyway, while we’re talking about it,” Ethan moved on breezily, “muscle really is overrated, in a lot of ways. Dedication and skill are what matter in something like self-defense, for example, if you care about anything other than looks.”

“Yes, of course,” Benji nodded like he had any expertise on the topic, outside of owning a bunch of Jackie Chan movies.

“You don’t have to be built, you just have to know where the weak spots are,” Ethan continued, “If you can shatter someone’s kneecap, it doesn’t matter how many pounds they’ve got on you.”

“Ah…yikes,” Benji flinched at the imagery. “Yeah, I’m basically a kitten, so—”

“So, you should still know a few basic moves,” Ethan pressed, and Benji got the same sense of danger he’d felt when his sister’s last obnoxious musician boyfriend had tried to get him to take up playing the bongos, “I’m not talking about offensive strategies, just ways to keep yourself safe or even alive in a dangerous scenario.”

“Do you see me getting into a fistfight with pirates in my future, or…?”

“Muggings, home invasion—these are very real possibilities.”

“You sound like you’re trying to sell me something,” Benji put his hands on his hips, trying to look less like the easy mark he knew he was.

“I…do self-defense training as part of my personal fitness work,” Ethan admitted, “But I’d be happy to teach you something, gratis. Call it a neighbor discount.”

“Don’t I already owe you, though?”

“Fixing that software glitch more than made up for whatever you owed me, and besides…” There was a roguish twinkle in Ethan’s eyes that sent shivers down Benji’s spine, “Most people aren’t exactly thanking me when I get through with them.”

Whoa. Benji might have a bit of an overactive imagination on his hands, but that sounded very much like flirtation to his ears.

Benji weighed the potential—no, certainty—of embarrassment, versus the likelihood of getting to ogle a sweaty Ethan…well, there was no real choice there.

“Alright, yeah, let’s give it a go.”

“Great. Meet you in the gym tomorrow at, say…six?”

“In the morning?” Benji asked, going a little pale.

“Eight?” Ethan offered.

“Depends on whether you want me to be conscious or not.”

“How about ten.”

“Much better.”

“Alright, I’ll see you then.” Ethan retrieved his laptop and left with a wave, pulling the door shut behind him.

Benji stood at his desk in the silence that followed, feeling a little lost. He wandered over to the sink, just the sight of it triggering a memory of Ethan’s touch that had him smiling to himself.

That was the moment, standing in his kitchen and grinning at nothing, that he realized how very bad he had it for his neighbor.

He blew out a long breath, and then said out loud to his blurry reflection in the sink’s basin: “I am in big, big trouble, aren’t I?”

Chapter Text

“Mags, I think I’m losing my mind,” Benji said without preamble.

“This is not news to me,” his sister drawled on the other end of the line.

“I’m serious!” Benji insisted, “Because this incredibly hot guy just moved in next door—”

“How hot?” Maggie interrupted, “Are we talking like Brad Pitt hot, or that one guy who worked on our parents’ roof that summer you visited from college hot?”

“Hotter than roof guy.”

“Holy shit.”

“Yeah. And to make it worse, he’s really nice and friendly….and expressed an interest in men.”

“Ok, you really might be going crazy, because that can’t be true.”

“I know!”

“What’s his name, I need to stalk him on social media immediately.”

“Uh, Ethan Scott…” Benji put his phone on speaker so he could open up his browser, “Shit, I can’t believe I didn’t Google him before now.”

“Amateur,” Maggie said, sing-song.

“Ah, buzz off,” Benji muttered without much heat.

“Ohhhh my god, I think I found him,” Maggie hissed, “Dark hair, toothpaste-commercial smile, says he’s an architect?”

“That’s him.”

“You weren’t kidding. He truly surpasses roof-guy.”

“It’s a lot to take in,” Benji sighed, finding the same Facebook profile and staring helplessly at it, “and it’s much worse in person.”

“His social media presence is pretty thin on the ground,” Maggie pointed out, judgment in her tone, “Other than your standard Facebook, all I’m getting is a business website, and…ugh, LinkedIn, of course.”

“Well, he seems like the private type. Keeps things buttoned up, and I get the feeling he doesn’t have much for family or friends.”

“That could be a warning sign. What do you think, serial killer? Secret wife and kids in California?”

“God, I think I’d rather he turn out to be a serial killer than married.”

“Hmm, so we’ve already reached that stage of obsession. Moving pretty fast, are we?”

“It’s not like I can help it. I’m just some silly, useless bit of driftwood getting tossed along in the current,” Benji waxed poetic.

“Whatever. It seems to me you’ve got two options: grow a spine and ask if he’s down to bang, or pine hopelessly after the guy until you die.”

“I think I’m gonna go for the pining-until-death option, thanks.”

“It’s your funeral. Oh, hey!” There was the sound of a door opening and closing in the background, and boot-steps, “Rob just got back from his show aaaaand judging from his expression, I don’t think it went well.”

“Alright, go take care of your wandering bard,” Benji said, trying to keep the derision he felt for his sister’s useless boyfriend out of his tone, “Talk to you later.”

“Byeeee!” Maggie trilled, before ending the call.

Damn, Benji groused, I didn’t even get to ask her advice on how to deal with the whole shirtless-and-sweaty-in-close-quarters fiasco that was lurking in his future.

He ended up texting Maggie: “PS – he asked me to WORK OUT WITH HIM tomorrow!! so one way or another i’ll probably b dead after that”

“RIP bro,” Maggie shot back a minute later with a skull emoji. Benji felt marginally better.

~~~~~

The morning of The Great Workout, as Benji had titled it in his head, arose sunny and bright.

Benji had set an alarm for nine, five after nine, ten after nine, and so on until nine-thirty when they started going off every minute. At 9:37, the opening notes of Walking On Sunshine, his go-to alarm song, got irritating enough for him to stop snoozing and actually drag himself out of bed. He zombie-walked into the shower and then gnawed listlessly on a granola bar for breakfast while he got dressed in his least worn-out t-shirt and sweatpants.

He may have missed the human companionship of a 9 to 5 job, but the benefit of setting his own schedule was pretty tough to beat—he’d forgotten about the misery of waking up before the clock rolled into double-digits.

Naturally, when he went down to the apartment’s medium-sized gym complex, Ethan was doing pull-ups and looking every bit as alert and refreshed as Benji was not.

Ethan’s light gray tank top was already darkened with sweat, and the extra inches of muscled arms Benji was treated to shone almost obscenely under the florescent lighting. God, he looks so good I could eat him with a spoon, he thought hungrily.

Don’t say that out loud, not out loud, not out loud, he begged himself a second later.

“Spoon!” He ended up greeting Ethan with, which, all things considered, wasn’t the worst thing he could have led with.

“Sorry?”

“Oh, uh, just thinking about cutlery! You know, like you do…”

Ethan grinned and shook his head. “Good morning to you, too.” He clapped his hands together and gestured towards the blue mat in the center of the room. “I figured we could start with some warm-ups, stretches, and then get into a few basics of self-defense.”

“Yeah, sounds good,” Benji said, hoping he looked more confident than he felt.

“You look like you’re being led to the firing squad,” Ethan noted drily, crushing that hope.

“I’m not exactly a gym rat,” Benji said sheepishly, “I am, in fact, rather gym-adverse.”

“You’ve never trained with me,” Ethan pointed out, “Maybe I can change your feelings on the topic.”

A week ago Benji would have said he’d sooner die painfully than work out, probably because the second felt about as bad as the first, in his opinion. But now, he found himself saying, “You never know.”

Ethan led them through a series of easy stretches that had Benji thinking “hey, maybe this won’t be so bad.” Then they started up some core-strengthening exercises that had Benji going “nope, first instincts were right, this is pretty bad.”

After about half an hour of sweating—which was an incredible look on Ethan, but which just made Benji want to go drown himself in a shower—Benji was starting to flash back periodically to the torture of high school Phys Ed.

“I’ll bet you just killed it in dodge ball, didn’t you,” Benji panted accusatorily at Ethan after finishing a set of crunches.

“I think I had a coach describe me as ‘brutal’ once,” Ethan agreed, taking Benji’s non sequitur in stride.

“I knew it,” Benji let his head fall back, catching his breath, “I bet you were prom king and the star quarterback too.”

“Swim team was my thing, then,” Ethan corrected him.

Fuck, now all Benji could think about was Ethan in one of those terrible little speedos.

“And I wasn’t prom king,” Ethan protested, but after a minute of increasingly guilty silence he added, “I abdicated.”

“Oh my god.”

“My best friend at the time was head over heels for the prom queen, and he came in second, so…”

“You loyal, successful bastard,” Benji sighed, “I hate you.”

“Not yet you don’t.”

“Uh oh,” Benji cut his eyes over to Ethan, who was bouncing lightly back and forth on his feet.

“You ready to get a little sore?” he asked, moving into Benji’s personal space.

“Yes?” Benji choked, eyes going a little wide at the whole world of inappropriate interpretations of that sentence.

Ethan’s eyes flashed and he grinned knowingly, then he burst into motion, the world turning into a blur for a long, startling second before Benji found himself lying on his back with Ethan smiling above him.

“By the time we’re done here,” Ethan tapped two fingers to the center of Benji’s chest, “you’ll be able to put an assailant on their back and out of the game, just like that.”

“Really,” Benji gasped, still a little dizzy.

“Uh-huh.”

“I don’t know if you’re overestimating me or your teaching skills.”

“Neither.” Ethan stepped back and held out a hand, which Benji gratefully latched onto, letting Ethan do most of the work in pulling him back to his feet.

“But before we get to the full take-down, we’ll start with some simple blocks...”

Ethan showed Benji how to drive an assailants’ punches and kicks away from his body and use their own momentum against them. He guided Benji’s forearms, showing him how to hold his fist, how to stand so he was as grounded as possible.

There was an intensity in Ethan’s eyes as he explained each step and move, demonstrating jabs and uppercuts with fluid ease, his body moving with a precision and control Benji’d never seen outside of a martial arts movie. It was more than a little hypnotic, and Benji was glad Ethan was such a patient teacher, because he couldn’t keep his focus on his own body when Ethan’s was so close.

“Ready to get knocked down again?” Ethan finally asked after Benji had mastered a set of basic blocks.

“Nope. Do I have a choice?”

“Nope. Now, make like you’re gonna hit me.”

Benji complied, and Ethan began to explain. “This move is great to use against people with a height advantage, because your lower center of gravity will help you stay upright while sending them to the dirt. You start by grabbing their forearm with your left hand and pulling it towards you,” Ethan demonstrated in slow motion, “then you grab their neck with your free hand and kick out their nearest ankle with your right foot. This is a two-fer, it knocks them down and messes with their breathing. And, you can hold onto their hand once they’ve hit the ground and put a foot in their armpit, keep them from getting back up. Got it?”

Benji nodded, not because he got it, but because Ethan’s hand on his throat was making him think thoughts that were more suited to a bedroom than a gymnasium, and he’d frankly rather get knocked on his ass again than have Ethan start to pick up on that.

Ethan showed him the move a few more times in increasing speed, hand closing around Benji’s neck while his foot swung around to press into the joint of Benji’s foot.

“Okay, your turn.” Ethan stepped back and made a fist, slowly aiming it for Benji’s face.

Benji got hold of Ethan’s arm and clumsily grabbed for his neck, fingers reluctant to close around their target.

“Like you mean it,” Ethan insisted, grabbing Benji’s hand and pressing it harder into his own throat.

Benji gulped and did as he was told.

A few more tries and he was moving smoothly, hands and foot connecting with arm, neck, and ankle like they were supposed to.

“Good, now faster,” Ethan ordered.

Benji just nodded, focused on keeping his footing.

“Okay, take me down.” Ethan’s fist came at Benji’s face and he reacted instinctively, hands shooting out and foot following without his having to think about it.

There was a whump, and he realized Ethan was on his back on the mat, Benji standing over him.

“Jesus!” Benji exclaimed, startled. “I…I did it?”

“You did,” Ethan beamed up at him.

“I did it!” Benji repeated, loosening his grip on Ethan’s wrist.

Ethan’s leg shot out, cutting Benji’s celebration short as his feet flew out from under him.

He landed with an “oof!” and a groan, blinking up to see Ethan’s face only inches from his own. He realized the warmth and pressure against his stomach and thighs was Ethan, straddling him and holding his arms down with both hands.

“The follow-up to a take down is key,” Ethan explained patiently, like he wasn’t on top of Benji. “Namely, you run away, or do something to make sure they stay down.”

“Mmhmm,” Benji said through tightly pressed-together lips, trying not to hyperventilate.

“Always remember, in a life or death situation, there are no rules. Kick ‘em in the groin, claw out their eyes, bite, scratch, whatever you can do.”

Ethan had that look again, the one that made Benji wonder exactly what this mild-mannered architect might be capable of, under the right circumstances.

“Has anyone ever told you,” Benji began delicately, “that you have a very…intense sort of energy?”

“Nope,” Ethan said easily, finally sliding off Benji.

“Ah, well then, let me be the first. Have you considered yoga, to calm your angry inner spirit?”

Ethan watched, bemused as Benji struggled upright. “I do yoga every morning.”

“One: of course you do. Two: I’m now alarmed as to what you might be like without yoga. Oh, and three: ow.” Benji pressed a hand to his aching back.

“I’d say I’m sorry, but it’s for your own good.”

“Mmm, I’ll let you know if my chiropractor agrees with you.”

“Send me the bill.”

“You’re kidding, but I actually will.” They shared a laugh, and Benji continued, “Thank you, really. Even though I feel a little like death, I’m sure I’ll forgive you eventually.” He glanced at the clock, which read almost noon. “How about smoothies, from that place down the street?” he suggested, “On me. That is, if fitness gods like yourself drink that sort of thing.”

“Well,” Ethan pretended to consider it, “Fruit is far healthier in its original form, with all the roughage intact, but…I’ll make an exception.” He leaned towards Benji, “For you.”

“I’m touched,” Benji played up the sentiment, pressing a hand ardently to his heart.

Ethan slung a friendly arm around Benji’s shoulders as they left the gym, and Benji couldn’t stop smiling.

He’d forgotten how nice this was. Having a friend.

Chapter Text

“Hey, Benji, you have a minute?” Ethan asked when Benji answered his buzzing phone.

“Hrmmph,” was Benji’s grumpy response from where his face was mashed against his desk, staring glumly at the profile of his laptop as if the answers to the universe lay hidden in its USB ports.

“Uh, you doing ok?”

“I grow…fatigued.”

“Yeah?” Ethan sounded both amused and sympathetic, which was a tricky combination to pull off.

“Yes. And that line was an only slightly arcane Star Trek reference, by the way. I assume that’s yet another piece of pop culture you managed to miss?” Benji propped his chin up in one hand, slightly more alert at the sound of Ethan’s voice.

“Tragically, yes.”

“I’m adding it to your list.” Benji kept a note on his phone of all the essential media Ethan had managed to bypass in his decades on this Earth, and which Benji was making it his personal mission to educate him on. It so far included such diverse items as Silence of the Lambs, When Harry Met Sally, Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure, and about seven Bill Murray movies that Benji quoted with regularity. “You know, when you said you liked movies, you should’ve mentioned that that didn’t include anything made after 1975.”

“Some people might argue there’s no point in watching anything made after that.”

“Some people like blood sausage. People are idiots,” Benji quipped. “That gem was from Groundhog Day, for your information, another national treasure you’ve ignored. And don’t even get me started on your television literacy! I mean, you’re like a caveman, you don’t even have Netflix. What do you do with your spare time?”

“I’m not used to having this much spare time,” Ethan admitted.

“Your old job keep you a lot busier?” Benji inquired, tone casual. He’d put together from Ethan’s vague remarks that there had been some sort of past employment, which had ended on not-excellent terms, and resulted in his relocation. He was still curious as to what someone like Ethan, who seemed the epitome of a responsible go-getter, could’ve done to get on his boss’ bad side.

“Yep,” Ethan agreed shortly, before moving on, “Anyway, why are you so ‘fatigued’? Did you stay up until two AM watching videos of alpacas chasing people again?”

“They were llamas,” Benji corrected snootily, “Alpacas are much nicer. And it was time well spent! I now know not to try and tickle a llama.”

“Take a nap,” Ethan ordered.

“Ugh,” Benji slid back down towards his desk. “I’m not tired, exactly. More annoyed. Apathetic, maybe. My brain’s like oatmeal and everything I’ve tried to do with my Project today ended up looking like the programming equivalent of a toddler’s crayon drawings. A not-particularly-talented toddler, at that.”

“You hit a rough patch. You’ll pull through, you just need some inspiration.”

“Not sure what inspires good coding. Coffee? Renaissance art? Lap dances?”

“Well, I can help you with two out of the three of those.”

“For the sake of both of our dignities, I’m not gonna ask which two. Also, did you just make yourself my muse?”

“Huh, guess so.”

“Perhaps you should play the lute for me when you come over tonight for dinner, that seems like something a muse would do.”

“As much as I’d love to locate and learn to play an instrument that went out of popularity in the eighteenth century, I was actually calling to see if I could have a rain check on dinner.”

“Oh.” Benji sat upright. He felt a little like the bottom had just dropped out of his stomach. 

“A meeting with a client came up that I really can’t miss.”

“Of course, that’s—of course, rain check, no big deal. It’s just dinner.”

“I’ll make it up to you,” Ethan promised.

“I know you will. Well, um, I’ll let you go then—talk to you later.” Benji hung up quickly, barely hearing Ethan’s farewell.

This was ridiculous. It was just dinner, like he’d said. It had become a sort of standing appointment with them in the last weeks of their growing friendship, but it was still casual. It wasn’t like it was a date, or something.

You wish, the nastier part of his subconscious grumbled.

Benji let out a frustrated noise and pushed back from his desk.

It’s fine, he told himself sternly, it’s not like I don’t have plenty of other things to do.

Except, when he looked around his apartment, he realized he didn’t feel like doing much of anything.

Before he’d started spending so much screen time on his Project, he’d been a pretty avid gamer. He opened the box where he kept his consoles, but the prospect lost its appeal almost immediately. He tried to take a nap like Ethan had suggested, but just ended up staring at the wall, curled up on his side and wrapped up in miserable thoughts. He turned to the internet for entertainment, but no number of adorable animals doing ridiculous things could cure his rainy mood.

He finally ended up in the kitchen, in the company of one of the very few recipes within his culinary grasp: chocolate chip cookies.

Were she here, his sister would accuse him of grief baking, but she would be wrong. He was making cookies because sometimes a man just wanted cookies, that’s all!

And if he was being overly precise in his leveling of the flour and digging out an antiquated kitchen scale to measure the quantity of chocolate chips to within tenth of an ounce, all so he wouldn’t have enough stray brain cells free to analyze why he was so disproportionately upset by the polite rescheduling of a dinner non-date by a man he’d barely known a month, well. That was his business.

He’d just retrieved the first pan of cookies from the oven and slid the second one in to bake when the hair on the back of his neck stood up.

He froze, and then peered slowly over his shoulder to find a figure walking towards him out of the shadows of his living room.

“Jesus Christ!” Benji jumped about a foot in the air, before realizing he recognized that silhouette.

“Sorry!” Ethan held up his hands, glancing with amusement at the spatula Benji was brandishing at him like a weapon.

“You sneaky son of a bitch…” Benji doubled over, clutching his racing heart.

“Client meeting let out early,” Ethan explained, biting his lip, “I thought I’d see if you were still free for dinner.”

“But you decided first to try and send me to an early grave?”

“The opposite. You should really lock your doors.”

“I lock my doors!” Benji bristled, “Sometimes. When the feeling takes me.”

“Well, with a rigorous schedule like that, it’s a wonder I got in here at all.”

“Bastard. Just for that, you’re not getting any of my amazing, freshly baked cookies.”

Ethan approached the counter with interest. “I thought you didn’t cook.”

“I don’t, but I bake occasionally. It’s just chemistry,” Benji explained, “There are rules and numbers and specific steps to follow to achieve a desired result—and that I can do.” The timer went off and Benji pulled the second sheet of cookies from the oven. “Et voilà!”

“Now…” Benji went to the fridge and retrieved a pair of beers, cracking one open and setting it before Ethan. “When you say the client meeting let out early…” he prompted, sensing more to the story.

“I mean, the client was being a prick, and I suddenly realized that I couldn’t justify wasting my time listening to him rant at me when I could be here with you,” Ethan stated, calm as could be.

“Oh.” Benji had no idea how he should respond to that, except perhaps with a profession of his undying love. He realized he was about three seconds from doing that, and so shoved an entire cookie in his mouth to stop himself.

“Thas ver nice ah ooh,” he said after a minute of labored chewing.

Ethan’s eyes crinkled with amusement as he propped himself up against the counter, stealing a cookie of his own. “I assume you’re saying, ‘that’s great Ethan, also, I’m going to start locking my doors like a responsible adult.’”

“Oh my god,” Benji mumbled, “You’re still harping on about that?”

“Even the simplest of precautions can deter theft and other crimes of convenience.”

“And you know this because…?”

“…I used to consult for a security firm,” Ethan admitted reluctantly.

“Of course, you did,” Benji rolled his eyes, “You really are a jackass of all trades.”

Ethan almost snorted his beer. “I think it’s just ‘jack.’”

“Not in your case. Anyway, what else have you done in your colorful, adventure-filled life? Skydiving instructor? Lion tamer?”

“I’ve skydived, but never taught it. And I’m allergic to cats.”

“Noted.”

“I also did a summer at Le Cordon Bleu in Paris.”

“Now you’re just bragging.”

“Or trying to impress you,” Ethan countered.

Benji scoffed, “Well, I’m not impressed in the slightest. You are, in fact, the least impressive person I’ve ever met.”

Ethan pouted, and it was far more attractive than should be allowed. “I think I liked it better when you said nice things about me and then looked all cute and embarrassed afterwards.”

“I’ll bet you did, you egomaniac,” Benji shot back, taking a swift drink from his beer to cover the rising color in his cheeks. “But I’ll have you know I’ve got talents of my own.”

“I have no doubt.”

“For example, I can read palms.”

“Really?”

“I can. Skimmed almost half an article in Cosmo about it at the dentist’s office last week, so I’m basically an expert.”

Ethan held out his hand and raised his eyebrows, challenging. “Show me what you got.”

“Alright.” Benji rolled his shoulders and shook out his arms, like he was preparing for a boxing match. “Let’s take a look…”

He took Ethan’s hand in both of his own, cradling it gently in his right while he skimmed light fingers over the palm with his left. He was so caught up in appreciating the moment—the feeling of Ethan’s lightly calloused skin, the weight of his hand, the trio of curious little pink scars that branched out from the juncture of his thumb—he forgot to actually start speaking.

“Well?” Ethan prompted.

“Right, just…getting in tune,” Benji coughed, “With the, uh, ghosts. That assist in the whole palm-reading process.”

“I had no idea ghosts were involved.”

“Few do,” Benji said, wisely. “Okay, here we go….” Benji trailed his thumb across the central crease in Ethan’s hand, “Life line, hmm…very short. That doesn’t mean you’re going to die!” he clarified quickly. “It just means you’re independent, that your life isn’t impacted by others as much as by yourself and your own choices. And it’s very deep, too, indicating a great zest for life. Hear that? You’re zesty.”

“Good to know,” Ethan smiled up at Benji from under his lashes.

Benji indicated another spot on Ethan’s hand, “And this valley here means you enjoy scaring the bejeezus out of your friends, as a hobby.”

Ethan hmmed. “How specific.”

“The art of palmistry is useful like that. Anyway, your uh…” Benji cast about for inspiration, “your bacon line is very strong…”

“I hate bacon,” Ethan laughed.

“Exactly! Your hatred for bacon runs deep.”

“Amazing,” Ethan smirked. “What about my love line? You see anything in my future?”

Benji gulped, feeling that Ethan was well and truly onto him now. What he didn’t know was what sort of game Ethan was playing.

“The heart line, as it’s known in the trade…” he began, a little shakily, “Well, based on where it begins, I’d say you’re restless in relationships…” Benji traced his pointer finger down the crease, “and it fractures in several places. No stranger to heartbreak, are you?” Benji tried to gauge Ethan’s expression at that, but he wasn’t giving anything away.

“Oh, how interesting,” Benji lifted Ethan’s hand up for closer inspection, “Your heart line intersects with the fate line in a big way. I’d say destiny is lining up your dance card, even as we speak. Better be on the lookout for that special someone.”

“Hmm. But what if I think I’ve already met someone?” Ethan asked, looking Benji straight in the eye.

What? Benji felt trapped in his head as he struggled to form a response. Could Ethan seriously be talking about Benji? No, no, that was some damned wishful thinking—or was it? Was he being an absolute fool about this? Was Ethan talking about someone else, and Benji was on the verge of pulling him across the kitchen counter and kissing him senseless? Was he talking about Benji, and Benji was just sitting there ignoring him like the world’s biggest asshole?

Don’t panic, stop panicking, stop panicking right now for god’s sake, okay, yelling at yourself in your head while saying nothing and staring blankly like a deer that’s about be roadkill is the definition of panic, cut that out immediately--!

“I think I might know a little about palm reading too,” Ethan interrupted Benji’s internal frenzy, flipping their hands gently and running his thumbs in sync along the edges of Benji’s hand, “And I see…sushi in your future.” He glanced up at Benji. “From that place you love with the hibachi grill and more food safety violations than customers.”

“You have the gift,” Benji managed to reply, still recovering internally from whatever the hell had just happened. “Have you considered buying a gauzy veil and setting up shop in a circus tent?”

“I’ll leave that to the real experts,” Ethan said deferentially, nodding at Benji as he released his hand, letting it fall to the counter.

“So, dinner,” Benji coughed.

“Dinner,” Ethan agreed.

“I’ll just…grab my wallet and be back in a jiff.” Benji escaped to his bedroom, where he tried to get his breathing under control. He wanted to kick himself. Now he would never know what Ethan meant, and if there was even the tiniest chance that it had meant… That he’d wanted…

That’s it, he promised himself. If something like that ever happened again, he was going to go for it, goddammit. No more cowardice.

Chapter Text

“What’re you up to over there?” Benji squinted at Ethan, who seemed preoccupied with the base of one of Benji’s tower computers, of all things.

“Nothing,” Ethan stamped his foot down hard and there was a sharp crunch, “just killing a bug.”

“That sounded...not like a bug,” Benji frowned.

“Don’t worry,” Ethan gently took Benji’s shoulder when he moved to investigate, wheeling him back towards the couch where the two of them had been working on their laptops in companionable silence, “it was gross and there was goo, and we both know you’re a little squeamish so—”

“So, yeah, I don’t need to see that,” Benji shuddered. “Bet the little bastard came in with the last shipment.”

“More parts for the Project?”

Benji could hear the capitalization in Ethan’s voice and smiled. “Yeah, more nonsense for my software to try and talk to. Jake warned me that those crates sit around gathering dust in warehouses—and insect inhabitants, as well, it seems.”

“Who?” Ethan asked, looking strangely serious.

“You know, Jake? He’s that new delivery guy I told you about. Been coming by for a few weeks now. Nice, friendly, enjoys lifting heavy things whilst wearing tight-fitting clothing, so that’s a bonus.”

Ethan frowned. Benji continued, brow drawing a bit at Ethan’s expression, “He’s, uh, tall, blonde? Can’t miss him, he’s even more built than you are.”

“I might have seen him around.” Something in Ethan’s tone made that sound like it was a capital crime, rather than a completely innocent occurrence. “Is he coming by again any time soon?”

“Uh, yeah, I’m getting a new batch of materials tomorrow afternoon. Why? You kind of look like you want to waterboard him.”

“Waterboarding’s ineffective,” Ethan replied thoughtlessly, “unreliable results.”

“See, when you say things like that, it makes me think my sister was onto something with her theory about you being Hannibal Lecter’s slightly more attractive cousin.”

Ethan blinked, looking suddenly crestfallen. “Your sister doesn’t like me?”

“She likes you fine,” Benji gave Ethan’s shoulder a supportive squeeze, “she just thinks you probably indulge in a bit of cannibalism or something, because otherwise you’d be too good to be true.”

“Oh,” Ethan looked relieved, then pleased.

A terrible possibility occurred to Benji at that look, and he pointed firmly at Ethan, “You are not, under any circumstances, allowed to date my sister.”

“The thought never even crossed my mind,” Ethan said truthfully. “I was just worried, because I know how close you are with your sister. Figured if she warned you off me…”

“Well, yeah, but that doesn’t mean I trust her judgement when it comes to men. I mean, I told you about that bloody incompetent con artist she hooked up with in college?”

“If you’re gonna run a Ponzi scheme, at least do it right,” Ethan completed the story easily.

“Exactly. So, the fact that she’s lowkey convinced you’ve got a literal skeleton or two in your closet doesn’t really speak to your actual character.”

“Good.”

“Good. Now can you please, for my peace of mind, assure me that you’re not going to chop me—or Jake, for that matter—into little pieces and cook us in a stew?”

“I promise.”

“Thank you.”

“Though, that is exactly what an actual cannibal would say.”

“Damn, you’ve got a point.”

~~~~~

Benji didn’t think it was a coincidence that Ethan showed up the next afternoon with his tablet in hand, claiming he wanted company while he was drafting apartment layouts. Benji let him in, of course, and was confirmed in his suspicions when a knock sounded at the door and Ethan sat up on the couch like an overprotective German Shepard.

“No biting,” he cautioned Ethan as he went to answer the knock.

Ethan quirked a confused look at him, and Benji shook his head, “Never mind.”

“Hey, Jake!” he greeted the deliciously burly delivery man.

“Hey, Benji, how’s it goin’?” Jake asked, friendly smile wide. “Any exciting developments in the Project?” He’d been hanging around long enough to start emphasizing the simple noun too.

“Well, actually—” Benji started to answer but was cut off by Ethan.

“Not much, we’ve been a little busy,” Ethan grinned, sliding right into Benji’s personal space like he belonged there.

“Uh. Hi. This is, er, Ethan,” Benji awkwardly introduced them, “Ethan, Jake. Jake, Ethan.”

“Hi…” Jake looked askance at Ethan but held out his hand for a shake. Ethan took it and, if Jake’s ensuing wince was any clue, used quite a bit more force than was necessary.

“Well, here’s the manifest,” Jake scratched the back of his neck and handed the clipboard over to Benji, who perused it with one eye, keeping the other on Ethan. “We’ve only got the one crate today, but it’s heavy so I can—”

“Oh, no,” Ethan stepped forward, blocking Jake from coming inside, “I’ve got it.” He took the crate from the other man’s arms and carried it over to Benji’s workspace, quickly returning and throwing an arm around Benji’s shoulders.

Benji stiffened under the unexpected weight, the warmth of Ethan’s skin that seemed to burn right through his shirt. Part of Benji wanted to lean into it, but another, louder part of him was ringing with alarm bells.

The gesture was…protective. More than that, possessive. Twenty years ago, he might have thought it was a little hot, but this wasn’t twenty years ago, and he’d seen what possessive could turn into.

“Hey, have a good day, man,” Ethan said to Jake, casual, but Benji saw the threatening promise in his eyes.

“Yeah, right. You too, I guess.” Jake cut a glance over at Benji, who managed to dredge up a strained smile.

“See ya around, Jake,” he said, managing to keep his expression civil.

As soon as the door swung shut after him, however, Benji rounded on Ethan, throwing off his arm.

“What the hell was that?” he demanded to know.

“What was what?”

“Do not try that with me,” Benji warned, “You’re acting like—like a jealous boyfriend!”

Ethan scoffed, disbelieving. “I am not jealous.”

“Nor are you my boyfriend!” Benji half-shouted, his control slipping as his anger rose. “So, you don’t get to act like one! Not that I’d be letting you get away with that crap if you were.”

“I am cautious,” Ethan explained stiffly, “I got a really bad feeling from that guy.”

“Why? Because he’s friendly and handsome and actually gave me the time of day?”

Ethan’s expression hardened. “If you really want to sleep with him that much, I can go tell him to come back.”

“That’s not— for god’s sake, he’s at least fifteen years younger than me.” Benji pressed a fist to his forehead, trying not to let his emotions get the better of him. “It’s just nice to be appreciated every once in a while. You wouldn’t understand, every person with an interest in men wants to tear their clothes off when you’re in the vicinity. It’s harder when you’re a schlubby geek with no social skills.”

“You are not—” Ethan’s hand flew up, curling almost roughly along the back of Benji’s neck, cradling his face. “You’re—you just…you seriously underestimate yourself…”

Benji slumped, the fight draining out of him.

“Listen to me,” Ethan said firmly, “You know that girl behind the counter at the tea shop on fifth?”

“The one who always undercharges us?”

“The one who always undercharges you. She flirts herself breathless every time you’re there.”

“What? No, she doesn’t.”

“She really does. I know, because she asked me if I could give her your number.”

“Wha— did you do it?”

“No. I…may have let her draw certain assumptions. About the nature of our relationship.”

“Ethan!” Benji threw his hands in the air, backing out of Ethan’s grasp, “What the hell?”

“I’m sorry, I know I overstepped—both times—and I promise, it won’t happen again. I’m just…protective of my friends. And you’re pretty much the only one I have right now.”

Ethan’s puppy dog eyes were devastatingly effective, but Benji couldn’t let him entirely off the hook, not just yet. “You swear to me on—on something you really care about, that you won’t do any creepy, controlling shit like that again. I’m serious.”

Ethan put a hand over his heart, “I swear on your life, I won’t do it again.”

“Nice line,” Benji complimented sardonically, “But I’ve had…experience, with this sort of thing. My sister isn’t the only one who’s got shitty radar when it comes to bad-news boyfriends.”

“Benji,” Ethan breathed, radiating shame and remorse, “I never meant…and I know that most people don’t mean to, but…god. I’m really sorry.”

“Okay, okay…” Benji held up placating hands, “You are officially forgiven. You look so sad, I’d be a monster not to. Just so long as you’re aware this isn’t a three-strike system. You’re on your second chance, and that’s it.”

“I understand,” Ethan said, looking as grave as Benji’d ever seen him.

“Alright. Well, as part of your penance, you’re welcome to pry open that damned crate and unpack it.”

“It would be my pleasure.”

They set to work going through the new materials, the tension in the room slowly draining away as they settled into a rhythm together.

“What’s this?” Ethan asked, holding up a bundle of wire.

“Ethernet cable,” Benji identified it, before setting it aside.

“And this?” Ethan shook plastic sheeting off a compact metal cube.

“Uh…fan-less box PC. Used in a lot of hospitals, I’m checking to make sure its specialized hygienic design interfaces properly with my software. Are you going to keep asking what everything is like an over-curious little kindergartener?”

“Yes, I am. What’s…” Ethan trailed off, plucking a small black prism off the bottom of the box PC. “What’s this?”

“That is…” Benji squinted at it, “Actually, I have no idea.”

Benji took the slim black bit of plastic and held it up to the light. His heart skipped a beat.

He stumbled over to his desk, grabbing a pen and jamming it into the little box’s thin seam, cracking open the case.

“It’s…I mean, I’ve never seen one in person before but…” Benji dropped the little device like it had grown fangs. Then he scrambled for a notepad, writing out with shaky hands, “Spyware!!” Then he added, “Camera + audio!?”

Ethan reached out to lay one hand calmingly on Benji’s shoulder, while he brought the heel of the other down on the bug with splintering crack. He swept the remains up and headed for the kitchen, where he dumped them in a glass and then filled it with water, shorting it out entirely.

“I definitely didn’t order surveillance equipment,” Benji said, breath still coming fast as he joined Ethan in the kitchen, staring with no small amount of panic at the out-of-commission bug.

“Especially not the kind that records you,” Ethan agreed, mouth pressed into a thin, angry line.

“So….you might have been right about Jake,” Benji admitted.

“Would anyone else have had both access to and knowledge of what equipment was yours?”

“Probably not,” Benji said, miserable.

“Hey,” Ethan tapped his finger under Benji’s chin, lifting until he looked up and met his gaze. “That’s not on you.”

Benji sucked in a deep breath, squared his shoulders, and nodded. “Right. Okay. You said before that you did security stuff, right?”

“Yes.”

“You ever sweep for bugs?”

“Uh-huh. I’ll go get my gear.”

Ethan returned with a thick canvas bag of tech that looked like it had wandered off the set of the latest Bond movie. Benji was too freaked out by the possibility that someone had been watching him sing Madonna songs badly and mainline Doritos in the middle of the night to bother questioning why Ethan had so much equipment so conveniently on-hand.

Ethan proceeded to go over every inch of the apartment with a set of sophisticated-looking bug detectors, finishing off with a radiofrequency discovery device for good measure. Benji focused on his computers, drives, and other equipment, which might’ve been hacked or bugged or otherwise contaminated with internal, digital spyware.

After almost two hours of stressed, studious quiet, they found a total of seven bugs, two physical ones and a whopping five burrowed into various subroutines on Benji’s many, many machines.

“Well, this is disturbing,” Benji said lightly, after they’d destroyed the surveillance tech. His fingers were tapping a nervous dance along the outside of his thighs, and he felt like he wanted to cry, or break something, or possibly both. “Why the ever-loving fuck would someone want to spy on me that badly?”

“The Project,” Ethan replied simply. “I know you don’t think of it as being dangerous, but—"

“That’s not—it’s not supposed to be used to make money, or hurt anyone, or control anything—the whole point is for it to open up the digital world!” Benji dragged his hands through his hair.

“And the number of potential applications tech like that could have in terms of statecraft and corporate gain are off the charts,” Ethan countered, not unkindly. “I realize you don’t see it that way, and I love that about you—you see the best in everything and everyone, and I don’t want you to have to change that.”

“But apparently my lack of cynicism has well and truly bit me in the ass,” Benji finished.

“I’ll just try and be cynical enough for the both of us, from now on,” Ethan said, smiling wryly and moving closer to Benji. Not pressing into his space, just being there. Warm and solid and safe.

“God,” Benji tilted his head back, willing traitorous tears to go back where they came from, “I can’t believe I went off on you like that, earlier.”

“You were right to,” Ethan said, garnering a surprised look from Benji. “I went too far, and you called me on it.” His already somber expression turned downright stony. “You reminded me there are lines I shouldn’t cross.”

Benji didn’t know what to make of the strange gravity to Ethan’s words, so he just clapped his shoulder and said sincerely, “Well, I’m lucky to have you, mate.”

Ethan ducked his head and reached up to squeeze Benji’s hand. “Do you, uh, do you want to stay at my place?” he asked. “After a violation like this, I’d get it if you wanted out.”

Benji shook his head, “Thanks, but…I don’t want to let them—whoever the hell they are—run me out of my own home.”

“Then…do you want me to stay here?” Ethan gestured towards the living room, “Your couch is plenty comfortable.”

“I don’t want to impose…” Benji said awkwardly, stuck between wanting to seem cool and collected and the truth of the matter, which was that he felt profoundly unsafe and Ethan might be the only person in the world who could make that feeling go away.

“You wouldn’t be,” Ethan said firmly. “So, it’s settled. I’m staying here tonight.”

“Thank you,” Benji said, packing as much gratitude as he could into those two words.

“Hey,” Ethan wrapped an arm around Benji’s shoulders, everything about the gesture different than when he’d done it earlier that afternoon, and Benji couldn’t help but melt into it. “You don’t have to worry. I won’t let anything happen to you.”

Ethan’s other arm came up to pull Benji in close, and Benji realized they’d never actually hugged before. It was a shame they hadn’t, because Ethan excelled at it—he was blessedly warm, steady and yielding all at once, and Benji never wanted to let go.

He did let go, eventually, mainly because if Benji was pressed up against those smooth planes of muscle for another second, he couldn’t be held responsible for his actions.

They spent the rest of the evening as they often did, cooking and laughing and watching movies, all while pretending fairly successfully that this was any other ordinary night. A careful observer might have noticed, however, the way that Benji startled at any unexpected noise, or the way that Ethan never quite sat still, his head on a swivel to monitor all the exits.

When the time came, Ethan ducked out and returned with a tidy duffel bag and a pillow.

Benji grinned at the sight, the apparent innocence of it all contrasting so sharply with the cause. “I feel like a kid at my first sleepover,” he said, “Shall we stay up late? Watch scary movies and eat too much popcorn?”

“Isn’t that what we do almost every night anyway?” Ethan pointed out with a matching smile.

“Fair point.”

“And not to be a downer, but you look like you could use some sleep.”

“I am offended. I’ll have you know I look like a dream.”

“You do,” Ethan agreed easily, “but a dream that could use a good eight or nine hours to recharge after a stressful day.”

“Can’t argue with you there,” Benji sighed.

They conducted their respective evening routines with a minimum of clashing. Benji was privately quite pleased at how easily they moved in and out of each other’s space, brushing their teeth in sequence like an old married couple.

When Ethan stepped out of the bathroom after changing into boxers and a t-shirt, Benji appreciated the sight distantly, feeling like he watching events unfold on the jumbotron at the back of a concert.

“You’re still pretty shaken up, huh?” Ethan asked, hands on hips and a worried wrinkle in his brow, “I thought I’d get at least a little of your famous unfiltered commentary with all this.” He gestured vaguely to his sleep attire and their shared lodging.

“Um, something about sleeping in the nude, maybe? Or, uh, sleepwalking? Naked sleepwalking?” Benji offered, half-heartedly.

“Alright, to bed with you.” Ethan spun his finger in an about-face gesture, ending up pushing Benji gently in the direction of his room.

“Wow,” Benji yawned, “you’re right, I’m definitely not running on all cylinders, because I should have had a field day with that.”

Ethan paused at the threshold of the bedroom, and Benji turned around, teasing, “What, not gonna check under the bed for monsters?”

“I did a pretty thorough sweep this afternoon. Pretty sure I’d have noticed if bigfoot was camping out under your mattress.”

“Only if he’s not invisible. And all rational theories point to his—or her, we don’t know—deployment of some sort of anti-spotting technology, or possibly an evolutionary quirk that renders them unseen to the naked eye.”

“Goodnight, Benji,” Ethan said pointedly, but he couldn’t suppress a smile.

Benji smiled back. “Goodnight, Ethan.”

Ethan pulled the door three-quarters shut behind him, enough to still let a little sound and light escape. Benji allowed himself one more moment of paranoia, peering into his closet just to be absolutely certain no knife-wielding psychopath was waiting inside to murder him in his sleep, before falling into bed with a heavy exhale.

I’m safe, he told himself, and I’m not alone. Ethan’s barely a dozen feet away.

And with that thought, he fell into a dreamless sleep.

Chapter Text

Benji awoke with an Idea. A web of interconnected ideas actually, but they all coalesced around one Idea, an Idea that would blow his coder’s block out of the water and might bring his Project (and all the related bugging bullshit) to a conclusion once and for all.

It was a sign of how distracted he was by the enormity of this Idea that it wasn’t until he’d thrown on a robe and left his room that he registered the smell of fresh pancakes wafting from the kitchen.

“You…made breakfast?” he said, rather superfluously, as he peered around the corner to find Ethan standing in front of the stove, wearing Benji’s “Kiss the Cook” apron.

“Yes?” Ethan reflected Benji’s questioning tone, holding up a whisk as if to say, ‘look, proof!’

“That’s very kind of you. Considering you were doing me a favor by staying here.”

“Not really,” Ethan cracked an egg expertly with one hand, pouring it neatly into a ready pan, “I would’ve been worried about you anyway, this way at least I could keep an eye on you.” He paused. “Not literally. I mean, I didn’t watch you sleep. Because that would’ve been creepy.” Ethan looked at Benji as if for confirmation, which he gave.

“That would indeed have had a touch of creep to it. Though, under the circumstances, I can understand the impulse. But never mind! I have news.”

Benji launched into a detailed, if haphazard, explanation of his Idea, but after about twenty seconds of rapid-fire technical terminology Ethan’s eyes glazed over and Benji gave up, waving his hands.

“Never mind, I’ll nutshell it for you: apparently mild terror is a really great motivator, because I think I’ve finally got the key to finishing my Project.”

“Oh! That’s great.” For a second Ethan’s expression flickered, but it quickly settled on blandly pleased.

“Yeah, so I’m gonna go start working on that, don’t worry if I get distracted and don’t eat or shower or whatever, I’ve done it before and it’ll be fine…” Benji’s fingers were already itching for his keyboard as he spun around, headed for his desk.

“That doesn’t sound fine…” Ethan demurred, following Benji, “I was also hoping we could have a conversation about security around here.”

“Do you think I should install metal detectors at the door?” Benji kidded, booting up his computer, “Get a guard dog?”

“The dog wouldn’t be a bad idea.”

“Buy me a dog then, whatever you think’s best, I trust your judgment…” Benji scratched his chin, impatiently rifling through a stack of external drives.

“Okay, first security lesson: don’t leave important decisions about the safekeeping of your home to other people,” Ethan lectured, hands on hips. He’d probably have looked more imposing if he wasn’t still wearing that novelty apron and if his hair wasn’t sticking up at adorably odd angles, Benji noted distantly.

“Mmhmm.”

“Second lesson: you should do an inventory of keys to your apartment. Besides you and the building maintenance personnel, does anyone else have one? A neighbor, your sister?”

“Nope, just me and the super. Plus the one on the doorframe.”

“The….? Benji. Tell me you don’t keep a spare key in the single most obvious and exposed place possible.”

“Ethan, I don’t keep a spare key in the most obvious and exposed place possible.”

Ethan blew out a long, beleaguered breath, face pinched.

“Would it make you feel better if I got rid of the key on the doorframe?” Benji offered.

“Yes.”

“Okay,” Benji went to the door and flung it open, feeling around the doorframe and returning with a key. Then, he picked up Ethan’s hand and pressed it into his palm.

Ethan glanced up at him, surprised.

“What?” Benji smirked, “I can’t think of a safer place for it.”

“I….thank you.” Ethan closed his fingers carefully over the key, like it was more than just five bucks’ worth of cheap steel.

“Excellent. Now that that’s sorted, I really have to get to work…” Benji clapped both hands on Ethan’s shoulders, before leaning in and smacking a kiss to his cheek.

He pulled back and they both looked a little stunned.

“Don’t know why I did that. Maybe I couldn’t ignore the call of the apron,” Benji frowned down at the offending article of clothing and its tempting message, “Just ignore me.”

“Never,” Ethan murmured, but Benji didn’t hear him, already returning to his desk and beginning to type furiously, fingers a blur over the keyboard.

Ethan retreated to the kitchen, returning a few minutes later with a plate of pancakes and fried eggs.

“You really do need to eat,” he insisted, scooting the plate onto one of the few inches of Benji’s desk not covered by electronic detritus.

When Benji just hmmed and nearly stuck his elbow directly into the maple syrup, Ethan swiped it back up out of harm’s way and jammed a threatening finger in Benji’s face, “Do not make me force feed you, that would just be embarrassing for both of us.”

Benji held up a hand in surrender and, without taking his gaze off the stream of characters running on his computer, hacked off a hunk of pancake and began to chew.

His eyes widened and he let out an involuntary moan. “Wow, this is really good.”

Ethan clasped his hands behind his back and nodded, “You’re welcome.”

“I’m sorry,” Benji finally ripped his focus away from his screen to look up at Ethan, apologetic, “I’m being an ungrateful ass, but I appreciate your cooking and your company and your general well-intentioned mother henning—”

“Hey—”

“Very manly, very sexy mother henning,” Benji corrected. “It’s great, and it’s been a while since I had someone who cared enough to bother. But I get like this sometimes, where the work just takes over, and really the only thing for it is to ride it out.”

“I can live with that,” Ethan decided. “As long as you come back to the real world, eventually.”

“Eventually,” Benji winked up at Ethan, before shoveling another heaping bite of pancakes into his mouth.

“Alright. I’ll leave you alone for now. Okay if I check in on you later?”

“Feel free. You’ve got the run of the place, now,” Benji gestured with a forkful of eggs towards the key Ethan was still holding. “Make sure you use your new powers for good, not evil.”

“I’m sure you’ll keep me on the straight and narrow,” Ethan shot back, before heading out the door.

He returned around lunch, preparing sandwiches for them and then making pointed little “ahem” noises and sending increasingly intimidating glares at Benji until he actually ate his. He was in and out of the apartment for the rest of the afternoon, finally settling in around three with a sketchbook and pencils.

“How long have you been staring at me?” Benji asked, when his peripheral vision finally picked up on the direction of Ethan’s gaze.

“Not staring, observing. And, uh, about an hour.”

“Uh, why? If I may ask?”

“The light’s really good. Interesting shadows,” Ethan answered evasively.

“Oh, okay,” Benji accepted, before pausing again. “Wait, what?”

“You’ve got a really expressive face!” Ethan defended himself before Benji had even cottoned on to what was happening, “It’s perfect for sketching.”

“You’re drawing me?” Benji finally realized, flabbergasted.

“I should probably have asked…” Ethan lowered his pencil, looking like a scolded schoolboy.

“No! I mean, yes, that might’ve been good manners, but it’s not like I mind. I just, I don’t know, I guess I’d have thought…”

“What?”

“If you went to the park or something, you could probably find a pretty girl who’d be happy to sit for you. Or a pretty guy, or a pretty pigeon or tree or anything that’s not a middle-aged computer programmer who had a roast beef sandwich practically force-fed to him not that long ago. Not much of a face to inspire art.”

Ethan cocked his head, visibly considering his response before settling on, “Benji, there are few faces I enjoy looking at more.”

Benji had no idea how to respond to that.

An irritatingly rational voice in the back of Benji’s head reminded him that he’d promised himself he’d act the next time his admittedly shaky flirtation-radar pinged with Ethan—and this was a hell of a ping. But a louder, used-car-salesman type of voice piped up to pitch a convincing counterargument: we’re busy right now, we can’t afford to exert the kind of emotional processing power required to deal with a situation like that, no matter if it ends up having a positive or negative conclusion.

The result of this internal kerfuffle was Benji staring slack-jawed at Ethan for at least twenty seconds before blurting out in a half-accusatory tone: “Flirt?!”

Ethan raised an eyebrow.

“You flirt,” Benji tried to clarify, his words coming out like thick sludge, “Flirt, you, with me?”

“I…think there’s a question in there,” Ethan deduced, “A question to which my answer is…yes?”

“Yes?” Benji echoed.

“Yes, I am flirting with you,” Ethan confirmed. “Is that alright?”

“Not sure,” Benji answered honestly, “Seems to have a…bad. Effect. On brain.”

“I don’t know,” Ethan said, a smirk drawing across his lips, “I’m enjoying the show.”

“Bad,” Benji scolded, face growing hot, “Bad Ethan, using your powers for evil, like I warned you not to!” He pressed a finger to his temple and tried to refocus on his screen, announcing, “Now, if you don’t mind, I’m going to go back to ignoring you…”

“Okay if I keep sketching?” Ethan asked, hopeful.

“Knock yourself out,” Benji said as casually as he could, considering his heart genuinely skipped a beat at the overwhelming, Titanic-esque romance of it all.

Benji’s thoughts did eventually drift away from “if you wanted to do some life drawing, I’d be down, if you know what I mean” to “goddamn there’s a forward slash in this messy pile of code somewhere that’s ruining everything, where are you, you little bugger.”

As the day wore on, Benji didn’t notice Ethan leaving or returning, even when he dragged a side-table over to Benji’s desk and laid a bounty of Chinese take-out boxes out on it.

“Fascinating,” Ethan said, snapping a pair of chopsticks in half, “I’ve never seen you approach orange chicken with anything less than the zeal of a starving man, and yet here you are. Ignoring it, like the side of broccoli I always try and force on you.”

“There are things in life more important than orange chicken. Not many things, but they do exist.”

“Why haven’t I seen you like this before?” Ethan asked, curious eyes boring into Benji’s profile.

Benji raised one shoulder in a distracted shrug, “I guess I’ve had better things to do than hyperfocus on work.”

“Like what?”

Benji answered without thinking, “You.”

Benji’s face scrunched up to one side as he ran that back in his head. “Not that I’m…doing you.”

“I think I would’ve noticed that,” Ethan agreed.

Benji’s hand shot out to grab the nearest container and shove its contents in his mouth before he managed to say something else incriminating.

They ate dinner in comfortable silence, Ethan apparently content to enjoy his mushroom stir fry and watch Benji frown at his computer. Dusk came and went, and Ethan relocated to the couch with a novel he pulled from Benji’s shelf.

It eventually became well and truly late, and Ethan finally left after extracting a promise that Benji would go to bed soon, stepping out the door with one last glance cast over his shoulder.

Chapter Text

Ethan returned the next morning to find Benji in exactly the same position as he’d left him.

“Did you sleep?” he said, more an accusation than a question.

“Pretty sure I passed out for a while. Woke up with the ‘J’ key stuck to my face,” Benji pointed swiftly to the corresponding gap in his laptop’s keyboard, “But I’m carrying on fine without it. Silly letter, anyway.”

“It’s one of the letters in your name,” Ethan pointed out.

“Is it?”

“And what’s this?” Ethan picked up an empty, powdered-sugar-stained plastic bag of the corner of Benji’s desk.

“I needed brain food.”

“Donuts are not brain food,” Ethan said, pained. “Right. I’m gonna go make you something to eat that’s not just structured corn syrup, then you’re off to bed.”

“Yes, dear,” Benji agreed absently, not listening to a word.

Ethan disappeared into the kitchen and returned a few minutes later with a plate of fruit and scrambled eggs. “Down the hatch,” he said briskly, putting a fork in Benji’s hand and the plate in front of him.

Benji managed to spear a strawberry, but then missed his mouth by a good two inches, only succeeding in getting fruit juice in his beard.

“Okay, never mind,” Ethan took back the silverware before Benji took out an eye, “Breakfast can wait, sleep first.”

Benji didn’t move.

“I will pick you up and carry you, don’t think I won’t,” Ethan threatened.

“Sorry, you saying something?” Benji tilted his head slightly in Ethan’s direction.

“Bed!” Ethan hooked his arms under Benji’s and lifted, pulling Benji half out of his chair.

Benji yelped and tried to wriggle out of Ethan’s grasp. “Hey!” he squeaked indignantly, “Wait, when did you get here?”

“Benji!”

“No, hold on, I knew you were here. Sort of. Uh, what do you want?”

“For you to step away from this computer and get some sleep.”

“What?” Benji shook his head, bewildered, like Ethan had just suggested Benji move to Finland and become a sheep-herder. “Why would I go to bed, it’s light out!”

“Yes, it is. It was also light out about twenty-four hours ago, which, incidentally, is the last time your head was acquainted with a pillow.”

“That was a lot of words, too many words… I’ll get back to you when I have the spare brain power to understand that many words.”

Benji tried to sit back down, but Ethan got a stubborn look in his eye and renewed his effort to physically remove Benji from his desk.

“Oh, c’mon, Ethan,” Benji struggled, feeling like he had the strength of a baby bird in Ethan’s clutches, “like you’ve never cared about something enough to sacrifice a bit of sleep over it?”

Ethan’s poker face was excellent, but Benji knew better than to fall for it. “If you can swear to me you’ve never done the same for something you cared about, then fine, I’ll hit the sack. But otherwise….”

Ethan glared at him for another minute, but when Benji didn’t break, he did, releasing his hold. “Fine.”

“Thank you.”

“Just for today, though. I’m cutting you off at midnight.”

“Like Cinderella, understood,” Benji patted Ethan’s elbow reassuringly. Ethan didn’t look particularly reassured, but he finally stepped back and gave Benji some space.

Benji returned to his programming, taking a few listless bites of the abandoned breakfast. Ethan picked up the novel he’d been reading the night previously, scanning its pages and shooting mildly concerned glances up at Benji whenever he swore at a misbehaving protocol or missing piece of data.

“Gold star treatment here, at the Hotel de Ethan,” Benji ribbed him when Ethan emerged from the kitchen with lunch.

“I live to serve,” Ethan replied, droll.

“When I’m done with all this, I’ll make it up to you. Not sure how, considering I can’t cook or anything, but…”

“I’m sure I’ll think of something,” Ethan said, mischief in his tone.

Benji shot a glance over at Ethan, “Pretty sure you didn’t mean that to sound as suggestive as it did.”

Ethan just raised his eyebrows and made a show of returning to his book.

The day wore on and the sun tracked its way across the sky, beginning to make its downward journey towards evening.

Benji vaguely took note of the fact that Ethan was rearranging his living room furniture, but not enough to ask him why. 

If he’d been paying attention, he’d have realized it was so Ethan could clear a space for a workout, which he proceeded to complete without Benji ever noticing.

“You know, I never expected to be jealous of a hunk of plastic and metal, but here I am, playing second fiddle and hating it,” Ethan complained mildly, wiping at the back of his neck with a towel.

“Hmm?” Benji mumbled in reply. 

There was a whoosh of fabric, and Benji glanced up for a moment to find the source. 

He did a comical double take, cracking his neck with the whiplash. 

“Uh, Ethan?” Benji asked, staring unabashedly, “Why have you taken your shirt off?”

“I was working out, it got warm.”

“As a point of fact, I’m getting a bit warm myself,” Benji tugged on the collar of his shirt. 

Ethan grinned. “I was also trying to catch your attention...” Ethan twirled his discarded shirt lazily, like the absolute tease he was. 

“Consider my attention caught. Was there a particular reason, or...?”

“I’m concerned about eye strain. You’ve been staring at that screen non-stop for hours.”

“If you’re worried about eye strain, then I don’t think you’ve quite taken the right approach. I’m not sure if I’m physically capable of looking away right now.”

Benji wasn’t joking, it would take at least three lifetimes to build up the strength of character not to ogle those glistening muscles. 

Ethan smirked. “Good. Now that you’re all mine…”

Benji gulped.

“You’re going to shower, eat something with real nutritional value, and then possibly take a nap.”

“Nooooo….”

“Yes. Or I’ll…” Ethan cast around for an appropriate punishment.

“Put your shirt back on?” Benji suggested.

“Is that the worst thing you can think of?”

“Yes. Actually, no, clowns with the ability to phase through solid objects. That’s at least ten percent worse.”

“God, you’re cute when you’re half crazed with sleep-deprivation.”

“Did you just call me cute?”

“Yep.”

“Huh,” Benji blinked.

“I should’ve tried this strategy sooner,” Ethan said, satisfied.

“This is an unfair advantage!” Benji gestured helplessly at Ethan’s bare chest.

“Shower,” Ethan insisted, clasping Benji’s forearm and dragging him out of his chair.

“I’m not that ripe—oh,” Benji caught a whiff of himself, “I retract that statement, I should be hosed down for the sake of the neighborhood.”

“Agreed.”

“I also feel I must make the obligatory ‘you’re welcome to join me’ joke,” Benji added.

“When your brain isn’t so fried, ask me again,” Ethan replied easily.

Benji half-nodded and stumbled towards the bathroom, head spinning from more than the sudden movement after hours of being stationary.

He came out of the shower a while later feeling refreshed and smelling much less like a dumpster behind a Chinese restaurant, which he thought was a win.

“What’re you making in there?” he called to Ethan in the kitchen, popping around the corner a second later.  

Ethan had, unfortunately but sensibly, put his shirt back on. “Sautéd onion and pear, I’ll puree it in a moment with some pumpkin and—”

“Never mind,” Benji wrinkled his nose, “I don’t think I want to know.”

Ethan paused, then amended, “It’s soup.”

“That’s better.” Benji leaned his hip against the counter, “Pretty sure I didn’t have any food that fresh in here yesterday.”

“I stopped by the grocery store during your work-haze and restocked. Hope you don’t mind.”

Benji laughed, “Hardly. Though you’re feeding me so often, you ought to start charging me.”

Ethan grinned and countered, “I spend so much time over here, I really should start chipping in on the rent.”

“Just move in altogether, make it neater,” Benji suggested.

“Sounds like a plan.” The corner of Ethan’s mouth pulled up in a little smile, the kind that felt private, like it was meant for Benji and Benji alone. Smiles like that made him think that Ethan might have wondered about the same things Benji had, contemplating what it might be like if they were a real couple and not just friends who lived in each other’s pockets.

“So, have you been freed of your computer’s spell?” Ethan asked, transferring the contents of the pan into the blender and retrieving a can opener.

“Almost. I think I really am close to being finished with the big stuff—one last push, and I’ll be moving on to final testing.”

“That’s great. I’m really proud of you,” Ethan said, not quite meeting Benji’s gaze.

“Thanks,” Benji watched Ethan pry open the can of pumpkin, a slight feeling of unease prickling at the back of his neck.

“When you’re done with this project, do you have plans?” Ethan asked, studiously nonchalant.

“Plans?”

“Yeah, like, take a big vacation to Paris. Maybe go visit your parents in England, or start some new project, or…or move on to something else entirely.”

Move somewhere else entirely, is what Benji heard.

“I don’t know about anything like that. I mean, I have always wanted to see Paris—I grew up a quick flight away from the bloody place and still never found the time to go—but I don’t have any concrete plans about my future, no. I imagine I’ll just stay here for a while, see what happens.”

“And you still want to be near your sister, right?” Ethan said, sounding more settled than he had a minute earlier.

“Yep,” Benji agreed, steeling his confidence before adding, “And you, of course. Not gonna leave you all by your lonesome.”

Ethan gifted him with a brilliant smile, all bright teeth and gently crinkled eyes. “I would be very lonely without you.”

Benji’s heart positively ached at that. Surely it wasn’t just a friendly sentiment? Was this the perfect emotional beat to parlay their friendship into something…else?

He mentally marshalled his choices. Option 1: Do something for Christ’s sake, what did he have to lose? And Option 2: Do nothing, because that was so much easier and less likely to give him a stroke.

“Ethan—” Benji began, voice catching.

Ethan started up the blender at the same time, effectively ending the moment before it could begin.

Probably for the best, Benji thought, shuffling his feet and trying to settle his nerves.

Ethan finished pureeing the soup in batches, giving it a stir and then grabbing a fresh spoon.

“Here, try this…” he turned to Benji with a loaded spoon.

Benji gave the sample of soup a skeptical frown.

“Trust me,” Ethan said gently, and Benji let him slip the spoon between his lips.

Benji’s eyes closed of their own volition as a unique and utterly delectable flavor burst across his tongue.

“That’s…incredible,” Benji admitted, “I’d never have guessed it contained such a heinous mixing of fruit and vegetable.”

“Culinary risks often pay off,” Ethan said, wisely.

“Occasionally they don’t, however, as my sister and I learned when we were kids and we had the ingenious idea to try and make cracker soup.”

“I’m almost afraid to ask…”

“We took a pot, filled it with tepid water, and then dumped a box of saltines in it. We ate it all, and were so, so sick—”

“Ugh,” Ethan held up a palm to stop him elaborating but chuckled anyway.

They spent a pleasant dinner trading stories, Benji’s often embroidered with fanciful details, while Ethan’s were often absent of identifying markers. Ethan did exciting but vague things, with interesting yet blurry people, in exotic but non-specific locales. Benji was tempted to press for more, but ultimately decided to trust that there was a good reason Ethan was so guarded about his past.

Benji eventually gave in to the siren song of his computers, retiring with a mug of tea to continue grinding away at his software.

As night closed in, he noticed Ethan was sketching away again, even though the whole room was cloaked in shadow.

“Can you even see what you’re drawing over there?” Benji asked suddenly.

“I’ve got better-than-average night vision,” Ethan answered without glancing up, “And although natural light’s generally best for drawing, the computer’s illumination gives you a dramatic look.”

“Hmm," Benji flushed slightly at the reminder that he was the subject of Ethan's drawings, "Do I ever get to see one of these masterpieces?”

“I’m…not very good,” Ethan said, hesitant.

“Bollocks,” Benji said immediately, getting to his feet and marching over.

He flicked on a nearby lamp, since his night vision was decidedly mediocre, and peered down at the sketchbook resting in Ethan’s lap.

It was…him. A portrait of Benji, brow folded as he looked intently down at his screen, chin propped up in one hand. But he didn’t look anything like he felt he did. Where his shoulders sagged with exhaustion, his graphite counterpart was determined, where he felt weighty lines adding decades to his face, he found character and reminders of all the laughing and living that had written themselves into his skin.

“That’s me?” Benji wondered aloud, his emotions all tangled up in one another and difficult to decipher.

“Were you expecting someone else?”

“But that’s, it’s…it’s lovely. I mean, I know jack all about drawing, but look at how delicate your lines are, and you’ve done that fancy shading with the criss-crossing lines, and, honestly, this looks like something that they hang in a museum next to a big famous oil painting… One of those sketches-before-the-masterpiece exhibits, you know?”

Ethan’s chin was stuck proudly up in the air, all previous traces of shyness vanished.

Benji gave his shoulder a playful shove, which didn’t dent Ethan’s grin. “And, I just realized that your little bashful artist act was all a ploy to get me off my computer.”

“You’re on to me,” Ethan conceded with a laugh.

Benji wagged a chastising finger at Ethan, backing towards his desk. “No more distracting me with your wannabe Michelangelo shenanigans!”

“Michelangelo was more of a sculptor, Da Vinci’s probably a better comparison if you want to stick to that time period,” Ethan casually rebutted him, “Also, ‘wannabe’? I’m hurt.”

“Nope!” Benji pressed his hands over his ears, “Not engaging with you!”

“Your time is running out,” Ethan tapped his wristwatch pointedly.

“How not-at-all-ominous of you to say,” Benji snarked back, though it was a good point—eleven had come and gone, and midnight was bearing down on him.

“Just a friendly reminder…” Ethan rolled gracefully to his feet, taking his sketchbook with him as he moved a few feet towards the desk, perching on the couch.

Benji cracked his knuckles and got back to work.

As the final hour ticked nearer, Ethan moved steadily closer until he was lounging on the corner of Benji’s desk.

Benji blew out a frustrated huff of air when his gaze caught for the millionth time on Ethan’s arms, muscles working delicately beneath the skin as he idly touched up his sketch.

Ethan badly hid a smirk at Benji’s irritated exhale, giving up any charade of pretending to draw in favor of watching Benji with amused eyes.

“Are you just gonna sit there staring at me?” Benji grumbled, curling in on himself at the close-range attention.

“Until you go to bed? Yes.”

“Maybe I shouldn’t have given you that key to my place. It’s made you mad with power.”

“I was already mad with power.”

“But you’re mistaken if you think a firm look is gonna sway me, I was a bit of a hellion in high school, and even Mrs. Johnson’s infamous Death Squint couldn’t stop me from throwing paper airplanes at that annoying Johnny Wilcox’s head.

“Also!” Benji held up a threatening finger, “Don’t go taking your shirt off again, that was underhanded, and you only get to do it once.”

Ethan took this into consideration and found a different tactic.

He pulled on the most magnificent pout he was capable of and stuck his elbows on the edge of Benji’s desk, pleading, “Benji, please. Turn the computer off.”

Benji’s jaw dropped when he turned and was hit full force with that gorgeous, beseeching visage. “Oh, god, Mr. Buttons,” he said under his breath.

“Um, what?”

“He was this absolutely fruity little poodle I had when I was a kid,” Benji explained, “He used to be a show dog, but then there was an incident with a lawn mower and….well. Long story short, by the time Mr. Buttons was in my youthful custody, he was only in possession of three legs.”

“This childhood anecdote is taking a dark turn.”

“Anyway, Mr. Buttons used to get this look, this completely heart-wrenching pitiful look when I wouldn’t pay enough attention to him, and that is exactly the look you just had on your face.”

“I object to this comparison,” Ethan grumbled.

“Objection noted. Now, do you need to go for a walk? Perhaps have your water bowl topped off?”

“You’ve seen me work out, you know I’m physically capable of killing you, right?”

“With just your little finger, I’m sure. But you never would, because you’re far too fond of me.”

“You may be overestimating that fondness.”

“I’m still here, and in one piece, aren’t I? And, I still have half a minute until that midnight deadline of yours.”

Ethan harrumphed and turned to stare at the clock hanging behind Benji’s desk. He waited for the last seconds to tick down, foot tapping an impatient staccato.

“There, midnight, on the dot,” Ethan announced as the minute and hour hands overlapped perfectly.

“Just another second, just a second…” Benji chanted, frantically hitting buttons and checking processes.

“Don’t make me do something we’ll both regret…” Ethan laid a hand significantly over the nearest of Benji’s external drives, inching it towards the edge of the desk.

Benji threw himself over the drive like he was blocking a bullet, smacking Ethan’s wandering hand away. “Ethan, I adore you completely, but if you harm any of my equipment I will not hesitate to do you deadly harm.”

“You adore me?” Ethan repeated, sounding thrilled.

“Shut up, I’m barely lucid,” Benji mumbled. “Just…give me twenty seconds, to make sure everything’s running smoothly so it can keep chugging away overnight without me.”

Ethan crossed his arms and jerked his head in grudging approval, and Benji jumped to it.

“Alright!” He pushed back from the desk nineteen seconds later and stood, knees creaking their objection. “God…” the room spun slightly around him, and he was grateful for the supporting hand Ethan pressed to his back when his balance became visibly impaired, “I think I could use a lie down.”

“Good idea,” Ethan deadpanned, “wish I’d thought of that.”

“You know, this is getting to be a bit of a tradition, with us,” Benji gestured expansively to the phenomenon of Ethan putting him to bed, “Or a bad habit, depending on your perspective.”

“A good habit, I think,” Ethan mused, “after all, I skipped yesterday and look what happened.”

“Can’t argue with that,” Benji admitted, the door to his room swimming into view, "Guess you'd better go to bed with me from now on. Or, something like that..."

Ethan half-carried Benji over to the bed, tossing him unceremoniously on top of the mussed sheets.

“Oh, wait,” Benji bolted upright, “I just thought of a parameter I forgot to—”  Ethan pushed him back down with a firm hand to his chest.

“Write it down,” Ethan produced a piece of paper and a pen from his back pocket, apparently having predicted this outcome, “You can do it in the morning.”

Benji reluctantly obeyed, scratching down a note for himself that he hoped would be comprehensible come dawn. He shot a rebellious glance at the open bedroom door.

Ethan followed his eyeline and sighed, “I’m tempted to lock you in here.”

“Kinky.”

Ethan laughed, and sound vibrated through the hand he still had laid on Benji’s chest.

“No computers until morning, do you hear me?”

“Yes, sir,” Benji yawned. He was pretty sure Ethan said something else then, but he couldn’t quite make it out through the rush of unconsciousness that overtook him the next moment.

Chapter Text

Hungry was Benji’s first, overwhelming sensation upon crawling blearily back into awareness. He half-rolled, half-fell out of bed, pulling most of the covers down to the ground with him. He quickly gave up on disentangling himself from them, just dragging the whole lot with him into the kitchen like a quilted burrito.

It was almost two in the afternoon the clock above the stove informed him, which explained why he felt like he’d been asleep for a decade. He tore into a banana before investigating the fridge, finding a container of leftover soup from the night before. He downed a huge glass of water while waiting for his soup to heat in the microwave, checking his phone to remember what day it was.

As he dug ravenously into the lukewarm soup, he discovered something crinkly in the pocket of his robe. He dug the object out and found what appeared to be a note from himself, but not in any language he recognized. Another minute of staring allowed him to decipher enough of the scribbles to remember what he’d been trying to remind himself of, and so he took his soup with him and returned to his desk.

He swept a finger across the touchpad of his computer and found the best message any programmer could hope for: “Test Complete: Success.”

The message was repeated across the other open windows, on the laptop and the desktop he’d called to service the day before to deal with overflow.

“Holy shit,” he whispered, then said more loudly, “Holy shit!” He leapt to his feet, nearly upending his half-empty bowl of soup in his excitement.

He turned in circles on the spot, clashing intentions sending him every which way. He should jump up and down and shout his success to the heavens! He should call his sister and tell her! He should email the non-profit that was funding this leg of his work with the news! He should eat an entire pint of Ben & Jerry’s in celebration! He should jump directly out the window to inform the entire suburb that he, Benji Dunn, had done it!

No, wait! He should tell Ethan.

That finally kicked him out of his overexcited, indecisive loop and sent him racing to the door, throwing it open intent on barreling over to Ethan’s to share the news.

However, a loud, angry voice bursting from the seams of Ethan’s door stopped him in his tracks. It definitely wasn’t Ethan’s voice, though his quickly followed just as angry as the first.

Benji’s first thought was “wait, Ethan has someone in his apartment who’s not me?”

His next thought was, “don’t be dense, of course he knows other people, and has them over sometimes, apparently in order to get in shouting matches with them.”

His third thought was, “I really hope this isn’t some sort of lover’s quarrel, because I may actually cry if that’s the case,” which was when he decided to stop thinking and start listening.

He inched closer, bare feet noiseless on the carpeted floor, until he started to make out some distinct words and phrases.

Ethan’s voice, growling in reply to something, “You’re not in charge here.”

“No, I’m not, I’m telling you this as a friend—”

“Don’t give me that—”

“Me? Like I’m being unreasonable? You’re—”

Ethan hushed the stranger suddenly, and the hallway became deathly quiet.

They can’t have heard me, Benji rationalized, frozen stock still. Then: okay, maybe Ethan did, because super-hearing seems like something he’d totally have.

Benji raised his fist and knocked cautiously on the door, figuring he’d cut his losses and at least get to see who’d pissed Ethan off to the point of shouting.

There was a beat of tense waiting, and then Ethan pulled open the door with a flat, cold expression. His face softened when he saw Benji.

“Uh, hi,” Benji wiggled his fingers in an uncomfortable little wave, eyes flickering over Ethan’s left shoulder to catch a glimpse of a stocky man with short hair and a grumpy countenance, “I just came by to, er, talk, but if I’m interrupting…”

“No, Will was just leaving.” The finality of Ethan’s tone brooked no argument, so the stranger just shook his head one last time and pushed past Benji with a huff.

“Bye?” Benji offered weakly as he watched the man go, marching down the hallway with almost military posture.

“Sorry about that,” Ethan said, eyes sharp and flinty as he followed the man’s exit, “Just having a little work conflict.”

“No need to apologize to me. Are you alright? You kind of looked like you were on the verge of brawling with Mr. Beige Suit.”

A laugh bubbled up under Ethan’s frown, “That’s a good name for him. And don’t worry, I might’ve wanted to punch the guy before, but I’ve never actually done it.”

“Good for him, then, because I’m sure you’d knock him on his ass.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence, but he’s tougher than he looks.”

“I’d bet on you every time,” Benji said, not missing a beat. “Or, if required, I’d fight him myself for your honor.”

Ethan smiled again, visibly decompressing. “I’m touched, but I’d advise against that. He’s a seventh-degree black belt in Tae Kwon Do, and once told me his master’s motto was ‘shake it, break it, dislocate it.’”

“How colorful. Also, this architecture business is a lot more intense than I imagined. Do most of your lot need to be highly skilled marital artists?”

“Comes in handy during negotiations.”

“I’d buy a ticket to that show.” Benji cracked a smile, but had to add, “You know, one of these days I’m not gonna let you off the hook like that.”

“Hmm?” Ethan’s expression was mild, but there was a subtle crack in his façade, maybe still shaken from his confrontation a few minutes earlier.

“I’m just saying, I don’t think I’ve ever actually seen you use that drafting board,” Benji gestured to the pristine piece of furniture tucked in the corner, “And your colleague looked more like a Navy SEAL than a paper pusher.”

Ethan hid his shock well, but not completely. Benji worried for a moment that he’d pushed Ethan into a corner, that he was about to lie outright, and Benji didn’t know if he could take that.

But after a few moments’ thought, Ethan composed himself and said simply, “You didn’t say anything before.”

“None of my business. You do what you do, right?” Benji shrugged, “As long as you come back in one piece, I don’t really care if you’re a karate-chopping architect or a jewel thief or Santa Claus. We already nixed the cannibal possibility, and honestly, that’s the real deal-breaker for me.”

Benji hadn’t noticed how tense the lines of Ethan’s body were until he relaxed, shoulders falling and weight shifting to one foot as he eased back into his usual, composed self. “If cannibalism is the only line you have, then I think you need to raise your standards,” Ethan suggested, mock-serious.

“Hey, I’m rarely disappointed.”

Ethan drifted forwards, like a magnet drawn to its opposite. “You deserve to be more than not-disappointed.”

“Yeah?” Benji felt a little breathless, whether at Ethan’s proximity or his words, he didn’t know, “You gonna do something about that?”

“Maybe. Not sure I’ve put my best foot forward though.”

“Aw,” Benji grinned, “Your foot is fine. The best actually. My favorite foot. Okay, this is starting to sound like I have a foot fetish, which I emphatically do not.”

Ethan’s head fell back as he laughed, a graceless snort that was somehow even more charming for its inelegance. “Okay, I assume you didn’t come over here for the specific purpose of telling me you don’t have a foot fetish.”

“Oh, right!” In the tumult of the last few minutes, Benji had nearly forgotten. “Oddly enough, I had another conversational topic in mind. Namely…” Benji did a little drum roll with his knuckles on a nearby bookshelf. “The Project is done! I’ve finished!”

“Really? That’s—” A conflicted mess of emotions sparred across Ethan’s face for a second, but genuine delight won out. “That’s incredible, congratulations.”

“Thank you! I mean, I’ve still got to work on the UI, and polish up the rough spots but overall, the biggest hurdles have been dealt with. It’s…almost over.”

Benji felt a little prickle of fear as he said those words out loud for the first time, like he’d just peered over the edge of a cliff into a bottomless void, and— nope, he wasn’t thinking about that. He was shelving those what’s-the-purpose-of-life anxieties indefinitely.

“So! I thought maybe you’d like to celebrate,” he pressed on, “with a movie night, if you’re free?”

“For you? Always,” Ethan said. Benji tried not to shiver at the promise in those words.

“Alright, excellent. I’m thinking we tackle the Die Hard series…”

“Is that the one with the dinosaurs?” Ethan asked, the picture of innocence.

“It is not, and I think you know that,” Benji said, hands on his hips and scowling like a disapproving schoolteacher. “But seriously, your lack of cultural knowledge does sometimes make me think you sprang fully formed from the utility closet down the hall, like a Greek god, or maybe a time-traveled Cary Grant.”

“I do know Cary Grant,” Ethan pointed at Benji, victorious.

“And I’m so proud of you,” Benji patted his arm. “So, shall we say six?”

“I’ll bring dinner.”

“Hoping you’d say that,” Benji winked. “Try not to fist fight any men in bland suits before then.”

“No promises,” Ethan winked back.

~~~~~

Ethan arrived at precisely six o’clock, using his key to open the door Benji had actually remembered to lock for once in his life.

He found Benji sitting upside-down on the couch, legs tossed over the back and head practically on the floor, looking utterly dejected.

“What’s wrong?” Ethan asked immediately, setting aside a number of containers and going to squat down next to Benji, “Did something happen with your project?”

“No,” Benji mumbled, “it’s the aliens.”

“The...what?”

“The aliens!” Benji repeated, distraught, “They probably don’t exist! I was just reading this article about a new study on Fermi’s paradox, you know, the scientist who basically asked, ‘if there are aliens, then where the hell are they?’ And they’ve been honing the estimates and now they’ve concluded that it’s pretty damn likely there aren’t any aliens in our galaxy, and maybe not even in the entire universe!”

“Okay...?” Ethan sat back on his heels, concern fading into amusement, “And this is bad because...?”

“What’s not bad about an absence of aliens?” Benji scoffed, “Aside from the obvious lack-of-awesome factor, that means that humanity is all there is! If we destroy ourselves - as we seem likely to do - that’s it! Life is gone from everything, forever.”

“Hmm,” Ethan gave Benji’s arm a bracing squeeze, “if I might suggest a hypothesis of my own...is the conclusion of your Project leading you to have an existential crisis, and project it onto this whole aliens thing?”

“No. Maybe. Hrmph,” Benji considered the idea with a grumpy twist to his mouth, “well, first of all, you missed a prime opportunity for the pun “extraterrestrial crisis’, and second...okay, so I haven’t got a second point. But! I really am upset about the aliens.”

“Well, at least there are still aliens in the movies.”

“A flimsy comfort,” Benji sighed, “And there aren’t any aliens in these movies, though if they make yet another sequel, there probably will be…”

Benji tried to turn himself back upright, but only managed to flop off the couch and onto Ethan, sending them both tumbling to the ground in a tangle of limbs.

“I am…truly, the epitome of grace,” Benji said, as regally as someone with his face pressed into the carpet was capable.

Ethan laughed, giving Benji’s legs a friendly pat before gently scooting them away from his face and pushing himself back into a sitting position. “I wouldn’t have you any other way.”

Benji followed suit, collapsing with a huff against the couch and pressing a hand to his blood-rushed head.

“Well, if we’ve had enough acrobatics for the evening, shall we move on to dinner?” Ethan suggested.

“Capital idea,” Benji said, packing a little extra British-ness into his accent.

They tucked into the homemade pizzas Ethan had brought, Benji favoring the barbecue and pineapple, while Ethan enjoyed his signature Thai-peanut-sauce and feta version.

“You’re getting the full experience tonight, my friend,” Benji said as he set up the first film, “from the classic original movie on, until we pass out or can’t physically stand it anymore. I’m talking recycled plot, bad dialogue, and increasingly unrealistic fight scenes, and you’re gonna love every minute of it.”

They ate their dinner while Hans Gruber crashed a Christmas party, polishing off their pizzas while an unfortunate Nakatomi executive met his gruesome end.

John McClane’s shoeless situation led to him picking bits of glass out of his feet, and Benji was pretty much in a permanent wince, squinting so hard he could barely see the screen.

“Sorry,” Benji muttered, feeling a little childish when Ethan noticed his discomfort, “That bit always makes me squeamish.”

“It should,” Ethan said firmly, “It’s horrible and hurts like hell.”

“Would hurt like hell,” Benji corrected, “Like, hypothetically, right?”

“Right,” Ethan agreed, a beat too late. Benji’s dismay tripled as his brain replaced the movie’s protagonist with Ethan, bloody and limping.

“Don’t look,” Ethan counseled, wrapping an arm around Benji’s shoulders and pulling him into his chest. Benji gratefully leaned into the warm, cozy reprieve. He stayed right there, long after John McClane had wrapped rags around his feet and moved on. Ethan seemed content to stay as they were, and Benji would personally be fine spending the rest of his life comfortably nestled into Ethan’s side.

Holly and John drove off into the metaphorical sunset, and Ethan made to stand up.

“Dessert?” he offered, gesturing towards another of the containers he’d brought.

Benji was loathe to put an end to their perfect couch-cuddle, but he didn’t know how to express that other than to say “I don’t want to ever leave your incredible, deliciously snug embrace.” And he wasn’t at all sure that that would play well. So, he just nodded, not quite masking his reluctance.

Ethan returned quickly with two bowls, handing one to Benji as he announced the contents as, “Chocolate rosemary pudding.”

“My mother used to make that!” Benji exclaimed, delighted.

Ethan matched his pleased expression. “I found it in this old British cookbook I found, and hoped you’d like it.”

“I love it. Thank you,” Benji said fervently, eagerly accepting the dessert. “Also, insert mandatory joke about the farce that is an English cookbook here.”

“Joke noted,” Ethan grinned, settling back down on the couch. He waited a moment, then shifted his pudding to his left hand and wordlessly held up his right arm, inviting Benji to scoot right back into the crook of his shoulder, which he did. Benji barely muffled a happy sigh, feeling like he belonged right there more than he had in any other moment of his life.

“Really struck gold with this, huh?” Ethan prompted, looking down at Benji’s contented face.

“Yep,” Benji smiled up at him, hoping Ethan knew he wasn’t just talking about the pudding.

They kept watching as the night grew darker, Bruce Willis’ hair grew thinner, and Ethan’s suspension of disbelief grew weaker.

“That…is not a realistic recovery time for an injury that serious.”

“I think you have to accept that Bruce Willis is not entirely human. Ooh, maybe he’s part alien!”

“That would be more plausible than that shot he just made.”

And, “That’s a good way to cap yourself in the ass. Has no one heard of gun holsters in this universe?”

“You don’t watch movies like this for the realism…” Benji sighed, feigning exasperation.

“No, I watch them for the company,” Ethan agreed. Benji’s face flushed at that, and he was grateful for the cover of dark.

They got all the way to the fourth movie, but by that point they were less interested in Jon McClane’s exploits than in talking to each other.

“Jesus, it’s almost two AM,” Benji realized, after his third consecutive yawn.

“It’s not like either of us has to go to work in the morning,” Ethan pointed out.

“I believe it was you who’s been lecturing me about the health benefits of a regular sleep schedule?” Benji prodded Ethan with a grin. “And besides, it’s not like we’re spring chickens – despite what my recent actions may indicate, we can’t just pull all-nighters whenever we fancy.”

“Are you calling me old?” Ethan asked with mock outrage.

“I’m calling us both old.”

Ethan grumbled something under his breath, and then the arm he’d had slung around Benji’s shoulders dipped lower so his fingers could dig in under Benji’s ribcage in a completely underhanded sneak-tickle-attack.

Benji squeaked and tried to escape, but Ethan was far too quick for him, wrapping both arms around his middle and reeling him into his chest. Benji stopped struggling when he realized the threat of tickles was abated, appreciating the way their breathing was in sync and how tempting Ethan’s smile was up close, just begging to be tasted—

“Paris,” Ethan said, apropos of nothing, interrupting Benji’s train of thought.

“Tokyo,” Benji replied.

Ethan released him with a confused stare.

“Sorry,” Benji said, “Thought we were just naming great cities of the world.”

“Tokyo’s nice too,” Ethan said, “You could go there.”

“Why are you shipping me off to Japan?”

“I’m not shipping you anywhere. I was just thinking, you mentioned before about always having wanted to go to Paris… I think you should do it. When you’re finished up here, just pack a bag and go.”

“But what about my sister? That cactus I haven’t killed yet?” Benji hooked a thumb over his shoulder at the succulent bravely clinging to life on his window sill. “Who’d take care of them? And you! How bored would you be if I was off sharing all my inappropriate internal commentary with a bunch of Parisians.”

“So, so bored. Which is why I should come with you.”

“Did you just invite yourself on my trip to Paris?”

“I thought of it,” Ethan argued, “So really, it’s my trip.”

“Did you…just invite me to come to Paris with you?”

“It appears I have.”

“Well.” That was it, the tipping point. No more excuses. Benji felt every last one of his inhibitions melt away in the warmth of Ethan’s eyes, and he found himself wondering what the hell had taken him so long to get to this point. “What man could refuse that?”

Benji knew what he had to do, but making his body comply was another thing. His hand was shaking as he reached out to cup Ethan’s jaw, but he figured that was fair considering the enormity of what he was doing.

He moved in slowly, letting Ethan have all the time in the world to pull away, but he didn’t. He just watched Benji with wonder until finally, their lips met.

It would be nice if Benji’s brain would shut off now, if the moment was so incandescently romantic that all he could think about was embracing the man he’d been falling in love with for weeks. Naturally, however, his brain was going at super-speed, analyzing every unbearable second that Ethan didn’t respond.

Was Ethan frozen with disgust? Was he confused about what was happening? Was Benji just the world’s worst kisser and Ethan was trying to figure out how to break the news? Was Ethan maybe, just maybe, paralyzed with the same indecision that had wracked Benji for days?

That last panicked thought apparently had some merit, since after a heart-stopping minute of Benji convincing himself he’d just made a world-shattering mistake, Ethan burst forward, kissing Benji within an inch of his life.

His free hand clutched Benji’s face while the one around his shoulders dragged him in close. He tilted the angle of their kiss, nose pressing into Benji’s cheek as he worked his way into his mouth. Benji could hardly breathe and he didn’t care, running his fingers along the side of Ethan’s face, tracing from his hairline to his jawbone, trying to commit those planes of skin to memory.

He was feeling a little faint when Ethan pulled abruptly away, leaving Benji blinking dumbly into empty space.

“I-I’m sorry, I…” Ethan stuttered, hands raised and frozen on either side of him.

Benji had never heard Ethan stutter.

“I thought…?” Benji said weakly, not able to compute what was happening, or why Ethan looked like he’d been hit with a truck, regret and shame tracked across his features.

“It’s my fault, I shouldn’t have—you just—you were there and I—” Ethan’s stumbling explanation dried out as he rose from the couch, Benji mirroring him, reaching out for him.

Ethan just held up a hand and said quietly, “I have to go.” Without another word, he turned around and left.

Benji’s knees gave out from under him at the sound of the door slamming, a crack of thunder bringing him crashing down to the couch.

He sat there for a long while, not moving. He played back the whole evening from start to finish, endlessly rerunning those critical last moments, but nothing quite explained what had just happened.

Benji eventually stood and got ready for bed on autopilot, because what else was there to do? He brushed his teeth and undressed mechanically, like his body was just some flesh machine he was operating remotely. He laid down in bed, covers pulled up to his chin, and stared at the ceiling. And he thought about nothing and felt nothing.

He didn’t sleep.

Chapter Text

For a few blissful seconds when Benji woke the next morning, he couldn’t figure out why his stomach was twisted into a knot of guilt and despair. Then, the previous night came hurtling back down on him, the weight like a physical force pinning him to the mattress.

The light in his room was strange, and it took him a while to realize it was because the sun was only barely above the horizon. He wasn’t sure when he’d last been awake that early, or what it was that other people did at such a godforsaken hour.

He considered just staying where he was; he’d hardly had a restful sleep after all, and no pressing engagements later on. No engagements at all, ever, now that he’d most likely alienated his best and possibly only friend.

The claws of self-pity scratched at his insides and he threw himself out of bed trying to escape it. He lurched down the hall to the bathroom, suddenly very taken with the idea of a shower hot enough to scald his skin off.

His shower, of course, was in a mood, and wouldn’t go past moderately balmy no matter how he coaxed it.

Typical, he groused, even my hot water has abandoned me. He idly wondered if there was something he could do to improve the hot water heater’s pathetic functioning, which reminded him of the problems he’d had with his sink, which reminded him of who had swooped in like a sexy repair-god to help him—

Dammit. Benji let his forehead clunk down on the cool wall of the shower. He could already tell this was going to be worse than when Jack the hot badminton player had dumped him in undergrad—and this time, there hadn’t even been a real relationship to mourn. A real romantic one, anyway.

Do something, a small voice suggested, from somewhere to the left of his rising depression and above a layer of self-loathing.

Certainly, standing there empty and motionless under the spray waiting for life to move on around him wouldn’t help.

Do something, do something, do something, the mantra beat a tattoo against the base of his skull.

“Fine, dammit!” Benji yelled at himself, twisting the handle down until it sputtered out one last chilly splash of water. “I’ll do something!”

He didn’t know what he was gonna do, but he sure was gonna do it. Maybe it would be smarter to wait, see how things shook out with his own feelings and Ethan’s, but it might actually kill him to not know where they stood. Whether they could move forward, at all.

He formulated a plan as he hurriedly dried off, slipping on the wet tile and barely catching himself on the sink.

Okay, first step: clothes. Second step: ??? Third step: reconciliation.

Benji finally realized in a brilliant flash of inspiration that surely one of the most important reasons people bothered to get up with the sunrise was so that they could get fresh pastries before going to work (he’d never heard another excuse that could compare to the joy of a crisp, warm, cruller).

There was a bakery just around the block that he always gazed longingly into when he passed, but it was usually picked clean by the time he managed to get there.

He threw on the first clothes he found in his closet, which turned out to be a wrinkled pair of khakis and a pink pinstripe button down still tangled in a navy sweater vest, which he put on in the end since it was less trouble then trying to separate the two.

He marched out the door, then marched right back in to retrieve his forgotten wallet, then left again, walking down the street with purpose in his steps. He was pleased to find the bakery in full swing, practically overflowing with donuts and muffins and fancy-looking frilly things he didn’t recognize but wanted immediately to devour. He settled on a box with a dozen mixed pastries, taking his purchase and doing an about face, back to his apartment.

He quick-stepped up to Ethan’s door before he could really process what he was doing and chicken out, shuffling the box into the crook of one arm so he could knock on Ethan’s door with his free hand.

He’d just raised his fist when the door flew open, leaving him nose-to-nose with an Ethan who looked as shocked as he felt.

“Benji?”

“Correct,” Benji choked.

“Hi.” Ethan stood in the doorway, flustered as Benji had ever seen him, his hair wild and his long-sleeve T-shirt rucked up a little at the hip, showing off a patch of golden skin.

“Um, breakfast?” Benji held the box out, not sure what else to do. “Pastries were the best olive branch I could think of, but that might have just been because I was getting kind of hungry, and now I’m seeing you again and remembering you’ve probably never consumed an ounce of refined sugar in your life and the stupidity of this choice is hitting me like a ton of bricks—”

Ethan reached out wordlessly, taking a danish and shoving it whole into his mouth.

Benji watched him chew with open astonishment.

“How you doing there?” he asked after a minute, when it appeared Ethan might be able to respond.

“That was a lot of sugar, I might go into toxic shock,” Ethan admitted nonchalantly, “but it was worth it to see the look on your face.”

“So…does that mean we’re good?” Benji asked, hopefully.

“Not yet.” Ethan grabbed Benji by the front of his shirt, hauling him inside and slamming the door shut. He tossed the box of pastries neatly onto a nearby side table, pressing Benji back against the closed door.

“I’m going to kiss you now, if you’re alright with that,” he said, matter of fact.

“Uh…isn’t that what started this mess in the first place?” Benji asked, mostly to clarify whether or not he’d just stepped into some sort of alternate universe, because this really wasn’t how he imagined this meeting going down.

“No,” Ethan shook his head fiercely, “I started this mess because I was being an idiot. I’d like to fix my mistake now.”

“Oh….oh!” Benji wondered briefly if perhaps he’d fallen and hit his head in the bathroom earlier, and if this was all just a concussion-induced hallucination. But delusion or not, there was no way he was turning down a kiss from Ethan. “Well, go right ahead then.”

This kiss was even better than the first, partly because of the massive rush of relief and endorphins, but also because there was no hesitation on either of their parts. They picked up where they’d left off, mouths crushed desperately together and hands searching for something, anything to hold onto as they were swept up in the moment.

“Wait, wait,” Benji mumbled against Ethan’s mouth, using every bit of strength he had left to pull away, “I think—yeah, I’m gonna need an explanation for last night.”

Ethan nodded, mouth drawing into a thin, worried line before he admitted, “I was afraid.”

Benji scoffed automatically. “Right. You, scared.”

“I was, I just kept thinking about how this,” Ethan gestured between them, “could’ve ruined things. Our friendship, for starters. And there are…other factors.”

“Something to do with your oddly cloak-and-dagger architectural work?” Benji guessed.

“Yeah,” Ethan nodded, solemn. “My colleague’s visit, what he said…he got into my head. And I fixated on that until I realized that I was acting out of fear, and that’s something I promised myself I’d never do.”

Benji tilted his head, examining Ethan’s contrite expression from a different angle. “I…should probably not let you off the hook just yet, but to be fair, I spent a long time agonizing over what to do or say to you, and you had about four seconds after I planted one on you to figure things out.”

Ethan broke into a soft smile, lifting one of Benji’s hands and pressing a line of reverent kisses to his knuckles. Benji did his best to stay strong, but in reality, was about six seconds away from suggesting they elope.

“I don’t think I realized exactly how much you meant to me until last night,” Ethan murmured, pressing Benji’s hand to his cheek, “And seeing that, feeling that...it threw me. A lot. It’s been a long time since I let anyone get that close, and you just slipped right past my defenses.”

“I’m sneaky like that,” Benji grinned.

“So…can you forgive me?” Ethan asked, biting the inside of his cheek.

“It was a forgivable offense, under the circumstances,” Benji concluded, “those circumstances being that we’re both emotional incompetents. Though I should make it clear: you cannot run off on me like that ever again.”  

“You won't be able to get rid of me,” Ethan promised.

Benji ran a fond hand through Ethan’s messy hair. “So. You look like you were on your way out?” he prompted.

“Yeah. Over to your place, to beg your forgiveness.”

“Damn! So, I should have just been my usual slovenly self and slept in, then I would have been treated to the Great Ethan Scott, begging for my favor?”

“Hey, if you want me on my knees, you only have to ask.”

“You…” The implication in Ethan’s words forcibly evacuated the breath from Benji’s lungs. He finally gasped out, “You can’t just say things like that.”

“Even if they’re true?”

Benji let out a frustrated noise and gave up on verbal communication, opting instead to drag Ethan into another scorching kiss, this one significantly filthier than the last. Ethan quickly got with the program, tangling one hand in Benji’s hair while he shoved him back up against the door, pressing their bodies together into a line of white hot heat.

Benji regretted not taking the time to free himself of the sweater vest, which now represented anther unacceptable layer separating him from Ethan.

“Mmph!” Benji flinched when something cold and metal jabbed into the small of his back. “Your door handle is attacking me,” he complained, while Ethan slid a hand around his waist to rub comfortingly over the abused skin.

“Sorry,” Ethan laughed, pulling Benji towards him and walking them both backwards. “Let’s get a little more comfortable.”

They collapsed onto the white faux-leather of Ethan’s mid-century modern couch, which was too fashionable to really qualify as ‘comfortable’, but they were both too wrapped up in each other to care.

“This is familiar,” Benji laughed breathlessly when he found himself under Ethan.

“Mmm, the gym,” Ethan agreed between kisses, “I was so proud of you. That was the first time I had to stop myself from kissing you.”

“You ridiculous creature,” Benji sighed, letting his hands roam over the expanse of Ethan’s back, “you should have just done it. Saved me a lot of suffering.”

“Suffering?” Ethan reared back, an adorable little frown on his face, “Like you weren’t torturing me the whole time.”

“Pardon?”

“Every time you said exactly what you were thinking, without any filter—” Ethan eyes went dark and Benji shuddered with anticipation, “You practically propositioned me every day.”

“I sure did,” Benji spurred him on, “Couldn’t help myself…”

“You would just say things, say you wanted me and then get all flustered…it was so hard not to reciprocate, not to just take you on every surface in every room of your house...”

“Oh, fuck…” Ethan was hiking Benji’s knee up over his hip and it was getting very difficult to process anything he was saying, much less reply. “I had no idea,” Benji managed to gasp, “I’d have let you do whatever you wanted to me if I’d had an inkling…”

“Does that offer still stand? Because the first thing I wanna do is tear this sweater vest off of you.”

“God, please.”

Ethan masterfully pulled the offending article of clothing off in one fell swoop, tossing it over the back of the couch.

“Your turn. Whoops!” Benji said, utterly delighted as he lived out one of his most frequent guilty fantasies and peeled Ethan’s shirt right off of him.

Ethan’s hands were frantically attacking the buttons still keeping him from Benji’s skin, but he drew to a shaky halt and said, “Just checking in: should I be slowing down any time soon?”

“I think we’ve both waited damned long enough,” Benji replied decisively, reaching down and grabbing Ethan’s ass to make his point clear.

Ethan agreed, if the way he kissed Benji after that was any indication, hot and messy and desperate.

“In that case,” he panted against Benji’s mouth, hands finally slipping under the folds of his shirt, “there’s something I really want to do.”

“Mmhmm,” Benji urged him on, down for pretty much anything at this point as long as it involved the two of them and as little clothing as possible.

“I thought about it a lot, about you—I wasn’t supposed to, but I couldn’t help it, every night, I couldn’t stop thinking about your eyes and your hips and god, those hands, I was going crazy.”

Benji thought he might be going crazy too, because he was pretty sure Ethan was nosing his way down his neck, only pausing to nip at an exposed collarbone for a second before working his way down Benji’s chest.

But there was no mistaking this for anything but reality when Ethan slid to his knees and pressed an open-mouthed kiss to the front of Benji’s pants.

Benji wanted to frame that image for eternity, savor it, secret it away somewhere safe and private to keep him warm on cold winter nights.

Fate, however, had other plans.

A furious knocking sounded from a little way down the hall, which wouldn’t have been enough to distract them if it wasn’t accompanied by a shout of “Benji!”

Ethan froze, fingers on the button of Benji’s khakis.

“No, no, no, this is not happening, not now—” Benji hissed under his breath, squeezing his eyes shut and praying for that very familiar voice to go away.

“Were you expecting a guest?” Ethan asked, tone strained.

“No, I was definitely not.” The knocking continued, putting the kibosh on Benji’s hopes.

“You could ignore them?” Ethan offered tentatively, though he was already sitting back on his heels.

“I could,” Benji sighed, stuck between furious and resigned, “but the last time I ignored my sister she threw my favorite pair of shoes into the Hudson.”

“Your sister?”

The volume of Maggie’s knocking got impossibly louder as she shouted, “Benjamin Reginald Dunn open up!”

“Reginald?” Ethan wheezed, already doubling over with laughter.

“Shut up,” Benji swatted at him, “you’ll keep your opinions on my middle name to yourself if you ever want to resume this,” he gestured to their interrupted embrace.

Ethan mimed zipping his lips shut and pressed a kiss to Benji’s knee, before standing up and offering a hand to him.

“We should probably go see what she wants before somebody calls the cops with a noise complaint.”

“Wouldn’t be the first time,” Benji grumbled, hurriedly re-buttoning his shirt, stomping over to the door, and flinging it open.

“For the love of god, Mags!” he shouted, waving to get her attention, “I think there are some people in Yemen who didn’t hear you."

Maggie tried to spin around to face him but went too far, ending up turning a couple of circles before she finally stumbled to a halt, staring blearily at him. She was clearly astonishingly drunk, which was unusual for her on any day, but especially now, considering it was barely 8am on a Tuesday.

Her eyes narrowed and flickered between the door she’d been hammering on and where Benji stood. “You…moved?” she said accusatorily.

“No,” he sighed, “I was just visiting….someone.”

Ethan, who’d retrieved his shirt, stuck his head around the doorframe to better watch the goings-on.

“Someone?” Maggie echoed, “Wait, is that Ethan? The famed Ethan?” 

“No, no,” Benji tried to shove Ethan back into his apartment, but it was about as effective as trying to move Mount Everest with a forklift.

“I have heard a lot about you,” Maggie announced, swaying closer to them, “Like a lot. So much. My brother talks about you like…like…” she cast around for an appropriate descriptor, finally settling for, “like you’re really fuckin’ hot shit.”

“I do not, he is not—” Benji scowled at Ethan, who was trying so hard not to laugh that it was probably causing him physical pain, “He is a just a friend.”

“Friend?” Ethan repeated in an amused tone. “I feel like I’ve been demoted.”

“Well, what should I call you?”

“Is ‘boyfriend’ too corny for you?”

Benji shook his head, sure his expression was disgustingly besotted. “Boyfriend sounds fine.”

“Boyfriends!” Maggie interrupted with a regal air, “Are for shit.”

Ethan looked lightly offended, while Benji knew well enough to ask, “What did Rob do now?”

“Rob. Is cheating on me. With a ballerina.” Maggie emphasized this last as if it was particularly damning.

“Bastard,” Benji said without much heat, or any surprise.

“I’ve got the worst taste in men!” Maggie moaned, half-collapsing against Benji’s door, which flew open under her weight.

She fell inside, just barely righting herself at the last minute. Benji winced and jumped forward to help her.

“Benji,” Ethan said calmly, following the siblings into the apartment and slamming the door shut after him, “Are you opposed to locking your door? Is that it? Do you have some sort of moral aversion to basic security?”

“I’m just forgetful,” Benji defended himself half-heartedly, “Also, stop picking on me, I was a little upset when I left this morning, as you may know.”

Ethan instantly wilted, repentant.

“Why were you upset?” Maggie cottoned on to that part of the conversation. She followed the guilty flick of Benji’s gaze to Ethan and reared up, saying at a much higher volume than was required, “Did you do something? To my brother? Do I have to kick your ass?” She turned to Benji, asking very seriously, “Do I need to kick his ass?”

“You do not,” Benji assured her, taking her arm and trying to lead her to the couch. “There was an incident, a misunderstanding, really, it was just – you know what, never mind, you’re probably to drunk to process the details anyway. Let’s just say we had a disagreement, but we worked it out.”

“And….he’s your boyfriend,” Maggie stated, deadpan. “And you didn’t tell me. That you finally hooked up with the Ethan.”

“We didn’t –” Benji cut himself off, not wanting to have this conversation with his sister, least of all when she was this smashed. “It’s new. You would’ve been the first person I told. Anyway, enough about my love life, tell me about the implosion of yours.”

“Right! Rob, that dastardly little fucker.” Maggie launched into a colorful explanation of the events leading up to her appearance on Benji's doorstep, which seemed to involve Rob developing unusually stringent hygiene habits, a tell-tale shoe ribbon, something about a stuffed panda bear, and ultimately, Maggie figuring the game out and going to confront the philandering guitarist and his dancer sweetheart at their two AM post-ballet recital rendezvous.

“And I went to the green room and found them….in flagra—flager—flagrante.”

“And so you decided to go out and colossally drunk, yeah?” Benji concluded.

“Not on purpose,” Maggie drawled, like she was speaking to a particularly slow child. “I had to destroy all his stupid fuckin’…artsy fartsy homebrew beer crap…”

“And pouring it down the sink was out of the question?”

“That would’ve been a waste!” Maggie grabbed Benji’s shirt front and shook him as best she could, “And I’m a card-carrying member of Greenpeace!”

“That you are,” Benji agreed, delicately removing her fists from his shirt.

Ethan, who’d ducked out somewhere around the confusing bit with the panda, returned from the kitchen with a glass of water and a grilled cheese, handing it to Maggie with a gentle, “Here, this’ll make you feel better.”

Tears sprung to Maggie’s eyes, and she turned to Ethan with a breathless, “Thank you! How did you know that that's my favorite…?”

“Lucky guess,” Ethan shrugged, gifting Maggie with one of his megawatt smiles.

She looked a little stunned by it and Benji couldn’t blame her. It took a while to get sufficiently desensitized by Ethan’s presence to not gawk at him constantly.

“Okay,” Maggie turned back to Benji, “This guy’s a keeper. Official sister seal of approval. Even though I am, currently, in protest of men.”

“I’m glad. About the approval, not the protest of men. Though, I do get that.”

“Yeah, you do,” Maggie said around a mouthful of grilled cheese, “Where do you think I got it from? I remember badminton-Jack.”

Ethan raised an incredulous eyebrow. “Who?”

“No one,” Benji said firmly, wondering if it was legal to suffocate ones own sister if they were being really annoying.

“You don’t know about Jack?” Maggie exclaimed, “Oh my god, Benji was in pieces over this guy. It was like a century ago, but still. He was this dreamy badminton player—yeah, total contradiction in terms, right? Us Dunns really do have shit taste in guys, no offense.”

“None taken,” Ethan said mildly, “Anyway, tell me more about this Jack. Do I need to kill him?”

Benji intervened then: “Uh, no, definite nope to that. Pretty sure last time I heard about him on Facebook, he was developing a beer belly and selling life insurance in Tampa. So, he’s basically already dead.”

“But learn from Jack’s mistakes, Mister Hotpants,” Maggie said wisely to Ethan, who leaned forward, listening intently. “He fucked it up, real bad. Thought he was too good for some computer nerd with weird elbows.”

“My elbows are fine!” Benji protested, indignant.

“You keep telling yourself that,” Maggie said serenely, with that air specific to younger siblings who know exactly how to push their older sibling’s buttons. “Anyway, he didn’t appreciate what he had, and now he’s dead in Atlanta, or whatever.”

“I can promise I’ll never forget how lucky I am to have Benji in my life,” Ethan said soberly.

Benji opened his mouth, most likely to say something dreadfully sentimental, but was interrupted by a tinny Ke$ha song bursting from Maggie’s purse.

After about three misses, she managed to hook the handle of her purse, reel it in, and extricate the ringing phone.

“He’s calling me?!” Maggie shrieked after squinting down at the screen.

Benji didn’t need to ask who was calling, he just ducked when she chucked the phone as hard as she could at the window. Fortunately, the window was closed and made of some pretty sturdy glass, so nothing was broken. That was, however, when Benji decided he’d indulged his sister enough.

“Right, time to sleep this off,” he announced, gesturing for Maggie to get up.

She ignored him, instead ranting, “The nerve of this guy! I can’t believe! After fucking a fuckin’ ballerina?”

“Yes, he’s the scum of the Earth,” Benji agreed, taking her wrists and pulling her to her feet.

“You should make your hot boytoy neighbor beat him up,” she told Benji earnestly, as if Ethan wasn’t standing three feet away.

Ethan looked pleased as Benji replied, “Hey, say the word, and I will absolutely sic my hot boytoy neighbor on Rob the Knob.”

Maggie nodded, satisfied, and let Benji lead her towards the bedroom.

“After I get over this…slight tipsy thing,” Maggie held her thumb and forefinger about an inch apart, as if to indicate the state of her inebriation, “we’re going back to my place and burning all of his stuff.”

Benji made a noise of agreement as he plopped her down on the mattress and helped her pull off her shoes.

“Sleep first, then lots of water, and probably a ton of Acetaminophen,” Benji reminded her.

“But after that: fire?”

“Lots of fire,” Benji promised, as if he wasn’t planning on confiscating any and all matches and lighters before she could get her hands on them.

“You’re a good brother.”

“I am, thanks for noticing.”

“And I’m fine now, you’ve done your job, you can go back to boning your hot new boyfriend.”

“Okay, first off: gross, stop talking. Second, I’m not leaving you here to die of alcohol poisoning all on your own.”

“Fine, be a martyr,” Maggie sighed, rolling over and pulling the covers up to her chin, “Just saying: I’d tap that.”

Benji sighed and looked upwards, searching for strength. “So glad we had this talk.”

When he looked back down, Maggie was snoring.

Benji left a glass of water and some meds on the side table, and then rejoined Ethan in the living room.

“Well, that was a bit of an adventure,” he said, rubbing the back of his neck as he flopped down next to Ethan on the couch, “Did you enjoy that little peek into my formative childhood years?”

“I really did. Your sister is a character,” Ethan said, somehow making that usually passive-aggressive description sound positive.

“I know she seems a little…much,” Benji admitted, “But this is her at her very worst, when she’s at her best, she’s a great kid.”

“Kid? She’s barely two years younger than you.”

“All younger siblings are kids,” Benji declared, “that’s just a fact. And something you’d know if you had siblings. Wait, I assume you don’t have siblings. Do you?”

“Nope,” Ethan shook his head, a touch wistful, “It was just me.”

“Huh. Well, I’m sure Maggie would be happy to be your sister-in-law.” Benji froze up when he realized what he’d just said, not daring to look at Ethan. “I mean honorary sister. That’s what I meant. I wasn’t thinking about marriage, that would be super weird, I was definitely not going down that route at all—”

Ethan cut off his panicked rambles by tenderly turning his chin to kiss him.

Benji hummed with contentment, whispering, “How many times did I wish you’d do that?”

“About as many times as I thought about doing it, I’d bet,” Ethan murmured back. 

“What a pair we are,” Benji whispered, before giving in to temptation and sealing his lips against Ethan’s.

When some real intent started to slip into the kiss, however, Benji reluctantly pulled back, leaving one last peck on Ethan’s cheek as he said, “As much as I’ll never tire of kissing you…”

“It would be weird to make out when your sister’s in the next room,” Ethan concluded.

“Right,” Benji winced. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be. I’m glad I got to meet her.”

“Me too.”

“Well, I’d better let you rest up then,” Ethan clapped his hands on his knees and stood, “I think I heard you two are planning on violating city fire ordinances later?”

“She’s sure gonna try.”

“I’m sure you’ll figure out a way to keep her from committing arson,” Ethan grinned, before leaning down to press a soft, chaste kiss to Benji’s lips. “To be continued?”

Benji smiled, feeling his heart press up against his ribcage like it was trying to follow Ethan out the door, “To be continued.”

Chapter Text

Benji dozed for a while on the couch, catching up on some lost sleep from the night before. He woke up around one in the afternoon to the sound of Maggie rattling around in the kitchen.

“Make yourself at home,” he called out to her, sitting up and stretching out the kinks in his spine.

“Duh,” Maggie called back succinctly, sounding none the worse for the wear despite her early-morning alcohol binge. “So, you still down to go burn all of my cheating bastard of an ex-boyfriend’s belongings?” she asked, her sobering nap having apparently not lessened her lust for revenge.

“Of course,” Benji sighed, joining her in the kitchen where she was eating cereal out of the box, “Who doesn’t enjoy the odd bit of pyromania?”

“That’s what I thought,” Maggie chuckled, “I already called us an Uber.”

The siblings bundled themselves into their ride, and Maggie told her story to their driver in vivid detail. Benji tipped the man solidly for his kind listening and friendly farewell of, “Have fun, sugar! Burn the fucker to the ground!”

In the end, Benji managed to talk her out of setting the whole place ablaze, instead just sticking Rob’s extensive collection of custom guitar picks onto the charcoal grill outside and giving them a good roasting. The picks were made of plastic and ended up mostly just melting rather unpleasantly onto the metal slats of the grill.

“This is actually great,” Maggie realized, “this goddamn grill is the only piece of furniture he contributed to our whole apartment!”

“It’s karma,” Benji agreed, fascinated by the slow drip of an electric pink pick into fiery oblivion.

Maggie decided she felt marginally better after the ritual burning, and so Benji helped her load the rest of Rob’s stuff into boxes headed for the nearest Goodwill, hugged her goodbye, and headed home.

He marched sluggishly up the stairs to his apartment, regretting making the healthful choice and bypassing the elevator. He arrived at his door and pushed it open, debating between continuing his nap, making a sandwich, or tracking down Ethan to pick up where they’d left off.

“You should lock your doors,” a deep, accented voice said.

Benji froze, terror sending his heartrate into the stratosphere as a silver-haired man in black leather spun around in Benji’s desk chair, smirking and holding a big, shiny gun pointed directly at Benji’s chest. He looked exactly like a Bond villain, complete with Russian accent and a flair for the dramatic.

“It is the most basic precaution, but then,” the stranger grinned wider, “you are not the most circumspect of men, are you, Mister Dunn?”

Ethan, was all Benji could think. If he was here, he could do something. Or maybe I could, if this joker was standing two feet in front of me and not holding a gun and if he stood still long enough for me to try that neck-ankle-kick move—

“Enough pleasantries,” Benji’s captor waved a hand breezily, as if they were discussing the weather over a cup of coffee, “To business. You managed to remove our surveillance devices, but we have other ways of monitoring you. We know you’ve completed the software. You will give it to me, now, or…” He cocked the gun.

“Or you’ll shoot me?” Benji finally spoke, surprised to find that his voice sounded absolutely normal. “Because that doesn’t sound like a good idea. I mean, it would be a real downer for me, of course, but no joy for you, either. Since the fact that you’re bothering to try and extort me means that you’ve found out the encryption on my machine’s is a lot better than the lock on my door.”

The gunman nodded graciously. “This is true. I couldn’t break through your codes, but I suspect you will not be so robust…” He leafed idly through the jar of pens sitting on Benji’s desk, finally selecting a long, thin, steel-and-gold one that Benji had gotten as a gift from his mother when he graduated with his Master’s degree.

“I will lay this out for you,” the man twirled the pen expertly over and under his fingers, all while keeping the gun trained on Benji, “I’m going to hurt you. Badly. I will stab this pretty little pen into your very soft places, and you may die. Or,” he stood and began to move around the desk, “we can skip all that ugly, messy, business, you can give me what I want, and I leave. You dec—”

Two incredibly loud bangs went off in quick succession just behind and to the right of where Benji was standing. When he blinked, two dark red spots appeared in his assailant’s chest, spreading wider as the gun slipped through his fingers and fell to the carpet with a dull thunk. The man quickly followed suit, collapsing to his knees with a look of utter shock in his eyes, before toppling face-first to the ground.

A crash sounded behind him, muffled in the ringing aftermath of what Benji realized now must have been gunshots, and suddenly, familiar hands were spinning him around.

“Ethan!” Benji cried, shaking with a heady mix of profound relief and lingering fear as the person before him swam into focus, “You’re here!”

“Yeah, I am,” Ethan grabbed Benji’s face with both hands, checking him over, “Are you all right?”

Benji didn’t answer, instead pointing at the corpse behind him, “Ethan, this man’s been shot!”

“I know,” Ethan said grimly, “I’m the one who shot him.”

“You?” Benji glanced down and saw a matte-black handgun slung in a holster against Ethan’s chest. “Oh.”

“I’m sorry I couldn’t intervene sooner, but I was just working off your voices and I couldn’t get a clear shot until he moved.”

Benji looked over Ethan’s shoulder in a daze, finding two smoking holes in his door.

“Well,” he breathed, “there goes my deposit.”

Ethan let out a surprised laugh, the sound discordant in the ringing silence left by the recently dead.

“Good to know your humor’s intact. Come on, grab your project, then we have to get out of here—”

“What?” Benji planted his feet instinctively, “Ethan, you just shot a man. In my apartment.”

“Yeah, that’s why we have to go, because his friends won’t be far behind.” Ethan took Benji by the elbow and pulled him to the desk, not leaving him much choice in the matter of moving.

“There—there are more of them?” Benji’s stomach dropped and he scrabbled for his laptop, hugging it and its precious data close to his chest.

“Yes,” Ethan pulled him into the hallway, one arm protectively covering Benji’s chest while the other hand closed around his gun, gaze expertly sweeping the space. “Cameras caught at least four hostiles covering the exits.”

“Cameras?” Benji echoed.

“I tapped into local security.”

“Okay,” Benji decided to take that in stride, because there was a dead man staining the carpet of his home who would remind him that they had bigger things to worry about than some minor hacking. Though that did raise the question, how could someone as unskilled in tech as Ethan have broken through that kind of cybersecurity?

"Wait!" Benji stopped again, panic rearing back up, "Maggie! Those people, they could have seen—"

"She's fine," Ethan assured him, "I've got a team at her place, they've already checked in. They won't let anything happen to her.

Ethan dragged Benji over to his apartment, shutting the door behind him before heading to the window and throwing it open.

“The doors are out,” Benji said slowly, “so…you want us to jump to our deaths from a fifth-story window?”

“We’re not going to die,” Ethan said patiently, running his fingers over the edge of the molding on his bookshelf.

“You do know this isn’t West Side Story,” Benji pointed out, “we don’t have some romantic tangle of fire escapes to climb out on.”

“I know.” There was a satisfying sort of click, and Ethan retrieved something composed of heavy metal hooks and bundle of rope from a secret panel that slid open in the side of the bookshelf.

Benji first fixated on the secret panel, intending to ask “what the fuck” and also “how the fuck,” but then recognized what Ethan was holding. “Is that fucking grappling hook? What are you, Batman?”

“You like Batman, right?” Ethan said, hands flashing over the contraption as he skillfully rigged the mechanism to fire.

“Everyone likes Batman!” Benji sputtered, watching Ethan throw open the window and take aim.

“Good, okay, then for now, I’m just…Batman.” The grappling hook exploded forward, embedding in the concrete roof of the taller apartment building next door.

“Batman doesn’t use guns,” Benji pointed out, panic-babble-mode setting in as Ethan tugged the line, testing its strength and hold, “though, actually, he did in the beginning. Most people don’t know that, but I’m a hopeless geek, so I’m chock full of useless caped-crusader trivia. Anyway, you can be, like, an early-days, extra-pissy and heavily-armed Batman, if you want.”

“Sure, sounds good.” Ethan slipped closer to Benji, wrapping an arm around his waist and edging him towards the window until they were both perched on the sill. Benji was about to look down, but Ethan stopped him with a finger under his chin. “So,” he said conversationally, like they weren’t seconds from swanning out the bloody window, “Does that make you my Lois Lane?”

“That’s Superman, you philistine,” Benji sniffed, “The closest parallel for Batman would probably be…Catwoman? Yeah, I could get behind that. Lots of tight black leather and moral ambiguity.”

“Sounds like you to a T,” Ethan smiled. He leaned in before Benji could talk or think about anything else, kissing him hard. He pulled back, leaving Benji pleasantly dazed.

“Just hold on, and trust me,” he whispered in Benji’s ear, and then he threw them into the open air.

For a minute, their momentum carried them lightly along, but gravity quickly remembered its role and pulled them down, down, down—

They reached the low point of the swing and the line jerked, propelling them up and over the gap between the buildings, and Benji was absolutely convinced they were going to be flattened against the unforgiving brick façade. But, they just skidded past the corner of the building and Ethan released the line, dropping them neatly onto a second-floor balcony.

“See?” Ethan stepped free of the cord, letting it swing away, “We’re just fine.”

A hail of bullets burst past them, barely missing Benji’s elbow as they embedded into the concrete and pinged off the metal railing.

Ethan pulled Benji into his chest, crashing backwards through the glass balcony door and out of the gunman’s line of fire.

The apartment’s lone inhabitant, a startled tabby cat, hissed its indignance at them before fleeing to a back bedroom. Ethan dragged Benji through the minefield of shattered glass and out the door of the unfortunate stranger’s apartment, then grabbed his hand to pull him in a run down the hallway. They pounded down a flight of steps, Benji too out of breath to verbalize the string of panicked thought running through his mind which could be roughly summarized as: who the fuck is doing this, why am I not dead, how does Ethan seem not-terrified, I figured he was some sort of secret badass but this is something else—

They burst into a parking garage and a sleek black BMW purred to a halt in front of them, the driver’s seat conspicuously empty.

“C’mon,” Ethan threw open the passenger door and bundled Benji inside, “let’s get out of here.”

“But—what—this isn’t…you drive a Prius!” Benji faltered as Ethan slid into the driver’s seat and sent the car roaring out of the garage.

“My employer supplied this car,” Ethan said tightly, eyes locked on the road.

“Not your architecture firm,” Benji guessed.

“No, my real employers.” Ethan paused, hands tightening on the wheel, “The US government.”

“Ha! I knew it,” Benji slapped his knee and Ethan finally looked at Benji, bewildered.

“Well, that’s a bit of an exaggeration,” Benji admitted, patting Ethan’s elbow, “I suspected. The general badassery, skill with combat, suspicious nature, convenient stash of surveillance-locating equipment…” Benji raised an eyebrow at Ethan who now looked a little sheepish. “For some sort of spy or whatever, you weren’t being that sneaky.”

“More agent than spy,” Ethan hedged, “And I am usually a pretty excellent liar. You were just so…you, it made it hard to keep it up.”

“I’m…sorry?”

“Don’t be,” Ethan shook his head, brow wrinkling with distress, “I’m the one who should be sorry.”

“Why?” Benji felt lighter than air, zooming down a highway in a gorgeous car with a gorgeous man who’d just saved his life rather spectacularly, “How lucky am I to have the sexiest agent alive living next door to me…?”

Benji trailed off, the guilt radiating off of Ethan starting to make sense.

“Right,” he said, processing this realization, “Not luck.”

“No,” Ethan agreed through gritted teeth.

“You don’t happen to live next to me, you…” Benji tried to step logically forward, landing on, “you were ordered to move in next to me?”

Ethan didn’t reply.

“Because of the Project? But, what were you even supposed to do?” Benji stared hard at Ethan, but his gaze was fixed on the horizon. “Are you going to jump in or shall I start offering wild hypotheses? Because I think that could turn out worse than whatever the actual truth is.”

A muscle twitched in Ethan’s jaw, and he finally spoke, stilted, “Benji, what my original job was…it doesn’t matter. All that matters now is that I’m going to take care of you, keep you safe, no matter what.”

“I believe you, Ethan. I can’t help it, the way I feel about you…I’d probably believe anything you told me.”

Benji watched with rising despair the lines of pain that threaded along Ethan’s hunched shoulders. “But you have to tell me. You have to tell me the truth, now. Because I’m seeing some pretty scary scenarios where whatever I thought we had was all just a sham to get at my technology, and I can’t—”

“No.” Ethan spun the wheel, sending them flying down a tiny side road stuffed between a pair of disused office buildings, “I…it wasn’t just a sham. Everything that’s happened these last weeks, the way I feel about you—that’s as real as it gets.”

Benji didn’t know where to start with that, so he decided to be practical and ask, “Okay, before I wade into that Bermuda’s triangle of emotion: where the hell are we going?”

“Safe house, of sorts.”

“Of sorts?”

The line of Ethan’s mouth grew impossibly thinner, and Benji got the impression he wasn’t much for answering questions in situations like this. But, he eventually sighed and said, “I’m on loan to the FBI from a different agency. But they shouldn’t know where I’m taking you, they’d want to confiscate your project for themselves. So, we’re going somewhere off-the-books.”

“Is that what you were supposed to do? ‘Confiscate’ my work?” Benji put as much derision into the euphemistic way of saying ‘steal his life's work’ as he could.

The car careened around a tight corner and squealed to a stop. Ethan leaned across Benji to push open the passenger door, saying roughly, “We’re here.”

Benji didn’t even look to see where they were, he just stared at Ethan and tried not to hyperventilate.

Ethan undid Benji’s seatbelt and growled, “We have to move.”

“Alright, alright,” Benji got unsteadily out of the car, heart pounding and head spinning, “I’m not dumb enough to stay out here and get shot—”

“I know,” Ethan said gently, his tone a complete 360 from just seconds before, “I know you’ll make the smart move.”

For a second, Benji could almost pretend that this was the old Ethan, his Ethan. That they were just making a mid-afternoon grocery run, or taking a walk in the park, like they had on one beautiful day when Ethan had been worried Benji wasn’t getting enough Vitamin D and had dragged him by the elbow into the sunlight. Benji had dreamed of holding his hand, and even though he never did, the way their shoulders brushed as they wandered through the trees and the dappled patterns of light sliding over Ethan’s peaceful features were more than enough.

But this wasn’t the park, or the apartment, or anywhere near the blissful bubble of ignorance he’d been living in since the day they’d met. This was a dank alleyway, where they were hiding from men with guns, and the only person between Benji and a horrible fate had just revealed a side of himself that Benji wasn’t sure he could reconcile with the man he’d fallen for.

Ethan led Benji down a twisting alley until they came upon the dilapidated back of what may have once been a laundromat. He yanked open a rusted fuse box and flipped a couple of switches, activating a shiny rectangle of metal and glass which slid out from behind a “beware: electrical current” sign, lighting up with the shape of a hand. Ethan pressed his palm to it and the overflowing dumpster to their right came suddenly to life, scraping forward to reveal a small hatch.

Ethan grabbed the hatch’s handle with both hands and heaved it open, revealing a steel ladder leading down into a darkened pit.

“This will bring us to a tunnel, which will lead us to an elevator, which will take us to a safe place,” Ethan explained, taking a couple steps down the ladder, so his waist was level with the ground. “It’s alright,” he held a hand up to Benji, “I promise I’ll take care of you.”

Benji didn’t reply, he just took the proffered hand and descended, holding his computer so tightly the case creaked.  

They reached the bottom of the ladder, surrounded by pitch darkness. There was a scratching noise and then an electric rattle, and a lone line of florescent tubes flickered to life, dimly illuminating the passage.

Benji shivered and Ethan took his hand, beginning to guide him forward. Benji swallowed hard and pulled his hand free, not looking at Ethan’s face. He couldn’t stand to see his expression, terrified that he might see relief in his eyes at the end of a long charade.

“You do know me,” Benji admitted, picking up on Ethan’s earlier words, “And I thought I knew you, knew enough about you, at least.”

“You do know me, Benji.” Ethan’s voice was low and breathless, and if he was acting then Benji would nominate him for an Oscar on the spot. “I was more myself around you then I ever get to be. You know me in a way almost no one else does, a version of me that’s not defined by what I do.”

“Not defined—?” Benji scoffed, “Our whole relationship is built on what you do, so how can I possibly know you? All I know is that I’ve been a fool.”

He pushed forward, past Ethan, marching down the passage. God, of course he wanted to believe it—wanted to believe that it had all been real, all some marvelous coincidence of fate, rather than the machinations of the United States intelligence apparatus. But how could he know? How could he tell if Ethan truly cared for him, or cared only for keeping him alive and out of the hands of enemy agents long enough to complete his work? How could he know if Ethan was just acting, putting on a show because he knew that ending whatever strange thing had grown up between them might send Benji running in the opposite direction?

And even if he was telling the truth, even if he really did care about Benji…

He’d told Ethan before that he was on his second chance, and there wasn’t a third waiting in the wings. If Benji reneged on that now, he’d be setting himself up to be used and lied to for the rest of his life. Right?

Anger, he realized. That was the feeling squeezing the back of his neck, balling his hands into fists, making him want to punch something, someone, until he saw blood, his or theirs, he didn’t care. It was a confusing, unfamiliar state—he tended to push things inward, favor sadness over fury, fix the things he could and ignore the rest. But right now, he wanted to burn something. And not some stupid guitar picks either, something that couldn’t be replaced. Something that would hurt.

He leaned into it, liking the warmth and the righteousness and the strength of it, building like stone up his back and helping him stand taller.

He could feel Ethan’s eyes on him as they arrived at the end of the passage, finding a tiny caged elevator waiting for them. Benji wrenched it open and stepped inside, Ethan following him cautiously, hitting the lone, unmarked button and starting their ascent.

The space was close and dark and warm, and Benji couldn’t help but think how he might have taken advantage of the situation only a few hours ago.

“It was about you,” Ethan admitted suddenly, expression unyielding. “I was supposed to gain your trust, infiltrate your workspace, and gauge the progress of your project. My directive was to ultimately acquire it if possible, but destroy it if necessary, in order to maintain our national security. Our tech people said your encryption was bulletproof, making you the obvious weak spot, both for us and other interested parties. I was given my mission.”

Mission. I’m his mission. Benji processed that information as best he could, but it was like trying to put a live chicken down a garbage disposal – it just didn’t fit, and there was a lot of pain and noise.

Benji nodded, wishing he wasn’t trapped in that elevator, close enough to Ethan to feel the heat of his body, unable to see anything but him.

“I can’t defend my actions,” Ethan continued, gaze intent on Benji’s face like he was trying to listen in on his thoughts and respond to them. “What I started out to do was horrible, but at the time I thought it was the right thing. My duty. Once I realized how good your intentions were, how much you thought your work could make the world a better place, I knew that I was wrong. I knew that my handlers were wrong, and that they wouldn’t understand.”

“I don’t want to hear about your handlers,” Benji shook his head, squeezing his eyes shut. “Or your duty, or right or wrong, I just want—I just—” Benji didn’t know what he wanted, except impossible things like for this whole afternoon to disappear into a black hole, leaving him and Ethan on the couch in his apartment, tangled up together and delightfully unaware of anything to do with spies or guns or grungy back-alleys.

“Benji…” Benji’s eyes flew open as he felt a pair of warm hands close tenderly around his face.

Ethan looked so earnest, eyes shining in the dark. Did he have to practice that expression in the mirror? Benji wondered.

“This was never about work,” Ethan insisted, tracing his thumbs down Benji’s cheeks, to the corners of his mouth, “How I feel about you has nothing to do with my job or your project or anything but how much I liked you and how badly I wanted you—”

Benji kissed him. It was the eerie reverse of the first time he’d done so—he was fast and sure, hard and rough. He wasn’t waiting for a response, he was looking for answers.

But he pulled back, leaving Ethan’s mouth red and his own lips tingling, with questions still buzzing in his skull like trapped hornets.

“You feel the same, you taste the same, but you’re not,” he said, voice threatening to crack. “Or you are, and that’s worse, because then you’ve been this…this Agent Ethan Scott person all along.”

“Hunt,” Ethan said, despair warring with resignation across his face. “My name is Ethan Hunt.”

“Right.” Benji nodded. “Yeah, of course.” Benji removed Ethan’s hands from his face, movements slow and purposeful.

“I’m telling you this because you asked me to.” Ethan looked more panicked now than he had when bullets had been ricocheting around them. “You asked for the truth, and it’s going to hurt, but if it’s the only chance I have to keep you—”

“It was your job,” Benji cut him off. “It was your job to keep me. Keep the idiot programmer on Uncle Sam’s side, right? Make sure he doesn’t give his technology to some foreign power, find a way to grab it for yourself, give the good old US of A an edge in the digital world!”

“Only in the beginning. As soon as I started to get to know you—”

“But that’s the thing, isn’t it? If it wasn’t your mission,” Benji spat out the word, “You wouldn’t have bothered to get to know me in the first place. You wouldn’t overlooked all my little idiosyncrasies, you’d have headed for the hills the first time I made a fool of myself and hit on you.”

Benji didn’t give Ethan a chance to respond, clawing at the door even before the elevator clanged to a stop in a dark room lit only by the faded sunlight of a lonely, dusty, leaded glass window.

Chapter Text

Ethan followed Benji into the darkened room, stance no longer cautious but combative. “Neither of us can know that, can know what would have happened if we’d met by chance,” he argued, trying to get Benji to meet his eye. “We can’t go back. And besides, you knew I couldn’t tell you the whole truth. You as good as said you were ok with it!”

Benji rounded on Ethan, incredulous. “You want to try and put this on me? Sure, I knew something was going on, but I trusted you—I trusted that it didn’t have anything to do with me, that it was your life and you’d deal with it. But this is all about me, Ethan! And not in a good way. For god’s sake, I mean…you were supposed to seduce and rob me of the most valuable work I’ve done in my life! That’s so much worse than anything I thought you might be up to. And I was considering stuff like trafficking black-market organs!”

Ethan blinked, mouth opening and closing before he asked, “You think software theft is worse than organ trafficking?”

“Well, no, probably not!” Benji waved his hands, bitter and exasperated as the conversation veered off-course, “Forgive me for being a little selfish right now and caring more about my personal life being blown to smithereens rather than the fictional bodily integrity of imaginary victims!”

Ethan took a step back, head bowed. “Sorry. I just…”

“It’s not about stealing my work, Ethan,” Benji sighed, scrubbing a hand down his face. “Not really. It’s about what was real and what wasn’t, and if being with me was part of your job or…or just convenient.” Benji hadn’t even thought of that possibility, and he wondered if it was better or worse, to just be some toy used to entertain a bored super-agent.

“Falling for you was definitely not part of the job. It was actually pretty inconvenient,” Ethan said quietly, shoving his hands in his pockets. “Why do you think I bolted the first time you kissed me? I had to figure out how to make things work, how to reconcile my job and wanting to protect you… I was being monitored too, you know.”

Benji sat back on his heels, considering that. “Huh.”

“Yeah.” Hope sparked in Ethan’s eyes and Benji took a deep breath, trying to get a hold of himself.

“The hell is this place?” he wondered aloud, almost tripping over a low wooden bench as he finally bothered to investigate their surroundings.

“Church,” Ethan replied, leaning forward to catch Benji’s elbow and right him, “So, I’d recommend you keep your voice down.”

“And my invocations of eternal suffering to a minimum, got it. Sorry,” Benji whispered at a nearby cross on the wall as if it was listening in, “extenuating circumstances.” He realized he’d been unconsciously leaning into Ethan’s touch and jerked away, more brusquely than he meant to.

Ethan’s features shuttered and he marched past Benji towards a darkened stairwell leading even deeper into the Earth. Benji reluctantly followed, watching as Ethan descended to a dimly lit table covered in candles. He rearranged a trio of tapers and one of the wooden slats on the wall behind the table gave way to reveal a number-pad.

“You lot really love your secret panels, don’t you,” Benji sighed, stepping down next to Ethan. After he said it, he recognized it for what it was: an olive branch. Something in the family of a joke, to try and thaw the frozen conversation.

Ethan smiled, an actual smile if a wry one, and Benji relaxed by a degree. “Goes with the trade,” he shrugged, tapping in a combination and pushing against the wall to his left.

The wall gave way into a door, which Ethan held open for Benji.

“After you,” he waved elegantly over the threshold and Benji rolled his eyes.

“Now he’s a gentleman,” he sighed, sliding past Ethan and into a room that hummed to life as they stepped inside.

“This is…” Benji stood, flabbergasted, surrounded by gleaming chrome bulkheads and paper-thin HD screens, rows of weapons and gadgets, some of which even he didn’t recognize.

“Holy shit,” he finally declared.

“Watch your language in this house of the lord,” a deep, commanding voice sounded from the shadows, preceding its large, stern-looking owner.

“Ah, oh god—no, gosh, sorry,” Benji backed away, wondering if he should cross himself or something, “Uh, Father—is that what I’m supposed to call you? I’m not really…”

“It’s alright Benji, he’s not a priest, he’s just messing with you.” Ethan glared at the newcomer, “Luther, cut it out.”

“Alright,” Luther put his hands up in mock surrender, “but you’re the one who told me how fun it was to push his buttons—and you were right.”

Benji rounded on Ethan, vibrating with renewed, astonished fury. Ethan squeezed his fists at his sides, “Thanks Luther, very helpful.”

“Anytime. And hey, it’s nice to meet you, even under these circumstances,” Luther held a hand out for Benji to shake, which he did on autopilot. “Ethan won’t shut up about you, it’s embarrassing. For him,” he clarified.

Benji wasn’t appeased. “Yes, well, I am apparently his number one professional priority.”

“Hoo boy…” Luther pretended to shiver, “things seem a little chilly between you two.”

“Understatement,” Benji growled.

“Jig is up, huh?” Luther said sympathetically, though it wasn’t clear if that sympathy was directed at Ethan or Benji.

“We’re blown,” Ethan confirmed, “Armed hostiles came for Benji and his tech directly – no one’s playing games anymore.”

Luther nodded. “Glad you invited me to the party then.” His gaze returned to Benji, sizing him up. “You’re taking this pretty well, all things considered. Doesn’t look like you tried to punch Ethan yet, anyway, and it couldn’t have been easy to hear about all this.”

Ethan made an abortive hand-across-throat motion at Luther, freezing guiltily when Benji caught sight of it.

“Hear about…?” Benji trailed off meaningfully, not sure who he should be focusing his glare on, settling for flipping back and forth between the two men.

Luther replied, “The whole set-up, the surveillance, the dossiers…”

“The what?”

Ethan threw his hands in the air, swearing under his breath.

“On you and your family…” Luther added, not looking at all guilty about spilling the beans, “guess Ethan hasn’t done the full debrief yet.”

“No, apparently not,” Benji said as calmly as he could, which wasn’t very.

Ethan dragged a hand through his hair, half turning away before spinning back to scowl at Luther, “I was sharing information at a pace I thought he could handle.”

“Oh, and that’s working out real well for him, isn’t it,” Luther shot back.

“Excuse me?” Benji raised a hand, “I’m standing right here. Rather you didn’t discuss me in the third person.”

“Alright,” Luther crossed his arms and settled his knowing gaze on Benji, “I don’t know you from Adam, but Ethan likes you, so I figure you must be decent. Which means you don’t deserve to be hurt any more than he does when this little workplace romance blows up in your face.”

“It hasn’t already blown up?” Benji asked at the same time Ethan growled, low and threatening, “Luther, I asked you here to help, not make things worse.”

“Tough shit,” Luther shot back, unbothered, “Believe it or not, I am helping you, man. I saw what happened with Julia. Why do you think this will be any different?”

“Who’s Julia?” Benji asked, though he already suspected he’d regret doing so.

Ethan’s hands were clenching and unclenching at his sides, while Luther just gave a ‘what can you do’ kind of shrug.

“Julia is my ex-wife,” Ethan finally replied, shortly.

“You were married?” Benji couldn’t even put a name to his feelings about that. Maybe it was just one too many shocks for his system to absorb.

He laughed, startling himself and Ethan.

“You know, my sister’s first instinct about you was so right,” he said loudly, “She thought you might be a serial killer or have a secret family hidden away somewhere – and she was right on both counts!”

“Benji, I’m an agent, not a serial killer,” Ethan corrected, patient and anxious all at once, “And I don’t have any family, secret or otherwise, not anymore. Just you.”

“You…” Benji couldn’t even reply, his hands shaking with the infuriating, battling desires to grab Ethan and either shake him roughly or kiss the life out of him.

He finally choked out through the paralysis, “I am not your family. I don’t know what definition of the word you’re working from, but I think you should check your fucking dictionary because mine doesn’t include anything about endless lies and manipulation and half-truths and conveniently left-out facts—” The world tilted on its axis by a fraction and Benji had to interrupt his rant to take in some air, which seemed suddenly very thin.

“There’s that shock setting in,” Luther noted idly, going over to a bank of computers and flipping them on.

“Maybe you should sit down,” Ethan suggested, already wheeling a chair over.

Benji wagged a finger weakly, “You listen to me, Ethan, if I want to be hysterical and start hyperventilating then by god, that is my right as a naturalized American citizen—!”

Ethan nodded graciously as he lowered Benji into the chair, where he folded in half and tried to drag in deep, shaky breaths with his head between his knees. Ethan rubbed a hand in gentle circles on his back and Benji despised himself for soaking in the comfort.

“Benji, I’m so sorry,” Ethan whispered, his voice close enough that Benji could feel his breath on his skin.

“I know,” Benji covered his face, “I know.”

He finally pushed himself upright with his hands on his knees, and caught a glimpse of something terrible and broken in Ethan’s face before he tucked it away behind a calm, controlled mask.

Something moved in Benji’s heart, like the tumbler of a lock trying to click into place but missing the notch. “Why do you look so sad?” he asked Ethan, desperate to understand.

That mask slipped again as Ethan answered, “Because I can feel myself losing you.”

Benji’s hand moved of its own volition, reaching desperately for Ethan and ending up tangled in the front of his shirt. He gripped it tightly, the closest to touching Ethan as he could handle, even as it was only barely enough.

He wanted to promise Ethan that he wouldn’t. Wanted to say that nothing short of actual death would move him from his side, because Ethan was his sun, dammit, and nothing could pull him free of that gravity no matter how much his orbit was knocked off course.

But he also didn’t want to lie. And the fact was, he didn’t know if Ethan would lose him, could lose him, or if maybe he already had.

“Just an FYI,” Luther broke in, startling Benji into releasing his grip, “Brandt’s on his way down, so if you two are gonna make out or something, I’d get it over with quick.”

“Wait, who?” Benji shook his head, trying to remind himself of the whole ‘stuck in a secret government base because bad guys are trying to rob and kill me’ situation.

Ethan ground his teeth together for a moment, collecting himself before explaining, “A colleague I called here to help us. He’s from Luther and I’s organization, he’s the one who handed me off to FBI operations.”

Benji just looked at Ethan blankly until the door they’d entered through slid open to reveal a familiar figure.

“Aha!” Benji pointed at the newcomer, “Beige man!”

“What?” Brandt froze in the doorway at the unusual appellation, glancing down at his suit, “This is…this is tawny.”

“The fact that you can tell the difference just makes it worse,” Luther called, peering around his screen to cast a judgmental look in Brandt’s direction.

“Also, speaking empirically, light colors like that are just asking for ketchup stains,” Benji added.

Brandt finally stepped inside, letting the door clang shut behind him as he strode to the center of the room and put his hands on his hips. “Did you ask me here specifically to critique my wardrobe?” He directed this at Ethan, who just shrugged.

Luther smirked, “I can think of a few other things to critique, if you wanna spice things up. Your taste in music, for example—”

Brandt shook his hand and turned around, marching right back towards the door he’d just come through.

“No, hey, wait,” Ethan materialized between him and the exit, “Will, I asked you here because I need your help.”

“No kidding,” Will said drily.

Ethan gave a conceding nod to that. “I was hoping you could—” he paused, frowning down at the cardboard cup clutched in Will’s hand. He raised an eyebrow. “Are you late because you made a coffee run?”

“No, I’m late because my crazy friend made me interrupt my coffee run to meet him for an unsanctioned mission in a creepy church basement!” Will shouted back, almost upending the fruits of said coffee run.

“Hey, have some respect,” Luther said lightly, “this basement barely counts as spooky.”

“I should call your handler right now,” Will said, no longer shouting and seeming all the angrier for it, “I should call him right fucking now and put an end to this before we all end up dead, or in prison, or both.”

Luther looked like he was going to inquire as to how they could be both dead and imprisoned, but Ethan stopped him with a pleading look.

“You know I won’t let that happen,” Ethan said soothingly to Will, and Benji felt an acidic twinge of jealousy at the familiarity of those words.

“You say that every time you come up with one of your bullshit schemes—” Will railed.

“—And we’ve come out the other side every time,” Ethan cut him off.

“Not every time,” Will reminded him. “Do you remember why you’re here?”

“Because I did what was necessary—”

“Because you did what you wanted to do! You blew off orders—”

“—and it was a good thing I did, people would have died—”

“You disobeyed direct orders!” Will shouted over him. “And this assignment was supposed to be your punishment! Stuck on babysitting duty to think about the consequences of your actions. And what’s the first thing you do? Ignore your orders, yet again, and if that wasn’t enough, you start sleeping with the target.”

Ethan burst forward without warning, tendons standing out in his neck as he stopped just short of Will’s personal space, violent promise in his eyes. “He’s not ‘the target,’” Ethan said, enunciating each word carefully, “He has a name. And you don’t get to talk about him like that.”

“You’re compromised, Ethan,” Will bit out.

“You’re damn right I am.”

“And you’re making this about you. You get knocked down to the minors for a season and you couldn’t just ride the pine, you had to make a show of it and endanger the mission—"

This time, when Ethan made to strike like a snap of lightning, he didn’t look like he was going to pull back, and Benji reacted on instinct. “Don’t!” he said, hands flying up, palms out.

Ethan froze, inches from Will, and turned slowly to look at Benji. Will stayed in his defensive pose, but his eyes darted over to Benji, wide with surprise. In the corner, Luther let out a low whistle and looked at Benji with something resembling respect.

“Just, don’t,” Benji let his hands fall to his sides and Ethan mirrored the action, stepping back from Will. “Because I don’t know what the hell you two are going on about, honestly, but I’ve decided the only one allowed to be angry here is me. You’ll just have to wait your turn, Mister…” Benji trailed off, tilting his head, “Uh, sorry, what was your name again?”

“William Brandt,” Will sighed, shoulders deflating. “But you can just call me Traitor-to-the-State and Dumbass Extraordinaire.”

“Bit wordy,” Benji found himself grinning, “Think I’ll just call you Mister Dumbass, for short.”

Ethan was smiling too, and the tension in the room sank like a physical weight off their collective shoulders. “Is that your way of saying you’ll help?” he asked Will, the fact that he’d nearly socked him only seconds earlier apparently irrelevant.

“It appears so,” Will agreed, squinting up at the ceiling like he might find his common sense lurking up there.

“Great.” Ethan clapped his hands and surveyed the room. “Then, gentlemen, I believe we have some work to do.”

Chapter Text

If Benji set aside all the heartbreak and deception, it was actually kind of exciting to be involved in the real-life equivalent of an Ian Fleming novel. And since Benji was doing his best not to focus on said heartbreak and deception, he decided to lean into the excitement.

“I’ve always wanted to be part of a clique,” he shared with the assembled as they pulled up chairs around Luther’s computer set-up, “One of the cool kids.”

“Welcome to the gang,” Luther said with a wink.

“This isn’t a gang, or a game,” Will grumbled, disapproving.

Luther hooked a thumb across at Will, saying to Benji, “He’s our local killjoy, as you’ve probably noticed.”

Will and Luther continued to snipe at each other while Ethan leaned over to murmur in Benji’s ear. “Believe it or not, these guys helped save the world, more than once.”

“The whole world?” Benji whispered back.

“Mmhmm. Which is all to say, you’re in good hands.”

“Yeah, well, I knew that didn’t I? Never doubted the quality of your hands.” Benji played up the familiar double entendre with a waggle of his eyebrows, pleased when it merited a laugh. Ethan settled into a fond smile and Benji’s heart ached. Oh, fuck, that smile. He wondered if there was anything Ethan could do, any atrocity he could commit, that would finally render Benji impervious to its destructive charms.

Nope, those kinds of thoughts definitely went against his newfound policy of ‘don’t think about it don’t think about it don’t think about it’ so he summarily quashed them and asked instead, “So, lads, how bad is all this? Should I be writing my last will and testament or…?”

“No offense, but this is small potatoes for us,” Luther said, propping his feet leisurely against an extremely expensive-looking steel briefcase, “No nukes, no large-scale hostage situation, no super-plague virus about to take down half the Earth’s population…”

“Jesus. Is that a usual day at the office for you?”

“There are slow days, sometimes. But the IMF generally promises thrills, and it delivers.”

“The IMF? You work for…the International Monetary Fund?” Benji asked, nonplussed.

“Impossible Missions Force,” Ethan corrected him.

“That is not actually what you’re called.” Ethan’s half-wince, half-smile in confirmation made Benji laugh out loud. “Okay, I understand now why you didn’t tell me about your job. Because you knew I’d laugh in your face, and your ego couldn’t take it.”

“Guilty,” Ethan admitted.

“Seriously, though, you guys must be a big deal if you consider the Federal Bureau of Investigations a step down,” Benji raised a meaningful eyebrow.

“The FBI is our full and equal partner in domestic operations,” Will parroted, as if reading from a notecard.

“Don’t listen to him, he drank the bureaucratic Kool-Aid,” Luther said dismissively.

Before their bickering could start up again, Ethan jumped in, “Could we please focus? Specifically, on how to get these jackals off of Benji’s back, preferably permanently.”

“How permanently?” Luther asked.

“Not cement shoes, if that’s what you’re implying,” Ethan answered. “We need a plan that removes Benji from the focal point of this technological storm, something that erases his value.”

“Gee, thanks, that sounds great,” Benji snarked.

“Erases your value to them,” Ethan clarified. “Right now, you’re the only one with the tech, the code to get through the encryption, and the know-how to use the software, which paints a huge target on your back.”

“Well, actually, just about anyone with a decent tech background could use the software at this point,” Benji said idly, patting the laptop which he’d been holding for so long now, it was starting to seem like an extension of his person. “That was the whole point, make it accessible to—” Benji froze mid-gesture, his hand held out in front of him like a statue.

“Is he broken?” Will asked, prompting Ethan to kick the base of his chair hard enough to send him wheeling away.

“That’s it, isn’t it?” Benji burst back into motion, looking excitedly around the circle, “If everyone has it, then no one wants it. Problem solved.”

“I’m not following,” Ethan frowned, but Luther broke into a grin.

“That could work!” Luther spun around and started typing something furiously. “Guessing it’s a big chunk of data you’ve gotta move?” he called over his shoulder.

“Terabytes,” Benji confirmed.

“Compression algorithm?”

Benji scrunched his nose and held his hand out flat, palm down, tipping it from side to side. “Work in progress. I don’t have anything available that could bring it down to the gigabyte range.”

“Got a place to host it?”

“Purchased a site a while back, very generous server space.”

“But we’ve still gotta get it out there.”

“And my machine was infected, which means even with a VPN—”

“They can probably still track the IP. And if we move the file and there are any remains of a tracker embedded somewhere—”

“All we’ve done is infect another machine.”

“Yeah, okay, so we’ll have to find a location with sufficient bandwidth to upload it all at once…”

Will finally tired of listening to Luther and Benji’s incomprehensible back and forth, pinching the bridge of his nose and interrupting, “Do you think the nerd squad could speak in English for just a moment?”

“Yes, the technologically savvy will deign to dumb it down for you,” Luther rephrased. “Long story short: we’re gonna open source this shit.”

“In other words,” Benji doffed his metaphorical teaching cap, “I was always planning on doing a worldwide release of my software—after I’d done a lot more debugging and refining and so on, but we’ll have to sacrifice that—and if I do it now, then everybody, all the corporations and governments and what-have-you, will have the same advantages and disadvantages. Every line of code available online for the world’s perusal and use. I become functionally irrelevant.” Benji slapped his knees, thrilled for the first time in his life at the possibility of obsolescence.

“That’s it?” Ethan asked, the line between his eyebrows deepening, “We just connect your laptop to the internet and offload the software?”

“Ah, well…” Benji held up a finger and Luther picked up for him, “This sucker is way too big to go over the connection we have here, not least because this whole bunker is designed to keep signals from getting in, not help them get out. We’d need some industrial-sized bandwidth. Especially because as soon as we start to upload it—”

“Those bad guys who bugged my computer in the first place will almost certainly be able to track our location with the data they snatched,” Benji finished.

“So, we need to upload it fast, is what I’m hearing,” Ethan said.

“Correct.”

“Which is why I’m looking for the fastest uplink in the area, and…there we go.” Luther tapped the side of the screen triumphantly. “NYU’s CS department is testing commercial-grade fiber optics. An article from the local science reporter claims they hit 0.9 terabits per second in their most recent test.”

“If that’s even half true, then we could get this big bastard up in less than a minute,” Benji mused, fingers tapping a speedy staccato on his computer case.

Ethan sat up straight in his chair, a plan forming in his eyes. “Alright, so I go to the university, upload the software—”

“Uh, I don’t think so,” Benji interrupted, snapping everyone’s eyes to him. He felt like shrinking under the sudden scrutiny, but he stood firm. “You’re not going anywhere without me.”

“Benji,” Ethan said, calm but resolute, “you’re safe here in the bunker.”

“I’m safe with you,” Benji countered.

Ethan’s response lodged in his throat, his mouth half-open as a whirlwind of emotions chased each other across his features.

Benji pushed past his own careening feelings, needing to make his case more than he needed to work through what it meant that he did still feel safest with Ethan, despite everything. “Besides,” he said, “this is a delicate procedure. And more than that…this is mine. My creation, Ethan, my baby, and I thought I was gonna get to spend weeks, months more with it – take it to its first day of school and all that. Instead, I’m chucking it onto the web without a stitch of user-interface to wear, and I’ll be damned if I’m not there to hold its hand to the very end.”

Ethan’s expression softened and Benji could tell he’d won, even as Ethan tried to argue, “You could be in the van, monitoring it remotely.”

“Nope, don’t think so. Besides, if something goes wrong on the technical end, I’m the only person in the world right now who knows how this thing works—you need me.”

A smile broke the surface of Ethan’s control as he nodded and agreed, “Yeah, I do.”

“Uh…are all tech guys this weirdly attached to their stuff?” Will asked Luther out of the corner of his mouth, eyes flicking between Ethan and Benji.

“Hush, for once in your life,” Luther said, shoving Will’s shoulder, “Can’t you see they’re having a moment?”

“Well, I hate to break up this ‘moment’,” Will said loudly, “No, actually, I don’t, because it’s really not the time—but I feel I should remind you, Ethan, that your job was not to put this highly volatile piece of technology into public hands. It was, in fact, quite the opposite.”

Ethan’s smile disappeared like it had never been there. “Are you planning on stopping me?”

“Don’t be stupid,” Will sighed, “I’m not gonna try and stop you, or tattle to your boss, I just want you to actually pause and think about what you’re doing. About the consequences you’ll face if you disobey orders, dramatically, again.”

“Those consequences are a lot better than what could happen to Benji if we don’t do this.”

“I don’t disagree. Which is why I’ll be in your corner, backing up your decision when they lower the boom on you. If I’m not getting thrown into a cell myself, that is.”

“Wait, could that really happen?” Benji cut in, worried, “Could you get locked up for this? Or, like, drawn and quartered?”

“They don’t do that anymore, I can promise you that much,” Ethan assured him.

“No? Do they favor the firing squad? Hanging? Electrocution? Defenestration?”

“Benji, try to stop panicking. And listing horrible ways to die.”

“Roger,” Benji coughed.

“Besides, this is my fault, remember?” Ethan’s smile returned, but with a wistful bent this time, “I should be the one to fix it, and take the blame.”

“I…” Benji didn’t know how he’d intended to finish that thought. Maybe he was going to say, ‘I don’t want you to take the blame,’ or even, ‘I don’t blame you, not really.’ Maybe he’d wanted to tell Ethan that he couldn’t fix things, not the important things, if he was tossed in jail. If he was in jail, how could they be together?

That thought had him standing up, stumbling to his feet and turning away, insides hissing with self-revulsion. It had been what? Half a fucking hour, and here he was, pining away after his hot not-really-a-neighbor again like he was back outside his door, juggling groceries and trying to extricate his foot from his mouth. Completely blowing past the mountain of insecurities that Ethan had ignited with his truth.

“Benji?” Ethan prompted, chair scraping as he made to follow.

“Just give me a minute,” Benji whispered, disgust only burrowing deeper into his gut at the weakness in his voice.

If I had even a shred of self-respect, I’d be happy at the thought of Ethan getting chucked in a dark cell for a very long time. I should be angry at him. I shouldn’t be able to stand the sight of him.

Why? His mother’s no-nonsense voice sounded abruptly in his head: What’s the point of being angry? All you’ve done is make yourself feel bad because someone else did something they shouldn’t 've. Now go clean up those bloody Legos, before your sister tries to eat them again.

Okay, that last bit probably wasn’t so relevant. But the advice had been sound, and the fact was, keeping up that kind of rage would be exhausting.

“Hey,” Ethan approached Benji with caution, likely meaning that Benji wasn’t controlling his facial expressions as well as he’d hoped he was. “Mind if I ask what’s going on?”

“Nothing much. Just contemplating the usefulness of anger and resentment in terms of long-term emotional security and satisfaction.”

“Oh.” Ethan blinked. “Come to any conclusions?”

“Still thinking on it,” Benji said truthfully, “Though I suspect my deep-set laziness and consequent inability to maintain a grudge will win out.”

“You are one of the least lazy people I’ve ever met,” Ethan declared, “And considering I work in a profession that regularly consumes people’s lives, that’s saying something.”

Benji scoffed faintly, looking away. “You don’t have to keep it up, you know,” he said, before he could think better of it. “It’s not your job anymore. I promise I won’t take off if you start being honest.”

“I have been honest,” Ethan insisted, eyes wide.

“I don’t mean about the, the spy stuff, or whatever. I mean…” Benji blew out a nervous breath before finishing in a rush, “you don’t have to keep saying nice things to me. About me, whatever. You can stop, it’s alright.”

Ethan frowned, confusion writ large on his features. “Benji, I already told you…I’m not lying about how I feel about you.”

“Well, sure, you say you like me but…”

“But?”

Benji’s mouth open and shut for a few painful seconds before he finally said, “…why?”

Understanding finally dawned and Ethan reached out to pull Benji closer, his hands warm on Benji’s shoulders. “Benji. I don’t have the hours, the days, it would take to tell you all the things I like about you.”

“Come off it…” Benji tried to shift away but Ethan followed, grip firm, though not enough to keep Benji from leaving if he really wanted to.

“Never,” Ethan said stubbornly. “You are so intelligent, and talented, and funny and loyal and just plain good. You’re good to be around, you’re good for me, and I am happier when I’m with you. HQ was trying to punish me with this assignment, and instead they gave me the greatest gift I could’ve asked for.”

Benji wanted to deny it, at least try and push away the sentiment with humor, but he couldn’t get past Ethan’s intensity, the way his eyes tracked every micro-expression flitting across Benji’s face like he could hunt down Benji’s self-doubt and yank it from his subconscious like a weed.

“Shut up,” Benji finally replied, feeling he either had to say something or cry, and he’d be damned if he started tearing up at this stage of the game.

Ethan laughed. “Make me.”

Not being one to turn down a challenge, Benji did just that, hooking a hand around Ethan’s neck and pulling him into messy, slightly off-target kiss.

Luther wolf-whistled in the background, and Ethan flipped him off behind Benji’s back before pulling Benji in closer.

Benji leaned into the embrace, welcoming the not-yet-familiar circle of Ethan’s arms around him. Screw anger, he thought, this was better.

Benji jerked back without warning, eyes wide. “I just realized something!”

“What?” Ethan asked, startled.

“It was less than twenty-four hours ago that I kissed you for the first time!” Benji was staggered as he went over the timeline again in his head and came to the same conclusion. “How could all of this have happened in barely a day?”

Ethan laughed again, relieved, and wrapped his hands more securely around Benji’s waist. “It has been kind of a wild day, hasn’t it.”

“Kind of? It’s been absolutely batshit. And look at me! Only almost fainted once. I’m pretty fucking fantastic, all things considered.”

“That’s the spirit.”

“You’ve been pretty decent too,” Benji allowed, “Especially considering you ended up spending this morning helping me corral my drunken sister instead of...”

Benji swallowed hard, remembering a little too vividly exactly what Ethan had been up to before Maggie arrived. 

Ethan smirked, clearly reliving the same memories. His hands slid dangerously low on Benji’s hips, threatening the bounds of decency.

“I’d like to take this moment to remind you two idiots that you’ve got an audience,” Luther drawled, “And you might want to take your soap opera shit to a more private safe house.”

“Or maybe, if you’re done reminding the rest of us how terminally single we are, we could get this show on the road,” Will added.

“Yeah, I think we’re about done,” Benji said mildly.

Will rolled his eyes, but his mouth twitched with a repressed smile.

“Okay,” Ethan agreed, “If we’re all set, then let’s grab our gear and go to school.”

“Go to school,” Luther repeated, shaking his head, “Do you think up those pithy little catchphrases beforehand, or do they occur naturally, in the moment?”

Benji sat back, watching the trio of agents banter as they gathered up their guns and computers and unidentifiable gadgets.

In an ideal world, his life wouldn’t be in danger, and he wouldn’t ever have come to the point where he needed the help of people like them. But as it was, he couldn’t think of a team he’d rather have watching his back.

Chapter Text

“I’ll drive,” Will declared once everyone was equipped with sufficient arms and tech, “No way I’m getting stuck in the back with those two.” He pointed at Ethan and Benji with the butt of a sniper rifle, before tucking it into what looked from the outside like an innocent violin case.

“I’ll take one for the team,” Luther sighed, “Now let’s pack it in, there’s a show at The Blue Note at eight tonight, and I intend to be there.”

“I’d never dream of impinging on your social life,” Ethan said dryly, pressing his hand to a metal-and-glass pad that scanned his palm, activating a steel door that slid open with a very Star Trek-like whoosh, leading them to a small, underground garage.    

Luther and Will went about prepping the black van that waited there, while Benji lingered near the door. He felt rather bare, standing there awkwardly and clutching his computer to his chest like a safety blanket. Although he had no real desire to hold a gun, having never used one outside of the plastic replica he blasted zombies with in one of his favorite arcade games, it might’ve made him feel a little more secure. A little less useless.

Ethan noticed his unease, sidling up next to him and putting a hand on his shoulder. “Hey. Just focus on the endgame: when this is over, you’ll be safe, and you can put all this behind you.”

Benji gently rapped his knuckles against his laptop, speaking to it, “You hear that, you little bugger? You’ve caused all sorts of trouble.” He glanced back up at Ethan and added, “But I hope that I won’t put all of this behind me.”

Ethan’s eyes crinkled with a smile and he leaned in to brush a kiss to Benji’s cheek, almost like couldn’t help himself. “Not ruing the day you met me, then?”

“No,” Benji shifted his computer to the crook of his left arm, freeing his other to wrap around Ethan’s waist. There was still a part of him that couldn’t believe his feelings for Ethan were reciprocated. That bit of his psyche was cheering and throwing confetti in the back of his mind at the fact that he could do this, touch Ethan casually and be welcomed for it. “Ruing some of the foolish things I said, maybe...”

“You shouldn’t regret anything you’ve said to me,” Ethan countered lightly, “All of it just made me want you more.”

“Well,” Benji tried very hard not to blush, but suspected he was failing miserably, “I’m very glad my unique charm offensive worked on you.”

The van rumbled to life, belching exhaust, and Luther called from his set-up in the back, “Eight o’clock, remember! And I don’t feel like missing the pre-show hors d’oeuvre bar, either.”

Ethan shook his head and leapt nimbly into the van, holding out a hand for Benji to grab as he made his considerably less agile ascent. Benji frowned down at his comfortable but worn loafers, providing him with exactly zero grip on the car’s slippery floors.

“If I’d known I’d be on the run for my life when I got dressed this morning, I’d have made different choices,” Benji announced as he plopped down into one of the few seats not covered in electronic detritus. 

“Yeah?” Ethan looked amused as he settled into the seat next to Benji. Luther muttered something under his breath that sounded like, “Lord, here we go.”

“Yeah, I’d have gone for something more sporty,” Benji struck an athletic pose, then shifted into something faux-sultry, “Or sexy, to throw my pursuers off their guard.”

Ethan laughed at Benji’s antics, scooting closer and resting a hand on Benji’s knee. “Well, I think you make a sweater vest look very sexy...”

Benji scoffed but leaned in closer. “Stop flirting with me when I’m supposed to be furious with you.”

“I thought you were moving past anger. Finding your zen, or something.”

“Honestly, I haven’t been zen a day in my life. But it’s very hard to stay mad at you, you’re like a naughty dog – like Mr. Buttons!”

“Oh, god, not Mr. Buttons again…” Ethan hung his head, despairing.

“Listen, when you stop acting like a pouty little ill-behaved puppy, I’ll stop comparing you to one.”

“Okay, this,” Ethan gestured to his own face, “is not a pout.”

“Little bit pouty,” Benji tapped Ethan’s bottom lip with his index finger, “Just a little….”

Eyes sparkling, Ethan nipped the finger Benji had brought so carelessly into range.

Benji gasped, definitely not thinking about puppies any more as Ethan gave the abused digit a curious little lick, as if to apologize. “Naughty,” Benji breathed, which was the single worst thing he could’ve said if his goal was to get Ethan to cool down.

The hand Ethan had left innocently enough on Benji’s leg began to slide upwards, thumb tracing the inseam of Benji’s pants, starting at the bend of his knee and moving inward. It was a game of chicken, Benji realized, and god knew Ethan wouldn’t be the one to flinch.

While Benji tried to remember how to breathe and Ethan visibly delighted in this struggle, Luther sighed deeply and called up to Will, “Hey, Brandt?”

“What?” Will shouted back over his shoulder.

“You made the right call not being back here.”

Will snorted. “T-minus five to an unwanted peep show, huh?”

“You got it.”

Without taking his eyes off of Benji, Ethan said to Luther in a tone loaded with meaning, “I would remind you of Mexico, 2005, a certain individual named Carmen, and an incident involving the creative use of flan.”

There was a beat of silence, then Luther nodded and refocused on the laptop screen in front of him. “Carry on.”

As much as Benji would have loved to carry on, he didn’t particularly want to do so in spy van loaded with weaponry and a disapproving audience.

“Okay, first off,” Benji laid a hand over Ethan’s, gently halting his progress, “I desperately want to hear more about this story involving flan.”

Luther shook his head and mumbled, “Not under pain of death.”

“Second,” Benji fixed Ethan with a pointed look, “I know you’re just trying to distract me from our impending doom.”

“There is no doom, impending or otherwise,” Ethan said firmly, “Though I will admit I was trying to distract you. Also…” he grazed a thumb over Benji’s cheek, “I love it when you blush.”

“Well, that’s good, because I spend a not insignificant part of my life in a state of extreme embarrassment—”

The van hit a bump in the road, tossing the contents of the vehicle roughly forward and sending Benji tumbling into Ethan’s lap. Ethan seemed pleased, if surprised, at this development. Benji just threw a hand in the air, grumbling, “And the universe is conveniently providing you an example of this! Also, do spies not believe in seat belts?”

“Hey, we’re all about safety around here,” Ethan replied loftily.

“Oh, yeah, I can tell,” Benji agreed, plucking up a wicked-looking serrated knife from where it had been jittering across the van floor.

Ethan frowned and carefully removed the knife from Benji’s grasp, giving it a once-over before tucking it into a nearby case. “Hey, who left behind this mess?” he asked Luther, who raised an eyebrow over his computer screen.  

“Manifest said Schneider and co. were the last ones to base here.”

Ethan rolled his eyes and Luther nodded knowingly. “That explains it.”

“Ooh,” Benji clapped his hands, “got some intra-department drama to share?”

“If you wanna dish on who’s who, who’s screwing who, and who’s screwing who over, then you’ll wanna talk to our local gossip guru…” Luther jabbed a pen in the direction of the driver’s seat.

Will noted the significant silence and glanced back. “Hey! Who’re you calling a gossip?”

“You,” Luther said bluntly, “I’m calling you a gossip.”

The two of them kept up a stream of amusing bickering for the next few miles, and Benji relaxed into the atmosphere of adversarial companionship.

“Well, they’re certainly a good distraction,” Benji shared in a whisper, “I’ve hardly thought about immanent death at all.”

“Eh, I like my method better,” Ethan murmured back, adjusting his hold on Benji’s waist. Benji let his fingers splay across Ethan’s chest, feeling suddenly hyper-aware of the fact that he’d never moved back out of Ethan’s lap after being unceremoniously dumped in it. Probably, this wasn’t terribly appropriate, but Benji figured he deserved the comfort considering his extremely stressful day.

Will was heatedly defending his uncannily accurate knowledge of the ins and outs of some couple named Tory and Fletcher’s relationship, but Luther had apparently bored of teasing him, ignoring his rant in favor of retrieving a slim Velcro pack and extracting a tiny piece of tech from it before tossing it over to Ethan.

Ethan caught it one-handed, easily, and pulled it open. “Earpiece,” he explained, tucking the tiny device into his right ear, “Speaker and embedded microphone, so we can all stay in contact.”

He slipped another from the pack and tucked it into Benji’s ear before he had time to flinch.

“That felt very intimate,” Benji said with a shiver, tapping at the tech experimentally, “Do you do that for all of your targets?”

“Only the cute ones.”

“Ha. Quite comforting, actually, having your voice in my ear.”

“We’re five minutes out,” Will announced loudly, and Benji winced at the magnified voice in his ear.

Luther apparently felt the same, flipping the bird up at Will as he said, “Could do without your dulcet tones, Brandt.”

“I feel the same way, Stickell,” Will sent back a middle finger of his own, but it had to be said that the rude gesture was not without fondness.

“We are actually highly trained professionals,” Ethan commented, “despite appearances to the contrary. And on that note, we should probably go over the basics of the plan.”

“Oh, there’s a plan?” Benji feigned surprise, “How novel.”

Ethan tickled Benji’s ribs for that, eyes sparkling in his otherwise aloof expression as Benji squeaked and squirmed.

“Luther located the lab with the fiber optics, it’s on the main floor, back of the building,” he continued blandly, producing a tablet and pointing out the relevant points on a high-def blueprint, “I’ll stay at the primary, we’ll set you up at a secondary location with the next-best connection–"

“Wait, you’re not going to be with me?” Benji interrupted. He felt a little foolish as soon as the words left his mouth. Well, perhaps it wasn’t the words exactly that were embarrassing, but the slightly panicked, even needy way he’d said them.

But Ethan’s look wasn’t one of judgement, but of serious, thoughtful certainty, “Trust me, it’s the right move. There are some details of this op that it’s better for you not to worry about.”

“I can handle it,” Benji insisted. His voice only broke a little on that last vowel, so he thought he’d sold the performance pretty well.

Ethan fixed him with a sympathetic look and said, “You’re gripping my hand so tightly I’m losing feeling in my fingers.”

“Oops,” Benji released Ethan’s hand, which he’d been unconsciously clutching in a death grip. “Alright, fair point. But how is us being separated going to help?”

“Will’s gonna have your six from his eagle’s nest,” Ethan assured him.

“Brandt’s gonna be up high with a big gun watching your back,” Luther translated.

“And Luther’ll stay outside the active zone, monitoring the surveillance feeds and other technical inputs.”

Luther twirled a pair of pliers idly, “I’m your man in the van.”

“And I’ll be on the main floor, ready to divert or neutralize any hostiles who may have ascertained our location.”

“Pull some MMA ninja shit if any bad guys show up.” Luther karate chopped a USB cable to illustrate this last point.

“Right,” Benji nodded, “Okay, that sounds—”

“We’re here,” Will announced, putting the van into park and yanking up the handbrake.

“Really? What happened to all that famed New York traffic?” Benji joked weakly, rubbing suddenly sweaty palms on his knees.

“Me,” Luther raised a hand, “You’d be surprised how easy it is to hack the DOT and turn a few key stoplights on and off.”

Ethan turned to level an appraising look at Benji, who was trying so hard not to panic he’d begun panicking over his inability to not-panic.

“You don’t have to go through with this, if you don’t want to,” Ethan told him, tone soft and utterly free of judgement.

“Yeah, he does,” Will cut in brusquely, “or all of the paperwork I’m inevitably going to have to do about this unsanctioned disaster of an operation will be for nothing.”

“Brandt—” Ethan growled, but Will just rolled his eyes.

“Stop barking at me, already. What’re you gonna do, give me a wedgie? Get a move on, boy scout.”

“Oh, wow. He’s finally snapped,” Luther said, sounding vaguely impressed as Will stomped across the street with his not-violin case under his arm.

“Bound to happen eventually,” Ethan sighed, before turning to Benji with that same gentle, sympathetic look from before. “You really don’t have to go through with this, no matter what he said.”  

“No, it’s alright. Bit of tough love does me good. Also, he kinda pissed me off and the anger’s, you know,” Benji gestured up the center of his torso, miming a fire blazing upwards, “un-freezing me a bit.”

Benji took a deep breath and stood, relieved to find that although his knees felt like jelly, they still held his weight. “Right. Let’s go, uh, upload some code. Gee, that doesn’t sound very dramatic does it?” he mused as he and Ethan piled out of the van, Ethan helping Benji down with one hand while lugging a steel case with the other. “Lacking that special something, that panache.”

“How about, ‘let’s go change the world?’” Ethan offered.

“Yeah! That’s got a great ring to it, significant and yet generic. You really do have a knack for these snappy little one-liners.”

“Thank you. I should put it on my résumé.”

“Oh my god, do you actually have a résumé?” Benji marveled at the possibility, “What would that look like? ‘Experience in statecraft and seduction?’ Did you put ‘smolder’ under special skills?”

Ethan laughed and took Benji’s hand, letting their intertwined fingers swing between them like they were just another obnoxiously affectionate couple strolling through campus. “It’s less a résumé, more a thick file full of redacted text and red stamps in a locked box in a locked room in a locked building that doesn’t officially exist.”

“Yeah, that tracks,” Benji nodded.

A breeze swept through the row of buildings before them, gaining speed and whipping past with a wintry bite. It snapped at jackets and rustled through hair, reminding everyone that autumn was in its death throes.

Benji shivered and gripped Ethan’s hand tighter, peering around at the innocent faces of people – just kids, really, most of them—going about their days, unaware of the drama unfolding in their midst.

The early evening sun was starting to snuggle up to the horizon, lighting up the campus with an orange, transient glow. The time of the long shadows, he’d heard it called once. Had a nice, poetic sound to it, and he still enjoyed taking the occasional walk at this time, just to enjoy the almost other-worldly glint the dramatic shadows and slicing beams of faded light brought to the moment.

Right now, he’d just as soon be curled up on his couch with a good TV show and a warm pizza.

“It’s dinner time!” Benji realized as his thoughts went to food, “And we haven’t eaten anything.” He was deeply offended by this fact, and made it known in his tone.

Ethan startled slightly at the declaration, then relaxed back into an amused smile. “Sorry for the low blood sugar. That’s probably not making all this any easier.”

“It is not,” Benji sniffed. “Right, as soon as this life or death situation’s all squared away, you’re buying me a nice meal. Something with lots of carbohydrates and saturated fat.”

“You sound like you’re asking me to take you to McDonalds.”

“Maybe I am asking you to take me to McDonalds. Would you deny a man a medium fry and a chocolate shake after the kind of day I’ve had?”

“I would never. Don’t worry, you’ll be clogging your arteries with processed foodstuffs in no time.”

“I’ll hold you to that.”

Ethan nodded deferentially as he held open the door to a large, blandly modern building done up in dull brick and sweeping glass. Benji stepped cautiously inside, half-expecting more Russian wannabe-Bond-villains to melt out of the shadows carrying Uzis.

Instead, a couple of pale, exhausted-looking undergrads with identical looks of resigned nihilism sloped out of a classroom, laptop cases in tow.

Benji said under his breath to Ethan as they passed, “Yeah, I remember those days.”

Ethan glanced after them with a frown, “Do all computer science majors look like…”

“Like they’re waiting for the sweet embrace of death? Pretty much. But, all that repressed rage at the world makes for some really killer post-finals parties.”

“Really?”

“No, everyone just gets sloshed on cheap beer and plays Super Mario until they pass out on someone’s grungy dorm room carpet.”

“That sounds like your scene.”

“It was,” Benji said wistfully, “But now I prefer to get tastefully sauced on wine in the comfort of my own home.” They walked swiftly past the rows of now-empty classrooms, heading deeper into the building towards the graduate and faculty labs.

“Wouldn’t mind a swift half now, I’ve gotta say,” Benji continued, hoping a bit of his trademark babble could siphon off his rising nerves, “A nice Guinness, or a splash of vodka. Even accept a lukewarm wine cooler, if it took the edge off.”

“You’re gonna wanna hold onto that edge,” Ethan advised, wisely, “It’ll keep you alive.”

“Right. Stay edgy. Got it.”

“Third door down, on the right,” Luther’s voice sounded in their ears, making Benji jump. He’d nearly forgotten about their auditory-company.

Ethan gave Benji’s hand one last comforting squeeze before releasing it, slipping a hand into his jacket pocket and removing a set of lock picks. He set down his heavy case, the contents of which Benji was vaguely curious about but simultaneously apprehensive of, and made quick work of the door’s basic deadbolt.

They slipped into the darkness of the lab, the hulking outlines of desks and cabinets shambling out of the eerie shadows, lit up in disjointed bursts by flurries of blue-white blips leaping from the computers and wires and hard drives and routers that covered every available surface.

Ethan flipped the light switch and the lab was revealed to be quite ordinary in the florescent illumination, though that didn’t quite calm the foreboding twist in Benji’s gut.

“Blueprints show a set of stairs at the back of the lab leading up to the next floor,” Luther cut in again, and Ethan led Benji to another set of doors on the opposite side of the room, “It’s currently designated as a storage area, but after peeking into some of the staff and faculty’s emails, it looks like they’re using it as an overflow location for their fiber optic testing.”

“Got it,” Ethan confirmed as they found the stairs and headed up them, Ethan taking them swiftly two at a time. Benji didn’t want to admit it, but he was out of breath by the time they reached the top. Maybe I should start doing that damn CrossFit thing with Maggie like she keeps badgering me to, he thought, surreptitiously pressing a hand to the stitch in his side.

Ethan was scouting around the edges of what indeed appeared to be a secondary lab space, far less organized than the first, but equipped with the basic tools they needed.

There was a haunted-house-style squeak from the corner of the room, and Benji found Ethan investigating a rusty door labeled “Janitorial.”

“Can we get those cables to reach here?” Ethan asked, gesturing from the lab space to the door.

“Here?” Benji asked, pointing to what was unmistakably a janitor’s closet, complete with mop and bucket. “This is a closet.”

“Yes. A nice, safe closet.”

“A not-very-clean closet,” Benji countered, “You’ll notice the suspicious stains on the—well, on the everything? It looks like an Oompa Loompa met its untimely end in here.”

“It’s one more layer between you and a bullet,” Ethan pointed out with his I’m-amused-by-your-colorful-similes-but-we-need-to-be-sensible-here expression, an expression Benji was getting quite familiar with.

“Sold,” Benji sighed. “Okay, yeah, we can get one of those cable lines over here, just let me…” Benji trailed off as he performed a quick search of the messy workstation, finally unearthing a pair of thick gloves.

He turned back and found Ethan about to pick up one of the bundles of cable.

“Don’t touch that!” Benji hissed, just barely remembering he shouldn’t shout when they were in the middle of breaking and entering.

Ethan tensed and froze. “Why? I didn’t think these cables carried electricity.”

“They don’t, they work via lasers, in this case, seriously powerful lasers. They’re currently active and a huge mess – if you dislodge a loose end you could blind yourself in seconds.”

Ethan took a dutiful step back but frowned, “I don’t see any light.”

“Exactly. It’s not visible to the human eye, which means you wouldn’t notice it until the damage had been done.”

Ethan nodded seriously. “Right. I’ll leave this to the experts then.” He gestured for Benji to continue, which he did after donning the gloves.

“Sorry, sorry,” Benji chanted under his breath as he undid what was surely weeks of effort, gently unwrapping the cables and extracting the set that was currently connected to a compatible fiber-optic-to-ethernet converter. He cajoled the stiff cables out of their comfortable loops, pulling them along the table and onto the floor, dragging them over to the storage closet.

“Gee, this espionage business really is glamorous,” Benji griped, upending a bucket and sitting unsteadily on it, maneuvering open his laptop with one hand while holding the cables at a safe distance with the other, “Wonder why I never joined up before.”

“Next time we’re trying to save your life, I’ll make sure it’s in a more fashionable location,” Ethan promised.

“Cheers to that,” Benji said, carefully connecting his computer to the cable and sending up a silent wish for good fortune as he wheedled his machine into interfacing with the unfamiliar tech. 

“Moment of truth,” he muttered when his monitor claimed to be connected, pinging off a quick speed test to see if those university scientists were just talking a big game or—

Holy shit.

“I take back any bad things I said about this closet,” Benji breathed, marveling at the numbers scrolling down the screen. “I am going to live in this beautiful closet.”

“We’re good to go?” Ethan prompted.

“So good,” Benji laughed, feeling a little high with the power of nearly unlimited speed at his fingertips.

“Then can we get on with it?” Will piped up over the earpiece, impatient.

“I’ll get into position,” Ethan said, backing towards the closet door. “I want to make sure the exits are clear before we start the transfer.”

Benji saluted Ethan absentmindedly, still enamored with his computer screen.

“Benji?”

Benji glanced up at the summons, something about Ethan’s tone drawing him out of his techno-infatuation.  

“I’m going to close this door,” Ethan said, very slowly and very clearly, “And you are going to stay here. No matter what you hear, no matter what you think might be happening, you stay here. You don’t leave until I come back and tell you the coast is clear. Can you promise me that?”

“Uh, yeah,” Benji agreed uncertainly, not sure why Ethan had put so much gravity into the simple request.

“Then I’ll see you in a few minutes.” A glimmer of a smile shone through the determined set of Ethan’s jaw, and then the door shut behind him with soft click, leaving Benji in the yellow-dark of the single incandescent bulb swaying above him.

It didn’t take long to prep his directories for transfer – he might not be good at keeping up with his dishes or doing laundry before he was down to a holey T-shirt and one sock, but he’d be damned if his digital organization wasn’t spotless. The upload site was ready and waiting, and Benji swore he could almost feel his laptop purring like a sports car just begging for someone to slam down on its accelerator.

Brandt echoed Benji’s agitation a moment later. “Are we good?” he asked, or rather, complained, as that seemed to be his one and only tone of voice, “I’ve been in position for minutes, and my knees are killing me.”

“Age catches up to us all,” Luther philosophized.

Will snorted, “Whatever you say, grandpa.”

“We’re set,” Ethan confirmed after a pause, “first floor’s clear, and the contingency’s in place.”

“Contingency?” Benji echoed.

“Every plan’s only as good as its Plan B,” Ethan replied, “Though, hopefully we won’t have to use it.”

“Okay, vague and alarming, your specialty,” Benji said, before stretching his arms above his head and cracking his knuckles. “Right, enough spy nonsense. Time to make this repo public.”

“English, please,” Will reminded him, his dramatic sigh audible through the earpiece.

“That is English,” Benji shot back, “It’s not my fault that CC’ing someone on an email is the height of your technical know-how.”

“Excuse me—?”

Luther’s laughter echoed through the line and Ethan cut in, “We can make fun of Will’s technical inadequacies later.”

“Is that a promise?” Luther asked.

Will shot back some sort of rejoinder, but Benji didn’t hear it, feeling abruptly overcome with how pivotal—and likely dangerous—this moment in his life was. His breath was coming in short, choppy bursts, and the next words he spoke felt like they dragged most of his oxygen out with them. “Alright, I’m going to start the upload.”

“Affirm— wait.” Luther’s voice sharpened the edges of Benji’s anxiety, turning it to a crystal clear knife’s edge threatening to slice his lungs. “Guys, I’ve got hostiles approaching from the Southwest and the East. Armed, barely bothering to hide it. Pretty sure at least one civilian spotted their hardware—yep, there’s a 911 call going out. Campus police will be here in minutes, bad guys will be on you in a lot less than that.”

“Shit.” There was a metallic clink from Will’s end of the line, “I see them. How did they find us?”

“Does it matter?” Luther shot back, “They’re here.”

“Should I upload or not?” Benji asked, the clarity of fear making the pixels on his screen stand out, differentiated, every speck of dust on his keyboard a spotlight.

“We could abort,” Will suggested.

“That wouldn’t fix anything, we’d still have to get out of the building,” Ethan overrode him. “Benji, start the upload. I’ll take care of this.”

Benji was already on it, fingers flying over the keyboard as he did everything in his power to speed the transfer along. It was what he imagined riding an untamed stallion would be like, unpredictable and more intense than a conscious mind could process. So, he slid into the flow of the process, letting his instincts click through the menus and guide the data to its new home. Despite the incredible speed of the connection, in fractions of moments things seemed to go into slow motion, dread compounding the passage of time as Benji couldn’t stop thinking about guns and bullets and how a closet door suddenly seemed a very flimsy form of cover.

A crackle sounded over the earpiece but Benji ignored it, so focused on his work that the very walls of the room around him seemed to recede.

The green bar illustrating his progress inched agonizingly slowly across his screen, even as terabytes of data flew along the cables from his computer to the client to the server and back, each second bringing the work of the last year of his life closer and closer to fruition.

An incredibly loud bang shocked him out of the digital world and brought him trembling back to the physical one.

Gunshots.

These weren’t the popping rubber-band snaps of cinematic gunshots, either, these were huge and deep and reverberating. They shook Benji’s very bones, like the bass at a rock concert as they tore into the concrete of walls, pulverized glass windows. Benji couldn’t see a thing that was happening, but it was all playing out in a symphony of sound that painted an all-too-clear picture of hot metal and vulnerable flesh playing out on the floor below.

“Ethan!” he called, stumbling to his feet, laptop perilously balanced on one arm. “Ethan!” he hissed again, but there was just dead silence on the line. “Luther?” he tried, “Will? Anyone?” There was no answer, and Benji pulled up the Wi-Fi menu on his computer, confirming his hypothesis.

All networks were offline, rendering their earpieces useless. The only reason his software was getting through was because of its hardwired connection. Whoever was here to stop this transfer from happening was jamming all the out-going signals they could…but they were too late.

Benji watched with detached astonishment as his computer informed him that the transfer was complete. His software was uploaded to the site, in all its glory, available for any coder to see and use.

The gunshots stopped. Quiet fell like a snowfall, a damp, reverberating static filling the building.

Benji’s stomach dropped. Had the gunmen realized their objective was impossible now? Had they retreated? As much as Benji wanted to believe that, it didn’t seem very likely that they’d just give up and leave without their objective. Without, at least, a little retribution for victory being snatched from their grasp.

Ethan must have planned on the possibility of them showing up, Benji realized. That’s why he made Benji promise to stay put. Goddammit, of course he’d prepared for it.

Benji dropped his laptop down on the bucket with a clatter and grabbed a wrench from where it hung on the wall opposite. If Ethan was so good at predicting the future, he thought grimly, then he’d better well have guessed that I’m not going to sit here in a goddamn closet when he could be out there taking gunfire for my sake.

Benji opened the door a crack, peering out into the half-lit lab. Nothing was disturbed, and if it weren’t for the ringing in his ears, he could almost have convinced himself that a firefight didn’t take place just one floor below less than a minute previously.

He snuck across the floor, sticking close to the wall and listening intently for any sound that might indicate hostiles were still in the building. He crept down the stairs, still finding no signs of life or damage, but when he reached the first floor he found a spray of debris, chunks of drywall and shattered glass from the bullet-riddled door.

His swallowed hard, trying to listen over the sound of his pulse pounding in his ears. The bullet holes lent him scattered views of the destroyed lab, bits of broken technology spraying sparks and fritzing their last breaths as de-magnetized sensors whirred to a halt and shattered circuits gave out.

He tightened his grip on the wrench and used it to carefully edge the remains of the door open.

At first glance, the lab seemed to be empty. Police sirens were beginning to wail in the distance, and the exterior lights had just flickered on in the early evening dark, illuminating a shard of the lab floor like a searchlight.

Just on the edge of that light, Benji spotted a familiar boot, attached to a familiar leg, part of a very familiar body currently lying prone on the ground, something dark and sticky covering its torso.

A choked, “Jesus Christ,” slipped from Benji’s throat as his eyes landed on the face of that motionless form, because it wasn’t the face he expected, it was his face. Benji’s face, his own face, pale and unmoving. It was him lying there on the ground, limbs splayed across the floor and blood spattered in his beard. Except, that didn’t make any sense, because he was standing in the doorway, and he definitely would have noticed if he’d been shot. And those were, without a doubt, the clothes Ethan had been wearing when he’d left Benji. And those were Ethan’s hands, strong and tan and pressed to the seeping wound in his chest.

“Oh god—” Benji burst forward, skidding on the tile and tripping over stray bullet casings until he crashed to his knees next to the person he could only assume was Ethan.

“No, no, no…” he patted shaking hands around the perimeter of the wound, reaching up to his neck to try and find a pulse, but the skin felt…wrong, rubbery, like a—like a Halloween mask. He dug his fingers into the collar of Ethan’s shirt and found an edge, where the strange texture ended and soft skin began. He clawed at it with his nails, ripping it free and dragging the sticky, stretchy, synthetic horror up and away, finally revealing Ethan’s face. He looked perfect, eyes closed and mouth slack, like he was sleeping. And that, yes, that was definitely a pulse, though he was no doctor and had no clue if it was good for it to be going that fast when he’d lost so much blood, god, that was a lot of blood—

Benji shook Ethan’s shoulder, rationality falling to the wayside in the wake of adrenaline and panic and some terrifyingly deep chasm of emotion that felt an awful lot like love.

“Wake up,” he half-sobbed, “Wake up, goddammit. You cannot die when I’m still angry with you, you absolute bastard!”

“Ugh…” Ethan groaned, eyes blinking open, “not exactly the heartfelt near-death scene I was hoping for.” He shook his head, looking vaguely disoriented but otherwise calm as he reached into his jacket and removed a dripping red square of plastic, tossing it aside and wiping half-heartedly at the gory mess on his shirt.

Benji pressed a hand to where a life-threatening wound had just been marring Ethan’s perfect chest, but only found tattered fabric covering warm, unharmed skin. Fake. It had all been fake.

“You—!” The rest of that furious, wordless thought caught in his throat, and he was struck with a nearly irresistible urge to slap Ethan hard across the face, like a midcentury film starlet repelling the uncouth advances of a frisky gentleman.

Ethan winced slightly, apparently reading Benji’s mind, and braced for impact.

Benji kissed him instead. It was somewhere in the muddy middle ground between rough and gentle, infused with equal parts vexation and relief, clarity and confusion. He pulled away after a minute with a huff, sitting back on his hands as he tried to catch his breath.

Ethan smiled, soft and a little silly around the edges, as he reached up to cup Benji’s face, thumb tracing a familiar path across his bottom lip. “That’s more like it.”

Now Benji slapped him. Not enough to leave a mark, just hard enough to sting.

Ethan blinked, shocked as he pressed a hand to his cheek. “Alright. I deserved that.”

“You did,” Benji agreed fervently. “You are…such a bastard. I don’t even have to words to describe what a complete bastard you are.”

Ethan raised a finger, still covered in fake blood, “In my defense: I told you to stay put.”

“Right, just keep me in the dark while you’re off playing fast and loose with your life, hope you make it through unscathed, clean up the mess and pop back for me later, saying it’s all peachy fucking keen?”

“That’s the broad strokes of it, yeah,” Ethan admitted.

“Well, bit of a crap bet to make, considering I haven’t listened to anyone when it comes to staying in closets since I was fifteen.” Benji leaned heavily onto the double meaning, waiting for Ethan to laugh, which he did.

“Now I know you’re not that angry, if you’ve got puns,” Ethan said with a smile, cautiously inching his hand onto Benji’s forearm.

“On the contrary, I break out the puns when I’m absolutely incensed.”

“Then I guess I love it when you’re incensed…” Ethan carefully articulated each syllable of that last word, dragging it slowly across his tongue as he slowly leaned in to steal another kiss.

“Oh, god,” Will’s grouse sounded abruptly over their earpieces, “Why couldn’t those assholes have jammed our comms for just a little bit longer?”

“You know, Brandt,” Ethan growled, “You’re really getting on my nerves.”

“And I shouldn’t have used a blank,” Will replied.

Benji raised a quizzical eyebrow and Ethan explained in a quiet aside, “That was the contingency. If anyone showed up looking for you, then they’d find you—”

“Except, not me.”

“Exactly,” Ethan said, like their conversation was making any sense, “The bullets start flying, Will shoots me with an empty shell to activate the blood capsule, I go down, their mission is accomplished. They leave, you’re safe.”

“And that terrifyingly realistic mask of me?” Benji pressed, shuddering slightly at the all-too-fresh memory, “Which, by the way, I feel I should be suing you for identity theft or something after that little stunt.”

“Just a basic face swap," Ethan gestured to the large metal case he'd brought from the van, now lying open on the floor a few feet away, "I’ve done them more times than I can count.”

“He has,” Luther added over the comms, “I think he’s used that damn mask-maker more times than his firearm. Anyway, I’ll leave the rest of the explaining to you guys – I’ve got a show to see. If I leave now, I can still get some of those tasty little shrimp canapes before the warm-ups start. Have fun cleaning up this mess with HQ!” There was a soft click, and Luther was gone.

“The going gets tough, the tough get gone,” Will sighed, and there was another click as he left the line.

“Alone at last,” Benji said, the stock line tripping easily off his tongue even as his fingers tapped nervously against his leg, “Which means we should have a talk.”

“A talk?” Ethan repeated, blanching slightly. He looked more nervous now that he had when he’d been preparing to be shot and ‘killed’ by friendly fire.

“Not that kind of talk,” Benji assured him, before backtracking slightly, “I mean, a little bit that kind of talk, if by ‘talk’ you mean serious and relationship-based, but it’s not like a Dear-John-type situation, it’s just that after everything that’s happened we need—”

“Unfortunately,” Ethan interrupted regretfully, “I think this talk—that I definitely want to have—is going to have to wait.” His fingers trailed regretfully off of Benji's skin as he raised both hands in the air.

Benji followed the turn of Ethan’s gaze and was immediately blinded by the bright white light of a high-powered police-issued flashlight.

Various heavily armed and armored police shouted some thoroughly perplexing combination of “nobody move!” and “hands in the air!” as they rushed the room, thundering in to surround the two of them. Benji chose to answer these conflicting commands by freezing with his hands half-raised in front of him, looking like the world’s most timid T-Rex.

“Rain check?” Ethan murmured as a rifle was shoved in his face and gloved hands began to pat him down for either wounds or weapons, it wasn’t clear which.

“Yep,” Benji agreed from the corner of his mouth before settling his best I’m-innocent-and-harmless-please-don’t-shoot-me smile into place.

Chapter Text

After the whole face-swap and fake-death fiasco, there was a great deal of yelling and gun pointing, and then Will showed up with some well-dressed strangers and there was a profusion of badge-flashing and argument over jurisdiction. Benji was quickly separated from Ethan, who disappeared from sight in the shuffle. Benji was declared a non-threat with relative speed, but nonetheless confined to the back of a government vehicle for ‘his own safety.’ He thought ‘his own safety’ would be better served by being in Ethan’s company, and possibly in the company of a good cheeseburger, but this was not an opinion shared by his new friends in blue.

He did eventually receive a turkey sandwich at the FBI’s headquarters, but he could hardly enjoy it, not just because it was stale and lacking in key condiments, but because he was then tossed headfirst into a rigorous debriefing process.

A number of eerily identical men and women in drab suits and ties flooded him with questions, about his software, about what had happened in the lab, and most of all, about Ethan.

He refused to answer any questions without an attorney present, because he hadn’t seen every episode of Law & Order for nothing, and so a somewhat bedraggled man with an askew tie and bad hairpiece was produced, bearing a legal license and the name Sal. Benji didn’t feel particularly confident in Sal’s abilities to protect his rights. But, he eventually conceded to his counsel because, as Sal sensibly pointed out, “it’s getting really fuckin’ late and drinking the coffee in this office is worse than the caffeine deprivation you get from not drinkin’ it.”

So, Benji told his tale (a slightly expurgated version, minus the naughty bits, because he figured the way Ethan tasted wasn’t a matter of national security), and told it some more, and told it again in eight-part harmony with the recordings of himself and the agent testimony and the witness statements and the wire tap transcripts and the surveillance video and the CSI reports.

Just when he was about ready to tell every single one of those FBI suits to bugger right off and leave him in peace, they beat him to the punch, setting him rather condescendingly on an uncomfortable wooden bench and telling him to sit tight.

Benji might have been inclined to wander off but he was so very tired, and the mere concept of standing, much less walking, was exhausting.

He spent the better part of two hours on that bench, twiddling his thumbs, almost nodding off on several occasions, and generally wondering what the hell his life had turned in to.

“Hey.”

Benji glanced hopefully up at the hail, but it was just Will, standing with his hands in his pockets and weariness chiseled into his features.

“Uh, hi,” Benji replied. Then, knowing he didn’t need to name who he was thinking about: “How much trouble is he in?”

“Oh, mountains,” Will said, casual as can be, “but that’s using a normal-person scale. On the Ethan-scale, this is barely a blip.”

“I suppose that’s comforting.”

“Is it?”

Benji turned an incredulous eyebrow on him.

“Sorry,” Will scrubbed a hand over his features, leaving his hand to rest over his eyes, “That was glib. It’s been a long day.”

“Right. And how much trouble are you in?” Benji asked, charitably.

Will snorted, not looking up. “The managerial equivalent of being told to clean the latrines with a toothbrush for the next year.”

“Sounds unpleasant.”

“Highly. But it’s alright, you don’t have to pretend to care.”

“I care,” Benji protested, “A little, anyway.”

“Yeah, cause you’re a decent guy. I was kind of hoping you wouldn’t be, it would be easier to hate you then.”

Benji pursed his lips and squinted up at Will. “Why exactly would you want to hate me?

Will put his hands on his hips, taking half a step away and half a step back before apparently coming to a decision and dropping down on the bench next to Benji.

“He’s my friend, you know,” he finally said.

“Yeah? Despite appearances?” Benji volleyed back.

“He’s not an easy guy to be friends with.”

“Well, I can sympathize there,” Benji sighed.

“I know. That’s why I’m trying to say….” Will blew out a frustrated huff of air. “It’d be a shame.”

“What?”

“If you made it through all this, the worst of the worst, if you survived all this together…and then you ended things? Like, you paid through the nose for it, but then never actually got the goods.”

It took Benji a minute to work through what Will was trying to say. When he figured it out, he couldn’t decide whether to laugh or shudder. “Okay, first: what a disturbingly economic analysis of the situation.”

“Yeah. I’ve never been accused of being a romantic.”

“And second…” Benji sighed. “I do hear what you’re saying, but it seems to me that with Ethan, things could always get worse. Much worse, if all you and Luther’s talk of nuclear disasters and almost-apocalypses wasn’t just a load of hot air.”

“I wish it was.”

“Where does that leave me, then? Being with me was his job—even if being with me wasn’t,” Benji corrected his emphasis when Will looked like he was going to argue. “Now that that’s over, he’ll be jetting off to fist-fight evil geniuses on top of volcanoes, right? Even if he really wanted to be with me—”

“He does,” Will said firmly, “I may not know much of what’s going on in that head of his, but I know that.”

“Alright. But even so, it doesn’t exactly sound like your job leaves much room for significant others. And there was that whole ex-wife business, which, really, we did not spend near enough time hashing out…”

Will stared at him for a minute before saying simply, “Excuses.”

Benji’s jaw dropped. “I beg your pardon?”

“You’re making excuses,” Will said, without a hint of apology. “Now, if you don’t wanna be with him—maybe you just can’t trust him, maybe you’re realizing that you just didn’t care about him that much—that’s fair. You can walk away.”

“That’s not—”

“Then don’t let the job be the reason you’re not together.” Will’s voice was steely and determined as he demanded more than asked: “You just solved one of the biggest problems in computer engineering with your software, right?”

“Uh, sort of,” Benji agreed hesitantly.

Will stood, definitive. “Then figuring out how to make things work with that idiot should be a piece of cake.”

~~~~~

Paris, France

Two months later

“I know why you’re doing this,” Maggie said, apropos of nothing as she wheeled her compact little green suitcase through the crowds of people milling about the Gare du Nord, Benji trailing after her.

“You know why I’m helping you go on a weekend trip to Brussels?” Benji replied, affecting nonchalance. “Maybe it’s because of your lifelong fondness for their sprouts.”

“No, smartass,” Maggie thwacked his arm with her ticket, “I know why you’re oh-so-subtly trying to kick me out of the country after I flew across an entire ocean specifically to see you. He’s coming here, isn’t he?”

“He who?” Benji said, frowning up at the departure schedule.

“Don’t play dumb, it hasn’t been cute since you were eight. Ethan, the love of your stupid life. Also, incidentally, a man who I owe a good right hook, since he fucked your life up so spectacularly.”

Benji gave up the charade with a sigh. “To be fair, it was the foreign agents with guns who did the real damage.”

“And if I ever meet any of them, I’ll kick their shins so hard they’ll cry for their mums. But, it would be a lot more convenient to just beat the shit out of your lying trash man of an ex-neighbor and almost-boyfriend.”

A grin snuck into the curve of Benji’s mouth. “Hopefully, after this alleged meeting, not just ‘almost.’”

Maggie dropped her suitcase and just looked at him, despairing. “You dumb fuck.”

Benji shrugged and picked up Maggie’s suitcase, trundling it along towards the whistling train that promised to keep his dear-but-prone-to-bad-timing sister several hundred miles away from his anticipated reunion. “Can’t disagree with that assessment,” he said, chipper. “But please, will you at least promise not to do him physical violence? And maybe even be nice to him if I hypothetically bring him round for Christmas dinner?”

“Yeah, yeah…” Maggie grabbed her suitcase from Benji’s hands and swung it up onto the train with more force than necessary.

“Have fun painting Belgium red.” Benji wrapped Maggie in a tight hug, suddenly loathe to let her go and leave him alone in a country that still felt foreign even after living there for over a month.

“I hope everything works out with your dream boy,” she murmured, giving him one last squeeze before stepping back and hopping on board the train.

“Thanks,” he said, waving goodbye as the whistle blew and the engine rumbled to life.

He watched and waited until the last car of the train had chugged out of the station. He scratched his chin and turned around but didn’t spot any familiar faces in the crowd.

Not yet, then.

Now he had only to go find a suitable little café where he could sip coffee and nibble on a pastry and wait for the rest of his life to show up.

He ended up sitting outside in the crisp fall air, drinking something delicious he couldn’t pronounce but had grown fairly skilled at pointing to on the menu and then shrugging to communicate, “yes, I’m useless and monolingual, please have mercy.”

It was a pretty perfect day, as so many of his days in this city had been. He had a lovely little apartment, provided by the institution on digital technology currently funding his research (those offers had conveniently flooded in after his software was released, especially after a few splashy news stories containing censored versions of his escapades with foreign intelligence operatives). He had bright, friendly colleagues, and great prospects on the horizon. He also had new romantic possibilities, in surplus in this city filled with handsome men with deep laughs and gorgeous accents and technological savvy to match Benji’s own.

Benji had exactly zero interest in them.

It wasn’t that they weren’t as beautiful as the person Benji thought of before he fell asleep every night, the first person he wanted to talk to when he woke up. It wasn’t that they weren’t as smart, or kind, or funny, because the world was wide and full of wonderful humans with those qualities in spades. In the end, it was just the fact that they weren’t him. And, apparently, he had taken the lease on Benji’s heart, and wouldn’t be evicted no matter how many weeks passed in his absence.

All that remained now was to see if that particular, gorgeous, infuriating, risk-taking and breathtakingly loyal tenant would ever return home.

“Hi.”

Benji looked up and there the subject of his musings was, in all his considerable glory. Ethan was backlit by the hot glow of the sun, haloing his dark hair and shadowing his features. A canvas jacket clung to his shoulders, highlighting his silhouette while a light blue scarf thrown about his neck whipped playfully in the breeze.

“Howdy,” Benji said, suddenly breathless. He cringed as soon as the greeting left his mouth. “Right, no, that was horrid, I sounded like the world’s shyest cowboy. How about a good old normal ‘hello’?”

“I’ll take it, but I was honestly kinda charmed by the ‘howdy.’” Ethan stepped forward, sunlight flooding past his cheekbone and lighting up his grin.

“You would be. No taste to speak of in that whole exquisite body of yours...” Benji had to physically tear his eyes away, because Ethan looked like such a vision it was impairing his ability to think or speak. “On that note, how is it that when you wear a scarf like that, you look effortlessly bohemian, and when I wear a scarf like that, I look like an aging hipster who’s not ready to let go of the golden days?”

“You say that, but I could never pull off a bow tie and suspenders, and you…well,” Ethan gestured to said ensemble as if it spoke for itself.

Benji patted down the striped suspenders his sister had informed him just this morning made him look like he should be selling cotton candy at the county fair, “I look like a very sexy grandpa?”

“The sexiest.” Ethan paused and squinted, mouth scrunching up as he thought over that response. “I…think that came out wrong.”

“My foot-in-mouth syndrome must be catching.”

Ethan grinned. “I’d be happy to catch anything from you.”

“Oh god,” Benji covered his face with his hands, trying not to snort in front of the elegant Parisians breezing past him on the sidewalk, “That was even worse.”

“I could keep these bad lines coming all day…but I was hoping you’d let me sit down, first.”

Benji gave the chair next to him a contemplative once-over before kicking its legs gently, scooting it out in front of Ethan. “You can sit if you answer me one question.”

Solemnity eclipsed Ethan’s easy smile. “Of course. Anything.”

“Alright.” Benji folded his hands neatly up in his lap and waited a moment, before asking very seriously,  “Have you ever had a bad hair day?”

To his immense credit, Ethan didn’t even blink. “Yes, once, in 1999,” he replied, as utterly serious as Benji, “Luther has pictures.”

“You may sit,” Benji decreed. Ethan dropped quickly into the seat, as if Benji might try and rip it out from under him. There was a tired pinch around his eyes that made Benji’s heart ache, that made him want to be gentle with his words. But, given his track record with Ethan, the direct approach seemed advisable.

“My sister owes you a good punch to the face,” Benji announced.

Ethan nodded, unsurprised. “You can take it in her place. I’d let you.”

“I know. But I really can’t bring myself to harm a jawline that perfect.” The joke didn’t seem to land right, and Benji winced. “Sorry for the incessant objectification, it’s just been a while since I saw you and I’d forgotten how much….” Benji gestured weakly to Ethan’s person, “Well, how much. You are, always.”

“Is that a good thing?” Ethan asked, genuinely curious.

“The best,” Benji declared without hesitation. He’d been thinking on that question a lot lately, and he always came to the same answer.  

Somehow, Ethan didn’t seem settled. “Well, at least I have my looks going for me, if nothing else.”

Ah. Benji leaned forward, catching Ethan’s eye and holding it as best he could, “Listen, Ethan, you could have the world’s weakest chin and a ferocious unibrow and a collection of unsightly moles, and I’d still love your face because it’s yours. I didn’t fall for you because you’re pretty. Sure, that’s some nice icing on the cake, but it’s hardly the reason I’m sitting here, talking to you.”

Ethan smiled, and this time, it wasn’t weighed down by melancholy. “You know, for someone who seems convinced that they never say the right thing, I find that you always know exactly what to say.”

Benji chewed his lip but that didn’t stop a matching smile from spreading across his face. Affecting an airy attitude, he replied, “Yes, François says that too.”

“Who’s François?”

“My boyfriend,” Benji answered easily, watching Ethan’s face.

And what a sight that was.

“Oh.” Ethan rocked back in his chair, eyes very wide and then very narrow, fists clenched until his knuckles went white.

“Oh my god, I am kidding,” Benji burst out after just a few seconds of watching near-literal steam come out of Ethan’s ears. “But you should have seen your face! You just bought it, completely. Wow.”

Ethan looked like he was doing some sort of yoga-style, deep breathing exercise. It also looked like it wasn’t working.

“I’d say I’m sorry, but I’m not,” Benji continued, actually looking a little bit sorry, despite what he’d just said. “Mainly because I have so rarely managed to get one over on anyone, much less a Hottie McSuperSpy like yourself.”

“Hottie Mc….” Ethan half-repeated, trailing off incredulously. “I cannot believe I dodged three different countries’ airport security for this.”

“I thought we’d already established that you deserve at least a little penance for your actions,” Benji parried.

“I do,” Ethan admitted, “But I really wish you’d punched me instead.”

“Just keeping you on your toes,” Benji said cheerfully, toasting Ethan with his half-drunk coffee.

“I’d almost forgotten,” Ethan said, suddenly wistful. “That you do exactly that. That you can always surprise me, always make me smile.”

Benji set his cup back on the table with a hand that suddenly threatened to tremble. There was a somber note in Ethan’s voice that hadn’t been there before, and that spelled trouble.

Ethan confirmed that when the next words out of his mouth were, “You said before, the first time I broke your trust, that I was on my last chance. Then I went and blew that last chance, completely. And that’s a fair standard to have,” Ethan said, so earnest it almost broke Benji’s heart, “That’s smart. And I’m—I’m not sure I deserve your forgiveness.”

“Alright.” Benji set his hands flat on the table. “Let me get this straight. You are referring to…that first, odd incident where you turned into an overprotective German Shepard at that hot delivery guy who totally turned out to be a spy set on bugging my apartment? That whole thing?”

“Yes,” Ethan confirmed, intent.

“Alright. Let’s call that Event A, which corresponds to Chance #1. And, your later betrayal—that word sounds very dramatic, but I guess it’s appropriate—with the whole, uh, ‘I’m a spy, surprise!’ thing, was only an extension of Event A, so…I suppose, it was all part of the same first chance, which you did completely blow. But! That means you’re currently living in Chance #2, meaning that I am sticking to my guns on the whole no-third-chances thing, but you’re still in the clear.”

“Benji.” Ethan frowned. “I’m trained in over a dozen different high-risk hostage-negotiation techniques, but I’m not following you at all.”

“Right. Let me rephrase.” Benji reached out and took Ethan’s hand, lifting it from where it had been clenched in a tight fist on his knee, and gathering it in both his own. “You and me? We’re copasetic. Simpatico. All good. Even stevens. A-Ok, hunky dory, peachy keen, right as rain…uh, palsy-walsy? Not sure about that last one, and I’d need a thesaurus if you want any more adjectives to describe how totally chill we are, at least on my end.”

Ethan’s look of utter enchantment at that was tinged with a distinct note of regret, which Benji immediately objected to.

“Why does my saying that make you look like you’re about to tell me you ran over my dog?” he demanded to know, shaking Ethan’s hand gently.

“Because no matter if you’ve forgiven me, it—you and me, being together—it still might not be a good idea. In this line of work, caring about people just puts a target on their back.”

Benji blinked, not quite able to believe what he was hearing. “Wait, what?”

“Being with me, it’d be dangerous,” Ethan explained, as if Benji was having trouble understanding what he was saying rather than why he was saying it. “I’m speaking from experience, here.”

“Well that’s….that a load of bollocks,” Benji declared.

It was Ethan’s turn to blink in confusion. “Excuse me?”

“You think I’m gonna turn tail and run?” Benji asked, astonished, “Think I should dash off because, what, because I could get kidnapped and used against you? Been there, done that. If there’s anything I’ve realized since meeting you, it’s that fear is a stupid reason not to do something.”

“Uh—”

“So, that’s settled,” Benji cut him off, finally prying Ethan’s closed fist open and lacing their fingers together. “Like hell I’m gonna let some hypothetical supervillain stop me from being with you.”

“It’s…what?” Ethan tilted his head, like the world had tilted slightly off its axis and he was trying to compensate, “Are you saying you want to be with me…out of spite?”

Benji shrugged. “It’s as good a reason as any.”

“Not really,” Ethan said, deadpan.

“Listen, I was under the impression you were here to win me back.”

“Technically, yes.”

“Then, technically, you should kiss me so I can remember why I feel in love with you in the first place.”

Ethan wasted no time doing just that.

God, Benji had spent so long going back over these memories, he thought there was no way he could’ve forgotten. But he’d ran his fingers over them so many times the texture had worn thin and couldn’t compare to the huge, glorious, warm, rough, real feeling of Ethan’s mouth, his skin, his hands, his whole presence pressed up against Benji…

“You really want to do this?” Ethan asked, pulling abruptly away to look at Benji with a concerned wrinkle in his brow.

Benji blinked, struggling first to understand the question, then to formulate an answer while his brain was still busy yelling “It’s him! He’s here! He’s kissing me!” on repeat.

“Yes,” Benji finally mustered up enough brain cells to reply. “Emphatically, yes. You probably should’ve figured out by now that I’m a soft touch. And frankly, I’ve got better things to do with my time than mope around after you. But, if you hurt me again, Luther promised to beat you up on my behalf.”

“Luther?”

“Yeah, he was the one who warned me you were coming. Figured I should have the chance to think up what I was gonna say. Which I did. Also, kept me from having a cardiac event when you showed up out of the blue just now.”

“Huh.” Ethan squinted into the distance, “I wondered why I didn’t get more of a reaction. Traitor.”

“I had to promise to let him officiate our wedding,” Benji said jokingly, though it was actually quite true.

Something wild flashed across Ethan’s face and Benji immediately backpedaled. “Uh, please forget I said that.”

“Nope,” Ethan said fervently, pulling Benji in for a crushing kiss, “Definitely not forgetting it.”

There was still wonder lighting up the edges of Ethan’s face when he leaned back, his hands holding Benji’s shoulders just shy of too-tight.

“You know, Ethan, I’m not going anywhere,” Benji assured him tentatively, validated in his concern when Ethan shifted uncomfortably.

“I believe you, it’s just…” Ethan trailed off, and Benji wasn’t a psychic, but he’d gotten pretty good at reading these particular tea leaves.

“Maybe you’ll hurt me again,” he said bluntly, monitoring Ethan’s expression. “Maybe I’ll lose you. Maybe I’ll regret this down the line. Those maybes hurt, but not half as much as it would hurt to lose you for certain, like I would if I cut you out of my life trying to protect myself from that uncertainty. It would hurt so much because…I love you.”

There it was. The Big Truth. The one Benji had arrived at approximately three minutes after his plane to Paris lifted off, as he was busy clutching the worn armrests and second-guessing every decision he’d made that ended up with him putting an ocean between himself and the man he loved. That actual phrase, “man I love,” had run through his mind, and he’d nearly started hyperventilating. He’d also realized shortly afterwards that a superspy like Ethan who ate bullets for breakfast probably wouldn’t have any trouble tracking Benji down, no matter the distance, and this thought was the only thing that kept him from busting into the cockpit and demanding they turn the damn plane around.

“You…” Ethan, in the here and now, seemed to be having some trouble digesting this news. Benji was not comforted by this, nor by the next word out of his mouth, which was a vaguely astonished, “Really?”

“Yes,” Benji confirmed.

“You’re…sure.”

“Very.”

“Hmm.” Ethan seemed unconvinced. Or perhaps just in so deep of a state of shock that whatever he was really feeling hadn’t filtered up to show on his face yet. As it was, Benji was getting increasingly antsy, and there was a practical little voice in the back of his head already preparing to deal with the mortifying fallout of what would happen if Ethan didn’t return his feelings. This preparation mainly revolved around wondering if perhaps Lithuania was nice this time of year, and if it was far enough off the map that no one would ever find him there if he decided to go live in an abandoned cabin with just a sheepdog for company.

“Listen,” Benji began when the quiet became unbearable, “you seem to be struggling with this revelation, which isn’t particularly fair, since I think I struggled over it plenty enough for the both of us.”

“I’m sure you did, it’s just…”

“What? Do you need me to draw you a diagram?”

“Do you have one handy?”

Benji gave Ethan his most unimpressed look. He didn’t get to use that look very often, since it was so frequently directed at himself by others, so it was very sharp and new, fresh out of the box.

It prompted Ethan to finally articulate whatever was crossing his internal wires, which was the question: “How…no, why are you in love with me?”

Benji dug deep and managed to find an even more spectacularly unimpressed look. “I can’t tell if you have spontaneously developed immense self-worth issues since I last saw you, or if you’re fishing for compliments.”

“Neither. But I am…concerned.”

“Concerned…?”

“That you might just think you’re in love with me because I tricked my way into your life and purposefully manipulated events so your day-to-day routine would come to always include my presence, hoping that proximity and charm would lead to you developing an emotional attachment to me.” Ethan’s words tumbled anxiously out of his mouth, like they’d just been waiting for the dam to break.

Benji considered the concept for a moment, before deciding, “Nah.”

“Nah?” Ethan repeated.

“Nah,” Benji confirmed. “I mean, give me a little credit. I’ve had more than two months to detox from your masculine wiles,” Benji wiggled his fingers in Ethan’s direction, “and my feelings haven’t changed.”

Ethan didn’t look like he knew what to do with that, so Benji sighed, and decided to hell with playing it cool, he might as well put all his cards on the table.

“I love you because you lead with your heart, even when your head knows better,” he said, looking into Ethan’s eyes and finding the courage to go on. “Because of all the soft, bright pieces of you hidden underneath the job and the pain and the scars. Because when I’m around you I feel like I’ve been dropped out of a plane at ten thousand feet, only it’s fine because as long as we’re together we’ll never hit the ground. I love all those things, but loving you doesn’t really come down to any one thing. If it did, I’m not sure it would really be love. So. That is….that.”

Ethan looked like he was either going to cry or bolt, and Benji frankly didn’t know how to deal with either response.

“Thank you,” Ethan finally said, tone delicate and even. 

“You’re welcome,” Benji replied primly. Internally, he was calculating the cost of a train ticket to Eastern Europe.

After another beat of silence, thoughtful on Ethan’s side and anguished on Benji’s, Ethan said casually, “Well, obviously I’m in love with you too.”

Benji’s face did something gymnastic and probably unflattering as he attempted to process that.

“Obviously,” he echoed.

Ethan’s lips twitched and Benji watched as a smile finally broke free. “Since we’ve cleared that up…” Ethan trailed off, as if they’d just determined the chance of rain for the day or something equally mundane.

“Right, now that we’ve cleared that up,” Benji replied, business-like even as he slipped a hand around the nape of Ethan’s neck, “That means I can kiss you and not spend the whole time panicking that you’re going to vanish into thin air the second I close my eyes.”

Benji paused just before he reached Ethan’s mouth, murmuring against his lips, “Some verbal confirmation of your intention to not-vanish would be comforting right about now.”

“I hereby swear not to vanish on you,” Ethan whispered back, before latching onto Benji’s bottom lip with his teeth and tugging, starting one kiss that lead to another, and another.

Being this close to Ethan was a dizzying mix of new and familiar, the intricacies of the muscles shifting in his arms as he pulled Benji tighter to his chest providing fresh territory for exploration even as the deep, crackling heat of his presence warmed Benji’s very bones.

Benji’s elbow caught on the tablecloth and his cup jangled dangerously as it was knocked about on its saucer, but neither of them paid it any mind. If they weren’t in Paris, they’d probably have already been kicked out of the café for the show they were putting on, but as it was, their embrace didn’t even rate a second glance to most passersby.

“This is a really bad idea,” Ethan said gleefully, as his lips danced along Benji’s jaw. “I thought I was going to have to pull out all the stops just to get you to talk to me after you fled to Europe—”

“I didn’t flee,” Benji protested, “I came over here because some people offered me a lot of money to do really cool things, and because I love how there are always carbohydrates within arms reach in this city.”

“I believe you,” Ethan said, lips brushing against Benji’s ear, “Though fleeing might have been the smart choice, given our history. Seriously, you should run for the hills.”

“Yes, and you should be dangling off of Mount Rushmore or karate-chopping pirates, but we’re both here, and both slightly stupid, so let’s make the most of it,” Benji replied as sensibly as he could with Ethan sucking on his pulse point like he was considering a career in vampirism.

“Any chance we could continue this conversation somewhere a little more private?” Ethan asked, nipping at Benji’s earlobe.

“Yes,” Benji agreed eagerly, bounding instinctively to his feet and tugging Ethan along with him. “My place is this w—no,” Benji shook his head and did an about face, reorienting himself, “this way…”

His first step in the correct direction, however, brought him colliding into a waiter burdened with a teetering pile of dishes. Plates crashed to the ground and a half-full cup of coffee went flying in the air, sending its contents splashing rather artistically down Benji’s front, splattering him from collar to belt.

Typical, was Benji’s only thought as he stood frozen and dripping. Isn’t this just typical.

Ethan looked caught between shock and laughter, one hand gently touching down on Benji’s shoulder. “Are you alright?” he asked kindly.

“It was…lukewarm,” Benji said, once he regained his power of speech. “The coffee, that is. So. Small miracles.”

“That’s good,” Ethan agreed. “No need for third degree burns at this stage of the game.”

“Je suis désolé....” the waiter said, distressed as he wavered between attending to the broken dishware and hovering over the acrid stains in Benji’s shirt.

“No, don’t worry, this was definitely my fault, entirely,” Benji assured the waiter, “I’ll just…leave. So sorry.” He brushed off the man’s soft French apologies as politely as he could before dashing away, Ethan on his heels, still looking like it was taking his deepest stores of control not to laugh.

“I don’t know why you look so entertained,” Benji shot back at his companion, more than a little grumpy as he felt the intrepid coffee begin to sink down into his trousers, “Nothing short of an actual bucket of icy water could have killed the mood more thoroughly than that.”

“I would politely disagree,” Ethan said, hand slipping between Benji’s shoulder blades and skimming down to press firmly at the small of his back. “You’re thinking of this as a set-back, I see an opportunity.”

“Oh, do tell,” Benji said, letting the full weight of his irritation and embarrassment settle in his tone, though that only seemed to egg Ethan on.

“I think I’ll wait until I have you to myself to share this particular insight,” Ethan murmured, setting shivers racing up Benji’s spine.

“Bastard,” Benji replied, the bite in his tone as weak as his knees.

“Mmhmm,” Ethan agreed easily, guiding Benji up the steps to his apartment.

Benji started, glancing up at the familiar façade. “Wait, how did you know this was my—” he cut himself off, rolling his eyes. “What am I saying. Of course you knew. You probably know what I had for breakfast.”

“Credit card records are notoriously easy to hack,” Ethan said by way of reply, hand dipping into Benji’s pocket to retrieve his key, and unlocking the door. “Brioche and orange juice at the place around the corner from your work.”

“Show off,” Benji said, breezing past him. He paused in the foyer, however, the deja-vu of the moment washing over him.

“You remember how we met?” Benji asked, half-turning to Ethan, even as his mind’s eye wandered into the past.

“You mean, when I was just a handsome stranger getting my hands in your pants?” Ethan answered, cheeky as he slid Benji’s key back where he found it.

“Good God,” Benji sighed, eyes slipping shut, “you really do remember every mortifying thing I’ve ever said.”

“I treasure every word,” Ethan said, fingers drifting from Benji’s pocket to settle on his hip. “You know…” his free hand skated up Benji’s still-sodden front, “you should probably take a shower.”

“Ugh,” Benji said by way of agreement.

Ethan smiled, his lips pressed to Benji’s cheek. “I think you’ll feel much better after a shower.”

“…alright.” Benji headed towards the bathroom and Ethan followed like a shadow, still wrapped tight to his side.

Benji turned to look at Ethan, almost going cross-eyed doing it with Ethan standing so close. “Are you going to let go of me?”

Ethan glanced significantly between Benji and the bathroom, a sliver of sky-blue tile peeking out from behind the carved-wood door. “That would be kind of counterproductive.”

“Counter…?”

A smile blossomed on Ethan’s face as he watched the penny drop in Benji’s expression.

“A shower.” Benji repeated.

“Mmm.”

“That is….a fantastic suggestion.”

Benji lurched forward and immediately tripped in his excitement, but Ethan caught him with an easy laugh, “Well, you seem like you definitely need accompaniment. For your own safety,” Ethan gestured expansively to Benji’s two left feet, and Benji had never been so grateful to be an irredeemable klutz.

“I do,” he agreed fervently, “You’d better keep ahold of me at all times.”

“That’s the plan,” Ethan murmured, distracting Benji with a kiss while he slid the suspenders off his shoulders.

They stumbled over the threshold, Benji’s pants hanging dangerously low on his hips and suspenders swinging at his sides while Ethan attacked his shirt buttons.

Ethan started pressing open-mouthed kisses to each new inch of skin he discovered, and Benji was so distracted by these attentions that they were butting up against the frame of the shower before Benji realized that there was a rather significant variable they hadn’t accounted for.

The shower was extremely slim, clearly designed for the exclusive use of one occupant. “It appears we have a slight logistical problem,” Benji frowned, even as Ethan’s progress on his buttons didn’t slow. “Really makes one wish for American’s predilection for excess.”

Ethan’s reply was to pull his own shirt off in a liquid movement that set Benji’s head spinning. “I think we can make do.”

“I’m inclined to agree,” Benji replied faintly, not because he had a clue what Ethan was saying, but because there was simply no arguing with pectorals like that.

Ethan yanked Benji’s at-last unbuttoned shirt out of his waistband and tossed it in the corner, before diving back down to taste the newly freed, coffee-stained skin. Benji’s hands gravitated naturally to Ethan’s hair, tangling gently at first, then more firmly in his thick, dark locks.

Ethan traveled back upwards, tracing a path with his mouth and hands, and the experience threatened to overload Benji’s senses, the rough hot swipe of Ethan’s tongue, the calloused caress of his fingers, the visual bouquet of Ethan’s golden skin laid out in never-ending miles before him…

Benji stumbled backwards at Ethan’s urging, seizing up when the bare skin of his shoulders hit the chilly tile of the shower.

Ethan chuckled low, nose pressed into the hollow of Benji’s throat. “Guess we’d better warm you up…”

One of his hands abandoned its post at Benji’s flank, hopping over to the shower handle.

“Hey—” Benji half-protested at the movement, sensing a problem with this suggestion, but not quite in possession of enough brain cells to put a finger on it.

Water poured down on them a moment later, Benji letting out a shocked yelp while Ethan just laughed some more.

Benji spluttered under the onslaught of—thankfully warm—water while Ethan just shook his head like a pleased dog, dragging fingers through his hair to get it out of his face before diving back in to steal kisses from Benji’s shocked “o” of a mouth.

“You’re making a mess!” Benji complained as best he could, his lips being somewhat occupied at the moment.

“Not important.”

Benji was pretty sure the shower’s contents were splashing their way out the open door, across the bathroom and possibly even into the hall, what with Ethan’s enthusiasm. “There’ll be water damage!”

“No one lives below you, and this place was built in the sixties, so there’s no historical value to worry about damaging,” Ethan rebutted neatly, with the air of a man who’d done his research and would brook no argument. 

“Except…except money…” Benji argued faintly, logic fast evaporating from his brain like the steam gushing over their heads that was making Ethan look like even more of a divine apparition than usual.

“I think my expenses can cover it.”

“You’re going to make your super-secret spy club pay for water damage inflicted while you were busy ravishing me?”

“Money well spent,” Ethan decreed, sinking to his knees.

Benji watched his descent with widening eyes, his lungs forgetting how to process oxygen as Ethan popped the button on Benji’s pants with his teeth.

“Last time I tried this,” Ethan said casually, like he wasn’t nosing his way past Benji’s fly and sending his heartrate into high orbit, “we were interrupted. I intend to finish what I started.”

“I’ve never been more grateful for your stubborn streak,” Benji gasped.

Ethan paused, so close Benji could feel his breath on his skin, mingling with the water still pouring over them. “So, just to confirm: this is alright?” he asked, glancing up to meet Benji’s eyes. “Because I did kind of drag you into your own shower and yank your pants down without asking, and feel I should check in.”

“You did do that,” Benji agreed, hoarse and a little dizzy with how close Ethan’s mouth was, “But it’s fine. Great, even. Spectacularly hot, one might say. Please continue.”

Ethan smiled, earnest and devious all at once, crinkling at the corners of his eyes, and Benji loved him so much in that moment that he thought if he didn’t say it out loud he’d burst.

But, that was also the moment Ethan decided to duck forward and take him in his mouth, and so all that Benji found himself capable of saying was, “Holy fuck.”

There really were no other words to describe it. Those words weren’t really even sufficient for it, really, but Benji was no poet, so they’d have to do. This was a thoroughly holy fuck, in the most sacrilegious of ways.

Ethan’s mouth was red and wet, the sight more than a little obscene, made all the more so by the water sluicing down his face, catching in his eyelashes. Benji’d had people do this before, but none of them had been super-hot super-spies with the determination of an army and almost supernatural control over their gag reflex. Ethan was sucking like this was his job, no, like this was his life, and being the center of that kind of razor-sharp focus was almost as ecstatic as the physical glory of Ethan’s perfect mouth and tongue and throat working around him, setting off a fireworks display of heat and pleasure at his core.

Benji’s hands found Ethan’s hair again, stroking it back from his forehead before digging in, nails dragging along his scalp. Ethan moaned around him and took him deeper, and Benji pulled a little harder.

One of Ethan’s hands was working over what his mouth couldn’t take while the other was gripping Benji’s hip hard enough to bruise. A small part of Benji’s brain fixated on that idea, hoping that Ethan’s fingers would leave a visible, tangible mark on his body to match the one on his heart. Benji slowly realized that he was babbling but didn’t have the power to stop himself, an endless stream of, “Fuck, you’re incredible, Ethan—fucking hell I can’t—you just…god, there, right there, Ethan I—” tumbling out of his mouth as his hips arched forward, equally out of his control.

He tugged a little more urgently at Ethan’s hair, trying to get across the message that he was close, so close. He wasn’t entirely clear on the etiquette surrounding surprise French shower blowjobs, but he’d be damned if he didn’t do his best to guess on the matter. Ethan didn’t pull away, however, but grabbed Benji’s wrist as if to say “hold on.”

Alright, then. Hold on was about all Benji could do, eyes threatening to close as the world narrowed to just their bodies, connected and alive. Ethan made a noise and Benji’s eyes flew open at the vibration, locking with Ethan’s. Earthy green and as mysterious as they were beautiful, Benji couldn’t look away from Ethan if he tried, even as pleasured crashed down on him like a mountain, threatening to pull him under.

He shuddered through the thrills rocking his body in the aftermath, blinking and gasping as Ethan pulled off, joy and pride writ large on his features. If he wasn’t so busy floating down from cloud nine, Benji might have made some sort of smartass comment about Ethan’s overly pleased expression, but as it was, he couldn’t string two syllables together. Which was probably Ethan’s plan all along, he thought fondly.

“C’mere,” he slurred once he felt confident enough that his tongue would respond to his command, slinging an arm around Ethan’s neck so he could drag him into a messy kiss, licking deep into Ethan’s mouth.

Rough fabric marred their perfect line-up of skin, and Benji glanced down to see what sort of reality had intruded on their dream world.

“You are still wearing jeans,” Benji realized out loud, scandal in every syllable.

“It would appear so,” Ethan agreed with a laugh as Benji worked to rectify this problem with shaky fingers, Ethan eventually having to take over in dragging the water-soaked garment down his hips, pulling his underwear with it.

Benji tried not to sigh out loud at the stunning sight of a finally, completely naked Ethan. Hard muscle and soft skin, dewed with water, gold tinged with the pink of exertion—Benji was overcome with the strange desire to learn to paint just so he could depict Ethan in oil with the kind of renaissance elegance he deserved.

“You still with me?” Ethan asked, playful and a little breathless as he nipped tentatively at Benji’s chin, teasing closer and closer to his mouth.

“Yep,” Benji confirmed, taking a moment to find his voice. “Just…fantasizing. About keeping you forever.”

“You can keep me forever,” Ethan said lightly. “No need to fantasize.”

“Oh,” Benji choked out. Then, “I really fucking love you.” Benji wrapped an arm around Ethan’s shoulders, dragging him in as close as he could while his free hand slipped south, skating over acres of muscle that he would give their rightful attention later, but for now, he had a more immediate target.

He wrapped his hand around Ethan and grinned, gratified at the bitten-off gasp his touch elicited. Ethan buried his face in Benji’s neck, and Benji took the opportunity to kiss his shoulder, before turning his head to try and coax Ethan’s mouth back within range of his own.

Benji’s stole each choked moan and quiet whisper of his name off of Ethan’s lips, worshipping each inch of him he could reach while he stroked him, firm and slow, then faster when Ethan whined against his cheek and gripped his wrist, urging him on.

It didn’t take long before Ethan was coming between their stomachs, quiet and biting his lip, clutching at Benji’s shoulders. Benji held him and watched, entranced, so wrapped up in the moment that his earlier fantasies had no room in this visceral reality.

Ethan settled against him, eyes drifting shut as his chest met Benji’s with every drawn breath. The honor, the privilege, of seeing Ethan like this, with his guard down on every level, struck Benji like a physical weight. How often was he this vulnerable? This open?

Ethan always seemed taller, radiating strength and energy, but here, slumped against Benji with no shoes or swagger to make up for it, the inches Benji had on him were quite apparent.

Benji kissed Ethan’s forehead as blinked up at him, sleepy and content.

“So,” Ethan reached up, tracing a thumb along the ridge of Benji’s brow, down his cheek, to cup his jaw, “Was the water damage worth it?”

“Indubitably,” Benji laughed, leaning into the touch, “I’ve been thoroughly convinced as to the merits of shower sex.”

“Thought I could persuade you,” Ethan grinned, not quite kissing him, just enjoying their closeness.

“Makes for easy clean-up,” Benji noted idly, tracing a pattern in the water running down Ethan’s chest, “very practical.”

“Yes, a good, practical fuck,” Ethan stated.

Ethan’s matter-of-fact tone had Benji laughing so hard he almost forgot to breathe. Ethan laughed along with him, but mostly just had that pleased expression on again, like making Benji laugh was the height of accomplishment.

Benji would have liked to stay right there, possibly forever, but the building’s hot water tank had other ideas. With barely a hiss of warning, the pleasantly warm water dove into subzero temperatures.

“Jesus—!” Benji practically shoved Ethan out of his way in his hurry to escape the suddenly arctic spray. Ethan followed, laughing as hard as Benji had been a minute ago.

“I—I guess—” Ethan had to pause to catch his breath, still laughing, “you’re not a fan of the cold?”

“I am not,” Benji sniffed, wrapping himself in the nearest towel with as much dignity as he could muster (admittedly, not much).

Ethan sidled up to him, suppressing a lingering giggle, and Benji reluctantly opened one arm to let Ethan into the circle of his towel.

“I think I can probably manage to warm you up again,” Ethan teased, pinching Benji’s behind and earning a squeak and an adorably displeased pout.

“Well, I was going to invite you to my nice warm bed, but I’m not sure your ungentlemanly behavior has earned you a place…”

Ethan matched his pout and stole a kiss, whispering, “I’ll make it up to you.”

Benji’s put-upon expression slipped, leaving him with what was probably a fairly goofy smile. “Alright, deal. C’mon…” Benji took Ethan’s hand and dragged him down the hall, intent on being under warm covers as soon as possible.

He paused at the doorway after showing Ethan through, scrubbing the towel through his hair to try and catch the worst of the moisture before jumping into his freshly made bed.

Sunlight streamed through the half-open curtains and Ethan stretched out across the comforter in the brightest patch of it, distinctly cat-like. Benji took a moment to glory in the lithe movement, strong limbs spread out in his bed like an offering, an offer he couldn’t refuse. Benji crawled after him, kissing along Ethan’s back, tasting the warm, still-damp skin.

“I feel like Frank Sinatra should be singing in the background of this moment,” Benji said dreamily, wrapping his arms around Ethan’s waist, while Ethan scooted around to face him. “Or maybe we’re inside the lyrics of a Sinatra song, I don’t know, I just know there’s definitely something Sinatra-adjacent about this...”

“I’ve definitely got you under my skin,” Ethan agreed, a croon in his voice.

“Can you sing?” Benji asked, intrigued.

“Mention the word ‘karaoke’ within fifty feet of Will and you’ll have the opportunity to find out,” Ethan said, throwing a hand over his face.

“Well, now I’m definitely going to do that.” Benji grinned at the thought. However, it also reminded him of something he’d been trying not to think of, namely, the fact that Ethan had a life that existed outside these four Parisian walls.

“Are you going to have to run off and do spy nonsense any time soon?” Benji asked.

“Nope. No spy nonsense scheduled for at least two weeks.”

“Does spy nonsense keep a schedule?”

“Not really,” Ethan admitted, “But I’ve got Luther and Brandt playing keep-away with the secretary on my behalf for that long.”

“That’s good of them.”

“Pretty sure they’re only doing it because they like you,” Ethan nudged him with a smile.

“Maybe I just have that effect on spies,” Benji mused, “Like catnip for spooks. I’ve finally found my people.”

Ethan grinned up at him, and Benji could only describe the expression as “lovestruck.” Having a look like that directed at him was enough to trip Benji’s heart up in his chest.

“I love you,” Ethan said abruptly, like he just couldn’t keep it in anymore.

“I love you too,” Benji replied, the words still shiny and new on his tongue. Benji couldn’t wait to say them and hear them again and again, until they were comfortable and worn like antique silver, worthy of generations and perfectly fit for just the two of them. 

“And although I do eventually have to leave,” Ethan continued, low and serious, “I can promise you that I will do everything in my power to come back to you. Every time.”

Benji considered that. Maybe Ethan would be gone in a couple weeks. Maybe he’d be jetting off to distant continents to disarm ICBMs and outwit villainous masterminds, seduce beautiful heiresses and wear lots of leather, or whatever the hell he did for a living. But for now, he was here, with Benji, and he’d promised he’d be back.

Benji believed that promise.

“Right,” Benji tapped his chin, “You know, I think I ought to send your boss some flowers.”

Ethan blinked. “Huh?”

“In thanks,” Benji explained with a mischievous grin, “For assigning you to me.”

Ethan huffed a laugh and shook his head. “He definitely didn’t assign this.”

Benji tangled their legs together, reeling Ethan in close. “I should hope not. And for the record, I’m just teasing, I do know I’m more than just a mission to you.”

“There aren’t words for how much more,” Ethan confirmed, his hand settling at the crease of Benji’s jaw, stroking gently. “You know, with some missions, you don’t choose them, they choose you. And I am beyond grateful that you chose to accept me.”

Benji laid his hand over Ethan’s and leaned in for a kiss, slow and soft and perfect. “Ethan Hunt, I’ll choose you every time.”