Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Chris Smith is good at finding ways to numb the pain. Sex, alcohol, drugs, fights. Usually, it works. But since getting back from Earth X, he was just carrying too much grief. His brother dying again, his dad dying again. And it was his fault. He had gotten them killed, again. His tricks weren’t working anymore. He was feeling more and more numb, can’t move through the day without a fix. Reality just hurts too much.

Chris had his established habits. His list of dealers and shady pharmacists. Sometimes he would intercept some drug shipment and sneak a little aside before Vigilante took whatever was left to God knows where. But every time he had gotten drugs before, they had lasted much longer. Usually days, sometimes more. But now he was having trouble keeping up with his cravings.

With Vigilante's thing about drugs, Chris usually tried to buy away from his usual stomping ground- their usual stomping ground. Adrian was ruthless. Chris wasn’t sure what he would do if he found out he was doing illegal drugs, if he found out he was buying off the street. Vigilante had threatened to kill him for smoking weed the first time he saw Chris’s bong. Chris had only barely talked him down, even after reminding him weed was legal. But the need for a quick fix was getting more and more urgent. He started hitting up places he knew dealers tended to congregate, places he and Vigilante had frequented to kill some shady figure or another before he was sent to prison. He was afraid Adrain might be there, but right now he didn’t care. He needed to forget all his ghosts.

Chris was halfway through the exchange when Vigilante showed up, immediately slitting the dealer's throat. Some young kid, maybe still in high school. And then Adrian locked eyes with Chris. Vigilante was never great at interpreting what was happening; Chris prayed he wouldn’t now.

Adrian ripped off his mask. His smile was as wide as it always was when he saw Peacemaker. Thank God, Chris thought.

“Hey man, I thought you were done killing random criminals.”

Chris had almost stopped patrolling with Vigilante since the butterfly incident. It had made Vigilante confused, and then sad, but Peacemaker said he wanted to move on to bigger issues. Bigger criminals. Vigilante liked spending time with Chris and the rest of the gang tracking down the big criminals, gang leaders and such, but he still missed him and Peacemaker’s quiet patrols.

Chris didn’t know what to say. His muscles were aching already. His head was swimming, pictures of his dad and his brother, Rick Flag Jr, his dad again. He felt sweat pooling on his stomach despite the cool night air. He needed to find a way out of here. But his mouth was too dry to talk. Or maybe it was his head. Either way, he couldn’t come up with anything to say, any lie to tell Adrian. He made some lame attempt to hide the parcel the dealer had given him: a bag of pills. Chris knew he had paid too much for it, but he didn’t care. He needed it to get through the night. He needed it now.

“Where’s your suit, P?” said Adrian. He was covered in blood and was still so cheery. Chris wished he could hide. He was afraid of Adrian, or Vigilante, or both. He just wanted to get away. “Hey, what do you have there?” Adrian said, reaching for the package. It split open as he reached for it.

“Shit!” He was so fucked. Chris instinctively dropped to his knees and scrambled for the bottles inside.

“Hey man, let it go. I already killed the guy I don’t need evidence-” Adrian acted like he was going to say more but stopped abruptly. Chris’s blood ran cold. He felt his already clammy skin turn even whiter.

“Hey, why aren’t you wearing your suit?” Vigilante repeated. His cheery tone was gone, replaced with something serious, something dark. Chris wore his suit as many places as he could. They both knew he wouldn’t go patrolling without it. Chris even used to wear the suit to the grocery store when he first got out of jail so that people would complement his on his heroism in Corto Maltese. He was dressed too normally, like he was in disguise. A different disguise, one meant to hide him from Vigilante.

Suddenly Vigilante’s hand was on his gun. And then his gun was up to Chris’s head. Chris felt too cloudy to do anything but put his hands up in surrender. Vigilante had never taken mercy on someone before, but maybe he would this time. Maybe he would take mercy on the man he saw as his best friend. But Chris knew he was probably kidding himself.

“Please, I’m trying to stop!” He finally managed to shake out a few words. “Please! Please! I promise this is the last time.” Hot tears rushed down his face. He looked up at Vigilante. At Adrian. Please, please, please, let this man show mercy. Just this once. “You can have them. Take them. Please.”

Vigilante’s gun was still to Chris’s head. He lowered it as the other man started to pick up bottles in his large hands. “Okay, but if I ever find you out here again, I’ll have to pull the trigger. Laws apply to best friends too.” Adrian giggled, dropping his serious expression, and shoved the pills into the backpack where he kept extra weapons and ammo on long nights patrolling. Chris cringed at the lighthearted way Vigilante treated the threat. He knew he was serious. Then Vigilante pulled his mask back on and started searching the body of the kid for anything else. Of course, Vigilante would never leave any drugs behind for someone to find. Chris wanted to kick Adrian, to knock him out, to make him leave the rest of what this dealer had on him. But he was weak, sobbing and shaking on the ground next to Vigilante’s feet. Next to the kid’s expanding pool of blood. The blood that could’ve been his.

He had a little coke at home. It wasn’t what he wanted, but it would tide him over. He would have to decide how to get more again in the morning. Adrian was clueless, but he was smarter than people gave him credit for. A cunning serial killer. Chris knew Vigilante would be keeping an eye on him anywhere in town, and he wouldn’t have the strength to make it very far. Not like this. Not with his junker of a car and his always-cloudy mind and his screaming body.

Chapter Text

Chris isn’t sure he slept at all that night. Between the pains and chills running up his body, and his fear over how he could possibly live with the pills he needed out of reach, maybe forever. He wasn’t sure he could live without them. No he was sure. Sure that he wouldn’t be able to face the day without something in his system. Not Harcourt, not Adebayo, not the criminals they were trying to destroy.

He had to find a way. Somehow.

After a few restless hours, he got up. He drank most of a bottle of some cheap liquor and finished off the rest of his cocaine.

Adrian had a soft spot for him. He usually worshipped the ground he stood on. Plus, he knew Vigilante would have killed him if he was anyone else. And he had that basement full of drugs from every shipment they had intercepted together. Maybe he could just turn on the waterworks again, emphasize how much pain he was in. He was confident he could make it work. He had to.

He showed up to the Chase household a few hours later. It was barely 5, but Adrian had the morning shift; he should be up by now. Adrian’s mom answered the door in robes and slippers, a spatula in her hand. Shit. He hadn’t thought about her. Mrs. Chase was retired, but she was obsessed with doating on Adrian. She made him a breakfast every morning, which he usually ignored. Mrs. Chase gave Chris a cheerful, although slightly confused, smile and let him in. Chris tried to arrange his hair so that maybe she couldn’t tell how his sweat was gluing it to his forehead. Chris felt like he was 14 again, when his dad found him drinking for the first time and beat him bloody. He felt his heart in his throat. He hated feeling like a scared kid. He hated when memories of his father grabbed onto him like this.

But Chris wasn’t that scared kid anymore. Chris had gotten good at hiding when he was high. Mrs. Chase wouldn’t notice. And if they kept their conversation brief, she wouldn’t smell the liquor on his breath.

“Uh, where's Adrian.” Chris stammered out. He wasn’t being himself; he knew that, but Mrs. Chase barely knew him.

“He’s in the shower, sweetheart. How about you sit down. I have some extra eggs, or I could make some pancakes? Adrian had me get these protein ones, but I think he hates them.” How could this sweet old lady remind Chris so much of Vigilante, vicious killer he was?

Chris felt a pang of guilt. Was he really going to use Adrian like this? The second he thought about it, he knew the answer. He didn’t care if he hurt Adrian, not right now.

“No. I-I'm good.” Chris needed to get himself under control. “You said he was in the shower?”

Chris barely waited for an answer. He started down the hall towards the small bathroom, just in time to hear the shower switch off. He opened the door and saw Adrian step out of the shower-bath combo and start toweling off his hair.

“Hey, P. Or uh- Chris.” Adrian was convinced that calling Chris ‘Peacemaker’ when he was out of costume would somehow give away his secret identity, as though everyone didn’t already know who Christopher Smith was.

“How you doing man?” He was so cheerful. Did he not remember last night? Chris wondered if he really thought the answer would be anything good.

Chris pulled himself from the memories that hiding in front of Adrian’s mom had drawn out. He let them swirl around in his mind until he felt his knees buckle and tasted vomit in his mouth. He collapsed on the floor, crying. Sobbing in a way he didn’t know he could. He didn’t think drawing on those feeling would affect him so badly. But maybe this was a good thing. Adrian was bad with emotions. He would give in.

“Please. I’m in so much pain. I need something.” Chris was struggling not to hyperventilate. What was going on with him? He was loosing control of himself, struggling to hold on to the situation.

But he saw a flash of something go across Adrian’s face. Maybe it was too wishful to think it was concern. No. It was. This was working.

Chris took a few deep breaths and rattled something off about how dangerous it was to go through withdrawals. He wasn’t really sure it was true, but figured Adrian wouldn’t know either.

Chris reached out for Adrian’s legs, the bottom of his towel, something. He was being dramatic. He knew it. He wasn’t sure how much of this was theatrics and how much was his genuine panic.

Suddenly Adrian was down on his level, giving him the most awkward hug of his life, somehow both too hard and too soft. Not to mention that Adrian was still just wearing his just towel, his hair dripping lightly onto Chris’s shoulder. Chris felt Adrian’s chest rise and fall against his cheek. It was strangely comforting. Chris tried to make his ragged breath match the other man’s.

Adrian pulled back and looked Peacemaker in the eyes. He furrowed his eyebrows, clearly thinking.

“Okay, so we’ll wean you off.” whispered Adrian softly. Adrian was worried, really worried. He had never seen Chris like this in all their time knowing each other. He didn't know how to deal with this, he had no blueprint. Maybe it was worth it to break his code, just this once. For Peacemaker.

Chris struggled for a second to contain his secret happiness. It had worked. Chris lets out a few shaky sobs onto Adrian’s shoulder. More purposeful this time as he started to pull himself out of his memories.

Fuck. Chris wished he could forget the tug of guilt at his stomach. He cared about Adrian, he really did. He wasn’t like this; he wouldn’t do this. But it didn’t matter how much Chris cared or how much he knew this was wrong. None of that was enough. Not enough to stop him. Not against this feeling.