Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Sleuth had bought himself the camera about 40 years back. He was probably about 30 or so at the time. Slick can’t remember exactly; dates and ages had always been arbitrary numbers to him.
The camera was an old, rustic looking thing, but new and flashy for its time; wide and rectangular with black, textured grips and a large gaping lens. The top had dials Slick couldn’t make heads or tails of. Then again, he usually left any kind of technical finagling to Deuce.
“Cost me a salary and a half,” Sleuth had admitted, carefully turning over the complex piece in his hands like it was a work of art. Slick had just said something witty, probably. Made fun of it. Funny what time does to the less striking parts of your memory.
Sleuth had said that, too, at one point. He was always pretty forgetful, even for a human.
“And that’s where this ol’ thing comes in!” he had said with a flourish, lifting it up beside his head in both hands. He tapped it with his index finger lightly, waiting for some sort of response. But all Slick did was stare on skeptically.

Time passed and his hobby seemed to be just that; a hobby. Slick’s interest in it peaked a few months later; maybe less, he thinks. Since then, Sleuth had kept his photographic endeavors to himself. He kept it in his office, mostly; a few times Slick would come across it in Sleuth’s ratty apartment, stowed away in some ill-suited drawer alongside some rolls of new and used film.
The only processed photograph Slick ever saw was the one Sleuth had taken when he had been off guard. The black and white image was blurry, white highlighting the glint in Slick’s half closed eyes as his open mouth welcomed an entire forkful of bacon in a spray of movement. It was one of the worst pictures Slick had ever seen. He made Sleuth burn all the copies he could get his hands on, but he always had the sneaking suspicion Sleuth had just one more hidden somewhere Slick couldn’t reach.
Since then, Slick made it a pointed rule that photographs of him were absolutely banned. He never liked thinking one of them could end up in the local Gazettes anyways; the press always had creeped him out a bit. Some of those journalists just didn’t have the common sense reaction to buzz off, even when introduced to Slick’s favorite set of skewering knives.

Slick, in the present, glares down into the box in his hands. Sleuth’s camera becomes less and less notable in his stream of consciousness, despite the fact that throughout all these years, it’s survived whatever the hell Sleuth’s put it through, now sitting on top of stacks of papers and a clutter of pens and keepsakes. His hands tighten their grip and the cardboard handles in his hands crumble against brittle carapace.
Ace Dick had stopped by Sleuth’s apartment earlier to drop a box full of Sleuth’s office things. He hadn’t said anything when he saw the door ajar, lock picked and Slick on the other side of it.
“Had a feelin’ you’d be here,” he had said in a raspy voice, handing Slick the box and leaving almost immediately after. His expression was pulled and exhausted, though Slick recalls for a brief moment, that’s how Sleuth got to looking about a year ago.

He bitterly wonders if that means Ace’s due for a visit from Death as well.

Slick slams the box down on the kitchen counter. The camera inside rattles dangerously, the small flash attachment clattering and eventually shooting apart from the main contraption with a sharp snap. Rolls of film rattle out from underneath sheets of paperwork, all of them labeled “USED” on paper stickers in Sleuth’s messy scrawl. A stack of processed photos peek out from a manilla folder. Slick sees the unmistakable point of his own terrifying maw in blurred white. He pulls the folder out.
Paperclipped to the front of the folder is that god forsaken image, the smear of movement that is Slick’s arm only barely obscuring the forkful of bacon and his frozen expression. He sneers, but his heart isn’t quite in it. Being adverse to something is a lot less entertaining when there’s nothing to fight against. The thought of burning the photo gives him a queasy feeling, so instead he just sets it aside.

Slick doesn’t really know what to expect when he opens the manilla folder. Well, admittedly, a part of him knows. The folder’s too bulky and gives its contents away too easily. But that doesn’t make opening it any easier.
The photographs are paperclipped together, organized by dates, seemingly. Of course he didn’t buy an album, that lazy asshole, Slick thought to himself, gingerly lifting the first stack (the oldest) in his claws.

The first picture is Midnight City’s skyline. Most of the image is too dark and hazy to make out, but speckles of glowing whites and grey take shape into buildings and windows. The skylights are dizzying, and the faint desert sky spectacular. The moon wanes, powerful and sharp. He took this from Slick’s balcony, the one on the 18th floor on Main Street.
“Hm? Oh,” Sleuth had said distantly, leaning against the iron railing and staring out into the grand expanse of everything.
“The view up here’s nice. We’re right in the middle of everythin, you know?” He let his shoulders slouch and leaned heavily against Slick’s side, the camera in his right hand tucked snugly in the crook of his left elbow. The late evening breeze carried the fading smell of sand and asphalt. Behind it hissed the sounds of the city, and in that moment, they found it in themselves to be content.

Slick drops the folder like he’s been stung. He storms out of Sleuth’s apartment, not even bothering to lock the door behind him. His arm burns where he feels a ghost of a weight against his side, heavy but familiarly warm.

Chapter Text

Less than two days pass before Slick returns for the cardboard box on Sleuth’s fading kitchen counter. He pushes aside the front of the manilla folder and grabs the first stack of photos. He pulls up a chair and slides his city’s skyline to the other end of the counter.

The next few photographs mean little to Slick. Dame and Broad standing beneath the oak tree in Central Park, holding onto their hats with one arm as their skirts billow in the wind. A torn and faded green post-it note clings to the back. Make copies for Dame.
Slick sets it aside in a new pile.

The next few are devoid of recognizable people, instead filled with dark, contrasting shots that pretty much scream tacky noir film. There’s a slanted row of bright street lamps illuminating a dark road, a man standing on the river’s bridge with a cigarette, smoke faint and grainy against a backdrop of black sky. Strewn case files beside an ashtray, a discarded end still smouldering where it’s been crushed. Slick stares at the picture. One of the case files is a utility bill. The tray is full of fresh ash. He must have micromanaged the shot dozens of times before he was satisfied, the high-maintenance fucker. Slick shoves the picture to the back of the pile with a faint grin. His face falls again when he sees the next photograph.

It’s deeply blurred, as if the image was taken three times and transposed on itself again and again, each time slightly shifting to the right. Violent spatters of dark liquid completely cover Sleuth’s tiled kitchen, a cooking pot overturned and left on the floor. The angle it was taken at is concerningly tilted.

“A crime scene!” Sleuth had slurred, stumbling away from the kitchen, ignorant to the tomatoey mess he was spreading to his living room. Slick was still on the floor mourning their lost dinner through the bottle of whiskey cradled in his arms.

“The fuck are you up to,” he managed to mutter, peering with his good eye into the neck of the bottle before lifting it up for another swig. Slick paused before reaching into his sleeve and wrangling out a stray, half cooked spaghetti noodle.

Sleuth had returned triumphant and a half with his camera, hands evidently wiped completely clean on his own trousers and shirt before he gathered it up from whatever corner he had it in before. He raised it to one open eye, tongue sticking out and up in concentration as he poised as a beatcop taking numberless shots of a horrifying murder.

“Slick, put somore effort into your corpse posin,” Sleuth said as he lowered the camera from his face. Slick had just leered up at him halfheartedly, good arm outstretched.

“Can’t move,” he complained. “Too drunk.”

Sleuth set the camera aside, saying something or other about how Slick was a shit actor, before dropping to the small clean spot on the floor next to where Slick sat, reaching for the whiskey. Sleuth’s other hand took Slick’s outstretched hand in his and let their fingers fold together gently.

He was always a fucking sap when he was drunk.

Slick throws the photo across the counter, cutting the vivid recollection short. It collides with the skyline, sending them both back an extra few centimeters. The next couple of photos are the same, smeared freezeframes of Sleuth’s messy kitchen. They get slid under the first, at the end of the counter, until the series cuts short and goes back to actual photography.

The pile’s been whittled down to about half, now. Slick feels a heaviness in his chest that only emphasizes the weight in his bones. It makes him feel older than he is. He drags up one of the stools next to the island counter of Sleuth’s small kitchen, keeping the printed photos clutched tight in one clawed hand.

He stays there, slouched over the pile in his hands, unmoving until the sun drops down below the horizon.