A Storm Brewing; in which the honorable Spencer Smith asks questions and finds answers

Ever since he started university, Spencer has been quite content studying his dragons and trying to talk to Brendon, the young man who works at Spencer's boarding house. Having the dragons fall mysteriously ill is the last thing he wants, but then again, it does mean more time spent with Brendon as they try to figure out what's wrong.

Notes:

Written for this year's bandombigbang. Huge thanks to the mods for all their hard work!
Gorgeous art provided by the fantastic abtagrl. Spencer and Brendon and dragons, what more could I have asked for? And the fabulous mix was created by the equally fabulous leish. Her stuff just makes me so very happy. Head on over and show them some love!
And last but not least, attackegg's mad betaing skills helped iron out the kinks and streamlined the story immensely. Any remaining mistakes and oddities are all my bad.
You can also read the story on DW here.

(See the end of the work for other works inspired by this one.)

Work Text:

There’s a storm coming, dark clouds gathering over the steeple of Spencer’s boarding house as he strides down the sidewalk. It’s been brewing all day – black and thick, it hangs over the city like some kind of supernatural wrath and speeds everybody’s steps. Spencer nods to a gentleman rushing along with his overcoat tightly drawn and tips his hat to a woman struggling with her parasol as the wind picks up sharply. There are no airships in the sky today, and while that’ll set deliveries and travels back and no doubt upset a fair amount of people, Spencer can’t blame them.

He takes the three stone steps up to his front door just when the first spots of rain start to dot the sidewalk, too light to feel through his coat at first but quickly picking up in speed and ferocity. By the time he’s latched the door behind him, the rain can be heard through the walls and pattering down on the roof as if there’s no tomorrow, and Spencer vows firmly to pay more attention to the weather forecast and not leave his umbrella to be a victim of his early morning rush.

For now, however: Home sweet home.

He’s barely pulled off his coat, fabric glistening with a handful of raindrops he hadn’t managed to evade, when there’s a clattering sound from father inside the house, and Brendon pops his head into the entryway. His curious look gives way to a big smile, and even though Spencer sees him every day, wearing the same expression and much the same waistcoat and jacket over his crisp white shirt, Spencer’s heart still begins to thump painfully at the sight.

“Mr. Smith!” Brendon says happily, shuffling around the doorway. “Welcome home. I was afraid you’d still be out there when the storm hits, but you made it.”

“Barely, Mr. Urie, barely,” Spencer says. There’s heat rising in his cheeks, but he ignores it in favor of shedding his hat and overcoat. “Another few moments, and I would have had to spend the evening huddled in front of the radiator.”

Brendon laughs good-naturedly. “The parlor is quite warm and cozy today, so you’re welcome to do so anyway, if you wish.”

He must be telling the truth, because his cheeks are the rosy-pink color of a man who’s just a little too warm, so Spencer smiles but regretfully shakes his head.

“Thank you for the offer, but no. I have a lot of work tonight.”

Brendon looks away for just a moment before the smile is back on his face. “Certainly, as you wish,” he says. “I would hate to be the reason you do not do well in your studies.”

They lapse into a somewhat uncomfortable silence. Spencer never quite knows what to say around Brendon. He’s not a social butterfly the way his friend Ian or the younger of the Way brothers are, but he is still perfectly capable of carrying on a pleasant conversation – with everyone, it seems, but Brendon Urie. They’re friendly enough, no doubt about it, and what pleasantries they do exchange are always warm and heartfelt, but every conversation inevitably seems to come to this point: When they are both reaching for more, but neither of them know exactly how to get there.

When Brendon begins to fidget, reaching up to finger at the silver chain that holds his watch, Spencer puts him out of his misery. He shifts his hold on his outer garments and says, “I’ll just head upstairs for a moment to hang these up.”

“Ah, yes.” Brendon’s smile is just a little too wide. “But don’t dally, Mr. Smith. Dinner will be ready soon.”

Spencer suspects dinner will be ready at 6 pm on the dot, as it has been every day since he moved in, but he doesn’t point that out. Instead he nods, says, “I’ll be looking forward to it,” and earns himself the sweetest smile in reply.

It makes his stomach twist in the most uncomfortable of ways, and that is the only excuse he has for his rather abrupt nod and departure. One day, Brendon will feel at ease around him, will chat with him beyond the most polite of conversations; but clearly, today is not that day.

The dinner bell rings at six o’clock sharp. Spencer has just barely begun reading his second chapter, Dragon Wing Physiology, and feels no qualms at sliding in a marker and shutting the book without delay. As much as he loves his area of study, it doesn’t make the books in the field any more captivatingly written.

He can hear footsteps on the stairs as he does up the topmost button of his shirt; he thinks it must be William, from the easy cadence of his heeled boots on the wooden steps. There are two occupants on the floor above him – William and Nate, with Pete and Gabriel sharing the second floor with Spencer. The little suite underneath the roof is where their landlady lives. Brendon, as far as Spencer knows, doesn’t reside in the house, unless he’s somehow managed to set up shop in the storage cellar without anyone noticing.

Somewhere in the house, a door closes none-too-gently, and Spencer shakes his head. His pocket watch is resting on his desk, face open, the replica of a dragon about to strike appearing to be nothing more than abstract lines at this angle. He closes it as he reaches for it and slips it into his pocket. His parents gifted it to him when he reached the age of majority, and he’s quite fond of it, but sometimes he wishes it were a little less good at dictating his life.

Even though it is early in the evening still, the storm rattling the shutters has darkened the skies, so when Spencer turns off the gas lamp quietly guttering on his desk, he has to wait for his eyes to adjust for a moment before he can safely head for the door. From the sounds echoing up to him, he’d say everyone else is downstairs already, unlikely to hear the stairs creak underneath his soles. There’s a bout of laughter just as he reaches the first landing, and there’s light spilling out from the combined sitting and dining room into the darkened hallway, with the door left slightly open for him. Brendon, he thinks, even though it might have been any of his fellow boarders. It’s the sort of thing Brendon would do, and Spencer, when given the choice, will always want to assume that Brendon is thinking of him.

Spencer’s entrance, despite a few nods and glances, goes mostly unacknowledged. It’s an all-male boarding house – mixed houses are new and still a little scandalous, and it’s not as though Spencer has any complaints about the company. The others, however, spend quite a bit of time peering out the window trying to catch glimpses of the occupants of the female dormitory at the other end of the block, and Spencer’s shared quite a few amused glances with Brendon at their expense.

Today, the weather being what it is, Spencer is not surprised to find his fellow boarders mostly gathered around the dining table, outfitting themselves with napkins and cutlery. Spencer seats himself in the chair next to Pete, across from Gabe. William and Nate are the only ones who remain standing, huddled together over by the mantel with their pipes in hand.

He only realizes his mistake a moment later, when Pete leans around him, coat bunching alarmingly, to continue whatever conversation he’s been involved in with William, while Gabe rolls his eyes and reaches for the pitcher of water.

“No, Mr. Beckett, no one need be attractive when they’re rich,” Pete says with a grand sweep of his arm. “Look at our lords and ladies – years of inbreeding have made them as ugly as a herd of boars. And yet, people gladly marry them. Because they’re rich.”

Spencer tamps down on a sigh. Sometimes he’s awfully glad his parents have yet to start pressuring him into seeking a match. He doesn’t have a lot of experience with dating, but it seems to be a mightily complicated business. Sometimes he thinks he envies his dragons, simply mating with whomever they please.

However, Pete, it seems, has yet to finish with his diatribe. “The poor, though,” he says, pausing for emphasis. He has his finger in the air, and speaks like the word is an exclamation in and of itself. The Poor. “They have no choice but to be attractive. A poor but attractive man or woman still has options. They can find someone rich, because money and beauty are equals, in a way. The pretty can marry the wealthy, and the rich can marry the beautiful, and nobody bats an eye. And if you’re beautiful and wealthy, well, you never need worry again.”

His pause this time lasts long enough that Spencer starts to garner hope he might even be finished entirely, but then Pete licks his lips and says, with his donkey laugh, “Of course, someone unfortunate to be poor and ugly might as well ask for a place in a labor house right now.”

William rolls his eyes and tosses his hair as he seats himself, but he doesn’t protest.

Instead, it’s Brendon who butts in with, “Careful, Mr. Wentz, someone might take offense at that,” pushing into the room with a steaming pot of soup.

Spencer has the urge to rise and offer his help, has already set his palm against the edge of the table to push himself upright, but despite his straining arms, Brendon shows no sign of being bothered by his load.

“Well then,” Pete says, grinning the grin that melts even the hearts of ladies as old and hard-nosed as Mrs. Witthorn. “Let it never be said that Pete Wentz offend such a handsome young man as our very own Mr. Urie.”

“Some might argue that a person’s attractiveness should not factor into one’s treatment of them,” William comments dryly, tilting his brandy glass so only one edge of the stem remains in contact with the tablecloth. “In fact, happily offending those of lesser physical beauty strikes me as being in rather poor taste.”

He doesn’t sound very cross, however. He is, as they all are, used to Pete by now, and he appears to be readying himself for a spirited philosophical discussion rather than an actual argument.

“My dear Mr. Beckett,” Pete says, folding his hands over his plate and leaning forward onto his elbows, a mischievous grin spreading over his features. “Would you rather I offend those I find attractive and treat those of unfortunate looks as kings and queens? An unusual approach, I’d say, but it could lead to some interesting results.”

“Soup?” Brendon interrupts, and lifts the ladle so quickly Pete has to jerk back to avoid staining the cuffs of his shirt. Brendon moves when Pete does, thwarting his attempt to peer around Brendon’s arm to meet William’s eyes, and after the second time, Spencer starts to suspect Brendon is doing it on purpose.

“Shall we not speak of more agreeable things?” Spencer suggests. “A political discussion, perhaps? Has anyone recently attended a protest?”

“I,” Pete says, once again unable to look his sparring partner in the eye when he leans to the side and Brendon sets down the basket of bread directly in his line of vision.

Spencer looks up, and he thinks there might be something mischievous in Brendon’s expression. A moment later, he meets Spencer’s eyes briefly and smiles, the corners of his eyes crinkling in delight.

Pete sighs then, explosively, and throws his hands into the air. “Let’s,” he says. “Mr. Beckett, we shall carry on this conversation at a more convenient time.”

“That sounds wonderful,” William responds drolly. He looks up and says, “Thank you, Mr. Urie,” as Brendon steps back and indicates that he has finished serving up with a short bow.

Spencer looks over to him, eyes drawn by the movement, to find Brendon looking right back at him.

For a singular, breathless moment, it feels like they are the only people in the world – just he and Brendon, eyes fixed across the room, separated by half a dozen paces, their families and social status, and yet equally exasperated by Pete’s diatribe, protected by the same room, warmed by the same fire.

Then Mrs. Witthorn emerges from the kitchens to seat herself at the head of the table to a chorus of ‘Good evening, Ma’am,’s,’ and Brendon moves off to sit at her elbow, and the moment is lost.

The house tends to quiet down by the time closing time rolls around. Gabe will tumble out the door at half past nine as often as not, usually with Nate or William or Pete in tow. Most days, Spencer is already shut up in his room by that time, bent over his books, but he’ll hear them laugh and holler on their way, readying themselves for a night that will not end until Mrs. Witthorn unlocks the door once again in the early hours of the morning.

After that, the house falls silent. Occasionally the pipes will creak when someone uses the washroom, or someone will sit up in the living room for a little while longer, laughter and enthused voices drifting upwards through the corridors.

There’s no such thing tonight, though, and after a while Spencer heads downstairs to see if there is any tea left to help him stay awake while he works through the final pages of his chapter.

There is, cooling in the kettle on the stove, just enough to fill one of the battered old mugs most of the way, and Spencer drinks it quickly in the hopes of maximizing its animating effect. He places the cup in the sink, afterwards, and at first he thinks the noise he hears was caused by the motion, except then it happens again a moment later. Curious but not particularly alarmed, Spencer follows the sound into the corridor. The door to the storage room is partly open, the warm light of a gas lamp spilling out into the hall, which means it is either Mrs. Witthorn or Brendon and therefore none of Spencer’s business.

For a moment, Spencer contemplates going over and peeking inside, to offer his help if it’s his landlady or perhaps exchange a few words if it’s Brendon, but the impulse lasts only for the blink of an eye before Spencer firmly reminds himself that he’s being silly. Neither of them would much appreciate Spencer getting underfoot, and he already acts the fool in front of Brendon on a regular basis – he hardly needs any more opportunities to embarrass himself.

That decided, he sneaks along the corridor and up the staircase, and he’s most of the way up to the first landing when Brendon emerges from the darkness with a lamp in his hand and wrapped up tight, and freezes awkwardly at the sight of Spencer standing on the stairs, staring back at him.

“You’re leaving?” Spencer says, even though with the coat and the bag and the hat on top of Brendon’s head, the answer is quite obvious.

Brendon nods, regardless. “Off to bed,” he says, with the kind of forced cheer Spencer recognizes from himself, when he’s had exams and far too much time to spend in the laboratory, and wants to disguise how badly he just wants to go home and to sleep.

“Have a save journey,” Spencer says, hand still curled around the bannister. For all that he’s a scholar and quite close to the completion of his studies, he feels particularly unintelligent at the moment. Unnecessarily, he adds, “The storm has not yet passed.”

Brendon smiles at him, and for a moment, it looks pleased and real, and not at all like a mask to hide his exhaustion. “Thank you, Mr. Smith,” he says. “Try not to work much more tonight.”

“I have to do all the work there is to do,” Spencer says helplessly, and Brendon looks away and sighs, shortly, like he knows exactly how that feels.

“Then I wish you much success,” he says, with a tired quirk of his lips and an implied doff of his hat. He only looks back once more, when he’s wrestled his umbrella out of the stand and opened the door to the continuing downpour outside.

Spencer can’t read Brendon’s expression, and he’s gone too quickly to catch Spencer’s hasty, almost desperate smile. There is nothing to connect them but stilted conversation, it seems, and Spencer finds himself still standing on the bannister until long after the door has shut behind him.

The storm, despite awakening Spencer with roars of thunder once or twice, dissipates over the course of the night, and the following morning dawns bright and early. Spencer turns off the alarm rattling on his bedside table, cogs and arms whirring wildly, and crawls out from beneath the covers.

He’s the first one to the washroom, as usual, and ends up spending a little longer than most mornings with his head underneath the creaking faucet, trying to shake the last of the night’s tiredness out of his eyes. The cold water helps, thankfully, and by the time the boiler has groaned to life, he’s awake enough to at least contemplate breakfast. He’s too early for the regular scheduled meal, will be for another hour and a half, and he doesn’t have time to wait around for it if he wants to double-check his laboratory results before he has to turn them in.

Brendon will probably be awake, though, and perhaps he’d be willing to fry Spencer up some eggs. He’s done it before, chattering away while Spencer leaned sleepily against the counter. No, Brendon wouldn’t mind.

His sleep-addled brain makes getting dressed and gathering his books together a chore, but by the time Spencer’s good and ready to go, he thinks he’s fit to be among people at least. The house is still quiet, though, and he takes care to sneak down the stairs, avoiding the creaky steps so as not to wake his fellow lodgers. The downstairs is mostly silent as well, besides the indistinct noises that come from someone puttering around in the kitchen.

Spencer heads over with determination, stomach contentedly contemplating the eggs and sausage in its future, but pulls up short when he catches sight of Brendon through the half-open kitchen door. He’s whistling, dancing around a little, though Spencer has no idea how - it’s been a scant seven hours since Brendon left, less even, and while he has no idea where Brendon lives, that hardly seems like a reasonable amount to do more than go home, sleep, and then perhaps roll over and sleep some more.

As he watches, though, Brendon pauses in his performance to reach up to the spice rack for salt or pepper or what have you, and his other hand knuckles at his eye. Something thick lodges itself in Spencer’s throat at the sight, and even though he’d like nothing better than to go over and say hello, Spencer withdraws. He can find something to eat on his way to school – there’s no reason to add to Brendon’s load.

He stops by the dragonry before his lecture, as he does almost every morning. Two of his colleagues are already there, Miss Salpeter and Miss Asher, both with their hair tied back with ribbons and the safety goggles firmly over their eyes.

Miss Asher doesn’t look up at the sound of the door clicking shut behind him, but Miss Salpeter does, and when Spencer nods at her, she gives him a brief smile. She’s distracted, however, by the Yellow Fangtooth Miss Asher’s holding firmly in place on the tabletop. Spencer can’t see what they’re doing to it, but it whimpers unhappily, and that is never a good thing.

Still, he knows better than to distract them, and heads for his favorite workstation instead. The microscope there is particularly sharp, without the wear and tear of some of the older models, and the more advanced students all tend to have and respect other people’s favorites, so it’s usually free when he comes in.

It is now, as well, and just as clean as he left it, and it’s with a great sense of satisfaction that he gets to work. The samples he’d collected the previous weeks have come along well, and he takes his usual studious notes, only half-aware of the conversation carrying on behind him.

One of the participants is Marcus Fischer, coming out of the dragon pen with a blood-red but listless Suntail draped over his shoulder. The orange tail curls around his forearm, Spencer notices when he looks up to reach for another petri dish, and Marcus strokes it absently while he confers with Miss Salpeter about Zina’s apparent lack of appetite.

Spencer doesn’t look up again, but he can hear the worry in Miss Salpeter’s voice when she says, “I don’t think she’s been sleeping.”

Spencer frowns to himself at that, but it’s not his business to interrupt, so he turns back to his microscope and tried to put the matter out of his mind.

A light tapping sound makes him look up some indeterminate amount of time later, and he blinks in surprise at Miss Salpeter standing near his seat, knuckle resting against the wooden work plate.

“Uh, yes?” he says, and she smiles grimly at him.

“I don’t know if you heard,” she says, mouth twisting unhappily. A few golden curls have escaped from her headdress. “Professor Keade would like all students to come speak to him in his office. Apparently our work ethic and moral code have not been up to par recently.”

Spencer stares at her for a moment, trying to ignore that awful sinking feeling, before she quirks an understanding smile and he nods quickly. Miss Salpeter smiles and walks away, over to where Miss Asher is waiting by the door, and the two swish out into the hallway without another look in his direction. Spencer watches them go with a heavy heart and a sour taste in his mouth.

Professor Keade is notorious for his unpleasant demeanor and his unreasonable demands, his exacting standards that go beyond ‘working hard’ and move straight to ‘impossible to please.’ Lord knows what he’s found to complain about this time, because the lab is as clean as it’s ever been and as far as Spencer can tell, everyone has been absolutely diligent in following procedure, but he’s sure to catch an earful when he goes to find out.

Not that he has a choice, of course. But he still doesn’t want to go.

Professor Keade’s office is in the lecture hall on Rosewood Avenue, a medium-sized brick building flanked by similar structures and guarded by the honking, rattling traffic. Spencer nods to the secretary on the ground floor on his way past and makes his way up deserted stairs to the offices at the far side of the building. Spencer had a class here in his first year, and a professor who was very gracious in allowing students to come in for extra help, and it’s with some apprehension that he heads past Dr. Ballard’s room and to another, a couple of paces and a few doors down.

Spencer raps his knuckles against the wood, just underneath the brass nameplate. He half-wishes the professor isn’t in, that there was some kind of misunderstanding and he’ll be able to just take an early lunch instead, but no such luck, of course.

“Who is it?” comes a displeased voice from within.

Spencer rolls his eyes once, holding back a sigh, and reaches for the handle. “Spencer Smith, Professor,” he calls. “May I come in?”

“Yes, do,” is the reply, and Spencer has to jiggle the handle a little to get it to unstick.

It’s dark inside, only sparse daylight falling in through the grimy window. There’s a desk and a shelf with books, a few framed certificates of achievement hanging on the wall. Keade is at his desk, hunched over a typewriter illuminated by light bulbs of a garish red and green, hitting keys with the precision born of bad eyesight coupled with inexperience. The typewriter dings loudly, several bulbs lighting up simultaneously. The sound doesn’t help much with the headache Spencer can feel building, and his tone is perhaps a little more abrupt than is polite when he takes his hat off and says, “You wanted to speak with me, sir?”

“I did, Mr. Smith,” Keade says. He hits one more key, causing the carriage to produce an earsplitting noise and rattle down to another line, and only then does he look up enough to acknowledge Spencer’s presence. He points at the plain wooden chair waiting in front of his desk. “Have a seat.”

He settles back into his own, comfortable armchair with a contended sigh, steepling his hands together, and fixes Spencer with a look.

“Was there something I can help you with, Professor?” Spencer asks, after a long moment of silence.

“I certainly hope so,” Keade says. He picks up a shiny pen lying on his desk, next to the typewriter, and threads it between his fingers. “You see, Mr. Smith, it has come to my attention that there are certain rules of conduct in place at the laboratory that are not being, shall we say, adequately adhered to.”

He bares his teeth at Spencer at that, who returns a blank, hopefully equally annoying smile. There are plenty of procedural rules in place, to protect both dragons and students, and he cannot recall himself or anyone else he knows breaking any of them. Sure, someone will occasionally forget to sign themselves in or out, but everyone Spencer has regular contact with is absolutely stringent in following the rules that actually matter.

“Is that so?” he says. “I’m very sorry to hear that.”

“So am I, Smith, so am I.” Keade puts the pen down again and leans forward to fix Spencer with an earnestly condescending look. “It has therefore become necessary for me to grow more vigilant in my controls, something I had hoped wouldn’t be necessary.” He shakes his head sadly. “I am extremely disappointed, Smith, I hope you know.”

Spencer doesn’t roll his eyes, but it’s a close thing. As far as he knows, there’s nothing to be disappointed by. But Keade is still a professor, much as Spencer might wonder why, and so he nods and says, “I understand, sir,” and blinks innocently when Keade gives him a sharp look.

“Excellent,” he says after a moment. “That’s settled then. I will issue a revised set of rules for conduct within the laboratory shortly. I expect you will report any deviations from these guidelines?” He raises his eyebrows as though that is to be expected, as though he has any business asking Spencer to keep tabs on his classmates.

“I will be sure to take appropriate action,” Spencer says blandly, to mask how badly he wants to ball his hands into angry fists and growl. Keade isn’t even the supervising professor for the laboratory, that’s Professor B. Walker, and Spencer’ll be damned if he causes trouble with his peers just to feed into a teacher’s self-inflated ego.

Judging by the tight line Keade’s lips flatten into, he knows full well that Spencer intends to do no such thing. He doesn’t have enough authority to force the point, though, and they both know it. Spencer suspects that’s the reason for the sour expression forming on the professor’s face.

“Very well, Smith,” he says. His smile looks like it hurts. “I expect to hear from you soon.”

Finally, thankfully, dismissed, Spencer heads for the door as quickly as propriety will allow him. “You’ll hear from me just as soon as there’s something I need to speak to you about,” he can’t resist adding, when he already has the door handle in his hand.

When he glances back over his shoulder, Professor Keade has his hands poised over the typewriter and a displeased expression on his face. “And watch that attitude, Smith.”

“What attitude, Professor?” Spencer asks as blandly as he is able, and with a quick nod, shuts the door behind him.

Professor Keade’s office is, unfortunately, two streets and a large square away from Spencer’s lecture hall, and he has to narrowly dodge a two-wheeler carrying two young women with trailing skirts as he rushes through traffic. He doesn’t have time to apologize, despite the curses trailing after him, rushes past the main building’s ornate doors when the corridors are already emptying of students and eases into his lecture hall with the last trail of attendees bare moments before his professor calls to order.

Amidst the scrapes of wooden seats and heels against the floor, Spencer squeezes past a small gathering of students aiming for empty seats and makes his way up the auditorium stairs. Halfway to the top, there’s a familiar face waiting for him, and Ryan gives him a smile as he gathers up his coat and hat from the empty seat next to him.

“Smith,” Ryan says, with a roll of his eyes and a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. “Punctual as usual.”

There’s a dainty blonde sitting on Ryan’s other side, with large dark eyes and impeccably coifed hair, who smiles prettily when Spencer catches her eye. She’s absolutely Ryan’s type, and Spencer assumes he’ll like her when they’re properly introduced, but for now he’s got other things to worry about.

“Like you’re one to talk, Ross,” he replies, dropping into the seat and immediately pulling his notepaper from his book bag.

Down at the podium, professor Larkin clears her throat and begins her lecture, and Spencer unearths a worn down nub of a pencil. The lecture hall is large and not particularly well lit, the high windows and sparsely doled out lamps hardly enough to brighten up the dark wood. It makes it hard to stay alert after particularly long nights working in the laboratory, but it does work quite well for moments like these, when Spencer has things to share with Ryan that absolutely cannot wait another two hours.

Dragon sick, he jots down on the last page of his notebook, next to a classmate’s telephone number and the date of a guest lecture on aquatic dragons and their nesting habits. No idea why. NO SLEEP. He underlines the last bit three times, and then pushes the note over to Ryan to read.

Ryan glances at it, frowning, and then whispers, “So now you finally know how the rest of us feel most days.”

Spencer stares at him for a moment before he understands. “Not me, the dragon,” he hisses, and is extraordinarily glad for the warning glance Professor Larkin casts towards their section, because what he wants to say next certainly wouldn’t end in pleasantries.

The lecture ends amidst another scrape of shoes and chairs, almost drowning out Larkin’s assignment for next week. Spencer jots it down as well as he can, before Ryan impatiently nudges him out of his seat and steers him from the hall. When they emerge from the building, the sun is out for once, sending weak rays through the smog thick in the city, and Spencer turns his head towards it. He cradles his books against his chest and sighs happily. This feels like it could be a very good day.

He turns and says as much to Ryan, who laughs good-naturedly at him, but Spencer can tell his attention is mostly on the blonde and her friends, who have congregated a couple of feet away. At least she seems to be just as taken with him, glancing past her friend’s parasol to not quite meet their eyes.

“They’re going to go down to the river,” Ryan informs him, when he catches Spencer looking. “Explore the docks.”

It’s not the easiest task he’s ever completed, but Spencer manages to refrain from rolling his eyes. Of course that kind of activity – that kind of woman – is attractive to Ryan; an adventure like that would appeal to his fascination for the seedy underbelly of society, while still allowing him to have a perfectly academic discussion about it later.

“Are you going to join them?” he asks dutifully. Lord knows he won’t, if Ryan were to ask him along. He’s done his share of youthful exploration when he first arrived in the city, and he’s had quite enough of being sneered at by dockhands and questioned by the police guard whether he’s gotten himself lost. He looks like an upper-crust university student, and he’s made his peace with the fact a long time ago.

Ryan, though, has turned that particular phase into an art form, and he’s dying to go – Spencer knows him well enough to read it in his eyes, because even though he and Ryan are no longer as close as they used to be when they first arrived, they still have over a decade of friendship to build upon.

So it’s to Spencer eternal surprise that Ryan shakes his head regretfully, with another look back at the group of ladies. “She’s hinted that I might be welcome, but I can’t – I’ve made an order that I need to pick-up poste-haste, and I’ve just received a note this morning that the shipment has come in.”

He gives Spencer a hopeful look, and Spencer sighs and holds out his hand. “Where is it?” he asks.

Ryan’s sorrowful expression almost immediately gives way to delight, and he quickly digs a slip of paper out of his pocket and lays it in Spencer’s waiting palm.

Spencer scans the jerky writing quickly, feeling his brows furrow. “Cannery Road?” he asks. “Ryan, that’s not an area I feel any particular desire to go.”

“It’s the only shop in town who could procure the – the product for me,” Ryan insists.

Spencer raises an eyebrow. “Perhaps it’s a sign,” he says. “If only one shop in town will sell it, and that shop is on Cannery Road, then perhaps it would be prudent to go without.”

“Don’t be such a drag,” Ryan admonishes him. His eyes flicker over Spencer’s shoulder momentarily, and he smiles briefly before he turns his attention back to Spencer. “Please, my friend,” he says, with a winning smile. “I’ll be forever in your debt.”

“You already are forever in my debt,” Spencer grumbles. “Twice over, if I recall correctly.” He doesn’t bother putting any more effort into protesting, however. They both know he’s as good as agreed.

“To a third forever,” Ryan says, unbothered. A triumphant smile is tugging at the corners of his mouth. “Smith, you are a prince among men.”

“Naturally,” Spencer says drolly, shrugging off Ryan’s hand when he attempts to lay it on his arm. “Give me the order details, then,” he says, “and go on before I change my mind.”

The taxi driver drops Spencer off at 449 Cannery Road with a disbelieving shake of his head, and Spencer can’t even blame him. There aren’t many people about, but the street seems to carry a threatening air about it whatever the company or time of day. Everybody knows there is always something fishy going on at Cannery Road. Rumor has it that it’s where people go to replace limbs they’ve lost with hooks or guns, where they outfit themselves with mechanical tongues or insert compasses into their forearms. Spencer hasn’t met anyone like that, but he’s seen photographs, heard stories, had nightmares. Cannery Road isn’t a place for university students. It isn’t a place for anyone.

Still, he’s here, ever the push-over for Ryan, left eyeing a dilapidated storefront with a skeptical frown. Spencer is reasonably certain even rodents have passed this place over in search of more acceptable accommodation, but this is where Ryan sent him, so for Ryan, Spencer will go.

The store he’s been instructed to go is called Finn's, and if it weren’t for the small sign by the door proclaiming it as such, Spencer would have walked right past. When he walks up the steps and tries the door, however, it’s unlocked, and creaks open with a terrifying wail.

Inside is darkness. Spencer has to wait for his eyes to adjust until he can make out a shelf not a foot in front of him, one he would have inevitably walked right into if he hadn’t hesitated. There’s no bell to announce his arrival, and no one coming forward to greet him, and he cannot deny the feeling of dread growing ever-more persistent in his belly as he edges inside.

“Hello?” he calls. “Good afternoon?”

“Good afternoon,” someone says, right by his ear, and he squawks and whirls around. He only narrowly avoids taking down an entire shelf of glass vials.

Good Lord, this was such a terrible idea.

“Can I help you?” the man says, pushing the door shut behind Spencer. There’s a modicum of sunshine falling in from a skylight, so Spencer can still see him, at least. Not much of him, given his top hat, style woefully out of date, is casting most of his face in shadow. Still, he doesn’t appear particularly threatening, so Spencer presses his hand to his heart until his breathing has calmed somewhat, and then he says shakily, “Mr. Finn?”

The man hms thoughtfully, not quite in reply. Spencer wonders idly if he’s blind, considering the way he keeps not quite looking at Spencer. One eye certainly looks a little duller than the other. Maybe he’s had it replaced with a prosthetic. Perhaps some sort of weapon? The scientist in Spencer desperately wants to ask, but his breeding won’t allow it. And then it also would probably not be a good idea to go around upsetting people in this part of town.

The enduring quiet, however, is more than Spencer can gracefully bear. “You are Mr. Finn, are you not?” he presses, and the man hums again.

“And you are?”

“Oh. Smith. Spencer Smith.” Spencer sticks his hand out with a relieved smile. “I’ve come here for a pick-up?”

“Is that so,” the man says. It isn’t a question. He somehow manages to squeeze through the narrow gap between Spencer and the nearest shelf. A crooked finger beckons Spencer to follow him, and although he has a sudden vision of what his mother might say if she caught him in a place like this, Spencer follows.

There is a counter in the back, surface almost entirely covered by a rattling copper register and a display of what may or may not be shrunken heads. There’s also another man, reed-thin and younger than the first, if not by very much, and Spencer tries to focus on that rather than the wares they’re offering.

“Spencer Smith,” he tells the man behind the counter, who nods.

“Fitz,” he says. “My colleague is Mr. Finch. And what can we do for you today, Mr. Smith?”

“Right,” Spencer says, hurriedly reaching into his coat pocket for the crumpled bit of paper Ryan left him with. He has to squint down at the letters to make them out in the gloom, and he doesn’t regain his sense of unease until he’s read out, “One Ouija planchette palm reader,” and one of the gentlemen next to him stiffens notably.

Spencer can understand the sentiment. Ouija is certainly nothing socially acceptable, though more and more of his peers will unearth it for parlor tricks and cheap entertainment. What Ryan is asking for, however, isn’t the toy version – it’s a newly developed machine that moves the planchette not through some mythical connection but through electricity being shocked into the summoner’s hand. Spencer has only seen such a device once, and the sight of the metal caps fitted over twitching fingers, the planchette whirring and rattling and casting a dim yellow light, has stayed with him ‘till this day.

As a result, he had almost balked upon hearing what Ryan intended to purchase – perhaps would have, if he had had any doubt Ryan truly only wanted to satisfy his curiosity, as he had promised Spencer, rather than use it to some darker end.

As such, he can understand the closed off expression on the two men’s faces, but his heart still falls when Mr. Finch shakes his head.

“I’m afraid we don’t carry that kind of thing,” he says. “You’ll have to go somewhere else.”

“Oh,” Spencer says, floundering. He glances down again at the slip of paper. “I hope I don’t have the wrong establishment,” he says, “but, uh, my good friend Mr. Ross requested I pick it up for him here. I was told the delivery would be ready today.”

He holds out the note first to one, then the other, and Mr. Fitz reaches for it reluctantly. His frown smoothes over a little as he reads it over, however, two fingers holding it steady in Spencer’s flustered grip. Then he fixes Spencer with a sharp look.

“You’re a student, then?” he asks. “At the university?”

“Ah, yes.” Spencer can’t help his confusion creeping into his tone. “Dracology.”

“Fascinating.” Mr. Finch gazes at him for a moment longer, his unfocused eye just as intent as the other, and Spencer tries not to shudder. It doesn’t prevent him from imagining that perhaps it’s reading his mind, somehow.

He startles badly when Finch suddenly springs into action, rounding the counter as he says, “Mr. Ross’ delivery did come in, as it were.”

“Oh, excellent,” Spencer says, breathing a sigh of relief.

Finch rushes off, to parts unknown and half-hidden in the darkness, and Spencer avoids Fitz’ without a doubt amused look by letting his eyes wander over the shelf displays in the shop. The tops are piled high with what looks mostly like junk – cogwheels, springs, half-assembled mechanical toys. Every bit of available surface is crammed with more of the same, screws and bolts and discarded keys, so tightly Spencer suspects removing a single piece would cause the entire construction to collapse. He wonders idly how Ryan found this place, but decides quickly that he doesn’t really want to know.

After some rummaging, Finch returns with a thin, flat package wrapped in newspaper, an innocuous item that Spencer pays handsomely for. He plans on making Ryan pay him back for every penny, though, so it’s alright. And he’s now allowed to head for the exit, which certainly makes the indignity worth it.

“Please come again,” Mr. Fitz calls after him, and even though Spencer’s first thought is, not in my life, he tips a finger to his forehead politely as he closes the door.

The street outside is, to some surprise, relatively unchanged. The world seems to have accepted his slip into semi-legal realms with relative ease. Relieved, Spencer slips the device into his inner coat pocket and takes a step forward, intending to hail the next taxi that might have ended up through some accident at this end of town, and it takes him a moment to recognize the figure on the other side of the street. Once he has, however, his feet start moving of their own accord, carrying him across the pavement with a speed that is not quite gentlemanly.

“Mr. Urie,” he says, the words coming out a little more sharply than he intended due to his surprise. “What brings you here?”

“Oh,” Brendon murmurs, after his initial start. He clutches the bags in his arms more tightly as a flush climbs upwards from his neck all the way to his ears. “Mr. Smith. I didn’t – I didn’t expect to see you here.”

Spencer gestures awkwardly at the wrapped parcel resting against his chest, where Brendon cannot see. “I came here for a specialty order,” he says. He can feel his own cheeks heating. “I certainly wouldn’t be in this neighborhood otherwise.” He laughs, but it feels uncomfortable and forced, and it makes Brendon frown and look away.

“Of course not,” he says, but there’s something bitter about his tone that isn’t usually there. “Nobody would, I think.”

There’s something in his voice that makes Spencer pause uncertainly before he asks, can’t help but ask, “Are you here to pick up something as well?”

There are bright spots of red gathering over Brendon’s cheekbones, and Spencer follows his jumpy gaze down to the load he’s carrying, a bag in each hand.

“Something like that,” Brendon says, tossing his head to move a few escaping strands of hair out of his forehead before he gives in and lifts both hand and bag to brush them behind his ear.

“I,” Spencer says, and when it all comes together in his mind, he feels like a terrible fool. There are stalks of green peeking out of Brendon’s bags, and a vegetable market on the next block, and Spencer feels heat rising in his cheeks all the while his stomach drops.

“God,” he says helplessly. “How terribly rude of me – forgive me.”

Brendon shakes his head determinedly, but he can’t hide the red in his cheeks – though he clearly tries – and that just makes Spencer feel even worse.

“It’s fine,” Brendon says firmly. “It’s not a problem, Mr. Smith, you didn’t know.”

“But I,” Spencer says, because he still feels like he should have, somehow. He should have been able to avoid making Brendon feel bad, because that’s the last thing he ever wants to do.

“It’s fine,” Brendon repeats, sharper this time. “There’s nothing to apologize for, Mr. Smith.”

The words are all the right ones, but Spencer still gets the sense that Brendon also thinks that he himself has nothing to apologize for – living on Cannery Road included. And he’s right, of course he’s right, because the place having a bad reputation doesn’t mean Brendon endorses any of the going-ons around here, much less is actually involved in them. It doesn’t, and Spencer would never think to imply anything of the sort.

“Yes, of course,” he says, and he still sounds frazzled, despite firmly wishing he could stay as cool and collected as the situation requires. Who’d ever heard of a gentleman so thrown by someone else living in a bad part of town? Even if that someone was a person he maybe, possibly, had more than a fleeting interest in.

Brendon looks away, biting his lip, and it’s the misery showing on his face, it must be, that makes Spencer blurt out, “Come have coffee with me.”

He realizes as soon as the words are out of his mouth that not only did he word his request incredibly rudely, no, it’s also hardly a good way to approach someone he’s just learned has no choice but to live on Cannery Road. No wonder Brendon’s unhappy expression quickly morphs into something like irritated disbelief.

He opens his mouth, perhaps to tell Spencer off, perhaps merely to gape, and Spencer quickly adds, “On me. As an apology for offending you.”

“You didn’t offend me,” Brendon says quietly.

Spencer shakes his head. “Still. I was incredibly inconsiderate, and I feel terrible. Please allow me to make it up to you.”

Brendon hesitates, still, so Spencer adds the most sincere “Please” he can muster, and he can see the exact moment Brendon caves.

“Alright, then,” he murmurs, reaching up to brush at his bangs again. He lifts his arms in a shrug to indicate his bags. “I’ll just need to take these home.”

“That’s fine,” Spencer assures him, too quickly, but he can’t help it. His heart started to beat painfully fast the moment Brendon agreed, and he thinks he’d be fine with anything if that ensured Brendon actually follow through on his promise.

Brendon doesn’t invite him upstairs. Propriety would never have allowed him to, so Spencer was not expecting him to, but with the way Brendon won’t meet his eyes as he bids him wait by the building’s door, he suspects embarrassment also plays a part in it.

And he understands, in a way. The neighborhood certainly hasn’t improved any on their way deeper into the maze of houses. The building he stands, awkwardly, before, is run-down and shabby, bricks stained with dirt and exhaust fumes, and when he tilts his head back he thinks he can see some missing shingles. It’s rickety and old and, from what glimpses he could catch over Brendon’s shoulder, the interior doesn’t look much better. It certainly doesn’t compare to Spencer’s boarding house.

But then, knowing what he knows now about Brendon’s situation, he doesn’t feel any of the disdain or pity he expected he would. Instead, he finds himself bizarrely impressed with the way Brendon has managed to take care of himself so far. He has work and a place to live and, obviously, enough pride to strive for something better, when he could just as well be in a poor house or a labor mill or even, God forbid, succumbing to the lure of the brown powder in one of the drug dens Spencer sometimes hears about.

But no, Brendon wouldn’t do that. Brendon’s one of the most orderly, determined, and earnest people Spencer knows, and he wouldn’t do any of that. Spencer doesn’t think he could become so attached to someone who played fast and loose with the law. No, he likes people in his life who understand that rules are in place for a reason. Even Ryan’s moral grey area of loose women and gamblers and cheats that he likes to surround himself with makes Spencer a little uncomfortable. He doesn’t like it when people are too – common, and while he’s been teased for it often, and not always in a friendly manner, he can’t help it. People like that bother him. But Brendon – Brendon’s something else.

So distracted, Spencer jerks out of his contemplation when Brendon yanks open the door behind him, free of his shopping and clearly frazzled. He steps through and jumps when the door smashes shut once again; blinks, and pulls his coat straight in an obvious effort to steady himself. Only then does he look up to meet Spencer’s eyes.

“Shall we?” he asks, with a shaky smile, and Spencer returns the most reassuring one he can muster as he says, “We shall.”

Spencer, once they approach the city center, is a little unsure if the imposing university buildings and the streets bustling with young, fresh-faced academics won’t make Brendon feel inferior after their brief miscommunication earlier. Bizarrely, however, Brendon seems to relax more and more the farther they leave Cannery Road behind. Slowly, he regains his usual cheerful disposition; he happily points out particularly garish fashion choices or salespeople disdainfully meeting his eyes through the windows of the shops they pass. It’s not long before Spencer has to bite his lip to keep from laughing out loud, and in the end, only ordering Brendon to cease his little comments manages to save him.

He’s quite thankful when he spots their intended destination, a café he used to frequent and still visits from time to time, occupying an entire street corner. Spencer moves first through the sea of tables lining the sidewalk, but only to hold the glass door open for Brendon, who smiles a little but doesn’t comment.

It’s fascinating how much more at ease he is now. He’s still wearing the same clothes, still looks the same, and yet his unfamiliar surroundings don’t seem to bother him very much. In fact, Brendon seems quite content to let Spencer steer him towards a table by the window, allowing a good view of the streets and the students strolling by, and guide him into a seat.

Spencer sheds his coat before taking the chair across from him, but Brendon hardly seems to notice, busy as he is taking in their surroundings. The coffee shop is large, to accommodate the many university students who stop by during the day, but has managed to retain its homely feel. Small tables and chairs fill the entire floor, and the corners house the sofas that everyone is always desperate to snatch up. Spencer has spent more time in this café than he cares to count, with study groups and fellow students and boys he thought might catch his fancy. He likes it because it is only a few short minutes away from campus – the university chapel’s steeple can be seen rising above the rooftops with ease – and it is clean and friendly, yet professional.

He’s never been like Ryan, in that regard, with his love for dingy coffee shops and bars where half the thrill seems to be reaffirming that one’s wallet is actually still there. He’d gone to a couple of those, too, before his coursework became too demanding to allow for such fanciful distractions, but he never quite developed a taste for it the way Ryan so clearly had.

He prefers places like this, less adventurous but infinitely more trustworthy. He knows this place. It has good service, and the staff remembers him. No one will ever try to slide a knife between his ribs here.

There is a small list of specials lying out on the table, and Brendon idly toys with a corner before he says, “I’m sure you’ll be able to recommend something worth having.”

He doesn’t look at Spencer while he’s speaking, but he doesn’t seem upset, so Spencer nods despite the lack of eye contact and glances over towards the bar.

A moment later, a waiter in a crisp black and white uniform heads for their table, comes to a halt between them and crosses his hands behind his back.

“Gentlemen,” Jon says, nodding at them both. “Mr. Smith. What will it be today?”

At Brendon’s nod, Spencer orders tea for them both, foregoing the platter of scones. He suspects Brendon would love them, but also feel self-conscious about the amount of money Spencer is spending, and Spencer wants Brendon to be as comfortable as possible.

“It’ll only be a moment,” Jon assures them, with a warm smile in Spencer’s direction. After a moment, he turns it on Brendon, as well. “Please don’t hesitate to let me know if there is anything else you need.”

“Thank you, Mr. Walker,” Spencer says. He’s too captivated by Brendon to watch Jon go, the way his companion is picking at the neatly stitched napkins laying on the table with a fingernail. Fidgeting is a habit Spencer himself had had trained out of him at a very young age, and it’s really quite fascinating to witness in someone else.

“You must come here a lot,” Brendon says suddenly, and Spencer starts.

“Fairly, yes,” he admits. “Not as much as I used to.”

Brendon leans his head to one side. “How come?” he asks.

Spencer shrugs. He’s tempted to fiddle with a napkin himself; after a moment’s hesitation, he lays his hands in his lap instead. “No real reason,” he says. “When I was younger, this was where my acquaintances came between their lectures, to philosophize and gossip. Now I have fewer classes and a lot more work to do.” He gives Brendon a small smile. “It seems less important to while away my time in a coffee shop now, that’s all.”

“That seems reasonable,” Brendon says, smiling as well. It fades after a moment, and he says, quietly, “I don’t go to coffee shops very much.”

He meets Spencer’s eyes only for a moment before he looks away. He brushes his finger against the single flower resting between them in a tasteful vase before glancing down at Spencer’s motionless hands and drawing away as if ashamed.

Spencer clears his throat. He feels terrible, suddenly, for being able to afford an afternoon tea for two so easily – if he truly wanted to, he could take Brendon out for tea every day and still get by. And it’s good tea, sure, he likes it a lot, but considering how much more cheaply he could have the same at home, it certainly is a frivolity. And Brendon has to work, doesn’t he, to afford the most basic of groceries. He doesn’t have the time to sit around in coffee shops all day.

He feels even worse when Brendon begins to leaf through the sandwich section of the menu and his eyes grow wide. Spencer desperately wants to tell him that he’s not missing much, but that would just add insult to injury, wouldn’t it? Because Brendon wouldn’t ever know, and he wouldn’t ever be sure that Spencer wasn’t simply lying to make him feel better.

Brendon glances up, smile and embarrassment spreading over his face equally, and Spencer realizes with a start that he’s staring.

“Sorry,” he says quickly. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s alright,” Brendon assures him. He’s still red. “I didn’t realize I was that interesting, that’s all.”

You are, Spencer wants to tell him. He’s never met anyone who intrigued him as much as Brendon does, who makes his chest so full of something he can’t quite name. At the university, he has the world’s future elite at his fingertips, and yet he’s choosing to spend his time with a boarding house aide. That alone makes it so obvious that he doesn’t know how Brendon could have missed it.

He doesn’t know how to say any of that, however, without being horribly forward, so he lowers his eyes and clears his throat again.

“I don’t mind,” Brendon says, so quietly Spencer isn’t even sure he didn’t imagine it. Only the smile lurking at the corners of his mouth convinces him it’s not just something his mind wanted to hear.

Brendon leans back suddenly, and when Spencer glances up, startled, it’s to find Jon there with a tray and two sets of tea. The sight turns something in his stomach, and he’s almost tempted to send Jon back and go home, but then he catches Brendon’s brief smile and reminds himself that no, he can’t. This is his apology to Brendon, and Spencer refuses to ruin it with his own feelings of inadequacy.

It doesn’t take Jon long to set everything down, cups and saucers and pots and a small bowl of rock sugar and a little plate with lemon slices. He takes a second or two to nudge everything into position to his satisfaction, and then departs with a cheerful, “Enjoy.”

There’s not much to enjoy yet, of course, as the tea has to steep for a little while longer, but Brendon reaches in and opens his pot regardless. He moves his nose into the steam rising upwards and sighs a deep, heartfelt sigh.

“Delicious,” he says, before he opens his eyes and grins at Spencer. “This was a fantastic idea, Mr. Smith, I have to admit.”

“All my ideas are fantastic,” Spencer says. He can’t stop himself. There’s just something about Brendon that always makes him say the most inappropriate things.

“If you keep making decisions such as these, I might have to agree,” Brendon assures him happily. He turns over his teacup eagerly and reaches for the pot's handle, even though it cannot possibly be ready yet, pulling his hand back a moment later when the steam rising from the spout scalds his hand.

“Let me,” Spencer begins, but Brendon rallies quickly, shaking one hand to numb the pain as he reaches around for the handle with the other.

“I’m fine,” he assures Spencer. He gives him a brief smile. “Now that you’ve convinced me to come here, though, you could tell me a little more about yourself. I want to hear stories, Mr. Smith. I expect to be entertained.”

There’s an impish smile on his face, and he stirs his tea looking well pleased with himself, but Spencer finds he doesn’t really mind. There are few things he’d like to do more than to spend time with Brendon, and if Brendon is going to express an interest in finding out more about Spencer in return – well, Spencer is hardly going to complain.

“There’s not much to tell,” he replies regardless, because that’s what’s expected of him. He pours himself a cup of tea as well, the liquid still watery and weak - it's a waste of perfectly good tea, but everything in his being rebels against letting Brendon drink by himself. “I grew up in Linnford with my parents and two sisters, and lived there until I went to university.”

“Ooh, a Linnford boy,” Brendon teases. He doesn’t sound like he means anything by it, but it still makes Spencer a little uncomfortable, so he hurriedly goes on.

“I started learning about dragons in secondary school and decided that was what I wanted to study at university, I was accepted, the end.” He takes a big gulp of too-hot tea that burns his throat and the roof of his mouth, and has to dig around for his handkerchief to cough into to ease the pressure.

Brendon waits before he’s gathered himself before he says, quietly, “That must be so wonderful. To be able to study whatever you want, with everyone’s support.”

“I work very hard,” Spencer says quietly. He doesn’t want to sound like he’s tooting his own horn, but he does, and it’s perhaps a little of a sore point that some of his peers seem to think he’s just come about his good grades and recommendations by accident.

Brendon just nods, though, like he understands, and leans forward to rest his chin in his hands. “Will you tell me about the dragons?” he asks. “You work with dragons, don’t you?”

“I do.” There’s a grin spreading over Spencer’s face, he can’t help it. The dragons always bring out his inner chatterbox. But there’s just so much to talk about, even if no one else he knows can still stand to listen to him going on.

Brendon nods at him to continue, though, so he says, “They’re absolutely wonderful. People tend to either think they’re lapdogs to be coddled and petted, or else that they’re vicious and hostile and should be kept far away from any human being.” He leans closer to Brendon in his excitement, knowing his eyes are probably shining, and says earnestly, “But really, what most people don’t want to understand or even know, is that they’re neither of these things. Yes, they’re dangerous, of course they are. They’re like big cats, or – or wolves, you know? You can raise them to interact with human beings, to respond to being touched and petted and tested on, but that’s not their natural state. They’re predators. They hunt and they kill and they live in terrible, rough, deadly conditions, and no one should ever underestimate them, but that doesn’t make them bad.”

Brendon nods at that, and smiles, and Spencer realizes abruptly that they’re practically nose to nose by now. He clears his throat and hastily withdraws to his own side of the table, adding a quiet, “I’ve wanted to further our understanding of dragons for a very long time, and the work may be tough, but I’m still extremely privileged to be allowed to do what I do. I know that very well.”

“I’d love to see a dragon some day,” Brendon confides quietly. “I’ve seen drawings and read books, of course, but that never quite lives up.” He gives Spencer a determined smile. “Sometimes I envy you very much, Mr. Smith.”

With that, the topic seems to have been dealt with for him. He drinks his tea and looks out the window, smiling at something Spencer doesn’t pay any attention to. Instead, he contemplates Brendon’s face, the way they’ve been acquainted for so long and yet he still can’t ever tell when Brendon is genuinely upset, and has a terrible, terrible idea.

“Would you like to see one?”

Brendon’s gaze snaps back to him, mid-sip, and his eyebrows rise sharply. “Pardon?”

“A dragon,” Spencer repeats slowly. “If I offered to take you to one, would you want to?”

Brendon makes a little noise, half cough and half squeak. “You mean – now?”

“Right this very second,” Spencer assures him. He hesitates. “After we’ve paid.”

“Oh.” Brendon’s eyes are wide and dark. He blinks, but Spencer doesn’t take it back, and Brendon’s shocked expression doesn’t fade.

“I, uh. Mr. Smith, I don’t really know what to say.” There’s a small smile forming at the corners of his mouth, however, and Spencer feels some of the tension draining from his shoulders.

“Well, you could say ‘yes’ or ‘no.’ Or possibly ‘later,’ that works as well.”

Brendon frowns, despite his ever-growing smile, and sternly shakes his head. “Mr. Smith, you are quite impossible, I hope you know.”

“It’s something I strive for every day,” Spencer assures him. “If you don’t decide soon, I’m going to make the choice for you. Just so you’re aware.”

Brendon laughs, disbelieving and too loud in the quiet café, before he catches Spencer’s eye and shakes his head. There are so many emotions flittering over his expressive face that Spencer has no chance of reading them all.

“You’re serious,” he says, and it isn’t a question, exactly, but it certainly isn’t a statement.

“I am,” Spencer says. “I can bring you into the laboratory without a problem,” he adds, when Brendon frowns. “All you need to do is sign the visitor's list. That’s all, I promise you.”

“But I – I’m not a student, I’m not-.” Brendon breaks off, glancing out the window with his hands wringing together in his lap, and he looks so uncertain that Spencer almost regrets asking him.

“That doesn’t matter,” he says, though, because taking it back is not an option, not when he’d seen that brief shimmer of hope flickering in Brendon’s eyes. “As long as I’m with you, nobody will toss you out, I promise.”

“All these promises,” Brendon whispers, more to himself than Spencer, and Spencer can hear the ‘yes’ underneath the doubt. Still, he doesn’t say anything else until Brendon suddenly, having come to some conclusion, sits up straight, lowers his shoulders, and says, with a teasing lilt, “I expect to be impressed, Mr. Smith.”

Brendon’s bravado vanishes the moment Spencer pulls open the building’s main doors and bows him into the ornate hallway.

“Are you quite sure it’s alright for me to be here?” he whisper-hisses at him, following so close on Spencer’s heels that he’s in danger of stepping on them. “You’re not going to get into trouble, are you?”

“We’ll be fine,” Spencer assures him, working hard to hide his amusement. He can see why Brendon, with where he lives and where he works, would be intimidated by the busts on the walls and the machinery glowing at the door to each laboratory, but he can’t help but feel mainly fond amusement at Brendon’s expense.

He certainly doesn’t look any more assured when Spencer guides him into the nearest elevator and pushes shut the safety door. He definitely jumps when the lift whirrs into motion, heading down with a stomach-dropping jolt. He tries to hide it a moment later, but Spencer, who’s had over three years now to get used to the sensation and still isn’t entirely at ease with it, certainly isn’t in any situation to judge him.

Instead, he says, “Did I ever tell you about the time my friend Ross and a lady acquaintance of his found themselves stuck in a library elevator after hours?” and that, at least, is enough to distract Brendon for the rest of the journey and their walk down the hall all the way to Spencer’s lab.

Brendon laughs appreciatively at the unfortunate pair being rescued, and then catches sight of the doorknobs shaped like dragon heads and trails off, eyes wide.

Spencer can’t deny the warmth he feels at Brendon’s obvious awe. After signing them in on the sheet next to the door, he turns to give his companion a significant look. “This is it,” he announces, not without some pride, pulling open the door to reveal the gleaming laboratory inside.

It feels a little bit like coming home every time he steps over the threshold, he can’t lie about that. The machinery, the scratching and cooing from the cages in the next room over, the hiss and whirr of analyses being run and studies being completed. It’s comfortable, to him. There’s little in this room he doesn’t understand, just as there’s little about dragons he doesn’t understand, and he doesn’t think there’s anything that could ever truly make him uncomfortable, here.

There are only a few other people in the room, nothing that might intimidate Brendon or cause him to feel like he might be in the way. And yet, when Spencer looks back, Brendon hovers by the door, not quite daring to step over the threshold. He has his hand wrapped around the frame like he needs the support, and his eyes keep on darting over to Miss Salpeter and Mr. Lippert, who, so far, have glanced his way but not paid him any further attention.

Spencer can afford to be patient. He’s had to learn how to be, in his line of study, and he can honestly say he feels no annoyance as he catches Brendon’s eye and beckons him into the room. Instead, Brendon’s wide-eyed wonder is something he finds rather endearing, the way he stares at the microscopes and the ledgers and the vials. If he is this entranced by a few glass vessels, Spencer can only imagine what he might look like when faced with an actual dragon.

Brendon is slow to step into the room, but picks up speed when passing the expensive equipment. He all but rushes into Spencer’s space, breathing shallow, and Spencer has to stop himself from reaching out a calming hand. They’re not close enough for Spencer to touch him so casually, and who knows – maybe they won’t ever be.

“It’s this way,” Spencer tells him quietly, nodding his head at a darkened passageway.

When Brendon shuffles through with an uncertain glance back at him, Spencer reaches in to ignite the lighting. Lamps flicker to life along the floor, dim enough not to startle the dragons resting in the semi-darkness while still allowing researchers and visitors to walk across the room without breaking their necks.

Brendon hesitates only for a moment before a shimmer of scales in one of the cages catches his attention, and then all his uncertainty appears forgotten.

A contended smile pulls at the corners of Spencer’s mouth. He hangs back while Brendon, open-mouthed, wanders down the aisle, pausing here and there to gape and gawk, but never touch. Every once in a while he’ll look back at Spencer to point at a cage or a spidery wing in disbelief, and Spencer can feel his expression grow more and more indulgent with every passing moment.

It’s not until he’s already over halfway through, Spencer following idly behind, that Brendon finally pauses in earnest, peering at a young Bluefinn curled up but fidgeting in the litter in her cage. Brendon doesn’t say anything, but Spencer can see his sharp intake of breath as he leans in closer, the shine in his eyes that can’t be contained. Spencer feels a warm rush of affection so strong he has to look away for a moment, and when he’s gathered his wits about him and turned back to the cage, Clara has apparently decided she likes Brendon just as well. She’s nosing upwards, cautiously sniffing the air between herself and her visitor, dark eyes trained on Brendon’s carefully shaved jaw.

“Oh, she’s…” Brendon whispers. “She’s gorgeous.”

Spencer takes a step closer. “Would you like to say hello?”

He reaches out before Brendon has the chance to offer his opinion, inching into Brendon’s space so Brendon has plenty of time to move out of his way.

Brendon sucks in a sharp breath when Spencer unhooks the latch on the door and reaches inside. It makes Spencer smile, remembering when this was still new and breathtaking – the thought of touching a dragon, actually touching one, reaching in to run his hands over their scales and feel their hot breath ghosting over his fingers.

Clara knows him by now and no longer shies away from his seeking hands, merely wriggling away the discomfort when he lifts her into the air. Spencer eases her through the opening and readjusts her as quickly as he can, making sure the delicate folds of skin on her underbelly are protected before he offers her to Brendon.

Eyes shining, Brendon holds out his hands, and Spencer breathes in through his nose and hands her over.

“Oh, hello,” Brendon says, oophing softly when the young female is unexpectedly heavy.

Spencer spends nearly every day with this specimen, and he’s still surprised every time he goes to pick her up and it’s like trying to lift a block of lead.

Brendon doesn’t seem to mind, though. He shifts Clara on his arm, moving so he’s cradling her like one would a toddler, and grins down at her. “Hello, beautiful.”

She growls, half-heartedly, and then wastes no time nosing her horn upwards for scratches. Spencer automatically steps forward to explain, to demonstrate, but Brendon is more than fine on his own – he rubs at her nose with the pad of his forefinger, and then, when she wriggles in delight, sets the rest of his hand to work as well. He grins briefly at Spencer when the bluefinn all but melts in delight, and then has eyes for nothing but the dragon in his arms.

Clara clearly relishes in the attention, squirming in pleasure whenever Brendon’s rough fingers find a particularly sensitive spot, and Brendon looks like he wouldn’t mind doing nothing but scratch at her neck for hours. Spencer is extremely reluctant to separate them, but eventually he has to, because if Brendon winds her up too much now, she won’t get to sleep ‘till late, and Spencer knows for a fact that Jennifer Myde needs her alert and sharp for a reaction test in the morning.

So it’s with a deep sigh and a deeper note of regret to his voice that Spencer finally says, “I should really put her back.”

Brendon bites his lip but doesn’t protest, which Spencer wasn’t expecting him to. Instead, he hands over the dragon as carefully as a novice can, catching the underside of her belly with his nails, but while she twitches at the uncomfortable sensation, she doesn’t turn her head to snap at his fingers. The love between them, Spencer decides, must be mutual; that very dragon had once left a neat imprint of her jaw in the flesh of his palm, and clearly not regretted it, either.

Glancing at Brendon and the delight and sadness warring for dominance on his features, however, Spencer can’t really blame her. Lord knows he’s more than charmed by his companion – he certainly can’t find fault in someone else for feeling the same way.

Still, he doesn’t want to be entirely replaced in her affections, so he takes especial care lifting her into her cage, and scratches at the rough scales at her neck for a moment before pulling back and shutting the door. It’s true he stretches out the moment a little to avoid looking at the crestfallen look on Brendon’s face, but who could blame him? With those wide eyes, Spencer has no idea how anyone has ever denied Brendon anything.

“There’s something else you should see, if you’d like,” he tells Brendon, once the door to Clara’s cage is properly latched once again.

Brendon reaches in to scratch her through the bars only once more before he gives Spencer an absent smile and says, “That would be lovely.”

Spencer smiles back easily, stepping back and indicating another, even darker passageway with a nod of his head. “It’s this way,” he says, and Brendon nods slowly and follows, intrigued.

There aren’t any lights to guide the way in the second dragon room, only red heat lamps spread all over the room. Even Spencer, who knows what to expect, still smiles a little when his eyes adjust to the gloom, recognizing the artificial nest filled with eggs arranged at the center of the room. He feels more than hears Brendon gasp at his elbow, and allows himself to smile at the way he goes stock-still.

It’s always nice to meet someone who can appreciate such a wonderful sight as well as Spencer can.

“Careful,” he warns, though he probably doesn’t have to, and gently ushers Brendon closer.

Brendon goes slowly, hesitantly, keeping his hands far away from the eggs as he leans forward. There’s not much to see in the semi-darkness, nothing but speckled shapes in the red glow of the lamps, but Brendon’s mouth still hangs open as he looks.

Spencer, while Brendon is occupied, checks the readers set into the wall for temperature and humidity, satisfied to find that all is well. If the eggs were to be damaged, it would be a major disaster not only for the laboratory but for the entire university, as well.

Everything is as it should be, however, and Spencer occupies himself with the observation log until Brendon appears at his elbow, body angled towards Spencer but head still turned towards the nest.

“This is fantastic,” he whispers, hushed.

Spencer nods, waiting him out, and sure enough, it doesn’t take long for Brendon to continue.

“The, the eggs,” he says. “What’s going to happen to them after they hatch?”

“We’ll raise them, the hatchlings. They’ll be fed on raw eggs. Maybe fish. As long as they’re kept warm, they’ll be snug as a bug.”

“Right, right,” Brendon says, a little distracted by who knows what. “But, um. Don’t they-? Don’t they need their mother?”

“They’ll be fine,” Spencer says. “They’re warm enough, and once they’re hatched they’ll have plenty of food and water. You don’t have to be worried about them, I promise.”

Brendon doesn’t look entirely convinced, biting his lip as he looks back, and Spencer feels a sharp stab of annoyance. He’s been working closely with dragons for three years, now, and his supervisors for far longer than that; they should know, shouldn’t they?

But then Brendon shakes his head and smiles. “You’re right – how silly of me. I’m sure they’re in the best possible hands.” He pushes his own into the pockets of his waistcoat and rocking on the balls of his feet. “It must be amazing, to be here every day, to see them hatch and grow.”

And die, Spencer almost adds. But he doesn’t, very often, and Brendon is right: It is amazing, that moment of cradling a clumsy, exhausted hatchling in his open palms, to see a dragon mature enough to lay eggs of her own, the first time one of them waddles over and voluntarily lays its head on Spencer’s knee.

“I’m very privileged to work here,” he says instead. It comes out a little stiffly, but he doesn’t know how to express it any better than that. He’s not like Brendon, so willing to share his emotions with the world.

Brendon nods and bites his lip, looking away. Spencer can’t help but worry if perhaps he’s offended him in some unknown way, but then Brendon meets his eyes again, and all Spencer can detect in his face is elation. “And I’m very privileged to be your friend, Mr. Smith,” he says. “Words cannot adequately convey how much I’ve enjoyed this.”

He smiles again, ducking his head as though he’s embarrassed, even though Spencer firmly shakes his head. It wasn’t any kind of hardship to do this for Brendon, and if he’d ever doubted that this was the right decision, the shine in Brendon’s eyes would have convinced him otherwise.

Although both of them clearly don’t want to, Spencer finally has to concede that the time has come to go. It’s late, certainly late enough that Brendon needs to rush back to the boarding house to help with dinner preparations if he doesn’t want to be late. So when Spencer, regretfully, makes noises about heading homewards, Brendon nods solemnly, but doesn’t stop smiling.

It turns a little sad when he reaches through the bars of the nearest cage to scratch Lola’s willing head, but when she purrs and tosses her horns, he laughs, and by the time he turns to face Spencer with his shoulders drawn back, there’s nothing left on his face but relaxed delight.

“Lead the way then, Mr. Smith,” he says.

Spencer gives him a serious nod in return before he ushers him to the door. When he reaches for the handle, however, he almost collides with someone heading inside. It’s Christopher Eastly, another of his colleagues in the year above him, wearing a face to rival the storm from a couple of days ago. He apologizes profusely but Spencer can tell he’s still preoccupied with whatever has him in such a state.

When he raises questioning eyebrows, however, Christopher only shakes his head. He nods his head at Brendon, perhaps telling Spencer that this is a conversation not to be had in front of strangers, or perhaps that Spencer ought to focus on his visitor instead. Spencer can’t quite tell, but the two of them are hardly close. Sometimes they exchange their worries about lectures and exams and studies, but if Christopher would rather not speak about it, Spencer certainly won’t be the one to force him to.

So he nods and ushers Brendon out the door with a hand hovering just over his elbow, and Brendon appears to forget about the incident almost immediately, reminiscing instead about his encounter with the dragons – almost as if it had been more than just minutes ago, and as if Spencer himself hadn’t been there to witness it.

Spencer doesn’t mind, though. He’s starting to suspect he won’t ever mind Brendon speaking about something with so much enthusiasm in his voice and movements.

Brendon chatters on about Clara and the eggs and the machinery in the laboratory all along the corridor and during their brief elevator ride and then the entire walk to the exit, and doesn’t stop until Spencer’s pulled open the door and gestured him back out into real life.

It feels quite warm outside after the coolness of the cellars, and they both blink in the bright sunlight waiting for them on the university square. It’s the middle of the afternoon, so there are students rushing in every direction, heading to class or to a different class or home or to some other, more exciting afternoon pursuit. Most of them are in a hurry, too, so Spencer gently herds Brendon out of the main trajectory and over into a linden tree’s shade, where they can readjust to the hustle and bustle of the real world without getting into anyone’s way.

Brendon seems to be caught in his own head, still, so Spencer lets him be for a while, turning to watch his classmates instead. He recognizes a few faces, even, but no one he knows well enough to call them over, and he wouldn’t want to make Brendon uncomfortable in any case.

Instead, he observes the pigeons on the square for a while, and the chattering first-years who have yet to learn that feeding them is a surefire way to unleash hell, and idly contemplates heading over and telling them, in graphic detail, what the dragons the university is so famous for would do to the birds if the two were ever to meet in the wild. It’s a particularly satisfying fantasy, and so he startles a little when Brendon clears his throat next to his ear.

“Thank you,” he says, nudging Spencer’s shoulder lightly with his own. “This was wonderful.”

“It was my pleasure,” Spencer says honestly. And it was – he can’t think of any better way he could have spent the afternoon.

Miss Asher is the only one there when Spencer arrives in the laboratory the next morning, wearing a dark purple dress that matches perfectly the scales of Cornelius curled up on the table before her. Spencer is secretly quite in awe of her and her no-nonsense attitude, and the fearsome first impression she tends to make.

She’s not the most talkative person, usually, too focused on her work to care much about her coworkers, but this morning she smiles when he walks in the door, and Spencer finds himself initiating a casual conversation. They exchange idle chitchat over airship pirates for a while, about the rogue Captain Weekes and whether he is a handsome devil or ought to be hanged immediately, and Spencer spends some time privately marveling at her particularly ambitious corset and how lucky he is to not be interested in women that way, or he might find himself painfully tongue-tied. His thoughts stray to Brendon before long, and how he might react if he were to see Spencer speak with Miss Asher in this very moment, and while Spencer doesn’t want to make Brendon unhappy or cause a scene, he does find some pleasure in the thought that perhaps Brendon might be a little jealous.

“Mr. Smith,” Miss Asher says a moment later, a little too loud and too intrigued, and Spencer realizes with a start that he’s smiling.

“I’ve never seen you smile like that, my good sir,” she accuses him. Her eyes are sparkling. “Is there anything you might like to share with us?”

“There’s nothing to tell,” Spencer assures her quickly, but then he smiles again, ruining whatever sway his words might have had. He ducks his head under her knowing expression. “But perhaps in the future, I hope.”

She shakes her head at that, but lets the matter drop, turning back to her research instead. “Could you pass me the pipette then, Mr. Smith?” she says, and Spencer obliges her before making his way to his own workstation.

For the additional workshop he’s taking along with her lecture, Professor Larkin assigned him and his nine fellow students an independent study looking into the age of dragons, so he’s got an entire box full of teeth to determine the maturity of. It’s not the most fascinating of exercises, but it’s not hard enough to be tedious, and it doesn’t take him long to sort through.

Part B of his work sheet requires him to confirm the age of a living dragon, any one of his choosing. It’s not that Spencer doesn’t already know the age of every single dragon housed in the laboratory, but it’s good practice, and Spencer won’t ever get tired of handling the animals they have on hand.

He circles around Miss Asher on his way over to the holding room. She’s entirely preoccupied with peering into her microscope, so he doesn’t bother her. Instead, he heads for the first cage on the right, cooing a hello at the Southern Neckridge inside before he unlatches the door.

Marco is one of the dragons Spencer works with the most, even if he’s not one of his favorites; he’s reliable and relaxed, and so used to being handled by inexperienced, nervous newcomers that he always reacts to Spencer’s deft touch with absolute bliss.

Not this time, though. This time, Spencer can barely jerk his hand back in time to avoid Marco’s vicious teeth, and his yelp of surprise and, indeed, hurt, is loud enough to draw Miss Asher’s attention.

“What is it?” she asks, already on her way over with her skirts swishing behind her.

“He tried to bite me,” Spencer says indignantly, feeling oddly vindicated when this makes her frown.

“Marco?” she asks incredulously. She peers into the cage, frowning, and withdraws quickly when Marco shows his teeth and growls. “What on Earth?” she asks Spencer.

Spencer, wondering much the same, turns slightly away from the cage. “Is there a chance he could be ill?” he asks her quietly. There’s a steep frown forming between his brows that will probably give him a headache, but he can’t help it. Spencer has never, not even in anecdotes, known Marco to snap.

Miss Asher shakes her head, frowning as well, but it’s a thoughtful frown rather than a confused one. “No one’s said anything, but then no one’s had him since the day before yesterday, as far as I know.” She taps her finger against her chin a few times before crooking it at Spencer expectantly. “Come with me.”

Growing steadily less and less pleased, Spencer follows her into the holding room, where she leads him past a row of brass cages to point at a particular one. Spencer steps closer, just barely close enough to recognize its occupant as Rover, the green-golden Chameleon Snapper that rarely gets taken out because he’s a notorious jumper. Or rather, he recognizes his tail, because that’s all he can see of the usually so lively animal, and he turns to Miss Asher in surprise.

“He’s had an upset stomach for a while now,” she says quietly. “Hardly anything we feed him will stay down.”

Spencer frowns. Rover is as far back as his cage will allow, half-hidden behind a make-shift shelter, and still, Spencer can see the greyish pallor to his scales. He doesn’t twitch even when Miss Asher offers him a treat of dried meat, doesn’t even so much as flare his nostrils in their direction. Spencer doesn’t think he’s ever felt such a pit in his stomach.

“What is going on?” he asks Miss Asher, and it really doesn’t make him feel any better when she looks just as lost as he feels.

By the time he’s returned to the boarding house, having discovered and reported another two unwell dragons hidden away in their shelters, Spencer can feel an exhausted headache building at his temples. He certainly doesn’t feel like having any of the shepherd’s pie Mrs. Witthorn has made, but he knows himself well enough to know what if he doesn’t eat now, he’ll regret it in the morning. No one can force him to participate in the chatter going round the table, though, and despite the concerned looks he garners, no one tries to speak to him.

Spencer doesn’t mind. He occupies himself with determinedly chewing his food and covertly watching Brendon, instead. It’s a little strange, to see Brendon working at the boarding house now that they’ve spent an entirely pleasant afternoon together – now that Spencer knows what poor accommodations Brendon is staying in, and how much he struggles to make do. He tries not to treat him any differently, but he keeps catching himself staring at Brendon as he works, as he cuts fruits for dessert and doles out pudding and pours coffee.

And Brendon doesn’t say a word, but he must notice, too – the back of his neck is bright red, and he refuses to look in Spencer’s direction, not even wishing him a good night when Spencer finally excuses himself to his room.

The laboratory is quiet when Spencer gets in, the corridors calm and deserted. He knows many of his fellow university students indulge in a life of excesses, of drinks and late nights and wild flirtations with their peers, but Spencer prefers this: The silence of the early mornings when the only thing he can hear is the echo of his own footsteps, the rustle of his clothes as he walks. Spencer does his best work before most of his peers even climb out of bed.

He doesn’t know what it is, really, but there’s something soothing about the laboratory in the mornings, before most other students get in. Today, the only occupant is Christopher, and Spencer gives him a brief nod on his way over to the hold, but they don’t speak. Spencer is fine with that. When they’re in the laboratory, they generally have more important things to do than to chitchat and gossip.

He can’t see what Christopher is doing, juggling powders and liquids, and he doesn’t rightly care – he has his own experiments to contend with. His next lecture is on the relevance of a dragon’s tail to its balance during flight, and he hopes to come to some early conclusions by watching Clara fly around the aviary before the class actually takes place.

His plan is instantly derailed, however, as soon as he actually opens the door to her cage. He pulls up a stool when he sees that she’s still asleep, or at the very least dozing, prepared to coax her into waking. From what he can see, she’s got food and water enough, and she’s usually ready for breakfast at this point, but maybe she just had a bad night. It happens.

“Hey, girl,” Spencer says fondly, sparing a quick thought for Brendon as he reaches in.

Clara growls unhappily when Spencer rubs her stomach, and when he adds his other hand to her cage to offer her her favorite treat, she turns her head away. Spencer feels an unhappy frown twisting his features. Clara isn’t the most lively of the dragons in the observatory, but she’s certainly the most sweet-tempered, and Spencer has never seen her turn down a slice of dried meat a day in her life.

“What’s wrong, girl?” he asks quietly, soothingly, but he withdraws his hands despite his worry and she seems happier for it, curling into a tight ball in the soft bedding.

Brows pinched in a tight frown, Spencer sits back on his stool. Clara ignores him, folding her wings close to her body and twitching her tail to lie over her nose. She looks absolutely miserable. It’s enough for an unhappy knot to form in Spencer’s stomach. It’s just not fair – he’s studied dragon physiology for years, but much of how to treat dragon illnesses is still a mystery. Spencer can’t properly diagnose her from her symptoms alone, and he certainly doesn’t want to admit it to himself, but there is absolutely nothing he can do for her in this situation.

Brendon is laying out breakfast when Spencer finally stumbles in the door, having spent all night in the laboratory going over facts and theories over and over and over again. There are platters of meats and cheeses and thick slices of bread. It looks delicious, but Spencer is too tired to feel any hunger – he’d much rather drop his head onto his pillow and not move again until the following morning.

In any case, Brendon abandons the food upon Spencer’s entrance, coming around the table to fix him with a concerned look. He’s taken off his jacket and rolled his sleeves up to his elbows, white fabric stark against the dark brown of his waistcoat, and Spencer doesn’t think he’s ever seen him so informal, but he’s too exhausted to be properly scandalized.

“Are you alright?” Brendon asks urgently.

Spencer manages a nod, and then yawns, his body finally getting the better of him. “I think I’ll just go to – bed,” he manages, and leaves Brendon standing there alone, too tired even to feel bad about it.

Spencer wakes up with the sun high in the sky, disoriented and dizzy. There’s a nauseous pit in his stomach that could stem from a lack of sustenance or a lack of solutions, and he ends up pulling his knees up to his chest and resting his forehead against them while he waits for it to go down. He’s missed one of his classes, he finds when he drags his pocket watch from the nightstand and flips it open, but he’s too fuzzy to really care. He’ll make up for it somehow. He’s the best in the class and his professor thinks highly of him; it’s not the way to make a good impression, he knows, but there’s nothing to be done about it now.

He doesn’t realize he’s dozed off again until a low rumble of voices outside his door has him jerking upwards, some time in the afternoon. Gabe, he thinks, and possibly William, and tenses in unhappy anticipation of a knock on his door, but after a while the voices fade and quiet settles over the house once again. He’d be quite content to sit here until the sun set and he’d be able to return to sleep, but eventually his stomach informs him that at least some of his unease is due to hunger, and he’s forced to toss the blankets aside, tug on some clothes and head downstairs.

Outfitted with a roll and spread that he’d discovered in one of the kitchen cupboards, Spencer idly investigates the ground floor. The sitting room, when he pokes his head in, is empty, and although he usually prefers to study in his room, he can’t help but think that maybe the change in scenery might do him some good. When finished with his food, he leaves his notebook in his room but brings his reading downstairs with him, settling into the armchair by the window with a sigh. Upstairs, the lure of his bed would be too great, but perhaps he can make some headway on his readings to make up for the time he wasted sleeping today.

Although his private room is right above this one, the large windows here mean that it’s a lot brighter, and he squints down at the small print in the hopes that the changed conditions might allow him some of the concentration he’s been so sorely lacking in the last couple of days.

He can’t, however, rightfully claim any sort of surprise when it doesn’t work. His mind is so full of suspicions, theories, fears, smothered with his ever-present longing for Brendon, that it refuses to take in anything more. Even his much-beloved anatomy text cannot keep Spencer distracted for long, and he shuts the lid again before very much time has passed, sighing in annoyance.

There are curtains covering the lower part of the windows, letting in sunlight but obscuring the figures passing by on the sidewalk, and Spencer lets the book rest and watches them go by instead. After the highs and lows of the past couple of days, it’s extremely refreshing to do nothing but observe, to force his mind to focus on only visual cues and forcibly drag it back whenever it tries to wander.

Of course, this also means that he pays very little attention to his surroundings, and so he startles quite badly when a soft voice asks, behind him, “Are you alright, Mr. Smith?”

He whirls around, one hand pressed to his heart, and Brendon withdraws quickly, face growing somber. “I’m sorry for frightening you, Mr. Smith,” he says quickly. “I should have announced my presence. I’m sorry.”

“It’s alright,” Spencer tells him, once his heartbeat has slowed enough to no longer hurt. “I was lost in thought. It was hardly your fault.”

Brendon nods, still looking contrite, so Spencer adds, “I am a little out of sorts today, Mr. Urie. Truly, you could not have known.”

Brendon bites his lip. His gaze darts over the trinkets set up on the mantelpiece before returning to Spencer. “Is there anything I can do to help?”

A deep, involuntary sigh escapes Spencer, and he shakes his head. “I’m afraid not,” he says. When Brendon’s face falls, he’s quick to add, “This problem has even my supervisors and professors stymied, Mr. Urie, there’s truly nothing you could do in this situation.”

Brendon makes a little face, and then, after a moment’s deliberation, seats himself on the arm of the chair across from Spencer’s. “Well,” he says with determination. “I assume this is about dragons, if your professors are involved?” And at Spencer’s nod, he says, “Now, I might not know very much about the scientific side of things, but sometimes it helps to talk things through with someone who’s not predisposed to his own opinion, don’t you think? Someone who’s not emotionally involved.”

There’s not much of a chance of Brendon not being emotionally involved, not with the look Spencer recalls on his face when he’d held Clara, but he does have a point of not being biased in any particular direction, so Spencer sighs and nods towards the empty seat. “It’d be best for you to get comfortable, then.”

Brendon settles into the chair with an earnest expression, leaning towards Spencer in expectation. Spencer, ridiculously, thinks he could start to like this – Brendon at his side, waiting to hear about his troubles, his work, his day. He wants to asks about Brendon’s day, too, but he’s not sure he’s allowed. Brendon is so cagey with personal information sometimes, and Spencer can’t help but think that if he were to inquire after Brendon’s life at this very moment, Brendon would only grow flustered.

So Spencer sighs again, for a variety of reasons, and explains. He tells Brendon about the dragons behaving oddly, when it started, how many animals have been affected, what symptoms they have, what causes have been ruled out. There’s not much because no one knows much of anything, but he still feels like he talks for an extraordinary amount of time, going on and on while Brendon nods along solemnly. It doesn’t help, exactly, but it settles him a little – makes it easier for him to focus on the important aspects instead of his mind circling around useless little details for hours on end.

“…and that’s that,” is how he finally concludes, hands spread helplessly. He shakes his head. “If you have any ideas, any ideas at all, by all means, let me know.”

Brendon’s response is to tilt his head from side to side, slowly, like an evaluating turtle. “That sounds tough,” is what he finally says. “It can’t be easy for you, watching them all fall ill like that.”

It’s something Spencer hasn’t really allowed himself to dwell on, but yes, it is. It really, really is.

“I just,” he says, and then breaks off, frustrated. “I just wish someone would do something, but the official plan of action seems to be to simply wait it out. The most any of the professors have contributed to the matter is leaving notes asking everyone to strictly adhere to sanitation protocol, and that’s just – sticking your head in the sand, is what it is.” He gets a little bit loud at the end, he knows he does, but he can’t help it. The whole mess is enough to make him want to tear his hair out, he thinks he’ll probably be forgiven for voicing his frustration.

Brendon’s eyes have grown big in response to his tone, but he still nods easily, like he understands. Maybe he does. Spencer is all too painfully aware at the moment that he knows next to nothing about Brendon’s life.

“Have you tried looking for an answer yourself?” Brendon asks, quietly. He keeps his gaze on his knee as he speaks, only occasionally risking quick glances upwards at Spencer’s face. “Maybe the answer is right in front of you, and no one has found it because everyone assumes someone else has checked the obvious things.”

“Maybe,” Spencer says, with a frustrated sigh. “Maybe that would be best.”

He looks over at Brendon who looks away, for reasons Spencer cannot discern, and says, slowly, “I suppose I would just feel like too much of a fool, wandering around the university all alone playing detective like a child. It’d hardly make a good impression on anyone, least of all myself.”

Brendon nods, pensively, before he suddenly balls his hands into fists on his knees. “Perhaps – perhaps I could be of assistance? I don’t know much about dragons or detective work, of course, but perhaps I could be of some help regardless.”

The offer makes Spencer’s heart thump painfully fast, though he tries his best to hide it. “Do you not have to – work?” he asks hesitantly, but Brendon just shakes his head, smiling wide.

“Two afternoons a week are mine if I want them, Mr. Smith,” he says. “And today is one of them. I was actually just about to head out the door when you came in.”

Considering Brendon has yet to button his jacket, Spencer isn’t particularly convinced, but he’s not one to say no to Brendon when he’s grinning like that.

“Well,” he says. “It must be fate, then,” and Brendon laughs with delight.

“It’s official then,” he cries, eyes shining. “You and I, Mr. Smith, shall go detecting together.”

Spencer grins, infected by Brendon’s enthusiasm. “So we shall,” he says, catching himself in adopting Brendon’s excited tone as well. “Fetch your hat and coat, Mr. Urie, and I will find my own, and then we shall get to the bottom of this.”

“Onward!” Brendon says. He lifts his hand into the air triumphantly. “I will rejoin you momentarily, Mr. Smith, armed and ready for our adventure.”

Spencer laughs at Brendon’s retreating back before he himself heads upstairs to get ready for their spontaneous excursion. Hand trailing along the bannister, he is almost at the second landing before he realizes that he is still smiling, and that his previous blue mood has blown away almost entirely.

When Brendon meets him by the door a few short minutes later, his eyes have lost none of their shine, and his cravat shows signs of having been done up very hastily. Spencer finds he doesn’t mind, though – he would be in a similarly disheveled state if he hadn’t forced himself to pause in front of the mirror and fix his appearance.

“We’ll take a taxi,” Spencer says. “It’ll be faster.” And then, off Brendon’s pained look, says, “My feet have been hurting a little, these past couple of days, so I’ll take care of it.”

Brendon narrows his eyes, just a little, but Spencer refuses to let him dwell on it, pulling open the front door and ushering him outside. As soon as it has closed behind them, he flags down a passing taxicab, which pulls to the curb with screeching tires and an alarming rattle.

“After you,” he tells Brendon, extending a hand. He only intended it as a gesture, but Brendon seizes it instead, using it as an aide to steady himself on the rickety step. The touch is unexpected and searing and oh so short, and then Brendon is sliding across the leather bench all the way to the other side of the cabin and Spencer is left to scramble in after him.

“To the conservatory,” he tells the driver who doffs his cap.

A moment later the automobile pulls back into traffic. Spencer rubs his hands together before he catches himself and plants them firmly on his knees. He thinks he sees Brendon looking at him from the corner of his eyes, but when he turns his head, Brendon’s gaze is fixed steadily on the shop fronts passing by outside.

After the success of his last interaction with the dragons, Brendon’s insecurity at being within the university halls seems to have mostly melted away. He’s still wary of touching the busts set into the walls and won’t press the button for the elevator, but he walks easily and chatters away as if he actually belongs.

It’s odd, but refreshing, seeing such an easy, confident version of Brendon, someone who knows what he wants and that he’ll get it. Spencer finds himself smiling not at Brendon but because of Brendon, because he can’t watch Brendon speak and gesture with such self-assurance and not be caught up in his confident air. It suits him, Spencer thinks, it really does.

He finds himself sneaking little smiles Brendon’s way, too distracted to properly glance at the machine logging visitors as he pushes the laboratory door open to admit him. It’s empty regardless, and Spencer grins at Brendon once again, feeling giddy, as he makes a beeline for the dragon pens.

He’s almost at the doorway, half-turned to meet Brendon’s excited smile with one of his own, when the sound of raised voices makes him pause .Or, one raised voice, rather, because any sort of opposition is notably absent. He is unsurprised when he recognizes Keade’s disparaging tone a moment later.

Clearly, Brendon has noticed, as well, and casts a questioning glance in Spencer’s direction. Not wanting to alert Keade to their presence, Spencer ushers his companion to the wall, out of sight of watchful eyes, though sadly not out of earshot.

“I didn’t,” someone says. Christopher, Spencer thinks. It might be Christopher. “Professor,” he adds, only to be harshly interrupted.

“What makes you think I want to hear your excuses?” Keade snaps. “Mistakes like this are unacceptable! If word got out that these are the kinds of results our students deliver, how do you think that would reflect on the university? On me? No wonder none of you can determine what illnesses the dragons have, if this is the best you can do.”

Christopher sucks in a sharp breath, thankfully masking Spencer’s own.

“Sir,” Christopher says, a note of anger creeping into his voice now, but Keade interrupts him yet again.

“Do you think any sort of employer will accept this shoddy workmanship? Do you think the university would have let you into the program, knowing that this was what was on offer?”

When Spencer risks a peek, Keade has Christopher backed into the nearest wall, and Christopher’s head is ducked low. Spencer wishes he could say this is the first time he is witness to such an encounter, but the sad truth is that this is nothing out of the ordinary. Keade regularly seeks out students to humiliate, and Christopher is one of his favorite targets: Good enough to occasionally veer off the beaten track, and yet too self-conscious to defend himself and his choices when challenged by authority.

Nothing appears to have changed this time, either – Christopher mutters a barely-there, “No, sir,” and Keade returns to berating him with smug satisfaction.

Spencer turns to meet Brendon’s wide eyes and inclines his head towards the exit. Brendon, it seems, is more than eager to agree.

They end up running into Keade regardless. They’ve reconvened at a display case around a corner, and then gotten sidetracked by the skeletons inside, Spencer earnestly relating everything he knows about the oldest dragons known to man. He can’t seem to stop, and he continues to wait for the moment when Brendon discreetly tries to cover a yawn, but it doesn’t seem to come.

Instead, Keade is the one to halt his diatribe, marching over with a sharply barked, “Smith!”

Spencer had really hoped they wouldn’t run into him. While it is allowed to bring visitors into the laboratory, it is certainly not standard operating procedure, and he had hoped to avoid the questions that might come with an encounter such as this one. He desperately wants to sigh, but it can’t be helped now.

“Mr. Smith,” Professor Keade says, sounding deeply unimpressed. “Hard at work, I see?”

Spencer bites his lip. There’s no glory in mouthing off to a superior, especially not with Brendon at his side, so he settles for a painful smile and a noncommittal, “You know how it is.”

Keade nods dismissively, already rounding on Brendon. “And you might be…?”

“Urie,” Brendon says, stepping forward decisively. He thrusts his hand out. “Mr. Brendon Urie, at your service.”

“A pleasure,” Keade says, face pinched. “Mr. Smith, I wasn’t aware you made a habit of bringing strangers into our work space.” It’s clear from his tone and expression that he’s not even making a perfunctory effort at politeness, and even if he couldn’t feel Brendon’s protective stiffness, Spencer would bristle at the underlying accusation.

“I don’t,” he says, as blandly as he can get away with. “However, policy clearly states that students are allowed to invite visitors so long as they are monitored at all time, and I can assure you that Mr. Urie and I have been following procedures most diligently.” He’s extremely tempted to cross his arms over his chest, but even in this situation, he can’t bring himself to do something so blatantly confrontational in front of a teacher. Instead, he smiles, all teeth, and adds, “Surely you don’t doubt my dedication to the program, Professor?”

“I would never presume to do anything of the sort,” Keade says, with a sour twist to his mouth. “I’m well aware you’re the program’s rising star, Mr. Smith.”

Spencer feels his cheeks heat, both at the sardonic tone of the professor’s voice and the quick glance he can see Brendon shoot him from the corner of his eyes, and has to work quite hard not to scowl.

“Then I’m not sure what the problem is, I’m afraid,” he says. He sounds a little more waspish than is strictly polite, but really. No one can blame him for not wanting to look like a fool in front of Brendon, can they?

“The problem is,” Keade says slowly, like he’s speaking to a child, “that allowing the uneducated,” with an unsubtle nod at Brendon, “to infiltrate an already unstable environment is tantamount to inviting disaster into our midst.”

Spencer just about swallows his tongue in anger. Brendon, however – despite being so out of his depth, here – says brashly, “Actually, Mr. Keade, considering that most dragons tend to react to unfamiliar situations by reverting to their most basic instincts, thus revealing oddities that might not be quite as apparent in their caged state, bringing in outsiders might be just what you need.”

Keade narrows his eyes, thankfully drawing the focus away from Spencer’s dropping jaw, and finally nods. “Perhaps then you’ll achieve some results where our star students have so unfortunately failed,” he says, raising an unpleasant eyebrow.

“Perhaps in the future,” Brendon says grandly. His little nose is high in the air. “I’m afraid there are other matters I must tend to at the moment. Come along, Mr. Smith.”

And with that, he turns on his heel and walks away, leaving Keade to stare after him in obvious anger, and Spencer to rush to catch up.

Spencer steers them into the walkway leading over to the library rather than outside. It’s closer, and generally deserted at this time of day, and Spencer has always found the little arches allowing sunlight to fall across the red bricks to be oddly soothing.

It’s also not somewhere Keade is likely to go, which is a point in its favor seeing as Brendon can barely contain his laughter. Spencer’s spirits aren’t quite so high, but he won’t let it show, leaning back against the wall instead. He keeps his arms crossed while Brendon gets himself under control.

Eventually, Brendon’s shoulders stop shaking, and he moves over to one of the glass-protected arches to sneak a look at the courtyard and the students beyond. “I suppose there’ll be no detecting today, then,” he says. His overall elation doesn’t seem to suffer for it, too caught up still in silencing Keade, no doubt.

Spencer, though – Spencer’s mind is somewhere else. “I never told you that,” he says.

Brendon half-turns towards him. “Pardon?” he says.

“The thing about dragons in unfamiliar situations,” Spencer says slowly. “I never told you that.”

“Oh, I’m enrolled in a course on dragons. Basic introduction,” Brendon replies, and then goes back to looking around with that pleased smile of his, unaware of the sudden drop in Spencer’s stomach.

Spencer knows it’s silly. He knows it’s silly, but he still feels like a fool, being caught so obviously surprised by Brendon’s education. The last thing he needs to do is give Keade any more ammunition, and yet there it was, Brendon utterly throwing Spencer with a single line.

“Oh, that was wonderful,” Brendon says. “Did you see his face? You saw his face, didn’t you?” He’s rocking on his heels in obvious pleasure, all boyish grin and gesturing arms, and Spencer can tell the moment he catches sight of Spencer’s expression because all the delight drains from him within moments, leaving only a worried frown behind.

“What’s wrong?” he asks, with a confused smile obscuring his features. He hesitates. “Did I do something to upset you?”

“I didn’t know you were taking classes,” Spencer says slowly. It’s none of his business, not really, but he can’t help the stab of hurt he feels at that news. He and Brendon have talked about Spencer’s assignments and his professors and his courses so often now, is it really too much to think that Brendon might mention that he is enrolled in a program himself?

Brendon looks away; at the question or Spencer’s tone, he doesn’t know. He won’t meet Spencer’s eyes as he speaks, and he twists his fingers in the chain of his watch so tightly it makes Spencer’s knuckles ache in sympathy.

“It’s only one class,” he says quietly. “And only at the college. It’s not like I’m a university student, or anything like that.” He ducks his head even further, pale and tired-looking, and Spencer suddenly feels terrible for somehow making this about himself.

He comes from a relatively affluent family, one that affords him the ability to attend the university and pay the extra fee for a boarding house, a family that allows him to make something of himself. The university is filled with young men and women such as himself, and he knows in a passing kind of manner that it’s hard for people from the lower classes to be accepted into the academic ranks.

Brendon looks so tired, and he must be working so hard, logging all his hours at the boarding house and taking his class and doing his work in secrecy where Spencer knows very well how exciting it is to be taking classes, to be making that step, how much it makes one want to share one’s experiences with it. He must be facing so much opposition, from both above and below, everyone thinking he’s trying to be something better than he is. And now he’s told Spencer, and not even Spencer is being the friend he is supposed to be.

So he smiles, an expression that comes far more easily than he thought it would, and reaches out to briefly squeeze Brendon’s hand. He lets go a moment later, and when Brendon gives him a wide-eyed look, he says, “I think it’s wonderful. I’m sure you’re doing wonderfully, Mr. Urie.”

“Oh,” Brendon says, and drops his eyes again, but he’s flushing this time, and smiling. “I’m not anywhere as smart as you, Mr. Smith, but I try.”

He offers Spencer a crooked smile, and Spencer smiles back, feeling something warm and fond replace the hurt from a moment before.

The lab is awash with people, it feels like, when Spencer opens the door. He realizes after a beat that it is only a handful of regulars, but after spending most of his time there alone, the small group of fellow students picking their way through the machinery seems like an awful lot.

No one takes note of his arrival but Miss Asher, who gives him a wan smile edged with solemnity. She looks like she might know the cause of the commotion, so Spencer takes a hesitant step closer and asks her what’s going on.

She nods towards the stack of fabric on one of the tables. “We’re testing feed bags for contaminants,” she says grimly, and Spencer doesn’t even hesitate, just strips off his coat and asks, “How can I help?”

There’s some sort of lyrical and deeply inspirational performance taking place on stage, but Spencer can’t bring himself to care. He likes things he can understand, that are tangible, that he can grasp. He likes the solid bones in a dragon’s wing, fragile but there. He likes a full set of teeth that will sink into a slab of meat without hesitation. He likes the coolness of his laboratory in contrast to the sun outside his window.

He’s never had any sort of patience for men and women rolling around groaning and clutching their bellies, reciting modern poetry while they pretend to gun each other down. It’s some sort of metaphor for the loss of individuality and the death of art in a militarized society. Ryan explained it to him, but that doesn’t mean Spencer is able to make heads or tails of it.

Ryan, however, is fascinated. In the darkened theater, his gaze is fixed on the stage like the savior might descend at any moment, and he’s already nudged Spencer’s knee once for fidgeting. He probably won’t take kindly to Spencer asking him what the hell is going on.

With his mind unable to follow the atrocities on stage, however, it inevitably wanders off to Brendon instead. Imagining Brendon in the audience next to him, whispering snide comments in his ear, is enough to force him to stifle a laugh. But then he thinks of how it might feel, to have Brendon sitting next to him, the two of them here together, perhaps holding hands furtively between their thighs. He glances over at the audience member on his other side, but it’s a woman old enough to be his mother, and he quickly looks away again. On Ryan’s other side are a few of his other, more artistically inclined friends, including the blonde from class, all of whom are watching the stage with rapt attention.

Brendon wouldn’t like it, of that Spencer is reasonably sure. But maybe he wouldn’t say anything, because he wouldn’t want to seem uncultured in front of Spencer and Ryan and all his university friends. Maybe he’d grit his teeth against the ridiculous, and then later pretend to have been absolutely enraptured, just so Spencer wouldn’t think he wasn’t smart enough for him.

Spencer wouldn’t, though. Especially now that he knows what he knows about Brendon and his situation, he’s more impressed with the man than ever. He’s not sure he could ever do what Brendon does, and he’d tell Brendon to his face if he thought it prudent to bring the topic up again.

But what if Brendon knows? Maybe Brendon looks down on Spencer because Spencer is already in his early twenties and still relying on his parents to clothe and feed him and pay the fee for the boarding house. Maybe he won’t ever like Spencer the way Spencer likes Brendon, because how could he ever view him as an equal in such matters?

It’s a horrifying thought. It’s also the reason Spencer leans over and whispers into Ryan’s ear, “Do you think Mr. Urie thinks me incompetent?”

Ryan, startled out of his reverie, frowns at him. “The assistant at your boarding house? Why on earth would he?”

“He’s a good man,” Spencer insists, a little more vehemently than a hushed exchange during a theater performance really allows for. “I’ve been spending some time with him. He’s helping me with something, it’s – it’s nice.”

In the semi-darkness, Spencer can see Ryan’s unimpressed look, and bites his lips together. He knows better than to talk during a performance, he truly does, but the play is terrible and Brendon is still at the forefront of his mind.

“Do you think people will care?” It’s a horrible thought, and Spencer swallows heavily. “Do you think it’s been going too far? Do people mind how much time I spend with a boarding house aide?”

“Will you just watch?” Ryan hisses at him. He ducks his head when someone in front of them glances around. “You’re like a child, Smith, for heaven’s sake. Just relax and enjoy it.”

Spencer can’t resist a heartfelt sigh, but he doesn’t want to cause a row with Ryan, either. He sits back in his seat and watches.

Spencer makes it through the door just a few short minutes before closing time, and for a moment, he simply stands in the hallway with his head still spinning from Ryan’s admonishments and the spectacle he’s just witnessed. It’s not until Brendon, keys jangling in his hand, comes into the hall and pauses at the sight of him, eyebrows raised, that he even manages to pull off his coat and gloves. It’s true he feels like a fool for being caught at such an utter loss, by Brendon no less, but at least Brendon doesn’t seem to think anything of it. Instead he just smiles and asks, “How was the theater, Mr. Smith?” as he goes about locking the front door for the night.

“…Interesting,” is the most polite descriptor Spencer can conjure up, and though he tries to mask his disdain with a smile, Brendon laughs like he’s reading Spencer’s mind.

“That’s good,” Brendon says. “One should always have interesting evenings.” He tosses a grin over his shoulder. “Wouldn’t you say?”

“Good isn’t necessarily the word I would use,” Spencer says, because Brendon has already figured him out, and he can’t help but think it’d be nice to share his experience with someone. He lifts his scarf over his head and drapes his coat over his arm. “But plenty of others come to mind.”

“Oh dear,” Brendon says. He pulls the key from the second lock and turns to give Spencer a mock-serious look, though there’s still a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. “Would you like to tell me which ones? I was just about to have a tea before I went home for the night, and I certainly wouldn’t mind some company.”

He gestures towards the darkened, deserted living room, still smiling, still so lovely, and Spencer’ll be damned if he says no to an invitation like that.

Spencer was right about one thing, which he’s quite happy about: Brendon wouldn’t have liked the play either. With Spencer’s disapproval clear in every word, he laughs until he has to wipe the tears from his eyes, kept upright in his armchair only by virtue of the fact that he’s clinging to the hand rests. It’s a lot later than either of them intended, the clock having struck twelve not so recently, and no doubt someone will make a snide remark about overly long and overly merry discussions in shared areas over breakfast, but for now, Spencer doesn’t care. He has someone to talk to the evening about and Brendon is clearly having the time of his life, and Spencer never wants it to end.

If this night could go on forever, he thinks he could be alright with that.

Eventually, though, he’s run out of stories to tell, and Brendon regains his breath, and after several minutes into a silence that started out as only a moment but ended up dragging on longer and longer, Brendon shakes his head and gives Spencer a solemn look.

“Any news on the dragons?” he asks quietly, like he’s not sure the question is welcome. “Have you figured out what’s wrong with them?”

Just like that, Spencer’s good mood fades. He shakes his head and looks away, looks down at his hands and says, “Nothing yet.”

“Oh.” In the quiet, he can hear Brendon swallow. Then, with forced levity, Brendon says, “Well, if you need any more amateur detecting done, I’d be happy to help.”

Spencer lifts his head at that. “Really?” he asks.

He sounds more incredulous than he meant to, and Brendon clearly notices, because he frowns and looks away. In the dim light of the lamp, Spencer can see the heat creeping up his cheeks.

“Well, of course,” Brendon says after a moment. “I quite enjoyed being around your dragons, in case that wasn’t clear. I’d be more than willing to help if there is anything I can do.”

“You’d come back to the laboratory with me?” Spencer stares at him. There wouldn’t be really anything for Brendon to do, of course, nothing he could truly be of assistance with. But it’s not as though they’re making any headway for him to get in the way of, anyway, and Spencer at least would feel a lot better with Brendon at his side.

“Let’s go, then” he says. Even he can tell how manic he sounds. “Let’s go right now.”

“Now?” Brendon asks. He laughs, but there’s something cautious in his eyes. “Mr. Smith, it’s practically the middle of the night.”

“I’ve never heard of adventures that only take place during business hours,” Spencer announces. He jerks his head at the door. “Come on,” he says, dropping his voice to little more than a whisper. “I have an early class, and you have work in the morning, and think of how it’ll feel, being exhausted not because we couldn’t sleep for worrying but because we went out and did whatever we wanted to.”

“You won’t even be able to get back into the house, later,” Brendon says, shaking his head, but there is a note of excitement creeping into his voice.

“I’ll figure something out,” Spencer promises, thinking of Ryan. This can be one of the endless favors he has to repay.

“It’s ridiculous,” Brendon insists, but Spencer can see the temptation in his eyes, and he’s not man enough to not take advantage of it.

So he holds out his hand instead, gesturing Brendon towards him as though he’s an illusionist and Brendon his willing victim. It works, too, Brendon swaying closer like he’s drawn by some invisible string binding them together.

“Come on an adventure with me, Mr. Urie,” Spencer says, and Brendon looks down at his extended hand, swallows thickly, and says, with his voice hoarse like an old man’s, “Yeah, okay.”

Although Spencer, from experience, can confidently say that there is always some student working on something, somewhere, at all hours of the day, there is a strange hush that falls over the university buildings at night. It feels odd that the doors are unlocked, and the hum and crackle of electricity makes the interior only seem more deserted than they already are. Machines beep and whine in the lecture halls and classrooms they pass, and even Spencer, who has been down these corridors countless times, feels the urge to peer back over his shoulder. He doesn’t blame Brendon for sticking close.

They take the stairs to the lower level, because there is just something disquieting about locking yourself into a rattling cage of an elevator in a deserted building, and while the heels of their shoes echo in the stairwell as though there are elephants stomping about, at least it makes Spencer feel less discomfort than that wailing metal lift.

The hallways below are hardly any more comforting, showcases displaying animal skulls and delicate dragon bones side by side with studies on electricity and yellowed photographs of fossils and blueprints of an early airship. Heavy doors lead off left and right, some with lights blinking above them to indicate someone is inside, and Spencer gives in and glances back over his shoulder several times in the anticipation of seeing someone, anyone, following along behind them.

There isn’t anyone, of course, merely the dual echo of their footsteps, and Spencer forces himself to smile at Brendon, to ease his pinched expression, and so takes entirely too long to notice that the door to his own laboratory is standing ajar.

“Well, this is…” Spencer trails off, reaching for the door handle even as his heart starts beating faster. It could be absolutely nothing – Lord knows he’s spend enough nights working until his eyes started to water, face pressed against the cold metal of the microscopes in search of some new insight. But he’s always lit the lamps to alert people to his presence, and there’s no name listed on the sign-in machine by the door, and he’s quite sure he doesn’t like this at all.

“Spooky?” Brendon whispers by his ear, hot air ghosting at the nape of Spencer’s neck. He’s leaning in close, so close Spencer can feel his body heat, and his shudder isn’t simply from being startled.

“Unusual,” he finishes his original thought, and pulls the door open.

There’s no one inside. Even after he’s groped for the switch to let the gas lamps mounted on the walls and worktables flicker to light, the laboratory is empty. One of the tables is in disarray, goggles abandoned by an assortment of vials filled with colorful liquid and a notepad lying open, but as far as Spencer can see, their owner is no longer on the premises.

Behind him, Brendon ventures away a couple of steps, peering along shelves and underneath benches. “Do you think someone just forgot to close the door?” he asks, voice echoing in the empty room, and turns to raise a questioning eyebrow.

And Spencer wants to agree. It is the explanation that makes the most sense, of course, the simplest one, the one easiest to accept. Whoever left behind his or her goggles went for a late night coffee or rushed out the door in a hurry, intending to return in the morning, and didn’t latch it properly as they went. A draft could have easily pushed it open. There has to be nothing worrisome about this situation.

And yet, he doesn’t. The whole thing is just a little too odd. The dragons are falling ill, one after another, and now there are unlogged nightly visitors. There’s no way Spencer can chalk this up to a coincidence.

“Let’s take a look around,” he tells Brendon, ignoring the tremble in his voice.

Brendon nods and goes, leaving Spencer to look over the left of the room, the shelves filled with samples and the emergency burn kits. He checks each one without result – everything is accounted for, and there are no extras to be found. Strangely enough, it makes him feel a little better. It’s not enough to lead him to believe that he’s imagining things, but there’s a little thread of hope blooming in his chest. Just the idea that maybe, just maybe, there’s an innocent explanation to all of this. Maybe there’s nothing malicious going on in his laboratory after all.

“Mr. Smith,” Brendon says from across the room, tone somewhere between horrified and thrilled. When Spencer turns, frowning, he holds a vial filled with tiny, colorless crystals into the air. “This was hidden behind one of the machines,” he says. “I can’t tell what it is, but it must be important?”

Spencer’s already moving, twisting past the sensitive equipment with his hand outstretched. Brendon hands the vial over without protest. It’s unlabeled, which alerts Spencer immediately, nothing left but a ridge of old glue where the identifying paper used to be.

Brendon leans in close when Spencer turns the vial around, so Spencer shifts to allow both of them to look at the vessel at the same time.

“What is it?” Brendon breathes.

“I’m not sure,” Spencer admits. There’s another, half-removed label on the back, and some of the writing has survived, words and names blurred and faded.

“It’s odd, though, right?” Brendon presses. “It shouldn’t be here.”

Spencer finally deciphers the word ‘pesticide’ and shakes his head sharply. “It really, really shouldn’t,” he says, feeling unexpectedly somber. “If this says what I think it says, then it really, really shouldn’t.”

He turns away before Brendon has a chance to ask him what the matter is. “Can you fetch me the encyclopedia from the shelf, please?” he asks. There’s a magnifying glass in its intended spot on one of the workbenches, and he picks it up gingerly. “It’s the big, brown one. Thank you.”

Brendon goes quickly, clearly trying not to rush when surrounded by priceless machinery, while Spencer turns the magnifying glass on the last vestiges of the vial’s labeling. He can’t make out much, not more than a handful of words, but what he can decipher is enough to make him freeze.

“Mr. Urie,” he says, voice going low and rough.

Brendon is immediately at his side. “What is it?” he asks, leaning close, but Spencer doesn’t mind the heat of his body close to Spencer’s at all. He feels cold enough as it is.

“This is rotenone,” he tells Brendon, shaking the vial lightly. The crystals shift inside. Off Brendon’s blank look, he says, “It’s a pesticide, and poisonous to dragons. This shouldn’t even be on this floor, let alone lying around the laboratory.”

Brendon’s eyes go wide, and he nods, leaning in even closer, and it makes Spencer’s heart beat so fast he almost misses the tiniest of sounds coming from the back room.

As it is, though, he’s immediately on high alert, and Brendon is righting himself as well. He gives Spencer a sharp look, who nods, and a moment later they’re both circling around the room to approach the doorway from separate sides. He thinks, wildly, that he can hear breathing just beyond, in the darkness, but perhaps that’s just his own roughened respiration.

He presses his fingers to his lips regardless, and Brendon nods seriously. He lifts up three fingers, counting down, and once all of them have gone down, both he and Spencer rush around the corner, Spencer groping for the light switch while Brendon calls “Who’s there?”

He needn’t have, honestly. Christopher is right in front of them, pressed tightly against the wall. He’s holding Shauna, a sweet-tempered but squirmy Redtail, firmly against his chest, and any reasonable doubt on Spencer’s part is dispelled quickly by the incredibly guilty look on his face.

“Mr. Eastly,” Spencer says sharply, just as Brendon says, flatly, “What on Earth.”

Christopher bites his lip. “Mr. Smith,” he says. His gaze flickers over to Brendon for a moment, but they all know who works in these labs and who doesn’t, and Christopher quickly refocuses his attention on Spencer.

“You’re the one behind this?” Spencer demands. There’s a part of him hoping Christopher will deny it, explain his late-night appearance, protest his innocence with the righteousness of the wrongly accused.

But he doesn’t. Instead, he looks away, fingers trailing tenderly over Shauna’s twisting neck. “I’m not proud of it,” he says. He looks down at Shauna, half-smiling, face so openly affectionate that Spencer wants to tear the dragon from his grasp on sheer incomprehension alone.

When Christopher looks up at him, his despair is plain to see. “I just needed to come up with something, you know, and this was the only thing I could think of to hurt him.”

“Hurt who?” Spencer asks, though he has a sneaking suspicion. There’s a pit at the bottom of his stomach that’s growing with every passing second. He’s not surprised when Christopher says, plainly, “Keade.”

He gives Brendon a look, half amused, half conspiratory. “You don’t know him,” he says, “but the man is a monster. I’ve never met anyone so determined to ruin other people’s lives.”

Spencer makes a noise, soft and low, because he might agree but that doesn’t mean he understands.

Christopher hears, clearly, because he abandons Brendon’s wide-eyed expression once more. “You must be aware of his behavior,” he says, turning to Spencer with pleading eyes. “Smith, I know you are. The man should not be allowed to treat us or these creatures the way he does.”

“He’s never poisoned them,” Spencer says, and he knows he sounds horrified, but in the turmoil of his feelings, he can’t quite nail down which of them is the most prominent at the moment.

He feels Brendon move closer to his side, and that helps, a little, lets him take a deep breath and steady himself. Yes, certainly, Keade is far from a gentleman, and Spencer himself often violently objects to the way the man treats his students. No doubt the man deserves to be reprimanded for his behavior.

And yet, Spencer cannot condone this kind of vigilante justice. Poisoning the dragons hurts the dragons – and their handlers and caretakers, those who have stake in the dragons faring well – far more than the loss of reputation would Professor Keade. Much as he understands, as he sympathizes, he can’t just let this go. These dragons are his livelihood, his life, and as long as they are in his laboratory and in his care, Spencer is honor-bound to protect them.

So he looks at Brendon who looks back with sure, steady eyes, trusting Spencer to do the right thing. Because there is only one right thing to do, here, and when he turns to Christopher and says, “I have to report this,” his tone is regretful but firm.

And Christopher doesn’t look surprised, or even particularly dismayed. He just sighs explosively and sinks down on the nearest stool, looks down at his flexing palms and says, “I know.”

Spencer feels like he answers the constables’ questions for hours; who is he, who is Brendon, what is his relationship with the culprit, what does Spencer think his motives are. There are lots of questions about Brendon. After it becomes apparent that Brendon is not a student at the university, they grow a lot sharper, as well, and Spencer has to curl his hands in the hem of his coat to keep his answers respectful.

A couple of yards away, far away that Spencer can’t hear them speak but can still make out their expressions, two more officers are interrogating Brendon. The unhappy tilt of his mouth is heartbreaking to watch, but Spencer firmly reminds himself that they did nothing wrong.

Yes, it is highly unusual for a university student and his boarding house aide to visit the laboratory at night, but it did, after all, lead to the capture of the culprit – something the constables are none too pleased with, Spencer can tell. But Spencer still thinks he did the right thing – telephoning Professor Larkin, who promptly called in the dean, who alerted the gendarmerie and stands only a few paces away, arms folded as he answers questions of his own.

His presence makes Spencer nervous, in an authoritarian way, especially since he’s never even interacted with the man personally. Still, he doesn’t think he would have done anything different had he known the outcome. And they can’t do anything to them, the constables, can do nothing but make Brendon feel inferior to any and all of them and to try and make Spencer regret ever dragging his friend into this mess.

He doesn’t, though. He remembers far too clearly the delight on Brendon’s face during their little adventure, the way he’d lit up with the possibility of being more than just ‘the help’ to someone in his life. Spencer won’t ever regret making Brendon feel appreciated.

It’s well past dawn when his answers are finally deemed satisfactory, and the campus is already growing active. Fellow students have begun arriving for their first classes, casting curious looks over towards them, some outright staring, especially with the dean there in a flurry of robes. Spencer suspects the dean is also the reason for the constables’ eventual departure, long after Christopher has been taken away – the university is important to this city, after all, and he imagines its dean putting his foot down would be enough of a reason for anyone to flee.

None of this makes his heart beat any slower when the dean catches his eye and gestures him over. His aide hovers in the background, shaking his head with increasing despair, and Brendon has taken to huddling underneath a nearby tree with his arms hugged around his middle. It goes against every instinct Spencer has to heed the dean’s call instead of going over, and his attention is only half on the man himself as he indicates a bow and says, “Sir.”

“Mr. Smith,” the dean says. “I hear I have you to thank for avoiding a majorly unfortunate event for the university.”

He gives Spencer a stern look, and Spencer nods hastily. He gestures over his shoulder, though, saying, “Myself and, um.”

“Yes,” the dean says. “My sincerest appreciation goes out to you, and the shy gentleman in the background.”

With Spencer bobbing his head stupidly, the dean inclines his head at his fidgety aide and says, “There are some things I need to sort out, in light of recent events. It’ll be most unpleasant, I’m sure.” He gives Spencer a crooked smile. “Although you, Mr. Smith, should perhaps take the morning and spend it with that young man of yours – he looks like he could use a kind word or two.”

“Yes, sir,” Spencer says, with a hasty bow. He doesn’t quite look up when the dean departs, too shell-shocked by everything still, but the man was right about one thing: Brendon looks entirely too lost for Spencer to just abandon him to it.

So he heads over as soon as he can convince his legs to spring into action, trying in vain to catch a glimpse of Brendon’s expression.

“Mr. Urie,” he says, and it maybe comes out a little desperate, but Brendon won’t quite meet his eyes, and after everything they’ve gone through in the past couple of hours, Spencer feels justified in seeking a little reassurance himself.

“Mr. Smith,” Brendon echoes. The words sound a little hollow, but after a moment, his gaze flickers up to Spencer’s and he smiles. It’s wan and tired, but there, and Spencer feels an answering one spread over his own face in relief.

He wants to ask Brendon if he’s alright, if there’s anything he needs, if he’d like Spencer to accompany him home – but it all seems trite, after the past couple of hours, so he settles for smiling and rubbing at the back of his neck uncertainly.

Chuckling weakly, he says, “So that was… quite an adventure, wasn’t it?”

“Well, we did ask for one,” Brendon says, looking away with a smile.

“That we did,” Spencer agrees. He doesn’t say that he’s learned his lesson, because now that everything is said and done, he can feel the desire for more of the same itching in his fingers. And, with the mischievous smile that’s threatening to take over Brendon’s smile now, he’d have to accuse him of the same.

Despite the early hour, he doesn’t feel tired at all. He feels like he could take over the world if he wanted, and if he had Brendon at his side. The lack of sleep must be getting to him, however, because when he opens his mouth to tell Brendon as much, what comes out is, “I’d like to court you, if you don’t mind.”

Every expression drains of Brendon’s face in response. “Pardon?” he stammers out, after several seconds in which Spencer has called himself all kinds of fool, ruining something potentially so great over this ridiculous attraction he just can’t seem to move past.

“With your permission, I’d like to court you,” he repeats, although his heart is hammering away merrily in his chest.

“Mr. Smith,” Brendon murmurs uncertainly. His eyes flicker everywhere; to the last, still-lingering traces of the crowd, to the imposing university chapel, to his shoes. “You can’t mean that.”

“I do,” Spencer assures him. There’s something hot growing in his chest, and he can’t tell yet if it’s good or bad. “I do, Mr. Urie – very much.”

Brendon shakes his head. His neatly coifed hair has disintegrated over the course of the night, leaving single strands to quiver tiredly with the movement. “Mr. Smith, I… Why would you?”

It is said so tiredly, so plaintively, that Spencer can’t help but frown. “What do you mean?” he asks carefully. If he’s quite honest with himself, he can’t really think of a reason why he wouldn’t.”

“I’m not, because I’m not…” Brendon breaks off, stark red patches forming on his cheeks; Spencer can’t tell if they’re from embarrassment or anger. “You know.”

“I don’t,” Spencer says, bewildered.

There must be something in his tone, or his expression, that convinces Brendon, for his shoulders unclench and his expression softens. “Wouldn’t you rather be with someone of your…” He trails off there, and gestures at Spencer’s torso as if trying to incorporate his elegant dress and his expensive books and his carefully groomed appearance at once.

Spencer is aware of his looks, is aware of the differences between them, of the pressed collar of his shirt to the off-color thread used to repair Brendon’s, the neat crease in his pants to the worn hem of Brendon’s that comes from having pant legs that are just a little too long. He’s never cared less. Because Brendon is still Brendon, still flushing furiously at the thought that Spencer might like him as more than a friend, still looking determinedly away like that might stop his hands from shaking.

It doesn’t take much wavering for him to step forward and reach out, to pick up Brendon’s hand where it’s hanging loosely at his side and grip it tightly.

“I’d rather,” he says quietly, so that Brendon has to turn his head and look at him, “be with someone who makes me happy.”

There is still color in Brendon’s cheeks, but his unhappy excitement fades to something softer, something warmer. “Oh,” he murmurs. A smile curls at the corners of his lips.

Spencer’s palm is slowly gathering sweat where their fingers are curled together, but he can’t think of a reason why he’d want to let go. “Is that a yes?” he asks instead, and can’t stop the smile overtaking his face when Brendon nods reverently.

“I can’t imagine a world in which I would say no,” Brendon confides. He bites his lip a moment later, looking away only for his eyes to flicker back to Spencer a moment later.

Spencer would like nothing better than to lean in and kiss him, but he knows that would be far too forward. So he smiles instead, squeezes Brendon’s hand just to feel him squeeze back. “Would you like to look at some more dragons with me?” he asks. “I imagine they’ve missed you terrible.”

“Mr. Smith, you know better than to assume they even remember me,” Brendon chides, but he doesn’t let go of Spencer’s hand as he moves forward, towards the laboratory.

Spencer, smiling, allows himself to be tugged along. There is a hair at the back of Brendon’s head that is stubbornly separate from its neatly combed brethren, and there are stains on Brendon’s coat that look suspiciously like mud that managed to resist being brushed out, and as Spencer lets Brendon lead him across the sun-lit square under the eyes of his curious classmates, he can’t think of anything he would rather do.

The End

Works inspired by this one:

3 pieces by abtagrl
[Restricted Work] by growlery (Log in to access.)

Actions

Kudos

Truhe3, hellspit, Damaged_by_love, staralfur, hawthorn626, beth9891, AuroraMizu42, prucanada, geram, SecretHarmonies, inahailofbullets, MAVEfm, ShadowsGold, Tori_Libertine, Writers_Paradise, Herbcitty, Sele_Art16, anjaspeaks, mandyreads, betterlookalive, sodunwithyou, rtub, TheOneCalledEli, youwerethefirstthing, Faitour, LadyLegendTitan16, flyingcarpet, renegadedoughnut, leftovercrumble, Eli0t, MusicalC, fillory, idkupick, koolbeans56, merelyn, EponymousAnon, emmalinerosette, paperdollkisses, ermengarde, winterlover, spyro, kcracken, ficcety, tryfanstone, and SunRainDownOnMe as well as 24 guests left kudos on this work!

Archive of Our Own

Actions

Work Header