Six Ways Cain and Glitch Never Met
Title: Six Ways Cain and Glitch Never Met
Author: Ameonna1
Rating: R, mention of drugs, gay bars, self inflicted injuries, and other adult stuff
Disclaimer: I don't own Tin Man, Portal, any of the songs, the El Rio, history, Clark University, but I am glad for their inspiration.
Obligatory Author Drivel: Here's a new combination of AU/drabbles/song prompts. I pretty much decided to do alternative universe first meetings and to inspire I threw the itunes on shuffle and hoped for the best. They all came out pretty good, I was kind of thrown off when 'Still Alive' came on. It was a 'thanks shuffle, wtf?' moment. If you've played Portal you'll get it, if not hit up the wiki for info on the video game. The song titles are there along with around what time and place I was going for. Enjoy!
Walk Away - Franz Ferdinand
1903 - Clark University
“Wyatt, I'm just not interested.”
He watched her walk away, amber curls glittering in the setting sun. It had taken him almost two months to get up the nerve to talk to her and... just like that. He let out a breath, he didn't know if he should be devastated or relieved. Sighing, he adjusted his bag over his shoulder, he'd have to make it halfway back across campus before his psychology class started and if he was late, he'd get locked out of the room. Which was always a brilliant blow to the ego, ego... Id. Super-ego... He was going to fail that class...
He felt a lump form in his throat as he turned and faced a rather bright eyed man who was sitting on a bench not far off, with a wax paper wrapped sandwich in his lap and a bag full of papers next to him.
Wyatt found himself wanting to sink into the ground, somewhere away...
“You... you saw all that, didn't you?”
The man with the chocolate curls nodded, a bit too brightly for Wyatt's tastes, “Oh yes, it was a very good effort on your part. I think she might have even accepted your offer had she not had her eye on that rather thick headed idiot... James Zero? I think that's his name.”
“Great, thanks.”
The man blushed, and shrugged sheepishly, “Sorry, I have a tendency to say anything that comes into my head. Professor Hall says it's a terrible habit.”
“Right,” Wyatt nearly turned away, “Wait, you're in Professor Hall's class? Shouldn't you be there now?”
The man shook his head, “Ah, I'm Professor Hall's assistant and class is canceled today. You're Wyatt Cain, aren't you? The one who sits in the back and is asleep half the time?”
“Yeah,” there really wasn't a big enough hole that Cain could crawl into right now.
“I'm Ambrose Andersen, please to formally meet you. Now sit down and have a sandwich.”
Wyatt shrugged and had a seat, class was canceled after all.
Viva la Vida - Coldplay
4476 - Planet Katuria
“You filthy liar!”
Ambrose felt his head snap back as another blow landed, harder this time, across his cheek and he saw stars.
He didn't even care what the boy was asking him anymore. He'd killed his mother? Probably, he'd had a lot of people killed during his reign. It wasn't as if he could remember every face and name. He'd ruled this entire land, he was feared around half the world. Overlord D'luviael, the king slayer. Now what was he? Tied to a chair in a filthy house while his legacy crumbled into civil war.
Another hit, he felt the chair tilt this time. The boy, and he was just a boy, was getting angrier with every word Ambrose didn't say.
A door opened and a growl issued through the silence that had fallen in the room,
“Jeb! Step outside!”
A shuffle and a door slamming now. But Ambrose knew he wasn't alone in the room. Carefully he opened his eyes, well, the one that wasn't swollen shut, and regarded the tall blond man standing across the room.
His blue eyes were like ice and Ambrose felt a shudder creep into his bones as the man smiled, a slow vicious smile like a cat who'd caught a bird.
“Overlord D'luviael.”
“I highly doubt that's what you're 'revolutionaries' are calling me,” a broken smile through a split lip, “let me guess, you're going to read me my charges and execute me at dawn, am I right? Do I get a last meal?”
The blue eyed man smiled, “You've been dictator of this country for how long? Thirteen years? Thirteen years of murder and chaos?” He crossed the room, and reached a gloved hand out, grasping Ambrose's chin and tilting his head up at an almost painful angle, “no, Overlord, we aren't going to kill you. You owe us at least thirteen years.”
It wasn't until then that Ambrose felt truly afraid.
Temptation Greets you Like Your Naughty Friend - Arctic Monkeys
2009 - Washington D.C.
The window slammed down hard and the man halfway through it gave an agonizing grunt and went limp for a moment before lifting his head.
“What the hell was that for!?”
Blue eyes widened in exasperation, “I think it's for breaking into my apartment at four in the morning, sweetheart.”
Brown curls gave a rather stunning smile, even as he was trapped in an open window, “It's only four?”
Wyatt Cain did not have the patience for this, what he did have was a 9mm handgun.
The brown haired man in his window didn't seem to take this very seriously.
“Why do you have a gun anyway?”
“I'm a cop.”
“Oh, can I come all the way in, Mr. Cop? My ass is freezing! It's snowing out there you know.”
He knew because damp curls were dripping onto his kitchen floor. They guy had to be drunk or high. Something that would make crawling into an apartment window that was not his a good idea.
In a smooth motion, he holstered his gun in his pajama pants, trying not to cringe at the feeling and slid the skinny junkie all the way into his apartment. It was against his best judgment but the genius wasn't wearing a coat and it was the middle of winter.
“Got a name?”
“People call me Glitch.”
He looked down at his damp guest who was lying on his kitchen floor.
“Who calls you Glitch?”
“My pimp.”
The man called Glitch, on his floor grinned at Cain's look before he tilted his head and yawned.
“Hey, Mr. Cop, do you have a couch?”
Oh yeah, this was a bad idea.
Still Alive - Jonathan Coulton
2001 - Aperture Science
“Good morning subject Y709. It is a lovely day. I hope you're well hydrated. When you're ready please go to the first door and we can open the first test chamber.”
Glitch hummed slightly to himself watching the orange jumpsuit clad man make his way out of the stasis chamber on a wall of monitors. He was a new one, after all the other ones had failed, they had decided to try this one.
Wyatt Cain.
No other information.
It was the 'no other information' line that made it so exciting. They knew who all the other's had been. Mother's, father's, teachers, scientists, thugs...
Glitch wiped away the chocolate frosting on his lips and watched the AI give the blond his first basic instructions.
The camera got a glare and test chamber 001 was cleared in record time. Glitch blinked as the numbers came up on the screen in front of him.
“Oh, AMbROSE, this one's going to be feisty.”
Voodoo Child - Rogue Traders
2008 - San Francisco
“Okay, guys, that's nice. I'll just be over here...”
Ambrose was pretty sure his friends didn't hear him. Not over the headache inducing music or the come hither looks that were oozing off the dance floor.
Yeah, guys, let's go to a gay bar. It 'ill be great.
Ambrose frowned into his drink, he hardly remembered what he ordered. Some monstrosity of grenadine and vodka with a withered cherry bobbing around in the bottom. He knew it had some terrible name that had made him blush six ways from Sunday when he'd ordered it.
He hated places with lot's of people. His friends knew this but they always dragged him out anyway. He hated it.
He had work in the morning. The drawings for the new fuel lines needed to be sent in before lunch and... He closed his eyes. No, he wasn't supposed to think about work. He wasn't a drafter here, he wasn't an engineer, he was just... In a corner watching some sweaty bear men rubbing on each other...
He needed some fresh air.
Halfway around the room someone elbowed him and he lost his drink. Stuck between apologizing and trying to pick up broken glass he barely noticed when another pair of hands were there, scooping up pieces of glass and shooing people away from the wall.
It wasn't until he'd stumbled out the front of the El Rio and had just enough time to catch his breath that there was a tap at his elbow.
“Hey, are you okay?”
Ambrose looked up at the most handsome man he'd ever seen. Blue eyes and gorgeous blond hair accented a wonderfully fit body and was it legal to wear pants that tight?
“Well?”
Ambrose blinked as he stuttered, “Uh... y-yeah. Sorry, I didn't mean... I meant um... Hi.”
“Hi,” with a grin and then a, “this doesn't seem like your kind of place.”
“Um, oh it's not. Really. I don't like bars and crowds...” Wait, did he mean the bar? Or the fact that it was a gay bar? “I mean, I like guys but not... these places...”
Ambrose cringed at his sentence, someone shoot him, please.
Instead he got a chuckle and a, “I'm Wyatt. There's a diner down the street if you're looking for somewhere more quiet. I could buy you a coffee.”
Suddenly, the night was looking up.
Breath Me - Sia
1999 - Seattle
Dr. Cain was frowning.
He had a cup of coffee halfway to his lips but it had stopped in mid-air.
He'd just found their John Doe and now he only had to count the hours before the shit hit the fan.
Ambrose Pearlman. Noted pianist. A child prodigy since the age of four. Experienced seven years of obscurity after the death of his mother. Newly managed by his Uncle who is notorious for bad mouthing press and overbooking booking shows.
Dr. Cain put his coffee down. He'd thought the man had looked familiar. Score one for the internet. Finally he let out a sigh and shut down his computer. He slowly made his way down to the psych wing where they had put their guest after confirming that his wounds were indeed self inflicted.
He paused behind the two way mirror, looking at the white clad figure who sat, not on the bed, but on the floor in the corner with his bandaged hands in his lap.
Somehow the man had managed to break the fingers on his left hand and seriously injure his right. Then he hadn't said a word, except to complain and bicker with the staff.
The door opened with a thunk, letting cool air from the hall into the room, and brown eyes looked up at him with a bit of derision.
“I know, I know, it's cold. I'm shutting the door.”
Dr. Cain shut the door and instead of taking a seat in the wall bolted chair he sat down on the floor, leaning against the opposite wall.
Brown eyes never left him and he matched them coolly for a good fifteen minutes before his patient began to squirm.
“So, are you going to ask me about my favorite colors?”
“I'm not Dr. Gale or Dr. Raw. I don't really do that touchy feely crap. I'm mostly research and theory.”
“So, do you have any theories?”
“On why a pianist would break his own hands? Yeah.”
Brown eyes widened and a frown appeared on thin well shaped lips.
“Bravo. You know who I am. What do you win?”
“Pretty much, just a pissed off pianist.”
That got him a smile. A small one, but it was better than nothing.
“Why did you break your hands, Ambrose?”
“If I told you that you wouldn't understand, would you believe me?”
“I think if you told me that, you would be seriously underestimating me as a human being.”
A brown curl had slipped loose and was bouncing between brown eyes. Brown on brown on pale.
“Well, I'd have to get to know you before I can estimate or underestimate you, doctor.”
“Somehow, I think we both have time.”
Author: Ameonna1
Rating: R, mention of drugs, gay bars, self inflicted injuries, and other adult stuff
Disclaimer: I don't own Tin Man, Portal, any of the songs, the El Rio, history, Clark University, but I am glad for their inspiration.
Obligatory Author Drivel: Here's a new combination of AU/drabbles/song prompts. I pretty much decided to do alternative universe first meetings and to inspire I threw the itunes on shuffle and hoped for the best. They all came out pretty good, I was kind of thrown off when 'Still Alive' came on. It was a 'thanks shuffle, wtf?' moment. If you've played Portal you'll get it, if not hit up the wiki for info on the video game. The song titles are there along with around what time and place I was going for. Enjoy!
Walk Away - Franz Ferdinand
1903 - Clark University
“Wyatt, I'm just not interested.”
He watched her walk away, amber curls glittering in the setting sun. It had taken him almost two months to get up the nerve to talk to her and... just like that. He let out a breath, he didn't know if he should be devastated or relieved. Sighing, he adjusted his bag over his shoulder, he'd have to make it halfway back across campus before his psychology class started and if he was late, he'd get locked out of the room. Which was always a brilliant blow to the ego, ego... Id. Super-ego... He was going to fail that class...
He felt a lump form in his throat as he turned and faced a rather bright eyed man who was sitting on a bench not far off, with a wax paper wrapped sandwich in his lap and a bag full of papers next to him.
Wyatt found himself wanting to sink into the ground, somewhere away...
“You... you saw all that, didn't you?”
The man with the chocolate curls nodded, a bit too brightly for Wyatt's tastes, “Oh yes, it was a very good effort on your part. I think she might have even accepted your offer had she not had her eye on that rather thick headed idiot... James Zero? I think that's his name.”
“Great, thanks.”
The man blushed, and shrugged sheepishly, “Sorry, I have a tendency to say anything that comes into my head. Professor Hall says it's a terrible habit.”
“Right,” Wyatt nearly turned away, “Wait, you're in Professor Hall's class? Shouldn't you be there now?”
The man shook his head, “Ah, I'm Professor Hall's assistant and class is canceled today. You're Wyatt Cain, aren't you? The one who sits in the back and is asleep half the time?”
“Yeah,” there really wasn't a big enough hole that Cain could crawl into right now.
“I'm Ambrose Andersen, please to formally meet you. Now sit down and have a sandwich.”
Wyatt shrugged and had a seat, class was canceled after all.
Viva la Vida - Coldplay
4476 - Planet Katuria
“You filthy liar!”
Ambrose felt his head snap back as another blow landed, harder this time, across his cheek and he saw stars.
He didn't even care what the boy was asking him anymore. He'd killed his mother? Probably, he'd had a lot of people killed during his reign. It wasn't as if he could remember every face and name. He'd ruled this entire land, he was feared around half the world. Overlord D'luviael, the king slayer. Now what was he? Tied to a chair in a filthy house while his legacy crumbled into civil war.
Another hit, he felt the chair tilt this time. The boy, and he was just a boy, was getting angrier with every word Ambrose didn't say.
A door opened and a growl issued through the silence that had fallen in the room,
“Jeb! Step outside!”
A shuffle and a door slamming now. But Ambrose knew he wasn't alone in the room. Carefully he opened his eyes, well, the one that wasn't swollen shut, and regarded the tall blond man standing across the room.
His blue eyes were like ice and Ambrose felt a shudder creep into his bones as the man smiled, a slow vicious smile like a cat who'd caught a bird.
“Overlord D'luviael.”
“I highly doubt that's what you're 'revolutionaries' are calling me,” a broken smile through a split lip, “let me guess, you're going to read me my charges and execute me at dawn, am I right? Do I get a last meal?”
The blue eyed man smiled, “You've been dictator of this country for how long? Thirteen years? Thirteen years of murder and chaos?” He crossed the room, and reached a gloved hand out, grasping Ambrose's chin and tilting his head up at an almost painful angle, “no, Overlord, we aren't going to kill you. You owe us at least thirteen years.”
It wasn't until then that Ambrose felt truly afraid.
Temptation Greets you Like Your Naughty Friend - Arctic Monkeys
2009 - Washington D.C.
The window slammed down hard and the man halfway through it gave an agonizing grunt and went limp for a moment before lifting his head.
“What the hell was that for!?”
Blue eyes widened in exasperation, “I think it's for breaking into my apartment at four in the morning, sweetheart.”
Brown curls gave a rather stunning smile, even as he was trapped in an open window, “It's only four?”
Wyatt Cain did not have the patience for this, what he did have was a 9mm handgun.
The brown haired man in his window didn't seem to take this very seriously.
“Why do you have a gun anyway?”
“I'm a cop.”
“Oh, can I come all the way in, Mr. Cop? My ass is freezing! It's snowing out there you know.”
He knew because damp curls were dripping onto his kitchen floor. They guy had to be drunk or high. Something that would make crawling into an apartment window that was not his a good idea.
In a smooth motion, he holstered his gun in his pajama pants, trying not to cringe at the feeling and slid the skinny junkie all the way into his apartment. It was against his best judgment but the genius wasn't wearing a coat and it was the middle of winter.
“Got a name?”
“People call me Glitch.”
He looked down at his damp guest who was lying on his kitchen floor.
“Who calls you Glitch?”
“My pimp.”
The man called Glitch, on his floor grinned at Cain's look before he tilted his head and yawned.
“Hey, Mr. Cop, do you have a couch?”
Oh yeah, this was a bad idea.
Still Alive - Jonathan Coulton
2001 - Aperture Science
“Good morning subject Y709. It is a lovely day. I hope you're well hydrated. When you're ready please go to the first door and we can open the first test chamber.”
Glitch hummed slightly to himself watching the orange jumpsuit clad man make his way out of the stasis chamber on a wall of monitors. He was a new one, after all the other ones had failed, they had decided to try this one.
Wyatt Cain.
No other information.
It was the 'no other information' line that made it so exciting. They knew who all the other's had been. Mother's, father's, teachers, scientists, thugs...
Glitch wiped away the chocolate frosting on his lips and watched the AI give the blond his first basic instructions.
The camera got a glare and test chamber 001 was cleared in record time. Glitch blinked as the numbers came up on the screen in front of him.
“Oh, AMbROSE, this one's going to be feisty.”
Voodoo Child - Rogue Traders
2008 - San Francisco
“Okay, guys, that's nice. I'll just be over here...”
Ambrose was pretty sure his friends didn't hear him. Not over the headache inducing music or the come hither looks that were oozing off the dance floor.
Yeah, guys, let's go to a gay bar. It 'ill be great.
Ambrose frowned into his drink, he hardly remembered what he ordered. Some monstrosity of grenadine and vodka with a withered cherry bobbing around in the bottom. He knew it had some terrible name that had made him blush six ways from Sunday when he'd ordered it.
He hated places with lot's of people. His friends knew this but they always dragged him out anyway. He hated it.
He had work in the morning. The drawings for the new fuel lines needed to be sent in before lunch and... He closed his eyes. No, he wasn't supposed to think about work. He wasn't a drafter here, he wasn't an engineer, he was just... In a corner watching some sweaty bear men rubbing on each other...
He needed some fresh air.
Halfway around the room someone elbowed him and he lost his drink. Stuck between apologizing and trying to pick up broken glass he barely noticed when another pair of hands were there, scooping up pieces of glass and shooing people away from the wall.
It wasn't until he'd stumbled out the front of the El Rio and had just enough time to catch his breath that there was a tap at his elbow.
“Hey, are you okay?”
Ambrose looked up at the most handsome man he'd ever seen. Blue eyes and gorgeous blond hair accented a wonderfully fit body and was it legal to wear pants that tight?
“Well?”
Ambrose blinked as he stuttered, “Uh... y-yeah. Sorry, I didn't mean... I meant um... Hi.”
“Hi,” with a grin and then a, “this doesn't seem like your kind of place.”
“Um, oh it's not. Really. I don't like bars and crowds...” Wait, did he mean the bar? Or the fact that it was a gay bar? “I mean, I like guys but not... these places...”
Ambrose cringed at his sentence, someone shoot him, please.
Instead he got a chuckle and a, “I'm Wyatt. There's a diner down the street if you're looking for somewhere more quiet. I could buy you a coffee.”
Suddenly, the night was looking up.
Breath Me - Sia
1999 - Seattle
Dr. Cain was frowning.
He had a cup of coffee halfway to his lips but it had stopped in mid-air.
He'd just found their John Doe and now he only had to count the hours before the shit hit the fan.
Ambrose Pearlman. Noted pianist. A child prodigy since the age of four. Experienced seven years of obscurity after the death of his mother. Newly managed by his Uncle who is notorious for bad mouthing press and overbooking booking shows.
Dr. Cain put his coffee down. He'd thought the man had looked familiar. Score one for the internet. Finally he let out a sigh and shut down his computer. He slowly made his way down to the psych wing where they had put their guest after confirming that his wounds were indeed self inflicted.
He paused behind the two way mirror, looking at the white clad figure who sat, not on the bed, but on the floor in the corner with his bandaged hands in his lap.
Somehow the man had managed to break the fingers on his left hand and seriously injure his right. Then he hadn't said a word, except to complain and bicker with the staff.
The door opened with a thunk, letting cool air from the hall into the room, and brown eyes looked up at him with a bit of derision.
“I know, I know, it's cold. I'm shutting the door.”
Dr. Cain shut the door and instead of taking a seat in the wall bolted chair he sat down on the floor, leaning against the opposite wall.
Brown eyes never left him and he matched them coolly for a good fifteen minutes before his patient began to squirm.
“So, are you going to ask me about my favorite colors?”
“I'm not Dr. Gale or Dr. Raw. I don't really do that touchy feely crap. I'm mostly research and theory.”
“So, do you have any theories?”
“On why a pianist would break his own hands? Yeah.”
Brown eyes widened and a frown appeared on thin well shaped lips.
“Bravo. You know who I am. What do you win?”
“Pretty much, just a pissed off pianist.”
That got him a smile. A small one, but it was better than nothing.
“Why did you break your hands, Ambrose?”
“If I told you that you wouldn't understand, would you believe me?”
“I think if you told me that, you would be seriously underestimating me as a human being.”
A brown curl had slipped loose and was bouncing between brown eyes. Brown on brown on pale.
“Well, I'd have to get to know you before I can estimate or underestimate you, doctor.”
“Somehow, I think we both have time.”