Fic: the truth and what to make of it (Bones, Wendell/Hodgins, PG)
Title: the truth and what to make of it
Fandom: Bones
Pairing: Wendell/Hodgins
Rating: PG
Summary: Preslash. Shared history. ~1500 words.
A/N: This isn't exactly a request ficlet, but I sort of wrote it that way anyway. The idea is 100% cinderlily's, I just stole it and wrote something that probably isn't at all what she was envisioning. Liz, I can scrap this at any time. Totally not married to it. I just needed something to do to keep me out of trouble this morning (seriously going crazy here) and this is what happened. I hope that's okay. If you do like this, please feel free to add onto it. If not, start over and we'll go from there.
After awhile it wasn't so much the words as the way Jack's lips moved around them. The way his mouth curved around the 'o' sound, the way he pursed his lips whenever he said anything that started with a 'w', or even the little line of spit at the corner of his mouth when he got really fired up. Wendell had seen the look before hundreds of times, so he knew what it meant. Still, it was kind of weird to see it on Jack and find it familiar -- comforting, even -- but sort of sexy at the same time.
"I mean, obviously they're not going to keep the alien spacecraft there," Jack was saying, hands moving independently of his brain as he worked on the samples he was analyzing while keeping up a running commentary on a completely different subject. "The minute the news first leaked they started moving things. By the nineties there wasn't a single bit of recognizable alien technology left in the desert. It's all in some underground bunker in, like, North Dakota. Somewhere no one would ever think to look."
"So, what, Area 51's totally empty now?" Wendell asked, leaning forward on the lab station and propping his chin in his hand to watch Jack move around the lab.
"Of course not. They built a complete simulation of the moon underneath the desert."
"I thought that rumor started in the sixties," Wendell said, shifting to the right so he could follow Jack as he crossed to another work station. "If they didn't move the rest of it until the nineties then one of those theories can't be true."
"No, no," Jack said, shaking his head without looking at Wendell. He paused long enough to set a fresh sample onto a slide, then he crossed back to the microscope. He put the slide into the microscope, but instead of leaning over the viewer he looked up at Wendell. "You're thinking of that asinine theory that the Apollo landing was all a hoax. This is completely different. The government's recreating the environmental conditions on the moon so they can control the colonization when we run this planet into the ground."
That was a new one for Wendell, but the only indication he gave that he wasn't buying it was a slight quirk of the corners of his mouth. Still, Jack wasn't the type to miss even the smallest detail, so it was just as well that he'd turned back to the microscope as soon as he finished talking. It wasn't like Wendell was laughing at him, after all, and he didn't want Jack to get the wrong idea. The truth was it was kind of nice to hear a new theory after all the years he'd spent listening to the same ones being rehashed by his old man.
Aliens were a favorite of his father's, but he was pretty into most of the government stuff. JFK, the FBI, secret government agencies; you name it, his father had entertained a theory about it. The newspaper clippings alone were bordering on obsessive, and even though he didn't really buy into any of it, Wendell hadn't been able to let go of them. His mother couldn't get rid of them fast enough, though, so when Wendell left home for grad school he brought with him the notebooks his father had put together over the years. They were sitting on the shelf in his dorm room right now, wedged between the Forensics textbooks and his old lab manuals. He hadn't opened any of them since he moved in, practically, but he liked knowing there were there, full of yellowed newspaper clippings and old photos clipped out of tabloids and notes scrawled in his father's messy handwriting.
"Man, I wonder how you get a gig like that," Wendell said, as much to himself as to Hodgins. He was still watching Hodgins move around, his own work long forgotten and if Dr. Brennan caught him just hanging around admiring the view, he'd probably be off the grad student rotation. But she'd been in court with Booth all day, and he figured what she didn't know wasn't going to hurt either of them. "I mean, all those top secret government scientists. Cheyenne Mountain, Area 51, whatever they've got going on up in North Dakota...and that doesn't even start to cover what's going on right here in D.C. Can you imagine the clearance you'd have to get just to interview for a job like that?"
Jack did look up at him then, frowning suspiciously the way his dad did sometimes when one of Wendell's brothers started egging him on about his own theories. For a few seconds they just looked at each other, Jack trying to decide if Wendell was making fun of him, and Wendell wondering just what Jack's mouth would feel like against his. Then Jack shrugged and turned away, and Wendell blinked a few times and hoped he wasn't blushing as hard as he thought he was.
"They recruit from within, mostly," Jack said, like he'd done careful research on the scientists just as much as the conspiracies. Which made sense, considering, now that Wendell thought about it. "Most of them move up through the ranks as they prove themselves trustworthy. Though if somebody on the internet gets a little too close to the truth the government moves in pretty quickly, and if they're not completely brain-dead they might get recruited."
"And if they are brain-dead?"
"There are other ways of shutting people up."
"Save the conspiracy theories for someone who cares, Mr. Hodgins."
Wendell started at the sound of Cam's voice, pushing off the lab station and looking around for the data he was supposed to be analyzing. He'd set it down...somewhere, then he'd gotten so caught up in the sound of Jack's voice that he'd forgotten all about it.
"I care," he said, blushing even harder when Jack and Cam both looked at him. Jack raised an eyebrow, the corner of his mouth quirking into a grin, and Wendell couldn't help smiling back at him.
"Then save it for when I'm not within earshot," Cam said, rolling her eyes and crossing her arms over her chest in that way that told them she wasn't interested in getting involved in anybody's personal business today. "Now what have you got for me?"
Jack switched gears instantly, rattling off the results he'd been compiling while he lectured Wendell on secret government cover-ups. And if Wendell hadn't already known how smart Jack was, the fact that he could handle two completely different subjects at once without losing track of either would have proved it. Wendell, on the other hand, still hadn't even found his print-out. He finally spotted it on the table near the edge of the lab, glancing over to make sure Cam was still ignoring him before he crossed the room and picked it up.
He ducked out of the lab and headed down the hall, around the corner to listen for the sound of Cam's heels clicking against the floor before he headed back to the lab where Jack had been holed up all day. He paused in the doorway and just watched for a second, his gaze on Jack's hands as he slid the slide out of the microscope and set it on the table. It took a few seconds to realize that Jack had stopped moving, and when Wendell looked up he found Jack watching him. "What?"
Wendell blushed again, but he smiled and glanced over his shoulder to make sure Cam wasn't lurking anywhere before he answered. "Do you want to get a beer later? There's something I want to show you."
For a few seconds Jack just looked at him, still suspicious but Wendell could tell he was curious. He hoped that was curiosity, anyway, and not the look Jack gave somebody when he was trying to decide whether or not he needed to file for a restraining order. It wasn't even the first time Wendell had invited him out for a beer, but this time felt different somehow. Maybe it was the fact that Jack was looking at him like he'd never seen Wendell before. Or maybe it was spending the whole afternoon hanging out in Jack's lab, just watching him move without worrying about who was going to catch him looking.
"I'm free tonight," Jack finally said, and Wendell let out a breath he didn't know he was holding.
"Good," he said, and he wasn't sure why he was grinning like an idiot, because it wasn't like Jack had just agreed to an actual date or anything. Except it sort of felt that way, and even if he was being delusional, Wendell was going to hold on to this feeling as long as he could. "Good. So I'll see you later."
He tapped his print-out against the door frame and turned on his heel before Jack had a chance to change his mind, grin firmly in place for the rest of the day.
~
Unrelated to the above: Somebody rec me some music. I am in that place where I am just spinning my wheels and nothing is working for me. You don't have to upload anything (though you can if you feel like it, of course), just tell me what I'm not listening to that I should be and I'll go from there. I need a new Kings of Leon album. And for Troubled Hubble not to have broken up.
ETA: A very happy birthday to taylorea! I hope you and that adorable family of yours have a wonderful day together.
Fandom: Bones
Pairing: Wendell/Hodgins
Rating: PG
Summary: Preslash. Shared history. ~1500 words.
A/N: This isn't exactly a request ficlet, but I sort of wrote it that way anyway. The idea is 100% cinderlily's, I just stole it and wrote something that probably isn't at all what she was envisioning. Liz, I can scrap this at any time. Totally not married to it. I just needed something to do to keep me out of trouble this morning (seriously going crazy here) and this is what happened. I hope that's okay. If you do like this, please feel free to add onto it. If not, start over and we'll go from there.
After awhile it wasn't so much the words as the way Jack's lips moved around them. The way his mouth curved around the 'o' sound, the way he pursed his lips whenever he said anything that started with a 'w', or even the little line of spit at the corner of his mouth when he got really fired up. Wendell had seen the look before hundreds of times, so he knew what it meant. Still, it was kind of weird to see it on Jack and find it familiar -- comforting, even -- but sort of sexy at the same time.
"I mean, obviously they're not going to keep the alien spacecraft there," Jack was saying, hands moving independently of his brain as he worked on the samples he was analyzing while keeping up a running commentary on a completely different subject. "The minute the news first leaked they started moving things. By the nineties there wasn't a single bit of recognizable alien technology left in the desert. It's all in some underground bunker in, like, North Dakota. Somewhere no one would ever think to look."
"So, what, Area 51's totally empty now?" Wendell asked, leaning forward on the lab station and propping his chin in his hand to watch Jack move around the lab.
"Of course not. They built a complete simulation of the moon underneath the desert."
"I thought that rumor started in the sixties," Wendell said, shifting to the right so he could follow Jack as he crossed to another work station. "If they didn't move the rest of it until the nineties then one of those theories can't be true."
"No, no," Jack said, shaking his head without looking at Wendell. He paused long enough to set a fresh sample onto a slide, then he crossed back to the microscope. He put the slide into the microscope, but instead of leaning over the viewer he looked up at Wendell. "You're thinking of that asinine theory that the Apollo landing was all a hoax. This is completely different. The government's recreating the environmental conditions on the moon so they can control the colonization when we run this planet into the ground."
That was a new one for Wendell, but the only indication he gave that he wasn't buying it was a slight quirk of the corners of his mouth. Still, Jack wasn't the type to miss even the smallest detail, so it was just as well that he'd turned back to the microscope as soon as he finished talking. It wasn't like Wendell was laughing at him, after all, and he didn't want Jack to get the wrong idea. The truth was it was kind of nice to hear a new theory after all the years he'd spent listening to the same ones being rehashed by his old man.
Aliens were a favorite of his father's, but he was pretty into most of the government stuff. JFK, the FBI, secret government agencies; you name it, his father had entertained a theory about it. The newspaper clippings alone were bordering on obsessive, and even though he didn't really buy into any of it, Wendell hadn't been able to let go of them. His mother couldn't get rid of them fast enough, though, so when Wendell left home for grad school he brought with him the notebooks his father had put together over the years. They were sitting on the shelf in his dorm room right now, wedged between the Forensics textbooks and his old lab manuals. He hadn't opened any of them since he moved in, practically, but he liked knowing there were there, full of yellowed newspaper clippings and old photos clipped out of tabloids and notes scrawled in his father's messy handwriting.
"Man, I wonder how you get a gig like that," Wendell said, as much to himself as to Hodgins. He was still watching Hodgins move around, his own work long forgotten and if Dr. Brennan caught him just hanging around admiring the view, he'd probably be off the grad student rotation. But she'd been in court with Booth all day, and he figured what she didn't know wasn't going to hurt either of them. "I mean, all those top secret government scientists. Cheyenne Mountain, Area 51, whatever they've got going on up in North Dakota...and that doesn't even start to cover what's going on right here in D.C. Can you imagine the clearance you'd have to get just to interview for a job like that?"
Jack did look up at him then, frowning suspiciously the way his dad did sometimes when one of Wendell's brothers started egging him on about his own theories. For a few seconds they just looked at each other, Jack trying to decide if Wendell was making fun of him, and Wendell wondering just what Jack's mouth would feel like against his. Then Jack shrugged and turned away, and Wendell blinked a few times and hoped he wasn't blushing as hard as he thought he was.
"They recruit from within, mostly," Jack said, like he'd done careful research on the scientists just as much as the conspiracies. Which made sense, considering, now that Wendell thought about it. "Most of them move up through the ranks as they prove themselves trustworthy. Though if somebody on the internet gets a little too close to the truth the government moves in pretty quickly, and if they're not completely brain-dead they might get recruited."
"And if they are brain-dead?"
"There are other ways of shutting people up."
"Save the conspiracy theories for someone who cares, Mr. Hodgins."
Wendell started at the sound of Cam's voice, pushing off the lab station and looking around for the data he was supposed to be analyzing. He'd set it down...somewhere, then he'd gotten so caught up in the sound of Jack's voice that he'd forgotten all about it.
"I care," he said, blushing even harder when Jack and Cam both looked at him. Jack raised an eyebrow, the corner of his mouth quirking into a grin, and Wendell couldn't help smiling back at him.
"Then save it for when I'm not within earshot," Cam said, rolling her eyes and crossing her arms over her chest in that way that told them she wasn't interested in getting involved in anybody's personal business today. "Now what have you got for me?"
Jack switched gears instantly, rattling off the results he'd been compiling while he lectured Wendell on secret government cover-ups. And if Wendell hadn't already known how smart Jack was, the fact that he could handle two completely different subjects at once without losing track of either would have proved it. Wendell, on the other hand, still hadn't even found his print-out. He finally spotted it on the table near the edge of the lab, glancing over to make sure Cam was still ignoring him before he crossed the room and picked it up.
He ducked out of the lab and headed down the hall, around the corner to listen for the sound of Cam's heels clicking against the floor before he headed back to the lab where Jack had been holed up all day. He paused in the doorway and just watched for a second, his gaze on Jack's hands as he slid the slide out of the microscope and set it on the table. It took a few seconds to realize that Jack had stopped moving, and when Wendell looked up he found Jack watching him. "What?"
Wendell blushed again, but he smiled and glanced over his shoulder to make sure Cam wasn't lurking anywhere before he answered. "Do you want to get a beer later? There's something I want to show you."
For a few seconds Jack just looked at him, still suspicious but Wendell could tell he was curious. He hoped that was curiosity, anyway, and not the look Jack gave somebody when he was trying to decide whether or not he needed to file for a restraining order. It wasn't even the first time Wendell had invited him out for a beer, but this time felt different somehow. Maybe it was the fact that Jack was looking at him like he'd never seen Wendell before. Or maybe it was spending the whole afternoon hanging out in Jack's lab, just watching him move without worrying about who was going to catch him looking.
"I'm free tonight," Jack finally said, and Wendell let out a breath he didn't know he was holding.
"Good," he said, and he wasn't sure why he was grinning like an idiot, because it wasn't like Jack had just agreed to an actual date or anything. Except it sort of felt that way, and even if he was being delusional, Wendell was going to hold on to this feeling as long as he could. "Good. So I'll see you later."
He tapped his print-out against the door frame and turned on his heel before Jack had a chance to change his mind, grin firmly in place for the rest of the day.
~
Unrelated to the above: Somebody rec me some music. I am in that place where I am just spinning my wheels and nothing is working for me. You don't have to upload anything (though you can if you feel like it, of course), just tell me what I'm not listening to that I should be and I'll go from there. I need a new Kings of Leon album. And for Troubled Hubble not to have broken up.
ETA: A very happy birthday to taylorea! I hope you and that adorable family of yours have a wonderful day together.