Nicotine, Lotrips, Elijah/Viggo, PG
Title: Nicotine
Author: inbetweens
Rating: PG
Pairing: Elijah/Viggo
Disclaimer: Fiction. Characters are actually Real People who would probably be offended by reading this.
Notes: Written for this challenge.
Elijah started smoking because it gave him something to do. Buy cigarettes, or bum a few off of someone older and kindly apathetic. Find a light, go outside. Open, select, hold. Balance between fingers. Feel it there, familiar presence asking to be taken care of. Strike, light. Lighter back into the pocket, and weight between his lips.
And breathe in. Relax, something's getting done.
He smokes now more than ever, but it's still for the same reason. It might be futile, fatal, but he feels like something's being accomplished as he sucks it into his body.
Liv chalks it up to an oral fixation (a phrase the entire nation seemed to adopt in the week after the loud proclamation), citing his fingernails as evidence. The two are mutually exclusive: nail-biting is a nervous habit that he doesn't care to quit, and smoking is a task. He just gets antsy, that's all.
He's sitting on the stairs of the costume trailer, and he feels a little antsy now. Waiting feels like it's nothing, but if he goes to smoke, he won't get to see...
There he is. Strider ambles purposefully across the grass, fully costumed and looking absolutely wretched. It's colder today than it's been in the past two weeks, and every time he comes to stand beside Lij outside of costumes, he looks a little colder, eyes a little more bloodshot. A little more satisfied. Ending his shot as Elijah prepares for his, a passing outside of Costumes that would be almost spiritual if Viggo didn't look as if he'd gotten into a fight with a hurricane. And won.
It's the most beautiful thing Elijah will see all morning, and his fingers feel awkward, empty.
Viggo stops two feet in front of Elijah, sword in hand, damp and somehow sated. His fingers are cold-stained: ghastly pale beneath a tan stretched so thin it seems no more than a half-hearted whim. Strong but war-weary, stoic. Helm's Deep is putting the actors through hell, and Viggo hides it better than the others well save his white knuckles and painfully red fingertips. He catches Elijah's eye for a moment, and nods in greeting, "Good morning."
"Morning," Lij mumbles, and doesn't watch Viggo bring his hands slowly together, fingers interlacing as though it's painful. Quietly discolored skin finds its matching spot and protests because nothing fits the way that it should. He doesn't watch Viggo breathe sharp white heat onto the hands, resuscitation. The smoke-white breath runs through fingers, the way fingers move through hair, and Elijah is definitely not watching it.
And if he does watch, it's only because... Um, because frostbite has suddenly developed sex appeal.
Frost-sucked rather than bitten. That's how cold really is. Draws a finger into its mouth and pulls, leeches warmth out with its tongue rather than its teeth. It looks mildly painful, like they're just short of being numb. Prickling little waves of pain, hissing like static, incessant reminders of the cold.
Viggo rubs his fingers together slowly, as defying the frozen nerves. Elijah's own fingers itch, reminding him that they're all alone, that it's been a long morning already. He could reach out with his warm, thirsty fingers, to feel the sharp cold of Viggo's. He could press a thumb into Viggo's aching skin, and it would burn a little: too warm. Viggo might look at him the way he always does when he thinks Elijah's not looking. Gentle surprise and eventually a smile, confirmation. Elijah could draw the forefinger past his own lips, ice-cold, and bring it back to life. Viggo's eyes would widen, and accidentally gasp in pain or shock or maybe -
It's become a new morning ritual without his permission. Viggo seen through watering, cold eyes and breath turned to smoke. Viggo, detached and tired and triumphant, just like he always is. Viggo and his smug satisfaction that he's already taken on the world and won. Elijah just watches, heart pounding into his body because it wants... something. His lips are parted and he's been sitting here too long, nothing accomplished, same as always. He never does anything these mornings. It's time for a fucking cigarette.
He stands abruptly, glancing at his watch for effect. "I've got fifteen minutes," sounds stupid even in his own ears. He pulls out the pack of cigarettes, see? Just getting the morning smoke. Just doing something, anything, to keep his fingers busy.
"Your drugs are going to kill you, Elijah." Viggo's voice is worn and grainy, but amused almost to the point of being derisive.
Elijah grinds his teeth together, air and expectations crushed between them. He shrugs as he walks past because Viggo doesn't know shit about his drugs. "Probably," and it certainly won't be the nicotine.
Author: inbetweens
Rating: PG
Pairing: Elijah/Viggo
Disclaimer: Fiction. Characters are actually Real People who would probably be offended by reading this.
Notes: Written for this challenge.
Elijah started smoking because it gave him something to do. Buy cigarettes, or bum a few off of someone older and kindly apathetic. Find a light, go outside. Open, select, hold. Balance between fingers. Feel it there, familiar presence asking to be taken care of. Strike, light. Lighter back into the pocket, and weight between his lips.
And breathe in. Relax, something's getting done.
He smokes now more than ever, but it's still for the same reason. It might be futile, fatal, but he feels like something's being accomplished as he sucks it into his body.
Liv chalks it up to an oral fixation (a phrase the entire nation seemed to adopt in the week after the loud proclamation), citing his fingernails as evidence. The two are mutually exclusive: nail-biting is a nervous habit that he doesn't care to quit, and smoking is a task. He just gets antsy, that's all.
He's sitting on the stairs of the costume trailer, and he feels a little antsy now. Waiting feels like it's nothing, but if he goes to smoke, he won't get to see...
There he is. Strider ambles purposefully across the grass, fully costumed and looking absolutely wretched. It's colder today than it's been in the past two weeks, and every time he comes to stand beside Lij outside of costumes, he looks a little colder, eyes a little more bloodshot. A little more satisfied. Ending his shot as Elijah prepares for his, a passing outside of Costumes that would be almost spiritual if Viggo didn't look as if he'd gotten into a fight with a hurricane. And won.
It's the most beautiful thing Elijah will see all morning, and his fingers feel awkward, empty.
Viggo stops two feet in front of Elijah, sword in hand, damp and somehow sated. His fingers are cold-stained: ghastly pale beneath a tan stretched so thin it seems no more than a half-hearted whim. Strong but war-weary, stoic. Helm's Deep is putting the actors through hell, and Viggo hides it better than the others well save his white knuckles and painfully red fingertips. He catches Elijah's eye for a moment, and nods in greeting, "Good morning."
"Morning," Lij mumbles, and doesn't watch Viggo bring his hands slowly together, fingers interlacing as though it's painful. Quietly discolored skin finds its matching spot and protests because nothing fits the way that it should. He doesn't watch Viggo breathe sharp white heat onto the hands, resuscitation. The smoke-white breath runs through fingers, the way fingers move through hair, and Elijah is definitely not watching it.
And if he does watch, it's only because... Um, because frostbite has suddenly developed sex appeal.
Frost-sucked rather than bitten. That's how cold really is. Draws a finger into its mouth and pulls, leeches warmth out with its tongue rather than its teeth. It looks mildly painful, like they're just short of being numb. Prickling little waves of pain, hissing like static, incessant reminders of the cold.
Viggo rubs his fingers together slowly, as defying the frozen nerves. Elijah's own fingers itch, reminding him that they're all alone, that it's been a long morning already. He could reach out with his warm, thirsty fingers, to feel the sharp cold of Viggo's. He could press a thumb into Viggo's aching skin, and it would burn a little: too warm. Viggo might look at him the way he always does when he thinks Elijah's not looking. Gentle surprise and eventually a smile, confirmation. Elijah could draw the forefinger past his own lips, ice-cold, and bring it back to life. Viggo's eyes would widen, and accidentally gasp in pain or shock or maybe -
It's become a new morning ritual without his permission. Viggo seen through watering, cold eyes and breath turned to smoke. Viggo, detached and tired and triumphant, just like he always is. Viggo and his smug satisfaction that he's already taken on the world and won. Elijah just watches, heart pounding into his body because it wants... something. His lips are parted and he's been sitting here too long, nothing accomplished, same as always. He never does anything these mornings. It's time for a fucking cigarette.
He stands abruptly, glancing at his watch for effect. "I've got fifteen minutes," sounds stupid even in his own ears. He pulls out the pack of cigarettes, see? Just getting the morning smoke. Just doing something, anything, to keep his fingers busy.
"Your drugs are going to kill you, Elijah." Viggo's voice is worn and grainy, but amused almost to the point of being derisive.
Elijah grinds his teeth together, air and expectations crushed between them. He shrugs as he walks past because Viggo doesn't know shit about his drugs. "Probably," and it certainly won't be the nicotine.