Fic: All You Need Are Eyes Tonight (Bones/Torchwood, Seeley Booth/Jack Harkness)
Possibly the longest thing to result from a ficlet prompt. Let this be a lesson to everyone.
Two new fandoms, so I'm not sure where to self-pimp -- comm suggestions are welcome. Where do the people who want to read cracky slash crossovers congregate?
Title: All You Need Are Eyes Tonight
Fandom: Bones/Torchwood
Pairing: Seeley Booth/Jack Harkness
Spoilers/Continuity: s3-ish Bones, post-s2 Torchwood, no real spoilers.
Summary: Seeley Booth makes a choice. For science.
Rating: PG-13 for sexual content.
Word Count: about 1,600.
Disclaimer: Bones is the intellectual property of 20th Century Fox, Far Field, and Josephson Entertainment. Torchwood is the intellectual property of BBC Wales. This original work of fan fiction is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License; attribution should include a link to this Livejournal post. This story is a labor of love, not money, so it's protected in the USA by the fair use provisions of the Copyright Act of 1976. I put on my wizard hat.
Notes: Title is from "Niagara Falls at Night" by Aimee Nezhukumatathil. Inspired by a prompt from bluesauce and held to PG-13 for sapience14. Thanks to callmesandy for the beta!
*
There's an especially bizarre partially decomposed body in a dumpster in New York. Booth spends the whole flight explaining to Bones how Long Island City is part of New York City and located on Long Island, although not all of Long Island is in New York City, and not all of New York City is on Long Island. It's like one of those old comedy routines, and by the time they land, Booth thinks, Those old comedians must have really tired themselves out.
They drive across Queens to the dumpster with the body in it, and Bones is just snapping on her gloves when a man wearing a trench coat and suspenders strides up to them as if emerging from mystical fog and says, "Torchwood. We're taking this one over."
Torchwood is on the very short list of agencies that, if they say they're taking over the investigation, Booth is supposed to turn it over without asking any questions. Bones, on the other hand, has never done anything without asking questions, so she wants to know what Torchwood is, and why Booth is just letting the case go without a fight, and "Aren't we Special Investigations too?"
The Torchwood agent says Bones and Booth are like an Abbott and Costello routine, and Booth laughs because he can imagine Hodgins leaping up on a table and shouting, "Synchronicity! That's what I mean by synchronicity." Which is how Booth even knows that word.
Torchwood-trench-coat-possible-gay-flirting guy is looking at Booth the entire time, one corner of his mouth turned up slightly, eyes focused just below Booth's line of vision. Flirting. With Booth, not with Bones, which is new. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but it's new. He says, "Why don't you give me your card, and if it turns out we can give this one back to you, I'll ring you." There is no way the FBI is getting this case back, but the guy wants Booth's phone number. Booth hands the guy his card, smiling sideways as their hands touch, hoping the guy is observant enough to read the Thanks, but no thanks in his eyes. Hoping Bones is oblivious enough that he won't have to explain this in the car.
They can't get a flight out until tomorrow morning. The good news is, they have hotel rooms and the rental car until then. Booth, not in the mood for the city, stays in his hotel room. He calls Parker, who wants to tell him all about recess, and the distance of his son's voice makes him feel small in the big world.
When he hangs up, he has three missed calls. Two voicemails from Bones, asking him if he wants to get dinner and why he isn't picking up. One call from a restricted number, no message, no way to call it back. Why would he want to?
He calls Bones and says he's staying in, which is not a lie at this very moment, but he can see a pizza place from his hotel room and so goes down for a slice. He stands at the counter that runs along the window and watches all of humankind splash by in the rain.
He blinks fast when he sees the Torchwood agent pass the window. He wonders briefly how the guy found him, but there's GPS in his phone. The last time Booth had to weigh his options this quickly, he was lying in low brush with a rifle in his hand. He decides on a friendly and guiltless smile and, "Of all the pizza places in the world..." But he doesn't finish the sentence, because this isn't really his pizza place, and he's not feeling much like Bogart tonight.
The Torchwood agent gets his slice and stands next to Booth at the counter. He holds out his hand and finally introduces himself. Agent Jack Harkness, but as Booth turns the name around in his head, he knows that's not right. Admiral Jack Harkness. The Honorable Jack Harkness, Esquire.
"Wow. Sometimes I forget that the Welsh have not mastered the art of pizza," Jack Harkness says.
"The Welsh?"
"I'm based in Cardiff." He reaches out like he's about to put a hand on Booth's arm, but he rubs two greasy fingers together and makes a face. Using his dirty hands as a way to cover for thinking better of a social error.
Booth starts to ask him what he's doing in New York, but he assumes that's classified. "Listen, I -- with the phone number, I --"
Jack Harkness laughs. The joke is classified, too. "I didn't think you were actually going to sleep with me. But sometimes it's nice to know that someone would."
Booth is chewing, and he's chewing on the idea, too. It is kind of a nice thing. And it would be a nice thing if he could say yes. Yes, this is a strange city, and I will never see you again, and we are both consenting adults, and holy cow has it been a while. He'd like to be able to take the offer and wonders what's stopping him. People decide all the time who they're going to be attracted to. He's decided against it with Bones and again with Cam after they broke up the second time. He doesn't think it really works in the other direction, though, with being attracted to someone because you want to be.
Maybe he's been spending too much time with squints, but he feels the urge to prove this scientifically.
"But you're here about the case," Booth says. He's slow-playing his hand.
"Oh, that. Not really. But the body, it -- it fits with some patterns we've seen in Wales, so it's -- good they asked me to come to New York."
Booth stops himself just short of exclaiming, A transatlantic serial killer! That's so cool! And awful. Unfortunately, he doesn't come up with something else to say instead.
Jack nods up and across the street at Booth's hotel. "It's really coming down out there. The rain."
The only polite answer to that is, "Do you want to come up? I mean. For the free towels."
In the elevator, their fingers are almost touching. Jack is grinning, and it looks like the anticipation is part of what's making him so happy. Booth, well, he needs a minute, because he's going through with this, and that's making his mind race. He's trying to figure out how it will feel. He's trying to remember if he brought protection on this trip, although Jack looks like the kind of guy who never leaves home without a condom in his back pocket. Or maybe that's what the trench coat's for.
Inside the hotel room, Booth expects to be mauled by the overzealous gay guy, especially because that's how these business-trip one-night-stands usually work. You're trying to get it over with before you start to feel ashamed. But Jack approaches Booth slowly, as if training him. Booth has to fight each chance to change his mind by digging his heels into the carpet.
He means to give Jack a serious, romantic kiss, the kind of kiss he's used to get at least a dozen women into bed, but as he leans in, his neck stiffens and it's more like a junior-high dance. He tries to close his eyes tighter, but there's already no light getting through. He tells himself it's just a kiss, the same mouths and tongues no matter what you've got between your legs.
But everything about it is wrong. Jack's height, and the roughness of his cheeks. The size of his head. Booth has never compared head sizes, but it's like there's too much of Jack to hold. And there's a smell, like a public-gym locker room only gentler and cleaner. Not horrible, but it doesn't make Booth want to tear anyone's clothes off.
Booth puts all that in the back of his mind. He adapts to it the way he's adapted to three hours of sleep before a four-AM muster, to running up mountains in 90-degree heat while carrying two tents and a bag of medical supplies on his back. All kinds of things that are far less pleasant than being kissed.
It is a good kiss, a new kiss. It's like Jack is overestimating Booth's tongue and assuming he'll keep up. Booth is swallowing Jack's breath and trying to hang on to the hair at the back of Jack's neck. Jack's hands are down Booth's back to his butt and then up his shirt, squeezing his nipples. Jack is an expert, and he's turning Booth on. Until Booth thinks about smell or texture or where his own hands are, and he pulls himself out of the moment.
Suddenly, and so sharply that Booth thinks he hears the sound of a suction cup yanked away from tile, Jack releases him and backs away. "It's okay. You're not into it." Jack has a sad smile on his face, and he's holding his palms out and away, white flag, cease fire. "I appreciate it, though. That you gave it a shot."
Booth tells him it's fine, keep going, he's having fun. And he is. But it's a fun experiment. It's not what he would want if he were in Jack's position: curiosity and misplaced generosity. Pity.
"You're straight. You're really straight." Jack's voice is damp with regret, like Booth reminds him of someone he used to know.
Or someone he knows now. "Is there... someone else?" Booth ventures.
"Not really. It's an open relationship." But he says it fast and then bites his lip, guilty. "It was... a lovely surprise to have met you." He bends and kisses Booth's hand before he puts his coat on and leaves. He seems to float as he shuts the door behind him.
Two new fandoms, so I'm not sure where to self-pimp -- comm suggestions are welcome. Where do the people who want to read cracky slash crossovers congregate?
Title: All You Need Are Eyes Tonight
Fandom: Bones/Torchwood
Pairing: Seeley Booth/Jack Harkness
Spoilers/Continuity: s3-ish Bones, post-s2 Torchwood, no real spoilers.
Summary: Seeley Booth makes a choice. For science.
Rating: PG-13 for sexual content.
Word Count: about 1,600.
Disclaimer: Bones is the intellectual property of 20th Century Fox, Far Field, and Josephson Entertainment. Torchwood is the intellectual property of BBC Wales. This original work of fan fiction is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License; attribution should include a link to this Livejournal post. This story is a labor of love, not money, so it's protected in the USA by the fair use provisions of the Copyright Act of 1976. I put on my wizard hat.
Notes: Title is from "Niagara Falls at Night" by Aimee Nezhukumatathil. Inspired by a prompt from bluesauce and held to PG-13 for sapience14. Thanks to callmesandy for the beta!
*
There's an especially bizarre partially decomposed body in a dumpster in New York. Booth spends the whole flight explaining to Bones how Long Island City is part of New York City and located on Long Island, although not all of Long Island is in New York City, and not all of New York City is on Long Island. It's like one of those old comedy routines, and by the time they land, Booth thinks, Those old comedians must have really tired themselves out.
They drive across Queens to the dumpster with the body in it, and Bones is just snapping on her gloves when a man wearing a trench coat and suspenders strides up to them as if emerging from mystical fog and says, "Torchwood. We're taking this one over."
Torchwood is on the very short list of agencies that, if they say they're taking over the investigation, Booth is supposed to turn it over without asking any questions. Bones, on the other hand, has never done anything without asking questions, so she wants to know what Torchwood is, and why Booth is just letting the case go without a fight, and "Aren't we Special Investigations too?"
The Torchwood agent says Bones and Booth are like an Abbott and Costello routine, and Booth laughs because he can imagine Hodgins leaping up on a table and shouting, "Synchronicity! That's what I mean by synchronicity." Which is how Booth even knows that word.
Torchwood-trench-coat-possible-gay-flirting guy is looking at Booth the entire time, one corner of his mouth turned up slightly, eyes focused just below Booth's line of vision. Flirting. With Booth, not with Bones, which is new. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but it's new. He says, "Why don't you give me your card, and if it turns out we can give this one back to you, I'll ring you." There is no way the FBI is getting this case back, but the guy wants Booth's phone number. Booth hands the guy his card, smiling sideways as their hands touch, hoping the guy is observant enough to read the Thanks, but no thanks in his eyes. Hoping Bones is oblivious enough that he won't have to explain this in the car.
They can't get a flight out until tomorrow morning. The good news is, they have hotel rooms and the rental car until then. Booth, not in the mood for the city, stays in his hotel room. He calls Parker, who wants to tell him all about recess, and the distance of his son's voice makes him feel small in the big world.
When he hangs up, he has three missed calls. Two voicemails from Bones, asking him if he wants to get dinner and why he isn't picking up. One call from a restricted number, no message, no way to call it back. Why would he want to?
He calls Bones and says he's staying in, which is not a lie at this very moment, but he can see a pizza place from his hotel room and so goes down for a slice. He stands at the counter that runs along the window and watches all of humankind splash by in the rain.
He blinks fast when he sees the Torchwood agent pass the window. He wonders briefly how the guy found him, but there's GPS in his phone. The last time Booth had to weigh his options this quickly, he was lying in low brush with a rifle in his hand. He decides on a friendly and guiltless smile and, "Of all the pizza places in the world..." But he doesn't finish the sentence, because this isn't really his pizza place, and he's not feeling much like Bogart tonight.
The Torchwood agent gets his slice and stands next to Booth at the counter. He holds out his hand and finally introduces himself. Agent Jack Harkness, but as Booth turns the name around in his head, he knows that's not right. Admiral Jack Harkness. The Honorable Jack Harkness, Esquire.
"Wow. Sometimes I forget that the Welsh have not mastered the art of pizza," Jack Harkness says.
"The Welsh?"
"I'm based in Cardiff." He reaches out like he's about to put a hand on Booth's arm, but he rubs two greasy fingers together and makes a face. Using his dirty hands as a way to cover for thinking better of a social error.
Booth starts to ask him what he's doing in New York, but he assumes that's classified. "Listen, I -- with the phone number, I --"
Jack Harkness laughs. The joke is classified, too. "I didn't think you were actually going to sleep with me. But sometimes it's nice to know that someone would."
Booth is chewing, and he's chewing on the idea, too. It is kind of a nice thing. And it would be a nice thing if he could say yes. Yes, this is a strange city, and I will never see you again, and we are both consenting adults, and holy cow has it been a while. He'd like to be able to take the offer and wonders what's stopping him. People decide all the time who they're going to be attracted to. He's decided against it with Bones and again with Cam after they broke up the second time. He doesn't think it really works in the other direction, though, with being attracted to someone because you want to be.
Maybe he's been spending too much time with squints, but he feels the urge to prove this scientifically.
"But you're here about the case," Booth says. He's slow-playing his hand.
"Oh, that. Not really. But the body, it -- it fits with some patterns we've seen in Wales, so it's -- good they asked me to come to New York."
Booth stops himself just short of exclaiming, A transatlantic serial killer! That's so cool! And awful. Unfortunately, he doesn't come up with something else to say instead.
Jack nods up and across the street at Booth's hotel. "It's really coming down out there. The rain."
The only polite answer to that is, "Do you want to come up? I mean. For the free towels."
In the elevator, their fingers are almost touching. Jack is grinning, and it looks like the anticipation is part of what's making him so happy. Booth, well, he needs a minute, because he's going through with this, and that's making his mind race. He's trying to figure out how it will feel. He's trying to remember if he brought protection on this trip, although Jack looks like the kind of guy who never leaves home without a condom in his back pocket. Or maybe that's what the trench coat's for.
Inside the hotel room, Booth expects to be mauled by the overzealous gay guy, especially because that's how these business-trip one-night-stands usually work. You're trying to get it over with before you start to feel ashamed. But Jack approaches Booth slowly, as if training him. Booth has to fight each chance to change his mind by digging his heels into the carpet.
He means to give Jack a serious, romantic kiss, the kind of kiss he's used to get at least a dozen women into bed, but as he leans in, his neck stiffens and it's more like a junior-high dance. He tries to close his eyes tighter, but there's already no light getting through. He tells himself it's just a kiss, the same mouths and tongues no matter what you've got between your legs.
But everything about it is wrong. Jack's height, and the roughness of his cheeks. The size of his head. Booth has never compared head sizes, but it's like there's too much of Jack to hold. And there's a smell, like a public-gym locker room only gentler and cleaner. Not horrible, but it doesn't make Booth want to tear anyone's clothes off.
Booth puts all that in the back of his mind. He adapts to it the way he's adapted to three hours of sleep before a four-AM muster, to running up mountains in 90-degree heat while carrying two tents and a bag of medical supplies on his back. All kinds of things that are far less pleasant than being kissed.
It is a good kiss, a new kiss. It's like Jack is overestimating Booth's tongue and assuming he'll keep up. Booth is swallowing Jack's breath and trying to hang on to the hair at the back of Jack's neck. Jack's hands are down Booth's back to his butt and then up his shirt, squeezing his nipples. Jack is an expert, and he's turning Booth on. Until Booth thinks about smell or texture or where his own hands are, and he pulls himself out of the moment.
Suddenly, and so sharply that Booth thinks he hears the sound of a suction cup yanked away from tile, Jack releases him and backs away. "It's okay. You're not into it." Jack has a sad smile on his face, and he's holding his palms out and away, white flag, cease fire. "I appreciate it, though. That you gave it a shot."
Booth tells him it's fine, keep going, he's having fun. And he is. But it's a fun experiment. It's not what he would want if he were in Jack's position: curiosity and misplaced generosity. Pity.
"You're straight. You're really straight." Jack's voice is damp with regret, like Booth reminds him of someone he used to know.
Or someone he knows now. "Is there... someone else?" Booth ventures.
"Not really. It's an open relationship." But he says it fast and then bites his lip, guilty. "It was... a lovely surprise to have met you." He bends and kisses Booth's hand before he puts his coat on and leaves. He seems to float as he shuts the door behind him.