Fic: Deja Vu - Chapter Five
Dean is dragged from his room by two of the black-clad intruders. Of the remaining four, two take point and two walk behind him with Carmen.
Dean is trembling and his stomach churns with fear as they head to the elevators. Carmen had told the guys with the guns that Dean was to be escorted straight to Governor Morgan and then she’d sneered at him and told him that he’d be going before a firing squad for sure; that not even his daddy could save him this time.
Dean isn’t exactly sure what she means by that. Not the firing squad bit; that he gets all too well, but the part about his daddy saving him. That didn’t gel with what he knew. He’d gathered, from the snippets of Jensen’s memories that he’s been able to recall, that Jensen and his father don’t get along. Why would he save him? Then again, he isn’t a father himself, but he supposes that not many parents would be cool with the idea of their kid being killed.
The guys dragging Dean come to a stop. One of the point guys presses the button to call the elevator and then they all stand patiently like a bunch of heavily armed office workers and wait for it to arrive. It’s a little surreal and Dean finds himself sniggering quietly, which earns him a smack in the ribs with the butt of an assault rifle. The down arrow above the elevator flashes, the elevator pings and the doors slide open.
Three of Dean’s captors are dead and everyone else has dived for the ground, before Dean has even managed to process the fact that Jay is standing in the elevator, long jean-clad legs spread wide for balance, as he rapid fires a handheld Gatling gun.
Dean wonders what it says about him that he’s incredibly turned on right now.
He shakes his head and refocuses on the situation at hand. Two more of his escort are lying unmoving on the ground and Dean’s inner-Jensen decides that he likes these odds. He steps quickly through his cuffs so that his hands are bound in front of him rather than behind, and then he liberates a Sig Sauer tactical pistol from the dead hands of one of his former captors. Before he can do anything useful with it, he has to throw himself out of range of the hand gun that Carmen is suddenly firing at him. She and the one remaining black-clad armed guy are taking cover on the far side of the bank of elevators and Dean returns fire from where he’s hiding behind a convenient pillar. Jay steps out of the elevator and fires and both Carmen and the black-clad guy retreat. Dean doesn’t blame them; the Gatling gun can fire 1000 rounds a minute and when someone as tall and built as Jay comes at you with one, it’s got to be a little scary.
Black clad dude goes down and Carmen puts her gun on the ground and surrenders.
“Honey,” she calls out to Dean. “You’re not gonna let him hurt me, are you? We’re married, remember?”
Jay produces an epic bitchface and turns to glare at Dean. “You got married, Jensen?”
“No,” Dean hurries forward. “Of course I didn’t. The Agency just implanted memories of being married in my head, that’s all.”
Jay scowls. “You have memories of being married. To her.”
“Omigod!” Carmen says. “You’re Jensen Ackles! Holy shit. I knew you were some guy who Morgan had Ghosted rather than executed as a favor to his father, but I had no idea… Wow. All that time, I was shacked up with a celebrity,” she inclines her head and stares at him. “I didn’t recognize you without the beard and the aviator sunglasses and the usual cloud of smoke,” she shakes her head. “Jensen fucking Ackles. Well…fuck me gently with a chainsaw.”
Jay glares at her. “That could be arranged,” he says snippily.
Carmen’s eyes narrow. “You must be the Boy Toy,” she says. “So I guess you know all about that awesome thing he does with his tongue?” she giggles, high pitched and girly and Jay treats Dean to another epic bitchface.
“Oh for fuck’s sake,” Dean says. They really don’t have time for this. “I didn’t touch her, Jay, I swear. And we should probably leave, before Morgan sends in reinforcements.”
The words are barely out of his mouth and Carmen has pulled a knife and is holding it against Jay’s groin. “Yeah, I don’t think so,” she says. “You and lover boy aren’t going anywhere.”
Dean raises his gun and Carmen sneers at him. “Try it,” she says, “and I’ll cut off some parts that you’d probably like him to keep.”
“Jensen?” Jay says. “Your wife’s a bitch.”
“Maybe I should ask for a divorce?” Dean says and squeezes the trigger.
Carmen goes down and Dean is hit by a wave of shock and grief. His Dean-brain is telling him that he just murdered his wife and his inner-Jensen is telling him to get a grip and move before reinforcements arrive.
“C’mon,” Jay says. He abandons the Gatling gun and pulls a Taurus out of the back of his jeans. “We gotta get out of here.”
Jay pulls the keys to the handcuffs out of Carmen’s pocket and releases Dean, and then they go to the fire stairs and run down them, clearing each level as they go.
When they get to the ground floor, Dean peers through the glass panel in the door and sees a group of heavily armed people waiting for the elevator in the lobby.
He gives Jay all the details using military hand signals and then frowns. He really needs to stop being surprised by the things he suddenly finds that he knows.
Jay comes close up beside him. “That door’s alarmed,” he says.
Dean smirks. “It looks pretty calm to me.”
Jay rolls his eyes. “Yeah, cuz that joke never gets old. I’d almost be disappointed if you didn’t make it. Almost.”
Dean looks at him. “Puns are a Jensen thing, huh?”
Jay’s face falls and he looks away. “Yeah. Jen makes really bad puns when he’s stressed. And with what we do,” he pauses and bites at his lip, “well, things are stressful a lot.”
Dean nods. “Thanks for the rescue, by the way,” he says. “How did you know I was in trouble?”
“We’ve got eyes everywhere,” Jay says. “Besides, I was going to come and get you anyway. Misha says you need to see Loretta.”
Dean nods as if that makes sense. “You know,” he says to Jay, “you’re an amazing, badass fighter. For a hooker.”
Jay’s face twists incredulously and then he scowls. “Seriously? I’m not a hooker, you asshat. That’s just a cover.”
Dean can’t pretend that he doesn’t feel a rush of relief at the news. “Oh,” he says. “That’s good.” Jay continues to look epically pissed and Dean figures that he’s just doomed Jensen to a lengthy period of sleeping on the couch. “What about Danneel?” he suddenly wonders out loud. “Is ‘hooker’ just a cover story for her too?”
Jay shrugs. “She’s part of our courier network and she’s got a reputation for being tough and fierce. But I don’t really know her.” He peers out of the glass panel in the door. “They’re leaving,” he says.
They wait until all of the armed guys have gotten into the elevator and then they burst through the fire door and out into the hotel’s lobby.
Ignoring both the wailing alarm and the concierge’s shout, they run past the reception desk and out onto the street. Jay tells Dean to follow him, before heading into a grocery store a few doors down. They sprint in between shelves of canned produce and then push through a swinging double door into the storage room at the rear, before disappearing into the labyrinth of alleyways behind the shopping strip. It all feels very familiar to Dean, and he really hopes that nothing triggers one of those head crushing migraines that make him pass out. Jay leads them through a trapdoor, down into an underground passageway and the sense of déjà vu becomes so strong that Dean stumbles.
“You okay?” Jays says, reaching back to steady Dean with one strong arm.
Dean’s head is throbbing and he’s being assaulting by Jensen’s memories, but he refuses to pass out. “This…right here…” he gasps, “it’s where I first kissed you. Where Jensen first kissed you. We’d just…wiped out the Tax Office’s computer network and you were so high; so happy and I just…Jensen just…couldn’t help himself.”
“Try not to remember,” Jay says, throwing both arms around Dean’s shoulders and hurrying him down the passageway. “Just try not to remember anything until Loretta has a chance to see what she can do. It could be dangerous.”
Dean huffs out a laugh. Or maybe it’s Jensen who laughs. It’s getting a little crowded inside his melon. “You’re kind of unforgettable, Jay,” he says. “The Agency tried to wipe my entire life from my mind, I forgot… everything. I forgot Mars, I forgot my job, I forgot me; but I never forgot you, not even for a day.”
Jay has the goofiest smile on his face, but there’s a heat in his eyes that goes straight to Dean’s groin.
“When you’re back to yourself,” Jay says. “You are so getting laid.”
The passageway comes to a rocky dead end and Jay moves a small stone to one side and presses a red button that’s hidden in an alcove behind it. A section of rock slides away to reveal a large cavernous room, filled with storage shelves, and a dozen armed people with weapons levelled at Dean and Jay.
The door behind them slides closed and the woman nearest to them, a middle-aged blonde woman, lowers her gun.
“Jensen?” she says. “Misha said… but you know what he’s like… I didn’t…You’re alive!”
She comes forward and wraps him in her arms and Dean hugs her back and looks helplessly at Jay.
“Sam Ferris,” Jay says quietly.
She pulls back a little when Jay says her name and Jay reminds her that Jensen isn’t exactly himself right now, that his memories tell him that he’s Dean Winchester.
“Is it safe to bring him here?” a male voice asks.
Jay shrugs. “Misha thinks so. He wants him to see Loretta. She thinks she can reverse the Ghost program, or at least make it recede.”
The man nods. He’s dark-skinned and bald, with a short beard and intense brown eyes.
“I’m Charles,” he says, holding out his hand for Dean to shake. “I’m guessing you don’t remember any of us?”
Dean shakes his head. “I remember Jay,” he says. “I get flashes of other things,” he rubs a hand over his chin. “I remember a guy with really blue eyes and messy dark hair.”
“That’s Misha,” Jay says.
“Okay. Well I remember him a little, but I’m sorry,” he looks at Sam, “I don’t remember anyone else right now.”
“We need to move,” Jay says, apologetically.
He escorts Dean through another secret door, down another long rocky passageway, and then through another secret door, into yet another long rocky passageway.
Another door that looks like a section of rock slides open off to the side, and a man with short dark-blond hair and a woman with long red hair approach. Behind them, in the small room they’ve just exited, Dean can see an impressive array of computers and monitors.
“Dean?” the man says. “We talked on the phone,” he holds his hand out and Dean shakes it.
“Dr Badass?” Dean says, recognizing the voice.
The redhead sniggers and the man blushes a little. “That’s just my online handle. It’s Chad really.”
“And I’m Felicia,” the redhead says. “You…well, Jensen, and me, we’re like this,” she crosses her index and middle fingers. “I’m the one who talked you through bugging the Agency’s computer systems for us.”
“Oh,” Dean says. “Okay.” He massages his temple as he feels his head starting to throb again.
“I need to get him to Loretta,” Jay says. Dean misses whatever response the computer nerds might’ve made, because his brain is being flooded with memories of walking through a wide glass sliding door, showing his pass and exchanging pleasantries with the guys on the security desk, and then taking a glass elevator up to Governor Morgan’s office, with Felicia’s voice in his earpiece singing I’m walking on sunshine to distract him from how fucking nervous he is.
When he’s able to focus on his surroundings again, Jay is half carrying him through what appears to be a large cave, full of tents. It’s hotter in this area than the previous areas and it dawns on Dean that the temperature in these subterranean passageways is much cooler than in the main part of the dome.
The smell in this section is a little overwhelming, though; sweat and salt and spice and cinnamon and something he can’t quite put a finger on which is screaming home in the far recesses of his brain.
There’s a one-armed woman hanging out washing and a small gathering of children are being given lessons in reading and writing by a gaunt-faced woman with grey hair.
“What the hell?” Dean says to Jay. “What is this place?”
Jay looks down at him, relieved. “You’re back with us, huh? You gotta stop remembering stuff, man.”
“I can’t help it,” Dean snaps. “What’s with the tents?”
“Oh,” Jay looks around. “Right. You wouldn’t… refugees. Governor Morgan decided that Morganville-the shanty town of people who got too badly injured in the mine collapse two years ago to keep working-anyway, he decided the area was a drain on the colony’s resources, so he shut off the air. We were able to break in and get…maybe two thirds of them out before they suffocated to death.”
“Fuck,” Dean says. “Fucking prick!”
They pass close by a tent with a campfire out the front. A man with one leg and one eye, half his face marred by ugly scar tissue, is stirring some kind of stew and the sweet, spicy scent of it triggers another barrage of memories, so painful and intense that Dean blacks out.
When Dean comes to, he’s lying on a thick orange and green woven mat on the floor of a…room. A yali, his inner-Jensen supplies. Dean sits up and hands rush to help him. Not Jay’s hands. Dark hands; the hands of a woman. His head throbs with agony, the ceaseless scent of spice and cloves and cinnamon, triggering a near-constant barrage of micro-memories.
I’m dying, he thinks, and the woman takes his head in her hands.
“Not on my watch,” she says. She closes her eyes and begins to hum.
The pain in his head intensifies, but the woman-Loretta, his inner-Jensen supplies-is anchoring him and he can’t pass out, despite the fact that he really, really wants to.
“Easy now, Dean,” she says and he opens his eyes, even though he doesn’t remember closing them. He’s standing in a blank white room and Loretta is standing opposite him.
“Where are we?” he asks.
She smiles. “I don’t want to get jargon-y on you, sweetheart. Can you just accept that we’re going to find Jensen?”
Dean frowns. “I…yeah. I guess.”
“That’s wonderful. She takes his hand. “Lead the way, then.”
Dean gapes at her. “I don’t know where Jensen is! Why the hell would I know where he is?”
Loretta sighs. “You’ve been searching for him in your dreams,” she says. “You’re getting better at it, closer. We’ll find him together. Okay, sugar?”
And it’s as if her words unlock some hitherto inaccessible part of his mind. Suddenly, Dean remembers nights spent wandering a stony labyrinth, trying to find whoever was calling his name. No, Dean frowns. Not his name. Jensen’s name. No… he was Jensen. In the dream…he’s not Dean. He’s Jensen and someone is calling for him.
“I’m Jensen,” he tells Loretta. “And somebody’s looking for me.” He frowns again. “But…I’m Dean…”
“Don’t force it, sweetie,” Loretta says. “Just let it come.”
Dean closes his eyes and let’s himself relax and that’s when he hears it; “Jen-sen. Jen-sen,” called again and again. He opens his eyes and finds that the blank white room they’d been in has morphed into a dimly lit grey stone passageway.
He begins to walk and then grinds to a halt when he gets to a dead end.
“Why did you stop?” Loretta asks.
Dean gestures at the wall of solid stone in front of them. “Dead end,” he says.
Loretta peers at him and then out toward the solid wall in front of them. “Ah,” she says. “They’ve put blocks in. Clever.” She pats him on the hand. “You just focus on getting us where we need to go. I’ll take care of those blocks. Shut your eyes, honey, and just listen to the voice.”
He does as she says.
“That’s it, sugar,” she encourages, and Dean walks forward, toward the voice that’s calling out to Jensen. He knows he should walk slap bang into a stone wall, but somehow he doesn’t, so he stops worrying about potential obstructions and just focuses on getting to the voice.
“Took you long enough,” says the voice and Dean opens his eyes.
The man standing in front of him is him, but not him. He’s a little leaner than Dean, with a light beard, and carefully styled hair. He’s wearing a silver pin-striped suit with a silver shirt and an olive green tie, and Dean can’t see his eyes because he’s wearing mirrored aviator sunglasses. He flips a cigarette out of a packet and then lights it with a silver cigarette lighter.
“Still,” the man-Jensen, Dean supposes-takes a drag on the cigarette. “I guess you did pretty good for a construction worker.”
Dean frowns and then he yanks off Jensen’s sunglasses. “Take those off, you douchebag,” he says.
Jensen’s (green) eyes widen. “You do realize you just insulted yourself, right?”
Dean shrugs. “We’re not the same person,” he says. “We might each be, uh, a fragment of, of, uh, a total, um, like, we’re different compartments of-”
“Oh God,” Jensen groans. “You’ve been talking to Misha, haven’t you? I swear if you tell me that we’re different parts of a dragonfly’s eye, I will punch you.”
Dean smirks. “You’d only be hurting yourself,” he says. “And no, I haven’t spoken to Misha. Loretta’s been trying to help me,” he frowns. “And speaking of, where is she?”
“Okay, this is good,” Jensen says. “Loretta knows what to do. In theory,” Jensen nods. “She’s gonna be able to dig me out of here.”
“Here being our brain?” Dean says.
Jensen frowns. “My brain. You’re just an artificial construct.”
Dean’s eyes narrow. “Wow. I can’t believe that I’m actually a great big bag of dicks. What a letdown.”
Jensen’s lips thin and then he mutters a grudging apology. “Could’ve put that better,” he admits. He runs a hand through his hair and sighs. “Actually,” he says, “our core personalities are the same. The Ghost program just changes a person’s memories.” Jensen looks Dean up and down, his eyes assessing and cataloguing. “You’re not going to cease to exist,” he says. “In case you were worried. Loretta is going to try to integrate us, but we’ll both still be in here,” he taps his head.
Dean nods. “So if we’re actually having this conversation inside your brain and I’m an artificial construct, then what are you?”
Jensen screws up his nose. “A residual self-image.”
“Huh,” Dean inclines his head. “Well, I don’t smoke and I’ve been driving the meatsuit for the past couple months, so maybe you could keep going with that?”
Jensen’s nose wrinkles. “Meatsuit? That’s grotesque.”
Dean grins. “But accurate. So. Any idea what happens next?”
“Loretta should give us some sort of,” Jensen pauses and then he closes his eyes. He frowns and then rubs a hand across his chin. “I, uh. I think she wants us to hold hands.”
Dean grins wickedly. “Hey,” he says, “do you think if we had sex it would count as sex? Or would it just be advanced masturbation?”
Jensen stares at him.
“Sorry,” Dean says, rubbing the back of his neck. “I make bad jokes when I’m nervous.”
Jensen smiles, a sudden, wide, genuine smile that makes his eyes crinkle. “Me too,” he says.
“C’mon then,” Dean wipes his hands on the thighs of his jeans and then holds them out for Jensen to hold.
“Ah what the hell,” Jensen says. He bypasses Dean’s hands and hauls him in close, wrapping his arms around his neck and shoulders. “It’s not every day you get to give yourself a hug. My therapist would be so proud.”
“You have a therapist?”
“Not any more,” Jensen says. “Now I have a Rebel army. Much more therapeutic.”
And then Dean is in freefall, tumbling through long forgotten memories; he’s four and staring at the portrait of the beautiful lady that hangs in the foyer of his large, cold house; he’s seven and eating with the servants in the kitchen because his dad is away again on a business trip; he’s eleven and his father is shouting at him, telling him that a half-Martian mutant is not a suitable playmate for a boy from the Upper District; that the children of the Help, aren’t suitable playmates for an Ambassador’s son; he’s fourteen and being sent away to Boarding School on Earth, because his father caught him kissing another boy; on and on the memories tumble and he’s Jensen; he knows he’s Jensen; he feels like Jensen. He’s strapped down to a gurney, a helmet of electrodes fastened to his head and you’re lucky, Governor Jeff Morgan says to him, I’m giving you a second chance because your father begged me to. I’ll even do him a favor and give him the straight son he always wanted. He remembers indescribable agony, he remembers losing himself, he remembers…
He wakes slowly. He’s lying on something soft. He’s warm. He can smell tsebhi cooking somewhere close by, extra spicy, just the way he likes it. He inhales deeply and detects the more subtle aroma of Martian coffee brewing. God, he’d kill for a cup. Jensen groans and sits up cautiously. His head feels…too big. He can feel memories sloshing around inside his skull and they’re not all his. He inclines his head to one side and then processes the fact that he’s sitting on Loretta’s sleeping mat, surrounded by sheer white dust nets and…fuck. Dean.
Jensen puts his head in his hands. That fucking bastard Morgan had stolen two months of his life; had tried to turn him into someone he wasn’t. Jensen stumbles to his feet and tries to fight his way out of the dust nets, before composing himself enough to gather them up and tie them back.
Oh God. They’d made him forget who he was. He’d been living on Earth. Jensen’s breath comes in fast shallow bursts. He’d…had a wife. Jensen feels sick. He’s going to be sick. He… needs to calm the fuck down. Funnily enough, the last thought is accompanied by an image of Dean with one eyebrow raised. Jensen takes a slow deep breath. He’s feeling pretty fucking violated right now, but when all’s said and done, Dean did good. Dean got him home. In fact, he’ll go so far as to admit, grudgingly, that Dean’s okay. For a guy who wears plaid. Jensen shudders.
The curtains between Loretta’s sleeping quarters and the living area of her yali are pushed back and Jared is there, hovering uncertainly in the doorway like a yeti.
“Jared,” Jensen says and there’s an entire universe of meaning in that one word.
Jared’s eyes flutter closed and then they’re both moving forward and wrapping their arms around each other, holding each other close. Jensen’s eyes are screwed shut and his nose is buried in Jared’s neck. “Jared,” he says. “I missed you so fucking much!”
Jared’s laugh is a little shaky. “No you didn’t. You couldn’t remember me.”
Jensen drags Jared to sit on the sleeping mat, not losing body contact for a single second. “I remembered you,” he says. “Dean told you that.”
Jared’s eyes flicker uncertainly. “Is he still in there?”
Jensen isn’t quite sure how to answer that. “Dean isn’t really a different person,” he says. “He’s just me with different memories and experiences,” he shrugs. “I think he’s always gonna be a part of me. I think I’m always gonna have an ‘inner-Dean’,” Jensen angles himself so that he can look at Jared square on, but he doesn’t let go of his lover’s hands. “The Ghosting didn’t really take properly. I think, partly, I just didn’t believe in a life that didn’t have you in it.”
Jared’s eyes are large and warm and liquid. “I missed you so Goddamn much,” he whispers. “The only thing that stopped me from taking a topside walk without a suit was the fact that I wanted to make Morgan pay.”
“Jay, no,” Jensen pulls him close again.
They’re holding each other for comfort and reassurance, but it isn’t long before that changes and Jensen pulls back and looks searchingly into Jared’s eyes before slowly bringing his lips to the younger man’s. Jared surges forward, all passion and need, and Jensen responds in kind, plundering Jared’s mouth with his tongue, his hands tangling in Jared’s hair in an attempt to bring him closer, although how Jared could be closer without Jensen slipping inside his skin is a mystery.
A loud throat-clearing makes them break apart. “I will throw cold water on you if I have to,” Loretta says. “Don’t think that I won’t.”
Jared ducks his head.
“Sorry,” Jensen says. And then, because apparently he’s hugging everyone today, he stands up and pulls Loretta into an embrace. “Thank you,” he says.
Loretta tells him that’s he welcome and then invites both him and Jared to come and have a bowl of tsebhi.
“God, yes,” Jensen says. “And I’d kill for a proper coffee, too.”
Jensen sits cross-legged on the mat by Loretta’s hearth and mops up hot stew with Martian flatbread. The tsebhi is awesome. It’s like an orgasm in his mouth. Jensen frowns. Actually, that’s not really true. Jared orgasms in his mouth on a fairly regular basis and the tsebhi is nothing like that.
Loretta smacks the back of his head and glares and Jared is staring intently at his stew, pink-cheeked. And yeah, in some ways Jensen really hasn’t missed being around psychics all the time. Of course, the way Jared can read his mind to improve the sex between them is pretty awesome, and Loretta smacks the back of his head again.
“Sorry,” he gripes, “my ‘dealing with psychics’ skills are rusty!”
“So what was it like?” Jared says. “Being Dean?”
It’s a very obvious attempt to drag his brain away from sex, and Jensen goes with it.
“He liked to wear plaid,” he says with a pout. “And, oh God, he had to wear an orange safety vest and a hard hat. And he had to use a drill. Every day.”
“Very manly,” Jared says. He even manages to keep a straight face for a few seconds before he bursts out laughing.
Jensen exaggerates his pout, because he likes to watch Jared laugh.
“Actually,” he says, “I quite liked using the drill. There’s something very satisfying about building stuff.”
Jared licks his lips, his eyes wickedly wide. He darts a look at Loretta seconds before she smacks his upper arm. “That’s it,” she says, “we need to finish up so that you two can get out of here before you set fire to my yali with your lustful thoughts!”
Jensen doesn’t need to be told twice. He finishes mopping up the last of his stew with the flatbread and then drinks down the last of his coffee, before clearing away all of the plates to Loretta’s washing trough.
“Would you like us to stay and help you tidy up?” Jared asks Loretta.
She shakes her head and then turns to Jensen. “Sit back down and tell me how you’re doing, sweetie,” she says.
Dean goes and sits cross-legged in front of her. “I can feel Dean’s fake memories sliding around in here,” he taps his head, “but now that my genuine memories are back, they feel somehow… less real.”
She quizzes him for a while, asking him random questions that span his entire lifetime. There are gaps, here and there, memories that won’t come; questions that bring false Dean-memories sparking to life, but there’s no doubting that he’s Jensen again.
“I can even remember our holo activation code,” he tells Jared. “494. Even Dean remembered it,” he chuckles. And then frowns. “No way. Sonofabitch,” he huffs. “Dean’s holo code was 147 which is radio code for ‘undercover officer’. Carmen’s idea of a joke, I guess.”
Jensen bites at his lip. He almost doesn’t like to ask, but he needs to know. “Jared was worried that Morgan might’ve set up some sort of psychic time bomb in my head; that I might’ve been programmed to do some sort of damage, given the right trigger. Did you find anything like that?”
“I did,” Loretta’s eyes flick to Jared’s. “But it’s been dealt with.”
“What was it?” Jensen says. “What was I programmed to do?”
There’s a long moment of silence and Jensen glares.
“I need to know,” he insists.
Loretta remains tight-lipped, so he turns to Jared. “I know she told you. C’mon, man. I need to know.”
Jared has a silent conversation with Loretta and then relents with a sigh. “You were programmed to kill any man you had sex with.”
Jensen blinks. “So, you, basically.”
Jared shrugs. “Your Ghost persona was programmed to be straight, but, uh…” Jared pauses, “I guess if you, um,”
“Slipped and fell on some guy’s dick?” Jensen says flatly.
“Right. If you did that, I guess they wanted that to make trouble for you.”
Suddenly Jensen really wants a cigarette. “Sounds like the sort of asshole thing my father would do,” he says.
Loretta reaches out and grips his hands. “Well I got rid of that trigger, so you don’t need to worry. You’re safe, Jensen.”
Jensen takes a deep breath and inhales the scent of cinnamon, cloves, curry spice and coffee that is so distinctly Mars, so distinctly home. He looks across at Jared, who’s observing him cautiously. Jared looks tired and there’s turbulence behind his wide, watchful eyes.
“Jared?” he says, standing up and wrapping his hands around his partner’s hips. “Take me home?”
Their yali smells strongly of incense and dust and it feels unlived in.
“I got some food in,” Jared says, “and I changed the sheets on the bed and burned some desert sage to freshen the place up. But I’ve been staying with friends, the last couple of months. I couldn’t stand being here without you.”
He looks shamefaced and Jensen wraps him in another hug and says that he understands. He pulls back and takes Jared by the hand and leads him into the bedroom.
“I need you,” he says. “Need to touch you. Need you to touch me. Need to be inside you.”
“God, yes,” Jared breathes. He fists his hands in Jensen’s tee-shirt and falls back onto the bed, pulling Jensen down with him.
Jensen goes with it, falling in between Jared’s spread legs and grinding against him. He’s feeling a little bit like a caveman or a wolf right now, if truth be told; feeling a need to re-stake his claim on Jared, to mark his territory, to show the world that Jared is his and he is Jared’s and nothing can ever truly separate them.
“Yes,” Jared says, reaching up and pulling Jensen down to kiss him. “Yours,” he says, between brief, biting kisses. “All yours. Need this. Want to feel it. Want to feel it for weeks.”
Jensen slides his tongue in between Jared’s lips as soon as Jared stops speaking. He plunders his mouth thoroughly, licking his way inside, and thrusting deeply, while pressing his lips hard against Jared’s, nipping and sucking and biting. Jared’s hands come around and paw at his ass, grabbing and squeezing, and Jensen rocks harder against him, thrusting against the swollen outline of Jared’s cock until Jared moans and arches his back. That’s Jensen’s cue to pull away and start stripping. He rips off his tee-shirt and Jared sits up and sucks one of Jensen’s nipples into his mouth.
“Fuck,” Jensen swears. “Need you naked,” he pulls at the hem of Jared’s tee-shirt and Jared sits back and starts to take his clothes off. They get naked quickly and then Jared rolls over and pulls open their bedside drawer. He pulls out a pot of salve and a condom and turns back to face Jensen. He looks at him for a moment and Jensen is struck, as he is always struck, by the contrast between Jared’s powerful, muscled physique and the soft, warm innocence of his eyes. Jared smiles and lowers his eyes and Jensen knows that his partner is skimming his mind.
He holds his hand out for the pot of salve and Jared gives it to him, along with the condom, and then rolls onto his belly and spreads his legs wide.
Jensen takes a moment to just sit and look. He loves the man spread out before him so damn much and the fact that Morgan and his own fucked-up father tried to take the love of his life away from him makes him tremble with rage. It wasn’t so long ago that he was lying beside Carmen, trying to figure out why it all felt so wrong, feeling sick at the thought of touching her. It wasn’t so long ago that he was dreaming about the long legs that are in front of him right now and wondering why the mere thought of them turned him on so much more than the naked reality of his wife.
Jensen sees Jared’s shoulders tighten and knows he’s picking up on Jensen’s furious thoughts, so Jensen takes a deep calming breath. They tried to wipe Jared from his mind and they failed, and now that he’s back, he’s going to love Jared with every ounce of passion in his being. He unscrews the salve pot’s cap and dips two fingers into the jello-like ointment.
He strokes one slick finger against Jared’s puckered entrance and smiles when Jared sighs and relaxes beneath him. He pushes his finger inside, up to the first knuckle, and then begins to pump in and out. When he works his way in deep enough to find Jared’s p-spot, Jared moans and begins to thrust against the sheets. Jensen pulls out and adds more salve to his fingers before plunging back in with two. He lies down beside Jared and places open-mouthed kisses against his neck and shoulders while he opens him up, slowly and thoroughly. His own cock is lying flush against his stomach, red and swollen, and Jensen begins to rock against Jared’s hip.
“C’mon, Jen,” Jared groans. “That’s enough. Just do it. Get in there. It’s been way too long.”
Yes, it really has.
Jensen pulls his fingers out and wipes them on the sheets before opening the condom and rolling it on. He taps Jared on his hip and Jared gets his knees under him, but keeps his chest down on the mattress. His ass is raised high, his legs spread and Jensen places the sheathed tip of his cock against Jared’s slick pink hole and then slides slowly inside. Jared groans, long and loud, and pushes back against him, and Jensen grasps his hips and grinds in deep. Jared is warm and tight around him and this is life, this is real. Jensen needs Jared to be closer. He sits back on his haunches and hauls Jared up so that he’s sitting on Jensen’s lap. Jared turns his head and Jensen kisses him, lips against lips, pressing and licking. He takes hold of Jared’s cock and begins to stroke it, and Jared lifts and lowers, screwing himself on Jensen’s dick. It’s quiet in the yali, the only sounds the slap of skin on skin, the squelching of bodies coming together and low moans of pleasure. Jensen can feel his orgasm building. He strips Jared’s dick fast, gripping him tightly, twisting his wrist on each upstroke and flicking his thumb over the fat head of Jay’s cock. Jay’s breathing hard now, gasping and moaning, and Jensen can feel him tightening around his cock. He thrusts up hard, and Jared comes, wetting Jensen’s hand. The incredible squeezing tightness milks Jensen’s own orgasm from him and he cries out against Jared’s lips, lazily circling his hips until he comes down from the high.
Jensen holds Jared close and they enjoy the slow wet press of lips and tongues until the way they’re twisted together starts to get uncomfortable. Reluctantly, Jensen pulls out and gets up, padding across to the bathroom, rolling off the condom and dumping it in the trash. He looks up at the mirror and wipes a hand across his five o’clock shadow. His face has matured in the last few years; even without the beard he doesn’t look like some pretty-boy underwear model anymore. He wonders if Jared really does prefer him without the beard or if he was just saying that. He wonders how long they’ve got until Morgan hunts them down. Jensen sighs. Right now is the calm before the storm. They’d better make the most of it.
<
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Return to MasterPost
Dean is trembling and his stomach churns with fear as they head to the elevators. Carmen had told the guys with the guns that Dean was to be escorted straight to Governor Morgan and then she’d sneered at him and told him that he’d be going before a firing squad for sure; that not even his daddy could save him this time.
Dean isn’t exactly sure what she means by that. Not the firing squad bit; that he gets all too well, but the part about his daddy saving him. That didn’t gel with what he knew. He’d gathered, from the snippets of Jensen’s memories that he’s been able to recall, that Jensen and his father don’t get along. Why would he save him? Then again, he isn’t a father himself, but he supposes that not many parents would be cool with the idea of their kid being killed.
The guys dragging Dean come to a stop. One of the point guys presses the button to call the elevator and then they all stand patiently like a bunch of heavily armed office workers and wait for it to arrive. It’s a little surreal and Dean finds himself sniggering quietly, which earns him a smack in the ribs with the butt of an assault rifle. The down arrow above the elevator flashes, the elevator pings and the doors slide open.
Three of Dean’s captors are dead and everyone else has dived for the ground, before Dean has even managed to process the fact that Jay is standing in the elevator, long jean-clad legs spread wide for balance, as he rapid fires a handheld Gatling gun.
Dean wonders what it says about him that he’s incredibly turned on right now.
He shakes his head and refocuses on the situation at hand. Two more of his escort are lying unmoving on the ground and Dean’s inner-Jensen decides that he likes these odds. He steps quickly through his cuffs so that his hands are bound in front of him rather than behind, and then he liberates a Sig Sauer tactical pistol from the dead hands of one of his former captors. Before he can do anything useful with it, he has to throw himself out of range of the hand gun that Carmen is suddenly firing at him. She and the one remaining black-clad armed guy are taking cover on the far side of the bank of elevators and Dean returns fire from where he’s hiding behind a convenient pillar. Jay steps out of the elevator and fires and both Carmen and the black-clad guy retreat. Dean doesn’t blame them; the Gatling gun can fire 1000 rounds a minute and when someone as tall and built as Jay comes at you with one, it’s got to be a little scary.
Black clad dude goes down and Carmen puts her gun on the ground and surrenders.
“Honey,” she calls out to Dean. “You’re not gonna let him hurt me, are you? We’re married, remember?”
Jay produces an epic bitchface and turns to glare at Dean. “You got married, Jensen?”
“No,” Dean hurries forward. “Of course I didn’t. The Agency just implanted memories of being married in my head, that’s all.”
Jay scowls. “You have memories of being married. To her.”
“Omigod!” Carmen says. “You’re Jensen Ackles! Holy shit. I knew you were some guy who Morgan had Ghosted rather than executed as a favor to his father, but I had no idea… Wow. All that time, I was shacked up with a celebrity,” she inclines her head and stares at him. “I didn’t recognize you without the beard and the aviator sunglasses and the usual cloud of smoke,” she shakes her head. “Jensen fucking Ackles. Well…fuck me gently with a chainsaw.”
Jay glares at her. “That could be arranged,” he says snippily.
Carmen’s eyes narrow. “You must be the Boy Toy,” she says. “So I guess you know all about that awesome thing he does with his tongue?” she giggles, high pitched and girly and Jay treats Dean to another epic bitchface.
“Oh for fuck’s sake,” Dean says. They really don’t have time for this. “I didn’t touch her, Jay, I swear. And we should probably leave, before Morgan sends in reinforcements.”
The words are barely out of his mouth and Carmen has pulled a knife and is holding it against Jay’s groin. “Yeah, I don’t think so,” she says. “You and lover boy aren’t going anywhere.”
Dean raises his gun and Carmen sneers at him. “Try it,” she says, “and I’ll cut off some parts that you’d probably like him to keep.”
“Jensen?” Jay says. “Your wife’s a bitch.”
“Maybe I should ask for a divorce?” Dean says and squeezes the trigger.
Carmen goes down and Dean is hit by a wave of shock and grief. His Dean-brain is telling him that he just murdered his wife and his inner-Jensen is telling him to get a grip and move before reinforcements arrive.
“C’mon,” Jay says. He abandons the Gatling gun and pulls a Taurus out of the back of his jeans. “We gotta get out of here.”
Jay pulls the keys to the handcuffs out of Carmen’s pocket and releases Dean, and then they go to the fire stairs and run down them, clearing each level as they go.
When they get to the ground floor, Dean peers through the glass panel in the door and sees a group of heavily armed people waiting for the elevator in the lobby.
He gives Jay all the details using military hand signals and then frowns. He really needs to stop being surprised by the things he suddenly finds that he knows.
Jay comes close up beside him. “That door’s alarmed,” he says.
Dean smirks. “It looks pretty calm to me.”
Jay rolls his eyes. “Yeah, cuz that joke never gets old. I’d almost be disappointed if you didn’t make it. Almost.”
Dean looks at him. “Puns are a Jensen thing, huh?”
Jay’s face falls and he looks away. “Yeah. Jen makes really bad puns when he’s stressed. And with what we do,” he pauses and bites at his lip, “well, things are stressful a lot.”
Dean nods. “Thanks for the rescue, by the way,” he says. “How did you know I was in trouble?”
“We’ve got eyes everywhere,” Jay says. “Besides, I was going to come and get you anyway. Misha says you need to see Loretta.”
Dean nods as if that makes sense. “You know,” he says to Jay, “you’re an amazing, badass fighter. For a hooker.”
Jay’s face twists incredulously and then he scowls. “Seriously? I’m not a hooker, you asshat. That’s just a cover.”
Dean can’t pretend that he doesn’t feel a rush of relief at the news. “Oh,” he says. “That’s good.” Jay continues to look epically pissed and Dean figures that he’s just doomed Jensen to a lengthy period of sleeping on the couch. “What about Danneel?” he suddenly wonders out loud. “Is ‘hooker’ just a cover story for her too?”
Jay shrugs. “She’s part of our courier network and she’s got a reputation for being tough and fierce. But I don’t really know her.” He peers out of the glass panel in the door. “They’re leaving,” he says.
They wait until all of the armed guys have gotten into the elevator and then they burst through the fire door and out into the hotel’s lobby.
Ignoring both the wailing alarm and the concierge’s shout, they run past the reception desk and out onto the street. Jay tells Dean to follow him, before heading into a grocery store a few doors down. They sprint in between shelves of canned produce and then push through a swinging double door into the storage room at the rear, before disappearing into the labyrinth of alleyways behind the shopping strip. It all feels very familiar to Dean, and he really hopes that nothing triggers one of those head crushing migraines that make him pass out. Jay leads them through a trapdoor, down into an underground passageway and the sense of déjà vu becomes so strong that Dean stumbles.
“You okay?” Jays says, reaching back to steady Dean with one strong arm.
Dean’s head is throbbing and he’s being assaulting by Jensen’s memories, but he refuses to pass out. “This…right here…” he gasps, “it’s where I first kissed you. Where Jensen first kissed you. We’d just…wiped out the Tax Office’s computer network and you were so high; so happy and I just…Jensen just…couldn’t help himself.”
“Try not to remember,” Jay says, throwing both arms around Dean’s shoulders and hurrying him down the passageway. “Just try not to remember anything until Loretta has a chance to see what she can do. It could be dangerous.”
Dean huffs out a laugh. Or maybe it’s Jensen who laughs. It’s getting a little crowded inside his melon. “You’re kind of unforgettable, Jay,” he says. “The Agency tried to wipe my entire life from my mind, I forgot… everything. I forgot Mars, I forgot my job, I forgot me; but I never forgot you, not even for a day.”
Jay has the goofiest smile on his face, but there’s a heat in his eyes that goes straight to Dean’s groin.
“When you’re back to yourself,” Jay says. “You are so getting laid.”
The passageway comes to a rocky dead end and Jay moves a small stone to one side and presses a red button that’s hidden in an alcove behind it. A section of rock slides away to reveal a large cavernous room, filled with storage shelves, and a dozen armed people with weapons levelled at Dean and Jay.
The door behind them slides closed and the woman nearest to them, a middle-aged blonde woman, lowers her gun.
“Jensen?” she says. “Misha said… but you know what he’s like… I didn’t…You’re alive!”
She comes forward and wraps him in her arms and Dean hugs her back and looks helplessly at Jay.
“Sam Ferris,” Jay says quietly.
She pulls back a little when Jay says her name and Jay reminds her that Jensen isn’t exactly himself right now, that his memories tell him that he’s Dean Winchester.
“Is it safe to bring him here?” a male voice asks.
Jay shrugs. “Misha thinks so. He wants him to see Loretta. She thinks she can reverse the Ghost program, or at least make it recede.”
The man nods. He’s dark-skinned and bald, with a short beard and intense brown eyes.
“I’m Charles,” he says, holding out his hand for Dean to shake. “I’m guessing you don’t remember any of us?”
Dean shakes his head. “I remember Jay,” he says. “I get flashes of other things,” he rubs a hand over his chin. “I remember a guy with really blue eyes and messy dark hair.”
“That’s Misha,” Jay says.
“Okay. Well I remember him a little, but I’m sorry,” he looks at Sam, “I don’t remember anyone else right now.”
“We need to move,” Jay says, apologetically.
He escorts Dean through another secret door, down another long rocky passageway, and then through another secret door, into yet another long rocky passageway.
Another door that looks like a section of rock slides open off to the side, and a man with short dark-blond hair and a woman with long red hair approach. Behind them, in the small room they’ve just exited, Dean can see an impressive array of computers and monitors.
“Dean?” the man says. “We talked on the phone,” he holds his hand out and Dean shakes it.
“Dr Badass?” Dean says, recognizing the voice.
The redhead sniggers and the man blushes a little. “That’s just my online handle. It’s Chad really.”
“And I’m Felicia,” the redhead says. “You…well, Jensen, and me, we’re like this,” she crosses her index and middle fingers. “I’m the one who talked you through bugging the Agency’s computer systems for us.”
“Oh,” Dean says. “Okay.” He massages his temple as he feels his head starting to throb again.
“I need to get him to Loretta,” Jay says. Dean misses whatever response the computer nerds might’ve made, because his brain is being flooded with memories of walking through a wide glass sliding door, showing his pass and exchanging pleasantries with the guys on the security desk, and then taking a glass elevator up to Governor Morgan’s office, with Felicia’s voice in his earpiece singing I’m walking on sunshine to distract him from how fucking nervous he is.
When he’s able to focus on his surroundings again, Jay is half carrying him through what appears to be a large cave, full of tents. It’s hotter in this area than the previous areas and it dawns on Dean that the temperature in these subterranean passageways is much cooler than in the main part of the dome.
The smell in this section is a little overwhelming, though; sweat and salt and spice and cinnamon and something he can’t quite put a finger on which is screaming home in the far recesses of his brain.
There’s a one-armed woman hanging out washing and a small gathering of children are being given lessons in reading and writing by a gaunt-faced woman with grey hair.
“What the hell?” Dean says to Jay. “What is this place?”
Jay looks down at him, relieved. “You’re back with us, huh? You gotta stop remembering stuff, man.”
“I can’t help it,” Dean snaps. “What’s with the tents?”
“Oh,” Jay looks around. “Right. You wouldn’t… refugees. Governor Morgan decided that Morganville-the shanty town of people who got too badly injured in the mine collapse two years ago to keep working-anyway, he decided the area was a drain on the colony’s resources, so he shut off the air. We were able to break in and get…maybe two thirds of them out before they suffocated to death.”
“Fuck,” Dean says. “Fucking prick!”
They pass close by a tent with a campfire out the front. A man with one leg and one eye, half his face marred by ugly scar tissue, is stirring some kind of stew and the sweet, spicy scent of it triggers another barrage of memories, so painful and intense that Dean blacks out.
When Dean comes to, he’s lying on a thick orange and green woven mat on the floor of a…room. A yali, his inner-Jensen supplies. Dean sits up and hands rush to help him. Not Jay’s hands. Dark hands; the hands of a woman. His head throbs with agony, the ceaseless scent of spice and cloves and cinnamon, triggering a near-constant barrage of micro-memories.
I’m dying, he thinks, and the woman takes his head in her hands.
“Not on my watch,” she says. She closes her eyes and begins to hum.
The pain in his head intensifies, but the woman-Loretta, his inner-Jensen supplies-is anchoring him and he can’t pass out, despite the fact that he really, really wants to.
“Easy now, Dean,” she says and he opens his eyes, even though he doesn’t remember closing them. He’s standing in a blank white room and Loretta is standing opposite him.
“Where are we?” he asks.
She smiles. “I don’t want to get jargon-y on you, sweetheart. Can you just accept that we’re going to find Jensen?”
Dean frowns. “I…yeah. I guess.”
“That’s wonderful. She takes his hand. “Lead the way, then.”
Dean gapes at her. “I don’t know where Jensen is! Why the hell would I know where he is?”
Loretta sighs. “You’ve been searching for him in your dreams,” she says. “You’re getting better at it, closer. We’ll find him together. Okay, sugar?”
And it’s as if her words unlock some hitherto inaccessible part of his mind. Suddenly, Dean remembers nights spent wandering a stony labyrinth, trying to find whoever was calling his name. No, Dean frowns. Not his name. Jensen’s name. No… he was Jensen. In the dream…he’s not Dean. He’s Jensen and someone is calling for him.
“I’m Jensen,” he tells Loretta. “And somebody’s looking for me.” He frowns again. “But…I’m Dean…”
“Don’t force it, sweetie,” Loretta says. “Just let it come.”
Dean closes his eyes and let’s himself relax and that’s when he hears it; “Jen-sen. Jen-sen,” called again and again. He opens his eyes and finds that the blank white room they’d been in has morphed into a dimly lit grey stone passageway.
He begins to walk and then grinds to a halt when he gets to a dead end.
“Why did you stop?” Loretta asks.
Dean gestures at the wall of solid stone in front of them. “Dead end,” he says.
Loretta peers at him and then out toward the solid wall in front of them. “Ah,” she says. “They’ve put blocks in. Clever.” She pats him on the hand. “You just focus on getting us where we need to go. I’ll take care of those blocks. Shut your eyes, honey, and just listen to the voice.”
He does as she says.
“That’s it, sugar,” she encourages, and Dean walks forward, toward the voice that’s calling out to Jensen. He knows he should walk slap bang into a stone wall, but somehow he doesn’t, so he stops worrying about potential obstructions and just focuses on getting to the voice.
“Took you long enough,” says the voice and Dean opens his eyes.
The man standing in front of him is him, but not him. He’s a little leaner than Dean, with a light beard, and carefully styled hair. He’s wearing a silver pin-striped suit with a silver shirt and an olive green tie, and Dean can’t see his eyes because he’s wearing mirrored aviator sunglasses. He flips a cigarette out of a packet and then lights it with a silver cigarette lighter.
“Still,” the man-Jensen, Dean supposes-takes a drag on the cigarette. “I guess you did pretty good for a construction worker.”
Dean frowns and then he yanks off Jensen’s sunglasses. “Take those off, you douchebag,” he says.
Jensen’s (green) eyes widen. “You do realize you just insulted yourself, right?”
Dean shrugs. “We’re not the same person,” he says. “We might each be, uh, a fragment of, of, uh, a total, um, like, we’re different compartments of-”
“Oh God,” Jensen groans. “You’ve been talking to Misha, haven’t you? I swear if you tell me that we’re different parts of a dragonfly’s eye, I will punch you.”
Dean smirks. “You’d only be hurting yourself,” he says. “And no, I haven’t spoken to Misha. Loretta’s been trying to help me,” he frowns. “And speaking of, where is she?”
“Okay, this is good,” Jensen says. “Loretta knows what to do. In theory,” Jensen nods. “She’s gonna be able to dig me out of here.”
“Here being our brain?” Dean says.
Jensen frowns. “My brain. You’re just an artificial construct.”
Dean’s eyes narrow. “Wow. I can’t believe that I’m actually a great big bag of dicks. What a letdown.”
Jensen’s lips thin and then he mutters a grudging apology. “Could’ve put that better,” he admits. He runs a hand through his hair and sighs. “Actually,” he says, “our core personalities are the same. The Ghost program just changes a person’s memories.” Jensen looks Dean up and down, his eyes assessing and cataloguing. “You’re not going to cease to exist,” he says. “In case you were worried. Loretta is going to try to integrate us, but we’ll both still be in here,” he taps his head.
Dean nods. “So if we’re actually having this conversation inside your brain and I’m an artificial construct, then what are you?”
Jensen screws up his nose. “A residual self-image.”
“Huh,” Dean inclines his head. “Well, I don’t smoke and I’ve been driving the meatsuit for the past couple months, so maybe you could keep going with that?”
Jensen’s nose wrinkles. “Meatsuit? That’s grotesque.”
Dean grins. “But accurate. So. Any idea what happens next?”
“Loretta should give us some sort of,” Jensen pauses and then he closes his eyes. He frowns and then rubs a hand across his chin. “I, uh. I think she wants us to hold hands.”
Dean grins wickedly. “Hey,” he says, “do you think if we had sex it would count as sex? Or would it just be advanced masturbation?”
Jensen stares at him.
“Sorry,” Dean says, rubbing the back of his neck. “I make bad jokes when I’m nervous.”
Jensen smiles, a sudden, wide, genuine smile that makes his eyes crinkle. “Me too,” he says.
“C’mon then,” Dean wipes his hands on the thighs of his jeans and then holds them out for Jensen to hold.
“Ah what the hell,” Jensen says. He bypasses Dean’s hands and hauls him in close, wrapping his arms around his neck and shoulders. “It’s not every day you get to give yourself a hug. My therapist would be so proud.”
“You have a therapist?”
“Not any more,” Jensen says. “Now I have a Rebel army. Much more therapeutic.”
And then Dean is in freefall, tumbling through long forgotten memories; he’s four and staring at the portrait of the beautiful lady that hangs in the foyer of his large, cold house; he’s seven and eating with the servants in the kitchen because his dad is away again on a business trip; he’s eleven and his father is shouting at him, telling him that a half-Martian mutant is not a suitable playmate for a boy from the Upper District; that the children of the Help, aren’t suitable playmates for an Ambassador’s son; he’s fourteen and being sent away to Boarding School on Earth, because his father caught him kissing another boy; on and on the memories tumble and he’s Jensen; he knows he’s Jensen; he feels like Jensen. He’s strapped down to a gurney, a helmet of electrodes fastened to his head and you’re lucky, Governor Jeff Morgan says to him, I’m giving you a second chance because your father begged me to. I’ll even do him a favor and give him the straight son he always wanted. He remembers indescribable agony, he remembers losing himself, he remembers…
He wakes slowly. He’s lying on something soft. He’s warm. He can smell tsebhi cooking somewhere close by, extra spicy, just the way he likes it. He inhales deeply and detects the more subtle aroma of Martian coffee brewing. God, he’d kill for a cup. Jensen groans and sits up cautiously. His head feels…too big. He can feel memories sloshing around inside his skull and they’re not all his. He inclines his head to one side and then processes the fact that he’s sitting on Loretta’s sleeping mat, surrounded by sheer white dust nets and…fuck. Dean.
Jensen puts his head in his hands. That fucking bastard Morgan had stolen two months of his life; had tried to turn him into someone he wasn’t. Jensen stumbles to his feet and tries to fight his way out of the dust nets, before composing himself enough to gather them up and tie them back.
Oh God. They’d made him forget who he was. He’d been living on Earth. Jensen’s breath comes in fast shallow bursts. He’d…had a wife. Jensen feels sick. He’s going to be sick. He… needs to calm the fuck down. Funnily enough, the last thought is accompanied by an image of Dean with one eyebrow raised. Jensen takes a slow deep breath. He’s feeling pretty fucking violated right now, but when all’s said and done, Dean did good. Dean got him home. In fact, he’ll go so far as to admit, grudgingly, that Dean’s okay. For a guy who wears plaid. Jensen shudders.
The curtains between Loretta’s sleeping quarters and the living area of her yali are pushed back and Jared is there, hovering uncertainly in the doorway like a yeti.
“Jared,” Jensen says and there’s an entire universe of meaning in that one word.
Jared’s eyes flutter closed and then they’re both moving forward and wrapping their arms around each other, holding each other close. Jensen’s eyes are screwed shut and his nose is buried in Jared’s neck. “Jared,” he says. “I missed you so fucking much!”
Jared’s laugh is a little shaky. “No you didn’t. You couldn’t remember me.”
Jensen drags Jared to sit on the sleeping mat, not losing body contact for a single second. “I remembered you,” he says. “Dean told you that.”
Jared’s eyes flicker uncertainly. “Is he still in there?”
Jensen isn’t quite sure how to answer that. “Dean isn’t really a different person,” he says. “He’s just me with different memories and experiences,” he shrugs. “I think he’s always gonna be a part of me. I think I’m always gonna have an ‘inner-Dean’,” Jensen angles himself so that he can look at Jared square on, but he doesn’t let go of his lover’s hands. “The Ghosting didn’t really take properly. I think, partly, I just didn’t believe in a life that didn’t have you in it.”
Jared’s eyes are large and warm and liquid. “I missed you so Goddamn much,” he whispers. “The only thing that stopped me from taking a topside walk without a suit was the fact that I wanted to make Morgan pay.”
“Jay, no,” Jensen pulls him close again.
They’re holding each other for comfort and reassurance, but it isn’t long before that changes and Jensen pulls back and looks searchingly into Jared’s eyes before slowly bringing his lips to the younger man’s. Jared surges forward, all passion and need, and Jensen responds in kind, plundering Jared’s mouth with his tongue, his hands tangling in Jared’s hair in an attempt to bring him closer, although how Jared could be closer without Jensen slipping inside his skin is a mystery.
A loud throat-clearing makes them break apart. “I will throw cold water on you if I have to,” Loretta says. “Don’t think that I won’t.”
Jared ducks his head.
“Sorry,” Jensen says. And then, because apparently he’s hugging everyone today, he stands up and pulls Loretta into an embrace. “Thank you,” he says.
Loretta tells him that’s he welcome and then invites both him and Jared to come and have a bowl of tsebhi.
“God, yes,” Jensen says. “And I’d kill for a proper coffee, too.”
Jensen sits cross-legged on the mat by Loretta’s hearth and mops up hot stew with Martian flatbread. The tsebhi is awesome. It’s like an orgasm in his mouth. Jensen frowns. Actually, that’s not really true. Jared orgasms in his mouth on a fairly regular basis and the tsebhi is nothing like that.
Loretta smacks the back of his head and glares and Jared is staring intently at his stew, pink-cheeked. And yeah, in some ways Jensen really hasn’t missed being around psychics all the time. Of course, the way Jared can read his mind to improve the sex between them is pretty awesome, and Loretta smacks the back of his head again.
“Sorry,” he gripes, “my ‘dealing with psychics’ skills are rusty!”
“So what was it like?” Jared says. “Being Dean?”
It’s a very obvious attempt to drag his brain away from sex, and Jensen goes with it.
“He liked to wear plaid,” he says with a pout. “And, oh God, he had to wear an orange safety vest and a hard hat. And he had to use a drill. Every day.”
“Very manly,” Jared says. He even manages to keep a straight face for a few seconds before he bursts out laughing.
Jensen exaggerates his pout, because he likes to watch Jared laugh.
“Actually,” he says, “I quite liked using the drill. There’s something very satisfying about building stuff.”
Jared licks his lips, his eyes wickedly wide. He darts a look at Loretta seconds before she smacks his upper arm. “That’s it,” she says, “we need to finish up so that you two can get out of here before you set fire to my yali with your lustful thoughts!”
Jensen doesn’t need to be told twice. He finishes mopping up the last of his stew with the flatbread and then drinks down the last of his coffee, before clearing away all of the plates to Loretta’s washing trough.
“Would you like us to stay and help you tidy up?” Jared asks Loretta.
She shakes her head and then turns to Jensen. “Sit back down and tell me how you’re doing, sweetie,” she says.
Dean goes and sits cross-legged in front of her. “I can feel Dean’s fake memories sliding around in here,” he taps his head, “but now that my genuine memories are back, they feel somehow… less real.”
She quizzes him for a while, asking him random questions that span his entire lifetime. There are gaps, here and there, memories that won’t come; questions that bring false Dean-memories sparking to life, but there’s no doubting that he’s Jensen again.
“I can even remember our holo activation code,” he tells Jared. “494. Even Dean remembered it,” he chuckles. And then frowns. “No way. Sonofabitch,” he huffs. “Dean’s holo code was 147 which is radio code for ‘undercover officer’. Carmen’s idea of a joke, I guess.”
Jensen bites at his lip. He almost doesn’t like to ask, but he needs to know. “Jared was worried that Morgan might’ve set up some sort of psychic time bomb in my head; that I might’ve been programmed to do some sort of damage, given the right trigger. Did you find anything like that?”
“I did,” Loretta’s eyes flick to Jared’s. “But it’s been dealt with.”
“What was it?” Jensen says. “What was I programmed to do?”
There’s a long moment of silence and Jensen glares.
“I need to know,” he insists.
Loretta remains tight-lipped, so he turns to Jared. “I know she told you. C’mon, man. I need to know.”
Jared has a silent conversation with Loretta and then relents with a sigh. “You were programmed to kill any man you had sex with.”
Jensen blinks. “So, you, basically.”
Jared shrugs. “Your Ghost persona was programmed to be straight, but, uh…” Jared pauses, “I guess if you, um,”
“Slipped and fell on some guy’s dick?” Jensen says flatly.
“Right. If you did that, I guess they wanted that to make trouble for you.”
Suddenly Jensen really wants a cigarette. “Sounds like the sort of asshole thing my father would do,” he says.
Loretta reaches out and grips his hands. “Well I got rid of that trigger, so you don’t need to worry. You’re safe, Jensen.”
Jensen takes a deep breath and inhales the scent of cinnamon, cloves, curry spice and coffee that is so distinctly Mars, so distinctly home. He looks across at Jared, who’s observing him cautiously. Jared looks tired and there’s turbulence behind his wide, watchful eyes.
“Jared?” he says, standing up and wrapping his hands around his partner’s hips. “Take me home?”
Their yali smells strongly of incense and dust and it feels unlived in.
“I got some food in,” Jared says, “and I changed the sheets on the bed and burned some desert sage to freshen the place up. But I’ve been staying with friends, the last couple of months. I couldn’t stand being here without you.”
He looks shamefaced and Jensen wraps him in another hug and says that he understands. He pulls back and takes Jared by the hand and leads him into the bedroom.
“I need you,” he says. “Need to touch you. Need you to touch me. Need to be inside you.”
“God, yes,” Jared breathes. He fists his hands in Jensen’s tee-shirt and falls back onto the bed, pulling Jensen down with him.
Jensen goes with it, falling in between Jared’s spread legs and grinding against him. He’s feeling a little bit like a caveman or a wolf right now, if truth be told; feeling a need to re-stake his claim on Jared, to mark his territory, to show the world that Jared is his and he is Jared’s and nothing can ever truly separate them.
“Yes,” Jared says, reaching up and pulling Jensen down to kiss him. “Yours,” he says, between brief, biting kisses. “All yours. Need this. Want to feel it. Want to feel it for weeks.”
Jensen slides his tongue in between Jared’s lips as soon as Jared stops speaking. He plunders his mouth thoroughly, licking his way inside, and thrusting deeply, while pressing his lips hard against Jared’s, nipping and sucking and biting. Jared’s hands come around and paw at his ass, grabbing and squeezing, and Jensen rocks harder against him, thrusting against the swollen outline of Jared’s cock until Jared moans and arches his back. That’s Jensen’s cue to pull away and start stripping. He rips off his tee-shirt and Jared sits up and sucks one of Jensen’s nipples into his mouth.
“Fuck,” Jensen swears. “Need you naked,” he pulls at the hem of Jared’s tee-shirt and Jared sits back and starts to take his clothes off. They get naked quickly and then Jared rolls over and pulls open their bedside drawer. He pulls out a pot of salve and a condom and turns back to face Jensen. He looks at him for a moment and Jensen is struck, as he is always struck, by the contrast between Jared’s powerful, muscled physique and the soft, warm innocence of his eyes. Jared smiles and lowers his eyes and Jensen knows that his partner is skimming his mind.
He holds his hand out for the pot of salve and Jared gives it to him, along with the condom, and then rolls onto his belly and spreads his legs wide.
Jensen takes a moment to just sit and look. He loves the man spread out before him so damn much and the fact that Morgan and his own fucked-up father tried to take the love of his life away from him makes him tremble with rage. It wasn’t so long ago that he was lying beside Carmen, trying to figure out why it all felt so wrong, feeling sick at the thought of touching her. It wasn’t so long ago that he was dreaming about the long legs that are in front of him right now and wondering why the mere thought of them turned him on so much more than the naked reality of his wife.
Jensen sees Jared’s shoulders tighten and knows he’s picking up on Jensen’s furious thoughts, so Jensen takes a deep calming breath. They tried to wipe Jared from his mind and they failed, and now that he’s back, he’s going to love Jared with every ounce of passion in his being. He unscrews the salve pot’s cap and dips two fingers into the jello-like ointment.
He strokes one slick finger against Jared’s puckered entrance and smiles when Jared sighs and relaxes beneath him. He pushes his finger inside, up to the first knuckle, and then begins to pump in and out. When he works his way in deep enough to find Jared’s p-spot, Jared moans and begins to thrust against the sheets. Jensen pulls out and adds more salve to his fingers before plunging back in with two. He lies down beside Jared and places open-mouthed kisses against his neck and shoulders while he opens him up, slowly and thoroughly. His own cock is lying flush against his stomach, red and swollen, and Jensen begins to rock against Jared’s hip.
“C’mon, Jen,” Jared groans. “That’s enough. Just do it. Get in there. It’s been way too long.”
Yes, it really has.
Jensen pulls his fingers out and wipes them on the sheets before opening the condom and rolling it on. He taps Jared on his hip and Jared gets his knees under him, but keeps his chest down on the mattress. His ass is raised high, his legs spread and Jensen places the sheathed tip of his cock against Jared’s slick pink hole and then slides slowly inside. Jared groans, long and loud, and pushes back against him, and Jensen grasps his hips and grinds in deep. Jared is warm and tight around him and this is life, this is real. Jensen needs Jared to be closer. He sits back on his haunches and hauls Jared up so that he’s sitting on Jensen’s lap. Jared turns his head and Jensen kisses him, lips against lips, pressing and licking. He takes hold of Jared’s cock and begins to stroke it, and Jared lifts and lowers, screwing himself on Jensen’s dick. It’s quiet in the yali, the only sounds the slap of skin on skin, the squelching of bodies coming together and low moans of pleasure. Jensen can feel his orgasm building. He strips Jared’s dick fast, gripping him tightly, twisting his wrist on each upstroke and flicking his thumb over the fat head of Jay’s cock. Jay’s breathing hard now, gasping and moaning, and Jensen can feel him tightening around his cock. He thrusts up hard, and Jared comes, wetting Jensen’s hand. The incredible squeezing tightness milks Jensen’s own orgasm from him and he cries out against Jared’s lips, lazily circling his hips until he comes down from the high.
Jensen holds Jared close and they enjoy the slow wet press of lips and tongues until the way they’re twisted together starts to get uncomfortable. Reluctantly, Jensen pulls out and gets up, padding across to the bathroom, rolling off the condom and dumping it in the trash. He looks up at the mirror and wipes a hand across his five o’clock shadow. His face has matured in the last few years; even without the beard he doesn’t look like some pretty-boy underwear model anymore. He wonders if Jared really does prefer him without the beard or if he was just saying that. He wonders how long they’ve got until Morgan hunts them down. Jensen sighs. Right now is the calm before the storm. They’d better make the most of it.
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