2 January 2005
The Authority
Apollo/The Midnighter, AU
R for disturbing content, sexuality, and violence. Reader discretion is advised.




He smokes a lot, because the cigarettes give him a reason not to be hungry, and because it goes with his image.  Black trench coat, black eyeliner, dyed-black hair.  Boots.  Black nail polish.  He's not always sure whether he's going for Trenchcoat Mafia or Buffy-refugee vampire, but either look's enough to keep most people at bay.  He goes to school like he's supposed to, hands in all the homework he's assigned, and smokes when he doesn't have to be in class.

You can go to high school for a long time and not notice anything.  It's just this place you have to be.

Except sooner or later he gets in shit with Mr Bendix, senior biology teacher and all-around prick.  He wasn't doing anything.  The room had six girls talking about clothes, two guys talking about sex, four starfish mutilated beyond all recognition, a binder about to fall on the floor, two flickering fluorescent light-tubes, and a cell-phone vibrating in a backpack two rows away from him.  And Mr Bendix looked him right in the eye and said, "If you can't pay attention in class, maybe you'll pay attention after class."

Two small female giggles and this squirm he was way too familiar with from the guys in the back row.  None of the lab stools have backs, so you have to keep adjusting your posture or risk falling, but there are levels of adjustment.  That one had nothing to do with premature lower-back pain.

So he showed up after school and sat like he was supposed to.  Read through his bio notes and half-watched Mr Bendix working in the supply room and tried to figure out why he was there.

No words, no touches.  Just that soft breath-huff in the other room that made him feel sticky all over.

He wasn't really surprised when he got in shit for nothing again.  And again.  There are always problems with his work now, even though it's perfect.  Or with his handwriting or with his posture or with his attitude.  He's served more detention this week than most of the school's actual hard-cases.

Not always by himself, at least.  Other guys show up.  A couple of freshmen.  This guy from the other senior biology section.  Blond and built.  Glittering smile on him.

He gets permission to go to the washroom.  Stays there for a bit longer than he probably should and contemplates jerking off.  Thinks about Bendix's heavy breathing and loses all inclination.

When he comes back, there's a piece of looseleaf stuck like a bookmark in his textbook. 

what's your name?

This is what it must be like for monks.  Those vows of silence lead to passing notes like little girls.

Neither of the freshmen will lift their heads.  One of them looks like he might cry.  Like he actually thinks they're all in trouble.

He sighs and goes back to his notes.  Forty minutes studying before Mr Bendix comes out of the supply room and slides up behind him.  He doesn't move until the hand slides down his back and toward the waist of his jeans.  Then shoves all his stuff off the lab table onto the floor.

"Oops."

And jumps down off his stool to pick it up.

Bendix looks down at him.  "You need a serious attitude adjustment, pal."  Walks away.

Very quietly, "One of us does."

He can get through this.  He's smarter than slime school divisions hire to teach stupid children about the life cycle of cells.

Except.  He kind of hangs around the school for a few minutes after Bendix sends him and the blond guy away.  Long enough to know the freshmen are in there a long fucking time.  Long enough to see one of them walk out ice-white.  Long enough to smoke another cigarette before the other one comes out, and that kid is crying.

Flare of his lighter, acid-smoke in his mouth, and when he exhales the blond guy's standing opposite him.  Serious and just looking, like he already knew.

They both know.

It makes what happens next necessary.

They don't actually leave the next time Bendix sends them away.  Just walk around the school's hallway maze once, cracking the tension out of their spines.  Right back into the lab and into the supply room and.  Yeah, pretty much what they thought.

Crying boy in the corner and one on his knees sucking Bendix off.

They're, like, fourteen years old.

He looks at them and says, "Run.  Go tell someone what happened."

Happy blond guy hulks beside him, too big for Bendix to get past.  Grins and says, "Attitude adjustment."

Teeth can cave right in if you hit them hard enough.  It's a biology lesson all on its own.  He learns what it sounds like when you hit a guy very hard for a long time.  What it sounds like when two guys do that together.

They're almost two miles away from the school, just walking steady with their bloody hands in their pockets when Blondie says, "Oh shit.  What did we just do?"

He says, "It was right."

Big sigh.  "Yeah."

Kisses him.  This is right too.


jane
go back