Summary: Travis has a secret. Turns out, so does Wes. Also, there are superpowers. Oneshot. Remix fic.
Warnings: Superpowers. Wes & Travis bonding. Blood and minor injuries. Some swearing. Mention/implied child abuse.
Disclaimer: I neither own nor am affiliated with Common Law in any way.
This is a remix of my previous fic, Mind And Body. I had a thought that quickly evolved into a full-blown idea for a fic, and when I sat down, it just came right out. Remixes are fun. I hope you enjoy.
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Mind And Body (Psychosomatic Remix)
"The mind and body are not separate. What affects one, affects the other."
—Dr. Joe
XXXX
Travis doesn't know what they hit him with, just that it's heavy and hard and sends the world spinning until he doesn't know which way is up. He collapses, and he knows the bastard is getting away right now, can hear the footsteps racing away like thundering hoofbeats in his skull, but he can't get up, can't force himself to follow. He wonders if his brains are leaking out, and despite the fact that he knows that's not a thing that can really happen with one blow to the head, it kind of feels like it, and that freaks him out.
Wes would know if his brains are leaking. Wes would tell him flat out if there was any leakage at all, but Wes is not here, so Travis does the only thing he can: he calls for Wes.
His mouth has other ideas. What comes out is a disjointed, slurred mumble, and that might very well be a sign of brain leakage. That makes him freak out a little more.
So he closes his eyes and reaches out with his mind instead. There are glittering strings in his head, stretching out towards all the people he knows, and he finds the one that feels like Wes, sharp and sweet, freshly cut grass and lemons. He finds it and he follows it down the line and Wes is at the end, and he sighs in relief because Wes is there, Wes will fix this. Wes is good at fixing the messes Travis gets into.
He sends the SOS down the line, and he can feel Wes stiffen, a sort of horrified shock, but Travis pushes past that and says, Wes, come quick, hurry hurry hurry.
Travis? Wes demands incredulously, his mental voice very very loud and it makes Travis's head ring. What is this? What? This is impossible!
If we were up for it, Travis would totally roll his eyes. The man hears his partner in his head asking for help, and the first thing he does is argue. Seriously, Wes. The guy has no sense of adventure.
I heard that, Travis.
It is possible that Travis is not filtering as much as he'd like. He blames the gaping head wound.
Gaping head wound!? Wes still sounds a bit disbelieving, but also kind of panicky, and now he's started moving. What do you mean, gaping head wound?
Didn't I mention that? Travis wonders muzzily.
You absolutely did not! Wes is double-timing it now. Travis sighs, relaxing. Wes is on the case. It's all good now.
Travis!
Ooow. Travis sends vague waves of annoyed irritation at his partner. Stop yelling. What the hell?
Talk to me, Travis. Keep talking to me. And Travis isn't entirely sure why it's such a big deal, but Wes sounds so worried, so Travis forces his brain in order—it's harder than he thinks it should be—and just thinks in his partner's direction. He thinks about how much his head hurts and about Wes swooping in and giving him a couple aspirin because Wes always has a fully-stocked first aid kit in his car (I am NOT giving you blood thinners while you have a head wound, Travis, are you kidding me?) and wow, he wants pizza.
He opens his eyes as Wes skids into the room and mumbles, "I want pizza."
"As soon as you're feeling better," Wes promises, kneeling beside him. He snaps a few sharp orders, but then Travis sees the phone in Wes's hand so he figures Wes probably isn't talking to him.
"My head hurts," he mumbles, reaching up, but Wes grabs his hand and eases it away before he can touch.
"Trust me," Wes says, lips a thin, unhappy line, "You don't want to touch," and Travis knows that look, it's Wes's worried-upset look, usually seen after Travis has done something incredibly stupid, and Travis frowns (tries to, that makes his head pound, everything makes his head hurt more) and mutters, "Sorry."
Wes pauses, mouth going even thinner. "You didn't do anything," he says gently, and there's a rush of feeling in Travis's head, gentle and reassuring and oh so familiar.
Travis lets his eyes close and basks in the feel of his partner, cut grass and lemons, floating until the ambulance gets there and he can properly pass out.
Wes doesn't leave for an instant, not from his side and not from his brain.
XXXX
The first thought Travis ever heard was, God, stop crying, you worthless brat. He was maybe four, five, crying on a chair while his foster mom put a Band-Aid on his skinned knee. His foster mom, who always smiled and was super nice, and she never hit and never raised her voice and Travis adored her.
So the thought, when he heard it, shocked him. He was so stunned to hear such a cruel thing that he stopped crying immediately, staring at her with wide eyes. She'd looked up at his sudden silence, smiled sweetly and brushed her thumb over his cheek.
"See?" she said, soft, gentle, sweet, "It doesn't hurt so bad, does it?" but in his head, he heard her say, Finally, his wailing was giving me a headache.
It didn't take him long to realize he wasn't hearing things she was saying.
It took him even less time to realize it wasn't just his foster mom.
It was everyone.
XXXX
Wes is there when Travis wakes up, a solidly reassuring presence in the edge of his brain, zinging sharp and sweet and familiar. He sighs without opening his eyes, relief, because if Wes is here then it's all okay.
A magazine rustles, and then Wes approaches, fingers lighting on Travis's arm. "How are you feeling?" he whispers.
Travis does a mental inventory. "My head hurts," he decides, opening his eyes in tiny little slits. "Drugs?" He's painfully hopeful.
Wes gives him a sardonic little smile and pats his arm. "Not with a head wound. Get some sleep. You'll feel better."
"Kay." With another sigh, Travis closes his eyes. "You won't leave?"
There's a pause, and then an uneasy mental touch. I won't leave, Wes promises in his head, and Travis drops into sleep, knowing his partner's got his back.
XXXX
From the moment he arrives to the moment he's released from the hospital, Wes is almost constantly there. Other people visit, family members and a few coworkers, but Wes is the one who doesn't seem to leave. And Travis knows that's probably his fault—he's hanging out in his partner's head, has been since he got hit in the cranium and reached out, clinging to the one person he trusts more than anyone else. Wes probably doesn't want to go too far while the weirdness is happening.
As he recovers, he starts worrying about how he's going to explain everything.
But Wes doesn't ask. Wes is just there, and there's no resentment or annoyance, just his partner puttering around, reading magazines and making snippy comments and just being himself. And everything should seem fine, but Travis can't help feeling uneasy.
As soon as his headache has abated enough, Travis quietly slips out of Wes's brain. He's not sure Wes even notices—if he does, he doesn't say anything. It's harder than Travis thought it would be; he relies on Wes, feels safe with Wes, and disengaging like this almost hurts more than the head wound. But Wes's brain is Wes's alone, Travis can't hang out just because he feels like it.
Wes probably won't say anything in the hospital, he decides. Too many people, visitors and medical staff wandering in and out. He'll wait until Travis is released and they can have a proper conversation, no interruptions.
The better he gets, the sicker he feels.
XXXX
He told one person in his life about what he can do. One of his foster brothers—he was eleven or so, and they'd just done the whole pricked-fingers-blood-brothers routine. It had seemed like a good idea at the time.
Joshua had freaked out. They'd both read comic books, when they could get their hands on them, and being able to read minds wasn't cool like fire powers or invulnerability. Reading minds was weird and scary and things were never the same between him and Josh again.
He never told another soul.
XXXX
The day after he gets released, Wes arrives with two cups of coffee and sits at Travis's table. He doesn't drink his coffee, just plays with the cup, and that's how Travis knows he's in deep shit. Anything that can get in the way of Wes and his morning coffee is serious indeed.
"So," Wes says.
Travis cracks like an egg. "I can read minds!" he blurts, the words rushing out. "Usually only if I touch people. And—and not anything deep, just, like, surface thoughts, and stuff! I don't know how or why, I just can. I don't mean to."
Wes frowns. "You weren't touching me, before."
"That's…" Travis spins his cup. "The better I know someone, or the more I touch them, the less I need to touch them to read them." There are glittering strings of light in his brain, connecting him to dozens of minds, if he just reached out. Most of them are family, foster siblings and foster parents, but a good third of them are just people he went out with, no matter how briefly. Even a one-night stand is enough to establish a solid connection, such strong emotions mixed with extended physical contact.
Wes has been his partner for years now. Their connection was established a long time ago.
Wes doesn't say anything. Travis bites his lip and studies his coffee cup. "I keep to myself, mostly. I don't pry, or anything. I just…I was injured, and confused, and you're…" Protection. Comfortable. Safe. I feel safe with you, Wes.
Travis doesn't send that thought.
"You're my partner."
"I see." Wes takes a slow sip of his drink, looking pensive and a little upset. Travis very firmly keeps his mind to himself—he wants nothing more than to reach out and find out what Wes is thinking, what's running behind that stony façade, but he doesn't dare. He can't risk it.
"Wes?" he ventures carefully, after Wes has been silent way too long. Wes looks up, and Travis doesn't think he's seen Wes so guarded since they first met. Travis swallows and pushes on. "Are we okay?"
Wes smiles a smile that doesn't mean anything and says, "Sure, Travis, we're fine."
It doesn't feel like they're fine. It doesn't feel like it at all.
XXXX
When they first met, Travis shook Wes's hand and took a quick, quiet dip into the blonde man's brain. Just a little, just enough to get a measure of the man. What he found was someone who'd been through pain but kept going, a strong sense of justice and a refusal to give up, solid and stable like the earth beneath his feet. He tasted/smelt/felt like cut grass and lemons, sharp and sweet and wonderfully sarcastic, and Travis liked him immediately, despite the suit and the reserved, annoyed-at-the-world attitude.
Sure, Wes could get on his nerves, and there was some weird shit going on in his head, but honestly, that was hardly an issue when Travis felt so comfortable touching Wes's brain. He'd never been so instantly easy with anyone else before.
Like everyone else, Wes had his secrets, wrapped in a tight cold ball in the center of his mind, and there was some turmoil in there Travis did his best to avoid. But otherwise…well, let's just say if Travis were a cat he'd curl up in the sunny spot of Wes's brain and sleep like twenty hours a day.
He didn't, of course, because that would be crossing boundaries and also Wes might get an inkling that something was happening.
As Travis had learned long ago, mind reading was weird and scary and Travis didn't want to lose his partner over something like this.
XXXX
What he realizes is that he might have lost his partner anyway.
There's a sudden shift in dynamics after the hospital. Travis notices it right away—something is off between them. It seems normal enough, but Wes stands a half step further away, shrugs away from Travis's teasing touches. And maybe that could be just a Wes thing, because Wes is finicky about people touching him.
Except…
It seems fine, but something is wrong. Tentatively, Travis mentally reaches out, just the barest brush of his mind against Wes's, light enough Wes can't possibly notice even if he's paying attention. He's just hoping to get a clue.
All he gets is a roiling confused swirl of This can't go on and How do I tell him and Travis has to excuse himself and hide in the bathroom until he doesn't feel like throwing up anymore.
He can read between the lines, can put two and two together and realize what's happening. It's Joshua all over again—Wes knows, and now he doesn't want anything to do with Travis.
Wes is his partner and pretty much his best friend and Travis wants to grab him tight and never let him go. But he knows that won't do any good, not if Wes can't even accept a casual touch between them anymore.
His secret is out, and he doesn't know how to fix this.
XXXX
Paekman, he thinks, knew. Travis never told him, but Paekman was good at reading people, and he'd worked with Travis long enough to know that Travis was a little strange. That sometimes Travis knew things he shouldn't, or pulled confessions from suspects like he was shooting fish in a barrel.
Paekman never said a word, and his thoughts never betrayed anything. But sometimes he would smile, a knowing, mysterious thing, and he would make these little offhand comments like he'd put the pieces together and figured it out.
If he did know, he didn't change his interactions with Travis at all. Travis never realized how grateful he was for that.
He died before Travis ever confirmed anything.
XXXX
He's going to lose Wes. If he doesn't do something, he's going to lose his partner. Travis can feel it, can see which way the winds are blowing. He's been through enough uprootings in his life he knows when an ending is coming.
More than anything, Travis doesn't want to lose Wes, doesn't want their partnership to end. He throws his brain into finding a solution, a way to fix this, but try as he might, he doesn't know how to make this better.
Wes continues to be stiff around him. They do their jobs, work and banter as easily as ever, but the distance is there and if Travis can't bridge the gap they're going to fall apart and Travis will lose Wes.
He's determined not to let that happen.
XXXX
The turning point comes two and a half weeks after their little talk (more like when Travis confessed everything and Wes sat there stoically and didn't give Travis any reassurance that things were okay like he said, no Travis isn't upset at all, why do you say that?).
They're at the warehouse where their witness works, and neither of them suspect this guy even a little so it's an absolute shock when he pulls out a gun and makes a break for it. They set chase, of course; they hadn't suspected him before, but they certainly do now.
"O'Dale! Freeze!" Travis hollers, legs pumping.
The guy turns, shoots wildly over his shoulder, and the bullet sails right toward him, and Travis has a split second to think oh shit!
And then he's being forcefully shoved out of the way, and as he slams into the wall he sees Wes go down, clutching his stomach, a bright patch of red spreading between his fingers and—
Travis's vision goes white for a solid ten seconds. When it clears, O'Dale is face-down on the ground and Wes is curled on his side, clutching his stomach, face twisted. Travis ignores their suspect and races to his partner's side.
"Shit!" As gently as possible, he rolls Wes onto his back, tries to move Wes's hands to see the wound. "Shit, shit!"
"It's fine," Wes hisses through his teeth, but that would be a lot more convincing if his face wasn't screwed up in pain and, oh yeah, if he wasn't bleeding from his fucking gut.
"Shut the hell up," he snaps, fear making him sharp, and he wrenches Wes's hands away. There's a giant hole in Wes's belly and the blood is way way too bright which means arterial which means fuck, and he slaps Wes's hands back over the wound and frantically fumbles for his phone.
"Travis, I'm fine—"
"—get you an ambulance—"
"—will you calm down—"
"—gonna be fine, Wes, I promise—"
"—listen to me, dammit—"
"Fuck, fuck fuck—" He finally wrests his phone from his pocket, stabbing the tiny keys, babbling, "You're gonna be alright, it's not that bad, we'll just get you to the hospital and all patched up and you'll be good as new—"
TRAVIS! SHUT THE HELL UP!
The mental shout is enough of a shock to make Travis freeze, staring at Wes with the number half-dialed. He's used to reaching out and mentally touching other people; he's not so used to having it happen to him.
Wes glowers at him. "Finally. Listen to me. I'm going to be fine." And then he lets go of his wound and tries to sit up and even Travis knows that's a fantastically stupid idea.
"Lay down, you bastard, just lay down until the ambulance gets here—"
"Travis Marks, I swear to god if you don't listen to me I will shoot you myself!"
Wes's roar certainly doesn't sound like something from a man with a gut shot, and Travis falters once more. Wes takes his hesitation as a chance to sit up completely.
"Look," he says, using his bloody shirt to wipe his stomach, and all Travis can see is a giant hole in his partner's abdomen that needs to…be taken…care…of, what the holy fuck?
He drops heavily on his ass, phone clattering from slack fingers, and stares at Wes's gut, watching the edges of the wound knit together.
"What the hell?"
"I told you it would be fine." Wes grimaces, poking the edge of the wound like it's not a bullet hole in his gut. "You're not the only one who can do things that can't exactly be explained." The blonde shifts under his scrutiny and offers, "I've always been a fast healer."
Travis scoffs. "Yeah, that's one word for it." He can't tear his eyes away from the rapidly shrinking hole in Wes's flesh. This isn't fast healing, this is…this is weird and scary and Travis suddenly wonders if this is what Wes has been trying to tell him, rather than an impending termination of their relationship.
Wes fidgets again, coughs into his fist. "Yes. Well. Haven't you ever noticed I've never gone to the hospital? Ever?"
Travis finally drags his gaze from Wes's stomach to his face, gaping at his partner. "I just figured you were too cautious to do anything that would end with you getting hurt."
"That's certainly part of it, yes." Wes wipes at his stomach again. It doesn't do much good; the shirt is so blood-stained it really just smears on Wes's skin, rather than wipes anything up. "But I mostly didn't want to get to the hospital and have the medical staff realize I was healing faster than anyone reasonably should."
"Yeah, I get that." And he does—Travis can read minds, he knows exactly what would happen if the wrong people learn about that. He leans forward, peering curiously at the wound. "Does it hurt?"
Wes gives him a flat look. "I was shot in the stomach, dumbass, of course it hurts." But the tight lines around his eyes have disappeared and the wound is almost completely gone. It doesn't look like Wes will even have a scar.
"Jesus fucking Christ," he breathes, shaking his head. Then he whips his head up to glare at Wes. "What the fuck is wrong with you? Hey, I'll tell Travis about my secret by getting shot? Really?"
Wes glares right back at him. "This wasn't how I planned to tell you, idiot! Who's the one who was standing in front of a bullet anyway?" Wes waves an agitated hand. "I can handle a bullet better than you can!"
Looking at the now-smooth expanse of Wes's stomach, Travis has to concede that one.
"Jesus," he breaths again, shaking his head. "What the hell?" The odds of Wes being another freak of nature is just. Wow.
(Now Travis wonders how many other people he knows secretly have superpowers he's never picked up on.)
When he looks up again, Wes is staring down the alley; Travis follows his gaze and sees O'Dale, who hasn't moved one inch. "What did you do?" Wes asks, and all Travis can do is shrug.
"Knocked him out, I think." He reaches out, but all he can tell from here is that O'Dale is alive. He never touched the man, never made enough of any sort of connection to tell anything more. "I didn't kill him. But he's not going anywhere for a while."
"Good." Wes holds out his hand. "Come on."
Travis stares.
Wes scowls, shakes his outstretched hand. "Well, come on, don't just stand there. Help me up. I need to change before we call backup." Which, yeah, okay, Wes does look like he was a murder victim, fair enough. Travis climbs to his feet, reaches for Wes's hand.
Then he realizes what this means, and he freezes, staring at their clasped hands. Wes hasn't touched him since they talked, since Travis admitted he could read minds through skin contact, which means…
It's okay, Travis, Wes whispers, a thought that travels up their arms and nestles in Travis's head, cut grass and lemons, sharp and sweet and familiar. I trust you.
Wes's eyes are frank and open, and his mind—his mind is a wide open field, radiating sincerity and faith, and Travis's chest goes tight, but in a good way.
He can't stop the grin that crosses his face as he hauls his partner to his feet.
XXXX
Less than ten minutes after leaving the crime scene, Wes makes a sound like he's going to throw up. His throat works, and his face twists, and then he cups his hand in front of his mouth and gags.
Travis pulls a face. "Aw, dude, that's disgusting."
Wordlessly, Wes holds out his hand. In the middle of his palm lies a single, spit-covered bullet.
"Oh, that is awesome!" Ignoring the drool, Travis plucks the bullet out of Wes's hand and holds it up. He gasps as a thought occurs to him. "Oh my god, we're like superheroes!"
Wes doesn't take his eyes off the road. Travis can still feel his scorching glower. "Absolutely not."
"No, no, we totally are! Dude, I'm gonna have to come up with the coolest names. How do you feel about costumes?"
Wes rolls his eyes and grumbles, "I hate you so much."
But Travis grins, because he can taste Wes's feelings in his mind, cut grass and lemon, sharp and sweet and familiar, and Wes really, really doesn't.
OOOO
This is probably one of the easiest fics I've ever written. I came up with the idea, I sat down, I wrote it from start to finish in one go. I think I wrote the first draft in about four hours. I wish they could all be that easy.
Anyway, I hope you liked it. Let me know what you thought! Comments, reviews, and constructive criticism are always welcome.
Until next time~!