Title: Solidarity
Author: Anactoria
Characters/Pairing: Dan/Adrian. Slash; don't say you weren't warned.
Rating: R overall, PG-13 for this part.
Disclaimer: I don't own these characters and am ill-getting no gains from writing this.
Summary: It's 1992 and this isn't Utopia.
Notes: In the interest of full disclosure, I should mention that, while this is fairly different in terms of content, the idea of putting familiar characters in a dystopian setting was partly inspired by Telanu's The Devil Wears Prada fic, "The End of All Things." Canon and approximate character ages are from movieverse.
Thanks to muse_of_graphia for beta-reading ch3 onwards.
February 1992
It's become routine. Dan checks in at least twice a day -- more if he's got time in between tinkering with Archie, collecting rations, watching the street-level entrance and whatever else needs to be done -- just sticks his head round the comms. room door, tuning out the radio babble (...rumours of thirteen more arrests in Manhattan, and further disappearances. Noted journalist Susan Wells, former senators for New York, Wisconsin...) a mute question and not much hope in his eyes.
It's Maria this morning. Not that it really matters; whoever's on duty, the look's the same. The small, sad smile, the sympathetic headshake.
"You have engine oil on your nose." She's trying to soften it. She understands. They all do. They've all got someone, some voice or name they're hoping against hope to hear, someone they can't quite give up on. These days, though, Dan's hopes ebb a little lower every morning.
He should stop asking, really. It's two months since he last heard Laurie's voice, six months since he saw her, and communications from Europe get sparser every week. But he can't quit. Not yet. Even if they're not lovers anymore, she's his last link to the life before. He has to believe she's alive out there, somewhere.
None of them could have predicted this. Not even Veidt; he's pretty sure this isn't the kind of brave new world Adrian had in mind. Dan doesn't even think about what happened much, these days -- it's surprisingly easy not to dwell on the past when every day could be the last one you spend free -- but when he does it's without anger. He doesn't have time. There's just quiet weariness now, and regret.
The door bursts open. "Dan! Can you come give me a hand, please? We've just had ten arrive from New York, I haven't got a fucking clue how I'm gonna find room for all of them, and I can't find Judith anywhere -- "
Dan nods at the harassed young man in the doorway. "Sure, Serk. Just give me a minute to get cleaned up."
"Apparently one of them's some hot-shot politician from the old administration. You ought to have a word with him, see if he can help us. Connections. Something. Fuck. Where is everyone today?"
Dan heaves a sigh. "Okay, okay, I'm coming."
So Dan still has engine oil on his nose, he's still sweaty and scruffy and cleaning his glasses on the edge of his t-shirt, when he rounds the corner into the loading bay and sees him. Surrounded by a gaggle of people already, turning to Dan with a gracious smile, like it's 1985 again and they're old friends.
Dan just jams his glasses back on and stares.
"Adrian?"
December 1985
The Christmas tree's huge, and the lights are a little gaudy for his or Laurie's taste but, well... Sally insisted. It takes pride of place in their front room, since they don't have a TV these days. Couldn't switch the damn thing on without running across Nixon talking about foreign co-operation, or Adrian holding forth about how we need to take this opportunity to rebuild a better, more unified society, or some crappy comedian on some crappy satirical panel show making a crack about Rorschach nutjobs.
They're joking about it. Already. Dan can't quite fathom how quickly the mood's changed, how eagerly people have forgotten their shellshock and moved on to buoyant optimism. Call him crazy, but it just seems wrong.
"Daniel, honey..." Sally wiggles her empty Martini glass at him with a wink.
Laurie's in the kitchen, leaning back against the counter. She smiles at him, a little tiredly, but there's real contentment in her eyes. She's always loved Christmas, she told him, ever since she was a little girl. Sally was never ungenerous with presents, and she'd even make a special effort not to fight with Larry, at least not where Laurie could hear them. It was one of the few times she got to play at being normal.
"You ok?" she asks him. "Hope my mom isn't being too much of a pain in the ass..."
Dan forces a smile. "Nah. I'm good," he says. And he tries to be. He mixes Sally another Martini, gets himself a beer from the fridge, and does his best to hope.
February 1992
"Do keep your voice down, Daniel. They'll all want one."
Adrian's clothes are travel-rumpled, there are shadows under his eyes, and he probably hasn't showered or shaved in a day or two, but somehow he still looks unruffled. He's still beautiful. Still holds himself like royalty, still stands out like he's got his own personal spotlight, halo-blond in the dingy loading bay. People still turn their heads to look at him.
After all of this, after everything he's brought about, he's still beautiful.
Mostly that makes Dan want to hit him. But at the same time he feels his insides knot up, tight and painful, because in all of this something from the life before -- something is the same.
"What are you doing here?" he asks Adrian, instead of punching him.
"The same thing as everyone else, it would appear. 'Liberal sympathisers' aren't exactly popular in government these days, Dan," Adrian half-smiles, "As I would have expected you to be well aware." The tone is almost teasing, almost a challenge, only none of it reaches Adrian's eyes.
That's when Dan realises that, maybe, he isn't the same. For all the way he stands out like a painted angel in the basement gloom, a light has gone out of him.
"You know each other?" Serk is looking at them with eyebrows raised, incredulous and not a little impressed.
Dan hesitates before answering and then, when he realises Adrian isn't going to cut in and take over the conversation, replies, "Yeah. You could say that," in a voice that, he hopes, implies that's it, end of story, no further questions. "Look, Judith'll be back before long, she can deal with these guys. I've got other things to do." It's not a lie. He's always got things to do.
Adrian nods polite agreement. "Since I'm here, perhaps I can make myself useful. Is there anything I can do to help?"
Serk jumps at the offer like an excited puppy. "Sure! I mean yeah, yes, of course. This way..."
Dan scrubs at his eyes, suddenly exhausted. They'll be calling him 'sir' next.
He manages to avoid Adrian, and his own whirling thoughts, pretty successfully by holing up in the workshop and stripping Archie's engines, double- and then triple-checking for minor faults that might not even have existed in the first place, then volunteering to monitor the comms. room at night. It's gone midnight by the time he's done with Archie, and pretty much everyone else has turned in. He's yawning, so he lets himself into the makeshift kitchen, hoping there'll at least be an inch or two of foul-tasting instant coffee left in the pot.
There isn't. There is, however, Adrian, sitting at the table with heavy-lidded eyes and fingers pressed to his temples.
"Dan," he says, pleasantly enough, without looking up. His tone is neutral; open.
Dan's not in the mood for a conversation, not right now. His brain hasn't exactly processed Adrian being here yet.
"Do you have somewhere to sleep?" he asks.
As avoidances go, it's not exactly subtle, but Adrian accepts it gracefully. "I'm afraid not. It appears you have more strays than spaces at the moment."
Clearly he's going for 'cheerfully resigned,' but he doesn't quite manage to disguise the fatigue in his voice, or the way his eyes are half-closed as though against a blinding headache.
Dan's fishing in his pocket for his keys even as he sighs. "Here."
Adrian blinks.
"I've got my own room. Well, more of a cupboard really, but it's one of the perks of being a permanent fixture." He tries for a grin. "I'm on radio duty 'til four. You can crash out there. It's down the hall, next to the showers. Third left."
For a moment he thinks Adrian's about to argue, but then he just takes the keys and nods, gratefully, before leaving Dan alone in the empty kitchen.
Dan's halfway to the comms. room when he realises he's forgotten his glasses. He was never a huge reader, before -- he prefers technical stuff, things that fit together neatly -- but when he's up in the dead hours it's comforting. He reads whatever he can get his hands on: crappy novels, the few newspapers that are left in print, or the small stack of contraband he's got under his bunk. Under the Hood, of course, a couple of bird books from his childhood, and a thin, stapled-together pamphlet, made up of photocopied pages from the long-defunct New Frontiersman.
And tonight, he definitely needs a distraction. He's passing the kitchen on his way back when a small, stupid impulse seizes him. He resists for an instant -- it's late, and there's no reason he should even care, not about Adrian Veidt, of all people -- but curiosity gets the better of him.
The door's ajar, and Dan's rescuing his glasses from the windowsill when Adrian walks in, towelling his hair dry and wrapped in a bathrobe. Dan's bathrobe. And Dan immediately feels as though Adrian owns the place and he's the intruder.
Regretting it already, he nods at the cup of coffee cooling beside the bunk. "Probably won't keep you awake. I figure you don't usually drink instant, but..."
"I'm learning to appreciate small luxuries, believe me," Adrian says dryly, his lips quirking without amusement. He looks at Dan for a second longer, as though he is about to speak again, but doesn't.
Then, as Dan's turning to leave, he hears his name again. Spoken slowly, as though it is a word Adrian has not used in a long time. He stops.
"Thank you." This time, the smile Adrian offers him is brief, gracious, and perhaps the most genuine Dan has ever seen.
Maybe that figures. It's easy being honest when you've got nothing left to lose.