Elliot twisted nervous, sweaty fingers on his backpack. His forehead was sweating too; so hot on the train, for how cold it was outside. He chewed his teeth and watched the dark subway tunnel pass by; becoming clearer as the overhead light flickered a few times. The train stopped; the young hacker knew his stop had arrived, but for several seconds his legs would not move. Fingers barely grazed his arm; his body was spurred back into action to subconsciously pull away.
He had forgotten Mr. Robot was with him on the train.
"Come on," the older man said, moving through the door onto the empty platform. It was late. "If you can," he added, gently.
"I can," Elliot answered.
But the whole thing was still swimming in his mind. Darlene was his sister, he'd known Mr. Robot since he was a child. That's why you felt so familliar, why I could let you touch me, why I was vulnerable, why I ended up in the hospital. I trusted you past skin-deep; all the way down to my bones, really, and I ended up on the rocks. He remembered the fall from the pier; the split-second. He hadn't known what had happened. No fear, too numb from the morphine for fear. Only shock. He really hadn't expected the push.
The subway door started to close and the young hacker's legs moved, carrying him through just in time.
The arcade was only a few blocks away. Mr. Robot walked fast, and Elliot walked fast to keep up, his breath puffing out in clouds of smoke as they cut through the cold night together. When they came to the slender alley leading to the door, Robot held the door open for him and he slid in first. The arcade was empty, dimly lit. Skeeball machines along the side wall gave off a yellow-orange light as he turned to face the older man, lowering his hood.
Mr. Robot closed the door behind him, and crossed his arms. "Thank you for coming."
Elliot stared for a moment. "You told me to come. Why?"
"Did you figure out how to remove the Honey-Pot?"
The young hacker tipped his head. He squeezed the strap of his backpack harder. His stomach was in knots, and he was still sweating, tense all over. Did you talk to Darlene? Is that why you brought me here? Do you know that I know? Do you know what I did? Why didn't you tell me? What happens now? Fatherly disapproval, maybe you scold me and I tell you I'll start taking my meds again, which we both know is a lie.
"Good work. I told you we were gonna change the world, didn't I?" Robot held his hands wide, putting on a grin. Elliot didn't respond; he was waiting for the change, and Mr. Robot didn't disappoint him, folding his arms again, growing grim. "I spoke to Darlene. That's why we're here. She's very worried about you, she said you forgot who she was."
"I kissed her." The words tumbled out. No stopping them. Sometimes he couldn't get words to come out, sometimes he couldn't keep them in. They were meant as an apology. "But I didn't know..."
"She's not angry with you. She just wants you to be okay. You haven't been taking your medication."
It wasn't a question.
"I didn't remember you, either," Elliot found himself speaking. His voice was growing tight; as tight as his body felt; strung out. "But you knew that. You let me think we were strangers... you let us be strangers."
"We couldn't ever be strangers," Mr. Robot said, holding out a hand like trying to sooth a mad dog. "You still knew me on some level, right? I thought it would be best for fsociety -and for you- if I let you come to this on your own. I didn't know what kind of state your mind was in, or what you would be like after, and we needed you. Okay?"
"No."
Elliot shook his head, blinked a few times. His eyes were burning. Was he going to cry?
Shit.
He spun away when Mr. Robot reached out for him, crossing the center bank of computers into the line of ancient arcade games on the opposite wall. Most of them were out of service, one that was still running was Pac-Man, and he stepped into its bluish glow, wiping tears away on his palms.
"Elliot?"
"I didn't mean to forget," Elliot choked out, his face scrunched up. When Mr. Robot tried to move to face him, he spun away again. "I didn't mean to forget. But you did. You forgot me on purpose."
"That's not true."
"You found Darlene again." Other things he meant to say stopped up at the knot in his throat. You found Darlene again, what? Months ago? Maybe a year? Maybe more? I'm a better hacker than she is, but you didn't bring me in until you needed me for something.
"I thought you were doing well. You didn't need me coming back into your life, -look. I was young, when I met your mother, and you know-."
"-No," Elliot interrupted. He turned to look at Mr. Robot and forced his hands to his sides, shrugging his shoulders, trying to work out some of the tension.
"Things were good at first, but they didn't last. I'm sorry. Come on, Kiddo, you're a grown-up, now, you know how this grown-up shit works."
"-No."
"No? What do you mean, 'No'?"
Mr. Robot reached out for him again, he shrunk away, taking a few steps. "No."
There, in the back corner of the arcade, was the little office Robot had carved out for himself, with the tiny desk, and computer, and chair, and the blanket on the floor. He didn't live there, Elliot had figured out, but he probably stayed here sometimes. The single lamp in the room shined out from a red shade, casting a bloody tone over Elliot's skin in slattern lines through the mesh of metal that caged in the office on one side.
Mr. Robot didn't relent, giving chase. "No, you don't understand how sometimes things don't go the way you'd planned? What about that girlfriend of yours, do you really think that'll last the week?"
Elliot spun and latched onto the front of Mr. Robot's green jacket, dragging him in close. He was wild and big-eyed and grimacing through the furious anger that surged through him all at once, drawing back a fist when the older man surged forward and slammed him back against the wall. The section of metal rattled behind his head, the crossing bars dug into his knuckled when Mr. Robot fumbled and finally snatched hold of his wrist, pinning it. Elliot's other hand was pinned as well, and his body was squished between Mr. Robot and the wall, painfully so.
The older man was panting hard into Elliot's ear, stubbly cheek scraping Elliot's. "What the Hell was that?"
Elliot squirmed against the stronger man's chest, twisting his wrists against his bruising grip and bucking his hips, trying to throw Mr. Robot off of him. The older man only moved in tighter and suffocatingly close at the hips; so close that Elliot was lifted to his toes. He growled low in his throat, surprised at the gutteral sound that came out of him as he hissed through his teeth, glaring at Robot, seething with hatred.
"What? Something happened?"
Elliot couldn't answer, struggled even more, thrashing and not gaining even a centimeter. He crumbled all at once. His knees gave out, his mouth fell open and he was panting, and sobbing, and crying again. Through the lump in his throat, he murmured, "She's dead. She's dead. Dead."
"Oh," Mr. Robot's grip loosened, he felt the younger man squirming against him still and came too suddenly, pulling away. "I'm sorry." He let go of Elliot's hands, then, but when Elliot started to fall he was right there again, catching him under the arms and holding him up.
"Stop-."
"-It's alright," Mr. Robot said, "It's okay, Kiddo. I've got you."
Elliot sank into the embrace, but was still unsteady, and fell back into the wall, taking Mr. Robot with him. The tears finished almost immediately, then his breath slowed down, then the shaking stopped. It took maybe ten minutes. Mr. Robot held him the whole time, stroked his back, and the back of his head, traced fingers down his neck, sending soothing electric currents down his spine, all through his body.
After a while, Mr. Robot asked into Elliot's ear, "You okay?"
Elliot nodded.
In the background, the Pac-Man console chirped away its opening screen.
In the back of Elliot's mind, he was surprised he didn't shrink away from the touches even now. Even after the fall and the rocks, and knowing Mr. Robot had walked out on them years ago and lied to him for months. He was briefly angry that this had happened at all. If he was still on Morphine he wouldn't have broken down like this. If he'd felt sad he would've just done a line and not felt so much.
People say it's better to face these things but it doesn't feel good. Not at all.
But Mr. Robot's body tight against his did feel good. He realized that his dick had stiffened to attention, and shifted in place, shocked to feel Mr. Robot hard against his hip. He drew back his face, but left his arms around the older man's body, kept their hips together, and stared. Mr. Robot glanced down, then away, then back, and waited for Elliot's reaction.
Elliot thought maybe he should leave, but his dick was practically screaming for attention. And he wanted to make that go away. He'd had sex with Shayla a couple times after they got high together, and he hadn't minded, but he didn't really know much about that stuff. And definitely not the stuff that would happen if he stayed. But he wanted to stay.
He shifted his hips, creating friction as their members skipped over each other. Mr. Robot's tongue darted out to skim his lower lip. Elliot moved again, moving his hands down to the older man's hips and grinding boldly against him. Mr. Robot caught himself humming, eyes shut, and cleared his throat. "Mm-hm, Elliot-."
"Yes," he interrupted. "Yes..."
Wide-eyed, dry-mouthed, and with shaking hands, Elliot reached down for the bulge in Mr. Robot's pants, but the older man turned his hips away, wincing.
"Elliot..."
"What?"
He didn't need to say it. It was wrong. He used to sleep with Elliot's mother. He'd known the young hacker since he was a child. Mr. Robot licked his lips again. Elliot caught ahold of his hips and pulled him back in, grinding into him, rolling his hips in and out, in and out. The older man shut his eyes against the onslaught, exhaling slowly.
"Elliot..."
Mr. Robot grabbed his hands and held them up, away. Elliot was vaguely hurt by the rejection, but he persisted, intertwining his fingers into Robot's and moved his face in a little closer. He opened his mouth to ask permission, then remembered Shayla. She told him not to ask. So he swiveled in and locked his lips on Mr. Robot's, solidly.
The next thing he knew, the kiss was changing. Mr. Robot parted his lips, his tongue was hot and subtle in Elliot's mouth, and he moved his entire body in, pushing Elliot back against the wall, pressing his hands against the cage. He liked the feeling of being pinned, and tried to move his lips but they were forced open, and their teeth gnashed together, then Mr. Robot was biting down on his lip, hard enough to get a moan out of him.
They slotted their legs together and began to move, dry-humping like a couple of teenagers. The cage groaned under their weight and Elliot spread his legs wider. Mr. Robot arched under and up into him, changing the sensation. He laced one hand in the younger man's hair, and pushed the other under his shirt and sweater, finding the tight skin of Elliot's stomach, exploring further up to the smooth panels of his chest.
"Jesus, Kiddo," Mr. Robot hissed, still slowly fucking into him through the fabric of their jeans. "I've wanted this since the Steel Mountain trip." His hand expertly undid Elliot's jeans and crept under the liner of his briefs, then latched onto his dick, rubbing a slow circle around the head with his thumb, then tracing the slit in the top. "Since I saw you-," the pre-cum slick on his fingers, he started to work them down Elliot's length, spreading that slickness. Elliot was wide-eyed, he swallowed hard when Mr. Robot first wrapped a hand around him and pumped along his length. "-Vulnerable, and-," he started slow, steady strokes, "-Slick, and-," speeding up, he tugged sharply on Elliot's hair, stretching his entire body taught, exposing his neck and biting on the curve of it, making the young hacker jump, "-Writhing."
"Ha," Elliot gave a weak laugh, biting his lip when the older man stopped his wonderful stroking. He grumbled, "I've- wanted this... since I was like fifteen. I win."
"Fifteen?"
Mr. Robot didn't believe him, he thought. The words locked up. He shouldn't have to explain himself. He shrugged.
"That's... that's... this is so fucking wrong," Robot said, and kissed him again, starting to shove his shirt and sweater up in a bundle over his slender stomach, then chest, and breaking the kiss to growl, "Arms up, arms up, let's go." His hands turned desperate and groping, turning tense muscles to loose, willing flesh beneath his rough hands.
"You too," Elliot said. When Mr. Robot ignored him, he reached out and started to push the green jacket down off his shoulders, forcing the other man to take control, shed the jacket, then tear his grey t-shirt off, over his head.
Elliot stared a moment, and Mr. Robot let him take in the sight. When he reached out to explore his partner's muscles and the patch of hair on his chest, his hands trembled with reverence. The older man flinched.
"What?"
"Your hands are freezing," Mr. Robot said quickly, and clasped the young man's hands together between his, brought them to his mouth and breathed on them.
Elliot practically started to hum from the buzzing warmth that spread from his fingertips. He was passified a moment, but then Mr. Robot took one of his hands, and placed it squarely in the center of his chest. Once again his erection was begging for attention, and his other hand reached down to tug at his jeans, now hanging loose on his hips. Mr. Robot took that as an invitation, and turned Elliot, pressing him against the wall, then leaving him there and sliding into his office. Elliot watched the older man rustle in his desk, checking three different drawers before finding a square of foil and a little white tube. The young hacker twisted his fingers through links in the mesh, tried to slow his breathing. He could hear his own heartbeat, going a mile a minute, and his inner torrent of thoughts was silent for the first time since his last line of morphine.
Then hands were maneuvering to get into his pants again, one beginning a slow rhythm, stroking his cock, the other palming the small of his back, turning his legs to jelly. When that hand slid lower, the finger that teased at his tight pucker was already slick, and felt especially hot prodding at him. A tickle, at first, then Mr. Robot eased his fingertip past Elliot's sensitive rim and worked himself in up to the first knuckle, then the second. Elliot was panting, the pressure of his walls being worked open, and that one finger exploring the channel it created, had beads of sweat breaking out on his chest. A second finger pushed in alongside the first, and those two fingers felt wide and impossible as they started a slow undulation.
"Christ, Kiddo," the scratch of Mr. Robot's voice brought him back with perfect clarity; he had been drooling, shit, and the surreal thought of what was happening made his mouth fall open. Mr. Robot had two fingers inside him; Mr. Robot was inside him. He started to push a third finger inside Elliot's slick hole, and the young hacker gasped, squeezing the chain links in front of him so that his knuckles turned white. "You've never done this before." A statement, not a question.
The fingers inside him splayed wildly, stretching and embedding into new points within him, then they were leaving him and he caught his breath. His cock was leaking, almost ready to burst, it felt like. "Please, please," he begged, the words tumbling from his lips along with a thin stream of saliva that stuck to the metal chain links in front of him. Foil tore behind him. He stole a glance and saw Mr. Robot cloaking his member in a condom; using two hands to roll it down his length. The sight excited him, sent a trill through his lungs, and he found himself grinding against the wall through his jeans.
A second later, they were shoved down, one leg lifted, the sneaker pried off, then the jeans, then the other side, so he was naked. He should feel exposed, he figured, but he did not. If the man was going to touch him, surely he could see him, slender and tan and shaking with anticipation. Mr. Robot kicked his legs open a bit further, and one arm wrapped around him as he finally lined himself up against Elliot's ass. The panic hit him all of a sudden; this was bigger than the other man's fingers had been, and he already felt stretched beyond reason. But at the same time, the stretch as the head of Mr. Robot's cock invaded him made him salivate, made him aware of the chill all over his slick body.
Slowly, so slowly, the older man tilted his body in and pushed his length in a bit more, just past the head. Elliot's casm expanded obediantly, but his hands fumbling for a hold on the wall in front of him and Mr. Robot behind him and his mouth falling open and throat letting out a strangled moan, they all told him he wasn't in control. His ass was hot and slick and when Mr. Robot stopped to put calming hands on his chest and stroked his hair, his dick slipped back out an inch. He was watching Elliot's face, saw the panic there and pulled him back for a kiss, deep and soft. "It's okay, Elliot, I've got you..." He kept them like that, faces close, as he started to push in again, reclaiming the lost inch and hooking a hand onto the younger man's hip for leverage. He sank in a bit more and Elliot's whimper made him freeze.
"Do you want to stop? Elliot?"
The Pac-Man machine chirped in the second it took for Elliot to shake his head, pinching his eyes shut.
"Look at me," Mr. Robot ordered, and Elliot obeyed after a moment. His hand moved to Elliot's dick again, stroked him slowly as he started to press the rest of his length in, murmuring into the young man's ear, "Just relax, Kiddo, you're almost there; you're doing so good; so proud of you. Deep breath. Just relax and take it."
When he finally slid all the way home, a gutteral moan echoed in the younger man's chest, and he rocked in place, testing the feeling of being full to the breaking point. Mr. Robot started to withdraw and Elliot instantly hated the empty space in his furthest depths. On the push back in, a million nerve endings were rubbed into tender submission. And this time, Mr. Robot's length stroked his prostate and set him alight all the way to his toes, and stayed right there, deeply seated in him, too full. Elliot's body had lurched, but Mr. Robot's arm around him and hand on his hip held him still, dragged him back, only let him bend forward at the waist, keening and arching his back like something possessed but getting no relief. He was on fire, rippling with pleasure, but not enough to end his torment. The older man's withdraw was slow, then he snapped forward and buried himself deep, hips slapping Elliot's ass, cock hitting his prostate again and making him jerk to full attention, and a whine escaped his lips as his hands fumbled back in the air for a grip anywhere on his partner. Finally he found Mr. Robot's hair and twisted a hand there, craning his neck for another deep kiss as the older man started a rhythm, and two fingers pinched one of Elliot's nipples. In, and out, fast, then maliciously slow, making whimpers break out of Elliot's throat every time his sensitive nerves were stroked, maybe every other pass.
Mr. Robot reached above him with one hand for a grip on the metal links, quickening his pace with slow dedication as he fucked Elliot into the wall. The younger hacker found himself reaching for his cock, but Mr. Robot had him pinned flat as he pounded into him. Nearly delirious with his need for release, Elliot called in punctuation to each thrust, "Please, please, please!"
"What?"
"Please... uh, hm- please, I need- need release. Please!"
Mr. Robot pulled him from the wall suddenly, and dragged him away a few steps, slipping all the way out of him as they moved. With one sweep of his arm he cleared a desk at the center console among the computers. He bent Elliot at the waist and held him down flat while simultaneously lining himself up and pushing back inside, then one hand traced up and down Elliot's spine while the other reached under the table to clutch his cock and pump it in time to his thrusts. The younger man grabbed the edge of the desk to brace himself against the hard fucking, eyes shutting and rolling back.
"So beautiful," the older man rasped in his low, needy voice, "So beautiful like this, Kiddo."
It took only one more shot to his prostate to make him dribble cum onto the floor below. Elliot let out a sob of relief as his entire body went slack. Mr. Robot fucked him through it, and suddenly sensitive, Elliot let out a stream of little noises during the last of his companion's thrusts.
"Ah- hm, hm, uh-." He broke off when he felt Mr. Robot come inside him, finally stilling his frantic thrusts. Then there were soft lips trailing down from his ear to his neck, and the hand that had been rubbing his spine found his hand and gave it a squeeze, which he returned, stunned, distantly elated. His thoughts had stopped again; he operated only on the physical plane, where his entire body was ringing like a bell. When Mr. Robot pulled out of Elliot, he hissed as the head of the older man's dick gave a catch on his rim.
Neither of them moved away; in fact, Mr. Robot moved closer, wrapping both arms around him. He was standing again, but he couldn't fathom how, since he couldn't feel his legs.
"You okay?"
Elliot considered. "Mm-hm." He turned his head to glance back at Mr. Robot, then dislocated himself and turned his body to face him, too. "Are you?"
He thought that was funny, he huffed a laugh and folded his arms. "Pretty good for a guy who's going to Hell."
"No," Elliot said, with a tiny smile.
"Kiddo... that's the worst thing I've ever done in my life. And I'm not even sorry." He turned away and retrieved his clothes, scooped up Elliot's too and threw them at the young man. "Get dressed. You need to go home and get some sleep."
The two men dressed in silence. The young man's mind started to wander, but not far from the two of them. Does he think he's a bad person? Does he think this was disgusting? Does he think I'm disgusting? Do I think I'm disgusting? No. He tugged his shirt and hoodie back on, then moved over to Mr. Robot and set a hand on his shoulder, taking a minute to find the words. "This... felt too good to be wrong. And... we should do it... again. We should."
The older man looked at him with an unreadable expression. He slid into his office and ruffled around in the desk again, and when he came back out, thrust a picture at Elliot, bent and faded. He squinted at in the low light. It was a picture of the three of them; him, Robot and Darlene. Christmas. Childhood. Mother not in the picture, he realized, and was vaguely pleased.
"I never forgot you," Mr. Robot was saying. "I never tried to, I never wanted to." He snatched the picture away again and tossed it onto his desk. "Come on, let's get you home."