We Came Along This Road

by EyeofMazikeen

Immediately post-WWII, ex-Colonel Sebastian Moran finds himself in a bit of a jam. He can either stay locked up in his new home, a dingy cell somewhere in London. Or he can take the mysterious, dark haired stranger up on his offer of a short term employment. Adrift without The War, Sebastian agrees, if only to give himself a purpose. What he finds is something else entirely.

This is fic I whipped up for the first ever Mortastic Fic Exchange over on Tumblr! Go on over and hit the tag to see what amazing things other MorMor lovers came up with.

Prompt: Vigilante Serial Killers: town-to-town wanted serial killers who seem to be "untouchable" and they don't seem to be able to be caught. Provided by the incomparable Never-to-See.

Warnings: Graphic Violence, Mentions of Drug Use, Mentions of Alcohol Use, Mentions of Homophobic Behavior, Mentions of Underage, Mentions of Non Con, Mentions of Suicide, dubious use of post-WW II as a setting, general MorMor fuckery

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We Came Along This Road:

I was your lover, and I was your man. There never was no other. I was your friend, till we came along this road... - Nick Cave

Sebastian Moran missed The War. The War changed everything. The War had given him purpose, focus. A job. A place to be. Something to anchor him. It was the reason he woke up every morning smiling. There was nothing quite like a good war, as his father had always said. His Da had fought in the first World War, lied about his age so he could go fight on behalf of Queen and Country. Said it made a man out of him. The only time Sebastian had ever seen his father happier than when the second War broke out was the day his son came home to tell him he was off to fight in it.

His sharp eye and already-practiced marksmanship set him apart from his peers early in his career, helping his ascent through the ranks at a fairly rapid pace. By late 1942 he had achieved the rank of Colonel, and was sent off to train as a sniper. He practiced with a few Soviets; who evidently had whole fucking units of sharpshooters and some of the most beautiful weapons he had ever seen. Upon returning to Europe he completed his training with one particularly spooky Finnish bastard who eschewed the modern conveniences of scopes, claiming that they made him too much of a target for counter-fire. After that it was all a blur, moving from location to location, filling gaps wherever needed. The neverending haze was the good kind of blur; the kind that happens when your senses are sharpened but your memory is dulled by the hazy after-effects of gunpowder and adrenaline. All the different battles, days, hours, all blended into one long stretch. He fought under several different names; after all glory was for the Russians with their fancy guns and their high kill counts. Let them have it. He was content to stay above it all, sometimes quite literally.

Still, you'd think someone had been keeping count, and that the total would have meant something, even after the whole mess in Burma. God, that was a fucking nightmare. Under-equipped troops being given ridiculous orders by a chain of command that viewed them as largely disposable. Of course he ignored anything and everything that was handed down to him, opting instead to use his own good judgement to keep his head attached to his shoulders and his men largely out of harm's way. There weren't any dishonorable discharges handed out, not at least during wartimes, but he sure as hell never got out of the Burma Campaign after that. Too useful to get rid of but too volatile to move back to Europe, they said. He stayed in Burma through the remainder of the war. While he was there he made friends, the kind of friends you don't write home about, with several members of the Indian Army. And what did it matter if they had sympathies with the pro-independence movement? Sympathies that Sebastian adopted? Just about any damn man who had fought with any of the Indian divisions felt the same way.

It must have mattered to someone though, because no sooner than Rangoon was reclaimed, Sebastian found himself marched at gunpoint right into a cell. The last of the Japanese holdouts hadn't even surrendered but the war, their war, his war, was essential over. Sebastian went from asset to liability in a matter of moments. After a few frustrating days of silence, he was retrieved by silent men in dark suits with sharp knives, who wanted to know all about his involvement and knowledge of the Indian Independence Movement. The answer was largely nothing, other than the fact that he knew just about everyone he met and fought with didn't want to be a part of the empire anymore. Sebastian didn't feel compelled to share even that much information. The suited men didn't take very kindly to his reticence. He gained a few new scars from that experience, and the general feeling that the whole 'independence' thing was just a front to make sure he'd eventually get executed for the things they never prosecuted him for during the campaign itself.

Once collected by the men in suits, Sebastian began the long and arduous journey back to London. He spent the majority of his travels either handcuffed or tied down, at least one set of eyes on him at all time. Instead of feeling bright and sharp, everything felt washed out and grey. He ached in an odd, homesick sort of way to get loose and head back to India, maybe Calcutta. Surely things there would always be bad enough to make him feel alive. Hell, given how upset these suits were about the whole Indian Independence Movement, there may even be another war brewing. The idea sent sparks down his spine, lighting up his entire nervous system, and he had to bite his lip to keep from smiling.

Opportunities to get loose were few and far between despite his desire to be free, and no opportunity that presented itself had nearly a good enough chance of escaping to risk going another few rounds with his captor's knives. Instead of making a break for it Sebastian slept on the floor of tiny hotel rooms, sometimes in jail cells, sometimes in the back of the transport vehicle. It took the better part of a month, three changes in his guards, and an incalculable amount of boredom on Sebastian's part for him to finally end up in the damn stone cell in his home city.

London. It was just as dreary as he remembered, the sky the same color as his cell walls the one time he got a good glimpse of it, as they were walking him into whatever nondescript warehouse they were using for this sort of... slightly less than legal and certainly less than chivalrous kind of interrogation. But that interrogation never came. Five days of nothing but bland meals and stale water to break the overwhelming boredom, unbound from the chair he was tied in only to eat and take care of other needs. By the middle of the sixth day, Sebastian seriously considered chewing his tongue off just for something to do. Before he could jump to anything so hasty, he appeared. The flash bastard in the black suit, dark hair slicked back, the only weapon on him a knife sharp smile on his face.

At first glance, Sebastian thought he was just another posh bastard in a sharp suit come to ask him more inane questions before they finally dragged him off to trial or, if they were feeling merciful, directly to execution. But the slender, dark haired man seemed to have no intention of taking him anywhere. He simply smiled and snapped his long fingers. A decidedly not military man dragged in a chair, which the suited man sat in backwards. He rested chin on interlaced fingers which were supported by the back of his seat. Cocking his head to one side in an almost birdlike manner, he looked over Sebastian with a carefully appraising gaze before finally speaking.

"So. Colonel Sebastian Moran. Or rather, ex-Colonel Sebastian Moran. Welcome back to London. I do apologize for your rather paltry accommodations, but I was away on business and didn't really have somewhere to store you." Sebastian narrowed his eyes at that comment, but held his tongue. He most certainly wasn't cargo, to be stored somewhere until some higher-up dandy looking bastard had time for him, but damned if he was going to say anything at all. The last batch of men had to take a knife to him just to get him to admit to his own name. This odd little man wasn't going to get anything out of him for less.

Despite his internal bravado, though, something about the whole situation and the man across from him in particular set off every alarm in Sebastian's head. The strange man was slight and short, almost delicate looking in a way. Certainly he couldn't be dangerous. But when his almost black eyes met Sebastian's he found himself reminded of the pythons that were all too common in Burma. The damn fucking things looked at everything, whether it was larger than them or not, as if it were a puzzle to be solved. Normally that puzzle was whether or not the snake could manage to eat whatever it was that it was studying. This new man's eyes looked like that. Cold. Calculating. And above all, hungry. Whoever this man was, he had eyes like he could swallow the whole world.

"Reticent, aren't we? Well, I don't blame you. Her Majesty's Royal Army hasn't treated you very well these past few days now has it, Colonel?" Again, Sebastian answered with silence, and the smaller man merely rolled his eyes.

"Fine then, you big lout. Don't talk. Just listen. I'm not military, obviously. And in case you hadn't figured it out, this isn't exactly some secret army base. I had you... redirected... here so that we could meet." The sniper arched one blonde eyebrow in distrust, but the words did ring true. Nothing about his cell spoke of military efficiency, or really even indicated any sort of plan for him, other than what seemed like jailing him forever.

"I'll be blunt, Sebastian. May I call you Sebastian? I know so much about you I feel like we're on a first name basis already." The sniper answered that with a bit of a growl and a sneer, the only vocalizations he felt inclined to give during his strange interrogation. The dark haired man merely smiled as if Sebastian had cordially nodded and given permission to use his first name, and went right on speaking.

"I'm in need of a partner. See, I have some business to take care of. Some cleaning up to do. But I'm not much one for getting my hands dirty, you see." The man raised his head, unlaced his fingers and held them out for Sebastian to inspect, as if any prior sins would be visible. When Sebastian merely rolled his cobalt eyes the man retracted them, smiled his frigid smile, and kept fucking talking.

"You're an odd one. Loved the army for setting you in the middle of something dangerous, a situation that allowed you to indulge some of your more violent tendencies. You liked the structure, but hated the idiocy of the men stationed above you. You loved the war, but hated that it had to end." The dark eyed man gave him a knowing little smile, and Sebastian felt oddly laid bare. This odd little man did a better job of putting his thoughts into words that Sebastian himself could have. It was unnerving, to be read so easily. But one look in those sharp black eyes told the blonde that it was something that, should he decide to work with the man, would be a regular occurrence.

"So," he delivered smoothly, sliding off his jacket and draping it across the back of his chair. "I think that we both have problems that we can help each other out with. You want a war to fight, I've got a war that needs fighting." Sebastian cocked an eyebrow at that statement, but the smaller man's face gave no indication of exaggeration or mockery. His dark, almost black eyes were hard and glacial; every inch of his slight frame screaming ruthless determination. As soon as he noticed Sebastian watching, though, he gave the blonde an easy smile and his entire demeanor changed from cold to jovial in an instant. The ease with which his moods changed made Sebastian feel a little off, uncertain which face to read as true. The flippant bastard in the posh suit, or the hollow, hungry man with the cold black eyes.

Despite his almost languid movements and charming smile, Sebastian was currently believing him to be the icy, inscrutable bastard as the smaller man had fished a knife out of his jacket pocket. He held the rather tiny blade in one hand while using the other to uncuff and roll up his sleeves. So much for not wanting to get his hands dirty. When the man's sleeve had been rolled up past his elbow, Sebastian finally found something worth talking about.

"You some sorta fucking junkie, mate?" Those were the first words he ever spoke to his captor, blue eyes fixed on the slight line of scarring and faded bruises at the crook of the man's elbow, rather than on the small but sharp looking the knife held in his hand. The man ignored Sebastian for a moment, instead switching the knife to his other hand while he rolled up his other sleeve. Once it was fastidiously folded into place, he looked up and smiled at his captive, the disparity between his easy grin and the coldness of his eyes giving Sebastian a slight chill.

"Are you writing a book?" One elegant black brow arched in disbelief, but an actual smile may have tugged at the corners of his lips, if just slightly. "No, nothing so crass. I occasionally use morphine to help me sleep. Do you find that to be a disagreeable trait in a business partner, Moran?"

"Nah. Just like to know what kind of man I'm dealing with." Fathomless black eyes bored into Sebastian's with a ferocity that the larger man had only seen a few times in his life. In a fight, he'd occasionally see it in the eyes of his opponent; usually a man who was about to die and was hellbent on taking Sebastian with him. It sent an odd sort of shiver down his spine. This Moriarty was chasing death, and for whatever incomprehensible reason wanted to drag Sebastian along for the ride.

"Consumed. You're dealing with a man consumed." his voice was soft, a bit hollow. The moment only lasted a second, but there was something almost sad about Moriarty's tone. It was subtle, but the man's shoulders hunched in slightly before he straightened, gathering a false air of offhandedness about him. Almost flippantly, he smiled broadly and waved his knife-wielding hand before continuing to speak.

"I haven't the time or the inclination to be a junkie, Mr. Moran. I have more important things to do. So if you agree to work for me, please don't worry that you'll wake up one day to find I've skittered off in the night with all your things in search of a fix."

"Now, are you in or out? Six months, with me. Fight my war. Agree, and I'll make sure that you walk out of here and never see a court marshall. After your 'contract' is up, you're free to go. With a new identity if you want one, and with more than twice all the money you could hope for. Now what do you say, Sebastian?"

"Not to be blunt, but how do I know you can make good on those promises?" The deal sounded good. A fate was being offered to him that was a hell of alot better than what he had expected when he was dragged back to London, but hell if part of him didn't think it was too damn strange to be believable. The slender man simply moved forward with a fluid grace, snaking back behind the chair that Sebastian was bound to. Instinctively, he tensed. There were few things in the world more unnerving than someone behind you with a knife. One of those was someone behind you with a knife when you couldn't do a damn thing to defend yourself.

"You don't. I would have supposed that snatching you away from the army and bringing you here would have been enough to impress the extent of my resources on you, but that doesn't appear to be the case. So you'll just have to take my word for it, I suppose." The man's voice was close behind him, his breath a little warm puff of air on the back of Sebastian's neck. Impossible as it seemed, the sniper tensed even more. Oddly enough, instead of taking the knife to him the man crouched down and carefully sawed through the rope that bound Sebastian's hands. Once those were free he stood and rounded back to the front of the still-seated sniper, tossing the blade at Sebastian so he could free his own legs.

"You can walk out of here if you don't believe me. The army'll pick you up in a matter of days, and I'll move on to the next prospect on my list. Or you can come with me. Six months as the only soldier in my private war. I'll take care of all our living expenses, all your equipment, everything. Oh, look!" he exclaimed, gracing Sebastian with a smile that actually reached his icy gaze. "You've already made up your mind. I can see it in the set of your mouth, the look in your eyes. Funny, though. I can't tell if you're in or out. So, which is it? Will you be coming with me?"

Sebastian shrugged and nodded his agreement. Like it had ever really been a question. Given a choice between dishonor by trial followed by death in a cell, or accompanying a mysterious stranger on some sort of unspecified quest, Moran knew he'd choose the latter every time. If he was going to die, it'd at least be running somewhat free instead of holed up in some damp cell somewhere. And well, fuck. Even if he managed to stay away from the Army, what did life have to offer him other than a rather dull existence. Getting back to India on what resources he had available would be impossible, and getting his hands on cash while trying to dodge drawing heat would be difficult at best.. Yeah, the best option available was to work for this odd little man, doing something that at least had the potential to be interesting. He could either earn enough to get back to India, or if the man turned out to be some sort of con he could just knock him off and take whatever he had. Even if it wasn't much it'd still be more than Sebastian had now, which was approximately nothing.

"Yeah. 'M coming with. One last question, though. When I'm not calling you Boss, what should I call you?"

"Moriarty. Jim Moriarty. Pleasure doing business with you."

The first 'assignment' told Sebastian just about everything that he needed to know about his little arrangement with Jim. The slight, dark haired man was reticent about his plans, merely insisting that Sebastian accompany him each evening as he went out for drinks. Jim armed him sparingly, a simple knife for his boot and a basic pistol to go under his jacket. Sebastian hoped that after the first 'job', whatever it may be, that the man would trust him to carry whatever he pleased. After all, carrying just the two weapons on him made Sebastian feel almost naked.

Accompanying Jim to the pubs wasn't anything like the 'war' that he had promised; but at least the bastard was paying for drinks. After two days of spending days lazing about in a hotel room and nights waiting in a particular pub, being bored and attempting to make small talk while the slender man across from him silently kept his eyes fixed either on his lager or the door, he'd had his fill. Sebastian was about ready to shake his boss until answers fell out of him. In fact, the third night he was about two drinks from doing so when Jim's face lit up like a kid on Christmas morning.

"Oh! Wonderful! Look at that, Bash. The silly little bastard finally decided to show up." Sebastian gave his boss a quizzical glance,which was greeted by a charming grin. God, so that was a nickname he was going to have to put up with, then. Wonderful.

"This is who we've been waiting for?" Blonde brows furrowed together in concentration. "So, what. I'm going to watch your back while you go over and have a little 'chat' with him?" Jim's response was to school his face into a perfect mask of mock horror, his mouth forming a perfect little 'o' shape, his dark eyes opened wide.

"Nooo~oo. Nothing so pedestrian. I'm going to head outside for a fag. You're going to wait a minute or two, and then take him out."

"What?" Sebastian dropped his voice to a whisper, looking around to make sure nobody had heard the smaller man's request.

"Don't be such a flat tire." Jim's fine boned features twisted into a little grimace of disgust, the expression only settling on his face for a moment before a giant grin took back over. "Oh, I can't stay mad at you. Not on a day like today. Now. I'm going to be blunt, so listen very carefully." The smaller man spun on his stool, leaning over the tabletop and crooking onf finger to indicate that Sebastian should too. The blonde leaned forward as indicated. It put his face almost uncomfortably close to Jim's; a few centimeters apart at the most. He swore he could smell the man's shampoo.

"Sebastian. Just drop him, would you? That'll be the first item off our to-do list." Jim flashed that smile again, which would have been charming and almost sweet if he wasn't asking Sebastian to kill a man with the same amount of gravity that he'd been using to order his drinks.

"What? Why?" Not that Sebastian found the idea of killing someone so distasteful; he'd done that plenty of times. Up close and personal as well as from far away. But at least then he'd known what he was fighting and killing for.

"I don't believe providing you with any type of answers was part of our agreement, Sebastian. Now hurry along. I'll bring the car around." And with that Jim was gone, sliding off his stool to melt into the crowd so quickly that Sebastian was almost left wondering if the man had even been sitting across from him to him in the first place. Well, best to get to work then. So what if the bloke might've had a wife and kids. Plenty of the people he shot in Burma surely had families, it didn't matter then. And if it didn't matter then, it shouldn't matter now. The idea of not having to answer to anyone after the end of his term with his black eyed Irish madman of a boss pushed the blonde past the initial hesitation. Once that socially enforced barrier broke, Sebastian found the feel of the war flooding him again. The adrenaline, the anticipation, the ridiculousness and the danger all washing over him in a tide of familiarity. And for the first time since he came back to London, Sebastian Moran smiled.

He quickly inventoried what he had on him. His pistol, of course. But it was loud, and would draw more attention than the sniper was comfortable with. That left his hands and his boot knife. Neither option was particularly quick, and the bar was crowded. It took about two minutes of watching before Sebastian calculated a plan. The folks at his mark's table were in a constant state of flux; always up and down, coming and going. When the mark himself rose, Sebastian did as well, intercepting the man on his way to the bar.

"I don't mean to be a bother, but I just came in from the alley and I think one of your mates is out there. He looks like he's been bashed up," Sebastian insisted, clasping one large hand around the drunken man's wrist, tugging him towards the front of the pub. Fortunately it was late in the evening and the man was sloshed, immediately believing the lie. He staggered along behind Sebastian with a confused, then concerned, look plastered stupidly across his face.

" Sss Billy innit? Silly bastard prolly got himself rolled again. I keep telling him to stay away from whores with no teeth, but he won' listen to me." The man babbled on behind Sebastian, who ignored him in favor of focusing on a nice dark patch of alleyway between two bins. He pulled the man in close, and pointed to the space.

"Over there," Sebastian directed. "I'll stay here and watch your back."

"You're a real good chap," the man slurred as he stumbled over into the shadows. Sebastian grinned as he stooped down, snatching his boot knife from its sheath before following his mark over to the shadowy patch of alley.

"Billy?" The man sounded confused, bent over and looking on the ground for a man that wasn't going to be there. Well, there'd be a man there shortly. But it wouldn't be Billy, it'd be him.

"Nah, mate. No Billy. Just me." Before the man could sound any kind of alarm, Sebastian pushed forward, sliding the knife easily between two of the man's lower ribs, effectively puncturing the lung. He gasped and spun around before the pain hit him, and he staggered backwards into the brick wall.

"What're you..." His voice was thin and reedy; almost hollow sounding as the punctured lung collapsed. Stepping forward and closing the distance between them, Sebastian gave another few quick stabs to the man's torso, sliding each between the ribs, carefully making sure that he didn't turn the blade as he withdrew. No need to snap the thing off inside the fellow. It was a decent knife, after all. Three more strikes delivered and Sebastian stepped back to admire his handiwork. Every nerve in him sung, and he felt... whole. Unburdened by the dullness that had plagued him for the entire trip back to London. The tang of blood in the air set his mouth to watering. God, he had missed this.

"Why?" The word was a barely audible rasp. Blood burbled from the corner of his mark's mouth, confused eyes dimming as he slumped over. A wet bloom of crimson started to seep through his jacket, and Sebastian bent down to wipe the knife blade off on the leg of the man's trousers.

"Why?" He repeated. This time it was followed by a weak cough that spattered Sebastian lightly with blood. The blonde grimaced a bit, more in annoyance than disgust, and shrugged before standing back up.

"That's a good question," he answered, leaning forward and drawing a clean line across the man's throat from ear to ear. Sebastian managed to keep any arterial spray from getting on his clothes, but he felt a warm sort of stickiness on his fingers that he found comfortingly familiar. Transfixed, the blonde stared at the deep red stains on the webbing between his fingers.

A short, sharp honk from the end of the alley caught his attention. Jim was waiting in the same big black car that they had taken to the pub. One pale hand waved at him from the open passenger side window. The mad bastard looked for all the world like he was just some ordinary bloke waiting to pick up a friend. Without hesitation, Sebastian strode quickly down the length of the alley, opened the car door and slid in. Jim spared him a quick glance to the blood sprayed across his fingers, the tip of his tongue darting out to worry at the corner of his mouth.

"God," Jim lilted, dark at the sight of Sebastian's hands. "First one down. I could just kiss you right now." Sebastian snorted a bit at the tease, but something drew his eyes to the smaller man's lips all the same. It looked like Jim really was biting the inside of his bottom lip at least, and the look in his eyes was more appreciative than shocked. A small chill ran icy fingers down the length of Sebastian's spine, triggering an almost unfamiliar and entirely unwelcome heat to uncoil low in his gut.

Fuck.

It'd been years, years since he'd found another man attractive. Not since that one fateful night when, at thirteen years old, he learned what semen tasted like by cornering one of a rather attractive if hapless gardeners out in the shed. The experience was one that sustained him for years; the memory of the firm planes of the man's body pressed against his, the slight scrape of his stubble as their mouths melded seamlessly together, the hot and heavy feel of the man's cock on his tongue all filed away and used regularly on extremely private nights. As much as the memory of the act itself was a source of pleasure, the aftermath was a source of great pain. He'd never quite been beaten so badly in his life. A doctor actually had to be called to help tend the wounds. It was the beginning of his collection of scars, the price of his deviancy, and something that his brain simply hadn't been able to get past. Sure, there were moments when a good jawline or the curve of a man's shoulder would turn his head, but nothing more than aesthetic appreciation ever surged through him.

Now, the almost forgotten tendrils of lust were uncoiling in his abdomen because his mad little boss was staring at his bloody hands, looking for all the world like he wanted to lick the blood off each of Sebastian's fingers in the filthiest of ways. And as much as Sebastian hated it, the thought seemed to have loosened the stranglehold that he had on his libido. Because fuck, having that mad little bastard sucking on his fingers didn't sound divine. The blonde managed to suppress a shudder, and turned his attention away from Jim, focused instead on how he could tidy up so the man would stop looking at him like that.

With a quickness honed by both practice and desperation, Sebastian re-sheathed his knife and yanked a handkerchief out of his back pocket. Dutifully ignoring his boss, the ex-Colonel began scrubbing the blood off his hands before it dried any further. The instant the cloth was out and the blood was gone Jim's eyes had traveled back to the road. He merged into traffic before tearing down the street at a breakneck pace, laughing out his open window for a few long minutes before turning back to his employee.

"One down, Sebastian. Six more to go."

So. This was the 'war' then. Seven. Seven fucking people on the madman's hitlist. Without thinking the blonde dug a crumpled pack of smokes out of his jacket pocket, lighting up and puffing away. Six more men to kill. Another six months in Jim's employ. It should have been terrifying. Instead, a rush of excitement filled him, mixing with the cooling lust that had surged through him before, and he found himself laughing, long and loud.

"So, I'm utterly fucked aren't I?" he asked the smaller man when their breathless laughter had finally tapered off, flicking the spent butt of his cigarette out of the window as Jim maneuvered them out of the town. In what seemed like no time at all, the diminutive brunette had driven them onto the highway, seeming to head out of the city without even stopping by their hotel to retrieve the few things that the two of them had stashed away.

Well, it made sense. It was unlikely that anybody would find the body before morning, and even more unlikely that anyone in the bar could identify Sebastian, but 'better safe than sorry' seemed the right way to play it. And if Jim had the type of resources he promised, it wasn't like they had anything that couldn't be replaced. The only item of any importance to Sebastian was his dogtags, and those never left his neck. The rest of it was just stuff. Unimportant, replaceable. Still, it would have been nice of Jim to ask. Though his new boss didn't seem to be the type to consider other people's needs, let alone concern himself with being 'nice'.

Moran turned to his boss to tell him off a bit anyway, but Jim looked positively delighted as he tore down the dark, open road. The wind from the open window rumpled his hair, and when combined with the smile that still graced his lips it gave the normally severe looking young man a carefree look that suited him. Something else stirred in Sebastian, this time in his chest, dull and unfamiliar. Whatever it meant, it certainly caused any caustic words to die unspoken on Sebastian's tongue. With a glance to his side, Jim gave his new 'favorite' (a much more flattering term for 'only') employee a wink and a smirk before finally answering.

"Fucked? Oh, Sebastian, you have no idea. You. Have. No. Idea."

The second assignment was the same as the first. Jim checked a little notebook that he always kept in his jacket pocket, scribbling a few more furious notes in it before looking up with something wild and almost feral burning in his dark eyes.

"We're headed out to Durham," he said, lips twisting in a little scowl. "Looks like most of the chicken shits I'm looking for left London thanks to the bombings. We're going to have to travel a lot, I suspect. And I may have to ask this one some questions before he's ready to be... disposed of."

"Any chance that you're going to tell me what this is all about?" Sebastian tried to sound casual, but he was unbelievably curious.

"Absolutely none. Do you mind taking over driving? It's going to be a long trip, what with some of the roads being damaged and all. I figured we could trade off steering."

"Yeah sure," Sebastian answered. "So... you're not going to talk about you. You going to talk about anything else, or is this going to be the most boring trip in the history of the automobile?"

Over the next week Sebastian remembered that phrase, and very nearly kicked himself every single time. Once Jim had started talking, it was impossible to shut the man up. He talked about everything, and anything. The mad little bastard identified breeds of cows and genuses of trees, calculated their mileage and their speed, and rattled on about maths that Sebastian, despite his educated background, couldn't really begin to understand other than in the vaguest of ways.

Once Sebastian started asking questions, though, it became a different game. While his boss wouldn't talk about his history or answer any questions about his own life, he was happy to discuss anything else. Sebastian had a fantastic time trying to find topics to that the dark haired main didn't know anything about. But Jim, as it turned out, was both fascinating and well rounded; the younger man well versed in a variety of topics that Sebastian would never have expected. He loved music and math, art and history, poetry and science... there wasn't a topic that the dark eyed man didn't seem at least conversationally familiar with. Despite his distaste for what he considered his overly lavish and stuffy upbringing, Sebastian did still carry a few of the interests from that time.

They talked for two days straight about Shelley and Byron, Poe and Dickenson, finding their tastes in poetry to be remarkably similar. After that conversation ran its course, the pair spent the better part of the week debating the meanings behind some of Chaucer's works. During the day Jim was animated and lively, but the evenings always heralded a drop in his mood. Whenever they checked into whatever little motel Jim chose, the younger man (Sebastian was convinced he was older than Jim, though he had no proof at all) would shed his suit, don sleeping trousers and a simple white tee, and curl up on his side.

As far as Sebastian could tell Jim didn't sleep. No, he just laid there awake but completely quiet. Every effort the blonde made to try and initiate a conversation was met only with silence. After the first three days of trying to pull the man out of it Sebastian gave up. He purchased a book at one of their stops to refuel and eat, busying himself with that while Jim stared blankly off into space. By the next morning all would be well again, with Jim bright and chipper as ever, and their easy dialogue would continue until the following evening. Occasionally the dark haired man would nap in the car when Sebastian drove, but it seemed that overall he had an unnatural ability to go without actual sleep for days and days. Just another little quirk about the man that made him interesting, though Sebastian was surprised to find that he worried just the slightest bit about whether or not it would have an adverse effect on his boss's health. Funny that. Ah, he was probably just worried because he hadn't gotten paid, and might very well not if Jim ended up in the bin because he turned into a nutter from not sleeping.

At the end of the week, they finally pulled into Durham. They would have rolled in sooner, but there had been a map misreading incident that Sebastian was beginning to suspect that Jim had intentionally planned, just so they could draw out the trip for an extra day while they got back on the right track. When questioned about it, the smaller man simply gave him one of his enigmatic smiles and a small shrug, before tearing off into a completely different topic.

"We're looking for a man named Adam Thacker. Before he dies, I want him to answer a series of questions about the five other men I'm looking for. This isn't going to be quick, or clean. Is that a problem?" Sebastian had yet to acclimate to the measuring stare that Jim leveled him with each time he wanted an answer. It felt a bit like being flayed; as if those dark eyes stripped away the unnecessary surface parts of him to get to the real meat underneath.

"No." Sebastian hadn't ever gotten to try his hand at interrogation in Burma; he was too busy sniping and it wasn't within the purview of his division anyway. But when he saw the way that the Indian Army POWs were treated by the Japanese he had to admit that the idea of torture was something he used to lull himself to sleep at night. Towards the end of the campaign he'd gotten, at least in his own mind, rather creative. It would be interesting to try out some of the ideas that he'd had floating around in his head for the past three years. And it'd be nice to see if he was as good at it as he suspected he'd be.

"Good. We'll drive by his place, follow him around, pick up his habits. While we're at it I'll pick out a place for our... activities. There's bound to be at least one well suited building in town. After that it should be a quick snatch and and grab. We'll drag him back to our base of operations and let the fun begin!" Jim spoke the words in a breathless voice, making the activities sound more like foreplay than a planned torture and eventual murder. That unwelcome feeling of lustful interest started to thread through Sebastian's nerves again, and he had to bite down on his bottom lip until the coppery taste of his own shocked him out of his trance.

"Problem, Moran?" Jim's voice was sharp, his eyes focused on Sebastian's bloody lip.

"None. Just, ah. Excited, I suppose. I'm eager to see if I'm any good at this." The answer seemed to mollify his boss, and Jim gave an easy laugh. "Oh, it's in your nature, Bash. I'm sure you're a natural." They bantered on for a while, discussing different methods that had been used historically, comparing their theoretical favorite techniques, making mental notes on what order their choices should go in to produce the most possible pain for the victim.

For the first time on their trip (that Sebastian was aware of, at least) Jim truly slept that night. Curled up in his hotel bed he looked almost peaceful, his face appearing even younger than it did when he was awake. Fascinated, though strongly off-put by said fascination, Sebastian watched him for at least an hour before finally turning off the light. They reversed situations that evening, with Sebastian being the one to lay awake all night, staring off into the darkness, lost in his own thoughts.

A few days later Sebastian learned that he was very good at extracting information. Jim, on the other hand, was an absolute genius.

They spent about three days on surveillance and another day on setting up what Jim was affectionately referring to as their "hideout" in an abandoned barn about half an hour outside of town. Said hideout was now covered in blood and viscera. Amazing, how much blood and tissue a human body could produce.

Sebastian suspected that as bad as the barn looked, he and Jim didn't look all that much better. He had to admit, though; he was both surprised and impressed at Jim's enthusiasm and creativity. Sebastian had often thought about removing someone's teeth as part of the torture process, but it had never occurred to him to then make his victim swallow them. Jim had a way of taking the viscerally physical aspect and twisting it until it horrifyingly psychological as well.

Throughout the process they had gathered information on three of the other names in Jim's book. Potential locations, names of business contacts, information on family and friends. Despite not having information on two of the five, Jim still seemed relatively pleased with their progress. Or maybe he was just still a bit high off the adrenaline rush. It was hard to tell. But his smile was easy and genuine, even if his face was smeared a bit with red. His forehead in particular was badly streaked from where he kept raking his dark hair back with bloody fingers.

"God, you're a mess." Sebastian wrinkled his nose in faux disgust, rubbing his thumb across the younger man's forehead. He then presented said thumb, covered in crusty dried blood, to Jim as proof. The brunette's only reaction was to chuckle, then give Sebastian a scrutinizing once over that left the blonde feeling uncomfortably bare.

"You're not much better," the smaller man countered, returning the sniper's faked disgust with a haughty look. With his dark eyes narrowed and his chin raised, he managed to look down on Sebastian despite being several centimeters shorter.

"I suppose that's true." Sebastian glanced down at himself and grimaced. He was coated in viscera. And while they had both brought a change of clothing tucked away in the trunk of the car, there was no way that they'd be able to get their skin and hair clean enough to pass in public, even if it was just to dart into the motel to shower.

"Don't worry, Bash," Jim admonished, wagging a finger at the larger man. "I know what I'm doing. There's a pump out back, on the side of the barn opposite the road. It'll be cold as fuck, but it'll get the job done." Sebastian rolled his eyes, despite the wave of gratitude he felt for Jim's thoroughness.

"You wanna go first? Or should I do the honors?" As he asked the question, Sebastian suddenly found himself very aware of how naked he was going to have to be. While that thought didn't bother him all that much (there was very little privacy in the trenches) the twin realization that Jim would also be stripping down caused a swell of molten hunger to crash over him. The sensation was overwhelming at first, but soon contracted to a tight, pulsing tangle of need just below his navel.

"I'll go first," Jim offered with a shrug. If the smaller man noticed Sebastian's sudden wave of lechery he gave no indication. Instead, he started to work at the buttons of his shirt, jacket having been discarded hours ago. The garment was stripped off, leaving the slender brunette clad in just his trousers and undershirt. The dark eyed man gave Sebastian a wicked grin that panicked the sniper for a moment; the smug smile plastered across his face making the sniper sure that Jim had seen the momentary flash of hunger he displayed, and was volleying it back at Sebastian.

"By going first any sun-warmed water that there is in the cistern will be mine," the brunette delivered smoothly. Fortunately the smaller man turned around before Sebastian could blush, embarrassed at his own misreading of the situation. When Jim's hands moved to his belt, though, the blonde quickly turned around. Not wanting his boss to pick up on his unease, Sebastian made short work of busying himself with collecting any implements they had used that he might want to keep.

"Ah, leave 'em," Jim called out, his voice indicating that he was nearing the back of the barn. Sebastian closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and turned around. Framed in afternoon sunlight, Jim stood in front of the open barn door. He was bare chested, clad in nothing but his shorts, with red on his face and hands and paler pink streaks crossing the other areas of his ivory skin. He looked a glorious, bloody mess, and the knot in Sebastian's groin pulsed in time with his heartbeat, flooding his system with need.

"We'll pick up more in the next town. And I really want to see what the papers have to say about our little collection, don't you?" With that, Jim was gone, the light in the barn fading as the massive wood door rolled shut again. Sebastian gave a shuddering sigh and moved to a relatively clean patch of ground, half sitting and half collapsing as he raked a broad hand through his blonde hair. That little bastard was going to be the absolute death of him.

It was then that he noticed Jim's jacket, not but a few meters away. Inside one of the inner pocket was his notebook, the one that seemed to be filled with whatever information he'd been able to gather about this quest of his. As tempting as it was, Jim would undoubtedly notice if it had been messed with, because Jim noticed everything. Which begged the question of why the hyper-observant man hadn't picked up on Sebastian's steadily growing interest in him. The thought sent a chill through the larger man; perhaps he had and Jim was just toying with Sebastian now. Or... he'd noticed and... no. He wasn't going to let his mind go there.

Instead of trying to figure out what exactly it was he wanted or even thought would happen, Sebastian closed his eyes and focused on his breathing. In and out, holding each for three seconds before releasing, focusing on reclaiming the calm he felt before taking a shot. Before he knew it Jim had returned, smartly dressed in yet another suit. By that time the larger blonde had managed to cool the heated feeling building inside him some, though it did start to flutter back to life when he realized that Jim wasn't wearing a tie; his collar open to reveal a length of creamy white skin along his throat. The delicious little sight came to a stop in the slight hollow between his collar bones, and it took Sebastian a second or two longer than he would have liked to tear his eyes away. Jim just gave him another of those unreadable, wicked little smirks of his and rolled his eyes.

"I forgot to pack a tie," the brunette said, his tone smarmy to the point of almost being petulant.

"Pity for you," Sebastian shot back, hoping that the sarcasm saturated point would draw attention away from his obvious fascination. Before the smaller man got a chance to answer the sniper had hauled himself up off the floor, bolting out the door before the conversation could continue. He stripped hastily, half expecting Jim to pop up out of nowhere and get the last word, but fortunately he was able to slip under the icy water without being interrupted his boss.

The frigid torrent did wonders to quell the last bits of lust that his concentration hadn't been able to quash, and killed any building feelings Jim's damn shirt kicked up as well. By the time he retrieved his change of clothes from the car and dressed again he felt almost normal. Nothing but a vague sense of both hunger and shame lingered in the back of Sebastian's mind; both sensations ephemeral and easy to push aside.

When he came back around Jim was lounging in the back seat of the sedan, managing to both curl up and sprawl across the leather bench at the same time. Sebastian almost called out, mocking the smaller man for his ridiculous pose, but as he got closer he realized that Jim was sleeping again. Something in him just wouldn't let the blonde wake the other man, and he slid into the drivers seat as silently as he could. Jim stirred for a moment when the car started, but he fell back into his slumber easily and Sebastian simply drove; uncertain whether or not the direction he was headed in was even the right one, but content to just travel if it allowed his mad little boss to get some actual rest for once.

"Well, this is the one that'll make us officially serial," Jim chirped cheerfully, black eyes sparkling as they pulled into the next town. It had taken them almost a month to hunt down the next name on their list, after tracking down a few false leads that had them seemingly just days behind their intended target, a man named William Carson. "And they said I'd never do anything with my life. Now I've proving them wrong, twice. I'm rich and a wanted killer. You can't get much more 'something' than that."

Sebastian snorted and rolled his cobalt eyes. "You haven't actually killed anybody yet. It was my knife in Thacker's throat that did him in. So far this has been all my show. I'm the wanted killer in this car," he boasted teasingly.

"True, true. But I'm masterminding! Plotting and scheming. Surely they'd hold me accountable as well, if they even knew about me. Which they don't," Jim added, a frown crossing his face. "The papers think you're working alone, even after our lovely teamwork in the barn. That's a pity. Maybe I should do the next one myself, just to throw them for a loop. Whaddaya think, Bash?"

"I think as part of a celebration on becoming 'official' serial killers, you should tell me what this is all about." The sniper kept his voice was smooth, and he tried to back up his request with a charming grin, hoping that Jim wouldn't once again shut him down. But the easy repartee they had going a moment ago was gone; Jim closed up like a book, face gone blank in a matter of seconds.

"Why do you even care?" His voice was flat, almost toneless. Everything that had been so animated about the diminutive brunette a moment ago had drained away, leaving this odd, listless creature in his stead.

"Dunno. Killed two people, gonna kill five more. I'm curious as to what it's all about, I guess." Sebastian continued to watch his boss carefully as they drove around the town, looking for the 'right' kind of motel. Something towards the outskirts; cheap but not too sleazy. The kind of place that profited from maintaining a professional facade while specializing in not asking any questions. Jim had an eye for them. Jim had an eye for everything. Everything except Sebastian's still growing fascination, it seemed. Which cooled some every time the younger man rebuffed his request for more information. Talk about literature was good and all, but what the sniper really wanted to know was more about his boss.

"Curious," Jim tested the word on his tongue as if it were unfamiliar. They rode for the next several minutes in silence, and Sebastian had all but given up the topic once again when he heard Jim's voice, so quiet he could barely make out the words.

"They killed my brother." Flat, emotionless, quiet. The lack of inflection made Jim's voice sound strange. Almost alien. It struck Sebastian as odd; he had expected that when Jim finally did give up the mysterious stranger bit that he'd dive into his story with the kind of enthusiasm he seemed to hold for everything else. That was obviously not the case. Sebastian remained quiet for several more minutes, but gave a soft sigh when it became apparent that the one sentence was all the information on the topic that he was going to get.

"I'm sorry to hear that." The blonde didn't really know what else to say. Sebastian had convinced himself that his boss's vendetta was business related, given the amount of resources that were at Jim's disposal. The man was obviously obscenely rich; the fact made obvious by his constant giving away and purchasing of cars, his collection of expensive suits, and the amount of money he seemed to be more than happy to throw away on bribes.

Given his affinity for changing cars and plates, using fake names, and generally being familiar with the seedier sides of life Sebastian had immediately figured that however those riches were earned, it wasn't in a way that was entirely legal. Not that it made much of a difference why he wanted these men dead, not really. Sebastian had given up understanding after that first week. All he knew was that this was the most vibrant he'd felt in years, even more so than during the war. He certainly wasn't about to stop just because Jim wasn't going to share some basic fucking information with him.

Jim was more withdrawn than usual as they went about their routine of picking out their victim, following him, establishing a base and a plan. His silent nights crossed over into equally reticent days; no amount of goading on Sebastian's part seemed to pull him out of it. It wasn't until they actually had William Carson in the trunk of their car that Jim spoke at all, uttering the first words that weren't merely snapped orders in the past 36 hours.

"I want you to hold him down for me, Bash." The smaller man slid off his jacket and took to rolling up his sleeves again, much in the same way that he had when they first met, or when he prepared to work over Thacker. The pinprick scars still remained but there were no new bruises there in the crook of his elbow, and it occurred to Sebastian that for all that Jim had confessed his use of morphine he hadn't partaken of it once during their entire trip.

The sniper filed that information away for later, instead choosing to nod his agreement to his boss before pulling himself out of the car and their third victim out of the trunk. He screamed around his gag, but the sound was muffled, leaving only the softest of grunts to echo off the underside of the bridge that Jim had picked as their 'safe' spot to work. It was two hours outside the town they had been staying in, in a truly desolate pasture. The bridge and the stream it ran over were a good deal out of the way, and at least a mile from the road where they had parked their car. The stream would provide a good spot for washing up. All in all it was exactly what Jim preferred. Quiet. Isolated. Convenient.

Once they were obscured from the road beneath the arch of stone. Jim turned his dark eyes to Sebastian. "Beat him. Badly. I want to hear his ribs breaking." Sebastian followed his orders, noting with a small amount of satisfaction the approval in Jim's eyes as he watched his sniper work. Finally, the man was unable to stand on his own, and Sebastian let his limp body fall to the rocky grass.

"Perfect. Now, I'm going to tell Carson a little story. Would you kindly hold him down for me, Bash?" Moving up towards the man's head, Sebastian secured Carson's shoulders to the ground with his (now somewhat sore) hands. Damn, it would have been nice if Jim had let him know the plan beforehand. A pair of brass knuckles could go a long way in preserving one's actual knuckles when it came to a beat down like the one he had just delivered.

Jim wasted no time getting in position, straddling the man's abdomen, pinning his arms in place with each of his knees. One long-fingered hand waggled his little penknife in a mockingly menacing way, tapping the tip of it to the man's gagged mouth.

"I had a brother, once. Nice chap. Looked a lot like me, seeing as how he was my twin and all." Carson's eyes narrowed for a second before they snapped wide open in horrified recognition; though Sebastian thought that as twins they must not have looked too much alike because it took Jim's prompting to get Carson to recognize him. Still, once the connection was made, the man thrashed feebly under Sebastian and Jim's combined restraint. Unintelligible moaning started to pour out from underneath the gag, though it turned to sobs when the tip of Jim's knife started moving across his left pectoral. Captivated, all Sebastian could do was listen and watch, and Jim wrote his story out on their captive's bare chest.

"Mother used to refer to both of us as her little spider when we were little. 'Eight limbs but one heart,' she said." Jim calmly explained to the man writhing beneath him. He continued to carve away at the man's chest, stopping once to slap their sobbing captive when he started being too loud. "We did everything together. Played together, shared a bed in our tiny little house together. Went to school together, moved away together, even started up our own business together. We lived together, worked together, ate together... we were never apart. We needed nothing but each other."

"I'm telling A STORY," he roared as the moans got louder and louder, the sheer force of his anger reducing Carson's pitiful groans to choked whines.

"Our lives were perfect, and thanks to my intelligence and my brother's charms we never wanted for anything. We had the whole world in the palms of our intertwined hands." Finally satisfied with the bloody mess that he had made of Carson's chest, Jim leaned back, allowing Sebastian a good look at what he had been carving into the man. It was a spider, huge and bloody, carved so deep in some places that Sebastian could actually see the sickly whiteish blue of exposed the man's rib bones. The gaping cuts pulsed with fresh blood each time the man took a shallow breath. Obviously Carson was losing consciousness, but that didn't seem to faze Jim at all. The wild eyed brunette just kept going, voice almost brittle with bitterness, his normally attractive face twisted with rage until it was almost unrecognizable.

"It's a terrible thing, to lose a piece of your soul. Your person. Your identity," he hissed. "Not that you would know. There isn't anyone alive that would miss you if you were dead. No one that would mourn you. If there was, I'd have carved them to pieces in front of you, then fed you off their remains for a week. But there isn't, so I'll have to exact my price in some other way."

Carefully, the smaller man drew back so that he was no longer seated across Carson's belly. Sebastian's large hands remained on the man's shoulders kept him pinned. Moriarty stabbed the knife into the man's newly exposed abdomen, giving an appreciative laugh at his captive's anguished cry. The tiny knife wasn't nearly long enough to do terrible damage, but the former Colonel knew from personal experience that it would hurt like a sonofabitch.

"Be a dear and hold onto that for me for a moment, wouldya Carson?" Dark eyes flashed with sadistic delight at the terrified gaze their captive gave to the little knife sticking out of his belly, and gave the wounded man a nasty grin. The arachnid that the dark eyed man had carved into their captive's pectorals pulsed with fresh blood each time he feebly struggled against the strong hands that held him down.

"I really don't like to get my hands dirty," Jim explained, tone almost conversational as he yanked the blade from the man's stomach with a flick of his wrist. "But for you," he smiled darkly, dancing the knife point up Carson's sternum, "I'll make an exception." Drawing the knife up, he ran the flat of it along each of the man's cheekbones before inserting it carefully into one nostril.

"You wanted to play with my brother, Carson? Things got out of hand? Well. Now you get to play with me. And I'll show you what 'out of hand' really looks like." Sebastian wasn't sure which he smiled more at, the man's muffled scream or Jim's answering laugh.

Later on that night, once all the blood had been washed away and Sebastian's hands had largely stopped hurting, Jim rolled over in his bed. It was the first time he ever really made eye contact with Sebastian at night, let alone spoke to him. The blonde noticed Jim watching him and waited for a moment, quietly enjoying having the intense young man's attention focused solely on him for a moment before speaking.

"What is it," he murmured, trying to keep the natural amount of gruffness out of his voice, at least as much of it as he could. He didn't want to startle Jim, or worry him, or do anything to break this oddly fragile moment that seemed to be suspended between them.

"His name was Richard. My brother, Richard." He whispered the words like a sort of confession, deep sorrow visible in his dark eyes for a moment before the regular blank nighttime mask settled over his features. Slowly, he rolled away, turning his back to Sebastian once more. At a loss for words, the blonde studied the graceful lines of his shoulder blades as they poked out of the thin cotton barrier of his shirt; scrutinizing them as if they held the secret of what to say in response to Jim's words.

"Thank you," Sebastian said finally. It seemed so paltry an offering for the amount of... trust? honesty? openness? that Jim had given him. Whatever it was, his murmured thanks seemed too little to offer in return. But it was all he had, so it had to do. Evidently it was the right thing, made obvious when the smaller man gave a contented little sigh. Sebastian sat up quietly in the darkness, listening as Jim's breathing slowed, falling into a sleepy cadence that made the sniper smile.

"You're welcome," came the answer, murmured and almost indistinct. No further words came after that. Sleep didn't either, at least not for Sebastian. The rugged blonde stayed up until his eyes burned, listening carefully to the darkness and Jim's sleepy sighs just in case.

They were another month into the hunt, still tracking down number four (a bloke named John Abrams) before Sebastian got the nerve to bring up Richard again. It seemed like a bad idea. But he was curious. And reckless. It wasn't a combination that helped him hold his tongue. That Sebastian didn't understand the mere concept behind Jim's killing spree didn't help either. The sniper himself had three brothers, and none of them were particularly close. Certainly he wouldn't go on some sort of cross-country vengeance quest, even if something particularly nasty happened to any of them. Hell, he'd only even consider it a possibility if something happened to all three of them, and even then it was unlikely.

"So," he started off, one night. They were laying in their newly acquired convertible with the top down. Jim was sprawled across the front seat, Sebastian curled up in the back. He couldn't see the dark haired man but he knew that he'd be staring up at the night sky with wide black eyes. Stargazing was the only time he ever seemed inclined to talk at night during their entire trip. And that was only the once really; Jim went over every visible constellation in the sky in a soft murmur. After that, on the nights that they decided to sleep rough or out in the car, he'd often catch Jim staring at the sky rather than staring at nothing.

The lengthy silence that followed his question had Sebastian immediately regretting his decision to speak, let alone what he was going to ask. Still, if he was going to risk going to jail for the sake of avenging someone's dead brother, he should at least get to know what the man was like. After a few agonizing minutes, Jim made a curious little hum in response, and the blonde gathered up his courage and asked.

"What was Richard like?" The answering silence went on long enough that Sebastian though Jim was going to fully disregard his question. With a barely suppressed growl of frustration locked in his chest, the sniper shifted in his uncomfortable backseat bed with a grumble as he settled in to try and get some sleep. It was another five minutes after he closed his eyes that Jim's uncharacteristically soft voice answered him. Sebastian had to strain to make out the words, but didn't want to ask his boss to speak up for fear of breaking whatever spell seemed to settle over the smaller man.

"He stuttered. It's the first thing everyone noticed about him, so it's the first thing I say when asked about him." Jim gave a short, bitter laugh. "Not that anybody other than you or the police seemed to have any interest, and even theirs was fleeting."

"He stuttered, so people assumed that he was simple. But really, he was quite bright. Not in the same way as me. I've always been better at maths and sciences. He was better at emotions. Psychology. People. Reading them, telling them exactly what they wanted to hear. He could smooth over any... almost any situation." After that slip up, there was another long stretch of silence and Sebastian felt himself falling asleep. Jim's voice was barely enough to shake him back to wakefulness when he finally started speaking again.

"Richard was charming and clever and everyone he met was his friend within the first five minutes of their acquaintance. Undoubtedly you would have liked him. Why do you ask?"

"I just supposed that I should know a bit about who it is I'm going to hell for."

"Oh Sebastian, don't be silly. I'm going to hell on behalf of Richie. But you? You're going to hell for me." The following laugh was velvety, and if Sebastian hadn't known better he'd have sworn that there was just a hint of teasing lustiness hidden in the rich undertone. Heat uncoiled within him at that sound, and the sniper found himself unable to say any words to refute Jim's claim. He was going to hell for Jim. For so, so many different reasons.

After that, his partner's silence lasted until Sebastian really did fall asleep, thinking of some other strange Jim. A Jim that wasn't exactly Jim. One that stuttered a bit, smiled regularly, and laughed with his whole body. Sebastian woke feeling strangely guilty, like he had betrayed his boss somehow by imagining him in some other way. He tried bringing the subject up again But Jim didn't want to discuss it any further, meeting each question with a silent stare or outright dismissal. After a few rebuffs Sebastian gave the topic up again. He had the answer, what difference did the details really make?

These men had wronged Jim, taken something from him that Sebastian couldn't even imagine having, let alone having had and then losing to... whatever it was that they had done to Richard. A sort of nausea caused the blonde's stomach to tighten; the implications of what Jim said while dealing with Carson were clear. While didn't quite realize it at the time, it would be quite obvious in retrospect; that was the exact moment when the entirety of Sebastian Moran's mission changed. Before, he had been doing the job for himself; for his own entertainment and profit. In an instant, things subtly shifted; he wanted to kill those men, not just for his own benefit, but for Jim's. To bring the obviously troubled younger man a measure of peace in his life that would hopefully sustain him in his brother's absence. Sebastian decided, that day, to make Jim's crusade his own.

The memorable part about their fourth kill wasn't so much the actual murder itself. That was rather mundane; a bit of a departure from the bloody messes they had made of their last three victims. But it turned out that John Abrams was a well known stoolie, and all it took was the threat of a gun leveled at him in a dark alleyway to get him to spill all the information he had on the remaining two names on Jim's list, let alone to get him to willingly get into the back of their car. Contented and evidently not wanting to make a mess of it for once, once they arrived at their destination Jim simply requested that Sebastian shoot the man. So the blonde did, a shot ringing out across the dingy bricks of the half-ruined, broken down manor house that the brunette had scoped out for them to use as their latest hideout.

After he pulled the trigger, Jim regarded him with an unreadable look in his wide, dark eyes. Something about that look sent a not-wholly unpleasant shiver down Sebastian's spine, and he found himself unable to hold his boss's gaze for longer than a few seconds. Cobalt eyes darted away to take in the body laying before them, and when he turned back to Jim the look was gone, a cool detachment settling in its place. Though behind that mask, something strange and inscrutable burned behind those black eyes. Something hollow and needy, something wild and untamed, something altogether indescribable that caused Sebastian's head to spin. And that unnameable something raked lusty claws through the bodyguard's abdomen, causing his pulse to quicken and his breathing to hitch.

"Pick him up and put him in the car, would you? He may be dead but I'm not done with him yet." If Jim noticed the sudden surge of desire he said nothing, displayed nothing, as usual. The only reaction the smaller man had was the same little smile that always graced his lips. The one that never touched his gaze. The one that remained unchanged even as Sebastian visibly blushed in front of him. Jim continued to smile his inscrutable smile as the rugged blonde packed the body in the trunk of the car. He said nothing as they drove off, the only sound their wheels screeching as they tore down the street.

As if to make up for the mundanity of the kill itself, his boss insisted that they stage the body in a public park. "One of the other marks lives here in town," he explained with a small shrug. "I want him to know. I want him to feel us behind him with every step he takes. I want him to shake and cry at night instead of sleeping." A frown crossed his lips, brows knitting for a moment as he focused. Jim stayed that way for about half an hour, stuck behind the steering wheel, staring off at some fixed point in the distance, mouth occasionally moving with words that he never actually spoke. Finally, the brunette resumed their conversation as if he hadn't just been silent for nearly thirty minutes.

"Plus, something sensational for the press. They haven't even managed to catch sight of us yet, so we should at least give them something for their cameras. After all, we're a bit famous now. We're the 'Twin Rippers'. And as stupid as that name is, we have an obligation to our public to dazzle!" Sebastian rolled his eyes at the suggestion, but some part of him had to admit that their growing notoriety gave him a swell of pride.

"Carve Richie into his chest and leave him facedown in the middle of the playground. That oughtta do it." Sebastian bled the body the same way you'd bleed a deer, wrapping the largely dry carcass in a tarp and stuffing it away in the back of their trunk. The rest of the day went normally; they checked into a little motel at the outskirts of the town. Jim showered and changed before allowing Sebastian to do the same. Away from his boss, the desire to simply relieve some of the pressure that had been building inside him over the past several months was nearly overwhelming. Only the thought that Jim would know, unequivocally and indisputably know kept the sniper from getting himself off. Before he exited the shower, Sebastian stood under the freezing spray for longer than strictly necessary, just to be sure he had his body under control before joining Jim back in the main part of their room. When he got there the younger man had already turned over on his side and was staring at the wall. It was a little early for one of his quiet spells - Jim didn't even have those every night any more - but at that moment his boss obviously he didn't want to be disturbed.

Sebastian snatched a book out of his bag and started to read, passing the remaining hours until dark quietly. At some point Jim's breathing did slow, and the sniper rose long enough to take the blanket from the foot of the bed and drape it over the slender man's sleeping form. That close to his boss, he could smell the man's aftershave, and that was all it took. Parts of him that he had hoped would take a fucking hint and stay down started to stir again. Phantom fingers coiled around the base of his spine and squeezed, and Sebastian gave a choked moan as the already noticeable pressure in his groin increased. When the blonde returned to his own bed he realized that he didn't even remember crossing the room. He'd been too drunk on Jim to notice. Silently, cobalt eyes fixed on the ceiling, Sebastian lay in his motel bed and tried to breathe through the worst of it.

Fortunately the surge of arousal had mostly passed by the time that Jim rose on his own, woken by the soft noises of Sebastian readying himself for their nocturnal excursion. They both got dressed in silence. It wasn't awkward or sullen, but simply a companionable silence of two men who truly had nothing to say and didn't feel the need to make small talk. Neither Jim nor Sebastian said anything until they got to the park. Jim broke the silence with two simple words, the tires of their car scraping softly on the gravel of the parking lot nearly drowning out the sound of his voice.

"Fifteen minutes." Though softly spoken, the timeframe was a firm order. Not bothering to look back to catch Sebastian's nod, Jim leaned his head against the glass window, eyes staring distantly off into nothing. Well, that wasn't uncommon. The posh little bastard never seemed to concern himself with the physical details of his plans that he wasn't directly involved in, only delighting in them when they were completed and reported on by the press.

His hands-off approach to something that he could take so personally had always stuck Sebastian as odd, but it had just become another strange but acceptable habit in their odd little existence. He gathered the corpse from the trunk, and after some almost embarrassing maneuvering, managed to drag the dead man by his heels to the spot that Jim had specified. The knife-work to the chest was hasty, but the "Richie" that Jim had requested was still legible. And it's not as if the knife blade came with a bloody eraser. It would have to do.

After staging the body Sebastian retreated to a darkened patch of trees at the edge of the park, opposite to where Jim was waiting with the car. A cautious glance around confirmed that his boss hadn't followed him out to supervise the mutilation, and Sebastian felt the building tension drain out of him. Well, all but the tension in his lower abdomen which pulled tighter and tighter, enough now that it was physically distracting. Sebastian let one broad hand wander down between his legs to roughly palm at his growing arousal. Fuck. There was no way that he'd manage to slid that by Jim. The observant little bastard noticed everything. And his attraction to his boss was a topic that Moran was not yet ready to broach. Would never be ready to broach.

Well. Jim was still in the car, waiting for him to come back, true. But he had made quick work of setting up the corpse to Jim's specifications. Taking five minutes to care for his own problems wouldn't put the blonde so far off their timetable that his waiting boss would come looking for him. And god, did Sebastian need some sort of relief. Ever since that odd moment with Jim after the murder that morning the blonde had been half hard almost all day. Hell, he'd been driven to distraction with the need to relieve some pressure during his incredibly scarce alone time before returning himself to his boss's company for the night.

Being around Jim already did strange things to his mind and his libido; being this frustrated was the last thing Sebastian needed. Hell, with his luck he'd start having wet dreams like some sort of horny teenager as his mad little boss slept (or rather, pointedly didn't sleep) in the bed next to his. That arousing and terrifying mental image bolstered Sebastian's convictions. This was something he needed to do, and quickly. The blonde had managed to get his belt and trousers undone and had one broad hand inside his pants when he was interrupted by a soft, familiar lilt.

"When I said that all your needs would be taken care of as part of your employment, I didn't expect you to take me up on the more... carnal... aspects of that offer," a voice purred from behind him. Instinct took over and Sebastian spun around, fist coiled and aimed perfectly as it collided with Jim's face before his rational mind could stop him. The smaller man tumbled backwards, landing in a graceless heap. He chuckled softly as he rose, pulling himself out of the inelegant sprawl he had landed in to sit cross legged in the dirt. His soft laughter didn't stop at all as he looked up at Sebastian, lips curled in a smile, red with the blood running from his nose to his chin.

"What're you trying to do, Bash? Turn me on?" His tone was sultry, which he punctuated with a suggestive flicker of his tongue across the trickle of crimson running over his lower lip. Long, pale fingers trailed through the stream of blood running from Jim's nose, and he brought them to his lips, sucking on them obscenely. The intensity of the tableau unfolding before him was heightened as Jim's pink tongue darted out of his mouth to lathe at the tip of each of his elegant digits. Those sharp, dark eyes remained unreadable as he smiled at Sebastian the entire time, making an obscene show of cleaning his hand off. It was so different from the strange not-quite-flirting that Jim occasionally hit him with that it stunned the sniper into complete silence. Sebastian simply gazed down at his boss with what he could only assume was a stupid look plastered across his face.

"Thinking about what my mouth would feel like around that rather impressive cock of yours, Bash?" Sebastian opened his mouth to say something, to deny the truth of the other man's statement, to question how the little fuck knew anything about his cock at all, but he was knocked speechless as Jim rose up on his knees and closed the gap between them. The sniper only had to fight to keep his arms at his sides for a moment, because the very second that Jim started to mouth at his open fly his body went completely unresponsive; his limbs deadened by the sheer rush of lust that surged through him.

"Fuck... I.. ungh... Jim." He managed to say the man's name with enough force that Jim looked up at him through his dark lashes, a questioning pout on his lips. Unable to string together any words, Sebastian simply nodded in the direction of the corpse nearby.

"Well that's lucky for us. He's dead, Sebastian. He's not going to tell anyone about us. But," he sighed, moving backwards a couple of paces on his knees, beckoning Sebastian to come along after him. "If it bothers you so~oo much I think this nice, big tree here will obscure any unpleasant view."

When the sniper didn't immediately follow, his hands darted out and tugged at the blonde's belt. He stumbled forward, knocked off balance by Jim's unexpected strength. For a skinny little rail, he sure could summon up some force if he wanted to. The forward momentum was all it took to break Sebastian out of his frozen state. He offered his hand to Jim, helping the other man off the ground. Almost innocently, they walked to the tall oak his boss had indicated hand in hand, but once beneath the branches all pretense at delicacy was abandoned.

Sebastian found himself roughly shoved against the trunk of the tree, bark digging into his back as Jim used his surprisingly strong hands to pin the sniper's hips. With a fluid grace, Jim was back on his knees again. Long fingers pushed belt and trousers out of the way as he freed the sniper's rigid erection from the confining cloth of his pants. Those same fingers traced lightly up and down the sensitive underside as Sebastian bit back a moan, clamping his teeth down on his tongue to keep the litany of noises he felt welling in his chest stifled inside him.

God, it had been so long since he had touched his own cock, let alone had someone else handle him in such a manner. Jim studied him intently for a moment, seeming to savor every pulse and twitch of the thickened shaft in his hand before lowering his lips down to the flushed, exposed head. With a wicked gleam in his eye his boss glanced upward and gave Sebastian a little wink. Then the blonde's world went a bit turvy as Jim lett his tongue trail across then around the sensitive tip, working the sensitive glans on each circular pass. All Sebastian could do was groan and let the tree support him; his knees had gone watery and weak the instant Jim's hot, surprisingly rough tongue made contact with his skin.

The foreplay, such as it it was, was over in a heartbeat. Wet heat surrounded him as Jim took him deep; the smaller man's nose nestled against the fabric of his pants. One cool hand worked itself inside Sebastian's trousers, the awkward angle of its approach quickly forgotten as slim fingers firmly tugged at his balls while that scorchingly hot mouth bobbed up and down his cock. That sinful tongue alternated between tracing the vein on the underside and circling the head when Jim wasn't busy stretching his lips wide to let nearly all of Sebastian's length fill his mouth. All breath stolen from him by the sheer intensity of the sensation, Sebastian was reduced to merely gasping out his surprise and appreciation.

After a moment's worth of positioning, Jim pushed himself hard Sebastian's length again, and the sniper let one of his broad fingered hands come up to rest on the top of the dark haired man's head. His fingertips played lightly in the dark silken strands, though even his hand stilled when the tip of his dick hit the back of Jim's throat. The smaller man hummed in what almost sounded like appreciation, hollowed his cheeks, and sucked hard. A few passes at that pace and pressure was all it took to push Sebastian over the edge, shuddering and gasping his boss's name as he pulsed again and again into the hot cavern of Jim's mouth.

It was all a bit sloppy, Sebastian realized after Jim finished mouthing him through his completion. His chin was wet, gleaming slight in the moonlight with what Sebastian could only imagine was the result of his staggering orgasm mixed with the blood that had fortunately stopped flowing from the man's swollen nose. In an uncharacteristic show of untidiness, Jim simply wiped his mouth on the back of his jacket sleeve and smiled up at the dazed blonde. Face wiped clean, the slender man stood up, brushed off his knees and smoothed out the wrinkles from his suit the best he could. Throughout the entire process Sebastian leaned against the tree with his mouth agape, slowly coming back down from the immense high that flooded his veins. Jim patiently tucked him back into his pants, gathered up the sniper's trousers, and rebuckled his belt before Sebastian could even form a sentence.

"Wh-what about you?" As soon as his brain was capable of processing such information, he noticed the prominence in Jim's well tailored trousers. Though he was quite certain that he couldn't match the level of skill that his boss had just displayed, Sebastian remembered with a quirk of his lips that the gardener from so long ago certainly didn't complain about his technique.

"Let's talk about that some other time," Jim said, his tone almost chastising. When all Sebastian could answer with was a confused blink, the smaller man nodded his head over to where the corpse Sebastian had just defiled laid out across the playground. "After all, there's a dead body over there, Bash. We should probably stop dawdling and go." Sebastian opened his mouth to protest, desperately wanting to argue that he had made the exact same point not but a few minutes earlier but he was interrupted by the diminutive brunette pushing one silencing finger against his lips. When it withdrew, the long fingered hand wrapped itself around Sebastian's wrist and tugged, gentle but insistent as he lead Sebastian back to their car.

"We're going to switch out once we hit the next town," Jim murmured as he pulled them both into the back seat. "So it really doesn't matter what we do to the upholstery."

The two and a half months that it took them to hunt down and dispatch numbers five and six on Jim's list passed by in a blur; the same kind of blur that enveloped Sebastian throughout most of the war. Again, it was a god kind of blur. Except instead of being made of adrenaline and fear this rush was made of the heady combination of lust and power. Every second that they weren't immediately doing something else, which usually involved the planning or execution of taking a life, Jim's hands were all over him in all the best ways. Sebastian's body reacted with astounding sensitivity to each of Jim's touches, obviously hungry for stimulation after a rather lackluster sex life.

They never went quite 'all the way', but Jim knew exactly how to work him into a frenzy with his perfect mouth and elegant hands, so there wasn't much for Sebastian to complain about. And he was more than happy to return the favor. One of his favorite pastimes was mapping out every sensitive inch of the other man's skin, noting which places made him giggle and which places made him moan. Through the summer they spent more nights out in the back of whatever car they had at the time, though Sebastian did notice that Jim's tastes shifted from sleek and sporty to nice solid sedans with large back seats as the days got longer. Whenever they stayed at motels they still ordered a double room, stifling their moans and giggles as they both tried to fit into one of the narrow beds. The few times that they caused enough of a ruckus to get called out on it were barely of any concern. It wasn't like they'd be staying in town. They wouldn't have to face the rumors, the scorn, the ostracization that Sebastian told him would inevitably come if he indulged himself and his 'urges'. So they touched each other when- and wherever they felt like it; the back of smokey bars, under tables at diners, and one memorable time in the back of tiny brick alley between a butcher's and pharmacy.

It was, Sebastian found, entirely liberating. Now that he was free to indulge in every set of urges that crossed his mind, life was so much easier. If he wanted Jim, it was as simple as dragging him into an alley or a washroom, or into the back of their car. If he wanted something, he stole it or Jim bought it for him. And when he wanted to hurt someone, see someone bleed, that was easily obtained as well. Even if they hadn't hunted down one of their marks, which seemed to be taking a backseat to their languorous tour of the English countryside, there were plenty of pub fights to be had, especially when Jim's sharp tongue came into play. They fought (sometimes with each other) drank, and traveled; their wandering almost aimless until they finally managed to track down the last of Jim's vendetta list.

Life with his mad little boss had become normal, or what Sebastian was content to consider normal. They traveled, killed, fooled around. Occasionally if they were bored his boss would set something on fire or Sebastian would steal something for Jim; a nice car, a suit jacket from a department store window. They were always moving, and despite their growing reputation they remained largely uncatchable. Jim was doing something, or had someone, behind the scenes covering for them, Sebastian was sure. Nobody could be that lucky. Not even the devil himself. They read about their exploits in the papers as they ate their cheap diner breakfasts, laughing into their awful coffee. The list stopped having as much meaning to Sebastian, other than the fact that it simply provided the next target on what they both affectionately started to refer to as 'The Tour'.

So it came to the sniper as quite a shock when one morning, what seemed to be out of the blue, Jim rolled over and fixed him with one of those blank stares that seemed to come less frequently than they ever had before. They had fallen asleep sprawled across the front seat of their current sedan, and Jim made a variety of faces as he stretched, elbowing Sebastian several times before managing to pull himself into a sitting position.

"We're almost back to London now," he murmured sleepily as he sat up and shifted to the passenger side of the front seat. "Just a few more hours till we're in the city. And your contract with me is almost up. Just a few more days until it's all over." A solemn silence stretched over the pause between Jim's words, but when he did finally speak again his eyes regained none of their former sharpness, his voice none of it's previous fervor.

"Do you feel like doing the driving? I'd like to watch out the window for a while," he mused quietly, almost as if he were speaking to himself. "I feel like haven't been back here in ages."

Once Sebastian took the keys, Jim didn't speak again for hours. The closer they got to the London, the tighter Jim's hands clenched into white knuckled fists. Sebastian felt his innards clenching in a similar fashion. The reality of the situation struck the blonde like a brick had been dropped into his stomach. This really was the end. One more hit or a handful of days, whichever way he looked at it, his time with Jim was nearly up. A handful of hours, really, and they'd have hunted down their last (deserving) victim. It seemed like there should be something said about it, but any words he thought of stuck in his throat, lodged in by their own triteness. So instead, they drove on together in silence, with London and all the finality it held rapidly approaching.

The last man's name was Carl Powers, and while Jim seemed to harbor a special amount of hostility for him he declined to say why. The smaller man's secrets were something that Sebastian had grown used to dealing with. They weren't what was important, not in the long run. Jim. Jim was what was important. And the longer they stayed in London hunting the man down the more unsettled his boss became. He withdrew more and more into his lengthy silences, the ones that Sebastian thought had passed entirely months ago. Within a matter of days, Sebastian found that his boss had retreated almost entirely, becoming the silent young man that the sniper had first traveled with. Instead of tangling together in cheap hotel sheets, Jim started 'sleeping' in his own bed again, eyes wide and vacant all night long as he stared out into nothingness.

In a way, Sebastian couldn't bear for it to be over. But seeing Jim so obviously distressed, the end couldn't come quickly enough. He found himself imagining his hands wrapped around this Carl's neck, face indistinct as Sebastian had no idea what the man actually looked like. The idea was what lulled him to sleep over the next few dangerously quiet days. Every one of his strongly honed self preservation instincts told him that this was the calm before the storm, that something big was coming. In the face of mounting pressure and Jim's overwhelming apathy, Sebastian found himself secretly praying to gods he hadn't spoken to since his childhood; asking that the end would come swiftly, if only to end the heartbreaking monotony of Jim's blank stares.

When they finally managed to track Powers down, without help from any deity, the mournful-eyed brunette actually let him in on the final plan. Surprisingly, Jim had actually planned on being the one to take Powers out. A few well ominous notes left in seemingly random places and a single phone call drew the man out of hiding. What Jim said in those notes, Sebastian would never know, but the call implied a heavy amount of blackmail, including turning the man's information over to the police as well as feeding his children to their family dogs if he didn't show up at the appointed meeting spot.

Jim had picked the bombed out shell of a factory down near Mitcham Common as the location, with the ungodly hour between three and four am as their meeting time. Sebastian stood out in the rubble, partially obscured but still partially visible, meant to lure Powers over to them under the guise of being his blackmailer. Jim stayed behind him in the shadows, pistol clutched in his white knuckled hand. The whole situation had the hairs on the back of Sebastian's neck standing on end but it was so close to being over, they were so close to being finished and Jim obviously needed this so badly that the sniper found he couldn't bring himself to voice any complaints. All Sebastian found he was able to was stand sentinel in front of his boss (his partner, his fucking liberator, his - ). Cold cobalt eyes scanned the occasional movements in the darkness, as if he could deter anything from approaching them with his gaze alone.

When Powers did finally appear, he was all bluster and bravado. The rather unremarkable man strode confidently through the rubble, demanding to know who the fuck Sebastian was, why the fuck he was doing this, and a hundred other questions. The words spilled out of the man in a frothy rage as he approached Sebastian while gesturing angrily. That anger immediately dropped when Jim stepped out from his hiding place, pistol leveled directly at the man's heart. Powers stopped dead in his tracks, blood draining from his face until he was as white as the ghost it looked like he'd seen.

"D-done d-dicing with d-death, hmm?" The phrase must have meant something significant to them as Powers trembled a little, though it was equally likely the man was frightened speechless because Jim was using his brother's voice. It was lighter and softer and slower than Jim's but the stutter was what triggered Sebastian's memory. Richie stuttered. Jim was stuttering. Powers looked about ready to piss himself, his face frozen in a rictus of terror.

"You l-loose, P-powers. D-death a-and I, w-we're old l-lovers. T-tell the b-bony ol-old bas- b-bastard I said 'h-hi'." Two shots rang out, their sharp cracks echoing off the stone of the building in a way that left the sniper's ears ringing. God, he'd give Jim hell for that tomorrow. The echo prevented them from hearing the body slump over and hit the concrete floor. That was it. Nothing complicated, nothing grotesque. Just two loud shots and limp corpse, bleeding out onto the dark concrete of the ruined factory floor.

The man's death was almost an anticlimax, considering the buildup. But London was London, and it was a lot harder to get away with protracted torture and murder in the middle of a city that never really seemed to quiet down or keep secrets. It would have been difficult to get away with what they had been able to do along the sides of empty countryside roads. Besides, there was something about the way that Jim looked at Powers that told Sebastian that the diminutive brunette was perhaps as scared of Powers as Powers was of him. That look had faded. In fact, all the tension Jim had been carrying dissipated in an instant, and he sagged quietly against one of the ruined stone walls before looking up at Sebastian with wide, dark eyes.

"We're done," he whispered, disbelief saturating his voice. Jim looked so lost in that moment, so utterly heartbroken that Sebastian could help himself. The sniper leaned in and captured his boss's lips with his own, pressing a heated kiss to Jim's now-familiar mouth. He stopped when those clever lips didn't move back against his own, the embrace going unanswered. When Sebastian pulled back and gazed into those empty dark eyes, there was something so haunted about them that it made a protective wave of sensation surge in Sebastian's chest.

"Don't be sad," he admonished gently. "It's just shock, is all. It'll pass. This is great. They've all paid. You're free to do whatever you want to do with your life now, Jim." The comment seemed to spark something in his boss, and the man raised a questioning eyebrow at Sebastian.

"Whatever I want?" His voice was flat, but there was a touch of something sharp and dangerous there. It sounded enough like Jim that Sebastian was encouraged.

"Yeah. Anything you want, Boss."

"Hmm." Jim's hum was thoughtful, a flicker of something unreadable flashing across his face before he raised an eyebrow at his sniper, face a perfect picture of consideration.

"So, what do you want to do, Jim?" He knew he was goading, but he couldn't help it. Something about seeing Jim go... away... like that was more than disturbing. It had been odd to see the man retreat before, but after they had forged some sort of connection it was actually disturbing. Like he had said, Sebastian bet that was just shock. Something that would pass, especially if the blonde could give his boss something else to think about.

"You. I want to do you." Sebastian halted for a moment, confusion at Jim's immediate change in demeanor taking him off guard. One minute the man was completely apathetic and disinterested in everything. In the next moment he had stood up, slipped one hand below the waistband of Sebastian's jeans, and started whispering filthy things to him as his long fingers teased and caressed every inch of skin they could reach.

"I want that magnificent cock of yours buried so deep inside me that I can feel you for the next three days, Sebastian. You said anything I want. That's what I want." Jim's eyes were hungry, lips parted, breath panting as he took another step closer to sebastian, his fingers curling around the rapidly hardening length between the sniper's length. "You. I want you."

"Right. Well. Let's do that then, shall we?" Sebastian was fully surprised at his ability to make what almost qualified as sentences, though he was a bit disappointed in the soft groan that escaped his lips as that teasing touch withdrew.

"Hotel, now." Even the soldier in Moran was impressed by the swiftness of his response. He'd never followed an order so quickly in his entire life. Perhaps he had just been waiting for the right one. Undoubtedly, that was it.

"We're done. Finally done." They were the first words on Sebastian's lips as he woke in the morning, breathed a sigh of relief, and turned over on the mattress to face Jim. The slender brunette had already woken and pulled himself into a sitting position, his back turned to Sebastian. Warm morning light from the window haloed around him, making his thin frame seem even more ethereal than usual. He bore bite marks and long, thin red scratches across his back from Sebastian's less than tender ministrations the previous night. A smile crossed the sniper's face, something warm and pleasant settling in his chest at the thought of having marked the smaller man as his own. That warmth faded, though, when he realized that today was the first day in almost six months that he wasn't 'under contract' with Jim anymore. Sebastian tried to figure out what that meant for him, for Jim, for their future plans, but couldn't come up with anything. Tentatively, he put one hand on the small of Jim's back, hoping to steady them both from the impact of his next sentence.

"What do you think you'll do now?" He tried to keep his voice even, but if there was an underlying tone of uncertainty Sebastian surely couldn't have been blamed. Jim had become his life in the same way the War had become his life. He'd be just as adrift as when Jim found him if the man decided to leave, though significantly less likely to be detained and executed. Still, even that fate sounded better than... well... nothing. Because whatever came after Jim was certainly going to be closer to nothing that he had ever experienced before. Dull. Worse than dull. Empty. It almost didn't bear thinking about. At least, not until Jim told him to shove off. There was still a chance, however small, that whatever the brunette decided to do next he'd feel inclined to take Sebastian with him.

"Well, I suppose I finally have time to become that junkie you were always afraid of me secretly being." Jim's slim shoulders offered a noncommittal shrug. "It's not like I have anything better to do. Not like it would last long anyway." The larger man laughed for a moment, but a baleful over-the-shoulder glance from Jim told him everything he needed to know. Hell, the bastard wasn't playing around. He was going to find some shitty hotel room, stock up as much morphine as he could, and spin himself out into oblivion. Sebastian wasn't sure how he knew. It wasn't as if the blank expression on Jim's face gave him away. But something in his gut, possibly the same something that pulsed and writhed within him every time Jim' said his name in that tone of voice, just knew. Jim was telling the truth.

"Jesus," he breathed out slowly, contemplating what Jim had essentially said he was going to do. "Really. That's how you want to go out?" Another bored shrug was all the other man was willing to give in return. Evidently that question didn't even merit a worded answer. It was so heartbreaking and strange to see Jim so lackluster. His normally sharp eyes were dull and sort of glassed over. Long fingered hands hung limply at his sides, face almost entirely slack. He seemed completely apathetic, when previously he had been almost consumed with his passion for their task. It was as if every ounce of passion, of focus, of life had been drained out of him.

Now that the work was done and their agreement was over, Jim seemed completely hollowed out. The previous evening flashed through Sebastian's head, and how they had immediately fallen into each other before they had even made it out of the ruined shell of the factory. How they barely managed to get back to the Caddy before they started tearing at each other. How it took every remaining drop of willpower they both had to make it back to the hotel room before falling together, months of building sexual tension coming to a heated crescendo. They'd fucked until neither one of them could keep their eyes open. Now, less than 12 hours later Sebastian was faced with this. Jim didn't even seem like the same man. It wasn't right.

"Well, have you, I don't know. Thought about keeping on the way we have been, maybe? Just because the original list is dead doesn't mean we have to stop. There're plenty of assholes in the world, as far as I see it. Some people could just plain use killing." Sebastian wrapped his arms around Jim's waist, as if his physical touch could somehow anchor the smaller man, keep him from drifting off to whatever place it was that he went to whenever the darkest of his black moods hit him.

"We could do it, you know. Keep on. It's not as if there's any shortage of people to drop, whether they deserve it or not."

"Is that so." Jim's voice dripped with scorn, but was also tinged with disbelief. It was almost as if he couldn't quite get himself to go along with what he was hearing. "That's what you'd do, Sebastian? Keep on going? You're not going to hightail it off to India to hunt big game? That's what you talked endlessly about doing months ago, when I first picked you up."

"Yeah, well. I'd rather hunt big game here with you," he murmured, rising up to press his face to the warm patch of skin between Jim's shoulder blades. Hesitantly, he placed a single kiss to one of the protruding vertebrae. "Besides, didn't you say at one point we had a duty to our public to entertain?"

"I believe the exact word was dazzle," Jim replied, a hint of humor coming back to his voice. "So, you want to keep going. Make another list? Keep the band together?" Maybe it was just a reflection of his own emotional state, but Sebastian thought he detected a note of hope somewhere buried underneath the carefully constructed layers of apathy.

"Yeah, why not? It's not like hunting elephants and tigers in India is going to keep me on the front page of the paper. Maybe we can get really cheeky and have someone catch a picture of us, or at least leave a witness that could give a police sketch. I've always wanted a good portrait done, and plus my mum would be so proud." That seemed to be the sentence that broke the dam, and Jim doubled over in a fit of giggles. He laughed until tears started to gather in the corner of his eyes, using the back of Sebastian's hand to wipe them away.

"Oh, you're a right wanker, you know that? I had a really good plan you know. I was going to use the evidence I'd been collecting to frame Powers for the deaths of the rest of his group, mark him as one of the Ripper Twins, with me as his reluctant accomplice and final victim. It was going to be glorious." Jim spun around on the bed, and fixed Sebastian with a scowl that melted easily into a genuine smile. It only lasted a second before his eyes went back to oddly dark and distant, but if they hadn't been he wouldn't have been Jim. Whatever moment of darkness that had temporarily consumed him had passed. Sebastian wasn't about to fool himself into thinking it was gone forever, but it was gone for at least a little while, and that was good enough. Jim was always just a series of good moments strung together by long, dark moods. In a way, this new attitude wasn't any different. Just a bit more serious. Once again the smaller man donned his flippant persona, dropping back on the bed with his arms stretched out above him, hands gesturing emphatically as he continued to speak.

"Well we should probably get out of London for a while, let things cool down. I swear the last few days I've seen these two odd blokes following us. I've only caught them twice, but the second time they were in disguises." Jim gave a derisive snort, lips curling into a smug smile as he stared up at Sebastian. "The tall one's was rather good, I don't know that even I would have been able to pick him out if he'd been alone. But someone really should tell the shorter blonde one that you need to do more than shave your moustache and don a leather jacket to look like someone other than yourself."

"Perhaps we'll him a nice note? One with a good account of our physical descriptions, so they can have the police sketch us?" Jim chuckled at the ridiculousness of Sebastian's request, sat up, and punched the man in the shoulder.

"Fuck you Moran. One more round before we hit the road? I'm really thinking that I want to drop that bitchy motel owner back in Devon. She was really exceptionally rude, don't you think? And it'll certainly throw the press for a loop. We haven't done a woman yet. Just think of it! 'Lock away your wives! Protect your daughters! The Ripper Twins have taken their first female victim proving once and for all that NO ONE is safe!'" He collapsed in another fit of giggles.

"C'mere you little fame obsessed shit," Sebastian growled, wrapping an arm around Jim and tugging the smaller man to him. "Maybe we can leave them with a better suggestion for our serial killer aliases than 'The Ripper Twins'. That's hokey as all hell."

"Ooh, we can carve it into the next victim's body," Jim purred, nuzzling his face into the side of Sebastian's neck.

"Yeah, but we have to think of it first." he countered, running an affectionate hand through Jim's hair. "But we're much, much more clever than the papers. And we've got some time. We probably won't hit Devon until tomorrow, at least if I get to have my way with you for another day."

"Well then. We've got time. For now," the smaller man agreed, though a slightly cold shiver ran down his sniper's spine. Jim's addition of 'for now' rang especially true in Sebastian's mind, even if Jim didn't mean to put across the finality that his partner picked up. Intentional or not, it was true. Their run of luck wasn't going to last forever. Every serial killer got caught, eventually. Especially in these modern times. Photographs and telephones and all sorts of things made the sharing of information easier than ever. The could outrun the actual police, but they couldn't outrun radio or television broadcasts. When they did finally get identified, even if it was only a description, that meant the end. It'd only be a matter of time before they got caught after that, no doubt about it.

No, Sebastian knew it wasn't going to last forever, it couldn't. But damn it all to hell if the remaining time they had wasn't going to be fun. He always knew he was going to die young anyway. May as well die doing something he loved. Sebastian always thought that it would have been the war. Now, it looked like it was going to be Jim Moriarty.

"Yeah. Yeah we do. We've got time." His voice was an affectionate rumble, and he pressed a series of kisses to the diminutive brunette's lightly stubbled jaw, stopping only when Jim pulled away and fixed him with a carefully measured stare.

"For now," Jim added, his voice and eyes slipping into that grim seriousness for just a moment, almost as if he was daring Sebastian to challenge him. But the smaller man obviously recognized that Sebastian had come to the same conclusion as he had. The truth must have been written in the former sniper's gaze, because when Jim looked into those cobalt eyes his own gaze softened just slightly, a bit of a smile tugging at the corners of the grim line of his mouth.

"For now," Sebastian agreed, meeting Jim's gaze with equal gravity, before breaking into a genuine smile. So the phrase held a portent of ill for their future. It certainly didn't make their present any less enjoyable. Jim mirrored his grin and his words, somehow picking up on the sniper's thoughts with little more than his facial expressions to go by.

"For now,' he echoed before pulling Sebastian into complete, distracted silence. "For now."

~ Fin ~

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3 Mazi