"Do you know how hard it is to get molds of someone's teeth when they're asleep, Layton?"

It's the first thing that Clive says when Layton's awake and it's timed so that the other has had enough time to stir to a point where he can process the question, but not enough time to form any questions of his own. Clive sits back to let Layton process it and understand the implications; with those molds it had been easy enough to have passable dentures made - even with the stipulation that Layton couldn't know about them - and easy enough to request one of the prisoners as a 'pet project' and prepare them in case of the pagoda being breached. When the pagoda had been breached it had simply been a case of killing the prisoner in question and dragging the petrol-doused corpse to a believable place to set a fire.

There's a part of Clive that recoils at how easy it had been, how quickly the logic had slotted together, but - whether it's a conscience or the last dregs of his sanity - he's had enough experience in ignoring it to do so with barely a second thought.

Particularly when Layton is sitting up with that look he gets sometimes: part smug, like Clive's a pet who's just mastered a new trick; part irritation, the look he gets when the rebels have enacted some sort of ridiculous scheme and it's succeeded. Acknowledging that someone has out-thought him doesn't come easily to Layton, after all. But the half-smug, half-irritated look is the closest Layton seems to come to genuine respect nowadays, and the few times he's seen it in the past have lead to one particular reward so exclusively that Clive finds himself suppressing an almost Pavlovian reaction as Layton murmurs, "Ah, dental records. Clever. And I presume we're somewhere off their record?"

They are, and he confirms as much. A small house near Dartford, close enough to the pagoda that his arrangements to get them there had been sufficient to do so even with Layton unconscious but not somewhere with any links to them known to the rebels. Rented out under a name that - if the place were discovered and the rebels looked into it - would trace back to a contact of Clive's who's out of the country, difficult to get ahold of at the best of times, and a master of being exceedingly unhelpful even while still appearing perfectly polite and charming.

Layton's mouth twitches at that last part like he wants to comment, but all that he says in the end is, "You've been planning for this for a long time, then. The rebels succeeding." It's not posed as a question but it is one, and it needs a good answer. Clive's not so stupid as to think that saving Layton's life would be any real guarantee as to the retention of his own if Layton truly suspected betrayal.

"Of course," he says, careful. "I was one of them for a long time, and I didn't think for a minute that my loss would cripple them, at least not permanently. Besides, your government were dull but I still needed something to occupy my time with while you were dealing with them. Coming up with failsafes like this one was... interesting. At least as something to pass the time without you."

There's a tone of need at the end that makes Clive bite his tongue, but it's evidently enough for Layton. At least for the moment. "Sleep," he says eventually, "I'll keep watch for now."

ooo

Clive's failsafes go further than just getting Layton out of the pagoda, as he establishes once he's up again.

"I was never joking, when I told you I could run rings around your entire government," he tells Layton in between noting down every piece of blackmail material he has on the other's cabinet, and half of the rebels to boot. "I had to burn my original notes of everything, of course, but I'd memorised enough of it that we shouldn't be particularly slowed down."

He's correct, as they discover once they're in a better position to start making use of the information Clive has. Enough to bring the government and the resistance to their knees quickly, but subtle enough that they'll be able to do so without it being immediately obvious who's pulling the strings. It obviously calls to mind Clive's other plans for Layton because he asks at one point why they're in this place rather than in the underground caverns. Surely they're hospitable, still?

"Yes," Clive bites out, only just managing not to roll his eyes. "But seeing as how the resistance know full well I'm still alive and Crow knows all about the caverns, I didn't exactly think it was the best idea to drag you down there so that we could be sitting ducks in the first place they'd think to look for me."

He gets an odd look for his troubles, something like the smugness-cum-irritation he's accustomed to and something like jealousy - at the mention of Crow? perhaps, and it's not as if there's nothing to be jealous of between them - but he pays it no real mind. For now all that's important is that Clive is good at what he's doing for Layton. Anything more than that can be dealt with once they're back in the pagoda and Clive can listen to whatever the hell it is that Layton wants to say while lying in a bed that doesn't feel like it's made of concrete.

ooo

It's a long time before they manage to get time truly alone, once they're back in the pagoda. When they do though, Layton draws Clive into his chambers, locks the door and fucks him hard up against the wall until he's almost sobbing because it's been weeks. Weeks since anything more than getting himself off in the shower and Layton has thrown him right back into it. It's like Layton's lack of interest during all the time in Dartford had just been a case of him storing it all up, so that now there's weeks' worth of lust that Clive has to deal with in one go.

"You're mine," Layton growls into his ear partway through, buries his teeth in Clive's ear lobe enough to draw blood and then digs his thumb into the wound he's made so that he can smear the blood over Clive's swollen lips. "You'll always be mine."

It's the first time he's ever said it outright - implied it, yes, said it in other ways but never just straight like that - no matter how many times Clive has said it to him and it makes Clive come explosively, only opening his eyes afterwards to see Layton's face a mirror of the time in Dartford when Clive had mentioned Crow.

"Oh," he breathes, "Oh." Once he's gotten his breath back it's immediately stolen again by laughter. "Oh, Layton, you arse."

The only thing that quiets his laughter is Layton starting to move again, and even that doesn't stop him snorting quietly to himself in the aftermath once they've moved to the bed and Layton's fallen into a light sleep.

ooo

It's sudden. He's not even with Layton when it happens but he hears the shot from two rooms away and there's a sharp, sick feeling in his stomach that tells him even before he reaches the room Layton's in. He reaches it in time to catch Layton and go down with him as the other starts to slump, but before he's even had a chance to really look at the wound he knows. The shooter is still there (too dumb to run but he's not important now; he'll be important later but not now) and Clive gives him a glance just long enough to take in his appearance before everything is about Layton again.

"It's okay, I-" The look Layton gives him silences the lie before Clive can finish, so he makes do with a strangled sob instead. It's not eloquent but it gets the point across - the same point he's getting across by just holding Layton, by not bothering to put pressure on the wound or call for help or anything. He hisses out a brief 'fuck' after a moment and the breathy chuckle he gets in return is like a slap in the face.

"I don't think I'm really up for that, my boy," Layton says softly, and it's all wrong. Layton calling him that, Layton talking like he's trying to spare Clive's feelings over the fact that he's dying, Layton dying at all. Layton is supposed to live forever, or at least forever for Clive. Clive is supposed to be the first to go and watching Layton die isn't something that he can do, but he can't look away or leave either and it's not fair. This isn't the way that things are supposed to go. He understands it, objectively - understands the logic behind taking out Layton so that neither of them are a problem, understands that taking him out wouldn't affect Layton like that so it has to be this way around - but it doesn't make it right. It doesn't make it okay that it's happening.

It is happening though, right or not, and all that Clive can do is hold Layton tightly and whisper to him; loud enough for Layton to hear but too quiet for the shooter. The shooter who still hasn't run and oh, that makes sense all of a sudden. He'll have time to deal with it afterwards though.

For now it's only important to be there with Layton, to keep talking and not think. He doesn't even really register what he's actually saying, but he manages to keep talking the whole time, even if his voice falters when Layton presses a hand to his cheek and smiles up at him - almost a proper smile, nothing that anyone is used to from Layton any more, least of all Clive - in the last few moments. He feels it when Layton's gone; a physical jerk like a knife in his chest, but a knife in his chest had never hurt this much before.

"You," he manages to rasp out to the shooter, "Tell the guards to call a press release. And then run."

He knows the rebels. Knows how they'll take it, knows that by now the attempt on Layton's life will be common knowledge amongst them even if the result isn't. Knows what they expect from him. Clive has always been predictable in his madness.

Unfortunately, Layton has always been the only one who could really predict him, even before Clive joined him.

He doesn't clean himself up in the slightest before the release. Let everyone see the blood. Let the resistance think him broken. They won't be wrong; the only thing wrong is how they think he'll react. Let every little one of the rebels think that he's broken and forget the fact that broken glass is all the worse.

Once he's in front of the microphone it's harder though. Harder to get out the words, harder to tell the world that Layton's gone when the words are meant for the rebels alone. The end, though, is easy.

"The protocol that he set up says that I'm the one to take over the role of prime minister in this situation," Clive breathes - doesn't need to check because he was the one who wrote the protocols - and bites down on his lip hard enough to add his own blood to what's staining him. "And take over I will. The people who killed Layton wanted to break me, but believe me when I say that it won't be me who breaks when I find out who made the order for him to die."

He smiles then, slow and broken and wrong, all the moreso because he knows how wrong it is.

"And rest assured that if I don't find out, then I'll burn everything until I do."