Cabin Pressure

[Jedediah/Octavius]

Real life AU.

He was only 47 minutes into his seven-and-a-half hour flight from London back to New York and already Octavius was ready to open the plane door and jump out, parachute be damned. In all his years of travelling alone (which he had found more and more common as his passion for his job tended to leave little room for people), Octavius had never had an issue with a seatmate.

That is, until now.

Octavius hadn't noticed the man when he first boarded the plane but it quickly became obvious that his blonde-haired neighbour wasn't someone he could just ignore. The man had a pair of headphones over his ears and yet might as well have been blasting the music out over the plane's loudspeaker. Octavius' glasses slipped down his nose and he narrowed his eyes as he watched the man get particularly engrossed in a drum solo, arms flailing and eyes closed in concentration.

Octavius had tried multiple times to get the attention of the blonde sitting next to him but his "Excuse me's" fell literally on deaf ears as Octavius had no idea how anyone could listen to music at that sort of volume and not suffer some level of hearing damage.

Either way, he decided he had finally had more than enough of the other man when he ended up with water all over his crotch thanks to being whacked during an especially energetic air guitar mid-drink.

Seeing red, Octavius promptly ripped the headphones from the other man's head, consequently ceasing the loud music as the force tugged the headphone jack out of the iPod.

"Oww! Man, you threw off my groove!" the blonde whined and rubbed his ears. His expression turned confused and slightly disgusted as his eyes roamed down Octavius' body "…did you…wet yourself?"

"No!" Octavius screeched. "If you must know, you buffoon, you hit me and caused me to spill my water!"

The blonde ran a hand through his hair as he flashed a sheepish smile at Octavius.

"Ahh, my bad. Ol' Jedediah can get a little too into the music…" Suddenly, Jedediah (Octavius assumed this was the man's name and he wasn't blaming the water incident on an imaginary friend) frowned "Hey! Who ya callin' a buffoon, Mr High-and Mighty?!"

Octavius rolled his eyes, muttering "Oh dear lord, spare me…" before calling over a flight attendant for some napkins to dry himself off.

"Look," he said, dabbing at the wet patch on his trousers, "I'm tired, I'm currently not in the most comfortable position, I just do not want an argument, alright? All I ask is that you turn down your music and let me get some rest."

Octavius turned to face the window and tried to shift himself into a more relaxing position, doing his best to ignore Jedediah's grumbling behind him. He did however notice that all he could hear now was a dull humming from what he assumed were the other man's headphones and let out a relieved sigh. He checked his watch before letting his eyes slip closed.

'Only six hours to go'.

When Octavius awoke, the first thing he noticed was that he wasn't facing the window anymore. The second thing he realised was that his body was covered by a blanket. Both of these things wouldn't have bothered him too much if he hadn't finally realised that his cheek was pressed against something soft and warm and unless he seatmate had left and been replaced by a giant pillow, he knew what that meant.

Octavius sprang away as if he'd been burnt - and judging by the colour of his face, he could have been - and shifted as far away from Jedediah as he could, spouting apologies for sleeping on him and that he didn't mean to do that and he was just so tired he mustn't have realised and Jedediah should have just pushed him away-

"Woah there, kemosabe! Hold your horses." Jedediah chuckled. Octavius had no clue what 'kemosabe' meant but judging by the blonde's easy smile and warm eyes (Octavius tried to push his thoughts away from how blue those eyes were), he assumed it wasn't an insult. "I just…wanted ta make sure you were comfortable. Ya know, ta kinda make up for the water thing…" The blonde cleared his throat nervously. "Ya were asleep for a pretty long time. There's only about an hour left of the flight."

The brunette met these words with rapidly blinking eyes and a hanging jaw. Jedediah just smiled and stuck his hand out.

"I think we got off on the wrong foot. How's about we start again? Name's Jedediah Smith."

Octavius hesitated for a moment then tentatively took Jedediah's hand. It was warm and a little calloused but nice all the same.

"Um…Octavius. My name is Octavius Gaius."

"Wow," Jedediah raised his brows "That's one heckuva name! Gotta be a story behind that!"

"Not really," Octavius answered with a shrug "My parents were history enthusiasts and decided to name me after the first Roman emperor. Naturally, their passion was ingrained into me from a young age and here I am today, a historian specialising in the Roman Empire. Quite ironic, really."

This made Jedediah laugh and the sound sent a tremble down Octavius' spine. He told himself it was just the cabin pressure.

"Well, I'll be! Ya couldn't make that one up!" the blonde's laughter died down and he rested his chin on his fist, looking at Octavius with interest. "Is that why you were in London?"

Octavius nodded, trying to push down the feeling of shyness at being studied by the other man's deep eyes.

"I was working with fellow historians at The British Museum for a few days. They have an abundance of Roman artefacts, coins, pottery, sculptures. I'd looked at them on their website but I just had to see them in person!" Noticing Jedediah's amused gaze, Octavius promptly shut himself up and looked down, playing with a fraying thread on the hem of his blazer. He thought it best to drive the conversation in a different direction.

"What about yourself? What were you doing in London? I'm sure something slightly more interesting than hanging about in museums."

Smiling, Jedediah pointed to his forgotten iPod on his lap.

"Those songs you hated? They're mine." Octavius stared at Jedediah, absolutely mortified, but the blonde just laughed "I'm an indie singer-songwriter and I was in London for a gig. Support act for an ol' friend who's slowly makin' his way up in the music biz."

Octavius coughed.

"Maybe…they wouldn't sound so bad if I listened to them properly…"

Jedediah grinned, his eyes crinkling at the corners, and he passed the headphones over to Octavius who slipped them carefully over his head and positioned them on his ears.

"I think you'll like this one."

And Jed pressed play.

Octavius found that he didn't have as much of an aversion to Jedediah's music when he could properly hear the man's deep, gritty voice drifting into his ears alongside the comforting twang of an acoustic guitar. The two had spent the remaining hour of the flight discussing not only Jed's music but also their childhood's (Octavius discovered that Jed had grown up in Texas and had only recently moved to New York to try and further his music career), hobbies and favourite food. Just as they started to compare which were the best pizza toppings, they heard the loudspeaker of the plane crackle and the perky voice of the flight attendant announcing their subsequent landing.

"Guess we'd better get ourselves ready, partner." Jed said as he stretched his arms and buckled his belt.

"Yes," Octavius muttered, trying to hide the glumness from his voice as he strapped his own seatbelt around him "I suppose we should."

After the plane had landed and they had collected their luggage, the two stepped out of the airport together. They were both quiet, as if waiting for the other to say something. Octavius held his hand out.

"I didn't think I'd say this but it has been very nice meeting you, Jedediah."

Jed grinned and shook Octavius' hand firmly. They broke away from the contact slowly, and Jed averted his eyes to the floor as he reached into his pocket. Pulling out a card and a pen, he quickly scribbled something onto it before handing it over to Octavius.

"I dunno if this is too forward o' me, partner but…well, if you wanna maybe meet up for a coffee or a beer sometime…"

Octavius looked down at the card, smiling as he read the number scrawled there in untidy handwriting. A feeling of warmth erupted in his chest and he looked back up at Jedediah with a mischievous grin.

"I'll see you later, cowboy."

The sun began to set over the New York skyline and Octavius turned to make his way home, thinking that maybe this was the night when he'd finally started to figure out what it really means to be alive.