Title: We Are a Philosophy, Oh Wow

Authors: artemis_sparks, dysenchanted2, neverevered

Pairing or Main Characters: Tony (by artemis_sparks), Cook (by dysenchanted2), Cassie (by neverevered)

Rating: R

Word Count: 1362

Warnings: Blood!

***

"You know what's lovely about you two boys?" Cassie smiles, twirling once, twice, thrice - and moving the leather whip in her hand like a baton with a ribbon attached to the end. She is kind of soliloquizing, like a lovely Shakespeare.

Then in one smooth motion, she whips the two boys' back. They scream mid-air, their feet wrapped in metal, tied to the ceiling, hanging upside down and swinging back and forth like a pendulum.

"You sing." She closes her eyes, listening to their pain.

"Cass," Tony says patiently, craning his neck to try and see her. "Fun as this is, think you could let us down? The blood is rushing to my head. Also I have an exam to study for."

"Yeah, blondie, why don't ya get those whats-its a rest. This is getting too mental even for the cookie monster. We can work something out, yeah? More gateau and less chick from the ring," Cook adds.

Cassie whips the two boys again, this time in quick succession, no time for them to even properly breathe. She fidgets a little with the edge of her jean shorts and looks up at the two of them shyly. "But I like to hear you sing. You boys sing so beautifully, I want to keep you forever with me." She giggles.

She walks up to Tony and trails her slender fingers down the scars she's made, smearing his young blood on his back. "Oh wow, it's lovely and really red."

Tony expels a long-suffering sigh. "I can't even express how rude it is to snatch someone off the street and chain them to the ceiling. Honestly, Cassie, of all the looney things you've pulled, this takes the cake."

Cook laughs. "As much of a whizzer time we're having, you should listen to the guy. Look at him, there's a trustworthy fellow, a real renaissance man." Then he turns to hiss at Tony, "You know looney bins?"

"She's a dear friend," Tony says. He swings slightly, knocking against Cassie. "Hear that? Dear friend. Dear friends do not whip other dear friends. Unless they ask for it and there's a safe word, of course."

"Friends. Dear friends." Cassie hums, and gives Tony an upside down hug. "You too, strange boy." She looks at Cook affectionately, her face smudged with Tony's blood.

"And we totally have a safe word. The safe word is Effy. Eff Eff Effy." Cassie grins, then kisses Tony full on the mouth, upside down, Spider-man style.

"Eff?" Cook squints at her. "You know her?" he asks. "Bird used to be a real cock cruncher, gone around the bend a bit lately."

Tony swivels to look at the kid. "You know Effy? How do you know Effy?"

Cassie kisses Tony on the cheek, walks over to Cook. "Effy is Tony's baby," she says, seriously to Cook. She turns to Tony. "Effy is Cook's love! Baby love!" She smirks at Cook, whips him hard. Twice. "Love." She grins goofy.

"Ow! You gotta do that so hard? Almost bit my pucking tongue off." Cook stumbles over the words. "So what, Eff's boning you too?" he directs towards Tony.

"No!" Tony practically squawks. He fidgets, knocking into the other boy. "She's my little sister, you twat!" He wriggles in his bonds. "Which one of them are you, eh?"

"It's the one who really really loves her," Cassie smiles. "He loves her as much as you do, Tony." She leans into kiss Cook too, Spiderman-style. "Oh wow. He kisses really lovely. Almost as lovely as you, Tony."

"Right. This surf and turf session has been a real delight, but Cookie needs some non-cuckoo time. I got people to do and things to see, blondie," Cook says.

"No, wait, go back a bit." Tony stills - he's making himself dizzy and therefore hindering his ability to escape. "Hold on. I am deeply concerned by this. I do not approve. I am, in fact, offended."

He glances at Cassie, upside down. He is uncomfortably aware of blood dripping down his neck. "And not just by the kissing remark, though I am obviously superior." Remembering the matter at hand, he knocks into Cook again. "Offended, you hear me? Now I've told you, now you know. You cannot just go around fucking with people's sisters when they already have their own fucking drama going on, alright?"

"Don't fight, boys." Cassie frowns. She presses the two boys' bodies together, tries to make their mouths meet. When it doesn't work very well, she frowns even more.

Cook ignores Cassie's attempts, addressing the Effy issue instead, "Effy's got drama herself. We're just all fucking burning in the same boat."

Tony snorts. "I didn't realize I was hanging here with the Philosopher of Bristol."

Cassie gives up trying to get the guys to make out, and sighs dramatically. She throws her bloody whip aside, walks over to the table nearby, and grabs two donuts from a box. She stares at them. "Tony and strange boy who is in love with Effy are both philosophers. Maybe that's why they both love Effy." She looks up, smiles at the boys. "Effy is a philosophy."

She begins devouring the donuts.

"Eff just likes taking the piss off people." Cook snorts. "Pass me one, will ya blondie?"

"Eating, are we?" Tony raises an eyebrow at Cassie, though he imagines the effect is somewhat dampened by being upside down.

He glares at Cook out of the corner of his eye. "And she doesn't mean to take the piss. It's just how she seems. The whole silent, closed-mouth smile thing. You're reading into it."

"She's more interested in Freds. That whole closed-mouth smile is being sucked up by the funsponge. Cookie doesn't get nothing."

"Oh Cookie, you don't get nothing," Cassie looks up at Cook, his heart breaking a little. "I'll give you a big lovely donut." She offers it to him.

"It'd go down easier if you untied me. Might be forced to retch on you from this angle," Cook suggests.

"Cassandra," Tony interrupts, suddenly pleasant, drawing out the syllables flirtatiously. "Will you please let us down?"

"If I let you down from the sky," Cassie looks at them both. "Will you kiss each other and tell each other you love each other?" She asks, seriously, eating the donut that she offered to Cook like a compulsion.

"You love each other, really, because you love Effy." She swallows the donut. "It works this way: We love the people who love the people we love." She turns to Tony. "Like how you and I love each other because we both love Sid."

"Cass, I cannot kiss someone that my sister - " Tony stops, sighs. "Fine. If you will let us down, alright."

"Blondie, I will make with whichever smelly bitch you want as long as I get down," Cook says.

Cassie pulls at the chains, and lowers them slowly. She takes out the keys from her pockets and unlocks their feet, puts them down on the floor, really gently in case they break. She hums.

She leans in to kiss Tony hard, pulls back, turns to Cook to kiss him hard too, her hands in their hair. She grabs their hands, links them together, and makes them look at each other.

"Now, say that you love each other. You have to mean it."

Tony wraps a hand around Cook's shoulder and yanks him closer. He says, with as much sincerity as he can possibly muster (which is a lot, because Tony is fantastic at faking sincerity), "I love you, Cook."

"Right then, I fucking love you too, man." Cook grabs Tony's face and kisses him.

Tony kisses back appreciatively, thinking that out of all of the looney things Cassie's done, maybe this one was not so bad. He pulls back. "Well, Effy's onto something here. Good on you, mate."

"People Effy loves love each other -" Cassie laughs, brightly, grabs and cracks the whip in the air. She throws donuts in the air in a greasy and bloody celebration. "Oh wow!"

Lovely Effy will be okay. She picks up a donut from the ground, and stuffs it in her mouth.

***

FIN