Disclaimer: I own nothing.
Written based on this prompt by bloodsoakedleather: AU. Moriarty is basically himself, high powered, dangerous, crime lord etc. One of our boys is his lover and one of our boys is his employee. Doesn't matter which is which, I can see both ways working for different reasons. Moriarty is violent and abusive towards his lover. A chance meeting at the office (some other work related scenario) leads to the employee falling in love and entering a secret affair with the obviously unhappy lover and deciding to rescue him from Moriarty.
I am taking a couple liberties with the prompt. One of which being that this will be uni AU. Because I love teenlock/unilock and it's been too long since I wrote it.
This will also be long chapter fic, which I also have not done recently. I don't know how long I mean when I say "long" yet, but I am positive it will be more than 10 chapters.
Trigger warning: abuse.
M because I know me and there'll be smut eventually. Also, there might be violence depicted in a graphic way, but that's just a guess. This is what I get for writing the warnings when I've only just started the story.
Enjoy.
John, in most ways, was an ordinary person. He'd been raised by a fairly regular family (divorced parents and a lesbian sister are hardly uncommon anymore), played football and got average grades in high school, had a group of friends that were only just barely bound to each other for shallow reasons…
And he also worked for a crime lord.
It was a new development, admittedly. He certainly hadn't done so in high school. But he had been raised in part by an ex-cop who was a little too gun happy, and thus had taught his only son everything he knew. It was about the only bonding they ever did, other than talk about football.
So because of his being in excellent shape and having uncanny aim with a handgun, when he started uni and realised he needed a job… well, this became an option.
Of course, he didn't go looking for it. It sort of found him.
When John, Phil, and Mike left the pub, the other two were pretty tanked while John was buzzed at best. He'd been planning to match the other two drink for drink, but his dad called and asked how football was doing and John still hadn't mentioned that he wasn't even on the football team and had to lie and it was all a pretty big downer. He wasn't into it after that, and only had enough beer to dampen his guilt.
They were on their way back to campus when John glanced down an alley and saw something rather odd. And definitely suspicious.
There were three men, all in black, messing with something in a skip. At two in the morning in an unlit alleyway, nothing good could be going on, but this was especially unsettling.
He stopped walking, and Mike said, rather too loudly, "John, wha' the hell you doin'?"
All three men turned, and it turned out John's instincts had been correct. John had rarely seen faces so severe, so intimidating.
At the sight of them, his two friends went running. But John stood his ground.
They all stepped towards John, one a little in front of the others. He was uncommonly tall and had blond hair, blue eyes, and a distinct scar running down one side of his face. His accent was Cockney when he said, "You best run on home, boy. This is no concern of yours."
John prickled defensively at being patronised and took a step into the alley. The two in back looked at each other with smirks, as if saying with their eyes, "He's playing right into our hands." If John were any other mildly drunk university student, that would probably be true. They could knock him out and go about their business.
But John wasn't any ordinary student.
"Seriously, kid, follow your little friends and butt out," said the guy in front. "You're pissing me off. And I don't think you'd like to see what I do to people who piss me off."
John took another step forward. "I really think I'd like to, actually."
Rage flitted across the man's face, and John knew what was coming before it did. He barreled forward, and it was easy enough to shove him to the side so he could get to the main issue at the moment: one of the guys in the back who had a gun on him. John had known he had it from the way his hand had hovered over his jacket pocket. He'd just guessed on it being a gun rather than a knife and gotten lucky.
When the man took out the gun, John put his hands up and pretended to look afraid. He luckily was pretty close by then. Definitely close enough to disarm him. He just needed the right distraction.
The best one being dialogue. If the gunman was trying to hear what John was saying, or pay attention to speaking himself, he was less focused on his trigger finger.
Luckily for John, he spoke right then.
"Alright, kid, this is your last chance. Get the hell—" John took the man by the wrist and flipped him onto the ground, pointing the gun at him now. He turned so all three of them were in his line of sight. The man who had the gun had hit his head on his fall and was out of play—not passed out, but dazed enough to not be an issue right then. The bulky blonde was just getting up.
And the third man came forward to try to disarm John. John didn't want to kill anyone, so instead he just hit him with the gun. Good enough. The guy who he took the gun from was getting up and John socked him.
That made two down, one to go.
The blond looked furious still, but also… kind of interested.
"You're fast, kid. I'll give you that. And apparently you get into danger for fun, since this still isn't your business."
John chose to say nothing, as to give as few windows for being disarmed as possible. Though John felt this was his business. Probably that wasn't true, but whatever they were doing was bad news. If he could stop it, shouldn't he?
The man lunged forward when he thought John wasn't ready. John ducked underneath his arms—one of the nice things about being short—and turned to be ready for the next move.
And then the man knocked him out.