Summary: Not everyone is as excited about Travis's new partner as Travis is, and Paekman has some ideas on how to keep Travis safe. Demon!Wes AU. Oneshot. 5+1.
Warnings: Paekman being overprotective. Travis being reckless. Demon!Wes.
Disclaimer: I neither own nor am affiliated with Common Law in any way.
Inspired by a lovely anonymous ask on tumblr. Nonnie, thank you for this idea, I really hope you don't mind me using it!
Also continual thanks to autisticwesmitchell and mizufallsfromkumo for coming up with this amazing AU idea for me to play with.
OOOO
Self-Defense
"The best way for me to protect you is to encourage you to be able to protect yourself."
—Patricia Briggs
XXXX
1.
When Travis says he's getting a demon for a partner, David spits soda across the table.
"Aw, man, that's disgusting," Travis scowls, grabbing a handful of napkins from the dispenser and wiping his face. "I think you got some in my ear."
"A demon?" David demands incredulously. "Your new partner is a demon?"
"Yup," Travis says, like there's no problem with this, like this is fine but it is not because it's a demon!
"Is Captain Sutton insane? Why are you working with a demon? Why is a demon on the force in the first place?"
Travis just shrugs. "I dunno. He's into this whole therapy thing now, maybe this is the New And Improved Captain." He grins at his friend. "It's gonna be pretty cool. I'm excited."
"Travis." David leans over, wrapping his hand around his friend's forearm. "You can't be partnered with a demon."
Travis simply blinks at him. "Well, sure I can. I'm the only one without a partner right now. The cap can't just break up a team so I don't get partnered with a demon."
"That's not—" David closes his eyes momentarily, takes a breath. This is always Travis's problem—he doesn't think things through, doesn't look at the risk and the danger, just goes rushing right in. One of these days he's not going to walk back from one of his escapades.
So many times David has wished for Travis to get a partner, sometime who will reign him in, who can keep him in line. Sometime to keep him from getting himself killed. This was not what he meant.
Travis is bad enough on his own. Travis plus a demon?
David is afraid he's going to be attending his friend's funeral sooner than ever.
He opens his eyes, glares at Travis. "Christo."
"Bless you," Travis says cheekily, and David has the sudden, irrational urge to throttle his friend. Travis is being obtuse, and David can't tell if it's deliberate or not but it's kind of pissing him off.
"No," he says with a calm he doesn't feel, "That's what you say to identify demons."
Travis gives him a Look, something between Seriously? and Dude come on. "Paekman, I already know he's a demon."
"But it'll make him flinch if he comes at you."
"What do you think he's going to do?" Travis asks, sounding way too bemused and not concerned enough. He's being partnered with a demon, for chrissake!
"I don't know," David says darkly, which just causes Travis to roll his eyes. A moment later, David sits up, snaps his fingers. "Salt!"
"My favorite condiment," Travis says, like this is some word association game they're playing.
"No," he snaps, scowling at his friend. "Salt. Pure, not ionized. It'll ward him off."
"Ward him off from what?" Travis asks incredulously, but David ignores him, frantically wracking his brain for any other demon-warding tidbits he can remember.
He's going to have to do some research on this when he gets home.
XXXX
2.
The day before Travis's new partner is set to arrive, David gives him three small glass bottles. Travis picks up the one of the bottles, looking at the clear liquid inside.
"Is it vodka?" he asks, popping off the cork to sniff it. "Because let me tell you, giving me vodka would make you a truly good friend."
"It's holy water," David says, and Travis almost drops the bottle. David reaches out to grab it before it can fall, quickly corking it back up. "Careful with that, that stuff was expensive."
"Paekman," Travis says cautiously, eyeing the bottles like they're bombs about to explode in his face. "Why are you giving me holy water?"
"Because," David says, in what he feels is a perfectly reasonable tone, "your new partner is a demon."
One of Travis's eyebrows goes up. "So what, if he gets frisky you want me to…what's this the equivalent of?" He waves his hand at the bottles. "Macing him? Or is it more like throwing acid in his face?"
"Does it matter?" David says shortly, crossing his arms.
"Yes it matters!" Travis barely refrains from throwing his arms in the air. "I can't keep holy water in my desk drawer on the off chance my partner's gonna, I don't even know what you think he's going to do to me."
"It doesn't matter," David says, and god, he wishes Travis weren't so oblivious sometimes, wishes Travis wasn't so reckless because if he actually looked at the situation he's getting into he would see that maybe it's a good idea to be prepared for—for anything.
"Paekman," Travis shakes his head, "nothing's gonna happen."
"I don't have that much faith, Trav. He's a demon. You can't trust him." David shakes his head. "And I know you damn well aren't going to think about any of this, so I'm going to make sure you can protect yourself."
Travis rolls his eyes and mutters something deprecating under his breath. He doesn't take the bottles when he leaves.
That's alright. David will find a way to stick them in his desk later.
XXXX
3.
"Here," he says, thrusting his hand out. Travis takes the chain dangling from David's hand, studying the heavy silver amulet.
"And it's not even my birthday," he says, turning the amulet in his fingers. "It's nice, but I don't think it's my color."
"It'll protect you," David says earnestly. "It'll keep you from getting possessed."
"Possessed?" Travis frowns, looking up at him. "Oh, Paekman, seriously?"
Because they both know this isn't about any random demon on the street possessing Travis, it's about Travis's partner suddenly going rogue and jumping down Travis's throat.
Travis sighs gustily, the corner of his mouth tight. "Paekman, he doesn't need to possess me. Wes has got a perfectly good body of his own, some nerdy white guy."
"And how did he get that body?" David demands. "What if he decides your body looks so much better? You can't stop him if you don't have something like that."
"He's not gonna just jump inside my body," Travis says, rolling his eyes, but David is pleased to see Travis shove the amulet in his pocket. Maybe some of this is finally sinking into Travis's head.
XXXX
4.
Sometime after the third beer, David pulls put a box. It's a lovely box, ornate, carved mahogany with a delicate brass clasps. It looks like something from an antique shop.
"Another present?" Travis asks, taking the box from him. "Am I gonna like this one better than the last present you gave me?"
"Yes, I did notice you haven't been wearing the amulet," David says dryly.
"Told you, man, I don't need it," Travis retorts, flipping up the clasps.
"So you keep saying."
Whatever Travis's next response was, it dies in his throat when he lifts the lid and sees the contents of the box. His face goes through a truly astonishing range of emotion, finally settling on something stiff and cold.
"Paekman," he says with a very deliberate sort of calm. "What the fuck is this?"
"Devil's trap bullets," David says. "And a gun to shoot them with."
"I have a gun already." Travis is trying to be light, friendly, but since he's speaking through clenched teeth it's not really coming across. "And I can always check out devil's trap bullets from the armory at work."
"Yeah, but this one is for you."
Again, that complex shift of emotion crosses Travis's face, ending this time on something a little less cold, a little more angry. "I get that you're trying to protect me, but this is crossing a line, man."
"You're working with a demon now," David explains as calmly as he can, because dammit, why can't Travis see how important this is? "You've encountered more demons on the job in the past couple of weeks than you have in the rest of your career. The rules have changed here, Trav."
Travis stares at the gun, nestled in black velvet, for a long, silent minute. When he finally speaks, his voice is quiet. "He's not like that, Paekman. You've got him all wrong."
David wishes he could believe that, wishes he could trust Travis's word about his partner, but he just doesn't have that much faith in a demon. "Then keep it for any other demons that might come around," he says reasonably—if Travis won't be swayed by arguments against his partner, use other arguments. "Just don't throw it away."
Travis's mouth is a thin, unhappy line when he snaps the lid of the box shut, and David doesn't know if his words did any good. He just has to hope.
XXXX
5.
"Paekman?" Travis blinks blearily at him, yawning behind his hand. "What time is it?"
David glances at his watch. "Just after seven."
"Seven? Dude, it's my day off. Why are you waking me at seven on my day off?" Travis yawns again, jaw creaking, and slumps against the doorway of his trailer. "Go away. Come back in a few hours."
"Nope," David replies cheerfully, the indomitable force. He grabs Travis's arm and drags him into the warehouse, ignoring Travis's sleepy, mumbled curses. "We're doing this now, and we're doing it until I know you've got it."
"Got what, man?" Travis whines, dragging his feet across the concrete. "What's so goddamn important you had to wake me at seven in the fucking morning?"
David stops by his supplies, dropped on the floor of the warehouse where there's a big, wide expanse of empty concrete. "You," he says grandly, picking up a box of chalk, "are going to learn how to draw devil's traps."
And suddenly, between one blink and the next, Travis is wide awake, staring at David with a clenched jaw. He takes a step back, crosses his arms over his chest, glaring with more ferocity than David really feels is necessary.
"Are you kidding me?" Travis snaps, and he sounds sincerely pissed right now. "Man, it's been a month since I was partnered with Wes, I thought we were over this!"
"Of course we're not over this!" David shoots back. "We will not be over this until I'm certain you can protect yourself!"
"Protect me from what?" Travis yells, as angry as David has ever seen. Usually Travis keeps a lid on his temper, always smiling and charming, but now he's well and truly pissed. "What do you think he's going to do to me?"
"It's not just about Wes!" David hollers right back (even though this is totally about Wes). "It's about you knowing how to keep yourself safe! I know you like to just jump into things, so this is a bit of a stretch for you, but I would really like it if I didn't have to attend your funeral in the near future, okay?!"
The loss of temper is as unusual for David as it is for Travis, and Travis's eyes widen, taken aback. David folds his hands in front of his face, takes a second to breathe and find his words.
"Travis," he says, softer now but still sharp, fear and anger and worry threatening to spill out in a flood. "Look. In the past month, how many times have you encountered demons, as drug dealers or gun runners or whatever else?"
Travis shifts, suddenly subdued, and looks at his feet. "I dunno. A couple?"
"Three times. Three times, in the last month." David waves an urgent hand. "And I don't know if it's 'cuz you're not working alone anymore, so you're getting bigger cases, or if it's because you're partnered with a demon and he attracts this kind of crap, or if you just have the shittiest luck in the world. But Travis. You're my best friend. I need to know that if you get in trouble, you can do something to keep yourself safe."
There's still a stubborn line to Travis's jaw, but eventually his shoulders drop and he nods, once, a reluctant acceptance of David's words.
David doesn't care. He'll pound this into Travis's head, make Travis redraw the lines over and over until he's got it, until he can draw a damn devil's trap in his sleep, because one day it might be the only thing between him and something nasty.
If this is the only part of David's help Travis will accept, then dammit, Travis is going to learn it perfectly.
XXXX
+1.
The first time David sees Wes, it's in passing. He's in the lobby as Travis walks by, and it's only through deductive reasoning that he guesses the blonde man in the suit at Travis's side is Wes. Travis doesn't notice him; David watches them go, and there's only a slight hint that Wes isn't what he seems, something David can't quite put his finger on. Some aura that makes the back of his brain perk up and say, That's someone to watch out for.
The second time David sees Wes, they're preparing for a raid. Property Crimes and Robbery-Homicide have joined together for this case, and this whole time, Travis has acted as liaison, keeping Wes well away from Property Crimes—more specifically, keeping Wes away from David.
As he moves through the police gearing up, David half expects to find Wes chomping at the bit, raring to go in. He'd have thought a raid exactly is the sort of things demons love.
Instead, he finds Wes standing in front of Travis, strapping him into a bulletproof vest. Travis puts up with the fussing with good humor, mildly amused by the whole thing. At one point, he even jokes, "I need to be able to breathe, baby, we're not all like you," and Wes grumbles and readjusts the strap. After, he tugs on the vest, not looking satisfied at all.
"It's not great," Wes mutters, "but it'll do the job," and David never would have imagined a demon would sound so much like a mother hen.
And then Travis pulls out a second vest, and Wes goes from mother hen to sulky child in .03 seconds flat. "I don't want to," he says, crossing his arms. "I don't need it."
"It's the rules, babe," Travis cajoles, holding out the vest. "They won't let you go in without a vest. Besides, this'll keep you from getting any holes in your suit! We know how that pisses you off."
Wes glowers a few more seconds, then snatches the vest from Travis's hands, grumbling as he yanks it over his head.
Unnoticed, David slips away, mulling over what he's just seen.
The raid itself is remarkably easy—the suspects barely even get their guns up before they're surrounded. Not a single shot is fired.
But this is what David notices: The entire time, Wes stands in front of Travis, putting his own (invulnerable) body in front of Travis and whatever lies before them. And after, when the bad guys are being handcuffed and taken away, Wes drags Travis off to a corner and checks him over, even though no one fired a shot. From the amused, slightly exasperated look on Travis's face, this is the sort of thing that happens a lot.
And David starts to reevaluate everything he'd thought, remembering all the times Travis said, He's not like that or He's not what you think.
He catches up to Travis outside, grabbing his arm and pulling him to the side. Travis lights up, gives him a hearty clap on the shoulder. "Hey, Paekman, how's it going?"
"Hey, Travis." David casts a quick look at Wes, who is hovering nearby, far enough not to hear their conversation (for a human, David doesn't know what demon hearing is like) but close enough to be clearly interested in what's happening here.
"It's about Wes," David says, and Travis's face instantly shutters closed, his whole body going closed off and suspicious.
"What about Wes?" Travis demands tightly.
"He just…" Another quick glance at Wes, who has clearly noticed the way Travis's body language has changed and is watching David with glittering eyes. David is a little freaked out. "He seems very protective of you."
"Oh. That." Travis waves a hand, like this is something that happens often, like oh, of course the demon is just being an overprotective silly-head. "Yeah. It's a little annoying sometimes, but, you know, can't complain. He keeps me safe. To the point of smothering, really." He lifts his voice a little. "You hear that, babe? You're smothering me!"
Wes waves a dismissive hand Travis's direction, never taking his gaze from David.
And David…David really doesn't know what to say to that. He's spent a lot of time imagining what Travis's demon partner would be like; he never imagined anything like this.
Suddenly, Travis's reactions to his helpful, protective gifts make a lot more sense.
"Travis," he says, grabbing Travis's arm before his friend can walk off. "If you want to break a devil's trap, you have to break the line. Cut through it, or scrape the paint, or whatever."
Travis blinks at him, looking puzzled. "Thanks, but I already knew that." And David isn't really surprised at that statement—if he'd been taught how to make devil's traps, the first thing he'd do is look up how to break them too.
Travis turns away, and David lets him go with a sigh. So much for that.
And then Travis pauses, and he whirls around, eyes wide. "Wait, really?" he gapes, and David knows Travis recognized the peace offering for what it is. He just smiles, and Travis breaks out in a huge grin, grabbing his arm and dragging him over to where Wes is standing. "Wes, this is my friend, Paekman. Paekman, this is my partner, Wes."
"David Paek," David says, holding out his hand. "Nice to meet you. Travis talks about you a lot." He really does—despite, up until this minute, knowing how David felt about Wes, Travis rarely talks about anything but his partner and the scenarios they get into.
Slowly, Wes takes his hand, shaking once, and there's a look in his eye that judges David and doesn't find he measures up. "Wes Mitchell," he says blandly, and underneath that there's a possessive ring of, Mine, go away, leave him alone.
David still doesn't really like it. He's definitely not sure he trusts Wes. But Wes seems just as dedicated to keeping Travis safe as David is, and David can live with that.
OOOO
So for the longest time I didn't know how I was going to incorporate Paekman into this AU. We get such a small glimpse of him in canon, and this AU is so different right from the get-go, I had no idea. And then a lovely anon on tumblr said this one little sentence— "but i see paekman teaching travis about demon traps. and how to break them after he introduced them." And my mind just started racing, and suddenly I knew how to toss Paekman into the mix.
So thank you, tumblr-anon. Without you this fic would never have come into fruition.
As much as I love Wes and Travis, I do enjoy exploring other characters' points of view and feelings about them, so this was very fun to write, Paekman being way too overprotective until he finally sees that Wes is just as protective of Travis. Honestly, this 'verse is one of my favorite things I've ever written, so I love exploring it from every angle.
Anyway, let me know what you thought. Comments, reviews and constructive criticism are always welcome.
Until next time~!