Subsequently
Warning: There is a spanking in here. If this is not something you dig, run like hell. (Or don't, you might like it, neh?)
Summary: Dorian and John discuss John's decision to dispatch the Bishop. Continuation of the Episode THE BENDS. Warning: discipline, hint at Jorian.
This just sort of...happened.
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In the darkest corner of McQuaides, I am wedged into the booth with my back against the side wall. Dorian sits across from me, picking at the label on one of the empties. He is trying to look human. "You're quiet, John," he says, looking around the sparsely populated lounge. Rudy is up at the counter surrounded by a group of women, laughing as they pass his fedora around.
"Women love nerds now," I marvel, tipping the rest of my third-beer-too-many up and finishing it off.
The android is smiling thinly in Rudy's direction and shaking his head. He is quieter than usual tonight. "You okay?" he asks, wincing as I hold a finger up at the waitress. Guess he doesn't think I need another.
I wait for my new beer and then stick my legs up along the length of the booth, "Got the Bishop," I grin around the lip of brown glass, "I'm fine."
"Too bad we couldn't bring him in," Dorian says, fixing on me. "I would have liked to ask him some questions."
I take a deep draw from my bottle and rest the back of my head on the grimy wood-paneled wall behind me, my arm flopped along the top edge of booth. Shit, I could fall asleep right here. I don't want to deal with Dorian's roundabout interrogation.
"Ready to go?" Dorian can be so pushy when he doesn't feel like I'm giving him the right attention. I shake my half a beer at him; it's all the reply he needs.
"Did the Bishop say anything before you—before he died?" Dorian pressed. He is arranging the beer bottles on the table mindlessly, the textured glass bottoms vibrate low and soothing against the heavily varnished wood.
I open my eyes and pull myself up with my elbows, glaring at him, "I'm off duty," I spit, "Tomorrow is my day off." I poke my finger down onto the table for emphasis, "That means I don't have to think about this shit." My mouth tastes bitter from the hops.
His full lips purse on his synthetic face. I've managed to piss him off again but he'll swallow it and smooth it out in a minute. But, I'm ready to go now. My eyelids hurt and my leg needs a charge. I drain the beer and poke at the light screen on the table, paying for our drinks. My drinks, I guess.
"John," Dorian persists. I pull myself out the length of the booth and walk over to Rudy at the bar. He's got hands all over him. Never fucking mind, he can get his own way home.
Dorian follows me too close, I'm annoyed and it's showing. What do they say in anger management? I don't need to prove myself in this situation. I can't control other people. Opinions are not facts. I don't have to be strong, blah blah blah bullshit.
"I'll be driving," he announces in a matter-of-fact voice. Smug because I'm impaired.
I turn and lean against the cruiser. There is no point in telling him I'm not drunk.
"Oh point one seven seven," he says.
See?
I hold up my hands and get in the passenger seat. He's over his pissy mood because he gets to drive. I hate riding shotgun and Dorian's precision driving means we're going the exact speed limit and we're perfectly in the lines. I'm not complaining, I'm just sayin'.
He gets out at my place and I realize he's staying the night, which I actually don't mind. I'm thinking shower and bed, shower and bed. I got a nice smooth buzz on that makes me want to skip the shower, but today was too intense for that.
He doesn't need to sigh, but he does it anyhow. "It's a shame we couldn't bring Captain Barros in alive."
He just can't give me a fucking break. I shoulder my apartment door open and step inside, slapping the lights up. He follows me in and I slam the door shut for emphasis, "Why don't you just say what you want to say?" I pull my jacket off roughly and toss it to the nearby chair.
There is that look on his face again and I wonder if he knows my mother. They both have perfected looks of smoldering disappointment. "John, you murdered him."
Well that was sobering.
He sees he's about to lose me to a rage and quickly keeps talking, "He had a bullet in his leg, he was disarmed, beaten, and sitting on the floor," he is dead serious. I feel myself sweating. "You shot him point blank in the head. It is the only possible explanation, forensically."
I don't know what to say. I mean. He's right. The Bishop wasn't fighting back anymore, just popping off about a mistrial and I ended him. Dorian's waiting but I've got nothing.
It's a standoff. Except I sit down because now I wish I hadn't drank so much. You don't do this to a man.
He gives in, "I'm worried." He must literally know my mom. "I noticed right away. If forensics notices, even Maldonado won't be able to save you."
"You want to go over how many people Barros killed as the Bishop?" thank god I finally thought of a good comeback. Things were looking desperate.
"I wish we knew," Dorian counters, "We'll never know for sure because we didn't get to interrogate him."
"You think he'd tell you anything?" I snapped, a little too abrasive. I swallowed the taste of the beer running back up my throat mixed with stomach acid. Gross. "That asshole was going to bleed the system, drag it out. He might have walked." My argument got weaker with each word; I am running out of steam.
"We'll never know," Dorian says, accusatory.
"Well that is the fucking point," I gesture ineffectively, "isn't it?"
"No," Dorian is so much calmer than I am that I'm losing this battle on that alone, "the point is that you take a lot of risks and you jeopardized your career. Maybe even your freedom."
"S'my fucking life," I'm getting déjà vu from my teenage years.
"No, mine too," Dorian looks so serious, "What happens to me when they take your badge?"
Ouch. My god I need a shower. Sweat on top of old dried sweat is repulsive.
"Okay, point taken," that is as close to I'm sorry, you're right as he is going to get.
He takes off his coat and folds it in half, placing it on the table so slowly and purposefully I am instantly annoyed. What is with all the theatrics tonight?
"John," he says my name gravely. Man, he's creating a lot of tension. I need to get out of here. I live here. Shit.
He adjusts the waist of his pants and stands in front of me. I'm taller than him but not when I'm sitting, of course. Hands on his hips. He's so fucking close to me. It has the desired effect; I'm curling in on myself against my will. I feel efficiently guilty.
His hand on my chin gives me a quick crawl of goosebumps. Most people's eyes search and flit around in their sockets like hummingbirds. Not Dorian's though, when his eyes find me they are stone still, piercing. I squirm like a worm on a hook. And, I'm drunker than I think.
"Maybe a reminder?" he says, flinty.
I gawp stupidly, still thinking about the shower.
He puts a hand on my shoulder and yanks me up to my feet. What the fuck is going on?
He sits in my place and gestures to his legs. What the fuck is going on?
Uhg, cottonmouth. It's so hot in here. I tug at my shirt and look around.
His hand shackles my wrist and he draws me toward him at an unexpected angle. I feel myself pitch forward and I'm lying there on his lap. My wrist is still trapped, my arm twisted and pinned into the small of my back. I wrench my shoulder, unsuccessfully trying to escape. Seriously though, what the fuck is going on?
"Dorian," I find my voice but it's shaky and startled, betraying me, "You can't." I press my toes into floor to leverage myself upright and Dorian spreads his knees apart, supporting my frame better; one knee under my hips, the other angled close to my chest. My efforts are squashed.
I'm a grown man. I'm a grown man. I'm a grown man. "I'm a grown man."
I feel his hand under my belly and he deftly maneuvers my belt loose. It snakes around my waist slowly as he pulls it from the loops. The sensation is dizzying. This is why the DRNs were decommissioned, I'm sure of it now. He is one of the crazy ones.
I feel his anger and it is frightening. No, wait—it is scary, but it is mostly just very serious. Maybe he doesn't get what he's doing. He thinks this is normal. "Let's talk first," I reason, "I think you may be confus—" He shoves my pants down under my ass. Fucking fuck.
I twist; maybe if I can look at his face I can get him to stop. He lays a stripe of pain on my exposed backside and I turn into a stone statue. I'm going to have him disassembled, and then hung up in Rudy's lab, as a warning to the others. Another hit.
My teeth crush into each other. "Hhhh-ck,"that's what fuck sounds like when you are clenching your teeth and trying to breathe through the pain. This hurts way more than I anticipated it would, not that I had a lot of time to contemplate the situation.
"The rules are there for a reason," Dorian says, steadily. He puts another stroke down with my own goddamn belt. Another.
I'm sweating in drops on the floor in front of my face. I feel my eyes itch. No way. My free hand has a full time job as a support beam on the floor. I rub my face into the sleeve of that arm and steel myself. Two more and then I hear the clatter of clasp; he lets the belt drop sharply on the floor to the side of the chair. It startles me.
He releases my wrist and yanks on the waist of my pants, covering me. I regret the beers, now. I regret the bullet, too.
He slides his leg out from under my hips and helps me to my knees. He isn't letting me go but I'm not fighting yet. My face is flushed and sweaty. I am still trying to find a way to make this unhappen.
"John," his voice is so calm it makes my notched breath seem panicked and out of control. I force myself to get a fucking grip.
I'm stuck there on my knees between his thighs. He winds his arms around me and pulls me close, my face is shoved into the middle of his torso. He feels softer than I thought he would, realer. This really happened.
My arms feel like jelly, but they numbly move against my will, encircling him, clinging to him. I clasp my hands in the small of his back.
We stay there a while. My ass throbs.
It's late, really late. I am so glad I don't have to wake up in the morning and go to work. I'm still not sure how I'll get out of this embrace with my dignity intact. Impossible.
Dorian puts a hand in my hair and his thumb rubs deep into the back of my neck. It's heaven.
"I, uh, read about that," his voice is not angry anymore, "it sounded like something you needed and I kinda wanted to try it."
Oh, I'm so glad I could help Dorian experience a new part of humanity. I roll my eyes; my head is still being held in place by his unyielding hands.
He frees me at last and looks at me again with those eyes that don't judder or shift. They capture me in all my shame and stay on me, blue and sweet. The deep curvy lines around his mouth return and I realize I've missed them all night.
My body is betraying me. I feel heat gathering between my legs and my genitals grow heavy and thick. I should be mad, railing.
His hands on my face make me burn with heat. In the space of a few minutes, I've let him think he's an authority in my life. My stomach aches. "You tell anyone about this Dorian, and I'll—"
"I won't," he cuts me off, the words are a promise. I trust him.
A pang of pain in my chest raises the alarm. How can I trust anyone after Anna? I trusted her, too.
Dorian helps me to my feet. My head swims as my equilibrium returns, my blood running through my body normally once again.
This is awkward.
"I'm going to take a shower," I say it slowly and realize it sounds a little bit like I am asking for permission. Dammit.
Dorian nods and plants a kiss on my forehead, he has to go up on his toes for it.
I'm tired. I'm worried now that my actions with Captain Barros are going get me in real trouble. The anxiety creates a brick of stress on my chest.
"One more thing," Dorian says, staying my departure. He's unwinding a cord for his charger and I turn to look at him. "I took care of the Bishop. I don't like messing with crime scenes, but I did it this one time."
I want to stay tough, though I've never felt so un-tough in all my life. My lips part, falter, reseal.
"Go take your shower, John," he says softly.
So I do.