Rating: M

Words: 2100

Spoilers: Minor spoilers for Doubletake.

Warnings: Cal language and Niko gropeage.

Summary: Never take your eyes off your brother. Especially in a room full of pucks who all have the hots for him.

Disclaimer: Everything is owned by someone else.

A/N: A missing scene that occurred to me whilst reading The Panic scene in Doubletake. In no way canon-approved!

ONE MINUTE

I was pretty sure I'd had enough of The Panic.

Things were going downhill rapidly at the Ninth Circle, and I wasn't sure how much longer I could take it.

There were naked and semi-naked pucks everywhere, and it wasn't so much what they were doing to each other or the "entertainment" that bothered me as the way they kept looking at Niko while they were doing it.

So Robin had explained how all pucks were basically copies of each other, but it seemed pretty damn obvious from the get-go they'd all picked up Goodfellow's fascination with zen-ninja-monster-hunting blonds, if the number of times one of them had tried to grope my brother was anything to go by.

Nik was somehow managing to hang on to his cool, although having a katana hidden behind the bar was proving useful. Having one puck lusting after him was bad enough; having a whole race of pucks lusting after him? That was a whole other class of annoying.

"We've run out of brandy," he announced suddenly, almost breaking one of the pucks' fingers as he made to shove his hand up Nik's shirt when he thought he wasn't paying attention.

Nik was always paying attention.

"No touching the bartenders," he repeated for the hundredth time, as the puck continued to gaze at him longingly, despite almost having his fingers crushed.

Nik sighed audibly, releasing the puck's fingers before heading off towards the stock room at the rear of the bar.

I almost asked him if he needed an escort, but figured I liked my fingers intact, thank you very much.

I didn't point out the six bottles of brandy under the bar either.

"He's…" the puck with the crushed fingers mumbled dreamily, "…lickable."

I squinted at him. At first I thought, there's no way he meant to use the word "likeable" about a six foot blond ninja bartender that just crushed his fingers; but then it suddenly occurred to me the puck had used exactly the word he'd intended in the first place, and I may have thrown up in my mouth a little.

The puck drifted away from the bar at that point, and I did my best to put him out of my mind, breaking up a fight between three pucks involved in a dick-measuring contest (they were all exactly the same as one another, for crying out loud!) and listening to another go on and on and on about Boadicea, her amazing chariot, the things they got up to together in it and how much he appreciated good suspension these days.

It was as I was drifting off from sheer boredom that I suddenly realized Nik hadn't returned from his supply run and he'd been gone a pretty long time.

So, yeah, my brother could totally look after himself – probably better than any other person I knew, actually.

But he was just one person. And there were at least seventy pucks in the bar, many of whom seemed to have already mounted anything wet and willing, and were now looking for something a little bit more challenging to stick bits of their anatomy into.

Shit.

I pretty much launched myself down the narrow hallway leading to the back room, armed only with Nik's sword and a guilty conscience.

One minute. I'd not paid attention to what was going on around me for one minute. If something happened to Nik as a result? It was gonna be Puckmageddon, let me tell you.

There was a crowd of naked pucks clustered at the far end of the hallway. I couldn't see what they were clustered around, but had a horrible feeling I already knew.

As I got closer I spotted one of the pucks with a hand fisted in a long, blond braid, while another was busy gnawing on my brother's wrist, apparently heedless of the choking risk posed by his mala bead bracelet.

A third puck was trying to simultaneously unfasten both Nik's shirt and his jeans, resulting, thankfully, in his not getting very far with either, and I took a second to thank Whoever that the pucks were all completely shitfaced and, as a result, slightly less competent at raping and pillaging than they usually were, considering the position they'd got my brother in.

They had Nik up against a wall, at least eight of them, pulling, tugging, biting and licking at any part of him they could get their hands, tongues, mouths or other parts of themselves anywhere near.

And the weirdest thing?

Nik wasn't putting up a fight.

Nothing.

No resistance whatsoever.

He was just letting them have their way with him.

I suddenly realized there was another puck running down the hallway in front of me, and this puck was fully clothed.

"What part of 'monogamous' did you idiots not understand?" he roared, wading into the crowd of naked horny pucks, yanking them off Niko one at a time and tossing them down the hallway like horrible, sweaty bowling balls.

"This is your boyfriend?" the puck whose mouth had seemed apparently superglued to Nik's neck turned as he was unceremoniously dragged away from the object of his lust. "A sheep?"

"But a very pretty little lamb I think you'll agree," Robin returned, grabbing the last of the pucks by the hair and yanking him off my brother. He splayed a steadying hand against Nik's chest in an effort to keep him upright as he turned to examine the trickster trash littering the hallway. "If any of you so much as looks at this one again tonight, I swear I will run you through with so many spiky objects they'll be finding pieces of you scattered about Manhattan for the rest of the millennium. Are we clear?"

The pucks grumbled not-so-quietly amongst themselves, before picking themselves up and slinking past me back down the hallway and into the bar area.

How I resisted slitting every single one of their throats I'll never know.

"What's wrong with him?" I demanded of Robin, finally making it to my brother's side.

Nik looked completely out of it, his eyes unfocused and his legs barely able to hold his weight.

"Pheromones," Robin replied, putting a gentle hand on Nik's cheek. "Hey there, kiddo," he said. "You with us?"

Nik frowned minutely, tilting his head slightly to one side, which only succeeded in giving me a widescreen, IMAX view of the bite marks on his neck and his shoulder, where one of the pucks had managed to yank away his shirt.

"Robin?" he said, voice slurred and uncertain, sounding for all the world as if he'd drunk every single one of the bottles of brandy he'd come down here to pick up. "Were you kissing me?" His eyes were at half-mast and he blinked, as if trying to bring Robin into sharper focus.

Robin snorted. "You wish, sweetheart," he said. "No. That was someone else."

"Wait," I interrupted, almost as confused as Niko. "I thought you said puck pheromones only affect supernatural creatures during the Panic?"

Robin glanced back at me uncomfortably. "Ordinarily," he agreed, "yes. But... If we want to, we can alter their chemical composition slightly in order to make them affect humans."

My eyes widened as he hung his head a little in shame.

"They roofied my brother?" I burst out.

Robin grimaced. "More or less."

"They roofied and tried to gang rape my brother?" I added, just to be clear.

Robin shrugged. "I suppose you could look at it that way."

"What other way is there to look at it?" I exploded. "They drugged him and were trying to get in his pants."

Robin nodded. "Fair point," he agreed, taking hold of both of Nik's shoulders and inclining his head slightly to get a better look into his eyes. "Hey, sleepyhead," he said. "You with me?"

Nik blinked at him. "Why were you kissing me?" he asked. "I'm pretty sure you're not supposed to do that."

Robin patted him fondly on the cheek. "Not me, honey, not me."

I was fairly certain if Nik had any idea what was going on he would have objected strongly to all the pet names Goodfellow was throwing in his direction.

I'd never even heard Promise call him "honey."

I shuffled impatiently from foot to foot. "He's gonna be okay though, right?" I asked, not at all sure I could cope with a passive, clueless, sexually docile big brother for very long.

Robin nodded. "Don't fret, mother hen," he assured me. "It'll wear off. We just need to get him a little more horizontal for a few minutes."

I snorted, feeling the tension slowly ebb out of the arm that had been gripping Nik's katana like the last prayer of a dying man. "Not the first time I've heard that phrase come out of your mouth," I observed, pushing open the door to the break room, and motioning Robin to follow me.

"Dear boy, get it into your skull," Robin insisted. "Monogamy. Ish would drop me from the roof of the Chrysler Building if he caught me looking at another—" he sniffed, "—living creature."

He took that as his cue to heft Niko up onto his shoulder in a fireman's carry, which was kind of impressive considering Nik was pretty much all muscle.

I held the door open for him and, without looking behind me, ordered, "Get your hands off my brother's ass, Goodfellow."

Robin sniffed in disgust. "As if I would ever take advantage of someone in Niko's condition!" he returned, apparently mortified I should think such a thing of him.

But I heard the unmistakable sound of hands moving across denim all the same.

"Although one would think I deserved some kind of reward for defending your brother's honor," he continued to grumble, before carefully laying Niko down on the battered old couch that pretty much filled the entire break room.

"I'll remember you in my will," I told him, crouching down next to Nik and taking the opportunity to check his pulse. It was hammering so hard it was a wonder he wasn't having a coronary.

"Cal?" he said, blinking rapidly. "How…? Where…?"

"Break room. Ninth Circle. Puck pheromones. Okay now," I explained shortly.

He frowned. "Was Robin kissing me?" he asked again.

I snorted, and Robin virtually growled. "Does no one in this godsforsaken city believe me capable of monogamy?" he demanded.

"Not a one," I replied truthfully.

"So who…?" Niko continued to ask, obviously trying to figure out what the hell just happened to him.

"Pucks. Lots of pucks," I explained.

A light seemed to snap on behind my brother's eyes, and he instantly tried to jump up off the couch.

I pushed him back down again insistently.

"Not until the whammy wears off, big brother," I told him.

He ran a hand across his face wearily. "There…there was more than one," he murmured, closing his eyes for a second, as if trying to recreate the scene in his head. "And they all looked like Robin."

"We are all blessed with unnatural beauty," Robin commented.

"They were all crowding around me," Nik continued, ignoring the puck. "And when I tried to fight them off, I suddenly felt kind of dizzy. And then Robin was kissing me."

"Oh for the love of Zeus—"

"Not Robin," I corrected him again. "Although they do all think you're Robin's boyfriend now."

Nik blinked. "They…what?" he asked slowly.

Goodfellow shrugged.

Nik seemed to digest that snippet of information for a second, before suddenly looking down at himself. "What did they…did they…?"

I shook my head. "Robin defended your virtue," I told him.

"And I think I deserve some kind of reward for my chivalrous service," Robin grumbled again.

Nik nodded, suddenly grabbing the puck's shirt, pulling him towards him and kissing him firmly on the cheek. "Thank you," he said, releasing his hold on him. "Consider yourself rewarded."

Robin didn't move, apparently so surprised he'd forgotten how to work his face. Or his mouth. "Uh," he stammered. "You're welcome?"

"I guess from that you're feeling better?" I asked.

Nik grimaced. That was more like the Niko I knew. "Where's my sword?" he demanded. "I believe there are a few pucks requiring its attention."

I handed him the katana, which he took gratefully, pulling himself to his feet with barely a wobble.

"You ready to get back out there?" I asked him.

He nodded grimly. "Drinks to pour and pucks to chastise," he declared, heading purposefully toward the door.

I heard Robin sigh behind me. "Do you think he'd chastise me if I asked nicely?"

"Monogamy, Robin," I said. "Remember?"

Robin sighed again. "Maybe my brothers have the right idea…"

The End

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