Armor of Ice
Author's disclaimer: I do not own Halt and Catch Fire and its associated characters. AMC does, for which, for the most part, they have my utmost respect. No copyright infringement is intended in writing these stories.
My deepest respect also goes to the talented actors that brought to life the characters we see in HaCF. My portrayal of the characters here is based on my perception of the work of Lee Pace, Scoot McNairy, Mackenzie Davis, Kerry Bishé, Toby Huss, Aleksa Palandino, and James Cromwell.
With the exception of personal interpretation and expansions, extracts from existing episodes of the series remain the copyright of the story and teleplay writers: Christopher Cantwell, Christopher C. Rogers, Jamie Pachino, Jason Cahill, Zack Whedon, Dahvi Waller, and Jonathan Lisco.
Other assorted original characters (i.e. those that don't really appear in the show) are my own creation, and they, along with the original material presented here are © Eirian Phillips 2015.
Story is rated for mature readers, according to whatever rating system is adopted these days for Fan Fiction. It changes on a site by site basis… It was so much easier way back when…
Feedback is always welcome and comments/emails are usually answered.
Characters and events are purely fictitious, and any similarity to anyone living is entirely coincidental.
Prologue: Grace
The club was loud, dark and smoky, just the way he liked them and as if in defiance of the part of him screaming for abstinence, knocked back the last shot of Jack Daniels from the bottom of glass and took in a deep breath of the fetid air.
'Why the hell not?' he thought. He had abrogated responsibility for everything else through his life, knowingly and unknowingly, why not let the nicotine – and god only knew what else – ladened atmosphere pull another few years off his life. It was worthless anyway.
That's what she'd said, when he came to her; had always said, when they'd talked – that he abrogated responsibility, never looked inside himself to see the reasons why things happened, why he did what he did. Always blamed other people; too much distance from himself…
He'd done it when she told him she needed to leave.
The ink was barely dry, and should have held his attention as he walked into the room carrying the legal document like some kind of sacred text to present in deference to the one that held his heart; had helped him to find his heart, and yet, the weight of the room drew his attention to her as she stood, staring out of the open slats of the blinds across the patio window, even though he didn't look at her.
He stopped, and raised his eyes; held out the papers, still only half looking at her, as if he already knew the way the conversation would go.
"Turn to the last page."
She turned to him. He felt her reluctance in the way she almost turned away again, but over her shoulder her eyes fell on the papers, and from somewhere deep within – he recognized the depth of it in her – she asked, "Why?" glanced at him and then back at the pre-nup.
"Just… turn to the last page." She took it from him, he barely dared breathe, as she rifled the papers, opening them to the page at the back, where in the blue of all the bruises from his past, he had signed his name – signed away all else than the truth. "The only thing I'm after… is you."
He watched her stare past the document, saw the stiffness in her back sag toward defeat as she let the final page fold closed, curled the papers in her hands and resumed, for a moment, her gaze through the window, then she stood, without looking at him turned and set the papers down on the chair, the back of which she had been perched on, and folded her arms. Her eyes closed as she drew breath to speak.
"I think… we need to slow things down," the measured way she took the future from his grasp slipped like a knife between his ribs, spilling dread inside of him as the axe he'd felt hanging over them since he entered the room fell, and shattered the fragile restraint that lay between them. His lips parted to take a painful breath, but she went on. "I think it's all going too fast," she closed her eyes again, looked away before looking back at him, "I just… need some room to figure it out."
"Is this about Cameron?"
"No it's about you." Her words were sharp; a knife blade – one cord that bound them cutting loose. He felt it drift, and nodded in the pain of understanding. "And maybe it's about me… too, I don't know."
She wasn't looking at him. He couldn't take his eyes off her. Opposites again. Backward, so far back in such a short amount of time.
"I just need some time—"
"Time, what does that mean?" His eyes dropped from her, hit the ground with his heart – breaking open.
"I'm going back to Austin."
"For how long?" The exchange came thick, fast; she looked up at him and he at her, their eyes met and everything stopped. Could she not see his pain?
She held his gaze for barely a moment before she shook her head, a strange, twisted expression entering her face. "I don't know."
He felt the heat of the flood inside him rising, his eyes stung with the tears that came to them as she said the final words, "I'm sorry."
It didn't sound as though she were.
He couldn't breathe, he couldn't move. The slow, steady clump of her footsteps on the wooden floor like a funeral march over the ache that he, again, became. He staggered under the weight of it.
He wasn't the kind of man to cry, but he had. Tears of loss. Tears of anger. Tears of self-righteous indignation and finally an agony of self-loathing until his head ached and his nose bled from the number of times he'd blown it through his desolation.
Then he'd picked himself up, dressed in ice and pushed on… except that the ice kept melting, as now; staring out across the crowded club to where his personal, self-destructive drug of choice surrounded herself with her latest cabal of hero-worshippers and hangers on, living it up, knocking back the youthful elixir, and laughing.
'Laughing at me.'
That wouldn't do.
He pried himself from where he was leaning, swung by the bar, downed a second double Jack Daniel's in a single long swallow, and then turned – predatory, sheathed in ice once more, to prowl across the edge of the dance floor; mask of a smile firmly affixed to his handsome face – beneath his eyes.
He saw her as the rainbow reflected off the mirrored ball turning overhead cast a multi-colored arrow across the white of her shirt; loose, free – hanging over the waistband of an equally flowing skirt. Dark hair fell across her shoulders like a river of memory; a slight curl, the promise of wildness in the haphazard way it wrote remember me across her collar bone.
"Hey," he stopped, and leaned against the pillar beside her, looking down at her in a way that sent her friends scattering to the corners of the dance floor. One, he noted, touched her elbow before she left, and her slender fingers gestured her away; confidence or bravado? "Can I refresh that for you?"
He nodded to the glass she held in her other hand. She shrugged, but her eyes were hungry, a reflection of his own ravenous need, trapped behind the very shield he'd raised against it. He could do this; slipped an arm around her waist and tugged her closer. The shock of her warmth ran over him with all the tenderness of a sledgehammer. Green eyes met his and held a space of time before she pushed him back. Not so fast, they told him, even as he persisted and covered her fingers with his own, large hand, sliding the glass from her hand, and guiding her back toward the bar with him. She went willingly, leaned against the bar at his side as he gestured to the bar tender to refill her glass, and to bring him the same.
"Joe," he told her. No need for second names in the impermanence of the moment.
"Grace," she said, then surprised him as she went on. "I've seen you here before."
Spider web cracks began to run from the top of his head and he became the spinning mirror ball before he caught himself. Green. Her eyes are green.
"Oh?" Non-committal question, he wouldn't give head to his rising curiosity.
She nodded, and took a pull of the light beer she'd ordered. "Hard to miss."
Appeal to his vanity – just who was playing whom? He knew he should just walk away – this was playing with fire. Instead he moved closer, framing her with his arms against the bar. This time she didn't push him back.
Her mouth was cold beneath the heat of his, her taste the bitter-sweet of the beer that he took from her hand and set blindly on the top of the bar, to possess her with both hands. Her fingers reached up to tangle in his hair as he devoured her, stealing the very air from her lungs until she pulled away breathless, and he gasped to fill his own even as he picked up his glass and half drained it.
"Come with me," he half growled, tugging at her wrist, all but crushed in his hand, and the mirror-ball-Joe spun again, chips falling free as he moved – no. Her eyes are green – trusting she would follow.
"Joe!"
The voice was hot like opium, but too alive, like the spark of an arc weld that stilled the motion in his legs. Had he chosen this route across the club toward the door purposefully, to bring the two of them within the range of her sight?
"What, no date?"
The sarcasm stung, amplified by the smugness resonating like the pulse of electricity he'd once used to excite the both of them. He would have answered, but the lead weight behind him suddenly eased and the short brunette, with the unruly-memory hair moved around him, to the front, and stuck out her hand.
He didn't hear the words exchanged; stepped closer behind and slid both of his arms round the top of her shoulders. Demonstrative. Possessive. Lacking from before.
"…you're leaving already?" A verbal shrug in the cocaine smile, and his blood boiled. Didn't she care? She had. He'd seen it before her cheery congratulations underscored just how she hadn't moved on.
"Of course," the surface of his words was smoother than the stiffening current that roiled beneath. Uncomfortable he shifted closer to the woman in his arms, and the movement brought no ease. "We have places to be, Sar—"
She ducked under out from under his embrace, turned to hold his gaze for barely a moment, a strange expression twisting her face into a parody of a smile. Shit. Her eyes are—
"Goodnight, Joe!"
The verbal slap physically moved him, and unbalanced, he took a step before he caught himself, drew upright.
"I guess not." Cameron laughed without a sound, and dismissed him too, returning to the fawning attentions of those around her. This wasn't how it was supposed to go. Laughter followed him as he turned rapid steps to follow Grace.
No one walked away from him…
…but Sara had.
"Grace, wait!"
The cold in the air hit him the moment he stepped into the parking lot and left his head swimming. Christ! How much had he had already? Not nearly enough. Green.
Grace faltered and he caught her arm by the wrist.
"What is this?" he asked, holding fast as she tugged against his hold, "Grace…"
She stopped and turned to face him.
"Who is she to you, Joe?" she admonished.
"Nothing." A lie.
Green eyes shook her head, "Don't lie to me. Not with what you're asking."
"What do you want me to say?"
She started walking, heading for a row of cars. He followed. What was it about this woman? Even as he asked it, he knew the answer.
"What is she to you, Joe?"
He blinked, surprised when the movement of his lashes freed chilled drops to track downward on his cheeks. Three days of almost constant conversation, and very little sleep and he still felt like the proverbial dam and the cracks were more than showing. He felt her hand close around his, and allowed her to tug him toward the lounger… encourage him to sit, and then…
"Sara—" she straddled him, resting her hands on his shoulders to steady herself as she settled.
"Sssh," she said quietly, against his protests, murmured against the kiss she brushed to his brow. "Just answer the question."
"Nothing… she nothing to me." He closed his eyes feeling the warmth of her, soothing… the promise of redemption, something more.
"You can tell yourself that, Joe, and lie to yourself all you want, but I know you better than that, and I won't hear them. No lies, no deceit…"
"No secrets," he murmured.
"Excuse me?" Grace frowned up at him, coming to a stop beside a beat up old station wagon. He jarred to a halt.
"Nothing," he said, stepping closer, "Forget I even—"
"You're a man made of secrets," she cut him off, "and raised on lies."
"Then why are we still here?" he growled, denial of her words falling hollow inside of his brittle shell.
She shrugged, and raised an eyebrow, challenging softly, "You're the one that followed me, remember? Why are we still here? Inside – sure – I was just a piece of ass to try and make tall, blonde and snarky just that little bit jealous. Now…?"
Now she was playing with him, and the animal instinct reared in protest. He stepped closer and she trailed off, stepping back against the car, and he framed her, arms either side as he leaned down to take her mouth – the mouth that spoke uncomfortable truths that echoed those more gently spoken – and make it his… trying to forget that she had green eyes.
He kicked the door closed behind them, filling his hands with the feel of her… his mouth with the taste of her, hard where he pressed against her, breathless where his lips and teeth grazed across her shoulder; alternately pushing at her hands as she tried to peel away the leather of his jacket to pin her to the hallway wall, and mapping the straight lines and curves of her body.
She moaned his name as he released her mouth. Still full of the taste of her, he hushed her; half shuffling, half lifting her along the hallway, and through the open door into her bedroom. He shrugged out of his jacket, letting it fall to the floor. Taking her hands, he brought them down his body to the button of his fly, feeling the tremor in her fingers against the heat of his risen need as she tugged the button open and slipped her hand inside; grasped him through his shorts. He moaned deeply into the following kiss, pushed himself against her hand, moving to catch her touch. How he needed to bury himself inside her – lose himself and his pain to their mutual need.
He broke the kiss, removed her hands and would have turned her to face the wall, save for the softness of her repeated whisper of his name. Instead he lifted her again, took the few steps from the doorway around which their heated caresses had rolled them, and lowered them both to the foot of the bed, lying back even as he guided her lips to another searing kiss.
His tongue plunged into her mouth, a mirror of the desire to plunder the sweetness of her sex. The thought drew another deep moan from the seat of his need, and as she pushed at the snug fit of his jeans. He rolled above her, then reaching between them to free himself still further, and to gather the folds of her skirt against his wrist, guided the head of his aching length between her soaked folds and with a strong, sure roll of his hips, claimed her – filled her – sank deep within the well of her wet heat and with a soft cry, stilled.
"Don't," she gasped against the side of his neck and arched beneath him, the breath and the invitation to take her deeper still burned straight to his loins. "Don't stop."
Unlocked, he drew back and rocked them with the sudden ferocity of the ensuing rut. Breath came hot and fast; perspiration matched the exertion of their passion, and when her fingers moved against his shirt, he caught her wrists, pinned her arms away from the fastenings and took her mouth in a deep kiss to swallow her sighs of appeal, and moaning nipped at her lips as he felt himself begin to come unraveled; surrendered to the rush of pleasure and sank against her as he flooded her within, to the straining beat of his icy heart. When he could move, he pulled away, rolled aside and threw his arm across his face, still breathing hard, unmoving and unmoved as she turned to pillow her head against his chest.
He hadn't meant to sleep, but exhaustion, - he couldn't remember when last he'd slept – laid the weight of his release over him like a blanket, and he dozed, waking only when the tangle of his pants pinched, disturbing the mockery of rest.
Squinting at the clock on the nightstand, and moving slowly to free the ache in his shoulder, still raised across his face, he moved carefully, trying not to disturb the warm body at his side as he slipped from beneath her. Her fingers closed around his wrist as he sat up. A tug prevented him from standing.
"It's okay. You don't have to—"
He turned back to her, leaned over to kiss her almost softly, almost allowed himself to feel – the ice had long since melted.
"I gotta go," he murmured, his voice quiet, thick with the burden of his actions, his mouth brushing with hers one last time before he stood and walked away; kept walking until the slam of the door behind him was not that of an innocent lamb to his slaughter, but was his own.
He shrugged out of his clothes as he passed, ghostlike, through his apartment, stepped naked into the shower, and turned on the water. Then he sank to sit, knees to scarred chest, head back against the tiles, shaking with breathless sobs as the rising steam drowned the evidence of his distress.