Mycroft moves his mouth cleverly.
The noose tightens.
Jim comes undone, finishing with a strangled moan.
The trap door opens beneath him.
He fills Mycroft's mouth. He tastes like Mycroft's damnation. Hot and bitter and delicious.
He falls spectacularly. Limbs flailing like a marionette. Neck snapped.
Knees buckle, unable to carry the weight of his shame, and Jim slides down the wall.
His executioner laughs, because that is what is expected of him, but it is a hollow sound. Too much death- he's seen too much. He takes no pleasure in this boy's little death.
Jim's eyes snap open and watch Mycroft coldly. The resentment rolls over him in waves- he let's it. He returns Jim's look but with triumph- false, lying victory. He doesn't feel like he's won.
Was it worth it? He asks himself expecting a hiss of yes from one side and a cry of no from the other. But there is nothing but resounding silence. They have left him alone to face his ultimate temptation, Jim Moriarty, the one that will be his end.
Because pain begets pain. begets pain begets pain begets pain
Revenge is viscous. And when it is between two boys, beguiled into believing they are men by their intellects, revenge is cyclical. Unending.
They both see it too well. But they are both too obstinate to relent. They will take each other apart until there is nothing left but their mechanical hearts.
Jim is breathing heavily, panting, it is the only sound in this prison they have built up around themselves. He is too loud in the silence. He hates it. Hates the sound of him and how it quickens his pulse.
"Hush, boy. Hush." Mycroft murmers, pressing their lips together.
Jim kisses back but it is languid, strangely unresponsive. Mycroft strokes his tongue deliberately against Jim's, so he might taste himself. Hot and bitter and delicious. He wants Jim to know that, just as he has spread through Jim like darkness, Mycroft has him under his skin now. He'll never get him out- we're the same. Isn't that just awful? Disgusting?
Mycroft pulls back to sneer, "You're a lot more fun when you're fighting." but it falls flat. He's flushed and uncomfortable, a steady throbbing against the front of his trousers.
Conflicted- he's too conflicted. He knows what he wants Jim to do but the shame is smothering him. He hates but he wants. He's hungry but he's sick. Shame but lust.
In the end it is his desire to not show weakness that pushes him on.
Mycroft shifts himself a little closer between Jim's thighs and wraps long fingers around thin wrists and places Jim's hands on the front of his trousers, over the pulsing flesh beneath the cloth.
"You can still leave." Mycroft says slowly, wearing a smirk and raising an eyebrow carefully like he's taunting him. Jeering coward, run away, show me your weakness, fail. When really he is begging please, run away, allow me your weakness, win.
He doesn't run. He opens Mycroft's trousers and takes his master's weight in his hand, as if judging- deciding if he should, and Mycroft cannot meet his eye. He sucks a sharp breath through his teeth and leans forwards to place his forehead on Jim's shoulder.
"You can still leave." He repeats, like he's trapped in a loop.
Well, that's the thing, he is, isn't he?
Hush, boy. Hush. Oh, those words to things to Jim that they shouldn't. Because that's what he is, isn't he? A boy trying to plan a man's game and failing. He's back to being the puppet boy who thought he could play the master—but at the end of the day, he is still nothing but a wooden toy.
And he can taste himself on Mycroft's tongue and it tastes like shame and humiliation, because that's what that was an act of. Mycroft knew all along what Jim's domination would result in, and so he allowed his submission to gain his control again. Clever, Mycroft. Clever.
"You're a lot more fun when you're fighting." Jim just scoffs quietly at the jeer, shrugging his shoulders. Of course his face is still that of hate, but internally, Jim feels defeated, because how could he possibly win?
Jim watches warily from behind his wooden mask as Mycroft edges forward and god he just feels even smaller. Pulling his strings, Jim feels his hands leave the safe place on the floor and come to rest over Mycroft's groin and well, he shouldn't be surprised. There is always a price to pay in the games of men—just another thing the little puppet-boy forgot.
"You can still leave." Oh, how smart that would be. In truth, Jim knew that if he had left, he would have won, but what was the price of winning? It was the same as losing.
No matter what he did, shame would follow him, whether it took its own form, or the shape of its sister, cowardice. And so Jim unzipped Mycroft's trousers and shifted through fabric until he was holding him in too-small hands. The heat was so close to setting the puppet-boy aflame when he heard something that sent cool water rushing over him.
"You can still leave." But this time it was different. Mycroft's head was on his shoulder and the words were…they were a plea. It was quiet and almost hard to hear, but the undertones of a begging man could be heard and Jim's eyes lit up.
Because maybe all wasn't lost after all. Maybe Mycroft saw this as his own defeat, rather than Jim's—and if that were the case, didn't that make Jim the victor? Oh their poem was so twisted and broken that there was no hero or villain—no winner or loser.
And maybe Mycroft had the quill that would write out Jim's life story, but at least he could sway the hand, right?
The puppet twisted his head to whisper in the creator's ear, "Now where would be the fun in that?" and there is defiance laced into every word; defiance against an unspoken plea of 'Please leave and end this now, because I do not have the strength to do it myself.'
One of his hands slips down to cup Mycroft, while the other slowly teases, feeling all of the ridges and lines. His finger runs over the pulsing vein that runs underneath before coming around to press a finger against the slit at the head.
He can feel the delicious way that Mycroft shudders at his touch and it eggs him on further as he wraps his fingers around the creator's length and strokes slowly, smoothly, lightly at first until the hand grows just a little heavier and the rhythm faster until he can hear Mycroft break and let out small whimpers and moans against his shoulder.
He closes his own eyes to the classroom as he feels Mycroft's hands come to rest on his thighs, lightly gripping at the fabric of his trousers. With that touch, Jim realized he still had power. His tugs and strokes were more assured now, and stronger—confident and eager for the creator to come apart in his wooden hands.
"Moan for me, Mycroft," he purrs into the man's ear as he presses in that same place that got Jim to cry out earlier, and the results were more than he could have hoped for. It came out as a strangled cry into the fabric of his shirt as fists tightened around Jim's trousers.
He can feel that Mycroft is close—so close. There was the tell-tale twitch and it made Jim positively shiver. Mycroft was trembling lightly as Jim twisted his wrist and added pressure in all the right places. Oh here it was…the moment he'd been waiting for. Jim grinned like the devil as he slid his hand down and pinched at the base, halting the release in its tracks.
Jim chuckled as he felt his Master convulse, digging his fingers into Jim's thighs and biting into his shoulder.
"Ah-ah-ah, Mycroft. You didn't think I would make it easy, did you?" Jim couldn't believe that he actually thought he'd lost only a few minutes before. He continued to whisper dangerously in Mycroft's ear. "Oh, no…I want you to beg." Jim dragged his nose down from the other's ear, nuzzling until he got Mycroft to lift his head out of Jim's shoulder. He nudged the collar away from Mycroft's neck and bit down, hard enough to draw blood. Jim licked and sucked at the coppery taste, drawing up a bruise beneath it. Let him try and hide it.
A mark for a mark. The master belonged to his puppet as much as the puppet belonged to the master.
Moan for me, Mycroft.
And he does. Wantonly, shamelessly. Jim's fingers are wicked and they force depraved sounds from Mycroft's throat; who knew hell could be so sweet? He's burning beneath Jim's fingertips in the worst way, and he likes it. It's driving him to the edge, only seconds before he falls.
But suddenly it is as if he's become tangled in his own puppet's strings, obeying the will of a boy as Jim halt's his release and he jerks forwards, biting Jim's shoulder just to stop the cry of almost-pain.
Ah-ah-ah, Mycroft. You didn't think I would make it easy, did you? Oh, no…I want you to beg.
Jim sinks his teeth into Mycroft's throat hard. The rational part of Mycroft, the part that registers blood trickling beneath his shirt, assess the damage- healing time, three weeks, probably visible above the collar, scarring... most likely. But the part that rules Mycroft in Jim's presence, the animal, just feels teeth- He's marking you, you're his.
And then Mycroft is gasping and struggling for air against Jim's shoulder, but every time he breathes he is just taking on water. Drowning. No matter how hard he seems to kick he cannot get his head above the surface, and it's not that Jim is above him, holding his head, it's that he is below, dragging him down by his ankle. We drown together.
Humiliation is almost no problem now because he just wants to breathe again.
"Please." His voice comes out hoarser than intended, shaky and weak, into Jim's shoulder. Not content, Jim pulls his head back and Mycroft thinks he says something- again, again his lips form the words, mouth tugged into a vicious grin- but he can't hear it for the blood pounding in his ears.
"Please." It's a child's voice this time, almost a cry. Most certainly a plea.
"Was that so hard?" Jim says, barking with laughter and if Mycroft was in a better frame of mind he would wring the life from him, but Jim is moving his hands again, destroying Mycroft with simple strokes. With barely the flick of a wrist.
He finishes with a groan, a horrible noise- ungraceful and raw-, and empties his sin over Jim, thighs and stomach and fingers. He tries not to think about how disgusting this how- how disgusting theyare.
Jim's smile is sharp, jagged- a knife- and as he leans forwards to press a chaste kiss to Mycroft's mouth- like a seal of victory- he can taste his own blood on the lips that marred his throat. He squeezes his eyes shut and wills this moment away. And when it's over he pulls himself up and fumbles with his trousers, pushing Jim back down the wall when he tries to stand. If he has nothing he has this is, Jim at his feet.
"I suppose you think you've won this round." Mycroft drones and Jim grins like he knows he has, Mycroft laughs bitterly, the sound falling from his lips like acid, "You idiot boy." Because he's still a boy. They can fuck and curse until the devil owns their souls but, Jim will still be a child and Mycroft barely more than that. "Look at yourself." He's on the floor, slicked with sweat and Mycroft's seed, "Look at me. We're neither of us going to come out victorious in this. Trapped in a stale mate."
"Then why don't you forfeit the game?" Jim calls as Mycroft walks away.
And Mycroft turns back to smile with thin lips and a melancholy look in his eyes, "Why don't you?" Jim snaps his mouth shut, "Exactly. I'll see you soon, Jim."
