AN: Wow, the fandom is picking up again, huh? Thank you for the reviews you guys. You're all so awesome.
And thank you to Greg for beta-ing. He's going through rough stuff lately, so send him warm, fuzzy thoughts. Or just read, I don't know.
LI.
As soon as word reached Jimmy, Professor Mason returned to the 2nd Mass only to be gunned down by his son, Jimmy sprinted to the medic van, bursting round its corner and staggering to a halt. His eyes found Ben first, sitting on a bench outside the van, slumped over his knees and cradling his head in his hands. Hal leaned against the van, grave features carved as though from stone, distantly watching Matt play a game of chess alone on the bench next to Ben. Jimmy caught his breath and approached Hal first.
"How is he?" Jimmy carefully questioned, heart drumming painfully in his ears.
"Dr. Glass is removing the bullet now," Hal answered. Jimmy folded his arms over his stomach and fixed his gaze on Ben.
"How is he?" Jimmy reiterated, emphasizing his meaning with his pointed stare. Hal cleared his throat, straightening.
"Go talk to him," he recommended, "I've tried, but he won't…nothing I say means anything to him."
Jimmy faltered, dropped his eyes to the ground, as a heavy weight dropped into his stomach and threatened to drag him hopeless to his knees.
"I don't think he'll want to talk to me," Jimmy admitted, explaining sullenly, "We had a fight."
"Somehow I don't think that'll be the topic of your conversation," Hal muttered, shoving Jimmy towards Ben, and then starting away, calling over his shoulder, "Matt, let's take a walk."
Matt shot Jimmy a blank look, then scrambled to his feet and rushed after Hal. Jimmy hesitated a few heartbeats, attempting to steady himself as he watched Ben sitting unmoved on the bench. Sure, go talk to Ben, Jimmy thought sardonically, go cheer the guy up for possibly killing his own father a few days after accusing him of being a killer in waiting. Jimmy drew in a deep breath, and a couple shaky steps towards Ben, tremble increasing the closer he got, until he stood directly in front of Ben and felt certain he'd collapse. He realized he was holding his breath, let it out, and carefully slipped into the seat beside Ben.
They sat side-by-side in silence for several tens of seconds, Jimmy scouring his mind for something to say; some word of encouragement or condolence. Ben slumped a bit more in his seat, but otherwise remained frozen in his devastated pose.
"They're talking about me, around camp," Ben spoke up first; his voice had a strange croak to it from so long without use.
Jimmy didn't reply. He sat rigid, torn between wanting to reach out and touch Ben and the fear that Ben would shove him none too kindly away.
"I can hear them all now," Ben whispered, "I tried to kill my own father. How can I be trusted after that? And they're right. If he dies…it'll be because of me. It'll be my fault."
"It's good, though," Jimmy murmured, "That you shot him."
"What?" Ben stammered, finally turning his head to stare at Jimmy, his eyes pinched into narrow slits, and features screwed with heartache.
"Well, you know," Jimmy mumbled, folding his hands together to stop their trembling, "Because you're such a shit shot."
"This is your pep talk? What the fuck is wrong with you?" Ben cried
"No, I mean, think about it," Jimmy persisted, his voice growing in confidence as he continued to clarify, "I mean, if someone like…say, me for instance, was the one that shot him, man, he'd have no fucking chance right now. It would've been a clean head shot, he'd of been dead instantly. But because it was you that shot him, he has a good chance of surviving. Fuck, I've seen the way you shoot; it'll be a miracle if he dies. So if you think about it, it's good that you shot him."
Ben gaped at Jimmy for what seemed an uncomfortably long time, and Jimmy fought the urge to squirm under that scrutinizing stare, forcing all his energy into maintaining a light-hearted disposition. Then suddenly Ben smirked, snickering slightly under his breath, and shaking his head.
"Instead of you?" Ben prompted.
"Yeah, instead of me," Jimmy confirmed.
Ben sighed, his expression relaxing into one of melancholy, whispering in earnest, "Thanks."
"Yeah, no problem," Jimmy replied softly, and then grinned, "I can not shoot your dad anytime."
Ben smiled, clutching his head in his hands again. Jimmy leaned back, watching Ben wearily. Meekly, Jimmy offered his hand, resting it with the palm up against Ben's thigh, and Ben considered it briefly, before sliding his own palm over it and twining their fingers.
"Your dad's alive," Jimmy said, "That's something, right?"
"I guess," Ben murmured, and quietly confessed, "People are talking about him too."
"Why are you listening to them?" Jimmy groaned, "I thought we talked about this, they don't matter…"
"They have a point though," Ben argued, tilting his head slightly so that he could see Jimmy, tightening his grasp on the other boy's hand, "My father climbed onboard an alien space craft. He never should've been able to walk back off, but he did. How did he manage that and what did the aliens want with him in the first place? There has to be a reason he's back, a reason that's entirely their making…"
Jimmy said nothing, giving Ben's hand a gentle squeeze. He couldn't say the thought wasn't crossing his mind. Ben was harnessed, and now his father walked away from certain death at the aliens' claws? It was just too great a coincidence.
The door to the medic van opened and Lourdes stuck her head out, her hair and clothes disheveled. Jimmy instantly disentangled his hand from Ben's and though Ben didn't react to the action, Jimmy felt a strange and sudden disgust in himself. Lourdes met Ben's eyes, and then glanced to Hal and Matt several yards away. They approached, eyes locked on the weary young woman.
"He's awake right now, if you want to see him," she announced.
The Mason brothers headed for the van entry, and Jimmy watched a second or two, a ping of envy aching in his chest as one-by-one the brothers ascended the ladder. There'd never been a chance for Jimmy's parents. His mother toasted during the first invasion while lounging poolside with her martini. He could still smell the singed flesh, still see her innards spilled across the floor. And his father, there was a kind of poetic justice that the man died in his overpriced luxury car on the way to work. It was almost a pity he didn't die at work with his co-workers, in the only place, with the only people he really cared about.
It was nice that the Mason brothers had their family together again, though maybe only a select few people like Jimmy truly knew how nice it really was.
Jimmy took a deep breath, a few steps back, then turned away and started across camp. He didn't notice Ben's hesitance on the steps, didn't see when the other boy turned back to call for him, only to falter and linger on the steps briefly, watching Jimmy's retreating form with a distant forlorn in his eyes.
…
By awake, Lourdes had meant eyes open but severely drugged. Tom didn't have much to say to his sons, but he clasped Hal's hand, and touched Ben's shoulder, and smiled crookedly at Matt, before slipping into a deep slumber. He looked a wreck, his clothes tattered, his body battered – the bullet wound looked to be the least of his concerns next to the excessive bruising and lacerations. Tortured came to mind, and Ben winced, reminded of the "how" that brought his father back to camp. Had he talked and, if so, about what?
When it was clear Tom wouldn't be waking again anytime soon, the two older Masons left Matt to sit vigil. Hal went to report in to Weaver, and Ben sought out Jimmy for the promised talk three days earlier. He found Jimmy sitting beside Maggie in a circle of some older fighters, and Ben felt a strange relief spread though him that at least Jimmy wasn't with the formerly harnessed teens.
Wasn't with Roman.
Ben slipped round the group, gently brushing Jimmy's shoulder in passing, then paused, glancing back and meeting the other boy's quizzical look. Then Ben started across camp, another strange relief spreading through him when he heard Jimmy fall in step behind him. As if there was some doubt he would follow.
2nd Mass had set up camp in a corporate district of some unknown city, all of the cities blurred together now and their names didn't matter much anymore, they were part of the world before, a world that no longer existed no matter how people tried to cling to its remnants. There were plenty of buildings around to break into and find privacy, and despite the danger of secluding themselves from the larger group in a possibly alien infested area where the likelihood a quick get up and run might be in order, Ben and Jimmy picked out an old office building for their meet.
"How's your dad?" Jimmy questioned as soon as they were inside. Eerily, the desks, chairs, papers, office equipment were all in place as they may have been the day of the invasion. There was even a coffee cup still partially filled with a bit of mildew coated coffee, a half-rotted donut on a yellowing napkin beside it, as if waiting for some nameless office worker to come back and finish eating.
"Dr. Glass says the bullet missed any vital organs," Ben answered, casually pacing around the room, trailing his eyes over the debris. From the paperwork, it looked to have once been an insurance company, "He'll be okay with a bit of rest."
"See, I told you. You're a shit shot," Jimmy teased, and Ben smirked.
Then Jimmy suddenly dropped his gaze, leaning back against one of the desks.
"Maybe your dad fought his way out," Jimmy suggested uneasily, "Maybe he bided his time then saw opportunity, seized it-"
"Stop," Ben growled, and Jimmy furrowed his brow, peeking up.
"What?"
"For the past several months everyone else bounced around ideas, theories, whatever, about my dad, but you never did. If you thought anything about it, you never said so, and I always felt like it was because you weren't judging. You weren't suspecting anything, you wanted to wait for the truth. Out of everyone, you were the only one that cared about the truth. Whether you really felt that way or not didn't matter, because it felt like you did, and I relied on that, you have no idea how I needed it then," Ben explained heatedly, "Now that he's back, everyone is still bouncing around those ideas, and I still need you to be the one who cares about the truth even if you don't, because I need you to be that person. Even if you're trying to pretty up the theories, make them sound better, it still hurts. It hurts even more because I know you're doing it for my benefit, not because you actually believe it, which makes me think you believe something else, something terrible, so just stop. Please stop."
"Okay," Jimmy whispered, taking a few small steps towards Ben, "I'm sorry. You're right. We'll wait for the truth."
"Thank you," Ben mumbled and they were silent a few moments, contemplating and digesting, and then Jimmy closed the distance between them and placed his mouth against Ben's own, waiting anxiously until Ben responded, deepening the kiss, slipped his hand up around Jimmy's neck, the other placed on Jimmy's waist, dragging Jimmy closer. Their lips parted and Ben's tongue swept inside, delicately tasting every available inch of Jimmy's inner mouth, until Jimmy's fingernails bit like claws into Ben's sides, and a low, satisfied groan erupted from far within him and they parted slightly, gasping for air.
Ben pushed Jimmy's hair away from his ear then claimed the lobe with his teeth and tongue, nibbling the flesh gently, and Jimmy fumbled with the hem of Ben's shirt, fingertips tickling the vulnerable flesh of his belly, sending tiny, sensuous shivers racing his spine.
"How are you feeling?" Ben asked, voice brusque and heated.
"Hm…?" Jimmy pulled back a bit to give Ben a confused look.
"You threw up the other day," Ben reminded Jimmy, "I just wondered if you were feeling better."
"Oh," Jimmy realized, working on kissing every inch of Ben's exposed flesh, murmuring distantly, "Yeah. No. I'm fine. Just…too much excitement, I guess. It was nothing."
"Really?" Ben droned unimpressed but Jimmy pressed an insistent kiss to Ben's mouth, and the subject was instantly dropped in favor of knocking everything off one of the desks to make a place for Jimmy to sit and Ben to hover over him.
Ben ran his hands up along Jimmy's thighs, causing an involuntary whimper to quake in the back of Jimmy's throat, then Ben's fingers slid up under the hem of Jimmy's shirt, peeling away the fabric, slightly sticky with sweat, and he tossed it away across the room as he dropped kisses along Jimmy's chest. Jimmy furled his hand in Ben's hair while his other hand slid down Ben's shirt and traced the spikes along his spine. Ben's body was warm, almost burning up under Jimmy's palm, and Jimmy felt a rush of desperate need to wrap himself as much as possible in that warmth. He pushed Ben back a bit, starting to lift away Ben's own shirt, and Ben quickly caught on, ripping away the garment and dropping it to the ground, their mouths crashing eagerly together again.
Through a hot chaos of kisses and eager hands seeking bare flesh to touch, taste, tease, they maneuvered their way out of their other garments, their armaments, and somehow ended up on the floor. Jimmy lay on his back, Ben atop him, their naked bodies melded and writhing together in an overwhelmingly erotic rush of sensation. Jimmy gasped for air as Ben dotted kisses along his jawline, neck, and collarbone, nipped the already raw flesh playfully then soothed the area with a flick of his tongue. Jimmy's hand slipped down to encircle Ben's erection, causing the other boy to gasp in pleasant surprise, then Ben made noises of increasing approval as Jimmy expertly stroked the sensitive skin, until Ben groaned ecstatic, shivering with orgasm. He kissed Jimmy hard, daring fingers seeking new places to explore and grasp, and hovering rather suggestively around Jimmy's buttocks.
"…no," Jimmy murmured sheepishly, swallowing air in large gulps, pushing Ben back slightly to meet his eyes, glazed and filled with heat. Jimmy was flushed from head to toe, and though he was making an attempt to deny Ben access to certain alleged pleasure points on his body, Ben didn't look entirely convinced.
"Wow. If you are about to try convincing me that sexual experimentation is a bad idea right now, you are doing a horrible job turning me off," Ben commented, and Jimmy darted a sheepish look up at him.
"I don't know if…"
"I don't believe you. You're backing out after you agreed…and you were ready to do it before," Ben complained, though he sounded breathless.
"Yeah, but that was before and this is now," Jimmy replied, his voice soft and quaking, childish almost in its stubborn tone.
"Shit…baby…" Ben groaned, burying himself against Jimmy's sweat drenched collar, and pathetically whimpering, "I just really want to touch you, it won't be bad, I promise…please let me touch you…"
"Ben, we talked about the pet names," Jimmy grumbled, and Ben propped himself up again, eying Jimmy warily.
"I thought we agreed we liked the pet names."
"No, you agreed we liked the pet names and I agreed to shoot you if you used them."
"Do I need to get you alcohol? Is that what we're missing here? Should I steal a bottle of vodka from our severely depleted supplies so that I can finally know what you feel like from another angle…?" Ben wondered.
"Can you shut up and just start kissing me again?" Jimmy returned, pulling himself up slightly to capture Ben's mouth with his own, dragging Ben down by the shoulders.
Their mouths locked once more, and Ben begrudgingly took Jimmy's own heated erection and purposely began a steady rhythm. He felt Jimmy go lax, absently nibbling at Ben's ear several moments, before finally lolling his head back, eyes closing, as he made small, sensual noises. Ben studied the other boy as he worked, those lips bruised red, parted slightly as he panted in time to each stroke of Ben's hand, the blistered stain of heat across his pale, ivory face, dark hair tumbling silken and loose across his eyes and tangled in Ben's fingers, hand cradling the back of Jimmy's head.
Ben felt inexplicably captivated by the image, afraid that something as simple as a touch or a soft word, whisper, could shatter that frail moment. It wasn't fair, sometimes Jimmy could take Ben's breath away, leave him vulnerable and speechless, and he felt certain he'd never be able to fully express it, or even hope to stir in Jimmy a fraction of what Jimmy stirred in Ben. Jimmy climaxed, features contorting with the rushing feelings, his arms wrapping up around Ben's shoulders, his back arched and he buried his face into Ben's shoulder, trying to muffle the groan of pleasure rumbling in his chest. For several minutes after they lay tangled around one another, Ben's hand still wrapped around Jimmy's cock, though his fingers were loose and relaxed, his other hand lazily tracing the contour of Jimmy's jaw, neck, chest, down across his hip bone.
Then Ben lifted himself up, carefully maneuvered out of Jimmy's arms and legs and stood, using a piece of paper off one of the desks to wipe his hand clean. Jimmy sat up and reached for his pants. There was a long and strange silence that fell over them. Jimmy started to pull on his clothes and Ben studied the items on a desk. It had a red mug with the words "Ask me on Tuesday" painted on it in white lettering, a pen with a cheap plastic flower on top, a plaque that read "July Employee of the Month" with a picture of a large haired woman.
"You're dad," Jimmy started, voice soft and faraway.
"Yeah," Ben reluctantly agreed, "I guess we should talk about that…"
"It's okay," Jimmy interjected, leaning back on his palms and tilting his head to one side, forcing a smile, "We don't have to have a long talk about it or anything, hash out emotions or whys, all the stupid shit, and whatever. I'm okay with it."
Slowly, Ben turned around to look at Jimmy, eyebrow perked in startle.
"Okay with…what?"
"This ending," Jimmy whispered, shrugging, "Kind of sucks, but whatever. I mean, I knew it wasn't going to last forever…I'm kind of surprised it lasted as long as it did…"
"Whoa, wait, what?" Ben stammered, heart stopping stone cold dead, "What the fuck are you talking about?"
"I just…I know with your dad back that we kind of have to stop," Jimmy said quietly, "It was fun, when we weren't fighting I guess. This was nice, I wanted to be together one last time, but I think that it would be good to just end it completely after we leave here, so that..."
"What? Shit, slow down, stop," Ben growled, frustration growing, "You want to break up? Why?"
"No, I don't want to break up, I just know that…"
"But just so we're clear, you don't want to break up,"
"No, fuck, Ben, why would I want that?" Jimmy returned, "But with your dad back…and it's not like we can't still hang out, right? We were friends before. We can still hang out. Can't we?"
"Stop that. Goddamn it, Jimmy, don't do that to me! We're not breaking up. The only way we'd ever break up is if one or both of us doesn't want to be with the other anymore. Neither of us wants to break up, so forget it, it's not happening, and what the hell do you mean you're surprised we've lasted this long?"
"But what about your dad?" Jimmy asked.
"What about my dad?" Ben demanded.
"You said we had to talk about your dad, I assumed…"
"That this was a long good-bye? One last fondle for posterity? Shit, I just wanted to talk about when we should tell him about us," Ben explained, agitated and exasperated, "Should we do it after he wakes up or wait until we're sure he isn't under some kind of alien mind control?"
"You want to tell him?" Jimmy cried, incredulous.
"Yes. Of course I do."
"No," Jimmy groaned, burying his face in his knees, "Why the fuck would you want to tell him?"
"Why would I not?" Ben retorted, scoffing, "People around camp do know about us, babe, that cat's getting out of the bag one way or another. It should be from us."
"Not if we drown the damn thing," Jimmy muttered.
"Are we back to breaking up again?"
"No," Jimmy said, pulling himself to his feet and pacing a few times, sighing as he rambled, "I don't know. Can we just wait a while? Please? Give me time to think about it…"
"Why are you so stressed about this anyway? He's my dad, I'm the one that should be freaking out right now," Ben said, missing Jimmy's subconscious flinch at the unintentionally harsh words.
"I don't know," Jimmy admitted, "For some reason, there's something incredibly scary about confessing to one of the few people in camp whose opinion really means anything to me that I've been screwing around with his son."
"Okay. Fine. We'll wait, for a short while," Ben relented,
"Thank you," Jimmy mumbled. The two continued to dress.
"What has Roman told you about the signal?" Ben asked when he couldn't take the restless silence anymore.
Jimmy perked a brow, but casually answered, "Not much," then dropped his voice, "That it started about when you seemed to start acting strange."
Ben said nothing.
"Am I right? That the times match up?" Jimmy pressed.
"Maybe," Ben whispered, "I'm not sure but they seem connected."
"Jesus Christ, Ben," Jimmy muttered.
"It's not as bad as it sounds!"
"You start picking up an alien signal right around when you start losing chunks of time, how can that not be as bad as it sounds?" Jimmy demanded.
"Okay, maybe it is as bad as it sounds, but what am I supposed to do? I don't know what it means," Ben replied.
"What would you even tell him?" Jimmy mused, and the swap of subject jerked Ben around so hard he was sure he'd have whiplash.
"Tell who what?"
"Your dad. About us," Jimmy answered as though it were the most obvious thing in the world.
"I'm sorry, because I thought we were done talking about that."
"We're not. Why would we be done with it if you still want to tell him?"
"I already agreed to wait," Ben said carefully, smiling despite himself, "We can't wait forever though, like I said, he's going to find out."
"Why? And why do so many people have to know in the first place?" Jimmy mumbled, rubbing at his face furiously.
"I told you, babe, not that many people know," Ben soothed.
"Enough people know, though, and more and more people know every day. It's just getting to be too much…"
"What do you mean by that?" Ben asked with a jolt in his heart.
"Nothing," Jimmy sighed, "I don't know. It's just that…that the more people who know, the more I feel like there's all these expectations…"
"What expectations?" Ben demanded, "Why do you keep doing that? You're the one who likes to say that other people don't matter, but you keep going back to other people: my dad, my brothers, the 2nd Mass."
"They don't," Jimmy replied, "Except when they do."
"That doesn't even make sense," Ben cried.
"The whole time you were missing out there, when I didn't know where you were, I could just feel everyone looking at me, like they were waiting for something, or like they knew something I didn't," Jimmy rambled, pacing as he spoke, nervously rubbing at his forearm, "Half the time I don't know what I'm supposed to do, and the other half, I think I know, and it always turns out that I'm wrong."
"I can't keep up with you," Ben groaned, leaning back against the desk and shaking his head exasperated at the other boy, "You know, and I mean this in the nicest way possible, babe, you're psychotic."
"Have you even thought about what you're going to tell him?" Jimmy questioned.
"Are we talking about my dad again?" Ben wondered, blind-sided by the seemingly rapid subject changes.
"Of course we're talking about your dad. Who the fuck else would we be talking about?" Jimmy ranted and Ben innocently shook his head, "What are you going to tell him? How are you going to begin to explain…this…us? Have you even thought about it?"
"I don't know. I was kind of thinking I'd go with the…uh…the truth."
"But what exactly is the fucking truth?" Jimmy demanded, "I mean, what are you going to say? 'Hey, so dad, while you were away me and Jimmy have started slipping away from camp to jerk each other off because, well hell, a person gets tired after a while doing it by himself.'"
"I figured I could tell him I'm in love with you."
"Because Jesus Christ, Ben, what the fuck else is there to say?" Jimmy faltered, and slowly turned to eye Ben askance, features washed clean and jaw slightly slackened, asking in a stammered whisper, "What did you just say?"
Ben took a deep breath, straightened, cleared his throat, and met Jimmy's eyes with the most sincere expression he could manage despite his limbs feeling heavy, his breath clinging to his lungs, and a pressure in his chest like the weight of the world resting atop him.
"I'm in love with you, Jimmy," he repeated, bracing himself for the inevitable impact.
Seconds ticked by in a painfully drawn out silence, Jimmy staring blank-faced. Ben's heart clenched as though a fist was squeezing the blood from it, the world spiraling round him, he couldn't force his breath in, he couldn't push it out. Everything seemed frozen in a cold, gray haze. Fighting those words had seemed the hard part, but now that they were out there, now that they hovered in the space between both boys, it was waiting for that response, the acceptance, rejection, whatever, that felt more crushing than the struggle to keep those words in had ever been.
And then silently, Jimmy turned around and swiftly left the room, the doors slamming shut on his retreat echoing like the cold, cruel, sluice of his response.
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AN: Yay, so everyone is excited that Tom is back. Can't wait to see how people feel about this chapter...
Let me know what you guys think, please!
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Reviewers: NoXOne, yeah, I only really take the essentials of the canon scenes, so things that are coming up will look awfully familiar but how they play out exactly will change drastically. I've been looking forward to writing in some stuff from season 2 with the perspective of Jimmy and Ben in a relationship. I'll be sad to see this story come to an end too. I don't know what I'll do with myself. Write something else, probably. IcicleLilly, the moment you've been waiting fifty chapter for finally arrived. I swear, I did not intend for it to take this long for Tom to appear in the story. It was actually only supposed to take like twenty chapters, but twenty chapters in my head always turns into fifty on paper. Damn brain. SassySavanna190, I'm glad you liked last chapter. Yeah, I can see what you mean about it feeling a bit different. I love writing Jimmy/Weaver bonding scenes, almost as much as Jimmy/Maggie scenes, and a little less than Ben/Jimmy super angst scenes. JDMlvr1, welcome back. Yup, I sort of assumed that's what it was. I'm a fanfic reader/writer too, so I know the phases of fandom-craving. You should see the list of fandoms I've dabbled in and stories I've left woefully unfinished. I have one under another penname that I need to finish before people explode over there, but I lost the "feels" for it, I guess. Oh well. I am super glad to see you back though, and hope the rest of this story does not disappoint.
See you guys Sunday!
