Current mood:

relieved

because Apollo can fly us both above the rain (the authority)
Uh-oh. Where should I be crossposting this? D:. (I just joined theauthority, but...). I'm not liking this writing things in fandoms I'm not really in the LJ fandom of. It makes the sharing hard! Boo.

Title: Because Apollo can fly us both above the rain.
Author: Jess.
Rating: R.
Fandom: The Authority.
Pairing: Apollo/Midnighter.
Notes: Set here and there in the years before Jenny Quantum grew up. Beta by the best: mandysbitch.
Summary: This is a lot of little stories about one love.

---

Don't get me wrong, I like mud and blood. I get the urge, sometimes, to bury my fist to the elbow in some bastard's skull and listen to them breathe blood.

As long as he’s there, I know I’ll come back from that snarling, spitting, psycho grinning bastard that’s always so quick to tear out from under my skin.

---

Every time I see Jenny float across a room, fry some toy that’s not working or some meal that’s not what she wants, I can’t help think how many ways she could kill us, how many ways we might kill her.

There’s almost no chance it would ever happen. It’s the almost that gets me.

---

Sometimes, I'm not sure we got what we paid for, but I know we paid for what we got.

---

I got him, and I'd pay the price, go to Bendix willingly, a million times over.

---

"Hey, Clark Kent, go get me a beer," I say.

"Fuck you," he replies from the bathroom.

"Not feeling so charitable this afternoon, Supes?" I ask.

"Are you ever going to drop that?" He replies.

"You rescued a kitty from a telegraph pole for a little old lady," I say.

"So that's a no.” He replies, finally.

"Oh, that's a fuck no, Superman," I say, smiling to myself.

---

Life is unfair. I know that. Who the fuck is human (mostly) and doesn't know that? Across the multi-verse, people starve, lonely, uncared for, sick and in pain, and I have him.

---

Apollo stands in the middle of stinking, spurting death like a statue of a Greek god brought onto the battlefield, the last sight for the dying eyes of enemy soldiers. Sunlight halos his head, turning him golden. The chest of his uniform is torn again, and my heart beats harder at the sight of him. He radiates power in a more tangible way than The Doctor, or Jenny, or any of us, more or less powerful than him.

---

I stopped counting all the ways I could kill him years ago.

He, however, can kill me two thousand and three ways at this exact moment. I would have a forty-nine percent chance of survival if he made the first move at me now, and I fought back. The number fluctuates, given time, situation, how charged he is, location, hundreds of thousands of variation, big and small.

I love knowing, and I hate it.

---

"I'm sure there was a time when 'busting heads' wasn't exactly this literal," Apollo says. He laughs, and shakes his hand, splatters of red streak the carrier wall and the whiteness of his uniform.

"I'm not," I say. My hands are still itching, veins pounding with adrenaline. There might have been a time for him but not for me. That was too easy, and I want more.

---

In my dreams I: snap his neck, smash his head open, over-charge his system, blow him up, suck his cock, stab him in the back, kiss him, stick the needle into his neck, fuck him, kill the sunlight until he's weak and do whatever want to him. Shoot him....

---

The sight of him fighting makes me hard, sometimes.

---

We spar, and I make the first move, just so he can hold me down.

---

Jenny Q has learned to say Dad. Best part was we weren't sure who she was talking to. She tries to say "Midnighter" too, but it comes out something like "Mindy". Little brat does things to piss me off, I swear. Apollo said, "I love you, Jenny," after she first said it. As if her being a smart ass needs positive reinforcement. She thinks it's hilarious. She's too smart for her own good and mean to boot. Takes after Apollo and I respectively there.

The point is, somehow the knowledge that my name had been abbreviated to "Mindy" made its way from Apollo and I, through everyone on the Carrier, all the way down to the lowly homophobic scum-fuck, Kevin, and from Kevin, to everyone in Britain. Including the tabloids, apparently.

And, of course, the alien bastard who'd hitchhiked through the bleed on the carrier’s tail had ended up here, smack dab in the middle of Kevin's home turf, just as “Mindy” was being splashed over magazine covers and TV news fluff stories.

The next cockney fucker who calls me Mindy is going to choke to death on his own colon.

"We're looking for a man, won’t be taller than 5’0, he’d be wearing all green..." Apollo is quizzing the bartender, while I look threatening in the background.

Someone in the corner of the pub coughs, attention seeking. I make my way over to him. He's a frail looking old man, with a bulbous, alcohol reddened nose. He's smiling, crinkle-eyed.

"Are you...?" He trails off. He has less than a 0.003% of being fatally dangerous to me.

"Midnighter," I say.

"Mindy, is it!?" He bursts out laughing, holding up a copy of a trashy magazine, and waving it in my face. Jesus Christ fucking a raptor, I am going to have to do something violent to someone really soon.

"Only if you'd like your autopsy to read "literally ate shit and died”," I say. I walk back to Apollo, clenching my fists until my gloves creak. Okay, that's fine. He’s an old man. It wouldn’t be any fun to force feed him his own intestines like spaghetti. But the next pint-chugging fuckhole that calls me Mindy....

"You're pouting," Apollo says, without looking at me.

"Apollo," I say warningly.

On the empty path outside the pub, I relax a little. "We about done here?" Apollo asks.

"We're done," I say, meaning it. Apollo chuckles a little, but muffles it. I'm about to call for a door, when:

Some cocky young skin-heads shout from across the road; "Oi, Mindy, wassamatter, you look down!"

"Yer boyfriend not fuckin' ya hard enough Miiiiiindy?"

There's a nightstick the thickness of my wrist hooked on my belt. I take it out and spin it over my hand once. It’s a move that looks far more impressive than it actually is. I smile. It's not smile people find pleasant, I've noticed.

"Let's talk about fucking, shall we?" I ask, teeth clenched into that special grin. Hopefully looking as frustrated as I feel.

Watching them shit themselves and nearly kill each other trying to get away is enough to satisfy me. Well, I could go beat them a little. I take a step off the curb, but Apollo's hand is on my shoulder.

"Come on, it's not worth it," Apollo says, right as usual. "And I know it'd be so satisfying, but we can get out of here right now, and I vote for that."

"Door," I say, defeated.

Apollo steps through, hand moving from my shoulder to my wrist.

"If you’re really good I might blow you back at the carrier," he says, voice perfectly soft and concerned, totally at odds with the evil smile on his face, “…Mindy.”

I am going to kill him. He better mean it about the blowjob.

---

I remember: Apollo's hair curling on the back of his neck in the moonlight. He was growing it out. He didn't want to look the same anymore, didn't want the face in the mirror to remind him of their dead team, Bendix’s insanity, looming over their shoulder. His hair curls especially well when it's damp from the shower, or sticky with sweat. It's dark grey when it's wet, instead of silver-blonde. He said the length irritated him, but it won't be for long. I couldn't grow mine. Wouldn't be practical with the mask.

I reached out and disturbed the perfect curls with my finger.

---

Apollo is the only beautiful thing about me.

---

"Jon Stewart?" I ask, glancing at the TV over Apollo’s shoulder. Apollo has such a hard-on for the guy. He’s pretty smart, funny if you care. Yeah, but I don’t really get it.

"Yeah," Apollo answers, eyes on the screen.

"If I didn't know better, I'd say you w--,"

"Wanted to fuck him silly?" Apollo deadpans.

"Well, you said it," I reply, and turn to leave the room.

"Where are you going? It just started," Apollo says, his back still to me.

"To kill Jon Stewart. Back soon." I turn, smiling behind Apollo's back. I don’t bother asking how Apollo knew I was leaving. I’ve long since learnt no amount of stealth the implants can impart on me can fool Apollo.

"You're cute when you're jealous," Apollo says, twisting around on the couch to face me, his eyes crinkling with laughter.

"Mm," I say. I take a step forward, and lean over Apollo, taking a moment to look down at Apollo's face. It's not like I (or anyone) gets to look down at Apollo often. The familiar planes of Apollo's face aren’t hard on the eyes from any angle. I’m still waiting for the day when just looking at him doesn’t make me illogically, incalculably breathless with want. "You're cute when you're naked, hard and spread eagle on the bed,” I say. My voice sounds scratchy and deep, like it does when sex or violence is involved.

Apollo grins up at me, blue eyes full of fire.

"Sorry, Jon Stewart,” he says to the TV set, “raincheck."

I make the first move and find myself flat on the bed, looking up at an already shirtless Apollo, his bare, powerful arms either side of my neck.

There is nowhere in any universe I’d rather be.

---