"You want this?"
Pete stares across the table as the words fall from Stump's lips. "I don't know what you -"
"Yes, you do," he says, leaning back in the chair and spreading his legs out, a hand trailing over his hip to rest near his crotch.
Pete blinks hard when he realises he's been gazing at the in-seam of Stump's grubby jeans for far too long, but he doesn't miss it when those long, white fingers reach to rub at the fly. There's a bulge, for sure, it can't just be the way jeans fit, there's definitely a - no. No, there's no bulge, it's just a trick of the light, Pete is not currently looking at the outline of Stump's dick.
"Mr. Stump - "
"Call me Patrick," the other man all but purrs, pushing his hips forward to - to get more comfortable, surely.
"Patrick," Pete says, fully intent upon finishing his sentence this time until Patrick runs his tongue over that plump bottom lip, sinking his teeth into it, dragging until it springs back into place, wetter and pinker and far too much for Pete to handle.
Pete attempts to adjust his trousers discreetly, but Patrick's eyes light with knowing and his smirk broadens. "You do, don't you?"
Patrick's eyes are on him, glittering with hints of feelings caught between his head and his cock. Pete could so easily get lost in both.
"'Cause you can take it," Patrick says, and Pete barely hears the words over the movement of Patrick's lips, begging to be wrapped around Pete's dick, to be bitten red and raw, to be kissed slick and silly. The man rolls his shoulders back and his tatty jean jacket moves aside to reveal the peaks of his chest straining at the thin fabric of his t-shirt, the hint of nipples Pete would love to close his mouth around.
Pete's about to decline, to shake his head and leave Patrick sitting there with spread legs and nothing to put between them, but then Patrick's fingers reach to scratch at the stubble on his chin before dipping into his mouth and dragging shining trails of saliva in their wake. Pete's brain hands the wheel to his cock. His cock is a poor navigator.
"You're not going to leave me hanging, are you?" Patrick coos, suddenly all fake innocence and wide eyes. "I don't do this often, y'know." Despite the falsity, the mockery, Pete somehow still feels special.
"Well - uh, why don't - why don't you come over here," Pete stammers, his efforts at seduction falling flat. Patrick's eyes still light with a smile, though, and Pete's feels his face flush with arousal. It's been so long since he's had anything other than his own hand. He watches as Patrick gets to his feet, trains his eyes on the hint of hardness pushing at the crotch of Patrick's dark jeans.
He's not entirely sure what Patrick's going to do when he moves nearer to Pete - Pete's half expecting a lap dance, or perhaps Patrick simply wanted to get close enough to knock Pete out and make a run for it - but his heart begins to sprint as Patrick hops up onto the table and spreads his legs so that Pete's eyeline is level with his dick. Pete swallows the sudden excess of saliva in his mouth.
The sound of Patrick's jacket hitting the floor brings Pete back to his senses; he looks up at the man, heat pooling low in his belly as he sees the lust on Patrick's face. He's handsome in a sinfully dirty way, his hair lank under his hat and the beginnings of a beard framing his face. He'd look older if it wasn't for the soft porcelain of his rounded cheeks and the dancing sparkle in his blue eyes. The things Pete wants to do to him are certainly non-regulation. And yet, here they are.
"Go on, then," Patrick smirks, unbuttoning his jeans, and Pete doesn't need to be told twice. He reaches forward and grabs at Patrick's thighs, running his fingers along the in-seam of Patrick's jeans and feeling the warmth of his skin through the fabric, begging to be touched. He presses his palm to the line of Patrick's cock, squeezes it lightly and hears Patrick let out a breathy grunt above him.
It's so gratifying yet so teasing, and as Pete looks up at Patrick's lips, slick and open, he finds himself wanting to drag more sounds like those out of him, to make those quirked brows knit together, beg for ecstasy. He teases Patrick's jeans open and almost moans out loud when he sees that Patrick isn't wearing any underwear - when he helps Pete push his trousers down, Pete watches his bare ass spill from the seams and spread over the table, his dick bouncing free.
Patrick is possibly even more beautiful from the waist down - or perhaps it's just that Pete hasn't seen another man's cock in the flesh for so long - and Pete's sure this must be some kind of simulation. Pete can't help but run his hands over Patrick's skin to nestle in the bed of curls between his legs, take Patrick's dick and feel the size, the weight of it. It responds instantly to his touch, curving up towards Patrick's bulging belly and beginning to glisten at the tip. Pete swears he feels his mouth start to water.
"Suck it," Patrick growls, resting a hand in Pete's hair and pushing his head down. Pete's mouth drops open faster than a trapdoor.
Closing his lips around the head, Pete starts to suck, his heart leaping when Patrick's fingers tighten in his hair and a rush of air sounds from those pretty pink lips. Pete savours the taste, the bitter-salt of velvet skin beneath his tongue, the way it hardens oh-so-eagerly in his mouth. He takes it inch by inch, moan by moan, sinking down until his nose is brushing the coarse hair at the base, the scent of sweat and faded shower gel filling his head. The noise Patrick makes when Pete begins to bob his head is hotter than all the porn Pete's got saved on his hard drive.
"Fuck," Patrick gasps, "just like that." Pete would smile if he didn't have a mouth full of cock. Patrick's hips are thrusting slightly with each drag of Pete's tongue over the underside of Patrick's cock, a steady weep of pre-come trickling down Pete's throat. Pete knows how achingly hard Patrick is because he's almost there himself - his own dick presses painfully against his trousers, begging for contact. But this might be the only dick Pete sucks in a long time - he's not about to let this end too quickly.
Just when Patrick's breathing becomes frantic, his chest heaving and his nipples peaked beneath his shirt, Pete pulls off, letting a string of saliva stretch from his lips to the flushed tip of Patrick's cock. "What happened, too much for you?" Patrick pants, sliding his hand from the back of Pete's head to rest his thumb against Pete's bottom lip. "'Cause you better finish the fucking job."
Pete just looks up at Patrick with a face full of innocence as he takes the man's thumb into his mouth, lapping his tongue around it and watching the lust in Patrick's eyes blaze. When Patrick pushes him back down, though, he avoids Patrick's cock, giving it a few fleeting laps before cupping Patrick's balls lightly in his hand, squeezing them softly, dipping his head down and sucking one into his mouth, pressing his tongue into the fuzzy hairs and pulling ever so gently.
Wrapping a hand around Patrick's cock once again, Pete begins to jerk him, still lapping at his balls, saliva glistening among the hairs. He's missed this; it should be disgusting, to have his face pushed into another man's crotch, especially when said crotch belongs to a man like Patrick, but it's a release, a breath of sex-heavy air to be with another person like this. There's saliva smudged across his face but he couldn't care less about dignity when Patrick's pulsing prick rests snug against his cheek.
He licks around it, trailing his tongue over the underside before swallowing Patrick down again, arousal fuzzing his brain as his own cock begs for attention. Patrick curls his hand tight in Pete's hair, snarling breaths wheeling through the silence along with the obscene sounds of his dick thrusting into a tight, wet mouth.
Patrick's balls are tucked up tight in Pete's hand as he lets out a long breath and begins to come, pulsing liquid heat into Pete's mouth and coating his tongue in the bitterness Pete had resigned to distant memory.
Pete sucks Patrick through the aftershocks, stroking slowly along his length and listening to the sounds of him trying to regain his composure. When Pete finally pulls off, a stripe of white dribbles from his lips and Patrick's thumb rushes to catch it, pushing into his mouth and resting there, Patrick's palm warm against his chin. Pete hums contentedly as he looks up at Patrick and sees the look of dazed wonder painting his face.
"Fuck," Patrick says, his eyes flicking down to Pete's bulging crotch and alerting Pete to the fact that his dick has been sorely left of out proceedings. Pete only has to press a hand to his clothed dick and the friction has him spilling in his underwear, pleasure fuzzing through him and forcing a moan past the thumb still pressed inside his mouth. It's still the best orgasm he's had in - in, well. However long it's been since he's jerked off to more than pictures on a screen.
Patrick seems to read his mind. "Been a while, has it?" he asks, taking his hand from Pete's face and wiping at his soft dick with his sleeve, of all things. "I know the feeling." He tucks himself back into his jeans and zips himself up, hopping down from the table and strolling back towards the chair. Pete can't help but stare at the way his plush ass pushes at the seams. He wants so much more than this.
Clearing his fucked-out throat, Pete pulls his chair closer to the table, the noise shattering the soft post-coital atmosphere. "Okay," he croaks, colour rushing to his cheeks as he realises how much he sounds like he's just had a cock shoved down his throat, "Mr. Stump. I - uh - I hope you understand why I've brought you here?"
"To give you something to suck on?" Patrick asks innocently, sitting back in his chair.
"Uh - no," Pete says, trying to hold on to the last scraps of meat from the ravaged corpse of his professionalism. He folds his arms neatly across the desk, and does not think about the fact that Patrick's bare ass was pressed into it just moments ago. "As I stated earlier, we believe you've been shipping stolen cargo from Osiris and out of the Pegasus system. You don't have to say anything, but anything you do say may be given in evidence. Do you understand?"
Patrick laughs, and Pete's chest grabs the sound and hugs it tight. "Does the dirty talk count?"
"I - no," Pete sighs. "But do you understand?"
When Pete doesn't smile back, Patrick folds his arms. "Yes. You think I stole shit, blah blah blah. Where's your evidence?"
"We're in the process of searching your ship," Pete says curtly, if he can call the heap of metal sitting in the docking bay a ship, "we'll be thorough."
"Damn right you will," Patrick says with a grin, then licks his lips and leans forward. "You got a warrant for that?"
"Since your ship is both unlicensed and uninsured, we won't be needing one," Pete says smoothly, quirking an eyebrow at the other man.
Patrick's smile drops. "You were more fun when you were sucking my balls," he grumbles, glowering.
"Be that as it may," Pete continues, "were you, or were you not on course for the Ursa Major Supercluster?"
Patrick shrugs. "My aunt lives there. Fucking lock me up."
"So, you weren't heading for Herschel? A well-known haven for smugglers?" Pete says, but before Patrick can cook up a smart-arse response, there's a knock at the door.
Pete's painfully aware of the stickiness of his own come in his underwear as Joe, one of the more tolerable officers, peers around the door.
"Uh - he's clean," Joe says with a sigh, "we didn't find anything."
Pete's almost braced for the smugness as he turns back to Patrick, whose mouth has dropped open in mock surprise. "Whoa, would you look at that?" he exclaims, spreading his hands wide as if performing to an invisible audience. "So - did you just waste both of our time?"
With an eyeroll and a scowl, Pete gets to his feet, tucking the chair neatly under the table and hoping to God they didn't get any come on the floor. Whenever he moves his tongue, he can taste the memory of Patrick in his mouth, wonders if Joe can tell just by looking at him that he's been sucking cock. Probably not. Joe can't tell a lot from anything, really.
Patrick stands, a galaxy of smug spattered over his face, and fixes his stupid pretty eyes on Pete. "I presume I'm free to go?" he asks, but he's already walking.
It's the most reluctant nod Pete's ever given anyone, but he does it anyway, holding the door open with a sigh as Patrick nears.
"You're going to need to get a license for that ship," Pete growls at him, but Patrick just smirks.
"It'll be the first thing I do when I arrive on Herschel," he says, eyes dancing with mockery. He gives Pete a slap on the ass and a wink before sweeping from the room. Pete hates that all he can do is stare.
-
Later that day, Pete can't quite tell if he's grumpy because that son of a bitch isn't rotting in jail, or because he won't get to see that rather magnificent cock again. Fortunately, Joe assumes the former, clapping Pete on the shoulder as they both watch Patrick's ship disappear into the depths of space.
"We'll get him some point, dude," Joe sighs, and Pete nods. He'd like to get Patrick every day of the week. "Either that or we'll run into the remains of whatever the fuck he was driving."
Pete laughs like Joe wants him to, but tries not to think about Patrick being simultaneously frozen and boiled alive by the dark void around them. He's far too pretty to die like that.
Despite Pete's best efforts, Patrick is not easily forgotten. Pete tells himself he should move on, and yet he can't help the images slipping through his mind as he snakes a hand into his pants late at night. Nothing on the TV quite matches up to the curve of those lips, the way they moaned for him, the way they might look framing his cock, buried between his thighs.
But memory becomes fantasy as the weeks roll by and life goes on. They pick up runaways and scavengers and thieves alike, and although Pete bores confessions out of most of them and annoyance out of all of them, he receives exactly zero blowjobs. The fifteen minutes he spent with Patrick form a spike in the plateau of his life, a comparison against which all other moments are weighed.
Just as he's beginning to think it didn't really happen, that maybe his sex-starved mind had made it up just to spare him some sanity, he sees a lump of metal crawling across the darkness in the flight deck window.
"What's that," he says, tapping Andy the irritable pilot on the shoulder and pointing. "Is it a ship?"
Andy looks rather offended that Pete even thought about touching him, then taps at his screen with a sigh. "Yes. It's not registered on the system, though. You want us to hail it?"
"Yeah. Yeah, change course for - y'know, over there." Pete flails, waving a hand in the general direction of the moving dot.
"We've been ordered to head for Méchain," Andy warns, throwing a sharp glance at Pete.
"We can still make schedule," Pete snaps back, "hail the damn ship."
A few minutes later, and Pete's bouncing on his toes, hovering around the docking bay like a fly around a soon-to-be-deserted lunch. He rather resents the fact that there's ten other cops there with him, but he's holding on to the distant hope that if it is Patrick (which it must be, the patchwork scrapheap heading towards them is unmistakeable) he might get lucky in the interrogation room again.
"Well spotted," Joe congratulates as they watch the air lock gape through the glass. "That motherfucker is going down."
Pete surely hopes so as they watch Patrick's ship judder through the airlock, shedding metal and shaking like a leaf. God knows how it's survived this long.
He watches them march into the ship, he watches them duck out of Patrick's door with the small man in tow, trucker hat still shoved onto his head and that daring smile still playing on his lips. He grins when he sees Pete, the flash of a wink crossing his face and sending sparks down Pete's spine.
Pete makes sure to get a good look, this time. "I'll take him from here," he tells Joe, placing a hand on the small of Patrick's back as they reach the middle deck.
"Okay," Joe nods, none the wiser, "I'll let you know if we find anything."
Pete frowns and nods and acts as normal as he possibly can with a heart that's currently bruising his ribcage, and guides Patrick deeper into the ship, abnormally aware of the presence of two other officers beside them. He resists the temptation to squeeze Patrick's ass - just about.
"You want us in there with you?" one of the Todd brothers asks, "it's not this son of a bitch's first time."
"I know," Pete says, deliberately avoiding Patrick's dancing eyes, "I'll be fine. I'll call you if I need you."
But despite all the anticipation, all the haste to get Patrick alone, all the things Pete wants from him, when he finds himself opposite Patrick again, all of Pete's words appear to have been sucked out of the airlock. His mouth flaps as his eyes skate over Patrick's body, the layers of fabric that Pete can't wait to squirm underneath.
"Uh - so, Mr Stump - "
"Wanna bone?" Patrick says brightly, shuffling his chair forward and grinning like the sun in Pete's face.
"I - well, I didn't think, " - he thought, oh, Pete thought so much - "that you'd - y'know -"
"Oh, fuck off," Patrick dismisses with a wave of his hand, "why else would you have dragged my ass all the way over here? I was in the middle of something, man!"
Something is most definitely another word for smuggling, but Pete's professionalism falls away as he reasons that thief or not, this guy has a dick to die for. That's gotta be worth something, right? "Look," Pete says with a sigh, "you're a criminal. You're gonna get found out, maybe even today. But the truth of the matter is that that was the best sex I've had in lightyears and if you give me a round two, I'll let you off with a warning."
Patrick laughs, low and dirty, and leans back in his chair. "Baby, I was gonna fuck you anyway, but hell, I'll take the bribe," he says, and Pete tries not to let the thrill of the phrase fuck you show on his face. "Now get round here and bend over."
Pete scrambles to his feet, almost knocking his chair over in his haste to get to Patrick. He's already embarrassingly hard, and watching Patrick shrug off his hoodie and rub himself through his jeans is not helping the situation.
"Go on then, let me see what you're packing," Patrick says with a flick of his finger, pulling Pete towards him by his belt loops and looking up at him expectantly.
Pete's hands shake a little as he goes to undo his buckle, placing his gun and radio at the far end of the table. He feels rather self-conscious as he pushes down his trousers and underwear, awaiting Patrick's judgement.
"Nice tatts," Patrick remarks, reaching his hands towards Pete's hips as he rises to his feet. "Got any more under there?" Patrick's hands begin to slide up Pete's chest, a flutter of arousal in their wake. Patrick's lips hover far too close as he concentrates on undoing Pete's buttons, his pink tongue poking from the corner of his mouth. Pete wonders if their agreement includes kissing - he can feel Patrick's breath on his neck, can see the shine of saliva over his plush lips and it would be so easy to dip his head and press their mouths together. But Patrick wants sex, not romance. Pete looks away.
His attention, however, is entirely diverted when Patrick starts to suck on one of Pete's nipples, his other hand trailing down Pete's now-exposed torso to grab at his dick. Pete has to steady himself against the table as the sensations overwhelm him, the occasional flash of teeth making him yelp and harden in Patrick's hand.
Patrick's eyes are dripping with lust as he pushes Pete's shirt off his shoulders and his gaze rakes over Pete's chest, his hand rising to prise his hat from his head and ruffle the shaggy hair underneath. He lets it drop into the ever-growing pile of clothes, then grabs the hem of his own shirt and yanks it over his head, grinning at the awe on Pete's face.
Pete can hardly wait to get his hands on it, to catch Patrick's pink nipples between his fingers and bite marks into his belly, to hear what Pete's touch does to Patrick in the form of wanton moans. Patrick doesn't disappoint, groaning with each drag of Pete's teeth over his skin, his nipples hardening instantaneously under Pete's hands. They work together to push Patrick's pants down, a shiver running through Pete as he sees that Patrick still isn't wearing underwear, and fantasises that it's specifically for this encounter.
Half of Pete simply wants to drop to his knees again when he sees Patrick's cock, pink and leaking, spring from his jeans. He could refresh his memory - he can barely recall the taste, the weight of it in his mouth - but then Patrick's hands squeeze his ass and his fingers dip between his cheeks and suddenly the stakes are so much higher.
"You got lube?" Patrick breathes, his face so close that Pete can see every fleck of colour in his eyes, and Pete is suddenly very glad that he was so hopelessly hopeful when he got dressed this morning. He stoops and pulls the sachets from his boot, watching as white fingers prise them from his grip and whiter teeth throw him a dirty grin.
"Ass up, Officer Wentz," Patrick smirks, hands sliding over Pete's hips as he turns, folding his arms over the table and presenting his hole for Patrick.
"It's Commander, actually," Pete says as he feels Patrick's fingers press between his cheeks, cold and slippery with lube.
"We'll see about that," Patrick responds darkly, a finger pushing into Pete's hole and sending a shudder down his spine.
Patrick is surprisingly gentle as he works Pete open, his hands soft on Pete's ass as he spreads his cheeks apart to circle his thumb over Pete's rim. He slips a second finger inside and crooks them just so, pleasure shooting through Pete and a moan spilling from Pete's lips. Pete savours every second, every probe of Patrick's fingers, every hint of burn as he's stretched open; he'll be jacking off to this for months, he wants to note down every detail.
Pete's close to tears by the time Patrick's four fingers deep - he's massaging Pete's prostate with each shallow thrust, and Pete's so, achingly hard against the underside of the table that one touch would have him spilling all over the floor. "Please," he says, writhing under Patrick's touch, "I need you, please."
"I'm sorry," Patrick says softly, leaning over Pete and pressing the weight of his dick against Pete's ass. "What do you need, exactly?"
Pete wonders what the rest of the squad would say if they'd heard him moan, "I need your cock," at a criminal. But the thought of people seeing, of people watching him being wrecked from behind by another man only makes his prick fill up even more. "Please," he gasps as the head of Patrick's cock pushes slowly past the taut ring of muscle.
"Since you asked so nicely," Patrick all but purrs, and he thrusts forward into Pete, sinking to the hilt to the tune of Pete's desperate gasps. Pete's mind reels, the feeling of being so full teetering just the right side of too much. Patrick's cock throbs inside him, warm and wet and everything Pete hoped for. "You okay?" Patrick asks gently, stroking a hand over Pete's hip.
Pete nods at the table, his mouth hanging open to accommodate the deep breaths he's dragging in, and gasps a yes at Patrick. He has to grab for the far edge of the table when Patrick begins to move.
He goes slow at first, excruciatingly slow, drawing almost all the way out before slamming back in and sending cries spilling from Pete's mouth. Patrick's hands hold Pete's hips tight, anchoring him to reality, a fond reminder that there's a person attached to this dick, something Pete's not experienced since he stepped onto this godforsaken ship. It's so much better than the dildo Pete's got hidden in his drawer, it's so real and alive and every one of Pete's senses are set alight with overwhelming pleasure.
"More," he gasps, "harder," and he can almost hear Patrick's grin as he leans further over Pete and quickens his thrusts.
Pete can feel everything now; the obscene slap of Patrick's balls against his own, the warm press of Patrick's belly into the small of his back, the waves of ecstasy every time Patrick brushes his prostate. He can hear the little groans slipping past Patrick's lips with each snap of his hips, the squeaks of the poor spindly table underneath them, the - the footsteps of another officer heading down the hall outside.
"Stop," Pete manages to moan, "stop - seriously, shh."
Patrick stills inside of him, hands still clasped to Pete's hips.
There's a knock at the door which, thankfully, does not have a window. "Command-"
"Don't come in!" Pete blurts, his eyes fixed on the door, begging it not to open. There is no way he'd be able to talk his way out of having a criminal balls-deep in his ass.
"Everything alright in there?" Officer fucking nosey asks, and Pete's mind reels as he tries to think.
"Yeah, ye - oh - yes," he stutters, cursing Patrick's dick for twitching at just the wrong moment. "Just getting a confession."
In that instant, Patrick hits him, hard, on his ass, the sound of the slap and Pete's yell of pain and surprise bouncing around the cell. "Fine, fine, I'll talk!" Patrick shouts, "Just don't hurt me!"
Ah, Pete's mind supplies as he suddenly gets it, "You better talk!" he bellows, "or I'll - I'll smash your face in!"
"Okay, Commander, as long as you've got it under control. Just came to tell you that we found fourteen barrels of whiskey on board and no permit," the officer responds, and the footsteps wander back down the hall, fading into silence.
They burst into breathless laughter at the same time, the air rushing out of Pete's body as he contemplates how utterly fucked he would have been if anyone found out that Patrick was utterly fucking him.
"Whiskey, really?" Pete asks, twisting to look at Patrick.
Patrick shrugs. "Keeps me going on the long journeys."
Pete barks a laugh. The slippery little shit is still lying his voluptuous ass off.
But the ghost of a smile still lights Patrick's brilliant blue eyes, and for a moment, Pete can't help but stare, transfixed. "You good to keep going?"
"Fuck yeah, move your ass, slacker," Pete spits, and it's mostly a joke, but his dick is deadly serious.
Patrick retaliates by gripping Pete's hips and beginning to pound into him, bottoming out on every thrust and growling grunts into the almost empty room. Pete cries out, the pump of Patrick's cock sending tingling waves across his hips that sink between his legs. His own cock is weeping steadily, and Pete begins to wonder if he could reach it from this position.
As if he's read Pete's mind, Patrick's hand slides down to brush Pete's prick, taking it gently in his hand and gripping until Pete cries out, desperate for more. Patrick must be close by now, his groans are rising in volume and his rhythm is slipping away from him, but Pete can't find it in himself to care as Patrick begins to jerk him. He imagines Patrick's pearly white fingers wrapped around his cock, wishes he could see the pinch of Patrick's brows and the shine of his slick lips as he approaches his climax.
Pete's whole world seems to slow down as reality slips away from him and he starts to come. His hips snap forward into the edge of the table but he doesn't feel any pain, only the tide of sweeping pleasure that washes him away. For a few seconds, he drifts, body slack and mind blank, until he feels the touch of caring fingers over his hips and the warm drip of come between his cheeks. Both seem equally wonderful.
Patrick sighs against Pete's back, placing the ghost of a kiss against Pete's skin before slowly pulling out. Pete bites back a whine at the loss - he wants it all over again, can't quite face the fact that that's all he gets for who knows how long.
He'd like to feel guilty when his heart leaps as Patrick presents him with a come-covered finger; he'd like to be disgusted as he sucks it into his mouth, he'd like to say he didn't savour the taste and lick greedily for more. But every stroke of his tongue keeps Patrick here another second longer.
When Pete finally begins to stir, it's with an ache in his hips and a weight on his heart. There's a dark line across his pelvis where the table edge was pressed, and he wishes it wouldn't fade. He pulls his underwear up before Patrick's come begins to drip - he knows it's a vile thought, but he'd like to keep the wetness between his thighs for as long as he can, that way, it's almost as if it isn't over.
He throws a glance towards Patrick, catching a last glimpse of that cock - soft between Patrick's legs but still earning a place in Pete's mental porn folder - before it's tucked away in Patrick's jeans. Unashamedly, he watches Patrick stoop to grab their shirts from the floor, watches his creamy belly fold and his rounded ass wobble, and once again wants more than he can have.
It takes Pete far too long to realise that Patrick is offering Pete his shirt, but he grins when Pete's eyes finally snap to his face and his hands scrabble to close around the fabric. "Thanks," he blurts, shoving his arms through the sleeves as Patrick jams his t-shirt over his head. His hair emerges crackling with static, long red strands waving in the air. Pete wonders just how short is too short a time in which to fall in love with someone.
"Shit," Patrick says suddenly, pointing at the spurts of Pete's come on the floor. "I got it." He grabs his hoodie and crouches to wipe at the floor with the inside lining. Pete'd think him gross, but he's in no position to call out disgusting acts after swallowing come scooped from his own ass. Some twisted voice is rather pleased - now Patrick will carry a piece of Pete around with him, too.
As Patrick rises to his feet, he sweeps his hat off the floor and leans back against the table. "So - You'll let me off with a warning?"
Pete exhales slowly as he remembers that this is simply a transaction, a payment in exchange for Patrick's freedom. Patrick's probably got a hot criminal girlfriend back home with whom he'll laugh about that one time he fucked a guy to get out of going to prison.
"Yeah," Pete nods, "if you agree to hand the whiskey over, they won't put up a fight."
"Aw, man" Patrick groans, shifting his feet and thrusting his hands into his pockets. "That's good stuff."
The silence hangs between them, punctuated only by the sounds of distant noises from the ship's engine. When Pete finally plucks up the courage to lift his gaze to meet Patrick's, he sees hope mirrored in Patrick's eyes, and his mind makes several decisions for him which he can't quite fathom until his lips touch Patrick's.
Patrick kisses like he fucks - soft and gentle, cupping Pete's face and fitting his mouth easily against Pete's, and then hard and fervent, sinking his teeth into Pete's bottom lip and raking his fingers through Pete's hair. Pete mostly just stands there and feels, feels the give of that plush mouth and the roll of a desperate tongue, the warmth of rounded hips and the scratch of stubble and sideburn.
It leaves Pete breathless; when Patrick pulls back just a little, Pete can't do much more than gape. "You're fuckin' gorgeous," Patrick states like it's a fact, his lips brushing Pete's with every word and his breath rushing through Pete's lungs.
Pete can't think of anything to say in response so he simply crushes his mouth back to Patrick's, the sounds of their slick lips ringing in his ears and the silk-soft of Patrick's rounded cheek dimpling under his thumb. Patrick makes the most wonderful breathy noises when Pete dips his tongue into Patrick's mouth.
They kiss for far too long and with far too much feeling, bound tight in each other's arms, until Pete wraps his hands around Patrick's bare biceps and gently pushes him away. He tries to think of something to say as he looks into Patrick's frowning face, but all he ends up blurting is a stumbled, "Thanks."
Patrick's smile is knowing as he holds tight to Pete's hips. "I'll miss you too," he says, more breath than voice. "Commander," he adds, eyes glittering. He presses a soft, slow kiss to Pete's lips, then pulls away, scooping his hat and hoodie from the table and heading for the door, leaving Pete to stumble after him.
-
Pete spends the rest of the day half filling out documents, half trying not to think about the fact that come the afternoon, Patrick will be gone. He gets some shit for letting him off again, but the whiskey goes down like a spaceship on fire. No-one notices when Pete slips away from the drinking to gaze out of the window at the little metal insect crawling slowly away from him and taking Patrick with it.
Pete does not suppose he'll see him ever again. Pete supposes wrongly.
-
He wakes to the wall-rattling groan of the airlock being cranked open.
Drawing the covers over his head, he tries to block it out, cursing whatever stupid scavenger decided to get themselves caught at this hour. It only seems to drill further into his brain.
Throwing a glance at the clock, he sees his alarm is due to go off in half an hour. He refrains from letting out a scream. He might as well get up now. Stupid noisy airlock.
He's muttering under his breath like a madman as he stumbles around his room fishing semi-clean underwear off the floor. He was never a morning person, and that half hour's sleep he missed out on seems to have taken a piece of his sanity with it - perhaps that's why his mind doesn't immediately think Patrick until he falls onto the main deck and sees Captain Davis dragging a man with reddish hair and sideburns down the hall.
"Patrick?" he blurts without thinking, staring at the cuffs round his wrists, "I mean - Mr. Stump, what are you -"
The captain grins and hauls Patrick up by the collar. "Guess who thought he could sneak past us? We caught the little shit with thirty barrels this time."
"I didn't steal them," Patrick snaps, rolling his eyes. "I used to, but -"
"Used to my arse," Davis scoffs, "we'll see how that excuse holds up after half an hour with me."
Pete forces a laugh. "Oh, I'll have him - interrogate him, I mean, if you like. Your shift is nearly over." His heart leaps when Patrick shoots him a smile from under the brim of his hat.
"Yeah, and yours hasn't even started yet, commander. And with all due respect, I'm looking forward to beating the crap out of this jumped-up son of a bitch. Go eat, I'll have a confession by the time you're done." Davis seems gleeful to the point of madness.
Pete can only stare as the captain hauls Patrick away, shoving him towards the room. When Patrick throws a glance back towards him, Pete thinks it might be the only time he's seen Patrick Stump scared.
Pete spends the next ten minutes shovelling yoghurt into his mouth and pacing the break area; he can't wait outside the room, he can't listen to what might be going on in there. Davis has a reputation for not-so-lawful violence towards criminals - he gets away with it only because they're a million miles from anyone who might care. They're as low on funding as they are on morale; as long as they deliver their paperwork and a few prisoners every so often, they're free to beat up as many gorgeous whiskey-smugglers as their hearts desire.
When Davis emerges, it's with bloody knuckles and a smug smile.
Pete watches him stride into the break room and stare around at the other officers. "Well, he talked," Davis smirks, "after I gave the little fucker a piece of my mind."
"What did you do," Pete asks, with enough of a smirk that Davis will see it as encouragement. That's the theory, anyway.
"Oh, don't worry, commander. I left plenty of him clean, just for you."
Pete forces a chuckle. "Good. I think I might - uh, escort him to his cell. If he loses a few teeth along the way, well. That's just his bad luck, isn't it."
The captain roars with laughter and claps Pete on the shoulder. "Great minds, eh? We're made of the same stuff, me and you. Give him hell."
Pete flashes a brilliant grin and walks out of the break room, supressing an eye-roll. Davis has always been more brawn than brain. Pete just hopes Patrick had the good sense to confess before he lost the feeling in his face, or, god forbid, his dick.
With a deep breath, Pete makes for the interrogation room, trying not to think about what Davis might have done. Patrick is a criminal, he deserves this, and Pete's spent most of the few months since their last meeting trying to convince himself that he doesn't care. It's sex, there's no caring involved. Patrick knows that, Pete should know it too. And yet, Pete's heart is cuddling his voice box tight as he scans his card and opens the door to the room.
Patrick's head is bowed, his cuffed hands clasped together on the table in front of him, his hair falling over his face. His hat is lying lonely on the floor in the corner of the room.
"I already confessed, dickhead," Patrick growls at the table.
"Patrick?" Pete asks, closing the door behind him and leaning against it. "It's me."
When Patrick looks up, Pete's chest squeezes. There's a cut in his eyebrow, the beginnings of a bruise staining his skin, and his lip is split, a smudged line of blood trailing down his chin. It could have been worse, it could have been so much worse - Pete's seen people leave Davis' grillings with slabs of meat for faces - but it seems Pete grossly underestimated how much it would hurt to see Patrick this way. Criminal, he reminds himself.
"Are you alright?" Pete asks gently as Patrick's eyes rest on him.
The way Patrick's eyes light and his face splits into a dazzling grin has Pete's stomach doing somersaults. "I am now," he says, looking Pete up and down.
Pete returns the smile, stumbling nearer to Patrick and falling into the chair opposite him. For a moment, he simply stares, replenishing his memories of Patrick, filling in everything he'd forgotten. Somehow, Patrick's even more handsome than Pete remembers. "I'm so sorry," Pete blurts when he feels he should say something, "I would have done something but it wasn't my shift, I could've - "
"Hey, it's cool," Patrick soothes, reaching a cuffed hand towards Pete. "I was fucking stupid to fly so near here anyway."
"So - you confessed?" Pete asks, staring at Patrick's hand resting in the middle of the table and wondering if he should take it.
Patrick nods, his smile turning sour. "That captain of yours did not appreciate my whimsical sense of humour."
"I'm sorry," Pete mumbles, guilty.
"I didn't steal 'em, though," Patrick insists, slapping the table. "That's the finest bloody whiskey in Hercules, I treat it with respect."
Pete gives him a sad smile. "Patrick, you don't have to lie to me, this is off the record."
"I'm not lying!" Patrick says, "I'm not some common thief! I only confessed because I value my fucking face," he bristles, scowling.
Pete still isn't remotely convinced, but he's rather too preoccupied with how hot Patrick is when he's angry to notice, staring at his panting, parted lips and his heaving chest. He's looking as scruffy as usual, but it only feeds Pete's fantasies; he wonders how that ratty t-shirt might smell, how Patrick's stubble might graze the insides of his thighs.
After a few moments, Patrick's face softens. "So, do you wanna -?" he trails off with a grin.
Oh God, Pete wants, but not here, not now. "I've - uh - I've got to take you to your cell."
Patrick's face falls. "Oh. Okay, that's cool, whatever, we don't have to -"
"There's a bed in there," Pete adds with a smirk.
The way Patrick's eyes glitter all of a sudden has Pete's heart beating a little faster. "Ah," Patrick smiles, "well then, commander, take me to my cell."
Pete grins and stands, puffing his chest out and straightening his jacket. "Follow me, Mr. Stump."
The excitement is palpable as Pete leads Patrick from the room and through the maze of corridors, a hand clasping his upper arm and another placed on the small of his back. The warmth of Patrick's skin taunts him, begs him to touch it, to slip his fingers under Patrick's shirt and grab at those soft love handles, to drop his hand to the swell of Patrick's ass.
Pete's hands buzz with anticipation as he unlocks the door to a vacant cell and guides Patrick inside, trying not to touch until he's shut the door and drawn the metal sheet across the small window. When he turns around, Patrick's face hovers inches away.
Pete can't resist any longer. Grabbing Patrick's wrists, he fumbles to unlock the handcuffs, finally yanking them free and letting them drop to the floor. Then, he brings his hands to cup Patrick's face and crushes their mouths together, his head spinning as Patrick kisses back, his lips as soft and plump as Pete remembers them. It's only when Pete tastes blood that he pulls back, watching Patrick's eyes flicker open and his delicate brows knit into a frown.
"You're bleeding," Pete says, and when Patrick goes to scrub at his face with his sleeve, Pete catches his wrist. "Here, let me." He pulls a tissue from his pocket and spits on it like his mother used to, using it to dab away the blood and blurting an apology every time Patrick flinches. By the time Pete's finished, the only red on Patrick's face is the blush on his cheeks and the two small nicks in his eyebrow and his lip. Pete'll just have to be gentle.
Gentle, as it turns out, makes Pete heart ache for things he knows he can't have. When Pete presses his lips to Patrick's once more, he yearns for morning cuddles and hand-holding. When Patrick glides his thumb over Pete's cheek, it's so close to being something more. Pete won't say it, won't risk being shot down, but it's all there in the way his lips move against Patrick's, the stroke of his fingers through the soft hairs at the base of Patrick's neck.
Pete lets himself get lost for a few seconds, feels the sweetness of Patrick's touch and imagines that this is what he's woken up to, that they're in a king-sized bed on some beautiful far-off planet and Patrick's just smiled at him from across the pillows and brought their lips together. Then, he stops imagining. They're here for one reason. He drops his hand from Patrick's face and slides it down the back of his jeans, digging his fingers into the plump give of it and pushing their hips together.
Patrick whines against his mouth, his hand tightening in Pete's hair and his teeth grazing Pete's bottom lip. He pulls away with a wet pop and runs his fingers across Pete's chest, spending a moment fiddling with Pete's badges and colours with a hum of interest before finding Pete's buttons and undoing them. When his jacket falls to the floor, Pete's reminded exactly how good it feels to have someone else's hands on him.
Half a minute and a uniform shirt later, Patrick's got Pete pushed up against the cell wall, grinding their hips together to a litany of curses, and Pete needs this to move faster otherwise he won't last nearly as long as he wants to.
"Bed?" he pants in a brief moment when their lips aren't locked together. Patrick nods in response, taking Pete's hand and dragging him over to the small and rather sorry-looking single bed in the corner. It creaks something horrid when they fall onto it, the mattress sagging and kicking up a strange musty smell.
Somehow, Patrick's managed to keep all his clothes on apart from his hat, which they must have left in the interrogation room, and this is a veritable travesty to Pete. "Wanna see you," he breathes against Patrick's lips, tugging at the sleeve of his hoodie.
Patrick grins, sitting back and catching his breath. He shrugs off his hoodie in one smooth movement and tosses it to the floor, then yanks his t-shirt over his head in the next moment, laughing at what must be an awestruck look on Pete's face.
Pete grabs for Patrick's chest, pulling him closer and latching his mouth to Patrick's nipple, feeling it harden between his lips. He's kneeling between Patrick's thighs now, so he drops a hand to the in-seam of Patrick's jeans and slides it up to the crotch, squeezing lightly and feeling the moan rumble through Patrick's chest.
When Patrick finally gets the message and unbuttons his jeans, Pete pulls back for the sole purpose of watching him free his cock. It's mouth-watering as ever; half-hard and fat in Patrick's hand, lengthening as Patrick plays with it purely to tease Pete to insanity. He toes off his trainers and Pete takes this as a cue to strip Patrick from the waist down - soon, he's sitting fully naked in front of Pete, slowly tugging at his cock like he knows exactly how to drive Pete crazy.
Then, he's reaching for Pete's trousers, rubbing Pete's prick through them and forcing a choked moan from Pete. Soon, they're both naked and staring at one another, and something feels different when Patrick pulls Pete closer and kisses him, all soft edges and breathy sighs.
Pete snaps out of it when Patrick's hand wraps around his prick, squeezing just tight enough and slicked with Patrick's own pre-come. His hips snap forward instinctively, grazing their cocks together, and Pete drops his head to Patrick's shoulder, hands tracing through the fuzz on Patrick's belly.
"Can I ride you?" Pete breathes, lifting his head to look into Patrick's lust-fogged eyes.
"Fuck yes," Patrick grins, sliding a hand to Pete's ass, "you got lube?"
With a nod, Pete pulls away from Patrick's warmth and fishes over the side of the bed for his belt. He's had a few sachets tucked into one of the compartments since Patrick's last appearance, hopeful as ever.
He relishes every touch of Patrick's fingers as they tease him open, thrusting gently into his hole as Patrick whispers kisses against Pete's collarbone. Pete busies himself with jerking both their cocks rather than thinking about the fact that this is almost definitely the last time they'll do this.
When Pete finally lifts himself up and presses the weeping head of Patrick's dick to his hole, he savours the sight of Patrick's pupils blown wide with want and his kiss-bitten lips hanging open in anticipation. As he begins to sink down, the burn blazing through his hips, he pushes Patrick back until he leans against the wall and Pete can see the heave of his chest and the wobble of his belly.
Patrick's hands hold tight to Pete's hips as he fills himself with Patrick's cock. He'd forgotten how thick it was, how it felt to have it throb inside him, and now he's got a naked Patrick to add to the picture, complete with Rubenesque curves and an expression like Pete's just given him the known universe. When he begins to move, slow and steady, Patrick lets out a groan that has Pete's dick leaking.
Soon, Pete's head is filled with the smell of sweat and sex, the sounds of skin slapping and breaths heaving bouncing off the grey walls. Patrick looks utterly wrecked, his hair a mess and low moans leaking from his lips with each push of his cock into Pete's hole. He's thrusting to meet Pete's ass now, brushing Pete's prostate with the swollen head of his prick and jerking Pete's cock at the same time. Pete knows he himself must look twice as wrecked as the man in front of him.
They're both so close, he can feel the aching hardness of Patrick's cock inside him and his own is leaking over Patrick's hand, but before he can spill onto his chest, Patrick's taking hold of his hips and pushing him back onto the bed, and in the next instant, Patrick's pounding him into the mattress, hiking Pete's legs up around his waist and driving his hips forward fast and forceful.
"Patrick - please," Pete moans, reaching for his cock, but Patrick gets there first, jerking him in quick strokes as he kisses Pete and their tongues crash together in time with their hips. When Patrick slams into him one last time, balls snug to Pete's ass, Pete feels the first pulse of Patrick's cock inside him and falls apart, crying out as his orgasm rolls over him and he spurts across both their stomachs.
For a few, surreal moments, his mind goes blank but for the beating release of Patrick's prick and the warmth of Patrick's body against his own. The points where they're touching - lips and chests and hands and hips - seem to blaze with bright white heat, which engulfs him when Patrick breaks the kiss and drops his face to the crook of Pete's neck, panting tickling breaths across Pete's skin.
After a few seconds, Patrick pulls out, rolling off Pete and sinking into the covers beside him. His face is sweat-slick and tranquil, his eyes shut and his mouth pink and open, unaware of Pete's staring. Patrick's beautiful, that's the truth of it - an oil painting, a marble sculpture lying serene and satiated next to Pete.
Pete wants so badly to snuggle up to him, to escape the chill of cooling sweat and share Patrick's warmth. Instead, he stares at a snaking crack in the ceiling, willing himself not to ruin this with a gaze filled with a little too much love. But then, Patrick's hands reach for him, pull him closer until they're chest to chest and Patrick's arms are curled around Pete's shoulders, wonderfully solid and enveloping Pete in their very own pocket of heat.
They share a soft kiss as their breathing slows, hands clasping at one another and heads sinking into the pillow. Pete lets out a hum of contentment that he thinks might be a sappy step too far until Patrick brushes his hand through Pete's hair and kisses his forehead. Pete ends up burrowing further into Patrick's chest, his head tucked under Patrick's chin and his fingers trailing through the patch of fuzz between his nipples.
They stay like that, tangled together, until Pete's eyelids begin to droop, lulled into drowsiness by the ache in his muscles and the slow rush of Patrick's breaths through the silence. He's pretty sure Patrick's fallen asleep until the man runs a hand over Pete's hip and states a fact that Pete's been pushing away since they first started this thing, "You know this is probably the last time, right?"
Pete pulls back a little so he can look at Patrick properly, grazing their noses together and feeling the ghost of Patrick's breath across his face. "There's still time, we could -"
But Patrick shakes his head. "That was amazing. Let's end on a high. Plus, I gotta save my ass for the six-foot meatheads that corner me in prison," he laughs, but his smile drops too soon and his eyes flicker with a fear that makes Pete's stomach turn. "How long do you think I'll get?"
Pete sighs, shaking his head. "I don't know. If you plead guilty, which you should, you could get it down to about a year." It's not fair and Pete knows it, but the system hates thieves and smugglers alike and it seems as if Patrick is both. Plus, he doesn't exactly scream innocent.
"I'm not guilty," Patrick says again, "I don't smuggle whiskey." He looks so defiant that Pete almost believes him.
"But you don't have any evidence," Pete says as gently as he can. "If you had a permit -"
"I do have a permit, I just can't tell them where it is because - um, it doesn't matter," Patrick trails off, looking away from Pete and biting his lip.
"What?" Pete asks, catching Patrick's wrist before he can fiddle with the cut on his mouth, "where is it?"
"It doesn't matter," Patrick says, frowning at the ceiling. "Let's not ruin this."
Pete nods, deciding not to pry. He'll never know Patrick by anything other than his dick and his criminal record. "I'm so sorry, I'd do something but I've already given you a warning and it might start to look suspicious - "
"I know, it's cool," Patrick says, "It was gonna blow up in my face at some point. It was too risky, flying this close."
"Then why did you?" Pete asks, cupping Patrick's jaw and turning Patrick's face towards him.
Patrick smiles. "Why do you think?" he says, brushing their lips together.
Warmth floods over Pete's body as he realises that he might not have been hallucinating the reciprocation. He kisses Patrick softly, dipping his tongue into Patrick's mouth and stroking his thumb through Patrick's sideburns, a smile curving on his lips. "I always hoped it was you," Pete breathes into the kiss, "whenever I saw a ship. You just made me feel so - I don't know," Pete trails off in the absence of an adequate descriptor.
"I know," Patrick replies, "I feel it too. You're just - beautiful," he shrugs, barely finishing his sentence before Pete drags him into another kiss, full of desperation and love and longing for everything they could have had.
That's when Pete makes up his mind.
"I'll get you out," Pete gasps, pulling away from Patrick's lips and framing his face with his hands. "I can - I can take you to your ship, I can open the airlock for you. You won't have to go to prison." Pete can't bear the thought of Patrick in a place like that - he can hardly stand looking at the cuts on his face as it is.
Patrick gapes. "No, you idiot, you'll get arrested," he says, shaking his head.
"Yes, but I won't go to prison."
"You'll get fired, though," Patrick frowns, "and you'll get a criminal record."
"I'll get another job," Pete insists, "I hate it here anyway."
Patrick just stares, his hand unmoving in Pete's hair and his mouth flapping wordlessly until Pete kisses it shut. "You can't do that for me," Patrick mumbles, "you can't -"
"Shut up," Pete tells him, "you're the best thing that's happened to me in the past year."
Patrick's eyes are wide when Pete lets go of his bottom lip and looks up at him. His hand still rests in Pete's hair and the tip of his nose brushes against Pete's. Pete's never noticed how pretty Patrick's eyes are - they're so much more than blue, their edges flecked with green and a halo of gold circling his pupils.
He stares for more than a few seconds, his lips quivering like he knows exactly what to say but doesn't know how to voice it. Pete's about to ask what he's thinking about when Patrick says, "Come with me."
"What?" Pete blurts, clutching the back of Patrick's head like a crutch.
"Come with me," Patrick says again, confirming that yes, Pete did hear him right.
"I can't, I -"
"We can both escape," Patrick smiles, his eyes regaining that trademark sparkle, "we're lonely as fuck, but we can travel the universe, together. Pete, I could - I feel like I could really fall for you."
It's Pete's turn to stare shamelessly. "I don't - we don't know anything about each other," Pete breathes, exasperated.
Patrick shakes his head. "But we can learn. We know we're both phenomenal at sex, what more do you want?"
"But I hardly know you, I can't -"
"I was born on Earth," Patrick says quickly, "my mum's a merchant and I didn't know my dad. Mum couldn't keep up the rent so the kicked us out. I've lived on a ship ever since."
Pete can only fixate on one part of that sentence. "Earth? Really? Is it as beautiful as they say?"
Patrick shrugs. "I don't remember it. I was really little when we had to move - I've never seen the blue sky," he smiles sadly. Everyone always asks about the sky. "What about you?"
"Uh," Pete struggles, his mind moving too slowly, "I grew up on this planet called Hogg. It's, like, the rough end of Messier 81. My mum died when I was young and my dad left pretty soon after. I'm an only child, so they put me through military school and did a few years in the 3031 army. I hated it, so I ended up here. Most of the officers here are orphans - makes the long trips easier to stand, I guess."
"I'm so sorry," Patrick says softly, stroking his thumb over Pete's face. "That's awful."
Pete just shrugs. "It was better than starving."
"I can take you to Earth," Patrick insists, propping himself up on his elbow and leaning over Pete. "We can - we can make a home there."
"Don't be stupid, Patrick," Pete scoffs, "no-one in a million light years is rich enough to get to Earth, let alone -"
"I am," Patrick says, his eyes dancing with runaway dreams, "I can take us there, I can take us to see the blue sky, I can take you to see anything you want."
"No, Patrick, that's -"
"Crazy? Crazier than floating aimlessly through space doing a job you hate?"
Words evade Pete as he looks up at Patrick's face, lit bright with excitement and far-flung hope. He needs time to think, to analyse every benefit and every risk, to comb through the fine print and come to a reliable conclusion. Instead, all he can say is, "Okay."
Patrick's lips part and his eyes widen almost comically. "You - you'll come?"
Pete's face blossoms into a smile. "Yeah, alright then."
The grin that graces Patrick's lips is utterly dazzling, but Pete barely gets a good look at it before Patrick's grabbing his face and kissing him hard. "This is gonna be amazing," Patrick breathes, touching his lips to Pete's one last time before sitting up and running a hand through his hair. "But first, we gotta get the fuck out."
Ah yes, Pete thinks, that small hurdle. Only a ship full of highly trained armed officers and an airlock between them and freedom.
"I'll cuff you," Pete ponders, sitting up and looking around at the mess of their clothes on the floor. "We need to get as far as possible before we run. Once we run, they'll start shooting."
"Okay," Patrick nods, huffing a sigh that makes his belly wobble, "there's a countdown to the airlock opening, right?"
"Yeah, you get five minutes. Can you start up the ship in that time?"
"Yeah, probably," he frowns, and Pete gapes.
"Probably? What do you mean, probably?"
"I don't know, it's an old ship!" Patrick cries as Pete scoffs his agreement, "It can be - volatile."
"Brilliant. Alright," Pete tuts, rolling his eyes. "We'd better get dressed, then."
They manage to keep their hands off each other for the majority of the dressing process, with the exception of the squeeze to Patrick's ass Pete sneaks and the resulting kiss Patrick drags Pete into. Pete can't help but smile at the feeling of drying come between his thighs and the thought of being with this man for longer than a day at a time.
"If I die," Patrick says to Pete once they're both dressed and passably unruffled, "take the ship. She deserves a kind owner."
"She's a pile of junk," Pete tells him as he buttons his shirt cuffs, "she'll never get us to Earth."
Patrick shakes his head. "I know I said you were beautiful, but I will throw you into the depths of space if you speak ill of Uma again."
Pete snorts, shrugging on his jacket and brushing at the dust. "Whatever. If I die, have a glass of whiskey for me."
"Noted," Patrick nods, then stoops to pick up the handcuffs. "Cuff me."
With a grin, Pete takes the cuffs and clicks them into place, tight enough to stay on Patrick's wrists yet loose enough that he could wriggle out of them in a crisis.
All that's left to do now is escape. Pete tries not to think about the risks, the possible consequences that might await them, and instead takes Patrick's face in his hands and kisses him softly. Their lips touch once, twice, and then Pete rests their foreheads together and closes his eyes. "If it all goes to hell," he breathes against Patrick's skin, "I think I could've fallen for you, too."
He hears the rush of a smile from Patrick's lips, and when he opens his eyes, Patrick presses their mouths together a final time. "Ready?" Patrick asks, his eyes all fire and starlight.
"Ready," Pete nods. They head for the door.
-
They get three-quarters of the way there before they have to start running.
Walking through the corridors is strange - no-one seems to bat an eyelid at them, yet Pete reads into every movement, every flick of their gazes, every choice of word. He holds tight to Patrick's arm, maintaining a steady frown, and nods calmly at every officer he sees, keeping up a brisk pace. He keeps his other hand curled tight into a fist so that no-one will see the way it's shaking.
It's only when they reach the lowest deck that anyone pays them any notice.
"Commander?" an engineer calls, "can I help you with anything?"
"No," Pete replies simply, "this is a police matter."
"Well, I respect that, but you really shouldn't be down here if -"
"Tom!" Pete snaps a little too loudly, "this really isn't any of your concern." They've so nearly reached the airlock control panel, if only they can -
"Does anyone know you're down here?" Tom asks, "because I'll have to call security otherwise."
"Yes, we're supposed to be down here," Pete growls, shoving Patrick towards the door, "and I can make life very difficult for you if you rat on us."
"Are you threatening me?" the engineer accuses, and Pete begins to panic.
"Yes, now leave us be."
Tom stares for a few seconds. Then he takes out his radio and puts it to his ear. "Hi, yeah, the commander is down here unauthorised and he's got a prisoner with him. Yeah. I don't know. I think they might be trying to escape..."
At that, Pete pushes Patrick through the door and into the control room. He's got one hand out of the cuffs and his fingers dance over the keys, punching in the code Pete knows will override the safety measures. Then, he pulls a lever and the glass lid on the big red button pops open. They exchange a glance and a nod before Patrick lifts the lid and slams his fist into the button. Instantly, the world explodes with noise.
"Warning: Airlock opening in T-minus five minutes," the voice booms, as they run from the room and head for the stairs. "All personnel, please vacate the area."
Footsteps echo behind them as they thunder down the stairs towards the large danger-lit door at the bottom of the stairs. They almost slam into it in their haste, and Pete fumbles for his key card, swiping it and cursing when it asks for a fingerprint and a retinal scan. Patrick watches the top of the stairs - if they're caught now, it'll be like shooting fish in a barrel. Whatever fish are.
Finally, with shaking hands and a racing heart, Pete heaves the door open, stumbling through it and pulling Patrick with him. "Get to the ship," he tells Patrick, "I'll lock the door."
Patrick frowns, but nods, backing away from Pete and breaking into a sprint. Pete knows that this is it - the greatest test of Patrick's integrity. Right now, he could betray Pete laughably easily, and Pete would be powerless to stop it. Pete shakes the thought from his mind and pushes the door shut.
"Warning: Airlock opening in T-minus three minutes. All personnel, please vacate the area."
Pete attempts to scan his card, but the screen flashes red and won't engage the deadbolt. "Come on," he mutters, trying again, but before he can swipe it a second time, a weight slams against the inside of the door, knocking Pete backwards.
The muzzle of a gun slides between the door and its frame, and Pete hastens to throw his body against the door and shove with all his might. The gun won't budge, no matter how hard Pete tries.
"Open this door!" A voice shouts from the other side, "surrender or we shoot to kill!"
"Warning: Airlock opening in T-minus two minutes. All personnel, please vacate the area."
A hand curls around the door, pushing against Pete, and Pete struggles to drive his heels into the floor and thrust his weight into the metal. There must be several of them; he can hear multiple voices shouting and the force from the other side is beginning to get the better of Pete.
"Commander, if that's you, cancel the request," someone yells, maybe Davis. "It's coded to respond to your vocal frequencies, cancel it."
Pete nearly laughs. Of course Patrick managed to override the manual cancel coding. He throws a glance at Patrick's ship, sitting like a sore thumb among the bright white machinery, and sees it shudder into life.
"Warning: Airlock opening in T-minus one minute. All personnel, please vacate the area."
With every ounce of strength left in his body, Pete crushes himself against the door, the owner of the hand letting out a pained yelp and the muzzle of the gun cracking, retracting. With a cry and a blind swipe of his card, he sees green and feels the deadlock slam into place. Then, he starts to run.
Patrick's ship sputters ahead of him, hovering slightly off the ground, the doorway two feet up from that. Pete's muscles burn with fatigue but he pushes them to their limits anyway, two hundred metres feeling like two hundred miles.
"Warning: Airlock opening in T-minus thirty - twenty-nine - twenty-eight - twenty-seven..."
Pete can see Patrick in the doorway, beckoning Pete like he isn't already running faster than he has in his life. His breaths rage through him, raking down his throat like barbs, his ears ring and his chest feels cold with exertion. If he doesn't make it, he just hopes to God Patrick closes the door before they're both pulled into space.
He's slowing now, he can't help it, and yet he knows he'll need speed to make the leap. His vision begins to split in two and Patrick seems farther away than ever now, his figure blurring and his shouts slurring around Pete's head.
He doesn't know when he jumps. All he knows is that he's no longer touching the floor, and he wonders if this is it, floating through space without a suit. Then his knees slam into something solid, and he glimpses a grubby pair of trainers near his face. Hands hook under his arms and drag him forward, and in the distance, he can hear a voice.
"Warning: Airlock opening."
And in that same instant, Patrick shoves the door shut. Pete briefly registers a whooshing feeling in his gut before he throws Patrick a grin and promptly passes out.
-
"Patrick?" is the first thing Pete manages to blurt when he finally opens his eyes.
He's on a couch - a comfy couch, the sort he could sink into without knowing - and said couch is facing a rather haphazard lounge area, a garish patterned rug thrown over the floor and mismatched furniture scattered around the edges. At the far end of the room, there's a sweeping control deck and a panoramic view of the expanse of space.
"Hey," the man calls from where he's settled in a mustard-yellow armchair, a book propped in his hands and thick-rimmed glasses on his face.
"I didn't know you wore glasses," Pete observes, sitting up and rubbing at his throbbing temples.
"I'm an intellectual," Patrick shrugs, closing his book and placing it to one side. "Are you okay?"
"I am now," Pete smiles, and Patrick returns a glittering grin, blowing Pete a kiss that shouldn't make Pete's heart skip but somehow does anyway.
"Please, try the whiskey," Patrick offers, gesturing to a stout tumbler on the table beside Pete, "It's the finest in Hercules."
"Of course," Pete says, picking up the glass and staring at the movement of the burnished liquid. He smells it just for show and then downs it, relishing the burn of it down his throat and the buzz that fuzzes his tongue. "Mm," Pete hums, then catches Patrick's look of utter disdain. "What?"
"I will teach you how to taste whiskey properly," Patrick tells him, "and it is nothing like that."
Pete rolls his eyes with a smile and attempts to stand up, steadying himself against the arm of the couch. Then the head rush hits him and he has to immediately has to sit down again, but he congratulates himself on a good effort. He examines the glass in his hand. "So - did you seriously not smuggle it?"
Patrick sighs and stands, then moves over to the wall and places his hands against a very specific panel. Pete watches curiously as the panel shudders to one side to reveal a shelf of mismatched objects, including a stack of ancient-looking CDs and a ratty old teddy bear. Patrick rummages around for a few seconds before producing a crumpled piece of paper and tossing it towards Pete, who rushes a little too fast to catch it and has to collapse into the nearest chair before he passes out a second time.
License to trade liquor across all borders within Sector C of the Known Universe granted to: Mr. Patrick Stump. Valid until 20th of August 2657.
"Oh," Pete says, turning it over as if the word fake might be scrawled over the back of it. "Wow. Well, I owe you an apology."
"Too right you bloody do," Patrick huffs, leaning against the wall with a haughty look on his face.
"Wait, so, why didn't you just show them this?" Pete questions, and Patrick smirks.
"Because I don't steal whiskey," he says, digging around in the compartment until he finds a large, clear packet of - well, something. He tosses it to Pete and Pete snatches it out of the air, gasping as he examines its contents. "I steal diamonds."
"Fucking hell," is all Pete can think to say as he stares at all the clear stones. He stands, successfully this time, and staggers over to Patrick, peering down into the compartment. There must be a hundred of those packets down there. "You're a jewel thief?"
"Yeah, and a bloody good one too," Patrick grins, and Pete believes him. He's never heard a whisper about any jewel thief. It seems his department weren't as thorough as they liked to believe. "So when I say I can take you anywhere," he says gently, cupping Pete's face in his hands and pushing him lightly against the wall, "I can take you anywhere."
Patrick must know that that particular look in his eyes is absolutely irresistible to Pete, because he's ready for the kiss Pete pulls him into. It's somehow soft and rough at the same time, Patrick's lips plush and plump as ripe fruit and his stubble grazing Pete's skin, his hands finding Pete's hips and squeezing hard enough to coax a moan from Pete's throat. Pete wraps his arms around Patrick's neck and lets Patrick kiss him silly, his glasses getting a little in the way but his tongue doing no such thing.
When Patrick finally pulls back with a soft peck to Pete's mouth, Pete realises something that makes his heart leap. "We - we can do that all the time," he breathes, stroking a hand through Patrick's hair.
"Damn right we can," Patrick replies, running his fingers down Pete's chest and grinning widely. All of a sudden, he grabs Pete's hand and pulls him over to the window, gesturing wildly at the star-studded darkness beyond. "And we can go anywhere in the universe!"
For a moment, Pete simply stares at the man beside him, his brilliant blue eyes and his smile brighter than the stars outside, and wonders how in hell he ended up holding his hand. When he thinks of his bed, it's no longer empty. When he thinks of his smiles, they're no longer false. When he thinks of his future, it's no longer lonely. He clasps Patrick's fingers tight and gets a meteor shower of a grin in return.
"So," Patrick says with a flourish, his eyes shining with starlight, "where do you want to start?"