Work Text:
It’s a normal day for the RCM in Jamrock, Jean thinks bitterly, as he stares down the barrel of a massive humming artillery gun.
He can hear Harry talking on his right, working that silver tongue on the gang member they’ve been tracking down. He can’t hear all the words, distracted by the experimental weapon that’s levelled at his chest. When you’re smuggling illegal weapons, you have no qualms about using them - especially if your back is against the wall. Literally, in this tiny stockpile basement; nowhere to run.
Harry has softened up the angry, scared man in front of him as far as he is able. He asks for his surrender. For a moment, both of them think it might work.
The answer is the shrill whine of the gun whirring to life.
Jean is ready to accept death, when something heavy and warm slams hard into his side.
The world disappears. He’s not unconscious, but he’s not exactly conscious either. Everything is unnaturally grey. He wants to shout, but there are no words. There’s nothing. Beyond nothing.
Moments pass, though it feels like an eternity and back. When Jean picks himself up dizzily from the floor, the jam-sandwich spread of gore across the back wall indicates they won’t be taking in their perp for questioning. The discharged weapon - cracked across its barrel - lays on the floor with the remainder of him.
Jean screws up his nose, and looks for Harry, half-thinking about where the nearest phone is to call for backup, when he realises what happened.
Harry. The gun. Fuck -
Jean finds him on the floor not too far from him. His heart lurches to find him alive, but not in the shape he expected.
After five very confusing minutes, Jean makes a call, but not to the precinct.
*
Across town, Lieutenant Kim Kitsuragi is enjoying a rare day off-duty. He’s laid across the sofa with the latest of the In System book series propped up against his lap for company.
The phone interrupts him mid-page, and he frowns. Harry isn’t due off-shift for another couple of hours. He sets the book down and pushes himself up from the sofa to answer it.
“Kim? Kim - it’s Jean.” He doesn’t even wait for a reply. “This is urgent - he’s not dead or dying, but it’s not good. How fast can you be at Jambrook Road?”
Kim blinks. In an instant, he shifts from relaxed to focused, spine straight and ready, ever an RCM officer. “... Ten minutes, this time of night.” He awaits further instruction.
“Fuck, it’s - I can’t. It’s too fucking weird to explain.” Jean’s voice is strained, which indicates to Kim he’s either still in shock, or he has just had some kind of out-of-body experience. Either is entirely possible. At one time, Kim didn’t entertain the idea of the supranatural, but having worked with Harry...
“Harry’s in some shit; he needs to be taken home without questions, and it’s gonna need both of us. Be here as soon as you can. Fuck, break some traffic laws if you have to.”
Kim thinks he could hear Harry in the background, though he can’t make out the words. The phone line isn’t the greatest, but Harry’s voice sounds… off, somehow. What worries him is the tone: it’s bright, cheerful, and carefree. It makes his blood run cold. Harry might manage the first two, but not ever the latter.
Not without drugs.
Kim tries not to draw a conclusion from limited evidence, because Harry relapsing in the middle of a case with Jean - he doesn’t even want to think about it.
He rapidly pulls on his boots, jacket, pocketing his badge and gun - just in case - and takes out his anxiety on the asphalt, the Kineema making short work of the quiet night roads.
It gets busier as he gets closer to Boogie Street, with more pedestrians to deal with, but he still makes it in eight minutes. He knows the area well by now; he didn’t even need to ask for an address. He pulls up by the only payphone on Jambrook, and sure enough, Jean is waiting there, tense and shifting in agitation.
Kim pops the door and hauls out.
“You’re not going to believe this,” Jean tells him, in lieu of greeting, already marching off in a hurry. Kim falls into step beside him.
“Where’s Harry?” An obvious question, but a necessary one.
“Inside,” Jean answers, quickly, as he leads the way into a nearby building - an old shopfront, Kim notes, before being swallowed up by the dark inside. “Trying to keep him from leaving. He - he doesn’t recognise me.”
Kim hears the shake in Jean’s voice, and a surge of empathy for his fellow officer fills him.
Two years ago when Kim and Jean were first officially introduced, Kim could see how deeply it hurt Jean that Harry did not recognise or remember him. In the time since, Harry and Jean have grown their partnership anew from the ashes of the old, but it will always be a hurt that Jean carries with him: no closure for their shared past. No wonder, Kim thinks, that he is so out-of-sorts tonight.
“What happened?” Kim asks, in a low voice, as Jean starts down a set of stairs, towards a brightly-lit basement, a hazy corona emitting from the door below.
“Our fucking perp had some sort of pale gun. Literally spawns fucking pale - straight out of a horror story. Levels it at us when we had him cornered. Harry pushed me out of the way, he took it full blast -”
Kim’s stomach lurches, but he bites his tongue. He has less-than-fond recall of the Pale Latitude Compressor, and this sounds a lot worse.
And yet, it doesn’t surprise him. Two years ago, not long after the whole debacle in Martinaise, the RCM was at all-out war. Weapons flooded the streets. Experimental, deadly military gear made its way into the hands of gang members, civilians, the Débardeurs’ Union…
Those were dangerous times. It was a miracle as many of the 41st survived as they had, and Harry had played no small part in that.
He couldn’t believe, refused to believe, that a single gangbanger had managed to take out Lieutenant triple-Yefreitor Harrier Du Bois.
They reach the bottom of the stairs. Kim notices, suddenly, that the door to the basement is both shut and bolted. Jean locked Harry in this room?
“You’ll see,” Jean mutters, as he unlocks the door.
“Finally! You promised you’d only be five minutes!” The voice sounds like Harry inside the room, but also, not quite...
Kim steps into the bright room, and stops dead in his tracks.
It’s Harry alright. He’d recognise that nose and dimpled chin anywhere, even lacking the full excess of facial hair, along with the roguish smile and unique dress sense. But Harry - the Harry he knows - isn’t so powerfully built, his muscled physique muted with age and bodily abuse. This before him is Harry in his prime, built like he’s been sculpted from marble as an example of man. He’s wearing the same clothes as when he left this morning, but the difference in fit is striking. He’s tightened the belt. His shirt is lazily untucked, the fabric dragging over a hard set of abs. His hands are on his hips, and there’s powerful thighs shaped beneath his fingers.
Kim realises he is staring, and not staring in a manner befitting a professional of the RCM, and so he forces his eyes up to meet Harry’s. On this second glance, he notes the lack of broken capillaries, the healthy glow to his skin. The trimmed version of his full beard. How much younger he looks.
“So… who’s your friend, Jean?” Harry asks, giving Kim such an obvious once-over that Kim inwardly cringes that he had been too obvious in his own assessment.
“This is your housemate, Kim,” Jean growls. “We need to get you home and sort this mess out.”
“Kim...?” Harry inquires, ignoring Jean, continuing to look over Kim with interest. Kim recognises the look from seeing Harry work, even on this younger face. He’s being read like a book in the first instant, the pages rifled through, but the intensity of his gaze indicates he’s now examining him right down to the glue of his spine, the places no one else sees.
The way Harry says his name is as if saying it for the first time. “Look, Kim - I’d definitely remember if I were living with you. This is clearly some sort of mix-up - can you help a guy out, here?”
It’s all flirtatious innocence and “no trouble here, officer”, which Kim has dealt with far too many times in juvie to possibly believe at face value, even when it’s Harry.
Kim looks to Jean, who gives him a sharp half-nod back. This is dangerous. When Harry lost his memory in Martinaise, he was also compromised by a severe hangover and, later, a shot leg. This Harry absolutely could take both of them in a fight if he wanted. It’s best, therefore, that they play along until they know what they’re dealing with.
“Certainly, Harry,” Kim says, much more calmly than he feels. He needs information. “I am an officer of the RCM, and I first need to ask you a few questions.”
There’s not much point pretending otherwise: Harry will have seen the patches on his jacket as well as Jean’s. The trick is to have Harry connect the dots himself.
“Fine,” Harry says, smiling in a way that makes Jean and Kim both sideways glance at each other. The Expression, not yet taken hold of his face, but recognisable nonetheless.
Kim knows the questions he wants to ask, but here, he’s a professional - not Harry’s closest confidante. He shuts himself off from his feelings, a well-practised art. “How old are you?”
“Twenty-seven,” Harry answers without hesitation. Jean’s eyebrows shoot up. Kim is sure his own eyes widen a bit, but he keeps his cool.
“And do you remember how you came to be here this evening?”
Harry now looks unsure. “Now you mention it… no.” He frowns, then shrugs. “Must have been a great party. Can I get back to it, officer? No, wait…” His gaze flickers over Kim again. “Detective?”
Kim nods.
Something guarded pulls over Harry’s expression. “Am I being arrested? Is something wrong?”
“No. Please humour me, Harry,” Kim says, smoothly. “Tell me about yourself. What is it that you do?”
“I disco,” Harry answers with enthusiasm, a sparkle in his eye. “I also teach gym.”
“Any family?” Kim asks, steeling himself for the answer. He’s done the mental math: Harry would have been with Dora Ingerland at this time. It’s an unkind question, but somehow anything associated with Dora always triggered memories for Harry.
“No.”
Kim is brought up short. Harry doesn’t look like he’s lying, either. “No girlfriend?” He tries, throwing caution to the wind, as direct as he dares.
Harry gives him a shit-eating grin. “I’m single, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“That is not what he’s asking,” Jean cuts in, frustrated. “Harry, we’re your friends. You’ve… forgotten some things.”
“Sure.” Harry clearly doesn’t believe him. His expression turns more serious, more calculating. “Friends don’t lock other friends in a basement. Especially with this for the view.” He tilts his head indicatively towards the wall, decorated with the brains of their former captor.
Jean does have the good grace to wince. “You tried to run off after being hit with an experimental weapon, Harry. You don’t even remember who I am. Or Kim.”
Harry folds his arms, his biceps straining at his shirt sleeves. He looks unimpressed. “If there’s things I need reminding of, could we discuss them somewhere more scenic?”
“Yes. We’ll go to my apartment,” Kim says, which was the original plan. He doesn’t bother reiterating that it’s theirs - no sense distressing Harry anymore than they already have.
“Fine. Fine.” Harry looks put-upon, but that’s easier to deal with than actively resisting.
“I’m going to make a phone call when we’re at your place,” Jean tells Kim, sotto voce. “I’m hoping Trant might know how much shit we’re in.”
Kim nods. He can’t let this get to him, can’t think through the implications, it’s too much. Not until he is in private. And that means not in front of Jean. It was hard enough to make the decision to split rent with Harry, letting him into the minutiae of his life on the daily. As fond of Vicquemare as he’s become, he’s not about to do it for anyone else.
They lock the basement door. It’s a breach of protocol, but so is being hit by a full radioactive blast of Pale: one problem at a time. They step out into the cool of the night. Kim keeps one eye on Harry, but he seems relaxed enough, and he whistles at the sight of the Kineema, impressed.
Harry gets in the back, Jean beside him. Kim is glad to have gotten Harry in the car without dramatics. He still remembers his first encounter with Harry and his amnesia with mixed emotions. He had been prepared to be angry, and then he had watched the detective flounder over the concept of money. In the end, he’d relegated himself to observer. That’s what he has to do now, he thinks. There’s so much he wants to say, but it’s better kept quiet. There are some things he would only say to the Harry he knows best.
He can see the younger Harry peering out of the windows with interest as they drive down Jambrook Road, turning onto Clinton to avoid the inevitable foot-traffic of Boogie Street this time of night. There’s no helping it when nearing the intersection, the Kineema emerging into the raw streetlights and glowing signs, the speedfreaks weaving their way out into yet another party night in central Jamrock, meandering across the road as if they have all the time in the world.
As they come to a stop, Kim’s danger instincts kick in a split-second too late: Jean shouts, there’s a clunk, and Harry exits the Kineema and sprints off into the crowd.
“Shit!” Jean swears, gripping his arm - he’d tried to grab Harry, and he’d been easily thrown off. “He planned this!”
“He’s still Harry,” Kim says, caught between exasperation and despair, begrudgingly impressed. How are they going to find him?
He parks the Kineema, and turns to face Jean in the backseat. “You’ve known him longer than I have,” he says, bluntly. “Where would he go?”
“Okay. Fuck.” Jean takes a deep breath, looks back at Kim. He’s drawing strength from Kim’s calm. He’s glad to have the Lieutenant here, and not just because he quietly idolises the man as a shining example of the RCM.
He closes his eyes, thinks of the early days of meeting Harry.
Harry was already partying far too hard. Jean couldn’t match him out drinking and nearly killed himself trying. Harry was so dangerously fun back then - still occasionally oscillated between suicidal despair and outrageous public indecency - but Jean hadn’t heeded the warning signs. In his dark hours, it haunted him to wonder whether he would have made any difference if he’d pulled the brakes sooner...
Jean tempered Harry’s larger-than-life confidence; Harry dragged him out of his shell - Jean had sat in every worn-out bar stool of Boogie Street, Harry grinning at his partner-in-crime. Then the darkness began to claim Harry, the bad times bleeding into their working days, and never stopped. Harry never could stop himself - one more drink, one more bar, one more party -
An unpleasant walk down memory lane, but he remembers where to go.
“He’ll have his wallet, so he’ll have the reál to make a night of it. We’ll start with The H&G, then Ree-zon, and - I’m really hoping we don’t find him in Nebula.”
Kim doesn’t hesitate, sliding out of the driver’s seat and onto the streets with a grace that Jean is frankly envious of.
Jean explains his thinking as they walk - not really for Kim’s benefit, so much as to calm his own nerves. Harry’s favourite haunt of old, followed by the disco-themed bar, the kind that plays Guillaume Le Million ironically - not somewhere present-day Harry goes, but might appeal to the younger one. The last one he doesn’t have to explain. You barely have to walk through the door for someone to sell you your preferred poison.
In thirty-five minutes, they find him. At Nebula, staring at himself in the men’s bathroom mirror. He’s holding onto his jacket in one hand. A light sheen of sweat on his skin indicates he had been dancing, but he’s not breathless: he’s been staring for sometime now.
“It’s you,” he says, simply, as they step into view, reflected behind him. He smiles the smile of the very high, lopsided and soft. “I think I believe you, now.”
“Do you?” Kim says, quietly. He wants to trust. But he knows it could be another ploy.
“Saw a newspaper with the date on. Saw the clothes people are wearing. Saw disco is dead.” It’s that last one that forces a bitter, hysterical laugh from his lips. His eyes go wide, desperate in the reflection of the mirror. “I’m still alive - I - I can bring it back to life.”
“You’ve said that for years, Harry,” Jean says, putting a hand on his shoulder.
Harry sighs, sounding that much older for it. “I just wanted to party,” he says quietly. Jean feels a stab of sympathy, despite his terrible choices, present and past. Reality really was a comedown.
Harry turns, looks at him with slow-blinks. “I work with you.” He says it with such certainty that for a moment, both Kim and Jean are convinced he has regained his memory. “I saw - I saw the patches. On my jacket. My favourite jacket.”
Kim steps in on his other side, leans in as Harry is slightly off-balance. Harry lets him take his weight. “Come on, Harry. Let’s get you home. We’ll go from there.”
Harry smiles again, but weakly. “Okay.”
It’s a far more subdued walk back. Harry allows them, this time, to bundle him into the back of the Kineema unresistingly.
“Where is home?” He asks at last, eyes a little unfocused on Jean as he returns to his side.
“Aumbry. Off Perdition.” Kim nearly adds, not far from your old place, but this Harry never lived there.
Harry hums in absent agreement, and slides bonelessly back against the seat. Kim brings the Kineema to life. Jean keeps one eye on Harry this time for any signs of him taking flight.
He’s not going to lose him again on his watch.
After a few minutes, Harry tilts his head, and sees Jean looking at him. He smiles slightly, looks over Jean in kind. It reminds Jean of the way Harry had sized up Kim back in the basement, seeing beneath his exterior. He tries to ignore the prickle of his skin.
Harry’s smile spreads across his face to a broad grin. His gaze sharpens suddenly. He looks over Jean once more with interest, like he’s worth the extra examining. Jean wearily wonders if he’s going to mention his old pox scars, but it doesn’t seem like it.
Harry leans in, swaying close.
Jean doesn’t get the chance to ask if he’s alright, as a very warm hand slides up his thigh, and before he can open his mouth in protest, Harry’s mouth settles wetly over his. He’s too stunned to respond for a moment, before hastily pushing Harry back into his seat with both hands.
“Fuck, Harry!” He snarls, utterly mortified on multiple levels.
The first:
All those years ago when he was told he would be assigned to Lieutenant Harrier Du Bois, Jean had been ecstatic. Rumours had reached his ears even then about Du Bois’s capacity for drink, but with the rose-tinted glasses he wore, Harry looked like everything he aspired to become as a detective.
In the RCM, you live and die by your assigned partner. Harry was unorthodox, but passionate in a way that had Jean utterly sucked in from the first, starry-eyed like he was a new recruit all over again. He never liked to examine that feeling too closely. He is sure Harry always knew, and he never pushed Jean on the subject, for which he was all too grateful. Time and Harry’s vices wore off the shine, but it never truly left him. He loved the man deeply, but there was a line he would never cross.
He’s horrified, because despite everything, despite that he swore he’d never let Harry under his skin ever again, his body remembers how he wanted this infuriating, brilliant man.
The second:
Lieutenant Kim Kitsuragi is driving.
Jean admires the Lieutenant almost as much as he had admired Harry. As a professional, and more than a professional should.
After Kim joined the 41st, he got to know him and like him all the more. Kim and Harry were unlikely friends, and Jean couldn’t help be impressed at how Kim maintained such strong boundaries with him, something he himself had never managed. At the time, Jean was so bitter, so angry, that he couldn’t find it in him to forgive Harry, as much as it hurt knowing that Harry needed a friend. He was glad that Kim could do what he couldn’t back then.
As time went on, Jean got to see more and more of Kim by way of Harry, and Jean noticed the shift in their interactions. The added spring in Harry’s step. The way Kim’s spine relaxed whenever Harry approached his desk. The smiles. Jean accepts he might not be a detective of their caliber, but he knows Harry well enough to see there’s something there.
So when Harry and Kim mentioned they had decided to split rent on an apartment, Jean had his suspicions, and said nothing. He still hopes that Harry will tell him the truth one day, but he also knows he has to earn it. He’s got the trust of his partner at work. He’s not going to push for more.
Right now, he is trapped in the backseat of the Lieutenant’s Kineema with Harry plastered against his side. Harry is high. Harry always did get touchy-feely when intoxicated - although never quite as badly as this. Jean does not want this happening in front of the man he suspects might be Harry’s better half.
“Sssh,” Harry soothes, as if he hadn’t just been shoved back into his own seat, nuzzling back up to Jean’s side like a giant housecat. Jean freezes as he feels his breath, warm and tickling against his ear as he whispers, “I wanna blow you, Jean.”
Jean’s brain stutters in place - he doesn’t mean that - he didn’t just say that - and it’s only when Harry folds himself over his lap with a lazy smile and his hands move over his belt -
“No.” Fuck, he sounds strained. “Harry, absolutely fucking - no.” He hauls him up from his lap, fists curled into his jacket sleeves.
Harry lets him, but grins even as he’s held in place. “But you want me to,” he says, pretty green eyes all hazy with intoxication and lust as he looks squarely into Jean’s.
Jean hates, hates that his pulse jumps in answer, that his breath is ragged and not just with shock. He’s always been so damn transparent to Harry. Damn him, damn him for making him feel things he thought were long-dead and buried…
He can’t keep looking at Harry, not with him looking at him like that. Like Jean is the hottest new thing since disco. Jean turns his face away, towards the front where the Jamrock night beckons, the streets darker, ill-lit as they drive further away from Boogie and Main.
They pass a dead streetlight, and Jean catches a glimpse of Kim’s reflection in the window.
He thinks he can see the Lieutenant looking straight back at him.
Uneasy guilt lances through him. He nearly has a lapful of Harry, who is still struggling prettily against his fists, making no real attempt at escape, just aiming to get his attention. It works when Harry sets his hands on Jean’s arms in kind and squeezes around his biceps.
Jean turns back to him to tell him to knock it off, and Harry smiles at him with such smouldering intensity that it steals the air from his lungs.
Off-limits, he screams inside his skull, but his body asks, when was the last time anyone this good-looking threw themselves at you like this?
“God, Jean, these muscles,” Harry says, voice full of awe. He’s high, Jean tells himself furiously. “Fuck, you really work out.” Harry’s hungry gaze fixes at his lips. “I bet you’re wild in bed.”
Jean does work out. It’s stress-relief, it’s survival, but the compliment still makes its mark. The second statement, however, only has him give a dry, empty laugh. He’s really not. He’s a wreck of a man at thirty-six; clinically depressed and scarred inside and out. He has seen far too much shit, too much of it being Harry’s. Harry has broken his heart over and over, and he’s still here like a fucking masochist.
Yet it’s not really his partner in front of him. He has a young, very horny, attractive man feeling him up, blunt and open about his intent. Jean has never cared to label himself, but if he had, it would be cautiously-pencilled as bi-curious. He’s never risked acting on it, and it’s not like he goes actively out on the pull - he’s got enough issues without adding another person to the mix. He hasn’t had sex for as far back as he can remember, but his body remembers, already responding to Harry’s solicitations.
He forcibly shelves the issue. He can’t afford to be compromised, least of all by Harry, the manipulative bastard.
“Kim,” Jean calls, deliberately too-loud in hopes of reminding Harry there is in fact someone else here with them. “How far are we?”
There’s a pause, and Jean thinks he hears Kim clear his throat. “Two more blocks,” Kim answers neutrally.
Harry, if anything, only looks at Jean with increased delight, down to his lap, and flicking back up to his eyes before Jean can protest. “I won’t make you wait long,” he purrs at him, and then re-takes his seat, looking deeply pleased with himself.
Jean doesn’t know whether he wants to be grateful, smack him, or drag him back into his lap.
He looks guiltily across to the driver’s seat, but Kim only has eyes for the road.
*
All three of them make it into Harry and Kim’s apartment without issue. Harry keeps his hands to himself, but if his gaze was a touch, he’d have thoroughly undressed both Kim and Jean before they even made it through the door.
Kim is having none of it, and Jean is profoundly relieved for his steel as he directs Harry to the sofa, and sets down a large glass of water in front of him.
“Drink,” he commands.
Harry gazes up at him resentfully. Kim glares back. A wordless battle takes place, and Jean watches, breathless, wondering if even Kim’s extraordinary ability to rein in Harry would work on him this time.
After a long pause, Harry picks up the glass and knocks half of the water back in one go, before setting it down defiantly.
“I’ll drink the other half when you tell me who I really am,” Harry says.
He looks entirely serious all of a sudden. It catches Jean off-guard, but Kim seems to be appraising him. Jean wonders what Kim sees.
“Then we had better fill you in.” Kim looks to Jean for his support, and Jean nods. “I’ll put on some coffee. You start.”
They explain everything that they know. They explain the little they know of Harry’s twenties. Jean speaks for everything Harry’s ever told him about his thirties. He tells him of his sorrow, seeing his friend destroy himself. Kim tells him about their time in Martinaise, his transfer to Precinct 41, their friendship (in not so many words), and their living situation.
Harry listens raptly, only interrupting for clarification or to ask a question about a concept. His eyes are sharp now, absorbing every piece of information. Jean can see the wheels turning in his head. It frustrates him still, that Harry is somehow still a brilliant detective even while half-cut, though the story seems to have sobered him.
They reach the end of the story, and Harry stares at the floor for a long stretch, rubbing his chin.
“I appreciate that it is a lot to take in.” Kim says, solemnly, as the silence stretches out.
“Mm.” Harry acknowledges this, but doesn’t look up. Still thinking.
Jean can’t bear it, finally giving voice to the thought that’s been giving him background anxiety since picking Harry up from the basement floor. “I’m no expert in entroponetics. I have no idea how this shit is at all possible. Fuck. If we can't fix this… does he stay like this?”
“I’m not sure that is in our hands,” Kim says, simply, still looking at Harry fixedly, expression unreadable.
“He is our Harry. Right?” He sounds brusque, but he’s terrified. If this Harry never joined the RCM… if Harry left him, forgot him all over again…
“I am.”
Harry sounds as surprised as Jean and Kim look, even though he’s the one who says it. He licks his teeth, brow furrowed. “It feels right. I know that I know you… even though I didn’t want to believe either of you. I knew, somehow. When I saw you both.”
Kim’s posture subtly relaxes. “Would you say… an inner voice told you?”
“How did you know that -” Harry’s voice fades to a whisper as he stares at Kim in a way that Jean can’t fathom, a strange and private language being spoken through eye contact alone. “You know about...?”
Kim inclines his head slightly. Harry continues to stare.
Kim knows the implications, but says nothing. There is one more check he wants to make, and he’s both impressed and resentful that his Harry again has proved him wrong. It’s almost as if he knew this might one day happen, and prepared for it.
“Harry.” He says sharply, all of a sudden. “Password?”
There’s a short pause, and then -
“Oranges.” Harry blinks after saying it.
Kim exhales slowly. He can’t quite believe it, but his heart feels lighter. It’s Harry, and he will remember. The relief brings a smile to his lips despite himself.
“You once suggested we have a password, in case you ever lost your memory again. So you could ‘find your way back’. Is what you said.” Kim catches himself, realising how unguarded he’s being. He nods smartly to Jean. “He’s our Harry. He will be alright.”
Jean clearly needed to hear it: a little colour returns to his face, the tension seeping from the angles of his body.
Harry looks hesitant, scrubs at his jaw with one hand. “It’s weird, remembering stuff that hasn’t happened yet. As soon as you spoke, I knew the answer but… there was this other faint thought. Of apricots. But it felt… wrong. Dark. ‘Oranges’ was stronger. Brighter.”
“Mm.” Kim elects to say nothing, again. Some memories are best laid to rest. Or at least, not exhumed tonight.
“Okay. Good. We’re all good. Fine,” Jean mutters, and then at normal volume, “but Harry sure as shit can’t turn up for shift tomorrow like this.”
“We can both corroborate he has a legitimate illness and cannot work. Kuklovian flu.” Kim's lips twitch into a wry smile, having learned himself the hard way, once and once only, the hazard of Precinct 41’s nearby kebab shop. “I will stay home to keep an eye on his condition, of course.”
Now the worst is over, it’s a matter of making plans. Jean is envious of Kim’s ability to keep calm in crisis. They’ve been given a reprieve, and he wants to make himself useful. “Mind if I make that call to Trant?”
“Wait.”
Harry’s head has snapped up, and he looks at both Kim and Jean in turn. There’s something calculating and clever in his expression that makes an uneasy prickle run up both detectives’ spines.
“When are you going to tell me the things that you are not telling me?” Harry says, standing up, eyes not leaving either of them, flicking to each of them. Jean knows he’s doing that thing, the thing he never understood but when done to suspects, Harry gets them to talk.
Harry steps in closer to both of them. His body posture is not hostile, but curious.
“Or should I tell you?”
Kim exhales. There’s something resigned about it. “If you feel you must.”
Jean’s eyebrow lifts. Kim does have a secret, then. He’s always wondered - the man never gives much of himself away. Not like Harry, which makes it a small miracle Harry has never blabbed Kim’s all over the precinct. Out of respect? Or something else?
Harry smiles at Kim, and there’s something oddly tender about it. Apologetic. “I think I do.”
There’s a pause so loaded that Kim is tense and braced for whatever comes next.
“How did I convince you?” Harry asks Kim, fixing him with his gaze.
“To join the 41st?”
“To go out with me.”
Jean inhales sharply. This is the answer to the question he’s always been dying to hear, and he suddenly doesn’t want to know. It feels invasive.
Kim’s back remains ramrod straight, but his tone is softer. “In your usual manner. Unexpected, but… charming. You asked me to dinner. At my desk, like it wasn’t a terrible risk for you to even ask, to even do, as two RCM officers. I argued. You made your case.” His lips curl slightly in memory, and he relaxes a fraction. “And you made dinner.”
Harry nods, closing his eyes. Savouring the knowledge. “And I stole your heart sometime thereafter?”
“Harry,” Kim sighs, voice quiet. He lets the tension release from his shoulders, the words a low rush into the space. “You already had.”
Jean tries not to blush. It’s possibly the most private thing he’s ever heard out of Kim. It’s strange, hearing it confirmed, just like that. Not that he blames Kim for keeping it quiet. Even in the rare accepting circles, it invites prying questions. For someone like Kim, it would be unbearable to be outed. It twists a little in his chest to know it’s love, a jealous pang. He’s glad that they have each other, and he’s glad he’s being trusted with the truth. He knows if Kim didn’t trust him, he wouldn’t have answered Harry’s question in front of him. He stays respectfully silent.
“Thank you,” Harry says, sincerely, opening his eyes again. “For being honest.”
Kim nods. His expression is unreadable. “I made a promise to you.”
Harry nods back, and doesn’t enquire further. He turns to Jean. “So now you know, I hope it might be easier for you to admit.”
“Admit what?” Jean knows what’s coming, knows resistance is pointless, but damn his pride, he has to try.
“Jean,” Harry shakes his head. “I hurt you. Or some other version of me did. But here you are, still. Why is that?”
Jean already knows what he’s driving at, and wants to take control of the narrative. “Because I care about you, shitkid. Obviously. Not in the same way as Kim,” he adds, quickly, throwing Kim an apologetic glance.
“Not entirely, anyway,” Harry agrees, but there’s something soft in the way he says it. It rips Jean’s heart out all over again. “You’re a good man. And a good partner, from what I’ve seen and heard. A good friend.”
Jean says nothing and bites the inside of his lip.
“It’s all mixed up, isn’t it? You’ve mourned for me twice without closure. And here we are again, with a new do-over. Third time’s the charm… or the breaking point.” Harry smiles at him gently. “I don’t want to do that to you again.”
“There’s a lot of things neither of us wanted,” Jean says bitterly, unable to help himself.
“And things that you did.” Harry says quietly.
Jean tenses. Kim is watching, listening. He can’t say this. It’s wrong.
“Let’s make this do-over a better one.” Harry steps into his personal space. “I have some ideas how you can work out some of the mess I’ve left you in.”
“Harry, you’re high as a fucking kite and you just told me that you’re in a relationship with Kim,” Jean growls, on the defense, placing both hands on his chest to hold him at a distance.
Harry smiles at that. “You didn’t say no.”
“I can say “no” as many times as needed.”
“I meant that your reasoning: that I am high, and that Kim is my partner. Not that you don’t want to.”
“Those are very good reasons,” Jean protests, while inwardly cursing himself.
Harry shakes his head. “The party favours wore off a while ago. You can check my pupils if you want. As for Kim…”
Harry turns his head and gives the man a devilish smile. “Kim’s been thinking about getting you undressed since I came onto you in the back of the Kineema.”
Jean’s so startled that he drops his arms, staring at Kim.
Kim meets his gaze briefly, though with embarrassment. “Apologies,” he mutters at Jean. Jean’s face is pricelessly shocked. It’s so at odds with what he knows about Kim, but he’s more blindsided by the idea that Kim finds him attractive. Kim knows Jean, as much as anyone does, his propensity to be tetchy when he’s stressed, his utterly fucked-up self on display, and yet, he’s seen all that and still wanted him.
“Would you like that, Kim?” Harry asks, as casual as if about the weather, stepping beside Jean, shoulder-to-shoulder, not otherwise touching him, but hovering close to it. “Wanna watch me go down on Jean?”
Kim says nothing, but there’s enough of a shift in his features to say that yes, yes he does, punctuated by drawing his lower lip into his mouth, as if to hold the words in.
“Or whatever you’d like to work through,” Harry says, turning back to Jean, voice low. “If you prefer to watch. But I don’t think you do.”
“God, Harry.” Jean is struggling to collect together the brainpower to get this insane conversation back onto something normal, that doesn’t involve saying yes, because that’s where this is going. He wants to.
Any explorations of his sexuality have been limited solely to imagination. Harry is not the only man that’s featured in his occasional fantasies. The other man he’s quietly admired is looking at him with curiosity and concern from behind his glasses.
Jean knows with absolute certainty, with the bond of fraternity, that Kim or Harry would never betray a word uttered in this moment. If he accepted, it would never leave the four walls surrounding them. That he could absolutely decline, and it would never be mentioned again.
It’s the latter thought that spurs him to speak. He’s not reckless like Harry, but neither does he have his tipsy courage to ever ask. It’s not an opportunity he’ll likely ever get again.
“Is this - Kim,” Jean tries to find the words. They’re going to damn him, but he has to be certain. “Is this insane shit alright with you?”
Kim’s eyes drift from Harry to Jean.
He’s been watching with fascination how even this younger Harry can drag out someone’s innermost secrets and he’s not even yet a detective. No wonder Dora had pushed him towards the RCM.
He was absolutely correct, of course. Kim has been thinking about it. It’s not the first time, either, and of course, this mouthier version absolutely knows that.
The present-day Harry knows more about Kim than anyone else ever will. Secrets shared under the cover of darkness. Some he’s never said aloud - he never needed to. Harry has confessed to plenty of his own in kind, and that has a way of eliciting a response from him, but most of his secrets are hard-won by Harry. The early days of their relationship were a struggle to say the least. It’s been both a source of conflict, and a source of relief that Harry invades his private world, when he himself does not always know how to share it. It’s the only reason he’s opened up so readily to this Harry. He’s had some practise by now.
This Harry almost certainly also knows that Kim likes to work out his frustrations with him in their bedroom. He’d have had Harry there from the second the front door closed if Jean weren’t with them.
But Jean is here, and Harry, damn him, has laid out an irresistible lure, neatly sidestepping all of Kim’s would-be objections to extend the invitation, to which Jean is now seeking only his approval.
Indecent thoughts of Jean were a private, idle indulgence, one Harry had (eventually) teased out of him, unoffended by it and if anything, a little turned-on by the idea. There is, after all, a lot to like about Jean Vicquemare. Impeccably dressed, deeply loyal to his friends beneath the prickly exterior, and possessing the patience of a saint to deal with Harry on the daily. It took Harry considerably more prying for Kim to admit to the more carnal qualities that snared his imagination: the low growl of his voice, a physique that suggested he could take some punishment, and that ass. It had felt faintly ridiculous to voice, since it was never actually going to be on the table.
Except Harry has made it so. The temptation proves too much.
“I’m used to insanity by now,” Kim replies, with a wry smile.
Harry laughs at that, soft and genuine. “You’re amazing, Kim.” He adds more soberly, as if no other fact could be more true, “no wonder you’re the love of my life.”
Kim squirms at the words, and looks away. It’s Jean’s turn to be fascinated. Kim so rarely loses his cool that it makes Jean realise Harry means it. He also realises it’s not the first time Kim’s heard it, judging by his expression: his face is priceless as it goes through myriad emotions: shock, bashfulness, annoyance, and when he schools his expression, it’s into something darker and potent and confident. Jean has to suppress a shiver. He’d never quite imagined what Kim would look like when thinking I am going to fuck you through the floor.
Harry steps back towards the bedroom door with an easy smile, unthreading his tie. It’s the smile of a man who knows he’s hot stuff, knows Kim and Jean are watching his every move. It’s so insufferably arrogant, it makes them both want him all the more.
“I’ll let you both fuck me,” he says, grinning, stretching into the imaginary limelight. “You wanna decide who goes first?”
The gauntlet is thrown. Jean guppies, but Kim demonstrates his famed composure by actually responding.
“Mm. Jean, I think you should.” Kim’s voice is cool, but his eyes tell a different story, as does the casual way he pulls off each of his gloves as he speaks.
Jean swallows. Is this really happening? He jumps slightly as a hand is pressed into the small of his back as Kim steps in behind him and encourages him to step into the bedroom.
“You gonna watch, Kim?” Harry asks lazily, his tie looped between his fingers, now making work of his shirt buttons.
“Perhaps.” Kim doesn’t elaborate, but he nods at Jean as if to say, relax, I’ve got this.
Harry smirks and saunters into the bedroom. Kim makes to follow, but Jean grabs his arm on impulse, and Kim turns obligingly to face him. He’s nervous, and he has to check, keeping his voice low.
“Kim, are you really okay with this? If it’s Harry putting you up to this -”
To his surprise, Kim’s mouth quirks into a smile. “Far from it. You’re an attractive man, Jean Vicquemare.”
Kim would never say this, if not for Harry opening the door first. He likes Harry’s competent, blunt-spoken partner, and he never thought this opportunity would ever present itself: he’s determined not to screw himself out of a very good thing by playing hard to get.
Jean sucks in a breath as Kim’s fingers curl teasingly at the edge of his tie. Kim notices, and his empathy overrides his desire. “And yourself? I appreciate this was... unplanned.”
Jean gives up and gives in. If Kim is willing to admit to it… “Fuck, yes.”
He sees Kim’s eyes turn darker in response.
“Good.” Kim hooks a couple of fingers into his tie and gently leads Jean beyond the threshold of the bedroom. Jean goes willingly, almost chest-to-chest with Kim the whole time. He finds himself staring at Kim’s mouth as they walk, but not quite daring to take the plunge.
Harry watches their arrival from the foot of the bed, where he’s sat to pull off his socks. His shirt is already tossed carelessly across the room.
Jean barely takes stock of the room layout before Kim is slipping loose his tie, looking at Jean with an intense seriousness, like he’s a prize about to be unveiled instead of merely undressed.
It makes Jean feel more desirable than he’s felt in years. He reaches out and cups Kim’s cheek. Damn if he doesn’t want to kiss him until he’s wild with it. The Lieutenant is unflappable, a still pool in the swirling chaos of the 41st. Jean wants to dig in under his skin, just enough to see what he’s like underneath that veneer of professionalism.
Kim closes his eyes into the feel of a warm hand on his skin. Not Harry’s broad hand, different. He opens his eyes in time to lean into the kiss that Jean initiates, and promptly shuts his eyes again, giving himself over to it.
There’s no hesitance. Both of them, by nature, give everything in what they do, and they pour their all into it. It’s all fire and greed, unexplored territory for either of them, open-mouthed and quickly turning messy with tongue. Jean’s hands move to sit on Kim’s slim hips, fingers questing over his outer thighs and towards his ass. Kim’s hands fist into his suit jacket, as if he won’t let Jean escape until he’s had his fill. It’s an incredible turn-on that makes Jean hum low as Kim stakes his claim on his mouth.
“God, you look good together.” Harry stands up and walks over to them when they finally pull apart for air. “Any love spare for me?”
Kim sighs in admonishment, but his shiny-wet lips curl into a smile as he steps closer to his partner and obliges him.
He loves Harry, all of him, past, present, and future, and he can’t help but admire his current physique with his fingertips, feeling the muscles shudder and tense as he gets a good feel of the broad expanse. He’s delighted Harry still has enough body hair for his fingers to scrape through, but what’s even better is when he licks teasingly at his lower lip and Harry moans. He knows Harry likes that, and he’s glad some things have remained the same. It makes him hunger, drag his open-mouthed kisses over Harry’s jaw and lay claim to his neck.
“Fuck, fuck Kim, that’s - nngh.” Harry shivers, eyes fluttering.
Jean finds himself self-conscious watching the pair, moving together with such ease. This version of Harry clearly has no hang-ups about pursuing who he wants sexually - and with a body like that, Jean doubts Harry ever struggled much for company - and Kim, Kim clearly knows his way around a man’s body. If the way Jean had just been kissed hadn’t proved that already, Kim’s hands are precise in finding where Harry shudders under his touch, and he is ruthless about exploiting his advantage.
Jean hopes his own inexperience won’t be obvious as he slips off his jacket: he’s far too hot to bear it any longer. He finds his fingers are too poorly-coordinated to unbutton his shirt. That is, to take his eyes off of Kim and Harry undulating against each other to do so.
He can see how Kim backs off, teases, waits until Harry capitulates in desperation before giving him what he wants. Harry like this might be a mouthy, horny little shit, but Kim is bringing him to heel.
Until Harry gets a little too wound up, hands getting grabby on Kim’s ass, and Kim pulls back with a shudder, even as Harry tips him back so he can mouth into his collar.
“Harry.” Kim’s voice has turned deep, throaty in a way that goes straight to Jean’s groin.
“Mmm.”
“Harry,” Kim repeats, injecting more authority into his voice. “Get Jean undressed.”
Harry lifts his head at that and meets Jean’s eye.
Jean knows he is done for. He’s so turned-on he looks half-wrecked already, and he hasn’t a hope in hell in hiding it from Harry.
Harry releases Kim and saunters over to Jean, all disco hips and cockiness, his firm fingers making easy work of Jean’s top buttons.
“What am I gonna do with you, Jean?” Harry murmurs to him. It’s a tease, but the lack of grin indicates it’s an entirely serious question.
Jean swallows. “Shit, Harry.” He already knows the answer. Same thing as he’s given Harry all these years. “Goddamn anything.”
Harry kisses him, and Jean shudders in surrender to his desire, his hands clutching into Harry’s broad, bare shoulders before exploring the warmth of his whole back. Harry is right: he has a lot of issues to work out physically tonight, and the way Harry is kissing him indicates he’s absolutely willing to take it.
Kim watches them both, subtly adjusting himself, thinking ahead. He knows how Harry is in bed; Jean is an unknown quantity, but he likes what he sees. And how he kisses, too, he remembers how full and demanding Jean’s mouth was against his, how it sparked excitement low in his gut. The potential of having the two younger men in his bed gives him all kinds of ideas for how the evening might go.
His eyes glitter behind his lenses as he watches Harry push Jean’s shirt from his shoulders, resting admiringly on the muscular form beneath. Harry hadn’t been exaggerating from the backseat. Between them, enough pure muscle to hold him down, throw him around, suspend him. But they won’t, and he likes that more.
As the only one not yet shirtless, he pulls off his vest and lets it join the mess of clothing already deposited on the floor.
His own body is mostly lean, with a little bit of padding of age setting in. The contrast is especially stark with the two powerful bodies in front of him. Fortunately, Kim is content with what he has: he knows how to use it and moreover, Harry has never spared words about how much he enjoys Kim’s body. He loves that he can make use of his body to have Harry beg for him, beg for his cock.
He hopes to leave an impression on Jean, too, in the short time they have. He knows he’ll have his chance, and very soon: already, Jean’s hips are pushing against Harry’s in tiny increments, Harry encouraging the grind with one large hand pressed over Jean’s ass.
Jean finally pulls back from kissing Harry, feeling dizzy. He’d kissed Kim earlier, but he’s never had the novelty of a beard scraping against his own to really feel how he was kissing a man. He’s virtually riding Harry’s thigh, and he can feel Harry’s hardness in kind pressed against him through the layers they’re both still wearing, both thrilled and daunted by it. He draws in a deep breath, trying to get some oxygen back to his brain.
“I asked you to get Jean undressed,” Kim comments mildly to Harry, as if he hadn’t just been watching them half-mounting each other in the span of a kiss. Jean marvels that Kim’s voice can still manage to sound so unaffected, even when tellingly dropped an octave.
“Mm. Got distracted.”
Jean gets to briefly appreciate Kim is also shirtless before Harry distracts him in turn by sliding his large hands from his hips to his belt.
Jean’s next breath is held in as Harry tugs his belt open, and escapes him in a gasp when Harry drops to his knees in front of him. Harry’s smug grin says he knows exactly the effect he’s having. Jean’s just trying not to have a heart attack as Harry doesn’t waste time unfastening his trousers.
He just about manages to hold it together, when Harry leans in and darts out his tongue just below his navel into the treasure trail leading down.
“Fuck!”
Jean is determined not to let his knees buckle, but it’s reassuring nonetheless when Kim slides up behind him and leans into his back, inviting him to lean against him. Kim is warm and solid, a dependable surface as he shivers, helpless as Harry’s lips and tongue dip below his waistline. Kim presses kisses across his shoulders and strokes his sides, and he feels pinned between the dual sensations.
Harry grants him mercy. His skin still tingles with the heat of Harry’s breath even as Harry sits back to work off Jean’s shoes and socks, Jean himself obligingly lifting each foot in turn.
“Mm. Jean,” Kim murmurs behind his ear conversationally, “if Harry blows you now, how soon until can you go again?”
He knows why Kim is asking, and Jean groans. “.... Might not take long,” he grates out, as Harry finally pulls his trousers and underwear down his legs to pool at his ankles. His dick throbs hot against the cool evening air.
Harry lets out a hungry little groan from in front of him, eyes raking him up and down. “Fuck, Jean, you’re gorgeous.”
“Shut up,” Jean mumbles. He’s embarrassed by the praise, face glowing hot. It’s even worse when Kim hums in agreement - and makes a comment of his own.
“You heard Jean. Find a better use for your mouth.” Kim’s eyes give away it’s no mere admonishment.
Harry’s eyes flash, his smile widening as his gaze turns to Kim. Jean knows that look all too well: Harry’s planning something, and there’s going to be trouble.
“You’re right,” Harry muses, and settles in close, setting his hands on Jean’s hips. He flashes him a particularly wicked look upward, maintaining the eye contact as his tongue darts out and licks at the tip of Jean’s dick.
Jean tries not to buck, and fails. Harry’s hands are strong and keep him from doing any actual damage, but he quivers trying to keep his hips still anyway.
Kim hums approvingly. With Jean’s shoes off and himself still in boots, he’s just about able to rest his chin over Jean’s shoulder - on tiptoes - to watch. Harry meets his eye and winks before returning to task, releasing Jean’s hip to have one hand free to guide him to his mouth. Kim enjoys how Harry’s lips stretch wide and the shudder of Jean’s body against his own. He soothes Jean with his palms set flat against his stomach rubbing circles, enjoying the trembling beneath the firm abdominals as Harry takes him in deeper. Jean presses back against him, and he adjusts his centre of gravity to take him.
It’s a good thing he has a will of iron. Jean is delightfully warm in his arms, nude and squirming. The temptation to rock his hips into the plush swell of Jean’s backside is maddening, but he knows it will throw off Harry’s rhythm. As with all good things, Kim is willing to wait for it. It doesn’t mean he’s not affected by it. His breathing is laboured, chest swelling against Jean’s back. He groans despite himself, caught by the sight of Harry being a tease with a slow, slick drag of his lips all the way back to the tip.
“God.” The word is ripped from Jean, half-choked, and Kim tilts his head to mouth at his neck, wanting to give himself something to do to distract himself as much as continue to break Jean into vocalising his pleasure.
Between all the hands on him - and now the heat of two mouths in different places - Jean does break, both hands sliding into Harry’s thick hair either side of his head, just for something to hold onto. Every other breath is a groan, or a low, emphatic “fuck” forced from his throat. His brain replays and recoils every time he remembers that it’s Harry that’s doing this to him. Harry is destroying him, like he’s always done, except this time he wants him to.
He’s going to come, and it’s far too soon - it’s not like he actually gets laid on a regular basis, least of all in a threesome with the subjects of his most taboo fantasies. He doesn’t want to, not yet, it feels like they just got started…
Harry gentles his mouth almost an instant after he completes the thought. Coincidence? Maybe. It’s both torture and a relief when he releases him from his mouth with the most obscenely wet sound. The cocky grin he pulls on is diminished (or, rather, improved) by the deep flush of his face, his swollen lips and a spit-slick chin.
“Mm, Jean, you sound so pretty.”
Harry’s voice does too, rough at its edges as his eyes flick from Jean to Kim. “Kim. Come here,” he requests. A little bit of hunger in his voice makes it near enough commanding.
Kim does, amused and curious as to what Harry has in mind. It’s made quickly apparent as Harry attacks his trousers with the same enthusiasm he had Jean’s. It makes him smile, and he slides a hand into Harry’s thick hair, lazily petting him as he works his trousers down his slim hips.
“Khm. Boots,” Kim reminds him, sensing Harry is about to get carried away, and he will be left stuck in place in an undignified manner.
“You really get off on bossing me around, don’t you,” Harry remarks. It’s rhetorical and he’s still grinning as he roughly tugs the laces loose.
“... Is there a problem?”
“Nope.” Harry doesn’t even look up until he’s finished the other boot. He sits back on his heels while Kim toes out of them and winks at Jean. It’s so obnoxiously smug that it makes Jean kind of want to shove his cock back in his mouth.
But Harry has a plan, seeming comfortable with waiting for Kim’s belt and trousers to hit the floor. Jean admires Kim’s body, mesmerised. He likes the contrast in their builds, Kim compact where he and Harry are broad. Kim’s skin doesn’t flush, but his tells are in the slight sheen of sweat and heave of his chest, his nipples pert - Jean remembers the pleasurable feel of them pressed against his back. He’s nowhere near as hairy as Harry - almost no one is - possessing a conservative dark smattering at his chest and armpits, mostly smooth until the navel, inviting Jean’s gaze down to Harry’s hands.
His mouth floods with fresh saliva as Harry helps liberate Kim from his underwear. It’s his first time getting up close and personal with a hard cock that’s not his own, and his fingers twitch. He wants to get his hands all over Kim. Make him lose his famous cool with his hands and mouth and -
“Soon,” Harry soothes at him suddenly, and Jean shivers. He must mean not leaving him neglected, because Harry’s good, but he can’t read minds.
Kim lets out a sharp exhale as Harry takes his erection in hand and strokes him teasingly; a few tugs at his hair makes him chuckle and he puts his mouth to work. When Kim’s eyelids flutter closed, Jean has to stifle a groan. He’s not the one getting sucked off, but damn, looking at Kim is almost just as good. He strokes himself for a few long seconds, but Harry pulls off Kim and beckons him closer.
“Perfect, both of you,” Harry says breathlessly, impatiently smacking Jean’s hand away with his own and taking him in his fist, and chases the tip of Kim’s dick with his tongue to draw him back into his mouth.
Jean’s not sure whether to be appalled or admire Harry’s audacity. He quickly comes down on the side of thankfulness, having a front-row seat to watching Kim’s cock slide wetly from Harry’s lips as he mouths at him sloppily, still working his free hand over Jean.
“Khm.”
Jean realises he might have been staring between their bodies for a little too long, embarrassed when he looks up to meet Kim’s gaze, but oh, Kim looks so good with his eyes soft and his lips parted. Jean doesn’t hesitate, doesn’t resist the urge as he pulls Kim into a kiss that’s almost as wet and messy as what’s going on beneath his waist. It’s a kiss where they playfully wrestle for dominance, and Jean is content to let Kim have at him and explore his mouth with his tongue, conceding to the older man’s obvious experience.
Kim suddenly moans into it, a surprisingly desperate sound, and Jean’s remaining braincells try to make sense of what he’s not giving - except in the next moment, there’s hot breath on his dick and suddenly the engulfing heat of Harry’s mouth and the realisation has him shaking as much as the action. It’s too much, it’s not like any sex he’s ever had; filthy and exciting.
He can just about hear Kim making soothing words at him, holding onto his shoulders firmly with both hands, his own voice beyond his control, and the slick hot slide of Harry’s mouth as the world seems to grey out before his eyes, his senses overwhelmed and burning bright.
Harry’s other hand sets firmly on his hip, hot as a brand in its broad spread, strong and confident - and that’s all it takes.
He shouts - he’s not sure if he successfully made a word, but he’s sure if he did it was obscene - his body jerks into the hands that hold him in place and he’s spilling into Harry’s mouth, feeling him shift and swallow and coax him through it. He’s shivering, gasping, feeling like he’s run a marathon, Kim still murmuring something, close-but-not-quite endearments, soft and encouraging.
“God,” he croaks after working his throat for a few more moments, heaving in deep breaths.
“Let’s get you onto the bed,” he hears Kim’s voice float nearby, and then Harry’s in agreement, and everything is hazy and blurred. He’s suddenly wrapped up in warm arms and lifted off the floor. Then there’s sheets against his back and someone warm above him.
He loops his arms around them and presses his face into their skin.
He’s still trembling. He feels good, but damn it, he’s also just pushed himself beyond his comfort zone. He now needs that reassurance while his world realigns. Mortifying, but necessary.
Fortunately, he’s been taken by two detectives to bed, and they wordlessly take up the cause. The bed sinks a little beside him and he’s cocooned in warmth on both sides. There’s a hand in his hair and on his arm and one wrapped around his waist, and it takes a few moments to resolve which belongs to Harry and which is Kim’s, both of them pressed snug up against him.
Ah, there’s the shame he’s been holding back, mind spiralling with the enormity of what he’s just done. Before he can work himself up into panic, Harry puts a finger on his lips. He radiates fondness, looking comfortable, calm, and ready to continue rubbing Jean’s back for as long as he wants. Jean blinks, but accepts the gesture for what it is and relaxes into the embrace he’s in. The feelings fade as quickly as they came, leaving only peaceful contentment, which is truly a novel experience for him.
“... I can’t believe I let you talk me into this,” Jean tells him with mock grumpiness. It’s hard to summon up any annoyance when wrung out in post-orgasmic bliss with two very warm bodies encircling him.
“Not ready for round two, then?”
Jean lets out an almost-irritated huff, and Harry chuckles before nudging him into a languid kiss, which Jean accepts, melting into it. Fuck, he hasn’t felt this good in a long time. He indulges in it, fingers exploring the contours of Harry’s muscular bulk and taking in the details now he has a clear head. The little dips and curves. The places where the body hair thickens and recedes.
Harry makes a needy little sound as Jean’s fingertips pass over his pectorals. He tests his immediate hypothesis, letting his thumb and forefinger drag over a nipple. The full-body shiver against him tells him he is correct, and he does it again, more deliberately, grinding the pad of his thumb in place.
Harry pants and breaks from the kiss to gasp, “fuck.”
So Jean keeps teasing the nub, slowly circling around it with his other fingers. He’s thinking about whether he should change position to play with both at once when Kim pushes himself up to kneel, his hand sliding over Jean’s hip with a gentle possessiveness; traces idle circles where his hip bone ends and the curve of derrière begins. He’s watching.
Jean’s too relaxed to feel self-conscious at having Kim’s undivided attention. If anything, he wants to be responsible for causing Kim to come undone. If that comes with getting his hands on Harry in all the unspeakable ways he’s ever imagined, that’s a bonus. He wonders whether Kim’s hand might be more adventurous if he ups the ante.
Spurred on by the thought, he shifts just enough to free both arms and make good use of his upper body strength to pull Harry closer, and push himself a little further down the bed. He closes his mouth around the nipple he’s just teased, and rolls the flat of his tongue over the area.
The moan he gets in response is gratifying. He hums, licks, tastes, and generally enjoys the tactility of having his face pressed warm into Harry’s skin, short hairs tickling his nose, and the smell of him up close, heady, potent, and wild like the man himself. He scrapes his teeth gently over the hard bud and Harry’s hips kick forward, leaving a sticky-hot streak against his midsection.
He’s teased the man enough, he thinks, but he’s not quite sure where to take this next. He’s one-hundred-percent game, or he wouldn’t be here, but nonetheless, he’s going to be outside of his field of relevant experience soon enough.
“That’s enough, Jean.” Kim’s voice is soft in its instruction, but it makes Jean sit up straight regardless. The look Kim gives him is hungry, though he remains still, restrained. Jean licks his lips, not having any words as Kim reaches across his side of the bed - giving him a good view as Kim stretches - and after a moment, returns and presses a pump bottle into Jean’s hands, meeting his eyes directly as he makes his request:
“Get him ready.”
Kim is looking forward to seeing this very, very much, and the dumbstruck look on Jean’s face in response is pleasing, even more so when the man swallows and nods. Kim is managing to keep his hands off himself so far, but it’s proving more difficult with the thought of seeing Jean give it to Harry. What will he be like? Kim’s mind supplies the potential options: Jean firm, dishing out the rough punishment he usually gives verbally when Harry gets under his skin, bending Harry to however he desires. Or, as alluded to earlier by Harry, that past longing he never acted on made manifest with gentleness; slow and steady as the tide, taking Harry apart piece by piece until he’s entirely swept away. Both appeal. He’s keen and curious to see what Jean does with the opportunity.
Jean panics at precisely this point, mouth going dry. He knows the theory. Arguably, he’s had practise, but this is very different from cautious self-discovery in the shower with just his fingers. He’s not sure how to explain this - in retrospect, it would have been better to raise this before his dick took over his rational thinking.
He turns to face Harry, who responds with obvious delight, settling with his arms behind his head and his legs drawn up, willing and trusting. When their eyes meet, Harry’s self-satisfied smile fades, and his eyes flicker over Jean with concern. Jean doesn’t even get a chance to bristle, as Harry’s eyes snap back to his, and he says, quietly, “really, Jean?”
“Shut up,” Jean growls at him.
“Mm, no.” Harry sits up, enough to lean in and kiss him on the nose, just for the joy of watching Jean scrunch it up with a scowl, turning smugly to Kim before Jean can object. “Guess what, Kim? Jean’s never been with a man.”
“Damn it, I’m not a fucking blushing virgin, Harry,” Jean snaps, embarrassed that Harry just put it out there bluntly like that.
Except Harry’s still smirking, and not at him. Jean follows his gaze, and sees Kim frozen in place, eyes wide.
Harry chuckles, and murmurs against his ear, “I think you’re helping to fulfill more than one of Kim’s fantasies tonight.”
Kim shakes himself at that. He glares at Harry, before his gaze rakes Jean covetously.
He’s probably just as embarrassed as Jean, but that’s Harry for you: the great equaliser, when it comes to secrets. Kim has never gone out of his way to pursue someone inexperienced - if not on ethics alone, then the potential risks to himself - but he’s gotten off more than once to the thought of having a younger, not-fully-declared homo-sexual in his bed and teaching him the ropes.
Harry had caught up on the basics just fine about the time he started to pursue Kim in earnest, which Kim had actually appreciated. He hadn’t liked the idea of being just an experiment. He had long accepted some fantasies weren’t meant to intersect with reality.
Until now.
He trusts Jean. There’s no risk here that he’ll lash out and proclaim he’s straight after all, or out Kim to the rest of the RCM. There’s nothing unethical in their age difference - he’s surprised Jean hasn’t explored for himself sooner - but then, if he’s learned anything from Harry, bi-sexuals have even less guidance in matters of sexuality.
In short - Harry is infuriatingly correct, and Kim is going to teach Jean how to fuck the smugness right out of him.
His lips quirk into a smile as he addresses Jean directly. “Would you like instruction?” He’s confident of the answer, but he wants to hear it anyway.
Jean has the ‘yes’ ready on his tongue, but holds it a moment longer - the mischief in Kim’s expression is just that delightful. He fights down an answering smirk of his own, having a feeling he knows what Kim has planned, and he’s more than willing to play his part to make it work. He feels less like he’s being coddled for his lack of experience, and that increases his confidence. He pauses to savour the moment of power he holds before he hands over the reins.
“Not a problem, Lieutenant,” he says seriously, and when Kim’s eyes flutter ever-so-slightly, he makes a mental note he might need to avoid repeating that exact phrase down at the precinct for a while.
“Khm. Very good.” Kim coughs into his fist and the fracture in his composure passes. He gets down to business.
Jean learns quickly, face burning hot as Kim bluntly tells him how much lube to use, how much pressure, not to push inside but instead circle, stroke, and Harry fusses and demands more, clearly at the limits of his patience, but Kim doesn’t ask that Jean appease him, and so Jean doesn’t. But god, Harry begging him by name, writhing around against the sheets tests Jean’s resolve. He never was very good at saying ‘no’ to Harry. Having it taken out of his hands, as it were, reduces his internal conflict.
Soon enough he has two fingers moving smoothly inside Harry, his ears ringing with pleading noises interspersed with the slick sounds as he pistons and rotates his hand according to Kim’s direction. It’s different from doing this to himself, the feel of fluttering muscle, the change of angle when he curls his fingers, on Kim’s command, driving Harry’s torment to new heights.
“Fuck Jean, fuck I’m ready, Jean - Kim - nnngh, one of you just please, please fuck me already…”
Jean has no idea how Kim still looks so composed in the wake of Harry’s visible desperation: his hair is sweaty and sticking to his forehead, sporting a full-body flush but nowhere near as bright as his cock, weeping a clear pool onto his belly. Kim holds onto one of Harry’s wrists, as if to dare him to try anything with the other hand, which grips tightly into the sheets.
Jean knows if Harry were so inclined, it would be easy for him to turn the tables on the Lieutenant or himself, but he doesn’t. He lets Kim take charge, and begs him and Jean in turns for mercy.
And Jean is shamefully hard by now from the whole scenario. He’s tense and coiled like a spring; if Kim gave him the permission, he’d answer Harry’s demands in a hot second. It’s not even about working out his feelings anymore so much as Harry needs him right now.
He swallows, trying not to look as desperate as Harry must feel, focussing intently on listening to Kim. It’s worthwhile, hearing the quiet man’s breath hitch between instructions, and the throaty quality his voice takes on that gives away that while Kim may look uncompromised, he’s getting definite pleasure out of this.
“Mm. Jean.”
Kim’s next instruction is wordless, holding out a neatly-folded towel in one hand, accompanied by a square foil. Jean nods, not trusting his own voice at this point. He carefully extricates his fingers and accepts both.
The next few moments are silent save for breathing, only briefly interrupted by the crinkle of the foil and the bedsprings as Harry wriggles a little and hooks his hands under his thighs to bring them higher and further apart. He’s blessedly quiet and attentive as Jean sets aside the lube bottle and settles between his thighs.
Jean only breaks eye contact long enough to line himself up. He gets to see Harry’s eyes go wide before rolling closed as the muscle gives way to the insistent pressure. After that initial resistance, Harry’s grip falters, and Jean plants both hands into the meat of Harry’s thighs to keep them aloft. He inhales deeply to get oxygen back to his brain, his breath stolen from him not just from the heat and pressure, but the semi-coherent thought that this is not how he ever imagined getting both his hands on Harry and his cock inside him. It’s a good thing he’s wearing a condom or he might have had to call for an immediate time-out.
As it is, with Harry urging him with his body, somehow nudging him with his heel in his side even with his thighs being splayed wide, he’s still shaking by the time his cock is fully sheathed inside him. It’s as much with emotional catharsis as it is physical, this new intimacy between them.
His gut hums with satisfaction at seeing Harry just as affected as he is with it, heavy-lidded eyes and lax-limbed. Harry blinks slowly and regains his senses quickly enough, but the cockiness is gone from his smile, replaced by genuine affection.
“C’mon, Jean,” he growls in that low, gravelled voice that’s so familiar to Jean and Kim both; made so by arousal rather than the years of cigarettes.
“Goddamn, Harry.” Jean says it feelingly, tone verging on a threat. His head drops forward as he tries to get a hold of himself, the tension in his hips threatening to make short and messy work of him. He fights it, lets his hips rock in tiny increments only. Embers glow and spark, burning through his already-fragile restraint.
Harry, of course, chooses to invite trouble as he’s always done, and provokes his partner. “You’ve always held back with me, haven’t you?” he accuses, in a low voice. His voice is still gentle; the honesty brutal, and he reaches out with one hand and tips Jean’s chin up to meet his gaze. “For fuck’s sake, Jean, just have at me. I can fucking take it.”
Jean glares. If that’s how he wants it to be...
“Fuck,” he mutters, shifts on his knees for greater leverage, and snaps his hips forward in one firm, sharp smack against Harry’s skin. He sees stars. “Fuck!”
The way Harry half-moans, half-sighs beneath him is all he needs to give into the rhythm his hips urge him into.
Kim curls his fingers into the bedsheets beneath him to give his hands something to do that isn’t touching himself to the sight of the two athletic men twining together for the first time.
He always loves the sight of Harry, eager to get fucked. The fact it’s not going to be him doesn’t bother him so much as make him determined to stake his claim on Harry later, which he knows from experience his partner likes when he feels possessive. He also trusts and respects the man who they invited into bed although in this moment, lusting after would be a more accurate description. Jean looks almost feral in his desire as incited by Harry, teeth almost set in a snarl as he makes good on Harry’s challenge, their powerful bodies shuddering when they meet, Jean’s ass rocking against him.
Jean has got a great ass, too. Kim has never indulged himself in looking overlong at work, regimented as he is, as tempting as it is. Bare, it’s lusciously curved and full; even muscled as it is, there’s a pleasant little ripple in each bounce struck off Harry. It makes him want to sink his fingertips into the flesh. His teeth, too.
The pair of them, grunting and growling in animal desire, earthy and masculine… Kim keeps his thighs pressed tightly together, because if he touches himself now, he will not be able to stop himself, and this side of forty-five, it’s unlikely he’ll be able to go again. Instead, he wants to drink this in, and enjoy the memory in full for weeks.
Jean can see out of the corner of his eye how Kim is watching, and it encourages him to give Harry all he’s asked for and more. He shifts a little for comfort and on one particularly hard thrust, Harry is all shivers and ‘yes’ beneath him, and Jean makes note to try it again. For now, he’s enjoying the ride, absorbed in the finer details of sex with a male partner: the shape of his body and the sounds he pulls out of him, the way Harry’s cock bounces against his stomach, so hard and flushed that Jean wants to put his mouth on it, except he’s not that young that his spine is up to it. The thought strikes him, maybe he will get his chance some other time tonight…
Harry gasps his name and it takes him back into the moment - it’s not some stranger he’s picked up at a bar (with confidence he’s never possessed), it’s Harry, and all the chaotic emotions he inspires in Jean are narrowed down to the impetus to have him cry out like that, again and again. He lets go of Harry’s thighs - which immediately clasp around him, as he knew they would - to plant his hands into the bed and loom over him.
Like this, Jean can drink in all the details of his partner’s expressive face as he fucks him, the way his features contort in pleasure, eyes screwed shut. He slows down just enough to make Harry’s eyebrows knit in dissatisfaction, and then drives into him just as before to see his expression slacken, lips parted as his breath stutters.
Then Harry’s eyes open, meet Jean’s. The look they share is far more affectionate than the other one expects, and Jean goes willingly, hungrily when Harry tugs him down for a kiss. For Jean, the next few minutes are hazy bliss, wrapped up in warm arms and the slow grind of their bodies. It’s been a while, and for all the crazy rollercoaster tonight has been, this is the aspect of sex he’s missed, and he’s not even realised until now.
Soon, though, Harry is making soft, urgent noises into his mouth, and finally breaks the kiss. Jean takes the hint and pushes himself up to resume the snap of his hips, and is immediately satisfied by the way Harry’s head tilts back, arching a little off the sheets.
Except Harry is moaning and scrabbling at the sheets, his voice uttering a low and desperate string of “fuck, fuck fuck fuck Jean…!”
Jean is a few moments too late to make sense of it, and is wide-eyed with amazement when Harry’s cock throws a pale string of pearl all over his belly. Holy shit. He had no idea Harry was that close - or even that he was likely to orgasm without a hand on his dick first.
He lets out a deep exhale, slowing down. He’s unsure of what to do next, his brain a little bit staticky, fixated on the mess of Harry’s heaving chest and stomach and hearing only the smug internal voice of I did that on repeat. He’s still dazed even while he makes the decision to carefully pull out because Harry looks like he’s not up to taking more.
Kim intervenes, murmuring something fond to Harry as he cleans him up with the corner of the towel. Jean removes the condom before he becomes the culprit of any mess to the bedsheets.
“Where’s -” Kim nods to one side of the bed. “Ah. Thanks.” Jean bins it, studiously ignoring the thrum of his blood and the throb of his cock in complaint at being denied stimulation.
Returning to the bed, he thinks to say something, but the words die as he sees Kim pull Harry to him and crush their mouths together with a flash of tongue, arms winding around his taller partner. Harry groans, hands all over Kim shamelessly, every inch that he can reach. They kiss like it’s their last day alive, hot, artless, and messy. One of Harry’s wandering hands creeps calculatingly over Kim’s hip, and Kim bats it away. Harry takes the hint, but they still make for a pornographic display together that Jean doesn’t want to interrupt.
It doesn’t take any of Harry’s extrasensory abilities for either of them to tell that Jean is hovering on the periphery at the edge of the bed. Kim looks up first, and the look he gives Jean is downright predatory while Harry lazily grins.
“Shit, Jean, get over here,” Harry says breathlessly, an arm raised. Jean accepts the invitation, and is promptly tugged on top of Harry in an uncontrolled whirl of limbs. He doesn’t get the chance to grumble as he’s taken in one big hand and stroked firmly from root to tip, drawing out a different kind of moan from him instead. He’s beyond self-consciousness as he pushes into it, chasing the sensation.
“That’s it,” Harry encourages him, with zero filter. “You’re hot as fuck. Just like that. Just like you fucked me, feels so good -” his smile curves wicked as his words, “- you’re so big, next time, I want you to come inside me -”
Jean’s hips falter as the words crash together in his brain, the surprise dirty talk actually working and he’s that close all of a sudden, fucking into the tight circle of Harry’s fist in rabbit-like speed until he comes violently over the canvas of Harry’s chest and stomach.
I am too old for this shit, Jean thinks as he flops over to the other side of Harry onto his back, chest heaving, vision still sparkling at the edges. He can just about make out Kim moving next to Harry, but he feels completely boneless and unwilling to move to figure out what’s happening.
If Jean were to move, he would see Kim’s wry smile as he cleans up Harry again, and Harry’s bright answering grin. He’s not going to be tired out properly anytime soon, Kim thinks, though he’s glad to have him far more pliable than at the start of their evening: he easily nudges Harry onto his side to face Jean while he spoons up behind him, letting out his feelings in little nips up his spine.
“Gonna fuck me?” Harry rumbles. The tone is hopeful, and Kim nearly laughs at his insatiability. It’s probably a good thing he’s had Jean to help him shoulder the burden of his libido.
“Mm,” he agrees, letting a hand wander Harry’s stomach, touching him how he usually likes to be touched, keen to get him as hard and straining as he was for Jean. He can wait that long, at least. He can feel the muscles jump as he slides his palm lower. “Unless you have any objection?”
“God no,” Harry confirms, leaning into Kim’s touch. “I wanna feel you, Kim.” Kim thinks that’s going to be it, but Harry adds, slyly, “unless you wanted to get Jean to fuck me again first.”
Kim nips him harder on the shoulder for that, satisfied by the almost-mewl he elicits. Usually Harry has the good grace not to speak all of his observations aloud, especially kinks that Kim is still in the process of working out: namely, how excited he is that he gets to fuck Harry while he’s still slick and open from taking it from Jean. He didn’t know how much he liked the idea until he got to watch Jean pull out of him… the thought reminds him to sit up and reach for the lube and another condom, before he gets too carried away.
Jean, meanwhile, has just about figured out how to breathe normally again, and rolls over to face Harry. He’s stunningly attractive, no denying it: some of the cockiness has gone, but he’s still a live wire of reaction as Kim continues to caress him everywhere except his half-hard cock. Jean can’t believe his refractory period, watching Harry squirm gently against the other man.
He licks his lips, as an idea comes to mind. He could return the earlier favour, though he’s not confident enough he’ll be any good at it. It’d be a crash course in giving head. But he wants to.
“Jean?” Harry’s voice is soft, breathless.
He knows, Jean thinks, meeting his eyes. He hums questioningly.
“Whatever you’re thinking… yes.”
Jean takes the permission, and pushes himself down the bed, ignoring the heat pouring off his face. He’s curious, dammit. He wants to try this before he loses his nerve, while he’s still feeling relaxed enough not to overthink it.
The scent of his partner is thicker and enticing as he levels with his thighs. Unsurprisingly, he’s wildly hairy here, too, only the inner thighs thinned to baby-down. For a second he wants to bite and mark that unblemished skin as a kind of bestial graffito in evidence that he’s here doing this to him. The urge passes in a flash and instead he kisses the tender flesh, exploring the new territory with his mouth, both in terms of understanding his sexuality and intimate acquaintance with Harry’s body.
Harry sighs, pleased. Kim at his back, and Jean between his legs.
“God, both of you. This is disco. In stereo.”
Jean snorts against the inside of his hip where he’s been mouthing, but accepts the praise. It makes him brave enough to follow an idle desire of his. He’s got one hand drawing idle circles with his thumb on his other hip, and now, he follows the deep iliac faults inwards with his fingertips until he can gently cup his balls, the heft of them resting against his palm. His dominant hand fits at the base of his cock, until he can set his lips against the head. Harry grunts, but Jean keeps his focus - he’s not going to waste this chance to learn how to do this right.
It’s more difficult than Harry made it look, fitting his mouth around him, moreso as he feels Harry thicken and harden fully on his tongue. It feels almost too much. He makes some undignified noises as he adjusts, but soon forgets to care when hearing Harry’s low, encouraging sound as he tries to take more in. The rest of the world fades to background noise as Jean gives this endeavour his best efforts. And fuck, it feels good. The fine tremors in response to his experiments with tongue, the sharp tang as he licks over the head. He thinks he’d like to try this again sometime: he knows he’s not going to be able to finish the job, but he can sure as hell start it.
He can feel Harry shift beside him, but not under his own steam. He pulls up and off to adjust his own position, and immediately understands why: Kim has one arm hooked around Harry’s thigh. His other hand is…
“Nngh.” Harry’s fingers curl into the bedsheets in front of him. “Kim…”
Jean sits up. Kim is no longer dispassionate and removed, though his eyes are just as intense with all focus on what he’s doing with just a few fingers to his partner. His motions are as enthusiastic as they are purposeful: Jean has to admire how he holds command over him, turning the broader body he holds loose and malleable through his expert manipulation. Harry is a squirming mess and panting by the time Kim removes his fingers and wipes them clean.
Jean stays quiet. He’s smart enough to put two and two together: Harry might have been the one intent on getting them both into bed, but without saying a word, it’s obvious that Kim has the greater experience. Whether that’s specific to making Harry squirm or generally knowing his way around another man’s body, that’s harder to tell. All he knows is it’s hot as fuck, seeing Kim manhandle Harry to how he wants him, mostly on his side, almost onto his knees, while Harry babbles in his eagerness.
“Please, Kim, don’t stop -”
“I don’t intend to,” Kim answers, voice rough as he settles against him, guiding himself in without preamble. Harry pushes back against him with a low groan. Jean stays silent, not wanting to miss a moment.
Harry’s eyes are closed, overcome, and then Kim moves. It’s not fast or frantic - not like when he was teasing Harry with his fingers, but still powerful. Jean can see the shudder of Harry’s frame with each undulation of his body. Kim’s glasses are slightly askew, his breath pulled in deep lungfuls, but he doesn’t break rhythm or focus. Jean’s caught Kim smoking his one cigarette sometimes, seen how he relishes it, from the moment the lighter sparks until burned all the way down to the filter. Kim doesn’t let himself indulge often, but when he does…
He’s goddamn beautiful, and Jean is in the other man’s thrall. He wants to be in Harry’s place if only to be the one to make Kim look like that. Despite his earlier thoughts, his body purrs with low-key interest. No matter how old and worn-down he may feel, he’s a physically fit man in his mid-thirties. His body suggests he could take another workout.
Especially as his eyes move to Harry, who doesn’t hold anything back, unashamed in his hedonism. His neglected cock bounces, beading fluid at the tip that Jean now knows the taste of. He’s tempted to touch, but he’s not about to interfere with how Kim has him arranged; he wouldn’t dare.
Kim toys with Harry like a cat with a mouse. There is absolutely no question as to who is in charge. When his hips slow to a grind, Harry squirms and begs and Kim doesn’t answer his cries until they turn pitiful; when Kim indulges him and fucks him hard, he’s shuddering, gripping onto the sheets. Jean does the same - he has to bite his lip as well to not let out an embarrassing noise of his own. Kim Kitsuragi fucks. He’s sweating, pounding Harry with more energy than Jean thought was possible for a man in his mid-forties, and is both relentless and unapologetic every time he tortures Harry anew, relishing his position.
Harry looks like he’s having the time of his life. His eyes are glassy, the detective’s focus utterly gone, a slave to sensation. It gets Jean wondering, despite himself. Curiosity sinks in its hooks as Harry whimpers and scrabbles at the sheets.
Kim notices the intent way Jean’s eyes rove over them both, but his focus is elsewhere. He knows Jean likes what he sees and that’s all he needs when he already has Harry how he wants.
He’s kept a tight leash on his desires all evening. Now he doesn’t have to, and his self-control is fracturing. He fights it on sheer instinct. He’s not one to let go. Yet it feels so easy - the recent delicious memory of touching Harry, feeling the evidence for himself how Jean had him first. Harry, strong and beautiful and coming apart underneath him...
When he finally breaks, it’s with a guttural moan forced through his parted lips. He pushes Harry onto his front and grabs hold of his hips to take what he’s denied himself. Any leisureliness is gone. There is no thought, only chasing his pleasure and riding the high of Harry moaning into the pillow he’s just grabbed.
“Harry…” his voice sounds hitched and quiet over the roar of blood in his ears.
Harry’s answering groan is loud enough to be heard. “God, Kim, say it again, please, please-”
“Harry,” he snarls, strained. He’s so close -
“Fuck.”
Not Harry’s voice. It’s Jean’s, heartfelt and hungry.
Kim cries out, inarticulate. He shoves in to the hilt, collapsing over Harry’s back as he shudders, throwing most of his body weight against his partner. He’s too out of it to feel embarrassed as his body gives out, limbs trembling too much to hold him. Harry lets his legs unfurl until they’re both supported by the mattress. It’s a messy sprawl, and Kim simply cannot find the will to care.
He’s quiet, limp and breathless as Harry gently tips him onto his back. His chest heaves, his glasses are off-centre. He’s vaguely aware of Harry over him, removing his glasses to plant a kiss on his brow.
“Amazing,” Harry whispers. “You’re amazing, Kim.”
Kim finds a small reserve of energy at those words, wordlessly tugging Harry down for a brief kiss before he gets too effusive. It’s sloppy, but it works.
“Glasses,” he pants, and Harry passes them to him. It takes him all his concentration to steady his hands to replace them on his face.
Harry grins down at him, soft with affection. “Mm. You okay while I see to Jean?”
Kim summons up the energy to twist onto his side. Jean makes a pretty picture on his knees, expression full of conflicted arousal. He’s impressed by the other man’s stamina. He hums at Harry. He’s content to sit this one out, but he’ll enjoy the show regardless. Harry’s still raring to go.
Harry sits up and stretches, arms over his head like he’s limbering up for gym. Jean’s too busy staring at the image that he creates to sense the danger incoming when Harry pounces on him, pushing him flat back onto the mattress.
“Goddamn -!”
He makes to sit up, but Harry grinds against him and his complaint is cut off into a low grunt of surprise and pleasure.
With a filthy grin, Harry sits up, allowing Jean to do the same with a glare, albeit with a continued lapful of sexy menace. Harry casually slings an arm around his shoulder, and looks into his eyes like he can see the answers to the mysteries of the universe in Jean. It makes him sweat, makes him feel pinned, like one of their goddamn suspects, but he’s so turned-on that he doesn’t think to protest. He’ll be interrogated, and his secrets, no matter how shameful or illicit will be dragged into the light, and he’s going to like it.
Harry’s eyes narrow calculatingly, then relax into confidence. Jean’s breath catches, waiting for the opening gambit.
“What can I do with you now, Jean?” Harry whispers, leaning in so their foreheads almost touch, his breath almost a kiss. “Tell me how I should make you feel good.”
“Shit.” Jean tries to hold his tongue. He can’t give in at the first attempt. He just can’t.
Harry makes a dissatisfied rumbling sound, and shifts in his lap, bringing both hands up to rake through Jean’s short, already dishevelled hair. It makes his eyes roll back closed; it feels far better than it should.
“Is that what you want?” Harry murmurs, his breath tickling Jean’s beard as he moves towards his ear. “For me to force it out of you?”
Jean shivers at the evocative mental image. A lance of fear runs through him - Harry absolutely could - and while his dick says yes, who knows what else Harry might find while rummaging his darkest desires?
“Or to tease it out?” Harry sucks a kiss at the edge of his jaw, slides a hand over one of Jean’s thighs, rubbing circles with his thumb. “I’d like to see how much you can take…”
“Nngh…” Jean hates that he’s so easy for him. He has to resist spreading his legs to let that hand explore inward a little further.
“C’mon, Jean. I’m willing to give you anything.” It’s all sweet promise, a murmur against his skin. Not even Kim can hear it. Harry is offering, and it’s only pride and nerves combined that keep him from taking it.
“What if -” Jean has to swallow, his voice sounding too-loud after all Harry’s gentle cajoling. “What if I wanted to try something?”
“Then I’m game.”
“And what if I changed my mind?”
“Then we can do something else,” Harry answers without hesitation. He pulls back, expression far more sober than a few moments ago, taking the request seriously. “But now I’m intrigued. What did you have in mind?”
He has to take a few deep breaths to shore up his courage to put it into words. His resultant answer is far more blunt than it should be, given what he’s asking. “I want to get fucked.”
The reaction is almost worth the difficulty in saying it: Harry’s eyes go wide, pupils blown. His hands cup Jean’s face, and he kisses him breathless.
“God, Jean. Yes. Absolutely - yes. Gonna make you feel so good.” The words fall from him in a torrent as he sits up and gropes around the sheets blindly for the lube in a whirlwind of movement. Jean feels his stomach swoop with nerves, alarmed at the intent.
“Easy, detective.” Kim’s voice is gentle and amused. He picks up the bottle from behind him - and doesn’t pass it over. “You may want to slow down.”
Harry looks torn at that, breathing heavily. He turns back to Jean with wild optimism, but one look at Jean’s you are fucking kidding, don’t you dare expression tells him that Kim is absolutely right. He takes one deep breath. He doesn’t look any less wild for it. He takes another. And another. It makes Kim smile, despite himself. Bless Harry and his enthusiasm.
“Why don’t I help?” He suggests. His eyes turn to Jean, and soften. “If you don’t mind.”
Jean gives a short nod, relieved for Kim’s intervention, with Harry practically vibrating with excitement in front of him.
Kim sits up with a slow stretch and a short groan, but it’s only his muscles that are complaining. This was absolutely the last thing he expected to hear from Jean, and he wants to see it done right, not rushed. His pride demands it, his mind’s eye already conjuring up a striking image of Jean, days later, alone and aroused by the memory of pleasure received, hungering for more. It’s not for everyone, and maybe Jean won’t decide to repeat this experiment, but Kim allows that he can quietly fantasize it. At the very least, he’d like to orchestrate that Jean enjoys the experience as much as possible.
“Have you experimented at all?” Kim asks unblushingly, ascertaining how much work he’ll need to put in. He smiles when he gets a nod in reply. “And did you like it?”
“Yeah. Uh. Yes.” Jean has to try his voice twice to get the response out.
Kim senses his embarrassment, and pretends to be more interested in the bottle in his hands: perhaps this will be easier on Jean without the direct eye contact. “How much? Just fingers? Or more?”
“... Just fingers.” Jean hates how he has to clear his throat to stop his voice fading. It doesn’t help that Kim isn’t even a little bit fazed while he is flustered.
Kim nods. “Mm. Would you prefer to prepare yourself?”
Goddamn it, Kim. Jean decides Kim is trying to give him a coronary. At the very least, he’s got him off-balance, and he hates that. Harry used to make him feel that way all the time, until he got a handle on it. He just never expected it from the sharp, quiet man he knows at work. Fuck. He draws upon the sardonicism that has served him so well for many years, a biting shield when he feels at his most vulnerable.
“Fuck. You offering?” He tries a smirk, but has a horrible feeling it looks like Harry’s terrible facsimile of Guillaume le Million.
Which explains why Kim’s answering smirk is brief and muted, and his voice is surprisingly soft. “Of course.”
“I’m not gonna pass that up,” Jean says, decisively, as if he hadn’t been thinking about it from the second Kim had joined them. “You seem to know what the hell you’re doing.”
It’s not an intentional dig at Harry, but he still feels guilty the moment it leaves his mouth: he’s done it so many times. Harry hasn’t always deserved it, but it’s almost a reflex.
“I do,” Kim answers, and there’s a trace of steel in his voice that distracts him thoroughly from his internal chastisement, forcing him to meet his gaze. The Lieutenant continues, slow and deliberate, “and while I would enjoy making you come from just fingers alone, personally - I want to see you come with Harry inside you.”
“Fuck.” Jean shivers, and Kim looks satisfied at that.
“Mm.” Kim nods, far more business-like, and then nods to Harry. “Why don’t you help him to relax?” He prompts, gesturing with a twirl of his fingers for Harry to sit behind Jean, which he hurriedly obeys in a sprawl of limbs, jostling the other men on the mattress until he settles.
“Good. Let him recline - perfect,” Kim praises, pleased to be in charge once more over the two men. Jean still looks somewhat uncertain, a distinct tension under his attempt at an impassive face, which simply will not do. Nerves are understandable, but he also wants to allay them.
He catches Jean’s gaze, and holds it steady. “I am not going to rush this. If you need to stop, say so. Try to relax, let Harry take your weight…” he moves in closer on his knees, and sets his hands on Jean’s thighs. “... and let me take care of you.”
“God,” Jean mutters, caught between nerves and heat as Kim gently pushes his thighs further apart over Harry’s lap. He groans softly as Harry makes himself useful by mouthing at his neck, and his breath catches as Kim strokes the insides of his thighs in slow circles.
It turns out, the Lieutenant wasn’t joking about not rushing. He’s trying not to squirm by the time Kim sees fit to extract contents from the lube bottle. He’s a lot less tense from Kim’s gentle caresses and Harry squeezing his shoulders, and it’s only the coolness that makes him tense when Kim runs a slick finger in place, not probing or pushing, just a glide over the hot, tender skin. He bites his lip as Kim splays a palm over his ass and digs in to help part him for easier access.
“Want me to help?” Harry rumbles, shifting until he can get his hands under Jean’s thighs, his bigger hands easily dwarfing Kim’s.
Kim checks Jean’s face for consent, and seeing it, hums his approval. Jean has to close his eyes, feeling how exposed he is as Harry obligingly holds him open.
But it does feel good, Kim tracing the skin lightly until everything feels wet and the glide of his finger rocking back and forth is smooth. It feels good in a way he doesn’t quite have the voice to articulate, different to how he had roughly explored himself. It is also inexplicably hot to see Kim’s bespectacled face so intently focused on his ass, with the kind of expression Jean’s seen on him when admiring a particularly fine piece of machinery. He’s not hard, but it’s clear he’s getting something out of this.
“Fuck, Kim.” Jean can’t take it anymore, he’s trying not to push his hips forward now - he’s still hard, getting off as much on the idea as the action, and he’s demanding because he’s afraid his body will give him away first. “Stop teasing and get on with it!”
Kim looks up, and the smile that graces his lips spreads so wide that Jean swallows. He half expects to be eaten alive. Instead, Kim blessedly obeys, increasing the pressure and slips in one fingertip - just barely. He strokes and teases with sweeps of his other fingers tracing the muscle.
You’re an absolute bastard, Kitsuragi, Jean thinks, trying not to impatiently beg for more, and all thought is swept away afterwards as while Kim teases, Harry finds a particularly sensitive spot at the back of his neck with his teeth and tongue, his hands still massaging and kneading.
By the time Kim has his fingers pistoning slickly inside him, Jean is panting, sticking to Harry with sweat, and limp against him. He’s simultaneously wound so tight that he wants to scream while feeling so completely relaxed and open that Harry is forced to absorb all of his body weight. Kim is ruthless, keeping him suspended in a limbo of semi-arousal: he offers kisses, the press of his own body, deliberate strokes that make him writhe and bear down for more, and then he withdraws his heat and touch to the shallowest stretch, repeating the cycle until Jean is dizzy with it.
It can’t go on.
Jean’s hazy thoughts turn to the rugged boiadeiros of North Mesque and the strong, proud stallions they capture on the steppes. Jean has only ever ridden the stable-trained and bred hacks of the RCM, but he knows the boiadeiros can capture the fiercest bronco and wear the animal down until it is obedient, even-tempered, and accepting.
He’s beyond begging or demanding, utterly at the mercy of the two men holding him.
As Kim pushes in until his knuckles grind against his skin there is no discomfort, the muscle yielding easily. He feels completely unspooled, and yet, completely safe. It feels contradictory in Jean’s tumultuous life. He has these two men to thank for it. He lets out a low grunt, feelingly, as Kim seems to test spreading him wider still.
“Kim…” the voice is pleading and cuts through his haze. It’s Harry’s, low and begging.
Harry has shifted him a few times to get a hand in and take the edge off, and as far as Jean can tell, he’s been fully hard all this time.
“Khm. What do you think, Jean?” Kim leans in, eyes flashing affectionate and wicked, a purr against Jean’s cheek. “Feel ready?”
Such a bastard. Jean shores up the dregs of his remaining rebelliousness to kiss Kim in answer, but loses all fight as Kim lets him plunder his mouth for a few stolen moments. Kim takes the opportunity to slide his fingers free. Surprised and satisfied, Jean pulls back, a smile threatening to break out on his face as he sinks back. “Yeah.”
And he is. He is absolutely more than ready to find out what this is going to be like, and especially with the person he’s going to do this with. He wants to know all there is to know regarding both.
He tilts his head, just enough to indicate his next words are for Harry, his voice full of challenge to mask his nervousness. “You gonna make good on your earlier threats?”
Harry whimpers at his neck in reply. Jean can feel his breath shudder in his chest, pressed against his back.
“Jean…” but whatever Harry planned to say is lost in a sigh. He instead delivers in action, sliding Jean from his lap down onto his knees in one easy movement, and with one hand spread in the small of his back, encourages him to bend over. Jean does. The position makes him feel open and exposed, and he hides his mortification with his face pressed into the sheets, his arms folded in front of him. Harry’s hands smooth over his back in a soothing caress, down to his hips. He takes a deep gulp of a breath as the same hands massage in, and exhales sharply when they nudge his thighs further apart. Jean expects for him to move, but Harry seems content to continue tracing mindless circles over his lower back. It takes him a moment to work out that Harry is looking at him.
“Come on, Harry,” he groans, aiming for commanding but falling far short. Nonetheless, it makes Harry snap out of his reverie and Jean can see out of the corner of his eye his partner scramble for a condom and the lube, and settle behind him again. For all his earlier haste, it doesn’t seem like he’s fumbling this time, although Jean is certain from the sounds he can hear that he’s using an excessive amount of lubricant.
“Jean… ” Harry’s voice quavers, and it makes all of Jean’s insides dance and his skin glow fever-hot. He almost wants to snap at him to hurry up, to not sound like that because he can’t take it, but he’s not left waiting. A hand strokes his hip, and then there’s the slick, blunt press of Harry’s cock. His fingers tighten in the sheets, trying not to tense as Harry tests the give, waits for him to relax.
The sound he makes when Harry finally pushes inside is ungodly, and thank fuck half of it was muffled by his arms. Harry stops, immediately, but it’s not pain that ripped the sound from his throat.
“Fuck, Harry…” Jean knows his voice is slurred, but if Harry doesn’t continue, he might have to kill him. He mercifully takes the hint, and Jean welcomes the sensation, the heat of him and the stretch; somehow both more and less intense than the head of his cock was. It’s new and strange and good, the feeling of fullness, the way Harry’s fingers clutch involuntarily at his hips. He moans again, overwhelmed as Harry’s thighs meet his own. “F-f-fuck…”
God. He’s trembling. It’s just sex, he tells himself furiously, but he can’t even convince himself. It’s just so goddamn intimate.
“Jean?”
And Harry’s voice is all warm breath and tenderness. He can’t speak, but he does let out a little grunt to let him know he’s fine. He can feel Harry exhale and relax, above and around him, and the careful nudge of his hips that sends sparks through his whole body, a hint of more.
“Okay?” Harry is stubborn, not moving more, and Jean has to resist to bury his face deeper into the bedsheets. He knows he’s going to sound as wrecked as he feels when he lifts his head to answer.
“Yes, fuck, just - move -” he rasps, his voice cut short as Harry does, and then Jean has to turn his face back into the sheets to bury the noises he can’t help but make. He’s never been loud during sex, for god’s sake, and here here is, vocalising his pleasure with every other thrust, unable to stop himself from growling, moaning, grunting with the pressure nudging against his prostate and feeling the hot, heavy weight of Harry above him.
And hearing Harry, still as talkative as ever. “God Jean, you feel so good, you’re so hot, fuck,” Harry groans, his hips gaining pace. The change rips a low sob of pleasure out of Jean, and he feels instantly mortified by it, trying to bite his lip and stifle the sounds.
Harry can hear the difference as he tries to coax more sounds out of Jean, and he lets out a growl of frustration. He slows his thrusts to a lazy grind, a subtle rocking. “Don’t, don’t - I want to hear you,” he murmurs fervently, leaning over his back and kissing him in the centre of his spine.
Jean swallows. He’s a little too overwhelmed, the idea just that side of too vulnerable.
Harry makes a distressed sound at Jean’s continued silence, and then pulls out. Only then Jean rouses, raising his head from the safe cage of his arms in alarm, but Harry scoops him into his arms and rolls him onto his back, manhandling him gently. It takes a moment for Jean to take stock of their new position, and his eyes roll back as Harry grasps his thighs and pushes back in. He moans then, open and loud as he’s filled.
One of Harry’s hands cups his jaw, and he opens his eyes.
His breath stills. Harry’s eyes shine down on him like he’s discovered the hidden treasures of Le Royaume in his bed instead of Jean, perfectly ordinary. If he weren’t feeling so desperately horny, he might have hid his face again. He closes his eyes.
“Don’t hide,” Harry says, hoarsely, stroking through his beard with his thumb in circles. “Let me see you.”
And that’s it, Jean realises, that’s what thrills him and terrifies him. Having Harry see him, the way he sees everything else. Having that attention turned on him, and him alone. Even now, he’s still pulling away from it. Deep down, he wants this, and he wants to be known. He just has to give himself that permission.
He takes a deep breath, and opens his eyes. He doesn’t fight it, and he lets himself get lost in the sea-green eyes peering down at him.
Harry’s stares at first, caught by surprise at the boldness, his breathing turning uneven, but then his expression brightens into an adoring smile, and he shifts to haul Jean’s legs up and around his waist.
“That’s it,” Harry encourages, as he rocks his hips again, and Jean’s eyes flutter closed for a moment; he can’t help it. It feels good in this position, caged by Harry’s broad frame, the angle not as deep but seeing Harry’s hips flex and his face contort with pleasure more than making up for it.
Harry dips his head and whispers praise onto his skin between open-mouthed kisses, and Jean feels like he’s being set aflame, not sure which is worse as he’s fucked steadily senseless. His moans fall freely now from his mouth. His hands clutch two fistfuls of pillows either side of his head: his cock is leaking steadily over his stomach, throbbing, and he doesn’t trust himself not to just grab at himself and jack himself off to a short and messy completion. He’s already beginning to push back, try and draw Harry deeper.
“Fuck, you’re perfect,” his partner groans, backing off enough to see him splayed beneath him, how Jean’s face alternates between slack, open-mouthed pleasure and furrow-browed tension, and how his body arcs to meet his thrusts. Harry pushes up onto his elbows and thrusts faster, giving into some of his own desire. The slick-slap of skin rings loud, and Jean growls at the feel of being so taken, tightening the grip of his thighs on Harry’s frame.
Jean looks at Harry - really looks. He sees Harry as he first met him, before the sharp slide downwards, but he also sees the Harry he knows as his partner today - the twinkle in his eye, the strain to his smile - for a moment, Jean blinks and he sees Harry as he knows him: ruddy-faced, aged, survivor of self-inflicted damage. He’s not having sex with a handsome stranger, and he realises he knew that all along. He would never do this with someone he didn’t trust.
It’s not a revelation, but it’s acceptance, ceding himself to his desires. He frees a hand to take the back of Harry’s hand, fingers curled into his sweaty over-long hair, and tug him down to kiss him again, wanting to feel their bodies pressed together. Harry gets it, and bears down on him with his full weight, stopping the snap of his hips to enjoy twining together like this instead.
When both of them are satisfied and eager to continue, Harry pulls himself back up, looks at Jean with fire in his eyes, and resumes at that same eager-fast pace, and then it’s all Jean can do to keep air in his lungs, the groans fucked out of him.
“Shit, m’close, gonna come,” Harry gasps, also out of breath.
The thrill of it, the idea that Harry might come inside him any moment has Jean forget any and all self-consciousness as he grabs his cock and oh shit, it feels too good, he’s not going to last long enough to see it -
Except it’s Harry whose eyes turn wide, locked onto Jean’s desperate rutting into his fist, his eyes screwing shut as he shoves forward hard, once, stilling and shuddering all around him, his breath leaving him in a gasp.
Jean might have survived watching Harry come, might have managed to hold on a little longer despite his own furious motions, but then Harry’s hips shift into lazy circles, and a soft “Jean…” fills the quiet after the smack of their bodies has stopped. That more than does it, and Jean ejaculates, missing his hand entirely in his clumsy haste and coming all over his belly.
His legs slide, jelly-like, from Harry’s waist. He can only gasp for air in a cloud of post-coital hormones and utter exhaustion, his limbs completely uncooperative. He lets out the weakest of moans as Harry pulls out, only vaguely aware of the dull ache, and shivers with residual pleasure in the process. He can’t ever remember having sex that’s left him so wrung out in his life.
Images float hazily past his still-glassy gaze: Harry sitting up. Kim leaving the bed, and then the room. Harry looking tired but pleased as he leans in and nudges Jean into a quick kiss that he can barely reciprocate. Kim returning to the room, and then the bed, a hot and damp cloth swept over him from sternum to groin with gentle care. He manages to grunt his thanks, and earns a kiss from Kim.
Jean just about can breathe evenly again by the time Kim and Harry are padding around the room, picking up the detritus of clothing and gently bickering over whose garment is whose. Harry makes a playful quip about Kim enjoying two sets of tailoring and then disappears into the bathroom. Kim locates pyjamas in a drawer several sizes too big, and tosses them beside Jean’s head, much to his surprise.
“Make yourself comfortable, Jean,” Kim says, with a soft smile. He looks relaxed, content. It’s such an unfamiliar expression that Jean can’t help but follow it around the room for a moment, even as he sits up to consider the borrowed pyjamas, and what that means. It makes absolute sense to stay the night. He’s too fucked to go home, but he feels out of his depth. Harry and Kim seem comfortable enough - have they done this before? Or are they just that comfortable with him?
He moves to the edge of the bed - very carefully, after a reminding twinge of his recent activity - and pulls on the bottoms. He foregoes the top, knowing he runs hot.
Harry returns from the bathroom, a towel around his neck and his face still slightly damp. He eyes Jean wearing what must be his pyjamas, and looks delighted. Kim makes to move past him for the bathroom, but Harry stops him and kisses him first. Jean boggles at the domesticity of it, at the same time his heart squeezes in longing. He’s been made part of this private world, but he has no tools by which to navigate it, feeling unmoored. He’s too tired to find the words and ask, and so he stays where he is. Harry walks around to Jean’s side of the bed.
“Here, get under the covers.” Harry helps manhandle him in, and once he’s settled sitting up against the headboard, he kisses him on the forehead. “You’re welcome to stay. If you want to just rest and leave later, that’s fine too. But we’d like it if you stayed.”
The explicit permission helps alleviate some of his worries. He nods, and Harry beams before striding out towards the living room.
Jean settles against a pillow and makes himself comfortable. He feels relaxed, sleepy, tired in a good way. He rarely sleeps well, but suspects he may do tonight. He should first see about maybe brushing his teeth, or drinking some water, or a proper wash…
But he falls asleep almost immediately.
*
When Jean wakes, it’s dark. He feels hot as a furnace, slightly sticky and uncomfortable. This is explained by a very warm, slightly furry chest pressed up against his back and an arm swung over his hip, as though Jean is the softest of teddy bears.
He also needs the toilet, and so he spends a few minutes very carefully extricating himself from the bed without making any noise. Despite the persistent press of his bladder, he turns back to gaze in the semi-dark on the sleeping forms beneath the blanket. Blankets, he notes: the bedspread wasn’t made for three, and so Kim and Harry have improvised.
He swallows down the irrational pounding of his heart, and heads to the bathroom. It’s significantly cooler outside of the bedroom, and it wakes him up enough to begin to think.
What happens next is a conversation for when one or all of them are awake. Jean can’t really believe what he’s done, but neither does he regret it. What concerns him is Harry’s condition, now he isn’t being thoroughly distracted by him. He also has background concerns about finishing the job as far as the weapons stockpile is concerned, but Harry is taking up most of his capacity for worrying right now. Always has done.
Mind made up, he slips into the living room, and shuts all adjoining doors. He doesn’t turn on the light, not wanting to flood the bedroom through any cracks in the door and disturb its occupants. Moonlight spills through a window, making it easy enough to carefully make his way over to the phone.
He dials Trant’s number from memory, feeling out the numbers. The man keeps odd hours so chances are that he’ll answer, and given the unusual nature of his enquiry, he’ll be smart enough to understand that Jean hasn’t just developed a sudden dead-of-night interest in entroponetics.
He expects to wait for long peals of dial-tone, but the line clicks after two rings. Jean is relieved to hear Trant answer, cheerful but tired: “Trant Heidelstam speaking.”
“It’s Jean. Damn, you really don’t ever sleep,” Jean greets, with his usual acerbic brand of affection.
“Luckily for you,” Trant retorts, but his voice is warm. “What do you need?”
“Your knowledge on entroponetics, and confidentiality,” Jean replies.
“Colour me intrigued.” Trant genuinely sounds it, unfazed by the lateness of the hour and his own audible fatigue. “My knowledge is purely hobbyist, I wouldn’t use it in developing a case... so with the caveat it’s not one of my specialisms, what did you want to know?”
Jean smiles slightly, because that’s Trant’s inevitable modus operandi: to deny he knows anything if he knows it at anything less than a PhD level.
“Let’s say… let’s say it was possible to condense the pale. Put it in a bullet in a gun. Hypothetically,” Jean stresses. “If someone got hit with something like that. Is it possible it could change them - physically?”
Trant lets out a low whistle. “Hm. That’s an… interesting circumstance. I don’t think anyone has seen anything like condensed pale - or at least, managed to leave the far-Pale with their mind intact enough to tell us about it. But it sounds like you’re talking about Harry’s unusual theory - with pale appearing outside of the Pale itself?”
“Yeah.” It’s a little annoying how quick on the uptake Trant can be, and Jean’s concern is that he’ll ask too many questions about this seemingly-hypothetical scenario.
Trant hums a moment in thought. “Contained to a bullet…”
“Or similar. Weaponised, at any rate,” Jean corrects, quickly.
“We’d be talking immediate over-radiation, extremely localised. If the individual’s mind survived it - well. I think any physical change would be a matter of perception.” Before Jean can ask what he means, he continues, “it’s well-documented that pale alters perception. If localised to a person who is irradiated, they might unwittingly transmit the effect. Like a beacon of pale, themselves.”
Jean feels his stomach drop. “Like walking nuclear waste?”
“Oh, not as bad as that - it wouldn’t irradiate others in the same way,” Trant says, tone reassuring. “Although not without its own issues… Jean, understand we are talking beyond hypothetical, here. I can only make suppositions based on my readings of observed entroponetic studies, and this is… unobserved, to say the least.”
“Understood.” Jean knows Trant is working up to something. “Hit me with it.”
“Alright.” Trant clears his throat. “So in regards to immediate concerns - provided there’s no further source of pale, I think we can reasonably conclude that it has no further ability to metastasise - reality is safe. However, there would be two major observable effects: on the individual, and on those who interact with such an individual, if close enough to be within the area of radiation.
“As we know, pale interferes with the human psyche, and especially memory. A person hit with intense pale - it’s almost certainly a system-shock for the mind. How this might manifest - this could be taken from several theories, depending on the school of thought: Königstein psychology, Graadian entropenetics, neurology…”
“Pick whichever seems most damn likely to you,” Jean cuts in, keen to head off a lecture on the history of academia for each.
“Very well.” Trant takes in a breath, a pause for thought. “I would think of the mind in this case as a misprogrammed radiocomputer, built in with operations to restore itself as efficiently as possible. So the consciousness would… hit the reset button. Or take a temporary system-shutdown, like a coma, before booting back up. Perhaps both.”
Trant pauses in case of challenge, but Jean is both impressed and wary that Trant absolutely nailed what happened in that basement room, and remains silent for him to continue.
“Fortunately, the human brain is incredibly resilient, and has a tendency to search for patterns and stability when information - and sensory input - is absent. That much is observable in all those overexposed to the Pale: even those who are socially removed can be scanned to see that they have highly active thought processes.
“With this model in mind, my guess is that a pale-blasted mind would be a blank slate seeking content, something like a sponge - wanting to fill the void with whatever it can absorb from its surroundings. To compensate for the extreme sensory deprivation and fill it as soon as possible. Nature abhors a vacuum, at its conclusion.
“Let’s take Harry’s unusual memory loss episode, for example,” Trant continues conversationally, while Jean’s mouth turns dry. “Note how as time passed with familiarity of his old role, he regained his usual skill, but also note the changes in him - how the interactions he made with others influenced his rate of recovery.
“With true, instant pale exposure? It might resemble that, but in a symbiotic relationship: the pale-irradiated individual would pick up on subtle cues and expectations from others, and react accordingly. Maybe even directly intuit them from memory-radiation.”
“Wait,” Jean breathes, “are you saying you could… alter the mind of someone like that? Like, fucking brainwash them?”
“Not exactly,” Trant hedges, and Jean nearly snaps at him, until he continues, “perhaps a metaphor would better explain. If our affected person was a carpenter, in his carpenter’s workshop, wearing the clothes and wielding the tools of the profession, and others met him, they would expect he is a carpenter. This would actually benefit the individual and more rapidly stabilise his mind, as he draws on existing long-term memory and the external feedback that he is, indeed, a carpenter. In fact,” Trant’s voice turns excited, “I could see some very possible benefits to this scenario! If the carpenter was asked to work under such conditions, it’s possible they would outperform themselves. Become the epitome of what they could be. Perhaps there is something to the ancient practise of Iilmaraan pale-walking - while I don’t endorse it, it would be interesting to know whether the performance-enhancing properties could be -”
“Trant.” Jean interrupts him, impatiently.
“Right, sorry. The concern would be in the reverse scenario: if those who met the carpenter expected him to, say, be a metallurgist - perhaps misunderstanding his role. Or maybe, after being found in the wrong place. The belief of those finding him would have to be genuine, of course - it is the void of the subject pulling in the thought processes of others to make up for the elements missing in the brain. Therefore, the carpenter may try, given the tools, to work metal, but all that would be left is an innate belief he is a metallurgist, but none of the skill.” Trant tuts. “Pale could not fundamentally alter his lived experience: only his perception of it.”
Jean turns this over in his mind for a moment. “And his memories as well?”
“Of course. To a greater or lesser degree. That might depend on a number of factors.”
“Such as…?”
“Khm.” Trant thinks through his answer. “Now we’re really off-book as far as actual studies go, but my hypothesis for the degree of change would be whether the persons involved were strangers or familiar. Let’s say a parent greets their irradiated child… the parent has memories of the child, the child has memories of the parent; together, they build and affirm each other’s identity. However, if a stranger meets the child, they have no memories that map to the child’s past experience. The child’s recovery may be longer. It could be quite dangerous, depending on the stranger’s intent - if they wanted the child to behave in a particular way, it could subtly alter the child’s mind.”
Trant chuckles. “Not that a parent wouldn’t influence the child, too, but who would be to say whether that’s pale-induced or natural?”
“Would this be true of an adult?”
“Yes - all minds are young, compared to the Pale.”
Jean says nothing as he absorbs the concept, and Trant continues. “I would also hypothesise the reverse is possible: the individual could be more talented in other ways, and perhaps, having a strong influencing effect on their own… but this is pure conjecture, of course.”
Jean thinks very carefully back to how he had interacted with Harry, from the moment he had found him on the basement floor. “... So how does this explain the… irradiated individual looking physically different? Especially if the people knew each other well?”
“I mentioned it before: perception.” Trant has warmed to the topic, all hesitance forgotten now. “And symbiosis. The irradiated-mind absorbs and memory and thought from others - but it’s still radiating pale itself.
“Back to our carpenter - let’s say he had a scar on his face from an accident, but was found by an old friend of his, who knew him before then. His friend would have numerous memories of him without the scar. If those memories were touched upon as they interacted - he might very well see the same man, but as though before the accident. And it would be the same for the carpenter, believing it himself.”
“You can’t mean - that’s bullshit,” Jean can’t help but exclaim. “Surely touching it would be enough to break the illusion -”
“It’s not an illusion,” Trant interjects calmly. “We still don’t really know how much the Pale influences our reality. Even in neurology, we’re still groping in the dark... it would certainly feel real, and who is to say it not? Perhaps it could cause a permanent change, under the right circumstances. Belief is a powerful thing… it can change the nature of a man. But I think we would be talking near-constant reinforcement over a period of days, maybe even weeks.”
“Fuck.” Jean stares at the dark wall on the other side of the apartment, thinking through the ramifications of having just spent a whole evening and the night next to Harry, thinking how much he wanted him, this. Wondering what damage he might have already done. But did he have a hope of making this phone call earlier, when Harry was drawing on Jean’s own belief in Harry’s brilliance?
“Jean?” Trant prompts. “Forgive me for speculating on this, ah, hypothetical scenario, but… is there any other salient information you would wish to add?”
This is why Jean fought tooth and nail to keep Trant Heidelstam in C-Wing. He’s not only smart, but he’s actually a decent damn human being.
“Yeah,” he exhales, trying to keep his voice casual. “You suggested changes could be permanent. Let’s say they weren’t. How long would this last? This… warped perception?”
“Without means to identify it, it could be some time,” Trant says, but he sounds more upbeat. “Fortunately, if all parties are aware of this happening, then it should be more possible to detect, and hasten stabilising the individual. Theoretically.” Trant takes a deep breath. “There is one more area of concern, and that would be around physical distance. Taking the parent-child scenario: they would doubtless be in near-constant close contact after such an event. If the parent was traumatised by the surrounding experience, they may well pass those demons directly to the child, unwittingly. Of course, the inverse is equally true - if the parent believes wholly that the child is good and whole, it might help. And if the parent believes their child is a mathematical genius, they might find themselves doing surprisingly well at school.”
It’s on the tip of Jean’s tongue, to ask how sex would factor into this theory of physical distance, but that might be too much information, even for Trant. He has enough to chew on.
“Thanks, Trant,” he says, wearily. “Keep this one between us, alright?”
“I will.” Jean has no doubt about it, though he can tell Trant is dying to ask more and start writing a paper on it. “If you need anything else, just call. This… hypothetical sounds fascinating.” There’s a fractional pause, and Jean nearly speaks, but Trant adds, fast, “one more thing, Jean. If there were ever such an incident, I would advise you not to feel at blame for any changes wrought upon a person. We are influenced by those significant to us all the time. Being shot is enough of a trauma to make someone reconsider their calling - no entroponetic influence required.”
Jean takes a moment for the information to settle. “Right. Thanks.”
“You’re welcome.”
“No, really - thanks, Heidelstam.” Jean appreciates both the information and the reassurance.
“Give my regards to Harry.” Before Jean can think of a smart reply to Trant’s insinuating request, the phone clicks back to dial-tone.
Jean sets the receiver down, and lets himself have a full-blown moment of panic.
It all makes sense, in a fucked-up and horrifying way. Jean’s always wanted his old partner back, the one that hadn’t fucked himself up on an excess of booze and drugs. And deep-down, he still remembers that version of Harry Du Bois. Worse still: how many times had he wished that Harry had never met Dora Ingerlund? Jean’s fucking projected him into existence from his own insecurities - to a certain extent, he could live with that. What worries him is how Harry flirted with both him and Kim from the get-go. Did he make Harry do something he would never otherwise do, by way of his own past desires? He kept them well-buried, but thinking Harry was possibly dead had brought them to the fore…
Though some of it was likely Kim’s influence, he reminds himself. Kim couldn’t have known he was feeding Harry’s thoughts that way. Shit, it probably explained how Harry was practically insatiable - one big feedback loop of altered brain chemistry between all three of them, pale skewing the physically possible.
What if Harry hadn’t wanted it?
He hears footsteps padding out towards the living room, too heavy to be Kim’s.
“I could hear you fretting,” Harry says quietly, from the doorway, before stepping closer. Jean can’t really see him in the semi-dark, just a broad outline. “It’s not that bad.”
“Really.” Jean exhales through his nose and looks away. “You can’t know that.”
“You’d be surprised.” Harry steps closer behind him, sets a hand on his shoulder. “I know a lot of things.”
“That’s the problem. Harry,” Jean says, tightly. “What if your memories are fucked and that’s my fault?” He decides not to deny what he’s just been doing - for all he knows, Harry had heard him place the call. “Apparently my thoughts could have influenced you after you got hit with that pale weapon -”
“So what if you did,” Harry says, unconcerned, fingers digging into his shoulder in reassurance, an impromptu massage into the tension. “You couldn’t have stopped the weapon being fired. What would the alternative have been? I’m glad it’s you and Kim who were there first. People who had good intentions towards me. People who both genuinely care about me.”
Jean wants to argue, but Harry slides in closer, getting both hands on his very tense shoulders. “You couldn’t make me think anything I didn’t already think. Hadn’t already considered. Just - didn’t think it was possible. The stuff I remembered…” Harry pauses, tries to think how to frame it. “It’s impressionistic. I know I was in a lot of pain… before. Now - it feels less. I feel better. Maybe that’s temporary. But I’m still me.” His voice is more somber. “Jean. I still know I fucked up. I still remember that I fucked you over. And you could have carried that resentment, and you’d have had the right to… but that you wanted to help me, even while I was still a mess…”
Harry sighs. “You’re a good man. A very good man. Wish it hadn’t taken me two rounds of regaining my memories to understand that.”
Jean swallows. He hears the unsaid. What could have been.
Jamrock nights are never silent, but it’s still a special kind of stillness in the dark, the sounds of the world muted. A dog barks in the distance. The beat of new dance music can be faintly heard thrumming on the horizon like a heartbeat. Here, there’s only the sound of their breathing together. Thoughts loud and unspoken.
It takes him a few breaths, a few more passes of Harry’s warm, firm hands for him to find the courage to ask, “so what happens now?”
“Mm.” Harry considers, his fingers stilling. “I need to get my head back together, fully. So do you.”
Jean can’t argue that. It’s been a rollercoaster ride. He’s fairly sure he’s going to have some sort of full-on panic attack when he gets home.
“Then we can talk… more. About what this means.”
Jean hums his acknowledgement. He’s not sure whether that’s something to look forward to, but he agrees with its necessity.
“But…” Harry hesitates, and the moment stretches out so long that Jean is about to prompt him, when he finally concludes the thought. “... I hope it means something.”
Jean considers the words. He takes a slow, deep breath, and then takes a risk. He mentally puts one foot in front of the other, stepping up to the cliff’s edge. “...It does.”
“Good.” Harry sounds relieved. “That’s good.”
The words hold the silence that fills the room again. One of Harry’s thumbs strokes musingly in place.
“And Kim?” Harry finally asks.
Jean thinks of the other side of Kim he’s seen tonight. Not yet fully explored. Not yet fully reconciled with the upstanding man he knows from work and as a friend over the past two years. But he would like to.
“I’d like to get to know him better,” he answers.
“I’ll talk to him,” Harry says, voice soft and warm. “And we can go from there.”
That’s as good as either of them can manage, sinking into their own private thoughts. Jean can’t let himself hope for anything. It’s too much of a risk. But he trusts Harry, and he can at least hope for an answer. Harry rubs his shoulders again, and he closes his eyes and lets him. At least he has tonight.
The night air settles on them both, and despite warm hands, soon his skin turns cool.
“Let’s go back to bed,” Harry suggests after a few more moments.
“Yeah. Alright.” Jean smiles at the words, and turns to face his partner.
Harry’s face creases into a smile, cast in moonlight - an older, wearier face, familiar and welcome. Jean quietly sighs, glad to see the man he knows best at last.
“Yeah, I know,” Harry huffs, the smile turning into that familiar awkward grimace. “Going to miss being that physically fit again though.”
“You could work out, like I do,” Jean says after a pause, because everything else on his mind and tongue feels too emotionally loaded.
“I’ve seen you work out, I’ll take being hit with the damn pale gun again.” Harry’s smile falls, seeing Jean blanch. “Hey. I didn’t mean - I’m not -”
“Just shut up, Harry,” Jean grumbles at him. He’s too weary to sift through his emotions now. “Let’s just go to bed.”
They do, Harry first, and then Jean. It’s difficult to not let the springs creak or bounce its other occupant as they shuffle under the blankets, and Kim stirs enough to mumble, “okay?”. Harry makes soothing sounds at him, and he slips back into sleep.
Jean settles against his bit of pillow, and looks across at them both. Precinct 41’s finest. His friends, his colleagues. Possibly more. Possibly his. But he can’t dare to hope. It’s enough that Harry is alright now. Everything will be alright, he thinks, as he closes his eyes, and lets his thoughts go.
Tomorrow will be just a normal day for the RCM in Jamrock.