(#21) lightning strike [Evil West]

[hexmix]

Title: lightning strike
Author: hexmix
Fandom: Evil West (Video Game)
Rating: Teen
Category: M/M
Relationship(s): Jesse Rentier/Vergil Olney
Character(s): Vergil Olney, Jesse Rentier, Emilia Blackwell, brief mentions of others
Word Count: 3121
Spoiler: very mild spoilers for the first half of the game
Summary: Vergil came back from that first time out on the field with Jesse feeling that something inside him had changed; like there was some kind of transference. He could explain Faraday’s Law; he could explain induction coils. He couldn’t explain this. [Or: Vergil has a crush.]
Notes/Warnings: references to off-screen violence; also written for the 100ships prompt "electric"

Vergil didn’t think there was anything else quite like watching Jesse Rentier fight. It had taken his breath away the first time he’d seen him, his heart feeling like it was beating in his throat, feeling like it was trying to escape him, and even though he knew that wasn’t physically possible, he’d understood the sentiment, the kind of description he’d read in adventure books as a boy springing to mind.

There was more, too: he wouldn’t say that Jesse was beautiful like that, like he might read in some tale of chivalric codes and romance. Because Jesse Rentier didn’t fight in any way that anyone could describe as beautiful. It was horrible and ugly and it scared Vergil to watch him, to see the kind of violence he could dish out like it was nothing, tearing into bodies like they were no more substantial than wet newspaper.

And then when he’d come to stand next to Vergil after, calm and loose and easy like nothing had happened, like he hadn’t ripped some foulblood’s head from its body or shoved a shotgun into a Highborn’s mouth and pulled the trigger, like he didn’t smell of copper blood and musky sweat, his voice rough like whiskey around Vergil’s name, low and sometimes chiding, sometimes exasperated, sometimes fond, and all of it felt like too much, like something Vergil couldn’t possibly contain on his own.

He mentioned it to Scott once. Have you seen how he fights? Have you tried to quantify it? Qualify it? Have you seen that he’s like the electricity that he channels through the gauntlet? He’s like a force. He’s like a disaster. William Rentier thinks he can change that. That it can be forced into another shape. I don’t know how to tell him how wrong he is.

Scott had listened as he always did, hands fluttering into the shapes of his thoughts, chin dipping into a nod, It’s possible Mr. Jesse has a natural affinity for the gauntlet– He’d listened, and Emilia would listen too, Vergil thought, if he tried to tell her.

But Vergil also knew that she wouldn’t hear him any more than Scott had.

He thought that there was an impossibility in the attempt; a failure in language to capture what he saw. He’d never been very good at explaining himself, anyway. Machines, formulae, theories, sure.

But he couldn’t capture what he saw in Jesse. If there were words for something like that they were beyond Vergil.

He came back from that first time out on the field with Jesse feeling that something inside him had changed instead; like there was some kind of transference. Electromotive force. He could explain Faraday’s Law; he could explain induction coils. He couldn’t explain this:

Jesse Rentier had touched him–hand on his shoulder, quick grasp of camaraderie–and it had traveled through him like an electric charge. The touch; the knowledge that this was a man who was made for destruction. A man who destroyed. If Jesse was an equation it was one of violence.

Vergil had felt the difference between that and the way Jesse had touched him and had thought that it could be like a grounding wire. That he could be like that. That he wanted to. 

“Verg,” Jesse would say, leaning up against the counter in his lab. Or, “Verg,” hand on his arm as they passed in the hall. “Verg,” voice low and rough and mouth ticked up in a grin, snow swirling around them, the cold creeping in, Vergil’s hands on Jesse, on the gauntlet, fingers absorbing the warmth of the device, of Jesse’s skin-warmed glove.

Like becoming part of a flash channel, electroporation, thermal burns; lightning struck.

There’d be nothing left of him if he kept holding on.

He kept holding on.

“Mr. Jesse, a moment–” he’d say, or, “There’s an idea I’d like to try with the gauntlet–”

He’d see Jesse at night, up at the bar sometimes with Mr. Gravenor, or in the briefing room with another agent, or arguing with Emilia in her office.

“Mr. Jesse,” he wanted to say, “I don’t understand why I want to be near you but I need to.” To understand, to be near; it was becoming the same thing.

He spoke to William Rentier when Jesse was away, out on mission after mission, chasing Felicity D’Abano. He learned about Mr. Rentier’s designs for his gauntlet and he learned about his designs for his son.

“Have you ever watched him fight?” Vergil asked, the words coming to him as a surprise; spilling out like he was a glass overflowing.

Mr. Rentier had paused, and his jovial expression had dimmed a bit–lower wattage–and he’d said, “I didn’t raise my son to be some brute. He’ll accept his responsibilities and fall in line, don’t you worry.”

Vergil had had to excuse himself. Had had to return to his lab. Shuffle papers. Organize his tools. He felt out of sorts, like he was back in school seeing something no one else could. Understanding something that even his teachers didn’t.

“Verg,” Jesse Rentier said, and it was early morning, barely even dawn, and he was just getting in, covered in grime and road dust and dropping a gun on Vergil’s counter. “Think you could look at this?” he asked, but he was bleeding.

“You’re bleeding,” Vergil said, already crossing over to him, frowning as Jesse glanced down at his arm, at the cut that sliced right through his coat to the skin beneath.

“Ain’t nothing worth–dammit Verg–” his voice going sharp and testy, his shoulders hunching.

But Vergil already had a hold of him. “Best get Dr. Blackwell to look at it all the same,” he said, leading Jesse out of his lab and knowing that Jesse was allowing it, that Jesse could rip his arms from their sockets if he wanted.

“Aw, don’t go bothering her about something like– You even listening to me, Verg?” 

“Of course I’m listening,” Vergil said, pulling him up the stairs, Jesse following along with no resistance, as easy and loose as ever.

“Sure don’t seem like it,” Jesse grumbled, but he let himself be directed into a chair in the infirmary, dropping into it with a sigh. “Just give me something to clean it with,” he said, “No sense waking the good doctor.”

Vergil turned a full circle, chewing his bottom lip at the realization that Jesse was right; Emilia was still asleep.

He looked over at a sound and watched as Jesse unlatched the gauntlet and removed it, setting it onto the table next to him. He shrugged out of his coat next, grunting a little as the leather drug over his wounded arm.

“I’ll–I’ll help,” Vergil decided, turning before he could see what kind of look Jesse gave him, already scanning Emilia’s meticulously organized shelves for antiseptic. 

He got soap and water. Found clean cloths. Rolled a table with a basin over and paused once everything was at hand, reminding himself that he could do this. That he’d seen Emilia tend to patients enough–that he’d even helped her enough–that he could clean the wound at least.

“Told you I could take it from here,” Jesse said, voice gone sort of quiet. Like Emilia was close enough to worry about waking.

When Vergil looked up it was to find Jesse already staring at him, expression softened by a smile. “You can get on back to your lab,” he said.

Vergil shook his head so quickly he could feel his braid whipping back and forth. “I’m not leaving you when you’re wounded and I can help,” he said. Both his father and Emilia had long instilled in him the importance in helping whenever you could.

And besides, he didn’t want to leave Jesse alone. Didn’t want him to try to clean out the wound on his own.

Didn’t much like seeing him wounded at all.

“Feel like I’m wastin’ your time,” Jesse mumbled, but he held his injured arm out, resituating himself in the chair so Vergil could better reach it. “Guess you know what you’re doing?” he asked a few moments later, watching from under the brim of his hat as Vergil soaked a cloth in the basin.

“Washing a wound is about the extent of my medical knowledge,” Vergil said, knowing he was speaking a little too fast but unable to stop it, “but I’ve done it enough that Dr. Blackwell is confident in my ability.”

“Huh,” Jesse said, and his skin was warm when Vergil touched his arm. “Well you certainly seem to know your way around the place.”

“I grew up here,” Vergil said absently, eyes on the wound and careful as he cleaned it, trying not to exert more pressure than was necessary. “After Dr. Blackwell took me on at this cell.”

“That’s right,” Jesse said, like he’d just remembered. “All that necromancer business.”

Vergil reached for a clean cloth, soaking it as well. “I don’t really remember any of that,” Vergil said, watching the ripples spread through the basin. “It was after that. After my dad…” He turned back to Jesse, blinking at the strange look he was met with.

Jesse had his head cocked to the side, his hat tipped up, brows furrowed. 

He looked like he was trying to solve a particularly difficult equation.

Vergil cleared his throat, wondering if he’d said something weird. He wanted to ask Jesse what it was that had him looking like that. He made himself turn back to the wound instead. “I’ve been living in Calico for almost ten years,” he said. “It’s my home.” The wound was oozing blood sluggishly and would probably need stitches, but Vergil wasn’t going to risk making things worse.

He got a new cloth, soaked it through and wrung it out. Folded it over itself and lay it over the wound, holding Jesse’s wrist with one hand and putting slight pressure on the wound with the other. He could feel Jesse’s arm hair against his fingertips. It set his heart to beating a little faster. It felt strange; he didn’t think he’d been this close to another man for this long before. Certainly not one that he couldn’t stop thinking about touching.

“Dr. Blackwell offered to teach me medicine,” Vergil said, needing to say something in order to keep himself from thinking too hard about warm skin and electric charge, “Said I had the head for it, but I…”

He’d been afraid. If he messed up some calculations and blew something up in his lab it’d just be him.

If he messed up mid-operation it was someone else’s life. Someone else’s death on his hands.

Vergil swallowed, “I’m just better with machines,” he said.

“Dunno about that, Verg,” Jesse said, still quiet, but a lightness to his voice that had Vergil looking up at him. As soon as he had Vergil’s attention he winked, “Looks to me like you’re doin’ just fine.”

“Uhm,” Vergil said, heartbeat still increased. He wondered if it was loud enough that Jesse could hear it. It certainly felt like it was. “I’m not doing anything?” he said. Tried to say. It still came out sounding like a question.

Jesse snorted, his grin going a little wider. “You’re helping me, ain’t ya?” he said, and reached out to nudge Vergil’s boot with his own, a strange little tap that seemed merely playful but still wasn’t doing anything to make Vergil feel any less off-balance.

“Well, of course,” Vergil said, because he always would, “I can’t stitch you up, and I can’t fight alongside you, and I’m not even half as good as Mr. Rentier when it comes to the gauntlet, but I can do this, at least, even though it’s not–” much, he was going to say; not enough.

But then Jesse interrupted with, “Y’ain’t responsible for any of that. You’re the Institute’s best engineer, remember?”

Which normally would have been enough to have Vergil beaming, pride shooting golden all through him, but it was tempered by the reminder, He’ll accept his responsibilities and fall in line, and it didn’t feel like that to Vergil. The way William Rentier said it, it was a weight. Shackles. A ball and chain.

And even if it was, even if wanting to help in all the ways he couldn’t was some kind of weight he didn’t feel, he still…

“I want to be,” Vergil said, and when Jesse just blinked at him he continued, wanting him to understand; wanting to be understood. “Responsible for it,” he said. “I want to help you like that too.”

I can’t stop thinking about how you fight, Vergil wanted to say. Like a force of nature; like a lightning strike jumping from target to target.

He was still holding Jesse’s arm. Thought he should probably be letting go. Grounding wire, he thought.

Jesse’s expression narrowed; his eyes fixed on Vergil’s he said, “Why’s that?”

Why? Vergil nearly panicked; felt everything bubbling up like it was going to boil over. 

Because you terrify me, he couldn’t say. Because you’re not a brute. You’re not what he thinks you are or what he wants to make you. Because no one can understand you like I can and I want to understand. 

Because I know the electricity will roll right through me, and even if it changes me it will be worth it because it will have been you.

But Vergil couldn’t say any of that, he knew he couldn’t say any of that, and panic steadily building, he blurted, “Because I like you.”

Jesse’s eyes widened, brief surprise, and then he said, a smile curving the word a little, “Well.”

And then what he’d actually said started to catch up to Vergil–oh he was a damn idiot, Jesse wouldn’t want to hear that, he was the last person Jesse would want to hear something like that from.

“Mr. Jesse–” he started to say, trying to decide if he should apologize or tell Jesse to just ignore him or–

“Might be,” Jesse said, derailing that train of thought simply by leaning forward, bridging some of the distance between them, “that I like you too, Verg,” he continued, his free hand coming up to Vergil’s chin, tipping his head down and then flattening to his jaw, Vergil’s heart pounding so fast and sounding so loud to his own ears that Jesse had to be hearing it now too.

And then just like that Jesse leaned up and pressed his lips to Vergil’s.

They were sort of chapped, and his stubble was scratchy against Vergil’s skin, and he didn’t know what he should be doing because it really was like an electric charge, every inch of him feeling like it was lighting up.

But then Jesse started to pull away and Vergil reached for him, almost startled into it by the thought of him stopping before Vergil could reciprocate; he needed to complete the circuit. Got his free hand bunched in Jesse’s shirt and pulled him forward into another kiss, his glasses knocked a little askew, cataloging the amused huff of breath against his lips in between kisses, the way Jesse combed his fingers back into Vergil’s hair and the way it loosened his braid, the feeling of every second Vergil spent touching him, skin and stubble and the thick material of his shirt.

It was, after all, an experiment he’d like to repeat.

Vergil pulled back slowly, following Jesse’s lead. Had to let go of his shirt to right his glasses, his eyes immediately fixed on Jesse’s pleased expression, the smug grin and smile lines digging deep, his eyes bright when they met Vergil’s.

“Have to say,” Jesse said, his voice that warm rumble that Vergil liked the most; he felt jittery just listening to it, “yours might be the best bedside manner I’ve–”

“Ahem,” came suddenly from the doorway, causing Vergil to jump, yelping a little in surprise, and then Jesse was jerking up straight where he’d been sort of slouching forward towards Vergil, his head whipping around the same as Vergil’s.

Emilia stood staring at them with the sort of imperiousness that Vergil rarely ever saw turned in his direction. He felt himself hunching in a little, like a schoolboy being reprimanded.

“As good as it is to see you applying your medical knowledge, Mr. Olney–” Holy moly was she mad– “I believe I should take over from here?” Emilia was already striding towards them, her bootheels clicking against the floor, her skirts swishing around her ankles; her demeanor as brusque and no-nonsense as ever. 

“Yes, ma’am!” Vergil said, dodging out of her way as she drew near. He cast one last look over her shoulder at Jesse who, as if he’d felt Vergil’s eyes on him, looked up.

“Appreciate the help, Verg,” he said, and winked.

“I’ll bet you do,” Emilia muttered under her breath, the tone confirming for Vergil that she’d seen exactly what he’d thought she had. 

He felt his cheeks go a little hot but he felt charged–sort of light almost–jitters still setting his hands to picking at his clothes. 

“Any time, Mr. Jesse!” he said, meaning it, and seeing that Jesse knew he meant it in the way he smiled at him.

The trip back to his lab happened as if in a blink, Vergil just sort of finding himself there again, smiling stupidly to himself and repeatedly bumping into the counter and his own equipment because he couldn’t stop thinking about–about–

About Jesse kissing him. Might be that I like you too, Verg, his touch gentle and warm when Vergil knew that he didn’t have to be. 

Vergil brought his fingers to his lips, an exploratory repetition, just standing there in the middle of his lab not knowing what to do with himself.

He turned slowly, eyes sweeping over familiar projects, familiar disarray, and landing on the gun that Jesse had left behind on the counter.

He went to it, picking it up and running his fingers over the metal of the barrel.

It was heavy–a double-barrel shotgun–and decorated in a finely carved filigree that made it look strangely delicate.

It would conduct, he thought. It could, synchronous, become part of the circuit that was Jesse and the gauntlet. 

“Increase the voltage,” he muttered aloud, his thumb tracing the filigree.

There were things he could do to improve that gun. To improve all of Jesse’s arsenal. His adjustments dialed to the exact frequency of the destruction Jesse dealt.

Vergil replaced the shotgun on the counter and stepped away, already calculating, already compiling a list of what he’d need.

Absently, he again brought his hand to his lips; he could feel the smile curving against his fingertips.

He got to work.