hector chasse. (ironarmor) wrote in warrantlogs, @ 2016-01-09 02:40:00 |
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No matter how many times Sawyer teasingly asked if he wanted another physical, it wasn't until the precise day that Hector saw the note on his calendar reminding him to get his two-month review that he showed up in the medbay, ready to submit to the necessary tests. It could have been Anya, yes, but — it made sense to Hector to seek out Sawyer, to look for the person who spent the most time bothering him about getting this taken care of at every available opportunity. Sawyer wanted to check him over and sign his paperwork? Fine. He was in excellent shape, and he knew it. Practically religious about exercise and diet, he trained daily, and he kept his body in top form. It was a tool just like any other, which needed to be taken care of and meticulously judged if he expected it to be of any use to him. Discipline about his health had been hammered into Hector for as long as he could remember; upkeep was habit, as much as a point of pride. Of course, there were challenges that had developed over years of hard use, and he paid the price for it sometimes: knuckles that were sensitive to repetitive abuse, joints that weren't as flexible or as forgiving as they used to be, and he watched himself carefully for other signs of degradation, but he knew he was still capable of passing a physical with flying colors. That, and after a week, it was time to cut off the bandages that Sawyer had carefully wrapped around his hand to protect it once he'd returned from his little excursion to Mars. There were few lines Sawyer Clafton drew for himself: respect authority. Don't run with scissors. Separate business from pleasure. He'd been the one to focus, cut out the jokes entirely, when someone was hurt: to dedicate his complete focus to every perfect black stitch in someone's skin, to concentrate on the facts and not the emotional bullshit when one of his crewmates was in dire need. Where everything else was a joke, Sawyer's dedication to his job, his medical expertise, was something he avoided compromising. A line he didn't cross. Lines seemed to disappear, looking at the head engineer. It had been all too easy to make jokes about coming for a physical, promising sponge baths, examinations. In the privacy of his bunk, he'd shaken his head at himself; at least he knew that he could, would, still focus under the pressure of Hector wounded. He'd done himself proud when the engineer came back, hand bleeding and splintered, without explanation. So he'd resolved to conduct himself with professionalism. Dignity. Then Hector took his shirt off, and his cheeks flushed pink and his slate grey eyes looked him over and that all went to hell. His hand scratching at his scruffy face, the medic forced out, "So." Hector had folded his shirt over his wrist, setting it aside on the exam table, and was reaching to unbutton his pants before he realized anything else was going on. He could practically feel Sawyer's gaze crawling over him, and his hands hesitated at his zipper; looking up, he arched an eyebrow at the medic. "So?" His tone was skeptical, at best. "Did you want a striptease, or can I fucking finish getting undressed here?" "I mean, if you're offering." The joke was weak, weakened even further by the way the medic winced after it left his mouth. As if writing over that impression, he abruptly cut across his own comment with a, "No, I just need to be able to sign off that you're in top physical shape before you go, you know," jabbing at the air halfheartedly, "fight the baddies." Just as quickly, Sawyer's reaction turned, his shoulders sagging in apparent surrender. "You're just—beautiful," he said, admitting his stare, admitting his lack of professionalism, admitting as he shuffled his feet embarrassedly to his own utterly smitten state. "What?" The response was almost automatic, unthinkingly sharp as Hector's brows drew together in disbelief. Beautiful? What the fuck kind of thing was that to say to him? He didn't know whether he disagreed more with the premise that he could be described in such terms, or with the idea that Sawyer would just — say such a thing to him. "I don't think the word you were looking for was beautiful," he told Sawyer at last, choosing to give him an escape route to slide out of the uncomfortable position in which they'd found themselves. His mouth set in a thin line as he finished undoing his fly and shucked his work pants off of his hips, leaving him in the boxer-briefs beneath; unselfconscious, he shifted to sit on the exam table, rolling his shoulders back. Still the stare couldn't be helped. They'd had many a tryst by this point—frantic, needy, hungry and rushed—but it was rare enough that he saw Hector with more than pants around his hips to expose what was necessary, let alone had the freedom to drink it in. Sawyer drank it in. His eyes lingered on the line of muscle that marked the underside of his arm, the dusting of hair beneath a flattened navel, the mass of scars that declared everywhere, everywhere, 'I am not afraid'. He feasted, gorged himself, on the visual of his body, the look in his eye that was as much confidence as it seemed uncertainty, and more than that, the freedom to do so. To look. To memorize. "No," the medic finally exhaled, shaking his head ever so slightly, not even bothering to convince himself he wasn't as fucked as he could be over this stupid, stubborn engineer, "I said what I meant to say." Eyes narrowing, Hector sat a little bit straighter, frowned a little bit more deeply. He was comfortable in his own skin, and yet uncomfortable with the way that Sawyer was looking at him, gaze raking over every detail like it had to hold some hidden meaning. He was exactly what he presented himself as: there was no need for all this staring. It wasn't lust in Sawyer's eyes, which might have been excusable even in this professional situation where he should have simply been doing his job. No. This was something else entirely. "Stop that." Hector cut through the tension abruptly, a growling edge to his smooth voice that turned the words into something more dangerous, less benign. It cut through his haze, potent in the face of his awe: made it sober up, at least a little. "Stop what?" Came his protest, uncertain, unexpected. Stop—admiring him? Stop complimenting him? Stop coexisting? "Don't play stupid," the engineer warned. His fingers clenched the edge of the exam table as tightly as they could with the bandage around one hand. "You know what I'm talking about." I like you. Sawyer's words, which still banged uselessly around in his head ever since he'd heard them from Sawyer's lips. Crashing into each other, careening wildly into other thoughts, going places they didn't belong and resolving nothing. This crush of Sawyer's was supposed to be harmless, a ridiculous tangent to an otherwise straightforward story: the two of them having a mutually beneficial arrangement, one that satisfied their needs at the moment and added a new dimension to their every interaction — secrecy, attraction, the promise of the next intense, consuming tryst. The way that Sawyer was looking at him didn't fit the story. And it didn't feel harmless, either. It felt loaded, complicated, imposing. How was he supposed to ignore it when Sawyer stood there and stared at him like that? "You have to stop." He laid force into the words. "Stop it. All of it. Do you hear me, Sawyer?" It had been hard enough, to hold his tongue at the first reprimand, the first insistence that he was being stupid for acting as though the insistent he were different, important. It was hard not to break in, interrupt and tell him not to belittle what Sawyer felt, disregard what Sawyer saw. It was even harder, at the absolute demand that he stop it all, every feeling, everything behind the way he looked at him. "Why?" Was his protest, still not making a move toward the other man, not under medical pretenses, not with him so insistently refusing. "I don't want to stop." Of course he didn't want to stop. Of course Sawyer would insist that what he wanted mattered, for some reason. "You and your whys," Hector exhaled heavily, exasperation thick in his voice, and he slid off the exam table to retrieve the clothes he'd carefully set aside, dragging his pants back on in order to cover himself once more. Why, why, why. Like a three-year-old, always asking for reasons that weren't always so clear and clean when no ought to suffice. Because I said so. Hector pulled his shirt on over his head again, movements sharp and abrupt. "Because this isn't going to end well. Because you're setting yourself up. I didn't sign on for this —" His hand sliced the air, drawing a line for Sawyer to see: the line he wasn't going to cross. "Sex, fine. It works for us. But the way you're looking at me right now? That's not part of it." "That's always been part of it," came the argument, as if it would help matters even in the slightest. "I told you it was part of it." The 'it' conveniently going undefined, his passion drove him forward, intent on making sure that finally, for once, the other man understood. "Look," he said, almost exasperated, "if you want Anya to do your physical instead of me, sure, but—" He'd been slowly edging closer, almost uncomfortable or embarrassed in the uncertain way he closed the distance in tiny steps, but now he was closing in on Hector's personal space, looking at him with vulnerable grey eyes, wanting. Impatiently, ridiculously loving. "That's not stopping me," in a low voice, pitched only for the two of them, intimacy dripping off it. "That's not stopping—this." Hector's hips hit the exam table. He didn't realize he was backing away until that moment; the resistance building in his chest was a pressure that made it difficult to breathe, difficult to think, difficult to do anything except focus on his desire to shove Sawyer and his absurd puppy eyes forcefully away. "No," the engineer growled, "I'm stopping this. Right now. I'll get Anya to do my physical. We're not going to fuck around anymore. Period. Whatever the hell you think you feel about me, it's not going anywhere, and I need you to — stop it." He set his hand on Sawyer's chest. Not pushing him away, not yet — but holding him still, guarding himself. Preventing him from coming any closer. His palm was broad, spread over Sawyer's shirt, barely any force behind the gesture, yet there was that coiled strength, ready to lash out with the slightest provocation. He'd shoved Sawyer against more than enough walls for him to know. It was a snowball rolling down a damn hill, growing larger and more forceful with every second: it was an avalanche, a terrifying heart-sinking bullshit avalanche that had him pressing forward, wanting, refusing to give in. Sawyer knew the power in that movement, the power in his open hand, and some voice in the back of his head gave warning. He knew better. He'd been taught better. "I know what I feel about you." This sturdy. Certain. For once, not even vulnerable, just absolutely convinced of the words he pronounced. "I know—" "Shut up, for fuck's sake," Hector interrupted, his voice rising harshly, but it was his hand that flew up to enforce his demand, fingers grasping Sawyer's chin, all but covering his mouth. "Shut up. I get it. You think you can do whatever you want, feel whatever you want. But you know what? The world doesn't work that way. Take it from me. Your little heart's going to get broken, smashed into a million pieces because that is what reality does to you. And I'm not going to encourage that by leading you on. Acting like everything's fine while you — drip your fucking sentimentality all over me." He knew he was holding Sawyer too tight, too roughly. But he had to make this point. It was vital. "You want to be friends? I said fine to that. You want to fuck? I agreed to that, too. But I'm not going to let you go down this road any further than you already have. Nod if you fucking understand me." The medic had started to cringe long before he was finished. Yes, he understood: he nodded, and grudgingly, slowly, Hector released his chin, eyes narrowed warningly as he gave Sawyer back his voice. "I'll tell Anya you need to see her tomorrow," came the soft answer, a little painful, a lot submissive. Hector turned away from him. This wasn't the kind of pain he enjoyed inflicting, nor the kind of subservience he loved to command, but it had to be done. Save both of them from the insanity of getting too tangled up in this mess to ever extricate themselves from it. Some wounds never stopped bleeding. "Trust me," Hector ground out through his teeth, reaching for his boots where he'd left them. "This is a lot better than what it could be." Sawyer was quiet and still, as he gathered his things, and left. |