Old War Horses 29

[lit_gal]

AND HERE COMES THE SPURT!
Wed Chapter --26
Thursday's first chapter--27
Thursday's second chapter--28
Thursday's third chapter--29

Title: Old War Horses
Firefly x Sentinel
Mal/Jayne, Blair/Jim
Rated: ADULT
Taming the Muse prompt:

Malcolm Reynolds fought for the Browncoat rebels. They wanted their freedom. They lost. James Joseph Womak was a commander for the Alliance, determined to bring justice to the common people. His side won, but he still lost.

This time on Old War Horses:
Jim and Blair and William--all in one space.  Oh so fun. 


If you want to read the early chapters, go to Twisting the Hellmouth. 

If you want to read the most recent chapters, use tags.


29.

Jim stood right behind his father as Mal and Blair crossed the pasture. Blair had on a big smile, and he waved enthusiastically.

“He is a rather energetic sort,” his father offered in the most mild tone ever.

“Gorram hyper,” Jayne agreed after a few awkward seconds of Jim not responding. “But he ain’t half bad to look at.”

Jim leaned around his father to glare at Jayne.

“What? Being that I’m sly now, I get to notice other men, and he’s real pretty.” Jayne bristled, and then he frowned, his expression turning less certain.

“If Mal catches you saying that, you and Blair are both going to be dead,” Jim warned.

Jayne gave one of his big horse snorts. “Don’t need anyone to tell me that. Mal’s a possessive bastard.” And yet, despite the words, Jayne had a very satisfied expression on his face. Jim’s father just looked more confused than ever.

Blair started trotting, and Jim stepped forward to meet him. The second Blair got close, he slipped into his place at Jim’s side, slipping an arm around his waist. “Oh man, River is so relieved that we finally managed to get our shit together and figure out the whole plan. She was twirling. She tried to get on the shuttle only Captain Crankypants over there wouldn’t let her on.”

“Captain Crankypants?” Jim asked, looking up at Mal.

“Kaylee was calling him Captain Tightpants, but there is not a force in the ‘verse that can make me comment on his tight pants.” Blair gave Mal an overly sweet smile before he turned to William. “So, River seems to think that you know how to handle this, so just tell us what we can do to help.”

It took Jim’s father several seconds and a couple of coughs to get his voice engaged. “I need to make copies, secure them, make contact with a number of allies before dropping a few hints that lets them know that I’m a player in the game.” He cleared his throat. “Quite frankly, while they will clearly recognize me as an enemy, it could be quite advantageous to confuse the matter somewhat—to imply that I had this information despite you rather than working in concert with you.”

“The enemy of my enemy….” Jim muttered.

“Is probably still my enemy, but I’ll work with him as long as it works out to my benefit,” his father finished for him with a small smile. As a child, Jim had grown so tired of hearing that, but here he was risking his life and freedom—Blair’s life and freedom—on the theory.

“Karma. That’s all I’m saying,” Blair offered. “Karma.”

“Some of us don’t believe in reincarnation,” William pointed out.

“Which so don’t make it less true,” Blair countered.

“I don’t care,” Mal interrupted. “Unless someone’s shooting me dead in the next five minutes, reincarnation ain’t a topic I need to do much thinking on. However, I got a crew I have to look out for, so you need to lay out how this works so that if I don’t like your plan I can shoot you and make my own.” Mal rested his hand on the butt of his gun and looked at William. Jim felt a flare of anxiety as the two men faced off. They were both gorram stubborn, and if one of them decided to dig his feet in, this could still get ugly.

“I plan to imply that my son hired you, which would imply that you and your crew are insignificant players, little more than hired help,” William offered. Mal narrowed his eyes, but he didn’t seem to notice the captain’s aggravation. “Meanwhile, I will suggest that Jim and Blair are guests here until such time as I decide they are safe to send on their way.”

Jim tightened his hand on Blair’s shoulder. This might be a prettier prison than he’d been in before, but he certainly didn’t want to be trapped in it.

“Okay,” Blair said slowly. “Am I the only one who thinks it might be a bad idea for you and Jim to be on the same planet?”

Jayne snorted.

“Blair,” William said slowly, as though feeling his way through the words, “if they believe you acted with Captain Reynolds, then everyone on that crew will be at risk as these people attempt to determine if any of them have the power to release this information. If the Serenity leaves and I am the only one negotiating—”

“Then Blair and I are the only ones in danger because we’re the only other ones who’ve seen the information,” Jim finished. He hated the plan, but it was solid logic. It minimized their exposure and allowed Mal to get the civilians to safety. Jim looked down at Blair, desperate to hold onto his lover and equally desperate to have Mal take him to safety.

“Forget it,” Blair said before Jim could comment. “They already know I tanked my entire career and put my medical license on the firing line for you, so they’re going to know that I’m in this with you. I’m not hired help.” For emphasis, Blair planted an elbow in Jim’s stomach.

“I didn’t say anything,” Jim defended himself.

“You were thinking it so loud even I could hear it and I ain’t exactly one for picking up on subtle,” Jayne pointed out. Jim glared at him.

“Jayne, secure the shuttle,” Mal ordered, and Jayne headed across the field, that Callahan fullbore autolock held at the ready. “Ellison, can we talk?” Mal asked, jerking his head back toward the shuttle. Jim nodded. If he took Blair, they could both get on the shuttle and run for it, leaving his father to clean up the mess, but that would put everyone on the Serenity at risk—Kaylee and Simon Tam and River. They didn’t deserve that.

“Chief, wait here,” Jim said, letting his partner go and giving his father one hard look that he hoped the old man understood. If anything happened to Blair, if his father so much as upset him or ruffled his hair, Jim was going to prove that he could be just as much of a hwun dan as Charlie ever had been. Threat delivered, Jim followed Mal to a tree a good fifty yards out. It was close enough that Jim could still hear his father and Blair, but far enough that they wouldn’t be able to overhear his conversation with Mal. Jim looked over and Blair was shifting nervously from foot to foot.

“This plan work for you?” Mal asked straight up.

Jim thought about that. “I’m not fond of staying here with my father.”

“Ain’t surprised to hear that. You want I should take Blair? Jayne can be mighty persuasive when people need getting dragged out of some place kicking and screaming.” Mal frowned. “Except the one time I ordered him to do that with River. That didn’t end so pretty.”

“You sent Jayne after River? And he went?” Jim knew that Jayne was about as loyal as an old dog, but he never thought the man would go on a suicide mission. “And he lived?”

Mal rolled his eyes. “River wasn’t actually trying to kill him. She just wasn’t fond of being restrained and removed. However, Blair wouldn’t stand a chance against him, and you know it.”

Jim looked at his partner. “I don’t know. He’s a mean little shit when you rile him.”

“That don’t surprise me.”

Jim sighed. “But he’s right. They know we’re together, so if I send him off with you, they’re going to assume I trust you enough to protect my lover.”

“Can’t have that,” Mal commented.

“Not if we want to keep Kaylee and her man clear of this,” Jim said. “You and I are soldiers. Sooner or later we’ll probably die on the end of some gun, but the civilians don’t deserve to be in the middle.”

Mal’s eyes scanned the house and the field where Jayne stood in the open door of the shuttle. “They don’t deserve it, but it seems like they end up there anyway.” Mal said, his voice mild, but his gaze settled on Blair and William.

“Yeah, they do,” Jim agreed. He didn’t consider his father a civilian because the man knew how to fight, even if it wasn’t with a gun, and Blair would argue that he put himself in the fight by taking the job at the Institute. It was too late to keep either of them out of this fight. “They really do,” he agreed sadly.

Mal nodded, and then he turned toward the shuttle. “Be seeing you around, Ellison,” he called over his shoulder. Jayne watched, and Jim turned back toward the house. His father might say they were making a pretense at being unwilling guests, but as far as Jim was concerned, it wasn’t pretense. He would give about anything to be on that shuttle with Mal. He just wouldn’t give up the chance that he could buy their way out of this mess.

Feeling a little like a man walking to the gallows, Jim headed back up to the house.

“They’re leaving?” Blair asked.

Jim nodded. “Hopefully these people will ignore them.”

“If this works, they will,” his father promised, but Jim had learned that his father’s promises meant very little. He just looked at the man.

Blair moved back to Jim’s side. “You two were fighting, weren’t you?”

“It doesn’t take a degree in psychiatry to see that, Einstein.”

“James,” his father said in an exasperated tone as though Jim had the audacity to use the wrong fork during a formal dinner.

“Whoa, hey,” Blair jumped in. “No offense here because River says we can trust you and I have shitloads of respect for River’s opinion, but you do not get to set the rules for the relationship I share with Jim. Sarcasm is a normal part of our communication, and as long as we understand that the frustration is for the world and not each other, that is not an unhealthy thing. True, it’s not exactly recommended by most forms of couples therapy, but hey, we’re fine.” Blair tightened his arm around Jim, leaning in him, and Jim could feel some of his tension ease. “Now you and Jim is another story.” Blair said with an exaggerated eye roll as he pointed from Jim to his father.

“Don’t start,” Jim warned. If they were going to be stuck here, Jim did not want the entire visit to be one long fight, and once Blair got his claws into something, he was the most persistent little shit in history. He’d never drop if.

“What?” Blair blinked up with innocent blue eyes—yeah, like that worked. Jim just glared. “Hey, maybe I just want William to admit that he was so totally off-base that you have a right to be angry.” Blair pointed out.

Surprisingly, it was William who answered. “Do you think I don’t know that?” he asked.

“I suspect you totally know it. I also suspect you spend way more time making excuses than just letting Jim be mad.”

Jim could see his father pull himself up straight. His eyes dilated with emotion. “Anger doesn’t solve anything,” he informed Blair stiffly. If Jim liked his father better, he would have warned him that no one won these kinds of fights with Blair.

“Oh man, you are so totally wrong there,” Blair said with a chuckle. “If we don’t feel our emotions, we can’t get through them. Trust me, as a professional, I am saying that Jim has every right to be angry with you. I may understand that you acted out of ignorance, but as the adult in this house, you should have figured out that Charles was borderline Schizoid Personality Disorder without his twin brother having to explain it, especially since children and adolescents do not have that kind of cognitive distance from their immediate family.”

“He… what?” William actually looked confused.

“Come on. Charlie has never had a link to anyone romantically, he has totally detached from his family unless he wants something, he has poor interpersonal relationships at best and has been demoted several times, and he does not have the sort of affective response you expect from someone during times of stress. Total Schizoid Personality Disorder. He is not even functional in the traditional sense of the word.”

“Do you know him?” Jim demanded. It seemed that Blair should have mentioned that before now.

Blair snorted. “No way. However, when the Institute discussed the value of having a twin as a control group, a chance to torture two people with the same genetic code and see how having the Sentinel gene activated or non-activated affected the response to stimuli, his file came across my desk. I told them that he clearly had mental health issues that precluded using him as a control group for anything. His file looks like a case study in unhealthy. Seriously.” Blair shuddered before poking a finger toward William. “As his father, you should have seen that, so Jim gets to be angry with you. No excuses.”

William blinked several times. “I’m not trying to offer up an excuse.”

“So you’re willing to straight up say that you screwed this up?”

“Didn’t I just say that?” William looked at Jim for some sort of confirmation, but Jim didn’t comment. He was on Blair’s side in this.

“I don’t know,” Blair said with a casual shrug. “I wasn’t listening to you. Try saying it again.”

“Fine. I badly misjudged the entire situation. I was a horrible father, but—”

“Ah! No but,” Blair said loudly. Jim had to work to avoid smirking at the sight of his lover reading his father the riot act. This might even be worth it. “Leave it right there. You’re admitting that you’re a horrible father, right?”

With a sigh, William admitted, “Yes.”

“Good. See, Jim, people can change.” Blair patted Jim on the arm. “Now you need to admit that you have this totally unrealistic expectation. I mean, he thought being a good father meant making money, which is clearly the stupidest plan in the ‘verse; however, it was an attempt to do the right thing. He has no psychological training, he was totally caught up in his work, and face it, he was blind when it came to Charlie’s bullshit. So admit that he’s an idiot and not evil.”

Jim’s mouth dropped open as his lover turned on him. It took Blair poking him in the stomach to make him answer. “I never said he was evil.”

“Really? Man, are you sure of that?”

“Yes,” Jim said, his voice dark with unspoken threats.

“So you’re willing to admit right now that your father isn’t evil, he didn’t try to ruin your life or drive you out of the home? You’re willing to admit that he is a man who loves you and is simply an idiot who screwed up and was a horrible father?”

“I—” Jim stopped he didn’t want to admit that. He realized he was actually fond of hating his father.

Blair’s expression grew soft, and his father looked away. “Jim,” Blair pleaded, “come on. I know you hold a grudge, but enough is more than enough.”

Realizing that he either gave in now or gave in after days of nagging, Jim sighed. “Fine, I know that he fucked up without having any of it come from malice.”

Blair smiled at him, and that almost made up for the little ball of resentment in Jim’s stomach. “Good. So we’re good?” Blair asked, looking from Jim to William.

“You think we’re good now?” William asked.

Blair snorted. “Not even. I could have therapy with you two for a year and not scratch the surface, but if you can admit that much, you’ll get through the rest on your own eventually. Just try to do it before one of you dies, okay? Karma’s a real bitch when you refuse to emotionally engage. She just makes you live the same shitty life over and over and over until you finally get your head out of your ass, and I do not plan on having this same conversation with you two five hundred years from now. Got it?” Blair pinned each of them with a sharp look, and then he smiled and wandered off into the house.

William looked over at Jim. “Well, he’s quite interesting.”

“You don’t know the half of it, Dad,” Jim said. If nothing else, Blair would give his father incentive to get this plan of his underway so they could leave. Very few people had the constitution to handle long term exposure to Dr. Blair Sandburg.