Fanwork 19

[sharknasty]

Title: It
Rating: PG
Pairing: N/A
Warning(s): N/A
Summary: Lee just wants to take an afternoon off to catch up on reading, but the Whalers are playing tag and Fergus wants them to participate just this once.

Someone smacks Lee lightly on the shoulder and jerks their masked head towards the door, and Lee takes a moment to take in the height and build and colors the person is wearing. It isn't Billie or Daud, so there isn't a need for much respect or instant reaction in the gesture. It doesn't look like Langley, so there's little need for them to completely and spitefully ignore it by getting up and moving away. And it definitely isn't Fergus, because if it was Lee would have been hauled up ages ago for whatever it is they're being roused from their book to take notice of. So Lee is about to go back to ignoring their surroundings and reading--they've just gotten to the part about the poisonous properties of bleeding hearts and their effect on the human body--when the magic words are uttered.

"Transversal tag," the unknown Whaler says.

Lee curses softly to themself, slams their book closed in a fit of pique, and tucks it under their arm. The corner of the binding pushes a sleeve garter just slightly out of place, but they pay it little mind while walking away from the other Whaler, who stares after them and shrugs before jogging towards the exit to the roof.
In a few minutes, the entire Flooded District is going to be a mess of assassins throwing themselves off of roofs and so on trying to avoid whoever is 'it', and Lee wants absolutely no part in it. They walk down the halls, eyes set on their shared quarters while a few other Whalers stomp down in the direction opposite of where they're going. 'May as well be children than assassins', Lee thinks, stopping at an old wooden door with a fair amount of burn marks on it. They push the door open with a sigh which immediately changes into a dour expression when they find Fergus rooting through a familiar evergreen Whaler's coat. Their coat.

Lee turns and closes the door, taking a deep breath while they do. It wouldn't due to start shouting at Fergus now when they have a surefire way of getting the man out of their hair for the next hour or so. The room smells like cedar and old paper and wet dog. When Fergus isn't in here, sometimes it only smells of the former two.

"What are you doing?"

"Not digging through your jacket for food, if that's what you're thinking."

Lee gives him an extraordinarily deadpan look while they toe off their boots and socks, stuffing the latter into the former to keep them from getting lost. Fergus returns it with one of innocent guile. They don't even bother to repeat the usual threats, because Fergus already knows and has been victim to a few of them. If not all. Lee hates it when people go through their stash of food. What else are they supposed to eat when they're put on watch reserve for one of the more boring missions?

"Right. Anyway, there's a game of transversal tag going on soon if you want to go play," they say, as offhandedly as they can manage it. Fergus perks up immediately, scrambling off his hammock and nearly breaking his head on the floor in his efforts to drop their coat on the bed below the hammock and get off at the same time. He lands on a tangle of limbs on Lee's bed and coat, and the other hopes that he's taken a shower recently, because sheets take an age to wash and dry here. Lee waits until he's done and out of the way before plopping themself in their bed and re-opening their book, ready to finish up the chapter they were on before they're interrupted again, this time by Fergus' call of their name.

"What," they say. "What is it now?"

"Yer comin' right?"

Lee stares at him again, and then looks back to their book and trusts that to be enough of an answer for Fergus. It's apparently not, considering he's kneeling next to the head of the bed, looking at her like he wants to say something.

"What?"

"C'mooon. Come n' play with everyone."

"No."

"I'll be yer best friend," he says, looking at Lee with the sweetest face he can muster. It's ruined by the fact that he's Fergus and therefore anything but sweet, and also by the fact that his mask is perched on his head and ready to be pulled down over his face. It has Lee rolling their eyes and turning away from him again.

"I was under the impression we were already best friends," they say, casual as can be. It's a strange thing to admit, but Fergus is the only person in the Whalers outside of Daud that Lee would stick their neck out for. Daud is reasonable man to take that risk for, because he's the one responsible for making Lee who they are now. Fergus is... something else.

"I'll be yer best friend forever," he adds.

"We're assassins. We're probably going to die sooner than most people anyway, and that's if the plague doesn't get us first. Forever isn't a long time for us."

Fergus huffs and curls gloved fingers into Lee's shirt, shaking them lightly. "Accept my friendship," he whines. "And stop being a joyless fuck and come play with us."

"No."

"I'll do your bathroom cleaning duties for the next week," Fergus says, shaking them again and looking at them with the most simpering look they can muster.

Lee pauses and considers the amount of work they have to put in to making the bathroom spotless this week, then runs over how quickly an entire troop of assassins managed to fuck that up with blood and piss and other bodily fluids. The general conclusion is that they'd rather Fergus take those responsibilities than waste time this week doing it themselves.

Fergus' puppy eyes do very little, but they are sort of strangely adorable in a very weird way.

"Fine, fine," they say, turning on their back and bracing the ball of their foot against Fergus' face and lightly pushing him back. "I'll go. Get away so I can get up, you idiot."

Fergus grins and whoops, and Lee can feel the woosh of breath and vibration against the arch of their foot. They curl their toes and then splay them out on Fergus' face, and then there's a hand gripping their angle and a warm wet muscle pressing against the bottom of their foot and then wiggling teasingly between their toes. Lee makes a high-pitched noise of displeasure and kicks around until Fergus lets go of their foot and throws himself back before Lee can kick him in the face.

"You're repulsive," they hiss, scraping their foot off against the rag they use for a bedside floor mat.

"No take backs! Getcher stuff and let's go!"

---

A few moments later, Lee finds themself outside, the usual mask of a Whaler settled on their head and covering their face. Their evergreen coat is wrapped around their form, and it feels lighter than it should by several tins of crackers, sausages and whalemeat. Lee only hopes no one will take the opportunity of the room being empty as an invitation to snack on the food they'd emptied out of their pockets. They only have so much sleeping draught left with which to wreak a terrible vengeance, and the use of it for that purpose is frowned upon anyway. The only reason they'd emptied their pockets was because the idea of losing a tin for certain in this stupid game would be worse than maybe losing it to a hungry mouth.

They're in line with several other Whalers, each and every one of them so obviously bristling with excitement. Lee stands next to Fergus because standing next to him is more familiar than standing next to everyone else. They can't help but roll their eyes at his obvious enthusiasm for something so stupid as 'verse tag. Fergus loves these games of tag almost as much as Lee dislikes them, which isn't surprising. His jumps are almost like spasms in their frequency and complete lack of grace, but Lee doesn't jump nearly as fast as he does, so they have little room to criticize. Lee likes being a Whaler, but they see less point to the active powers behind the organization than the passive ones. Toxin resistance is more useful in their line of work than transversing.

Langley is the one refereeing this game, which essentially means that she's there to make sure no one dies. It's how Lee knows it's going to be a surprisingly serious occasion, or at least as serious as Langley can manage to make it. No one will leave with any sprains at least, which suits Lee fine, even if Langley does make them want to sever multiple tendons out of spite sometimes. Lee takes the opportunity that the mask provides and pulls a face at Langley when she walks by. Langley only gives them a vague look, like she's surprised that Lee even showed up, then passes them by.

Their arms and thighs ache with the memory of pull-ups carrying both their weight and that of another Whaler.

A whaler in cerulean is finally designated 'It' and a few people groan and then quiet up once Langley starts to the edge of the roof. The air is tense and thick and Lee feels distinctly uncomfortable when Langley walks up to the edge of the roof, drops her foot on a piece of loose scrap metal, then rears back and kicks it. It sails through the air and hits an adjacent roof with a bang, and everyone scatters in different directions that are as far away from the cerulean Whaler as possible.

Lee drops down in a crouch and kicks their leg out, catching the person next to them in the knee. They don't wait for the sound of the person to hit the floor before sprinting away and tumbling off the roof, grabbing the edge of it and looking to the side at a twisted metal balcony. They concentrate on it for a moment, and then there's a sharp feeling, like someone's looped a hook around one of their ribs, and Lee has to let go of their concentration of where they are at now to where they are going to be.

They end up safely on the balcony, and peek into the room. There are four other Whalers inside, dressing in matching uniforms and colors and all playing cards. Lee wishes they were playing cards instead of this, and they look up from their game for a moment to stare.

"You're not allowed inside during tag," one of them says. Lee gives them a look that must convey their loathing, even through the mask, and turns away from the group to look around.

They hop down from the balcony onto one of the vents outside the building, shimmying across it and around the corner, then dropping down to a series of pipes. They're seriously considering staying there when there's a noise above them, that vague and indescribable sound of someone transversing. Lee looks to their side to find Fergus there, and they can feel the frown behind his mask. They turn away from him and huff, and he just clamps his arms around their sides and wiggles their fingers in.

"You gotta actually play, Lee!"

When he says it, he practically crows, and Lee makes hissing sound and slaps his hands away and focuses on a different point, 'versing away from him as fast as possible. They know he knows what stealth means, but it's obvious that Fergus just wanted to force them into actually participating.

Their transversing takes a while but Lee can make up for it with length, not that it keeps them from eventually feeling a hard slap on their back and Fergus practically screaming into their ear: "YER IT!"

There is a moment where time seems to freeze, and Lee knows it's not actually frozen, because otherwise they wouldn't be able to feel the clench in their jaw and the near shriek of frustration waiting to tear it's way out of their throat. They loathe being It. Hate it, even. It's tedious and annoying and the way they transverse over long distances means little when most of the other Whalers can do it much faster. And either way, they know they're just going to end up chasing around Fergus trying to get him back.

Instead of screaming, they tamp it down into a mutter.

"This is why I hate this game."