du_vallon | (no subject)

(no subject)

It's only been a few days since they've escaped from the underworld they'd been trapped in and there are two things he's been doing since. One is making sure to obsessively watch over Aramis and Athos, and the second is that he's been basking in the sun as much as he can, indulging in the feel of it on his skin. Today, despite his project of assembling the pieces of a fancy crib he'd purchased at the flea market, he's opened the window to the fire escape and perches half-in, half-out, allowing the sun to shine on his face and make him feel right.

He leans inside to pick up the screwdriver and two slats of wood, bringing them outside as he begins to assemble them in the crisp air. He knows he's getting far, far ahead of himself here, but he also thinks it will be a treat for Aramis. Besides, if nothing else, they can keep the Captain in it until they actually need it.

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"Of course we ought to," says Aramis, heaving a frustrated breath, "But that does not seem to matter. I already wake up every day and my first thoughts are of you, but you disappeared regardless, and no matter how I searched it was days before I found you, because this place did not let me. How are we to fight against that?"

"What if we asked Jim to help us? Could he put some sort of tracker in under our skin? Some way to always find the other?" He'd joked about it after Aramis had been kidnapped, but now he's beginning to honestly think that it's something he might not think is so awful an idea. He leans in for a slow kiss from Aramis' lips, cupping his cheek. "I looked for you down there, too, and couldn't find you."

Aramis shakes his head, and the fact that he can scarcely understand Jim's methods half the time only makes him more agitated. "Our phones did not work there," he says, "Why would these trackers? It did not even seem as if we were in the same place as Darrow, like the world itself had opened up to let us in, one at a time."

He rubs his cheek against Porthos' palm. "I suppose," he concedes, "For the basement, it would have helped."

Porthos works at Aramis' hand, staring down at it as he thinks about broaching the other topic. "It would have saved us days of searching to find you," he agrees, breathing in and out slowly. "I think we need to talk about writing wills, too, chou. Just in case of the worst case scenario."

Aramis gazes at Porthos in astonishment. "No," he says when he can find his voice. He cannot even begin to entertain Porthos leaving him for good. "To what end? Everything I have is yours as my husband. I know you will give Athos anything he desires, and that you will provide for our child whether - " He swallows tremulously. "Whether I get to meet her or not. What else is there?"

Porthos gives Aramis a stern look, because he knows that they need to address the issue somehow. "The shelter?" he points out. "Your friends? Aramis," he murmurs softly, curling into him. "I don't want to think about loss, but I need us to be ready."

"Darling," he murmurs. "You'll be there for our baby."

"If these last experiences have taught us anything, it is that no one can guarantee that," says Aramis with a touch of bitterness. "If you wish me to write a will, I will leave you everything. You will know what to do with it. Beyond that I cannot bear to think of it," he says, feeling ill.

Porthos bears in on Aramis and wraps his arms around the man, holding him as tightly as he can as he bears him down into the ground next to the crib, an embrace so tight that Aramis would have trouble breaking out of it. "I want us to be prepared. I got scared, thinking that if you and Athos left...well, then I couldn't pay for the house and I'd end up back on the street."

"Porthos," says Aramis, nudging his nose with his own when he can scarcely move to do more. "That could not happen here. It would be as it was at the start, with a stipend arriving each month in your bank account. At the worst, you could keep this place. You don't have to fear going back to the streets. Even if that stipend were not there, you are no longer a helpless child. You have always made your way in the world."

It's been given to him. He hasn't earned it like he had at home and for some reason, that sits poorly with him. He inhales sharply and buries his crumpling face in Aramis' shoulder. "I hate to think of being here without you," he manages, a muffled and quiet sound. "And I want to stop it. You've hardly left my side in seven years, now. I want the rest of the hundred years we've promised to each other, but you're right. How do we stop things like being kidnapped and torn away?"

"I don't know," says Aramis quietly, and for all his wisdom, he knows that Athos does not, either. They are all of them powerless, completely unable to do much more than accept what they have been given already, and hope that they will be allowed to keep it. "Now you know what keeps me awake at night," he says, squeezing Porthos.

Porthos lets out a soft snuffling sound as he eases back, wiping at his eyes to dry away the traces of tears that have been there. "I know it's been plaguing you, but I just want to make it better," he insists, as passionately as he can. "Aramis, how do I make you feel better?"

"Well, not by weeping," says Aramis with a small laugh lest he cry in the face of Porthos' own tears. He cups his cheeks, kissing each of his eyes until his lips no longer come away wet. "I don't believe there is better, Porthos," he tells him in a quiet voice. "We live with it, that is all."

Porthos is an emotional man, and he cries without meaning to. He knows that it's not true despair and hopes Aramis knows that, too. "There has to be better," he chastises. "Whether it's us having children and making cribs or just going out there and fighting wrongdoings," he insists eagerly. "We have to find the good in this."

"That is what I intend," Aramis admits. "If these thoughts keep me awake at night, it is these hopes that make me rise again, to spend another day with you." It is more than they will get at home, and Aramis holds onto Porthos tighter.

"At home, life would have lost all color without you in it. Now - " Aramis shakes his head. "It is unimaginable."

"We should come up with some sort of signal or code or stretch of words," he says suddenly. "If ever we were to show up at home, if we said those things, it would be a secret code to the other, to see whether we remembered this place," he murmurs, because he wants to make sure that even if he goes home, he gets this chance again.

"If I went home, even if you didn't remember, I don't know that I could live without pursuing you."

Aramis has no way of knowing if they'll be allowed to keep their memories, but he nods. "Call me chou," he tells Porthos. "And I will call you cariño." He brushes his nose against Porthos'. "Even if I do not understand, pursue me. Whatever it is I would have to give up at home, it is worth it."

"What if instead, I just skip over all those steps and just kiss you?" Porthos suggests, feeling like getting straight to the point fits more in with his style than anything else. "Right up against the post in your room at the garrison, against the wall you share with Jussac."

"Use your best judgment," says Aramis with a small laugh. "Not where the Captain can see. But no matter what you do," he continues, lifting Porthos' hand to curl it once more against his cheek, "It will work. I no longer believe there's any life for me without you in it."

Porthos laughs warmly as he reaches for a few of the crib pieces to start putting them together. "What do you think Treville would do if he saw me pin you to a bed?" he wonders. "I think that'd serve him right for sending me to the Court, having to watch me pursue happiness."

"Scrub his eyes and demand that Athos walk first into all rooms that might contain us for the rest of time," Aramis chuckles. "If that is to be our method, I will be happy to punish Treville with you whenever you desire."

Porthos grins as he taps Aramis lightly with an assembled piece of crib, easing in on hands and knees for another kiss, humming thoughtfully as he imagines what he would actually do. "I don't think I'd pin you to anything. I actually think I'd just start leaving anonymous notes and presents at your doorstep and watch you try and weasel out the answer."

"That's very romantic of you, Porthos," says Aramis in surprise and pleasure, reaching for two pieces of the crib to put together and hand to Porthos. "Shall I woo you in similar fashion? Or will the direct approach always work best with you?"

Porthos accepts the pieces back, moving back on his arse to give them room to begin the base a little more. "I don't know," he confesses. "I'd like to think I'd be charmed by them, but I think maybe I'd be confused. And clearly looks and comments weren't doing the trick. Maybe you'd have to corral me in dark corners and tell me, very suggestively, what you'd like me to do to your body?"

"I think you are right," Aramis tells him, piecing together two more slats of the crib. "I would start by touching you more, on the shoulder, the hair - let my hand skim against your arse when you couldn't be certain it was not by accident. And when you began to work yourself up, then I would corner you."