FIC: [Haven] Seven Day Week - Duke/Nathan, Mature

[roseveare]

TITLE: Seven Day Week
AUTHOR: roseveare
RATING: M
LENGTH: 11,500 words
SUMMARY: Duke has no memory beyond the last few days and seems to be existing in a life of hard labour he's fairly sure shouldn't be his life, but things aren't all bad -- not since falling in love with the likewise-amnesiac 111, of the blue eyes and compulsively helpful nature. Duke/Nathan.
NOTES: Slightly canon divergent late season 1 setting where Audrey already knows she's immune to Troubles. Second of two mid-length Duke/Nathan fics written while I was supposed to be doing NaNoWriMo. The Trouble in this one was inspired by the Farscape episode Thank God It's Friday... Again.

Seven Day Week

The wind was coming cold and abrasive off the sea, making work in the fields harder still. Labourer 72 brushed the back of his wrist over his forehead, trying to clear the ratty ends of his hair from his eyes, along with the dust and grime sticking to his skin. He'd lost his overcoat yesterday, when it had been warm enough to remove it, and someone else had evidently taken it. It left him with little protection against the elements but hard work.

His knees ached from so many hours spent on them, tending the crops, and they snapped and crackled when he moved, but he couldn't complain -- after all, everyone else was in the same situation, and there wasn't long left of the day to work, now. He'd been too aware of the hazy sun climbing down the sky, behind its cloud cover, through the hours of the afternoon. Very soon they'd be able to leave the field and retreat to the relative warmth of the bunkhouse, and the real warmth of each others' bodies if they were lucky.

He frowned as he flexed his hands in the soil. And it seemed to him... not for the first time, he thought... it seemed odd that his hands, though they were callused, weren't callused enough for this kind of work, or in the right places. He slipped his fingers inside his collar, disturbing the lie of his grubby shirt to smooth over the bold stamp of '72' decorating the skin over his collarbone, above his heart. It was seamless to the touch, feeling no different to the rest of his skin around it, but he could see the numbers when he looked down, and that was comforting. This, here, was him, a declaration that he belonged, like everyone else here who had one of their own. There were other markings on his arms and chest, and it seemed there should be a story behind those, but he couldn't remember how he'd come to have them. The little cuts and bruises on his skin from working with tools in the fields were no more than days old, even though he'd -- surely he'd been here, doing this, for as long as he could remember?

When he tried to think about it, his muddy brain resisted and his head started to spin, and he had to sink his hands in the soil and go back to work tending the field for everything to feel right again.

He shook his head, unsettled, feeling strange.

'72' is not a name. I have a name--

Today it was like a refrain in his head, beat in time with his heartbeat. His memories of the world -- yesterday, maybe the day before, were like this, but before was -- was -- His head swam and his stomach lurched unpleasantly as he ran up against a blank.

"Are you okay?" Feet that had been walking past him stopped, and the man they belonged to dropped down on his haunches, peering into 72's face. 72 saw a cute cleft chin and stubble that was on its way to several days' beard growth, and when he squinted up higher, amended the impression to, foremost, one of very blue eyes. '111', said the markings on the other man's bared collarbone, a series of tidy straight lines. 72 let his gaze fall back down. The feet of the man in front of him were bare, lacking boots, and his exposed skin showed goosebumps, but he displayed only a relaxed cheer with the world and no trace of discomfort.

"Hello," 72 said, feeling rather stupid. 'Hello' seemed to be all that his brain had to offer.

"Hello," 111 said. "You looked like -- you looked different."

72 cast his eyes around. Everyone else nearby was working, and engrossed in the work. He was ashamed to realise he'd been staring down at his hands, doing nothing, while everyone else worked. "I--I didn't mean to. I feel strange today."

He did feel strange. Strangest of all, though, was the push of insistence from within that said he was not strange, this was strange, everything else around him was not right, and he needed to... to do something. Something which was not the work he knew he should be doing.

"Someone collapsed earlier," 111 said. "I was worried."

72 realised this was the man who'd carried the woman that had collapsed back to the bunkhouse and urged everyone else to return to work. 72 actually thought he'd probably seen this man many times before, but his mind was so sluggish and slow that he hadn't registered as much, then or now.

They had numbers written on them, for crying out loud. It wasn't hard to pick out one person from another, to keep that memory in mind. He shouldn't just be forgetting people. Not when they were as memorable as this man was, with his blue eyes and shy smile and concern for others. "No-one's ever collapsed before," he said slowly, although there were other things he wanted to say.

"I don't remember," 111 said. He touched 72's arm. "You are okay, aren't you?"

He asked that, but his skin was cold, and he didn't have shoes, and he wasn't wearing much more than 72 otherwise.

Getting no reply, 111 declared, "I'll help you finish, then we can go back to the bunkhouse together." So saying, he knelt opposite 72 and sank his hands into the earth. 72 watched for a moment, then slowly joined in. He felt his hands brush against 111's under the soil, but the other man didn't react in the least. He was head-down-working, just like the rest.

But this man was different, too. Why?

Not different the same way he was, but still different. He'd noticed, he'd cared, he'd stopped working to investigate. 72 had so many questions, and so far as he could tell, no-one else here had any. Was he wrong to be asking them? But no, no, no...


72 is not a name. I have a name...


Duke. It's Duke.

That's not a name, either! It's a title. I have a... Oh, to hell with it. He slid his hands under the soil again, catching 111's hands (though they, too, felt like they were callused wrong, albeit in different wrong places). "I think we're done here. Let's move on."

"No," 111 said, eying the sky, the light levels. "I think it's time to stop. Or it's soon enough there's no point moving anywhere else." He pulled both their hands up and started to rise.

"Oh, ow." D-- 72 pulled back and touched his fingertip gingerly to where his new friend's hand was oozing a line of red from a small cut. The other man only smiled and didn't flinch at all. 72 was driven to prod a little harder, out of curiosity, and receiving no response still, he asked, "Don't you feel that?"

"Apparently not." 111 curled his fingers around 72's hand, heedless of the small injury. "Come on. We can go rest. Or... not." His eyes were light, though there was something in them -- in the alignment of the lines at their edges -- that suggested it wasn't a look he was used to wearing. In the same way, his beautiful smile seemed at odds with the collection of lines around his mouth that were harder, harsher.

And apparently he'd chosen Du-- 72 as his recreational partner, at least for tonight, if he wanted to accept the offer. His heart started to beat faster. He let himself be pulled up and towed along, and despite his many questions, none of them were so diverting as to keep his eyes from roaming over 111's ass and the easy movements of his thighs and the trimness of his back under the tattered white shirt. Thinking about how all those things would be his to enjoy tonight.

The open-air showers outside the bunkhouse saw more revealed, as they both stripped down to nothing and left their clothes clear of the water. 111 didn't hurry to rinse himself down and then get out of the cold water, affording an even better view -- though 72 had to pull his clothes back on and wait for his teeth to stop chattering before he could really appreciate it properly.

"Hurry," he urged, grabbing 111's wrist. "We can be first in the meal line. Let's take it upstairs and get a corner."

"I want to check on 181," 111 said, shaking his head. "The person who fainted earlier?" he prompted.

Oh... "Get your food first." 72 wasn't going to be allowed to get a second portion. "I'll take both up."

It was odd but not impossible to receive a nod of compliance and such trust. Although D-- 72 should have been all over this -- he had this guy, didn't want to lose him, fickleness of people's memories and choices here being as it was. Yet somehow he had no such fears. 111 had remembered the woman who fainted; wasn't like the others, would remember him. "Please don't be long," Duke begged, though, at the head of the meal line, because he didn't want to push it, didn't want to be forgotten along with the poor guy's food. The line wouldn't deal out extras.

"I won't." The sly way 111's eyes eased over his form made it clear he was doing just as much undressing with his eyes as D-- 72... dammit, Duke was. Duke, and he'd figure out what the rest of his name had been later.

Duke snagged a corner in the communal bunkhouse and guarded it jealously. It even had something of a curtain, made of old crop sacks, was almost private. He ate his own food and twitched and vibrated, waiting, trying not to touch the other plate. Trusted, he'd been trusted. What was more, tonight he was going to be both warm and laid.

His bedmate took way, way too long, leaving Duke seriously worried by the time he showed. But he was looking around in expectation, not dozy with the haze of someone who'd forgotten, and Duke raised a hand and enthusiastically waved him over.

"Your food will be cold. What kept you?"

"It's alright, I can't tell." 111 propped himself against the wall and took his bowl. Duke started pulling at his clothes. "I took 181 to the meal line and back, made sure she wasn't missed out. She seems better."

Well, that was nice, but Duke wasn't incredibly interested. Far more interested in getting his bunk partner out of his pants. He tried not to jostle the guy as he scarfed his food, unfastening his belt with fingers that rasped on the leather, roughened by work. Then he stopped abruptly, one of his hands inside 111's belt and the guy reacting... as little as he'd reacted to anything, though he seemed earnest in his efforts to throw the last of his meal down his jaw. "Can you... can you do this?" Duke asked, uneasily.

111 gave him a blank look.

"Your body. You -- if you can't feel it--"

"I can see it," 111 countered, like it was the most self-evident thing in the world. He put his plate down and dabbed his fingers at a pat of butter left untouched. "This might be useful."

"Genius," Duke said. He hadn't figured them for going that far, but he could take that in his stride. First he touched his fingers to 111's, smearing oil over his dry and rasping fingertips, and then returned his hand to exploration of intimate territory.

111 pouted at him and started trying to very quickly shimmy out of his pants. "Said I need to see."

The air of the bunkhouse was losing its chill from the blaze of the big fireplace in the centre and the sheer weight of all the bodies, though the smokiness and heavy scent of the air was the trade-off for that. Duke supposed that 111 didn't care anyway. They both shed their clothes, and the guy was solid underneath, more so than he'd looked when dressed, big and warm and Duke just wanted to cling. Instead, they explored each other with their hands, Duke's returning constantly to the partial erection slowly forming between the other man's legs, but trying not to get obsessed with it. If the guy couldn't make it happen exactly to order... there was still stuff they could do.

"Mm," said 111, groaning and rising up to Duke's lips to savour a kiss. He hadn't expected that, either, but took it enthusiastically and rolled their bodies together.

"Do you have a name?" Duke asked, panting to breathe, his arousal fierce, and he splayed his hand over 111's heart-number, bold on his otherwise unmarked chest, parallel lines reminding him of a symbol for river, known from somewhere inaccessible in the depths of his memory, sinuous and elegant. "Other than 111?"

He could already see the other man's puzzlement before he answered, "No, I don't think so." He didn't sound bothered, which Duke didn't understand, since it bothered him greatly that he couldn't seem to remember such a fundamental thing properly.

"Duke. I'm called Duke," he gasped. "Or that's a part of it. I'm not sure."

"Okay." 111 still didn't sound bothered, although Duke was convinced that he should have a name, too.

He also began to be increasingly aware that they were both making moves to prepare each other. The slick fingers that delved into his ass were purposeful, not for idle play. He responded in kind, pinning the other man down and sliding two fingers inside him -- not the first time, but perhaps he hadn't noticed -- and slowly and deliberately adding a third. "I'm not planning on just receiving."

"Well, I can't see that, so neither am I." He almost got an elbow in the face as 111 flipped them, despite three fingers up his ass.

"Whoa! You trying to do yourself some damage?" Duke eased his fingers right back where they'd been jostled from. "You're going to feel amazing with me inside you."

"Well, that's entirely a matter of perspective," 111 bitched. "But sure, we can both have a turn."

"Mine first." Duke nipped with his teeth at the corner of the other man's jaw, cupped his free hand over stubble and kissed hard while the fingers of his other hand worked. 111 bucked against him and thrust a knee between his legs. Duke pushed himself against the offered thigh with a moan. He was so ready to be inside this guy. There were a few puzzling warning bells ringing in the back of his addled mind -- which he knew was addled, which was probably part of the reason for the warning -- but he ignored them.

111 pushed both their cocks together and curled his fingers around them, thrusting with his hips for friction, and his length sliding against Duke's was enough to stop thought and breath for a stretch of seconds. Combativeness wasn't something Duke had noticed in the other couplings around him in the bunkhouse. He didn't think he'd have wanted this guy so much without it, though -- the proof he was different, more alive than the rest. Duke flipped their positions, caught the knee that was between his legs and guided it up, and spread 111's other leg outward. "I can do you from the front."

111 nodded shakily, by now very much aroused despite his problem. He helped Duke out by curling his body further back, and he was relaxed and unresisting as Duke sank into him, slow; deep breaths huffing in and out of him as his eyes travelled up and down their joined forms.

Inside him was amazing. Duke's body ached, myriad hurts from his day in the field that convinced him his body wasn't used to that kind of labour, but at the same time, he couldn't imagine he'd ever felt this good. He stayed where he was, palms spread on 111's chest and thigh, allowing the other man's body to adjust even if he couldn't feel the burn of being stretched. 111 curled his hands over Duke's, around his wrists, insistent caresses that were hard, and perhaps a way of affirming that the contact was there in the absence of the physical sensation he seemed to lack.

Moving was even better. Duke's brain whited out. He wanted to be closer to the other man than he could get from this angle, wanted to be pressed against him with every part of himself. He started to work on that, edging around that upraised knee with each thrust, a little surprised when his partner so readily cooperated, but maybe he wanted the closeness too. It was something of a struggle, neither of them willing that Duke should withdraw as they scrambled to change angle. But then Duke was pressing his face into the back of 111's neck, breathing into his ear, wrapping arms around his chest, and apparently that was enough. His hips worked, sinking his cock deeply and firmly, and 111 arched and pushed back into the thrust, managing to match rhythm somehow. "Mmh, so good." Duke sucked and kissed at the taut line of neck and prominent tendon he had at his disposal.

"Mm," 111 said languidly, and relaxed again into Duke's rhythm. But it was only so long before he arched back too much, spilling Duke over, breaking contact -- only for a moment, before his body rolled back and pressed insistently at Duke's. "My turn."

"--killing me," Duke moaned. It had felt so good, he had really not expected the other man to remember their agreed terms, or enforce them. They'd been in sync, they'd been working it, they'd been... Fingers parted his ass again and he pushed back onto them with a grunt. But 111 was just testing, making sure he was ready before he shifted his body over Duke's and set his cock head to Duke's hole. Its steady pressure sat against his rim, paused and ready.

"Good?" his partner asked. His hands curled at Duke's hip and shoulder, and his sensory lack clearly gave him superhuman powers of patience.

"Slow. Slow." Was it unusual he couldn't remember the last time he'd done this, if he couldn't remember the last time he'd done anything? Shouldn't sex be as instinctive as breathing? Seemed to be for everyone else here, after all...

"I will," 111 promised, and sank in with that crazy control. Duke could feel every pushing increment of his entrance, slow and stopping often as he listened to Duke's breathing and other noises and stroked his sides if they weren't easy enough for his satisfaction. It was an effort to get there and the burn was fierce, but with his partner finally fully sheathed inside him, Duke took a deep, readying breath and started to experiment with tiny movements while the other man stayed still, careful and understanding. His breath whooped into his lungs with the stages of adjustment, until he felt that he could, he might...

He still didn't want to tell the other guy to move: wasn't sure a thrust wouldn't kill him off, but he moved a little more, rocking back, and felt his ass stretch and accept the movement, and suddenly the pressure and presence inside him was okay -- no, more than okay, it was the best. "Please," Duke said, reaching back to stroke the hands on his hips for encouragement. "Please."

And after all that fuss, apparently he needed to be fucked now or he was going to explode.

111 got it, sending a deep, slow thrust into him, and then they were moving again, together, their perfect sync recaptured. Duke was suddenly absolutely convinced they must have done this before in that whole rest of his life that he couldn't remember.

Throughout the night, they woke up, they touched, they'd end up inside one another again as their bodies responded. The competition of the first time faded and the sex just happened as it happened. Duke was pretty sure they both agreed it was good either way.

***

Morning brought its own sense of terror. Duke didn't know if it was a feeling they didn't have to talk about it or that they didn't dare to, but they didn't say anything about this not being something easily forgotten and cast aside, a matter of one-night-only. Duke's fears disappeared the first time he saw 111 look across at him out in the field and smile, a smile that took over his entire face. Duke shared his water at midday break because 111 gave most of his to somebody else, and they both managed to scramble for something different from the food barrel and then shared that, too.

Duke had reclaimed his overcoat midway through the morning, the man who'd taken it offering his palms and a shrug rather than a fight. So once they'd eaten, he tore the sleeves from his shirt and wrapped them around his new partner's feet, careful to pick out any sharp pieces of grit and brush them as clean as he could first. He managed to fix in place a secure pad of cloth that should both warm and protect. It wouldn't last more than a few days, but maybe they could think of something else by then.

He got extra kisses and the last portion of his lover's food urged upon him for his efforts. Even though he felt, deeply, that there was something wrong here, this whole set-up screwy and the world just not right, there was still something freeing about being able to embrace in front of so many people, none of them minding in the least.

He'd seen couplings happen, though most of the activities that went on at night couldn't so much be called that, when they were forgotten already by breakfast the following day. An odd few seemed to survive. Duke hadn't expected it to happen to him.

Forgetting wasn't happening. He knew he had more about him than most of these others, whatever was affecting them, and for sure 111 did. He was the guy who noticed if someone else in the workgroup wasn't right, and throughout the afternoon he'd disappear from Duke's eyes to go help them. It was hotter that day, hotter than the one before by a long way, and both Duke's overcoat and torn shirt ended up on the ground, though he made a point of keeping a better eye on them this time. If no-one else fainted in the heat, it was because 111 was making sure things didn't get that far, urging people to take rests even though their drive was to keep going.

It was about time someone had thought to deal with his hurts in return.

The working day came to an end far quicker than the previous days Duke could recall.

111 made it obvious he wanted to start their play in the shower, but it was a bit too public and a lot too cold, and Duke wanted food first besides, and he wanted to get their spot in the bunkhouse again. He got pouted at for hurrying the other man through washing, but it turned out there were also people 111 wanted to look in on again, when he was put on the spot. They ended up doing the same as they had done the day before, and 111 rejoined Duke upstairs to eat his food cold.

He was almost as fast to do that as he was to shed his clothes afterward and pull Duke into his lap. Duke curled his arms around him in return and happily grabbed two handfuls of ass. He felt hard kisses turn to a lapping, tasting tongue that travelled fiercely up his throat and around under his jaw. Today, 111 was already hard against Duke's thigh. The heat of him there made Duke want him inside. He tried to lower himself down, but without prep it wasn't happening.

"Let me..." 111 wiped his fingers around a little oily residue on the edge of their plates. There was nothing so helpful as butter today, and after this, they might have to find other things to do.

Tomorrow, Duke thought, enduring the prep, he was going to go stealing from the kitchens.

"God, you're perfect," he said, gasping and clinging harder as the other man sunk into him. "What's your name? Come on, you have to have one. Try to remember..."

111 lay him back and kissed his knee, where it was swollen from kneeling on the ground all day, licking gently around the swelling. Duke groaned at the relief offered by the heat of his mouth. They had nothing here to look after themselves, except each other. Food three times a day, a cold shower and a place to sleep, so far as Duke had seen. His partner didn't even have feeling in his body, and what was that? What did it mean? Did it mean something that he wasn't more worried about it? It definitely meant his control of himself was something else as he manoeuvred Duke around on his dick.

"Doesn't matter," 111 said, between the wet applications of his tongue and the lazy thrusts of his hips. "You know what to call me. Got it written on me." Duke stretched his fingertips to trace the lines above his heart.

No... This wasn't enough.

"I really, really want to know what to call you," Duke grunted. "Please... please try." He moaned as the other man paused, buried deep in him. Duke could feel every ridge and vein of his cock resting inside, and okay, it felt like a good torture, but still...

"It matters to you so much?" 111 asked, and Duke nodded, trying to get his hitching breath under control, crawling his hands over the other man's shoulders and half trying to climb his partner, almost as desperate for movement as he was appreciating the sensation of being so filled. He could feel muscle shifting under the sweaty surface of the skin his hands touched. 111 looked uncertain, and his tongue sneaked out, wetting his lips. Then he said, "I think it's Nate, but that's because I have... a sort of a memory... of your voice saying it."

"Nate," said Duke, with deep satisfaction, and squirmed around until he could reach to kiss Nate, clasping his hands either side of his jaw. He felt the soft release of fluid sliding warmly down the crease of his ass as their bodies shifted, and they both broke from the kiss to look down. Nate half shrugged with one shoulder and disengaged to curl his hand around Duke's cock instead.

Duke kissed him again.

"You can do me on spit and -- that," Nate murmured against his lips. "It doesn't hurt anyway."

"We're not that desperate. Though I'm stealing the butter tomorrow." He wrapped himself over Nate like a blanket, carrying him down, and joined his hand to the one already on his cock, since Nate couldn't see what was happening between the press of their bodies.

Laughter huffed against his ear. Then, hesitantly: "You knew my name, before. That memory of you speaking it. I think we're--"

"Yeah," Duke said, burying his face in the strong curve of Nate's neck. "No matter what, we found each other, right? But if you know that..." He hadn't dared address this yet, but what he was feeling now was a trust so absolute he couldn't believe that Nate wouldn't listen. "You know something isn't right here."

A snort of warm breath against his ear, this time. "You could say that. I'm spending all day in a field."

"That, and... you can hardly think." Duke addressed that even more hesitantly. "Right? And that's not normal, is it?"

Nate shook his head. Duke's erection was softening so he just focused on pressing close, pulling their clothes and the rough sack-sheet on top of them both, and moving both their hands out from the crush. He laced his fingers between the fingers of Nate's hand and held it slightly off the floor next to them, making sure Nate could see it in the flicker of the firelight. Nate flexed his fingers, then pulled their hands closer back into their bodies, into the warmth.

"This is good, though," he said, and pulled Duke into another kiss.

And because they were simple and stupid right now, it seemed good enough just to leave things at that.

***

Their lives fell into the pattern for the next two days. Duke stole a whole block of butter at breakfast and hid it, and they made themselves unpopular by keeping everyone awake in the bunkhouse. But it was the only thing, as far as Duke was concerned, that made this... life, if such it was, this holding pattern worth living. Plus, everyone should've been super-tolerant for Nate getting some joy, since he helped them all the time. But they didn't remember that, for the most part, and that made Duke angry no matter how dutiful Nate remained. On the other hand, no-one remembered that the two of them were the reason everyone was so tired, either.

It was the day after their fourth night together that the woman walked into the midst of their workgroup while they were out in the fields and re-ordered the universe.

She was clean, in a way no-one else around was. Her clothes, her white blouse and pale grey skirt and jacket, and her black shoes, had the minimum of dust and wear. Her hair was long, but it was glossy and shone brightly blonde, wasn't in a tangled stack on her head like everyone else's. She stopped and looked around with a kind of resigned helplessness, and said, pitching her voice loud enough to carry, "You don't need to do this, you know! You can decide to stop. The only thing keeping you working is you."

About half of the people in the field stopped and looked at her. The rest kept working. Duke felt suddenly very foolish. All the time he'd spent hating the work, letting it wreck his body, and he'd never made that connection for himself. Some of the others returned to work. The rest murmured, uneasy and confused.

Nate stood up, his face angry and his movements heavy, hands fisted at his sides. He started walking toward the woman. Duke... felt strongly that the best possible place for him to be was next to Nate, and so followed him.

"You can't come here and just tell people that!" Nate faltered, as the manner in which the woman was looking at him visibly sucked out his anger. Shock and joy filled her face all at once, then she hurled herself across at him like a blonde cannonball. Duke's protest stuck in his throat.

"Nathan!" the woman said. "I am so glad to see you!"

She pulled back, because Nate -- Nathan?? -- was twitchily trying to pull clear of her, acting like Duke had never seen him act. He stared at his skin like it had offended him somehow, but then lifted and squared his jaw to continue, albeit with less certainty than he'd started out, "They don't know anything else. It's better to leave them as they are. Wait, I... know you."

He hung his hands at his sides and just stared at her.

"I know you, too," Duke said, realising it was true, and seeing it confirmed as she made another delighted start. He pulled back before she could mob him in one of those attack-hugs too, tucked in closer to Nate and curled his hand in the dirty fabric of Nate's shirt.

"You guys..." The woman sighed and scratched her head, and looked them over, muddy and battered and exhausted as they were. "Okay, I go out of town for less than a week, and this is what I come back to?" She shook her head and rolled her eyes. "You know, never mind, I'm actually thinking I should have seen this... well, maybe not this, but something like this coming."

She took a tentative step toward them. Nate didn't retreat, so Duke... racked his memory for more than the vague but stubborn recognition, and not finding it, stayed put only because Nate did. She put her hands on both their arms. "I'm really glad to see you both, but you are not yourselves." She grimaced at the sight of Nate shuffling uneasily around her touch on his arm, and she moved it to a patch covered by his shirt, where it did seem to bother him a lot less. "There are things you can't remember, but.... I could really use your help, guys. It feels like I'm all alone here, otherwise."

"What do you need?" Nate asked.

"No, um, first..." She winced slightly. "Do you know your names are Duke and Nathan, even? Everyone else has--"

"Yeah," Duke said slowly. "We know that. Though he'd have been happy with 111." He poked Nathan in the arm.

Who scowled and said, "It didn't seem relevant at the time. I'm sorry, I can't remember your name."

"Audrey," the woman said, heaving a breath. "It's Audrey Parker. And you're my partner, Nathan Wuorn--"

"He's my partner," Duke disagreed, fiercely, then realised he'd missed Nate's name and scrambled to recover. "Okay, but go on. Go on. He's still my partner. Go on." Nate sensed his disquiet and reached between them to take his hand.

Audrey's eyes pinned on the gesture and her face twisted oddly, but she said, "We work together," and Duke would have argued that, too, but she added, "for Haven Police Department," and police rang as a vaguely threatening concept to Duke. He clutched Nate's hand harder.

She sighed. "Why don't you come with me. I think it's -- the routine is a part of it, so I think if you can break out of that, then more will start to come back. Getting away from here is the first step."

Duke was so on board with that. He couldn't believe he'd been dumb enough to keep stumbling through the days here when he could walk away. But Nathan looked unhappily back toward their workgroup, and said, "I can't."

"Let me talk to him," Duke said. He eyeballed Audrey until she retreated to a good distance, still watching them. He looked directly at her and she looked away... for a moment.

"Nate, Nate," Duke said, grabbing his hands, his waist, raising his head and ending with both hands on Nate's lightly bearded jaw. "You know we need to do this, right? All along, we knew this wasn't how things should be. Maybe we can fix it for everyone else, but first we need to escape."

He turned Nate's jaw back to him, and it strayed back toward their group. Nate's eyes when he returned them to Duke were accusing.

"I know you look after them. This is a better way to do that. Trust me." Duke curled his hands over Nate's shoulders, rocking them both.

"I do trust you." Nate nodded, and tore himself away, though it looked like it pained him to turn his back on the field.

"Ooookaaay." Audrey's eyes had gone big. Duke wasn't sure what her problem was, but she sort of shook it off and said, "Good. Then follow me." And they followed her, the mystery woman, away from the field and their workgroup and the distant comfort of their bunkhouse, and everything they had known.

***

He'd never realised how the boundaries of his world ended so abruptly, in a fashion that made no sense whatsoever but somehow he'd just disregarded before.

He watched Nate stare at the wall where the sky met the ground, that was like -- like fake scenery, from a show or play or... something else that didn't fit into his memories of a whole world encompassing this place and no more.

Nate reached out a hand to touch it and it went bok under his fingertips; repeated the sound louder as Nate fisted his hand and struck it harder against the blockage. "What is this?"

"Confines of our world?" Duke suggested. So they couldn't have walked away, after all. That made him feel a little better. He looked at Audrey. "Someone did this to us? On purpose? Are we prisoners here?"

"Not... quite," she said. "Okay, um, here--" She stepped over into the scenery. Duke felt his eyes widen as he watched it become real under her feet. She held both her hands out to them. "I think this will work." She pulled a little face. "Sorry, Nathan."

He dubiously put his hand in hers, sort of squirming with the contact. Duke put his hand in her other hand, but it just felt like a regular hand to him, whatever her magical powers were that she could step through a solid barrier and escape the effects of what had happened to everyone else. She backed off, pulling them both with her, where they emerged into sunlight and... another field.

"We're back where we started?" Duke asked, dismayed.

"No," Nathan said. "The people are different. I don't know anyone here."

"And you--" Duke sighed. "You know everyone. You're the nice one."

"But you're the smart one." Nate smiled and put his hand back in Duke's, now that Audrey had let it go.

She was sort of tipping her head and smiling at them both. "It's really cute," she said. "I always knew you two could get along if you tried."

Duke exchanged an uneasy look with his lover. That... actually did not sound good. They'd been banking on being together, and in fact he wasn't sure he wanted to go back to a world where he wasn't an item with Nate. Then he realised something else, and snapped the fingers of his free hand. "I feel clearer. Do you feel that?"

Nate nodded. He looked at Audrey. "It's been like trying to think through fog for... however many days we were there." He flexed his fingers in Duke's hand, and disengaged carefully, though he moved his hand up to clasp it on Duke's upper arm instead. Duke instantly missed the touch on his fingers, but supposed it was all the same to Nate. "How many days were we there?"

"I left Haven a week ago," Audrey said, "and I think it must have happened fairly soon after that."

Haven? "A week tallies with my memory," Duke said. "By which I mean all of my memory. When am I going to get that back?"

She frowned. "I thought stepping outside your own little--" She waggled her hand at the scenery wall behind them "--whatever you'd call this. Field? Cell? I thought that much might work. But hey, at least you got your brain back."

"I missed it," Nate said, with a tight smile. He looked harder, already, than the man Duke had known, and Duke was starting to get a definite sinking feeling.

"Wait." He remembered something, now his mind was sharp, and he pointed at Nate. "What's his name, again?"

"Nathan Wuornos." She volunteered, before Duke could ask, "and you're Duke Crocker."

"That's really my name?" Duke asked, a bit offended. "It's not a title?" He shook his head. "I thought I was--"

"Some kind of gentry?" Nate asked with a sly smile.

"No, I thought I was confused," Duke emphasized. "What kind of a crappy name is--?"

Nate clapped his shoulder and then dropped his hand down with amused affectation, offering a shake. "Pleased to meet you."

"I've already been very pleased to meet you, a whole bunch of times," Duke said wryly, accepting it. He tried to keep Nate's -- Nathan's hand, but he wriggled it free, and didn't even grab hold of Duke's arm this time. Duke sighed. He'd been perfect, but that wasn't the real Nate. The real Nathan. And he wasn't the Duke who'd found 'Nate' perfect. Was steadily moving away from being that person. And honestly, the vague, personable 'Nate' he'd been hanging with was seeming more like a silly dream with every second. Their most intelligent conversation had probably been about the comparative lubricant value of different food products. Not that that was a conversation without value...

"Are you guys all right?" Audrey asked, and he realised they'd retreated into silence and staring at each other for a long moment. "I get that this messed with you and things are going to be... weird... but we need to be moving on."

"We're good," Nathan said, casting Duke a shifty look.

She didn't try to approach the people working, instead heading right past them. Nobody in the field paid any attention to their passage. It took about fifteen minutes to walk the length of the field, where they hit another scenery wall.

"How many of these are there?" Duke asked, as she pulled them through into another field. "Do they keep going forever?"

"Well, it's Gus Renshaw's farm," Audrey said, "so there's a limited amount of space for it to fill. Still, I wasn't expecting this when I stepped through the gate. And there've been Troubles that were bigger on the inside before."

"Was ours your first stop?" Nathan asked.

She sighed. "Fifth. Trying to talk to people or tell them to throw off their bonds didn't work at any of the others. It didn't work with anyone except the two of you. Maybe you're picking up a little bit of my immunity, huh? Or maybe you've been exposed to so many Troubles by now that you're just more cynical than anyone else is on a really deep level."

"Troubles." Duke pointed at Nathan. "You. You can't feel anything. That's a Trouble." Honestly he had no idea what component of that was guesswork and deduction, or memory.

Nathan pulled a face. Audrey said, "That's right."

"Did you travel in a straight line?" Nathan asked.

"Excuse me?" She squinted at him.

Nathan picked up a stick, kicked flat an area of dirt, and started drawing in it. "The fields are square. Approximately the same shape and size. If we're looking at a grid..."

Duke and Audrey frowned at the grid he drew.

"I might've gone in a circle first," she admitted, "I did walk to the nearest corner. The edges look... fuzzy to me. I know it was solid for you--"

Nathan tapped a square at the edge of the grid, and she said, "Um," and then took the stick from him and pointed. She selected three corner-adjacent squares, then moved one up, then moved one along. "This was you. We left through this side." One square along again. Both Duke and Nathan could take it from there to where they were now.

"Does it help us?" Nathan asked uncertainly.

"Well, it tells us where not to go back to," Audrey allowed. She squatted on her haunches and frowned at the grid. "The problem is, we don't know how big the grid is in each direction, or whether our goal is at the centre or at the other side."

"Why not just outside?" Duke asked abruptly. "I mean, here." He dragged the toe of his boot through the straight path of adjacent squares back to the edge where Audrey had said she'd started out. "Or here." He tapped the square she had started at. "Retrace your steps to be certain. Get out."

"We need to get everyone else out," Nathan said, "and they won't come by themselves. There are too many to force them out one by one."

"No," Audrey agreed. "I should look for Gus. I think this is his Trouble. Before I left, Vince and Dave mentioned to me that they were writing something up in the paper about Gus Renshaw's farm labourers refusing to work unless he improved their conditions. I'm pretty sure this is connected to that somehow."

Nathan grunted and took his stick back. "We could go this way, or this way--" He drew straight lines. "Check where the edge is. Or we could head back up this way to try and hit the centre."

Audrey sighed. "The farmhouse was near the western edge, not near the centre of Gus's land." She stopped and swallowed hard, her forehead creasing in annoyance. "In the theory where this actually follows the real world's geography, that would put it in the square right next to the one where I started out from."

"And you missed it?" Duke curled the corner of his mouth in amusement.

"Picked the wrong square right back at the gate." Her face softened. "But I found both of you, so it's not all bad. Though my feet are hating me for the decision."

"Well, we know where we're going now," Nathan said.

"Back where we came from. But how about we bypass your field? I don't want to lose you guys again." She squeezed Duke's arm, and smiled at Nathan. "Come on. The sooner we fix this, the sooner we can get you both showers and new clothes. I hate to tell you, but you're a mess." Her face turned cross. "When I find this guy, I'm going to have something to say about what he's been doing to people."

"You should," Nathan said, surprising Duke a little with how severe his tone was. "Some of these people were never up to being worked like that." He looked at Duke. "We're alright, though."

Audrey took the lead again as they retraced their steps, and Duke deliberately dropped further back as they re-crossed the next field, hoping that Nathan would follow his example. He did, and they regarded each other soberly as they fell in step.

"We're... different people," Duke opened, unsure quite what he was trying to say, just having the certainty inside him that if they didn't address this it was going to crash and burn much more horribly sometime soon.

"No, we're not," Nathan said.

"You've sure as hell lost your easygoing charm," Duke pointed out.

"It's like we were drugged," he said stubbornly. "I'm still me. I was me back there."

"Dumbed down, I think." Duke grimaced at the thought. At the idea someone could do that. "Not drugged."

"It doesn't matter. So I'm not stoned anymore," Nathan griped. "Duke, I still--" He stopped. His mouth thinned as he pressed his lips down hard. He took a step closer. They'd both stopped even trying to keep walking. "I still love you. It's just harder to say it. Less simple." He tentatively touched Duke's chin.

Duke didn't need any more encouragement to be all over him, exploring his mouth with his tongue. He tasted the same from the standpoint of additional IQ points.

Eventually, reluctantly, Duke pulled away again.

"She thinks we're not together," Nathan said, his voice low, eyes flicking ahead to Audrey. "She seems to know us pretty well, so at least, if we are together, we didn't tell her."

"She could be lying," Duke said, keeping his voice even lower, sliding his fingers over the extra skin revealed where Nathan's shirt was torn around the collar, littlest finger caressing the number above his heart. "She could be a part of all this." But even as he said it he felt that it wasn't true. Nathan didn't even credit it enough to reply.

He said instead, "We can decide now that we are together."

"From now on," Duke agreed. His stomach did a flip. "What if we're married? Or at least committed elsewhere? What happens then?"

Nathan wavered. "Then we'll have to choose. But I... don't feel married. How about you?"

Duke shuffled. Something was kicking him in the back of his brain, hard. "I don't feel... committed?" he hazarded.

Nathan narrowed his eyes.

Duke could not let this get away from him. He chased it frantically. "If we have to choose, I want to choose you. Whatever information we're lacking right now, we'll have to assess it when we get that back, but I want to choose you."

"I guess that's the best we can agree on." Nathan nodded, and they leaned in at the same time for another kiss. Duke loved how Nathan's tongue moved, following the taste of him rather than the feel, even if the same lack resulted in a lot of clashes of teeth.

"Hey!" Audrey waved her arms from a long way ahead of them across the field. "Are you coming?" Hardly any of the people working the field paid her any attention.

"We should..." Nathan jerked his head.

Duke curled his hand around it, caressing behind Nathan's ear and feeling the soft, wild hair there tickling his fingers. "I do not want to lose you. If we're not committed, if we're free to do this, then no matter what else..."

"Agreed." Nathan wrapped his hand over Duke's and waited a moment before firmly disengaging Duke's fingers. "We need to help her. Learn what we've just sworn to." Both cynicism and amusement lurked in his eyes, but the softness Duke had grown to know over the past days was still there at the back; deep down, but there.

They ran to catch up with Audrey, sprinting across the field. Duke was exhilarated that they could physically match each other, as they ran, legs flying over the ground. The possibilities were... lurking somewhere in the inaccessible part of his brain, but he was pretty sure that had possibilities, ones his regular self would be invested in.

One of Nathan's improvised shoes finally fell apart halfway across the field, but he shook his head to ignore it and ran on. They arrived only somewhat out of breath and Audrey gave them a questioning look.

"We had something to sort out," Duke said. "Now we're good."

"Ready to finish this and remember," Nathan said.

"Good." And Duke watched her quash a smile. She held her hands out for each of them, to take them through the next division. "Then let's go."

They moved onward, working their way back through Nathan's grid, and Duke at least hoped the theory was right, because all of these sections looked the same to him, and they'd deliberately avoided their own square -- nobody wanted to be caught up in dumb and the urge to get back to work again -- so he didn't even have the chance of recognising that to tell him they were going in the right direction.

Eventually, Audrey said, "This is it, or it should be it and I think that it is. I wish I'd thought to mark it somehow, but I didn't know at the time that I'd be wandering through dozens just the same."

"Where do we go?" Nathan asked.

"Over there." She pointed to the opposite straight edge.

"Here's hoping," Duke said sourly, and started to cut across that way. The nearer they -- in theory -- got, the more it was rising to the surface how much it rankled with him that someone had used him like this. He was starting to get an inkling that he wasn't someone who believed in hard work, and definitely not hard labour, and his own work ethos was deeply offended.

Nathan was offended in different ways, purposeful with righteous indignation, and Duke wondered at the things that they had both chosen to so doggedly hang onto. If in himself that had been individuality, then for Nathan it had been duty.

Duke had become so used to seeing the endless repetition of what honestly looked like the same field, after a whole week in that exact same field, it was a shock for him to walk into scenery that was different. At his side, Nathan groped for his arm, so he knew he wasn't the only one who felt unbalanced by the sight of something unfamiliar.

A small, untidy farmhouse squatted in front of them, tattered and sad with neglect. The windows were dirty and it was dingy inside. It didn't look like anyone was home, but Audrey walked on up the path to the door anyway. She pushed it open without resistance.

Nathan, driven by some further sense of duty kicking in, surged forward to take position behind her as she entered the farmhouse, and he still had hold of Duke's arm so Duke got dragged with him.

Immediately behind the door was a grubby kitchen. Now, running water and so much evidence of ready food on hand was the height of luxury after the past week, but Duke knew it was a grubby kitchen anyway. Something inside him was particular on that point. From a square table in the centre of the kitchen, its surface mostly commanded by a large rifle, a shabby, worn-down man with red-rimmed eyes moved to look up at them.

Duke could smell him before his eyes zeroed in on the bottle of whiskey on the table next to his hand.

"Gus Renshaw?" Audrey asked.

Blinking rapidly, his mouth opening soundlessly, the man got up. Nathan stiffened when he first rose, but relaxed when he made no move to go for the gun.

"I'm Gus," the man croaked. "Is -- is it over?" His eyes went wide and he started trembling. This wasn't what Duke had been expecting, and from the look of her, it wasn't what Audrey had, either.

"I'm working on it," Audrey said.

Nathan took Renshaw's arm before he could grab for her, diverting his urge for reassurance. "Calm down. We're here to fix this."

"Detective Wuornos?"

"Mm." Nathan nodded stiffly and gave nothing away, but Renshaw's eyes fixed on the number partially exposed on his collarbone and his knees started to give way, leaving Nathan holding him up.

"It's all right," Audrey said, sounding a fraction exasperated beneath her comforting tone. "Can you... tell us what happened?"

Kind words were all very well. Duke rounded to the table and refilled the guy's tumbler from the whiskey bottle and pushed it toward him. He grabbed it and gulped gratefully, and while he was wiping his mouth on his sleeve, both Audrey and Nathan gave Duke peevish looks.

"Cal Holness," Renshaw said. "Must have been him. A week last Thursday, he said -- said that all I wanted out of people was dumb drones to work my fields, and not real people with real minds and lives of their own at all."

"The newspaper was going to print something," Audrey prompted. "This was about the dispute?"

"I made them an offer! It was all I could afford. He threw it back in my face, and that -- that--"

"We need you to stop them," Nathan said, mustering an edge of threat in his voice. "Some of the people out there are too old, too young, too frail for the work. You--"

"I've been out there every day for the last week trying!" Renshaw cried. "You don't think I've tried?! They don't want to stop, don't want to leave, don't want to do anything but work... and then eat and sleep and work again!"

Duke coughed and cleared his throat awkwardly. "Some other things." Audrey shot him a look of at least partial amusement and he grimaced at her.

"It doesn't help," Renshaw groaned. "Nothing changes. I was just -- it's my best whiskey. Saved it all year. I was going to drink it and then take the gun and--"

"Don't," Audrey said quickly. Yeah, they could guess. "Mr Renshaw, do you know about the -- is this your Trouble?"

He shook his head. "My family's never been Troubled, either side."

"Then why would you ever--?"

Duke groaned, getting it before Renshaw said, "Cal's out there in the fields, same as all the rest. I can't change it with words. But I figured maybe if I -- if I took away the reason they'd all changed. It's almost this whole goddamn side of town, I think. Hard to keep track from who I've seen in there. Too many people to... just wait and do nothing..."

"Cal's caught in the loop of his own Trouble?" Duke said. "Shit, you mean we have to go back again and find him... if we can even persuade him to snap out of it and fix this when we do find him. I mean, I'm sure we can do that," he added quickly.

"Mr Renshaw, this is not your fault and you do not have to die," Audrey emphasized, and watched him collapse with relief. Her face went through various thinking contortions as she watched Nathan sit him down. "Maybe we don't even need Cal to fix it. You might have something there, about taking away the reason they changed... perhaps in a less permanent fashion, though. Mr Renshaw, are you able to leave this farm?"

He shrugged his shoulders dejectedly. "Can't leave, can't do anything. It's like there's a wall around the whole estate."

"Then that's what we need to try," Audrey declared. "We'll all leave."

"I just said--!"

"I can leave," she told him, "and I can take you with me. Come on."

It was more or less a case of Nathan picking him up and carrying him, anyway. Though he mustered himself and managed to be stumbling on his own as they left the farmhouse and walked down the bleak little path toward the gate at the end. The light outside was starting to take on an evening hue, and Duke had never seen a farm gate that loomed so ominous.

If Audrey was right, on the other side of that gate waited the real world, and they didn't fully know who they'd be, or what they'd be to each other, within it. Duke caught Nathan's eye, and his lover looked unhappily back at him. No stepping boldly out into this new world for either of them.

But they couldn't stay like this.

"Okay..." Audrey was frowning between the scenery-wall of the gate in front of them, and the three men with her. "I guess if you two hold hands with each other, that shouldn't be any hardship..." She faltered. Duke and Nathan had anticipated her, though not with a mind to practicalities. Nathan's hand was firm and warm wrapped around Duke's. A little too firm, perhaps, but he'd rather endure that than relinquish it. "Um," said Audrey, a little creased 'v' between her brows as she looked at them. "I really hope this next step is going to go okay for you both."

"We've talked about it," Duke said.

Nathan nodded.

Renshaw looked perplexed.

Audrey was afraid for them, Duke thought, all kinds of fears gnawing unpleasantly at the inside of his belly. She didn't think they were going to like what awaited them, if they got their full selves -- at least memories -- back.

Nathan squeezed his hand even harder and jerked his elbow in a nudge, which was also hard, and murmured, "No matter what."

Duke heaved a breath. "Yes."

Audrey nodded, though her eyes were sad, and she hung onto Renshaw, disengaging his hold on Nathan, and reached out and placed her free hand over Duke and Nathan's joined hands. "Ready..." she said, and pulled them all forward. The gate was... the gate was suddenly real, but still closed, and Nathan reached to open it. Duke's hand lagged more reluctantly a beat behind him to help, and then they were pushing the tattered rope loop that served as a lock over the gatepost, shoving forward against the rickety wooden frame. Then they were stepping through...

The world sort of opened up and spread out around them. Colours and depth came flooding back. There was a horizon again, in every direction, and a sense of space, things Duke hadn't even realised were missing. And... and the same effect took root inside him and spread inward, unravelling the contents of his brain and rolling out the whole of a life that had been locked away from him, with the complexities of the real person that he was.

He lost the two hands clasped to his, didn't know who'd pulled clear first but he was holding both his hands to his head, so there was a good chance that was on him. He moved his hands from his face, and patted down his chest, pulling the tatters of his shirt aside to prove that the number '72' was gone from his skin. He'd spun away from the others when the real world hit, and his line of view now encompassed a few tens of feet of dirt track road, leading to the tarmac of an actual road, and beyond, in the distance, the clustered, colourful little houses of... Haven.

Fucking Haven, Duke thought, fervently. Because what even...?

"Oh... fuck." That heartfelt expulsion belonged to Nathan, and was everything Duke had feared, a moment ago. Except now...

How? Just how? That was all he could think. He turned around. Nathan hadn't moved after they came through the gate, just stopped still where he was, his hands stiff at his sides -- his whole body held rigid, in fact. Audrey still had his elbow and was looking in alarm between him and Renshaw, whose fugue and shell-shock seemed to be vying for her attention. Apparently she wasn't so worried about Duke.

Nathan's eyes rose slowly, jerkily, to fix on Duke's.

How? Duke thought again, the question overwhelming anything else.

How had this happened? Was that for real? Like, remove all the context from himself and Nathan and what they actually wanted was to fuck each other? Nathan wasn't even remotely bisexual, so far as Duke knew -- at least, he'd never given away any inkling toward liking men. Then again, Duke had been pretty conspicuous about flaunting his own female dates since coming back to Haven; Haven, as opposed to the big wide world outside it.

And this was Nathan. Nathan he'd known since school, who griped and scowled and gave him parking tickets, even though they'd been friends sometimes over the years. His Nathan. Forget the first day of school, they'd known each other forever, and that was fucked-up-complicated and absolutely not about banging each other.

They'd had their brains turned off, that was how the fuck this had happened. Some stupid, ridiculous Trouble to tie them in new knots, complicate them even more. Was Nathan ever going to want to look at him again after this? After they'd been inside each other, after Duke had touched all over the Troubled body that Nathan guarded so fiercely, privately, against him since Duke's ill-conceived taunts in school?

"We--" Nathan started, and just stopped, and his fingers twitched at his sides and he looked absolutely helpless, like he had no idea what came next. His body might be still, but Duke could see him flailing inside.

And Duke was falling, faltering, his stomach sunk into the bedrock, something just dying inside him. He didn't know where it came from, but a little voice rasped and squeaked out of him to complete Nathan's statement, so very hopefully doomed in its optimism, with, "...had a deal?"

"I--" Nathan's hand rose to his mouth, clamped hard over it from his nose to his ample jaw, fingers squeezing, digging into his own skin. His eyes showed whites all around them. He looked past Duke like he couldn't face him. It seemed to take an effort of will to jerk his gaze back.

There was three feet of mud ground between them, and they hadn't allowed distance to have any sway in the past week, but now that space was gaping. Nathan's blue eyes were filled with horror. He squeezed them shut, taking them from Duke's view.

So that was that, and Duke started to sag, the wild moment of hope -- he didn't even know where it had come from, there was no chance in hell they could make this work -- deserting him.

There was a glimmer in the corner of Nathan's closed eyes, startling him as the fading sunlight picked out the reflection of moisture. This wasn't something Nathan would ever appreciate him having seen, either.

Then Nathan opened his eyes, pulling the hand away from his face, and both his wet eyes and his jaw were set with determination. "A promise is a promise," he said, voice rough and raspy, and stepped forward like he was using a tremendous effort of will to haul his body into movement, one hand moving out, fingers stretching toward Duke.

Duke discovered his body wanted to move as well, and had only been waiting for the signal to step back into Nathan's space.

Nathan caught his arms as Duke dared try go for his waist and the back of his neck to trap him against him, draw him into a kiss, but Nathan quickly gave up the tightly distant hold to allow Duke to come in close.

They kissed each other fiercely and... nothing had changed. Duke couldn't even think why things had seemed so impossible for that moment of hesitation. Fuck, everything was right. There was no impediment to the two of them being together except that they'd been such boneheads their entire lives in not realising the truth of the dance they'd been doing. Duke had wanted Nathan's friendship since they'd met, and he'd spent years trying to get Nathan's attention.

Nathan unbound, these last five days, had been a gift. It had been everything he'd ever only dreamed lurked behind all that control.

It was emerging again now, teased out as they both committed to the kiss. One of Nathan's hands had managed to find Duke's ass, even though Duke knew he couldn't feel what he was touching, but there was a certain philosophical declaration in its decidedly squeezing presence there. Duke returned the favour joyfully.

They came out of it in stages, as the real world sidled back in, though it wasn't the shock it had been the first time, and they sort of stuck, clinging to each other, and Nathan's smile was the most completely fucking ridiculous expression Duke had ever seen, so he could only assume his own was equally dopey and unrestrained.

Nathan nudged and turned him with a frown of concern and they both looked nervously at Audrey.

Her grin lit up her eyes. It came with a generous side-helping of relief. "You guys are okay?"

"We're great," Duke said. "We're just great." His brain was spiralling out over how much better it was going to be fucking each other through the mattress when they actually had a mattress, and all the other comforts of their own spaces, and a whole new universe of possibilities with them both fully themselves. Nathan was clinging to his hand again, so he was pretty sure that Nate was on that same page.

They drew apart at least to the extent of that hand-clasp being the only contact between them. Maybe it wasn't very manly, but right now Duke couldn't give less of a fuck about that.

Renshaw was looking pretty startled, but if he had any issues with the idea of a gay romance playing out in front of him, those were far overwhelmed by Audrey's proven capacity to break the spell that had almost led him to take his own life. His eyes drifted away from Duke and Nathan.

"If we're back," Duke began, cautiously, "then..."

His eyes were drawn by Renshaw's focus, over to the gateway they'd come through. Nathan stepped back toward it, pulling Duke via their joined hands, and carefully caught and closed the open gate.

What they could mostly see leading away toward the horizon was a bunch of empty, well-tended fields.

"They're... are they really gone?" Renshaw stammered. "Are all those people okay? Where did they go?" Panic fluttered at the edges of his voice.

Audrey said, "I really, really hope that they went right back to wherever they were in town when this started with no memory whatsoever of the last week."

"I need to see them." Renshaw wrung his hands frantically. "I need to be sure."

"We will make sure," Audrey promised.

"We remember," Duke said, abruptly, though the interruption made him feel kind of a dick. But... He exchanged a horrified glance with Nathan at the idea that they might have forgotten.

"You were holding onto me when we stepped out." Audrey's face scrunched up with an odd indecision before she admitted, "I did debate grabbing Renshaw and going for it alone... Whether that would ultimately be best for both of you."

"Audrey!" Nathan protested, aghast.

"Yeah, well, I didn't, did I?" she said defensively. "I was worried, because you're so... at each other's throats... I wasn't sure at all how you were going to cope with this. But it all worked out. I gave you a chance, you gave each other a chance."

Nathan nodded slowly. "Back to... back to the police station, then?" He cast an apologetic look at Duke. "I suppose we need to look for Cal, to make sure this doesn't happen again."

Audrey laughed at him. Her hand squeezed Renshaw's shoulder in a silent reassurance. "Not a chance, Wuornos. Have you seen the state of you? We'll drive back with Mr Renshaw to establish that this really did fix itself, and then I will do whatever proves necessary to follow this up. You're going to go home and get a shower... and a change of clothes... and some shoes." Her nose wrinkled cutely. "And I'd say a good night's sleep, but..." She looked at Duke with a rather mischievous smirk.

Duke grinned broadly back at her. "Not so much. I'm not so sure on the necessity of the change of clothes, either. How about we both use my shower?" He jogged Nathan's arm, prompting an eyeroll and, though more hesitant in coming, a tight, fond smile and a small nod. "I'm guessing he doesn't need to check in at work again afterwards?"

"Now, wait," Nathan objected. "I've still a job to do. I really ought to--"

"--No." Audrey rolled the word around her mouth with warm amusement. "Take a break, Wuornos. You know, it seems to me that after the last week, both of you are definitely due a day off."

END


Context for the random mention, Duke can read Chinese, this is the Kanji for “river”: