Mar. 17th, 2008 11:51 am
The Quest For The Holy Grail 2/8
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lovely_ambitionTitle: The Quest for the Holy Grail 2/8
Pairing: Gawain/Galahad, this part.
Rating: R
Disclaimer: Nope, not mine.
Summary: Years have passed, but circumstances have changed and it's time to bring everyone back for one more heist.
Notes: This is, indeed, a sequel to Modern Day Legends. Thanks to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
bwc_baby for the lookover and to melloniel for the constant support.
5.
It had a thickness that nothing could cut through, was Galahad’s opinion of the records room of the prestigious and dignified museum, the British Historical Institute. He swatted away dust bunnies as he sat sprawled on a creaky old desk and every few moments, Dagonet glared at him, reaching for another ancient piece of paper. Galahad was beginning to think that every single item in the entire museum had to be one-hundred years old to be admitted.
This, really, should have been why they sent Bors.
“Hand me that manuscript,” Dagonet ordered and Galahad rolled his eyes. If this were Gawain, he would have been childish and if this were Tristan, he would have replied with some misguided innuendo, but Dagonet had been there for Galahad when he needed him most and they owed their lives to each other, in a way. So he kept quiet and he handed over a wrinkly and yellow old sheet of paper.
He sighed, for what was probably the twentieth time.
He listened to the silence, the ticking of Dagonet’s Rolex, the way the dust bunnies seemed to have wings and congregate in the air and the quiet creaking of footsteps on the floor above them. There were also the muffled sounds of the bound security guard.
“The nightshadow compound isn’t working,” Galahad pointed out, and it might have been complaining for the sake of complaining.
“It will kick in,” Dagonet assured, flipping a page.
“He’s still awake, so obviously there’s something wrong…”
“It takes thirty minutes.” No names. No names were to be used while there were witnesses around.
They wore their masks and Galahad’s hair was itching underneath the fabric and he wanted to take it off and that meant the security guard had to be unconscious. The bickering went back and forth until Dagonet eventually pulled his gun on Galahad and took the safety off.
He didn’t even say anything. Galahad just knew immediately to drop the subject.
“Fine,” he muttered underneath his breath, turning to face away from the gun aimed at his shoulder and away from Dagonet to grumpily watch the effects of the drug and to see if Tristan and Dagonet really were that good with chemicals as they swore they were. Everyone seemed to have their expertise, even if it was shared. Galahad took his pride in his driving and his aim with the sniper-shot was becoming hard to beat. Only Tristan could ever challenge him. Obviously he had none of Bors’ or Gawain’s strength, and definitely not Dagonet’s patience or raw anger, but he had his own skill-set to offer.
He wouldn’t be out of a job anytime soon unless he fucked it up. And he didn’t plan on fucking it up.
“He’s out,” Dagonet called over, bringing Galahad out of his thoughts.
Galahad shook his head, coming back to reality. “Well. Good,” he said, hesitantly.
Dagonet held out a timesheet to Galahad, who put it into a folder of information they planned on photocopying and bringing back to the room the next day, when the shift changed. “So what’s this I hear?” Dagonet asked, finally.
“Hm?” Galahad was distracted and with Dagonet’s tendency to withhold words, communication between them was strained. “What’d you hear?”
“There’s a new place the both of you are moving to.” With Dagonet, things were never a question. He had the confidence to turn everything (even falsities) into cold, hard truths. Galahad envied that kind of power over the English language, the way he could con anyone into something with a hard look and a few well-chosen words. There was a reason Dagonet was their front for official business and it had everything to do with the man he was. “And the wedding.”
“Oh,” he realized with a dour grunt. “The fucking wedding.” Galahad had been bitching about it to everyone and he wasn’t surprised that Dagonet had heard about it. “Elaine’s getting married,” he muttered. “Mum’s making me go.”
“She’s your cousin,” was Dagonet’s patient answer.
“I hate weddings,” Galahad complained. “I have to sit there and I get to dress up, sure, but I have to see the family, and I’ll have to bring a date.”
Dagonet stopped searching through sheets and blueprints and records of artifacts to level Galahad with a dubious look.
“I can’t bring Gawain,” Galahad answered the unanswered question. “Elaine doesn’t like ‘that sort of lifestyle’,” he mimicked his cousin’s shrill voice; the one that seemed to go right with her perfectionist anal-retentive personality. “And since it’s her special day, I don’t get a say, or else she’ll beat me with the bouquet. Her words.”
Dagonet seemed to nod at that, but he didn’t say a thing in reply and this was how Galahad had become accustomed to working with him. He just didn’t speak sometimes and you had to understand or else you were drifting face-down in the stream, listening to the birds chirping above.
“Security systems,” Dagonet changed the topic. “Very high-tech.”
They exchanged a look, the masks making it so that the only focal point was either the lips or the eyes and Galahad’s gaze drifted to the lips while Dagonet’s went to the eyes and a moment of silence lasted.
“Oh, shit,” Galahad muttered.
Of all the skill-sets that they had within the Knights, none of them were technological geniuses. Of course, they knew one, but it just happened to be Galahad’s second-least favourite person in all the world (least favourite being that bitch-cop, of course).
Dagonet just snapped the folder shut and began to tidy up the records. “There’s no other choice right now.”
“Anyone but him,” was all Galahad muttered as they untied the guard and made their way out, cleaning up the scene of all evidence that they were there in the first place as they went.
6.
The glasses sitting low on Galahad’s nose had a prescription that was so weak that it might as well have just been pure glass out of any old window. They were strictly cosmetic and Gawain wished to Arthur’s God that he had stepped on the things weeks back when Galahad had bought them (all five hundred and sixty pounds worth of them). It wasn’t that they were ugly, though they were unnecessary. It was that while not ugly as sin, they were distracting as hell and Gawain was fighting every last urge to wipe the library desk clean of about twenty tomes and jump Galahad, right there and then.
Of course, then Arthur wouldn’t join their crusade because they wouldn’t have given him enough detail and fact, but Gawain would be sated, at least.
“I hate reading,” Galahad complained as he flicked over another page, squinting at the words, not using the glasses properly, but Gawain knew that there was no reason to be using them. They were cosmetic, of course, and purely to drive Gawain to the brink of sexual madness. It was almost enough to make him snap at Galahad; almost. Galahad sat back, slumping childishly in the chair while Gawain did his best to renew his vows of patience.
I love this man, he said to himself. I will not shoot him for being an utter waste of resources no matter how good it would make me feel.
Galahad did, at least, occasionally offer information. Like the moment that he leaned forward, peering over the thin rims of the black glasses to tap a page. “Here,” he offered. “It’s a history of the Grail throughout history and where it’s been. Museums, records.” He extended a sheath of papers. “And these are the debates over whether it’s actually the real thing. According to this, three museums in England are showing a supposed Holy Grail this month at the same time.”
Gawain looked at Galahad, with mild distress. “So how do we know which the real one is?”
“The one with the market value?” Galahad clarified, smirking as he eased back and fiddled with the glasses.
Gawain nearly snatched them off, but he forced that impulse lower and lower until it was a burning desire to match the other desire he had regarding Galahad at that exact moment. “Yes, Galahad, which one?” he said, gritting his teeth.
“Tristan’s finding out.”
And then Galahad did something completely unforgivable. While Gawain was looking his way, Galahad slowly licked his upper lip with excruciating slowness, then the lower and then the glasses slipped just an inch down his nose and that was that; the breaking point. He leaned forward to yank Galahad up by that perfectly-pressed button down of silk and yanked him halfway over the table, sending texts and papers flying to the floor as he used his superior strength to haul Galahad through the empty library towards the men’s room in a narrow corridor by the back of the building.
That was when Galahad tugged Gawain against the wall, just outside the door to the men’s room, the sign worn and tarnished from years of being pushed on and abused. “If I didn’t know any better,” Galahad remarked, with an affected naïveté, “I’d think you were trying to do something, Gawain.”
That evoked a deep rumble of a laugh from Gawain, one that nearly remained trapped in his throat as he gave a sharp sound of desire, letting everything bottled come undone and spill over. “You would think that, wouldn’t you?”
A sharp push and they went crashing back into the bathrooms, the doors swinging as Gawain opened the handicapped stall and yanked Galahad in, mouth descending on his neck with immediate urgency, teeth scraping up the stubble of an unshaven jaw as Galahad’s hands yanked Gawain’s trousers down and Gawain threw the glasses to the side.
“Those cost a lot of money,” Galahad said, voice low and angry.
Gawain liked it when Galahad got angry without the irritation and sulking. It was a side of him that he ever so rarely saw, but when it burned, it burned bright and ignited everything around him within a radius of several rooms. Their clothes were disheveled and their hair mussed and Gawain’s was falling in his face all too easily. “However will I make it up to you?” Gawain replied, voice heavily afflicted with the shallow gasps of his current condition of need and want.
Galahad was already in the middle of spinning them until he was shoved up against the stall, torso pressed firmly to the lime green divisor.
A pretty, pretty sight, especially from that angle.
It helped that Galahad had pressed a condom into Gawain’s hand and that the ‘no touching’ rule had been so utterly dashed and never once brought into the conversation in years and that Gawain could work with such quick efficiency when it came to Galahad (a teamwork they had always had, but had never thought to apply to sex until they realized places they could get away with it with the application of quiet and quickness). Gawain yanked the tucked shirt out of Galahad’s grey slacks and yanked the tie Galahad was wearing with his free hand, pulling Galahad back so that Gawain’s lips were pressed firmly against the shell of Galahad’s ear, his pants being shoved down with his other hand.
Gawain ran his thumb along the silk pattern of the black tie as he breathed heavily, Galahad leaning his head back, curls falling softly over the nape of his neck. Gawain moved his lips slowly over the back of Galahad’s neck to nip at the skin there, always marked with the contrasts of pink and red from past liaisons like their current one.
Gawain shoved Galahad’s slacks to the ground, stroking himself slowly, to the rhythm of Galahad’s heavy breaths – in, out, in, out, inout, stroke up, down, repeat – and continued to murmur quiet words into Galahad’s ear, the things he wished to do to him. And all Galahad did was agree in a low, willing tone.
Gawain didn’t dare let go of the tie, simply tightening his grasp around the garment and yanking it tighter as he slid into Galahad, slick enough from the spit he had coated his palm with, knowing it would hurt, but pain was an acceptable side-effect. And pain usually evoked the most beautifully broken sounds to be coaxed from Galahad’s throat and past his lips. This was no different, Gawain yanking on the tie, pushing hard into Galahad, growling, “I love you like this” as he licked up the first beads of sweat from the back of Galahad’s neck.
The reply was incoherent as Galahad let out a sharp cry of his own in return, pushing back for every thrust forward that Gawain gave, every rock of his hips with every ounce of strength he possessed, knowing that Galahad would match it. Within minutes of the breakneck pace, fucking as though they wouldn’t be able to for months after this encounter, Galahad came first, having been jerking himself off with a firm hand, having swatted away Gawain’s help, insisting he keep working at Galahad’s tie.
Gawain followed soon after, the climax feeling like the most relieving thing since the rain after the ten days they had gone without rain earlier that summer. He let his forehead slump against Galahad’s shoulder, releasing his tie and letting it fall back to its normal position, wrinkled and ruined.
They reclothed silently, like this were a stakeout and Gawain tried to help, but was swatted away with a low, whisper of a laugh. “Stop it,” he said.
Gawain opened the stall, peeking left and then right, holding up a hand when he heard voices in the narrow corridor, echoing like they hadn’t pitched their voices down. Ingrates, he thought. Don’t appreciate the sanctity of the library. The little hypocrite of him was dying of laughter at Gawain’s thoughts.
“Have you seen the new artifact? I wasn’t planning on seeing the exhibit at the Metropolitan,” a disinterested female voice was musing. She sounded familiar, like she was the librarian from the way up or something, but Gawain couldn’t place it. “But then I spoke with some of my higher-ups.”
“What did they say?” an elderly male was asking.
“Apparently, this is the Holy Grail. The one worth millions.”
Gawain’s eyes, were they prone to, might have lit up with dollar signs at that very moment. He yanked Galahad closer to him, but didn’t dare make another move that might give away their presence. They couldn’t be seen doing this, not when they were supposed to be unseen while doing their research.
“I don’t think the Holy Grail actually exists.”
“Well, I believe.”
And so did Gawain.
7.
Arthur held an old rosary within his hands. It was burgundy, the colour of blood, and the beads were cold against his palm. The light pouring in through the stained glass windows spilled over his legs. He was waiting solemnly for Father Franks to be ready for him. In the meantime, Our Fathers were offered up to the heavens for forgiveness for the things Arthur had cause to do in the past.
The line of sinners in search of penance had reduced greatly and Arthur glanced over his shoulder to find a small blue-haired lady leaving the booth, leaving the curtain open for him and he tucked his rosary into the pocket of his shirt as he entered, drawing the curtain shut behind him.
“Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned,” Arthur began easily, his voice repentant and deep. “It has been five days since my last confession.”
“Welcome back, Arthur,” the Father welcomed with a mildly tired sigh, though there was nothing chastising in his tone. Rather, it held a bemusement that was utterly harmless. Arthur’s expression shifted, a sly smile turning up the corners of his lips as he sat there, running the rosary beads through the slip of his thumb and his index finger. “Tell me your sins, son.”
In that little wooden box contained all of Arthur’s sins and all of his downfalls, the perils of mortality and the killing of men. Those four walls held so many secrets that they might heave and sigh under the collective woes that they had absorbed from Arthur alone, never mind the multitudes of other sinners come for their penance.
Arthur had a tricky situation.
He couldn’t out and out tell the Father what he did. There was only so far that the privilege of taking on the sins of a man went before that man was reported to the authorities for being a killer. And the excuse that ‘everyone I’ve killed has deserved it’ never did hold up in court.
“Since my last confession,” Arthur began haltingly, thinking of what he had done. There had been considerably less since he had retired. “I’ve severely doubted those I have sworn to never doubt.”
“How so?”
“My faith wavers,” Arthur admitted, gripping his rosary and the wood of the seat with an iron grip. “In those I have sworn to love and never doubt and I cannot help but find myself reeling in this epiphany.”
“Has something in particular caused this breach in faith?” Father Franks always had a soothing tone that made Arthur feel better about coming there to find relief from the stark contrast of a world drawn in shadows and blood and the relative safety of his home-life. “Perhaps a new event?”
“You know I’ve retired.”
“Yes, from your… ‘tricky’ job,” Father Franks chuckled. “You never did extrapolate on what you did.”
Arthur remained quiet, silence his steady companion in the hours of darkness, as he never did wish to draw unsuspecting people into his world because Plato did have it right, so many years ago. Once they realized just what the shadows on the wall were, everything changed, and not for the better. Ignorance was bliss.
“Go on, Arthur.”
“I’ve been asked to come out of retirement one last time and for a good cause. I believe with all my heart that the reasons behind this are just, pure, and motivated by good.” Arthur kept his gaze on the mesh that separated the man of god and the man who did the devil’s bidding. “But my faith in whether my crew is able to do this job wavers.” As did his voice, which wavered on each word in the last sentence. The words were like blasphemy simply to say. “Too much time has passed.” Aches compounded, wrinkles appeared, complacency set in. “And I cannot lose these men.”
There was a long pause, a hitch in an otherwise flowing conversation.
“Tell me, Arthur,” the Father mused, sounding almost content to have fallen to some conclusion. “Is it that you’re afraid they’ve lost their abilities or that you’ve lost yours? Faith in one’s self is important as well.”
The beads of Arthur’s rosary slipped past the sweaty palm holding them, but Arthur said not a single word in reply to the Father’s (rather apt) words.
“Two Our Father’s,” Father Franks advised. “And one act of charity involving your coworkers.” Though it was little more than acts to appease men and women who wanted to see their souls rest in some form of heaven, it set Arthur at mild ease and he gave as much of a smile as men like Arthur could ever give.
He pressed his palm to the screen between him and the priest, a sign of his thanks before he rose to his feet and made his way to a pew in the back of the church, where the majesty and the breadth of the place could always conspire to take his breath away. The words of the Our Father were exhaled past his lips, breathed out reverently, each one more earnest than the last and when he finished, he rose and toyed with the car keys in his hand.
The drive back to work was quiet, no news radio to appease him, no traffic reports, and not a single bar of music to accompany his thoughts.
When he unlocked the door, he was met by Galahad’s shining grin and a foisted fistful of papers, all in a mess. “C’mon,” Galahad encouraged. “You’ve just missed it. We’ve got enough to get it. It’s real, Arthur. It’s really real.” A quick glance around the room proved to show much the same sentiment. Lancelot was smiling with that same devil-may-care grin and even Tristan looked eager, chomping on an apple and throwing glances to Dag every now and again. Bors, of course, was already chomping at the bit to get working and Gawain had that smug and settled look he got after a kill or a fuck.
One act of charity.
“Well, boys,” Arthur remarked, a slow smile appearing on his lips and showing many a laugh line from years past. “I’m in.”
8.
The wheels of Gareth’s chair scraped against the wood floor of the room and made Galahad wince at the noise, quite visibly so. It was enough to earn an elbow in the side from Gawain. “Ow,” Galahad hissed. Gawain didn’t seem to care, being that he was more concerned at the moment with what his brother’s answer to the question was going to be.
It was no secret at all that while Galahad loved Gawain’s mother like his own (“she has the best trifle this side of the Thames”), he despised his brother and had never given a good reason for it.
Gareth didn’t resemble Gawain much, beyond the colour of his hair and his eyes. He had a headset on more often than not and rather than sport a messy array of dreads, his hair fell haphazardly into his eyes, sitting at chin-length. There were scars on his face from growing up a pimply, gangly teenager and had never gone away and though Galahad might have sympathized (having been more than a little gangly himself), Gareth had spent those formative years making Galahad’s life hell and telling him that he had little place in the house. He was tall, just a mite taller than Gawain, but you might never know, as Gareth spent most of his life in front of a keyboard or a microscope. He could fix anything technological or electrical and anything online was his kingdom.
“But,” Galahad had protested, one late night, “he can’t fire a gun.”
“And you can’t shut your mouth,” had been Gawain’s retort.
“So, let me get this straight,” Gareth was chatting, leaning back in his chair, the leather creaking and the wheels giving off a horrific whine that made Galahad wince yet again, his fingers itching to go towards his concealed weapon. “You need me. You need me to help you with your oh-so-secret job.”
Gawain sighed. “It’d be a one-off, Gareth. That’s it.”
“How would I be paid?”
“Well enough,” Galahad snapped in retort. He was rolling his eyes and Gawain was beginning to look more than a little irritable at the entire scenario. He just wanted to come and finish this without getting any bloodshed on the floors. His mother would never let him live it down. She’d allowed him this lifestyle, provided he left it outside the front door. Never in my house, she was fond of saying.
Gawain leaned over to hand a cylindrical container to Gareth. “Blueprints. We need security passes coded, the system disarmed, and an escape plan. You do it right, you get paid. You don’t…well, I’ll try and make it so you don’t disappear.” Perhaps he could appeal to Lancelot’s sense of family. The man had a sister who lived just off the Black Sea whom he hadn’t seen in almost fifteen years. Usually, bringing up family loyalty was enough to get a favour or two in the pocket.
Rather than answering, Gareth was staring down Galahad, who seemed all too willing to stare right back, locked in the world’s most immature staring contest.
“Oh, for…” Gawain sighed.
“Would I have to work with him?” Gareth demanded.
That got a derisive snort out of Galahad, almost immediately, like he was programmed to do it anytime Gareth opened his mouth (and if you compared all their prior interactions to the one that day, you might almost start to believe that). Gawain had a moment’s fear that if the two of them did end up working with each other, there would be fatalities in the vein of friendly-fire.
“We’d try not to,” Gawain carefully replied. He got a doubly strong glare for even saying so much and wound up sighing. “Oh, for fuck’s sake, what do the two of you want?” he snapped.
“I can’t believe we need him,” Galahad was muttering. “Dag could do it…”
“No, he couldn’t,” Gareth cut him off, shoulders lifting as he sat back in his chair, giving both Galahad and Gawain a smug, superior look. “I’m the best there is and you know it. That’s why you’re here. And you’re lucky too, because I’m going to help you. And get paid for it,” he stressed, shooting Gawain a cold look. “Where and when.”
“We’ll be in touch.”
“Well, obviously,” Gareth rolled his eyes. “You’re still moving your things out.”
How Gawain stopped himself from smacking his younger brother that moment, he never did know.
tbc
Pairing: Gawain/Galahad, this part.
Rating: R
Disclaimer: Nope, not mine.
Summary: Years have passed, but circumstances have changed and it's time to bring everyone back for one more heist.
Notes: This is, indeed, a sequel to Modern Day Legends. Thanks to
bwc_baby for the lookover and to melloniel for the constant support.5.
It had a thickness that nothing could cut through, was Galahad’s opinion of the records room of the prestigious and dignified museum, the British Historical Institute. He swatted away dust bunnies as he sat sprawled on a creaky old desk and every few moments, Dagonet glared at him, reaching for another ancient piece of paper. Galahad was beginning to think that every single item in the entire museum had to be one-hundred years old to be admitted.
This, really, should have been why they sent Bors.
“Hand me that manuscript,” Dagonet ordered and Galahad rolled his eyes. If this were Gawain, he would have been childish and if this were Tristan, he would have replied with some misguided innuendo, but Dagonet had been there for Galahad when he needed him most and they owed their lives to each other, in a way. So he kept quiet and he handed over a wrinkly and yellow old sheet of paper.
He sighed, for what was probably the twentieth time.
He listened to the silence, the ticking of Dagonet’s Rolex, the way the dust bunnies seemed to have wings and congregate in the air and the quiet creaking of footsteps on the floor above them. There were also the muffled sounds of the bound security guard.
“The nightshadow compound isn’t working,” Galahad pointed out, and it might have been complaining for the sake of complaining.
“It will kick in,” Dagonet assured, flipping a page.
“He’s still awake, so obviously there’s something wrong…”
“It takes thirty minutes.” No names. No names were to be used while there were witnesses around.
They wore their masks and Galahad’s hair was itching underneath the fabric and he wanted to take it off and that meant the security guard had to be unconscious. The bickering went back and forth until Dagonet eventually pulled his gun on Galahad and took the safety off.
He didn’t even say anything. Galahad just knew immediately to drop the subject.
“Fine,” he muttered underneath his breath, turning to face away from the gun aimed at his shoulder and away from Dagonet to grumpily watch the effects of the drug and to see if Tristan and Dagonet really were that good with chemicals as they swore they were. Everyone seemed to have their expertise, even if it was shared. Galahad took his pride in his driving and his aim with the sniper-shot was becoming hard to beat. Only Tristan could ever challenge him. Obviously he had none of Bors’ or Gawain’s strength, and definitely not Dagonet’s patience or raw anger, but he had his own skill-set to offer.
He wouldn’t be out of a job anytime soon unless he fucked it up. And he didn’t plan on fucking it up.
“He’s out,” Dagonet called over, bringing Galahad out of his thoughts.
Galahad shook his head, coming back to reality. “Well. Good,” he said, hesitantly.
Dagonet held out a timesheet to Galahad, who put it into a folder of information they planned on photocopying and bringing back to the room the next day, when the shift changed. “So what’s this I hear?” Dagonet asked, finally.
“Hm?” Galahad was distracted and with Dagonet’s tendency to withhold words, communication between them was strained. “What’d you hear?”
“There’s a new place the both of you are moving to.” With Dagonet, things were never a question. He had the confidence to turn everything (even falsities) into cold, hard truths. Galahad envied that kind of power over the English language, the way he could con anyone into something with a hard look and a few well-chosen words. There was a reason Dagonet was their front for official business and it had everything to do with the man he was. “And the wedding.”
“Oh,” he realized with a dour grunt. “The fucking wedding.” Galahad had been bitching about it to everyone and he wasn’t surprised that Dagonet had heard about it. “Elaine’s getting married,” he muttered. “Mum’s making me go.”
“She’s your cousin,” was Dagonet’s patient answer.
“I hate weddings,” Galahad complained. “I have to sit there and I get to dress up, sure, but I have to see the family, and I’ll have to bring a date.”
Dagonet stopped searching through sheets and blueprints and records of artifacts to level Galahad with a dubious look.
“I can’t bring Gawain,” Galahad answered the unanswered question. “Elaine doesn’t like ‘that sort of lifestyle’,” he mimicked his cousin’s shrill voice; the one that seemed to go right with her perfectionist anal-retentive personality. “And since it’s her special day, I don’t get a say, or else she’ll beat me with the bouquet. Her words.”
Dagonet seemed to nod at that, but he didn’t say a thing in reply and this was how Galahad had become accustomed to working with him. He just didn’t speak sometimes and you had to understand or else you were drifting face-down in the stream, listening to the birds chirping above.
“Security systems,” Dagonet changed the topic. “Very high-tech.”
They exchanged a look, the masks making it so that the only focal point was either the lips or the eyes and Galahad’s gaze drifted to the lips while Dagonet’s went to the eyes and a moment of silence lasted.
“Oh, shit,” Galahad muttered.
Of all the skill-sets that they had within the Knights, none of them were technological geniuses. Of course, they knew one, but it just happened to be Galahad’s second-least favourite person in all the world (least favourite being that bitch-cop, of course).
Dagonet just snapped the folder shut and began to tidy up the records. “There’s no other choice right now.”
“Anyone but him,” was all Galahad muttered as they untied the guard and made their way out, cleaning up the scene of all evidence that they were there in the first place as they went.
6.
The glasses sitting low on Galahad’s nose had a prescription that was so weak that it might as well have just been pure glass out of any old window. They were strictly cosmetic and Gawain wished to Arthur’s God that he had stepped on the things weeks back when Galahad had bought them (all five hundred and sixty pounds worth of them). It wasn’t that they were ugly, though they were unnecessary. It was that while not ugly as sin, they were distracting as hell and Gawain was fighting every last urge to wipe the library desk clean of about twenty tomes and jump Galahad, right there and then.
Of course, then Arthur wouldn’t join their crusade because they wouldn’t have given him enough detail and fact, but Gawain would be sated, at least.
“I hate reading,” Galahad complained as he flicked over another page, squinting at the words, not using the glasses properly, but Gawain knew that there was no reason to be using them. They were cosmetic, of course, and purely to drive Gawain to the brink of sexual madness. It was almost enough to make him snap at Galahad; almost. Galahad sat back, slumping childishly in the chair while Gawain did his best to renew his vows of patience.
I love this man, he said to himself. I will not shoot him for being an utter waste of resources no matter how good it would make me feel.
Galahad did, at least, occasionally offer information. Like the moment that he leaned forward, peering over the thin rims of the black glasses to tap a page. “Here,” he offered. “It’s a history of the Grail throughout history and where it’s been. Museums, records.” He extended a sheath of papers. “And these are the debates over whether it’s actually the real thing. According to this, three museums in England are showing a supposed Holy Grail this month at the same time.”
Gawain looked at Galahad, with mild distress. “So how do we know which the real one is?”
“The one with the market value?” Galahad clarified, smirking as he eased back and fiddled with the glasses.
Gawain nearly snatched them off, but he forced that impulse lower and lower until it was a burning desire to match the other desire he had regarding Galahad at that exact moment. “Yes, Galahad, which one?” he said, gritting his teeth.
“Tristan’s finding out.”
And then Galahad did something completely unforgivable. While Gawain was looking his way, Galahad slowly licked his upper lip with excruciating slowness, then the lower and then the glasses slipped just an inch down his nose and that was that; the breaking point. He leaned forward to yank Galahad up by that perfectly-pressed button down of silk and yanked him halfway over the table, sending texts and papers flying to the floor as he used his superior strength to haul Galahad through the empty library towards the men’s room in a narrow corridor by the back of the building.
That was when Galahad tugged Gawain against the wall, just outside the door to the men’s room, the sign worn and tarnished from years of being pushed on and abused. “If I didn’t know any better,” Galahad remarked, with an affected naïveté, “I’d think you were trying to do something, Gawain.”
That evoked a deep rumble of a laugh from Gawain, one that nearly remained trapped in his throat as he gave a sharp sound of desire, letting everything bottled come undone and spill over. “You would think that, wouldn’t you?”
A sharp push and they went crashing back into the bathrooms, the doors swinging as Gawain opened the handicapped stall and yanked Galahad in, mouth descending on his neck with immediate urgency, teeth scraping up the stubble of an unshaven jaw as Galahad’s hands yanked Gawain’s trousers down and Gawain threw the glasses to the side.
“Those cost a lot of money,” Galahad said, voice low and angry.
Gawain liked it when Galahad got angry without the irritation and sulking. It was a side of him that he ever so rarely saw, but when it burned, it burned bright and ignited everything around him within a radius of several rooms. Their clothes were disheveled and their hair mussed and Gawain’s was falling in his face all too easily. “However will I make it up to you?” Gawain replied, voice heavily afflicted with the shallow gasps of his current condition of need and want.
Galahad was already in the middle of spinning them until he was shoved up against the stall, torso pressed firmly to the lime green divisor.
A pretty, pretty sight, especially from that angle.
It helped that Galahad had pressed a condom into Gawain’s hand and that the ‘no touching’ rule had been so utterly dashed and never once brought into the conversation in years and that Gawain could work with such quick efficiency when it came to Galahad (a teamwork they had always had, but had never thought to apply to sex until they realized places they could get away with it with the application of quiet and quickness). Gawain yanked the tucked shirt out of Galahad’s grey slacks and yanked the tie Galahad was wearing with his free hand, pulling Galahad back so that Gawain’s lips were pressed firmly against the shell of Galahad’s ear, his pants being shoved down with his other hand.
Gawain ran his thumb along the silk pattern of the black tie as he breathed heavily, Galahad leaning his head back, curls falling softly over the nape of his neck. Gawain moved his lips slowly over the back of Galahad’s neck to nip at the skin there, always marked with the contrasts of pink and red from past liaisons like their current one.
Gawain shoved Galahad’s slacks to the ground, stroking himself slowly, to the rhythm of Galahad’s heavy breaths – in, out, in, out, inout, stroke up, down, repeat – and continued to murmur quiet words into Galahad’s ear, the things he wished to do to him. And all Galahad did was agree in a low, willing tone.
Gawain didn’t dare let go of the tie, simply tightening his grasp around the garment and yanking it tighter as he slid into Galahad, slick enough from the spit he had coated his palm with, knowing it would hurt, but pain was an acceptable side-effect. And pain usually evoked the most beautifully broken sounds to be coaxed from Galahad’s throat and past his lips. This was no different, Gawain yanking on the tie, pushing hard into Galahad, growling, “I love you like this” as he licked up the first beads of sweat from the back of Galahad’s neck.
The reply was incoherent as Galahad let out a sharp cry of his own in return, pushing back for every thrust forward that Gawain gave, every rock of his hips with every ounce of strength he possessed, knowing that Galahad would match it. Within minutes of the breakneck pace, fucking as though they wouldn’t be able to for months after this encounter, Galahad came first, having been jerking himself off with a firm hand, having swatted away Gawain’s help, insisting he keep working at Galahad’s tie.
Gawain followed soon after, the climax feeling like the most relieving thing since the rain after the ten days they had gone without rain earlier that summer. He let his forehead slump against Galahad’s shoulder, releasing his tie and letting it fall back to its normal position, wrinkled and ruined.
They reclothed silently, like this were a stakeout and Gawain tried to help, but was swatted away with a low, whisper of a laugh. “Stop it,” he said.
Gawain opened the stall, peeking left and then right, holding up a hand when he heard voices in the narrow corridor, echoing like they hadn’t pitched their voices down. Ingrates, he thought. Don’t appreciate the sanctity of the library. The little hypocrite of him was dying of laughter at Gawain’s thoughts.
“Have you seen the new artifact? I wasn’t planning on seeing the exhibit at the Metropolitan,” a disinterested female voice was musing. She sounded familiar, like she was the librarian from the way up or something, but Gawain couldn’t place it. “But then I spoke with some of my higher-ups.”
“What did they say?” an elderly male was asking.
“Apparently, this is the Holy Grail. The one worth millions.”
Gawain’s eyes, were they prone to, might have lit up with dollar signs at that very moment. He yanked Galahad closer to him, but didn’t dare make another move that might give away their presence. They couldn’t be seen doing this, not when they were supposed to be unseen while doing their research.
“I don’t think the Holy Grail actually exists.”
“Well, I believe.”
And so did Gawain.
7.
Arthur held an old rosary within his hands. It was burgundy, the colour of blood, and the beads were cold against his palm. The light pouring in through the stained glass windows spilled over his legs. He was waiting solemnly for Father Franks to be ready for him. In the meantime, Our Fathers were offered up to the heavens for forgiveness for the things Arthur had cause to do in the past.
The line of sinners in search of penance had reduced greatly and Arthur glanced over his shoulder to find a small blue-haired lady leaving the booth, leaving the curtain open for him and he tucked his rosary into the pocket of his shirt as he entered, drawing the curtain shut behind him.
“Forgive me, Father, for I have sinned,” Arthur began easily, his voice repentant and deep. “It has been five days since my last confession.”
“Welcome back, Arthur,” the Father welcomed with a mildly tired sigh, though there was nothing chastising in his tone. Rather, it held a bemusement that was utterly harmless. Arthur’s expression shifted, a sly smile turning up the corners of his lips as he sat there, running the rosary beads through the slip of his thumb and his index finger. “Tell me your sins, son.”
In that little wooden box contained all of Arthur’s sins and all of his downfalls, the perils of mortality and the killing of men. Those four walls held so many secrets that they might heave and sigh under the collective woes that they had absorbed from Arthur alone, never mind the multitudes of other sinners come for their penance.
Arthur had a tricky situation.
He couldn’t out and out tell the Father what he did. There was only so far that the privilege of taking on the sins of a man went before that man was reported to the authorities for being a killer. And the excuse that ‘everyone I’ve killed has deserved it’ never did hold up in court.
“Since my last confession,” Arthur began haltingly, thinking of what he had done. There had been considerably less since he had retired. “I’ve severely doubted those I have sworn to never doubt.”
“How so?”
“My faith wavers,” Arthur admitted, gripping his rosary and the wood of the seat with an iron grip. “In those I have sworn to love and never doubt and I cannot help but find myself reeling in this epiphany.”
“Has something in particular caused this breach in faith?” Father Franks always had a soothing tone that made Arthur feel better about coming there to find relief from the stark contrast of a world drawn in shadows and blood and the relative safety of his home-life. “Perhaps a new event?”
“You know I’ve retired.”
“Yes, from your… ‘tricky’ job,” Father Franks chuckled. “You never did extrapolate on what you did.”
Arthur remained quiet, silence his steady companion in the hours of darkness, as he never did wish to draw unsuspecting people into his world because Plato did have it right, so many years ago. Once they realized just what the shadows on the wall were, everything changed, and not for the better. Ignorance was bliss.
“Go on, Arthur.”
“I’ve been asked to come out of retirement one last time and for a good cause. I believe with all my heart that the reasons behind this are just, pure, and motivated by good.” Arthur kept his gaze on the mesh that separated the man of god and the man who did the devil’s bidding. “But my faith in whether my crew is able to do this job wavers.” As did his voice, which wavered on each word in the last sentence. The words were like blasphemy simply to say. “Too much time has passed.” Aches compounded, wrinkles appeared, complacency set in. “And I cannot lose these men.”
There was a long pause, a hitch in an otherwise flowing conversation.
“Tell me, Arthur,” the Father mused, sounding almost content to have fallen to some conclusion. “Is it that you’re afraid they’ve lost their abilities or that you’ve lost yours? Faith in one’s self is important as well.”
The beads of Arthur’s rosary slipped past the sweaty palm holding them, but Arthur said not a single word in reply to the Father’s (rather apt) words.
“Two Our Father’s,” Father Franks advised. “And one act of charity involving your coworkers.” Though it was little more than acts to appease men and women who wanted to see their souls rest in some form of heaven, it set Arthur at mild ease and he gave as much of a smile as men like Arthur could ever give.
He pressed his palm to the screen between him and the priest, a sign of his thanks before he rose to his feet and made his way to a pew in the back of the church, where the majesty and the breadth of the place could always conspire to take his breath away. The words of the Our Father were exhaled past his lips, breathed out reverently, each one more earnest than the last and when he finished, he rose and toyed with the car keys in his hand.
The drive back to work was quiet, no news radio to appease him, no traffic reports, and not a single bar of music to accompany his thoughts.
When he unlocked the door, he was met by Galahad’s shining grin and a foisted fistful of papers, all in a mess. “C’mon,” Galahad encouraged. “You’ve just missed it. We’ve got enough to get it. It’s real, Arthur. It’s really real.” A quick glance around the room proved to show much the same sentiment. Lancelot was smiling with that same devil-may-care grin and even Tristan looked eager, chomping on an apple and throwing glances to Dag every now and again. Bors, of course, was already chomping at the bit to get working and Gawain had that smug and settled look he got after a kill or a fuck.
One act of charity.
“Well, boys,” Arthur remarked, a slow smile appearing on his lips and showing many a laugh line from years past. “I’m in.”
8.
The wheels of Gareth’s chair scraped against the wood floor of the room and made Galahad wince at the noise, quite visibly so. It was enough to earn an elbow in the side from Gawain. “Ow,” Galahad hissed. Gawain didn’t seem to care, being that he was more concerned at the moment with what his brother’s answer to the question was going to be.
It was no secret at all that while Galahad loved Gawain’s mother like his own (“she has the best trifle this side of the Thames”), he despised his brother and had never given a good reason for it.
Gareth didn’t resemble Gawain much, beyond the colour of his hair and his eyes. He had a headset on more often than not and rather than sport a messy array of dreads, his hair fell haphazardly into his eyes, sitting at chin-length. There were scars on his face from growing up a pimply, gangly teenager and had never gone away and though Galahad might have sympathized (having been more than a little gangly himself), Gareth had spent those formative years making Galahad’s life hell and telling him that he had little place in the house. He was tall, just a mite taller than Gawain, but you might never know, as Gareth spent most of his life in front of a keyboard or a microscope. He could fix anything technological or electrical and anything online was his kingdom.
“But,” Galahad had protested, one late night, “he can’t fire a gun.”
“And you can’t shut your mouth,” had been Gawain’s retort.
“So, let me get this straight,” Gareth was chatting, leaning back in his chair, the leather creaking and the wheels giving off a horrific whine that made Galahad wince yet again, his fingers itching to go towards his concealed weapon. “You need me. You need me to help you with your oh-so-secret job.”
Gawain sighed. “It’d be a one-off, Gareth. That’s it.”
“How would I be paid?”
“Well enough,” Galahad snapped in retort. He was rolling his eyes and Gawain was beginning to look more than a little irritable at the entire scenario. He just wanted to come and finish this without getting any bloodshed on the floors. His mother would never let him live it down. She’d allowed him this lifestyle, provided he left it outside the front door. Never in my house, she was fond of saying.
Gawain leaned over to hand a cylindrical container to Gareth. “Blueprints. We need security passes coded, the system disarmed, and an escape plan. You do it right, you get paid. You don’t…well, I’ll try and make it so you don’t disappear.” Perhaps he could appeal to Lancelot’s sense of family. The man had a sister who lived just off the Black Sea whom he hadn’t seen in almost fifteen years. Usually, bringing up family loyalty was enough to get a favour or two in the pocket.
Rather than answering, Gareth was staring down Galahad, who seemed all too willing to stare right back, locked in the world’s most immature staring contest.
“Oh, for…” Gawain sighed.
“Would I have to work with him?” Gareth demanded.
That got a derisive snort out of Galahad, almost immediately, like he was programmed to do it anytime Gareth opened his mouth (and if you compared all their prior interactions to the one that day, you might almost start to believe that). Gawain had a moment’s fear that if the two of them did end up working with each other, there would be fatalities in the vein of friendly-fire.
“We’d try not to,” Gawain carefully replied. He got a doubly strong glare for even saying so much and wound up sighing. “Oh, for fuck’s sake, what do the two of you want?” he snapped.
“I can’t believe we need him,” Galahad was muttering. “Dag could do it…”
“No, he couldn’t,” Gareth cut him off, shoulders lifting as he sat back in his chair, giving both Galahad and Gawain a smug, superior look. “I’m the best there is and you know it. That’s why you’re here. And you’re lucky too, because I’m going to help you. And get paid for it,” he stressed, shooting Gawain a cold look. “Where and when.”
“We’ll be in touch.”
“Well, obviously,” Gareth rolled his eyes. “You’re still moving your things out.”
How Gawain stopped himself from smacking his younger brother that moment, he never did know.
tbc
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I read your other KA stuff on your website long before I joined
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