Title: Start Something

Author: Edible Lit

Author's e-mail: [email protected]

Fandom: Enterprise

Pairing: Reed/Hayes

Rating: NC-17

Category: Slash

Summary: Hayes finds himself fighting not only Reed, but the past as well.

Spoilers: Harbinger

Comments: This is a response to Miera's birthday challenge, involving the line
"You just had to start something", a reference to 'trained monkeys' and the
presence of Major Hayes. I intended this to head towards a positive light, but
sometimes these things take a life of their own, and it became more ambiguous.






  "You just had to start something, didn't you?"

  Hoshi. Hayes gazed at her pursed lips, her guileless eyes, with guarded
affection. They had had fun together, those early months after he'd come aboard
the Enterprise, but he much preferred this easy companionship to that heated,
inchoate affair of that time. The attraction between them had been a tense
maneuvering between their oppressive duties: his to the MACOs, hers to her ship
and friends. The pull had not been powerful, but perfunctory and short-lived, and
Hayes shameful admitted to himself that he was relieved when Hoshi had
suggested they attempt to become friends instead of lovers. Still, it had been fun.

  Of course the comfortable truce that had descended on them allowed Hoshi to
criticize his faults and actions as she saw fit. The thought was unfair, as she
rarely did so, but occasionally she would push through the soft shell of her kind
serenity and express in brutal simplicity her immutable displeasure. Hayes
grimaced. He loved it. Even in reference to the subject of Lieutenant Malcolm
Reed. His thoughts drifted to the training session cut abruptly short by the
petulant man, but what anger he had felt was abstract, as though it was simply
required, but the impact of it brought no force. Instead, all he had felt was a
disquieting jitter, as though some great font of emotion was preceded by those
quiet tremors, and the waiting was worse than final explosion. Pushing the
memory of the odd sensation away, as though considering it would give it the
power necessary to break through him now, in the nearly empty mess hall.

  "I didn't start anything, he just didn't like seeing Mayweather beaten, that's all,"
Hayes replied curtly, though his petulance was merely a familiar front that he
drew upon, rather than reveal the complete lack of anything resembling interest
in the issue.

  "Hayes, you went over his head," Hoshi rolled her eyes with impatience; a
gesture that could only attribute to him the folly of all male kind. He resisted the
urge to grin, to reach out and tug on her soft dark hair like a mischievous boy on
a childhood playground.

  "He never would have taken me seriously if I hadn't," Hayes answered, his
response almost by rote. He disliked working on auto-pilot around Hoshi, but
this was getting to close the dull ache, that constant pain, that inundated him
when he looked at Reed. Actually she was light-years away, but that was still too
close.

  "I don't know what it is between you two," she said, her exasperation filling the
air like a fragrant perfume. Hayes inhaled of it deeply, knowing what the 'it' of
the issue was with the certainty of the past suffocating the present. At least, for
his part.

  Why won't you let me do my job? Why are you such an asshole? Why are you
so much like him? Blood and anger flow like wine; something to be cherished.
You think it's so simple. Hayes punches him with the exuberance of self-hatred,
and oh it hurts, hurts so much, but it's so much better than what was there
before, and for that he thanks the officer with his best lunge and kick.

  Later, in his quarters, the pain throbs in his bruised flesh as he lies in a pool of
his own morbid failures. Like alcohol and narcotics, anger is only a temporary
escape and how easily it had drained away leaving Hayes with the memory of the
touch of Reed's flesh, the disdain of his eyes. So remarkably like Joshua's eyes,
though they're neither the same shape nor colour. Joshua's eyes, emerald green,
piercing and shattering, closed now forever. And the disdain, the gaze that
registered no difference between Hayes and the walls or the floor, entirely
unworthy of note was as familiar now in Reed as it had been in Joshua.

  At least that was what Hayes had thought in the beginning when Joshua had
entered the training room, years ago in the Jupiter Station, and begun the slow
arduous task of turning young, green soldiers into efficient killers in zero gravity.
He'd not been a MACO himself, but a Starfleet officer, hard and cold as if forged
from the depths of space itself. Hayes had called him Lieutenant Bryston then, as
had all the young soldiers in the lieutenant's course. They had often had the
impression, during those long hours of training, that he thought them little better
than an army of trained monkeys. The man had been fiercely reckless with their
training, or so it had seemed, pushing them to there limits in the dangers of space
far earlier than they had thought they would be ready, battering them with the
hammer and anvil of his haughty proficiency, his flawless competence. And he
had been no more than five years Hayes' senior.

  The dreams had started early on; full of flesh and vibrancy, of compounding
heat inspired by Joshua's dark taught skin, his easy musculature, and finally the
flash of his eyes that both devoured and ignored in the same moment. Hayes had
often woken in the midst of orgasm, his unwanted nocturnal desires as wanton as
an adolescent boy's. With shame and unparalleled determination he would enter
that training room where his classmates suited up and prepared for the ordeals to
come.

  He had succeeded, he and all his fellow soldiers, as it became apparent that
Joshua Bryston left none behind, and surprisingly seemed to have been pleased
by their progress. The day of their graduation from his class was the first night
they spent the evening drinking beer and listening to the stories he finally offered
to share of his life in space, of aliens strange and magnificent, of violence and
hilarity. Hayes had not taken his eyes from the man the entire night, yet it was
weeks later, a new semester upon them, that Hayes had run into Joshua, and was
profoundly shaken when the man had offered to buy him a drink. Their first time
together, that night, was embarrassingly short for Hayes, the sight of Joshua
naked, the feel of his hands stroking so profoundly close to his nightly fantasies,
that he'd been unable to pace himself. Joshua had merely laughed, not unkindly,
and offered his body up to Hayes' lips and hands until he was aroused and ready
for more. To this day Hayes could recall the taste of Joshua on his lips.

  The progression had been surprisingly easy: they met and fucked, they went to
movies and bars, met each other's friends and parents, they moved in together.
There had been an unquestioning logic to it, a kind of preordination that, though
was not without its moments of anger and frustration, surprised Hayes that such
a thing could happen to him. They returned to Earth where Hayes continued
serving with the MACOs, and Joshua overseen the development of security
personnel in Starfleet.

  Two years later Joshua became sick. At first a cold, a chill, a fever, then he got
better. Then sick again. The doctors were baffled, yet it was happening to several
Starfleet officers, officers who had all served aboard a warp 2 vessel that had
explored portions of the galaxy. Finally it was traced to a wild planet uninhabited
by intelligent life, but creative in the kind of viral development it had hosted.
The virus hid amongst human DNA like a chameleon in a rainforest. The doctors
and scientists could not cure it, the vulcan and denobulan medical specialists
stumped. Joshua's body began to fail slowly, no particular part first, he simply
grew weaker, more enfeebled. Yet there was no easy death, no predictable
prognosis, just a steady degeneration. It was another year before Hayes could
stand no more, and he took the first commission available to him on Jupiter
Station, leaving Joshua in the hands of his loving but tortured parents.

  And there it was, the weakness that Joshua had driven away in that first year,
but had not vanquished. The weakness that no amount of training, no amount of
study could conquer. It consumed Hayes, and he had fought it, or thought he
had, with all his being, but finally he could not watch Joshua die. It had been a
beautiful day, Jupiter rising with violent glory, fully illuminated by the distant
sun, when Hayes received word that Joshua had died. He had left his quarters,
stood on the observation deck, and watched as the station slid into the great
planet's shadow. He hadn't cried, or shouted, or screamed, or struck something
with the force of his pain as he had wanted to. He simply didn't sleep that night,
or the next night. In fact, he didn't sleep for nearly a week, until he was finally
sedated in the infirmary. When he awoke, he realized he had missed the funeral.

  The chime roused Hayes from the depths of memory. Gingerly he rose from his
bed, his bruises stiff but not as sore as they had been. He keyed the door open,
and squeezed his eyes shut as if to clear the unexpected image that greeted him
from his sight. Reed stood there, clearly lost, his face swollen and bruised by
Hayes' own hand. Why was he here? The Lieutenant seemed about to speak,
then hesitated, and Hayes knew he didn't want to hear anything the man had to
say, knowing words were deflections of truth, the path of lies. Instead he grasped
the man by the front of his black shirt stretched taught over the compact
muscularity of Reed's body, and pulled him into the room, into Hayes. There was
no resistance as he seized on Reed's mouth, mercilessly ignoring wounded flesh,
his tongue insistently opening the man's mouth, only to be met with equal force
in return. Reed could not even give in to him even that much, but fought back
with lips and hands.

  There were no spare moments to consider Reed's motivation, his inner
contradictions that combined disdain and desire in equal parts. It was obvious
that the Lieutenant was ensnared in his own battles, the evidence revealed earlier
that day with each strike of flesh and bone as painted strokes on a canvas. All
Hayes knew was his lips and his walls were so like Joshua's, and he knew also
how to conquer that fortress as he had not so many years ago. Hayes' cock was
rock hard in seconds, and he reached down between Reed's legs to see what was
there, grinning with satisfaction at the heat and hardness he found. Without
preamble, he began to undress the lieutenant, pulling his clothes from his form
carelessly. Finally exposing Reed's heavy erection, so much larger than he'd
expected of the smaller, compact man, Hayes knelt and drew it into his mouth.
This was no seduction, just heat and need, and he was going to take from the
man whatever he could.

  Reed groaned under his mouth and hands, his gasps rasping in his throat. His
salty taste and smell inundated Hayes as he slid down the man's length, his hands
tugging at Reed's balls and stroking the dark thatch of hair between his legs.
Hayes' jaw had just begun to ache from his efforts when Reed pulled away, his
hard cock jumping as he stood back, his bare body exposed to Hayes' sight, his
eyes veiled with desire and resentment.

  The Major stood, stripping his loose clothes in rough, jerky motions, knowing
that Reed watched his own complex lust. His skin bared to the cool room, he
waited, his own sex rigid and demanding. Reluctantly, his body driven by some
unseen force that was not his will, Reed staggered to the floor at Hayes' feet, his
hand grasping the hard manhood and brought his lips to it. The descent of his
mouth was the descent into madness, both a resistance to and a revelation of the
animal lying quiescent within, and Hayes' found his hands gripping the man's
head as he forced himself down into that liquid heat, that velvet obeisance. He
made no noise as he watched Reed's head bobbing on his cock, only the sounds
of wet suction and the occasional resisted gag as the man bottomed out
becoming a visceral counterpoint to the pleasure coursing abstractly from his sex
to the core. Hayes thrust forcefully, Reed struggling to contain him, before
pulling himself away, tilting the man's head until their eyes met.

  "I'm going to fuck you," Hayes said, and despite the shock in Reed's eyes, he
nodded his confirmation as if there had been no question to the fact. The Major
took his time to arrange the lieutenant over the small bed, on all fours, his ass
bare and exposed to Hayes' probing fingers, slick with lotion, then soon his cock
pushing against the tender flesh. Reed buried his face in his arms, his groans the
symptoms of his surrender. Hayes drove into him without mercy, the man's
taught muscular body the domain of his mastery, his command, yet with each
thrust and stroke of his slick flesh it became the manacles and chains of his
enslavement.

  Hayes grunted and groaned as he rode the waves of sensation, his breathing
short with exertion. He stroked Reed's back, gripped his chest, his hips, and then
reached down to the hard girth of the man's sex. It slid easily through his hands,
the strength and heat of it Reed's shameful admission of what could only be
resented arousal. How long had Hayes dreamed of feeling that cock just as it
was, straining in his hands as he jerked it? Hayes felt his own balls tighten, his
hips straining, and suddenly he was cresting over the edge, a hoarse shout
exploding from his lungs as he came into Reed, thrusting until his erection began
to diminish, spent.

  He withdrew from the man, but could feel Reed had not followed him into
orgasm. Turning him over, he knelt between the man's legs, taking the waiting
sex into his mouth. Reed's shuddering groan was as welcome as the salty taste of
him and his consuming presence. He pressed two fingers into Reed, triggering his
prostrate, and the man flew, his hips bucking. Hayes, in the wake of satiated
desire, felt burdened by Reed's ejaculation as the bitter fluid filled his mouth, yet
he dutifully took it and suddenly all that was left to him was a sweaty man who
despised him and a shrinking dick in his mouth. Who said romance was dead?

  Hayes allowed himself to collapse beside Reed, and they lay there for a long
moment not looking at each other, watching as the ramifications of their guilty
weakness rising like a boundless wall with no escape to the safety of the past
before this had happened. Yet Hayes was perversely grateful as the absence of
the driving act of sex revealed that Reed was not Joshua, and that the fucking
had not brought the dead to life.

  Finally, Reed sat up, facing away from Hayes, and reached for his briefs on the
floor.

  "I should go," he whispered.

  Suddenly, a withdrawn anger rose in Hayes at the defeated tone of the man's
voice, and he wanted to push Reed down, to strike him again, to unleash on him
the edge of his own self-hatred. Yet something else was growing in Hayes that
could not be defined by what it was, but by what it was not: it was not anger or
rage, or even resentment. It was something more appropriate in the aftermath of
the frenzied act of love, and Hayes reached out to touch Reed's shoulder.

  "Don't," he said, then considered adding 'if you don't want to', but decided to
let it hang in the air and let the man come to his own conclusions about Hayes'
motivation. Then, after a long moment, Reed looked at him, the clear crystal of
his blue eyes sharp yet arresting. There was no warmth there, only surprise, but
he did not dress, or stand, or try to escape, but instead nodded, and lay down on
his back, his warm skin brushing against Hayes the length of his body. It was a
marvel how the touch of warm skin could be so potent, even when love or even
friendship was absent. Hayes decided he was satisfied, though; maybe more
could be had here. Maybe in a few hours he'd let Reed fuck him, and then later,
the morning might see the dawn of possibility. Then again, the emptiness was
never far away, and really what could Reed offer in the end? Hayes closed his
eyes, drifting to sleep, not with the security of peace, but as one who has simply
learned to sleep despite themselves.

  Sometimes we shoulder the weight of ourselves. And then sometimes we're
crushed beneath.