Disorder Ch. 03

In the living room, Soren stood with his arms crossed, not because he was angry or annoyed at anything but just because that was where he liked to keep his arms when he was resting. It did have the unwanted effect of making him look a little surlier than usual, but he did have a bit of a frustrated resting face too, which came in useful from time to time. Not because Charles needed any kind of bodyguard, of course, but it was entertaining!

"They were your brothers?" Soren said with a smile that softened his features just a bit, his shaved face making him look younger again than he actually was. "They seem... Uh."

But what could he say to that, sheepishly rubbing the back of his neck and shifting his weight. Some things were better left unsaid and Charles shrugged, at least thankful in some little, softer part of his dark heart that Soren understood that in part.

"Yeah," Charles snorted. "Blood thicker than water and all that... I don't see them often."

Soren shook his head and half-shrugged again. His shoulders were going to get sore if he kept on doing that.

"I get it. I'm not very close with my family either."

An awkward silence - uncharacteristic, for them - stretched between them and Charles rubbed the back of his neck, abruptly uncomfortable. Just why did his brothers have to cause a ruckus whenever they turned up? Normal families, not that he wanted anything at all like a normal family or the crap that came before ever again, didn't have to deal with that. He could have gone with grabbing a burger or something with them. Food was usually a good thing, as long as he wasn't the one making it, which was where the caveat came into play.

But none of that. He wouldn't be on the back foot anymore on his own turf and with Soren hovering about expectantly, just as he always was. Laughing lightly, Charles flipped his hand, grabbing his gloves off a hook that was supposed to hold keys beside the door. Of course, he didn't bother with keys when he was usually off jacking some car or another. And, for those, he wouldn't even keep any stolen keys as a trophy: too much evidence.

"Yeah. Maybe. But come on. I've got a job to do, no thanks to those idiots. Did you bring your car? It's a bit of a drive so I hope the radio is working this time, hellish boring without some tunes..."

Soren sighed. It wasn't going to be so much of the relaxing day that he was looking for, after all. But what more could he have hoped for, concerning time with Charles? The thickness and tightness at his crotch would have to wait in lieu of something that he hoped was just a little adventure.

What? He couldn't help that he was a man with needs too!

*

"The thing with my brothers is that they go big, regardless of what they're doing. You hear me?"

Out of the car in a shadier part of the city, Charles hummed a tune to himself, the paper denoting the details of, well, what needed to be done tucked away in a pocket. Of course, he didn't need it. Everyone knew about Lord, an up and comer who thought he was top dog in the city underworld, taking what he wanted and leaving a trail of destruction in his wake. He wasn't much of a threat, if one was watching their steps closely as it was, but he thought he was, which was, sometimes, more dangerous in itself.

Soren shook his head, following Charles with his usual, rather worried, look in his eye. The man needed to lighten up a bit, really!

"Charles, you should be doing this on your own... I'm no good here."

"What, you'd leave me out here on my own to deal with him?"

Charles hid his grin as Soren backtracked rapidly, scurrying quickly to keep up even though he was taller and with longer legs than Charles. He was a funny one... And neither did it take much to get him flustered, although Charles did suppose that going through an abandoned hospital outside the city was not the most usual and reassuring of tasks to do or places to be. He was well enough used to being in dark, dank places in the city but there was always an air that there was someone waiting around the corner, someone always not all that far away, regardless of what was going on.

The hospital creaked underfoot, although their movements weren't what made them so uneasy or even caused the noise. Charles kept a wary eye out, although it was like playing a video game, in a way, to be sneaking about through an abandoned building with clear plastic sheeting covering some of the windows, torn off on most sides and flapping in a breeze that, strangely, he could not feel himself. It was a hospital that, they said, had been used a lot in the eighties and was several storeys high, although not all that impressive either when it came right down to it, as it had been abandoned before its time. Parts had been finished and parts had been used but it was the sort of eerie, dirty building that had a history to it.

It came as no surprise that needles and evidence of blatant drug use littered the area, further cementing the idiot crime boss' - seriously, if he had to proclaim himself to be such, he most definitely was not one - position in the seedy underworld. It wasn't even a central location, one well off the beaten track of city life and surrounded by an abandoned section of industrial units that, really, were only empty because of the greed and superstition that surrounded the hospital itself. After the war, no one had really wanted to return there, even if it had not been one fought in the country: the memories haunted as well as any ghosts.

Lord... What the hell sort of name was that? Charles scoffed, eyeing up the main elevator and disregarding it. There was no reason to suspect something like that would even work. But the man, probably younger than him again, didn't even to have half a foot at all in reality with what Charles heard on the grapevine, news filtering down through the city as it did. He didn't need to be making headlines to be a threat, of course, but he also needed to be making more than a toddler's tantrum ripples. He could see just why his brothers didn't want to waste time with him when they had bigger fish to fry but it was also a petty, little, nagging thought that he shouldn't have to do what he was doing for them, even if they were family and all that. It was a pain, that's what it was, but the only thing that made the whole pain in the ass ordeal even the slightest bit better was that he had Soren's company. A friend could make a lot better and he had, even if he wouldn't admit it, warmed to him over time.

Just a bit. Not much. Just a little bit.

Soren, however, wasn't all that pleased to be out and he didn't need to say that out loud for it to come across to Charles right and loud and clear. He just knew, watching the set of his jaw and tense lines running through his body, visible even through his light jacket. Charles, of course, was just wearing his gloves for how fitting they seemed on his hands, something that was always there and would have otherwise been out of place, if so missing. His coat hung down to his calves but he left it open, knowing in all practicality that he may need to move quickly, even though he did not, by any means, predict that things would be at all difficult. He wouldn't have brought Soren along, after all, if he thought there was any danger and, well, there was something to be said about the sex after something that Soren thought he 'shouldn't have been doing...

Charles smirked. Just a touch of manipulation. It couldn't hurt. Could it?

"So..." Soren said quietly, although his voice still seemed too loud in the comparative silence. "What do you have to do here? There's someone after your brothers."

"Yeah, but not for long. He won't be about for long so it's not something that I need to go to an extreme with. They just don't want to show their faces around here. Donnie's got to keep his good looks in order, don't you know."

Affecting a voice from another place and time, Charles chuckled and shook his head wryly, although the touch of sentiment would not serve him well and, so, he pushed it away as quickly as it had shown itself. That would not do. That would not do at all.

On with the job. Who knew what floor those souls were on but he didn't have to worry about that: his part of the job was simple and easy, beautifully so. And it was an easy one indeed with a little help that his brother was likely not even aware that he'd given him in the form of a small device of terror and corruption, as innocuous in appearance as a remote control but far, far deadlier in use.

Down the stairs a level to get down the back way. Although he was sure the area was deserted and Donnie's little gift (stolen gift, that was) was in his hand already, he tapped the few buttons necessary to disable the cameras, for cameras didn't need to be on show and viewable to be in action. He would have thought that Lord or whatever was a tad slyer than that but it was better to be safe and he knew the code to punch in to do the trick.

Soren watched him, his curiosity raised even if he would not ask what Charles had (he wouldn't have honestly wanted to know). Smirking, Charles winked and tugged him out onto another floor that seemed to be set up with meeting rooms rather than anything strictly hospital related. Perhaps it was one of the floors that had had temporary patients during the influenza epidemic? Some metal beds on frames and wheels lay against a wall, one on its side, but the remnants of a hastily evacuated business teased his own sense of desire to simply know. Maybe that would have to come at another time.

"He's so obsessed with that card scanner that he doesn't watch what else he's got on his person," Charles chuckled, tossing it from one hand to the other. "And he had the tool to do the job right there all along with him... Idiot."

But whether or not his brother was an idiot or simply, perhaps, an evil genius was by the by as he headed to the only place in the whole building where any sort of electricity lay. And there he would plant the seed of his brother's design and generation, sowing distrust in the systems for just long enough to occupy Lord. He was no big boss and he would be taken down easily, even if Charles didn't all that much care whether he was about the city or not, just whether he was going to cause trouble in his own life. And that included whether he would be making his brothers whinge and complain to him half the time to. Honestly, the two of them were worse than children!

But he had what he needed to do the trick and heading into the belly of the not so abandoned building - perhaps just taken up fresh residence - would see him through. A quick code implemented into a weakness in a system that the fool himself had publicised on the rumour mill... He was an idiot and Charles was brilliant, was he not? And he was using a thieved piece of equipment to complete the job (hey, if it was a job, just why wasn't he getting paid for it?), which was truly the crème de la crème of a job well done.

"Is this going to be long?" Soren ventured, although he was not one to ask questions except when nerves prompted him. "I just... Charles, this is..."

Yet there were hardly the words for what he was experiencing, breath catching in his throat and wariness up. He couldn't keep his heart rate from increasing, licking his lips even though his mouth was far too dry for any sense of comfort. Not even Charles' hand briefly but reassuringly gripping his shoulder was going to soothe him, not that Charles was really much of the soothing type. No... He kept on just telling himself that he only really had Soren there in the first place because he had a car and, well, that was at least something to get him about when he was too busy or something to take a car that wasn't his. And, for some sense of a quiet life, he didn't really want to steal cars all of the time... He pressed his lips together, reassuring himself that there was nothing there, that it was just a convenient excuse.

Whether or not was true, however, was another question entirely as he showed Soren the little remote, letting him see it even as he pressed it up to the control panel he'd been seeking out. Lord truly was far, far too predictable... And that was just why he wasn't worried about anything, not one bit.

"Donnie doesn't know I have this but, really, I don't know why he wouldn't use it himself and get the job done quicker still. I mean, they knew where Lord was so..."

But Charles knew the reason that they hadn't wanted to waste time on something that they saw as, truly, a menial task and shook it off, lips turned down in a frown that he didn't really want to acknowledge at that moment in time. Let them do whatever the hell they wanted to do, as long as they didn't ask him to engage or be a part of it. Their infatuation for different reasons, one as different from the other as they were alike, was...

...Strange. Yes. He'd go with strange.

Let them be. They'd do whatever it was that they wanted to do and he was sick of the musty, metallic stench of the hospital already, the acrid tang of it working its way up into his nostrils in such a way that he doubted he would - not very easily, at least - be able to rid himself of it later, the cloying thickness hanging on his clothes.

"And you're sure this will work?"

Charles shrugged.

"Enough. It'll work enough. It wouldn't really do anything for someone who really wanted to hurt my brothers or me...or anyone else. But it'll keep them busy enough for me to do a few more things in the meantime."

He snorted, the gadget buzzing as if it had, all of a sudden, been infested with bees. The high-pitched twang thrummed through and Soren's fingers twitched, the man clearly fighting down the urge to pin his hands over his ears. But that would be childish and so he stubbornly kept his hands in his pockets, breath raking through his throat with each and every lungful he dragged in, pulse up and everything appearing to move in slow-motion. Even the flap of clear plastic to the side of the room, which should not have been so very integral (alas, Lord was flawed in himself and would not be memorable or back for more either) to the workings of what he'd set up, Charles knowing just a little more about what was going on than he let on.

Yet that was a conversation for another time, if it even needed to come up at all, and he pressed his lips together as he sealed the deal, a code chiming through as he gestured with a particular kind of flourish, pleased with what he well enough saw as a job well done.

"That should do it!"

Standing, he swept his arm out, smirking. What more could he say?

"Now, let's -"

"Initiating sequence."

That had not come from either of them and they stared wide-eyed at one another for the briefest of moments before a red light swallowed them up, spilling over them as if every tile in the ceiling of the hospital floor had been layered through with beams that betrayed a deeper, more deadly intent than any mere light possibly could have.

"Charles! What's going on?"

"What?" He snapped, pummelling his fist into the wall as he snatched Donnie's creation back. "Did he rig this? Fuck!"

But it was not rigged, just a wannabe crime overlord with too much time on his hands and not enough money in his pocket to really make anything of himself. The floor rumbled and they lunged for the exit, cursing as the wall itself seemed to crumble but the tremor was only blocks falling with odd strategy out of the ceiling at intervals as if Lord had been playing one too many video games. There was no rhyme or reason to it and what he'd set up, clearly, was easily dodged, although that didn't stop them from panting and gasping, curses only serving to steal breath from them that they sorely needed.

What sort of idiot set a trap like that? Although it was hardly a trap at all and Charles leapt with a giddy sort of whoop, sliding down the railings bordering the stairs as they made good their escape, a trail of crimson beams following them, although there was nothing behind them. What sort of crime boss did Lord think he was? Charles could have done a better job than him? It was all laughable, simply laughable, although Soren wasn't all that entertained at the moment, fumbling his steps and staggering as they reached the ground floor and raced for the main entrance through which they'd come. But the door slid down, the inner metal barrier creaking and grinding to life as if Lord's last wicked call to keep them trapped, even though he should have, perhaps, chosen something crueller and more intrepid if he had really wanted to rig his hideout, if it could have even have been called that.

Diving for the door, Charles yelled for Soren and he leapt with him, sliding underneath even as the barrier jammed itself down with a grinding clank, searing into the ground as if it was trying to pummel through. Newer and shinier than anything else in the hospital, it proved to be just another remnant of what Lord thought was control, intimidation that may have thrown a lesser soul than Charles but, well, he would have too had to have the manpower to back it up. And Charles was hardly one to admit that he'd been caught on the back foot, not even for a second, especially considering how feeble the attempt itself had been.

It was almost as if they'd been wanted to escape...

"Fuck..." Charles exhaled, his eyes wide at the door that had slammed down, only a hair's breadth after their heels, far too close for comfort. "What's this bastard been watching - Portal or what?"

Soren blinked, chest heaving and jaw agape, his mouth a dark hole into which one could descend, horror twisting the muscles in his face into tense, aggravated lines.

"What..." He couldn't even get out the words he needed to, heaving himself over onto all fours and hacking a cough, his lungs near enough giving up. "What... What the hell is Portal?"

But Charles was hardly going to answer that as he sprang up to his feet, jacket flying and flapping about his legs, a giddy laugh on his lips. It was funny how adrenaline could do that to someone at the point where they had, finally and justly, made good an escape and he could not help but spin in a circle, whooping for the sheer glee and release of energy. Of course, he wouldn't have done that if he hadn't already known that Donnie's tech hadn't wiped the cameras out already, although Donnie most likely would not have believed that he knew how to use any of his gadgets anyway. In a way, John was a blend of both of them, although he was his own person too and would stick to that adamantly, ignoring whatever trouble they wanted to get into or not with the big city players.

And his life was destined for a simpler time, a time where he could get on with what he wanted to do and, well, get 'done' himself in a far more pleasurable way. If he was not so close to the little big shot's lurk, he would have grabbed Soren and got his cock out right then and there, adrenaline coursing through his veins with a sense of luxury and strength that he had not had since, well... It must not have been since the last time since he'd tricked Soren out on some trap or another, letting the thrill of doing something that he really shouldn't have been doing rile up his friend until he could not help himself, growling and pinning Charles back up against a wall for the much-needed release of tension.

Charles smirked and held out his hand to Soren, still leaning back on the floor with only his torso propped up, legs sticking out like prongs from the main body of a thing. It was not his sexiest pose but, damn it, he'd be way better when he had his clothes off; that was something that Charles would never doubt or second guess, blood up and heart pumping furiously in the aftermath.

"Come on! Let's hightail it out of here! Their sorry as shit job is done and I don't want anything more to do with this hell hole."