Fic: The Bellerophon Brothers
Apr. 29th, 2006 08:30 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
trinityofoneThis was totally unplanned, and totally not what I was supposed to be working on today. That was probably a great deal of the appeal.
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wychwood, I hope you don't mind my taking the 'verse out for a spin.
Title: The Bellerophon Brothers
Raiting: NC-17
Pairing: McKay/Sheppard
Length: ~1625 words
Summary: An off-the-cuff excerpt from the Four Quarters-verse. Yeah, the joke’s on somebody, all right.
The Bellerophon Brothers
It’s generally agreed upon that over the years, Teyla has had the worst hair, Ronon has worn the worst clothes, Rodney has said the dumbest things to the press, and Shep has generally made the biggest ass of himself.
That’s okay, though: that last. Because he’s Shep, and everyone loves him.
“Fuck you,” Rodney says, when John comes into his room, metal loop of a hanger dangling from his fingertip. “No fucking way.”
John grins. “Come on, Rodney,” wheedling, “it’ll be great. Hilarious.”
“To whom?” Rodney asks. He knows that John thinks he’ll cave in the end, and he often does. But he’s not gonna cave on this. “You?”
“Well, yeah.” A smirk now. “To all of us. Come on,” pressing, “it’ll be an awesome joke. A great trick to play on our home town.”
Rodney bites his lip. He’d already agreed to the plan in its early stages, but he hadn’t agreed—
“You wear the fucking dress,” he says.
It’s even an ugly dress. It’s got fringe on it.
John rolls his eyes. “I can’t wear the dress. I’m going to be singing, they’ll know I’m not a girl.”
Rodney snorts. “Oh, and all I’d have to do is shave my legs and everyone would be fooled?”
“You’d shave your legs for me?” John asks, pressing close. Rodney can feel the cheap polyester fabric of the dress rubbing against the bare skin of his arm. Cloying and fake.
“I said no.” Rodney turns, shoulder bumping the hanger on the way. “Go make Ronon do it.”
Out of the corner of his eye, he can see John shrug. “Okay.”
And of course, because he’s John, because he’s Shep, he does.
The joke is this: they open for themselves. Get all dressed up: Shep in a wig that looks like a dead cat, Teyla in an oversized flannel shirt and a cowboy hat, Rodney in a fake mustache that John talked him into wearing, and Ronon in a dress. Not the same dress—this one is still ugly (uglier, maybe, as there is by necessity more of it)—but another big brown fringed country western number with little sequinned darts all down the sides. Ronon dons a wig that rivals Shep’s for hideousness, and he wears red cowboy boots. He even shaves his beard, because Shep asks him to.
Rodney stands in the corner and tries to keep his fake mustache from falling off.
So the joke is this. They go on stage when the Staples Center is still just filling up. Shep puts on a thick, ridiculous Texas accent and introduces them as the Bellerophon Brothers. He’s Al Bellerophon and Teyla’s George Bellerophon and Ronon’s their sister, Mary Lou Bellerophon. Rodney’s cousin Percy.
Yeah, the joke’s on somebody, all right.
The crowd claps uneasily, uncertain. They’re here to see the Puddlejumpers, man. Rock ‘n’ Roll! But Shep gets up there with his cowboy strut and his “Hello. I’m Al Bellerophon” and he plays Johnny Cash covers and Willie Nelson covers and Waylon Jennings covers. Ronon stands on his right, in Rodney’s usual spot (switch the bass player and the lead guitarist up! all part of the joke!), playing his instrument and grinning like he doesn’t know that he makes the ugliest woman in the world.
“Thank you very kindly,” Shep says, at the end of their set. “God bless.”
They’re ushered off with a smattering of polite applause and a lot of “what the fuck?” faces.
Later, back in their own skin, Shep glides out onto the stage in his leather pants and his sunglasses and his voice like silk and shattered glass. “Hello Los Annnngeles!” he shouts. “How nice to be back in our home town! Where everyone knows us!”
The crowd goes wild.
Rodney doesn’t really think it’s funny at all.
That night, after the concert, Rodney has a late dinner with his sister. Homemade lasagne in her warm, too-cramped kitchen, and they don’t really have anything to say to each other, but for once that’s okay. Jeannie’s there.
Then Rodney goes home to his own house in Laurel Canyon, the one he thinks is too dark, confined by the press of hills. He keeps meaning to sell it, but he’s barely ever there anyway. Sell or stay, it doesn’t really matter.
The house is dark. Rodney goes from room to room, turning on the lights. When he gets to the bedroom, he hears breathing, sees a shadow. He tenses even though he recognizes both: he flips on the light and John’s waiting for him.
John’s waiting there, mouth a slash of red lipstick, his body cocooned in a tight green velvet dress.
Rodney feels a stab of— “That’s funny,” he says. “I don’t remember ordering a whore.”
John’s eyes flash. But he just says, “I shaved my legs for you,” and spreads them, like Sharon Stone with a surprise.
Rodney drops the little Tupperware container of lasagne he’s carrying, the one he forgot to put down when he was in the kitchen. He stares at John, who lies back, velvet rucking up over newly smooth thighs, cock peeking out from under the hem of the dress and sliding easily into John’s hand.
It’s beautiful and it’s sick and Rodney trembles, throbbing with an emotion he can’t, doesn’t want to explain.
But lust he can do. Lust they can always do. So even though he says, “I’m never really fucking you, am I?” he still walks forward, goes and stands at the foot of the bed, between John’s legs. He drops down, runs a hand up John’s thigh. Up close, the illusion is less complete: the job was rushed, obviously, and there are patches of red skin, tender from razor burn. Rodney bends down and presses a kiss to one such crimson blush. “I’m fucking your latest idea.”
“I think that’s all there is,” John says, and Rodney lifts him up, tastes the alcohol on his breath and in his mouth. Bitter and stale.
“You gonna fuck me like a woman, Rodney?” John asks. Drawing a hand across his collarbone, picking up and dropping one emerald strap. “Do you even know how?”
Rodney stiffens. They don’t talk about this. They don’t ever talk about this. Because even though they don’t talk about it, they both know that for Rodney, John is the first and only. And for John...
They don’t talk about it.
Except, “I’ve fucked lots of women,” Shep says, wiggling on Rodney’s lap. His cock poking out the bottom of his dress. “They can’t get enough of me.”
Rodney’s had more than enough. He wants to push John off of him and walk out, leave him to sleep it off or try to get a taxi to drop him somewhere other than West Hollywood. He wants to yank that stupid dress up above John’s waist, tear it, turn him around and pound him into the mattress. But...he sees the determined look in John’s eyes, sees the sharpening of pupils not as liquor-drowned at John would obviously like him to think. And he gets it. The joke. The grand old joke.
That’s what John wants him to do.
Rodney raises his hand. Digging deep into the hair at the back of John’s neck so that John’s long throat is exposed, his Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallows, breathing hard. “I don’t believe you,” Rodney says. “I don’t believe a single thing you say or anything you do.” He lets go with a jerk. “And you like it that way.”
John starts to laugh. Rodney shuts him up with a kiss.
He’s angry. Furious. He wants to fuck John’s mouth, bite at his lip until he bleeds. But he can be a joker, too: a wild card, turning the kisses gentle with steady concentration and patience and practice. Playing John with careful fingers, just like he would a guitar.
“But you can’t fool me forever,” he says, lowering John back down onto the bed. Sliding down, over him, with his mouth: tasting clean, soapy skin and cheap, thrift store velvet, and John, the intense flavor of him, nuzzling his balls and the root of his cock. “I do know you,” kissing the shaft, “I know you better than anyone,” the tip, “and you hate that,” swallowing, mouth applying steady suction, humming. You hate that, you hate that. But you need it, too.
John makes a choked sound and then his hands are on Rodney’s head, brushing over the tips of his ears, knuckles scraping across his cheeks and chin. He comes with a muted sob, arm moving up, flung across his face. And then Rodney does fuck him, does push the dress higher up, over the warm curve of his ass, and fucks him, pulls him into his lap and thrusts gently up, tiny rocking movements, John’s arms coming slowly around his back, his head on Rodney’s shoulder.
“I fucked up,” John says. They’re still doing it, still fucking, having sex, though there’s only the gentle rise and fall of Rodney’s hips to go by, to mark the movement. Rodney’s hands traveling across John’s back, over the dress’ straps, tight green bands of velvet, cutting into his shoulder blades.
“No,” says Rodney, who’s learned a little about lying through the process of osmosis. “They’re the morons who didn’t get it.”
John thinks about this. He licks at Rodney’s neck.
“You’re right,” he says after a minute, and suddenly he’s clenching his ass around Rodney’s cock, and Rodney is gasping, his hips spasming, the velvet crumpling in his fists.
“I mean,” John says, “Ronon in a dress: what’s not funny about that?”
John’s eyes are open and uncovered. Rodney bites his tongue, and laughs like he doesn’t know the answer.
NOTES:
1. For those of you concerned with continuity, this takes place before the end of ‘Four Quarters.’ Before the end of ‘Bootleg,’ too.
2. And for those concerned about how fucking angsty this damn story is: it doesn’t end here, or with ‘Bootleg.’ There’s something more I want to write, andwychwood is gonna help me with it, and I’m pretty damn sure it’ll end more brightly than this. Stay tuned.
wychwood, I hope you don't mind my taking the 'verse out for a spin.Title: The Bellerophon Brothers
Raiting: NC-17
Pairing: McKay/Sheppard
Length: ~1625 words
Summary: An off-the-cuff excerpt from the Four Quarters-verse. Yeah, the joke’s on somebody, all right.
The Bellerophon Brothers
It’s generally agreed upon that over the years, Teyla has had the worst hair, Ronon has worn the worst clothes, Rodney has said the dumbest things to the press, and Shep has generally made the biggest ass of himself.
That’s okay, though: that last. Because he’s Shep, and everyone loves him.
“Fuck you,” Rodney says, when John comes into his room, metal loop of a hanger dangling from his fingertip. “No fucking way.”
John grins. “Come on, Rodney,” wheedling, “it’ll be great. Hilarious.”
“To whom?” Rodney asks. He knows that John thinks he’ll cave in the end, and he often does. But he’s not gonna cave on this. “You?”
“Well, yeah.” A smirk now. “To all of us. Come on,” pressing, “it’ll be an awesome joke. A great trick to play on our home town.”
Rodney bites his lip. He’d already agreed to the plan in its early stages, but he hadn’t agreed—
“You wear the fucking dress,” he says.
It’s even an ugly dress. It’s got fringe on it.
John rolls his eyes. “I can’t wear the dress. I’m going to be singing, they’ll know I’m not a girl.”
Rodney snorts. “Oh, and all I’d have to do is shave my legs and everyone would be fooled?”
“You’d shave your legs for me?” John asks, pressing close. Rodney can feel the cheap polyester fabric of the dress rubbing against the bare skin of his arm. Cloying and fake.
“I said no.” Rodney turns, shoulder bumping the hanger on the way. “Go make Ronon do it.”
Out of the corner of his eye, he can see John shrug. “Okay.”
And of course, because he’s John, because he’s Shep, he does.
The joke is this: they open for themselves. Get all dressed up: Shep in a wig that looks like a dead cat, Teyla in an oversized flannel shirt and a cowboy hat, Rodney in a fake mustache that John talked him into wearing, and Ronon in a dress. Not the same dress—this one is still ugly (uglier, maybe, as there is by necessity more of it)—but another big brown fringed country western number with little sequinned darts all down the sides. Ronon dons a wig that rivals Shep’s for hideousness, and he wears red cowboy boots. He even shaves his beard, because Shep asks him to.
Rodney stands in the corner and tries to keep his fake mustache from falling off.
So the joke is this. They go on stage when the Staples Center is still just filling up. Shep puts on a thick, ridiculous Texas accent and introduces them as the Bellerophon Brothers. He’s Al Bellerophon and Teyla’s George Bellerophon and Ronon’s their sister, Mary Lou Bellerophon. Rodney’s cousin Percy.
Yeah, the joke’s on somebody, all right.
The crowd claps uneasily, uncertain. They’re here to see the Puddlejumpers, man. Rock ‘n’ Roll! But Shep gets up there with his cowboy strut and his “Hello. I’m Al Bellerophon” and he plays Johnny Cash covers and Willie Nelson covers and Waylon Jennings covers. Ronon stands on his right, in Rodney’s usual spot (switch the bass player and the lead guitarist up! all part of the joke!), playing his instrument and grinning like he doesn’t know that he makes the ugliest woman in the world.
“Thank you very kindly,” Shep says, at the end of their set. “God bless.”
They’re ushered off with a smattering of polite applause and a lot of “what the fuck?” faces.
Later, back in their own skin, Shep glides out onto the stage in his leather pants and his sunglasses and his voice like silk and shattered glass. “Hello Los Annnngeles!” he shouts. “How nice to be back in our home town! Where everyone knows us!”
The crowd goes wild.
Rodney doesn’t really think it’s funny at all.
That night, after the concert, Rodney has a late dinner with his sister. Homemade lasagne in her warm, too-cramped kitchen, and they don’t really have anything to say to each other, but for once that’s okay. Jeannie’s there.
Then Rodney goes home to his own house in Laurel Canyon, the one he thinks is too dark, confined by the press of hills. He keeps meaning to sell it, but he’s barely ever there anyway. Sell or stay, it doesn’t really matter.
The house is dark. Rodney goes from room to room, turning on the lights. When he gets to the bedroom, he hears breathing, sees a shadow. He tenses even though he recognizes both: he flips on the light and John’s waiting for him.
John’s waiting there, mouth a slash of red lipstick, his body cocooned in a tight green velvet dress.
Rodney feels a stab of— “That’s funny,” he says. “I don’t remember ordering a whore.”
John’s eyes flash. But he just says, “I shaved my legs for you,” and spreads them, like Sharon Stone with a surprise.
Rodney drops the little Tupperware container of lasagne he’s carrying, the one he forgot to put down when he was in the kitchen. He stares at John, who lies back, velvet rucking up over newly smooth thighs, cock peeking out from under the hem of the dress and sliding easily into John’s hand.
It’s beautiful and it’s sick and Rodney trembles, throbbing with an emotion he can’t, doesn’t want to explain.
But lust he can do. Lust they can always do. So even though he says, “I’m never really fucking you, am I?” he still walks forward, goes and stands at the foot of the bed, between John’s legs. He drops down, runs a hand up John’s thigh. Up close, the illusion is less complete: the job was rushed, obviously, and there are patches of red skin, tender from razor burn. Rodney bends down and presses a kiss to one such crimson blush. “I’m fucking your latest idea.”
“I think that’s all there is,” John says, and Rodney lifts him up, tastes the alcohol on his breath and in his mouth. Bitter and stale.
“You gonna fuck me like a woman, Rodney?” John asks. Drawing a hand across his collarbone, picking up and dropping one emerald strap. “Do you even know how?”
Rodney stiffens. They don’t talk about this. They don’t ever talk about this. Because even though they don’t talk about it, they both know that for Rodney, John is the first and only. And for John...
They don’t talk about it.
Except, “I’ve fucked lots of women,” Shep says, wiggling on Rodney’s lap. His cock poking out the bottom of his dress. “They can’t get enough of me.”
Rodney’s had more than enough. He wants to push John off of him and walk out, leave him to sleep it off or try to get a taxi to drop him somewhere other than West Hollywood. He wants to yank that stupid dress up above John’s waist, tear it, turn him around and pound him into the mattress. But...he sees the determined look in John’s eyes, sees the sharpening of pupils not as liquor-drowned at John would obviously like him to think. And he gets it. The joke. The grand old joke.
That’s what John wants him to do.
Rodney raises his hand. Digging deep into the hair at the back of John’s neck so that John’s long throat is exposed, his Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallows, breathing hard. “I don’t believe you,” Rodney says. “I don’t believe a single thing you say or anything you do.” He lets go with a jerk. “And you like it that way.”
John starts to laugh. Rodney shuts him up with a kiss.
He’s angry. Furious. He wants to fuck John’s mouth, bite at his lip until he bleeds. But he can be a joker, too: a wild card, turning the kisses gentle with steady concentration and patience and practice. Playing John with careful fingers, just like he would a guitar.
“But you can’t fool me forever,” he says, lowering John back down onto the bed. Sliding down, over him, with his mouth: tasting clean, soapy skin and cheap, thrift store velvet, and John, the intense flavor of him, nuzzling his balls and the root of his cock. “I do know you,” kissing the shaft, “I know you better than anyone,” the tip, “and you hate that,” swallowing, mouth applying steady suction, humming. You hate that, you hate that. But you need it, too.
John makes a choked sound and then his hands are on Rodney’s head, brushing over the tips of his ears, knuckles scraping across his cheeks and chin. He comes with a muted sob, arm moving up, flung across his face. And then Rodney does fuck him, does push the dress higher up, over the warm curve of his ass, and fucks him, pulls him into his lap and thrusts gently up, tiny rocking movements, John’s arms coming slowly around his back, his head on Rodney’s shoulder.
“I fucked up,” John says. They’re still doing it, still fucking, having sex, though there’s only the gentle rise and fall of Rodney’s hips to go by, to mark the movement. Rodney’s hands traveling across John’s back, over the dress’ straps, tight green bands of velvet, cutting into his shoulder blades.
“No,” says Rodney, who’s learned a little about lying through the process of osmosis. “They’re the morons who didn’t get it.”
John thinks about this. He licks at Rodney’s neck.
“You’re right,” he says after a minute, and suddenly he’s clenching his ass around Rodney’s cock, and Rodney is gasping, his hips spasming, the velvet crumpling in his fists.
“I mean,” John says, “Ronon in a dress: what’s not funny about that?”
John’s eyes are open and uncovered. Rodney bites his tongue, and laughs like he doesn’t know the answer.
NOTES:
1. For those of you concerned with continuity, this takes place before the end of ‘Four Quarters.’ Before the end of ‘Bootleg,’ too.
2. And for those concerned about how fucking angsty this damn story is: it doesn’t end here, or with ‘Bootleg.’ There’s something more I want to write, and
wychwood is gonna help me with it, and I’m pretty damn sure it’ll end more brightly than this. Stay tuned.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-29 08:02 pm (UTC)Because even though they don’t talk about it, they both know that for Rodney, John is the first and only. And for John...
I always thought of myself as an OTPer but Rodney really, really needs to have an affair. An affair with someone he likes and who geniunely likes him. He deserves it.
John can have him back. Eventually. When he's earned it. ;)
Ps. Thanks so much for the soundtrack. "The Last High" is my new favorite song.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-29 08:27 pm (UTC)John can have him back. Eventually. When he's earned it. ;)
I've actually been thinking about that. *squirms* Hmm.
(The sad thing is, I think John's mostly been true to Rodney. He's just put a lot of effort into making it seem like he's not.)
Ps. Thanks so much for the soundtrack. "The Last High" is my new favorite song.
I'm so glad you like it! (It, and the story.) Let me know if you want some more Dandy Warhols; I can hook you up.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-29 10:12 pm (UTC)And as for Sheppard? Even if he isn't sleeping around? He's still being deliberately hurtful by acting the part. And I kind of think that Rodney straying would be partly him getting a taste of his own medicine and also partly the thing he clearly needs to make him move past his own issues/reservations.
(Because, while I think his reasons for acting this way are actually complicated--[testing Rodney, testing hismefl, feelings of not deserving happiness/Rodney, wishing he were something he's not, trying to make himself believe that he doesn't care?]--I also think that he needs some kind of 'Event', soemthing to push him past all that and actually all out commit himself to his desires and not be ashamed/embarassed/wavering/insecure/unsure of them.)
*coughs* not to intrude on you conversation. ;) Sorry. :)
I sincerely enjoyed this piece. And the image of Ronon in a dress has me a little scarred. Thanks.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-30 12:47 am (UTC)yeah, I got this too, which is some ways is better (yay! John is somewhat faithful) but in a lot of ways, worse -- lying in order to inflict emotional hurt. He's not driven to cheat, he's just constantly trying to keep Rodney from being in love with him while still loving him in his own, inimitable way. He's so fucked up.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-30 05:49 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-30 07:22 am (UTC)And he probably felt like shit every time he did cheat, and then did it again, or bragged about it to Rodney, just to prove to himself that actually, he totally doesn't care. He doesn't! Even if Rodney looks like someone just killed his puppy, with those big, blue, hurt eyes. It's Rodney's own fault, he should have known he's being stupid, falling for Shep. It's not like John cares. No, really.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-30 07:50 am (UTC)Re : Affair. I've actually been thinking about that. *squirms* Hmm.
Please, please, please. Girl, guy, doesn't matter as long as they truly like Rodney and are too grounded to mess with him. I think he needs a hint of healthy before he can make anything real with John. Their relationship is so unequal.
Plus, John can come on to that mystery someone and get turned down. Because he totally needs someone to say, "Why would I want you when I have Rodney?"
(The sad thing is, I think John's mostly been true to Rodney. He's just put a lot of effort into making it seem like he's not.)
God bless his dysfunctional AU heart. I do get that feeling. No guy brags about the women he sleeps with unless he has something to prove. He needs to show Rodney he doesn't actually need him which is ridiculous because he's needed him from the moment Rodney started playing for him. Maybe it's because Rodney is a genius. John does seem terribly insecure. Which is in perfect character for a lead singer. They are such as strange mix of bravado and vunerablility.
I'm so glad you like it! (It, and the story.) Let me know if you want some more Dandy Warhols; I can hook you up.
Sweet! I'd love that. I only have The Scientist, We Used to be Friends and The Last High. They hit one of my ultimate music kinks which is having seriously moody and dark lyrics to the most upbeat pop. So good.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-05-01 01:47 pm (UTC)Re: Dandy Warhols
Date: 2006-05-01 04:30 pm (UTC)That's cool - you've been busy writing (yay!).
Whichever is less trouble but I would like to know what your favorites are since I've really enjoyed your music posts.
Thanks :)