Work Text
Theseus knows that he’s lying, and Percival knows that he knows. Where in Hell did he think his partner in— pretty much everything would buy the whole I’m fine, please don’t worry, just a few broken bones?It’s here, the look of hurt and disappointment, and it’s tangible, and he feels it pull at his chest.“I don’t hate you. I hate that after all of this, you’re still trying to lie to me, Perce.”Residual guilt. Do better than that, Percival.“I’m protecting you, Thes.”Theseus arches an eyebrow in total disbelief — and in aggrieved anger — then frowns, looks at him inquisitively. “I don’t need protecting. I’m old enough to take care of myself.”“It’s not as easy as it looks—”“I have your bloody coordinates tattooed on my back. It’s as easy as that,” Theseus shots back desperately, and fuck, fuck he tries so desperately to keep his composure despite everything unfolding before his eyes.Percival lets out a dark chuckle. “And yet, it took you awhile to realise something was wrong with me. Thes, come on,” the older man sighs as he closes his eyes, exhaustion dripping painfully in his veins, “we’ve been over for years. Just say it. Say that you don’t care all that much anymore.”Theseus’ whole body contracts before the words hurt him at full speed, his hands shaking as his fingers tighten upon his knee. He inhales a great gust of breath; this can’t be good. What did I expect? Why did I say that? Percival tells himself.“That’s what you think? That I’m over you? That I don’t care about you? You broke it off, not me,” he bites with the intensity of a roaring fire or a burning spell.Percival looks away from him, ignores his question. There’s this ancient kiss still burning out in his lungs, along the destroyed skin of his lips, that fills all the empty aches inside of him.They both know the answer to this one, but Percival finds it easier to swallow back down the hurt and acid in his throat, while Theseus is a fire spreading through the slightest breeze, passionate and bold and whole in the way he expresses himself.Seeing right through me, uh. Of course he does; and that, Percival does, too. He can hear the heartache in Theseus’ voice, yet doesn’t stop. He quietly starts picking up the shards of glass in his heart, the ice swirling in his veins, around the muscles, and works his way toward protection.Protection. Protecting Theseus. That’s all that matters to him, now. All that he still has the strength to do anymore.“You shouldn’t worry this much,” he hears himself say; worse are the next words, the murmured, “because we’re over.”It hurts, seeing Theseus like this, worn out and exhausted and full of tears and anger— but it hurts Percival more to know the younger man still wants him. They can’t. They can’t be together anymore. He can’t allow it to happen. He can’t let Theseus waste away his youth and brightness with what Percival is, now, what he’s become and what he will never be ever again. There’s an old blend of pride in his body when he thinks about this, about reaching out one last time to be able to protect; like he did when he was still himself, still Percival Graves, Director, and not a scam. Not a shame of a man, not just a disgusting shadow.It’s fire racing across his skin, unkind; but resistance becomes mere obligation, and he absolutely cannot back down.“Please go, I’m tired,” Percival mumbles, giving the British Auror one last look before he curls onto his side and he buries his face into his pillow.There’s panic that’s thick in his throat, so thick he can barely contain the atrocious white-hot pain that smokes out of his eyes. It reminds him of Credence, of the black clouds of particles dancing angrily in the air around him, and it makes him want to scream and cry and die.He’s in love with Theseus, and that’s a truth he’s always known, that won’t go away.He just cannot act upon it anymore.
Collapse.
One day your lungs will collapse, isn’t that what you once said, in the trenches?
Theseus’ knees give out in the corridor leading to Percival’s room.
----- CHAPTER BREAK -----
Collapsed, but not defeated.
Rise.
Percival is kneeling by his side, looking down at him, eyes dark with worry, breathing fast as if he had run miles and miles to get to him. Theseus can see a few bandages poke out from underneath his hospital gown where it’s open and it makes his stomach churn; they’re a proof that he took so long to make it through to him, to this disgusting cell he was kept in, in his own living room, in his own home.The constant ache in his chest beats so hard he starts wondering if a fresh cut jerked open over his skin for it to be this real, this alive.For a very long moment, Theseus can’t even breathe, face gone pale and tight.“Thes—”“Shut up, for Merlin’s sake— you let me do the talking, now.”Once loved, never forgotten, and forever intertwined; he must go on, now. To never stop, to never let it slip again. He allows himself to pursue this goal, to replace fear by a feeling of anger, instead, that makes his fingers grow both cold and hot.“Thes—”“Are you bloody deaf? I told you to let me talk!”“More like you shouted,” Percival mumbles, mouth pressed into a tight line before he drags a weary hand over his face. Theseus would have laughed if the circumstances didn’t scream urgency and quick and fast and infiltrate the breach.He yanks his vest open, pulls at his shirt and grabs Percival’s hand so as to plaster it upon the warm flesh of his back where ancient magic runs across dark ink turned blue-green; and Merlin, the way Theseus’ anger slithers across his skin is nothing short of mesmerizing.“These,” the British Auror starts with a harsh intake of breath, “are the proof that I care. If you can’t believe that, you can fuck off, Percival, because I ruined my bloody perfect skin for your sorry arse.”Crafts and lies.
Proceed.
He listens to his own heartbeat for a while, picking out the words carefully in his head with eyebrows drawn together in concentration — and frustration. They both have matching coordinates on their backs, seared into their skin, and Percival is dismissing all of the memories they have together, all of their trust because he’s frightened, so frightened it reminds Theseus of Newt’s creatures before his brother has coaxed them into peacefulness.He pauses, trying to weigh the best decision. Percival’s eyes are so close that he can see the way the colour shift in the changing light of the day, dim and grey and charged with unshed truth.
Words that are knives to make him wake up.
“If you can’t be arsed to make this work, I’d advise that we stop this, Perce, whatever thisis,” and his cheeks are flushed close to the colour of dawn from the pressure of anger.Percival’s face falls, and Theseus honestly didn’t expect any of it.“You make it sound like I don’t care,” the ex-Director of MACUSA manages to breathe out.“Isn’t that what you just did to me? Making it sound like I don’t care?”The older man stills and looks down at Theseus for a moment; uncertain grace freezing and melting away.“That’s not what I wanted,” he says ever so quietly that Theseus isn’t sure he’s heard well as he rolls his neck along his shoulders to release the tension there, and narrows his eyes to pick out any defining detail out of Percival’s expression. “Or maybe it was, but you don’t understand. You don’t understand, Theseus, and you’re making it so much more complicated for me.”There’s a bitter chuckle escaping the British Auror’s lips at that, a low, dark, silent streak of annoyance and frustration peeking through. “Oh, because pushing me away is this complicated? You’ve done that countless times already; this doesn’t even come as a surprise.”Somehow, Percival sports exploded blood capillaries around his eyes, dusted right down over his cheekbone in a flutter of purple and overripe red, and the sight is haunting. He must have retched for so many days and thrown up so many times, Theseus thinks, and the thought makes his lungs burn with distress, words completely deserting him. So much anguish presented there and so little things to fix it; if any at all.“I’ve scrubbed too much of my own fucking blood from the fucking floor during my captivity to let you say this— you don’t understand!”
“You will fade among the hills;
They will all fade along with you.”
That’s what it read on the walls of Percival’s cell in sharp, bloody handwriting, letters curling and uncurling in a savage dance.
“Then bloody talk to me!” Theseus shouts back, throwing his arms in the air; pain explodes in his chest and veins, ripping a scream from his throat. “Talk to me instead of pulling me apart and sewing me back together like nothing ever happened!”Percival’s entire body shakes with suppressed anger and sparks of fury.“How much thicker can you get? I’m trying to protect you, you absolute dunderhead!”Theseus snorts sadly, looks at him for a long moment; narrows his eyes into thin slits, and ends up wrapping his long arms around Percival’s waist, pulling him close.“Baby, I’m not losing you to darkness yet again,” Theseus murmurs against his temple, branding the words in the skin offered under his lips; presses a kiss in his hair and leaves it be to settle, to soak before he kisses Percival fully on the mouth, who chokes on tears, blinking them away through chunks of fragile bones.“But he has cursed me,” the broken vowels sing through his sore throat once they part, “I won’t forgive myself if something happens to you—”It feels like all of his strength has suddenly left him, guilt prickling in his chest, and he collapses into Theseus’ arms, blame on default, wounds crushing him; falls upward, falls along. Falls. He can’t help falling anymore because that’s all he’s able to do; pondered.
The hills will be a trap you won’t ever escape.
Theseus brushes a thumb along his cheek, searching the other man’s face. “I’d rather die by your side fighting than hating myself forever for thinking I wasn’t enough for you. Plus, who’s still an Auror? Not you. You’ll need all the help you can take if we are to hunt him.”Tipping forward to catch Percival’s mouth with his own, Theseus pulls him tighter to him, impossible tighter as a way of saying, don’t let me go, don’t let us go, let me help. Let us be through this hardship.