"The Sign" (Simon/Hotdog, R)
Title: The Sign
Pairing: Simon/Brendan "Hotdog" Costanza
Rating: R for sex, dubious consent
Prompt: #6, stock image
Length: 2,510 words
Summary: It said "keep out", so you did.
A few blocks away from the house where he grew up there was this abandoned building. It was a warehouse of some kind, or a factory, or a steel mill, or an auto plant. Nobody knew for sure.
There was a fence around the building twice as tall as any grown-up. And on that fence was a metal sign as old and beat-up as the building it stood in front of, but with letters clearly readable nonetheless.
“NO TRESPASSING. KEEP OUT.”
The neighborhood kids would gather in front of the fence and tell each other stories. About what they thought, or had heard, lay inside. About what the place really had been once upon a time. And they’d bicker and argue over it, and dare each other to find proof.
But none of them ever did.
Walking home from school in the afternoons he would pass it, and he’d stand there with fingers curled into the chain fence, peering unblinkingly at the big empty building with the broken windows and the rusty walls. And he’d wonder, just what was this place? What was inside? And curiosity burned in him to know, an itching like crawling bugs in his brain that kept him awake long after his parents made him turn the lights out and go to bed.
He wanted to climb the fence. He wanted to explore the building. He wanted to know.
But he never did it. He never dared. Because of the sign.
Silly that stamped letters hanging on a rusty fence could have such power, but they did. Those words had some kind of strength, some kind of authority.
“Keep out”, it said. And you did.
He doesn’t know why he’s thinking about this now: why he’s remembering pointless stuff from when he was a kid, when there are some far more pressing things going on.
Like his Viper getting shot down in a deep-space dogfight. Like it exploding seconds after he’d managed to eject.
He only hopes most of the Fleet got away. He only hopes the other pilots took the Raiders out.
He can only hope these things, because he doesn’t know what happened. He must’ve been knocked unconscious by the explosion, or a piece of debris, because the next thing he remembers is waking up here.
The white and silver walls gleam blindingly, the only sound the hum from the pulsing red light. The bed is a standard hospital cot, hard mattress and thin sheets, except for the straps across his wrists and ankles holding him down.
He’s naked save for his regulation gray boxer-briefs and his entire midsection is wrapped in gauze. The area underneath the bandages burns in pain, searing worse when he tries to move. Not that he really can move.
His teeth are chattering from pain and cold and anger and yeah, okay, fear. No shame in admitting it, he figures. Not when it’s just to himself.
Maybe Starbuck wouldn’t be afraid. Maybe not Apollo, or Helo, or any of the big ones, the hot-shots, the pilots with Galactica since the day of the attack that haven’t been shot down yet. But he isn’t one of them: he’s Hotdog, the experienced rookie, the Fleet wash-out that got lucky enough to get a second chance when everybody better got killed.
Yeah, he’s been real lucky. Right up until the part where he got captured by Cylons.
He doesn’t know how long it is he’s left alone like this, when the door finally opens and a single toaster strolls in.
It’s the darker skinjob, the one that’s supposed to be a doctor. It bends over him, checking his bandages. Those Cylon fingertips brush against his naked skin and he freezes. He holds his breath, waiting for it to say something.
But it doesn’t. It smiles to itself as it examines the gauze, and its eyes flicker up to his face for the briefest moment before it goes back to its work. Not ignoring him, just not saying anything.
With practiced ease, it begins unwinding the white cotton.
“I’m going to change your bandages now,” it says. Its voice is calm and informative.
“What did you do to me?” he blurts, finally. He knows he shouldn’t be talking to this thing, but he can’t hold it in.
“Nothing.” The Cylon quirks an eyebrow, just slightly: “Nothing besides saving your life, that is. Your abdomen was penetrated rather badly by a fragment from your Viper, Lieutenant.”
When the bandages are pulled away he can indeed see a nasty gash along one side, the edges of his skin puckering where they’ve been pulled back together after having been ripped apart. The sight makes him woozy, and he quickly looks away.
“My Viper never would have exploded if you hadn’t shot me,” he counters sharply, biting out his words in a spasm of rage.
The Cylon only looks back at him with a smile.
“If we hadn’t brought you onboard, you would have died out there,” it says with smooth, infuriating calmness.
“Maybe I’d prefer that,” he replies, harsh, “over being a Cylon prisoner.”
The Cylon doesn’t say anything to this. Its shoulders rise slightly in a dismissive shrug as it goes to work replacing his bandages, but other than that it chooses not to dignify his statement with a reply.
He lies there, wanting to flinch away from every touch against his skin, but unable to because of the restraints and the pain. He curls his fingers into fists and pulls his lips back in a snarl until the Cylon is finally done.
“Now, I’d like to undo your restraints,” it says, almost cheerfully, “but I don’t know if I should. You have no chance of escape. There’s only one door to this room and it’s quite impenetrable from this side. All that getting up from this bed will accomplish is ripping your stitches out.”
It folds its arms and looks down at him patiently.
“So, what do you say? Can I trust you to behave yourself?”
He wants to refuse, just to spite it. But his wrists are already killing him and he’s losing circulation in his toes. He grits his teeth and nods.
“Good.” It loosens the buckles carefully and he immediately pulls free, exhaling despite himself in relief as he flexes his fingers to restore feeling. “I’m Simon, by the way.”
“I know which one you are,” he grits. It occurs to him, too late, that when the Cylon was still bent over him was an opportunity to reach up and grab its neck.
“And I know who you are, Lieutenant Costanza,” it replies evenly. “Hotdog.” The corner of its lips rises peaceably. “Do you mind if I call you Brendan?”
He draws a breath, stiffly, and holds it.
“Can I really do anything to stop you?”
The Cylon- Simon -actually chuckles.
“No, I suppose not.” It turns its back on him. “Rest up, Brendan,” it calls over one shoulder, before going out the door.
_________
He doesn’t know how long he’s been here. The lights never turn off and there’s nothing to gauge the passing of time.
He figures it must be days at least. They keep feeding him, giving him water, and his body keeps needing it, which tells him it’s been awhile.
He sleeps a little, probably less than he should, but between the frakking lights and the fact that he’s a prisoner on a Cylon ship…well, mainly, he lies there and thinks, because he can’t do anything else.
He’d get out of the bed if there was actually somewhere to go. He’d get out of the bed if it didn’t hurt so damn much. He’d get out of the bed if there was even a chance he could find a way out, fight his way across the ship and somehow escape before he bled to death. But there isn’t, so he just lies there and stares at the pulsing ceiling, feeling like he’s going to puke.
He keeps thinking about the old factory and the sign hanging on its fence.
Simon keeps coming. He assumes it’s the same one, because he has no real way of knowing. The Cylon cleans his wound, redresses it; checks up on how he’s doing.
He’s healing, which is another way he knows he’s been here some time.
“What do you want with me?” he demands of the Cylon. He keeps expecting questions, an interrogation, but so far there’s been none. He keeps wracking his brain for what the toasters will do to him, but keeps coming up empty. “You wouldn’t be fixing me up if you just wanted to kill me.”
“That seems like a fairly reasonable assumption,” Simon responds conversationally. It takes in the state of his stitches and makes notes on a clipboard.
He swallows; grits his teeth as he forces himself to continue.
“You wouldn’t be doing this if you were gonna torture me either,” he says. “So, what: Am I gonna wind up a guinea pig in some Cylon experiment? Gonna cut me apart and do something with the pieces, or use me as a stud in your freak-baby breeding program?”
Simon snorts a little. Like it thinks he’s funny.
“Don’t worry, Brendan. You’re in good hands,” it says enigmatically. “We have some very special plans.” It smiles to itself. “You’re part of something important.”
It feels along the edge of his bandages, making sure they’re secure. Then it runs its hands smoothly along his ribs and stomach, stroking. Caressing.
He chokes; jaw clenches and he grips the mattress.
“Are you cold?” Simon asks.
“What?” His fingers twist in the sheets.
“Are you cold, Brendan?” The Cylon’s eyes narrow and it looks at him pointedly. “You’re shivering.”
It’s smiling again, but differently.
“You done?” he bites out, unable to reply any other way.
After it’s gone, he gets up carefully and walks along the walls. He limps stiffly in a loop three, five, twenty times until he’s worn out. Just like he expected, there’s no way out.
He already knew there wouldn’t be. He had to look anyway.
He thinks he knows now, why it is that the metal sign from his childhood keeps coming back to his thoughts. It’s because right now, he could use something like that: a talisman, a warding charm, something to keep him safe. Something to protect him. A shield. Any kind of defense.
It had power, the sign. It said “no”, so you didn’t. It said “keep out”, so you did. You didn’t touch. You didn’t go near. You didn’t dare.
He wishes he had power like that. Especially here and now.
The next time Simon comes, it only takes a few seconds to give his bandages a cursory glance.
“How are you feeling, Brendan?”
There’s a hand resting on his knee. The gesture could seem almost casual, automatic even. But the fingers tighten ever so slightly, the digits brushing in a meaningful way across his skin. He struggles to draw breath.
“I’m a prisoner on a frakking Basestar. I’ve got an aching hole punched in my gut and I’m almost naked in a freezing metal cell. How do you think I feel?”
Simon chuckles lowly.
“I wasn’t talking about the obvious.” There’s something dark in its eyes, and it strokes him further. “I was wondering if you had any other needs. Are you lonely?” The fingers slide down along the inside of his thigh. “Tense?”
That one word is low and gravelly, filled with sharp innuendo.
A lump forms in his throat and his eyes start to burn.
“Don’t,” he says.
“Don’t what?” it asks brightly. It caresses along the side of his leg slow and gentle, almost tickling, until it reaches his cock. Then it starts to caress that too.
“N-no. No.” He almost wishes he was still strapped down because at least then he’d have an excuse for why he doesn’t get up, doesn’t move. “Get your hands off me.”
“Why, exactly?”
There’s a wry smile on about half of its mouth. Its fingers keep stroking him, teasing along the head of his dick and then pressing harder across his balls until the whole hand is gripping him by the base. His body reacts even though he doesn’t want it to, and he breathes in sharply.
“Because you don’t like this? Because you don’t want me to? Or because you feel like you shouldn’t? Like you’re not allowed?”
It tightens its grip on his cock and begins rubbing him more firmly, with unmistakable intent. A groan is torn from the back of his throat. He tilts his head back, trying to look away, but he can still feel the Cylon’s hand and then the press of its legs against his, the weight of its upper body as it climbs onto the cot over him and straddles him, leaning against him to get close.
“I said no,” he forces out, shaking. “I told you to stop.” The hand doesn’t, and he feels the smooth material of the Cylon’s dress shirt, the rougher fiber of its doctor’s coat, glide against the bare skin of his chest. “I told you I didn’t want it.”
“No, you didn’t.” It whispers now, serene and matter-of-fact, even as it jerks his hard-on with one hand and runs the other along his back, touching his spine. “You didn’t say anything of the sort.”
He opens his mouth but all that comes out is a half-formed sound of desperate protest, trailing off weakly into something like a whimper.
“I tell you what, Brendan. I’ll make you a deal.” The pumping motion it’s been making on his cock is getting faster now and it’s rolled its grip around so he’s secure in its palm, drawn tightly into its fist. “If you can look me in the eye and tell me you don’t want this, if you can say ‘no’ and really mean it, then I’ll stop.”
Against his will his back starts to arch; his hips start to thrust with the motion, even though he desperately wants them not to.
“So go on, if you can. Say you don’t want it. Say it.”
The words flash inside his head; those big bold printed metal letters you could read from even a few feet away. He can see it in his mind clear as day.
No trespassing. Keep out. Stay back. Don’t Touch. Stop.
He wishes he had a sign. A sign he could hang over himself, casting a protective net over his body. A line that none dared cross, not because of any reason but just because that’s what it said: “Keep out”. So everyone did.
But he doesn’t have that kind of power. He doesn’t have a sign.
His mouth opens, closes, and opens again in a half-formed circle from which only tiny ragged pants escape. Simon presses against him his cock in its hand, its other hand in the space between his shoulder blades. Its lips brush on the side of his throat.
He closes his eyes tight, reading the sign over and over in his mind.
Pairing: Simon/Brendan "Hotdog" Costanza
Rating: R for sex, dubious consent
Prompt: #6, stock image
Length: 2,510 words
Summary: It said "keep out", so you did.
A few blocks away from the house where he grew up there was this abandoned building. It was a warehouse of some kind, or a factory, or a steel mill, or an auto plant. Nobody knew for sure.
There was a fence around the building twice as tall as any grown-up. And on that fence was a metal sign as old and beat-up as the building it stood in front of, but with letters clearly readable nonetheless.
“NO TRESPASSING. KEEP OUT.”
The neighborhood kids would gather in front of the fence and tell each other stories. About what they thought, or had heard, lay inside. About what the place really had been once upon a time. And they’d bicker and argue over it, and dare each other to find proof.
But none of them ever did.
Walking home from school in the afternoons he would pass it, and he’d stand there with fingers curled into the chain fence, peering unblinkingly at the big empty building with the broken windows and the rusty walls. And he’d wonder, just what was this place? What was inside? And curiosity burned in him to know, an itching like crawling bugs in his brain that kept him awake long after his parents made him turn the lights out and go to bed.
He wanted to climb the fence. He wanted to explore the building. He wanted to know.
But he never did it. He never dared. Because of the sign.
Silly that stamped letters hanging on a rusty fence could have such power, but they did. Those words had some kind of strength, some kind of authority.
“Keep out”, it said. And you did.
He doesn’t know why he’s thinking about this now: why he’s remembering pointless stuff from when he was a kid, when there are some far more pressing things going on.
Like his Viper getting shot down in a deep-space dogfight. Like it exploding seconds after he’d managed to eject.
He only hopes most of the Fleet got away. He only hopes the other pilots took the Raiders out.
He can only hope these things, because he doesn’t know what happened. He must’ve been knocked unconscious by the explosion, or a piece of debris, because the next thing he remembers is waking up here.
The white and silver walls gleam blindingly, the only sound the hum from the pulsing red light. The bed is a standard hospital cot, hard mattress and thin sheets, except for the straps across his wrists and ankles holding him down.
He’s naked save for his regulation gray boxer-briefs and his entire midsection is wrapped in gauze. The area underneath the bandages burns in pain, searing worse when he tries to move. Not that he really can move.
His teeth are chattering from pain and cold and anger and yeah, okay, fear. No shame in admitting it, he figures. Not when it’s just to himself.
Maybe Starbuck wouldn’t be afraid. Maybe not Apollo, or Helo, or any of the big ones, the hot-shots, the pilots with Galactica since the day of the attack that haven’t been shot down yet. But he isn’t one of them: he’s Hotdog, the experienced rookie, the Fleet wash-out that got lucky enough to get a second chance when everybody better got killed.
Yeah, he’s been real lucky. Right up until the part where he got captured by Cylons.
He doesn’t know how long it is he’s left alone like this, when the door finally opens and a single toaster strolls in.
It’s the darker skinjob, the one that’s supposed to be a doctor. It bends over him, checking his bandages. Those Cylon fingertips brush against his naked skin and he freezes. He holds his breath, waiting for it to say something.
But it doesn’t. It smiles to itself as it examines the gauze, and its eyes flicker up to his face for the briefest moment before it goes back to its work. Not ignoring him, just not saying anything.
With practiced ease, it begins unwinding the white cotton.
“I’m going to change your bandages now,” it says. Its voice is calm and informative.
“What did you do to me?” he blurts, finally. He knows he shouldn’t be talking to this thing, but he can’t hold it in.
“Nothing.” The Cylon quirks an eyebrow, just slightly: “Nothing besides saving your life, that is. Your abdomen was penetrated rather badly by a fragment from your Viper, Lieutenant.”
When the bandages are pulled away he can indeed see a nasty gash along one side, the edges of his skin puckering where they’ve been pulled back together after having been ripped apart. The sight makes him woozy, and he quickly looks away.
“My Viper never would have exploded if you hadn’t shot me,” he counters sharply, biting out his words in a spasm of rage.
The Cylon only looks back at him with a smile.
“If we hadn’t brought you onboard, you would have died out there,” it says with smooth, infuriating calmness.
“Maybe I’d prefer that,” he replies, harsh, “over being a Cylon prisoner.”
The Cylon doesn’t say anything to this. Its shoulders rise slightly in a dismissive shrug as it goes to work replacing his bandages, but other than that it chooses not to dignify his statement with a reply.
He lies there, wanting to flinch away from every touch against his skin, but unable to because of the restraints and the pain. He curls his fingers into fists and pulls his lips back in a snarl until the Cylon is finally done.
“Now, I’d like to undo your restraints,” it says, almost cheerfully, “but I don’t know if I should. You have no chance of escape. There’s only one door to this room and it’s quite impenetrable from this side. All that getting up from this bed will accomplish is ripping your stitches out.”
It folds its arms and looks down at him patiently.
“So, what do you say? Can I trust you to behave yourself?”
He wants to refuse, just to spite it. But his wrists are already killing him and he’s losing circulation in his toes. He grits his teeth and nods.
“Good.” It loosens the buckles carefully and he immediately pulls free, exhaling despite himself in relief as he flexes his fingers to restore feeling. “I’m Simon, by the way.”
“I know which one you are,” he grits. It occurs to him, too late, that when the Cylon was still bent over him was an opportunity to reach up and grab its neck.
“And I know who you are, Lieutenant Costanza,” it replies evenly. “Hotdog.” The corner of its lips rises peaceably. “Do you mind if I call you Brendan?”
He draws a breath, stiffly, and holds it.
“Can I really do anything to stop you?”
The Cylon- Simon -actually chuckles.
“No, I suppose not.” It turns its back on him. “Rest up, Brendan,” it calls over one shoulder, before going out the door.
_________
He doesn’t know how long he’s been here. The lights never turn off and there’s nothing to gauge the passing of time.
He figures it must be days at least. They keep feeding him, giving him water, and his body keeps needing it, which tells him it’s been awhile.
He sleeps a little, probably less than he should, but between the frakking lights and the fact that he’s a prisoner on a Cylon ship…well, mainly, he lies there and thinks, because he can’t do anything else.
He’d get out of the bed if there was actually somewhere to go. He’d get out of the bed if it didn’t hurt so damn much. He’d get out of the bed if there was even a chance he could find a way out, fight his way across the ship and somehow escape before he bled to death. But there isn’t, so he just lies there and stares at the pulsing ceiling, feeling like he’s going to puke.
He keeps thinking about the old factory and the sign hanging on its fence.
Simon keeps coming. He assumes it’s the same one, because he has no real way of knowing. The Cylon cleans his wound, redresses it; checks up on how he’s doing.
He’s healing, which is another way he knows he’s been here some time.
“What do you want with me?” he demands of the Cylon. He keeps expecting questions, an interrogation, but so far there’s been none. He keeps wracking his brain for what the toasters will do to him, but keeps coming up empty. “You wouldn’t be fixing me up if you just wanted to kill me.”
“That seems like a fairly reasonable assumption,” Simon responds conversationally. It takes in the state of his stitches and makes notes on a clipboard.
He swallows; grits his teeth as he forces himself to continue.
“You wouldn’t be doing this if you were gonna torture me either,” he says. “So, what: Am I gonna wind up a guinea pig in some Cylon experiment? Gonna cut me apart and do something with the pieces, or use me as a stud in your freak-baby breeding program?”
Simon snorts a little. Like it thinks he’s funny.
“Don’t worry, Brendan. You’re in good hands,” it says enigmatically. “We have some very special plans.” It smiles to itself. “You’re part of something important.”
It feels along the edge of his bandages, making sure they’re secure. Then it runs its hands smoothly along his ribs and stomach, stroking. Caressing.
He chokes; jaw clenches and he grips the mattress.
“Are you cold?” Simon asks.
“What?” His fingers twist in the sheets.
“Are you cold, Brendan?” The Cylon’s eyes narrow and it looks at him pointedly. “You’re shivering.”
It’s smiling again, but differently.
“You done?” he bites out, unable to reply any other way.
After it’s gone, he gets up carefully and walks along the walls. He limps stiffly in a loop three, five, twenty times until he’s worn out. Just like he expected, there’s no way out.
He already knew there wouldn’t be. He had to look anyway.
He thinks he knows now, why it is that the metal sign from his childhood keeps coming back to his thoughts. It’s because right now, he could use something like that: a talisman, a warding charm, something to keep him safe. Something to protect him. A shield. Any kind of defense.
It had power, the sign. It said “no”, so you didn’t. It said “keep out”, so you did. You didn’t touch. You didn’t go near. You didn’t dare.
He wishes he had power like that. Especially here and now.
The next time Simon comes, it only takes a few seconds to give his bandages a cursory glance.
“How are you feeling, Brendan?”
There’s a hand resting on his knee. The gesture could seem almost casual, automatic even. But the fingers tighten ever so slightly, the digits brushing in a meaningful way across his skin. He struggles to draw breath.
“I’m a prisoner on a frakking Basestar. I’ve got an aching hole punched in my gut and I’m almost naked in a freezing metal cell. How do you think I feel?”
Simon chuckles lowly.
“I wasn’t talking about the obvious.” There’s something dark in its eyes, and it strokes him further. “I was wondering if you had any other needs. Are you lonely?” The fingers slide down along the inside of his thigh. “Tense?”
That one word is low and gravelly, filled with sharp innuendo.
A lump forms in his throat and his eyes start to burn.
“Don’t,” he says.
“Don’t what?” it asks brightly. It caresses along the side of his leg slow and gentle, almost tickling, until it reaches his cock. Then it starts to caress that too.
“N-no. No.” He almost wishes he was still strapped down because at least then he’d have an excuse for why he doesn’t get up, doesn’t move. “Get your hands off me.”
“Why, exactly?”
There’s a wry smile on about half of its mouth. Its fingers keep stroking him, teasing along the head of his dick and then pressing harder across his balls until the whole hand is gripping him by the base. His body reacts even though he doesn’t want it to, and he breathes in sharply.
“Because you don’t like this? Because you don’t want me to? Or because you feel like you shouldn’t? Like you’re not allowed?”
It tightens its grip on his cock and begins rubbing him more firmly, with unmistakable intent. A groan is torn from the back of his throat. He tilts his head back, trying to look away, but he can still feel the Cylon’s hand and then the press of its legs against his, the weight of its upper body as it climbs onto the cot over him and straddles him, leaning against him to get close.
“I said no,” he forces out, shaking. “I told you to stop.” The hand doesn’t, and he feels the smooth material of the Cylon’s dress shirt, the rougher fiber of its doctor’s coat, glide against the bare skin of his chest. “I told you I didn’t want it.”
“No, you didn’t.” It whispers now, serene and matter-of-fact, even as it jerks his hard-on with one hand and runs the other along his back, touching his spine. “You didn’t say anything of the sort.”
He opens his mouth but all that comes out is a half-formed sound of desperate protest, trailing off weakly into something like a whimper.
“I tell you what, Brendan. I’ll make you a deal.” The pumping motion it’s been making on his cock is getting faster now and it’s rolled its grip around so he’s secure in its palm, drawn tightly into its fist. “If you can look me in the eye and tell me you don’t want this, if you can say ‘no’ and really mean it, then I’ll stop.”
Against his will his back starts to arch; his hips start to thrust with the motion, even though he desperately wants them not to.
“So go on, if you can. Say you don’t want it. Say it.”
The words flash inside his head; those big bold printed metal letters you could read from even a few feet away. He can see it in his mind clear as day.
No trespassing. Keep out. Stay back. Don’t Touch. Stop.
He wishes he had a sign. A sign he could hang over himself, casting a protective net over his body. A line that none dared cross, not because of any reason but just because that’s what it said: “Keep out”. So everyone did.
But he doesn’t have that kind of power. He doesn’t have a sign.
His mouth opens, closes, and opens again in a half-formed circle from which only tiny ragged pants escape. Simon presses against him his cock in its hand, its other hand in the space between his shoulder blades. Its lips brush on the side of his throat.
He closes his eyes tight, reading the sign over and over in his mind.