[FIC][GEN] Kicking Pumpkins
Title: Kicking Pumpkins
Fandom: comics: DCU
Rating: PG-13
Characters: Hartley Rathaway, Axel Walker
Warnings: language. I have not used the three letter "f" word so many times in ever.
Notes: A brief genfic, wherein I explore Axel and Hartley's relationship as Trickster and the Pied Piper.
Angry Closet Case.
There was a certain kind of anger in Axel that Hartley, though he hated to admit it, recognized. It was the kind of anger that was the result of years of containment, before it eventually bubbled to the surface and burst in an uncontrollable way. Sometimes, though it was rare, Hartley saw a glimpse of the boy Axel could have been. In these moments, Axel was surprisingly kind, with a crooked, childish smile, and a playful attitude. It was in these moments, Hartley could almost see Axel deserving the Trickster moniker, but that faith in him would be shattered as soon as Axel would open his mouth and deliver another hate filled statement.
"Fag. Sick, disgusting fag. Don't touch me!" Axel threw his hands up, swatting at the air, and he glared at Hartley across the small space the rogues occupied.
Hartley narrowed his eyes, peering at him through the green lenses of his glasses. "I didn't even touch you."
"Yeah, but you were gonna!" If Axel were to glare any harder, Hartley swore he would bust a blood vessel.
Rolling his eyes, Hartley looked away, over at Len, who was playing a game of solitaire on a rickety card table. "I would never touch him" he said, to no one in particular.
Len lifted his head up and looked at Hartley through the white fur of his hooded jacket. He had one eyebrow raised.
Hartley recoiled slightly. "I'm gay, not desperate."
"Whatever." Len slapped down another card, causing the table to shake, showing his lack of interest in the conversation. Another card, and it was obvious he wanted nothing to do with the two other occupants in the room.
Axel turned in mid air, shoes leaving behind a trail of yellow and blue sparks. "Just keep it in your pants, fag." He ducked, the tips of his hair just barely brushing against the doorframe.
Hartley watched the door close behind him.
"No," Len said, suddenly, cutting Hartley off before he could speak. "Don't talk to me. I don't want to hear your gay agenda."
"It's not an agenda," Hartley protested.
"It's an agenda. You're going to stand there, and you're going to complain about that kid, and I don't want to hear it. So he hates you because you're gay. Get over it. I don't know why and I don't care." Len slapped down another card. "If you care, talk to him, not me."
Despite Len's protests to be involved, there he was, giving the best advice he could think of.
"Then--" Hartley began, but Len was waving a hand at him.
"No. I said, don't talk to me. Get out of here, Piper."
Hartley lingered for a moment longer, before finally turning to leave, wrapping his arms around himself to keep from brushing against the leg of the rickety card table. He stopped, startled at the door as it swung open, revealing Mick's large body, clad in white and orange. The smell of soot suddenly filled the air, and Hartley wrinkled his nose.
"Heatwave."
"Piper."
It was a greeting of mutual respect; after all, they had followed similar paths of going straight and coming right back to the seedy underbelly of being a rogue. Hartley bowed his head and slipped past the exit, watching from the corner of his eye as Mick took heavy strides towards Len, hand falling on his shoulder.
The safest thing for Hartley to do, was ignore what he saw. What rogues did together in their personal time was none of his buisness.
Hartley was very rarely out during the day, and he was grateful that the sun was on its last legs, and the sky was painted purple and blue. He buried his hands into the pockets of his green sweatshirt, ducking his head a little so that his chin dipped into the warm cotton. It wasn't the typical outfit for a villain, but he wasn't a typical villain. He started down the streets, kicking his torn sneakers at a stray puddle of water.
He paused, catching sight of a familiar figure in blue and yellow, and he ducked behind a building, watching.
Axel was grounded, for once, holding his hands out towards a young, handsomely dressed, Asian man. "Come on, Danny! It'll be like old times!"
"No way, Walker!" The Asian man, was shaking his head, looking away, hands in the pockets of his suit pants. "I don't do that kind of stuff anymore."
"You used to love it. C'mon, we can egg a few houses, kick a few pumpkins--"
"Pumpkins, Walker? Seriously? I haven't done that kind of shit since I was twelve! Grow up already!"
"I have grown up! And I still know how to have fun!" Axel was pounding a fist against his chest, looking pissed.
"Fun? I've been watching the news, Axel. I see what you do for fun. You steal from people. You hurt people. You've become a monster!"
"Well at least I didn't become a fag!"
Hartley held himself back from wanting throttling Axel when he heard that word, and he could see the young man was fighting the same urge.
"You're right. At least you didn't. If you had, you might still have a heart."
"You know what? Fuck you, Danny! Fuck you! I hate you!"
Sucking in a deep breath, Hartley watched and waited for Axel to act out of turn, throw bombs, attack the young man, but that didn't happen. Instead Axel stood there, shouting at the retreating figure of the young Asian man, stomping his foot against the conctrete, hands in fists at his side. Axel looked like a child having a temper tantrum. There was something about seeing him there like that, pissed off and annoyed in such an unintimidating kind of way, like an angry puppy. It was hard to hate an angry puppy.
Hartley stepped out from behind the building, hands still in the pockets of his sweatshirt. "Who was that?" he asked, sounding as casual as possible.
Axel jerked his shoulder back, turning at the sound of the voice, and he has an unlit bomb in one hand, eyes narrowing. "Back off--!"
"Whoa! It's just me!" Hartley held his hands up in a display of being unarmed.
"Even worse," Axel spat, but the bomb was going away, tucked back into his bag of tricks. "What the hell do you want, fa--"
Hartley cut Axel off before the forbidden three letter word could finish passing through his pale lips. "I was just walking by. Who was that?"
Axel turned away, and he was fiddling with a yellow colored yo-yo, playing with it, letting it rise and fall with a slight flick of his wrist. "No one," he finally responded with a mutter, head cocking. "He was no one."
"An old friend?" Hartley wasn't quite sure why he wanted to know so badly, but seeing that argument was like a revelation, a peek into the child Axel once was, the man he could have been.
A shrug of his shoulders and a shake of his head, and Axel was refusing to commit to anything. "Something like that. I guess."
"A classmate?"
"A friend," Axel finally offered, and then he was turning around to look at Hartley, frowning. "Why do you care anyway, faggot?"
It was Hartley's turn to shrug this time. "We're part of the same team. Knowing and understanding each other is part of the job. For example, if you wanted to know something about me--"
"Yeah, I want to know something!" Axel was jabbing a finger into Hartley's chest. "Why are you gay?"
There was a moment, where Hartley didn't know what to think about the question. It was said with the same kind of hateful attitude that Axel always seemed to impress in his words, but there was an innocence to the question, that only Hartley could hear. "Because I like men," was his answer, plain and simple.
Axel snorted. "That's disgusting."
"Says who?"
"Says my old man!"
"Your old man?" Hartley raised his eyebrows. "Is this the same old man that told you that you need to trick, or be tricked?"
"Yeah!"
"Do you always do what your old man tells you to do?"
Axel looked startled, and he took a step backwards, as if thinking about running, but he didn't. Instead he stood there, rocking back onto his foot, the sole of his sneaker giving off a faint array of colored sparks. "No..." he answered, after a long moment of silence. "He just..." The hesitance in Axel's voice meant Hartley was onto something. "Being gay is bad," he finally stated.
Eyebrows still raised, Hartely gave Axel a pointed look. "And killing people isn't?"
"That's different!" Despite Axel's protests, Hartley could see a wisp of hesitation in his bright blue eyes.
"Different how?"
The singular question was enough to seemingly short circuit Axel's simple mind. The bottom lid of his left eye twitched. "It's just different!" But there was a hesitation in his voice, and Axel's hand clenched into a fist.
Hartley folded his arms over his chest, and there were very many things he could have said in that moment, but he chose to be silent. Instead he watched Axel try to think his way through the situation, mouth opening and closing, muttering things that a normal person would not have been able to hear.
Hartley wasn't a normal person.
"But my dad... and... but it... and I... when I... and Danny..."
Axel finally seemed to still, and he was staring hard at the ground. There was silence then, save for the sounds of children running through the streets, begging for candy and chocolate. "Piper?" His voice was a slight whisper.
"Yes?"
"I had sex with a guy."
Hartley was startled. He had expected Axel to say a lot of things. To apologize, to say he understood, or to not have cared at all. Hell, he even expected Axel to reach out and shove him. What he didn't expect was for Axel to say that. "I'm sorry, what?"
Axel lifted his head to look at Hartley, and he looked... Hartley hated to admit... human. He looked so tremendously human, and innocent, and sweet. "That guy. We were twelve and stupid. My dad caught us. He told me Danny was playing a trick on me. He told me--"
"That it was wrong?" Hartley offered.
"He said Danny was trying to humilate me. That I was being tricked into being disgusting. My dad was trying to protect me. He was trying to..."
Axel wasn't even twenty years old. He had nineteen years of his father's poison polluting his brain, stuffing itself into whatever corners of his mind that weren't preoccupied by sociopathic thoughts. He had seven years to hate himself for one homosexual act. Hartley reached a hand out and touched it to Axel's shoulder.
"My dad would have a fucking cow if I turned gay," Axel managed, giving Hartley an awkward, crooked smile.
"In addition to your murders and bank robberies? You're shaping up to be quite the son."
"Good! I hate that bastard anyway." Axel pulled away, and he gave Hartley a long look. "So do you want--"
Hartley shook his head quickly, holding a hand out to stop him. "No thanks. You're too young for me."
It was Axel's turn to raise his eyebrows. "I was going to ask if you wanted to kick some pumpkins with me."
"Oh."
"Did you really--? Oh man, I can't believe-- you're such a fag!" Axel laughed, wrapping his arms around his stomach, nearly folding in half at the idea, and as much as Hartley wanted to reach out and punch the kid, he didn't. It was too soon to expect that much change. Instead he let the laughter continue, a smile on his own lips.
Catching his breath, Axel wiped the tears of laughter from his eyes. "So what do you think, you want to kick some pumpkins with me?"
Hartley shook his head. "I'm too old for kicking pumpkins." He continued before Axel could interrupt him. "But I'm not too old to go trick or treating. Do you want to come with me?"
"Really?"
Hartley turned on his heel, with only a tilt of his head as a subtle invitation for Axel to follow him. "Really. We can donate the candy to the needy afterwards too."
"A-Awww! Can I at least keep the caramels?"
"Sure. You can keep the caramels. And the raisins."
"I hate raisins!"
Fandom: comics: DCU
Rating: PG-13
Characters: Hartley Rathaway, Axel Walker
Warnings: language. I have not used the three letter "f" word so many times in ever.
Notes: A brief genfic, wherein I explore Axel and Hartley's relationship as Trickster and the Pied Piper.
Angry Closet Case.
There was a certain kind of anger in Axel that Hartley, though he hated to admit it, recognized. It was the kind of anger that was the result of years of containment, before it eventually bubbled to the surface and burst in an uncontrollable way. Sometimes, though it was rare, Hartley saw a glimpse of the boy Axel could have been. In these moments, Axel was surprisingly kind, with a crooked, childish smile, and a playful attitude. It was in these moments, Hartley could almost see Axel deserving the Trickster moniker, but that faith in him would be shattered as soon as Axel would open his mouth and deliver another hate filled statement.
"Fag. Sick, disgusting fag. Don't touch me!" Axel threw his hands up, swatting at the air, and he glared at Hartley across the small space the rogues occupied.
Hartley narrowed his eyes, peering at him through the green lenses of his glasses. "I didn't even touch you."
"Yeah, but you were gonna!" If Axel were to glare any harder, Hartley swore he would bust a blood vessel.
Rolling his eyes, Hartley looked away, over at Len, who was playing a game of solitaire on a rickety card table. "I would never touch him" he said, to no one in particular.
Len lifted his head up and looked at Hartley through the white fur of his hooded jacket. He had one eyebrow raised.
Hartley recoiled slightly. "I'm gay, not desperate."
"Whatever." Len slapped down another card, causing the table to shake, showing his lack of interest in the conversation. Another card, and it was obvious he wanted nothing to do with the two other occupants in the room.
Axel turned in mid air, shoes leaving behind a trail of yellow and blue sparks. "Just keep it in your pants, fag." He ducked, the tips of his hair just barely brushing against the doorframe.
Hartley watched the door close behind him.
"No," Len said, suddenly, cutting Hartley off before he could speak. "Don't talk to me. I don't want to hear your gay agenda."
"It's not an agenda," Hartley protested.
"It's an agenda. You're going to stand there, and you're going to complain about that kid, and I don't want to hear it. So he hates you because you're gay. Get over it. I don't know why and I don't care." Len slapped down another card. "If you care, talk to him, not me."
Despite Len's protests to be involved, there he was, giving the best advice he could think of.
"Then--" Hartley began, but Len was waving a hand at him.
"No. I said, don't talk to me. Get out of here, Piper."
Hartley lingered for a moment longer, before finally turning to leave, wrapping his arms around himself to keep from brushing against the leg of the rickety card table. He stopped, startled at the door as it swung open, revealing Mick's large body, clad in white and orange. The smell of soot suddenly filled the air, and Hartley wrinkled his nose.
"Heatwave."
"Piper."
It was a greeting of mutual respect; after all, they had followed similar paths of going straight and coming right back to the seedy underbelly of being a rogue. Hartley bowed his head and slipped past the exit, watching from the corner of his eye as Mick took heavy strides towards Len, hand falling on his shoulder.
The safest thing for Hartley to do, was ignore what he saw. What rogues did together in their personal time was none of his buisness.
Hartley was very rarely out during the day, and he was grateful that the sun was on its last legs, and the sky was painted purple and blue. He buried his hands into the pockets of his green sweatshirt, ducking his head a little so that his chin dipped into the warm cotton. It wasn't the typical outfit for a villain, but he wasn't a typical villain. He started down the streets, kicking his torn sneakers at a stray puddle of water.
He paused, catching sight of a familiar figure in blue and yellow, and he ducked behind a building, watching.
Axel was grounded, for once, holding his hands out towards a young, handsomely dressed, Asian man. "Come on, Danny! It'll be like old times!"
"No way, Walker!" The Asian man, was shaking his head, looking away, hands in the pockets of his suit pants. "I don't do that kind of stuff anymore."
"You used to love it. C'mon, we can egg a few houses, kick a few pumpkins--"
"Pumpkins, Walker? Seriously? I haven't done that kind of shit since I was twelve! Grow up already!"
"I have grown up! And I still know how to have fun!" Axel was pounding a fist against his chest, looking pissed.
"Fun? I've been watching the news, Axel. I see what you do for fun. You steal from people. You hurt people. You've become a monster!"
"Well at least I didn't become a fag!"
Hartley held himself back from wanting throttling Axel when he heard that word, and he could see the young man was fighting the same urge.
"You're right. At least you didn't. If you had, you might still have a heart."
"You know what? Fuck you, Danny! Fuck you! I hate you!"
Sucking in a deep breath, Hartley watched and waited for Axel to act out of turn, throw bombs, attack the young man, but that didn't happen. Instead Axel stood there, shouting at the retreating figure of the young Asian man, stomping his foot against the conctrete, hands in fists at his side. Axel looked like a child having a temper tantrum. There was something about seeing him there like that, pissed off and annoyed in such an unintimidating kind of way, like an angry puppy. It was hard to hate an angry puppy.
Hartley stepped out from behind the building, hands still in the pockets of his sweatshirt. "Who was that?" he asked, sounding as casual as possible.
Axel jerked his shoulder back, turning at the sound of the voice, and he has an unlit bomb in one hand, eyes narrowing. "Back off--!"
"Whoa! It's just me!" Hartley held his hands up in a display of being unarmed.
"Even worse," Axel spat, but the bomb was going away, tucked back into his bag of tricks. "What the hell do you want, fa--"
Hartley cut Axel off before the forbidden three letter word could finish passing through his pale lips. "I was just walking by. Who was that?"
Axel turned away, and he was fiddling with a yellow colored yo-yo, playing with it, letting it rise and fall with a slight flick of his wrist. "No one," he finally responded with a mutter, head cocking. "He was no one."
"An old friend?" Hartley wasn't quite sure why he wanted to know so badly, but seeing that argument was like a revelation, a peek into the child Axel once was, the man he could have been.
A shrug of his shoulders and a shake of his head, and Axel was refusing to commit to anything. "Something like that. I guess."
"A classmate?"
"A friend," Axel finally offered, and then he was turning around to look at Hartley, frowning. "Why do you care anyway, faggot?"
It was Hartley's turn to shrug this time. "We're part of the same team. Knowing and understanding each other is part of the job. For example, if you wanted to know something about me--"
"Yeah, I want to know something!" Axel was jabbing a finger into Hartley's chest. "Why are you gay?"
There was a moment, where Hartley didn't know what to think about the question. It was said with the same kind of hateful attitude that Axel always seemed to impress in his words, but there was an innocence to the question, that only Hartley could hear. "Because I like men," was his answer, plain and simple.
Axel snorted. "That's disgusting."
"Says who?"
"Says my old man!"
"Your old man?" Hartley raised his eyebrows. "Is this the same old man that told you that you need to trick, or be tricked?"
"Yeah!"
"Do you always do what your old man tells you to do?"
Axel looked startled, and he took a step backwards, as if thinking about running, but he didn't. Instead he stood there, rocking back onto his foot, the sole of his sneaker giving off a faint array of colored sparks. "No..." he answered, after a long moment of silence. "He just..." The hesitance in Axel's voice meant Hartley was onto something. "Being gay is bad," he finally stated.
Eyebrows still raised, Hartely gave Axel a pointed look. "And killing people isn't?"
"That's different!" Despite Axel's protests, Hartley could see a wisp of hesitation in his bright blue eyes.
"Different how?"
The singular question was enough to seemingly short circuit Axel's simple mind. The bottom lid of his left eye twitched. "It's just different!" But there was a hesitation in his voice, and Axel's hand clenched into a fist.
Hartley folded his arms over his chest, and there were very many things he could have said in that moment, but he chose to be silent. Instead he watched Axel try to think his way through the situation, mouth opening and closing, muttering things that a normal person would not have been able to hear.
Hartley wasn't a normal person.
"But my dad... and... but it... and I... when I... and Danny..."
Axel finally seemed to still, and he was staring hard at the ground. There was silence then, save for the sounds of children running through the streets, begging for candy and chocolate. "Piper?" His voice was a slight whisper.
"Yes?"
"I had sex with a guy."
Hartley was startled. He had expected Axel to say a lot of things. To apologize, to say he understood, or to not have cared at all. Hell, he even expected Axel to reach out and shove him. What he didn't expect was for Axel to say that. "I'm sorry, what?"
Axel lifted his head to look at Hartley, and he looked... Hartley hated to admit... human. He looked so tremendously human, and innocent, and sweet. "That guy. We were twelve and stupid. My dad caught us. He told me Danny was playing a trick on me. He told me--"
"That it was wrong?" Hartley offered.
"He said Danny was trying to humilate me. That I was being tricked into being disgusting. My dad was trying to protect me. He was trying to..."
Axel wasn't even twenty years old. He had nineteen years of his father's poison polluting his brain, stuffing itself into whatever corners of his mind that weren't preoccupied by sociopathic thoughts. He had seven years to hate himself for one homosexual act. Hartley reached a hand out and touched it to Axel's shoulder.
"My dad would have a fucking cow if I turned gay," Axel managed, giving Hartley an awkward, crooked smile.
"In addition to your murders and bank robberies? You're shaping up to be quite the son."
"Good! I hate that bastard anyway." Axel pulled away, and he gave Hartley a long look. "So do you want--"
Hartley shook his head quickly, holding a hand out to stop him. "No thanks. You're too young for me."
It was Axel's turn to raise his eyebrows. "I was going to ask if you wanted to kick some pumpkins with me."
"Oh."
"Did you really--? Oh man, I can't believe-- you're such a fag!" Axel laughed, wrapping his arms around his stomach, nearly folding in half at the idea, and as much as Hartley wanted to reach out and punch the kid, he didn't. It was too soon to expect that much change. Instead he let the laughter continue, a smile on his own lips.
Catching his breath, Axel wiped the tears of laughter from his eyes. "So what do you think, you want to kick some pumpkins with me?"
Hartley shook his head. "I'm too old for kicking pumpkins." He continued before Axel could interrupt him. "But I'm not too old to go trick or treating. Do you want to come with me?"
"Really?"
Hartley turned on his heel, with only a tilt of his head as a subtle invitation for Axel to follow him. "Really. We can donate the candy to the needy afterwards too."
"A-Awww! Can I at least keep the caramels?"
"Sure. You can keep the caramels. And the raisins."
"I hate raisins!"