Poi's already seen it, but here it is.
Just Like You: Prequelling
by Alestar
"What's imporant," he'd told Sarah, "is that we act in our normal manner."
Because she had always been wont to wander off into the Morlock tunnels for days at a time, they decided that it would be safest for her to withdraw there until some conclusions about their situation could be drawn. And Hank had taken his own adivce-- and found himself here, in his second bedroom, the pristine white and metallic of the medlab. And as long as he's here, he thinks, he might as well get some work done.
He explores, and finds all of his equipment in the same place, and all his files logged in the same directories on what looks just like his computer. The research is a week behind his own, but that is easily compensated for--and soon Hank slips into his work, deep down into routine and old familiar haunts. After awhile, he's almost forgotten about the dimensional wall between himself and his home-- and after a little while more, he has completely.
The hand on his back startles him.
"Whoa, settle down there, big guy."
He turns and looks up. "Oh. Bobby."
"Nah," says the grinning and goateed but very Bobby face. "I'm an alternate reality interloper in Bobby's body. Boo."
Hank swallows. Remembers to grin back at the obvious tease. Bobby sits on a relatively uncluttered corner of the desk. "Whatcha doing?"
Well, Hank thinks. Normal manner.
"Examing the results of several type O Legacy blood samples. Running them through the partitioner. Just catching up."
He watches as the other man picks up a sheet of paper from the desk and looks over it, brow furrowing. Alright, catalogues Hank, slight difference. Bobby-- his Bobby-- knew enough about the virus from his discussions with Hank to ask questions, but he'd never shown any interest in the specifics. Bobby-- this Bobby-- reaches out and pats Hank's chest-- and, finding the pen in his labcoat pocket, marks something on the paper.
"You made kind of a jump here, didn't you?"
"Oh. Well, I," drew those conclusions from tests I ran a week ago in an alternate reality, "had a hunch."
"Mm. Well, looks right." Then he lays the paper back down on the desk and shrugs. "But it's late. We better get to bed."
"I have only to finish a few more things, and I'll be done. I'll be sure to get some rest."
Bobby laughs. "Don't gimme that. I'm not *Jean*." He stands and pushes the labcoat off of Hank's broad shoulders. "C'mon. Bedtime for Bonzo."
So, Hank surmises. Bobby helps in the lab to some degree . . and tells this reality's Hank when to go to bed. Fair enough.
"Whatever you say, Robert."
And, Hank realizes as Bobby proceeds to follow him to the elevator, down the hallway, through his bedroom door, he also takes it upon himself to make absolutely sure I go to bed. Fair enough.
Bobby walks past Hank to the bedside table and turns on the lamp. He straigtens then, and looks over at him. "Hank? Is everything okay?"
Hank blinks the confused half-smile from his face, and nods his head. "Certainly. As you said. Bedtime for Bonzo."
The other man sighs, then smiles. He takes Hank's arm and pulls him towards the bed, sits him down. Crouches down in front of him, with his hands on Hank's knees.
"Y'know, Blue, I think you oughta reward yourself for this hunch you had. Maybe take a few days off. Chill." His concerned smile tilts in some sudden way, and his hand moves up slightly on Hank's knee. "Concentrate on something else."
Normal manner? What?
"All. Right."
Bobby pulls back, stands up, and his smile becomes a grin. "Good. It's settled then. Let's hear it for hunches."
Hank slowly echoes Bobby's nod. "God bless hunches."
And then the lamp goes out and Bobby walks around to the other side of the bed, and Hank can only assume from the sounds behind him that he is undressing-- and then, there, slipping underneath the blankets and settling warm against his back. Hank remains sitting, staring into the now dark room, for a few minutes before he gets a light poke in the side.
"Hey. Bedtime for Bonzo."
Hank takes a deep breath and slowly unbuttons his shirt, slips it off, drapes it across the beside table. Turns around to see Bobby already snoring softly against his pillow. His pillow.
"Alright."
Hank settles beneath the blankets and exhales carefully as Bobby's sleeping arm comes up around him. He lays awake for a long time, hearing his breath loudly in the large room, and Bobby's-- but when he finally falls asleep, it is deep and untroubled.
* * *
"Dmmdmm dadmm, mmMmm a mystery . . holdin onnn, dadmm dmm . . "
It's the Bobby-singing-in-the-shower dream again. Minus Randy McNabb and his plow, and the eggplant garden-- but mostly the same, Hank feels. Until Hank realizes that he can't see anything, which would make it quite different from any dream he's ever had.
He also realizes at this point that he can't see anything because his eyes are closed-- and this in turn leads to the realization that he isn't dreaming, and that he is, in fact, laying in bed, burrowed into a peculiarly Bobby-smelling pillow. Which is when he opens his eyes, and finds he can still hear Bobby singing.
"Bobby?"
The bathroom door opens in a swath of steam, and Bobby steps out, toweling his hair. A very undressed Bobby. And quite alot of steam.
Oh, yeah, thinks Hank. That's right.
"You snooze, you lose, big guy. Don't worry," he throws the towel at Hank, who is pushing himself up in bed, blinking rapidly, "I saved you some hot water."
"Thank you," he replies, looking down at his hands as Bobby rifles through the chest of drawers, pulling out fresh clothes. "What time is it?"
"Um. Noon."
Hank forgets about Bobby's state of undress, and looks up sharply. "Noon? I never sleep until noon."
Bobby balances against the dresser as he pulls on a pair of boxers. Light blue, with little white rainclouds. Hank feels a muscle in his shoulder twitch. "You do sometimes."
"Oh, well-- well, yes, that's what I meant. I do sometimes."
Bobby pulls a t-shirt over his head, chuckling. "You so need this vacation. You're going all spacey on me."
Hank leans back on his elbows, forgetting not to watch Bobby pull on a faded pair of blue jeans. "Vacation?"
Dressed, Bobby walks over and plops onto the bed in front of Hank, regarding him with an earnest look of determination. "Don't even try to pull that, Blue. You agreed last night that you were gonna take a few days off. And you need to. So, no backing out."
He leans forward, concern for one Hank or another bleeding through his gaze, and he's waiting-- so Hank looks down at his hands for a moment, and then up at him again, and nods, and leans forward into him, mouth against his.
Bobby's hand comes up to the side of his face, fingers pushing through the fur-- and Hank doesn't startle when the mouth opens under his, and he doesn't notice when his own hand finds its way to the other man's waist. Maybe it's this reality telling him that, here, it's always been this way, but he doesn't notice-- and when Bobby starts to withdraw Hank makes some sound of protest and pulls him back.
Norrrrmal manner.
So, Hank discovers his second mutant power. Give him a Bobby who tells him when to go to bed and whose hand kneads thickly through the fur at the back of his neck, with his mouth moving into him, shallowly, deeply-- and suddenly, he transforms into some other Hank, who's a week behind on his work and who falls back against his Bobby-smelling pillow as his best friend travels down his body, having been here a hundred times already.
"Bobby. Bobby."
He might even have to change his codename.
Afterwards, he finds his hand resting, sifting lightly through Bobby's still slightly damp hair as it lifts and falls on Hank's chest. Both of them breathing evenly, peacefully. Hank decides to excercise his new mutant power.
"I love you."
Bobby lifts his head and smiles sleepily. "Yeah, I know. Let's go get some breakfast."
* * *
"Alright, furry man. We've been to the art gallery, the charity auction, Wal-Mart, and the shriners' circus. Where to now?"
The Hank McCoy of the visitors' team and the Bobby Drake of the home team face each other under an overjoyed August sun. Bobby turns in the driver's seat to ask the question. Swallowing the last bit of fast food burrito, Hank answers with a sigh.
"Quite a full day indeed, my dear Robert. The only thing I could desire further would be a bit of well-wraught rest. I'd have to say: to the Batcave."
Bobby grins and nods, throws the car into drive.
After a few miles, Hank glances out the window at unfamiliar scenery. "Bobby? This isn't the way home."
"Nah," the other man replies with an affectionate glance, "I'm taking you into the woods to kill you."
Hank cocks an eyebrow-- lets his hand drop from the driver's side headrest to Bobby's neck, casually petting. "When I said that I wanted rest, that wasn't exactly what I had in mind."
Bobby leans back into Hank's soft hand. "Gah. Party-pooper." Makes a right turn onto an unpaved road. "Do you remember that time that we got lost going home late, and we picked up that hitchhiker-- Lance, or something-- and we found that really pretty place on the river? With the willow trees?"
Hank nods without hesitation. "How could I forget? The land looks quite different in the daylight."
Bobby makes another right turn. "Mm-hmm."
* * *
They stare up at the sky, backs pressed flat against cushioned earth, watching the world stumble past the treeline. Hank runs his knuckles against the worn quilt beneath him, musty from its time in the trunk of the car, and listens to the softly devoted breathing of the man beside him.
Bobby points to a cloud. "Shi'ar battle-cruiser."
Hank scrunches his nose. "Impala."
"Isn't that a car?"
"Yes. But it's also a large brownish African antelope."
"That doesn't look like a large antelope."
"You're right. But it looks like the car."
"Shi'ar battle-car."
"Agreed."
He is reluctant to admit that he may have actually needed this vacation, but he cannot argue that this is the happiest he's felt in a long, long time. He turns his head to regard the other man, and Bobby turns when he does, and they gaze at each other, and Hank's heart just *fills*.
How could he not have noticed this before?
Their wrapping together isn't fevered or desparate or any of those things--it is slow and measured and content, loving and lazy and easy. He opens his mouth to Bobby and Bobby's hands work their way under his shirt, under an overjoyed August sun. They run together like water, pulling away and falling back again, for a little eternity before Bobby backs slightly away to whisper against Hank's mouth.
"Can I ask you something?"
Hank nods and moves his mouth down to Bobby's throat, gliding along planes and curves he's already memorized.
"Who are you?"
Hank's eyes open.
"What?"
Bobby pulls back fully, and a sudden chill moves in to take his place. Hank sits up. Bobby tugs absently on a loose string on the quilt.
"I've never been here before. Jean told me about it once, told me how to get here. Thought we'd like it. Or, y'know." He looks up at the other man. "Me and whoever. I mean-- who the hell is named Lance anymore?"
That same muscle in Hank's shoulder twitches, but through some miracle of restraint, Hank doesn't reach out to him-- only shakes his head helplessly. "I. I'm sorry."
"No," says Bobby, "I mean. Just tell me."
Hank scrubs a hand over his face. The pleasant leisure of only seconds before is now fatigue. He sighs, and explains as best he can-- and when he finishes, he lies back down and blocks the sun with his forearm.
He releases a long, slow breath when he feels Bobby lie down again beside him.
"Me and Hank-- my Hank-- have been together for almost fifteen years . . and *together* together for two. Did you really think I wouldn't get that you weren't him?"
Hank lowers his forearm and looks up at the sky-- thinking about the weeks-long, marrow-deep certainty in him that someone, *someone* would recognize his absence, would recognize the doppleganger for the imposter that he was, *surely*.
"Yes. Yes, I suppose I did think that."
Out of the corner of his eye, Hank sees the other man turn his head to look at him. "You and-- your Bobby . . you're not . . ?"
Hank smiles ruefully. "No."
"Are you friends?"
"Yes. Good friends."
"Very good friends?"
"Very, very, quite good friends."
"But not. Y'know."
"No."
Bobby sighs beside him, and a hesitant hand comes out to rest against Hank's arm. "Why?"
Hank looks over at him.
"I-- couldn't say."