spectrenightfell

[spectrenightfell]

@toracainz @the-arachnid-queen

@rmoonstoner @daddysfavoritesexkitten @devilish-mirage

I am sorry sorry I forgot to tag you all!!!!!

Summary: Steven’s never been this scared before. He knows Jake had been to see you, had the flashes of memories to prove it but now your gone, disappearing without a word. He can’t help it, how terrified and desperate he feels. What if Jake has done something to you, hurt you? It would all be Steven’s fault because he hadn’t been strong enough to protect you from the psychotic murderer sharing the body.

Pairings: Steven Grant x fem!reader / Marc Spector x fem!reader /Jake Lockley- fem!reader

Rating: M (mentions of sex ~ canon typical violence)

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first

When Steven comes back to the body he’s met with the insistent feeling that something is wrong. It takes a long few seconds for his sluggish mind to catch up to what’s going on, his ears ringing and eyesight fuzzy. When he does manage to concentrate Steven is happy to find that he’s still in the flat and that the place looks mostly intact though he thinks one of his many bookcases might have collapsed at some point. That’s about where his relief ends and the horror of reality creeps in.

He’s only in his underwear, body splattered with blood and the burn of alcohol still strong in the back of his throat. There’s dirt under his nails, his knuckles split and still oozing blood. His whole body’s shaking but Steven can’t tell if it’s from adrenaline or pain. Maybe it’s both. There’s a lot of pain, Steven feeling like he had been hit by a bus and it only gets worse when he manages to stumble over to the full length mirror and get a good look at the state the body has been left in.

He’s a mess. A mix of cuts and bruises that are scattered all across his body. He had a black eye, an angry looking gash on his cheek as well as a fat and swollen lip. There’s bruises around his neck, admittedly faint but clearly from someone’s hands having been wrapped around it and squeezing. There’s big angry looking bruises running down his side, a mix of deep dark purples and sickly yellows decorating his skin like some sort of weird art project. He feels like he could maybe have a cracked rib or two, maybe even a fracture in his radius but what he definitely had is a bandage wrapped around his left shoulder and right thigh, the white fabric stained red with blood. As soon as he notices each injury, pain begins to radiate out from that area, burning bright like he had been stabbed with a red hot poker.

Steven understandably panics, worried about what the hell had happened because “look at us Marc! We look like we’ve been in a death match. Oh bloody hell we have, haven’t we? He’s been in a sodding cage fight or something, probably killed a few people whilst he was at it. I tell you that man’s going to get us killed, bloody reckless idiot.” Steven had never awoken in such a state before, sure there had been a few bruises and maybe a little bit of blood to clean up but it was like Jake had gone out of his way to deliberately mess with the body as much as he could without killing them or rendering it useless. It was terrifying to think that he would do this to them let alone himself and for the life of him Steven can’t think what set him off because there had to be something. Things didn’t get this bad for no reason.

Marc’s the one who actually catalogs all their injuries, Steven more than happy to give the other man control to do so. He’s methodical about it, checking every inch he can and telling Steven what he thought had caused it and how bad it actually was. Most of it was superficial apart from the cracked ribs though Marc didn’t think anything else was broken, just bruised and aching. The most concerning thing though was what lies underneath the bandages.

It’s horrible watching Marc unravel the bandages, Steven’s heart in his throat as their skin is revealed one inch at a time. He can’t help but wince when Marc pulls the last bit away, the other man groaning as the tacky blood soaked bandages cling to his skin and pull at the wound below. Marc thinks they’re stab wounds, the cuts long and thin and most likely deep if he’s right. Jake had already stitched them closed, though Marc thought his handy work was “sloppy. Just look at this mess, it’s not even straight and the scars are definitely going to be massive thanks to this botch job.” It takes some convincing but eventually Marc reluctantly agrees not to unpick the mess and start again. Steven doesn’t really have the stomach for it and he’s sure that if he had to watch Marc unpick then stitch them back together that he’ll pass out and the darkness is the last place he wants to be right now.

Jake had been oh so kind as to leave a half drunk bottle of rum on the bedside table and Steven doesn’t even complain when Marc snatches it up before gingerly sitting down on the bed. They sit in silence, both of them sitting on the bed and staring straight ahead as they try to work through their thoughts. Well that’s what Steven’s doing anyway, he thinks Marc is just trying to drink himself into unconsciousness. It’s a problem, one that Steven was becoming more aware of but he had thought Marc was getting better, cutting back and exercising more. Maybe he had just gotten better at hiding it.

Marc’s drinking is something they will need to address but not now, there are other things that need Steven’s attention. There’s something niggling at the back of Steven’s mind, a whisper of something that he had thought was just a dream but now he wasn’t too sure if that was actually the case because it seemed far too clear to be that. It was like when he had first started fronting, when Marc was out on missions and Steven was convinced it had all been a dream when he had awoken in his bed safe and sound.

There had been snippets, little flashes of images and sensations that Steven had been convinced were just bits of jumbled up dreams and memories, playing out in an unintelligible mess that had meant nothing to him at the time. Now though Steven wasn’t too sure. What if they had been glimpses of Jake, of the things he had been up to whilst keeping Steven and Marc in the dark?

Steven breaks the heavy silence between them, turning to look at Marc as he speaks because he really does “think that I might have fronted for some of it mate,” and he needs to talk these jumbled thoughts through with someone before he starts fixating on all the wrong bits. Marc’s movements are slow and deliberate as he lowers the bottle to rest next to his thigh, turning his head to look directly at Steven with surprisingly sharp eyes considering how much he had drunk in such a short amount of time . He demands that Steven “tell me what he did. I want to know everything that bastard got up to.” Steven doesn’t hesitate to comply, trying to describe everything he can recall in as much detail as possible because there would probably be some small detail that would clue Marc into what the other alter was actually up to.

Some things he could remember seemed unimportant, just snippets of random moments that meant nothing without context. Steven could remember leather clad hands curled tightly around the steering wheel of a car as the London skyline passed him by far too quickly for Jake to have been sticking to the speed limit. He had been inside of a rather fancy but nondescript bathroom with a large arched window and the moon almost glowing in the night sky as it shined through the window and into him making him feel cold and judged. He had been in an alleyway, Steven surrounded by shadows as he watched two people fight at the other end under the only working street light.

Though it had only been a short few seconds he had spent in control and actually aware of the world around him it had been enough for him to be able to tell Marc the car had seemed rather fancy though it had smelt like stale smoke and their aftershave but almost like the bottle had been upended over them. He could tell Marc that he had been bare foot and freshly showered, the water still clinging to his skin and cooling quickly as he had stood glaring up at the moon like it had insulted him. Steven had been able to taste the alcohol on his tongue whilst he stood in the alleyway, felt his grip tightening on the handle of a knife and he could hear the sound of balled up fists slamming into flesh followed by grunts of pain and cry’s of anger.

It had been jarring and off putting, Steven mostly confused throughout the whole experience but there had been other moments that had stood out more than those and no more so than the woman Jake had taken to bed. This had felt different to the other times, like someone had grabbed hold of him and yanked him to the front. It had only been for a few seconds, Steven in the car one moment then suddenly not but it was long enough to burn the moment into his memory and leave a sickly feeling of unease in his gut.

His body had still been moving with Jake’s momentum, his grip tightening on the hips of the woman he was draped over to the point he had probably left bruises. The air had smelt like sweat and sex, his own loud moan echoing back at him mixed in with the woman’s breathy gasps. As soon as Steven’s mind had cleared he had jerked back, a shocked ‘fuck’ already falling from his lips but as soon as he had let go of the warm body beneath him Steven had been swallowed up by the darkness once more, Jake presumably taking back control and shoving Steven as far away as he could.

Steven hadn’t had sex in, well a long time and to suddenly find himself half way through what had appeared to be a rather passionate bout of love making had been quite the shock to the system. Marc had asked a few questions about that incident, wanting to know if he could recall any details like “what did the room look like? Was there any decorations or personal stuff that stood out? What about the woman? Did you get a good look at her face?” Unfortunately the answer to most of that had been no. He had caught a glimpse of an exposed brick wall and thick black curtains that had not quite been drawn closed but he hadn’t noticed anything else other than the bed had been large and soft, the sheets as black as the curtains.

As for the woman, well Steven hadn’t really gotten that good a look at her either. She had been on her hands and knees, her chest dropped forward and her face buried in the pillows and completely hidden from Simon’s view. She had a row of hieroglyphs down her spine, the black ink vibrant and looking like it had been painted on just hours before. He hadn’t had a chance to really see what they said, only just making out the glyphs for sun and what he thought was either servant or maybe slave before he was being yanked back into the darkness.

Marc had been disappointed by Steven’s lack of information but considering he had only been present for a handful of seconds he thought he had done pretty well getting as much information as he had. There was something that Steven hadn’t told Marc though, to afraid to give voice to his fears because then they might come true and he didn’t think he would be able to cope with everything that entailed.

Despite what some people think Steven isn’t stupid. He had recognised the smell of your perfume, the shape of the windows both in the bedroom and the bathroom he had found himself in after. The woman’s skin had been soft and warm under his callous hands, the familiar tingle running up his arms and making him feel warm all over. He wasn’t stupid, but he was blindly optimistic that he had it all wrong because if he hadn’t, if that fear was justified then that meant Steven had failed. He hadn’t been able to protect you from Jake and the other alter had been able to take advantage of your feelings for Steven and taken something from you that wasn’t his to have.

Steven did have his doubts, things that meant that maybe he had it all wrong and he clung onto them desperately. He knew you had tattoos, had seen the ones on your wrists several times since that first date but never once had you mentioned having another. Well you had hinted at it once but as you had never brought it up again Steven assumed it had only been meant as a tease, a way of getting him thinking about other parts of your body. Something he hadn’t needed help with. Then there had been the room, so dark and impersonal. True he had never been inside your home but he had seen the inside of your locker, the thing covered with photos of places you had been as well as a strip of photos of the two of you together, taken in a tiny booth at a shopping centre you had dragged him to just a few short months ago. The bland walls and black furnishings didn’t match the person he knew, not after you had insisted Steven’s own flat had been too dark and in need of some brightening up. And don’t even get him started on the position, so impersonal and a blatant display of power, most definitely not how Steven would make love to you and he hoped that you knew him enough by now to know that he would want to be face to face, pressed as close to you as he could get whilst wrapped in your arms. He would treat you right, gasping and moaning his love into every inch of skin he could reach. He most certainly wouldn’t go at it like some kind of animal, treating you like nothing more than an end to a means.

If he’s right though, if you and Jake had slept together how was Steven supposed to tell you that it hadn’t been him in your bed but an imposter wearing his face and taking advantage of your feelings for him? He knew that would be it for the two of you. Knew that as soon as he started telling you about Jake and Marc and what had happened that you would either chuck him out thinking he was loony or still kick him out but because he had lied to you and allowed that maniac to get his filthy murdering hands on you. It didn’t really matter how you would react to the truth, Steven would lose you anyway and it would be no one’s fault but his own. He should have told you when he originally wanted to. Should have just said yes to Marc and then gone and done it anyway. Maybe then he would have been able to prevent all this from happening.

He doesn’t get to wallow in the what ifs and self hate for long, Marc moving the conversation on and wanting to know if there were any more moments that stood out in Steven’s little mystery tour of Jake’s life. He was grateful for the slight change of subject, more than happy to push his seemingly never ending fears to the side and concentrate on something else. He should tell Marc, and he will tell Marco but just not yet. It’s clear to see he’s angry and agitated and Steven doesn’t want him to feel even worse knowing they had both failed to keep their promise to you and each other. Steven will talk to you first, find out if it’s true first before putting that kind of pain on the other man's shoulders.

Other than the possible trist with you there are only two other incidents that stand out to Steven. The first one was presumably from where the black eye came from, Steven only conscious to feel someone’s fist collide with his face and send him stumbling to the dirty concrete below. He had seen enough to know he had been surrounded by a group of men dressed like they were from an early 2000’s rap video, the bright glare of headlights from the cars parked around them making it impossible for Steven to get a good look at any of their faces. Marc said it sounded like Jake had “gotten into a fucking fist fight with a bunch of street scum. He’s lucky we only got stabbed twice and no where important at that.” Steven thought it was best not to point out that everywhere on their shared body was an important place that shouldn’t be stabbed, not wanting to agitate Marc any more than he already was and risk him pulling their stitches or causing any more of their many bruises and cuts to start hurting again.

The second moment was probably the most important because for the first time Steven actually got to see what Jake looked like. It had been in a bar, one that looked like it had seen better days and reeking of stale cigarette smoke and the unpleasant mix of alcohol that had probably been spilt over the floor and never cleaned up. Steven’s face and hands had ached, his grip tight on the glass of something dark and strong smelling but all of that had drifted to the background because staring back at him from the grubby mirror behind the bar was Jake, looking like hell and ready to kill anyone who pointed it out.

It had been a shock, Steven’s face scrunched up at the horrible taste in his mouth only to wince when it made the right side of his face throb with pain. He had looked up to get the bartender's attention, hoping to get some water and maybe some ice to dull the swelling. Instead he had come face to face with a clenched jaw and dark eyes full of anger and what quite possibly could have been hate. They had stared at each other for a long few minutes, Steven wide eyed and feeling like a deer in headlights whilst Jake’s glare had just got harder and meaner. Steven had thought Marc grumpy and mean looking but Jake was ten times worse, looking damn right terrifying and leaving Steven feeling like he was just seconds away from getting his teeth kicked in.

Their little stare off ended as quickly as it had started, Jake’s lips curling up into a vicious smirk as he tipped the front of his cap forward. It had felt like a threat, Jake just that terrifying that he didn’t even need words to make Steven fear for his safety. Now Steven was sure it had been Jake’s way of taunting Steven. He had looked frustratingly smug and he knew why, or at least suspected he did. Though Jake had been practically nonexistent for the last couple of weeks the bastard had probably been listening in, spying on him and Marc to find even the slightest weakness and he had found it in you. You were Steven’s weak spot and though Marc might not admit to it Steven knew that you were his as well, just from the way he had been with you when you had turned up at the flat, your eyes full of anger and tears. Jake had taken advantage of that, exploited Steven’s relationship with you and had left Steven holding the broken prices and wondering how the hell he was ever going to put them back together again.

Steven hadn’t had the time to do or say anything at the bar, Jake’s eyes flickering to something behind Steven and his smug smirk falling into a scowl that would probably strike fear into anyone who was unfortunate to see it. A hand had landed on Steven’s shoulder, their fingers digging in but the world had gone dark before he could turn and see who it was. The next thing he knew Steven was coming to in the flat, looking like he had been hit by a bus and feeling like it too. Steven had given Marc the time to think about everything had said, the two of them sat in silence though Steven wasn’t still, fidgeting restlessly as he waited for the other man to say something.

Marc thought it was strange that Jake was being so careless all of a sudden and Steven had to agree. Jake had been a mystery since they had found out about him back in Cairo, it was only in the last couple of months that he had started to make his presence felt and even then he hadn’t actually introduced himself. He had just been this dark looming threat in the corner of their minds, shrouded in shadows and blood but now Steven had seen him, had been left to front in moments he was clearly not supposed to be and it was worrying, just like it had been when it happened with Marc. Something had to have happened to set Jake off but what? For Marc it had been his mum’s death, his abuser finally gone from his life for good and the mix of emotions that had brought with it. With Jake though Steven didn’t know anything about his life to even start speculating about what could upset a man like Jake Lockley so much that he wouldn’t be able to keep grip on his control over Steven and Marc.

There wasn’t much they could do right now, the body was in to much of a state for them to be moving around so freely but neither of them particularly wanting to risk sleep right now, just in case Jake popped up again to take the body and actually finish the job this time and put them in the hospital. They had just sat for a while, Marc slowly emptying the bottle of rum whilst Steven had let his head fall back to rest against the shelves behind him, his eyes closing as he tried to lose himself to the sounds of the world around him.

He didn’t know how long they stayed like that but when he heard his neighbours door slam and her kids start yelling as they ran down the hallway Steven knew it was about the time he should be getting ready for work. When he told Marc he had been quick to tell Steven that if “you think for one second I’m getting out of this bed this side of the weekend then you really are an idiot.” Steven had been quick to inform Marc that had been planning on calling in sick because he wasn’t “bloody daft. I ain’t planning on going anywhere any time soon mate.” There had been a few grumbled exchanges of light insults but soon enough Steve had found himself leaning over to grab his phone off the bedside table and Marc back in the mirror.

It had hurt, Steven’s bruised ribs and aching shoulder protesting the movement but he had clenched his jaw and pushed forward until he could reach his phone, slumping back in the bed once his hand had curled around it. The first thing Steven noticed were the excessive amount of miss calls and unread texts, not only from you but Donna and the museum as well. The second thing was the date. A week. A week had passed since you had walked out his flat and the world had gone dark.

Steven just stared at his phone, his brain struggling to comprehend what he was seeing because it couldn’t be right. Sure Jake had taken the body for a day or two here and there but it had always been on days when Steven or Marc didn’t have anything to do, it was horrible as all hell to go through but it had still been oddly considerate of the man. This though, this was a complete take over of their lives, a blatant disregard of their shared body and the lives they lead outside of one another. Oh bloody hell, a week? No wonder he had over a hundred missed calls and texts.

Steven was quick to unlock the phone, desperate to call you back and hoping you hadn’t reported him missing to the police whilst Jake had been running around and committing god knows how many crimes. Marc had wanted to know what was wrong, yelling Steven’s name and demanding that he “tell me what is going on right now Steven or I swear to god I won't let you have the body any more.” It was an empty threat, they both knew that so Steven had no issue ignoring the other man in favour of talking to you. Except he didn’t talk to you. Your phone just went straight to your answer machine, not even ringing once before the automated voice was telling Steven to leave a message after the tone.

Steven had never known you to have your phone off, not even when it was sitting in your locker at work and the fact that it was now had his gut twisting with nerves. He left a message, words rushed as he apologised because he was “so sorry love. I’m going to explain everything, I promise I just need you to call me back yeah? As soon as you get this, please.” Marc’s annoyed scowl softens slightly when he hears Steven’s pleading, silently watching as Steven’s rambles into your answer machine but as soon as he hangs up Marc demands to know what happens, his voice low and calm and oh so dangerous sounding that Steven has no choice but to tell him everything.

He still leaves out the part about you and Jake possibly having slept together, the words getting stuck in his throat and making him feel sick. So instead he tells Marc that there had been a flash of consciousness, Steven still in Jake's car and looking up at your building. Just a flash, a moment in time but it was enough to have Steven panicking, afraid that Jake had done something to you and now you weren’t answering your phone, leaving Steven feeling like he had swallowed a ball of lead that was now sitting heavy and uncomfortable in his stomach.

Marc was understandably angry that Steven had kept things from him. Steven had been expecting that, he was angry at himself after all but what he hadn’t expected was the sharp and slightly painful tug of Marc forcibly taking back the body. It had been a fast and aggressive switch, Steven’s head snapping up to look at Marc with a mix of shock and hurt. Marc didn’t even look at him as he got out the bed, jaw gritted against the pain. Confused and alarmed, Steven had called out, trying to hide his own wince as he quickly scrambled out the bed to watch Marc tearing through their shared wardrobe. Still he hadn’t looked at Steven as he got dressed, snapping over his shoulder instead. “What does it look like I’m doing? One of us has got to sort this shit show out and it sure as hell ain’t going to be you.”

Marc’s words hurt. Steven had made a right mess of things and sure he wasn’t the only one to blame, Marc having been responsible for keeping you in the dark about his mental state but he had been the one who had gone along with it. He had been the one to push you away and pull you back in, mucking you around and making you worry and feel neglected. Steven had been an idiot and now you were the one paying for his mistakes. He hadn’t said another word, the silence heavy and full of tension as Marc moved around the flat, clearly in pain but fighting against it as he grabbed their phone, keys and wallet before striding out the flat and slamming the door behind him.

They weren’t in any condition to walk let alone run to yours. Marc had managed to grab a taxi just as it was dropping someone off, sliding into the back seat before the driver could even agree to take him though considering how messed up they looked the poor man probably thought it was in his best interests to just go along with the obviously irate man. It had taken too long to get there even with the driver's insistence that he was taking the quickest route when Marc had angrily snapped “what is taking so long? We should have been there by now.” The morning traffic was heavy though and it took a good ten to fifteen minutes longer than it should have to get to your flat. The longer they were in the car though the more agitated Marc became. He tried calling you several more times, his knee jumping and mumbling “come on. Pick up, pick up, pick up.” No matter how often he called you or how much he begged you to pick up you never did, every call going through to your answering machine.

He only just about remembered to pay the man, shoving a handful of notes at him before practically jumping out the car and running up to your building. It’s a miracle that they even get in the building, someone coming out as Marc rushes up the steps and he slips in quickly before the door can close properly. It’s only then does Marc stop, cursing under his breath and pressing down on his leg and the probably pulled stitches underneath. Steven watched from the glass in the building's door as Marc leaned against the wall, one hand pressed flat against the brick and his head tipped forward to rest next to it. He’s in pain, probably bleeding from several places but he still says no when Steven asks him to “swap with me Marc. You need the rest.” Steven huffs and rants, trying to urge Marc to let him take control but all he does is snap at Steven to shut up, trying to act like he’s fine but Steven knows he’s not.

Before he can start properly begging Marc though he pushes away from the wall with a grunt, his shoulders back and face set in a grim mask of determination as he strode purposely towards the lift. Steven doesn’t ask how Marc knows what floor and flat you live at, just watches him from the highly polished metal and glass inside the lift and tries to figure out what he’s more worried about, you or that Marc’s going to pass out before he even makes it two steps out of the lift.

He wants to yell, to snap and tell Marc that he would be no good to you if he passes out from blood loss and pain but then Steven reminds himself that though Marc’s bleeding and in pain he’s probably been through worse. A lot worse. Though he’s stubborn and reckless and honestly a little bit self destructive Marc knows his limits, knows how far he can push himself before he gets into serious danger. Steven trusts him with this, with you because as much as the other man might deny it Steven knows he likes you, might even love you if he gave himself the chance to actually feel something instead of shutting down. Marc’s priority is you and keeping you safe, from Jake and the scumbags of the city as well as himself and the danger he poses to yours and Steven’s relationship. Bloody idiot he is but Steven knows his heart is in the right place even if Marc doesn’t.

As soon as the lift dings Marcs out the door, shoulders back and eyes determinedly set on the door at the end of the corridor. There’s only two doors, one on the left and one on the right, made from heavy duty wood and metal from the looks of it with a slight industrial feel to it. Steven has a split second to wonder exactly how rich you are and how you got that way before Marc’s pounding on the door, the dull thud surprisingly loud in the otherwise silent hallway.

Steven watches from the number plate on the door opposite, holding his breath when Marc’s fist stills. The seconds drag on, the silence heavy as they wait for you to answer. With every passing second Steven’s fear gets worse, his panic spiking drastically as your door remains closed. Marc knocks again, his closed fist banging into the door with such force Steven worries he might damage the already bruised and bloody hand. Steven can’t really blame him though, the other man’s desperation leaking into his voice as he yells your name in between the frantic and demanding knocking.

Still your door remains closed and Steven’s about to suggest they break in when the lift dings from the other end of the corridor and both their heads snap in the direction, hoping that it’s you that gets off all wide eyed and surprised to see him. It’s a hope Steven grasps onto tightly as the doors slide open in slow motion, his heart thundering away in his chest and sucking in a deep breath as he waits to see who's inside. Marc’s just as bad, his dark eyes fixed on the lift with such a sharp intensity that it reminded Steven of some kind of bird of prey, watching the little wood mouse and waiting to strike. Finally the doors open and Steven lets out the breath he had been holding, disappointment now mixing with his fear.

It’s just some guy, maybe in his forties and dressed like he’s been to the gym. Marc’s shoulders slump, his eyes darting down to the floor. He looks lost, like he has no clue what to do or how to even start attempting to fix it. He looks how Steven feels, so lost and helpless as he gives into the fear that something really has happened to you. That Jake had slipped into your home looking like Steven and taking advantage of your love for him only to wrap his hands around your throat and squeeze the life right out of you.

It’s a horrible thought, sending a blade of ice right through his heart and a cold fear spreading through every inch of him. No. Not possible. As vicious and barbaric as Jake was, he had no reason to hurt you like that. Steven hadn’t done anything to him. He hadn’t interfered with the other alters life or gotten in the way of his murdering ways. There’s no reason, no reason at all for the other man to have hurt you but then there hadn’t been a reason for Jake to crawl into your bed and spend the night between your legs. There was no reason for anything Jake had done and yet he had so why would now be any different?

Steven calls out Marc’s name, his voice strangled and full of desperation. Steven needs to see you, needs to know you’re ok or he’ll crumble quicker than a sandcastle caught in the path of the incoming tide. The call of his name seems to jerk Marc out of his own spiralling mind, his head snapping up and his eyes refocusing. He turns back to the door, banging on it once more and calling out your name along with a demand that you “open this door right now or I’m calling the cops.”

They probably should call the police but how would they even begin to explain what they thought had happened? They would end up locked in the loony bin with Harrow and Steven wouldn’t know what had happened to you until the old bill turned up to arrest him. No. Steven would break the door down his bloody self if he had to and then beg for your forgiveness when all was said and done. It was just as Steven was telling Marc to break it down that the man who had gotten off the lift spoke, his voice hesitant and looking a little frightened of Marc whilst trying to keep as far away from him as possible.

Not here.

You’re not here.

Marc’s aggressive, getting in the other man’s personal space and shoving him into the wall as he demands to know what the man is talking about. For once Steven doesn’t protest the unneeded aggression, listening intently as the man stutters and stumbles over his words. You had left a couple of hours ago, at the same time as you always did on a Saturday with a bag slung over your shoulder and dressed relatively smartly.

Marc takes a moment to process the words and then he’s back to demanding, wanting to know specific times, the direction you had gone in, if you had seemed ok, if you had spoken to anyone. He barely gives the man time to answer before moving onto his next question but it becomes clear pretty quickly that he had only seen you getting into the lift, ignoring his morning greeting where you would normally be the first to say hello.

Marc doesn’t seem to notice letting the guy go, his brows furrowed and a deep frown tugging his lips down. The man makes a quick escape, getting through his door and slamming it behind him, the sound of the lock sliding into place loud even through the thick wooden door. They probably only had a couple of minutes until he called the police, reporting them and the assault. Steven's mind was focused elsewhere though, too consumed with you to think about anything else.

His mind's racing, trying to figure out where you would have gone. The bloke said you had seemed fine just a little off and that could be expected if you thought Steven had slept with you then vanished off the face of the earth. It was a minor miracle, knowing that you were ok but your clothes could have been hiding a multitude of things that Jake might have done to you. Especially your work ones that you had purposely chosen to hide your tattoos. The realisation seemed to hit Steven and Marc at the same time, their heads snapping up and looking at one another as the said “museum!” at the same time.

The museum. How could Steven be so stupid to not have considered your place of work. Saturdays were part of your contract and you had never missed a tour before so of course you would be there. He would have hit himself if it weren’t for the fact that the body was already messed up and that it was Marc in control. It should have been the first place Steven thought to look and yet he had been so panicked he hadn’t stopped long enough to really think about the time and date. They had wasted time coming to your flat when they could have already been at the museum and sure that you were safe.

Marc was quick to make his way back down the hallway, jabbing impatiently at the call button as they waited. As soon as they were in he was pressing the close door button, leaning back against the glass as soon as the doors were closed. He looked exhausted and Steven wasn’t sure if Marc would be able to make it out of the building let alone all the way to the museum. So Steven took a deep breath and reached out for the other man, pressing forward as he urged Marc back. He went surprisingly willingly, the transition smooth and effortless, over within a blink of an eye.

Steven groaned when he registered how much pain the body was in, his hands quickly going to his leg and clamping down on the now bleeding stab wound. Marc had sounded genuinely concerned when he had asked if Steven was ok, nervously darting his eyes between Steven’s face and where his his hands were still wrapped tightly around his leg. Steven brushed his concerns off, waving his blood stained hand dismissively and forcing out that he was “fine mate. Don’t worry abou’ it. Just need a second yeah and then I’ll be as right as rain.”

It did take Steven a few minutes to compose himself, a constant mantra in his head that he needed to get to you and make sure you were safe. With a deep breath and a clenched jaw Steven had wiped his bloody hand on his thankfully dark trousers. He was moving slower than Marc had and the other man had spent the whole time in the lift trying to convince Steven to swap back but he didn’t force it, didn’t take control from Steven. He just kept asking for it, insisting that Steven didn’t “have to go through this. You're not used to it Steven, I am. Just give me back the body and I’ll get us there, then you can have it back as soon as we are at the museum. I swear I will Steven, just, give it back yeah? You don’t need to go through this.”

He sounded genuinely concerned but no matter how much it hurt, Steven was about to give the body back. It broke his heart knowing Marc was so used to this kind of pain. Sure Steven had known that but it still left him feeling like shit. He was supposed to protect Marc, it was the whole reason he existed and yet he hadn’t been able to protect him from things like this. Hadn’t been allowed to because Marc was always trying to keep Steven safe, sheltered from the horrors of the would. Guess that hadn’t really worked out for either of them.

It was more than just his guilt over Marc’s awful life though. This was all Steven’s fault and he felt like this was his punishment to bear, whatever gods were up there deciding that Steven should go through this for lying to you and letting you end up in danger. He should have just been honest with you from the start and especially after Jake’s first threat and the knowledge that he had known where you lived and how easy it would be for him to get to you. Steven should have done a lot of things differently over the last couple of months and there were a lot of decisions he had regretted but he would make them right. As soon as he had made sure you were ok he would spend the rest of his life making it up to you, literally grovelling for your forgiveness if he had to. So Steven clenched his fists and jaw against the pain and told Marc that he was fine, “I got this yeah. You don’t need to worry,” and by the time he was stepping out of your building Marc had gone blissfully silent and Steven made his way towards the museum as quickly as he could.

The museum wasn't that far away and instead of wasting time looking for a taxi Steven headed straight for the nearest tube station. He was hobbling by the time he gets there, his leg burning like he’d been stabbed with a red hot poker but he still manages to make it through the gate, somehow not dropping his Oyster card as he slaps it down and takes off as quickly as he can for the platform. His small bit of luck continues when he gets down there because a trains just pulling in and he even manages to snag a seat, slumping down and groaning loudly at having been able to take the weight off his injured leg. He knows people are watching him, can feel their eyes on him but he doesn’t care. There’s only one thing on his mind and it’s you. The world could be ending around him and he still wouldn’t care, to desperate to get to you and make sure your ok.

As soon as the train pulls into Tottenham Court station, Steven's up and out of his seat, the first one to the door and moving as quickly as he can towards the exit. Marc had been suspiciously quiet the whole time, something that Steven had been grateful for at the time but now he was starting to get a little worried about the man’s silence. He wasn’t even demanding that Steven move quicker, that he had to be a man and all that rubbish and pushed past the pain. As the escalator goes up Steven chances a glance towards the many framed posters along the wall, looking for Marc’s faint image in the glass. He still looked angry, his jaw still set and shoulders tense as he looked forward. To anyone else, if they could see him that was, Marc would look standoffish and cold but not to Steven. He knew Marc well enough by now to notice the impatient way he was tapping his fingers against the handrail, to see the little twitch in his jaw as he clenched his teeth tighter, to notice the growing worry and desperation in his dark angry eyes. Marc was one unnecessary delay away from punching someone and Steven really didn’t want to have to add resisting arrest to today's list of problems.

It should have only been about a ten minute walk from the station to the museum on any normal day but today wasn’t normal and Steven was seriously starting to feel the pain from the beating Jake had taken. His leg was damm right throbbing now, slowing down his movements and Steven was sure he could feel fresh blood running down his leg and soaking into the dark fabric of his trousers. By the time he makes it to the museum Steven’s exhausted, the pain almost too much and making him feel like he’s either going to be sick or pass out, maybe even both. He has to take a moment before going in, leaning back against the cool stone wall and groaning loudly as his grips at his leg, his thumbs digging in against the wet spot on his leg.

It’s then that Marc decides to break his silence, looking at him from a puddle and urging Steven to “come on, you're almost there. Just another couple of minutes and then we can go home and rest. We just gotta go in there and find out she’s ok, we can grovel for her forgiveness later just…Come on Steven, all we’ve gotta do is see her, please.” Marc’s pleading tugs painfully at Steven’s heart, the fact that the other man was talking like he was the one dating you and not Steven seemingly going unnoticed. He was right though, just a few more steps and they would find you safe and sound, all ready to head off with your first tour group of the day and maybe if he was lucky, relieved to see Steven in one piece after a whole week of radio silence. But honestly he thought he would be lucky if you didn’t yell at him and tell him you never wanted to see him again.

J.B was behind the security station, his eyes briefly flicking up at Steven when he stumbled into the desk before dropping his gaze back down to his phone only to do a double take when he realised who it was slumped over his counter. There had been a lot of pointless back and forth, J.B going from wanting to know what had happened and informing him that he was “in a heap of trouble, especially turning up looking like that.” Steven had tried to be polite, to get him to listen but he talked right over Steven like he hadn’t even uttered a word.

His outburst was a long time coming and Steven was genuinely surprised it hadn’t happened before. He had gotten used to how people treated him but not now, not when it was keeping him from you. His loud cry of “will you shut up,” echoed back at him, J.B’s voice seeming to disappear as he locked at Steven with a mix of shock and a little fear. Before the man could regain his composure and throw Steven out he barrelled on, demanding to know where in the museum you were.

The man’s mumbled reply that he couldn’t do that without having even turned to look at the monitors behind him had been met with even more hostility, Steven knowing full well that he could because “there’s over a hundred bloody cameras in this place J.B so don’t tell me you can’t. Now. Find. Her.” Steven wasn’t really sure if that had been him or Marc talking, maybe a mix of both because if it had just been Marc J.B would probably be supporting his own black eyes and a broken nose by now. He looks nervous, eyeing Steven wearily and taking a slight step back like that’s going to save him from being shoved out the way when Marc jumps over the counter and starts looking over the multiple screens himself. Steven’s about ready to let Marc front when J.B informs Steven that he can’t look for you because you weren’t at work today.

Steven’s anger drains away so quickly it leaves him feeling cold. That can’t be right, can’t be because “it’s a poxy Saturday morning J.B, of course she’s bloody well here.” You always worked Saturday’s, ten till two and then you would get lunch at Victoria House before heading home. It was your routine, one Steven knew off by heart and not once in the last few months had you changed it. You should be here and the only reason Steven could think that you wouldn’t be was that something had happened to you.

Not here. You're not here. No. Not possible. It can’t be. You were supposed to be here, meant to be effortlessly gliding through the museum halls for Steven to find, safe and sound and right there but you're not. Steven had been pinning all his hope on finding you here, angry and upset sure but safe, none the wiser that Jake Lockley had been the one to have his bloody hands all over you and not Steven. But that’s all gone now, that last little glimmer of hope gone with just a few simple words. No here. You're not here but then where were you?

Steven’s spiralling, his thoughts getting away from him as his panic and fear sky rockets. Gone. You're gone and Steven doesn’t know where or how to even begin trying to find you. He doesn’t know if you're ok, if Jake had said or done something to hurt you or drive you away. Steven didn’t know and that in itself was terrifying because it allowed his imagination to run wild and nothing it came up with wasn’t good. He was pulled from his increasingly bloody and violent thoughts by a loud and aggressive “OI!” that echoed through the large and open room.

Steven’s head snapped up from where he had buried it in his hand’s his eyes wide and desperate as he looked around. Donna was storming across the room, looking pissed off and ready to start yelling at him but Steven had lost any of his previous fight, unable to care about what the other women had to say. It wasn’t pretty. Donna yelled at him about his sudden disappearance without so much as a text to say he wouldn’t be in. Apparently you had covered for him, saying he was really sick and unable to phone due to his constant vomiting. Donna hadn’t believed you and she had been right to do so considering he had turned up at the museum “looking like you’ve been on a bloody week long bender and gotten your arse handed to you by Tyson Fury. Look at you, you’re a bloody mess. No wonder she’s done a runner. Probably wanted to get as far away from you as possible.”

That got Steven’s attention.

He demanded to know what she had meant about you doing a runner, cutting her off as she had tried to continue to belittle Steven’s existence. She had seemed nervous, eyes dating to J.B when Steven had gotten in close and continued to insist that she tell him “if you know something Donner then you tell me right now or I swear I’ll report you for bullying and harassment, so help me god I will and then we will see whose jobless.” She’s taken a back by Steven’s outburst but he doesn’t care anymore. She knows something and she wasn’t telling him. Steve would bloody report her directly to Hartwig Fischer if he had to, as long as it got him what he wanted. The threat seemed to work but what Donna said just made him even more confused.

You had turned up that morning but not to work, informing your boss that you needed some time off with immediate effect due to a family emergency out in the states. Your request had been granted and you had left for the airport straight away, promising that you should be back in a week or two depending on how things went. Steven didn’t understand because you didn’t have any family, at least that was what you had told him anyway but here you were, having run off to bloody America because something had happened with your family whose existence was questionable at best and suspicious at worst.

His confusion had seemed to give Donna her confidence back and she had been quick to demand Steven leave before she called the police. Steven hadn’t even protested and J.B led him out of the building, telling him that he needed help and that he probably shouldn’t come back because he was most likely going to get fired anyway. Steven had gotten into a taxi, with no clue who had gotten it and mindlessly giving his address to the concerned looking driver who had suggested they go to the hospital instead. Steven wasn’t sure of the conversation that came after but at some point he had started to recognise the streets so he had known that they were heading back towards his flat and not the nearest A&E. He had just sat there in silence looking blankly ahead of him at the back of the driver's headrest, trying to make some sort of sense of what was happening.

It didn’t make sense though. No matter what way he looked at it, nothing about your sudden departure to America made sense. Sure you had been there a time or two, had told him a few stories about various museums and private collectors you had worked for but there had never been anything or anyone in your stories that would suggest that you had left anything behind that you cared about enough to ever need to rush back to. Now that he was thinking about it, Steven knew a lot about the places you had been and the people you had worked for but apart from a few scraps of information he didn’t really know much about you or your past, Marc’s background check only having turned up basic information that Steven probably could have gotten from googling you.

The amount of moving around you did should have been suspicious from the start but Steven had been so taken with you that he hadn’t stopped to consider why you were constantly moving from one place to another. Maybe the fact that he had been so drawn to you from the start, already halfway in love with you before the two of you had even officially met, should have been another red flag. There was so much that he should have been questioning. Like the fact that you would never invite him to your flat, always insisting you go to his, like you didn’t want him to know where you lived. Or that you didn’t seem to care that Steven just disappeared for three days a week without any kind of explanation, something that most people would have been suspicious and unhappy about.

Steven knew that you liked museums and art galleries. That you liked to eat out and try new places but also enjoyed cozy nights in with a home cooked meal and a documentary playing on the telly. He knew that you liked it when he brought you flowers and that you were particular about how you took your tea and that you enjoyed your job and that your smile could rival the sun. He knew a lot about the person you were but as Steven sat in the car, his whole body throbbing with pain he came to sudden realisation that he didn’t really know you and maybe, you just weren’t the person he had thought you were.

[spectrenightfell]

Summary: Steven’s never been this scared before. He knows Jake had been to see you, had the flashes of memories to prove it but now your gone, disappearing without a word. He can’t help it, how terrified and desperate he feels. What if Jake has done something to you, hurt you? It would all be Steven’s fault because he hadn’t been strong enough to protect you from the psychotic murderer sharing the body.

Pairings: Steven Grant x fem!reader / Marc Spector x fem!reader /Jake Lockley x fem!reader

Rating: M (mentions of sex ~ canon typical violence)

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first

When Steven comes back to the body he’s met with the insistent feeling that something is wrong. It takes a long few seconds for his sluggish mind to catch up to what’s going on, his ears ringing and eyesight fuzzy. When he does manage to concentrate Steven is happy to find that he’s still in the flat and that the place looks mostly intact though he thinks one of his many bookcases might have collapsed at some point. That’s about where his relief ends and the horror of reality creeps in.

He’s only in his underwear, body splattered with blood and the burn of alcohol still strong in the back of his throat. There’s dirt under his nails, his knuckles split and still oozing blood. His whole body’s shaking but Steven can’t tell if it’s from adrenaline or pain. Maybe it’s both. There’s a lot of pain, Steven feeling like he had been hit by a bus and it only gets worse when he manages to stumble over to the full length mirror and get a good look at the state the body has been left in.

He’s a mess. A mix of cuts and bruises that are scattered all across his body. He had a black eye, an angry looking gash on his cheek as well as a fat and swollen lip. There’s bruises around his neck, admittedly faint but clearly from someone’s hands having been wrapped around it and squeezing. There’s big angry looking bruises running down his side, a mix of deep dark purples and sickly yellows decorating his skin like some sort of weird art project. He feels like he could maybe have a cracked rib or two, maybe even a fracture in his radius but what he definitely had is a bandage wrapped around his left shoulder and right thigh, the white fabric stained red with blood. As soon as he notices each injury, pain begins to radiate out from that area, burning bright like he had been stabbed with a red hot poker.

Steven understandably panics, worried about what the hell had happened because “look at us Marc! We look like we’ve been in a death match. Oh bloody hell we have, haven’t we? He’s been in a sodding cage fight or something, probably killed a few people whilst he was at it. I tell you that man’s going to get us killed, bloody reckless idiot.” Steven had never awoken in such a state before, sure there had been a few bruises and maybe a little bit of blood to clean up but it was like Jake had gone out of his way to deliberately mess with the body as much as he could without killing them or rendering it useless. It was terrifying to think that he would do this to them let alone himself and for the life of him Steven can’t think what set him off because there had to be something. Things didn’t get this bad for no reason.

Marc’s the one who actually catalogs all their injuries, Steven more than happy to give the other man control to do so. He’s methodical about it, checking every inch he can and telling Steven what he thought had caused it and how bad it actually was. Most of it was superficial apart from the cracked ribs though Marc didn’t think anything else was broken, just bruised and aching. The most concerning thing though was what lies underneath the bandages.

It’s horrible watching Marc unravel the bandages, Steven’s heart in his throat as their skin is revealed one inch at a time. He can’t help but wince when Marc pulls the last bit away, the other man groaning as the tacky blood soaked bandages cling to his skin and pull at the wound below. Marc thinks they’re stab wounds, the cuts long and thin and most likely deep if he’s right. Jake had already stitched them closed, though Marc thought his handy work was “sloppy. Just look at this mess, it’s not even straight and the scars are definitely going to be massive thanks to this botch job.” It takes some convincing but eventually Marc reluctantly agrees not to unpick the mess and start again. Steven doesn’t really have the stomach for it and he’s sure that if he had to watch Marc unpick then stitch them back together that he’ll pass out and the darkness is the last place he wants to be right now.

Jake had been oh so kind as to leave a half drunk bottle of rum on the bedside table and Steven doesn’t even complain when Marc snatches it up before gingerly sitting down on the bed. They sit in silence, both of them sitting on the bed and staring straight ahead as they try to work through their thoughts. Well that’s what Steven’s doing anyway, he thinks Marc is just trying to drink himself into unconsciousness. It’s a problem, one that Steven was becoming more aware of but he had thought Marc was getting better, cutting back and exercising more. Maybe he had just gotten better at hiding it.

Marc’s drinking is something they will need to address but not now, there are other things that need Steven’s attention. There’s something niggling at the back of Steven’s mind, a whisper of something that he had thought was just a dream but now he wasn’t too sure if that was actually the case because it seemed far too clear to be that. It was like when he had first started fronting, when Marc was out on missions and Steven was convinced it had all been a dream when he had awoken in his bed safe and sound.

There had been snippets, little flashes of images and sensations that Steven had been convinced were just bits of jumbled up dreams and memories, playing out in an unintelligible mess that had meant nothing to him at the time. Now though Steven wasn’t too sure. What if they had been glimpses of Jake, of the things he had been up to whilst keeping Steven and Marc in the dark?

Steven breaks the heavy silence between them, turning to look at Marc as he speaks because he really does “think that I might have fronted for some of it mate,” and he needs to talk these jumbled thoughts through with someone before he starts fixating on all the wrong bits. Marc’s movements are slow and deliberate as he lowers the bottle to rest next to his thigh, turning his head to look directly at Steven with surprisingly sharp eyes considering how much he had drunk in such a short amount of time . He demands that Steven “tell me what he did. I want to know everything that bastard got up to.” Steven doesn’t hesitate to comply, trying to describe everything he can recall in as much detail as possible because there would probably be some small detail that would clue Marc into what the other alter was actually up to.

Some things he could remember seemed unimportant, just snippets of random moments that meant nothing without context. Steven could remember leather clad hands curled tightly around the steering wheel of a car as the London skyline passed him by far too quickly for Jake to have been sticking to the speed limit. He had been inside of a rather fancy but nondescript bathroom with a large arched window and the moon almost glowing in the night sky as it shined through the window and into him making him feel cold and judged. He had been in an alleyway, Steven surrounded by shadows as he watched two people fight at the other end under the only working street light.

Though it had only been a short few seconds he had spent in control and actually aware of the world around him it had been enough for him to be able to tell Marc the car had seemed rather fancy though it had smelt like stale smoke and their aftershave but almost like the bottle had been upended over them. He could tell Marc that he had been bare foot and freshly showered, the water still clinging to his skin and cooling quickly as he had stood glaring up at the moon like it had insulted him. Steven had been able to taste the alcohol on his tongue whilst he stood in the alleyway, felt his grip tightening on the handle of a knife and he could hear the sound of balled up fists slamming into flesh followed by grunts of pain and cry’s of anger.

It had been jarring and off putting, Steven mostly confused throughout the whole experience but there had been other moments that had stood out more than those and no more so than the woman Jake had taken to bed. This had felt different to the other times, like someone had grabbed hold of him and yanked him to the front. It had only been for a few seconds, Steven in the car one moment then suddenly not but it was long enough to burn the moment into his memory and leave a sickly feeling of unease in his gut.

His body had still been moving with Jake’s momentum, his grip tightening on the hips of the woman he was draped over to the point he had probably left bruises. The air had smelt like sweat and sex, his own loud moan echoing back at him mixed in with the woman’s breathy gasps. As soon as Steven’s mind had cleared he had jerked back, a shocked ‘fuck’ already falling from his lips but as soon as he had let go of the warm body beneath him Steven had been swallowed up by the darkness once more, Jake presumably taking back control and shoving Steven as far away as he could.

Steven hadn’t had sex in, well a long time and to suddenly find himself half way through what had appeared to be a rather passionate bout of love making had been quite the shock to the system. Marc had asked a few questions about that incident, wanting to know if he could recall any details like “what did the room look like? Was there any decorations or personal stuff that stood out? What about the woman? Did you get a good look at her face?” Unfortunately the answer to most of that had been no. He had caught a glimpse of an exposed brick wall and thick black curtains that had not quite been drawn closed but he hadn’t noticed anything else other than the bed had been large and soft, the sheets as black as the curtains.

As for the woman, well Steven hadn’t really gotten that good a look at her either. She had been on her hands and knees, her chest dropped forward and her face buried in the pillows and completely hidden from Simon’s view. She had a row of hieroglyphs down her spine, the black ink vibrant and looking like it had been painted on just hours before. He hadn’t had a chance to really see what they said, only just making out the glyphs for sun and what he thought was either servant or maybe slave before he was being yanked back into the darkness.

Marc had been disappointed by Steven’s lack of information but considering he had only been present for a handful of seconds he thought he had done pretty well getting as much information as he had. There was something that Steven hadn’t told Marc though, to afraid to give voice to his fears because then they might come true and he didn’t think he would be able to cope with everything that entailed.

Despite what some people think Steven isn’t stupid. He had recognised the smell of your perfume, the shape of the windows both in the bedroom and the bathroom he had found himself in after. The woman’s skin had been soft and warm under his callous hands, the familiar tingle running up his arms and making him feel warm all over. He wasn’t stupid, but he was blindly optimistic that he had it all wrong because if he hadn’t, if that fear was justified then that meant Steven had failed. He hadn’t been able to protect you from Jake and the other alter had been able to take advantage of your feelings for Steven and taken something from you that wasn’t his to have.

Steven did have his doubts, things that meant that maybe he had it all wrong and he clung onto them desperately. He knew you had tattoos, had seen the ones on your wrists several times since that first date but never once had you mentioned having another. Well you had hinted at it once but as you had never brought it up again Steven assumed it had only been meant as a tease, a way of getting him thinking about other parts of your body. Something he hadn’t needed help with. Then there had been the room, so dark and impersonal. True he had never been inside your home but he had seen the inside of your locker, the thing covered with photos of places you had been as well as a strip of photos of the two of you together, taken in a tiny booth at a shopping centre you had dragged him to just a few short months ago. The bland walls and black furnishings didn’t match the person he knew, not after you had insisted Steven’s own flat had been too dark and in need of some brightening up. And don’t even get him started on the position, so impersonal and a blatant display of power, most definitely not how Steven would make love to you and he hoped that you knew him enough by now to know that he would want to be face to face, pressed as close to you as he could get whilst wrapped in your arms. He would treat you right, gasping and moaning his love into every inch of skin he could reach. He most certainly wouldn’t go at it like some kind of animal, treating you like nothing more than an end to a means.

If he’s right though, if you and Jake had slept together how was Steven supposed to tell you that it hadn’t been him in your bed but an imposter wearing his face and taking advantage of your feelings for him? He knew that would be it for the two of you. Knew that as soon as he started telling you about Jake and Marc and what had happened that you would either chuck him out thinking he was loony or still kick him out but because he had lied to you and allowed that maniac to get his filthy murdering hands on you. It didn’t really matter how you would react to the truth, Steven would lose you anyway and it would be no one’s fault but his own. He should have told you when he originally wanted to. Should have just said yes to Marc and then gone and done it anyway. Maybe then he would have been able to prevent all this from happening.

He doesn’t get to wallow in the what ifs and self hate for long, Marc moving the conversation on and wanting to know if there were any more moments that stood out in Steven’s little mystery tour of Jake’s life. He was grateful for the slight change of subject, more than happy to push his seemingly never ending fears to the side and concentrate on something else. He should tell Marc, and he will tell Marco but just not yet. It’s clear to see he’s angry and agitated and Steven doesn’t want him to feel even worse knowing they had both failed to keep their promise to you and each other. Steven will talk to you first, find out if it’s true first before putting that kind of pain on the other man's shoulders.

Other than the possible trist with you there are only two other incidents that stand out to Steven. The first one was presumably from where the black eye came from, Steven only conscious to feel someone’s fist collide with his face and send him stumbling to the dirty concrete below. He had seen enough to know he had been surrounded by a group of men dressed like they were from an early 2000’s rap video, the bright glare of headlights from the cars parked around them making it impossible for Steven to get a good look at any of their faces. Marc said it sounded like Jake had “gotten into a fucking fist fight with a bunch of street scum. He’s lucky we only got stabbed twice and no where important at that.” Steven thought it was best not to point out that everywhere on their shared body was an important place that shouldn’t be stabbed, not wanting to agitate Marc any more than he already was and risk him pulling their stitches or causing any more of their many bruises and cuts to start hurting again.

The second moment was probably the most important because for the first time Steven actually got to see what Jake looked like. It had been in a bar, one that looked like it had seen better days and reeking of stale cigarette smoke and the unpleasant mix of alcohol that had probably been spilt over the floor and never cleaned up. Steven’s face and hands had ached, his grip tight on the glass of something dark and strong smelling but all of that had drifted to the background because staring back at him from the grubby mirror behind the bar was Jake, looking like hell and ready to kill anyone who pointed it out.

It had been a shock, Steven’s face scrunched up at the horrible taste in his mouth only to wince when it made the right side of his face throb with pain. He had looked up to get the bartender's attention, hoping to get some water and maybe some ice to dull the swelling. Instead he had come face to face with a clenched jaw and dark eyes full of anger and what quite possibly could have been hate. They had stared at each other for a long few minutes, Steven wide eyed and feeling like a deer in headlights whilst Jake’s glare had just got harder and meaner. Steven had thought Marc grumpy and mean looking but Jake was ten times worse, looking damn right terrifying and leaving Steven feeling like he was just seconds away from getting his teeth kicked in.

Their little stare off ended as quickly as it had started, Jake’s lips curling up into a vicious smirk as he tipped the front of his cap forward. It had felt like a threat, Jake just that terrifying that he didn’t even need words to make Steven fear for his safety. Now Steven was sure it had been Jake’s way of taunting Steven. He had looked frustratingly smug and he knew why, or at least suspected he did. Though Jake had been practically nonexistent for the last couple of weeks the bastard had probably been listening in, spying on him and Marc to find even the slightest weakness and he had found it in you. You were Steven’s weak spot and though Marc might not admit to it Steven knew that you were his as well, just from the way he had been with you when you had turned up at the flat, your eyes full of anger and tears. Jake had taken advantage of that, exploited Steven’s relationship with you and had left Steven holding the broken prices and wondering how the hell he was ever going to put them back together again.

Steven hadn’t had the time to do or say anything at the bar, Jake’s eyes flickering to something behind Steven and his smug smirk falling into a scowl that would probably strike fear into anyone who was unfortunate to see it. A hand had landed on Steven’s shoulder, their fingers digging in but the world had gone dark before he could turn and see who it was. The next thing he knew Steven was coming to in the flat, looking like he had been hit by a bus and feeling like it too. Steven had given Marc the time to think about everything had said, the two of them sat in silence though Steven wasn’t still, fidgeting restlessly as he waited for the other man to say something.

Marc thought it was strange that Jake was being so careless all of a sudden and Steven had to agree. Jake had been a mystery since they had found out about him back in Cairo, it was only in the last couple of months that he had started to make his presence felt and even then he hadn’t actually introduced himself. He had just been this dark looming threat in the corner of their minds, shrouded in shadows and blood but now Steven had seen him, had been left to front in moments he was clearly not supposed to be and it was worrying, just like it had been when it happened with Marc. Something had to have happened to set Jake off but what? For Marc it had been his mum’s death, his abuser finally gone from his life for good and the mix of emotions that had brought with it. With Jake though Steven didn’t know anything about his life to even start speculating about what could upset a man like Jake Lockley so much that he wouldn’t be able to keep grip on his control over Steven and Marc.

There wasn’t much they could do right now, the body was in to much of a state for them to be moving around so freely but neither of them particularly wanting to risk sleep right now, just in case Jake popped up again to take the body and actually finish the job this time and put them in the hospital. They had just sat for a while, Marc slowly emptying the bottle of rum whilst Steven had let his head fall back to rest against the shelves behind him, his eyes closing as he tried to lose himself to the sounds of the world around him.

He didn’t know how long they stayed like that but when he heard his neighbours door slam and her kids start yelling as they ran down the hallway Steven knew it was about the time he should be getting ready for work. When he told Marc he had been quick to tell Steven that if “you think for one second I’m getting out of this bed this side of the weekend then you really are an idiot.” Steven had been quick to inform Marc that had been planning on calling in sick because he wasn’t “bloody daft. I ain’t planning on going anywhere any time soon mate.” There had been a few grumbled exchanges of light insults but soon enough Steve had found himself leaning over to grab his phone off the bedside table and Marc back in the mirror.

It had hurt, Steven’s bruised ribs and aching shoulder protesting the movement but he had clenched his jaw and pushed forward until he could reach his phone, slumping back in the bed once his hand had curled around it. The first thing Steven noticed were the excessive amount of miss calls and unread texts, not only from you but Donna and the museum as well. The second thing was the date. A week. A week had passed since you had walked out his flat and the world had gone dark.

Steven just stared at his phone, his brain struggling to comprehend what he was seeing because it couldn’t be right. Sure Jake had taken the body for a day or two here and there but it had always been on days when Steven or Marc didn’t have anything to do, it was horrible as all hell to go through but it had still been oddly considerate of the man. This though, this was a complete take over of their lives, a blatant disregard of their shared body and the lives they lead outside of one another. Oh bloody hell, a week? No wonder he had over a hundred missed calls and texts.

Steven was quick to unlock the phone, desperate to call you back and hoping you hadn’t reported him missing to the police whilst Jake had been running around and committing god knows how many crimes. Marc had wanted to know what was wrong, yelling Steven’s name and demanding that he “tell me what is going on right now Steven or I swear to god I won't let you have the body any more.” It was an empty threat, they both knew that so Steven had no issue ignoring the other man in favour of talking to you. Except he didn’t talk to you. Your phone just went straight to your answer machine, not even ringing once before the automated voice was telling Steven to leave a message after the tone.

Steven had never known you to have your phone off, not even when it was sitting in your locker at work and the fact that it was now had his gut twisting with nerves. He left a message, words rushed as he apologised because he was “so sorry love. I’m going to explain everything, I promise I just need you to call me back yeah? As soon as you get this, please.” Marc’s annoyed scowl softens slightly when he hears Steven’s pleading, silently watching as Steven’s rambles into your answer machine but as soon as he hangs up Marc demands to know what happens, his voice low and calm and oh so dangerous sounding that Steven has no choice but to tell him everything.

He still leaves out the part about you and Jake possibly having slept together, the words getting stuck in his throat and making him feel sick. So instead he tells Marc that there had been a flash of consciousness, Steven still in Jake's car and looking up at your building. Just a flash, a moment in time but it was enough to have Steven panicking, afraid that Jake had done something to you and now you weren’t answering your phone, leaving Steven feeling like he had swallowed a ball of lead that was now sitting heavy and uncomfortable in his stomach.

Marc was understandably angry that Steven had kept things from him. Steven had been expecting that, he was angry at himself after all but what he hadn’t expected was the sharp and slightly painful tug of Marc forcibly taking back the body. It had been a fast and aggressive switch, Steven’s head snapping up to look at Marc with a mix of shock and hurt. Marc didn’t even look at him as he got out the bed, jaw gritted against the pain. Confused and alarmed, Steven had called out, trying to hide his own wince as he quickly scrambled out the bed to watch Marc tearing through their shared wardrobe. Still he hadn’t looked at Steven as he got dressed, snapping over his shoulder instead. “What does it look like I’m doing? One of us has got to sort this shit show out and it sure as hell ain’t going to be you.”

Marc’s words hurt. Steven had made a right mess of things and sure he wasn’t the only one to blame, Marc having been responsible for keeping you in the dark about his mental state but he had been the one who had gone along with it. He had been the one to push you away and pull you back in, mucking you around and making you worry and feel neglected. Steven had been an idiot and now you were the one paying for his mistakes. He hadn’t said another word, the silence heavy and full of tension as Marc moved around the flat, clearly in pain but fighting against it as he grabbed their phone, keys and wallet before striding out the flat and slamming the door behind him.

They weren’t in any condition to walk let alone run to yours. Marc had managed to grab a taxi just as it was dropping someone off, sliding into the back seat before the driver could even agree to take him though considering how messed up they looked the poor man probably thought it was in his best interests to just go along with the obviously irate man. It had taken too long to get there even with the driver's insistence that he was taking the quickest route when Marc had angrily snapped “what is taking so long? We should have been there by now.” The morning traffic was heavy though and it took a good ten to fifteen minutes longer than it should have to get to your flat. The longer they were in the car though the more agitated Marc became. He tried calling you several more times, his knee jumping and mumbling “come on. Pick up, pick up, pick up.” No matter how often he called you or how much he begged you to pick up you never did, every call going through to your answering machine.

He only just about remembered to pay the man, shoving a handful of notes at him before practically jumping out the car and running up to your building. It’s a miracle that they even get in the building, someone coming out as Marc rushes up the steps and he slips in quickly before the door can close properly. It’s only then does Marc stop, cursing under his breath and pressing down on his leg and the probably pulled stitches underneath. Steven watched from the glass in the building's door as Marc leaned against the wall, one hand pressed flat against the brick and his head tipped forward to rest next to it. He’s in pain, probably bleeding from several places but he still says no when Steven asks him to “swap with me Marc. You need the rest.” Steven huffs and rants, trying to urge Marc to let him take control but all he does is snap at Steven to shut up, trying to act like he’s fine but Steven knows he’s not.

Before he can start properly begging Marc though he pushes away from the wall with a grunt, his shoulders back and face set in a grim mask of determination as he strode purposely towards the lift. Steven doesn’t ask how Marc knows what floor and flat you live at, just watches him from the highly polished metal and glass inside the lift and tries to figure out what he’s more worried about, you or that Marc’s going to pass out before he even makes it two steps out of the lift.

He wants to yell, to snap and tell Marc that he would be no good to you if he passes out from blood loss and pain but then Steven reminds himself that though Marc’s bleeding and in pain he’s probably been through worse. A lot worse. Though he’s stubborn and reckless and honestly a little bit self destructive Marc knows his limits, knows how far he can push himself before he gets into serious danger. Steven trusts him with this, with you because as much as the other man might deny it Steven knows he likes you, might even love you if he gave himself the chance to actually feel something instead of shutting down. Marc’s priority is you and keeping you safe, from Jake and the scumbags of the city as well as himself and the danger he poses to yours and Steven’s relationship. Bloody idiot he is but Steven knows his heart is in the right place even if Marc doesn’t.

As soon as the lift dings Marcs out the door, shoulders back and eyes determinedly set on the door at the end of the corridor. There’s only two doors, one on the left and one on the right, made from heavy duty wood and metal from the looks of it with a slight industrial feel to it. Steven has a split second to wonder exactly how rich you are and how you got that way before Marc’s pounding on the door, the dull thud surprisingly loud in the otherwise silent hallway.

Steven watches from the number plate on the door opposite, holding his breath when Marc’s fist stills. The seconds drag on, the silence heavy as they wait for you to answer. With every passing second Steven’s fear gets worse, his panic spiking drastically as your door remains closed. Marc knocks again, his closed fist banging into the door with such force Steven worries he might damage the already bruised and bloody hand. Steven can’t really blame him though, the other man’s desperation leaking into his voice as he yells your name in between the frantic and demanding knocking.

Still your door remains closed and Steven’s about to suggest they break in when the lift dings from the other end of the corridor and both their heads snap in the direction, hoping that it’s you that gets off all wide eyed and surprised to see him. It’s a hope Steven grasps onto tightly as the doors slide open in slow motion, his heart thundering away in his chest and sucking in a deep breath as he waits to see who's inside. Marc’s just as bad, his dark eyes fixed on the lift with such a sharp intensity that it reminded Steven of some kind of bird of prey, watching the little wood mouse and waiting to strike. Finally the doors open and Steven lets out the breath he had been holding, disappointment now mixing with his fear.

It’s just some guy, maybe in his forties and dressed like he’s been to the gym. Marc’s shoulders slump, his eyes darting down to the floor. He looks lost, like he has no clue what to do or how to even start attempting to fix it. He looks how Steven feels, so lost and helpless as he gives into the fear that something really has happened to you. That Jake had slipped into your home looking like Steven and taking advantage of your love for him only to wrap his hands around your throat and squeeze the life right out of you.

It’s a horrible thought, sending a blade of ice right through his heart and a cold fear spreading through every inch of him. No. Not possible. As vicious and barbaric as Jake was, he had no reason to hurt you like that. Steven hadn’t done anything to him. He hadn’t interfered with the other alters life or gotten in the way of his murdering ways. There’s no reason, no reason at all for the other man to have hurt you but then there hadn’t been a reason for Jake to crawl into your bed and spend the night between your legs. There was no reason for anything Jake had done and yet he had so why would now be any different?

Steven calls out Marc’s name, his voice strangled and full of desperation. Steven needs to see you, needs to know you’re ok or he’ll crumble quicker than a sandcastle caught in the path of the incoming tide. The call of his name seems to jerk Marc out of his own spiralling mind, his head snapping up and his eyes refocusing. He turns back to the door, banging on it once more and calling out your name along with a demand that you “open this door right now or I’m calling the cops.”

They probably should call the police but how would they even begin to explain what they thought had happened? They would end up locked in the loony bin with Harrow and Steven wouldn’t know what had happened to you until the old bill turned up to arrest him. No. Steven would break the door down his bloody self if he had to and then beg for your forgiveness when all was said and done. It was just as Steven was telling Marc to break it down that the man who had gotten off the lift spoke, his voice hesitant and looking a little frightened of Marc whilst trying to keep as far away from him as possible.

Not here.

You’re not here.

Marc’s aggressive, getting in the other man’s personal space and shoving him into the wall as he demands to know what the man is talking about. For once Steven doesn’t protest the unneeded aggression, listening intently as the man stutters and stumbles over his words. You had left a couple of hours ago, at the same time as you always did on a Saturday with a bag slung over your shoulder and dressed relatively smartly.

Marc takes a moment to process the words and then he’s back to demanding, wanting to know specific times, the direction you had gone in, if you had seemed ok, if you had spoken to anyone. He barely gives the man time to answer before moving onto his next question but it becomes clear pretty quickly that he had only seen you getting into the lift, ignoring his morning greeting where you would normally be the first to say hello.

Marc doesn’t seem to notice letting the guy go, his brows furrowed and a deep frown tugging his lips down. The man makes a quick escape, getting through his door and slamming it behind him, the sound of the lock sliding into place loud even through the thick wooden door. They probably only had a couple of minutes until he called the police, reporting them and the assault. Steven's mind was focused elsewhere though, too consumed with you to think about anything else.

His mind's racing, trying to figure out where you would have gone. The bloke said you had seemed fine just a little off and that could be expected if you thought Steven had slept with you then vanished off the face of the earth. It was a minor miracle, knowing that you were ok but your clothes could have been hiding a multitude of things that Jake might have done to you. Especially your work ones that you had purposely chosen to hide your tattoos. The realisation seemed to hit Steven and Marc at the same time, their heads snapping up and looking at one another as the said “museum!” at the same time.

The museum. How could Steven be so stupid to not have considered your place of work. Saturdays were part of your contract and you had never missed a tour before so of course you would be there. He would have hit himself if it weren’t for the fact that the body was already messed up and that it was Marc in control. It should have been the first place Steven thought to look and yet he had been so panicked he hadn’t stopped long enough to really think about the time and date. They had wasted time coming to your flat when they could have already been at the museum and sure that you were safe.

Marc was quick to make his way back down the hallway, jabbing impatiently at the call button as they waited. As soon as they were in he was pressing the close door button, leaning back against the glass as soon as the doors were closed. He looked exhausted and Steven wasn’t sure if Marc would be able to make it out of the building let alone all the way to the museum. So Steven took a deep breath and reached out for the other man, pressing forward as he urged Marc back. He went surprisingly willingly, the transition smooth and effortless, over within a blink of an eye.

Steven groaned when he registered how much pain the body was in, his hands quickly going to his leg and clamping down on the now bleeding stab wound. Marc had sounded genuinely concerned when he had asked if Steven was ok, nervously darting his eyes between Steven’s face and where his his hands were still wrapped tightly around his leg. Steven brushed his concerns off, waving his blood stained hand dismissively and forcing out that he was “fine mate. Don’t worry abou’ it. Just need a second yeah and then I’ll be as right as rain.”

It did take Steven a few minutes to compose himself, a constant mantra in his head that he needed to get to you and make sure you were safe. With a deep breath and a clenched jaw Steven had wiped his bloody hand on his thankfully dark trousers. He was moving slower than Marc had and the other man had spent the whole time in the lift trying to convince Steven to swap back but he didn’t force it, didn’t take control from Steven. He just kept asking for it, insisting that Steven didn’t “have to go through this. You're not used to it Steven, I am. Just give me back the body and I’ll get us there, then you can have it back as soon as we are at the museum. I swear I will Steven, just, give it back yeah? You don’t need to go through this.”

He sounded genuinely concerned but no matter how much it hurt, Steven was about to give the body back. It broke his heart knowing Marc was so used to this kind of pain. Sure Steven had known that but it still left him feeling like shit. He was supposed to protect Marc, it was the whole reason he existed and yet he hadn’t been able to protect him from things like this. Hadn’t been allowed to because Marc was always trying to keep Steven safe, sheltered from the horrors of the would. Guess that hadn’t really worked out for either of them.

It was more than just his guilt over Marc’s awful life though. This was all Steven’s fault and he felt like this was his punishment to bear, whatever gods were up there deciding that Steven should go through this for lying to you and letting you end up in danger. He should have just been honest with you from the start and especially after Jake’s first threat and the knowledge that he had known where you lived and how easy it would be for him to get to you. Steven should have done a lot of things differently over the last couple of months and there were a lot of decisions he had regretted but he would make them right. As soon as he had made sure you were ok he would spend the rest of his life making it up to you, literally grovelling for your forgiveness if he had to. So Steven clenched his fists and jaw against the pain and told Marc that he was fine, “I got this yeah. You don’t need to worry,” and by the time he was stepping out of your building Marc had gone blissfully silent and Steven made his way towards the museum as quickly as he could.

The museum wasn't that far away and instead of wasting time looking for a taxi Steven headed straight for the nearest tube station. He was hobbling by the time he gets there, his leg burning like he’d been stabbed with a red hot poker but he still manages to make it through the gate, somehow not dropping his Oyster card as he slaps it down and takes off as quickly as he can for the platform. His small bit of luck continues when he gets down there because a trains just pulling in and he even manages to snag a seat, slumping down and groaning loudly at having been able to take the weight off his injured leg. He knows people are watching him, can feel their eyes on him but he doesn’t care. There’s only one thing on his mind and it’s you. The world could be ending around him and he still wouldn’t care, to desperate to get to you and make sure your ok.

As soon as the train pulls into Tottenham Court station, Steven's up and out of his seat, the first one to the door and moving as quickly as he can towards the exit. Marc had been suspiciously quiet the whole time, something that Steven had been grateful for at the time but now he was starting to get a little worried about the man’s silence. He wasn’t even demanding that Steven move quicker, that he had to be a man and all that rubbish and pushed past the pain. As the escalator goes up Steven chances a glance towards the many framed posters along the wall, looking for Marc’s faint image in the glass. He still looked angry, his jaw still set and shoulders tense as he looked forward. To anyone else, if they could see him that was, Marc would look standoffish and cold but not to Steven. He knew Marc well enough by now to notice the impatient way he was tapping his fingers against the handrail, to see the little twitch in his jaw as he clenched his teeth tighter, to notice the growing worry and desperation in his dark angry eyes. Marc was one unnecessary delay away from punching someone and Steven really didn’t want to have to add resisting arrest to today's list of problems.

It should have only been about a ten minute walk from the station to the museum on any normal day but today wasn’t normal and Steven was seriously starting to feel the pain from the beating Jake had taken. His leg was damm right throbbing now, slowing down his movements and Steven was sure he could feel fresh blood running down his leg and soaking into the dark fabric of his trousers. By the time he makes it to the museum Steven’s exhausted, the pain almost too much and making him feel like he’s either going to be sick or pass out, maybe even both. He has to take a moment before going in, leaning back against the cool stone wall and groaning loudly as his grips at his leg, his thumbs digging in against the wet spot on his leg.

It’s then that Marc decides to break his silence, looking at him from a puddle and urging Steven to “come on, you're almost there. Just another couple of minutes and then we can go home and rest. We just gotta go in there and find out she’s ok, we can grovel for her forgiveness later just…Come on Steven, all we’ve gotta do is see her, please.” Marc’s pleading tugs painfully at Steven’s heart, the fact that the other man was talking like he was the one dating you and not Steven seemingly going unnoticed. He was right though, just a few more steps and they would find you safe and sound, all ready to head off with your first tour group of the day and maybe if he was lucky, relieved to see Steven in one piece after a whole week of radio silence. But honestly he thought he would be lucky if you didn’t yell at him and tell him you never wanted to see him again.

J.B was behind the security station, his eyes briefly flicking up at Steven when he stumbled into the desk before dropping his gaze back down to his phone only to do a double take when he realised who it was slumped over his counter. There had been a lot of pointless back and forth, J.B going from wanting to know what had happened and informing him that he was “in a heap of trouble, especially turning up looking like that.” Steven had tried to be polite, to get him to listen but he talked right over Steven like he hadn’t even uttered a word.

His outburst was a long time coming and Steven was genuinely surprised it hadn’t happened before. He had gotten used to how people treated him but not now, not when it was keeping him from you. His loud cry of “will you shut up,” echoed back at him, J.B’s voice seeming to disappear as he locked at Steven with a mix of shock and a little fear. Before the man could regain his composure and throw Steven out he barrelled on, demanding to know where in the museum you were.

The man’s mumbled reply that he couldn’t do that without having even turned to look at the monitors behind him had been met with even more hostility, Steven knowing full well that he could because “there’s over a hundred bloody cameras in this place J.B so don’t tell me you can’t. Now. Find. Her.” Steven wasn’t really sure if that had been him or Marc talking, maybe a mix of both because if it had just been Marc J.B would probably be supporting his own black eyes and a broken nose by now. He looks nervous, eyeing Steven wearily and taking a slight step back like that’s going to save him from being shoved out the way when Marc jumps over the counter and starts looking over the multiple screens himself. Steven’s about ready to let Marc front when J.B informs Steven that he can��t look for you because you weren’t at work today.

Steven’s anger drains away so quickly it leaves him feeling cold. That can’t be right, can’t be because “it’s a poxy Saturday morning J.B, of course she’s bloody well here.” You always worked Saturday’s, ten till two and then you would get lunch at Victoria House before heading home. It was your routine, one Steven knew off by heart and not once in the last few months had you changed it. You should be here and the only reason Steven could think that you wouldn’t be was that something had happened to you.

Not here. You're not here. No. Not possible. It can’t be. You were supposed to be here, meant to be effortlessly gliding through the museum halls for Steven to find, safe and sound and right there but you're not. Steven had been pinning all his hope on finding you here, angry and upset sure but safe, none the wiser that Jake Lockley had been the one to have his bloody hands all over you and not Steven. But that’s all gone now, that last little glimmer of hope gone with just a few simple words. No here. You're not here but then where were you?

Steven’s spiralling, his thoughts getting away from him as his panic and fear sky rockets. Gone. You're gone and Steven doesn’t know where or how to even begin trying to find you. He doesn’t know if you're ok, if Jake had said or done something to hurt you or drive you away. Steven didn’t know and that in itself was terrifying because it allowed his imagination to run wild and nothing it came up with wasn’t good. He was pulled from his increasingly bloody and violent thoughts by a loud and aggressive “OI!” that echoed through the large and open room.

Steven’s head snapped up from where he had buried it in his hand’s his eyes wide and desperate as he looked around. Donna was storming across the room, looking pissed off and ready to start yelling at him but Steven had lost any of his previous fight, unable to care about what the other women had to say. It wasn’t pretty. Donna yelled at him about his sudden disappearance without so much as a text to say he wouldn’t be in. Apparently you had covered for him, saying he was really sick and unable to phone due to his constant vomiting. Donna hadn’t believed you and she had been right to do so considering he had turned up at the museum “looking like you’ve been on a bloody week long bender and gotten your arse handed to you by Tyson Fury. Look at you, you’re a bloody mess. No wonder she’s done a runner. Probably wanted to get as far away from you as possible.”

That got Steven’s attention.

He demanded to know what she had meant about you doing a runner, cutting her off as she had tried to continue to belittle Steven’s existence. She had seemed nervous, eyes dating to J.B when Steven had gotten in close and continued to insist that she tell him “if you know something Donner then you tell me right now or I swear I’ll report you for bullying and harassment, so help me god I will and then we will see whose jobless.” She’s taken a back by Steven’s outburst but he doesn’t care anymore. She knows something and she wasn’t telling him. Steve would bloody report her directly to Hartwig Fischer if he had to, as long as it got him what he wanted. The threat seemed to work but what Donna said just made him even more confused.

You had turned up that morning but not to work, informing your boss that you needed some time off with immediate effect due to a family emergency out in the states. Your request had been granted and you had left for the airport straight away, promising that you should be back in a week or two depending on how things went. Steven didn’t understand because you didn’t have any family, at least that was what you had told him anyway but here you were, having run off to bloody America because something had happened with your family whose existence was questionable at best and suspicious at worst.

His confusion had seemed to give Donna her confidence back and she had been quick to demand Steven leave before she called the police. Steven hadn’t even protested and J.B led him out of the building, telling him that he needed help and that he probably shouldn’t come back because he was most likely going to get fired anyway. Steven had gotten into a taxi, with no clue who had gotten it and mindlessly giving his address to the concerned looking driver who had suggested they go to the hospital instead. Steven wasn’t sure of the conversation that came after but at some point he had started to recognise the streets so he had known that they were heading back towards his flat and not the nearest A&E. He had just sat there in silence looking blankly ahead of him at the back of the driver's headrest, trying to make some sort of sense of what was happening.

It didn’t make sense though. No matter what way he looked at it, nothing about your sudden departure to America made sense. Sure you had been there a time or two, had told him a few stories about various museums and private collectors you had worked for but there had never been anything or anyone in your stories that would suggest that you had left anything behind that you cared about enough to ever need to rush back to. Now that he was thinking about it, Steven knew a lot about the places you had been and the people you had worked for but apart from a few scraps of information he didn’t really know much about you or your past, Marc’s background check only having turned up basic information that Steven probably could have gotten from googling you.

The amount of moving around you did should have been suspicious from the start but Steven had been so taken with you that he hadn’t stopped to consider why you were constantly moving from one place to another. Maybe the fact that he had been so drawn to you from the start, already halfway in love with you before the two of you had even officially met, should have been another red flag. There was so much that he should have been questioning. Like the fact that you would never invite him to your flat, always insisting you go to his, like you didn’t want him to know where you lived. Or that you didn’t seem to care that Steven just disappeared for three days a week without any kind of explanation, something that most people would have been suspicious and unhappy about.

Steven knew that you liked museums and art galleries. That you liked to eat out and try new places but also enjoyed cozy nights in with a home cooked meal and a documentary playing on the telly. He knew that you liked it when he brought you flowers and that you were particular about how you took your tea and that you enjoyed your job and that your smile could rival the sun. He knew a lot about the person you were but as Steven sat in the car, his whole body throbbing with pain he came to sudden realisation that he didn’t really know you and maybe, you just weren’t the person he had thought you were.

[spectrenightfell]

Summary: Steven’s making a mess of things, the treat of Jake looming over his head and leading him to make one bad decision after another. He thinks he has time thought, time to fix things whilst keeping you safe and away from the other alter but time time is not on his side and when you turn up at the flat unexpectedly Steven has to face the horrifying truth that he night messed up in a way that would have you walking out of his life for good.

Pairings: Steven Grant x fem!reader / Marc Spector x fem!reader

Rating: T

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first

Things are tense in the days following.

When he had woken up the next day Steven had felt calmer. Sure he was still angry and scared but he wasn’t falling apart at the seams anymore. It had been almost like any other normal day, Steven getting out of bed and going about his morning as if the night before hadn’t even happened. He can feel Marc watching him as he moves around the cramped space, his tentative and slightly awkward “how you doing buddy?” answered only with a noncommittal grunt from Steven. It’s the only words they exchange the whole time Steven’s making his breakfast and morning cuppa. That is until the photos pinned to his wall catch his eye and Steven remembers to ask Marc about the one from the night before, the one that had seemed to rattle him so much. He couldn’t quite believe he had forgotten about it but there had been other more concerning matters on his mind at the time.

Marc’s face hardens at the question, jaw visibly clenching as he answers and looking like he would rather be talking about anything else. It was a photo of him, of Marc. He said it was from when he was a mercenary, taken whilst he was on a job but he couldn’t remember where or when it might have been. That prompts a lot more questions from Steven, Marc clearly getting agitated the more Steven pressed for details. There’s a little bit of yelling on both their parts, though it's only Steven’s voice that carries through the flat and out into the hall. Steven’s looking for answers and expecting Marc to have some because he’s the one with the violent past, the one closest to Jake’s mentality. It’s unfair of him, Steven’s well aware of that but he can’t help it. He’s worried, the panic from the night before creeping back in and leaving him feeling a little desperate.

After a lot of back and forth and one broken mug they come to the conclusion that this Jake must have been gathering information on them, learning who they were and keeping tabs on their comings and goings. It’s unsettling, knowing this other person knows everything about them whilst they know practically nothing about him other than he’s extremely violent, has a very active sex life and liked to wear a flat cap. It’s not a lot to go on really and it leaves Steven feeling a little deflated, unsure how best to keep you safe and as far away from this Jake bloke as he possible can.

It’s not an easy thing to accomplish and Steven ends up swinging between sticking to you like glue or trying to stay as far away from you as he can. You know that somethings wrong, your brows furrowed as you watch him make every excuse under the sun as to why he can’t spend time with you only to grab you at the end of your shift and practically beg you to come back to his for dinner and cuddles.

You ask him what’s wrong a couple of times, reassuring him that “whatever it is you can tell me, it won’t change how I feel about you and maybe I can help. Please Steven I’m worried about you.” It breaks his heart every time, especially when you look at him with big pleading eyes and cling onto him like you’re afraid he’s going to disappear. In those moments he wants to tell you everything, confess every secret he’s been keeping from you but he knows Marc’s right. Telling you now would just drive you away and he needs you somewhere he can keep an eye on you, somewhere close and safe.

Marc’s understandably tense, well tenser than normal anyway. He’s constantly surveying every room you go into for possible threats or quick exits, always right there and ready to slip into the body if he needed to. It’s a little uncomfortable at first, Steven hyper aware of the other man’s presence when he had gotten so used to Marc scurrying off when you’re around. It’s awkward, Steven feeling like his every move is being judged, especially when he kisses you but he gets used to it eventually. It eases some of Steven’s worries having Marc close by just in case something happens, another set of eyes to watch over you. And watch you he does, a little too much in Steven’s opinion.

Steven catches him a fair few times staring at you, cataloguing every inch of you, especially your arse. The man must think he’s being subtle but he’s really not and Steven had to stop himself a few times from snapping at Marc and telling him to pack it in. He always looks away when Steven catches him, looking embarrassed and apologetic but it doesn’t stop him from doing it again. Steven can’t even really blame the guy though because you do have a rather lovely bottom and you’ve even caught Steven admiring it a time or two. He’s always extremely embarrassed when you catch him, stammering out his apology but all you ever do is smile at him, eyes alight with mischief as you wink at him and turn your back to whatever you were doing. It’s different with Steven though, he’s dating you and Marc, well Marc’s not so it’s completely inappropriate for him to be making eyes at you like that.

It adds to Steven’s irritation, his nerves frazzled and his paranoia growing every day that goes by without Jake making an appearance. It’s like he’s vanished, gone radio silent all of a sudden and somehow that’s so much worse than finding traces of the other alter throughout his life. It doesn’t help that Steven feels like he’s constantly being watched, the hairs at the back of his neck prickling and leaving him feeling twitchy. He’s constantly looking over his shoulder, searching out for anyone whose gaze is a little too fixed on him. There’s never anyone there though and Marc is always insisting that Steven’s letting it all get to him but how can he not? It’s hard not to when there’s someone else living in your body whose capable of hurting the person closest to you and making it look like he had been the one to inflict god knows what horrors on you. The constant state of fear and anger takes its toll on Steven though and he knows that if he carries on like this somethings eventually going to break.

He didn’t think it would be you though.

You turn up at the flat on one of Marc’s days, the rain having soaked through your clothes and looking up at Marc with determination in your eyes. You don’t wait for Marc to even utter your name before pushing past him and into the flat, looking around like you were expecting to find someone else there. Marc looks at Steven with wide eyes and a set jaw, gesturing to you like Steven might know why you were there but he has no clue, not having spoken to you since the day before and definitely not having made any plans to spend time with you. Steven’s already reaching out to take control of the body back, hissing at Marc to “give me the body Marc. Somethings wrong, she needs me,” but you turn on Marc before they get a chance, looking far too beautiful even though you’re clearly angry and leaving a little puddle on the floor where you stand.

It’s a one sided argument, you facing Marc and ranting about Steven’s behaviour whilst he looks at you with wide shock filled eyes, clearly not knowing what he’s supposed to do in this situation. Steven’s never seen you angry before, not like this anyway and as he listens to you demand to know “what’s going on with you? One minute you can barely even look at me let alone stand to be around me and then the next you're acting like I’m going to vanish into thin air if you’re not there to watch my every move. I don’t understand what’s going on Steven. Please, just talk to me,” Steven’s forced to realise exactly what his behaviour over the last couple of weeks have done to you.

Steven feels horrible, like the rotter he is. He wants to reach out, wants to pull you in close and hold you tight whilst apologising for his awful behaviour and promise you that everything’s ok, that the two of you are fine. He can’t though because Marc’s the one in control of the body and all he’s bloody well doing is looking at you like he’s so far out of his depth he’s already drowned. Steven hissed at him, demanding that he switch with Steven so he can fix this mess before his relationship falls apart completely but Marc ignores him, all his attention focused on you as tears well up in your eyes as you look away like you’re bracing for a blow. Steven’s never been that good at forcing his way to the forefront before but seeing you now, like this he’s willing to try because he knows Marc finds this kind of thing hard and this is Steven’s fault anyway, he should be the one to bear the brunt of your anger. He takes a deep breath, a redundant endeavour but it helps him concentrate and focuses his mind on taking back control of the body but everything goes out the window when Marc finally decides to do something instead of just stand there like some sort of life size doll.

He moves slowly like he’s afraid to spook you, his hands gently curling around your biceps and pulling you closer to him. You go easily, pressing your face against his chest and wrapping your arms around him, clutching at the back of his t-shirt so hard your knuckles start to turn white. Marc holds you as you cry, his own big arms wrapped tightly around you and his face pressed against the top of your head. Marc’s voice is nothing but a whisper as says “I’m sorry,” his hold on you tightening as he ducks his head to press his face against your neck. Steven doesn’t know who or what he’s apologising for but it had your breath catching with a shudder between sobs, pressing closer still against Marc like your trying to burrow you way inside him.

It’s quite the intimate display, what with the rain beating down heavily on the roof and the room dimmed due to the thick dark clouds outside. Steven can’t help but stare, his heart aching not only for you but the other man as well. Steven can’t remember the last time Marc had touched someone, most probably not since Layla had left and he most definitely hadn’t let himself be this venerable since he had quite literally given Steven his heart back in the Duat. By all rights Steven should be angry that Marc’s taking advantage of your obvious pain and stress but he can’t help but feel that maybe Marc needs this, just for a little while.

He doesn’t like the thought of leaving the two of you together but he wants to give Marc the chance to experience what it’s like to be held by someone who cared for him. Sure he had most likely had that with Layla but that was a while ago and Steven knew what being touch starved could do to a man. So Steven slips back into the darkness, trusting Marc to look after you and confident that you would do the same for the other man, even if you didn’t know it wasn’t Steven who you were clinging onto.

When Steven comes back to the body the rains stopped, the room lit with just the soft glow of the bedside lamp now that it’s night time. He’s stood by his bed looking down at your sleeping form. You look so peaceful, tucked up under Steven’s boring sheets and snuggled down into the pillows. He can’t help but just stand there and watch you for a moment, taking in this side of you that he had never gotten to see before. Marc gives him maybe a minute before clearing his throat and drawing Steven’s attention away from you and towards the mirror set up in the bedside table. He looks a little nervous, his posture ridged but his head tuned to the side and refusing to meet Steven’s eyes. There are probably a hundred things that he should ask first like ‘what happened’ or ‘is she ok’ but what comes out is a soft and concerned “how you feeling mate?”

That gets Marc’s attention, his head snapping round and looking at Steven like he’s grown another head. It’s a bit of an over reaction but Steven can’t blame him for his surprise. He was pretty sure Marc had never really been someone’s first concern before and he had probably been expecting Steven to be angry about the time Marc had spent with you when he had always promised not to interfere with yours and Steven’s relationship. Neither of them say anything for a long couple of seconds, Steven patiently waiting for Marc to find the right words and Marc trying to figure out if Steven’s mad at him or not. Eventually though his shoulders drop down and he gives Steven a jerky nod of his head “yeah, I’m erm fine. Thanks, for…yeah.”

The conversation that follows after happens in whispers, Marc even keeping voice down though Steven was the only person who could hear him. The two of you had barely spoken two words to each other, Marc doing his best to keep his accent hidden and he seemed to think you hadn’t noticed. Steven had hoped that Marc might have told you about himself, about their condition and what Steven actually was but that had apparently been too much to ask for. Instead arc had held you whilst the two of you curled up on the sofa and watched rubbish telly, taking comfort in being close until you had finally fallen asleep. Marc hadn’t wanted to wake you and as you were already in one of his old tops and a pair of joggers he hadn’t thought twice about carrying you over to the bed and tucking you in beneath the covers. He had drawn the line at getting in there with you though, thinking that Steven might want to be the one to share a bed with you first as you were his girlfriend. Even if it was just to sleep.

He feels awkward slipping in behind you, well aware that Marc was watching him and not know what to do with his hands. Your natural warmth had already seeped into the sheets, making a warm cocoon under the duvet and begging Steven to wrap his arms around you and hold you tightly. Marc eventually tells him to just get on with it, demanding that Steven “just hold her. It’s what she wants.” There’s a small pinprick of jealousy at that but Steven pushes it down as deep as it will go. It’s soon forgotten anyway when he presses his front against your back, wrapping an arm around your waist and pressing his face against the back of your neck. You’re so warm, smelling like sunshine and happiness and everything Steven wants in life. He sighed happily, smiling softly as he snuggled against you and delighting when you seemed to relax back against him, letting out your own little hum. It’s perfect. A beautiful, perfect moment and though it had been brought about by Steven’s poor judgment and your consequential pain but to have you hear, like this. It was a dream come true, a dream that carried him off into a peaceful and comfortable night's sleep, Steven actually feeling relaxed for the first time in weeks.

The next morning was a little on the awkward side, what with the two of you tangled together amongst the sheets, and Steven’s body having reacted to having you pressed so close to him all nigh. At some point in the night you had rolled over, ending up tucked against Steven’s side with your head on his chest. He still had his arms around you, still holding on tightly and it was lovely waking up like that but bloody hell he was hot. His sleep shirt was clinging to his sweat damp skin, his duvet having been shoved down to his legs and he was sure he must be as red as a tomato. He had tried to discreetly move you off of him but apparently you were a light sleeper because he hadn’t even moved you an inch before you were grumbling sleepily, your eyes fluttering open even as you rubbed your face against his chest.

There’s confusion first, your eyebrows furrowing when you lift your head to look at him like you can’t quite work out if he’s real or not. You look adorably sleep ruffled and Steven can’t help but smile, boldly tucking a stray bit of hair behind your ear and wishing you a “good morning love.” You look at him for a long moment, long enough for Steven to feel like he’s mess up somehow but before he can start apologising you let out a groan, your head falling back to his chest as you mumble out your muffled “mornin’.”

Things aren’t so bad after that first bit of uncertainty. The two of you cuddle for a few minutes more before you reluctantly fight your way free of the tangled sheets so you can go pee. Steven makes breakfast for the two of you whilst you make tea, the telly turned on low with some cooking show playing as background noise. It was nice, domestic and gave Steven a glimpse of what life together could be like in the future if he stopped mucking things up. Seeing you like that last night, hurt by his actions, well it had been a slap to the face and the kick up the arse that he needed. Steven couldn’t lie to you any more, he wanted you to know everything but first he needed to talk to Marc. He wasn’t going to let the other man bully him out of it this time but after how Marc had been with you the night before Steven hoped that he wouldn’t need much convincing.

You left shortly after breakfast, apologising for having disturbed his evening and “dumping all my issues on you like I’m not a grown ass adult who knows how to take care of themself.” Steven had been quick to brush off your apology, assuring you that you could turn up any time you liked and it would never be a problem, he was just glad you had felt you could talk to him considering “it’s all my fault anyway in’ it. I’ve been a right tosser.” Steven promises he’s going to tell you everything, he just needs a little more time, “a day or two, just get me head on straight,” and surprisingly you agree but there’s something not quite right, a sudden heaviness to your shoulders that has Steven frowning.

You stand hesitantly in his open doorway, your eyes flicking between him, the lift at the end of the corridor and something over Steven’s shoulder. He doesn’t know what’s wrong, if it’s him and his insistence that you wait a little longer for him to be honest with you or if maybe he had messed up so badly you didn’t want to be with him any more. He’s quick to try and pull you in for a cuddle, his hand curling around your elbow as he tries to pull you back to him but a firm hand on his chest keeps you from coming any closer. There’s determination in your eyes again as you look up at him but unlike last night there a hint of sadness lurking just underneath that had him starting to panic. Things weren’t that bad were they? Steven hadn’t messed up so much that he couldn’t fix this? Before he could ask what was wrong though you were already talking, silencing all his words and leaving him wide eyed and breathless with his heart beating rapidly away in his chest.

Steven knew he loved you, had for a while now and though he had longed for you to feel the same way he hadn’t dared hope for it because he knew it would hurt spectacularly if you didn’t return his feelings. But here you were, looking so serious with your palm pressed against his frantically beating heart and telling him you loved him. No one had ever said that they loved Steven before. Sure Marc had used to write ‘love from mum’ on the postcards he sent but that wasn’t real, it was just a lie to keep Steven blissfully unaware of what was really going on around him. This though, this was as real as you were and it was bloody fantastic, brilliant even, one of the best moments in his life. It should be a happy moment. It should but you were looking at him like the world was ending, talking like you had just told Steven he was going to die.

You don’t let him talk, shaking your head when he tries to ask you why you made it sound like loving him was a bad thing. You need to talk, that’s what you tell him. There’s something important you need to tell him but you need time to sort a few things out but you “should have it all sorted when you're ready to talk, just….just remember I love you. Please.” It leaves him feeling uneasy, that same gut churning dread coming back ten fold. Steven can’t do much more than mumble out a confused “ok,” watching you walk away from him. It feels final, like something importants been decided and how things turn out is now completely out of his control. He doesn’t like it, his heart feeling heavy and worry weighing him down, the fear of the unknown making him feel twitchy. It should have been a happy moment, one of the best things to happen to him except all it’s done is leave him feeling like he’s about to lose you.

Marc tries to reassure him that its fine, that’s it’s probably nothing to serious but Steven can’t get the way you had looked out of his head, heartbroken and on the edge of tears. That wasn’t nothing, no matter how much Marc insisted it was. Something was wrong, that was obvious but Steven couldn’t figure out if it was because of him or if there was something else, something you had been keeping hidden from him. He can’t imagine what kind of secret you could be keeping from him that would warrant such a bleak love confession, nor that you would keep something so important from him. Steven was the liar in this relationship, not you.

It’s easy to let Marc take control, Steven slipping into the background whilst Marc gets ready for his shift at the club. He barely said a word to the other man, getting stuck in his spiralling thoughts as he tries to figure out what you could possibly want to talk about. Marc tries to get his attention, even knocking on the mirror and demanding that Steven “knock it off. I looked into her, twice. There’s nothing there to be worried about. Trust me.” It’s not that Steven doesn’t trust Marc, it’s just that it had seemed like something, something big and he was a little terrified of what that was. Marc hadn’t found anything even remotely strange or worrying when he had done a background check on you so that only really left one option didn’t it? You were going to break up with him, it had to be. Why else would you be acting like you were saying your final goodbyes? Steven let that familiar nothingness swallow him up, his last lingering thoughts about everywhere he had gone wrong with you and how he could even possibly begin to fix it before darkness took him.

When Steven comes back to the body he’s missing a week.

@rmoonstoner @daddysfavoritesexkitten @devilish-mirage

[spectrenightfell]

Summary: One date turns into another and then another until Steven's spending most his time with you. His life is on the up, Steven the happiest he's been in a while. Sure he's still arguing with Marc about telling you about the other man and what Steven actually is but its not enough to dampen his almost constant state of happiness and excitement. The other man will come around eventually and when he does Steven can only hope you will hear him out before deciding if he's worth the hassle or not. Stevens happy and in love so naturally this is when the other alter makes himself known in the worst way possible.

Steven's never been so terrified in his life.

Parings: Steven Grant x fem!reader / Marc Spector x fem!reader

Rating: M (implied sexual activity)

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first

From then on out Steven’s days consist of work and you. The two of you go on one date after another, the first of many dinner dates coming just two days after your breakfast turn lunch one. Steven had taken you to a semi fancy restaurant out in Shoreditch that served a mix of vegan and meat dishes that sounded exotic and interesting that maybe you would like. He had given you a bunch of sunflowers again, grinning widely when your eyes had lit up when he presented them to you. Just like with the last date time had gotten away from the two of you, the manager having to usher you both out when closing time arrived and it became clear neither of you had plans to leave any time soon. He walked you to the nearest tube, getting another kiss on the cheek before you got on your train and heading in the opposite direction to him, though he had almost followed you on to the crate, in to much of a daze to notice.

After that Steven starts spending almost all his free time with you and even some of Marc’s. He insisted it was fine, that Steven deserved it considering Marc had gotten to have a life with Layla and “its not like I do anything with my days anyway. So you might as well get some use out of them.” Steven begrudgingly accepts but only because Marc can be a stubborn pillock when he wants to be and refuses to take the body just to get his point across. He still thinks he’s doing it as some sort of weird apology, trying to make up for lying to Steven, for making him feel like he was going bonkers, for getting to have a loving and happy relationship with Layla whilst keeping Steven hidden and shunned like he was some sort of dirty secret. Whatever Marc’s reasons were Steven couldn’t really complain that much considering it meant he got to spend more time with you.

Steven goes out of his way to come up with fun and creative date ideas, always trying to find something for the two of you to do that will have you smiling at him. Marc even helps, suggesting local events that Steven’s never heard of or reminding him of your little likes and dislikes that might have slipped his mind. It gets Steven thinking, about how much attention Marc pays to you, about how he actually feels about you. Marc had told Steven that he liked you, thought you were a good match for Steven and that’s why he had pushed so hard for him to ask you out but the more he thinks about it the less sure Steven is of that.

He gets that Marc doesn’t let himself have nice things, that he thinks he doesn’t deserve to be happy after everything he’s done regardless of if it’s actually his fault or not. He’s the kind of man who would see a pretty girl and the other guy (Steven) who also liked her and step aside believing that he wasn’t good enough for her so why even try. It was frustrating because despite his rather colourful and bloody past Marc wasn’t a bad guy. He was smart, funny in a sarcastic and slightly condescending way as well as fiercely loyal and protective. Didn’t hurt any that he was ridiculously good looking as well. Yes they shared the same face but Marc just wore it better. All dark and brooding with his chiselled jaw and swept back hair. He deserved to be happy and if you could do that for him, for both of them then Steven shouldn’t really get in the way of that.

Steven also knows that if it came down to a choice between him and Marc that you most likely wouldn’t be picking him. Doesn’t stop him from wanting you and Marc to meet though.

Marc isn’t so keen on the idea. Doesn’t even want Steven telling you about him at all actually. That results in probably one of the biggest arguments they’ve had in a while, both of them saying hurtful and untrue things in the moment. Steven’s not proud of his actions yelling that “it’s not really up to you is it? Just because I care about the person I love enough to actually be honest with them unlike you.” Marc’s no better threatening to “take control of the body and move us to Switzerland. I swear to god Steven if you so much as breathe a word about this I will.” It’s a mess, one that results in Marc taking control of the body and making Steven miss his next date with you. And yeah, it’s one of Marc’s designated days but he had agreed to it, hadn’t been bothered about missing time with the body when you had asked Steven to a vintage cinema playing reruns of old adventure films that you had thought he would like.

Steven screams and shouts, throwing one curse after another at the other man but Marc doesn’t relent, going about his day like Steven doesn’t exist. It does things to Steven, had him feeling like he’s finally gone round the bend. Like maybe he doesn’t actually exist and it’s just the constant mantra of “my names Steven Grant, I work at the museum gift shop. This is my flat, mine not his. I’m real. I have a life, a girlfriend, a fish. I’m real. I’m real. I’m real.” When Steven’s phone starts ringing Marc ignores it, turning the telly up to drown out the noise and his eyes not even flick over to the phone when the texts started to come through. Steven begs him to answer it, to just tell you that something came up and he was sorry he hadn’t let you know. To tell you something, anything just so you didn’t worry. Steven thinks he does, his fingers quickly tapping away before he turns the phone off and chucks it back onto the table to be forgotten about.

By the time Marc’s three days are up Steven’s caved, promising that he won’t tell you a thing, just “please, don’t do that to me again yeah? I can’t…I just can’t ok?” Marc doesn’t say sorry, but then Steven didn’t think he would any way. He doesn’t forgive Marc, not for making him miss his date and definitely not for making him feel like his whole existence was falling apart. Things are tense between them, Marc watching silently from one of the mirrors as Steven frantically apologises down the phone, begging for your forgiveness and promising to make it up to you. He’s tempted to turn all the mirrors around, make Marc look at the walls and make him feel as alone as Steven had but despite how he was feeling Steven couldn’t do that to Marc. Not after going through it himself.

You are incredibly understanding about the whole thing, Marc having told you some lie about a family emergency that Steven had needed to deal with there and then. Steven had still apologised a few more times though, asking to take you out that very night to make it up to you. Somewhere fancy that he might potentially have to swipe Marc’s bank card to pay for. Apparently you don’t need that though, the bouquet of sunflowers and blue Egyptian lotuses a beautiful and apt apology. Steven had just laughed nervously, stating that “they’re pretty flowers of a pretty lady but I want to do something with you. I hate I miss our date and it sounded bloody brilliant to. So please, let me make it up to you love?” He tried to catch Marc’s eye in the mirror but the man’s being stubborn once more and glaring off in the opposite direction, arms crossed and a slight tinge of pink to his cheeks.

So maybe he’s not as much of an asshole as Steven had thought. He still swears not to schedule anymore dates on days Marc should be fronting, to terrified that he will force Steven to miss another one and that you won’t be so understanding the next time round.

Steven’s begging seems to work but maybe not in a way he would have thought. You don’t want to go out, “I want you all to myself tonight. Just us. I’ve missed you Steven.” You ask to come over to the flat, your voice a low hesitant whisper that Steven had to strain to hear. It has his heart beating rapidly away in his chest, his fingers tingling with nerves and anticipation but he still says yes, nodding his head even though you can’t see him. From there the conversation wraps up quickly, the two of you agreeing on a time and Steven giving you his address whilst you promise to pick up take out on your way to him. It’s only when he puts the phone down does Steven really realise what he’s agreed to.

His flat isn’t exactly messy as much as it is organised chaos. He had books everywhere, postcards and news clippings stuck up on the walls and not to mention all the random trinkets and nick-naks everywhere. Some of them he had brought himself, mostly from the museum gift shop but some had come from Marc, sent to Steven whilst he was pretending to be Steven’s mum. The flat was dark, even with the windows uncovered and cramped to, the vaulted ceiling somehow making the place seem smaller than it actually was. Then there was the leg restraint by the bed and the ring of sand that surrounded it. Oh bugger it. The place looked like it belonged to some crazed shut in, not an ideal place for a dinner date. He would be lucky if you didn’t take one look at the place then turn right back around and leave, ditching Steven’s sorry arse quicker than Steven could even begin to explain.

Over the next few hours Steven cleans the flat from one end to the other, attempting to make it look a little less creepy then it normally does. There’s nothing he can do about the staggering amount of books he has stacked all around the place other than straighten them up and try and make it look like there’s at least some order to his madness. He hoovers and dusts, the windows protesting as he shoulders them open to let some much needed air in. Steven even gets down on his hands and knees with the dustpan and brush, desperate to get up every grain of sand possible, emptying it into a black rubbish bag before hiding it away in a cupboard and praying to every god he knows that you don’t somehow find it. The foot restraint is easy enough to hide, Steven impatiently yanking on the cord as he unwound it from the post, shoving it under the bed to be retraced latter.

He tries not to think too much about his bed and how noticeable it is as he changes the sheets, faffing around as he tries to make it look perfect, or as perfect as he can get his old and faded sheets to look. He had wanted to get new ones before you came over for the first time, had wanted something expensive and soft that you would have been happy to sink into. Not that he thought you would jump into bed with him the moment you stepped foot in his flat but, well, the thought was there. How could it not be?

You were beautiful, Steven taken with you from the moment he had laid eyes on you and he would be a rotten liar if he said he hadn’t thought about you like that on more than one occasion. But you were taking it slow. Hadn’t even had a proper kiss yet. Steven was pretty sure he had kissed every part of your face over the last few weeks yet the feel of your lips against his was still unknown to him. Its not because he didn’t want to he just chickened out at the last moment, terrified he was going to mess up. He didn’t really have much experience, if you could even call that one kiss with Layla that. He just didn’t want to disappoint you. Didn’t want to be a disappointment.

By the time you were knocking on the door Steven had just about finished getting himself ready calling out that he would “be there in a sec, just got to, bollocks. I’m coming,” as he tripped over a chair in his haste to get to the door. When he flung it open you were there waiting for him with a bright smile and a paper bag full of delicious smelling food. You looked beautiful as always and Steven didn’t realise how much he missed you until you were there in front of him in your to large sweatshirt and leggings and looking like you had just stepped out of one of his dreams.

It takes a raised eyebrow and you asking if you were “allowed in or are we having dinner out here?” to get Steven moving again, rushing out yet another apology and ushering you into his home. He takes the bag of takeout from you, ducking his head down and placing a quick kiss on your cheek before heading off towards the kitchen, calling over his shoulder for you to make yourself comfortable.

He can hear you moving around behind him, the two of you making general conversation as he finds plates and cutlery. It makes him nervous, knowing you’re there and seeing what he’s really like in his own space but it’s also kind of exciting. He’s never had a girlfriend before, never had someone that he liked enough to want to share his space with but with you it’s different. Steven wants you in his home, wants your little trinkets and books to mix in with his. He wants you in his life in every way possible and this is a step towards that but he knows that until he comes clean and tells you about Marc and the other alter that won’t be possible.

He doesn’t want to do to you what Marc had done to Layla, pushing you away to keep his shameful secret safe and end up losing you. The way things were between him and Marc at the moment Steven knew that if he brought it up Marc would go silent, refusing to show himself and making Steven look like the lunatic he’s always kind of feared he was. There would be no coming back from that and he was sure you would keep your distance afterwards, looking at Steven the same way J.B and Donna looked at him some times, like they were just waiting for him to snap.

Steven jumped when he felt arms wrap around his waist, almost dropping the plate when you pressed your lips against his neck. You’re concerned, picking up on the fact that somethings wrong and wanting to help ease his worry. It’s easy to lie when he’s not looking at you, covering your hands on his stomach with one of his and telling you that “everything’s fine love, just day dreaming is all.” He doesn’t think you believe him but you don’t press the matter, just humming softly and pressing another kiss to his cheek before slipping away, grabbing one of the plates as you go. Steven misses your warmth instantly, the phantom brush of your lips against his neck and cheek making his skin tingle. Like he had been out in the cold for ages then stepped into a heated room, his skin prickling and tingling as he acclimatised to the sudden warmth.

When they had gotten back from Cairo Steven had gotten a small sofa and telly for Marc in an attempt to make his home feel more like their home. He had even gotten rid of one of his reading tables and shuffled other things around to make space for it all. Steven wasn’t much for the telly but Marc seemed to like it, flicking through channels where Steven would rather have been curled up with a book. It’s where you are now, legs curled up under you with the plate of vegetable curry balanced on your legs and asking Steven what he wants to watch. So he doesn’t have to admit that he only knows the main four channels Steven tells you to pick, sitting at the other end of the rather small sofa with his own plate of food.

You chatter away happily as you flick through the channels, asking Steven for his input and quickly moving onto the next channel when he scrunched up his nose at whatever programs playing. Eventually though you settle on some documentary about histories greatest mysteries, promising to turn it off if Steven doesn’t like it.

He does like it though and once the foods gone you end up curled up against his side, his arm draped over your shoulder and fingers intertwined with yours. It’s nice, really nice and Steven can’t stop himself from grinning like a mad man as you snuggle in closer to his side. It was so domestic, something real couples did and Steven had only ever dreamed of having someone in his life that he could do these kinds of things with.

You were Steven’s first serious relationship, his first relationship at all and he couldn’t believe how lucky he was to have found someone who fit so easy into his life. In his eyes you were perfect, his dream girl come to life and Steven couldn’t wait until the day Marc pulled his head out of his arse and he could actually let you into his life fully. Until then though Steven was going to be the best boyfriend he could and hopefully when you found out the truth you wouldn’t leave him before giving him a chance to fix what Marc had broken.

You don’t stay the night, leaving around eleven and brushing off Steven’s attempts to walk you to the station. You thank him for the evening, your hands sliding up across his chest so you can curl your hands over his shoulders. Steven blushed, tentatively placing his hands on your waist as he stutters out that he had “had fun with tonight, YOU! I had fun with you tonight. I erh liked having you here, in the flat, just us.” That had you smiling, fingers playing with the hair at the nape of his neck as you told that you had liked it to. There was a moment, your eyes darting across his face as if looking for some sign but before he could ask of he had something on his face you were leaning forward, head tilted back and eyes fluttering closed. Steven had frozen, eyes wide and feeling slightly panicked at the prospect of having your lips against his. If it wasn’t for a hash whisper, Marc demanding that he “move Steven” he probably would have remained frozen, making it look like he didn’t want this, want you but he managed to tip his head forward slightly just in time to meet your lips with his.

It’s a lot better than the last kiss he’d had. Not that Layla had been bad. Kissing her had been nice enough but it had been a hard press of her lips against his, Steven too startled to even attempt to kiss back and it was over as quickly as it had started. With you though it’s gentle, tentative. You didn’t force anything, slowly guiding him with your lips until they slotted perfectly together. It was perfect and beautiful and Steven didn’t ever want to stop. You felt so right against him, so familiar. Like he had done this a hundred times before and was already addicted to the taste of you.

Eventually you pulled away though, Steven swaying forward in an attempt to keep his lips against yours. You laugh gently, a soft smile on your lips as you lean forward and press a quick kiss to his cheek before stepping out of his grasp and further out into the hallway. You go with a smile and a wave, wishing him a “good night Steven with a v” as you slip into the lift, the doors closing behind you and leaving Steven wishing you had stayed, that he’d had the courage to coax you back into the flat and spent the night holding you close as you shared one kiss after another.

He moves around the flat with a dopy smile, stripping his clothes and getting ready for bed in a daze. His lips are still tingling and the memory of your kisses are on a constant loop in his mind and driving him to distraction. He doesn’t get the ankle restraint back out, doesn’t redo the ring of sand around his bed. He doesn’t do any of his normal nightly routines in fact, to happy and distracted to even notice. He falls asleep easily, memories turning into dreams where he had the confidence to not let you go, to keep you there with his lips and hands until you where gasping for breath and moaning his name. It was the best night’s sleep Steven had in months and when he wakes up he feels refreshed and happier than he had in years.

There were many kisses after that night. Hello kisses. Goodbye kisses. Kisses just for the sake of kissing. There were even stolen ones, the two of you hidden away in the museum stockroom or behind one of the exhibits, both of you grinning like idiots as you exchanged one kiss after another and tried not to get caught. Steven couldn’t get enough of you and it seemed you felt the same way about him to if the time you spent together was anything to go by. Fancy dinners and trips to book stores or museums and art galleries turned into dinners cooked in Steven’s rather pitiful kitchen and movie marathons spent curled up on his sofa that often lead to long and languid kissing sessions that had Steven longing for more.

You hadn’t made it past kissing yet, past hands on hips or buried in hair as the two of you pressed close together and just enjoyed having the other in your arms. Steven was more than ok with the slow place, letting the anticipation for what was to come next build with every drawn out and longing kiss when it came time for you to leave. Considering how long it had taken to get to this point Steven knew that he still probably had a while to wait before he finally got you in his bed and anyway he wanted that first time to be special. He wanted to take you out, wine and dine you before taking you back to his rose petal scattered bed and a hundred candles lighting up his flat to make it feel more romantic. Well maybe not candles, what with all his books and the fire hazard they would cause. Maybe he could get some little light up orbs or something instead? There had to be options right? Alternatives to potentially burning the building down.

His life’s pretty fantastic in that moment, what with you and how well your relationship is going. Things are even looking up at the museum, Donna finally letting Steven apply to be a tour guide. He thinks you might have something to do with that but when he brings it up you just smile, a knowing glint in your eyes when you declare that “it’s about time. Your knowledge is amazing Steven and I can’t believe it’s taken this long just to get an interview. Your perfect for this, trust me. Now hand over the gummy scarabs before I come take them from you.” He’s nervous about it. About the interview, not you throwing yourself at him and kissing him breathless to get at the overpriced bag of sweets. You reassure him every time that he voices his concerns that he had no reason to worry, that he’s going to do just fine. You do help him though, letting Steven trail behind whilst you give your tours at the museum so he can see first hand what would be expected of him.

It helps, makes him a little more confident with what he might end up doing. Doesn’t hurt any that he loves watching you work. The way you light up with excitement when someone asks an actual interesting question, how in-depth and engaging your stories are, making history come to life and adding little snippets of information that definitely weren’t in the museum’s guide book. It was almost like you had insider knowledge, like you were sharing a secret with your group about people you knew personally. Steven obviously knew that was impossible but it added to the whole feel of it being something a little more intimate and personal instead of it just being yet another repeat of the same thing again and again. He knows he won’t be able to achieve the same sort of thing if he actually gets the job but it does give him hope that he’ll be able to make it his own somehow instead of it just being another generic retelling of facts and assumed truths.

Things with Marc get slightly better as well. Though neither of them apologise to the other about their behaviour they manage to get back to the normal routine. For the most part anyway. Steven still doesn’t arrange to spend any time with you on the days that Marc’s fronting. He doesn’t want to risk hurting or disappointing you and he’s still a little scared that the other man will follow through on his threat and Steven will lose you somehow. He and Marc function though and to Steven’s relief you don’t question why you don’t hear from him for three days a week. He dreads to think what you assume he’s up to during the time and when he sees you next he always makes sure that you know how much he missed you, how much he cares for you just in case you thought he wasn’t interested or that he had someone else on the side. Not that he ever would. He’s amazed he somehow managed to convince you to date him and he doubts he would be able to manage it again with someone else. Not that there was or would ever be someone else.

Marc hadn’t tried to get Steven to take you out on his days, hardly mentioned you at all actually and always made sure to make himself scarce when you and Steven spent time together. He should be happy about the privacy, after all he liked having you all to himself without worrying about the other bloke watching your every move and judging Steven’s behaviour but he couldn’t shake the feeling that by staying away Marc was punishing himself. Like denying himself your company balanced out how he had kept Steven away from you. Steven really didn’t like it and he would have brought it up with the other man but considering what had happened last time Steven had tried to have a serious and open talk with the former mercenary he wasn’t in a rush to try again. Marc was the suffer in silence kind and Steven knew if he pushed to much the other man would implode, talking Steven and most likely his relationship with you with him. So he tried to act like nothing was wrong whilst Marc did the same. Both of them avoiding the conversation they needed to have if anything was every going to change.

In what Steven was sure was some sort of attempt at distracting himself Marc got a job. An actual honest and legal job that gave him a steady pay check and only required him to work two of his designated nights. It was only as a bouncer at some club out in Soho but it was a job and Steven was insanely proud of the other man for getting it. He did find it rather boring though and often left the other man alone whilst he was there, trying to give Marc the illusion that he had his own separate life to Steven’s. The extra income did wonders for their living standards though, Steven able to finally afford to go organic and Marc upgrading the telly package to include American sports channels, channels that had you giving Steven an amused and slightly confused look when you had discovered them. Lucky enough he had been able to distract you with kisses and brownies so he didn’t have to lie to you yet again.

Overall Steven’s life was good but there was one glaringly obvious issue that had both him and Marc worried. They were still both blacking out, were still missing large chunks of time that neither of them could account for. Most Sundays were now a mystery to them, Marc going to sleep in the early hours on the Sunday morning when he finished his shift and Steven waking up with his alarm on the Monday morning. Steven would be inclined to think they might have slept through the whole day except there would always be something that proved that theory wrong. A few bottles of beer might be missing from the fridge, there might be a sink full of pots and pans that hadn’t been there before and on one occasion Steven had even awoken to new Gus and Gus II’s tank having been cleaned and the little statues rearranged.

They knew it had to be the other alter, the one prone to violence and sex with random women in Steven’s flat. Though that hadn’t been too much of an issue lately. He still woke up sometimes feeling satisfied and content, scratches and bite marks littering his skin that ache pleasantly but there had been no other incidents where his bed had been left reeking of another women so Steven could only assume this other alter was going out to meet his one night stands again. Something he was thankful for even if it did still make him feel extremely uncomfortable knowing it was still happening. Though he wasn’t the one engaging in the act it still left Steven feeling like he was betraying you every time he woke up with a fresh set of marks decorating his skin.

There were still bloody clothes, loads of washing left in the machine that Steven would then hang up to dry. Another set of shoes showed up by the door, a couple of outfits hung up in the wardrobe behind his and Marc’s. There would be food in the fridge that Marc hadn’t brought and that Steven hadn’t made, ingredient’s appearing in the cupboards that Steven had never even heard of. This other alter was slowly carving a space for himself within their home, making it more obvious that he was there and yet he was still a mystery, something completely unknown and that scared Steven because Marc had been like that to start with before he had invaded Steven’s life, pulling it apart at the seems and completely changing everything he had thought he had known. Steven liked his life now, was happy and he really didn’t want that to change.

So obviously something had to go wrong. That’s just how his luck was.

Steven’s the one who finds it, a go back just like Marc’s except this one’s hidden the the floor boards in the corner of his flat under a stack of books Steven hasn’t moved in months. He had only found it by chance, looking for a book on Egyptian culture that he had told you about and you had seemed keen on reading. He had looked everywhere for it, rifling through his shelves as he tried to remember exactly where he had put it amongst his chaotic system. That stack had been the last place to look, hidden away in the corner behind a chair and almost forgotten about. There it had been right at the bottom and with a thin layer of dust clinging to the spine. Steven had been triumphant, loudly declaring “there you are you little bigger” as he dug it out from under the other books. He wouldn’t have thought anything of it, would have placed the books back and gone on his way but with the weight lifted the floorboard had creaked loudly and lifted up from the others, like the weight of the books had been the only thing keeping it secured in place.

Steven stared at the slither of darkness between the floor and the slightly raised board, a sense of dread filling him. Slowly he reached forward, Marc at the back of his mind as he asked Steven what was wrong, unable to see from the mirror across the other side of the room. The book landed on the floor with a thump, forgotten as Steven reached out, curling his fingers around the lose board and prying it up. That feeling of foreboding had only grown, knowing that he was about to find something that would change his life yet again. Just like finding out about Marc had.

It was a black nondescript duffel bag that he pulled out, the thing heavy as he picked it up and carried it over to the table. Marc was already waiting in the mirror Steven had set up there, his frown deep as he started at the bag that didn’t belong to either of them. Nor the contents inside. There were clothes that didn’t fit either Steven’s or Marc’s styles. Marc actually scrunches his noise up at the flat cap when Steven pulls it out, taking control of the bodies hands to throw the thing to the side when Steven lifts it to try it on, giving a firm “no” that leaves no room for arguments.

Marc fully takes over then, Steven relegated to watching out from the mirror as the other man pulls out the rest of the items and laying them across the table. There’s a hand gun, small and deadly followed by a silencer and an extra clip of bullets. Watching Marc handle the weapon Steven’s remind of the kind of person the other man is, his familiarity as he checks the thing over unnerving to watch. It isn’t that Steven had forgotten what Marc had done for a living before Steven had known he existed but it was easy to let it slip to the wayside when everything else had come to light.

The money and passport were to be expected, the fact that it had been in Spanish not so much but at least they now had a name to put to the alter who had been causing so many problems. Jake Lockley seemed like such a normal and unassuming name that didn’t really fit with the image Steven had built up in his head but then again the name Marc Spector didn’t really suggest a mercenary turned ancient God powered vigilantly that could kill you quicker then he could look at you.

Amongst the clothes they found the other alters phone, Marc turning it on quickly but a passcode kept them from delving any deeper. Not like how Steven had been able to get on Marc’s old school style phone and start nosing around. Marc did try though, tapping in different combinations of numbers until it locked him out. Steven hadn’t expected they would be able to guess. They didn’t know this other alter, didn’t know how his mind worked and all they were doing was taking random stabs in the dark and hoping something stuck. It didn’t and Marc gave up quickly, going back to the rest of the bags contents with a new determination that Steven found a little off putting. He wondered if this was how Marc was when he was on a job. All furrowed brows and tense shoulders as he methodically unpacks the bag and places the items to the side, each one lined up perfectly as they waited for further inspection.

The last thing to come out of the bag is a folder, the thing stuffed full of paper and Steven can see the edge of a few photo sticking out the sides, though he’s at the wrong angle to know there of. He watches the other man’s frown deepen as he pulls the photo from the file so he can look at it properly. Marc sucks in a breath, his dark eyes going wide and the panic so obvious it has Steven demanding to know “what is it Marc? Marc, what is it? Marc talk to me, your scaring me mate.” And Steven is scared, terrified of what could be so bad to have Marc acting that way because it had to something bad, really bad like a dead body or maybe something that could implement their involvement in a crime they knew nothing about.

Still Marc doesn’t say anything, staring down at the photo like he’s seen a ghost. Steven doesn’t have a choice, his fear driving him as he reaches out to forcibly take the body. He sees Marc stiffen, his eyes rolling back before there’s that telltale tug in his gut he gets when they switch, like he’s being pulled forward or tugged backwards. Steven expects to open his eyes and find Marc glaring back at him from the mirror, trying to convince Steven that it’s nothing, to not look at what had gotten him so worked up. He’s prepared for the worst, already anticipating the horror that’s probably waiting for him. The folders probably filled with a list of people this Jake guys probably killed or is going to, a hit list he’s working from for whatever reason. Steven’s ready for the worst or so he thought.

When Steven comes back to the body he’s not in the flat anymore.

Panic and confusion are quick to settle over him, Steven franticly looking for something familiar to gage where he is but it quickly becomes apparent that neither he nor Marc recognise this place. It had been mid afternoon when he had found the other alters bag but now it was the dead of night, streetlights glowing a hazy yellow along that quite street. He’s in the middle of a residential street, a row of town house behind him and what looks like a converted factory across from him. It looks expensive, a lot more expensive then his tiny attic flat and he feels out of place even just stood out in the street, like someone’s going to see him and think he’s up to no good, calling the police before he can even figure out where exactly here is.

Marc’s looking back at him from the dark glass of a car windows, trying to take control of the situation as best as he can without actually being the one in control. He tells Steven to stay calm, somethings that’s “bloody difficult to do considering we’ve lost hours doing gods knows what with that, that man in the driving seat.” He’s not outright panicking though, following Marc’s ordered when he tells him to check his pockets for anything useful, “his phone or wallet. Anything that could tell us where we are and help us get the hell out of here before someone notices the suspicious man talking to himself in the dead of night.” Steven doesn’t find a phone but he does finds his wallet stuffed in the pack pocket of his jeans, Marc’s bank card slotted right next to his and about a hundred pounds in cash that hadn’t been there before. As weird as that is though it’s not the thing that grabs his attention.

There’s a business card slotted behind the crisp looking notes. It looks like it’s been handled a lot, bent and the edges fraying slightly. He would recognise it anywhere though, the museums logo printed on the top in dark black ink. Steven’s hands tremble as he pulls it out, his heart beating so fast it feels like it’s almost humming in his chest. He’s vaguely aware of Marc saying his name, asking “what is it Steven? What have you found?” but he can’t answer, his mouth dry as his eyes follow the familiar curves and dips of your handwriting.

It’s the card you had written your number down on when you had first given it to Steven, smiling sweetly up at him as you asked him to send you one of the silly pictures he had been telling you about and promising to send him one back. It had felt like a monumental victory when you had slid the card across the counter before disappearing back to your tour group and Steven had stared at the thing for a long few moments before pocketing it. He had never put it in his wallet, instead having pinned it up next to Gus II’s tank and that’s where it had stayed right up until the moment it had peen placed inside his wallet with money that he was pretty sure wasn’t his.

Marc’s agitated hissing of his name had Steven looking up, his eyes finding the other mans instantly. He didn’t know how he looked but whatever Marc could see had his brows furrowing and mouth setting into a grim line as he demanded Steven show him what he was holding. Slowly he flips the card round, holding it up for the other man to see. His eyes flick across it quickly, his jaw tensing to the point his teeth might crack but once again Steven’s to distracted by the little card in his hand to pay Marc’s growing anger much attention. There’s an address on the back, one that Steven doesn’t know in handwriting he doesn’t recognise. All he knows is that it hadn’t been there before and as he stares at it, a feeling of dread wells up within his chest and tightening around his heart.

Across the street a light comes on, spilling out into the street and making Steven squint at the sudden brightness. He lifts a hand to shield his eyes, turning his head to look at the flats. It’s coming from a couple of the large windows on the third floor, the flat obviously large and covering almost half the floor if the lights anything to go by. There’s the flicker of a shadow, someone walking from one side of the room to the other and then there you are, stood in the middle of the window and completely unaware that Steven was watching you from the street below. The feeling of dread solidifies, turning into lead and sinking down into the pit of his stomach.

To say he panics is an understatement, Steven practically hyperventilating whilst Marc tries to talk him down from his spot on the car. He tries to reassure Steven, tries to tell him that its “a coincidence yeah? This Jake guy was probably here for one of posh assholes in those fancy houses. You don’t even know where she lives so how could he?” Steven wants to believe him, he does but he’s not an idiot, he knows a threat when he sees one.

It’s all too much to be a coincidence. The way he had come back to the body looking up at your window, the card with your number slipped in his wallet with what he was betting was your address written on the back. They had invaded this Jake’s privacy, found something that he clearly hadn’t wanted them to find and this was how he retaliated. The old ‘get in my way and the people your care most about will be the ones that get hurt’. This was him proving he could, that he knew things that Steven didn’t and was more then willing to act on the information. They knew he was violent, the bloody clothes Steven had been forced to get rid of proof enough of that and that’s not even taking into account those moments in Cairo where he and Marc had blacked out in a fight and woken up surround by blood and destruction. The man was a monster and now because Steven couldn’t leave well enough alone his sights had been set on you.

He said as much to Marc and he knew that the other man was thinking the same thing just from the look of fear and hopelessness in his eyes. He still tried to deny it though, offering Steven comfort in the form of a lie that neither of them believed. Steven understood why he was doing it, Marc still trying to protect Steven from the horrors of the world but they were past the point of no return by now, Steven having been exposed to to much at this point to ever be that naive again. He was scared, more than he had been even when Khonshu had had first shown up in his life, all billowing bandages and towering presents with his booming voice that had rattled Steven to the very core. This was worse though because it’s you. It had only been a few months since this thing between the two of you had started but you had become the most important thing in his life and he would do anything to keep you safe, even if that meant he had to keep you at a distance. It would hurt like hell but at least you would be safe, away from him and away from this Jake Lockley and whatever horrors he was capable of.

You moved across the windows, brows furrowed as you read through a stack of lose papers. You were dressed for bed, looking so soft and welcoming as you moved slowly from one window to the next. Steven wants to be up there with you, wants to hold you in his arms and never let you go whilst he tells you that everything will be okay, that he’ll keep you safe. He can’t though, knows that if he turns up on your doorstep without you ever having told him where you lived would be a red flag so big that it would probably get your door slammed in his face and a phone call made the the police before he could even begin to explain the truth. You would never believe him, even if Steven could convince Marc to show himself You would just think him crazy like everyone one else did and maybe he was. Had to be if he thought he’d had any chance of actually having a normal life with you.

Steven can’t watch you any longer, all his feelings getting too much and twisting violently in his stomach. He doesn’t know where he’s going but he know he can’t stay there any longer than he already had without drawing to much attention. He keeps his head down, that stupid flat cap chucked into a bin and his hands shoved in his pockets in an attempt to hide how he’s shaking. Marc stays silent but Steven can feel his eyes on him as he made his way through the dark streets of London. It’s comforting, knowing Marc’s there but also leaves Steven feeling on edge because what if it’s not Marc? What if it’s Jake watching and plotting just in case the two of them hadn’t gotten the message? It had Steven glancing at his reflection every couple of minutes, checking to make sure it’s still Marc there. It looks like him, what with his ridged posture and tense jaw but Steven doesn’t know how this other alter holds themselves so for all he knows it could also be Jake. Steven shoved that train of thought aside, confident that he would recognise Marc anywhere.

By the time they make it back to the flat Steven’s fear had slipped mostly into anger, the feeling bubbling and grown with every second he spends thinking about it. As soon as the door was slammed closed behind him Steven went off on one, ranting and raving whilst demanding that Jake “show his bloody face so I can give you a right good what for.” How dare he threaten you. Just because he had been caught out with whatever illegal and dangerous thing he was involved in. It wasn’t like Steven and Marc didn’t know about him, about the things he was capable of and any way if he “didn’t want us finding out about your sordid little activities then you shouldn’t have left it just laying around for any old Tom, Dick or Harry to find.” He’s rambling, spewing out nonsense but it’s easier then actually thinking about how much danger you could be in and how it’s all his fault.

Marc’s the one to finally calm him down. Yelling and making threats won’t get them anywhere any way and it was probably best not to antagonise the homicidal maniac any more then they already had. As all the anger drains away Steven’s legs give out, exhaustion taking over and sending him to his knees in front of the floor length mirror. He can’t stop the tears, crumpling over and wrapping his arms around himself as he sobs. He’s scared, terrified even and he feels helpless to stop it. He’s lost so much time since Cairo, Jake easily taking control of the body and shutting Steven and Marc out. They didn’t know what he did when he had the body, even when they got it back they couldn’t tell. Steven wouldn’t be able to stop him from hurting you, wouldn’t know that he had until he woke up and by then it would be too late.

He hadn’t realised he had been saying that all out loud between gasping sobs until Marc starts talking. He’s crouched down and Steven’s so close to the mirror that he can almost believe the other man is actually there, about to wrap Steven in his arms as he mumbled reassurances into his hair. He’s not though and all Marc can do is press himself as close as he can and promise that everything would be ok, “I swear it Steven. I won’t let anything happen to her. We’ll keep her safe, me and you, together. No one’s going to hurt her.” Steven wants to believe him but he doesn’t see how they can with Jake able to take over the body seemingly whenever he wants.

If it wasn’t for the hint of desperation in Marc’s voice Steven probably would have said as much but instead he bites down on his next sob and nods his head in agreement. Maybe Marc needed to believe that as much as Steven wanted to and Steven couldn’t very well deny him that small slither of hope now could he? So he would pretend, let Marc believe that they stood a chance at keeping you out of harms way whilst knowing that it was just a matter of time before everything came crumbling down around them like a thousand year old tomb left to the elements.

[spectrenightfell]

Summary: Steven’s excited for your date. Really excited. He’s so exited that he mages to work himself up into a right state, worrying about how he looks and being late, not to mention that he’s convinced this is all some big misunderstanding because you can do so much better then the weirdo from the museum gift shop that’s always talking to himself and got fired for smashing up a public toilet. If it wasn’t for Marc stepping in and taking control of the disaster of a situation Steven was sure he wouldn’t have made it out the flat let alone to your date. Thankfully he does make it there in time, a bouquet of Sunflowers clasped in his hands and a smile so wide it hurts. Now all he had to do is make it through the date without driving you alway. Easy. Right?

Pairings: Steven Grant x fem!reader / Marc Spector x fem!reader

Rating: G

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first

Steven comes back to the body with a gasp, jerking up in bed and already worrying that he had missed your date. He frantically scrambles for his phone, fumbling with it as he tries to find out the date and time, mumbling a stream of “no, no, no, no, no” as he does. He sighs loudly when he sees that he hasn’t missed it, flopping back onto the bed and smiling up at his ceiling, his phone falling into his tangled sheets. Its fine, he’s got time. Four hours of time to be precise before he’s due to meet you. That’s more than enough time for him to raid his and maybe Marc’s wardrobe for a suitable outfit, scrub every inch of his body and get to the café he’s supposed to be meeting you at.

The relief he feels at knowing he hasn’t missed the date is short lived though, the realisation that he doesn’t actually know where he’s supposed to be meeting you dawning on him quickly. Steven jerks back up in the bed, franticly looking for his dropped phone and hoping that Marc had thought to find that little but important bit of information out before disappearing for his hour’s long run. Thankfully Marc had, you having sent through the location as well as a copy of the menu so Steven knew what kinds of food were available. That in its self was a thoughtful gesture but Steven’s to distracted by the texts straight after you had asked him out for breakfast to give it much thought. The texts that Marc had sent you pretending to be him.

Steven wouldn’t have been so bold, so forward to outright ask you if it was a date but Marc didn’t suffer with the same awkward nervousness as he did, stating that it sounded an awful lot like you were asking him out on a date. Steven sucked in a breath as he carried on reading, your reply just as blunt and stating that was exactly what you were doing. Oh and now he understood why Marc had smirked, telling you that he was glad the two of you were on the same page and that he was looking forwards to your date. The last few text were nothing important, you passing on the cafe information and Marc telling you he would see you there.

A date.

Steven had a date with you and Marc had made sure there would be no doubt in Steven’s mind about it. He smiled dopily towards the mirror set up on the bedside table but his reflection was the only thing that stared back at him, looking like a love drunk idiot but Steven couldn’t quite bring himself to care. He made a promise to thank the other man latter but for now he had a date to get ready for. A date he wouldn’t be late for and definitely wasn’t going to miss. He quickly got rid of the cuff around his ankle, the thing falling forgotten to the floor with a loud thud and headed for the shower, already mentally going through his wardrobe as he tried to think of something to wear.

Marc turned up about an hour and half latter, yawning and grumbling only to fall silent when he took in the state of the room. Steven had probably tried on every single thing he owned, discarding them quickly and growing more and more frustrated with every outfit change. He didn’t know what he was doing. His last disaster of a date had been easy enough. It was dinner so he had dressed smarter than normal, an outfit that fitted the setting but this was different. This was breakfast and breakfast definitely didn’t require a suit. He had tried on casual clothes but he was sure they made it look like he wasn’t making an effort and he couldn’t really ware his work clothes because he didn’t want you thinking he thought of this even anything remotely close to a work thing. He was at a loss and seriously considering raiding Marc’s half of the wardrobe because nothing he had seemed right for his first of hopefully many dates with you.

He felt like he was on the edge of tears, brought on by frustration when he heard Marc’s voice gently telling him to “calm down. It’s gonna be fine. Let me help you.” Steven had sucked in a shaky breath, his eyes screwed shut as he gave a firm nod. He let Marc have the body without a fight, feeling calmer for it and actually able to breath. He was getting worked up, stressing over nothing but this was important to him. You were important to him and Steven didn’t want to mess this up. Not now after months of dancing around what he really wanted.

Steven watched from the mirrors around the apartment as Marc picked through his discarded clothes, asking Steven’s opinion on certain things and getting shot down on most of his suggestions because Steven was finding it hard to remember why he actually even liked the clothes he owned. At one point Steven had said for Marc to “just dress like you yeah? Girls seem to like that G.I.Joe thing you have going on,” because Steven knew that Marc would look better, did look better than him. That had gotten him a scowl, Marc pointing out that you had asked Steven out on a date not Marc so clearly you liked his messy and quirky dress sense. Once that had settled in and Steven realised he was right things had gotten a lot easier for the both of them. In the end they had agreed on a blue short sleeved shirt with leafs and flowers decorating it in a light brown. Steven wasn’t so keen on showing his arms off like that but Marc said that he had “worked hard for these muscles so might as well flaunt them,” winking at Steven in the floor length mirror as he flexed his arms slightly, making his biceps strain against the material.

Steven had wrinkled his noise at that. He wasn’t the kind of guy to put his body on display like that and he didn’t think you were the kind of person who cared about that sort of thing but Marc had insisted it would be worth it, all cocky charm and confidence. In the end they had compromised, Steven convincing Marc to put on Steven’s black jacket whilst he promised not to keep it on the whole time he was with you. Marc wasn’t too fond of the tan chinos Steven insisted on wearing, the other man grumbling about the lose fit as he rummaged through Steven’s scattered clothes for them but he had admitted they went well with the shirt with some gentle prodding from Steven.

Watching Marc trying to sort his hair out without slicking it back like he normally would was a whole new form of entertainment that Steven didn’t realise he had needed to see until he had. Marc cursed and grumbled, trying to get it to sweep to one side so his curls hung lose on one side whilst the rest was pushed back, something he wasn’t having much luck with. It probably didn’t help that when he had finally caved and asked Steven how he managed to get the birds nest he called hair under control he had just shrugged, saying it just kind of went that way on its own. That hadn’t been the answer Marc had been looking for apparently and he had let go of the comb instantly, letting it drop in the sink with a clatter and declaring himself done, telling Steven he could “do it it your damned self if you don’t like it.”

The switch had been practically seamless, Marc’s scowl disappearing as Steven took over with a small chuckle and a shake of his head. It hadn’t taken to long to fix the mess Marc had made of his hair, Marc huffing from the bathroom mirror and Steven gently teasing him about his stylist skills. Eventually though Steven was ready, keys in hand and his phone and wallet tucked inside his jacket pockets. He had hesitated in front of the mirror though, lifting his arms out and asking Marc if he looked ok one last time. Marc had huffed, rolling his eyes and telling Steven he looked fine before trying to get him out of the flat before he became late but Steven was a little reluctant to go.

Marc wasn’t coming with him.

Obviously Marc was coming with him. They had the same body, Steven couldn’t just leave him behind even if he wanted to but Marc was going to give Steven and you privacy though. He was going to disappear off to that place inside their minds where they went when the other was in complete control, the place where time just vanished and days went by in seconds.

For Marc it would be a blink and it’s over experience but that didn’t stop Steven from feeling bad about not only stealing one of Marc’s designated days off of him but also forcing him into that nothingness that stole hours and days from their lives. He had told the other man that he didn’t mind him being there, that Steven would never ask him to do that but Marc had insisted it was fine, stating that he could do with the rest and that Steven deserved the privacy he so rarely got these days. There had been a lot of back and forth, both of them growing frustrated with the other but eventually Steven had reluctantly given in, promising to let Marc have the body in a couple of hours when the date was over.

Steven nervously hovered in the doorway, hand curled around the handle and looking back and forth between Marc and the lift at the end of the corridor. He was nervous, really nervous if he was being honest and the thought of not having Marc there scared him. What if he messed up? What if he rambled so much that you got bored, realising that he really wasn’t that interesting and that you could do a thousand times better then Steven Grant from the gift shop?

He had said as much to the other man and Marc had given him a reassuring half smile, telling Steven that he would be fine, that Marc would be “right there if you need anything but I know you’ll be fine. She likes you Steven. You. So just be yourself.” Steven had taken a deep breath, trying to get his nerves under control as he listened to the other man. Marc was right. Though Marc was the one to agree to it Steven was the one you had actually asked out. Regardless of how this went you had found something about him appealing in the first place, something that made you want to spend time with him outside of the museum. With that reassurance firmly lodged in his mind Steven had said his finale goodbye, promising to let Marc have the body afterwards once more before heading out.

The cafe wasn’t that far away from the museum and easy enough to find. Steven even stopped at a florist and picked up a bouquet of sunflowers to give to you. He’s in a good mood by the time he arrives at the cutesy blue fronted building, quickly checking his hair in the window before pulling the door open and slipping inside. He has a second, a split second were he fears that you’ve stood him up before his eyes land on you, already sat at one of the tables by the window and smiling brightly at him as you waved him over. To say he was relieved would be an understatement.

Those first few seconds were awkward, Steven leaning across the table as you stand up to press a quick kiss to your cheek and missing, getting the side of your nose instead. You sink back down into your seat with a gentle laugh, gesturing to the seat opposite you but like the complete plonker he is Steven just stands there staring at you. He has only ever seen you in the smart attire you ware for work. He had thought you beautiful then but seeing you like this, in a soft grey jumper and jeans was beauty on a whole different level. You look comfy, warm and inviting and Steven wants to wrap his arms around you and nuzzle his head into your neck. He’s sure you would be an amazing cuddler.

Your laughter knocks him out of his day dream and has him blushing like crazy, hurriedly sitting down as he apologises and tells you that “you look bloody amazing. Not that you don’t normally but yeah. You’re stunning.” That gets you laughing again, smile wide and cheeks tinged slightly pink as you tell him that he looks “pretty stunning yourself” that has Steven beaming like a mad man. You thank him when he remembers to hand over the flowers, giving a sweet smile when he tells you that they had reminded him of you.

When the waitress turns up Steven hasn’t even picked up the menu let alone looked at what food was on offer. It’s a quick scramble to pick something out whilst the waitress looks down at him with boredom and a fake smile but eventually he settles for smashed avocado on toast and a cup of breakfast tea whilst you go for banana butterscotch pancakes and a cup of earl grey. The waitress disappears quickly, snatching up the menus and moving on to the next table. He should probably feel a little more annoyed about the service but Steven’s to focused on you to really notice anything else.

Conversation is a little generic to begin with, Steven unsure of what to say and you trying to coax him to open up with small talk about how easy it had been for him to find the place and general bits about working at the museum. Normally Steven wouldn’t have a problem with talking to you, chatting away easily but he’s acutely aware of how much he rambles and how 90% of his chosen topics have something to do with ancient Egypt and its Gods. He doesn’t want to bore you, doesn’t want you thinking he’s too odd or nerdy so he tries not to bring it up. He rapidly runs out of things to say though, struggling to find a topic that you would both enjoy and that isn’t over and done with after a few exchanged sentences.

Thankfully it doesn’t take to long for the food to turn up, both of you seeming to sigh in relief when the waitress turns up, placing the plates down in front of you with a clatter. It looks and smells delicious and Steven’s stomach rumbles loudly, reminding him of how long he had been awake and denying himself a snack just to make sure he would eat now. That gets a smile from you that coaxes a matching one from him and the strange awkwardness between the two of you eases slightly. You roll up your selves, pushing them up to your elbows before picking up your cutlery and declaring that you “have been thinking about these beauties since last night” but Steven’s brain has screeched to a halt, eyes fixed firmly on your wrist and avocado loaded fork hovering in front of his open mouth.

Steven had never seen your wrists before, your long sleeved shirts and blazers always hiding them away from view and you have never mentioned them before so it was well within reason that Steven was a little shocked to see the two tattoos covering the inside of your wrists. The black lines were thin and delicate, the yellow almost seeming to glitter like gold and the blue so bright that he would swear it was freshly painted just moments before whilst the reds were tinged with orange. It was like a sun set on your skin, the colours matching one almost perfectly.

Your right wrist has a scarab beetle on it, wings spread out and curling around to meet on the other side of your wrist, what looks like a sun held between its front tibia. On your left wrist was a side profile of what Steven assumed is a pharaoh wearing a pschent surrounded in a decorative oval border of snakes and blue lotus flowers. A basic depiction of a sun sat under the neck of the pharaoh, matching the one that was held aloft by the scarab and the same wings coming from behind the portrait to wrap round your wrist and meet at the other side. They are beautiful, eye catching and completely against the museums dress code so it was no wonder you had kept them hidden whilst at work.

It wasn’t that hard to catch him staring and when you had glanced down to see what had his attention you had huffed in amusement. The sound jerked Steven back to himself and he had apologised for being so rude whilst also letting you know how amazing he thought they looked. You brushed the compliment aside, telling him that it was all down to the artist and yeah that was true but it was the contrast to your skin that made them really stand out, like at any second the scarab beetle was going to scurry away and the pharaoh was going to turn and look at him.

Khepri and Atum. That’s what they represented you had told him, the morning and evening sun. Steven was slightly confused as to why you would have representations of two lesser known Gods tattooed onto you skin but he supposed they fit, what with you being so bright and warm like the sun. He had made some of-handed comment about where Ra was hiding, shoving his forkful of food into his mouth and delighting in the laugh that had gotten him. You tipped your head forward then, looking up at him through your lashes as you told him that “Ra is right where he belongs, in the middle” before winking at him and going back to your pancakes.

Steven had been confused at first, frowning at you as you smiled at him, your eyes alight with mischief as they dropped down to his chest then back up again. It was about then that Steven realised what you were implying and he almost choked on his toast, gulping down a mouth full of hot tea in an attempt to stop his coughing. He could feel his cheeks getting hotter and not from his near death experience. Ra was the God of the midday sun, amongst other things and if he was right you had to have another tattoo somewhere else on your body to represent that. Steven blushed even harder as he tried to keep his eyes from dropping down to your chest, like he would be able to see the thing through the soft fabric of your jumper if he stared had enough.

In an attempt to distract himself Steven asked about where you had gotten the tattoos done because “they really are stunning. Like little works of art you can carry around with you.” You were more than happy to answer, explaining that you had gotten them done out in Alexandria when you were much younger and working as an assistant to an American archaeologist. That had been enough to have Steven forgetting all about the other tattoo and its possible location, the two of you launching into a conversation about your rather colourful work history.

The two of you spend hours talking, Steven finding out that you were as big of a nerd about ancient history as he was, though your interests were a little broader than his. It’s fascinating and Steven quite happily listens to your stores and the seemingly endless facts you know, mesmerised by the way your face lights up as you talk. He asks question here and there when he doesn’t quite understand something or he wants more details, the two of you normally breaking off into almost mini debates about the different opinions historians had on the same subject across the year before you move onto the next topic.

Breakfast passes quickly, turning into lunch and the two of you end up ordering a couple of sandwiches and splitting a side of chips, completely unbothered by the world around you. Steven’s so engrossed in you and how much he’s enjoying his time with you that he didn’t even notice when his reflection shifts slightly and Marc appeared, watching the two of you for a long few minuets before disappearing again. Nor did he notice the other person, looking just like him and Marc but not, their lips set in a deep frown and dark angry eyes firmly fixed on you as you laughed loudly at a story Steven was telling.

Before Steven knows it five hours have passed, another waitress popping up at the table all bright smiles and politely asking if you wanted her to put your flowers in some water before they begin to wilt. It’s only then that you both realise the time and it dawns on Steven that he’s stolen almost a whole day away from Marc. He swears loudly, apologising about having kept you so long but you insist its fine, that you “couldn’t have though of a better way to spend my day off. Plus it doesn’t hurt that you’re easy on the eyes.” Steven had agreed, eager to let you know how much he had enjoyed the time he had spent with you whilst trying to brush off your compliment and hide his bashful smile and red cheeks.

Steven had tried to pay when the bill arrived, like a gentleman should, but you wouldn’t hear any of it, insisting you had been the one to ask him out so you should be the one to foot the bill. He hadn’t been able to fault that logic and eventually Steven had given in, promising to pay for next time. He hadn’t realised what he was saying at first, that he was already asking you out on another date until you had said that you would like that and how maybe next time could been dinner.

He walks you back to Tottenham Court tube station, the two of you chattering away about pointless little things that have you both laughing. He wants to take your hand, wants to lace his fingers with yours and rub his thumb across the back of your hand. He really wants to but he can’t quite bring himself to reach out across those last few inches that remain between you and take what he so desperately wants. He gets a kiss on the cheek when you say goodbye, this one lingering longer as heat spreads out from where your skin touches his and when you pull away Steven is helpless to stop himself from from lifting his hand and pressing his fingers against the spot where your lips had just been. Something that has you smiling as you wave goodbye, descending down the stairs to the tube station with a promise to see him at work but to talk to him even sooner.

He grins all the way home, even whistling and humming, saying hello and waving at random people as he went. He’s probably coming off as some kind of weirdo, off his meds and escaped from the loony bin but he doesn’t care. It had been a great date, amazing even and he tells Marc just that when he gets in, calling out the other man’s name before he’s even got the door closed. He appears in the mirror by the door before Steven’s even finished saying him name, a smug smile tugging up the corners of his lips as he takes in Steven’s wide smile that was starting to hurt his cheeks.

As soon as Marc asks how it went Steven goes off on one, relaying every detail from how you had looked, to the food you had eaten and even what the two of you had spoken about. On and on he went, chucking his coat over the back of his dining table chair before flopping back onto the couch. He talks for what feels like ages, Marc having moved to a closer mirror and actually listening as Steven talks about how amazing his breakfast turned lunch date had gone and about the next one. The dinner date. The one Steven was supposed to be planning.

Oh bugger.

Marc had found Steven’s dawning realisation of that funny, telling him to “at least pick a vegan place this time yeah? Don’t want to be picking you sick ass off the bathroom floor again.” Steven had grumbled about that being all Marc’s fault, unlacing his shoes and threatening to withhold body controlling privileges if he made Steven late for this date. Marc’s promised not to get in the way of Steven’s date is cut off as he slips into the body, Steven relinquishing control like he had promised to do and Marc doesn’t waist any time shedding Steven’s date outfit and slipping back into his normal lazing around outfit of jogging bottoms and a t-shirt, insisting that he wouldn’t help Steven sort himself out for that one, “no matter how pathetic and desperate you are.”

Steven doesn’t quite believe him.

[spectrenightfell]

First uploaded 08/06/2022

Updated 19/07/2022

Steven Grant x fem!reader / Marc Spector x fem!reader / Jake Lockley x fem!reader

title w/link | [rating] | word count

Synopsis

Ratings are bracketed: e.g. [G], [T], [M], [E]

[G] - appropriate for general audiences

[T] - appropriate for audiences 13+

[M] - contains non-graphic adult themes

[E] - explicit, 18+ readers only

Tags to follow series: liamwl | lonely is a man without love

🌗 Part One | [G] | 4k |

After Harrow and everything that had happened in Cairo, Steven’s finally back home in London. He and Marc are getting along for once and peacefully sharing the body, both of them eager to get back to a normal and crazy God free life. The only problem is a normal life is boring and after the last few weeks of adventure Steven is now a little dissatisfied with his lonely and unfulfilling life.

One day bleeds into another, boring and grey and so very lonely. It’s enough to drive a normal person mad so he can only imagine how crazy it’s driving Marc. He’s just on the verge of getting a cat for some form of companionship when suddenly you enter his life like a ray f sunlight cutting through rain clouds.

Steven’s never fallen so hard so quickly but there’s something about you, something a little off that has both Steven and Marc on edge despite how perfect you seem to be. Maybe to perfect.

🌗 Part Two | [M] | 6k

Steven’s handling the blackouts as well as could be expected, meaning he wasn’t handling them at all. When he wakes up in some fancy hotel room with someone hidden away in the bathroom and clear signs that the mysterious third alter had had a rather good night Steven panics, running from the room before he can find out who his companion is.

He’s on edge, worried about what the other alter is up to and Marc isn’t being any help at all and to make matters worse he snaps at you yet again when really he had been directing it at the other man. It’s not all bad though because somehow he manages not to scare you off and over the weeks a friendship develops between the two of you.

Now if only he could get Marc to shut up about asking you out and figure out how he can miss your touch before even having laid a finger on you.

🌗 Part Three | [M] | 4k

Steven spends weeks getting to know you, stubbornly ignoring Marc's insistence that you were flirting with him and that he should ask you out before he misses his chance. He wants to believe the other man, he does but Steven knows that someone like you would never go for an odd ball like him. Never had and never would. He's ok with that, mostly. After all friendship is better than no relationship at all.

Well he was fine with that until he wakes up smelling like sex and alcohol, with no memories of the night before and the sweet smell of your perfume clinging to his sheets.

It's all downhill from there until suddenly it's not.

🌗 Part Four | [G] | 4k

Steven’s excited for your date. Really excited. He’s so exited that he mages to work himself up into a right state, worrying about how he looks and being late, not to mention that he’s convinced this is all some big misunderstanding because you can do so much better then the weirdo from the museum gift shop that’s always talking to himself and got fired for smashing up a public toilet. If it wasn’t for Marc stepping in and taking control of the disaster of a situation Steven was sure he wouldn’t have made it out the flat let alone to your date. Thankfully he does make it there in time, a bouquet of Sunflowers clasped in his hands and a smile so wide it hurts. Now all he had to do is make it through the date without driving you alway. Easy. Right?

🌗 Part Five | [M] | 11k

One date turns into another and then another until Steven's spending most of his time with you. His life is on the up, Steven the happiest he's been in a while. Sure he's still arguing with Marc about telling you about the other man and what Steven actually is but its not enough to dampen his almost constant state of happiness and excitement. The other man will come around eventually and when he does Steven can only hope you will hear him out before deciding if he's worth the hassle or not. Stevens happy and in love so naturally this is when the other alter makes himself known in the worst way possible.

Steven's never been so terrified in his life.

🌗 Part 6 | [T] | 4K

Steven’s making a mess of things, the threat of Jake looming over his head and leading him to make one bad decision after another. He thinks he has time thought, time to fix things whilst keeping you safe and away from the other alter but time is not on his side and when you turn up at the flat unexpectedly Steven has to face the horrifying truth that he might have messed up in a way that would have you walking out of his life for good.

🌗 Part 7 | [M] | 9K

Steven’s never been this scared before. He knows Jake had been to see you, had the flashes of memories to prove it but now you’re gone, disappearing without a word. He can’t help it, how terrified and desperate he feels. What if Jake has done something to you, hurt you? It would all be Steven’s fault because he hadn’t been strong enough to protect you from the psychotic murderer sharing the body.

[spectrenightfell]

Summary: Steven spends weeks getting to know you, stubbornly ignoring Marc's insistence that you were flirting with him and that he should ask you out before he misses his chance. He wants to believe the other man, he does but Steven knows that someone like you would never go for an odd ball like him. Never had and never would. He's ok with that, mostly. After all friendship is better than no relationship at all.

Well he was fine with that until he wakes up smelling like sex and alcohol, with no memories of the night before and the sweet smell of your perfume clinging to his sheets.

It's all downhill from there until suddenly it's not.

Pairings: Steven Grant x fem!reader / hints of Mark Spector x fem!reader & Jake Lockley x fem!reader

Rating: M (implied sexual activity)

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first

As the weeks went by and Steven got to know you even better things began to get even more out of control, like the other alter was getting bored of hiding but didn’t want to just straight up come out and introduce themselves so instead they were making their presence known in other more annoying and worrying ways. They had a bad habit of leaving dirty dishes in the sink as well as their dirty and sometimes blood splattered clothes scattered around the room. That was fine, had to be even if it left Steven panicked and slightly scared when he came across a blood soaked shirt and no noticeable injuries on the body. He didn’t really want to think about what this other alter got up to because both he and Marc were half way convinced he was some sort of mass murdering sex fiend. The point was Steven could deal with the few extra chores this new alter generated even with Marc grumbling in his ear about how much of an asshole this other alter was.

What he couldn’t deal with was waking up as naked as the day he was born, smelling like cigarettes and alcohol with a pair of lacy underwear clutched to face like some sort of deranged pervert.

Steven had freaked out and Marc had had no choice but to take over the body because Steven was to busy hyperventilating over the fact that whoever this alter was had clearly brought someone else back to the flat, to Steven’s home. It felt like an invasion of his life, like his space had been violated, almost like someone had broken in and moved everything half an inch to the left just so he would know something was wrong. He could sort of deal with the other person going out and picking women up but not this, not having them here in his home. It wasn’t just anyone that had been here though was it? The other alter had left the sheets smelling like sex, papaya and sweetness. Steven would recognise that smell anywhere and the fear that this other alter had done something to you, with you, had set in quickly.

He hand been terrified that they had pretended to be him, had used the number he had been so chuffed to get to lure you in and take advantage of your kindness. Steven had been worried beyond rationality that your friendship would now be in tatters and it had only been Marc’s strong and grounding voice that had stopped him from having a full on panic attack. He had shown Steven his phone, letting him see that there were no new calls and the last text that had been sent to you had been the photo of a mouse sitting on top of a cats head that he had sent to you the previous day before his mind had gone blank.

That had helped calm him but he had still let Marc stay in control of the body, getting them ready for their shift at the museum and paying hardly any attention to the other man complaining about the state of Steven’s hair because “how the hell do you even see with this shit flopping in your face like that.” If he had been paying attention Steven would probably have found it funny watching Marc trying to make himself look like Steven but as it was he was still stuck staring at his bed with absolute dread and horror, that sweet scent that had clung to the sheets invading Steven’s mind and making his stomach churn.

Even though he knew that he hadn’t spoken to you Steven couldn’t shake the uneasy feeling that had settled over him. It stayed with him all the way to the museum, even when Marc practically forced him into fronting because he couldn’t deal with Steven’s job. Steven stayed on edge the whole day, right up until the point he saw you striding across the room towards him and then he would have sworn his heart stopped, his breath catching in his throat as he waited for you yell at him or slap him, maybe even both. His hands were shaking and he felt like he was going to be sick. He can’t do this, can’t lose you because of something some other alter did.

In his mind Steven’s already lost you, either to anger or the realisation that he isn’t who you might think he is because Steven’s well, Steven and this other alter probably had the same confidence and charm like Marc to lure you into his bed because he knows, is so sure of the fact that you would never do anything remotely like that with him. You are beautiful, confident and smart, the literal embodiment of sunshine in his grey and dismal world. Steven is nothing like that. He’s weird and nervous, a mess really, both physically and mentally. A walking disaster as Donna would say. You would never pick him. Would never want him and he had come to terms with this. Steven wasn’t the guy who got the girl but some part of him had gotten you, the other alter having confidence and charm to take what Steven so desperately longed for.

It hurt, the unmistakable sting of jealousy poking at his fragile heart. He already felt like he had lost you which was ridiculous because Steven hadn’t had you in the first place. Didn’t stop him from feeling like an unwanted and pathetic mess though. Marc tries to reassure him, to comfort Steven from the reflective surface of the counter but it doesn’t do much to get Steven out of his slump, just reminds him of how jealous he had been of Marc at the begging. He got to go on adventures, got the beautiful women on his arm, a real James Bond type. Of course Steven had been jealous what with his sheltered and unfulfilling life and complete lack of any kind of relationship. Seems he was meant to be the one who missed out, relegated to the shadows and only good for keeping a roof over their heads. He was nothing, a nobody and he was sure if he let Marc have the body, if he slipped back into the darkest recesses of the other mans mind never to be seen again that there would be no one to miss him, let alone even notice if he was gone.

So deep in his wallowing Steven didn’t even notice you stood before him, your smile quickly falling as worry took over. Steven didn’t answer you the first couple times you said his name, to lost to himself and Marc’s attention was firmly fixed on his alter. So it came as a surprise when warm and delicate fingers brushed across his brow, brushing his curls away from his eyes. His head jerked back, eyes wide as he looked at you like a startled animal. Warmth radiated out from where you were touching him, your fingers gently trailing down the side of his face until you were cupping his cheek. You looked worried, the concern obvious when you asked what was wrong.

Steven didn’t know what to say, how to even begin trying to find out if it had been you that had left his sheets smelling like sin and sunshine and everything Steven longed for but knew he would never have. He wanted to know, desperately so but at the same time he didn’t because then what? He would have to tell you it wasn’t him, would have to explain about Marc and then this other alter, this unknown person who had swept in and stolen you away. Oh gods you would run away from him quicker then Steven could probably even explain himself properly.

He took your hand in both of his, missing your warmth as he placed your hand down on the desk. He should ask, had to ask but when faced with the worry and concern in your eyes he couldn’t do it, to scared to know the answer. So he he just smiled tiredly, promising you that he was fine “just had a rough morning is all, nothing to worry about love.” You don’t seem convinced, eyes darting across him as if you’re looking for anything physically wrong with him that could explain his weird behaviour. When you couldn’t find anything you reluctantly gave in, double checking that he was sure and insisting that he could tell you if something was wrong, that you would always have time for him, to listen to him. And oh wasn’t that something, stealing Steven’s breath away and making tears prick at his eyes because Steven had never had someone like that in his life before, so willing to offer up that level of comfort and companionship. Yes Marc had tried his hardest to give Steven a simple and easy life, letting him believe that he had at least had his mum but that had all been fake hadn’t it. This though, this was real and Steven couldn’t stop the painfully wide smile that stretched across his lips if he tried.

It took remarkable effort but Steven managed to pull himself together long enough to start fiddling with the packets of sweets on the counter, making himself look busy and trying to hide the idiotic look on his face. It was probably why he didn’t think about what he said next, acting like a right dope at the fact you were being so nice to him. He didn’t even realise he had said till the words were out of his mouth, his casual enquiry about what you had been up to the night before slipping out easy because Steven had asked you the same question time and time before. He froze, body tensing as he waited for the answer that he feared was coming.

You seemed to still for a second, your eyes boring into his as if you were looking for something. Steven held his breath, eyes wide as he remained trapped in your intense gaze. This is it, he’s sure of it. Even Marc is watching you, his eyes dark and intense as he to waits for you to laugh at Steven, to roll your eyes and say “with you silly.”

That’s not what you say though, your brows furrowing slightly before you slump forwards against the counter with a huff. The next five minutes we’re filled with you complaining about the night before. You had gone out with some of the other tour guides to a new club out in Soho, a mistake apparently because that wasn’t your idea of a fun evening. You had stayed though, slowly sipping on your cocktail and trying to at least try and have a good time whilst also turning down guys who were looking for something more then you were willing to give. Eventually though you had given up and headed home in the early hours of the morning, not wanting to be too tired for your shift that day.

The relief Steven felt at knowing you hadn’t been anywhere near him or his flat was probably obvious but Steven didn’t care. As much as Steven wanted you in his life in the romantic sense he didn’t want it to be like that, almost like he had lied to you, using deceit and trickery to get what he wanted. Plus he would be a rotten liar if he said the thought of someone else getting to see you like that didn’t make him stupidly jealous. Even if that other person shared the same body as him. It was just some strange coincidence that his bed had smelt so much like you that morning, taunting him with what he wanted but couldn’t have. You couldn’t be the only women in London who used the same perfume or body wash or shampoo or any combination of those things. He had been stupid to jump to conclusions like that. After all, you wouldn’t go for him like that, no matter how charming and dashing this other alter might be.

You are absurdly cute as you role your eyes and grumble about everything you had hated about the whole experience, stating you would rather go to a nice pub instead. Somewhere where you didn’t have to shout to be heard over the music and where you could actually get some personal space because people weren’t packed in to the last available inch. Steven wanted to suggest a nice little place he knew of, not even ten minutes walk from the museum. A real traditional pub with a beer garden that you could enjoy the limited sunshine in and it even had vegan food on the menu that was actually pretty decent. It was the perfect opportunity, a brilliant idea for a first date and even Marc was hissing at him to “do it Steven. Come on ask her, she’s gonna say yes.” Steven should ask, he really should and the invite was on the tip of his tongue but then something shifted and a beam of sunlight fell across you, making you look like some sort of angel or nymph and whatever small speck of confidence Steven had had vanished as he was reminded yet again that you were to good for him. To perfect for a head case like him.

Instead Steven had offered his opinions on those kind of clubs, wrinkling his nose up in disgust and agreeing that he to would much rather spend an evening in a nice pub, with decent company and a pint or two of good quality beer. That had gotten a smile from you, your eyes sparkling with mischief as you leant across the counter to tease him “oh I don’t know. I’m sure you go down a treat at those sort of places. What with those big innocent eyes and all those muscles you’re hiding under those outlandish shirts. I bet you’re completely irresistible.” Marc was adamant you were flirting with him but Steven was to busy blushing like a virgin to do much more then laugh in nervous embarrassment, brushing off you words and telling you that “nah, not me. Bet you do though. Pretty girl like you probably had a queue a mile long for a dance. Probably had to beat them off with your purse or some’ing.”

Marc tells him that was a good thing to say, that he apparently had some sort of game but Steven wasn’t really sure what that meant so he did his best to ignore the other man and focus all his attention into you. You blushed, a glorious pink colouring your cheeks as you ducked your head slightly as if to hide from him. Steven was captivated though, a feeling of pride welling in his chest because he was the one who made you look like that and wasn’t that bloody brilliant.

He wants to keep you there, wants to make your blush and smile and maybe even giggle like some sort of giddy school girl. He wants all of your attention on him and only him, just like how when you’re in the room nothing else exists for him. He knows it’s obsessive, probably a little creepy and possessive but you are all Steven thinks about these days and he’s hard pressed to care about the reasons why he should probably be trying to put some distance between the two of you.

You turn back to look at him, your eyes wide and practically glowing in the sunlight. Marc’s hissing almost a constant stream of “ask her Steven, ask her now,” and for once Steven is inclined to listen to the other man. He loved you. Oh gods does he love you and whatever he had been feeling before that had kept him from telling you that suddenly vanishes and is replaced with a confidence that Steven had only felt after the Duat, once he and Marc had decided to coexist and accept one another. He opens his mouth, the first few words of his invite slipping past his lips and he swears that he sees hope and excitement in your eyes but then someone’s calling your name and the moment is lost.

Your head snapped to the side and Steven deflates, all that confidence disappearing as Marc groans loudly in frustration. He swears he hears the echo of laughter coming from somewhere far away yet frightened close but it’s gone before Steven can concentrate on it enough to figure out where it’s coming from. Steven feels colder now that he doesn’t have your attention and he can’t help but frown as he listens to one of the other tour guides tell you off for having wandered away from your group for so long. You are apologetic, giving Steven a sad smile and a quick goodbye as you rush off to wrangle your group back together and move onto the next exhibit.

He doesn’t see you for the rest of the day though he does get a text from you, a text that has Steven giddy with excitement and a nervous wreck all at once. You start off with yet another apology for running off so suddenly, something that Steven had assured you it wasn’t a problem because he understood how busy you were. He even apologised for keeping you from your duties though he hadn’t been expecting you to turn round and say that you “would happily allow you to distract me any day,” that you enjoyed his company and your daily chats. He was stunned and giddy, sat at his rickety little table in his cave like flat with his glasses perched on his nose and staring down at your text like it was a communication from some great deity. And then your next text had come through and Steven had dropped his phone like it had electrocuted him.

Let me make it up to say tomorrow morning at 9:30? There’s this vegan cafe not far from the museum that I think you will like. Have breakfast with me?

Steven just stared down at his phone in shock, body unmoving as Marc demands to know what’s happened from the mirror propped up on one of the nearby shelves. He stutters over his words, unable to fully form a sentence and pointing at his phone like that would explain everything to the other man. There’s a loud huff and then a tugging in his gut like he’s being pulled back. Steven goes willingly, letting Marc slip into place as his eyes role back and everything goes dark for a second until he’s the one looking out through the mirror and watching as Marc roles his shoulders, shoving his hand through his hair to get it out of his face and settles into the body. He chucks Steven’s glasses onto the table as he reaches for the phone with his over hand, his brows furrowed in concentration as he reads through the messages. It should feel like an invasion of privacy but Marc already knew half of what you two talked about and it wasn’t like anything inappropriate had been said. It would just become glaringly obvious how much of a love struck idiot Steven was but again, Marc already knew that.

He’s silent as he reads and Steven can’t help but fidget, toying with the cuffs of his shit and nervously waiting for Marc to say something about it all and bring some form of order to Steven’s chaotic mind. Eventually he placed the phone back down, leaning back in the chair and staring out across the flat. His voice is calm and kind of flat when he speaks, what Steven thinks is a small condescending smirk tugging at the edges of his lips. “So a date huh?” Steven makes a small wounded noise, likes he’s just been kicked and quickly starts trying to explain why it’s not that. Not a date. It quickly dissolved into a one sided conversation where Steven ends up convincing himself it is a date and full on panicking because he had never been on a date before “except that one to the steak place but erh I didn’t get that date now did I and anyway can’t really say it was a date because I was two days late thanks to you and that bloody pigeon.” Before Steven can get too lost in his rambling though Marc cuts him off with a laugh, a small smile on his normally stoic face as he watches Steven in the mirror.

Steven’s mouth suddenly feels dry, his words disappearing. He didn’t think Marc was laughing at him, not in a malicious way any way but it still leaves him feeling a little unsure of the whole situation. Marc picks up the phone again, completely ignoring Steven as he timidly demands to know “erh what you doing mate?” He doesn’t answer, the phone buzzing in his hands before he’s tapping away again. Panic sits heavy in Steven’s chest, back to wringing his hands as he waits for Marc to tell him what’s going on.

There’s another buzz of a text coming through, Marc smirking as he reads it and Steven practically whines wanting to know what you had said. What Marc had said to you? In one fluid movement Marc pushes up from the seat and drops Steven’s phone next to his glasses, turning and winking at Steven and telling him that it “looks like you’re gonna to be busy tomorrow morning.” Steven’s to busy grinning like a dope to pay attention to anything else, Marc informing him that as Steven was getting the body on one of Marc’s designated days he was taking the body now, going for a run so he didn’t have to listen to Steven panic about the next morning. Steven just mumbled out a “yeah mate,” waving the other man off as he slips into that dark nothingness that they go to when they want to be truly alone, already panicking over what clothes to wear and if he should bring flowers. Should he try to kiss you after or would that he pushing it too far too soon.

Oh gods this was going to be a mess.

[spectrenightfell]

Summary: Steven’s handling the blackouts as well as could be expected, meaning he wasn’t handling them at all. When he wakes up in some fancy hotel room with someone hidden away in the bathroom and clear signs that the mysterious third alter had had a rather good night Steven panics, running from the room before he can find out who his companion is.

He’s on edge, worried about what the other alter is up to and Marc isn’t being any help at all and to make matters worse he snaps at you yet again when really he had been directing it at the other man. It’s not all bad though because somehow he manages not to scare you off and over the weeks a friendship develops between the two of you.

Now if only he could get Marc to shut up about asking you out and figure out how he can miss your touch before even having laid a finger on you.

Pairings: Steven Grant x fem!reader / hints of Mark Spector x fem!reader & Jake Lockley x others

Rating: M (implied sexual activity)

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Steven went through the rest of his shift in a sort of daze, stuck replaying his first interaction with you over and over, only half paying attention to what he was doing and the people that came up to his counter. He was stunned yet thrilled that you had approached him, amazed that you had actually known his name and had seemed to have some sort of interest in him. The more he had thought about your interaction though the stranger it seemed.

There had been a familiarity there that shouldn’t have been considering it was the first time you had ever actually interacted and the amused fondness you had seemed to view the whole exchange with had been far to soft and understanding, like you were almost used to his chaotic and anxious behaviour. It left Steven feeling confused and Marc suspicious. Something didn’t quite add up now he was thinking about it without your presence clouding his judgment and his heart sank. He had thought for one glorious and idiotic moment that you had actually miraculously been interested in him, that somehow he had gotten your attention just by being himself.

He really should have known better.

It puts a major dampener on his mood and by the time he leaves the museum Steven’s nothing more then a dejected mess, most definitely moping as he trudged to the bus stop. Marc tries to cheer him up but he’s never really been that good at that sort of thing and his “so what, she’s not that grate any way” does nothing what so ever to make Steven feel better because they both know it’s a lie. You’re smart and funny, confident but not in a way that makes you seem like an arse. You’re beautiful to boot and that’s not just Steven’s opinion, he knows Marc finds you attractive as well.

Steven doesn’t see you the rest of the week. You’re of with some kind of emergency the next day and then he’s off for the next four. Marc does some more digging into you, ignoring Steven when he whines and begs Marc to “just leave it alone mate.” He doesn’t listen, even calling a few old contacts but he didn’t find out anything new apart from your address, national insurance number and the fact that you had a monthly subscription to national geographic traveler. There was nothing to suggest you were anything other then what you appeared to be and that left Steven feeling both relieved and frustrated. Relived because the thought of you having only been playing him for nefarious reasons was, well it was down right terrifying and soul crushing if he was being honest. No one had ever liked him for him before and he desperately wanted to hold onto that feeling of shock and wonder that had taken over when you had spoken to him but neither he or Marc could shake the that strange feeling that something wasn’t quite right about the whole five minutes that Steven had spent gawking at you. Whatever it was neither of them could think of it and Steven was more then ok to push his suspicious to the side in favour of playing out every other way he could have handled the situation. That was until they blacked out again.

Steven guessed he should be thankful that he hadn’t come back to himself in some foreign country, covered in blood and running from the local authorities or some deranged gang out to kill him. No, thankfully this time he was still in London, jerking back into the body with a gasp and full of panic and confusion. A quick look around the room was good enough for Steven to see he was in a hotel room and a rather fancy one at that, the London skyline visible through the wall of glass and lit up with a thousand lights, the moon hanging full and bright to the west as it made its way back down to earth.

The next thing Steven noticed was that he was sprawled amongst the rumpled sheets of a large and rather comfy bed. He was in nothing but tight black boxers, leaning against the headboard and staring out across the city. Steven had no idea why the other alter that was living rent free in the body would book themselves into a hotel, his confusion mounting and imagination running away from as he tried to figure it out. Then Marc had helpfully pointed out everything Steven had missed and the reason why became so obvious Steven couldn’t believe he had missed it to start with.

It wasn’t just his clothes thrown haphazardly across the room.

Steven really didn’t know how he had missed the white lace bra draped over the back of the sofa or the matching panties hanging off the bedside light. Not to mention the other bits of clothing that made a trail from the door that obviously belonged to a women. It was round about then when Steven realised he could hear the shower going and he realised he wasn’t alone. Really the fact that some unknown woman’s clothes were thrown all the over the place should have clued him into that little fact but he had been kind of confused and stunned by the situation he was in to really think about what everything meant when the pieces were put together.

Naturally Steven panicked. He managed to get his legs tangled in the sheets in his haste to get out of the bed, stumbling over and ending up on the floor, his face pressed into the ridiculously soft and plush carpet. He was quick to recover, yanking the sheets away from himself and frantically looking for the rest of this clothes. He ignored Marc’s suggestion to stay and get some answers about their other alter, doing his best to ignore the other man in the vast amount of glass in the room. In that moment he didn’t want to know what the other alter had gotten up to, embarrassed and horrified about the prospect of having to explain to some poor women why he didn’t remember them or what they had spent the evening doing. He might be able to make it through a lot of weird and uncomfortable situations but this was one thing he really didn’t want to have to experience. Not if he could help it.

He was barely dressed when he headed for the door, his shirt half unbuttoned and belt hanging open. He did a quick check to make sure the jacket he had pulled on had his keys and wallet in before he yanked the heavy door open and slipped out in to the corridor, the sound of the shower shutting off reaching him just as he shut the door. He righted his clothes as best as he could in the lift, trying to get Marc to get out the way so he could see but the other man wasn’t having any of it, arms crossed over his chest and looking at Steven with a mix of annoyance and disbelief that made Steven even more fidgety then he had already been. It wasn’t until he was safely back in his flat and under the to hot spray of his crappy shower that Steven realised he had probably left whoever had been in that hotel room with him to foot the bill, something they might not have been able to afford.

Steven had been to tired and sore to really think about it to much, promising to call the next morning and make sure it had been paid for. But first he needed actual sleep, letting Marc take control of their hands. He slipped the cuff into place, making sure it was tight before Steven collapsed back against his pillows. He had attempted to get comfy but his muscles felt well used and achey making it difficult to find a good way to lay. It didn’t help that his back was stinging, the scratch marks running from his shoulder blades to his waist surprisingly deep and stinging from the hot water. He had bite marks and hickys scattered across his his chest and pelvis, even a couple along the inside of his thighs that were particularly dark and tender. Whoever she had been had clearly enjoyed themselves and Steven could only assume that the other alter had enjoyed it to.

He’s still thinking about it the next day, the scratches along his back itching under his shirt and making him fidget more then he normally would. Donna keeps eyeing him suspiciously and that just makes Steven fidget more, toying with the collar of his shirt like maybe she can see the rather aggressive bite mark on his shoulder somehow. Eventually Marc had slapped his hand away, hissing angrily for Steven to “quit it” before marching them off to the stockroom and spending ten minutes lecturing Steven about his weird, weirder behaviour until Steven finally had enough and demanded that Marc be quiet and get out of his space. Steven’s luck was just that bad that as he was informing Marc that he could “keep your option to your bloody self yeah?” you walked in.

Steven froze as his eyes landed on you, stood in the doorway and looking rather taken aback by his sudden outburst. He couldn’t tell if the loud groan echoing around his head came from him or Marc, might even have been both of them. Again? Again you had caught him snapping at Marc, Steven so wound up and on edge that he had been unable to stop himself from lashing out at the other man. You had to think he was crazy by now, not to mention rude and abrasive when in reality you were just catching him at the worst possible times. Yeah, well, fine. Sure he is a little on the crazy side, how could he not be with someone else living in his body and constantly nattering away at him. And that wasn’t even taking into account whoever the hell was in the driving seat when both he and Marc blacked out. Maybe he really should see a therapist. A real one with actual diplomas and letters after their name.

Before Steven could pull himself together and blurt out an apology, the look of shock had faded and you were back to smiling at him, a twinkle of amusement in your eyes. His outburst hadn’t seemed to faze you, making a joke about promising to be a neutral party if you were allowed to get to the boxes to guide books in the corner. All Steven had been able to do was laugh, nervously rubbing at the back of his neck as he gestured to the stack of boxes and telling you to “have at it.” He sounded awkward and pathetic even to himself and he couldn’t even begin to imagine how stupid he sounded to you but all you did was smile brightly at him, offering him a polite “thanks Steven” as you breezed past him.

You didn’t speak another word as you started pulling out the glossy guid books from the boxes, stacking them neatly to the side, seemingly keeping to your promise by not saying anything at all. Steven just stood there like the idiot he was, watching you like some kind of creeper whilst alternating between mentally berating himself and sighing about how pretty you looked. He didn’t know how it was possible but even in a windowless room you seemed to glow like you were bathed in sunlight. Almost like you had absorbed all its rays as they beamed down on you and now that you were away from the sun you were releasing them all back out into the universe. Steven though you looked warm, not like to hot and should lose your waistcoat or something but like if he were to touch you, your skin would be pleasantly warm under his fingers and if he were ever so lucky to be wrapped in your arms it would feel like being surround by a nice warm blanket in the colder months when the heating in his flat gives out. He can easily imagine the two of you huddled under his duvet, rain pelting against the glass as the two of you cuddle and read. It’s an appealing fantasy, one that Steven probably would have gotten lost in if Marc hadn’t taken control of his hand and jabbed a finger into his side, making him yelp loudly as he jerked away from the sensation.

The sudden noise makes you stop, looking back at Steven with concerns from where you had been halfway out the door. Steven laughed nervously, mumbling out some rubbish about getting an electric shock that sounds like borderline incoherency and had Marc rolling his eyes from the shinny table top. You look away from him, eyes darting out the door before returning to Steven. You’re nibbling on your lip, clearly nervous about whatever you’re thinking about. You look adorable in Steven’s opinion but then he is kind of biased. You seem to decide what you’re going to do and quickly without a word you’re striding back into the room and towards the desk, dropping the guide books down with a dull a thud before demanding to know why Steven wasn’t a tour guide.

He’s taken aback by the sudden question, eyes wide and mouth hanging open like he’s trying to catch flys. You were stood before him, eyes locked with his and crystal clear as you waited expectantly for his answer. Marc was for once quiet, seemingly waiting for the same answer as you. It was a sore spot between them, Marc insisting Steven should go for it because he was more then qualified for the position and Steven had always just shrugged him off, his own inadequacies getting the better of him. Not that Donner would ever allow him to apply for it even if he could somehow borrow Marc’s confidence. She hadn’t allowed it before all the crazy stuff that had happened and he doubted that had changed since then. It just wasn’t something he would get to do and Steven had accepted that.

The silence had seemed to stretch on for to long and you were back to nervously nibbling on your lip, the determination slipping into worry. The lip biting was cute but Steven didn’t like seeing that look in your eyes. It dimmed your natural brightness and that just seemed wrong. You were born to shine, bright and beautiful and blinding. He wanted to see you smiling again. Wanted to be the reason why. He wanted to give you everything you could ever want and need and that in itself was kind of terrifying but Steven still found himself eager to answer the question you had had asked, simply because it had been you asking.

Steven didn’t get the chance to say anything though, your words rushing out from between your bitten red lips as you tried to backpedal. You apologised for being rude, assuring him that he didn’t have to answer because it was none of your business. You had tried to wave the whole thing off, apologising yet again as you picked up your stack of guide books and went to walk away from him. Steven wasn’t sure who moved the body, all he knew was one moment you had been about to leave, thinking that Steven didn’t want to talk to you and the next he was leant across the table, his hand curled around your wrist and keeping you from taking another step away from him.

Your eyes are wide and full of surprises as you slowly turn to look down at where Steven has a hold of you, your lips forming a cute little o shape. Steven knows his cheeks are red from the way he can feel his face heating up, probably looks as red as a tomato and like a right plonker to boot but he can’t let go and can’t seem to get his eye to go any lower than your lips despite how badly he wants to see what his skin looks like against yours. Your soft to the touch though and just as warm as he had imagined, his thumb absentmindedly rubbing against your pulse as it speeds up.

The silence drags on, neither of you doing anything to put a stop to whatever is going on between the two of you. Steven knows he should let go, should straighten up and apologise for his rude behaviour before answering you question. He knows he should do those things but it’s like he’s stuck, his body turning to stone as soon as he had made contact with you. There is something strangely familiar about holding you, like his body already knows the feeling of his calloused hands against your smooth skin. That can’t be though because Steven’s never laid so much as a finger on you before let alone his whole hand. Doesn’t change the fact that he knows that if he trails his fingers up along your arm ever so lightly it will have you shivering and moaning softly.

Steven does it without realising, his fingers uncurling from around your wrist, his fingertips lightly trailing across the inside of your arm. It seems to snap you out of your trance, and your quick to pull you arm away from Steven’s grasp. He misses you almost instantly, his hand feeling cold now he was no longer encircling your warmth. There’s an awkwardness between you now, one that doesn’t go away when Steven moves back and straightens. He catches Marc in the reflection, the other man having been oddly quiet throughout the whole exchange. He’s frowning down at what Steven thinks is his hand, his brows furrowed in concentration or confusion. Steven wasn’t quite sure if he was being honest. Whatever the reason was Steven didn’t like it, made him feel uneasy. He really didn’t like feeling like that.

Your hesitant voice cuts through the silence and Steven looks back up at you slowly, almost afraid of what he will find. You’re smiling again, softly and hesitant as you gesture behind you towards the door and tell him you should be getting back, another tour group waiting for you. Steven nods, rambling as he tries tell you it’s fine because “of course ya do. You’re a very beautiful, BUSY! woman. Don’t let little old me keep you.” Marc groans loudly and Steven’s face burns with embarrassment, mortified about his small slip up but it seems to get rid of the tension between you, your obvious unease disappearing as you laugh. Not at him though. Your smile is sweet, eyes full of fondness and you’re back to glowing warm and inviting like the sun again. Steven’s embarrassment is forgotten as quickly as it had come and he smiled back at you, wide and slightly dopy.

You leave quickly after that, stack of guide books in hand and still smiling as you slip from the room, waving and promising to “see you around Steven with a v.” He waves back even though you are already well and truly gone. The room seems duller without you there, colder and Steven knows that’s not the case but he can’t help but wrap his arms around himself and rub at his biceps. Marc is still frowning, staring towards the door from where he’s reflection is stuck in the table. Steven can’t help himself, asking what’s wrong and mimicking the other mans look as he glances towards the door. Marc doesn’t know, can’t quite place his finger on it but something had left him feeling on edge once more.

It makes Steven worry and Marc tries his best to assure him that it’s probably nothing , “years worth of distrust and having to look over my shoulder catching up to me.” Steven wants to believe him, wants it to be that simple but they both know it’s not going to be. Not with their luck. He doesn’t say any of that though, just nods and tells Marc that “yeah, you’re probably right mate. Just paranoid is all.” Steven grabs a box of scarab shaped gummies before heading back to his station, not wanting to give Donna yet another reason to yell at him again.

To Steven’s surprise he does see you around. A lot. Every day he is at the museum you seem to find him, smiling brightly and easily pulling him into conversation. Those moments never lasted more then ten or fifteen minutes if he was lucky before either Donna came round to chase you off or you had another tour group to lead through the museum. Those few minutes were the highlight of Steven’s day though and as the weeks went on he would spend hours trying to think of new and exciting topics to keep you engaged much to Marc’s annoyance. Steven couldn’t really blame Marc for getting annoyed with him though, after all he was the one who had to listen to Steven prattle on and on about a whole range of subjects whilst getting all dopy over your smile and laugh and the way you looked at him. Like he was the centre of your universe, something Steven found fundamentally absurd. If anything you were the centre of his universe, his radiant sun and he was the small sphere of rock orbiting around you.

Marc was almost as bad as him though, pointing out things he thought you would like and giving Steven pointers in how to flirt with you. Marc wanted him to be suggestive, wanted Steven to get in close and accidentally on purpose brush his fingers against yours. He wanted Steven to tell you how beautiful you were, to quote Shakespeare and Byron and Neruda like Steven should know the rather flowery words the other man was sprouting but most of all he wanted Steven to ask you out on a date and out of everything Marc asked him to do that was the most terrifying.

Steven was painfully awkward and annoyingly shy at the worst of times. He had made a complete idiot of himself more then once in front of you and though you had seemed to never see any fault in his fumbling and clumsy words Steven couldn’t help but feel that his complete lack of social skills would end up with him making even more of an arse of himself. So he completely ignored Marc’s suggestions. Keeping his hands to himself as well as his opinions about how beautiful you where. He didn’t recite poetry and he most definitely did ask you out on a date much to Marc’s frustration.

Instead Steven tried to push it all aside and concentrate on becoming your friend. Something that was realistically within his grasp. Over the weeks Steven strives to find out anything and everything he can about you, filing away every scrap of information he could get until Steven felt like he knew everything he possibly could. Everything from your parents names and where you were born to your work in Cairo, Athens, Prague and Rome. You answered every question Steven asked, filling in the gaps and painting a picture of a truly spectacular life and in return Steven told you half truths and little white lies.

He didn’t like lying, wanting to be open and honest with you but the thought of telling you about Marc and everything he had been through terrified him. If you didn’t think he was crazy now you would then and Steven really didn’t want to lose the friendship he had built with you. Marc seemed to be ok with being in the background for now so Steven decided it was best to keep it that way. For now anyway but he did weave in little things about Marc’s life into the tale of his own, using the things he had recently learnt about the other mans childhood to fill in the gaps of his own life.

Overall life was good. Sure Steven’s job is a little on the unfulfilling side of things and he’s started having blackouts again but he isn’t alone in it this time because Marc’s having them to. They thankfully don’t wake up in any more hotels but there are mornings when they wake up in the flat, body aching but satisfied and neither he or Marc knowing how they had gotten there. What they did know was that whoever had been in that hotel hadn’t been a one off, scratches and love bites appearing scattered across their chest and back almost every other week.

Steven didn’t like it. Didn’t like the fact that there was some unknown person running amuck with the body and doing gods knows what with it. Steven had insisted that they get tested for everything, Marc clearly uncomfortable with the topic but agreeing that it was probably for the best. That had been a rather awkward trip to the doctors but thankfully they got back a clean bill of health so they at least knew that whoever was driving was at least being sensible or was just extremely lucky. He and Marc both had their separate opinions on which one of the two it was most likely to be.

[spectrenightfell]

Summary: After Harrow and everything that had happened in Cairo, Steven’s finally back home in London. He and Marc are getting along for once and peacefully sharing the body, both of them eager to get back to a normal and crazy God free life. The only problem is a normal life is boring and after the last few weeks of adventure Steven is now a little dissatisfied with his lonely and unfulfilling life.

One day bleeds into another, boring and grey and so very lonely. It’s enough to drive a normal person mad so he can only imagine how crazy it’s driving Marc. He’s just on the verge of getting a cat for some form of companionship when suddenly you enter his life like a ray of light cutting through rain clouds.

Steven’s never fallen so hard so quickly but there’s something about you, something a little off that has both him and Marc on edge despite how perfect you seem. Maybe to perfect.

Things only get worse when Steven and Marc both star blacking out.

Pairings: Steven Grant x fem!reader / hints of Marc Spector x fem!reader

Rating: G - rating will change in other instalments

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Steven’s never been a social person. He’s awkward and nervous, talks to much and at the worst possible times about things that people don’t really care about. He makes people uncomfortable, he knows that but people make him uncomfortable to so he suppose it’s fair turn about.

He’s always kept to himself. No friends. Definitely no girlfriends. Just him and Gus, well new Gus now thanks to Marc’s negligence and Gus II because Steven didn’t want Marc feeling left out, now that their finally getting along and all that. He had had his mum for a while except it hadn’t even really been her had it? All those phone calls that went unanswered, Steven’s pointless ramblings filling up Marc’s voicemail for him to listen to once he took control of the body again or just delete with an annoyed huff. Then there had been the postcards, sent from all the different places Marc had been as either a mercenary or at Khonshu’s request, sending them back to Steven and painting a picture of a life that was being lived and a women who loved her son when the reality was that she had never loved Steven at all because to her he hadn’t even existed. She hadn’t loved Marc either, not for a long time and Steven was still trying to undo the damage she had caused him. It was tricky though and Steven wasn’t the best at these sort of things, often pushing things to far and saying the wrong thing that just had Marc retreating so deep inside himself that Steven could go days without seeing him in his reflection. Or if he was feeling particularly vindictive the ass would take control of the body and make Steven watch as he devoured a steak so rare it was practically still mooing and wash it all down with enough beer that when he woke up the next morning Steven would have a hangover that made him feel like his head was splitting open and find all the bloody paracetamol had been flushed down the toilet.

The point was Steven was lonely and had been for a while, even before Marc had been forced to show himself. He didn’t have much human interaction apart from at work and only Marc’s dry and somewhat sarcastic company when he got home. It hadn’t really been a problem before, Steven so used to it that he hadn’t actually realised how desperate he was for someone, anyone, to just talk to him. To touch him. To remind him what it was like to feel like an actual person.

Layla had been there for a while, all soft smiles and gentle touches that had Steven acting even more of a nervous idiot then normal. But it had all become a little to much for her, the strain starting to show when her smile became forced, her eyes tired and weary. She had left a month after the whole business with Harrow and Ammit, divorce papers signed and a promise to keep in touch. He’s not surprised, not really. Hurt, sure but not surprised by her seemingly sudden departure, though Marc hadn’t been shocked at all, watching from the various reflective surfaces around the flat as she packed up the last of her stuff before disappearing out the door and their lives. It’s a lot to deal with. He’s a lot to deal with. What with the whole two people one body thing and though they had seemed to make amends Steven didn’t think she had ever truly forgiven Marc for the years he had spent lying to her or the role he played in her fathers murder.

Once again they were alone, Marc sulking in the back of his mind whilst Steven tried his hardest to make him feel better but like he said, he wasn’t very good at these kind of interactions, awkward even when he was talking to his own reflection. Steven had found himself craving touch and company like he was an addict jonesing for his next hit and feeling even more lost and helpless then he had before. He plastered on a smile though, tried to act like nothing was wrong even though he could feel Marc’s heartache and knowing he could most likely feel Steven’s crushing loneliness. Neither of them said anything though, sinking back into their normal routine and ignoring the hole Layla had left behind. It was fine. They were both used to being on their own and at least now they had each other, even if that aspect of their relationship was a little bit stilted. They managed, even got some sort of schedule established for who fronted when. Life went on, the loneliness becoming another aspect that they just kind of ignored and got on with.

It’s roundabout the point when Steven was contemplating getting a cat for at least some kind of affection that you enter his life and everything gets a bit, well, confusing.

It doesn’t take much to get his job back at the gift shop. A mumbled and stuttered out explanation about his absence involving a lie about getting help at a psychiatric hospital that isn’t really a lie considering where they had ended up whilst trying to balance their scales but he made sure to leave that part out. He tells them what feels like a thousand time that he’s ok, “all better now mate, no more destroying museum property. No sir. Not little old me. My loo destroying day are a thing of the past. Ancient history.” Maybe they feel sorry for him or are just terrified that what Marc did to the toilet will happen to the office if they say no but Steven miraculously gets his job back and not two days letter he’s back behind the desk, restocking magnets and stuffing little wire basket with cuddly toys whilst wondering what the actual god they’re based off are like.

Nothings really changed. Donna is still kind of rude and still calls him Stevie even though he has corrected her a thousand times before. After the first couple of tries go ignored Steven stops trying to correct her, shrinking back into his meek and nerves self from before. Marc helpfully suggests to start calling her Donnie and ignoring her when she corrects him and though Steven does entertain the thought he’s to much of a nice person to be intentionally rude like that. He flat out ignores the tiny whisper in the back of his mind that suggests he smash her head against the closest hard service next time she does it. J.B is still watching stupid animal videos on his phone instead of the security monitors, only managing to glance Steven’s way when he had come rushing in on his first day back, eyeing him wearily like he was waiting from him to start smashing stuff up again and rambling like a mad man.

Life goes on, boring and kind of anticlimactic after everything he had been through but there is one thing that breaks up the long slog of his days selling overpriced tat to tourists and school kids.

The first time he see you it’s like he had been in the shadows all his life and was glimpsing the sun for the first time. It’s almost to much, makes his eyes sting when he sees you smile bright and oh so beautiful. Then there’s your laugh, clear and light and carrying across the room like bells. Donna catches him staring, snapping her fingers in front of Steven’s face and startling him out of his stupor. She’s quick to tell him to keep dreaming, that you’re so far out of his league you ain’t even in the same galaxy. Steven knows she’s right, knows that someone like you would never look his way for any other reason then to look round him but that doesn’t stop him from looking at you, tracking you across the room as you lead your tour group with confidence and smiles.

It doesn’t take him long to find out your name or the fact that you had joined the museum just a few weeks after he had started working there again. Marc had been the one to do a little more digging though, finding out that you had been working at the Cairo museum beforehand as a researcher and for a private collector out in Athens before that. You were clearly overqualified to be working as a tour guide but as Donna had pointed out, it’s what you applied for and the museum had been silly not to have snapped you up. Marc couldn’t find a reason as to why you had left Cairo other than wanting a change and Steven had been quick to brush off his suspicion, still naively believing the best in people despite everything that he had been through.

Despite how taken he is with you Steven doesn’t actually talk to you, just watches from behind his counter as you breeze into the room, always smiling as you talk your tour group through the last part of the tour. The whole time you’re in Steven’s line of sight he’s spell bound, fixated by your beauty and enthusiasm. You remind him of that actress in those mummy films that had been so popular back in the early 2000s, beautiful in that classic bookish way and endearingly passionate. You speak with your hands, using them to emphasise words and paint a picture of a time long since past. Your passionate, clearly knowledgeable and excited to be sharing it with others, even if they didn’t share your same level of enthusiasm. Steven though, he could listen to you for hours, had imagined many a conversation between the two of you that lasted well into the early hours, just basking in the way you talk about times long since passed.

It’s pathetic, he knows that. He’s half way in love with you and yet you had never spoken a word to one another. Steven was sure that you didn’t even know that he existed, never once having even looked his way. Marc tries to encourage him to introduce himself, to take advantage of those few moments when you’re all alone after sending your tour group off to explore the gift shop. Steven can’t though, brushing of Marc’s awkward and slightly aggressive pep talks with his own brand of awkwardness and self doubt. He knew that if he could Marc would have taken control of the body ages ago and asked you out himself, all confidence and rogue charm that had women swooning over him but they had a deal. The museum was Steven’s territory and whilst he was at work Marc wasn’t allowed to rear his annoyingly chiselled face. Not unless it was a life or death emergency and asking a pretty girl out to dinner was not a life or death emergency despite how much the other man insisted it was because it involved the death of any hope Steven had at actually having a social life.

So life went on. Steven worked three days a week at the gift shop and Marc had three days to do his, well, whatever it was that he did when he was in control and then that left one day of free space for them to either flit between the two of them or if that allusive sinister voice in the back of both of their minds wanted to make an appearance. It never did and Steven often spent the day pottering about the flat whilst Marc would spend his time working out much to Steven chagrin.

Days turned to weeks with nothing out of the ordinary happening. It was mundane, normal and completely boring if Steven was being honest. The only bit of excitement in his life were the few precious minutes at work when you breezed into his line of sight and stole all his attention. You were like the morning sun, breaking through the dreary grey and deep blues of the night sky and bathing the world in your light, chasing away the darkness and making everything feel warm and bright. Alive. Well that’s what Steven thought any way. His life was dull and grey but when he saw you he felt warm, bathed in your light and he would swear that in those few minutes it was like every ache and pain had been soothed, his perpetual tiredness vanishing and he was left feeling refreshed and alive. But then you would call your group to attention, moving them on to the next room, the next story and everything would come rushing back. The world seemed dimmer when you weren’t around, like the colour had been drained out of his surroundings leaving Steven feeling cold and shockingly aware of just how empty and meaningless his life actually was.

Marc was no help, urging Steven to snap out of it or actually do something because he couldn’t stand the pining and self deprecation anymore because “really Steven? You’re starting to make me feel depressed now and I have enough shit going on without adding your issues on top of it”. Steven decides to ignore him, purposely staying out of Marc’s reflections when the other man has control of the body, buried as deep as he can comfortably get until he’s forcibly yanked forward once it’s his time to be driving again. It’s harder to ignore him like this though, everything super modern and ridiculously shinny. Steven knows he’s not being mean on purpose but it eventually gets to much for him and Steven snapped, yelling at Marc to stop because he “can’t bloody take it any more,” and “it’s so easy for you but not me. Not stupid, weird Steven whose not even bloody real.” He must look like a right looney, demanding that his own reflection shut the hell up and leave him alone.

Marc stops then. Doesn’t bring you up or anything to do with Steven developing a social life. Steven doesn’t either, even going as far as to force himself not to look when he hears your voice carrying across the large room. Things are awkward and tense between him and Marc, stilted and absurdly polite in a way they never had been before. Steven’s life seems to lose all colour and warmth, the world grey and cold around him as summer starts to come to an end and autumn begins to creep in. To make things worse he and Marc both start blacking out. The last time Steven hade come to two days after he had gone to sleep in some back ally in Prague hands covered in blood and no idea what the hell was going on. It’s only Marc’s quick thinking and commanding confidence that keep Steven from having a rather minor yet catastrophic breakdown there and then. As it is that happens once the former mercenary has gotten them back home safe and sound, the flat door firmly shut and locked as the two of them try to work out exactly what happened. Admittedly Steven’s a little more manic and scared then Marc but Steven can see his worry in the way he paces, hands shoved through his hair and shoulders tense.

Steven calls off sick that week, rambling about having a cold and not wanting to pass it on until Donna cuts him off with an annoyed “fine ” and puts the phone down on him. They spend the week trying to piece things together, trying to get the other personality that’s hiding within the body to show themselves but nothing they do works and after a rather angry and aggressive shouting match that had him and Marc rapidly switching control they finally give up, conceding the fact that the other alter would only show themselves when they were good and ready. They do go back to cuffing themselves to the bed again, combination lock and all but considering that hadn’t worked with Marc Steven’s not at all confident that it will work with this other alter.

They’re still tense though, both of them worried about what’s lurking deep in the recesses of their shared mind but they know that unless they become shut ins there isn’t much they can do so weary and more jumpy than normal Steven goes back to work, Marc promising to be on the lookout. For what Steven isn’t really sure but he’s grateful for it any way. Underneath all that gruff indifference and macho army man-ness Marc is a protector and Steven knows he would do his darn best to make sure Steven was safe.

He had to have a meeting when he goes back with someone from HR. He eyes Steven with suspicion, wanting to know about his mental state and if his sudden time off was because he was having some sort of relapse. Steven just laughed nervously, fidgeting in his chair and word vomiting over the man whilst Marc hissed for him to “shut up before you end up jobless and with an actual shrink knocking at the dammed door”. He manages to get through the uncomfortable ten minute conversation without making to much of an idiot of himself and he’s sent on his way with a stern warning about his attendance and tardiness. It doesn’t take Donna long to make a comment about Steven still having his job and he just about keeps Marc in cheek, stoping him from telling the women to shut up or not having a job would be the least of her worries.

Steven’s day just gets worse from there. A kid knocks over a whole stand of Egyptian themed stationary that Donna has Steven down on his hands and knees to find every last blasted pencil and rubber that had rolled under the other stands. Then he has to deal with a German tourist who doesn’t speak English seemingly at all and was refusing to part with the twenty quid needed to pay for the little model of the Great Pyramid of Giza he had picked out because he was insisting a tenner would be enough. Everyone who comes through is just plain old rude, looking down on Steven and his rather lacklustre attitude. The day drags on and soon enough Steven is fantasising about going home and just curling in on himself and letting Marc take over things while he just wallows in the knowledge of how pathetic his life is.

But then the unimaginable happens and Steven’s day suddenly take a turn that he would never have expected.

Steven’s to busy trying to get an irate mum to pay for the chocolate bar her kid had opened to spare you more than a quick glance when you come in, a group of bored looking school kids following along behind and looking like they would rather be anywhere else. By the time the women had handed over the couple of quid and stormed off in a huff Steven’s practically forgotten you were even in the room, mumbling under his breath about how rude people are and how they should teach their kids to behave better whilst angrily tidying the shelves of books and posters behind him. Marc hissed his name, urgent and annoying in the back of his mind but Steven ignores him. That is until he does it again and again, sounding more annoyed with every word until Steven is spinning round to glare at his reflection in the counter and snapping out an angry “what?” as he went. Except it isn’t Marc’s scowling face that greets him.

His eyes go wide, voice leaving him as he looks at you with a mix of horror and surprise. In his head Marc’s groaning and Steven can see him throw his hands up and turn away in the counter top, shaking his head as he did so but Steven’s to busy panicking to give it much thought. He can’t believe he did that. Can’t believe that the very first words that he had said to you was an angry demand to know what you wanted when in reality he was yelling at annoying American man who lived in his body. Oh no. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Bloody hell. You probably thought he was a right weirdo. Rude and aggressive. Probably would try and get away from him as quickly as possible and never come near him again. He would deserve it, wouldn’t even try and force his apology on you once you had gone.

Apology!

He should apologise, should explain himself before you were gone for good but it wasn’t like he could tell you he had actually been yelling at the other personally that shared his body. You would think him a right looney, more so than you probably already did. Oh hell, this was just getting worse and worse and Marc telling him to “breath Steven. You gotta calm down. It’s gonna be fine you just gotta stop before you have a panic attack. Steven? Steven listen to me,” wasn’t helping in the slightest.

Steven starts spluttering out a rather pathetic attempt to apologise but he trips over his words, not making any sense because he can’t even get a whole word out before cutting himself off. It’s a car crash. One of those terrible things that you just can’t look away from but Steven desperately wishes he could because with every excruciating second that passes he’s just digging his hole deeper and deeper and he had no idea how to fix any of this.

The shock at being addressed so rudely fades and soon enough you’re smiling softly and reassuringly at him. Steven sucks in a breath, his rambling coming to a sudden stop as the early afternoon sun shone in through the high up windows and cut across you, making it look like you were backlight with a golden glow. You were beautiful and soft, warm and calming and he was so taken with your almost otherworldly appearance Steven completely missed you speaking to him, your softly spoken “it’s ok. I’m sorry for interrupting you,” going unnoticed as he tried to commit every little thing about you to memory. It was only his hand suddenly slipped from the counter top and sending Steven jerking forward that finally snapped him from his day dream, an act that he was sure was Marc’s doing considering the pointed look he was giving him from the small mirror above the jewellery stand on the counter as he jerked his head towards you.

Steven was a stammering mess as he turned his attention back to you, laughing nervously as he yammered pointlessly on about the counter being slippery and his poor reflexes until him finally managed to get himself under control but what come out was a rather awkward and slightly cheery “hello” that had Steven only just managing to hold in a wince. Marc did no such thing, groaning loudly and burying his face in his hands. The action didn’t stop Steven from being able to hear his mumbling though, the other man questioning how Steven had ever managed to get laid. If they had been alone Steven would have pointed out that just because he was a bit of a mess didn’t mean he was completely incompetent just, you know, the opportunity to prove that didn’t come around that often. And anyway, the last time he had had a date it had only gone so wrong because of Marc. None of that had been Steven’s fault. He wasn’t the one who ran off looking for some bloody mystical scarab that had made Steven miss his date by two whole days.

They weren’t alone though so Steven tried his best to ignore the other man and smiled shakily at you waiting for you to say something. He had been expecting you to give him a funny look, tell him something needed restocking or had been broken or both knowing his luck and then disappear back to your tour group, never to look at Steven again. Really it was more then he ever thought he would get and at least now he knew you smelt as good as you looked, unable to stop himself from taking a deep breath as he leant forward slightly. Yeah he knew it was a little creepy, thank you Marc but you smelt like sunshine and papaya with the unmistakable sweetness of vanilla that would probably haunt his dreams for a while.

What he hadn’t been expecting was the fond look you gave him, eyes alight with amusement as you answered his complete lunacy with an almost teasing “hi Steven”. He was sure he stoped breathing, his heart stuttering in his chest as he was struck by the undeniable truth that you knew his name even though the two of you had never interacted before. And yeah, Steven had already known your name but he was crushing on you harder than a carbon deposit about to become a diamond so of course he knew your name but there was no way in this universe or any other for that fact that you would feel that way towards him. Like Donna had said, you were way out of his realm of possibility and women like you didn’t go for the shy, awkward, nerdy type despite what modern day media wanted everyone to think.

The next few minutes were so surreal that Steven wasn’t so sure that he wasn’t dreaming. You wanted to know how he was, having noticed his absence the past week. Steven had only just managed to pick his jaw up of the floor to answer, still in shock as he gave you the same semi rambling answer he had given the HR person. There had been noticeable relief in your eyes when he had said it was simply a cold, “nothing that a bit of the old Vicks VapoRub and a lot of honey and lemon couldn’t fix”. You had been glad that he was feeling better and was back at work, saying how the place had “just seemed a little empty and lonely without you here”. It was at that point Steven became almost 100% sure he was dreaming but not even in his dreams had you made him feel as wanted as he did in that moment.

He had barely gotten out a dazed “am I dreaming?” before you were saying your goodbyes, having to get back to your tour group that was getting a little to boisterous near the display of glass pyramids. You didn’t wait for Steven to say anything, giving him a smile and a promise to talk latter before you were turning away, calling your tour groups attention and leading them from the room and onto discover more about the worlds that had come before. Steven could only stand there in shock, lifting his hand slightly to wave even though you were already gone and whispering an absentminded “laters gators” to the last lingering phantom of your strange and sudden appearance.