#lord have mercy im so old and rickety

[queenofbaws]

Queenie my dear may I please request 💧?? Thanks and hope you’re doing well!!

💧Share something romantic/hot from your WIP, or just something sweet if it's gen.

for you kenzie??? anything ;)

jeez louise, an actual-factual queenie fic where there's SOME level of spice???????? at all?????? who'da thunk it??????? :Oc hehehehehehe maybe i'm not a one-trick pony after all...........................

“Yeah, I don’t know about you, but I definitely didn’t plan on getting chased by a bear.” “Or mercy-killing a moose.” “Ooor getting lost in a mine!” “Or walking halfway across the fucking countryside to get to this place.” “Or for Emily to be such a major bitch.” Letting his hands slide a little lower, Mike quirked an eyebrow. “Speak for yourself, ma’am. I fully expected that.” The last shred of Jess’s apprehension disappeared (or so he hoped) and she laughed, tipping her head back while pressing every other part of herself against him. “Smart man…” “My point being,” he interrupted, finally bringing his earlier desire to fruition by skating his fingers over her shoulder and catching the strap of her bra, pushing it aside to press his lips to the spot instead. “I’m a little worked up…” Another kiss. “You’re a little worked up…” A third. “But this place is the size of a shoebox, okay? If there was anyone else here, we’d know. We’d be shaking hands with them. Trading recipes for banana bread. Neighborly stuff.” She didn’t say anything to that, instead leaning into his touch, sighing when his mouth moved up to her neck. “So what say we…oh, gee, I don’t know…make our way back to the couch…get nice and toasty in front of the fire…and figure out some kinda way to work out all this excess energy, huh?” He felt her throat buzz as she hummed, and without her saying anything, something about it had him grinning. Even when she nudged him back, he couldn’t help smiling, trusting she was putting juuust enough space between them that they could look at each other. “Will you…maybe close the shutters first? Just in case?” she asked, wrapping her arms around him, her fingers carding up through his hair.

[ratisnotcrying]

you’ll get him back

Summary:  Morse had done foolish things before, on several occasions, often running alone into whatever half formed theory he had, and Jakes or Thursday usually found him bleeding, but mostly okay. Jakes used to be annoyed whenever he did this, thinking it a waste of time, but now he feels much the way he imagines Mrs Thursday does every time her husband leaves each morning.

Pairing: peter jakes/endeavour morse, fred thursday/win thursday

Warning: graphic depictions of violence, canon typical violence, murder,  descriptions of murder

Word count: 2.5K

A/N: this is crossposted on AO3 under the same title - im working n a follow up piece but dont hold ur breath xoxo 

~~~

Morse had done foolish things before, on several occasions, often running alone into whatever half formed theory he had, and Jakes or Thursday usually found him bleeding, but mostly okay. Jakes used to be annoyed whenever he did this, thinking it a waste of time, but now he feels much the way he imagines Mrs Thursday does every time her husband leaves each morning.

The thing is, Morse was good at talking. He could explain obscure classical references in layman’s terms, in a way that meant Jakes didn't have to listen to any bloody opera to solve a case - which he was always thankful for. At first he had thought it was condescending, some young bloke lording his knowledge over the lowly Cowley coppers, but when he got to know Morse, really got to know him, he realised that Morse had a genuine interest in this, that all this music really meant something to him. In a way, it meant something to Jakes too now, seeing as most nights he fell asleep with Morse’s records on quietly in the background.

Morse was good at talking about nothing too. Peter couldn’t count the number of times he had found Morse after he had run off, hands up and definitely scared, though not in any real danger because he just kept talking, a steady stream of thoughts and theories about this and that, distracting the suspect long enough that Jakes could cuff them.

This killer though, the way he killed, seemingly without mercy and with no signs of stopping, he wasn’t the type to be talked down.

It was a rough case. The only good thing about it was that no children were involved. The list of bad things gave Jakes a headache; the long and the short of it was that young men were being viciously beaten and then strangled, and they were all found in some remote expanse of fields on the outskirts of Oxford. That would have been enough to put anyone on edge, but the only thing that seemed to connect the victims was their appearance - tall, slim, blonde academic types.

Dr DeBryn had always been something of a rock to the younger officers, always calm and collected, even in the face of danger, but it seemed that the good doctor was shaken by this one. After the first autopsy, Jakes and Morse had gone to see Max; and the latter pair had looked like they were about to pass out - their expressions grim, their already pale skin almost sickly, and both shaking so much that Peter reckoned he could feel it through the floor. He likely wasn’t doing much better - the body on DeBryn’s table looked a little too much like Morse.

“This young man went through… quite the ordeal. Knife wounds and blunt force trauma all over his body, both sustained over several hours, and if you look here,” Max pointed to the victims fingertips and ears, “you can see the beginnings of frostbite setting in.”

Jakes nodded, glancing at Morse to make sure he was still upright before asking, “What about these bruises, on his wrist?”

“Yes, he has them on his ankles too, which indicates he was tied to the arms and legs of a chair, and you can see from the angle of the bruising on his neck that the killer was taller than him whilst he was sat down. What doesn’t make sense, though, is that there are multiple ligature bruises. It could mean that he was brought to the brink of death multiple times, but I suspect that the killer simply wasn’t strong enough to do it in one.”

Thursday went alone to the second autopsy, which was for the best because the killer had escalated to cutting out his victims tongues, and Morse would definitely have collapsed had he seen that. The third and fourth were the same as the second, the cuts were deeper and bruises bloomed over more pale skin, but ultimately they were the same.

At ten o'clock the morning after the fourth body had been found, Morse was surrounded by Jakes, Thursday, Trewlove, Strange and Bright who were all trying to convince him to stay with another officer at all times.

“These are very clearly crimes of passion.” Morse snapped, slamming the newspaper onto his desk. Strange and Trewlove looked taken aback by his outburst, but Jakes just rolled his eyes, used to Morse’s dramatics.

Morse stood, planting both hands on the desk as he continued. “Likely someone has been wronged - or lied to, hence the tongues - and is going after men who look like the guilty party. I don’t know if you’ve ever actually been to Oxford, but ninety percent of the male population look like the victims; the chances of me personally being targeted are so microscopically small that it would be a waste of manpower to have somebody protecting me instead of searching for the killer.” Morse all but shouted before storming out, his coat billowing behind him.

Morse had become restless after the second murder - people had made the connection between the victims and started hovering around Morse. He didn’t like people fussing over him when he had been shot, so, what with the amount of attention he was getting now, it was really no surprise that Morse had done a runner, Jakes was only surprised it took this long.

That didn’t mean Jakes was happy about it.

He was, however, less happy to find out that Morse had been snatched off the street, in broad daylight, not fifteen minutes after leaving the station.

They’d had multiple calls from witnesses and it didn’t take long to put two and two together, which was all well and good, but they still couldn’t work out where the men were actually being killed. Trewlove had been coordinating searches of all buildings surrounding the fields, to no avail, so their only option was to split up and search buildings further afield until they found Morse.

It was freezing. In reality, Jakes knew that was because it was in the middle of winter, but he couldn’t help feeling as if the real reason he was shivering so violently as he sprinted across the field was the mind numbing fear that this time he would be too late. Or too slow, because despite the fact he was running fast enough to give him a stitch, the rundown barn he was trying to reach didn’t seem to be any closer than it was two minutes ago. He had always reached Morse before he came to any serious harm - he almost laughed when he realised that being shot or drugged no longer constituted ‘serious harm’, at least not when it came to Morse - this time though, this time his Morse could be killed and he’s not sure he’s ready to deal with that possibility.

His shirt was completely soaked with sweat when he eventually reached the building - if you could even call it that. The doors were crooked, barely hanging on; there were panels missing from all of the walls, and the one that were still holding on were more rot than anything else. There were tyre tracks leading from the doors away and cross the field - how the fuck did I miss them? - and in the cold glow of dusk he could see spots of dried blood painting a trail pointing towards what would no doubt reveal Peter’s worst nightmares come true.

There were footsteps behind him, likely uniforms who were only now catching up, but he didn’t turn to check - he just needed to find Morse, he just needed to move, but his joints had locked into place and he couldn’t find it in himself to push open the doors. At least not until he heard someone cry out over the sound of his laboured breathing.

He couldn’t stand there any longer and with a sudden surge of adrenaline, he yanked the door open and rushed inside.

For a moment it seemed that everything was moving all at once - Peter was still hurtling towards the centre of the barn, the unis behind him were cocking their guns, the killer was scrabbling for a weapon and there, bloody, but mostly okay, was Morse.

The next moment was deathly still. Jakes stopped a few feet from where Morse was tied to rickety wooden chair and inhaled sharply at how terrible he really looked: his hair was matted with sweat and blood, his eyes were red rimmed and bloodshot, his skin as pale as the day he saw the first body and bruises almost as dark as the circles under his eyes after a long case.

“Do not come any closer or I will kill him.”

The unexpectedly feminine voice drew Jakes’ gaze upwards, where, standing behind Morse, holding a knife tightly against his neck, was a young woman.

“There are multiple ligature bruises. I suspect that the killer simply wasn’t strong enough to do it in one.”

“These are very clearly crimes of passion.”

Jakes could have smacked himself for not realising sooner that they were looking for a woman. Instead he raised his hands, signalling to the officers behind him to stand down.

“Alright, okay. No one else needs to get hurt, okay?” He hadn’t realised he was moving towards Morse until the girl waved the knife at him and he froze.

Looks really could be deceiving - Jakes reckons he should be used to that by now, what with Morse, but there was something about this girl that threw him off balance. Not necessarily because she was a woman, he thinks, more because there was something decidedly innocent about her. She was young, probably Morse’s age, though she looked much younger. Her hair was shoulder length and the dark curls bounced as she shook with rage; her pale yellow dress looked like a massacre in early spring, as did her coat which was discarded on some old equipment. Her eyes are what really threw Jakes off - a sort of unhinged sadness desperately looking for a way out that no one, especially not someone that young, should ever feel.

“None of the men you killed already are the one you really want, are they, miss?” Jakes said, hoping he sounded calmer than he felt, though his shaking hands gave him away.

She seemed momentarily distracted, as if she wasn’t about to kill a policeman, as if she was remembering a happier time.

“No, I suppose not.” She laughed humourlessly, a few tears falling to the ground. “No, no one can quite live up to my Jamie. He always knew just what to say to me. It’s a shame he had another girl on the go - we could’ve been awfully happy.”

There was a door on the opposite end of the barn, and over the girl’s shoulder Jakes could see Thursday creeping through it.

“I thought he was going to ask me to marry him - I was going to be Mrs Sarah Jones. I went to his house and I was trying to calm myself down - worked myself into a right flap, I had. But,” she took a deep breath, “as I was about to go and knock, the door opened and some… leggy tart came out, draping herself all over my Jamie.” The girl - Sarah - was getting agitated again and so was Jakes. Morse looked bloody terrified and he had the strangest notion to call out and tell Thursday to get a fucking move on.

“He didn’t even apologise. Merely told me to pack my things by the end of the week. I had a sudden urge to do the women of Oxford a favour and make sure they couldn't get hurt like I did.” Sarah was still smiling, but it was more sinister now and time seemed to slow giving Jakes plenty of time to watch as everything went spectacularly wrong.

Sarah pressed the knife against the side of Morse’s neck just as Thursday reached her and began to pull her back. Morse looked at Jakes, all doe eyed and teary, and all Jakes could do was look on in static horror as Sarah drew a line of blood that immediately cascaded crimson onto Morse’s already ruined shirt.

Jakes isn’t sure he’ll ever forget the sound Morse made - weak and broken, slicing right through his heart.

He moved on autopilot; if anyone asked he couldn't have said with any certainty how he got Morse untied, but he wasn’t really concerned about that. Peter used one hand to support the back of Morse’s neck and pressed the palm of the other firmly over the cut. Almost immediately, blood started seeping through his fingers, and Morse’s whimpering went up an octave, his eyes were glassy and unfocused, gazing vaguely at the other coppers who were standing around as if Morse wasn’t bleeding out.

“Are you just going to stand there or are you going to get a fucking ambulance!?” He shouted over his shoulder. Morse flinched and Jakes turned back to him, ignoring the sound of now-moving heavy boots behind him.

“Morse, you need to stay awake.” Jakes pressed harder against the wound, trying to ignore the blood that was rolling down his wrist and soaking into his cuffs in favour of adjusting his hold on Morse’s neck as his head lolled and he fell silent, causing Peter’s panic returned anew. It was careless, what with the number of people so close to them, but Jakes couldn't help stroking his thumb across the cold skin of Morse’s jaw.

“Morse? Morse, come on open your eyes.” Peter was only rewarded with a feeble fluttering of his lashes, just as they had on their last day off: the sun had peered over the horizon and Jakes had kissed Morse awake, running his hand through golden curls and in return Morse had blinked up at him, grinning sleepily.

“Come on, Dev. Open your eyes for me, please?” This time he didn’t get a response at all. “Please, love?” Peter isn’t quite sure if anyone heard his voice crack. He’s not sure he cares.

It seemed an age before the ambulance arrived and when it did, Thursday had to bodily drag Jakes away. He was vaguely aware that, at some point, everyone except himself, Thursday and Morse had left - which was probably for the best.

“He’ll be alright.” Thursday said quietly, as if Jakes was a frightened animal. “Always is - he’s a stubborn bastard. Won’t let something like this stop him.”

Jakes didn’t really listen, too preoccupied with trying to light his cigarette. The matches were taken out of his hand, and he didn’t look up until he was exhaling the first lungful of smoke. Thursday pressed the pack back into Peter’s hands, guiding him out to the car, and in an almost characteristic display of kindness and acceptance, he handed Jakes his hanky to clean up with.

“You’ll get him back, Peter.”