Aquatic AU

[simplepuzzle]

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[simplepuzzle]

Chuck finds his pod, endures the 'i told you so's that are swept up in just happy you're backs.

And it's years before he takes his skin off again, even when he's around his pod. He's content to flop in the sun as a seal, pile up with the others and dive after fish.

Raleigh's never too far from his thoughts though. He wonders if Sam found him, made him pay in some way for setting Chuck free. He wonders if he stayed with Janine, if he ran and took her with him. He wonders where he could have gone that he refused to tell Chuck.

It's still years before he takes his skin off and walks among humans, and when he does it's in Sitka. It's a long shot, and he doesn't know if Raleigh's even there. If he's not, he'll go back to the sea and give up.

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Years pass and somehow, Raleigh evades notice - Janine tries to find him and damn, but she gets close. He sees her in Sitka once, asking around for a Raleigh Becket and he hides out in his shitty little apartment for a week, feigning illness until he's SURE she's gone.

He doesn't know if she's looking for him for her own benefit or if she's teamed up with Sam, but he doesn't want to find out.

He keeps his promise to Chuck and manages to take care of himself - he stays relatively healthy, keeps in shape, but he's miserable. He works to eat and eats to work and he's a little skinnier than he should be, but he's alive and he's healthy.

Years pass and Raleigh ages and by the time he's thirty he feels ninety, and he's slinging his work sack over his shoulder and heading off for the day when he sees a familiar face.

The bag he's holding hits the ground with a clank, and he's standing there staring, open mouthed, unaware of people bumping past him and grumbling things like move it, Lapierre--

He's too busy staring at Chuck.

[simplepuzzle]

It's the clank that gets Chuck's attention--he's been wandering around the construction site for a while now, pretty much blending in with the rest of the humans (and when someone tries to get him to do something he mutters something and pretends he's going off to do it only to hide somewhere else until they get distracted). It's bigger than he thought.

Raleigh looks...Not worse, because he's clearly been taking better care of himself than he had been a few years ago, which...at least he's keeping his promise.

Chuck digs his hands into his pockets and smiles crookedly at him, head tilted.

....is this a good staring or a bad staring. Did Raleigh not want him to find him?

[unbreachable]

He's dumbfounded by what he's seeing, and just --

crosses the distance and sweeps Chuck into his arms, pulling him into a tight hug, lips ghosting over his ear.

"Chuck."

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There's a soft 'oof' as he's engulfed in a hug--and through several layers, it turns out Alaska is cold--and Chuck's hugging him back, pressing his face into Raleigh's scarf and gripping him tightly.

"Sorry, I know you didn't want me to find you I just--had to know you were gonna be okay," he mumbles, only shuddering a little as Raleigh's breath tickles his ear.

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He doesn't want to let go and people are surprisingly giving them a fairly wide berth. Raleigh doesn't speak a lot, doesn't have any friends, so for him to be physically affectionate to someone is kind of weird and they just...go around.

"What're you doing here?" He murmurs, breath warm on his cool skin. "Why'd you come back to land?"

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"I wanted to know you were okay," he says again. "I wanted--" to see you.

"Are you busy?" Chuck can come back. Or he can hang out somewhere in the area.

If Raleigh wants to see him.
...which, by the hug, he probably does.

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He buries his face in Chuck's neck and just inhales before pulling back and gripping his shoulder.

"I'm off for the day. You wanna...?"

Come back with him, have coffee or tea or something?

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"Yeah."

whatever Raleigh wants to do. Hang out, drink tea, do...something. With him.

...unless Janine's there too.

[unbreachable]

Raleigh leads Chuck back to his apartment - it's tiny but clean, and not far from the construction site. Raleigh's truck had finally died and it's parked outside, but poor Gipsy needs some parts.

He lets Chuck in, and it's a painfully lonely apartment with the bare furnishing and no decorations.

"...You, uh. Want something to drink?"

[simplepuzzle]

Well that's a relief.

....it's also depressing.

"Whatever you're having." He takes his coat off but he's got a thick sweater under that. His skin's under all of that too; he's never letting it out of his sight ever again.

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Completely understandable.

"I've got tea and coffee." And water. That's...about it. He decides on tea and fumbles around for the kettle -- his hands are cold and achey, the older he gets the worse off his hands are - and sets the water to boil.

While it heats, he sort of leans on the wall and watches Chuck, confusion still written on his face.

"What're you doing here, Chuck? Really."

[simplepuzzle]

Chuck shrugs a little.

"...wanted to see you." Is that not reason enough? "I wanted to make sure you were going to be okay. You didn't want to tell me anything about what you were going to do and...I mean if it's because you didn't want me to find you, that's, I can go."

He just wanted to see him again.

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"No, don't go."

His hands grip the wall, using it to hold himself up.

"I wanted you safe, Chuck. That's why I didn't tell you. You shouldn't be on land."

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He moves forward, getting his hands on Raleigh and holding him up if he looks like he's going to fall.

"And I haven't been," he says quietly. "Nobody knows me here, I'm not letting go of it ever again, if I didn't find you I was going to leave and stop looking."

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The tea heats in the background and Raleigh swallows, eyes moving over Chuck's face, drinking him in and memorizing his features all over again.

"You look good," he says hoarsely, swallowing the lump in his throat. "Didn't think I'd ever see you again."

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"For a while I didn't want to see the face of any human ever again," he admits, keeping a hold of Raleigh's arms and almost leaning him against the wall.

"...couldn't manage to forget yours, though." It was almost irritating. He pulls a hand from Raleigh's arm then to run his fingers over his face, as if to reassure himself that it's really there.

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He does sort of slump against the wall, though he leans into the touch when Chuck's fingers graze his face.

"Don't blame you. I can't believe you came back at all."

For Raleigh. He's not -- worth the risk.

[simplepuzzle]

Chuck's only at risk if people know or he tells anyone. It's been years, Sam's got to have moved on.

"You don't want me to go but I'm not getting the sense that you want me here either," he says quietly. "I had to know you got away too."

[unbreachable]

Maybe he has, maybe he hadn't. Hard to say.

"I worry for you." It's not really verification either way. He wants Chuck see, but seeing him on land kind of scares him. He doesn't want him trapped again.

"I've been hiding," he says eventually. "I go by Richard Lapierre now."

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Raleigh is so confusing, he hugged Chuck so hard when he saw him and he said he didn't want him to go--

Maybe this was a mistake.

"Your dad, right?" He remembered that.

Raleigh seems all right to stand on his own, he thinks, so Chuck takes a step back, giving him room.

[unbreachable]

"Dads first name, mothers maiden," he says, and Chuck moves back but Raleigh reaches out for his hand, a quiet whine in the back of his throat.

"I've missed you, Chuck. I'm glad you're alright. Never stopped thinking about you."

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He looks at Raleigh's hand and takes it after a moment, curling their fingers in together.

"Are you okay?" he demands.

Because for as much as he seems to be taking care of himself, the jury for 'okay' is still out.

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Raleigh sighs when Chuck accepts the touch and leans his head back against the wall with a soft thump.

"I'm alive. I...guess I'm okay."

He exists. He lives, breathes, eats - but that's it. He's lost everything, his whole family, and doesn't know how to even begin making himself happy again.

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'Alive' and 'okay' aren't the same thing.

"You don't look okay." He squeezes Raleigh's hand, jaw tightening. "...Have you called Janine since you...disappeared?"

Because that was the last time he remembered Raleigh being anything resembling happy. He doesn't know if she'll help, but--she liked him too, he could tell, she'd do what she could to help Raleigh.