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Title: The Virtue Of Men
Pairing: Karl/Viggo, Orlando/Bean, Dom/Billy
Rating: R
Disclaimer: Schyeah, never happened.
Summary: Orlando finds hope, Viggo makes things right, and Billy looks for strength.
Notes: Thanks to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
captnobvious for the beta and twinklypixie for the translations.
spes
Orlando has heard the words ‘no’, ‘no thanks’, ‘maybe later’, and ‘I’m sorry’ more times in his life than he’d care to admit to. When he’d heard through his agent that someone had wanted him to play Legolas – more than just a passing acceptance – he had literally jumped for joy before heading out with friends to celebrate the whole night. In terms of relationships, people, and events though, he’s heard the letters N and O far more than one wants to.
But he presses on. It takes him a while to let his barriers down again, but he never gives up. When Ella had dumped him, he had asked out Nina, and when she had said no, he had taken it in stride and indulging in a quick fumble in the closet with John, and then triumphantly earning a ‘Yes’ from the prettiest girl on the block, a brunette named Lilah.
The moral behind Orlando’s life story is that he just has to press on.
He remembers during shooting when Karl had mounted the horse and had muttered, “Do not trust to hope. It is forsaken in this land.” Orlando can identify with that one. He gets it. Hope isn’t something that’s there to back you up in the grand scheme of things. It’s more like the flimsy friend that shows up once in a while, but you know you can’t trust him with anything important.
He hopes though. When he has nothing else, and when he’s frozen in place without a way to move forward, he closes his eyes and just concentrates on thinking about a better future. He tries to see a way out of the darkness.
He hopes with all his heart that Billy can be happy.
He hopes that he will find someone who can give him peace of mind.
More than anything, he hopes everything will work out in the end.
“Ready?” Orlando shouts above the howling winds.
“No.”
“Oh for Christ’s sake!” Orlando shouts a little louder, letting out an animal of a scream – one that breaks in the middle and is loud, obnoxious, and utterly Orlando. “You,” he shakes his head wildly, letting the wind toss back a few curls. He takes a deep breath and looks over behind him. “You were the one who came to me and said, ‘Orlando, I’ll do it. I will bungee jump with you!’”
“It’s high.”
“Bill, I know you can do this,” Orlando immediately switches gears and puts as much encouragement as he can into his voice. The wind only sweeps away the first few syllables of his sentence. He feels a swell of pride in him at getting Billy to finally come with him. “Just take a leap of faith!” Orlando encourages at the top of his lungs.
If Billy can jump; if Billy can conquer his fear, then Orlando knows that he can do anything. His friends have strength enough, and maybe if Orlando just follows his heart and does things that will make him happy, everything will turn out right in the end. If he can conquer his own roadblocks and fears, he can finally find a good place to be.
That’s what he’s been holding out hope for. He’s waiting for happiness.
Orlando is the first to jump, strangely silent as he plunges face first into the wind and lets the atmosphere slowly tug him towards the ground, faster and faster until the cord cushions his fall and tugs him skyward again. Finally, his feet are on the ground again. His entire body is shaking with excitement as he looks upward, cups his hands around his mouth and nearly screams up.
“You can do this, Bill!”
He looks up, shielding his eyes from the sun and watches as Billy takes a step off the platform and makes the jump. He lets loose a terrible scream that sounds entirely girlish – which might have been done for Orlando’s benefit, he’s not quite sure at the moment – and when he’s lowered to the ground and had his equipment taken off, he nearly tackles Orlando with a hug. Billy’s arms shake as he clings.
Orlando grins and whispers, “You’re strong, Bill. Look at you. Bravest Scot in the whole vicinity.”
Billy parts, and Orlando could swear that he sees the hints of tears in Billy’s eyes. It might have be a trick of the light because the next time he looks, everything is normal, and Billy’s eyes look dry. He pats Orlando on the back once more as he gets out of the special suit, and nods slowly.
“You’re right,” Billy acknowledges quietly with a calm smile. He wraps his arm around Orlando and begins to walk, tugging Orlando with him. Orlando’s not sure he’s heard properly, but it sounds as though Billy’s just said: “Things are going to be all right soon, Orlando, I promise.”
“Are you going to be okay?” Orlando murmurs as they make it to the parking lot.
Billy turns, and gives a listless shrug accompanied by a half-smile. This time, Orlando is not second-guessing when he sees the tears in Billy’s eyes. Billy visibly swallows, and suddenly, Orlando feels like he has a lump in his throat. He furrows his brow as he watches Billy, not blinking once in case he misses something.
“Things are going to be all right,” Billy promises, more conviction in his voice this time.
“No, I just mean…” Orlando trails off, laughing to himself and scratching the side of his face. He had called Bean on a whim, and had spent the last thirty minutes feeling extremely pleased with his whims. “He went bungee-jumping with me! Christ, I half expected him to break down and start whimpering for Dom to come save him.”
“You mean that wasn’t the first pleading cry out of his mouth?” Bean retorts with a snide, yet caring laugh.
Orlando laughs harder. “No, no he begged for someone to save him. Dom was included in those cries. He just didn’t make a specific plea for Dominic Monaghan to come whisk him off his feet and take him away from the evil elf.”
“You are quite devious,” Sean laughs a bit on his end.
“But he did it,” Orlando remarks with admiration. “He really, actually did it.”
“You’re a terrible influence with a heart of gold,” Sean murmurs quietly. Orlando strains to hear each word, but he’s fairly sure that he didn’t mix anything up. Orlando grins as he relaxes further into the chair, clinging tightly to the phone as his nerves jump around, almost on a cue that he’s about to ask Sean on a date…
…which really isn’t why Orlando had called. Or so he’s telling himself. It’s not as though the thought had never crossed his mind. Realism had taken Orlando aside for a conversation, however, and it was a quick decision that Orlando should do nothing in the way of asking Sean Bean out on a ‘date’. After all, it could only end in badness and further rejection.
Orlando is getting ready to brave rejection when he hears the quiet hum of Sean’s voice on the other end, and for a moment, Orlando is unsure as to whether he heard anything at all.
“What?” he asks loudly, furrowing his brow in thought as he tries to think what he could have missed.
“I said,” Bean starts again, “I ought to head up over there. It’s not right for the lot of you to be having all these good times without me. What happened to a fellowship of men?”
“And elves,” Orlando retorts quickly.
“And hobbits, what have you. The point is, I’m missing out!” Sean replies swiftly, sounding close to petulant. Orlando laughs at this, loudly and possibly at Sean’s tone. “Besides, I was going to take a drive up to see you. This way I can see Vig, maybe chat with Bill, Dom…have a boy’s night out.”
“Yeah, we’ve been hitting the pub just about every…” Orlando begins enthusiastically before slowing down when Sean’s words finally make sense in his brain. “See me?”
“You,” Sean confirms. “I figured it would be crass to ask you out over the phone, except that I just did. Anyhow, Orlando, you want to head out with me? We could have dinner, pop a few drinks back and see where things go?”
“Date?” Orlando repeats slowly, blinking in shock.
“We could call it that,” Sean agrees with a warm laugh. “I’ve got to run. The girls are yelling at me for the phone. I’ll come by though, we’ll go out. See you soon, Lando.”
Orlando hangs up the phone slowly, grinning stupidly as he replays the last sentence in his mind once or twice. He bites back a laugh as he realizes that things might just be looking up.
For the first time in weeks, Orlando feels a flicker of hope course through him.
It’s the best thing he’s felt that entire month.
If Billy tells himself that things will be all right one more time, he might just snap and start yelling at himself to snap out of it. He’s just gotten off the phone with Margaret, and she had said everything he’d wanted to hear. He had wanted her to say everything that he needed to be told.
He had needed to hear from her mouth that his life wasn’t healthy.
Deep down, he knows it. It doesn’t matter how many times Dom shouts it at him, Billy has always known that what he’s doing to himself is simply not healthy. So maybe, one day down that yellow brick road, things are going to be okay. They just aren’t okay right now, and if Billy doesn’t do anything, they never will be.
So Billy closes his eyes, and makes his decision.
He’s going to be strong.
Karl has been wandering around the courtyard in the middle of the day, risking the scolding he might receive from Sean later about slipping off without telling anyone. He needs to get away though, or else he fears that just being around Viggo will overwhelm him completely. He finds that walking through the halls with just the knowledge that Viggo might be in the next room has the ability to choke him, and makes the world spin a little faster.
Karl finds Viggo sitting by the pond.
He doesn’t run away – which is a feat all its own. Karl takes cautious steps forward until he is sitting directly across from Viggo. They do not touch, they do not speak, and they most certainly do not make eye contact.
“We’ve never done this before,” Viggo says, and the words catch Karl by surprise. Viggo is running his hand lightly through the water, creating patterns with his fingers. “You didn’t like the water.”
Karl pauses, and clears his throat. Everything seems too small, too closed-in. “No, I…I like the water. I think you just started to think that I didn’t. Or, you didn’t think I should.”
They sit in renewed silence as the sound of splashing takes over Karl’s hearing. Karl understands that they are sitting at an impasse and that something is going to have to change before someone walks away. Karl is hoping that the walking away won’t be of the ‘leaving forever’ variety.
“I don’t know you,” Viggo says plainly, locking eyes with Karl.
“No,” Karl agrees.
Karl cringes when there is a long silence.
“Why didn’t you want me when you first came?” Viggo asks quietly when he breaks the silence, the words barely audible. Karl cannot look into Viggo’s eyes now, he cannot look there for he is afraid of what Viggo might see, what Karl might inadvertently let slip through. “I had it all planned so perfectly, it was all so…it was perfect, but you didn’t want it. Why?”
“Viggo,” Karl says just as quietly as Viggo had spoken. He reaches across and takes Viggo’s dry hand into his own, cradling it gently and comfortably. They finally lock eyes, and Karl lets everything slip through.
“What do you need?” Viggo leans forward and begs, pressing his forehead to Karl’s. “Anything. Name anything, and I’ll do it. I’ll make us perfect again, I swear, I…”
“Just let me be me,” Karl interrupts, and murmurs. He presses a quiet kiss to Viggo’s lips before resting complacently with their foreheads merely touching, hands interlocked. “Let me be me,” Karl repeats with a note of desperation to the words. “I don’t need perfection, or any kind of overwhelming utopia. I need you, and I need you to let me be who I am instead of some perfect vision.”
The beginnings of a tiny smile of realization crinkle on the edge of Viggo’s lips.
“Can you do that?” Karl asks, keeping his voice soft – and a part of him dreadfully fears the answer. He closes his eyes and gives in to the feeling of warm skin against his own, a strong hand clasping his.
“You are your own creation,” Viggo replies in his rough voice, caressing the side of Karl’s cheek with a slightly damp hand. “You are whoever you want to be, whatever you are under the surface people make for you. And I’m right here, and I won’t leave you.”
“And if it isn’t perfect?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
tbc
Pairing: Karl/Viggo, Orlando/Bean, Dom/Billy
Rating: R
Disclaimer: Schyeah, never happened.
Summary: Orlando finds hope, Viggo makes things right, and Billy looks for strength.
Notes: Thanks to
captnobvious for the beta and twinklypixie for the translations.Orlando has heard the words ‘no’, ‘no thanks’, ‘maybe later’, and ‘I’m sorry’ more times in his life than he’d care to admit to. When he’d heard through his agent that someone had wanted him to play Legolas – more than just a passing acceptance – he had literally jumped for joy before heading out with friends to celebrate the whole night. In terms of relationships, people, and events though, he’s heard the letters N and O far more than one wants to.
But he presses on. It takes him a while to let his barriers down again, but he never gives up. When Ella had dumped him, he had asked out Nina, and when she had said no, he had taken it in stride and indulging in a quick fumble in the closet with John, and then triumphantly earning a ‘Yes’ from the prettiest girl on the block, a brunette named Lilah.
The moral behind Orlando’s life story is that he just has to press on.
He remembers during shooting when Karl had mounted the horse and had muttered, “Do not trust to hope. It is forsaken in this land.” Orlando can identify with that one. He gets it. Hope isn’t something that’s there to back you up in the grand scheme of things. It’s more like the flimsy friend that shows up once in a while, but you know you can’t trust him with anything important.
He hopes though. When he has nothing else, and when he’s frozen in place without a way to move forward, he closes his eyes and just concentrates on thinking about a better future. He tries to see a way out of the darkness.
He hopes with all his heart that Billy can be happy.
He hopes that he will find someone who can give him peace of mind.
More than anything, he hopes everything will work out in the end.
“Ready?” Orlando shouts above the howling winds.
“No.”
“Oh for Christ’s sake!” Orlando shouts a little louder, letting out an animal of a scream – one that breaks in the middle and is loud, obnoxious, and utterly Orlando. “You,” he shakes his head wildly, letting the wind toss back a few curls. He takes a deep breath and looks over behind him. “You were the one who came to me and said, ‘Orlando, I’ll do it. I will bungee jump with you!’”
“It’s high.”
“Bill, I know you can do this,” Orlando immediately switches gears and puts as much encouragement as he can into his voice. The wind only sweeps away the first few syllables of his sentence. He feels a swell of pride in him at getting Billy to finally come with him. “Just take a leap of faith!” Orlando encourages at the top of his lungs.
If Billy can jump; if Billy can conquer his fear, then Orlando knows that he can do anything. His friends have strength enough, and maybe if Orlando just follows his heart and does things that will make him happy, everything will turn out right in the end. If he can conquer his own roadblocks and fears, he can finally find a good place to be.
That’s what he’s been holding out hope for. He’s waiting for happiness.
Orlando is the first to jump, strangely silent as he plunges face first into the wind and lets the atmosphere slowly tug him towards the ground, faster and faster until the cord cushions his fall and tugs him skyward again. Finally, his feet are on the ground again. His entire body is shaking with excitement as he looks upward, cups his hands around his mouth and nearly screams up.
“You can do this, Bill!”
He looks up, shielding his eyes from the sun and watches as Billy takes a step off the platform and makes the jump. He lets loose a terrible scream that sounds entirely girlish – which might have been done for Orlando’s benefit, he’s not quite sure at the moment – and when he’s lowered to the ground and had his equipment taken off, he nearly tackles Orlando with a hug. Billy’s arms shake as he clings.
Orlando grins and whispers, “You’re strong, Bill. Look at you. Bravest Scot in the whole vicinity.”
Billy parts, and Orlando could swear that he sees the hints of tears in Billy’s eyes. It might have be a trick of the light because the next time he looks, everything is normal, and Billy’s eyes look dry. He pats Orlando on the back once more as he gets out of the special suit, and nods slowly.
“You’re right,” Billy acknowledges quietly with a calm smile. He wraps his arm around Orlando and begins to walk, tugging Orlando with him. Orlando’s not sure he’s heard properly, but it sounds as though Billy’s just said: “Things are going to be all right soon, Orlando, I promise.”
“Are you going to be okay?” Orlando murmurs as they make it to the parking lot.
Billy turns, and gives a listless shrug accompanied by a half-smile. This time, Orlando is not second-guessing when he sees the tears in Billy’s eyes. Billy visibly swallows, and suddenly, Orlando feels like he has a lump in his throat. He furrows his brow as he watches Billy, not blinking once in case he misses something.
“Things are going to be all right,” Billy promises, more conviction in his voice this time.
“No, I just mean…” Orlando trails off, laughing to himself and scratching the side of his face. He had called Bean on a whim, and had spent the last thirty minutes feeling extremely pleased with his whims. “He went bungee-jumping with me! Christ, I half expected him to break down and start whimpering for Dom to come save him.”
“You mean that wasn’t the first pleading cry out of his mouth?” Bean retorts with a snide, yet caring laugh.
Orlando laughs harder. “No, no he begged for someone to save him. Dom was included in those cries. He just didn’t make a specific plea for Dominic Monaghan to come whisk him off his feet and take him away from the evil elf.”
“You are quite devious,” Sean laughs a bit on his end.
“But he did it,” Orlando remarks with admiration. “He really, actually did it.”
“You’re a terrible influence with a heart of gold,” Sean murmurs quietly. Orlando strains to hear each word, but he’s fairly sure that he didn’t mix anything up. Orlando grins as he relaxes further into the chair, clinging tightly to the phone as his nerves jump around, almost on a cue that he’s about to ask Sean on a date…
…which really isn’t why Orlando had called. Or so he’s telling himself. It’s not as though the thought had never crossed his mind. Realism had taken Orlando aside for a conversation, however, and it was a quick decision that Orlando should do nothing in the way of asking Sean Bean out on a ‘date’. After all, it could only end in badness and further rejection.
Orlando is getting ready to brave rejection when he hears the quiet hum of Sean’s voice on the other end, and for a moment, Orlando is unsure as to whether he heard anything at all.
“What?” he asks loudly, furrowing his brow in thought as he tries to think what he could have missed.
“I said,” Bean starts again, “I ought to head up over there. It’s not right for the lot of you to be having all these good times without me. What happened to a fellowship of men?”
“And elves,” Orlando retorts quickly.
“And hobbits, what have you. The point is, I’m missing out!” Sean replies swiftly, sounding close to petulant. Orlando laughs at this, loudly and possibly at Sean’s tone. “Besides, I was going to take a drive up to see you. This way I can see Vig, maybe chat with Bill, Dom…have a boy’s night out.”
“Yeah, we’ve been hitting the pub just about every…” Orlando begins enthusiastically before slowing down when Sean’s words finally make sense in his brain. “See me?”
“You,” Sean confirms. “I figured it would be crass to ask you out over the phone, except that I just did. Anyhow, Orlando, you want to head out with me? We could have dinner, pop a few drinks back and see where things go?”
“Date?” Orlando repeats slowly, blinking in shock.
“We could call it that,” Sean agrees with a warm laugh. “I’ve got to run. The girls are yelling at me for the phone. I’ll come by though, we’ll go out. See you soon, Lando.”
Orlando hangs up the phone slowly, grinning stupidly as he replays the last sentence in his mind once or twice. He bites back a laugh as he realizes that things might just be looking up.
For the first time in weeks, Orlando feels a flicker of hope course through him.
It’s the best thing he’s felt that entire month.
If Billy tells himself that things will be all right one more time, he might just snap and start yelling at himself to snap out of it. He’s just gotten off the phone with Margaret, and she had said everything he’d wanted to hear. He had wanted her to say everything that he needed to be told.
He had needed to hear from her mouth that his life wasn’t healthy.
Deep down, he knows it. It doesn’t matter how many times Dom shouts it at him, Billy has always known that what he’s doing to himself is simply not healthy. So maybe, one day down that yellow brick road, things are going to be okay. They just aren’t okay right now, and if Billy doesn’t do anything, they never will be.
So Billy closes his eyes, and makes his decision.
He’s going to be strong.
Karl has been wandering around the courtyard in the middle of the day, risking the scolding he might receive from Sean later about slipping off without telling anyone. He needs to get away though, or else he fears that just being around Viggo will overwhelm him completely. He finds that walking through the halls with just the knowledge that Viggo might be in the next room has the ability to choke him, and makes the world spin a little faster.
Karl finds Viggo sitting by the pond.
He doesn’t run away – which is a feat all its own. Karl takes cautious steps forward until he is sitting directly across from Viggo. They do not touch, they do not speak, and they most certainly do not make eye contact.
“We’ve never done this before,” Viggo says, and the words catch Karl by surprise. Viggo is running his hand lightly through the water, creating patterns with his fingers. “You didn’t like the water.”
Karl pauses, and clears his throat. Everything seems too small, too closed-in. “No, I…I like the water. I think you just started to think that I didn’t. Or, you didn’t think I should.”
They sit in renewed silence as the sound of splashing takes over Karl’s hearing. Karl understands that they are sitting at an impasse and that something is going to have to change before someone walks away. Karl is hoping that the walking away won’t be of the ‘leaving forever’ variety.
“I don’t know you,” Viggo says plainly, locking eyes with Karl.
“No,” Karl agrees.
Karl cringes when there is a long silence.
“Why didn’t you want me when you first came?” Viggo asks quietly when he breaks the silence, the words barely audible. Karl cannot look into Viggo’s eyes now, he cannot look there for he is afraid of what Viggo might see, what Karl might inadvertently let slip through. “I had it all planned so perfectly, it was all so…it was perfect, but you didn’t want it. Why?”
“Viggo,” Karl says just as quietly as Viggo had spoken. He reaches across and takes Viggo’s dry hand into his own, cradling it gently and comfortably. They finally lock eyes, and Karl lets everything slip through.
“What do you need?” Viggo leans forward and begs, pressing his forehead to Karl’s. “Anything. Name anything, and I’ll do it. I’ll make us perfect again, I swear, I…”
“Just let me be me,” Karl interrupts, and murmurs. He presses a quiet kiss to Viggo’s lips before resting complacently with their foreheads merely touching, hands interlocked. “Let me be me,” Karl repeats with a note of desperation to the words. “I don’t need perfection, or any kind of overwhelming utopia. I need you, and I need you to let me be who I am instead of some perfect vision.”
The beginnings of a tiny smile of realization crinkle on the edge of Viggo’s lips.
“Can you do that?” Karl asks, keeping his voice soft – and a part of him dreadfully fears the answer. He closes his eyes and gives in to the feeling of warm skin against his own, a strong hand clasping his.
“You are your own creation,” Viggo replies in his rough voice, caressing the side of Karl’s cheek with a slightly damp hand. “You are whoever you want to be, whatever you are under the surface people make for you. And I’m right here, and I won’t leave you.”
“And if it isn’t perfect?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
tbc
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