discoveredinalj | Discovered in the Christmas Tree - 19th December

Posting on behalf of

murphybabe, who is all but internet-less right now - Pros fic! I'm warming the mince pies and pouring the ~~gin~~ ~~mulled wine~~ ~~cup of tea~~ gin all ready...

Home for Christmas
by Murphybabe

Doyle was cold and tired. Tired of hiding, tired of slinking through the back streets like the fugitive he was. And the streets had changed since he was a lad: Derby's civic pride in being granted city status had spawned a rash of new one-way systems and blocked-off streets.

He resented being sent up to Derby, chasing a will-o'-the-wisp because he knew the territory and could slip back into the local accent without much bother. He'd run from Derby down to London, all those years ago, and hadn't wanted to come back to relive his past. There were just enough changes to make a dislocation in his senses, pubs boarded up and streets not as they used to be. His shoulder blades itched: waiting to be spotted, he had one final piece of information to confirm from a grass and then he was out of here.

Light beckoned, shimmering through the sleet. There weren't many people out on the street, and those who were late leaving the office scurried, heads down, towards warm homes and loving families. What would it hurt, just to take a few minutes in the shelter? He looked around, wincing as a cold trickle of rain ran down the back of his neck. He ducked under a branch, hopped over the low wall and opened the big door quietly.

Warmth, light and sound hit him like a wall. Oh, but he remembered this. All medieval tracery on light stone from the outside, Derby cathedral was a baroque creation of space and light and golden highlights inside. And tonight, sound - baroque again, curlicues of sound rising through the heated air. He looked cautiously down the aisle. At the far end, a choir was drawn up in serried ranks, focused intently on the conductor. The orchestra was busy, heads down, creating beautiful patterns of music with a strength and rhythm that transcended the centuries, speaking to modern man, taking time from one century and gifting it to another. And the choir, totally focussed on the man at the front, jeans-clad and waving a little baton - all that power and beauty harnessed, leashed, controlled.

He recognised the music now. A classic Christmas pop, Handel's Messiah would bring the good citizens of Derby out to listen in self-satisfied comfort, smug in the knowledge that they were cultured because they knew that they had to stand for the Hallelujah Chorus - if not why.

Caught up in the beauty of the music, he took time out from the miserable job and just listened. He had the best stereo system he could afford, with Dolby sound and sub-woofers and tweeters, but nothing compared to hearing the music live, with human frailties transcended by the beauty of the music. The separate strands weaved over and through each other, echoing back and around and building to create a delicate tracery of sound. A hushed pause, and suddenly, trumpets and the full choir. He listened, weary past belief, and the music and the warmth and the light sent him into a trance-like state, borne up by the beauty around him. A sudden discordance, the tap-tap of the conductor's baton, and the choir and orchestra fell into siulence. Doyle couldn't hear what was said, but there was a rustle of laughter from the choir and a gathering, purposeful, as they launched into intricacy again.

He looked at them as he backed away to the door. Mostly middle-aged, dressed informally, fumbling for page-turns - their lives were so different to his, yet they were what he fought for, that they might come to choir practice in the cathedral and cluck like contented chickens as they gave each other lifts home to happy suburbia. They wouldn't even know he existed, he and the rest of Cowley's minions, until something went wrong and there was a stern twenty-second feature on the 9 o'clock news. And that was how it should be, he concluded.

If he could wrap this up, confirm the suspected terrorist cell, he could be back in time for Christmas. Maybe Bodie would be there, finished with whatever op they had him on , and maybe they could have Christmas Day off together. A cosy little fantasy flitted through his tired brain, of the two of them warm and comfortable on the settee, watching telly after turkey and Christmas pud.

He slipped silently out the door and shivered as the sleet hit again. Time to finish up this op and go home.

______

There was a prolonged buzz at the door: long, short. long, long. Bodie launched himself at the entry phone, knowing that code.

"Not today,thank you, I've got all the Tupperware I need."

The growl came through the tinny transmitter clearly. "Stop pissing about and let me up, Bodie."

Grinning, Bodie released the door and leaned against the wall, waiting.

It had obviously been a long few weeks, and his partner looked rough, strung out and moving with little of his usual grace. The overlong curls hung into shadowed eyes, and he had lost weight.

"All done, then?"

"Yeah, all wrapped up, seen the Old Man an' got time off for good behaviour. Well, two days, anyway."

"Just enough time to cook all this food I've got in, then."

"If I cook it, mate, and you eat it, you're washing up as well."

Bodie smirked. "How could you think otherwise, sunshine?"

Later, Bodie smiled faintly as Eric and Ernie skipped off into the distance. Bring me sunshine, indeed. Without glancing sideways, he shuffled slightly into the corner of the settee, allowing the head sagging against him to loll more comfortably against his shoulder. He slid an arm up and around, and Doyle sighed and curled into him. He felt the broad shoulders relax, and wrinked his nose to dislodge the tickling curls. Home for Christmas. He'd obviously been a good boy that year.

~End~

Title: Home for Christmas
Author: Murphybabe
Slash or Gen: Slash
Archive at ProsLib/Circuit: Yes please
Disclaimer: I wish they were mine, but they’re not.