[Gunnwesley] Fic: Kungai Part Two 11/12 (Wesley/Gunn, NC17)

[helenraven]

Title: Kungai Part Two 11/12

Author: Helen Raven

Email: helenraven at talk21.com

Pairing: Wesley/Gunn

Summary: The full history of the relationship between
Gunn and Wesley in the Birthdayverse. A novel in six
parts.

Rating: NC-17

Disclaimer: Not mine, not for profit, not even a blip
on the litigation radar.

The Story's Home Page: http://www.kelper.co.uk/kungai

-----------------------

Angel had a vision on Wednesday, just as they were
starting their training session. The vision didn't
bring out Angelus and didn't give Angel too hard a
ride, so he was steady and lucid once he was free of
the reverberation phase, and was able to tell them
immediately that he knew the location: a water-tank
built on the site of an abandoned convent. Wesley said
that the demon in the drawings looked like a Thrall,
in which case the figures in the robes were probably
human worshippers who had been dragged under its spell
and the vision must be telling them to kill the
Thrall, which would free the worshippers from the
spell.

"What'll happen if they're not freed?"

Gunn had put the question to Wesley, but the answer
came from Angel. "With what we've got here, they'll
hack each other to death. There's at least two groups
in there. It felt as if they were fighting over how to
worship it."

"Hey! Our big chance to get mixed up in a religious
war. What're we waitin' for?"

For most of the drive out to the water-tank, they were
talking over the problem of having to fight the human
worshippers. There were a lot of these worshippers,
they were heavily armed, and they all seemed
determined to fight to the death. How could you defend
yourself against a mob like that, and not run the risk
of killing one of them? More than one. Yes, they could
all three live with the guilt, they would see it as an
accident, but what to do about the police? Angel
couldn't turn himself in, Gunn wouldn't (not for an
accident, and not when it was obvious you couldn't
tell the cops one word of the real story), but
Wesley... Wesley was really disturbed by the idea that
he might start to think of himself as above human law.
No, he wouldn't turn himself in over the type of
accident they were discussing - for the same reasons
as Gunn - but he knew that having made that decision
once, he would find it all too easy to make again.

Angel listened seriously to Wesley having all these
doubts, but Gunn couldn't help laughing at him. "Wes,
you couldn't slide down that slope if it was waxed to
a shine. You might think you got a look of psycho
vigilante, but I havta tell you that image gets
trashed the second you open your mouth and start
worryin' like that. Anyway, we're gonna sneak in, do
that left-and-right thing to slip behind the Thrall
'n' split its head. They won't see us before it's all
over, and if they do, one of us'll get through in
time. Save y'r worrying for some other buncha dopes."

They did sneak in, and Gunn got around behind the
Thrall and split its head open before the worshippers
had noticed any one of them. The worshippers didn't
seem to notice them afterwards, either. Very strange,
how they acted once it was over, not like they'd been
freed, more like they'd just switched to another
spell. No "Where the hell am I? Who're all of you?
What's with the robes and the swords? And, oh God!
what's that dead thing stuck in the floor?" They just
dropped the swords, shrugged out of the robes, then
made for the stairs, like they'd all done this ten,
twenty times before.

On the way home Gunn called Matt to tell him that
Wesley wouldn't be able to come on the tour. "He's
giving me the background, though. The stories. Not
sayin' it'll be just as good or anythin', but should
still be fun. That's OK, yeah?"

That was fine. "Gonna be at the club tomorrow?"

"Should be. Around nine?" Gunn had already planned to
go to Caritas on the Thursday night. The boys had
obviously seen enough on Sunday to decide that he and
Wesley weren't a pair of assholes, and Gunn hadn't
wanted to push for any more than that at the time. But
he didn't want to wait until the tour before he did
the follow-up, found out if they really did know
people in Caritas who could use an expert like Wesley.

"Great. See you then, man."

They were on a table at the far side of the room, and
they'd kept a chair free for Gunn. He'd just missed
seeing them sing "Wouldn't it be nice?" and their next
song should be either "Werewolves of London" or
"Looking for the Heart of Saturday Night". Piriti was
choosing all the songs tonight, their way of making up
to him for the hard week he'd had at home.

Matt asked after Wesley, and Gunn told them that
Wesley had been reading some stories in Chachaspe. "He
thought, from the title, they were going to be about
dreaming - still got the song in his head - but
they're mostly about dealing with strangers."

Later, Grouw asked Gunn if he knew how Wesley had lost
his arm. "That was one of the demons he said he didn't
kill. From near the beginning of the list. The
Kungai."

"Oh. But he made it sound like..."

"Yeah. Well, he would."

Matt said, "Was it an accident?"

"No."

"You don't want to talk about it, either."

Gunn shrugged. "Don't know much about it. Was before I
met him. Think he nearly died."

A sombre silence, then Grouw said, "But he was back.
Saving his humans again. Couldn't have been much more
than a month after."

"Like I said, he's stupid some ways."

"Is that why he hired you? To help with that side?
You'd been doin' the same, right? With vampires."

"He didn't hire me. He's my partner, he's not my boss.
But, yeah, that was how we met. First obvious thing we
had in common."

"What else do you have in common?" Piriti sounded
curious, slightly puzzled.

"Enough to like working together."

Grouw said, "You gonna become an expert, like him?"

"Not a chance, with the languages. I learn a tenth of
the rest, I'll be doin' well. He's been studyin' his
whole life. And he loves to study. I'm more about
gettin' out, gettin' things moving."

Piriti grinned and said, "Like you'd be doing now, if
the three of us'd stop talking about our 'happy' songs
and let you get down to business?" Matt and Grouw
laughed, and all three looked at Gunn expectantly.

A few seconds, then: "That was only about half a dig,
yeah?"

Grouw shook his head. "Not even that. We put you
through the secret identity thing. Know you didn't do
all that work so you could listen to us argue, and
then give up another weekend. Thought you'd've called
us on Monday, or something."

Gunn shook his head. "Yeah, I'm that pushy, but Wes
said... So you'd be OK about Wes and me talkin' to
your friends here? Not asking for introductions or
anything. But if we handed out cards and people asked
you about us, you wouldn't, like, warn 'em off?"

"Only for your sake, 'cos some guys you don't want
calling. No, we'll do more than that. We'll tell you
'bout who we know, not just in this crowd. You know,
what we've heard, where you might start. And put the
word round."

Matt said, "For what the word's worth, coming from us.
There's only so much respect a kickin' Talking Heads
chorus'll get you in this town."

"And some of us still get sent out to collect bark
whenever the conversation might get interesting."
Looked like Piriti's hard week had mostly been about
getting treated like a kid. " 'nother few years I'm
gonna have to move to a different dimension, change my
name and pretend to be a fifth-brooder, just so I can
find out what proper gossip sounds like."

"Yeah, but you're not sneakin' off without us.
Respectable fifth-brooder can't travel without his
entourage. Like, his mysterious Hull personal
trainer."

"And his tame human that he raised from a puppy. Look!
I can carry eggs in my mouth." Matt opened his mouth
wide, looking every inch the eager puppy proud of his
new trick.

When Piriti had stopped giggling, he turned to Gunn
and said, "So when d'you want to start? We could come
round some evening. Spend a solid hour or two fillin'
you in."

"Um... Be great, but have to be somewhere else." Gunn
pulled a face. "Got this roommate situation."

"Oh God, roommates!" Grouw nodded and sighed. "What
about Wesley's place?"

"No, he's got the exact same situation. 's a long
story. Angel, guy who founded the business. He and
Wesley go way back. But he got sick, had to stop
working. And he's sick in a way that..." Gunn shook
his head hard. "He can't have people in the
apartment."

Grouw was the one who broke the silence. "You're
saying he's your roommate too? This sick guy. You and
Wesley sort of lookin' after him?"

"Sort of. Way it worked out. Like I said, long story."

Piriti looked almost scared. "Is it really tough?"

"No, not really. He's not whiny or anything. Just some
things you have to work around."

Matt shrugged. "My place then. Or how d'you feel about
getting your hands dirty? Piriti's got this project he
needs to work on. Home improvements thing. That's what
we got planned for Saturday afternoon. I know,
weekends again. But it's the best time when we're all
free."

"Sounds good. Where's the project? I need to bring
anything? Work-clothes? I'll see what Wes is doing,
but it'll probably just be me again."

Wesley was asleep when Gunn got home, but nearly
choked on his breakfast coffee when Gunn told him
about the plans for Saturday. Finally he got the
laughing and spluttering under control, but then just
stood and shook his head for the longest time.

"Charles. I don't know what I expected when you came
to join us. This isn't supposed to happen, not even
with your talent for meeting people. Two humans
building a nest for a Chachaspe! There may be fifty
people alive who'd understand what that means. And
none of them would believe it."

Gunn smiled. "That's another reason you're not coming?
'cos you couldn't tell anyone about it?"

"I'd much rather hear about it. Leave the
minute-by-minute details to my imagination."

Gunn thought he had some idea of Wesley's imagination,
but he was taken completely by surprise when he got
home early on Saturday evening to find Wesley
extremely horny. Wesley definitely wouldn't let him
change his clothes or shower off the sweat and grit.
Wesley wanted him in the bedroom, immediately.

Gunn had never seen a lover so hungry for his skin.
Wesley pressed himself against Gunn, slid over him,
around him, the movements too slow and determined to
be called restless, but constant, always pushing for
more. Gunn found it exciting, maybe even more so
because none of it seemed to be meant for him, done to
make him feel good, not even the kissing. This was all
about Wesley; this was something between Wesley's
imagination and Gunn's skin.

Afterwards, Gunn said, "So it gets to you like your
stubble gets to me? The idea of me nest-building with
demons."

"No, I wasn't even really thinking about that. Just
about you out in the sun. With your new friends. Your
hands in the earth. I can still smell the sun on you."
Smiling: "You weren't thinking about me at all, were
you?"

"Um. Not really. We were busy. Lots to talk about.
Piriti's brother was there. New songs. And some really
old ones. Finding more money for beer."

"You had an ordinary day with friends."

"Well, one way to look at it. Just yesterday you were
all woo-hoo about the wackiness of me getting to help
with the nest. Sounds like you're over that."

"Anything but. You did have a good day, though? They
are friends?"

"Yeah, it was a blast. They'd've driven you crazy but
they make me laugh."

"I'm glad." Wesley raised himself up on his elbow and
looked down at Gunn, studying Gunn's face, watching
his own hand as it stroked Gunn's head.

Gunn could feel Wesley becoming excited again. He
lifted his hand and touched his fingers to Wesley's
lips, then laid the back of his hand against Wesley's
throat. "Love the way you show you're glad. How you
gonna be next weekend, when we've been out all day
havin' fun with your tour?"

"Well, at the risk of sounding conceited, that
probably won't be an ordinary day. And you'll be
thinking of me too much. Today was... I don't know.
Imagining you as if we hadn't met yet. Or as if I was
the sun on you, I was your clothes. You were doing all
of these normal, simple things, nothing to do with me.
But I could feel your body as if I was the air around
you."

"Wow. English. Wow." Gunn slid his hand around to the
back of Wesley's neck, and drew him down into a long
kiss. "But now I'll be thinkin' of you whenever I'm
out in the sun. Know that's the opposite of what you
need to imagine. But you've told me now."

Wesley shook his head. "Enough sun. Enough songs.
Enough sand under your nails. You'll forget me until
it's time to collect the empty beer-bottles and head
for home."

Much, much later, when Wesley was at least a hundred
percent fucked, and they'd slept for about half an
hour, and had just agreed that they would get up and
shower (but not yet): "So you met Piriti's brother?
What's he like?"

"God. Incredibly shy. Would only speak to Piriti, and
in Chachaspe. Think that was mostly because I was
there. They look like they're identical. But you can
tell them apart in a second just from the way they
hold themselves."

"Were they physically affectionate with one another?"

"Oh, boy! Practically makin' out. I was gonna get to
that. How'd'you know?"

"I'd wondered, from what I'd read about the Chachaspe.
And other species where the males from a generation
raise the children together. Scarcely even meet the
females. Their sex drive has to work differently from
ours. I've never seen anything written about the
females having a need for physical bonding. Not with
anything. But any number of scandalised footnotes
about the way the males behaved with each other. I
couldn't find out if it was overtly sexual, though."

"Matt said it wasn't. I asked him when the two of us
were goin' for beer. He said Piriti doesn't understand
sex as somethin' you'd do for fun. With another
person. For him sex is all about the nest. Somethin'
about the smell of eggs in the nest. He doesn't have
fantasies about it, he doesn't wanna do it. But he
gets spooked at the idea of having to sleep apart from
his brother. And, yeah, that's what it looked like
when I looked again."

"I'm glad we're not Chachaspe."

"They seemed happy together. But yeah. The brother
asked at the end if he could come along next weekend.
Could see that was a big surprise to Grouw and Matt.
Course we said yes. And he couldn't cope with that,
was gone into one of his tunnels." Gunn had snapped
his fingers to show the speed. "Nearly killed us,
stoppin' ourselves from laughin' at him." He laughed
now, and Wesley too. "Just hoping Grouw's sister and
the boyfriend are OK with him. Everyone says I'll like
the sister. Grouw says she's a jewel." Gunn sighed.
"Kind of sweet, isn't it? He must really miss her when
she's away working."

Dinner, about an hour later, was a tuna salad. Or
"tyoona", as Wesley kept on calling it, said he never
stop calling it because he liked to think that the
language he spoke was English, and he could see no
good case for abandoning his standards, even if it did
take him half an hour to make himself understood
whenever he placed his order in Subway. Gunn loved
Wesley's rants, wanted to take him straight back to
bed.

"You just like being difficult."

"I am the soul of reason. The people behind me in the
queue at Starbucks are grateful to me for explaining
so thoroughly why 'small', 'medium' and 'large' are
entirely adequate to the task of describing a range of
three sizes, and that the management's decision to
defect to the G word and the V word can be seen only
as a ludicrous and unhelpful pretension."

"Grateful, yeah?"

"Indeed. They always show a lively and touching
interest in where I'm from. And in how soon I'm going
back."

Gunn had just started his slice of pie when Wesley
said, "Grouw's sister. Tell me again what work she
does."

"She's a prison guard. They really have whole prison
dimensions?"

"They certainly do. You know, I don't think Grouw was
saying she was a jewel. I think he said 'dual'. As in
dual control, dual nationality. Have you ever heard
him order tuna?"

"So what's that mean? I guess she's got two sets of
paperwork or something, if she works in this other
dimension."

"She's got two bodies. She's a dual-body demon. One
body would be a Hull, the same as Grouw. And the other
body would be a Sas Vanna. Her boyfriend is probably a
dual as well. They're very popular for security work.
You get two guards for the price of one. Or at least
less than the price of two."

Wesley had to be joking again. Didn't he? "You saying
there's gonna be four of them on the tour? Damn! but
the boys are getting their money's worth. I thought
we'd fit in two cars."

"If she was born here, then you'll just see her in the
combined body. They can only split in some dimensions,
and never in the native dimension."

Gunn stared at Wesley. "Show me some pictures." Wesley
brought three books to the table, but the first was
enough to convince Gunn. "But this looks like the
combined body's just about the same size as each of
the separate bodies. It doesn't add up. Or is that
'cos of how it's drawn?"

Wesley shook his head. "There are theories about where
the mass comes from or goes to. All impossible to
test. You're going to meet two dual-body demons next
weekend. That's very exciting."

"Exciting enough that you could come along and not
sulk? About not being at home with your books."

"Maybe too exciting. I'd stare. Ask inappropriate
questions."

"Ask them to do tricks?"

"Very possibly. If the boyfriend wasn't born here then
maybe..." Wesley swallowed then shook his head
sharply. "No. I will stay home. But can I give you
some questions to ask in case the subject comes up?"

* * * * *

-----------------------

Rather read Kungai in HTML or PDF? See http://www.kelper.co.uk/kungai