Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

BANDSLASH FIC: The Watch (1/2)

Basically. I've decided that My Chemical Romance should fight crime. I've discovered a burning need within my soul to have Gerard Way walking around dressed in an all black suit and long overcoat while plotting elaborate methods of stopping crime in his city, aided by his younger brother Mikey, Ray Toro: Marine Veteran, his childhood friend Matt Pelisser, and 'reformed' criminal Frank Iero. The group forms, starting on the street they all live in and pushing outwards as they shut down the crime around them (or at least put a HEAVY damper on it). They meet at the neighborhood bar, nice and neutral in the back and Mr. Koslowski who runs the bar pretty much leaves the place in the hands of his bartender, Bob Bryar (who followed his ex-boyfriend's band out east to work tech and never left) day and night.

The neighborhood, long used to made guys and secrets, knows who the boys are, but doesn't really DO anything with the knowledge. Omerta isn't just for the mob, you know, and it's nice. The kids can go out in the evenings, you can talk to your neighbor without worrying who's listening, and the evening barbeque is making a comeback, that sort of thing. So, while no one knows precisely what's going on, they all know the Way brothers and that nice Toro boy have something going good behind the scenes.

The gang makes great strides after some...unfortunate mistakes (apparently, some ice cream trucks in the neighborhood ACTUALLY JUST SERVE ICE CREAM.) And they gain enough success and influence that the crime syndicates start to get antsy, which is where Matt and Frank come into it. Matt's got gambling debts and an expensive interest in horse races. He agrees to pass information and also get Frankie Cools (because he smokes Menthol Cools) into the gang so he can report up close and personal. Matt, although hesitant, is more than happy to exchange information and an 'in' for not having Frankie put out his cigarettes on Matt's eyes (or something. Frankie wouldn't do that—Bert would, though--but Matt doesn't know that.) Matt knows Gee's always a soft touch for a sob story, and twice as likely to believe it if he hears about it from someone in the inner circle, and not Frankie.

To cover his entrance, they put it out there that Frank's boss (Bert McCracken) found Frank in an indelicate position with Quinn Allman, and so he got kicked out. Literally. Thankfully, it was a two story apartment and Frankie hit a storefront canvas cover-thing on the way down. This is the story as told to Gee, anyway, blown up like all neighborhood gossip. Actually, Bert had Quinn kick Frankie in the ribs and blacken his eyes for 'artistic' effect. So Matt tells Gee and Gee thinks about how nice it might be to have a connected guy to go to for information if Frank could be 'turned' (and BOY CAN HE.)

Now, Bert and Gee go way back. He knows the score, bring intimately familiar with Bert McCracken's crew. So he knows of Frankie Cools, but he's never met him. What's more, Gee knows that Bert and his second in command Quinn Allman have this…thing between them. This highly explosive relationship where they never sleep together, but God Help anyone who gets in between them. Bert and Gee used to fuck all the time, but as long as Gee's known him, Bert's kept Quinn on a very tight rein.

Gee was his dad Handsome Don's right hand man, running around as part of the collections circuit and then graduating to more 'hands on' employment. Never Mikey though, never, ever Mikey, because Gee spent the majority of his childhood and youth convinced he was going to get shot in the back if he wasn't the fastest and the best and the scariest, so he MADE himself menacing...albeit in a very off the wall, goth way, and he NEVER wanted that to happen to Mikey. (Who spent the majority of his youth in the house with Mrs. Way.)

So, he goes to Frankie's mom's house (where Frankie is staying because he thinks it makes him seem more pathetic and also. Ouch, his ribs hurt like fuck) and sees Frank all beat up and asks about it and does his 'I am Gerard Way and I CARE ABOUT YOU' thing and Frankie doesn't understand what it is about the guy but he thinks maybe Gee actually means it. They talk for an hour, sitting in Frankie's mom's kitchen. Gee drinks coffee and talks with Frankie's mom and pets Frankie's dogs. He's sweet, and dorky, and smokes like a chimney and before Frankie knows it he's got an invite to Koslowski's Bar for Thursday.

Frank gets up, wincing all the way, to show Gee out the door, but before Gee leaves he leans in close and puts his hand delicately, oh so soft, on Frankie's largest bruise, and suddenly Gee's colder than ice, smiling down at Frankie and telling him in a low voice that if Frankie joins up he might get hurt again, but if he fucks Gee's people up then he WILL get hurt again. And Frankie remembers that Gerard Way is Handsome Don's oldest boy and before he saw the light, he'd grown up kneecapping guys trying to join the wrong unions. And when Gee takes his hand off Frankie's bruise he's the dorky, lovely Gee from the kitchen with a smudge of ink on his cheek and a twinkle in his eye.

Frankie says good bye and closes the door and feels very much alone.

But he's got a job to do, so he goes to the bar, waves at the big blond guy serving drinks and heads in the back. The whole time, he's convinced Matt's gonna blow the whole thing with his shaky nerves and stupid fucking giggle, but no, he meets Toro and Mikey and they seem like good guys. Toro's built like a brick, but he's got crazy hair he's VERY proud of and he likes the music Frankie likes and knows a lot about blowing shit up which Frankie could REALLY learn to enjoy.

Mikey Way won't talk to him. Actually, he doesn't even look at Frankie all that much, and at first Frankie thinks it's because of his cover (which 'techinically' isn't true because Bert just thought it was hilarious and "just what that fucking Ger-ar-duh would buy"), but then he sees that--outside of the group--Mikey just doesn't talk that much at all. Frankie starts off small, gives them information on Bert's rivals more than Bert himself, and rides shotgun on low-security raids. He's not on the inside yet, doesn't know about a raid until it happens, etc. and Bert's pissed--and crazy in case Frankie forgot--so Frankie figures the best way to get inside the group is to get inside Gee's younger brother. He's heard the rumors after all, and it wouldn't be such a hardship. Frankie likes boys, he just likes 'em prettier than stick thing, funky-hair-and-coke-bottle-glasses Mikeyway. But, hell, any port in a storm and better Mikey's pants than Bert's Glock, you know?

So Operation: Fuck Mikey Way begins in earnest, with Matt passing info through Frank and Frank making Mikey trust him and talk to him so he can start passing some information himself. Only, it turns out that Mikey's...kind of nice. And sweet. A little daffy, and he goes into his head too much, but he's got this music collection that makes Frankie would perform circus tricks for, and these hips that fit in Frankie's palms like…like something delicate, something Frankie's mama would wrap in soft cotton and protect. Weeks go by where Frankie does nothing but feed Gee information and keep Bert happy and then suddenly, Frankie's spending a hell of a lot more time over at Mrs. Way's house up in Mikey's room with headphones on, than down in Gerard's place attempting to figure out where the gang's gonna hit next.

One day he stays so long it's night by the time Frankie sits up on Mikey's bed and pulls off the headphones he's taken to leaving on the CD rack. Mikey uncurls from his position at the head of the bed and scoots forward. Frankie yawns, turns his head to say good night, and Mikey kisses him. Just…leans forward and kisses Frankie on the cheek like they were...Frankie doesn't even know. But it's...sweet. It's...Mikey's blushing and turning away and suddenly Frankie's really fed up with Mikeyway not letting him get close. So he grabs Mikey's chin and kisses him properly. And after that he...

It's almost like Frankie forgets, or maybe like there're two Frankies. There's the one who works with Gee's gang and laughs and has old ladies nod at him in the street and not sidle away in fear and who gets Mikeyway's long arms wrapped around his body at night, and then there's Frankie Cools who has two cell phones and calls in tips to his mob boss so he can move the product from his Meth labs before Gee can blow them up. Yeah, two Frankies and never the twain shall meet. Until one day Frankie Cools calls it in that the Brothers Way are buying warehouse blueprints for what might be Bert's latest depot from a local agency. He gets all the way back to his place, just getting started on washing the dishes Mikey ate breakfast off that morning, before he realizes what he's just done.

After that, it's just waiting for the call, and when it comes, it's the Gee who fondled Frankie's bruised ribs and not the one who drank his ma's coffee. There's no mention of Mikey, but Frankie can hear whimpering down the line. But Gee doesn't say word one about his little brother, that's how Frankie knows he's the dumbest, lowest man alive. He snaps the phone shut and runs all the way to Koslowski's bar.

Ray's there (and when did Toro become Ray?) and fucking' Matt's there looking green and Bob is taking Frankie by the elbow and showing in the back room the bootleggers used to unload their shipments in the twenties. Gee's back there, pulled up to a table Mikey's laid out on.

Mikey's shot--once in the arm and twice in the leg--and they can't take him to the hospital because they have to report gunshots. So Gee's called in a guy he knows from AA, a doctor who lost his license named Brian Schector who comes and swears a lot, but cleans up and takes the bullets out and Mikey wakes up mid-bullet extraction and starts moaning and crying and Frankie can't take it. Doesn't know whether to go forward, or run away, but then Mikey screams when Brian has to dig for the final bullet and Frankie bolts to the table. He grabs Mikey's head and kisses him, closing his eyes because blood is everywhere and he did this. He did this. He did this to Mikey.

But Mikey lives! And all Brian asks in payment is a hamburger, well done, and Gee's so happy he's crying and Ray's grinning like a loon, and Matt's passed out at the bar and suddenly Bob's in the room, taking Gee by the elbow for a talk outside. And Frankie gets up on the table, even though it's sort of...sticky, and holds Mikey while Mikey mumbles his drugged out passage into the land of unconsciousness. He falls asleep like that.

And then he wakes up. And Gee wants to talk to him.

***

Ray and Gee have a funky sort of history. They knew of each other more than anything else growing up in the neighborhood, but Gee was Handsome Don's kid and Ray's dad was a Marine veteran who didn't want his only son associating with trash, so they basically didn't do much together until Ray had done his tour overseas and returned with an aversion to the military and a liking for alcohol. Around this time, Gee's reaffirming his own enjoyment of fermented beverages and so they meet up at Koslowski's one night, and Bob ends up pouring them into the back room, the one they used to hide the goods during Prohibition and where Bob keeps a cot set up.

When they wake up, they're only mildly horrified to find themselves sort of...look, Ray's a cuddler okay? And Gerard's part-octopus, or something, and there was a lot of booze involved and now it's more like a hell of a lot of unsexy groaning and aspirin and Bob giving them highly amused looks before he tosses their hungover asses on the street. Eventually, it just sort of becomes this--this thing they do were they go out drinking and bitch about their families and their jobs (although Ray gives more details since he's working at Guitar Center and Gerard's still running errands for his father) while they drink until Bob cuts them off and sends them off to snore on the cot together. More often than not, Gee and Ray wake up to Bob's industrial strength coffee, which they drink while watching Bob—who lives above stairs—set up the bar for the day. It's…oddly soothing.

This is sort of Ray's Rebellion, really, making nice not only with a Way, but with Gerard Way--the Halloween Prince himself who's supposed to eat children and worship the devil...or maybe it was eat the devil and worship children, Ray's a little vague these days. Ray figures he'll get embroiled in a bar fight, maybe some low profile crime, and stick it to the old man for trying to make him into a carbon copy. And sure, sometimes he and Gee get in fights at Koslowski's, but that's usually over whose turn it is to sit on the stool facing the back wall mirror, so they can watch Bob bend over for supplies, or why IPA is the worst beer ever invented by man.

The only real fight he and Gee get into, they're on the same side, because one night Gee kisses Martin Scalieri's youngest boy and never calls him back and so the family's feeling a little bruised, but that...wasn't really what Ray figured he'd ever get into a fight about. And, actually. his Rebellion is more...not? Because Gee's a dorky guy who likes Pall Malls and whiskey and drawing portraits on napkins when he thinks no one looks which he always loses or destroys by the end of the night (actually Bob saves them when Gee's not looking, snatching them away and piling them up neatly in a folder he keeps in his apartment.) After awhile, through the alcoholic haze they start to realize neither of them were ever actually happy with what they grew up to do. Ray likes boys, likes playing guitar, liked not knowing 12 different ways to kill someone with a spoon, and pretty much came out of the Marines with a wish to grow his curls out as big as would let him get through a door and make fireworks or something. He has a skill, he figures, and at least when you blow fireworks up if people get hurt it's an accident.

And Gee's doing his job because if he didn't it'd probably fall to Mikey to do his job and that just isn't ever going to happen. Mikey's not soft, but he's not tough in the way that Gee or Ray or, hell, even Bob are tough. Mikey's a bit of a brawler when he has to be, but mostly he wants to sit back and play his records and just...play music. He might make a good DJ if half the music he ever put on the player didn't have the words, 'revenge,' 'death,' and/or 'thrill kill' in the title. Violent music for a man who stands on chairs at the threat of a mouse in the kitchen. Gee would find it amusing, but since he's been drunk for about two years and counting he finds it hilarious.

Anyway, somewhere along the way, Ray and Gee wind up falling asleep on each other when Bob doesn't have to pour them into the backroom's cot, waking up in Gee's bed in the Way house because Koslowski's Bar is closer to the Way's than any place else and Ray can't actually remember where his house is some nights. And his parents always give him a hard time whenever he comes home anyway, so really Gee's house is the best place for him. While Mrs. Way isn't exactly thrilled to pieces that her oldest son is bringing that odd little boy from down the street home with him five nights out of seven, she warms up to Ray because, when not drunk, he's warm and funny and has this lovely habit of standing whenever she enters the room.

Gee thinks it's the funniest thing ever, and even funnier when Mikey starts going down on one knee and kissing Gee's hand when HE enters the room (of course, they don't do that around Mr. Way, because that means something far, far different in that context.) Eventually everybody just sort of...gets used to Ray being the second drunk in the house, the one less likely to knock over a lamp, but twice as likely to walk into a closed door. Gee's parents just hope Ray's enough to look out for Gee when he's stumbling around drunk and Mikey, while a little jealous, is secretly happy for the increased music!geek ratio in the house. Sooner than later, Ray's sitting at the dinner table and Ma asks him to pass Dad the potatoes, and Ray realizes he's been adopted with his own place at the dinner table and a toothbrush next to Gee's in the bathroom (Ray uses his more. He's working on that.)

So, he gets up on his free day (he's been sleeping! With Gee! WHY HASN'T HE NOTICED THIS BEFORE?) and goes back to his house, where he hasn't slept in…Jesus, a month? He walks up the drive, eyes on the dirty tops of his service boots. None of his civilian shoes fit him anymore, they feel too flimsy and loose.

He opens the screen door, unlocks the inner door and steps inside. His parents are sitting in the living room, and Mr. and Mrs. Toro are...displeased. Their son has left the Corps, gotten a job selling guitars to 13 year olds, drunk his paychecks away and is now living in sin with the neighborhood psycho. Ray's lucky they didn't have the priest over for an exorcism. As it is, Father Carter was just in the area.

So an awkward, tearful shouting match ensues, with Ray saying he's happy, he's...hanging out with Gee and he's happier than he's been since the day he got his discharge papers and then there's possibly some screaming and carrying on and then the long story short is Ray gets to choose staying with his folks and going to church to pray for his sins (they don't believe the 'sleeping with Gee' part is at all platonic), or he can cut all ties. And Ray looks around at the home he grew up in, with the people who will only love him (he feels) if he gives up all the little pieces of self he's managed to hold on to through boot camp and service and just plain growing up. And suddenly he's walking down the street with no memory of getting up off his parents' couch. He…why did he do that? Why did he just chuck his entire family, his mother for a drinking buddy?

He walks back to Gee's house and opens the door (he has a key, he realizes. Gee gave him a key so he'd have a place to crash if he ever got drunk alone and needed a place) and for a wonder, Gee's home in the middle of the day.

"I just got kicked--I..." Ray says, staring at Gee's wrecked black hair, his funny smile and the way he's cleaning a Glock in the middle of the living room while Ma watches her stories next to him.

Ray looks at Gee, watches as Gee puts his pistol down carefully and walks forward. Gee rests his hands on Ray's shoulders and kisses him once on the mouth. He tastes like cherry candy, like the ones in Ma's secret stash.

"How about I make everybody something to eat," Ma says, and rubs her hand downs Ray's back as she walks by.

Ray puts his head on Gee's shoulder and thinks, "Oh, so that's why."

After that, Ray just keeps working at Guitar Center. He watches Gee get drunker and, suddenly, higher and they're together, which is good, but Ray's getting steadily not so much drunk as Gee steadily leaves sobriety behind. He needs looking after, he needs someone to pick him up off the ground when he falls, and Ray can't do that if he's down on the floor too. Mikey's too skinny to pick them both up.

It's like Gee just can't stop. Can't or won't, and it's killing Ray just like it's killing Ma and Mikey and even Mr. Way (although not so much there. Handsome Don figures a little lost piece of mind is the cost of doing business). So he keeps going to Koslowski's with Gee, always making sure he drinks less than Gerard so Ray can watch out for him. He starts packing his old service pistol because it just...it seems like the thing to do (which Mikey totally understands and shows Ray the gun Gee bought Mikey for his 11th birthday after the first time Gee had to kill a man. Mikey carries it everywhere, even though most days people don't quite know who he is.) And because Gee's drunk he's not much of a conversationalist and so Ray starts talking to Bob the Bartender instead of just ogling his ass.

Good Ol' Bob Bryar, as Gee calls him--usually just before he becomes incoherent--is quiet and bulky, more with muscle than fat, like a farm boy. Only he's never been on a farm, Ray finds out when he makes the comment one night, and also, Bob remarks, men with hickeys on their necks shouldn't make jokes about haystacks. Ray's hands fly to his neck even though it's winter and he's wearing Gee's scarf and no way did Bryar see, and then Ray looks up and Bob's smiling down at the bar, wiping up a spill. Ray doesn't know whether to punch him or collapse into the ground in embarassment, so he throws his napkins at Bob instead, laughing for the first time it feels like in weeks.

After that, Ray just starts talking to Bob about everything, all the time, and because Ray talks to Bob then Gee talks to Bob which sets Mikey off and suddenly Bob's their third musketeer, switching off Gee-Watching duties. They all three of them love music, and Mikey is absolutely fascinated that Bob used to do front of house sound for The House of Blues in Chicago. They learn that Bob's boyfriend, Patrick Stump, and his boyfriend's band came up to NY for a gig with Bob to do sound and decided to stay to record, but then his boyfriend realized that he'd been in love with his bassist for years. Gee, maybe a little too seriously offers to kill the bassist, but Bob assures him that there's no hard feelings. Sure, he's tending bar in New Jersey and doing the occasional bit for the local hardcore scene while Patrick and Pete are off being co-dependent and in love around the US…but Bob's not bitter.

Which--Ray realizes--is a shame, because Bob should be bitter. Bob uprooted his life for a guy who left him at the studio, or whatever, and now he's tending bar and teching for shitty bands because this Pete guy is EVERYWHERE in Chicago and Bob figured he didn't need the static. Bob is a saint. Bob is a broad-shoulder, charming smiled saint and he deserves a fuck-load better than what he got. And he tells Bob this. Loudly. It's possible he also says this drunkenly while hanging off Bob's shoulder on the way to the backroom again. (Hey, Ray hasn't quit drinking, he's just stopped working his way through the Alcohol A-Z Poster his squad gave him as a going away present.) It's also possible that Gee seconded this statement while listing off Mikey's arm and ending on "and you've got a great ass."

Next morning at the Way/Toro house is a little tense. Mikey doesn't know if he should smack Gee and Ray (who aren't speaking much to each other and appear to be communicating solely by blushing. And throwing bottles of asprin.) or get Bob to come over and talk about the sanctity of a bartender's ass, or something. So he puts some Joy Division in his cd player, slips on his headphones and pretends he knows how to play bass instead.

Eventually, Gee and Ray get tired of drinking at home and also of Ma banging pots in the kitchen all fucking morning when she sees the mess they make when drunk in the kitchen. So they go back to the bar and Gee drinks way too much because of the nerves, but Bob's there and he's the same good, solid man that everyone overlooks until they need him and then forgets when they don't. Only this time Ray makes an effort not to forget, because Gee's getting worse as his dad gets older and frailer and starts talking about his legacy. Currently, his legacy is some really scenic areas to dump bodies, an easy in to Bert McCracken's drug supply, and a bunch of guys who walk with canes because Gee kneecapped them. Good times.

Suddenly, everything's tense and quiet. Handsome Don takes longer every day to get out of bed and Gee doesn't come to bed at all anymore. So Ray goes looking for him, night after night following Gee to jobs and trying to hide all these pills he finds and it's tough. He hasn't slept and Mikey isn't sleeping either because if Ray gets to go then so does Mikey so they're seeing parts of Gee he never wanted them to see, the Halloween Prince, the guy Mr. Way sends to hurt and scare and collect debts. Some nights Ray, Mikey, and Bob lose Gee while following him, and then Mikey and Ray drink all of Bob's coffee in his apartment, trying to stay awake and staring at their cell phones, just waiting for Gee to call…or stumble down the street or anything. Bob's very neat, and Ray kind of gets in the habit of futzing with his stuff to get a rise out of Bob, and during one of those 'rearrange Bob's couch pillow' moments, Ray finds the folder with all of Gee's napkin drawings in it. He looks up and through to the kitchen area, where Bob and Mikey are talking around the table. Bob rubs the back of Mikey's neck, his large hand curling at Mikey's nape protectively. Ray puts the folder back exactly where he found it.

It just gets worse. Handsome Don gets a little paranoid one week, and sends Gee out at all hours to roust his 'employees' and make sure everyone knows who's in charge. No one can keep up, and finally Gee-Watching falls all to pieces. Ray lays awake all night in their bed, waiting for Gee to come home, and thinking about all the ways a human body can die. And Ray should know, he's the combat veteran.

Booze, pills, it's all six of one and half a dozen of something round and blue. At that point, it gets so bad Gee has a freak out on acid and wakes up with shorn hair, dyed whiter than chalk, and doesn't remember what happened, or where he was, but when he gets back home and pushes Ray off so he can clean up, there's lipstick on his inner thigh.

Gee stands there in the shower, water pouring down on his head and begins to scrub, working his way through his soap and his ma's and that shit Mikey uses on his pimples. He scrubs until his skin is red and stinging from the now frigid water and it still isn't enough because he doesn't remember and he--he could have something now, something wrong with him because he doesn't know what he did or who--he gags and puts his hand on the shower wall for balance, but it's no help. Nausea hits and suddenly Gee's vomiting onto his feet, thick yellow bile that burns as it churns up his throat.

Eventually, Ray comes for him, the way Ray always seems to, and pulls him out of the water. He dries Gee off and puts him to bed, wrapping his arms around Gee's stomach and throwing a leg over Gee's. And Gee can't take it. He closes his eyes and tells him everything. He tells Ray, that he doesn't know about where he's been, or…or who he's been with, and all the time he's just waiting for Ray to pull away and leave him and maybe tell Mikey so Mikey'll know exactly what kind of fuck up his older brother is, down to the last atom, and maybe it's better that way. Better that everyone knows just how horrible and bad Gerard Way truly is, maybe he should just go off and die and let Ray get together with Bob because he's seen how Bob looks at Ray and how Ray laughs and smiles when Bob's there and it'd be better. So much better. Only Ray doesn't pull away and eventually it's just Gee and Ray, shivering on the bed. Gee falls asleep and wakes up in exactly the same position he fell asleep in. He feels awful, mouth like a graveyard and claws stripping his nerve endings to raw, bloody shreds. He wants a drink and a hit in exactly that order and he gets up, sitting up in the bed and looks at his shaking hands.

"What's up?" Ray mutters. (He's been a light sleeper since boot camp.)

"I...feel like getting drunk," Gee says.

"...oh."

Gee looks behind him, turns to face Ray with his crazy hair flopping over the pillow and wishes he could see Ray's goofy smile again. Ray puts his hand on Gee's knee and Gee shivers. He lays back down and curls into Ray.

"Yeah, I think...I...I don't think I want to do this anymore," Gee says.

"Yeah?" Ray asks, cautious.

"Yeah," Gee says. "I'm not this person. I'm quitting."

Ray kisses the top of his head and tries to believe him, because Gee's said he'll quit, or he'll slow down, or cut back so many times he and Mikey have a morbid little bet as to what excuse Gee'll use next. Bob keeps score.

Funny enough, it sticks. Whatever it was, the bad trip, the haircut, the lipstick (and wasn't THAT fun, taking Gee down to the free clinic to get tested.) or just Gee reaching his limit, but it sticks. He's shakes, puking his guts out at the slightest provocation. He smokes every cigarette in the house, but he gets clean, going to AA, and talking to his cousin, Greta, who does the headshrinking in the city. Gee gets better and better and finally they all go to Koslowski's because Gee's got something to prove and he and Ray have been talking in between Gee's prayers to the porcelain god and They Have a Plan. Which Gee promptly ruins by manhandling Bob into the backroom and kissing the bejesus out of him while Ray watches, shaking his head.

Bob, of course, is understandably startled and (hey! turned on, he's human and Gerard's hair is kind of cool after you get used to it) looks at Ray. And Ray explains that they really like him and he's been there when they needed him for Gee Dragnets and late night talks and places to sleep, etc. and, well, he's hot like a motherfucker, so pucker up, Bryar, and enjoy the sex.

And, really, it was sort of supposed to be a one off thing, because Gee and Ray are rather traditional that way, but it's just habit to go to Koslowski's and shoot the shit with Bob (who gives Gee sodas and, occasionally O'Douls if Gee's really hurting for the taste) and he's sweet and funny and there, completely there when you need him. It's...it's like having one safe place in the entire world, and Bob's standing right in the center, ready to kick your ass if you don't get with the program, which is a novel experience for both Gee and Ray and it's BOB. So Gee and Ray becomes Gee and Ray and Bob, while Mikey bobs his head in the background and learns to knock before entering bedrooms.

***

It's a funny thing, but Mikey Way has always associated love with terror. When he was a kid, he had routes: one for school, one for church, and one to his dad's office if he ever actually had to go there (which no one really let him do). The routes weren't straightforward, they twisted and curved, down some alleys and never others, past storefronts where grown men ducked out of view when Mikey's dad walked by, or sent their sons to shove envelopes into Mr. Way's hands. Mikey had places he could go and places he couldn't and some weeks he couldn't go anywhere.

It's because he's the youngest and the smallest, the one with the shy smile and bedroom eyes (that's what Mary Alice Hancock said in sixth grade anyway, but she was kind of weird), but it sometimes feels like the less he knows about what Dad and Gee do, the better off he and Ma will be. Except of course he knows what Dad and Gee do, because he's not stupid. He's just scared.

Some days--most days--it was just Mikey and Ma watching the tv and making up stories about the neighbors who never came over when Dad was home. Mikey and Ma and Gerard, who snuck into Mikey's room and drew him nighttime stories, covered his walls in pictures of the X-Men, and London, and the New York skyline from the part of the island Mikey wasn't allowed into. Outside the house was cold, was full of traps and gangs of men who'd shot at Mikey on his way back from school when he was nine. Outside the house made Ma nervous and Gerard cold, made his older brother stalk like the tigers in the zoo, hands at his sides and eyes everywhere at once. Mikey didn't like the outside, didn't like the people who looked at him like they knew him, the way Dad stopped laughing at the edge of the door, or the way Ma never talked about what Gee and Dad did unless she and Mikey went along too. So, for most of his childhood, Mikey practiced the fine art of disappearing.

If Gee asked him to, Mikey would do anything. He loves Ma and Dad, loves his grandparents, but if Gee asked Mikey to choose it'd be Gee all the time and twice on Sundays. Gerard looks after Mikey, makes him safe, stretches out his hand and knocks whatever obstacles there are in Mikey's path out of the way. Not that there are many, it's just that Mikey has always had that sort of support at his back, knows it even when he can't feel it, even when Gee's stoned out of his mind and (once) trying to grope him like a girl. For his eleventh birthday Gee bought him a cd player and a gun, then went out all night and came back smelling like a distillery.

"You're such a good kid, Mikey," Gee said, and his voice puffed out of him on a wave of booze. "Keep that in your pocket, okay? I'm gonna--you don't gotta use it, but just...I'm gonna throw up."

He did, right there on the kitchen floor and Mikey put Gee to bed before cleaning up the mess. He's Mikey and that's Gee and even though Gee can't let Mikey help him all the time, Mikey can make sure his brother is taken care of. By the time Mikey is seventeen, the outside has almost forgotten he existed in the first place, thinks of him less as Mikey Way and just as plain ol' Mikeyway, the kid with the glasses and the headphones and only later on, if someone maybe thought they could get fresh with Mikey did it become "Jesus don't look at him or his brother'll get you, don't you know? That's Handsome Don's boy, that's Gerard Way's younger brother." And Mikeyway was cool with being forgotten. It was nicer in his room, anyway.

It changes, of course, when Gee meets up with Ray. And then Bob. And, fuck, it's not like Mikey wants either of them, but...his girls don't stay and the boys who like Mikey aren't the type to stick around. Mikey's too much inside his head, too used to not being noticed (and too used to ENJOYING the anonymity) and then suddenly, Handsome Don Way does the unthinkable. He dies in his sleep, in his own bed.

For a few weeks, there's nothing but Mikey's music, headphones blasting The Misfits into his ears until his head rings with the sound. He watches Ma cry in the kitchen, watches his relatives descend on to the house like crows, watches Gee stop eating, stop sleeping, sit up nights in the kitchen with Ray by his elbow and Bob across the table staring at a bottle of whiskey like it holds the secret to the universe while Mikey makes him toast Gee never touches. He can't hear, he can't feel, his father's dead and his mother is crying and Gee's next in line. He knows it and Gerard knows it and so does the whole goddamned neighborhood craning its neck over the fence to see the Halloween Prince take his throne, take over his dad's operation, maybe worse, maybe better. Here comes the new boss, same as the old boss. And now Mikey's the prince. He feels his hands shake, his muscles spasm, throwing cds at the wall to crack against the paint. It's him and Gee now, no more painting, no more music, nothing but going outside and taking care of business.

The day of the funeral, Mikey's cd player dies in the car while following the hearse. He doesn't have any batteries, nothing but static and a dull throb. He looks around, digging through his pockets frantically and Ma just watches him, twisting a handkerchief in her gloved hands. It's Gee who pulls the useless headphones off his head, Gee who pulls him off the seat and into his lap, sets Mikey's feet over Ray's thighs, and cuddles Mikey like a fucking baby--like he needs to be cuddled or something, which isn't true. He's just. Fucking. Fine. He's not even crying, just...the window's open and maybe some rain is getting on Gee's collar, is all.

The service isn't quick. It drags on and on and Mikey starts to shake halfway through, staring at his lap because his father is in a coffin in front of him and it's not fair. It's not fair, none of this is fair. He starts to get up and Bob, who's sitting as close to the family as possible in the pew just behind Mikey and Ray, pulls on Mikey's suit jacket until he's flush against the pew. Without looking, Ray puts his hand on Mikey's shoulder and when the time comes to go out to the graveyard, Gee takes hold of their mother and Ray and Bob take hold of Mikey.

Afterwards it's quiet, very, very quiet. Gee just sits in the living room, smoking, and staring out into space until one night Mikey goes to bed and wakes up with Gee sitting next to him, still staring. The tip of his cigarette flares red with every inhale. Mikey sits up, rubbing his eyes and says, "Gee? Is there...what's going on?" And he's thinking someone's broken in, or Ma's died of a broken heart (though he figures if she could she would have done so before this. And Gee has never looked so little like his older brother in this moment, not even the times Mikey watched him hurt people, watched him shoot other men on the orders of his father. Gerard Way has never looked less like the Gerard Way Mikey knows than at this moment.

"You're not gonna be me," Gee says. "I love you too much for that."

Two days later, Bob has moved into the Way house (Ma is...she gets used to it. Ray was fine, Ray's family, but TWO MEN at once, Gee? That's not how she raised her boys.) and Ray's gotten Gee to make bullet points. Slowly, the word gets out that The Way Family is no longer open for criminal business, and that the Halloween Prince is having MUCH more fun hunting his own kind, rather than living off the backs of gamblers, addicts, and protection rackets.

***

The Watch, as Mikey starts calling it, doesn't get off the ground all the easily. Nobody outside trusts Gee, all they see is Handsome Don's boy making a grab for more territory, and it continues that way until Ray (who'd helped with the planning and everything, but flatly refused to have anything to do with violence.) finally turns up at the planning table with a handful of wires and a brick of grey putty and says, "this is the last time you (Gee) or Mikey are comin' back home wounded. I won't stand for it) and from then on it's Ray and Mikey and Gee, shutting down labs and running crooks out of their boltholes. It's tough, it's almost impossible and Mikey's outside. He's at Gee's shoulder, one hand on his holster at all times, watching Gee's back. And it's nothing like walking with Dad, nothing like that cloying, drenching fear of being Noticed with Gee. Mikey wants this, he wants to be here making a difference in people's lives, showing them that they don't need to be scared, that their children can play outside and The Watch will have taken care of all the bodies or the needles. That some places are safe and some places are going to be safe and that'll never change.

Mikey doesn't think he's ever felt more...more in his entire life, and he has Gee to thank for it. He and Ray and Matt (who came in when they needed another guy for back up because Ray wasn't gonna do it yet) and Bob and Gee all working together, everybody with their roles, sitting around the kitchen table with Ma at dinner like a gang, like a family. Things build up in the Watch, the plans get bigger, more intense, Ray and Gee and Bob all working together make Mikey feel almost like he's watching it all happen. They have this connection--this drive—but Ray never lets Mikey feel left out. Even when Gee's at his most menacing, Ray's there to back him up so Mikey can calm him down. They work as a team and if Mikey feels a little alone, he's not going to begrudge his brother Ray Toro. He loves Ray like he was a brother (which is a little creepy if he extrapolates, so...Mikey doesn't.)

The day Gee decides they need a guy with a more current bead on underworld activity and invites Frank Iero (Frankie Cools, a voice whispers inside Mikey's head, the guy who threw Adam Lazarra out a nine story window and then went down stairs to kick the corpse) is an off day for Mikey. The guy he'd found through his a/v club (music geek! GENERAL RECRUITMENT OF THE GEEK FORCES!) who made plastic explosives in his spare time had suddenly 'taken a vacation' in a federal sort of way, and so Mikey's been scrambling to find Ray a new source. It's not that Mikey knows more people than Ray or Gee, or even Matt, it's just that people are far less frightened of Mikey than they are of Gee, more likely to look the other way when Mikey buys fireworks for their gunpowder, and Matt...knows people of substandard reliability.

So, basically, Mikey Way is now The Watch Supply Master whether he wanted it, or not. Which is cool, because when he finds the really hard stuff everybody gets this proud look on their faces (everybody being the four people in his life who matter--who all live in his house and are mostly related to him) and it's nice. He's needed. But anyway, the first time Mikeyway meets Frankie Cools, he's not all that happy. In fact, he's pretty distracted and...all right, so maybe he didn't know that Frankie was hot like a house afire before they met, or that he had these tattoos on his knuckles and his neck and it made Mikey want to know where else he might have tattoos. So what? Guy wasn't here for Mikey to look at. He was here to help The Watch kick ass and erase names. (Mikey has a rather elastic sense of morality, possibly even more so than Gee, and certainly more so than Ray or Bob. Matt, on the other hand, is just sleazy.)

Except apparently no one told Frankie he was just the hired help, and suddenly he's everywhere. Tagging along with Gee and Ray to Koslowski's, walking around with Matt at weird hours, making friends with Bob and EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. He's sitting, or standing, or walking, or JUMPING ON Mikey. Every time. He's looking at Mikey, tongue playing with his lip ring, or putting his hands on Mikey, not...it's not bad touching, it's just...it's casual and warm, like Frankie's got so much energy even his skin generates it. One day, Mikey runs into Frankie at a music store, hovering over the Misfits and Frankie gets Mikey talking. He worms an invitation to dinner and a look at Mikey's music collection and suddenly Frankie's everywhere again, but closer now. He's lying on Mikey's floor, stretched out in t-shirts that ride up over his belly, showing off the back feathers of two sparrow tattoos on his stomach and Mikey has to stop himself from leaning over to trace the images with his tongue.

After they finally get it together (and really, by this point no one was very surprised at the outcome, even if no one--except possibly Matt--knew the motivation behind it) Mikey doesn't even have a word for what it feels like to be with Frankie. No one's ever Noticed Mikey like this before, with this light in their eyes as if Frankie's been waiting all day just hear Mikey's footsteps on the sidewalk. They talk about music, they talk about movies, Mikey meets Frankie's mom and it's not awkward at all. No one says they're wrong together, or that it'll end badly, or that Frankie's using him to get to Gee (which would signify girlfriends 1-4) because it's not true. Frankie's kiss is too good for that, the way he sleeps curled up next to Mikey, holding on like Mikey's his only anchor. Frankie cares, he notices, and he sees, and he pulls Mikey out of his head when he needs the help.

Bert McCracken's a problem. He and Gee used to be pals, or rather, he and Gee used to take a lot of drugs together and then shoot their guns at lighted windows (this is more Bert than Gee, but he was there.) He hasn't taken too well to Gee new lease on life and The Watch have been feeling the heat. Every time they make a play for him, Bert just slips out a second too fast. Gee's frustrated, Ray's frustrated, Matt's nervous--a lot nervous, it's weird--and Frankie's at his wit's end trying to figure out Bert's next play. Finally, one of Mikey's new friends in the city Planning Office phones in that they've got new blueprints of some dockside warehouses, ones owned by McCracken fronted business. Mikey tells Frankie as they're eating breakfast, but Frankie, for all the hyperactivity, isn't at his best in the mornings, so Mikey isn't all that sure if he heard or not. He kisses Frankie good bye as he leaves, sliding into Frankie's lap and holding him close to make it a proper kiss.

He and Gee make good time to the office, Gee goes first through the door and Mikey follows. This saves Gerard's life, because it's Mikey who sees Jepha Howard coming out of the next doorway, already raising his gun, and Mikey knows just what to do. He draws his own pistol, shoving Gerard through the door and falling forward as Jepha starts firing.

***

The first thing Frankie sees when he wakes up is Mikey's face, pale and tense with dried blood sprayed across his forehead. He closes his eyes again and puts his head on Mikey's shoulder, because if his eyes are closed then Frankie's asleep, and if he's asleep then he never called Bert and Mikey never got hurt and it wasn't ever Frankie's fault. He takes a deep breath and the taste of blood, thick and metallic, hits the back of his throat.

He coughs, eyes flying open, and rolls off the table, smacking onto the floor. His hands come up wet. He looks, already wincing, but it's only floor cleanser—Bob, probably, since it's his boss' backroom.

"Shh," Ray says. "You'll wake up Mikey."

Frank stops moving, stops breathing, because he never even noticed Ray in the room, didn't notice anything but Mikey and how his breath hitched in pain as he slept. He hears Ray's footsteps cross the floor, the deliberate rise and smack of metal-tipped boots against old wood. The boots stop at Frankie's ankle, then Ray squats down, crossing his arms on his knees.

"How you holding up?" he asks, mild as milk.

Frankie's hands begin to shake. He bits his lip, drags in a stuttering breath and can't hold it, the air escapes just as quickly as it comes, taking more air with it as it leaves his chest. Frankie scrambles for more, opening his mouth as wide as he can get it, but the shaking in his hands travels up his arms to his chest and it just won't stop. Ray puts his hands to either side of Frankie's head, cups his palms over Frankie's cheeks.

"Not like that, Frankie," he says. "Breathe how I breathe, okay? Just like me, watch."

And Ray gets down on his knees to straddle Frankie's useless legs, tilting Frankie's head so he can watch Ray. Frankie stares at Ray's mouth as air rushes in, then out, in, and then out. He feels the shaking lessen, the constriction around his lungs loosening every time he finds Ray's rhythm until he can hold it down on his own. Ray's mouth closes as he stands, hands falling from Frankie's face.

"All right," he says, and suddenly his eyes dim, the lines of his face tensing sternly. "You come with me now. Gee wants to see you."

Frankie's mouth clamps shut, threatens to close off all the air once again, but this time he gets a hold of himself. He's been doing this so long, acting like he isn't scared of talking to Gee, as if the man can smell a lie when he's already swallowed a thousand, that it's second nature to make himself performance ready—so ready, in fact, that sometimes he forgot and caught hell from Bert during the next phone call. ("Always for Mikey," a small voice in his head whispers, "always because Gee thought he could trust the man holding Mikey's heart.")

Nobody knows. No one knows what he did, and if nobody knows what he did than he can make up for it. He can—he can make up for almost killing his Mikey. Everybody trips up once and awhile, right? It's not—nobody knows.

Except, maybe, Matt.

The muscles in his back lock in place, even as he takes Ray's hand and stands on his own two feet. Behind him, Mikey coughs, makes a distressed sound and Frankie turns, but Ray's there again, one arm blocking him from going back to the table.

"Brian'll look after him," he says. "Don't keep Gee waiting."

Frankie nods, watching the rise and fall of Mikey's chest.

Outside in the bar, Ray leads Frankie to the Watch's usual booth. Koslowski's should be open—it's the middle of the day—but there's nobody in the place but the Watch. A group of regulars walk by the large window pane in the front, look in, and then start walking away very quickly when Bob looks up briefly and shakes his head. Bob's at table nearby, mopping up a spill with a rag next to Matt, who's slumped over in his chair, very obviously unconscious. Ray puts his hand on Frankie's back, wide fingers pressing in hard to propel him nearer to where Gee's sitting.

Frankie falls more than sits down into the booth, prodded by Ray until he's sitting next to Gee. He looks up only to see Ray turning his back and lean on the side of the booth, arms crossed.

"Heya Frankie," Gee says.

He's sprawled out at the back corner of the booth, a glass of dark liquid sloshing in his hand as he takes a sip. He plops the glass on the table. His head falls forward even as he's tilting it in Frankie's direction, the gentlest, most charming smile Frankie's ever seen sliding across Gee's face. Everyone's being so nice, and it's all Frankie can do to not make a break for the door. That, and the knowledge he probably wouldn't reach the door before someone shot him.

He never crossed paths with Gee when they were (really) in the same line of work, but he's heard the stories. He'd seen the flash of a black coat leaving a doorway, seen mud-splattered boots lying next to Bert's in the office and known it was time to lay low for a week until the circus left town. He's been to gambling halls in basements that shut down when a runner tells them Gee's in the area. Frankie's never really had the chance to experience the Halloween Prince, but he's always been a believer.

But it's the man who turned his life around on a dime to make sure Mikeyway never became him that Frankie's really worried about.

That's not alcohol, Frankie tells himself. Gee's not going to get drunk and neither Ray nor Bob would ever let him get drunk and so Gee's not drinking himself back into an early grave on account of almost losing his little brother. Frankie swallows and nods tightly.

Gee leans forward, smooth and quick, wrapping a gloved hand around Frankie's shoulders and pulling him tightly to Gee's body. "Would you do me a favor, Frankie?" he asks, lips skimming Frankie's cheek.

Frankie's throat constricts, suddenly dry. He coughs to clear it, and Gee kisses his cheek. He reaches between them, into his jacket and holds a pistol flat against Frankie's stomach. The cold metal freezes Frankie's skin, Gee's placed it exactly over one of the sparrow tattoos, and it's like the bird's come to life. He feels something scrabbling in his stomach, trying to break free.

"Could you kill Matt for me?" Gee says.

The pistol drops into Frankie's lap as Gee reaches up to grip the side of Frankie's neck. His gloved hand squeezes once, there's another kiss placed delicately on his cheek, and Frankie can't help it. His head whips around to look outside the booth. Ray's still got his back to them, but he's not blocking the view at all. Matt's still unconscious at the table, just starting to snore. Bob's stopped wiping up and he's…he's watching Gee grope Frankie in the back of the booth with a blank look on his face. His hands are clasped over his stomach as he leans against Matt's table. Ray can hear them, Frankie's sure of it, he can hear the way Frankie's breath has started to come in bursts and Gee just won't stop touching him.

"He's always been a talkative drunk, you know?" Gee says.

He reaches back to the table, grabbing his drink, and taking a sip. The liquid sloshes and Frankie wishes he could smell it, wishes he knew what it was. Bert has stories about 'That Fucking Turncoat' back when he and Gee took drugs together. Gee replaces the glass on the table and continues,

"Now, he hasn't been drinking so much these days, which I figured was a very nice turn of events since he can be a bitch to carry home, but today's special isn't it?"

Gee's voice snaps, as his fingers spasm on Frankie's shoulder. Frankie swallows, shakes his head and he still can't bring himself to speak. If he talks he's gonna tell Gee everything, he just knows it, if only to get out of the booth and back to—no, if he talks to Gee, he's not gonna see Mikey again. Ever.

Frankie nods. Bob walks over to the booth, leans on the other side like Ray, only facing in.

"I gave him the bottle," Bob says. "I figured he needed it."

On reflex, Frankie glances at Gee's drink. The gun weighs heavy in his lap, not once warming up from Frankie's body heat. He keeps both hands on the table, and takes a deep breath when Gee finally moves away.

"So now we know," Gee says, voice frosting over so fast it turns Frankie's blood to ice. "I'll just be waiting here, okay? Bob's got a mop."

And, with that, Gee sprawls out in the booth, moving to the side nearest to Bob, and letting Frankie go without looking at him. He picks up his glass and takes a drink.

"Any time you're ready," he says, and Frankie's hand falls to the gun.

It's muscle memory, automatic to curl his palm around the butt of the pistol and lay his finger along the trigger guard. The pistol is heavy and cold in Frankie's hand. He swallows, shifts in his seat, glancing from Gee to Bob to Ray and then fixates on Matt's snoring on the table.

He's a big guy, Matt, muscles turning to fat as he drinks his way through Bob's stock, but he's…he's a sleazy bastard who sold out his whole crew to pay off his gambling. Who had no problem visiting hookers even while Gee was trying to get them off the streets and into programs. He's the only man here who knows everything Frankie did.

The churning in Frankie's stomach starts to burn, shooting flares up into his throat. He takes a deep breath and holds the gun in his lap.

If he kills Matt, he'll prove himself to Gee, he'll be the go-to guy. That's how it works in every gang Frankie's ever been in, shoot a guy and make your bones with the man in charge. It's…okay, so he thought he'd found something different (which is funny, because he wasn't looking in the first place. The world was hard and cold and it didn't give a shit for a kid who'd lost his dad in a barfight and never found anything to replace him but the mob). So, maybe, he'd been buying in to what Gee was selling, but it was stupid to think Gee wasn't Handsome Don's boy where other people couldn't see. Stupid.

Frankie gets out of the booth, and Ray moves silently out of his way. The sun's shining through the window, warm on Frankie's cold, dead-fish hands as he stands in front of the booth. Matt snorts in his sleep.

If he kills Matt, it won't be the first time he's committed murder—won't even be the seventh or the twelfth. He's killed a lot of people for a lot less of a reason. He can kill Matt (right in front of the window where people can see) and no one will bat an eyelash because that's the price of doing business sometimes. If he kills Matt, right here in Koslowski's bar, he can go back to Mikey and take him home to bed and pull the covers over both their heads.

Frankie steps forward, feeling his head disconnect from his body. His feet keep walking forward, his hand raises the gun, but in his head all he sees is Mikey kissing his cheek, Mikey listening to music with his feet in Frankie's lap, Mikey crying on the table with blood on his face. Mikey saying good bye that morning. If he kills Matt, he can go back to Mikey.

He puts the gun up to the back of Matt's head, barrel flush against Matt's lank, brown hair. His hand starts to shake. He hears cloth rustling behind him, but it's not louder than the beating of his own heart, hammering in his chest. Something raw and barbed claws its way up his throat, he tries to swallow and can't suddenly—oh God, no, come on--Frankie can't stop shaking, can't stop talking,

"I just want Mikey, okay?" he whispers. "I just—I can do this, and I can--then I can go back to Mikey, right? Please, I just want to go back to Mikey, I promise, I don't—I won't, I just want Mikey, I just want to be there when he wakes up."

He feels someone step up behind him and closes his eyes. He's gonna die, he's gonna—they know and then a hand is taking the pistol from Frankie's grasp and that same someone is turning him around. Frankie opens his eyes. He's gonna die staring them all down, he's—

Gee's standing in front of him, holding the gun. He bends down and kisses Frankie's forehead.

"That's the right answer," he says.

Part Two