Work Text:
Michael was reading on the couch when he heard Mike stirring through the thin walls of their apartment. Furrowing his brow, Michael glanced at his watch. Only 7:45. He still wasn’t used to Mike getting up before noon, though it was a welcome change.
He stretched and launched himself off the couch, heading to the kitchen to throw together some breakfast. As Michael fried up the bacon, he heard one door open and another close, followed by the sound of the shower running. A bit later, Mike shuffled into the kitchen wrapped in a towel and shivering.
“Y’alright?” Michael called to him while scrambling eggs in bacon fat. He glanced over to see Mike digging through a laundry basket.
“Yeah, we’re just terrible at actually doing the last step of the laundry and putting it away,” Mike called back. “Is this all your stuff? Where are my clothes? Fuck. I told Boris I’d take Bruno before he left for the weekend.”
Michael snorted. “In your room, pilgrim. I didn’t put 'em away 'cause, as you say, that ain't our strong suit, but I did put our stuff in separate baskets. Did you even open your eyes before you hopped in the shower? It was right by your door.”
Mike groaned and shuffled back out of the kitchen, heading for his bedroom.
Michael was sitting at the kitchen table eating his bacon, eggs, and toast when Mike walked back in. Seeing the plates of food, Mike paused.
“Somethin’ wrong?” Michael asked, blowing on his coffee.
Mike shifted uncomfortably. “No, just—the laundry and the breakfast…”
Michael grunted and kicked out a chair for Mike. “Just sit down and eat. You don’t have to make a whole thing about it.”
Just as Mike sat down, they heard a thump from outside their apartment door.
“We’re not expecting Mikey, are we?” Mike asked, looking at Michael.
Instead of answering, Michael got up and headed to the door. He didn't need the peephole to know what was on the other side, but he checked anyway. He was right.
“Fuck,” Michael muttered under his breath.
“What? What is it?” Mike asked as he entered the living room.
Michael huffed a sigh. “Right. So, I’m gonna send you down to Boris’s with the calculator so you—”
Mike blinked. “What? Michael, what are you talking about?”
Michael pressed on through Mike’s interruption. “You better grab your plate, 'cause you're taking breakfast to go.”
“For fuck’s sake, this is insane. Just tell me what’s going on,” Mike griped.
“This ain’t up for debate. Grab your coat and your plate while I get the calculator,” Michael ordered, already heading back toward his bedroom.
Michael moved with swift, quiet purpose toward his bedroom to retrieve his pistol. Mike could not be here for what had to happen next. When he heard Mike's faint, “Mikey?” he swore to himself under his breath and hurried back to the living room.
The wide open front door gave Michael a clear view of the danger that lay outside. Sitting on the floor in front of the doorway was, indeed, Mikey. But he looked… wrong somehow. Too skinny; his gaunt face aged him by a decade.
“The fuck are you doing? What did I tell you?” Michael growled, coming up behind Mike. He pulled Mike back from the door as if there were a feral animal on the other side rather than a weak, half-starved Mikey.
Mikey groaned a little as he shifted his position on the floor. Mike made to move forward—likely to help Mikey to his feet or offer some comfort—but Michael’s hand on Mike’s chest was firm.
“Mike, you need to head on down to Boris’s. Take Bruno for a long walk. Mikey and I need to have a chat.”
Mike shook his head, clearly confused as to why Michael was so insistent on keeping him away. Michael saw the exact second the reality of it struck him. This wasn’t Mikey. Not their Mikey, anyway. Dread dawned on his face. “Michael, what are—”
Michael turned back to the visitor and pulled him to his feet, half-carrying, half-hauling him into the apartment. Mikey groaned but otherwise didn’t protest. “Mike, you have somewhere to be, and it ain’t here.”
Mike waffled for a moment before standing a little straighter. “I don’t like the idea of leaving you to deal with this by yourself. We’re a team. I should—”
“Mike, I appreciate that you’ve rediscovered a sense of responsibility lately, but I’m gonna need you to go on and git for the time being. I’ll see you in an hour. Breakfast will keep.”
For a moment Michael worried he'd need to forcibly shove Mike out the door with the way his body seemed to sway forward in his and Mikey's direction, clearly wanting to follow. But then, head ducked, eyes averted, Mike finally did as he was told and left the apartment.
Ty. Fucking. Betteridge.
Up until now, Ty had always timed the deliveries of Compound Mikeys for when Michael was alone in the apartment. Michael didn’t want to think about the logistics of how Ty managed that. It was deeply disturbing, but at least it meant Michael could deal with them on his own. The last thing he wanted was for Mike to be involved; the poor guy was only just pulling himself back together.
This particular Mikey was unnerving him. He hadn’t said a word since arriving and was now just sitting on the couch where Michael had placed him, staring into space. He looked so frail. Everything in Michael screamed to give him something to eat and check him for wounds. But this wasn’t his Mikey.
“You escape the compound?” Michael finally asked, handing him a glass of water.
It seemed to take Mikey ages to look up, every movement costing him valuable energy. His eyes looked sunken. “No.”
Well, this was different.
“You’re not here from the compound?” Michael pushed, not buying that for a second.
“Oh, I’m from the compound, but I didn’t escape. Ty sent me.”
Michael considered this. Not one other Compound Mikey had so readily admitted to being sent by Ty—at least not without being hog-tied first.
“He says he wants me to observe and report, but that’s bullshit,” Mikey continued, his voice cracking. He took a sip of water.
“And what is it you think he actually sent you here for?” Michael asked.
Mikey looked back up, holding Michael's gaze. “To have you kill me.”
Michael flinched. Mikey wasn’t wrong. Of course that’s why Ty sent him here. But this wasn’t how it was supposed to go. Mikey was supposed to be blissfully unaware of what came next. Michael was supposed to be able to distract him with a story or a meal so that Mikey never felt afraid.
“Why’d Ty send you to me?” Michael pressed. “You seem docile enough. Thought Ty liked himself a docile Mikey.”
Mikey didn’t answer at first; he just stared off into the room. Finally, he said, “I was uncooperative.”
Michael huffed. “Stop pussyfooting around or we can get right to the wet work. Mike’s gonna be back in no time, and we are going to be done with this conversation before then, you understand?”
Mikey swallowed hard and nodded. “I just refused. That’s it. I refused, and they did the experiments anyway. I refused to talk, I refused to eat, I refused to fill out the questionnaires.” Mikey shook his head helplessly, and Michael had to push down the fierce, aching instinct to protect this younger version of himself.
“Ty tried to entice me with food and old movies and shit, but that didn’t last long. Soon it was isolation for days at a time. They started knocking me out and feeding me intravenously every so often. And then they started making me sit and watch them experiment on Edgar. Consolidation experiments. Such a tidy little euphemism for what it actually was. I tried not to watch, to deny them even that, but… it’s Edgar. I couldn’t look away. But even then, I tried not to react. To just… go somewhere else.”
The hairs on the back of Michael’s neck stood on end.
“Anyway. This morning Ty told me he was sending me to you to observe and report. He said he knew it’d been a hard few weeks and was sending me on an easy mission. You know the rest.”
Michael tried to remember how to breathe. Was Ty trying to mess with him? Well, yes, almost certainly. But did he know this Mikey would be so forthcoming? Did he know he would see through the pretense and instinctively know why he was being sent to Michael?
“Well?” Mikey asked, breaking Michael’s train of thought.
Michael blinked and then scowled. “Well, what?”
“You said you were in a rush, and frankly, so am I. Can we finish this, cowboy?”
Michael couldn’t remember ever meeting another Mike Walters so ready to die. Not like this—not when there was nothing at stake. To die for someone, sure; he’d died for Edgar countless times. But this was different. If there was something he could do to protect Edgar or members of Base, he was always going to do it, no matter the cost.
“Mikey—” Michael started, not sure what he was going to say or why he was hesitating.
“Please,” Mikey begged, his voice breaking, the true depth of his desolation finally surfacing. His blank expression had burned away as he relived his time in the compound, and in its place, only devastation remained. “Michael, please. I can’t—I’m too much of a coward to do it myself—please.”
Michael closed his eyes and took a steadying breath. This is what had to be done. He told himself that, for once, it would be a mercy. He nodded, opened his eyes to look at Mikey, and said, “Okay.”
Out on the pavement, Mike couldn’t stop thinking about Michael and Mikey—the way that look of horror had flashed so quickly across Michael’s face that Mike almost missed it, and how frail Mikey had looked. He’d wanted to walk right back into the apartment, but Boris had left at dawn and, at the very least, Bruno needed a quick walk and his breakfast.
Much to Bruno’s delight, Mike ran with him around the block a few times to burn off some of the pup’s energy. Unfortunately, the plan backfired, as Mike tired much faster than Bruno. After only ten minutes of alternating between a jog and a walk, Mike was a shaky, sweaty mess. Making his way back to Boris’s, Mike decided to feed Bruno and then run upstairs to check on the situation. He’d come back for Bruno once things seemed safe.
Back inside the apartment, he thought maybe they’d left, seeing no one in the living room or kitchen. But then he heard soft voices coming from the bathroom, the door ajar. As quietly as possible, Mike approached and stood just outside to listen.
“—and you know Edgar, he’s all about the rules. So him using the calculator just to surprise me like that felt real special. I don’t know where he learned to run a film projector, but he transported us to the theater when it was closed, something like three in the morning. One of them tiny little theaters with only a couple a screens, you know?”
"I bet you loved that, didn't you, cowboy?" Mikey said wistfully.
"Yeah. Meant a lot," Michael murmured in return.
Michael was… telling Mikey an Edgar story? What the fuck? This was what he’d rushed Mike out the door for? Mike even knew this story; it wasn’t like there was a risk of propagation. Utterly confused, Mike started to step into the bathroom, but what he saw when he reached the threshold stopped him cold.
Mikey sat in a wooden kitchen chair planted right in the middle of their tub. He looked entirely relaxed, contented even. Michael stood in the tub behind him, holding a knife to his throat. But somehow, it didn’t look threatening. Michael’s free hand was gently rubbing Mikey’s shoulder, slow and reassuring. Mike felt irrationally angry for a moment, unsure why.
“He really loves us,” Mike heard Mikey say.
“That he does,” Michael agreed, his voice soft and gentle.
Blood splashed across the glass of the shower door. Mikey slumped forward.
“Fuck,” Mike gasped without meaning to. Michael’s head snapped to the right, noticing Mike for the first time.
“Mike,” he croaked, his eyes wide. For a second, Mike couldn’t figure out why Michael looked wrong. Then he realized: he wasn’t wearing his cowboy hat. He must’ve taken it off to—
The knife clattered against porcelain, slipping out of Michael’s hand. He appeared frozen in place. The hand that hadn’t been holding the weapon was still resting on Mikey’s shoulder. It was only then Mike realized Michael was shaking. Mike scrambled over to the tub and slid the glass door open, grabbing Michael’s arm to steady him as he stepped out. Michael’s feet and hands were covered in blood; a fine red mist had sprayed across his face.
Mike wasn’t entirely sure what to do. There was no grand plan in his head, only the fierce, overriding desire to protect Michael—though from what exactly, he wasn't sure. He sat Michael down on the floor, where the older man slumped with his head in his hands and elbows on his knees. Mike caught sight of the calculator resting on the sink and snatched it up. It was already set with coordinates.
Mike crouched down, resting a gentle hand on Michael’s knee. Michael flinched but didn’t look up; he just continued to shiver.
“Michael,” Mike started, his voice quiet. “Are these coordinates where I should send the body?”
For a moment there was no response, but then Michael gave a slight nod. Mike pressed the button and looked over at the tub. Sure enough, the Compound Mikey was gone. So was the chair, dammit. Mike hoped it was the one with the uneven legs. He was going to have to go to those coordinates to actually bury the body, but given Michael's current state, that could wait. A plan was starting to form.
Mike leapt up to turn on the shower to rinse the blood from the basin, then turned back to Michael. “Alright, big guy, let’s get you cleaned up.”
It had been a long couple of hours, but through sheer determination, Mike had managed to coax Michael into the shower, buried the Compound Mikey in the middle of a remote forest, scrubbed the mud and blood off himself, and scraped together something resembling lunch.
Mike had known that Alaska Mikey wasn’t the only one Ty had sent out to be killed. They’d argued about it more than once, with Michael refusing to even discuss it, let alone let Mike have a say in how they handled the visitors. Mike just hadn’t considered what it did to Michael to carry the sole weight of those deaths.
Finally having a second to breathe, Mike went to check on him. He had convinced Michael to go back to bed by suggesting that Bruno needed a snuggle to calm down, having been riled up by the smell of iron. Tiptoeing into the bedroom, Mike’s suspicions were confirmed: Michael wasn't sleeping.
Michael lay on his side with Bruno curled up next to him, the pup’s head on the pillow and Michael’s hand resting on the dog’s back. Michael’s eyes flicked up to Mike, then back to Bruno. He was still shivering, though the apartment was significantly warmer than it had been that morning.
Mike kicked off his shoes and started climbing into the mattress. Michael propped himself up on an elbow, confusion written across his face.
“Nuh-uh,” Mike told him, giving his shoulder a firm, gentle shove. Michael lay back down without much resistance, but his expression remained uncertain. Mike maneuvered himself behind him, one arm cradling Michael’s head in the crook of his elbow, the other pulling Michael’s spine flush against his chest. One of these days, Mike was going to figure out the coordinates of a queen-sized bed and duplicate it. As it was, their double frames weren’t really built for two grown men and an oversized puppy, but here, it felt cozy rather than suffocating. Shivers still wracked Michael’s frame. “I’m here, Michael. I’m here with you,” Mike crooned into the hair at the nape of his neck.
Mike wasn’t sure exactly when the trembling stopped, but noticing the stillness was the last thing he remembered before falling asleep himself.
Michael woke to the heavy, grounding warmth of another body. It took him a moment to remember why he was in bed in the late afternoon. He looked over his shoulder; he hadn’t dreamt Mike crawling into bed with him. Mike was pressed up close, his breath a steady, rhythmic warmth against Michael’s neck. Bruno had relocated to the floor and was snoozing peacefully, his tail giving the odd, lazy thump against the floorboards in a dream.
Michael rolled onto his back to stare at the ceiling, replaying the morning in graphic detail. Beneath the dull ache of the grief, it was the look on Mike’s face in the bathroom that kept bubbling to the surface. He’d looked horrified, yes, but also desperately sad—as if what horrified him wasn’t what Michael had done, but what Michael had been made to do. At least, Michael hoped that’s what he saw.
Mike’s fingers twitched against Michael’s ribs, a sign he was starting to rouse. Michael debated just getting up, grabbing the calculator, and flinging himself into time to recover. He could take a fortnight to get his head right and pop back to this exact second, leaving Mike none the wiser. But for a reason he couldn’t quite name, he wanted to stay right where he was, anchored in Mike’s arms.
It took almost another half-hour for Mike to actually stir. His hand began tracing slow, mindless circles over Michael’s sternum. “Hey,” Mike mumbled, eyes still shut. “How you feeling?”
Michael didn’t know how to answer that. “You didn’t have to take care of Mikey like that. I was handling it,” he growled instead.
Mike opened one eye and squinted at him. “I’m going to pretend you didn’t just blatantly lie to my face, since you were very much not handling it. Instead, I'll point out that you shouldn’t have to handle it alone.”
Michael huffed and rolled back onto his side. He expected Mike to withdraw his hand, but instead, Mike pulled him back flush against his chest, giving his middle a gentle squeeze. They were silent for a long stretch. Suddenly, the quiet comfort gave way to the exact spike of claustrophobia Michael had been bracing for. He didn’t want Mike to let go, yet his pulse spiked with a sudden, suffocating panic over being handled so tenderly.
“I don’t want you involved in this. It’s between me and Ty. I want you all the way clear, you hear?” Michael grumbled.
“No,” Mike objected simply. There was no heat in it; just a statement of fact.
“The hell you mean ‘no’?” Michael demanded, rolling back over to look at him.
Mike opened an eye, looked at him, and let it drift closed again. “I mean what I said. No. You aren’t doing this on your own anymore.”
Michael wasn’t sure why he was bothering to argue. Usually, Mike wasn't even in the state when Ty dispatched a Mikey. Today had been a fluke. He didn’t need Mike’s permission to go it alone the next time the door knocked.
“I can hear you thinking,” Mike murmured, his hand giving Michael’s hip a small squeeze.
“I’m thinking you should mind your business. This doesn’t concern—”
Mike’s eyes snapped open. He propped himself up on his elbow, fingers digging hard into Michael’s side. “You are not about to tell me it doesn’t concern me. Ty is actively trying to break you, and if this morning is any metric, I’d argue he’s succeeding.”
Michael took a slow breath. He reminded himself that Mike lacked the sheer, grueling perspective of his extra years of survival—never mind the weight of the collapsed timelines. “Why am I here, Mike?”
Mike blinked, thrown by the sudden pivot. “I don’t—”
“Yes, you do. Why am I here, in this time?”
“To support early Base?” Mike asked.
“You ain’t completely wrong, but that ain’t it either. I’m here to do what I can to protect Mike Walters. And that includes you—even though half the reason *you’re* sitting in this room is to protect Mikey.”
Mike stared down at him, puzzling it out. Slowly, the realization settled into the lines of his face. “You don’t want me helping with the Compound Mikeys,” Mike began, his voice dropping an octave, “because it means sharing the weight of the executions. You’re… you’re trying to spare me.”
Michael didn’t answer. Mike had found the meat of it, but it was bigger than that. It was one thing for Mike to know, theoretically, what Michael did behind closed doors; it was another thing entirely to be *witnessed* doing it. He didn’t possess the vocabulary to explain how naked it made him feel, knowing Mike had stood in that doorway and watched.
Mike studied him for a long, heavy minute before giving his head a slow shake. “I hear you. But Michael, I cannot stand by and watch you eat yourself alive. You have to know I won't accept that.”
Michael closed his eyes, the bone-deep exhaustion washing back over him all at once. Reading the room, Mike eased back down, letting his head come to rest right over Michael’s heart. To Michael’s own quiet shock, his arm lifted almost on instinct, wrapping around Mike’s shoulders as the younger man nuzzled into the crook of his arm. The last thought he had before drifting back to sleep was: I could get used to this.