The bookstore was located down a twisting maze of alleys, approximately fifteen minutes from the trolley stop. It had an unassuming front, drab brown wood with one small, dirty window set into the door. The name of the shop, according to the yellow letters on the window, was ‘Ephemeral Fantasies’, a name which would have drawn a considerably different crowd if not for the hanging sign above the door that proclaimed its real purpose in large yellow letters. It was by the singular word scrawled overhead that Edmond Holloway referred to the shop.

‘Books’ was his favorite shop, situated in his not-so-favorite district. The street, known for some obscure reason as Knuckleback Lane, smelled of decaying vegetables and rotting fish, due in part to the grocer at the end of the street and to the refuse overflowing the gutters along the sides of the road, throwbacks to before London had instituted a proper sewage system.

Like the rest of the shops on the street, ‘Books’ was frequented by a small number of very loyal patrons and seemed to oddly thrive despite its limited sales. It was bordered by a cobbler and an herbalist, each adding their own unique fragrance to the cacophony of smells outside the door. In the two years he’d been coming to this particular shop, Edmond had rarely seen anyone besides store owners walking the street, and he had yet to encounter another patron inside the bookstore.

He approached the bookstore at exactly 9:54 in the morning, a black messenger bag slung over one shoulder and a take-out box from one of the local bakeries in hand. The bell inside the door chimed as he entered, the only sound in the quiet bookstore aside from his footsteps. Edmond smiled, automatically relaxing as the smell of old books and freshly brewed tea filled his lungs. All around him, books littered every available surface, completely filling the shelves and overflowing into carefully managed stacks on the floor. He knew from experience that there was a mad sort of order to the lot, though he’d given up trying to find a book by himself after his first few adventures in the shop.

“Welcome!” The shop’s owner, Arianrhid Kalestor, stepped from the backroom with his normal brimming smile. Blue eyes sparkled as he slid past Edmond with a brief clasp on his shoulder.

The blonde-haired man was a strange sort of friend to Edmond, one he’d stumbled on quite by accident while searching for a particular book on Nechtu demon culture. He’d found Ari’s shop by accident after another shop owner had recommended him a shop in Fitzrovia and Edmond’s notoriously bad sense of direction had gotten him lost down side-streets. He never had found the initial shop he’d set out for, but that seemed to be to his fortune. Ari had produced the required text, after Edmond had almost caused a small avalanche of books, and then proceeded to explain aspects of the Nechtu demons that were not written in the book.

Edmond was quite in awe of the seemingly normal shopkeeper. He had yet to get Ari to reveal any details of himself beyond his name and that he’d been living in London for quite a few years. He had no idea how old Ari was. Ari appeared to be in his late thirties, but spoke of events before Edmond’s time as if he’d been there. If he hadn’t seen Ari step into the sun a number of times, he would have been tempted to think Ari a vampire, though the notion that Ari was anything other than an strangely knowledgeable shopkeeper seemed preposterous.

Slipping behind the counter, Edmond brushed aside the curtain that served as a door with his free hand while Ari flipped the sign on the door from Open to Closed. The back of the shop was decorated similar to a Victorian parlor, with expensive furniture and china artfully positioned in a rich style that Edmond had come to associate uniquely with Ari.

He set the bakery box on a small wooden table draped with a cream lace tablecloth. China service for two was already set out. This week it was the pink-and-white cherry blossom set, a gift, Ari had once explained, from an old friend in Japan. Dropping his bag beside his usual chair, Edmond set out a piece of cake for either of them on the waiting plates and tucked the empty box under his chair.

“And how fares the world this morning?”

Edmond returned Ari’s smile as the blonde man joined him. “Doing well, last I checked.” He poured tea for them both before taking his seat.

“Good to know.” Ari sipped his tea slowly, his every move executed with the finesse of an aristocrat, a trait which Edmond deeply envied. His father had always harped about proper etiquette and stately manners, though even at his best Edmond tended to appear more like an over-educated commoner. “I trust you received the books I sent over?”

Edmond nodded quickly and dropped two cubes of sugar into his tea. “Yes, thank you. They were- are much appreciated. Miss Everetts informed me this morning that the funds should be dispersed to your account on the ‘morrow.”

“How nice.” Ari nodded politely, slipping a fork into his cake and taking a bite with barely a sound.

Edmond fell to the desert, eating as quickly as possible while still maintaining manners. This was by far the highlight of his week, and he would have gladly dispensed with the formalities of tea and cake if he thought Ari would let him. As it was, Ari still made occasional jokes about Edmond starving himself, despite the numerous times Edmond had proven that he could indeed put down his books and eat what passed as a decent meal. Admittedly, the only decent meals he did manage to eat during the day were the times Ari invited him out for dinner. He simply… forgot about the necessity of food when he was left to himself, and really, there were more important things than meals. Like that book on Cerulean Dragon-snakes that Ari had sent him two weeks ago, or the compendium he was preparing on the ancient demons that had once inhabited the British Isles before the time of the Watcher’s Council or the Slayer.

He set his empty plate aside, waiting until he received a nod from Ari before pulling a well-worn notebook from his bag.

“Where did we leave off?” Ari asked patiently as he poured himself another cup of tea.

Edmond quickly flipped to the last page. “You were telling me about the Balak demon, the one with the green scales and the tusks protruding from the lower mandible.”

“Ah, yes.” Ari smiled at him and began his narration, pausing every few minutes for another bite of cake or sip of tea. “The Balak were originally inhabitants of what is now Northern Ireland. They are believed to be kin to the Fomorians, though their influence on the land diminished with the appearance of the Tuatha de Danann and then disappearing almost entirely after the Milesians drove the Tuatha de Danann underground.” Edmond’s pen flew across the page, doing his best to note down every word Ari said. Ari’s voice had him trapped in rapt fascination. “The Balak are most commonly associated with fog. They have never viewed mortals in a kindly light and have developed a particular fondness for human flesh. They enjoy, above all else, to devour the human heart shortly after death and thus tend to eat their victims alive starting from the outer extremities…”

Edmond pressed a hand over his mouth to stifle a yawn. He’d stayed in far too long today, but the book Ari had sent over on demons in early Ireland had been too interesting to put down. The street was dark when he stepped out of the Watcher’s Council headquarters, lit only by dim streetlamps and the rare open window. Fog hung low on the street, making it seem like the setting of one of those cheesy horror movies they played on the telly. He made his way home on instinct, thinking more about the prospect of a welcoming bed at home than where he was walking. Tomorrow, he thought, he’d start on that book about water sprites.

“Spare a light?”

Edmond paused, looking around the empty street for the source of the voice. Movement at the entrance to the alleyway across the street made him turn. The light in this area was poor. He could barely make out the figure of a man huddled under a blanket. Pulling out his wallet, he started towards the poor man.

“I’m sorry, I don’t smoke, but I can spare a few bills for a hot meal if you’d like.”

“You’re too kind.” The man’s voice was deep and gravely, most likely damaged by years of smoking. Edmond held out a twenty pound note as he stepped into the alley. The man stood, presumably to thank him.

He realized the danger too late as the man kept rising well past the size of a human, towering a solid three feet over Edmond. He caught a glimpse of tusks curving up from the demon’s lower jaw and green scales, which meant…. he should be running.

“Oh, Bullocks.”

He turned too late. The demon grabbed his arm before he’d taken one step. There’d be bruises there tomorrow, if he lived to tomorrow.

“Thanks for the meal,” the demon rasped with a grin, its mouth stretching almost to where a human’s ears should be.

“I… uh, I…” He was shaking. He’d thought that whole quivering in terror bit only happened in movies, but he was currently proving himself wrong. There weren’t supposed to be any demons in London, not with the Watchers here.

The demon chuckled, mouth opening wide to reveal two long rows of sharply pointed teeth as he pulled Edmond’s hand toward his jaws.

That was his writing hand! He screamed, flailing wildly in panic. He must have hit something damaging because the demon released him with a shriek. It recovered in seconds and stepped to the side to block the way back to the street, its eyes blazing a murderous red. Edmond didn’t hesitate a second time. Turning quickly, he fled down the alleyway. The demon pursued but Edmond was faster, size and considerably less weight giving him a bit of an edge. He took his turns blindly, darting away at every possible intersection.

In his head he started going through the few facts he knew about Balak demons. He’d lost his bag at the entrance to the alley and with it the stake he carried. Ari had mentioned special weapons needed to pierce a Balak’s hide, though Edmond had already found they were vulnerable somewhere… he just wasn’t sure where. Slowly sounds of pursuit dwindled and he slowed to look back over his shoulder. Fire might work but first he’d have to….

The arm came out of the fog in front of him. Out of the corner of his eye he could see green scales swinging towards him but there was not time to stop. The demon backhanded him in the chest, a feeling comparable, he imagined, to being hit by a truck. Edmond experienced flight for a brief second before smacking shoulder-first into a brick wall.

Pain blinded him. He heard himself hit the street. Blinking rapidly, he cleared his vision in time to see the demon step close, drool glistening on his tusks.

He never expected to die like this.

The demon reached forward and then stopped, its arm freezing in mid-air. From the look on the demon’s face, it hadn’t planned to stop. A wet, squelching sound filled the air, followed by the demon’s high-pitched screams as its arm twisted backwards to point behind him. The limb detached from the demon, spraying white goo onto the cobblestones as it flew off into the garbage lining the alleyway.

Edmond finally got a glimpse of his savior as the demon whirled, furious. Ari stood behind the demon, his normally mannered face cold with rage.

“He’s mine.” The words came to Edmond through a thin haze and he shivered.

The demon took one look at its attacker and fled.

Cool hands brushed gently on his forehead. Edmond blinked. He hadn’t seen Ari move. Time seemed to be passing in strange spurts now as his consciousness faded in and out. “What have you gotten yourself into?”

His consciousness faded out before he could answer. He was vaguely away of being lifted by strong arms, and then of a cultured voice speaking from a far away distance. After that, there was nothing.

He woke in a soft, unfamiliar bed. His chest ached. The entire right side of his body blazed with pain, throbbing steadily with his heartbeat. His head hurt, and he was thirsty.

Very carefully, Edmond eased himself into a sitting position, glad that he was alone in the room since that meant his very unmanly whimpers of pain went unheard. Once he rested comfortably against the headboard, he took a moment to assess his situation. His forehead and torso were wrapped in bandages, with more circling his right shoulder. Someone had seen too his injuries with a decent amount of skill, and he knew despite how badly he ached at the moment, he should have more injuries than he did. He remembered having more injuries.

The bedroom he lay in was elegant, reminding him of a late Victorian noble’s house. Burgundy and mahogany filled the room, with freshly picked flowers sitting in a crystal vase next to his bed. The vase itself appeared to be worth more than a year’s rent at his flat, and he hated to think how expensive the rest of the furnishings were. Wherever he was, the owner had obvious expensive tastes and a wonderful sense of style. Considering Edmond’s acquaintances, that left only one option.

“How do you feel?”

Edmond blushed as Ari walked in carrying a tray, feeling suddenly self-conscious of his half-dressed state. “I’m not quite sure.”

Ari set the tray beside the bed and took a seat, pressing a cool palm to Edmond’s forehead. He barely held back a sigh, not realizing how feverishly hot he felt until Ari touched him.

“Do you have a headache?”

“A bit.” There was hardly a part of him that didn’t hurt.

“Understandably.” He was oddly disappointed when Ari leaned back into his chair. He quickly put that thought aside as Ari poured two cups of tea. “You had quite the night.”

Edmond accepted the tea with a small smile. Setting the saucer in his lap, he awkwardly drank with his left hand. Curiosity won over discomfort and he ignored the signals his body was sending to relax and go back to sleep in favor of questioning Ari. “What happened with the demon last night?”

“It fled,” Ari answered simply, his smile widening slightly as he sipped his tea.

“I’m aware. It fled from you.” Edmond’s memories of the previous night were a bit foggy, but he distinctly remembered the demon fleeing at the sight of Ari. He’d never seen a demon flee like that. Admittedly, he’d also never seen a demon in real life either, but tales of a demon fleeing from a human were extremely rare.

“A wise choice, I’m sure.” Ari had an enigmatic smile on his face, the same kind he used when he was teasing Edmond with some piece of information he knew Edmond desperately wanted.

He resisted the urge to glare at Ari, knowing a foul mood would only encourage Ari to tease him more. “But why? Meaning no offense, but I would hardly consider you dangerous.” Edmond remembered the demon’s arm twisting off and thought he might need to re-evaluate that opinion.

Ari’s smile shifted to an expression Edmond had never seen on his friend before. It made his stomach warm up like he’d just swallowed half a pint of rum. “That, my dear friend,” the shopkeeper’s voice came out like a silken purr as he leaned forward, “is because you have nothing to fear from me. The Balak demon’s situation was quite different.”

He opened his mouth to ask about Ari’s strength. Cool lips closed over his before he could voice his question and Edmond froze with his lips still parted. The kiss scattered his thoughts to the four winds. Ari had made jokes before about… he’d thought Ari had been joking, he wouldn’t… Ari couldn’t like him. A too-cold tongue slipped inside his still open mouth, leaving no doubt in his mind as to Ari’s intentions.

His mind took a minute to restart after Ari moved away. “Oh.” That was the best response his mind seemed capable of producing.

“Before you ask, which I know you will,” Ari extricated the forgotten cup from Edmond’s lap before it could spill, “I am not one of your kind, though my species is quite benevolent.” A hundred questions jumped to Edmond’s mind. The look Ari gave him kept him silent. “And I’m not interested in discussing it further.”

He pouted. He’d never heard of a supernatural creature that had such strength and appeared so humanoid. Well, there were vampires but they couldn’t stand in daylight. And there was the Ilthal, but their skin had a blue tint. There were others that could pass but they would have had to show their demon features in order to exert such strength.

Ari ruffled his hair playfully and chuckled, well used to Edmond’s incessant thirst for knowledge. “We can talk later,” Ari added softly, his hand still resting in Edmond’s hair. He had hope that meant that Ari might tell him more eventually. “For now, you need more rest.”

His eyes were already turning heavy again. “What about the…”

“The Watcher’s Council has already been informed of your need for a short leave. I spoke with Miss Everetts earlier this morning and took the liberty of appraising her of the situation. Everything will be taken care of.”

“Oh, that’s nice.”

He wanted to ask Ari to send for the book on water sprites but sleep came quicker than speech.

Daniel was not known for being observant. Well, he was observant when it came to languages or foreign cultures or ancient artifacts, but it was well known around the base that he was oblivious when it came to noticing things about the people around him. It took him two weeks to realize that Carter had cut her hair, and he finally remembered that General Hammond was on vacation the day he got back.

He tended to forget that other people were not as socially blind as he was, so it came as a bit of a shock the first time he overheard someone talking about him and Jack. It wasn’t uncommon for their names to be mentioned together in the same sentence. The first few years he’d served with SG1, he’d overheard a number of comments, most of which were bets on how long it would take the Colonel to snap and send the crew’s resident dork packing. And of course, several thousand light years between planets didn’t stop the rest of the Stargate personnel from finding out about any of the awkward blunders Daniel happened to make while they were away. He blamed Jack for those, and rightfully so, since Jack had admitted to it after the first few months. He’d even admitted to starting a couple of the outlandish rumors about Daniel that had a tendency to pop up on base, like the one about Daniel buying stock in Kleenex since he used it so often.

Still, he never would have expected to overhear people on base talking about him and Jack as a couple. He knew for certain that wasn’t a rumor Jack would have started. What surprised him more was that all the comments he overheard were positive, sometimes even resigned, as if it was a given that Jack and Daniel had been dating for years.

All those secretly overheard comments tumbled around in his brain until there was only one thing he could think to do about them.

He knocked on the door to Jack’s office, fidgeting slightly as one of the privates walked down the hall and smiled knowingly.

“It’s open.”

Daniel ducked inside as quick as he could, trying to shake the image of the smiling officer out of his head. He shut the door behind him, leaning on it like his weight could keep the reality of what was going around the base from leaking into Jack’s office.

Jack was staring at him like he’d grown a third head, and the words spilled out of Daniel’s mouth before he even had a chance to think about it.

“Do you know what they’re saying about us?”

One of Jack’s eyebrows lifted as Jack put on his ‘humoring the mad scientist’ face. “No, what are they saying about us?”

Now really was not the time for one of Jack’s games. He stalked across the short room to plant both of his palms flat on Jack’s desk as he glared at the older man. “Everyone thinks we’re dating!”

Jack didn’t even blink. “We are.”

“Yes, and they know that,” Daniel hissed.

“And?” The word was drawn out far too long for Jack to actually be ignorant of it.

Daniel’s threatened to smack into the desk. “You knew?” His glare sharpened as another thought crossed his mind. “You told them?”

Jack’s hands came up in an instant, palms out in an effort to placate him. “I didn’t tell them.”

“But you knew that they knew?” He couldn’t believe Jack didn’t tell him! Who knows what the base personnel were thinking about them, and he’d been blindly going about his day like nothing was different.

“Yeah, I thought you knew that…” Jack stopped himself with a shake of his head. “Ah, hell, this is getting ridiculous.”

“But….” Daniel dropped into one of the chairs in front of Jack’s desk. “How’d they find out if you didn’t tell them? I certainly didn’t tell them.”

Jack stared at him for a long minute before shaking his head. “We haven’t exactly been discrete.”

“But, we haven’t…” His words died on his lips as he started to realize just how obvious they had been. Enough covert kisses in dark corners or in their offices with the doors only half-closed and someone was bound to see.

“When was the last time we left to go home separately? Or came in at different times? Hell, we spend more of our time together than not. Someone was bound to notice. At the very least, Teal’c and Carter are sure to have us pegged, and while Teal’c wouldn’t say anything, Carter would.”

“Oh.”

Daniel slumped back into the chair and digested everything Jack had just said.

“Is it a bad thing that they know?”

That was one of the last questions he would have expected Colonel Jack O’Neil to ask. He shook his head slowly, awed at Jack’s placid acceptance of what should have been taboo in the military. “No, it’s not.”

“Good.” Finally, Jack smiled at him, one of the big grins that let Daniel know that no matter how much of an oblivious idiot he was being, Jack still loved him.

“Yeah.” Standing slowly, Daniel left the office. Another officer smiled at him as Daniel shut the door quietly, and this time Daniel smiled back.

“Whoa.” Bill rolled off to the side, flopping down onto the linen and whatever it was they used for mattresses back in 410 BC. Sweat made his bare chest shiny and slick. Bill’s breathing slowed as he carded a hand through his hair.

“Yeah,” Ted agreed, staring up at the ceiling with a newfound respect for all the weird columns and frilly marble loops that decorated the edge of the room. He’d never look at peacocks carved into a ceiling quite the same again. Unless of course they came back here and he happened to be sleeping in the same spot. Even so, he definitely had a new appreciation for Greek rooms. Really, had a new appreciation for anything Greek. Greeks were cool. Greeks invented a lot of cool things. “That was…” He paused for a moment, trying to think of an appropriately monumental word for the monumental event that had just taken place. That had totally just rocked his world. “…Olympic.” He nodded to himself, liking the way the word fit how very Greek that had been.

Bill glanced over at him with a smile, rapidly nodding his agreement. “Yeah! Totally, dude! That was totally Olympic!”

“That was so Olympic they should make it a sport, dude!” Ted’s overactive imagination supplied images of beds stationed around a track while two guys moved around under the sheets of each one, thousands of onlookers watching from the stands.

Both boys looked at each other, rumbled bed sheets and naked flesh filling their vision before shaking their head as one. “Nah!”

Bill’s hand idly brushed against Ted’s side in a move that Ted couldn’t decide if it was accidental or intentional. “Hey, do you think this means we’re gay?”

Ted stared at the columns for a long minute as his mind pondered the question. They were two guys. They’d had sex. Olympic sex, without gold medals or judging, but still sex. The most bodacious and totally rad sex he’d ever had. Back in California, that would have meant they were gay, but they weren’t in California. He knew he wasn’t gay. He would have notice if he was gay. He would have felt… different. He just felt comfortable and relaxed and maybe a bit hungry.

He wanted to do it again.

“Nah,” he drawled out slowly. “It’s…. Dude, what did Socrates call it?”

Bill’s face twisted as he tried to think. “It’s paidara…. pedaera…. pygze…” He gave up with a shrug. “I don’t remember, dude.”

Ted wracked his brain, trying to remember what Socrates had been talking about earlier in the day, and came up empty. “Yeah, I totally don’t remember either, dude.” He counted the birds on the ceiling as he pondered the… thing that had happened with him and Bill.

“Nah, dude,” Ted spoke slowly as his mind sluggishly worked out an answer. “We’re not gay, we’re…” Staring at the columns, the answer came to him. “We’re Greek!”

Bill glanced over at him, mouth hanging slightly open as he thought it over. “Yeah, dude,” Bill smiled, nodding rapidly. “We’re Greek!”

“Yeah,” he agreed. “And when we get back, I wanna totally go hit some Greek restaurants. ‘Cause this Greek thing is totally cool.”

Bill hi-fived him in bed, shaking the bed as he nodded his agreement. “A most excellent idea, my Greek friend.”

John Constantine dreamed. That in itself wasn’t unusual. He was used to dreams. They came and went, but normally they weren’t this… weird. John Constantine was used to weird. He lived weird, but he normally didn’t dream it. Normal seemed to have left him two months ago.

He dreamed vividly. He dreamed in color and emotion and sound, which was as far from his normal dreaming that he could get. Like now. He knew he was dreaming. He knew for certain that he was dreaming, but that didn’t stop him from doubting. Still, reality had never been this weird.

A giant red rose hung in the sky above him like a demented bastard-child of the sun, its petals shaped into hearts, complete with arteries and slowly dripping blood. He stood on a beach, the ocean disappearing into the horizon on his left, the sand stretching as far as he could see in every other direction. It wasn’t warm, not with the sun bleeding into the ocean, making the water swirl purple briefly before the blood dropped below the surface. It wasn’t cold either. The sand radiated heat, as if it had been baking in the sun a few short hours ago, before he’d stepped into this dream. Footprints in the sand trailed away from the shore.

He’d been here before.

He followed the footprints, like he did most times he came here. Sometimes he’d dive under the water, swim down into the endless nothing only to awake minutes later. It seemed the water didn’t lead anywhere, and when he fell asleep again he’d be right back here on the shore with the footprints in front of him. He’d tried walking in other directions, but that was the same as swimming. The sand went on endlessly and he’d wake up before getting anyway.

Following the footprints was the only way to get anywhere. He was beginning to get sick of the sheer repetition of it.

The footprints led him to a park, lush and green like out of some Home and Gardens picture book, only here the flowers grew in bouquets complete with plastic and paper wrappings and little note cards. Sometimes he’d stop and read them. He’d spent an entire night going through them once, without coming to an end of them. While the words were different on each card, they all said the same thing.

He flipped open the card on a bouquet of orchids, already knowing what it would say.

Endless Love.

He pulled his hand away slowly and followed the white cobblestone path through the garden. The air was filled with the cloying perfume of flowers, the scent changing with each step. He walked past roses and carnations, tiger lilies, orchids, baby’s breath, daisies, tulips, gardenias, hyacinth, and more flowers that he didn’t know the names of.

The garden ended in a stone archway. Through that he’d walk onto a boat filled with vacant-eyed lovers dining under the stars. All of them were as repetitive as the cards, professing love to John with glassy eyes in a singular hollow voice. There was one vacant table, set for two and he knew if he sat down, the waiter would bring him whatever he asked for and in the morning he’d wake up with the taste of the meal on his lips and his stomach oddly full. Busy as he was these days, that was sometimes the only time he ate a decent meal.

Beyond the boat was a movie theater, then a park with a picnic set out on a red and white checkered blanket, then a dark hillside where there was always a meteor shower. Then, at the very end, was a bedroom that had to be straight out of some girl’s romantic fantasy. The sheets were red and black silk, the bed large enough for two with room to spare. Candles burned on every surface, filling the room with a different fragrance every time he came here. Today it was vanilla. Some relaxing, wordless tune played from the stereo, the sound washing away the tension of his day.

Shedding his clothes, he slipped under the sheets and closed his eyes, relaxing into the wonderfully soft bed. He didn’t have to wait long before the music changed, shifting to a quieter background melody. He knew better than to try and open his eyes as the sheets lifted, the bed rolling slightly as a new weight settled on it. His eyes always stayed shut no matter what he tried.

Chilled hands reached out to him, pulling him back against an equally chill body. Whoever it was, whatever it was, kissed him as it wrapped its arms around John’s torso, holding him tightly. The kiss was strong, possessive, demanding in the way that the unseen person’s tongue forced its way between John’s lips. The hands moved, lifting one of John’s legs so that the whatever or whoever in bed with him could slide a leg between his thighs, an obviously male appendage poking John in the rear.

One hand slid down his stomach to fondle him, playing with him lightly in a touch that grew more familiar each night that he came here. The hand warmed as it moved over him, feeding off the heat of John’s erect flesh as if they were trading warmth for pleasure. Sometimes this was as far as it went – kisses and a hand job by a guy he could never see.

He could tell this was not going to be one of those nights.

John Constantine was not an expert on gay sex. Before he’d started having these dreams, he would never have even considered putting the word ‘gay’ into any sentence concerning himself. Despite that, even he knew it should have hurt when his mysterious bedmate pressed fully erect flesh slowly but relentlessly inside of him. It should hurt, but it didn’t. He knew, logically, that there was at least a little bit of preparation needed in this sort of thing – lubrication, touching, sometimes condoms. Apparently none of that was needed because his dream-lover was able to slip inside John like his ass was an express freeway with all lanes open.

These dreams were making him reconsider what he knew about himself because nothing in the real world felt as good as it did when the guy in his dreams moved, his hips rocking into John in a tempo that started out slow then ended in what John knew from experience would be a mad, pounding finish. All the time, the hand on John’s erection kept moving, pumping along with the tempo like it was directing the choir and with the rhythm of hand and cock flowing through him John sure felt like singing. He certainly wasn’t quiet, his voice rising with each thrust until he was gasping, moaning, sometimes even begging for release.

He always got what he asked for, though the mystery man took his own sweet time bringing John to completion. It had felt strange the first time unseen hands had jerked him off, stranger still when his mystery lover came inside him. Now those things seemed more commonplace than waking up.

They were reaching that point now. Warm breath puffed against the back of his neck, one of his lover’s hands jerking roughly against John’s erection, pre-cum wetting the now-hot palm. Inside him, behind him, powerful thrusts jerked him forward into the waiting grip, striking a spot deep inside of him that made pleasure like molten lava burn through his veins.

He felt wetness behind him seconds before he came, his body tightening in the throws of climax to squeeze around his lover.

After that they slept, still entangled, the mess magically clearing from their bodies without either of them moving.

John awoke, as was becoming custom, sore, sated, and slightly horny. He stretched, not for the first time admiring the tiny little kiss-bruises that marked his shoulders. His ass ached as he moved, but it was an ache he was slowly getting used to, and not nearly bad enough that he couldn’t work around it. Dressing quickly, he mentally reviewed his plans for the day. Much as he enjoyed his dreams, there was too much hidden meaning in them for him to ignore. The last week had been spent tracking down a new lead in his dream mystery.

He dropped his cardkey and credit card on the motel counter, not even glancing at the chick behind the counter. Two months ago, he might have ogled, maybe even booked the room for an extra night not spent alone. That was before the dreams. Now he barely looked at the girl as she checked him out of the room, his mind focused on his current mystery.

His stop for the day was four hours down the road, a tiny little shop in the backwoods of Connecticut. The sign above the door advertised herbs and teas. There were two other cars parked in front of the shop. Both looked as if they’d seen better years. He walked in, ignoring the neatly labeled jars and bags on the shelves. He asked for Adie. The girl behind the counter showed him through the hanging curtain into the back room without a word, leaving him in a small sitting room with a cup of tea. He sipped slowly, the taste of lavender sticking to his tongue.

An old woman with hair so gray in was pure white joined him after a moment, pouring a cup of tea for herself before smiling at him.

“You have the touch of the Endless on you.”

John knew better than to question how the woman knew that. “I’ve met them before.”

The woman’s eyes twinkled merrily and she laughed at a joke that only she knew. “Meeting doesn’t leave a mark. One has marked you.”

Wracking his brain, John tried to think of the last time he’d met an Endless. It had been years, surely. “Which one?”

The old lady’s smile widened and she chuckled into her teacup. “You know which one.”

When John stared at her in confusion for several moments she laughed out loud before elaborating. “You’ve been having dreams?”

John stood with a curse, dropping an American fifty on the table before stalking out of the store. He drove until sundown and beyond. He wouldn’t have stopped except his eyelids were drooping and the car was threatening to swerve off the road. Pulling over to the side or the road he parked, swearing all the while. His eyes fell shut as soon as he switched the car off.

He was on the beach, rose-heart sun bleeding into the ocean, footprints in the sand leading away. He ran down the path, thoughts churning. He made it to the bedroom in record time. Pulling off his clothes, he jumped under the covers and closed his eyes. He waited until the mystery man joined him, until they were entwined and fucking like rabbits before he let the name slip from his lips.

“Morpheus.”

All motion stopped. He had expected his lover to disappear, but the hands still held him, erection still burned between his cheeks.

He opened his eyes, turning his head to the side to stare at a pale white face frozen in shock. John smiled. Reaching up with one hand, he tangled his fingers in Morpheus’ hair, using his grip for support as he leaned up to kiss the Endless. Morpheus’ tongue slipped into his mouth the same as it did on any other kiss and they were moving again, bodies slowly falling back into their previous rhythm.

This time he kept his eyes open as Morpheus fucked him. This time he saw pale hands drawing him inexorably to completion. This time he watched emotion dance across the Endless’ face as Morpheus came inside of him. And when they were done, he didn’t fall asleep like he normally did but he let Morpheus slid out of his body as he turned around.

He kissed Morpheus, amused that he could make one of the Endless look surprised.

This time he fell asleep knowing fully well whose arms he slept in.

They toasted with water glasses in the Paper Lantern, smiling at each other across the table, Will’s broad grin a match for Warren’s more sedate smile.

“So, what’s it feel like to be free finally?” Will grinned over at his friend. Part of him was a little disappointed, but he was very careful to keep any sign of that off his face. Okay, so maybe he was more than a little disappointed, he was fully bummed. Now that Warren graduated, they wouldn’t be able to see each other everyday. Not that he didn’t have other great friends to hang out with, but that was different. They weren’t Warren.

“It feels…. kinda the same actually.” Warren’s smile widened. If he noticed any of the glum hanging around the edge of Will’s expression, he didn’t say anything.

Will stuck his tongue out. “Come on, you’re free. That’s gotta be a bit of relief. You get to go off and save the world, while the rest of us have class.”

“Not until Fall,” Warren pointed out as he picked up a piece of broccoli with his chopsticks.

“Oh, yay.” At least they still had the summer to hang out before it was back to school for another year. And while he was hitting the books, Warren would be hitting the bad guys. Life was so not fair sometimes.

“Hey, did I tell you what my parents got me for a graduation present?”

Will’s eyebrows twitched up and he forgot his earlier gloom. “No! What?” Warren had been hinting that his parents were getting him something cool when he graduated, but he’d been adamant of not telling Will until after Graduation Day.

“An apartment.”

Will’s mouth was in imminent danger of falling into his Sweet and Sour Chicken. “Really?”

The smirk on Warren’s face would, in other circumstance, have made him reach across the table and punch his friend. Right now he was too busy being in shock to care that he looked like a complete idiot with his mouth hanging open or that Warren was starting to laugh at him.

“It’s not a big deal.”

“It is so a big deal,” Will retorted. “It’s freedom. It’s your own place. It’s so cool!”

Warren didn’t even bother trying not to laugh. He chuckled, shaking his head at Will while he picked at his Beef and Broccoli.

“When can I see it?”

He knew as soon as he opened his mouth that Warren had been waiting for him to ask.

“You could come over tonight, if your parents don’t mind. I already moved stuff over there last night.”

“Cool!” Will didn’t care if he looked like a dork. He made a mad dash to the pay phone to call his parents.

Warren’s apartment was far cooler than anything Will could have imagined. The slightly more rational part of his brain pointed out that the only reason it was cooler was because it was Warren’s apartment. Occupant aside, the place looked fairly normal. There was a common room that blended into a small kitchen, bathroom, and most importantly, a bedroom.

Will stuck his head inside the bedroom, staring at the bed, Warren’s bed, and not for the first time wondering what Warren expected them to do tonight. They’d been dating for a little under a year, but with their parents almost always around kissing and a little touching was as far as they’d gotten.

Now here they were, in Warren’s brand new apartment, with no parents around to walk in on them.

“You can go in, you know.”

Warren stopped a step behind him, his hands settling lightly on Will’s hips. He turned, chewing his bottom lip nervously as he glanced up at Warren. “D’you wanna?” That was about as far as he could vocalize them actually…. He blushed just thinking about it.

Warren’s expression didn’t change. He just smiled, his entire posture so much cooler than anything Will could ever hope to pull off. “Yeah,” Warren’s voice matched Will’s in nervousness, and he was glad there was at least some part of Warren that proved he was as unsure as Will. “I’d like to.”

“Cool.” Turning quickly so that Warren couldn’t see exactly how badly he was blushing, Will stepped into the room.

Hands stopped him halfway through pulling off his t-shirt. “Let me.”

He turned to face Warren, staring at a point on Warren’s chest instead of meeting the older boy’s eyes. Warren took over undressing him, slowly pulling off Will’s t-shirt while Will nervously returned the favor. He couldn’t help his blush when Warren started unfastening his belt. Then they were down to just boxers and he couldn’t stop thinking about how scrawny he must look to Warren. Even with his super-strength he still looked like a flabby wimp, so much so that he wondered sometimes what it was that Warren saw in him.

“Stop worrying about it,” Warren scolded him before tipping his chin up. Warren’s kisses were like fire, burning straight through him and he wondered what it would be like with more than kisses.

He’d soon find out.

Warren shuffled forward and Will moved with him, doing an awkward backwards dance down onto the bed. The mattress dipped beneath them, Warren’s weight pinning him down onto the sheets. He didn’t remember Warren removing their boxers, but they were somehow pulled out of the way and Warren slipped between his thighs. Will trusted Warren to know what they were doing. Warren always knew what they were doing, so he didn’t question when a wet finger pressed against him.

“Relax.”

That was easy for Warren to say, he didn’t have a finger shoved up his ass. It felt like Warren was using his super power, the way Warren’s finger burned inside of him, and really, how was he supposed to relax like this? Then Warren sucked on his tongue like his parents had somehow worked a Hoover vacuum somewhere into the gene pool and Will stopped thinking about relaxing. He stopped thinking entirely until Warren’s hand moved away just when he finally thought he’d got the hang of the whole relaxing thing.

Apparently he wasn’t done with his lessons because something much larger than any of Warren’s fingers brushed between his thighs and he only had a split second to realize what it was before Warren’s erection pushed into him.

He gasped, eyes opening wide as he tried very, very hard to relax like Warren had told him too, and he was glad to see from the look on Warren’s face that he wasn’t the only one loosing his cool.

Warren groaned, his head falling down onto Will’s shoulder as they lay there frozen, neither one of them ready to move. Slowly, Warren turned to brush his tongue along the rim of Will’s ear in a move that made him shiver. As if that was a sign, they both started to move. Warren’s lips closed around his earlobe, nibbling slightly on the tender flesh as he panted. Will wrapped his legs around Warren’s waist as his arms came up to grip Warren’s shoulders.

They started out slow, hips barely moving as they got used to the slow slide of their bodies moving together. Actions grew bolder with each passing second, until Warren was thrusting his hips up hard into Will. After that Will lost all sense of who did what and what was going on, he just held on and gasped. Climax was a bright burning light that he would never forget.

It took them just as long to wind down as it did to get started and when Will slowly fell back to reality, Warren was panting as hard as he was.

“Wow.” He couldn’t think of a better way to express himself.

“Yeah.” Warren grinned at him and he couldn’t help but grin back, and then they were laughing though he had no clue what they were really laughing about, it just felt good. He couldn’t believe they’d waited so long to try this.

A devilish grin spread across his face and he looked up at Warren with twinkling eyes. “Wanna go again?”

Gil always bought Greg breakfast. That was one thing Greg had learned early on in his relationship with Gil, the older CSI always picked up the bill. If there’s one thing Greg learned in college, it was never turn down a free meal. Not that Gil would let him take the bill when he tried, so he stopped trying. He thought it was sweet.

Really, he was lucky that Gil was so eager to take him out to eat. Some of the guys Greg had dated would rather have been caught dead than be seen in public with a boyfriend.

There was a reason Greg didn’t date that type anymore.

But after the seventh or eighth time, he began to wonder. If it were any other guy, Greg might have thought Gil was hiding another lover at home, but Greg had been there, on numerous occasions. He’s seen it all, bed, bath, and everything in between, so he knew Gil wasn’t hiding anything, or if he was he was cleaning up the evidence of such an affair with the kind of precision that only came after working crime scenes for a number of years. But Gil wasn’t the type to fool around like that, though even knowing that didn’t stop Greg’s overactive imagination from coming up with all sorts of wild conclusions.

He’s been in Gil’s kitchen enough to know that Gil did indeed have a stove and, more importantly, a coffee maker, one that Greg avails himself of quite frequently. There’s even a single box of cereal, tucked away in a corner of a cupboard, behind the sugar and more types of tea than Greg had ever seen in any place other than the grocery store. Gil never touches the box of cereal, and Greg never mentions it because the whole breakfast thing is just another chapter in the mystery that is Gil Grissom and Greg isn’t the type to skip ahead to the end of the book just to find out whodunit.

Somewhere after their fifteenth date, Greg starts to pick up the pattern. He’s been over to Gil’s house enough times to catch a glimpse of dirty dishes, normally cups, occasionally some silverware, and very rarely a plate or bowl, but he’s never seen Gil cook. He’s never eaten over at Gil’s unless it’s take-out, or something pre-made from a bag or a box. The only home-cooked meals they get are at Greg’s apartment and after glancing through Gil’s cabinets he’s not sure there’s enough food in Gil’s house to actually cook with, even if Gil did have the inclination.

That knowledge in mind, he developed a test. He showed up at Gil’s house with a bag full of groceries and the kind of relentless determination that only seemed to hit him when he was pursuing the scientific method. He brushed past Gil’s complaints with a grin and his usual bravado. While the stove did indeed work, the pans were dusty, leading Greg to one solid conclusion.

Gil Grissom did not cook.

As soon as Greg came to that conclusion, he was able to look back at their relationship, and even before then, and add up everything he knew about Gil’s eating habits. The evidence all supported his theory.

He didn’t say anything about it to Gil. He didn’t have to. If Gil noticed that Greg’s smile quirked a touch wider whenever Gil suggested going out to eat, he didn’t mention it. He also didn’t say anything when Greg brought food over to cook at Gil’s more and more often.

Neither of them said anything about it as the containers in Gil’s refrigerator slowly shifted from entirely take-out to mostly home-cooked, or when things like olive oil and uncooked pasta appeared in Gil’s cupboards, but they both knew what it meant. It wasn’t much surprise when the food was followed by more things that were distinctly Greg, until one day Greg looked around Gil’s house and tried to figure out when he’d last been to his apartment. That was when he noticed that it wasn’t just Gil’s house anymore. It was their house.