dsfic: the affair of the moose (snippet)

synecdochic and winterlive == not my drug free zone. Especially after midnight.

Current Theories on the Origin of Fraser:

1.) He's actually an Ascendant, who was one of those medieval monks who did nothing but meditate and accidentally Ascended. He got irritated with the Ancients lack of intervention and came back. He currently makes the other Ancients nervous when he goes on about justice and they just know if he comes back, he will be organizing the Ancinet Mountie Brigade to bring justice to the universe. And they are afraid. (blame Syne on this one. Okay, and me too, but it makes sense.)

2.) He's a Timelord who has totally forgotten his timelordness. This explains the fact reality bends around him. I'm sorry, if you have a better theory, I want to hear it. (This was me and winterlive--we. Well. It made sense. And it was after midnight.)

3.) I read the Sentinel one by jacquez -- wow, so much sense making.

You know, I keep thinking every time I must have imagined how insane some of the eps were. But no, they're not. I go back and watch and it actually did happen like that. I love this show more than chocolate. And I still want to write the one where he and John are insanely and creepily polite to each other while pollen-hit and have no sex at all but increasingly esoteric conversations that sound a lot like some kind of very very metaphysical foreplay.

Child still has a strong Vecchio crush. I think we're edging into IRL flamewars.

In lieu of that, a random snippet. To warn you, I'm still getting the voices down, so--yeah. Originally posted as comment-fic for astolat, a bit revised, still trying to get the voices right.



It takes Fraser exactly ten seconds to realize exactly why someone had taped a circle around Ray's desk at exactly the length of Ray's arm plus the length of one crutch. Looking down at the quivering rubber tip two inches from his chest, he follows it to glazed eyes, bared teeth, and, in peripheral vision, a bottle of percocet. "I'm *fine*."

Ray and painkillers have never been compatible. Fraser nods in polite disbelief. "I see that."

Glaring, Ray drops the crutch, turning back to his desk and burying his head in a stack of files.

Fraser's eyes flicker down to the bare foot currently wrapped in new white bandages and elevated on a chair. A brief glance around the room reveals furious industry and absolutely no one looking their direction. Just in case, Fraser suspects, Ray kills him and they're called in as witnesses.

He's been here too long, Fraser thinks with a mental sigh. He's becoming cynical. "Ray--"

"Go away." One hand gropes vaguely over the desk. If the narration Detective Huey had subjected him to was accurate, soon after the realization that Ray did not react positively to painkillers, Francesca had cleared the desk, leading to attempted assault by inanimate object, leading to tape to indicate minimum safe distance. Detective Huey had then limped away (apparently, he had not been as quick as Francesca), indicating custody of Ray Vecchio (the newer) was now in Fraser's hands. Which had been the moment Ray had attempted assault by crutch for the second time.

Partners, Fraser reminds himself. "Ray--"

"This is your fault," Ray mutters into the stack of folders, wrapping his arms around it like a pillow. "This shit did *not* happen before you. It was--" A few folders slide away and onto the floor, spilling reports around Fraser's feet. "Not *weird*. Jesus Christ, my head hurts."

"I'm sure there's a reasonable explanation," Fraser says evenly, ignoring the choked sound from across the room. Fraser braces for stopping Ray from trying to hop his way toward homicide, but no one says a thing. "Head injuries, especially concussions--"

"Shut. *Up*."

"--can cause hallucinations, and as you know, retrograde amnesia," Fraser continues doggedly, raising his voice enough to drown out the flurry of officers who seemed to have something caught in their throats, "so it's probable, even *likely*, that the entire experience can be chalked up to--"

"You were right!"

Ray's head snaps up. "Frannie. You didn't. I have a *concussion*. I didn't know what I was *saying*--"

Francesca slides a paper across the desk. "They just discovered the body of one of the volunteers--well, pieces anyway," she adds as Ray shrinks into his chair. "But the weird part is, you wont' believe this--"

"You're right. I don't."

"They found a *animal* by her body!" Leaning against the desk, Francesca shakes her head in wonder. "Guess what animal."

Ray leans his head back and covers his face. "This is because of the acid, ain't it?" he mumbles into his hands. "One trip, add twenty years, and it all goes downhill. Starts with hallucinations, ends with--"

This would be a good time to intervene. "Ray, I don't think--"

"Alzheimer's," Ray says loudly, drowning him out. "Roofies. The entire job, causing severe cog-conit-"

"Cognitive," Fraser say before he can stop himself.

Ray points at him without looking up. "That. Crazy. I've gone crazy."

"Not news, Vecchio," Welsh says from behind them. Fraser turns to look at the lieutenant with a growing sense of disaster. "But good to hear confirmation. Frannie?"

Ray and Francesca both go for the paper, but Francesca's quicker. Cradling his hand against his chest, Ray watches with wide-eyed horror as she flourishes it. "Murder at the zoo," she says triumphantly. Welsh doesn't take the paper; Fraser isn't quite sure he actually sees it. "They're bringing in the bodies."

"Bodies," Welsh says hollowly. Fraser wonders if he's feeling ill. "

Francesca bounces. "And one of them was--"

A crutch sails by them and lands with a clatter on the floor. Fraser supposes it's lucky that Ray's glasses are still in his car.

"A dead moose."

There's no way to stop it now. "So," Huey says from the safety of his desk halfway across the room, "how often do you get tips from dead animals, Vecchio?" and it's all downhill from there.

*****

Twenty minutes, three conversations, and another percocet later (after Ray tried to lunge, tangled his sprained ankle in the chair, and nearly knocked himself out on the desk), this is what Fraser learns:

At six this evening, during a routine pick-up, Detective Ray Vecchio vanished ("Into thin air!" Detective Dewey said, sounding distressingly awed. "I *heard a noise in the alley*," Ray hissed back. "A moose call?" Huey asked.), only to be discovered fifteen minutes later in a dumpster ("Beside the dumpster, asshole," Ray said, listing pathetically onto the arm of the couch. "Not when I write my report," Huey answered.), with a sprained ankle, several bruised ribs ("They did look like hoof prints," Huey admitted. "Or *boots*," Ray said viciously, but at least by that point, he'd stopped trying to climb over Fraser to get to him.), and a minor concussion. During the trip to the hospital ("Concussion!" Ray shouted before curling into a bitter, unhappy ball and turning a glare on Francesca), Ray had apparently called Francesca and told her that there'd been a murder at the zoo and to send all units. When she asked him how he knew, he told her--

"I did not *say moose*."

"I heard moose," Francesca says stubbornly. "You said--"

"I *did not say*--"

"That a moose told you where to find her," Francesca finishes with relish, leaning against Welsh's desk. "Also, the body is a woman, and she died near a moose." She stops short, frowning. "You think the moose did it?"

"I'm going to kill you," Ray says.

Perhaps, Fraser thinks, it's time to take Ray home.

*****