badly_knitted | FAKE Fic: Shot Down (Reply)

Title: Shot Down

Fandom: FAKE

Author: badly_knitted

Characters: Dee, Ryo.

Rating: PG

Setting: Vol. 4 Act 11.

Summary: When it comes to Ryo, Dee is a glutton for punishment.

Word Count: 712

Content Notes: None necessary.

Written For: Challenge 152: Shot at fan_flashworks.

Disclaimer: I don’t own FAKE, or the characters. They belong to the wonderful Sanami Matoh.

Dee looked across the squad room at his partner, working busily at his desk, oblivious to everything but what was on the screen of his laptop. After the events of the previous evening, and his disastrous attempt to express his feelings to the object of his desires, he’d come to an inescapable conclusion; Ryo was the biggest tease he’d ever met. The open, inviting body language, the touches, smiles, and even kisses, all welcomed Dee, but the moment he tried to start something… BAM! The walls came up and he was shot down. It was beyond frustrating, and the worst part of it was that Ryo didn’t even seem to be aware that he was doing it.

‘Airhead’ was beginning to see like too mild a term for the infuriating man, ‘thick as two short planks’came closer, and yet despite knowing that his attempts were doomed to failure from the start, for some reason Dee just couldn’t stop trying. When it came to Ryo, he was a masochistic glutton for punishment.

It wasn’t that Ryo was unobservant, he wouldn’t have made detective if he didn’t have an eye for detail and a talent for piecing together tiny clues and seemingly insignificant facts to build a case. It was just the personal stuff that seemed to escape his notice. Flirting with Ryo was completely pointless because he simply never recognised it for what it was. More than once Dee had been left with the distinct feeling that he was banging his head against a brick wall, but then Ryo would smile at him and Dee’s heart would skip a beat, and so help him he’d do anything to earn one of those sweet smiles.

The thing of it was, despite being infuriatingly dense when it came to Dee’s feelings for him, in every other way Ryo was Dee’s ideal man. Not that Dee had known that before he met his partner, but since the day Chief Smith had assigned the squad’s new detective to work with him, Dee had come to realise that Ryo had all the qualities he looked for in a lover, wrapped up in one undeniably attractive package. He was intelligent, easygoing, caring, honest, trustworthy, funny, and relaxing to be around. He also dressed well, had good taste in clothes, and was more organised and efficient than Dee would ever be. The only downside was that he just didn’t seem to want Dee as much as Dee wanted him, or at all really, which sucked big time.

‘I’d be good to him,’ Dee thought gloomily, making his way across the room to his desk. ‘I could make him happy if he’d only let me, I just need a chance to prove it.’

Dee’s train of thought got completely derailed moments later when Ryo took an anonymous call from someone saying the precinct house was rigged with explosives; all thought of personal matters went straight out the metaphorical window in the mad rush to get everyone to safety. They managed to evacuate the building before it was levelled, but the next few days were total chaos. Without a place to call their own, it meant that all the personnel of the 27^th had to move into the already occupied Bronx station, which was a nuisance, especially since it meant a much longer commute for Dee. So when after a long and exhausting day Ryo suggested that Dee stay the night at his apartment, which was much closer to their new workplace, Dee couldn’t help but feel a surge of hope.

For all the good it did him. As he slumped half on top of Ryo on the apartment floor he silently berated himself for being an idiot. He should have known he’d just get shot down yet again. Ryo didn’t even need to outright reject him to get the message across; maybe he should just stop chasing after something he was never going to get. It would be the sensible thing to do, and yet deep down, Dee knew he never would, because Ryo had him by the heart and no matter how many times he got shot down he would just get back up, dust himself off, patch up his wounded pride and try again. Ryo was worth it.

The End