Get the Gold, (griff)

[Bryan Peterson]

Bryan was a predictable sort, even now. While he was still working out what he wanted from life and who he wanted to be, he was still very much becoming a creature of habit and responsibility. Even though he had stopped playing football because he'd been afraid that he'd hurt someone he still loved the feeling of pushing his body and of working out. It was part of him as much as his art and as much as Gabe was becoming increasingly important to him. Part of that predictability extended itself to the route he took every other day through town when he ran. As he left the District and downtown he turned south and west toward the park as he always did.

He liked running through the park. It broke up the more urban feel of the rest of his run and offered a closer connection to nature than the shops, the pavement, the passing cars. The park was usually almost empty this time of day. It was too early for most. He liked to run early, before classes on days that there were classes that is. Today his run happened to fall Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. He loved the freedom of the weekends even if he was up and out to run before most of his school mates were even thinking about being awake.

Running gave him the opportunity to chill out and think and if he didn't need to think it was simply relaxing. Today he didn't really feel like thinking. He had been one of those caught and mind wiped so he had no idea that anyone had a reason to watch him or seek him out. In his mind he was still an undiscovered entity. In his mind, a morning run was just that and nothing more - even if he did have to force himself to hold back. He was a little worried that he was getting stronger, too strong to be able to hide it. He'd ended up with ink all over his hand one day last week when simply picking it up had crushed it. He'd blamed the pen for being faulty when he'd shown his teacher the mess and asked to excuse himself to clean up.

There was still a small remnant of ink beneath his nails. He wiped some of the sweat from his forehead as he turned along the path that wove it's way through the woods surrounding this side of the park. The monument was near here and every fifty feet or so the path would clear to reveal grass and sky. When it did, he'd have a good view of it as he ran. Beyond that there was the cemetery and the residential streets that adjoined the harbor and the ocean beyond. He decided to test himself in the next portion of the path as it wound deeper into the woods. It would emerge right upon the base of the monument. Until then he wanted to see if he was any faster than the last time he'd tried this.

[Peter Griffin]

OK, Peter thought as the tracking gem he'd been given began to glow faintly, here goes nothing.

He'd been following... or, well, perhaps stalking was a better word... Bryan Petersen ever since Supervisor Newbury had assigned him the job of making contact with him and with the other boy who'd turned out to be his brother. He'd already made contact with Matt at the St.Valentine's library, but finding an opportunity to approach Bryan alone had proven more difficult; the boy was awfully popular. Eventually it had become clear that he went for a run in the park most mornings, though, and Peter had tried to arrange a meeting there, but even that proved a challenge: Bryan was fast and tireless, and it was clear that Peter just was never going to be able to keep up with him. Hell, just spying on him had proven difficult, especially doing it without being seen.

Not that the attempt had been any kind of chore, granted. Quite the contrary, his primary regret was his inability to keep the athletic senior in sight for longer; he was impressive to watch. In fact, the assignment to investigate Bryan had inspired him to dust off a scrying spell his mom had taught him a few years earlier, but that had led exactly nowhere: he was pretty sure that he'd cast it successfully, but he'd been unable to establish control over his target; the clearest image he'd gotten appeared to be of someone's laundry. Eventually he'd given up and returned to more old-fashioned surveillance methods. Fortunately, Bryan seemed to take more or less the same route every time, and Peter had been able to piece together the route after watching several such expeditions from different vantage points... all of which had left him feeling rather voyeuristic, which was not an entirely bad thing in this case.

Anyway, said route passed through a section of Mooreland Park that was more or less deserted at this time of morning, and that had inspired Peter to work out a plan for meeting Bryan, seeing what he was capable of, and with luck establishing a relationship with the senior without actually coming across as a creepy stalker. That plan involved recruiting some rather unsavory types that the Cabal sometimes used when someone needed to be beaten up without any hint of esoteric involvement... a goon squad, was really the only word for them, three extremely large, muscular ex-convicts. They didn't know what the Cabal was, they didn't know the details of Peter's plan, and they didn't want or need to know; their assignment was simply to attack him, put up a fight if anyone intervened, and to not say a word about any of it to anyone. Peter wasn't sure how the Cabal ensured that last bit; he suspected he would rather not know. He looked up from the gem, pocketed it, and nodded to the three of them. "OK, let's do it," he said quietly, then "Help! Help!" more loudly as Petersen came into earshot.

He tried to defend himself, of course, and didn't do too bad a job at first... he'd had some self-defense training, after all. He dodged a swinging baseball bat, backed up quickly and tried to run away, was cut off by the one he'd privately labelled "Bulldog", actually managed to land a solid punch to his solar plexus before a fist connected with his jaw. Boy, I hope this works, he thought as he spun and hit the ground. I'll feel really stupid if he just keeps jogging by.

[Bryan Peterson]

The Saint Valentine's senior from Bakersfield had no idea that he was being watched. Magic aside, Peter was pretty good at his job because Bryan had never questioned his presence as anything but natural. He wasn't exactly looking to be watched. Generally his life was pretty quiet. He didn't recall exposing himself at the beach that night as he'd been caught in the proverbial net of magic that had left most of Hart spell bound into forgetting everything they'd seen. So the fact that someone had taken interest in him other than one of his friends or his family would have made him feel like he had to perform.

It wasn't that he lacked confidence but winning a game or doing something important was different than just doing it. Being watched without knowing it was like someone had the one up on you. It was like you were being punked by life. Only without the cameras and the notoriety. If he'd known he was being watched he might have worn a better shirt.

"...Help!"

Bryan came around the bend of the tree line in time to hear the second exclamation. He didn't recognize Peter at first but it was easy to see that the guys who were attacking him were huge. Another two footfalls made it clear that the guys ganging up on him were kind of rough looking. Bryan's mom would have called them low lifes. He frowned as he saw the kid he recognized as his classmate go down. The kid was a druggie and had been in prison back in England or someplace in the UK. He wasn't necessarily someone Bryan would have chosen to hang out with because of that.

None of that mattered right now though. When it came to helping people or doing the right thing, the choice came to him naturally. If he was being set up, he was about to jump right in. Bryan was still careful but he picked up his pace. Luckily he wasn't that far from them all so getting between Peter and the one who looked like he'd been beat a few too many times in the face with an ugly stick wasn't a problem. Standing his ground, Bryan asserted, "Three on one hardly seems fair." He wasn't a fighter, not trained to be one anyway.

Peterson dodged one fist but got sucker punched by another. Realizing that these guys weren't going to back off he reached for the bat as it was swung and stopped it in it's tracks. He could have shattered it if he wanted to but he was trying to be careful. He held the bat securely in his left hand and used his right to upper cut the dude's jaw. He might have been a tad bit enthusiastic because the force of the punch forced the larger, obviously more experienced criminally accurate in his attacks fellow to release the bat and stumble backwards.

"You okay?" he asked the guy on the ground behind him. He was tempted to turn around and get a good look at him but he was sort of occupied. Strange though, he really wanted to turn around but forgetting about these big guys would be a mistake.

[Peter Griffin]

When Bryan intervened in front of the bat-wearing goon, Peter privately breathed a sigh of relief; it seemed his plan was going to work after all. Or at least, it wasn't going to get him pounded into the dirt all by himself by three overmuscled he'd hired to beat him up, which was close enough to working. He looked up from the ground to find himself staring at Bryan's back, and as the cursed Lust coin in his pocket hummed imperceptibly he found his attention focused more specifically on his rescuer's ass. Which was quite worth the attention, he concluded, but not really what Supervisor Newbury had asked him to look into. Um, to investigate, he corrected, then shook his head in bemusement; really that wasn't any better. Anyway, the point was he was supposed to be observing Bryan's physical capabilities -- that is, his fighting skills.

They didn't seem especially promising at first... though it was noteworthy that he wasn't out of breath at all, despite having run all the way here. Still, he had no sort of fighting stance, barely seemed aware of his opponents, didn't seem to have even as much combat training as Peter had, which wasn't much at all. He dodged one punch, got nailed by another, and Peter winced in sympathy as he saw the goon with the baseball bat begin a swing towards Bryan's head. He braced himself to watch the boy drop to the ground, but didn't happen. The senior just shrugged off the punch and snatched the bat out of the air like it was nothing at all, then sent the bat-wielder staggering with an uppercut. Wow. If he was capable of that sort of feat while pretty much untrained, he'd make one hell of a soldier -- though what he'd been able to figure out about Bryan from looking at his records suggested that he lacked a soldier's temperment.

"I think so, yeah," he replied as he got back to his feet. "I am now, anyway. That's one hell of a punch you've got there!" Their chatter was interrupted by a charge by the two goons while their companion was still recovering from Bryan's blow, and Peter prepared himself to dodge anything that got past his muscular defender.

[Bryan Peterson]

"I think so, yeah," he replied as he got back to his feet.

"Good." Bryan called back to his classmate. He thought about introducing himself but there wasn't time. He was pretty sure that if Gabe saw this, or if Matt did, that they'd be laughing at him once they realized he wasn't in any danger. He was deadly with a paintbrush or in his dance shoes but as a fighter, not so much. Finding the way he was holding the Louisville Slugger awkward given the two remaining assailants, Bryan pulled it back, deciding that it didn't serve as any kind of suitable wall or talisman against the crooks. Of course. he'd decided instantly that they were in the wrong since they'd been attacking the kid behind him. He'd heard stories about the kid but he wanted to hold out before forming an opinion even if he was a druggie and not the kind of person he should be hanging with, he was willing to give the kid the benefit of the doubt until proven he shouldn't.

As Bryan shifted the bat in his hand to get a more secure grip, he adjusted his hold to make it easier to swing at them. He had played a lot of baseball so he looked more like he was ready-for-batter-up rather than bring-it-on-big-guy. He has several talents to be sure, but a guy couldn't have everything so he was just lucky that he was as least large enough to appear relatively intimidating with a baseball bat. One of the goons backed off slightly for just a second which earned a momentary smirk from the Saint Valentines senior. Bryan made the mistake of thinking, cool, guess I showed them..., thinking that all of this might be over with soon.

"I am now, anyway. That's one hell of a punch you've got there!"

The rough dudes must not have thought so because they were on him like white on rice, swinging and slugging to their heart's content. Well, provided slugging did in fact make one's heart content. It didn't Bryan's so he sort of hoped they'd draw some attention from someone who could help them get out of this. No matter how much he tried to deflect, or gently persuade them to desist, the three seemed like they were getting more and more enthusiastic about the scuffle. They weren't giving up like he'd hoped they would when he'd stepped in. Maybe some policeman would ride by before he had to resort to any drastic measures and expose himself or worse, hurt one of them. It would be much more preferable that the police arrive and scare these goons away. They were hitting him harder now, almost like now that they had a target they were giving it their all. Bryan was a bit overwhelmed by the attention though none of it really hurt too much, thankfully, but he did his best to keep up and dish out as good as he was getting.

He gave the large of the two a shove, sending the larger man back a foot or so, far enough that he could kick him in the gut. He'd really been holding back but the man still doubled over. The other one he managed to his but not before the guy smacked him good in the jaw busting his lip just enough that it began to bleed. The punch stung that time and it was just enough to cause him to forget his super human control and put a little bit more heat behind the punch than he'd intended. It connected with the man's chest and shoulder, sending him flying back roughly a dozen feet and into a tree trunk.

"Oh shit..." he muttered mostly to himself but it was clearly not what he'd intended to do. He looked apologetic and meaning every word, he ushered forth an, "I'm sorry." He had yet to realize that now that he'd showed up none of these guys were going after Peter.

[Peter Griffin]

Two things became very clear very quickly as Peter observed Bryan face off against their assailants.

The first was that he really just wasn't a fighter... he was carrying the bat he'd taken away from that one guy as though he were prepping for a curve ball rather than a fight, and it was clear from the way he engaged with them that he really wasn't into this at all. It wasn't just that he didn't want to get hurt -- in fact, it wasn't clear that that thought crossed his mind in the first place. Rather, it really did seem that he was trying to defuse the whole situation rather than fight. He even apologized to one of them! Peter concluded that Bryan was an unusually gentle soul, which probably made him of limited use to the Cabal. Pity, he thought.

The second was that his attitude notwithstanding, Bryan had a level of physical prowess than any soldier would kill for a chance at. He was shrugging off blows that would have flattened pretty much anybody else; as far as Peter could tell the young man didn't even feel them. There was no form behind the kick he gave the larger goon, even Peter could get more of his body's power behind a roundhouse kick, but it didn't seem to matter; it took the guy down anyway. The punch he delivered to the second goon was a different story; that he seemed to mean, and the result was something Peter had never seen outside of television and magical duels. The man literally went flying across the field. Absolutely astonishing... that shouldn't even be possible!

Well, OK, there were actually three things becoming clear, if he was going to be honest... the third being that Bryan was unbelievably hot. It wasn't just the young man's sheer physical power, though that certainly helped, it was also the air of gentleness he seemed to exude... like he could totally mess you up, but he wouldn't, because that just wasn't the kind of guy he was. That was an incredible turn-on, and Peter was briefly distracted by a vision of thanking his knight in shining armor in the traditional manner for a rescued damsel in distress. Not a role he ordinarily thought of himself in, granted, but under the circumstances... Under the circumstances, he reminded himself forcibly, I have a bloody job to do here! What the hell is wrong with me, anyway, I don't even fancy blokes. Peter knew that dangerous situations sometimes led to adrenaline rushes and related physical reactions, but this wasn't his first time in a fight and he'd never experienced anything like this before. And this wasn't even a real fight! Jesus Bloody Hell, it's like something's messing with my...

He was distracted then by movement out of the corner of his eye, the previously dazed assailant who had earlier been relieved of his baseball bat was back on his feet -- apparently the only one of the three left standing -- and had pulled a wicked-looking switchblade from somewhere as he came up behind Bryan. Peter was actually tempted to stay quiet and see whether Bryan's impressive physical attributes extended to being knife-proof, but decided against it. "Dude, look out behind you!"

[Bryan Peterson]

If it was obvious to Griff then it was more obvious to Bryan, he wasn't really a fighter. He probably could have been if he'd been born to different parents or had more of a temper. Or if he'd been given the coin that was now beginning to afflict his brother Matt. As it was, he was simply just Bryan, a guy with amazing power who really just wanted to dance, do his art and love his boyfriend Gabe. While such motivations might not have been exciting to some, for Bry it was the perfect recipe for happiness and life.

Like Peter, Bryan was aware of something else going on, namely that there was this inkling forming in his mind that was causing him to want to be distracted by the other student. He looked back over his shoulder at Peter and gulped, reacting to the coin in Peter's pocket. He shouldn't be looking at another guy, much less thinking that he was hot. His cheeks reddened in embarrassment and shame as thoughts of sucking the other student's dick began to rush through his mind. Fighting against those desires was actually something Bryan was more comfortable with though, so mentally he shut those thoughts down and tried to focus on the real fight.

"Dude, look out behind you!"

Bryan turned toward the approaching goon. The knife caught the sunlight and he cautioned, "You don't want to do this man." The robber, or whatever he was, didn't seem to care that he was trying to talk him down. He kept coming. This put Peter in as much danger as Bryan felt he was, at least in Bryan's perception. He reached out and pulled Griff behind him carefully. The physical contact was a bad idea. Images of the two of them naked and fucking flashed through his mind and he released Peter's arm. Just as well, he needed to concentrate on eliminating the knife and the guy wielding it.

The blade sliced the air and Bryan hopped backward, arching his torso to avoid getting cut. He displaced the swing with a forearm block to the man's arm and reached for the man's wrist with his other hand. He lifted the arm holding the knife and tightened his grip on the man's wrist and hand. The fact that this man was trying to hurt Peter began to mess with his mind, just like the coin. The pressure and force behind Bryan's curled fingers increased and the other dude collapsed to his knees and began to cry out in pain. Bryan kept up the pressure, the man's skin was turning red as if it were bruising. The man's screaming grew louder until he dropped the knife and Bryan released the hand and wrist. The man clutched at his injury, pulling it inward to his chest protectively.

"What the F...are you?"

Bryan bent down and picked up the knife. Aiming it toward the sea some two to three blocks away he let it rip, tossing the knife away. Up and into the distance it flew, much farther and faster than would have been humanly possible. Unable to fight the distraction that was Peter Griffin any longer, Bryan turned back to Griff and asked, "Who are these guys? You forget to pay for something?" He thought it rude to simply ask if this was drug related. He'd heard the rumors though so he figured as much. Even so, it didn't mean that these guys had any right to hurt the other student, "You're hot." He was surprised by the admission, trying to recover, he muttered, "Sorry."

[Peter Griffin]

"I'm hot?" Griff replied incredulously, unable to tear his gaze away from Bryan and barely noticing as the three goons, finally realizing how absurdly outmatched they were, fled the scene. "I'M hot?!? Bloody hell, have you looked in a mirror lately?" He ran a hand against his forehead, brushing his hair back as he did so and noticing the sheen of sweat that had formed. "You were bloody amazing... and hot... like some kind of bloody Greek god or something, and how the hell did you do that?!?" In a sense his incredulity was a facade, of course; he knew Matthew had some manner of magical ability, and he'd inferred from hints Supervisor Newbury had dropped that it was physical in nature. That's why he had set up this little test in the first place, after all.

But in another sense it was completely sincere; whatever he'd been expecting when he arranged this situation, he hadn't been expecting the pure mind-shredding hormonal rush which had surged through his body when Matt turned his attention from the ruffians he'd chased away to the boy he'd rescued from them, still less the jolt that joined it at the realization that those feelings were being, unaccountably, reciprocated. "Sweet mother, I'm practically swimming in gravy just looking at you, and I don't even --" He'd been about to say "don't even fancy blokes," but he cut himself off before those words could form themselves; not only was that the last thing he wanted to say to the young Hercules in front of him, it was also self-evidently just not the case, however much it might have been mere weeks ago. "...don't even know your name," he said instead. Which was also a lie, but a more convenient one; he likely wouldn't have known Bryan's name if he hadn't been assigned to make contact with him.

He took a deep breath and started over, trying to maintain at least some pretense of not being a blithering idiot with a schoolboy crush. "I'm Griff, by the way. Peter Griffin. New transfer student, just started at St.V's a couple of weeks ago. I've seen you around the school, you... you..." he trailed off as he noticed that Matt's shirt had gotten torn in the scuffle, and whatever he'd been about to say was lost in the haze of blood urgently being routed from his brain to other, higher-priority parts of his body "...your shirt," he said dazedly, reaching out to poke a finger through the torn hole and trail it along Matt's sculpted pecs. "Jesus, you didn't even break a sweat," he rasped wonderingly. Then, as though talking to himself, he added "I bet I could make you sweat." He paused for a moment, then added "Bollocks. I said that out loud, didn't I."

[Bryan Peterson]

Bryan wouldn't normally look at a guy other than Gabriel Fox so why did the way Griff asked if he was hot send shivers all through him? He grinned in response, really finding the other guy more and more attractive the longer they were together. He stood a little straighter, inched up the hem of his shirt so he could tuck his thumb into his loose basketball shorts. "I don't need a mirror to see how hot you are man." The words were openly flirtatious, again not something Bryan did very easily - well, except with Gabe. With Gabe everything came naturally. All he had to do was hear Gabe's voice or see his face and he was completely blown away.
Gabe made him forget everything else and everyone.

It was strange how this felt almost like that. Bryan knew it was wrong, because it felt wrong. It felt wrong because he was so very tempted to drop down onto his knees and take the other kid's dick into his mouth and milk that puppy with his lips, teeth and tongue until Peter's balls went dry. "Sweet mother, I'm practically swimming in gravy just looking at you, and I don't even --" Bryan loved the accent and the way the other boy used his words. Even though it was humorous the idea of licking gravy off of every inch of Peter's naked body was incredibly appealing.

"...don't even know your name."

"Bryan. Bryan Peterson."[ If you were going to suck a guy off, he should know your name. Right? He'd only ever tried with Gabe. And well, himself when he was like ten or eleven but that didn't count.

"I'm Griff, by the way. Peter Griffin. New transfer student, just started at St.V's a couple of weeks ago. I've seen you around the school, you... you...your shirt."

"Oh...um," Bryan wanted to back away but he couldn't. When Peter had touched him he felt this rush of heady attraction and lust wash over him. He loved Gabe, this wasn't that. It was completely different. he knew he should let Peter touch him, just as he shouldn't want Peter to touch him. But he stood there, eye lids heavy beneath the dirty thoughts running through his mind. He licked his lips and let his eyes trail down Peter's body to stop and stare at the other senior's junk. "Damn."

"I bet I could make you sweat."

That earned Peter Bryan's lifted gaze and another hungry look. Mouth falling open slightly, Peterson tried to shake off the desire but he was having a hard time doing so. His body was beginning to fight against his internal alarms. Peter wasn't Gabe, but it was beginning to become hazy as to whether or not that mattered. He grinned again at the way Peter seemed suddenly sheepish about saying what he'd said. Looking into his eyes, he replied, "Maybe I want you to make me sweat."

Bryan hesitated, fighting the urge to reach forward for the waist band of Peter's shorts. He couldn't keep from letting his gaze fall to Peter's crotch. After an all too brief expression of anguish, Bryan reached forward and tucked his fingers inside Griff's elastic bands. The skin was incredibly warm there and it only made him want to taste him even more than he already was. For now, he was able to hold back and keep from dropping to his knees or better yet asking Peter to lie back in the grass or lean against a tree.

[Peter Griffin]

Peter's erection was obvious under his sweats, hard and throbbing, which might ordinarily have left him embarassed, maybe even ashamed. But in fact, the way Bryan stared at it through his heavy-lidded eyes, the way he licked his lips and the flushing of the other boy's skin, triggered feelings far more urgent and overpowering that left no room for such trivialities as embarassment. In that moment he wanted Bryan more than he'd ever wanted anyone, or anything, in his entire life.

"Maybe I want you to make me sweat."

It took Peter a moment to register what Bryan had just said, but when he did the world seemed to swim around him. "Really?" Then Bryan's hands were under his waistband, fingers strong and at the same time gentle against his skin, and Peter closed his eyes almost reverentially, each breath feeling heavy and hot as it came panting out of his throat. He was pretty sure the tingling sensations that seemed to shoot from the taller boy's fingers into his hips, that surged down to his toes and his fingers and back into his groin, he was pretty sure all of that was just his own body's reactions, and not any kind of magic power, but it was hard to believe that; it felt like magic. "O-OK..." he replied dazedly.

Unlike Bryan, he didn't have any exclusive relationship to protect; his engagement had fallen apart weeks earlier. He had no reason to resist the impulses flooding through his body, except maybe for having thought of himself for most of his life as straight, and that was proving about as much of a barrier as a paper screen to a freight train. The only thing that even slowed him down was a lack of familiarity; he was no virgin, but he'd never been with another man before, and wasn't exactly sure what to do. Some things seemed very much the same, though, so he went with that. Bryan was standing right next to him, inches away, and he took a half-step forward, closing the distance between them, slid a hand behind the other boy's neck, craned his own back and kissed him. It was tentative at first, just a light pressure of lips on lips, as Peter grew accustomed to the strangeness of kissing someone taller than he was. Then more confidently, his tongue lightly flicking across Bryan's lips as though requesting entry.

Growing more confident, he reached his hand down into the other boy's pants, wrapped a palm around his length... though not so confident that it stopped him from suddenly pulling his mouth away from Bryan's and gasping for air after a moment, when he suddenly realized that he had been nervously holding it for some time. "I can make you sweat," he promised, nuzzling the other boy's neck. "I bet I can make you scream..."

[Bryan Peterson]

"Really?"

Bryan didn't answer. He didn't know why he was doing this, only that he felt like he had to do it or he was going to die. Not a literal death, of course, but more of a need that only seemed to increase with each passing breath. Now that they were so close it was getting harder to think of why he shouldn't be doing it too. Although his boyfriend was ever present in his mind. He'd even asked Gabe to be his so doing anything with anyone else was simply wrong.

Still, having Peter touch him like this felt really good. He didn't know enough about magic, basically nothing beyond what he had seen have happen to he and Gabe - and he guessed Matty based on some of their conversations that skirted the issue -so he didn't recognize that this was anything other than some strange, strong attraction. When Peter kissed him sensations washed over him from the lips down rebounded and threatened to cloud his mind even further. He felt the hand loosely grip him and he was about to both let Peter's tongue into his mouth and stroke the other man's penis when his own morality kicked in.

"I bet I can make you scream..."

"Oh, God." Bryan breathed out. It could have been construed as a passionate response if you'd only heard the words. However the expression on his face made his real intentions all the clearer. He withdrew his hands from Peter's shorts and said, "Sorry...I bet you can but I have a boyfriend. I'm sorry....I don't know why I said or did any of this..." He backed away, looking as apologetic as he felt. There was still the urge to go through with it, to have the best sex of his life - or so the sensations promised, but he ignored those thoughts and just focused on Gabe and how he felt about him.

"I love my boyfriend. I can't do this to him. I can't." He shook his head, trying to continue to resist all the wrong feelings as he continued to back away, but then stopped. Rushing back up to Peter he kissed him, until he realized what he was doing and then stopped as abruptly as he had before. He couldn't shake the feelings, however good they felt, that they were wrong. "Damn it...sorry....I should go." Only problem was that his feet weren't moving yet.

[Peter Griffin]

"Boyfriend?" Peter echoed the word in confusion, so far gone in desire that he didn't quite register what Bryan was saying at first. His mind had already moved on ahead in his imagination to feverish fantasies of Bryan's powerful arms ripping their clothes to shreds, making love to him in the green grass, and what Bryan was saying just didn't make sense in the context of those fantasies. But then the other boy pulled away from him, their lips were no longer touching, their hands were no longer busy beneath each other's waistbands, they were no longer touching at all, and that at least he was able to understand. He whimpered needily for just a moment, his hands reaching out instinctively, imploringly, then he took a shuddering breath and tried to center himself and understand what was happening here.

"I love my boyfriend. I can't do this to him. I can't."

"Boyfriend..." Peter repeated dully as understanding trickled into him, "oh." He wasn't sure what else to say, or what to do. He'd never thought of himself as the kind of guy who would fuck someone else's boyfriend behind their back, but then again until recently he'd never really thought of himself as the kind of guy who would fuck a boy in the first place, so it was pretty clear that his model of himself was pretty unreliable where sex was concerned. "Sorry... I didn't know..." he managed to get out, but the truth was he wasn't really sorry. He might be, later, when he'd had a chance to cool down and think about what he was doing... or more to the point, about what he wasn't doing... but right now, he was too keyed up and horny and confused and frustrated to be in the least bit apologetic. The only thing he knew for certain that he wanted right now was Bryan. Wanted him sweating and naked. Wanted him moaning with pleasure and screaming for mercy. Wanted him like he'd never wanted anyone in his life, not even the woman he'd once chosen to spend his entire life with. Wanted him so badly it was like he wasn't even himself anymore, like an outside force was manipulating him, and...

That thought faded without a trace as Bryan suddenly seemed to change his mind, rushed back into his arms like something out of a bad romance novel. Griff hesitated for a moment, maybe even two, his conscience nagging him about the boyfriend who for all he knew was a decent guy who didn't deserve to be lied to. Collateral damage, he rationalized to himself feverishly as his arms wrapped themselves around Bryan's implausibly powerful physique as though of their own volition, but the rationalization was flimsy at best. Sure, he understood that sometimes during an assignment innocent people got hurt, even decent people who didn't deserve it. And Bryan is your assignment, he reminded himself eagerly, and if the impetus for that argument was less his own mind than a cursed coin that happened to be using his mind as a mouthpiece, Peter never even suspected the difference. Nevertheless, the curse was still relatively new with him; it hadn't yet had time to fully take root and flower, and his conscience was still strong enough to argue back: Yeah, but fucking him isn't! Which was true; he'd already obtained the information he'd been assigned to obtain, the making out afterwards was just because he'd wanted to.

Oh, God, did he want to.

He stood there for what felt like hours, though it was really no more than moments, caught between conscience and lust -- not that the struggle stopped him from returning Bryan's kiss with enthusiasm, or from molding his body against the other boy's rock-hard muscles with promiscuous abandon. But then Bryan pushed him away again, and frustration overcame both conscience and lust. "Fuck, dude, I'm not a fucking Yo-Yo," he shouted, his face reddening, "don't fucking play with me like that!" A combination of anger at Bryan's cockteasing and mortification at how eagerly he was responding to it drove him to walk away from his rescuer, but he took no more than a step or two before memories dragged at him -- the taste of the man's flesh, the feel of his penis, the smell of him -- and he stumbled, looking over his shoulder, noticing that despite his words Bryan hadn't moved an inch.

"Look," he said finally, the words all coming out in a rush, "I don't know what I'm doing here either and I've never even kissed a guy before but you're amazing and you're beautiful and you saved my fucking life back there and any time you want to pick up where we left off I'm so fucking there. I don't mind that you have a boyfriend, hell, invite him along if you want!" Which actually wasn't a bad idea at all, now that he thought of it. He had no idea what Bryan's boyfriend looked like, but if he resembled Bryan at all then, well, they did say two heads were better than one. "But I don't want to get between you and him, either... um, well, no, actually, that sounds like a hell of a lot of fun, I mean I don't want to fuck anything up -- I mean," he corrected himself exasperatedly, "I don't want to cause any problems. And awesome as your cock is, I don't like being teased with it like a cat with a fucking piece of string." Which was kind of a lie, as he was actually kind of liking it a hell of a lot more than he wanted to admit to, but he set that aside for the moment. "So I'll tell you what: you talk to your boyfriend. Once you figure out what you want, well, I'm room 402, west wing. Meanwhile," he added, gesturing at the tent he was still raising in his shorts, "I'm gonna go take care of this before I bust a nut." He'd meant that to be funny, but it came out completely serious, and in retrospect he realized he hadn't actually been kidding.

Walking away was surprisingly simple afterwards, though it didn't happen without a certain amount of longing looks over his shoulder. Still, turning around after that little speech would just be pathetic, so he didn't. And he reminded himself every time he was tempted to do so... which was about every other step.

[exit Griff]