Birthday Month Fic - #8
Aug. 31st, 2020 04:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
galadriel1010Prompt: Bad At Feelings
Fandom: Raffles (E.W. Hornung)
Pairing: Raffles/Bunny
When Bunny is kidnapped by people intending to hurt Raffles, he doesn't doubt for a second that Raffles will walk willingly into the trap to rescue him. Raffles is incapable of saying how he feels, Bunny is incapable of recognising even the most brick-like hint. They do crime.
To this day, I don’t know how I ended up in the mess I found myself in. An invitation to lunch with an old friend, which I had no reason to be suspicious of, somehow resulted in my being trussed like a Christmas goose in an upper room of what I can only describe as a den of iniquity, somewhere north of St Pancras Station in the early hours of a Thursday evening. The young lady who had arranged it all sat in a fine, if somewhat battered, wingback chair, and regarded me through the smoke of her third cigarette of our brief acquaintance. If pressed I would have guessed at a refined but not expensive brand rather than the cheap cuts of her assistants, but I had other things on my mind at the time. She leaned forwards at last and watched with interest as I tried my bonds and found them decidedly secure. “Mr Manders,” she said, a soft Irish accent giving away her background, if not anything of use, “I am sorry to make your acquaintance in such difficult circumstances, but the situation had become rather urgent.”
I looked up at her from my position on the floor and tried to guess what Raffles would have done in this situation. Unfortunately, I kept returning to the answer that he would not have been foolish enough to put himself in this situation, so I reverted to following my own, rather less well tuned instincts. “Delighted to meet you,” I lied. “But I fear you have the advantage of me.”
“Yes, I do rather.” She sat back in her chair with a smug expression and did not rectify that. Instead she told me, “We have a mutual acquaintance, you see, in Mr Arthur Raffles, and I need your help to get a message to him.”
As I was, as I have alluded to, tied up and held hostage against my will and entirely at her mercy, my inclination to help her was already minimal. If, as she implied, she required my help in bringing harm to Raffles, well, that was simply impossible. I did not say this, though. Instead I relied on that which Raffles has always found most useful in me, that being my innocent, guileless expressions and evident incomprehension. “Well, if you merely wish me to take him a message, you could simply have asked! I’d be happy to deliver it, although rather less happy after our decidedly unconventional meeting.”
She smirked again and lit another cigarette. “No, Mr Manders, you misunderstand me. You will send the message, and one of my friends will deliver it for you.”
“And what would the nature of this message be?”
“Oh, something along the lines of ‘I have been kidnapped and held against my will by vicious brutes who intend to kill me’, that sort of thing.” She gestured vaguely, indicating that I could choose the precise wording myself. “If you would do me the kindness of writing such a note, I will of course untie you. Or at least have you untied.”
I pushed my luck. “And let me go?”
She laughed. “You are funny. I see why he likes you. And it was worth the try. So, will you write me the little note I need?”
“No, I don’t think I will.”
“I see.” Her smirk disappeared, but she looked disappointed and resigned rather than angry. “A shame. Indulge my curiosity, if you will… is it because you don’t want to be responsible for luring him into an obvious trap, or because you fear he will not come?”
She was trying to manipulate me and I knew it, but I had spent too long with Raffles, who was a master manipulator and could play me like a fiddle. If he had tried it on me I would undoubtedly have folded, but knowing that only made me angrier and more resistant. Besides that, the insult against Raffles’s character offended me deeply. “Not in the slightest,” I insisted hotly. “Raffles would never leave a friend in the lurch knowingly, and I will not lead a friend into the same lurch willingly!”
“Well, you are a delight.” Although I had feared retribution for my resistance, when she got to her feet and stalked towards me it was just to rifle through the pockets of my jacket, which had been discarded on a chair near me. She pulled out my cigarette case and flicked it open, lifting it to her nose to take a sniff. “You have fine taste in cigarettes, Mr Manders. No engraving on the case, but I think the combination will be familiar enough to dear Arthur, don’t you?”
I glared up at her, unable to do anything more. “I think that anyone who has observed us at all closely could replicate the combination quite easily.”
“Well, we shall see.” She pulled one of the cigarettes out and lit it to replace hers, then slipped the case into her pocket. “I’m afraid I have to leave you here, Mr Manders. But don’t worry, I’m sure dear Arthur will be along to join you soon.”
Resigned and frustrated, I did my best to get comfortable on the floor, and tugged again, futilely, on my bonds.
My watch was in my jacket pocket and a sheet pinned across the window blocked out all but the slightest slivers of light from outside, so I had no way of knowing how long I lay there. The silent thugs who had taken and bound me visited from time to time to check my bonds were still tied and, I presumed, that I hadn’t expired yet, but they came at irregular times so I couldn’t use their arrival to keep track. Certainly it was long enough that I was dizzy and nauseous with hunger and thirst before a scratching at the window roused me from an uncomfortable doze. At first I assumed it to be a pigeon or perhaps a corvid perching on the sill outside, but the sound persisted and grew more determined, and before I knew it the small window was swung open and a familiar and most welcome face appeared. He pressed a finger to his lips, unnecessarily, to warn me to keep my quiet, and then squirmed in through the opening that had looked too small to admit him. In a matter of a moment he had shot the bolt on the door and drawn a knife, which he used to sever my bindings. I bit back cries of pain as the blood flowed back into my hands and feet, and he massaged my sore shoulders and wrists with gentle hands in silence until I was able to sit up. His long fingers fluttered about me, and he eventually produced a flask from his pocket and held it out to me. “Brandy,” he whispered. “I’m afraid I have nothing better.”
“But Raffles, how did you find me?” I demanded in a whisper.
“A story for later, dear Bunny.” He brushed fingers across my cheek gently. “Can you stand?”
I moved my leg and had to bite down on my sleeve. His hand gripped my shoulder and clutched me into a tight embrace until the pain had long passed and my tears had dried. After a time I was able to stand without pain, and we made our way as quietly as we could through the den and onto the street outside. Soon we were in a cab and then settled in at our club, with a hearty meal and a stiff drink in front of us. Raffles told me the full story of his daring rescue, from receiving my cigarette case – which he had returned to me – and dismissing their claims to visiting my rooms and finding me gone, and ultimately to an adventure along the canal and between the chimneys of Camden whilst my captors pursued him and lost him in the underground stables. I laughed aloud at his description of one of the silent thugs falling in the canal and becoming rather less silent, the first time I had done so in what felt like days, and reached across the table to grasp Raffles’s hand. “Well, I was glad to see you, Raffles, much as I felt an ass for landing myself in such trouble again.”
His eyes grew worried. “We must find some way to deal with them,” he murmured. “They have found my weakness, and on principal alone I cannot permit this state of affairs to continue long.”
“Heavens, Raffles!” I wondered back over his story, and worried about what else had befallen him whilst I was laid up and unable to be of any assistance. “What happened?”
“My dear Bunny,” he said, a touch frustrated, “they took you!”
“You have to know, though,” I protested, “I would never give you up. Why, I refused to have any part in luring you into their trap. She accused me of lacking faith in you, suggested that I feared you wouldn’t come for me. I set her right about that quickly, I can tell you!”
He stared at me through my exclamation, with an expression of confused curiosity that was becoming familiar to me. When I’d finished, he signalled a waiter to refill our drinks, buying himself time to arrange his thoughts. “Bunny, you are the most extraordinary person. Your pluck, tenacity and loyalty are a rarer and more valuable treasure than any in any vault on this earth.” He held a hand up to prevent me speaking. “It had never even crossed my mind that you would, as you say, ‘give me up’, and they took great pleasure of informing me of your loyalty to me. As you know, I would never have left a friend in such a situation as you found yourself in, but there is no one else on this earth I would find myself plotting revenge for as I am now on your behalf.”
I was still bewildered and oblivious. “What are you saying, Raffles?”
“My dear, dear Bunny.” He chuckled like I had told a particularly good joke, and I am afraid to have to say that I did not fully understand until we were in the privacy of his rooms at the Albany some hours later.
Fandom: Raffles (E.W. Hornung)
Pairing: Raffles/Bunny
When Bunny is kidnapped by people intending to hurt Raffles, he doesn't doubt for a second that Raffles will walk willingly into the trap to rescue him. Raffles is incapable of saying how he feels, Bunny is incapable of recognising even the most brick-like hint. They do crime.
To this day, I don’t know how I ended up in the mess I found myself in. An invitation to lunch with an old friend, which I had no reason to be suspicious of, somehow resulted in my being trussed like a Christmas goose in an upper room of what I can only describe as a den of iniquity, somewhere north of St Pancras Station in the early hours of a Thursday evening. The young lady who had arranged it all sat in a fine, if somewhat battered, wingback chair, and regarded me through the smoke of her third cigarette of our brief acquaintance. If pressed I would have guessed at a refined but not expensive brand rather than the cheap cuts of her assistants, but I had other things on my mind at the time. She leaned forwards at last and watched with interest as I tried my bonds and found them decidedly secure. “Mr Manders,” she said, a soft Irish accent giving away her background, if not anything of use, “I am sorry to make your acquaintance in such difficult circumstances, but the situation had become rather urgent.”
I looked up at her from my position on the floor and tried to guess what Raffles would have done in this situation. Unfortunately, I kept returning to the answer that he would not have been foolish enough to put himself in this situation, so I reverted to following my own, rather less well tuned instincts. “Delighted to meet you,” I lied. “But I fear you have the advantage of me.”
“Yes, I do rather.” She sat back in her chair with a smug expression and did not rectify that. Instead she told me, “We have a mutual acquaintance, you see, in Mr Arthur Raffles, and I need your help to get a message to him.”
As I was, as I have alluded to, tied up and held hostage against my will and entirely at her mercy, my inclination to help her was already minimal. If, as she implied, she required my help in bringing harm to Raffles, well, that was simply impossible. I did not say this, though. Instead I relied on that which Raffles has always found most useful in me, that being my innocent, guileless expressions and evident incomprehension. “Well, if you merely wish me to take him a message, you could simply have asked! I’d be happy to deliver it, although rather less happy after our decidedly unconventional meeting.”
She smirked again and lit another cigarette. “No, Mr Manders, you misunderstand me. You will send the message, and one of my friends will deliver it for you.”
“And what would the nature of this message be?”
“Oh, something along the lines of ‘I have been kidnapped and held against my will by vicious brutes who intend to kill me’, that sort of thing.” She gestured vaguely, indicating that I could choose the precise wording myself. “If you would do me the kindness of writing such a note, I will of course untie you. Or at least have you untied.”
I pushed my luck. “And let me go?”
She laughed. “You are funny. I see why he likes you. And it was worth the try. So, will you write me the little note I need?”
“No, I don’t think I will.”
“I see.” Her smirk disappeared, but she looked disappointed and resigned rather than angry. “A shame. Indulge my curiosity, if you will… is it because you don’t want to be responsible for luring him into an obvious trap, or because you fear he will not come?”
She was trying to manipulate me and I knew it, but I had spent too long with Raffles, who was a master manipulator and could play me like a fiddle. If he had tried it on me I would undoubtedly have folded, but knowing that only made me angrier and more resistant. Besides that, the insult against Raffles’s character offended me deeply. “Not in the slightest,” I insisted hotly. “Raffles would never leave a friend in the lurch knowingly, and I will not lead a friend into the same lurch willingly!”
“Well, you are a delight.” Although I had feared retribution for my resistance, when she got to her feet and stalked towards me it was just to rifle through the pockets of my jacket, which had been discarded on a chair near me. She pulled out my cigarette case and flicked it open, lifting it to her nose to take a sniff. “You have fine taste in cigarettes, Mr Manders. No engraving on the case, but I think the combination will be familiar enough to dear Arthur, don’t you?”
I glared up at her, unable to do anything more. “I think that anyone who has observed us at all closely could replicate the combination quite easily.”
“Well, we shall see.” She pulled one of the cigarettes out and lit it to replace hers, then slipped the case into her pocket. “I’m afraid I have to leave you here, Mr Manders. But don’t worry, I’m sure dear Arthur will be along to join you soon.”
Resigned and frustrated, I did my best to get comfortable on the floor, and tugged again, futilely, on my bonds.
My watch was in my jacket pocket and a sheet pinned across the window blocked out all but the slightest slivers of light from outside, so I had no way of knowing how long I lay there. The silent thugs who had taken and bound me visited from time to time to check my bonds were still tied and, I presumed, that I hadn’t expired yet, but they came at irregular times so I couldn’t use their arrival to keep track. Certainly it was long enough that I was dizzy and nauseous with hunger and thirst before a scratching at the window roused me from an uncomfortable doze. At first I assumed it to be a pigeon or perhaps a corvid perching on the sill outside, but the sound persisted and grew more determined, and before I knew it the small window was swung open and a familiar and most welcome face appeared. He pressed a finger to his lips, unnecessarily, to warn me to keep my quiet, and then squirmed in through the opening that had looked too small to admit him. In a matter of a moment he had shot the bolt on the door and drawn a knife, which he used to sever my bindings. I bit back cries of pain as the blood flowed back into my hands and feet, and he massaged my sore shoulders and wrists with gentle hands in silence until I was able to sit up. His long fingers fluttered about me, and he eventually produced a flask from his pocket and held it out to me. “Brandy,” he whispered. “I’m afraid I have nothing better.”
“But Raffles, how did you find me?” I demanded in a whisper.
“A story for later, dear Bunny.” He brushed fingers across my cheek gently. “Can you stand?”
I moved my leg and had to bite down on my sleeve. His hand gripped my shoulder and clutched me into a tight embrace until the pain had long passed and my tears had dried. After a time I was able to stand without pain, and we made our way as quietly as we could through the den and onto the street outside. Soon we were in a cab and then settled in at our club, with a hearty meal and a stiff drink in front of us. Raffles told me the full story of his daring rescue, from receiving my cigarette case – which he had returned to me – and dismissing their claims to visiting my rooms and finding me gone, and ultimately to an adventure along the canal and between the chimneys of Camden whilst my captors pursued him and lost him in the underground stables. I laughed aloud at his description of one of the silent thugs falling in the canal and becoming rather less silent, the first time I had done so in what felt like days, and reached across the table to grasp Raffles’s hand. “Well, I was glad to see you, Raffles, much as I felt an ass for landing myself in such trouble again.”
His eyes grew worried. “We must find some way to deal with them,” he murmured. “They have found my weakness, and on principal alone I cannot permit this state of affairs to continue long.”
“Heavens, Raffles!” I wondered back over his story, and worried about what else had befallen him whilst I was laid up and unable to be of any assistance. “What happened?”
“My dear Bunny,” he said, a touch frustrated, “they took you!”
“You have to know, though,” I protested, “I would never give you up. Why, I refused to have any part in luring you into their trap. She accused me of lacking faith in you, suggested that I feared you wouldn’t come for me. I set her right about that quickly, I can tell you!”
He stared at me through my exclamation, with an expression of confused curiosity that was becoming familiar to me. When I’d finished, he signalled a waiter to refill our drinks, buying himself time to arrange his thoughts. “Bunny, you are the most extraordinary person. Your pluck, tenacity and loyalty are a rarer and more valuable treasure than any in any vault on this earth.” He held a hand up to prevent me speaking. “It had never even crossed my mind that you would, as you say, ‘give me up’, and they took great pleasure of informing me of your loyalty to me. As you know, I would never have left a friend in such a situation as you found yourself in, but there is no one else on this earth I would find myself plotting revenge for as I am now on your behalf.”
I was still bewildered and oblivious. “What are you saying, Raffles?”
“My dear, dear Bunny.” He chuckled like I had told a particularly good joke, and I am afraid to have to say that I did not fully understand until we were in the privacy of his rooms at the Albany some hours later.
