Out Of Place Chapter 24

[galadriel1010]

Greg ran a hand through his hair and felt the embarrassing tug of dawning comprehension. He wagged a finger at the two men, then pointed behind him, “I’m going to put some pants on, then I’ll… do breakfast? Or should I not suggest that?”

“Pants fist.” Jack Saturday fell backwards into one of the armchairs and grinned, “Close your mouth, you’ll catch flies.”

Greg glared at him, nodded once to Jacob and retreated upstairs to his room. He grumbled to himself as he pulled out a pair of jeans and a band T-shirt, then grabbed for his phone as it finally rang, “Nick, do you know anything about the weirdos in the living room?”

“Ah.” His boyfriend paused, “They arrived safely then?”

“Yeah, they arrived. Why does the name Jack Saturday ring a bell?”

“Vampire, popping up all around the country with his companion Jacob Glass, who was reported dead in Minneapolis.” There was the sound of Nick changing ears, “They didn’t wake you did they?”

“Wasn’t sleeping anyway, not without you baby.” He lay back on the bed and rolled over so his head was almost buried in Nick’s pillow, “Someone needs to point out to Ecklie that we function much better awake than unconscious.”

“Yeah, but it can’t be either of us. Or Grissom.” Nick pointed out with a sigh, “I gotta go babe, my suspect has just arrived for a little chat.”

“Good luck, love you.”

“Thanks, love you too.” Greg sighed sadly and dropped the phone onto the bed, rubbing his hand across his eyes tiredly before levering himself upright and padding across the room again and heading downstairs.

Jack and Jacob looked up at him in amusement as he entered and Jacob bounded upright to greet him, “Let’s try again shall we? I’m Jacob, that’s Jack, you’re Greg. Nice to meet you.”

“Nice… to meet you.” He frowned, “Can I ask what you’re doing here? Not that this is entirely unusual, but you know. Coffee?”

They nodded their amused assent and followed him through to the kitchen, where Jacob sat on the work surface and Jack leant on the table, watching Greg fussing around with the coffee. Jack sighed happily into his mug and remembered the question because of Greg’s questioning glance, “Oh, yeah, we’re dead. Hello.” He waved and Jacob grinned, “Vampires, so when we sleep… Someone called it in, we ended up in the morgue, your boyfriend sprung us, here we are.”

“Right…” Greg stared at his coffee mug, “Did I put something in this? Furniture polish for example?”

“No, vampires are real, we’re two of them.”

“Yeah, I know.” He sighed heavily and ran a hand through unruly hair, “Life has got so weird since we met Jazz, two months ago I didn’t even believe in aliens.”

“Yeah, you’re going to have to run this by me in words of one syllable.” Jacob cocked his head on one side like a bird, or the cat watching the bird, “Aliens?”

“Well that’s got two syllables for starters, so we could be in trouble.” Greg tipped his head back and tapped his mug, “Basically, I sort of clean up after aliens who aren’t supposed to be here.”

“They’re not?”

“No, all part of being aliens. First official contact won’t be for another…” He shrugged, “It’s a while off, anyway.”

“So how many people know about them?” Jacob was fascinated by the new concept; Jack just looked bored

The older vampire beat Greg to the explanation with a languid wave of his hand, “You, me, him, Nick… There are loads of secret organisations around the world, all doing the same job, making sure that people like us never find out that aliens occasionally visit and either try to take over the world or are just genuinely lost. Except that we get to know about aliens, because they’re also keeping the existence of us secret. We like Liberty Towers.”

“Right.” Jacob stared between them, “So, how do you go about finding out about a secret organisation?”

“Well Nick and I were chosen to do it because of a case we were working on. Other routes are being chosen for your specialist skills, encountering aliens first hand, dating members of the organisations or generally living in Cardiff.” Jack snorted at that one and Greg grinned about him, “So which box do you tick? Or did you just refuse to die?”

“Met the head honcho in a bar in New York during the 1970s, in the heat of the punk invasion. She bought me a drink, I tried to get a different drink, she thumped me and we headed off to a different bar.” He laughed, “I drank her under the table. Several times. Is she still around?”

“Who?”

”The Lady.” He shrugged one shoulder, “Jasmine apparently though.”

“Oh Jazz!” Greg’s face cleared beautifully, “Yeah, she’s around, she was over here last month actually, she recruited us.”

“She’s back in the UK then?”

“Yeah, living with her boyfriend in London.”

“Sorry pardon what?” Jacob waved a hand and smiled cheerfully, “Hello, feeling like I’m on another planet here.”

“Don’t worry about it; Jasmine is immortal, Liberty Towers hunt aliens, Greg works for Liberty Towers, Nick works for Liberty Towers, I refused, we’re all cool.”

“You’re not going to explain, are you?” Jacob sighed

“Nah, you don’t want to know.” Jack grinned at Greg, “You enjoy it then?”

“It’s not a bed of roses. I mean, we’ve not had to do much, but in the first week we were doing it Jazz and Nick got kidnapped and we were outed, so now we’re on different shifts.” He sighed, “Speaking of which, I need to head into work soon, will you be OK on your own here?”

“You’ve got blackout curtains?”

“Yeah, of course, every room.” Greg nodded and smiled dryly, “Nick will be back at about one, unless he pulls overtime. I think the far bedroom’s already made up, catch you later.” He saluted them casually and headed upstairs to change into a smarter pair of jeans and pull a shirt on, then headed out to work.

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Nick rubbed his eyes tiredly and closed the file, starting as a warm hand landed on his shoulder. “Hey!” He grinned broadly up at Greg and covered the hand with his own, squeezing briefly before grabbing the file and standing up, “I gotta get this to Sofia, walk with me?”

“Sure thing.” Greg straightened up and held the door open for Nick, “You pulling overtime today?”

“Yeah, Sofia’s keeping tabs on how often I do it, but when we’ve got a case to close,” he waved the file, “She loves my dedication.”

“She’s taking advantage of you.”

”And I’m taking advantage of her, it’s a win-win situation.” They stopped as Sofia emerged from her office and Nick flipped the file open, “Sofia, I found plant matter at the scene, it comes from a rare breed of orchid, not naturally occurring in the USA.”

“That narrows the search down, any idea where it may have come from?”

“Not yet, I’ve checked with all the museums and botanical gardens in the state and none of them has an example. I’ve widened the search but there are a few private collectors in the state who are…” He pulled the universally recognised face for ‘reclusive, uncooperative and generally unpleasant’. Every planet in the universe has them, although none of the CSIs knew that then. “Still waiting for some of them to get back to me though.”

“OK Nick, I’ll approve your overtime.” She raised her hands with a laugh, “Good work on closing that case yesterday by the way.”

”Thanks, I’ll try to repeat it.” He grinned

“Do do, and no lab nookie!”

“Got it.” Sofia waved and headed off away from them down the corridor, whilst Greg and Nick returned the way they came, dropping into the break room for Greg’s briefing.

Nine hours later, after Nick had tracked down his illusive orchid and the Police Department were tracking down a gardener, and after Greg had come face to face with a killer with a fetish for… you really don’t want to know, Greg unlocked the door of the house and tugged a barely awake Nick in, pushing him up the stairs gently, “Come on, straight to bed,” he encouraged him with a soft smile, “we can sleep all day.”

Nick got into their room at last and managed to undress clumsily before falling onto the bed and blinking up at Greg blearily. The older man had been lagging towards the end of his second shift and had then fallen asleep in the car on the way home, so he was now seriously dozy. Greg thought he was adorable.

He got all the washing into the laundry basket and pulled the covers back on the bed, manoeuvring Nick under them and crawling in after him, curling up against his lover with his head on Nick’s chest and Nick’s hand coming to rest automatically on his hip. Nick was asleep by the time Greg’s head settled on his chest, but it didn’t stop Greg from talking, “One day, we’ll go somewhere where we can do the same shift and actually sleep, novel idea I know. I’m not giving you up though, not for anything.” He held on tighter as Nick muttered something incomprehensible and chuckled as he nodded off as well, “Glad you agree babe.”