I have so many things I need to be doing, things of actual importance to my actual life, and meanwhile this sneaky, unhelpful part of my brain is continually whispering shit like AU where Fenris and Morrigan are angry foster siblings who hate each other only slightly less than they hate everyone else, or what if Cop!Aveline and Federal Agent!Cassandra get set up by their colleagues and go on the mostawkward oblivious date in the history of awkward oblivious dates that only gets awesome when some douchebags try to mug them and get their assess kicked, or crackfic where Fenris and Dorian meet on a Bring Your Boyfriend To Work Day (shut UP, Sera, THAT’S NOT WHAT WE’RE CALLING IT) (they’re both the boyfriends) and basically have to be separated from each other’s throats by their very amused and tolerant partners (Hawke and Iron Bull share a long-suffering sigh of affectionate Dating A Provocative Asshole fellowship) and I just -
I do not have TIME for this, okay? I DO NOT HAVE TIME, and yet Dragon Age continues to give me FEELINGS
DAMN YOU, BIOWARE
Ahem. This is the one I want. (I should really not allow myself to draw before the morning coffee shakes have worn off, though.)
The date was going so terribly, Cassandra felt perversely vindicated
in having accepted it. ‘I don’t need
to be set up,’ she’d snapped at Varric, just before he
twisted her metaphorical arm. The fact that she’d let him do it
didn’t mean she hadn’t also been right to protest,and
now, in the form of Aveline Vallen, she had incontestable proof to
that effect.
Cassandra liked hard evidence. It
was what made her good at her job. She loved being a federal agent,
and under most social circumstances, she was more than happy to go
into detail about why. But dates, as she’d already, patiently
explained to Varric, and especially first dates, were the one arena
in which she preferred to talk about, oh, literally
anything else. Dates were where
she went to be off duty: only once she’d gotten to know a partner did
she like to invite them in to that part of her life. Varric, by his
own admission, had never understand this preference, but as Cassandra
didn’t require him to, it usually wasn’t a problem.
Except that, now, it was; because
Aveline Vallen was a homicide detective – a fact which Varric had
known full well – and the only time she’d shut up about her goddamn
job since they sat down at the bar was when she drew breath to order.
'– so the case went cold, or we thought it did,’ Aveline said, at
a speed just shy of gabbling, 'but then, a week later –’
'Stop,’ said Cassandra – sudden, cold, and all out of patience.
'Just – stop.’
Aveline did so, her mouth hanging open a little, cheeks as red as
her hair. A very small part of Cassandra approved the combination;
the rest of her focussed on scowling.
'I’m sorry,’ Aveline said, tightly. Her mouth was pinched with anger
or embarrassment or possibly both, Cassandra couldn’t tell. 'I didn’t
mean to bore you.’
'You’re not boring,
per se,’ Cassandra said, aware that this was a casually vicious
remark but too exasperated to care. 'I just didn’t come here to talk
about work, of all
things.’
'Really?’ snapped Aveline. 'And did you come to talk at all? You’ve
barely said ten words to me since you got here!’
'I might have done,’ said Cassandra, stung, 'if you’d given me the
chance!’
'My apologies,’ said Aveline, scathing. 'Was that gaping,
minute-long silence when we first sat down an insufficient venue for
your wit, or did I just imagine it?’
It was Cassandra’s turn to flush. 'I wasn’t – I was wrongfooted,’
she said, hating the admission. 'You weren’t what I was expecting.’
'Oh? Too plain? Too tall? Too cop?’
There was a sting in the words, but bitterly so, and Cassandra’s gut
gave an ugly lurch at the realisation that these were Aveline’s real
insecurities. Aveline seemed to realise in the same instant what
she’d betrayed of herself, and looked away, taking a furious sip of
wine.
'You just –’ Cassandra tried.
Faltered. Shut her mouth, completely unable to articulate how, after
all Varric’s teasing and taunting about her singleness – about how
he knew another “lady-inclined lady who’s just as hopeless at
getting dates as you are, which is saying something,” never mind
the fact that Sera and Isabela literally fell down laughing
when Cassandra let slip who Varric had set her up with – she’d been
braced for Aveline herself to be… well, a joke. So demonstrably,
clearly unsuitable a match that Cassandra could storm straight out
again, the matter resolved forever. She’d agreed to the date out of
spite, to prove it would all go badly enough that Varric would stop
his pestering, and had, as such, given no thought to what she might
say to actually make it work.
And then she’d seen Aveline, who
looked like a lean-hipped Valkyrie, threads of red hair escaping from
a knotted bun coiled low on her head, and Cassandra had been utterly
struck dumb.
All of a sudden, she saw the night through Aveline’s eyes: the other
woman had come here in good faith, only to be stonewalled by
Cassandra’s prickly silence. Likely as not, she’d started talking
shop out of sheer nervousness, their jobs the only thing she knew for
sure they had in common, and rather than contribute or try to change
the subject, Cassandra had let her ramble on before finally, rudely
snapping.
'I’m sorry,’ she said, squeezing the stem of her glass. 'I… I’m
not very good at this. At any of this. I’ve been horrible company.’
'You have,’ allowed Aveline, stiff but not unyielding.
Cassandra’s lips twitched in an almost-smile. 'I appreciate the
honesty.’
'You deserve nothing less.’
'Ouch,’ she said, but there was a bare flash of humour on Aveline’s
face that softened it, and in the silence that followed, Cassandra
felt them both relax a little.
'So,’ said Aveline, after a moment. 'If you don’t want to talk
policework, name the topic.’
Tit for tat,
Cassandra thought, and reached into the vulnerable core of herself,
to offer up a suitably penitent truth. 'How do you feel about
poetry?’
That startled a laugh from Aveline, bright and glorious. 'Poetry!
Now, there’s a shock.’
'If you disapprove –’
'I never said that.’ Aveline’s smile was smaller, softer. 'Actually,
I’ve a fondness for Robert Service.’
Cassandra felt something in her lighten. 'What about Robert Frost?’
*
Getting to know Cassandra
Pentaghast, Aveline thought, was less a date than a détente. Even
with her shiraz in hand, she radiated federal agent,
crisp white shirt and smart grey pantsuit, making Aveline’s cop
senses tingle with the threat of invaded territory (and, just a very
little, with the promise of something else). Her eyes were storm
grey, wide and intense, her black hair trimmed in a pixie cut that
set off her startling cheekbones. Perversely, it was the scar on her
jaw that softened her: a sign of raw humanity, that her armour could
be chinked. Aveline was trying not to stare at it, but the more she
drank – and she’d already done more of that than she’d ever meant
to, nervous reflex putting her planned restraint to flight – the
harder it was not to simply reach out and run her thumb across it.
Cassandra was… Aveline wanted to
say difficult, but
only because she was feeling residually uncharitable. She was
awkward, certainly, but combined with her straight-backed demeanour,
it was the kind of trait that saw men called professionally
reserved and women mocked as
prickly, and even
nettled, Aveline refused to endorse the stereotype. God, and it
likely didn’t help that Varric had been the one to set them up,
either: Aveline had known him for years, was immune to his particular
brand of sarcastic teasing and knew enough of the intellect
underlying it to trust his judgement anyway, even – or perhaps
especially – if his delivery of it made her want to punch him in
the face. But Cassandra, she knew, was a newer acquaintance than
that, and Varric’s uniquely autonomous role in the grand governmental
hierarchy compared to Cassandra’s fixed job description likely meant
she was yet to parse his bullshit from his bullseyes.
I am going to murder
him, Aveline thought,
because it was always good to have a scapegoat. And then, as
Cassandra’s long fingers tapped against her throat, pale and
inviting, she amended, with a slight gulp, Politely,
though. I will murder him very
politely.
Détente thus established, they talked about, in no particular
order: poetry, wine, family, foreign films (Cassandra, it turned out,
spoke fluent French, and Aveline spent an embarrassed two minutes
trying desperately to pretend she didn’t have a language kink when
given a demonstration), and gun control laws, on which potentially
dealbreaker topic they were both in complete agreement.
When the bill came, they split it amicably, headed out of the bar,
and stopped together on the pavement.
'This was, ah –’ Cassandra’s gaze flicked guiltily sideways, '–
well, barring my initial behaviour, it was certainly very…
enjoyable. And I would, if you –’
'We could do this again,’ said Aveline, lips twitching. 'If you
wanted.’
Cassandra smiled at her, wide and grateful; it was, by an order of
magnitude, the most relaxed, genuine expression to have crossed her
face all evening. The effect of it was transformative, so much so
that Aveline’s stomach fluttered, a fierce blush creeping up her
neck.
'Well, then,’ she said, grinning. 'Goodnight, Cassandra.’
'Goodnight, Aveline.’
And then they both walked off in
the exact same direction.
Mortification curdled through
Aveline, head to toes. Oh, god, Christ
– they’d finally gotten past the fucking awkwardness, and now they
were right back to square one, all easiness gone as they cut through
the same damn sidestreet to the same damn parking garage, too
mutually embarrassed to either talk or hang back. Aveline snuck a
glance at Cassandra, whose gaze was fixed determinedly on the ground,
and was on the brink of attempting a joke to lighten the mood when
she realised – belatedly, given her agitated state – that they
were being followed.
The back of her neck began to prickle. She kept her eyes on
Cassandra, mutely trying to convey her sudden, unerring sense that
something was wrong, but for all her opposition to talking shop back
at the bar, Cassandra’s realisation was as sudden as her own. She
flicked a sharp glance at Aveline, and in moment of silent
communication, they assessed the situation. Two pairs of footsteps
behind them, heavy and increasing in speed, while up ahead, a third
shape loomed beside a convenient dumpster.
'I came straight from work,’ said Aveline, voice low: meaning, I’m
still armed. 'You?’
'Likewise,’ Cassandra said, and her grin was sharp and furious. 'You
want to take point?’
'First time a fed’s ever offered me that.’
'Was that a refusal?’
'Hell, no.’
'Evening, ladies!’ The dumpster-lurker stepped into view, leering at
the pair of them. He was white, unshaven and – Aveline’s heart sped
up – that was absolutely a gun in his hand. She feigned shock,
letting momentum carry her an extra step forward, muscles tensed for
action. Peripherally, she was aware of Cassandra shifting her stance;
of the crucial cessation of footsteps behind them.
'Now,’ said the mugger, 'this doesn’t have to get ugly, pretties.’
He chuckled at his own joke. Fucking amateur hour, Aveline
thought, struggling not to roll her eyes: not only had the asshole
stopped her well inside of twenty-one feet, he wasn’t even pointing
the gun at either of them – just lolling it in his hand, like he
expected the showing alone to be enough. 'Just hand over your
valuables, and –’
Aveline moved like the pro she was, surging forward in a sharp,
sudden burst to grab his wrist and twist his gun-hand up behind his
back. Digging her fingers in between the bones of his wrist, she
kicked down hard at the back of his knee: the gun spasmed free of his
hand and he dropped, shouting in pain as her grip damn near
dislocated his shoulder. Meanwhile, beside her – or beside where
she’d been, and in the same instant, as synchronised as if they’d
timed it – Cassandra had turned and pulled her own gun on the
hapless grunts who’d come up behind them.
'I’m a Federal Agent!’ she barked. 'Put your hands on your heads and
kneel the fuck down, or I’ll shoot!’
'Christ allfuckingmighty!’ one guy yelped, while Aveline’s collar
thrashed and whined in her grip.
'Shit!’ he whispered. 'Shit, fuck –’
'You stay where you are,’ said Aveline, 'or I’ll have you for
resisting arrest, too.’
'Shit,’ he moaned again.
Aveline could’ve laughed.
The logistics of the next ten minutes might have been somewhat
tricky, being as how they only had two sets of handcuffs between
three criminals, if not for the fact that, while Cassandra cuffed the
first of them, the second goon tried to run. Aveline, preoccupied
with cuffing the lead mugger, opened her mouth to shout a warning,
but before she’d made so much as a peep, Cassandra leapt up and
pistolwhipped him soundly across the back of the head. He yelped,
staggered and fell back down, clutching his skull.
'Unless you want me to shoot you,’ Cassandra said, dryly, 'I’d
consider staying put.’
'Fuck you, lady!’ he spat out, but Aveline could see he was shaking,
and with Cassandra’s gun on him, he didn’t move again.
It was Aveline who called it in, and Cullen who showed up with the
cavalry, evidently having been unable to resist the irony of his
partner getting waylaid on her first goddamn date in forever. As all
three muggers were bundled away in squad cars, the injured one
protesting vocally, Cullen looked her over, eyes crinkling up with
amusement.
'Only you, Vallen,’ he chuckled. 'There’s a story to tell the
grandkids!’
Cassandra was just far enough away that Aveline couldn’t tell if she
was still in earshot. 'Hush!’ she hissed at him, trying to neither
smile nor blush and not quite succeeding. 'God, what a truly
ridiculous night. If Isabela cracks so much as a single joke about
nightsticks, I may throttle her with police tape.’
Cullen shuddered. 'Don’t say her name; you’ll summon her!’
'Summon who?’ said Cassandra, walking up with one brow raised. There
was a snap to her stride, a spark to her gaze that hadn’t been there
before, and damned if the combination wasn’t fetching as all hell.
'Isabela,’ said Aveline, knowing she was another mutual friend of
Cassandra’s. 'Cullen here thinks she’s the devil.’
'I don’t think anything,’ Cullen muttered darkly. 'I know.’
He looked set to say more, but one of the uniforms was waving him
over, and so he settled for flashing a quick grin and leaving.
'Well!’ said Cassandra, as he departed. 'That was bracing and
unexpected, if a little more work-oriented than I usually like my
dates.’ But she smiled, taking any sting from it, and Aveline was
helpless not to smile back.
'In that case,’ she said, 'I’ll have to make it up to you next
time.’
The barest touch of pink coloured Cassandra’s cheeks. 'Oh? With
what?’
Oh, to hell with it, Aveline thought, and stepped in close,
and kissed her. She meant for it to be gentle, but as Cassandra
responded by grabbing her hips and tugging her in, the kiss turned
deep and hungry. Aveline let momentum carry them back against a wall,
Cassandra gasping into her as Aveline thumbed her scar.
When they finally broke apart, they were panting a little, both
wide-eyed, dishevelled and smiling.
'I’ll think of something,’ Aveline said, and kissed her again –
more softly, as in promise.