Work Text:
An Inspiring Chat
by Cathy
I hear the door open behind me, but I’m not going to look to see who it is. I hear the shuffle of feet, two sets, then they stop. A shhing sound, then a whisper.
“Hey, she’s actually writing. Maybe we should leave her alone.”
The other scoffs, then responds, “If we leave her alone, she may decide that someone else is better to write than us.”
I can almost hear Nick’s shrug in response to this. I *do* hear his whisper, though. “But if she writes a good sex scene, maybe she’ll come back to us.”
I hear Greg sigh, then the footsteps come closer. From the corner of my eye I can see Greg pulling Nick behind him. Nick’s reluctant to disturb me, but I can tell he thinks that Greg is right.
I ignore them until they are standing right in front of me. Their shadow falls over my laptop. I look up at them and glare. “And what, exactly, do you two fools want?”
Nick hangs his head, looking contrite. Greg rolls his eyes and gestures to the computer. “You’re writing, which is a good thing. But, you’re not writing about us, which is a bad thing.”
“Yes, I *am* writing. And, frankly, I hadn’t expected to have a talk with you guys for several more fics.”
Nick looks up, puzzled. “You actually were going to talk to us about the fics?”
I shrug and sigh. “Yes, something about where you think I should go from here. I think you were going to ask me about a threesome.”
Nick looks surprised, but Greg just grins. He glances at Nick, but when Nick is not more forthcoming, clears his throat and decides to talk to me himself. “Well, that sounds interesting, but I think you need us *now*.”
“Why?” I’m impatient to get back to my writing.
Greg sighs again. “For a smart girl, you sure can be dumb sometimes.”
I drum my fingers restlessly on the wrist rest of my keyboard. “I don’t have to sit here and listen to you insult me, you know.”
Greg smiles, that goofy, sideways smile that he knows I love. I melt a little, but just a little. I still have images of two very buff, very blue-eyed, musicians in my mind. Greg’s brown eyes don’t have the same allure at the moment. He shakes his head, and then, as if he can read my mind, says, “Would you get your mind away from them? Hello! Nick and I are right in front of you.”
I look down at my screen, notice that I still can’t see it properly. “You know, you guys have just made the one computer I have left in my life unusable. At least until you leave, that is.”
Nick looks at me. “You still having troubles with your computer, Cath?”
I sigh again and shake my head in frustration. “Yes. My home desktop probably needs a new hard drive, but I should reformat the one I have first. Course that would involve me knowing what the hell I was doing first, which I don’t, so it sits there, crashing randomly and pissing me off. And then today, my computer at work stopped liking my screen saver. ‘Illegal error.’ God, I hate computers sometimes!”
Greg looks over at Nick and winks. Then he turns back to me and fixes me with his gaze; suddenly his eyes seem a lot deeper than they did a moment ago. “Well, I think that your computer at work is just reacting to the Rammstein pics is all.” I blink, then grin. Although he’s wrong about the screen saver, I love how he pronounced the name right, rolling the R, making the ‘a’ sound like ‘ah’ (as in open up and say ‘ah’), and drawing out the ‘ei’ like the word ‘eye’.
Then I feel like kicking myself. Of course he says it correctly. I shake my head a bit and move on. “I don’t think so. I bet if I put the CSI screen caps back up it still wouldn’t work.”
Greg grins again. “You’re probably right. But I still think the computer had too much of the fire and weird images.”
I narrow my eyes at him. “I took out the bondage pics for work; I deleted the shots of the dildo spewing fake come and the image where Till is holding the bullwhip.”
Greg grins and looks over at Nick again. Then he leans closer to me and whispers, “Nick is the only one who should be holding a bullwhip.”
I grin – an evil grin. Nice image. I wink at him. “True, but that’s what started me off on this tangent anyway.”
Greg smiles knowingly. Nick is still puzzled. He steps forward, upset at being shut out of the conversation. “Okay, I know you have this plan for me to have my way with Greg, but where does Rammstein come in?”
I smile sweetly. “I decided that the scene needed a soundtrack. Something hard, but not necessarily angry. So, Rammstein came to mind.”
“But they sing in German.”
“Yeah, which makes it better.”
Greg reached out and put a hand on Nick’s shoulder. “Then she decided to see if she could find anything else out about them, and it was all downhill from there. It’s about a month later and she can name all the members on sight, has burned a copy of their first and fourth albums....” He looks sideways at me.
“Yeah, it’s the fourth, assuming the live album counts as the third.”
Greg continues, “She’s also been downloading live clips, videos, remixes, and extra songs that were only released on singles.” He pauses, thinking. “Oh, don’t forget the message boards and e-groups.”
I stare wide-eyed at him. “Geez, Greg. I don’t think the readers need to know about all that.”
“I’m just saying that this obsession with Rammstein has gone on for awhile.”
Nick looked at him, then looked at me. “Okay, so you’re obsessed with Rammstein. Where does that leave us?”
Before I can answer that, Greg cuts in. “High and dry, I’m afraid.”
Nick narrows his eyes at me. “Well, that sucks.”
I shrug. “Yeah, but I haven’t been motivated to write you guys.”
Greg smiles again. “Well, that’s why we’re here.”
Nick looks confused again. “I think I missed something. Last I checked Rammstein was connected to us. When did that change?”
Greg smirks. “About the time she started playing them incessantly.”
I smile sheepishly. “You can never have too much Rammstein.”
Greg rolls his eyes again. “Maybe not, but you *can* have too little Nick and Greg.”
Finally, a way for me to shift the conversation. “Yes, you can. What’s up with TPTB and no Nick/Greg scenes this season?”
Nick thinks about that for a moment. “There was one in the second ep of the season. Remember we talked about the dice?”
I look at him, startled. “Yeah, now that you mention it. Where the hell was I?”
Greg winks. “Probably doing something Rammstein.”
I shake my head. “Probably. Anything else I missed?”
Greg shrugs. “I’m in the credits. Well, Eric is anyway. And, I’ve got more of a role in the discussions around the table.”
I smile. “That I did notice.”
Nick chimes in, “Yeah, Greg, you have more of a role, although I’m not really sure you’ve been a help yet.”
I see Greg narrow his eyes and decide I need to break this up or I’ll never start writing again. “Guys! Didn’t you say you came to help me? How is fighting going to help me?”
Now Nick smirks. Hmm, interesting look for him. I’ll have to use it sometime. Before I can continue with that thought he speaks. “Well, you *are* trying to connect the fight scene to the rest of the fic.”
I sigh. “Yes, but the rest of the fic is trying to come out right too.”
Greg sits on the edge of my coffee table, finally deciding that hovering over my seated form on the couch doesn’t help him any. Taking the hint, Nick also takes a seat next to me. When they are both comfortable, Greg is the first one to talk. “Okay, so when you left us, we’d just had incredible sex.”
Nick grins at Greg and winks, while I just roll my eyes. “Would you cut it out?”
Nick looks sheepish and apologies. “So, we had incredible sex. And, we’re going to have even more incredible sex. Apparently to the sound of Rammstein. So what’s the problem?”
I sigh and settle back. “Well, at first there was a lot of sex and frankly, I was tired of writing it and feeling a bit jealous that I didn’t have anyone to practice on except my characters.”
Greg cuts me off. “What about John?”
I shrug. “What about John? He’s my brother’s friend, and is as oblivious as, well, as the grass to whether it’s green or not.”
Nick sniggers and Greg grins. “Interesting simile. But you’re right, it’s irrelevant to this discussion. You were saying?”
I take a deep breath. “As I was saying, I got tired of writing the sex, and there were issues I had to deal with in canon so I decided I needed to write some angst. But I needed a background, so I had to write that first. So, pages and pages of background came out, then I wrote the next fic - three parts, mind you - and after a 123 pages I thought I was done.”
Greg grins. “We had more sex, too.”
I grin back. “Very good sex, but I still wasn’t done. As you said a moment ago, Nick, I have to connect the fight to the rest of the fic. It doesn’t connect now. It feels tacked on.”
Greg leans over and pats my knee. I notice how masculine his hand is, how strong his arms... I tear my eyes away and look up to meet his. He smiles knowingly, then says, “So it was back to the drawing board and rewrites.”
“Yeah, 17 pages in one weekend. That was a great rewrite of the first part.”
Nick is interested now. “So then what happened?”
I shrug. “So then I started thinking about the next story and major angst. Then I depressed myself.”
Greg nods thoughtfully. “So, to get yourself out of the funk, you started thinking about the next sex scene and decided you needed a soundtrack. And we’re back to Rammstein.”
Nick nods, finally understanding. “And then you were off and running with Rammstein and didn’t give a thought to us.”
I wrinkle my nose slightly, annoyed with myself. “Yeah. Sorry about that. It was just that I already knew I wasn’t going to finish all the fics I have planned before the new season started, so I figured I could get inspiration then. Then the new season started, and, well, you already know how much of an impression that made on me.”
Greg and Nick nod in unison. There is silence for a moment. Then Nick speaks. “Okay, so why didn’t you write last week?”
I can’t meet their eyes as I reply. “Cause I was afraid the computer would crash on me.”
Greg snorts. “Sure. Your computer locked up a little while ago, and you pulled out your laptop to write this fic. Doesn’t fly. Try again.”
“Okay, I was resting. My job is stressful, and after all, I *was* on vacation.”
Nick looks at Greg and sticks out a foot to kick him gently in the shin. “See, she was on vacation.”
Greg rolls his eyes at Nick and then looks at me. “You were resting all right. Resting your newly pierced tongue.”
I blow a raspberry at him (something I’m glad I’m able to do once again, now that said tongue has mostly healed.) He grins. “You know I’m right.”
“Yeah, I was resting my tongue. You know that writing slash was not the first thing on my mind when I could only drink my food, not actually chew.”
This time, it’s Greg who narrows his eyes at me. “Well, you weren’t *writing*, but that doesn’t mean you weren’t *thinking* slash.”
I blush. “What, you guys can read my mind?”
Nick grins. “We’re in it, so why not? But Greg is right. You were thinking slash, but it wasn’t about us.”
I shrug. No reason denying it at this point.
Nick decides to try another tactic. “Okay, so Saturday, when you were feeling better, could actually chew and talk, why didn’t you write then?”
I narrow my eyes at him again. “I did!”
Greg shakes his head. “Yeah, you did, but it wasn’t part of the series, it was the beginning of a new story. Besides, you didn’t finish it so I’m not sure that counts.”
Nick nods in agreement then adds, “And it wasn’t inspired by us, so I’m seconding the motion that it doesn’t count.”
I sigh. “Geez, you guys are relentless. I was reading slash and getting inspired. Does it matter that it wasn’t CSI slash?”
Greg leans over and picks up two pens that I have sitting on my coffee table. Holding one in each hand he starts air drumming. He looks over at Nick and says, “Okay, start singing in German and she’ll be inspired to actually write about *us*.”
I blush again, but then come back with, “Riiiggghhht, both of you need to grow about 5 inches taller and eat a cheeseburger or two to even start resembling Till and Christoph. Besides, Nick, you’re no Till, and frankly, Greg, Christoph is a much better drummer than you.”
“He looks cute in a dress too.” Greg winks at me.
I wipe a bit of drool from the corner of my mouth and retort, “Does he ever.” I turn to Nick. “I don’t think you’re going to set yourself on fire to win me over, so why don’t you tell your boyfriend that you and he will never be band members of Rammstein.”
Nick grins and takes the pens from Greg. Greg play pouts for a moment, then straightens his face for a serious comment. “Leaving aside the possible moral implications of slashing real people instead of characters for a moment, do you think you’re going to be getting back into writing us any time soon?”
“I think so. And what do you mean by moral implications?”
Greg looks at me steadily. “You know what I mean. It’s one thing to take two characters and write them doing what you want. But to take real men and slash them is a whole different ball game.”
“But I know so little about them, it’s like they’re characters. Besides, the writers are amazing. Really hot stuff, I’m telling you.”
Nick pokes me in the knee lightly. “You’re an amazing writer. Really hot stuff, I’m telling you.”
I frown at him. “I don’t think you get to say that.”
Nick grins. “It’s true. I came how many times? Four? That’s pretty hot.”
Greg chimes in, “I came at least three times in the last story. So, yeah, really hot stuff.”
I sigh again. “That’s not what I meant. I meant that you guys are in my mind and I’m writing this, so I don’t think you can say how great of a writer I am. Sounds like I’m self-centered.”
Nick shakes his head. “Nah, we were reading your feedback before we came here.”
Greg smiles gently. “Yeah. We decided to think of some way to convince you to write us again, in case having us in front of you wasn’t enough to do it.” He pauses, then continues. “But I saw the way you were looking at me earlier, so I’m thinking that us in front of you may just be enough.”
Greg stands up and starts to unbutton his shirt. Nick looks over at him and his eyes get wide. He stands as well, walks over to Greg, pulls him close, and kisses him. I can’t tear my eyes away as Nick’s hands slip around Greg’s waist and grab his ass; his lips doing a dance with Greg’s. Greg twines his fingers in Nick’s hair, holding him tight. I can see their mouths working; know that their tongues are sliding against each other, a slow, passionate duel that will lead to more. More touches, more teasing, hard bodies pressed against each other, warm mouths on stiff -
Finally, I do tear my eyes away and glance down at the computer screen, realizing that Till and Christoph will just have to wait for someone else to write them, or my dreams, whichever comes first. Right now, Nick and Greg have my attention again.
I raise my eyes again when I hear a thump. The pillar candle in the middle of my coffee table is now on the floor (unlit, thank goodness), and Nick and Greg are on my coffee table instead. I clear my throat and they break apart for a minute to look at me. Then Nick winks and goes back to nibbling Greg’s neck. Greg moans and tilts his head back.
Grinning, I shake my head and arch my fingers over the keyboard again. A moment later and the coffee table is gone. A firm bed is in its place, a bottle of lube handy on a side table and a towel tucked just under the bed. Greg looks over at me and nods slightly, then turns his attention back to Nick’s nipple, which he begins to swirl his tongue around. I smile and know that there will be fic written tonight.
The End