ds_flashfiction | School Challenge by lordess renegade

soundslikej.livejournal.com posting in

Well...school is mentioned....Fraser/RayK if you squint. Would be rated G if Ray wasn't such a foulmouthed little bastard. 1237 words.

And, um...I'm sorry.

Six Is the Loneliest Number

"Why do you do this, Fraser? I mean, every time. Every freaking time. You have to touch things. You have to lick things. You have to—" Ray flailed his arms around, nearly knocking himself off balance. "I hate you."

"Ray, let's be reasonable. You do not hate me."

"Oh, trust me, Fraser. This?" he pointed at his face. "This is my hate face." Fraser's eyes swept over him, and he wasn't quite sure, but he thought that he could see the corner of his mouth curving up into a tiny smile. "It's not funny."

Yeah. That was definitely a smile. "It's a little funny, Ray."

"It's…" he paused. "Ok, the hat? The hat is funny. The rest of it, not so much."

Fraser shoved the hat back from his eyes and frowned, tipping his head back. "I don't see what's so funny about…"

"Fraser." Ray reached out and grabbed him by a big floppy sleeve, tugging him towards him. He spun them both around to look at the window of Fraser's office, where they were clearly reflected back at themselves. "Tell me that's not funny."

Fraser's eyes narrowed intently as he peered at their reflection. There was a picture, somewhere, maybe in his grandmother's attic, that looked just like this. Six year old Benton with his dad's Stetson on, falling down over his eyes. But Ray…Ray was much more interesting to look at. Still skinny, still with hair that stuck up comically in all the right places, but his eyes were huge, and his smile, when he saw Fraser looking at him, was missing a lopsided hint of sadness that Fraser had never noticed until it was gone.

"I do hate you," he told Fraser, meeting his eyes in the window. "Because, ok, I know how fond you are of endangering my life in wildly ridiculous ways, but this? This wins, Fraser. This takes home the goddamn prize."

"I don't think your life is necessarily in danger, Ray."

"Not in—Fraser, have you looked at me? Because I’m about two feet tall and thirty pounds, and there are a bunch of dangerous criminals who are after that thing," he flung an arm at the stone carving on Fraser's desk, "who could be busting in here at any minute. And…and…" his face crumpled. "And it's all your fault!" He pulled away from Fraser and climbed up onto the cot in the corner, curling into a ball.

"Fascinating," said Fraser, watching Ray's back tremble with fury. "It appears that our emotional responses have been altered along with our physical states."

"Our?" Ray repeated, his abnormally high voice muffled by his knees. "I don't see you freaking out. I don't see you being anything but Mr. Cool and Collected Mountie, same as usual. Even though you're a freaking preschooler." A thought struck him and he rolled over with a panicked look on his face. "Oh god, Frase, what if we're stuck like this? What if…what if we have to go back to preschool, and kindergarten, and...shit, middle school…" His fingers clenched at the blankets. "I don't think I can do that. Not again. I mean, once is bad enough, but…."

"Ray. You're getting ahead of yourself. There is no reason to think that our situation is anything other than temporary."

Ray sat up and wrapped himself tighter in his baggy shirt. "You think?"

"Well, it's not entirely unexpected, you know."

"It's—what do you mean? What do you mean, Fraser? You mean to tell me that you…that you knew this was going to happen…you knew we were going to be turned into…into this, and you touched the goddamn carving anyways?"

"Of course I didn't know, Ray, don't be foolish. What I mean to say is, there have been reports—"

"Reports. Reports of what, Frase? Of…kidifying? Because I think people might have noticed if there were reports of—"

"Ray. Ray. Ray." Ray stopped talking and glared resentfully. "I am feeling the strangest desire to punch you in the face right now." Fraser shook his head to clear it. "What I meant to say was, that when I was young, I remember hearing folk tales that…well, that resemble this situation quite closely."

"What, like, Eskimo stories?"

"Inuit, Ray."

"Inuit, Eskimo, whatever. Just…skip to the important part. Did the people turn back?"

"…yes."

"I heard that."

Fraser tipped his head and the Stetson slid off. "Heard what?"

"That dotdotdot. There was a dotdotdot there, Fraser. What aren't you saying?"

"Well, it tended to…take a few days, Ray. Until the people in question learned whatever valuable lesson happened to be the moral of the tale."

"How many days is a few?"

"I believe it was about a week."

"A…a w—What're you, freaking nuts? I can't stay like this for a week! I'm a cop! I can't just…I can't be…Fraser, they don't let six year olds carry guns!"

"I'm sure they'll understand, Ray."

"Oh, right, sure, I can see it now. Sorry, Lieutenant, I can't come in today on account of me being, you know…six. No, sir. Not sick. Six. Yeah. That'll go over great."

"Well who says you have to work during this time? I'm sure you have some vacation time coming to you."

"Yeah, to do what? I mean, I can barely even reach the doorknob. I don't think they'll let me, you know, drive. Or travel. Or do pretty much anything."

"But just imagine, Ray. Haven't you ever wondered what it would be like to see the world through the eyes of a child again?"

Ray yawned hugely. "Not really."

"Well I for one intend to enjoy this week. But right now, you're tired. And I feel utterly exhausted."

"Yeah, losing thirty years in a split second really takes a lot out of a guy."

Fraser raised an eyebrow in his direction. "Thirty?"

Ray frowned. "Give or take."

"I think we should get some sleep. Nothing is going to be resolved until the morning anyhow. We might as well have some rest before we have to explain this to everyone."

Ray's eyelashes were already fluttering shut. "Yeah," he said, voice muffled in the pillow. "Sleep sounds good."

Fraser crossed the room to turn out the light and then stripped down to his oversize t-shirt and boxers in the dark. As he was lying down on the floor beside the bed, he heard Ray say his name in a tiny voice.

"What is it?" he asked, leaning up on an elbow to peer at Ray in the dim light filtering in from the streetlamps outside.

"I think…" Ray managed to sound surprised and ashamed at the same time. "I think I might be afraid of the dark."

"Did you want me to turn the light back on?"

"No. I can't sleep when there's light." Contrary, even at six years old. "Just…can you come up here? So I'm not alone?"

Fraser climbed back to his feet. "Of course, Ray." He hoisted himself up onto the cot and lay down beside him, feeling the warmth of Ray's breath tickling the back of his neck.

"'Night, Frase."

"Goodnight, Ray."

In the morning, when Inspector Thatcher and Constable Turnbull arrived at the consulate to find two small children curled up together on Fraser's cot insisting they were Ray Kowalski and Benton Fraser, they were not nearly as surprised as other people may have been.

These things just tended to happen with those two around.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

j-s-cavalcante.livejournal.com

Awwww...love them so much! I love the leeway "magical realism" gives us in this fandom, too!

They're beautifully in character, even when six. :) I love Ray's "I think I might be afraid of the dark" and his solution for the problem, too.

These things just tended to happen with those two around.

Hee! You can say that again!

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School Challenge by lordess renegade

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