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ajremixTitle from A View to a Kill by Duran Duran. Descriptions inspired by my own drives through Kansas and to the summit of Mt. Evans.
Title: The Whole Earth Opening Wide
Fandom: DC TV
Rating: G
Word Count: 2314
In Responds to: ColdWave Weekend 2018: Fun in the Sun
Characters: Len, Mick
Summary: After the death of Len's grandfather, Mick takes them on an impromptu roadtrip.
Len's grandfather died a couple months before he turned seventeen. It was from some complication or other brought on by the inability to afford proper medication. Mick didn't really know, too busy trying to keep Len from slipping into panic attacks as the last buffer between Lewis and his children finally slipped away.
Not that Mick was in a much better mental space given it had been less than a year since he killed his own family.
But Len scrimped and saved and ran risk after risk, trying to get enough money to send Lisa to two different camps that would keep her away from Lewis through almost the entirety of the summer and Mick helped out to the best of his ability. He went with Len to drop Lisa off for her first camp, three weeks of figure skating training with the second starting two weeks after that. Lisa hugged Len tight, obviously afraid of leaving him with their father for so long by himself. Mick wasn't insulted by it; he couldn't intervene the way their grandfather had and Len wanted Mick to stay away from Lewis as much as possible. Probably because he knew Mick had no qualms killing the man if he ever had the chance.
But Lisa was bundled away onto a bus with all the other hopeful skaters and Len watched it disappear forlornly down the street. Then Mick swung a duffel bag into Len's midsection, jolting him out of his sulk. "C'mon," he said. "Let's go."
Len took the bag by reflex. "Where?"
"Hell if I know."
Westward was basically the extent of Mick's planning. He drove them out of Central, through Keystone and just kept going. The sun was bright and sky speckled with clouds and it was still early enough that the wind was still cool so they drove with the windows down. They stopped at a fast food place off the side of the highway for lunch, stretching their legs out for a bit, then drove off again. Len stayed silent almost the entire time, barely responding to Mick's words and just staring aimlessly out the window. Mick tried filling the silence with the radio but all he could get with any consistency was country music and talk stations. Having had to grow up listening to both, he had no interest in doing so ever again.
The highway was straight and flat and in the afternoon with no shade, the air heated up quickly around them. Mick turned on the air conditioning- his father had always been stingy with it given how much gas it used, but he wasn't driving anymore. Mick called those kinds of shots now. He'd never driven out this far before and it was kind of difficult not letting his attention wander. There was nothing to look at but farmland after farmland, the occasional speeding vehicle and billboards advertising either food or salvation. By the time they stopped for gas, Mick felt like screaming. It felt like this hellhole was doing its best to keep him from leaving, just making him drive one monotonous mile after another until he was half convinced they'd already driven that same stretch of land before.
As Mick dug cash out of one of the wallets Len had pocketed during their lunch stop, Len asked, "Do you want me to drive for a while?" Len hated driving. He was also a shitty driver but he couldn't stand driving and Mick couldn't imagine what he looked like to have Len offering.
"Nah. Just get me a bunch of candy for the road. I'll need the pick-me-up."
Mick paid for gas, two bags of chips and a huge slushie. Len was already inside the car while Mick filled up. After they'd driven a few miles away from the gas station, Len started pulling out handfuls of candy packages. He opened up a bag of Skittles and passed it over to Mick. Then he opened up the glove compartment, pulling case after case of cassette tapes from his pockets and stuffing them inside. Wordlessly he picked one from the stash and pushed it into the tape deck. After a couple seconds, synthpop filled the car and Mick eventually recognized it as Duran Duran's Rio.
"Are you fucking kidding me with this crap!"
Len didn't say anything but Mick could see his smile in the reflection of the window.
~*~*~*~
It was a weird thing to say, but the Rocky Mountains had been a bit of a surprise. Mick had seen the sign that said they'd gone into Colorado but overall it wasn't that much different from Kansas. It was the same empty horizon with farms and billboards and a whole lot of nothing for hours. He hadn't even noticed the mountains at first, they were so far away they were just irregular smears in the distance, barely indistinguishable from the rest of the sky and could disappear any time the road curved. Then it was like the moment he started seeing signs for Denver, the mountains just appeared. Still distant and still faded blue but dark enough that the jagged line they made was obvious.
Mick reached over, shaking Len's shoulder as he dozed in the passenger seat. Len woke up with a start, hands coming up, ready to fight someone off. "What?" He asked groggily. "What is it?"
Mick just pointed out the windshield. "Mountains."
Len peered forward, waiting for Mick to drive under an overpass that was obstructing the view. "Yes," he said at length. "Those are mountains. Your geographical knowledge is astounding."
Mick snorted but magnanimously didn't point out the fact that Len wasn't settling back to sleep again. He knew Len was oddly excited about them. After all he, like Mick, had never seen mountains in person before.
They stopped again to fill the gas and their bellies and Mick picked up a map and directions from the clerk while he was at it. When he rejoined Len- with more snacks and drinks because why not -Len asked snidely, "Are you planning on going into the mountains?"
"Sure," Mick said easily, dumping everything in Len's lap so he could buckle himself in. "Why not?"
Len scowled and tossed everything into the back. Except for the map. "It's a big rock, Mick. What's the point?"
"Because we're going passed 'em anyway."
Len raised an eyebrow. "We are, are we?"
"What, you wanna head back already?" When Len didn't say anything, Mick turned the ignition. "Yeah, didn't think so."
Len narrowed his eyes at Mick. With great flair, like an act of defiance, Len pushed a new tape into the player. Mick caught sight of the case, just long enough to recognize it as one of Lisa's favorites: Cyndi Lauper.
"Mother fucker!"
Len chuckled maliciously but graciously opened the map while he was at it.
~*~*~*~
The closer they got to the mountains the less Len was able to pretend he didn't care. His eyes grew wider the higher they loomed and with every crest they made, there was another line right after. It took Mick a while to realize that, for as big as those first line of ranges were, they were only foothills. Rolling greens with deep crags of rocks and thick with trees, they were nothing compared to the actual mountains. They passed through a tunnel and suddenly the land was high enough to block out the sun. Len had to crane his neck out the window in order to see the tops.
Mick drove carefully, somewhat unnerved by how closely the narrow, winding road hugged the mountain walls, especially having only ever driven either packed city streets or the wide open countryside. It looked like Len could lean out and touch it with his fingertips in places. He drove so cautiously, in fact, that Mick even pulled off a couple times in order to let other cars pass him. The way they sped by made him swallow hard. And he thought Len could get reckless. Not to mention, as much as Mick claimed to have grown up in the middle of bumfuck nowhere, but a town with only a two lane highway passing through and impossibly high mountains all around seemed incredibly isolating.
But still he drove if not just because now Len was no longing hiding his excitement. He kept marveling at the rocks, at the river they drove alongside, at the sheer number of trees around them. Then they started on the switchbacks, going higher and higher until the trees started to thin out and once the road broke out of the treeline and they could see the land falling away, Mick pulled over at the first available place.
They got out and just... stood there, staring at everything below them. The mountains and hills rolled away, fading into the distance and Mick hadn't even noticed how many ranges they'd driven through. "Holy shit," he said quietly. "I can't believe we didn't snag a camera."
Len grabbed Mick's arm, a bright grin spreading over his face. "C'mon. Let's see how it looks from the top."
They drove on, high enough they started passing patches of snow that still lingered despite the pre-summer heat that had them sweating all through Kansas and the eastern part of Colorado. They stopped again when they reached a huge lake near the summit. The water was so clear and blue they could see the rocks along the bottom. Out of curiosity, Mick went up to the edge and stuck his hand in for a split second before jerking it back. That shit was freezing! He knew it would be, of course, given the snow and how chilly it was so high up and the fact they drove through a fucking cloud on the way up, but it still took him by surprise. Len was pretending he wasn't laughing at Mick but Mick glared at him anyway.
They continued, the road almost entirely switchbacks from that point on, barely any vegetation at all, just rocks and sparse patches of grass. Len slapped Mick's arm so hard Mick nearly drove them off the road. Mick was too surprised to be angry, however, when he realized Len was point at a couple of mountain goats that were just chilling a few dozen feet from the road. There was a parking area near the top where the ruins of a building that had burnt down a few years prior and, further beyond that an observatory sat. The actual summit was a short hike up a fairly impressive pile of rocks. They still had to stop for a breather a couple times, though, as altitude sickness got to them. But Len was determined to reach the top and wherever Len went, Mick followed.
When they finally reached the top- a few other tourists giving them words of support as they passed -Mick crawled up to the top of the rocks and flopped on his back, trying to stave off the dizziness. Len was also breathing hard, but he was sitting up and taking in the view.
"Goddamn," Mick said faintly, "mountains suck. Why is breathing so hard?"
Len just hummed, eyes never moving from the horizon. After a while, Mick sat up. The view was spectacular, the land undulating until it faded to blue, blending in with the sky yet again. After a long stretch of silence, Len said, "Do you think that's Kansas?"
"What?"
"Over there." He pointed out to the horizon. Mick assumed he was pointing east. "Do you think that's Kansas? Or still Colorado?"
Mick leaned forward slightly, squinting his eyes as if he could see some delineation of a border when he couldn't even tell if he was looking at flat land or more mountains. "I dunno. Why?"
"I just... never realized how big the world is, I guess." Mick could see that. Until the impromptu roadtrip, Len hadn't even been to Kansas. "Less than thirteen hours and already there's an entire state and a half between us."
"We could keep going." Len visibly hesitated so Mick continued, trying to keep his voice both neutral and coaxing. "Still got nearly three weeks until Lisa's back from camp. We could head back to that little town and get a room for then night, then keep going west in the morning. Spend a week traveling the California coast. We'd still make it back before she does."
Len looked down, twisting his fingers together. "My dad will be pissed when I get back."
"He's gonna be pissed no matter what you do."
Len took a deep breath, pulling his lower lip between his teeth and worrying at it. Mick just put a hand to Len's back, thumb rubbing circles at the base of his neck. "Just a thought," Mick said, "we don't gotta do it."
They sat there, long enough for their shadows to spill out down the mountain side, the valley below them getting darker and darker. Just as Mick was about to suggest getting a move on before the sun got much lower, Len said, "Okay."
"Huh?"
He turned to Mick, smile a little wavery but determined like he was trying not to talk himself out of it. "Let's see what's on the other side of the mountains."
Mick grinned, heart pounding in his chest for reasons he didn't understand. Daringly he pulled Len into a tight, one-armed hug. "Sure thing, Boss." They went to the car, Len still tucked up against Mick's side.
Their adventure was slightly waylaid when the mountain goats decided to stand in the middle of the road as they were leaving the summit but eventually Len managed to startle it off by cranking up a Motorhead tape. When they were able to start driving again, Mick socked him in the arm for hiding that up until now. Len just laughed, bright and happy.
Title: The Whole Earth Opening Wide
Fandom: DC TV
Rating: G
Word Count: 2314
In Responds to: ColdWave Weekend 2018: Fun in the Sun
Characters: Len, Mick
Summary: After the death of Len's grandfather, Mick takes them on an impromptu roadtrip.
Len's grandfather died a couple months before he turned seventeen. It was from some complication or other brought on by the inability to afford proper medication. Mick didn't really know, too busy trying to keep Len from slipping into panic attacks as the last buffer between Lewis and his children finally slipped away.
Not that Mick was in a much better mental space given it had been less than a year since he killed his own family.
But Len scrimped and saved and ran risk after risk, trying to get enough money to send Lisa to two different camps that would keep her away from Lewis through almost the entirety of the summer and Mick helped out to the best of his ability. He went with Len to drop Lisa off for her first camp, three weeks of figure skating training with the second starting two weeks after that. Lisa hugged Len tight, obviously afraid of leaving him with their father for so long by himself. Mick wasn't insulted by it; he couldn't intervene the way their grandfather had and Len wanted Mick to stay away from Lewis as much as possible. Probably because he knew Mick had no qualms killing the man if he ever had the chance.
But Lisa was bundled away onto a bus with all the other hopeful skaters and Len watched it disappear forlornly down the street. Then Mick swung a duffel bag into Len's midsection, jolting him out of his sulk. "C'mon," he said. "Let's go."
Len took the bag by reflex. "Where?"
"Hell if I know."
Westward was basically the extent of Mick's planning. He drove them out of Central, through Keystone and just kept going. The sun was bright and sky speckled with clouds and it was still early enough that the wind was still cool so they drove with the windows down. They stopped at a fast food place off the side of the highway for lunch, stretching their legs out for a bit, then drove off again. Len stayed silent almost the entire time, barely responding to Mick's words and just staring aimlessly out the window. Mick tried filling the silence with the radio but all he could get with any consistency was country music and talk stations. Having had to grow up listening to both, he had no interest in doing so ever again.
The highway was straight and flat and in the afternoon with no shade, the air heated up quickly around them. Mick turned on the air conditioning- his father had always been stingy with it given how much gas it used, but he wasn't driving anymore. Mick called those kinds of shots now. He'd never driven out this far before and it was kind of difficult not letting his attention wander. There was nothing to look at but farmland after farmland, the occasional speeding vehicle and billboards advertising either food or salvation. By the time they stopped for gas, Mick felt like screaming. It felt like this hellhole was doing its best to keep him from leaving, just making him drive one monotonous mile after another until he was half convinced they'd already driven that same stretch of land before.
As Mick dug cash out of one of the wallets Len had pocketed during their lunch stop, Len asked, "Do you want me to drive for a while?" Len hated driving. He was also a shitty driver but he couldn't stand driving and Mick couldn't imagine what he looked like to have Len offering.
"Nah. Just get me a bunch of candy for the road. I'll need the pick-me-up."
Mick paid for gas, two bags of chips and a huge slushie. Len was already inside the car while Mick filled up. After they'd driven a few miles away from the gas station, Len started pulling out handfuls of candy packages. He opened up a bag of Skittles and passed it over to Mick. Then he opened up the glove compartment, pulling case after case of cassette tapes from his pockets and stuffing them inside. Wordlessly he picked one from the stash and pushed it into the tape deck. After a couple seconds, synthpop filled the car and Mick eventually recognized it as Duran Duran's Rio.
"Are you fucking kidding me with this crap!"
Len didn't say anything but Mick could see his smile in the reflection of the window.
~*~*~*~
It was a weird thing to say, but the Rocky Mountains had been a bit of a surprise. Mick had seen the sign that said they'd gone into Colorado but overall it wasn't that much different from Kansas. It was the same empty horizon with farms and billboards and a whole lot of nothing for hours. He hadn't even noticed the mountains at first, they were so far away they were just irregular smears in the distance, barely indistinguishable from the rest of the sky and could disappear any time the road curved. Then it was like the moment he started seeing signs for Denver, the mountains just appeared. Still distant and still faded blue but dark enough that the jagged line they made was obvious.
Mick reached over, shaking Len's shoulder as he dozed in the passenger seat. Len woke up with a start, hands coming up, ready to fight someone off. "What?" He asked groggily. "What is it?"
Mick just pointed out the windshield. "Mountains."
Len peered forward, waiting for Mick to drive under an overpass that was obstructing the view. "Yes," he said at length. "Those are mountains. Your geographical knowledge is astounding."
Mick snorted but magnanimously didn't point out the fact that Len wasn't settling back to sleep again. He knew Len was oddly excited about them. After all he, like Mick, had never seen mountains in person before.
They stopped again to fill the gas and their bellies and Mick picked up a map and directions from the clerk while he was at it. When he rejoined Len- with more snacks and drinks because why not -Len asked snidely, "Are you planning on going into the mountains?"
"Sure," Mick said easily, dumping everything in Len's lap so he could buckle himself in. "Why not?"
Len scowled and tossed everything into the back. Except for the map. "It's a big rock, Mick. What's the point?"
"Because we're going passed 'em anyway."
Len raised an eyebrow. "We are, are we?"
"What, you wanna head back already?" When Len didn't say anything, Mick turned the ignition. "Yeah, didn't think so."
Len narrowed his eyes at Mick. With great flair, like an act of defiance, Len pushed a new tape into the player. Mick caught sight of the case, just long enough to recognize it as one of Lisa's favorites: Cyndi Lauper.
"Mother fucker!"
Len chuckled maliciously but graciously opened the map while he was at it.
~*~*~*~
The closer they got to the mountains the less Len was able to pretend he didn't care. His eyes grew wider the higher they loomed and with every crest they made, there was another line right after. It took Mick a while to realize that, for as big as those first line of ranges were, they were only foothills. Rolling greens with deep crags of rocks and thick with trees, they were nothing compared to the actual mountains. They passed through a tunnel and suddenly the land was high enough to block out the sun. Len had to crane his neck out the window in order to see the tops.
Mick drove carefully, somewhat unnerved by how closely the narrow, winding road hugged the mountain walls, especially having only ever driven either packed city streets or the wide open countryside. It looked like Len could lean out and touch it with his fingertips in places. He drove so cautiously, in fact, that Mick even pulled off a couple times in order to let other cars pass him. The way they sped by made him swallow hard. And he thought Len could get reckless. Not to mention, as much as Mick claimed to have grown up in the middle of bumfuck nowhere, but a town with only a two lane highway passing through and impossibly high mountains all around seemed incredibly isolating.
But still he drove if not just because now Len was no longing hiding his excitement. He kept marveling at the rocks, at the river they drove alongside, at the sheer number of trees around them. Then they started on the switchbacks, going higher and higher until the trees started to thin out and once the road broke out of the treeline and they could see the land falling away, Mick pulled over at the first available place.
They got out and just... stood there, staring at everything below them. The mountains and hills rolled away, fading into the distance and Mick hadn't even noticed how many ranges they'd driven through. "Holy shit," he said quietly. "I can't believe we didn't snag a camera."
Len grabbed Mick's arm, a bright grin spreading over his face. "C'mon. Let's see how it looks from the top."
They drove on, high enough they started passing patches of snow that still lingered despite the pre-summer heat that had them sweating all through Kansas and the eastern part of Colorado. They stopped again when they reached a huge lake near the summit. The water was so clear and blue they could see the rocks along the bottom. Out of curiosity, Mick went up to the edge and stuck his hand in for a split second before jerking it back. That shit was freezing! He knew it would be, of course, given the snow and how chilly it was so high up and the fact they drove through a fucking cloud on the way up, but it still took him by surprise. Len was pretending he wasn't laughing at Mick but Mick glared at him anyway.
They continued, the road almost entirely switchbacks from that point on, barely any vegetation at all, just rocks and sparse patches of grass. Len slapped Mick's arm so hard Mick nearly drove them off the road. Mick was too surprised to be angry, however, when he realized Len was point at a couple of mountain goats that were just chilling a few dozen feet from the road. There was a parking area near the top where the ruins of a building that had burnt down a few years prior and, further beyond that an observatory sat. The actual summit was a short hike up a fairly impressive pile of rocks. They still had to stop for a breather a couple times, though, as altitude sickness got to them. But Len was determined to reach the top and wherever Len went, Mick followed.
When they finally reached the top- a few other tourists giving them words of support as they passed -Mick crawled up to the top of the rocks and flopped on his back, trying to stave off the dizziness. Len was also breathing hard, but he was sitting up and taking in the view.
"Goddamn," Mick said faintly, "mountains suck. Why is breathing so hard?"
Len just hummed, eyes never moving from the horizon. After a while, Mick sat up. The view was spectacular, the land undulating until it faded to blue, blending in with the sky yet again. After a long stretch of silence, Len said, "Do you think that's Kansas?"
"What?"
"Over there." He pointed out to the horizon. Mick assumed he was pointing east. "Do you think that's Kansas? Or still Colorado?"
Mick leaned forward slightly, squinting his eyes as if he could see some delineation of a border when he couldn't even tell if he was looking at flat land or more mountains. "I dunno. Why?"
"I just... never realized how big the world is, I guess." Mick could see that. Until the impromptu roadtrip, Len hadn't even been to Kansas. "Less than thirteen hours and already there's an entire state and a half between us."
"We could keep going." Len visibly hesitated so Mick continued, trying to keep his voice both neutral and coaxing. "Still got nearly three weeks until Lisa's back from camp. We could head back to that little town and get a room for then night, then keep going west in the morning. Spend a week traveling the California coast. We'd still make it back before she does."
Len looked down, twisting his fingers together. "My dad will be pissed when I get back."
"He's gonna be pissed no matter what you do."
Len took a deep breath, pulling his lower lip between his teeth and worrying at it. Mick just put a hand to Len's back, thumb rubbing circles at the base of his neck. "Just a thought," Mick said, "we don't gotta do it."
They sat there, long enough for their shadows to spill out down the mountain side, the valley below them getting darker and darker. Just as Mick was about to suggest getting a move on before the sun got much lower, Len said, "Okay."
"Huh?"
He turned to Mick, smile a little wavery but determined like he was trying not to talk himself out of it. "Let's see what's on the other side of the mountains."
Mick grinned, heart pounding in his chest for reasons he didn't understand. Daringly he pulled Len into a tight, one-armed hug. "Sure thing, Boss." They went to the car, Len still tucked up against Mick's side.
Their adventure was slightly waylaid when the mountain goats decided to stand in the middle of the road as they were leaving the summit but eventually Len managed to startle it off by cranking up a Motorhead tape. When they were able to start driving again, Mick socked him in the arm for hiding that up until now. Len just laughed, bright and happy.
