Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Zari watches the sun set from forty-three stories above a completely empty city. 

Well, not empty. There are roads and buildings and sidewalks and traffic lights — all the things that make it a city, except one. 

People. 

Zari is, as far as she can tell, the sole inhabitant. 

She doesn’t know how she got here. She doesn’t know how much time has passed. 

And she doesn’t know who she is. 

Not really, anyway. She knows her name, she knows she feels like she’s a good person, and (since the luxurious apartment she’s currently in contains numerous mirrors) she knows she’s a total smokeshow. 

But that’s about it. 

At least, until she turns around and locks eyes with the first person she’s seen in, well, however long she’s been here. Then she also knows that she doesn’t feel frightened or threatened or any of the things she’d expect to feel upon seeing a strange man in what should be a private space. 

She just feels safe. Happy. The pervasive sense of terror and isolation that had been haunting her is gone, banished. 

He’s just standing in the apartment behind her, all wild blond hair and twinkling eyes, hands crammed in the pockets of his trench coat and smiling at her softly as he rocks back on his heels. 

“You’ve got a strange definition of hell, love. This place is downright posh.”

He saunters toward her and Zari allows it, balanced on her spike heels, suddenly aware of how tight her pink dress is and the cool brush of the air conditioning over her mostly-bare shoulders. 

But he stops a respectable distance away, standing beside her and staring down into the city through the solid glass wall. The sun just dipped below the horizon, the first of the streetlights and neon bar signs beginning to switch on. 

He watches the streets; Zari watches him. His profile is striking — strong jaw covered in stubble, heavy brow bone, straight nose — with light creases and faint crinkles in his skin that only serve to make it all more interesting. 

“I was expecting to be battling off hordes of demons when I landed here.” He looks over at her with one raised eyebrow. “But there aren’t hordes of anything now are there?”

“Just you.” She peers at him more closely. “And who are you?”

“Ahh, and there it is,” he mutters, his eyes squeezing shut; she hadn’t realized he’d still been smiling until it falls off his face. “So it’s to be a psychological hell for you, then, eh?”

Zari has a feeling she wouldn’t understand even if she had her memories. “What are you talking about?”

“I’m afraid you got a bit whammied, love — by a fides demon that was gunning for me but with shite aim, so it hit you instead.” He rubs a thumb at his bottom lip, and she doesn’t know how she knows that it’s one of his nervous habits, but she does. It’s disconcerting — both foreign and familiar at the same time, like she’s been split into two people… which is weirdly also a familiar feeling. “The curse left you in a coma where you’ll, and I quote, ‘experience a hell of your own making until you listen to the truth within your heart,’ whatever that bloody means.”

Zari, despite all her instincts telling her that she’s safe and that he’s okay, has been slowly backing away from this strange man since the moment he said demon. 

“Great,” she mutters, taking another careful step behind her, ankle wobbling a bit on her tall heels. “Of course it’s my luck that the only man on earth is insane.”

He grins. “That I might be, but I’m also telling you the truth.” He waves a hand at the modern, monochrome apartment around them and the empty streets below. “How else do you explain where we are?”

“I don’t know — but I also don’t have a reason to believe you.” Zari licks her lips and flicks her long hair over one shoulder, trying to hold onto her composure. “Maybe if I had any clue who I am, I’d have an answer.”

“Wait, you don’t know who you are either? Bollocks.” He scrubs his hand through his hair; it’s impossible to mess it up more than it was before, so now it’s just messy in a slightly different way. “I suppose that makes sense, though, your subconscious struggling with your identity.”

Zari tilts her head at him. “Oh, does it now? And I suppose you think you know who I am?”

“Bloody right I do. You’re—“ he stops himself short, grinning humorlessly and shaking his head. “You’re somebody who’s going to have to figure that out for themselves if we’re ever to get out of here.”

Zari frowns, desperately wanting to know whatever he’d stopped himself from saying — but too proud to ever admit it. “I think I liked it better when I was alone.”

“Yeah, well, I wasn’t exactly trying to get myself stuck in your brain either, sweetheart, but we are where we are.”

Zari watches him with narrowed eyes. He hasn’t tried to close the distance between them, and nothing about his posture is threatening. And there’s still that pervasive sense of comfort, that she knows him, that she’s safe. 

Even without reason to, she relaxes a fraction. 

“So,” she asks, “who are you and how did you end up here?”

“Name’s John Constantine,” he says, producing a business card from his pocket. 

“‘Master of the Dark Arts’?” Zari reads, raising her eyebrows. 

“I meant to change that to petty dabbler — which is really all I should be allowed to claim after buggering this one up.” He huffs, rolling his eyes as he scratches at his neck. “I did a spell, after the demon hit you, trying to send your brother into your consciousness to help you out; for some infernal reason, the magic took me instead.” 

“I have a brother.” 

Zari lets the word linger on her tongue, feeling the shape of it in her mouth. It feels right. She feels like someone’s sister, someone who loves her very much. 

It’s like the smallest point of light in a pitch black sky. Something to follow, something to show the way. 

The man in front of her... well, she hasn’t decided if he’s another light or just more darkness. 

He pulls a pack of cigarettes from his pocket and places one between his lips—

And she yanks it away before he can flick his lighter open. 

“Oi! Come now, love, this place isn’t even real — which makes it practically the only place I can smoke anymore.” He leans in closer, raising an eyebrow. “It’s not like anything here can hurt me.”

“It hurts me,” Zari says, holding the cigarette at arm’s length and wrinkling her nose. “I like this apartment and I don’t want you stinking it up.”

“Right then,” he says, snatching the cigarette back before spinning on his heel and stalking to the open elevator, his trench coat flapping around his knees with every stride. “When you figure out what you do want, I’ll be down on the street catching up with an old friend.”

He steps into the elevator and leans against the back wall, arms crossed, dark eyes watching her until the doors shut between them.

Zari makes him wait twelve minutes. 

Twelve minutes while she paces the length of the apartment, heels clicking on the marble floors, cheeks flushing with anger and exercise and something else, something she isn’t willing to name just yet.

And then she walks out the front door expecting to find John equally worked up — angry at being exiled to the street, at how long she made him wait, at something, at everything.

But he just inclines his head at her in greeting, tossing the second of his cigarette butts to the ground and crushing it beneath his leather shoe. 

Zari finds it infinitely frustrating, for some reason. She'd been itching for a fight, for something to release this feeling beneath her skin, like a thousand bees buzzing between her ribs.

Instead, she can do nothing except stare at him, folding her arms across her chest to try to contain the emotion trapped there. “Well, where do you think we should go now?”

“That’s really up to you," John answers easily, "since the whole world is literally yours.” He grins and gestures down the street with his chin. “But there’s a pub right there on the corner and I could use a drink or twelve, and maybe some supper.”

Zari glances in the direction he’d indicated; she still wants to argue (she's beginning to think that it’s her first impulse to fight with him about everything) — but she is a little hungry, and at least she won’t have to go far in these sky-high heels. 

She rolls her eyes. “Fine.”

Zari had given no thought to the weather before leaving the apartment. There are coats in the closet, she'd seen them when she’d checked everything out when she’d first arrived, but she hadn’t grabbed one.

Turns out, she didn’t really need to — it’s exactly the same as it was indoors, as if the whole world is temperature controlled. (Which lends a little credence to John’s whole “everything is fake” story; a story she’s stunned to find herself starting to actually believe.)

So, despite her dress having only two thin shoulder straps and stopping above her knees, she’s perfectly comfortable.

But when John shrugs off his coat and drapes it around her shoulders, she gladly takes it. It’s still warm from his skin and smells like smoke and aftershave and something peculiar and yet so familiar, some amalgamation of magic and herbs and skin that’s she knows is perfectly, indisputably, and uniquely John. 

She tries to be discreet but she can’t help turning her head a little into the upturned collar, breathing him in.

They saunter down the empty street, John holding out an elbow for her to thread her hand through.

“Such a gentleman,” she says lightly. The heat of his skin radiates through his shirtsleeves and into her fingertips; he's all compact strength and barely contained power, smoke rising from a sleeping volcano.

But then he laughs, and she can feel the soft rumble of it against her arm. “That just proves you don’t remember me.”

“Well, then,” Zari asks, stopping in front of the pub and staring into his dark eyes, “if you’re not a gentleman, what would you call yourself?”

“Most often?” John pulls the door open and gestures for her to step inside. “A right nasty piece of work.”

As she passes, she feels the ghost of his fingertips against the small of her back for the tiniest fraction of a second, as if the touch was an instinctive habit that he’d forgotten to break. 

She finds that she doesn’t mind it.

Not at all. 

“So, we know each other,” she says, once they’re settled in side-by-side on tall barstools, Zari's heels hooked over the crossbar. In front of them is a long, scarred wooden bar; John’s poured himself a generous tumbler of whiskey, the bottle left conveniently within reach. “Out there, in the so-called real world.”

He takes a sip of his drink, watching her over the glass rim. When he swallows, she can’t help the way her eyes dart to the sharp bob of his Adam’s apple. 

“Aye,” he says, voice a smoky rumble that seems to be carrying more weight than the words require, “that we do.”

Zari traces one manicured finger around the perimeter of a knothole in the bar. “Are we…friends?”

“I think it’d be for the best if we kept our focus on the here and now, yeah? Must be a reason you don’t have your memories — if we go cheating the rules of the game, we might not ever make it back.”

She keeps her head tilted down but looks up at him through her lashes, eyes big and soft.

“Will you at least tell me who I am?”

John smirks, tossing back the rest of his drink. “I’m afraid your effortless charms won’t work on me when your life is at stake, love.” 

Zari frowns and slumps, propping her elbow on the bar and her chin in her hand. “Great,” she sighs. “You know, it’s entirely possible that you’re the least helpful person in existence.” 

She reaches for the whiskey bottle, hoping to find help there instead.

“Ah, no,” John says, stopping her. “You don’t want to do that.” 

His hand rests on the back of hers, trapping it on the bar between them; Zari thinks about moving away, but doesn’t. His fingertips are calloused and feel a degree or two too warm, like he’s got fire burning just beneath the skin and ready to blaze into life. 

“And why don’t I?” 

Maybe her voice is a little higher, a little breathier than normal. Maybe John won’t notice.

(Except Zari is certain that John notices everything about her.)

He’s watching her eyes, his own dark and fathomless; he makes no move to pull his hand away from hers. “Because you don’t drink.”

She shifts back on the stool, dropping her hands to her lap; he leans across the bar to grab a clean glass and the soda gun, making a sparkling water for her. She can't tear her eyes away from the way his white shirt stretches across the hard line of his shoulders. 

“I thought you weren’t going to tell me anything about my life.”

“It’s against your beliefs.” He sets the glass in front of her with a tiny, soft smile. “I’m willing to break the rules a little to keep you from doing something you’ll regret.”

Zari looks him up and down; she finds herself wondering if that applies to keeping her from doing him, too. 

“So if you’re some super powerful wizard—“ John flinches at the term but she just flaps a hand at him and carries on, “or whatever, why don’t you just do a little magic spell and get us out of here?”

“My magic brought me here, sweetheart, but we’re under the demon’s curse now. You’ve got the trick that’s going to get us back home.”

“Well, then there’s a problem,” Zari says. “I don’t have any idea what I’m supposed to learn about myself, and I definitely don’t have any magic.”

He runs one finger feather-light along the back of her wrist; Zari would swear literal sparks followed behind it. 

“Come now, love, of course you do. Everyone’s got access to a little magic. Like when you meet someone for the first time and you just click, that instant chemistry — that’s magic. Or when a traffic light changes just when you need it to, when you walk down a street you’ve never been on before but get hit with a wave of deja vu—“

“—When I get a CatChat notification and know exactly who it is before even checking?”

He narrows his eyes. “You don’t remember me, you don’t remember anything about your life beyond your own name, but you remember CatChat.” He laughs, rolling his eyes to the ceiling. “Of course. You and that bloody phone.” 

Zari just shrugs, utterly unapologetic. 

“But yeah, sure,” John says, waving his hand around, the lit cigarette between his fingers dropping flecks of ash on the bar. “That kind of stuff, that seemingly insignificant, everyday magic. Personal magic.”

“So my small magic is going to get us home?”

He stares into her eyes as he takes a drag, the cigarette tip flaring; he’s careful to blow the smoke away from her before answering. 

“I didn’t say it was small. I said it was yours.”

She stares at him but he doesn’t blink.

“Anyone ever tell you you’re frustratingly cryptic at times?”

“It’s one of the nicer things people say about me, love,” he answers with a wink. 

“I thought you were going to make us dinner,” Zari says half an hour later, surrounded by utter chaos.

John is standing in the middle of the pub’s industrial kitchen with his sleeves rolled up to his elbows; one hand is literally on fire, the other stabbing haphazardly at a half-raw half-charred chicken breast.

“What does it look like I’m trying to do?!” 

Zari moves farther away from him in a futile attempt to keep her hair from reeking like smoke. “You look like you’re committing a literal crime.”

The fire blazes a little higher; overhead, the smoke detector begins screeching. And then half a second later the sprinklers go off, water pouring down around them both.

Zari shrieks, hands going to her hair and then her face, imagining her mascara running in black rivers over her cheeks, but there’s nothing to be done about it now. They’re both soaked already. 

John’s hair is plastered against his forehead, his wet shirt practically translucent where it sticks to his chest and shoulders. He’s laughing and tilting his head back, letting the water hit his tongue. 

(Zari wants to know exactly how that would taste, the combination of the water and his lips and his laughter.) 

“Sorry about that,” he chuckles, before flipping his palms up and reciting some Latin; the siren and sprinklers stop, and then everything is dry and clean and exactly as it was before.

Zari examines the smooth ends of her hair with approval. “Neat trick.”

“This one’s better,” he says, waving his hands over the two empty plates on the counter and mumbling until they’re filled with steaming, beautiful mounds of pasta.

“If you can do that, why did you even attempt cooking at all?”

John shrugs. “Gotta get our kicks where we can find ‘em in this infinitely boring world you’ve concocted, don’t we now?”

“Gee, I’m so sorry my existential crisis isn’t entertaining enough for you,” Zari glowers. 

“It’s not that,” he says, handing her a fork and sliding one of the plates in her direction. “I just want you to focus on finding whatever sodding truth is in your heart so we can get back to our real lives.”

Zari waves toward the kitchen door, indicating the empty pub, the empty street in front of it, the empty world. 

“And what would you suggest I do, huh? There’s literally nothing here. How am I supposed to find my truth in nothing?”

She’s frustrated and confused and certain that she’s wasting precious time, but without any clue where to begin. 

And some of that must make it through her carefully constructed facade because John is stepping into her personal space, running one hand soothingly over her upper arm. She’s so focused on the feel of his skin on hers that she almost doesn’t notice his other hand setting a cigarette between his lips; it bobs up and down as he speaks. 

“I dunno,” he says, with a soft sigh. “I’m just a passenger here, love; you’ve got to be the captain of this particular ship. The world is quite literally yours. Think of something, anything — you can have whatever you want.”

She’s staring at the shapes John’s mouth takes as it forms the words. The way it purses around the word want. The way his accent elevates the vowel, the way the rumble of his voice curls through her, the way his body heat radiates to her bare arms and shoulders and seems to slide straight down to her core. 

She knows exactly what she wants. 

So she pulls the unlit cigarette from between his lips and leans in, pressing her mouth to his, and takes it. 

And, true to his word, John lets her. More than that, his mouth opens eagerly, drawing her lower lip between his, tongue caressing it as his hands rest on the curve of her waist. She slides her fingers from his jaw to tangle in his hair, pulling him impossibly closer, opening her mouth, pressing her body against his. 

A few seconds later she pulls back just far enough to whisper, “Is that something we do? Out there in the real world?”

His fingertips trail across her cheek, his eyes never leaving her mouth. “Telling you that would be against the rules, now wouldn’t it, love?” He sounds a little breathless, his head tipping forward until his forehead rests against hers. 

“Well,” she says, toying with his loose tie, watching the way it makes the corner of his mouth turn up, “is it something that we can do in here?”

In answer, John surges forward, claiming her mouth with his own. Zari moans against his tongue and his hand is sliding up her ribs until his thumb brushes ever so softly against the sensitive underside of her breast; even through her dress and bra the touch makes her gasp. She feels John smirk against her mouth and almost pulls away, wondering if it’s judgment or mockery—

But then he’s spinning them and lifting her until she’s seated on the stainless steel counter, her dress hiking up nearly to her waist, John’s hips fitted neatly in the space between her spread thighs. 

And god but the man is thorough. Zari doesn’t remember being kissed before, true, but she can’t imagine that it’s usually like this, where she’s sure that the rest of the world has melted away and John seems focused solely on her, on the way their lips and tongues fit together and where his hands touch her skin, making sure that every single thing is designed to feel good and pleasurable, to make her feel special. 

She can’t help but lose herself in the slide of his tongue against hers, in his fingertips on her thighs, pushing her dress even higher, his thumbs teasing at the edge of her panties. She doesn’t mean to moan and shift closer to the edge of the counter, to give him better access, but she’s operating on sheer instinct now — and all that wants is more. 

John’s stubble brushes against her tender neck as he kisses his way across the pounding pulse there, scraping his teeth gently over her collarbone as his hand slips beneath her thong, one finger running the length of her damp center before slipping between the folds and brushing softly over her clit. 

Her hips buck into his hand as her head falls back, hair cascading down her spine, deep breaths making her chest strain against her tight dress, rising up against him. He mouths at the exposed top of her breast, the tips of his blond hair brushing her chin as his hand slides against her once more, fingers full of magic and dexterity and heat and electricity.

And then he drops to his knees. 

The floor looks cold and hard and she wonders what he’s doing for half a second before he’s hooking her knees over his shoulders and pressing his face between her legs—

—and she stops wondering about anything at all. 

He does some small bit of magic that makes her thong disappear entirely; she feels his breath blowing across her hot, wet, sensitive skin before the tip of his tongue follows the same long line as his finger, flicking when he reaches her clit at the top. 

There’s nothing hesitant or shy; this is a man who knows what he wants and knows exactly how to get it. Zari is so turned on and so safe, knowing she can just lie back and enjoy the ride, that John won’t stop until she’s satisfied, until her vision goes white with pleasure as she’s screaming his name. 

Zari digs a heel into his back and sinks her teeth into her bottom lip; he moans against her, the vibrations singing through her nerves — he’s clearly enjoying this almost as much as she is.

So Zari leans back, her elbows shaking as she stares up at the ceiling, the overhead lights burning stars into her retinas but she doesn’t care, she doesn’t want to close her eyes or miss a single second of this, of John’s tongue moving inside her, teasing and stroking and then flattening and pressing hard exactly where she wants it. One of his wickedly talented fingers slides inside and curls just right; it’s as if he’s done this before, as if he knows what she likes, what her body responds to, what will bow her spine and curl her toes and have her gasping, sweating, trembling, on the edge of the precipice and ready to leap—

He sucks her clit hard at the same time as he pumps two fingers inside her and that’s it. Zari is coming hard, trembling thighs clamping around his ears, joy and fire and magic rushing through her blood and brain and belly. 

John doesn’t let up until it’s too much, until she’s tugging at his hair and whimpering, until her nerves are so overloaded with pleasure and touch and heat that she can’t bear a single more second; then his hands slide soothingly up to her hips as he presses a tender kiss on her inner thigh. 

She can feel the curve of his smile against her skin, the warm brush of his exhale. Reaching forward, she cups his cheek and he turns into it, placing another kiss at the base of her thumb.

He might not have wanted to tell her anything about her life back in the real world, but the expression on his face and tenderness in his touch have betrayed him.

Whatever they are to each other, it goes a hell of a lot further than friends. 

He climbs off of his knees and avoids her eyes, summoning her underwear back from whatever dimension he’d banished them. She can see him trying to pull the cloak of his cocky swagger back around him, but now she can also see how tattered and worn it is, how much of the real man beneath it leaks through.

But if he wants to keep up the pretense, she’ll let him. 

For now, anyway.

Zari turns his face to her, swiping at his glistening lip with her thumb. 

“See?” She teases with a smile. “This world doesn’t have to be boring at all.”

Chapter Text

They’re finally finished with dinner (which took an absurdly long time given how much of it was spent bickering and bantering and kissing once or twenty times more), and Zari might not drink but she’s certain that this is what it feels like to be drunk — to feel champagne bubbles zipping through her bloodstream as the world grows fuzzy at the edges, everything light and airy except the electric weight of John’s arm slung across her shoulder. His rolled sleeves let his warm forearm rest on her bare skin, the metal band of his watch a contrasting point of cold, everything sparking and sizzling and real.

She’s so alive it nearly burns.

They stumble out into the street, his grip tightening a little to help steady her on her heels. 

“Should we take a car?” John asks. “Maybe go for a drive around the city, see if anything calls out to you — maybe your heart could use a little nudge to find the answer it needs?”

Oh. Right.

Zari had almost forgotten that she’s supposed to be learning some mysterious truth about herself, that the pavement beneath her feet isn’t real no matter how solid it feels, that there’s a whole world for her to get back to.

She’s surprised to find that she’s really not in any hurry.

“One small problem,” she says, gesturing to the row of sleek, shining cars parked at the curb. “None of them belong to us.” 

He scoffs and steps to the nearest one, popping the door open and lounging against it with a smile, all languid confidence. 

“Thought you’d figured out by now that the usual rules don’t apply to me, love.”

She stares at him for a moment, the way the light from the streetlamp plays across his features, the orange flare from the tip of his cigarette when he inhales, the smoke curling across his face and softening its sharp lines. 

He seems mysterious and dangerous and familiar and safe all at once, an enigma wrapped in a trench coat. 

Even if this fake world wasn’t empty, even if it was filled with wonders and riddles and adventures and excitement, he’d still be its most intriguing possibility. 

So she lets her fingers trail across his waist as she brushes past him, delighting at the way his breath catches ever so slightly with the contact, before climbing gracefully inside the car.  

It’s something dark and gleaming, no make or model that she recognizes. She thinks it might not actually exist, not out there in the real world, but its glossy leather and new car smell feel perfectly real to her. John settles in behind the wheel and with a snap of his fingers the engine roars to life; he holds his palm over the gear shift, muttering a few words she can’t make out, and then they’re gliding forward. 

“Where to, love?”

Zari shrugs, not feeling an inclination in any particular direction — except toward him. 

“Around.”

So he spells the car to drive aimlessly, touring them through the empty city streets before looping onto the highway leading out into the suburbs. The stars shine brightly overhead, illuminating trees that stand perfectly still in the motionless air. There’s not a scrap of litter or any weeds pushing their way through cracks in the sidewalk, no passing cars or barking dogs or planes droning overhead. The world seems to stretch on infinitely in every direction, but they remain the only two living creatures in it. 

And, despite somehow knowing that it’s completely contrary to her regular life, Zari finds herself enjoying that right now. Anything else would just be a distraction from this, from them, from the only thing she wants right now. 

John told her she’s in a coma; she feels like she’s on vacation.

She looks over at him, at the stubble on his cheeks and curve of his lip, the long line of his throat and that ridiculous loose tie, the way the cuffs of his rolled shirt strain against the taut muscles of his forearms, the tendons and veins visible beneath the skin of his skilled hands. Hands that bend the world itself to his will, that bring her pleasure like nothing else she’s ever felt.  

Hands she wants to feel on her skin again.

Right now. 

“You’re not actually having to control the car are you?” Zari asks. 

He flicks his gaze to her with a knowing smile, moonlight glinting off his teeth when he answers. 

“Not in the slightest.”

“Good.” 

And then she’s climbing into his lap and pulling the lever to lower his seat back until he’s lying down; John just smirks up at her, folding his hands behind his head. 

He’s a cocky little shit but it just spurs her on more, straddling his thighs and kissing him sloppily as she fumbles, trying to unbuckle his belt — but it’s too hard to get to from her current position. So she settles for rucking his shirt up and scratching her nails through the coarse hair leading down from his navel, his hips bucking up into the touch. 

She can feel how hard he is beneath her, how hard he’s probably been since the restaurant, and she wonders why he didn’t make a move, didn’t try to get something for himself out of this — but then she sees the wonder and sheer adoration shining in his dark eyes. And suddenly she knows, in some part of her that has nothing to do with her missing memories and everything to do with instinct and intuition and inherent truth, that when he said she could have anything she dreamed of he’d absolutely meant it. 

He’s here for her, in whatever way she wants him; nothing less and nothing more. 

The idea alone makes her moan. 

She twists her arms behind her back, wrestling with the zipper of her dress just long enough for him to get the idea of what she wants and then it’s magically gone. She’s straddling him in her matching lacy midnight blue bra and thong; John’s gaze is hungry but respectful, reverent almost. And despite how much her body throbs and aches to feel him inside her, she has to pause, kissing him slow and deep. 

His fingers tangle in her long hair and he hums softly beneath her mouth and she doesn’t know what she’s feeling but it’s huge and warm and threatening to crash over her, swallowing her whole — but she’s okay with it. More than okay. She welcomes it; she opens her arms and closes her eyes and would willingly drown—

—but then John’s fingers are teasing at the edge of her bra and her hips are rocking over his still-somehow-trouser-clad hips and she doesn’t have space to feel anything else. 

“May I?” His voice is low and rough with one hand stilled on the clasp of her bra.

And she’s nodding and gasping, “Yes, of course,” and with a flick of his fingers it’s gone — but that wasn’t magic at all, just skill. The same skill that has his mouth at her nipple, tongue circling and lips sucking and teeth grazing and she’s fumbling at his pants but can’t get to the zipper without moving and she’s definitely not moving. 

“Off, everything, I want it all off,” she demands and John barely lifts his face from her chest, their clothes disappearing in the second it takes him to switch nipples. She clutches the back of his head with one hand and reaches the other between them, finally, finally able to touch him. 

They both groan as she wraps her hand around the hot hard length of him and strokes, rubbing her palm across the tip to gather the bit of wetness there before pumping her hand a few times. 

“Condom?” She’s dizzy with want but she pauses, asking breathlessly.

“We can use one if you want to, but this place isn’t real,” he says, finally lifting his face from her flushed chest to meet her eyes. “Won’t be any consequences whether we’ve got one or not.”

“Good,” she says simply, the only warning she gives him before moving into position and sliding down onto him in one smooth motion. 

His fingers grip her hips and he slams his head back against the headrest, mouth falling open in a soft o-shape; Zari holds perfectly still, adjusting to the feel of him inside, the perfect stretch filling her, and trying to memorize this look on his face, his awe and pleasure. 

John wraps one arm around her waist, fingers trailing over the knobs of her spine; the other hand reaches up to softly stroke her jaw. 

“You’re breathtaking, Zari.”

She feels like she could come just from the way he says her name, the way it curls and slides across his tongue, the lyrical and mystical and spiritual sound of it in his mouth.

The city lights continue to whip by outside the windows as Zari begins to move, rocking her hips against John’s as he lifts and falls in rhythm beneath her. His hands move to her breasts, thumbs sweeping over her nipples, sending shivers across her skin. 

And Zari can feel the urge to rush, to quicken her pace and race to the finish line — but everything feels so good and right, the streetlights and storefronts and neon signs blurring as they drive past, the rough rumble of the car’s engine in her ears and the smooth leather seat under her knees. John is warm and steady beneath her, his palms sliding down her ribs and waist to rest easy on the the curve of her hips, clearly just as content as she is to enjoy the ride.

She tips her head back and he sits up enough to drag his mouth across her throat, the flash of a passing green light shining on his skin. He looks beautiful and rapturous and just this side of wrecked, like it’s taking all the strength in his body to hold himself together, to stay here with her instead of flying apart. 

Her fingers are digging into his shoulders, leaving white stripes against his flushed skin; her thighs begin to shake as she quickens the pace. 

John lies back and pulls her down with him with a hand on the back of her neck, kissing her deep and thorough as his right hand slips between them, rubbing small quick circles over her clit in time with her thrusts. Her heavy breasts are pressed against his chest and the car speeds up and they’re racing, practically flying, and John is inside her and all around her and it’s too much and not nearly enough; she wants more of him, she wants all of him, she wants something she doesn’t have a name for but she knows the shape of it, the place it would fit in her heart and soul. 

And then the coil wound tight within her suddenly springs free and she’s coming, clenching tight around his cock and crying out against his mouth. 

She feels him move beneath her a few more times before he groans, chin tipping back as he comes inside her. 

She collapses, sweating and panting and heavy on top of him but John just wraps his arms around her waist, palms pressing flat to her back as he pulls her in even tighter, his face burying in her damp neck and tangled hair. 

The windows have fogged over, cocooning them in soft quiet; their bare skin shines in the faint light of the dashboard.

And the car surges on, carrying them safely through the moonlit night.

Chapter Text

“What should we do now?” Zari asks. 

She’s finally disentangled herself from John and moved back to her own side of the car, where she sits fully dressed with flawless lipstick and not a single hair out of place. In theory, she’s trying to find the beacon or clue or whatever it is that she needs to see to learn the hidden truth of her heart — but in actual practice all she’s thinking about is how much she likes the way John’s nicotine-stained fingers look when laced through her own.

“That’s gotta be your call,” he murmurs, soft and low and warm. “It’s your truth we’re trying to find, love.”

Love. Zari knows it’s just a word, a verbal tic, a pet name he uses without serious thought or deep meaning — but when he says it to her… 

She feels things. Real things. Dangerous things. 

John rolls down his window before putting a cigarette between his lips and lighting it, not once letting go of her hand. Her hair dances in the wind, getting in her eyes and whipping across her cheeks and tangling all over again — but, for once, she doesn’t care. 

John’s just leaning against the car door and watching her, smoke curling from his lips, eyes sparkling in the glow of the dashboard lights. 

And Zari sighs, a strange blend of contentment and frustration warring within her. She doesn’t want to keep looking for whatever point this feverish coma dream demands. She doesn’t want to look out the window; she doesn’t want to think about the real world.

She just wants to be with him.

“Let’s go back to the apartment.”

They make it there far faster than should be possible, as if the rules of the physical world don’t apply. She simply wants to be back, and then the car turns a corner, and there they are.

It’s a jarring reminder that this place isn’t real, that she’s no closer to remembering her life in the outside world than she was when she first arrived.

As to remembering who she is, well, that’s more complicated. 

She might not remember details or specifics, but if she takes a deep breath and closes her eyes, she feels something sure and solid and good at the very center of her. Her essence, her soul, for lack of a better word. She’s certain of that, and she’s navigating this strange world by listening to it.

It feels like enough. More than that, it feels like it’s the only important thing.

John hops out once the car is parked and walks around to get her door, holding out a hand to help her.

“See?” She teases, squeezing his fingers. “I knew you were a gentleman.”

“Still wrong,” he murmurs, pressing a kiss into her hair. “I just wanted the excuse to touch you.”

Zari raises a single perfect brow. “As if you need one.”

“You either,” he answers, looping her arm through his as they walk back toward the high rise. “I told you, love. You can have whatever you want here.” 

“Trust me,” she says, hip bumping against his as she draws even closer to his side, “I’m enjoying that perk. Immensely.”

She hears John take a deep breath and feels him slow to a stop beside her, right there in the middle of the empty street; he turns to face her, waiting to speak until she meets his eyes. In the silvery starlight she can see him swallow, hard. 

“What I should have said,” he murmurs, “is that you can always have anything you want from me. Any time, any place. Real world very much included.”

He smiles then, quick and fleeting and strangely private, as if proud of himself for a single moment of direct honesty.

And then the moment is gone; he doesn’t wait for her to respond before turning on his heel and sweeping them inside the building. 

Zari finds it mostly irritating, but a tiny part of her can’t help but be relieved. There were words welling up inside her at the look on his face — beautiful words, terrifying words — words she can never come back from.

And if he’d given her even a second to speak, they’d have spilled out.

Instead, she steps with him into the waiting elevator in silence, the doors closing quietly before it whisks them back up to the penthouse. Zari breathes carefully, her hand wound through the crook of John’s elbow, turning his words and her feelings and this entire made-up world over and over in her mind.

The elevator dings and the doors open directly inside the penthouse; it greets them with the same cool, dark hush it had when they left it hours ago, all sleek and pricey modernity. 

They’ve spent the night going in one big circle, but it feels right. Ending where it began, standing here where she first saw him. 

Because the truth is that he’s been the only thing calling to her all along. 

“What if all I want is you?” 

Zari looks at him from beneath her lashes, hoping he hears the parts that she’s not saying — that she’s unaccustomed to vulnerability, that she’s not the kind of woman who wants to get lost in a man, that she knows there’s more — to her, to her life, to the world — than what she has here.

And yet, if she has to choose only one part of it to have here in the wasteland of her subconscious, she wouldn’t have chosen anything or anyone above him. 

Zari steps closer, breathing him in, letting the heat of his skin burn through the last of her defenses. 

“What if what I want is for you to have whatever you want?” 

For half a second, John looks as if she has struck him; his swagger and facade are reduced to a rubble of raw yearning and stunned disbelief. 

He hides it almost as soon as it appears; Zari finds herself wondering if it ever happened at all. 

Because now he’s just grinning wickedly and spinning her to the solid glass wall overlooking the city, sweeping her hair over her left shoulder and kissing the right side of her neck as he pulls her zipper down in one long, slow drag. He peels the dress from her skin without using magic at all, leaving it pooled around her ankles as she stands in her lingerie and heels. 

She’s staring out at the city but she can feel the heavy heat of his gaze at her back; she remembers, suddenly, the feeling of being stared at. How much it’s happened in her life and how complicated her relationship with it is, the way it usually makes her feel separate and inhuman, a cheap commodity to be mindlessly consumed — but that’s not what John is doing. He’s studying her like a great work of art or a master-level chess match; he sees the full, complicated person who deserves to be appreciated, admired, adored. 

He unhooks her bra and pulls the straps slowly down her arms, his lips pressing to the bare spot on her spine where the clasp had been. Then he’s on his knees behind her, pulling the thong down her legs, trailing behind it with open-mouthed kisses on the back of her thighs; he helps her keep her balance as she steps out of it and kicks the dress to the side. She’s not sure which one of them chooses to leave her heels on but she likes it, the way it evens out their height difference, leaving them on the same level. 

John does that same practiced trick that hastily makes his own clothing disappear and then they’re both standing naked, on display to the whole city but safe in the knowledge that there’s no one out there to look. 

He stands behind her, running his palm flat against her spine from base to neck until she’s standing at an angle with her hands pressed flat to the cool glass, her hips back and legs spread. He has barely touched her but she’s soaking wet and throbbing with want; she moans as he pushes into her so deliciously slowly that she can feel every inch. Her entire world narrows to the place where they’re joined; it feels like ages pass before his hips are flush against her ass, until he’s as deep inside her as possible. 

And even then she wants more, somehow; she wants him everywhere, touching every part of her overheated skin — but she put him in charge.

Clearly, he wants to torture her with a slow pace. 

His hands move to her breasts, her nipples under his calloused palms as he holds their heavy weight; he uses it as leverage to draw nearly all the way out before thrusting back in. Over and over and over again, he moves in a careful, contained rhythm; his breath is hot on her neck, his hands firm, his hips strong. 

Zari is spread before the whole world, the glass fogging in front of her face from her breath; her arms strain to brace herself against the window and her knees are trembling, but John’s strong hands help hold her up. She’s desperate for friction against her clit, for a faster pace, for more of him to touch her, but she bites her lip because she wants him in control this time, she wants to know what he’ll do with her—

—But it’s as if he already knows what she needs. He pulls out and she whimpers at the loss for half a second before he’s spinning her to face him and crouching a little; he hooks his elbows under her knees and lifts with more strength than she’d have thought contained in that compact body, putting her back against the glass. He’s grinning and she can’t help but smile back, kissing him hard and messy, all teeth and tongue as she reaches between them and lines him back up. 

And then John is fucking her hard and fast, her ankles hooked around his waist, her body weight held by his arms and the way his chest pins her against the cold window. The air fills with the sound of their slapping skin and gasping breath; Zari feels as if she’s flying, weightless, a burning comet rocketing through space.

He shifts the angle of his thrusts just enough to hit her clit with every stroke and she’s moaning and raking her nails across his back and biting into the meat of his shoulder; he just keeps going, pounding into her, and she’ll be sore in the morning but she can’t wait. She wants it, that reminder of this moment and the way the moonlight looks on his sweat-slick skin, the sound of his voice rumbling as he mumbles sweet nonsense into her neck. 

She holds on tighter and rolls her hips into his and she’s trying to hold out, to make it last, to stay in this moment of perfect pleasure as long as possible—

—But then he lifts his head enough to meet her eyes, whispering, “Come for me, love,” voice soft and face tender and eyes burning and it’s just all too good. She tips over the edge and falls, shaking and torn apart and utterly spent in his arms. 

He follows a second behind, staring into her eyes as she shudders and clenches around him. 

They stay like that for a long moment, Zari wrapped around John in every possible way, breathing each other in and slowly coming down. 

Zari feels like she’s stumbled across a threshold she hadn’t known existed, unlocking a secret room inside John’s heart that he’d lost the key to long ago. It’s terrifying and thrilling; it sets something in her chest trembling, tentatively drawing closer to him in a way far beyond their physical forms.

John slowly sets her back on her feet, softly kissing the corner of her jaw; she’d swear she could feel a tremor in his fingertips when they brush across her waist.

And even when they inevitably have to separate they don’t go far, curling up together under the soft blanket on the couch. Their bare skin presses together from their tangled-up feet to Zari’s cheek resting on John’s chest, his fingers combing gently through her hair. 

“Why are we still here?” Zari speaks so softly it’s nearly a whisper; it feels wrong to break the peaceful quiet that’s wrapped itself around them. “I mean, if that wasn’t magic and truth, I don’t know what is.”

John sighs; she feels the exhale against the crown of her head. 

“Shagging the only man on the planet isn’t exactly the stuff the curse is looking for,” he mutters. 

With her ear pressed to his chest, Zari feels the rumble of his voice as much as she hears the words themselves — which is why it takes her a second to process the self-loathing nature of what he just said. 

And then she shoves herself upright, the tips of her hair sweeping over her bare breasts.

“You’re an idiot.”

He raises his eyebrows, mouth curving into something that approximates a smile — except it doesn’t reach his eyes. 

“Your pillow talk could use some work, sweetheart.”

“I mean it, John. Listen,” she grabs his chin, forcing him to meet her eyes. “I may not know the details about who we are back in the real world, but I know who we are here — which means that I know who we are in all the ways that really matter. So don’t try to act like everything that’s between us is some kind of cheap last man on earth type of situation, because it is so much more than that.” 

She doesn’t want to keep talking, to open herself up like this, but she’s not going to back down just because she’s scared. She knows —in her bones, down to the very core of herself — that that’s not who she is. 

“I think maybe you’re the only one here because you’re the only one that matters.”

John blinks, stunned and seemingly broken open, and then a smile — a real one this time — edges onto his face. It’s like the sunrise on a cloudy winter’s morning — small and faint but painfully hopeful; its weak light radiates as he reaches up, cupping her cheek in his palm. 

“Thanks for that, love.”

It’s not acceptance, not an admission that he feels the same or confirmation that she’s right about something existing between them, but it’s clearly all she’s going to get from him. 

Damn him and his belief that telling her anything about their lives might ruin their chances to get back — especially since she doesn’t particularly care about doing that any time soon.

Even if the world came back, if there were suddenly people to see and parties to attend, if there was shopping and fashion and society, she knows it couldn’t offer her anything better than what she has right here. 

Now if only John felt the same way. 

Zari frowns but he’s obviously done talking about it; eventually she has no choice but to settle back down against him, craving his warmth and skin and the steady sound of his heartbeat beneath her ear. 

Its even, thudding rhythm combines with the smooth rise and fall of his chest as he breathes; his fingertips softly draw absent sigils over the bare skin of her back. It all lulls her into a floating state between sleep and consciousness, everything soft and fuzzy and blissfully wonderful. 

Some indiscernible amount of time later, unsure whether she’s awake or still dreaming, she hears John’s rough voice softly rumbling beneath her.

“God help me Zari, I know I need to let you get on with it and find your way out of here, but I can’t seem to take my hands off of you.” 

He sighs, the breath warm and soft against her shoulder. 

“Probably because I’m a selfish bastard,” he mumbles. “You know, if it was me in your place? If this was my hell and I had to listen to my heart?” She feels his hand on the back of her head, stroking her hair; he inhales deeply enough that it makes her cheek rise. “There’s only one thing it’s saying. And it’s your name, over and over again, with every damned beat.” 

He nuzzles in closer; she feels his lips brush over her skin when he whispers.

“I know I shouldn’t, know I’m no good for you, but I can’t help it — I love you.”

John snaps his eyes open and gone is the soft floral scent of Zari’s hair and the protective dark hush of the penthouse. Instead, his nose is assaulted by the sting of antiseptic and the recycled air of the Waverider. The fluorescent lights overhead are blinding; the incessant beeping of some medical monitor screeches in his ears. 

It takes him half a second to realize that he’s been ripped out of Zari’s mind and tossed back into his body in the medbay — and then he’s tearing heartbeat and brainwave monitors off himself, half-falling as he fights to get out of the chair and across the room to where Zari lies. 

Eyes closed. Face slack. Motionless. 

“Bollocks,” he mutters, scrubbing a hand over his face, slumping over her. 

“What happened?” Ava asks, rushing over to him; her hands hover worriedly in the air over both John and Zari. 

“I got kicked out — the demon’s curse must have transferred to me, too, when I went inside her mind. The second I realized my heart’s truth, it released me.” He grinds his teeth together, gripping the arm of Zari’s chair hard enough that the metal creaks beneath his fingers. “I shouldn’t have gone, I was just a distraction to her.”

“John, talk to me. What happened in there, why are you the only one that’s back, why isn’t Zari waking up?”

He rakes his fingers through his hair, trying to take an even breath, to form words out of the chaotic screaming inside his mind; when his voice finally comes to him it sounds dry and torn and bleeding, like he’s been gargling gravel. 

“She can’t wake up until she finds the truth hidden in her heart, yeah?” 

Ava nods; John’s mouth presses into a thin, hard line. “Well, she doesn’t even remember who she is, because of course somebody who’s met an alternate bloody version of themselves would have some identity issues. But instead of helping her find herself, I was a selfish git who just went along with whatever she wanted.” He sighs, rolling his eyes to the blindingly bright ceiling. “The only thing she did in there was waste her time with me.”

A sympathetic crease appears between Ava’s eyebrows; John knows she means well, so he tries not to let it piss him off. 

“You two are together, John, I think that’s okay.”

He scoffs. “I’m not the sodding secret hidden in anyone’s heart, pet, let alone someone as good as her.”

Ava’s mouth opens — to continue arguing with him, no doubt — but they’re both distracted by a small sound from the chair beside them. A blanket rustles from some tiny movement; there may be a slight disruption in the even cadence of Zari’s breath. 

John falls to his knees beside her, clutching her hand in his.

“Come on now, Zari, don’t do this to me, not again.” He presses his lips to the back of her hand as if he could brand the words into her smooth skin, send them coursing through her blood directly into her heart and mind. “Come back to me, love.”

But she doesn’t. 

She’s not moving; her eyes are still closed. And John’s a fool because of course she isn’t going to wake just because he whispered his own bleeding confession — and while she was sleeping, no less. But even if she’d heard him, it’s not like loving him is her heart’s hidden truth; that would be ridiculous, he’s lucky she’s even willing to waste some time with a damned mess like him—

—And then Zari squeezes his fingers. 

“Zari?” John sounds broken, ragged, but he doesn’t care, not as long as she hears him, as long as she comes back.

Her chest rises with a deep breath; her long eyelashes flutter as she blinks a few times, and then open for good.

She’s awake.

“Oh, thank god,” he mutters, dropping his forehead to her shoulder for just a second before yanking it back, eyes dark with worry. “Please tell me you’re really back, that you remember who you are.”

She smiles up at him; it’s easily the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen. 

“I’m Zari Tarazi, superstar influencer, entrepreneur, time traveling hero—“ 

John’s suddenly jerked forward by Zari’s hand wrapped in his tie, tugging his face down to hers so she can kiss him soundly. 

His lips melt into hers, his heart feeling like molten lava in his chest; it bursts into bright, burning flames when she pulls back just far enough to whisper against his mouth. 

“—And I’m someone who’s in love with you, too.”