For @vulptexvenator and @riphunterrp. John and John discuss Rip and Rip.
John felt a pang of guilt as he watched Rip swiftly leave the room, and then the other Rip followed him. He was about to make to go after him when he felt a hand on his good arm, and there was his counterpart.
“Best leave that pair for the moment. I recognise the look your boyfriend just got on his face, and the two of them have some serious brooding to do if I’m any judge. Besides, I know that arm hurts like hell. I know my own tells.”
The fox shifter let out a sigh, and shook his head. He turned his attention back to the problem at hand. He’d made the painkilling recipe far too much lately. It had been the only way of helping to ease Rip’s pain when he’d been poisoned, and John had made it every day for him.
“You’re going to need basil, sage, shepherd’s purse, willow bark, foxglove and feverfew. Then you’ll want to add...”
The other John showed him the contents of the bowl, and half the ingredients were already there. He nodded, a little impressed.
“No willow bark, but aspirin should do and digitalis for the foxgloves. Rip keeps a well stocked med bay. I’ll need to grab my bag for the last few bits. Boil it up in milk, right? Then mumble the Hippocrates Incantation over it?” asked his double.
“Right, which is nothing to do with Hippocrates...”
“... but starts “primum non nocere”.”
“And now we’re finishing each other’s sentences...”
“Yeah, well, it makes sense we’d at least think a bit alike. My day isn’t complete without a good dose of weird, and alternate universe versions of myself definitely come under that. Give me a sec, I’ll grab my bag and some milk from the galley.”
The other him disappeared for a few minutes, and came back with a leather bag and a bottle of milk. He began pulling out ingredients. John watched with some fascination.
“So, you and your Rip,” he asked. “You’re not together?”
The other John laughed. “No, just friends. I’m not even sure he’s interested in blokes. He’s definitely not looking for a relationship right now. There’s too much pain in those eyes for him to be moving on yet. I admit he’s pretty cute though. If he was on the market, I wouldn’t kick him out of bed.”
“You’re kidding me, he’s god damn gorgeous! His nose is sodding adorable, and those cheek bones are perfection,” said John, with a touch of indignant pride.
Other John laughed again, as he mixed ingredients. “Yeah, yeah, you picked a looker.”
“There wasn’t a lot of picking. He was my best friend long before we got together. We’re not even sure when our anniversary is. I go with the first kiss, he prefers to count the day we bought the double bed. We usually celebrate both to save arguments.”
He smiled. Arguing about when they’d actually got together was the kind of thing he didn’t mind some playful squabbling over.
“Why the long face earlier then? You two couldn’t keep your hands off each other until Rip mentioned his dead family. I’m guessing he hit a nerve.”
John let out a sigh and he watched the other him find a Bunsen burner and start heating up a crucible with the milk and other ingredients in it.
“Rip, my Rip, he’s never wanted kids. I hadn’t really thought about it until he asked me to marry him...”
“He asked you to marry him...?! Wait, can we just stop there. Rip Hunter is marrying John Constantine?” The other John was laughing again.
“Yeah, like I said, we’ve been together a long time. I’d have asked him if he hadn’t got there first.”
“I’m definitely not the marrying kind,” said the other John in explanation of his amusement. “So he didn’t want kids and you do, right?”
John nodded. “I get the impression you and I both had screwed up childhoods. Dad was a bastard, and I used to go to Rip and his Mum when things got bad.”
“Lucky you. All I had was Cheryl and she left as soon as she could. I blamed her for that for years. But like I said, I turned to magic to escape. Unfortunately that had its own consequences, but it did turn me into the distinguished warlock that you see before you today.”
John raised his eyes. “Right you are, mate. Anyway, there was my screwed childhood, and then there was this kid in Newcastle...”
His double stiffened. “Astra. You had an Astra?”
“Yeah, she was murdered. Fifteen years ago now. You too?”
John shook his head. “Nothing so clean and neat as murder. Astra was dragged to hell by a demon I summoned to fight another demon. Death would have been a mercy, but I will save her, and those demons know their days are numbered.”
John frowned. He hadn’t thought that there could have been anything worse than finding Astra’s dead body, but apparently he had been wrong.
“I’d never considered that I had it easy,” he said.
Other John decanted off the boiled herb and milk mixture into a beaker, and turned down the Bunsen burner.
“Not easy, never that when there’s a dead body at your feet, just different,” said the double. He intoned the spell required for activating the mixture, and handed it over. “Drink up.”
John did as he was told. Painkillers were comfort to his brain. He’d lost count of how many times Mary had made them for him when he was a kid. Often she didn’t ask if he needed them, she’d just pushed the mug of milk in his direction. She could tell when he was hurting without needing to ask, and John had been too proud to request them half the time. Of course now the mixture had also developed an association with Rip’s illness that wasn’t quite as pleasant.
“So you wanted to fix your mistakes. I’m going to get Astra out of hell, you wanted to adopt a kid to make up for the fact Astra was murdered.”
“I was right there... I knew her old man was a toerag of the worst sort. I even persuaded her not to run away because I knew what happened to kids that ended up on the streets...”
“Nothing good,” agreed the other John. “I’d have said the same if it was me.”
“Right, because you’ve seen it. I should have been able to save her...” He handed back the beaker to the other John. He could feel it was working and the break was hurting less already. “All I wanted was to save one kid, give them the life that Astra and I never got. And I was angry with Rip when he couldn’t give me what I wanted. I didn’t want to admit that even to myself, because I love that man more than life itself and I don’t want to hurt him. And he isn’t a selfish bloke. He’s loving and caring, he’d probably be great at being a parent if he’d give it a try. It hadn’t even occurred to me he wouldn’t be up for the idea of adopting. We had a massive fight, both of us threatened to leave at various points, and I gave up any idea of ever having a kid, because I didn’t want to leave him. My choice. But it’s something that’ll always be there between us now, so I’m still not sure it was the right decision. I keep wondering if Rip would be happier without me, because I just represent guilt for him now.”
“And then my Rip drops the little bombshell that he had a family, including a son,” said the other John.
“Yeah, your Rip... It’s weird. It doesn’t make any difference. I don’t want Rip to change, and it’s not like I’d ever want to swap him for yours, they’re so different... But it’s like looking at what could have been, if things had been different maybe he would have decided to adopt with me, and it brings all the hurt back to the surface.”
John rested his head on his hand, the one that wasn’t encumbered by a splint. The other John dumped his clothes on the end of the couch.
“Can’t say I’ve ever thought one way or the other about having kids, but then I’ve never found the right person to have them with. And in my line of work, they’d just be something else for my enemies to use against me. It’s probably better that I never had any of my own.”
“Yeah, we’re the wrong way around. You’re the one my Rip would want.” He sighed, because really it would be so much easier if he’d had that attitude to the entire thing, if he didn’t care so much.
The other John looked at him. “Come on, you’re me, and even I’m not that stupid. Or blind. We may look the same, but we’re not, and I’m not the one he’s in love with. He didn’t put a blanket around my shoulders now did he?”
John began to dress, pulling on his boxers and trousers. He raised his eyebrows at the comment. “Maybe not, but I don’t think he’s very happy with me right now.”
“Yeah, well, screw Rip bloody Hunter, both of them. He isn’t always right about everything. You probably both just need a moment. Anyway, get your keks on and I’ll take you to the bridge, and you can kiss and make up. If we’re lucky we might even manage to make my Rip blush a little, and then we can raid his spirits cabinet.” His counterpart grinned.
He couldn’t help but grin back. Rip was adorable when he blushed, and John would love a drink.
It was then that a loud thud reverberated through the hull of the ship. A second louder one followed it.
“Bollocks!” both Johns exclaimed in unison.
