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Creative Sportsmanship

"Where are you going?" Sands asked irritably, reaching out toward Methos. "Get back in bed."

Methos studied him, grinning. "I thought we were going to leave first thing in the morning."

"We'll leave second thing in the morning. First thing is you coming back here and reminding me why it's good to be alive."

"I suppose I could do that." Methos climbed back into bed, sliding in next to Sands, nuzzling at his ruined, beautiful face. "What luck for me that you're completely insatiable."

"I'm using sex as a coping mechanism," Sands retorted in the wry tone he seemed to use to disarm statements that were too close to truth. He rubbed his stiffening cock against Methos's hip. "It's keeping me from being the non-functioning kind of crazy."

"We certainly wouldn't want that." Methos bit at the arch of Sands's cheekbone. "I much prefer you being the jumpy, twitchy, dangerous-to-everyone-around-you kind of crazy."

*

Second thing in the morning turned out to be another shower, to rinse off the sweat and come. The third thing was getting Sands dressed -- and it took several minutes for Methos to find a t-shirt in Sands's wardrobe that wasn't too appalling to bear. And the fourth thing was huevos rancheros and cinnamon-spiked coffee in a little restaurant on the corner. Sands ate with slow, careful precision, as if determined to learn to do it without making a mess.

"You know, there was another Immortal here yesterday," Methos said as he sipped his coffee. "I saw him leaving right before I found you. Tall Mexican, hair about to his shoulders, in a mariachi costume."

Sands choked on his breakfast. "/El/? El's an Immortal?" He shook his head in disbelief. "So that's where the legends come from."

"There are legends about him?" Adam Pierson's curiosity and training coming to the fore, Methos thought.

Sands proceeded to tell an outrageous story he said he'd heard from an informant in a bar, about love and betrayal and a tremendous amount of gunfighting. And not one, but two men who didn't die when they should have.

"If you had to pick one, which would you rather go after?"

"We're going headhunting?" Sands raised an eyebrow.

"I think it'd be good for you to get your first Quickening under your belt." Good for both of them, most likely; if Sands took the influx of energy anything like the way Methos did -- anything like the way Kronos used to -- then helping him to a kill would be an immensely rewarding experience.

"Then I'd go for Marquez, if he's still alive. El and I have...a little personal bad blood that I don't think I want to deal with." He dragged on a cigarette, already less awkward with them than he had been the evening before. "Not without some practice, that's for sure."

"We can definitely get you some practice." Methos watched the way Sands' cheeks hollowed as he inhaled. "We have plenty of time." Even taking into account the fact that they were going to have to travel slowly, due to the several hours each day Methos planned to spend having sex. "You'll need a sword."

"Hmm." Sands exhaled a long jet of smoke. "Do you have a car?"

"Not in Mexico, no."

"We can use mine, then. Do you have a phone?"

"I'm afraid not."

"If you can get me a phone, I can get in touch with my people, and they can get me weapons." Sands smiled, bright and jagged. "And then we can get the party started."

*

Perhaps, Methos thought around noon, they would leave first thing the next morning. He'd gotten Sands a phone about half an hour before, and Sands had been bitching and snarling into it ever since. Now he snapped the phone shut with a click, rattling off an address on the other side of town.

"How long do we have to get there?" Methos asked, picking up the car keys from the table.

"An hour. And -- here." Sands held out his wallet. "One of the cards in there is blue. We need to go to an ATM and withdraw as much cash from that account as possible."

"What are we waiting for, then?" Methos stood, coming around the table, offering his arm for Sands's bone-thin fingers to grasp. He felt...alive, like something was new and fresh in his life for the first time in ages.

They got the money without incident. Getting the guns was somewhat more complicated. "You're sure you don't want a sword?" Methos asked, as they got out of the car.

"Never used one in my life," Sands replied. "I know how guns work. I know what I'm doing with them. I can take this apart," he touched the one in his shoulder holster, "and put it back together without needing my eyes."

"Fair enough." Methos took Sands carefully by the arm, leading him into the restaurant at the end of the block.

"How about you? How much help are you going to be at picking out my new toys?"

"Better than most of us," Methos said quietly, steering them toward the back table where their man waited, brooding over a tequila. "You're still the expert. But I won't be useless."

"Mister Sands," the man crooned unpleasantly as they stopped by the table, "how nice to see you." Methos tensed. How dare this slimy little bastard --

Sands moved so fast he was a blur, his gun pointed unerringly between the man's eyes. "If you heard that much, then you probably also heard that I can still shoot." He pulled his shades down far enough to expose the dark hollows underneath. "Even with my little handicap. Now, I know you probably have a gun pointed at me under the table. But I have a lot less to lose than you do, and I might just shoot you anyway."

The man swallowed visibly. "The cartel thought you were going to die."

"Maybe I did." Sands bared his teeth in something more feral than a smile. "Maybe Santa Muerte has a job for me."

Sweat was beading on the man's forehead, and he risked a glance at Methos.

Methos smiled reassuringly. "Take it easy," he said, laying a hand on Sands's elbow. "I'm sure we can all be reasonable men. Why don't you introduce us?"

Sands let the threat drop out of his stance, putting the gun away. "I certainly hope so. Adam, this is Lupo. He might be a bastard, but there's no-one better to provide what we need. Lupo, this is my friend Adam. He's the dangerous one."

Methos laughed in surprise. "I'm just the guy getting the drinks. You want a tequila?"

Sands grinned, pulling out a chair from the table. "I'm still breathing, aren't I?"

When Methos got back with Sands's tequila and his beer, there were three handguns on the table, and Sands held a fourth in his slender, pale hands, testing the feel of it. "Closer," he was saying as Methos put the drinks down, "but still not quite."

"Let me see that one," Methos said as he slid into a seat, his knee brushing Sands's under the table. Sands passed the gun to him, and Methos smiled at the heavy, ominous weight of it, the light-sucking black surfaces, the sleek silhouette. "I might want this. But you're right, it's not what you need."

"No." Sands turned to Lupo again. "Still bigger. Think 'exit wounds the size of your fist.'"

Methos sighted down the barrel of his new gun, smiling blissfully. "Think 'blowing heads clean off,'" he added.

Lupo was looking nervous again. He downed the rest of his tequila. "You want a shotgun," he suggested.

Sands's face lit up. "Yes! I want a sawed-off shotgun. I don't need much range, just carnage." He looked delighted. New toys indeed, Methos thought.

"You know they say that's El's favorite," Lupo said, reaching into a case on the floor beside him. "Try this, see what you think." He placed a new gun, double-barreled and shiny, on the table with a soft thunk. Sands reached for it with no hesitation, and picked it up so deftly that Methos had to stifle a smile. Give it a week, and Sands would be faking it so well he'd be able to hide his blindness if he tried.

"Yes," Sands breathed reverently. "Yes, this is more like it. Adam --" he paused, a smirk twisting at the edge of his mouth -- "take a look at this, would you?"

Methos set his gun down in front of him and took the sawed-off instead. He cracked it open, checking the action, watching and feeling the way the parts moved. "Not bad. If you like it," he gave the gun back to Sands, "then get it. It won't let you down."

"Good. We'll take them both." Sands cocked his head in Lupo's direction. "And some shells, of course. How much?"

"You got the shotgun, you got the pistol." Lupo reached into his case again. "Two boxes of shells. Let's say, sixty thousand pesos?"

Sands raised an eyebrow. "That's awfully high."

Lupo shrugged, looking nervously back and forth between them. "The guns you want, they are very good guns, yes? And the cartel, they are discouraging people from selling to you." He paused. "Tell you what. I'll throw in some bullets for the Desert Eagle, too. Okay?"

There was a long, expectant pause. "Okay," Sands said at last. "Adam, how much cash do we have on hand?"

"I think we should just about be able to cover that," Methos replied, reaching into his pocket for the fat wad of bills he'd gotten from the ATM earlier that day. He started to peel bills off the stack, the paper slippery and damp in the heat --

And by the time he realized Sands was moving, the whipcrack of pistol shots was ringing in his ears as Lupo flew backward in his seat, blood blossoming bright and vivid across his shirt. Sands cursed, his left hand clutched to his belly, and Methos drew his own gun as he spun to face the bartender. No time to decide whether the man was reaching for a phone or a shotgun -- one quick squeeze of the trigger and he was staggering backward into the rows of bottles, a spray of blood and liquor and glass.

"Can you walk?"

"I think so -- ow!" Sands yelped as Methos grabbed him by the collar and dragged him upright.

"Crazy bastard," Methos said affectionately. "You could have told me you were going to do that."

"I wasn't sure myself." Sands threw the guns on the table into his bag. "But I've wanted to shoot that fucker for years, and the chance was there."

"Okay, we'll talk about impulse control later. Let's go." At the bar, Methos paused. "Give me your lighter for a minute." The prickling tang of spilled liquor, a sharp, aggressive smell, filled the air.

"I need the lesson in impulse control, do I?" Sands asked mildly, passing the lighter to Methos and leaning heavily on a table. "This healing thing feels really weird."

"It does, doesn't it?" Methos smiled at the way Sands always seemed to be having two or three conversations at once, and sopped up some of the spilled alcohol with one of the bar's dishrags. "And I'm not being impulsive. You made a mess, and I'm cleaning it up."

"Or setting it on fire."

"Right. Whichever." Methos lit the rag and dropped it on the bartender's body. "Now come on. If that gets hot enough, it'll blow the rest of those bottles, and I have no desire to spend the rest of the afternoon pulling shards of tequila bottles out of either of us."

Sands flinched backward from the abrupt heat of the alcohol fire, and reached out a hand for Methos to take. "After you."

*

The dusty road unfolded in front of them, bathed in the golden light of late afternoon, and Methos smiled at the sheer simple pleasure of driving. Sands slumped in the passenger seat, smoking another cigarette.

"I suppose I should be passing on the lessons I've learned over the years." Out of the corner of his eye, Methos saw Sands sit up a little straighter. "I guess the first rule --"

Sands laughed. "You don't talk about Fight Club?"

Methos grinned at him. "Sure, let's start there. That one, and the ones about two guys to a fight and one fight at a time -- those are in the official rules. I expect you to break them whenever you need to."

"Okay." Sands exhaled a long jet of smoke through his nostrils. "I'm pretty good at breaking rules."

"Discreetly, of course; you don't want a reputation for cheating. But you don't want to lose because you were too honorable, either. The only one of the official rules that you should definitely take seriously is the one about holy ground. We don't kill each other on anyone's holy ground -- doesn't matter who it's sacred to. In an emergency, you can almost always find refuge in a church or a temple or a cemetery."

"What happens if you break that rule?" Sands stroked the butt of one of his pistols, a lazy motion like a cat grooming itself.

"Good question." Methos paused thoughtfully. How much did Sands need to know about him, and how soon? "I've heard probably half a dozen theories, and none of them are encouraging. That it kills you. That it strikes you mad -- really mad, I mean, completely gone. That it reverses the Quickening's effect, and the other Immortal takes over your body. That it turns your Quickening against you, and you feel like you're being hit by lightning all the time. None of it, like I said, encouraging."

"Nobody knows for sure?"

"Anybody who does isn't telling." Methos turned off the road into a battered gas station. "I haven't heard of it happening any time in the last millennium." He shut off the engine. "I'm getting gas here -- do you want anything?"

"Cigarettes," Sands said with certainty.

"Cigarettes," Methos repeated. "I'll be right back."

A full tank of gas, two packs of cigarettes, and a bottle of water later, they were back on the road. Sands had taken his sunglasses off, and the blank white scar tissue where his eyes had been was horribly fascinating. Like the remains of classical sculpture in modern museums, if mutilated statues could breathe and sigh and part their lips to taste the air.

"You've gone very still," Sands said sharply. "What is it?"

Methos shook himself. "Nothing important." He turned the wheel, easing them back onto the empty road. "We were talking about rules, weren't we?"

Sands grinned at the evasion, but all he said was, "Christ on a stick, there are still more rules?"

"Not official ones. We've covered the Rules of the Game pretty decently. But there are a few more things that I pass on to anyone I end up teaching."

"You take on a lot of students, then?" Sands lit another cigarette, almost without hesitation or awkwardness.

"Every five hundred years or so, somebody makes it seem worthwhile." Methos reached over and snagged Sands's cigarette to derail the obvious next question. "The first piece of advice is the more obvious one." Long drag, the bitter heat of smoke. "Don't get into fights you're not ready for. You have all the time in the world, as long as you don't make a stupid mistake. There's almost never a fight you can't avoid, so only get in the ones you're going to win." He took a second drag and handed the cigarette back to Sands, slipping it between his slender fingers.

"Got it," Sands said, though whether he was talking about the cigarette or the advice Methos wasn't sure.

"The other thing won't seem as important until you've been around for a few centuries, but it's the difference between survival and living: take your happiness wherever you can find it." This was always the hard one to explain. "You reach a point, eventually, where you get more jaded and bored than mortals can possibly imagine. It's easy to give up then, if you don't look for the things that make you happy, and savor them."

Sands's head tilted consideringly. After a moment, he asked, "Is that what you're doing here?"

Very clever, Methos thought. "Sometimes it's a beautiful, kind-hearted girl with six months to live. And sometimes it's a man who was still standing, still fighting, when the trauma he'd just been through should have broken him completely." That made Sands go completely still, barely breathing -- too much, too soon, so Methos continued, "Who also, now that I think about it, was wearing blood all over his pretty face, and that's a look I've always had a weakness for."

Sands laughed, the tension broken. "Pervert."

"I do hope you're not complaining."

"Not at all." The hand that wasn't holding the cigarette slid across the seat and into Methos's lap. "I could get used to it."

*

They tracked the rumors of Marquez to a little town in the south, dusty and hot with the white walls of the general's palace gleaming from the hillside. For three days, they scouted the area, Sands sitting in cafes and listening to gossip while Methos climbed the hills to survey their target.

"What's the matter?" Methos asked on the third night. "You've been getting tenser and nastier ever since we got here."

"Gee, what could possibly be the matter?" Sands took off his sunglasses, turning his face toward Methos. "Apart from the fact that I'm fucking crippled /forever/. I could live for hundreds of years, but I'll never see again. I couldn't do this job without you. I need your eyes."

"I'm sorry." Methos sat down on the bed next to Sands. "I wish there were something I could say that would help.... You're already managing so well, and you'll only get better. I know that doesn't make up for it --"

"Promise me something," Sands interrupted. Methos waited. "When I can't stand it anymore, I want you to be the one to kill me."

Methos raised a hand to Sands's face, stroking the line of his jaw. The irony of it was bitter -- here he was, the world's oldest man, drawn to people whose lives were cut much shorter than they should be. "I promise."

Sands smiled weakly. "Now stop talking." He turned toward Methos, reaching for him, and Methos leaned in to press their mouths together in a kiss. It was slow, languorous, the frenzy of their first encounters muted by growing familiarity and the lingering weight of Sands's despair.

Already, Methos thought, he expected kisses to taste like smoke and tequila, and he found the bony angles of Sands's body strangely comfortable. He pushed, and Sands collapsed gracefully backward onto the bed, the springs creaking beneath them. Methos threaded his fingers through Sands's hair to hold him still for more kisses -- to his mouth, to his cheekbones, to his temples. He paused there, trying to gauge Sands's state of mind.

"Please," Sands whispered, clutching tighter at Methos's back.

"Are you sure?" Methos asked. "I was afraid of reminding you."

Sands laughed bitterly. "Everything reminds me. I can't forget it. But when you -- when you do that is the only time it doesn't seem completely awful."

"Okay, then." Methos leaned down, breathing the words over Sands's skin. "In that case...." Gently, slowly, he licked his way into the hollows of Sands's empty sockets, tracing the alien ridges and swirls of scar tissue with his tongue. Sands came alive under the touch like he'd been electrified, clutching and writhing and gasping.

"There?" Methos asked, already quite certain of the answer.

"Yes, you sick bastard," Sands purred. "More."

Methos smiled, pulling his shirt off. "Do you know how long it's been since anyone called me a sick bastard as an endearment?"

Sands squirmed helpfully as Methos started to undress him. "Reminding you of the old friend again?"

"Only in the best of ways," Methos replied, and was relieved when Sands had the tact not to notice his voice cracking. Not five minutes ago, the man had been reminding him of Alexa, and now he was every bit as amoral -- and hungry -- as Kronos. Who'd have thought there would be someone who could combine those two?

And the way he looked, the way he felt was like neither of them, coltish and angular but still graceful, his hips rocking, his back arching as Methos slid back into bed with him. "Now," Methos murmured into Sands's ear, "more."

"And -- mmm -- about time, too," Sands purred, wrapping his arms around Methos's back, pressing as much of their bodies together as possible.

Methos leaned on one elbow, sliding the other hand down between them to reach for Sands's hard cock as he returned his mouth to its earlier occupation. The moans Sands made sounded almost like sobs, low and helpless.

/So beautiful/, Methos almost said. /So fucking beautiful/. But it was too soon for that, if it would ever be appropriate at all, so instead he just shifted his hips to bring their cocks together, wrapping his fingers around them both together.

"Jesus," Sands moaned, and then, hesitantly, "Do you want me to...?"

"No," Methos interrupted. "I just want you to keep making noise."

"Fuck, yes/," Sands growled, as the first thrust of Methos's hips made their cocks slide against each other. He kept talking as Methos licked at his eyesockets and stroked them off, pleas and curses with more and more hungry gasps in between words, his breath hot on Methos's throat. "Yes -- please, you sick fucking -- oh, God -- oh -- Jesus, more -- yes, /there --"

Methos could feel his own breathing getting ragged, his body tensing, muscles flexing toward a climax just out of reach -- and then Sands convulsed under him, shooting hot against his belly, and bit down on Methos's throat to muffle a groan -- and that set Methos off, made him throw back his head and howl as he came, as Sands's sharp teeth worried at the soft flesh.

His heart pounded in his chest, and for a long moment Methos didn't move. Finally, he slid off Sands to lie next to him, and made a half-hearted attempt to wipe them clean with the sheets.

"We have to sleep on these, you know," Sands muttered.

"Only tonight," Methos said absently.

"We're doing it tomorrow?"

"Tomorrow night." Methos pulled Sands against him, stroking his back soothingly. "So get some rest."

*

They made preparations as the sun went down the next evening. Guns cleaned and loaded, black fatigues tucked into black boots --

"Where's my shirt?" Sands asked.

"You're not wearing one."

His brow furrowed. "Why not?"

"Because Mexicans tend to be superstitious people. Because Marquez's guards are more superstitious than most, since they've seen him cheat death more than once. And," Methos opened a tin of black greasepaint, "because you're one spooky-looking bastard even without a costume."

"Okay, I'm game," Sands said dryly as Methos stroked greasepaint across the hollows under his cheekbones. "Who am I playing?"

"Death." Methos grinned, blackening the shadows between Sands's ribs. He'd missed this, the psychological theater of planning raids, the little adrenaline thrill that came from being not better armed or better equipped, but more clever than the enemy.

"And you? Who will you be?" Sands seemed to be having trouble holding still, like he wanted to lean into every touch.

"You're playing my part. I'll be stage managing."

Sands laughed. "So I'm playing your part, and you're playing mine. Great."

"It's good to be flexible," Methos grinned. This was different from raiding with Kronos, though, less tense -- more playful. Like pulling a heist with Amanda. He stifled a snicker as he imagined the introductions: Mac, this is Sands. He reminds me of everyone I've slept with in the last ten years, except you.

"What's funny?" Sands asked.

"Hard to explain." Methos shrugged. "You have any idea where you want to go after this?"

"Not really." Sands took the black suit jacket Methos handed him and shrugged it on. "I was thinking 'not Mexico,' but that's as far as I'd gotten."

"How about Paris?" Methos touched each of his weapons quickly, reassuring himself that they were all where they belonged.

"I don't speak French." Sands stood, tucking his new sawed-off into the holster on his belt.

"You'll pick it up." Methos took Sands's arm. "You're clever." The door closed with a click behind them.

*

The weather, Methos realized as they climbed into the hills toward Marquez's palace, couldn't be better. It was a moonless night, and patchy clouds hid most of the starlight as well. When the power went out at the palace, the enemy would be running blind.

So would they, of course. But then, they had more practice.

"This is where we part ways," Methos whispered, pulling Sands into a crouch behind a boulder. "We're about twenty yards from the back door. There's one guard there, with an automatic. I'm going around to the side to knock out the electricity. Give it ten seconds after I do, and then show yourself. Scare the fuck out of him, but don't shoot him unless you have to. The quieter we can be about getting in, the easier it'll be."

"You backing me up, then?"

"Yeah. Good luck." Methos squeezed Sands's fingers briefly and then let go, slipping off through the shadows and around to the side of the building. Power came into the house through a set of cables at the side; there was a generator for emergency power in one of the outbuildings, but Methos had taken care of that already. All that remained now was to pry back the cover protecting the cables, and then wrench them free to fall to the dusty ground, spitting sparks as the lights went out.

The compound came alive at once, panicked voices barking commands in Spanish to check the generator, to find the intruders. There were fewer of them than Methos had feared, he thought as he crept back along the wall to the back door where Sands would be. He slipped his next tool from its pocket as he went, feeling the wire uncoil between his hands as he palmed the grips.

He could see Sands now, skeletal and eerie in the blue light of the stars, and he could hear the guard saying, over and over, "No es posible."

Sands parted his blackened lips in a horrible smile and purred, "Es posible." He swayed as he walked forward, his hand weaving patterns in the air. Methos crept closer, and Sands continued, "Santa Muerte ama el general. Ella ha enviado sus niños a para visitado."

He stumbled, and the guard snapped out of his paralysis, swinging his gun up as he seemed to realize that his visitor was only human after all. Methos lunged, whipping the garrote around the guard's neck, and the man thrashed, his shots going wild before he dropped the gun.

It always seemed to take longer than it should, but eventually the man went limp, and Methos looked up to discover Sands standing there with an expression of intense concentration on his painted face.

"There are others on the way," Sands said tersely.

"Then let's go." Methos dropped the garroted body and took Sands by the hand. "This way."

He could sense a buzz almost as soon as they got inside. "Can you feel that?"

Sands shook his head. "What should I be feeling?"

"His buzz. Let me know when you start to sense it. That'll mean we're headed in the right direction."

Sands nodded, a tense grin on his face -- the look of an animal that was facing down a threat, Methos thought -- and they started down the hall. They could hear shouts from other parts of the house, terse commands to find the intruders, to stop them, to not let them get away. "I think --" Sands began. He stopped moving.

"We're close?" Methos whispered.

"I -- that way." Sands pointed.

"Up the stairs. Good."

"I hate stairs," Sands muttered. "Hate them." But he followed, climbing gingerly up each step behind Methos, balanced carefully.

"Almost there. Can you feel it, getting sharper?" This wasn't his Quickening to take, Methos reminded himself. No matter how tempting it felt. But it was so close, and it would feel so good -- there, he'd bet. The end of the hall.

"Yeah," Sands purred, clutching tighter at his arm. "I can feel it. Come on."

They kicked in the door at the end of the hall, and found Marquez sitting up in bed, wide-eyed, clutching the sheets in one hand and a gun in the other. "Mariachi?" he spat, half a question and half a curse.

"No," Sands growled back, reaching for his sawed-off, "El isn't with us. I'm sure he'll be disappointed when he hears that someone else finally took you down, and he wasn't there."

Marquez raised the gun -- and Methos shoved Sands to one side, hard, while he dove to the other, and he felt the wet crunch of bone giving way where two of Marquez's bullets lodged high in his chest. It was an ugly wound, and it slowed him down as he reached for a gun, hearing the general's angry curses. Didn't the idiot realize that making noise left him vulnerable to --

The roar of the shotgun was so loud Methos felt it in his bones, and the room filled immediately with the scent of blood and gunpowder. "Did I get him?" Sands asked hoarsely.

The cold light of the Quickening was already rising from Marquez's body. "Yeah," Methos said, "you got him."

"Good. Next question." Sands took a hesitant step toward Methos. "Are you okay?"

"I'll live," Methos shrugged, and then wished he hadn't. "Broke my collarbone, maybe a rib. Hurts like fuck, but I'll heal." He glanced over at the Quickening light swirling above the body. "Hang on. It's about to get interesting."

"Just now?" Sands dropped to his knees, reaching out carefully, one hand coming to rest on Methos's leg.

Methos didn't have a chance to answer that before the energy of the Quickening sharpened, focused, thrummed tight through the room -- and then everything turned to light, snapping and flickering, burning into him through the wound in his shoulder -- but that wasn't right, this should have been Sands's kill, should have gone to him -- a glance sideways showed that it /had/, somehow, Sands's head thrown back, mouth open, whole body convulsing in the grip of it -- something shattered loudly on the other side of the room, and there was a flare of heat --

"Fuck," Sands gasped, when it was over at last.

"Yeah," Methos agreed, shaking. More things in heaven and earth, indeed.

"No," Sands said fiercely. "That was a demand." Something in the corner of the room was on fire from the Quickening, providing enough light for Methos to see Sands crawling over to him, nimble fingers reaching for his belt.

"That shouldn't -- ah, fuck --" Sands's hand on his hard cock, stroking -- "that shouldn't have happened like that."

"Sex now. Theory later." Sands leaned down and throated his cock in one smooth glide of lips and tongue.

"Oh God --" Methos arched his hips, and Sands moaned around his cock. "We're not -- safe here," he made himself say. "Someone will probably come investigate --"

Sands pulled up enough to growl, "Then cover me," before sliding back down on him, and Methos gave up even token resistance. He left one hand wrapped loosely around the grip of the Desert Eagle, and watched Sands by the fire's light.

Sands managed to get out of his jacket without coming up for air, squirming out of it and tossing it aside to reveal greasepaint and the straps of his shoulder holster. The boots and fatigues gave him more trouble; he had to sit up to get out of them, snarling curses as he struggled. He reached for Methos again as soon as he was done, straddling Methos and groping for his cock.

He didn't even pause before forcing himself down on it, and Methos could feel the flicker of Sands's Quickening as his flesh tore and healed around the invasion. "Oh, fuck," Methos breathed -- he was so tight, so hot, it was almost too much to bear.

"That was -- the general idea," Sands panted, rocking his hips. "Are you helping or not?"

Methos let go of the gun and grabbed Sands's hips, thrusting up hard. "You tell me," he snarled.

"Yes -- yesyes, like that -- hard and fast --" Sands grabbed for his own cock, pumping it hard as Methos slammed up into him. This wasn't going to take long at all, rough and brutal and -- right there, the spot that made Sands arch and writhe and curse --

And there were shouts from the hallway, someone coming this way, soldiers in the doorway -- Methos grabbed the Desert Eagle and brought it up, both hands on the gun, behind Sands's back -- he squeezed the trigger, felt the kick through his arms as the solider staggered back and Sands hissed "yes" -- Sands's moans almost lost in the sound of the gunshots, still driving himself down on Methos's cock -- and he was shaking now, convulsing, come glistening in the light of the fire, sweat running down into the paint on his chest -- Methos barely held on through it, arching up, hands still locked on the pistol as it became too much, too good, and he tried to keep his eyes open tried to keep watch as he came -- so -- fucking -- hard --

His hands fell to his sides when it was over, limp and exhausted, his heart hammering in his chest. Sands hadn't moved to get up, had barely moved at all, his hands roving over his skin as if to make sure his body was still all there.

Sands laughed, hollow and unpleasant. "I look like a fucking disaster."

It took a minute for that to really sink in. "What?" Methos asked at last.

The smile on Sands's face was a look of panic, not pleasure. Methos rested hands on his thighs to try to steady him, and Sands repeated, "I look like a fucking disaster. I'm having visions, Adam, I'm riding in your head." His hands moved down to rest unerringly on Methos's, to clutch at them tightly. "When you open your eyes, /I can see/."