Work Text:
When Booster'd agreed to join the Justice League, he hadn't thought they'd be so, well…chaotic. It all seemed to be mostly yelling at each other and then yelling at villains and then yelling at each other some more. And now, surrounded by boxes and cartons and surly moving men, he's not entirely sure he made the right decision.
Of course, the endless, gaping void of grief he's been constantly skirting for the past couple of days isn't helping. The loss of Michelle is like losing an arm; he keeps reaching out with something that isn't there.
He's aching for a little human comfort, a little closeness, a little…all right, he wants to get laid. It's not going to fix things – he's not stupid enough to believe that – but it might help him stave off the sorrow for at least an hour or two.
Booster goes to find the Blue Beetle.
He's not sure about this, but he likes Beetle, and Beetle seems to like him. He was the only one who didn't glare daggers at him when Max, uh, "introduced" him to the League, and Booster's pretty sure he heard Beetle calling his name when they were fighting the Gray Men. Plus, well, Beetle seems to touch him a lot.
He finds Beetle under the computer console, apparently hooking it into some kind of network. The computers of this era are laughable, but it's still clear that Beetle's got a certain talent with them.
"Hey," he says.
Beetle slides out from under the console. He's pulled his mask off, and for the first time Booster gets a good look at the Blue Beetle's face. Messy auburn hair, dark blue eyes…his nose is too big, but when he smiles like he's doing now those eyes come alive, and yeah, this will work.
"Hey," Beetle replies. "What's up?"
Booster lounges in the doorway, draping himself to best effect. "You, uh…you wanna get a drink or something?"
Beetle glances upwards at the computer console, then back at Booster. Booster decides he likes seeing Beetle on his back like this. "Sure," Beetle says. "Give me five minutes."
Five minutes is plenty of time to change, especially since his clothing was the first thing he unpacked (well, he didn't want it to get wrinkled). No more tuxedo jackets over his costume for Booster; he's been watching Miami Vice, he knows the score. He pushes the sleeves up on his sports coat, runs his fingers through his hair one last time, and heads down to the front hall.
Oops. Beetle's still in costume; he's even put the cowl back on. Booster has a momentary twinge of panic – what if Beetle gets all weird about the secret identity thing? Booster can't imagine Batman stepping out in civvies for a casual drink. Then again, Booster can't imagine Batman taking his cowl off to work, or having a smile like that.
"Oh, we're doing civvies?" Beetle asks. "Sorry. Give me another five?"
Booster relaxes. "Sure."
It's less than five before Beetle is back downstairs, in a pretty-much-awful maroon sweater and rumpled pants. Okay, so he's not a GQ model. If things go as planned, he won't be wearing it long.
Beetle smiles at him. "Let's blow this popsicle stand."
It's a nice night, warm for the time of year. Though the sky is clear it's too bright in the city to see the stars, but the lights of Paris more than make up for it. They stroll along the banks of the Seine to a quiet café in the shade of the Eiffel Tower, and it's all so perfect Booster can't quite believe it's real.
"Bienvenue, monsieurs," says the waiter, handing them a wine list.
"Uh…hi." Booster feels suddenly awkward, but Beetle just grins at him.
"No French, huh?" he asks.
No use saying that French is a dead language where he comes from. Booster just smiles and shrugs.
Beetle scans the wine list, then looks up at Booster. "Red okay?"
"Sure." Booster hasn't actually had that much wine in his life; there are faster ways to get drunk in the future.
The waiter returns and Beetle orders in French, so perfect the waiter doesn't even sneer at him. Booster can't help but gape a little; it's a crime that a language so effortlessly beautiful was allowed to die, but even more of a crime that every word Beetle says isn't in it.
Beetle sees his expression and chuckles. "I had a French au pair," he explains. "Well, several, actually. And we spent summers here, me and my mom, while Dad was working."
"Well, of course," Booster says. "Who hasn't summered in Paris with their multiple au pairs? Naturally."
Beetle has the good grace to look embarrassed. "Mom wanted me to be cosmopolitan. She was speaking to me in three languages – she was Russian – from the day I was born."
Booster raised an eyebrow. "You speak Russian, too?"
"Da. And, um, Arabic."
"Arabic."
"Well, enough to get by. I learned late, so my accent is terrible."
"Yes," Booster says. "It must be awful to be only passingly fluent in a fourth language." He laughs and shakes his head. "Man, I took three years of Interlac in high school and forgot everything but the dirty words the minute the final was over."
"Interlac…?"
"Intergalactic Universal Language. It's required," Booster explains as the waiter returns with a bottle and two glasses. "They're actually speaking an archaic form of it offplanet now – at least, that's what Guy says."
The waiter pours out the wine. "Merci," Beetle says.
"Yeah, um, mercy," Booster says. He gets a sneer, but he ignores it. "And, you know, you pick up a lot of the slang here and there," he continues as the waiter leaves, "but it's still required to have some formal instruction in it. Uh, was requ — will be required."
"Man, that's so crazy." Beetle picks up his glass. "Well. To the League?"
"To the League," Booster agrees, and clinks his glass against Beetle's before taking a sip. Wowzer, that's more flavor than he expected, and he coughs as the wine goes down. He's not used to alcohol tasting like alcohol. "Grife!"
"Is that a future swear word?" Beetle asks, looking delighted.
Booster nods. "It means…well, about what you think it means."
He can see Beetle happily filing that knowledge away in that big ol' brain of his. Beetle leans forward. "Tell me about the future," he says eagerly.
Booster bites his lip. This isn't the first time he's been asked that, but it is the first time he's been asked that by someone with the capability to actually create some of the future tech Booster describes. "I dunno, Beetle…"
"Ted," Beetle interrupts. "Ted Kord."
Booster feels stupidly pleased. "Um, Michael Carter," he admits. "But even before I came here – people have been calling me Booster since I was 14. Football nickname."
Beetle – Ted – nods. "Fair enough. So…?"
Booster hedges again. "It's just…I'm afraid talking too much about it will, you know. Corrupt the timestream. Muddy the natural march of progress or something."
"You mean, like, if you tell me how to build a perpetual motion device before it's supposed to be invented, it'll break time?" Ted asks.
"Something like that."
Ted squints at him. "Do you know how to build a perpetual motion device?"
"…Well, no."
"Besides," Ted adds, taking another sip of his wine, and Booster sips some of his too and doesn't even cough too much, "you can't create a paradox."
"Huh?" Booster says wittily.
"If you change the future enough, you won't be born, right?" Ted asks. Booster nods. "But if you're never born, you can't change the future so that you won't be born. So maybe you're really supposed to tell me about the future, because that will help make the future what it is. Because if you weren't supposed to, you couldn't, because you wouldn't be here to do what you're not supposed to do. Right?"
Booster frowns. "Now my head hurts."
"Have some more wine," Ted suggest, and tops off his glass. "Look, I promise I won't build any future tech without your permission, okay?"
The wine is good, Booster decides. It tastes like an easing of tension, like afterglow. "Deal."
And he tells Beetle – Ted – about the future, as the stars pass unseen above them in the sky and the sounds of Paris traffic grow ever more distant with each sip of wine. Somehow talking about the future turns into talking about Michelle, and the ache in his chest eases at the sympathy in Ted's eyes, and the way he laughs in all the right places, like the time he read Michelle's holojournal and she managed to lock him out of the apartment without a stitch of clothes on in retaliation. It's easy to talk to Ted, natural, and easy to listen to him too, when he talks about his childhood, his projects, something the first Blue Beetle once said to him.
The wine is a slow burn deep in Booster's stomach. He's not drunk, he's just warm, relaxed, and he doesn't know why he was so down on Ted's sweater before, because there's a peek of dark chest hair at the collar that's captivating Booster utterly. It makes his thoughts drift rather lower than Ted's collar.
"Heh," Ted says, and nods at something behind Booster. Booster turns to see a total odd couple – him lanky and kind of goofy-looking, her petite and lovely – locked in an embrace.
"Cute," Ted says.
"Well, Paris," Booster replies with a little shrug. "City of Love, right?"
"City of Lights officially, but you're not far off," Ted says. "If I were…" He trails off, looking distracted.
Booster wants to bring him back. "Speaking of love," he says, "you know, me and Black Canary were here when we were fighting the Manhunters, but it wasn't exactly a pleasure cruise. What I mean is…" and he makes to oh-so-casually drop his hand on Ted's where it's resting on the table between them, "…last time I was in Paris I didn't really get a chance to enjoy it…but this time…"
Oblivious, Ted reaches for his glass, and Booster's hand lands on the table. "I just hope Black Canary's not too upset 'cause we skipped out for a couple of hours."
Bring him back, bring him back. Booster leans forward, lets the tip of his shoe slide along the edge of Ted's foot. "Aw, c'mon, Beetle – loosen up." He uses Ted's costumed name deliberately, to remind him they're not on business right now. "Canary's not going to mind."
"You don't know her as well as I do, Booster…she's one tough lady." Ted turns to watch a woman in extremely short, extremely tight candy-striped hot pants walk by. He doesn't seem to notice Booster's foot, and Booster starts to get a sinking sensation, overwhelming the comfort of the wine.
"Hey – and speaking of ladies…" You clearly like them, but is that all you like? he wants to ask, but he's already found that you don't just blurt out that sort of thing in this century.
Ted seems to take his words in an entirely different direction. "What they say about French women sure is true, huh?" There's naked appreciation on his face of the half-dozen gorgeous women who seem to be suddenly surrounding their table. And where did they all come from?
Booster sighs. He'd thought he was finally getting the hang of this era's social nuances – picking up on the subtext of Ted's touches, Ted's smiles, Ted's warm interest in him. And though to be honest he'd only been looking to get laid tonight, during their conversation he'd thought he'd felt…a spark. A connection. But Ted doesn't even seem to know they're on a date.
He doesn't understand this century at all.
But there's no sense moping about it – and he is, after all, still surrounded by beautiful women. "Yeah," he says, pasting on his cockiest grin. "Now the trick is picking out the lucky ones who are going to spend the evening with us."
It looks like he and the Blue Beetle are just going to be friends, he thinks as they volley quips back and forth across the tiny table. Friends. Okay. Booster can do that.
But he memorizes the name of the café, and the vintage of the wine.
Just in case.