Chapter Text
If Barry had to deliver Thawne’s lunch late that was his business.
The killer should be grateful Barry hadn’t left him to starve, instead of bitching about when his meal arrived. While some part of him could agree that being so late the blond essentially missed lunch might have been a bit... insensitive, it was certainly better than what he deserved. Barry at least had the decency to feed the man three times a day. Thawne should be grateful for that, too. Thawne could probably survive just as well on one meal, given the sudden decrease in the amount of calories he was burning, and the fact his lack of speed meant that he no longer had to eat his weight in Big Belly Burger a day. But the Reverse Flash seemed to have other ideas, if the way he acted when Barry was an hour or two behind schedule was any indication. On those days, his nemesis would throw an absolute raging fit. At first it had been almost satisfying to see his mother’s murderer reduced to some frothing animal pacing in a cell, or throwing a tantrum like a petulant toddler, but the behaviour had quickly become annoying much like everything else about caring for the other man.
So when Barry delivered lunch at the same time he usually delivered dinner, the silence that greeted him immediately put him on edge. Barry began to feel like he was walking into a trap as he approached the cell. It was too quiet. He couldn’t even see Thawne properly, only the vague outline of his form where he was sprawled across the floor of the cage.
These past few days, Reverse Flash had been a different kind of restless and knowing that was no comfort given the man’s sudden stillness. Gone was Thawne's usual performance, one that more often than not involved shouting, banging on the cell bars, and an excessive amount of hand gestures. Now, the only sign proving Eobard hadn’t finally died was the rage quietly simmering in the other's eyes.
“For the fastest man alive,” the Reverse shifted slightly, so he could get a better view of his captor, “You’re awfully bad at keeping your appointments, Flash. But then again,” Thawne huffed out a laugh, “I can’t really call you that anymore, not with the way you’ve been acting!”
The man went still again; a motion-activated animatronic, disjointed from his movements. Something in his tone made the hair on the back of Barry's neck stand up. While that was not an uncommon occurrence when talking with Eobard Thawne, this time was for an unfamiliar reason. This time, the voice felt empty against his ears; it lacked malice, or commitment. There was definitely emotion bubbling in the man, that was for sure, but it was almost as if he’d forgotten how to convey it. Like he was acting on the memory of an emotion long since burnt out.
For a moment, Barry let himself wonder if Thawne had finally broken from his time in the cage. The idea was appealing, if only for the possibility that Eobard would finally stop trying to break his wrist every time he pushed the bag of food into the cell. But he was as stubborn as a mule and was just as likely to give in as Barry was to let him go. So the idea remained a fantasy, tucked neatly away in the back of Barry’s mind.
“You should watch that tone, Thawne,” Barry threatened. The Reverse’s lethargy was unnerving him. “Keep up the attitude and I might just decide to stop feeding you altogether.”
Eobard huffed, and looked back up at the ceiling, “Ah, but you wouldn’t do that.”
Tiredly, the blond man closed his eyes and gave a half-hearted, dismissive gesture that made Barry feel oddly scorned; like he wasn’t worth the brainpower to think of anything new.
“You’re the hero...”
Again, there was no bite to the other’s words. Scowling, Barry let curiosity get the better of him.
“What’s with you today? Aren’t you supposed to be trying to convince me that I’m a horrible person? Don’t get me wrong, the change is refreshing - but I really don’t like the idea of you dying in there, believe it or not.”
Eobard let out a bark of laughter, “I guess it would be a mighty inconvenience to you - the great and powerful Flash - if you had to drag my lifeless corpse out in a fucking body bag. Where would you even put it?” Eobard turned back to him then, something almost like mischief glittering in his blue eyes. Was Thawne... joking with him? “Would you throw my body into the river and let the fish have a snack? Or maybe you’d want to go with something sexier like dismembering me before stuffing the bits into an old refrigerator horror movie style? Better yet; you’d keep me around in your basement, just let the body rot for a bit in a plastic bag before burying me in the woods. Your pathetic career in forensics might as well be good for something, after all.”
“Are you- Are you making jokes?”
Instead of responding, Eobard’s lips pulled back to reveal white teeth in some vicious mockery of a smile.
“There’s something seriously wrong with you,” Barry began to strut up to the cell, intending to wrangle his nemesis to the floor so he could check his temperature, “If you’re calling your own death sexy. And while I’m painfully aware you’ve convinced yourself you’re in the right here, have you ever stopped to consider that you’re just batshit crazy? This entire show here has pretty much been all the evidence you need to prove it.”
“Barry, darling," dragging out the last word, the blond rolled onto his stomach, kicking his legs into the air and resting his chin on his hands. The whole time looking positively delighted that he’d gotten a reaction out of Barry, “We’ve both known that I’m not completely sane since before we started this whole bullshit rivalry. My mental state is - after all - entirely your fault.”
Barry only glanced up at that, knowing better than to trust Eobard. Instead, he put down the bag of food and busied himself by rummaging around for the keys in his pockets.
Thawne seemed oblivious to his actions and kept on rambling, “But, if you had to make me pick something different about today, it’d be your lip.”
That brought Barry to a halt.
“My what?!” He crooked an eyebrow, incredulous and shocked in equal measure.
“Your lip,” he repeated, as if commenting on the weather, “It’s been split. Got me thinking.”
A strange look overcame the Reverse’s features and Thawne moved to lie back down.
Instinctively, Barry’s fingers snapped up to touch the cut on his bottom lip, nails brushing against the stinging flesh carefully. He’d nearly bitten through it earlier at Jitter’s while trying to work up the courage to ask Iris out on a date. As he made the motion, Thawne’s eyes jumped to follow it, his face lighting up in a way Barry hadn’t seen since the night he captured the murderer. A hungry gaze watched the digit with a predatory manner, and Barry suddenly wanted to run very, very far away from the whole bizarre interaction.
“Creep.”
He hadn’t meant to say that out loud. Gingerly, he palmed the keys in his pocket, taking a moment to steady himself before carrying on with the conversation. His pride forbid him from retreating now - especially considering he was the one holding the power. Thawne was his captive now, not his Reverse. Looking up again, Barry tried to figure out Eobard’s stupidly pleased expression, which had begun to ebb into an almost dreamy look.
“You better not be fantasizing about hitting me in the face up there. I might just take offence to it.”
“Hmm?”
Thawne met Barry’s gaze from where he lay on the floor of the cage, processing for a moment. Once again Barry was hit with the concern that Eobard was coming down with something.
“No, no. I wasn’t thinking of that. You’re not far off though, guess I’ve got to give you some credit there. It’s actually the... opposite that’s being distracting.”
The look in the Reverse’s eyes told Barry that this was some kind of game, a test, maybe. He was looking for a way to make a fool of Barry, and Barry - still furious that his chance with Iris had once again been thwarted by his own lack of confidence - was desperately looking to shut up Thawne for a bit. Figuring out whatever the hell the answer was would probably do the trick.
The brunet took a moment to buffer, aimlessly picking the bag of food off the floor as his thoughts scrambled to put meaning to the other’s words. Barry carded a hand through his hair, thinking. What was the opposite of hitting someone in the face?
“Kicking me in the shin?”
A decidedly breathy laugh came from the prisoner, “Wrong again, Flash!” Lurching to his feet - standing for the first time in the whole encounter - Thawne continued, gloating, “Future you would have gotten it by now. But then again...” Eagerly, the blond leaned forward to grab the bars of the cage, something wild in his expression, “He wasn’t as big an idiot; he knew how to give me what I want .”
“Well maybe if you weren’t such a cryptic bastard I’d have better luck with it! And I thought you weren’t calling me that,” Barry snapped.
With a shit-eating grin, Eobard asked, “Calling you what?”
At that, Barry whipped around, snarling in an animalistic way, fury burning in his lungs. Thawne had been riling him up the entire time, and on top of that he’d had a shit day after he’d unsuccessfully tried to ask Iris out on a date, not to mention the whole Wally-is-risking-his-goddamn-life-while-I-just-stand-on-the-sidelines-and-mope thing, so he was more than a little pissed. Who better to take it out on than his nemesis.
“I should just leave you to starve, you son of a bitch. Or maybe I’ll just stop visiting you - even that’s a gift on my part. Do you know what happens to the human psyche in solitary confinement? It’s not pretty. It wouldn’t even take much effort to barge in there and start pulling teeth, let’s see you keep running that goddamn mouth of yours without molars! And... ” He made an overdramatic, sweeping gesture with the keys, still tightly clutched in his fist, as he searched for words. Thawne just kept looking obscenely delighted, vaguely shifting his hips as Barry ranted, which wasn’t doing anything to improve the Flash’s mood. In a low threat he finished, “And at any time I could easily just drag you out of that filthy cage by your hair and just beat you to a bloody pulp.”
Looking up, checking for a reaction, or maybe to investigate the soft moan that had just come from the cage, Barry nearly choked at what he saw.
Eobard had, apparently, decided to take up pole dancing, an ambition only impaired by the lack of any kind of pole outside of the cage bar which was now crammed snuggly against his crotch. One distracting thigh had been pressed through the bars, making it easier for the yellow-clad man to flex against the metal, and his breath was coming out in short, heaving pants that shook the man’s frame. This, when paired with the hooded eyes and wet, half-open mouth currently plastered over his nemesis’s flushing face was a level of erotic Barry had never wanted to see on the other man. Until now, something in him crooned, traitorously. All thoughts of hatred and rage had left him for the moment.
His expression must’ve been incredibly amusing - Barry momentarily pictured his eyes popping while he attempted to splutter out some kind of response to the scene before him - because Thawne shook his head and laughed. This time the brunet could feel the rush of blood colouring his cheeks. With a soft hum, the blonde pressed his face against the bars, giving the bar between his legs a slow, filthy grind in time with the motion. Blues eyes burned, wild and alive in a way that should have terrified Barry.
Yet he couldn’t pull his gaze away.
Still pressed against the cage, Eobard seemed to take notice of the Flash’s mesmerization, and reached his arms up, letting blackened fingers hook against the cage door. There, he anchored himself and roughly pushed his chest flush against the bars, moaning once. It was enough. Shoving his fist into his mouth, Barry bit down on his knuckles, desperately swallowing down a whimper. He chose to ignore the way the blond purred at the sight. In his pocket, shaking fingers clenched hard into the biting teeth of his keys, seeking something to ground him. Barry’s tongue felt dry.
He was cursing himself internally, brain scrambling to find the reasons detailing why this wrong in every sense of the word, and answers that would’ve come so easily minutes ago were now impossible to grasp. Finally, answers bobbed up through the haze, and though they seemed like meee figments compared to the beast before him, they were something. First and foremost there was Iris, the love of his life, and his mother - dear god what would she think of him, getting hard for her would-be murderer. Not to mention any scrap of human decency he had left, which should have rendered this entire scene revolting. Yet it wasn’t enough. Despite it all he’d become Thawne’s captive audience. And the murderer was taking full advantage of it.
Prying one hand off the top of the cage door, Thawne eased his gloved fingers down his chest, gently taking the zipper of his suit with them. With a languid, borderline delicate pace, a strip of heated skin was revealed. The motion finished with a flourish: one harsh, final thrust of his bulging crotch against the cage, before the freed hand greedily palmed Thawne’s erection. A moan came not a second later, and it seemed neither man could tell if it belonged to Barry or to the caged slut.
“Say it again,” Thawne purred, eyes sliding shut as he punctuated the sentence with a roll of his hips. Barry could see where his chest muscles rippled as he did so.
“W-What?”
“Say it again,” demanding this time. “Tell me what a fucking monster I am. Tell me what you’re going to do to me.”
His blue eyes were vivid, and with his forehead pressed against the wall, the blond hair fell into the man's face, adding to the debauched nature of his posture. His right thigh, still loyally clamped around the pole, was now forced out even further, until leather-clad hips could press against the metal, and his hand-covered crotch could press between one of the cell’s openings.
Barry took a step back, swallowed thickly, and immediately began looking for an exit strategy. His brain was shorting out, and he knew he was ridiculously out of his depth. Whatever Thawne was trying to pull was thoroughly freaking him out, and he was still reeling at the fact the older man had - apparently - not been fearing an attack from Barry, but wanting it instead. The panicked state of the Flash seemed to sober Eobard up a bit. Cursing under his breath, Thawne pulled his remaining leg through an available gap before dropping to the floor, legs dangling over the sides of the raised platform. This reduced both the height difference between the two men and the amount of presence the Reverse Flash held over Barry. In short, he made himself less threatening, and Barry didn’t want to know why.
“You’re an idiot,” Thawne breathed. “Come here.”
He wanted to say no, honestly. He wanted to turn around and run far, far away from this godforsaken warehouse. He wanted to do a hundred different things right now and none of them were ‘listen to Eobard Thawne, serial killer’. But when his nemesis made an impatient noise followed by a beckoning motion, Barry found himself drifting over to the man anyway. While his mind had no interest in doing anything Thawne thought was a good idea, his dick remained stubbornly curious after the blond’s previous performance. As he moved forward, Eobard made a satisfied noise, and haphazardly shrugged off the top portion of his suit, fully exposing the toned lines of his chest.
Numerous scars were now highlighted in the harsh light, most of which - given Thawne was a speedster - shouldn't even exist. The worst ones were the rows upon rows of deep, vicious lines running parallel to his ribs, stark and pink and puckered against tanned skin. But that wasn't what really caught Barry's attention. No, what both terrified and aroused Barry was the great, sweat-slick lightning bolt seared into the flesh above Thawne's heart, haloed by an all too deliberate circle. It was the Flash emblem. His emblem. Barry swallowed around the lump in his throat, not sure how to interpret the feelings bubbling in him. The abandoned bag of food, still perched on one of the warehouse’s large wire rolls, was only duly noted as Barry passed by it, hypnotized by the display Eobard was making with his slow, relaxed movements, flexing muscles, and pale scars.
About a foot away from Thawne, he stopped. Barry just… stood there for a few tense moments that hung thick in the air like mayflies. Green eyes met blue, both calculating and being calculated in equal measure. Almost cautiously, as if not to spook him again, one now-ungloved hand came to brush gingerly against Barry’s bitten bottom lip. They hovered there, and Eobard measured his reaction, before tugging the lip between his forefinger and thumb with a newfound confidence. His hand was hot against Barry’s face, and the calloused fingers brought a whole new level of reality to the otherwise surreal interaction.
In some warped attempt at tenderness, the thumb began to run slowly back and forth across his lip, increasing in fervour each time until Barry, who had started leaning into the pressure, let out a soft whimper as the skin caught against the nearly-healed scab. His accelerated healing hadn’t been working as well as it should have lately. The thought was quickly dismissed as Thawne, instead of simply lessening the pace as his latest mood had led Barry to believe he would, dug his nail into the bruising flesh instead, drawing a cry from the hero. Thawne groaned and aggressively palmed his clothed member.
It shattered the illusion. Barry attempted to jerk back, to move away from the manipulative man who was so clearly trying to lure him into a false sense of security, but was quickly stopped. A jerking motion in the corner of his vision was the only warning he got as the hand previously occupied with Barry's now-bruised lip lunged forward to bury itself in his hair and pull him against the other’s shins with no small amount of force. Cursing his lust-addled brain for not responding any faster, Barry tried to ignore the feeling of heated breath against his face.
“I didn’t say you could go, Allen.”
“You’re the one in the cage, Thawne.”
Irritably, Barry tugged against the hand in his hair, not quite desperate enough to resort to vibrating through the grip. He still hadn’t completely recovered all his speed from his initial run to the warehouse.
Eobard huffed quietly, changing tactics. Purring again, soft and low, he whispered: “You want this.”
He did. But he wasn’t about to tell Eobard that. Thawne tried again, “You know, future you wasn’t nearly this stupid,” the other’s free hand came up to drag its fingertips along Barry’s cheekbone, “Knew what I wanted, what he wanted.”
The brunet didn’t react, instead opting to retort, “You said that already.”
An indifferent hum came from the dark speedster. “Barry, what’s important right now isn’t what I want or what I'm doing. It’s what you need; what you don’t know you need.” The man in question only rolled his eyes, “I know, I know. You’re not normally the one in the spotlight. We both know it’s usually mine, and that I don’t share - but - I’m willing to make an exception just this once. And only because your idiocy is frustrating me in more ways than one.” The statement finished with a growl, as Barry’s face was forced ever closer to the bars, too close for comfort. He thought of ramming his keys into Thawne’s jaw. Or taking the Swiss Army knife in his back pocket and pushing it through one blue eye.
“Let go of me.”
Rather than respond to the Flash’s demand, the hand not currently holding Barry hostage hooked around his wrist, leading it up and up and up until it was brought to rest high on one of Thawne’s thighs, so that his fingertips brushed the junction between leg and hip. His breath hitched. The rational part of him screamed about murder and knives and premeditated crimes. Everything else in him was too busy worshiping the feeling of rough fabric over taut muscle, the slight give of the flesh beneath his palm, the slide of slick skin over leather, the soft noises his nemesis made when Barry’s left hand moved to investigate the remaining thigh. He let his fingers roam and curl across the man in front of him. Skimming the hated suit and nudging at the crinkled layer of fabric ended and revealed flesh began. Barry didn’t dare to let his touch go any higher. Not for now, at least. Absentmindedly, he gazed up at the other in some kind of dazed awe, searching for an answer without knowing what he was asking.
“You need this.”
He did. And the tightness of his jeans agreed with him, so Barry let his roaming hands reach around to grip Thawne’s tight ass and squeeze with a sudden vindication. It earned him a shuddering moan, which gradually dissolved into a pleased laugh as Eobard realized he’d been successful in his efforts; Barry Allen was now undeniably interested in bending him over and fucking him.
“Come into the cage, Barry.” It was said in the same purr as most of Thawne’s previous statements.
Only now did Barry realize that it was supposed to ease the edges off of the other’s voice and make him feel safe. This epiphany struck him with a sudden wave of doubt, but he thought of his Swiss Army knife. He thought of Eobard’s weakened state due to his captivity. He thought of Thawne’s malnourishment from eating nothing but rations. He thought of all the reasons that, if he ended up needing to fight his way out, he’d have an advantage.
Barry went into the cage.