MORSE.

'Marry me,' he says, like it's obvious. Like it's as simple as offering her a handkerchief, rather than a stupid, impulsive commitment that he'll be sure to regret. A proposal. What is he thinking?

For a few seconds, she can't do anything but stare. She doesn't remember how to breathe, even, but then she exhales sharply, looks down and to the side. That's the most eye contact he's ever made with her. It's... More persuasive than it has any business being; a girl might do anything he asked when faced with that look. But that doesn't make this a smart idea. It doesn't even put it into the realm of possibility. "Morse," she says, shaking her head just slightly. What is she supposed to say? 'Oh, yes, what a brilliant idea, actually, let's just up and get married.' He's never even asked her for a date. All they have was him asking her not to go, letting her go anyway, and then finding her after she'd needed a voice on the phone.

I don't want your pity.

Perhaps she's trying to be kind. Perhaps she'd prefer to call it pity and push it away than to confront his desperate, foolish love. It is, at least, kinder than Susan's choice to say yes and then give him back the ring later, once something better came along.

It doesn't stop it from hurting. Even like this, when her options are few and her situation is dire, the thought of being with him is so bad that it isn't worth the protection it would bring her. He isn't worth it. It's not a surprise, but it breaks his heart all the same.

He has to turn away, desperately trying to blink back tears. Even now, after the rejection, he can't bear to fully tear himself away from the situation, or ask her to leave.

"I've been offered a job in London," he says, when it's been so long that he has to find something else to say, to try and move on from the utter mess he's just made. "The Met. Tintagel House. I've got to meet a detective inspector over there on Monday, but it's just a formality."

Not that it will matter much to her, he supposes, but she came here tonight, and if she needs somewhere to go, he'd rather she knew where to find him. If he can't offer her the protection of marriage, then... he has a little money, at least. Nothing else, on account of the recent burglary, and not a lot, but he has to do something. He takes the money from the tin and insists she takes it, and then the phone rings. It's work, because of course it is, and he really doesn't want her to leave, but he's powerless to stop her.

Save the world for me.

------

London is different. A new world all of its own, and he quickly finds himself drawn into saving it in the little ways he can. It's no easier to fit in there than it is for him to fit in anywhere else, but it's a new start with a rank he's more than earned by now.

Some things stay the same. At the end of each day, he still goes home to a cheap, empty flat, and spends his evenings with his music and a mind still occupied with whichever case he's on with. He's expecting to be doing just that in an hour or so, when he's told there's someone asking for him at the front desk.

Morse heads down, a little puzzled, but assuming it must be a witness or someone he's talked to recently on one case or another.

It isn't.

"What you did was incredibly stupid," she says, and Julian feels the guilt wash through him again. "Your boyfriend could have easily died from this complication, and even a pre-med student would know that. You have a great deal more education than that, yet you took the risk anyway. I have half a mind to contact your med school." She pauses, and Julian has to use an incredible amount of self-control to keep from saying anything that would only make the situation worse. "I haven't actually decided not to, yet. Frankly, I think your professors ought to know about this failure to follow basic ethical guidelines. Doctors don't treat family for a reason. Have you learned your lesson?"

Julian swallowed, looking awkwardly away. "Yes, ma'am. I won't take a risk like this again. I... I understand the mistake I made."

She waits a moment, evidently trying to decide whether he's being honest, then she concludes, "Good. Now go in there and hold his hand, and stop trying to be his doctor."

He listens as best he can, but he does have to really concentrate, and he doesn't catch every word. It's still enough for him to gather that Julian is getting a serious telling-off.

Julian is... giddy. Giddy is probably the best word for it. His joy and excitement and hope are all buzzing and fizzing inside him and it's wonderful.

To have graduated second in his class instead of first was an incredible achievement--he can't explain to anyone how delicate a line that was to walk or how pleased he is by it, but it was huge--and then to have his pick of assignments... Granted, not all of those assignments allowed families, and even fewer allowed families in the first six months. But Julian wasn't going to leave Morse behind--not ever. He'd decided that ages ago.

So they'd looked at them all, and they'd narrowed the options, and they'd discussed it, and somehow, Morse hadn't even objected to going so far away that the posting wasn't even within the Federation's borders. Someplace that was just coming out of an occupation and a war for independence, where the government was only provisional and the economy was in shambles. It was a station of Cardassian origin, run by Bajor now, where he'd be free to research in the time he had left over from handling the day-to-day medical needs of the local populace. He couldn't actually imagine anything better.

And so he'd applied and he'd been accepted, and they had excitedly shoved their entire lives into as few boxes and bags as possible and they'd gotten on a ship. A ship which was now approaching a station that maybe had seen better days, but Julian couldn't care about that. Everything has been going so well.

He reaches for Morse's hand and squeezes it tightly, grinning, then he points at the planet not so very far off. "Look at that! There's going to be a storm soon, over the southern part of that continent." Of course, they can't be allowed to marvel for too long.

"Lieutenant Bashir, we'll be docking with the station in four minutes. Please make your way to the port-side deck two airlocks."

He'd follow Julian Bashir anywhere. If a Bajoran station outside of Federation space is where Julian Bashir wants to go and make his home, then that's the place Morse will call home, too.

Excitement and pride for Julian are at the forefront of his mind, and so he hugs back tightly and kisses his partner several times on the cheek, rubbing his back firmly as though charging him up with energy, the way touches between them always seem to renew Morse's own energy. "Are you?" he asks, pulling back only enough to let him cup Julian's cheek, adoring. "You've wanted this for a long time. I'm- I'm glad, you know. To experience it with you."

It feels so overwhelmingly good that Morse briefly loses all awareness of his surroundings, completely entranced by the flood of sensations. His back arches sharply and he pulls at his arms again, straining against the binds without any conscious goal but to feel them. Self-consciousness forgotten entirely, he makes a whole series of desperate little noises, hardly even aware of them himself, as he tenses and jerks and squirms into and away from the pleasure inflicted on him by Julian's mouth. He bends his knees and presses his feet against the bed, as though trying to give himself leverage to press himself up, but he lets each foot slide against the bedcovers purely for the extra sensation instead of planting them properly.

He resists for a few seconds longer, gone stiff and tense with shame the way that he so often does, but when he doesn't manage to easily escape, he lets out a breath and just sags against Zan, his face hidden against his shoulder.

Morse folds into that hug desperately, still brimming with hurt. Thursday doesn't understand. He's disappointed. Somehow more so in Morse than in the police force. It hurts so much because Morse should've done better. He spent his whole stay in prison knowing that, hating himself for it, and though he'd already been sure, having it cemented by Thursday himself unleashes a new wave of guilt and self-hatred he hadn't known it was possible to feel.

The pain he can see on Thursday's face leaves his own looking nothing short of devastated. He can do nothing but look back at him with the same desperately sad eyes he's fixed on him on numerous occasions, and listen. If that's how it is. No matter how sure he felt before this visit, and no matter how surely he's just argued his point, Thursday holds the power to sew self-doubt in him with nothing but a look.

The teacup smashing startles him, snatching his attention immediately. He catches Zan's gaze briefly, and he knows, in that moment, that he's seen his hurt. He looks away again, tensing as Thursday takes a step towards him.