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Maxwell sits outside the brig, clad just in his shirtsleeves and trousers, looking through the small barred window at Torse. Even in confinement, even in rage, he is magnificent to behold, all broad iron plates and pointed spines, the red glow of his iron heart casting each joint in sharp relief. Beautiful. Maxwell would never say that out loud, but he was, at this point, brave enough to think it to himself. Even the events of yesterday, that had led to Torse's newfound sleeping chambers being the brig, would not change his mind. Knuckle knives, fully bared, flying towards his face. Torse's glowing red gaze directed full force at him, battle-fire enraging him. Max had ducked, and dodged, and his heart had leapt into his throat. Torse's knuckle knives had sunk into the deck of the Zephyr instead of Maxwell's skull, leaving a hole six inches deep in the hard wood.
A beat of silence had hung in the air. Two. Three. Maxwell's pulse raced, the heat of battle and the chill of fear warring within his chest. Were it not for his reflexes, Torse - with his iron heart and his glowing red gaze - would have killed Maxwell where he stood.
Torse had looked up then, from his position knelt on the deck, at Maxwell, and then at Marya. “Lock me up,” he had said, in low, gravelly tones. “It's not safe.”
He had not looked at Maxwell again, too filled with something like shame, something that did not quite fit inside his new, old, iron heart.
They had. Maxwell had not been there, had instead gone and sat on the floor of the washroom, an ice cold cloth around his neck, his hands trembling.
Now, in fact, is the first time he has set eyes on Torse since then.
“Leave,” Torse says.
“No.”
“Leave,” says Torse again, and his iron fist clangs into the bars of the door, ringing like an awful, dissonant bell.
“I'm not going to,” says Max, says The Max, stubborn as anything and with a complete lack of self preservation to boot. “I don't think you're a danger.”
Torse doesn't speak, just whirs at him, the red glow of his chest brightening.
Max looks at him, really looks, takes in every inch of shining iron - lovingly polished by Maxwell's own hands - every spine and blade, the minute scratches on Torse's right hand from punching the bars of his cage. He's still beautiful. Is that so awful to admit? Even when Torse had almost killed him, coming off the tail of a long fight, Maxwell had been unable to change that thought. It wouldn't have been the worst way to go.
“Why did you do it?” he asks, instead of admitting it.
Torse growls at him, the sound emanating from low in his chest. “I do not know. It is as I said. There is no room in my heart for anything but rage.”
Max nods, considering. “Why would that mean you try to kill me?” he asks, his curiosity deadly.
Torse looks away. “You are not going to leave, are you.” It's not a question, despite being phrased as one.
“No. Tell me. I'll sit here and ask you until you do.” It shouldn't matter so much. Someone Max cares for got his mind fucked and then tried to kill him. It happens. But if they can't get the golden heart out of that submersible's engine, Torse will be like this forever. Maxwell…
He needs to know.
Torse turns his face back to Max.
“If there is no room in this heart for anything other than rage…” says Torse, slow, deliberate, careful. “There is no room for you. I would cut you out.”
It should not be flattering. It should not make Maxwell's heart race in his chest. It should not do anything other than give him fear, make him leave, get away from the metal man who apparently takes the phrase love him to death a little too literally.
“He thinks you are beautiful,” says Torse. “The other me. He would not think so once I was done with you. This iron heart… it was not meant for such attachments. You should not be here. My- the heart of Zern makes it dangerous for you.”
“And now?” Max asks. “Do you think I'm beautiful?” He hadn't meant to say it. It's absolutely not the appropriate thing to ask. If his beauty makes Torse's machinery wish to see him dead, then surely the best answer would be a resounding no.
But when Torse growls out a “Yes,” reluctantly, through a gritted vocal modulator, Maxwell's heart damn near sings.
“How does that… feel?” he asks, all trepidation and curiosity, like the first time he'd stepped in the ring. Circling your opponent. Then the feint. Soon, the strike, whatever it will be. He's just checking his range right now.
One of them will land a blow soon.
“Awful,” says Torse. “Perfect. But awful. The iron of this heart is not meant to know beauty. It - I - wish to see it struck out. Then… I will be pure of purpose. You… I look at you, and am- overwhelmed, overloaded, Maxwell, you need to leave. Stop humiliating me like this. There is a reason he never told you, forcing my- my confession like this is cruel. Will you tell them I am a pervert as well as a danger?”
Heat floods Maxwell's abdomen, the adrenaline of a good fight, the thrill of arousal, breath leaving his mouth in short, sharp, bursts.
“No,” he says, and he unlocks the door. “Spar me.”
Marya had removed the knuckle knives, as a temporary precaution when Torse had been locked up. Even without them, his hands are still vicious clubs of hard iron.
“No. I will not hurt you.” There is the audible grinding of gears as Torse's hands flex and curl into perfect fists, as intricate as any humans. They would not be soft against Maxwell's skin, but he wants to feel them anyway. The punch, the caress, it's all the same.
“You won't,” says Maxwell, whose mind has somewhat fled him. “Spar me. No head hits. First to be pinned loses.” He's done checking, now. One of them has to make the first hit.
When he pulls open the door, Torse lunges for him, brutal speed and efficiency. He has an almost perfect economy of movement, not taking a single wasted step, nor extending his reach any further than he needs to to strike at Maxwell's abdomen. This is nothing like a friendly bout of gentleman fisting.
As Maxwell steps back to avoid Torse's blow, it feels like a fight to the death. He's at a distinct disadvantage here, as Torse's lesser in both height and weight. If he wants to avoid those blows, he has no choice but to close range, get in close and risk being pinned. With an opponent made of flesh, he could dance at the edge of their range, tire them out by baiting them into striking.
Torse has no such weaknesses. Built for war, he will not tire, he will not be baited. He is, Maxwell must admit, the perfect warrior. Maxwell darts a blow at his knee anyway, hoping that the joint can be encouraged to bend in a way that will lower Torse to the floor. It almost works - the knee bends, as if Torse is kneeling, and then it steadies, hydraulics hissing. “Clever,” says Torse, and it may be Maxwell's imagination but he sounds a little breathless. “You are a fine warrior. On that, my other and I agree.”
“Glad to hear it,” quips Max, despite not having the air to. It's dangerous to talk while fighting. Distracts you. Torse chucks a blow at his side, fist glancing off of ribs. Even without the knuckle knives, the ridges of his fist are a lethal weapon. A clever sidestep turns the injury Maxwell would receive from broken ribs to a mere bruise. He won't pretend the sensation isn't oddly pleasant, and neither will he pretend that he has any chance of really winning this. A six foot eight, twenty stone metal behemoth is not something a man can beat, no matter how much he believes. And there is neither Monty nor Marya to save him from the dinosaur this time. He makes another shot at Torse's leg, hoping to wrap a thigh and bring him down that way, but the thud of his full body weight into metal only succeeds in pushing Torse a few inches and bruising his shoulder quite severely.
Worse, it leaves him open. Torse's knee comes up, hits him square in the solar plexus, and all of a sudden Maxwell is flat on his back, a marvel of engineering standing over him. He pushes back with his feet, tries to squirm out from underneath him, but Torse kneels, pinning Maxwell's thigh between his own. He places a cool, broad hand on Maxwell's flushed chest, over his racing heart, and presses him into the floor. Heat floods Maxwell's body anew, Torse's knee just two inches shy of where he wants it, the danger of the situation doing everything but dampening the fire in his chest, between his legs.
Then Torse leans forward, and a smooth metal thigh presses where Maxwell strains against the front of his trousers. “I believe,” he says, in low, dangerous tones, “that I have won.”
“I'm still alive,” says Maxwell, who had never quite learnt when to cut his damn losses and take the safe option.
“You are,” says Torse. “And at my mercy.” The hand on Maxwell's chest moves to his hair, pulls his head back, exposing his neck. “I could kill you,” says Torse. “Part of me thinks I should.” His thigh pushes further into Maxwell, pure, electrifying sensation. Does the danger make it better? Or is it just the man above him that pushes him to new heights?
He rolls his hips into Torse's thigh, out of instinct more than anything else. He should be scrabbling to escape. He should be trying to get unpinned, to run, he should certainly not be rubbing up on his friend, not when said friend is currently far from his usual self. “Tell me not to,” says Torse. Maxwell had forgotten that his life was currently in danger. Or maybe he hadn't - maybe that very fact explained why he was currently the hardest he'd ever been in his life.
“No,” he says, swallowing down the high-pitched whine. “Make that choice yourself. Or finish me off.” Bruises are developing already on his skin, hair ripping out at the roots from Torse's grip, his lung capacity limited by the weight of Torse's body pressing him into the floor.
Then - the pressure lifts, just slightly. Torse still cages him into the floor, but his hand disentangles from Maxwell's hair, the weight on his lungs lessens, and Maxwell can take in strangled, greedy breaths again, can smell how his sweat dampens Torse's metal. The thigh between his legs doesn't move.
“I cannot do it,” says Torse. “I will not hurt you.” It looks like it pains him to say it, to go so firmly against what his nature wants. To carve room in his heart for something other than the fight.
He's beautiful. Maxwell had already known this, of course, but he notices it anew now, the way that Torse's jaw sets, hard and stubborn against his own unwanted wishes.
“Does that mean I can go?” Max asks. He can deal with it in his room, if Torse lets him up now. It's a better outcome than it could have been. It is likely even the sensible outcome, to wait until Torse is his golden self again and talk about it then.
“No,” says Torse, and he presses his thigh back into Maxwell's crotch. “You have flushed. Is it because of me?” His gaze is steady, but the ticking of his heart speeds up.
“Yes,” Maxwell says, a breathless, wrecked gasp, and he grinds up into Torse's leg again. “Either- either let me up, or help finish me off.” It's undignified, to beg like this, and he wouldn't do anything else.
A rumble emanates from Torse's chest. “I… I may hurt you,” he says. “If you would-”
“Please,” says Max. “I don't- Just- That's fine.” He wants it, wants Torse's hand in his hair or around his throat or somewhere, wants to feel this tomorrow and the day after and the day after that, a new kind of fight.
He grinds up into Torse, again and again, chasing pleasure, release, something. Torse's hand grips his jaw, hard enough to bruise, and forces him to make eye contact. He doesn't want to flinch away from that stern red gaze, for once in his life. One cool thumb touches his lower lip, and Maxwell can do nothing but take it into his mouth, taste metal and his own sweat from it.
Torse's other hand goes to the buttons of his trousers, flicks them open, untucks his shirt. He traces fingers down the trail of hair along Maxwell's abdomen, dips below the waistband of his undershorts. “Soft,” he says. “Fragile. It would be so easy to-”
“It wouldn't,” says Maxwell, cutting Torse off even as a wretched part of him finds a thrill in the threats. “You would not let yourself.” He puts a hand on Torse's chest, testing his resistance. “I trust you,” he says, despite the fact that he shouldn't, and he shifts to slot himself into Torse's lap, pressing his hips into Torse's pelvic plate, his underwear damp from arousal, his every nerve alight.
“That is unwise,” says Torse, and Maxwell wishes there was a mouth that he could stop.
“Shut up,” he says, and he presses his mouth, wet and open, to the side of Torse's face, to his jaw, to his neck. “Touch me,” he orders, begs, pleads, something. Torse obliges. It's easier to calm the urge to mangle, to strike, to squeeze, when he has commands, and he slides his hand back under Maxwell's waistband and wraps a deft hand around him, cold against heated skin. The contrast sings through Maxwell, sparking every nerve in electric fire. Cool metal and hot flesh, incredible violence and gentle touch, his pounding heart and heavy breathing against Torse's mechanical chest. He presses a forehead into Torse's shoulder, mouth wet and open against the sheet metal as Torse works at him, his hands unlike anything Maxwell has ever felt and the most perfect sensation he has ever known. Despite the red visor, despite the heart full of rage, despite his earlier fears, Torse's hands are gentle, grounding in their pressure. Max wishes briefly that Torse had his knuckle knives, that the possibility of violence was there, that he could get real pain out of this.
But this is good, too. Torse's hands on him, clockwork ticking in his ear, building heat in his groin as he bucks his hips into Torse's hand.
“Torse,” he sighs, desperate, longing, a little more in love than he should be.
“Yes?” says the robot, briefly stilling. “Is everything- Are you okay?” It sounds like a struggle to say it, his voice low and gravelly in his chest. “I warned that I may hurt you,” he says, and he starts to pull away.
“No,” says Max, and he tests his teeth on Torse's shoulder. “I- keep going. It was good. You're good, fuck, please.”
“Maxwell,” says Torse, into his ear, and Max whines, high pitched and humiliating. “Say it again. Tell me- Tell me I am good.”
Max's mouth drops open as Torse's hand moves, pressed open to his shoulder, tasting clean metal there. “You're good,” he manages to gasp out, between heated breaths. “You're good, Torse, you are, I swear.” He bucks his hips again, too quick, inelegant motions into Torse's hand. “So, so good, to me, fuck.”
“Maxwell,” says Torse, in a voice that on a human would be breathless, and Maxwell spills over, covering Torse's hand, going limp in his arms.
One of Torse's hands goes to Maxwell's back, supporting his weight, and Max takes the other to his mouth, cleaning between knuckles with his tongue. These hands are perfectly safe. He feels safe between them, and Torse's chest glows brighter when he takes the second knuckle into his mouth, tasting his own spend from now-warm metal skin. Torse's entire body seems to still, the world shrinking down just to his fingers and Maxwell's mouth, to a warm, gentle touch. Maxwell pulls off of him with a pop, his hand still wrapped around Torse's wrist, his chest still flushed and heaving with exertion.
“You're not a danger,” says Maxwell. “Iron heart or gold. You- You are good,” he tells Torse, suddenly the most important piece of information in the world.
“I… Thank you,” says Torse. “I did not- I do not- I would-” he breaks off into a frustrated whirring noise, unable to organise his thoughts. “I wish to keep you safe,” he says, eventually. “And I fear… this heart does not want me to. I do not- If I were to endanger you-”
“You won't,” says Maxwell, and he brings Torse's hand back to his mouth, kisses the palm of it, a featherlight touch. “I can defend myself. You have to- you have to trust me, Torse, if you cannot trust yourself.”
Torse nods. “I will trust you,” he says, more a promise than a certainty. “I have never met a stronger man of flesh.”
Maxwell laughs, and brings Torse's hand to press against his heart, to feel the beat of it, still steady and strong.