Brotection

Barney looks sad. He tries to grab his drink and misses, fingers passing through the empty air. Ted suspects that his friend has had way more than enough but he lets Barney keep going anyway. He lets him drink his way through the pain.

"I don't get it!" Barney announces suddenly, making Ted jump. His head is all swim-y and he clutches it briefly. "I don't get how she can't see." Barney continues. "Even you figured it out. Is Robin doing this deliberately? No… No, that's- That can't be… She wouldn't..."

Why is it always the case that recently it's always the two of them that are the last ones left at the bar? When Marshall and Lily have disappeared back to stinking suburbia, when Robin has gotten tired of their boy talk, it's always just them: Wingman to wingman, knocking back their beers and shooting the breeze. Ted's noticed something: When the others disappear, Barney kicks back. He stops grandstanding, he stops monologue-ing. He's actually a pretty cool guy. And Ted's got just enough empathy left (around the edges of his brain that haven't been marinaded in alcohol) to see how hard Barney is struggling to make excuses for Robin. How hard he's trying to defend her.

"Nah," Ted slurs, his eyelids feeling heavy. "That's just Robin."

"How did you get through it, dude?" Barney asks him, exasperated.

"I got her a blue orchestra." Ted says with a fond smile at the memory. "Then I made it rain."

Barney snorts.

"And I kept telling her I loved her until she believed me." Ted says, pointedly.

Barney waves his hand, knocking over his empty beer bottle, which Ted rights again. "Now I think we've had enough," he says.

Barney tries to stand but falls back on to the bench, looking a little confused. "Ted, I think my legs aren't working again."

Ted laughs. "How much have we had?"

"I'm not sure... but we finished that bottle of scotch about an hour ago. Doug was threatening to cut us off."

Now it's Ted's turn to snort. "Doug!"

Barney grins at him. "Yeah, who's the badass now, sucker?"

Ted fist-bumps him and then manages to drag his friend to his feet. "Dude, I think you'd better crash upstairs?" He says, wondering if he's even capable of getting up the stairs himself. How in the hell did he get this drunk this quickly? It's crazy! He hasn't felt like this since… he can't remember when he last felt this wasted. It's been a year at least.

He manages (by some kind of miracle) to get the both of them up to the apartment and into his bedroom. For some reason Ted can't quite understand, Barney seems to want to arm-wrestle him over some Bro-code article. Eventually, they both end up collapsed on the bed, the room spinning and spinning until everything goes kind-of fuzzy and Ted's brain goes AWOL.

*--*--*

It's still pretty dark but the window is illuminated by the ghost-light of pre-dawn. Ted yawns sleepily, his mouth parched, his head aching, but he's so warm and comfortable that he can't stand the thought of getting out of bed.

He snuggles closer to the someone in his arms.

There's a naked someone in his arms.

There are naked shoulders beneath his lips. The skin is smooth and warm and firm. The naked-person sighs softly, which Ted takes as an invitation for him to keep kissing, keep nuzzling. He wraps his arms around the naked-person's chest and pulls them closer.

Smooth, firm, flat chest… Flat chest… short hair tickling his nose… These sensations make no sense but he can't stop himself with the kissing and the nuzzling and soon the naked, flat-chest-ed person is making this cute little groaning noise and Ted's shifting his hips, getting hard, rubbing himself insistently against the naked-person.

Ted pulls away just far enough to roll the naked person on to his back.

His back, not her back.

Ted doesn't care. It doesn't phase him as much as it should. Because this naked-person is Barney and Ted knows that Barney's so depraved that there's no way he hasn't got it on with another dude before. And it's not as if Ted hasn't experimented himself in college (Marshall doesn't know everything) but what goes on in dorm-room, stays in dorm-room.

Ted can't see Barney's eyes in the darkness but he knows they're open, knows they're sad, knows that his friend (his bro, his brother) really needs him.

So he pulls himself on top of Barney and he kisses him, firmly, even harshly, because that's what you do with another man; you don't want to be tentative. The kiss grows rougher and as Barney responds, Ted finds himself holding his friend down. Barney becomes skittish, shifting fitful beneath him, so Ted takes his time, kisses him for long, long minutes, drawing the fight out of him, softening him up.

Part of him realises that he's wanted to do this for years.

*--*--*

Ted pins his wrists to the bed.

"Ted?" Barney gulps the name, losing the word as Ted's mouth covers his, his stubble grazing across his chin. He tries to protest, because if he says he doesn't want this, it means he definitely doesn't want this and Ted won't know that in the quiet, languid hind-brain of his sleep-fogged mind he does want this. God he wants this so badly.

So he tries to talk, although Ted has him on his back, on his bed, and he lets one wrist go so that he can insinuate his fingers between their bodies, fisting his erection and pumping it. His eyes go very wide in the darkness and his half-hearted protests die in his throat. It feels good, it feels electric.

It makes him forget the ache inside him, like Robin's a cancer that's spreading, eating him up, threading it's way through his veins, his bones, his marrow…

Ted's hand, jerking, squeezing, his clever, clever hand… it makes him forget…

Barney never understood before why Robin keeps coming back to Ted. He always thought that sex/love were the same thing to Ted. He never knew Ted was so good at this.

"Ted!" This time the word is louder, rounder, richer and full of longing. He squeezes his eyes shut, lips parted, breathing raggedly through the building pressure, building pleasure, building, swelling… "Yes…" He hisses, because he no longer cares about trying to guard himself, his bro-hood, his half-life… He no longer cares about anything but Ted's fist around his dick, Ted's tongue in his mouth, the simple, steady rhythm that only another dude really understands. He doesn't hold back, jerking his hips, and he's coming, coming, pulsing, his senses expanding in the sudden rush…

He snaps back to reality remarkably quickly, his heart racing, his body covered with perspiration. Ted holds him, kissing him softly because he doesn't resist.

It's light outside. He can see Ted's eyes. He can see Ted's brown eyes - kind eyes, compassionate eyes.

He grins. He can feel Ted's erection, pressed against his thigh.

"Thanks dude," he says. "What a way to wake up. You want me to do you?"

Ted chuckles.

*--*--*

They lay on their backs, side-by-side. "So, it's decided…" Ted begins. He looks over at Barney, eyes twinkling with humour.

"Tell no-one about this?" Barney quirks an eyebrow.

"Deal." Ted agrees.

"Deal." Barney grins.

"Deal!" Robin says, standing in the doorway, laughing. "Although hopefully next time you boys'll let me watch?"