Title: A Door Into A New World

Author/Pseudonym: Tinnean

Fandom: Them!

Pairing: Bob Graham/Ben Petersen

Rating: NC-17

Status: New/Complete

Series/sequel: A Door Into A New World series

Disclaimers: These characters belong to the movie studio that gave birth to them (sorry, can't remember which one). They're not mine, but I thought they could use a break after what they've gone through. Although I might be making things a little hard for them.

Notes: I watched this 1954 movie again after years, and was suddenly struck by the slash potential. This is one of those man screws up the earth type movies.

Summary: When FBI agent Bob Graham is sent to the New Mexico desert to investigate reports of several missing people, he meets Ben Petersen, a cop after his own heart

Warning: m/m graphic sex, language, spoilers for the movie

A Door Into A New World

By Tinnean

Episode 1

"When man entered the atomic age, he opened a door into a new world. What we eventually find beyond that door, no one can predict." -Dr. Harold Medford

I had been with the FBI since the end of the war. One of the OSS' youngest officers, the government agency snapped me up once I had been discharged. I was given cases that no one else wanted to touch, dared to touch. I had a reputation for being cool, thorough and tough.

But then everything turned to shit, if you'll pardon my French. I had too much to drink one night and something happened that wiped out eight years of loyal service, not to mention all the torturous work I had done during the war.

My superiors reacted predictably. They started shutting me out of the loop. I began getting piss-poor performance reviews, in spite of the fact that I was at the top of my game. My assignments were bottom of the barrel types, more suitable for the inexperienced members of local law enforcement agencies.

So when J. Edgar called me into his office, I wasn't totally unprepared for the orders he gave me. But I was still devastated.

"Bob, I think you need a vacation."

"Sir, I just came back from two weeks abroad. If I could just..."

"No. There is no getting around this, Bob. Things are becoming too delicate with this administration. I need you out of town, and I need you out of town, *now*! I'm sending you to New Mexico to look into some missing persons cases there."

"Sir, I think I deserve better than that!" I couldn't resist saying bitterly.

J. Edgar sighed. "You're a good man, Bob. But right now you're just too hot! I can't keep you here in DC. If you don't take this assignment, I'm afraid I'll have no choice but to request your resignation!"

I had to fight to keep a stiff upper lip. Thirty-three fucking years old, and I would have cried like a baby! The Bureau was my life, and they were kicking my ass out without a second thought!

"Will..." I had to stop and clear my throat, fighting to retain my composure. "Will I be allowed to return?"

J. Edgar's eyes were cold. "I can't promise anything."

In other words, don't hold your breath waiting.

I knew why he was doing this to me. He didn't trust me to keep my mouth shut.

And all because *someone* couldn’t keep his hands off my dick.

The paranoid son of a bitch! What went on behind Bureau walls, *stayed* behind Bureau walls!

I left J. Edgar's office, barely able to see through the tears in my eyes. The Bureau was all I lived for, and now I was being cut loose. I avoided the elevator and took the emergency stairs that led down to the first floor. Studiously I made it a point not to look anyone in the eye. I couldn't bear for them to see how far I had fallen.

****

I left town later that day, catching the red eye to the coast and then making the connection from there back to New Mexico.

The New Mexico state police sent an officer to meet me at the airport, and I nearly stumbled over a crack in the runway when I saw him.

He had to be a few years my senior, but the stripes on his dark blue uniform sleeve proclaimed him a sergeant. A warm smile greeted my raised eyebrow and he thrust out a welcoming hand.

"I'm Ben Petersen. It's good of you to come out and give us a hand!"

Obviously he had no idea that my presence in his state was in the nature of a demotion.

He still believed his government gave a rat's ass about its citizens.

Reluctantly I took his hand and received a jolt as the calluses on his palm pressed against the calluses on mine.

"Bob Graham," I said as I released him, surreptitiously shaking my fingers, wondering where that almost electrical shock came from.

"Nice to meet you Bob. Town's filled with tourists this time of year, so you’ll have to stay at my place, if that's okay with you?"

I was almost numb. I felt as if my dearest wish had been granted, as if my deepest fear had risen up to strike at me. I was torn.

"Oh. That's... fine, Ben. Thank you." My lips were stiff.

He clapped me on the shoulder and hoisted up the suitcase that was at my feet. "Great! Let's go! My car's just over there." He led the way to where a battered ‘49 Ford was parked, chatting cheerfully.

I didn't hear a word he said. I couldn't concentrate on anything except the smooth lines of his police issue slacks as they concealed the hard muscles of his thighs and his tight ass.

Somehow, I just knew he had a tight ass.

His hair was dark and hugged his scalp in a cap of tight curls. He was compactly built, shorter than me by a good six inches, and all I wanted to do was have him inside me.

I was shocked and horrified.

Had that one drink too many unleashed a beast I had unknowingly housed within?

Ben looked back over his shoulder and I jerked my eyes up from were they had been feasting on his butt. "Everything okay, Bob?"

"Yes. Uh...yes." I had to get myself under control. I fiddled with my hat. "Is your place nearby?"

"It's on the edge of town. It's small, but it's home!" He shrugged and grinned. "I like it."

Petersen stowed my gear in the back seat of the old Ford and climbed in behind the wheel. I just stood by the door, staring at him helplessly. He turned sideways and winked. "Come on, big guy, time's a-wasting! Let's get you settled and then head out for a bite to eat!"

I swallowed hard and got in beside him. The front seat was very narrow and my knee brushed against his thigh. I could feel the heat coming off him in waves. I jerked away as if I had been burned and tried to shrink in on myself, hugging the door to avoid touching him.

"It's okay, big guy. I don't bite!"

I lit a cigarette and looked out the window.

The drive to Ben's house took five minutes. They were the longest five minutes of my life.

****

Ben wasn’t kidding when he said his house was small. There was only one bedroom, which he graciously offered to me. "I don’t mind sleeping on the couch," he said easily. "And you're so tall, you'll be more comfortable on the bed."

Oh, sure. Me sleep in his bed, on the pillow that would still carry his scent, in the room that was redolent of him? Not in this lifetime!

"Thanks, Ben, but that’s not necessary. The couch will suit me fine." And all the while my cock was begging ‘please, please, please!’

I caught him looking at me with a strange glint in his eye, and I suppressed a shudder of desire, but only just barely. He grinned cockily. "Go get cleaned up, Bob. We’ll have time to get acquainted ...later."

I locked myself in his bathroom and reached in to my trousers. I was so hard I actually hurt. Pre come was beading at the tip of my cock. I smeared it over the broad head and squeezed it, then began jerking off. It took me less than a minute to come.

I didn’t utter a sound.

Quickly I cleaned up the evidence of my passion for the state cop and got myself in some semblance of order.

And I despaired. I was still just as hard!

I washed my hands and walked into his living room, then lit up another cigarette and waited while he used the john.

****

Ben took me to a tavern called The Dew Drop Inn. They served food there, as well as liquor so strong it could eat away the lining of your throat just going down. He ordered for the both of us, chicken fried steak, which was surprisingly good, and refried beans. As we ate, he explained the details of the case that was baffling the New Mexico state police.

A tourist family of four that had camped out in the desert was missing. The little girl had been found wandering alone in the night, clutching a tattered Teddy bear, almost catatonic. The police officer who found her brought her to the town’s only doctor. She sat and stared at nothing, seemingly deaf and mute. Old Doc Green couldn’t find a physical reason for her retreat into a world of silence.

In an effort to shock her back to awareness, the doctor had waved a vial of formic acid under her nose. It had shocked her out of her trance, all right. Her screams had been heard at the end of town.

"And no one knows what happened to her family?" I asked gently. I could see how upset Ben was by the little girl’s condition.

He shook his head. "Their trailer was torn apart. The mother, father and older brother weren’t anywhere around."

"Why call in the FBI? This hardly seems like something that would be up our alley."

"The woman who’s missing is the governor’s niece. We’re at a loss. Who would you suggest we call in?"

I had to agree with him. Politics was a bitch!

****

We were just having a piece of apple pie a la mode with our coffee when the police issue radio Ben carried with him chirruped annoyingly.

There had been a break-in at Gramps Johnson's place out in the desert. County mounties had been sent there, and reported back that the little store had been ransacked, the side of the building ripped out and Gramps was nowhere to be found. In the middle of the report, the listeners suddenly heard shots being fired and a challenging shout that rose to a terrified scream. And then the phone had gone dead.

Ben thumbed off his radio, his face ashen, and threw some bills down on the table. He was halfway out the door before I could get to my feet. I got my hat on my head and ran after him, managing to get into the Ford just as he stomped down on the clutch and threw it into gear. The tires spun in the gritty soil until the treads gained traction and the little car leaped forward.

Dusk had already fallen in the desert, but Ben knew where he was going. With casual ease he swerved past cactus and tumble weeds and rocks that stood guard in the night, and I watched him with hungry eyes.

The dark hulk of the patrol car sat like a brooding animal, crouched and waiting to spring. The doors of the vehicle stood open and the headlights, piercing the night, were starting to dim. The Ford slid to a stop next to it.

Ben got out and drew his gun, and my mouth went dry. He looked so competent, so in control. So goddamned sexy!

I scrabbled for the door handle and stepped out into the cool night air.

"Jesus!" I heard Ben whisper.

I joined him next to the destroyed shell of the old man's general store. "Oh, my God! What could have done that? A tornado?"

Ben shook his head, unable to speak, and took a deep breath, stepping over the torn boards that were once a wall. He was approaching the counter that held an old fashioned cash register when his foot shot out from under him. I jumped forward and caught him before he could land ass backwards in the pool of blood.

My eyes closed in bliss as I relished the feel of him in my arms, snug against my body. I breathed in the scent of him, soap and something that was undefinably Ben. My cock was hard and I had to struggle to avoid rolling my hips and thrusting forward. I could stay with him like this forever!

A hand feathered through the short hair at the back of my neck, and I opened my eyes reluctantly. I didn't want to see Ben looking at me with mockery, or disdain.

"Bob, it's okay!" Warm lips caressed the side of my neck and then Ben pushed himself upright. "We'll talk about this later, if you have no problem with that?"

I shook my head and managed to tear myself away from those deep blue eyes. Then I glanced down at the huge stain on the floor. "That's an awful lot of blood!"

"Yeah, and look at that shotgun on the counter!" Covered for some reason with sugar, the barrel of the weapon had been bent back upon itself. "Gramps is too neat to leave a mess like this!" Ben said in disgust as he flicked a finger through the powdery stuff that was already drawing ants.

I nudged his arm and nodded toward an open hatchway in the floor behind a row of shelves. Ben found a flashlight hanging under the counter and carefully went down the ladder into the crawl space under Gramps’ place. "Aw, Jesus!"

"Ben, what is it?"

His head appeared over the edge of the opening. "I found Gramps! Give me a hand getting him back up."

Together we wrestled the stiffening body of the old man up into the light. His face and bare arms were covered with bruises and puncture wounds. He'd been dead for some time.

"Where are the two officers?" Ben demanded suddenly. "Blackburn! Newbury!" he shouted into the darkness of the night.

I shuddered as the deep timber of his voice sent shivers dancing up my spine. And I was ashamed.

Here we were, in a perilous situation, with one dead man and two missing officers, and all I could think of was taking his cock deep in my mouth and sucking him until he came, of his cock fucking my ass until I was weak with it.

"Bob," he called, holding up the severed cord of the telephone. "I guess this is why the call was disrupted. Use the radio in the patrol car and get in touch with headquarters, will you?"

"Right. I'll tell them to send out a meat wagon. And I think we may need dogs to track down Blackburn and Newbury." I was a professional law enforcement official, dammit: it was time I started acting like one!

And then Ben smiled at me.

****

It was almost morning by the time we got back to Ben’s house. The officers hadn’t been found and the search had been temporarily suspended. They were calling surrounding ranches to bring in their tracking dogs.

In the meantime, Gramps Johnson was in the freezer of the butcher shop. The town was too small to have a morgue. Doc Green was scheduled to do the autopsy after his normal office hours. There was no one else to see his patients.

And I had thought that scared the piss out of me.

I needed to get in touch with my friend Pat. We had met when I was taking some night classes and we’d dated a few of times, even slept together once or twice, but now we were just friends. She and her father, Dr. Harold Medford, were experts in the field of entomology, specializing in all types of ants, from the little red grease-eaters, to the inch long soldier ants of the Amazon basin, known as mara bunta.

I shook my head tiredly and trudged up the path behind Ben, swatting my hat rhythmically against my thigh. He smiled at me over his shoulder and opened his door.

"No need for locks in this town," he grinned at my look of disbelief. He went into his tiny kitchenette and pulled open the icebox. The interior resembled iceboxes of bachelors around the country: it contained beer and some moldy cheese and a bottle of milk that was starting to turn.

He took out two beers and handed me one. I waited patiently for him to get out a church key, but Ben held the cap against the countertop and hit the bottle with the flat of his hand. The cap popped off and went spinning on the floor. He tilted the bottle toward me in a toast, then raised it to his lips and I watched avidly as his adam’s apple bobbed with each swallow.

I licked my lips and followed his actions, popping the cap and tipping my head back as the cold beer flowed down my throat. When I finished, I sighed and took the bottle from my mouth. I opened my eyes to find Ben standing right in front of me.

He took the bottle from my suddenly nerveless fingers and set it down next to his on the sink. "I need to know if you’ve ever done this before, Bob?" His mouth nuzzled against mine, and the warmth of his breath washed over my lips.

"Just once, when I was really, really drunk," I managed to say. "It...wasn’t pleasant."

Ben sighed in disappointment and stepped away from me. "I’m sorry. I really wanted to do this. We’ll just pretend nothing ever happened."

So there it was: I could let him walk away, and everything would be like it was before. I would never know what it felt like to have him inside me. I would never know what he tasted like. My life would be the way it had been: safe and bland and boring!

Well, that was bullshit!

I reached out and grabbed his shirt before he could get too far away from me. "No, we’re not going to pretend anything! Do you know what I did in your bathroom this afternoon? I jerked off thinking about you!"

Ben’s eyes widened and I felt like kicking myself in the ass. That was more information than I really needed to give him. My face flamed and I tried to turn away from him, but he wouldn’t let me.

"Bob, what do you think *I* was doing in the bathroom while you were waiting in the living room?" He laughed softly.

And then Ben’s mouth was caressing mine, tugging my lower lip between his teeth, suckling it gently. I gasped to catch my breath and he took advantage of my parted lips to slide his tongue into my mouth. It began a passionate duel with mine. My cock was hot and hard and begging to be touched. I could feel his arousal rubbing high against my thigh.

"We’re not going to have much time, big guy. Let’s go to bed!"

END