yuletide author identities have been revealed! Which I guess means that it's okay for me to post the fic I wrote. Luckily, my prompt was Justice (i.e. the only fandom I've actually attempted to seriously write for - also, a virtually nonexistent one, but ahaha it's the thought that counts?), gen interaction between Luther and Ron.

Title: Every Good Boy Does Fine
Fandom: Justice
Pairing/Characters: Luther Graves, Ron Trott, brief mentions of Tom and Alden.
Rating: PG
Summary: Luther Graves in past, present, and future.
Disclaimer: Not mine.
A/N: Written for the yuletide 2008 fic exchange, for joylee56. Originally posted here.

Once upon a time, Luther was supposed to become a corporate lawyer.

His family isn’t a wealthy one, but it’s rigidly respectable all the same, and his parents harbored certain expectations of their only child. Words like studious, filial, responsible, and all the other adjectives in the dictionary of his father’s expectations of a son were branded across Luther’s character from the very moment he understood what it meant to be daddy’s good boy.

Luther wore (still wears) his intelligence like armor, or in his flashier moods, like a cape. Through high school and college, new words followed in his wake, murmured in passing by peers and instructors alike: clever, precise, articulate. He wasn’t the star of the debate team, but without him, they’d have fallen apart; like stone, he’s a support base, calm and dependable and infinitely formidable.

Law school seemed a matter of course, after all that, and corporate law the obvious choice. Criminal law makes his family nervous, for what business should a Graves have, consorting with thieves and murderers?

Luther didn’t really give a damn one way or another, at least not at first. He’s a good man, and a smart man, but he’s too practical to be some idealistic crusader. He abandoned the wiles of big businesses for his modest district attorney’s office because he finds the subject matter fascinating, not because he thought he’d be playing the role of the glorious hero. That he became a prosecutor and not a defense attorney is a last ditch attempt at placating his mother, who’s been convinced ever since the OJ Simpson trial that criminal defense lawyers are the Devil’s children, or as good as. His work at the D.A.’s office was interesting, and meaningful, and he’d been content, for a time, to keep playing the good boy.

Of course, then he meets Ron Trott, and the whole damn thing blows to hell.

It’s entirely happenstance, practically accidental. It’s an act of serendipity or poor luck, depending on whom you’d ask. Ron’s a friend of a friend of a friend, and somehow, they end up at this exceedingly stuffy, exceedingly awkward luncheon. Together.

“So,” Ron says, his mouth curled into a subtle sort of smirk that practically screams of a stereotype.

Luther pauses, forkful of pasta salad halfway to his mouth, and raises an eyebrow. “So.”

“Your office has bumped heads with my firm a couple times in court.” The smirk shifts ever so slightly; Luther can’t tell if that’s for better or for worse. “Tom Nicholson says you’re pretty good.”

Tom Nicholson. The name conjures up a hazy image in Luther’s memory: boyish looks that made the man seem too young to be a lawyer, an impression hardly aided by his earnest manner. A white knight, if Luther ever knew one, the starry eyed crusader that Luther will never be. A dangerous opponent, nonetheless; Tom’s probably as bright as Luther, in his own way, and might very well have won the case, if the circumstances hadn’t forced them to enter the plea bargain.

This must be the elder partner, then.

Luther chuckles deeply, crossing his arms. “It’s not my office, Mr. Trott. I’m not in charge – I’m just an assistant D.A., doing my job.”

Ron Trott leans forward ever so slightly, but Luther notices the movement all the same; it’s what he does, after all. “But you’re much more than that, aren’t you?”

Luther frowns. “Sir?”

“I hear you’re considering a career change,” Ron says, offhand, examining a little tray of appetizers before selecting a pig in a blanket with a bit of distaste. “Reevaluating your choices, as it were.” A casually elegant shrug of the shoulders. “At least, those are the words Jennifer used.”

It takes an impressive amount of effort to refrain from rolling his eyes. Never let it be said, Luther thinks wryly to himself, that prosecutors don’t have big mouths. His coworkers include some of the best, brightest people Luther’s ever known, but they’re also the most notorious gossips. “Is that a job offer?” he asks now, uncrossing his arms, tone just shy of teasing. “No offense, Mr. Trott, but you’re a defense attorney. I’m…”

“A prosecutor?” That shark smile again. “Why ever should that make a difference? We both specialize in criminal law. Don’t we?”

At that, Luther laughs in earnest, flashing teeth. “That we do. But you’re on your side for a reason,” his grin widens into his own shark smile, “and I’m on mine.”

“Oh God,” Ron says, looking heavenward, “don’t tell me you’re one of those prosecutors who’s convinced the D.A. can do no wrong. Tom said you were sensible, at least.”

“That the word he used?” Luther quips, but there’s no malice in his voice.

“For an assistant district attorney,” Ron says lightly, before becoming serious. “We’re every bit as vital to this system as you are, you know. People forget that, because we’re better compensated.”

“Right.”

“You faced Tom in open court. You’ve seen how he is. He thinks we do what we do to protect the innocent. It’s okay for him to keep thinking that; he does his best work that way. But he’s wrong.”

Luther leans back in his chair, lips pursed. “Aren’t you being a little harsh? The man is your partner.”

“And a good one,” Ron says dismissively. “That doesn’t mean he isn’t wrong. We aren’t here to protect people, Luther,” and he spits out the word ‘people’ like it’s a particularly amusing joke. “We’re here to protect their rights. The rights guaranteed them by the law of this nation.”

Luther’s shaking his head and chuckling again. He can’t quite help himself. “And here I thought you were a cynic.”

“Oh, I’m a cynic all right,” Ron says, entirely too cheerfully. “But like you, I’m a sensible one. I expect you’re growing bored,” he adds, as they both get up to leave, clapping Luther on the shoulder in a manner that, disturbingly enough, reminds Luther of his father. “The work we do at my firm is quite interesting. I expect we’ll meet again, a year or two down the road – and not as opponents.”

“I doubt that,” Luther calls, half-jokingly, after Ron’s retreating back. The latter ignores him.

Six months later, Luther will turn up on the doorstep of Trott, Nicholson, & Tuller to be greeted by a pretty woman who’ll introduce herself as Alden.

“Please inform Mr. Trott that he was wrong,” Luther will ask of her, matter-of-factly. “It wasn’t a year. It was half.” He’ll grin at the thinly veiled confusion on her face. “I was right, to doubt.”

This is the future he forges himself.