@intrualityweek day 2! today's prompt is fake dating/first dates.
i originally had a fake dating at a wedding fic i was working on, slowly, but i hit 3k words and they still hadn't met and i was like hold on i don't have time to finish this to the quality it needs to be. so. look forward to a REALLY LONG intruality fake dating fic bc it's coming your way
instead, my aromantic ass is hitting you guys with the classic 'best friends who start dating but nothing really changes' trope. bc i love it and i love them and i dont know the difference between romantic and platonic love so patton doesn't either
Summary:
Patton hated first dates. He hated the nerves and the awkwardness, and he never knew how to act.
Did it make any difference that this first date was with his best friend? He didn't think so.
Warnings: some suggestive comments/innuendos from Remus but nothing crazy. this is mostly short and sweet
Words: 1832
Read on AO3
Patton chewed on his bottom lip, his leg bouncing up and down as he took another sip of his water. He’d already finished the jug.
He wasn’t even late. Patton was just… early. Crazy early.
He was being silly. There was nothing to be nervous about. Sure, it was a first date, but… It wasn’t the same. It wasn’t.
“Why, hello, gorgeous.”
Patton startled slightly, his head snapping up to stare as the seat in front of him was suddenly occupied. Two bright green eyes met his, a wide, toothy grin between them that Patton knew like the back of his hand.
“Hi,” Patton said, and he could feel his face heating up. Remus’ grin widened impossibly.
“You alright there?”
Patton nodded. “Mhm! Just— I got here early. You look nice.”
His friend— His date— laughed. “Why, thank you! You like this little number?” He stood up, his chair scraping against the floor so he could twirl. He was wearing the closest thing to a suit Patton had ever seen him in, with tight, jet black trousers and a dark green button-up made of some kind of shimmery, shiny material. He didn’t have it buttoned all the way up — he barely had any of it buttoned at all, leaving it hanging open down to just above his belly button, his thick chest hair bursting through the gap.
Patton smiled at him and nodded. “Is it new? I haven’t seen it before.”
“The shirt is,” Remus answered, sitting back down. “The pants are old as hell. You give me a twirl now, my turn!”
Patton let out another laugh and shook his head. “No way!”
“Why the fuck not?”
The man hesitated, staring at him. “Well— I’m not gonna twirl in the middle of a restaurant, Re!”
“Why? I just did it!”
Patton scoffed disbelievingly. “I’m not you!”
“So? You’re something way cooler, Patsky. You’re you. Give me a twirl, lemme see your ass.”
This time, Patton just stared at Remus, eyes huge and face burning, and he swallowed thickly. Remus waited a second, and then his grin faltered.
He wasn’t dressed as well as Remus was, nowhere near, but he’d tried. He was wearing a pale blue shirt, buttoned up to his neck and tucked into the nicest pair of jeans he owned. He had a suit jacket, too, but he’d slung it over the back of his chair.
Remus cackled, cheering loudly enough that several other people looked at them, and Patton sat back down, grinning past his blush.
“You suck,” he laughed.
“Oh, I can show you just how much I can suck later, if you want me to, Pattycakes,” Remus said, winking.
“Shut up,” Patton giggled.
The waiter came over then, taking their inital orders — a bottle of wine and a lemonade and a Bloody Mary — and the drinks menus away.
“So! What food we looking at, huh? This place is pretty fancy, eh?”
“Um— I think so. What’re you thinking?”
“Get a couple things and share?” Remus asked.
Patton nodded. “Sure!”
They both looked down at the menu, and Patton faltered. He didn’t know what any of those words meant.
Oh, goodness, he was wearing jeans.
“Shit, Pat, didn’t realise you were gonna take us to Paris for our first date,” Remus said lowly.
“I— I’m sorry,” Patton choked, and the joking expression slid from Remus’ face.
“Woah!” he said. “Hey, now! What’s the matter? We can google translate this shit, it’s all good!”
“I just— You hate fancy food, and fancy restaurants, and you bought a new shirt—”
“Don’t get ahead of yourself,” Remus teased. “I didn’t buy this for you. I just bought it and happened to wear it for the first time tonight.”
Patton snorted, but his face was burning and he wanted to cry.
“C’mon, Pat, what’s wrong? We can blow this place off. I thought you wanted to come here?”
“I thought— I mean— This is a date. We’re not— Aren’t you meant to go somewhere fancy on dates?”
“What? What d’you mean?”
“Like. That’s what you do.”
“It isn’t what I do. I take them bowling. It’s fun and you can talk and get drunk at the same time.”
Patton stared at him, eyes wide. “You hate this,” he said, his voice a whisper. “Oh, Re, I’m so sorry.”
“What? I don’t hate it!”
“Of course you do! You want to be having fun and getting drunk and— Oh, God, I’m so stupid—”
“Patton! What the fuck? I take strangers bowling, yeah. I could be sat watching paint dry with you and have the time of my life.”
“Don’t be— That isn’t true.”
“It is! Of course it is, you’re my best friend! Come on, let’s google some of this rich people shit and order and we can make fun of their tiny rich people portions and get fucking tacos or something after. C’mon. I promise I’ll show you a good time.”
Patton’s face was on fire, but he nodded, biting his lip and looking down at the menu again. “Okay,” he whispered. “Sorry.”
“Stop being sorry!”
Patton winced and nodded. “Right. Sure. Okay. You look up the stuff on this page and I’ll do this one. Remember any that sound good, okay?”
In the end, they found six dishes they actually wanted to eat. One was basically chicken tenders, and Patton had no idea why they were calling it whatever that said, and the others turned out to mostly be mixes of vegetables. Patton didn’t want any of the stuff with fish — because, ew — and that knocked out easily three quarters of the menu, which was around when he realised he should have researched the place first.
Patton really did have a great time, though, mocking the names of the dishes and the sizes of the plates and wheeze-giggling as Remus made fun of the serious-looking couples around them.
The ruckus they were causing made the waiter come over and ask them to leave. Remus’ expression of genuine shock was enough to send Patton all the way over the edge, and he practically screamed with laughter. They ran out of the place, giggling and throwing more money on the table than they could have possibly owed, and rushed into the street, their fingers intertwined.
“So! What do you think, now?” Remus asked.
“I picked that awful restaurant. You get to pick now.”
Remus snorted. “Hm… Follow me.”
He kept Patton’s hand in his own as he started dragging him down the street. Once Patton fell into step beside him, he swung their joined hands back and forth between them, and Patton stared at the side of his face, bathed in the golden light of the streetlamps and grinning like he’d won the lottery, and he let him talk and talk about how stupid that restaurant was and how he should’ve robbed all those stuffy couples before he left. Patton didn’t think he could have replied if he wanted to, too busy giggling and gasping at the more vulgar insults he would spit out.
Then, Remus stopped suddenly, and Patton turned to look at where they were.
“Uh— This is my apartment building,” Patton said slowly.
“Sure is.”
“I’m… Is this… Do you want tonight to be, um… over?”
“Nope! I wanna go inside.”
“Right,” Patton said, like he understood. “Is this— Are you… Were you only doing this for, um… sex? Because I don’t want that yet—”
“What? No. Of course not. I just want to go inside. We can watch a movie and order real food to be brought to your place like real rich people do. Or we can play games, or just talk.”
“But— But that’s just what we do anyway,” Patton said slowly.
“Yeah, so? Patty, I don’t want you to be a different person just ‘cause we’re dating now. We aren’t even dating, we’re just… trying it out. I don’t need to do the getting to know you bullshit that we have to do on most first dates. I know you. I love you. You’re my best friend. You took us to that restaurant because you thought you had to make us different to what we were before. I don’t want that. You don’t either. We can still be us. Nothing has to change, except I get to kiss you when I want to instead of pretending I don’t want to.”
Patton stared at him. Remus was still holding his hand, his thumb tracing Patton’s knuckles in a way he wasn’t sure Remus knew he was doing.
“Do we get to stay best friends?” Patton asked. “This won’t make it… weird?”
“Of course it won’t. You’ll be my best friend till I die, even if you kill all my family and get sent to prison and I’m not allowed to visit you. I’d think about you every day until I went crazy and started hallucinating you. Who cares if we call them dates now? We’re still us.”
“What if we decide this is a bad idea?”
“Then we go back to not kissing. It doesn’t matter. We’ll still be us.”
Patton stared at him, sniffling as tears began to burn in his eyes. “Do you promise?”
“Oh, you’re so lame, with your soft little feelings and your big wet eyes. ‘Course I promise.” He dragged Patton into his chest and hugged him tightly. “You’re stuck with me for life. This is just the first date. It doesn’t mean anything. You’ve been stuck with me for three years already — what difference could one first date make?”
Patton laughed wetly, burying his face in Remus’ bare chest. He sniffled, and pulled back to look up at him. “You— You’ve been wanting to kiss me?”
“Like, all the time.”
“Right now? When I’m all covered in snot and tears?”
Remus snorted, but released Patton from the hug so he could grab his face and press their mouths together. Patton gasped into it, and his legs went just a little bit weak despite the tender gentleness of the kiss. Remus pulled away, just a little bit, enough to whisper, “All the fucking time. I wanna consume all your fluids at least once.”
“Oh, ew, you’re so gross,” Patton laughed, wiping his face on his hands. “I wasn’t even actually snotty.”
“Then that’ll have go back on the list,” shrugged Remus.
Patton laughed, but reached up on his toes, kissing Remus again. “C’mon then. You can pick the movie.”
“You pick the movie, I pick the takeout. You lost food choice privileges.”
Pouting, Patton turned away and moved to unlock the door to his building, shooting forlorn glances over his shoulder as he did so.
“Aw, c’mon. Obviously I was gonna pick pizza anyway. I know your favourites, Pattycake.”
Patton grinned and turned away to hide the redness in his cheeks. Yeah. Remus did know him pretty well, didn’t he? Maybe this didn’t have to change much at all.
My next thing I wrote for @seasonal-skirmish!
This is the longest thing I've ever written in this amount of time (25k in about 4 days, which is. wild. anyway. I'll posting it in chapters.)
I hope everyone enjoys, I had a lot of fun with it :D
Masterlist - Chapter 2 - AO3
Prinxiety - Fae/Supernatural
Despite being human, Virgil has always been able to see magic. When he manages to get a job at a supernatural embassy, it turns out one of his clients is a lot more than he appears.
Even for a fae.
Virgil took a deep breath, staring up at the building in front of him.
It was intimidating for a number of reasons, none of which were the ones most people would probably expect.
For one, he had just started this new job. He’d been working there for a couple weeks now, but this was the first time he was officially on his own. His assignment was simple enough: introduce himself to the clients now assigned to him and make sure they knew how to contact him if needed.
He’d already met two. He only had a handful left to go.
And so far, he’d been given mostly softballs. Because he was new, the organization had assigned him a few clients considered easy cases - people who were unlikely to cause problems while he learned the ropes.
That all sounded fairly normal.
Until the details came to light.
Virgil worked for what was, essentially, a supernatural embassy. V.E.I.L. existed to assist the beings who chose to live in the human world, helping them blend in, navigate human customs, and prevent incidents before they happened.
Very few actual humans did this kind of field work.
Virgil was one of the exceptions.
He had always been a little different. Since childhood, he’d been able to see things other people couldn’t.
An older man whose eyes reflected light a little too unnaturally.
A young mother in a grocery store whose teeth were just slightly too sharp.
A beautiful classmate who seemed to have a faint shimmer beneath their skin.
It wasn’t until he was older that he learned what he was seeing.
Magic.
More specifically, the things magic was meant to hide from human perception.
Sometimes it was obvious - a feature that was supposed to be concealed, a glimpse of what someone truly was. Other times, he could see the magic itself, like a second layer laid over reality.
He had no idea why he could do it. No one else in his family could, as far as he knew. Even at the embassy, he’d never met another human who could do the same naturally.
Thankfully, one kind supernatural being had noticed him noticing several years earlier and, instead of panicking - or worse, had taken the time to explain.
And now he was here.
Meeting clients.
Acting as their point of contact.
Keeping an eye out for anything unusual and making sure anyone who needed help had someone to call.
Part of his job was carrying enchanted business cards. To humans, they were especially forgettable pieces of paper, the kind someone would lose without ever thinking about it again. To supernatural beings, they were a way to find resources and assistance.
The fact that he was just a human walking into situations involving beings far more powerful than he could even imagine should have been the scary part.
But the two clients he’d met so far had been nothing but kind.
The difference was that yesterday, he’d visited a nursing home and a university campus.
Today, he was standing in front of a financial company skyscraper.
He pulled out his phone again, rereading the profile for what was probably the twelfth time. He did have a physical folder with him, but standing on the street and flipping through paperwork felt far more awkward and noticeable than just casually checking his phone.
His eyes skimmed over the information yet again.
Profile: Rosamyr of Aurellian, the Rosecrown
Pronouns: He/Him
Species: Fae
Native Realm: Aurellian Court
Abilities:
Fae magic, including but not limited to:
Healing
Plant manipulation
Animal affinity and expertise
Glamour
Human Alias: Roman Prince
Current Human Presentation: Male; apparent age approximately 40 human years
Preferred Language: Human (English), Fae Common
Preferred Contact Method: In person
Place of Employment: Sylvan Capital Group - Employee
Employment History/Stability: Exceptional
Length of Human Residency: 112 years
Integration Status: Exceptional
Documentation Status: Complete
Eligibility for Assistance: Eligible
Housing Assistance: Declined
Financial Assistance: Declined
Medical Assistance: Declined
Risk Assessment: Low*
*Suitable introductory case for newly appointed liaisons
Known Associates:
Maerion of Aurellian**
**(Current Human Alias: Remington Dormir)
Notes:
Cooperative long-term realm resident.
Has maintained consistent human identity.
Requires minimal oversight.
No known violations of V.E.I.L. Accords.
No history of magic misconduct or unauthorized memory alteration involving humans.
Lax with fae-specific protocols. Despite this, remains an S-Class magic user.
Follow standard fae interaction guidelines unless otherwise instructed by resident.
Exercise awareness of fae customs, particularly in the presence of other fae or supernatural beings.
Virgil really was here to see a nature fairy who worked at a financial institution.
Maybe he was the landscaper? Places like this loved to have intimidatingly perfect areas around them, didn’t they? Or maybe he worked at a coffee cart? A charming, attractive man who remembered faces and favorite coffee orders would certainly be a bright spot in such a dreary locale.
Why was he so much more intimidated by the building than the fact that the fae were some of the scariest beings that he was aware of? Even other supernaturals were wary of the fae.
He took one more deep breath before squaring his shoulders in feigned confidence and making his way inside.
Virgil stepped into a beautiful lobby, all marble and sharp lines, tastefully decorated in a way that said this place had serious money backing it up. The receptionist at the far end of the room eyed him, watching him approach with his folder until he was standing directly in front of her.
“Hello, I need to speak with Roman Prince. …Does he work here?” Virgil asked.
The seated woman blinked, looking at Virgil like what he’d just asked didn’t make a bit of sense.
“...Yes, he does indeed work here.” She said slowly. “I can call and see if he is available for a meeting. May I have your name, and what your business is here?”
Virgil hadn’t been working at this embassy for all that long, but it had certainly been long enough to know that “may I have your name” was a very dangerous question. He knew this woman wasn’t fae, but it had been ingrained in him to dodge that exact wording.
“Please tell him that Virgil Webb is here from V.E.I.L. to see him.” He said smoothly.
She blinked again. “Veil?”
Virgil nodded.
V.E.I.L. stood for Veiled Entity Integration Liaisons. But when a human asked, that certainly wasn’t what he was going to say.
He had been given approximately a dozen approved explanations, each tailored just enough to cover any situation he might find himself in. So he just used whichever one made the most sense at the moment.
Yesterday, at the nursing home, he’d claimed it meant Volunteer Eligibility & Independent Living.
At the university desk he’d said Verification of Enrollment & Institutional Leasing.
Tomorrow, when he went by that restaurant, he planned to use Vendor Employment & Inspection Liaison.
But today? At a financial institution?
“Verification of Executive & Investment Licensing.” Virgil said. “I need to speak with him about his account.”
She nodded and picked up her phone, quickly dialing a few numbers before bringing it to her ear.
“Hello, Mr. Prince. This is the front desk. There is a Virgil Webb here from Verification of-”
Her voice faltered for a split second, as though she was struggling to remember the phrase.
“From V.E.I.L. here to see you. Is now a good time?”
Virgil smiled faintly to himself.
The wording of all their cover stories were very carefully chosen. Meant to be believable enough to avoid extensive questions, but bland enough that a human would forget it almost immediately. And even if someone managed to forcibly hold onto the wording long enough to search for it, or had jotted it down, upon looking it up they’d find exactly what they were meant to.
Nothing, effectively. Nothing, hidden by a painfully dry government website. One with pages of dense legal language so very tedious that no one would be able to force themselves through all of it.
The website was lightly enchanted, just enough to make sure that whoever went looking decided, very quickly, that literally anything else would be a better use of their time.
Virgil still had no idea how it knew which version someone had heard, seeing as they could have just searched V.E.I.L. to see what would come up.
But the very first thing he’d learned at this job was that magic was weird. He chalked it up to that.
She paused, clearly listening to the person’s response.
“Very good, sir. I’ll send him up, thank you.”
She hung up and turned back to Virgil.
“Mr. Prince will see you. Please take the elevator to the forty-second floor.”
Virgil blinked, but did his best not to let the surprise show on his face.
“Oh, thank you. I’ll... Do that.” He nodded, then turned to the side. Thankfully, the elevators were in immediate view, and were clearly labeled to show which floors they serviced.
Virgil chose the one that went up to forty-two and stepped inside as soon as the doors opened.
As he ascended, the pieces finally began to shift into place. The receptionist’s confusion when he’d asked if Roman Prince worked there. Being sent to what was, apparently, the very top floor. Calling him Mr. Prince. Calling him sir.
Unfortunately, it didn’t come together completely enough to save him from the shock which stemmed from exiting the elevator, walking up to a second receptionist, and being gestured to a closed office door.
“Mr. Prince is expecting you.”
He barely registered those words as his eyes traced the plaque on the door.
Roman Prince
Chief Financial Officer
…
So.
Not the coffee cart.
That certainly explained the reaction of the receptionist.
He knocked on the door, unable to stall any longer with the receptionist still watching from her desk.
“You may enter.”
A rich, deep voice called from the other side of the door.
Virgil’s hand was trembling slightly on the doorknob, but he managed to turn it and step through the threshold.
“Close the door behind you.” The voice added.
Virgil obeyed quickly, slipping inside just enough to shut the door as instructed.
Once he turned away from the door, he let his eyes take in the space.
The office was enormous.
The far wall was made entirely of windows, providing a dizzying view of the city stretching out below. Another was lined floor to ceiling with dark wooden bookcases, every shelf filled with neatly arranged binders, ledgers, and books that all looked impossibly important. The room somehow managed to feel warm despite its size, the rich wood - and the noticeable absence of chrome and marble - giving it a completely different feel from the lobby and reception areas.
Plants occupied several spaces throughout the office, though not so many that anyone would think it unusual. A broad-leafed tree stood beside the windows, smaller potted plants rested on shelves and tables, and an arrangement of flowers grew from a dish on the desk. One would have assumed it was a small bouquet at first glance, but they were actually not cut blooms, they were simply planted together.
Every single plant looked perfectly healthy, despite being approximately forty-two stories above the nearest patch of soil. Virgil couldn’t spot so much as a browned edge on a single leaf in the room.
Then his eyes landed on the man he was there to meet. Roman Prince, the apparent CFO of this company. Or, as absolutely no one in this building knew him, Rosamyr of Aurellian, the Rosecrown.
Virgil didn’t know what some of those words meant, but they all sounded important.
Glamours interacted strangely with Virgil’s sight.
Sometimes they failed entirely, leaving him looking at a being’s true form while everyone else saw the carefully crafted illusion.
Other times, he couldn’t see through them at all. He simply knew they were there.
This was one of those times.
The man sat behind his desk, his attention fixed on the computer in front of him. His fingers moved steadily across the keyboard, posture impeccably straight, brow furrowed in quiet concentration.
To everyone else, the air around him was just that - perfectly ordinary air.
To Virgil, it shimmered.
Magic clung to Roman in distinct shapes, denser in some places than others. Around his head, the shimmering gathered where elegantly pointed ears were almost certainly hidden. Then, behind his back, two broad fields of faint glimmering light hinted at the wings that were concealed from every other person in the building.
Smaller pockets of shimmering magic lingered elsewhere as well - around his face, his hands, even the edges of his clothing - but none were nearly as pronounced as those surrounding his ears and wings. Virgil had long since learned that concealing something required far more magic than simply creating an illusion.
Twenty years ago, seeing a man surrounded by faint sparkles would have stopped him in his tracks.
Today, it simply confirmed that this really was the person he was looking for.
Roman sighed, still not looking up from his computer.
“I’ve told them so many times, this is not how this report is supposed to be formatted,” he muttered. “What is it, Maer? You don’t usu-”
His eyes finally lifted.
Then froze.
Bright green eyes studied Virgil for a brief moment before understanding settled across his face.
“Oh.” He stood immediately, shaking his head once as he came around the desk and extended a hand. “My apologies. I didn’t realize.”
Up close, he looked exactly like the person his glamour wanted him to be.
Human.
Not young, exactly. He was the kind of handsome that came with experience rather than youth. His dark hair was neatly kept, his suit perfectly tailored, every part of him suggesting someone who had spent years working to become exactly who he appeared to be.
But Virgil could see where reality blurred.
The faint shimmer around his ears. The dense concentration of magic gathered behind his shoulders. The subtle distortion around his face where the glamour had added details that weren’t actually there.
He looked like an attractive human in his forties.
But he was clearly neither forty…
Nor human.
Virgil accepted the offered hand automatically, though his attention lingered on the magic surrounding Roman rather than the handshake he’d only half remembered to participate in. Standing this close made it even easier to see. There was another unusually dense concentration of shimmering air above his head.
Roman wasn’t simply hiding ears and wings - he was making himself shorter.
Some fae were scarcely larger than humans.
Others…
Others weren’t.
Even compressed into a human guise, Roman still stood well over six feet tall, comfortably towering over Virgil without seeming unusual enough to draw attention. It occurred to Virgil that, if this was him making himself smaller, his true height must be…
“...You have an eye in the courts, don’t you?”
Virgil blinked, finally dragging his attention from the details of the glamour to meet Roman’s gaze.
“Huh?”
Roman regarded him for another moment before the faintest smile tugged at the corner of his mouth.
“I can see the way you’re studying me,” he said. “You can see things humans aren’t meant to, can’t you?”
“Oh, I… Yes?” Virgil admitted. “I’ve just never heard it phrased that way.”
Roman nodded, finally releasing the forgotten handshake neither of them had seemed to notice had gone on a bit too long.
“It’s not a common expression amongst your kind. But anyway…” He tilted his head slightly. “Might I have your name?”
Virgil blinked.
Unlike with the receptionist, that hadn’t been a coincidence.
It was a test.
He smirked softly. “I’m afraid it's not on offer, actually. Though, you may call me Virgil.”
“Good answer,” Roman’s side smirk grew. “Now… Is there something you need from me? My next check in isn’t scheduled for another year and three months.”
“Not exactly,” Virgil shook his head. “I’m your newly appointed liaison. I’m just here to introduce myself and give you my contact information should you need anything.”
Roman nodded slowly. “Ah. That’s rather surprising. I’ve never met a human liaison.”
“I’m one of the first. Since I have an eye in the courts, apparently.” He said with a slightly awkward laugh. “So I guess I'm suited for it.”
“Interesting.” Roman’s bright green eyes were studying him once again. “That’s rather uncommon for a human. Is this something that goes back in your line? Or did something befall you?”
“Neither actually.” Virgil shrugged. “It seems to have come out of nowhere.”
Roman hummed thoughtfully, as though filing the answer away for later. Whatever conclusion he’d reached, he seemed satisfied with it. He turned back toward his desk, Virgil watching him as he walked back around it and settled into his chair.
He moved in a very particular way. His posture was perfect, his shoulders squared. But it didn’t look unnatural in a way he’d seen some supernaturals move. It looked deliberate. Practiced.
Roman gestured toward the two chairs in front of his desk. “Sit, I need to get your information.”
Virgil nodded, swiftly moving to do as he’d been instructed.
He felt a bit like he’d been called into his high school principal’s office.
Roman pulled a cell phone out of his pocket, opening it and tapping a few times before handing it over. “Here, please enter your contact information.”
Virgil blinked, staring at the phone for a long few seconds as though he was trying to decide if there was a rule here he was supposed to remember.
Roman seemed to catch it. “I’m not giving you a gift, you will be returning my phone to me once you enter your information. There will be no obligations placed upon you for accepting this from me. …Besides needing to return it to me.”
“...Sorry, I didn’t mean to imply that I think you’re trying to trick me or anything. I just… There are a lot of rules I’ve had to learn very quickly.” Virgil admitted, rubbing the back of his neck before taking the phone and starting to put his information in it.
“I’m not surprised. Most beings learn these rules in their youth. You’ve been expected to learn customs your own people were never meant to know in a matter of weeks.” Roman nodded. “No offense taken. It’s simply a little more work you’ll have to do as a human. If there is ever anything you have questions about, you may come to me. I will not be offended by your inexperience. Unless offense is your intent, but I promise I can tell the difference.”
Virgil glanced up to find Roman watching him patiently. His eyes were…
Pretty.
Such a rich shade of green that they almost didn’t seem real. Crucially though, they didn’t cross the line into impossible. Unusual? Sure. But not unbelievable.
It seemed like after so long, Roman knew exactly how much of himself he could keep without triggering a human brain to find something amiss. He could only imagine what his eyes might look like unglamoured.
“...I’m distracting you from your task, my apologies.” Roman said, Virgil only just then realized that he was staring at Roman in return. “Might I peruse my file while you finish entering your information?”
“Oh, no it’s fine. I… Sure, go ahead.” Virgil said quickly, pushing the paper folder across the desk before going back to focusing on spelling his work email correctly.
“Thank you.” Roman took the folder and opened it, laying it on the desk before him as he read over the information that had been compiled about himself.
By the time Virgil finished what he’d been tasked with, he looked up to see Roman still reading, clearly amused.
“...Is anything wrong?” He asked, holding the phone back out.
Those green eyes flicked back up.
“No, no. I’m merely amused.” Roman smiled faintly. “I see why they’ve appointed me to you.”
He tapped one finger on the page before him.
“I’m safe.” Roman laughed softly.
Virgil raised an eyebrow. “What do you mean?”
“Risk Assessment: Low.” Roman tapped the page again. “Suitable introductory case for newly appointed liaisons. They know I won’t mistake ignorance for disrespect. That is, admittedly, an unusual quality among my kind.”
“Oh. I’m sure they don’t mean offense by that or-” Virgil quickly tried to explain, but Roman continued.
“I know. As I told you, I promise I can tell the difference.” Roman smiled.
Virgil nodded, unsure what to say.
He eventually settled on, “...Understood. Thank you.”
Roman nodded once again. “Of course. Now, is there anything else you’d like to ask of me? I don’t wish to take up too much of your time. I’m sure you have other clients.”
“Oh, um. Not… Specifically?” Virgil managed, quickly taking his own phone out of his pocket to scroll through his personal notes. Points he wanted to hit, things he wanted to be sure he’d brought across.
Roman, once again, waited patiently.
“Most of this is about documentation,” Virgil said, scanning his notes. “But your’s is already filed. You will need to renew your residence form by the-”
“The seventh.”
Virgil blinked. “Right. And the waivers for financial and medical assistance are due by the twelfth."
“My declinations are already in the mail.”
“Okay. And did you receive the event invitations from liaison services?”
“Both have been responded to.”
There was a pause.
“...You’re really on top of this.” Virgil said, laughing awkwardly.
Roman looked faintly confused. “I try to be. Organization makes things run smoothly.” He gave a small shrug. “There is little point in creating unnecessary difficulties for myself.”
“I guess I just- Well, uh. Not to say that-”
“Please speak freely.” Roman nodded encouragingly.
Virgil cleared his throat, rubbing the back of his neck. “...I guess I’m just surprised by all that? You’re, uh-”
“Rather unlike what you expect fae to be?”
“Yes. I mean, when I walked up to the building-”
“This simply wasn’t where you expected to find a fae.” Roman laughed softly. “I’m as unusual in my profession as you are in your’s, it seems.”
Virgil smiled faintly. “That’s a good point.”
They shared a smile before Virgil wordlessly reached for the folder and Roman pushed it more into his reach. He gathered it back up before looking up at Roman once more.
“May I ask you something a little more personal?” Virgil asked.
Roman nodded. “Of course. Feel free.”
“Do you actually like this?” He gestured to the space around them. “All this finance stuff?”
Roman blinked, leaning back in his chair as he seemed to seriously consider the question.
“...I do.” He replied after a moment. “A surprising amount.”
“What about it? If you don’t mind me asking that as well.”
“I think…” Roman considered once again. “Because it didn’t come naturally to me.”
Virgil tilted his head slightly.
“There are countless things I can do because of what I am. Things that have been part of me for longer than I have known the words for them.”
He brushed his fingers lightly over his keyboard.
“This was not one of those things. I had to learn. Study, fail, improve.” Roman smiled faintly. “I became good at this because I worked hard, not because of the advantages I was born with.”
He took a moment to look around his office before his eyes landed back on Virgil’s.
“Everything I've accomplished here is because of who I am. Not what I am.”
Virgil had to sit back for a moment, letting that sink in. He hadn’t really known what he expected Roman to say in response to his question. He’d simply been surprised that someone who could command magic without even thinking would choose to work with spreadsheets and expenditures - or whatever it was that he actually did.
Virgil had about as much chance of understanding Roman’s finance work as he did figuring out how the enchantment on V.E.I.L’s website worked.
It took him a minute before he found a response.
“That’s…” Virgil began. “A surprisingly human answer.”
Roman’s mouth twitched.
“Yes,” he agreed. “That’s the point.”
Virgil walked out of the building feeling better than he had when he’d walked in.
The skyscraper was still intimidating. The company within it was still intimidating. The fact that what was very likely the most powerful supernatural being he’d ever encountered spent his days forty-two floors above the ground managing financial reports was, quite frankly, bizarre.
But Roman Prince?
Surprisingly un-intimidating.
He’d been friendly, kind, and open. Which was, somehow, the most confusing part.
It hit Virgil later that night, lying in bed, that he’d just had a conversation about personal accomplishment and career fulfillment with a possibly ancient fae who just happened to be the Chief Financial Officer of a multinational company.
…Or was it multi-dimensional? Considering that Roman was actually…
No. He wasn’t going to touch that right now.
It was the strangest thing that had happened to him that week, and it was only Tuesday.
Though something told him that very well may change before the week was out.
A fic for @i-will-physically-fight-you for Camp Cartoon 2026~! By: @zeonycreates & I ^^ very sorry for the delay, but we hope you enjoy the story!
Summary: Coming back from their sampling mission on Sol-3 like any other season, something went wrong with their ship's navigation.
Patton and Roman crash land onto a barren moon of the biggest planet in this star system...or one they thought was barren. Sollians had made it further than they thought in the past two centuries. And now they have to find a way off this icy rock with a sham of an uneasy alliance before they're found or perish in the harsh cold environment they were unprepared to face.
Prompt: Platonic Royality Space AU Hurt/Comfort with Patton & Roman as the main characters
WC: ~6.3k || It’s on AO3!
@tss-camp-and-coffee
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Chapter 1: Downed
Violent quaking. A shout. Drowning static.
Roman was disoriented. Fear made his vocal cords freeze up.
Green smoke. Increasing heat. A chilled blast of air from his left. Darkness.
Roman came to violently, with the overwhelming smell of burnt coppery eggs clogging his airways and the eerie, loud hum of a windstorm rocking their ship. He coughed, choking on the fumes as he fumbled with his straps and let himself fall from the pilot seat to the clearer acidic air near the floor. Something in the ship– almost definitely the copper sulfate in the engine– was burning, and Ro didn’t have time to figure out if it got to their cargo or the spare bio-fuel that could spread faster than kindling with a spark. If he had time, he could cut off the supply valve and drop it: their ship could switch to full wave-power easily due to its small size. If it survived this fire that had surely compromised it.
Roman realized the wind during the descent was the only thing that had put out the exterior entry fire. Roman just hoped it didn’t tear their vessel apart any more than it definitely already was. He couldn’t go out to check unless it was their only option. Comms were almost guaranteed to be down, so he needed to find some way to contact their headship crew. Remus would never let him hear the end of it once they got out of here and Patton was probably…
…shit. He remembered he wasn’t alone. Patton was with him this time. Ro needed to find him.
Ro crawled with low, hazy visibility towards the exit door; it didn’t bode well that the heat got more intense the closer he moved to it. Their vessel was compact and efficient by design. So long as the main exit wasn’t blocked by flames, he’d get Patton— the life-astronomist had been securing precious samples in the minilab for a rough landing but they’d had short notice on it being a crash— and get out immediately.
With the system down and the back-up system pulsing ominously for manual restart, Roman wouldn’t know of any breaches to the interior immediately. They were still able to breathe, so that was something. He didn’t know if starting the ship immediately would turn it into a plasma ball or not. He would not risk their lives to find out.
“Pat’n!” he called, voice hoarse from strain and the words garbled as he realized he’d inhaled more smoke than he thought.
He fought his body’s natural urge to breathe deeper in the panic, as the fumes were absolutely making things worse. His nose was overloaded with too much information, and his vision was getting more frayed by the ting. That probably wouldn’t be great for his next med check.
“Here, Ro!”
Roman looked over towards the light and saw a small open hatch leading outside. The outline of a small creature stood out like a shadow to the bright grey beyond the ship. Ro shuffled faster towards it, and it took everything in him to not just grab the small Hedd-ri and hold him close immediately. He had to fight back the instinctive need to huddle up for now. Outside was safer than inside.
Pat crawled out first only to make way for Ro to escape the side-hatch. Immediately Ro was hit with a very unpleasant, dry cold. The burning ship suddenly didn’t seem that bad to his unprotected skin.
The first thing Ro noticed was how difficult it was to breathe normally. But given their ship had not imploded and the fact he nor Patton had blacked out (or worse)…there was some sort of thin atmosphere of this place. At least they were able to respire at all.
But Ro felt incredibly sluggish; his body’s ability to pull nitrogen from the air was limited. Patton seemed to be faring better than him. His kind easily adjusted to high altitudes with thin air. He caught a glimpse of the carnage in their minilab— the collected flora samples laid scattered across the floor, their dirt escaping the transport crates entirely. Samples could be replaced…but this would not be easily explained to the flagship.
Patton was worriedly clicking at him, setting down one of the items he’d dragged off the ship with him. He hurried over to where Roman had stopped and small hands held Ro’s head off the ground.
“Ro,” he called to get his attention, and then there was a series of concerned clicks that didn’t need translation to a common language.
And in his arms, one of the PL-3 samples he had dragged from the back, as tall and fluffy on top as he was, but somehow almost entirely fine. Of course Pat had tried to save a plant during a crash. Roman decidedly didn’t thump at him for his priorities. Pat wasn't harmed...he must have gotten strapped in in time in the back. It didn’t matter right now, but if Roman had lost him for a plant...
He didn’t want to think about it anymore. Roman struggled to get his arms under him to prop himself up. “’m a-alrig’…we need…t’ get away f-from this.”
It was hard to say more right now. Every move felt like it took more of the last ounces of energy quickly leeching away from him. They were lucky they were still alive at all, on an unknown barren body of some kind.
More worried popping noises. His friend didn’t look at all convinced, but tugged at his face to ensure Ro did in fact move with him.
Ro would have gasped if he had enough breath to. Even all his exposed skin was barely able to compensate his needs here like it could easily in natural water.
…He really wished he had some water. Why couldn’t they have landed on an ocean planet…preferably with life beginning for his nitrogen fix? Roman could thrive on that.
Roman dragged himself towards the fresh air, hoping that’d do enough to clear his head. The gravity was moderate— less than their ship’s artificial magnetic gravity, and so easier to move. Small comforts.
He saw it before he was fully free of the ship: they were on some icy wasteland of a…moon? It had to be. No other planet fit this look. Certainly not the gas giant they’d been falling into. Roman looked up. The sky was filled with a view of said gas giant, and it was like they were hanging over it, gravity all that kept them from falling into its crushing forces. Ro shuddered at how truly massive it was: at how lucky they got to not be dragged right in entirely and to fall onto one of its moons instead. Its stunning red stripe wispy clouds like a swirling painting would be a sight to behold if they weren’t terrifying. He decidedly didn’t look up— down?— into that swirling eldritch abyss anymore.
He fixed his gaze instead on the moon they were most likely on. The place was icy and debris-covered from frequent (hopefully old) impacts. It was not reassuring, being they were stuck there for at least the next rotation. Ice was extremely promising, however it was thick. Any liquid water buried impossibly deep. And cold. Or may be nonexistent.
Their ship had fallen onto a slope, which was lucky to have eased their descent. He wondered if he’d managed that on purpose, but the sheer damage to the vessel showed proof of a hard uncontrolled landing. They’d almost shot past the moon entirely, and would have continued to plummet into the gravity of the gas giant…but they’d managed to be pulled down onto it’s inner face.
The ‘hill’ was actually a very long, windswept ridge that went on as far as Roman could see in both directions away from the ship. Ro shivered, looking in alldirections, trying to blink his vision clear. There were many more of these ridges along the crust of this place, in semi-regular intervals, as far as he could see. They at least weren’t very tall; these weren’t steep mountain ridges, but more like white icehills making grooves all over the surface. It might have been kind of pretty if they weren’t stranded here.
How was Patton after such a violent stop? Ro tried to get a good look at his shipmate, but the amount of thick fuzz on him made it difficult to tell any damage beneath it. But Pat was moving fine, if a bit shivery— he was understandably on-edge. No limping or favoring any limbs that he could see.
…he was staring at something intently, not speaking. Ro turned to see what he was looking at. But what he started to make out on the barren, cold moon…was a little disconcerting. He stared as if his eyes might be lying to him, trying to see if things changed. Not far from where their ship had landed, there were…what even was that?
The more he looked, the more…unnatural structures were seen dotted across the expansive permafrost in the distance. Huge shiny tower-like pillars had been erected in the ice. They looked to be spaced equally but far apart. Ro could see 7 of them just from where they were. Maybe the tops of 2 more.
They were not made of material obviously native, either. But this star system– it was one of several forbidden for colonizing. Sure, there were many shady outposts made anyway…but this place was watched closely because it was so newly discovered and isolated on a galactic scale. It was why they were essentially being audited for their excursions to continue here. It would be insane to put a mining colony or illegal satellite post in such an obvious, resourceless place.
Roman squinted, displeased and annoyed with how off this all was. He reached out to Patton and pulled him in, feeling far too exposed with his mottled reddish skin.
“We need…shelter.”
Patton’s fuzzy pincers latched onto the metal pot but he let Roman pull him over.
“Are we…gonna turn on the distress signal? The others need to know what happened.”
Roman didn’t really know how to tell him about the state of their transmitters. Roman had flipped the distress beacon the minute they’d been yanked in by the gas-giant’s gravity. It was inescapable without enough momentum. Roman didn’t even know how it had happened. He’d been following their navigation exactly, and Janus was never wrong to this degree—
“Ro.” The slight stress in the way Patton said his name got his scattered attention again.
“…I just need a few minutes to make sure our ship won’t explode. Then I’ll go mess with ‘em. But uh…it should have sent an alert soon as we star`ted getting pulled far off our course. So they p-probably know something’s wrong. If not now, then when we miss the coordinate check window. They’ll come get us.”
Ro just hoped their equipment was intact for retrieval. That Remus and Janus would realize they weren’t actually falling into the planet.
Pat nodded slowly, settling against Ro to watch rather helplessly as the smoke engulfed their ship. He hoped the fire would put itself out from the lack of components.
“So…are others here? Should we…try to get help?”
“…you see someone?”
Patton had better farsight than him, and he started to click uneasily, “Not exactly, just…that’s tech, of some kind. What are those…? Were those out here last time we passed through Sol-4R15?”
Ro was quiet, because he didn’t know.
Roman paused in his thoughts were taken by another thing, and he slowly pulled Patton closer as it put him on edge. There was another structure, seemingly set into the ground…he could see the top of what appeared to be a dome, blending in with the low-light of the thin atmosphere. It only shimmered in the strips of staticky light streaking across the upper atmosphere, which was how Roman had eventually noticed it at all, huge as it was. There were also lights over that way. Ro wanted to get a higher vantage point, but couldn’t really exert himself to get up even the shallow slope they were on.
Ro’s eyes drifted around them, observing the horizon and structures more closely for…anything that could be of use to them. Somewhere to hide…to see if anything was coming their way.
“...we…might n-not have picked up the ac-activity…this is the inner side of the moon, fa-facing the planet. Something about the moon or planet probably hid their presence f-from us…”
“So you think it too. T-There’s…others here.”
Roman grimaced, squirming uncomfortably. “...others who don’t w-want to be noticed.”
By who was anyone’s guess, but Roman didn’t want to find out while stranded here. He looked around them for somewhere to go. Despite being half-way down their icy hill, they were too high up. If they could see the dome, it stood to reason they also could be seen by anyone looking the right direction. He spotted a dip in the ridge wall nearby. Likely a small meteor impact from over a century ago. This landscape was riddled with them, but they all looked so old…smoothed and weathered over. It wasn’t quite a deeper enclosed cave like he’d prefer, but it was a safe and close enough distance from their ship.
“Let’s get lower and hide out. We can barely s-see anything, so maybe they didn’t notice us…if they’re from Sol-3, then…we know their signal technology doesn’t register our ship.”
Patton thought that just sounded a bit like Roman trying to convince them both there weren’t people coming right for them right now.
“...but…they could have seen us crash,” he whispered, feeling bad to say it. He didn’t want to contradict Ro, but if people were going to show up where they saw the ship go down…they’d be found immediately.
Ro started to scoot slowly down the soft-icy slope. There was nowhere to run out here, really. It was too open. The ship was all they had. They’d be in dire trouble either way.
“...let us h-hope that they didn’t.”
⋆˙⟡ ⋆.˚ ⊹₊⟡ ⋆
“Alright, flyling, no golfing off and getting dissected, okay? Did you pack your lunch and all that extra crap you’ll never use for your day trip? Got your tracker on for when you get lost?”
“Shut up, Rem, it’s protocol equipment!”
“More like baby’s first spacewalk overkill! When will you ever use a firestarter? Gonna burn down the forest as a distraction? And what, is the rope for abducting the witnesses to your fuck up?”
Ro shoved past Remus in the cramped hanger full of all their extra junk more than ships.
“As if we’ve ever been seen! There are barely any Solians in the area after dark, it doesn’t matter how close it is to civilization. We’ll be in and out faster than you’veever been AND we won’t forget a third of the damn plants we are going for, so.”
“Spare me, you couldn’t find a stick in a forest,” Remus snickered.
“Wha– you’re one to talk!! You couldn’t find a TREE in a forest!”
“You can’t steal mine, protozoa-brain!!”
“Yeah, well— you couldn’t find sand at the beach! Impossible when you barely have two neurons to rub together.”
“Look, when Pat and I get back with all the required samples, you’re going to look real stupid. You’ll be buying us the new equipment too.”
“Right, we’ll see that happen when sol turns to ice. You have yourself a bet—“
“Why haven’t you two finished loading the shuttle?! Departure is in 10! Hurry up!”
“Ughhh we are!! You have no heart, Jan, can’t you see we’re bonding before Ro’s 10-turn trip?”
Janus’s flagella rattled. “He’ll be back in two rotations,” he deadpanned. “But I’m more than happy to find room to shove you on board with him if you’re soo torn up about it—“
“Nooo, no thanks! Pat and I are sooo good, more than enough help thanks! He should definitely stay with you and continue making a great impression on the core team.”
Janus hissed irritably. “No thanks to either of you, they actually are interested to continue funding our sector. If you still want a job and thisss ship when you get back, don’t screw this up.”
“Your confidence is inspiring.”
“Well I can’t exactly leave anyone else to watch Remus and host our guests, so I’m making do. Don’t get separated out there.”
“We won’t, Mom. Thank you for your loving concern.”
“I swear to— just hurry up. The sooner this is over, we can get back to getting paid and our other objectives.”
⋆˙⟡ ⋆.˚ ⊹₊⟡ ⋆
Roman slumped against the crater wall, shielding Patton with his webbed arms. They needed to get back to them… he wondered if they had noticed something was even wrong. Their ship’s comms being offline should get noticed…but how would they know where to look? Would they assume the worst?
Patton looked up at him worriedly as Roman’s shivering was definitely noticeable. But there was nothing they could do about it. Their singed tarp was working overtime barely covering the entrance to their hiding spot.
It would be much worse in the open wind. They just had to be grateful they had that much…though an actual fire would be nice.
Pat set the plant down beside Roman and Roman’s hazy thoughts got just a little clearer. He blinked. “...oh. That’s…a lil better.”
Pat looked at Ro questioningly, then down at the plant before it clicked for him. “...oh. That’s right! These can help you! I completely forgot…it’s not the plant. The soil--bacteria are denitrifying…which makes nitrogen for you to breath.”
Pat’s smile fell marginally. “I-I just…don’t know how to make sure they stay alive here. It’s…really not much for this one pot.”
“I don’t need much at all if I’m just sitting here. It’ll buy time.”
Pat glanced at the ship but Roman held onto him, worried he’d go for it. “No. Just stay here, we…we can think about that if we need them.
“…I don’t like the look of those clouds.”
Patton looked up at their thin golden hue and the static charge felt through the thin atmosphere. Static was drawn to the tops of the towers in an increasingly intense light show. It might have been cool outside of the circumstances. He grimaced, tucking in closer to Roman.
“…do you think we’re covered enough? You can smell that too, right?”
Roman’s sensitive nose crinkled. “I smell ozone…definitely plasma in the atmosphere…we just need to stay in here. In case it’s a bad lightning storm and not just ion blasts.”
The sky rumbled, and a few sparks flashed above them in the atmosphere. Again, Roman thought it strange there was any atmosphere at all.
Patton curled up beside Roman’s leg, his long plumy tail curling around his friend anxiously. He pressed the side of his face to Roman’s chest and Ro knew what he was doing. What his friend was listening for.
“Pat, I’m okay, really.”
“We need to find you food. I know you need it soon.”
Ro bumped his tail against Pat’s reassuringly. “It isn’t dire. I can last a while just fine.”
And there was probably little to no organic matter on a moon this far from the only inhabited planet in the star system…Ro tried not to think of those implications.
“...if we have to, we can find the edible samples. And draw from food we can salvage in the ship.”
Pat didn’t say anything, because he already knew how little there was. Their ship was only equipped for a rotational round trip. They’d brought 2 meals along each, and emergency rations would give them an extra 4. If repairs or rescue didn’t come when those were up, then…
Patton tensed, small hands clinging to Roman’s uniform, distracting them from their current crisis.
“Did you h-hear that? Something’s out there, Ro, I heard something,” he whispered in a rush. Eyes wide behind his foggy visor.
“Shh, it’s okay, it’ll pass,” he murmured, tucking Pat further away from the entrance. Their shelter spot was shallow, and their ship was anything but hidden. But the broken cloak would just have to work well enough on the dark terrain. He tried to recall what information they had on the outer system of Solis. He didn’t think the further planets were even inhabited by anything living. Certainly no complex life they’d noticed in their scans of the planets. Only Solarian…Sollian signatures ever appeared…but…surely those guys hadn’t gotten to somewhere so far and desolate in only the past two-hundred years?
…
“Pat, if that thing is dangerous, you have to run.”
“I-I’m not leaving you here! I don’t want to be alone,” Patton whispered frantically, curled against Roman’s chest.
Roman looked from the approaching figure to Patton. He didn’t want to stress the Herian further, but this was serious. “Pat– t-the others will surely come for our distress signal. At least one of us should still be here when they do. Shh.”
“No!! No-no data is worth splitting up, we both have to make it, I won’t let you–”
Roman’s body vibrated defensively (and for a bit more warmth) and he quickly covered Patton, muffling his noise as the approaching figure paused, listening. He would protect Patton if nothing else. They had to get back home. The plant would only buy Roman so much time…it was doing poorly in this thin atmosphere compared to its environment of its nitrogen-rich home. He felt too weak to fight if they were a threat…or eventually brought more of its kind with it. First Contact was never supposed to go like this. They were alone, outnumbered— practically defenseless with no useful tools to speak of.
…he really needed to know if they were a threat. Roman risks peeking out after some motivation to.
The creature was smaller than Roman by about a head or so…at least Ro had size to his advantage. Ro hid again. Maybe they’d go away…? But they couldn’t be so lucky.
Roman peeked out the opening once more to see the being was closer. Apparently, the scans were correct. How can they survive in such a cold place?
Roman pointed to the long probe the Sollian had and the spiny scales along his back flexed unhappily. Patton just looked curious. “What are they doing?”
“...they must have seen our ship come down out here,” Ro admitted unhappily.
He eyed their weird bendy 5-appendaged grabbers at the end of their upper limbs uncomfortably. What did a being evolve all of those for? They’d never quite figured it out, in all their distant studying. They were probably for tearing, but with blunt claws, it seemed at least inefficient for his thick skin.
“Maybe they came out to help, then.”
“Are you kidding, Pat, because it’s not funny. Sollians are hostiles. Zero contact for a good reason.”
Pat shifted uneasily in Roman’s grasp. “We need help, or we’ll never get back up! They’re also a cross-communal species. If they know we aren’t a threat–”
“Then they’ll capture us!” Roman argued.
Patton sighed. “Ro, we have to take the chance!”
“No, we don't! We could take a chance and one of us gets hurt! I want you to make sure you're safe and I can't do that if they capture you, or separate us, or- or whatever else they may do.”
“Patton. This isn’t worth the risk! I-I can’t lose you like— you of all beings know what those ones do to their fellow creatures— and even other Sollians, when they want to learn about them! I’m not letting it happen to you!”
Patton stopped, startled at the outburst, but…he knew Ro. Ro wasn’t yelling at him. This was stress. Rightfully so. Ro had a point. They had seen it in their own studies of the planet…being another spacefaring species did not guarantee they would be safe and welcomed as fellow scientists. The Sollians could see their constant monitoring as some threat to them, easily. It was a reasonable assumption to have about beings more advanced were certainly capable of harm and to be avoided.
Pat looked down. He didn’t want that to happen to them. But then what were they supposed to do…?
The being stilled as they stopped beside Ro and Patton’s ship, and then turned to look directly at them, noticing Roman’s barely-there movement. Were their senses that heightened?
Roman’s arms twitched at the direct eye contact. A lone Sollian had found them. Then the Sollian started to make a low, droning series of noises that was their speech. Roman didn’t know what to make of it and just moved back out of sight.
The being lifted the stick in their hand Ro had assumed was some sort of walking support, still making the repetitive low tones. Even though it wasn’t pointed at them, it instantly read as a threat to Roman and he stood, making himself bigger. His webbed arms helped with the bluff, and the Sollian scrambled back a few feet.
It set the stick down and started talking faster, pointing and waving with their palms at them.
Roman looked confused by the gestures, then frustrated. He slowly lowered to sit again, but he didn’t recognize any basic Sollian words for this conversation…how was he supposed to know he would ever actually talk to one??
Oh. But maybe their translator had survived? He knew its scanners could roughly decipher basic Sollian writings…he’d never used it for audio there, but it should be capable of it. It had a log of a few hundred words some researchers had worked out. Sollian was one of the least decoded auditory languages that existed, however.
“Pat…can you go check the ship for the translator? It might be of use for this. The ship isn’t smoking anymore, so…maybe it’s the best time to check on things.”
He wasn’t willing to leave his small companion defenseless with this unknown. It didn’t seem to have natural sharp parts or any tools– anything could be in that bag, though. At least Roman had size going for him. He was a head and a half taller than this being.
Patton skittered out, though not without an uneasy glance back at them.
Roman sat in tense silence, staring at this…new development. While he didn’t look away in case they tried anything, the Sollian seemed intent on not making eye contact, looking everywhere else with only an occasional darting glance at his face.
Patton was thankfully back before Ro or the threat could get antsy. He thanked him and looked at their translator: a triangular clunky device with a handle. It was old tech and not anywhere near as nice as the updated ones…but it was all they had, given they weren’t expecting to need to translate much on these missions. Ro could regret it later and complain to Janus to finally shell out for a new one.
He turned it on and fidgeted with it before speaking near it’s flat microphone. “Here. Translator. You pause and press this button between exchanges to use it. It isn’t entirely accurate and translate extremely literally, but use the most basic words and we can hope it’s close enough.”
The Sollian took it when it was offered out, tilting their head.
“Oh. Even my words you understand?”
Patton perked up. “Oh! Yes, I understood that! Love that it works for them!”
“A miracle, truly. Alright, Sollian, let’s cut to the chase. We don’t need any of your other kind coming out here to find us. You aren’t even supposed to know we exist. Did you tell anyone else you came out here?”
The Sollian looked at them, and their posture tensed a little.
“No. I thought ship was other … vessel. My people but of Soil.”
Roman and Patton exchanged confused looks.
“...right. Dirt people. Okay…well, no. It was ours. And we won’t have to do anything drastic if you cooperate, not like anyone would believe–”
“Roman,” Patton chided. “Don’t do that! Let’s hear them out and make nice.”
Patton looked to the Sollian, tail flapping slowly. “Hello! You can call me Patton.”
“Sure, just give the being your name, that’s totally protocol–”
“And my friend and I are just hoping for a little assistance to get off your lovely moon? It’s quite nice, don’t get me wrong, but we need to get home to our crew. But our ship…crashed here. Is there any way you can help us?”
The Sollian listened as the translator played back a rough translation that sounded a lot longer than what Patton had thought he said.
Finally they looked up. “Call me Logan. I am a … from Soil, but we built station here. Need what four help?”
Roman made a humming noise. “It’s skipping words it doesn’t have a translation for,” he muttered to Patton, and the alien– ‘Lo-gan’-- tipped the translator closer as it didn’t pick up what he said.
“Repeatable?”
Patton smiled at the progress. “That’s okay! It’s better than before. He’s just saying the translator isn’t perfect, but I think it’ll be fine. Nice to meet you! We…um. Hmm.”
Patton looked out at their damaged ship. What could they even do about it? It certainly wasn’t up to code anymore for space travel.
“We just need tools,” Roman answered, and Patton looked at their ship again. “Uh…Ro, I don’t think tools alone will help us…and they don’t even have the same technology–”
“I can try. We have tools. Parts. Ships. Risk. But need help too. Help each other. Need to leave now.”
Patton looked down at his feet, clearly thinking.
“I see. Well. If you help us get our ship running, we could probably–”
Roman thought fast, thinking of anything that could satisfy the Sollian.
“--bring you to Sol 3!” he blurted out before he had a proper chance to think about it. Why did he say that!?
Patton looked up, pure confusion on his furry face.
That seemed to catch the alien’s attention. They straightened, attentive now to the deal at hand. “You are going… Soil? Home planet?”
Roman couldn’t take it back now. Not after getting the Sollian’s interest in helping them.
“…yes. And we can take you there too if you help us.”
Logan clenched the strap of his backpack. Patton wondered if it was an air supply or belongings. “I need to get off moon…but all of … interplanetary ship launches are heavy guarded. I cannot pilot. This is opportunity when I saw … crash. I can look at … ship four you.”
Four? There weren’t four of them. This translator wasn’t working right, he suspected, and so he disregarded that.
Ro somewhat doubted the Sollian could truly figure out what was going on with their ship. But what else was he supposed to do, say no?
“Fine. But don’t try anything. That thing isn’t too flyable right now.”
It wasn’t at all but this unknown alien didn’t need to know how helpless they were.
The Sollian disappeared to go look in their ship and Patton, while he thought they should probably be escorted for safety and security reasons, stayed back beside Ro to make sure his friend was okay. He’d been in the ship briefly and it at least seemed stable enough to not explode anymore. The smoke was gone, so…it was probably fine.
After a while, Roman started to doze off, head feeling fuzzy. Patton worried right next to him and did end up going back into the cargo hold. He dragged out more of the most promising surviving plants. Half seemed to already be wilting. Logan noticed his efforts, poking his head out of the front cabin, translator mic pointed his way.
“What wrong with him? Cold?”
Patton looked over at Logan, who he hadn’t realized was out of the ship. He was honestly surprised it was a question, but then again, the body-covering suit and half-mask they wore might be compensating for warmth this planet lacked. It wasn't as cold as expected this far from their home star, though...he wondered if they Sollians had truly managed to do something to this moon's atmosphere. The lack of plants, however, made him second-guess it.
“He…is struggling in this atmosphere. The air. Used to more nitrogen.”
The Sollian tilted their head. Patton decided that must be what Sollians did when intrigued or confused, as Logan had a follow up question.
“We change to be like Soil. Not there yet. But plankton helping... what home planet is like?”
“Oh…Ro’s? it…it isn’t that different from Sol-3. But more bio water, and less land…less population. His people are spread through his star system on most of the planets…”
Pat trailed off as Roman looked unhappy with him saying so much. Patton didn’t know why telling them anything was an issue when they already found out other complex life existed outside of their area. But he figured Roman might know more there.
They looked at him as if waiting for him to continue.
“What ‘bio water’?” Logan inquired.
“Um…we just use it to mean water with high biological content. Similar to earth’s. It’s more of…a soup than pure water and minerals. It has a high parts per million of stuff like algae and uh…microscopic life.”
Logan didn’t seem surprised by this. They looked at Roman next, looking Roman over entirely…long enough that Roman started to grow uncomfortable. Logan didn’t seem to notice the way Roman’s body stiffened immediately. Patton was grateful that it wasn’t universally a challenge signal…or perhaps Logan just hadn’t noticed with how subtle it was.
“You need ocean or water four better?”
Roman looked Logan up and down in annoyance. “Not just water. It’s the nitrogen that’s important, and that this place lacks.”
Logan took a moment to puzzle out how that had somehow translated.
“This ocean nitrogen yes. Organic life high parts. Project … life start study. Nitrogen yes here.”
Roman couldn’t help looking a little hopeful there. Patton perked up. “Really?? There’s ocean near here? Can you show us?”
Logan faltered. “Ocean…beneath ice. Deeply. Apologies. Access holes covered in towers. Sensitive, but you need. Specific nitrogen kind?”
Ro slumped. “Doesn’t matter, I can make do with both common types. But we have no way to make our own hole here, it’s not really worth it.”
There was a long pause of silence.
“Ice 95…deep, but not everywhere. Ship heat melt thin ice?”
“And damaged our ship more?? We aren’t leaving our ruined ship for others like him to find and reverse engineer.”
“Then new ship. Bigger. I help you fly understand control. You fly.”
Roman made a face at the idea of having to use the Sollian’s technology. It was less than ideal and would likely be very difficult without the instrument assists he was used to having. But what choice did they have?
“...you should teach me how to control it beforehand so we do not crash. You are an engineer.”
The Sollian’s mouth curved and its eyebrows bent.
“Leverage no.”
Ro’s tail thumped at him. “And you have no experience in space flight. More than one of us should know how and I’m a pilot.”
There was a long pause as the alien made a series of scrunched expressions and then tapped the translator.
“You crash you space ship.”
Roman’s arm thumped his leg and Patton’s tail immediately wrapped around his arm comfortingly, trying to ease his irritation.
“That was not my fault. We were just passing by! It’s not like we knew anything was here…why are you people here, anyway?”
“Largest moon in sol system. Exploration. Test satellite science station after local moon success.”
“...and on this side? Is there a reason?”
The Sollian just looked at them for a long moment before answering. “...safer from impacts and … radiation. Moon is tidally locked.”
“And…you want to leave. Why?”
The Sollian shuffled a little at the interrogation. “...ocean depth exploration. Don’t want to go. It is…dangerous. Two ships, 9 people lost this orbit year. Director say I get my navigation assignment next before could permission to leave moon on ice transport. You help me fly to Soil, I commandeer new ship. Water, food, supplies too.”
Roman barely even had to exchange a look with Patton. “Alright. Deal. But it needs to be soon. I doubt you are the only one to have seen us. And your people will not be happy about this, I presume.”
The Sollian– ‘Lo-gan’-- looked out at the towers for a long beat, as if watching for something.
“We go tonight. Storm is four cover.”
Patton flitted, his semi-plume fur lifting and lowering anxiously. “But it's…dangerous. That storm had to have damaged our ship’s instruments or something.”
Ro nodded, siding with Patton intrinsically and ever-suspicious of their reluctant new ally. “Exactly. And where exactly are you attempting to take us?”
They pointed out at one of the tall towers with their stick. “Short travel. We go to Well Rig. Big ships cut and move ice, quartz, silica off world to Soil. We take ship. Water pressurized to surface. Tonight during lockdown or can’t.”
Roman steeled himself for the walk and exertion, since there was no way he was trusting this alien alone with Patton to come back for him. He would simply carry the plant and hope it did not hinder them much. As futile as it seemed to bother.
“Fine. But you’d better keep your end of this deal.”
“Our goal is same. I help.”
Roman didn’t reply nor did he meet Patton’s gaze to see what he thought about that.
Vision is having a wonderful day the first time he sees the lilac shadow in the corner. The beauty gives him butterflies, and Vision finds he simply can't get enough of the feeling.
----
| Ao3 |
----
Warnings: Minor blood mention
Pairings: Prinxiety
Word Count: 1728
Notes:
Hiiii This is a silly lttle oneshot I wrote after the new episode came out! That's how long the backlog of stuff I have to post is, haha.
I really love this though, it's short and sweet and I could not figure out how to tag it properly, if anyone has advice please lmk lol.
Either way, please enjoy!
----
Vision was feeling absolutely spectacular today.
He wasn't entirely sure what exactly was so brilliant about this day in particular, but he still found himself skipping through the halls of the mindscape, which in turn seemed to put Thomas - and thus Right Brain too of course - into a particularly good mood.
All well and good, considering Thomas had a party to go to this afternoon. A little get together his friends were hosting to celebrate nothing at all really! Just an excuse to hang out where lives had gotten a little busy. Thomas would need to be in his best mood for something like that, and Vision was always happy to keep a pep in his step in order to help out with that.
The party had gone swimmingly, especially when Vision had taken charge in getting Thomas introduced to all of the new people in the room! Just think about what new experiences Thomas could have, right? So he had of course spent the evening talking to everyone he could, getting to know people he thought were interesting, that kind of thing.
Who knows, maybe his soulmate could be there! The Prince of their dreams! That's what Vision had told the others anyway when he asked to take over. They'd agreed - albeit reluctantly - and Vision had just about been lucky enough to actually find someone who they seemed to get along with. He was gay, which of course was a good start, and he was just so cute! He'd laughed at Thomas' frankly amazing jokes, he'd complimented the stylish American Eagles shirt that he had rightfully directed Thomas to wear tonight. And! To top it all off! Thomas had managed to get the cute guy's number!
Now Vision was even more excited, so excited in fact that he'd dragged everyone up for a meeting with Thomas the moment he had gotten home, flapping his hands and talking animatedly about the whole experience. He felt like one of Left Brain's experiments bubbling over.
"You should call him!" Vision cried as the idea struck him out of nowhere.
"Call him? I only just got home!" Thomas said, already looking at his phone.
"A text then perhaps! With a lovely poem! You have to woo him with your creativity, Thomas, you can't let this chance go to waste!"
"The chance will still be there tomorrow, kiddo," Right Brain said, even though he seemed to be just as excited as Vision was.
"But what about now!" Vision cried, "You need to let him know how you feel, Thomas. you must charm him! Make him see how wonderful it would be for him to date you!"
Thomas laughed a little, "I'll send a text, does that work?"
"Yes, Thomas, I believe a text is an adequate way to start a conversation! Maybe we can all suggest a few things to say..."
Vision tuned out of the conversation just a little, focusing instead on the bubbly happy feeling in his chest. He felt flustered, like his face was heating up and getting warm and he had butterflies squirming around his stomach. He was so very happy right now, maybe the happiest he'd ever been! And he felt a little like he was going to explode with the euphoric joy of it. He closed his eyes for a moment, stimming with his hands as he did, and when he opened his eyes the whole world looked different.
Everything was just a tad darker around the edges, not enough to be bothersome, but enough to be noticed. The others were still talking, and he could hear them just fine, but what was really distracting him were the butterflies. All around him were little glowing butterflies, all of them golden and shimmering and Vision could only gasp at their beauty as they lazily flapped their wings around him. One landed on his shoulder and the other on his arm as he held it up, and Vision couldn't help but giggle when one landed on his outstretched finger.
And then he realised he couldn't let the others know about this.
If they knew, they'd take him even less seriously than they already did. Left Brain already didn't think he was always worth listening to, if they knew he was surrounded by glittery butterflies he wouldn't be taken seriously when it came to what Thomas needed at all. And if Right Brain found out then he'd be called cute and adorable and treated like a little kid! Which he wasn't! Thank you very much.
It quickly became obvious that the two couldn't see them, though their looks of confusion and worry directed towards him. Right Brain going as far as to ask Vision if he was okay.
He promised he was, just excited about the new wonderful opportunities, and then went to keep talking to Thomas, only to catch sight of a hint of purple in his peripheral.
Someone was sitting back there in the shadows. Another side whom Vision had never seen before.
He looked... absolutely dazzling, and frankly adorable. And suddenly Vision realised he very much wanted this evening to end so that he could talk to this strange new side. The guy behind the bed was wearing the prettiest sparkly purple eyeshadow, and was surrounded with butterflies just like Vision's - though his were silver and not gold.
Suddenly he was staring right back at Vision, and he felt his heart stutter.
He desperately wanted to talk to this guy.
And Vision was certainly not the type to give up on things that he wanted.
---
Luckily for Vision, the meeting was ended fairly soon after that and everyone began sinking out. They couldn't leave soon enough if he had anything to say about it, but still. Thomas left them soon afterwards - with maybe just a little encouragement - to make a midnight snack, but the cute shadowy side stayed behind with him.
Vision wasn't even sure if the side had meant to stay, but he had, looking after Thomas with that hopeful glittery expression. He wasn't even looking at Vision, which meant he got a few lovely moments longer of admiring the way this side glittered despite the oversized black hoodie that near drowned him. The feeling radiating off of him - an energy that buzzed across Vision's skin as he crept a little closer. A warm fuzzy feeling, almost a similar feeling to the one Vision would get when he got so excited about a project that he just had to jump up and flap his hands and spin around to dispel the energy.
It wasn't exactly the same, though. This feeling made him want to giggle and spin the other side in his arms. It was well and truly love, but a nervous kind of love. An excited lovesick but oh so jittery kind of love that made Vision want to do something like-
"Ow! What the hell!" Vision yelped as sharper than expected teeth sunk into his wrist. He had gone to cup the sparkling side's cheeks, because he was just so so cute Vision couldn't resist! and now he was being bitten.
"You- you can't just touch people!" The side spluttered after he had released Vision. He seemed equally as shocked that that had happened as Vision was, "It's an instinct!"
"I thought you were a cute little kitten! But no! You're a little spider! With little spider fangs! Go away!" Vision huffed, cradling his injured hand before sinking down, leaving a very confused little ball of Anxiety in his wake wondering what on earth had just happened.
----
The next time it happened, Vision was once again enraptured. He hardly even remembered the time before, and He felt like he was giddy, and once again when he approached the side causing such a feeling. He'd ended up with yet another bite to the wrist - another scar to match the first one.
"What did you think would happen!" The other side yelped when Vision protested, "You tried to grab me again!"
"Again?" Vision asked, pouting as he wiped away the blood before it could get onto his white sleeves.
"Yeah again! Don't you remember doing this to me when we got his number?" The side said, now more confused than anything else, "You grabbed my face and I bit you and you called me a spider-?"
"You know I have far too many things in my head to take something in on the first go around," Vision waved his good hand dismissively, "I'm sure I'll remember it now, but goodness you are just far too cute to resist! How am I not to want to squish your adorable little face!"
"I- wh- what?" The side said, some of that lilac returning to his undereye. Slowly - this time making sure the other side could actually see what he was doing - Vision reached out to cup his face.
"I think you are so very very pretty, and the way you make me - well, all of us - but especially me, feel, with the butterflies... well I can't even explain it! It makes me want to sing to the heavens!" Vision cried, gesturing with his free hand, "Okay okay, since you bit me-"
"Because you grabbed me?"
"Whatever, because you bit me, I think you owe me a bit of information! So.... what's your name?" Vision asked, "Who are you?"
"I- I don't... really know?" The lilac beauty said, seeming to lose faith in the answer as he said it. Vision tilted his head in confusion.
"Whatever do you mean you don't know?" He asked.
"I mean I don't know! What- what are you?"
"What am I?"
"This conversation is never going to get anywhere if you keep repeating me..."
"Why I'm Thomas' Vision of course!" Vision pressed on regardless, striking a dramatic pose that made the purple side giggle, "You really don't know what you are?"
"...No," The other said after thinking about it for a long moment, "I'm... new, I don't know what I am yet."
"Well that's okay!" Vision said brightly, grabbing the other's hand and spinning away, "For now I'll call you Butterfly! Okay?"
"Butterfly?"
"Yeah! 'cause it's what you make me feel! All full of butterflies," Vision grinned, pulling the other side close and watching how purple bloomed under his eyes and glittery butterflies filled the space around them.
Yeah. Butterfly was definitely right.
----
Taglist:
@full-of-roman-angst-trash @your-local-random-dino @cutebisexualmess @glacierruler @roseianxiety @bella-bugatti-frogetti-baguetti @scalesfeathersnfur @oatmealdaydrea ms @littlerat2 @goldnskyart @virgeandhis-pocket-protector @amateurmasksmith @sleepy-nova-tea @queer-and-fearful (if anyone wants to be added, let me know!)
warnings: captivity, restraints, panic attacks, unethical science, experimentation, wounds, injury and blood mention, character being kind of an ass, fear, bird ex machina, lmk if i missed any
-
Virgil woke up to find he was surrounded by darkness and completely unable to move.
Seeing as the last thing he remembered was being poisoned into unconsciousness by a demon slayer with mad scientist leanings, this was about as far from reassuring as an awakening could be.
For a disoriented moment, he tried to check for the baby crow, which mostly just involved him listening closely for any loud, raspy-voiced swearing. Naturally, there wasn’t any, because he’d blacked out and the slayer very clearly hadn’t wanted Roman’s bird anywhere near him.
Bizarrely enough, he felt a little morose at the baby crow’s absence. Maybe because she was the only creature who had figured out that despite being a monster, he wasn’t actually a threat to humanity.
Or maybe it was just because being immobilized in a dark, silent place was totally freaking him out, and he would have taken any company so long as it meant he hadn’t been locked away forever or buried alive.
(Could he still die from a lack of oxygen? Would he be stuck underground, conscious and alone, for the rest of time? He couldn’t even call out for help.)
His body was unresponsive, and nothing his brain was coming up with was remotely helpful, so Virgil focused on his breathing, trying to keep his count steady as he inhaled and exhaled air that could be rapidly running out—
By the time the slayer entered the room, Virgil had already hyperventilated himself into unconsciousness a few times, each time utterly convinced he was dying.
The man didn’t bother saying anything to him or even sparing him anything more than a glance, simply walking around the space and lighting several lamps at a brisk pace, but Virgil felt a vast, sweeping sense of relief fall over him regardless.
He wasn’t buried. He hadn’t been left alone to rot away in the dark.
He was… extensively strapped down to a waist-high table in the center of the room?
A significant amount of his relief started to fade. Right. He’d been caught by a slayer who wanted him dead or worse, and was now entirely at his mercy— assuming he even had any for demons.
There was another person in the room, too, and they scurried about so quickly that it took Virgil a few moments to identify them as the wary stranger who had sent him to go find their brother. They were wearing the same uniform as the slayer, now, which answered basically all of Virgil’s potential questions about the situation.
“Subject ABN-V3, Log 1,” the slayer started, and Virgil’s eyes flicked over to him curiously. “The subject regained consciousness approximately half an hour after halting the regular wisteria toxin doses, indicating remarkable poison resilience, comparable to a Lower Rank.”
There was the distinct scratch of hurried writing, but the slayer’s hands were unoccupied as he circled Virgil’s prone form. The younger slayer must have been an assistant.
There was a muted pressure on his hand, which refused to even twitch, even as the pressure grew heavier. The slayer hummed, pulling away. “In contrast, regeneration ability appears relatively slow. Internal organ function has resumed, but exterior nerves and muscles remain paralyzed.”
His organs had been paralyzed?! Virgil’s breathing stuttered, and he wrestled with the instinctual panic for a moment. His lungs were clearly working now, so he should just keep breathing and not pass out again.
When he looked back over, it was to the sight of the slayer staring directly at his face with a detached sort of curiosity. That composed mask of his may have dropped for a few moments in the clearing, but it was fully repaired and glued in place now.
“Do you have anything to say?” he asked, which was a little startling.
Virgil blinked at him for a moment, and then very quickly recalled that blinking was about all he could do. His hands weren’t cooperating with him, and even his head felt too heavy to shake or nod at the moment.
An irritated rumble started up in his chest for a moment before dying out, and he heaved a low sigh, already exhausted. He’d burnt through all his default terror while panicking in the dark, and now there was barely anything left to scrape up for his impending dehumanizing death.
The slayer only watched him impassively for another long, silent stretch of seconds before turning his attention away.
“Subject’s nonverbal behavior remains consistent with previous encounter,” he narrated, which succinctly explained why he’d bothered to verbally prod Virgil in the first place. “No secondary manifestations present in the room. We’ll proceed with direct regeneration testing while the paralytic is still in effect.”
There was a metallic clink, and Virgil’s gaze flicked over to a tray covered with tools he could only guess at the purpose of. Most of them were sharp-edged.
At least he wouldn’t be able to feel them. Yet.
The slayer picked up a thin blade, and Virgil squeezed his eyes shut, in an attempt to not have to see whatever was being done to him.
The narration of that calm, clinical voice couldn’t be as easily blocked out, so he found out regardless.
—
His healing factor had improved a lot since being turned into a monster, but it wasn’t anywhere close to the level he’d seen from some of the other demons he’d fought, so he wasn’t surprised to find that the first thing he felt when the paralysis began to wear fully off was pain.
The wounds weren’t serious, at least. He hoped that didn’t mean they were saving more lethal ones for when he could actually feel them, but he wasn’t optimistic about his odds.
(Unsurprisingly, it seemed like most demon slayers really hated demons.)
The slayer seemed strangely perturbed by the way the methodical injuries he’d inflicted hadn’t healed yet. Apparently, vastly accelerated healing was the norm for most demons, so this was just another way in which Virgil was a freaky outlier. Virgil could have told the slayer as much himself if he’d been able to sign.
Not to say that he’d regained all his vocabulary. With his limbs strapped firmly down, his post-poison communication was limited to signs that he could form with just his hands, and no accompanying movements. Fingerspelling was tedious, but at least it was possible.
“S-L-E-E-P,” he’d signed when the slayer had been theorizing on his apparently deeply unusual slow healing. “L-O-N-G.”
It took a few repetitions for his captor to pay it any mind, but once he did, his expression immediately creased with doubt. Virgil let himself look irritated about the reaction, because really, what was the point in pretending? He was screwed either way.
“If hibernation periods could heal demons, there would be longer stretches of inactivity between attacks,” the slayer said, frowning down at him. “It would make my job much easier if that were the case, but it isn’t.”
Since when was Virgil the representative for all of demonkind? He’d barely even spoken to other demons, since generally their interactions tended to start and end with them trying to kill each other. This was his supernatural sleeping schedule, not theirs.
Generally, he only slept like that when he was injured. If he wasn’t hurt in a fight, he didn’t get tired. He signed as much to the slayer, and earned a disbelieving scoff for his efforts.
Virgil had only been dozing lightly so far, seeing as he was currently trapped and about as far from safety as he could possibly get, but the disbelief rankled, and he huffed before pointedly closing his eyes as though to prove it.
He thought maybe the slayer wouldn’t allow it— there probably wasn’t much to scientifically observe when your subject is sleeping— but to his surprise, the man only noted down the behavior and then left.
It took a good part of the first day to force himself down into genuine sleep, but being left alone in a quiet space was close enough to his usual cave naps that he eventually managed to sink into the heavy unconsciousness of one of his impromptu hibernation sessions.
A full week later, he snorted into wakefulness to see the slayer had unstrapped one arm and was inspecting the smooth skin where the incisions had been previously.
This must not have been the first time he’d removed a restraint to see if Virgil was faking his beauty rest, because his head shot up with keen alarm the moment Virgil’s eyes fluttered open.
He released Virgil’s hand and drew a thin, needle-like dagger from his side in the same moment, presumably a breath away from poisoning him back into temporary organ failure.
Virgil barely even registered the movement, his eyes still crusted over with sleep. Half-awake and triumphant, he blearily inspected his completely-healed arm and then promptly signed, “I told you so.”
“Return your arm to the restraint,” the slayer instructed, his voice brooking no argument and his gaze assessing.
Virgil made a sour face, rubbing at his eyes. “Don’t you have cuffs?” he asked, turning slightly so he could tap his free wrist to his strapped down one for the last sign. “I could at least sign in those.”
“The restraint. Immediately,” the slayer replied, firm as stone.
A low grumbling growl of complaint started up in Virgil’s chest, but there was no way he could get free of the other restraints quickly enough to try and escape, and he really wasn’t looking to get his organs shut down again for no reason.
Besides, the assistant kid was still there in the corner, watching him with wide eyes, and he didn’t like the idea of scaring them.
Fine. He’d go back to his stupid nap then.
With a petulant scowl, he closed his eyes and stuck his arm back out and allowed the slayer to pin it back into place and tighten the straps over it. He flipped him off afterwards, though, just to make things clear.
It was quiet for long enough that he pried his eyes back open suspiciously. Both of the slayers were staring at him like he’d just started abruptly juggling fish or something, and he raised his eyebrows in a display of irritated bewilderment.
For once, the slayer didn’t have some snappy annotation to spout, only glaring down at Virgil with his jaw working like he was gritting his teeth.
Was he really that pissed off that Virgil had been telling the truth about his healing? Why?
“Professor Logan—,” the baby slayer whispered, faltering when Virgil’s gaze flicked their way.
“That’s enough for today,” ‘Logan’ answered, stepping away from the table. “We’ll speak elsewhere.”
Virgil only barely managed to stifle an incredulous noise as the two of them left, putting the lights out as they went. They’d never bothered to take their rude and often horrifying conversations about him elsewhere before. Maybe he should try being right about things more often.
—
“Bastard!”
Virgil’s eyes flew open at the muffled call, his head feeling much clearer after sleeping off the last of the poison’s symptoms.
It was quiet and dark all around him, as always, and for a moment, he nearly convinced himself that he’d imagined the noise entirely.
Then, from outside the door, there was a raspy squawk and an audible ruffling of feathers. “Fiend! Fiend?”
… Just how determined to swear at him was this bird?!
He couldn’t exactly respond, and he wasn’t sure why he would want to. Logan had reacted extremely negatively to the bird existing in the same space as him last time, and he wouldn’t wager that the slayer’s attitude had changed in the past however many days.
Still, the crow was clearly looking for someone, possibly even him. He could hear the distinctive pitter-patter of little taloned feet scurrying back and forth on the floor, with the occasional inquisitive swear thrown in.
After a few long minutes of this, Virgil gave up on trying to go back to sleep, unable to tune the little creature out. He may as well try to answer in the limited way he could.
It took entirely too long, but he managed to purse his lips and whistle a long, low note.
The clicking of steps stopped dead, and then grew abruptly louder, the bird’s faux-speech taking on an excited tone.
The baby crow audibly scrabbled at the doorway for a few seconds, before evidently managing to worm her way under the door gap. From there, she made short work of the flight up to the table, where she immediately perched directly on Virgil’s forehead and peered upside down at him.
“Scourge!” she announced gleefully.
Someone certainly hadn’t learned her lesson about fraternizing with big scary demons. He whistled an amused note at her, fingers twitching in an impulse to reach up and ruffle her feathers before he remembered his situation.
Right. No bird-petting for monsters, he guessed.
The crow— wasn’t her name Fluffbutt or something?— seemed to notice the movement, though, and she traversed down Virgil’s arm in little hops. He still couldn’t really reach her scruff of downy baby feathers from this angle, but he gave it his best attempt.
Fluffbutt pecked him harshly, which, rude, and then she turned around and started picking at the straps holding his forearm down.
… No fucking way.
Virgil craned his neck to look over at the bird, his disbelief slowly melting away as he saw that yes, the crow really was tugging and prying at the corded knot holding the restraints in place like her life depended on it.
It was slow going, but as she steadily worked at it, Virgil could tell that progress was being made. He wiggled his arm testingly every so often, usually getting bit for his efforts, and after what felt like hours of agonizing waiting, he finally managed to pull through the last threads of the restraints.
He only had one arm free, but that and some time was all he really needed. Fluffbutt reclaimed her spot on his forehead, watching as he quickly tore at the restraints on his other limbs.
As it turned out, quickly sitting up for the first time in days was a bad idea. Virgil rode out the surge of dizziness and pushed to his feet, pacing back and forth in the small room until he was confident that his legs had remembered how to function well enough to get him out of there.
A simple test of the handle revealed the room had been locked, and Virgil wasted a few minutes poking through the unsettling number of medical tools in the room before realizing there was no way they’d left the key in here with him.
He could probably kick the door down if given a few tries, but the more noise he made, the more likely it was that Logan would find him mid-escape and put him right back in those restraints. Virgil had no illusions on how a second match between him and the uncannily quick slayer would turn out, which meant that stealth was currently his best friend.
He turned his gaze to the wall, wondering if they were flimsy enough that it would be better to try and punch a hole through one of those, but before he could decide further, he heard the sound of approaching footsteps.
Shit. Plastering himself against the wall, he waited tensely for them to pass by— only for them to pause right outside the doorway. There was the distinct click of a key being inserted into a lock. Double shit.
The door swung open, and the assistant slayer had just enough time to look up and see the empty specimen table before Virgil leapt at them.
Don’t freak out, he would have said if his hands weren’t currently occupied with covering the slayer’s mouth and dragging them bodily into the room. Instead, he made a series of low chuffing sounds from deep in his chest, which helped absolutely nothing about the current situation.
“Scourge!” Fluffbutt crowed, her contribution equally as unhelpful.
Hurriedly booting the door shut with his foot, Virgil only had a moment before the baby slayer gave up on trying to pry his hand away and instead went for the sword sheathed at their side.
Since letting them do that was basically a one-way street to getting decapitated, he risked releasing them for long enough to tear his claws through their belt and yank the sword free, sheathe and all, before tossing it into a corner with a muted thud.
“PRO—,” they started, and Virgil slapped his hand back over their mouth, hissing lowly in the closest approximation to a shush that he could manage. They responded by glaring and biting him, which he really should have expected after living with teenagers for a few months.
It only took a glance around the room to find a suitable cloth from the cache of cleaning supplies, and Virgil wrangled the baby slayer into a headlock for the handful of seconds it took him to assemble a makeshift gag and shove it in their mouth.
With the slayer now unable to raise the alarm, Virgil paused for a moment to think, his whole body jittering with sudden adrenaline. The easiest solution would obviously be to strap the slayer into the convenient demon-proof restraints readily available on the specimen table, but he really didn’t want to do that. The kid was already panicking hard enough, the last thing he wanted was to make them think he was going to experiment on them or something.
Instead, he tore a larger piece of linen into strips and wound them around the slayer’s wrists a few times before knotting the end of the faux-ropes intensively around one of the table legs.
The slayer started yanking against the makeshift restraints the moment Virgil stepped away, their cries muffled but still audible enough that he should really be escaping sooner rather than later.
Luckily, his cloak had been dumped on a nearby shelf with the rest of the meager belongings he carried with him, mostly ignored after Logan had finished snooping through it for bones or something. Virgil ignored Fluffbutt swooping noisily around his head as he slung the comforting weight back around his shoulders and pulled the hood up, and then stepped back around the table towards the door.
The baby slayer seemed to think he was headed for them instead, their gaze very obviously wide with terror as they scrambled ineffectively to get away from him. He stopped short, guilt swamping him.
“I’m not going to hurt you,” he signed, backing up a few paces to try and give them some space. “I just want to get out of here, okay?”
The kid stared at him, chest rising and falling as rapidly as a sparrow’s. He sort of wished he had heard their name at some point, but it probably wouldn’t have made a difference. As it was, he didn’t even know if they knew sign, let alone how to calm them down.
He sighed, lifting his hands up to his shoulders in a gesture of nonaggression, and edged around them to finally get to the door. Fluffbutt settled on his shoulder, apparently content to be identified as a little feathered demon-associating traitor.
The hall was blessedly empty when he stuck his head out to check, and so he waved a small farewell to the kid— almost certain that they would wriggle out of those haphazard bonds within the hour— and closed the door after himself.
The key was still sitting there in the lock, so he twisted it to relock the room, and after a moment of thought, dropped the key and kicked it under the door so that the kid wouldn’t be stuck if nobody else came by in the next few hours.
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
New fic is here!
Summary: Nico can, for some reason, see the sides. So of course, he assumes the obvious. That Thomas is an identical septuplet.
This is not the case.
Maybe fiction really is stranger than the truth.
But now Roman was gone, and Janus found himself spending every night in a cold, unfamiliar bed. He doesn't have a home anymore, and he's not sure when it all slipped away.
Fic below the cut, or read on AO3.
reblogs appreciated!
today i offer you thomas & janus friendship and roceit angst. tomorrow... who knows?
With Roman, Janus was always home.
It didn't matter where he went. He was home by Roman’s side.
It had always been that way. Ever since the beginning. When ‘Creativity’ was one being rather than two. Janus had been home when next to him. And then after the split, Janus had been home by Roman.
Maybe that’s why it hurt so badly.
The separation had been silent. Janus isn’t entirely sure if that’s better. Would a conversation have made him feel better than the quiet disconnect? He hadn’t even noticed Roman slipping through his fingers, hadn’t seen him pulling away. Should he have been more observant? Should he have noticed? Was he too self-centered? Too self-absorbed? Was he too focused on himself to see what was going on right under his nose?
There’s something wet on his face. Some cold and salty trailing down his cheeks, rushing over his lips. The tears come in steady waves, they come without noise, without a rumble, without a flash of lightning. The invisible storm rages on, crashing Janus’ rocky sailboat into rocks and cliffs, without an anchor to cast down, without a life jacket to keep him afloat. The icy waters clasp their frozen hands around his calves, the crocodile in the river clamping sharp teeth around his ankle, intent on dragging him below the surface. Would it be easier if he went willingly? If he gave in to the murky depths, allowed the water to fill his lungs, succumbed to the kelp prison? The weeds wrap around his wrists, keeping him bolted to the sandy floor. And the tears don’t stop.
When will he run out? Run out of energy, run out of tears to cry, run out of time? Is this his sacred fate? Is he destined to a lonesome existence, wandering the halls, wondering where he went wrong? When will this end?
Janus has no home.
He has his room, he has his space within the Imagination, yes.
But he has no home.
His room is cold and desolate, a pile of rubble in a vast junkyard. He wades through the mess everyday, looking for something warm to cling onto. He digs, hands scraped and bloodied by rocks and glass, desperately seeking comfort in the abyss.
The void isn’t cold. It isn’t warm. It simply… is. Janus floats there, after the chill wears off. After he lets the ocean take him, after he searches through trash. He merely allows himself to exist, suspended in a boundless abyss. He could say it’s similar to floating, but he can’t even be certain that’s how it feels. It’s as though air never existed, there’s nothing to float in because there is nothing. There’s no darkness, because there’s nothing. It’s the experience of total nothingness, no light, no sound. He can’t hear or see anything, and it doesn’t become a vast darkness, but simply as though those senses… never existed.
This could be home.
It’s far simpler, the nothingness. The complete absence of self. A rolling abyss with no entrance, no exit in sight. There is nothing. No emotions, no senses, no talking, no touching, no Roman.
Janus sits on an empty couch in an empty room. He doesn’t tend to materialise himself for no reason. Thomas hasn’t called upon him, there’s no dilemma to be worked through, there’s no cunning disguise about him. In fact, he doesn’t even know where Thomas is. He must be in the apartment somewhere, because Janus is in the apartment. It’s strange, sitting here. Undisguised, unspeaking, just… staring. Staring down at his knees and his shoes and the carpet. His head hangs low and heavy off his slumped shoulders, hands shaking ever so slightly in his lap. He keeps picking at his gloves, pulling at the right one, then tugging it back down. He could take it off, swear on his life, give a million different truths, a thousand apologies, but it wouldn’t mean anything. It wouldn’t do anything.
Truthfully, he’s not accustomed to feeling so… unsure. Typically, he’s headstrong, he knows exactly what he wants, always. He wants what Thomas wants, what he really wants. He wants a happy life, a safe, enjoyable life. Is that selfish? Apparently so. His methods, maybe, are. But in small doses aren’t they necessary? Would he exist if being a little selfish was a bad thing?
Something stinks. It’s not the trash that needs to be taken out, it’s not the pairs of shoes lined by the door. It’s a stench that hovers in the air, that sticks around, that follows Janus wherever he goes. It reeks. Of what, he can’t be certain.
He just keeps mindlessly fiddling with his clothing, attempting to calm his thoughts. But he isn’t thinking anything. His mind is racing silently. A stream of incoherent ramblings, screaming, shouting, slowly getting louder and louder.
Janus clasps his hands over his ears, sinking lower, hunching over even further. How is he meant to get out of this one? He doesn’t even know what happened. Roman was there, and then he just… wasn’t. When had it started? Where did he go wrong? He’s all questions, no answers.
There’s someone on the stairs, footsteps creeping down. They sound so far away, six feet underwater. Or, on land, and Janus is underwater? He’s beginning to lose track of his own grieving metaphors. But creativity was never his strong suit. He thinks about that a little too hard, and something cold is running down his cheeks again. His hands come off his ears to cover his face, gripping hard around his skull, pressing his thumbs harshly into his cheeks, fingers clasping at his temple. If he pushes hard enough, can he make it stop? Could he pop himself like a balloon?
“Janus?” The call is gentle, concerned — but apprehensive. “What are you doing here?” Janus doesn’t look up. He doesn’t need to. He already knows who it is.
Thomas pauses on the bottom step, phone still in his clasp, other hand holding onto the end of the railing. He hovers in a nervous space, torn between backing away slowly, and approaching. He had just been going to the kitchen, but this is… weird. Even for him. This is weird.
Janus doesn’t respond. Strange. In his experience, the side always has some sort of sarcastic, sassy, or otherwise sardonic quip primed and ready to go. He’s quick-witted, Thomas can grant him that. Not that he’d say that out loud.
“Are you… okay?” He tries hesitantly, dropping down off the last stair, sliding his phone into his back pocket and lacing his fingers together in front of him. He rocks nervously on the balls of his feet, throwing a sideways glance into the kitchen. His sandwich is in the fridge in there…
There’s still no response. And that is concerning. The side continues to sit in silence, hands over his face, hunched over. What is going on?
“Do you wanna talk or…?” Thomas tries for a third time, taking another apprehensive shuffle closer.
Janus doesn’t say anything, but he parts the fingers of his left hand, one yellowed eye meeting Thomas’ own. Even from across the room Thomas can see tears welling up, slowly sliding down his face. He isn’t making any noise, isn’t shaking, but he’s crying. Which scares him. He doesn’t want to imagine the horrors it takes to make Janus cry. Snarky, snakey Janus? It sends a shiver down Thomas’ spine. What could be going on inside his own head to make Deceit, of all of the sides, this upset? Upset enough to emerge, to come into the real world, rather than crying in his imagination.
His feet are carrying him over before he can stop them, and he finds himself sitting on the opposite side of the couch. The spot after the corner curve, the slightly shorter stretch.
Only then, does Janus mutter out a reply. “Don’t. Don’t come over here trying to comfort me. Go eat,” he turns his head away, and it seems his hands come away from his eyes, one falling limp by his side, the other wiping his tears away, resting over his mouth. And of course, he doesn’t want Thomas to concern himself with the emotions of others. He wants Thomas to go, to leave, to take care of himself, and not worry about others. He knows that sharing his own emotions will just make Thomas feel worse, and what’s the point in that?
Thomas is quiet for a long minute. “What happened?” He cocks his head, making it quite apparent he’s not going anywhere.
And then there’s a feeling. A feeling rushing into the abyss, lighting it up, sending Janus crashing down. It’s anger.
“Jesus Christ, Thomas! Listen to me, very carefully! Nothing! Nothing is wrong! Stop being such a people pleaser, for once, and leave me alone!” He still won’t let the man look at him. Is ignoring him everyday not enough? Is forcing him into disguise in order to be heard not enough? Does Thomas despise him so entirely that he simply must see Janus at his lowest in order to feel satisfied? Perhaps he and Virgil are more alike than first assumed.
There’s another pause, a still moment where Janus wipes furiously at his eyes, all for naught, as the tears do not stop.
Thomas clears his throat awkwardly. “I know we don’t always see eye to eye… but y’know, if you’re upset then there’s something wrong in my head, so… what’s going on?”
“You’re trying to help because you’re worried it’ll affect you?” Janus perks up ever so slightly, glancing back over his shoulder, eye reddened from weeping.
“I… guess so? If there’s something wrong with you, then there’s something wrong with me.”
“I taught you well, then,” Janus chuckles wetly, rubbing his snotty nose.
Thomas looks slightly shocked. “No, no I mean, that’s only part of the reason — I also can’t stand seeing people upset,” he assures, leaning forward from his spot, craning his neck in an attempt to peer around at the side’s face properly. Even if the scales do still give him a shock after all this time. He’s just never expecting them. “C’mon, Decei- Janus. What’s going on?”
Janus tips his head back, bouncing his skull off the back of the couch, groaning. Stupid fucking empathy. Can Thomas just leave? Can he not muster up the selfishness required to just… walk past? Can he let Janus suspend himself back in his empty void, where he doesn’t have to confront his feelings.
Thomas is eerily quiet. It’s becoming more and more clear he’s not going anywhere. And Janus isn’t going to play the long game. It occurs to him he could simply sink out and disappear, but now Thomas knows he exists, he could just summon him back into place. And they could play that game for a while. Janus knows Thomas, Janus is part of Thomas, and he’s all too aware of the fact that if he did try to leave, he would just be brought back. He can already see it happening. Maybe he can just give silent treatment.
But Thomas is burning holes into him with his staring. It’s starting to get hard to breathe under the pressure. There’s a boulder on his chest, slowly squeezing all the air from his lungs, crushing his ribs under its immense weight.
“Fine,” Janus manages to hiss out under the overwhelming heft of the rock.
He waits for Thomas to respond, but he doesn’t. He just keeps his gaze fixed on Janus as he drags his head up, slouching over. Janus rests his arms on his legs, curved over his knees a little.
“It’s very complicated, and you’re going to find out… some strange things about yourself. Are you prepared for that?” He tilts his head to the side, flicking Thomas a quick glance. He realises quite quickly that this whole ordeal is going to be a hell of a lot easier if he doesn’t look at the man.
Thomas raises an eyebrow, “as long as you don’t lie… What kind of things? Should I be worried? Should I call on someone else to mediate-”
“Don’t get anyone else,” Janus spits swiftly. That would be the worst possible outcome. But Thomas stares at him strangely, clearly trying to piece together if Janus is lying or not. Jesus Christ, it’s like the boy that cried wolf. He begins to worm his right glove off, holding his bare hand up to the world, declaring he’ll be truthful. “I won’t lie to you, okay. For once it’s… it won’t get me anywhere. Besides, I already tried and you saw right through it.”
“Okay,” Thomas spends a second examining his palm, “I believe you. No matter how naive of a move that is.”
Janus laughs weakly, bunching up his glove in his hand, fidgeting with the fabric as he tries to find a place to start. “You’re going to find this all very weird.”
“And talking to a metaphysical aspect of my personality is so normal?”
“Fair enough,” he clears his throat. “It’s about Roman.”
Thomas’ mouth falls open in surprise. Not what he had been expecting. “What’s he done now? Did one of his weird little nickname insult things hit a nerve? Or was he super harsh? I can talk to him if you’d like?”
Janus shakes his head. His hat remains, as always, atop his hair. “No, no. It’s… deeper than that, I suppose,” he rubs across his face, pulling his cheeks down as he does, sighing. Why is he doing this again? “I just- we’re not… close anymore.” The final two words push all the air from his chest, a heaving breath following them as Janus tries to remember to inhale.
“You two were close?” That’s the most bewildered Thomas has sounded so far, that’s the sentence that’s thrown him off kilter.
He gets a hummed response. “Yes. Very close. And… he started pulling away, and now he’s gone. And I didn’t even see it happening, I don’t know when it started, I didn’t even realise. I mean, how could I be so clueless? I didn’t even notice him leaving, and now he’s gone. He’s left me laying in the dust. It’s like…” Janus takes a deep gulping breath, “have you ever thought that your home is a person? It doesn’t really matter where you are, what room you sleep in, as long as that one person is there, then you’re home?”
“Yeah, I suppose so,” Thomas muses, raking his fingers through his hair, eyebrow raised curiously. He can’t see where this is going. “Forgive me, for being clueless, but I’m just trying to wrap my head around that whole statement. So. You two were super close friends, and you didn’t realise he was slowly starting to stop talking to you, and now you two don’t talk at all, so… you’re sad about it?”
Janus mutters something into his palms, hands pulled back over his face.
“Huh?”
“We were more than friends, Thomas.”
It hits like a bomb. Like a shot to the chest. Thomas freezes in place, mouth hanging open on an unspoken response. He keeps opening and closing his lips, blubbering like a fish. “Like… I’m sorry, wait,” he waves his hands in front of his face, eyes squeezed shut. “Dating? The aspects of my personality- Christ, how fucked up am I?”
“I wouldn’t think about it too hard,” Janus mutters, scrunching his glove up and tossing it across the room.
“How can I not think about it!” He shudders, whole body rippling and writhing. “It’s-” Thomas cuts himself off when he notices Janus peeking at him, his deep frown, the cool tears still steadily streaming down his face. He can’t call it weird. He can think it, yeah, but he probably shouldn’t say it. “Sorry, sorry, just… go on.”
“I keep trying to pinpoint where it started. Thomas — I’ve been close with Creativity since before he was two sides. We worked as a little duo, and then when it was two creativities… For a while we all got on. When you were younger, and all of us were too, I would play the villain in Roman’s make-believes. I was the evil dragon or snake or whatever story he made up,” Janus seems to smile fondly at the memory, “Remus was my henchman, every time. And Roman was always a knight, running around with his cardboard sword. And I suppose as you grew up, we did too. I can’t even remember when we became… more.”
“I mean…” Thomas breathes deeply, trying to cast any thoughts of how damn strange this whole thing is from his mind. He focuses entirely on Janus, on his feelings. He pretends they’re not talking about aspects of his personality (who all look like him… Christ, Thomas, stop it!) and instead imagines Janus as a regular, non-snake-faced friend going through a breakup. “Ever since I’ve known you exist… I’ve never seen Roman be particularly fond of you.”
That’s putting it lightly.
“He was not happy about the theatre… or the disguising…” Janus muses, “took a lot of apologising for us to move past that. Maybe we didn’t get over it. Perhaps I just… thought we did. But I don’t know. Maybe I was blind. Maybe I still am.”
“So you miss him?”
“Everyday,” Janus sighs, he hates this. This vulnerability. It’s like something is physically clawing at his skin, gnawing at his spine, trying to rip his ribs out of his chest one by one. His entire body is on fire, burning and smoldering. “This is gross,” the words slide out, a scary truth he’d never intended to vocalise. His hand slaps across his mouth.
“What is?” Thomas has shifted closer on the couch, scooted until he’s sat beside Janus properly, confused. He’s never in this close proximity with any of the sides, and if he’d had to pick one to be the first he’d have a proper sit down chat with… well it wouldn’t have been Janus. He almost wants to reach out and comfort him with a shoulder hug, but that might be pushing it.
“This,” Janus gestures vaguely in a circle with his index finger, “I don’t… I don’t do this.”
“Feelings?”
“Precisely.” He nods.
“Could that be part of the problem?”
“I’m… not sure,” Janus pulls his head from his hands and looks over to Thomas. “Maybe. Possibly. I think… I think Roman thinks I’m evil. He hates me. I don’t know when he started to hate me, I don’t know what I did. I think my existence… I think everything I frame myself as. He thinks I’m evil incarnate. That I have schemes and plots in mind. He can’t seem to see that I too, just like him, want the best for you. So much of my purpose is to protect him, your ego, and he can’t see that. Or he doesn’t think he needs protecting. I just… he’s gone.”
Thomas doesn’t say much. He glances around the carpet. “You’ve just got the memories left. Maybe you can rebuild that bond?”
“I don’t want any advice,” Janus hisses out sharply. He huddles in on himself, shrouded in his capelet. He sort of wishes it was a proper cape now, he could use the swaddle.
Thomas chews on his lip. And then there’s an arm curling around Janus’ shoulders, a silent camaraderie. Neither of them say anything, but Thomas makes his presence known. Perhaps the truce won’t last, just a temporary surrender before they’re back to butting heads, but it helps. It feels like having a friend again.
Janus doesn’t smile. He doesn’t say anything. But he doesn’t shrug Thomas off, and Thomas doesn’t move. He still doesn’t have a home, he still doesn’t know why Roman left. He still doesn’t truly know where he went wrong.
But he’s pushed his face above the surface of the water. He’s not drowning anymore, and that’s a start.
-
angst is defo my forte in writing, but i am Still trying to get used to writing for the sides rather than sad gay 80s musical men. still, i had a good time with this one! see u all tomorrow for day 4!
So. Has this been on AO3 for two years? Yes. Sorry. I once again forgot to keep my lovely tumblr updated. My bad, guys, have some pre-royality as an apology
Summary: Roman knows everything there is to know about his best friend, Logan. He knows he loves bees, and books, and his little brother, Patton. He knows he would kill anyone that hurt him, and he knows never to get near in case he’s the one that does so.
It works.
Until it doesn’t
Characters: Roman, Logan, Patton
Warnings: implied child abuse (minor), arguments, school anxiety (minor)
Words: 3854
Roman met Logan when he was seven. They were both sent to a gifted and talented club in elementary school, and were the youngest two there by three years. The rest of the kids had hated them, feeling shown up by the two young geniuses.
So of course, they had to team up! And team up they did. They soon became the best of friends, unable to be separated. They would bounce ideas off each other, debate endlessly and viciously, critique everything the other said, and still offer to kill someone for each other, after everything.
Roman knew everything about his best friend. He knew that his family life was… complicated, but that he and his mom were happy. He knew that he wanted to own the largest beekeeping facility in history when he grew up, and he knew that the only time he was ever physically violent was when he punched a kid in the jaw for purposely standing on a bee which Logan had been trying to get out of the classroom.
He knew that Logan had a half-brother who was just over a year younger than him, Patton. Roman had never seen Patton, though, not even in photograph form. He knew he lived really far away, with Logan’s dad and his mom. He knew they FaceTimed sometimes — just Logan and Patton, never any of the adults, he said.
When they were ten, Patton suddenly moved house to live with Logan and Ms Foster. His last name was Hart, though, and he was really hurt. Roman hadn’t been allowed to meet him until months later when he was all better, and he’d never been told why Patton moved in, or what got him so bruised and broken.
When they did meet, Roman realised that Patton was Logan’s polar opposite. They both had the same jet black hair, but that was where the similarities died. Where Logan’s was pin-straight and lay flat on his head, Patton’s was large and coily and wild. Where Logan was fair-skinned with pale blue eyes, Patton’s was a golden brown, freckles dotting across his cheekbones. Patton cried a lot — all the time, it seemed, when Roman first met him. Logan never cried. Patton loved flowers and pretty colours, though was deeply, deeply ashamed of this fact, while Logan adored space and insects and spoke about it with every chance he got. Patton was very small for his age, while Logan was gangly and lean.
Roman didn’t speak to Patton often. Logan was fiercely protective of him, constantly scaring off anybody who dared to look at the boy wrong. He hated when people flirted with him, and he made Roman swear to never speak to the kid so that he couldn’t be another one of Patton’s apparent suitors.
To be fair, Roman wasn’t all that mad. He probably would flirt with the younger of the brothers, even if it was just to irritate his best friend. He didn’t really care enough to disobey though, and the opportunity never arose.
Sometimes, Roman saw him around school. At first, he’d wave, and Patton would smile shyly and wave back, but as they grew older he realised how uncomfortable the kid looked and stopped. Around the same time, Logan stopped having proper birthday parties, and Patton started going out with his own friends, so Roman… never really saw him at all. For all he knew, the kid was still the same frightened, soft-spoken nine-year-old that just appeared in Logan’s life one day.
However, all of that changed when Roman was seventeen.
He was meant to be meeting Logan at his house at 1pm. They were, as always, partnered together for an English project, and were supposed to be working on it that day.
However, when Roman arrived at Logan’s house, he was early. Seven minutes early.
He shrugged it off, actually rather pleased with himself — he had never been early for anything in his life — and knocked on the door.
A voice shouted from inside. “I’ll get it, Lo! I think it’s Virgil!”
Roman hesitated. Should he have texted his friend before knocking, to warn him of his presence? Or maybe he should have waited in his car until 1pm, and then knocked a few minutes later.
Before he could hurry away, the door swung inwards, revealing the most beautiful person Roman had ever laid his eyes on. The first thing Roman noticed was his hair. His curly black hair that seemed to float away from his head freely. Next was the small gap in between his front teeth that showed when he grinned. And then he was talking.
“Hi! How can I help you?”
Roman stared at him, suddenly realising how gorgeous of a brown his eyes were. This is ridiculous, he snapped at himself. Speak! Like a normal person!
Roman could only stare. The boy — this must be Patton, but he looked so different, what the fuck? — had freckles dusting the golden-brown skin of his nose and cheeks that bunched on the ends of his bright, gleaming smile. His bracelets clinked against each other prettily, earrings swinging as he bounced lightly on the balls of his feet. His large, round glasses showed Roman his own reflection, standing like a deer caught in the headlights.
Roman! Speak!
The angel’s grin disappeared, replaced by an embarrassed oh shape and widening eyes. “Oh! Roman! Hi! I’m so sorry, it’s been a while, huh? I didn’t even recognise you and Lo never told me you were coming round! Hang on a sec, I’ll go grab him. Come on in!”
Suddenly, there was a thump upstairs, and then frantic footsteps. Patton sighed, shot an apologetic look at Roman, and turned to the stairs.
Before Roman could ask what was happening, Logan was bolting down the stairs.
“Roman! Stop talking, right now!” he called. He reached the bottom of the stairs and stood in between Patton and Roman.
Roman stared at his best friend in surprise. “Nice to see you, too, specs. How was your day? Mine’s been great, thanks for asking.”
“Shush. We’re going upstairs. Patton, leave us alone.”
“What? But Log—” Patton began.
Logan cut him off. “We have very important school business to attend to. No distractions. Especially not for Roman.”
“Rude,” Roman muttered.
Patton frowned at his brother, putting his hands on his hips. “Now, Logan, don’t you think that maybe I’d like to actually meet your best friend? You’ve met Virgil enough times!”
Logan blushed at the ‘best friend’ part. “You have met him.”
“I was nine, I don’t remember it!”
“Well, too bad. Come on, Roman, it’s work time.”
Roman stared at him as he ran back up the stairs. He looked at Patton, and, after a second’s hesitation, bowed.
“It was truly a pleasure meeting you, fair sir. I hope we meet again.”
He then turned and hurried after Logan, rolling his eyes at his friend’s call.
He went into Logan’s bedroom, and saw that his friend was already sitting at the desk chair, his arms crossed and an unimpressed glare on his face.
“What? I didn’t do anything!” Roman instantly defended, his hands up in mock surrender.
“I’ve told you many times I don’t like when people talk to Patton like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like he’s some— some prize to be won!”
“I didn’t speak to him like that!”
“That’s how you speak to everyone, Roman.”
“So, what, when he opened the door I was meant to just stare at him until you came along?”
That’s what you were going to do, a voice in his head hissed. He pointedly ignored it.
“No! But you’re meant to warn a person before you knock on their door. Those are the rules of houses.”
Roman rolled his eyes and sat on the bed. “Oh, whatever. I can’t believe people claim that I am the dramatic one.”
“Roman. I don’t want you to try and make a move on my baby brother, understood?”
Roman let out a startled laugh. “Make a move? Oh my god, Lo, never say that again, okay?”
His friend didn’t rise to the bait. He leaned
forwards seriously, face set. “Promise. Promise you won’t try and create a romantic relationship — or any other kind of relationship, for that matter — with Patton. Promise.”
“Logan. With all due respect, it isn’t any of your business who Patton has a romantic-or-otherwise relationship with.”
“Roman.”
Roman could see how serious his best friend was. He sighed. “Fine. I won’t try and date your brother.”
“Promise?”
“Promise.”
Logan nodded, satisfied, and sat back in the chair. “Okay. Thank you.”
Roman smiled at him. “As adorable as your younger brother is, I wouldn’t want to make you leave.”
“Thank you. But don’t call him adorable. Don’t talk about him.”
“Lo. He’s a person. No offence, but you can’t control who he interacts with. That isn’t up to you.”
Logan glared. “You don’t understand, Roman. He’ll get hurt.”
“You think I would hurt him?”
“No! Because you’re going to leave him alone!”
Roman rolled his eyes. “Yes, but you think I would hurt him? Hypothetically?”
“He’s fragile. You wouldn’t do it purposely, but he would get hurt. I won’t let anyone hurt him.”
“Logan, this is bordering on possession. You need to calm down. I swear, I’m not going to try and romantically involve myself if it’d really freak you out this much, but you can’t control his every move. That’s scary, and it’s not okay. Chill.”
Logan narrowed his eyes. “Fine. I will ‘chill’. But if you hurt him, Roman—”
“I just said I won’t, Logan! I’ve basically only just met him — we barely even had a conversation! I’m not going to fall in love with someone based off their looks okay? Gosh, anyone would think you didn’t trust me.” He tried not to show too much of his hurt in his voice. Did Logan honestly think so little of him? That he would ever date a person — any person, let alone his best friend’s younger brother — just to string them along and then break their heart? Did Logan think he would ever purposely hurt someone?
Despite how hard Roman did try to hide, Logan picked up on it, and sighed. “Roman, I’m not attacking you. I’m just saying. He’s my brother, you can hardly blame me for wanting to protect him, can you?”
“No. You’re right, Lo, I just… you don’t think I’d hurt anyone on purpose, right?”
“Of course I know that. I know you’re not evil, Roman, okay? Calm down. You’re being ridiculous.”
Roman sighed. “Ridiculous? Why? You keep telling me not to harm your brother, and you keep ignoring me every time I say I won’t. How would you feel if I kept ignoring you, huh? You’d freak out. Just… please trust me. I said I wouldn’t start a relationship, I said I wouldn’t hurt him, what else do you want me to do? You need to trust me.”
Logan stared at him. “I trust you. Obviously I trust you. I just… I don’t want anyone to hurt Patton. Okay?”
“I said,” Roman snapped. “Fine.”
Logan jerked back, before his eyes blazed with anger. “You know what? If all you are going to do is yell at me we’ll do this another day. Go home.”
Roman scoffed. “You’re kicking me out?”
Logan scowled at him. “Yes. Go home until you can stop acting totally irrationally.”
Roman stood up. “Fine! I will! But I’ll come back when you can quit being a dick. Call me if it happens. But I won’t hold my breath.”
He stormed out of the room and slammed the door.
As he walked down the stairs, pretending his eyes weren’t stinging with tears, Patton appeared at the bottom, eyes clouded with worry.
“What’s wrong? Are you alright?”
Roman nodded, smiling shakily. “Yes, thank you, I’m very well. Your brother is just—” He let out an embarrassed laugh and tried to subtly wipe his eyes. “Sorry. I shouldn’t talk crap about him. Not to you at least.”
Patton giggled, and Roman’s stomach turned. “Oh, don’t worry about that. I know how he can be.”
Roman grinned. “Yes. Thank you, I’m glad someone understands.”
“Oh, I totally do. It’s… I love Logan, but it’s ridiculous. He gets so worked up, and then pretends that he literally doesn’t feel anything. It’s a little exhausting.”
Roman laughed. “I know .” Patton grinned even further. In a conspirator’s whisper, Roman added, “And he is so totally not emotionless. He’s one of the most sensitive people.”
“Isn’t he just?”
Roman chuckled. He walked down the rest of the stairs and stood in front of Patton.
“He’s like a tower,” Roman said suddenly, breaking the silence. Patton tilted his head with a confused noise. “He locked you up and hid you away from me, a gorgeous little prince like you.”
Patton’s eyes widened, his face darkened slightly in red. “O-Oh! I— Uh— Wow…”
Roman grinned. In the back of his mind, he was thinking of the promise he made Logan, but…
No. This was wrong. There was no way he could betray Logan like this, no matter how angry he was.
He took a step back, feeling a blush in his cheeks.
“Um, well! Goodbye, Patton. It was truly an incredible experience to meet you. Again”
Patton blinked again, shocked by the sudden change.
“Oh, yeah. Um… you too. Maybe I’ll see you if you come over again. It’s weird how we always miss each other, considering how doyen I know you’re here.”
Roman grinned. “It is. And, I hope so.”
Patton smiled. “Me too. You should probably go. Before Lo realises we’re looking at each other.”
Roman laughed. “Fair, true. Bye.”
Patton waved cheerfully and Roman left the house.
Why was his heart beating so fast? Roman had had a crush before, and this did not feel like a crush. Crushes were short and sweet. They were butterflies, not nausea. They were skips of beats, not racing pulses.
They were good. Not wrong. And this felt so, so wrong.
He couldn’t think of doing anything with Patton without the image of Logan’s face popping into his head. And that was just as weird as it was wrong.
But… it surely wasn’t up to Logan who Patton formed relationships with. And it wasn’t up to him who Roman formed relationships with. So he wouldn’t actually be doing anything—
Stop.
He swore that he wouldn’t do it, and so he wouldn’t. Simple as that. It didn’t matter how fast his heart beat, how his lungs emptied and his blood ran to his face.
“Crap,” he muttered, hitting his head against the steering wheel. He honked the horn, and shot upright. Patton peered through the window at him, frowning. He smiled slightly, seeming to draw himself up taller when he realised it was Roman. The older teen knew he was bright red by now. He waved with a shaking hand and drove away.
Roman forced himself not to think about Patton for the rest of the weekend. He ignored the urge to search for him on Instagram, ignored the urge to go back to Logan’s house under the pretence of an apology, just so he could see Patton again.
“No,” he growled to himself. He wasn’t even going to pretend to apologise to that… that… that jerk.
Every time he thought about Logan, he felt like he might cry again. Logan was his best friend, his oldest. Roman didn’t want to lose him. Roman loved him.
But the fact that Logan had believed what he said. He’d believed that Roman would try to hurt Patton, would try to seduce him only to hurt him afterward. Like… like a siren, a literal siren.
Anger burned in his stomach again. He wasn’t going to think about it.
When Roman went back to school, he didn’t see Logan until third period — English. They still sat next to each other.
Logan, predictably, was already there when Roman arrived. He sat next to him, tense and awkward. Logan ignored him for a moment.
Then, he muttered a tense, “Good morning.”
“Is it?”
Logan winced. “I think… so…”
Roman scoffed quietly. The teacher walked in before Logan could say anything else.
“Alright, guys,” he said. “Good morning. We’re just going to continue with our projects today, so you can just get started. I’ll do roll call as you do so.”
Roman groaned, and pulled his notebook out of his bag. He threw it onto his table and made sure to keep his eyes off Logan.
“Roman, I—”
“I’m not in the mood, Logan, just do the project and stop talking.”
“Roman, please, let me—” Logan’s voice cracked, and Roman’s head snapped around to stare at him.
“Lo?”
Logan was staring straight ahead. His jaw was clenched, lips trembling. Roman saw tears in his eyes.
“Please let me speak. If you interrupt I will… I will ‘chicken out,’ as you like to say.”
Roman hesitated, and then he sighed. “Okay. Go ahead.”
Logan’s shoulders relaxed imperceptibly. He still didn’t look at Roman. “I would like to… apologise for my behaviour previously. I was being irrational and… and rather cruel. I didn’t intend to… to do so. However, that is what happened, through my ineptitude. You were offended, and I attacked that, and then I… I kicked you out of my house. That was unnecessary, and I should have tried to understand what you were feeling. I… sincerely apologise, Roman. I would be greatly relieved if you… forgave me. Although I will understand if you don’t.”
Roman stared at him for several seconds. Then, he laughed. Logan looked at him in shock. “How many times did you practise that?”
Logan flinched, and looked away. “I… Roman…”
“Lo. I’m kidding. We’re fine, Poindexter. Just… tell me the truth. Do you think I’d be able to just… string someone along like that?”
“No,” Logan hissed, vehement. “No, Roman, I don’t. I was… I was shocked, and I was protective and I was… scared. The thought of Patton getting hurt, even… even a little bit… terrifies me. And he gets so attached to things, he’s almost never not a little bit sad, and high school romances just don’t last, something would inevitably come up and you’d break up, and he’d be heartbroken, he would be so upset, so… so I got scared. And I took it out on you, and I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to suggest that you… that you were some kind of monster. I’m sorry.”
Roman stare at him again. “It’s okay. I forgive you, nerd.”
“Really?”
“I promise.”
Logan relaxed completely, slumping over the table. His breaths were coming in gasps, as if he’d been holding it the whole time.
“Hey, it’s okay, buddy. Breathe for me, Logan. Okay?”
Logan sucked in a deep breath and straightened up. “Thank you, Roman. Really.”
Roman smiled at him.
“However, I still do not want you to date my brother. Okay?”
Roman suddenly felt like he’d been punched in the gut. He continued to grin. “Okay, Lo, I’ll leave him be.”
“Thank you. Would, um… would you like to continue?”
Roman nodded and they continued working on their project. However, he couldn’t manage to pull his thoughts off Patton. Off his curly hair, off his gorgeous eyes and the gap between his two front teeth that made Roman blush for no reason.
God, this was a mess…
Roman didn’t see Patton again for weeks, even when he was permitted to return to Logan’s house.
The next time he laid eyes on him was at lunch, when Patton hurried over to where Logan and Roman were eating.
His cheeks were red and his chest was heaving through his pants. He threw his bag into the table and sat beside Roman without even looking up, before pulling out a book.
“Lo, please help me.”
Roman looked at his friend as Patton passed the book over. Logan ignored it, focussing instead on Patton’s face with stony eyes. “What is it? Are you okay?”
“No— I mean, yeah, I— Logan, I forgot to do my math homework. Again. And I can’t— I can’t miss another assignment, Lo. She’ll fail me, and then I won’t graduate with Virgil and I’ll have to stay in school till I’m, like, twenty, and by then I’ll probably have given up and dropped out and even if I haven’t it’ll be too late to get a college tuition and I’ll end up being a bum forever and— and— I’ll turn out like dad and I can’t—”
“Patton!” Logan interrupted. “Calm down. You’re being ridiculous. One failed subject in your junior year won’t decrease your GPA so wholly you fail to graduate.”
“How do you know? What if I screw up the SATs so bad I end up relying on my GPA and—”
“ Patton . Stop . Take a deep breath.”
Patton sucked in a deep breath and blew it out. “Please just help me, Logan. I’m begging you.”
Logan glared at him, and Patton stared back. Roman kept his eyes on his best friend. If he looked at the other teen, he’d lost his nerve and blush and blabber and Logan would put two and two together.
“I’m not doing your homework for you, Patton.”
“Please, Lo! I need you! You know I won’t be able to finish it before lunch ends and it’s due next period and— and I really need you to help me. I’ll do anything.”
“Patton—”
The younger of the two had tears in his eyes. His voice cracked when he spoke, “Lo, I can’t fail this. Please.”
Logan’s facade cracked, and he made a hurt noise in the back of his throat. “That’s cheating , you always start crying, you know I can’t say no when you’re crying.”
Patton sniffled and wiped at his eyes. “I don’t want to. Don’t like crying…”
Logan sighed. “Come here. I’m not doing it for you, but I’ll help.”
Patton let out a relieved half-sob and stood, hurrying around the table to sit next to Logan.
“Where’s Virgil?” the older asked.
“Um… he— he’s sick today.”
“Sick?”
“Yeah. Lo, please, the math?”
“Sure, sure.” Logan started walking Patton through the problems. Roman watched him, watched the softness on his face even as he rolled his eyes in annoyance at his younger brother.
Roman really did know everything about his best friend. He knew Logan was kind, and thoughtful. He knew that he cared about people so fiercely it killed him sometimes. He knew people didn’t get that — didn’t get to know the Logan that was gentle and caved as soon as his little brother shed a tear. That rehearsed apologies in mirrors because he was scared of getting it wrong and almost burst into tears when he wasn’t allowed to say it.
But now, watching Logan speak to his brother like he’d get the moon for him if he asked, Roman had to wonder how anyone at all could look at Logan and call him emotionless.
And, looking at Patton, eyes wide and earnest and awing, he wondered how the fuck Logan expected him to stay away.
