2020-01-30 - The Rogue and the Barbarian

It's quite something that Dante gets laid more often in tiny little Gray Harbor than he did in bigger cities. As usual, their clothing is a trail from the living room. It's the only time his flat sees even a little bit of clutter. He stretches luxuriously, toes flexing, hand back through his own hair to ruffle it. The only time he touches his hair is when it's already too far gone. Can't risk the curls making an unruly appearance. "You're harder to keep up with than a twenty year old. Did you know that?"

Cristobal rumbles a laugh as he rubs his cheek on Dante's chest, folded against his side with an arm draped over the writer's stomach. He really needs to shave in the morning, but right now he's enjoying how the tiny hairs rasp against smooth skin. "You inspire greatness and impure thoughts, what can I say?"

Dante's hand drops to finger through Cris' hair, massaging the short hairs at the base of his neck. "I needed the distraction. It's been a shit day, honestly. I had an argument with my editor. I didn't make progress on my manuscript. A package I ordered got delayed." And then he pauses, chuckles. "Mhmmm, woe is me, right? All these absolutely horrible things that are in no way the whining complaints of a privileged person."

Cris angles his face back up to give a grin at Dante. "I guess it depends on what was in the package I might want to be woeful too if it was from some website with triple x's in the title." He gives a scratch of the ribs, nails digging temporary red lines in the words inked there. "What was the argument about, do I need to fly out somewhere and kick their ass?"

"Mhmm, hmm, no, that wouldn't help. She could probably take you." Dante chuckles. His chest vibrates softly. He closes his eyes and is quiet for a moment, then opens them. "Tell me somethng. Who was the first boy you ever had a crush on?"

"Well that's a boring answer. It's you. Seriously, most of the interactions I've had with guys have always been bag and tag. I was very focused on women for a long time, got married and only had eyes for her. Since she left me, I've just been tearing a trough through the country side on my way up here. Phoenix I settled for three months, but I never so much as took someone back to my place. I walked on a lease when someone came around my work and asked to see me again." Cris says.

"Really?" Dante draws out that word and shifts so he can try to look Cris in the eye. He thinks it must be a joke, but then he explains further. It's hard to tell in the semidark of the room, but he might be turning a little pink. "Well, I'm flattered. And a little bit baffled. I had images of you chasing down someone in high school that y'fancied and shagging in the boys room every chance you got."

Cris looks absolutely serious about that, the paw of his hand dragging down Dante's face with a quiet show of affection. "You wouldn't even recognize me back then, I was goal driven. Family focused. Wanted a good job and to start a big fucking Catholic family as fast as my wife could pop them out. Family was such a big part of my life and I couldn't wait to start my own part of it."

"I thought I wanted all of that at first. Well, not the Catholic part. But the family. One of several reasons why my wife and I were doomed." Dante catches Cris' hand and presses a kiss to the inside of his wrist, tonge touching the pulse point briefly. "Turns out I was only considering fatherhood because that's what everyone expected of me. When it came to that point with Beth, I kept putting it off. Saying I wanted to get my career off the ground and be home more. That she needed to move from the ER to private practice. She accused me of making up excuses and there would never be a perfect time." He inhales. "She was a hundred percent correct. Though I wasn't doing it consciously."

"Never wanted kids, huh? Not everyone does, and there's no shame in that. In fact, I think it's worse to bring them into the world if your heart isn't in it. So in a way what you did was a karmic boon, at least for that child's soul, if not for your marriage." Cris takes Dante's hand and drags it over to his ribs, "Do you know what this means?" He asks of the tattoo that's scrawled and wrapped around his side.

"Most of my younger life was the fight against what everyone expected me to be and when I actually am. I still don't know what I am. But I know I'm not a family man." Dante leans his head back and looks at the ceiling for a moment. "Everyone always says that you change your mind when you see your child. But that's not guaranteed. And I feel like that's a horrible gamble and a large amount of pressure to place on a small, fresh soul." He looks down as his hand is dragged. He fingers over the ink. "Tell me."

"I know my opinion is for shit, and it's not like you can change the past anyways, but you made the right decision. You can't rely on brain chemistry alone to put that in your heart." Cris looks like for a moment he's going to back out of telling Dante. It'd be easy to just make something up, but then he ventures ahead anyways with the truth. "'Real isn't how you are made. It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but really loves you, then you become Real.' It's a quote from the Velveteen Rabbit." The book he was buying at Mori.

"I know that book well. A staple of English nurseries, and for good reason." Dante's quiet after that. He flattens his palm against the words and moves his hand back and forth, fingers tracing. He lets the silence rest for a moment, then leans forward to kiss his forehead. And he says, quietly, "Thank you for telling me."

Cristobal's eyes dash away as Dante kisses his forehead, for a moment bashful almost. "Really? I thought maybe that was just your inherent author superpower, to be able to recognize and quote literary classics at the drop of a hat. You guys have that, right? C'mon, quote something for me." He turns back to Dante, open mouth biting at his chest without really closing his teeth in a clench like he did at the club.

Dante will allow Cris the deflection, as he knows that's likely more than he's shared with anyone in a good while. Even if he didn't articulate anything in detail. He chuckles. "Oh yes. Not an author superpower, but a public - " he stops himself, "private schoolboy thing. I always forget the two terms are reversed here. There was a lot of rote memorization in my schooling. Ah, let's see..." he closes his eyes. Then he starts to recite a poem, pausing here and there to search his memory. He has a good voice for reading, and it's not just the accent.
"What are to me those honours or renown
Past or to come, a new born people�s cry?
Albeit for such I could despise a crown
Of aught save laurel, or for such could die.
I am a fool of passion, and a frown
Of thine to me is an adder�s eye
To the poor bird whose pinion fluttering down
Wafts unto death the breast it bore so high;
Such is this maddening fascination grown,
So strong thy magic or so weak am I."

Cris rolls over on his stomach, sandwiching Dante to the mattress though he keeps the majority of his weight on his elbows so he doesn't squish. Chin propped on the other man's sternum and blue eyes intense on Dante's face. He at least waited to shift his position until the man finished, lest he interrupt the flow of words. "That was hot. Okay, so questions. What's that from. And what's an Adder?"

"Lord Byron, highly suspected bisexual and writer of Don Juan fame. Although some academics think he was more gay than history makes him out to be." Dante shifts to make the new position more comfortable for both of them. Shark-smile makes an appearance. "An adder is a snake, and it's a poem often cited by academics as evidence of his bisexuality. Which is how it came to be wedged in my brain. I was fascinated in school even if I didn't quite know why. The poem is called "Last Words on Greece" and the common academic discourse is that he..." another smile. "But you don't want to know about academic discourse. Just the naughty bits, yes?"

Cris might be drawing nonsensical lines on Dante's side as he talks but he does seem to be paying attention. "Tell me." He puts it to voice with the same weight as Dante did when he they spoke of his tattoo. Not that the naughty bits aren't his favorite part it doesn't preclude him apparently wanting to hear about his discourse thing.

"Really? You want to hear me wax academic about Lord Byron? Or are you about to tell me everything sounds good in my accent?" Dante chuckles warmly. "Or you're just humouring me and you'll drift off to sleep any moment." He traces a finger over the edge of Cris' ear.

"Can't it be a little bit of all of the above?" The question asked as Cristobal settles back down to Dante's side, leaving one leg twined with his and resting his cheek on the rise and fall of ribs. He reaches down to tug the blanket back up over them both. "But the dirty parts in your voice while I drift off to sleep is certainly a bonus."

Dante chuckles again. He closes his eyes and traces a finger along Cris' shoulderblades. Then he starts to talk about Lord Byron, about his poetry and his supposed sexual activities. He does so with his eyes closed, and before too long, there's quite a bit of time between words. Eventually, he drifts off completely.

Depending on how deep asleep Cris is, there's a few things that he might find curious. The first, is the slight chill in the air. The second, is fluffy softness covering him up and beneath him. The third is slowly growing brightness. Then there's the snap of frost in the air, the smell of campfire, the rustle of canvas on the breeze and the chirping of birds.

When he does open his eyes, he'll find himself surrounded in furs in a canvas tent. Dante is still beside him, but he'd be forgiven for not recognizing him. His hair is long and a mass of curls, his body tanned and scarred. He's lying on his stomach, surrounded in furs. Sitting to one side is leather clothing, a pair of swords, a war axe, and other equipment. It seems the World of Dreamcraft has pulled them in for another round.

Oh Lord, he feels hungover. At the very least his head is fuzzy and his mouth feels as dry as the desert. It's the later that stirs Cris really, that and a dire need to pee. He groans, and rolls over away from the warmth of Dante, meaning to throw his leg over the side of the mattress. Only. There is no mattress. His bare foot touches the cold ground off the side of the pallet of furs, toes curling in reflex. Confusion takes over for a moment, the unusual surroundings, the cold air, the strange tattoos covering his torso. 'What the actual fuck.' Well. It's what he means to say. Instead he's just grunting back at Dante in his guttural language.

There is a strange glowing amulet around Cris' neck. It pulses yellow and feels warm against his throat. It turns some of those grunts into half-words. If he focuses, he might just be able to form actual syllables.

Dante stirs at the noise next to him. "Cris, if you're going to go for a piss, just get on with it and come back here to warm me up. I..." he shifts, sits up, and paws the curtain of hair back from his face. "Oh, bloody hell." He looks down at himself. He's uh...he's more cut than he normally is. By quite a bit. And there's battle scars that the dandy definitely does not have in his waking life.

"This...is...Dream?" Cristobal twists again to get a better view of the tent, their fur laden bed, and the pile of belonging piled up yet still somehow at the ready should they need. "Still. Got it. Even as." Shit, Barbarian is a lot of syllables, so the last word just comes out as a grunt again as Cris pats his chest and chuckles. But all of this does not abate his need to piss, so he's throwing off the last of the coverings with a shiver and glancing around. Well. Where do you pee in a case like this? He starts wandering buck ass naked towards the tent flap.

"Cris! Be careful. Where are you going?" Dante starts to get up, but the cold morning air shocks him. He grabs the furs and bundles them up around him.

The camp seems semi-permanent, rather than something set up on the way to somewhere else. It was clearly meant to be a base of operations for at least the short-term. There's a fire pit not far from the tent flap with black embers that still smoke slightly. There's a skin of a rabbit drying against a rock, and what looks to be arrows in the process of being re-feathered. The camp is in a forest clearing, surrounded by tall, ancient trees. High above, an impressive mountain rises. It's all very picturesque in a high fantasy way.

Well at least no one screams when the bulk of a naked barbarian trundles out of their tent, because he wasn't going to pee in the tent, no matter if a bucket is the style of the times. His words are getting easier to say in the common tongue the more awake he becomes, "If I die, I die with my member in my hand. It's a noble way to meet my maker." I mean, he would have chosen 'dick' and probably something less poetic about going to hell, but it'll do.

"Christ," Dante mutters as he fumbles for what he thinks are his clothing. The leather pants have all sorts of straps and things to hold them tight against his body. He puts them on the wrong way around at first, but then manages them the right way. Boots come next, but he opts to drape one of the furs around his shoulders rather than fiddle with all the lacing of the top. He steps out of the tent and squints around the valley, and at the remains of the fire. "Is it ordinary to come back into the same Dream scenario?"

"Guess it depends on how tied to it we are." Cris is standing in the shadows near a tree as Dante finally emerges half dressed, showing his rump to the other man and the dark swirls that continue onto his back as he drains his bladder. "Or maybe this is just our subconscious after the last one, toying with the fact we wanted to couple in these forms when we first laid eyes upon each other over the fire." His voice is still deeper and guttural but that stone is growing brightly now with its imbued magic.

"Why are you talking like that?" Dante asks. He's enveloped in the fur and looks more like an arctic explorer than a rogue. "Wait, I couldn't understand you at all the last time." And he already sounds the way Hollywood would make his 'character' in this setting, so there's little need for the Dream to mess with him. "It's been my experience so far that it's either a terrible scare, or a game."

Cris shakes it off, twice because he's probably playing with it, and turns back to Dante with a shiver, his hand hooked in the string that holds the amulet around his neck. "I didn't have this shiny bauble last time. Maybe the Dream got tired of hearing me grunt like a pig. If we are to be scared, let us be so where it is warm."

"I'm quite warm, thank you." Shackleton the arctic explorer over there, all bound in the furs of some large, fluffy animal. "You're the one who marched out of the tent in nothing but your tattoos." In spite of everything, he's grinning.

"And if we were set upon by wolves or ruffians, someone would have to distract them while you fiddled with your britches. My bladder was not so patient." Cris claps Dante on the cheek before ducking back into the tent. He practically makes a dive for the pallet of furs again, throwing the heaviest over his skin as his teeth chatter.

"So you were going to distract them with your cock? Interesting strategy." Dante stays out of the tent for a moment, looking around the clearing. He then turns and ducks back inside. The tent holds warmth decently enough, at least compared to the outside. He crosses and sits on the edge of the makeshift bed and flares his nostrils. He's quiet, contemplating his surroundings and the scenario they find themselves in.

"The mightiest of weapons in my stable, my axe only a close second." Cris lays on his back, fiddling with the amulet where it sits heavy on his collar bone, still glowing with that yellow amber collar. "Come. Enjoy the calm before the storm. It it puts you at ease, I shall not doze off again."

"You've got a glowing bauble round your neck and you don't sound like you. I've six times the hair I normally do and..." Dante peeks under the furs, "...thirty per cent more muscle. You dozing off isn't what's going to make me uneasy." But he kicks off his boots and quickly slides his feet up under the furs. He rolls over, the curtain of dark curly hair partially obscuring his face. He blows on it. It drifts right back into his face.

"I could remove it from my person, should that be your wish, and return to trying to communicate in grunts. I dare say that's closer to truth of the matter anyways. Unfathomable a time when I used such a vast litany of words to portray such an infinitesimal thought. It is apparent this gem has been bequeathed the unearthly charms of a running tongue." Cris paws at the drift of curly hair that insists on spilling out from around Dante's ear, giving a chuckle. "It's sort of fetching. For a time."

Dante just sort of stares at Cristobal. His expression is still for a moment, but then, a few breaths after he finishes talking and while his hair is being pawed at, he starts to laugh. It's a slow chuckle at first, but it isn't long before his whole body is shaking with laughter. He rolls over and buries his head against the other man's shoulder. He thumps his head a few times against his shoulder to try and calm it, but the waves keep coming.

"You mock me!" Cristobal shoves playfully at Dante's shoulder as it shakes with laughter. "You mock me!" This time he rolls over slightly to dislodge Dante from laying against him so he can kneel back. "I demand you cease your incessant cachinnation or face the whole of my wrath." Which at the moment is just him piling a fur on top of Dante and smooshing it down.

Dante stops laughing for a half second, dark eyes dancing with mirth. He manages to hold it, but then he sputters and starts to laugh again. The sound is muffled by the fur, but it doesn't stop. He kicks bare toes outside of the furs and shoves gently and playfully against the pile of furs.

"You, sir, are a fiend." An asshole, dammit. "A cad!" Shit stain. GRR. "Let it be known I am withholding from you carnal affections forthwith until thy tittering has been properly...oh, forget this foolish prattle." And then Cristobal is pouncing on Dante and grabbing him up in a bear hug to roll him around in a playful tussle.

"Ahahah!" Dante laughs. It's a deep-chest, out of control sort of sound. It's not often that he's that - if at all. Tears streak down his face at completely uncontained mirth. "You..." gasp, "...you sound more like yourself when you're grunting!" And then the bath turns belly, which only amplifies when he gets bear-rolled.

Oh that's it! The rolling about stops, if only so Cristobal can start poking Dante with a stab of fingers in the ribs, only now he's laughing too. So what? It's contagious. And it is funny. Because it is true. "Foul beast."

"Language!" And then that toothy shark-smile of Dante's is on full display. It's definitely more roguish than normal with the full halo of curly dark hair. He swats at the poking fingers and makes rough sounds of protest. "Ow ow, I think you've found m'scar tissue. How cruel." He does indeed have a few jagged scars around the rib area, like he took a few sharp blades to the torso over the years.

Cristobal rolls away onto his back at the first 'ow' whether or not it is said jokingly, the literal ribbing goes no further lest it actually become painful for the other man. He's still chuckling deep in his belly as he laces his fingers together on top of his stomach as it starts to die away. "Perhaps the terror this night is the nightmare of enduring my seeming inability to tell you to go rut thyself upon a rusty spire."

"Your nightmare is sounding like a very bad actor trying to sound Ye Olde, and mine is actually having scars and hair that cannot be tamed." Dante reaches out and slaps Cris' stomach gently. He looks down at himself, then over at him. He then pats his face. "Is my face covered in scars as well?" No, in true fantasy fashion, his face is unblemished - though it does look far more sun-baked than it does in the real world.

"Your appearance is as fine as if it carved in marble to represent that of Adonis. Thy ass however, has yet to be seen to be able to warrant comment, and I dare say I require the complete tapestry." Cristobal makes a little 'stand up' gesture with a flick of his fingers rising from his stomach.

Dante tries really, really hard not to enter another laughing fit. He just sort of swallows it, cheeks going rosy, dark eyes still dancing. "Basically what you just said to me is, I need to see the whole meat market, do a little twirl?" He does so, showing off the road-weary Dream-altered body, before dropping back down to the pile of furs, and leaning in for a kiss.

It's hard to ascribe intent or any kind of logic to the Dream, but as they are amused rather than unnerved, and as they haven't gone exploring beyond their tent, they're spat back out before too long. Furs morph back to Dante's plush mattress, and the tent and valley fade back to the warmth of the Bayside apartment.