[closed] a very late catch all for november-december

[nastyboy]

Who: Some adults and the feral messes around them (Grant, Sylvain, Claude, Chip, Dimitri, Karako)
Where: Violet City
When: In the vague realm of November and December
Summary: Grant adopts a stray juggalo. Dimitri finds a couple of old friends. What is wrong with this group, and what are they doing?
Rating: T..... probably

So a werewolf dad, a demon child, a juggaglo, two medieval knights, and a wyvern ride walking into a city...

Comments

[bestswordmaster]

[Felix finishes up quickly, too, and towels off his hair so that it's only damp rather than dripping before he follows Dimitri. Fortunately, the spot the prince chooses is bereft of anyone else, and Felix starts to lose patience with himself and all this pointless hesitation. If it were anyone other than Dimitri (or...a few other specific people) here, he wouldn't care one way or the other about taking off his clothes. So what's the big deal?

He aggressively decides that it isn't a big deal and pulls off the towel, dropping it unceremoniously by the side of the bath and stepping down into the water.]

[nastyboy]

[At least one of them is thinking about taking their towel off, because Dimitri sure isn't. Then again, he's mostly preoccupied with fiddling with his hair, making sure it completely covers the right side of his face before he sinks down into the water.]

[A surprised noise leaves him.]

It's so hot...

[bestswordmaster]

You told me it would be hot water, what did you expect?

[Felix sighs, sinking into the water to his shoulders and leaning back against the side of the bath, his hair fanning out in the water around him.]

I always considered this kind of thing an unnecessary indulgence. But...this isn't so bad. [It's better than 'not bad,' in fact.]

[nastyboy]

Mm, it's an indulgence for us, as it was more difficult for us to get a hold of such things in Faerghus...

[In all of Fodlan, as a matter of fact, and of that he's fairly certain. You know, even before they got dragged into a war.]

Yet here... It seems expected. [Dimitri starts to sink into the water a little more as well, before he decides that's too warm and straightens up again.] Although perhaps only in the present. I was told this was an older and more traditional way of bathing... so perhaps that is why it is public like this, and why they fuss over cleanliness even before entering the bath.

[bestswordmaster]

Mm. If it were this easy to heat up this much water in Faerghus, I'm sure the people would appreciate something like this. Beats huddling up in a pile of blankets all winter. [He snorts.] Although if we did have baths like this, Sylvain would be even more of a menace.

[nastyboy]

I am unsure if bath houses would be able to be sold so neatly... Some people might find it crude.

[Mostly the nobles, Dimitri suspects, which could lead to a whole different problem where they're snobby towards anyone who doesn't have a mansion to live in. Poorer people might copy such attitudes... but overall, he thinks it could still go over well.]

[You learn to let go of a lot of bullshit in favor of comfort and warmth. Dimitri knows from firsthand experience.]

I simply do not know how the water could be made hot like this.... [He shakes his head.] ...What would Sylvain do?

[bestswordmaster]

Anyone foolish enough to avoid it for a stupid reason like that is welcome to freeze, then. [Felix shrugs, as if this were obvious.

Then he gives Dimitri a withering look, as if to say, really?] It’s Sylvain. What do you think he would do in a place like this?

[nastyboy]

....Ah.

[Yeah, that's... yeah. Dimitri blinks.]

Are you concerned for... Disregard that. Still, even he could behave himself considering the circumstances...

[bestswordmaster]

What circumstances? When have you ever known Sylvain to behave himself? The war doesn't count, he doesn't have a choice on the march.

[Does Dimitri think Sylvain would hold back out of some kind of sense of propriety or respect for the tradition? Because Felix is pretty sure that's nonsense.]

[nastyboy]

[What circumstances? Dimitri had thought it would be obvious.]

You.

[bestswordmaster]

[...oh.

Somehow, Felix hadn't thought that Sylvain might stop...shamelessly flirting with everything that moved, just because they've gone from being best friends to being...something more. After all, that hadn't stopped him from shamelessly flirting with Claude, back in Goldenrod. Why would that change in a place like this? Felix has accepted--well, tried to accept--that this is just something he'll have to learn to deal with, if he wants to be with Sylvain. If he crushes his fear that Sylvain will grow tired of his thorough lack of romance and crave someone else enough times, maybe it will stop coming back.]

My presence never stopped him before. I don't see why it would now.

[nastyboy]

Is it not different now? Especially as he realizes that it bothers you, or that he is relying on old habits which have outlived their use?

[That's what you do when you're in love, isn't it? Dimitri can't think of any other way to be... Especially for something so minor as to stop flirting.]

[bestswordmaster]

Who knows? He relied on them plenty with Claude during the bandit raid.

[He frowns.] Which I don't understand, because Claude was the one who told me...ugh. Never mind.

[nastyboy]

[Ah. Dimitri glances back at him, tugging some of his hair a little bit to make sure it sticks to the right side of his face.]

...Is that why you were quiet, back then? When we were returning?

[bestswordmaster]

I don't know. Maybe. [Dammit, he's said too much. Now Dimitri's going to pity him and it'll be sickening. Ugh.]

Why are you hiding your eye? Do you think I've never seen it before?

[nastyboy]

[As a matter of fact, Dimitri is about to try and... offer advice, if he can even give it, but those thoughts are quickly derailed. Instead, his shoulders go a little stiff, and he slips one hand underneath the water again.]

I... do not think you have. Not from what I know.

[He wears an eyepatch for a reason, after all.]

[bestswordmaster]

What you know is moons out of date, Dimitri. It took a lot of effort to take care of you when you weren't taking care of yourself on the march. I was there for plenty of Mercedes' attempts to get you to bathe and sleep properly. She washed your hair and face for you more than once. Usually after you passed out because you'd been awake for over 48 hours at a time.

[nastyboy]

[Dimitri's fingers still at his hair, mid-tug.]

So you... have seen what is properly past my eyepatch?

[He can remember Mercedes asking him again and again to let her look at it, make sure it was healing properly...]

[bestswordmaster]

Yes. And it's hardly the worst scar I've ever seen, either.

[And if Felix had, once or twice, gently run his fingers over it while Dimitri was asleep and no one else was present, well...he'll take that secret to his grave.]

[nastyboy]

...That is not saying much, in a war such as ours.

[Still... He breathes out, and forces his hand down into the water. He doesn't remove the hair from his face, however. That can just... stay as it is.]

[bestswordmaster]

Perhaps so.

[For once, he doesn't feel like arguing over it; not here in the warm, relaxing bath, spending time with Dimitri like this for the first time in ages, watching the water trickle down his neck and across his shoulders and down his back--

Wait. No. What? No.]

So. Hugs and snowballs. What else do you plan to do without your Crest getting in the way?

[nastyboy]

[Being reminded of how the world has opened up to him is enough to swerve Dimitri's mind in an entirely different direction, and he perks up slightly.]

I - there is so much that I could do! [He's obviously still kind of reeling from that fact.] Everything always broke underneath my fingers, and so I could never truly get into so much...

[He has to do something with his hands, and Dimitri reaches up, slides one wet set of fingers along his neck and up into his hair - although he still doesn't dislodge what he has covering one side of his face.]

I could learn to sew properly!

[bestswordmaster]

[Felix's eyes follow Dimitri's fingers before he has a chance to stop them. Oh, no. No, this is bad. Coming here was a mistake. But getting out of the water would be even worse, so he stays where he is and tries to fix his gaze on the prince's face instead.]

I remember Mercedes trying to teach you. It's a useful skill. Maybe less so here, where clothes are so easily available.

[And then Felix is thinking about something else Dimitri could do without fear of breaking anything--or anyone--and he is very glad that his face was already flushed from the water's heat.]

[nastyboy]

[Fortunately for Felix, Dimitri is too drunk off the elation of being able to hold every day objects. He doesn't notice Felix dying as all the blood fights to go lower than his head.]

Clothing still costs money, Felix. It would be useful to know how to sew, so that we could make things last longer! Besides, we will be traveling often, and it would be handy to know such things on the road.

[bestswordmaster]

Nuisance can generate money out of thin air, apparently. But I said 'less so,' not 'not at all.' Of course it's still useful on the road.

[What else could Dimitri do without his Crest? Felix tries to remember other things they did as children that the prince had trouble with. Like...]

I remember when you tried to braid our hair. Me and Ingrid. And you practically yanked it out of my head.

[And Felix had cried about it and declared that from then on, only Sylvain and Glenn were allowed to touch his hair. Not that he plans to mention that part.]