krow's writings

Janus, lord of the lies and all things deception, evil mastermind extradonaire, feels his breath hitch.

Just look at the little paws.

"No!" Janus exclaims, shaking out of his cute-induced stupor. "The last pet I had was Sacagawea the hamster, and we all know what happened to her! Not that I care about teacup sized critters. Begone, little beast."

"Mew," another plaintive meow comes as the kitten reaches his ankles. It swats at him with its stubby claws, trying and failing to climb his pants leg.

"I am a gentleman of standards," Janus tells the cat seriously.

The puny kitten looks up at him imploringly with round-saucer like eyes.

Janus drops to the ground and coos, "Oh no, you're meeting all of my standards!"

The kitten starts up a punitive-engine of a purr as Janus scoops it up in his gloved hands. It chirps intermittently and Janus's ice-cold snake heart melts.

"I'm not keeping you," Janus promises fondly. "This doesn't go beyond a simple scratching. Do I make myself clear?"

"Meeew," the kitten squeaks and Janus nearly falls over himself to bring the kitten's face to his so he can rub their noses together.

The next day the sides are in the midst of filming a video with Thomas in his living room when Logan cuts himself off in the middle of citing his sources to say, "What was that noise?"

"Sorry, I ate burritos earlier," Remus apologizes, not appearing very apologetic.

"No, it sounded like–" Logan cuts himself off again as everyone hears the sound this time.

A muffled mewing.

All eyes fall on Janus in his corner. He stands there, seemingly unaffected, but upon closer inspection with eyeballs, one can see how stiff his posture is.

Patton peers closer with his balls of eyes. "Jan...is this that mewing trend all the kids are doing nowadays?"

"That is not what that means," Roman says, but he's mostly distracted with staring at Janus. "Wanna tell us something, Cat in the Hat?"

The deceitful side bristles. "I haven't the foggiest what you mean."

Janus's hat meows. More than that, there's something shuffling underneath.

Thomas's mouth is slightly agape as he asks, "Janus, did your hat just meow?"

"It did nothing of the sort."

"Kiddo, do you have a kitty cat under there or are you just happy to see us?"

"I– since when do you make jokes like that?"

"Jokes like what?" Patton blinks back.

Janus rolls his eyes and brushes imaginary lint off his imaginary shoulder. "Nevermind. Weren't we discussing Thomas's never-ending cycle of conundrums?"

"Yeeeah," Virgil drags the word out. "You can't just act like we all can't see your hat moving."

"Yes, and we all heard it meowing," Logan muses, ignoring Janus's automatic hissing of, "You heard nothing!"

"But why the hat?" Thomas ponders.

Logan nods, also curious, "Is this a coping mechanism after the loss of Sacagawea the hamster?"

"May she rest in peace, amen," Patton prays while Roman performs a Catholic cross over himself.

Thomas glances at all of them, "You guys know that I never actually owned a pet hamster, right?"

"Dude, too soon," Virgil chides him, and Thomas has the consideration to look abashed.

Janus crosses his arms to look cool. He doesn't. He keeps tipping his head this way and that to keep his hat from toppling over.

"This is a perfectly normal way for me to stand," Janus says.

Roman secretly slides Remus five bucks. Remus dives onto the floor and army crawls behind Janus. Somehow everyone but Janus sees it.

"By all means, do keep staring," Janus says, guarded and on edge and his rolls definitely tootsied. What.

Remus rises up behind him. Off comes the hat.

"Mew!"

"Oh my goodness, that's so precious!!" Patton squeals.

The kitten is belly flopped on top of Janus's head. It's so small that it almost gets lost in the hair, if not for the stark contrast against Janus's lighter color.

"Hey Virgil, it looks just like you!" Roman crows, earning himself a well deserved middle finger.

"Drat, you've uncovered my secret," Janus drones and gives Remus a withering look that promises they will exchange words later. Remus is too wrapped up in giving little chin scritches to the kitty to be bothered.

Thomas also inevitably succumbs to cuteness overload, but he does manage to ask why the heck Janus felt like he needed to keep the cat a secret.

"Because Thomas," Janus throws his arm out to make his cloak flare out. For the drama. Then he flourishes his hand towards the cat on his head. "You weren't ready to meet this new side of yourself, but I guess the cat is out of the bag."

"The cat was under a hat, to clarify."

"LITERALLY NO ONE ASKED YOU, LOGAN!"

"No one ever does, and yet that would solve over half of Thomas's problems."

"When you mean new side, does that mean...?" Thomas asks Janus, his voice filling with wonder. His eyes are getting that crazed glint in his eyes, like he's five seconds away from becoming a Florida Man meme. The background music ramps up into a crescendo at this new epiphany. Thomas knew there were more sides he hadn't met, but to think–!

"No, no, no," Logan says, waving his hands in an X motion. "This is a misunderstanding created from Janus's misleading statement. Don't do this–whatever it is you're doing. Stop it."

Virgil weighs in as well, "Hate to break it to you, but your most animal side is Janus."

"Does this mean Thomas is a furry?" Remus gasps.

"Yesss," Janus hisses out. Then he thinks about it. "I mean no. I mean– what?"

"So what's the baby's name?" Patton asks. He has come close too to join Remus in the giving of scratchies. A noble cause!

"It's a black cat, so why not Catman?" Roman offers. "I am the darkness. I am the night. I am...Catman!"

"Very original," Virgil praises, but it's just subtly sarcastic enough that Roman gives an heartfelt, "Thank you!"

"Can I pet?" Thomas asks, hand reaching out hopefully.

The sides grimace and wince.

"Oooh, yeah, about that..."

"Sorry, man."

"You can't actually..."

"Imaginary, remember?"

"Maybe if you think really hard and imagine touching fur..."

"Don't patronize him. Not with this."

"Yeah, kitty buisness is serious buisness."

"Are we ever going to return to the original topic?"

"Cats take priority. Don't you know that?"

"By what parameters? Any by whom?"

"It's like when a cat falls asleep in your lap. By law, you cannot disturb it. On pain of death."

"A bit overdramatic, but not wrong. It's an actual thing."

"Achoo!"

"Bless you."

"Thank you!"

"Patton, why are you petting a cat when you know you're allergic?"

"You would think that imaginary cats wouldn't agitate allergies."

"Thomas has a really vivid imagination."

"Why does everything innocent sound dirty coming out of your mouth?"

"Speaking of mouths and coming–"

Thomas, Patton, and Roman all shove their hands over their ears and scream, "LA LA LA!"

With everyone distracted (as part of Janus's master plan), Janus uses the moment of ensuing chaos to skeddadle away.

Logan woke up with a severe headache and a dry throat. Despite having lived in many places over the past few years (and even more in the past few months), he knew instantly and without opening his eyes that this was not any place he would have chosen as a temporary base. The room smelled fruity. It was an artificial fruity, almost like fruit loops.

He squinted open his eyes, his brain muddled. He was staring at a light green ceiling. It was late morning judging by the angle at which the sunlight hit the wall across from him. This was much later than he normally slept. His phone had an alarm on it for 5:45am every morning, but he had no idea where his phone was. It had been in his back pants pocket the last he’d known, but upon inspection of his person, he found he wasn’t wearing pants. He was wearing his shirt and underwear still, but his shoes were also missing, and his tie had been pulled out of his collar. He saw a blur of blue fabric next to his own hand. That was the tie.

His glasses were off, but he saw the glint of them on a nearby nightstand. He reached over and grabbed them, putting them on his face.

As he was taking in the room with sharper vison, he heard footsteps. He sat up to watch the bedroom door open.

There was a soft curse. “Diesel Fuel, sweetheart, no,” Remus’s voice quietly said, as the man shouldered open the door, but this ‘Diesel Fuel’ did not listen, hopping lithely over the foot trying to bar her entrance to the room. The cat bounded over and jumped onto the bed next to Logan.

Remus pushed open the door the rest of the way and spotted Logan sitting up in the bed. Unlike Logan, he was fully dressed. He was also sporting a tray with breakfast dishes on it. “Oh,” he said. “Hey.”

Logan eyed him, unsure.

“We extended the truce,” he said at Logan’s look. “Though I would not be surprised if you don’t remember that.”

“I’m hungover,” Logan concluded.

“Yeah,” Remus confirmed, his lip turning up at the side. “I didn’t think leaving you alone was the most responsible thing, so I brought you back to my place.”

His place. In theory Logan knew where Remus lived. He’d even gone so far as to look up pictures of the apartment online, but he didn’t recognize the room he was in or remember any green ones. Had Remus painted?

The cat made a sound and rubbed up against Logan’s arm. He reached over to pat her idly.

“I made you breakfast,” Remus said.

“I can see that.”

Remus titled his head at him, eyes sharp in a way that meant he was seeing more about Logan than Logan had wanted. “We didn’t have sex, if you were wondering,” he said casually. He walked over to place the tray on the nightstand next to Logan. “You did take your pants off before crawling into bed, but to be honest it was the least sexy pants removal I’ve seen an adult human perform in my life. You then passed out immediately and I slept on the couch.” He caught the cat as it attempted to lunge towards the bacon.

A quick mental check of himself did not indicate any of that was a lie. Logan leaned over slightly to spot his pants crumpled on the ground beside the bed.

He looked back up at Remus. “Diesel Fuel?” he asked.

“Ah yes,” Remus said with a grin. He held the cat out in front of himself to show her to Logan. The cat must be extremely docile to accept such a hold. “This is my child.”

“Why would you name your cat Diesel Fuel?”

Remus shrugged. “It fit.”

To be fair, the cat was the correct coloring. Its main body was mostly grey, but its face and paws were dark black almost as if it had dipped them into black ash. So, perhaps one could argue she looked like she’d been dunked in (dirty) diesel fuel. Still, it was not a name most would come up with for their pet.

Logan reached over for the coffee mug, not bothering with cream and sugar this morning. He just needed caffeine.

“You should eat too,” Remus said. The cat was rubbing its cheek against Remus’s and Remus was returning the gesture absently. “I made you my patented hangover breakfast minus the ketchup noodles.”

“Ketchup noodles?”

“I make ramen, but instead of serving it with the broth I drain the water and then add ketchup and the spice packets.”

“Why would you do that?”

Remus shrugged. “Easier to shovel into my mouth.”

Logan rolled his eyes. He glanced at the tray of food. There was enough for at least three people. There was a large stack of bacon (probably an entire pack) as well as sausage, half a loaf worth of toast, half a dozen eggs, fruit, a stack of pancakes, and French toast.

“I can’t eat all that,” Logan said, moving to curl his legs up under him. (He kept the sheet carefully over his lap.) Then he patted the bed where his legs had been. “Here, eat with me.”

Remus smiled. “Okay,” he agreed, but then he turned his attention to Diesel Fuel. “But Little Miss is going to have to be locked out of the bedroom.”

The cat seemed to almost understand what was being said, because she mewed her complaint.

“I’ll be back,” he told Logan.

He left with the cat and returned with a cup of coffee for himself, shutting the door behind him. In the brief time he was gone, Logan grabbed his pants and slipped them on, finding his dead phone in the pocket.

It turned out Remus was a decent cook when it came to breakfast food. He used a bit more cinnamon on his French toast than Logan would have, but everything tasted good. The man had also, blessedly, included aspirin on the breakfast tray, and Logan was feeling much better by the time he’d finished eating.

Remus picked at the food long past when Logan was done. He popped a grape into his mouth and glanced at Logan. “Do you… remember everything we talked about at the park? In particular, the stuff about your… sexual history?” he asked.

Logan hesitated, but answered truthfully, “Yes, I do.”

“Okay, good,” Remus said awkwardly. “We don’t have to talk about it, but I just wanted to make sure we were on the same page. Since you forgot some stuff later.”

Logan nodded. “Is there more coffee?” he asked.

“There’s a whole pot,” Remus said. “I assume you’re done eating. I’ll take the tray to the kitchen and grab us both another cup.”

“Sure,” Logan agreed.

Remus did not bother to leave the door closed when going to the kitchen and the cat instantly slipped back in and was up on the bed next to Logan before Remus’s footsteps disappeared down the hall.

“Hello,” he said to the cat. She purred and leaned into his touch as he scratched her head. Logan had honestly not pegged Remus as a cat person. Maybe a dog person with how much energy he had, but really, he wouldn’t have pegged him as a pet person at all. Yet, the cat was meticulously groomed and had colorful claw caps to keep her from scratching. She was also clearly very well socialized.

She had settled into his lap by the time Remus returned with the coffee.

“Sorry,” Remus said indicating the cat. “She’s a bit of a cuddler.”

Logan shrugged. “I don’t mind.”

Remus sat and reached over to scratch the cat’s ear. “Did you ever have pets?” he asked.

“No,” Logan sighed. “Dad loved cats, but he was allergic, so we couldn’t have any in the house permanently.”

“Dogs?”

“We thought about it,” Logan replied. “Dad owned his own business, so was usually a bit too busy to want one. He promised I could pick one out the summer between middle and high school, since by then I could care for it mostly by myself, but that… never happened.”

He was surprised at himself for saying as that much, but he supposed once you spilled your biggest secret to someone, telling them smaller things was not as hard. It was, however, still dangerous. He had come to trust Remus with a lot of things, perhaps more than he should considering their situation.

Remus didn’t push on the subject, but he surely catalogued the new information about Logan’s identity. “And as an adult you were too busy running around the country being pursued by the government,” he concluded, his tone light.

And other entities, Logan thought, but was smart enough not to say. “Yes,” he agreed. And he really had been running all over the country in the last few months. Ever since he’d managed to get his hands on the Cuttler files, he’d been going nonstop. He’d burned 4 long standing identities, had been in each state at least twice other than Hawwii, and was mentally and physically exhausted, but it was worth it. All of the dominos had been put into place; some of them had already started toppling. Now he just needed to go to ground until the dust settled.

“Maybe you could get one in your ‘retirement’ or whatever you’re planning to do.”

Logan’s eyes flickered to Remus and then to the cat. “Maybe,” he agreed.

Remus opened his mouth to say something, but Logan cut him off.

“I believe interrogating me about my evil plans would violate the terms of the truce,” he said mildly.

“How would you know?” Remus asked, eyebrows raised. “You were a vodka bottle deep when the terms were laid out.”

“And I’m sure you took full advantage of that by changing the usual terms of our truces,” Logan said blandly as he rolled his eyes.

Remus grinned at him and didn’t argue or push more on the topic of what Logan had been doing the past 6 months.

Instead, they talked about banal thing as they drank their coffee. Logan mostly let Remus lead the conversation. He spoke about various movies and television shows he’d watched recently. It was nice; Logan hadn’t had a normal conversation with anyone in months.

They ended up eventually moving to Remus’s living room, because Remus wanted to show him a horror anthology he’d been watching. The forwent lunch after the very late, very large breakfast, but ended up ordering a pizza for dinner.

It wasn’t until it was almost 11pm that Logan finally realized just how long he’d stayed. “I should probably go,” he said. The movie they’d been watching was paused on the television screen and Remus had just returned from the bathroom.

“Right,” Remus agreed, but then paused. “Although it is kind of late.” He looked at Logan with something unidentifiable in his eyes. “We could extend the truce again,” he suggested, “but I get to sleep in my own bed tonight.”

Logan thought about it for a moment, but then nodded. “Okay,” he agreed. “We’ll extend it through tomorrow.”

Remus did sleep in his own bed that night, but Logan ended up accidentally falling asleep there as well after they’d moved to watching Netflix in bed.

They spent the next day together in Remus’s apartment as well, and, at the end of that day, Remus made the suggestion to extend the truce again. Logan accepted.

“Do you think they’ll light your trees on fire this year?” an amused (but slightly concerned) voice asked from behind Jeffers. Jeffers ran a finger over the empty thumb of his slightly dirty gardening gloves while watching the two boys. They were currently leaning over an unlit lantern and various “supplies.” In truth, he’d stopped his own work to watch the two boys out of the very concern the king had just vocalized.

“Virgil helped me fertilize that tree a week ago,” Jeffers replied. “So, I would hope he exercises some caution.”

“Virgil likes fire though,” Thomas pointed out.

Jeffers sighed. “That he does.” He tilted his head towards Thomas. “You did confiscate the fire knife again after last week, yes?”

“I did,” Thomas confirmed, “but that means very little. Even burying that thing with a corpse did not dissuade him.”

As he spoke, a sudden spark of light flew from where the boys were working. A whining sound and then pop sounded as the spark exploded into 10 pieces, raining down colorful light. Luckily, the sparks burned up before hitting the ground (or the tree).

“Boys, if you set anything on fire, you will be grounded from the festival,” Thomas called in a booming voice. Both boys jumped. Jeffers imagined Logan hadn’t even known he was there. (Virgil certainly had, but he’d still jumped. “For the second year in a row in Logan’s case.”

“They’re not flammable!” was the claim from Logan.

“I don’t believe you,” Thomas called back.

The boys ignored this, turning back to their experiment.

“We should have kept them grounded,” Thomas muttered.

Despite Thomas’s original decision to ground Patton and Logan until their 50s (and Helen’s push to keep them grounded until Thomas, Helen, and Jeffers himself were all dead and couldn’t enforce it anymore), the boys had only been truly grounded for two months after Thomas had found out the truth of Virgil’s origins. (Though there were still jokes they were still technically grounded.) That did, however, mean that Patton and Logan had been grounded from most of the Lantern Festival the year before.

Logan, at least, seemed to be trying to make up for lost time this year (explosively). Jeffers did worry about where Patton was slightly, but honestly Patton without Logan or Virgil tended to be much less destructive in his hijinx. The worst he was probably doing was stealing sweets out from under Helen’s nose. Which was why both Jeffers and Thomas were currently here watching these two.

There were more sparks from the boy’s experiment. The grass caught fire at their feet. Virgil hastily stomped it out.

“I’ll watch them if you want to get food to bribe Virgil away,” Jeffers offered.

Thomas shook his head. “No need,” he said, and began walking towards them. “I thought you said that was ‘not flammable,’” he called as he walked towards them.

“Well, they’re technically not,” was Logan’s reply. “…The grass is though.”

Jeffers rolled his eyes for the benefit of no one as he turned away. He decided he was going to go get food to bribe Virgil away from destruction.

Since it was spring, he didn’t have as much food readily available, but he did already have a small crop of a new breed of radishes he could harvest to taste test. The vegetable garden was a good walk away, but he figured Thomas would be good enough supervision for the moment.

~~~

“Give,” Thomas demanded upon stopping a couple of feet in front of the children. Logan frowned but packed up and handed him the travel sized potion set without argument. (Thomas regretted giving that thing to him. Yes, it had made logical sense after the attempted poisoning. No, it had never been used for anything as practical as an antidote.) Thomas turned to Virgil. “You too,” he said. “Give.”

“I don’t have anything,” Virgil said with no hint of deception in his expression. Which, of course, meant he was lying to Thomas’s face.

“Nuh uh,” Thomas said. “Give it.”

They had a staring contest for a few moments before Virgil finally sighed. To Thomas’s surprise, he did not take out the fire knife. Instead, Virgil reached into his pocket and pulled out a handful of what looked like rocks. He put them in Thomas’s outstretched hand.

Thomas had no idea what they were by sight, but considering the theme of their lantern decoration attempts (that is explosives and fire) he could hazard a guess.

“Am I holding explosives in my hand?” Thomas asked.

“They won’t explode unless they come into contact with vinegar,” Logan said.

“So, they are explosive,” Thomas said. “Just not currently active ones.”

“…I suppose,” Logan said.

Thomas opened Logan’s potion kit to get one of its sterile empty containers and put the explosive rocks into it. Then, he zipped the potion kit back up, with a mental note to himself to make sure to take the explosive rocks out of it before giving it back. He pointed at the lantern on the ground. “Paint it like normal people, please.”

Virgil leaned over towards Logan and spoke out of the side of his mouth. “King of Boring more like.”

“I can hear you,” Thomas pointed out, but Virgil, of course, had intended to be heard.

He grinned up innocently in response and Thomas just shook his head before lowering himself to the ground next to the scorched patch of grass.

In addition to their nontraditional decorating supplies, they did also have the usual supply of paints, ribbons, and colorful pieces of paper with them. They brought these out now and began work on making a few more lanterns to decorate. (As Logan and Virgil had only bothered to make one and it was now scorched on the inside.)

Patton and Helen arrived as they were finishing setting up their 6th (unburnt) lantern. The fact that Helen was not in the kitchen must mean all of the food for the festivities was officially finished and likely being handed out by other members of the staff. She’d been working almost nonstop for the past week to make sure everything was ready.

Both of them were carrying a basket full of enough food to provide snacks and dinner for their group for the rest of the night.

Most people did not go back inside during the Lantern Festival from midafternoon until all of the lanterns had been released into the night sky and disappeared, so, they had to have food for the entire night. Most of the food Helen had prepared was traditional for the festival (though there was a nonzero chance Helen had slipped some chicken alfredo into one of the baskets.)

Virgil had gotten to try a lot of the traditional dishes last year, but Thomas still couldn’t help but smile thinking about all of the sweet breads and meat stuffed pies the boy was going to shove into his face tonight.

One of Thomas’s personal favorites was a soft muffin-like pastry. When broken apart, a golden filling reminiscent of the lit lanterns was revealed. The dessert was usually eaten a bit before the lanterns were released and was shared between two people. Thomas had shared the treat with Virgil the year before and the boy had been entranced by the sparkling filling.

It had been a nice moment, one where Virgil’s leeriness towards him (that had never quite gone away after Thomas knew about his past) had faded for a moment, and the boy had just been a 14-year-old. It had warmed Thomas’ heart to see it.

God, but in those moments when his walls dropped, did he always remind Thomas of Aedan.

Now, Virgil was 15, and while Thomas could always see traces of his past in the ways he acted sometimes, things were better now. Thomas saw more of those moments where Virgil felt safe every day.

Like right now, when Logan pulled out a book detailing common Lantern Festival symbols and their meanings, Virgil only took a moment to glance at their surroundings with a cautious eye before bending over the book to take a closer look.

He had gotten much better at reading after Thomas got him a real tutor, but he still mouthed a few of the words to himself as he read the page.

He seemed to make a decision about one of his drawings because he sat back and grabbed some of the paints. Patton spoke happily to him, complimenting his color choices enthusiastically for “that one.”

Jeffers returned from wherever he’d gone off to a few minutes later. He’d brought himself a chair from his shed to sit on instead of sitting on the ground with the rest of them. Despite all the active work he did in the gardens all day, apparently sitting on the ground hurt his back.

He’d also brought a handful of something which he slipped to Virgil.

“Are these the new radishes?” Virgil asked, a hint of excitement to his tone.

Jeffers grunted an affirmation. “Thought you could be the first to try them.”

Virgil was more than happy to do so of course. (It was food, and it was gardening.) Thomas watched him chew happily; his eyes were brighter than the lanterns they would release in a few hours.

He was unsurprised when, amongst the traditional painted symbols representing safety, family, and home, a radish also appeared on Virgil’s lantern that night.

Perhaps it was a strange thing to put on a lantern symbolizing your wishes for the next year, but when the golden lantern floated into the sky hours later, Thomas thought it was perfect.

~~~

Thanks for reading and to everyone who voted and interacted as I live wrote this story over the past few years! Don't forget to check out the Little Kestrel Stats Page to see how your votes affected the end of the story. (There were 27 possible endings!)

If you'd like to impact my writing in the future, watch the Study Break Stories Tag. I hope to be returning to Folds in Paper before the end of the year.

For more in the Birds of Different Feathers Series, see my Birds of Different Feathers Master Post.

For more from me, see my Masterpost.

When she opened her eyes, she knew where she was, and she knew what had happened.

The ceiling was white, and she could hear a steady beeping sound she knew followed the pace of her own heartbeat. She was not in pain exactly, though there was some general discomfort from laying supine a bit too long. There was also a noticeable lack of pain or discomfort in certain parts of her body.

She turned her head to one side. The heart monitor she’d heard was there along with an IV bag. A cord extended from the IV bag and disappeared under the blankets covering her. She thought she could feel the impression of the IV in her arm.

The call button was hung over the bed’s side rails. She reached for it and paused. Her arm did not look like her arm. It was extending out from her body, and it was obeying her commands, but for a moment, her mind had trouble reconciling it as a part of herself. The loose hospital gown had fallen down her arm as she moved, bunching around her shoulder. What it revealed was an arm significantly thinner than she ever recalled it being and much paler than her usual darker skin tone.

For a moment, she worried she was somehow waking up in the wrong body, but the birthmark on the back of her hand was the same as it always had been. So, this was her.

Having been in the hospital a few times before both for minor and major (though never anywhere near as major as this) things, she was surprised just how immediate the response to her call button was. There was a nurse at the door before she even managed to turn her head in that direction. They seemed surprised when they saw her looking at them.

“I’m awake,” she said. Her voice also did not sound like hers and it hurt slightly to use it. Her words seemed to shock them more, but they also pushed them into action.

“I’ll call your doctor.”

The room was a flurry of activity in no time. In her own head, she compared this to the time she’d woken up after having her appendix removed.

Then, she’d been in a room with three other people being tended to by one nurse as she came out from under anesthesia.

Now, the attention made her feel like a minor celebrity. Now, there were four nurses to their one patient in the room at any time.

However, they were not always the same four nurses. They were all running in and out, talking amongst themselves and to her. She honestly didn’t know how many of them there were in total as they were constantly moving. Even after they’d inclined the head of the bed, so she was almost sitting up, she didn’t have the energy to track them all.

She was given ice chips to help her throat when she mentioned it was dry, and she was promised crackers and then eventually a sandwich after it was okayed by a doctor. Two different nurses took her blood pressure at different times even though there was a cuff that automatically took it at infrequent intervals permanently on her arm.

There was constant chatter directed at her, pulling her attention in many different directions, though little of it was of any substance or concern to her. They mostly talked at her, skirting around asking her how she felt too much lest she notice. They were trying to keep her distracted until her doctor arrived to explain. To be fair, she also wouldn’t want to break that news.

She was told her family had been called soon after she awoke and that they’d be there soon. The nurses seemed casually familiar with her family which made sense. They’d certainly talked to them more often than she had as of late.

The doctor on call had come by to say hello and check her vitals once again, but he was apparently not the doctor, not her doctor. He did allow her to have crackers, however, telling her they’d remove the feeding tube if she could keep them down.

She was chewing on them idly, pretending to listen to the nurse who was pretending to do something with her heart monitor when her doctor entered the room.

She recognized him as one of the ER doctors she’d met a few times over the course of her career. She’d never been his patient or, if she had, it had been for something brief and forgettable. If memory served, he was known as an expert emergency surgeon, the top in the city if not beyond. That may explain why she was alive.

“Hello,” the man said, and there was a look in his eyes that was similar to and very different from the look all of the other medical professionals had given her today. He looked at her not with surprise exactly, but with a particular sort of relief, like how a high school senior might look after opening their first college acceptance letter. He looked at her kind of like she was an extra special Christmas present come early. Though he did his best to keep a professional mask over his expression, it didn’t foot her. “I’m Dr. Sanders,” he said. “I was your surgeon.” He reached out a hand to her and she took it.

“Hello,” she returned politely. “I’m Rhea Silvia, but I imagine you already knew that.”

“I do,” Dr. Sanders answered with a smile. “It is a pleasure to hear you say it, however, Chief of Police Silvia.”

“Rhea is fine,” Rhea replied swiftly. She doubted she would ever be called by that title again except, perhaps, at some formal event for her official retirement.

“In that case, you can call me Patton,” he said. It was a surprise because usually even the most personable doctors still went by their surnames with patients. Yet, as he sat down in a chair beside her bed, she sensed there was some sort of kinship between them even if she had not been awake when it had been forged.

The nurses had all fled, she noticed, and they were alone except for the quiet beeping of the heart monitor.

“Now,” Patton continued. “I’m sure you have questions. If there’s anything pressing you want to know, feel free to ask now. After that, I’ll give you a brief rundown of everything that’s happened since you’ve been here and then let you ask anything else you want.”

She nodded and twisted the sheet slightly in her unfamiliar hands. “How long?” she asked.

He hesitated for half a second. Obviously, this wasn’t what he’d expected for her first question, but he still answered it easily enough. “It’s been a little over 6 months.”

She nodded again. It sounded about right from what she’d pieced together, but still… it was a long time.

There was a lengthy pause while he waited for her to either freak out about the length of time or ask something else. When she didn’t, he tentatively proceeded.

“Do you remember what happened, Rhea?”

“I do,” she said. “There was a speedster, I managed to give them a shot of Oxyproxicolotin, and then they shoved me off a building.”

“Yes,” Patton confirmed. He smiled tightly. “It’s a good sign you remember the events leading up to your injury.” He paused for a moment before continuing. “There was extensive damage,” That was one way to say she’d shattered into pieces on the pavement. “particularly to your lower spine. Reconstructive surgery was able to reverse some of the damage, but considering the severity and location of the injury, there is a high probability of paralysis of your lower body.”

“High probability is a funny way to say 100% Doctor,” Rhea pointed out blandly.

He grimaced slightly but tried to hide it. “I take it you’ve noticed.”

“That I can’t move or feel my own legs?” she asked. “Yes. I have.”

“There is always a chance…”

There was not, Rhea knew instinctually, not for her. She would not say it out loud and she would attempt whatever physical therapy treatment he suggested to her, but she knew. She known it before she’d even woken up.

He seemed to read the knowledge on her face. “I’m sorry,” he said, and while at no point during the conversation had his tone been unempathetic, the professional mask slipped for a moment, showing her a very human expression on his face. He was clearly torn up about it. She did not think he should be.

To be fair, Roman never used his desk. He usually worked on schoolwork on campus in the library or the student union and occasionally he’d work at an off-campus coffee shop. The rare times he did study at home, he usually did so on the couch. His desk had become more of a storage location and bookshelf. You could rarely see the top of the desk, especially since Roman had a tendency to throw extra blankets and pillows in its general direction when he was done with them.

To not be fair, it was Roman’s desk… in Roman’s room… at 3pm (aka during one of Virgil’s classes).

“Ow,” came from the bundle of “blankets” under his desk when Roman accidentally kicked it. He’d been sitting down to look for a notebook he’d lost at some point between class last week and lecture this morning.

“What are you even doing down there?” Roman asked in leu of an apology. He didn’t move to get up, but he did move his foot back. He could not see Virgil’s face, but he could see a telltale puff of black hair sticking out from one of the blankets.

“Napping.”

“Under my desk?”

“Your desk sits over a heater,” Virgil replied. “And you have a lot of blankets here.”

Which, okay, that second part was Roman’s fault. What did he expect at this point? Blankets were Virgil magnets.

“…Have you seen a green notebook with stars on it?”

The blankets next to Roman’s feet shifted and he heard a soft scraping noise. A hand briefly appeared, dropping the notebook at his feet before retreating. “It had slid down and fallen behind the desk,” Virgil said.

“Well, your habits are useful for something at least,” Roman said picking up the notebook. “You doing okay? Don’t you have class right now?”

“Professor canceled class,” Virgil said.

“Cool,” Roman said. “Well, I’m going to The Hideout. You want to come? Or I can bring you something back.”

Virgil sighed an amusingly weary sigh. “Give me 20 minutes?”

Hey. This is a mind the tags kind of chapter. Both the alcohol and past sexual assault tags apply here. Be safe.

Logan attempted to buy them plain vodka.

Remus had parked his car in a parking garage that allowed overnight parking for 15 bucks, and they’d walked to a nearby liquor store. Remus quickly vetoed Logan’s beverage choice (and then he vetoed the next one which was everclear). Honestly, had the man only ever heard of alcohol from bad films about college students?

Remus silently decided to not let himself get too drunk, so he could keep an eye on the other man. He clearly didn’t have much experience with hard liquor, and Remus didn’t want to kill him.

Logan bought the cherry flavored vodka Remus gently directed him to, paying with cash and a fake ID before Remus could protest.

Remus had spent his high school and early college years buying a fuck ton of illegal alcohol with friends, so he knew enough to hold his tongue until they were out of the store.

“Camillo?” Remus asked once they were a good distance from the storefront.

Logan glanced at him, confused.

“You don’t look like a Camillo? Why would you use that on a fake ID?”

Logan chuckled slightly. “If I’d known you’d take offence, I would have asked you your opinion first. For future reference, would you have preferred Dave or Lucas?” he asked.

“How many fake IDs do you have?” Remus asked, eyeing him.

“On me?” Logan asked wryly.

“Let me guess,” Remus said. “You didn’t and won’t tell me about all of them.”

Logan just smiled his aggravating-piece-of-shit smile and didn’t answer. Remus, knowing he wouldn’t get anywhere with this conversation, dropped it.

Remus had been leading them towards a park near the liquor store. It was technically closed, but… if they didn’t have a fence… it wasn’t really his fault if he “couldn’t see” the hours on the sign in the dark.

Still, Logan was a wanted criminal, so they decided to hide from street view. The easiest location to do so was in the children’s playground. One of the pieces of equipment was one of those fancy ones that looked like a castle. It was three stories tall and had a slide from the top into a hole filled with little pieces of old tires. They took refuge under the slide.

The ground was a little bit cool and slightly damp underneath them since it had rained the day before and, while the rest of the ground had dried in the sun, their spot had been in the shade all day. Remus was sure the butt and legs of his dress pants were getting stained with mud.

They settled themselves side by side with their backs partially resting on the bottom of the slide. It was pretty dark, only the light from one park lamp reaching them, and even that being blocked mostly by the slide above them.

Remus grabbed the brown bag the clerk had given them and pulled out the bottle of flavored vodka. It opened with a quiet hiss of released pressure. Remus took a small sip himself before offering the bottle to Logan.

Logan took a much larger swig than Remus had. To Remus’s surprise, he didn’t choke on it or even seem surprised by the intensity of the alcohol content. He shot the bottle a contemplative look after swallowing. “Huh,” he said. “That’s not as bad.”

It was then that Remus realized… he may have misinterpreted Logan’s attempt to buy plain vodka. He’d interpreted it as an inexperienced drinker picking out the first thing they identified as hard liquor, but when Logan handed Remus back the bottle, Remus estimated a bit over two shots worth was missing. (Remus had probably had about 1/8 of a shot.) Logan hadn’t even blinked. Did Logan just buy himself a bottle of plain vodka whenever he wanted to get drunk? Who the hell had taught this man to drink? A Russian Tsar?

Remus let himself take a bit more of a sip this time before handing the bottle back. They passed it back and forth a few times in relative silence. Even though Remus was restraining himself from drinking a lot, he started to feel the warmth of an almost buzz after a while.

He handed back the bottle with a sigh, leaning his head against the back of the slide (the best he could with its awkward angle). “So,” he finally broke the silence. “Six months?”

Logan just took another sip of alcohol.

“I didn’t think it was my place to tell Virgil that the first time I’d seen you in those 6 months was when you showed up at my apartment 5 hours ago,” he continued. “(I’m still a bit uncomfortable you know where that is, by the way.) But, I was surprised you didn’t mention it to him yourself.”

Logan made a grunting sound. “It wouldn’t have made a difference.”

Remus squinted at him. “How do you know Virgil so well and also not at all?”

“What do you mean?” Logan asked. Remus accepted the bottle as it was pushed towards him but didn’t drink yet.

“You being no contact for months on end is one thing,” Remus explained, head titled so he could see the shadows of Logan’s face while mostly still facing forward. “It’s another thing when he thinks you were only no contact with him.”

“I don’t know why,” Logan said. “The results for him are the same.”

Remus rolled his eyes so hard he thought he saw his brain and then titled his head back to take a slightly larger drink of vodka than he had so far. He decided while swallowing to drop the conversation. Explaining people to Logan wasn’t exactly easy even when the man wasn’t being a mopey, halfway to being absolutely pissed, mess.

“Where were you, by the way?” he asked, as he let Logan take the vodka back out of his hand. “I mean, I get you’re running from me, so I shouldn’t expect you to send postcards or stop by for visits frequently (emo birthdays notwithstanding), but usually you’re around. You just… disappeared.”

Remus had been… worried. After all, the last time he’d seen Logan, Logan had a bunch of files on one of the most notorious mobs in the country. If he’d gone missing and had never shown up again, well, it wouldn’t exactly be a surprise.

The Cuttler Mob was known for a lot of sordid stuff, homicide and human trafficking being the least of it. There were files and files of missing persons cases over the past 50 or so years that were attributed to them, though very little had ever legally been pinned on its members. What did stick usually only stuck to the lower-level grunts.

So, yeah, Remus had been worried. Sure, he was supposed to be trying to put Logan in prison, but what The Cuttler Mob could do to someone was worlds worse than a prison sentence.

“I was busy,” was Logan’s only answer, half smothered in the drag of vodka he took after the last word.

“With the files?” Remus pressed.

When Logan didn’t answer and also didn’t pass back the alcohol, Remus took his silence as a yes. That heavy silence settled on them for a long few minutes.

“It’s been quiet without you around,” Remus finally said. “They have me on your case full time now, since I’m the only person who has ever gotten close. I’ve basically been on vacation. I’ve taken up knitting.”

Logan scoffed. “I’m sure.”

Remus had actually.

“Should I be planning to end my vacation?” Remus asked.

Logan sighed and took another drink before finally handing the bottle back over. “Hopefully I’ll be putting you into an early retirement soon.”

Remus glanced at him, but doubted he could made much of his expression in full light. “…Is that a threat?” he asked.

Logan actually laughed, though it was a short, aborted thing. “No.”

“Is it a threat… to yourself?” Remus hedged.

“I am not planning to get myself killed,” he said dryly. Then, he tacked on under his breath. “Intentionally.”

“What are you planning then?”

“I am not telling you that.” When Remus didn’t drink quick enough for him, Logan snatched the bottle back to drink himself.

“Come on,” Remus entreated. “I’m not asking for details.”

Logan sighed and looked up, though what on the bottom of the slide he was looking at, Remus didn’t know. “I think I’ll try to retire myself,” he said. “I’ll drop off radar, maybe find myself a deserted island to live on or a cabin in the woods where no one can find me. Or maybe I’ll go…” He trailed off, frowned, and drank again.

The clear question was ‘go where,’ but Remus knew he would get no answer. He reached over to take the alcohol from Logan less because he wanted a drink and more because he noticed the man had taken the last 5.

They were silent again. Remus drank a bit more, but Logan was still outpacing him by quite a bit.

“Man,” Remus finally said, shifting forward enough that he could lay down supine under the slide. “I feel like a teenager again.”

“How so?” Logan asked, curiously. He still sat, but at some point he’d wrapped an arm around his knees.

“Hiding out in a park at night,” Remus said, “talking about shit we’d probably not talk about in the light of day, splitting a bottle of vodka with someone who’s kind of a friend and kind of not. The only difference between this and high school is I’m legally allowed to drink. Still not legally supposed to be in this park at this hour.”

“I see,” Logan said, toying with the cap of the vodka bottle. “I never really got to be a teenager, so I wouldn’t know.”

“Strict parents?” Remus asked. Logan shook his head. “Too nerdy of a personality?”

“No.” He took another swig of vodka.

Remus peered up at him. The shadows on his jaw made him look tense and the slump of his shoulders made him look tired. Remus reached up to steal the bottle and its cap. He capped the vodka and set it on the ground next to him, on the opposite side from Logan. “Come on,” he said. “Come lay down with me.”

“So, I can dirty my shirt as well as my pants?”

“Yep!”

Logan took a few seconds more to think about it before shifting. He slowly lowered himself down, so he was laying on Remus’s left, their arms just barely touching.

“So,” Logan said after a moment. “This is a fundamental teenager experience?”

“It is,” Remus confirmed.

“And is this all?”

“Well, it depends on who you’re with,” Remus said, “and how drunk you all are.” He turned his head fully to the side. “You don’t seem like the type of guy to have a competition of who can piss furthest.”

Logan’s mouth twisted up in distaste.

“Yeah, didn’t think so,” Remus said. “Maybe if we’d gotten that Everclear I could have gotten you to do a competition of who can piss more accurately, but vodka just isn’t enough.

“I think I’d need harder drugs for that,” Logan said.

“I’m really good at both competitions,” Remus informed him. “If you were wondering.”

“I was not.”

“I could give a demonstration,” Remus said. His eye wiggle was totally lost on Logan since he was staring straight up.

“I,” Logan said, tone droll, “don’t have a piss kink.”

Remus snorted. “Noted,” he said. “I’ll recalibrate my flirting and get back to you.”

“Are there any activities not involving bodily fluids?” Logan asked.

Remus gave an exaggerated sigh. “I’ll be honest, you’re really restricting me with that request.” He thought for a moment. “How about 20 questions?”

“Ah, yes,” Logan replied. He turned his face towards Remus and suddenly they were nose to nose. “Exactly my idea of fun, being interrogated by a cop.”

“Strictly non-work subjects,” Remus said. “I promise. I’m not even thinking about work right now.”

“Fine,” Logan said with a puff of breath that ghosted over Remus’s nose, “but I go first.”

“But of course.”

He seemed to already have a question ready to go. “Is this really something you used to do a lot when you were younger?” It was an odd question and Remus had a feeling there was something more to it.

“Well, yeah,” Remus said. “Small town, half blind gas station clerk, and shitty parents. What else was I supposed to do but get drunk with a bunch of half strangers? It was pretty much every weekend from 8th grade until I went off to college. Then I went to house parties to get drunk with strangers until about halfway through my second year. The underaged drinking definitely killed some brain cells which explains why I’m an idiot.”

“You’re not an idiot,” Logan said almost immediately.

“Why?” Remus asked with a smile. “Because I’ve almost caught you?”

“Yes,” Logan said, unrepentant. “You say stupid things and make crude jokes, but most if not all of it is by design. You make people underestimate you on purpose.”

And it wasn’t exactly false. It was Remus’s main strategy.

“My turn,” Remus said. “Why geology?”

Logan laughed quietly. “I like rocks,” he answered simply.

“Really, that’s your entire answer?”

“It isn’t that deep, Remus,” Logan said, amused. He hummed and thought. “I guess because it’s a type of science I’m good at but doesn’t immediately make people think I may be an expert hacker.”

“Fine, I’ll accept that answer,” Remus said. “Your turn.”

“During those times you did stuff like this as a teenager, was it all just pissing contests and getting to know you questions or did you ever do other things?”

“Like?”

He dithered for half a second. “Like, romantic type things?”

Oh, so they were going there?

Remus considered. “I wouldn’t call most of it romantic, but there was some sloppy making out sometimes depended on who I was with. Small town though, like I said, so most of the guys had to get pretty drunk to admit they swung that way.”

“I see.”

When he didn’t press for more, Remus took his turn. “Did you have a boyfriend, or girlfriend for that matter, in high school?”

“No,” Logan said, and Remus thought that would be all the answer he got, but then he tacked on, “I did not go to high school.”

Remus was surprised. He’d had a certain idea in his head of what Logan had looked like in high school. Nerdy, of course. Maybe he’d started working out in the summer after Freshman year, so he’d get less bullied as a Sophomore, and he’d kept that up into his adulthood. Apparently not though.

“What about you?”

The alcohol slowed Remus’s processing power enough that he had to think for a moment about what he meant. “A boyfriend?” Remus clarified. Logan nodded. “Not in high school,” he said. “I had better luck finding openly gay guys in college, but most of those were more situationships than relationships. I think there were two during college I’d actually consider boyfriends. One was when I was still drinking a lot, and it ended badly and there was one in senior year, but we were going different directions in life.” He figured that was a sufficient answer, and so asked his next. “Were you homeschooled then?”

“No,” Logan said. “I did not have any schooling then. I self-taught and got my GED later. Do you have a lot of sexual partners now? You joke about sex a lot, but I can’t tell if that’s because you have a lot or just use it as a cover for something.”

“I date someone every so often,” Remus answered, “but believe it or not, I’m not one for casual sex, not since college. Now, I have been around the block admittedly and have probably been in more sex clubs than most people, but you always have to be careful who you sleep with as a fed. It’s not worth it most of the time. I have plenty of dildos though.”

Logan puffed out a breath somewhere between amused and exasperated, likely more because of Remus’s tone than the contents of his words. (Logan had asked after all.) “You’re question.”

“Alright,” Remus said. “Hmm.” He looked away to think for a moment. “When did you first get to 3rd base?”

There was silence and Remus looked back at Logan to see his jaw locked.

“What?” he asked. “You’re not a virgin, are you? Not that there’s anything wrong with it, I just didn’t get the vibe…”

He trailed off as Logan suddenly sat back up. He reached over Remus for the bottle of vodka and took a large gulp.

Remus half sat up, propping himself up with his arms. “Uh.”

“I am,” Logan said, staring down at the bottle of vodka in his hands. “At least I am in the way that Virgil was my first kiss.” He glanced down at Remus. “Not at all, except in every way that matters.”

“…Shit,” was all Remus could say.

“Yeah,” Logan said and took another, slightly bigger, swig of vodka.

“I’m sorry if I ever…”

“Oh please,” Logan said. “you’re harmless. Besides, if I wanted you or anyone else to treat me differently because I’ve been sexual assaulted in the past, I would have told someone by now.”

“You’ve never…”

“Told someone? No. There was no one to tell.”

“Virgil?”

Logan drank a bit more. “Virgil has likely guessed,” he said, “considering my reactions to certain activities we’ve engaged in, but no, I’ve never said it.”

Remus wanted to ask ‘Why not?’ and ‘Why now?’ but it was not his turn to ask a question, and he thought the game was probably over.

“Don’t,” Logan said.

“Don’t what.”

“It was already true before I told you. Don’t change.”

Remus paused. “Okay,” he said. “Maybe give me 12 hours before expecting me to make a sexual pass at you in joke form.”

“Okay.”

“’Scuse me, itsy bitsy,” someone says from behind him, and Virgil turns to see a vaguely familiar man in a dazzling prince costume holding a fresh plate of deviled eggs.

Virgil moves so that the prince dude can set the plate down on a clear spot on the table, and frowns. “I'm taller than you, Princey.”

Prince dude shrugs, plucks one of the eggs up, and takes a large bite. “Lucky you, or we'd've had to ask you to vacate the premises,” he says. “No little spiders allowed, real or fake.”

Which, yeah, now that he's mentioned it, Virgil had noted an extreme lack of spider-themed decorations, which is unusual for Halloween. Usually there'd at least be spiderweb cupcakes, but the cupcakes at this party are mostly cute ghosts.

There's probably a good reason for that, Virgil realizes with a sinking feeling. “Should I change?”

“You got another costume handy, or were you planning on spinning a spider-silk cocoon and metamorphosing into a butterfly?”

Virgil grimaces. “No,” he admits.

Prince Dude considers him. “It's not very realistic,” he says, which is true. Virgil hadn't been going for realism, he'd been going for passable costume I can make on short notice. He's wearing black jeans and a black hoodie, and he'd cut some pool noodles in half and wrapped them in more black cloth and stuck them to his back for the other four legs. It had been a pain to get them to stay in place properly, actually, and he'd ended up sewing their wrappings to the back of his hoodie in order to keep them where he wanted them. He'd been pretty proud of it, given that Remus had dropped “we're going to a costume party at my brother's house” on him like an hour beforehand, but now he's wishing he'd come up with any other idea. He could have put a sheet over his head and been a ghost, or something. Granted, that would have required him to have a sheet that was both white and that he was willing to cut holes in, which he didn't, but still.

Prince Dude continues to quietly scrutinize Virgil, and he wants to squirm under his gaze. Eventually, the guy shrugs and says, “Might be best to ask the scaredy-cat himself. Wait here, I'll be back.” And he saunters off before Virgil can answer.

For lack of anything better to do, Virgil picks up a deviled egg and shoves the whole thing in his mouth. It's really tasty, actually, and now he's wishing he'd taken smaller bites rather than horking it down in one.

Virgil had thought that Princey was just being mean with the “scaredy-cat” thing, but the guy he's talking to now actually is dressed as a calico cat. Prince Dude points back at Virgil, and Mister Calico Cat glances in his direction, then turns back to Princey. Virgil can't hear what they're saying, but he supposes Prince Dude must've asked Calico if Virgil’s costume was too creepy crawly scary.

They talk for way longer than Virgil had expected, and he can't tell if Calico's response was more like “No, he's fine,” or more along the lines of “Yes, that's terrifying, please have him removed immediately from my sight and also my home.”

He occupies himself with another deviled egg. If he's going to get kicked out, he might as well enjoy some more of this tasty food first.

Oh, fuck. Remus.

Remus isn't going to want to leave early just to take Virgil home, and Virgil still doesn't know where he even is! Fuck!

Well, Remus could have warned him not to be a spider, so if Virgil gets kicked out of the party it'll be at least partly Remus's fault. Virgil doesn't know anybody here, but Remus knows at least half these people, and if Calico’s spider aversion is enough that there are no spider-themed decorations in the house on Halloween, that sounds like the kind of thing Remus would know about.

Granted, Remus revels in being gross and annoying, but still! He's not a total dick. He should have told Virgil.

Fucker.

Calico vanishes into the other room, and Prince Dude comes back over to Virgil. He doesn't look like he's about to kick Virgil out on the curb, at least. Virgil braces himself anyway.

“Good news!” Princey says with a grin. “Li’l Mister Muffet says you don't look like a creepy crawly death dealer and he doesn't have the urge to remove you with arson!”

Virgil blinks. “...gooood?” he says slowly. He hadn't even considered kill it with fire being a potential response to his costume. That would have been worse than just getting kicked out of the party, actually.

“Honestly you're much more Doc Ock in silhouette, Spider-Man,” Princey continues. “That helps a lot.”

Virgil glances back at where Prince Dude and Calico had been chatting. “So he didn't leave the room because he can't stand the sight of me?” he asks anyway.

“Nah, he wanted to make another plate of horse devours,” Princey says, reaching past Virgil to grab a cupcake off the table. This one has a little frosting bat.

“A plate of what?” Virgil says, because surely he didn't hear that right.

“Little snacks,” Prince Dude clarifies instead of repeating himself. “Our fridge is crammed with delicious bits and bobs. It's been so hard to resist the temptation to eat them before the party.” He bites appreciatively into his cupcake, then adds with his mouth full, “You'd think he wouldn't notice what with how much he made, but nooo, sneak one chocolate covered cherry before party time and it's a lengthy scolding for you!” Princey sighs dramatically, then cheerfully devours the rest of his cupcake.

“...hors d'oeuvres?” Virgil says hesitantly.

“Yeah, a couple ordervs of deviled eggs, cheese and crackers, and those scrumptious little pinwheel things,” Princey says. Virgil’s not sure if Princey actually doesn't know how hors d'oeuvres is pronounced, or if he's messing with him, but then Princey gives him a mischievous grin that one, confirms that yes, Princey does know what he's doing, and two, is so familiar that it freezes Virgil in place as the pieces click together in his brain.

The lack of a mustache makes Prince Dude's face look different, and so does the way he did his makeup, and he carries himself differently, but it's undeniable all the same: Virgil knows that grin.

This is Remus's twin brother.

Now that he's connected the dots (you haven't connected shit) the family resemblance is clear even to Virgil’s honestly rather faceblind eyes.

This is Remus's brother, and it's his house they're partying at.

… Virgil doesn't remember the guy's name.

Fuck, he should've made sure he at least knew who the party hosts were, especially the one related to his mischief goblin of a best friend.

Well he can't exactly ask now, can he?

“Also like, five types of cupcakes,” Princey continues, oblivious to Virgil’s inner turmoil. “Seriously, have you tried the cupcakes? Chef Boiardelightful made multiple separate batches of different flavors, from scratch. And they're all delicious!”

Virgil smirks. “And did you try to snitch them before the party too?”

Princey gasps theatrically, pressing a hand to his chest. “How could you accuse me of such a thing!?” he protests with exactly as much dramatic emotion as Virgil would expect from Remus's twin. “For your information, I did not! I merely sampled a portion of the batter left on the spatula after the cupcakes had gone into the oven. Also some of the frosting.”

“He means that he licked the bowls clean,” says a new voice, and Virgil does not jump out of his skin, thank you very much. And even if he did jolt a little, it's nothing to the startled squawk Princey emits.

Calico's back, holding a platter of little finger sandwiches on toothpicks. He offers them up to Virgil, who takes one. “Thanks.”

“No worries, kiddo!” Calico says cheerfully, and puts the rest of the platter down on the snack table. Princey plucks up two sandwiches by their toothpicks, and gets a stern look in response. “Make sure to leave some for the guests,” Calico scolds.

“My delightful and beloved Patissier,” Princey says, cupping Calico's face gently with his free hand. “I assure you that each of our guests could have a heaping plateful of food and we would still have leftovers until next Tuesday. No-one will be going home hungry.”

It really is an impressive spread. Everything Virgil’s tried has been really good. Remus really could have played up the ‘free food’ angle more when trying to convince Virgil to come. If he'd known the food would be this good, then overriding his usual party-related reservations—it's gonna be loud, there will be a lot of people, I don't know anybody, etc—would have been a lot easier. Then again, Virgil probably wouldn't have believed him. He'd mostly been expecting pizza and cheap beer, honestly, not– not homemade delicacies.

The tiny sandwich Calico gave him is lightly toasted, with some kind of sliced-meat-and-cream-cheese filling, and a little green leafy garnish on top. It definitely looks much fancier than most things Virgil eats, and he can understand why Calico doesn't want Princey to eat them all. That probably took a decent amount of effort. He almost feels bad eating it himself, except that Calico had offered it to him specifically, and it would probably be more rude at this point to not eat it.

“Are you sure my costume is okay?” Virgil asks, interrupting the minor squabble Princey and Calico had fallen into.

“Oh, yes, you're fine,” Calico assures him. “Trust me, if you were pinging my brain as an actual spider I wouldn't be in the room right now, let alone standing next to you.”

“Really, cause most cats I know would eat a spider soon as look at it,” Virgil quips, and is rewarded with Calico laughing.

“That wouldn't be very good host-ly of me, now would it?” he says. “I would never eat a guest!”

“Not unless they're a reptile with scallions,” Princey teases, and Calico flushes.

“Hey!” he protests, swatting Princey's shoulder with one hand and trying to cover his extremely red face with the other. Virgil wonders what the reference was, exactly, but doesn't think it's his place to ask. It seems rather personal, from how hard Calico is blushing.

…maybe he'll ask Remus later if he knows what the story there is.

~~~~