#aero zero

He woke up before dawn to the remains of his legs aching. It happened sometimes, as was the result of losing both legs. It didn’t hurt as badly as when he first lost them. Now, those first days had been filled with pain. They had filled him with a longing for death when he thought he might never walk again, might be useless, and a burden on the one man he cared for above everything else (save the other half of his heart). The trial of learning to walk again, and having Osric ever by his side, encouraging and uplifting him, had made it all worth it in the end. He had relearned how to walk, and was now even able to fight with his prosthetics and not stumble.

He rubbed a hand over his face, red goatee itchy against the dusky tan skin of his face, and then wasn’t surprised to hear Lily moving around outside of their tent. He lifted himself off of Ramzi’s warm back, and watched as Osric pulled Ramzi closer in his sleep. Osric’s red-to-black magma skin was a dark contrast to Ramzi’s brown, half nude as they both were. Osric’s red eyes flickered open for a moment, and Xerxes pressed a finger to his lips and shook his head. Osric understood, and closed his eyes again, and was soon asleep once more. The only light in the tent came from the bright fiery heart at the center of Osric’s chest, a consequence of the spell placed on him.

He took care of business outside, and then splashed water on his face to wake himself up more. A glance inside the tent showed that Ramzi and Osric were still asleep, and Xerxes couldn’t blame them for that. They had had a long, fun night. They always had fun together, and he greatly enjoyed being able to wake up each day with the knowledge that they would be there by his side and he had little reason to doubt that they would continue to be there.

Lily, the gryphoenix that they’d raised, honked next to him, and he shushed her. She honked again, white beak clomping down on nothing, and he motioned at her that he’d be right back with something for her to snack on until Osric awoke to feed her properly. She was more Osric’s than his, but she still loved him, and he still loved her. It was like what having a child would be like, he imagined. Parents played favorites, and children played favorites too.  He hoped sometimes that he didn’t have any unknown children running around somewhere but with his adventures, it wasn’t too easy to say “Of course not.” He did take care, but taking care only worked so much.

He didn’t think he’d make a very good father, and that was largely thanks to his upbringing. Attachment forming hadn’t really been a large concern of the sect who had raised him after he’d been abandoned there. They’d focused on preparing Xerxes for sure, but not for living amongst humans, and not through exploring concepts that they didn’t consider important to them. Strato was a god of sex and war, not of compassion and love. He’d been raised to fuck and to fight. It wasn’t all he was good for by any means, but sometimes… it felt like that.

He found some desert fruit for Lily and brought it back to the gryphoenix. She ate it quickly and messily, and then headbutted him for more. This caused his head to fall off, and he just held it underneath his left arm as he considered her. He wasn’t one to point fingers at why she was so spoiled but it was very clearly not something he had done. She headbutted him again, and he finally got what she wanted. He stuck his head back on and pressed a kiss to the top of her fluffy head before patting her until she got bored with that. She really was like a huge child, and to be honest, she was all the child he could handle.

He left off thinking about that, and went back into the tent. Ramzi’s face was buried in Osric’s neck, and both of his black-haired loves were both sound asleep. A glance outside showed him what he already knew. It was still a long time till morning, and they had only been asleep for a few hours. He considered joining them, but his mind was restless and he knew that even the lush, plump ass that was just right there wasn’t going to be enough to distract him. He rubbed lotion into his stumps, and then reattached his prosthetics. He got dressed as quietly as possible, but not quietly enough because Osric was watching him when he turned back around.

“Going somewhere?” Osric asked softly seemingly as to not wake up Ramzi who was glued to him. Xerxes made a few motions of his hands, and then shrugged. “Don’t go too far without us.”

Xerxes kissed him and kissed the top of Ramzi’s head, and then left, sword at hip just in case. When he looked back before the tent closed all the way, Osric looked concerned yet was closing his eyes again. They looked nice like that, he couldn’t help but think. A stone settled in his gut at leaving them.

A few people in the caravan were starting to wake up but he mostly ignored them as he headed out. It wasn’t as if he could speak or anything of the sort to them; it would be an exercise in frustration if he were to attempt it. He headed out, keeping the sun to his left as it rose in the sky. The desert was warming up around him, and he was glad for his loose but fitted clothes. He wasn’t honestly planning on wandering too far away from the camp in case they decided to leave or something.

He could see the camp in the distance as he reached a cave.

The thing about caves was that it was always hard to be sure what was in them. Sometimes it was a monster that wanted to fight. Sometimes it was a monster that wanted to fuck. Sometimes it was a monster that wanted to do both. Those tended to be fun to deal with, what with having to race to get off before the monster’s bloodlust caught up with it.

This cave was emptied out, as if the previous occupant had left in a huge hurry. A dragon by the looks of it, from the claw and scorch marks left on the floor and cave walls. He built up a fire and examined the cave. There were a few branching off paths, but when explored yielded nothing but bats and dust. It was empty, and just a bit too quiet to sit there in front of his fire. He should really just go back, he thought, but couldn’t bring himself to do that just yet. Sometimes he liked to be alone like this, even if it was lonely. It helped him renew himself, focus on what he was after.

The goal for the immediate future was to keep trying to track down the sorcerer and beat a cure for their djinni status out of him. Then it was back home to Sarcius and life would go back to normal. And most importantly, ‘normal’ this time would include Ramzi at last.

He didn’t know why that left him with a taste of dissatisfaction in his mouth.

That’s what he was fighting for— what they were fighting for— after all. A return to normalcy.

But yet, he’d miss this, and he could admit that to himself in the stillness of the cave with only the fire for company. It reminded him of Osric’s flames, and he grinned at it. Life was interesting in a way that it hadn’t been before. There was nothing wrong with the quiet life, with settling down, with belonging to one place— but he’d never been content like that. He was young and not quite ready to settle down into a quiet life. Maybe in the future he’d be ready to settle down in some laid back town again, but for now, he wanted to keep moving. He wanted to keep fighting.

It sent a thrill through him, akin to when he and his lovers were fucking— this simple thought that he wanted to keep traveling and exploring even after they had gotten back their bodies. He wanted to map out the continent with Osric and Ramzi.

He settled his head next to him as he crossed his legs and basked in the flames in the cool cave. The sun was fully up, but the cave was almost freezing despite that. Was he just too used to Osric’s presence? There wasn’t much more he could use to build the fire up, so he settled on moving closer to it. He considered returning to the camp but he was still thinking things over.

They would get the caravan to the nearby town, and then they would continue their search. Fucking and fighting their way across this grand continent until they found the sorcerer and put an end to his plans. Until they got their regular human bodies back.

He patted his head, and then picked it up and stuck it back on.

There were some unexpected benefits to becoming a djinni, but he truly did want to go back to being human again.

He put out the fire, and headed back to the camp.

He should have anticipated that when the sun rose higher in the sky, it would also increase the activity in the desert. The first hit caught him by surprise, but he rolled with the impact, shaking off the worst of the damage as he faced the beast.

It was a naga, taller than he was, wider too, with more heads than he could count as it kept attacking him. He reached for his sword, but a swipe of the naga’s tail had him having to dodge again. He pulled it out, and twisted again as the creature went for his leg. He couldn’t feel it of course, but the tears in the cloth suggested that it would have hurt if he could. He kicked one head, and slashed another with his blade.

There was no time to second guess himself, no time to wonder if this was the right thing to do. There was a monster trying to kill him, a monster that probably didn’t want to kill him, a monster that was probably in pain, but still it was still a monster that’s trying to kill him. Xerxes wasn’t going to die alone in the desert, because that was just not how he’s going to allow death to catch him.

His sword swished and flashed as he cut off one head of the naga. The beast screamed with its other heads and started fighting him with something akin to desperation. Xerxes took a blow across his chest, and it knocked off his head. His body rolled, and his hands picked up his head and reattached it, even as he blocked a blow from the naga with his other hand.

He looked wretched, but he’s never felt more alive than when he plunged his sword into the naga’s chest and ran it up and up— separating several of the smaller heads from the main body. The damn thing was still moving though, pressing on only through sheer willpower, Xerxes figured. He could admire that.

He cut off the remaining head, and the monster’s body fell and twitched in the sand.

Xerxes watched it for a long moment. He was coated with both its blood and his own. He wiped his sword off in the sand to get rid of most of the blood, and walked back towards camp.

It was necessary, and yet seems like such a waste. Usually they try to bargain and talk in general with the monsters before they fight them. Give them one last hurrah before killing them. But then there are times like this, when the monsters are so far gone that there was no time to talk or reason with them. This was all that sorcerer’s doing, and yet he felt something like guilt crawl up on him for just leaving the body there. If he had died against it, it would have eaten him, he knew that. There would not have been a body to bury.

He would have disappeared from this world as mysteriously as he was brought into it.

He didn’t want that.

When he died he wanted to be with the people he cared for most. He wanted to have found and accomplished his reason for being. He would die satisfied and with a smile.

Instead of going directly back to the camp, he went to the lake that they’ve settled down near and strips. He’ll wash properly later, this is more about just getting the worst of the blood off of him so he can see if the wound to his chest needed stitches or not. His leg was clawed up to hell, but fixable and still useable. He managed to walk back to camp on it after all.

He got dressed again in his bloody clothes and made his way to the tent he shared with Osric and Ramzi. Osric was outside tending to Lily, and he smiled to see him. It felt like days had passed since he’d left, but it’d been a handful of hours. He stopped walking as he just watched Osric and Lily.

Osric was cleaning her off, carefully and gently. The desert sand was rough on her, she was made for forests and mountains after all. Ramzi poked his head out of the tent, and Xerxes was just too far away to make out what they were saying, but they were laughing and exchanging smiles, and Xerxes was hit with the fiercest longing that he’d had in a long time. Ramzi came fully out of the tent, and he and Osric exchanged a brief kiss. Xerxes couldn’t move as he watched them, and he couldn’t help the small smile that came to his lips. They looked so happy, and he was so glad that they were able to be that way with or without him.

It was the without him part that had that stone in his stomach from earlier shifting, and what made him take a few steps forward. Ramzi noticed him first, and was smiling, but then his smile turned to a frown, and he was taking a half running steps towards Xerxes with a cry of his name.

Osric patched him up, and Xerxes wanted to say something about it being like old times back in their training days, but he just settled on resting his hand on top of Osric’s after the other man finished his stitches and squeezing it. Osric kissed him, and then Ramzi came back to the tent with some supplies from the healer they were traveling with.

“I told you not to wander off too far,” Osric muttered. Xerxes shrugged, and Osric sighed, and then patted his leg. “We’ll get you a replacement as soon as we can. Can you manage with it like that?”

Xerxes looked at what remained of his leg, and winced. It was a mess, worse than originally thought but he supposed that he could manage. He should still be able to fight. He nodded.

“Well, even if he can’t, Lily can carry Ketan round,” Ramzi said, dropping down on the pillows next to him and peering at the stitches. He looked satisfied with the job that Osric had done, and laid back with a yawn. Xerxes looked out of the tent at Lily who was scratching at the sand and getting herself dirty again.

Osric touched his chest, and Xerxes looked down at him and smiled. He wanted to show that he was okay, but without words the only thing he could do was kiss Osric. He had been stripped down to his boxers, but the biggest concern for both his lovers was on making sure that he healed properly.

Ramzi touched his thigh, and he knew that he was watching the kiss even if he wasn’t joining in. This was Ramzi’s own way of participating. He liked to watch, and there was nothing like showing off to get things more interesting.

Osric allowed the kisses, and the petting for a while, and then pulled away much to Xerxes’s frustration and touched his chest.

“You,” Osric said, “are not going to do anything to damage yourself further. Ramzi come with me to find lunch.”

If he could laugh, he would laugh at Osric mothering him, but instead he leaned back and threw an arm around Ramzi in an attempt to make him stay. Ramzi shot him an amused look, which softened when he glanced down at his chest and then leg.

“We’ll be back with lunch, Ketan.”

He waved them off, because the sooner they left the sooner they’d return.

He took off his left leg, and examined it more closely. The damage was contained, and the prosthetic was banged up a bit, but it was still useable. He should, by his earlier statements, still be okay to fight. And he will fight. That was why they are with this caravan after all.

He laid back on the pillows, and closed his eyes. His earlier… whatever one would call it— has mostly disappeared. He’s surrounded by the scents of the ones he holds dearest in the world. There’s Ramzi’s; flowers on that curious edge of life and death, almost overpowering with their fragrance. And Osric’s balances it out; clean water running through dirt and stirring up the scent of the world.