#metalbound

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Luis gave the stranger a soft smile, taking the time to take in little things, like stance and mannerisms, like he did with most people. It was a habit to read what he could off of anyone he met. Proud, confident, and sure in his own beliefs. That’s what Luis was reading.

The Spaniard leaned on his cane, taking a very casual stance, all things considered, as he returned Heisenberg’s smile with his own. “As a scientist, I’m quite intrigued. But perhaps distance is best for now, yes?” he suggested. “But I’ve never seen a mutation quite like this in all my studies over the years. You’re quite the interesting fellow.”

                          One of the unheard of perks of being an on call freelancer were the opportunities that came up with different companies -- after the laborious process of showing ones talent and work to them over time that is. This was the expenses paid trips to places his keen eye for photoshoots of the surrounding architecture. This trip was going to be a bit more extended than usual, but Henry was not bothered. It was comfortable enough to call home for now.

His trip into the town was supposed to be a quick trip out to the shops -- just a quick trip out and nothing more for his latest photoshoot... Until his eyes briefly glanced across a shop filled with a fascinating array of metal and antiques off to his side. For a moment, his mind kept forward and walking toward his destination but as the visualization of the items came back into his head he was quick to take a few paces backward and crane his head inside the door.

Well . . . It couldn’t hurt to take one detour. 

Karl’s hair was a disaster. Decades of cutting it himself, probably, with maybe Donna’s help, before things had gotten out of hand between them. Ethan thinks of those long, feminine fingers pressing through the length of the younger lord’s locks, watching them fade from dark brown to ghostly silver shot through with dark strands. The same way Ethan does now, tracing an identical path from scalp, where he applies just the smallest pressure of his short finger nails, all way the down to tip. 

“It’s getting long.” He murmurs, the sound of his voice strange and foreign in the silent golden hours of lazy summer mornings. Soon, he would have to get up for a Zoom call; his world had ended almost three times in the span of as many years, but capitalism could not halt it’s deadly march towards doomed infinity.  Soon, but not yet.

Mornings had been lazy, had always been lazy, even when Ethan had been young enough that he should have rebounded from the unpleasant reality of waking life, but with Karl it had become harder. Work became a nightmare proposition... maybe they wouldn’t need to eat that week, in exchange for twenty more minutes with the taller man pressed into his chest, the smell of masculinity heavy in Ethan’s nose.

Karl certainly did like the fruitier smelling shampoos. 

-- More than that, it was easier to be like this in the hazy space after waking, before Ethan’s bones remembered how to be bones. Despite the fact that they lived together, slept together, knew eachother intimately, Ethan still struggled from time to time with the complexities of affection when it came to Karl. He’d had boyfriends in the past, of course; it had nothing to do with gender. Those boyfriends, however, had not tried to kill Ethan and had not, in turn, killed their oppressors side by side with Ethan.

They had not watched Ethan almost die, they had not held him together with their own hands, covered in blood and whatever other muck there had been.

Those things could leave a mark, physical and emotional. They could make things awkward.

But, now, in the morning, dozy and comfortable and unwilling to put a shirt on and waddle over to his laptop, Ethan knows in his bones there’s no one else he’d rather press his hips against.

“You wanna find somewhere to get it cut today? Maybe, I dunno, styled for once in your life?”

Not Dracula. Very much not Dracula. So much worse…and so much taller. By his guess, he figured that was ‘Lady Supersized Bitch’ and honestly, Leon wasn’t going to come up with a new codename for her. It felt apt. Dead now, thank god. 

“Regular house of horrors.” Leon mutters to himself as he pulls out his communicator and sighs when Hunnigan’s face doesn’t materialize on it. “Really need to invest in better equipment. Why is it I’m always losing service? I need to change service providers.” It’s the jokes, even to himself that helps settle his nerves and he puts the communicator back in his pocket.

continued for @metalbound​

seems   everywhere   he   goes   in   this   shithole   village   there’s   always   someone   lurking   ,   just   waiting   to   take   a   shot   at   him   .   wouldn’t   be   too   different   from   the   last   twenty   some   odd   goddamn   years   on   the   job   .      the   captain   often   wonders   why   the   hell   he   hasn’t   retired   ,   but   there’s   still   too   much   work   to   be   done   .   a   lot   of   it   he   cannot   trust   in   the   hands   of   just   ANYONE   .   

there   is   only   ONE   mission   .      take   out   MOTHER   MIRANDA   .   if   anyone   dares   to   get   in   his   way   then   he   has   authorization   to   dispatch   them   as   well   .      if   only   he’d   opened   his   damn   mouth   from   the   beginning   then   they   might   not   be   in   this   situation   ,   but   there’s   not   shit   he   can   do   about   it   now   .   only   to   move   forward   through   the   LORDS   that   keep   presenting   themselves   .   find   ethan   and   kill   miranda   .