#prophis

Every year, Callisto swears he’s going to quit working at Bowenburg Academy, and every year, Prophis convinces him to stay, but this really might be the straw that breaks the camel’s back. He stayed late grading papers and helping students with work as they came in and out of his office -having a strange admiration of the teacher that Callisto cannot for the life of him understand, but Prophis always laughs and shakes his head whenever the dark-haired man mentions it- and when he finally decided he should pack up and head home it was nearly 8:30 at night. And to top it all off, it was raining hard enough for the raindrops to sting as they struck Callisto’s skin.

He is power walking home as fast as his 6’5” legs will allow him which makes him look like a grey-and-black blur zipping through the town. Most of the world is simply white noise to him, the only noise being the pounding rain as everything else that is sensible is hiding somewhere dry.

Or at least, that’s what he thought.

As he rounds a corner, sharper and faster than is safe given the very slick concrete, he stumbles forward as his heel steps on something far too soft, and said soft thing begins yowling and crying loudly. Callisto spins around and sees a tiny black and white kitten, drenched to the bone, and, even to Callisto’s untrained eye, severely malnourished.

The man pauses before the guilt -and some of his animal-loving husband’s consciousness- overwhelms him, and he steps under a nearby awning and clicks for the kitten as he crouches down.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to step on you,” he apologizes quietly, feeling a little ridiculous talking to the tiny creature as he digs into his bag and pulls out his half-eaten salami sandwich, offeringsome of it on his palm to the little thing. The kitten quickly eats it out of his hand before looking up at the tall man expectantly. Callisto gives him more with a small smile.

He offers everything he can to the kitten before standing up. He is beginning to shake with the cold and wants to get back to his husband. He nods to the kitten and turns to walk away before noticing that the kitten is still following him.

“Go on, go home,” He tells it sharply, trying to sound mean and drive it off, but instead he is given an honestly pitiful meow. “Oh, you’re quite cold, aren’t you…” he says quietly. He intends on taking another step away, but his legs don’t seem to be listening to his brain as they instead bring him closer to the sopping wet cat, and his arms seem to be listening even less as they reach to grab the kitten.

He feels around its neck for the collar, deciding that he can deliver the kitten back to his home before coming to the upsetting conclusion that there was no collar.

He straightens up and looks at it for a long moment before sighing heavily. “Alright, then, I suppose you’re coming with me.”

He gently picks up the black-and-white mess of fur. The kitten begins purring as hard as it’s shivering and Callisto can’t bring himself to put the kitten down. He gently wrings the excess water out of its fur and looks at him pensively before tucking him down the front of his grey sweater.

Though he was certainly walking fast before, he nearly doubles his speed as he barrels home, feeling the need to deliver this kitten to safety. He silently gives his thanks that their house is not that far from the campus, and he bursts through the door to their little home in only five minutes.

“Callisto!” Prophis yelps, jumping straight up from his seat. “What on Earth are you-?”

“Cat,” Callisto says bluntly, fishing the mewling thing from his sweater and holding it straight out.

The elf stares at him and the kitten for a long moment before quickly approaching and swiping it from his husband’s hands.

“Oh, Callisto, where did you find this poor little dear?” he asks, immediately fretting over the kitten.

“On my way home,” Callisto explains as he peels off his drenched jacket and drops his bag by the door. “I accidentally stepped on its tail.”

“You what?!” Prophis exclaims, turning sharply to look at his husband as if he had said that he had punted the cat.

“On accident,” Callisto rectifies quickly. “And I apologized, and fed it half my lunch.”

The elf inspects the kitten twice over and gives a satisfied nod. “Well, other than being a hungry little fellow, he seems unscathed.” He pauses and turns his gaze to his husband, and the dark-haired man knows that look.

“No, Prophis,” he says with as much conviction as he can muster in the face of his husband. “We cannot keep it.”

“Why not?” the elf pouts. “He’s perfectly fine and well-mannered!”

“Prophis,” Callisto all but pleads.

“Oh, come on, you can’t be as heartless as to cast the little one out into the rain!” Prophis doubles down, putting his bleeding heart on full display as he cradles the kitten closer to his chest. “He wouldn’t survive the night and winter is just around the corner and-”

“Alright,” the human says tiredly.

“Alright?” Prophis echoes, the hope edging into his voice.

“Yes, alright, we can keep it.” Before his husband can properly cheer he adds, “Just until we can find someone who can take care of it instead.”

Prophis has a look on his face for a moment, one that Callisto recognizes as his “I’m plotting something face” before he nods with a smile. “Well, if he’s going to stay he needs a name.”

“A name?” Callisto echoes.

“Yes, something to call him instead of just ‘the kitten,’” Prophis reasons.

The human considers it for a moment before he concedes with a nod. “I suppose that much can be true.”

The blonde holds up the black-and-white mess of still-soggy fur before saying, “Mr. Business.”

Callisto smiles at his husband’s choice of naming. “We can’t call it that, the Monopoly Man would steal it.”

Prophis sighs. “Fair point.” He walks into the living area and gently sets the kitten down on the table, looking at him intently as if the cat will tell them his name.

Callisto follows his husband after a moment. He looks at the kitten before thinking about his lesson on the Greek mythos this evening. “What about Clio, after the muse of history and heroic poetry, from the old tales?”

Prophis snickers. “That’s truly a you thing to say, but look at him.” He gestures at the cat. “That’s not a hero of old.” As if cued by his words, the cat tries to walk off the table.

The history professor watches with bemusement as his husband scrambles to save the kitten before considering his comment. “You may have a point.” He pauses, weighing his options before smiling as he says, “Dionysus then, the old god of intoxication, that seems to fit the cat’s,” he trails off, looking the tiny thing up and down before landing on, “Everything.”

“I still feel a god’s name is too clever for him,” Prophis points out.

Callisto nods, watching as the kitten tries to eat a strand of his husband’s long white hair. “I suppose you’re right,” he says slowly.

“What about,” he trails off before grinning. “Spot? After the three-headed dog.”

Callisto pauses for a long moment, looking at his husband before slowly saying, “Did you just-? Do you mean-?” But the hopeful look in Prophis’ eye causes him to stop. “Alright, love, Spot it is.”

“Yay! Spot!” He stands up with Spot and spins around. The cat, to his credit, is completely unbothered, just lazily looking around as the 6-foot elf twirls around with him.

Callisto chuckles. “I don’t know what I expected from you,” he says before shaking his head. “Scratch that, this is exactly what I expected from you”

Prophis doesn’t even respond as he stands there with the kitten, smiling and laughing. He is on cloud nine with this little thing in his arms because he loves animals, but that’s not the only reason. While Prophis may love animals, Callisto does not, and one of the compromises they made when getting married and moving in together is that they wouldn’t have any pets in the house.

His husband snickers before deciding to be dramatic. He sniffles and pulls his, still-wet, cardigan closer around him. “I was out in the cold rain too, you know. The kitten’s not the only one who needs cuddles.” He huffs and turns to walk towards the stairs. “I suppose I’ll just go curl up in bed under the blankets.”

Callisto barely finishes his sentence before Prophis wraps him in a tight, one-arm hug. He litters his face in kisses, muttering “I love you” between each one. In his other hand, he holds the kitten away from Callisto in an effort to not smash the tiny thing.

“I love you too, darling, but I really should go dry off.” Prophis huffs, but does not let go, causing Callisto to chuckle. “Let me dry off and then we can cuddle, sound good? Wouldn’t want you getting all wet, considering you’ve already had your bottom surgery,” he teases, tapping Prophis’ hip.

Prophis slowly blinks as he processes that Callisto is still dripping wet and slowly steps back. “I somehow missed that- yes, yes, go dry off. I’ll be here taking care of this little guy.” He kisses his husband's cheek.

“You were offered cuddles after a long day of being home alone, and dove for the opportunity, my fault really. I’ll be back in a moment, darling.” Callisto walks off to the bathroom, but a second later his head pops back into the room. “I’d like to point out that ‘Spot’ is also soaking wet.”

Prophis nods and follows him into the bathroom, sits down on the floor with a towel, and dries the kitten off while cooing at him while Callisto dries up.

Callisto tries to wring the water out of his hair and clothes before mumbling “To hell with it” and completely stripping and snatching Prophis’ fluffy pink robe off the wall. He carefully pulls it on before loosely tying it in the front and burying his nose in its soft sleeve. The exhustion of the day begins to catch up with him as his eyes droop and his shoulders sag.

Prophis sees him out of the corner of his eye. He slowly stands up, still cradling the kitten in one hand, and gently readjusts the robe on Callisto with the other.

“Pink is your color, love,” Prophis hums, mirth alive in his eyes.

“Shh,” he mumbles into the sleeve. He lifts his head just enough to see his husband. “It smells like you, okay?”

The blonde trails his hand up to Callisto’s face and gently twirls one of the strands of brown hair around his fingers. “Mhm,” he hums. “Is that why you steal all my clothes?” he questions. Spot meows and Prophis briefly redirects his attention to the kitten, curling it closer to himself and making sure he is still securely held before giving his attention back to his very suddenly sleepy husband.

“Yeah, you have a nice smell, and furthermore, it’s the smell of my husband. I’d love your smell if you smelled like rancid garbage, but luckily for me you smell like vanilla candles and warmth.” Callisto rests his head against Prophis’ chest, but the cat's tiny tail keeps smacking him in the nose. He makes a disgruntled expression while shifting to rest his head in the crook of his husband's neck.

Prophis snickers as he gently puts the cat down, and wraps his husband in a proper hug before swaying them there. “I still think I smell like stale food, but I appreciate the compliment nonetheless.”

Callisto scowls against his husband’s neck. “You do not smell like stale food, this is a hill I will die on.”

The elf laughs, squeezing his husband a little tighter. “I know, we ‘argue’ about it once a week.”

“Yes, yes, we do.”

Prophis sighs. “How about this, let’s call this argument a draw and go to bed for some proper cuddles?”

Callisto nods with a loopy smile, the need to sleep finally winning.

“I love you,” he says quietly as the blonde leads them to the bedroom.

Callisto was tired. He had sat through no less than ten meetings about restructuring Symetris and he was ready to just be home with his freshly married husband.

With an exhausted sigh, he teleports into their living room, expecting to see Prophis sitting in his armchair, but his husband is not even in the room.

The human does a quick scan of the room and sees Prophis' book lying on the seat, the bookmark several pages forward in the book, and an empty mug sitting on the side table. Callisto carefully picks up the mug and turns it over in his hands. It's a simple brown clay mug with poorly drawn flowers littering it and the mug itself is lopsided and poorly constructed. It would have been thrown out as trash, but this is Prophis' favorite mug.

Callisto smiles distantly as he thinks about the night that he made this mug with Prophis. It was far before the rift had happened and they had only just begun dating. The blond had the idea of doing a crafty date. Callisto was head-over-heels for Prophis and completely powerless to object -despite his general inability to do anything creative. He had made the mug -with Prophis' help, clearly- and had nervously given it to his then-boyfriend as a gift. He expected Prophis to put the ugly thing on a shelf, but it quickly became his favorite mug to drink anything from. Tea, coffee, water, never mattered to him.

After the Rift, it became Callisto's favorite mug, just as all of Prophis' favorite things became his favorites as well. His favorite mug became something for Callisto to drink from as he mourned his husband while he wore his husband's favorite shirt -which he hadn't taken off in days- and read his favorite book -a sappy romance that Callisto had never seen the appeal in but simply could not put it down even if it was his third read through.

He's pulled out of memory lane by the sound of muffled music. It's upbeat dance music that the man doesn't recognize as he follows the sound into the kitchen. Prophis, long white hair tied back in a messy bun, is dancing around the kitchen, singing, albeit poorly, along to the song.

The music is admittedly not Callisto's type, he prefers more classical-sounding music, but since Prophis' return, the elf's been obsessed with the more recent trends in music. He adores the upbeat nature of it and smiles every time any of the songs comes on.

Callisto notices that he must be cooking something as there are a number of ingredients scattered across the countertops and Prophis himself is dusted in flour and sugar and there appears to be chocolate streaked in his white hair.

The human watches from the doorway as his husband dances and spins, singing almost in key with the song. Somehow the Chaos God has yet to notice his husband as he returns to the oven and pulls out something that smells heavenly.

"Perfect!" Prophis says happily, hips still swinging side-to-side as he places it on the countertop. "Now I just need to taste-test the tea." Humming along to the music, Prophis blindly reaches for something to his left but finds nothing. He turns to look at the empty space and "hmphs" irritatedly as he starts to brush the powder off himself. "Must've left it in the living room- shit!" he yelps as he turns around and spots Callisto, dressed in his dark robes leaning against the doorway.

"Hello, love," Callisto says with a lopsided smile. "Did I scare you?"

The elf takes a moment to regain his composure before quickly and breathily saying, "Oh, just a little." He takes a deep breath, grounding himself, before walking over to his husband and giving him a kiss and melting into his arms. "How was work?"

"Awful, I don't think Doc breathed for the last two hours," Callisto laments as he holds onto Prophis, kissing his cheek before dropping his head to rest on Prophis' shoulder.

"Doc breathes?" Prophis counters feigning bewilderment.

Callisto pulls back and gives his husband a defeated look. "I'm beginning to question it."

Prophis barks a laugh. "I'm sorry, love," he comforts before his face lights up. "I made something for you!"

"Is it the thing you pulled out of the oven?" Callisto asks.

The elf stares at him for a moment before realization slowly dawns on his face. "How long were you standing there?" he asks slowly as the tips of his ears slowly turn pink.

"Long enough to see you dancing around the kitchen with chocolate in your hair," Callisto teases lovingly as he reaches up and wipes as much of the chocolatey goop up as he can. Prophis turns a brighter shade of red as the human pops the finger in his mouth. "It's quite good. What did you make?"

Prophis lights back up. "Oh, chocolate croissants!"

"Really now? Any reason why?" Callisto questions as he admires Prophis' smile, one of his favorite sights in all of Vontral and the eight realms.

"You had a long day of meetings and Doc ramblings," Prophis reasons, "And I know you like them."

Callisto smiles at his husband. "I certainly do like them, my dear."

Prophis kisses his cheek as he steps back. "I also made tea. I was going to taste-test it, but I left my mug in the other room."

"Do you mean this one?" Callisto holds out his husband's cup who stares at it for a moment before tentatively taking it from the human's hands.

"I still can't believe you kept this for seven hundred years," Prophis says quietly as he admires the subpar craftsmanship like it was handmade by the sculptors of old.

"It was your favorite, Gods know why, that thing is uglier than Glib, but it was still your favorite so I had to keep it for when you came back," Callisto explains easily and for the dozenth time since his husband has returned.

Prophis stares at the mug for another moment, turning it in his hands before looking up at the human with an amount of love that is not foreign to the elf's face, but nearly knocks him off his feet every time Callisto sees it. "I love it because the man I love made it for me."

They sit in a shared silence, both of them still, as if afraid any sudden movements would shatter the peace of it, only for the whistle of the kettle to startle them both.

Callisto glares at it as if it had murdered his family which only causes his husband to titter out a laugh.

"Tea's ready," Prophis says, walking swiftly over to take the pot off the eye and pouring the hot liquid into his mug, and getting another mug from the cabinet next to him and pouring some tea into it. "Here," he says as he hands the secondary cup to his husband.

"Thank you, my love," Callisto says as he takes the swiftly warming cup from Prophis.