Some guy's sideblog

Needed a new place to brainrot👍

Most recent Xtho longfic is Old Ghosts!!!

Read my sfawtdne longfic Cherophobia!!!!

Read my lastest fic (behemoth) in the Philophobia series Fragapanophobia!!!!

I thought this would be a nice continuation of this ask so enjoy some post motorcycle accident cuddles

Avery would like to point out that he is trying very, very hard to follow the movie.

It is not his fault the movie is terrible.

It is also not his fault that D3r is warm.

The combination of those two facts is rapidly becoming insurmountable.

They’d spent a good fifteen minutes scrolling through movies before settling on this one, because D3r had instituted what Avery considered an incredibly discriminatory post-motorcycle-accident movie policy.

“No horror.”

“Okay.”

“No tragedies.”

“Fine.”

“No movies where the dog dies.”

“I wasn’t going to suggest one!”

“And it needs a happy ending.”

Avery had stared at him from his carefully arranged position in D3r’s bed, pillows propped behind his back and injured leg stretched out over the blankets.

“You have extremely specific requirements.”

“I like happy endings.”

“You know that severely limits our options.”

“I’m comfortable with that.”

So now they’re watching some absolutely god-awful action movie in which a disgraced former special forces operative has apparently been forced out of retirement because somebody kidnapped his estranged daughter, except Avery is reasonably certain the daughter escaped forty minutes ago and the protagonist simply hasn’t noticed.

There’s also a government conspiracy.

Probably.

Avery lost track somewhere around the second helicopter explosion.

He’s tucked against D3r’s side beneath the blankets, head resting on his shoulder, one arm laid lazily across D3r’s stomach. D3r has positioned himself very carefully so Avery can lean against him without putting pressure on anything sore, and every few minutes his fingers drift absently through Avery’s hair.

That is the real problem.

Avery’s eyes keep closing.

He opens them stubbornly.

On-screen, somebody crashes through a skylight.

“Who’s that?” Avery mumbles.

“The brother.”

“What brother?”

“The villain’s brother.”

“I thought we killed him.”

“That was the other brother.”

Avery lifts his head just enough to squint at D3r. “There are two?”

“There were.”

“Oh.”

His head drops straight back onto D3r.

D3r’s chest moves beneath his cheek with a quiet laugh.

Avery frowns at the television, determined to understand. He’s good at following complicated stories. He survived the fucking King in Yellow. Surely he can comprehend Generic Action Movie Number Fourteen.

Unfortunately, his body has apparently decided that surviving getting knocked off a motorcycle earlier means it is now entitled to shut down.

His leg hurts in a distant, throbbing way beneath the dressing. His neck is stiff despite the careful positioning of the pillows. There’s an ache through his shoulders that promises tomorrow is going to suck significantly more than today.

But right now?

Right now he’s warm.

Painfully warm.

D3r is basically a human furnace, and Avery has discovered this is dangerous information because apparently his body interprets D3r’s warmth as permission to immediately stop functioning.

“You’re falling asleep,” D3r murmurs.

“No.”

“You haven't opened your eyes in about two minutes.”

“I’m visualizing the plot.”

“You’re snoring.”

“I do not snore.”

“You absolutely do.”

Avery cracks one eye open.

D3r is smiling down at him.

It’s that small smile Avery has gotten increasingly familiar with—the one that feels private somehow, softer than D3r’s usual expressions. His fingers continue moving lazily through Avery’s hair, scratching lightly over his scalp.

Avery’s eye closes again.

“You’re doing that on purpose.”

“Doing what?”

“Making me sleepy.”

“I’m sitting here.”

“You’re warm.”

There’s a pause.

“…Sorry?”

“You should be.”

D3r laughs quietly, and Avery can feel it beneath his cheek.

He shifts closer on instinct.

D3r immediately adjusts around him, one arm settling more securely across Avery’s back while being careful not to jostle his neck. Avery makes a small, content sound before he can stop himself.

This is bullshit.

He’s supposed to be watching the movie.

There’s another explosion on-screen but Avery doesn't even bother opening his eyes this time.

“Did he get his daughter back?”

“She escaped an hour ago.”

“Right.”

“She’s currently helping expose the conspiracy.”

“Good for her.”

Another few seconds.

“Is the dog okay?”

“There isn't a dog.”

“Good.”

D3r’s hand pauses briefly in his hair.

Then resumes.

Avery feels himself slipping farther, thoughts becoming loose and disconnected around the edges. The adrenaline from the accident is long gone. So is the stubborn insistence that he’s fine, apparently. Now there’s only exhaustion—the heavy, bone-deep kind that shows up after something frightening has already happened, once the body finally realizes it doesn't have to keep itself wound tight anymore.

He hates admitting how much the accident shook him.

Not because he thought he was going to die. He hadn’t. Everything had happened too quickly for that kind of thought.

But afterward, sitting on the pavement with his bike on its side and his leg burning, there had been that delayed realization of how easily things could have gone differently.

He doesn't particularly want to think about that.

D3r apparently doesn't want him thinking about it either.

“You can sleep,” D3r says quietly.

Avery hums.

“I’m watching.”

“You haven't looked at the screen for five minutes.”

“I can hear it.”

“You just asked me if there was a dog.”

“That was an important question.”

D3r’s arm tightens gently around him.

Avery shifts until his face is tucked closer against D3r’s chest, seeking warmth without even pretending otherwise now. His hand curls loosely into D3r’s shirt.

“Wake me up for the ending,” he murmurs.

“Why?”

“So I know it's happy.”

D3r goes quiet for a moment then Avery feels lips brush softly against the top of his head.

... Slimeknight whump where one of them gets hurt and the other takes care of the wound? You can pick which is which, but I think it would hit especially harder if it was Avery who got hurt :)

Avery would like it formally entered into the record that the accident was not his fault.

This is important.

Extremely important, actually, because D3r has been staring at him for the last several minutes with the particular expression of a man reconsidering every decision that led to allowing Avery out of his sight.

“I’m good with motorcycles,” Avery insists for what has to be the fourth time.

D3r, kneeling on the bathroom floor in front of him with a first-aid kit cracked open beside his knee, looks up very slowly.

Avery immediately wishes he hadn’t said anything.

“You were hit by a car.”

“Technically, the bike was hit by a car.”

“You were on the bike.”

“Yeah, but—”

“Avery.”

“It was his fault!”

D3r closes his eyes.

Avery decides that now would be an inappropriate time to joke that he’s been hit by a car before and thus has built up an immunity.

Probably.

Maybe.

Definitely.

The accident itself hadn’t even been dramatic by Avery standards, which is unfortunately a sentence that would make D3r significantly more upset if Avery said it aloud.

He’d been riding back to the apartment, perfectly normally, perfectly legally, enjoying the afternoon and the familiar rumble beneath him. Avery genuinely is a good rider. He’s been around motorcycles long enough to respect exactly how quickly they can turn dangerous, and he isn’t one of those idiots weaving through traffic at ridiculous speeds because they think protective gear makes them immortal.

He’d seen the car.

The car, unfortunately, had not seen him.

One stupid turn. One driver apparently incapable of checking properly before moving over. Avery had reacted quickly enough to keep the whole thing from being much worse, but physics remained physics. The bike went down. Avery went with it.

His protective gear did its job.

Mostly.

His leg had still managed to meet pavement hard enough that by the time everything stopped moving, Avery was sitting there thinking two things in rapid succession.

Ow.

And then:

Oh fuck, my bike.

Which was why the first thing he'd done after establishing that he could move everything and knew exactly where he was had been to scramble toward the motorcycle.

Someone had asked him if he was hurt.

Avery had responded, horrified, “He scratched the fucking tank!”

That had apparently been the wrong answer.

Now the bike is somewhere safe, the other driver’s information has been exchanged, and Avery is sitting on the closed toilet lid in D3r’s apartment with his pants awkwardly pulled up far enough to expose the road rash along his leg.

D3r is Not Happy.

Not angry, exactly.

Concerned.

Which is somehow worse.

“It really isn't that bad,” Avery says.

D3r looks down at the raw scrape.

Then up at Avery.

Then down again.

“Your definition of ‘not that bad’ concerns me.”

“I've had worse.”

“That sentence also concerns me.”

Avery wisely shuts his mouth.

D3r’s hands are incredibly careful despite the tension written through his shoulders. He cleans the abrasion with the sort of concentration Avery usually associates with dismantling something expensive. Every time Avery’s leg twitches, D3r pauses.

“Does that hurt?”

“No.”

“Avery.”

“Okay, yeah, obviously it hurts, but it's road rash. It's supposed to hurt.”

D3r gives him another look.

Avery reaches down and runs his fingers lightly through D3r's hair before he can stop himself.

That gets D3r's attention.

“I'm okay,” Avery says, quieter now. “Seriously.”

“You got hit by a car.”

“And I'm okay.”

“You said your neck hurts.”

“Whiplash.”

“You could have a concussion.”

“I don't.”

“How do you know?”

Avery immediately starts counting symptoms off on his fingers. “No loss of consciousness. No memory gap. No confusion. No nausea. No vision changes. No headache beyond the normal amount I'd expect after getting thrown around. Pupils are fine. I know what day it is, I know where I am, and I know you're currently considering wrapping me in bubble wrap.”

D3r pauses. “…I wasn't.”

“You are now.”

“I am now.”

Avery smiles.

Unfortunately, smiling pulls slightly at the stiffness already setting into his neck, and he winces.

D3r notices immediately. Of course he does.

“Don't.”

“I didn't do anything!”

“You made a face.”

“My neck is stiff.”

“That is, once again, because you were hit by a car.”

“The bike was—”

D3r points one warning finger at him.

Avery shuts up.

There is something deeply endearing about how thoroughly D3r is fussing over him, though. Avery isn't used to this. Growing up, getting hurt had generally meant determining whether anything was broken, cleaning whatever was bleeding, and getting on with things. He'd spent enough time hunting, riding, working with his hands, and generally existing with an apparently supernatural attraction to minor injuries that pain registers less as an emergency and more as an inconvenience.

D3r does not share this philosophy.

D3r finishes cleaning the road rash, applies ointment, then dresses it with painstaking care.

Avery watches him the entire time.

“My bike's okay, by the way.”

D3r stops.

Avery smiles hopefully. “Mostly.”

“Avery.”

“It's cosmetic.”

“I don't care about the motorcycle.”

Avery gasps.

D3r stares at him.

“You take that back.”

“I care about the motorcycle because you care about it. I care considerably more about the person who was riding it.”

Avery's expression softens despite himself.

“Oh.”

“Yes. Oh.”

D3r secures the dressing, then sits back on his heels and looks Avery over again like he might discover an additional injury through sheer suspicion.

Avery reaches for him, catching his hand.

“Hey.”

D3r lets him.

“I'm okay.”

D3r's fingers close around his.

“You're accident prone.”

“That wasn't my fault.”

“You nearly fell down my stairs yesterday.”

“The sock was slippery.”

“You cut your finger opening a package.”

“The knife slipped.”

“You walked into the bathroom door.”

“It was dark.”

“You are allergic to bees and voluntarily seek them out.”

“That isn't an accident!”

“That might actually make it worse.”

Avery starts laughing.

D3r doesn't.

That makes Avery laugh harder until his neck protests and he abruptly stops with another wince.

Immediately, D3r is leaning closer.

“Okay. Bed.”

“What?”

“You're resting.”

“D3r—”

“Bed, Avery.”

Avery looks at him for a moment, then his mouth twitches.

“Are you going to carry me?”

D3r's expression goes completely flat.

Avery's smile becomes downright evil because they both remember the kitchen and the stairwell.

They both remember exactly which one of them can effortlessly pick up the other.

“No,” D3r says.

“That's unfortunate.”

“You can walk.”

“I have road rash.”

“You have been telling me for twenty minutes that it's nothing.”

“Circumstances have changed.”

D3r stares.

Avery stares back.

Eventually D3r rises, still holding his hand, and Avery allows himself to be pulled carefully to his feet. His leg stings immediately, his neck feels like somebody replaced several muscles with old rope, and his hip is probably going to develop a spectacular bruise by tomorrow.

But he's upright.

He's okay.

And D3r is hovering close enough to catch him anyway.

Avery can't help smiling.

“You know,” he says as they start toward the bedroom, “the bike really does only have cosmetic damage.”

“I swear to God, Avery.”

“I'm just saying.”

“If you mention the motorcycle before your own leg one more time, I'm confiscating your keys.”

Avery turns his head.

D3r is serious.

Mostly.

Avery considers complaining some more because he deserves to, but then he considers how nice it might be to spend the rest of the evening sprawled across D3r while D3r continues fussing over him.

He decides he can lose this battle.

Morning settles in slow and quiet, like the world is trying very hard to pretend the night didn’t happen.

D3r does eventually sleep—briefly, lightly, the kind of rest that never fully lets go of awareness—but by the time Avery wakes again properly, the sun is already higher and the worst of the tension has dulled into something manageable.

They end up outside again.

It’s easier out here.

The wall of the base is warm at their backs, the ground solid beneath them, the chickens busy with their small, important lives. The chicks have figured out how to stay upright slightly longer than before, which D3r seems to consider a significant improvement.

Avery is half draped against him again, not quite asleep this time, just… lingering. The light from his core is low and content, his head tipped slightly against D3r’s shoulder like he’s decided that’s just where it belongs now.

Neither of them mentions the night.

Not yet.

Avery picks at a loose thread on his sleeve for a moment, then glances out at the clearing. “So,” he says, voice casual in the way it is when he’s definitely thinking about something. “This is going to sound like a weird question.”

“That is not unusual,” D3r replies.

“Rude,” Avery says automatically, then nudges him lightly with his shoulder. “But yeah, fair.”

D3r waits.

Avery tilts his head back, looking up at the sky instead of at him. “What’s… courting like? Where you’re from.”

D3r’s hand stills slightly where it had been resting against Avery’s side.

“Define,” he says after a moment.

Avery hums. “Like—how people show interest. Before anything’s official, or whatever.” He gestures vaguely. “What do they do.”

D3r considers the question seriously.

“Acts,” he says.

Avery glances at him. “Acts?”

“Devotion,” D3r clarifies. “Consistency. Presence.”

Avery shifts a little, more attentive now.

“If one person was interested in another,” D3r continues, “they would demonstrate it through behavior rather than declaration. Staying near. Offering assistance without being asked. Ensuring the other’s safety.”

Avery’s brows lift slightly. “So like… helping out?”

“Yes. But not in a general sense.” D3r’s gaze drifts briefly toward the coop, tracking the movement of one of the chicks. “Specifically. Intentionally.”

He pauses, then adds, quieter, “Standing watch while they slept was… common.”

Avery goes still.

“…Oh.”

“It indicated trust,” D3r says. “And willingness to prioritize another’s well-being over one’s own rest.”

Avery’s glow flickers faintly.

“That’s—” he huffs a small laugh. “That’s kind of intense.”

“It was normal.”

Avery looks down at his hands, then back out at the clearing. “Huh.”

There’s a short silence.

Then he brightens slightly. “Mine’s… different.”

D3r looks at him.

“Way less intense,” Avery says quickly. “More—uh—gift-based. I guess?”

He shifts a little, getting more comfortable where he’s leaning against D3r. “Like, if someone’s interested, they’ll start bringing you things. Small stuff at first. Food, mostly. Things they made.”

D3r listens.

“Flower jewelry’s a big one,” Avery continues, warming to it now. “Like crowns or bracelets. You make them yourself, usually. It’s kind of a flex if they’re really well made.”

D3r glances at him. “A flex.”

“Yeah,” Avery says, grinning. “Like—‘look how skilled I am, please be impressed.’”

D3r hums softly.

“And saplings,” Avery adds. “Mangrove ones especially.”

“Why.”

“Because they’re hard to grow right,” Avery says. “They need specific conditions. So giving someone one is like—” he gestures vaguely, searching for the right words, “—‘I trust you with something that takes effort. And I want it to grow with you.’”

D3r’s gaze lingers on him for a moment.

“That is also… intentional.”

Avery shrugs, a little sheepish. “Yeah. I guess.”

“Have you received these gifts?” D3r asks.

Avery hesitates.

“…A few times.”

D3r waits.

Avery scratches at the back of his neck. “I didn’t really… pursue anything, though. Skywars makes that kind of complicated.” He huffs a quiet laugh. “Hard to build something when there’s a decent chance one of you is getting knocked off a floating island every other day.”

“That would complicate continuity,” D3r agrees.

“Yeah.”

Another pause settles between them, softer this time.

Avery glances at him again, then away.

“…You’ve kind of been doing that,” he says.

D3r’s attention sharpens. “Doing what.”

Avery gestures loosely. “The… acts thing. Watching. Making sure I’m okay. The whole ‘standing watch while I sleep’ thing? That’s—pretty much exactly what you said.”

D3r does not respond immediately.

“I did not classify it as such,” he says after a moment.

Avery snorts softly. “Yeah, well. I am.”

D3r considers that.

“And you,” he says, “have been providing food. And resources. And…” he pauses slightly, “sapling equivalents.”

Avery’s glow warms, a hint of pink starting to appear.

“…I didn’t give you a tree.”

“No,” D3r says. “But you gave me something that ensures I can find you.”

Avery stills, the pendant at his chest catches the light briefly.

“…Oh,” he says, quieter.

There’s a long moment where neither of them says anything.

The chickens cluck softly in the background. One of the chicks chirps, and D3r’s gaze flicks toward it automatically before returning.

Avery shifts a little closer, almost unconsciously.

“So,” he says, voice softer now, “by both our standards…”

D3r looks at him.

“…We’ve been doing this already,” Avery finishes.

D3r’s expression doesn’t change much but something about it settles.

“Yes,” he says.

/hj

The apartment door had barely clicked shut behind them before the silence changed.

Not awkward but there was definitely some underlying tension.

Months of phone calls, late-night movies streamed across distance, pictures of meals, messages that began with look at this and ended three hours later. Months of knowing each other's voices better than anyone else's.

And now Avery was standing three feet away.

Again.

D3r set Avery's bag down by the door, fingers lingering on the strap for no reason other than he suddenly wasn't sure what to do with them.

"...Hi," he said, because apparently all of his vocabulary had evaporated.

"Hi." Avery laughed softly.

Another heartbeat passed.

"I missed you," Avery admitted.

"I know."

"I mean... a lot."

"I know."

Avery took one step closer.

"So did I," D3r said quietly.

That was apparently all the permission Avery needed.

He closed the distance in two quick strides, hands finding D3r's waist before either of them had time to overthink it. D3r barely had a chance to inhale before Avery kissed him.

It wasn't tentative.

It wasn't perfectly coordinated, either.

Months apart had left them both a little overeager, and the first kiss landed slightly off-center before they both laughed against each other's mouths. The laughter lasted all of two seconds before Avery kissed him again, slower this time, and D3r melted into it with a sigh he'd been holding onto since Avery's plane landed.

His hands found Avery's shoulders almost automatically.

Then they were both smiling into another kiss that turned into another and another, conversation dissolving into quiet breaths and stolen moments.

"I really," Avery murmured between kisses, forehead resting against D3r's, "really missed doing that."

D3r smiled, cheeks already warm. "I noticed."

Avery kissed him again before he could say anything else.

The rhythm changed without either of them meaning for it to.

The kisses lingered longer. Avery's hand slid up to cradle D3r's jaw, thumb brushing his cheek with surprising gentleness before that same hand disappeared into the hair at the back of his neck.

D3r's fingers curled into the back of Avery's shirt.

He hadn't realized how much he'd missed simple proximity until now.

The warmth, the familiarity, the fact that Avery always smelled faintly of cedar soap and fresh air.

"You keep looking at me," Avery whispered.

"I know."

"Like you're making sure I'm still here."

"I am."

Avery's expression softened into something almost unbearably fond and the next kiss stole whatever reply D3r might have had.

It deepened almost immediately, months of restrained affection collapsing into one another with surprising ease. Avery's free hand settled against D3r's side, drawing him closer until there wasn't any space left between them.

D3r answered without thinking, rising onto his toes slightly as his arms slipped around Avery's neck.

Somewhere in the back of his mind, he registered that they were moving.

Not intentionally.

Just... drifting.

A few unsteady steps.

Another kiss.

A quiet laugh when D3r bumped lightly into the hallway wall.

"Sorry," Avery mumbled.

"You absolutely are not."

"...No."

Another kiss.

They made it as far as the bedroom entirely by accident.

D3r's knees bumped the edge of the mattress first.

He looked over his shoulder just long enough to realize where they'd ended up before Avery kissed him again, and whatever thought he'd been about to have disappeared completely.

His balance tipped backward and the mattress caught him with a soft bounce.

Avery followed a heartbeat later, catching himself with one hand braced beside D3r's shoulder, careful not to put his full weight on him even as the momentum left D3r comfortably pinned beneath him.

For a moment they simply looked at each other.

Both a little flushed.

Both breathing a little harder than before.

Avery smiled first.

"I've wanted to do that," he admitted.

"For how long?"

"The entire drive home from the airport."

D3r laughed, reaching up to brush a strand of hair away from Avery's forehead. "I was wondering how long your self-control would last."

"Long enough to make it inside."

He's pretty good at thinking up scary stories or remembering them after hearing them or seeing them briefly mentioned, this was absolutely to Avery's younger siblings determent when they were growing up because Avery likes being a storyteller

D3r didn't really have ghost stories back in his home server so despite essentially living in one at the moment he's curious about Avery's favorite ghost story

He gets a chance to ask when they're out camping near the village, just far away enough that they can see the lights in the distance but not be bothered by any villagers meandering

Avery smiles when D3r gets to ask about the story, it doesn't quite reach his eyes though

He tells D3r about a story his grampa used to tell him when Avery was much younger and was still learning to be humanoid, about something that shouldn't have been there

Hybrids are fairly common on Avery's server, hell Avery himself isn't completely human, but what this thing was definitely wasn't a hybrid and couldn't even be considered a player

It was just something else

It looked like a dog at first glance, something normal and unassuming, but the longer you look at it the more you grow uneasy. Have its limbs always bent like that? Why did it look like it was smiling at you? Why was it standing? That's not a dog

Avery continued on about how it preferred watching groups of people, that you'd always need to count the number of players around you if you heard someone calling your name, that you shouldn't whistle in the swamp if you didn't want someone to answer, that if everything grows quiet that you don't want to be the person that breaks it

D3r was all too aware that he couldn't hear anything besides the fire and Avery at this point, the woods about them were completely silent, there wasn't even the distant groaning of a zombie or the rustling bones of a skeleton

It'd learn your patterns if you came back to the same swamp repeatedly, you'd wake up hearing the distant splash of something you'd hope was just a frog and exit your tent to find something gone, you can't remember losing anything but there's just the feeling of loss and you'd know it followed you

Turns out that Avery had wanted to find out for himself when he was younger, that when he was a teenager he'd gone deep into the swamps of his home server and gone looking

D3r never finds out if Avery saw whatever the thing was and he decides that he doesn't really want to know

He's not surprised when Avery curls up by his side in the tent after sound returns to the forest, a little closer than he'd be if he hadn't stirred up old memories with the story. He doesn't mind when Avery cuddles just a little closer, instead just wrapping an arm around Avery's shoulders and tucking him more against him

Haunted! Zoglin!? may also briefly make an appearance lol

Also try Limbo!

Getting ready to freak!

Run, coward! I hunger!

Full of stars!

Welcome to your Doom!

Something's not quite right…

Living, breathing world!

Survive!

One of a kind!

He had discovered Avery's bee allergy completely by accident, it had come up before when they'd been talking about growing up and all the ways Avery had managed to injure himself but it hadn't really become relevant until they were walking through a botanical garden.

"Oh, those are bumblebees," Avery had said happily, already wandering toward a patch of wildflowers. "They're so cute."

"You like bees?"

"I love bees."

"You..." D3r had frowned. "Aren't you allergic?"

Avery had looked over his shoulder with a grin that should've been illegal. "Yeah."

"...And you're walking toward them."

"They're cute."

Now D3r understood this wasn't a one-time lapse in judgment and Avery tended to seek bees out.

He'd stop to watch them bounce clumsily between flowers, smiling like he'd stumbled across puppies instead of the one insect capable of turning a pleasant afternoon into an emergency room visit.

"They're fuzzy," Avery said one afternoon, crouched a respectful distance away from a patch of lavender. "Look at her. She's got little pollen pants."

D3r pinched the bridge of his nose.

"You carry an EpiPen."

"I do."

"You are allergic."

"I am."

"And yet you're voluntarily watching bees."

"They've never done anything to me."

"They literally have."

D3r can appreciate a nice day don't get him wrong, he likes it when it's not too cloudy or when it's the perfect temperature outside, when it's just windy enough to smell the flowers on the breeze

But he's much more fond of casual walks and meandering than hiking

Avery however absolutely loves hiking, there's something satisfying about pushing himself and going to see some gorgeous sights that not everyone else got to witness, there was just something nice about the mountain air and the sense of freedom