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dontasktheradiodemon · 4 years

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Snake Bite

Chat log: Alastor learns to dab, Sir Pentious bites Alastor, and a couple of lonely old villains reluctantly talk about feelings and friendship.

If the read more doesn't work for you and you've gotta see this WHOLE LONG CHAT LOG on your dash, 1) you're probably on mobile, and 2) I am very very sorry, it's tumblr's fault and I did what I could.

Sir Pentious

Pentious is waiting outside the Hotel in HIS realm, he's out back in the garden and pacing... well. As well as a snake can pace. He's occasionally slithering in a circle.

Alastor

Alastor's practically scrubbed his skin raw in the shower; he's brushed his teeth until he's numb to the taste of artificial mint; he's picked a bow tie out of the ones Angel gave him—one of the red-and-gold ones designated for "sparkly douchebags" with the matching rose-shaped pin; and he's left something like a will with Rosie, along with a note to put it into effect if she hasn't heard from him by Monday.

He doesn't know what to expect.

He knows biting is going to be involved. He knows Sir Pentious wanted him to clear his schedule, with no indication of how long he was supposed to clear it for. Everything else is a mystery. Interpreting Sir Pentious's words literally, he's going to get bitten, writhe around for a while in excruciating pain, and then go home.

But knowing Sir Pentious—knowing his own—it might be a plot to disable Alastor so Sir Pentious can gloat over him for an hour before taking off his head with an exterminator's blade. And knowing the population of Hell in general, it might all be a euphemism for something far more salacious that he was simply expected to assume. All he knows for sure is that Sir Pentious is going to be very close, and aside from that it's going to be very unpleasant.

He could have asked for clarification. But asking for clarification would imply that his answer would change depending on Sir Pentious's.

It won't.

So here he is. Painfully clean, absolutely clueless, braced for anything, looking around the lobby, and realizing he's actually braced himself for anything EXCEPT the possibility that he might be stood up completely.

A few minutes after one, he sends out a few shadows as espionage—to Sir Pentious's room, to the boiler room, to the hotel's public areas—and finally, relieved, heads to the garden. He wasn't expecting outside. Maybe Sir Pentious wants to show off his big victory over the great Radio Demon.

When Alastor finally sees him, by way of greeting he calls out, "So how DOES one perform a 'dab'?"

Sir Pentious

Pentious awaited him in the garden, merely to avoid the eyes of that Weird Cat and the others who hung around the Hotel. The outside was brighter, and provided much more ominous lighting. Upon seeing Alastor and hearing his voice, he perked up quite suddenly, hood raising.

The question gets a scoff out of him.

"THE DAB? YOU DON'T KNOW??? IT'SSS LIKE THISS!" Stretching one arm out to the right, he bends his left at the elbow, and dunks his head towards the bend in his arm, holding the pose for at least three seconds.

Alastor

"Like this?" He copies the gesture, a mirror image of Sir Pentious's. A new weapon in his arsenal. "Ha. Like Dracula trying to hide from the sun." He plays a sizzling bacon-in-a-frying-pan sound, like vampire skin burning in the day.

Sir Pentious

Pentious claps his hands together, clearly amused.

"YESSS, JUSSST LIKE THAT! THEY HATE THAT ONE THE MOSSSST."

Alastor

The applause sends a jolt through his chest that he studiously ignores. "I'll add it to my catalogue of torture techniques."

He'd stopped walking far enough away from Sir Pentious that they're out of arm's reach of each other but close enough that they can talk at a normal volume—he wants to get so much closer and stay so much farther away, and this is the point where the impulses barely balanced out. Doing his best not to sound as awkward as he feels, he says, "So, speaking of Dracula..." He spreads his arms: here I am, ready and willing. "Were you planning on having this bite out here? Fine weather for it."

Sir Pentious

Pentious eyes him--he's happy with this distance, too. Satisfied, though, he wants to get closer too... his fangs ache a little, watch the other spread his arms. Yes, they had agreed upon that... At the time, he really didn't think that Alastor would agree. And now here they were! His head darts around some, the cobra looking him over.

"YOU AREN'T GOING TO TRY TO SSSLITHER OUT OF THISSS, ARE YOU, DEEREST ALASTOR?"

Alastor

The jolt is replaced by something more like a knife at the punny term of endeerment. He thinks he kept his wince off his face, but he's not totally sure. He lets his arms drop. "If I was going to be a coward, I would have gotten it over with before agreeing to meet and wasting both our time. I even dressed up for the occasion." He tilts his head, calling attention to his new bow tie.

The trophy Sir Pentious is showing off in his own attire hasn't escaped his notice.

Sir Pentious

"AH, I NOTICED. SSO HAVE I."

He pulls on the bow-tie gift from Alastor, truly VERY smug about it.

"THEN HOLD SSSSTILL..." He moved closer, quite suddenly--the rapid and threatening striking of a snake, his tongue flicking as he was mere inches away from the other.

Alastor

Alastor's eyes widen, he leans back, and his hand flies halfway up to his throat; and then he freezes. Damn. So much for acting completely unflappable.

Sir Pentious would enjoy seeing him flinch, at least.

So. Outside it is. Sir Pentious is probably hoping half of Hell will hear him make the Radio Demon scream.

Alastor completes the motion of his hand up to his throat, but only to undo his tie and fold down his high collar. When was the last time he'd been this close to Sir Pentious? Alastor can see individual scales on his face. He forces himself to make eye contact, offers a wan smile, and says, "Ready when you are."

Sir Pentious

He certainly does enjoy it.

His tongue flicks again, the appendage briefly touching the other's cheek. He didn't MEAN anything weird by it, but he certainly got a scent of him.

Pink hellish slitted eyes focused on the other, and he opened his mouth, baring those enormous fangs. Not yet dripping with venom, but oh the threat was there... Not allowing for anymore hesitation, he lunged--SINKING his fangs into Alastor's neck, deep and piercing.

Alastor

Alastor's eyes automatically squeeze shut as Sir Pentious licks him, his breath freezing. Before he has a chance to process the what the hell that means—

He gasps in sharply, a noisy crackling sound, as Sir Pentious's fangs sink in; but the gasp itself is buried under the sound of his voice stuttering across several stations, bursts of overlapping songs—a few incoherent notes of "Ah, Sweet Mystery of Life" and " Snake Eyes" and "Black Snake Moan." The pain from the bite alone is excruciating. Focusing. Focusing him primarily on the fact that Sir Pentious's face is pressed between Alastor's shoulder and his throat.

Sir Pentious

Pentious didn't really know what to expect upon sinking his fangs in, but the radio sounds should have been first on his guess list. It was definitely jarring to hear them so close to his head. Pentious places his hands on both of Alastor's shoulders, now digging his claws into his suit. Just claw him up! Why not!!!

At this closeness, it was all too easy to hear that raspy, human like breathing that cobras made. Like he was going to devour the Radio Demon whole.

Alastor

If Sir Pentious wants to take a strip of Alastor's throat with him when he pulled back—hell, if he wants to take Alastor's whole shoulder—Alastor isn't going to complain. He has to bite his lower lip hard enough to make it bleed to fight the urge to bite Sir Pent back—he's RIGHT THERE, it would be SO EASY to taste his blood—but that would be the end of this trust exercise.

At times it's struck Alastor that Sir Pentious's hissing sounds more than passingly close to a radio's static—and that's even more evident now, hearing his breathing like a rush of wind over a microphone, blowing over his neck. Alastor tries to steady his stuttery station-jumping breath. He leans into the pain cutting up his shoulders and curls his claws into the fabric at the waist of Sir Pent's jacket.

Sir Pentious

He can taste Alastor's blood, and it fills him with madness.

Pentious draws back, blood coating his fangs, as he holds the other up.

"HHMMM.... YOU REALLY DIDN'T MOVE. HAD YOU TRIED, I WOULD HAVE INJECTED YOU WITH MY VENOM!!!"

... But also, the lack of trying to escape, of trying to turn this into some sick broadcast... It resonated with the inventor. Pentious looked over his former ally, and frustration filled his gaze. Frustration and longing.

"... Why couldn't you have ssstayed?"

Of course, this wasn't the same Alastor. Not his own, but... whatever. A moment of vulnerability, just one.

Alastor

Alastor leans longingly after the retreating fangs before catching himself and straightening back up.

At the question, for a moment, his smile almost cracks. His brows draw closer, the corner of his bloody mouth twitches. When he replies, the constant distortion overlaying his voice dies. He almost sounds like a person. "Because I'm a coward."

He didn't mean to say it. He would never have said it under any other circumstances, but he's dizzy and lightheaded and euphoric from the pain and the close contact, and sick guilt he's spent over half a century trying to suppress is buzzing in his chest—and he's said it now.

Sir Pentious

The admission causes Pentious' hood to flare out--whatever he was expecting to hear then, well, just as before, it completely caught him off guard. He couldn't take it at face value, he couldn't trust him. His hand immediate shoots to Alastor's neck, grabbing him and pulling him closer.

"ARE YOU MOCKING ME, ALASSTOR? TELLING ME WHAT YOU THINK I'D WANT TO HEAR??? YOU??? A COWARD??? YOU MUSSST THINK ME A FOOL!!!"

Not that it sounded any which way! But... Pentious was angry to hear it, all the same. It's like he wanted the other to deny it, he wanted him to make up some sort of joke and play him for a fool. He wanted an excuse to tear him apart--but hearing this vulnerability in return put a sense of mortality in him he hadn't known in so, so long.

He'd been betrayed by his only friend, after all, and the serpent struggled so much in trying to make any.

It had been years since then, but still... It hurt him in a way he hadn't thought possible for his old black heart.

Alastor

His hands immediately fly up to the hand around his neck, claws digging into the wrist, prepared to wrench it off—and then, just as abruptly, he forces himself to let go. No, damn it, he's not here to fight.

"You don't want to hear this! I don't think there's a single answer you'd trust out of me but whatever's the cruelest thing I could think of to say—no matter what the truth is." Wasn't that the point of this exercise? To get around the limitation of words, the fact that Sir Pentious couldn't trust and Alastor couldn't be trusted?

So much for that. Hadn't Alastor already known there were no such thing as second chances? Let him be torn apart, it would heal in a few days and he'd learn an important lesson.

Sir Pentious

"CAN YOU BLAME ME!?"

Pentious' voice cracks as he speaks, and he eyes where he'd bit him. He had to think of Valera's words... He seems lonely. She'd compared the two, made them sound so similar... Could trusting him really be a good idea?

... He really did enjoy that visit they had together, eating pasta bolognese and drinking brandy. It had been so... familiar. Pentious frowned, frustration and... distress pulling at every part of himself. His claws flexed, but he pulled them away from Alastor's neck... and he looked down, pulling at his hood like he were considering covering his face with them.

Alastor

"No! I can't!" His voice is thick, a feedback echo whining under his words. "You have EVERY REASON not to trust me! I'd sooner ask Saint Peter for a second chance than ask you." He flings a hand carelessly in the vague direction of Heaven.

And yet, for a moment he'd been stupid and let himself hope. He had to remind himself who he was here to help. "I'm not ASKING for a second chance. Just—don't fight me. And I won't have to fight you."

He feels colder without Sir Pentious within touching distance. He crosses his arms tightly, biting one corner of his mouth to make sure his smile is still up.

Sir Pentious

It stings.

Pentious knows how he's being difficult. His hands open and close, and he grits his teeth, eyes closed tightly. He wishes he could just... move past this and immediately either be fully friends or fully enemies. This was purgatory like no other.

Agreeing to anything felt like giving up and the snake wasn't good at that either.

He glares at Alastor, "DON'T GO ANYWHERE. LET ME THINK."

Alastor

What is there to think about? How hard is it to decide whether or not to keep starting one-sided fights with someone?

But he collects himself. He takes a deep breath, uncrosses his arms, smooths out his bangs, clasps his hands behind his back, corrects his posture, fixes his smile properly back in place, and tries to look past Sir Pentious's visible turmoil and at the garden. Lightly, he says, "I'm not leaving," and immediately regrets as he realizes how easily he could have followed it up with this time.

Sir Pentious

Sometimes he wants to just... grab him by the face and force that smile OFF. But he'll calm himself...

He can't have him as a rival, or as a nemesis. Their paths were too different, and not only that, they were from entirely different Hells!

So close, yet.... Pentious took a deep breath. You're not losing anything, man. You're not. Why was this so hard?

His gaze travels back to the bite, and he flicks his tongue.

"... WHEN WASS THE LASST TIME YOU ALLOWED YOURSSSELF TO BE ATTACKED LIKE THAT?"

Alastor

He blinks, taken aback by the question—and then has to stop and think.

He's always had an unusually casual relationship with pain—and that only increased after he died and no longer had to worry about any damage being permanent. Hell, he's voluntarily been skinned alive so that he could get his own hide tanned—but that wasn't being attacked, that was more like an extreme cosmetic surgery. He's let people who would otherwise never leave a scratch on him get in a stab wound—but that was so he could lure them in close enough to rip them apart. As a child he'd sometimes been too afraid to fight back—but that's very different from consenting to being attacked, isn't it?

"Never."

Will Sir Pentious even believe that? Probably not. Of course not. Alastor wonders why he bothered to ask.

Sir Pentious

He looks at him a long time... studying his expression. Looking for something to pick apart... but it was always that same damn face.

The hum of radio feedback if he stared too long.

Alastor

There isn't much to pick apart. He meets Sir Pentious's gaze when he feels that sharp stare on him, then almost immediately looks away.

He wants to ask whether he ought to be contributing something to the proceedings or if this thinking Sir Pentious is doing is still a solo endeavor, but he forces himself to swallow his nervous chatter and quietly start playing "Snake Eyes" again to fill the silence.

Sir Pentious

The tune is so jaunty, and Pentious twitches... but this was exactly like Alastor, too. You couldn't have a moment's silence with him... The snake groaned, covering his face. Alright. Alright.

".... ALASTOR."

Alastor

The music snaps off. "Sir Pentious?"

Sir Pentious

... You know, it was. Definitely surprising not to hear "Sir Harold". It takes him a moment.

He takes out a GUN, and aims it at Alastor.

"TELL ME AGAIN WHAT YOU WANT OUT OF THISS, AND I WILL NOT QUESSTION IT AGAIN. YOU HAVE MY WORD ON THE MATTER. DO YOU WANT TO BE MY ... FRIEND? OR DO YOU JUST WANT ME OUT OF YOUR HAIR?"

Alastor

Oh—oh, good god, he hadn't planned on being asked directly. (Or with a gun. But the gun was meaningless, the gun was for emphasis. The gun was an exclamation point.)

Being honest had been the biggest mistake of this conversation so far. The closer Alastor got to telling the truth, the less trustworthy he sounded, the less Sir Pentious was going to take what he said into account. The safe answer was "out of my hair." It was the answer that would make sure Sir Pentious was...

... gone, again. Gone and safe.

But, unless Alastor was completely wrong about everything he thought he knew about this Sir Pentious—

—it sounded like he was, impossibly, offering Alastor a second chance.

He croaked, "Friend."

And then, with the dam broken, more tumbled out: "I give you my word that's not what I came to ask for. I'm only here to try to get myself out of YOUR h—hood. But if— What I want— That's what I WANT."

Sir Pentious

Well, he was damned. Valera was right.

This Alastor, much like himself, was a lonely old man. He wanted to be his friend. The snake could only stare, his arm lowering, and with it the pistol too.

"... Really?" This wasn't a voice of accusation or vitriol, or demanding anything. Just, outright, innocent confusion.

Alastor

Alastor had been half expecting a bullet through his pretty new rose-shaped pin. He HADN'T been expecting that look. Perplexingly, it looked like a sort of expression that suggested that Sir Pentious might actually believe him.

A wild panicked voice in the back of his head tried to tell him to yell JUST KIDDING, drop Sir Pentious through a particularly painful portal, and bolt from the scene like a buck out of Hell.

It was the same panicked voice that had gotten him into this mess fifty-fucking-four years ago. He wasn't going to listen to it again.

He looked for something snappy to say, couldn't find anything, and said, "Yes. Really."

Sir Pentious

VALERA WAS RIGHT AAAAAHe put the weapon away, straightening his Alastor's bowtie, and gave a smile... although it was strained. Struggling. "... YOU REALLY ARE FROM ANOTHER DIMENSION, YOU KNOW. THISS COULD NEVER BE MY REALITY."

Alastor

Bow tie. Right, he should—Alastor straightened his collar back into place and retied his now slightly bloodstained bow. "Nor mine," he muttered, his smile sinking toward a grimace. He could have said the exact same words to his own Sir Pentious—but those words NEVER would have been trusted by someone who knew exactly what he'd done when he left. The only reason he'd gotten this far was because that not-knowing meant he could get the benefit of the doubt.

What could he do, then, but milk it for all it was worth as long as he could?

"I can't do anything about my duplicate in your universe. But any time you care to come to mine... well." Well. Friends.

Sir Pentious

Oh, damn. There was that warm feeling in his chest--it felt like he had internal bleeding. It ached and stung, and Pentious clutched his suit some to try to soothe the pain.

He was too expressive for his own food, clearing his throat.

"DON'T SSOUND LIKE YOU'RE ABOUT TO TAKE YOUR LEAVE, ALASTOR. I TOLD YOU TO TAKE THE DAY OFF, AND YOU'RE GOING TO!"

Alastor

"Am I!" His face lit up. "Why? Are we finally going to get to thar part you promised where I'm crying like a baby from pain?"

Sir Pentious

"WHY DO YOU SSOUND SSO EXCITED?"

"YOU WANT THAT?"

Alastor

"Well, you were so graphic about it, you got my hopes up! I set aside the rest of the week to recover and everything." He paused just long enough to get Sir Pentious time to process that. "KIDDING! No, what did you have planned?"

Sir Pentious

.......... NOW HE'S ADVANCING ON ALASTOR, hood raised and eyes glowing red. That menacing long grin.

"OH, NO, ALASTOR, YOU WERE SSSSO EXCITED. I INSSSISSST!"

Alastor

For a moment, he stares at Sir Pentious, eyes wide. Somewhere beneath his usual static, S.O.S. beeps in Morse.

Then he flatly asks, "Do we have to?" But he's reaching for his bow tie again. One final test would be fair, wouldn't it? Alastor deserves at least that much.

Sir Pentious

Oh no. He looks conflicted!!! This man just told him he wanted to be friends!

",,, ALASTOR! YOU CAME HERE WANTING TO BE BITTEN AND POISONED AND NOW YOU DON'T WANT IT BUT ALSO DO?? BE CLEAR, BE CONSISE!!

Alastor

"I was joking about the poison part!" No more masochistic humor in THIS universe. "It sounds a little bit extreme for my idea of a fun afternoon. I was willing to do it to prove my, ah... sentiments—but if we're PAST that, I'd just as happily move on to something less excruciating."

Sir Pentious

He HUFFS. His fangs ache, wanting to bite into something again, but also... He looks strained.

".... SS... SSSSINCE YOU'RE HERE.... DO YOU WANT TO... COME INSIDE???"

Alastor

Is Sir Pentious disappointed? Alastor eyes him carefully a moment, then says, "Sure." After another pause, even more carefully, he asks, "Are you opposed to letting me see what you've been up to in that boiler room of yours?"

Sir Pentious

Little does Alastor know, Penny is suffering from a dizziness spell. It was a side effect of using his fangs like that, even if he didn't use his venom. He had a lot of physicality issues.

Pentious slithered towards the front entrance, "AH, MY RAIL GUN? SURE, AS LONG AS YOU DON'T THINK YOU CAN TAKE IT FROM ME."

Alastor

"Wouldn't dream of it!" Rail gun! Alastor followed after Sir Pentious, just short of skipping in delight. "What would I do with it, anyway—try to carry it around on my shoulder like a bazooka? Ha! No, no—I just want to see what kind of damage it can do."

Then they went inside to play with dangerous toys, the end.

#hissandvinegar #chat log #((anybody who followed my RP blog randomly rather than through my main fic blog is prrrobably gonna be surprised lmfao))#((SURPRISE guess what we ship around here))#((for those of y'all who DID follow me from my main fic blog: look it's like it's an AU post CDIH redemption arc speedrun))

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