[KKM] Not Where You Left It (Adult; Conrad, Yozak)
Co-written with lynndyre.
Rating: NWS (sexual content)
Spoilers: This is set post episode 65 of the anime.
Summary: "Time for all good captains to go to bed, eh?"
NOT WHERE YOU LEFT IT
Aside from the fact that the pale, dry Volare he'd lifted from the cellars went down much smoother than the rotgut they had drunk when they were young and that back then they'd played games of poker uncomplicated by all the foreign rules Yozak had picked up in his mysterious travels, it could have been an evening twenty-- no, thirty years ago, spent passing bottles back and forth over the oak table in Conrad's Blood Pledge quarters while Yozak beat him at cards. He suspected Yozak made up half the rules, and that the few hands Conrad 'won' were friendly gifts to stop their game from becoming utterly ridiculous. He couldn't prove either for certain, and considered it all part of the unique pleasure of playing Yozak.
One of the candles guttered, drawing Conrad's attention back to his cards. His pairs of eights came into focus as three fours and the three of cups, his bluff far better than he had intended. Yozak's poker face was coolly focused on his own hand, but Conrad knew better than to think his own face was anything but transparent. He folded and explained. Yozak laughed.
"Time for all good captains to go to bed, eh?" Yozak shooed him away from the table laughing, saying that clearing up was for those who could still see straight.
Conrad bent to reach the laces on first one boot and then the other, balancing unsteadily against one of the four carved wooden pillars that raised the canopy of his bed. He let his boots drop where they would, grateful that he managed to remove both without falling over. His jacket was more difficult to strip than his belt. His fingers fumbled the row of tiny buttons and seemingly tinier holes. He was not drunk, but so tired that he might as well have been. With half an ear, Conrad heard the quiet rustle of cards behind him be replaced by the clink of empty bottles, and then nothing. After the last button finally slipped free, his uniform jacket joined his belt and his boots on the floor.
Turning back around to face the table, he saw Yozak's back and beyond him, the closed door that joined Conrad's room with the castle corridor.
For a moment, it was like being on the mountain still, the ground sliding out from under him with sick realisation. It was sheer fantasy that he and Yozak were always of one mind. Last night, they may have slept soundly side by side, but that was at Gisela's command, not their choice, and the first time since before the war. Fifteen years ago, it wouldn't have even occurred to Conrad to spend an evening like this and he wouldn't have known where to find Yozak even if it had. But thinking of the mountain also made Conrad remember what Yozak had said earlier in the afternoon.
"It's late," he began. "The barracks are on the other side of the castle. You should-- you could--"
Yozak had turned; Conrad found himself weighing his words until he no longer knew what he wanted to say and so, said nothing at all. He ducked his head, and struggled with bringing his undershirt up and over himself with even less success than he'd had with his jacket.
"Taichou--"
Conrad felt Yozak's hands gently tugging at the cloth of his shirt, untangling Conrad's left arm and raising the garment well over Conrad's head. This close, and without his boots, it was a choice between looking up or at the neck opening of Yozak's tunic.
"You could stay. It's late."
---
Conrad felt good. He was warm, relaxed, drowsy but just alert enough to appreciate how very good he felt. Yesterday, he had fallen asleep immediately, so tired that he couldn't now recall if Yozak had been cold then, which made a certain logical sense that Conrad didn't want to examine too closely, or whether Yozak had been as warm as nostalgia and present experience suggested that he always was and always would be.
"Want some privacy?"
Yozak had pitched his voice low, but his speaking at all startled Conrad. He had thought Yozak was asleep.
In the slim moonlight that bent between the bed's curtains, Conrad couldn't see much more of Yozak than his body already told him. Yozak lay on his back, his head turned perhaps a little toward Conrad and his left shoulder solid against Conrad's cheek. His left hand was keeping Conrad's bare shoulder warm since the edge of the blanket had slipped down to his elbow.
Conrad considered whether pulling the blanket back up to his neck would be worth of the bother of moving his sleep-heavy limbs. The night air was much cooler than Yozak. Conrad pressed closer, hip to thigh, nose to neck. The arm he had between their bodies had less room to move-- had been moving, he found, and was still-- the heel of his palm languidly stroking the bulge under his shorts.
This, Conrad realised, was probably what Yozak had been asking about.
He mumbled something polite as he dropped his head back to Yozak's shoulder and closed his eyes, his hand sliding discreetly over to rest on his thigh.
Conrad was used to privacy. He'd have privacy tomorrow, and the next day, and weeks and weeks to come without needing to send Yozak away now and have it tonight. Sleep was also good. He could have privacy in the morning if he really needed it, though he was old enough to know that nothing would fall off if he did not.
Yozak coughed; Conrad opened his eyes to look at him.
"Do-- uh-- been a while?" Yozak's tone made his nonchalance pointedly obvious.
Conrad decided he was too tired to care if he'd said any of that aloud; this was Yozak.
"Yeah."
"...want some help?"
Conrad snorted. "Not that long."
He turned to look at Yozak, trying to keep his expression one of appropriately wounded dignity, despite the darkness. Yozak's face, Conrad could imagine without seeing: a paragon of selflessness, with perhaps a flicker of amusement around his eyes or lips.
The pause lengthened. Conrad couldn't see Yozak's eyes, but he could feel that Yozak still watching him. Conrad caught himself fidgeting, his feet, his hands, so he reached across to dig his fingers into Yozak's ribs.
Yozak retaliated, tickling, instantly making Conrad squirm and defensively pull at Yozak's hands. They grappled, but Yozak had Conrad's hands pinned by his sides within moments. He wasn't ticklish, while Conrad was; another relic of their past, they both knew that the only card Conrad held was his own stubbornness.
"Yield?" Yozak asked.
Conrad struggled on, tangling their legs further with the blankets. Yozak scratched his fingernails along Conrad's palms, sparking sensation. While Conrad flailed, Yozak transferred his grip from two hands to just one; his freed hand then mercilessly roamed Conrad's midsection. Conrad twisted in Yozak's grip, too distracted to struggle loose but striving to outlast the itch inflaming his skin-- until, finally, dizzy with laughter, he gasped for breath. "Yield."
They both relaxed against the mattress. Conrad dropped his face into the crook of Yozak's neck, breathing hard. Yozak let Conrad's hands go and reached up to ruffle Conrad's hair.
"Well, if you need to-- whatever--" Yozak's fingers moved through Conrad's hair erratically, like his words; Conrad was not the only one to have been out of breath. "Nothing I haven't seen before."
They'd shared a bed more times than Conrad could recall, caught low on coin in provincial inns, or when he'd tried to match drink for drink a second who didn't trust him to sleep it off safely alone, or in tents where one of them was always awake. Conrad remembered that he was always colder, and bent his bent knees further to keep his feet away from Yozak's. But, his hands were hot now, still hot from before, heavy on his chest, on his abdomen. He let them move down, trusting Yozak's words more than his own faint, lingering sense of uncertainty, trusting Yozak's touch to be firm instead of ticklish as it moved over his hair, along his shoulder, his side; trusting Yozak's warmth, steady, solid heat wherever Conrad pressed into him; trusting Yozak to hold him still when his body thrust--
Conrad's finish rushed over him quickly, his hand sliding clumsy along the heat spreading through fabric. His pulse thudded under his palm and in his chest. Yozak hummed something like a question, and Conrad could feel it in his nose. He turned away to breathe air instead of skin.
"I need to take my shorts off," he told Yozak.
"You-- Yeah. You should--"
Yozak's snickers were breathy, helpless. Conrad shrugged out of the arm around him and rolled onto his back, working on the drawstring of his shorts before Yozak could offer to help with that, too. He planted his feet on the mattress, lifted his hips slightly to wriggle his shorts to his knees and then kicked them off the rest of the way.
"Do I--" Yozak's voice sounded odd, strained. "--get a turn?"
Yozak wanted--? That was-- "Uh-- ok." Conrad rolled back towards Yozak--
"Ow."
One of his elbows hit first, or maybe it had been a knee (the back of his hand had been after his elbow, Conrad was certain) he'd tried to pull it out of the way and--
"--oops. I--"
But Yozak was patient with him, strong hands holding him steady as he found his limbs if not his balance. He settled with an arm slung across Yozak's broad, bare chest and an ankle between Yozak's slightly spread feet anchoring him well in place, his body on his side as he preferred to sleep, fitted to Yozak's warmth.
Yozak sighed quietly. Conrad flexed his fingers on Yozak's far shoulder to show that he was still awake.
"Comfy?"
"Warm," Conrad answered, and then, "your turn." He wasn't sure that his murmured reminder had been heard, until he felt Yozak's arm tighten across his back.
Yozak was quieter than Conrad usually managed, though there was no mistaking the rhythmic shifts of his lower body. Conrad stroked Yozak's shoulder, his hair, recalling how much better it was not to be alone. Yozak's legs spread wider and the movement rolled Conrad further over him. Conrad could smell Yozak stronger than he could smell himself, and wondered if Yozak could smell him. He wondered how close Yozak was, listening to his breath grow harsh and staccato. Yozak's hand tensed and twitched on Conrad's back, finally gripping his side tight, so tight that it almost hurt, and Conrad could feel Yozak's body trembling under him. Conrad held his breath. Yozak made only the tiniest sound when he came, a sort of grunt as his breath caught, and then he was panting, relaxing, and Conrad could actually move again. He grinned; from the sound of it, it had been even longer for Yozak.
With a flash of inspiration, Conrad wriggled down under the covers. Crumpling his discarded shorts in his hand, he pushed them at Yozak, who thanked him, absently. Conrad watched the indistinct movements of Yozak's arms outlined in the moonlit dark, and waited.
"This is... oh, Tai-chou."
Yozak sat up smoothly, throwing the balled-up fabric out of bed. The ribbon of light through the curtains caught his scowl. Conrad got as far as, "your face--" when laughter overtook him.
Yozak grabbed him, dragging him back against his chest while Conrad struggled, managing to wrap his own arms protectively around his midsection. Yozak rubbed his knuckles vigorously over Conrad's scalp.
Conrad yelped.
"Your face," Yozak retorted, with satisfaction, and let them both sag back to the mattress.
Conrad moved back into the comfortable sleeping arrangement he'd found before, fitted along Yozak's side. Yozak was warmer now, his skin tasted saltier, but he was strangely slow to relax. After moving Yozak's arm into position over Conrad's back, he poked the underside of Yozak's chin with his nose.
"Feel better now?" Yozak asked.
"We should do this more often."
Conrad was too tired to join in Yozak's abrupt and quiet laughter, but he was glad to feel the strange tension fade from his pillow's muscles. He stretched against Yozak's hand stroking over his back. Conrad thought about saying goodnight, but fell asleep before he did.
---
Conrad woke well-rested, if perhaps a little too warm from the body sleeping under him. The thick curtains on his bed cut out much of the sunlight streaming into his bedroom, but Conrad could still recognise it was well past the time he usually rose. A moment later, it came back to him that today was the last of the days Gisela had insisted he and Yozak be exempt from their duties. Conrad relaxed, slowly stretching. Too warm was certainly better than too cold. The knit of Yozak's leggings was smooth against Conrad's bare skin.
Conrad went rigid, almost wishing he had a hangover: something to excuse his behaviour and to distract from his awkward, yet all too clear memories of acting a fraction of his age-- especially since they'd never jerked off together back when they were young and stupid.
Remembering more of the old days, Conrad forced himself to take a series of level breaths, regaining his calm, hoping that he hadn't woken Yozak. They were both early-risers: Yozak by inclination, Conrad by training. For Conrad to have woken before him, Yozak must have been completely worn out the night before-- perhaps the only assurance Conrad had that this wouldn't become another of Yozak's 'crazy Taichou' stories, or at least, only a private one. Gingerly, Conrad levered himself up.
Yozak raised his eyebrows in greeting.
Conrad thought about asking how long Yozak had been awake, and several other questions, but didn't. The silence stretched and Yozak's patience began to feel like duty instead of courtesy. "It's late. We should get up."
Yozak nodded, a hint of something twitching at the corners of his mouth. "You're going to have to get off of me first."
The silence broadened, Yozak's grin with it, but the sight left Conrad more rather than less unsettled. He looked down to think, which didn't help at all. Yozak's hands were scrupulously laid by his sides, flat on the sheet. Conrad's skin prickled with sweat. Neither of them were laughing, when last night had been ridiculous; hadn't it?
Conrad rolled to the side and out of bed. Putting on his uniform occupied his hands but took little conscious thought, an everyday rhythm of bending, straightening and dressing as he worked his way down each successive drawer of the dresser: socks and shorts from the first, an undershirt from the next. Bending down yet again, Conrad tried not to think of how much simpler Yozak's 'uniform' was than his, these days, or how yesterday, Conrad had woken up alone.
"Forget something?" Yozak called out.
Conrad straightened, turning-- so that last night's shorts hit him full in the face. They smelt ... ripe.
Yozak stood leaning against the wall by the door, arms folded and completely dressed. On the table beside him lay Conrad's sword and belt, and at its foot, his boots.
"I've already found another pair--" Conrad swivelled his hips to illustrate his point, hands full of yesterday's underwear and today's clean trousers. "But thank you."
"Oh, any time, Taichou. Any time."
Using only the one hand, Conrad pitched the shorts to land perfectly atop yesterday night's impromptu laundry pile, smiling sunnily at Yozak's exasperated look.
He had expected scaling Makadira with Yozak would be like stepping back in time, but instead, it had proved how little they resembled what they once were. He missed that. Everything was simpler thirty years ago.
But there was something in how he kept wanting to be stupid like this with Yozak -- and how Yozak kept letting him.
Conrad pulled on his bootlaces, working them perfectly even and tight. "We must have missed breakfast already," he told Yozak. "We should bathe, and see what we can find in the kitchens."
"Sounds good, but I'm getting some fresh clothes first." Yozak ducked his nose toward his collar, and then pulled away, miming waving away the smell. " I'll catch you later."
Conrad buckled on his sword as he walked to the door; Yozak held it for him and pulled it shut behind them. Conrad couldn't see anyone in either direction. A mischeivious impulse welled in him, watching the strong lines of Yozak's back as the redhead started down the right-hand corridor towards the barracks.
"Same time tonight?" Conrad paused to flutter his eyelashes. "Oh companion of my dreams?"
Yozak's incredulous look lasted only as long as Conrad kept his straight face. At Conrad's helpless laughter, Yozak made a rude gesture and kept walking. "Try a cold bath, I hear it's good for that sort of thing."
Conrad hid his smile behind his hand. Whatever they were now, it wasn't all bad.
LD & MC
20/02/07
Rating: NWS (sexual content)
Spoilers: This is set post episode 65 of the anime.
Summary: "Time for all good captains to go to bed, eh?"
NOT WHERE YOU LEFT IT
Aside from the fact that the pale, dry Volare he'd lifted from the cellars went down much smoother than the rotgut they had drunk when they were young and that back then they'd played games of poker uncomplicated by all the foreign rules Yozak had picked up in his mysterious travels, it could have been an evening twenty-- no, thirty years ago, spent passing bottles back and forth over the oak table in Conrad's Blood Pledge quarters while Yozak beat him at cards. He suspected Yozak made up half the rules, and that the few hands Conrad 'won' were friendly gifts to stop their game from becoming utterly ridiculous. He couldn't prove either for certain, and considered it all part of the unique pleasure of playing Yozak.
One of the candles guttered, drawing Conrad's attention back to his cards. His pairs of eights came into focus as three fours and the three of cups, his bluff far better than he had intended. Yozak's poker face was coolly focused on his own hand, but Conrad knew better than to think his own face was anything but transparent. He folded and explained. Yozak laughed.
"Time for all good captains to go to bed, eh?" Yozak shooed him away from the table laughing, saying that clearing up was for those who could still see straight.
Conrad bent to reach the laces on first one boot and then the other, balancing unsteadily against one of the four carved wooden pillars that raised the canopy of his bed. He let his boots drop where they would, grateful that he managed to remove both without falling over. His jacket was more difficult to strip than his belt. His fingers fumbled the row of tiny buttons and seemingly tinier holes. He was not drunk, but so tired that he might as well have been. With half an ear, Conrad heard the quiet rustle of cards behind him be replaced by the clink of empty bottles, and then nothing. After the last button finally slipped free, his uniform jacket joined his belt and his boots on the floor.
Turning back around to face the table, he saw Yozak's back and beyond him, the closed door that joined Conrad's room with the castle corridor.
For a moment, it was like being on the mountain still, the ground sliding out from under him with sick realisation. It was sheer fantasy that he and Yozak were always of one mind. Last night, they may have slept soundly side by side, but that was at Gisela's command, not their choice, and the first time since before the war. Fifteen years ago, it wouldn't have even occurred to Conrad to spend an evening like this and he wouldn't have known where to find Yozak even if it had. But thinking of the mountain also made Conrad remember what Yozak had said earlier in the afternoon.
"It's late," he began. "The barracks are on the other side of the castle. You should-- you could--"
Yozak had turned; Conrad found himself weighing his words until he no longer knew what he wanted to say and so, said nothing at all. He ducked his head, and struggled with bringing his undershirt up and over himself with even less success than he'd had with his jacket.
"Taichou--"
Conrad felt Yozak's hands gently tugging at the cloth of his shirt, untangling Conrad's left arm and raising the garment well over Conrad's head. This close, and without his boots, it was a choice between looking up or at the neck opening of Yozak's tunic.
"You could stay. It's late."
---
Conrad felt good. He was warm, relaxed, drowsy but just alert enough to appreciate how very good he felt. Yesterday, he had fallen asleep immediately, so tired that he couldn't now recall if Yozak had been cold then, which made a certain logical sense that Conrad didn't want to examine too closely, or whether Yozak had been as warm as nostalgia and present experience suggested that he always was and always would be.
"Want some privacy?"
Yozak had pitched his voice low, but his speaking at all startled Conrad. He had thought Yozak was asleep.
In the slim moonlight that bent between the bed's curtains, Conrad couldn't see much more of Yozak than his body already told him. Yozak lay on his back, his head turned perhaps a little toward Conrad and his left shoulder solid against Conrad's cheek. His left hand was keeping Conrad's bare shoulder warm since the edge of the blanket had slipped down to his elbow.
Conrad considered whether pulling the blanket back up to his neck would be worth of the bother of moving his sleep-heavy limbs. The night air was much cooler than Yozak. Conrad pressed closer, hip to thigh, nose to neck. The arm he had between their bodies had less room to move-- had been moving, he found, and was still-- the heel of his palm languidly stroking the bulge under his shorts.
This, Conrad realised, was probably what Yozak had been asking about.
He mumbled something polite as he dropped his head back to Yozak's shoulder and closed his eyes, his hand sliding discreetly over to rest on his thigh.
Conrad was used to privacy. He'd have privacy tomorrow, and the next day, and weeks and weeks to come without needing to send Yozak away now and have it tonight. Sleep was also good. He could have privacy in the morning if he really needed it, though he was old enough to know that nothing would fall off if he did not.
Yozak coughed; Conrad opened his eyes to look at him.
"Do-- uh-- been a while?" Yozak's tone made his nonchalance pointedly obvious.
Conrad decided he was too tired to care if he'd said any of that aloud; this was Yozak.
"Yeah."
"...want some help?"
Conrad snorted. "Not that long."
He turned to look at Yozak, trying to keep his expression one of appropriately wounded dignity, despite the darkness. Yozak's face, Conrad could imagine without seeing: a paragon of selflessness, with perhaps a flicker of amusement around his eyes or lips.
The pause lengthened. Conrad couldn't see Yozak's eyes, but he could feel that Yozak still watching him. Conrad caught himself fidgeting, his feet, his hands, so he reached across to dig his fingers into Yozak's ribs.
Yozak retaliated, tickling, instantly making Conrad squirm and defensively pull at Yozak's hands. They grappled, but Yozak had Conrad's hands pinned by his sides within moments. He wasn't ticklish, while Conrad was; another relic of their past, they both knew that the only card Conrad held was his own stubbornness.
"Yield?" Yozak asked.
Conrad struggled on, tangling their legs further with the blankets. Yozak scratched his fingernails along Conrad's palms, sparking sensation. While Conrad flailed, Yozak transferred his grip from two hands to just one; his freed hand then mercilessly roamed Conrad's midsection. Conrad twisted in Yozak's grip, too distracted to struggle loose but striving to outlast the itch inflaming his skin-- until, finally, dizzy with laughter, he gasped for breath. "Yield."
They both relaxed against the mattress. Conrad dropped his face into the crook of Yozak's neck, breathing hard. Yozak let Conrad's hands go and reached up to ruffle Conrad's hair.
"Well, if you need to-- whatever--" Yozak's fingers moved through Conrad's hair erratically, like his words; Conrad was not the only one to have been out of breath. "Nothing I haven't seen before."
They'd shared a bed more times than Conrad could recall, caught low on coin in provincial inns, or when he'd tried to match drink for drink a second who didn't trust him to sleep it off safely alone, or in tents where one of them was always awake. Conrad remembered that he was always colder, and bent his bent knees further to keep his feet away from Yozak's. But, his hands were hot now, still hot from before, heavy on his chest, on his abdomen. He let them move down, trusting Yozak's words more than his own faint, lingering sense of uncertainty, trusting Yozak's touch to be firm instead of ticklish as it moved over his hair, along his shoulder, his side; trusting Yozak's warmth, steady, solid heat wherever Conrad pressed into him; trusting Yozak to hold him still when his body thrust--
Conrad's finish rushed over him quickly, his hand sliding clumsy along the heat spreading through fabric. His pulse thudded under his palm and in his chest. Yozak hummed something like a question, and Conrad could feel it in his nose. He turned away to breathe air instead of skin.
"I need to take my shorts off," he told Yozak.
"You-- Yeah. You should--"
Yozak's snickers were breathy, helpless. Conrad shrugged out of the arm around him and rolled onto his back, working on the drawstring of his shorts before Yozak could offer to help with that, too. He planted his feet on the mattress, lifted his hips slightly to wriggle his shorts to his knees and then kicked them off the rest of the way.
"Do I--" Yozak's voice sounded odd, strained. "--get a turn?"
Yozak wanted--? That was-- "Uh-- ok." Conrad rolled back towards Yozak--
"Ow."
One of his elbows hit first, or maybe it had been a knee (the back of his hand had been after his elbow, Conrad was certain) he'd tried to pull it out of the way and--
"--oops. I--"
But Yozak was patient with him, strong hands holding him steady as he found his limbs if not his balance. He settled with an arm slung across Yozak's broad, bare chest and an ankle between Yozak's slightly spread feet anchoring him well in place, his body on his side as he preferred to sleep, fitted to Yozak's warmth.
Yozak sighed quietly. Conrad flexed his fingers on Yozak's far shoulder to show that he was still awake.
"Comfy?"
"Warm," Conrad answered, and then, "your turn." He wasn't sure that his murmured reminder had been heard, until he felt Yozak's arm tighten across his back.
Yozak was quieter than Conrad usually managed, though there was no mistaking the rhythmic shifts of his lower body. Conrad stroked Yozak's shoulder, his hair, recalling how much better it was not to be alone. Yozak's legs spread wider and the movement rolled Conrad further over him. Conrad could smell Yozak stronger than he could smell himself, and wondered if Yozak could smell him. He wondered how close Yozak was, listening to his breath grow harsh and staccato. Yozak's hand tensed and twitched on Conrad's back, finally gripping his side tight, so tight that it almost hurt, and Conrad could feel Yozak's body trembling under him. Conrad held his breath. Yozak made only the tiniest sound when he came, a sort of grunt as his breath caught, and then he was panting, relaxing, and Conrad could actually move again. He grinned; from the sound of it, it had been even longer for Yozak.
With a flash of inspiration, Conrad wriggled down under the covers. Crumpling his discarded shorts in his hand, he pushed them at Yozak, who thanked him, absently. Conrad watched the indistinct movements of Yozak's arms outlined in the moonlit dark, and waited.
"This is... oh, Tai-chou."
Yozak sat up smoothly, throwing the balled-up fabric out of bed. The ribbon of light through the curtains caught his scowl. Conrad got as far as, "your face--" when laughter overtook him.
Yozak grabbed him, dragging him back against his chest while Conrad struggled, managing to wrap his own arms protectively around his midsection. Yozak rubbed his knuckles vigorously over Conrad's scalp.
Conrad yelped.
"Your face," Yozak retorted, with satisfaction, and let them both sag back to the mattress.
Conrad moved back into the comfortable sleeping arrangement he'd found before, fitted along Yozak's side. Yozak was warmer now, his skin tasted saltier, but he was strangely slow to relax. After moving Yozak's arm into position over Conrad's back, he poked the underside of Yozak's chin with his nose.
"Feel better now?" Yozak asked.
"We should do this more often."
Conrad was too tired to join in Yozak's abrupt and quiet laughter, but he was glad to feel the strange tension fade from his pillow's muscles. He stretched against Yozak's hand stroking over his back. Conrad thought about saying goodnight, but fell asleep before he did.
---
Conrad woke well-rested, if perhaps a little too warm from the body sleeping under him. The thick curtains on his bed cut out much of the sunlight streaming into his bedroom, but Conrad could still recognise it was well past the time he usually rose. A moment later, it came back to him that today was the last of the days Gisela had insisted he and Yozak be exempt from their duties. Conrad relaxed, slowly stretching. Too warm was certainly better than too cold. The knit of Yozak's leggings was smooth against Conrad's bare skin.
Conrad went rigid, almost wishing he had a hangover: something to excuse his behaviour and to distract from his awkward, yet all too clear memories of acting a fraction of his age-- especially since they'd never jerked off together back when they were young and stupid.
Remembering more of the old days, Conrad forced himself to take a series of level breaths, regaining his calm, hoping that he hadn't woken Yozak. They were both early-risers: Yozak by inclination, Conrad by training. For Conrad to have woken before him, Yozak must have been completely worn out the night before-- perhaps the only assurance Conrad had that this wouldn't become another of Yozak's 'crazy Taichou' stories, or at least, only a private one. Gingerly, Conrad levered himself up.
Yozak raised his eyebrows in greeting.
Conrad thought about asking how long Yozak had been awake, and several other questions, but didn't. The silence stretched and Yozak's patience began to feel like duty instead of courtesy. "It's late. We should get up."
Yozak nodded, a hint of something twitching at the corners of his mouth. "You're going to have to get off of me first."
The silence broadened, Yozak's grin with it, but the sight left Conrad more rather than less unsettled. He looked down to think, which didn't help at all. Yozak's hands were scrupulously laid by his sides, flat on the sheet. Conrad's skin prickled with sweat. Neither of them were laughing, when last night had been ridiculous; hadn't it?
Conrad rolled to the side and out of bed. Putting on his uniform occupied his hands but took little conscious thought, an everyday rhythm of bending, straightening and dressing as he worked his way down each successive drawer of the dresser: socks and shorts from the first, an undershirt from the next. Bending down yet again, Conrad tried not to think of how much simpler Yozak's 'uniform' was than his, these days, or how yesterday, Conrad had woken up alone.
"Forget something?" Yozak called out.
Conrad straightened, turning-- so that last night's shorts hit him full in the face. They smelt ... ripe.
Yozak stood leaning against the wall by the door, arms folded and completely dressed. On the table beside him lay Conrad's sword and belt, and at its foot, his boots.
"I've already found another pair--" Conrad swivelled his hips to illustrate his point, hands full of yesterday's underwear and today's clean trousers. "But thank you."
"Oh, any time, Taichou. Any time."
Using only the one hand, Conrad pitched the shorts to land perfectly atop yesterday night's impromptu laundry pile, smiling sunnily at Yozak's exasperated look.
He had expected scaling Makadira with Yozak would be like stepping back in time, but instead, it had proved how little they resembled what they once were. He missed that. Everything was simpler thirty years ago.
But there was something in how he kept wanting to be stupid like this with Yozak -- and how Yozak kept letting him.
Conrad pulled on his bootlaces, working them perfectly even and tight. "We must have missed breakfast already," he told Yozak. "We should bathe, and see what we can find in the kitchens."
"Sounds good, but I'm getting some fresh clothes first." Yozak ducked his nose toward his collar, and then pulled away, miming waving away the smell. " I'll catch you later."
Conrad buckled on his sword as he walked to the door; Yozak held it for him and pulled it shut behind them. Conrad couldn't see anyone in either direction. A mischeivious impulse welled in him, watching the strong lines of Yozak's back as the redhead started down the right-hand corridor towards the barracks.
"Same time tonight?" Conrad paused to flutter his eyelashes. "Oh companion of my dreams?"
Yozak's incredulous look lasted only as long as Conrad kept his straight face. At Conrad's helpless laughter, Yozak made a rude gesture and kept walking. "Try a cold bath, I hear it's good for that sort of thing."
Conrad hid his smile behind his hand. Whatever they were now, it wasn't all bad.
LD & MC
20/02/07