Chapter Text
“Ajaw’s been getting…” Kinich pauses, turning the words over in his tongue. There’s a tense trepidation as Mualani waits for his response, words weighted like carefully picked quenepa berry. He settles on a nondescript, “strange.” Another second ticks. “Ever since the incident.”
The incident. Ever since, Kinich says, as if so much time has elapsed that measurements have been buried; like unearthing a grave, it might have been sacreligious to say. But, “Yesterday?”
Kinich nods, awkwardly. “Yesterday.” He adjusts his knapsack over his shoulder, which, Mualani observes, is full of fish, a meat which Kinich never developed a palate for, being the inland treetop dweller he is. There is little reason for the trip, but if they were talking about Ajaw, then there must be just the one. “He must be kicking up a big fuss, for you to have bothered coming all the way here.”
“He’s been eager to try new things,” Kinich says, his voice sticking a little on eager, and things. Mualani looks on sympathetically at the bag, slapping wetly against Kinich’s back (he looks behind his shoulder rather miserably). The People of the Springs pride themselves on fresh catches, daily! “I could help you fillet those.”
“I’m afraid,” Kinich says thinly, “He wants to try them raw.”
Mualani winces with him. “He’ll get sick,” she says, as if such a thing needed to be explained, “If he’s…” The words don’t come. She just gestures to herself, head to toe, and Kinich’s eyes drag along her frame as her hands move. She ought to feel exposed, as when another man would ogle her in a similar manner, but the way he rolls his eyeballs back up to her face feels like a chore. As if the outline of her silhouette was the distance he had to trace, from the Scions of the Canopy, to the People of the Springs, for fish.
“Human,” Kinich completes for her. He sounds constipated. He’s a strange fellow. Not that Mualani thinks anything good of Ajaw becoming a human (other than the fact that, if he has a body of his own now, he’ll stop cawing for Kinich’s death. Sure, Ajaw still helps in the battle, but it’s still demoralizing to hear him shriek about the merits of a downed man. It always leaves her feeling ill.)
“I think his stomach’s still made of iron, or phlogiston,” Kinich says. “He ate a deer yesterday.”
Mualani opens her mouth.
“Raw,” Kinich finishes. She shuts it.
“And, he’s still alive and kicking, last I saw.” He lifts the bag. “And he better be, or I’d have made this trip for nothing.”
Mualani says, “You should have made him come instead.”
Kinich just says, “He’s being shy, now.”
And Mualani has no further comment on the matter. Ajaw, shy? She supposed. Anyone would be shy with a new body.
“But I’ll make him do the rounds, once he’s used to it,” Kinich promises. “Once he can use the grappling hooks.”
That was her other question. Are his phlogiston abilities gone? But Kinich’s eyes have fallen back down to his watch. He’s still wearing it, now as an ordinary timepiece, given that it’s original inhabitant is… not fitting inside, anymore.
“I best get going. It’s time for dinner.”
“We’ll catch up!” Mualani says. “You can bring the pest with you, or leave him at home. I don’t mind!”
“We’ll see,” Kinich says, and then pivots on his heel. Mualani watches, quite mesmerized, as he goes the distance from the Springs camp to the grassy knoll on foot, before only triggering his Nightsoul once he’s within range of the plains’ grappling hook. Huh. It is quite an inconvenience without that little bugger. (And to think Kinich went all the way here, handicapped! Ajaw should be appreciative.)
“I’m back,” Kinich announces, with words and a knock on the door to his own house, because he’d gotten a pillow in the face when he’d last tried to enter a room in silence. Human Ajaw now had a dignity to preserve and none of the faculties to remember how to do it. Knock, you animal! He hadn’t even been doing anything untoward - he had just been brushing his hair.
In the adjoining bedroom, there’s a muffled thump, and a likely-curse in a language Kinich recognizes but still doesn’t understand the meaning of. Kinich sets his bag of (now deceased) fish on the small kitchen island. “I’m coming in.”
“NO!”
Kinich doesn’t force the door open (well, he taps it, and it creaks a little, because Kinich never installed locks on his door when he refurbished the place, because he lives there alone. Speaking of - one bedroom. Ajaw spent the previous night in the clinic, but today should prove interesting.)
“Are you making a mess?”
“NO!” Ajaw yells, again. “Ow! Why is this crappy body so fragile?! Yours can take hard smacks to the noggin’ and come off unscathed! I want a trade!”
Kinich rolls his eyes. “It’s because your body has not experienced physical exercise.” Also, “Did you hurt yourself?” He repeats, “I’m coming in.” Now, more of a warning instead of permission.
“NOOO!” Ajaw wails again, and Kinich pushes the rest of the door open. Ajaw is miserably sitting on Kinich’s bed, one leg extended like an ungraceful Yukumasaurus squat, propped up on a rickety tower of books (a few have fallen as he jostled). His other leg is folded underneath him. Raise your leg - Kinich is just surprised Ajaw remembers basic human first aid. There’s no visible wound, but Kinich walks closer to examine his wriggling toes, and then has to snort.
“Hey!” Ajaw has his arms folded, face screwed into a pout. His hair is unkempt, which, considering he threw a tantrum with the comb this morning, Kinich is not surprised by. (Also, Ajaw as a blond - not unexpected. It suits him.) “Don’t laugh at me!”
Big baby. “You stubbed your toe. It’s nothing serious.”
“It hurts!” Ajaw whines. “Why doesn’t this body listen to me?!”
“Happens to experienced users like myself,” Kinich finds himself reassuring, even though Ajaw deserves his just deserts - his voice is the same, complaining on and on about Kinich’s inferior form . “That is why we wear shoes.” Speaking of, he’d picked up the pair from the cobbler on the way home. Kinich’s shirts fit like oversized pyjamas, and his pants can be tied together with belts and pins, but Ajaw has, of all features to retain in the transition to bipedalism, retractable claws. Kinich had to commission open-toed shoes. Perhaps… they won’t be much protection. “We’ll see how yours fits, later.”
Ajaw pouts for a few more seconds.
“Also, I brought dinner.” Separate dinners.
“Oh!” Ajaw perks up, and an involuntary smile spreads on his face. He has sharp cheekbones, and the points of his face are angular, like he’s still pixellated. “You got the fish.”
“Sure did,” Kinich confirms. “I still don’t see why you’d want it. You’re not fond of it, previously.”
“Well, my tastebuds have changed.” Ajaw sticks his tongue out. Pink.
Kinich snorts. “Come outside.” He turns on his heel and regrets it. Crash! A deep breath. He forces himself to continue to the kitchen.
Ajaw stumbles out a minute later. Kinich does not have one of the fishermen’s good scaling blades, so he grabs a crude butcher’s knife. On the table, goes the trout. Ajaw’s eyes widen.
“Go easy,” Kinich warns, but Ajaw extends a claw, and slices the fish from head to tail. Kinich is not disgusted, he’s seen Ajaw (the dragon) eat multiple times, far messier in nature. Also, aforementioned yesterday’s deer (it was a cut Kinich had in the freezer, from a hunt a week ago.) There was something about a human face with inhuman teeth, housing a raw steak.
Kinich delicately unfurls his rice bundle (leaf-wrapped) and nibbles at it, feeling bemused.
“You’ve been here all day. Anyone drop by?”
“Little drillbit munchkin girl from the Echoes-” So, Kachina, “-Picked up the artifact.” Ajaw crunches on a particularly juicy section of gill frills. Blood drips down his chin. Kinich resists the urge to grab his chin and wipe his face down for him, but it’s his shirt that Ajaw is defacing, with raw fish guts. “When will they figure out how to turn me back? I’m sick of this useless body!”
“Thought you’ve always wanted one,” Kinich quips.
“I wanted yours!” Ajaw whines, teeth puncturing a swollen swim bladder. Splat.
“Alright,” Kinich says. He stands up and grabs a spluttering Ajaw hard by the chin, and a kitchen rag. “You eat like a child.”
“I eat like a dragon!” Ajaw splutters. “Kinich! You are not permitted to manhandle the almighty-”
“The almighty dragonlord has fish in his hair,” Kinich says. “Stay still.”
Ajaw is obedient in a body Kinich cannot smack around without feeling guilt (like his father) a little sorry for. He keeps his displeasure known in the form of his pursed mouth, highlighted by a fish scale fragment (Kinich flicks it away, from his bottom lip) with a fanged tooth puncturing the flat of Kinich’s thumb.
“You,” Kinich proclaims, “need a bath.”
“Bleh,” Ajaw says, and snatches Kinich’s hand away from him.
Kinich has been undressed around Ajaw before. Because, of course, “What’s the point in hiding your puny, pathetic body from my eyes? There is nothing I covet about your physique!” (Followed by cackling laughter.)
Considering Ajaw crowed constantly about Kinich’s corpse which he craved to inhabit, Kinich took none of the complaints in mind. He’d appreciate this body once he got it - Kinich took care of himself. He’s stripped down to nothing with Ajaw in the room, still huffing and puffing away, when he had to take a bath. Were people chaste around Saurians? It was like that.
Now, human, Ajaw seemed to have flipped standards upon their heads. He kicked Kinich out of the bathroom, and he stood with his ear pressed to the door (trying not to feel like a pervert) until he was sure that Ajaw knew how the shower worked and wasn’t drowning himself. Then he busied with sorting letters.
Nothing from Xilonen - of course not, Kachina must have just gotten the relic to her, today. There’s still the commission missive from the Adventurer’s Guild, that Kinich must remind himself to trace. He should write to the Archon. He drummed his fingers against the table.
Ajaw emerged shirtless, with a towel snug around his hipbones, and he smelt of Kinich’s soap. “Did that witch tell you how to fix this, yet?” He complained.
“Do you mean Xilonen? Because I’ve not written to Citlali, yet.”
“I hate her,” Ajaw complained, with no elaboration, and Kinich with knowledge of how Ajaw usually is, is none the wiser for who he’s referring to in that remark. He wandered the house dripping puddles into the wood, touching and tapping and nudging years of Kinich’s trophies and memorabilia, and for the first time since his parents’ deaths Kinich felt like the house might be too small.
The moment passes quickly. Ajaw lets out a spittle of curses at something or other that distracted him; Kinich goes back to his letters.
“It’s weird,” Ajaw says that night, “For the both of us to be sleeping on the same bed, right?”
“Hm?” Kinich pauses in his adjustment of the furs. “Why would you say that?” It’s not as if they’ve never rested together, on the field. Granted, Ajaw would have been in the form of a tiny phlogiston pixellated widget. Kinich feels a little dread in the pit of his stomach, at the insinuation of this societal faux pas (as they say, in Fontaine.)
“They were talking about it, yesterday,” Ajaw says. “When they asked about you, and whether you only had one bed.” They were the gaggle of student nurses, who had clearly been egging each other on to pop the question to fuel whatever morbid curiosity they had about Kinich’s personal life. It’s not the first quip he’s heard about his bedroom, and also (he will never tell Ajaw this) not the first he’s heard in relation to Ajaw and his bedroom. There’s a market for such proclivities: Ajaw’s no run-of-the-mill Saurian, but he’s intelligent, and has some capacity to shapeshift. Kinich has seen the drawings, and burnt them.
“That was just gossip,” Kinich dismisses. “You shouldn’t think too much about it.”
Ajaw watches him, with inhuman eyes, brown tinged with a slight reddish glow more prominent with only their oil lamp as ambient lighting. He says, “But what if I think it’s weird?”
“Then you can sleep on the floor,” Kinich replies.
Ajaw does not move from his side of the bed. He tugs over more than his share of furs, but Kinich opts to let him have it, with the way he’s hiking them over his shoulders, and there’s a slight tremble in his small frame. He does not have much fat or muscle, and also, nights in Natlan can get surprisingly cold.
“It’s not weird if you say it’s not weird,” is Ajaw’s final verdict, as he kicks a toe out from under his heap of blankets. It’s the red, swollen one from the evening, and now Kinich is wondering if the injury is more severe than it looks, like an impacted claw. A stubbed toe does not last this long, unless the rules are different for a new body?
Also, “Why am I the judicator for societal norms?” Kinich reasons, “I’m quite the social outcast, if you’ve not noticed.”
“True,” Ajaw says. “No one likes you.” He looks quite comfortable in Kinich’s proximity, despite his words. Kinich slides into bed, leaving a good distance between them (he’s been a quiet sleeper for the most of his life). Ajaw shuffles closer, as Kinich expected. Saurian nesting behaviour.
“You’re going to teach me grappling, right?” The sun rises over the Scions of the Canopy, flinging sunlight across the graffiti-carved cliffs. Ajaw was up by the time Kinich woke, and he was outside on the grassy knoll with his bare feet kicked up into the grass. He was watching a Yumkasauri family toss themselves over the edge of a boulder. Ajaw tipped his head back at Kinich’s arrival, and asked, clearly itching to move.
“First, I need to teach you to walk on two feet.” The swelling had gone down overnight.
“I can walk, you stupid human!” Ajaw stamps a foot.
“Pot, kettle,” Kinich jests.
Ajaw’s toes curled and flexed, and his claws briefly extended, stark against the soil. Ajaw stretched, and his (Kinich’s) clothes fell in sweeping drapes over his frame, like they threatened to swallow him. Kinich had considered himself rather lean, for most’s standards. Ajaw was of a healthy weight, as decreed by the human physician, but he looked jaunt swimming in Kinich’s clothes.
“We need to get you better fitting clothes,” Kinich says. “A whole set.”
Ajaw looked displeased at the prospect of either a trip to the market, or any delays in what he wanted at that moment. “Can’t I just cut this one up, or something?”
“No, because you need multiple sets of clothes. And so do I,” Kinich points out. “We’ll walk.” He’s not swinging Ajaw around with loose pants; that, and Kinich himself shall require a training session or two to re-calibrate his own threshold. Other than a decreased range, he should test out the limits of losing Ajaw’s phlogiston source before it overwhelms him in battle.
Speaking of, “Do you still have any latent phlogiston in your body?”
Ajaw thinks, his hand stretching out. His fingers clenched, and undid so. “Yes,” he proclaims, with no other recommendation.
“...Alright,” Kinich says. He’s not willing to discount that Ajaw might just have a better grasp on his nightsoul ability than most. After all, he’s clearly retained some draconic traits. Also,
“Put on the shoes I got you last night. I spent money on them.” There’s no explicit contract for repayment, before Kinich blew tens of thousands of mora on the doctor’s checkups, and an overnight bed, and custom shoes, and also fresh fish from the People of the Springs. So he’s well aware that this is money down the drain, as if Ajaw would ever pay him back. No, he would just wait for Kinich to die to reap his debts. Ah, they should rediscuss the terms of his contract.
Ajaw clamours to his feet, and tightens the drawstring on Kinich’s pyjama pants. It still swims around his ankles. Perhaps that’s why he’s tripping.
“I’ll take in that pair before we go,” Kinich acquiesces. Should he teach Ajaw sewing? How fares the dexterity in his fingers at the moment? Ajaw bitches at him - Should’ve done it earlier, stupid Kinich! - but pads after him, shoes in the house (Kinich points it out) and then flops on the couch.
“I’m not altering you a full wardrobe in case you turn back,” Kinich tells him.
“Fine by me,” Ajaw sniffs.
Kinich would have preferred to shelve grappling lessons much later (hopefully, if the body-morphological situation is settled, never at all; he dislikes having to meddle in uncertainties, why bother if there’d be no return for payoff?) but Ajaw remains insistent. Stupid Kinich. “Not everyone gets a hang of it immediately,” he warned, because his roommate had the tendency to pitch a fit about impatience. Walking was the long way, usually.
Ajaw swung an arm up into the air, one sleeve slipping off his shoulder, and mimed closing his fingers around a hook in the distance. It mimiced how Kinich always connected to one with his nightsoul. Ajaw’s stance was set apart, his jaw set in determination. Kinich watched. He opted to say nothing, and he watched Ajaw’s fingers flex and curl up against his palm, as a more frustrated look took over his face.
“Alright,” Kinich said, when even the spectating Yumkasaur had gotten bored and ambled off. “Let’s-”
“Wait, I almost got it.” Ajaw said, brows furrowed. He stuck his tongue through his teeth. Kinich snorted, and resumed leaning against the shaded bark of the tree, and Ajaw’s other hand shot out.
An instant spark shot through the air - blinding amber.
“BWAAAAAAA, KINICHHHHH!”
Kinich sprang into action, and flung himself after Ajaw into the air, and caught him with an arm around the waist. Their parabola peaked, and then they began to fall, and Ajaw shrieked again, his legs kicking out for purchase and his hand slapping Kinich in the face.
“Relax,” Kinich tried to say, with Ajaw’s screams whipping him in the face. He knew the area well enough to lock on to the next grappling hook with a flick of his wrist, and then they were flying up again.
He landed them on a flat outcrop jutting out of the cliff face. There was enough space to maneuver Ajaw back on his two feet, but his legs shook so much he continued to hold onto Kinich anyway, and locked his arms around his neck.
“If you fucking drop me, I’m going to kill you!”
“If I was going to let you die, I wouldn’t have caught you in the first place,” Kinich said, eating a bit of Ajaw’s hair. Wet eyes glared crimson at him.
“I want to take the stairs!”
“Not at option at this juncture,” Kinich said, only taking a little bit of pity on him. “Now, hang onto me.”
Ajaw sniffled. He took one leg and swung it over Kinich’s hip, and after some consideration, pulled up another. Kinich kept a firm hold on his waist until Ajaw had locked onto him, like a baby Yumkasaurus on its mother’s back. With his claws in Kinich’s collarbone, he growled, “You didn’t warn me it was this bad!”
Kinich thought for a moment. “You are constantly flying as a phlogiston manifestation; I didn’t think motion sickness would be a problem for you.” And then, “Do not bite me.”
Teeth grazed the nape of his neck, barely. Ajaw huffed like an indignant child.
They make a spectacle on the landing deck on the Scions of the Canopy. Ajaw flung himself to the floor immediately, and everyone ogled him, either because artists’ renditions of what him as a human had already made their rounds; or because Kinich had a passenger, and he never does.
Kinich, adept at managing the peanut gallery, chose to ignore the stares. Ajaw looked distinctly more uncomfortable, and he was turning something more reminiscent of his former body (a sickly shade of green.) Kinich hauled him to his feet again and pushed him into a corner where a wooden stool was sitting.
“All that swinging made me nauseous,” Ajaw groans. “Bleh!” Kinich sympathizes, and pats Ajaw on the back. He remembers his first Yumkasaurus spin, although there’s nothing to remember (he had no parent to comfort him about vomiting, so the then-Chief pulled him on his lap and stroked his head.) He stood by Ajaw as he heaved with his hands on his knees, and looked up at Kinich miserably.
“I’m walking the way down,” he said in a tone of voice that simply challenged for Kinich to take any other direction. He was tempted, but perhaps there was a little bit of a sadistic part in Kinich that had enjoyed Ajaw clinging onto him for once like Kinich was a lifeline.
The nausea persisted annoyingly throughout the trek to the market, and Ajaw bitched enough about it that Kinich cut their errand run short and herded him to the physician’s clinic once more. The doctor did not look surprised to see them. “Trouble?” He said blandly.
“This asshole-” Ajaw threw his finger somewhere in Kinich’s direction, “-brought me swinging and now I want to puke my guts up!”
Kinich did nothing of the sort - Ajaw had gone swinging; he’d saved Ajaw from himself. He remained silent.
“Looks like your proprioception has also been affected,” the physician said, as if it was not a given. “I’ll give you something for nausea.”
“Ugh,” Ajaw groaned, and curled in over himself, head thunking against the receptionist desk. Kinich pulled him upright, and placed him on his feet. “We’re walking back,” Ajaw repeated sullenly to him, as a nurse giggled behind them (the black market must be booming) .
“Alright,” Kinich just said, because he knew he had the endurance for it, and Ajaw bitched at him some more, even halfway down the trek when he claimed his ankles were swelling up; and Kinich took him on his back so he could deal with less complaints. Equivalent exchange.
Ajaw remained ill for the rest of the afternoon when Kinich tried to bring up returning to the Scions of the Canopy for the evening market.
Citlali’s letter reached them before sunset, informing Kinich of her scrying session - there was a light at the end of the tunnel, and it would be their own exploration that got them there. It was characteristically cryptic and uncharacteristically unhelpful of her, and Kinich showed the letter to Ajaw, who threatened to burn it and send back the ashes, so he kept it on a high shelf.
It was nothing Ajaw couldn’t reach on a stepstool, but Kinich wagers he’s developed a wariness for heights now that he’s seen the merits of being grounded.
Xilonen, too, had written in with her terrible left-handed scrawl, which meant she had been busy with something ambidextrous (she was rarely so). It was nigh indecipherable. Still, she had bothered to respond with anything at all, which meant that Ajaw’s predicament was somewhere in the mass of billboard notices in her mind.
Never one to be deterred by a spoilt child, Kinich left on his own, sailing through the air with something (a lack of Ajaw) still slightly off kilter; taking special care to plant his feet solidly on the middle of platforms lest he graze the edge. There was no more dragon hovering over his head to catch him.
When he returned, Ajaw was puking in his toilet. Kinich pulled his hair back and combed it in his fingers, and scolded, “...Must be all that raw meat you ate.”
“It’s not!” Ajaw sniffles miserably. “That quack doctor didn’t help at all!”
Kinich sighed. He fed Ajaw ginger root and a glass of quenepa brew, and let Ajaw crawl miserably to bed. Kinich joined him a little before midnight to see Ajaw shivering a wild thing, face buried in Kinich’s pillow.
“Did Nightsoul trigger something in you?” Kinich asked, this time properly worried.
Ajaw lifted his head and pried one eyelid open. “I’m tired.” He sounded it. His head fell back. He moved none of his limbs when Kinich put a palm on his forehead, and then on the nape of his neck. He was not feverish, but Kinich was not sure what stood as normality for Saurian-turned humans. “We’ll see someone tomorrow, again,” he promised. “Does your stomach still hurt?”
“I want to throw up,” Ajaw complained. Kinich still bet it was food poisoning, but he figured Ajaw would only believe him if heard from a medical professional’s mouth. Trying to ease him, Kinich pats Ajaw on the stomach.
And froze.
Kinich brought Ajaw to Ifa. If there was anyone well-versed in Saurian biology enough to comment, and eccentric enough to avoid comment, it would be him. Ororon was there, as he was present around the veterinary clinic on most days, and he must have heard about this from Citlali, who had a surprisingly hard time keeping her mouth shut for a shut-in. Which of course meant that Ifa had already expected them.
(Ajaw had protested on the way. “That madman is going to ask you to smack me around again!”
“He will not,” Kinich says, hand clamped around Ajaw’s wrist. He had a thought to forcibly grapple the both of them, but Ajaw had thrown up breakfast; and his stomach rolled so roughly that Kinich felt sick on his behalf. It was not a walkable distance; so they had to take frequent rest stops. Each time, Ajaw attempted a break for it.)
In front of the clinic, he seemed demure in comparison. Was there a different perception map with human eyes? There were Saurians lounging in the vicinity as far as Kinich could see, and whether they recognized Ajaw or not was yet to be determined - most animals ignored him even as a dragon. Ororon ogled them quite unsubtly (Ajaw heaving, Kinich rebraiding his hair) and Ajaw growled when Cacucu mumbled in his direction. “Scram, you little brat! Voyeur!”
“No way, bro!”
Kinich asks, “Do you understand him in this form?”
“I never understood the freak!”
“Not that this isn’t entertaining,” Ifa piped up, having sweet-talked his remaining waiting patients into returning same time tomorrow, “Ajaw, not in the bush. Throw up in this bowl, please.”
Ajaw gapes at him. “So you’re the sick freak!”
“I am your doctor,” Ifa says pleasantly. “Now, come in.” He locked Kinich and Ororon out. Ororon took the floor by a snoozing Tepetlisaur and kicked his legs out; with nothing much else to do, Kinich sat next to him.
“THE HELL YOU MEAN I HAVE EGGS?!”
“...It’s either that, or three large, horrific tumors in your stomach,” Ifa says. He rolls the ball of his palm, again, over Ajaw’s abdomen, and Kinich sees the flesh undulating over compacted, hard masses. Ajaw grits his teeth, and claws pinch a little deeper into Kinich’s bicep. Ifa continues, “It should be a holdover from your dragon biology, although I don’t ever recall eggs being an issue for you.”
“That’s because I’m not a girl!” Ajaw howls.
Ifa smiles gently. “Well, you can still be a boy even if you have eggs.” He says this incredible sentence with the poise of an experienced doctor. Good bedside manner - Ororon looks like he’s taking notes. But then he tacks on, a little less tactfully, “Or, a uterus.”
“What?” Kinich says, alarmed, and grabs Ajaw’s free arm before he swipes Ifa with it.
“Huh? Haven’t you been living with him?” Ifa says, quite judgmentally.
Ajaw pipes up. “The human doctor told me I shouldn’t show Kinich.”
“Well, you don’t have to show him,” Ifa explains. “But you ought to have told him, so he can prepare.”
“What does he have to prepare for?” Ajaw says, voice accusatory. A slitted eye slides to glare at Kinich, as if this new knowledge would spur him to kick Ajaw out. As if. (What kind of judgement upon Kinich’s character has Ajaw made?)
Ifa’s tone remains measured; light. “Well, the appropriate supplies for mensuration, for one. I’m aware Saurians have longer heat cycles, but humans have it every month, you know. Did the human doctor not explain this?”
Ajaw pales. “Uh…”
Ifa smiles genially at him. “Don’t worry. We’ll go through all you need to know.” He looks at Kinich and Ororon. “Show’s over. Both of you, get out.”
Outside of Ifa’s veterinary hut, Ororon turns to Kinich. “They seem to be getting along.”
“...I need to drop by the People of the Springs again,” is all Kinich can think at the moment. He means, Mualani. Ororon glances to Ifa’s door, and with some consideration, flips the sign, closed. “I’ll come,” Ororon invites himself. “I’ll bring Cacucu, in case he gets too bored.”
Actually, Kinich would appreciate the distraction. His ears are still ringing with, Ajaw, and uterus, in the same sentence. (It felt silly to have been surprised, on hindsight, because where else would the eggs be?) Ifa is not shy about these things - he hopes the same affliction will not be influenced upon Ajaw.
Hm, but he didn’t have any qualms taking his shirt off in front of Kinich, so, why-...
Ororon elbows him. Cacucu is sitting in his arms like a plump, self-assured berry. “What’s up, bro?”
“Hello.” Cacucu was generally more agreeable than Ajaw the dragon, and Ajaw’s irrational hatred of him amused Kinich immensely. Today, he couldn’t help but notice the agreeable way he settled into Ororon’s arms.
He asked, “Cacucu hatched from an egg, right?”
“He was hatched already when Ifa found him,” Ororon said first, then, “all saurians hatch from eggs,” then, voice a little breathless, “ little Ajaws?”
Kinich felt something that resembled faint, not with any exhilaration. The world needs quite the opposite. He said firmly, “You need two to fertilize an egg. So that would be impossible.” He stared straight ahead, where the sun was hovering high in the sky in the direction of the Springs, staring down at him. Mavuika, eyebrow raised. Kinich shook his head. “Right?”
Ororon shrugged a shoulder. “Where did this one come from, then?”
Kinich ignored him and swung himself forward. He heard Ororon’s footsteps pumping as he leapt after him. Cacucu cawed and hurried with frantic wings.
“Aeeeee?” Mualani shrieks. “I thought Ajaw was always a boy?!”
“He is,” Kinich says firmly. “He just has…” He gestures. Mualani makes a face at him. Far less graceful than Ifa’s unflappableness - that makes the both of them.
“Like Granny,” Ororon says, who had long perfected his poker face. It was quite the opposite.
She stares warily at him. “So, what, do you want me to give Ajaw sex ed…?”
“I think Ifa has it covered.”
She narrows her eyes. “But for humans, or saurians?”
Ororon pipes up, “It’s hard to say.” His ears are flicking quite dramatically in the ocean breeze; it’s difficult to tell if he’s stressed. He says, “Ifa can do both.” It’s never clear if he’s talking up Ifa because it’s Ifa, or because it’s true. Kinich recalls the time Kachina tipped over her mobility device and bent her leg an angle too acute underneath her, and Ifa splinted it straight. Anatomy was anatomy.
“But,” Kinich said, “You know what he might need, right?” Pause. “I’m also here for some fish.”
Mualani’s eyes were still wide, resembling a bloated trout. She plasters a grin over her cheeks. “Well, if he’s pregnant-” Her smile strains at the edges. “Eggnant-” (“New word,” Ororon mutters.) Kinich coughed greatly.
“No periods. No swimming in hot springs! Unless-” She shakes her head. “Unless, because the expecting Kohlasaurs are obviously okay with-” Her braids bob harder. “No! No swimming!”
“Okay,” Kinich says.
“We’ll ask Ifa first,” Ororon said, also. That seemed to satisfy Mualani. She took a deep breath.
“I’ll host him, for girl’s night, if he wants.”
“He doesn’t want to be called a girl,” Kinich says.
“Right. Right.” Mualani says. “I’ll host him anyway.” There was an awkward determination on his face, and Kinich remembered the day she insisted on befriending him. They were teenagers, and Kinich hadn’t been sure yet whether men and women could be friends without mutually assured destruction. It did not help that the first ancient name bearer he’d met was Chasca. She was lovely once Kinich had a conversation with her, but he’d stared a bit too hard their first meeting.
Kinich nods. “I’ll let him know.”
Mualani did not look like she knew whether she was relieved. She said that regardless. “That’s good. I’m relieved. Us uterus havers have to stick together!” She swung out a fist; Ororon delicately bumped it. Kinich was still undecided. She continues, “Kachina and I meet to talk shop once a month. Every last Thursday at mine. Evening.” She heaved her woven bucket back on her hip. “Come on. Let me give you some stuff.”
Ajaw was sulking up a storm when Kinich, Ororon and Cacucu returned to the Flower Feather Clan. He was still sitting in Ifa’s clinic nursing a cup of tea, and not stomping his feet out on the sidewalk, so Kinich thanked Ifa for his assistance.
“I want to see Ajaw next week,” Ifa says. He glanced at Kinich’s knapsack, that smelt of salt. “Nothing raw.”
“Got it,” Kinich said.
“It’s probably all infertile.” Ifa claps him on the back. “By the way. In case you were worried.” Kinich was. He tried to remain worried, given that Ifa used the word probably.
“Stop talking about me like I’m not here,” Ajaw whined, without heat. He batted Cacucu away without his usual verbal agitation, although this time he had a claw out. Kinich took this as a sign to take them home, with a bottle of supplements. Ajaw had scowled quite brilliantly in its direction, so Kinich adds it to their soup.
Ajaw, human, detests soup.
“Drink the damn thing,” Kinich says. Ajaw grumbled a bit, but remained obedient, and Kinich wondered if being human actually settled his temperament. They tried to keep to routine until it was time for bed, and Kinich entered his bedroom to see Ajaw with his knees drawn up to his chest.
“You’re still going to sleep in the same bed as me?” The words blurt out.
Ajaw’s eyes turn wide, and flash red, and then his jaw tenses. Kinich prepares for the barrage of abuse before he explains himself. But they stare at each other, a beat passes, and Ajaw wordlessly begins to gather his blankets up to leave.
“Wait.” Kinich grabs him. “I didn’t mean…”
“Ifa said I can go over if you start being weird,” Ajaw spits at him with his usual vitriol, but the words are rounded, watery.
Kinich sets his jaw. Ifa? “Don’t.”
“Don’t tell me what I can or cannot do!” Ajaw jabs him, with a sharp and pointy knee. If he’d meant to do damage, he’ll use a claw. Kinich holds on to his arm. “Ugh, I wish Ifa didn’t tell you!”
Something cold settles in his gut. Kinich scowls. “It's late at night and you cannot defend yourself, or use grappling hooks yet. Go tomorrow if you wish.” He flips over, back turned to Ajaw, and stares resolutely at the wall across him.
Movement behind him. For a moment, Kinich fears that he might drop to the floor, but then the bed behind him dips, with the weight of a body rolling, and something glances Kinich’s back.
“...Are you really kicking me out?”
“No.” Kinich says. “You said you wanted to go.”
“But I don’t want to go.” The pressure in Kinich’s back continues to dig, as Ajaw squirms closer. For a moment, Kinich has trouble discerning the topology of their limbs; whether Ajaw was facing him, or not. But then a cautious hand curls around his waist, so Ajaw’s front must be pressed to his back, and he mentally slots them together. Ajaw’s forehead on the nape of his neck, hot breath dampening the fabric stretched over his shoulder blades, and the bone knocking into the back of his thigh must be Ajaw’s knee, not a curled up ankle. “Are you going to put me in time out?”
“...No,” Kinich says. He thinks of flipping over, but Ajaw has gotten himself comfortable, his fingers tightening over Kinich’s stomach. Flexing, like they’re testing their right to be here. His other hand is nowhere to be felt, so it must be curled somewhere underneath them. Kinich grabs his wrist (soft) and holds him there. Kinich’s thumb rubbing over the fat in his palm.
He stays awake long after Ajaw falls asleep, his soft snores permeating in the room. A light echo, like Kinich’s heartbeat in his ears.
Ajaw doesn’t bring up the moving-to-Ifa’s-place thing tomorrow. Truthfully, Kinich doesn’t think there would be space, he’s seen how Ifa lives, and every square inch of his floor is covered with either veterinary supplies, or the patients themselves. Truth to be told, it stinks a little in there, but with the kind of love that Ifa’s nose has grown used to. The only Saurian (he cannot make that comparison out loud) Kinich lives with is Ajaw, and now he smells like Kinich’s cinnamon shampoo. It’s not like Ifa would have a spare bed to offer Ajaw with, either, and there’s certainly no space to share his, because Kinich knows he has a single, and it’s already doubling as a double with Ororon as his occasional guest. So, Ajaw would have the observation table in the clinic, at best. Maybe he’d have settled for that.
“So,” Kinich starts over breakfast (toast), “What did Ifa say about the eggs?”
Ajaw doesn’t meet his eyes. He pokes at the hardened crust of his bread. “I just gotta hope they come out naturally.”
“Did he give you medication?”
Ajaw nods. “For the pain. But he doesn’t know if it’d work.” Before Kinich can get upset, he continues, “Because these things don’t happen to humans, right?”
It’s a lot of guesswork on Ifa’s part. Kinich nods. He says, “Maybe that’s why you’re so skinny.”
“Hah?!”
“You’re eating for… four.” Three eggs, he remembers. “You’ll need more nutrition.”
Ajaw says, horrified, “I’m not planning to grow them!”
“You don’t have to plan to allocate nutrients specifically to the eggs,” Kinich says. “They’ll take what they want from you regardless.” It’s a terrible fact he’d learnt from Mualani (he has pamphlets in a bag). As he speaks, he passes his buttered toast to Ajaw, who shoves the two slices into his mouth and starts furiously chewing. But he’ll need something more substantial than that. Kinich watches him eat, considering, and says, “We’ll go shopping after this.”
(Also, they’ll need more money.)
“Then I’ll stop by to say hi to the Chief.”
“Ugh,” Ajaw says, mouthful of crumbs.
The week passes uneventfully, and Kinich had to drag Ajaw to Ifa again. The clinic was closed that day, and Ororon was bouncing Cacucu like a ball between his palms. Ajaw didn’t ask Kinich to leave, and although Ifa raised an eyebrow, he said nothing on the matter. He put a hand on Ajaw’s abdomen again and chattered about his lifestyle. Yes, of course Kinich was feeding him well. It wasn’t helping.
“Well, you’re going to need to pass the eggs before they calcify or break inside of you.”
Ajaw pales. “Can that actually happen or are you just saying that to scare me?!”
Ifa looks grave. He passes them a pamphlet each - What is Dystocia? Kinich flips it open, Ajaw shoves his to him. “But I’ve tried! You said I need to get comfortable, and… and go get some UV light, and eat well, and…! And!”
Ifa thinks for a moment, and then reaches for his latex gloves. “Maybe you need some stimulation.”
Kinich blinks. “You’re going to stimulate him?” Ajaw’s grip tightens in his hand, and Kinich feels a surge of protectiveness well up in him. He’s not going to punch Ifa in the face.
Ifa looks at him, one eyebrow raised. “Above the stomach, Kinich.”
Ajaw clamps his thighs together. “Should’ve specified.” But he scoots closer to Kinich, and rearranges his limbs so he could use his knee as a pillow.
Ifa waits, and then motions for Ajaw to hike up his shirt. (Kinich’s shirt.) A gentle press on his abdomen, first, just below his sternum. “How do you feel?”
A short breath. Ajaw says slowly, “Fine.”
“This might be uncomfortable,” Ifa says, and gravitates lower. Kinich watches the muscles of Ajaw’s stomach flex and contract over the brush of Ifa’s fingers. Ajaw’s hand swipes blindly behind his head for purchase, so Kinich grabs it. He’s here.
“They feel like they’ve hardened a little,” Ifa says. “But any more and I fear they’ll turn brittle. But I see your problem-”
He speaks plainly, more to Kinich than Ajaw, like Kinich is the owner to this pet, and Kinich has to keep staring at Ifa’s face as if he’s not dancing his fingers all over Ajaw’s belly, between them, and eliciting little whines and gasps and moans. It must be uncomfortable for Ajaw, it must be, the way his face is flushed, and Ifa’s hand just wanders lower, but only to cup his fingers around the lump that has appeared low on Ajaw’s pelvis, and massage it. “This one is a little smaller. You’ll probably have better luck passing this naturally. The other two-”
Ajaw keens in a high pitch, as Ifa presses-
“Stop,” Kinich commands, and Ifa’s hand flies up to hover in the air. For the first time, he seems to have noticed how much of a whimpering mess he’s reduced Ajaw to. He turns a little pink, although it’s nothing compared to the mess of red that Kinich’s own face is (he can see himself in the reflection of Ifa’s window.)
“We could do surgery,” Ifa says.
“I don’t want surgery!” Ajaw whines, which is a normal sentiment. But then he wails, “Kinich!” In the same tone of voice, and Kinich thinks of grabbing a pillow to cover Ajaw’s face with, but that would mean he has to stand up.
“Are there any… natural remedies?” Kinich asks weakly.
“...You could try sexual stimulation, since his cavities should loosen naturally,” Ifa says, and Kinich wishes he didn’t ask, and really wishes Ifa would stop with the gestures.
“But…” Kinich says. “How?”
“You’ve never gone down on anyone before, Kinich?” Ifa says, and this time his voice is full of sympathy.
“Of course I have!” Kinich snaps. “But not on a woman!”
Ajaw explodes. “I’m not a woman! Kinich!”
Kinich falters. “Sorry. I know. I meant-”
Ifa clears his throat. “No penetration. Would kind of defeat the purpose. I’ll give you a room.”
“Here?!” Ajaw shrieks. “I want to go home!”
Home. Kinich nearly doubles over from the ache in his chest.
“I’d rather you pass eggs where I can see - ahem, hear - ahem, reach, you,” Ifa says. “Lest there are complications. I know this isn’t ideal, but I’ll keep it professional. You won’t even know I’m there until there are screams-” He clears his throat, “-that sound painful.”
“Ifa,” Kinich growls.
“Also, ignore the medical part of it - it’ll help you relax.” Ifa says. “Just get comfortable with each others’ presence like always.”
Like always? Wait. “You totally think we fucked when Ajaw was a dragon, don’t you,” Kinich accuses.
“HUH?!” Ajaw says.
Ifa starts coughing. “I don’t, er, judge. I’ve had patients come to me with related injuries-”
“We’re not talking about this!” Kinich yells.
Wisely, Ifa remains mum, and directs them to a room. It’s a nesting area, and it’s relatively clean, dressed up for what it is. Kinich imagines many other Saurians have christened the place. Luckily, since Saurians are territorial and sensitive to smells, the cleaning agents that Ifa employs are very potent. Ajaw sits gingerly on a mat, folding his legs under him, and he stares at Kinich with an impressive scowl.
“Have you ever…?” Kinich trails off, a little embarrassed.
“Of course I have!” Ajaw hisses at him. He wraps his arms around himself. “I know what sex is. I’m a millennium old!” He was still blushing furiously, hiding half his face behind his spread-out fingers, and his chest was rising and falling hard. His legs fell away from each other, and Kinich could not stop staring at him.
Ajaw glared until it seemed that his head felt too heavy for his neck, and he rolled back into the straw. He looked up again when Kinich inched closer, hands falling on top of either of Ajaw’s knees. Nudging them apart. Ajaw clenched his teeth together, nostrils flaring, and he kicked a leg out, but it seemed like it was in slow motion. Kinich grabbed a slender ankle and wrapped his fingers around it, and tucked it into the crook of his neck. The outline of Ajaw’s inner thigh pressed up against Kinich’s abdomen. Kinich’s length brushed up against him; he had to squeeze his abdominal muscles to remain seated upright.
Ajaw’s mouth fell open, and his eyelashes fluttered. He does look like a girl. “I’m kissing you now,” Kinich informs him.
Ajaw swallows. “What will that do?”
“Remember what Ifa said?” Kinich says. “Relax.”
Ajaw lets out a warbly breath through his nose. “Hard to,” he complains, “When you’re going to stick your dick in me.”
Kinich withdraws sharply through his teeth. “N-none of that.” His voice is strangled. Hard. Dick. “Remember what Ifa said? No penetration.”
“Yeah,” Ajaw says.
Kinich dropped Ajaw’s foot, and threw it around his hip, and eased Ajaw to lie flat on his back with both his hands flattened under Ajaw’s hip. Kinich crawled forward on his elbows until he and Ajaw were nose to nose, and Ajaw looked unfortunately pretty, with his angular nose and blond hair and scratchy voice. He leaned down and Ajaw leaned up but all they did was to knock their forehead together. It was hard to breathe, or move.
Kinich swallows and thought of something to say. “Take off your clothes.” As if Ajaw wasn’t pinned with Kinich’s legs.
“Y-you take off your clothes!” Ajaw snaps, and Kinich leaned back to pulls his shirt over his head. Ajaw avoids looking at him, his cheeks ballooned like red fruits, swelling with indignity. Kinich reaches out, with a gloved hand (he pauses, and shucks it off) and cradles Ajaw’s face. He pressed a finger by his lips to part his mouth - sharp teeth.
“Freak,” Ajaw says.
Kinich considers the title wholeheartedly. Would you fuck your Saurian if they were a human? Ajaw’s crotch moved uncomfortably over Kinich’s erection as he wriggled to find a comfortable position, and he decided that Ifa was a monster and Kinich would put him down after this if Ajaw didn’t. He leaned down again and thought that this time he would kiss Ajaw for real, and he missed him again, pressing them to his cheek.
“Stupid,” Ajaw spits, with venom. “You’re stupid, Kinich.” Kinich never gets a retort, because Ajaw drags him in by the back of his skull and swallows his gasp on his tongue.
Ajaw rutted against Kinich until the seat of his pants were soaked, and by the time Kinich had the right mind to remember what they were actually supposed to do, he felt barely cognizant with the haze of Ajaw trying to eat him out via his mouth, his tongue was another retained draconic trait, it was so long.
But Ajaw whined, “you’re crushing me,” and Kinich bolted upright. He eased pressure of Ajaw’s stomach, and gently pushed his hand over Ajaw’s stomach. The lumps were still there, round hard things protected by the soft fat lining his belly, and there was a thin trail of blonde hair tracing his navel to disappear under Kinich’s tailored pants.
Has he ever gone down on anyone before? Ifa had asked, as if they didn’t both know Chasca. Kinich snorts softly and tugs the garments off. Ajaw is no longer speaking, or perhaps Kinich’s heart is pounding too loudly in his head. Uterus. It came with the rest of the set. Ajaw’s knees knocked into both sides of him, like he was trying to squeeze the life out of Kinich; Kinich held on firmly to one of them, and rubbed his thumb over the kneecap.
If anything, it made Ajaw tense. He whimpered.
Kinich kissed his navel, then moved lower. One of Ajaw’s hands came to curl in his hair, not tugging, but unsure. Kinich let it stay there, and pressed the flat of his tongue over Ajaw’s pussy.
Ajaw jerked up. His thighs flexed around Kinich’s face, and blood thrummed in his ears. Kinich let his tongue trace the folds, not searching for anything in particular, and he tried to listen for the little chirps and moans that rumbled from underneath him; his cock was so hard that he pulled one hand lower to grip it. Ajaw jerked, and he yelled, “Kinich!” But he was pushing down on his head, and Kinich curled his tongue around the spot that made him convulse.
Kinich’s face was burning, and he briefly thought of the little pixellated dragon form that often batted little phlogiston arms at him, and decided not to think about it anymore with Ajaw’s cunt on his mouth. This was sick. Ajaw is a human. Ajaw is sobbing and then suddenly the muscles in his abdomen squeezed so tightly Kinich feared he might pop a vessel.
His fingers briefly relaxed in his hair. Kinich pumped himself a few more times and Ajaw resumed jerking up into his mouth, panting and gasping.
But then Kinich realizes that Ajaw trying to yank him away. His breath is hitching in increasingly desperate sobs, and when Kinich draws back he sees tears streaming down Ajaw’s red face. “I think - it’s coming, Kinich, Kinch-”
“Oh,” Kinich says, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “What… what do I do?”
“I don’t know, I don’t know, I feel-” Ajaw’s hand glances his pelvis, but he draws back just as quickly, like it burns. He hiccups, “It hurts.”
“It’s… It’s okay,” Kinich says, his tongue throbbing (is it actually?)
“It’s cramping - it hurts, it’s not moving, Kinich, Kinich-” Large, desperate gulps of air, and all Kinich can do is surge forward to Ajaw’s side, trying not to look down between his legs. Ajaw’s hands come to scrabble at his shoulders, and he pulls Kinich down on him, but it’s only to rub his face against Kinich’s chest. His legs spasm around nothing, and his hips buck into the air.
“Make it stop!” Ajaw shrieks, muffled. “It hurts! It HURTS! KINICH! KINICH!”
Kinich pries him away, leaps the three feet between their nest and the door, and slams his fist on the wood. “IFA!”
“Congratulations,” Ifa says. “It’s a dud!”
“I never want to do that again,” Ajaw groans, hand thrown over his sweaty forehead. Kinich thinks of comforting him, but Ifa is here. Then again, Ifa had just spent a couple of minutes listening to Kinich eat Ajaw out, so there would really be no one more fitting than he to witness untoward forms of comfort.
Kinich hopes Ifa would take this as no measure of Kinich’s… performance. Upon entering the room, he’d taken one look at the sorry state of them and maneuvered Ajaw into a crouch - “childbirth”, he’d said simply - and put a needle in his arm. Anesthetic. Kinich stayed, and stroked Ajaw’s hair through his tears, as Ifa manipulated his stomach.
“These are the small ones, considering they’re not fertilized,” Ifa says. “If you’re ever planning on becoming a parent… I’m afraid you’ll need surgery.” Then he drags a hand through Ajaw’s messy hair. “Good job, bro.”
Kinich furrows his brows. “He’s not going to birth children like a normal human?”
Ifa says, “I don’t know.” He looks at Kinich. “In view of this uncertainty, please use condoms.”
Kinich does not bother to offer any defense.
Ajaw wordlessly burrows his face into Kinich’s bicep. He’s still breathing hard, and he must be more exhausted than Kinich is.
“The anesthetic should wear off within the next four hours,” Ifa says. “I’d offer you the nesting room to rest up, but-”
“Home,” Ajaw mumbles, barely audible, but Ifa is used to picking up the most minute of audio differences, and Kinich simply understands what Ajaw wants to happen.
“Thank you very much for your assistance,” Kinich tells Ifa gratefully, and rearranges Ajaw to pick him up bridal-style. “Please send the invoice to my address.”
“I’ll waive your next consultancy fee,” Ifa says. “Plenty of fluids. I don’t care what Ajaw says, nothing raw. See you both next week.”
Ororon comes by before the day is up, and forces three things - a brown paper bundle, a basket of vegetables, and himself - through the front door. Ajaw is fast asleep in Kinich’s room, and Kinich is wearing a hole in his carpet.
“Ifa delivery.” The paper bag, first. Kinich rips it open. More supplements, that smelt different from the batch last week. Postnatal, he guessed. “Thanks.”
“I heard-” He tried to crane his neck over Kinich’s shoulder, but all he would see is Kinich’s messy dining table and what was left of a bowl of soup (Ajaw hadn’t been awake enough to finish it.)
“Kids shouldn’t meddle in adult affairs,” Kinich said.
Ororon pouted at him. Kinich sorely missed the year he was sixteen, legs crossed against the wall of Ifa’s clinic, too shy to make eye contact with neither Kinich nor Ajaw, twiddling his thumbs. “Granny said there was a new book about the both of you.”
“Great,” Kinich said, and was grateful Ajaw didn’t like reading.
Ororon, at least, was a kind kid. A little obtuse at times. He said, gesturing to the basket, “A lot of nutritious vegetables, for expecting mothers.” It was a shame that Ajaw didn’t like vegetables, or that the only thing he was expecting from now was a brand new relationship dynamic once they were both conscious enough to confront it. Kinich could blend the vegetables for the first thing. He hadn’t figured out the second, but he doubted the book would help.
Kinich greatly doubted his ability to make eye contact with the Archon for the foreseeable future. Citlali, then. She was liberal about her preferences, at least.
“We’ll see you when you drop by,” Kinich said, and remembered to thank, “the vegetables look lovely.”
Ororon left, pleased. Kinich put everything on top of the existing mess and then shut the lights for the rest of the day.
The bedroom is dark, blinds drawn. Ajaw is a misshapen lump on the bed, poorly disguised as blankets, but he shifts the longer Kinich stands at the doorway. Soon, a single glowing red eye appears, half-lidded, and Ajaw makes no words except for a low rumbling (the mattress seems to shake).
He turns his head away. His breathing does not ease.
Kinich swallows. Gingerly he crawls on his hands and his feet to position himself to sleep, the same way he has been doing since Ajaw took the aisle seat and Kinich was relegated to the side of the bed pressed up to the wall. It feels like a concession, somewhat.
But as his head hits the pillow Ajaw immediately rolls over (dragging some blankets with his movement) to face Kinich. Their breaths mix. Ajaw says nothing, and shuts his eyes again, and Kinich roves over the planes of his face, the lights and shadows cast by ambient moonlight through the slit in the curtains, the glistening of tears at the corner of his eyes, swollen lips with the imprint of Kinich’s teeth.
Kinich gently pressed their foreheads together. Then he threw one arm over Ajaw, and listened to their breaths slow, and then closed his eyes as well.