Work Text:
It is a quiet Sunday morning in early March when Agent John Myers rolls over in bed, not yet long awake, and takes notice of his lover: the immortal prince’s hair is slightly damp at the roots from a recent shower, falling over one shoulder as the older male takes a moment to inspect the tiny, lone potted plant that John had brought over just last night.
His typically sharp demeanor holds a rare softness while the Bethmooran prince carefully expends a precise amount of magical energy to re-invigorate the sickly Pothos cutting that John had ‘rescued’ from a slow death in one of the base’s windowless break rooms just yesterday. At the attention from the nature-attuned prince, the handful of yellowed, curling leaves on the abandoned houseplant unfurl and begin to resaturate with variegated verdure.
As John muzzily looks upon his beautiful lover, he notices something… different about the elf’s eyes; the dark colour that lines and partially covers part of the upper lid and some of the brow-bone looks a little lighter than it usually does— or perhaps it’s a different shade.
“Nuada,” he asks, voice sleep-dry and husky, “Why do your… markings look different? The ones on your eyes?”
Thoroughly distracted now from his delicate task of restoring a young life, the once-shunned reagent turns to John with a peculiar expression on his face. It is one part bemused, and equal parts something else. Something he is almost cautious about displaying.
“Markings?” Nuada says back, confused, brow lightly furrowed.
Undeterred from his curiosity-born line of questioning, the human says “Yeah, like above your eyes, and I guess on your lips, too?”
Turning all the way to face John, Nuada squints speculatively for a split second, before sitting down near the mattress’ edge as his features smooth out again in comprehension.
“Ah. These are not ‘markings’, but a personal choice,” he explains succinctly. “The stain or paint is applied once or so during a week and lasts for days on end until we choose to remove it— typically only to reapply it with full vibrancy again.”
Seeing the slightly gobsmacked expression on John’s face, Nuada cannot help but to poke a bit of fun, what with his own level of mild disbelief at the occasionally oblivious nature of his chosen mate. It is a testament to how much affection he holds for the BPRD agent in his bed that his reaction is one of mild humor and the desire to share more of his harrowed but surviving culture with the other man.
If this had happened merely a year ago, he would surely have tipped straight into a resentful diatribe about the race of man’s inherently uncultured nature. Now, though, he has begun to understand that to a great extent, it is a genuine ignorance (and not a willful one) that pervades many humans.
The rest of them— those that do subscribe to the damaging beliefs and malicious selfishness that have driven his people and many other supernatural beings into only the dark places on this plane? Well, for the moment, those individuals do not deserve his thought when he is in the presence of one far more worthy of his attention.
With a smile threatening to break out at any moment, Nuada leans slightly closer to the younger man and raises a brow.
“What, did you think that my lips are naturally tinted a darker colour that gradates toward either side? And that my eyelids just look like this?”
John’s brows knot together and he pushes up on one elbow, even squinting a little bit, momentarily, since he is ever-so-slightly farsighted.
“Wh- I like how your eyelids look!”
(‘Whoa, okay Myers, pull back a little bit: just because you’re dating someone doesn’t mean you can’t weird them out,’ he reminds himself before fumbling aloud.)
“I mean—”
And is Nuada saying that the way his eyes and lips look aren’t just like the scarified warrior’s line-work on his face (and mirrored on his sister’s): set there permanently? Certain half-discarded ideas slowly dawn on him, especially as Nuada cuts back in.
“John… do you think my sister’s eyelids and upper temples are that shimmering, golden-bronze colour naturally, too?” he asks, face serious, but rapidly beginning to soften as he barely manages to contain a small, indulgent smile.
John, now far less bleary, feels himself blushing what must be wretchedly red in the cheeks and tips of his ears.
“No… Nuada, stooooppp. You know I’m terrible with these things.”
Now John is beginning to laugh himself, helplessly. Turning over and burying himself into Nuada’s clothed hip, he feels weapon-calloused fingers fondly run through his sleep-mussed hair. But although Nuada can be nice (more-so to John than to almost anyone else, at that), he is, at heart, kind of an asshole.
So he keeps going; no way is the early-morning roast session anywhere near finished yet.
“And wait, haven’t you accompanied me and seen other elves of my ilk utterly bare-faced, when they are not courtiers? Have you not yet seen me without this makeup, John?”
John is listening, but is steadily trying to drown himself in the voluminous pleats of fabric of the undertunic that peeks out between a vent in the stiffer, dark fabric of Nuada’s long outer shirt-thing. He is not proud of the pained whine that comes from him, but its intended effect is clearly dampened by the fact that he is grinning from ear to ear in mirth at his own expense and barely able to contain fits of laughter.
“Nuaaddaaa, come on. I— maybe? But you always wake up first and then come out of the bathroom looking like this! Well— the makeup, at least, since we both know I’m prone to just… sort of leering at you while you get dressed for the day.”
The blush is back, but he allows his lover to gently nudge him away from his hip and onto his back, so his flushed face is in full view. A look of faux imperiousness is directed at his lax form that does not quite hide the genuinely pleased look in dark marigold eyes. (Nuada does so love to be admired, and by his chosen mate most of all.)
“Hm. Since we are in a relationship, John, I do not believe it is leering, anymore. Or, as I've heard your across-the-hall-neighbor call it, ‘skeeving’ on me. When we gaze upon one another with appreciation, it is only right.”
A more lax smile takes over the younger man’s face and it takes a bit of work for him to not avert his eyes from the intensifying gaze being directed right at him— him of all people. Agent John C. Myers from Franklin, Illinois.
Nuada’s head cocks slightly, consideringly, and his tongue darts out quickly to wet his artificially darkened lips. Curious, John raises an eyebrow in response and makes an inquisitive noise at the change in the elf’s demeanor.
The hand that had run through his hair is back and it tips his chin up slightly, moving his head briefly to either side as a familiar look enters Nuada’s eyes, one that has John’s throat a little dry and his stomach tightening with butterflies for a moment.
“Yes. Perhaps… we will see what painted aesthetic suits you best, too, John, as you are to eventually accompany me as consort when I travel in future.”
The heated gaze spearing through him almost allows the thoroughly distracted BPRD agent to not process what was actually said for several seconds, during which he gazes back, entranced, before snapping out of it.
“I— wait, what? And sure, but I’ve never worn any—”
Unbidden, alcohol-blurred memories from the one Pride he’d gone to in his freshman year at UIC crop up (before he knew he wanted to join the FBI, and had had to do his best to pass for straight), and then fade away again.
“Okay, then. Uh, sure? And also… I’m traveling with you? Where to, exactly? And when? You’ve been so vague until now with what we’re doing about my… ‘dreams’, and the—”
The blaring of his emergency ringtone cut him off mid-sentence, and he efficiently throws his mind into high-gear work mode, answering with a curt “Myers,” as he lifts the phone to his ear.
Nuada rises and moves fluidly out of the way as John tosses the flat sheet from atop his minimally clothed body, leaning against the wall and visibly leering— no, appreciating— the mostly bare form of his lover.
John catches him at it even while rapid-fire discussing the details of the incident to which his team is being called out, and manages to shoot a wink back at Nuada before closing the bathroom door. No doubt, he’s aiming for the first 3 minutes of the 5 total minutes of his rapid roll-out routine to be spent only on his morning ablutions and looking somewhat presentable for work. (He’s spent enough nights in Nuada’s rooms, now, for the elf to become familiar with the cadence and rhythm of what his being ‘on call’ looks like.)
2 minutes and 45 seconds later, he exits the bathroom, zips across the room to the spare wardrobe, pulls the doors open with gusto, and is dressed in a suit and pre-pressed collared shirt underneath in only a minute or so.
The feeling that he is forgetting something as he moves through Nuada’s quarters at a whirlwind pace persists, even as he tries to quickly (but neatly) finish taming his bedhead into an acceptable state for work.
“Okay, gotta run. Sounds like something with at least 2 heads is loose at the Zinco Corp. campus in New Brunswick. Sorry to run out on you—”
“Nothing new, in your line of work,” Nuada says silkily, striding to stand at the door, watching as John hops on one foot, tying one of his work shoes while one hand is encumbered with the shoulder holster he’d forgotten to put on before his suit jacket again.
(As he had on many other occasions, he would just secure it while on the way to the site, or even while making his way through the halls on the way to transpo.)
“Yeah, but still,” the young BPRD agent says, stomping and wiggling his foot a few times to make sure the shoe is on and comfortable. “We’ll catch up at… dinner? We’re trying the new Thai place, right?”
“Yes,” Nuada confirms, moving directly in front of John, and then wrapping something around the back of his neck at near-lightspeed.
John startles for a moment, brain just catching up to the elf’s supernatural speed as his dress shirt’s collar is popped up to make room for a tie that he’d completely forgotten in his hurry. There is also the familiar weight of his phone now weighing down his left pocket— he must have left that behind on the bathroom sink when getting some styling wax into his unruly locks, earlier.
Thankfully, as he sees the clock on an opposite wall past Nuada’s leather-lined shoulders hit the 5 minute mark where he should be leaving, the elf expertly finishes off his 8-second Windsor knot, turning the collar down and smoothing the front of John’s jacket with perfunctory hands.
“Go,” he intones with a barely perceptible smile, bussing a quick but tender kiss over John’s lips while opening the door. “I will see you later. Call if there’s any trouble.”
“Right, John says, pleased, but still too pressed for time to stay any longer. “Thanks— seeya’ later.”
And with that, he books it down the hall.
As the harried agent turns the corner and disappears around it, Nuada turns to his sister who is coming from the direction opposite where John had just run. Between that factor and how quietly she walks, her approaching figure had gone utterly unnoticed by the distracted human.
“Brother,” she says consideringly, peering down the now otherwise empty hallway, “Do you think he will remember before or after he arrives to the transportation center that this wing is less than one quarter of the distance away from his destination as are his personal quarters? There is truly no need for him to rush so.”
With a chuckle, Nuada gestures at the open door to his quarters, ushering his sibling inside.
“Ah, that is the question, hm? Whichever one is the case, I find nearly everything he does to be increasingly endearing— something you have experienced with your Abraham, I am sure.”
Delighted laughter like tinkling bells follows Nuala inside as the door closes.
The conversation with John about tracking down experts on his ‘Sight’ and past visions would have to wait for supper and not breakfast, then, after all.